Entry for December 31, 2007

Every year December 31 is viewed with the hope and desperate desire that the new year will be better, but deep down at some point cynical aspirations surface in my brain...yeah, a new year, and the inevitable questions- and inevitably the answer to hope for a new year better than the last is driven (I think) by the human fear of the future, the unknown.

And all i can say is that knowing that, maybe i should resort to some ceremonial offering like my ancient scottish ancestors.

National Geographic wrote about it:

Greeting the new year with friends and spirits is customary in many parts of the world. Residents of Scotland mark the arrival of the new year with particular passion in a holiday they call Hogmanay that draws on their history of Viking invasions, superstition, and ancient pagan rituals. Hogmanay's origins date back to pagan rituals that marked the time of the winter solstice.

Roman celebrations of the hedonistic winter festival of Saturnalia and Viking celebrations of Yule (the origin of the twelve days of Christmas) contributed to celebrations in Scotland around the new year. These celebrations and other ceremonies evolved over the centuries to become the Hogmanay holiday celebrated in Scotland today...

Hogma-what?

Even the origin of the word Hogmanay is a subject of debate. A few possibilities: It may derive from the Gaelic oge maiden meaning "new morning"; the Celtic hogunnus meaning "new year"; hoog min dag, a Flemish-Dutch phrase meaning "great love day"; or the Old French word aguillanneuf, which refers to both the last day of the year and the gift traditionally given on that day.

The last possibility seems especially likely since one of the old Scottish traditions was for children to run from door to door on New Year's Eve asking for presents and shouting, Hogmanay!

Whatever its origins, Hogmanay is an integral part of Scottish culture today. Apparently, one day to recover isn't enough: January 2nd is an official holiday in Scotland, too.

Aye, my scottish roots !

Happy New Year- er, Hogmanay

Entry for December 30, 2007

Today is my dad's birthday. He was killed in a car crash 24 years ago. When I talk to my mom, I ask her if dad was proud of me and my brothers, why did he always act like we were criminals? She says it was in his nature to be that way, having been a cop for so long.

I ask if he would have changed, because he seemed to have not been so negative the last time I saw him. She says he would have...that he had recognized that 20 plus years on the force had made him cynical, but he was coming around. Thoughts of retirement had cheered him up.

She says he would be very proud of what I have done, as a parent and in my career...and I would like to believe that. Why wouldn't I? She knew him way better than any of us kids did.

Happy Birthday Dad

Entry for December 29, 2007

Yahell dumped my blog, which I wrote about an hour ago....

so here goes again..

As 2007 ends I have been thinking about what happened over the last year, how my work has been pretty good, and satisfying.

We travelled to the southwest, and decided it was way too overcrowded in Phoenix-Tucson, but we like Flagstaff, a lot, although probably not enough to move there.

We travelled again to Washington, seeing the eastern part, but still have not made it to Spokane, so maybe 2008 will be the year we make it there.

Our best buddy got suddenly sick after that trip, and in the span of a single day we went from happy and lets go for a walk to crying and not being able to eat because she was gone, her vitality gone by the ravages of cancer.

But then Honey found me another Scottie, so we will build new memories with her to add to the ones we shared with Scarmouche...

I made a lot of new friends here on 360, feuded with some, and one sparked a renewed interest in creative writing i had let go dormant- Thanks Eric.

So here is the first of probably a couple of blogs about the year ending, and hopes for a better New Year...a new President, and maybe some good news in the world...

Entry for December 27, 2007

As I got dressed this morning, combing my hair I thought I heard someone my age had died...going to the living room and looking at the news, I learned what we all know, that former Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto had been killed...make that murdered. Such an awful word, murder. I felt a connection to this woman, having heard her speak at 8th annual “A Woman’s Day Professional Conference and Exposition” in 2001. She was a last minute replacement for Tipper Gore.

Just a month past 9/11, she spoke about the terrorist’s who attacked New York and Washington , “Their goal is to make people all over the world believe that this really is a confrontation between Islam and the West. And those in the West who would target and beat innocent Muslims as a response to the terrorists are merely swallowing the fanatic’s poisonous bait.” She added, “as Prime Minister of Pakistan I stood up to them. I battled with many of these same terrorists including Osama Bin Laden. I took them on and I paid the price.”

Well today she paid the highest price.

Whether the terrorists were the actual killer or not we will learn in due course. What we do know is that within minutes of her death being confirmed in Pakistan, Al-Qaeda claims Bhutto killing (wire story by Syed Saleem Shahzad )

KARACHI - ”We terminated the most precious American asset which vowed to defeat mujahideen.” These were the words of al-Qaeda’s top commander for Afghanistan operations and spokesperson Mustafa Abu al-Yazid, immediately after the attack that claimed the life of Pakistani politician Benazir Bhutto on Thursday (December 27).

The AKI news agency also reported "It is believed that the decision to kill Bhutto...was made by Al-Qaeda No. 2, the Egyptian doctor, Ayman al-Zawahiri in October,"

What a way to end the year...which still has four days left...

