Current Events

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I grew up outside of Cleveland, Ohio in the suburbs.  My parents bought a house that backed up to acres and acres of woods.  I remember every evening around dusk the rabbits would come out to graze.  I was probably four years old during this first memory and even then I physically towered over these harmless hares.

One day my mother said to me “Come on, we’re going to the mall to see the Easter Bunny.”  In my mind this was the Ultimate Bunny.  A rabbit that was able to visit the world during a single night to bestow candy and eggs to all the girls and boys.  I was excited.

I wasn’t prepared for what awaited me at the mall.  Instead of seeing the little animal that innocently hopped around my backyard every night I was greeted by a gargantuan.  This was a rabbit on roids.  It towered over me and it had the ability to walk on two feet and sit in an overstuffed chair.  This wasn’t a “bunny” this was a monster sent from Alice’s Wonderland to capture and transform me into a human peep.  I remember screaming like an extra in a Halloween movie as mom led me by my hand towards this buck-toothed barbaric bunny.  Surely I was about to be sacrificed right in front of Spencer Gifts.  If you think I’m alone in feeling this way CLICK HERE.

There will be NO carrots left at my house for the Easter Bunny.  Thanks to ADT my alarm will be set and I will sleep with one eye open just in case that huge-headed-hare decides THIS is the year he comes back for me.

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I’m a news junkie.  I make sure to pay attention to what is trending on the web and what others are concerned with.  I had to do a double take when I noticed one of the top stories is that teen-age singer Rebecca Black is under police protection after receiving numerous death threats.  READ STORY HERE.

If you have a life you probably don’t know who this chick is.  Cliff note version:  Parents paid $4k for her crappy “Friday Song” to be turned into a video.  110 million people have seen it.  She’s a viral superstar and many claim the song is “the worst song ever.”  WATCH VIDEO HERE

The song IS irritating but if writing a crappy song was grounds for being shot, Bobby McFerrin would have met his maker back in 1988.  My late father had a saying:  “Get your priorities straight!”  Unless this country takes dad’s advice I am afraid we need to look for the headless horseman to be on a future season of “Dancing With The Stars.”

Forty-five percent of our nation’s population doesn’t pay income tax.  Gas is close to five dollars a gallon.  We have accumulated an almost insurmountable federal deficit.  Foreclosures continue at an alarming rate and we are concerned with a crappy song/video financed by a couple of stage parents that only wanna make their daughter and her pimply faced friends happy???

Things gotta change or I’m shooting my foot and moving to Canada.  Who cares if their Navy is made up of one boat and three flare guns.  This is getting crazy!

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I was reading a story this morning about an eighteen year-old senior that is not allowed to take his nineteen year-old girlfriend to the prom because she is too old.  Read story HERE. I think everyone has experienced “old guy at the prom” and chances are YOU remember his name.

Another constant is the “super hot chick that’s too cool to date anyone from the school.”  In my case she was dating the quarterback for the Cleveland Browns but he knew better than to come to the prom so my memory of “old guy at the prom” belongs to Rick Davis.

Rick had another title as well:  “Guy whose house you would go over just to get him to buy ya beer.”  We made many trips to Rick’s house and even played a few hands of gin rummy with his parents but the only motivation we had in making the stop was to get him to run up to the beverage store and buy us a case of Little Kings.

Rick was twenty-three years old but to a high school senior you may as well be on television endorsing reverse mortgages.  It’s funny how I don’t remember much from my high school prom but the vision of Rick Davis doing the funky chicken to the Human Leagues “Don’t You Want Me” is permanently emblazoned in my subconscious. 

 So this prom season I offer ya this piece of advice:  If you 1) are married, 2) have a college degree or 3) have more than five thousand dollars in your 401-K; stay home and let the kids have their fun.

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 Everyone is talking about the six year old girl that received a full body pat down by the TSA in New Orleans.  See story HERE.  Watch disturbing video HERE.

