The Tillman Story

I just watched this documentary.  And if you haven't seen it you should.  It's playing on Showtime this month.  I've been alive long enough to have seen my country lie about some stuff, and give out misinformation on a lot of things.  But the Bush Administration seems to have raised the bar to a level previously unknown.

To take this brave and patriotic young man's death and lie about it and use it as propaganda is so wrong and evil that I can't even believe it.

Watch this movie, and pay attention.  Because you will catch Bill O'Riley and Anne Coulter denying the truth as they usually do, but in a special, evil way.

The East Coast Needs To Get Over Itself

Earthquake hits Washington DC!  OH, MY, GOD!  Felt all the way from Carolina to New York!  Gargoyles and spires fell off the National Cathedral, the Washington Monument has a CRACK in it!  Oh the horror, the horror!

Get the FUCK over it!  If that little, "shaker" happened in Iowa, or Colorado, or Utah, or Nevada, or as it does almost every MONTH in someplace in California, would it be the lead story on the national news?  Not only no, but HELL no!

You have to be some kind of science denier on the level of a Republican Congressman, to NOT know that the earth is still in flux, and will occasionally do something to you, that you don't expect.

Faux News actually ran a trailer assuring that there would be no Tsunami after the earthquake, on Long Island.  "Uuuuh, Bevis?  How would there be a Tsunami if the earthquake was on LAND, and not under the ocean?"

Yep, anything that happens in the Eastern Time Zone is news.  Even when it's not.  Because that's where EVERYONE lives!  Well, not, EVERYONE, but MOST of the people who live in this country live in that time zone.  Even if they don't want to.

I have a friend who works in television news in Michigan.  And he has told me that most of the folks in THAT state HATE being in the Eastern Time Zone.  They feel they have more in common with Chicago, Minneapolis and Milwaukee than New York, Washington or Miami.

Lets face it, the national news this week is going to be all about the hurricane that is about to strike fear and terror into everyone living closer to the Atlantic Ocean than West Virginia.  I'm pretty sure St. Louis doesn't give a shit.

Nor does Salt Lake City.

But if we had a 5.8 shaker here, where a million people now live in Salt Lake County, would it lead the National News?  Not only no, but FUCK NO!

Would it be too much to ask that the major networks have TWO news operations?  One for back east, and one for out west?  I know it wouldn't be based in the Mountain Time Zone.  But it would COVER the Mountain Time Zone!

Hell, this time zone now has two Major League Baseball teams!  THAT'S NOT enough to get some attention?

There will never be a show advertised as, "On at eight o'clock MOUNTAIN TIME!" in the national media.  But for crying out loud!  Can't we get SOME respect!

Say what you want about, "The Mountain" (MTN) Network, and how much they sucked.  And they did.  But at least when they announced times?  It was MOUNTAIN time!

So, to all you folks who have to clean up the pictures that fell off the wall.  And your books that fell off the shelves?  You have my sympathy.  Now, go look up the earthquake in Wells, Nevada a couple of years ago.  And tell me how bad YOU had it compared to THOSE folks.

Then shut the fuck up!  You got nothing to complain about!

Can't wait for the next big California shaker, not that I want to see one.  But just to see how the Eastern Media covers it.

Get over yourselves, Eastern Time Zone people.  You are NOT the only people in the world.

College Football Is Decedant And Depraved

OK, we're less than two weeks away from the start of the best time of the year.  College Football.  If you didn't go to college, you watch the NFL, and that's OK.  But if you DID go to college, you root for your school.

It's more important than your hometown baseball team.  It's more important than the NFL.  It trumps any PRO franchise you ever gave your heart to.  Your college football team will be what you live and die with the rest of your life.

But it's time to set the record straight about college football.  It's fixed, it's rigged, and it's all about TV money, not winning or losing, and lets not kid ourselves that these guys are, "student athletes" any more.

