Kid came by in a new pickup, I asked him, “That sure is some mighty tall cotton you are walkin in, how much is the payment on that?” and he smiled and said, “Oh, it is $560 per month Mr. Smith.”  I don’t see how they do it.  High insurance, high gas, high payments, the new American Dream.

I believe that there are two forces struggling to dominate this country. Reinvention and nostalgia. The first seeks to imagine and work toward a better future by changing the status quo. The second insists that things were better in the past and works to undo change. Oddly, the opposing forces have come to be represented by colors. Blue and red. It’s no secret where my sympathies lie.  I’ve always been a big fan of reinvention. My life is a testament to it, this is why I live in a fly-over state, in the last vast great stronghold of good community living and subsist on a weak diet of Oreo cookies and expired dairy products chilled in my fifteen year old refrigerator with the original lite bulb.

The nostalgic part of me grips my soul on a daily basis.  This is why I spend most of my idle time in quiet contemplation of where it is that I would REALLY like to live, whether it be blue or red.   Outside a picture-perfect waterfront mansion, the waves of the Pacific lapping gently at the Californian shoreline. It is utterly idyllic  -  my Sony earphones playing the Beach Boys and Little Surfer Girl, a haven of privacy from prying eyes, a peaceful retreat from the hustle and bustle.  But this peace is set to be shattered by the distant rumble of thunderstorms upon the plains and the threat of severe weather.

But I digress, we are talking car repair and new trucks.

Well, we are off to “car repair now.”  Had to spend $355 on my old truck this week, one of them thar Oxygen Sensors went out on it, and the poor old hoopie, just could not breathe.  Put me in the foot patrol for a couple of days, and a little lite in the pocket, but still, cheaper than a new truck pickup.  Like my Grand Daddy used to say, “Life was much simpler back then Sonny, a lot simpler.” (My Grandfather often referred to me as Sonny, I suppose it was because I was so bright as a child?)

Now I am going to the kitchen to get me a fresh juice box, brb.

You know I am watching this lawyer show on television.  And the lawyer tells the defendant, “this is a travesty of justice, we will win this, this cannot stand, we will fight it tooth and nail.  By the way, because your daughter gave me a box of Girl Scout cookies, I am going to take this all the way to the U.S. Supreme court and I will represent you for free!”

Then I go see MY lawyer and he uses words such as “expensive dog fight, too complicated, this thing is loaded with proactive political issues, this could prove to be drawn out for an extended period of time, and very, very expensive.  I am gonna need $2,000 up front to get started.”

So when I get home, the wife she looks at me and says, “Well, how did it go with the attorney today?” and I carefully explain it to her, in the best fashion I know how.  She then says, “YOU should have stayed home and let ME talk to him, it would have been much different.”  Of course it would have been different, she is right, she is ALWAYS right.  In her mind, that is.  But alas poor Youric I knew him well, women are often wrong … this is not just a casual statement, I offer proof:

Women always say giving birth is far more painful than a guy getting kicked in the balls. (Carol Burnett once described it as pulling your lower lip up and over your forehead)

But … A year or so after giving birth a woman will often say, “It would be so nice to have another child.”

You never, ever, hear a guy say, “I’d sure like another kick in the nuts!”

Here is another rule of nature. 

A shark will not eat a lawyer.

Why?

Professional courtesy.

Case closed.

Once upon a time the government had a vast scrap yard in the middle of a desert.  Congress said, “Someone might steal from it at night.” So they created a night watchman position and hired a person for the job.  Then Congress said, “How does the watchman do his job without instruction?”  So they created a planning department and hired two people, one person to write the instructions, and one person to do time studies.

Then Congress said, “How will we know the night watchman is doing the tasks correctly?”  So they created a Quality Control department and hired two people. One was to do the studies and one was to write the reports.  Then Congress said, “How are these people going to get paid?”

So they created two positions: a time keeper and a payroll officer then hired two people.  Then Congress said, “Who will be accountable for all of these people?”  So they created an administrative section and hired three people, an Administrative Officer, Assistant Administrative Officer, and a Legal Secretary.  Then Congress said, “We have had this command in operation for one year and we are $918,000 over budget, we must cut back.”  So they laid-off the night watchman.

NOW slowly, let it sink in.

Quietly, we go like sheep to slaughter … Does anybody remember the reason given for the establishment of the DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY during the Carter administration?  Anybody?  Anything?  No?

Didn’t think so.

