When my children were small enough to be exchanging valentines in their grade school classes, I started handing out the “penny dreadfuls” to random people. Both my children are now in their mid 30s.

It’s the most fun I have all year, excepting the grandkids on Christmas morning.

I’m doing it again today. I’ve already hit my three favorite coffee spots, the Red Cup, Will’s and Starbucks at Nichols Hills Plaza.

This year, I sent a select few folks an email valentine. This especially for those who live out of town.

It’s a “random act of kindness” kind of event for me. The reaction I get from strangers and friends alike is very positive.

From my perspective, there’s plenty of hate and angst in the world but a deficit of kindness and love. There are far more wonderful people in the world than there are complete jerks and sociopathic criminals, but the latter get all the press.

Too bad.

I strongly urge you to do something really nice for yourself and go out and be nice to someone you don’t even know. Naw, I ain’t solving world hunger or finding a cure for cancer and I know that. It’s just fun.

Maybe you’ll make someone’s day. Maybe you’ll give someone hope. Maybe you’ll have no effect on the world at all other than improve your own mood.

That’s enough to make it worth it.

If you’re a Christian, chalk it up to “love thy neighbor” and feel your closeness to your Creator.

All I really know is that it makes me feel good.

I love you. A whole big bunch of you. Not just the girly girls I flirt with, either.

If you see me today, don’t be shy: demand a heart sticker for your lapel. I’ve got one just for you.

Happy Valentine’s Day.

Jacques Chirac, The French President, is sitting in his office when
his telephone rings.

“Hallo, Mr. Chirac!” a heavily accented voice said. “This is Paddy
Down at the Harp Pub in County Clare, Ireland. I am ringing to inform
you that we are officially declaring war on you!”

“Well, Paddy,” Chirac replied, “This is indeed important news! How
big is your army?”

“Right now,” says Paddy, after a moment’s calculation, “there is
myself, me Cousin Sean, me next door neighbour Seamus, and the
entire darts team from the pub. That makes eight!”

Chirac paused. “I must tell you, Paddy, that I have 100,000 men in my
army waiting to move on my command.”

“Begoora!” says Paddy. “I’ll have to ring you back.”

Sure enough, the next day, Paddy calls again. “Mr. Chirac, the war is
still on. We have managed to get us some infantry equipment!”

“And what equipment would that be Paddy?” Chirac asks.

“Well, we have two combines, a bulldozer, and Murphy’s farm tractor.”

Chirac sighs amused. “I must tell you, Paddy, that I have 6,000 tanks
and 5,000 armored personnel carriers. Also, I have increased my
army to 150,000 since we last spoke.”

“Saints preserve us!” says Paddy. “I’ll have to get back to you.”

Sure enough, Paddy rings again the next day. “Mr. Chirac, the war is
still on! We have managed to get ourselves airborne! We have modified
Jackie McLaughlin’s ultra-light with a couple of shotguns in the
cockpit, and four boys from the Shamrock Bar have joined us as well!”

Chirac was silent for a minute and then cleared his throat. “I must
tell you, Paddy, that I have 100 bombers and 200 fighter planes. My
military bases are surrounded by laser-guided, surface-to-air missile
sites. And since we last spoke, I have increased my army to 200,000!”

“Jesus, Mary, and Joseph!” says Paddy, “I will have to ring you
back.” Sure enough, Paddy calls again the next day. “Top o’ the
mornin’, Mr. Chirac! I am sorry to inform you that we have had to
call off the war.”

“Really? I am sorry to hear that,” says Chirac. “Why the sudden
change of heart?”

“Well,” says Paddy, “we had a long chat over a few pints of Guinness,
and decided there is no fookin’ way we can feed 200,000 prisoners.”

Scooter Libby says he revealed classified materials to reporters on “orders” from superiors, naming Dick Cheney. Lest you be fooled, however, this is not as serious as getting a b.j., so there will be no impeachment.

Speaking of B.J.s, the bartender at Isis by that name was kind last night whilst I chatted with Clint Stone’s sweetie, Shannon. I admitted to a bias against Irish culture but she talked to me anyway. B.J., I’ll catch up with you tonight.

The lovely Juliet of Elastic Cafe fame came by Flip’s last night while I was having dinner and gave me a big drive-by hug on her way to Tulsa. Baby, you’re the best.

The absolute hottest place in town Thursday night was Rococo. It was Shy’s birthday and a bunch of his friends came to jazz jam with him. Bat-Ur sang. A sabra named Art played classical guitar and I swear he was better than Edgar Cruz and he knocked down the whole house and then raised the roof with an encore. Unbelievable! The guy sitting at the bar next to me, a guy named Joshua, said he would no longer call himself a guitarist until he practiced more. This guy, Art, was just that good. He says he’s taking music composition at OCU, but as a performer, he was amazing.

