Journey to Nowhere

Photo credit: o0o0xmods0o0o from morguefile.com

I’ve spent the first forty three years of my life avoiding regular exercise like a germ freak avoids gas station bathrooms but this goddamn cancer fatigue is going to force me to try it. I don’t know if it’s the Tamoxifen or a leftover effect from the radiation or what but everything I’ve read says exercise is the best thing you can do for it. I’ve never set foot in a gym and the thought of driving someplace to sweat in front of a crowd of people just doesn’t appeal to me so I crossed that option off my list first.

I did briefly consider the yoga center at the end of my street because I could walk there, but even as a child I was stiff as a board so I wasn’t sure stretching was the right thing for me either. Then I read that you do yoga barefoot and because of my foot cramps I haven’t been able to go without socks and shoes in months so that was out too. The one exercise I do engage in occasionally is walking but the temperature in Tucson is well above 100 degrees for a good part of the year and that didn’t really seem compatible with my hot flashes, so I finally decided to break down and buy a treadmill. I can use it in the privacy of my own home and watch TV while I’m doing it.

Plus, it will help me get in shape for my next Adventure Bus trip http://www.adventurebus.com/ap_home/index.asp. A lot of people assume because I’m thin and go on a hiking vacation every year that I’m actually into physical fitness. Nothing could be further from the truth. I’m not as bad as my ex who used to say that if you couldn’t pull a car up to it, it wasn’t worth seeing, but I don’t really want to feel the burn either. That’s the great thing about Adventure Bus, everybody goes at their own pace so you can hike as much or as little as you want. I do enjoy getting out in the wilderness but for me it’s not about how many miles I go, it’s what I get to see along the way. I keep trying to picture myself looking like the woman above but I'm afraid it’s going to be more like a Dog Whisperer episode where Cesar has to drag the bitch to the treadmill kicking and screaming the whole way.

The Dark Side of the Sixties

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As a budding young liberal it seemed like I’d missed out on the best era in America. Since I wasn’t born until August of 1966, about the only memories I had of the sixties were being pissed off at Kelly Lowe for blowing out the candles on my 3rd birthday cake and being terrified of the paperboy because the lady across the street told me he smoked marijuana and might go crazy one day and attack me. My parents were staunch Nixon supporters so they were no help either. When I was in college I remember being shocked to see a poster of John Lennon with 1940-1980 on the bottom. John Lennon and my dad were the same age?!? I couldn’t even imagine it. Instead of being one of those Woodstock babies, I only missed being born at the Grand Ole Opry by a couple of weeks.

Living without any rules or boundaries sounded great to me as a kid, but that’s only because I was lucky enough to have them. Mackenzie Phillips is just the latest in a long line of children from the sixties who struggled as an adult because she didn’t. Like John Phillips, Robert Downey Jr’s dad thought it was fine to treat his young son as an equal and let him take part in drug and alcohol use. And it’s only in the last few years that he’s finally managed to heal from the damage that did. Sadly, River Phoenix lost his struggle to come to terms with his past. In the interviews I’ve seen, he seems to downplay the effect that losing his virginity in the Children of God cult at age four had on him, but you can’t tell me that the pain that caused didn’t at least play a part in his overdose.

Mackenzie Phillips seems to be starting to come to terms with what happened to her but in one aspect I agree with her stepmother, Michelle Phillips. If she thinks any part of that relationship was consensual, she does belong on a psychiatrist’s couch. I understand Michelle Phillips’ disgust because who would want to admit, even to themselves, that they had a relationship with someone who could commit incest. But blaming the victim doesn’t help. I know some people think she’s only saying these things to sell her book but if that was so, why would she have told her youngest sister, Bijou, about it years ago?

