But critics say they are contributing to the very problem they aim to solve.

“Nobody denies this is an important event, but huge numbers of people are going, and their emissions are probably going to be greater than a small African country,” said Chris Goodall, author of the book “How to Live a Low-Carbon Life.”

Interest in climate change is at an all-time high after former Vice President Al Gore and a team of U.N. scientists won the Nobel Peace Prize for highlighting the dangers of rising temperatures, melting polar ice, worsening droughts and floods, and lengthening heat waves.

Two big climate conferences have been held in less than a month, both in idyllic, far-flung holiday destinations — first Valencia, Spain, and now Bali. They were preceded by dozens of smaller gatherings. In Bangkok, Paris, Vienna, Washington, New York and Sydney, in Rio de Janeiro, Anchorage, Helsinki and the Indian Ocean island of Kurumba.

The pace is only expected to pick up, prompting some to ask if the issue is creating a “cure” industry as various groups claim a stake in efforts to curb global warming.

No, says Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the U.N. Climate Change Conference. “Wherever you held it, people would still have to travel to get there,” he said. “The question is, perhaps: Do you need to do it at all? My answer to that is yes.”

“If you don’t put the U.S., the big developing countries, the European Union around the table to craft a solution together, nothing will happen and then the prophecy of scientists in terms of rising emissions and its consequences will become a reality,” de Boer said.

The U.N. estimates 47,000 tons of carbon dioxide and other pollutants will be pumped into the atmosphere during the 12-day conference in Bali, mostly from plane flights but also from waste and electricity used by hotel air conditioners.

Oh, really, Mr. de Boer?  With all of the advances in video conferencing are you telling me that it can’t be done?  That’s funny because I work for the federal government – not one of the quickest organizations to pick up on modern technology – and we use video conferencing all the time.  I can tell you from experience that it’s as good as getting all of the people around a table.

I can tell you now that the environmental movement is simply the latest refuge for the anti-capitalist crowd.  With the fall of communism world-wide, the Marxists had to find a new home, and the environmental movement was easy to turn to their designs.  Don’t get me wrong, I think the desire by true environmentalists to clean up this planet is a noble one, and I can get behind that; but by trumpeting impending doom and the demise of mankind and blaming it all on man-made “global warming” without solid scientific evidence, they’ve lost all credibility.  And to all of those who argue that there is scientific evidence to support global warming – there is scientific evidence, but it has been twisted to fit a preconceived hypothesis, and that is NOT science.  For example, most studies on climatilogical data go back only 100 years or so, but when you try to extrapolate 100 years of data into periods of time that run back hundreds of years, it does not work.  If we assume that the 1990′s were the hottest years on record (and there is some debate about whether the dust bowl years of the 1930′s were hotter – but for the sake of arguement we’ll accept that the 90′s were hotter) and we take that as proof that we are in a warm period such as the Earth has never seen, then how do we explain that the retreat of a glacier in Switzerland has revealed an entrance to an ancient mineshaft with mining tools still strewn about the entrance.  Seems to me that this would suggest that the glaciers have retreated before – an indication that there have been warmer periods that we simply do not have records on.

