Blogblah!!! » Sinatra Speaks

February 24, 2009 (updated)

John Long — Wed, 25 Feb 2009 02:43:42 +0000

THE TWITTER FEED WAS LUNATIC!

An Obama Speech Live Blog by Andrew Sullivan

LiveBlog of speech by Josh Marshall at Talking Points Memo

“Progressives” LiveBlog Obama’s speech at Daily Kos

ABC.com LiveBlogs the speech with Twitter Twist

I didn’t bother to watch — I don’t have TV at home now, and I didn’t want to go out — but that doesn’t matter as much as the blogosphere and CW reax in tomorrow’s papers, for which I am not going to wait up. If I have anything of substance to say, I’ll do it after digesting some likely bloated pontificating by pundits of all stripes.

DID TUESDAY MAKE ME LOOK FAT?

Historically Carnival has been a last hurrah before the Christian season of Lent40 days of fasting and penitence beginning on Ash Wednesday. But its roots reach at least as far back as ancient Rome’s Saturnalia, a hedonistic winter celebration of Saturn, god of the harvest.

National Geographic

A Saturnalian Moment in Brazil

I haven’t heard from my son, who lives in New Orleans, about his experiences, but I’ll give him a couple days rest before I make him talk to me on the phone. I did notice a tweet from him about missing the Vieux Crew ball, but I’m not all that sure I want to know what goes on at the Vieux Crew ball. Compared to my children, I’m not nearly as mature. In fact, compared to most people, I may not be that mature, but that’s another matter.

Blogblah

I didn’t celebrate Fat Tuesday this year. Something about me being a recovering alcoholic and knowing better than to go to slippery places if you don’t want to slip, but that’s 12-Step insidery stuff that I hate to foist on you Earthlings (AA term for non alcoholics). I really don’t ever remember being all that worked up about the start of Lent because I never really observed Lent. Advent also escapes me, among other things. Lent is kind of like Ramadan, isn’t it? A long period of fasting and penitential character building? Sorry, I’m already a character and it’s something of a ramshackle building, but I rather feel comfortable in it. I put my feet on the table and eat over the sink and no one complains as long as there’s plenty of wet cat food available. And “penitential”? Me? Whifff. Besides, I can resist anything but temptation. Why would I deliberately set myself up to fail before the Almighty? So, this year for Lent, I’m giving up ritual and cant. How’s that?

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY

If knowledge can create problems, it is not through ignorance that we can solve them.

ISAAC ASIMOV

I READ THE NEWS TODAY, OH BOY

Minnesota Still Without Senator

Former U.S. Sen. Norm Coleman, R-MN, has strung out last year’s election and is still going and we’re not yet to the appeal level. I don’t think most people believe he has a chance of being successful in this challenge to Al Franken, but that’s not the immediate point. If he strings it out, as he’s done so far, it is one less vote for the next big bill, the budget resolution, universal health care, whatever, and one more Republican that’s needed to break the filibuster deadlock at 60-40 in the U.S. Senate. Meanwhile, his legal position becomes more and more attenuated and ludicrus, as this day’s entry in the soap opera demonstrates.

This is about topical politics, but I’m not linking to any one particular headline, but I must admit to being puzzled by GOP decisions to oppose Obama as a bloc. Let’s take U.S. Rep. Mary Fallin, R-OKC, who voted against the stimulus bill along with her caucus. Trouble is that the stim bill includes beaucoup money for Oklahoma, including a HSR system that will go from Tulsa through Oklahoma City down to Dallas and from there to either San Antonio or Houston. Seems like this will create 100s of Oklahoma jobs and pour millions into the local economy. Unemployment is rising and those with jobs are crazy afraid and she votes against funding unemployment checks? She voted against a tax cut for 97.36% of her constituents? What’s next? Put Tinker up for closing? What the hell is she thinking? I mean, really? (The link in this paragraph will take you to her constituent access page where you can send her an email asking such questions, if you’d like)

Chairman of the Bored

SINATRA SPEAKS!
Muffy, he says there’s a lots of cool cats in Minnesota, but I still think I smelled a rat. I watched a robin and a mockingbird fight for nesting space in my back yard today. I think I like the jay fledglings the best, but you enjoy what you can and endure the rest, I suppose. I think something’s wrong with him, Muffy. He’s been waking up too early and getting up even when I cuddle in. That’s just not right. I’m pretty sure the boy’s just not right, but that’s what makes cats the rulers of the universe, isn’t it?
Mel Brooks had it right: it’s good to be king.

