NO-IDEA

Pluto Is No Longer A Planet....

2006-08-24T22:51:00.000-07:00

Borrowed from AP:

PRAGUE, Czech Republic - Pluto, beloved by some as a cosmic underdog but scorned by astronomers who considered it too dinky and distant, was unceremoniously stripped of its status as a planet Thursday.

The International Astronomical Union, dramatically reversing course just a week after floating the idea of reaffirming Pluto's planethood and adding three new planets to Earth's neighborhood, downgraded the ninth rock from the sun in historic new galactic guidelines.

The shift will have the world's teachers scrambling to alter lesson plans just as schools open for the fall term.
"It will all take some explanation, but it is really just a reclassification and I can't see that it will cause any problems," said Neil Crumpton, who teaches science at a high school north of London. "Science is an evolving subject and always will be."

Powerful new telescopes, experts said, are changing the way they size up the mysteries of the solar system and beyond. But the scientists at the conference showed a soft side, waving plush toys of the Walt Disney character Pluto the dog — and insisting that Pluto's spirit will live on in the exciting discoveries yet to come.
"The word 'planet' and the idea of planets can be emotional because they're something we learn as children," said Richard Binzel, a professor of planetary science at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who helped hammer out the new definition.

"This is really all about science, which is all about getting new facts," he said. "Science has marched on. ... Many more Plutos wait to be discovered."

Pluto, a planet since 1930, got the boot because it didn't meet the new rules, which say a planet not only must orbit the sun and be large enough to assume a nearly round shape, but must "clear the neighborhood around its orbit." That disqualifies Pluto, whose oblong orbit overlaps Neptune's, downsizing the solar system to eight planets from the traditional nine.

Astronomers have labored without a universal definition of a planet since well before the time of Copernicus, who proved that the Earth revolves around the sun, and the experts gathered in Prague burst into applause when the guidelines were passed.

Predictably, Pluto's demotion provoked plenty of wistful nostalgia.

"It's disappointing in a way, and confusing," said Patricia Tombaugh, the 93-year-old widow of Pluto discoverer Clyde Tombaugh.
"I don't know just how you handle it. It kind of sounds like I just lost my job," she said from Las Cruces, N.M. "But I understand science is not something that just sits there. It goes on. Clyde finally said before he died, 'It's there. Whatever it is. It is there.'"

The decision by the IAU, the official arbiter of heavenly objects, restricts membership in the elite cosmic club to the eight classical planets: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune.
Pluto and objects like it will be known as "dwarf planets," which raised some thorny questions about semantics:

If a raincoat is still a coat, and a cell phone is still a phone, why isn't a dwarf planet still a planet?

NASA said Pluto's downgrade would not affect its $700 million New Horizons spacecraft mission, which this year began a 9 1/2-year journey to the oddball object to unearth more of its secrets.
But mission head Alan Stern said he was "embarrassed" by Pluto's undoing and predicted that Thursday's vote would not end the debate. Although 2,500 astronomers from 75 nations attended the conference, only about 300 showed up to vote.

"It's a sloppy definition. It's bad science," he said. "It ain't over."

Under the new rules, two of the three objects that came tantalizingly close to planethood will join Pluto as dwarfs: the asteroid Ceres, which was a planet in the 1800s before it got demoted, and 2003 UB313, an icy object slightly larger than Pluto whose discoverer, Michael Brown of the California Institute of Technology, has nicknamed "Xena." The third object, Pluto's largest moon, Charon, isn't in line for any special designation.
Brown, whose Xena find rekindled calls for Pluto's demise because it showed it isn't nearly as unique as it once seemed, waxed philosophical.

"Eight is enough," he said, jokingly adding: "I may go down in history as the guy who killed Pluto."
Demoting the icy orb named for the Roman god of the underworld isn't personal — it's just business — said Jack Horkheimer, director of the Miami Space Transit Planetarium and host of the PBS show "Star Gazer."
"It's like an amicable divorce," he said. "The legal status has changed but the person really hasn't. It's just single again."

Winning Contests, New Jobs, Sex With Old Lovers

2006-06-19T13:51:00.000-07:00

Just an update here, in no particular order...

I dropped my name into a contest basket @ Pier 1 a couple of weeks ago, and I WON! I got very nice basket, packed nicely with a pale olive green paper, and it had a big candle, bath salts and bath flowers. Very nice!

I went to the Farmer's Market yesterday, dropped my name into a contest basket for local farmer's products, and... I WON! It's FILLED to the bursting with beautiful local produce such as collards, lettuce, squash, zucchini, garlic, leeks, tomatoes, and more!

I've been working at a fabulous local restaurant that serves beer and wine for a couple of months as the bartender two days a week. I don't make enough to pay my bills, but I'm not taking spending money out of the bank AT ALL. I am so happy, ecstatic, content, I cannot begin to explain.

I have responsibilities, I am doing a great job, and I have NO STRESS. No stupid, pointless, music business joke of a job.

Not quite 30 years ago, a friend of a friend moved to L.A. from Austin to start a new career, and he lived with me for a short time. We had talked on the phone, and decided, why not? he showed up on my doorstep, 22 years old, very sure of himself, and adorable. We had a great time together.

He came through town this past week with his band, and he looks fantastic, and is still the same wonderful guy. We hadn't seen or talked to each other since 1996. He was as pleased to see me as I was to see him, and, well, ya know...

He remembered stuff I had thought I'd forgotten from when we were together - very flattering, I must say.

Let me tell ya - I feel very positive about myself after that one night - I hadn't realised that I was feeling sort of asexual, but, now I feel attractive and sexual and confident again. I know this is what happens, but I had forgetten.

It's basically pheromones - if there is a long time one goes without sex (I was at 5 months here), I believe you stop emitting the pheromones that we all emit in order to attract someone. And, consequently, there is a tendency to stop feeling sexual that accompanies this. BUT - as soon as you DO have sex, all the feelings of confidence come back, and you become a more sexual being again. It's quite obvious to my friends that SOMETHING happened to me this weekend, just from my change in attitude.

I have adopted a mother cat, found under a house being rehabbed. She purrs, she likes to sleep on my chest, she has been here a week, and she is still peeing on the furniture. We're working on it.

I could bathe a million times a day in this heat, and still sweat all day long. Yah, yah, I know it's great for my skin...

My Mexico Vacation, Or, The Government Didn't Like My Passport Photo

2006-04-30T21:09:00.000-07:00

So, I have this timeshare in Playa del Carmen, which is 40 miles south of Cancun, on the Eastern side of Mexico.
Well, Katrina cancelled last year's trip as they had to repair the damage, so, I traded my week for a week in Puerto Vallarta, on the Western side of Mexico, and
my best friend, Pam, and I went for the third week in April of this year.

And, of course, I took a gazillion pictures, so this blog will be ongoing, as I continue to upload pix for a while.
Now, I've been travelling internationally for many many years, so I know how it goes.

However - I have been trying to get Unemployment, and one of the things I had to do was to register,

which meant I had to show them documents, one of which was my Passport.

Well, let me tell ya, it sure was fortunate that I'm trying to get unemployment, because if I hadn't, I wouldn't have realised that my Passport had EXPIRED until I got to the airport! Fortunately, I saw that it was expired a week before I was to depart, so I went and got the info from the Passport office as to what I had to do to expedite getting it.

I had to send 2 photos, some paperwork, etc. and spend around $200 to get it done in 2 weeks (it usually takes 6) , so I fedexed it all to this company in Texas who would take care of it.

Well.

They called me the beginning of the week I needed it, to tell me that the Passport Office had

REJECTED MY PHOTOS.

They weren't clear, and the background had to be white.

So, I retook them (here @ home), again, in front

of a white door.

THEY REJECTED THEM AGAIN.

They didn't like the background being a door, no matter what colour it

was, and they still didn't

like the photos.

So, passport-wise,

I was screwed.

My next option was to use a birth certificate, so, I dug thru all my documents, and found the birth certificate my mom gave me from the hospital where I was born. It had a nun's signature

as well as my little baby

foot prints in ink.

So, I arrive at the airport, ready to get my

boarding pass, and, they ask me for my passport. I tell them I don't have one, and they ask for my birth

certificate, which I give them.

'This isn't a birth certificate," the

agent says.

"Yes, it is - look, it says birth certificate, right here, at the top." I say.

"No, this is only the keepsake they give out at the hospital," he replies. "Do

you have a Voter Registration card , perhaps?"

'Sure, I do, but I didn't bring it with me to go to Mexico with!", I reply, getting PRETTY FUCKING WORRIED.

'Can you go home and get it?", he asks.

Now, I had just been dropped off by my friend Theresa,

who is house/dog/cat/car sitting,

and is on her way back to my house, and IF I had brought my cellphone, I could have called her, and MAYBE

she might have been able to get to my house, find the voter registration card, and POSSIBLY get back to the airport in time, BUT,

without calling her immediately,

which I couldn't do (no cellphone, as I mentioned), well, I was basically fucked.

ALL WAS NOT LOST. In the end, the agent got another agent, who was also a Notary, to fill out a paper that said I was cleared based on my birth certificate.

That's how the vacation started.

TO BE CONTINUED

John Lennon Is Rolling In His Grave....

2006-03-14T12:07:00.000-08:00

Geez, what some people will do for ratings (and dosh...):

(My friend Bruce says:)

" Oh man, let's get reeaalll GONE this time! Now, THESE are the people who NEED to get a life!!!!!

Is there no end??
Imagine if he was contacted.

Instead of ectoplasm, he'd just piss on everyone present, and rightly so!"

A Séance to Contact John Lennon

"The Spirit of John Lennon": 90 Minute Pay Per View Special To Debut April 24th

World Renowned Psychics Will Conduct Séance To Contact Music Legend
on iN DEMAND

Los Angeles (March 13, 2006)--On April 24, 2006, an historic event will unfold on iN DEMAND Pay-Per-View television as famed psychics around the world conduct a séance to contact John Lennon. (I doubt he'll want to be bothered...)

John Lennon was one of the most important musical talents of our time, but he was tragically taken from us much too soon. Now, an event will take place that will perhaps allow the world to

once again be touched by his genius.
Renowned psychics will travel to various sites significant to the former Beatle. Outside the Dakota building in New York, in the shadow of the Capitol Records Building in Los Angeles, and in the town in India where Lennon pursued his spiritual retreat,

(Didn't the 'spiritual retreats' end up being lots of drugs and the 'spiritual leader' hitting on Beatle wives and girlfriends?) psychics will use their exceptional talents to contact him for the first time.
In India, a spirit reader at an ashram believes he will be able to contact John Lennon to receive musical notes and lyrics from the other side. (Aaaaaauuuuggggghhhhh!) If successful, these notations will be flown to Los Angeles, where a composer will arrange the notes, add vocals and backgrounds to produce a new song. Could the results be a last musical legacy from beyond? (Oh, Lord, save us from these people...)
In New York, a psychic will not only visit the Dakota, but will also spend time at the Strawberry Fields memorial in Central Park, where he believes he will make contact with the spirit of John Lennon.
The special will culminate as psychics, colleagues and confidantes sit at a séance table for what promises to be the most incredible 30 minutes of psychic contact ever recorded. State of the art infra-red cameras will be in place for the entire séance, providing the ability to capture any presence or spirit that enters the room.
During the special, music professionals and individuals who worked with John Lennon will be used to verify whether they believe contact was made.
"The Spirit of John Lennon" promises to be one of the most riveting and controversial specials of the year.

The Spirit of John Lennon is being done without the knowledge or consent of John Lennon's Estate.

(No shit, Sherlock.)

More Government Garbage - U.S. Reclassifies Many Documents in Secret Review

2006-02-23T21:20:00.000-08:00

In a seven-year-old secret program at the National Archives, intelligence agencies have been removing from public access thousands of historical documents that were available for years, including some already published by the State Department and others photocopied years ago by private historians.

The restoration of classified documents was because the Central Intelligence Agency and five other agencies objected to what they saw as a hasty release of sensitive informationatus to more than 55,000 previously declassified pages began in 1999, when after a 1995 declassification order signed by President Bill Clinton.

It accelerated after the Bush administration took office and especially after the 2001 terrorist attacks, according to archives records.

"If those sample records were removed because somebody thought they were classified, I'm shocked and disappointed," Mr. Leonard said in an interview. "It just boggles the mind."

If Mr. Leonard finds that documents are being wrongly reclassified, his office could not unilaterally release them. But as the chief adviser to the White House on classification, he could urge a reversal or a revision of the reclassification program. A group of historians, including representatives of the National Coalition for History and the Society of Historians of American Foreign Relations, wrote to Mr. Leonard on Friday to express concern about the reclassification program, which they believe has blocked access to some material at the presidential libraries as well as at the archives.

Among the 50 withdrawn documents that Mr. Aid found in his own files is a 1948 memorandum on a C.I.A. scheme to float balloons over countries behind the Iron Curtain and drop propaganda leaflets. It was reclassified in 2001 even though it had been published by the State Department in 1996.

Another historian, William Burr, found a dozen documents he had copied years ago whose reclassification he considers "silly," including a 1962 telegram from George F. Kennan, then ambassador to Yugoslavia, containing an English translation of a Belgrade newspaper article on China's nuclear weapons program.

Under existing guidelines, government documents are supposed to be declassified after 25 years unless there is particular reason to keep them secret. While some of the choices made by the security reviewers at the archives are baffling, others seem guided by an old bureaucratic reflex: to cover up embarrassments even if they occurred a half-century ago.

One reclassified document in Mr. Aid's files, for instance, gives the C.I.A.'s assessment on Oct. 12, 1950, that Chinese intervention in the Korean War was "not probable in 1950." Just two weeks later, on Oct. 27, some 300,000 Chinese troops crossed into Korea.

Mr. Aid said he believed that because of the reclassification program, some of the contents of his 22 file cabinets might technically place him in violation of the Espionage Act, a circumstance that could be shared by scores of other historians. But no effort has been made to retrieve copies of reclassified documents, and it is not clear how they all could even be located.

"It doesn't make sense to create a category of documents that are classified but that everyone already has," said Meredith Fuchs, general counsel of the National Security Archive, a research group at George Washington University. These documents were on open shelves for years."

The program's critics do not question the notion that wrongly declassified material should be withdrawn. Mr. Aid said he had been dismayed to see "scary" documents in open files at the National Archives, including detailed instructions on the use of high explosives.

But the historians say the program is removing material that can do no conceivable harm to national security. They say it is part of a marked trend toward greater secrecy under the Bush administration, which has increased the pace of classifying documents, slowed declassification and discouraged the release of some material under the Freedom of Information Act.

Experts on government secrecy believe the C.I.A. and other spy agencies, not the White House, are the driving force behind the reclassification program.

"I think it's driven by the individual agencies, which have bureaucratic sensitivities to protect," said Steven Aftergood of the Federation of American Scientists, editor of the online weekly Secrecy News. But it was clearly encouraged by the administration's overall embrace of secrecy."
National Archives officials said the program had revoked access to 9,500 documents, more than 8,000 of them since President Bush took office. About 30 reviewers — employees and contractors of the intelligence and defense agencies — are at work each weekday at the archives complex in College Park, Md., the officials said.

Archives officials could not provide a cost for the program but said it was certainly in the millions of dollars, including more than $1 million to build and equip a secure room where the reviewers work.
Michael J. Kurtz, assistant archivist for record services, said the National Archives sought to expand public access to documents whenever possible but had no power over the reclassifications. "The decisions agencies make are those agencies' decisions," Mr. Kurtz said.

Though the National Archives are not allowed to reveal which agencies are involved in the reclassification, one archivist said on condition of anonymity that the C.I.A. and the Defense Intelligence Agency were major participants.

A spokesman for the C.I.A., Paul Gimigliano, said that the agency had released 26 million pages of documents to the National Archives since 1998 and that it was "committed to the highest quality process" for deciding what should be secret.
"Though the process typically works well, there will always be the anomaly, given the tremendous amount of material and multiple players involved," Mr. Gimigliano said.
A spokesman for the Defense Intelligence Agency said he was unable to comment on whether his agency was involved in the program.

Anna K. Nelson, a foreign policy historian at American University, said she and other researchers had been puzzled in recent years by the number of documents pulled from the archives with little explanation.
"I think this is a travesty," said Dr. Nelson, who said she believed that some reclassified material was in her files. "I think the public is being deprived of what history is really about: facts."

The document removals have not been reported to the Information Security Oversight Office, as the law has required for formal reclassifications since 2003.

The explanation, said Mr. Leonard, the head of the office, is a bureaucratic quirk. The intelligence agencies take the position that the reclassified documents were never properly declassified, even though they were reviewed, stamped "declassified," freely given to researchers and even published, he said.
Thus, the agencies argue, the documents remain classified — and pulling them from public access is not really reclassification.
Mr. Leonard said he believed that while that logic might seem strained, the agencies were technically correct. But he said the complaints about the secret program, which prompted his decision to conduct an audit, showed that the government's system for deciding what should be secret is deeply flawed.

"This is not a very efficient way of doing business," Mr. Leonard said. "There's got to be a better way."

Back To The Wiretapping Thing...

2006-02-18T13:41:00.000-08:00

... see, I've been thinking, and I'm back where I started - here's what I asked a couple of weeks or maybe a couple of months ago....