Bottom line is, we’ve spent several hundred billion dollars in support of an agency … the reason for which not one person who reads this can remember.  It was so simple … and at the time, everybody thought it very appropriate.  The Department of Energy was instituted on 8/04/1977, TO LESSEN OUR DEPENDENCE ON FOREIGN OIL.

Hey, pretty efficient, huh?  Government steps up to the plate to ease our burden, to make our world much, much better.

NOW IT’S 2012 — 35 YEARS LATER — AND THE BUDGET FOR THIS “NECESSARY” DEPARTMENT IS AT $24.2 BILLION A YEAR. IT HAS 16,000 FEDERAL EMPLOYEES AND APPROXIMATELY 100,000 CONTRACT EMPLOYEES; AND LOOK AT THE JOB IT HAS DONE.

(THIS IS WHERE YOU SLAP YOUR FOREHEAD AND SAY, “WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?”)

It has been said that 34 years ago that 30% of our oil consumption was foreign imports.  Today it is estimated or have been estimated that about 70% of our oil consumption is foreign imports.  Ah, yes — good old Federal bureaucracy.

NOW, WE HAVE TURNED OVER THE BANKING SYSTEM, HEALTH CARE, AND THE AUTO INDUSTRY TO THE SAME GOVERNMENT?

Everything seems to be peachy keeno (as long as you don’t get sick) … Wells Fargo Bank is now the largest investor in the private prison system in America today.  The kid at the beginning of the piece with the new pickup?  He has an annual A.P.R. that would shock you, courtesy of our good friends at Government Motors, who recently moved all the Volt technology to China.  Things are so damn bad that Batman sold his costume on eBay to raise money for his legal defense.  Hello!  Anybody Home?

Have a great weekend, or don’t, it is still your choice.

OOO

What Folks Have Been Reading On Creative Endeavors This Past Week:

WordPress.com says that if you sprinkle some photo’s here and there, throughout your post, it will improve your circulation.  So please imagine some pictures here and there as you read this.  As for circulation?  I woke up this morning and my left hand was asleep and it has not quite woken up at this time, so I think this post will be a little bit short.

Put my t-shirt on backwards this morning, I just don’t get it, I have at best, a fifty-fifty chance on getting it right.  Those are pretty good odds in anyone’s book.  But I always, or it seems, I always, put it on backwards.  Maybe it would be just be best to stop wearing them altogether.  Personally, I find them an invaluable resource, I mean, “How would I know what it was that I had for lunch, if I could not look down at my t-shirt?”

Think about it …..

Speaking of odds.  When a syndicate of firefighters in the Albuquerque Fire Department won a $10K pay out on the Mega Millions lotto draw, the group knew exactly what to spend the money on …  a fallen colleague.  Firefighter Vince Cordova, 24, has a rare brain tumor that requires urgent treatment in Los Angeles, and operation that will cost hundreds of thousands of dollars.  The firemen hope their donation will inspire others to come forward to help him pay his medical bills, and allow him to rejoin the team.

Tickets for last week’s Mega Million game were selling at a brisk one million per hour in the 48 hours before the drawing.  A 2008 study found that households with annual income less than $13K per year spend an average of 9% of their money on lottery tickets.  By the way … Just so you know (as Debra on Everybody Loves Raymond would say) … It would take the Federal Government just 80 minutes to spend the entire $640 million dollar payout.

That folks is incredible.

Didn’t take long, now someone is actually acting out the Hunger Games … A California woman is suing McDonald’s claiming it’s the burger chains fault she became a prostitute.  Yeah, and I am going to file mine today, for them making me into a hot wing.

Gawd.

Obama Care is now in the hands of the Supreme Court.  Kind of ironic,  a government sponsored HMO which I suppose now means …. “Hand Over Your Money … Or Die.”

Tampa officials have released a list of items considered a security threat during the Republican National Convention in August, including water pistols, masks, and even pieces of string.  By the way firearms are not on the list.

Donal Trump, owner of the Miss Universe pageant, has overturned a decision by pageant officials to bar a transgender Canadian contestant from competing.  As long as she meets the standards of legal gender recognition requirements of Canada, which we understand that she does, she can compete.

Must be nice being the boss and the owner.

Thinking outside the box … I suppose this will leave the door wide open for the white pasty faced little boys to get into the girl scouts and sell cookies.

Just when you thought you have heard or seen it all …..

A Chicago woman had to be rescued recently because “she walked off a pier, while texting on her phone.” 

Makes me wonder what it was that she was texting?

Don’t know the exact directions.  Using my phone navigator.
Finally getting the hang of texting while …
Course am at work.  Where else would I be?

