Good Morning, Dudge

English As The United States' Official Language?

2011-06-03T01:24:00.000-04:00

A little while ago I became lightly embroiled in an online spat about a Republican proposal that English be made the official language of the United States of America. You see, I actually agree with this idea, because English is already the de facto language of the United States.

After all:

The country originated as a number of British colonies, along the continental east coast. English law is the basis for US law.
All of our country's founding documents, and the debates and publications arguing for and against them, were in English.
All of our Presidents have been sworn in and given their inauguration address in English.
The Star Spangled Banner and our other patriotic and anthemic songs were written and are sung in English.
All of our Congressional business and judicial procedures are carried out in English.
At the Oath of Citizenship ceremony, the Oath is taken in English.

Going through the Naturalization process really made this hit home to me. Having to fill out the multitude of forms, obtain the documentary evidence required and the instructions received in various correspondences through the process were all done in English, and all caused at least a moment of confusion or trepidation by me. It made me glad to be a native English speaker.

Trips to the USCIS offices and the Oath Ceremony re-inforced this feeling, as I witnessed countless immigrants interacting with the USCIS officers in halting English, or through a family member interpreting for them.

At my Oath Ceremony, all forty of us, from twenty-three different countries, took the Oath in English, from the Palestinian great-grandma stood in front of me, to the Russian family across the aisle, to the English lady a few rows in front of me.

Yes, English is a tough language to learn, (I'm not sure that any but the most academic English scholar or grammatician ever fully grasps the language), and the USA is, by its very nature, a "melting pot" of nationalities, but is it really asking too much of the non-English speaking minority to become literate and conversant enough in English?

After all, centuries of immigrants to this country chose to learn English.

If I had moved to a country that was not Anglo-glottal, I would have learnt their language. In fact, I can demonstrate this by example of my only trip "abroad", a school trip to Boulogne in France.

I loved being able, (albeit with the back-up aid of a trusty Berlitz phrase book), to demonstrate to the residents I came into contact with that I had enough respect for them and their country that I wanted to use their own language to engage them, whether I was buying a pastry at the patisserie or asking directions to a place to buy a newspaper.

I even fantasized a little of becoming fluent and moving to France. If I had moved there, I would have used English at home, at every opportunity, but at work, in official business and around French people, I'd have spoken French.

I'm not expecting people to give up the languages of their motherlands. In fact, I'm glad they don't and any argument that a forced learning of English would destroy the immigrants' use of these languages just doesn't hold true for me.

At my sons' school, there are plenty of pupils of Hispanic heritage. They speak English just as well as my own kids, then go off with their parents at the end of the school day, conversing in Spanish, which is great. In fact, I'm jealous of them and the fact that I am not fluent in another language, which I could be teaching them to speak at home, despite coming from a bilingual part of the UK, Wales.

I love being in an ethnic restaurant and hearing Mexican Spanish, Mandarin, Hindi or Arabic being spoken and thanks to kids shows like Dora the Explorer and Ni Hao, Kai Lan I might even throw in the odd gracias or xie xie during the course of a meal's service, (though my reticence to do so is the fear of an attempt of engagement in a conversation in a language of which, I only know one or two phrases).

It will also save a lot of money, because if everyone can speak English, then there's no need for duplicating forms and information pamphlets/booklets into other languages. After all, if there's Spanish, French and Tagalog versions, why not Basque, Welsh and Swahili, too? And German and Polish and Mandarin Chinese and Urdu and Italian and Yiddish and...

So, in summary, the US should designate and use English as its official language and doing so will not impinge on an non-English speaking immigrant's use of the language(s) they learned in their countr(y/ies) of origin.

How Would You Deal w/ Being Caught in a Tornado?

2011-05-23T05:31:00.002-04:00

The moving 1st person video of the Joplin, MO tornado of 5/22/11:

Ah... Hiraeth...!

2011-05-17T06:17:00.000-04:00

I should be used to this crappy weather...

Laying A Cat To Rest

2011-05-04T05:27:00.003-04:00

Our pet cat, LittleOne, passed away yesterday and I now have to dispose of the body which, even though I have a "circle of life" outlook on death, I'm finding it to be a very difficult task to actually do.

Which is why I'm sat here blogging this out instead of taking on the task in hand.

There was no apparent illness with or injury to her, though she had been looking a little more emaciated than she usually does as she loses the winter fat in readiness for summer, and she had been meowing a little strangely, almost growling, on Monday.

We started to really worry yesterday morning when it became apparent that we had not seen her since sometime Monday evening. Being a fifteen year old cat, we had already been considering her inevitable demise and wondered if she had finally succumbed. We spent some time Tuesday morning, searching for her, to no avail.

As I was out picking up the boys from school, DW BBMd me with the sad news that she had found LIttleOne's lifeless body behind a box on the landing that is at the top of our stairs to the basement, right by the back door. I had been past that spot a few times during our search and didn't see her there, which makes me think that sometime around lunchtime, she found her way to that spot.

We weren't sure what, how or even if to tell the kids. DW wanted to wait a little, but she was so upset that within minutes she had told the boys LittleOne had passed away.

The response was interesting...

They took the news in their stride, but unfortunately a little too well, almost immediately talking about what our next pet would be... A dog? A parrot? A hamster? A snake? A little later DS1 was overheard including LittleOne's passing in his play acting, in an equally nonchalant way...!

They both acted out a little later on in the evening, which may have been a reaction to her passing, but it may also have just been that they were acting in their usual way and it was just the emotions of the day heightening our sensitivity to it. Or both, maybe!

Anyway... as soon as this blog posts, I'll be off to a secluded part of our back yard, (which is currently kind of boggy, thanks to the eternal rain we seem to be having), to perform the sad duty...

Anthem Overhauls

2011-05-01T07:39:00.001-04:00

You may want to adjust your volume for these!

In my previous blog entry I call God Save The Queen, "..somewhat flat, almost dirge-like...", but this isn't always true...

Here's some rocked up versions of some other National Anthems, starting with a "twofer" from Slash...

Wales...

Germany...

Romania seesm to have had a couple of modern versions done, incuding this pop/dance version...

Finally, Renault F1 show off their patriotism...

Four Songs And A Wedding

2011-05-01T06:26:00.001-04:00

DS2 put tv on this morning and the cable box was on BBC America. Unusually DS2 didn't turn over, so we've been watching the highlights of the Royal Wedding's ceremonies.

A number of things struck me:
I still have enough Welshness left in me to think it cool that the first hymn they sang was one readily identified with Welsh rugby crowds, ("Guide Me O Though Great Redeemer").
Seeing the Duke of Edinburgh stood next to Her Majesty, singing "God Save The Queen" struck me amusing.
I think "Jerusalem", with its crescendos, would be a better English anthem than the somewhat flat, almost dirge-like, "God Save The Queen", especially for sporting events.
Its interesting that back in The Revolution we took "God Save The Queen" and changed its words into a song more celebratory of the spirit of America, ("My Country 'Tis Of Thee").

All in all, it was nice to watch and, as I suspected, I did feel a little nostalgic for the Royal Wedding of 31 years ago...

TEDTalks - Kathryn Schulz: On being wrong

2011-04-30T09:44:00.001-04:00

Most all of the TED Talk videos I watch I enjoy, and get a click on the "thumbs up". Sometimes, though, one just has to mark a talk as a Favorite and get it out there in a blog...

Most of us will do anything to avoid being wrong. But what if we're wrong about that? "Wrongologist" Kathryn Schulz makes a compelling case for not just admitting but embracing our fallibility.

Ironic Royal Wedding Street Party Music

2011-04-29T11:39:00.002-04:00

I figured there must be some street party footage online by now and this one made me chuckle, once I realized what tune was playing...

A Right Royal Knees Up!

2011-04-28T20:10:00.001-04:00

If I were still living in the UK, I would probably be joining in whatever festivities were going on locally, in celebration of today's Royal Wedding. Maybe its because I'm a Londoner, (well... 1/4 Cockney, anyway!), but I always imagine that any "do" to do with the royal family always ends up with a good old Cockney knees up. Some older male, possibly Prince Phillip, playing the upright piano whilst they're all singing in their London accents, (their RP accents are pure show, y'know! ), about doing the Lambeth walk and how Mother Brown needs to keep her knees up!

Being ten years old, in 1981, the wedding of Prince Charles & Lady Diana was a huge deal to me. Of course there was the Queen's Silver Jubilee in 1977, but all I remember of that is a party at school, certainly not the huge celebration we had around my neighborhood. Part of the area I grew up in contained an old limestone quarry, the floor of which had been grassed over. This was known to all the residents as simply "The Green" and this is where we had the big party.

Sometime after all the pomp and circumstance and balcony waving was over on the tv, we all congregated on "The Green", where I remember there was a vast spread of fare including pop, bangers in buns, burgers, jelly and 'mange and fairy cakes, although a lot of my time seemed to be taken up with "running around" with kids I had only ever kind of known in passing.

It was kind of the same, but different, to the street parties for the Coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, in 1953, I had seen on old newsreels, reenacted on various tv shows' story lines and that I had heard of by way of stories from the older members of my family.

For Prince William and Kate Middleton's wedding, there'll be no special parties or attention from me. Still, knowing they are likely to pop over to this blog, I should like to wish them a long, happy marriage!

Why Judging Someone By IQ Score Alone Shows Lack Of Intelligence

2011-04-26T14:31:00.005-04:00

As someone who considers himself to be intelligent, I find it irksome when people use IQ scores to denigrate or celebrate people.The IQ tests I've seen, used to measure IQ for consideration as to a person's possible entry into MENSA, all focus on logic and patterns.

In 1905 the initial Binet-Simon Test, the precursor to what we know as an IQ Test, was published by Alfred Binet and Théodore Simon. Monsieur Binet felt that his test should not be used to measure and compare people's intelligence because:
"...the scale, properly speaking, does not permit the measure of intelligence, because intellectual qualities are not superposable, and therefore cannot be measured as linear surfaces are measured."

The Binet-Simon Test and the idea behind was bastardized during World War I when, in 1916, Lewis Terman, then a Professor of Educational Psychology at Stanford University, incorporated William Stern's concept of a person having an Intelligence Quotient. Terman's test, which he named the Stanford-Binet Intelligence Scale, then formed the basis for the modern IQ Test.

During his wartime studies, testing a large number of subjects, Terman concluded:
"High-grade or border-line deficiency… is very, very common among Spanish-Indian and Mexican families of the Southwest and also among negroes. Their dullness seems to be racial, or at least inherent in the family stocks from which they come… Children of this group should be segregated into separate classes… They cannot master abstractions but they can often be made into efficient workers… from a eugenic point of view they constitute a grave problem because of their unusually prolific breeding"

As someone who had already professed the belief that intelligence, or lack thereof, was inherited, and who considered certain parts of society as "a grave problem", it is hardly a shock to learn that Terman joined the Human Betterment Foundation, which championed the promotion and enforcement of compulsory sterilization laws in California. Makes the IQ Test a shitty kind of thing to champion, in that circumstance.

Unfortunately educators, and society, then proceded to take Terman's test and scale and use it as a measure of intelligence, just as Binet had warned against.

For me, intelligence is more than just how well one learns or can see patterns, it also encompasses a person's problem solving abilities, common sense and adaptability.

Rain, Rain, Go Away...

2011-04-24T10:24:00.002-04:00

Go to Mexico. Or Texas. Whatever.

Courtesy of DS2, aged 7!

Please Stop Spitting At Me Acceptance And Love In The Face Of Behavioral Defiance 02/15 by The Family Coach on Blog Talk Radio

2011-04-22T12:54:00.000-04:00

Listen to internet radio with The Family Coach on Blog Talk Radio

Link

I follow Marianne Sarola-Russo on Twitter, (@TheCoffeeKlatch & @ChildAnxiety), where I sometimes take part in the discussions through The Coffee Klatch, (via TweetChat w/ the hashtag #TCK).

We're "Having Some Weather"!

2011-04-19T22:29:00.001-04:00

About an hour ago, the third thunderstorm within 24 hours just woke me w/ hail hitting the windows! At that time we had FOUR weather alerts in effect:
ALERT 1 - Area Flood Watch
UNTIL 9:00AM EDT WEDNESDAY, APRIL 20
ALERT 2 - Flash Flood Warning
UNTIL 5:45AM EDT WEDNESDAY, APRIL 20
ALERT 3 - Tornado Watch
UNTIL 5:00AM EDT
ALERT 4 - Severe Thunderstorm Warning
UNTIL 2:00AM EDT WEDNESDAY, APRIL 20

Obama Tax Returns: President And First Lady Pulled in $1,728,096 In 2010

2011-04-18T22:42:00.001-04:00

They'd do better under the Fair Tax!
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Mmm... Jimmy John's...

2011-04-16T11:07:00.001-04:00

We went to Jimmy John's Gourmet Sandwiches for subs, for last night's "Date Night". We perused the menu and made our decisions: a "#15 Club Tuna", for DW & a "#17 Ultimate Porker" for me.

I have a cold, which always affects my hearing a little, and the place was playing music kind of loud - Egads! I'm getting old! - so when I tried to order DW's sandwich how she wanted it - w/o the cucumber & alfalfa sprouts and w/ whatever Italian dressing they have - instead we got her #15 w/o the undesired veggies and an extra "#9 Italian Night Club" sub!

I wondered why we were presented w/ three subs and sat down a little perplexed. We instantly realized the mistake that had occurred, but decided to keep the sandwich. Our sandwiches were delish. I almost opened the third sandwich there and then, but we waited until we got home. Between arriving home and the DSs arriving we split the #9!

Their sandwiches are freaking awesome!

So awesome, that I've been craving their subs ever since I finished last night's and now, I'm secretly hoping that when we go out w/ the iL's to eat today, we somehow end up @ Jimmy John's! *lol*

Hmm... we're yet to be inspired to gt any Spring cleaning done, and Spring Break is upon us. Now I know what to do...!

For The 96...

2011-04-14T21:36:00.002-04:00

As you may, or may not know, I am a fan of three forms of football - football/soccer, rugby union and [American] football.

My favorite soccer team, for about 30 of the 39 years I have had the privilege to have been around this Earth, has always been Liverpool FC. Whilst still something of a powerhouse in British and European soccer, they aren't quite at the heights they were back then and, if I'm honest, I likely became a fan of theirs because they were the best.

Anyway... 15th April, 1989 was the FA Cup semi-final between Liverpool and Nottingham Forest FC, held at the neutral Hillsborough ground, of Sheffield Wednesday FC. It was during a time in football when hooliganism, though waning, was still rife, so when LFC supporters started pouring out over and through the fences and gates at the Leppings Lane end of the ground, slowly at first, and then in great numbers, the other fans in the ground and the viewers at home all initially thought that hooligans were about to spoil another football match. If only that were true...

Wall, Meet Head

2011-04-10T13:22:00.000-04:00

*sigh*

DS1 has been in a pissy mood all day. He just came back in from outside where, apparently, he had been running away. He came back because its sunny and hot and he wants it to be "cloudy and cool", except when its cloudy and cool he's the one stood on the porch yelling at the clouds to go away so the sun can come out.

But in his illogical logic, apparently, I am the one who is never satisfied...

I don't know why I'm complaining, though... he's only been in this mood since 8AM-ish and its only nine hours or so before he goes to bed...

Eric Cantor: Debt Ceiling Vote Will Be 'Leverage Moment' For GOP Spending-Cut Demands

2011-04-10T12:10:00.002-04:00

How about this? Cut ALL the spending on EVERYTHING until expenditure < income.

You don't need to be an economist, a Washington analyst or even a frickin' genius...
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Conference On Private Initiatives In Education - Keynote Speech by J. T. Gatto

2011-04-03T21:21:00.001-04:00

The government began to compel us all to send our children to school in 1852 in the state of Massachusetts, and from that state the compulsion spread south, west, and north. But did you know that in 1818, 34 years before compulsion laws began, Noah Webster estimated that over 5 MILLION copies of his Spelling Book had been sold? That's pretty good in a population of under 20 million, don't you think? And every purchase decision was made freely, by an individual or a family, and there were no federal, state or city tabs to run bulk purchases on -- each decision was made privately, and in each somebody forked over some cash to buy a book.

That would seem to suggest that most folks don't have to be compelled to learn, they do it on their own, because they want to.

Here's another 5 million copy fact. Did you know that between 1813 and 1823, a fellow named Water Scott sold 5 million copies of his novels in the United States? That would be about equal to a writer selling 60 million books today, but we all know that could never happen. The puzzle becomes even denser when you pick up a Walter Scott novel and try to read it. Let me quote from the opening of Quentin Durward, published in 1823, and read by a lot of kids back then?

"The latter part of the fifteenth century prepared a train of future events that ended by raising France to that state of formidable power which has ever since been the principal object of jealousy to the other European nations. Before that period she had to struggle for her very existence with the English, already possessed of her fairest provinces, while the utmost exertions of the King, and the gallantry of her people, could scarcely protect the remainder from a foreign yoke. Nor was this her sole danger..."

That's pretty heady stuff, isn't it? I've never read an adequate explanation in John Dewey how an unschooled agricultural mob could manage such material, but I assure you the sales figures are accurate and drawn from the research of a well-respected American historian, Merle Curti. And remember, there was no compulsion then so the readers had to pretty much want to tackle stuff like that in between plowing and strangling the chicken.

