Much has been made of Condoleeza Rice’s willingness to protect the contents of an FBI memo, dated from before 9/11, entitled “Bin Laden Determined to Strike in U.S.”

That controversy has died down somewhat, but a new classified memo has since emerged.  Written by Rice herself in her previous guise as Skeletor, arch-nemesis of He-Man, the memo is entitled: “My Plans for Learning the Secret of Castle Grayskull and Conquering Eternia.”

Motherhood books are full of facts, figures, and statistics regarding the need for the mother to “bond” with her newborn baby within minutes of the birthing act.  Done via both touch and gaze, this bonding constitutes a crucially important step for both parent and child alike.  While I do not dispute the findings of these studies, I do take issue with the lack of any academic or clinical material on a less significant but still highly important form of bonding: Uncle/niece.  I present my own anecdotal evidence here in the hopes that more trained individuals can begin to update existing materials and include the role of the Uncle in the child development process.

(2 Weeks of Cam’s existence.  Dialogue proceeds while Uncle is attempting to burp her.)

Me: So, I’m Uncle Greg.  Great, huh?

Cam: You have no breasts.  Therefore, your existence is inconsequential.

Me: No no.  I’m an Uncle.  I’m less cool than a parental unit but totally better than your parents’ friends who irritate you.

Cam: Hey, watch the head.  So what does an Uncle do?

Me: I can read Lemony Snicket books to you and you can come over to my place and we can dance to Talking Heads.

Cam: Talking Heads?  That’s so very before-I-was-born.

Me: Whatever, you choose the tunes.

Cam: Whoa, hey, check this out.

(HUGE BURP.  It reverberates throughout several street blocks.  Union workers look up from loading crates into oil tankers and high-five each other: “She’s one of us.")

Cam: Sweet, that was almost as good going up as going in.  Milk is great.

Me: Yeah, milk is good.

Cam: Well, thanks for the burp and for not letting my head flop around. I’m going to have a crap and take a nap.  Care to join me?

Me: No no, I’m good.  You go ahead.

Cam: Okay, nice to meet you.  Don’t feet bad if I don’t remember your name next time I see you.  I’m not good with names yet.  Or, y’know, words.

Me: Not an issue. Take it easy.

Cam: Like that’ll be a problem.

People tell me that they’re drawn to religion so they can think of something larger than themselves.  It’s a line of reasoning I can never understand.  If I want to encounter something larger than myself, I just have to go to the movies. Some bozo is always in the seat in front of me, forcing me to watch his head in widescreen instead of letting me see Uma Thurman kill Bill.

I want to tap them on the shoulder and suggest that they curl up into a fetal position for a few hours, or simply migrate to the designated “Big Head” section of the theater (as mandated by the Surgeon General), but I never do because what if everyone is right and this person who is larger than myself is, in fact, God?  He’d be all, “Back it up homes or I’ll turn you into a pillar of salt or something.” And I’d be all, “What are you doing at a Tarantino flick anyway?  Shouldn’t You be watching The Passion?” And He’d be all, “Right, dawg, like I need to see some crazy actor try to recreate My home movies.  Besides, I’ve been finetuning the Cosmic Plan all day and the last thing I feel like doing is reading a bunch of subtitles.”

This weekend, I spent some time in an establishment where you can take gulps of beer inbetween playing Star Wars: Starfighter and waiting for your karaoke number to be called.  In other words, it wasn’t an institution of high culture.  And having spent time with this eatery and the people who frequent it, I consider myself up-to-speed on annoying T-shirt trends that are being embraced by today’s youth.

And I’m not pleased.  Here’s some of their current travesties:

1. I read the article but still couldn’t believe that Che Guevara T-shirts were really hot items.  But now I’ve seen dozens of them for myself.  I’m pretty sure that if you asked any of these people why they’re wearing them, they’d answer “I just love his albums.”

2. There’s been lots of complaints about young people wearing tight shirts that expose their midriffs.  But what bothers me is that so many of them have no business wearing skimpy clothes.  Some of these people look like they’ve swallowed inner tubes; that should be an incentive to suit up, not strip down.  To me, this is evidence that young people of today have no sense of responsibility, discipline, or work ethic.  In my day we wouldn’t leave the house dressed like that unless we had a sufficiently powerful eating disorder to go along with it.

3. “ANGEL” T-shirts. Honey, I’ll grant you, I’ve never seen an angel--but I’m pretty sure they don’t wear jeans with a hole cut out of each butt cheek.

