This little planet can be depressing at times. I picked up a magazine this week and came across three quotes that made me realize how desperate we are for a little hope. The first quote was an odd mix of funny and sad. Country singer Kenny Chesney had a very short lived and well publicized marriage to actress Renee Zellweger. His description of the pain he was feeling was like a parody of a bad country song. You know what I am talking about. Songs like My Girl Ran Off With My Best Friend and I Sure Do Miss Him. Chesney compared the pain of losing that relationship to “having someone come in and take the big-screen TV off the wall during the big game, and there’s nothing you can do about it.” Uhhhhh. Okay. Perhaps we have found a key to the breakdown of this marriage. I don’t want to make light of a broken covenant but what a shallow
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This may be a disappointment to you if you came here expecting George Carlin’s seven words you can’t say on television. But increasingly we have become a society that uses polarizing words instead of words that allow and engage conversation. So class…if you will take out your pencils and pads…today’s word is proselytise. I was surprised to see that proselytise is used as a synonym for brainwashing at an online thesaurus site. The actual definition listed by dictionary.com is:    1.  To induce someone to convert to one’s own religious faith.   2.  To convert (a person) from one belief, doctrine, cause, or faith to another. I had never paid a lot of attention to the use of the word.  I knew it was generally a perjorative when used to refer to Christians. But as I read the definitions it became clear to me that I need to gently challenge this word. As an evangelical Christian (perhaps  evangelical will be a future “bad word” topic) I do not feel
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First I must apologize to the three or four readers who eagerly show up each weekday to read these ramblings. I was stuck on the road with a defective power pack and no other computer access. So I have to admit that I “blogged” down for a couple of days. Sorry. I am now powered up and ready to ramble. Last night I was returning from a corporate meeting being held at a casino in Uncasville, Connecticut. Your reaction was likely the same as mine. Unca – where? Turns out it is about an hour from Hartford. But that is a future blog. My panic happened during a routine and boring flight from Hartford to home in Dallas. I was bored with the movie and tired of reading. As I absently mindedly fiddled with my wedding band it somehow flipped up and disappeared around my seat. I immediately thought of my bride and how I would explain this one. I can always play the idiot card
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This week I have felt lousy.  I picked up one of the early bugs to start off the flu and cold season. Before we even got to the regular flu/cold season I was downed by a lousy preseason bug.  Do those even count in the standings? So I did the anti-male thing and went to the doctor. “You are the twentieth person I have treated for this since yesterday,” she reported. “Do I get a group rate?” I asked hopefully. “No!” She said without even carefully considering the merits of my request. So after investing a couple of hundred dollars in the medical profession and drug manufacturers I am sitting at home waiting for this to run it’s natural course. I thought of how really crappy I have felt this week. And then I realized how much I take for granted the fifty weeks or so out of every year when I feel good or even great. Sure I have the
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Occasionally  I take another step in my inevitable march toward geezerhood. You know that stage of life where you get grumpy and tell people how it used to be back in the good old days. One of the things that advances me more quickly to that stage is the attempt to make life risk free. A group called the Michigan Law Suit Abuse Watch has an annual contest to find the stupidest product warning labels. The Wacky Warning Label Contest is in it’s eighth year and they have uncovered some beauties. They have an agenda of course. They want to point out how ridiculous and numerous lawsuits have forced product manufacturers to post warnings that are really just common sense. They don’t feel a manufacturer should have to be legally responsible for people lacking common sense. I agree. But that hasn’t stopped the avalanche of unbelievable warning labels. Here are some winners from other years and then we reveal the current year’s crop. Remember, these warnings
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There was a little controversy recently in the Dallas area. I live in a suburb of Big D so the story was a daily news item. Some of the seniors at an affluent high school in Dallas had a  couple of rather unfortunate traditions.  On senior Thug Day, students wore Afro wigs, fake gold teeth and baggy jeans. On Fiesta Day, which was to honor Hispanic heritage, one student brought a leaf blower to school.  A few students at the school dressed as gang members, rap stars, maids and yard workers  which offended many in our community. It was easy to throw these students of privilege under the stretch Hummer limo and many did. Words like insensitive and racist were thrown around. But I think Dallas Morning News columnist Jacquielynn Floyd got it exactly right. “It was less about racism than it was about rudeness.It was deliberately ill-bred behavior, the empty-headed mockery of people who got dealt a lower hand in life’s arbitrary card game.” Haven’t we
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I hope you read my blog about going to Homecoming last weekend at Baylor University. It was a wonderful weekend spent with family and friends. But I want these ramblings to be authentic and real. I have an embarrassing admission to make. I drove and parked carefully in Waco last weekend because I feared I was a wanted man. Let me explain. October 22nd dawned sunny and pleasant in scenic Garland, Texas. I blissfully strode to the mailbox to retrieve my daily dose of catalogues, junk mail, and bills. I sorted through the stack. “No annual fee for 12 months” – Correct. I am tearing it up. “A Special Invitation from Miracle Ear” – I don’t like what I can hear. No thanks. “A Charming Way to Show off Your Cleveland Browns Pride” – After last Sunday??? How about therapy? “A Special 14 Hour Sale Just For You” – I can’t be there. You can go ahead and cancel it.
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