It seems almost unfair to tell you that there was another writer beloved of common Americans before we had government compulsion schools, but there was; he was a man from upstate New York who sold millions and millions of books, and who currently has a box-office bonanza movie on the boards called "The Last of the Mohicans." His name was James Fenimore Cooper and he wrote material like this for ignorant, unschooled Americans:

The incidents of this tale occurred between the years 1740 and 1745, when the settled portions of the colony of New York were confined to the four Atlantic counties, a narrow belt of country on each side of the Hudson, extending from the mouth of the falls near its head, and to a few advanced "neighborhoods" on the Mohawk and the Schoharie...A birds eye view of the whole region east of the Mississippi must then have offered one vast expanse of woods, relieved by a comparatively narrow fringe of cultivation along the seas... In such a vast region of solemn solitude..."

Well, I'm sure you get the picture. Such attention to detail would take an ambitious college professor to attend to these days, a mere lecturer wouldn't have the span of attention for it. A transplanted Englishman, John Bristed, wrote in 1818 that the mass of Americans excelled every other people in the world in shrewdness of intellect, general intelligence, versatility and readiness to experiment with untried things. William Cobbett on his return to America in 1817 observed that every farmer was a reader, unlike the European peasant. How on earth did that come to pass and why isn't it true in our well-schooled era?

You and I are confronted with a great mystery: we had a perfectly literate country before 1852 when, for the first time, we got government schooling shoved down our throats. How we achieved this amazing literacy is wrapped up in the secret that reading, writing and numbers are very easy to learn -- in spite of what you hear from the reading, writing and number establishments. We aren't in the mess we're in today because we don't know how to do things right, but because "we" don't want to do them right. The incredibly profitable school enterprise has deliberately selected a procedure of literacy acquisition which is pedagogically bankrupt; thousands of years ago Socrates predicted this would happen if men were paid for teaching. He said they would make what is easy to learn seem difficult, and what is mastered rapidly they would stretch out over a long time.

The first thing that an effective system of school choice would demonstrate is that our children have been held captive by a method of literacy transmission that ignores reality -- and makes a very large fortune each year doing so. Eventually, with choice, the present system would run head-on into efficient competition that would destroy it. That would be inevitable because profitability would vanish once literacy is managed correctly.

Let me guide you to a few private businesses where literacy is managed correctly right now -- at a fraction of the public school cost. Before I do I want to caution you that the two places I'll cite use radically different methods from each other, are based on radically different theories -- but the outcome in both places is very impressive. We'll start at 8801 Stenton Avenue in Philadelphia in a place called "The Institutes for the Achievement of Human Potential" which has been teaching babies to read, and teaching mothers t teach their own babies to read, since shortly after the Second World War. Babies. By the time these kids are 4 what they can do would cause you to think murderous thoughts about your local government school. And what is diabolical is that the kids have a great deal of fun learning. Study sessions only last a few minutes, and the kids learn all the mathematical operations, too, fluency in several languages -- and the violin!

Well, don't believe me -- you have the address -- write them a letter and go see for yourself. IAHP isn't going anywhere, it's been there for decades. You might want to ask your local school superintendent why you haven't heard of this place -- presuming you're as impressed as I was.

Place number two is 20 miles West of Boston, a few miles from Nathaniel Hawthorne's famous Wayside Inn on the outskirts of Framingham. It's the beautiful Sudbury Valley School, in the old Nathaniel Bowditch cottage, which looks suspiciously like a mansion to 20th century eyes. A place ringed about with handsome outbuildings, private lake, woods, and acres and acres of magnificent grounds. This place is a private school, of course, with a tuition of $3,500 a year -- about 63% cheaper than a New York city public school seat costs.

Sudbury teaches a lot of things, but two things it does not teach anybody is reading and numbers -- and its kids range in age from 4 to 18!

Kids learn reading and calculation at Sudbury at many different ages (but never as babies), but when they are ready to learn they teach themselves. Every kid who has stayed for long at the school over the past 25 years has learned to read and compute, about 2/3rds of them go on to college without ever taking a standardized test or getting a report card, and the school has never seen a case of dyslexia. They don't even believe such a condition exists outside of a few physically damaged kids and the fevered imaginations of compulsion school reading specialists.

They don't teach reading and yet all the kids eventually learn to read and even to like it? A frustrating puzzle for many observers, but no more frustrating than trying to explain how Thomas Paine's Common Sense sole 600,000 copies in the year 1776 to a nation of two and a half million people, about 70% of whom were African slaves or indentured servants. It just boggles the mind to see today's graduate students in political science seminars wrestling with Paine (no pun intended) when young farmers whizzed through it with exhilaration over 200 years ago.

One final, more or less modern, example of how easy it is to learn to read well -- is myself. In 1941 when I went to first grade in Swissvale, Pennsylvania, a borough of Pittsburgh, at the age of 5, I could read fluently. For the first 200 years of our history most schools wouldn't accept children who couldn't read and count, so they must have learned it where I learned it, and where the Human Potential Institute children learn it -- at home. My first grade teacher, Miss Dane, came to our home on Calumet Street shortly after the term began to protest, "Mrs. Gatto," she said, "your son reads, I would guess, on the 6th Grade level. He is ruining my class and I want you to make him shut up, keep his hand down, and not answer any questions in class." How's that for pedagogy? I loved Miss Dane who was a wonderful woman so I'm not telling this story to insult her, just to give you something to think about.

I suppose the skeptical among you are wondering who this miracle woman was who taught me to read so well before I went to school at the age of 5? Well, her name was Frances "Bootie" Zimmer, and she graduated from Monongahela High School in 1929, the same high school that Joe Montana, the great San Francisco quarterback came out of about a half century later. There wasn't enough money to send Bootie to college but nobody despaired about that in those days because the country seemed to run very well without college graduates.

Did Bootie know some secret method of teaching that could have made her a fortune if she turned professional? I don't think so. What she knew was how to read to me every single day from the time I was 2 years old -- reach to me with me on her lap and her finger running under the words -- read tome from increasingly difficult stuff, none of which seemed hard because I was having so much fun. She read real fairy tales, not scientifically simplified ones; she read real history books and real newspaper stories and real grown-up storybooks including some tales from The Decameron. What she didn't read were scientific readers of any sort, the books with 364-word sanitized vocabularies and a lot of pictures.

Well, there we have the raw material for a revolution: the Institutes for the Achievement of Human Potential, the Sudbury valley School, Frances "Bootie" Zimmer...these are important clues to how deep the mess we are in really is, clues to what its nature is. Here is evidence that we already possess the engineering know-how we need to revolutionize schooling. And if you look closely, here too is a warning that the trouble we are in is not what it appears to be (an avalanche of dumb kids), but instead an avalanche of kids who have been deliberately dumbed down by an industry that will not stop what it has been doing just because it is killing us. When we consider the course 20th century government schooling has taken deliberately it is clear we are in the presence of no simple mistake in engineering but that of a powerful ideological agenda, one so passionately and grimly held by its proponents we might almost see it as a religion.

To understand how this happened, a brief tour through history is essential, otherwise you may continue to think that some tinkering or, God forbid, some more money will cure the disease of bad schooling. Come back with me then to 1812, when one of the founders of the immense DuPont fortune, a man named Pierre DuPont deNemours, published a book called Education in the United States. DuPont was many things but no one knew him as a soft-hearted fellow used to flattering people, so we can assign some credibility to his amazement at the phenomenal literacy he saw all around him compared to the European models he was familiar with. 1812. Forty years in advance of the passage of our first government compulsion school laws. Mr DuPont said that less than 4 people out of every thousand in the new nation could not read and do numbers well. He saw a world in which nearly every child was trained in argumentation (the old fashioned term for "critical thinking'). How would that be possible, do you suppose, without forced schooling?

And yet two decades later French aristocrat named deTocqueville wrote a book that's still in print, Democracy in America, in which he characterized us as the best educated people in history. And in 1838, still 14 years before the militia began marching recalcitrant children to school, another French aristocrat, Michael Chevalier, wrote a book that ranked the American farmer with the immortals of history, a book which said in effect that the farmer went into the field with his plow in one hand and Descartes in the other.

So from 1776, when Common Sense was selling up a storm to unschooled colonists, until 1838, when farmers were observed reading Descartes, the American people seemed to be doing fairly well for themselves educationally, making their own education decisions, using, inventing, or substituting for schooling -- as Ben Franklin did -- as best they saw fit. Individuals made their own decisions, not government experts. this was America, after all, not Prussian Germany.

How on earth did they do it? Almost immediately after the effective start-up of government factory schooling before the first world war it was obvious to anyone who cared to look closely that literacy was not what they were about, but that a redefinition of growing up was what was afoot. Growing up was not to be a socialization of the future labor force to suit some bureaucratic design determined by political experts. As the earlier lightly schooled America had proven, competency was not a scarce thing however you measured it - but the world of the government monopoly school set out to make it so. But the earlier, catch-as-catch-can entrepreneurial form of instruction offered abundant choices of useful ways to grow up, useful ways to read, write and think. Earlier schooling was about literacy, and that is why it succeeded. Literacy isn't very difficult to learn when the child perceives that the adults about him think that it's something important.

I want you to consider the frightening possibility that we are spending far too much money on schooling, not too little, as schooling people contend. I want you to consider that we have too many people employed in interfering with the way children grow up -- and that all this money and all these people, all the time we take out of children's lives and away from their homes and families and neighborhoods and private explorations -- gets in the way of education!

That seems radical, I know. Surely in modern technological society it is the quantity of schooling and the amount of money you spend on it that buys value. Surely. And yet last year in St. Louis I heard a vice-president of IBM tell an audience of people assembled to discuss the process of redesigning teacher certification that in his opinion this country became computer-literate by self-teaching, not through any action of schools. He said 45 million people were comfortable with computers who had learned through dozens of non-systematic strategies, none of them very formal; if schools had pre-empted the right to teach computer use we would be in a horrible mess right now instead of leading the world in this literacy.

MIT said a few years back that formal equipment seemed to play almost no role at all in scientific discovery and that inventors presented with state of the art equipment usually went sterile from then on! So MIT and IBM, which are both tied to being judged on outcomes, think one way, and compulsion schools which are tied to rhetoric about inputs, think another. If you're input-paralyzed you tend to stare at your abstract system when trouble arises, but if you care about results you tend to look at what makes Joe do best and you don't make the mistake of thinking that Joe is Sally.

Now think about Sweden, a beautiful, healthy, prosperous and up-to-date country with a spectacular reputation for quality in everything it produces: Sixteen million people in a nation that makes its voice heard all over the planet to such an extent that if you didn't know it was so small you'd swear it must be a world power. It makes sense to think their schools must have something to do about it.

Then what do you make of the fact that you can't go to school in Sweden until you are 7 years old? The reason the unsentimental Swedes have wiped out what would be first and second grades here, is that they don't want to pay the large social bill that quickly comes due when boys and girls are ripped away from their best teachers t home too early. Does that sound radical, or is what we do the radical thing? It just isn't worth the price, say the Swedes, to provide jobs for teachers and therapists if the result is sick, incomplete kids who can't be put back together again very easily. The entire Swedish school sequence isn't 12 years either -- it's 9. Less schooling, not more. The direct savings of such a step in the U.S. would be 75-100 BILLION dollars, a lot of unforeclosed home mortgages, a lot of time freed up with which to seek an education.

Who was it that decided to force your attention onto Japan instead of Sweden? Japan with its long school year and state compulsion, instead of Sweden with its short school year, short school sequence, and free choice where your kid is schooled? Who decided you should know about Japan, and not Hong Kong, an Asian neighbor with a short school year that outperforms Japan across the board in math and science? Whose interests are served by hiding that from you? Isn't that the question we should be asking?

One of the principal reasons we got into the mess we're in is that we allowed schooling to become a very profitable monopoly, guaranteed its customers by the police power of the state. Systematic schooling attracts increased investment only when it does poorly, and since there are no penalties at all for such performance, the temptation not to do well is overwhelming. IF that sounds like a shocking contention, it derives from a conservative reality that school staffs, both line and management, are involved in a guild system; in that ancient form of association no single member is allowed to outperform any other member, is allowed to advertise, or is allowed to introduce new technology or improvise without the advance consent of the guild. Violation of these precepts is severely sanctioned -- as Marva Collins, Jaime Escalante and a large number of once-brilliant teachers found out.

The structure of American schooling, 20th century style, began in 1806 when Napoleon's amateur soldiers beat the professional soldiers of Prussia at the battle of Jena. When your business is selling soldiers, losing a battle like that is serious. Almost immediately afterwards a German philosopher named Fichte delivered his famous "Address to the German Nation" which became one of the most influential documents in modern history. In effect he told the Prussian people that the party was over, that the nation would have to shape up through a new Utopian institution of forced schooling in which everyone would learn to take orders. I don't know how much you know about Prussia, but it's instructive to consider that Prussia began to police the female womb in the year 1735, long before the French and Indian wars. In Prussia unmarried women whose menses ceased had to register with the police.

So the world got compulsion schooling at the end of a state bayonet for the first time in human history; modern forced schooling started in Prussia in 1819 with a clear vision of what centralized schools could deliver:
1. Obedient soldiers to the Army.
2. Obedient workers to the mines.
3. Well subordinated civil servants to government.
4. Well subordinated clerks to industry.
5. Citizens who thought alike about major issues.
School should create an artificial national consensus on matters which had been worked out in advance by leading German families and the heads of institutions. Schools should create unity among all the German states, eventually unifying them into Greater Prussia.

Prussian industry boomed from the beginning. She was successful in warfare and her reputation in international affairs was very high. Twenty six years after this form of schooling began the King of Prussia was invited to North America to determine the boundary between the United States and Canada. Thirty-three years after that fateful invention of the central school institution, at the behest of Horace Mann and many other leading citizens, we borrowed the style of Prussian schooling as our own.

You need to know this because over the first 50 years of our school institution Prussian purpose -- which was to create a form of state socialism -- gradually forced out traditional American purpose, which in most minds was to prepare the individual to be self-reliant.

The Prussian purpose was collective, the American purpose, as it had come down from history, was singular. In Prussia the purpose of the Volksschule, which educated 92% of the children, was not intellectual development at all, but socialization in obedience and subordination. Thinking was left to the Real Schulen, in which 8% of the kids participated. But for the great mass, intellectual development was regarded with managerial horror, as something that caused armies to lose battles. For Prussia the ideal model society was not intellectual Greece or muscular Rome but solid, settled Egypt -- a pyramid of subordination where only the top leadership understood the big picture. Below this class were descending service classes, each larger than the one directly above it, each knowing less than the one above it until at the bottom almost nothing was known except how to do a small part of a larger task only dimly understood.

Prussia concocted a method based on complex fragmentations to ensure that its school products would fit the grand social design. Some of this method involved dividing whole ideas into school subjects, each further divisible, some of it involved short periods punctuated by a horn so that self-motivation in study would be muted by ceaseless interruptions. There were many more techniques of training, of course, but all were built around the premise that isolation from first-hand information, and fragmentation of the abstract information presented by teachers, would result in obedient and subordinate graduates, properly respectful of arbitrary orders. "Lesser" men would be unable to interfere with policy markers because, while they could still complain, they could not manage sustained or comprehensive thought. Well-schooled children cannot think critically, cannot argue effectively.

One of the most interesting by-products of Prussian schooling turned out to be the two most devastating wars of modern history. Let me cite two German thinkers on that subject. Erich Maria Remarque, in his classic, All Quiet on the Western Front tell us that the first world was was caused by the tricks of schoolmasters, and the famous Protestant theologian Dietrich Bonhoeffer said that the second world war was the inevitable product of good schooling. It's important to underline that Bonhoeffer meant that literally, not metaphorically -- schooling after the Prussian fashion removes the ability of the mind to think for itself. It teaches people to wait for a teacher to tell them what to do and if what they have done is good or bad. Prussian teaching paralyzes the moral will as well as the intellect. It's true that sometimes well-schooled students sound smart, because they memorize many opinions of great thinkers, but they actually are badly damaged because their own ability to think is left rudimentary and undeveloped.

We got from the United States to Prussia and back because a small number of very passionate ideological leaders visited Prussia in the first half of the 19th century, fell in love with the order, obedience and efficiency of its system, and relentlessly proseletyzed for a translation of Prussian vision onto these shoes. If Prussia's ultimate goal was the unification of Germany, our major goal, so these men thought, was the unification of hordes of immigrant Catholics into a national consensus based on a northern European cultural model. To do that children would have to be removed from their parents and from inappropriate cultural influence.

In this fashion compulsion schooling, a bad idea that had been around at least since Plato's Republic, a bad idea that New England had tried to enforcfe in 1650 without any success, was finally rammed home through the Massachusetts legislature in 1852. It was, of course, the famous "Know-Nothing" legislature that passed this law, a legislature that was the leading edge of a famous secret society which flourished at that time known as "The Order of the Star Spangled Banner", whose password was the simple sentence, "I know nothing" -- hence the popular label attached to the secret society's political arm, "The American Party".

Over the next 50 years state after state followed suit, ending schools of choice and ceding the field to a new government monopoly. There was one powerful exception to this -- the children who could afford to be privately educated. They could avoid the American version of Volksschule if their families were prosperous or canny enough to catch on to the new game. By 1990 88% of all our children were being "public" schooled.