... all that was needed to make the wiretapping legal was to get a court order - this is not my opinion, this is a fact.

Would that have been so difficult?

If the president was worried that doing so would make a leak possible and then the bad guys would know they were being tapped, wouldn't you think that the government official who approved the court order might be pursuaded to keep silent regarding the
order for security's sake?

ON THE OTHER HAND - the ONLY reason I can figure out that ANYONE would go forward with

an act such as this ILLEGAL wiretapping WITHOUT getting the court order is that they were SO SURE that what they were doing wouldn't get approved that they just SKIPPED all the LEGAL ACTION REQUIRED.

GEEZ.

These guys just do whatever the fuck they want to.

So, once again, I ask - exactly WHICH

country do I live in?!?!?!?!?!?!?!

Do You Know, There's An Actual Reason To Wear Slippers? And, Some Rolling Stones Censoring Information From The Super Bowl...

2006-02-07T09:11:00.000-08:00

Growing up in Southern California, I never really understood why people wore slippers. I figured it was because they were more comfortable than shoes for folks that didn't want to go barefoot in their homes, but, other than that, well, I just didn't see any point.

Well.

Living in a cold climate, where I am personally responsible for the heating bill, has opened my eyes.

There is a true reason to wear slippers - to keep your feet warm!

What an epiphany!

On another note:

Mick Jagger's mike was muted when he sang lyrics deigned offensive.

At least that's the way the NFL spun it Monday.

League spokesman Brian McCarthy told Reuters that Jagger and bandmates were told last week that the microphone volume would be lowered at "two appropriate moments" during their three song, halftime set.

"The Stones were aware of it, and they were fine with it," McCarthy told the news service.

The muted lyrics--or words, really--in question, per reports, were "come" from the "you make a dead man come" line in "Start Me Up," and "cocks" from the "but am I just one of your cocks" animal-referencing line in "Rough Justice."

"(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction," snipped by Ed Sullivan back in the 1960s, ran uncensored on Sunday.

Here's another batch of pics:

New Photos - But, Make Sure You See The Post Before This One If You Haven't...

2006-01-29T21:08:00.000-08:00

I'm Sorry, She Just Posed This Way....

2006-01-29T16:38:00.000-08:00

... what can I say aout my dog?

There Are Good Days And Bad Days...

2006-01-25T17:29:00.000-08:00

... yesterday was a really bad day.

Today, on the other hand, was a good day. Shelby Todd and I had a play date with our friends Joel and Betty T. Wilson.

So, here are some pix of the girls at play:

They're both pit and something; Joel knows what Betty is (I forgot already), and no one has

quite figured out what Shelby Todd is...

They're great friends - it may be hard to figure that out

from these pix, but they had

a blast!

And, BOY were they dirty!

Trying To Move On With My Life, And Politics Can Always Help...

2006-01-17T11:10:00.000-08:00

I still have trouble driving for any longish period of time - it makes me think I'm going on a long ride, and the last long ride was to Richmond, and then off my memories go... but, I'm trying here.

Check It Out:

www.voteToImpeach.org

People's Impeachment Lobby is a Huge Success Impeachment is in the Air:

New Polls Show Majority Favors Impeachment

Full page ads calling for impeachment will run again in the next few weeks with your help.
How many full page newspaper ads and radio spots will appear depends entirely on the generous support and contributions from people who believe passionately that impeachment is absolutely critical to maintaining the integrity of the Constitution.

The impeachment movement has hit the new year running. If you consider the following facts, it's clear that the issue of impeachment has decisively taken off:

1) The People's Impeachment Lobby is a huge success. Members of Congress received more than 70,000 letters urging impeachment.

2) A new Zogby poll will be released tomorrow showing that by a 52% to 43% margin, Americans believe that Congress should consider impeaching George W. Bush if he wiretapped the people of this country without court approval (and everyone knows and Bush has admitted that he ordered just such huge secret spying operation.)

The poll, with a plus or minus margin of error of 2.9%, shows that 66% of Democrats, 59% of independents, and 23% of Republicans support impeachment for wiretapping. Majorities favored impeachment across the country: the East (54%), South (53%), and West (52%), Central states (50%).

The significance of this poll can be seen by way of comparison with public attitudes in the months before the impeachment of Clinton. In August and September 1998, sixteen major polls found that only 36% supported hearings to impeach Clinton.

3) Even Republican Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman, Arlen Specter, who will be convening hearings next month on Bush’s authorization of secret electronic surveillance of Americans, said that if lawmakers find Bush violated the law regarding wiretapping (remember Richard Nixon here), then “impeachment is a remedy. After impeachment you could have a criminal prosecution."

4) There are now eight members of Congress including John Conyers, the ranking minority member of the House Judiciary Committee, who have put their name to a bill calling for a special committee to investigate impeachable crimes by the Bush Administration.

5) Newspaper Ads in the New York Times and other papers will be published again, as well as radio spots in the next few weeks, coinciding with the Bush State of the Union Address and the Congressional hearings on Bush’s illegal wiretapping operation. These ads have reached hundreds of thousands of people and we are planning to run more in the next few weeks.

How many full page newspaper ads and radio spots will appear depends entirely on the generous support and contributions from people who believe passionately that impeachment is absolutely critical to maintaining the integrity of the Constitution.

From, - All of us at VoteToImpeach/ImpeachBush.org

Farewell, Harvey Family (NEW THOUGHTS IN RED)

2006-01-09T21:22:00.000-08:00

This is gonna take me a while. I may add to it on and off.

I fall asleep OK, and I get up OK, but each day around 3pm I start to lose it. I just get so sad, and I can feel my brain trying to shut down. Today I was out on an errand, and suddenly thought about all those guys getting up and singing at the memorial, and I just started sobbing in my car. They were so strong, I just don't know how they did it. Stephen's voice was so clear. And I feel so bad, and then I think how really bad they must feel - they've all been living in Richmond for all these years, spending time with the Harveys... it makes me weep and weep.

Here's a lovely comment posted to this blog:

Hey there, I really enjoyed reading your post. Got the link from the blog, "Buttermilk and Molasses". I enjoyed your photos as well. I did not go to the Bryd Theatre b/c I did not know the Harveys and wanted to leave space for those who did. I do know several people who knew the Harveys very well. Such beautiful spirits they were. An amazing family. I cried for them and I almost cried reading you blog. My stomach hurt all last week because of this heinous crime. The thing that has helped me deal with my feelings is being in the here and now and not thinking about the crime, because that vision is horrendous. I imagine them in peace now and if they are happy that is what really matters. I also imagine how they have affected people on a global level. That are true inspiration for SO many people that will read their story and be inspired to change and become better people. The Richmond community will come together in amazing ways. We will erect a beautiful park in their memory. I will take my children there to play and make music there. Such a huge loss to humanity. Time will help heal the pain as will really trying to be in the present moment and doing beautiful things every day.

When I lived in LA in the lates 70's, early 80's, I managed bands, booked bands, lived with bands, etc. My friend Stephen, a member of The Long Ryders, asked me, another friend named Gary Stewart, who did A&R at Rhino Records, and from what I remember, a whole bunch of other folks, to listen to a tape by his friend Bryan Harvey. It turned out, Bryan told me later, that Gary and I were the only people that talked to him.

So, when Bryan formed his band House of Freaks with Johnny Hott, I became their manager, with my partner John Silva, and Gary signed them to Rhino. What a great part of our lives that was. Sometimes you're lucky and you meet folks who'll be your friends for life, no matter how things change, or where people go.

Johnny and Bryan moved back to Richmond, Virginia, John and I stopped working together, and the band eventually left Rhino, but we all stayed friends, along with all the other friends acquired along the way. Johnny, Bryan, Stephen, Armistead Wellford, formery of Love Tractor,

and Steve Wynn, formerly of The Dream Syndicate, formed Gutterball, and I'd see them (rarely) when they came through New York, where I'd moved to in the 90's.

Just a couple of weeks ago, a comment appeared attached to one of my blogs ... 'is this the famous Spock who used to manage House of Freaks?"... signed by a Bryan. For some computer-related reason, I couldn't link back to the poster, but I was sure it was Bryan Harvey, and I thought, 'gee, I should call those guys'. I never did.

This past week, Stephen and Johnny told me that it was Bryan, and he had found my blog, and said to them, 'hey, look at Spock - she's looking pretty good!' Classic Bryan. And, it turns out he'd had a couple of bands going in Richmond these past few years, one called NRG Krysis, a soul music kinda band, as well as another band with Stephen, where he dressed up, wig, white suit and all, as 'Fat Elvis'.

So, where does all this lead? As I said in my last post, Bryan and his wife Kathryn, and his daughters, 9-year-old Stella and 4-year-old Ruby, were all murdered on New Year's Day.

I did take the dog and drive to Richmond, as I also said, and I was there from Thursday night through Sunday afternoon. I cried on and off all the way down on the 10 hour drive, and I cried on and off with all our friends while I was there, and I cried on and off all the way back home.

And, I'm crying now.

You can't imagine what it's like, in the middle of a conversation, to see your friends suddenly start to cry... and you know it's because that at that moment, they've lost the battle to try and not think about what happened, or how much they've lost, or how incredibly sad they are. It is absolutely heartbreaking.

This is totally, utterly, fucking senseless; a random robbery turned murder. The police couldn't seem to find the murderers, and they even started intimidating some of the friends of the Harveys. But, when the police in Philadelphia pulled over a car a couple of days later, they found it was stolen from Richmond and filled with stolen stuff - because - THEY DID IT AGAIN. These 2 guys, one of whom had been released from jail in November after 10 years in for armed robbery, killed the Harveys, and then within a week, killed ANOTHER FAMILY - one which included the woman who it seems had been driving the car the 2 killers were in when they murdered the Harveys.

We all found this out Saturday night,

while a whole bunch of Harvey friends were gathered to remember the family. Folks were there from Nashville, North Carolina, New York, Los Angeles, and I don't know where else.

We had all been at a memorial service Saturday afternoon, along with 1400 other people, where one friend had put together a

wonderful slide show of the family - sweet and funny-

and 13 other friends performed 'All Things Must Pass'. I think they barely made it onstage; needless to say, it was very hard for them to do, and they did it well. The theatre

as filled with pictures, candles, wonderful arty things so reminiscent of Kathryn, and beautiful flowers. That's what all these images are from.

It seemed to really help us, although it was also pretty difficult to deal with. I had been afraid to look at the photos, but Mugsy convinced me it was a good idea, and she was right. I stood in front of the walls of photos, tears streaming down my cheeks, but there were so many wonderful images of this family that I'm glad I didn't skip the pictures.

The day before, Friday, there was a service with the immediate family, but I'm so bad at funeral homes that I wouldn't have even made it out of the car, so my friend Mugsy (and her dog Annie), who live across the street from Johnny, and put me up with open arms (we had never met before Friday) took me with her to the Harvey house, where we neatened up and relit the many, many candles placed out in front of the house.

We went back Saturday night to make sure they were still lit, too.

I want to know why those guys did what they did. I know it won't make any difference,

but I still want to know.

I thought about that today, though, and the day before, and the day before that, and just started to cry again, because no matter what we know or don't know, they're still gone. This just fucking sucks.

My Mom, totally against capital punishment, says she thinks she just may be changing her mind.

Time will heal, they say, but this may take more time than there is out there.

Here's some other stuff I found:

A very cool site with pixs of mostly House of Freaks, along with a few other bands Bryan was part of:

http://www.smugmug.com/gallery/1091599

From Richmond: News articles today focused on friends' memories of Bryan Harvey and his family, and hopes for healing in the wake of the family's murder.

[W]hile the investigation continues, close friends of the Harvey family say they are hoping to establish a permanent memorial to the musician who was such a prominent figure on the Richmond music scene and his family. Longtime friend and fellow musician Bob Rupe, who lives less than two blocks from the Harvey house, said that members of the community are hoping to raise money to buy the Harvey house where the makeshift memorial now stands. "We're going to buy that property and we're going to level that house and we're going to put a park there," Rupe told Crime Library. "The only thing we want to do is put their walnut tree back... they loved that walnut tree... and they lost it last year when (Hurricane) Isabelle came through. We're going to give it to them." It is, Rupe says, absolutely essential that the house, now a monument to murder, be replaced with a memorial to the virtues of the people who lived and died there. "I know that it would break their hearts to think that house was a monument to their misery and suffering... we want it to go away, not for us, we want it to go away for them," Rupe said. "That piece of property needs to be what it was before. There need to be children there, there needs to be music there, and there needs to be peace there."

Suspects in Richmond Slayings Sent to Va.

By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published: January 10, 2006
Filed at 8:41 a.m. ET

PHILADELPHIA (AP) -- Two men arrested in Philadelphia in the killings of seven people were sent back to Virginia on Monday to face murder conspiracy charges.
Ray Joseph Dandridge and Ricky Gray, both 28, were captured Saturday on charges stemming from the killings of members of two Richmond, Va., families.
Police said they found evidence linking Dandridge and Gray to all seven murders. The victims, including two children, were all bound with tape and their throats were cut, police spokeswoman Cynthia Price said.
Investigators have said they also are looking into whether Dandridge and Gray were involved in other cases, including the death of Gray's wife last year in Pennsylvania.
At a hearing Monday, Dandridge and Gray waived their right to fight extradition to Virginia.
The bodies of Percyell Tucker, 55; his wife, Mary Tucker, 47; and her daughter, Ashley Baskerville, 21, were found in their ransacked Richmond home Friday.
The murders in the Tucker home came less than a week after the slayings of rock musician Bryan Harvey and his family. Harvey, 49; his wife, Kathryn, 39, a businesswoman; and their daughters, Stella, 9, and Ruby, 4, were found with their throats cut on New Year's Day. Their house in Richmond was set on fire.
Police have said the motive in both cases appears to be robbery.
Police in southwestern Pennsylvania said Monday they were investigating whether the men had any connection to the death of Gray's wife, Treva, whose body was found Nov. 5 near Washington, Pa., 10 days after Dandridge was released from a Virginia prison. He had served a 10-year-sentence for robbery, prison records show.
Gray has always been a ''person of interest'' in the death of his wife, said John Haddad, police chief in Washington, Pa. He was released from prison in 2002 after serving six years for robbery, firearms possession and cocaine possession.
Bryan Harvey was a guitarist and singer who played in several rock bands, most notably the duo House of Freaks, which released five albums from 1987 to 1995. His wife was co-owner of a toy and novelty shop near downtown Richmond and was the half sister of actor Steven Culp, who has appeared in ''Desperate Housewives,'' ''The West Wing'' and other series.
Tucker was a forklift operator and his wife worked at a nearby cleaners.

Here's some more info:

From ABC 6 Action News in Philadelphia:

35-year-old Treva Gray (this would be one of the killers' wife) was found beaten and strangled in a wooded area on November 5th. The killing happened just days after Dandridge finished serving a 10-year prison sentence for robbery and went to live with the couple in their Pittsburgh area home.

Police tell Action News that once Ray Dandridge got to police headquarters Saturday, he quickly admitted he and Gray murdered the two families in Richmond. Police in the city of Washington are hoping he also gave up the details on the murder of Gray's wife. That's not all: we've learned that police in Pennsylvania, Virginia and Maryland are also reviewing unsolved cases. They want to know if the pair was responsible for other brutal home invasions and at least one attempted murder. Ashley Baskerville, who had been living at her mother's home after being recently released from jail, knew these guys.

BY JIM NOLAN AND MARK HOLMBERGTIMES-DISPATCH STAFF WRITERS

Ashley Baskerville, one of the seven victims bound and slain in South Richmond last week, was more than a casual acquaintance of the two men charged in the killings. The 21-year-old Baskerville, who was killed Friday with her mother and stepfather in their East Broad Rock Road home, was an accomplice in at least one of the crimes that police say were committed by Ray Joseph Dandridge and Ricky Gevon "Cooley" Gray, sources close to the investigation say. (...)Police are investigating witness statements that Baskerville was with Dandridge and Gray when they drove a van into the Woodland Heights neighborhood on the morning of New Year's Day looking for a house to enter for a home-invasion robbery. According to the witness statements, Baskerville sat in the van that morning, police said, Dandridge and Gray entered the Harvey home at 812 W. 31st St. with the intention of robbing the occupants. Just two days later, Baskerville also accompanied Dandridge and Gray to a home invasion in Chesterfield County, witnesses told police.

My friend Bryan, his wife and 2 young daughters were murdered New Year's Day

2006-01-02T14:50:00.000-08:00

I can't even think.

I don't know what to say. How could this happen? Why would anyone do this?

There are no clues, no leads. They were savagely murdered in their home.

I've been crying on and off since I found out - and, it must be so much worse for my friends in Virginia.

It is just so totally fucked up.

I think I'm going to drive to Richmond tomorrow; take the dog and hit the road. I think it's like a 9 hour drive, but I need to do it. There's a memorial on Friday and probably a service on Saturday. I don't know how I'll do it, but I will.

Just Some New Photos

2005-12-28T00:07:00.000-08:00

... and, I'm getting fat - it's pretty close to impossible to exercise/walk when it's cold...

...Shearing The Sheeple...

