As Ian Anderson Reflected...

...Life's a Long Song, but the tune ends too soon for us all.

I shan't be posting any longer. Not that it matters, really. I never had many readers. And what I scribbled was mostly worthless drivel. Just another blip on the radar.

If you would like to take over the blog send me an e-mail and we'll make some arrangements.

Life Is What It Is...

...and there ain't much you can do about it. So you swallow the medicine, take your pill, as it is, and hope for the best. Knowing that the outcome is not going to be good. Glass half full or half empty. Seems pointless to ask when you open the cupboard and there are no glasses to be found. You don't even get the chance to decide.

So I'll take what I don't have to whatever ends I can, knowing full well that it is partly my fault and partly genetics. As it should be. The creator likes to throw a change-up every so often, just so you remember whose on the mound. But my bat ain't big enough any longer.

So it is what it is...

I've Been A Parent...

...for upwards of 24 years. So I kinda feel qualified to speak about how parenting works.

If the officials decide to take your kid away and make them a ward of the state you've pretty much failed as a parent. I don't care how you try to spin it. Blame it on the father, blame it on the kid or blame it on circumstances. You just fucked up, plain and simple. You can try to assuage your conscience all you want but when you look in the mirror all you should see is what's really starring back at you. A narcissist. Plain and simple. Your son pegged you. You're just too damned wrapped up in yourself to see it. I called you on it months ago. It's come home to roost. Good riddance. I feel sorry for him, though, because you don't have the guts to step up and take responsibility for what has happened to him. Your solution is to always take him back to his father and let him deal with it, which of course he can't. So the cycle continues. And you wonder why the kid is fucked up. Go figure.

This Whole GOP Debate...

...is nothing more than a bunch of bullshit hoopla. A glorified press conference.

I read today where some drive-by-media pundit called it a coronation. Say what? And another said the spirit of Reagan would be guiding the participants. All ten of them? It's scheduled for 90 minutes. Ten candidates. Given that they all get equal time, that's nine minutes per person. Hell, I can't jackoff in nine minutes. Well, I can, but my point wouldn't be made. I want it to be succinct. I'm going to become a Libertarian. They don't subject me to this shit. Maybe that big plane they have hanging over everyone will fall off its moorings. Now that I would watch.

I wish Fred Thompson would throw his hat in the ring. I like him. He looks like an old hound dog just casually snoozing on the porch, droopy eyes and all, yet up for a good hunt.

The Hellions...

...aka my sons, have a trip planned the end of the month.

Their destination? VEGAS!! Yeah Baby!! It's in celebration of the youngests 21st birthday. I have never been because I know that what happens in Vegas would follow my ass forever.

I do happen to think it will be a trip that involves copious quantities of alcohol being thrown down their gullets, their being beguiled by some shrew that promises them a peek-and-tweak of her slot machine, perhaps some porcelain hugging and, no doubt, lots of money spent. I'm sure they will be effervescent in their enthusiasm to take in all the city has to offer. And I'm sure they will, if I know them the way I do.

I don't expect too many problems from the venture. After all, how much trouble can three or four 20-somethings get into in the sin city? So I'm cashing in my 401K just in case, ya know, they find a Russian lady that needs an older man to marry her and get a green card. They're always thinking about dear ole Dad. Or they need bail, whichever comes first.

It Befuckles Me...

...when I read blogs about child rearing.

Yeah, Yeah, your kids are not your friends. Throw down the gauntlet and show them whose boss and what the parameters are. Yada, Yada.

I was, unfortunately, only around my kids, on a full-time basis, for six years. After that it was peace meal. When I was with them full time, I took care of their needs, bathed and fed them, played with them and interacted with them. Was it as a friend or a parent. Both, in my book. I could pull the parent thing if they were acting up, but I never did it with the thought of authority in mind.

The ex never had any parenting boundaries. As long as she had Elle and Cosmopolitan to read when she got home, as she was sipping her wine, as I had bathed, played with and fed the kids then they were fine. I wasn't, once they went to bed. I had one too many beers and was shit for a father. So it goes.

Turns out, after all these years, that they are, in fact, fairly good men. Will they always be that way? Of course not. There are no guarantees. We've all seen examples of it. If you are a parent in my age group then you know that life happens in stages. Don't beat yourself up. You could do great raising them during one stage and fail miserably during another. It's probably genetic anyways. Give yourself some credit for what you've done to date, but don't think you've won the race. Think back on your own life when you were 20 and 30. See any changes? Point made.

