Who has the Time for THAT!

Don't you just love it when your flying along Route 128 enjoying a little sunshine after all the snowstorms and all of a sudden a sheet of ice and snow lifts off the roof of the car in front of you. There you are wondering if this thing is going to slam into your windshield. If there is a good amount of traffic, you can't do much to avoid this frozen projectile. Except to bitch at that asshole that did nothing to clean their car off.
Part of owning a car is to make sure it is safe on the road. When did people start forgetting about being safe for others as well. There's a lot of idiot's these days who go out after a snowfall and clean a space on their windshield barely enough to peek through then drive off into traffic. They don't have the time to clean off the six inches that coats the rest of the vehicle. So, screw the people behind them on a highway. A lot of people just don't give a crap about the other drivers around them. They want to get where their going and cleaning the car off is going to take up too much time.
I only hope all these bastards have to make a sudden stop sending the snow off the roof and into their windshields. That'll slow them down.

Hardy, Har, Har.

We have really been getting slammed with old man winter here in New England. We are on a scheduled track of at least one snow storm a week. Most weeks have an extra bonus storm thrown in as well. Yes sir, we are getting snow of historical proportions. But, life doesn't stop for us, work goes on, we have orders to complete and deadlines to meet. We drudge through this snow and sleet because we are hardy New Englander's. We can take what Mother Nature throws at us.
Of course, a few government offices have to close down just to lessen the traffic out there. Then, yes, the schools have to shut down. No sense having kids and teachers out there. Besides, there's one or two snow days every year, right?
Well, wrap your minds around this little factoid, you hardy New Englander's - today, February 2, 2011, is the first day in 12 years that the city of Chicago has closed schools on account of weather. I would imagine they have had a few flakes of snow in those 12 years.

Cheer for Beer

I recently came home to find a package on my doorstep. I knew I hadn't ordered anything of late, so I was a little curious as to what this might be. It was clearly addressed to me and the box had some weight to it. Well, I was quite pleasently surprised to open the package and find a 12 pack of beer.
A one page promotional flyer in the box told me this was sent from a Beer of the Month Club, but no other indication as to why I recieved this prize. Then, my wife tells me that we had recieved one of those email Christmas cards from and old friend back before the holiday. She said that in the email he had mentioned to keep an eye on the mail, we would be receiving something. I went back and took a look at his email which I admit I didn't really read at the time. Sure enough, he said something would be coming by post and it would be something aimed a little bit more towards my tastes.
I have to say, this was beautiful gesture on his part. I immediately emailed my friend, John, to thank him. He sent back a reply saying it was a just a little something thanking us for putting him up when he passed through these parts a few years ago. Well, the beer has been great. Some nicely crafted microbrewed ales from both New Hampshire and Colorado.
So, this 12 pack on my door step has prompted John and I to once again correspond. We have also connected through Facebook which also allowed me to connect with other mutual friends. See what a wonderful thing beer can be. Beer can bring people together. Of course, I've always had a great admiration for the benefits of beer, but this little episode is a reminder of what beer can do for us. I plan to enjoy more beer. I hope others will as well.

Which City?

Salem is a great town to walk around in. Fall is a great time to walk around Salem. Salem, Massachusetts has a lot of history. Of course, the big thing everyone remembers is the Salem Witch Trials. Not exactly something to be real proud of. However, Salem took this lemon and made a witch's brew!
Quite a few years ago, the town decided to tie their woeful witch history to Halloween. They came up with a number of spooky events and christened the two weeks before Halloween as "The Haunted Happenings". They had a public relations hit.
They kick off the Haunted Happenings with a night time parade through downtown. A lot of the spectators dress up in costumes and its tons of fun. It's a lot of fun for kids, as long as their not too squeemish. Some costumes can be graphic.
The trouble is, after a couple of decades this witch thing has gone a little too far. It seems that every shop downtown is nothing but witch junk. There's witches, actually folks dressed as the traditional pointed black hat witch, walking up and down the streets handing out brochures to psychic readings, wax museums, horror shows and macabre boutiques. Halloween is fun but, come on already. Did I tell you, Salem has a lot of history?
How about a few more shops that highlight the maritime history of Salem. Salem was a major seaport at one time. Yeah, there is a pirate museum but there could be much more. The town is trying to capture seafaring days by reconstructing Derby Wharf to look as it did in the 1700's. However, there needs to be much more to balance off the witches and goblins. But, you know, that Dracula's Castle is wicked cool.

I'd Like to Help, Son, But You Don't Even Vote

Hey, did you get out and vote this week? Oh, that's right, this was only a primary. Why bother voting in those things, right. There's no winners in those races. Primaries don't matter, the real election is in November.



