The writer rants about writing....

Dear Congressman,

While scanning my newsreader, netvibes, I came across the following story from the Northern Kentucky Times,

Woman dies after car hits deer.
A 30-year-old driver was killed Saturday night when she struck a deer on U.S. 25 in Corinth.
Kentucky State Police said Trisha Sullivan of Corinth was driving a 2002 Toyota south when she hit the deer in the road.She was pronounced dead at the scene. Two juvenile passengers weren’t injured. Alcohol is not believed to be a factor.
The crash was reported at about 8:17 p.m.

A couple of things here. It occurred to me that whoever wrote this story was not at the scene. In fact, based on the language used and the curt nature of the article, I would venture to say that this was written word for word from the police report that was filed after the incident. It contains all the generic factual statements that are the non-committal statement of facts that all officers are taught to use to describe events in a police report.

The one that is incorrect however, is the fourth sentence in the story. I would venture to guess that the two uni-sex juveniles in the car, were most likely related to Ms. Sullivan and while demonstrating no physical injuries, are actually extremely injured by the accident, and have a high probability of developing a form of post traumatic stress disorder after witnessing the death of a close relative. Whereas alcohol was not deemed a factor in the crash, it will most likely become a factor in the life of the two uninjured juveniles at some point.

A little blip in newsprint will be forgotten by most within an hour of reading it. It will be a lifetime for the uninjured.

I only say this to point out that, at a minimum, the reporter who filed this story had a moral obligation to make a phone call or two to provide some "color" in regards to Ms. Sullivan and her two juveniles. This story doesn't have the glamor of a Middle-Eastern revolution or an Asian disaster, but it is a mini-tragedy in itself, and deserved more than this.

More decline of Western Civilization

Dear Congressman,

I recently ranted about a song I enjoyed in my youth. That song is "Trampled Under Foot" by dinosaur aged rockers Led Zeppelin. I had a long standing love of the beat and riffs that are associated with the song, but never really took the time to listen to the lyrics. Imagine my horror when I googled them and found the following:

Greasy, slicked down body, groovy leather trim
I like the way you hold the road, mama, it ain't no sin

Ooh, trouble-free transmission, helps your oils flow
Mama, let me pump your gas, mama, let me do it all

Dig that heavy metal underneath your hood
Baby, I can work all night, believe I got the perfect tools

Now, I will never be confused with Bill Shakespeare, but this is some seriously lame songwriting. I don't expect Led Zep to produce anything along the lines of Robert Frost or Lord Byron, but I can't help but wonder that they couldn't put just a tad more effort into coming up with some lines that could have been composed in an 8th grade English class.

Let's face it, a 13 year old girl could write better lyrics than that!!!!

Or so I thought...

Meet the latest Youtube sensation Rebecca Black. I have attached the link to her new video, "Friday".

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CD2LRROpph0

Did you make it all the way through? I know I didn't. Just for fun, here are some highlights of the lyrics from this gem.

Seven a.m., waking up in the morning
Gotta be fresh, gotta go downstairs
Gotta have my bowl, gotta have cereal
Seein' everything, the time is goin'
Tickin' on and on, everybody's rushin'
Gotta get down to the bus stop
Gotta catch my bus, I see my friends

Yup, makes Eminem seem like a Rhodes Scholar to me. Here another example of Miss Black's wonder of modern music:

Yesterday was Thursday, Thursday
Today i-is Friday, Friday (Partyin')
We-we-we so excited
We so excited
We gonna have a ball today

Tomorrow is Saturday
And Sunday comes after ... wards
I don't want this weekend to end

I am speechless. I keep hearing artists claiming that they smoke dope to be more creative. In these cases, I would have gladly passed around the hat to get a dime bag to help the helpless compose a sentence or two, rather than have the dribble listed above unleashed on an unsuspecting public.

Sigh....

You know what happens when you don't make quota...

Dear Congressman,

We all have our pet peeves about our bosses or our co-workers, but this case I found from 2007 really ranks up there as a "hostile" work environment.

Prosper, Inc. is a company that provides, and I quote, “executive-level coaching for individuals, the education and hands-on experiences they need to achieve their personal and professional goals.” Sounds to me like this is one of those companies that sends out someone to individual corporate seminars that involve the famous falling backward exercise while your co-workers catch you. Yawn....

But these guys managed to spice things up. Meet J. Christopherson, a supervisor at Prosper. JC was named in a lawsuit by a worker who sued them. Mr. Christopherson had unusual motivational techniques to get workers to hit their sales goals. For example, Mr. Christopherson has been accused of the following:

If you did not make your sales goal, it is alleged that JC would draw a mustache on your face with a permanent marker. Or as an alternative punishment, you would come back to your desk to find you no longer had the privilege of the use of a chair. Also, the use of a wooden paddle to bash on the desk of unsuspecting slackers was another popular method of drawing attention to deficiencies in selling abilities.

But it appears Mr. Christopherson went into overdrive in the great ideas department of his frat house mind to come up with the motivational exercise that got him and Prosper, Inc. sued by an ex-employee.