An idiot will try anything … that is how you KNOW they are an idiot.

Well, I am outta here, I have those wake up its early, wash your face its dirty, eat your eggs and oatmeal rush to work blues … Time to get cracking.

What else is there to do on a Monday?

OOO

For your enjoyment, Idiots On Call.

The Mega Millions $640 million jackpot produced three winning tickets on Friday night. After the drawing, as the nation began to settle down from its lottery frenzy, thousands of Yahoo! readers commented on not beating the odds in order to strike it rich.

Some of the comments were hilarious, others showed honesty. And, as always, a few were a little too disturbing for general consumption.

Here are the top 10 editors’ picks:

10) Maggy (Providence, Rhode Island): “I guess 1,2,3,4,5 with a Mega ball of 6 was a bad choice?”

9) Stugots: “Oh well I was going to split it with all the Yahoo comment posters maybe next week.”

8) Brian (Mt. Prospect, Illinois): “Guess i told my boss ‘to shove it’ a little earlier than i should have…”

7) Gracie: “I won Ten Dollars, Please no Phone calls.”

6) Queenie: “Is any Lotto money still going to ED-Joo-KAY-shun?”

5) Norman: “Well honey, there is bad news and there is good news…….the bad news is that we didn’t win anything in the MegaLottery……the good news is that we won’t be hearing from your relatives.”

4) AstroBoy: “I am glad it is over, now I can go back to fantasizing about women again instead of money.”

3) Vik (Miami, Florida): “Only time I won a lottery was in 1972 when I was drafted into military service at #85. So did I win or did I lose?”

2) John Joe: “Now [the winners] can afford to buy gas.”

1) Justin Kase: “At least not winning saves a whole lot of deleting of Facebook friends this morning.”

OOO

Someone in the next couple of days is going to be richer to the tune of an estimated $600 Million Dollars.  At least that is what my electronic news service is telling me.  The “Big One” is happening again on the Lotto, Mega Millions to be specific and someone will basking in some new found prosperity this week.

As I am never all that lucky, I will never know what it feels like to win literally millions of dollars, but I can dream.  Which is basically what you are doing when you purchase a lottery ticket.  You are purchasing the right to dream about what it would be like to have ALL THAT MONEY in your hot little hands.

You win the Lotto and you either quit your job or you don’t?  Because now that you are rich, the only thing you have to do is sit around an count your money.  You no longer need a place to “hang around” all day long, so you pick up your phone and call your boss of 33 years and deftly tell him ….. “I won’t be in today, tomorrow, or for that matter, a week from never.”

Isn’t the Lotto grand?

Now you are able to fill out all your spare time playing golf and cards, laying out by the pool and buying lunch for all “your new found friends.”  After a short period of time, you notice that no one ever offers to buy your lunch, but you don’t care.  You begin to wonder if people like you or the free lunches? 

You go to the mall three times a week, but you shop only for essentials.  The little things in this world that will improve the quality of life.  An electric dog polisher, a pair of fur lined house slippers.  When you exit the room, you never turn off the light, what for?  You are rich, you don’t have to worry about little things anymore.

Life is good.  Aint the Lotto Grand?

You put on your best flowery-I-got-this-in-Maui-Shirt, load up in your jet black Lexus with the cellular phone and head out for the country club.  In a short while you resemble an ad for skin cancer and when someone says “Morning” the first word that comes to mind is “Lunch.”  You find yourself missing all those people you used to work with, those guys who wore socks with their shoes.

You soon find out that having money is neat and there are a lot of positive things that come with it.  All the negative things did not disappear; they just don’t seem so important now, almost trivial in most respects.

I have even heard stories of people who won millions, but did NOT quit their respective jobs.  Incredible.  If you did not quit your job, then it could possibly get worse.  Your co-workers after welcoming you back to the job (You are going to take an extended vacation with all that money aren’t you?) begin to slowly resent you.

Why work? 

Now that you have all that money, you notice that people change.  Your supervisor at work is especially “gnarly” now …. He is smarter than you (tells you all the time right?) that is why they’re your superiors, why should you have 1,000 times MORE money than them.  They begin to look at you somewhat differently each day.  The begin giving you all the lousy details, the curu7mmy jobs, your chances for promotion go right out the proverbial working window that you have been shooting for all these years.

In your dream, you begin to wonder why it is that you even bother to come in, and “on time” of top of all that?  When you do show up, for the fun of it, you drag your car keys down the side of your bosses car ….. while he is sitting in it.  No Big Deal.

