State of Unions

The state of my union is good. Wifey takes very good care of me and together we try to take good care of J. Not much more to say on that.

As to the State of THE Union. In most measurable terms, health care, real wages, economic and political security, the great majority of Americans are worse off than when Junior took office. The right wing continues to besmirch the Clinton years as the worse thing that ever happened to America, but it's simply not true, so I don't get it. And it's not just the recent downturn. The clown in office now in incomparably worse.

Good part of the state of the Union. We are less than a year away of dumping Junior. There's an election campaign going on and we have more legitimate choices than we may ever have had before. Record numbers of people are voting in the primaries. These are good things. There's some hope for the future.

No on Casino Props.

I know I'm just jumping to another random topic, but I can't help it. My mind gets all over the place and California's got a lot of strange things on the ballot again.

Anyway, it would be sort of nice to have the largest casinos in America right next door to my parents in Riverside county, but there are many reasons to vote no.

1. No minimum wage. There seems to be some sort of funky exemption that means these casinos don't have to pay what everyone else needs to get paid.
2. No Cal OSHA. These casinos have also been exempted by workplace safety regs.
3. No unions. Although unions are "encouraged". That means there isn't going to be anybody to argue for workplace safety or minimum wage.

Yeah, the state would earn some cash as would 4 of the 100+ indian tribes in California, but that doesn't seem like enough.

Upcoming Story

I've just been notified that another on-line journal has accepted one of my short stories for publication. They've asked for a bio sketch. For some reason that's a lot more stressful to me than actually submitting the story. I mean, what do I want to say about myself? It's not like I do this professionally. Can't the story just stand for itself? I guess I should welcome the marketing opportunity, but until I have that novel to promote, I don't have much to say.

It's unlikely, but I'm also curious if this story stirs up any controversy for folks. The religious right could end up denouncing me. So in the near future, I think I'm going to offer up some explanation as to my thoughts behind this piece and for me the very uncomfortable topic of religion. But for now, let me just make two sweeping statements that I'll get to later.
1. I believe in God.
2. I accept evolution as scientific fact.

Teaching the game.

I was just thinking to myself, babies are like power forwards. It's all about results and not about style. And given the chance, they want to finish the play themselves. It's our roles as their first basketball coaches to develop their inner point guard. We need to teach them to distribute the ball, to have the court vision to see the whole play before it develps, to control the tempo.

SO far, little J isn't much of a passer.

Bad Tea

Just a small gripe today. I'm not a palatte person. I'm not a food snob at all. But I had a Lipton Pure Leaf Iced Tea with my lunch today and it was sort of disappointing. Tea in America tastes like over sugared swill. In China, they have several grades of tea. I think the best grade they let out to stupid Americans is Grade D and yet why not? We drink that stuff.

Gashed

I took a pretty hard foul going in for a lay-up at basketball last night. Honestly, I think it was borderline between being a good hard foul and a cheap shot. I had already released the ball. And if the defender had been legitimately going after the ball instead of me, I don't think there is anyway I should have ended up crashing into the bleachers. I've got a nice sized gash along my right forearm. It's not very deep, but today it still stings a little.

I've played basketball for years. I've fouled and I've been fouled. I'm not one of those players who goes out looking for contact, but I play aggressively and probably get fouled a little more than average. I get that. But as I think about it today, I do think the foul, if not completely uncalled for, at the least showed extremely poor judgement on the person who committed the foul. The ball had been released and it wasn't going to change the outcome of the play one way or the other.

Not that it's going to change this person, but I'll have to mention this to him next week. As with most of the guys I play with, he's a decent fellow off the court. He just needs to show better judgment on the court.

Recent Randoms and Writing update.

Little J is at that stage where I'm constantly reminded of onomatopoeia and the word, pitter-patter.

These are fascinating times, watching the country choose its next leader. It's important, and encouraging that more people seem to be paying attention. Still, I worry, that people get wrapped up in the pundit heavy news cycles and can't distinguish the real news out there, from the not real news that looks like real news. Just try to keep all that in mind. The media will never be as good a safe-guard as the thinking mind.

The other day I imagined America as a person. Right now, she'd be sitting on the couch, trying to figure out what she wants in life, with all kind of conflicting thoughts, and only knowing it needs to change. That's what our country looks like right now.

As always, one of my resolutions for the new year is to try and work on my writing more. Yes, I'm still working on the beginning of my novel. It's been interesting. With a short story, I usually don't need a whole lot of creative thought before I start typing. I-I is usually enought. For a novel, I feel like things need to be worked out a lot more before you can write meaningfully. Sort of like in my head the thoughts have to go I---------------------------------------------------I before I can really get into it. That's why after a year, I'm still on my first few pages. Much tougher work.

New Year Randoms

Doesn't the college football season seem to be dragging on forever. I liked the old days where the season just ended with the bowl games all on one day. Or maybe its just that the games have been pretty bad this year.

And so it begins. The countdown really feels like it starts today with the Iowa Caucus. Hopefully, we'll do better this time. Not that we really chose Junior anyway. Nine old people in DC did that to us.

It was tough coming back to work today. As the alarm went off and it was still very very dark outside, I thought about how nice it would be to be retired, to not have to go up and do that thing I get paid for again. It had been so much better just lazing around the house like I'd just done all week. If I could just find someone to pay me to do nothing, that would be good.

Actually, Wifey and I did tackle one small project. I've mentioned before I've got really bad hands. I can't do much of anything. And house projects scare me. I know my lack of ability and I worry that anything I try will just end up a disaster, lowering the value of my home and costing more time and money and heartache than I can handle. I guess I'd say I'm afraid of breaking anything I touch.

But over the break, we managed to make our way down to Home Depot and buy supplies and painted Little J's nursery. Wifey had been irritated by the numerous marks on the walls in that room as well as a couple obvious holes in the plaster. Anyway, the paint job isn't up there with Monet or Picasso. Or probably even Tim Allen, but it's pretty much the color we were hoping for. Overall a serviceable job, but nothing to brag about. I wonder if Little J notices the difference. I wonder if someday in the future she will.