It’s kind of ironic that the same week we found out all these disturbing revelations about one of the most beloved singer/songwriters of the sixties, one of the most reviled figures of the era died as well. I'm in no way excusing Susan Atkins' crimes but good God, the woman had one leg and was dying of brain cancer, how much of a threat to society could she really have been by that point? Why are we so vengeful that we can't even show a little mercy to a killer who wasn't much more than a kid herself when it happened and had been brainwashed by a maniacal cult leader? I remember watching Helter Skelter in elementary school and being terrified at the ending when they said they would be eligible for parole in 1979. Now it just seems sad that 30 years later, we still can't let it go.

The Khadafi-Palin Cabal

A new study from Public Policy Polling finds that 42 percent of Republicans believe that President Obama was not born in the United States, while 22 percent still remain uncertain of his birthplace origin. On the flip side, the poll also finds that 25 percent of Democrats believe that George W. Bush intentionally allowed the September 11th attacks to occur to serve as a catalyst for a war in the Middle East.Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/09/24/birther-poll-42-percent-o_n_298456.html

When I saw these statistics on Huffingtonpost I thought, has the world gone insane?!? I used to think it was funny to listen people spout off their crazy conspiracy theories but after I lost my brother to late onset paranoid schizophrenia, I haven’t been laughing. There is not a shred of evidence supporting either one of these slanderous accusations and if you lend any credence to them whatsoever then you might as well accept my brother’s theory that I’m a government clone out to get him.

But that being said, I noticed a lot of strange coincidences when I was watching the Rachel Maddow show last night. Sarah Palin and Moamar Khadifi both made long-winded, rambling speeches that audience members walked out on in disgust. They’re also both from oil-rich regions and they bad-mouthed America. When you add in the numerology piece, it’s obvious that they’re after nothing less than the overthrow of the U.S. government.

Sure, Khadifi kept calling Obama his son but that was only a ruse to actually turn us against him and towards the radical right. And Palin still harping on the death panels? That’s because it’s really a part of the hidden Republican agenda. Only the unborn will be sacred in the Palin/Khadafi regime. And did you notice that Palin was making her first speech since her resignation in Asia? China will be turning us into slaves until December 21, 2012 when during the Apocalypse Kirk Cameron will come down and lift us up into heaven. Unfortunately, I won't be here to see it. Clones are scheduled to be exterminated in 2011.

We Don't Need No Education

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After reading the following article http://www.kentucky.com/latest_news/story/946537.html
about a Kentucky teacher who showed the film “Fitna” to his class on 9/11, I think I’m now officially old. Back in the eighties when I was in high school, a teacher got fired for letting her students watch Pink Floyd’s “The Wall”, which is basically a 90 minute music video for stoners, on a non-instructional day. http://www.pinkfloyd-co.com/band/interviews/art-rev/art-wallcase.html. In 2009 a teacher is able to show a gruesome, hate-filled 15 minute piece of propaganda and get a slap on the wrist.

I watched “Fitna” on YouTube and it’s kind of like “Faces of Death” with a xenophobic message tacked on the end. It actually says that just like we defeated Nazism and Communism, we have to defeat Islam. But Islam is one of the world’s major religions and the other two are failed political parties. Making people hate an entire religion sounds a lot like holocaust talk to me. Yes, by all means, work on defeating the radical Islamic terrorists but don’t lump every Muslim in the world in with that bunch. Most Christians don’t want to be associated with the hate of people like abortion doctor murderers or Reverend Phelps and his God Hates Fags campaign, so why would they want to judge Islam by its most radical faction?

The teacher said in his defense that he wanted to generate a discussion about the dangers of extremism but since the complaining student said the film made her hate Muslims, I don’t think he mentioned the extremism of the makers of “Fitna”. Along with the hate, she also got nightmares from seeing a beheading, an execution, bombings, blood, dead bodies and worst of all, discussing female genital mutilation with her high school teacher. When I was in junior high, the rumor was that an office girl at T.K. Stone middle school in E-Town got suspended for playing "We Don't Need No Education" over the intercom system. Ah, those were the good old days.