2005-12-26T15:49:00.000-08:00

I'm passing on the comments from Anonymous re: the Letterman suit post, as I feel it's good info to share.

I gotta tell ya though, that woman is batshit crazy, and I think her fantasy is not of television, but of Letterman, TV or no TV manipulators.

Ah, and I do SO love that word, Sheeples...

(sheeples. sheeples. sheeples. sheeples.)

Anonymous said...

Certainly the woman is crazy, but is there any truth to her claim?

What the general public does not realize, is that all broadcast stations and many specific television shows are playing the Mooks and shearing the Sheeple.

Every broadcast network tries to collect as much information as possible from the public, about its programs. There are many ways that this is done. Numerous television shows will also separately collect, analyze and use feedback from the public. Every word of every letter or email sent to a television station or program is scrutinized. Details as to likes and dislikes are gleaned, and the information is used to provide direction, as well as develop new material. Personal anecdotes from the viewers are captured and the core messages of these mini stories are likely to be incorporated into the show.

This is referred to as reflecting. Reflecting back to the fans, that which they divulge in their communiqués. It is a strategy very similar to the ‘cold reading’ technique performed by tarot card readers. The Mark is not aware of how much they are revealing, or to what purpose their entanglement might be used.

There are practical reasons for generating and perpetuating communications with viewers. It is difficult to know public sentiment while preoccupied with a daily show. Anything the public has to say may be used in creating content. It is difficult to continually come up with new ideas and things to say without regular input from the audience, as well as other sources. It is easy to become stale in a relatively brief period of time and the ratings will immediately reflect it.

However the application of such practices can and does lead to collateral damage. The Mark or Mook is being lead-on. There are ample teasers in the form of buzzwords, gestures and visuals which are intended to excite the interested person or persons. Instigation, antagonism and other forms of provocation are often used to whip up the target. Taking their cue from ubiquitous good cop bad cop scenes, the program creators push whatever buttons they can detect.

Creating conflict between a show and individuals or certain groups or other shows is all part of hightening the drama. It contributes to creating a sense of edginess which translates into ratings and dollars. The dance they dance can be dangerous for mentally unstable individuals, from within the viewing public.

The cast members and writers of sophisticated daily television programs share ideas and information. They collaborate. Writers who work for multiple programs bring with them the knowledge and ideas generated by their other gigs. The friendships that develop among members of different shows, mostly on the same network, are used to assist each other in various ways, such as promoting each other’s projects and programs and playing the Mooks.

It is all part of creating buzz, and it is easy for the dramatis personae and crew to transgress. The heady buzz created in the pursuit of ratings and dollars makes it easy to break ethical standards. Unfortunately for an unsuspecting few, the fantasy of television can become their reality and the result is devastating. The only real question that remains is whether the network programs are culpable, or not.

And Today's Story (and another email) Is....

2005-12-22T11:20:00.000-08:00

So, what I want to know is, is it taxpayer's money that pays for these court proceedings?!?!?!?

David Letterman has been temporarily restrained by a woman who believes that he torments her over the airwaves using a secret code.

New Mexico resident Colleen Nestler filed court documents late last week, alleging that Letterman has been using code words, gestures and "eye expressions" for more than 10 years to convey his desire to marry her and train her as his cohost.

As a result of Letterman's alleged methods of torture, Nestler claims she has suffered from "mental cruelty" and "sleep deprivation," and has been forced into bankruptcy.

She was granted a temporary restraining order by Santa Fe District Judge Daniel Sanchez, who signed off on her application and set a Jan. 12 court date to determine whether to make the order permanent.

In her six-page letter to the court, Nestler requested that Letterman stay at least three yards away from her and that he not "think of me, and release me from his mental harassment and hammering."

Letterman's lawyers have claimed Nestler's complaints are "without merit" and have asked Sanchez to quash the order.
"The claims made are obviously absurd and frivolous," Jim Jackoway, Lettermans attorney in Los Angeles, told the New Mexican. "This constitutes an unfortunate abuse of the judicial process."

Albuquerque attorney Pat Rogers contended that the Santa Fe District Court lacked jurisdiction over Letterman, that Nestler never served Letterman with restraining order papers and that she failed to follow other procedural requirements.

It's unclear from Nestler's complaint when her "relationship" with Letterman began to sour.

In her letter to the court, she claims she began sending Letterman "thoughts of love" after he began hosting The Late Show with David Letterman on CBS in 1993.
"Dave responded to my thoughts of love, and, on his show, in code words & obvious indications through jestures [sic] and eye expressions, he asked me to come east," she wrote.
Letterman upped the ante, she claimed, when he asked her to be his wife shortly before Thanksgiving in 1993.

In a teaser for his show, Letterman jokingly said, "Marry Me, Oprah," which Nestler rapidly deduced was a message intended for her.
"Oprah had become my first of many code names," she wrote. "...[A]s time passed, the code-vocabulary increased & changed, but in the beginning things like 'C' on baseball caps referred to me, and specific messages through songs sung by his guests, were the beginnings of what became an elaborate means of communication between he and myself."

Nestler did not reveal why she waited for so many years to take action against her tormenter. (We're guessing she was motivated by the recent revelation that she's not the only woman Letterman calls Oprah.) She told the Associated Press Wednesday that she had no comment regarding her pending request for a permanent restraining order, other than "I pray to God I get it."

And, here's ANOTHER one from Nick's Dad (I DID also get this from Wales...)

My dear friends,

As the holidays approach, my heartfelt appreciation goes out to all of you who have taken the time and trouble to send me "forwards" over the past 12 months.

Thank you for making me feel safe, secure, blessed, and wealthy. Extra thanks to whoever sent me the one about rat crap in the glue on envelopes cause I now have to go get a wet towel every time I need to seal an envelope. Also, I scrub the top of every can I open for the same reason. Because of your concern I no longer drink Coca Cola because it can remove toilet stains. I no longer drink Pepsi or Dr Pepper since the people who make these products are atheists who refuse to put "Under God" on their cans. I no longer use Saran wrap in the microwave because it causes cancer. I no longer check the coin return on pay phones because I could be pricked with a needle infected with AIDS. I no longer use cancer-causing deodorants even though I smell like a water buffalo on a hot day. I no longer go to shopping malls because someone might drug me with a perfume sample and rob me. I no longer receive packages from nor send packages by UPS or FedEx since they are actually Al Qaeda in disguise. I no longer answer the phone because someone will ask me to dial a number for which I will get a phone bill with calls to Jamaica, Uganda, Singapore, and Uzbekistan. I no longer eat KFC because their "chickens" are actually horrible mutant freaks with no eyes or feathers. (Huh - and I thought they were rats...) I no longer have any sneakers -- but that will change once I receive my free replacement pair from Nike. I no longer have to buy expensive cookies from Neiman Marcus since I now have their recipe. I no longer worry about my soul because at last count I have 363,214 angels looking out for me. Thanks to you, I have learned that God only answers my prayers if I forward an e-mail to seven of my friends and make a wish within five minutes. I no longer have any savings because I gave it to a sick girl who is about to die in the hospital (for the 1,387,258th time). I no longer have any money at all - but that will change once I receive the $15,000 that Microsoft and AOL are sending me for participating in their special email program. Yes, I want to thank you so much for looking out for me that I will now return the favor! If you don't send this e-mail to at least 144,000 people in the next 7 minutes, a large pigeon with a wicked case of diarrhea will land on your head at 5:00 PM (CDT) this afternoon. I know this will occur because it actually happened to a friend of my next-door neighbor's ex-mother-in-law's second husband's cousin's beautician.Sincerely,Your E-Mail Buddy

More Amusing Stuff, Some Annoying (Gov't) Stuff and Some New Photos From The New Camera (Since, if you remember,I have mislaid the old one somewhere)

2005-12-21T14:43:00.000-08:00

I got this forwarded to me by Nick's dad again:

Fun with the ACLU

Wanna have some fun this CHRISTMAS?

Send them a CHRISTMAS Card!

As they are working so very hard to get rid of the CHRISTMAS part of this holiday, we should all send them a nice, CHRISTIAN, card to brighten up their dark, sad, little world.

Make sure it says "Merry Christmas" on it.

Here's the Address, just don't be rude or crude. (It's Not the Christian Way ya know?)

ACLU
125 Broad Street
18th Floor
New York, NY 10004

Two tons of Christmas cards would freeze their operations because they wouldn't know if any were regular mail containing contributions...

So spend 37 cents and tell the ACLU to leave Christmas alone.

Also tell them that there is no such thing as a Holiday Tree. . . .

(Or a Chanukah bush, for that matter - hey, I'm a nice Jewish kid who grew up surrounded by friends with CHRISTMAS trees, and I'M certainly not upset - because, THAT'S WHAT THEY ARE.... please note my colourful use of Blue, White, Yellow, Black (well, Grey, as the Black wouldn't show up on the black background) and Green to include the Chanukah and Kwanza celebrators in this...)

On another (Gov't) note...

More on this President superceding a legally constituted intelligence court with his own brand of justice...

So, he admits he made an end run around the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 to authorise secret wiretaps at least 30 times since the 9/11 attacks. He insists these extraordinay measures were necessary to protect American lives, and, is blaming The Media for endangering the nation by leaking the information...

The 1978 Act was carefully constructed to avoid presidental overreaching, whicle protecting the need, which all Americans respect, to track down terrorists. The intelligence court, established under the act, routinely permits search warrants and wiretaps sufficient to any occasion the president might imagine.

So, here's the part that really got me - his wife - oops, SO sorry, did I say that? I mean Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice suggested that this process was 'too cumbersome'. This is a chilling reminder of this administrations disregard for the democratic processes it purports to be defending abroad. Hey, why does he even care if that Patriot Act is entended/continued - he just does what he wants anyway...

(I thank The Tennessean for this info.)

The photos are from the new camera. (Whilst cleaning this blog, I inadvertantly deleted some of the pix, so they may repeat in a later blog.)

Later.

A Cheerier Blog

2005-12-20T09:57:00.000-08:00

I'm on Nick's Dad's email list, and I'm sharing two of the latest with you today:

1. At lunchtime, sit in your parked car with sunglasses on and point a hairdryer at
passing cars, see if they slow down.

2. Page yourself over the intercom, and don't disguise your voice.

3. Everytime someone asks you to do something, ask if they want fries with that.

4. Put your trash can on your desk and label it "In."

5. Put decaf in the coffee maker for 3 weeks. Once everyone has gotten over
their caffeine addictions, switch to espresso.

6. In the memo field of all your checks, write "For smuggling diamonds."

7. Finish all your sentences with "In accordance with the prophecy."

8. Dont use any punctuation

9. As often as possible, skip instead of walk.

10. Order a diet water whenever you go out to eat, with a serious face.

11. Specify that your drive-through order is "To Go."

12. Sing along at the opera.

13. Go to a poetry recital and ask why the poems don't rhyme.

14. Put mosquito netting around your work area and play tropical music all day.

15. Five days in advance, tell your friends you can't attend their party because
you're not in the mood.

16. Have your co-workers address you by your wrestling name, "Rock Bottom".

17. When the money comes out of the ATM scream, "I won, I won!".

18. When leaving the zoo, start running towards the parking lot yelling, "Run for
your lives, they're loose!".

19. Tell your children over dinner, "Due to the economy, we're going to have to
let one of you go."

Then, he sent an email that contained an image of Tweety Bird being chased by that big cat, I forget his name, doesn't it start with a P?, and, it tells you to watch until the cat catches the bird, and then to scroll down, and to WAIT for it, it's worth it.

So, (if) when you finally give up waiting and scroll down, here's what you get:

This was an idiot test. How long did you watch?

0-2 seconds - There's hope for you

2-5 seconds - Having a bad day?

5-10 seconds - Are you maybe just a slow reader?

10-20 seconds - Remedial classes are nothing to be ashamed of

20-30 seconds - It is recommended that you don't breed.

30 sec-1 min - You probably can't read this anyway. So why bother?

1-2 min - The equivalent of the average house plant

2-5 min - Good afternoon Mr Bush (hahahahahahahah, my favourite, of course!)

5 min-1 hr - Dead people score in this range

1hr plus - Congratulations. You have a negative IQ.

To find out what your prize is, watch this following image of Bugs until he finishes his carrot...

...Big Brother Isn't Just Watching, He's Listening...

2005-12-18T21:19:00.000-08:00

(Well, what did you THINK I was going to write about?)

WASHINGTON -

Democrats and Republicans called separately Sunday for congressional investigations into
President Bush's decision after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks to allow domestic eavesdropping without court approval.

"The president has, I think, made up a law that we never passed," said Sen. Russell Feingold, D-Wis.. Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Penn., chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said he intends to hold hearings. "They talk about constitutional authority," Specter said. "There are limits as to what the president can do." (Gee, I guess not, huh......)

Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada also called for an investigation, and House Democratic leaders asked Speaker Dennis Hastert to create a bipartisan panel to do the same.

Bush acknowledged Saturday that since October 2001 he has authorized the National Security Agency to eavesdrop on international phone calls and e-mails of people within the United States without seeking warrants from courts.

The New York Times disclosed the existence of the program last week. Bush and other administration officials initially refused to discuss the surveillance or their legal authority, citing security concerns.

"It's been briefed to the Congress over a dozen times, and, in fact, it is a program that is, by every effort we've been able to make, consistent with the statutes and with the law," Vice President Dick Cheney said Sunday in an interview with ABC News "Nightline" to be broadcast Monday evening: "It's the kind of capability if we'd had before 9/11 might have led us to be able to prevent 9/11."

President Bush and other administration officials also have said congressional leaders had been briefed regularly on the program. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said there were no objections raised by lawmakers who were told about it.

"That's a legitimate part of the equation," McCain said on ABC's "This Week." But he said Bush still needs to explain why he chose to ignore the law that requires approval of a special court for domestic wiretaps.

Reid acknowledged he had been briefed on the four-year-old domestic spy program "a couple months ago" but insisted the administration bears full responsibility. Reid became Democratic leader in January.

"The president can't pass the buck on this one. This is his program," Reid said on "Fox News Sunday." "He's commander in chief. But commander in chief does not trump the Bill of Rights."
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said in a statement Saturday that she had been told on several occasions about unspecified activities by the NSA. Pelosi said she expressed strong concerns at the time.

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said on "Fox News Sunday" that Bush "has gone to great lengths to make certain that he is both living under his obligations to protect Americans from another attack but also to protect their civil liberties."

Several lawmakers weren't so sure. They pointed to a 1978 federal law, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which provides for domestic surveillance under extreme situations, but only with court approval.

Specter said he wants Bush's advisers to cite their specific legal authority for bypassing the courts. Bush said the attorney general and White House counsel's office had affirmed the legality of his actions.

Appearing with Specter on CNN's "Late Edition," Feingold said Bush is accountable for the program regardless of whether congressional leaders were notified.

"It doesn't matter if you tell everybody in the whole country if it's against the law," said Feingold, a member of the Judiciary Committee. Bush said the program was narrowly designed and used in a manner "consistent with U.S. law and the Constitution." He said it targets only international communications of people inside the U.S. with "a clear link" to al-Qaida or related terrorist organizations. Government officials have refused to define the standards they're using to establish such a link or to say how many people are being monitored.

Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., called that troubling. If Bush is allowed to decide unilaterally who the potential terrorists are, he in essense becomes the court, Graham said on CBS's "Face the Nation."

"We are at war, and I applaud the president for being aggressive," said Graham, who also called for a congressional review. "But we cannot set aside the rule of law in a time of war."

The existence of the NSA program surfaced as Bush was fighting to save the expiring provisions of the USA Patriot Act, the domestic anti-terrorism law enacted after the Sept. 11 attacks.
Renewal of the law has stalled over some its most contentious provisions, including powers granted law enforcement to gain secret access to library and medical records and other personal data during investigations of suspected terrorist activity. Democrats have urged Bush to support a brief extension of the law so that changes could be made in the reauthorization, but Bush has refused, saying he wants renewal now.

Oh, and, I can't find my damn camera - and, it HAS to be here in the house.

Some Tookie Williams Post Follow-Up

2005-12-15T21:15:00.000-08:00

So, just some info for y'all, from responses to my posting:

One said
... started an organization that requires murder for admission. you do the math.
11:27 PM
Another said
... Unfortunately, even in states that have capital punishment, it may take a long time before a death row inmate is actually put to death. I understand the fear of killing someone who may be innocent, but how about people who have murdered several people? Why are my tax dollars keeping him in a prison with state of the art gym equipment, cable tv, etc. and I don't even have that? It's not right! They say is costs over $40k per year to house one criminal. That's more than my salary! I have a problem with that!!!!!! I believe capital punishment would deter crime. The criminals know it is hard for people to actually get the punishment executed, so what do they care if they end up in jail? Personally, I think jails should be like Maricopa County in Arizona where the mayor there has set up camps - yes, camps out in the wildnerness and everyone sleeps on cots in a tent. Now THAT is jail!