Entry for December 25, 2007

What, Christmas is over? Its not over...it goes on and on, only the present giving is suspended...until the morning of the After Christmas Sales!

I got lots of gift cards, so tomorrow is shop and save day, as I plan to get up and hit the stores early . I got some nice bath gel and spray, the blue outfit in the picture (I actually like green or purple better, but this is what I got..) some books, a calendar of stupid sayings for my desk, a Scottish terrier calendar for the kitchen, a new pocketbook, and a lot of stuff, but ...the celebration was tempered by missing my dog, who used to wander around the family room checking out everyones gifts, before settling on her bed and watching; of missing our daughter, who is spending the week with her in laws, because her husband wants to spend more time with his folks. They are in snow country, while we are having a sunny day here...

Our Christmas was just us and our new puppy, our cats and a few phone calls from relatives, like my mom...still, I treasure Christmas, hope yours was Wonderful!!!

(Note: I know that Christmas is the symbolic date of Christ's birth, and the celebration we observe today is a amalgam of Christian and non-Christian beliefs...please don't lecture me on what Christmas means. Superficially it means buying gifts for friends and family, but the true meaning is in giving of ourselves to each other the rest of the year...Love your neighbor as you love yourself...say, did I ever mention i was a minister in the Universal Life Church??)

Dec 24, 2007 Christmas Eve

I was writing a long blog here that seemed pointless, so i have revisited it and decided to simply get to the point, for once..

D'ye spaek Scots ? Merry Yuil! Gaelic? Nollaig chridheil huibh!

Merry Christmas everyone...

Entry for December 23, 2007

Last night we took the puppy for a drive around to see Christmas lights, and stopped downtown to see the State Tree. Looking up some info online i found that the tree is lighted by LED lights, powered by a hydrogen fuel cell. So when are these going to be feasible for us regular folks...

Entry for December 22, 2007

9:06 AM- showered, dried hair, combed hair, brushed hair got fed up with hair brushed teeth, got dressed, brushed hair, applied face(aka makeup), and announced i was ready to go...all in an amazing 52 minutes!

Drove to where i will be working on other side of town, and then went to nearby grocery, which has best bakery...on par with the more snooty, and expensive, and bought food for the next three days. Thankfully had credit card, since a roast to feed us all Christmas eve and Christmas day( its just the three of us) added $68 to the shopping bill.

Went to starstrucks for coffee...I swear they have some really tasty coffee, but some of it is so high octane it should have a warning label (Side note: our government here in CA is planning to do just that " Warning: This beverage contains caffeine which may cause nervousness, awakeness, warm you on a cold day, and may otherwise be enjoyable,use with CAUTION.")had the usual ubertalle and some gingerbread...

On way home, we stopped for honey to "load up" on cigars, which actually smell good until he lights one up(YUCK- open the window will ya)

Came home, put on my sweats, and put away said groceries, unloaded the dishwasher, listened to some music, played with the puppy, started enjoying the first of 5 days off from work!!!

Happy Holidays, Merry Christmas, Feliz Navidad, and whatever seasonal greeting you choose!!

Coming soon, my other favorite day- Hogmanay (hog-muh-NAY) "In Glasgow and the central areas of Scotland, the tradition is to hold Hogmanay parties involving singing, dancing, storytelling and consumption of copious amounts of alcohol, which usually extend into the daylight hours of January 1."

In my family, I honestly can tell you that my family all got together at my grandparents, and grandpa and the boys (dad and his brothers) and other men folk would (as dad said) sling the bull starting Dec 31(New Years Eve) until well into the next day usually about 2 am or when the stove went cold( grandparents had wood stoves everywhere in the house, didn't install central heat until after grandpa died in 1983) sleep a bit, and then resume until it was time to either go home or go to bed...The copious amounts of alcohol was all whiskey (you know Scots only drink whiskey, its the uisge beatha in Gaelic or "water of life" )

Seasons Greetings!!!

Entry for December 21, 2007

Funny (strange funny not ha ha funny) are the thoughts you have while commuting to work. Mine were no doubt inspired by a song i was listening to, and thinking about how Christmas time has to me always been about family, and caring about other people, even when you think things are tough.

About halfway to work, i started thinking about something that I thought would have been a distant memory, and yet thinking about it made me cry, not the heavy boo hoo ruin your makeup cry, but like a soft tear rolling slowly from the corner of your eye down your cheek, and your eyes getting all blurry and that overall sadness that comes at thinking about things that evoke emotion..

I had started thinking about our dog that passed away, and how this was the first Christmas in the last 12 years that we would not have her here.

And then I started thinking about commitments, and that led me to the mother load of pent up emotion I thought I had dealt with.

Some reading this will not have a clue what I am saying, i am talking about when a someone gives her very soul to someone, makes a commitment to love that person forever and then that trust is stolen, maybe never to be restored. Yes, my damn ex...I was young, so full of what now seems idiotic notions.

We were together, and I wrote my mom and said that I was married and now going to live forever in North Carolina, or wherever we were stationed. HA! Here is how stupid I was, probably still am. Late at night, those muffled phone calls, then having to go "back to the unit, something has come up, we are on alert", well i believed it.

