For those of you who don't know, I went back to school last fall to get my Associate's in Computer Technology. My long range goals are to get my Bachelor's in Business Administration, then head on to law school. Well, the first summer semester's out of the way, and I have no classes scheduled for summer 2. I'm going to knock out a few certificates over the "down" weeks (for me, there are NEVER "down" weeks...I'll also be working up the October Woody Guthrie tribute, so the devil won't have an...
D, Today you are twelve years old. Twelve years that have flown by too fast, leaving me reflecting back on the blur that was your first tooth, your first steps, your first ballgame, your first plane ride…all of those special firsts that will forever be part of my memory. I don’t know if there’s a way I can begin to explain how special these years have been to me, how special you are to me. I am proud to see you become the young lady you’re becoming and making the choices you make. In so ma...
Back when I was 10 or 11, I was busted shoplifting. Not long before, a friend had shown me the "cool" way to lift items from the store, and I got greedy. With an unnaturally protruding belly shaped oddly like a Dolly Madison fruit pie and a can of Dr. Pepper, I attempted to exit the store. The store owner caught, me, I was taken home, and I had to face the punishment. I think I put in something like 20 hours of community service for those snacks I never got to taste. Lesson (mostly) learned. ...
I was doing a little research on an unrelated item and I came across this little gem: http://www.enidnews.com/enidnews/homepage/local_story_088004854.html Now, this particular paper's newspaper forums are particularly prone to censorship (can we say "irony", boys and girls?) so I'll post my thoughts here. Although this article is slightly dated, it lauds the Texas Alcoholic Beverage Commission for its program of sending officers into bars to arrest patrons for public intoxication on t...
(Note: The following is work product that I may or may not use at a future time) Over the years, I've worn many hats. I've been (in no particular order): a groundskeeper for a cemetary, an office assistant, a dishwasher, a bus boy, a fry cook, a factory worker for a fireworks company, a printer, a fast food restaurant attendant, a car wash attendant, a factory worker for a crutch factory, manager of group homes, stockboy at a WalMart, an underground miner, a plumber, a paperboy, a suppor...
<a href=" http://bbspot.com/News/2003/01/os_quiz.php"><img src=" http://www.bbspot.com/Images/News_Features/2003/01/os_quiz/os2_warp.jpg " width="300" height="90" border="0" alt="You are OS2-Warp. You're plagued by feelings of abandonment and disgust for your backstabbing step-brother. Oh, what might have been."><br>Which OS are You?</a> "
As the headlines of the sports sections around the country focus on Barry Bonds' chase for the AMERICAN home run record (Japanese baseball fans do not need to ask why the word "American" is in caps!), it is only natural for people to have a sour feeling towards professional sports. After all, Bonds has been cast, rightly or wrongly, as the epitome of the selfish athlete, and there are many who do not want to see Hank Aaron's record fall. And so, it is even more stunning, more beautiful when w...
Of course the lliberals are going to be all over George W. Bush's commuting of "Scooter" Libby's prison sentence. And while it is a curious move, to say the least, for the leader of a party desperately foundering in the polls, it is inconsistent in every way for liberals to criticize this move. First we must consider what good the incarceration of Libby would serve. While liberals press for early release for violent criminals, it is odd that they would even consider locking up nonviolent crim...
There's been a lot of talk about Guantanamo Bay. I find it quite disturbing that so many from the Republican camp believe that our government can do absolutely anything it wants to Gitmo detainees because they are terrorists, especially and most tellingly, without having to PROVE those allegations in a court of any standing. What disturbs me the most is the issue of human rights. Do you believe in human rights as our founding fathers did? The simple, plain truth of the matter is this: IF you ...
We've all seen the sitcom scenario. Junior trashes the family car then tries to hide the damage from the cheap auto repair. But try as he might he cannot hide the damage and the car is irrevocably scarred, even worse than it was when Junior ran it into the utility pole. Junior now faces consequences FAR worse than he would have faced had he simply faced up to the music. LW wrote a wonderful heart rending article that tells this story from a woman's perspective. One who has been there. One who...
It has sat there on the shelf for allmost ten years. Since before I played guitar, long before Texas. It has haunted me, jeering at me in my creative hours, begging to be finished, begging to be made whole so that it can be the masterpiece it was meant to be. "It" is a song I started years back. A song based on a fantasy of a chance meeting with an old folksinger (a la Woody Guthrie/Bob Dylan). Onlly in my song, the old folk singer has given in to the ravages of alcoholism and age, and the ch...
Over the years, I've come to believe that one of the greatest failings the church has is in bearing up one another's burdens. I firmly believe that if the church were operating properly, there would be no need for government welfare, and less need for psychiatric hospital (yes, before you say it, I am aware that many mental disorders are organic in nature and are best treated with medication. But many more are not, and many people's burdens could be lifted simply by the presence of a good, true ...
Tonight was our Friday night jam session. For those who've kept up this week, I put together song lyrics I'm pretty proud of ( Link ), and when I went in to the jam session, I pulled a couple of friend aside. I've never really written music before and needed a little help. As I sang the song a capella, we decided that it works best in the key of "G". We put together some rough tablature, with a little trial and error. The chorus begins in "C", and the arrangement is pretty simple. I decided ...
On a summer day just shy of twelve years ago, we brought our oldest girl, Destiny Marie, home from the hospital. As young, new parents, we spent many hours discussing the future we had for our new daughter, who, of course, was practically perfect in every way. She would not watch TV outside of a few videos, she would not date when she was a teenager (we still believe the idea of courtship is far closer to God's way of selecting a mate...but discussing that here would set this blog far afield), a...
Link This is the kind of thing that really annoys me. For years, I have heard the assertion that we are a nation that hates children, but it is only within the last year or so that I am becoming more certain that is true. William and Rachel Poczatek's young girls played regularly in the backyard pool, laughing and squealing as children do. Their neighbours had them charged with violating a noise ordinance as a result. Although a judge dismissed the complaint, this, in my opinion, shows ho...