But back to my arguement about the communists.  This whole climate change thing is a convenient ruse trumped up by the anti-capitalists.  Is the climate changing?  Of course!  Who would be silly enough to believe that the climate isn’t constantly changing, what with the cycles of the sun, and Earth’s relative distance to it, El Nino, La Nina.  That’s first grade science – Earth’s climate is changing all the time, a little bit at a time.  But this drastic change that everyone is crying about simply is not taking place – they’ve been making it an issue for at least 10 years and the oceans haven’t risen an inch – if it’s so drastic why aren’t we seeing it?  No, it’s an attempt by the anti-capitalist crowd at world-wide income redistribution.  The rich nations need to give some of their money to the poor nations.  That’s what Bali is all about.  Indonesia wants some billions of dollars from the U.S. and wealthy nations NOT to cut down their rainforest.  Could you imagine what would happen if the U.S. said to Indonesia, “give me a billion dollars not to use our missles to nuke you into the stone age”.  Blackmail pure and simple and blackmail is blackmail whether you’re talking trees or missles.  I say let them cut the trees down – I’ve been looking for some nice Indonesian rosewood for an guitar project and right now it’s just too expensive – a glut on the market would bring the price down more in my range.  I don’t understand anti-capitalism and communism, they are self-defeating ideologies – like a reverse ponzi scheme.  If it’s really all about income redistribution, take from the rich and give to the poor, that can only go so far.  It needs capitalism to survive.  Let’s say you competely eliminate capitalism – flip a switch and all of the sudden the world is a socialist paradise.  So then you take all of the money away from the evil rich and give it to the wonderful poor.  Everybody is equal.  But now we run into a problem.  The evil rich – the ones who used to earn all of the money that you’ve given to the poor- they’re not so inclined to be productive anymore because you’re just going to take any money they earn.  So now there’s no capital to redistribute but people still have to buy the essentials (which there are now less of, by the way, because the producers aren’t producing – remind anyone of the Soviet Union yet).  It reminds me of a woman I used to work with who was from Communist China – she used to say that communism made everyone in China equal – equally poor.  Like it or not, capitalim makes the world go round.

So Benazir Bhutto got whacked, eh?  It’s too bad, really, but I mean she had to see that coming. Setting yourself up as the opposition in the upcoming elections against a dictatorial ruler who contols a massive security and intelligence apparatus with known ties to multinational terrorist organizations, including al-Queda – not to mention the fact that she is a woman running for a position of power in a Muslim country.  Plus she rides around in an open vehicle – yeah, she couldn’t have expected that!  Hell, we can’t let our own presidents ride around in open cars, and we’re supposedly civilized about such things.

By the way, does anyone find it odd that no one has tried to off Bush, yet?  Lord knows there are a ton of Bush haters out there, and it surprises me that someone did try to assassinate both Reagan – who it seems like everybody seemed to like – and Ford – who was more like Uncle Jerry than a serious president (and not much of a threat to anyone) – but not one attempt has been made on W.  Don’t get me wrong, I would be seriously pissed if someone did try to knock him off.  I’ve got my issues with the way W has run some things, but you don’t try to kill the president just because you think he’s a screw up.  That’s what elections are for.  We’re not animals!  (That’s the Somalians)  Sorry, just watched Blackhawk Down again and I always get that way.  Speaking of which, I don’t think I could handle that.  I played paintball once and took cover behind this tin sheet, but everyone saw me and just opened up on it.  Sounded like a damn hailstorm and I actually was a little shaken up because I knew that if I broke cover, I’d be dead meat – and those paintballs DO hurt.  So I can about imagine the abject terror of being surrounded by an angry mob with REAL guns.

Santa was good to me this year.  I got an MP3 player that I’ve been dying for since I love music and the ol’ CD collection just wasn’t cutting it.  I also got a radio controlled model plane – a Corsair.  It’s really cool, but I’m terrified of destroying it since I have no flying experience and it’s supposedly for “expert”‘ flyers.  I put it together and taxied it around, but have yet to work up the courage to put it up in the air.  I’ve debated the merits of joining one of those RC clubs, but I don’t do well with having people tell me what I can and can’t do.  You have to go through this whole rigormarole where you have to have an instructor fly with you until they think you are okay to fly on your own (they have this deal where you can connect your radio to theirs and have dual control over the airplane – kinda like drivers ed cars).  Makes sense I suppose, but they also specify what kind of plane you can fly as a student pilot and on and on with the rules.  Again, I suppose it makes sense since you can’t very well have a lot of people flying planes at the same time and crashing them into cars and houses and other people, etc.  Of course, I also have this image of a bunch of guys (and maybe some girls too) who know a hell of a lot more about flying RC models than I do copping an attitude with me, especially since my entire little Chinese made electric plane cost less than one of their super cool nitro gas engines.  So I guess I’ll just dick around with my little model till I get the hang of things and then maybe build a gas powered trainer and sign up with a club.  Maybe by then I’ll know enough that they won’t make me train with an instructor after all. 

That’s about all I’ve got for now.