Like I wrote about before, believed it until I decided to make a surprise visit to cheer up someone at work, who just happened to have bought flowers(but not for me) and how many people can share this feeling I have even today of what a total idiot I must have been to allow myself to fall for that, to swallow the lies and trust nothing was going on because when i asked, i was told with a smirky laugh "nothing, nothing is going on you are being paranoid"...until that day, when my heart was ripped out. I really felt bad, knowing that everyone else seemed to know he was having an affair,and i was the stupid wife they had never met until that day; for many it was a one time event, because the next day I went back to California . I remember it today as though it happened last week, and thats the sad part. That it still hurts me, nearly 30 years later.

Not like it did, but it still a bad place in my memories..actually one of the worst, right up there with losing my dad a year after honey and I got married.

And yet after I thought about this and was walking to the office from where I park, I still wished my ex had a happy life after me, because I was the best thing he ever had and he let it go. His loss was definitely my gain, because a year after i came back home my brother introduced me to honey, and we are now near 27 years together... and thats what I am thankful for on this holiday, and what I wish for everyone of you, to find someone that loves you as much as you love them, and never have to look back...only forward.

Peace

Ye Olde Yule Log--Internet version (My, that seems oxymoronic)

Enjoy!

December 20, 2007

So0 many things to say...hmmmmmm

Countdown to Christmas is at 4 days and some hours...Will be in the mass of last minute shoppers on the weekend, I will be looking food to serve on Christmas Eve and Christmas...

Got a letter in the mail from an interview I had - Thanks for applying now go away type of letter...

OK, buckle up, here we go...

My day at work was puncuated by meetings, attending a retirement party for one of my co-workers, and meeting with Executive Director Special Advisor, aka the guy that does all the stuff the CEO wants done and has nobody else to give it to...he and I discussed my future, how badly I was needed there, etc. I am on a 2 year contract that started July 2006 and expires June 2008...next June. I told them that unless I was provided full time permanent employment, I would hahve to start looking for another job. Well, first of November I started looking. I sent out 4 or 5 applications, and got 2 interviews, one of which resulted in a second interview. This started people being concerned, because should i get a job elsewhere, then the project I manage is open to being run by someone else, who would have to get caught up. The problem is who would want to tackle that responsibility for 6 months.. I mean I used the position as leverage to get a full time promotion, and that plan is failing, since the best they told me today was hang in there, you won't be unemployed...taking a job now is better than waiting for a promotion later, right?? (DUH )

So I trudged back to my office, and was mulling over the options, when the phone rang...the second interview had gotten me a job!!!! It was down to two people, and they picked me!!!

So o o , i had to go back to the Special Advisor,and let him know i appreciated his efforts, but I had accepted a full time position at another agency...I have to honor an obligation I made at my current work to fill in during the Christmas to New Year period for my boss, and then I need a week to bring up to speed other people that are taking over my projects, so it will be January when i start the new job.

I will be a project administrator, coordinating the work of others on projects, which i have never done before (at least on this scale)..but then there is the money angle, so i allayed my fear of the unknown...

It really come down to this for me, money. If i start this job now, and work for 3 or 4 years, all that is used to calculate my pension, since they use an average of your top wages. Waiting means it will take longer to hit the top salary, and i can retire after a year at the top salary for my classification.

Entry for December 17, 2007

Its late on a cool almost winter night as I write this...

• I have been reflecting on the nature of this blog thing, and how people are reading it and not commenting, or not reading? I try to do a couple of things, which is mostly rant and whimper about stuff that is on my mind, or I try to be useful, in writing things that might help someone understand something. My focus is always though really revolving around my own need for recognition. Realizing one is not the center of the universe can be a sobering thought, especially when you tend to have ego problems, and tend to prop yourself up by throwing around your own sense of reality, morality, or whatever. I know thats what I do, and if that is annoying and offensive, you have a right to tell me. I also reserve the right to either acknowledge or not those comments.
• I sometimes think I have it rough, but thats not true, especially if contrast again what others are going through, there is almost always someone worse off, financially, emotionally, health wise, whatever.
• Is that now totally confusing? I hope not.

Daily Rant

A couple of things today made my whole day memorable, and not in a good way. First, on my way to work, i was as usual thinking about something while driving; not exactly daydreaming, but I did mess up and cut in front of a really angry looking guy in a pickup, so i stopped, and waved for him to go through the intersection; his reaction was a bit much, taking the time to roll down his window and say to " What the hell you doing you G## D##n F$$King B*(&*h.? Stupid F543king C8nt" and he proceeded to burn rubber and go on his merry way.

I have not be exposed to a sereis of run on expletives like that in years, really. All i could think to do was smile and wave a single finger salute at him as he left...not very nice on either count..

