I haven’t blogged since Sept. 21st?

Seems like just yesterday.

I’m not doing much of a good job with my personal journal, either.  I’ve routinely cataloged my every motion every day for years, but lately not so much.

Can’t explain it.

Even looking back at this blog, I’ve written about nothing but politics for several posts in a row.  Nothing personal at all.

(Political aside:  My prediction is that Brad Henry will beat Istook handily, that the GOP will retain control of the U.S. Senate 52-48 and the U.S. House 221- 214.  If you want to know why, ask me some time.)

Reading MCARP’s blog and talking to him, I’m concerned without freaking out about his health and pray he gets back on track without great troubles.

Suzart has made me very happy by accepting a new position at the OU Health Sciences Center that will provide her with more money and great benefits, chiefly health insurance.

So, what have I been up to lately?  You might well ask.  Or not.

Last night, I was again at the door as a volunteer for OVAC’s annual 12X12 show.  This year it was held at the old DPS building at 410 N. Walnut.  It was hot and it was crowded and the art was fairly strong.  I bid on a 3 dimensional piece, a copper covered clay bust, but I haven’t received a call that my minimum bid was accepted, so I don’t guess I got it.  I liked several pieces very much, including Oz’s horse, Michael’s smokey oil field, Brandenburg’s polkadot sillouette, Medina’s …  I liked my friends’ work, I guess.

Saw a lot of friends and acquaintences at the 12X12, but didn’t witness any dramas.  The Stringents were the only music act I caught and I liked the four girls on strings VERY much.

Last Wednesday, I had my first paid modeling gig.  It was for the Christmas catalog for SouthWest Publishing, the people who put out the magazines “Nichols Hills”, “Historic Homes” and “Downtown”.  Me and some very beautiful young women wore furs in a Heritage Hills home made up like Christmas and toasted each other at a lovely table set at Nonna’s in Bricktown at 8 a.m.  The most fun for me was being told by the SW people that they wanted me because I looked to them like Ralph Lauren.

Mostly, I’ve been working.  Sept. was a turnaround month for me and I made pretty good money after several months of being lazy and getting into big debt problems.  Now, I’ve paid off all the medical bills I rolled up in June plus a few others and have a small amount of money in the bank and I’ve billed more hours in the past 30 days than in the previous several months. 

However, the big turnaround in September wasn’t as visible as a checkbook register.  The big turnaround was between my ears.  Work that would set off a frenzy of procrastination in the past has been fun — for some unknown inexplicable reason, I’ve embraced the work and enjoyed the hell out of it.  Go figure.  I can’t explain it, I’m just going with it.  I can’t say this is related, but I took in a new client Friday and will meet a new client Monday morning.  I need the work and they need my help. Capitalism works, if not always fairly.

I’ve taken on a sponsee in AA and I take him to meetings at 8 p.m. every Tuesday and Thursday night at the Western Club.  I haven’t sponsored anyone in a couple of years and it was about time I took on that duty to pass along my sobriety.  It’s been gratifying to be asked and it helps me stay sober to watch him get sober.

My friend John X is involved in a project he’s calling OKC Noir.  He makes 30 second “films” in black and white of various people and little sound bites of their conversation covers the images.  Go to his website and catch a few — Sonic Sharon and Mara are good ones.  He’s asked me to help recruit folks for the project and if you would be willing to spend 45 minutes to an hour with a helluva guy and get to be UTUBE famous, please contact me or him.  It’s for art’s sake.

I’m sending out invoices this weekend, so it’s back to work.  As my fellow attorney, John Mc. at Starbucks, put it:  “Just two more working days until Monday.”  Ah, well. 

Peace out.

A couple days ago, I wrote that I thought the stage was being set for another scandal about voting irregularities.

I learned today the Diebold election machines can be opened with the round mini-bar keys you can steal from any motel/hotel.

You have been taken into custody by unknown ruffians, blindfolded and drugged and whisked away.  You believe you have been transported by airplane a long distance, but your memory is failing you right now.

Your memory fails at present because you’ve been stripped, doused repeatedly with water and kept standing in a 50-degree (F) room where the lights are always on and there are no windows, only bars on the door.

It is impossible to know when you last slept because it is unclear when the drugs wore off.

There is constant shouting at you and there are wails heard from elsewhere in the building where you are kept.  If you tire or slump, batons straighten you.