If there is a slow down, then all your co-workers begin to get nasty.  What right has he/she to take up a good job with all that money?  They begin to shun you at the water cooler each day.  You begin to wonder to yourself, “Is it my deodorant?  Or that ugly rash under my right arm?”  But we all know it is the MONEY.  So, eventually, one way or another, you wind up at the Country Club in your best flowery-I-got-this-in-Maui-Shirt sitting by yourself, alone, in the corner.

So you get the first check, the “Big One” after taxes.  The money starts to trickle down to the rest of the family.  The kid’s start doing badly in school, what the point of being smart if they’re already rich?  If they have finished school, they quit their jobs.  Soon they lose all ambition and become bums, just like their parents.

Aint the Lotto Grand?

But because even tho’ you have all this money, you still have values, so you don’t give them any of it.  (I really like this part of the dream!)  They in turn begin to hate you, because you are cheap.  But they are sly about it, they hate you on the side, because in this background they are all jockeying to become executor of your estate.  A position that they can hardly wait to fill, unfortunately for you.

There are other added benefits too. 

You come home from your hard day at the Country Club and your answering machine is filled with messages from salesman, promoters, charity fund raisers, Save The Whales, Oregon Loggers Association, long lost relatives you have not see in twelve long years.  There is believe it or not, a message from High School Classmate Harold, who is suddenly ready to renew or rekindle old friendships.  This is the same guy who made your life miserable in the showers after Gym Class.  Who used to hang around your locker or the parking lot after to school, just to beat you up.

You get an unlisted phone ….. Aint the Lotto Grand?

You sit there by yourself, and you think of Buddy Post who won $16.2 million in the Lottery.  (Incidentally, if I had won $16.2 million and my name was Buddy Post, the first thing I would do with the money, is buy me a new name.)  He never had a mortgage or credit card debt before this. 

How sad.

Thousands of American’s have this particular problem, but not millions of dollars with which to ease the pain from month to month.  Can you relate to this, what I am speaking of here people?  Buddy says that he is depressed because his brother was charged with plotting to kill him to get what was left of the prize money.  Woe to me Maria!  I had no pressure.  I didn’t have the worries before this. If you have not won the lotto lately (which is the case for MOST of us SUCKERS) you think Buddy has the IQ of say ….. room temperature … and offer to take all of his problems off his hands, for a reasonable amount of money. 

Like “$16.2 Million dollars!”

But we are talking winners here, and we are winners in this dream.  You bought the ticket, it is your dream, don’t forget that.  So, on top of all your other problems, you move.  Hey?  You are a winner, you are not required to live in a dump like this, right?  So you move to a bigger house, in a fancier neighborhood, where those little lawn sprinklers pop out of the lawn, twice a day to do their thing.  A place where people actually tie little red ribbons on their dogs ears, and the brick mailboxes are roughly the size of a small to medium two bedroom house.  We are talking a NICE neighborhood here people, where neighbor’s do not bother to argue with each other when they disagree, they just let a live gopher out on the other guy’s lawn.

You are rich! 

You are not going outside to mow the lawn, or stand there in the cool of the evening with your best Sears & Roebucks (guaranteed for life) 5/8-no kink-garden house with the solid brass nozzle.  No one is going to see you there, in your bought a K-Mart shorts, cheap imitation knock off tennis shoes, watering the crab grass.  You can hire an undocumented worker to do that for you now.

So you don’t meet anyone, and of course, you are now living in a neighborhood where you don’t really know anyone.  You don’t meet anyone new, because you have become suspicious of strangers, you’re afraid the want something from you.  Mainly money.  You find yourself sitting in this big house, alone, where the phone no longer rings and no friends come by to see you, and you realize that your children hate you (you didn’t share the money remember?).  Now I ask you, “how long can a marriage survive under these circumstances?”  Not long.

Before you know it you’re paying a lawyer a fortune to keep your spouse from getting “half of the Lotto Money” when it was she/he who laughed at you for buying the winning ticket anyway.  Soon you see half of your fortune floating away, and you end up paying for BOTH lawyers.  Things start going downhill.

You start hiring people to have lunch with you.  You start looking for a little companionship in this cold, cruel world.  You put on your best Flowery-I-Got0This-In-Maui-shirt, and head out for Las Vegas, Nevada.  Bad Move.  This is like throwing a pork chop into the center of a weight watchers meeting on a Thursday night!  You come home from Vegas utterly dejected with a bad cash flow problem.