February 23, 2009

John Long — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 22:31:01 +0000

Blogblah

Can’t swing a cat without hitting a blog
There are so many posts on my friends/fellow bloggers pages about cats! Don’t they know that Sinatra and I hold that franchise? I’ll show them: I’ll blog about relationships today. How ’bout them apples?
I was reminded this weekend of a conversation I once had with a woman about relationships that I thought interesting and enlightening. I won’t name her because I don’t want to shatter her privacy. Anyway, she had at the time what I’ve thought of since as a college transcript notion of relationships.

Everyone, she explained, has certain things they value in a relationship and that list of things may be long or short and each of us puts those values in a priority. Think of those values you have in a relationship as a college class, she went on, and give your partner a “grade” on a scale of 0-100. Maybe your values are: looks, money, security, intellect, sex, humor and kindness. Also imagine that your partner is AT THE MOMENT making a 92 on money, 71 on looks, 80 on security, 99 on intellect, 72 on sex, 68 on humor and 55 on kindness. As each “test” of the relationship comes along, the grades change from time to time, don’t you know. So, at the moment, you’re real pissed off about that failing grade in kindness class. However, the partner’s overall grade is 76.7, a pretty high “C”. Since the overall grade is “passing”, you don’t break up. It’s a theory that’s as good as the next as far as I’m concerned.
I have a more simple measure for relationships. Both partners have to be intellectually challenged and challenging; both must be emotionally fulfilled and fulfilling; both partners must be sexually satisfied and satisfying. Head, heart and body, the good old three part dance that the ego, superego and id demand, my “triune” brain looking for threes. A relationship can go a short time on only one of those three, longer on two, but can’t be stable and “good” for a lifetime without all three, IMHO. If you have trouble in one of the areas, the first thing to do is check out yourself. If your sex life seems to be getting boring, who’s fault is that if not your own? If you’re not emotionally fulfilled, are you getting back just what you are giving or are you blocking out the possibilities with your own “stuff” and baggage? You’d best be saying something other than “the game’s on” if you want to complain about the intellectual aridity of the conversation.
Past that, Solomon’s Proverbs say (Today’s Thought) that it’s better to live alone in a desert than to live with a quarrelling wife. It sounds like the voice of experience of a man who ended up with 700 concubines and wives.

I READ THE NEWS TODAY, OH BOY

Pot Legal In Mass., butt …
You can now possess up to an ounce of pot in Massachusetts and it’s a civil fine of $100. However, now they are arguing whether they can criminalize USE of pot — $300 and jail if you pull out a joint and start smoking in public. If it just weren’t so cold in Boston in the winter, but ah, well.

It’s not exactly headline news, but Che, daughter of Jer-Dog, is having a three family, three day garage sale March 6-7-8 and requests we bring cash. You’ve been warned.

John X, the heinous one, has now landed safely in Austria with only carry on luggage and a need to blog. You can catch his adventures on his temporary blog HERE.

A green, two-tailed comet will appear tonight

Green Two-Tailed Comet Comes Close Tonight

SINATRA SPEAKS!

Chariman of the Bored

Muffy, what’s he thinking? Of course there are a lot of blogs about cats. We rule the world, don’t we? The lesser beings always gossip about the royalty. Long Live Smudge! Long Live Ollie! Long Live Marley! Sinatra is the Master of the Universe!
What’s so hard about blogging about cats? We’re very interesting.

February 15, 2009 (updated)

John Long — Mon, 16 Feb 2009 00:25:00 +0000

Looking on

VALENTINE’S DAY
I had a lovely Valentine’s day weekend. I ran the gamut of emotions: content, happy, joyful, ecstatic, blissfully asleep. I ignored the troubles of the world and focused on the moment. I cooked a couple of meals, steak and salad Saturday night. I received in abundance validation and emotional fulfillment. Did some interesting things like antique shopping, thrift stores, book stores, coffee. Stress free and full of laughter and intimacies.
By comparison, my blogging buddy Flibbertigibbit vents a bit about Valentine’s and relationships and flirting and that whole boy-girl thing.
MindOverMary posts with passionate kindness and urgent wisdom in a lovely essay that made me admire my sister even more than ever.
Mom-A-Tron, aka RebL, gives us a lesson in green valentines that, I must admit, express a far more true and everlasting valentine than the pink and red crap we seem to favor.
LongRydeHome had a weekend full of trauma (a trip to the ER) and drama (a personal feud gone all bloggy) and despite the fact that MCARP shows up in a great many of her episodes, he has nothing whatsoever to report at 3:40 a.m. Wednesday through Saturday.
Sweet mystery of life.

I READ THE NEWS TODAY, OH BOY

gay agenda/Sally Kern

Broken Penis Syndrome

The End of All Marriages?

A BIT OF OLD BUSINESS

TODAY’S THOUGHT

Those who are kind reward themselves
But the cruel do themselves harm.

Proverbs 11:17

SINATRA SPEAKS

Chariman of the Bored

Muffy, it was a lovely weekend. Nothing better than having not one but two humans doing your bidding. I out-thought them at every turn. If one got tired of petting me, I went to the other one and said I’d never been petted in my life. One to let me in and one to let me out. LUXE! SCORE! The best that neither one knew the other one was feeding me. I don’t even care about the blue jay and the mockingbirds, there’s no room in my belly for another bite. Well, maybe one tiny, just a thin slice more.
More proof that cats rule the world.

February 5, 2009

John Long — Thu, 05 Feb 2009 03:58:05 +0000

BECAUSE I SAID SO

Do you remember the line from Desiderata: “Avoid loud and aggressive people”? King Solomon in his Proverbs and the Tao and others all warn against people who are quick to anger.
I have to admit that sometimes I’m that guy.
I have a temper. I frequently must apologize for things I say when I’m mad. Even worse, as some of the women who’ve dated me will testify, are the things I write in letters and emails when I’m pissed off and mad.

One of the more wise things ever said to me is about anger: Anger is hurt turned inside out. This from a tipsy shrink in a Tulsa bar about 30-35 years ago. It’s still true.
Mostly, anger isn’t a first emotion, it’s a second one. What comes before anger is hurt: someone steps on our toes in some way. Mostly, we’re hurt when we think we will not get something we want very much or that we will lose something we have and care about.
In many ways, this grandfather still has a child’s temper. I get angry the most and fastest about some jibe at my self esteem or when I think I’ve had my fabulous ego somehow punctured. I can throw a real hissy fit when I don’t get my way.
I’ve written women I really care about some pretty rough assaults on their personal dignity. Of course, I do this rather upscale — my wordsmithing goes into high gear so that there’s no mere namecalling or “flaming”. No, no. When I write a letter to an opposing attorney or someone else who has offended me, I do so at the very height of the language. Often, I write these missives with keen psychological insight and deft punctures of their assertions with cunning logical syllogisms of my own.
At least that’s what I think when I’m carefully crafting these social A-Bombs.
Solomon says that not only should you avoid a man with a quick temper, you should never listen to his advice.
An angry man, this angry man in all events, is likely to be surrounded by turmoil and trouble. When acting in anger, my actions are likely to be rash, irrational and hurtful.
And, I get predictable results.
People don’t like to hear my verbal lashings.
They don’t respond well.
I’ve never had anyone who received such a missive or tongue-lashing say, “Oh, well, I never thought of it that way before. You are so right that I’ll have to change my whole life and way of thinking to accommodate you, John.”
After repeating this same mistake over and over again for about a half century, I finally started doing something different a couple of years ago.
Oh, I still write the email or letter. I even edit it and hone it to a fine steel rapier that slashes and plunges deep into the human dignity and self respect of the intended recipient.
Then, I get a good night’s rest.
The next day, I delete it and write something else less incendiary.
When I write the second letter, I have to keep in mind that a kind word will turn away their wrath.
I have to keep in mind that I’m not perfect and that maybe I’ve done something to deserve their thrust against my self esteem and ego. Maybe instead of an angry reply what’s needed is an apology from me.
Maybe it’s possible to seek a compromise that would be impossible in an all out war of words.
I can’t stop having times when I feel hurt and I can’t stop having times when I get angry.
What I can do is stop acting on that anger and hurt.
It’s so much easier for me to hold my tongue (restrain my pen, stop typing) at the front end than it is to try and back off and explain my way out of the mess after I’ve set fire to my hair.
Now that I’ve figured out the whole email and letter thing, it would be lots better if I could only work out the installation of the delete button on my tongue.
SINATRA SPEAKS