You are roughed into a room where you are blindfolded and strapped to a 12 inch wide board.  A plastic bag is put over your head and water is poured into the bag as your feet are elevated.

You are alone and completely isolated.  There are no questions you may ask — THEY ask the questions.

This is what the present administration believes is Constitutional and is arguing for in Congress.

Now, picture something altogether different.

Picture two pairs of lips greeting in sweet kiss.  More than a peck but less than the full throated, wet tonguing of the throes of passion.

The kind of kiss you can kiss in front of your mother and 13 year old cousin, but still convey deep affection.

The kiss at the end of a marriage vow, before the happy couple parade together back down the aisle.

Imagine the lips belong to two women or two men becoming married.

This is a travesty and the present administration is adamantly and rabid opposed to such behavior and so argues in Congress.

Why, do tell, do we call these men and women Christians?

What is there about these two things that get such different reactions from the committed religious right?

How do we explain the fact that Jerry Fallwell and Pat Robertson and James Dodson and all the rest are not waving the New Testament at our Born-Again president and demand that he treat our prisoners better than Pontius Pilate treated Jesus?

Upon what theological underpinning does a Christian stand when he/she condones torture?  Of any kind on any one at any time?

I don’t think Jesus said that one must break a few eggs to make an omlette.  Or that the ends justify the means. 

Have we truly become the beast we oppose?

About a month ago, the news out of Afghanistan was that the U.N. estimated that opium crops were 75% larger than last year and that opium production would reach records this harvest season.

Today, the Thai military executed a coup d’etat while the prime minister was in New York at the U.N.

Are these two news stories connected?

Beuller?

Beuller?

Anyone?

OK.  Three hints:  1.  Ancient trade route from Afghanistan through south China into Burma, Thailand.  2.  Myanmar (formerly Burma), under narco trafficking military government.  3. Lawless drug warlord territory in Burma and northern Thailand called “The Golden Triangle” since at least the late 18th Century when the British successfully addicted Chinese to opium in order to get trade advantages in silk and tea.

Yeah, i know it’s been a long time since I blogged.

ya know, I just haven’t been very sociable or talkative lately in my real life, either.

I just noticed today that my journal, which I’ve kept rather religiously for many years now, no matter what was going on, had not been touched since Sept. 7.  I had a little bit of a hard time journaling because just not that much has gone on to journal about.

Oh, that’s not so honest, now that I think about it.  I’ve worked and gone to Wednesday Paseo and seen Juliet when she’s not staying in Tulsa or working on a “shoot”.  About the same as always, just not so much on my mind.  I’ve picked up a sponsee in AA for the first time in a rather long while and I’ve been taking him from his rehab. center to Tuesday and Thursday night meetings.  I’ve also taken down my MySpace page and the world didn’t even notice the ripple of that disaster going under.

However, mostly, i’ve focused on coming home for lunch and dinner and not eating out so much and doing other money-saving things and since I’m also focused on making money, I go to bed about 11 p.m. and get up before 7 a.m. and actually go to work and bill hours, but one effect of that is to keep me out of places like Rococo on Monday and Thursday nights to hear the live jazz.  I miss some of that, but I like how thick the stack of billing slips is getting this month.

I watched the Oregon-OU game this afternoon and it was a heartbreaker for Bob Stoop’s team to watch that field goal go through with only 40 seconds to go and there were a couple of undeniably bad calls.  Nevertheless, a really good team does not have three penalties in a row on first and goal from the two.  OU is not a really good team.  OU will also lose to Texas and maybe even more.  Too bad and oh well.  Not every year is a championship season.

I still get the feeling that most people are not putting two and two together about the gasoline prices.  A 1/3 drop in a matter of a couple of weeks after polling shows $3/gal gas is killing Bush’s approval rating.  Now, with $2.25 gas, his approval rating is going up and so are the chances that the GOP will retain control of both houses of Congress.  Nothing political about Shell, Exxon and BP, though.  NOOOOOOO.  Not so much.

I made beans and cornbread again this week and it’s still f’n good eats.  I spent $175 at the grocery this week, stocking up on a bunchacrap that will keep and get used up like deoderant and contact solution and that expensive stuff you buy at the grocery but don’t eat. 

I brought work home this weekend because I’m really jammed up on one case and as yet have not touched the file, much less opened it and worked on it.  I just don’t seem to be able to learn that trick.  However, I’ve been productive around the house, doing laundry, taking out the trash, doing the dishes, and — hold onto your undies — SWEEPING THE KITCHEN FLOOR!  Stop the damn presses, it’s a five star bulletin.

I hope this gentle weather is breaking OG&E, the lowlife scourge of working people.  The economics aside, I hate monopolies and can’t wait for every one of us to buy wind and solar power crap for residential use.  I wonder how efficiently a propane powered electric generator would work as an alternative?  If I can produce moving electrons cheaper than OG&E, I would do that so fast it would make heads spin, even if it meant a big metal cylinder in my back yard.

So, anyway, these days I’m reading other people’s blogs and enjoying them just like you guys. 

John X has been particularly interesting and I absolutely love his new, grainy, black and white noir series. 

MCARP has been rightfully nominated for an Okie Blog award and you should vote for him as often as you’re allowed. 

My daughter has started blogging on MySpace, now that I’m off, I guess, and she’s as funny as my sister and I know a lot of you read Mary’s funny stuff (she and I are one on politics this week).

If  you haven’t ready Erika West’s Karmic Ironies lately, she recently lost a beloved cat and mourns it lyrically on her blog this week.

Mike H, studied non-blogger that he is, provided this week’s Paseo Wednesday movie, “Winter Passing” with Oklahoma’s own Ed Harris and Saturday Night Live’s Will Ferrell.

I was bushed Friday afternoon and after an hour or so on the Paseo sidewalk, parted company with my Lido-bound buddies and went home and stayed there.  I’ve needed the rest, apparently, since I slept until 1 p.m. this afternoon, about 12 or more hours.

Love you guys and I’ll do my best not to go off the charts for so long again without some kind of warning — like, I’ll be gone Dec.2 for a long weekend to see my neice get married, that kind of thing.

oh! almost forgot!  Mary Beth Haas is a grandmother!

There’s nothing for it if you live in Oklahoma. 

 Football comes in fall.

There was a game today between OU and Washington and OSU played rinkydink tonight.

The Big Game was, of course, Texas and Ohio State, Nos. 1 & 2, blahblahblah.

It used to ruin my week when OU lost at football.

Texas and Nebraska and OSU, well, those were times that were not to be interrupted with the vagaries of real life like children and wives and whatnot.

What a bunch of crap!

One of the themes of my life since at least the early 80s is that I’m no longer going to be a spectator in this life.  It’s participate or die.

I couldn’t any longer live with the voyeurism of journalism.

I wanted in Teddy Roosevelt’s ring.

Watch football on TV?

Well, I might go to the odd game, but not watch on TV.  If I go to a game, I want it to be fun and not serious.  I don’t look for tickets to the OU-Texas game.  It’s an ordeal to go to Dallas, it’s an ordeal to go to an OU home game.  It used to be fun to go to OSU home games because you could walk right in and get a good seat with no muss and no fuss.  Now, it’s also a nightmare and the fans are SO f’n serious.

I can’t do that.

I liked going to the Heritage Hall football games when I was teaching there.  I would go to a football game in a small town because it’s about socializing and it’s fun and you can watch and enjoy yourself.  If you’ve got your ego on the line, forget it.

I would go see a baseball game at Bricktown Stadium and I haven’t watched baseball on TV in decades.  Baseball is great to go see.  There’s time to talk and look around and have a little something to eat and most stadiums are comfortable enough that a summer’s evening in a crowd and a little Bricktown nightlife afterwards is fun as can be.

I don’t much care for just sitting at home listening to CDs.  I don’t get to see giant acts, but I’d rather go to VZDs or GSpot and hear no one special and be part of being out on the town than hear great music on a great stereo.

I’d rather take the risk of having 100s of crazy friends (and I have 100s of such acquaintences) than the security of sitting in front of TV at home.

I don’t want to look out the window at a blue sky, I want to drive under it with the top down on the car.

I’d rather meet a mobster or a whore with a heart of gold than read about one.

I’m afraid a lot.  Most of the time, actually.  But that’s because I venture between my ears and not because I go outside the confines of my homestead.

I’ve said also that I am not good at love.  I’m not.  Sometimes, it has hurt like hell.  Nevertheless, I’d rather love and lose than watch “When Harry Met Sally” on DVD by myself.

I’m willing to risk my heart, my trust and my friendship despite the fact that the world does not always reward that risk — it’s what makes it risky.

No question that there are times when following this path that I’ve made an utter ass of myself.  I’ve certainly fallen flat in every way possible at one time or another.  I don’t care.  Yes, that’s right. I don’t care.  I prefer that I not embarrass myself, but I get more reward than punishment.  It’s a net good thing for me to be out there.

I meet great people and I generally have a good time.

I turn few people down because almost everyone has something to teach me or delight me.  I find beauty in the most unlikely places and in the most unlikely people.

Enough of that.  It’s time for me to go back into my cave and hide from y’all for about another 24 hours.  Later!  Buh-Bye!

Labor Day is the time honored and traditional start of the modern election campaign.  The primaries and runoffs are over and the issues are pretty much set.  It’s two months, 60 days to the election and people are finished with summer vacation and ready to pay attention.

So, let’s look at the state of the race and make some predictions.

All the pundits are all about whether there will be a sea change from the GOP to the Dems because, historically, presidents in their second terms lose badly at this stage of the game.

And, indeed, despite gerrymandering and incumbency and all the other advantages a party has when they control all the levers of power, there are about 40 races that will be competitive in the House and about 6-8 in the Senate.  That’s actually a tiny number.  In 1994, when the GOP grabbed power from the Dems, there were over 100 competitive races in the House.  That’s what all the Tom Delay redistricting fight in Texas was all about:  changing the rules of the game while they held the power to “fix” this election by reducing the number of competitive seats.

At present, Dems could nationally win 60-65% of the vote and pick up no more than 8 seats.

This is because in Blue States the vote might be overwhelming, but not distributed in a way that will change the outcome in some of the “purple” 40 districts.

So, if the election were held today, the so-called non-partisan pollsters say the Dems will pick up about 20 house seats and 4-5 Senators (not enough to change power in the upper chamber).

That will not be the outcome in November.

We are on the cusp of the most vituperous and negative campaign ever in history when regarded nationwide.

For the next two months, GOP candidates in Indiana, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Virginia, Michigan, Montana and elsewhere will blatently call Democrats villainous traitors ready to appease terrorists.  They have the money to make that charge stick for a large number of relatively uninformed and independent voters.

Because the president himself will not be on the ballot, the turnout, the people who actually vote, will be smaller than in 2004 (or 2008 for that matter).  Thus, the relatively small number of far right evangelical “moral issue” voters will have a greater effect than if everyone voted.

Because the turnout will be smaller, the GOP’s advantage in grassroots turnout capacity generally will have a bigger effect than in a larger turnout race.

Most of us will not see the scare tactics and lies that will be put in the mailboxes and email slots and on talk radio to get the “faithful” to the polls come November.  They will shake the Hillary boogieman at them along with the Osama 9/11 lie that ties Iraq to our national tragedy.

Whether we like it or not, it will work with millions of voters.

Don’t kid yourself about some other “advantages” held by the GOP.  One of the biggest that comes to mind is as close as the next intersection.  You must have noticed that gasoline prices have backed off the $3.00/gal heights and gone down to $2.40/gal, the price I paid at the local 7-11 yesterday.  DO YOU REALLY THINK THIS IS A COINCIDENCE?  Voter anger with Bush and the GOP fueled by high gasoline prices?  Well, what would Halliburton and Exxon do for their buddies in the White House?  Billions are at stake.  These corporations are not about right/wrong or even politics, they are about money — the very loong green.  I don’t even think it’s a conspiracy.  I don’t think anyone had to say a word.  Those guys are smart enough not to have to be told what to do.  They are “innocently” acting in their own long term self interest.  end of story.

So, here’s how I think it will go:

In the Senate, the Dems will pick up no more than 4 seats, not enough to change the majority, but enough to make it tight and uncomfortable.  The best news we may get in the Senate is the possible breakthrough upset of incumbent Pa. Sen. Rick Santorum.

In the House, about the same.  I think Dems will fall short of the 15 needed for a Speaker Pelosi — picking up maybe 12-14 seats, mostly in Ohio, Pennsylvania and maybe Indiana.  Dem seats that might have been picked up in California will be stymied by Arnie’s newfound interest in the environment that makes it more difficult for the Dem candidate, Angelides, to sweep in new ones on the West Coast. 

And, you know, it doesn’t really matter in some respects because so many Dem officeholders are Repubs in disguise and vote with the GOP on various issues like the estate tax.

Money is the mother’s milk of politics.  The GOP will outspend the Dems over the next 60 days in a way that stuns the mind.

Here in Oklahoma, for example, in any “normal” election, an open house seat in the 5th District would be a real race.  The national party would throw money at such a race.  This time, there isn’t enough money to go around and Mary Fallin will outspend Dr. Hunter by many multiples.  By party registration, Democrats are more than competitive, they have the advantage in the 5th District.  By actual voting in the ’04 election, GOP has a 60-40 advantage.  Rham Emanuel, the Dem in charge of national party money allocation, will not bother with even thinking about Oklahoma — he’ll concentrate elsewhere.  The Okla. 5th is not one of the 40 seats pollsters consider competitive.  Might as well crown that queen now.

so, my fellow lefties, don’t get your hopes up too high, you’ll just be more jaded and cynical in the fall if you do.

Damn.  Just read my last few posts and all I’ve been doing is bitching about my money.

Fuck that.

It’s OK, you know.

I just like to bitch about it.

Since I’m going in a new direction, I’d like to tell a really great story, a recollection, about my Dad and how funny and cool he could be.  I don’t tell many such stories about my father, but there are certainly some and I remember my Dad this way very fondly at times.

My Dad had a collection of friends he grew up with in Lawton, and Ed Dunn, God rest his loyal soul, was chief among them and there were many.  Dad was senior class AND junior class president at Lawton High, so there was far more to him than just giving me and my sisters a whuppin’ every night at 10:18 p.m. for not going to bed promptly.

Then there were a few “army buddies”, guys Dad may not have actually served in the Army Air Corps with, but who somehow had World War II stories and such.

Finally, there was the oilfield crew.  A mixed bag, to be sure, but often equipment salesmen and drillers and operators.  Cigar smoking and poker playing and whiskey drinking boys — you have to remember we’re talking about the 1950s post war oil field.  There were still wildcatters around in those days, if you can imagine that.

Red Adair and the oil firefighting business was born and I remember Dad coming home with a Red Adair Zippo, all painted red, from a gas well fire that lit up southern Oklahoma.

One of Dad’s great oilfield buddies was a guy named Tom Turk from Ardmore.  He’s dead just like Dad and Ed Dunn, but he went first by a long way.

His wife, Arlena, lived in Ardmore until rather recently and Mom has stayed in touch and been down to visit her often over the years.

They had a daughter, Nancy, who was a black haired curvey beauty queen teenager when I was still quite small.  I’m still drawn to brunettes (my daughter has beautiful brunette hair) and I’ve always suspected that it was Nancy who imprinted me.  In my mind, she remains the most beautiful woman ever, rivaled only by my father’s cousin Judy Morgan, another Cadillac driving brunette beauty.

Tom Turk was a southern boy through and through and reminded me a great deal of my mother’s Mississippi brothers in many ways.  He had wavy silver hair, a ruddy complexion and a cigar smoking out of his mouth at all times.  A short, stocky and powerful man with a keen eye for a baseball game, he may not have missed a single baseball game played by Ardmore Hi for decades.

His drawl was positively “chawmin'”. 

And I think he could have sold ice to Eskimos. 

(Yeah, yeah, I know it’s Intuit, but this is a 50s reference dammit and the saying then was ice to Eskimos, so get over yourself you PC bastards).

(I hate these fucking asides, it breaks up the flow of the story and they are not all that interesting.)

(Shut the fuck up)

Well, Tom Turk and my Dad greeted each other like bears and laughed and enjoyed each other’s company.

They would “poor mouth” each other.

It’s kind of like those stories about walking 15 miles to school in the snow uphill both ways.

Each sort of bragged about how poor they were during the Depression growing up.

They maybe embellished the truth a small sliver of a bit now and again.

Like,  I never once believed Tom Turk’s family put chewed tobacco in the coffee grinds to stretch them out for another week.

By all accounts, my father was something of a spoiled brat as a kid, never denied much of anything.  You couldn’t tell it from the stories he spun around Tom Turk, though.

Dad did stoop labor next to freed slaves and Indians from “can’t see to can’t see”?

Nope.  Not really.

Once Dad had a job out at Fort Sill along with Ed Dunn and they were set to digging a sewer line with shovels, but got fired when they couldn’t stop throwing dirt on each other.

Dad had another job at night (while going to Cameron in Lawton) working for a funeral home and one night had to go pick up a dead body that was on a second floor.  On the way down the stairs, the corpse lost bodily function and covered the downside guy with … well … shit … you know … and Dad started laughing, couldn’t stop and dropped the body on the stairs and his covered buddy and it all got to rolling down the stairs and … Dad got fired from that job, too.

Anyway, my Mom, who was one of many children of a plumber in Mississippi and had to bleach out flour sacks and dye them colors for fabric to make dresses, just kept serving beer to the men by the barbecue in the back yard and rolled her eyes at Arlena rather than get involved.

The best part to me wasn’t the stories they told of the Dust Bowl and the WPA.  The best part was the way that they would laugh at each other’s involved fabrications while trying to keep a straight face while telling the most enormous falsehoods.

Swearing of oaths on imaginary stacks of Bibles optional.

One of the things I love about Oklahoma the most is summer rain storms.

I love the lightning and thunder.

I love the winds.

i love the cooling off of the hot summer heat.

I love the grey, blue and black clouds all mixed in with some resolute white virgins.

I love the ozone smell — the rain smell.

I love the fresh washed smell of the town when the oil slick has run down the drains off the streets.

I love the fresh air smell when the dust has been toppled into the storm drains.

I love the fun of dashing to the car, getting pelted by raindrops, dodging the loafer deep puddles.

Last night, I cut off the air conditioner and opened up the house to air it out.  Turned on all the fans to get the smoke out and the good smell inside.

Although I tried to be careful and prevent this, Sinatra wormed his way through one of the outlets and got outside.

It wasn’t long before a very waterlogged kitten was outside the kitchen door whining to get back in.  He was a very funny looking cat with his pelt all spiked from the wet.

When I tried to towel him off, it pissed him and he tried to bite my hands as if they were the cause of his discomfort.

This is about the way I sometimes treat God.  Give me what I want and I’m still not pleased and get pissed when the solution to the new problem doesn’t suit me.

Ah, well, no harm done.  Sinatra’s fine and dry now.

Myself, I’ve been in a bit of a financial rainstorm lately.

I cut up and paid off my credit cards, using my home equity to lower the interest rate and extend the payments so that my monthly payments went way down.

I’ve never felt so broke.

I have a budget, to be sure.  It’s nice and orderly and complete and a good, hard, honest look at my monthly spending.

The only problem is that I’m only earning on average 3/5ths of the budget.

I’ve been going in the hole a little to a lot every month for a couple of years now and putting it on those cards.

That’s over.

I can sure feel the squeeze.

No more eating out, Wednesday Paseo dinner and movie excepted.  I just couldn’t give that up.

I’m rolling my own cigarets since that cuts my vice expense in half.

I’m eating breakfast, lunch and dinner at home and there’s lots more cold cereal and Peanut Butter and Jelly sandwiches in my diet now.

There’s a real question in my mind whether I will be able to kick in at work and be earning what I must in order to finance my debts.

There will be no more CDs, DVDs or movies in my near future.

I’m also resolved to have something in savings before I start making such purchases.

There’s no budget for clothes until my taxes get paid.

What?  No new clothes?!?

Yep.  NO NEW CLOTHES.

This is serious.

I have several thousand dollars of medical bills from June’s car wreck and annual checkup to pay before I have the next night out of the house.

My social life just became Wednesdays and the Tuesday-Thursday night AA meetings.

So, don’t look for me at Flip’s, VZDs, bin 73, Rococo, or even Sidecar and Blue Moon.  I won’t be there.

Even more shocking:  I’m giving up my $100/mo. Starbucks habit.  Don’t look for me there, either.

It’s my financial rainy day and I wanted out from under the umbrella of credit cards.  Now my hair is all wet and spikey and if you try and dry me off, I’ll try to bite your hands.

************************************

John X has done a very nice little film from some footage he and George took of me awhile back and has posted it on his webpage.  It’s pretty cool.  The link follows:

http://possibilityx.com/video%20files/echo.wmv