Pardon Me

I was arrested with 1.4 million dollars worth of cocaine in my briefcase but I am innocent. Who am I?















My name is John Forte and thanks to Carly Simon, Orrin Hatch (yes, the guy from Utah), and my good buddy Dubya, I have been pardoned for my crime.

The question is, how can someone that insists they are not guilty accept a pardon for a crime they say they did not commit?

Who's Helping Who?

Most financial advisers in this country provide a single line of advice to consumers, avoid credit card debt. If you are in hock to the credit industry, get out as soon as you can and if you aren't, good for you and stay that way.

There is also a general agreement that the average household is holding somewhere around $8,500 in credit card debt. If it is true and with the advice that we should avoid that type of debt, one has to question the goal of the bailout packages that have been handed out to Citigroup and the like.

Does it really make sense to provide more money to lenders so that they in turn will help the American consumer go deeper in debt? After all, part of the reason we are in the mess we are in was because home buyers were encouraged to go into debt for more than they afford and the plan is to increase the debt load by getting banks to loan more money?

It makes more sense to take the bailout money and help the average household eliminate their debt, be in mortgage or credit card or what ever. If we are going to act in a socialist manner, let's at least help the person struggling to put food on the table or keep their car instead of the person that can't decide whether to fly to St. Moritz for Thanksgiving or take their yacht down to Key West.

Our president elect seems to think that trickle down economics is not the path we should be on, yet that is precisely the avenue we are taking.

Bucket Blues

What Old People Do

I don't think of myself as one of the old people group, hell I'm only 61. To me the old guys are the ones that sit around the food court at the mall and talk about what the good ole days were like or all of their aches and pains. Or maybe its those that never leave their Senior Citizens apartment complex unless it involves a trip to the Doctor (or by ambulance to their final destination).

But yesterday, during a conversation with one of the guys I share a golf cart with I found myself talking like an old guy. He told me that he was going to have an endoscopy. The doctors call it a minimally invasive medical procedure. If you have ever had one you either an old guy or someone with a problem and you would know that it goes a little beyond minimal.

In any event, I found myself giving my golfing buddy advice. Not medical advice but economic advice since we both have the same health plan. You see he has not yet met his deductible this year since he is relatively healthy. After spending almost $5K in medical insurance premiums it takes another $2,750 each year to meed the individual deductible under our plan.

So, as the end of the year is near I told him the ought to think about having the procedure right after the first of the year. That way he might come close to meeting his deductible next year and would then limit his out of pocket expense if God forbid something else happened (like at trip to the emergency room after trying to slice your thumb off, which he did this year. He was trying to save the Koi in his pond after he lost power but that is another story.)

The minute my advice came out of my mouth I told him now I'm talking like one of the old farts in the Villages in Florida. Then I thought of the elderly lady at the pharmacy the other day that asked me if that was an earring in my ear. After her daughter said, "oh mom, what's wrong with you" the woman said well maybe he is just young at heart.

Evidently she thought I looked old that day.

Friday with Freddie

Talkin Turkey- Thursday Bonus

I must warn you that this video is somewhat disgusting but it says a great deal about the former VP candidate. While it is sickening I also found it to be quite funny that she could be so oblivious to her surroundings.

T is for Tamales

The word, maverick, was used so much in the past year or longer that I became nauseated every time I heard it. However, NanaK and I do consider ourselves just that when it comes to traditional eats during the holidays.

While most of you have what I am sure is a lovely turkey dinner, or ham, or prime rib for Thanksgiving and/or Christmas, we have always moved in a different direction.

Perhaps it comes from my roots. We always had Christmas Eve with my fathers family and we never had turkey. We did have potato sausage and lutefisk (for those of you not familiar with this it, is a whitefish soaked in water for a number of days and prepared with caustic soda or lye. The name literally means "lye fish"). I don't recall ever enjoying a bite of lutefisk but I did like the potato sausage and the orange rye bread that came from the local Swedish bakery.

So, in the non-traditional way of my paternal family, we switched from turkey/ham/beef for Christmas to gumbo (yea gumbo), and this year, for the first time we return to our maverick roots and will prepare a traditional holiday feast of tamales (you might guess that one of our favorite foods just happens to be from the Hispanic side of the food spectrum).

When we were young ins there were two Hispanic families in our neighborhood that always fed us well (they were very nice to us poor little gringos). Perhaps that is why we have a predilection toward Mexican dishes but there was also a famous Chinese cook in our neighborhood that provided many sumptuous dishes. That makes it a difficult choice for me to say one is a favorite over another.

While I prepare many different types of Chinese dishes, they just don't seem right for the holidays. So, we will prepare tamales and chili for for Thanksgiving dinner and gumbo for Christmas dinner. For New Years, we will honor our Southern roots and will have Black-eyed peas and Hoe Cakes.

P.S. - when I did the spell on this post, it did not like Lutefisk, well neither does NanaK or myself.

Wordless Wednesday

There is a gay and socialist facisim in this country according to Newt Gingrich! He leaves me speechless which is why I called this wordless Wednesday.

Toon for Tuesday

Freddie Football's Top 10

New Technology

I usually don't blog about TV shows but I am going to make an exception today. Yesterday I watched an episode of Boston Legal online. Since they switched it to Monday nights I don't have a chance to watch it then and since it is available online I catch up when I can, but I digress.

This particular episode was about an old love of Alan (James Spader) whose husband was arrested for the murder of his nurse (and lover). But that is not the reason I choose to write about this show.

