HAPPY HALLOWEEN – 10 seconds until Christmas

From my (crazy) family to yours… HAPPY HALLOWEEN.

Now that Halloween is over, the clocks are back – we are on the fast track to Christmas. Get ready for the traditional holiday bad behavior – although I promise to behave more or less!

MisterWriter

A LIGHT DISTRACTION – 1 WEEKEND, 5 SCRIPT PAGES TO A PROMPT!

I won’t win the Academy Award for the Best Screenplay in under 5 Pages, but it is a whole lot of fun and a distraction from the day to day gruel that predominates all other thoughts. 

I’m talking about the NYC Midnight Screenwriting Championships that I am now doing for the 2nd time. The premise is simple – you register and are assigned a group number. At a designated time on a Friday night (late), you are emailed the GENRE, the SETTING and an OBJECT and you have until Sunday night (late) to submit a fully developed 5 page screenplay that covers the topic assigned.

It is now Round Two and I have submitted by screenplay for that round which I cannot share with you until the results come back in November. But the first round is open to share now, so here it is.

The Genre was Science Fiction, the Character was a Veterinarian and the Object was a Carton of Cigarettes!

Fun, eh?

CLICK HERE to read the my submission - ENCOUNTERED. You may give feedback.

Round Two which I will post later (mid-November) had a Genre of Historical Fiction, a Setting of a Funeral Home and the Object was an Alarm Clock.  Even more fun.

You can view the NYC Midnight site HERE. There are some prizes including having your script viewed by some solidly useful Hollywood types, but for me it is a great way to break the monotony of a recessed economy life and fly!

MisterWriter

The New CONCORDIAN is available - FREE

The new issue of The Concordian is available online and at street locations throughout the city of Concord. Click the image to read it online. 

-MisterWriter

WATCH OUT FROM ABOVE!

Every once in awhile nature reminds us that we’re just not that smart. Case in point – Oct 8 an asteroid enters the atmosphere and explodes over Bone, Indonesia. The explosion was so large that Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) listening posts more than 10,000 km away were triggered to it.

Some great video footage can be seen below. My thoughts – no one knew this bad boy was coming. A little closer to Bone and that may have been all that was left of the Indonesian city.

 

 

Similar events have happened in Canada and other locations with scientists predicting an Earthly collision with one of these near Earth objects every few years. 

No one knew! 

Meantime, the Sun is cooking! Flare activity is increasing and depending how well you want your steak cooked…

Don’t just check the weather – check out SpaceWeather.com

MisterWriter

MISTERWRITER’S “HOW TO FIX THE COUNTRY”

Idea One- Secure the borders with popular support

It is time for some creative solutions to problems that appear to drag on without resolution.

SECURE OUR BORDERS:

First, build a wall stretching the entire border with Mexico. This would employ a lot of people for a good length of time.

 

The wall has enclaves every six feet or so and is wired for high speed internet. Install coin operated video game consoles and stools. The gaming revenue will fund the wall, provide eyes and ears for illegal crossing 24/7 and, if you legalize gambling, slot machines could be included for even more revenue.

The Wall would become a tourist destination, part Great Wall of China and part American ingenuity at work. Hotels and motels would spring up along the same route that the wall follows catering to the gamers and gamblers.  Loan companies, lawyers and bail bond companies would also thrive.

For add “protection” we could even build a similar wall at the Canadian border.

MisterWriter

FRIDAY FLU UPDATE – THE SWINE WINS

As promised, ongoing reports of the upsurge of H1N1 round two and it appears that even before we hit our winter season the dreaded swine has taken root quite firmly.  With the shots available mid-November, my opinion now from the upsurge in activity and the focus of the deaths on younger kids that the potential risks of the vaccine, now lessened by the thousands across the world who have received the shots, is now acceptable compared to the loss from the virus itself. Certainly I am not willing to risk the life of my two young children against the statistical odds of a fatality.

I say this tempered against the fact that I know my family has been exposed to the H1N1 on several occasions, through school associated infections, as well as children who have passed through our house with siblings with confirmed infections. And the likelihood remains that all will be fine – that my family will pass through this without injury, but nonetheless, the risk is there.  Since my only concern was the safety of the vaccine, I believe that quantities of people having been vaccinated is enough of a control group to put my concerns at ease.

Anyone else having revised thoughts?

