CONGRATULATIONS! Now, stick 'em up....

Good news Americans!

On the campaign trail last year, Democratic leaders said that it would be wrong to accept a pay raise for themselves until they raised the minimum wage to $5.85 per hour.

I am happy...no, delirious, to report that having accomplished that monumental feat they now feel as if the time has come to bump their salaries to nearly $170,000 per year. This, of course, is chump change for our duly elected representatives who spend a grueling six months or so on the job. (Not to mention the fact that we let them slide on those pesky social security taxes.)
Yes, the Dems and their Republican co-conspirators have fixed it so that they will receive their well deserved pay raise, estimated at 2.5%, in January. In a show of bi-partisan love and goodwill the House voted last month to kill a proposal that would have forced them to have a straight up-or-down vote on the issue. No...They knew that you would want them to have it because they have done such a great job of taking our money and spending it on things we are way too dumb to comprehend.

THANKS CONGRESS!!

YOU GUYS ARE THE BEST!

The U.S. Congress has the distinction of running the only money losing whorehouse in the UNIVERSE!

SAUCED IN SPACE!

So what's the big deal?

Supposedly, after drinking heavily, maybe one or two of our astronauts flew a spacecraft. At least that is what an independent panel of experts is alleging to NASA and the American public.

Am I missing something? I have always assumed that anyone willing to sit their ass down on several thousand pounds of rocket fuel in order to be hurled into space would either have to be a full-tilt bozo or irreparably gassed to the gills.

Have we all forgotten the words of this country's very first astronaut, Jose Jimenez, when he said, "I always take a blast before I take off."?
And the rest, as they say, is Jistory.

Jose Jimenez




"Jouston was a great town for jitting on chicks and joisting a few."




So, now I'm guessing that they are going to forget all of the advice that pioneers like Jose have given the program and will insist on a breathalyzer test for all astronauts before lighting the fuse on one of NASA's Roman candles. This, of course, will also mean an all female crew of astronauts from now on.
OH YEAH! It was long ago established that men harbor the gene that tells them: "Two drinks are good, but fifty will make you President of the World."

Women, on the other hand, are in possession of the gene that requires them to whine: "Dear, haven't you had enough?"
Sad... This will set the space program back years. Recently I was told that some of our female astronaut cadre have been just a little too busy driving non-stop between Houston and Orlando while wearing a diaper. Hmmmm.




Astro-nut Lisa Nowak (Now piloting her own driving academy)





Drinks anyone?

Puddy Tat killer deals death in Providence!

Ted Bundy rode "Old Sparky" straight to hell.
David Berkowitz casts his goofy peepers on the walls of stony lonesome for the rest of his miserable life.
But, Oscar the cat continues to deal his lethal cat breath to the grandpas and grandmas in the Steere House geezer garage in Providence, Rhode Island.

So far, the media have portrayed this feline serial killer as an affable furry little kitty who somehow senses when one of the residents of Steere House is about to catch the "Big Bus" to the great beyond. A "sixth sense", they say, allows him to curl up on the bed of the patient who is near death and in need of comfort.

Comfort my ass!! This damn cat is a psychopath! A snuff artist of the first degree...


Look at him. Is this the face of anything other than a stone killer?
Charles Manson has eyes like this for God's sake!
And...It isn't like this hasn't been going on for what could be one of history's longest killing sprees. No, Oscar has "presided over" the deaths of more than 25 residents of the advanced dementia unit at the Steere House. In fact, Dr. David M. Dosa submitted an essay about Oscar to the New England Journal of Medicine. (For my money, that makes the "doc" a co-conspirator.)
According to Dr. Dosa, Oscar typically arrives at a dying patient's bedside a few hours before they expire.
Uh....HELLO! EARTH TO DR. DOSA! Doc, the pussy cat is snuffing your patients! It's time to TAKE OUT TUNA BREATH!

We haven't a moment to lose. I suggest arming all of the remaining residents of the nursing home with squirt guns and catnip. Anything that will keep old Oscar from jumping up on the bed.



Oscar, waiting for the perfect moment to fulfill his contract.





Just a minute.
I have the solution!
My nephew Walt's dog, Dash!

He is the out of town talent we can bring to Providence to solve the "Oscar problem".

He hates cats and is willing to travel.
I'm almost certain that he once again pooped on that throw rug in the hallway at my brother's house and might need a little time away from my sister-in-law.