Three major ideas were transferred almost intact from Prussia and slowly worked into the final structure of our national schooling. Each of these ideas had, of course, to overcome major resistance. This seldom was done by direct confrontation but instead by a gradual process of wearing away the opposition. It was not until the conclusion of the first world war that the last avenue of escape from the trap was closed.

The first of this triumvirate of Prussian principles was the very sophisticated notion that State schooling did not exist to offer intellectual training, but to condition children to obedience, subordination and collective life. These social theorists included some of the greatest minds in history, including the most influential philosopher since Lord Bacon, Frederich Hegel. Each in his own way taught that general intellectual development will make central political control impossible, hence it is to be avoided. The will in children must be broken in order to make them plastic material. If the will could be broken all else would follow. Keep in mind that will-breaking was the central logic of child-rearing among our own Puritan colonists and you will see the natural affinity that existed between Prussian seeds and Puritan soil. Will-breaking had been carefully studied from time to time in European history, so to a leadership inclined that way, various devices proven in action were available -- best known of these was the English practice of "boarding-out" where children were sent to live with and work for strangers at an early age -- the constant stress of adapting to strange customs and practices usually produced a compliant, surface personality, easily manageable.

In the Prussian system, imposed over 50 years by the new State Education Departments, a Prussian management concept heretofore unknown in the U.S. was adopted. Children were not to be taught to think, but to memorize. They were to be discouraged from assuming responsibility for each other, because that weakened the grasp of authority, and they were to be intimidated away from the pursuit of their own natural interests for the same reason. Henceforth, teachers would define what their interests were. From this new logic of school management arose the need to eliminate the familiar one-room schoolhouse, the main vehicle of schooling during the first 40 years or so of the new government monopoly. The on-room school invested too much responsibility in the children themselves -- from such practices too much of the old, self-reliant, neighborly ways would be preserved.

The second important discovery of the Prussian method was that extreme fragmentation of thinking into subjects, fixed time periods, sequences, units, externally imposed questioning, etcetera would simplify the problems of leadership. Thoughts broken into fragments could be managed by a poorly trained, poorly paid teaching force; could be memorized even by a moron who made the effort; and lent themselves to the appearance of precision in testing and delivered beautiful distribution curves of "achievement". This form is curriculum (suggested by machine operation) was beginning to permeate Prussian factory operations, mining, and military life. It brilliantly solved the historical dilemma of leadership dependency on skilled craftsmen, too. A simplified workforce could be replaced quickly without damage to production. Such a workplace creates great psychological and social problems for the workers, true, but worker welfare was not a factor in this scheme.

That we have created such a workforce in the United States through our schools was never better illustrated than in the strike of the air traffic controllers some year back. These supposedly "highly skilled" men and women were replaced overnight without any increase in accidents through the system. The social costs of such a system, in alcoholism, suicide, broken homes, violence, despair, etcetera are not, as I inferred earlier, factored into the balance sheet.

The third premise of Prussian schooling is that the government is the true parent of children -- the State is sovereign over the family. In Western law that idea is known as the Parens Patriae power, I think, and at the most extreme pole of this notion is the idea that biological parents are really the enemies of their own children, not to be trusted. You can see this philosophy at work in court decisions which rule that parents need not be told when schools dispense condoms to their children, or consulted when daughters seek abortion.

What is the evidence that a Prussian system of dumbing children down took hold in American schools? Actually the evidence is overwhelming. Thousands and thousands of young men from prominent American families journeyed to Prussia and other parts f Germany during the 19th century and brought home the PhD degree to a nation in which such a credential was unknown. These men pre-empted the top positions in the academic world, in corporate research, and in government, to the point where opportunity was almost closed to those who had not studied in Germany, or who were not the direct disciples of a German PhD, as John Dewey was the disciple of G. Stanley Hall at Johns Hopkins.

Virtually every single one of the founders of American schooling had made the pilgrimage to Germany, and many of these men wrote widely circulated reports praising the Teutonic methods. Horace Mann's famous '7th Report" of 1844, still available in large libraries, was perhaps the most important of these, but Calvin Stowe's report, and Dallas Bache's report, Henry Dwight's report, and Henry Barnard's report, the reports of Dr. Julius and Drs. Smith, Griscom and Woodbridge all sent the same signal: Follow Germany.

By 1889, a little over one hundred years ago, the crop was ready for harvest. In that year the U.S. Commissioner of Education, William Torrey Harris, assured a railroad magnate, Collis Huntington, that American schools were "scientifically designed" to prevent "over-education" from happening. Harris is dead now, so we can't ask him what he meant by "over-education", but we can make a shrewd guess because Mr. Harris was among the leading German scholars in the nation. The average American would be content with his humble role in life, said the Commissioner, because he would not be tempted to think about any other role. My guess is that Harris meant he would not be able to think about any other role.

In 1896 the famous John Dewey, then at the University of Chicago, said that independent, self-reliant people were a counter-productive anachronism in the collective society of the future. In modern society, said Dewey, people would be defined by their associations -- the groups they belonged to -- not by their own individual accomplishments. In such a world people who read too well or too early are dangerous because they become privately empowered, they know too much, and know hot to find out what they don't know by themselves, without consulting experts.

Dewey said the great mistake of traditional pedagogy was to make reading and writing constitute the bulk of early schoolwork. He advocated that the phonics method of teaching reading be abandoned and replaced by the whole word method, not because the latter was more efficient (he admitted it was less efficient) but because independent thinkers are produced by hard books, thinkers who cannot be socialized very easily. By socialization Dewey meant a program of social objectives administered by the best social thinkers in government. This was a giant step on the road to state socialism, the form pioneered in Prussia, and it is a vision radical disconnected with the American past, its historic hopes and dreams.

Dewey's former professor and close friend, G. Stanley Hall, said this at about the same time, "Reading should no longer be a fetish. Little attention should be paid to reading." Hall was an important intermediary in the birth of modern American systematic schooling, one of the three men most responsible for building a gigantic administrative infrastructure over the classroom. How enormous that structure really became can only be understood by comparisons: New York State, for instance, employs more school administrators than all of the European Economic Community nations COMBINED!

G. Stanley Hall is a name to conjure with in many ways; he was the first American PhD out of Wilhelm Wundt's psychometric laboratories in Germany and subsequently a major eminence grise in the rise of American behaviorism, as the American promoter who brought Sigmund Freud to the United States to promote his theory that behavioral problems in later life can be traced to bad parenting and alleviated by expert interventions. Hall is also an important reason we have standardized testing in our schools.

But back to Dewey. Learning to read too well, said Dewey, caused children to turn inward and made them competitive and independent. The phonics method of teaching reading provided no motives to follow a teacher's lead for very long; it was selfish, even if it did work. It only appealed to the intellectual aspect of our nature -- the desire to get control of our own mind.

Reading, writing and arithmetic were not the purpose of this new form of American schooling, a form which substituted memorization for thinking and which we still have with us. In 1923 Dr. Cattell, of "The Psychological Corporation", a private entity composed of the inner circle of american schoolmen like John Dewey, announced the purpose of schooling to its clientele who were expected to support its enterprises in testing and teacher training. Dr. Cattell said this about the purpose of government schooling in 1923: "The scientific control of conduct is what schools are about. The scientific control of conduct is of greater economic importance than the use of electricity or steel."

Once you think that the control of conduct is what schools are about, the word "reform" takes on a very particular meaning. It means making adjustments to the machine so that young subjects will not twist and turn so, while their minds and bodies are being scientifically controlled. Helping kids to use their minds better is beside the point.

Somewhere around the turn of the 20th century, making people dumb for their own good became the point of our national forced schooling exercise. If you find that hard to believe, use the evidence of your own eyes and ears to confirm it. Do you think you can find a better way to teach? You're right, of course you can --but not a better way to teach obedience. Throughout the 19th century to a crescendo achieved at the turn of the 20th century, a small band of very influential people, substantially financed by money and ideas from the Rockefeller foundations and the Carnegie foundations, introduced a system of state socialism into our national education picture. Privately they had determined that this was the best course for the American democracy and with little wasted motion, and no public discussion, they pointed our nation toward that end.

Bertrand Russell once observed that American schooling was among the most radical experiments in human history, that America was deliberately denying its children the tools of critical thinking. When you want to teach children to think you begin by treating them seriously when they are little, giving them responsibilities, talking to them candidly, providing privacy and solitude for them, making them readers and thinkers of significant thoughts from the beginning. You keep the games and songs and pretty colors in balance with the soberer purpose. That's if you want to teach them to think. There is no evidence that has been a State purpose since the start of compulsion schooling.

When Frederich Froebel, the inventor of kindergarten in 19th century Germany fashioned his idea he did not have a "garden for children" in mind, but a metaphor of teachers as gardeners and children as the vegetables. Kindergarten was created to be, and was quietly celebrated as, a way to break the influence of mothers on their children once and for all. I note with interest the growth of day care in the U.S. and the repeated urgings to extend school downward to include 4-year-olds. The movement toward state socialism I've been speaking to you about today is not some historical curiosity but a powerful dynamic force in the world around us. It is fighting for its life against those forces which would, through vouchers or tax credits, deprive it of financial lifeblood, and it has countered this thrust with a demand for even more control over children's lives, and even more money to pay for the extended school day and year that its control requires. Herr Froebel disliked his own family intensely, a fact that may be useful to you when you come to regard the encroachment of school institutions on infancy.

A movement as visibly destructive to individuality, family and community as government-system schooling has been might be expected to collapse in the face of its dismal record, coupled with an increasingly aggressive shake-down of the taxpayer, but this has not happened. The explanation is largely found in the transformation of schooling from a simple service to families and towns to an enormous, centralized corporate enterprise.

While this development has had a markedly adverse effect on people, and on our democratic traditions, it has made schooling the single largest employer in the United States, and the largest grantor of contracts, next to the Defense Department. Both of these low-visibility phenomena provide monopoly schooling with powerful political friends, publicists, advocates and other useful allies from positions apparently outside the loop until an analysis map of special interest is drawn. This is a large part of the explanation why no amount of failure ever changes things in schools, or changes them for very long. School people are in a position to out-last any storm and to keep short-attention-span public scrutiny thoroughly confused.

An overview of the short history of this institution reveals as pattern marked by intervals of public outrage, followed by enlargement of the monopoly in every case. The net result of public alarm has been to diminish worthwhile alternatives, surely the richest of all the ironies, a cosmic reversal testifying to the secret systems of nourishment available to schooling, exactly as it is.

After nearly 30 years spent inside a number of public schools, some considered good and some bad, I feel certain that management cannot clean its own house. The structure is too brilliantly designed to allow that. It relentlessly marginalizes all significant change, or degrades it, and no watchdog mechanism exists to effectively combat how that happens -- nor is it possible, in my opinion.

Teaching the way children learn involves a dynamic too complicated to bureaucratize. Failure to see that simple truth, or our simple inability to act upon it in a monopoly situation when it is seen, dooms all in-system reform to trivialization. There are no incentives for the "owners" of the structure to reform it, nor can there be without outside competition. Indeed, I'm afraid that competition too tightly monitored from a central point, as it would be in a national test situation (which involves wildly incorrect assumptions about learning that are too complicated to go into in this essay), will not touch the existing monolith.

What is needed for several decades is the kind of wildly-swinging free market we had at the beginning of our national history. It cannot be overemphasized that nobody of theory exists to accurately define the way children learn, or which learning is of most worth. By pretending the existence of such we have cut ourselves off from the information and innovation that only a real market can provide. Fortunately our national situation has been so favorable, so dominant through most of our history, that the margin of error afforded has been vast in a material sense. We all eat whether we do this school thing right or not.

But the future is not so clear. Perhaps materially a case can be made that our position of advantage is too great at this point to squander, but when we enter the arena of emotional capital, of simple satisfaction with life and joy in living, our relative position has been slipping for many years. That holds true whether we compare ourselves to certain other nations or to standards we set for our own lives based on values, traditions and myths.

Violence, narcotic addictions, divorce, alcoholism, loneliness...all these are but tangible measures of a poverty in education. Surely schools, as the institutions monopolizing the day-times of childhood, can be called to account for this. In a democracy the final judges cannot be experts, but only the people.

And the courtroom of the people is the free market. Over 50 years ago my mother, Bootie Zimmer, chose to teach me how to read. She had no degrees, no government salary, no encouragement, yet her non-expert choice has given me a wonderful and interesting life. I have never been a public charge.

Trust the people, give them choices, and the school nightmare will vanish in a generation.

CONFERENCE ON PRIVATE INITIATIVES IN EDUCATION

Indianapolis, Indiana November 13/14, 1992

Sponsored by: Educational Choice Charitable Trust, The Philanthropy Roundtable, Texas Public Policy Foundation, and the State Policy Network.

Attended by educators, legislators, corporate executives and other interested parties from 25 states and the U.S. Department of Education, Washington, D.C.

KEYNOTE SPEECH: John Taylor Gatto

Author, Educator, Teacher of the Year (New York, 1989), Lecturer.

A Legal View Of Health Insurance As Commerce

2011-04-01T03:40:00.003-04:00

In an article published March 28, 2011 on The National Law Journal's website, Rob Natelson and David Kopel argue that:

"Under the Constitution, health insurance is a matter of state, not federal, jurisdiction. [...]the lower courts have relied on a single erroneous U.S. Supreme Court decision, U.S. v. South-Eastern Underwriters Association [1944]. Since the case is standing precedent, lower courts must follow it."

"[...]in the Constitution, "commerce" refers only to a particular subset of economic activity — primarily the buying and selling of goods by merchants. We know this from several studies of how the founding generation used the term."

The authors state that prior to this 1944 ruling, there were a number of cases that had set just the opposite precedent, including:
Gibbons v. Ogden (1824); &;
Paul vs. Virginia (1869).

So, they conclude:

"[...]when the cases challenging the recent health care legislation reach the Supreme Court, the justices should begin by overruling that case."

The complete article can be found here.

What's more important - who you know or what you know?

2011-03-28T03:13:00.001-04:00

Depends on the situation!

Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies!

Lamb Chops with Wine Sauteed Leek Sauce

2011-03-24T23:20:00.001-04:00

Description:
A fairly simple little dish I came up with off the top of my head, for celebrating St. David's Day, (March 1). I wanted ingredients that were "Welsh" and ended up with lamb chops and leek.

For the lamb chops, I used two blade-cut shoulder chops, each about 0.4lb. For a side, we had boiled carrots and baby gold potatoes. The wine could be any good red wine, I suppose, but we happened to have Cab Sav on hand and it helped the sauce turn out deliciously sweet.

Ingredients:
2 lamb chops, approx. 8 oz. each.
Olive oil
Salt
Pepper
1 c. chopped, rinsed leek

⅓ c. - ½ c. Cabernet Sauvignon
1 tsp. butter
Serves: 2

Directions:
Season both sides of the lamb chops with salt & pepper.
Put a little olive oil in a frying or saute pan over a medium-low heat.
When the oil is hot enough, gently lay in the chops.
Cook until the meat reaches the desired doneness, flipping to ensure both sides are cooked.
When cooked, place to one side to rest.

Without cleaning it, place the pan that the lamb was cooked in back onto the heat.
Once the oil/fat is hot again, put the leek into the pan.
Sprinkle with a big pinch of salt and saute until leek is soft.
Add the small pat of butter and stir until melted.
Pour in the wine to deglaze the pan.
Cook a minute or two, just enough to reduce the sauce a little.

Serve the sauce drizzled over the meat and any side dishes served.

Sowing My Oath

2011-03-21T15:14:00.000-04:00

My fellow immigrants and I, (forty people from twenty-three different countries), stand in a District Courtroom in Ohio and take the Oath Of Naturalization, becoming new citizens of the USA, March 17, 2011...

Hmm... Maybe He's Not So Crazy...

2011-03-14T03:05:00.000-04:00

"Who?" I hear you ask.

Charlie Sheen.

Two years ago, I fell for that whole Joaquin Phoenix stunt, but this...

"This what?" you say.

Oh... this:

Charlie Sheen's Winning Recipes from Charlie Sheen

Watching the video via one of the "sites du jour" of DW & I, Food Network Humor, I started thinking, "This looks quite well scripted". It seemed plenty of Commentors had the same thought, as this was the first Comment:

This was funny.

I’m beginning to wonder how much of the craziness has been staged. It’s gotten him out of a TV show he appears to be bored with and has brought him loads of attention that could be parlayed into something else (like a movie?).

[HuffPo Response] I Am Not a Muslim. I Am Not a Public Sector Worker.

2011-03-12T10:15:00.004-05:00

Nice piece, but a couple of points...

"...or the right of the people peaceably to assemble..."
"...Stripping public workers of their right to peaceably assemble as a union..."

I suppose I'm taking the words too literally, but very few protests, no matter the political persuasion, are peaceable, with all the chanting, speakers with bullhorns or p.a. systems and the screaming at those protesting with an opposite view point.

"...Colonists were protesting that, without their say-so, a tax was being levied on them to bail out the British East India Corporation..."

Isn't a union demanding higher and higher compensation packages for their members effectively levying a tax (increase) on the tax-payers, without their say so?

Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

If They Only Read The Paperwork

2011-03-11T14:04:00.001-05:00

DW and I were out earlier, when my phone rang. As usual, it not being a number I immediately recognized, I let it go to voice-mail, except the caller never left a message. A little while later, we got an email saying a voice-mail had been left on our home phone. I tried listening to the message online, but it wasn't working, so we headed home.

