of KINGS & carnies Before I Tell You That …

Nonsequitors for 2008-07-10

In Nonsequitors on 10 July 2008 with no comments

• The Little One wanted to know who built our house. And why they didn’t finish. #

In the Water I Am Beautiful

In Blog on 10 July 2008 with 3 comments

I’d forgotten where that came from: “In the water I am beautiful.”

Several years ago, I wrote a bit that contained the above quote. I don’t remember the bit and didn’t, until the other day, remember where the quote came from.

Citizen X from tanjents.com emails me several times per year asking if I could repost the bit because it struck a nerve with her. But I couldn’t remember. Until now …

The bit is long gone but I’ve rediscovered the source of the quote. It’s from the preface to Kurt Vonnegut’s Welcome to the Monkey House.

Without further adieu, Mr. Vonnegut:

I have been a writer since 1949. I am self-taught. I have no theories about writing that might help others. When I write I simply become what I seemingly must become. I am six feet two and weigh nearly two hundred pounds and am badly coordinated, except when I swim. All that borrowed meat does the writing.

In the water I am beautiful.

So there it is.

Nonsequitors for 2008-07-09

In Nonsequitors on 9 July 2008 with no comments

• If George Bush lied to bring us to war, is he responsible (criminally liable) for the people (troops & citizens) that died in Iraq? #

Purposefully Misled

In Blog on 9 July 2008 with no comments

Do you think George W. Bush purposefully misled to the United States Congress and its citizens when he led us to war in Iraq?

Do you think he purposefully misled us when he said that Saddam Hussein was linked to the terrorists who knocked down the World Trade Center, knocked a hole in the Pentagon, and killed a plane load of people in a field in Pennsylvania?

Do you think he purposefully misled us when he said that Saddam Hussein’s Iraq had “weapons of mass destruction”? Do you think he misled us when he said that those weapons were poised to be used against us in an offensive attack?

Do you think he purposefully misled us when he said that he sent our country to war to remove the terrible despot, Saddam Hussein?

If you believe that George W. Bush purposefully misled us, then you must take the step. You must conclude that his orchestrated deception directly resulted in the deaths of over 4,000 Americans and 100,000 Iraqis.

:::

Let’s take a step back.

If you entrusted me with the care of your child and I purposefully misled him/her into believing that it was safe to cross the street and, while crossing, got hit and killed by an automobile, am I responsible for that child’s death?

If I am responsible, what are the consequences? Are there criminal consequences? What is the punishment? Could I go to jail? Could I be executed?

If I am responsible are there other consequences? Are there civil liabilities? Could I be sued?

:::

If you believe that George W. Bush purposefully misled us, you need to think through what that really, really means. You need to have the guts to take those thoughts through to their logical conclusion, no matter how absurd and disgusting you feel that conclusion is.

And then you need to wrestle with that conclusion. And figure out what the hell you are going to do about it.

You owe it to at least 4,000 American children.

Nonsequitors for 2008-07-08

In Nonsequitors on 8 July 2008 with no comments

• Remind me to read some of Gerry Spence’s stuff: http://www.gerryspence.com/shared.html #
• Is what the right brain experiences real? #

Jill Bolte Taylor

In Blog on 8 July 2008 with 2 comments

On the way home from work I stopped at BJ’s to pick up dog food, cat litter, and Band-Aids. As is my wont, I perused the big book table. Books are a big deal to me — they are the tangible experiences of our collective unconscious; they are our communication with the great minds of our past and present; and they can be read on the toilet (or on the beach, or at our kids’ soccer games, or in our cars at lunch).

Even though my book shelves have books that I haven’t read (and may never read), I wanted a new book. I picked up and was fascinated by Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor’s My Stroke of Insight. Almost bought it.

But then I came across Vincent Bugliosi’s The Prosecution of George W. Bush For Murder. I don’t know what popular opinion of Bugliosi is, but I’ve always thought of him as well thought out, straight-forward, and true to himself. The title alone was enough for me to go, “Wow. I wonder what Bugliosi has to say.”

I bought “The Prosecution of George W. Bush For Murder.” I’m about a quarter of the way through it. Wow. But more on that at another time.

:::

I’ve studied brain function academically, professionally, and privately. I’m fascinated.

I believe that the two hemispheres of our brain essentially divides into two people — the Artist and the Scientist, the Poet and the Engineer, the Only Now and the Past-Future Linear. I have an inkling that God and the Universe and Nirvana is in our right brain (or is at least experienced there), but we live in our left brain. Our left brain holds us together and tries to make sense of All of This.

Speech-Language Pathologists are very tied into how the brain works and how experience, thought, and speech are formed. Many of them work with people who have brain problems. The Speech-Language Pathologists I work with is no exception. I shared with one of them my story about almost buying Dr. Jill Bolte Taylor’s book and told her some of the excerpts I read.

Essentially the book is about the experiences of a woman, a brain scientist, who had a stroke from a massive left brain hemmorage. Her left brain shut down and she was left living in her right brain. From her bio:

Jill Bolte Taylor was a 37-year-old Harvard-trained and published brain scientist when a blood vessel exploded in her brain.  Through the eyes of a curious neuroanatomist, she watched her mind completely deteriorate whereby she could not walk, talk, read, write, or recall any of her life.

Because of her understanding of how the brain works, her respect for the cells composing her human form, and an amazing mother, Jill completely recovered her mind, brain and body.  In My Stroke of Insight: A Brain Scientist’s Personal Journey, Jill shares with us her recommendations for recovery and the insight she gained into the unique functions of the right and left halves of her brain.

Having lost the categorizing, organizing, describing, judging and critically analyzing skills of her left brain, along with its language centers and thus ego center, Jill’s consciousness shifted away from normal reality.  In the absence of her left brain’s neural circuitry, her consciousness shifted into present moment thinking whereby she experienced herself “at one with the universe.”

Professionally, this book may give us tremendous insight into treating our patients with brain disorders. The Speech-Language Pathologist will buy the book on the way home this afternoon.

Personally, I’m fascinated. At least my Left Brain is.

:::

This is a short talk by Dr. Bolte Taylor. It is required viewing for all readers of ofKINGSandcarnies.com:

Martin Luther King Boulevard

In Blog on 2 July 2008 with 2 comments

The only other time I thought I was going to be killed in a felonious assault, I was working for the same company: OMNI Homecare.

I was in a town not dissimilar to the aforementioned Asbury Park driving along Martin Luther King Boulevard. You remember what Chris Rock said about Martin Luther King Boulevard:

If a friend calls you on the telephone and says they’re lost on Martin Luther King Boulevard and they want to know what they should do, the best response is ‘Run!’

I was looking for a certain apartment complex so that I could deliver some medical supplies. The problem was that none of the apartment buildings were marked. I looked woefully out of place as my white work van crept down the road.

That’s when three young Young Turks, hanging out in front of one of the buildings, waved me over.

“Maybe they saw the name on the side of the van and know that I’m there to deliver something for one of their neighbors. They’re helping me,” I thought. At the same moment someone else in my head said, “These guys are up to no good. I can smell it. Don’t trust them.”

I pulled the van up to them, but not straight on to the curb. I needed to make sure I could get out of there in a hurry just in case these Ne’er-Do-Wells decided to do something not too well to me. I didn’t even put the van in park.

I rolled down the passenger window and asked them, “What apartment building is this?”

“Which one are you looking for?” asked one of the Street Punks.

Ha! A setup! “No, no, no. It doesn’t work like that. You see, no matter what apartment building I’m looking for, you’re going to say that this is the one. I get out of the van and then you jack me. Just tell me what apartments these are.”

In the middle of my statement one of the Stoop Rats reached elbow deep into a bush. Uh-oh.

“He’s going for a gun,” I thought. “He’s going to shoot me because I have a big mouth.” I punched the accelerator and squirreled out of the parking lot. I looked in the review mirror and expected to take a couple of hits from a Saturday Night Special.

But that wasn’t the case. The Young Man didn’t reach for a gun; he reached for a baggy, which he held in the air as I sped off.

While I thought was going to be robbed and beaten, these Poor Sods thought they were going to make a dope sale and have some extra cash for lunch.

Typical misunderstanding.

Nonsequitors for 2008-06-30

In Nonsequitors on 30 June 2008 with no comments

• @sandrakay65 Dear Wife, Forgetting my birthday cake yesterday only means one thing: BIRTHDAY CAKE TONIGHT! WOOT! #

Jacked!

In Blog on 30 June 2008 with 2 comments

Over the last 12 years there have only been 51 permits to build new homes in Asbury Park, New Jersey. From 1996 until 2002, there were no, ZERO, permits to build new homes.

30% of Asbury Park’s residents have incomes below the “poverty level.” The average annual household income is only one-third that of the rest of New Jersey. Unemployment is twice the national average.

Violent crime is almost 4-times higher in Asbury Park than the national average. Robbery is almost 5-times higher.

Many of the 12,000 or so residents living in the one square mile of the city are poor and hopeless; some are desperate.

:::

One summer evening, I drove an employee who lived in Asbury Park home. I dropped him off in front of his apartment. He left his window open and his door unlocked (WARNING: Literary device “foreshadowing” in use). No matter, I figured I would take care of them when I stopped — this was a work van, no electric door locks and windows here.

At a red light, I reached over and slapped the lock down. At-that-very-instant, a person I didn’t see attempted to open the door. I quickly rolled the window up and just as quickly the unseen person (now seen) reached in the window and attempted to unlock the door. Now his arm is caught and we are looking at each other, eye-to-eye.

«Pause.»

I am not scared. It’s not that I’m a super manly-man. It’s just that this happened far too quickly for me to be scared. Besided I have the upper hand. He is stuck, elbow pinned in my window, with his arm reaching over his head. He’s probably on his tip-toes.

«Un-pause.»

He is scared. He spoke quickly. “It ain’t like that! It ain’t like that!” Quietly yelling. Pleading.

“It certainly seems like that,” I answered.

“No. No. No. You don’t understand,” he continued, panicking. He thinks I’m going to take off and drag him at 30, 40, 50 miles per hour. He’s stuck and trying to get out of it.

As he’s begging, all I can think is, “What the hell am I going to do with this mother-fucker?”

He looked at the side of the van. It read OMNI Homecare and underneath was the phone number. And then his tone changed from pleading-panic to hope, “Hey, man. Is this your company?”

“No.”

“Are they hiring? Do you have an application?”

The light turned green. I opened the window a crack. The pinned man was freed. “Call the number on the side of the van,” I said as I sped off. “Use me as a reference!”

:::

A friend of mine, Randy (aka The Big White Guy), asked me to tell that story. I first told him that as we drove through Asbury Park on a picture-taking safari six or seven years ago. I hope I did the story justice.

Nonsequitors for 2008-06-28

In Nonsequitors on 28 June 2008 with no comments

• 15 Greens In Regulation + 2 3-putts = 73 = $50 #