And, my replies -

Yah, I personally think he probably did it, as I mentioned earlier - I grew up in that neighborhood, I remember what it was like. BUT - for the sake of argument - what if he really didn't do those particular murders, even if he'd done others? This is just a thought regarding the law; he was executed for being guilty of those SPECIFIC murders. My comments are not re: Tookie Williams, but about the law itself. I guess I'm thinking, there are innocent men being MURDERED by the Government, basically, by the death penalty - but, this same death penaly DOES also rid us of the true criminals. Do we say those innocent (of murder, but highly likely not of other lesser crimes...) victims are a necessary part of getting the really bad guys out of the way? Just thoughts, not specific opinions here...

I like the idea of not-so-cushy quarters suggested by the second post - I TOTALLY agree - why should a convicted criminal live better than anyone NOT convicted?!?!?! I don't even have health insurance, and I've never been in jail, or convicted of even a MINOR crime, and, I've been paying taxes 'WAY too long, in my opinion, as I feel I haven't really got very much to show for it (or, to look forward to) from this Government...

And, I personally think that if someone is, in fact, an admitted convicted murderer, child molester, etc., then, I think they shouldn't have the OPPORTUNITY to be put to death - they should be locked in solitary confinement for the rest of their miserable lives, except for when they're scheduled for their REGULAR physical torture sessions, which I think would be much worse than being put to death.

Oh well, it's all pretty moot, isn't it.

I plan to post more cheerily next time!

OK, So Let's Talk ABout Tookie Williams...

2005-12-11T21:57:00.000-08:00

OK. Heres' some stuff from the Tennessean, my local paper:

He's co-authored children's books & counseled kids to avoid gangs. He co-founded the Crips , which keeps getting called the most violent street gang in history. (What about the Bloods? Weren't they basically the same kind of gang How about LA Chinese gangs? Brooklyn Russian gangs? The Gangs Of New York from that movie? I'm not comparing here, just asking.)

Here's some other interesting facts:

The death penalty is a retributive punishment rather than an attenpt to stimulate reform, so any con's 'exemplary' life is, unfortunately for them, irrelevant.

And, for the sake of argument, if good deeds can trump the death sentence, then anyone on death row, whether for real or lying, would have the option to get out of jail free, as the card says. Speak out against drugs, murder, violence of any kind - in return, get the sentence commuted. I have a problem with this...

Then there's the article that says: ... commute his sentence to life imprisonment without the possibility of parole and let him continue his tireless efforts as the best methods to resolving his crimes. ...

THEN this article says: ... the death penalty is NOT a deterrent to violence and murder. Actually, homicides have risen in the 38 states that allow for capital punishment. ...

The article directly beneath this one says: ... 75% of Americans support capital punishment, and a 2004 Gallup poll showed black support at nearly 50%. From 1966 to 1991 there was a national death penalty moratorium. Murders skyrocketed.
As executions resumed, the murder rate fell, and, it fell dramatically in states that use capital punishment. ...

HEY, are those the same 38 states that the OTHER article said homicides have risen in?!?!?!?!?!?

How the fuck is anyone supposed to get ANY INFORMATION HERE? I realise that these articles were written by two people who are not reporters, but, couldn't the PAPER have clarified this?!?!?!

It's possible that he did, in fact, commit the murders, and it's possible that he didn't.
BUT - you have to admit a couple of things here:

#1, he's black - not in his favor...
#2, he was a bad guy gang-member...
#3 although he continues to plead innocent, he was convicted on the word of 3 of his so-called friends, all of whom had criminal histories and motivation to lie (this does not mean that they DID lie... it is also possible that they told the truth.)

Anway, here's a couple of more disturbing bits of info, and I'm not sure of how to get more info regarding these in order to find out if they are true or not:

He is still a Crip
He refuses to renounce his gang membership formally
His has an unusually large prison bank account (he gets no money from the book sales)
His son, in prison for murder, is also an active Crip

So, what do you do in a case like this? Grant clemency to a convicted murderer? Grant clemency to a redeemed murderer? Grant clemency to a redeemed man who claims he's innocent? Grant clemency to a man who teaches kids to avoid gangs?

I still don't know what I'd do - I need more answers.

Just New Photos For This Post

2005-12-04T22:12:00.000-08:00

Oh... Such Sad, Sad, News... Chris Whitley Has Died...

2005-11-22T09:53:00.000-08:00

In 1991 or so, I was incredibly fortunate to see Chris play in a little club on the Lower East Side called The Ludlow Cafe... it was Chris, his guitar and I think the dobro, and his boot box. It was a religious experience, and I got to see him play many, many times after that.

Following that show, Chris played there again, and I dragged the head of the label I worked at to the show, not even knowing that it was a 2-night showcase for every label in town; we walked in, and there were all the other heads of labels.

I stood about 6 feet away, directly in front of him, and I went back the next night and stood about 6 feet away, directly in front of him. I was absolutely mesmerised, and I insisted his manager introduce us. He was sweet, unassuming, humble... I invited him (pleaded with him) to come up to the label to talk to us, and he agreed.

He showed up, and met with us, and let us know that he had pretty much decided to go with Columbia before he had come to see us. When I asked him why he was still willing to come and see me even so, he said "Well, you came to see me, so I thought I should come to see you."

We stayed friends for quite a long time...I got to go to the studio when he was recording, and I went to virtually every show he played in NYC for the next couple of years, and got to see him in a couple of other places as well.

This writer, David Bowman, wrote some great stuff about Chris in 1998:

Chris Whitley once sung about "Secret Jesus" on his "blood antenna ... coming through the concrete, baby." It sounded like he was singing about an extraterrestial Satan, not Jesus. But then there's a record industry rumor that Whitley actually met the devil out on some crossroads, just like Robert Johnson. ...

Whitley's first three records were released by Sony. He had hours of studio time. Big limos. Champagne for breakfast. But no more. Last year, Sony dumped him. Out in the cold, Whitley had zero budget to make a new album. So last December, he recorded one in a single day -- not in a studio, but in a barn on his daddy's farm in Vermont. And now "Dirt Floor" is being released on Messenger Records, a little label so tiny it's run by a 24-year-old kid out of his one-room Chelsea apartment in Manhattan.

How could Whitley fall so far? And what did he get from the devil in return? Before you learn the answers, know that "Dirt Floor" is a little album the way Bruce Springsteen's "Nebraska" was little -- which is to say it's not little at all, just incredibly ambitious in its modesty. Like Springsteen on "Nebraska," Whitley is the only player on his album, strumming his solitary guitar and singing. His voice is reedy, but good. Some of his songs are good as well. Others are striking. All of them are a little peculiar, borrowing imagery from William Faulkner and Mexican Day of the Dead festivals. He sings about someone called Loco Girl. He sings about a ball-peen hammer.

But "Dirt Floor" doesn't sound like "Nebraska" -- or Robert Johnson, or early Bob Dylan, or anyone else. There's something simultaneously medieval and funky about Whitley's sound. His National guitar has a brittle, otherworldly twang to it. "I think the guys that originally designed them 70 years ago were auto-body guys trying to make Hawaiian guitars that were louder," Whitley says. He spends the next 10 minutes discussing the National the way motorcycle enthusiasts go on about Vincent Black Lightnings.

Whitley introduced his National on his first Sony album, "Living With the Law" (1991), produced by Daniel Lanois cohort Malcolm Burn. It was a great album about Big Sky country and someone called Poison Girl and something that was said on a phone call from Leavenworth. It was an album Cormac McCarthy would make if he were a guitarist instead of a novelist. The record had solid sales. His second Sony release, "Din of Ecstasy" (1995), was the mother of all flops. What happened? Whitley traded his career for an electric guitar. Satan's unholy ax was Whitley's undoing.

"What's with this devil business, man?" Whitley laughs. "I grew up on electric guitar. Psychedelic blues: Hendrix, Cream. Early Muddy. Early Wolf. When I was a kid, I loved Johnny Winter and loved his first Columbia record. He used a thumb pick, not even a flat pick. Just plugged in." The lanky guitarist now closes his eyes as if he's remembering a girl. "Johnny sounded so fluid. He wasn't really playing any scale or riffs. He was just blowing it out." He opens his eyes. "The devil had nothing to do with 'Din of Ecstasy.' With that record it was, 'I can afford a band now.'"

Whitley's electric "Din" was a psychedelic masterpiece that bashed and screeched, even as it fell like a stone in the marketplace. The suits at Sony wrung their hands, but gave him another chance. But rather than return to the rootsy purity of "Living With the Law," Whitley clung to the devil's ax and redefined his psychedelic sound, releasing yet another quirky, unclassifiably brilliant electric album, "Terra Incognita" (1997). It went nowhere quicker than "Din" did.

Sony pulled his plug.

But if this was Satan's intention, the angels of art saved Whitley from hell. The guitarist didn't have the patience to do demos and shop around for another label. He wouldn't even wait for the schedule of his old mentor, Lanois, to get clear so that they could record together. Whitley had written new, simpler songs. So he took his beloved National up to Vermont and recorded nine songs in a day with Cassandra Wilson's Grammy-winning producer, Craig Street. The next day, they mixed the tracks. And a few weeks later, "Dirt Floor" was ready to be released on Messenger Records.
...

Hard to imagine Whitley needing anything more than a little weed to sing those words. And "Dirt Floor" proves that it is possible for art to triumph over corporate culture. ...

Whitley doesn't quite buy this "triumph of art" business, because he thinks his work is commercial. Or at least listenable. "I'm not exactly high art and I'm not pop. I look at my stuff now, it's very metaphoric to how I grew up. There's my art director dad and my sculptor mom. Pure. And expressionist. I never felt like there was a conflict between the art and commerce."

Yeah, OK. But anyone with a commercial bone in his body wouldn't have made two albums of psychedelia. McCarthy was mentioned earlier -- Whitley is like one of the author's kid cowboys down in Mexico. There's an innocence and naiveté about him that's touching. And deceiving. This 37-year-old is chronologically long-in-the-tooth, but he still looks about 23. Except in brief moments, say in the neon light of a bar sign on Seventh Avenue, where you can see what Whitley will look like when his age catches up with him. He'll look a little like a criminal -- like he's getting away with something.

So now, with "Dirt Floor" a big success, will Whitley fuck it all up again by recording Satan's electric guitar again with Daniel Lanois? Maybe not. And it's our loss. Nowadays, Whitley complains about guitar-hero bands. He even claims a banjo can thrash harder than any old Danelectro U1. "Banjo's are more pointed," he claims, as earnest as a choir boy. "People actually get it with a banjo. With a loud guitar, it's like just another rock band." Stephen Foster heavy metal? He gives a dry laugh. "It's good to express your existential anger on the banjo."

What does Whitley have to be getting existential about? It was the devil who suffered a loss, not Whitley. For just a moment, Satan lost control of his ax. And for just one blessed moment, true art has won a modest battle.

The Sony Legacy site says:

The most compelling, communicative music resonates with a "cry," whether it embodies a wail of pain and despair or the not-so-dissimilar shouts of spiritual elation and sexual healing. From Brahms to Billie Holiday, Hank Williams to Howling Wolf, John Coltrane to John Lennon, Astor Piazzolla to Ali Akbar Khan - enduring music often echoes the real, remembered or empathetic cry of the listener. Chris Whitley's music - whether the dust-bowl balladry on Living With the Law, the keening hard-rock of Din of Ecstasy or the synthetic poetics that power Rocket House - is suffused with the deepest blues feeling. And feeling is the essence of form with Whitley, so that no matter the particular idiom of a recording, his music always sounds recognizably, immutably like him; moreover, it is in his personally authentic, emotive sound that the fortunate listener can hear a little bit of himself, herself or, at least, someone close.

Here's a link to his site:

http://www.chriswhitley.com/index.php

There's lots of info as well as some mp3 files of a gig from this year.

There was a great little music scene going on in NYC when we all first met Chris... my friend David Pattillo hosted these unforgettable nights at Ludlow... David and his drummer Matt would play their dark, intense music, our friend David Poe would play his beautiful songs on acoustic, other folks would perform, and Chris would perform. At that time, he was the only one of the bunch with a record deal, but it made no difference. I think I heard music like I'll never hear again. We'd all sit around, just talkin ', smokin' and drinkin' ... Chris had a great laugh.

This is a time in my life I will never forget; one of those times that, if you had to be stuck somewhere in the past, well, this is where I'd pick; a funky little Salvadorian restaurant/club that served great food at 2AM, and closed the blackout curtains so that we'd walk out into the dawn, not even realising that the sun had started to rise, when the Lower East Side was all dark and dirty, and we were all in this special place in time - and Chris is a strong, definite part of this memory.

I still have the demos Chris gave me... I know I'll listen to all his music and cry for the next few weeks, but, as his brother says, we need to celebrate his life, too.

** Singer/songwriter Chris Whitley died Sunday (Nov. 20) at the age of 45 after battling lung cancer. The veteran Texas-reared artist recorded for Columbia, ATO and, most recently, Messenger Records, which released his eleventh album, "Soft Dangerous Shores," in July. A new release, "Reiter In," is due in mid-December on vinyl and will appear on CD sometime next year.

Whitley is survived by his daughter Trixie, his brother Dan and his fiancee Susann. "I hope you all will mourn my brother's death but more important celebrate his life as Chris was all about life and living," Dan wrote on Chris' official Web site. "I started the celebration by cranking up [the 1998 album] 'Dirt Floor' in his honor ... crying still."

"Chris is an example of one of those things that appalls me about the record industry - ATO co-founder Dave Matthews told Billboard in 2001. "That is, how could a talent like his go relatively unnoticed? So few singers have their own personality, and Chris is his own man to the bone. Honestly, I feel more passion for his music than I do for my own. My music I'm critical of. But I have a fervent, religious devotion to the magic that Chris makes." **

Oh, gee, I got a Job

2005-11-08T17:43:00.000-08:00

I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!! I got a job!!!

OK, I'm Finally Back

2005-11-06T21:29:00.000-08:00

So, there's ALOT of photo-catching up-on to do here, and this isn't even all of them...

These beautiful images are mostly from the Shelby Bottoms Greenaway and the Shelby Bottoms Park, both of which are 2 blocks from my home. There are some that are obviously manipulated, such as the gnarly tree, the sepia picture, the train trestle, but, most of them, like these with the multi-coloured trees, I didn't do anything to; it's just Nature.

Every day, Nashville gets more colour in the trees.

So, here's some catching-up on me.

I have been seriously job-hunting for a couple of months now, and I just thought I'd give a list of some of the interviews I have gone on, or the places I have sent resumes.

* I went on an interview for the position of optometrist's assistant (I think the pay was $6.50 an hour) - didn't get it.
* I went to Vanderbilt University and took typing and computer tests in order to get placed as a perma-temp. They didn't follow-up back, or return calls, and as I applied for various temp positions through their website, they sent computer-generated replys letting me know they found a more qualified candidate.

* Vandy did finally call, to have me come in and take an orientation class in preparation for me starting temp work, and I learned where I could and could not park, how much it would cost me to park, stuff about sexual harrassment, and that they had lost all my previously-filled out paperwork, and would have to bring another copy of my passport to them - this was after they sent me home from my first scheduled class, since I was 8 minutes late.
* I sent a resume to Regions Bank. No reply.
* I sent a resume to Nashville Lottery - no reply.
(These were answering ads.)
* I interviewed for an apprentice meat cutter's position. No reply.

* I went on one wild goose chase (I got lost) interview for what ended up being a sales job!!!!

* I emailed the head of the GRAMMY's - no reply.

* I applied for a bartending job at a yet-to-be-opened bar in East Nashville, but they said they're starting out with just the owners as bartenders, until they get up and running to save money.
*Interviewed at Dell - didn't get it.
*Applied at Home Depot - no reply.
Sheesh, it's been so long, that I've forgotten the rest - too bad!
My friend Kaz, who owns a restaurant, let me bar-back and bar tend, and even had me WAITRESS one night - believe it or not, that was the first time I have ever been a waitress!

While I was doing all this, I did get to have some visitors; my frieind Pam, and an old frieind from LA, Theresa, both came and stayed for a while, and it was really really nice. You gotta check out Theresa's blog, but of course, I can't find the url rigiht now...

Also, we helped my friend Warren put up his blog for his band,

Laughing Sam's Dice. Check it out, too! - As soon as I find HIS url, too!

BOTH WILL BE SUPPLIED, HOPEFULLY, IN THE NEXT DAY OR TWO.

I even had the visitor-from-New-York here for a weekend! Let me tell ya, that was nice - we both had a wonderful time. As you can see, he bonded with Shelby Todd.

My sister, brother-in-law, nieces and one new husband for a niece, will all be joinging me here for Thanksgiving! And, so will 2 neighbors, Warren and a new friend, Camilla, who lives a block away and has 2 dogs.

I'm still doing little things around the place, and this house just gets better and better. These five pixs are my front yard, porch and the tree in the front yard.

I AM sleeping with the window in the bedroom open and the ceiling fan on... I'm too hot!!!

Well, I'll try to keep up with this.

Yah, I changed the template for a while.

Later.

The Most Surreal Conversation in Nashville...

2005-09-30T22:51:00.000-07:00

OK, so my friend Pam is here for the week, and we have been visiting some of the malls... gee, what a surprise, Spock and Pam, shopping.

Anyway.

I had previously purchased a 'switch', a hair thingy, a ponytail-like extension, I don't really know what they're called, at the Green Hills Mall, and we went there to see if we could get one for Pam. We searched the mall, but couldn't find the little kiosk, so we poked our heads into a hair salon on the second floor of the mall.

