New Computer and A Football Game

I'm All lathered Up.....


I guess that you could compare my situation yesterday to that of having to spend the evening at Disney world while risking missing Santa Clause coming on Christmas Eve.

I love going to theater to do my set construction work, but at the exact same time that I was stomping around making sawdust over in Brunswick I knew that FedEX was hauling our new HP computer around in a truck somewhere for delivery.

I was right...and when I got home it was sitting in a box in the Foyer.

Dang it's fast.

And pretty.

And it has external speakers.

And it can display two full size pages of text on Microsoft Word on it's big flat 22" flat screen monitor.

I want to lay down in the floor beside it and take a nap, but I have to go back to the theater this morning to finish the panels for the set and screw around with Mister Ghost Puppet's framework before coming home to watch unranked Georgia Tech pound #7 Georgia in Football.

Then I have to put about a million lights on our friend Ski's Christmas tree (I'm in the Christmas tree decorating business also--haven't I mentioned that in the past?)

Y'all have a good post-Thanksgiving Saturday!

(Cheer for the Jackets if you will.)

Burp

Kitchen Clean...Coma Over With


I was awakened this morning from my lethargic daze about eleven by Heather at the Theater calling me on the telephone. It seems that I'm needed on the stage today with power tools in hand, so me and the PVC framework of the Ghost Puppet are heading over for a few hours of sawdust and hammering/nailing.

Actually, there's very little hammering because everything that isn't secured with a portable screw gun is connected with staples or brads using my new Craftsman air compressor and the appropriate pneumatic gun. I love moving my construction efforts from the dark ages into the 21st century in a single 12 month period of time. All it takes is money...

I'm proud to report that my epic cooking saga yielded a Thanksgiving dinner which was deemed a success, and surprisingly the Oysters Rockefeller and Prosciutto wrapped Sea Scallop appetizers were the biggest hit. I couldn't believe that I was able to get a dozen decent oysters at Harris Teeter for $2.99, especially since our local oysters are inedible because of industrial pollution and everything has to be shipped over here from the Florida Gulf coast.

So I'm off to Ace Hardware for a couple of items, then I stumble around and sweat over the final backdrop panel assembly before mounting Mr. Ghost Puppet's framework and fine tuning it's shape a little.

Watch your toes if you are going to the mall.


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Gobble Gobble

Anyone Wanna Try Some Of My Spicy Nuts?


Well, me and Missy the Turbo Pup are sitting around on the sofa at this early morning hour basking in the glow of having pretty well gotten Thanksgiving Dinner under control.

The turkey has finally allowed itself to thaw so I could toss it into a giant pot of water, vinegar, and spices iced down in a big Coleman cooler, and since then I've been jumping around on and off all evening working on the stove top and throwing things into the oven in the preliminary phases of my dinner preparations.

In addition to not one but TWO giant pones of cornbread, I also have home made turkey stock in one big boiler, my Red Cabbage with Apricots and Balsamic Vinegar in another, and a big cookie sheet covered with something called "Spicy Nuts" that I made in a big stainless skillet using canned Planter's Mixed Nuts and seasonings like Cayenne pepper, cumin, salt, and brown sugar.

Can you say S P I C Y?

Time for a little nap with the Turbo Pup before cranking up the oven and finishing everything off for my guests.

I hope everyone has a really nice Turkey day.

I think that we all deserve it, even if it is going to rain here on our little island.

Standing Room Only

Don't You Wish YOU Were Going To Be At Our House On Thursday?


I've just now gotten through putting together my final shopping list and menu for my concoctions to be served to our crowd for Thanksgiving Dinner.

Since Mr. Turkey spent last night in the Fridge not thawing out, he/she's been relocated to the giant brinning pot situated inside a big Coleman cooler in the kitchen in order to raise it's internal thermodynamic energy while at the same time preventing the growth of anything intent on causing me to kill myself or my holiday guests in the process of cooking and serving the ornery bird.

After spending tonight exposed indirectly to the ambient conditions of the kitchen, tomorrow I'll dump a nice mixture of water, apple cider vinegar, white vinegar, kosher salt, black peppercorns, and some Kristal hot sauce into the pot and then surround everything in between with an ice water mixture contained in the cooler--all the while praying that it all finishes thawing by Thursday about noon.

In addition to the Brined and Roasted Turkey stuffed with Sage Sausage & apple dressing, our guests can look forward to the following menu:

Appetizers

Home made Spiced Mixed Nuts
Oysters Rockefeller
Prosciutto wrapped Sea Scallops

Main Course

Red Cabbage with Apricots and Balsamic Vinegar
Creamed Red Potatoes
Porcine Mushroom Gravy
Cornbread Dressing

Being the contrarian that I am, you might notice that I've omitted the obsequious "Green Bean Casserole" from my menu.