Episode 2, Fun Day- I am in a meeting with a new executive, along with some other people. I am supposed to provide him a breifing on my project and how it interacts with the programs he administers. We are across a 8x32 foot conference table from each other in a large meeting room, a kind of room every meeting room should be- power shades, a projection system mounted in the ceiling, video conferencing, the works. Hey this is high tech stuff we're talking about, so we need a hi tech room. He asks me what the folder i have next to me is, and I explain its some charts that show blah blah blah, and he asks for them, and kind of half way stands to reach across the table, so i do likewise and hand him the report. Afterwards, in the elevator, my coworker Jean asks if I am going to file a complaint: "About what I ask" She proceeds to tell dunce me how he was checking me out,a nd when I stood and bent over, she swears he smiled as his eyes focused breifly down my blouse.

(This is classic me) I grabbed the neckline and pulled it out a bit, looking down, and then looked at her, "If looking at my black bra was a turn on for him, he really has big problems" I am not going to file a complaint, I don't think its warranted. Men do stuff like that; now if he said something weird, or slapped my butt, I would say something. But what bugged me is that she thought I didn't even catch him. I mean its almost a cliche, if you aren't wearing a turtleneck, someone is going to look . (Maybe this explains why most of my wardrobe is mock turtleneck sweaters?)

If you read this, please have a great day...and if you didn't read this, well thats your problem

Yahoo 360 Update, sort of

Yesterday while updating the appearance of my home homepage(My Yahoo) I couldnt help but notice several changes, including a tiny hyperlink, BLOG. I clicked it, and it opened a blog page which is apparently the My Yahoo blog on how great the new My yahoo is. Whoopee!

But id got me to thinking about how Yahoo has not really committed to what the "new " format would be; there is a lot of talk about MASH, but I doubt Yahoo on that. Silly me I know. Then yesterday I started getting all these messages, 9 in all, that I had NEW comments on my blog, but you know what? EVERY comment was from either October or November of this year, ones I had already read. So I am wondering whats up with that? So this morning I started redoing the My Yahoo home page, I noticed my recent posts pictures on Flickr are on my home page. (Flickr is owned by Yahoo)..

I think that Yahoo will likely incorporate all the features from yahoo 360 as seperate modules in My Yahoo. Why? Cost and revenue flow. I asked myself , as a developer, what makes more sense? I can keep what people like about 360, and make it more granular, in that Blogs can be a module, photos a module, etc. A new module like About me would be OK(Profile) and then all you have to do is export those modules out to a feed, and you would have essentially replaced 360, or replicated it? I think the comments I read earlier about how Yahoo was trying to copy the features from more popular sites like MySpace is true no matter what they say...and in fact thtis is also what they(Yahoo) say in their own MASH tutorials, that various modules will be interactive, which leads me to think that some of the content between My Yahoo and whatever they come out with will be shared...One last word. TopTen Reviews rated 360 as 4th best bloging page, after WorldPress, TypePad and Blogger: "Yahoo 360 beats out Windows Live Spaces because with Yahoo you get your own blog page page...This is the one of the best blog services we found for personal use. Yahoo offers numerous free tools, a clean layout and they do not put ads on your blog page. They also make it easy for you to connect to your friends and family."

So WHY is Yahoo so intent on killing 360?????

I like it because it IS different from MySpace and Facebook etc !!!

Speaking Facebook

"At Facebook’s Nov. 6 extravaganza to introduce its new social advertising features, I asked the first question after the speech of Mark Zuckerberg, the company’s 23-year-old chief executive. I asked why he thought lots of users would want to have information about their purchases sent to their Facebook friends through the company’s new system called Beacon."

Beacon is exactly the right name "Facebook Beacon enables your brand or business to gain access to viral distribution within Facebook. Stories of a user's engagement with your site may be displayed in his or her profile and in News Feed. These stories will act as a word-of-mouth promotion for your business and may be seen by friends who are also likely to be interested in your product."

Facebook came under withering criticism from its users and privacy advocates alike when a security researcher revealed that the ad system tracks user activities on third-party partner sites—including the activities of people who never signed up with Facebook, who deactivated their accounts or who were not signed on to the site. Beacon captures data on what users do and buy on the external sites and sends it back to Facebook.

How many of us would like the fact that we bought something online automatically posted to your freinds???

December 15, 2007 Famous People I've Met

Famous people come in all forms of fame-political, sports, entertainment...I was not really thinking of this until I was reading someones page, and the thing they wanted most was to meet William Shatner. OK I guess.

So I started thinking about what is fame and who have I already met. Anybody famous??

Well i met Cary Grant and his wife Barabra while working at the LA Olympics; I also met Richard Crenna and others at the games , not that would know me from anybody, I was "help" and hence unworthy of doing more than serve drinks, and occassionally get slapped on the ass. Jon-Erik Hexum, I met in the same time period, while working at a reception hosted by Warner Brothers in Marina del Rey. He was killed on the set weeks later.

I knew now famous baseball coach and former player Dusty Baker, but I doubt he even remembers me from school. At the 1979 Long Beach Gran Prix I met Giles Villeneuve, who went on to win the race. At the post race party( where for once I was a guest and not a server) he came over to be interviewed by some reporters, he looked at me smiled and winked. (He died in 1982 in a crash)

At the race at Laguna Seca the next year, I met Paul Newman (actor and racing nut) and Clint Eastwood, although again it was nothing either of them would remember I'm sure.