Chariman of the Bored

Muffy, if you’re waiting on an apology from me, you’d best watch the weather report from Hell for news of an incoming freeze because there will be ice skating on that pond of burning excrement before you’ll hear me say I’m sorry. Rulers of the universe don’t apologize, that’s for minions like him. I have no idea what he’s thinking. I’m a predator. We don’t apologize. We aren’t sorry. We do not display weakness in front of lesser beings.
It’s a good thing that cats rule the world.

TODAY’S THOUGHT

A proper apology has three parts:
1. What I did was wrong
2. I feel badly that I hurt you
3. How do I make this better?

The Last Lecture, Chapter 47
Randy Pausch

I READ THE NEWS TODAY, OH BOY

Obama Admits Appointment Mistakes

FOR NO REASON

The secrets of seduction revealed — hopes this works for you!

February 4, 2009

John Long — Wed, 04 Feb 2009 00:17:03 +0000

Blogblah

I’ve been thinking today about something my father used to say: “I cried because I had no shoes until I met a man who had no feet.”
Funny, isn’t it, how a man I thought so stupid when I was a hotshot teenager could grow so wise over time — even after his death.
Some of you know the story in my life demonstrating this saying. I was sitting in probate court one day, feeling very sorry for myself. Oh! Quel Catastrophe! Life just was not worth living, I thought as the court docket was being called. Then, the judge was stumped by the name of one of the cases. H-O-U-G-H, is it pronounced “How” or “Hoag”? A woman’s voice chirped from the back of the room: “Huff, your honor, like rough and tough!” We all turned to look as the woman gathered her metal canes to make the trek to the bench. All the way forward, step by awkward step, she joked with the judge. Her spine was twisted, as was her pelvis, and her legs were withered mockery of the swift. How could I feel sorry for myself if this woman, facing these problems IN PROBATE COURT (someone she was close to had died), could face life with quips and jokes?
Since then, my son-in-law gave me a set of “worry beads” he brought back from his tour in Iraq. The string has 67 beads, including the large tasseled joining bead. I take the beads to bed with me at night and go to sleep counting my blessings. It is the absolute best therapy instruction I’ve ever received.
If you are sad about what you do not have — money, mate or momma — the whole world is full of what you do not have and you will always be sad. On the other hand, can you see, hear and walk? These are gifts and you have all you need and more.

SINATRA SPEAKS

Chariman of the Bored

Muffy, he’s more full of bird do-do than ever. Why should I be grateful about being inside when there’s outside? So what he feeds me canned food? I deserve it. I deserve more than that little can. I deserve it more often than once a day when I want it all the time. I have to work hard to chase the birds. Why won’t they just come to me so I can play with them for a little while? I hid those beads under the bed once because they made a wonderful toy. He wasn’t grateful. So much for that theory.
No wonder cats rule the world.

TODAY’S THOUGHT

Don’t go around saying the world owes you a living. The world owes you nothing. It was here first.

Mark Twain

I READ THE NEWS TODAY, OH BOY

In vino, veritas; how the Greeks drank wine

FOR NO REASON

The Pretenders: “Back on the Chain Gang”

January 30, 2009

John Long — Fri, 30 Jan 2009 05:02:27 +0000

A lonely blogger types his fingers to the bone

I’m still thawing out and look forward to Friday’s expected high temperature around 60. I don’t have a lot to talk about except that I hope you noticed that I learned to “jump” my posts so that the page loads faster and you can scroll down to previous posts more quickly. You are clicking the “read the rest of the entry” thingy at the end of the posts, aren’t you? In other exciting blog news, I’ll be updating and revising my blogroll at the right — the sites that I link to. I’ve let them get seriously out of date. Before I do that, however, I want to hear from my readers whether they ever use the blogroll at all. Do you ever use my page to jump to another site by hitting one of the links on the right? I suspect many of you do not, for whatever reason. What can I do to be helpful and useful? Do you want links to Google, Yahoo, MSNBC, memeorandum, reddit, Digg, FARK or some other news aggregator? Should my personal blogroll of MCARP, Flibbi, Mary or my daughter be first and foremost? Does anybody care? Am I shouting in the wind to no one?