Pottersville

It won’t be long until families will be gathering together in front of the TV to watch the Christmas classic “It’s a Wonderful Life”. The irony is that most of them won’t realize that by the anti-Obama, tea bagger logic that a lot of hard-core Christian conservatives subscribe to, George Bailey is a dirty commie bastard. What could be more socialistic than using the Bailey Building & Loan Association not to maximize profits and support the free market but to share the wealth with the whole community? Pottersville would be the real utopia for these people, not Bedford Falls.

I watched the documentary “Which Way Home” on HBO a few weeks ago and it struck me how misinformed these illegal immigrant children are about the realities of America today. Kevin, a 14 year old Honduran boy wanted nothing more than to be adopted by some caring couple in the United States. Yeah, dream on kid, you obviously haven’t watched Lou Dobbs lately. We’d rather try you as an adult and throw you in prison than invite you into our homes. That’s the compassionate side of America today, a country that locks up more of its own citizens than any other place in the world.

To me, Crystal Lee Sutton, the real life “Norma Rae”, who died last week is the most representative of George Bailey ethics. She spent her whole life fighting for the working poor against powerful corporate interests but unlike “It’s a Wonderful Life“, her story didn’t have a happy ending. After her insurance company refused to pay for possibly life-saving medications, she ended up dying of brain cancer. In America today an angel doesn’t get his wings every time a bell rings, an insurance executive gets his bonus instead.

I'm Shocked!

When Republicans first started going after ACORN because of false voter registrations, I considered it pretty much a non-issue. Okay, so some employees padded their voter registration counts to make a little extra money. It’s not like Elvis Presley actually showed up to vote. The current charges are a lot more serious and I was somewhat skeptical of ACORN’s claims that the videos were deceptive and dubbed over until I viewed the clip above. Fox News said the clips were vetted editorially before they were aired but how much vetting could they be doing when they didn’t even take the time to verify that someone died?

Now I’m wondering if all the ACORN employees in these videos just thought they were being “Punk’d.” I mean, I’ll admit, I’m not the most street savvy person in the world but even I would have a hard time believing that some kid in a Huggy Bear outfit who looks like he just finished up his Mormon mission was actually coming in to ask about running an underage prostitution ring to finance a future political race. There may really be something to this story but somebody besides Fox News needs to do the investigation.

I’m all for finding out the real facts in this case just like I think someone should’ve dug up the real facts on the George W. Bush National Guard story. CBS was willing to back off the whole thing and throw Dan Rather under the bus because of one badly forged document and that‘s one thing I‘ll give Fox credit for. You can bet your ass they’ll keep beating this story like a dead horse and they damn sure won’t be giving Glenn Beck the boot.

Don't Drink the Kool-Aid

People were up in arms about Obama telling their kids to work hard and stay in school but I haven’t heard a peep about this case in Kentucky where a football coach took about 20 players to a revival at his church and almost half were baptized. The woman who’s suing thought her son was going to see a motivational speaker and get a free steak dinner. My guess is that if the coach had been a Muslim and almost half the players joined his mosque, things would’ve gotten ugly pretty fast.

The school superintendent (a fellow church member) tried to play it off by saying it was a voluntary activity but one of the students commented that the coach said it would bring the team together. To me, that sounds like if you’re a team player, you’ll hop on the bus and get right with God. And almost half of them did. The article doesn’t say how many of the others had already been baptized, but I’m thinking it was quite a few.

I know from my own experience growing up Southern Baptist that the pressure to walk the aisle starts early. My friend Jo was the first to get dunked in 2nd grade and everybody seemed to go like dominos after that. At 9 years of age I found myself being the only one in my Sunday School class who hadn’t accepted the Lord Jesus Christ as my personal savior. It was an old-time, hellfire and brimstone preacher who was filling in that finally got me to walk to the front of that church. I wasn’t sure whether I believed in God or not but I didn’t want to burn in the pits of hell either.

And even without the scare tactics, a revival is very alluring. The whole purpose is to get as many people as you can to either dedicate or rededicate their lives to Christ. People are singing and crying and laughing and hugging and the pressure to conform and become a part of the group becomes enormous. Well, for most people it's appealing. To me it's just terrifying. I couldn't think of a worse way to try and lure an introvert into your church. But these were team players who wanted to please their coach. And he took advantage of that.

