If an e-mail is sent in the forest and there's no one there to read it, does it make a sound?

If you've followed my previous blogs (and very few of you have), you know I think epinions.com is the devil and the telephone is satan. Then it should not come as any suprise to you that I think e-mail is evil incarnate.

Okay, put aside the fact that it is a souless tool, fraught with misinterpretation and unintended inuendo. Put aside the fact that it allows anyone with computer access to fire off endless junk mail begging you to buy non-existent perscription or send your bank account information to Nigeria. And put aside the fact that hackers (may they rot in hell) have made every e-mail you get, even if it is from your Aunt Sally, a potential letter bomb that can wipe out your entire computer.

All of that aside, and e-mail still sucks. Because in my experience, what should have been a boon to staying in touch has created new barriers that make reaching out and touching someone (figuratively) that was a friend or relative akin to a wave to that neighbor two doors down that you've never talked to. People these days treat e-mails from friends with a shrug and grunt and then move with whatever they were doing.

E-mail is a message, my friends. Unless it asking you to refinance or avoid embarrassing moments by ordering Viagra, it bears a response.

In the past, you could write a letter, pop it into the mail and assume you'd get a response. If you didn't, it was safe to assume some disgruntled postal worker had mangled it and tossed it into the shredder. With today's e-mail, you can ask for a receipt when a note is delivered and another when it is open and presumebly read. So when you write someone and they don't respond, you have to assume they don't give a rat's behind.

Case in point: I have a former friend I'd known since I was 16. Even when we both left Boise and went separate ways, we managed to stay in touch. When she got married in England 12 years ago, I was one of the only people from the states that went to her wedding. Okay, we communicated sporatically after that. She and her husband ended up in Montana. She became a college librarian. He taught English or film theory at the same college (I assume). I hadn't heard from them much in the past 5 years or so. But with the marvel of the Internet I was able to find her e-mail address a couple of years ago. I sent a note asking how she was. She responded with a few short lines. We exchanged e-mails a couple more times and then I didn't hear anything else.

So, in the past couple of weeks I happily sent out e-mails to friends announcing my engagement. I sent one to my friend in Montana. I heard nothing. So I assumed I had an old e-mail address. I double-checked and sent another e-mail with the return receipt option checked. Sure enough the e-mail was received and opened. I waited patiently for a reply, anything. Nothing. No "good to hear from you," no "congratulations," no "don't contact me again." And I haven't a clue why. We never had a falling out as friends. We don't even live in the same state, so I'm not sure how I could have offended her.

If this was an isolated incident, I'd write it off. But this happens all of the time, even with my family. I send e-mails to my brother, my nephews, my niece and I rarely get a response. I sent an e-mail to my nephew who got married in Las Vegas last spring telling him about my engagement and didn't hear a peep (likely because he thinks the government reads all of our e-mail...perhaps they are sending their bank account information to Nigeria as we speak).

The evil of e-mail is that is that it is forging a self-absorbed society that can't even type two lines of text and hit the send button because that would require thought and motivation. We are a society surrounded by so many instant communication methods that we have become numb to real communication. The telephone made us a disembodied voice, void of emotion. E-mail takes away the voice and turns even personal communication into mindless, electronic junk.

That's how I feel about it. Got a problem with that? Here's a quarter, e-mail someone who cares.

Spam Hall of Shame

Some spam is so incredibly ridiculous, it begs to be shared:

SUBJECT: Hellow, what do you do on Monday? Call me.
FROM: Jassmine Filenson Dear sweethart,

I just get round to email! My camera shootings takes a lot of time! I love and miss
you very much, I think just about you!! I'm fine, my first photosession has ended
yesterday, and you, as usually, the first who will see my photos. My photographer is the really genius! I there madly beautiful, especially when I oiled!!! I love you,
and I want you.

Love, yours Jassmine.

I’ll try to write as often as possible, I’ll send you new photos very soon.
Photos’ password: wantyou

Okay, please tell me no one falls for these things. Yes, it had an attachment and no, I didn't open it. Even my grandmother could tell it is a virus and she's been dead for years.

My favorite line is, "I there madly beautiful, especially when I oiled!!!" God knows what the line was when they plugged it into Babble Fish for translation.

Say goodbye Jassmine.

Seek and ye shall find

I get a kick out of looking at the stats for my Web site to see how people end up at Dizgraceland. A large percentage are looking for Elvis. But it is the extreme randomness for how people end up in my blog that really kills me. 

There are people out there actually doing google searches for "mechanical monkeys playing cymbals" and "dead animals in my crawlspace." I can only imagine their confusion when they end up at Dizgraceland. But it is a small world after all (that's going to get me those Disneyland hits for sure). 

 I've given up on the dream of being a blog celebrity, though. The whole "Build it and they will come" theory hasn't really worked with Dizgraceland. Neither has my "sell my crap on eBay and get rich" scheme. I guess I am just destined for that gray land of anonymity. That's what comes when your favorite character in Amadeus is Salieri, not Mozart. Though I did see Tom Hulce in a restaurant in Seattle years ago ordering a cinnamon roll (he played Amadeus Mozart in the 1984 movie called coincidently Amadeus...he also had a major part in Animal House). I've never seen F. Murray Abraham in a restaurant (he played Antonio Salieri in the movie...Amadeus, not Animal House). I did see Samuel L. Jackson in the Brooklyn Cafe in Seattle once, though (he was in neither Amadeus or Animal House). 