MisterWriter

SOME OCTO-JUSTICE IN THE WORLD

 

Everyone’s favorite fertility gone wild story has had an added twist – while OctoMom still basks in the shadow of her notoriety, her fertility doctor got the boot for repeated violations of his professional group’s standards.  Um – what standards? Click the orange to read more…

I think Kate, from the formerly Jon & Kate plus Eight should move in with OctoMom. Now there is a whole new TV show in the making! They can all go hang with Sarah Palin for some solid ‘rogue’ bonding.

MisterWriter

ALMOST 11,000 UNIQUE VISITORS A MONTH – THANK YOU VERY MUCH

In these difficult times, it is heartening to  find good news in the fray.  In this case, the site statistics for MisterWriter have shown a steady growth over the past few years. As of today I am showing almost 11,000 unique visitors to the site each month. To me that is huge and I am shocked.

I’ve done some checking around, comparing other sites and local blogs. While I still have some ground to gain to catch up with Claycord.com – not that it is a goal, mind you – it seems that  10,893 unique visitors have surpassed most of the other blog sites, some touting these numbers as though akin to the tribe following Moses out into the desert. I don’t feel that way at all. I feel fortunate that anyone would want to read what I have to write. Thank you.

When I first started MisterWriter the site allowed me to vent my frustrations at inequities I saw in education.  I am not pretentious enough to claim that my ranting had any effect on the end result; nonetheless I was pleased to be a part of the changes that took place. I also met a lot of interesting people, many bloggers and many not.

MisterWriter is about expression. The first publication I was published in was called Expressionists Magazine. A prior publication I put out was called Expressions Magazine.  I believe in communication. Yes, I have my views. Yes, I am happy to argue them with you.  No, I am not always right. What I am is inquisitive. I am the writer who observes, the one who takes in the ambience and attempts to find meaning. I am the one who waits to turn out the lights before leaving the room. I do not have an ulterior motive. I just want to live my life in peace.

MisterWriter is my way of trying to find reason and order and purpose where often none visibly exists. I am not after a cult following, but I am happy that many people seem to find this interesting enough to visit or read.  I also find it interesting that for the most part people read, but do not comment. Other sites have a different clientele.

I do hope that you will let me know topics that interest you. Please feel free to email me at andre@misterwriter.com. I am interested in what you have to say, even if you do not wish it printed or posted. I will always ask you first. My interests are wide and unbridled. From religion to aliens, politics to microbiology, a dabble in theoretical physics to how to cook the best rice dish. I’m game.

Another Friday looms ahead – I find that as I get older they tend to come faster. Life is not easy. Life is not fair. Like many others I make many stupid mistakes along the way. I’m human.  But as my wife so eloquently told me tonight – often times adversity drives people apart. For us it has brought our family closer. In the end, that is all that I have of worth. And with that I am a very rich man.

Thank you for your support and reading MisterWriter.  I am very appreciative and humbled.

MisterWriter

A NUCLEAR “I DIDN’T KNOW IS BETTER THAN I DIDN’T CARE”

Stick this one in with the “lube” reports that I have posted about recently, and a huge flag for those who blindly believe that if it has an official label it can’t be bad for you.  Who would have thought that anyone downwind from all those nuclear tests back in the “happy” 1950’s would have been exposed to high levels of radioactive isotopes as to increase their cancer rates?

 

Well, in fairness back then they just did not know, unless you are one of the conspiracy club members who see evil in everything. My point is that these high ranking people playing with the world’s most dangerous toy really did not know what to expect. Einstein’s formulas certainly showed that the energy discharge from such a weapon would be extremely high.

Nonetheless, watching whimsical pop-documentaries like The Atomic Cafe – whimsical by their sheer stupidity by what we know today; back then it was a training film – we can see how much like sheep the masses are; how the government and groups wielding power can subject us to experimentation whether it be on modified food, pharmaceuticals, vaccines or anything that has not been presented to us in a totally honest way. 

And therein lies the rub about society and those neat little blankets we all carry; the risk may be assumed by us, but it is not created by us. Click the color link to read more…

The winds carried Strontium-90, Iodine-129 and other lethal particles across a broad swath of the country. Infants who were bottle-fed, which was then considered the modern approach, were particularly vulnerable to the Strontium-90 that ended up in cows' milk.