Ohio State has been caught cheating.  USC was caught cheating.  Auburn was caught cheating.  Boise State is going to go down in flames soon.  Miami cheats. Always has, always will.  And now?  They are doing it again?  Big surprise.  Arizona State couldn't graduate an athlete at gun point.  Who's watching?  Well, EVERYONE, but no one is doing anything about it!

USC cheated so bad they had their national championship taken from them, had to give back, Reggie Bush's Heisman Trophy (but he got to keep the Kardashian!) and they got TWO YEARS of probation in which they can't go to a Bowl Game. 

Big deal. They still get their share of the TV deal money!  They still get ranked in the AP Top 25!  Their linebacker is on the cover of the Sporting News College Football Issue this year.  They still get to sell t-shirts and tickets and recruit!  How is this a penalty?

You want to make it count?  Give em the, "Death Penalty" like they did to SMU.  Make them not be able to PLAY football for a year.  Or better yet. TWO years!  That will make a recruit think twice about going there.

And this year, when Boise State, Miami, Ohio State all get proven to have cheated?  Don't give em probation!  Give em two years without football!  THAT might make the big schools quit cheating!  But maybe not.

They can make more money winning a national championship and paying their players, like Auburn does in ONE year than they would lose in two of NOT playing.

You want to stop this?  Have a playoff.  So EVERY team, in every conference, has a shot at playing for a national championship.  This might keep some kids home in Utah, or Idaho, or other small markets, instead of having them sign their lives away for a shot at a glory with cheaters like USC or Miami.

And lets stop kidding ourselves, and pay our, "student athletes" a living wage to play for us.  The scholarship is great.  I hope my kid gets one.  But the truth is?  They don't use it.  Many, I would even say, MOST of them don't get a degree.

Luther Ellis was the best defensive lineman to ever play at Utah.  We got to know him and his wife, Rebbecca while they were students at the, "U".  Luther was a first round draft choice in the NFL.  He earned about $20 Million in his NFL career.  He and, Rebbecca adopted six kids and had six of their own while he was playing.  He had a huge house in Deer Valley and one in Michigan.

Now?  He has no college degree.  He has no money, and he's living in a borrowed house in Salt Lake while trying to finish his degree so he can get a college coaching job.  Did we really do him any favors?  Shouldn't we have done a better job of making sure he actually earned a degree when we gave him a scholarship?  I think so.

Just thinking out loud.

Bladder Cancer Part Deaux. You Have NO Idea...

OK, again with the warning.  DON'T read this if you are easily offended.  I am going to discuss medical issues here, in the hope that any friends I have who are men my age, or women who LOVE men my age, will learn something.  This information might save you life.  But if might also offend you if you can't take frank talk about medical issues and body parts.  And blood.  And Urine.  And the word Penis. 

So this is your last chance.  If you don't want to read this stuff, I understand.  I'm not offended.  Please, feel free to tune out.  But I'm about to get graphic here.  YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED!

I'm only going to mention this in passing, because it's not really important except to explain that I was a miserable bastard when Wednesday morning rolled around.  I had an outbreak of gout in my right foot on Tuesday, and could hardly walk by Wednesday morning.  I had to be brought into same day surgery in a wheel chair.  That being said.  I got there about ten o'clock in the morning.

The nurse was great, even checked and found out she could give me pain meds for the gout, put my foot up in the bed and made me comfortable to await my surgery.

Of course, they were running behind, so I had to sit there for hours.

When I finally did get to go upstairs to the operating room, I had been told what to expect.  They would use a scope to go into my bladder through my penis and take out any tumors they found.  I would be under full anesthesia, out cold.  And on top to that, the anesthesiologist said he would shoot me full of some super, "Advil" like drug that would deal with the gout.  Yee ha!

I don't remember going out.  But I will never forget waking up in the recovery room.