DASH AND OSCAR...... A steel cage death match!
(I've got dibs on this one for pay per view on ESPN)


"Hate cats...Will travel"

"This stuff is GREAT!" Just ask The Donald

NO...Wait. How the hell would he know?
HE DOESN'T EVEN DRINK.

That, however, hasn't stopped Donald Trump from introducing his very own brand of Vodka. In fact, he has sold a few hundred-thousand cases of the potent potable to juice hounds willing to fork over in excess of $34 per bottle.

How could this crap be any good?? Have you seen his hair?

Anybody who thinks this is a good "look" is suspect when it comes to judgment calls of any kind. The guy basically arranges what looks to be about three feet of painfully sparse hair into some sort of swirly cow pie; then sprays the bejesus out of a can of some kind of hair lacquer and is ready to wheel and deal the day away. UNBELIEVABLE!
But, he's rich...He must also be brilliant.
Right?
WRONG! He is an obnoxious dumb-ass who was born on third base and thinks he hit a homer.
And now this......TRUMP VODKA, from a guy who doesn't drink. It's kind of like buying a car from the Amish isn't it?
Give me a break!
No, if I'm buying Vodka, (and I don't anymore) I want something recommended by a major lush of the first order.
"What is my old pal Dick Wagner drinking these days?", is what I say. Dick used to occupy the third stool from the end of the bar I frequented when I worked in San Francisco. The Iron Pot was a fine establishment that was Dick's vodka drinking home away from home. Now that I recall, it may have actually been Dick's home. Anyway, the guy knew vodka and had the face to prove it. My guess is that if Dick is still "drinking in the atmosphere" on stool number three, he's not sucking down Trump Vodka.

Come to think of it...Though I gave up wobble water almost eight years ago, (I'm saving myself for the next century), I went through a vodka phase in the early 1970's. I could have had my very own Copper Vodka...or perhaps: Ken's Potato Wine.

Here I am fortifying myself for a broadcast in either San Diego or San Francisco.
The Seventies were a bit of a blur for me.

"Liquid show prep anyone?"





TRUMP VODKA

Drink it and you'll look like this tool!




Donald...YOU'RE FIRED!

I'm NOT wild about Harry

What the hell are "Deathly Hallows"?
Didn't I have that in the service?







After nearly forty years of having a radio show there are many things that I miss now that I no longer have one. The primary hole in my existence these days is having a ready outlet for the bubbling cauldron of weirdness that seeps into my melon on pretty much a twenty-four hour basis.
This blog helps with that.
HOWEVER...There is one giant burden that has been lifted from me. I now relish, and I do mean absolutely relish, the fact that I am free at last from the drudgery of faining an interest in popular culture. God, I hated faking that! It was the bane of my broadcast existence.
Many program directors sucked down Maalox and ripped out what hair they had left trying to impress upon me the importance of "relating" to the audience.
Well...Excuse me, I just never cared. I might have been dangerous if I actually had liked most of the music I was promoting. I didn't. My tastes run to obscure traditional jazz acts and funky hillbilly tomes dedicated to achieving the good life through the power of Miller High Life. You know...the stuff that doesn't sell.
It's a curse and I know it.
I would sooner spend the afternoon sitting on the air hose down at the Texaco station than watch American Idol or read one of those damn Harry Potter books. (Look, I know that Ms. Rowling has made about a gazillion dollars writing that crap. But, come on!)

So, here I am not reading the new Harry Potter and probably not watching any TV shows that everybody else likes---but that's the way I like it. I did accompany Linda, a former librarian that happens to live with me, to Costco yesterday so that together we could fight for a copy of the new Harry Potter. In fact, she's reading it now. She is a far more pleasant an agreeable person than am I. I'm sure she'd be willing to loan you her copy when she's done.

In the meantime, I'll be at the Texaco sitting on the air hose.
I appear to be a couple of pounds low.

MAN OVERBOARD!

I'm trolling for large- mouth bass on a lake somewhere in northern Minnesota.
Two lines are in the water and the chop is fairly light.
Suddenly the outboard dies; water begins to come over the transom. I'm wet and the boat is sinking.
Then, miraculously, the engine fires and I'm once again trolling the lake. I bale the remaining water.
The scenario repeats in a nightmarish loop.

I awake and realize that I'm okay. Dry in my California bed and not lurching toward a watery grave somewhere in the wilds of Minnesota.
I also become aware of the fact that my wife is snoring.
Does Linda sound like an Evinrude Troll-O-Matic, or the 25hp Mercury from my old Lonestar aluminum runabout?

Exhibit A-Evinrude




Exhibit B- Mercury



I'm going to do some more research on this. Frankly, it's disturbing that I have lost my ability to ascertain the very real difference between the two outboard motors. Perhaps I will take a tape recorder to bed with me tonight.

On second thought...Forget I ever brought this up. If Linda gets word that I have even thought about confiding this, well, I may not see the sunrise.

In fact, fighting for my life while trolling for bass in northern Minnesota is starting to sound pretty good to me.

I wonder what they're hitting on tonight?
How about passing me a sandwich and your best lure.
The tape recorder goes in the drink!

Take your cell phone...YOU MAY NEED IT!

It's a bridge too far in restroom technology.
It is sheer madness...
Un-American!
Vile!
The final frontier in cheapness!
It's the Kimberly-Clark automatic toilet paper dispenser. In other words...If you have to go, take your cell phone in there with you. It could get ugly.







Mr. Richard Thorne: Evil director of electronic rolled paper dispensers for Kimberly-Clark. (aka...Satan Inc.)


Ask anyone who has ever traveled with me. The bane of my existence is those damn "wave your hand in front of the dispenser" paper towel deals found in an ever increasing number of public restrooms. How many times have I waved my hands like a lunatic in front of those stupid evil machines only to have them silently laugh at me as they send me on my way with dripping wet hands? How often has a fresh pair of pants sopped up the remains of a hand washing only because the demon dealer of automatic paper towels chooses to hate my guts?
I can't make those damn things work!!

And it's not just me. Last week in the SeaTac airport I stood right beside a well dressed intelligent looking gentleman who was wildly gesticulating to the towel dispensing god machine located right next to the one that was laughing at me. We both looked like a couple of candidates for the goon garage as we tried to cheer lead the dispensers into gifting us with a modicum of paper towel on which to dry our hands. No such luck.
As he turned to look at me, the man said, "This is some crappy technology!"
Then we both left in search of a friend or relative to wipe our hands on.

Now...they want to do this with toilet paper???!!!!!
The folks at Kimberly-Clark say that this device is foolproof. When one of the two motion sensors is activated, the battery-powered motor will automatically dispense a predetermined amount of toilet paper. The machine has a suite of "security" features to prevent malfunctions.

Yeah, right!
If it's all the same to Kimberly-Clark, I will be taking a ball peen hammer in there with me AND my cell phone. (Complete with the emergency numbers of my best friends...or, better yet, numbers for people I don't mind losing as friends.)

If all else fails...Be listening for the all-purpose fail- safe:

"MOMMMMMMM"!!!!

E.G. Marshall???!!!!

"You won't notice it happening until you see yourself in pictures."
That's what Tom Kennington told me over thirty years ago. Tom was a boss of mine in Tampa and he had long been a "chrome dome". Tom, a jolly good fellow, seemed more than comfortable in his follicular challenged state. He did, however, seem excited to be rushing a new pledge to the fraternity of the bald pate...that would be me.

To be honest, I had been noticing a slight retreat in the forward area of my hairline. I had been blaming it on recently wearing a steel pot on my head as I helped the U.S. Army hold the line against the godless commies in Kansas, but my forehead was not yet Dunkirk Beach. I'd worry about going bald...later.

So there I was the other day, going through some old family photo albums at the behest of my daughter Katie. She had called to ask for a baby picture of herself for some goofy deal at work. Naturally I said that it would be no problem to locate a sufficiently embarrassing picture of her to provide yuks for her office and began the task of sorting through the now ancient snapshots.
(My task loomed large after she informed me that I needn't send along any "nudies". Damn the good taste police!)

YIKES!! It had been way too many years since I had hopped in the photographic time machine! The "baby" had been a baby thirty-four years ago!
Who were these people? That couldn't be me? My wife? The kids??
It was a karmic whack in the gut. I had one of those "out of body... this can't be happening to me" moments. It was frightening. How could we all have changed that much? How could I now be older than my father was in these pictures? And...what the hell were these children doing with CHILDREN? Very scary stuff.