I met Governor Pete Wilson (California) when he was in office, and before that I met Jerry Brown and former California Assembly Leader Willie Brown. I shook hands with Arnold when he was running for Governator, and also met his predecessor Gray Davis.

I would have to say that meeting Cary Grant was a big deal, because he was extremely well known, was very wealthy...and spend several minutes talking to me. Imagine if you can, we are all there in parking lot in Beverly Hills, and the company I work for has been assigned by the Olympic Committee to handle transporation for these people from this location to the stadium. We have all received two way radios to stay in touch with the coordinators, and my mission is to greet each person, offer refreshments and assist them getting on the bus. My Grant was the first in line with his wife, and as we waited, he asked for some water, which I served from a pitcher of ice water. As he drank, and thanked me, he asked about some pins I was wearing- Warner Brothers had asked us to wear their logo shirts or label pins, and additionally other companies had asked we wear their pins-Xerox, etc, all appropriately Olympic themed..he asked about the pins, and we just exchanged small talk. I heard the sirens coming, an indication that the buses under police escort were near, and soon my radio cackled for me to get ready; we had to load them up and head the buses out quickly. As I helped Mr. Grant on the bus, he squeezed my hand and said" Thank you miss, for a most enjoyable conversation" As the door closed and the bus roared away, i noticed an envelope on the ground, and picked it up: turning it over I saw it had the Olympic rings at the top and was an invitation to the ceremonies they had just left for " The Organizing Committee of the Los Angeles Olympic Games cordially invites Mr Cary Grant and Mrs. Barabra Grant to ..." I have it in a keepsake box somewhere around here...gee, that was 23 years ago...

Paris Hilton Champagne label in the news

Ok, is this girl a publicity hound or what???

Heading to weekend December 14, 2007

I check the weather a lot..curious I guess. All i know is, compared to where my friends are, i'll take the Pacific coast weather...cool, but not 8 below!!! Thats why my relatives left Sweden 100 years ago.

Have a great day and remember to wear your mittens, Canice

Early Edition- December 13, 2007

Well, wintery weather means different things in different part of the land, and here is no different...awoke to a frosty 30 degrees, and frost covering most everything outside...still, not bad weather...a BIG cup of coffee,mittens, a light coat and hat...I'll be warm enough..I just hope when i get to work the engineers have managed to get the AC off and the heat on...Our building is like that Borg cube in Star Trek..and the basement level and top floor are always freezing, well real cold, which is OK in summer...not really, who wears a sweater all day at work when outside is in the 90's??? Has to do (I think) with controlling the temp for the various systems..basement for all the network stuff and top floor for all the business systems..

Have a GREAT DAY everybody!!!

Love, Canice

12 days to Christmas

Introducing the Apple i-Boob

Apple Computer announced today that it has developed a computer chip that can store and play music in women's breast implants. The i-BOOB will cost between $499 and $599. This is considered to be a major breakthrough because women are always complaining about men staring at their breasts and not listening to them.

another Entry for December 12, 2007

Note to Yahoo...not what i want to see going to my page

Notice

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Waterboarding...

In todays blog I am reacting to another persons blog, because my message to him got too big.

What started this mess:

Mike Kiriakou told reporters about the interrogation of suspect Abu Zubaydah.

Kiriakou revealed that Zubaydah asked him to smother him with a pillow when he emerged from a coma in U.S. custody after being shot by Pakistani police during his capture in 2002.

"No, no," Kiriakou said he replied. "We have plans for you."

He said Zubaydah was able to withstand 35 seconds of the procedure, which involves covering a prisoner's mouth with plastic or cloth and pouring water over his face. The prisoner quickly begins to inhale water, causing the sensation of drowning.

Kiriakou said when he was subjected to waterboarding as part of his training he could last only five seconds.

"It's entirely unpleasant," he told CNN. "(Your body) almost seizes up. You're so full of tension that you just tense up. Your muscles tighten up, and it's very uncomfortable."

Kiriakou said he did not personally witness the waterboarding but was told by other agents that after Zubaydah was subjected to it, it was like "flipping a switch" and he soon told his interrogators Allah had visited him in his cell and told him to co-operate to make things easier for his brothers.

He told his interrogators about alleged Sept. 11 accomplice Ramzi Binalshibh, and the confessions of the two of them led the U.S. to Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, whom the U.S. government said was the mastermind behind the attacks.

My friend wrote in his blog:

"Everyone is so upset that the CIA may torture an enemy of this county to obtain information that may save the life of a United States citizen or soldier. What am I missing here?
I don't know about the rest of you folks...but I prefer my intelligence service to be known to friends and enemies alike as the baddest bunch of bastards on the planet.
Sorry if this offends anyone...and anyone who has investigated a terrorist attack death scene...dealt with survivors or my most favorite memory..."

OK, so there it is...and pardon my language, but its like we (USA) are becoming a bunch of wimps...

