Happy Thanksgiving

Top Ten Things I'm Thankful For In No Particular Order

1. Mike's cooking, and the nurture it represents. And when he laughs really hard at my jokes.

2. My son's happy smile, so pure that it makes the rest of the world disappear. And his skinny arms around me.

3. My daughter's belly laugh that hasn't changed since she was a baby. And her energetic spunk.

4. My Mom's busy life and her subtly sophomoric sense of humor. And her quiet strength.

5. My sister's sick, oddball, and superficial yet deep sense of humor. And her friendship.

6. My brother's low-brow yet high-minded twisted sense of humor. And listening to him sing and play guitar.

7. Friends who appreciate or overlook my crude jokes and well-meaning insults. And so many to share laughs with. Till we cry and forget what we were laughing about. And so many shoulders to cry on.

8. Good wine, good margaritas, mediocre wine, mediocre margaritas.

9. Being old enough to have plenty of sweet things to look back on and being young enough to look back.

10. Having this place to heal my heart, mend my mind, gust my guts, and sigh my soul.

What I'm Not Thankful For:

It just doesn't matter.

Happy Birthday to my Blog's Biggest Fan

I'm putting this here for several reasons, but mainly because I couldn't find the perfect card for him, and even if I had, I would not have sent it on time, because I'm not as good a friend as most of mine are.

I gave a brief history about Chris a while back. Check the archives. We met when we went to school together in Paris in 1988. TWENTY YEARS AGO. As I have said before, we became instant friends when we found a common interest in cutting others down or mocking them not only for our entertainment, but also to make ourselves feel superior. Of course, that was 20 years ago. We're way more mature now. (NOT!) He has been like a little brother to me since then.

He is the world traveler friend who always takes the time to send a postcard to our family, no matter where he is. Even from brief business trips. Now, one might think he sends these out of friendliness, but I know him well enough that he's not using them to say "Wish you were here;" he's saying, "Look where I am!" That's just the kind of guy he is. He is also the kind of friend who emails links to picture albums, mostly pictures of his adorable little kids, but also pictures of himself standing in front of or next to million-dollar cars, supposedly famous hockey players, or one of the seven wonders of the world.

I know him to spend outrageous amounts of money on things like ink pens and watches and pottery and cravats and jodhpurs. I have never understood his penchant for such things, and I must admit, I've sometimes questioned his sexuality because of it, especially with his attraction to (and I'll say his/her name here just once for you, Chris) Ann Coulter (whom I maintain is really a dude).

After we returned from Paris, I eventually lost track of all the American friends I made there. But Chris. Even though he was in upstate New York and I was in Texas, he made sure to stay in touch. I think he knew that I might be of value to him someday (namely, improving his overall stature in society). No offense there, Chris, on the "stature" remark. (He's about 5 foot 3, I think.) He has always been great about sending cards and calling and giving me a hard time about not reciprocating.

He puts effort into things that matter to him: his family, his traveling (and wanting to fill up every inch of every page of every passport with stamps even from countries you've never heard of), his (fanatical right wing) political views, and his friendships. A lot of people (myself, to name one) have lots of things that "matter" to them, but they aren't nearly so dedicated.

I knew he was a kind and thoughtful and generous friend all those years, but I never knew how kind and thoughtful and generous until early May of 2006. I think he was living in Pennsylvania at the time, or maybe he was already in Boston, I can't remember. Anyway, there I was in my parents' house at the reception after my dad's funeral service. I looked at all the familiar faces, some I hadn't seen since I was a child. My best girlfriends were there, my in-laws were there. I felt at peace and comforted to be surrounded by so much love. And just as I was feeling all grateful and somehow even joyful at such a sad time, I suddenly thought I had lost my mind. There was Chris. He had figured out where and when, made the trip on short notice, rented a car, and showed up just for that afternoon. I was being pulled in every direction that day. He understood. Told me he just came to give me a hug and before I knew it he was gone. I honestly don't know if I could do something like that for a friend who lived so far away.

So, sorry I didn't get a card in the mail, Chris. I know you'll not be surprised at that. I hope this makes up for it. I'll "try" to call today. Thanks for having the guts and patience to be my friend for so long. (Most drop off after a decade or so.) And thanks for being not only the one who inspires me to maintain a superiority complex with grace, but also for being my political nemesis, and this blog's number one (and perhaps only) fan. Give Erin and the babies hugs and kisses from me.

Happy Birthday.

Happy Veterans' Day

{First, be sure to catch my post from yesterday below this one. I rarely treat my reader(s) to two posts in a row, so I don't want anyone to miss out on something that might certainly make your whole week.}

Today as I was updating my work website (fight4veteransrights.com), I thought that seeing as how one of my passions is helping veterans, I might also acknowledge them here. My hate for war is in direct proportion to the respect I feel for those who fought and fight. My hate for war is in direct proportion to the compassion I feel for its victims. Every time I go to BAMC (the military hospital here) for my own medical care, it is inevitable that I see at least 5 (and usually more) returning Iraq or Afghanistan war veterans. They are easy to spot because their faces are melted, their ears and hair have been burned off, their legs have been amputated. They are young. They usually have a young wife pushing their wheelchair. Sometimes they try to hold a baby with a damaged arm. All I can do is try not to cry. Sure, they are proud warriors. If you were to ask them, 99% would say they would go back and do it again. Do they say that and suck it up because they are proud warriors? Do they cry when they are alone? Don't they punch what used to be a fist at the sky and curse their fate? At least sometimes? Anyway, I'll get off my soapbox.