However, I’m okay with the shirts that say “Dorks are Hot.”

Nearly a year ago I complained about being moved from the fourth floor to the third floor of the place where I work.  Since then I’ve kept quiet about it.  But I haven’t been resting.  I’ve been politicking.  I’ve been conversationing.  I’ve been trying to return to my perch way up in the sky.

I talked to the Facilities Manager:

“I need to go back to my old location.”

“Well, space is tight and we have to put people where we have room.  What’s the big deal?”

“It’s noisy down here.  I can’t concentrate on reading other people’s blogs.”

“What?  What did you say?”

“Uh, I said the noise makes my head feel like it’s in a fog.”

“Oh.  I thought you said you couldn’t read other people’s blogs.”

“Ha!  Ha!  It is to laugh!  I would never say such a thing!”

“I don’t know whether you’d say such a thing or not.  What the hell is a blog?”

I also talked to the CFO:

“I need to go back to the fourth floor.  Part of my job here is creative.  I am an artist.  I need peace, quiet, and privacy to ply my trade.”

“Oh yeah, you’re a real artist.  Let me read a section from your latest press release: ‘The company today announced the appointment of Harlan Smithee to Vice President of Strategic Development.’ It’s practically Shakespearean.”

“No, I wrote that when I was still in my old space.  Here, take a look at one I wrote yesterday.”

“Let me see that:  ‘The company today announced the appointment of REDRUM REDRUM REDRUM REDRUM REDRUM’....okay, I can see your point.”

Today I return to my old, quiet location.  And I’m not going to treat this victory lightly.  I intend to use my newfound workplace stability to write the great American novel produce exciting marketing copy that will help my company reach its strategic objectives.

I think I belong to a new classification of people called “middle-class trash.” My job pays the bills and I can buy stuff now and then, but I don’t have a lot of extravagances in my life.  Therefore, when I’m faced with luxury, I have no idea what to do with it.

Case in point: during my trip last week, I waited over an hour in line at the car rental counter.  The lady felt sorry for me and gave me a free triple upgrade to a Cadillac.

I almost turned it down.  I didn’t know my way around Orlando, and I would have preferred a small car that zips in and out.  With a Cadillac, I thought I’d have to hire a first mate to help drive the thing.

“Ahoy, Cap’n!  There’s an SUV bearing down on us!  We’re on a collision course!”

“How long until we hit?”

“Two hours!”

“How long will it take to turn the steering wheel and avoid it?”

“Three hours!  All hands abandon ship.”

But then I realized I wouldn’t be the right demographic to drive a Cadillac for another 50 years, and by that time we’ll all have jetpacks.  So this might be my only chance to drive one.

The problem is, I couldn’t figure out which button made the seat go up.  I could adjust the back, but not the distance to the pedal.  By the second day I had it down cold--in fact, I’d just stroll up the car and the seat would jump out, do a triple somersault, and crouch patiently at my feet--but the first day I left the airport with my head barely poked over the dashboard.  I looked like something out of a Shirley Temple movie.  And from a distance, it probably looked as though no one was driving the thing at all.  Rumors spread quickly about the Ghost Cadillac zooming down highway 436.

The other luxury item that spooked me was the car’s satellite radio.  Great music, but no disc jockeys.  And the thing is, I hate disc jockeys. I should have loved a radio station that spared me all that inane banter.  But for some reason, I started muttering to myself as I drove along, making up for their absence:

“Thanks for tuning in to Satellite Radio.  We just heard Something Something, and we’ve got the new single from Something Something coming right up.  Don’t touch that dial.  And by the way, we can tell if you touch that dial.  We’re a satellite and we see everything.  For example, you may be interested in knowing your wife is currently sleeping with your business partner and your son is undergoing a gang initiation.  Oh, and Ghost Cadillac, you just slid into a family of five.”

I haven’t flown in a while and I was pleasantly surprised how quickly airport security lines go.  Even a year after 9-11, you could expect long, snaking lines presided over by 19-year olds wearing combat fatigues and carrying rifles. Now, the lines are still long but they move at a rapid clip.  Everyone knows what’s expected and what needs to be done.  I was in and out in twenty minutes--and I didn’t even hit a snag until the end.

“Please put your laptop in a separate box on the conveyor belt.”

“Right.”

“Please put your jacket into yet another box on the conveyor belt.”

“Right.”

“Please take off your shoes.”

“Right.”

“Please take off your cell phone.”