Okay, all progress is made at the expense of someone else’s life, whether that someone is Madame Curie having toxic levels of exposure to radium, or the first guy who died from lung cancer because of cigarettes. If you fly in an aircraft long enough it may well crash. That is different from the aircraft manufacturer shortcutting a production piece that ultimately fails in flight and causes the crash.  Case in point; the TWA 747 that exploded some years ago because of  a spark igniting gas vapors in the wing fuel tank – some lawsuits settled the mess. Boeing never retrofitted a fix into the planes because recalling all those 747’s to repair would surely bankrupt the company. It was easier to allow the few to explode and settle

the lawsuit later. Good to know that the cattle on board don’t mind THAT lottery game, eh?

 

But a study released Tuesday documents the enhanced cancer risk that Baby Boomers face because of these long-ago atmospheric tests. Epidemiologist Joseph Mangano analyzed the lingering radiation in infant teeth (donated long ago by the parents of baby boys born in the St. Louis area between 1959 and 1961) and compared the results to contemporary cancer data from the subjects. "What we found out was shocking," Mangano said. "Persons who had died of cancer had more than double the Strontium-90 in their (baby) teeth than did healthy persons."

 

Smoking won’t kill you.  Digoxin (heart treatment) won’t kill you – usually!

Since 1993, there have been over 1,000 deaths can be linked to pharmaceutical drugs. It is also a widely reported fact that over 20 million people have at one time taken a drug that was eventually recalled. Newspapers and television alike are constantly reporting on recalled drugs and the lawsuits that are filed because of them. Billions of dollars are awarded every year to patients, as well as their surviving family members, who have incurred serious loss or injury due to the adverse effects of recalled drugs.

So what’s a little fallout between friends? Really? It’s not like your genes were so damned perfect anyway? You know, everything from that aluminum based anti-perspirant, to the high levels of oil based products inhaled by those of us by oil refineries, let alone the toxic by-product found in certain plastics when heated, Aspartame, Nutra-Sweet and all those fake sugars, cell phone radiation that already has fried your kid’s eardrums and brain cells (which explains a lot) and the hair dye that you are using to hide the gray so that you look like a forty year old version of eighteen all over again. The 8 cups of coffee a day and the high fat diet has already turned you into a bipedal guinea pig for one company or another.  And if you are really lame you will wear their branding for free even though you paid through the nose for their product.

So none of this is really surprising. – fish in a slowly heated pan that never know they are being cooked alive.

 

It takes a lot of lube to live in the world. Between fees, fines, lies and half truths, just who do you believe? Certainly you can’t turn to your priest – you never know where they’ve been.  And these days there are far too many family affiliations on the Megan’s Law Database. And forget about politicians – find one with integrity that has no tendrils to PACS or groups that have a mission.

The other extreme holds true in disclosure law. Almost everywhere you go in California you see a sign that tells you that the location has used products that have been shown to cause Cancer. Hell, you can’t change it – you need to go to that doctor. What do you do?  Why are they screwing up my happy little day of ignorance with this piece of crap paper telling me something that I can do nothing about?

It is because…they truly care!

MisterWriter

 

Liars and Thieves – all: Target Organic Food may not be Organic after all

Health-minded people beware – I’ve often wondered just how an underfunded and overworked agency like the FDA could tell whether the Organic label was real or false. The answer is that they are underpaid and overworked – they can’t.

However The Cornucopia Institute isn’t happy with Target claiming it lied about items being Organic. Click the colored text to read their article. 

“The Cornucopia Institute, announced this week that it had filed formal complaintswith the USDA’s organic program, and Wisconsin and Minnesota officials, alleging that Target Corporation has misled consumers into thinking some conventional food items it sells are organic.”

Why am I not surprised?  More and more all business is becoming legalized theft and the consumers, idiotic as we are in our quest for bargains, labels, status and whatever else grabs our fancy, are basically endorsing these company practices through our patronage.

Keep bending – there's still more to come.

MisterWriter

BEND OVER FOR MORE BANK/CREDIT CARD SERVICING

Continuing on from yesterday’s gripe about getting screwed by the credit card banking industry, here is a tidbit about how Congresswoman Maxine Waters, trying to contact three banks on behalf of upside down constituents found that even a member of Congress has to bend over…  It’s worth the watch!

 

 

Isn’t it time to put the muzzle on the banks?