Now it's becoming clear to me why everybody on TV looks like a kid that I should be telling to clean up his plate or "stop teasing the dog". Thirty or forty years will tend to alter a person's appearance. Who knew?

This also goes a long way toward explaining why all of the pictures recently taken of our family have the late actor E.G. Marshall in them. (I thought they had been photo shopped.)



E.G. Marshall





For now, I'm okay with all of this. However, I may lose it when I start spotting Walter Brennan standing next to my wife and kids.



Walter "Grandpappy Amos" Brennan

D'Oh! I DEMAND A RECOUNT!!

How could this happen?
Springfield, Vermont gets the premier of The Simpson's movie??
Everyone who has ever passed through the place of my birth, Springfield, Illinois, knows that the capital of the "Land of Lincoln" is indeed the home of Homer, Marge, Bart, Lisa and Maggie. Ralphie, The Chief, Apu, Mr. Burns, Krusty and all the rest are there too!
Springfield.....where the men are men, and the women are after them! (Well, maybe not Smithers.)

Springfield is the home of Mel-O-Cream donuts, quite possibly the only donut with more calories than Krispy Kreme. Isn't that worth something?! Angioplasty anyone?
No, the fix was in. Some Hollywood lowlife rigged this deal and I aim to get to the bottom of it.

And...if it ever comes up in a trivia contest. Springfield is also the cradle of possibly the most cholesterol laden gut bomb of all time: The Horseshoe Sandwich.
(Don't make me tell you what's in it.)





No, it's not New England that the Simpson's call home.

If ever I have espied clueless slap-happy denizens of the good old Midwest, it's Homer and Marge's brood. I can drive you to their house.



These people are yellow because they eat CORN...not CHOWDER!




I think I am related to the Simpsons. This is my brother, Steve. You make the call.

LOST at Sea with the NY Times

Ahh....Alaska in July


I have been gone.
Did you notice?

Linda and I joined our daughters and their husbands for an Alaskan cruise. More beautiful than the scenery was the ability to gloat each day as we checked out the temperatures in the other states that enjoy more proximity to the equator. That information was available courtesy of the satellite reception of CNN in our cabin aboard the ship.

When I'm home I seldom watch CNN and after a week of depending on them and a daily two page fax of the stories considered important by the New York Times I now know why I hate them both. I will give CNN credit for their continuing coverage of the two most important stories of last week. (What? You thought it was Al Gore's "Private Jets for Climate Change" concert???!!!!) No, CNN gave us continuous updates of the arrest of Al Gore's son, Al III, and were almost correct in where the incident occurred. They had him busted in San Diego instead of Orange county. Well, he was on the San Diego Freeway which does go to San Diego. Considering that CNN's reporters are all remedial journalism school graduates, who ten years ago wouldn't have been hired to do the noon farm report in Sioux City, that's more than enough for what passes for TV news today.

The New York Times, as usual, buried the lead on the Gore story. Not until nearly the last paragraph did they mention the most astounding aspect of young Mr. Gore's arrest for speeding and drug possession...HE WAS DRIVING A PRIUS THAT WAS GOING OVER 100 MILES PER HOUR!!!!!!

Al Gore III (Is NASCAR in his future?)






Who knew those nasty buggy looking cars could go 100???? That's your lead!!
I don't even think Toyota thought that 100 mph was a remote possibility. There is a whole new marketing campaign right there! Maybe the Gore kid can hold them up for some big cheese just to be their new spokesman. (When does he get out of stir?)
Now, if they could just make the the damn ride look a little less embarrassing to be seen in, they might be on to something.

Toyota Prius



Perhaps some flames and a racing stripe? They have got to do something. This is one ugly car!



THIS GUY LOST!


One story I was happy to keep up with while on vacation was the wonderful victory of American Joey Chestnut in the Nathan's Famous hot-dog eating contest. I found myself tearing up as the defending champion, Takeru Kobayashi, suffered a "reversal" (see puking) during the final few moments of this truly ALL AMERICAN contest. Yes sir! It's good to have a red-blooded American holding the trophy in a contest that involves shoving over sixty hot-dogs down your pie hole. There is nothing more American than over-eating. That's why I love a good cruise. Everybody eats like they're going to "the chair".

It's good to be home.
What's in the refrigerator?