Also, our guests have demanded to be responsible for the dessert course.

As a warning, I have to report that if you bring Green Beans into my house this week in any form except raw and offered as a gift for future consumption, I'm going to have some kind of a cosmic conniption fit and hurt myself or someone else in the process; because I'm VERY TIRED of eating and even smelling green beans with French Onions on top (even if I only eat them once or twice a year for nearly a half century.)

With my cooking skills, does that little quirk make me a bad guy?

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I'm Busting My Skull

Designing Theater Set Parts...That Is


As of Monday morning at 10:30 AM I was in full construction mode building this year's rendition of my idea for the Set of Charles Dicken's "A Christmas Carol" opening down at Brunswick's Ritz Theater begining December 4th.

The stage decking is in place and I'm now working on the plywood backdrop panels, along with my first theatrical puppet.

Here's my inspiration for what "The Ghost of Christmas Future's" head is going to look like:

I found it over here at this site.

My version of this skull will be about 18" high, 15" wide, and 16" deep with an articulated jaw and it will sit on top of a 12' high body with a 10' arm span.

The current plan is for it to appear on stage from behind Scrooge's bed, do it's scene with sound effects (including glowing LED eyes) but no spoken lines, then disappear the same way it came in.

Needless to say I'm...

B U S Y ! ! !

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Do You Know The Difference Between Planting And Share Cropping?

A Larger Scale Harvesting Of BS...I Guess.


I guess that by now anyone with a TV or a Newspaper has heard about the Clinton campaign admitting that they planted a question on global Warming with a college student at a "Town Hall" forum in Iowa a couple of weeks ago.

Clinton campaign spokesman Mo Elliethee admitted that the campaign had planted the question and said it would not happen again.

"On this occasion a member of our staff did discuss a possible question about Senator Clinton's energy plan at a forum,” Elliethee said.

“However, Senator Clinton did not know which questioners she was calling on during the event. This is not standard policy and will not be repeated again.”

Yeah...R I G H T T T T T.

After tossing, turning, and spinning the story every way possible they finally just had to admit what they did for a change and take their embarrassing lumps in public.

I bet there were a few industrial strength butt chewings handed out by the former First-Lady-in-Chief since then (for getting caught--not for planting the question), and ironically it was the lamestream media that jumped on the little "plant" and clipped it off at the roots for a change.

Unfortunately, it took about a week for Mrs. sHrillary's people to come up with another idea to get around the literal intent of their half hearted promises.

The plan was obvious and brilliant at the same time.

Instead of stopping with the question planting in Las Vegas, they'd just get someone else to do their planting--this time not just one "plant" but instead a whole "crop" of questions--for FREE.

The Clinton campaign sharecropper was not a person, but this time was in fact the cable network airing the debate, CNN, and the plants they planted were the following people identified on the air to the viewers simply as "undecided Democratic voters:"

The first was an antiwar activist, Catharine Jackson, who's son is home now from doing three tours in Iraq and likes to attend an anti war rally or two when she isn't appearing on national TV.

Then there was a (former) Democratic Party bigwig from Arkansas, LaShannon Spencer, who was only identified as a member of the First African Methodist Church. See, religious people were at the Debate also.

An active Union official, Judy Bagley, who identified herself only as "a booth cashier [whom] moved here over 30 years ago. And I have three children, and as of yesterday, 8 grandchildren." Senator Obama addressed her by saying "Well, first of all, Judy, thank you for the question, and thanks for the great work you do on behalf of the culinary workers, a great union here."

An Islamic Leader named Khalid Khan--President of the Islamic Society of Nevada, and also a big donor to Nevada senator Harry Reid.

A "Hispanic Activist" named George Ambriz, Secretary Treasurer of a group called ¡Sí Se Puede! Foundation of Nevada. George was introduced by CNN as "a graduate student here, and ...also a mentor to children." George's group is actually demanding that everyone, regardless of immigration status, be allowed to attend college here in the United States.

Finally, the event ended with a softball thrown by a future Harry Reid Intern, Maria Luisa, the UNLV student that CNN asked to present the "diamonds or pearls" question to sHrillary.

I don't know about you, but this all looks sorta fishy to me, and the deeper I dig the worse things get. I did watch the entire debate without falling asleep, but I'm still reading the official CNN transcript and could come up with some more things before the dust finally settles.

I guess that my basic question here is this...

After the Clinton campaign machine already had their knuckles rapped for planting the question in Iowa, isn't it very telling that at the VERY NEXT event, this time on TV in front of three or four million viewers, that the Clinton News Network is afraid to leave to complete chance what sHrillary might have to answer to and/or for?

It seems like, in an effort to ensure fairness to ALL of the Democratic Candidates, that they would have done the exact opposite of what they ended up doing, but noooooooOOOOOO....can't do that.