Read yesterday’s rant HERE

MisterWriter

IT’S TIME TO LYNCH THE CREDIT CARD COMPANIES

Well I learned something today – it is perfectly legal for your credit card company to lower your credit limit and not tell you!  I learned this the hard way – after having received notice of a credit line increase, and transferring a balance to what would have been a lower interest rate on an existing card, we get a phone call telling us that not only has the limit been lowered but the check used to transfer the balance has now encountered an over limit level and was returned, with a fee for the decline.

This was with CITI on the ATT Card and you can imagine my opinion of that group right now. Operating business as legalized theft is a shoddy example of doing business the American way.

Calling some credit advocacy groups I learned that not only is this legal – they don’t have to give you notice because, I was told, “they are afraid that once you know the lower limit is coming you will run out and charge up to the max,”  - but also they have the right to close your account without notice as well.

What this does is to close the margin of your credit so that you look like you are maxing your cards out even when you didn’t – they did it for you. And that affects your credit score.

Legally, they have to notify you waaaaaay ahead of time that they will jack up your interest rate, but that’s where the notification system breaks down in their favor.

The person I spoke with added that the latest thing that credit companies are doing is charging you a fee for paying your balance in full when the bill comes, instead of carrying a debt.

Is it just me or does this sound like drug dealer tactics?

What a bunch of crooks. I have excellent credit, and yet I find that legally I am powerless to react to this action. The only reason I took advantage of the opportunity to transfer funds was that the rate was better.  Sure, I plan to file a complaint. Sure, it will tell them that I will make it my life mission to bad mouth their company wherever possible while I still have breath in my body. But the truth is they do not care.

I’ve been told there is legislation coming to correct this problem. It seems like taking them out and stringing up the nearest tree works better for me.

Like the health insurance dilemma – the healthy don’t need it and the ill cant get it – credit card issuers run on the trick of tying a knot around your private parts and being able to yank hard at will. All while telling you how damn special you are and how the really love their customers.

Yeah, I feel so damn loved!

MisterWriter

STREET STUPID

What makes people so stupid that they can blatantly avoid rules of the road or societal rules in general? Following last night's fatal accident on Clayton Rd in Concord, I watched the YouTube videos of the police stings posted on Claycord.com and was amazed at the number of drivers that sped through the crosswalk while people were crossing. This isn't anything more than abject stupidity. But it is prevalent EVERYWHERE!

There are people who consider themselves above the law. These people won't stop at red lights, so long as they do not spot a cop; instead they speed up ignoring people on the street. They have no road manners and deserve whatever they get happening to them. Unfortunately the bad things do not usually happen to them; their stupidity affects everyone else.

Yesterday, on the way to Apple Hill for a family outing, traffic came to a halt as emergency crews worked on a family SUV that had flipped, landing upside down on the embankment. A car had cut it off.  As traffic slowly edged past, we could see a young child on the stretcher being worked on by paramedics. It did not look promising. 

Equally mind-numbing are the numbers of people who do not apply basic common sense when walking on the street. These people wear dark or black clothing, made worse if it is night time and even worse if they have darker skin coloring that makes it difficult for drivers to spot them.  I have seen this with the added element of a rainstorm wondering just what they were thinking when they set out – if they were thinking at all.

Another favorite are those ignorant fools who cross the road and look away from traffic, almost a silent plea for someone to strike them so that a lawyer can be called in. There are huge numbers of people of such arrogance that they will saunter past cars they have caused to stop, moving as slow as they can because they have the power to stop cars from moving.

And then there are those parents of spare children - you know the ones who allow their two year old to toddle way behind them as they cross busy roads, seemingly unconcerned whether their infant will get struck or snatched.

With the new hands free phone law I am amazed to see how many people translate this to mean hands free driving. I have seen women applying mascara while knee-steering, men shaving, and even one person reading a book.

There are still far too many people who allow their children to ride out of seat belts, and far too many tragedies where these free-floating children sail out the windshield in an accident leaving grief stricken parents who should have known better.

And the car as an extension of self has taken on new heights with the current "pimp my..." series of modifications that can turn a plain old Buick into a true pimp-mobile. Those super large wheels on elevated shocks or those miniature wheels on regular frames look equally stupid.  But not as stupid as the unbridled muffler off sounds of some piece of crap revving through the neighborhood. No doubt some hormone-imbalanced teen thinks he has the coolest ride out there.

