Monday Morning Musings

Actually, not many musings, but I did want to pop back in and let everyone know I am still above ground. I am slowly getting better, but need another week or two to fully recover.

I'm glad the election is tomorrow. I am so tired of the political mud-slinging, it will be a relief not to have the ads on television. Of course, it seems like we hardly have a reprieve when it is time to start new campaigns for the next election.

And now, in honor of Halloween, here is a guest post from Slim Randles. I know we are past the holiday - I'm not that sick - but Halloween is one of my favorites, and I think most of us know someone like Herb. Grab a piece of coffeecake and enjoy.....

To look at Herb Collins, you wouldn’t think he was like that. A nicer, kinder guy you never met. But for one evening each year … one little slice of time … he’s downright diabolical.

Every small town has one, of course. There is always that one person who takes Halloween to its extremes of horror and fantasy. We have Herb.

Everyone knows about his penchant for decoration. Ever since he retired, his yard and house has celebrated every holiday from Christmas to Grover Cleveland’s wedding anniversary with great festoonation and an increase in the electrical bill from all the lights.

But on Halloween, Herb goes plumb nuts. It’s a good thing heart trouble is rare for the age group who go trick or treating, because Herb’s yard is a veritable booby trap of pouncing ghosts, swooping bats that swing out of the trees, loud sound effects as witches pop straight out of the lawn in front of children and cackle, and porch-side demons that shriek and leap just as the kid reaches what he considers the safety of Herb’s front porch.

It’s a running of the gauntlet that only the bravest of the brave attempt. Herb says he hasn’t had a four-year-old make it to the front door yet. But for the older kids, this is an annual challenge, and one by one they leave the safety of the sidewalk to do a broken-field run, often with screaming, until they hit the safety of the doorbell. Once that doorbell rings, they know, it’s all over but the candy.

Ah, the candy! As if to make up for all the screaming and terror, Herb gives out dollar candy bars. Some kids have been known to carry them around for several days to show off before eating them.

“It gives the little guys something to shoot for,” Herb says, laughing. “And the big guys get a different dose of demons every year so they aren’t sure what to expect.”

And Herb?

“I just have a lot of fun.”
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Brought to you by Saddle Up: A Cowboy Guide to Writing 

Friday's Odds and Ends

Its a beautiful spring day here in East Texas and I was out early picking berries and then I took my dog for a walk. We have to enjoy these spring days before the blast of summer heat hits. Here is a picture of one of my favorite wildflowers. They grow abundantly in my front pasture and I have been known to drive around them when mowing.

 We're headed into run-off elections across the country and some of them could carry pretty hefty price tags. I like what one small town in Reeves County Texas did. The two candidates for city council, Bruce MacNair and Bryan Studer,  agreed to a coin toss to select the winner. All that cost was a quarter. A run-off election would have cost the small town of Wolfforth, which is near Lubbock, $10,000.

According to Texas election laws, a coin toss is a legal method to break a tie between two candidates, and it appears it may be legal in other states as well. In doing some research I found that a coin toss has been used in Illinois, New Mexico and even in the Philippines.

I have an idea. Why not make it law to have a coin toss to settle every election tie? Obviously those are the two candidates that most people wanted, and it could save so much money. And another plus is we would not have to suffer through all those horrid campaign ads that sling so much mud you want to put on your wading boots.

Here's a quarter to use.

 A Truthout article by Mike Ludwig shed new light on the controversial fracking method of extracting oil. Fracking is used in many states, Texas included, and right now there is an effort to halt the proposed fracking in areas surrounding New Mexico’s Chaco Culture National Historical Park. If you would like to urge the Bureau of Land Management to deny this proposal, you can sign a petition HERE

After reading Ludwig's article that opened with, "Energy Information Administration officials told reporters on Wednesday that they are cutting their estimate of how much oil can be drawn out of California's massive Monterey Shale formation by a whopping 96 percent."

Fracking involves forcing gallons of water, containing chemicals, deep into the earth to break up rock formations.

Ummm... do we really want to keep doing that?

Now lets close with some fun. I got these jokes from The Laugh Factory in the Family Jokes category.

A woman gets on a bus with her baby. The bus driver says, "That's the ugliest baby that I've ever seen. Ugh!" The woman goes to the rear of the bus and sits down, fuming. She says to a man next to her, "The driver just insulted me!" The man says, "You go right up there and tell him off – go ahead, I'll hold your monkey for you."

An elderly couple are in church. The wife leans over and whispers to her husband, "I just let out a long, silent fart. What should I do?" The husband replies, "First off, replace the batteries in your hearing aid!"

Your Chuckle For The Day

I laughed so hard after reading this Mallard Fillmore cartoon this morning, I choked on my coffee.

Funny stuff:

"With only two days left in the campaign, the latest polling data show that 92 percent of registered voters now say they'll scream if they hear any more polling data...

"...while 84 percent say pollsters should be eaten alive by gerbils."

The other day, my husband and I thought we'd feed the pollsters to the coyotes, but death by gerbil might be more fitting. Coyotes kill their prey quickly.


Here's a link to more Mallard Fillmore fun

Want My Vote?

Looks like we dodged the bullet one more time and the whole global financial system is not going to implode after all. The stock market has recovered somewhat, and banks are getting assistance from government. The financial life of the world goes on.

But have we learned anything from this near-disaster? Is anything going to change in the way business is conducted? Are we going to continue to over spend, over borrow, over speculate, and over lend?

And what is this bailout going to do to the national debt?

The money has to come from somewhere, and since we are already borrowing millions, maybe billions, to cover the cost of government, the cost of the war, the cost of social services, where is this extra money coming from?

I am not an economist, and some people may find my approach to global economy a bit too simplified, but I'm savvy enough to know that borrowing to solve the banking problem is a short-term fix with some serious long-term negative effects.

So, to me, balancing the federal budget has become the primary issue for the coming election and is what the government should be focused on for the foreseeable future.

And may I make a suggestion to the next president-elect, why not cancel 95 percent of the inaugural ceremonies and parties that cost millions of dollars, and ask the lobbyists who pay for most of the parties to donate those millions to the cause of saving the economy. If you thought the general public was disgusted with the AIG execs who partied hearty after their recent bailout, imagine the reaction to the lavish inaugural parties.

Whoever is willing to do that, as well as stop all non-essential spending will have my vote.

Candidates' Qualifications

A recent Non Sequitur cartoon showed a man in an interview saying, “My qualifications are that I’m not nearly as unqualified for the job as the other applicants are…, who are all members of a satanic cult, buy the way.” He is carrying a sign that reads: Hire me or the terrorists win. The interviewer is looking over the applicants resume and says, “Oh, nice list of celebrity endorsements.”

In the bottom right of the panel Wiley Miller, the creative genius behind the strip wrote, “If we hired people the same way we elect them.”

I laughed when I read it, then I cheered. And I wished it could be a wake-up call for the voting public. If only enough people could see the truth behind the humor of this cartoon and start calling for change in the political process, I would be a happy camper.

In following the presidential campaigns, I have seen little being discussed that has anything to do with how a candidate would do the job. And the debates, especially the most recent ones, disgust me. There is no respect shown, candidates don’t answer the questions, and there is a lot of name calling.

Gee, remind you of Kindergarten anybody?

I’m tired of the candidates sniping at each other. I’m tired of the media telling us who is likely to win because he or she has the most money. I’m tired of the candidates avoiding a direct answer to a direct question. And I’m tired of everyone focusing on things that have nothing to do with a candidates ability to serve the office he or she is campaigning for.

Is it possible to change this political system, or are we forever tied to this huge machine that keeps clanking away and leaving the people in the dust?