Thursday Rant.

What ever happened to this guy?

Listened to the general this morning sorry I am not convinced.

I may be the only one but that's the way it is.

Will Gay Marriage Sway Election?

Can we not just let people live their own lives and get on with real legislation.
Something that will help out the average American and something that really needs to be addressed.

EDUCATION -- COLLEGE GRADS FACE BURDENSOME STUDENT DEBT: While the USA Today reports some good news that college graduates are entering the best hiring market in the past few years, the Christian Science Monitor notes that those same students will be burdened by massive student debt. "Student-loan debt encumbers almost two-thirds of the Class of 2006, according to federal statistics. With tuition costs continuing to rise far faster than inflation and interest rates on federal student loans about to increase, the debt load for future graduates is set to become so heavy that it's likely to turn more students away from low-paying occupations like teaching." As the Center for American Progress recently reported, the growing student debt is hurting American families. The debt of the typical American family earning about $45,000 a year rose 33.1 percent from 2001 to 2004, primarily due to the increasing costs of education, housing, and health care. But as "60 Minutes" documented recently, the debt crunch for students has provided great business for federal loan providers. Federal student loans are now a $62 billion industry, according to the College Board. "With rates rising and tuition outpacing inflation, there is no end in sight to the student debt escalator."

Mother's Day Thoughts on Blogs.

I’ve gotten away from the pox for a few minutes.

I’m going to try not to mention grubs or my lawn.

It has been rainy on and off, and cold so that won’t be hard.

It was a pox ridden weekend but it wasn’t bad. He has a mild case due to vaccination and he seems to be no worse for wear.

I’m going with something different tonight in the few minutes I have online.

First let's start with Darfur, something I knew very little about until on reading
political notio , sometime last summer, I started to read comments from a girl called Alice, from wonderland or not and consequently began reading her blog.

My full intention was to read mainly political blogs, a fair share which are on my newsreader. Alice had more of a mixture and she was a younger blogger than those I had planned to be reading. Nevertheless I started to read and was capitivated.

It wasn't a political blog per say it was a personal blog but it was full of politics and humor and an intelligent and sometimes raw banter which I enjoyed and would not have expected to find from a twenty year old.

Alice's is where I first heard about Darfur and lately the talk about Darfur on the web and otherwise has been heading in a direction leaning more toward the real solution instead of the pretense of being concerned. I feel a real solution is something that is going to be difficult to arrive at but if it is keep in the news we surely will have to try. I thank Alice for bringing Darfur to my attention and for also thinking about it and making posts beyond the basic humanitarian effort.

She started a new blog devoted totally to Darfur and so far my favorite post there is
Considerations on Darfur: Is it Genocide? Again and of course the Darfur: Happy Mother's Day post hit home, pictures always do.


Political Notio is where I found people could actually discuss politics and not yell it or ram it down my throat. Womderland or Not is where I found out that there is hope for the future as there is wit and brilliance and humanity there and not all twenty - year old spend all day watching MTV or shopping and when they do it is funny.




In case you missed Al Gore on SNL.








I'm going to leave this Sunday night with one opinion and I know that there is a lot of wavering on this. I think Bush should be impeached but not only impeached but possibly hanged.

The Pox

NEWS OF THE WEIRD
By Chuck Shepherd

LEAD STORY

A Texas jury decided in 1991 that Steven Kenneth Staley, now 43, should be put to death for killing a restaurant manager, but three days before his February 2006 date with destiny, psychologists testified that he is mentally ill, and the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled that a mentally ill person cannot be executed. The solution, declared state judge Wayne Salvant in April, is for the state to inject Staley with enough psychotropic medicine to make him sufficiently sane to understand why he is going to die, at which point he can be killed. (In similar cases, drugs improved Charles Singleton enough for his 2004 execution in Arkansas, but have failed since 1999 to restore Texan Emanuel Kemp's competency.)

Justice is totally messed up in this country.


My son has The Chicken Pox.

My wife has a conference for which she left with much prodding on my part. I was planning to work at home all weekend anyway. Sixty percent of my work is done at my home office because most of it is consulting.


Chicken Pox is visually quite and ugly condition even when mild. My son has a mild case. I am guessing it is because he was vaccinated.

I wish you all a good weekend and a Happy Mother's Day.

Post Kentucky Derby and Killing Grubs.

The Baltimore Orioles stayed in the game with four home runs and then got a much-needed win with a soft single. Coming off a road trip on which they went 0-5 and were outscored 35-12, the Orioles rallied three times for a 7-6 victory over the Detroit Tigers on Tuesday night.

Yea, they needed it.

The Derby was a very interesting affair. The weather was excellent and I drank a lot. The horses were spectacular to look at. It was nice to get away from it all and do something different. The winner boards in Maryland. I think I’ll be heading to the Preakness this year.



I keep meaning to expand the base of blogs I read on a daily basis but for some reason by the time I get through with the ones I do read I never have time.
Cooper has a interesting read at Darfur: An Unforgivable Hell on Earth. The girl does think. She also refuses to pontificate on Virgin Pledges at Wonderland or Not but makes us laugh anyway. MJ is doing something different with his blog as well by mixing it up and I like it.

