Thursday's Thoughts

• Today is 01/20/2017- best inauguration speech ever?
• My Hispanic co workers were gathered around a monitor watching it when I went to the front office. Without missing a beat I said, It was nice to know you. I will miss you guys.
• Today (01/22/2017) I saw maybe the most pertinent question I have ever read in my life, "Who will test Trump first?"
• Spoiler: It will be North Korea.
• The last provocateurs we will be worried about will be Russia and China as the world does not work the way a lot of people think it does.
• This morning I started season 3 of Game Of Thrones. Pretty amazing.
• My razors are lasting weeks now with the new lotion I have for shaving my head. If you decide to be a bald head enthusiast and you razor burn your noggin just slap some hydrocortisone ointment on it. You'll be good.
• A Oreo caramel milkshake from Jack In The Crack may be on the list for lunch.
• A lady that is interested in me is 65 years old. That makes her over twice as old as my last girlfriend. She actually has a child who is 3 years older than the last GF.
• Would you ever in a million years go to a sex club? I am not talking about swapping partners at all- those cards are not even on the table. The two of you go in and hang out and chat with the other freaks and watch them do freaky things and then the two of you go do your own thing together.
• This past weekend (today is 01/23/2017) I did nothing but read and watch movies- and I did not even bother to get out bed to do either. I would get up to take a pee and get a drink of water then I would fall back over in bed. I would awaken worn smooth out from one nap- so I would start another. The pile of books I read or read at was topped only by the stack of garbage movies I consumed. Aside from one giant lunch- I hardly even ate as I did not expend enough energy to justify eating much.
• Good. Weekend.

The Last Email I Received 01/13/2017

"Granny has become unresponsive and her breathing is labored, Mom Says we have a few days at most so if you want to go see her you shops poetically go this weekend. She was moved to the nursing home in Bridgeport that Grandma _________ was in. It's the one on 380 called the Stage coach something. I can get you the exact address if you want to go."

Monday's Missives

• Yesterday (12/19/2016 @2029) while reading Brave Men I noted Ernie Pyle mentioning he toured Pompeii during the invasion of Italy. He said to the effect that it wasn't Vesuvius that buried Pompeii as most people presume but Somma- a now extinct volcano nearby.  I had to check it out. Sorry Ern' everything on my internets says Vesuvius was the culprit.
• My hands look horrific and are in agony from torn cuticles due to the dry weather.
• First world problems...
• When you hear the tired old trivia that Russia sent their cosmonauts up with pencils instead of pens to solve the gravity dilemma just say, That is bull caca- they had pens, grease pencils, markers and pencils- just like US astronauts! as well- it is true. People use that erroneous trivia to make us look ridiculous for spending a million dollars to develop a pen that writes in space and to make Mother Russia look primitive. I hate to say it but yeah- there might even be a bit of racism to that old claim as well.
• My Marsona sound conditioner had not been used in 2-3 weeks so I loaned it to a friend to see if it would help his wife sleep and help her with a tinnitus problem. Predictably, I am having trouble resting tonight without it.
• Humans are weird.
• There are a couple of demanding skills I have nearly perfected and combined with complex processes done at work that I have taught myself to do well.  Consequently- multiple people have gotten it in their heads I am am the only one who can do those things.
• File that under the Good/Bad column if you will please.
• 98% of the time I am totally cool with coming home to an empty house and doing what I want when I want. 2% of the time- sucks.
• Although THE EDGE lost their way a long, loooong time ago it is still a shock to turn over to the new STAR 102.1 and hear Xmas music and ads for their impending change to adult contemporary format.
• The term adult contemporary always makes me pause and I have to consciously shake the feeling it is code for something seedy.
• This past weekend (today is 01/04/2017) Zac and I talked about the attack on Pearl Harbor. He may have been a little impressed at my knowledge of the event but I sensed he was a bit taken aback when I discussed how incredibly bold, brave and smart the Japanese were.

Wedesday's Digressions

• Last night (today is 12/22/2016) I had the crazy dream again where I climb up on top of a building and have to climb down the other side. It is tall enough to mean instant death (on impact of course) in the event of a fall on the down side but where I climbed up it was so easy to climb up it was practically a lark. It is so terrifying I almost always awaken at the time the fall is imminent.
• This morning I saw a Tahoe which was 2 years old advertised for nearly 42 thousand dollars. In another life when I first looked for a house to buy there were plenty of decent enough ones offered for only slightly more.
• The nicest car my dad ever had when I was in the picture cost him 600 dollars and we drove it all over Texas , Oklahoma and Arkansas. It was the only car we ever had with a working AC. I thought we must have become rich. It was 1969 Ford LTD. It had a 390 engine.
• The funkiest car he had was a 30s something model Ford? that had the trunk lid cut out and a small pickup bed placed there. It was done by the Texas Department of Transportation (or whatever it was called back then) to be used as a work vehicle. I had identified it in the past by a picture we had of him with it but I don't remember now the exact make or model. It was- according to an uncle who remembered it from when he was a boy a dark yellow color.
• On second thought- was it an International?
• Recently I saw an ex girlfriend with her husband. It is cool- good for her and good for him. The one thing I took note of was she had grown her hair out- as I had asked her to do back then. It looked great and although she was already fine looking- the long hair makes her look super pretty.
• An odd note about the preceding thought- he drives her old car and she a new SUV.
• Although I have mentioned it before- if cost was no object I could absolutely live in hotels and just travel for the rest of my life. For that matter if I had to work and could still afford to live in a decent one- I could live in a hotel long term.
• Somethings you do not know: Christians are the most persecuted religious group- on the planet. The war in Yemen and the war in Ukraine are every bit as intense and vicious as Syria and Iraq and plenty of people are suffering but most people have not heard of Yemen and when it comes to Ukraine most (I think) believe the war there blew over a while back.
• Recently at work I was acting bummed out so a buddy gave me a plastic articulated snake to cheer me up. Later I went back to make sure she knew it had worked and I felt better and thanked her for the snake and the general effort to make me happy. Several days later she sensed I was down again so she said, Well hey- you could always go to your office and play with your snake for a while- that might cheer you up!
• Sometimes people make my job as an aspiring comedian and overall vile reprobate too easy.