I think it's time for these arrogant assholes to realize that we live in a democracy not a theocracy. Just in my small circle of acquaintances, I know Agnostics and Atheists and Buddhists and Jews and Catholics. And I think they would be horrified if a public school teacher took their children to be baptized in a different faith. The one thing that people like this coach can't seem to understand is that freedom of religion also includes freedom from religion as well.

Tea and Stupidity

I might be able to take the people playing dress-up on the White House lawn a little more seriously if they had started protesting when Bush began running up the deficit in his first term. For eight years they cheered on a president who subsidized the rich and bogged us down in not one, but two astronomically expensive wars that he never had any sort of exit strategy for or any idea of what a “victory” in these conflicts would actually mean.

From what I can tell, the protestor’s message is, sure we’re all for racking up massive debts to kill and torture people but by god, we’re not spending our hard earned money on some pansy-ass bullshit like saving people’s lives. It would almost be funny if it weren’t so pathetic. The really ironic thing about these hard core Republican supporters is that they claim fiscal responsibility is their goal but the last president to run a surplus was a Democrat. I realize that the tea parties started because of the banking bailout but that was originally Bush’s idea. Obama just continued the policies of his predecessor and somehow he got labeled a fascist, socialist, Nazi-lover because of it.

I’ve been trying to avoid the elephant in the room but I’m having a hard time not coming to the conclusion that these are a bunch of racist imbeciles. From the ludicrous birther claims to the Obama’s a Muslim rants, they seem to be grasping for any nonsensical lie they can come up with to avoid having to admit that their democratically elected president is a black man. It seems appropriate that it was a congressman from South Carolina, the first state to secede from the union, who couldn’t bring himself to give our first black president even a modicum of respect during a speech he was giving about one of the biggest problems our country faces today. I’m just surprised he didn’t add the pejorative “boy” after his shockingly rude outburst.

South Carolina-Nobody Can Beat Their Cocks

Kentucky may be number one in people missing teeth but when it comes to whack job politicians, South Carolina can’t be beat. I watched Obama’s speech on healthcare tonight and I have to admit, he’s won me back into the fold. He framed it as a moral issue and even though he was open to Republican suggestions he made it clear that flat out lies would not be tolerated. And when he pointed out that illegal immigrants would not be covered in the health care reform bill Joe Wilson, a congressman from South Carolina, actually screamed “You lie!” during a joint session of Congress like a petulant 14 year old boy.

Once again I just have to say, what the fuck?!? I grew up in the South and they beat it into you to have respect for authority and sorry, but whether you voted for him or not, Obama’s your president so learn to show a little respect. It might be different if Wilson had a point but it’s in black and white. There is a line in the bill that says illegal immigrants are not covered. But at least he’s not a hypocrite. Unlike Senator Vitter and Governor Sanford.

Both were holier-than-thou Christians who were more than ready to condemn other politicians for sexual indiscretions but totally changed their tunes when it was them being asked to resign. Senator Vitter was calling up a prostitution service in Washington and Governor Sanford, well we all know how pathetic he was. First he was on the Appalachian Trail and next thing you know he's in Argentina with the love of his life. And both of their wives stood by them. That's what's painful to watch. These women humiliate themselves in front of millions of people and get nothing in return.

I've got an old postcard framed on my wall containing a poem that ends with the line, and politics the damnedest-in Kentucky. That may've been true in 1909 but in 2009 the real nuts have fallen a little farther south. Nobody can beat those gamecocks!
　

Kentucky Heroin

I quit smoking over 5 months ago and I gotta admit it, I am jonesing. I would smack your granny for a pack of Marlboro Lights right now. But I just keep having to tell myself that if I take that first puff then I'll be right back to my pack and a half a day, $60 a carton cigarette habit. And I know I would. Cause I first tried tobacco when I was 3 years old and I've loved it ever since.