Life is funny that way. Suffice it to say, I don't run in the celebrity crowd. I did see Alec Baldwin in the LA airport a couple of years ago. And I met Cynthia Lauren Tewes a week or so ago. She played Julie McCoy in the Love Boat series. I have a friend who stood behind Johnny Cash in a deli in New York once, too. So, we're back to it's a small world, after all. 

Did I mention I met Mickey Mouse once, too?

Go ask Alice

The one thing we all have in common as we age is a lively discussion of bodily functions and what medications we take. Having been raised a Christian Scientist and not taking medications for the first 23 years of my life, I've more than made up for it in middle age. I take about four pills a day, twice a day to control blood pressure, cholesterol, and stomach acid. If that wasn't irritating enough, I now find that I have to take potassium supplements to replace the potassium in my body being leeched out by one of the blood pressure medications. It was much easier being a Christian Scientist (though I never could get used to having to go to Sunday School).

I know it is not an original complaint that the cures they give us cause more problems (for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction). But this is my blog and I have a right to rant about non-original topics once in awhile. Or even all the time. It's my blog. It's not like you are paying to come here. Though you should. These are pearls my friend.

What was I talking about, oh yeah, my medications. Doctors are quick to dole out prescriptions and they all come with these nifty lists of possible side effects and interactions with other drugs. Have you ever read these things? "May cause shortness of breath. May cause coughing. May cause internal bleeding. May cause you to stop breathing. May cause you to watch more Reality Television. " The lists go on and on because I don't think they are written by medical experts. Rather they are written by legal experts trying to cover the butts of the pharmaceutical companies who want to make sure you realized all of the risks before you popped their stinking little expensive pills. And don't get me started about the cost of the pills. It's gotten so bad, we have caravans of seniors making trips over the Canadian border to score Lipitor and Atenenol. I'm not looking forward to retirement and wondering whether or not I can afford my cholesterol medication and the medication required to battle its side effects.

Then there is the Pharmacist who doles out the pills. Can anyone tell me why it takes a minimum of 45 minutes to count out 60 pills, pour them in a bottle and slap a label on it? And these are people who went to school just to make sure you are getting the size, type and quantity of pills are the right ones. I have a degree in Journalism and I think I could fill the bottle with the right number of pills in under five minutes. Given the proper training and encouragement, I think a chimpanzee could fill the bottle in under five minutes. But this is just my uneducated opinion on the challenges of filling prescriptions.

Call me cranky, but I attribute most of my frustration to the side effect of being doubled up in the bathroom for two days wishing I hadn't let my potassium supplement run out.

Oh well, live and learn. I've got this white rabbit I'm chasing.

Fifteen minutes

I spent most of yesterday sitting in a recording studio taping two 45 second radio ads. More accurately, I sat there watching the back Dave the engineer's head and listening to voice talent read the same lines 20 times. Watching radio commercials being made is a bit like watching paint dry. Or listening to paint dry.

It's a miracle how they are pieced together though. And it is a pretty lucrative gig for actors and moonlighting DJ's. You get paid pretty good to say the same three words in 50 different ways. Plus you don't have to wear a tie.

But like Alfred Hitchcock, I have grown fond of having a little bit of me show up in my work. So on one spot. I got to shout "Pull over" six or seven times in the recording booth and have it spliced into the commercial as a "sound effect."

One time, I had my 1976 era family portrait on a billboard. It was a really cool billboard of the inside of a car decked out to look like someone's parlour. The headline read, "Spending too much time in your car?" And there on the dashboard was my family portrait.

Another time I got to do the sound effect of a guy being poked in the eye with a pool cue.

Being a marketing manager has it's privileges.

Close but no cigar

"Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar."
-- Sigmund Freud

I don't claim to be a cigar aficionado. I'm not even sure what is meant by a "good" cigar. When I was a kid, my mom used to say, "I wonder how far he had to chase that dog" when she'd pass some guy smoking a cigar. Suffice it to say I don't smoke them often, but everytime I am outside the country and see a store selling Cuban cigars the rebel in me has to buy a couple and smoke them out of spite. I mean, they seem like such a stupid thing to boycott.

And cruise ships create these lounges that scream for you to smoke cigars. And, they always seem to name them Winston's. This last Carnival Cruise was no exception. This was a brand new ship built in Italy. It was pristine. And I am proud to say I got to stink up Winston's Cigar Lounge with some nasty Cuban cigars that tasted as if that dog my mom always referred to had crapped in my mouth. But for once, I got to be the nasty smoker blowing smoke at passersby, oblivious to their dirty looks as the filthy blue smoke billowed about the lounge. It gave me that taste of what it must be like to be a smoker.

Ironically, the ship designer had made Winston's Lounge the plushiest and most comfortable bar on the ship. And in his or her's great wisdom, they also made the lounge a major thoroughfare on the ship that people leaving one of the dining room's had to pass through after dinner. So, I got to blow my toxic cigar smoke on parades of people just passing through. What a major power trip!