Our family have become close friends with a man whom I used to work with. He is a Indian national having lived here since he was 15 (he's 38), and his wife has been in this country from india for about 12 years. When we talk about this stuff, as he and i did via email today, he says the problem with how the USA is seen overseas is that our friends( like india) dont think we have the stomach for what it takes to fight this type of war...that we are too nice and need to understand the foes are utterly ruthless in the pursuit of their goals. Read the Pakistani or Indian news online sometime. They are in this as much as us, in for a penny, in for a pound as the saying goes.

Another friend, who was in Israel in 1967 (lucky him, his bar mitzvah) was pressed into service and fought the syrians, and has wounds to prove it. He said they captured a high ranking soldier, and from checking his maps, knew there was an attack coming but needed more info. "Normal" techniques were not working, so he tells the story, so an Israeli Colonel walks over to the guy, and tells him to strip; then tells him to get in a trench and lay face down. They blind folded him and then placed a leather coat over him, saying" OK, you either tell us what we need to know, or I am going to shoot you, and leave your unshaven body face down, facing away from mecca, and covered with this pigskin coat to rot and fester in the desert heat until something comes along to eat your rotten... the guy started babbling, and the found out what they needed. Janos explained that they had basically told the guy they were guaranteeing a lousy afterlife a fear he did not relish.

Another friend told honey once (after the Israelis bombed the Iraqis nuclear power plant/ future bomb plant) " Forty years ago, WE would have taken that plant out"

So excuse me if i dont boo hoo too much for the means and methods we use to get info that might well prevent another serious attack, or lead us to those plotting such attacks.
I know I told you about my cousin that was in Iraq, giving up his job as a stock broker/financial analyst. He did it because, having seen combat in Panama, and later Desert Storm, he said the most horrific sight he had ever seen was a couple holding hands and jumping 100 floors to their death on 9/11...a vision he could never get out of his head. He told me" It must be my destiny to pay back those SOB's that tried to kill me and everyone else in our building that day" He is not alone, there are stories I have read or seen on TV about like minded Americans.

So what is the problem with waterboarding?? Is it the same as the "torture" of what routinely happens in the middle east and elsewhere? Do we hold our standards to the higher moral ground of no torture, and absolute, when those opposing us have no doubt that they absolutely want us to die? Are we REALLY that naive as to think we can reason with people that are educated, sophisticated and fervently believe WE are the most evil creatures on the planet??? How do you reason with someone who hold the unreasonable assumption as the cornorstone for their belief and value system?? I am not a philosopher, but I did study debate, and first all sides have to accept certain things to be accepted.

Our opponents are commonly referred to as IslamoFascists. The term may be offensive, but it has history, in 1939, when psychologist Carl Jung said about Adolf Hitler, "he is like Mohammed. The emotion in Germany is Islamic, warlike and Islamic. They are all drunk with a wild god"

People say 9/11 was a fluke, a one time thing: Consider then that many people have rsearched the topic, including in his book, "Brotherhood of Terror", author Paul L. Williams describes plans recovered from raids on terrorist camps in Afghanistan that indicate future attacks both on the United States and Europe, including strikes on targets highly populated by Jews and a plot to smuggle nuclear materials into America in order to construct and detonate a weapon on American soil. He also claims that al-Qaeda had purchased as many as twenty Russian suitcase nukes from members of the Chechen mafia.

Me personally, i would like the CIA, MI5, the German BND and other allied intelligence services find the plotters and their evil plans out before a suitcase bomb goes off in a major city somewhere.

Trials and Tribulations

December 11, 2007

Dear Blog-

My alarm clock radio slowly warms up to the task of waking by this slowly rising annoying humm, followed by a CLICK at which point the eternally sappy voice of the morning dj comes across, followed by the serious tone of the morning newscaster.."its 5:30, here's the news.."

I slowly riseup in bed on one arm, and never cease to be amazed by how my honey can continue to be sound asleep, yet let the car alarm go off down the street in the wee hours, and its a different story. As I turn on my lamp, the new puppy yawns and lets out that puppy sound, in between a yip and and yawning sound...I slip on some footwear, a sweater, and take her out...as i open the door to the yard, she takes a step, and her nose leaves the comfort of the heated house to the 30 something degrees outside and goes in full retreat, followed by my foot urgeing her outside, and I follow her out to make sure she does what is needed out side...

Following the morning routine, I go to the dentist, where he removes the temporary crown and places a gold crown over and over and over..finally saying, that he is not sure it has enough room between teeth, and by Friday I should know if its going to be a problem, and so i have another appointment to either get it set for good or redone.ARGHHHH. On my way home, i stop at the beverage store, to see if they have any diet rootbeer...actually to see if they have any Hank's Diet RootBeer, which they dont..Stewarts diet? Nope, sorry. So i buy some A&W diet, after finding no Barq's diet. UGGH