One of my earliest memories is of sitting on my Great Uncle Henry's lap on his front porch taking puffs of his cigarette when my parents weren't watching. Then there's the one I shared with 2 or 3 other girls underneath the bleachers at the high school football game when I was 7. By 5th grade I was meeting my friend, Sheila, every day after school so we could walk down the railroad tracks and smoke.

I found out I had cancer on St Patrick's Day and I quit smoking 3 days later. I don't think anything else could've gotten me to do that. As I remember hearing Mary Tyler Moore say once, I enjoyed every cigarette I ever smoked. It's the perfect drug. If you're feeling tired, you can smoke to perk you up. If you're feeling antsy, you can use it to calm you down. And if you're a smart, shy, short kid who sucks at sports, it's an easy way to be popular. It doesn't take any particular talent to smoke a cigarette.

As I'm typing this I'm sucking the nicotine out of a piece of gum that I was supposed to stop chewing months ago. But the truth is, I don't know if I'm ever going to be able to give up my methadone gum. I'm having a hard time picturing that day when I won't want to smoke. I just keep trying to remember that they radiated my lung as well as my boob and I don't want to end up being one of those people smoking a cigarette through a hole in my throat and dragging my oxygen tank behind me.

Battered Party Syndrome

Photo credit: blondieb38 from morguefile.com

I have to admit that I'm a somewhat reluctant Democrat. In order to vote in certain elections in Kentucky you had to be a Democrat or Republican so I switched from Independent. When Barack Obama was elected I held out a somewhat naive hope that Democrats would finally return to what are supposed to be the core beliefs of their party instead of kowtowing to every hot-headed Republican who could scream their lies loud enough. But it's looking like I was sadly mistaken.

Why, when Democrats have majorities in the House and Senate and control the White House, is Obama so insistent about reaching across the aisle and compromising with the Republicans? They don't want to compromise, they want to win. Nothing would make them happier than to shove you down and rub your face in the dirt. But I think I know what the answer is, Democrats are suffering from Battered Party Syndrome.

The last president to successfully fight for liberal values was Lyndon Johnson and ever since Jimmy Carter the Republicans have mostly succeeded in making liberal a dirty word. After years of abuse, Democrats just cave in and go back to cowering in the corner every time a Republican screams some asinine comment in their face. It's looking like Obama's trying to emulate Bill Clinton and actually identify with his abusers. Clinton gave us NAFTA, deregulation of the banking industry and the welfare reform act. With friends like that who needs enemies?

The real problem is that both parties are now controlled by huge corporations who don't care about anything but profits. I'm afraid we're headed back to start of the twentieth century when coal mining companies would refuse to send mules into the most dangerous parts of the mine because they could always replace a man but mules cost money. Compassion is what Obama needs to be stressing in the healthcare debate but after I found about the bargains he's made with drug companies, I figured we were fucked.

He's already starting to crawdaddy on the public option just like he did with end of life counseling. The bill we're probably going to end up with is going to be so watered down and wishy-washy that it's not going to do a goddamned thing for people who need it most. Just like closing Guantanamo Bay, Obama's going to give lip service to it but when it comes to real action, he's nowhere to be found. What he should say next Wednesday is that your bank account shouldn't determine if you live or die and an insurance company shouldn't be able to decide that since you didn't report an infected hangnail in 1975 they aren't going to pay for your heart attack. But since cutting into the profits of the insurance and pharmaceutical industries would also cut into the Democrat's campaign contributions, I think we all know what the outcome's going to be.

Hermit Weekend

Photo credit: jdurham from morguefile.com
Why is it considered freakish if you enjoy your own company?A couple of people at work asked me what I was doing for Labor Day and when I said nothing they gave me that pitying look that drives me insane. I've been looking forward to my hermit weekend all week long. The bra came off about 30 seconds after I walked in the door this afternoon and I probably won't put it back on until about 7 am Tuesday morning. I plan on sleeping late, fixing big breakfasts, doing some reading, writing, maybe watch a little TV. Sounds like heaven to me. And I need it after having company last weekend and visitors every night this week.