It was an exclusive club I joined. Look at all of the great images of cigar smokers we have: Winston Churchell of course, every World War II sargeant in every World War II film, Al Capone, Fidel Castro, Colonel Tom Parker (Elvis' manager), Daddy Warbucks and Sigmund Freud. I tell you, I was giddy with the power smoking a cigar gave me.

Now if I could get used to the crappy taste, the headaches and the smell, I'd probably smoke them more often.

Oh well, there's always the next cruise. I think the Diamond Princess also has a Winston's Lounge and I'm betting money I can find Cuban cigars in Mexico.

You Are Dumb

You Are Dumb

I found this site while doing a Google search for "The Real Gilligan's Island" (don't ask). Anyway Bryan, the author of the site is a genius that's not afraid to point out the dumbing of America. I couldn't resist passing on the address.

I'm no dummy.

But is it art?

Okay, I can’t really stand it when I’m over at someone’s house and they pull out the slides of the vacation. You can only see so many shots of Tuscany and picturesque tile roofs before you want to rip your eyes out of the sockets. Because, as with most things, you had to be there to appreciate them.

So, having said that, I’m going to violate my own rule and put up some shots from our recent cruise. These are from St. Thomas. They are various shots of Fort Christian. I like them because I think they are visually interesting regardless of whether you have been to St. Thomas or even know where the shots are from or of.

Fort Christian is St. Thomas's oldest standing structure. It was built between 1672 and 1680 and now has U.S. National Landmark status. The clock tower was added in the 19th century. This building has, over time, been used as a jail, governor's residence, town hall, courthouse, and church. Fort Christian now houses The Virgin Islands Museum, where you can see exhibits on USVI history, natural history, and turn-of-the-20th-century furnishings.

I really enjoyed exploring the Fort. It wasn’t crowded and I get a kick out of interesting architecture. Plus the place had interesting vibes. Having been a jail at one point, you can only imagine some of the lost souls hanging about. The dungeon, solitary confinement cell for one was very creepy.

Seeing the light....

One of the odd little anomalies of Web based reality is that we begin to measure ourselves in site stats. Tracking hits gives us that little affirmation that people are actually out there visiting our Web pages. It can become an obsessive thing, especially if you track statistics with one of the many sites out there that feeds into that desire to know that someone from Iceland visited your Blog at 2 p.m. on Sunday and stayed for 5 minutes before leaving in disgust.

I admit that I look at Web stats for my Web pages. And I found it was very interesting and predictable that my stats were pretty low during the holidays, especially since I was on a cruise and didn't make any new entries. After all, people are just sitting on the edge of their computer seats waiting for my next entry, aren't they?

So, when I announced my engagement on January 5, I was startled to discover that my Web hits went from 30 or 40 a day to more than 200. It was the affirmation I was seeking. People were indeed just waiting with baited breath for my wisdom to hit the Blog and were pouncing on any entry.

Then it dawned on me that Elvis' birthday was January 8. Every year around this time, people hit the Web looking for information about the King. They Google him and inevitably they run across Dizgraceland: A Tim-Elvis Experience. And inevitably, they are very disappointed.

Sigh.

But I look on the bright side. At least the disappointed people did not send me hate mail this year for disrespecting the King.

Not that I disrespect the King. Elvis has somehow become firmly interwoven with my life. Perhaps he has a message for me. Perhaps it is just a coincidence. But everywhere I turn, Elvis crops up. Now, you could say this is true for everyone, but I choose to believe the King speaks to me through many signs. For instance, when Tess and I were in Nassau a couple of weeks ago we went for a very expensive and non-informative carriage ride. The driver's name was Elvis and his horse's name was Nat King Cole. Elvis gave us a tour of the city that touched on the many high points of Nassau. I now know where the jail is and where all of the radio stations are located.

Here is a photo of Elvis and Nat King Cole:

Elvis also showed us many historic buildings and literally showed us a sign:

So, I am pretty safe is saying that Elvis is pretty much watching over my life. And to show you that I really am pretty much an Elvis-foamer, I bought a four-CD set yesterday that has a hundred songs done by other artists that were originally done by other artists. The CDs have the originally artist recordings. Did you know that Al Jolson originally recorded "Are you lonesome tonight?" I didn't think so.

Because I am the chosen one.

A modest proposal

Tom Robbins once wrote, "It's never too late to have a happy childhood." And, it's never too late to find your soulmate. I proposed to mine on our Christmas cruise and she accepted. I consider myself a lucky person. We plan to get married this spring.

And, no, I doubt if we'll get married by an Elvis impersonator. My nephew stole that thunder and frankly, I'm a romantic at heart and want something a bit more memorable than a chapel on the strip. We're thinking of getting married on another cruise if I can work out the details. A wedding at sea just seems appropriate. This would push the number of cruises I've been on to 14 and I'm feeling a bit decadent.

Anyway, here's to beginnings! Happy New Year!

Stalking the White Elephant

Just in case you were curious, I looked up why a white elephant gift is called a white elephant, I looked it up on the Web:

white elephant

An unwanted or useless item, as in The cottage at the lake had become a real white elephant--too run down to sell, yet costly to keep up, or Grandma's ornate silver is a white elephant; no one wants it but it's too valuable to discard. This expression comes from a legendary former Siamese custom whereby an albino elephant, considered sacred, could only be owned by the king. The king would bestow such an animal on a subject with whom he was displeased and wait until the high cost of feeding the animal, which could not be slaughtered, ruined the owner. The story was told in England in the 1600s, and in the 1800s the term began to be used figurative
ly.

white elephant
n.

