Sailing Along, Unaware

As we sailed tonight on our rented cat,
'cross wakes and tides and all of that,
I gave no thought to any dying,
easily done not a bit of trying.

We watched the setting sun,
Breezing along, cool as could be.
Joy, sails, and friends as one,
But his absence didn't touch me.

Arriving home, a mix of blessing
A friend lost long ago, now passed.
Another sends a note addressing
Connecting now, not in the past.

50 Cent, Uncle Scrooge and the Almighty Dollar

50-Cent, Uncle Scroge and The Almighty Dollar

Does anyone else see the irony? 50 Cent has filed for bankruptcy protection...Irony? The dictionary says "the expression of one's meaning by using language that normally signifies the opposite, typically for humorous or emphatic effect." The name 50 Cent literally means he is all about the money, doesn't it? Oh, and 50 Cent needs protection... Have you ever seen this guy? Talk about fearsome.

Just so we're clear, this is personal bankruptcy, and does not affect his various business interests and, as his attorney explains, this " just allows him the chance to pursue an orderly reorganization of his financial affairs." 50 Cent told the Wall Street Journal he still hopes to become a billionaire one day, and if it doesn't work out, "I'll be extremely disappointed and feel like I haven't done what I was supposed to do."  Sounds almost like a higher calling.

50 Cent himself points out that even Walt Disney once filed for personal bankruptcy protection. Oh, yeah? Are you sure it wasn't one of his characters? Was it just some Mickey Mouse stuff? I don't know, it sounds Goofy to me.

Ah, but back to 50 Cent--he is beset by some personal setbacks in two recent civil cases, and thus he faces some significant challenges and "needs protection." Even those of us who aren't named after money have the need for bankruptcy protection. But maybe having a monetary name makes it more difficult, not easier. By making it big early this man named for money has stumbled. To whom should he turn for help? A couple of options come to mind. He could take heed of some advice from another person whose name means money--like , let's say the Reverend Creflo Dollar. Or, perhaps he can continue to follow in the footsteps of Walt Disney. 

As it turns out, if Mr. Disney had money troubles, Uncle Scrooge McDuck was probably involved in Disney's bankruptcy adventure referred to by Mr. 50 Cent above. You remember Scrooge McDuck--he had a giant room filled with gold where he enjoyed spending time, as I recall. Scrooge McDuck was not always highly successful. He stubbed his toe (do ducks have toes in those webbed feet?) a few times prospecting for gold before he struck it rich in the Klondike.

Recently, the Motley Fool (financial and investing advice web site) published a story on this highly successful billionaire, Scrooge McDuck. Given his earlier mention of Walt Disney as a well-known figure in whose footsteps he is already following, perhaps 50 Cent ought to look to those tips based on Uncle Scrooge's career.

1. Work harder (but smarter) than everyone else, and keep an eye out for con men. Says McDuck, "Life is filled with tough jobs, and there'll always be sharpies to cheat me ... well, I'll be tougher than the toughies and sharper than the sharpies, and I'll make my money square!"
2. Don't ignore the value of good connections to family or friends.   Young Scrooge comes to America with little more than the clothes on his back in "The Master of the Mississippi," but one of the first things he does is seek out his riverboat-captain uncle. Scrooge's only connection in his new country makes him a teen aged riverboat captain several years later.      
3. Persistence pays off ... eventually.  There wasn't gold at the end of most of Scrooge's rainbows, but in "The New Laird of Castle McDuck," he reaffirms his overriding optimism by exclaiming that "there's always another rainbow!" Scrooge's story is familiar to many entrepreneurs and self-made men, who often go through several failed ventures before they find one that really works.     
4. Sometimes what you really need is a stroke of luck.   Scrooge spent years trying and failing to strike it rich around the world before finally finding a gold deposit in the Yukon. The value of hard work and an expert knowledge of prospecting surely helped him discover the gold. However, in Scrooge's origin story, it's made clear that much of his success comes from having arrived in the Yukon before the gold rush began, and then happened to chance upon a completely isolated spot in Canada.     
5. Put your money to work for you.  Two years after Scrooge found gold in the Yukon, he'd pulled enough out of the ground to become a millionaire. At the prevailing exchange rate of the day, that means he'd managed to dig up about 3,300 pounds of the stuff. After that, he decided to become a businessman -- and that business, naturally enough, was bank ownership. According to "The Billionaire of Dismal Downs," Scrooge became a billionaire within five years of transitioning from laborer to lender, 

On the other hand, look at Creflo Dollar. Now here's somebody well on his way to financial security. He's the well-known minister in the World Changers Church International, whose Megachurch outside Atlanta, which cost $18 million and seats 8,500 members for services. Dollar owns multiple million dollar personal residence and was recently rewarded with a $65 million Gulfstream aircraft for his travel needs. 

