My Robot Is Pregnant theme song!

this was under Sean’s go-kart…

I’m sitting here trying to remember what war we are in…doesn’t it have a name? Do you know? They always name wars…Desert Shield, Desert Storm…those are over, then we went into Afghanistan…Operation…operation… a wacky doctor…has the patient on the run… oh, Operation Enduring Freedom. Do you remember that one? We fought the tailban and burned down opium fields. But that was somewhere else… what war is this one in Iraq? And will we have a new name for when we go to Iran? Desert Sand? Enduring Occupation? Republican Fuck-Up?

I’m a realist. Let’s keep america strong. Taliban is like the moral majority, like joining sides with the Christian Coalition…I’m for drinking and smoking and sex without marriage. No way am I supporting Saddam Hussien or Amidinijad (spelling?) but please be honest with me. We want to secure oil wealth. I haven’t quit driving to work, I’m all for securing oil wealth. I like my home heated. I wear shoes with fake rubber soles. We aren’t seeing any alternatives offered, so let’s go “secure” the oil. Just don’t treat me like I’m dumb and tell me we are there because of 9/11. Let’s do Iran next, we don’t want them getting ahold of Iraq…but don’t pump that terrorism sunshine up my ass.

p.s. they call it Operation Iraqi Freedom. That’s the name of our current war.

image courtesy some dude’s ebay auction
Back in Vietnam, military bases required soldiers to convert their US dollars to U.S. Goverement issued Military Payment Certificates, or MPC’s for short. These were often psychedelic colored paper notes with women’s portraits featured on them – a far cry from the boring green and black inked old men in regular circulation.

The reason was to thwart black markets and to keep the opposition Vietnamese government from getting ahold of strong US currency to fund the fight against us. You can read a pretty good explanation at wikipedia.

Of course this money, meant to be spent on base, leaked out into the local economy which would then be destabilized. Just picture yourself a native running a bar in Saigon and deciding whether to accept US backed money or North Vietnamese money. Since it is armed US servicemen in your bar, you’d be inclined to think their money will hold its value for a lot longer than your own country’s in the middle of civil/international war.

Without notice the military base would close itself off and require all the MPC’s to be turned in for a new series, effectiviley annihilating the old currency and bankrupting blackmarketers – for the time being.

What I want to research now is how we operate in Iraq today. Are we minting a new currency or are we using our money as it is in hopes of destabilizing Iraq’s economy? Just think – US dollar, a weapon of mass economic destruction.

Wikipedia implies that today’s soldier is given a type of debit card, but since I am about to go to a funeral, I don’t have time to look into it right now…

It was a nice evening last night, by the way, at the funeral home. I saw a lot of relatives and friends and it was nice to reconnect with this large family of mine in New Hampshire.

My old high school chum Sean Ahern is serving some time in Pennsylvania and I hired him to write a review of the prison food. The letter arrived yesterday, so with no further ado, take it away Sean:

“One would expect a dull, oleaginous sheen coating the inner workings of the seventy-five year old colossus of confinement that is United States Penitentiary, Lewisburg. A slow walk through the crestfallen bachelor pad of serial killer “Buffalo Bill” in “Silence of the Lambs.” A greasy stroll to the putrescent cavity in the center. The dining hall. Despite the cold harsh semi-realities mirrored in the songs of David Allen Coe, I’m here to tell ya – it’s not all that bad.

Three hots and a cot are not nearly as good as some things that rhyme, but I assure you, you’d be hard pressed to find better biscuits and gravy this side of Cuzzin’ Richies*, my friend.

They say breakfast is the most important part of the day and the day starts at 6:30 am with a variety of cold cereals, pastry and fresh fruit.

But let’s do lunch. Vegetable soup compliments a hot turkey sandwich, sides of mashed or boiled potatoes, green beans, turkey gravy and and apple sauce accompany in mouth watering delight.

Care to kick it up a notch? Bam! Try the soup du jour, pasta rotini with meat sauce, mixed vegetables and garlic bread. Perhaps a tossed salad* is something you take pleasure in. (syrup and jelly are available for you deviants.) Those eating something other than ass, this culinary delight boasts a healthy mix of lettuce, cabbage and carrots. Low calorie dressing is always an option. (for the salad)

For the hypertensive convict “heart healthy” alternatives are offered as well as no pork for Muslim fundamentalist radical jihadi terror suspects.

Did I mention the beverage bar? Take your pick from these palate pleasing options to quench your thirst – coffee, milk, cola, diet cola, root beer, lemon-lime, lemonade and fruit punch. Go ahead and drink your fill. It’s free! Sort of.

What’s not easily washed down with the many fine selections from the beverage bar is the high price of this all inclusive resort. what you won’t be getting is the fuck out here any time soon. The federal system offers no parole, chances of early release are as hollow as the center of a bagel – your choice of margarine pats or grape jelly.

The food truly isn’t bad, but then again Olive Garden has the never ending pasta bowl with free salad and bread sticks. How would you like to live there though? Put a bunk bed in the bathroom, lock the door at 10 pm…

Pasta becomes insignificant after a while and even the most comfortable of comfort foods can’t ease the pain.

The chow hall isn’t just food. Let’s talk about ambiance. The quaint personal touch of racially divided Formica topped tables supply the background for a cultural stew, while the sectioned brown plastic trays and yellow plastic utensils wrapped in napkins add a festive burst of color, appropriate for all occasions.

A cheerful beeping of scanned prison identification cards chirps as each meal is served and a jovial corrections officer announcing the block rotation over the public address system can be heard over the many conversating patrons.

The lines are long and the service is less than perfect. It’s rare to find a server without at a sourpuss as he is forced to work under the watchful eye of The Man. I’ve only experienced worse service once, when I was accosted by a post-op transsexual at an eatery called “the Friendly Toast” in Portsmouth New Hampshire. It was over a harmless sausage joke and I’d rather not talk about it – Bon Appetit!”

*The truck stop in Greenland NH

*tossed salad is prison slang for analingous

My grandmother had one of these above ground pools when I was a kid. They’re so 1970′s.

I’d like to see my bud Josh tomorrow in New Hampshire, and he could play me the best Kevin King song ever…you know Kevin King, the sixth grader whose art folder we found … you just gotta hear Josh sing Kevin’s songs…

Here’s my Grandmother, grammy Fufu, Ruth Carlton, just a few months ago. “It’s not bad, dying in autumn in New England”, someone said to me. “If you have to…”

She passed away yesterday afternoon, at home in bed with her family around her.

Sums up why I came West.

I’m cleaning out my magazine closet. I don’t need twenty mid-1960′s issues of a CB culture magazine. I’ve had these for 8 years and never read them. I’m beginning to see that I’m a pack rat and it has to stop.

I’m selling off a bunch of magazines, this is an ad from Feb. 1983 Electronic Games. This magazine has lots of illustrations – LOTS – which you wouldn’t expect from a computer magazine…but 1983 was the stone age.

I’ll be scanning in all my old christian comics. I’m also selling some Doctor Who magazines…anyone want ‘em I’ll send ‘em to ya if you pay the shipping.

I’d be between Shirley Rollins and Elizabeth Rooklin. Leave your last name in the comments section and I’ll scan in where you’d be in this 1976 University of North Carolina year
book.

Here’s my roommate…

Here’s a huge tune from Sean and I. Our first collaboration with the help of garageband and an old standby of Red Simpson’s…Highway Patrol.