Even Another Reason...

...I hate environmentalists.

This is a goose. A fucking Canadian goose. You ever dealt with one? I have. Up close and personal. I spent three hours chasing these worthless creatures around so they could be caged and shipped to Louisiana and Mississippi. When you grab them, even though they are molting, they will bite the piss out your arms with their beaks and flap their wings with such force that you feel as if you have broken a few ribs. Despite shipping them off, they came back. With their children. We got a border collie to mark his territory and chase them off. Kinda works, but not so much.

UPDATE: As I started writing this the NBC evening news did a story on the same thing. I'm suing for plagiarism.

I don't like them and never will. When I was in the golf course industry they used to shit all over EVERYTHING. They still do, in my so-called backyard. If I go fishing I wear the oldest pair of boots I have because I have to walk through so much of that crap that it ain't worth cleaning the soles. But, I never hurt one intentionally. Nor had I ever thought of doing so. And I didn't tonight on the way home. There are several places where businesses think it's modern and sexy to have a pond at their entrance. No problem, 'cept when the fucking geese take up squatters rights. Then it's an issue, because it's on a major thoroughfare, and pretty close to the road.

I try to pay attention to my surroundings when driving. Hence no wrecks since I was sixteen and playing Le Mans on a rain slicked, winding road in a VW Beetle. I saw the little fucker on the side of the road, and honked as I always do, which usually scares them enough to scoot their ass out of the way. Not this Canadian. I believe it actually looked up at me with disdain in it's eyes and murmured through its beak..."Just try it!!".

Which I did. Dead duck. Or goose, in this case. I felt bad, but traffic moves at 50 MPH and I'm not about to come to a stop for a fucking Canadian, goose or not. But NOOO, the person behind me apparently became outraged. In an instance they were up beside me honking and wailing their arms demanding I go back and take responsibility for my actions.

My actions? The quacker stepped out in front of my truck. It's a goose. There's nothing left for soup or deep frying. Go home and have a drink. She was vehemently adamant that I go back and clean up my mess and check on its children. HUH? How do you know she had chittlins? Because they all do this time of year. HAH!! Not next year, they won't.

As I had pulled into the center turn lane to avoid delaying anyone else, I'd finally had enough and reached into the back seat, grabbed my sawed off shovel handle and told the bitch to call animal control to come clean up the carnage. Or she could do it. Either way. But I was done with her psycho-environmental ass.

I was going to have chicken tonight. Not so palatable now. I don't feel guilty, but I'm thinking beef. Cows don't walk out in front of my ass. Except in my dreams. Then I figure they're just metaphors for ex-girlfriends.

This Soldier Took Umbrage...

for something I posted with a link from Craig's List. He doesn't have anything in his sidebar where you link directly to a recent post, so if you want to find it do a search on GS.

I'll give him his due, as I did in the comments. It seems he wants total honesty on the internet and on blogs. I respect the man, but what the fuck? We can't get that in real life, and if you think the internet and blogs are full of honesty, well then I just might as well stick my head back up my own ass.

If I sit down and have a conversation with a friend(which is silly, because I don't have any) and he spews forth several things, how the hell am I supposed to go check on them to make sure they're true. And would I even care? What I posted was something I found. Did I research it? Hell no. I took it at face value for what it was.

I ran across something today that said the total number of American troops killed in Iraq is closer to 7000, because they don't count those that died on the way to Germany, or died when they got there. I didn't post it because I feared it the same ramifications. I happen to think it's true, from what I've heard my sources. But what the hell. It doesn't make any difference.

The truth is what it is. Whether we believe it or not is irrelevant. For example, this gentleman proposed marriage to this woman. Jokingly, I'm sure. But how would we know. I like the man's writing, as I do hers, and they seem truthful when doing so, but how does one really know? I know her slightly and I doubt this kinda shit would fly under normal circumstances. But given the fact that he likes to joke around, I would take it as such. Maybe he really is sincere. Then what?

When it comes to knowledge, truth is a very subjective thing, as the great philosophers said and wrote about. I tend to agree. On my planet, I make my own. That's what counts. Is it true? Damned if I know. Does it matter? Not likely.

Not everything that gets posted on this blog is true nor reflects reality. It isn't a papal dictum. I don't control reality. Just as there are books that are written that skew the truth or present facts that aren't true, so it is here. This is for fun, folks. If I go into my "reality" mode, trust me, it will be real and you won't have a fucking prayer.