Sorry, but I’m gonna have to come to the defense of the TSA here.  The agent was only doing her job based on the procedures that are already in place and approved by the TSA.  THAT’S THE PROBLEM!!

Don’t fault the worker for doing her job the problem lies with the morons that approved such procedures.  I hate to fly to begin with but I am willing to take my chances and assume a six-year-old is not hiding some C-4 in her Hello Kitty carry-on.

If two consenting adults did in public what the TSA is instructed to do to law-abiding citizens attempting to travel, they would be arrested and charged with lewd and lascivious behavior.  I remember my grandmother when she was seventy-five.  The only threat inside her brassiere was, after six kids, one of her boobs may fall out and knock over the drink cart.

There has to be a better solution than what is happening right now but don’t misplace your anger.  Focus on the cause and not the effect.  Go to the top.  Those responsible are the ones in need of a full body scan to see if they are in possession of ANY common sense whatsoever.

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I’m a social media junkie.  Find me HERE on facebook.  Follow me HERE on Twitter.  As I was surfing the net today I found a site that will predict your next tweet based on the DNA of previous tweets.  The site is HERE.

I thought I would see what happens and here is the post I was supposed to tweet:  I’m driving heather INSANE. : I can never applied Ben gay bar When people are LOSERS!

Now I’ll admit that is an interesting tweet but there are a few inaccuracies:  1)  I don’t know any Heathers  2)   You can’t drive someone crazy, they are already crazy and you just may push them over the edge and 3) I HAVE been to a gay bar and given the choice I would rather bask in the warm glow of Ben Gay the analgesic.

I look at Twitter like I do a break on the radio.  Your tweet should do one of three things:  1)  Make me laugh  2)  Make me learn something or  3)Call me to some sort of action.  Based on the many tweets I see during the day people don’t follow these rules and that will make someone “unfollow you.”  The “unfollowing” in Twitter is the same as changing stations in the radio business.  Either outcome is not desired.

Just some of the things I have learned with my short time on Twitter. Will YOU offer suggestions to ME?  Now I’m off to make some food so I can tweet a picture of it before I eat it (someone wanna explain that logic to me?)  🙂

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I was reading the facebook status of a friend of mine this morning:  “Exhausted and sore after yoga.”  I laughed.  Every time I see someone doing yoga they are just sitting there.  I can walk downtown and step over a half-dozen bodies doing the same thing.  They call that “passed out drunk.”  So either yoga leads to being homeless or I am missing something.

Next move was to YouTube to find a yoga video.  The one I selected a woman appeared on my screen telling me we would be doing a series of “breathing and stretching” exercises.  My first thought was : “Memo to self.  Never refer to it as ‘getting out of bed in the morning.’  You are doing YOGA!”

As I tried to mimic the poses and instructions of the limber lady on my computer screen, reality hit me harder than Chris Brown.  My heart rate increased, sweat was dripping down my forehead, and I was hoping I wouldn’t have a heart attack because they would find me in my Armour All boxers with my left foot above my head.  “We wonder why he watched all those David Carridine movies,” they would say.  (If ya don’t get the joke:  CLICK HERE).

I usually think I’m right but I don’t have a problem admitting when I am wrong.  I was DEAD wrong about Yoga.  It IS a workout and one not to be taken lightly.  I know that first hand as I’m too sore to reach my Ben-Gay.  When I’m able to walk without looking like I passed out at Richard Simmons’ house (visual joke), I’ll let ya know what I think about those sissies that think they’re working out if they’re “spinning.”

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We are currently on a countdown to the shutdown of our government.  When this happened at my local Blockbuster I was able to buy five DVD’s for less than twenty bucks so does that mean I will soon find the White House china on eBay?

Is this the same government that demands payment of personal income tax by the fifteenth of April every year or you face a monetary penalty?  My father will never be confused with Warren Buffett but he always told me this:  Save ten percent of your gross earnings and never spend more than you bring home. 