And of course since it was CNN that was the apparent guilty party, this story will get very little media play outside the Blogosphere.

I swear people, we're all going to go down a bumpy road to hell if people don't start paying attention to things like this.

Aren't you happy that I'm around to point things out for you?


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Is The News Story Actually About The Deaths...

Or Just Covering The Political Agenda Of The Dumbasses Reporting Them?


I was languishing around the Internet this evening trying to find something to bitch about write about when I saw a headline about the recent Cyclone in Bangladesh that has killed at least 2000 people.

Bangladesh said on Sunday that the death toll from a massive cyclone hit 2,000, with that grim tally certain to rise as they struggled to get aid to millions of people left homeless.

The death toll has been jumping by hundreds at a time as rescue workers fight their way to remote areas where entire villages were flattened by the fury of Cyclone Sidr, which tore through south Bangladesh on Thursday night.

''I have never seen such a catastrophe in my 20 years as a government administrator,'' said Harisprasad Pal, a local official in the hard-hit southern district of Jhalokati.

''Village after village has been shattered,'' he said. ''Millions of people are living out in the open and relief is reaching less than one percent of the people.''

This story of death and loss is certainly yet the most recent "natural disaster" to hit the news wires, and I'm sure that the United Nations will be happy to rattle their tin cups demanding financial aid and the use of the US's military resources (something we're already doing) to assist in the relief effort; while at the same time lamenting that America should and could do more, ignoring the Europeans while they make yet another of their typical stingy offers:

The European Commission said it was sending US$ 2.2 million dollars in emergency relief aid to the country.

I hope that somehow that figure is wrong or a typo, because otherwise the socialists over in Europe will be guilty of offering only the equivalent of $1,000.00 per corpse, or $1.00 per displaced Bangladeshi?

That can't be right, nor is it morally conscionable.

That said, what really pisses me off is the amount of news coverage that stories about the poor citizens of Bangladesh get in the US and world media.

FOR INSTANCE, I did a Google News search using the words "Bangladesh Typhoon" and only came up with a total of 49 hits.

Next I did a Google News search looking for "Hurricane Katrina" and was astonished by finding
22,453 stories printed in the PAST HOUR ( at 1:54 AM in the morning)!!!

What the heck?

Then I realized that tropical storms occurring in the Indian Ocean were called Cyclones, not Typhoons, so I did another Google News search for stories in the past hour using the words "Bangladesh Cyclone" and came up with again only 4,024 hits.

My point here is this, Hurricane Katrina, a storm which by varying accounts killed as many as 1836 people in its initial assault and the resulting floods occurred over TWO YEARS ago, in a country with modern infrastructure, where virtually every household in the affected area had cable TV, was warned to evacuate, and had a private automobile or other public transportation available to assist potential victims in their Exodus.

With the exception of the elderly and hospital patients, most of the people who died or were injured were just plain stupid by not leaving when told to do so, and I'm not making this statement based on political affiliation or lack of human compassion.

Yet today the lamestream media is still publishing stories about the Katrina aftermath two years later bashing FEMA and the administration of George Bush at a rate 300% (4,024 stories versus 22, 453 articles) above their use of newsprint and ink on a disaster of possibly ten times Katrina's magnitude, in a country full of tan skinned citizens that live in poverty in houses on bamboo stilts with tin roofs, and without the benefit of getting a warning from the Weather Channel or their government.

Doesn't something seem a little strange about that statistic--4 to 1?

And another thing, where the %$#@ is the UN before this debacle happened?

After all, Bangladesh historically gets inundated every TEN or FIFTEEN years with this exact same kind of natural disaster. Poor illiterate people are killed and stacked like cordwood every decade, and all Kofi Annan, his successor, and his predecessors could and can do is bitch about the US's failure to recognize global warming.

I'm sure the stories will be popping up soon saying that me, my Chevy Suburban, and all of my fellow gas guzzling citizens here in the US bear at least half the responsibility for the size and severity of the storm, and Bush and Cheney used secret Air Force technology to steer the storm into the country in order to deflect attention from their illegal War in Iraq and their failed domestic policies.

And another thing--where the heck is the outrage of the bleeding hearts in the Democratic Party and Paul Krugman at the NY Times over this loss of life and destruction of people's homes and lives?

I suspect that in reality Krugman doesn't give a tinker's damn about poor tan skinned people in some far off foreign land, because there is virtually no political capital in them--they're useless compared to Louisiana and New Orleans' vocal "victims", many of which haven't gotten off of their asses since the storm and are still living in free government housing over two years after the fact.

Maybe it's just me, but something seems wrong here when you carefully think about the details...anyone agree?

I think I'll walk outside now and let my head explode...