Despite all the conjectures we had on the way, it turns out that it was DS1's teacher. She was calling because DS1 has been showing signs over the last couple of days of what I can only call the pre-meltdown stage of behavior - talking low and quietly, turning red in the face, getting angry. Thankfully, no full-blown meltdown. Although this is something new for 3rd Grade, it is the kind of behavior that saw us start down this road, with Doctor visits, school board specialists, a diagnosis of Asperger's Syndrome and an IEP, way back in Kindergarten.

Of course, I should not be shocked, surprised or disturbed by this lack of knowledge by his current teacher, as every year the teachers that are receiving him don't seem to bother reading any of the paperwork concerning him, or even discuss him and his needs at length, with his previous teacher and so we get this whole acclimatization period, to his personality. However, this year, the teacher seems to be even more clueless than usual - come on... he's been in their class for six months now... - as beautifully illustrated at the Parent/Teacher Conference back in the Fall, when she mentioned that she "had heard of DS1" and expressed how she was surprised that he could even talk!

It could just be that it is all due to his schedule being a little off, as the specialist teacher he spends an hour or so with, each day, has been out all week due to a family illness. It could be a regression, as Wednesday evening saw him have a horrendous meltdown that resulted in a broken lamp and his screaming in such a manner that I expected SWAT to bust down the doors looking for the murder that was taking place - I have a feeling most special needs parents can empathize with that!

Instead of prompting me into action, by returning the call and/or dashing off to school, it’s just pissed me off royally. So, I'm sitting here, venting on a blog entry, waiting for the imminent end of the school day, at which point his teacher can have a word to me. As usual, I'll be cool and collected and be the concerned parent that I am, but one day, they're really going to catch me at the wrong time and I'm going to give my opinion of them with both barrels, metaphorically speaking.

And breathe...

Today's Mail...

2011-03-10T10:10:00.003-05:00

A credit card bill: blech...

An information card concerning the Antioch Writers' Workshop in July: unsolicited, due to my subscribing to Poet & Writers' Magazine, but not wholly unwelcome...

A letter from USCIS: seems that by this time next week I'll officially be a citizen of the USA!

Speaker Boehner Not Blocking Mr. Buckles' Laying In State (Politics)

2011-03-05T13:03:00.002-05:00

Thursday night I saw a tweet from @GottaLaff that didn't sound quite right to me:

@KeithOlbermann @DavidShuster John Boehner blocks Capitol Rotunda honor for the last WWI veteran http://tinyurl.com/4e4rdmx @maddow

So, I followed the link and read her blog entry. I then followed the link back to the original CNN article and there, I found these nuggets that had been conveniently ignored.

"...on Thursday, [Senator] Rockefeller released a statement expressing disappointment that the legislation had been blocked by House Speaker John Boehner..."

What does this say about Senator Rockefeller? After all, he has only introduced some Senate resolutions on the subject; why would he even think Speaker Boehner has anything to do with their (lack of) progress? Or does he think that the Senate Majority Leader is weak and "allowing" the Speaker of the House to interfere with Senate business?

Making separate searches using the search terms "rotunda" and "World War I", on the Library of Congress' THOMAS website shows a number of resolutions, in both the House and Senate, calling for the use of the Rotunda for the laying in state of Mr. Buckles' and all are in Committee.

"...[Speaker] Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Reid decided that Arlington National Cemetery is a more appropriate venue..."

I won't bother to keep an eye out for Gottalaff calling out Sen. Reid on his "blocking", too...

"...[Boehner spokesman Michael] Steel added that they have not ruled out some sort of memorial at the Capitol."

This got me to wonder if the use of the Rotunda for the laying in state of the last surviving veteran of a war in which the United States was involved, upon their passing, had any precedent. I looked on Google, Wikipedia and through the supplied links for the various Wikipedia entries and found:

Lemuel Cook, of the Revolutionary War? No.
Hiram Cronk, War of 1812? His body displayed in the main lobby of New York City Hall.
Henry L. Riggs, Black Hawk War? No.
Owen Edgar, Mexican-American War? No.
Albert Woolson, American Civil War? No.
Frederick Fraske, The Indian Wars? No.
Nathan Cook, The Spanish-American War? No.

I did look at some of the other, but disputed, "last surviving veterans" for some of these wars, but none of them appeared to have received the honor of being laid in state at the Rotunda, either.

So... 45 minutes worth of quick research and a tweet and blog that appears to be reporting news is shot out of the water.

I've learned a valuable lesson from this:
Do some research before posting a blog entry you intend to present as fact &/or news.

Ashton Kutcher's Twitter Account Hacked At TED (SCREENSHOT)

2011-03-03T07:57:00.001-05:00

For those naysayers, I would respond that whilst Twitter is full of superfluous tweets that are just people's microblog's, (i.e. the ubiquitous "I'm having dinner" type of thing), it can also be a very useful tool. Important enough for oppressive regimes to block access to it, for a start!

It can also be a great crowd-sourcing tool. Through it I have gotten some entries in a published book, (David @Pogue's "The World..."), and regularly give/receive comfort/advice as a Special Needs parent through hashtag interaction, (@TheCoffeeKlatch - #TCK).

I'm sure there are others that could give more examples...

And for the record I'm not a fan of Ashton Kutcher, nor someone who follows him on Twitter, but he does "get it".
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

7 Reasons You Don't Care About the Royal Wedding (and I Don't Either)

2011-03-02T20:19:00.001-05:00

Isn't it just a way to forget about one's troubles, and maybe even the troubles of the world, for a while? For me it equates to being about the same as having a few beers after work, or kicking back to watch House or American Idol, or pottering about out in the workshop or garden...
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

The Trip Is Almost "Oath"er

2011-03-02T13:16:00.000-05:00

Monday saw my trip to the nearest USCIS office for my final interview.

At the end of the day, we were most stressed about the paperwork they asked me to provide, (birth certificates, marriage certificates, etc.). When my last letter, notifying me of the interview time/date, arrived, Kerry suggested I get on top of it all as soon as possible. Of course, I procrastinated and then we've had a couple of weeks of disruption w/ illnesses, but we arrived with all we needed.

The drive down, for me, went by quite quickly and without incident, which is remarkable considering I was answering questions from the list of 100 that DW was asking me, the traffic was heavy and we were driving into a major city at around Lunchtime.

This time we didn't wander the city streets, as we knew where the nearest Starbucks was, so we got a coffee and a pastry before going to the USCIS office. We were there about 15/20 minutes before my interview's time. When the letters were eventually retrieved* from the tray that we had to deposit them into, it seemed to be no time before my name was called. Kerry wished me luck and I disappeared off into a back room for the interview.

I was asked to present my passport and "green" card, stand and swear an oath to answer all questions truthfully and then I sat and the interview began.

The main part of the interview was the Officer going over the N-400 form I had completed, answering randomly selected questions and ensuring that the answers I gave in person weren't different to those I gave on the form. Without her asking for any of the corroborating paperwork, that part of the process was over and it was onto a part of the process I had completely forgotten about.

I was, believe it or not, to do a simple English test! And when I say simple, it was something the DSs probably could have done.

First I had to read aloud a selected sentence:
What do we pay to the Government?

I then had to write the response, that she told me to write:
We pay taxes.

Seriously... that was the English test!

Then came the ten questions. The instructions were that she would read ten questions, until she got to the point that I had six correct answers. It took me six questions! First time I recall ever acing a test! *lol*

Unfortunately, I don't recall all six questions I was asked, except for:
What is freedom of religion?
(The first question asked me and that which required the longest answer, which I gave as "The freedom to practice, or not practice, any religion that one wishes to follow").
When was the Constitution written?
(The fourth or fifth question and one we went over a few times on the drive to the appointment. Answer is 1787).

And that was it!

I signed a few places on the N-400 and left!

I walked back into the waiting area with a smile and a "Ready to go?!" for DW, who gave me a hug back. As we hugged, I told her, with a momentary quiver in my voice, that we just wait now for the letter telling me when and where my Oath Ceremony takes place...

* For around ten minutes, there was no-one sat at the windows and the backroom area seemed silent. Luckily it was quiet, but still... no-one being there bugged me. I'm not a fan of bureaucracy...

Questions & Answers for the US Civics Section of the Naturalization Test

2011-03-02T13:11:00.000-05:00

Here's the 100 civics questions in the booklet, Learn About The United States: Quick Civics Lessons for the New Naturalization Test, which was provided to me the last time I was at the USCIS office. At the interview for Citizenship, the applicant is asked 10 of these questions, chosen at random, of which they will need to answer 6 correctly.

1. What is the supreme law of the land?
▪ the Constitution

2. What does the Constitution do?
▪ sets up the government
▪ defines the government
▪ protects basic rights of Americans

3. The idea of self-government is in the first three words of the Constitution. What are these words?
▪ We the People

4. What is an amendment?
▪ a change to the Constitution
▪ an addition to the Constitution

5. What do we call the first ten amendments to the Constitution?
▪ the Bill of Rights

6. What is one right or freedom from the First Amendment?
▪ speech
▪ religion
▪ assembly
▪ press
▪ petition the government

7. How many amendments does the Constitution have?
▪ twenty-seven 27

8. What did the Declaration of Independence do?
▪ announced our independence from Great Britain
▪ declared our independence from Great Britain
▪ said that the United States is free from Great Britain

9. What are two rights in the Declaration of Independence?
▪ life
▪ liberty
▪ pursuit of happiness

10. What is freedom of religion?
▪ You can practice any religion, or not practice a religion.

11. What is the economic system in the United States?
▪ capitalist economy
▪ market economy

12. What is the “rule of law”?
▪ Everyone must follow the law.
▪ Leaders must obey the law.
▪ Government must obey the law.
▪ No one is above the law.

13. Name one branch or part of the government.
▪ Congress
▪ legislative
▪ President
▪ executive
▪ the courts
▪ judicial

14. What stops one branch of government from becoming too powerful?
▪ checks and balances
▪ separation of powers

15. Who is in charge of the executive branch?
▪ the President

16. Who makes federal laws?
▪ Congress
▪ Senate and House of Representatives
▪ U.S. or national legislature

17. What are the two parts of the U.S. Congress?
▪ the Senate and House of Representatives

18. How many U.S. Senators are there?
▪ one hundred 100

19. We elect a U.S. Senator for how many years?
▪ six 6

20. Who is one of your state’s U.S. Senators now?
▪ Sen. Sherrod Brown
▪ Sen. Rob Portman

21. The House of Representatives has how many voting members?
▪ four hundred thirty-five 435

22. We elect a U.S. Representative for how many years?
▪ two 2

23. Name your U.S. Representative.
▪ Rep. Mike Turner

24. Who does a U.S. Senator represent?
▪ all people of the state

25. Why do some states have more Representatives than other states?
▪ because of the state’s population
▪ because they have more people
▪ because some states have more people

26. We elect a President for how many years?
▪ four 4

27. In what month do we vote for President?
▪ November

28. What is the name of the President of the United States now?
▪ Barack Obama
▪ Obama

29. What is the name of the Vice President of the United States now?
▪ Joseph R. Biden, Jr.
▪ Joe Biden
▪ Biden

30. If the President can no longer serve, who becomes President?
▪ the Vice President

31. If both the President and the Vice President can no longer serve, who becomes President?
▪ the Speaker of the House

32. Who is the Commander in Chief of the military?
▪ the President

33. Who signs bills to become laws?
▪ the President

34. Who vetoes bills?
▪ the President

35. What does the President’s Cabinet do?
▪ advises the President

36. What are two Cabinet-level positions?
▪ Secretary of Agriculture
▪ Secretary of Commerce
▪ Secretary of Defense
▪ Secretary of Education
▪ Secretary of Energy
▪ Secretary of Health and Human Services
▪ Secretary of Homeland Security
▪ Secretary of Housing and Urban Development
▪ Secretary of the Interior
▪ Secretary of Labor
▪ Secretary of State
▪ Secretary of Transportation
▪ Secretary of the Treasury
▪ Secretary of Veterans Affairs
▪ Attorney General
▪ Vice President

37. What does the judicial branch do?
▪ reviews laws
▪ explains laws
▪ resolves disputes disagreements
▪ decides if a law goes against the Constitution

38. What is the highest court in the United States?
▪ the Supreme Court

39. How many justices are on the Supreme Court?
▪ nine 9

40. Who is the Chief Justice of the United States now?
▪ John Roberts John G. Roberts, Jr.

41. Under our Constitution, some powers belong to the federal government. What is one power of the federal government?
▪ to print money
▪ to declare war
▪ to create an army
▪ to make treaties

42. Under our Constitution, some powers belong to the states. What is one power of the states?
▪ provide schooling and education
▪ provide protection police
▪ provide safety fire departments
▪ give a driver’s license
▪ approve zoning and land use

43. Who is the Governor of your state now?
▪ Gov. John Kasich

44. What is the capital of your state?
▪ Columbus

45. What are the two major political parties in the United States?
▪ Democratic and Republican

46. What is the political party of the President now?
▪ Democratic Party

47. What is the name of the Speaker of the House of Representatives now?
▪ Rep. John Boehner

48. There are four amendments to the Constitution about who can vote. Describe one of them.
▪ Citizens eighteen 18 and older can vote.
▪ You don’t have to pay a poll tax to vote.
▪ Any citizen can vote. Women and men can vote.
▪ A male citizen of any race can vote.

49. What is one responsibility that is only for United States citizens?
▪ serve on a jury
▪ vote in a federal election

50. Name one right only for United States citizens.
▪ vote in a federal election
▪ run for federal office

51. What are two rights of everyone living in the United States?
▪ freedom of expression
▪ freedom of speech
▪ freedom of assembly
▪ freedom to petition the government
▪ freedom of worship
▪ the right to bear arms

52. What do we show loyalty to when we say the Pledge of Allegiance?
▪ the United States
▪ the flag

53. What is one promise you make when you become a United States citizen?
▪ give up loyalty to other countries
▪ defend the Constitution and laws of the United States
▪ obey the laws of the United States
▪ serve in the U.S. military if needed
▪ serve do important work for the nation if needed
▪ be loyal to the United States

54. How old do citizens have to be to vote for President?
▪ eighteen 18 and older

55. What are two ways that Americans can participate in their democracy?
▪ vote
▪ join a political party
▪ help with a campaign
▪ join a civic group
▪ join a community group
▪ give an elected official your opinion on an issue
▪ call Senators and Representatives
▪ publicly support or oppose an issue or policy
▪ run for office
▪ write to a newspaper

56. When is the last day you can send in federal income tax forms?
▪ April 15

57. When must all men register for the Selective Service?
▪ at age eighteen 18
▪ between eighteen 18 and twenty-six 26

58. What is one reason colonists came to America?
▪ freedom
▪ political liberty
▪ religious freedom
▪ economic opportunity
▪ practice their religion
▪ escape persecution

59. Who lived in America before the Europeans arrived?
▪ American Indians
▪ Native Americans

60. What group of people was taken to America and sold as slaves?
▪ Africans
▪ people from Africa

61. Why did the colonists fight the British?
▪ because of high taxes taxation without representation
▪ because the British army stayed in their houses boarding, quartering
▪ because they didn’t have self-government

62. Who wrote the Declaration of Independence?
▪ Thomas Jefferson

63. When was the Declaration of Independence adopted?
▪ July 4, 1776

64. There were 13 original states. Name three.
▪ New Hampshire
▪ Massachusetts
▪ Rhode Island
▪ Connecticut
▪ New York
▪ New Jersey
▪ Pennsylvania
▪ Delaware
▪ Maryland
▪ Virginia
▪ North Carolina
▪ South Carolina
▪ Georgia

65. What happened at the Constitutional Convention?
▪ The Constitution was written.
▪ The Founding Fathers wrote the Constitution.