Hello, this is part of the democratic process! We call ourselves the greatest democracy in the world and here in the state of Massachusetts less than 15% of the voters turn out to the polls. Turn out was reported to be very light across the country.



As a nation we should be ashamed of ourselves. We tout the advantages of democracy to the rest of the world. We send our young kids to fight wars to uphold democracy and over three quarters of the country doesn't give a shit that elections are going on. This is the shining example of self governing we would like others to emulate?

Be a part of your community. Be a part of your government. Be a part of solutions. Take part in democracy, it would suck to lose it.

A Kid and his Comics

I read comic books. I love comic books. I have had a relationship with comic books for a very long time. I can honestly say that my appreciation for the printed word came originally from the pages of Green Lantern, Aquaman and Thor rather than any book assigned by teachers.

I can still remember as a kid the pleasure of opening up a new comic fresh from the corner store. The labors that went into obtaining that book were great. Comics cost twelve cents at the time and those twelve cents didn't come easy. Soda bottles had a two cent return on them back then and I remember scouring the neighborhood looking for six bottles in order to have enough to secure a new issue of Detective Comics featuring Batman. Of course, every other kid in the neighborhood was scrounging for the same number of bottles. Ah, but that's one of the reasons you made friends.

With a friend, who might be as good a scavenger as you, you could round up a dozen bottles or more and you had a great afternoon of reading ahead of you. The trick was to make sure you made friends with someone with the same tastes in comics.

However, I was pretty flexible when it came to the various titles that were out there. I started out with the typical Superman and Batman stuff. Early on, I stayed with a lot of what DC had to offer. I read The Flash, Green Arrow and Sgt Rock. Later though, it was Marvel Comics that hooked me. Marvel had a different style of writing and characters that seemed more alive. Marvel let you into the thoughts of their characters and damned if they didn't seem to be thinking a lot like I was. Some characters, Spiderman in particular, seem to be going through the normal problems of being a teen or young adult. Yeah, you might have superpowers, but you still have to get a date for the prom! So, I kept reading the comics right along with my assigned reading of Moby Dick, Tale of Two Cities and Julius Caesar. Of course, by now I had to suppliment the bottle hunts with a Sunday paper route. I needed more comics and they went up to 15 cents.

My desire for comics did wane a bit as I went through high school. After all, I needed to line up a date or two myself. Later, when I found myself in the service, I had a chance to rekindle the craving. Servicemen stationed overseas end up with a lot of down time cooped up in the barracks. The Post Exchange store realizes this as well as anyone else. So, they provide a lot of reading material. Yes, men left to their own devices will purchase a fair amount of glossy magazines of a certain genre, however that can only occupy just so much of your time. So, the Exchange also stocks comics, lots of comics. And, there is always a lot of reading, swapping and collecting of comics going on in all branches of the service.

Eventually, you move on and get on with living your life. Work, marriage, mortgage, kids, it takes up a lot of time. And, time seems to get more precious as it moves along. But, recently, I've made it a point to set aside a little time for an old fond pastime.

I still read comics and I still love comics

The Enemy at the Gate

Even though there is a lot of talk about how this country shouldn't be the policeman of the world. The fact is, we go ahead and do it. We go ahead and get ourselves involved in the affairs of other states on a regular basis. We try to make a lot of it look good by going to the UN. We see some other country that seems to be rocking the boat and we drop a dime at the UN Security Council. In a lot of instances we insist on throwing sanctions on the country causing unrest. Sometimes it leads to something more serious.

Currently the big bad guys are Iran and North Korea. These two states seem to be heading towards acquiring nuclear war heads. If these two regimes go nuclear chances are it will cause some instability. And, that's the whole idea about this policeman role we've taken on. Instability is not a good thing in this global community.

Well, if that's deal, aren't we kind of asleep on the job when it comes to our own back yard. There seems to be some heavy instability going on in Mexico and as policeman the US seems to be sitting in the donut shop. Do we know if anyone is running that country? And, who can blame the people there for fleeing to the north. Does Arizona really think they are going to stop them by putting up a No Trespassing sign?

Why isn't the US doing a little more towards stabilizing the situation in Mexico? The drug cartels now have the run of the country. They are knabbing mayors and prosicuters off the streets and executing them. Mass graves are now being found. This is our next door neighbor. You know a bar fight can many times spill out into the street. It is possible that the violence south of the border can spill into the southwest on a much larger scale than it has already.

Being the cop on the beat shouldn't we be checking on what's going on next to the station?