Wait, not yet... I will say that I'm glad these guys are welcomed home. I'm glad they seem to have the military taking better care of them. They seem to have good transition teams getting them from military health care into the VA health care system. And these guys are supposedly being screened at discharge for PTSD and other mental disorders. If they need treatment, they get it sooner rather than later. (High suicide rates don't look good for the VA.)

In contrast, the Vietnam vets were welcomed home with protests and spit. They self-medicated with drugs and alcohol for 20, 30, 40 years. Daily I see the extensive, ripple-effect damage all that government incompetence and neglect has left a lot of those vets with. Now, instead of mentally damaged veterans, we will see more who are physically damaged. Neither is better or worse. Loss is loss and pain is pain. Most war vets have been there or at least seen it with their own eyes.

After fighting for this government, not a single one of them should ever have to fight against this government to get the compensation they deserve. (I'll explain later why I believe there are very few freeloaders in the VA system.)

Here are the lyrics to a song I found:

A Veteran's Song by Nazareth

The bars are crowded with wasted youth
You just went, you didn't know the truth
You don't know that kid when you look back
You remember the music, Paint it Black

You had a brother in the movement and he burned his card
He's got a job in the white house, ain't life hard
You came back a hero on a stolen horse
You say you don't fit in, you can't stay the course

I may be right, don't care if I'm wrong
It's a veteran's song

The band paraded playing Oh gung ho
Your country needs you, you've got to go
When you came over they said "Soldier go back"
When you came home they put you on the rack

Between agent orange and the jungle and fear
You're just surviving to get out of here
You smoke some more herb and you keep your head down
Could be your number is on the next round.
© 1986 Nazareth

If you can't thank a veteran in person today, do it anytime. And if you don't know what to say or do, pay attention to what our elected officials are doing (or not doing) and support those who fight for the ones who fought for us.

Keep Reading; it Gets Better

So here's my excuse for the blog-lag this time:

Aside from the brutal mental and emotional malaise brought on by election saturation and its attendant gastrointestinal difficulties . . . .

I have been trying to get on top of my workload and that's not easy to do when you have no organizational or time-management skills, no secretary, and no away-from-home office. Plus I have to be a part-time mom, de-clutter in time for the housekeeper's visits, sometimes feed the dog, and keep the pantry and fridge alphabetized.

Then there's all the household paperwork management. Does anyone else go insane about paper? I know I've bitched about this before, but I need to do it again. I get stuff from everywhere daily and let it overwhelm me. Daily. Sure, the junk mail goes right into the trash, and magazines and catalogs are set aside to read at my leisure (which is why that stack is 4 feet high and the clothes advertised in the ones at the bottom are already out of style).

Then there are birthday invitations to respond to (and get a gift for), bills (to pay or dispute), insurance forms (to get the new liability card from then file away somewhere), health care questionnaires (to consider filling out only to trash them later), receipts (some to keep, some to throw away, some to record in a register somewhere, some to look up online so as to figure out which account that money came out of and what the hell it was for even though it is dated yesterday), septic maintenance notices, post office "package to pick up" slips, Amazon packing slips (for things I may need to return but most likely not), kids' school notices to read and calendar, order forms to fill out and write a check for, assignment sheets to review and sign, progress reports, report cards, Boy Scout and Girl Scout forms to fill out and emails I printed out to use as reminders that I never look at again or lose, permission slips, reminder notes to myself (that I always forget to look at), blog ideas on scraps, songs to remember to download scribbled on Starbucks napkins, songs to remember to delete from my iPod scribbled on business cards, oh, and business cards (either mine or someone else's), work ideas on post-its, certified mail receipts from work, letters from the VA, copies of letters to the VA, letters from clients, client-related paperwork, potential-client paperwork, my board-member paperwork, legal research copies or printouts, ads for summer camps, forms for basketball sign-ups, salon or spa brochures, coupons, coupons, coupons, phone message notes, to-do lists, grocery lists, newspapers, newsletters, quasi-newspapers or newsletters . . . these are just the things that dropped out of the side of my head in the past 5 minutes.

Sure, I can pretty much keep the work papers separate from the home papers. But they all just keep pressing in on me. Where to put this or that so I can prioritize and be efficient --- I get emails from this "Get Organized Now" website, but do I even open them? Who has the time??? And don't even ask about how disorganized and overloaded my 3 different email accounts are. At least those are virtual.

Anyway . . .