Over on MySpace, Kat with a K says I’m using my pussy to flirt. Like she doesn’t.

Went to Adobe Grill for dinner with the Paseo crowd Wednesday night and it was just great. I think Adobe is the best Latino food in town and that the management is the most in touch with its diners. Personalized service and great food. Hard to beat.

Later, we went to my house for the movie, this week provided by Oz: “Against All Odds” starring a very buff Jeff Bridges, Rachel Ward, Alex Karras, and a special appearance by an ancient Richard Widmark as the villain. The thought occurred to me that Jeff Bridges in “Tron” was the prequel to “Matrix”.

I haven’t been in to work all week. My excuse is that I can’t stand the paint and carpet adhesive fumes, but that’s partly bullsh*t, it’s mostly because I’m a lazy and crazy bastard.

Missed my Mom’s birthday. I always get it mixed up. I’m already dragging around a ton of Mommy guilt, so another few pounds of “missing birthday” guilt is just what I needed. Ah, well. I hate it that I’m human and prone to error, but that’s just the size of it.

Tonight, I’ll be at Son del Barrio at Galileo’s even if it hairlips every whore in Houston. I LIKE this band and I like the audience reactions to it. Every time I see them, it’s a mellow crowd that still buzzes with excitement. I like them in the GSpot venue — big enough for a crowd but not one of those warehouse venues. Easier parking than Bricktown. They have a drink named after me. I know the waitstaff and love them. Put on your woolen leggings and get out in the moderate cold and DO SOMETHING this Friday night other than sit in front of your stereo smoking pot and listening to Led Zep for the zillionth time, will ya?

Freakin’ stoners chap my ass.

I actually blogged yesterday, but it didn’t show up. Musta deleted it somehow. Sorry. One thing that was in the blog entry from yesterday that I’d like to replicate but can’t is my reactions to something I found over on MCarp’s blog, 3:40 a.m. He links to some guy who has a site called something like A Staggering Work of Illumination I’ll Never Read. In some large part, it’s a soap opera prose piece about his love life and I got to reading it and couldn’t stop. It’s good to know that I’m not the only one with a seriously fucked up lovelife. I especially like the part where he cheats on his terrific girlfriend with a fat poet named Dannie who has an affectation in her speaking voice that makes her pronounce “croissant” in a way that drives him mad. Why Why Why? he asks himself. BECAUSE YOU ARE A DAWG, SONNY. WE ALL ARE. It made me laugh.

I tried to comment on mcarp’s blog, 3:40 a.m. (linked at right), and I’m too technologically challenged to do it. He says his blog shut down when I linked. I’m hoping it’s because I have so many readers, it was like a Denial of Service attack when I linked. OK. So, it’s just a theory. I already said I was challenged. I want to be able to uplink images the way he does. I know I’ll never be able to draw in any medium as he does, I just want to be able to post the occasional picture of my grandkids. His latest blog entries are wonkspeak to me. Something about hardware that doesn’t work, I think. He’ll learn soon that if he wants readers, he’s gotta talk about sex. Even if he’s not getting any, he can lie. It’s what I do. Sex sells. When everything is pornographic, there is no obscenity.

I spent two hours last night on MySpace. I was just randomly jumping from one person’s page to another for no damn reason. Reading the inane and cute stuff, checking out the grrrls, listening to music from strange and independent labels. MySpace tends to be dominated by much younger people than me, 20 somethings from all I can tell. Most of the folks my age on MySpace seem to be the mothers and fathers of kids who are already wizards at constructing wild pages. There’s a kind of competitiveness about how many “friends” one can attract. I only have about a dozen friends, but lots of people have hundreds and a few have thousands. It’s a little like the blogosphere. It’s under the radar of the mainstream media and the “adult” worldview. This makes it a keyhole into pop culture that can be jaw dropping and mind numbing at the same time.

My daughter called the other day to tell me she’d bought a pink softball mitt for my grand-daughter, age 3. We talked about when RebL was a little leaguer and I coached her team. Yeah, I know. Hard to believe. Me coaching little girls how to play softball and being a good dad and all. Anyway, she and I shared some times we remembered fondly. I remember most vividly telling a ghost story to all her teammates at the end of the season and how all those girls squealed and ran into RebL’s room and jumped and screamed and then came running back downstairs for another story. She also remembered another year when her coach was a woman with an arrest warrant outstanding and they would get these clandestine messages about where practice would be. I love you, my darling daughter. Thanks for the call.