66. When was the Constitution written?
▪ 1787

67. The Federalist Papers supported the passage of the U.S. Constitution. Name one of the writers.
▪ James Madison
▪ Alexander Hamilton
▪ John Jay
▪ Publius

68. What is one thing Benjamin Franklin is famous for?
▪ U.S. diplomat
▪ oldest member of the Constitutional Convention
▪ first Postmaster General of the United States
▪ writer of “Poor Richard’s Almanac”
▪ started the first free libraries

69. Who is the “Father of Our Country”?
▪ George Washington

70. Who was the first President?
▪ George Washington

71. What territory did the United States buy from France in 1803?
▪ the Louisiana Territory
▪ Louisiana

72. Name one war fought by the United States in the 1800s.
▪ War of 1812
▪ Mexican-American War
▪ Civil War
▪ Spanish-American War

73. Name the U.S. war between the North and the South.
▪ the Civil War
▪ the War between the States

74. Name one problem that led to the Civil War.
▪ slavery
▪ economic reasons
▪ states’ rights

75. What was one important thing that Abraham Lincoln did?
▪ freed the slaves Emancipation Proclamation
▪ saved or preserved the Union
▪ led the United States during the Civil War

76. What did the Emancipation Proclamation do?
▪ freed the slaves
▪ freed slaves in the Confederacy
▪ freed slaves in the Confederate states
▪ freed slaves in most Southern states

77. What did Susan B. Anthony do?
▪ fought for women’s rights
▪ fought for civil rights

78. Name one war fought by the United States in the 1900s.
▪ World War I
▪ World War II
▪ Korean War
▪ Vietnam War
▪ Persian Gulf War

79. Who was President during World War I?
▪ Woodrow Wilson

80. Who was President during the Great Depression and World War II?
▪ Franklin Roosevelt

81. Who did the United States fight in World War II?
▪ Japan, Germany, and Italy

82. Before he was President, Eisenhower was a general. What war was he in?
▪ World War II

83. During the Cold War, what was the main concern of the United States?
▪ Communism

84. What movement tried to end racial discrimination?
▪ civil rights movement

85. What did Martin Luther King, Jr. do?
▪ fought for civil rights
▪ worked for equality for all Americans

86. What major event happened on September 11, 2001, in the United States?
▪ Terrorists attacked the United States.

87. Name one American Indian tribe in the United States.
(The following are just a sampling of acceptable answers)
▪ Cherokee
▪ Navajo
▪ Sioux
▪ Chippewa
▪ Choctaw
▪ Pueblo
▪ Apache
▪ Iroquois
▪ Creek
▪ Blackfeet
▪ Seminole
▪ Cheyenne
▪ Arawak
▪ Shawnee
▪ Mohegan
▪ Huron
▪ Oneida
▪ Lakota
▪ Crow
▪ Teton
▪ Hopi
▪ Inuit

88. Name one of the two longest rivers in the United States.
▪ Missouri River
▪ Mississippi River

89. What ocean is on the West Coast of the United States?
▪ Pacific Ocean

90. What ocean is on the East Coast of the United States?
▪ Atlantic Ocean

91. Name one U.S. territory.
▪ Puerto Rico
▪ U.S. Virgin Islands
▪ American Samoa
▪ Northern Mariana Islands
▪ Guam

92. Name one state that borders Canada.
▪ Maine
▪ New Hampshire
▪ Vermont
▪ New York
▪ Pennsylvania
▪ Ohio
▪ Michigan
▪ Minnesota
▪ North Dakota
▪ Montana
▪ Idaho
▪ Washington
▪ Alaska

93. Name one state that borders Mexico.
▪ California
▪ Arizona
▪ New Mexico
▪ Texas

94. What is the capital of the United States?
▪ Washington, D.C.

95. Where is the Statue of Liberty?
▪ New York Harbor
▪ Liberty Island
[Also acceptable are New Jersey, near New York City, and on the Hudson River.]

96. Why does the flag have 13 stripes?
▪ because there were 13 original colonies
▪ because the stripes represent the original colonies

97. Why does the flag have 50 stars?
▪ because there is one star for each state
▪ because each star represents a state
▪ because there are 50 states

98. What is the name of the national anthem?
▪ The Star-Spangled Banner

99. When do we celebrate Independence Day?
▪ July 4

100. Name two national U.S. holidays.
▪ New Year’s Day
▪ Martin Luther King, Jr. Day
▪ Presidents’ Day
▪ Memorial Day
▪ Independence Day
▪ Labor Day
▪ Columbus Day
▪ Veterans Day
▪ Thanksgiving
▪ Christmas

Alumin[i]um or Tin

2011-02-17T02:44:00.000-05:00

Crazy... ten years...! :)

'Atlas Shrugged' Film, Adaptation Of Ayn Rand Book, Has First Trailer Released (VIDEO)

2011-02-12T09:41:00.001-05:00

Its being broken up and filmed in four parts, so probably as slow going as the book...! Also, I doubt it'll do that much business as it doesn't look to be that appealing outside of those wishing to espouse or decry Objectivism.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

R.I.P. Gary Moore

2011-02-06T11:45:00.000-05:00

Sad, sad news today that guitarist Gary Moore passed away today, at 58.

Being into rock music, I knew him primarily as one of the many guitarists with Thin Lizzy, and whose guitar sang on the collaboration with TL's lead singer, Phil Lynott on Parisien Walkways.

Whilst he was in a number of bands over the years, from 1990 onwards he was, primarily a solo artist. I got to see him at St. David's Hall, in Cardiff, in 1990, as he embarked on his Still Got The Blues Tour. I can still remember, sitting in the fifth row, or so, in awe at the four huge banks of speakers. Whilst he played some of his more rocking tracks, mostly it was a night of some great "electric blues".

Here's a later recording of the live version of the SGTB:

I Know The Economy Is Bad But...

2011-01-31T11:57:00.000-05:00

...trying to collect on a non-existent debt, for a credit card account that was closed at least five years ago...?!

Samsung (@Samsungtweets) and The Dan Marino Foundation (@DanMarinoFdtn) Team Up for Autism

2011-01-31T09:30:00.000-05:00

Every FB share of this website nets $5 from Samsung for Team Up For Autism.

If you tweet, each (re)tweet w/ the hashtag of #TeamAutism also earns $5. The target is $100k and, at the time of writing, the total is at $80k!

Samsung and The Dan Marino Foundation - Team Up for Autism:

The Dan Marino Foundation - A Foundation Inspired by Family:

Just An Old Draft I Wanted To Publish

2011-01-24T02:13:00.000-05:00

My blogging has been reduced over the last year or two, maybe even three.

In fact I barely blog now. Some of it is because I have been blogging about the same things for a while, (basically "woe is me" kind of stuff), and I sensed that my readers have gotten bored with that kind of post from me. Another reason is that I have split myself in three!

I do use FaceBook quite a bit, as well as some rare blogging/tweeting, under my real name, but I try to restrict that because I am always concerned that potential employers Google every candidate and I don't want to look like an idiot, or too opinionated, or whatever.

The vast majority of my non-FaceBook online life goes on under my DudgeOH pseudonym. I tweet, blog, chat, FourSquare, leave comments, rate videos on YouTube, etc., almost exclusively as this persona. Of the three, this is the closest to the real me.

And then there's a third persona I started a few years ago. Initially it was "super-secret" as I felt I needed somewhere to be completely open and honest in my comments, blogs, opinions, etc. About 18 months ago I scrubbed the blog and started using it as my politically outspoken persona. Today, I started erasing this persona's online presence.

So... my presence online as DudgeOH is changing as I will be amalgamating the latter two personas. Not a lot will change on some sites, but I do plan to change my blogging presence. right now, the vague notion is that I will get my own domain name and start a more "professional" blogging existence.

9/29/10

Beating The Winter Blues

2011-01-21T10:35:00.000-05:00

Fed up of the cold, snowy, miserable winter? Me too!

I think its time already to be in...

Yes... I really miss...

In the meantime, I'll have to make do with some...

Catching Up

2011-01-14T20:43:00.000-05:00

Part of this past Friday evening saw me sitting in a Home Depot parking lot, using my Skype app on my smartphone, talking with a bunch of my friends back in Wales, who were all in a pub celebrating my oldest friend's 40th birthday.

I managed to speak to eight or ten of the group, in between the dropped signals (their end; they were sat in the bowels of the pub) and loud noise (again, their end; they'd been there for about four hours so were all well oiled!). I didn't once feel homesick, (still don't), even though I wished I could have been there.

Weirdest thing, to me, was not the lack of comments about my accent, (Its been many years, more than ten in a couple of cases, since any of them had heard me speak), but how quickly I fell back into my old way of speaking - very easy and relaxed, with plenty of expletives! Like I was talking with some old mates, which was appropriate, really! *LOL*

10:30AM And One Surprise Spoiled

2010-12-24T05:26:00.000-05:00

I woke up early this morning, (6:30AM), with the plan to sneak off to WalMart for a few random things, including bags for the kids' presents. So... I'm sneaking around, getting ready and am almost out the door when I realize I am missing my keys.

Crap.

By 7AM I have given up looking and come online.

About quarter past DS1 comes strolling out of the bedroom, which is, in itself, astonishing, considering his sleeping pattern, (or lack of it, right now).

He asks why I'm awake and when I get to the bit about missing keys, he tells me he knows where they are, and retrieves them from the only place I didn't look - the desk in the bedroom.

I thank him, and carry on w/ email and FB games for a while, until he mentions he's hungry. And that he wants to go out to Staples for some ballpoints w/ erasable ink.

I formulate a plan...

We swing by the bank, hit Waffle House for a quick breakfast - cinnamon raisin toast & coffee for me, sausage patty in a biscuit and sprite w/ vanilla for him - then off to Staples. We get the pens and I mention popping in WalMart, which is next door.

We're mooching around the store a little before I head to the area w/ the bird seed. As the section is right there, I decide to have a look-see in the Christmas Store. All was fine until we're looking down the aisle w/ toys.

Now, ordinarily, I'd be preparing myself for a meltdown at this point, but DS1 had been in such a good mood, and with Christmas Day tomorrow, I figured I'd easily dissuade him from any purchases or meltdowns.

And then it happened...

Mighty Morphin Power Rangers Dino Megazord.

*sigh*

This damn toy...

DS1 has been on about it for months. I have spent hours looking in stores and at various websites trying to ding this damn thing and there it is. Mocking me. The Zord's face looking through the clear plastic with a mocking smirk.

You see, this time last week, the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers Dino Megazord I managed to find and get the winning bid on arrived in the mail, in its little square box, (it was an ex-display model, from a collector). $33, inc. shipping.

Store Zord? $24.95.

DS1 is excited and my only plan that I could come up with was telling him the truth. On reflection, I could have bought it and just returned it some time, but I know how things work around here: we'd have ended up with two Zords.

I still can't believe it was there... on the shelf...

Typical!

Fox News Viewers Are The Most Misinformed: Study

2010-12-17T10:48:00.001-05:00

Seems to me that anyone who only watches/listens/reads only one news source is going to have a bias one way or another, as, imho, all the media outlets do any more is present an edited, biased view of the news instead of presenting the facts. Added to the blinkering is that most people only tune in at certain times, (i.e. when their favorite host is on), and think they are getting news, instead of the deliberate rantings of hosts whose diatribes and opinions are positioned only to increase their ratings.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Communicate to Educate - Speak Out and Speak Loudly

2010-11-01T12:23:00.000-04:00

The Coffee Klatch (#TCK) will be running a 24 hour marathon Tweetchat session from 9AM EST 11/1 through to 9AM 11/2, (instead of the usual daily one hour block of chat). For this marathon, there will be guest moderators for each hour block of chat, and for the 6PM hour I get the chance to co-moderate!

From the Klatch's FaceBook event page:
Are you aware of what Autism is? 1 out of 110 kids are. Monday November 1st is a day of awareness for Autism. Some people will be shutting down their computers in an effort to express the frustration due to lack of communication skills by many on the spectrum. We commend their effort. Others, like The Coffee Klatch will be speaking out and speaking loudly in a 24 hour interactive forum on Twitter. The Event is called "Communicate to Educate - Speak out and Speak Loudly" The event is to be moderated by prominent people in the autism community who will be sharing their experiences, resources and incredible knowledge. We in the special needs community know to well the disorder known as Autism - it is those that do not that we hope will take a few minutes of their day and join us. With 1 in 110 kids diagnosed with Autism - almost every family will be impacted by the disorder with someone they know or love - come and be educated - meet some great people and say hello.

The Coffee Klatch is a virtual coffee break for parents of special needs children. The purpose of the group is to provide a support network and information, in order to help the parents make informed decisions for their special needs children, either through the experiences of the other attendees or through interviews with renowned experts.

The usual chat schedule is Mon, Tue & Thu @ 9AM (Eastern) and Wed & Sun @ 9PM (Eastern).

Hello November!

2010-10-31T20:54:00.000-04:00

Busy month:
NaNoWriMo, (I'm a pantser, hoping to get into the quadruple figures this year);
Movember, (though I cheat as I'm permanently mustachioed);
1st 40th birthday in my clique of friends, (mines one of the last, in June);
Thanksgiving, (mmm... turkey...);
10th Anniversary of my coming to the USA, (can it really be that long)!

Shocking Aerial Images Of The Foreclosure Crisis (PHOTOS)

2010-10-11T10:45:00.001-04:00

Some of these images, like driving through any new development, instantly bring the song "Little Boxes" to mind...
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Countdown to Christmas 2010!

2010-09-21T12:48:00.000-04:00

Dad Life

2010-09-21T10:31:00.000-04:00

As a Dad, I have absolutely no idea what this is a parody of, but it is funny!

A Trip To The Toy Store

2010-09-19T03:52:00.000-04:00

I decided to torture myself today, by taking the DSs to Toys'R'Us to buy more crap toys, with the remainder of the cash they'd had for their birthdays, (they had already bought a LEGO Hero Factory figure each, back on their birthdays).

First part of the exasperation came when it took about two hours from the time I mentioned the plan to actually leaving the house. I mean... what kids take that long to go to a toy store, for Heaven's sake?!

My second exasperation came when DS1 decided to change his mind at the last minute and come along. This meant that I had to brace myself for the strong possibility of sibling tensions, but I figured the new toys would be a distraction from that.

Ah... so naive...

Final(?) point of exasperation was that DS1 had a definite idea of what he wanted, DS2 did not, which I knew would be another potential catalyst for some kind of whining or tantrum by DS1 as he is about the most impatient person I have ever met, even more so once he has what he wants.

So we head straight for the Power Rangers action figures section, for DS1's toy of choice - a Power Ranger Mighty Morphin Megazord, a toy he has been asking for for months. No luck. There's not even shelf space for it. Does DS1 want to try another store? Nope. He wants to stand there whining bitterly about it not being there, like I had called ahead and had them take all of these Megazord toys off the shelves and then decided to go look elsewhere.

So now, the DSs and I spend over an hour wandering aimlessly about the store accompanied by tetchy arguments, whining and a constant changing of minds over what treasures we will be taking home.

About an hour in, I tweet: "Waterboarding? Pah! Try taking my DSs to Toys'R'Us… I'm ready to confess!" I swear to the Gods, if the authorities had turned up right there and then, I'd have confessed to anything they wished!The man on the grassy knoll? That was me!
Where had I buried Jimmy Hoffa? Gimme a map!
Shergar? I keep him in the garage!

Moments later, I have this conversation w/ DS1...
DS1: Can I call this place The Store Of Doom*?
Me: If you like. Its most fitting!

Out of the mouths of babes...! *lol*

At the end of the day, DS1 ended up with:
a pack of colored chalks;
LEGO Hero Factory "Dunkan Bulk" and "Vapor".

DS2 left the store with:
an animated Spider-Man DVD;
a Ben 10 Omnitrix Illuminator;
LEGO Creator Propeller Power.

* ____ Of Doom seems to be a theme of his lately. When we were eating out, later that afternoon, towards the end of the meal, he declared we were in the Restaurant Of Doom!

2010-09-02T02:09:00.002-04:00

A quick test, as its been a while since I used Ping & i want to see where this turns up!

The Top 10 YouTube Earners Ranked By TubeMogul

2010-08-31T18:03:00.002-04:00

Much more interesting than the Ashton Kutcher/CNN race to 1 million Followers on Twitter would be which/who will be the first account on YouTube to earn US$1 million in one year.
Read the Article at HuffingtonPost

Two of Wales' Finest

2010-08-30T08:24:00.000-04:00

Pop meets classical when Tom Jones & Bryn Terfel perform "Green, Green Grass of Home" Live at "Star City Casino" in Sydney Australia 1990.

Not a particularly moving rendition of the song, but its a great song and I do like the banter at the beginning.

Dante Missed One.

2010-08-23T00:51:00.000-04:00

If there is a Hell, then there is certainly one level or circle that is made up of children having a meltdown...

RIP Jack Horkheimer

2010-08-22T03:22:00.001-04:00

When I heard the announcement of Mr Horkheimer's passing, on the NPR news this past Saturday afternoon, I immediately pulled over and IM'd Kerry. Like, I think, the vast majority of people, his show, Jack Horkheimer: Star Gazer, was, much like that other great astronomy program, the BBC's The Sky At Night, never a show I made sure I caught, but it was one I would always watch with interest, should I happen to come across it, as whilst I have never been a student of astronomy, I have always loved the opportunity to look and learn a little about at the stars and celestial phenomena.

The two programs are very different: JH:SG is/was a weekly, short, (between one & five minutes), "here's what you'll see" show, whereas TSAN is a monthly, longer, (thirty minutes), more informative show. But there are also some similarities: both are long-running, (thirty-four and fifty-three years, respectively), both have only ever had one host and both use classical music intros.

Whilst TSAN uses "At the Castle Gate", from the incidental music to Pelléas et Mélisande by Jean Sibelius...

...JH:SG uses Isao Tomita's electronic rendition of Claude Debussy's Arabesque No. 1, from his album Snowflakes Are Dancing...

As a final tribute, here is Mr Horkheimer's final broadcast:

Remember: Keep looking up! *s*

Ice Cream... Yes... I do!

2010-08-18T14:53:00.001-04:00

DS2 & I were out and about this afternoon and happened across an activity in one of the local parks, on making "Plastic Bag Ice Cream". When DS1 found out where we were he wanted to come, too, so we went home picked up the rest of the family and returned to the park. After about an hour there, he got a little mad that the activity was over, so we decided to make it at home. We stopped at the store for some rock salt on the way home.

After all the whining and cajoling that went on, on arriving home, he came out with this gem!

Here's a photo of the recipe, 'cos I'm too lazy to retype it!

The Final Countdown

2010-08-13T17:31:00.001-04:00

Trivial Perseids

2010-08-13T05:24:00.000-04:00

About 10:00PM the DSs decide they want to go outside and I took the opportunity to check out the night sky. Even in our suburban setting, just an hour or so after sunset, we could see a fair few stars, so I decided to put into action a plan I had gotten into my head when I first learned of the imminent occurrence of the annual display that is the Perseid Meteor Shower.