Ever wanted to know all about real Corsairs?  Check this out.

Website of the week: http://www.warbirdregistry.org/corsairregistry/corsairregistry.html

This double standard that leftists in this country have is driving me nuts.  They insist that purveyors of liberal thought be given free right to say what they wish, after all, we all have the right to free speech in this country.  However, that doesn’t seem to apply when the speaker is a conservative.  Witness the case of the Columibia University student from Norway who rhapsodized about how wonderful it was that Mahmoud Ahmadinejad was able to speak at Columbia.  Was she even questioned about whether it was so wonderful when the institution cancelled the invitation to a member of the Minutemen anti-illegal immigration group because of the conservative bent of his organization?

I’m a libertarian (small “l”) in that the Libertarian party’s views largely match my own, but there are parts of their platform I don’t agree with.  I am pro smaller government and personal freedom, but I am also pro interventionism as it applies to rogue nations.  I mean in an ideal world, you could just let the little guys duke it out amongst themselves while we stand idlly by, but in the modern world that just doesn’t work.  With advances in modern weaponry, a small group (or even one person) can do a lot of damage. So if you have North Korea, or whomever, supplying nukes or bio/chem weapons to whoever has the money to buy them, then you can’t just sit around and ignore the problem.  But back to my point … I’m relatively conservative in my viewpoint, but I like the Indigo Girls and Green Day – good tunes.  9 times out of 10, I’m tuned to NPR in the morning on my way to work.  I like to hear the liberal viewpoint.  I don’t usually agree, but I want to at least hear it.  Barbara Streisand really pushes my buttons, but we can’t all be perfect. 

The question is, why can’t everyone be more like me?  No, not 42 years old, underheight and overweight, but more like me in tolerating opposing views.  My wife would laugh at me if I held myself up as some sort of posterboy for tolerance.  I’ve been known to make enough snide comments about people of all sorts in the privacy of my own home to make a Klansman blush, but I’m equally harsh about myself and people like me.  I’m an equal opportunity offender.  But it’s more for the sake of rattling people’s cages to see what kind of reaction I get than actual biggotry. Gay people?  Let ‘em get married.  Do I like ‘em? Depends, do they like football? NASCAR? art? music? If so, yeah, we’d probably get along fine.  What about black people?  What about ‘em?  Skin color makes no difference to me, but I don’t get this whole African American reference.  That’s like me saying I’m European American.  Doesn’t make any sense.  I’ve heard black people say, “Well, we’re not BLACK”. Well, techincally, I’m not white either.  I’m sort of a peachy-tan color, but I don’t mind being called white, it’s all relative.  I mean, I’d prefer that we lose all reference to color period because if you look at the color palette of the human race there’s everything from alabaster to ebony and all points in between, and at what point does one go from white to black.  And what about bi-racial individuals?  I mean, you really CAN’T classify them.  But I admit it does make it easier to tell the cops that two white guys robbed you one a street corner (hah, see, you thought I was going to say black guys, huh?).

How about Al Gore and the Nobel Peace Prize, eh?  Whether you buy into his climate change alarmism or not, how does this merit the Nobel PEACE Prize?  I don’t get where peace fits into the equation.  I did get a summary of the committee’s reasoning, it ran something like this; if global climate change is as bad a Mr. Gore make it out to be (and this is a big if), then wars over dwindling resources COULD (and that is the operative word here) break out.  Supposedly, Mr. Gore’s efforts to reduce carbon emissions MAY have an impact on the environment and MAY slow that process.  That’s a whole lot of assumption of their part. And it’s not like there’s a dearth of other worthy candidates for the prize.  How about the monks in Myanmar (I still call it Burma), or the Dalai Lama?  Even Cindy Sheehan, nut case that she is, is more deserving of a Peace Prize – right or wrong, she IS working for world peace.  Do you get this carbon credits concept?  Sounds kind of fishy to me – it’s got fraud written all over it.  So I’m gonna pay some guy who can’t sustain a business without outside infusions of cash x number of dollars so that I can spew as much pollution into the air as I want.  And this reduces greenhouse gas emissions how?  Seems to me that if the problem is as serious as they claim it is, then we need to do something to reduce pollution NOW, not wait to see if some startup’s green energy plan is gonna pan out.