Sinatra is being such a kitten lately. He got up on my credenza and knocked over every single photo frame. He slept on a black sweater and covered it in white hair. He’s so enthusiastic about his kitty litter that it covers the kitchen half bath floor. He sleeps draped over me. When I pick him up and pet his face, he purrs at jet engine decibels. He’s outside right now making a bluejay scream. Life is good.

I’ve dedicated myself this year to a renewed devotion to AA. Went to a noon meeting yesterday. I’ve been pretty good about it so far this year. It’s good for me. I hear things I need to hear. I have also resolved to become more active in my church. It would help if I attended some Sunday. That would be a good start. I also resolved to write more this year. I started a story about my grandmother and now I’ve stopped writing again. I’ll take it with me today and maybe if I just keep the notebook handy, I’ll remember to write a paragraph or two every now and again. SuzArt called Sunday to say she’d finished a chapter, a hard one, at the last of her latest effort. It’s an inspiration to me. I’m very proud of her. For me, writing is more difficult than public speaking. It’s not as easy as you might think. It requires the one thing I’m weakest at: self discipline. I was thinking about how I’d like to be able to uplink images the way Mcarp does. All I require is a little application of focus and I know I can get that done. Yet, I don’t. Mcarp would call it “mindfulness”. I’m smart and therefore accustomed to having everything come easy to me. Yet, everything does not come easy. Sometimes you have to work for what you want. Waaa. Whine. Whimper. I don’t like that. I want to be handed everything. Life ain’t fair. It’s so much easier to watch a movie or surf through MySpace than to actually create a story. Or practice law. Or sumii. Or do the dishes. I’m oppressed by the expectations of others and most of all by my own expectations of myself. It’s also easier to intellectualize than to accomplish. I want to quit smoking, but I keep postponing and finding excuses. I want everything and nothing in particular. Most of my goals seem to be negatives: stay out of jail and bankruptcy court. In other words, my only goals are to avoid the consequences of my poor behaviors. I have no dreams for the future. I have no mountain I want to climb. We all get precisely what we are willing to settle for. I’ve settled for very little most of the time. Wish I had some big moral to this line of thinking. Some resolution that was emotionally satisfying or intellectually uplifting or spiritually soothing would be nice. Sorry, I don’t. Just tell yourself it doesn’t matter.

Happy Trails

The CIA has now been stripped of most of the senior intelligence officers with a lifetime of experience in the Middle East and with Al Qaeda by Porter Goss, the ideologue crony of Bush who is now the CIA chief. Let me make it simple: Bush is doing to the CIA what he did to FEMA and we will have a CIA equivilant of Katrina someday and the wingnuts will be in charge.

By Barton Gellman and Dafna Linzer
Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, February 7, 2006; Page A06

The CIA’s top counterterrorism officer was relieved of his position yesterday after months of turmoil atop the agency’s clandestine service, according to three knowledgeable officials.

Robert Grenier, who spent most of his career undercover overseas, took charge of the Counterterrorism Center about a year ago after a series of senior jobs at the center of the Bush administration’s national security agenda.

Here’s the link to the entire Washington Post article:

Spy Fired

Here’s the link to:

Fetch me my axe

Just discovered this at 3 a.m. and thought it was a blog worthy of your attention for a moment. This woman made me laugh

What a Super Bowl! The new TV commercials!

Didn’t watch even a single second. Have no idea who won or why or what was on the new ads.

Don’t bother to tell me, I don’t care.

I care a little about the OU-OSU basketball game this week because my Stillwater friends care so much that there will be exchanges of phone calls in the nature of “wait ’til next year”.

At least I’ll be able to catch up on their latest doings.

Played poker Saturday night. I think I won a dollar or two, but not much. Had a pretty darn good time, though, and even if I’d lost, the evening at SuzArt’s house would have been worth it. Chili and homedid, cheese covered cornbread was YUM YUM YUM!!! Kat with a K’s mom dropped by and schmoozed with us and sat in when one or another cardplayer needed to go smoke or pee or something so that the two tables could keep going. She’s not a poker night regular, so it was nice to have her drop by. Tall Ed, DanO — who I have now dubbed “Daddy-O” and I can’t tell you why, Oz, Deb, The Gary, Redheaded Pat and lawyer Doug husband showed up and took lots of our collective coins. Having the group of friends I hang with is such a wonderful blessing in my life. They are good people, smart people, fun people and I can trust them and do.

Saw the lovely Juliet Sunday. She was wearing a blue sweater that just perfectly set off her blue eyes and it was spectacular as the centerpiece of a young and kicky outfit. She was bouncey and happy and a delight.