I’m also struggling not to get too involved with politics, but today’s House vote on the stimulus bill requires that I ask what the hell Republicans are thinking? Vote against massive tax cuts for the middle class? I don’t care what anyone says about the spending side of the bill (and it’s probably chock full of crazy shit), I just don’t think that’s a very smart vote for GOP officeholders who want to come back in 2010. Speaking of potential moments of extra special stupid, what the hell is up with billions in Wall Street bonuses when the financial world is in extra special meltdown? No wonder Obama called it “shameful”! Remaining on political extra special stupid, now former governor Blagojevich’s Nixonian “I’m Not A Crook” plea got what it deserved in the Illinois legislature: a unanimous vote for impeachment. Bipartisan revulsion is exactly what was called for in that situation.

SINATRA SPEAKS

Chariman of the Bored

He finally got out of my house for awhile today, Muffy. Thank God! I was so tired of his interference, waking me up from a good nap just to talk and pet, smelling up the house with his little tobacco fires, refusing to feed me when there are perfectly good cans of wet food in the pantry, all the petty little annoyances of having a human in your house. If it weren’t for their opposable thumbs, there’d be a bounty on them, I swear.
It’s a good thing cats rule the world.

I READ THE NEWS TODAY, OH BOY

Heave Ho! “Unfriending” on Facebook

Hacked Sign Warns “Zombies Ahead” in TX

Former OKC Councilman Rev. Goree James died yesterday. James represented Ward 7 and served from 1973 to 1977 and again from 1981 to 1993. He was my friend. I covered him when he was on the council for the newspaper and he always remembered me and spoke to me when he saw me out in public. He was a guy who also liked jazz music and I would see him at places like Junior’s, the old Bianca’s and (that restaurant that used to be the north end of NorthPark Mall).

TODAY’S THOUGHT

I have a new philosophy; I’m only going to dread one day at a time.

Charles M. Schultz

FOR NO REASON EXCEPT I THOUGHT THIS WAS COOL

January 27, 2009 (updated)

John Long — Tue, 27 Jan 2009 18:25:55 +0000

My yucca plants covered with ice and snow

THERE’S SNOW BUSINESS IN OKC

Since the courthouse is closed today due to the weather “emergency”, I thought I’d take time from being bored at the house and maybe do a little blogging since I’ve not really written anything since the Inauguration on the 20th, a week ago. Before he tells you all about it, I’ve got to admit to a tiny bit of cruelty: I laughed and laughed and could not make myself come to the rescue of Sinatra late yesterday afternoon when he found himself in the middle of an icy driveway and couldn’t get any traction. Have you ever seen a cat lose its footing? I don’t think that happens often, or at least I don’t see it often, and watching my “snow cat” floundering just struck me funny. So funny, as it happens, I couldn’t keep my own footing well enough to go rescue him. When I finally got to him to pick him up and carry him back inside, he was PISSED. Fortunately for me, it was nothing a good petting and a little canned food wouldn’t assuage.

LongRydeHome's Earth/Sky/Water sculpture at my house, now improved and new with SNOW added!

While I was outside taking pictures, I snapped a shot of the sculpture that is installed in my front yard. This work is by my blog buddie, LongRydeHome, who graciously commends and refers to my Jan. 20 post, and I thought I’d plug her work. It’s not really set at such an angle, by the way, that’s just my bad picture taking. The small ball represents the earth and the semi-circle around it is the sky; the dangling piece is obviously waves of water if you ever get a chance to look at the piece. Now, of course, it’s new and improved with not just earth, not just sky and more than water — introducing the new and improved WITH SNOW version of KO’s work! I love the way the sculpture works with the arc of a wall just behind it and the rocks that provide the setting.