Here's the conversation:

(Me) Hi, maybe you can help us. We're looking for a kiosk where 2 Asian girls are selling clip-on ponytails. Do you happen to know where it is?
(Hair store Lady) No, there isn't anything like that here.

THEN.

(Hair store Lady) Are you looking for Asian girls?
(Me) Noooo... no, we're not looking for Asian girls. We're looking for the hair kiosk.
(Hair store Lady) They used to be at the botttom of the escalator.

Maybe you had to be there.

More Stuff re: The Government, And, Some New Photos

2005-09-07T14:07:00.000-07:00

I got this link from Nick: You MUST check out these photos, taken by a New Orleans dweller.
Besides the fact that some of them are beautiful, they show the timeline, and what happened to the city:

http://www.kodakgallery.com/Slideshow.jsp?mode=fromshare&Uc=14ewb3ap.b147fdut&Uy=nyvoby&Ux=1

Excerpt from a New York Times article, BEFORE he fired the scapegoat:

... In Washington, President Bush promised an investigation into what went wrong in the response to Hurricane Katrina and planned to dispatch Vice President Dick Cheney to the Gulf Coast to cut through any bureaucratic obstacles slowing the recovery.

The Senate and the House also announced their own investigation into the government's response, with Senator Susan Collins of Maine, a leading Republican, calling the response "woefully inadequate."

"If our system did such a poor job when there was no enemy," said Ms. Collins, chairwoman of the Homeland Security Committee, "how would the federal, state and local governments have coped with a terrorist attack that provided no advance warning and that was intent on causing as much death and destruction as possible?"..."

And, on a lighter note:

here's some of my latest art:

Here's Another One from The Times-Picayune in New Orleans

2005-09-07T11:13:00.000-07:00

'Times-Picayune' Calls for Firing of FEMA Chief
Editor & Publisher

Sunday 04 September 2005

New York - The Times-Picayune of New Orleans on Sunday published its third print edition since the hurricane disaster struck, chronicling the arrival, finally, of some relief but also taking President Bush to task for his handling of the crisis, and calling for the firing of FEMA director Michael Brown and others.

In an "open letter" to the president, published on page 15 of the 16-page edition, the paper said it still had grounds for "skepticism" that he would follow through on saving the city and its residents. It pointed out that while the government could not get supplies to the city numerous TV reporters, singer Harry Connick and Times-Picayune staffers managed to find a way in.

It also cited "bald-faced" lies by Michael Brown. "Those who should have been deploying troops were singing a sad song about how our city was impossible to reach," the staffers pointed out. "We're angry, Mr. President, and we'll be angry long after our beloved city and surrounding parishes have been pumped dry."

Here is the text.

***

We heard you loud and clear Friday when you visited our devastated city and the Gulf Coast and said, "What is not working, we're going to make it right."

Please forgive us if we wait to see proof of your promise before believing you. But we have good reason for our skepticism.

Bienville built New Orleans where he built it for one main reason: It's accessible. The city between the Mississippi River and Lake Pontchartrain was easy to reach in 1718.

How much easier it is to access in 2005 now that there are interstates and bridges, airports and helipads, cruise ships, barges, buses and diesel-powered trucks.

Despite the city's multiple points of entry, our nation's bureaucrats spent days after last week's hurricane wringing their hands, lamenting the fact that they could neither rescue the city's stranded victims nor bring them food, water and medical supplies.

Meanwhile there were journalists, including some who work for The Times-Picayune, going in and out of the city via the Crescent City Connection. On Thursday morning, that crew saw a caravan of 13 Wal-Mart tractor trailers headed into town to bring food, water and supplies to a dying city.

Television reporters were doing live reports from downtown New Orleans streets. Harry Connick Jr. brought in some aid Thursday, and his efforts were the focus of a "Today" show story Friday morning.

Yet, the people trained to protect our nation, the people whose job it is to quickly bring in aid were absent. Those who should have been deploying troops were singing a sad song about how our city was impossible to reach.

We're angry, Mr. President, and we'll be angry long after our beloved city and surrounding parishes have been pumped dry. Our people deserved rescuing. Many who could have been were not. That's to the government's shame.

Mayor Ray Nagin did the right thing Sunday when he allowed those with no other alternative to seek shelter from the storm inside the Louisiana Superdome. We still don't know what the death toll is, but one thing is certain: Had the Superdome not been opened, the city's death toll would have been higher. The toll may even have been exponentially higher.

It was clear to us by late morning Monday that many people inside the Superdome would not be returning home. It should have been clear to our government, Mr. President. So why weren't they evacuated out of the city immediately? We learned seven years ago, when Hurricane Georges threatened, that the Dome isn't suitable as a long-term shelter. So what did state and national officials think would happen to tens of thousands of people trapped inside with no air conditioning, overflowing toilets and dwindling amounts of food, water and other essentials?

State Rep. Karen Carter was right Friday when she said the city didn't have but two urgent needs: "Buses! And gas!" Every official at the Federal Emergency Management Agency should be fired, Director Michael Brown especially.

In a nationally televised interview Thursday night, he said his agency hadn't known until that day that thousands of storm victims were stranded at the Ernest N. Morial Convention Center. He gave another nationally televised interview the next morning and said, "We've provided food to the people at the Convention Center so that they've gotten at least one, if not two meals, every single day."

Lies don't get more bald-faced than that, Mr. President.

Yet, when you met with Mr. Brown Friday morning, you told him, "You're doing a heck of a job."

That's unbelievable.

There were thousands of people at the Convention Center because the riverfront is high ground. The fact that so many people had reached there on foot is proof that rescue vehicles could have gotten there, too.

We, who are from New Orleans, are no less American than those who live on the Great Plains or along the Atlantic Seaboard. We're no less important than those from the Pacific Northwest or Appalachia. Our people deserved to be rescued.

No expense should have been spared. No excuses should have been voiced. Especially not one as preposterous as the claim that New Orleans couldn't be reached.

Mr. President, we sincerely hope you fulfill your promise to make our beloved communities work right once again.

When you do, we will be the first to applaud.

FEMA, The Gov't and Business As Usual...

2005-09-06T20:27:00.000-07:00

What can I say.

By TED BRIDIS, Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON - The government's disaster chief waited until hours after Hurricane Katrina had already struck the Gulf Coast before asking his boss to dispatch 1,000
Homeland Security employees to the region — and gave them two days to arrive, according to internal documents.

Michael Brown, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency, sought the approval from Homeland Security Secretary Mike Chertoff roughly five hours after Katrina made landfall on Aug. 29. Brown said that among duties of these employees was to "convey a positive image" about the government's response for victims.

Before then, FEMA had positioned smaller rescue and communications teams across the Gulf Coast. But officials acknowledged Tuesday the first department-wide appeal for help came only as the storm raged.

Brown's memo to Chertoff described Katrina as "this near catastrophic event" but otherwise lacked any urgent language. The memo politely ended, "Thank you for your consideration in helping us to meet our responsibilities."

The initial responses of the government and Brown came under escalating criticism as the breadth of destruction and death grew. President Bush and Congress on Tuesday pledged separate investigations into the federal response to Katrina. "Governments at all levels failed," said Sen. Susan Collins (news, bio, voting record), R-Maine.

Homeland Security spokesman Russ Knocke said Brown had positioned front-line rescue teams and Coast Guard helicopters before the storm. Brown's memo on Aug. 29 aimed to assemble the necessary federal work force to support the rescues, establish communications and coordinate with victims and community groups, Knocke said.

Instead of rescuing people or recovering bodies, these employees would focus on helping victims find the help they needed, he said.

"There will be plenty of time to assess what worked and what didn't work," Knocke said. "Clearly there will be time for blame to be assigned and to learn from some of the successful efforts."

Brown's memo told employees that among their duties, they would be expected to "convey a positive image of disaster operations to government officials, community organizations and the general public."

"FEMA response and recovery operations are a top priority of the department and as we know, one of yours," Brown wrote Chertoff. He proposed sending 1,000 Homeland Security Department employees within 48 hours and 2,000 within seven days.

Knocke said the 48-hour period suggested for the Homeland employees was to ensure they had adequate training. "They were training to help the life-savers," Knocke said.

Employees required a supervisor's approval and at least 24 hours of disaster training in Maryland, Florida or Georgia. "You must be physically able to work in a disaster area without refrigeration for medications and have the ability to work in the outdoors all day," Brown wrote.

The same day Brown wrote Chertoff, Brown also urged local fire and rescue departments outside Louisiana, Alabama and Mississippi not to send trucks or emergency workers into disaster areas without an explicit request for help from state or local governments. Brown said it was vital to coordinate fire and rescue efforts.

Sen. Barbara Mikulski (news, bio, voting record), D-Md., said Tuesday that Brown should step down.

After a senators-only briefing by Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff and other Cabinet members, Sen. Charles E. Schumer (news, bio, voting record) said lawmakers weren't getting their questions answered.

"What people up there want to know, Democrats and Republicans, is what is the challenge ahead, how are you handling that and what did you do wrong in the past," said Schumer, D-N.Y.

Sen. Ted Stevens (news, bio, voting record), R-Alaska, said the administration is "getting a bad rap" for the emergency response. "People have to understand this is a big, big problem."

Meanwhile, the airline industry said the government's request for help evacuating storm victims didn't come until late Thursday afternoon. The president of the Air Transport Association, James May, said the Homeland Security Department called then to ask if the group could participate in an airlift for refugees.

BLOG SPAM - BAD!!!

2005-09-04T21:20:00.000-07:00

So, my latest blog has 3 comments on it - one telling me about cars and then asking me if I was interested in adult material, one about a magical stuff sales blog, and another about AdSense.

I'M NOT BLOGGING TO GET SPAM'ED.

So, here's what I found thru a search in Blog for all of you that feel as I do:

* What is the word verification option?

* The "word verification" option can be found on the Settings | Comments tab for your blog, and it looks like this:

* If you choose "yes" for this setting, then people leaving comments on your blog will be required to complete a word verification step, similar to the one presented when you create a blog:

* What this does is to prevent automated systems from adding comments to your blog, since it takes a human being to read the word and pass this step. If you've ever received a comment that looked like an advertisement or a random link to an unrelated site, then you've encountered comment spam. A lot of this is done automatically by software which can't pass the word verification, so enabling this option is a good way to prevent many such unwanted comments.

HAH! That's what I say!

I Actually Worked Last Night...

2005-09-04T15:39:00.000-07:00

My friend Kaz, one of the first people I met here, owns a restaurant/bar KAZU in the complex I used to work in - that's how I met him. Anyway, I 'interned' last night- I bar backed from 9PM - 2AM, to get myself back up to speed.

I started out just the dish washer, but by then end of the evening I was taking orders, getting folks beers and shots, and ringing up the tabs (I decided not to start with the mixed drinks too soon, since I really need a brush-up course on those). It was a blast, and Kaz seemed very happy with the job I did, and he said I can do it whenever I want.

So, this'll give me experience in Nashville that can be confirmed, and, it gets me out of the house and working! And I gotta tell ya, although I asked for no money last night, IF I had been making tips only, I still would have walked out with around $75. If I can get a real bartending job, I could make some real $$$$.
I know a new bar is opening in about a month in my 'hood - I just have to locate the owners and see if I can get them to hire me.
Also, the big promoters in town, the folks who I was hoping would be able to get me craft service jobs, (that, so far, hasn't panned out), are now booking a new venue, so I'm going to hit them up again and see if they need any extra hands.
All my friends from New Orleans are safe. I think they've pretty much lost everything they had, though.
My broken toe is still fat as a worm (ugh!), but it's a lot easier to get around, so I plan to start riding my bike in the beautiful park next week. I have also put myself on a diet where I eat my biggest meal during the day, nut in the evening, so I hope that'll help me get into shape, too.

These pix are of my old friend from New York, David Poe, who is on the road and played here @ The Belmont Theatre a couple of days ago. Check out his photos:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/mockstar/

Later.

Child Abuse Info and My Latest Job Update...

2005-08-31T22:35:00.000-07:00

So, I called a number I got from another East Nashburg blogger, which referred me to a new number, and they referred me to DHS in Oregon, and they referred me to DHS in Jackson County, Oregon, and first, here's some not-so-great news, in my opinion:

Although DHS agreed that being called 'you fat fuck' was inappropriate behavior for a teenager to put up with, unless the teen is showing signs of the results of the abuse, i.e., drinking, drugging, suicide attempts, and all the other bad stuff you can image, DHS WON'T GET INVOLVED. In other words, if my friend is doing her best to keep her chin up, she's not elegible for help! I guess it has to be too late before they'll get involved.

Here are some of their definitions (edited by me, only pertinent info for this situation is here):

Neglect

Neglect is the most common form of abuse seen and may have long-term effects. Neglect is failing to provide adequate food, clothing, shelter, supervision or medical care. Parents must provide adequate supervision, care, guidance and protection to keep children from physical or mental harm. Parents must also provide appropriate treatment for children's problems. Children will have minor injuries during childhood. When accidental injuries are frequent, they may be the result of neglect.

Neglect includes exposing a child to illegal activities, such as:

Exposing a child to parental drug abuse

Medical neglect

Children need adequate medical, dental or mental health care services. Medical neglect is when a parent or caregiver does not provide these. When a medical situation may result in serious impairment, pain or death of the child, CPS can intervene. Religious beliefs about spiritual care are generally honored, except when the child's life is in danger. If a parent refuses medical attention in a serious or life-threatening situation, CPS may intervene.

Mental injury

Mental injury includes:

Rejecting, abandoning or extensive ridiculing of a child.

Mental injury/psychological maltreatment is the result of cruel or unconscionable acts and/or statements made, threatened to be made or permitted to be made by the caregiver(s) which have a direct effect on the child; or caregiver’s failure to provide nurturance, protection or appropriate guidance. The caregiver’s behavior, intentional or unintentional, must be related to the observable and substantial impairment of the child’s psychological, cognitive, emotional and/or social well being and functioning.

Threat of harm

Threat of harm is subjecting a child to a substantial risk of harm to the child’s health or welfare. Substantial harm is defined as immobilizing impairment, life-threatening damage, or significant or acute injury to a child’s physical, sexual, psychological, or mental development and/or functioning. Some examples of this type of abuse are:

Caregiver behavior which is out of control and threatening to a child’s safety; e.g., driving while intoxicated with children in the car or a caregiver who is not taking prescribed medication. May also be due to drug or alcohol abuse; or a mental, emotional, or physical problem.

So, I sent this to my friend her aunt and to Sue, and we'll see what happens...

Now, on to my (lack of) employment:

Didn't get the $7.50 per hour job as an opthalmologist's asssistant (do you know, I had to type that word 3 times before I spelled it right?!?!?!?!).

I applied at T-Mobile Customer Call Center, Regions Bank, and I sent a resume to the head of a record company called Rust, based out of Cleveland, who've opened a Nashville office.

I know, I know, I said no more music business, but, what am I going to do? I look through thousands, and that number is no lie, of jobs a week online and in the Tennessean Sunday paper.

Ya know what I've found? I'm not an RN, I'm not a truck driver, I'm not a welder, I'm not most of the positions listed - I don't have alot of experience in what people are looking for...

I'm still looking...

And, finally, I saw Louis IV on Sunday, and they were as great as I had hoped. Yes, children, there is STILL a chance for rock n' roll!

Child Abuse Nashville Update, Jobs, & Back To Photos...

2005-08-26T16:37:00.000-07:00

1st of all, thanks to you all who responded, both here and at other emails - there's one from my East Nashville 'hood, too.

Just FYI - Sue's too young to get a 'divorce', become emancipated. And, I haven't heard from her in at least a week. Her aunt called the place she lives, and was told by the latest 'dad', 'Sue's not here.' When the aunt called back, he hung up on her, and then took the phone off the hook. Heeeeeeeyyyyyy, now that's a grown-up thing to do!
The aunt found out from talking to Sue later that she was there at the time.

I'll let you all know what happens.

I went on an interview in the Hickory Hollow shopping area at an eye place (exams, lens-making, frames, etc.) where a neighbor works, for a job of Dr.'s assistant. They train you to bring the patients into the room, and do the inital eye tests. Sundays and Wednesdays off (well, that's going to make it a little difficult when Luciano finally gets here for a visit...), hours are 9AM - 6PM, and 8AM - 3PM on Saturdays. After 90 days, you get health insurance, after a year paid vacation, after a year, paid holidays, after 90 days a raise.

Oh yeah - the raise would be from the starting salary of... $7.50.

Yikes. How can anyone live on that? Can you imagine what a bar back must make here?
BUT - if they offer it to me, I'll take it - I need a Nashville job on my resume, and I need a normal job on my resume, and even if I stay for 6 months and then leave, I'll have been trained.

I'm going to call the Vanderbilt temp service I went and tested at a couple of months ago, and see if there's any work...

Man, it's been grey here all day - it rained for quite a while, and it's basically looked like dusk all day.

BUT, I DID open all the doors and windows and just had the fans, not the AC on! Most a' y'all know that I do like it this dreary, so I'm pretty damn happy right now!

OK, so all of these pix should be new... you know my memory, so excuse me if there are repeats...