One thing we take for granted is that life has a way of culling from the masses. The term “survival of the fittest” is no longer used because it has lawsuit potential.  We see it on nature shows – the baby elephant that wanders from its mother only to get attacked and eaten by the hungry tiger.  The whole reason for a collective of life, whether it be a city or not is that a safety factor exists in a group setting. Unless you are standing at the edge where the tiger gets you first. Its one thing when an animal in the wild knows no better. It is another when an a human chooses not to think beyond their selfish ignorance.

After all wasn't it Forrest Gump who coined the phrase: "Stupid is what stupid does?"

MisterWriter

IS CALIFORNIA DYING?

It is a grim sign when the rest of the country starts to edge its way slowly out of the recession while California remains bogged down in a seemingly endless crisis.  And it shows everywhere…

click the images to read the articles…

The budget gap that was closed last time was $14 billion and that took large hits to education and social programs that are still teetering as a result. Already the projected deficit through the end of this fiscal year is TWICE that?  Can you imagine that scenario?

Is California dying? Is there hope? What is the solution and how do we get there?

MisterWriter 

 

H1N1 UPDATE – PIG GETS NOSEJOB

As promised, an ongoing update. I’ve been watching the reports of side effects as well as the incidence of the flu virus itself. So far, the vaccine appears to be fine with the ever larger numbers of people getting the vaccine also acting as the test subjects for a large control group. Lucky them!

The virus appears to be fine as well – very widespread and leaving no areas unscathed. Nonetheless, the death rates appear to be standard.  Of course the CDC website stats has not been updated since Oct. 3rd, so hardly current information beyond isolated pockets of reports.

[Update: Sat 10/17/09 – the CDC has now updated their site and the general death rate has increased out of the normal range.

“The proportion of deaths attributed to pneumonia and influenza (P&I) based on the 122 Cities Report has increased and exceeds what is normally expected at this time of year.”/]

Click the colored links for some full H1N1 stories…

"The most striking thing is how rapidly the swine flu spread," Freedman says. "Although the H1N1 virus is fairly mild compared to a lot of other novel flu viruses, it is very contagious. Back in 1918 and 1919 when we had the great flu epidemic, it took six months or more to spread across the world.
"The new H1N1 swine flu spread across the world in six weeks."

In a new survey, Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) researchers found that just 40% of adults are "absolutely certain" they will get the H1N1 vaccine for themselves, and 51% of parents are "absolutely certain" that they will get the vaccine for their children….About the same percentage of parents (60%) who say they do not think they'll get the vaccine for their children would change their minds if H1N1 was causing sickness or death in their community….At this point in time, only about a third (33%) of the public sees the H1N1 vaccine as very safe "generally for most people to take." By comparison, the figure is 57% for the seasonal flu vaccine. A smaller fraction of the public thinks the H1N1 vaccine is very safe for particular groups to take, including children ages 6 months to 2 years (18%) and pregnant women (13%)….Public concern about a fall or winter outbreak of H1N1 has risen since June. Roughly three-quarters of the public (76%) believe there will be widespread cases of H1N1 this fall or winter with people getting very sick, which is an increase from June when only 59% felt the same way.

I have said from the start that my only concern was the safety of the vaccine. This has raised the ire of  many visitors to this site slamming that approach and trying to make anyone not running to get the vaccine appear stupid.

The fact is that there is enough data to show an endless amount of “safe” medical products and medications that were later pulled after a wider range of test subjects – users – had adverse effects; the same effects that pharmaceutical companies denied existing until enough people had died that avoidance no longer worked.

Being safe, especially in light of a less than globally fatal outcome for the current H1N1, is a sound practice. Considering that at the outset only a few hundred people had received a test vaccine hardly demonstrates a population safe result.

Now, as more people in many nations are getting the vaccine, the evidence is certainly clearer. A shame that people have to be the guinea pigs for product safety.

Had the H1N1 been worse, my position may well have been different earlier. The objective is to not have the cure end up worse than the disease.

And now there are new reports that people are giving the Swine Flu to pigs!  Go figure!

MisterWriter

 

2012 – THOSE DAMN MAYANS!!!!

With all the popcorn munching mouth breathers that go to the movies with their I-toys, and talking to their pals explaining to those hard of thinking types what is going on in the film, I try to avoid the movie theater at all costs unless it is a super late or super early show.  Really, $10 admission per person and $20 in a soda, popcorn, candy “deal?” Not.