So there you sit.  Mr. Winner, in your rumpus room that is roughly the size of an aircraft carrier, eating “hot wangs” from Kentucky Fried Chicken  and picking out only the green M&M’s out of the bowl, because they taste better.  You think to yourself, “Gee, I sure am lucky to have won all that MONEY.  After all the odds of being hit by lightening were much better.”  It begins to rain, you walk across the room to shut the window and you get hit by lightning!

Naw, I don’t need no multi-million dollar payoff.  Bowl of Frito’s, some dip and cable TV is all I need.  $600 Million Dollars?  Wonder what kind of life that would bring?

Oh well, I have my total word count up for the day (1753) ….. I will see you later.

000

Have not written in awhile, a short-while it seems, so I thought this morning I might try and put something on the page before I rush to town for some breakfast.  Used to take the computer with me and write some at the beanery, but I fed it a cup of coffee one morning, and that cost me big time, so I do not do that anymore.

For all those inquiring minds that want to know, I have been lying around, soaking up some “me time” and that is about it.  Spent a little time devoted to my guitar, ran some errands, sat on the front porch with a cup of coffee and listened to the rain.  That special time when you have nothing on your plate, and you can do what it is that you want to do, which in my case, is usually nothing at all.

Rainy days are good for contemplation, quiet reflection.  When one considers the many mis-steps that he has taken over the course of a lifetime, like, for instance, blowing off a college education in order to be a second-rate guitarist in third-rate Ramada Inn bar band that play unfortunate renditions of “Bad, Bad Leroy Brown.”

Living the sixties badly or throwing away almost an entire decade trapped inside a religious cult that promised to turn one into a happy, super-duper spirit ala Casper the Friendly Ghost.  All the while one is dying of ulcerative colitis, or blowing up a perfectly good marriage because one is just stupid, or creating a rolling Taj Mahal out of old shot thrown away bus, well then, it’s easy to see how one might come to believe that “what doesn’t kill us, makes us bitter.”

I believe that inherently in all of us, is a code, the God-given right to the pursuit of happiness, is the equally the God-given right to the pursuit of unhappiness. That is why I support the American Political System in general and do not care for Political Correctness in any shape, form or manner.

This past week, I just checked out for some R & R.  Something I have neglected to do in a long, long time.  It was good … I enjoyed it, and lookie here, all done, just in time for the weekend!  You just cannot beat a deal like that.  Anywho, here is today’s post.  For some reason, I don’t know why, I have been thinking about Avatars this morning.

Are you being honest with your Avatar, does it show, as they say, “the real you” or is outdated and old?

Mine is not all that recent, it actually surprised me when I looked it up in the files.  The picture that I used for my Avatar was taken in October of 2006 on a trip to California, which is almost six years ago.  It was taken, photo-shopped or cropped from this photo, which was shot at Hearst San Simeon National Monument on the California coast south of Monterrey.

I wonder if people “shop around” for an appropriate photo, do they choose from many or do they just chose the one that is the most presentable (flattering in some cases) and not exactly representative of the truth.  Here is the same guy some six years later, a little bit heavier and sans the ballcap.  Not exactly the same eh?

The choices for most of us, are numerous, unless you are some Tibetan Monk or some religious nut that believes photo’s are not to be taken and actually capture your very soul.

I could have put up this one, if I were to be truthful, which seems to be a more than honest representative shot of myself and my life, but it just did not appeal to me, so I didn’t use it.  Here is another challenge for all you website overachievers, see if you can find more than one shot of yourself wearing the same old tired brown shirt or blouse … Now there is a photo journalism task worthy of consideration.  Most of us just prefer to put our best “happy face forward” and put up something that is fun, something that is real, something that is us.

To be candid about it, I am not a big fan of having my picture taken, never have been.  Just something about it, that I do not care for.  I understand that a lot of actors and Hollywood types are the same way.  They will make a movie but will never go to see it, as they cannot stand to see themselves on the screen.  Sadly, I have to agree with that, I would prefer to just remain anon.  Speaking of Hollywood?  I had a shot at a movie once, they wanted me to star in a re-make of Midnight Cowboy, but I turned it down, I go to bed around 10:30, so that did not work out for me either.

Perhaps it is time for “Avatar Overhaul” on Creative Endeavors.

Maybe I will just put one up of Jeremiah, he literally loves to have his picture taken.

You just say Cheese, he freezes up and presents his level best face, then quickly runs around to the back of the camera to see how it came out.  Yeah, that might work.

Have a great weekend.

OOO

Most Read on Creative Endeavors in the past week: