Former speaker of the house Newt Gingrich admits to James Dobson in a show to be broadcast today that, yes, he was having an extramarital affair during the time he was prosecuting the Clinton impeachment.  Read the Associated Press story here.

OK.  Newt is an ethically challenged American.  He married his high school Geometry teacher and had an affair and divorced her for a woman 20 years younger, who he told he was going to divorce while she was in hospital recovering from cancer surgery.  He chased out Jim Wright, Demo speaker, for a book deal ethics rap and then went under as speaker on just about the exact same ethics charges.

I’m not surprised Newt was having an affair.  I’m not even surprised he was doing so during the Clinton impeachment.  I always thought between Henry Hyde’s 40 year old “youthful indescretion” and the natural inclination of politicians to wanderlust that the whole GOP tut-tut attitude toward Clinton and Monica was strictly show for the faithful. 

No, what makes me want to puke is Newt’s insistence that he isn’t a hypocrite.

A certain synergy erupted on my blogs today.  There seems a cosmic connection between John X’s MindTurds here and Nina’s Flibbertigibbet here.

Nina is all about raunch vs. lovemaking while on her way to the Rick Springfield concert in her 80s vintage Tee Shirt.  John X is agog with a new techno product.  In my mind, they merge.

As John X says:  “why didn’t I invent THIS“?

Unintended humor?  The price on this product is $69.00.

No kidding.

The product tester said she liked using hip hop with its strong beat best, but I’m thinking 1812 Overture and Beethoven’s 5th would be good substitutes. 

Meanwhile, I’m in LUV with ChillyMamma (who blogs here), a frequent Flibbertigibbet contributor.  She’s funny, smart and lives in Colorado and that’s all I really know, but VA-VA-VOOM, her writing goes to my head.

so, I’ve got this pet peeve and I’ve got to get it off my chest.

There is a difference, dear ones, between an “excuse” and an “explanation”.

You’re sitting in a bar, waiting and waiting and waiting and the person you were supposed to meet 45 minutes ago comes breezing in all apologetic.  I’m sorry, they say, but I was in a business meeting and it was very important and I got caught in traffic.

This is an explanation.  It is not an excuse.  I may understand your explanation, but I don’t have to be sympathetic, I don’t have to like it and I don’t have to excuse it.  It was the late person’s problem.  They stacked meetings too close together and didn’t take life into account.  Traffic is ALWAYS a bitch.  Meetings ALWAYS drone on.  That’s why I understand.  I have no sympathy, however.  Essentially, you’ve just told me that I’m playing second fiddle to whoever and whatever you had going on before me.  Now you want my pardon and understanding and sympathy?  Fuck that.

Now, if you come in and tell me that on your way to meet me that a big hunk of blue ice fell from a plane up above and crashed through your windshield, now THAT’s an excuse!  It means that something happened that you couldn’t avoid and couldn’t plan for.  Act of God and unavoidable delay.  You’d best have a hole in your window and a smelly wet spot in the front seat, just to make it look good, but if that happens, I sympathize and excuse your tardiness.

In the first example, though, you could have said “sorry. gotta leave.  have another appointment.  hold that thought and we’ll talk again tomorrow.”  It might be inconvenient and uncomfortable and even awkward.  Nevertheless, you can do it and people do just that all the time. 

How about this one?  Excuse or explanation?

“I missed work because my boyfriend dumped me and I spent the night crying and sharing a few bottles of wine with my girlfriends and just couldn’t get out of bed this morning after I slept through the alarm.”

Well, if you’d come to work on time but in a very rotten mood, your boyfriend’s unexpected dumping would be an EXCUSE.  You, however, controlled your response to that and you could have had wine with your girlfriends another night and just prayed and read the Bible last night instead of getting drunk, so your reason for missing work this morning is only an EXPLANATION and I don’t have to like it and you are fired.

This does not just apply to suiting up and showing up when and where you promise you’ll be.  It also applies to money.

“I know I promised to pay the rent on the first of the month and that it’s the 10th and I still haven’t paid, but I had to pay the electric bill or they were going to cut off the lights.” 

Explanation and not excuse.  You are evicted.  Yeah, I understand we get blindsided by the electric bill in the summertime especially and that you can’t live a decent life without lights.  However, your explanation means the landlord must find another way to pay HIS light bill.  I’m not sympathetic.  It’s no excuse.  Next time, do better planning and saving.  Let this be a lesson.  Explanations are not a good substitute for performance of promises.

I think a large number of people say to themselves (in a mostly inarticulate way): “you know, if everything works out the way I’ve planned and everyone does exactly what I expect them to do and I have a very tiny bit of luck, then I really can keep this promise.”

WRONG!

Murphy’s law.  Everything will not go as you plan.  Everyone will not do exactly as you want them to do.  Your luck will routinely fail.  When you then explain to me that your plans were upset and people flaked out on you and you had a bit of bad luck, hellfire and damnation, I understand.  Things don’t go right for me, either.  People don’t always do what I want them to do.  I’ve certainly had my share of bad luck.  I really really really understand, I do.  But, it’s no excuse.  It’s just bad planning.  Shut up, take the consequences and next time say to yourself:  “if everything goes awry, can I still keep this promise?”  If the answer is “No!”, then don’t make the promise.

When you make a promise and don’t keep it, it’s dishonest and insulting.  Your explanation is a pretty wrapping for your dishonesty and it hides the insult, but it’s still dishonest and disrespectful.

An excuse is actually pretty rare.  It means that something happened over which you could exercise no control and could not plan for the circumstance.  It doesn’t just mean that events took YOU by surprise.  If you’re oblivious and stupid and don’t plan ahead, every single day is a freakin’ surprise.  No, you don’t get rewarded for stupidity.  One suspects the dumped girlfriend who couldn’t make it to work might also be just a little bit on the oblivious side.  Few of us get dumped without any warning.  I gave her the benefit of the doubt on that one.  the rest of her explanation, as before, is just blah blah blah.

“I forgot”.  Understandable explanation.  We all have brain farts and forget.  Now, off with your head and next time write yourself a note.

This brings me to the second part of this pet peeve.

No matter how lame the explanation, the giver of explanations is absolutely positively guaranteed to whine about consequences.  What do you mean I’m fired for missing work?  I told you my boyfriend dumped me!  It’s not FAIR!!!  What do you mean I’m evicted?  I told you they were going to cut off the lights!  It’s not FAIR!!!  Why are you pissed about me being 45 minutes late?  I told you I was in a meeting!  It’s not FAIR!!!

Shut the fuck up.

having to take the consequences of failing to perform on your promises is nothing but fair.  You just don’t like it.  You are not supposed to like it.  It’s supposed to be a negative consequence.  The person you promised to work for, pay rent to or meet for a drink has already paid a negative consequence because they relied on your promise.  Now, they must be even better planners to adjust to your failure to keep your word.  What in hell makes you think it’s not fair for YOU to take the consequence of your failure and for the person who took you at your word to have to pay the consequence when they did NOTHING WHATSOEVER wrong.  They kept their promise and should pay the consequence and you didn’t keep your promise and should get a free ride?  THAT’S your idea of fair?

Shut the fuck up.

Each of us make many promises every single day.  Everytime you buy something with a credit card, you’ve made a promise to repay.  Every workday is a promise that you will benefit the company and their promise to pay you a given wage or salary.  Marriages are promises.  We are only able to function as a culture, society and civilization because people take and make and KEEP promises.  In America, we have a zillion unspoken promises:  that we will talk things out or go to court and not just shoot first and ask questions later, for example.  This mutual promise of each of us to refrain from resorting to violence as a way of resolving disputes is one of the pillars of civilization itself.  It’s why we so heavily punish violent behavior as a crime in almost every culture and nation and society in history.  Do not kill other people was the rule long before Moses.

How about if the boss comes in one Friday and says:  “well, folks, I know it’s payday but the old ball and chain and I had a helluva fight last week and I hauled off and went to Vegas and lost all your wages and withholding at the craps table.  I know you will understand how domestic rows can upset things.  That is all.  Back to work.  Maybe next week the dice will roll more 8s the hard way. bye.  so sorry.”

You want to quit and/or shoot him?  Why?  You understand the explanation, don’t you?  Haven’t you ever had a fight with your significant other and then done something stupid?  Quit?  Not FAIR!!! 

I’ll leave it to someone else to talk about the other side of this same coin, also a pet peeve of mine:  people who won’t freakin’ take a stand and commit to anything or, even worse, who give you a “weasely” reassurance in the place of a promise.  (“I can’t exactly promise to pay you back on tuesday, but real soon, you bet, real real soon.”  “I’ll be as monogamous as the next guy as long as the next guy is don Juan.  Ho ho ho. pretty good, eh?  Let’s not talk about this tonight, honey, okay?” )

At random: Ann Coulter now slightly leads Condi Rice for the title: “The Cunt”.

Recently, the woman who The Gary and I speak of as The C*nt, Ann Coulter, smeared former U.S. Sen. John Edwards with the word “faggot” at the CPAC conservative political activist meeting.  A storm of response from both Dems and even Repugs brought her to the defense: “c’mon, it was just a joke.”  Conservative columnist and gay Republican writer for Atlantic Magazine Andrew Sullivan responds here.

Over the past six years, Sullivan has gone from Republican shill to a man who opposed Bush in ’04 and supported Kerry over the issue of wild government spending, from a proponent of the Iraq invasion to an anti-war activist, and from a gay man who made excuses for the religious right of the GOP to one who can no longer abide the hypocricy in that party.

He treats Coulter seriously, which I cannot.  As a result, he has a reasoned response when all I have is epithets and more name calling.  He’s a grown up and I’m not. 

So, read Andrew since all I have to say to Ann Coulter is:  “cunt!”

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I indulged myself last week and bought a crock pot.  I haven’t had one for some time.

So, I went to the store and bought some meat and put it in the new crock pot with two potatoes, a slew of them li’l carrots and a medium sized red onion.   Slathered some Woo-chester-shire sauce and some cajun seasons over the top and let ‘er rip.

Nuthin’ fancy.

Well, I’m as proud of this baby as if I’d invented sliced bread.  YUM.

Trouble is, I’m eating alone.

I hate that.

I grew up with a family and had a family of my own and eating has always been a communal ritual as much as nourishment for the body for me. 

A meal alone, well, it just doesn’t measure up to the crackle of conversation around a table.

Myself, I toasted up some sourdough bread and let that meat fall all over it and mashed up the taters and poured the simmmerin’ sauce over the taters and had about a tablespoon of the little carrots kinda off to themselves so the juices don’t mix any more than they already have for six or so hours.

Made me think of my children having to endure my plain cooking for the years I was a stay at home dad.  It’s funny to think of the times I fried potatoes with onions for teenagers in those years.  I miss those times.  I was in law school.  Life was pretty good.

I can make marinara sauce not out of a bottle and boil that pasta al dente.

Since it’s just me, though, I don’t feel like going to all the trouble of cleaning up after myself and after cutting up the credit cards, I can’t afford to go out to eat as much as I once did.  Lately, I’ve eaten a lot of meals standing over the kitchen sink.  Too many of those “meals” consisted of something on a saltine cracker.

Some of you know that every once in a while, I’ll haul off and make beans and ham with cornbread, spring onions and sweet ice tea.  Yeah, bay-bee.

which brings me back to the crock pot.  I figure this way, I can have a decent meal for a couple of days and not have to be a stay at home schmuck. 

And, that’s all to the good.

But, I miss having someone to share it with.

I also make a pretty good second chef in a kitchen when a big meal is being prepared because I like to chop vegetables and such and can put together a helluva elaborate “farmer’s” salad.  I also don’t mind being the one who tidies up as we cook and go along so that there’s always open counter space.  I even like going to search in the pantry for the spices and will, if suitably enticed, stir.

I’m not all that fond of things that must be stirred while heated, especially if opaque.  They scare me.  I’ve never really been able to force myself to burn the flour to make a good rue.

Once upon a time, I did a lot of hamburger cooking, but it seems I don’t do that at all anymore.  Wonder why that is?

Maybe this summer I’ll make everyone come over to my mom’s pool and I’ll cook burgers from dusk to dawn.  Eh. Maybe not.

Tonight, as I finish my amazing home made meal at my lonely table, jazz is on the music box in the living room and Sinatra is quiet, having been treated by a time outside since it was such a fine day.

It’s my sister’s birthday!  Happy birthday, left coast sister!

I took off today since it was so pretty.  Drove out to Hefner and stood on the North edge of the dam.  Took the top down on the Mid Life Chrysler.  Listened to Van Morrison.

I hate these full moons!

Man, I’m missing you tonight.  I’m not so much lonely while alone tonight as I am nostalgic for you.  I wish you were here.

I miss the way your lips caressed mine, the way it felt when you nuzzled my chest and tucked your shoulder under my arm.  I yearn for the way your breath feels on my neck.

I’m not trying to do it, but I keep thinking about the way you hold your knife and fork and eat while talking to me animatedly.  I can “hear” you cackling with laughter and rattling on with raucous commentary as we drive along in the Miata, top down despite the fact it’s too hot or cold to be strictly comfortable.

As the radio plays or the CDs unstack, I can feel the heat of your belly mixing with the heat of mine through our clothes as we sway to an indeterminate but slow beat.  We and we alone scuff along the dance floor — at least until the song is over and our eyes open to the world around us.

Damn, I miss you.