“Right.”

“Now juggle your shoes.”

“Right.”

“Here’s your cell phone.  Now juggle all three objects.”

“Right.”

“Now recite your favorite line from The Princess Bride.’”

“Huh?”

“Go on, hurry up.”

“Uh....”

(A number of security guards start to look over suspiciously at me.  One of them whispers: “He’s stalling.")

“Okay, okay.  Uh...’You fell victim to one of the classic blunders. The most famous is Never get involved in a land war in Asia. But only slightly less well known is this: Never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line.’”

(The guards peer at me.)

“That’s an awfully esoteric choice.”

“Well, I think it’s funny.”

“Most people just go with ‘My name is Inigo Montoya.  You killed my father.  Prepare to die.’ Perhaps you’re a pinko communist terrorist scum?”

“Look, I like that line too, but everyone quotes that.  It sort of loses its effect after a while.”

(The guards rest their hands on their weapons.  The air is thick with tension.  Then:)

“All right fine.  Pack up your things and get out of here. But we’ve got our eye on you, long-line-quoter.  Things are different now here in the good ‘ol U.S. of A.”

I hurried to catch my flight.  The whole thing had only taken twenty minutes.  It was great to see that airport security really had become more effective and efficient.

For my last act, I’m going to rant and rave about a subject near and dear to my heart.  Is there anybody in the world any more who is competent at what they do???

Fifteen years ago, I had a mid-life crisis. I changed jobs (went to law school). I bought a sports car, sort of, a Toyota MR2. I did not get a new younger wife (Greg’s Mom objected). MR2s of that year were designed with larger wider tires on the rear compared to the smaller narrower tires on the front. One time a few years ago, just before I traded it in, I took the car into the Toyota dealer (Thurston’s, for you Ukiah cognoscenti) for service and they ROTATED THE TIRES!  When I drove the car out of the service lot onto the street, I had a heck of a time getting the car to make a sharp right turn.  Well, duh, those large fat tires in the front were rubbing against the wheel well when I turned.

Somebody I know picked up his car after having an oil change (not at Thurston’s - let’s only blame them for their own screw-ups).  A few miles down the road, loud grinding noises and a burned odor were the prelude to an engine freeze-up.  It turned out the shop had forgotten to put in new oil after draining out the old.

I am a surgical specialist.  As a specialist, I am expected to know more about my specialty than the average general practitioner.  Hoping to improve the general level of care in the large group where I work, I have been providing “tips” by e-mail about my specialty.  Has there been any discernible result? No. Patients are still referred to me for the same stupid reasons they were referred to me a year ago when I started my emails.  They weren’t stupid reasons a year ago, actually. They were the result of the extremely poor level of education at too many medical schools and family practice training programs today. NOW, they are stupid reasons. Ignorance is an excuse only before you’ve been corrected.

From the bank teller the other day who had to refer me to another, then call the experts in Southern California, and still made mistakes in the forms she was preparing that had to be redone, to the nurses who rupture ear drums trying to wash out ear wax, people seem unable to get their jobs done without mistake.

Well, it’s Friday where I live. That means that Greg is coming back from his business trip. I hope he had time to see the manatees and the alligators. He’ll be taking over this space again.  Back to humor and pop culture references to bands whose musicians were all born after I started to think about retirement, and away from my ponderous pronouncements.  Back to puns and rapier-quick wit. Done with Thor’s Hammer!

I look forward to leaving comments on his site again. Having the responsibility means being responsible. Ugh!  It will probably take him a year to restore his readership! I’ll never get to guest blog again. Nobody loves me, everybody hates me, I think I’m going to eat worms! [Actually, my sincere thanks to those who have posted favorable comments. If I ever really do start my own blog, I think I’ll call it, “Thor’s Hammer” unless one of the millions of other blogs already has that name. Come to think of it, there are so many blogs out there that the only name I can probably adopt that is not already in use will be, “&*$%($$$((566pjklw"]

And a final P.S., my granddaughter, and Greg’s niece, Cameron, is 11 days old. Happiness IS being a grandparent.  30

Greg’s Mom never receives any acknowledgment from me on Mother’s Day. From the very first, after Greg’s older brother was born, it seemed to me that such acknowledgments should come from her sons, and not from her husband.  Hence, unlike many husbands, I have not given her gifts or cards or anything else on Mother’s Day.  This is one of many instances where, in my mind, the logic of the situation overrides the emotional content of the situation. Some consider this a character flaw on my part

