National Debt

It was just reported that Dubya convinced Congress to raise the debt ceiling for our country to 9 trillion dollars.Those idiots in Congress happily approved this request and sent it off to Dudya who then signed it. I would type out that 9 trillion dollar figure in numbers but I don't want to wear out the zero key my computer keyboard and besides, if you tried to read that number you would be forced to have laser surgery on your eyeballs after they tried to adjust to that ungodly figure. Those of you that are reading this will no doubt be in disbelieve when I report to you that this sum works out to about 30,000 dollars for every man, woman & child alive in this country. So if you use my oldest daughter as an example, with her family of 7, they represent almost a quarter MILLION dollars in debt that this country OWES to banks and other foreign countries, the Social Security system the government borrows from and so on. In contrast, when President Clinton left office, he left our country with about a 3 Trillion dollar debt, but with a budget SURPLUS. While this isn't ideal, it sounds WONDERFUL compared to the current idiot and the situation he has created. He has left a situation for our young people and their leaders that they will probably never find a way out of. He can also quit blaming Clinton for this mess, as we are now 5 years into our Bush sentence. The absolute worst thoughts that can come outta this is that we still have THREE, count 'em THREE more years of Bloopers, Blunders & Practical Jokes before this moron is gone.

The Day the Earth Still

This morning about 8 o'clock, #3 son came upstairs from his room still half asleep and mumbled something no one could understand. I said you are going to have to speak more clearly, son, so I can understand you. He repeated himself and I was able to understand "Do you know what time Best Buy opens?" For some reason he assumes I get up every morning and the first thing I do is check the Best Buy opening time for that particular day. With my mind racing full of a whole lot of ideas for a smart-ass comeback, I cut him some slack, and said I figured they would probably be open by ten o'clock. The only reason I'd be concerned about a Best Buy opening time was if a new ZZ Top cd was coming out and then I'd probably buy it at Wal-Mart. I asked him what he needed, and he looked at me like I was crazy and said "Oblivion" comes out today. I confess I already knew all about this video game but I just LOVE messin' with the kids. I'm thinking of saying "What's an "Oblivion?", but I knew he wouldn't fall for it because that's ALL he's been talking about for months. I can tell that 10 o'clock is toooo far away for him to deal with right now, and I was right. I'm sure I saw his eyes glass over and foam coming from his mouth at the thought of waiting nearly 2 hours for this life-altering event. I swear I heard him mumbling to himself so I looked around to see if the Thrift Center lady had come to visit and stalk ME. I leave for awhile and when I come back he starts telling me about the characters in this game have 24 hour lives, you can get arrested and yada yada yada. The only video game that's ever impressed me is "Pong" and that's because it was the FIRST video game. I must admit however that this X-Box 360 thing in high-definition is definitely impressive. Which brings up another question. WHY does Bill Gates, the richest man in the world, need to charge 70 DOLLARS for a video game?? and if he is going to make a system called the 360, why don't he re-release "Pong" so it would TRULY be a 360?? Just wondering. Anyhow, my 18 year-old son managed to make it thru those 120 minutes that the earth stood still waiting for the store to open. We walk in there and you should have saw the look on his face when they said they weren't in yet. I 'bout busted up laughing but didn't because he IS a really good son but about then another guy came up and said the truck was backing in right now. I hadn't seen that much EXCITMENT on his face since he found the Pamela Anderson/Tommy Lee video on the internet. Anyhow, he purchased his greatly over-priced game, we went home, and he retreated to his basement bedroom where there is now a steady stream of gaming friends coming and going and being "Wowed" about this earth-shaking event. Me? I'm just left with my computer watching Pamela and wishing I was Tommy.

* Thrift Center, Week 2 *

Wifey dragged me back to the Thrift Center for their Monday 99 cent sale this morning. Since I didn't have a fire to investigate or a truck to wash (I screwed up and washed it Sunday), I wondered around the store looking for bargains and instead found " I'm Talking To Myself" lady from last week. I have now come to the conclusion this is one disturbed person. I decided to follow her around the store to see what entertainment she might provide. I know you might say I'm stalking her. You might be right. But she does provide me with a wonderful source of blog material. She chooses a blouse from the rack, pulls it over the blouse she's already wearing, and goes over to the mirror and looks at herself. She never shuts up the whole time. It seems this week she is conversing with herself at a lower volume than last week. She stands there a good 5 minutes jabbering with herself about wheather this blouse looks good on her. 'Is this sleeve too long?" "Does this collar look right?". She asked herself these questions several times over. I finally got bored with the whole thing and went out to my truck and read the USA Today sports section. I went back inside a while later and found my lovely wife on her way to my FAVORITE section of the store, the fitting rooms. I plopped my butt down in a chair and waited for the show to start. And folks, it didn't take long. Wifey pops out of the dressing room with a nice black dress on and asked me how it looked on her. Why the hell she thought a bored out-of-his-skull 54 year old man dying to get the hell outta that store would have a decent opinion on a black evening dress is beyond me, but I smiled and nodded my approval, and back in she went. A lady standing there beside me who was waiting to get a room smiled at me, for being a thoughtful husband I guess, a room opened, and in she went. Wifey is STILL in her room, and all of a sudden this other woman pops open her door and looks at ME and motions to the pants and top she had tried on and asked me if they looked alright on her. Look ladies. I came in here for a show, not to judge a fashion parade. But being the gentleman I am, I shook my head in disapproval, and back in she went. In all fairness, it DID look awful on her, like my opinion really matters. I guess it did to her. At this point, I'd had enough. On my way outta the store, I did find a really nice brass and crystal chandelier for 99 cents that's should fetch me at least a hundred bucks on eBay. Out the door Wifey and I went to search for a fire so we could have lunch.

*** Top Ten List ***

Top Ten Ways to Tell If Your 16 Year Old Daughter Is Having An Affair With A Firefighter:

#10 - She's up and dressed 15 seconds after the alarm sounds

#9 - Has telltale smell of a Dalmation.

#8 - Installs fire ladder from her bedroom window.

#7 - Carries pets over her shoulder.

#6 - Demands a pole be installed from bedroom to living room

#5 - Whips up a delicious 3-alarm chili.

#4 - Keeps all yard hoses neatly coiled.

#3 - When confronted, she says: "It was just a drill"

#2 - Gets tattoo that says; "Stop, Drop and Roll

And the # 1 way To Tell If Your 16 Year Old Daughter Is Having An Affair with a Firefighter:

#1 - She stores her allowance in a big boot by her bed.

Reprinted WITH modifications and without any permission what-so-ever
from the Spokane Spokesman-Review, Dated 3-17-06. All portions are
probably copyrighted except for my modifications. I personally could care
less if you steal this like I did. As we say in Spokane, " Screw-The-Review".

Weird People !!!

We had a HUGE fire in our city last night. A 220 unit apartment building being constructed on the campus of Gonzaga University burned down after an explosion just after midnight. This project involved a complete city block and was completely destroyed. After learning about this, and having to go to the area anywhy, I decided to drive by, and what else, see what was going on. What a sight it was. I pulled into a parking lot across the street, and watched a few minutes and then went on my way. Anyway, my wife wanted to go to a nearby thrift store that has a sale every Monday, and I dropped her off and went off to wash my truck. My return trip happened to take me back by the scene of the fire. While waiting for the light to change, I noticed that the parking lot I had been in was now full of cars. There were 7 cars right in my sight line along the sidewalk. Now what makes this interesting is what they were doing while watching the goin's on. One was talking on a cell phone, this isn't out of the ordinary, but the other 6 were EATING. Sitting in their cars and having breakfast, I guess. Now I confess to having driven by out of curiosity, but never in my living days would I have made a mealtime excursion out of it. Breakfast in a disaster area.

The light changes, and off I go back to the Thrift Center. I go inside, find my wife, and she leads me to the changing room area, where I plop my ass in a chair to, as it turns out, watch more weird people do their thing. Wifey has an armful of things, so I'm gonna be here awhile. I didn't have another truck to wash, so I start watching the people go in & out of the rooms. The first person that goes in is a 20's something man who has an armful of slacks. He trips taking his jeans off in the little room, falls against the door, so I turn my attention to him to see what the hell's going on. I'm watching the door to see if he falls on his ass in there, and I see through the bottom of the door where you look to see if the room is occupied that he's standing on his shoes. He has his socks on, and he's standing on his shoes. I watch him try on 5 pairs of slacks, raising his leg, putting it through the slacks and putting his foot BACK on top of his shoes. He never once touched the floor in his stocking feet. The floor, by the way, was very clean. This on top of the "Breakfast Buffett" back at the disaster area.

This guy leaves, and up walks a women I heard talking 2 aisles away. This is unusual only in the fact that she was by herself. She's jabbering the whole time, to nobody, and goes into the little changing room. I can hear her the whole time. I can't make out everything she's saying, and I didn't really care. But then she comes out and knocks on the door to the changing room next to her. I hear a voice say "Who is it? She knocks again, and finally a man peeks out the door. This woman then asks him how the blouse she was trying on looked on her. He looked at her like she was crazy, and I silently and totally agreed with him, and closes the door. He didn't even know her. She came out and went one way, and he came out and looked around for her, looked at me and I just shrugged my shoulders, and he went another way. A little while later I heard her again, I had to look, and sure enough, nobody around.

**** I'm Back****

I hope somebody missed me besides Melanie (Plaid Toaster)...LOL. I'm gonna
Rant 'N Rave today. Here goes...

True Story : A fireman in my city was caught having sex with a 16 year old girl on the boiler room floor of one of our local firehouses. Evidently, the girls best friend told her mom who then , thankfully, called the police. Take his ass to jail and throw away the key, right?. Not in Washington state. Here, the age of consent is, take a guess?, right, 16 years old, unless the adult is in a position of trust (teacher, scout leader, so on). I guess firefighters aren't included in this equation. Oh, it gets worse. He met her on an adults-only internet site he accessed from the firehouse computer. Don't worry, it gets even worse. During this hot-house love-fest, he set his digital camera to take about 30 pictures, which he kept on the memory card, at least until the cops came. It gets even worse. When 2 detectives showed up to ask him why he was boinking teenagers while on duty at our local firehouse, he told them he didn't know she was only 16, she told him she was 22.

As amazing as this all sounds, it gets even WORSE. The cops BELIEVED him!!! They then told him he should delete the pictures from his camera because the girl was only 16, he could be charged with possessing child-porn. The cops then went and got into their cruiser and went off on their merry way.

We are right now 2-3 weeks later. An investigation produced a stack of documents that was presented to the Don-Juan firefighter, and he resigned, to go home to, oh, I forget to mention, his WIFE and young daughter.

So now our community is in an UPROAR. But not for the right reasons. We have womens groups, letters to the editor, newspaper articles, demonstrations in front of city hall, and visitors to the mayor. EVERYBODY is pissed-off , and rightly so, because these DUMB-ASS detectives told this horn-dog to delete these pictures and then they went on back to the donut shop.

Now, don't get me wrong here. Child-porn is just plain disgusting. True, this guy is an idiot for having these pictures. But in all the media coverage, letters, demonstrations, local news, etc, not ONE person has complained about this-------

WHY IS IT LEGAL FOR A 35 YEAR-OLD MAN TO F**K A 16 YEAR-OLD GIRL???