Yes, Mr. Christopher is alleged to have gone "Dick Chaney" on an employee. I will allow the court filing to tell the story:

On May 29, 2007, Mr. Christopherson asked for volunteers for a new motivational exercise. He offered no explanation to his team members regarding the nature of the exercise. In his search for volunteers, Mr. Christopherson challenged the loyalty and determination of his team members. Mr. Hudgens volunteered to be a part of the exercise to prove his loyalty and determination. Mr. Christopherson then led his team members to the top of a hill near Prosper’s office. Once on the hill, Mr. Christopherson ordered Mr. Hudgens to lie down, facing up, with his head pointed downhill. Mr. Christopherson ordered other team members to hold Mr. Hudgens down by his arms and legs. Mr. Christopherson then slowly poured water from a gallon jug over Mr. Hudgens’s mouth and nose so that he could not breathe. Mr. Hudgens struggled and tried to escape but, at Mr. Christopherson’s direction, the other team members held him down. After concluding the exercise, Mr. Christopherson instructed his team members that they should work as hard at making sales as Mr. Hudgens had worked at trying to breathe.


Folks, you can't make this stuff up.

So next time you are upset at your boss for some petty reason or other, remember, you could be working for Mr. Christopherson...

Will you be my Valentine?

Dear Congressman,

As you battle the liberal agenda on the Hill, I thought I would take the time to peruse the stories of the world to see if there is anything of interest.

I think I found it...

Courtesy of the BBC World News:

Malaysia tiger mauling stopped by wife with soup ladle

A man has been rescued from a near-fatal attack by a tiger in northern Malaysia by his wife. She entered the fray wielding a wooden soup ladle at the tiger - which fled.
Tambun Gediu, now badly lacerated and recovering in hospital, had tried hitting the tiger away in vain and says his wife saved his life.
Wildlife rangers plan to track the tiger and send it further into dense, unpopulated jungle in the the northern state of Perak.
"I was trailing a squirrel and crouched to shoot it with my blowpipe when I saw the tiger.
"That's when I realised that I was being trailed," Mr Gediu said after surgery.
The tiger pounced not far from the Gediu home in a jungle settlement of the Jahai tribe.
Mr Gediu had tried climbing a tree to escape the animal, but was dragged down by the tiger.
His wife, 55-year old Han Besau, rushed out of the kitchen on hearing his screams and used the kitchen implement to good effect.
"I was terrified and I used all my strength to punch the animal in the face, but it would not budge," the New Straits Times newspaper quoted him as saying.
"I had to wrestle with it to keep its jaws away from me, and it would have clawed me to death if my wife had not arrived."


Now, normally on Valentine's day we exchange cards, go to dinner at a nice restaurant, and catch the latest hit movie at the local theater. I personally am not familiar with anyone who's Valentine's present was being saved from a hunger tiger by your wife with a wooden ladel. This sounds more like a scenario for a new version of the board game CLUE then it does a real life event. But according to the BBC, this did happen.

To quote Eddie Izzard... "well done"...

And happy Valentines Day to the rest of you, whether you are ready to fight a tiger for love or not.

On this day...

Dear Congressman,

Today is February 13, 2011. In history on this day, the following events were recorded (courtesy of History.com):

The Catholic Church started proceeding against an Italian Astronomer named Galileo Galilei on the charge of heresy. It appeared that Galileo thought the earth revolved around the sun, and the Church disagreed. The Church won.

In 1945, Dresden, Germany was a nice place to live on the morning of February 13, but by the evening was a firestorm of death as RAF bombers turned it into a living hell, killing over 35,000 residents.

In 1689, William and Mary were proclaimed sovereign rulers of England, restoring Protestant rule in place of the Catholic reign of Mary's father, James II. This proclamation included a "Bill of Rights" for the people of Britain, a precursor to the 1789 version that amended the US Constitution 100 years later.

And nearer to my heart, on this day two years ago in 2009, my mum passed away in the early hours of the morning after a 5 year battle with cancer. Melody and I were aware the night before we left her that it would probably be the last time we would see her alive, as she had been non-responsive for over 24 hours as she concentrated on just breathing. My brother had flown into town a day before to join the vigil with my sister, my wife, and myself over those last few days. So she been attended to by the people who she loved the most when the final days came, and we got to be there for her to make her as comfortable as possible.

Two years have passed and I still think of her every day. She had battled cancer before in the early 1990's, and had beaten it back with the same strong will that she tackled every problem in her life. After the diagnosis of a stage 4 re-occurrence in 2003, I would talk to her every day on the phone, carving out time to see what was going on in her life and give her the lowdown on mine. Saturdays were generally reserved for going over to her condo and vacuuming, as the cancer had spread to her bones and made this task difficult. Afterward we would go out to eat at a nearby restaurant, calling Melody to join us if she was in the area and available. Many a good and bad story was shared at these festive tables.

Beginning in 2006, we would plan an annual vacation to Emerald Isle, North Carolina. We would always rent a cabin directly on the beach, allowing us to drink our coffee watching the ocean as we tried to spot the dolphins swimming along the shoreline in the morning sun. We would invariably lunch at our favorite Mexican restaurant, El Zarape, and then follow up with a family dinner that we would cook at the beach house.