"OUCH!  I HAVE TO PEE SO BAD!  GET ME TO THE BATHROOM!"  Nope, I don't.  It's the catheter inside me.  I couldn't pee if I WANTED to.  And believe me, I WANTED TO!  I have never felt a pain like this in my life.

Shortly, this comes out and I'm on my way to getting out of the hospital.  But, I have to prove to them I CAN pee.  OK, been waiting for this, steer me to the bathroom.  Nothing but blood coming out of me.  That counts, so they send me home.  But they didn't warn me about some stuff, so I will warn YOU!

Just because blood, and I'm assuming some urine, slowly comes out of you while you are still under the influence of drugs, in the hospital, does NOT mean that it will be this way when you get home.  As a matter of fact, I'm here to tell you, that it does nothing but lull you into a false sense of control.  You BELIEVE that when you get home, you will be able to point your penis toward the toilet, and pee into it.

And you will be wrong.

Because when the pee finally escapes from your penis, you will have NO control over where it goes!  It is like shooting a sawed off shotgun into your bathroom in the general direction of your toilet.  Keep in mind, that the pee coming out of you is backed up by all the gas they pumped into your bladder to keep it inflated so they could look at what they are doing while they are in there.  Your piss now has, "a muzzle velocity".

By the time I was through relieving myself, my bathroom looked like a scene from, "CSI: Miami".  There was, "blood splatter" from floor to ceiling.  I think there was even blood on the shower curtain BEHIND me!  I have no idea how.

I decided that I would, sit to pee for the next day or two.  Doesn't help.  You can't really get it all out that way, and it still has a muzzle velocity, so it shoots out of the toilet and all over the room through the crack between the toilet seat and the commode.  Like machine gun spray from a German pill box.  It covers the whole bathroom at knee level.

After going through a whole roll of paper towels and a bottle of 409, I told my wife I would just be peeing in the back yard for the next few days.  After all, I have a six foot fence and no neighbors with second story windows.  So, as they teach in the Police Academy, I have a, "reasonable expectation of privacy in my curtiliage".  Meaning that no one could legally use a periscope or ladder to look over the fence and accuse me of indecent exposure.  And I wouldn't have to mess up the bathroom.  This would suck in the winter, but this time of year?  Not so much.

And even when you are not peeing?  You're bleeding.  Yeah, guys, you will have to borrow a, "pad" from your wife or daughter and stick it inside you underwear, or you are going to leave a mark on your couch.

Cancer is not for the weak.

The day after?  Not much better.  Because now, you've been on pain medicine for a few days, and you're so constipated you can't stand it.  And the general anesthesia is starting to raise through your body and settle in your big muscles around your abdomen.  So when you laugh at something funny on TV?  It hurts like someone punched you in the ribs.

You think I'm kidding because you've never experienced this?  Ask the woman in you life how it feels the day after she's had a pelvic and that gas starts to move up.  She'll clue you in.

By Thursday night, I couldn't wait to go to bed.  I took a sleeping pill and was in bed by 10:30.

Friday morning, I was awakened by a call from my doctor.  Yep, it's cancer.  The worst kind of the best kind.  It's not in the bladder wall (good) but it's pretty bad (bad).  But, they think they got it all (good), yet just to be sure, they want me to go through all this again in a month so they can put in more chemotherapy at the spots they took the FOUR tumors out of (bad).

He originally thought I had TWO tumors.  I guess I should be glad he FOUND all of them.

The best part about it, is that after the treatment next month, I don't have to go back for a year, and he thinks that we caught this in time and I'll be fine (good).

I think I told you that the leading causes of this kind of cancer are smoking and exposure to chemicals at work?  Well, I smoked for 25 years (even though I quit in 2002) and spent most of the 90's standing in meth labs, so I meet all the above qualifications.  That being said.  I still smoke two cigars a week.  One on Friday afternoon, and one on Sunday afternoon.

My wife told my best friend I had to give up cigars because of this, so he shows up today without a cigar for, "Dog Day Friday".  WTF?  All things considered?  I don't think my two cigars a week are the problem here.