Here are a few important tidbits I needed to purge:

More irritating old-person words and phrases: whippersnapper (not that any of them actually say that anymore), on the fritz (who is Fritz and why is he the bad guy?), get your goat (what does this mean? What goat? You want my goat? Take it. Didn't even know I had one.), lickety-split (is it just me, or does that just sound incredibly nasty?)

A phrase I hear a lot that makes no sense: "I miss not seeing you!" What? You miss not seeing me? Gee, thanks. I could say that to a lot of people who are up in my face far too often, "Hey, you who won't leave me alone, I really miss your absence." This is similar to when people say "I could care less." You mean you could not care less. Why do I waste my efforts on these technicalities?

From the Mind of Luke:

After I told Luke I would help him get his backpack organized and he laughed at me, Mike, Luke, Katy and I started discussing our similarities. The kids realized that with parents like us, they really have no chance at being even-tempered, focused, manageable, organized individuals. Luke said: "Well, I guess we're all floating in the same toilet."

Cutting Out the Middleman:

So the kids got dressed up for Halloween, but we weren't sure where we were going. We used to go to our old neighborhood where the houses are close together and where they have sidewalks. But this time we thought we'd just go to the neighborhood next door where there are no sidewalks, but the houses are somewhat closer to one another. Well, the kids were met with nothing but unopened doors even at the houses with Halloween decorations. Guess you could say they were giving out tricks instead of treats. "Hey kids, come see our cool scary Halloween decorations . . . Oh, you want candy??? Psych!" So we go to the Baptist church where they are having this little "Fall Festival." At first I was scared (get it, scared?) that the kids' costumes were inappropriate for the Baptists. Katy was a trampy pirate wench and Luke went as her prisoner with a big fake chain and shackles around his neck and wrists. But they weren't frowned on too much, even though they seemed to be surrounded by princesses and football players and angels and cowboys. Whatever, kids. Halloween is for being scary, if you ask me. They didn't seem to have much candy flowing at this festival, but Luke and Katy still had fun with the games and bouncy stuff—until they realized they had no candy. A friend told me that the local grocery store strip center was the place to go to trick-or-treating with the various merchants. So we hop in the car to get some candy there, only to discover we were late. They were wrapping it up at like 7:30. On a Friday night. Are you kidding me? That's a podunk town for you. The kids were none too pleased. So I took them straight into the grocery store and told them to pick out 2 big bags each of any kind of candy they wanted. They were all over that, and everyone went home happy. Next year, maybe we'll skip the costumes, too.

Election Hangover

I'll sign off by saying that I can't wait to see who President Obama puts on his cabinet. Here are my predictions:

Of course his secret gay Muslim husband will come out of the closet and be named Secretary of the Interior because he's a great decorator.

Rosie O'Donnell will be Secretary of Agriculture, for obvious reasons.

Condoleezza Rice will remain Secretary of State, for obvious reasons.

Satan will be assigned the post of Secretary of Energy in hopes that we can harness the flames of hell to solve the energy crisis.

The Ghost of the All-Powerful Saddam Hussein, also known to his nephew Barack as "Uncle Saddy" will be tapped to act as Secretary of Homeland Security. This way, he'll be able to tell the difference between Egyptian or Saudi terrorists and those from Iraq.

The Secretary of Labor will be Sisyphus. (Google it if you must.) By the way, he was a Muslim.

Secretary of Commerce, my sister Kelly -- because she loves to shop. He will include her even though she is neither gay nor Muslim. Sometimes he's fairly tolerant of mainstream hetero Christians.

Health and Human Services -- Dr. Kevorkian, of course. And if he dies (or is already dead) then his spirit will do.

Housing and Urban Development —- maybe one of Barack's old Muslim slumlord buddies he used to shoot heroin with in Chicago back in the day.

The Secretary of Education will be replaced by the Secretary of Misinformation who will make sure all school children get a good dose of the gay leftist liberal Marxist/Socialist agenda. This will of course include required subjects such as Women's Rights, Constitutional Law, Religious Tolerance, and Ebonics.

The Transportation Secretary will be the river Styx ferryboat driver, Charon, who, by the way, is gay.

The Justice Department will be headed by a well-regulated team of sado-masochistic fetishists ready to spank or tickle any malfeasants into submission. Then put them in pink boas on a parade float in San Francisco. That'll teach 'em. A slap on the wrist may be in order as well. And for the really bad guys, they get to spend a weekend at the newly-renovated Trump Club Gitmo locked in a hot tub with Dick Cheney.

Alec Baldwin will act as Secretary of Defense because he can be a real asshole.

The Treasury Secretary will be unnecessary as no one will have any more money. All of it will go to a charity for gay atheist Muslim dope smokers so they can live in a commune and teach that cockamamie theory of evolution. The rest of us will have to rely on the higher power of our choice as we stand in line at vegetarian soup kitchens before going to the government voucher office to reload our Universal Big Brother Health & I.D. card to get authorization and funds to buy a few squares of environmentally-approved single-ply toilet paper to use before we go get treated at the mobile clinic for the ass-reaming we have only begun to endure.

And I get to be Secretary of Veterans Affairs so at least one important part of this messed-up government might finally get fixed.