Oh, oh, check this out.  I found this sentance as part of a comment on a news story about some Christian organization and it gave me a thought. “You see Exodus International is a group of ex-gay men, yes that is no-longer, “gay” men.”  Anyway, I started thinking about X-Gay men and what if there were a group of superheros called the X-Gay Men.  You could have Fashion Man, sort of a Tim Gunn like character who goes around preventing fashion disasters. The Event Planner, another one who makes sure parties go off without a hitch. I dunno, I think I need to think it through some more, but the idea is there.

I dunno, so many rants, so little time.  I’ll catch ya’ll next week – hopefully.

I dig this dude’s airplane photos.
Website of the week: http://www.flickr.com/photos/hawk914/

Politicians worry me.  They just seem to lack common sense.  John Bolton, former U.S. ambassador to the U.N., is a perfect example.  He says we should attack Iran and remove Ahmadinejad.  He characterizes Ahmadinejad as “the source of the problem”.  No question Ahmadinejad is a whack job, but what Bolton seems to forget is that Mr. Ahmadinejad would not be in power without the support of Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei and his merry band of religious leaders. Knock off Ahmadinejad and they’ll just put someone else in his place, probably someone even crazier.  Plus you piss off the entire Iranian population.  Now, I realize that I only hold a Bachelors degree in poli-sci, but come on, do we reeeally need this right now?  We’re bogged down with the insurgency in Iraq, and while I’m generally supportive of the mission (not the execution), I don’t think that embroiling ourselves in another regional conflict is particularly wise at this juncture – although transporation wouldn’t be so much of an issue since they’re right next door.

The Democrats WILL take back the White House in ’08, though it pains me to admit it.  The problem is the economic impact of meltdown in the subprime mortgage industry.  Now the more educated among us will realize that the Bush administration had little to do with that, nor did rampant capitalism. The problem was not even greed (though that figured into the equation).  The problem was stupidity.  See if you can figure this out.  Okay, you make a loan to someone with a proven history of bad credit and/or low income to begin with – not too smart – but understandable if you have enough good loans to cover the risk.  Then, you put them in an ARM to jack up the rate when their initial period is through, hoping to make a killing.  But, if they are struggling with a $900 payment (just for example), then how do you expect them to come up with $1200?  The answer is that they don’t, and whoever is left with the paper is out in the cold with a repossessed house in an ice-cold housing market. I say “whoever is left with the paper…” for good reason.  The mortgage broker or even the party who originally underwrote the loan is not going to be hurt. Many, if not most, subprime mortgages change hands several times over the course of the loan.  My daughter’s subprime ARM changed hands three times before it ended up in the hands of the company that originally wrote the loan.  But back to my train of thought.  There is no doubt in my mind that Hillary and company will make this all about President Bush and most of the American people will go along with it.  I’m a bit torn, because on the one hand a Clinton presidency is almost guaranteed good for pure entertainment value, but I worry just how much she can screw things up in 4, or God forbid, 8 years.

Well, college football is well underway, and I’m a huge fan, so check this out.  You have to wait til they show the replay at the end and you get a close up.  Just a flip over the shoulder and ….

Website of the week: http://youtube.com/watch?v=tVQbtqF0dDU

The look on Spurier’s face is priceless!

Speaking of women wearing too much or too little, I may be among a minority of men, but if it’s autumn, there’s nothing more attractive to me than a woman wearing a nice knee-length plaid skirt with a pair of boots and a comfortable cardigan.  It’s a very classic, polished look.  I’m beginning to sound like that dude on that TLC show “What Not to Wear”, but seriously, I hate women who try too hard to look sexy (comment about Avril Lavigne above not withstanding). That’s what bugs me about Christina Aguillera.  I love her voice and all – 100 times better than Britney’s, but she really went waaaaay overboard in trying to convince us that she wasn’t that sweet little thing that sang “Genie in a Bottle”.  Oh and that reminds me, what happened to LeAnn Rimes??  I mean I realize little girls have got to grow up, but lord who put all the black shit around her eyes – she’s in serious need of a new stylist because that look just isn’t doing it for her.