An example – when I saw the last Star Trek movie, the day before the general release, there were ten people in the theater. My kind of show!

So with the upcoming 2010 movie next month, I am again planning to venture out. The previews look great. Just watching the world fall apart in high definition effects is amazing. Watching California tilting like a ship as it slips beneath the waves – inspiring.  What a great idea – destroy the world in a biblically inclined event. What a concept.

And based on Mayan prophecy? Hmmm…wait a minute. You want me to believe that a race that is functionally extinct these days can prove that the world would end just because their calendar did?  I don’t think so.  For one thing, fortune telling is just not something humans do really well. That and never learning from the mistakes of the past.  Besides, I had my money on global thermonuclear war as the end game.

Nonetheless, it looks like a good movie, if you like those kill everybody but the hero and his love interest type of films.

And no Mayans were killed in the making of this film either!  Click HERE to visit the site.

MisterWriter

CHARLIE BAGGETT - #15 ON BILLBOARD

Following the release of his debut CD “I Only Dream of You” the song has made the Billboard classical list at #15 HERE with the young singer on a tour that includes…

(from The Baggett Record Group…)

First Stop......
Charlie will be the musical guest of Voice of America's Larry London Show on Friday, October 16th. He will be performing live from Washington D.C. beginning at 11:05 Eastern time.  Here is the link!
Next stop.....
CBS TV in Ft. Myers, Florida!  Charlie will be the musical guest on WINK TV-one of South Florida's most popular stations!  October 19th on the Morning Show! 
Next Stop....
Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach!  No performance-just lots of airplanes to see and to visit the campus.
Next stop-  R and R in Orlando!
Other News:  Please check out his brand new-just launched Myspace!
www.myspace.com/charliebaggett.
Have a Myspace? Add Charlie.
Have a Facebook? Add Charlie.

Click the album cover to buy the album.

MisterWriter

YOU KNOW YOU’RE GETTING OLDER WHEN…

You realize that you had no idea about the In-N-Out Burger’s secret menu! I mean, come on, how foolish to think that they offered only Hamburgers, Cheesburgers, Double double and Fries! I feel utterly out of the loop.

They have a secret menu, one that only those people with no job, bad eating habits and too much free time could possibly know about.

Animal style burger - Mustard-cooked beef patty, additional pickles, extra secret sauce with grilled onions… it actually sounds disgustingly good!

And the list goes on.

Look, I don’t mind it when I find things have slipped by unnoticed by me, but this is a conspiracy of the worst kind –a sauce dripping, cloned workers, non-stop kitchen busy laugh at the stupid older customers kind of conspiracy.

Now watch, when I finally get around to ordering one of the secret items the crew will laugh at me and feign ignorance.

Pass the ketchup will ya?

MisterWriter

Did I mention it is raining just a ton?

It’s so great to be living in California where the weather is always sunny and thin, tanned, beautiful people roam the pristine beaches…

…and then there is California proper, shake and bake one minute, fruit and nut flakes the next, bake them cookies hard before drenching it with an end of summer reminder that the hills do actually look green for a short window of time.

Be careful out there – it is ugly and Californians do not know how to do rain!

MisterWriter

 

MICHAEL JACKSON – NEW SONG SHOWS YOU ARE WORTH MORE IN THE AFTER-LIFE

Forgetting the allegations and the weirdness, Bubbles, the Oxygen Chamber, the bizarre death from anesthetic, the bad plastic surgery, “Jesus Juice” and all that stuff - whether you liked Michael Jackson or not – MJ proved that a sagging career can be instantly revived in death, with magazine covers, books, documentaries, posters, reissued old songs and more. 

And then – who said the music stops when you stop breathing – out comes NEW MUSIC. The new album “This Is It” offers the new song with the promise of many more to come, much to the collective relief of the Jackson family.

It could be said that celebrity figures like Elvis and Michael Jackson are larger than life. And in their deaths they certainly prove this fact. Elvis is certainly enjoying enduring sales since his death many, many, many, many years ago, with fans still weeping at his tomb.

Me – I liked Michael Jackson best before the first plastic surgery, when he was still a talented good looking black guy with a great voice and dance moves that made most two-left-feet males envious.