1. A rare, expensive possession that is a financial burden to maintain.
2. Something of dubious or limited value.
2. An article, ornament, or household utensil no longer wanted by its owner.
3. An endeavor or venture that proves to be a conspicuous failure.
4. A rare whitish or light-gray form of the Asian elephant, often regarded with special veneration in regions of southeast Asia and India.

That being said, after our office White Elephant exchange, I decided I should go into business selling people White Elephant gifts for family and office exchanges, because I never seem to run out of them. And my White Elephant gifts seem to be a hit in an “I can’t believe anyone ever owned one” kind of way.

It would be a great way to get rid of all of the crap I’ve accumulated. Ebay hasn’t proven to be as an efficient and lucrative trash disposal unit as I’d hoped. I did look up whiteelephant.com to see if it was taken and of course it was. Domain names are the beanie babies of this generation. Everyone buys them thinking they’ll be able to sell them for a profit. Yeah…

Anyway, happy holidays and let me know if you need any white elephant gifts. But I’m not parting with the mechanical monkey.

Frankly, my dear...

I only have one more day of work and then I'm on vacation for two weeks. It makes a big difference in how I view my day to day work environment. Rhett Butler just about said it all, when he said, "Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn."

Tess and I are going on a Caribbean cruise. It is her birthday present. And we are going to have fun. And I'm not thinking about work the entire time. I may even turn off my Blackberry when I'm on the beach.

This is actually my 13th cruise in less than ten years. I kind of like them. We went on an Alaska cruise in July. It just wasn't the same as a tropical cruise. Laying out on the deck under a blanket drinking a cold beer just doesn't cut it.

Oh, I know what you are thinking, only old people cruise and the ships are full of fat people salivating over the next buffet, but that's only half true. I look at it as a resort that travels with you. And it's a pretty darned good value when you think about it...food, lodging and entertainment rolled into one. Plus where else do you get the opportunity to wear a tux.

Regardless, I think this will be one of our best vacations ever. So, Bon Voyage and pass the sunscreen.

My roots are showing...

It began in Boise when we were visiting my 79-year-old mom over Thanksgiving. She started pulling out important papers she wanted me to know about. In particular, she wanted to show me that she had prepaid for her funeral arrangements, i.e. her cremation. My mother doesn’t want a funeral. It’s a tradition she started with my father’s mother. The H****’s don’t have funerals because my mom doesn’t believe in death. She is a Christian Scientist, but that is another story.

In the process of pulling out papers mom pulled out copies of her birth certificate and my father’s birth certificate. That led to a conversation about my father finding out he was adopted when his mother died in 1974. My father was 59 at the time. He learned about being adopted from some distant relatives who wrote him and said something like, “and by the way, did you know you were adopted.” And though my father wrote to the courts in Portland, Oregon, where he was born, they only confirmed that he was adopted and that there was no record of his natural parents.

At the time, I was 16 and the news hit me hard. I had grown up being proud to be a H**** and Irish. I was born the day after St. Patrick’s Day, but always celebrated my birthday on the 17^th. In one fell swoop, my heritage was ripped away from me. To my chagrin, all I had left was my mom’s side of the family—the Clark’s. No offense to all of the Clark’s out there, but no one wants to be one of a million Clark’s. And no offense to my mom’s family, but my maternal grandfather seem to have one particular skill and that was fathering children. My mother had 12 brothers and sisters. And my grandfather died relatively young at 47 leaving, I imagine, my grandmother very relieved and very tired.

But the discussion about my father’s parentage did trigger something in me. I didn’t really know anything about my roots. I copied the birth certificates mom had and a couple of other bits of information that would help me and determined to begin researching my family once I got home.

Ok, I have new found respect for Alex Hailey for tracing his roots back to Kunta Kintay without the Internet. It must have been a major bummer. Because once you start digging for relatives, you discover there is one hell of a lot of data out there. Fortunately, the Internet now offers a relatively easy way to access work that other people have already done organizing it. I started, of course, with Google and searched for “free family tree searches.” That turned up quite a few sites that promised free searches before they tried to sell you the free information. Much of it was indeed available elsewhere for free.

But weeding out the many pay sites (all of whom seem to have some kind of connection to Ancestors.com) I finally found a couple of places where I could type in some basic information and begin my search. I’m especially grateful for the Mormon Church and its unexplained desire to keep track of everyone’s families. I may not agree with their religion, but they have a particularly good database online that contains tons of information.

I decided to start with my father’s adopted parents and in particularly his adopted father—Eugene Chester H****. Born in Iowa in 1871 or 1872, he eventually made his way to Portland, married my adopted grandmother, Walburga L*****, in 1908 and then adopted my father – Eugene Arthur H**** at age four in 1919. My first discovery was that Eugene Chester had stopped in Kansas City along the way and married Mary Etta Davis in 1892. They fathered one son, Chester F. who died in 1920.