So, guys if you wake up and piss blood?  And your job does NOT involve getting punched in the kidneys all the time, see a doctor.  The treatment sucks ass.  It's the worst thing you will ever have to deal with. 

Right up until you die an awful, slow, death from bladder cancer.   Get it?

Nice Day After A Bad Week.

I love Sundays.  Since I gave up on religion and the NFL, it's the one day when I can pretty much do whatever I want.  My son is usually so worn out from soccer the day before, he sleeps late and crawls into the, "Man Cave" that he's created in the basement and plays video games on line with is buddies.

It's the day my wife likes to go to the mall or the spa for a massage, and my daughter is more than happy to take her.

When the weather is nice, I can take the Camaro out for a drive, listen to, Sunday Sagebrush Serenade on KRCL (which today was AWFUL!  Phil wasn't there, and who ever was doing the show turned it into, The Radical, Feminist, Lesbian, Girl Singer Show!  Look, I like, K.D. Lang A LOT!  I'm totally Gay supportive, I AM a feminist!  But I don't tune into this show to hear Stevie Wonder, and the chick with the nose ring who wants to know, "What If God Was One Of Us"? and ten other female singers I have never heard of.  I tune in for Robert Earl Keen and Nancy Griffith!  So get with it!).  When it's bad, I can sit in front of the fire and read the Trib.

Lately, meaning since I built the, "garage ma-haul" a few years ago, Sunday has turned into a second, "Dog Day".  The boys come over, bring the dogs, and we smoke cigars in the back yard when it's warm, and in the garage when it's cold.

But today, I was on my own.  The, "usual suspects" were scattered to the wind.  Golf, boats, family trips to Huntsville.  Danny is in Las Vegas.  Meagan took Deb to go shopping.  I told them that whatever they wanted me to burn on the Weber, I would.  As long as I didn't have to go buy it.

Funny story about Danny and Las Vegas.  He's down there with his friend, Andrew Ho.  The Ho family is Chinese.  Hence the name, Ho.  They asked Danny to go with them as they are meeting some family who lives in California there and spending a few days just enjoying the sun, and goofing off.  He's part of the Ho family for the next four days.

None of the guys on the soccer team call Andrew, Andrew.  They all call him, Ho.  So, for the next four days, my son is a Vegas Ho.  Insert rim shot here.

So, I went out in the back yard in the best home town in the whole world, set up my satellite radio, put my feet up and spent the afternoon listening to, Radio Margaritaville, enjoying good whiskey, a good cigar and the company of my dog, while watching the birds clean out my feeder.

Just me, Jimmy Buffett, an 11 year old Black Lab, the finches, the Red Winged Blackbirds and my own thoughts.  You could do worse.

The Tinder Box got in a new cigar this week.  And I'm here to tell you that a, G.R. Trabacalares Unides Gran Habano, Corojo #5 from Honduras in what I guess to be a Gran Corona or smaller Churchill size, is a great smoke and it WILL last THREE HOURS!  Three hour cigars are rare, indeed.

At the end of the day, I grilled some steaks and it was a good day.  Sometimes, you just need to have a day to do nothing.  And today?  I did.

Well, I DIDN'T see THAT coming!

WARNING:  I'm going to talk openly and honestly about a medical condition I have just experienced and it's not pretty.  It involves talk about urine and other things and it's not for the faint of heart.

I don't do this to shock, or push the limits of what I can get away with in a blog or on FB, I do this to hopefully make more men my age aware of what you might be up against, and hope you will do something about it.  Please take my advice if you're a man my age, or you love one who is.

If I have written blogs in the past that pissed you off (no pun intended), or goaded you about your politics or religion, I make no apologies.  I meant what I said.  But tonight?  I'm all serious and I want to save you some grief.  Even if you're a Republican.

So, here goes.  This is your last chance to pull out and not read this.  You have been warned.