Okay I had a really cool idea: a guitar body made out of Bondo. I realize I still have some kinks to work out, like how to get screws to adhere and stuff, but I’m getting there.  That’ll go along with my home brew amplifier … whenever I get time to work on that.  I got lots of stuff still to do around the house. Plus I have a ton of other interests, so …. Well, at least I have something to look forward to when I retire. I dunno if anyone is interested in homebrew amps, but if you are, check out my site of the week.

Website of the week: http://www.cs.cmu.edu/~ehn/ax84/

 I dunno.  It’s one of those weeks where I’m just single minded. Nothing but tennis on the mind.  Oh, did have my 15th anniversary – married to my beautiful wife for 15 years.  In another 15 years, I’ll be 56 … yeah, I guess I’ll still be alive then.  Just kinda trying to plan ahead ya know?

How good is this guy. Website of the week: http://youtube.com/watch?v=2Hp-EArV6s8

Well, old Merv Griffin died.  Too bad.  I really don’t know why we say that though.  The dude was 8o-some years old and riddled with cancer – he probably welcomed the end.  It sounds callous, but given the choice between this world and something better, which would you choose?  You do feel sorry for the family though, so I suppose you’d say it’s too bad for them.  Merv put on some great shows, I really like Jeopardy.  That’s something to think about.  I guess you could say TV was a mature medium by the time he got into it, it’s not like he took a flyer on whether this TV thing would succeed or not, but he definitely pushed the envelope on what would make entertaining TV, so we have him to thank for that.

I listen to a radio station out of San Francisco in the morning, 107.7 the Bone, and they were talking about the Bay Bridge and it got me to thinking about how terrified I would be travelling over the Golden Gate Bridge.  I don’t normally freak out about bridges, and I travel over a lot of them on the way to Louisiana when I go to my Mom’s house.  No big deal.  But I am afraid of heights and that bridge looks sooooo narrow on TV and in pictures that I just don’t know.  Somehow I picture having a blowout and my car careening out of control into the side rail and over the edge.  How frightening would it be plunging in the the San Francisco Bay from that height.  You’d actually have a chance to be scared.  Fortunately, I don’t have any plans to visit SF, but you never know.

Why is it that when I was in school none of the girls ever looked like Hillary Duff or Miley Cyrus or Lindsay Lohan?  Not that I would have had a chance to date them or anything ….

Website of the week: http://www.1077thebone.com/

Kinda stream of consciousness today.  How about this mine shit in Utah?  You just knew someone was going to try to hang this one on George W.  Some bitch who lost her husband in the Sago mine tragedy in W. Virgina said Bush was responsible for her husband’s death and the accident in Utah because he took out a lot of laws that were designed to ensure safety in the workplace.  Uh, what laws were those.  It wouldn’t have made any sense to ask her, because she wouldn’t have known – she was just parrotting whatever the union told her to say.  Her husband was union, so she’s union, and unions support democrats not repubicans, so Bush is bad.  Sad really how lacking in intelligence certain people are in a country where quality education is readily available.  There’s no excuse for ignorance – it’s just plain laziness on their part.  If those guys are still alive, you just know they have to be bored out of their minds.  From what I understand, they have food and water available for a few days, so if they can get a hole big enough, they can lower food and water.  How about some light and a Judith Krantz novel for God’s sake.  They’ve been in the dark (I assume) for all this time and only their co-workers to talk with.  I also assume that by this point they’ve talked about just about everything and they’re into discussions about the meaning of life.  Even that gets dull after a while.