But that was another life ago, wasn’t it? Click the video to see a bit of the behind the scenes followed by the song “This Is It.” 

MisterWriter

STOP – GO –GO SLOW…IT’S MONDAY TOO SOON

Just grumbling…

MisterWriter

BEFORE THE STORM – SATURDAY IN THE SUN

What can I say? Another ice cold beer would be nice right about now! It’s going to rain on Monday and Tuesday.

MisterWriter

MORE ON “GO NAKED AND RAISE MORE MONEY FOR SCHOOL SPORTS.”

I covered the Car Wash stories last week and the week before. You can click HERE to read them. And then ABC-7 news picked up on the Car Wash controversy – both scantily dressed girls and pulled down low speedo boys (complete with dollar bills hanging forth, it was said.)

Click the image to watch the ABC-7 news report by Cecilia Vega ( the newest member of the ABC-7 news team.)

 

Also interesting to see the mix of reactions. I find that there is always someone in every discussion who can be counted on to claim that the end justifies the means. For these people the money raised – about $1000 for the water polo team – justified the manner of solicitation –there were reportedly dollar bills hanging from pulled down low Speedos. Does it?  If you answer yes, then where do you draw the line? Should they just stand there naked and get more money? Where does appropriate stop and ridiculous start?

And then there are those people who just do not want to impose restrictions on anyone. To them, reports on blog sites and the news is just a waste of time. Kids will be kids. Boys will be boys. One site even stated how good it was to see how “hot” the boys’ bodies were. Enough said!

I do not have Victorian morals. Back then, a woman showing an ankle was considered of ill-repute. That was back in the day when divorce was a sign of lower class breeding and so scandalous that you would certainly lose your place in whatever social circles you had. Manners were in effect then, as well. Those days are long gone in just about every way.

Nowadays we have public displays where even the television will show a nude woman except for a small circular fuzzy patch where nipples would be. Why bother? Really! And if you want double standards, men are never shown in full frontal nudity with a fuzzy groin patch. Go figure.

The question of appropriate behavior of adults is one thing. At a school level, after years of trying to instill values of self-respect and decency, it should not be appropriate to permit any display of exhibitionism for a myriad of reasons including basic decency. 

And then a city like Walnut Creek or Pleasant Hill goes on high alert after a man tries to lure a teenage girl into his car, but thinks nothing of allowing a teenage girl to stand on a street corner pushing a car wash in a skimpy bikini? 

Where is that common sense line again? It seems to have gotten lost in the need for fundraising dollars to keep school sports going. Or should anything go, including the clothing if it brings in some much needed money?

MisterWriter

photo credit: by Mike Dunn

MORE H1N1 – A DOCTOR WHO WON’T GIVE THE VACCINE TO HIS OWN KIDS

An interesting listen…

Click HERE for more on Dr. Kent Holtorf. And HERE.

What do you think?

Thanks Cathy for the link.

MisterWriter

IS IT A GOOD PROGRAM – WELFARE/WORK?

With the cuts to the Welfare to Work program as part of the state’s budget solution, I am wondering whether the program actually helped get people back on their feet or whether it was another government program abused by people really wanting to stay home able to collect a better value on benefits and pay?

 

Click the image to read the story.

What are your thoughts?

MisterWriter

IT IS A BIG CRASH ON THE MOON – WATCH THE VIDEO

[UPDATE] It crashed – watch the video here.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

 

History in the making in just a few hours. At 4:30 am (PST) the Lunar Crater Observation and Sensing Satellite (LCROSS) will crash into the moon while its companion orbiter records the composition of the debris thrown off. All this to find water.

The debris plume will be visible with backyard telescopes. Wake the kids and check it out. It is exciting science in action.

Click HERE for the brochure detailing it.

MisterWriter

SO MANY CITIES-SO MUCH CRIME! EXCEPT CONCORD. Why?

Came across this great crime map – interactive from GOOGLE. punched in a few cities and… WOW! there is a TON of criminal activity out there.

Except for Concord, CA. Why?

Click the MAP to visit the site.

MisterWriter

CAN IT GET TO FRIDAY ANY SLOWER?

It seems like this week has just dragged on, which is untrue by the quantity of things that have taken place over the same time period. If  I were just sitting on my alter-brain and playing video games the week may have passed slowly; but I have been busy – loads of things in the works, some of which I will write about in the near future.