Now the fun begins...drop off the stuff at home, and then go to the doctor. I belong to a HMO, and the hospital is nearby, like about 1/2 mile away, so i leave 1/2 hour before my appointment, since they are doing construction there. I arrived at 11:07 for a 11:30 appointment, and drove around for 20 minutes until i found parking, after a parking lot guy I stopped said" Oh yeah, there is no parking, you need to go to lot 18 and take the free bus. UGGGGGGGHHHH. I get to the hospital at 11:27, and literally walk run up the stairs to the third floor where the office is. I check in and a moment later I am inside, where the nurse wants to take my weight height and bllod pressure. I can understand the weight and BP, but height??? I dont think i am shrinking(yet) so whats up with that. My BP is up, and i explain i literally ran to get there in time, she barely nodding - I am ushers into a room, where I have learned its a good idea to have a book or something, so i take out my pocket pc and play solitaire....eventually he comes in, and I acknowledge I am a new patient, that my doctor retired and I would see him time to time when she was on vacation. "So what brings you here today" he asks. " Your card saying I should make an appoiintment and see you before the end of the year, thats what" OH

We discussed all the medications I take, reviewed my latest round of lab work, and reviewed my other records. We did the follow the flash light with your eyes test, he looked in my ears, and then we did some interesting muscle tests(push out with your knees, OK now try to push my hands away, ok try to pull me towards you...) and then we discussed ....breasts. He never asked me to disrobe, but asked me questions and then the nurse came in again and her and I did some touchy feel stuff. All Ok, he rechecked my BP, which was by now normal.

I need a Thyroid test, to verify my thyroid function..OK, we'll see you next year, and get a flu shot on the way out.

In the lobby there was this nurse with a station, sounding like a peanut vendor at the ball game " Flu shot, get your flu shot here, dont wait, get em now..." I walked over, and explained my doctor said to get the shot...fill out the form, and then sit down. I took off my Jacket and pulled up my sleeve, and told her I really dont like these, they make your arm hurt, " OH missus, its just a little prick" I stared at her smiling face and then we both laughed, and she smiled broadly, all done. She had stuck me when i started laughing and I felt it, but it wasn't that bad.

Zoom home, change clothes and then drive like a maniac to a interview across town..second interview for a job as a Project Manager, in the CEO office. I got there late, and while waiting, here comes the CEO, says hi, we went to the wrong place...we had a good meeting, I was talking to him (and the lady I would actually work for) for about 45 minutes... now, go to work...only the slacks I was wearing seemed tight(read weight gain of 2-5 pounds) and besides, I dont want to be dressed up at work, everyone knows that means you were at a interview...go home again, change back to work clothes, and then...plop in chair and say forget it...OH no I have a meeting in 20 minutes.. so i called the office and my boss said dont sweat it, we can have that meeting tomorrow...then a co worker called and said that since I wasn't comeing in, our boss went home early, so they were all happy...she is a nice enough person, but a bit scatterbrained, which I think is why her and i get along so well most of the time...

Entry for December 09, 2007

OK, I'll admit it...I love shopping as long as i think i can find what I am looking for at a reasonable price, which means i watch the ads, scan the offers I get in email, whatever to save money..but I refuse to buy junk just to save! I bought a pair of fake Crocs at a big retailers for about half the cost and they were totally a waste of money. Then i bought a pair of real Crocs (I mean come on they are only $30) and wow..I loved em. Then this month I noticed people at work wearing them, and I thought maybe i should wear mine ..I did and got some comments, like those look comfie are they (they are). So this morning when i got done with our Sunday morning activities, I said I wanted to go look for some other ones, and we did..and these are them...I think the color is called Chocolate, but they look more root beer to me, but then, i am a root beer addict...

"America Planned Pearl Harbor" (say, did you pass high school?)

I did not post a entry yesterday, but that does not mean much.

I did, however, have on my calendar( physical and electronic) that December 7,1941 at about 10AM Pacific Time (8 AM Hawaiian) Pearl harbor was attacked by the Japanese. My father told me about living in Vallejo at the time, and his dad, a master carpenter at Mare Island Naval Shipyard, came home and told the family the nation was at war. My father in law also told me about it, how the nation was shocked and stood behind the government when FDR called December 7 a day that would live in infamy..

Fast forward, another foe decided that a sudden and deliberate attack would be the best way to deter America, and on September 11, 2001 Al-Qaeda (also al-Qaida or al-Qa'ida or al-Qa'idah) strikes.

In the aftermath of the first event, America joined a global war against an Imperial Japan and Nazis Germany...today we fight against a wide assortment of ideologues bend on establishing Islamist states throughout the world, overthrow ‘un-Islamic regimes’, expel U.S. soldiers and Western influence from the Gulf, and capture Jerusalem as a Muslim city..

OK, so enough with the history, what really flames my butt is people that say the US Government has any part in planning and execution of 9/11...we all should know by now the attacker has acknowledged over and over their glee at the attack, how they planned it and so forth. What I find really distressing is the prevalence of a lack of critical thinking and demonstration of the enormous degree to which public EDUCATION in this country has failed to teach us about our own history, past and present.

On this fine December evening, while reading some of my friends blogs, I came across this comment, which typifies the ignorance I am railing against "you are aware the government knew about the attack several weeks in advance arn't you? pearl harbour was planned. "

I am glad there are not as many of these ignorant souls as there are more educated people..