Meanwhile, Global Warming marches on.  It was 130 degrees in the shade yesterday (well, maybe not quite that hot) and it’s supposed to stay that way for the next couple of weeks.  Okay, so it’s hot for a couple of weeks.  What I want to know is where this flooding of New York and stuff is – yeah, yeah I know that had a big downpour yesterday that flooded a lot of stuff, but I’m talking 3rd floor of the Empire State building flooding like there was in the movie.  Actually, I’d like to see that.  New York flooded like that.  I mean I don’t want anyone to get killed or anything, but it would be fascinating to see the biggest city in the U.S. under several feet of water.  Of course, there are the inevitable consequences.  It would kill the U.S. economy.  Just think how bad it was after 9-11, and that was just a few buildings.  In my scenario, Wall Street would be under water.  It’s crazy how perception can bring down economies.  What did we really lose in 9-11?  Some building and a lot of people, but no one really lost money in the actual event except United and American airlines who lost some assets worth a few million dollars and the property owners of the World Trade Center complex.  And I’m sure those companies were all insured against loss.  Then there were the families who lost loved ones and their incomes, so there was some financial loss to those folks, but in the grand scheme of things, on a purely monetary basis, there was not much loss.  Yet the economic impact was huge – for the airlines, travel industry and financial sector.  Flooding NY would have a similar effect, though real dollar loss, with the exception of property owners would be minimal.  That’s what’s killing New Orleans now.  Real money loss is negligible.  Sure some property owners are taking a hit because insurance companies won’t pay up.  Hey, guys it’s not the property owners’ fault that you decided to underwrite the paper.  The risk was clear, so now you owe these folks their money!  True, you’re not responsible for the flooding, but when a guy’s roof blows off, you can’t blame that on the flood waters.  And hows about the payout for those that purchased federally subsidized flood insurance?  But otherwise this might turn out better than break-even.  As politically incorrect as it is, the facts are the facts.  The poor in New Orleans were a financial drag on the city.  From subsidized housing to extra police protection, the poor were taking out more than they were putting in.   As it currently stands, the damage in the 9th ward and adjacent areas cannot be repaired.  The city needs to go in with bulldozers and completely level the entire area.  It’s infested with vermin of all kinds and the only way to get rid of all that is to scrape it down to bare dirt.  Then rebuilding can start in earnest.  Replace what was there with mixed income housing, so you don’t have the poor all centered in one place.  You want to talk about socio-economic apartheid – that’s what DID exist there before the storm, I’m talking about eliminating that.  And with the prospect of developers being able to actually make some money, they would likely be interested in investing in rebuilding.  But as it stands, tourism is down and now the city is losing real money – not from the storm, but from perception.  Not that I expect the current leadership to be of any use.  Nagin is a craven politician interested in nothing other than maintaining his hold on power and the perks that come with it.  At the state level, Kathleen Blanco is totally incompetent and overmatched.  To see her on TV she always looks like she’s overwhemed and on the verge of losing it.  It would not surprise me to see her break down a cry on TV.  She’s nothing more than a figurehead anyway.  Her husband, Ray, pulls her strings and anyone who knows Ray Blanco, well, if I had to choose between Kim Jong Il and Ray Blanco, I think Kim is a little less dangerous.

It must be just me, because the more I see of Victoria Beckham, the more I’m digging that look.  Everybody else seems to hate the woman, and if I really knew her, I probably would too, because shallow bitches with attitudes really piss me off, but since all I see of her are her T&A – oh and legs, I gotta say . . .  just WOW!  Hee-hee, I’m just thinking about what her son is going to have face in a few years.  He’ll be hanging out with his high-school buddies and one of them – and you know it’ll be the dorkiest one – will say, “Hey Brooklyn (no, seriously that’s his name), you’re Mom’s really pretty.” Ah the trials of having a sex symbol for a mom.  I guess it’s better than what Frances Bean Cobain is having to go through now.  Jesus, is that family screwed up.  Ozzy Osbourne’s family looks almost normal in comparison.

Okay, I hinted at this week’s website.