So, by 11:00PM we were out on the road. First, we stopped at a gas station for a $20 top up for the van's gas tank and some refreshments for those of us humans who also needed a little "gas" in our fuel tanks. After that we hit the road.

As the shower's point of origin is in the NE sky, and we live in the S of our Metro Area, I headed for the area in the countryside to the NE, but where the next town in that quadrant is far enough away, and small enough so as to not interfere.

Instead of thinking on, and planning out a route, I just hit one of the small Interstates hereabouts, with a vague sense of where I wanted to get to. I got the idea as I drove of the place I wanted to park - the parking lot of a popular farmer's market.

Unfortunately, I made a mistake concerning State Routes and, long story short, took a circular route to a spot that was second choice after missing my initial spot!

With lots of creeks and rivers in this are, there was plenty of eerie mist patches; the best one was where the mist was actually about 6' off the road, so our lights reflected off the mist, yet the road was clear. It was really cool when a vehicle came the other way. Wish we could have got a picture.

Anyway... an hour or so of driving found me at a spot that was pretty good. Not perfect, but as good as anything I was going to find. I got out of the van and stood, looking at the sky. I was impressed with the amount of stars I could see. Unfortunately, despite looking steadily at the NE sky for about ten minutes, I saw no meteors.

Ideally, I'd have sat out for an hour or so, but my passengers had shown their disinterest by staying in the van and were all ready to head back home, as my pulling over had roused them all from their slumbers!

On the drive home, DS2 suddenly yelled for us to stop. Was he dreaming? Was he about to throw up? Or in urgent need of the bathroom?

No. He wanted to look at the stars! *facepalm*

I may go out again tonight, but if I do, it'll be on my own and with a lot more planning.

Not A Yogi In Sight!

2010-08-08T06:44:00.001-04:00

Grandma/MiL organized a picnic on the fly for us all yesterday. We haven't done a family picnic since DS2 was an infant! Apart from an ever-grumpy FiL, and some major grumpiness from DS1 as we were leaving, it was a nice couple of hours spent outside on a sunny, but not hot, summer's afternoon. :)

The spread was a combo of chicken, sides and dessert from KFC, a bag of potato chips and sides, veggies for dipping and fruit prepped by MiL. It was delish! The location was a small city a few miles north of us to a pretty cool park that had plenty of play equipment.

A Proud Son Moment, Thanks to @Pogue!

2010-07-30T05:29:00.001-04:00

If you're a long-time reader of my blogs, I'm sure you remember last year my excitement at being included four times in the Twittersourced book "The World According to Twitter"...

Earlier this week Kerry & I made some brief, passing comments about something we both read on Twitter. Mum mentioned that she didn't get what Twitter was all about. As Mum is on FaceBook, Kerry used the analogy of the FB Statuses, which seemed to get her to understand.

I then produce my copy of the book for her to peruse. After a little while and plenty of chuckles and other quick comments, she declared she liked the book.

"What did you think of my contributions?", I asked, knowing full well that I hadn't disclosed my part in the book to her, other than a long forgotten photo on FB of the flyleaf w/ David Pogue's inscription.

"Where?" she asked.

I pointed them out to her and she read them over again, as I remarked how chuffed I was that David had included four of my responses.

Earlier this morning, she handed me back the book to put away and asked if the book was still available, as she'd love to take it home to show the family. I felt my halo shine and I reveled in a "proud son" moment...

Tucking Fired

2010-07-25T22:19:00.000-04:00

The week's events are taking a toll on me. When I started writing this entry on Thursday morning, I had been up just a few hours and had already nodded off a couple of times. As I finished this post on Friday, I found myself yawning, once more!

We had been cleaning every afternoon & early evening for almost a week, in anticipation of Mum's visit, (she arrived, drama free, Wednesday night). Whilst we certainly haven't warranted inclusion in an episode of "Hoarders", we have been collecting copious amounts of mail and toys.

The mail problem stems from a fear of i.d. theft FiL has instilled in Kerry & I coupled with our natural predisposition to procrastination, so rather than shredding junk mail and old bills immediately, they have been collecting around the place slowly. I found our shredder and shredded some of the stuff as we were cleaning, but it has been quicker just to bag it up ready for disposing of in our new firepit, (obtained thanks to our bank's points rewards program - I just need to make a stable, fire-proof space far enough from the house for us to use it).

We were also being careful to pick up all the kids' LEGO pieces, so that we didn't vacuum up every small piece that was lying around, which meant CSI-like examination of every nook and cranny that the vacuum cleaner was poised to work its magic upon.

On Wednesday afternoon I made the executive decision that we would stretch our resources with a trip to IKEA for a sofa-bed. This decision was based on the fact that it meant we could get away with putting Mum up in the Living Room, leaving us in our bed, (in the past we've bunked in with the kids whilst she had our bed), and one less room to worry about cleaning up and the plan appears to be a good one. So far...

Sadly, time was just not on our side and there were places around the house that didn't get fully cleaned up before Mum's arrival. I keep promising myself I'll finish these areas, even with Mum here, but I just haven't had the energy to, partly to the defective A/C in the house keeping things in the 70's and partly thanks to taking plenty of time after the boys have been falling asleep before retiring myself, in the wee small hours.

To illustrate how tired I am, we went out for a late Lunch, (which was actually Brunch), Thursday then to the store for a few bits and bobs. We got home around 6:30PM and I decided to have a "quick nap". I was woken up a little before 9PM by Kerry, asking what my plan was for dinner. We ended up going out to eat, again. :|

Add to that we're driving around in 90+F weather in a 'van w/, basically, no a/c and only one working front window, (I got the shattered glass in the driver's door replaced the other week, but it turns out the regulator arm was in two, so the glass place just taped the closed), and you can imagine how hot & sweaty it can get in there, especially for me.

Now, here I am, blogging, emailing, Tweeting, FaceBooking and generally surfing about the 'Net instead of finishing the job of cleaning 'cos I just feel so knackered!

Twenty-Five Years Ago Today...

2010-07-13T13:07:00.000-04:00

The concert that opened with a most appropriate tune from Status Quo...

Two Dawn's MIssed

2010-07-10T02:16:00.000-04:00

DS1's new meds are screwing with his sleep patter, making him nocturnal. The past two nights I've been up with him, though tonight Kerry has spent all night awake too, and DS2 woke up around 2AM to join in the fun.

I think that tomorrow we should maybe pack some breakfast and go out to catch the sunrise on Sunday morning...

After missing a second sunrise in a row, realizing I had done so only after dawn had broken, appropriately, this is in my head:

What did you eat for breakfast today?

2010-07-09T05:03:00.002-04:00

I skipped it, this morning. I know... bad me!

Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies!

If you could be on one TV show which one would it be?

2010-07-09T05:00:00.002-04:00

Holmes on Homes &/or This Old House, assuming I could get the $150k loan for the demolishing and rebuilding that would be required around here!

Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies!

Turning Things Around?

2010-07-05T03:05:00.000-04:00

Over the last few years, DS1's behavior has been quite disruptive, especially at home. The current diagnosis is Asperger's Syndrome, but with the way he has been behaving, it could easily be a handful of other diagnoses, (in my completely unqualified opinion).

Starting Down A Dreaded Path

Back at the beginning of May, DW and I went for a consult w/ DS1's pediatrician. Reluctantly we all agreed that trying to work through what was going on was just not working and medication was needed.

We started w/ a small dosage of Vyvanse, (the intention was to start @ 1x dosage, then ten days later go to 2x dosage and then to 3x dosage ten days after that). It kind of helped, but when it wore off, the self control seemed to have disappeared. After a few days and a couple of incidents resulting in broken items around the house we took him off.

Another side effect was lack of appetite. It was so pronounced that even after just three days on the medication DS1 had shown some noticible weight loss.

Second Shot

The discussions in June's follow up visit, (this time DS1 accompanied us), resulted in a prescription for Methylin, a generic version of Ritalin. I remembered seeing a program on PBS about over prescription of drugs for ADHD, especially Ritalin, and I expected it to zombify him.

Again, we were supposed to follow the gradual increasing of dosages. This time we made it into the 2x stage, but it soon stopped. DS1 hates pills. a single pill was small enough for me to hide it in his breakfast granola bar. Trying the same for two pills was soon rumbled! Also, a side effect was an increase in what could be called "back-sassing" or "chopsiness", depending on which side of the Atlantic one resides. It has been like living with some stereotypical moody teenager, even after he came off the meds.

Third Time's A Charm?

This past week we had a third visit to the pediatrician. After discussing June's results, the Dr. thought that maybe, instead of focusing on DS1's focus issues, we should look to medication for the outbursts. After fully discussing all of the medication options available, we decided on Intuniv.

Yesterday, (the 4th), was the second day of the course of Intuniv.

Wow!

Typically, DS1 and DS2 end up, numerous times a day, arguing over something completely trivial, which quickly gets more and more heated, which is rapidly followed by fighting.

Yesterday, there was just one instance that came anything close to these situations. One. And even then, it just took a quick holler from me of "Hey guys... settle down" for it to all smooth over.

I spent all of the day astounded at the peacefulness that had overcome DS2, watching as, time after time, situations arose that normally would have ended in a brawl between the DSs, yet they passed with the briefest of bad words, at the most.

It was amazing. DW and I are already thinking that this is the med for the situation.

Meanwhile, the only noticible side effect is that DS1 fell soundly asleep at around 7:30PM; he had woken up around 9:30PM and he's still awake now, at 3:00AM. He's showing a little of that "old" grouchiness, but he's also looking tired, so... *crosses fingers*

Ten Years Ago...

2010-06-24T08:24:00.001-04:00

Kerry and I just last week passed the tenth anniversary since we first met, which in true guy style, I only realized when it occurred to me that my impending birthday would also bring about the tenth anniversary of my one and only trip to the Glastonbury Festival.

A few people have wondered how we met, what with us living on separate sides of the Atlantic at the time and I don't think we've ever given the definitive answer.

Well... dear reader, you're using the medium right now to read this blog. That's right: the internet. We met through the Personals on the now defunct Excite website.

We exchanged a few emails in the few days before I left on my long weekend at Glasto. Within a month we were IMing twice a day, and talking on the phone at weekends and the planning for me to visit Kerry in the US followed on soon after that. And... here we are...!

Oi! Gerroff My Sport!

2010-06-23T21:36:00.001-04:00

I'm amazed at how often these discussions of a sporting event seems to turn into "my sport's better than your sport" pissing match.

I grew up with soccer and rugby, found American football in my teens, and have been a player of rugby & football and it just bemuses me all this animosity towards other sports. I am not a great fan of basketball, but I don't sit and pick it apart every time its mentioned in a blog, (not that it is, ever, afaik, by the people I follow, but you get my point!).

Firstly, sports playing is different from spectating is different from seeing one or two matches. I really dislike people who complain about a sport after watching one or two games and assume that is how all of a sport is played.

The World Cup is a particularly good target, because of the nature of the first round. Very few teams play attacking, open soccer from the get go because of the fear of losing a game in the Group Stage. Why? Well... think about everything that goes with getting to the tournament.

First there are the two years or so of qualifying games. Then there's the weight of expectation: every national representative side knows that they have the hopes and dreams of their country's fans on their shoulders, whether they are the Faroe Islands, Brazil or China. There are fans, I'm sure that go to every qualifying match and the tournament, cheering and urging their side on to victory.

Want to criticize soccer? Pick a domestic team, (doesn't have to be the nearest one to you - I grew up near Cardiff, but support Liverpool F.C.), and follow them for at least one season. And don't just follow your own team, watch matches, or highlight shows, of other teams/leagues.

Also realize that a 1-0 or 0-0 scoreline can be more entertaining than a 5-4 game, and certainly more entertaining than a 10-0 blow out. For some reason a lot of Americans use the lack of scoring as reason the game is boring.

Well... I only caught the last 25 minutes or so of the USA/Algeria game and, with the score at 0-0 it was anything but boring. The USA were running at the Algerian defense, probing and trying for that go ahead goal, each run at the penalty box started anew the urging and the daring to believe that this time the ball was going to end up in the net. Each Algerian counter attack also brought about a new set of thoughts and urgings - please let the defense hold, we can't go out on a lucky goal scored from a counter attack. Each throw-in and corner, each clean tackle and foul, each goal kick and free kick, twisted the knife of hopes and dreams one way or another. Had we not scored, the disappointment would have been immobilizing - as a Welsh rugby fan, I've been there many a time.

As it was we scored. Oh, what a beautiful goal. As the 'keeper reached the ball, our picture froze momentarily, making me think it was a save, but it came back, just as the ball hit the back of the net and...

I leapt.

I yelled.

I ran through the house.

I grabbed our youngest son and raised him with a victorious cry.

I got back to my chair, sat down and the joy and relief was replaced with more tension...

Yes we had needed that extra time added on for the goal, but now there was more than two minutes left of the original four. Algeria got the ball and ran it down their left wing. In my mind's eye the nightmare played out of a still celebratory USA side caught out of position and in an overly joyous mindset letting the Algerians walk in an easy equalizer. I'd seen it before, I was sure, which made me sure it was about to happen again. Then we got the ball back...

"C'mon... c'mon..."

I urged the time to elapse... the referee to "blow up". And then he did! The game was over. We had won. We were through...

And I only started following the team of my adopted homeland these past couple of weeks!

And for those of you who are reading this who dislike sports for whatever reason, it makes us fans feel like we belong. Long ago our pack mentality ceased to be essential for our survival and sport has replaced it. Our teams are our tribal champions and their fortunes effect us in profound ways. Maybe this just means that us sports fans are a little more primitive, maybe even more instinctual, than non-fans. Who knows.

The Big 40 Is Looming Next Year...

2010-06-23T19:24:00.001-04:00

...that has been tempered by the fact that this birthday has been, all-in-all, bloody great! *s*

Slept in late...

Watched USA and England both win & progress to next stage in the World Cup...

Kids were taken early afternoon by their grandparents...

For a celebratory dinner, we ended up at our local Smokey Bones Bar & Fire Grill franchise. First time there, had a St. Louis Rib Combo w/ bbq brisket - delicious...

Dessert was a coffee and a piece of Lemon Cream Pie at my, (our?), favorite coffee shop...

Back to the in-Laws' for more cake, (Angel Food cupcakes w/ orange icing)...

Hung out, then napped a little, then hung out a little more...

Home...

The kids, especially DS1, had a couple of "moments", but all-in-all they behaved.

A Little Misheard Lyrics Levity

2010-06-19T15:06:00.001-04:00

Some will make you cry with laughter, some will make you go "Meh!", but all will make you mishear as you read the alternative lyrics and listen to the excerpt.

Tracks:
Celine Dion - My Heart Will Go On
Robbie Williams - She's Madonna
Vengaboys - We're Going To Ibiza
Bryan Adams - Summer Of 69
Anastacia - Paid My Dues
Eiffel 65 - Blue (Da Ba Dee)
Pink Floyd - Another Brick In The Wall
Bon Jovi - Living On A Prayer
Will Smith - Fresh Prince Of Bel Air
Tina Dickow - On The Run
Manfred Mann - Blinded By The Light
Ray Jr. Parker - Ghostbusters
Pat Benatar - Hit Me With Your Best Shot
Nickelback - How You Remind Me
Duffy - Mercy
Led Zeppelin - Stairway To Heaven
N-Trance - Stayin' Alive
Shakira - Underneath Your Clothes
Mariah Carey - Without You
Lady Gaga - Just Dance
Phil Collins - Easy Lover
Pussycat Dolls - When I Grow Up
Prodigy - Smack My Bitch Up
The Beatles - 8 Days A Week
Ac/Dc - Hard As A Rock
Men Without Hats - Safety Dance
Jimi Hendrix - Purple Haze
Foo Fighters - My Hero
Queen - Another One Bites The Dust
Green Day - Jaded
Toto - Africa
Moody Blues - Question
Agnes - Release Me
Bette Midler - Beast Of Burden
Joan Jett - I Love Rock And Roll
Pearl Jam - Even Flow
The Lonely Island Feat. T-Pain - I'm On A Boat
Britney Spears - You Want A Piece Of Me
White Stripes - Blue Orchid
Black Eyed Peas - Boom Boom Pow

What's the oldest piece of clothing you still own and wear?

2010-06-17T01:01:00.002-04:00

A #Cardiff RFC replica #rugby jersey from the early 90's, though the cuffs have seen better days!

Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies!

If you could change one thing that happened last year what would it be?

2010-06-17T00:59:00.002-04:00

Getting "laid off".

Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies!

Wave Your Flag...

2010-06-08T19:57:00.001-04:00

Yes... it's time for one of those wonderful quadrennial sports event where, just for the briefest moments of time, the time it takes to watch athletes that mean something to us, competing, the stresses and worries of life within and without our own little ecosystem of family, friends and life in general, all fade away...

Personally... I love them... which, considering my previous paragraph probably says a lot more about my dissatisfaction with aspects of my life.

Memories

My earliest World Cup memory is of Argentina '78 and the collecting of the ubiquitous Panini sticker album.

For Espana '82 I actually have a recollection of watching some games, as well as my first (and only!) proper piece of memorabilia - an England towel!

Mexico86 needs just one name and one phrase: Maradona: Hand of God. Looking back at video of both goals he scored in that fateful Quarter-Final game against England, it is just bizzare how one moment this man, the best player in the world at that time, is blatantly cheating and then five minutes later he scores what is considered to be one of the best goals of all time!