Go Meat!

When I was a kid there were still a few family farms left in Kentucky. I mean the kind like my grandparents had where the only cash you got all year was from your tobacco crop and maybe selling a few beef cows. They raised and slaughtered all their meat and got their fruits and vegetables from the garden and the orchard. About the only things they had to spend money on were things like sugar and coffee and maybe a few pairs of overalls and some fabric for sewing dresses.

People still farm there today but unless you have a large scale operation, you're probably going to need a day job. I always had that kind of hippie, romanticized notion of this style of farming but I think that's mainly because I grew up in a subdivision. We always had a garden and canned our own vegetables but that's nothing compared to the work that goes into a real farm. The whole natural, friend of the land fantasy I had was brought crashing down to earth by some of my mom's stories. Evidently chemicals were their friends in the forties and fifties. My grandmother would put a tablecloth over the leftovers from the midday meal, get everybody out of the house and then set off insecticide bombs to get rid of the flies.

They definitely didn't pass the organically grown test but they were more humane to their animals than today's factory farms. Hell, my grandfather's chickens were so free range they just ran around the yard. When I was about 3 years old my mom told me to stay away from the rooster because he would spur me but she neglected to explain the difference between a rooster and a hen so I just ran from all of them. All the men sitting out on the porch during family get togethers used to get a big laugh out of watching me running around and around the house with a flock of chickens trailing behind.

Not that I'm saying they treated their livestock particularly well. I remember seeing my grandfather knock a cow out cold with a tobacco stick and my mom's story about how the little baby lamb that she bottle fed later ended up being served on a plate could send chills down your spine. And don't even get her started about the lap dog she had as a kid. My mom left to go spend a week with my uncle in Louisville and while she was gone there was something killing the neighbor's chickens so my grandfather shot it, just in case it was the problem.

There is a point to all this and as my ex used to say, it's time for me to stop drifting and land the plane. The thing is, if I were a person who actually lived true to my beliefs I would be an organic-eating vegetarian. Unfortunately, I love meat. And I mean LOVE it. I could give a shit less about bread or sweets. Meat, cheese and potatoes are the crack cocaine for me. When I first moved to Tucson I tried going to Whole Foods and getting organic produce and free range, hormone free meat but I'm also a cheap ass so that didn't last too long. Since then, I've reverted to my hot dog strategy. I don't even want to know where my food comes from.

Heil Obama

http://www.docstoc.com/docs/10582301/President-Obama’s-Address-to-Students-Across-America-September-8-2009

I want you to read the above link and see if you think it has anything to do with indoctrination and Nazis. From what I can tell it provides an outline for kids to learn more about the office of President and the so called "indoctrination" is a message to work hard and get a good education. What's so subversive about that?

One of my high school classmates stated on Facebook that they're going to keep their kids out of school on that day so Obama can't "indoctrinate" them. The next comment was that it reminded them of the Nazis. What the fuck?!? Presidents have always talked to school children. Hell, Bush had to finish reading The Pet Goat before he could deal with 9/11. I was definitely not a Bush fan but I had enough respect for the office of the President not to call him a Nazi. I didn't agree with most of his policies but he wasn't a monster.

I grew up around Christian flag-wavers and I was taught to respect the President but I guess that only applies when he agrees with their point of view. When we had a mock election in 1976 I was only one of two kids who voted for Ford because everyone else's parents were Democrat. I was also one of only two children who voted for Harriet Tubman in the Weekly Reader poll of historical figures in a hypothetical race for the presidency. George Washington actually won hands down over Abraham Lincoln which was surprising since I grew up in Lincoln's birthplace. Even a hundred years after his presidency he was still a little too radical for Hodgenville.

The point is that even though it's 33 years later, I still remember voting in those elections. Obama is providing a golden opportunity for students to get excited about our government and learn more about the electoral process. Why in the hell would you want to deprive your kid of the opportunity to participate?