About a month ago, one morning after playing golf, I woke up and pissed blood.  Not a lot, but a little.  You're urine, if things are all good and you're not an NFL football player, professional boxer or MMA fighter, shouldn't include your blood.

And I had a dull ache in my gut.  Between the stomach and the part all us guys care so much about.  And I hadn't been kicked there.

I thought this would go away.  But over the weekend it didn't change much, and sometimes, there was more blood.  Sometimes, there was a LOT of blood.

My first thought was that I had a hernia.  And somehow, it was causing me to piss blood.  But I hadn't lifted anything heavy for a while.  And the only thing even remotely athletic I had done was play golf and smoke cigars with, "The Murray Boys".  But, I just had a feeling that this was something that was NOT going to be cured by a pill.  So I called my doctor.

My doctor is not a doctor.  I know what you're thinking.  I go to some quack chiropractor or, "Holistic" nut ball.  No, it's not like that.  I have been going to the same doctors office for 27 years.  I like the, Nurse Practitioner, Sharon.  She's not pretentious, she gets right to the point, and 99 times out of a hundred, I'm just in there for a sore throat or to get my allergy medicine renewed.  I trust her, she's a great person and that's what I want in a, "doctor".

When I told her my problem, she had me give a urine sample and told me, in no uncertain terms, that I needed to go to a Urologist, and if they didn't get me in that week, I should call her back.  She agreed, this is NOT something we can cure with a pill.

So, I go to the Urologist that week.  Feeling, prodding, more urine samples.  Still feels like I have a hernia to me.  But the follow up phone call is not so reassuring.

"There are some foreign cells in your urine sample, but it's NOT CANCER!  But we need to schedule you for a CAT Scan."  OK.  As long as it's not cancer, for crying out loud.

Last week, CAT Scan.  Results?  "There is a, Mass in your bladder.  We need to do a scope".  OK, I'm all over that.  I want to get better.

I had only HOPED that when he mentioned a bladder scope, it didn't involve putting a scope, I don't care HOW small, up where I knew it had to go, to get to my bladder.  No, no it didn't matter what I hoped.  It was going to happen.

I will say this about that.  The only OTHER time something had been put up there was about 35 years ago and  involved a public health nurse with a Q-tip, and NO lube telling me that no, I did NOT have Gonorrhea, but my current girlfriend had given me a yeast infection and the pills prescribed would stop the burning feeling in about a week.  And THAT hurt for DAYS.

Guys, this is NOT a pleasant experience.  Even when the doctor shoots your unit full of Novocaine, THAT hurts.  And when he puts the scope up there, after the Novocaine, THAT still hurts!

On the bright side, even though it feels like forever?  It only lasts a couple of minutes.  Maybe less than one minute, because your bladder is pretty small, so it doesn't take long to take in the whole thing.  Even on CCTV.

Well, if you're 50 and you're smart, you've had your first colonoscopy.  And in that case, the day before where you can't eat and have to take a ton of laxatives is the HARD part of that procedure.  Because before they shove that thing up your ass, they knock you out.  Totally out.  And an hour afterward?  You can have lunch.

And they can also tell you shit like, "We found some polyps, and we took them out and we will have them biopsied and get back to you."  Great.

First time I did THAT, I got told to get back in in a year.  Second year?  Not Cancer, come back in three years.

With your bladder?  Not so much.  About the time the Doc took the scope out, he said, "Well, it's cancer.  You have two tumors.  And there are two types of bladder cancer.  One means we snip off the tumors and most of the time, that's it.  We monitor you once a year for three years, and once every two years for four years, and then once every three years and you're fine.  But the other kind is very aggressive and you will need to go on chemo therapy right away.  Full cancer treatment."

Well?  Which is it?  In YOUR professional opinion?  He says MOST of the time, it's option one.

Not saying what he saw INSIDE ME is looking either way, just sayin...