Greg’s Mom and I have often discussed another issue related to male-female relationships.  It has been brought to mind for me because we have a large flock of wild turkeys living on and around our home, and this is mating season.  Unless you’ve seen one, it is hard to imagine how beautiful a tom turkey is in mating plumage.  When those hormones begin to flow in the spring, the dangling wattle under the turkey’s beak and neck turns an intense bright red-orange from which it is hard to turn away. The beak and head turn an iridescent pearly blue-gray. The feathers become iridescent, and as the toms strut with their tail feathers fanned out, the sun shimmers and bounces and dances off them. (If Greg permits, and if I can get a decent picture this weekend, I’ll post it so you can see some of what I mean. Photographs don’t really do it justice.)

Human beings are members of the animal kingdom also. They have their inborn mating instincts. One of them is, that women are more likely to draw attention if they are physically attractive.  Greg’s Mom tends to object to that.  She feels that male focus on physical attractiveness short-changes many women of good character, high intelligence and charming personality, who would be highly attractive to men on those grounds if they were just given the chance to make those assets clear to the men.  This is all true, yet, despite the advances of the feminine equality movement, the majority of dating advances are made by the men. The men ask the women to whom they are attracted. (Why would they ask a woman to whom they are not attracted?) Attraction is a largely biological issue.  So this is not going to change.

Notice however that I said a “largely biological” issue.  It is not solely biological. Cultural norms do play a part, but again, unfortunately, current American cultural norms reinforce the biological, and do not correct or adjust them. 

All that being said, beauty is in the eye of the beholder.  How many times has Greg’s Mom commented to me that some actress or person of our acquaintance is “beautiful” causing me to look at Greg’s Mom with astonishment that she could think so.  And how many times have we all seen a truly ugly man with an attractive woman, or the reverse.

But some beauty, both physical and other, is absolute. Keats knew it. Baudelaire knew it.  And how beautiful is Greg’s Mom, still so after 40 plus years together. So, a few weeks in advance, Happy Mother’s Day.

I read that Princeton University is going to start a campaign against grade inflation by restricting the number of “A” grades that can be awarded. The UC Berkeley School of Law (Boalt Hall) has been doing something similar for years.  Having been on the faculty end of the demand for good grades, I sympathize with their predicament. 

I gave an exam to my business law class asking them to regurgitate the elements of a valid contract, and then to apply that to a hypothetical situation. Two or three people got “A” on the exam, the rest got an “F.” This happened even though I had reviewed the information with them the week before and warned them that this was a standard law exam question. (When I was a student, a hint like that would have led to the information being underlined in red and written in CAPS) Well, I went over the problem in class, again.  Three or four weeks later, it was time for mid-terms. I went over the elements of a valid contract, again. I reminded them it was important information, again. I gave the same question as in the first exam. Same wording and everything.  Two people got an “A.” The rest failed.  On the FINAL exam, I gave the same question again. Same wording as the previous ones. Not just the same concept, or the same problem, but the same wording.  SAME result.  At the end of the semester, I ended up giving an “F” to about half the class. (That was the half still present - another half, seeing the handwriting on the wall, had dropped out)

So why am I telling this story, other than that my time to be a blogger is almost gone and I hate to give up the soap box??  It’s because it was ME who was called on the carpet by the school administration and told that I could not flunk so many students even though they had not learned the material.  Most of the students ended up taking the course again from an easier grader and my career teaching soon ended.

Did this happen because I am such a poor teacher?  I certainly don’t believe so. So stick by your TV sets, folks, because the Princeton faculty has yet to discover the storm their new policy will bring on them, not from the administration as it was for me, but from the parents who will react the same way.

Brothers and Sisters, gather round for today’s sermon. The taxt for today is . . . . Well, tempted as I am to write about “taxes are due today” and related matters, I think I won’t.  I will NOT go off for 200 words about wasted money, etc. etc.  I will NOT talk about how BILLIONS of dollars are being spent to kill Iraqis and Americans even though Iraq had never in its short history ever attacked the United States.  Think how much cheaper it is to kill Americans through drunk driving and street violence! Think of the tax money saved if we do it at home.

I will NOt talk about the waste of money in the Social Security Disability and SSI systems.  Bleeding-heart liberals talk about how the poor disabled have such a hard time getting benefits, and the system is loaded against them. Right-wingers complain about the cheaters who are getting benefits, and how the disability money just goes to pay for drugs and booze. The truth of the matter is that one-fifth of those receiving benefits are cheats, but on the other hand, the government relies on fraudulent reports and faked evidence to deny benefits to people who should qualify under the law.

Instead, I’m going to try to emulate Greg and make this post light-hearted and humorous. 

. . . . .

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Sorry, I just wrote the checks and sent in my returns. I don’t feel very light-hearted.

Greg is completely correct of course. I am a very conservative person. I was angry, annoyed, disappointed when the San Francisco Opera’s staging of the “Barber of Seville” had Figaro ride onto the stage on a red Vespa motor scooter.  OTOH, I believe all drugs should be legalized; let the chips fall where they may. I believe all activities between consenting adults, whether commercial or not, are no business of government. I believe the Patriot Act is as fundamentally flawed as the Alien and Sedition Acts, and I believe the McCain-Feingold election funding “reform” is just as dangerous to American democracy.  Why is it dangerous to democracy?  Because there are, in fact, no “special interests.” ALL “special interests” are either people or companies whose interests are being affected by government action. They wish to influence government so those actions are less detrimental to them. Can this be accomplished by a single person?  Did the government pay attention to the detailed memo I sent them explaining that fundamentalist Muslims and patriotic Iraquis would join to attack their occupiers?  Did they heed my warning that the Palestinian resistance to Israel would be a mere pinprick compared to what we would unleash?  For people to be heard, they must band together. Whether it’s Greenpeace, or NAACP, or ACLU, or the NRA, people join together to promote what they see as important. While one could justify limiting the activities of companies whose interests are purely commercial, the McCain-Feingold bill, which stops all such activity (if it names a candidate) for sixty days prior to the election, is a major chip out of the First Amendment and a blow to the Bill of Rights.

I’m also conservative because I still believe in honor. Honor is an elusive concept.  To me, it means having such self-confidence and self-respect that one always tries to do the right thing. I used to teach business law at a community college. Students would regularly plagiarize.  When caught, they would make excuses and would express remorse at being caught. But none of them thought they had done anything wrong. They are not honorable people.

Condoleeza Rice made it clear in her testimony this week what happened in the White House prior to 9/11/01.  They knew about al Qaeda. They knew about Osama bin Laden.  They knew further attacks were in the offing.  But the threat seemed too remote, too unfocused, for it to come to the forefront of their awareness.  Coupled with the laws that made it illegal for the CIA to coordinate with the FBI where American citizens were involved, 9/11 could not likely have been prevented.  But, Bush and Rice are unwilling to put it to the American public that way. They will not clearly and forthrightly say: “Yes, we had the information but it just wasn’t assembled in such a way that the threat crystallized in our minds. Hindsight is wonderful, but at the time, there was no such clarity.” Instead, they weasel and squirm and blame Richard Clark. They are not honorable people.

A member of my family was interested in body-building. If I recall correctly, she entered some amateur competitions.  When she expressed interest in continuing, she was informed that she would have to take steroids if she wished to do well.  Athletes in general, not just body builders, seem to consider it their unalienable right to enhance their performance through chemistry.  That they are competing against others who prefer to leave their bodies unaltered and that the playing field is not level does not bother them. I have heard steroid users express contempt for those unwilling to use the drugs.  These are not honorable people.

Honor. An old fashioned concept no longer much understood. Sort of like virginity, or music.

Everywhere I go, I see people advertising something on their clothing. Budweiser is popular, as is Harley Davidson.  People spend good money for their clothes and accessories, and then walk around covered with advertising because of the prominently placed logos and trademarks almost all clothing displays now.  This wasn’t always true.  Once upon a time, a person could buy a windbreaker whose manufacturer was discreetly revealed inside the collar but nowhere else. Then someone discovered that millions of Americans would love to brag about how much money they spent on their clothing by displaying the logo of the maker and the manufacturers had hit the jackpot of all jackpots. Millions of moving billboards advertising their products, AND THEY DIDN"T HAVE TO PAY A DIME.  People would advertise for the clothing makers and other manufacturers for FREE. 

Don’t get me started about tats.  Last week I treated a young woman for a medical problem. When she was getting ready for an antibiotic injection, the nurse noted a tattoo in the small of her back. Nothing unusual about that, you say, but this one said Pfish!  Has she thought about what that will mean in thiry years? I doubt it.

Having seen this advertising proliferating everywhere, I have thought of some advertisement cum tee shirts I would like to see.