So, I started tracing Eugene Chester’s roots further. His father was Chester H****. He was born in Quebec. The name Chester seems to be an unfortunate legacy on that side of the family. Chester’s father Justin moved to Quebec from Vermont. He was the one who took the family to Iowa. Justin’s father was John H****. He was born in Rehoboth, Bristol Co., MA in 1760. John’s father was Ithamer H**** (I can see why Chester was the preferred name to pass along). He was also born in Rehoboth, Mass in 1727. His father was Henry H****, also of Rehoboth, Mass. He was born in 1695.

Henry’s father Paul H***e* (note the dreaded extra “e” in the surname) was born in in Cambridge, Mass in 1664. His father was William H***e*. William was the immigrant of the family. Ok, I finally found when the H****’s had left the old Sod of Ireland and came to this country. Except much to my dismay, William didn’t come from Ireland. He was born in Cornwood, Devonshire, England in 1612 or 1613. This couldn’t be true…H**** is an Irish name, right? But William’s father, also a William, held the missing piece to the puzzle. His name wasn’t H****, it was Hele, an old English name dating back to Norman times. He was also born in Cornwood, Devonshire, England around 1587. Apparently William Hele’s son, William decided to modernize his last name when he sailed to the New Country.

That was it. Any trace of Irish heritage was now truly dashed. The plus side is that my father being adopted didn’t wipe out my green, shamrock roots. They never were there to begin with.

I’m now left with my mom’s side of the family. And I’m hoping for something better than the name of Clark to restore my now shattered lineage.

But that’s another blog or blogs.

An open question for the airlines

Here’s a math problem for you:

A typical Boeing 727 holds about 189 passengers. You can seat one passenger per seat. How many seats can you sell per flight?

This is a trick question apparently. The airlines seem to think the answer is 300 tickets. Their computers like to play some sort of airline version of Russian Roulette and sell many more seats than an airplane has in hopes that enough people will pay and not show up so they will have room on the airplane for everyone at the gate.

It is a mystery to me why the airlines overbook flights. I can understand reserving a few seats for people bumped from other flights. But I don’t understand overbooking a flight.

We went to Boise for Thanksgiving. The flight there was uneventful. Security wasn’t bad. We ended up with two hours to kill before the flight. The trip was fun. It was good to see my family. There were no political or religious discussions. My niece and nephew still talk to me despite the fact that they are rapidly approaching teenagedom.

We dropped off the Dodge Magnum the car rental person had convinced me to rent. It looked like a souped up hearse, but it was kind of fun to drive. We had checked in online so all we had to do was drop our bags off. That’s when the first ticket agent asked us if we were willing to give up our seats. “Give up our seats, why?” I asked. She gave me that smile that loosely masks disgust that airline employees have perfected and said, “The flight is overbooked and we are looking for volunteers to give up their seats and take a later flight. We’ll give you free tickets for anywhere Alaska or Horizon fly if we bump you.”

There it was, the free ticket offer. The catch….there was no guarantee when that later flight would be. We had tickets to Sunday’s Seahawk game and Tess had to be back to teach on Monday. We declined the offer and proceeded to the gate.

Well, they must have really been overbooked because the ticket agents at the gate were doing the hard sell over the loudspeakers. They were pleading with people to give up their seats and accept free tickets, hotel rooms, food. I was waiting for them to offer free pony rides.

Call me jaded, but a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush really applies to airline flights around the holidays. We watched the agents lure college kids up to the counter and coax them with free flights to Cancun and Cabo San Lucas. They found their victims and the rest of us waited for our delayed flight. Because the other mystery of the airlines are flight delays. They are based on the airlines own little chaos theory. Because all of the delays this Thanksgiving were apparently caused by snow in Reno. Oh my God, snow in Reno! That’s as rare as rain in Seattle. But apparently they had a little bit of trouble with radar equipment at the tower that lands planes. And our flight attendant told us they ran out of the liquid they use to de-ice planes. Bottomline was the plane on our flight was delayed in Reno on its way to Seattle before it came to Boise to return to Seattle.

Anyway, we got on the plane an hour and a half late and it didn’t look overbooked (apparently they got quite a few volunteers). The flight from Boise to Seattle is barely an hour. So, all and all, we spent almost four hours in the airport to make an hour flight to Seattle. I guess it beats driving 9 hours and dealing with mountain passes.

But back to my original question to the airlines: Why can’t you simply sell the number of seats you have on the airplane and leave it at that? Wouldn’t it make everyone’s lives easier?

Le Bois, Le Bois

Tess and I are flying to Boise tomorrow night to spend Thanksgiving in my birthplace. It's become a tradition to have dinner at my brother's house. It's an opportunity to whittle away at the guilt I feel about rarely seeing my mother. It's also an opportunity torment my Republican brother and remind my niece and nephew how much they have grown.

Their growth is a object of major angst for me. I touch bases on their lives on an annual basis so I'm only privy to their growth phases in condensed doses. As babies they were just these odd fragile things that spit up disgusting stuff when I bounced them around on my shoulders. This has been a tradition in my family to have my nieces and nephews spit up on me. Not being a parent, I have never taken that in stride as a normal thing.

As toddlers, my niece and nephew were even more of a mystery to me. They were usually too shy to warm up to me until I was ready to return to Seattle. When they started getting a bit older, I started to really enjoy messing with their heads. It was fun being "weird uncle Tim."

But now my nephew is essentially a teenager and my niece is 12. I saw them in May at my oldest brother's fundmentalist Christian wedding in Rainier, Oregon. It was still fun to mess with their heads, but I noticed a change. They are shifting into teenage mode and I'm sensing they are fast approaching that point where they aren't going to want to spend any time with Weird Uncle Tim anymore when we visit. Next thing I know, I'll be in Las Vegas watching them being married by an Elvis impersonator and I'll really feel old.

Stop me before I watch more reality television

I didn't mean to watch the Bachelor. I had set the TIVO to record LOST and had it record 30 minutes past just to make sure I got the entire episode. I didn't realize the Bachelor came on right after it. So there I was sitting on the barcalounger too lazy to stop the show after LOST ended and the next thing I know, I'm watching the Bachelor. I mean, it's like a train wreck, you just have to look. And then boom, the recording ended right before the jerk hands out his roses and I freaked. I had to know who he was keeping in the house and who was getting the boot. So I set the TIVO to record the Bachelor.

I'm so ashamed of myself. I mean, Tess and I end up watch a lot of crap like that at her house because she has basic cable and you just don't have a choice. We watch What not to wear and the occasional Fear Factor. It's that or the shopping channels, because basic cable is basic crap. But I have no excuse at my house. I have like 400 channels including every movie channel. And what do I end up watching but the Bachelor.

Though I did have a conversation the other day with a co-worker who confessed she and her husband watched a fascinating documentary the other night about how airlines handle luggage. So I don't feel quite as bad about my viewing choices.

What's really scary is when I find myself watching the Food Channel and realize I'm watching a show about extreme eating establishments where people are challenged to consume things like a 10-pound steak and all the trimmings in a hour and they don't have to pay for it. It's important for these people to avoid paying for that steak because they are going to need that extra money for the triple bypass surgery they are going to need down the line. The real sad thing is that I've seen this same program like five times.

It's kind of like watching the Travel Channel and realizing every week is Las Vegas Week.

So every now and then I try to watch something educational on the History Channel or the Discovery Channel. I was fascinated by the guys running around with metal detectors at the Little Big Horn recreating the battle based on the pattern of the bullets they found. But ultimately, I find history programs that debunk the myths of the past a real downer. The Custer's Last Stand documentary essentially concluded Custer and his men didn't actually stand anywhere. They heroically ran around like chickens with their heads cut off being methodically picked off by the Sioux. Not that I blame the Sioux. Custer just didn't seem to know how to deal with a situation in which the enemy was not a bunch of unarmed, sleeping women and children.
History just isn't pleasant without the Hollywood spin that requires heroes and a happy ending.

But I'm not sure what I'd do without television. I scoff at people who say they never watch it. "What do you do," I ask. "Oh, we read and listen to music," they say. Give me a break. Turn the close-captioning on and you can watch television, read and listen to music.

Television isn't just entertainment anymore. It's a way of life. Even if it is just on in the background while you cook or do dishes, it provides that soothing sense of being connected to the world. If I didn't have television shows to talk about with the woman who cuts my hair, I'd sit there in awkward silence for 40 minutes because the Sopranos, Melrose Place, Desperate Housewives and Sex in the City are our common acquaintances.

Face it, we tend to know more about the lives of the fictional characters in our favorite television programs than we do about our own families. I couldn't tell you boo about my brother's lives other than one is a teacher and one is a born again. But I can sure tell you what Tony Soprano has been up to. For one thing, Tony Soprano's life is pretty darned interesting and I rarely talk to my brothers. When I do we just talk about the superficial things people who don't see each other very often talk about.

But don't get the wrong idea. I love my brothers. They just live in different states and different states of mind than I do.

And as usual, I digress. But all of this talk about my brothers and television has given me a great idea for a reality channel for families. Why don't they create a network where you can tune in and watch your own families lives? Could be an interesting way to stay on top of what they are up to.

Just a thought.

You can count on me

They finally counted my vote. After three phone calls and two promises to call me back, the elections commission told me that they had found the absentee ballot in question and it wasn't mine. They sent my provisional vote to be counted and the Web site now verifies that it has been accepted and counted.

But what if I hadn't pursued this? What if I'd just assumed my vote had been counted? And how many people had similar problems? I may be jaded about lots of things about this country, but I believe in the fundamental concept that everyone here has the right to vote. They may not exercise that right and they may not vote the way I would like, but they all have the right to vote. It shouldn't be the right to go through the motions and hope the ballot gets counted.

So I still feel unsettled by the experience. It's like some basic principle I've always believed in has been shaken. And it can't be justified by blaming it on human error and shrugging. There is a lot at stake in an election. Regardless of what you believe about politics and politicians, voting changes cultures and effects our lives. The people who manage elections have a responsibility the same way someone who works in an automotive factory or builds jet airplanes. There isn't room for human error. If you screw up in these situations, you affect lives.

You know, I normally try to be at least a little humorous in my rants. I try to see the absurdity in everything and relate to it appropriately. But I just don't see anything funny about this.

But I suppose there is a bright side to everything. Whatever crawled under my house and died in the crawlspace has deteriorated to the point that it no longer stinks. The flys are gone. The yellow jackets nest in my gutter has died for the winter, my house is painted, I have new windows, my new bathroom sink is almost installed (if not hooked up completely) and the roof seems to have stopped leaking since I had the new roof vents installed. And best of all, Tess loves me even though I never make my bed, can't fold laundry worth a damn and can't cook without leaving a mess.

So, to hell with my vote.

Conspiracy

Call me wacky, call me crazy, but I think someone voted absentee using my name. I told the proverbial "you" about going to the polls on election night and being told I'd registered to vote absentee. So I went through the "provisional" vote farse only to get home to find a letter from the election commission stating they didn't have a valid signature on file for me and I had to sign and mail back a form to them in order for my vote to count.

Okay, I assume it was all taken care of and just a typical government agency mired in bureacracy and making mistakes. Now I don't know. Yesterday someone dropped a note off at my door saying I was on a list of voters whose votes would be invalidated unless a valid signature was on file with the elections committee. This note was from the State Democratic Party office. The local governor's race is neck and neck and they want to make sure they get all the votes counted. I'd noticed on my Caller ID that I'd received a call from the Republicans the night before. I assumed it was about the same thing.

So I go to the elections commission Web site and enter my provisional ballot number. It tells me my vote was void since I'd voted absentee and my absentee vote had been counted. This morning I called up the elections office and the nice woman there agreed that "this was a problem." She put me on hold and then came back on and said someone would have to call me back.

I just find it too much of a coincidence that after being registered to vote in this state for 24 years and voting at the same polling place for 17 years, my signature would disappear, someone else would register for me to vote absentee and then someone would actually vote absentee in my name. I'm willing to bet they didn't vote Democrat, either.

It's a helpless feeling. You read about identity theft all of the time. But in this case, someone has stolen my right to vote. And I'm not one of those whiners who want to do the election over just because my candidate didn't win. What's at stake here is the very principal we've been taught our country never compromises: we have the right to choose by voting. If you don't vote you don't have the right to bitch. I voted. That vote was invalidated by a system that has broken down or by some ass who wanted his candidate to win regardless of the method.

So are there really any winners in this last election?

Spambo strikes again!

Ok, I received another version of the spam letter from another country offering me loads of cash for nothing:

PLEASE SEND YOUR RESPONSE TO THIS EMAIL ADDRESS:mellamedbarukh@latinmail.com

Dear Friend, As you read this, I don't want you to feel sorry for me, because, I believe everyone will die someday. My name is MR Barukh Mellamed Crude Oil merchant in Iran,i have been diagnosed with Esophageal cancer . It has defiled all forms of medical treatment, and right now I have only about a few months to live, according to medical experts.

I have not particularly lived my life so well, as I never really cared for anyone(not even myself)but my business. Though I am very rich, I was never generous, I was always hostile to people and only focused on my business as that was the only thing I cared for. But now I regret all this as I now know that there is more to life than just wanting to have or make all the money in the world. I believe when God gives me a second chance to come to this world I would live my life a different way from how I have lived it. Now that God has called me, I have willed and given most of my property and assets to my immediate and extended family members as well as a few close friends.

I want God to be merciful to me and accept my soul so, I have decided to give alms to charity organizations, as I want this to be one of the last good deeds I do on earth. So far, I have distributed money to some charity organizations in Austra, cameroun, liberia,Algeria and Malaysia. Now that my health has deteriorated so badly, I cannot do this myself anymore.

I once asked members of my family to close one of my accounts and distribute the money which I have there to charity organization in Bulgaria and Pakistan, they refused and kept the money to themselves. Hence, I do not trust them anymore, as they seem not to be contended with what I have left for them. The last of my money which no one knows of is the huge cash deposit of fifteen million dollars $15,000,000,00 that I have with a finance/Security Company abroad. I will want you to help me collect this deposit and dispatched it to charity organizations. I have set aside 10% for you and for your time.

God be with you. MR Barukh Mellamed mellamedbarukh@latinmail.com

Here was my response:

Dear spammer:

I'm sick of receiving such poorly written letters from you people. So, I've taken the liberty of rewriting your piece of crap letter in real English that people can actually read. Please use it in the future and maybe you'll get a better response.

And can't you get a better job? There has to be a Starbucks or McDonald's somewhere in your country. Show some dignity man!

Your Friend


"Dear Friend,

As you read this, I don't want you to feel sorry for me, because, I believe everyone will die someday.

My name is Mr. Barukh Mellamed Crude Oil merchant in Iran. I have been diagnosed with esophageal cancer. It has defied all forms of medical treatment, and according to medical experts, I have only about a few months to live.

I have not lived my life particularly well. I never really cared for anything or anyone but my business. Though I am very rich, I have never been generous. I was always hostile to people and only focused on my business as that was the only thing I cared for (this is redundant by the way, so I'd probably delete it).

But now I regret all this. I now know that there is more to life than just wanting to have or make all the money in the world. I believe that if God gave me a second chance at life, I would live it very differently.

Now that God has called me, I have willed and given most of my property and assets to my immediate and extended family members as well as a few close friends. I want God to be merciful to me and accept my soul so, I have decided to give alms to charitable organizations. So far, I have distributed money to some charity organizations in Austria, Cameroon, Liberia, Algeria and Malaysia.