Entry for December 06, 2007

Whats new?

Well, I was nearly 2 hours late to work because I could not find my glasses, which i need to legally drive...I searched everywhere, and finally resorted to (1) removing everything from my bag to make sure they weren't in there(2) removed everything from the top of my dresser, to make sure i had not missed laid them there and then (3) in desperation began going thru the pockets of every jacket, coat and sweater/sweatshirt in my closet (see above)

I finally found them in the pocket of a jacket I dont remember wearing, and then realized I must have slipped them into the pocket while getting ready to go, got distracted and forgot I had put them there...

I got a note from the doctor to schedule an appointment, so i did when i got to work...ever notice how appointments sort of pile up? I also have to go back to the dentist to have a permanent crown put on the tooth they did a root canal on last month..which by the way was a tooth that already had a crown on it, because of how deep the filling was. I have the distinction(according to my dentist) of having really great teeth, deep root, well seated in the jaw bone, and probably the weakest enamel he has ever seen. I swear, I really thought growing up i would have no teeth (like my grandparents) by the time i was 50- but i still have them all, although there is an awful lot of metal in there... (Gross, I know, but come on people, this is reality)

Entry for December 04, 2007

I was looking to post something nice here instaed of the usual diatribe about something or the other and found this on YouTube...significant to me because in the summer of 1977 i went with some friends I had made in Germany to Copenhagen Denmark and we ended up seeing Abba...and significant because this song became kind of a secret theme between me and someone who I really fell for

I was here- I was just driving along and heard this music and got off the Embarcadero Freeway(which was later torn down) and followed the yuppies to see this

How weird it is that I now go to see performances like this: Not surprising, since i was listening to this when i was 9 or 10...I was an odd child.

Entry for December 03, 2007

I often have a multitude of stupid things rattle around in my brain: Why do people like me? Why did my dad expect so much from me as a kid, and why was he so quick to point out my shortcomings, but never really encouraged me like mom did??How did all that influence me, shape me as a person? How did it affect me as a parent?

Simply put, my dad expected a lot from us as kids. Nothing seemed to ever be enough; he was quick to chastise. He was proud of us too, but it seems like the things my brothers and I remember are the numerous episodes of him yelling at us. I particularly and vividly recall a time 34 years ago when he came to where i was living with my boyfriend: I was 20 and attending college, and we decided to move in together. Dad (a cop) found out where i live and just showed up. He didn't want to come in the apartment, and asked me downstairs to talk. As he spoke, i could sense the anger building, and i told him it was my life to screw up if i wanted to. He looked at me and said how totally disappointed in me he was, and he slapped me.
Two years later ( i had broken off my relationship w Richard) I was living w my friend J and her sister. I have a picture of dad and my adviser on graduation day, when he said how proud of me he was. I can really only recall a handful of times in life he said anything about being proud.
I did all these achiever things that in retrospective was me trying to get him to be nice to me..I played sports( I was awful- crap I knocked myself out with a bat at softball practice once, and twisted my ankle in high school trying to run cross country) I joined junior achievement, and gave a speech about what Junior Achievement means to me at some banquet in San Francisco.
There was all the comments when i was in junior high and high school, about me being a hippie, or a whore( I honestly don't know where that came from, i think he was just convince I was destine to be a slut by the way I dressed) He was adamant I could not get my ears pierced, could not wear makeup, crap, i couldn't even wear nylons until i was a junior in high school. No wonder I started drinking at 16. I think there was some good though- fear of him is likely as big a motivator as any for me not having sex in high school...gee, with my luck i would have got pregnant and then what!
Beside I made up for it later...But what this did to my self esteem, I don't think I fully ever accounted for.
I frequently am told at work what a good job I am doing, what a good staff person i am, what a good manager i am, and it all seems alien...Me?? I am doing good? I frequently ask my mother if dad was still alive, would he have been proud of us kids, and she always says the same thing, he was proud of us, just not able to show it. Thats my mom...always positive. Even when he left her after 25 years together, she tried to stay positive.

Her influence was the counter balance to his disciplinary way of running the family...although she could exercise her own authority...Once I was at a party and my friends said don't you have to go home, and I said something like i didn't, and here comes my mom in her 58 T Bird...she rolled down the window, and somehow spotted me, " Young lady, you better be home by the time I get there."
(How she figured I could start dads work car, an Studebaker Lark ( pictured in this blog), and get home before her I don't know. All I know is i ran two stop signs on the way home, and parked the car in the driveway as she was pulling in...I don't remember her even being mad. We just went in and went to bed. Dad on the other hand would have lectured me about being irresponsible.)

How did this affect me as a parent? The few times I found myself flying off the handle at our daughter, I would reflect for a minute, and then deal with it as emotionless as possible. And like my mom, I tend to be overly generous of myself. It bothers her now, because I insist on giving her stuff; when they come to visit I take them where ever they want, cook whatever they want(well mostly- Thanksgiving I totally did not have a pecan pie) ..
I am so messed up, sometimes i think I must be normal...