On the front: ZOVIRAX On the back: I’m loveable (most of the time!)
On the front: DULCOLAX On the back: Sponsored by moveon.org
On the front: Dr. James Cuttem for vasectomy On the back: Looking for love without consequences
On the front: Jeep from Daimler-Chrysler On the back: How pedestrian!
On the front: Read the Father Goose blog On the back: Genetically incapable of laying an egg!

You may cheer. This is a blog free of political comment.

The furor over Janet Jackson’s Super Bowl nipple exposure seems to have died down. I personally thought that the reaction was overblown.  Once you’ve seen one nipple, you’ve seen them all. The rest of the half-time show was much more offensive to me. However, I don’t see any part of the show as reflecting the decline of civilization.

To see an example of the decline of civilization, one needed only to read Sunday’s New York Times for April 4. There on the first page of a back section was a color photograph of three Iraqi boys either pointing to, or cheering because of, a human penis hanging from a telephone line. The NYT helpfully informed us that it was a “body part” removed from one of the four Americans whose death in Fallujah last week was the opening round in the current Iraqi counterattack against their American occupiers.

Remembering the NYT motto of “All the News that’s Fit to Print” and remembering that during Europe’s Dark Age, Baghdad was a world center of learning in medicine and mathematics, I find it hard to determine where civilization has declined the most.

It’s not that the NYT doesn’t have the right to publish the picture (they do), it’s that the publication adds nothing to our knowledge of Iraq, the insurgents, or anything else while being offensive to the relatives of the deceased. It’s not illegal. It’s just not a decent thing to do.

The invitation to be guest blogger caught me totally by surprise. To introduce myself, I spent some time thinking about ground rules. Here they are:

1. Any references to pop culture are limited to people and events prior to 1969, which is when I stopped paying close attention. (I do know who Madonna and Paris Hilton are, but then, sex sells)
2. No references to dirty old men in America are permitted. We’re Viagra-enhanced geriatric adult natives (VEGANs) References to dirty old men of other nationalities are permitted.
3. Any defamatory or derogatory comments making reference to George W. Bush, John Ashcroft, Donald Rumsfeld or the Patriot Act are welcome.
4. Any defamatory or derogatory comments making reference to Michael Moore, Al Franken, John Kerry or Terry McAuliffe are welcome.
5. References to justice, fairness, adherence to basic American principles of fair play and decency are welcome, but in the interests of accuracy, should not be used in conjunction with either (3) or (4) above.
6. Political comments must be avoided except for the ones made be me. . . . . . . . .OK, you too, but don’t overdo it!
7. How about them (fill in the name of your favorite sports team).
8. How about that (fill in the name of your favorite celebrity who has recently exposed his or her private parts in public).

All of that said, let me tell you about myself. When Greg announced, he was about to be an uncle (see, archives, “Say Uncle”), my careful evaluation of the etymological derivations of “uncle” indicated that it necessarily followed I must soon be a “grandfather.” Knowledge that a man is about to become a “grandfather” is part and parcel of the realization that he is becoming a VEGAN. (see above)

For example, pretty waitresses now refer to me as “Pops” or “Gramps” and offer me their help out of my seat instead of offering me their phone number. (Not-so-pretty waitresses also refer to me as Gramps, but I wouldn’t want their phone number. Waiters don’t seem to do this get-familiar-with-aging-people thing)

The teenage box boys and girls offer to take my groceries out to my car. It would be one thing if that was limited to a two-shopping-cart major errand, but when I buy a quart of milk and a loaf of bread?  At the movies and chain restaurants, I get the senior discount without asking.  I haven’t been carded when I order booze since Kennedy was president!  Getting old means one is going to die. (Getting old first is not, as we lawyers say, a “ necessary condition precedent.” Lots of young people go too.) But, as Saroyan said, “ Everybody has got to die, but I always believed an exception would be made in my case.” I know I will not be an exception because I am receiving announcements for “tasteful pre-need planning.” I don’t need to plan, thank you very much, because I won’t be here to worry about it. It’s my family that needs to plan!

Finally, I plan to be very topical, focusing on the common wisdom, which usually isn’t.  I am a realist, which means I don’t believe anything or anybody unless it meets the test of verifiability. So, I may spend some time talking about the nonsense I see around me.  A good place to see some of what I am talking about is to look at Walter Olsen’s blog. To start with, does anybody think that taking vitamins and minerals will change the size or shape of any bodily structure?

You do? Uh-oh . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . this is going to be a long week!