Shayna is alive and well after a close call and
Patriotic Cowgirl just returned from the Derby as well and Pia at Courting Destiny does what she does best. Write

I've got to deal with a lawn that appears to have some grub problems. See you all later.

Post Kentucky Derby and Killing Grubs.

The Baltimore Orioles stayed in the game with four home runs and then got a much-needed win with a soft single. Coming off a road trip on which they went 0-5 and were outscored 35-12, the Orioles rallied three times for a 7-6 victory over the Detroit Tigers on Tuesday night.

Yea, they needed it.

The Derby was a very interesting affair. The weather was excellent and I drank a lot. The horses were spectacular to look at. It was nice to get away from it all and do something different. The winner boards in Maryland. I think I’ll be heading to the Preakness this year.



I keep meaning to expand the base of blogs I read on a daily basis but for some reason by the time I get through with the ones I do read I never have time.
Cooper has a interesting read at Darfur: An Unforgivable Hell on Earth. The girl does think. She also refuses to pontificate on Virgin Pledges at Wonderland or Not but makes us laugh anyway. MJ is doing something different with his blog as well by mixing it up and I like it.

Shayna is alive and well after a close call and
Patriotic Cowgirl just returned from the Derby as well and Pia at Courting Destiny does what she does best. Write

I've got to deal with a lawn that appears to have some grub problems. See you all later.

The first of May.

Things have been busy and I have time to comment but nothing very elaborate to write.

Spring here is gorgeous and it is in full bloom.

Looks like Shayna got interviewed over at Political Notio.
It is a great interview if you haven't seen it.

Cooper has been at a rally in DC for Darfur.

She also reminds us of May Day in it's various forms.

We have been invited to the Kentucky Derby. Never having been and not being a horse person I'm not sure if we are going but I hear it is festive and fun and we have childcare for the day and evening.

I might just be headng down to Kentucky this weekend.

Weekends

Weekends are slow for most people as far as blogs are concerned.
Lately for me it is the only time I get to post.
My life is consumed with two marketing campaigns at this time and this is going to be going on for several more weeks.

I'm disappointed with the Oriole's pitching thus far.
It is early in the season so my fingers are crossed.

Many things I was able to scroll through today and it seems that Nepal is having some not so unexpected trouble.

Cooper makes note of a Bin Laden tape at her Darfur: An Unforgiveable Hell on Earth blog.

Shayna is busy but still manages to entertain us and touch our hearts at the same time.

Pia is having a guest poster this Monday.

I have a few more links I need to add to this thing when I get time. I am considering going to blog rolling sometime this week and handling it that way because it just appears easier.

Have a Good Weekend.

It's a great day here.
I'm going to play some golf and enjoy it while it lasts.
We have family coming on this evening and will hit up a new retaurant in town.

The country is going to hell and Bush, again, is standing by his man. This is getting very old.

I'm going to take the weekend off and worry about the fate of the world next week.

I get this " vision of doomsday" daily. I have a son I'd like him to know a different world.

Have a good weekend.

Not all That.

I'm having a hard time keeping up with it all.
The working vacation I took not too liong ago has resulted in a lot more loose ends than I had anticipated.

The weather here is great today and I am thinking of getting in a late afternoon round of golf. I suck at golf but I play sometimes and every year a week or so after the Master's I get in a few holes.

Baseball season has sprung and I just don't know what's going on with those Orioles.
They haven't had a good year in some time and every year the fingers stay crossed until it is evident there will be no redemption.


I'll get to a more elaborate post this weekend.

Everyone take care noe.

Not all That.

I'm having a hard time keeping up with it all.
The working vacation I took not too liong ago has resulted in a lot more loose ends than I had anticipated.

The weather here is great today and I am thinking of getting in a late afternoon round of golf. I suck at golf but I play sometimes and every year a week or so after the Master's I get in a few holes.

Baseball season has sprung and I just don't know what's going on with those Orioles.
They haven't had a good year in some time and every year the fingers stay crossed until it is evident there will be no redemption.


I'll get to a more elaborate post this weekend.

Everyone take care noe.

Basketball and other things.

My biggest concern right now, and it pales in comparison to the troubles of the world I know,is that the NCAA Basketball Championship is on this evening and we have a tornado watch out with potential for storms and high winds. When this happens often the cable goes out or the electricity. I am making several alternate plans in case I have to leave and make a mad dash to another location to watch the game. Often what happens is that there will be an outage where I live and two miles down the road all will be well so my plans include several different locations to the north , south east and west.

I would have preferred to see George Mason win but there was never really any question that they had met the end of the road. I'll enjoy it anyway and think I'm going with the Bruins.

That's it for me folks until tomorrow.

Blog Problems.

Almost three weeks of a "working vacation" was just what I needed.

It was hot, we spend some time at the beach, my son loved this despite his initial distrust of the waves.
Sand is not my friend I can tell you that.

My wife and I took a three day cruise to the Bahamas and if was a nice respite for us.
She is doing well post appendectomy and feels lucky they were able to do it laproscopically.