So now, I'm going to have a laporoscopy surgery next Wednesday.  And when they pull it all out of me, they will have it tested, and by Friday, they hope, they will tell me if I'm sick, or REALLY sick!

I'm glad I an afford insurance.  It's meant since my retirement insurance ran out, that I have to pay for it myself, and, "The Blind Lady" doesn't get to travel any more, but at least we won't go broke if I have cancer.  Great plan we have in this country huh?  If we lived in, Canada, Germany, England, France, Sweden, Finland, Norway, Greenland, Brazil, Mexico.... it wouldn't be a problem.

Socialism sucks SO much.  Until you get Medicare or Medicaid.  Teabaggers?  YOU SUCK!

So guys, if you're otherwise healthy, and you have to help your neighbor bail his driveway out because Salt Lake County didn't repair a storm drain in time, and when you're done, you piss blood?  Go see a doctor.

If you can afford it.  If you can't?  Quit voting for Republicans.  They don't want us to have a national health care program.

Just sayin...

New Record! Tossed From A Soccer Game In The FIRST Half!

The boys in the home colors had a bad week.  The Orange and Black lost 6-1 to a team they beat in May on Thursday night.  Lost yesterday morning by a goal, game started at 0830 hours, and this morning?  Had to be in Park City at 0700, because the game started at 0800!  That's awful.

Today's game didn't start well.  About a half hour in, the side judge (or as they call him now, AR, Assistant Referee) blew a call so bad, it should go down in history as the example of a guy not paying attention.  Three guys are behind our defense as the ball goes over their heads, and one of their guys goes in completely alone, and scores.  How could he not?

I was sitting on the other half of the field, and I could see it.  It was so bad, DEB could SEE it!  Kidding, she couldn't see it, I'm just making a point.

The coaches go nuts, and rightly so.  The other parents are really letting the ref have it.

I kept my mouth shut, and I'm going to tell you why.

I learned years ago, that if someone on OUR sideline says anything to a ref?  He's going to think it's me.  Even when it isn't.  I'm about 300 pounds, almost six feet tall, still have the, "shock" of an Afro I wore when we were in high school, but now it's white and since I'm no longer in law enforcement, I tend to let it get long, and wearing a bright ORANGE, Murray Max t-shirt or sweatshirt.  I'm easy to see.  You can find me on Google Earth.  So even if I don't say shit, I get accused of saying it anyway.

So, I try to limit my yelling to things like, "Good hustle, Murray", "Way to go, Trenton", "Shoot, Danny!"

But this morning?  Well, lets just say I can see where this is going.  The ref is getting all over Frank and Andy, and it's real apparent to me after all my time in the, "reading people so I can kill them before they kill me first" business, that this guy is looking for any excuse to throw one of them out.

He knows his linesman blew the call.  Knows it with all his heart, but can't, "man up" and admit it, or overrule the linesman, so he has to find a reason to throw SOMEONE out of the game, so everyone will shut up and quit reminding him of it. 

This is where I decide to step in.

After he comes over and yells at the coach's to keep quiet, the other parents are still letting him have it.  So, he turns around, comes back to our sideline, and lets go with, "Coach, if you can't control your parents, I'm going to give you a Red Card!"

Oh, he's REALLY reaching now, because no one has sworn at him, called him a name, or otherwise been abusive, they've just been asking why the offside call WASN'T made?  They aren't impugning his integrity, they are asking for an explanation.

Like I said, I can see where this is going.  So as soon as he threatened to throw out a coach, I looked at, Deb and told her, "I'm going to take the hit for this one today."  She knew what I meant, and didn't even TRY to dissuade me from doing it.  She knew that as soon as I gave him a reason to throw ME out, he'd lay off the coaches.

"How can you hold the coach responsible for his parents behavior?  You're responsible for you Linesman and he just screwed up BIG TIME!  Why aren't YOU getting thrown out of the game?!"