The secret, I think, is found in his teachings. He espouses the "Prosperity Theology," which Wikipedia describes as "a Christian religious doctrine that financial blessing is the will of God for Christians, and that faith, positive speech, and donations to Christian ministries will increase one's material wealth." Wealth is interpreted in prosperity theology as a blessing from God, obtained through a spiritual law of positive confession, visualization, and donations. Donations, donations and more, with several hundred thousand members in his church, Creflo has it made. 

 Except for the deeply flawed mission of turning church contributions in the tens of millions of dollars to his own use (ownership of two Rolls Royces, three multimillion dollar homes and a private jet).  Think of the good that could have been accomplished with all those contributions.

So, 50 Cent, what will it be--your own Disney World or will you try Creflo's approach to  produce some "Prosperity Entertainment?"  Do you hear a higher calling or a low one?

Bacon, Bakin' and Odd

Bacon, Bakin' And Odd


We're taking it easy today, except for getting ready for a 4th of July parade of visitors.  The preparation that consists mainly of a trip to the grocery store for "some snacks."  We delegated cooking the main course (and some of the sides, come to think of it) to Bullies' BarBQ--a merchant we have had the privilege of living about five minutes away from for the past couple of years.  

It really is too beastly hot for anyone to ask me to actually cook for all of them, trust me.  As I moved about the store and picked up  what I thought were "snacks," namely pretzels, potato chips, taco chips, I heard my dear wife say, "Oh, we'll be needing some bacon, too."  This reignited a condition I had only lately begun to recover from in just the past fifteen hours or so--Baconitis.  Yesterday it manifested itself when somebody observed that we were "bakin' like bacon."  

It was just an impulsive observation about how beastly hot it has been for the past few weeks.  Don't get me wrong, I don't really mind heat for the 4th of July.  All my life temperature in the 80' and 90's were typical on the 4th.  The problem was that someone had brought up bacon again.  It's all around me.  I've decided this is an "-itis" because bacon has become so ubiquitous that I am worried it is becoming some sort of obsession, or maybe it's possession--I'm being possessed by some sort of bacon spirit.  

Technically, "-itis" means inflammation.  Inflammation is, for me and most everyone I know, irritating.  So is Baconitis!  But the real problem is that you can never quite forget about it,    when you begin to realize you are surrounded by bacon, and people will bring it up or display it almost everywhere.  Here is just a brief recounting of where bacon has been popping up around me the past few days.  There was a report about the effect of the introduction of "baconator fries" on the price of Wendy's stock (it closed higher).  Baconator fries are intended to complement guess what? The Baconator burger, Wendy's most successful burger, of course.  Three nights ago, we ate out at the local Bonefish restaurant.  The special on the evening's menu was salmon topped with cheese and, what else?  Bacon.  My wife expressed her opinion that bacon and salmon don't go together.  Seriously, no one else has found any food with which bacon does not go.  There's bacon added to grits, bacon added to salads, even to a sauce you pour on waffles.  

Arby's has introduced brown sugar bacon sandwich, it consists of Arby's traditional sliced beef with brown sugar bacon sauce.  Paula Deen has a recipe for brown sugar bacon.  The web site EndlessSimmer.com has over one hundred uses for bacon.  I couldn't bring myself to read them all, but one included recipe was bacon apple pie--apple pie with a bacon lattice on top in lieu of the more traditional pie crust lattice.    

Want to stay current on all things bacon?  Subscribe to Bacon Today, "daily news on the world of sweet, sweet bacon"  Did you say you need a book to read to your children?  Another void has lately been filled--you will find there is now a children's book you can read to your child entitled, I Want To Be Bacon When I Grow Up.  

 Are you more of an Internet sort of person?  Go to BaconFreak.com.  I had been putting off the completion of this little essay until the bacon wave subsided in my world, but I concluded it never will, when my wife pointed out the bacon-flavored chocolate at the local chocolatier.  We're doomed.  Chocolate and bacon have formed an alliance.    

P.S., I recently attended a prayer service where the minister recited the following invocation:  Dear Lord, once we had Johnny Cash, Bob Hope and Steve Jpbs.  Now, we have no Cash, no Hope and no Jobs.  Please, please, please, we beg foe you-- watch over Kevin Bacon!