Speaking of blue eyes, Sinatra continues to be a joy. He’s got a “busy ball”, a small plastic ball with something inside that rattles. He will carry it in his mouth and bat it around and get on his back and juggle it and run away from it and back to it. Kittens. I’m easily amused, OK?

They are STILL painting my offices and it’s hard to stay here and smell the fumes. Especially since the adhesive from the new carpet hasn’t all the way cured in yet and still has it’s own smell underneath the paint fumes. My eyes are burning and I’m going to use that as an excuse to truncate another day at the office and this blogging as well.

Th-th-that’s all folks!!!

diatribe 101

This is Kat with a K’s mom, Rena. Read this. Blog that. Link up and live.

http://threefortyam.blogspot.com/

This is the blogspot for mcarp and I read it and like it and recommend it. Try it, Mikey, you’ll like it.

The GOP idea of reform eludes me. They bounce Tom DeLay, under indictment in Texas for campaign cash shenanigans, and go for a “reform” candidate to replace him. They elect as their new majority leader a guy who handed out checks from big tobacco on the House floor. Huh?

Yesterday, my friend Higgins amused me whilst we were talking the War on Terror. As you know, we’ve spent $300 billion on the Afghan and Iraq wars and Osama bin Laudin and his No. 2 are still making videos taunting Bush and America for our inability to position a drone Predator in a place that can kill them. Higgins shouted: Osama’s a CIA asset! He’s always been a CIA asset. How do you think they produce those videos?!? Lest you think Mike’s lost his mind, Osama was most certainly a CIA asset during the Russian occupation of Afghanistan. Lest you think he’s completely sane, if you follow his thinking then you must believe that the CIA knew of or participated in the 9-11 Twin Towers tragedy. Where you fall on that scale is a litmus test of paranoia. Of course, just because you’re paranoid doesn’t mean they AREN’T out to get you. Hmmmmm.

I went to see Woody Allen’s “Match Point” Thursday night with a new friend, the formerly Goth Cindy. Saw her again last night at Paseo. The movie was good, but somehow didn’t meet my expectations. Very twisty at the end. I can’t tell you what the problem was, but there were times I thought it moved fairly slow. Formerly Goth Cindy gave me another lesson in male-female relationships. She’s talked both nights about her most recent X. When all topics lead to another man, it’s hard for me to get my mojo working. Something tells me: “move along. This is not the droid you’re looking for”. I’m OK with that. Hmmm. Now that I think about it, what other choice do I have?

Last night was gallery opening night, the first Friday of the month. Sorry to say, I didn’t see much that excited me. I wanted to buy a Denice Duong small piece at JRB, but grandma bought it out from under me. I was hoping to score a birthday present for Mom, who has her special day very soon. Oh, well.

Don’t know the band’s name I heard at G Spot late Friday, but the band and the art I looked at last night was parallel. Competent musicians. Technically very good. The young woman had a good voice, kind of sweet. They played a good bit of blues. However, there wasn’t anything blue about the blues as they played it. It was empty of the angst and troubles the blues is all about. Landscapes. Maybe good brush technique. Maybe even wonderfully photorealistic. No heart. No soul. No emotional tug, no intellectual challenge. Flat and empty.

NEWS FLASH: As I write, Sinatra has finally consented to poke his head out of doors. He’s exploring my front courtyard as I write this. He reports many new and interesting things to smell. Small things are moving. There is a tree. Film at 11.

Friday morning, went with The Gary to Norman to the funeral of Leslie’s husband, J.W. I’d met J.W. a few times, but I mostly went for her. Leslie is someone I’ve known literally 40 years. At one time, she was practically a fourth sister. The very first time I laid eyes on her, she was in the 7th grade and doing a poem for speech class, Lord Buckley’s “The Naz”. She did the same poem at the funeral. It’s the perfect piece for the daughter of a jazz musician. I love you, Leslie, and you are in my prayers.

NEWS FLASH: Magnolia trees drop mouse-size and shaped seed pods. They roll when you paw at them. They don’t smell like anything in the house. You can pick them up by the stem, as if the tail of a rodent. It’s fun to fool the human into opening and closing the sliding glass doors. Film at 11

Tonight, I’ll play poker with my buds and Sunday I’ve been invited to a Super Bowl party. It’s nice to have friends and things to do. My life is a pretty good life, all things considered. On the other hand, reality is setting in and blogging must cease while I do my chores: laundry, dishes, make the bed, go to the dry cleaners, hit the grocery store, blahblahblogblah.