The view down 61st Street, looking east from my house

Just so that Nojackla, Mom-A-Tron and MindOverMary, living in New Orleans, Tucson and Charleston respectively, can remember what Oklahoma winter weather is like, I thought I’d let ‘em see down my street why their hometown is shut down. As I write this at midday, just about 11:30 a.m., the weather report says it’s 20 degrees (F) and snowing on top of the ice we got on the streets last night. A few good and brave folks, including Muffy, are out on the streets, but an old guy like me knows better than to even try.

New Avatar?

When I run out of cigarets, I’ll either stop or put on a lot of warm clothes because it’s pretty toasty here in my little studio and it just looks miserable outside with it snowing/sleeting hard enough for me to hear it hit the bushes even through my closed window.
John X was wearing a hat at the RC the other day when I tried to take a snapshot of him, but he turned the tables and took a picture of me wearing his hat. What do you think? Better or worse than the black and white “GQ” picture? Does this look like the sort of man who’s blog you’d like to read? Better yet, does this look like the kind of lawyer that could get you divorced? Yeah, that’s what I thought, too.

A lonely blogger types his fingers to the bone

I’ve been playing with my computer and i-Phone during this bad weather and picked up some nice free “apps” for the phone: Shazam, which will listen to a few notes of any music and then tell you what the song is, who sings it and refers you to the YouTube where you can see the video or refers you to the i-Pod/i-Tunes download; Stanza, which lets you download free books from the public domain and read them on your phone; and also Google Earth, with which most of you are familiar from your laptop or desktop. Does the thumbnail on the right look more “bloggish”? I think this is the best picture Sinatra has ever taken of me, but that may be a matter of taste.

TODAY’S THOUGHT

Just because you’re in the driver’s seat doesn’t mean you have to run over people.

The Last Lecture
Randy Pausch

I READ THE NEWS TODAY, OH BOY!

$100 Civil Fine for Pot Debated

Top 10 Ways to Destroy Earth

SINATRA SPEAKS

Chairman of the Bored

Muffy, he laughed at me. I am the most fearsome hunter in the territory and a ruler of the universe and he laughed at me. I’m humiliated. When he sees the heating bill from opening and closing the door and window to let me in and out 50 times today, he won’t be laughing then, oh, no. He’s been extra careful to keep his closet shut so I can’t get to his shoes and poo in them, but I’m watching and waiting and he’ll forget one of these days and then!…shoe poo!
Muffy, you just wait and see if I don’t.

January 11-12, 2009

John Long — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 19:48:07 +0000

BETTY BOWERS SINGS “STRAIGHT TO HELL”

TODAY’S THOUGHT

I READ THE NEWS TODAY, OH BOY

Russian crown jewels buried in Gobi Desert?

DEATH DELIVERS A GUT PUNCH

BECAUSE I SAID SO

I just about keeled over this weekend when my friend Lynne X told me that a mutual friend had died. The obituary:
Jack Hiatt is dead at 59
Jack was Student Council president and I was senior class president at Classen High School in 1967. We were pretty close, as I had been to his older brother, David, who was a senior and my debate partner my sophomore year. Jack dated a woman I just adored, Diana Dane, our senior year. He and I went to the drive in movie with our first bottle of Wild Turkey and you all know I had a love affair with that bottle for the next 30 years. He came to at least one of our class reunions and he was much the same except that he had something of a hearing loss in one of his ears. Even that was many years ago. I’m really really in denial. I just can’t believe it. Jack was flat out one of the smartest people I ever met in my entire life and left Classen to go to MIT, where he graduated in aerospace engineering. I’ve had other classmates die, but this one really goes to the heart of my youthful memories. Jack, rest in peace and God’s blessings on your soul. This is the second time in a short time that I’ve blogged about deaths that personally affected me. Getting older is not for sissies.

SINATRA SPEAKS

A cool cat with blue eyes. Call him Sinatra

Thanks for the note and the wet food, Muffy, always appreciated. He’s being wierd today. He says it’s all right to pounce the little brown birds washing and drinking in my yard but not the little blue birds. Doesn’t he know I’m color blind? I don’t get the big deal about death. I’m alive. Death is not now, it’s when it is. Birds die and cats live and rule the world. That’s the natural order of things. Birds die according to which ones fly away and which ones let me get close, not according to their color or what he prefers.
No wonder cats rule the world.

FOR NO GOOD REASON

Lenny Welch sings his 1963 classic “Since I Fell for You”