WebMaD (as renamed herein) and The Return To 2nd Grade

WebMD (as renamed herein) and The Return to 2nd Grade

Once you reach a certain age, your email is often filled up with regular appearances by providers of unnecessary information you never asked for, and find generally useless.  They arrive in the form of newsletters from people like WebMD, AARP, and more.  They often have messages aimed at "enlightening" you in some form by answering questions you never asked.  Just such a message arrived in my email recently, and its title made me set it aside for exploration when I had nothing else to do.  It was a WebMD newsletter with a title that editorial policy in my little column here forbids directly relating directly here.  Suffice to say that its subtitle, "The Truth About Body Noises," gives you a hint, but it could be misunderstood.  For example you might say to yourself, "Oh, it's probably about snoring and creaking, cracking joints," or. if you are someone who suffers from--or lives with someone who suffers from--seasonal allergies, you might even say "it's probably about coughing and sneezing, etc."  Nope.

It's really about something associated with digestion, and--more specifically--its leading headline deals with certain malodorous events that are associated with the intestinal tract.  Yes, it's flatulence, but, just to make sure the headline has the maximum impact, they scorn the use of the medical term and actually use the word.  It begins with "F" and rhymes with "That smarts," which is usually what you might have said after Sister Mary Borgia has smacked the back of your hand with a ruler for using the word in her classroom or even in the schoolyard during recess.  Our editorial board here is populated by people who were taught not to use certain expressions by the Sister Mary Borgias of this world--probably during the previous century to this one.  WebMD's editorial board, on the other hand, is probably populated with 2nd graders or those whose vocabulary remains thrilled with the same expressions they enjoyed in the 2nd grade.  This is much like what one imagines the editorial board of Mad Magazine to be, hence the suggested renaming of "WebMD" as "WebMad" cited  above.     

At any rate, the title drew me in and I set aside their newsletter--engagingly entitled "Gurgles, F-----, and More Body Noises."   When I got around to opening it, the page linked to it contained a number of exciting tools and "facts."  The most unsurprising of these "facts" was the following observation; "Working out will help you f--- less."  Yes the people who constantly nag you about the benefits of regular exercise "push up" the notion that "Exercise reduces unnecessary air anywhere in your body."  Hah! " They have never been to yoga class" is all I am going to say about that one.

Oh, and get this, "Air travel increases the amount of f---ing you do."  I am not making this up, they loftily point out that "the change in air pressure can affect more than your ears."  I am pretty sure that was true for the people that flew with me and I believe them, although I don't recall any unfortunate incidents I was responsible for.  There is another "benefit" of travel I don't miss.

Their engaging way of conveying these "facts about f----" was to offer an online quiz.  I took it and scored a 40%.  Now I have heard some talk about the lowering educational standards these days, and when I went to school 40% was an "F," (no, the "F" is just a coincidence, really--it stands for failure).  WebMaD gave me a "pass on the gas!"  How can you trust these people?

Oh, by the way, the next quiz offered after completing the one I took was entitled "The Scoop On Poop."  I did not even go there.

At A Losss For Words: A Doggie Reference Letter

At A Loss For Words: A Doggie Referece Letter

Recently a good friend of ours was talking about one of her favorite subjects, her dog.  Tucker, an English Black Labrador, is a nice, quiet, lovable mass of black hair and muscle, weighing in at eighty-five pounds or so.  Her favorite greeting is to approach you and run the entire length of her body against your legs.  My guess is Tucker is offering with this subtle "nudge,"an opportunity to give her a lengthy pat and scratch anywhere at all, as long as you wish, and  she will appreciate it just the same; whether it is at her head or above her tail, or anywhere in between.  But you had better act fast, as she plans to make this offer to anyone else who has arrived with you, so you will have to get in line if you miss your first opportunity.

Anyway, a friend of our friend (not the dog, our other friend), is looking for a dog, and, surprise-surprise, she is looking for a Black Labrador as well.  My guess is Tucker has charmed her too with a few of those aforementioned end-to-end extended nudges that Tucker will give to just about anybody.  Now, you may not have realized this, but Labrador pups are in great demand, and not just anyone can get their arms around one--and that's not because of their size, they aren't eighty to one hundred pound bundles of joy as puppies.  It takes a couple of years or so to eat enough of the food you haul before one of these friends/adopted family members before the grow into that eighty to one hundred pound territory.

The dog-seeking friend was describing the trials of finding a breeder willing to even return your calls, let alone grant her the opportunity to see one of the available pups.  The prices are too astounding to mention (ok, ok, I'll give you a hint--they run into the thousands of dollars--and I'm not talking about the cost of the food they will eat, the furniture they will befriend--giving the legs of your couch an occasional chew apparently is a gesture of friendship--or even the shoes of any and all household members to whom your new pup takes a "shine."  Oh, not the shoes, they will likely never shine again as you, like me, probably aren't willing to spend time and energy polishing shoes that have been chewed to pieces.