I know that for me the whole year has had this strange sense of being between two states of reality, pensive in apprehension of the things I am working on, while reticent in the pace that change seems to follow – slug slow! 

Perhaps it is just my perception of how the years gone by have been. Usually a year has a flavor, good or bad, something tangibly concrete that you can use as a marker for directions, achievement (or failure), as well as a time-sense. 

When I was a kid the weeks would flash by – oh look it’s Friday again –more beer!  And as much as people tell me that time speeds up as your age, and as much as I do agree with that statement, I find that the day to day of life has not sped up at all. There are just too few hours to get everything done and too many things to gripe about that need to be changed.

And perhaps that is more accurate a statement: there are too many things to gripe about and too many things that need to be changed and worse – there are too few people with the energy or the stamina to actually fight the good fight for change, anymore. 

And the pimped out Buick with ultra huge rims rolls by me with the bass on overload – thump bzzzzzt  thump bzzzzzt. And as the slovenly dressed twenty something looking more homeless than stylish in his dirty oversized white tee-shirt and oversized rectangular cut pants -  sagging so low that the front must be grabbed into a ball to hold them up – spits as we pass, I gaze skyward for the UFO only to realize that any intelligent life in the universe would have an “off-limit” sign on our planet.

Sigh!  Where’s Friday when you need it?

MisterWriter

Now this is VERY cool – Let’s share a virtual autopsy

Came across this very nice piece of technology in action – watch the video (it is not nasty.) 

The Virtual Autopsy Table from NorrköpingsVisualiseringscenter on Vimeo.

The ONLY thing that stood out for me was the small rotating circle when the operator selected a feature. The circular thing screamed out WINDOWS VISTA – which, while needing no added comment, seemed not to impede the device working well.  At least in the demo. get it home and no doubt there would be other issues.

MisterWriter

TAKE TWO FLU SHOTS AND DON’T CALL ME IN THE MORNING

More on the topic of the year.  From the California Department of Public Health, some statistics about the spread of H1N1 and the hospitalizations/fatalities.

As expected and reported on, most counties have had infections of H1N1 (see map) .

 

“The reported number of cases of H1N1 influenza (swine flu) in California do not reflect how many actual cases there may be in the state because individuals in outpatient settings are no longer being tested for the presence of the virus and many cases go undetected due to the mild nature of disease among most people. Laboratory testing is limited to individuals with serious H1N1 illness, including hospitalized patients, and those at high risk for complications. An update of the number of cases is published on a weekly basis to provide an estimate of H1N1 frequency among those patients being tested.”

The number of dead are reported, however, so it is safe to say that the percentage of people with H1N1 and dying is significantly lower than the available statistics since “many cases go undetected due to the mild nature of disease among most people.”

You can download a CDC information sheet on the H1N1 vaccine HERE.

An excellent paper on possible immunity to H1N1 and more details on the virus itself can be found HERE.

And from a CBS report:  “10)Should I get the 2009 H1N1 vaccine if I think I’ve already had the H1N1 flu?
The CDC told me "yes" - because the vast majority of patients diagnosed with 2009 H1N1 were not specifically tested for the virus. It may have been some other virus that made you ill. And even patients who had positive "quick tests" in the office for influenza A cannot be absolutely certain they had the 2009 H1N1 virus because the kits are sometimes wrong and because there’s a small chance that the strain of influenza A detected was NOT the 2009 H1N1. So the CDC recommends playing it safe and getting the both the regular seasonal vaccine and the 2009 H1N1 vaccine if you are in a group for which immunization is suggested.”

I do believe that this is one of those common sense vs. what you are told by professionals situations. You can stand your ground and decide that you have been exposed and thus do not need a shot, except that it may not have been the H1N1 and you do not know, or you can run to get the shot fearful that without it you run the risk of getting sick, exposing others, being exposed by others or some variant.  Or you can act prudently, observe the effects of the shot and the incidence of local infections/death in determining your course of action. 

Which are you?

Of course for those people with compromised immune systems this is not even a discussion – high risk individuals have a greater risk from not having the vaccine.

A unrelated study showed that only 74% of people attending a baseball game washed their hands after using the bathroom and 23% of food workers confessed that they did not wash  their hands before handling food. Now there is a glaring exposure to pathogens that deserves some attention.

MisterWriter