Website of the week: http://youtube.com/watch?v=7sK3AqFYAWQ

You have to admire brilliance, even when it’s directed to evil ends.  I have this co-worker who likes to, as we call it, “throw people under the bus”.  Makes us look bad in front of others.  It serves two purposes really.  She uses it as a tool get others in trouble for either not doing something she thinks they should have done, or not done it correctly; and she uses it as a means of misdirection to cover her own shortcomings – I didn’t do B because they didn’t do A first.  It really sucks.  The problem is that she executes it with skill.  Her primary weapon is e-mail.  She sends out a message that seems concilatory and polite on the surface, but the overall message is that we screwed something up.  Often she is accusing us of not telling her something she should already have known.  It’s usually something like, “…well you didn’t include that in the message you sent to me.”  Our response is, “because we sent you that same information last week in response to another issue.”  And usually she DOES know this, she just does it to piss us off.  Oh, and then there’s “THE MEETING”.  She says we have to meet to discuss this or that and then loads the invitaiton up with her supporters (or as we refer to them “evil minions”) and leaves off key people on our side.  It’s always easier to win when you’ve got a 3 or 4 to 1 advantage.  So kudos to the evil ***** for doing a fine job of screwing people over.

Ah, now that I’ve vented, I feel much better.  A friend of my parents just died and it’s got me thinking about my own mortality.  I always wondered whether it would be myself or my wife to go first.  Either way it sucks.  If she goes first, of course I would be devestated, but then I’d have to support my kids emotionally too.  My stepson, he’d be okay.  My stepdaughter, she’d probably be okay, although I dread what kind of comments she would make.  I love her and everything, but sometimes she just says all the wrong things, and because she and her mom are just alike on a lot of things – which leads to conflict – I just wonder what kind of things would be said.  Katelyn my youngest would be really sad, but she’s a tough one, she’d pull through.  Gabby, I’m worried about.  She is what I would call highly emotional – which means she’s just like me.  I cry at the drop of a hat really, but over the years I’ve managed to submerge my feelings should the need arise.  When I need to be strong, I put my own feelings aside and try to be supportive.  Sometimes I get accused of being cold because I don’t respond emotionally to certain situations, but it’s only because if I allow myself even a little bit, I just become a total wreck.  When my Dad died and I was by myself, I just totally lost it, but for the funeral I bucked it up for my mom and sisters.  Same with my grandmother.  At funerals, when I view the body, I try to rationalize that this is not the person I remember.  It’s just an empty container.  That person – or soul – is no longer there.  Somehow it makes it easier than to think, wow that’s my Dad – or Grandmother – lying there.  Anyway, I digress.  Point is, I think it would be really tough to handle.  If I go first, then it bums me out to think that my family would be sad.  I wouldn’t want my kids – or wife – to think I was abandoning them.  I like to be the protector, but the protector will be gone.  I guess it’s some consolation that I won’t be there to see them being sad (or maybe I will depending on how long you hang around after you’re dead). 

I wonder if that’s hell (I don’t believe in purgatory despite being born Catholic – nowhere in the Bible does it mention purgatory, it’s just a money making operation for the Catholic Church – or at least it was – and now they can’t say “Uh, well you know we said there was a purgatory but that was just a lie to make you pay us money, and we’re sorry but it’s just not true.  Which, of course those Catholics who have actually read the Bible already know.  And that’s what they teach Catholics you know?  Don’t read the Bible except what we want you to read since the church is the only one that really knows what everything in there means.) Okay, I got sidetracked again.  Oh yeah, hell on Earth.  Maybe that’s hell, that you don’t go to heaven, but get stuck here on Earth, unable to communicate, unable to be seen.  A true ghost.  If you think about it, it would suck.  Not being able to talk, being totally isolated.  TV show sucks and you can’t change the channel.  That would be hell for me.  I guess you could go places.  At first I thought it might be cool because then you could go spy on the hot chick down the street and watch her get undressed and stuff, but then I thought, why?  It’s not like you could do anything about it.  Talk about frustrating.  I’d rather be at home watching an episode of “Mama’s Family”… are you sure you can’t change the channel. 