That bomb had a laser sight on it.  "You're out of here!", he bellowed.

"You can't throw me out!  I'm leaving, because I can't stand to watch YOU work!"  And I left.

Mission accomplished.  He left the coaches alone the rest of the game.  I watched it from the parking lot.  My son had four shots on goal, and I wish he'd have scored, but it was not to be.  And the Murray boys dropped a third one in a row.  By ONE goal.  Wonder which one?

I won't repeat my words to the linesman who blew the call when I was on my way out, but I will say that I questioned his sobriety this morning and the night before and, a suggested that he was not worthy of working kids sports.  My observations were deemed appropriate by a parent of a guest player we had, who I don't know, who told me my observations were not only correct, but appropriately expressed.  Made me feel better.

But that's not all.  I was far enough away in the parking lot up the hill, watching the game, that I couldn't hear much of what was going on, except for, Coach Andy's occasional cry of, "COME ON!" after a, "no call" foul on one of our guys.  But it was told to me later, that the next team to play on that field was watching while warming up.  And they told the ref they would refuse to play, if the linesman who blew the call against our kids was allowed to work the game.

I guess they shifted him to some other field so the game could go on.

I'm not always right, and I don't always do the right thing.  But I refuse to see my kid, and his buddies get screwed by incompetent, lazy, jerk offs taking a pay day for sort of paying attention to a kids game.  If the boys take the game as seriously as they do and you want to ref it?  You should too.

And if you don't?  Well, I probably won't shoot you.  But I will verbally kick your ass.

New Broker

I have a new Broker to manage my accounts at Schwab.  Same guy in SLC, but the heavy lifting is done at the Phoenix office.  "Met" him today, on a conference call.  He's been in the business for 17 years, assures me that they can keep me wealthy, and I won't have to sell the Camaro.

And he went to Arizona and not, Arizona State.  Thank God for that.  They are SO much smarter in Tucson than Tempe.

But this is the third change in my account since 2005.  Is the financial business THIS unstable everywhere?  Or just here in SLC?

I'm asking.  I didn't have any money to manage until my dad got sick in 2005, and then I had to take care of HIM!  With HIS money.

Then it was managing the portfolio to take care of him, at about $5K a month for the next 20 years.  With assisted living, medicines, it was pretty close to $5K a month.

Then, less than a year an a half later?  He died.  Cancer can screw with you, despite the best care you can afford, and he had THAT for sure.

Then, being an only child, I had some money, could afford to retire from the State, had five years of paid health insurance for the WHOLE family (not quite as good as Chris Buttars LIFETIME paid PEHP, which I was PROMISED when I took the state job.  And he only had to work part time, for ten years to get HIS) so we did what we should have done.  Traveled as much as we could, while Deb could still see a little.

She saw Paris, London, Athens, and tons of places in the Caribbean MANY times.

Now?  It's hard to travel with her, and it's hard for her to travel.  And we have to pay for our own health insurance.  Because this country, unlike every, other, industrialized, nation, in, the, world, doesn't, have, a, national, health, care, program, and, it's, why, we, no, longer, have, a, middle, class, or, a, manufacturing, industry.

So, we've made some changes.  Won't go outside the country for travel more than once, if that, a year.  Keeping the Camaro, but no more cruises for a while.

We had a really good run.  It was awesome!  Now?  We'll enjoy the memories while enjoying the fact that we can afford health insurance.

They Don't Make It Easy To, "Unmonitize". And They Still Owe Me Money

Took me an hour to take all the, "Mormon" ads off my blog tonight.  To, "Un-monetize".  Did it months ago and they haven't sent me a check yet.  When I signed out, they owe me $1.22.  Not worth it.

I don't want anyone advertising on my blog anymore.  I want people who read it to read it because they think I speak the truth to them.  If not the truth, than SOMETHING to them.

But I will tell you this.  I only publish truth.  I will never tell a lie.  And if I kid you?  You'll know about it.

