"The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well." -Ralph Waldo Emerson

BIRD-BRAIN

From TMZ posted 5/6/09: Official photo of Sony Dong, who was busted recently by the Feds for smuggling songbirds into the U.S. from Vietnam. Dong has been charged with three counts of illegally importing wildlife, three counts of importing goods by means of false statement and conspiracy. What a ding-DONG!

HAPPY MEAL INDEED!

According to a report on PMSnbc, a 7 year-old Swiss girl found a condom in her McDonald's Happy Meal..among the french fries! My, my, my; many scenarios are playing about in my warped brain. Swiss police said Monday they were investigating where the condom came from and how it got into the Happy Meal. They said an analysis was being done to determine if the condom posed a health risk. (Translation: they are looking it over to see if it was used or not!) YUCK! I hope the condom was unused and the poor girl doesn't get sick, because if she does, I will feel guilty for laughing about this.

" In the End, we will remember not the words of our enemies, but the silence of our friends"
-Martin Luther King Jr. (1929-1968

JUST...WHY???

SOAPS--MY GUILTY PLEASURE

I've watched Soaps since I was a pre-teen, and I have been following the same ones since then (CBS soaps). However, I can only watch one nowadays on my lunch hour now that I have a 9 to 5'er--The Bold and the Beautiful. One of the reasons is obvious: I like to look at the hot men! The other reason it that they are extremely funny to me. The cliches, one liners and chick battles are most entertaining. I love the powerful bitchy mavens and the trouble they cause, like my favorite, Lucinda on As the World Turns. She is not being shown too often lately, and I miss her sarcasm, witty remarks and haughtiness. I swear she ad libbed a lot of her lines. I also love plot lines with rivalries among business moguls like the one among Victor Newman/Jack Abbot/Brad Carlton in The Young and the Restless, and the Everybody vs. Alan Spaulding in The Guiding Light. Right now I'm getting a huge kick out of Ridge Forrester vs. Rick Forrester on B&B. I will now give myself some B&B eye candy!
RICK--HOT!

RIDGE--HOTTER!!

"The problems of the world cannot possibly be solved by skeptics or cynics whose horizons are limited to the obvious realities. We need men who can dream of things that never were." --John Keats

TO HELL WITH CATNIP

Pictured is the bong-like contraption that Acea Schomaker of Lancaster County stuffed his girlfriend's cat into and smoked marijuana from it. Scomaker said that he constructed it in such a way that it wouldn't immerse the cat in too much smoke. He also said that he did it to calm the cat down, because it would bite and scratch both him and his girlfriend and they feared it would be euthanized if they took it to an animal shelter. AWWWWWW, such a kind thing to do! Schomaker was caught after local sheriff's deputies responded to a domestic disturbance at his residence. He was quoted as saying, "Every time we took her (the cat) out she would pretty much just lay down and proceed to clean herself and act like a stoned person". NO SHIT!

McMELTDOWN!

A Fort Pierce, Florida woman, Latreasa L. Goodman, called 911 THREE times after being told by McDonald's employees that they were out of Chicken McNuggets and was refused a refund. Stated Ms. Goodman, "This is an emergency. If I would have known they didn't have McNuggets, I wouldn't have given my money, and now she wants to give me a McDouble, but I don't want one." She was cited on a misuse of 911 charge, but was sent a gift card for a free meal because she should have gotten a refund. Personally, I think she should have also gotten a McBoot in the arse!

OBAMA HEALTH PLAN: KEY POINTS

*Expand Medicaid eligibility to include greater numbers of the uninsured
*Mandate coverage for children
*Create a national exchange through which the uninsured could purchase a public or private policy
*Provide subsidies to lower-income individuals and small businesses to help defray the cost of purchasing insurance
*Tax medium- to large-size firms that decline to provide their employees with health insurance. (This point irks me!)
*Small businesses would be exempt from mandatory coverage or contributions and would receive a tax credit of up to 50% on health care premiums for employees.

I have A LOT of questions regarding this plan, the dominant one being how will this be paid for?

As I said above, I have an issue with imposing a punitive tax on certain businesses that opt out of providing insurance to their employees. This is the land of the FREE--free choice included. That means the employers should make the decision without fear of governmental penalty whether or not they will provide health insurance. Additionally, people are free to choose jobs that provide health insurance. This may sound too simple and maybe a little unsympathetic, but I believe in a free market society and freedom of choice, not governmental control.