OH, BY THE WAY! I sold one of my prints at the Tomato Fest I have been talking about!!!!!!

Yeay! for Me! here it is again:

Well, I think I'm off to Margot's - they make a martini that has the most amazing blue cheese-stuffed olives!

Abuse of Childern - Child in Crisis - Parental Abuse

2005-08-24T14:40:00.000-07:00

OK, so this is real - maybe some folks I don't know will see the title and read and have some advice...

My new neighbors down the street have a 15-year-old wonderful niece. We immediately bonded over music, and we spent alot of time together in the last month - she was here in Nashville visiting them, and it was so apparent that her life at home is BAD BAD BAD, and that she wants to lead a good life. So, her awesome aunt and uncle (in their 30's, with 4 other kids, no less) offered to have her live with them, and register her in school, and take care of her and love her an respect her. She thought is was a great idea. This is a kid with dyed black/pink hair, pierced lip, rock t-shirts, torn jeans, music maniac, who, based on the information that will follow, would be a drinking, drugging, miserable, lawless kid; but, nope, she wants to go to school, she is smart, reasonable, great with her nieces/nephews, reliable, generous, fun to hang with, just a great kid all around. Her relatives are fantastic parents.

So, here's all the background info: her mom's an alcoholic, for a start. She keeps getting DUI's, and once they finally told her she could serve a sentence under house arrest, but, she continued to go out all day, all night and get hammered - and this was when my friend (let's call her Sue) was eight. Sue has a sister who is about 8 years older, who was the one bringing her up from when she was about 6 to 11, when her sister just had to leave. I've lost track of the number of men her mom has lived with, carting her daughter to each of the men's homes - the 2nd-to-last one she slept on a couch for a year, in the house with her mom, the boyfriend, the boyfriend's mom, sister and 4 nieces/nephews, all in a 3 bedroom apt. The boyfriend's friends would call up, and when Sue was the one to answer the phone would ask her if she was 'as hot as your mom' - she was 13 at the time.

She's lived on welfare and in ghettos, and moved her belongings in trash bags, over and over.

Her mother and father were together in their early 20's (never married) and he split a couple of years after she was born. her mom's been married a couple of times (I think twice to her sister's dad). Her hard-drinking dad been in so many bar fights that he's missing his front teeth, and now he's done a 180 and he's a Christian and remarried, and he has legal custody of her - so, he can declare her on his taxes, but he won't pay to fix her teeth, she has no money, and, when she told him she wanted to stay in Nashville and go to school, he told her that if she didn't go back to the Northwest, he's sic the cops on her and have her arrested - this is his daughter he's talking about.

Her parents don't give a shit about her; they just didn't want her to have what she wanted, and they didn't want her relatives to have made a decision that they hadn't made. The relatives have asked to be her temporary legal guardians in order to register her for school; they'd buy her clothes, school supplies, etc. They're not asking for anything; no money, etc.

Her mother and father are very very fucked-up people. Sue told her mom that she was not comfortable living with the latest boyfriend; her mother has now gone and married him; he's not well, and she'll get his trailer, insurance, etc. if/when he dies. Her mother actually told Sue that Sue was already on his health insurance, as if Sue'd believe it.

This man refers to Sue (to her face) as 'you fat fuck'. Her mother is aware of this; so is her father. I don't know what her mother's response is, but when it was pointed out over the phone to her dad by her aunt, his reply was 'well, she's been called worse'. No fatherly support or loyalty here, that's for sure.

There's lots of info out there about what to do with a 'teen in crisis', but it's all about how to intervene if the child is the cause of the problem.

What if the parents are the cause of the problem?

I'm terribly worried that this will escalate - something bad will happen; some friend of her mothers' will get too friendly, she'll cave into her friends and drugs, just to try to deal with this sad sad life.

PLEASE - if anyone has any suggestions as to where we can go for help, please let me know.

... And A Quick Addition Blog...

2005-08-19T00:08:00.000-07:00

OK, so I'm always posting my photos and raving about the flickr site.

Well, have a look, please, at this link.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/joammaspockdean/favorites/

These are photos other folks have taken that I liked so much I put into a 'favorites' place.

Thanks, you won't regret it!

Mostly A Photo Update...

2005-08-18T12:18:00.000-07:00

Had a big discussion with my Mom last week, about why she and my sister do not get along. I think my Mother actually listened, and even better, applied what I told her, to her view of things.

She is really making an effort to change things for the better. So far, it's not perfect, but it's sure alot better than it has been for, oh, 15 years...

Since I have had such wonderful luck with the Group Therapy I started in Brooklyn, and that I have continued to do over the phone every week since I moved here (and it ain't easy, let me tell ya), she was willing to join a group of her own in Van Nuys, and has learned so much from the experience.
Gee, and I kept adding all these images at the end of my blog...

OK, so I'm getting fat... I don't exercise, it's incredibly hot here, all I manage to do is walk the dog...

Even though I have lots of photo stuff to do, I never feel I have to get up any particluar time, so I don't...
I have cereal and maybe lunch and then dinner - it's not the food, it's the lethargy...

And now, I can't even really walk the dog for a while...

I broke a toe, it doesn't matter which one, they just have to heal, don't they?

I wish I had lots of money so I could do all the things I want to do around the house...

Still not working, still looking...

I'm really tired alot, I can sleep on and off all day and night... gee, maybe if I was working I'd have more eneregy...

Will use the Blogger photo link again...

Just Catchin' Up...

2005-08-13T23:14:00.000-07:00

I'm lazy - I'll use the sites photo uploader...

Anyway, so, my friends Alison and Sheila pointed out that #1, Sheila's wonderful daughter used to have 'rocket poo', the sound of which would bring the baby's head swinging around, and #2, that Allie's brother John has a dog who waits to fart until it is sitting next to you.

Didn't get the apprentice meat cutter job... I'm still lookin'....

My house is still coming along... this means, I'm still unpacking, and even better yet, I'm still moving! I figure I have 2, maybe 3 carloads left, with 2 of those carloads still having to be... packed!

Did I mention? I am down to one happy pill a day. Can you believe it? Once it was 4!!!

I'm feeling like I did in 2000; in fact, I haven't been this happy since then. I am a bit lethargic, but I am attributing that to 95+ degree days and no job...

I am obviously still taking a fair number of photos.

Here's the rest of the latest:

Oh, my God, the Dog just farted, and I heard this one!

... I actually took this photo of a LIVE bug!

Work, Dogs, And Stuff

2005-08-05T09:04:00.000-07:00

First, The Dog: We're off to our first dog training class. My dog is very smart, and the longer I have her, the more I can see how well she has already been trained, but, I wasn't her original trainer and she needs to learn things like, not to scratch the doors to get in (which will destroy the screens), not to jump, and not to drag me down the street (and not to pee on the carpet!!!) I should also break her of the habit of getting onto the bed in the morning, but since I have already managed to get her to sleep on her own bed at night, I just don't have the heart.

On another Dog note, She, like many dogs, has lots of gas. I personally have never heard a dog fart - well, up until recently. She was sitting in the front hall and farted, and looked around behind herself in surprise at the noise. Just wanted to share that with y'all.

The Cat is SO loving her outdoor life! She's very happy in general; she loves the house and tolerates the Dog a little more each day. (Cat photos are all on the top of this post as that's a new part of the program - I'd like to put the pix where I want, though, so I'll have to do the rest the old way...)

OK, Work: I went on an interview a couple of days ago for a marketing job. I should have quit while I was ahead... I got on the freeway going in the wrong direction. I then missed my exit as someone cut me off. I got back on, got off at the exit, and... went the wrong way. At this point I figured this would happen, so eventually I turned around and went the other way -- right past the street I was supposed to turn on. I only found this out when I decided to just go home, and passed it on the way back to the freeway, so, I actually went up the street, found the address, went to the suite the company was in, and... it was the wrong building. I went across the street to the right building and the right offices, only to find out that it was a SALES job.
Geez.

I went on another interview yesterday, for a job I really want. This is no joke. It is for an apprentice meat cutter; i.e., learn how to be a butcher. When I first escaped Virgin, I seriously thought about borrowing $$ from a relative and opening a business in Brooklyn that would benefit me and my neighborhood, and the main business I thought of was... a butcher/cheese shop.
I have also brought it up here in East Nashville.

So, keep your fingers crossed for me.

Next Day report: Oh, The Dog was so great in class!!! I am so proud of her!
And, I finished the Harry Potter Book - loved it, of course.

I love my home, if I haven't said that recently.

Later.

BUSH BULLSHIT!!!!!!!!

2005-08-01T13:23:00.000-07:00

WHAT COUNTRY DO WE LIVE IN, EXACTLY?!?!?!?!?!?!

WASHINGTON -
President Bush sidestepped the Senate and installed embattled nominee John Bolton as ambassador to the United Nations on Monday, ending a five-month impasse with Democrats who accused Bolton of abusing subordinates and twisting intelligence to fit his conservative ideology.

"This post is too important to leave vacant any longer, especially during a war and a vital debate about U.N. reform," Bush said. He said Bolton had his complete confidence.

Bush put Bolton on the job with a recess appointment — an avenue available to the president when Congress is in recess. Under the Constitution, a recess appointment during the lawmakers' August break would last until a newly elected Congress took office in January 2007.

Within five hours of his appointment, Bolton arrived at the U.S. mission in New York to begin work. He refused to speak with reporters.

Bush said that Bolton's nomination had been supported by a majority of the Senate but that "because of partisan delaying tactics by a handful of senators, John was unfairly denied the up-or-down vote that he deserves."

Bush had refused to give up on Bolton even though the Senate had voted twice to sustain a filibuster against his nominee. Democrats and some Republicans had raised questions about Bolton's fitness for the job, particularly in view of his harsh criticism of the United Nations.

U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan welcomed Bolton's appointment and steered clear of the controversy over whether Bolton would be weakened by the recess appointment. "We look forward to working with him as I do with the other 190 ambassadors, and we will welcome him at a time when we are in the midst of major reform," Annan said.

Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said Bolton was a "seriously flawed and weakened candidate." He said Bush "chose to stonewall the Senate" by using a recess appointment.

Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., (AAAAAAAAUUUUUUUUUUGGGGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!
THIS IS THE GUY WHO REPRESENTS MY STATE!!!!)
said, "The president did the right thing by sending Mr. Bolton to the U.N. He is a smart, principled and straightforward candidate, and will represent the president and America well on the world stage."

Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (news, bio, voting record), D-Mass., sharply criticized the move.

"It's a devious maneuver that evades the constitutional requirement of Senate consent and only further darkens the cloud over Mr. Bolton's credibility at the U.N," Kennedy said."

Republican Sen. George Voinovich (news, bio, voting record) of Ohio also said he was disappointed.

"I am truly concerned that a recess appointment will only add to John Bolton's baggage and his lack of credibility with the United Nations," Voinovich said.

Bolton's appointment ends a standoff between the administration and Senate Democrats.

In recent weeks, the fight had faded into the background as the Senate prepared to begin a nomination battle over John Roberts, the federal appeals judge that Bush chose to replace the retiring Justice
Sandra Day O'Connor at the Supreme Court.

At Bolton's April confirmation hearing, Democrats raised questions about his demeanor and attitude toward lower-level government officials. Those questions came to dominate Bolton's confirmation battle, growing into numerous allegations that he had abused underlings or tried to browbeat intelligence analysts whose views differed from his own.

Witnesses told the committee that Bolton tried to engineer the ouster of at least two intelligence analysts and otherwise threw his weight around. But Democrats were never able to establish that his actions crossed the line to out-and-out harassment or improper intimidation.

Separately, Democrats and the White House deadlocked over Bolton's acknowledged request for names of U.S officials whose communications were secretly picked up by the National Security Agency. Democrats said the material might show that Bolton conducted a witch hunt for analysts or others who disagreed with him.

The top Republican and Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee received a limited briefing on the contents of the messages Bolton saw, but were not told the names.

Democrats said that was not good enough. After much back and forth, no other senator saw any of the material.

In a letter released Friday, 35 Democratic senators and one independent, Sen. Jim Jeffords of Vermont, urged Bush not to give Bolton a recess appointment.

Some Fitzrandolph Wedding Photos - Sometimes This Thing STILL Doesn't Work Righ

2005-07-27T15:33:00.000-07:00

OK, this is my, like, FIFTH try on this posting!!!

You can view these few, but it's better to go to the photoo website:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/joammaspockdean/

and click on the Fitzrandolph Wedding Album.
They're in no order, which is annoying, but you can at least SEE them, which is better than here....

So I'm just going to skip right to some wedding photos from Jennie & Kenny's wedding:

Just Married!!!!!

Mr. & Mrs. Fitzrandolph

... And Their Rings...

The Yeiser Family

Mother and Sister Sister and Dad

The Bride's Best Friends A Yeiser Flower Jennie and Her Friends

The Bride's Shoes The Top of the Cake

Art & Sleep

2005-07-14T22:18:00.000-07:00

OK, here I am, back again, finally.

So, you ALL have to check out this place online -

http://www.flickr.com/.

This is THE MOST INSPIRING PLACE that I can think of.

No matter what I am doing, how I feel, how my life is going (good, bad, apathetic, whatever), I am so inspired to work on my photographs. Not only is it a place to display them, but, even better, there is SO MUCH SUPPORT from all the OTHER semi-professionals in the site.

I get emails and comments every day from other folks from everywhere - Japan, France, Australia, England, Canada - a friend from NY even found me, and sent me the link to all his fantastic photos!

It doesn't matter if you are a photographer. an artist, whatever - there is SO MUCH wonderful stuff all over this site!

Some of these photos I am posting here are older, and have basically been in a closet

until I found this site. Now, I update them, re-think them, ADD them to where folks can see them!

Not only does everyone have their own space, but there are also many, many different groups that can be joined - I am in a cat, dog, bridge, water, macro plant, couples, weddings and more groups, and, each time I join a new group, I see more beautiful work, and more people respond to my pictures.

I find myself on this site, and/or working on my stuff until, like, oh, 4AM!?!?!?!?!?!?!?
I am sitting here now, in fact, playing The Clash, Blue Man Group and The Darkness over and over and over and over...
This is a bit of a problem - I am having great difficulty sleeping, and consequently, can't wake up. So, I get up later and later, and work later and later...
For a while, I was actually doing this stuff during the day! What a concept!
ANYWAY - NO MATTER WHAT YOU DO, whether you paint, write, type, whatever you do creatively, photography or not, you need to check out this site.

Oh, by the way, for all of my friends who live on Mars, I am a homeowner. I will be living in the new house by Saturday.

Also, when I can work on the photos, I have some great ones from Jennie's wedding!

I miss you all.

Off To LA and Home-Less...

2005-07-05T19:19:00.000-07:00

Oh, I just can't take enough pictures of her...

"Spice"

I'm off to LA tomorrow (Thursday) afternoon, for my niece Jennie's wedding, and, as I fly through the air, my apartment in Brooklyn will be closing, and when I land, I will no longer be a homeowner.

This is Gizmo, our friend who lives at Anna's house,

"Gizmo"

down the block from our soon-to-be new home...

Here's some older art I don't think I've put up here.

"Ruby's", Coney Island, Brooklyn NY 2003

When I return on Monday evening, I will go to sleep

"Moss On Bricks", Red Hook, Brooklyn NY 2004

merely an apartment-dweller, and will awake to go to

"Ladybug Art", Nashville TN 2005
(thanks to my art tutor, Jeffrey Terzi)

the

CLOSING of my NEW HOME.

"Tomato Tote Bag #3",
iron-on transfer of my art,
3-D styrofoam tomatoes, ribbon, tassels,
and a butterfly with little shaky things
inside it

"Sake Bottles", Iron Man Restaurant, Brooklyn NY 2003

"The Sleeping Kitty", Nashville TN 2005

Will write when I return.

Well, I Seem To Be Writing Tonight...

2005-07-02T00:25:00.000-07:00

Well, I previously said that since I would be house-sitting for my friend Anna on Friday night and thru the 5th, that I wasn't sure if I'd get a chance to write for a couple of days.
So, I cleaned the cat box, put out a couple day's worth of food, petted her on the head, packed some clothes n' stuff for the weekend, and headed to East Nashville to buy fresh salad stuff and fruit for the next couple of days.
I got to Anna's, stuck my hand in the mailbox and - no key! No note, no nothing. I was rather perplexed, and was trying to decide if I should give her cellphone a call when... Anna came to the front door, opened it, said hi, invited me in, and nicely pointed out that they weren't leaving until Saturday morning @ 10AM, and she had been wondering who was playing with their mailbox...
Sheesh.
Oh, well, I came home and made a nice salad, made some lists, watched 'Sybil' and hung out with the kitty.

And did some more art.
So, I'll just do it all over again tomorrow - no big deal, just sorta silly...

So, here it is:

Happy Merry! (and, Gee, Don't We Girls Just Love Photoshop...)

2005-06-30T16:12:00.000-07:00

Tonight I spent the evening at a wonderful place in East Nashville called 'Family Wash' - a restaurant/bar that has live music and wonderful food, and one of my new friends Jamie runs it (a musician from Boston), and I was with my old friend Warren, and some other new friends, and I had a great time. (Jaime's old friend Peter Wolf (lead singer of the J.Geils Band) showed up, and we got to hang out with him, and he is still a 'rock star' - same hat, clothes, hair, etc.