I miss sleeping with you.  I mean literally sleeping with you.  Holding you in my arms for the warmth of you.  Waking up smelling you on the pillow and sheets. 

I miss your furrowed reading brow and the dance of cooking in the kitchen.

I yearn for you.

I would listen to all the world’s hateful words three times over without hurt for just another evening of ease with you, when the silence could sometimes be as comforting as the words.

You’re whispering in my ear now.  something about taking myself so seriously.  Ahhh.  Your voice.  The feel of your breath and the smell of it.  God, the smell of it.  How it changed “coppery” at the most heated times.

Oh, how I loved your pout and your triumphs and glories!  How I miss your pride and your thin skin!

Across a room filled with party-goers, with my back turned and engaged in another conversation, I would recognize your sotto voce and giggle.  Ah, but that memory pains me.  I loved the way you swam in my waters so effortlessly, born to it. 

Yet, every moment that passes increases the gulf between us just as I’m trying to hold you so very closely in my memory.

You fucking broke my heart, you bitch

I’ve got my laptop back!  It’s all revved up with a new battery that frees me from the power cord and I’ve jumped from 256Mg of memory to a gig. 

I have this theory that processor speed and memory are to this age what horsepower and fins were to men in the 50s.  Geeks endlessly compare operating systems and hardware.  In the end, though, it’s all a sex thing.  The teen boys of my youth thought that fast and stylized cars would get them the hot babes just like geeks think better computers will get them more porn downloads when offline.  Both wrong, but both with comforting thoughts for the incessantly masturbatory.

I’m Freudian about a lot of things, though.  I have a very elaborate theory that Republican politics is all about repressed sex.  Welfare becomes an issue about black women having babies; abortion is about young girls having sex; gun control is about the phallic symbolism of gun barrels; and so forth. 

Materialism, the root of MCARP’s diatribe about malls over on 3:40 a.m., is about getting laid.  I’ve even been known to quip — ruefully — that $30 million will make me much more handsome.  Goofballs get the idea that women are drawn to financially successful men.  ( Where would they get that idea?  Cootie-covered girls, of course. )  How else to better show one’s evolutionary success than by ostentatious display of wealth?  Big car, flashy clothes, big house, blah blah and bagatele.  Yet, when it comes to the relationships that women SAY they really want, how good is it to be married to a guy who’s married to his job so that he can keep generating the goods?  If, by “success”, what we mean is an evolved male who can share his emotions, then the financial pinnacle seems the least likely place to look.  How, though, can a man show he is an evolved human without some display of some kind of material goods?  Do I show I’m all warm and cuddly by wearing  hemp vests?  Are my environmental concerns adequate if I have a $3 bumper sticker on my $30,000 Volvo (“vulva” sounding name for a substitute penis)?

So, I want all the hot internet babes to know I’ve got a convertible, a nice house, a few bagateles, that I’m all about therapy and couples counseling and, by the way, I’ve got a hot laptop with a gig of RAM and a new battery so I can go wireless at the Red Cup where I hang out with all the other evolved people who are concerned about the environment and buy “fair trade” coffee and all that.

Took in my laptop for some maintenance, a new battery and some upgraded memory and won’t have it available at home for a few days.  Thus, won’t be posting and commenting.  Maybe this can be combined with the Webmaster’s changes???  Fastpipe???  Ultimate???

Anyway, I’ll be reading you from the office machine, but that’s about it for awhile.

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Just going to dash off a few words before I go to the showers to try and get this slimed green off me.

Now that Gore’s got the Oscar and a Nobel Peace nomination, can the presidential ambitions be far behind?

Just when I thought I was going to be overwhelmed by the sheer diversity of it all, I barely saved myself from a solo and a cappello version of kumbawyah when I noted — Oh My God, Ms. Etheridge, you sure did let that caboose go the last few million calories, didn’t you?

You can call me names til the cows come home, but I think that Beyonce girl is FINE!!!

Diane Keaton sure looks better than Jack Nicholson.

Who died and honorary Oscar.  Who cares and pass the hooka.

I’ll never forgive those assholes for ripping off Spike Jones, Denzil Washington and Malcom X. 

I just thought that it was only guys who could be real goofballs.

wrong again.

The national Delta Zeta sorority went to DePauw University and kicked out every girl who was overweight and well, you just have to read about it in the New York Times here.

I like the way the local sorority girls called their slim, blonde, white sisters from Indiana Univ. “plastic”.

Next thing you know, goofballs will get cooties.

what’s this younger generation coming to?  the world is just going to hell in a handbasket, I tell you.  why, in my day …

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