Oh, and speaking of which … how is it that that show has lasted as long as it has.  Jesus, it’s been on for like 20 years, and I have yet to watch more than 5 minutes of a show.  The dialog is worse than America’s Funniest Videos, and at least with that show you can watch some dude getting hit in nuts at least once during the show.  It just consists of that Momma character insulting her kids all show long.  Okay, it was kinda cute when it first came out as a sketch on the Carol Burnett Show.  But it had a supporting cast of Carol Burnett, Harvey Korman and Tim Conway at the time - I leave Vickie Lawrence out because even though she was a hottie at the time, she was highly annoying – and that cast was brilliant.  But even then, 5 minutes was enough.  It would be like making a show out of the Missus Wiggins sketch where Tim Conway was the old man boss and Carol Burnett was the ditsy secretary with the pencil skirt that was too tight to walk in.  There’s only so far you can take that.  For any readers under 40 or so, sorry if you have no clue what I’m talking about.

Ass whipping, that’s what I’m talking about, ass whipping.

Website of the week: http://youtube.com/watch?v=zZRQEtAyiTM

Did you ever think you’d be hearing yourself say that maybe it would be better if Britney and Kevin got back together?  I was thinking that the other day when I saw that Brit melted down in some magazine interview.  Don’t get me wrong, I don’t particularly think that Kevin Federline is all that great, but I actually think she still loves him and all of this acting out is because she misses him.  I would be willing to bet that this whole divorce thing came out of her handlers telling her how much of a drag he was being on her career and that she needed to ditch him.  I don’t think it was her idea and that she was just unhappy at the time and wanted to do ANYTHING as long as she could be happy again. Plus, I think that Kev has done some growing up and I actually think that he may be a good father to those kids given the chance.  Still, I do think about the kids he had with Shar Jackson and wonder if he’s doing the right thing with them.

I’m surprised at myself in a way.  Usually I’m more concerned with geo-politics and “serious” stuff rather than what’s going on out in Hollywood, but I dunno, I just have been in a mood lately where I’m burned out with all of that and just want to be stupid for a while.

Oh, oh, but there is one thing!  Cindy Sheehan!  Jeez, I almost wet my pants when she said she was going to take on Nancy Pelosi and win her House seat.  I had to ask myself whether she was just trying to get a rise out of the press or if she was flat-out delusional. She has a better chance of travelling to the moon (which is where she belongs).  I still don’t think that she has the realization that her 15 minutes is over and that she was just a pawn of the libs who has outlived her usefulness.  A shame really, I do feel for her.  But here’s what gets me, by her actions, she is demeaning the memory of her son that she claims to have loved so much.  He joined the Army to serve his country and do what he thought was right.  By saying that the Army, the country and the president are wrong to be fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan and our troops are dying for nothing, she is effectively saying that he son’s life accomplished nothing positive.  It is disgusting to me to place so little value on what your children accomplish, even if you don’t entirely agree with it.  If it were my child, and I do have a 25 year old son, I would be disappointed if he died in the line of duty, but I would be proud of the fact that he was over there trying to rebuild and strenghten Iraq so that the people could live there again in safety and freedom.

Do you ever feel some way about a particular person or issue and you just have to ask yourself: WHY?  I am ashamed and reluctant to admit this, but I just feel compelled to do so, and I ask myself why I feel this way because it is just really dumb, but I’ve been looking at these photos of Victoria Beckham (and really how can you avoid them) and I’m thinking – damn, she’s … hot.  Yeah, yeah, I know she’s a celebu-ditz and all but in my opinion, she’s got the total package physically.  The long legs, the dark eyes, um – heaven.

Oh, and your global warming update.  Elizabeth Edwards is saying she won’t eat tangerines anymore because the trucks that transport them cause pollution, and some study says that you should become a vegitarian because it reduces your carbon footprint because cows are a major source of greenhouse gas emissions.  Just to show you how even educated people can be idiots – hello, news bulletin for Elizabeth Edwards and whoever funded this study.  Your actions are not going to help the environment one whit.  Elizabeth Edwards giving up tangerines and even 1000 people giving up meat will not reduce the number of tangerines trucked into the great state of North Carolina or the number of cows grown to cut up into filet mignon.

For my website of the week, I have a tough time figuring out how to describe these clips (I have two this week) other than “disturbing”.

Website(s) of the week: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nadm3AxuYdM&NR=1

http://youtube.com/watch?v=J3ZcfbOXnoU