My first job: food service

I was only 14 and my mom came home from work one night and asked me if I was interested in working as a dishwasher at the restaurant she was working in. I took the job and that was the start of my +-20 year career in the restaurant industry. It was a very small, upscale Italian restaurant and I had been there with my father & brother to pick up my mom, and I was fascinated with the place. It had a 'mafia' theme, complete with a 'Godfather Table' , fake machine gun in a violin case as a wall decoration, and a giant charcoal sketch of Marlon Brando as Vito Corleone in The Godfather. My mother had to wear a black silk shirt, black short skirt, black beret, white tie and white gun holster (with a cap gun in it!) as her uniform. The male waiter had to wear the same, minus the skirt, of course. I have many fond memories of my time there (14-17)

I just joined Twitter to see what it's all about, and Shaquille O'Neil is one of the people you can follow. This is one of his best tweets:

"People n phoenix u have 5 min to touch me I have 2 laker tickets n my hand I'm on a corner at a bus stop" -- Shaquille O'Neal

Can you believe that? I wonder if anyone saw his post and touched him to get the tickets?! Well, he did say on his Twitter profile that he was going to "perform random acts of shaqness".

I WAS A CUCKOO?!

I was just reading posts commenting on a short interview in US News & World Report with Deborah Kotz, an author who feigned mental illness to investigate three different mental health facilities she checked herself into. The name of her book is Voluntary Madness: My Year Lost and Found in the Loony Bin (Viking, 2008).The interview and the following comments were intriguing to me, because I myself have suffered from a mental illness (clinical depression) and have been treated both as an inpatient and outpatient. Yes, mental illness is a serious condition and it is extremely important for those in need to be very cautious in choosing the facility in which to receive treatment (if they have a choice, that is!!!) and the truly mentally ill need compassion like everyone else. However, I am a person who believes that humor is so important in life and sometimes we cannot take ourselves too seriously. Yes, the previous statement is a lead-in to something people may consider offensive, but I feel okay with it because I don’t mean to offend anyone and I have a heart for the mentally ill. All of us have quirks, anyway. Okay-- so I found the following post which made me laugh hysterically. I don’t know if this person is truly crazy or just making some jackass comment to rile people up, but it struck me as incredibly funny and I want to post it!!!! Also, it gave me a visual of my first ex-husband doing this to himself…I CAN’T HELP IT!!!

"I avoid going to hospitals or clinics when I am feeling depressed, it costs way too much!! I have learned to treat myself at home. I just get good and drunk and hook myself up to my little machine I made.
I took a momentary contact switch, similar to a doorbell button, a ballast for fluorescent light bulbs, and just attach the output leads to various places on my body, such as my elbows
knees or fingertips, or between my toes, plug it in and sit down and watch some good comedy on TV, while knocking off a six-pack of beer and a pint of BACARDI 151 rum, when something on the show gives me a good laugh, I just tap the button once or twice. When I wake up in the morning I feel a whole lot better and I ask myself (WHAT DEPRESSION)!!!
I am ready to take on the world! DON’T GET IN MY WAY!"

I’m still laughing! Some people took offense to a comment that the author made about the facilities having a great pool of characters to write about, including the staff. Here again, I can’t blame her because I did the same thing. I had a horrible bout of post-partum depression after my lovely daughter was born and I was in an abusive relationship at the time, so one night I thought I was going stark-raving mad with anxiety and I checked myself into a local hospital. When I got into the mental unit, (my mom came along with me for moral support), I looked around at the other patients and said to my mom, “Oh my God! I’m in ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOOS NEST!” We couldn’t help but laugh. I said that because I was depressed and anxious but I didn’t feel “crazy”, for lack of a better word. Most of the other patients had issues like mania, schizophrenia and psychosis. I felt like I didn’t belong there and I was using humor to cope and to ease my mother’s fear. Thank God there was no Nurse Cratched !! I also passed the time by giving certain people nicknames, like the woman with schizophrenia who stole my John Grisham book. I called her The Mumbler because she was constantly walking around mumbling to herself. Judge me if you will. My good friend Stephen & I used to do the same thing when we were doing the city club circuit. There were regulars at certain clubs and we had code names for them. At one club there was Robert Smith (from The Cure), Cali Surfer Dude, and The Turtle. At another there was Marilyn (Manson, not Monroe) and Jesus—he didn’t look like Jesus, he just had this certain dance move where he would stand still and fling out his arms in a crucifixion-style pose, shirtless. I’M CRACKING MYSELF UP JUST THINKING ABOUT THIS STUFF. I haven’t thought about these club characters in a while. I worked my way through college as a waitress and did the same thing with customers...YOU may have been one of -em!! More about that another time!