It reminded me of how much better I feeel that I 'fit in' in Nashville - or, at least, in East Nashville. It's mainly artistic-minded folks who vote Democratic. I don't feel old, and the bands aren't all trying to be rock stars who hope to open for Oasis. I haven't felt this comfortable in years.

Another new friend, Ellen, owns a bed-and-breakfast walking distance from my home-to-be, and she's having a get-together for the 4th, so I will try to take fireworks pix then.

I am house-sitting for my realtor, and friend, Anna, and her family, this weekend, a block from my home-to-be (I plan to walk back and forth in front of it all day Saturday) so I may not write again until Monday, so I will share pix of a Brooklyn 2003 4th of July with you...

I spent Wednesday with Shelby Todd. I took her for her first trip to the vet. They loved her, of course. She got her shots, and a dog tag, and the whole place was run by women - very cool, I must say. We go back in 3 weeks to spay her.
After the vets we went to the dog run in Shelby Bottoms Park, and had a very good time running around with 4 big-ass dogs. When it was time to go, she would not get back in the car. I finally had to let her get in on my side, and then she sat where my feet go, until I finally bribed her with a number of handfuls of dog food.
She needs a dog seat belt - I may have to design one.

T'day is my birthday. My first call was from Nick, who left a happy birthday message, hoping I wouldn't kill him for mentioning it at all - I'm not one to do lots of advertising about it. He's so funny - he's a good friend...
Then my Mom called (I forgot to call her last week for hers, although I did remember it the night before), and then my old friend, and talented piano player called and sang and played me happy birthday over the phone.

For my birthday, I gave myself a visit to the doctor about my stomach ache (he is making me take some icky tests) and a mammogram (it's just a yearly thing).

Oh, yeah, and I plan to give myself a House. The present will be a little late though - July 12th is my closing date here in Nashburg.

Here's my latest tomato thingy - it can be a paperweight, a pen & pencil holder, a doorstop, or, whatever someone wants it to be.

Memory Loss, Short-Term Memory Loss, or Just Plain Old Confused?

2005-06-27T10:10:00.000-07:00

So, I get a bill from CompUSA for what I'm sure is the same amout as the last bill, and, the bill before that.
And, I know I've sent them 2 payments through online banking, for $110 each, but, they have no record of it, and, they've charged me $29 in late fees.
I found the info on my bank site, but when I got a bank person on the phone, I couldn't locate it anymore.

Well.

I finally figured it out - CompUSA... Comcast... tomato, tomaato... I have been paying my Comcast bill on time, and just remembering it as the CompUSA bill... $29 later...

I made a lisrt of the things I had to do TODAY, and, it came to 38 items, and some items are more than one item on a line, since they're related...

I finished 13.

I can still do a couple of them tonight, online - nah, I'm going to bed.

I still need a job.

Here's the latest kitty pic.

Just A Quick Catch-Up Blog

2005-06-25T10:19:00.000-07:00

Since it's been a couple of days and I want to at least try to stay up-to-date, here's the latest:

My place in Brooklyn finally has a closing date - July 7th! YEAY! It's a week later than I wanted, but, in reality, it's better than I thought that stupid lawyer (oops, sorry to be redundant) would do - at first, he said it wouldn't be until the week after.
This means that in a perfect world, the closing here in Nashburg will be July 13th. Ahh, that would be so great! I could potentially be living in my house by August 1st!

On another note, I went to a job interview, more like a 'personality'-type test, and, I did not get the job @ Dell. I did find out that the test is more about matching personalities to the job, not about checking wiith your old boss about what he might or might not say regarding your work ethics, so they said they can see how I have the personality in person of a potential sales person, and that I can take the test again in 6 months, and I should check their website for other Dell jobs.
So, I'm still looking, but I feel OK about it. Just gotta find an income somewhere!

On to the Nasville home - here's a pic of the front porch,
and the entryway, shot from the hall,
so it's not quite fully visible.

And, here are the two chairs I bought at the monthly flea market to go into that entryway!

I also bought a totally cool, enamel table for the kitchen. It's white, with an etched-in blue design around the top edges, as well as a drawer, and, two built-in leaves (they're tucked in underneath and pull out like drawers), so that it expands into a pretty big table - it is definitely one-of-a-kind, and as soon as I can find a place to put it (instead of the back of the car), I will take a picture of it, too!

Well, I'm off to that beautiful park in East Nashville that's right by my house, to spend some time with my dog. (So, here's a picture of her again.)

And, here's a pic of little Spice, who is lovin' hangin' out in the heat on the porch of my apartment - I can't wait until she sees her big backyard - I'm getting her a cat door! (My friend Bill, who has 4 cats, told me not to worry about her not using it - 'Just shove her through 2 times, and she'll go through it by herself the 3rd".

My stomach ache is pretty much gone, I am happy to say, although, I did have it for 3 weeks...

Ramblings

2005-06-21T00:31:00.000-07:00

This HTML stuff is not workin' for me tonight, that's fer sure...

Gee, and now it's tomorrow, and still not working...

Check it out.

... "NASHVILLE, Tenn. - President Bush today praised Southern Baptists for their strong family values and again proclaimed his support for a constitutional amendment to protect the institution of marriage." (Nothing personal about the Southern Baptists, it's the President I'm on about here)

What happened to Separation of
church and state, church and state, church and state, church and state, church and state, church and state, church and state...
Do you think if we all repeat this it will make a difference?

Or, how about this one:
... "VATICAN CITY, June 10 (Reuters) – In a speech on Friday to bishops from five African countries, Pope Benedict VXI attacked the use of condoms to fight H.I.V. and AIDS, saying the church was leading the fight against the epidemic by teaching chastity and fidelity."

Or, this one (this guy represents the state I live in!):

... "WASHINGTON - Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist said Tuesday he would keep pressing for a vote on embattled U.N. nominee John Bolton's confirmation after President Bush insisted that throwing in the towel was not an option."

OK, enough bad news.

As of right now, I DO NOT HAVE A STOMACH ACHE, and haven't for couple of hours. and I have pretty much had one non-stop for days, as we all know, and, boy, is this nice... in fact, due to program problems, I am finishing this blog on Wednesday AM, and I only barely have one today!

The only thing I can think of that might have lessened my stomach ache is possibly Arizona Diet Green Tea with Ginseng...

I have 99% finished the first 2 designs of my hand-printed images, handmade art-ed, canvas carry bags; these, obviously, will be on sale at the Tomato And Art Festival previously mentioned here a while ago. I've still got to find a better glue, though...

Canvas bag, my print iron-on transferred, red glitter spray paint,

3-D realistic-looking leaves, brooms and sunflowers and, ribbon

Canvas bag, my print-iron on transferred, stencilled leaves,
3-D ladybugs, ribbon

'Self-Portrait With Tomato'
(I'm including it here again),

and I plan to make a serving tray, a paperweight (or will it be a doorstop?), a hot dish protector - it's called a trivet - and hopefully more bags, all with a tomato motif, of course.

Here are some new photos:

....................

A Summer Toe ..............................................................A Stump And Dried Grass

......................... ....................

Plants....................... Plants........................ Plants

Sheesh. Sorry about the bad spacing - still learning, I guess.

And, the last unpleasant news:

Kee-rist, Top 40 Radio is unlisten-able. Total, utter, shit.

.. What Happened To Wednesday - Friday...

2005-06-18T21:55:00.000-07:00

OK, so I don't seem to be able to be consistent with Posting, I am sorry to say.
The main problem, unfortunately, is that I can't seem to spend 5 days in a row feeling normal and doing daily stuff. I'm either feeling too lethargic, or too ill. I don't really have too much recollection of the past week, although of course I do remember the sort of stand-out things that happened.
First, to feeling ill. I have been washing ALL fruit and vegetables here at home with that special spray made specifically for that, and, I have not once gotten a stomacheache from eating at home since I started. This is a big discovery. And, the two times I have eaten out, I DID get a stomacheache... which MAY mean that #1, restaurants don't wash stuff well, #2, restaurant workers don't wash themselves well, #3, who knows what it means...
I've also found that when I've eaten out, within an hour after finishing, I start to crash hard; I believe I've mentioned before that when this happens, I get really cold, and cannot stay awake, and pass out for a couple of hours - it's like either a serious carb overload reaction, or, if I am consuming bad bacteria, it's my body shutting down and drawing all energy to my stomach in order to make me better.
Or, maybe there's an alien in there.
As to lethary - I started taking an ADHD drug, and it really seemed to be helping - the last couple of weeks, that it, but not this last week. I can't have acclimated to it that fast... maybe the lethargy is just due to feeling ill...
I haven't really done too much art this past week, and I have been sleeping more, although I am reading alot. I also went on an interview for the Vanderbilt University's Temp Services, and I'm pretty sure they'll be calling me when they get some work. I remember doing that. Oh, and I worked out one day this week, and really worked hard. One day, though, that was it. I don't really remember doing anything else this week...
on the other hand, a note on the cat. I made myself a comfort meal of rice, tuna and a little mayo. We shared it (her idea, although I don't mind), and the entire time she was eating, she was basically humming - 'hmmmmm, hmmmmm, hmmmm'. She is so damn cute.

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY TO ALL!!!

Well, I'm just really rambling, so I think I'll stop. Tomorrow I'm spending time with my dog. And, hopefully, I'll get myself together and get back to my artwork on Monday. Here's some of the latest:

OK, So I Don't Quite have The House Yet, But It's Just Routine...

2005-06-14T20:10:00.000-07:00

See, I made an offer, and the seller counter-offered (initially I bid $2500 less than he listed, and he asked for $1000 more, which was still $1500 less than the listing,) a resonably standard action, and I went over the contracts this morning and OK'ed all his other little changes (so, I let him keep his washer/dryer), and supposedly he's counter-signing it tonight. I'll know Wednesday morning, I hope.
If all goes well, we all would like the Nashville closing to be July 6th, as I've said previously. But, I can't get my NY attorny to even tentatively schedule a closing - he says the buyer has to meet with the board and get approval, even though we know they will...
Fuck. This is so annoying.
And, then there's my Mother. I feel like she's very verbally abusive to me - she thinks if I don't agree with her, then I'm merely arguing for the sake of arguing, and that I'm lecturing her, and she becomes bitter, mean, whiny and selfish. The latest specific incidents involve One, me being annoyed at something really stupid one of my relatives said, and my Mother's reaction to this is that rather than deal with what this person said, she doesn't want to hear me say bad things about my relatives - of course, she can dis my brother-in-law (or my sister, or my niece) whenever she feels like it, and Two, her telling me a story about a relative I have no respect for, who treats her very well, and when I did not act overjoyed at the story, she became obviously pissed of and condescending and jusdgemental becasue I don't like him just by default because he treats her well.
This is such bullshit. She has no respect for my view; hey, I told her I thought it was great that she had a wonderful time with the realtive, but that doesn't mean I will change my mind about him, and she is just too selfish to let me be me; I have to unconditionally support her, or I am mean, with a total lack of understanding - oh, I am such a bad daughter. I think about calling her and trying to talk about how I feel, but just thinking about the possible conversation sends me into catatonia - my brain justs shuts down; I literally can't stay awake, - this has happened twice in the last week or so; it's like being drugged.
A couple of weeks ago, I called Pam and left her a message telling her I was resigning my position as daughter, and I thought she should take it. ha ha ha
Alright then.. let's talk about more cheerful things.
This week, I filled out an application @ Home Depot, and today I went to a Job Fair, and I have an interview on Friday with the Vanderbilt University Temp Services, and next Friday I have an interview with Dell Computers.
I must pat myself on the back a little. I went with resume in hand, knowing that giving someone my resume was a sure way to make sure I did NOT get a job, as it would only make me seem way too over-qualified, but - speaking to them in person might give me a chance, and that's exactly what happened with both the women I spoke to; each looked at my resume, and agreed after we spoke that without having spoken to me, they wouldn't have even called, but, after speaking to me, they wanted me to interview. The Dell woman was especially excited about my interviewing - she thinks I have the right personality for the job.
Yes, I know I would like to work for myself, but it's really difficult to get that off the ground. I'm certainly not giving it up, but I also need to support myself, and I think these are both good, interesting opportunites.
It would be nice to think that my cat and dog and I have a wonderful home, and a fun job and a great life for years to come.
Here's the latest batch of photos...

Tom Peterson Cheap Trick

Robin Zander & Tom Peterson

Brenda & Chuck

I Found The Backyard For The Dog, And Here She Is! (In Other Words, I Found A House!)

2005-06-13T21:35:00.000-07:00

I'd like to introduce my dog... this is Shelby. She's My Dog.
.......... Right now, she lives at my friend Anna's, since Anna's husband found her in Shelby Bottoms Park (hence the name of Shelby.)
..............................
Shelby will soon be leaving Anna's, because, oh, I put a bid on a house Sunday evening, and I...

GOT THE HOUSE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

It's an historic 1918 cottage. It's 1413 square feet, with a beautiful master bedroom full of light, with hardwood floors. There's 2 other bedrooms, one that I'll turn into a work space for my art projects. It has 2 very nice full bathrooms, with neat tile in the showers (rather than that standard all-in-one plastic-like bath deals), and one of the baths is big enough to have a closet space for my washer/dryer.

The living room and entryway also have hardwood floors. The kitchin is nice and big, big enough for a breakfast table. The house's interior was all re-done 2 years ago, so it's in great shape; no need for paint, or repairs of any kind. There's a small porch in both the back and front yards, and there's a picket fence in front, and a privacy fence in back - and, there's a garage, with automatic doors, so I can drive in from the back and close the door before I even get out! The backyard is a nice, big green space.

It's bright and airy, and perfect. I looked for weeks, and saw some amazing homes, and some not-so-amazing, and bid on a couple, and was starting to think that I was going to have to spend more than I wanted to, and, this one ending up being the cheapest of all the good ones!
Also, it's exactly where I wanted to be! I live the next street over from my old friend Warren, and a block from my new friend Anna, and a bike ride to the cool little center called 5 Points, and 2 blocks from the most wonderful park, Shelby Bottoms Park, where there are acres and acres of beautiful, green, wooded lands, and a couple of lakes, and a greenaway for me to bicycle on every day. I predict that 6 months after moving in I will have lost 20 lbs!
So, in a perfect world, my Brooklyn closing will be the last week in June, and my East Nashville closing will be the first week in July - boy, would that be the perfect birthday present, or what!

...And The Next Post Is About Madness...

2005-06-11T13:53:00.000-07:00

What is wrong with me?

It's Saturday afternoon; I'm not hung over, or drunk, or overmedicated...

I've been so weepy-depressed lately, and it's constant. The only things that take my mind off whatever it is that's making me this way, is reading (so I spent $41 on books yesterday, one of which was my Harry Potter pre-order, but even then, I was fairly miserable and walking arount the bookstore in what felt like an Elavil fog (and I would never take Elavil, bad, bad)),

finding out that I've captured a cool image on my camera (but that means I have to go out, on foot, which I must admit is happening more than usual, thanks to the fact that I am taking more interesting photos), and, lastly, I am back supporting the U.S. economy - I seriously shopped yesterday - yup, me, the independently wealthy (!) Nashville native - I went to Costco for batteries, and bought a brand new

(beautiful) set of pots and pans, along with the batteries.

Thank God I'm not a late-night tv-watcher, because what if I'm entering into the see-it-on-TV-and-buy manic stage - I have to admit, though, that after my Costco purchases, I lost the urge to continue shopping. Oh - I did buy a pair of shoes for about $28 even before I made it into the bookstore, but they are actually so comfortable that I continued to wear them when I got home, which is very unusual. So, by the end of the day, jobless me had spent nearly $1000. And the only reason I had left the house was to go get the HP book...

And, of course, the cat makes me happy, but sometimes only because she's comforting me as I weep and

hold and pet her, at which time she is very accomodating...

I was feeling really spaced out and disoriented last week, and got in the car to run some errands, and an old Bad Company song came on the radio (gee, where else would it have been?), and it amped me right up - I felt all happy-manic, hit the gas and rocked out up a hill, and a cop pulled me over and told me I was going 59mph (and this was in an area where men are working on the road.)

Do you know what that ticket costs?

Oh, how about $500.

When he told me, I started to cry. I think he was not prepared for that; he seemed to get very concerned that I was so upset, and he didn't give me the ticket.

The main reason I sat down right now to write this is that I returned an email from my friend Alison, and at the end I put, 'I miss you, Allie', and I just started to cry, and now I'm crying again thinking about it. And when I read Nick's response about my previous post and how sweet it was, and how he missed the cat, well, here I am again, tears pouring down my face.

What is it that would cause me to feel so sad? It's not like I only rarely tell my friends I miss them, or commiserate on missing a pet...

The worst part was this:
when I emailed Allie, I sent her jpegs of the photos I have recently taken of little Genny that I don't think she's seen, and I suddenly got this physical jolt - I felt nervous, and sick, because this is the thought that came to me:

'What if Nick and Sheila get mad and won't ever let me show the photos of their daughter?"

Where. Did. That. Come. From.
From some dark, fucked-up place in my mind, I guess.