Italia '90 was probably the World Cup I paid most attention to. I clearly remember avidly completing my wall chart and loving the story behind Roger Milla, a 38 year old player who came out of retirement and back into the Cameroon national side after years away and who became one of the top scorers of the tournament. He also ushered in the era of the elaborate goal celebration, with his crowd pleasing, corner flag dances after each successful strike.

Once more, Wales had not made it to the tournament, (the last time was 1958), and by the latter stages only England remained of any British team in the tourney. I can still feel the tension and pain of the semi-final with the emotionality of "Gaza's" tears, when England player Paul Gascoigne got a yellow card in his second game in a row, meaning he would have missed the Final, had his team made it, and a penalty shoot out loss against West Germany. Other memories are Salvatore Scillaci being hailed as some kind of Italian hero and Pavarotti singing Nessun Dorma being heard everywhere, due to the BBC using it as their theme music.

Oddly, WorldCupUSA94 holds very few memories... very hot temperatures during an Ireland match and something about Bulgaria, (on checking Wikipedia they made it to the semis, ousting Mexico & Germany on the way) is all that springs to mind.

France '98 was the last WC I followed whilst in Britain. Unfortunately another unmemorable tourney, for me. The only real memory I have is watching the final at a great party at a friend's house, with the game projected onto the wall!

2002 FIFA World Cup Korea Japan is another that holds no real memories for me other than being the first in which I had two teams to cheer on - USA & England.

Ah... Deutschland 2006... the memories of... er... Zidane's antics making it all over the 'net. Oh, and the USA failing to make it out of the Group Stage, despite a 1-1 draw with Italy in a very nasty game that saw them finish playing 9 men against Italy's 10!

So... for South Africa 2010... who knows?! England and USA are in the same Group in this tournament and theirs is the fifth match of the tournament, and the first of their Group on June 12th. Also, I have a wall chart winging its way to me and a 6 year old who has some interest in soccer, with who I look forward to enjoying watching some games on tv with and I bet we'll be waving our flags...

This is the English/Spanish version of K'Naan's "Wavin' Flag (Celebration Mix)" featuring Spanish singer David Bisbal. There are many different versions of this Celebration Mix out there, with singers of different languages dueting with K'naan, but of all the one's I've seen on YouTube, this is my favorite, due in part to the enthusiasm that the Spaniards have for "The Beautiful Game" that Sr. Bisbal seems to put across in his singing.

Can You Buy Vallium Online?!

2010-06-03T03:16:00.000-04:00

Amazing!

Day 1 of Summer Vacation and DS1 wakes us up before 7, (I have the feeling he's been up a lot longer), with his yelling & whining about a First Grade Math book to do "homework". During the school year (Second Grade) we had to drag his butt out of bed in the mornings and then cajole, bribe and manipulate him into doing any homework, of which he despised the Math.

Of course, he then gets pissy when bleary eyed and utterly bamboozled Kerry & I are like "What? Seriously?". To put a cherry on the icing of this little irony cake, he then doesn't want to know two minutes later when, by some miracle, I actually find the book he wanted!

I'm so glad that we only have to endure this kind of mind-bending craziness until the last week in August!

My Long, Long Day Hasn't Finished...

2010-06-01T14:21:00.000-04:00

... and I'm about to go on a burger run to Wendy's.

First thing this morning, we had DS2's graduation from Kindergarten ceremony, (he was out of the cap & gown before we got a chance to get any decent pics). He has now finished for the year.

Then there was a run to the grocery store w/ DS2 in tow. Had my first bite to eat here, when getting a sample of the lunch meats we were purchasing!

We had barely been home before it was time to go back to school for DS1's class to be a part of the Grades 1 through 4 awards program. DS1 was all grouchy when his class arrive in the Auditeria, (their school's combination cafeteria and auditorium). As well as getting some serious "grouchies" in the afternoons, these last few weeks, apparently he is getting bugged by some of his classmates. Add to that the fact the he was a annoyed that he was not going to Art class until after the ceremony and his routine was being disrupted...

He sat with us and was quite grumpy and restless, though the former eased a little, before his class' turn. He was one of those in his class receiving an award, (in fact he got two!), and as soon as his class' awards were over, he got real restless again.

After the ceremony he returned to class and we went for a drive for the 40 minutes before we had to pick him up again.

After school we had a follow up appointment w/ DS1's pediatrician. DS1 came with us, DS2 w/ his grandparents. after that, we dropped him off at our place, where he spent an hour or so w/ the Grandparents and DS2 whilst Kerry & I went to get his prescription filled and managed to grab a coffee and sandwich as we waited.

On arriving back home I've taken a time out, (longer than I anticipated), to play a few games, check some email, return a tweet and write this entry.

And now... a bathroom break then off to Wendy's, accompanied by DS2, carrying a long list of requests from the DSs...

All on four hours sleep, max!

International Stereotypical Social Networking Day

2010-05-28T23:02:00.000-04:00

When? July 20, 2010
Where? Your social network

In whatever social media you use, everyone should embrace the stereotypical misconceptions of social networking by those who denounce the use of such websites and services as Twitter, FaceBook, etc., without actually trying them for a protracted length of time, if at all, by announcing the banal and boring activities they do during the day, (e.g. "I'm eating lunch" or "Brushing my teeth before bed")!

Btw... a better name/acronym is required. Please Comment with your suggestion(s) below or at the original place of posting, here, (pop over there to see what suggestions, if any, have been made already).

Cool For Cats

2010-05-27T15:49:00.000-04:00

Right at the end of last Summer the AC wasn't cooling as well as it could. I investigated and found that the pipe carrying cold air in from the condenser had lost a lot of it's foam insulation and was collecting ice! I had planned to re-insulate the whole length, about 4' in a "C" shape, last year, but the foam insulation I bought was too big and it took me until today to get the right size.

So... at around midday today, in 90F sunny weather I replaced the foam. As the grass around that area was particularly long, I also spent time clearing a space around the paver that I intend to edge properly and then fill with stones or bricks/cobbles and some concrete. We actually have an area to the right of this photo, which is behind the back door, that seems to be a bed of small stones. I've been planning to concrete it, too, (DS2 loves to toss around the pea-sized stones), so I might just dig up a little more turf and use the stone/concrete mix to expand the "patio" area!

SI Article on Gareth Thomas And Coming Out

2010-05-15T07:22:00.000-04:00

Here's an excellent article about Gareth Thomas that not only shows the inner torment that I imagine a lot of gay people go through, but also demonstrates to those who are gay that the majority of people really are unconcerned with their sexuality and are intelligent and sensitive enough to be supportive of those who come out.

Finally Got The Veg Beds Built

2010-05-12T04:09:00.001-04:00

This is the first raised bed I put in, over the bed we had already dug. Although I had them on hand, I didn't use the carpenter's square and spirit level and it worked out fine.

I was rushing to have the second and third beds done before the kids were home from school and for the second bed, this resulted in some very askew joinery.

For the third bed the rushing resulted in a rather lop-sided bed. The middle bed is actually the on that is way out of whack, as the first and third beds are, comparatively, in line.

Would You Like Fries With That?

2010-05-11T05:00:00.000-04:00

Nothing can makes you feel more old & useless than seeing advertisements for jobs that you know you could do no problem, only to get to the qualifications part of the description to see you are painfully under qualified.

I would laugh, but it's not even funny. It seems like every job that actually might pay anything approaching a decent wage requires a Bachelor's and without one, and with Unemployment about to run out, I know that in the current job market I'm doomed to be working in a place that pays minimum wage, which I don't think is likely to do more than keep some food on the table.

USA Collegiate 7's on NBC on June 5th

2010-04-28T13:04:00.000-04:00

Disclaimer:
I have not been approached by, or received any compensation from, any of the entities related to this television broadcast.

Please.... No Spoilers!

2010-04-07T14:44:00.001-04:00

For St. Patrick's Day...

2010-03-16T23:19:00.000-04:00

I missed the opportunity to regale you with videos of Welsh songs for St. David's Day, back on the 1st of March, but thanks to my wife's Irish ancestry and the way St. Patrick's Day is celebrated here, I have the excuse to make that up some, and present a few vids from the other branch of the Celtic family tree!

To get some vids, I went to YouTube and threw "irish" in the search box. One of the first entries was a video for "The Fields Of Athenry". It's quite a sad song, but for some reason I couldn't get it out of my head, and I've now stayed up way too late watching dozens of versions, from aunts and uncles congregated in a kitchen singing "the Republican version", through amateur soloists and groups, via choirs and rugby crowds all the way to professionals, such as this version by Paddy Reilly:

After that depressing tune, we'll liven things up a little!

Here's Fiffin Market's, (now called Lexington Field, apparently!), modern take on "Molly Malone", (which seems to be one of those songs known by all rugby fans, regardless of nationality!):

And to finish off a more traditional version of a traditional Irish song, it's The Dubliners with "The Wild Rover":

Couple of "Choons"!

2010-02-17T19:06:00.003-05:00

For our 9th Anniversary! :)

IRREVOCABLE RELEASE OF YOUR PAYMENT VIA CONSIGNMENT BOX

2010-02-13T10:41:00.000-05:00

UNITED NATIONS (IMF ASSISTED PROGRAMME)
DIRECTORATE OF INTERNATIONAL PAYMENT AND TRANSFERS,
WIRE TRANSFER/AUDIT UNIT Our Ref: WB/NF/UN/XX029
(United Nation) Human Right Activist Dept
On Debts Reconciliation On Foreign Payment Matters,
Unit B1, 50 Bank Street London E14 5NS,
London, United Kingdom.

SUB: IRREVOCABLE RELEASE OF YOUR PAYMENT VIA CONSIGNMENT BOX.

Attention: Beneficiary,

I am Mr. Kenneth Thomas, the newly appointed national security adviser to the United Nation Owed Debts Payment Recovery Commission Representative, here in London United Kingdom. I am delighted whole heartedly to inform you that the contract/Inheritance and Lotto panel and unclaimed fund which is seating in London, United Kingdom territory just released your name among the presently approved beneficiaries to benefit from the diplomatic immunity payment. This panel was primarily delegated to investigate and to genuinely manipulated all debts and claims as it has eaten deep into the economy of the Great Britain-London.

However, we wish to bring to your urgent notice that your payment profile is still reflecting in our central computer as unclaimed fund Emanated from Bank In Africa and Europe in my department where i work to the (UN) office while auditing was going on today. Your file was forwarded to my office by the chief auditors as unclaimed fund. At this moment, I wish to use this medium to inform you that for the time being the Great Britain-London has stopped further payment through bank to bank transfer which you were previously having with the Authority from the Originated country where your fund was sent from that country in Africa and Europe over a period of time now due to numerous petitions received from the FBI,IMF and other financial and security agencies to monitoring the UK Government against their banks on wrong payment and diversion of funds to different account in many dimension.

In this regards, I am going to use my good office to send you your part payment in the tune of $6,000,000.00 (Six Million United States Dollars) only by cash to you via a universal immunity diplomatic means. In process of doing that, i will personally secure every needed documents as a representative of the (UN) office now to cover the money been your still yet unclaimed payment which is now in London United-Kingdom including the legit affidavit to claim this very particular payment from the British high court here in London UK and also with a clearance which will bestow the right and legit privilege to you as the rightful beneficiary who is to receive this payment after meeting up with the delivery requirement as the law stipulate which are the documents I'm securing for you right now once you accept to finalize this transaction with me only.

All these will be only on the condition that you will give me only %10 out of the funds which is just ($600,000.00) Out of $6,000,000.00 you are to receive as soon as you receive the money on your door step which will come to you in the form of a consignment method.

Note: The money will be coming on 2 security proof boxes The boxes are already sealed with synthetic nylon seal and padded with machine by the management of this organization and i also want you to know that the management are not aware of my personal plans or arrangement with you in this transaction, so you have to keep this as a very top secret between the both of us till me and you are able to conclude this very transaction completely. This fund was release to us from the World Bank special delegates who visited the British Government Prime Minister's Confidential Secretary Office in London on Wednesday and found out that they are doing nothing to help you in this matter because the funds itself was meant for our local afem market here in the UK hence it did not claim as it suppose while dumped here London UK.

But you don't have to worry for any thing, as the transaction is 100% risk free and will remain legit as long as you work with me transparently. The box are coming with a diplomatic agent assigned by the management of this organization who will accompany the boxes to your house address or any address you will provide to me for this transaction to enable us complete. All you need to do now upon your willing acceptance on my condition, is to send to me a guarantee that you will give me 10% of the funds as soon as you receive the $6,000,000.00 and your full house address and your identity such as, international passport or driver's license including your personal contact phone numbers which must be a working numbers, the diplomatic attached will travel with it.

He will call you immediately he arrives in your country's airport will call you for you to give them little financial assistance to get the consignment clear from the custom at your country airport. and I hope you understand each and every point that I've made known to you in this email message am sending you now, if you have any question please feel free to ask me asap.

MOST IMPORTANTLY: for security reasons and to also enable the both of us to conclude this very transaction successfully, note that the diplomat coming with the consignment boxes will not know the original contents inside the boxes that he will be delivering to you. So what l and our accredited management here will declare to him that is inside the consignment boxes is a sensitive photographic film material and some classified volume confidential company's contract documents.

Please, I need urgent reply on this issue,

CONGRATULATIONS ONCE AGAIN.

Highly Submitted.

Respectfully Yours in-service,

Mr. Kenneth Thomas.
(UN) Human Right Activist
In-charge Of All Pending Consignment/Fund Release.
Unit B1, 50 Bank Street London E14 5NS
London, United Kingdom,

They'll Be Dancing In The Streets of Heaven Tonight...

2010-01-19T06:30:00.001-05:00

RIP Bill McLaren.

The voice of rugby for so many years...

The Coffee Klatch

2010-01-17T11:34:00.000-05:00

Start: 09:00AM
End: 10:00AM
Location: Twitter

The coffee hour for parents of #specialneeds kids starts every weekday morning at 9:00AM EST (2:00PM GMT).

Twitter ID: TheCoffeeKlatch
Hashtag: #tck

The Screwed Up Logic of Banks

2010-01-14T09:29:00.000-05:00

We have $x in our account.

We deposit a check for £y (which will = $z; z > y)

Now our Available Balance (a) = x - (z - y)

Therefore a < x

Spending on groceries before alerted to a = g

g > a

Summary: the bank is holding existing funds to the difference between the deposited UK check and its $ equivalent, thus sending our balance to the point where it is lower than the amount we spent on groceries this morning.

F***!

Undeck The Halls

2010-01-05T08:56:00.000-05:00

We were late putting up our decorations this year, so Twelfth Night is upon us and it only feels like yesterday since we had busied ourselves with the few pieces we put up this year.

This year G made a paper wreath in school. In order to hang it from a light fixture, I found a package of tinsely pipe cleaners, took a read and a green one and twisted them together into a seasonal ornament hook. Meanwhile K had brought home a large jingle bell, which was reduced to "knocking around" the house.

A week or so later and I'm wandering about WalMart and I espy some small jingle bells and have the idea of picking up a package for marrying w/ the said pipe cleaners, for the kids to make more ornaments for the tree. Quickly, though I nixed the idea, imagining thrown jingle bells and siblings attacking each other with pipe cleaner swords!

A couple of days before Christmas and I am out on my own, Christmas shopping. Again, I'm in WalMart and the pipe cleaner idea hits me again. This time, I go with the idea not only picking up a package of small jingle bells, but also a pack of non-tinsely pipe cleaners.

Best. Idea. EVAR!

K's jumbo bell got a hook put on it and numersous pipe cleaner candy canes and ornaments were made by the four of us. The tree was adorned and I even put one up in the 'van, hanging off the rear view mirror.

Here's the results, immediately before I put them in a large baggy and packed them away for Christmas 2010...

Feeling I'm Grown Up, Even In My Dreams

2010-01-03T22:16:00.000-05:00

A few nights ago I had a dream and, for a change it was one I remembered upon waking, though its getting a little fuzzy now.

I was at a place where there was a lot of chain-link fencing with people around me in fatigues. I was near the guard post and, I guess I must have been on guard. A limo pulled up and Ricky Gervais stepped out, in a tux, and offered me a job bouncing the door at his club. I apparently did such a good job there that next thing I know he's tipping me $50 and a $300 bill w/ two holes punched in it! Initially I was taken aback by the $300 bill before the fact it was a joke hit home.

At this point I decided I needed to go to HR, so I find myself in the offices of this club, walking by some office with a 60-something shrewy woman yelling shrilly into a telephone about how its all [my real name]'s fault and pointing at me as I walk by. Around the corner is the HR desk; sat there is the HR guy and Alyssa Milano! The HR guy assures me that the shrewy woman is blaming everyone for everything as she's about to get busted for embezzlement and fired by Ricky! I sit at a table and Alyssa comes over to join me, sitting down across the table from me.

"Hey, Alyssa... I follow you on Twitter!."

"You do?"

"Yes. I'm Dudge OH, on there."

At this point my DSs come running in and are rough-housing, chasing each other around and ignoring my requests for better behavior, (some things are the same in the dream world as in reality!).

"They're cute! How old are they?"

"G is 8 and K is 6."

Some anatomical comment is made by G. Ms. Milano looks at me in surprise. I roll my eyes, shrug and give a sheepish "Kids, huh?!" smile.