Truth:  Of the 9+ Million votes cast in the last Presidential election in Ohio, 4 were found to be fraudulent.

Not 4%, not 400.  FOUR!  But the right wing nuts in this country want you to believe that voter fraud is rampant in this country, and that Obama was elected because, "Community Activists" like, ACORN were handing out packs of cigarettes to homeless people to vote under someone else's name.

It's bullshit, but if you have to have a drivers license to vote?  You cut out old people, young people, poor people, minority people who all happen to vote for Democrats!  Jim Crow?  Meet Voter ID laws sponsored by Republicans!

So, if I take their money, which I plan to sue for.  All $1.22 of it, just because I can.  I'm only feeding their bullshit.  Won't do it any more.

And if any ads show up on my blog site anymore?  They are NOT supposed to be there.  I signed out.  So please, click on them a LOT!  They will have to pay, and I'll give the next $1.22 to the Democrats!

Letter To The Editor. Mostly Positive, Some Really Silly.

Flags On The 24th.  That was what the Trib titled my letter to the editor that appeared in this morning's paper.  I got a couple of positive feedback's on FB from folks who, "got it".  No negatives.

But go to the Trib's web site, go to, Opinion then, Letters, and read the comments.  Wow.

They were mostly positive.  MOST people who bother to read the letters section in the local paper are well educated, and want to be informed.  They get it.  They knew that I wasn't hating America, or Mormons, or, Pioneer Day.

Just pointing out the fact that the biggest holiday in UTAH, is associated with a MORMON event which commemorates the Mormons fleeing the United States to illegally enter, what at the time, was Mexico.  And now, most of them would kill to keep Mexicans out of THEIR state.

And on top of it, they have the local Boy Scouts, sponsored in the most part, by Mormon congregations, put AMERICAN flags in front of their houses to commemorate this, and it's NOT an AMERICAN holiday.  It's a MORMON holiday.  You could stretch it just a bit and call it a UTAH holiday, but my family came over the plains on United Airlines in the 60's.  1960's.  No one I knew until I got married to a Mormon from California, had THAT history.  So it's not really MY holiday.

I think that's hilarious!  The irony just drips off this!  Most people got it.  But not all.

One woman in Utah County declared that she was glad I didn't live in HER Spanish Fork neighborhood!  I must hate seeing the American flag!  Because she puts one up every day and no one complains.

Please.  You could put up a burning Klan cross in Utah County and if you put a picture of Obama on it, no would complain about that, either.

She suggested that I was inferring that Mormons in Utah should fly the Mexican flag since they came there/here/whatever, I really couldn't figure it out.

The next commenter, obviously from Utah County, too, said, "Was he saying we should fly the Mexican flag?"

Yep, that's exactly what I meant.  I know they don't allow books in Utah County, but if you can find a Dictionary?  Look up sarcasm, and irony.

But a day apart.  I don't want your head to explode.

So, I had a little fun with them.  I thought I could get in there as, "exPO" which I signed into their new web site as, but no.  They had me listed as my alter ego.   The Gonzo PO.  After jumping through some hoops, I got to go in and comment.

I think I nailed it.  And if I didn't, and they think my attempt at humor/sarcasm/irony is a personal assault?  Fuck em.  They don't get it.  Never will.

These people, and I'm surprised that they read the Trib, frankly, are the same dummies who make $10 and hour, have no health insurance, and still vote for Republicans.  Because they still believe the bullshit line that if we DON'T tax the rich, the money will trickle down to them.  That Democrats want to take their guns.  And that the Republicans have ANY intention of trying to abolish abortion.

No, no they don't.  They could have at any point the last 35 years if they really wanted to.  But they need you to think they are still in the fight to do so, so you will keep voting for them, and giving them your money.

So, if you hated my letter?  You have no sense of humor or irony.  Or you're just dumb.

If you liked it?  Thank you.  You get it.