As this prospective adoptive parent was describing her plight, she mentioned the name of one breeder who had not even returned her calls, and it turned out to be our friend's source for Tucker--yes the dog breeder who had blessed my friends with Tucker still raises Labrador pups, apparently needing to add a few hundred thousand dollars or so to his own retirement nest egg.  On hearing this, the Labrador Puppy Parent Wannabe pleaded with our friend, asking that Tucker's "Mommy" provide a "letter of reference" for her to help her get the breeder to sell them a puppy (in case it is not obvious, she was asking Tucker's adoptive "Mommy," and not her real mother, who is apparently a tramp, making her living by giving birth to dozens of puppies; besides which she cannot hold a pen in her paws or tap keys on a keyboard worth a hoot--if she is the kind of dog who hoots--I should look that up).  My friend agreed, which was why she was telling us the story.  She was asking for our help.  As I am sure if you have ever been asked to write a letter of reference for someone attempting to undertake a career, for example, you might have struggled for the right things to say, composing this letter of reference had indeed left her at a loss for words.

Driftwood and Me

Driftwood And Me

When I woke up this morning, driftwood was on my mind.  I can't say why, maybe I was feeling windburned from the beach yesterday, struggling to keep beach umbrellas upright in a stiff breeze.  

I went to google to learn some things about it, and found myself tossed upon the waves in much the same way the very subject itself is.  (When I write my first allegory, driftwood will play an important part.)  But back to my journey of discovery on driftwood.  I was bounced from page to page as I started looking.  I was sent to Wikipedia, of course.  There I learned that driftwood is "wood that has been washed onto a shore or beach of a sea, lake, or river by the action of winds, tides or waves. It is a form of marine debris or tide wrack."

Sounds simple enough, but I also learned it isn't just created for our amusement--as in art, or aquariums, or as a nuisance where it sometimes completely covers a beach.
  

It also forms an important part of the food chain for sea creatures.  It seems that gribblesi, shipworms and other bacteria climb aboard and consume the insides, decomposing it and turning them into nutrients for the smallest of fish, who in turn are gobbled up by bigger fish, and so on, ad nauseam.  Or maybe not "ad nauseam," I've enjoyed some pretty tasty seafood around here, and it doesn't taste like bark to me--not to be confused with the cuisine of certain Asian countries who have been known to eat certain kinds of animals we treat as pets, but that's another story.  

Back to driftwood,   While the majority of driftwood is said to have formed as trees, roots and storm-damaged limbs are washed from our shores into the sea, a fairly large proportion is formed from flotsam and jetsam, from man-made wooden objects.  Jetsam and flotsam are two distinctly different things--jetsam sounds like the country cousin-- the result of deliberately discarded wood used as dunnage, while flotsam is the more dignified-sounding one.  Flotsam is the result of shipwrecked or storm damaged wooden boats and ships.  I can imagine large groups of driftwood floating on the seas.  If they are anything like humans, they are labeling each other and "making statements" about themselves by studying their heritage.  Imagine the "Daughters of the Sunken Ships of the American Revolution" or the "Sons of the Shipwrecked Colonials."  Then, think of all those who would consider themselves superior because they were organically-grown and formed, then washed into the sea as opposed to being sawed, hammered and planed into a man-made object.  If they are anything like humans, I now know why driftwood looks so haggard and torn when it land on the shore--all that time sniping at each other about whose heritage is better than whose.  Don't even get me started on the competition about the sort of passengers they allow on board--"Don't you know those Gribbles smell so much better than those old Shipworms, or, mercy-me, those stinky bacteria!" 

Anyway, it was a long trip just wading through Wikipedia on driftwood.  I soon found myself tossed among a sea of other entries--take this one for example:  Norse mythology has it that the first humans were formed by the gods not from clay or the rib of the opposite gender, noooo...They were formed out of driftwood and called "Ask" and "Embria" (note the "A" and "E" like "Adam" and "Eve."  Hmm, some connection there--but get this, they were formed out of the best kind of trees for driftwood--Ash and Elms, yes, "A" and "E" again; I am not making this up.      

It turns out there's a new novel (2014) entitled Driftwood, and a folk music group of the same name.  Look them up on YouTube, they are really pretty good.  In the process of exploring that link, I found the Driftwood band performing a song also covered by the Chieftains.  From there I arrived at a collection of recordings made by the Chieftains (a traditional Irish Band) and some of the better-known ladies of country and folk music (Martina McBride, Emmylou Harris, Alison Krause, et al.).  

Shortly after that I floated my way to a site that offered a guide to making my own driftwood--it's a lot of work, and can take months.  Finally I surfaced in familiar territory.  I washed up on Amazon which offered to sell me a piece for just $16.09--with free "shipping," no less.  I bought one.  It arrives in two days (how they know it will wash up that soon I don't know.  I can't wait.