MOST PIERCED WOMAN

The world's most pierced woman, Elaine Davidson, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, has added to her collection with a 6,005th piercing, the U.K.'s Telegraph reported. She added that many of her new piercings are internal...OUCH!

WHAT WE DIDN'T HEAR AT OBAMA'S SPEECH

PELOSI (breathlessly) "Happy Fifth Week...To You. Happy Fifth Week..To You. Happy Fifth Week, Mister Pwez-i-dent, Happy...Fifth...Week...To...You..."
BIDEN (to himself): "I'll be damned! He said 'nobody messes with Joe'. Now I can take on Hillary!"

TAKE THIS,PETA!

Designer Bruno Frisoni for Roger Vivier designed these shoes--The Dovima, as the shoe is known. Yes, those are rose pink-dyed taxidermy birds perched delicately on each toe. Each stuffed bird also has a crystal-encrusted head and is further complemented by 24 ct gold-coated mesh, silk, ribbons, and crocodile-skin rosettes. Plus every pair comes with special protective crocodile or snakeskin platforms that attach before you wear them to keep the shoes from ever touching the ground. All for just $43,000 and three months of waiting after you order.

HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY

MY AFFORDABLE DREAM CAR

I was just killing a few minutes by reading an article from a writer covering the 2009 Detroit NAIAS, which was accompanied by a slideshow of 10 significant Mustangs. The above was one of them-- the 2007 Shelby GT500! I freakin' love it! I have wanted one since the very minute I first laid eyes on it. The reason I call it my affordable dream car (a bit of an oxymoron) is that we could afford it but my hubby says "Dream On!" when I tell him we're getting one--says I have a lead foot, tailgate and I will end up killing myself and/or someone else with it. Yes, I am tempted to speed from time to time, but I don't tailgate!! Anyway, I'm gonna get that car someday, the 2010 version, in silver with black stripes! I promise I'll wear a helmet...

That said, I'll show you my Unaffordable Dream Car (SIGH!) The 2010 Bentley GTC Speed. SLEEK and SEXY!

I'M FO SHIZZLE DIZZLE!

"There's not a hoax," Phoenix said. "Might I be ridiculous? Might my career in music be laughable? Yeah, that's possible, but that's certainly not my intention."
******************************************************************************
He looks like he's channeling Jim Morrison in this pic; not looking like a rapper at all.

Whatever his intention, whether it be an actual transition to music or an elaborate, Andy Kaufmanesque stunt, I can't get enough!! Watch the YouTube video of him rapping to promote his new movie or his recent appearance on Letterman! FUNNY, FUNNY STUFF!

Joaquin is such an excellent actor that I hate to think he's finished acting for good. If Casey Affleck is actually going to produce the documentary he's filming of Joaquin's "career change", that is definitely a must see for me.

BEEF--IT'S WHAT'S FOR DINNER!

In addition to being incredibly insensitive and insulting to African-Americans, the PETA ad comparing the AKC to the KKK IMO is ideologically inaccurate and it bugs me that these idiots don’t know their history. PETA accuses the AKC of creating a “master race” of canines which, in their minds, likens it to the KKK. It was the NAZIS under Hitler, not the KKK, that believed in creating a master race and, as we all know, committed widespread, egregious acts of violence against Jews, gypsies, and other “undesireables”, culminating in the Holocaust.
Although the KKK is as loathsome a racist, anti-Semitic organization as the Nazi Party, it never attempted to “create’ a master race though genocide and sick medical experiments.
I may be splitting hairs here, but hey, that’s in my nature! And no, I do not condone the beliefs of either of these parties—I just like to pick out inaccuracies!!! At any rate, IMO PETA is an organization full of hysterical people that believe animals have the same rights as human beings. I do not share this belief and believe that animals were put here on this earth to help humans in many ways—as beasts of burden, companions, sources of clothing and, God forbid, FOOD! PETA is just another bunch of fanatics that take an idea too far. Yes, I believe in treating animals in a humane manner in both domestic and commercial settings and that all life deserves respect, but I don’t go so far as to say that animals are on the same level as humans. A calf is not the equal of a human baby for f**k’s sake!!!! There is a certain hierarchy in the animal kingdom, of which we are a part, and we are on the top of the “food chain”!