So with the many memories and good times I was able to share with my mum, I feel very blessed that we were able to squeeze so many years of living into such as short span. Thank you for being who you were, mum.

I love you.

Superbowl mania

Dear Congressman,

It appears that another NFL season has ended with the Green Bay Packers edging out the Pittsburgh Steelers on a cold night in Dallas. This annual "carnivale americana" went off with very few hitches, unless you were one of the 400 holders of $900 a seat tickets that were denied entry to the game by the Arlington Fire Marshall, and then it really sucked sitting deep in the stadium watching the game on a flat screen TV as you could hear the roar and rumble of the crowd above you.

But for us Cincinnatians, the ultimate outcome of any game against the Pittsburgh Steelers is a loss. For those who are unaware, Cincinnati became an NFL team in 1968 and has always been in the same division as the Steelers, providing a red carpet to a perennial two-easy-wins-a-year for Pittsburgh when they met Cincinnati in the home and away series that are an annual part of NFL division rivals. In fact, I think it would not be beyond rational thinking that the citizens and fans of the Pittsburgh Steelers owe a debt of gratitude to Bengals owner Mike Brown for continuing to field a team that provides a platform to base a winning season on year after year. But as a Bengals fan since their inception in the late 60's, there is a definite basis for hating the Steelers as they devour my team year after year.

Now don't get me wrong, this is not a slash the tires, curse the fans, kick their pet dog kind of hatred. This is a "damn I am so jealous I want to puke" hatred. After all, the Bengals will a draft a player regardless of their previous criminal record or very apparent attitude problems while Pittsburgh gets rid of trouble-causing thugs, to the point that they almost traded their Superbowl proven quarterback, Ben Roethlisberger, earlier this year after his alleged off-the-field escapades with assaults on drunken young women. So even though I hate the Steelers, I like hating the Steelers, and don't want them to change anything they do to be as good of a team as they are, as this is the type of team I want my Bengals to be.

Only not as hated as the Steelers...

Ark Park lark....

Dear Congressman,

It appears our good friends just south of the Ohio river have decided that having a creationism museum is not quite enough literal Bible interpretation for the good people of Kentucky. Now, as a stimulus to the local economy, that an Ark Encounter park is in the works, complete with a 500 foot wooden ark replica, lots of live animals, a replica of the Tower of Babel and a 1st century Middle Eastern Village.

In fact, Kentucky Governor Steve Beshear announced in December that the state would cough up $43 million in tax incentives if the park generated the $250 million annual impact on the state's economy that a consultant's study predicted.

The only problem is that the attendance figures they projected would outstrip the most recent year's attendance numbers for Kentucky Kingdom amusement park and match those of Cincinnati's Kings Island. Not that it isn't doable, as God can pack the house on any given Sunday, but when given the option of riding the Beast roller coaster or smelling a beast in a stall full of straw and manure, I think the roller coaster is going to win out nine times out of ten.

So, other than a giant ark, an unfinished Tower, and a petting zoo, it sounds like we need to spice things up a big at Ark Encounter. Of course, I have a few ideas....

Dunk Darwin: Tired of all that evolution mumbo jumbo and don't want to take it anymore? Then show your true feeling and take your turn at the Charles Darwin dunking booth, complete with a replica dinosaur egg to toss at a dodo bird target than dumps the Darwin look-a-like into the water, showing just how wet his ideas really are.

Swaggart Swing: Yes, you can experience the ups and downs of Evangelical Minister Jimmy Swaggart on his mini-ark swing ride. Shriek with excitement as you swing into the waiting arms of Jesus, only to be swung the next minute back to the land of Jezebels & temptation, all the while shouting out (in unison) "Jesus loves me" or "I have sinned!", depending on the ride's location. A great learning experience for the young ones!!!!

Sinbad's Islamoland : A great opportunity to learn about our neighbors to the east, as you ride a magic carpet sled through the land of Islamic rule. Watch in awe as they cut off the hand off a thief, stone a prostitute to death, and then attempt to blow up your magic carpet in a simulated suicide bombing attempt, only to be thwarted by a Rambo look-a-like who beats the crap out of them and then converts every last one of them over to Jesus's side. Good times...

and finally,

Hell, the Ride : a true-to-the-Bible rendering of what all those Evangelical preachers have been trying to get through to you ever since you have been sleeping through Church as a youngster. Walk through the maze of flame and sulphur that is kept at a constant 112F/44C for your total discomfort. Watch in horror as Satan's work force torture and maim sinners, fornicators, and people who didn't tithe with the same vim and vigor as if they were working on Stalin, Hitler, or Leona Helmsley. Let go a big sigh of relief at the end when the 50 foot mechanical Beelzebub chooses a family other than yours to be eternally damned to fire and ash as they are led away screaming and kicking by actors dressed as Satan's helpers. Of course, the family being dragged off are actors too, but your kids don't know that. Should be good for at least six months of pious and obedient behavior from your personal little devils....