 How come my father knows more than my government?  He could fix a washing machine and tear apart a car engine but he would be OVERWHELMED if he was running the government.  The fact that he would be BETTER at it than our current leaders tells me what kind of stooge routine is happening on Capital Hill.  When will Larry, Curly and Moe show up and start a pie fight.

If this was happening to any business in our country the entire management team would be thrown out on the street.  I think the blame falls on everyone in Washington with a starched shirt and Ward Cleaver hair.  This is not a party issue this is a money issue.  Put the ego on the back burner and fix it or WE will make OUR adjustments in November.

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I’m on facebook a lot.  I try to make my posts meaningful.  I’ll never make my status update a picture of an entre’ of food I’m about to consume or quote a lyric from a song.  This isn’t the Food Network and we’re not playing a round of “Name That Tune.”  I’m also a “black and white” type of guy.  It’s the grey in our lives that leads to stress and uncertainty. 

So let’s address your social status on facebook:  In my opinion you are either single, married or in a relationship.  Ever since I signed up for facebook I have been bothered by the status of “it’s complicated.”  The directions for assembling a gas grill are complicated.  Your relationship status should be fairly easy to label.  So I’ve had no choice but to assume that “it’s complicated” means one of three things:

1) WE ARE FIGHTING:  Disagreements happen all the time.  Communication is the key and you’re not gonna solve the problem by letting me know your husband has to sleep on the couch because he hit “like” on a former girlfriend’s status.  Wanna share something personal?  Send me your checking account routing number.

2)  YOU’RE DATING SOMEONE MARRIED:  If you made your profile picture one of you and your boyfriend, who also happens to have a wife and kids, that would “complicate” many issues in many lives.  Therefore, “it’s complicated,” is a good choice in status.

3)  THERE IS MORE THAN ONE PERSON IN YOUR BED:  Imagine you are dating.  Imagine being at that person’s house.  Now imagine finding a pair of underwear, a cat of nine tails and a rubber Nixon mask in their closet that doesn’t belong to either one of you.  I would say that particular explanation would be fairly “complicated.”

So unless YOU want ME to think of one of the three preceeding situations about YOUR relationship, let’s eliminate the grey.  🙂

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I was reading an article the other day about why Mr. Rogers was such a great neighbor.  READ ARTICLE HERE.  Mr. Rogers was very special to me as an only child and it amazes me that some people are creeped out by him.  His purpose was to stimulate the imagination of a child; not to be analyzed in a literal sense by adults. 

Allow me to be silly and offer a cynical look at Mr. Rogers.  Let’s start with that traffic light.  How hammered do ya have to be to climb a pole and zip line down some guy wire to cut that thing down?  The fish?  You’re talking to fish?  Talking to a cat or a dog I get, they may respond, but you’re trying to carry on a conversation with a submerged piece of sushi.  Next thing ya know you’ll be talking to a freaking TROLLEY CAR!  Wait……you do?  And ya think the trolley car is talking back to you???  This same trolley car, which is about the size of a loaf of bread, is able to transport an adult male to “The Land of Make Believe?”  Would someone please get the Department of Human Services on the phone???

WAIT!!!  Someone is at the door.  It’s some Colonel Sanders wanna-be called “Mr. McFeely.”  McFeely???  Really???  If I’m a parent I don’t want my kid anywhere near someone named McFeely.  Shouldn’t he be registered somewhere with the state? 

Sadly, some people actually feel this way about the show and for those that do I offer you this:  In our occupations, how many times have we been encouraged to “think outside the box?”  Show me a CREATIVE person and I’ll show ya a SUCCESSFUL  person.  Thinking outside the box is the “adult version” of “The Land of Make Believe.” 

So thank YOU Mr. Rogers for everything you taught me, however, I’ll never purchase a pair of those goofy tennis shoes ya wore.  🙂