Monday's Missives

• Leftists need to accept they lost. Trump needs to accept he won- and act like it.
• Today is Pearl Harbor day for 2016. In so many ways the war changed my dad (mostly for the better) and by extension; it changed me- I would have been less likely to serve without his example.
• One of the first bits of trivia I remember blowing my mind when I learned it as a boy: Yamamoto attended Harvard for four years and carried a soft spot in his heart for the US until Rex Barber piloting a P38 Lightning built in Burbank California shot him down over Bouganville- Murica! I just read he was impacted by two .50 caliber rounds- one hit him in the jaw and the other his shoulder. That puzzles me- I know I had heard in an interview or read somewhere he was struck once- in the lower back.
• Blogger quit automatically saving a draft copy of my posts after I published them.
• A buddy is so whipped by his girlfriend it is equally hilarious and sad. She dresses him in goofy looking clothes and he has quit doing some of the things he loved and started doing a bunch of crap he hates. When you remark on something that seems like an odd change for him he inevitably starts his reply with, Eh, well my girlfriend...
• I am already looking forward to Scarborough Ren. Faire.
• My truck looks like it belongs to an insane person. Honestly I do not know why I let it get so disgusting but when it finally gets cleaned out ( a task on the list entitled "Soon") it will require an hour or two of work and I bet at least a kitchen size garbage bag. In the past, I have never had to apologize for the appearance of a vehicle but I have done so multiple times over the past couple of months.
• We had dinner at Rio Mambo Monday night. Verdict: expensive and bland. How they made fajitas bland I do not know- but they somehow pulled it off- I mean really; lets give them a slow clap for that... If you are ever in Weatherford America and want fajitas that won't put you in the poor house- drive out Playa Maya. It is actually in Hudson Oaks (and the only good thing there) but yeah- good and reasonably priced.

Something I Pretend I'll Do Before I Die

Eat a handful of Oreo Cookies and caramels just before walking into the dentists office to get my teeth cleaned.

• In the early 1800s grave robbers in Britain and Scotland were called resurrectionists.



• In Britain it was illegal for surgeons to practice on cadavers until 2006. Crazy- absolutely insane.



• Yes, just watched a BBC documentary.



• I don't know which is worse- governments saying due to critical shortages corneas etc were removed without family permission or the absolute tragic waste of people denying the use of same from their dead family members. Instead of coddling every citizen over every irrational fear and superstition I wonder if it wouldn't be better if a spokesperson said,"Look, you're dead at that point- you won't care. People are suffering and dying due to ignorance and superstition..."


• Every member of my family are total body donors- yes especially my children.


• Supposedly there was a case at a teaching hospital near me where a med student was learning surgery techniques and the cadaver they brought out for her class was a long lost uncle who died in a shelter in the same city. Sounds urban legend-ish I know, but I personally know a professor from the same school who will tell you it's true and as part of an ethics exercise the case was addressed in a class I took in college.


• Companies have been busted for illegally selling body parts they were supposed to have cremated. This has caused people to start wringing their hands in absolute and  abject holy horror. That is fine- well and good, want to end practice of same? Flood the market with essentially 100% body donation of appropriate candidates.


• The Catholic Church banned autopsies and human dissection of any kind for hundreds of years calling it an abomination and desecration etc.  which is odd, since from front to back the Bible teaches the body is a shell and nothing more for the soul. They should have championed the use of corpses and taught the frailty of life and where the soul goes after death etc. Odd, very odd and it would be impossible to overstate how much this strange viewpoint has damaged mankind and how far back it set medicine and other sciences.

Getting Arrested Before Midnight On A

Saturday night is no way to go through life son- to say nothing of wearing ridiculous looking baggy pants down below your butt and your cap backwards.

Monday's Missives

• 1 ex wife, 2 business associates and at least 3 girlfriends- as of this writing the breakdown of people who have seen the Random Thoughts Girls on Barry's blog and thought they busted me watching pron.
• Good grief.
• I am looking (somewhat halfhearted) for another job.
• A homeless  patient I saw this morning is an interesting guy. He reported (and I tend to believe)he was a medical student at Galveston in the days of his youth but he had a series of transient ischemic attacks and was unable to complete his studies. I know they all have a story- I have seen supposed lawyers with poop smeared in their hair and have met homeless secret government agents by the score but I tend to believe him.
• The other day (today is 12/14/2016) I gave a homeless person a bunch of good winter clothing- for the second winter in a row. Interestingly, part of the gesture involved brand new still in the wrappers long Johns that my ex mother in law gave me 15 (at least) years ago. There are multiple object lessons in that part of the story.
• General homeless persons categories: Campers- they sleep in tents or ad hoc shelters for extended periods. Street people: They sleep where they pass out- literally on the street, vacant lot or maybe occasionally an abandoned building. Shelter people: They live uh, in a shelter for homeless persons.
• If you are in the market for a good used truck I will have one available after December 28 as I intend to win a new Infinity Q30 from the Normathon benefiting Austin Street Center.
• I have it all figured out don't I? Here I am just sitting here rocking back and forth wanting all that new car...

Sing It Marge

"The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people's money."

—Margaret Thatcher