Now we are both preparing to get back in the full swing of things next week.

I'm catching up on blogs and making plans for a weekend of basketball.

The whole George Mason thing is pretty remarkable but I think they will run out of steam even while hoping they do not. LSU? Who would have figured.This will be interesting. I doubt I will be able to talk about anything else this weekend.

I added blog inflence to my sidebar for fun. Don't think it is real accurate but the look was getting old and I needed a new link. Try it when you are bored.

Leaving on a Jet Plane

Not meaning to steal anyone's modus operandi but that title fits.

Leaving Saturday for three weeks in Florida/Bahamas with my wife and my son; it is more of a working vacation but I hope to get some fishing and golf in while watching the NCAA championships, and taking my son to the beach and on a couple of boat rides while missing the spring breakers who do not tend to congregate in Naples anyway.

Me and my wife hope to get to one of the out islands of the Bahamas for couple of days of peace and quiet later on toward our return as she will be further along in the healing process. Our son will be cared for by loving grandparents at this time.

I’ll try to check in and will before leaving Saturday.


I'm not going to Disney World. I am not a big believer in theme parks if you can take a boat out and fish and swim all day. Maybe when he is older.

News

Let me be the announcer here.
The Koufax awards are now open.

I don't know if anyone knows this especially you cooper because you tend not to read those award sites but Coalition for Darfur is up for an award as well; it is under blogs that deserve more recognition. I think you deserve more recognition but that is neither here nor there.
I hadn't seen this mentioned so I thought I'd mention it here.

My wife is doing fine and is hacking away at her laptop trying to catch up on her work.

Thanks for the well wishes all.

Go vote for our friends Bring it On and Courting Destiny. Courting - a real writing blog.

Crazy Weekend

I'm back for now.

My wife had an emergency appendectomy this weekend so things became a little frantic around here. She is fine and came home yesterday because they like to get people out of the hospital as soon as possible these days due to hospital aquired infections always being a concern.

The funniest thing occured on Sunday when I was driving into the hospital to see her.

I live in an area that is Republican even though in general the state is Democratic. Cooper you may recognize the state. ;)

Directly outside the hospital , right before the drive to enter there was a lone, very tall man around six foot walking back and forth along the roadway with a very large approximately five by four foot sign which read..........................> IMPEACH BUSH

I had a immediate urge to go out and hug him but I restrained myself.

After a crazy weekend it made my day.

out for two

Don't be alarmed if you get weird emails. I was emailing different people and cut and pasting email addresses which is what I usually do with mine and ended up putting others email address in for mine and mine in for others in a couple of places. I was trying to have someone email to remind me if the Koufax Awards are accepting voting and was cutting and pasting too many emails.

I'm out for a couple of days and will only have access to a computer for email but will try to get to the computer for voting so in case only the wrong people received my emails or in case you get emails from others but they seem to be from me, it's because I was cutting and pasting email addresses.

Email me over the next few days if the voting is on and I will try to get to a computer. It will be around two days without a computer after six or so this evening.

Today

I’m working from home this week but am pretty busy with not much of time for free cyberspacing.

If you pass by check out the nominations for a Koufax award for the two blogs below and then go vote for them.

Too much to do right now to write anything else.

Check out this site for the beginning of some best blog voting. The list is on the sidebar and soon voting will begin.

Two blogs I read and think highly of have been nominated.

Courting Destiny in the Best writing category and Bring it On in the best Community Blog. category.

Snow Day

I tried this before but have to do thumbnails because the regular pictures seem to cause havoc with the blog.





My drive and from my upstairs bathroom, sorry about the screen.


This stuff was heavy too, took all morning to get the drive clean.
Melted considerably by the time I took the pictures. I think we had close to a foot in some places but the roads were cleared quickly.

Snow this Weekend and the Olympics

Brown is fighting back and I'm not sure I blame him but he forgets we heard some of those tapes so I'm not sure this helps him but it sure does give us something more to think about. I don't think there are too many people out there with a funtioning brain that haven't been aware of the fact that our goernment in general and the White House in particular were largely responsible for this failure.

The warmest is 1200 years. W'eve sure been lucky this winter but it looks like, from the forecast anyway, that I will be home blowing snow this weekend.

I think I'm going go get a stockpile of food , some salt and settle down to watch the Olympics. I'm not much of a winter sports enthusiest but I do enjoy watching.

Post Superbowl Indigestion

I have let this thing go too long.

Superbowl weekend for me is usually spent with my brother and this weekend was no different. In order for this to occur one of us has to travel a significant distance and this year it was his turn so we had a houseful of people this weekend.

I don’t care that much for the game itself, most of these events are disappointing. The commercials are worth it and there is always a lot of food around. This is good because I live in a house where most of the time the frig is full of fruits, vegetables and whole grains. Junk food is allowed on Superbowl weekend and I take full advantage of this. The refs sucked in this game which does make it disconcerting. I say we have computers make the calls from here on in.

This is what happens when bad decisions are made.

I am all for freedoms of speech but you have to take potential consequences into consideration. Even twelve year olds do that.


Pepcid is a great drug by the way.