I can only hope that when I get regulated back on my Fluoxetine, this will all go away like a bad dream.

At least it's been raing almost all the time for like, the last 3 days, so that cheers me up (I mean it.)

I've inserted some of my latest pix - at least they aren't horror movies , like the one I feel I'm in these days...

OK, I'm Going To Write About The Cat

2005-06-10T19:29:00.000-07:00

So, I couldn't decide - should I write about the cat? The Cheap Trick show? My ongoing fucking stomach ache? House-hunting? Mental Disorientation? Or, when the fuck did I start to look 50?!?!?!?!?!?! (And it sure as shit is not MY fault...)

Well, this will remind me what I'll write about in the future - now, it's all about Spice.
"God, I'm A Happy Cat"

There is much research regarding animals knowledge; specifically, how much they really understand, and what they actually retain, i.e.'words'.

"And Sooo Fashionable"

I guarantee you, this cat learns words. I usually call her 'Shorty', and when I call to her, she responds. If I call to her in the same tone of voice, but substitute another word for Shorty, she does not respond.

I have sliding doors here that lead to a small balcony that I have tastefully decorated with cheap wire fencing and fake vines to block out all the folks walking in from the parking lot (which is eye level with the balcony.) Anyway, I bought some bolts of screening, and made a screen that is split at the bottom so that Spice can come and go as she pleases, without too many flying creatures getting in. When I put up the screen, in order to get her to figure out that going through them would takek her specifically to not-in-the-house, I sat there and said 'out' for days, each time I opened the doors.

Well, it worked.

If I stand in front of the sliding doors and say 'out', she'll come over to the doors and wait for me to open them so that she can access the screens. If I stand in the same place and say some other word in the tones of 'out', she DOES NOT come over.

OK. You can believe whatever you want.

My cat companion of 17 years, davethecat (rest in peace, my love), was also extremely smart. I've been told that when I got OFF THE ELEVATOR in my apartment in Brooklyn, his head would perk up and he'd go WAIT FOR ME TO COME IN MY FRONT DOOR.
He also used to know it was me when we lived in NYC, and I would open the main door of the building we lived in, which was 2 FLOORS BELOW my apartment.

Anyway, some quirkier facts about Spice - I know she eats when I'm not home, BUT - when I am here, she insists that I stay in the kitchen until she has really started her meal, and, she also insists that I pet her

butt before she'll start.

"Hey - Watch That"

I kid you not. So OK, she's a little spoiled.

I have ongoing conversations with her, too - and, if I meow, she'll reply, and then when I reply, she'll reply, and she is NEVER willing to not be last. I could lie in bed some nights, and unless I shut up, it will go on forever.

Silly cat.

Spice With Dad - Sheila's Wonderful Husband And My Friend Nick

I'm Going To Whine...

2005-06-07T22:35:00.000-07:00

It's my space and I can complain all I want.

I can't ever make my posts look how I want them to, since they look different on every server... Explorer, Safari, Firefox, and I'm not even going to check Netscape... one has a black background, one won't show me updated posts, one has one word in yellow and changed one section to Papyrus... Nick has generously been giving me a call every night to see if I need help; he pointed out to me how I could make various changes - bold, italic, colours, fonts - within the 'edit post' section, under 'Compose'; I hadn't realised what this section was, so I had been trying to do it all with html, which I am learning as I go.
So, I decided to enter this post from Explorer, and the 'Compose' section doesn't exist! (At least, not on my MAC). So here I am, back in Firefox.
And, here's a good one - when I click on the 'Text Colour', I get a nice little box with 70 empty, boxes in it - no way to tell which box corresponds to what colour, so I am guessing based on the standard colour box!
I've got my photos on this Blog, on Flickr and on pbase. I can't keep track of where all my pix are; they should technically all be in the two databases, but who knows? I can't keep up.
I'm either too hot or too cold, and it's not the weather, either. I keep the air on, but then I have to put on a sweater, and eventually that gets too hot, and then I take it off, and then I turn the air off, and then I have to start the cycle all over again, and by the end of every day I am sweating like I've been running in a marathon, which sure as hell isn't me.
And, why isn't that me? Because, I can't sleep without Ambien, no matter what I try; Calmes Forte, other homeopathic stuff, calcium, nothing works. And, so, I'm really not getting enough sleep, so, I can't seem to get up and get it together to exercise, so I am becoming a total sloth (didn't they kill a sloth in 'Seven'?) And, you can't walk here like Brooklyn, so, I'm driving everywhere - needless to say, I bet I've gained a solid 20lbs.....
I'm taking a new med and I think it's working, but I have been taking my Fluoxetine very irregularly, since I keep trying to get it free from NY, so, I'm feeling depressed from my own poor medicating, unless I just need some other meds...
Speaking of meds, I'm also really annoyed that I cannot deal on a normal basis without the meds. Very Annoyed.
And, I am sick and tired of my neverending stomach ache. I'd say that 99% of what I eat causes me to blow up like a Zeppelin within 1/2 hour after I eat - I mean to the extent that a skirt will go from comfortable around my waist to uncomfortably tight. That's like inches of extended stomach. Feeling not-well more often than not also adds to the depression.
Still not Working... I'm just focusing on trying to get myself a house. I know I should be able to do both, but the fact is, I also know I'm going to have a fair amount of money within a month (thanks to the sale of the Brooklyn co-op), so I'm not pushing myself, worrying about no money. Stupid. I still need to get a job.
And, speaking of houses, this house-hunting thing is also adding to the depression - the first house I put a bid on was taken off the market. I saw a perfect house last week, even before it went on the market, put a bid in on it that afternoon, and the lady who saw it after me bid higher (and I bid over asking...). So, I'm 2nd for that one, if her bid falls through...
Then, I saw another one today, where a contract had seemed to have fallen through, and it was back on the market, and I think it may even been more perfect than the other one, and, it turns out that there is still a contract on it, but the owner is giving the realtor about a week to get it together before they take it away from the realtor, and, it may have structural damage, but I can't even check until/unless the contract/agent falls through...
And, my closing could happen the last week in June, or it could not, depending on the real estate agents from my apartment complex - like, if they're not too busy taking a holiday... and having to wait for the actual closing is also hampering me when I bid on a house...
And my friend Sheila is feeling overwhelmed and that makes me feel bad. (Her husband Nick sounds pretty good, though, so that's one good thing I can think of...)
And, I miss my un-boyfriend, but that's how it always is for a couple of weeks right after I see him...
Oh, I had alot more, but as always, when I sit down to write, I forget all the stuff that I was thinking about @ 4am, waiting for the Ambien to kick in...

Here's a couple of new photos - I think...

... And, Now, A Week Later, The WEDDING POSTING!!!! (And, who knows, this may be one of two, no thanks to my computer skills...)

2005-06-05T14:36:00.000-07:00

It was PERFECT
..... Well, I wrote a whole blog about how great the wedding was, and about how stunning the bride looked,

and, how wonderful it was to see all of Nick's family and friends, and how I got to spend time with

Sheila's excellent Mom and her husband Mark, , and how I sat with her Dad, and the baby (who definitely said 'hi' to me), and her sister, who is really a piece of work,

and how serene and happy the seemed, and how I've spent more time on the phone with them in this
week since the wedding than I have in months,
and the post disappeared , so, screw it, this is the condensed version.

I WILL say, once again, how honored I am that I was part of this happy, happy day.

And, here are some pre-wedding photos...

And You Know What Else?

2005-06-02T21:01:00.000-07:00

... and my computer sucks and my camera sucks and I cannot sit still.

... but I did see Star Wars and it wasn't nearly as bad as I expected.

The Wedding Was Perfect, But I'm Feeling Crummy, So No Details Until I Get My Photos Done... But NOTE Photos Attached Here...

2005-06-01T19:19:00.000-07:00

Well, I'm back from NYC.

The day I left, (Friday), my bank erroneously bounced 2 transfers @ $30 a piece, so I spent my last minutes at home arguing with morons, before I took off for the airport.

And, I found out that I DIDN'T get the house I bid on; they took it off the market!
(Bastids...)

I'm pretty sure I ate something I wasn't supposed to on the plane (oh, like maybe fruit I negelected to wash), and was feeling pretty ill by the time I got to the city.

NOT ill enough NOT to see my un-boyfriend, of course, so that was VERY NICE.

Ill enough, though, to NOT GO SHOPPING on Saturday, and to have to miss a pre-wedding dinner...

On the other hand, WHAT A WONDERFUL, PERFECT WEDDING.
I can't describe it in detail right now, as I still feel to crummy, BUT... I will as soon as I feel better, and have some photos to include.

I was so still so ill when I got home Monday morning that I went straight to bed, and STILL felt crappy Tuesday, and, today is WEDNESDAY, and I still don't feel great...

I have been told I have a 'delicate' stomach - christ, does this mean I can't eat anything? I keep getting bad, bad stomach problems...

And, I'm starting to feel... wrong alot, like I'm not feeling very happy, kinda depressed, and I don't know if it's due to not feeling well for so many days, or is it unbalanced chemicals...

And my Mother - oh, I'll save that one for a later day....

Anyway, until I get the wedding photos done, I am posting these few as some stuff I have done recently, along with a pic of Genny Terzi from the wedding day preparations.

Thanks to all my friends who actually read this and even post responses once in a while - I guess I could be writing for myself - which isn't so bad, but it's nice to know follks are out there.

OK, So, I put In A Bid On The House I Want...

2005-05-24T16:22:00.000-07:00

Well, here I go, I've started the bidding process on the house of my dreams...

Here's a recap of the description: it's in East Nashville, about 6 blocks from the beautiful Shelby Bottoms Park, walking distance from 5 Points, the main area of shops, galleries, bars and restaurants.
It's got 2 beds, 2 baths, living room, dining room, entryway space and an office-type room, with 1535 Sq. Ft., on 0.18 Acres. There's a fence 'round the front yard which is grass and a couple of trees, and a fence in the back, with off-space parking off the backyard.

There's a nice deck in the backyard, too, along with a good amount of lawn.
There are hardwood floors throughout except for carpeting in one bedroom, and tile in the kitchen and marble in the baths. It's in great shape ; I am going to have it inspected just so that I know if/when the roof will need to be replaced, and all that kind of stuff. The rooms are all different pastel colours, and they're not all exactly square. The front porch totally rocks; it is covered, and wraps around, and is large enough that right now there is a 2-seater wicker couch, coffee table and 2 chairs just outside of the double glass bedroom doors that open onto the porch, as well as another small table that can seat 2, next to a big barbeque.
Hopefully, I'll have an answer in the next day or so...

PS. I must say, I'm sorta getting the hang of HTML a little... still can't do everything I want to do... how do I colour just one word?

Tomatoes

2005-05-23T21:55:00.000-07:00

East Nashville has a TOMATO ART FESTIVAL , and I have one of my prints accepted to be in it (so far!). The folks who sponsor it are Art And Invention Gallery- I met one of the owners, a totally cool woman named Meg with the most wonderful jewelry, along with all sorts of art, pottery, and furniture made by her husband.

Now I have become completely obsessed with tomatoes, and will attach a work-progress print that, when finished, I hope to also exhibit,along with tomato magnets I made, and I'm going to try to make a tomato souffle (I made a great corn souffle, so I should be able to figure it out...)

'Self Portrait With Tomato - A Work In Progress"

This is the 2nd of what should be many fun years, and they'll be closing a street or two, and very importantly, the festival is not just for pictures OF tomatoes, it is about anything INSPIRED by tomatoes.

Here's some info from the website:

2005 THE GREATER FIVE POINTS TOMATO ART FESTIVAL August 13, 2005
Pre Fest Events:
- Children’s Tomato Art Workshop - Children’s Art Exhibit
Events on Fest Day:
- Heirloom Tomato Tasting - Bloody Mary Contest - Recipe Contest - Beautiful Tomato Competition - Tomato Art Show

On August 13, 2005, Art & Invention Gallery along with the Greater Five Points Merchants Association will transform Five Points into a celebration of all things tomato! The highly acclaimed one-day Festival brings together music, art, good food and drink to make the humidity of August a just little more bearable! Five Points is THE heart of East Nashville, a progressive and eclectic neighborhood that is teaming with creativity, and the Tomato Art Festival exemplifies everything that that makes East Nashville the most vibrant neighborhood in Middle Tennessee. A costume friendly event, the Tomato Art Festival is a relaxing, laidback gathering with much-admired art, sultry sounds and tempting flavors.

NOTE:

I CANNOT figure out the code to center an inserted photo like the one in this post; any info would be greatly appreciated!!!

Fell Off The Bike Once...

2005-05-23T10:35:00.000-07:00

As I looked over my first posting from yesterday, on another server than the one I was using, I like the way it looks more, but, I also found a number of typos - geez, I must have gone over it 10 times! (And, I just corrected 3 in the last sentence...)

Anyway, today is house-hunting info day. I have been house-hunting for nearly 3 weeks, and have decided on the area of East Nashville, an up-and-coming, 'alternative, arty' sort of neighborhood; new restaurants, cool little shops; clothing, galleries, hair stylists, original furniture, re-done, refurb'ed, homes, historic homes, mostly Victorian styles, all with backyards (!), and an amazing, beautiful park. It's a neighborhood that also has until fairly recently had the 'not-a-safe-place' reputation - there are still quite a number of crack houses here and there, and there is still an extremely run-down, poor section, but, all in all, it can be compared to Brooklyn's Smith Street, which is also a historic neighborhood, once unsafe, and now considered pretty trendy.

We (my wonderful broker Anna and I) went and looked at a couple of places on Sunday, including one that we had colour xeroxes of, which looked and sounded very cool.
Of course, it wasn't quite what we expected - first of all, it was listed as 2 bedrooms, but if you have to go through one to get to the other, then I don't really consider that 2 bedrooms. And, it had a bird's nest in the porch roof, which was fine, but the misses of the house said she wasn't 'letting' her husband remove it until the fall (which will be after any sale they make), when the babies have taken off, because she wasn't going to be responsible for killing little baby birds, but, the nest had been there for a year, so it's not llike she wasn't expecting more birds...
We also looked at the lowest-priced one for what I'm looking for, and, although it was in great shape, it just didn't have whatever 'vibe' it is that I'm feelin' for...
So, I think I've decided on one that I had seen before - it is, of course, the most expensive of all of them that I've seen, but, hey like I didn't expect that?
It's got the vibe, it's got 2 bedrooms, 2 baths, a nice big kitchen, a deck in the backyard, off-street parking, a nice little 'office' space, a big dining area and a living room area (which I would reverse if I got it), and a porch big enough to have a couch and chairs and a barbeque thingy on it. It's in great shape, the rooms are different colours and different shapes, and the entryway has wallpaper of flowers, very Victorian, that I actually really like. I wouldn't have to spend a cent.

Keep your fingers crossed for me.

Just like Learning To Ride A Bicycle...

2005-05-22T20:52:00.000-07:00

So, that's how I feel about this Blogger thing, but, as often as I may fall off for a while, as long as I can keep getting back on, I guess I'll be OK.

I want it to look different, but I'll figure that out with the help of my friends who already Blog - like my friend Sheila, and my friend Alison, and my friend Nick.

In fact, speaking of Sheila & Nick, I'm off to NYC (and Jackson Heights & Queens) for their wedding - Sheila has asked me to be one of her bridesmaids. Sheila and I met a little over a year ago, when she started dating Nick, who is probably my closest male friend - and my ex-live-in-boyfriend. (I like to think of myself as his last girlfriend, ever, since Sheila is his wife; in fact, I like to take credit for (I wouldn't say 'breaking him in' to the living-together thing, but,) maybe for teaching him to swim, sort of? Hee hee hee!

We were together for, I don't know, maybe 2 years?, and split up (fairly) amicably, followed by a bad couple of months, and then it all worked out. Nick met this wonderful girl Sheila, in the building they had both been living in for 4 years or so,and they have this beautiful baby, Genevieve Terzi, who also happens to be the baby in all the phots you see here in this site. Man oh Man! She is something else! OK, I suppose I am somewhat biased, but she is just THE CUTEST,BESTEST, Just-had-her-First-Berthday-Baby out there!

And, while I am in NYC, I will hook up with my unboyfriend - mmmmm, he is fine...he is my-unboyfriend because we have seen only each other for the past 2 yearts, and neither of us has ever wanted a full-time relationship in that time - he has children and a full-time job, and has also started up his own business (one-manned, at this point, so he is still working the full-time job), and I have sort of been too all over the place to be able to focus on a relationship, working, not working, focused, unnfocused, a little crazy, a little medicated, so, while we used to see each other about once a month when I stilled lived in Brooklyn, now we see each other when I am in NYC, whic is like every 3 months. Needless to say, for what we want, it's purr-fect. Neither one of us can quite get it together enough to be in any relationship full-time, so our responsibilities are quite different that what you'd usually expect. We just get to entertain each other for a night!

Consequently, we're both really looking forward to seeing each other, catching up on what's going on with each of us in person, and, getting to spend a wild night together; so, that's the description of my long-distance sexual relationship.. when I get home, I'll get to dream about the next trip...

I also, of course, will go spend hours in Sephora and M.A.C., since I am a major makeup & product junkie.

Well, I think this should be it for my first post.

See you later.