Now that my health has deteriorated so badly, I cannot do this myself anymore. Once, I asked members of my family to close one of my accounts and distribute the money to a charitable organization in Bulgaria and Pakistan. They refused and kept the money. So, I do not trust them anymore. They are not content with what I have left them.

The last of my money (which no one knows of) is a huge cash deposit of fifteen million dollars ($15,000,000) that I have with a finance/security company abroad. I want you to help me collect this deposit and distribute it to charitable organizations. I have set aside 10% for you and for your time.

God be with you.

Mr. Barukh Mellamed mellamedbarukh@latinmail.com"

I hate being a "provisional" voter

I don’t know if it was from sitting outside freezing at the Seahawks game, or the stress of the election, but I was as sick as a dog last week. I’m not sure why we single out dogs as a simile, but nevertheless, I was pretty darned sick. I tried being a trooper and going to work. But between the hacking, sneezing and major snot flow, I was treated as welcome as a leper at a Mary Kay Cosmetics party. That was last Tuesday. I was sick, but I had to vote.

I don’t believe in absentee voting. I like to get my ballot, go to a booth, make my decisions and then watch the ballot safely slide into the ballot box. At least then, I know it should be counted. Something about trusting my ballot to the US Postal Service is terribly frightening to me. Don’t get me wrong. I think the USPS does one heck of a job considering the volume they have to deal with, but every now and then, some things just slip off into a black hole somewhere at the post office and never make it to the intended destination. I mean, these are the same people who stopped delivering my mail for a week when the evil tree removers were removing my neighbor’s tree. They never did explain that to me. I believe the carrier was morbidly afraid of chippers.

But I digress.

I went to my neighborhood polling place (why do they always make you vote in elementary school gyms) and slyly slipped by the bake sale strategically positioned right outside the gym. Ok, there weren’t the major lines reported in many places, but it was busy. I go up to the table for my precinct and hand my registration card to the elderly lady sitting behind it. This same old lady has worked the table for the past 17 years since I’ve been voting here and not once has she been able to find my name in the registration book in less than 15 minutes. This is where I’m going to rant about using volunteers to work at polling places. I’ve got nothing against old people. Shoot, I’m rapidly approaching being an old fart myself. But why do the elections offices use them to monitor something as important as distributing and logging ballots. This particular old lady was not even pleasant in a grandmotherly way. She was old and bitchy. When she finally found my name, she snapped at me, “This says you’ve registered to vote absentee.”

Ok, I’m sick. I’m standing there with mucus dripping from my nose like a river and this bitchy old lady is staring at me like I’m a terrorist trying to scam a ballot out of her to vote democrat. I tense up and respond that there must be some mistake. She tells me I have to use a “provisional” ballot, hands me one and says to vote and take it to another table where a younger volunteer is sitting, sorting ballot stubs. I’m a bit confused, but I sit down at a table (all the booths were full, so I didn’t even get the dignity of voting in an actual booth) and mark my ballot. I take it to the volunteer at the “provisional” ballot table and tell her that I was told I was registered to vote absentee and given the “provisional” ballot. She acted put out that I was interrupting her stub sorting, but handed me an envelope and told me to fold the ballot, place it in the envelop and fill out a stub and then place everything in a third envelope. I asked her why I was listed as voting absentee when I never voted absentee. She just shrugged.

I proceed to fill out the stub for the ballot. It asks for basic info like name, address etc. and then asks for my voter registration number. I look all over my registration card and I’ll be damned if there was anything on it that resembled a registration number. I asked the woman which number it was. She frowns and takes my card. And damned if she could find a registration number, either. She said to go ahead and put the ballot in the envelope and she’d get my number later from the old biddy at the first table. I’m getting pretty agitated at this point. The envelope obviously was too small for the ballot. I did my best to shove it in and seal it. Snot is literally dripping onto the table and the woman was giving me dirty looks. I handed her the ballot and watched her push it aside. I have my doubts if it ever made it near a ballot box, but I was given part of the stub with a number and Web site where I could track its progress through the system. To date it hasn’t been counted.

But that is beside the point. Everything’s decided now and my “provisional” ballot isn’t worth a rat’s behind now. You’ve got to love the system.

So, I dragged my sick self home. Ironically, I open my mail and find a letter from the elections commission saying they needed a copy of my signature on file before they could verify my vote. I’ve voted in this state for 24 years, 17 of those at the same place and now they tell me they need a copy of my signature. Oh, and they needed to know my voter’s registration number, too. I xeroxed a copy of my registration card, signed their damned form and put it out in the mailbox, certain the USPS knows how I feel about them and won’t deliver it anyway.

Finally, I staggered to the barcalounger and turn on the tube. Much as I love my TIVO and satellite system, it is nearly impossible to actually find anything but movies and shopping channels. Curious as I was about the election, I went to bed without much knowledge about who was winning. I spent the next three days in bed even sicker than that much slandered dog. I didn’t really care how the election was going or where my “provisional” ballot was.

I’m a bit better now. I’m back at work and I know the election results. All I can say is that I’m glad it’s over and I don’t care if I never see another campaign ad or hear the results of another poll.

But, I think I’m going to go register to vote absentee. A friend of mine was registered to vote absentee and they sent him two ballots.

God bless America!