It is really about the miracle of modern medicine, research and diagnosis in particular and how technology has evolved in the medical field.

The story really goes back an episode when it is revealed that Denny Crane (William Shatner) has a problem with blood flow that causes limpus erectus. After a visit to the doctor, he comes away with a monitor attached to his tool so he can make note of the frequency and time of stimulation and it comes with your choice of ringtone.

Back to Alan's ex....while they are discussing the case you here the sound of a rooster crowing, once, then twice. It is then that Denny explains to Alan that he has the monitor implant but he will switch it to vibrate to eliminate the interruptions.

When they finally get to court (the judge is a very attractive lady), the trial is constantly interrupted by a loud humming noise.

The episode was titled True Love but I think it should have been a State of Arousal.

Happy Anniversay

Shattered Dreams

We live in a very quiet, safe neighborhood or at least it was that way until sometime last night or very early this morning.


Every Sunday I get up and go out to get the Sunday paper. We don't get one any other day of the week so we kind of look forward to going through it. I read the sports, the editorials and the national and international news sections. Oh, I forgot the comics.


Normally I will go through the garage, out the side door and through our gate. We seldom use our front door. This morning, for some reason I went out the front door to pick the paper up and when I headed back to our house I noticed something different. There was something about one of our windows that did not look right.




















Then I realized what it was, someone had taken a shot at our house and there was a good sized hole in the glass and the window was cracked up and left and down and right. I looked around a little to see if there were any signs that any other houses had been defiled and did not see any.

When I went inside the first thing I did was to call the police. An officer showed up within about 10 minutes, looked at the glass, asked if there was any other damage, said it looked like it came from a pellet gun, took my name, phone number and SSN, gave me an incident number and left. He also commented on the 20 or so turkeys strolling through our cul-de-sac. They were everywhere, on lawns and walking down the middle of the street....he had to swerve around them when he entered the neighborhood and it is one of the things we really love about living here.


Nana Kaos wanted some pictures of the turkeys so she grabbed her camera but they were all gone, guess they are afraid of the police. Anyway before she went back in she saw the projectile that attacked our window.

















As you can see, it was a pretty good sized pellet. We were lucky it did not penetrate the window completely and come through into the house. If it had it would probably have hit our china cabinet causing damage that would have enraged me well beyond the pissed off feeling I already had.

Since our house is on the market I had to call our real estate agent to let her know that until we can get the window replaced it would be best if we did not show the house. I would not want to have to explain how such a wonderful neighborhood has to contend with random shootings.


All we can hope is that it was some kid out fucking around and that we were not targeted for some reason.

Postscript to Cheers & Jeers

Jeers - To the portion of the population in California that has suffered under constant discrimination for as long as they can remember....shame on you for your overwhelming support of proposition 8.

Jeers - to the designer of the dress worn by Michelle Obama on election night. The red patches on the black dress was one of the worst designs I have ever seen.

When Autumn Leaves

Winter has finally arrived in the midlands. No, we did not get any snow (that four letter word we love to hate) like they did north of us but the temperature has dropped to a bone chilling level, especially with the wind (gusts up to 40 mph).

While we are not quite ready for it to be here, we will have to deal with it. I have not yet cleaned up the yard of leaves since they have not all left their home in the trees. I refuse to do the cleanup more than once and I don't like to do even then.

We have also not yet stored the last vestiges of our summer patio furniture, it may get to its winter home under the deck this weekend (note to anyone that buys our home this winter, it will still be there when we leave). The last of our summer greenery was removed from their beds yesterday and I did prime and start the snowblower today.

Speaking of snowblowers, a friend of mine discussing the subject of moving away from here once said he did not really know where they would move when they did but they would just start driving with the snowblower on top of his vehicle until someone asked him what that thing was and he would stay there. Not really a bad idea if you really hate the snow.

Election Day - Cheers & Jeers

Jeers - to the voters of Arizona (and not just for McCain)

By a margin of 12% the voters of Arizona vote to recognize a union between one man and one woman as a valid or recognized marriage. The 18-29 age group voted against the measure by a margin of 4%.

Jeers - to the voters in Arkansas.

By a margin of 14%, the populace of Arkansas voted to not recognize the gay population as contributing citizens of this country by denying them the right to become foster parents or to adopt a child. The only group to vote against this measure was the 18-29 age group but not by a wide margin (10%).

Jeers - to Californiacators

The trend setters voted to ban gay marriage by a margin of only 4%. The 18-29 crowd voted against the ban by 22% but the old fogies voted for it by the same margin. The middle crowd, 30 - 64 carried the day. The voters of Florida also deserve a jeer for the same reason.

Cheers - to the voters of Colorado

They turned down a measure that would have amended the state constitution to define the term "person" to include "any human being from the moment of fertilization." The measure would essentially have had the effect of banning abortion.

Cheers - to Iowa voters

Iowa voters decided to change the language of the State Constitution to describe people not entitled to legally vote by removing the phrase "idiot or insane person" and adding a "person adjudged mentally incompetent to vote."

Cheers - to Michigan voters

The proud people in Michigan voted to allow for the use of medical marijuana and to allow stem cell research.

Cheers to Washington voters.

The fine people of Washington voted to allow for medical mercy when individuals are not predicted to live longer than 6 months (I don't like the term assisted suicide).

Wordless Wednesday - Hope not Fear

Election Day