"Looks like that special talk might not be too far away, Dad!"

"Gee, thanks," I laugh.

"If you need a model maybe these could help," she responds, thrusting out her bosom and playfully winking.

I laugh loudly.

"I'm pretty sure my wife would have something to say about that!"

We both laugh.

"So, are you and Dave, planning on having kids?"

"Yeah... some day. A couple would be nice."

And at that point I woke up!

Instantly, it occurs to me that I'm certainly getting old as back in the days of carefree single-hood, I had a bit of a crush on Ms. Milano, even back in her "Who's The Boss" days and, I would say it would be a surefire bet that any dream back then involving me and her would involve some... erm... intimacy. Instead, I dream about us chit-chatting about Twitter and kids! That actually makes me feel quite the grown up, and proudly so! *s*

I Hope Your End Of Year Holiday Has Been A Good One

2009-12-31T12:20:00.000-05:00

...full of family, friends, fine holiday fare, good times and new memories. A very Happy New Year to you all and may 2010 bring you and yours prosperity and happiness!

Quotes of the Day for 31 December 2009 – Resolution
(from http://www.qotd.org/)

Strong minded, resolutely willed, you can create out of nothing a great business, a huge empire, a new world. Others have and they have no monopoly.
     - Claude M. Bristol, 1891 - 1951

I think in terms of the day's resolutions, not the year's.
     - Henry Moore, 1898 - 1986

Obstacles cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who is fixed to a star does not change his mind.
     - Leonardo da Vinci, 1452 - 1519

There are very few things impossible in themselves; and we do not want means to conquer difficulties so much as application and resolution in the use of means.
     - François, Duc de La Rochefoucauld, 1613 - 1680

How few there are who have courage enough to own their faults, or resolution enough to mend them.
     - Benjamin Franklin, 1706 - 1790

Resolve to take fate by the throat and shake a living out of her.
     - Louisa May Alcott, 1832 - 1888

A Christmas Playlist

2009-12-23T16:47:00.000-05:00

Here's a selection of YouTube videos for some of the Christmas Songs I enjoy listening to, for one reason or another.

(There's No Place Like) Home for the Holidays

The Christmas Song

Silver Bells

Happy Xmas (War Is Over)

Mistletoe and Wine

God rest Ye Merry Gentlemen

When a Child Is Born

Little Drummer Boy/Peace on Earth

Fairytale of New York

Mull of Kintyre

Wonderful Christmastime

Another Rock 'n Roll Christmas

Merry Xmas Everybody

Proof of The Pudding... Well, Cake, In This Case!

2009-12-11T11:12:00.000-05:00

About a month ago, my friend and fellow blogger, Julie, found a recipe for Honey Mustard Lava Cakes.

Through various comments from her blog entry where she put forth the idea of trying the recipe, and the consequent blog of the family's verdict on the finished product, she decided to mail one for me to try for myself.

Almost three weeks later, the package arrived! As we found it as we were leaving on the school run, I took the frozen cake, (as we get afternoon deliveries around here, I think we may have missed the mail yesterday and it had been out there all night!), and put it in the 'fridge, for further investigation upon our return.

On getting back home, I was eager, yet tentative to open it. After getting through the packaging, (the cakes were double wrapped in cling film, inside a trimmed yogurt pot, within a layer of brown parcel paper, within a layer of clear packaging tape), I was surprised to find that the cake was looking OK. A cursory sniff around confirmed it... there was not even the merest hint of mould &/or fermentation.

The cake was placed in one of our finest paper bowls and zapped @ 35% power for one minute. I checked it... still no malodorous aromas and it still felt quite cold. I put it back in for nuking at 40% for 1:45. I watched, letting the zapping commence until the "lava" started to bubble out of the top. I took the hot cake and sat down, splitting it in half and flopping each portion onto its side so as not to lose the honey mustard lava.

I took a small portion on my fork, being careful to ensure that I had both cake and lava filling. Slowly I lifted the morsels to my mouth, the fork trembling slightly as a little nervousness, due to the negative reviews and attitudes already displayed towards this cake. My mouth closed over the food and it was deposited on my tongue, as the fork was retracted between my teeth and tightly pursed lips. I concentrated on the tastes...

First to come through was the familiar bitterness of the 70% chocolate in the light cake; as I moved the food around my mouth the savory/sweet/sour flavor of the homey mustard filling became apparent. I never got the intense hit of flavor I expected from the warm fondant filling, though. I had a little of the filling on its own, in order to try to get the "pop" of flavor I expected, but it still didn't come. It was a little unusual, but I didn't think it was particularly bad and, all in all, married with the cake well. In the end I only ate half of the cake, but because of the strong bitterness of the chocolate and not the lava filling. I did try a little of both later on, but the cake seemed to lose its lightness and the bitterness got denser as the cake was now cold.

So.. all in all, I liked it, but won't be going out of my way to ever eat it again &/or make it.

NaNoWriMo: A Debriefing

2009-12-02T02:51:00.001-05:00

As you may recall, I decided to get in on NaNoWriMo this year. Being unemployed right now, I figured I would do quite well, but in the end managed to eke out a mere 3766 words of the 50k target, (split into three chapters and since tweaked to 3771 words)! I still have no clear idea on where the story was going to go, but what I had written was feeling "nice".

My germ of an idea was that the novel must have an emphasis on the main character's paganism. I started by thinking back to when I was "working" with an active group of Pagans and Wiccans, back in my hometown, and the first chapter is an almost completely fictionalized account about that experience.

As one who had never been initiated into the Wiccan path, the second chapter is complete fiction and a little thin on ritual description as I was working from what I remember reading ten-plus years ago, (all of my source materials are still on shelves in Wales). The third chapter is my idea of how things would play out, should the protagonist meet up accidentally with the object of his unrequited crush in chapter one.

The title refers to any clockwise and anti-clockwise movement within a ritual circle. I also felt it kind of a guide for the story, wherein, like most anyone's life, things just go around and around.

As chapter two contains a little more mature imagery, I'm posting it on Blogger only.

So... what did I take from the experience?

I need to be more focussed - I spent way too much time surfing the 'net or watching tv instead of writing.
I need to be better prepared - a clear list of main characters and a brief plot line are needed, at the minimum, before commencing with the challenge.
I need to engage more - I posted one response in the forums on the NaNoWriMo website and didn't attend any of the meetings or writing sessions of the local NaNoWriMo group.
I enjoyed the experience and definitely need to go into it next year with the intent to rectify those first three points.

I am unsure whether to attempt to work on finishing this as a novel, or just leave it as it is. We'll see.

A Dedication to Descriptions of Delicious Donuts in December?

2009-11-30T05:12:00.000-05:00

Just had an idea for a blog theme - Donut December! I go to a local, independent donut store and work my way through their entire selection, trying a different treat for breakfast each day and then reviewing it!

Seemed like a good idea at the time, as Kerry & I had, just a few minutes before, discussed the how's and why's of the fall off in our blogging activities, but am now having second thoughts with considerations to the cost, the healthiness of such an endeavor and whether I can actually be bothered to!

And in honor of this stupid Idea, here's a poem I wrote a few years ago:
Doughnuts

Oh! What a marvelicious delight!
Such airy sweetness in each bite!
Its delicate shell, all snowy white,
of sugary splendor all around
those clouds that in the dough are bound,
so that devourous eating makes no sound.

But no ambrosia upon sweet Earth
can match the wondrous, palatable mirth
of one warm, fresh from its birth.
Oh! Such wondrous, celebratory taste!
Consumption just cannot be made in haste,
quick eating of its flesh is such as waste.

With a jelly, jam or custard filling,
however it is served it will find us milling
about the store to find that one, God willing,
that takes us to that other place
where wide, childish grins cross our face,
as we savour each morsel's grace.

And, lo! Alas and alack!
They are all gone; our mood is black,
our tummys are full and belts are slack.
So addictive they could contain crack!
But we look forward to going back
to the donut shop, stand or shack!

The Power of Twitter: A Best Buy Follow Up!

2009-11-28T08:40:00.000-05:00

You may recall that a little over a week ago, I had a bit of a bitch and whine about Best Buy and their Rewards Zone program. Well... as I was tweeting a link to the blog entry, I used "@BestBuy" in the title, just on the off chance someone from Best Buy is following tweets.

Well... I got a response a few hours after the initial tweet from @Coral_BestBuy, a young lady in the Best Buy Consumer Relations at the corporate office:
"I read your blog post you linked and I'd like to help out - can you please email me your info to twitter@bestbuy.com ?"

I was pleasantly surprised to see the response even though I didn't notice until this past Wednesday, but I emailed them w/ apologies and my Rewards Zone a/c #. Yesterday I got this awesome response from Coral:
"Hi Mark -

Thanks for writing and sending me your Reward Zone account information.

As I said before; I read your blog, prompted by your tweet to @BestBuy and thought I could help. So, I want to address your concerns.

Our Reward Zone program did go through a digital upgrade on 10/31; as such any members who chose not to participate forfeited their points. I understand this would be frustrating if you weren't aware and apologize that you didn't receive the communication regarding it. However, I was able to add 250 points to your account, which should post in about 7-10
business days, to make up for the lost points.

Regarding pending transactions, the reason it take 35 days for verification is to account for the exchange/return period which is 30 days on most products. Therefore, if you choose to return the product within the return policy the points will not have to be added and then deducted from your Reward Zone account.

Also, we state that you earn 1 point for nearly every $1 you spend because not every purchase counts towards your Reward Zone. For instance, when purchasing a gift card you receive Reward Zone points, but when you redeem the gift card you do not. So, we didn't mean to imply that it would be 99 cents or such, but rather not all purchases will qualify.

Hopefully I was able to answer all of your questions and provide some additional insight into your Reward Zone account, but if you have any other questions or concerns please feel free to reach out anytime.

Thank you again, Coral

Coral Biegler
Community Connector ~ Best Buy Corporate Campus"

I have to say, I was amazed. I've seen plenty of blogs, comments and tweets stating how bad Best Buy's customer service is, so I wasn't expecting any kind of response. The fact I got a response and they redeemed even a percentage of the points I was angry at losing was a pleasant surprise.

I kind of feel silly about the other two points of contention I had, after Coral's explanation... *blush*

So... I've already tweeted my thanks and kudos to Coral, but wanted to blog an update with an acknowledgment.

Another Holiday Whizzes By

2009-11-27T07:04:00.000-05:00

No huge plans for today. Originally we were going to have our postponed Thanksgiving, but a few hours after DS1 appeared to have recovered from the vomiting/diarrhea that seemed to be caused by a 24 hour tummy bug, (which caused that initial postponement of our Thanksgiving feasting), DS2 came down with the same. This means the only set plan is that I'll be popping across town sometime today to deliver some sliced turkey to my in-Laws!

Oh... and I seem to be coming down with a cold, too!

Seems like were sick about as often as we're well, around here, any more...

Fireside Dining

2009-11-20T23:00:00.000-05:00

So... tonight we got to go out for a Date Night, (we're getting them weekly again, but we prefer to expect not to get them).

For the last two weeks we have wanted to go to Cracker Barrel, but each time we tried it was so busy the vehicles had spilled into the overflow parking lot, (actually part of the parking lot of a neighboring Home Depot). Just as we were about done circling the parking lot tonight, we notice a free parking space, which we claimed as our own!

We got inside and it was a thirty minute wait, or so we were told. About fifteen minutes later we were being seated! I was admiring the huge fire as we walked through the dining area, and was pleased when we were seated at one of the nearby tables. It was nice to see the roaring fire from my seat... until I felt the heat on my face! We were sat about fifteen feet away from the fireplace, but it was so big, (the grate itself must be about five feet wide), that the heat was pretty fierce. I would say we were definitely at the edge of comfort.

Here's a photo:

We discussed having a fireplace like that in the dream house we're building when we win the lottery! The only difference will be that we will have functioning ovens in the walls each side of the main fire, (kind of like in a castle kitchen - actually, thinking on it now, just the fireplace would be fine for the living quarters, but the type w/ovens would definitely go in the kitchen)!

I remarked to DW that they could be cooking stuff on the fire, or in its embers. In the picture above, I imagined a stew bubbling in the pot on the left and tea or mulled cider brewing in the kettle on the right whilst foil-wrapped potatoes were baking in the embers. When some of the staff cleared the excess embers away I also figured they could have a few iron Dutch ovens of stew or cobbler or some other good eats cooking in the spaces to the side of the grate.

DW then remarked that it was probably against some regulation or law for them to do that and I agreed with her. Most sad...

Kids' Logic

2009-11-20T15:34:00.000-05:00

Lots of arguing going on in kids' bedroom. DS2 is bothering DS1 and called in to our room to be taken to task...

DW: Why are you bothering your brother?

DS2: *mumble, mumble*

DW: What?

DS2: Because I want him to stop bothering me.

Me: *looks blankly; shrugs shoulders and shakes head at the logic*

An A to Z of Me

2009-11-20T13:55:00.000-05:00

A – Area: SW Ohio.

B – Broken Bones: Come close a couple of times, but never managed it!

C – Camera: An old HP935 point and shoot or the camera on my Blackberry Storm.

D – Dance: Not often and not well! I can do the Time Warp.

E – Exercise: Not since I took a hiatus from playing rugby a few years ago.

F – Flavor: Ice cream – Rum ‘n’ Raisin; Pie – Lemon Meringue; Jam/Jelly – Strawberry or apricot, depending on my mood; Soda – Root beer, (Virgil’s or A&W).

G – God: I firmly believe that all religious teachings are just different paths to the same goal and that any God that might exist doesn’t really care what name(s) you use.

H – Height: 5’8” – I assumed I was 5’9” until a few months ago. Maybe the shrinking is beginning already…!

I – Instruments you play: Had an electric bass guitar for a couple of years in my early twenties, but never got more than a couple of chords out of it.

J – Jobs: mostly clerical/office/admin types; the last job I had was a Quality Analyst, testing software.

K – Kid(s): Boys, 8 & 6.

L – Living arrangements: A house in the suburbs, w/ my wife, kids and a cat. I'm a cliche!

M – Mom's name: Christine.

N – Nicknames: Dudge is the main one, but I have also been known as Fat Bap, Bap, Bapman, Smudge, Fudge, Stumpy Lodge and Stumpy.

O – Owies: Sliced into the inside of my right thumb, during a Chemistry class; it was so deep that I had to get neurosurgery done on it; have a z-shaped scar and little feeling in that area. Right shoulder, (separated during a rugby practice); occasional lumbar pain, likely due to a few years worth of three-point stances with a beer gut.

P – Pet Peeve: the use of the phrase “Write me”; the way that some areas of the US pronounce similar words the same.

Q – Quiet: Being unemployed right now, I get it while the kids are at school, otherwise, after the boys are asleep, sitting on the porch with a beverage, (weather permitting).

R – Right or left handed: Right.

S – Siblings: A brother three years younger than me and a sister four years younger than him.

T – Time you wake up: Usually around 7:30AM.

U – Underwear: Boxer briefs.

V – Vegetable you dislike: Can’t think of any.

W – Ways you run late: herding the kids; having a “quick check” of my email, FaceBook and Twitter; my general laid-back, nonchalance!

X – X-rays you've had: Right wrist, chest, right shoulder and a shed-load of my jaws/teeth at the dentist.

Y – Yummy thing you make to eat: I’m a good cook, so virtually everything I make tastes good.

Z – Zoo: Three or four years ago; Columbus Zoo.

Come On, @BestBuy... Are You Kidding Me?

2009-11-20T10:46:00.000-05:00

I feel like Best Buy is shafting me, when it comes to their Rewards Zone program, just because, being an infrequent shopper there, I am not filling the company coffers enough for their liking.

Back last week I made the trip across town for a specific item that I needed and I knew they had in stock. We're checking out and I offer my Rewards Zone loyalty card to the cashier and I am told that they recently changed the policy for the rewards and they need my email address, so I give it to them.

Yesterday I get an email to follow a link and update my information, which I do. On verifying my addy, I decide to check my account. 0 points.

"Huh?" I thought.

It had been a long time since I was last in Best Buy making a purchase, but I had just spent around $25. I should have some points. Then I cast my eye over the details in the onscreen statement...

The first thing I notice is that the existing Points I had, (a little over 130), were forfeited because I didn't provide the email addy for my account by 10/31/09. Unlikely. I'm geeky enough that with every rewards card I get I'm online as soon as I get the chance, providing/updating all of the info for the relevant account.

The other is that the points from my latest transaction are Pending. I clicked the link explaining the Pending status and apparently it takes 35 days for verification? I just don't get that. The cost has already been deducted from my bank account, so they have the $$$, why not verify the points as soon as the $$$ for the purchase is received?

Plus, on inspecting the T&Cs, I spot this nice little tidbit of information:
"As a member of the Reward Zone program you will earn 1 point for nearly every $1 you spend on qualifying purchases". Nearly? WTF? Define "nearly"... 99c on the dollar? 80c? 65c?

It reminds me of the standard language in any EULA you have ever agreed to, when installing software. You know the clause I mean. The one that states in flowery language that if you install this program and it f***s up your computer its all your fault for installing it, not the publisher's fault for providing a shoddy program.

That's like saying that when you eat out and the service &/or food is crap its not the establishment's fault, but yours for choosing to dine there.

Why do we, as consumers, take this stuff from corporations?