Look at the title, can any of you tell me where the sentence is from and what it is? If so, the first right answer in the comment section will get a great prize! And, the more supporting information that goes along with your answer will earn you extra credit. Such a deal! I'll give you a hint: I didn't make it up; this is real. Ready, set, go.

And now, an answer to my adoring fans (well, fan) out there in blogland. A question that was asked regarding my last blog concerning marbles, and the loss thereof. You see, "losing all your marbles", I believe, comes from the game of "marbles" wherein each player starts with a bag of marbles. A circle is drawn on the ground and each player places one of his marbles inside the circle. Each player then "shoots" his next marble using the thumb and index finger, and tries to knock the existing marble, or marbles, out of the circle. A successful hit will drive a competitor's marble outside the circle. The shooter now owns that marble and he continues to shoot until he misses, whereupon the next shooter takes his turn. Similar to popular card games, the tension builds as players win, or lose, money, or marbles. In the marble game, when you lose all your marbles, you have nothing to play with anymore and your stress levels undoubtedly are very high. So, to "lose all your marbles" could reasonably cause you to go insane. That's what I think anyway. Another related story concerns the seashore scenario mentioned in my last blog. This is a true story. There was an orator in ancient Greece (I'm not sure of his name) who would practice his public speaking at the seashore by putting pebbles in his mouth and then he would speak over the sounds of the Mediterranean Sea. He kept practicing with the pebbles because it was difficult to enunciate and this required him to form his words carefully to be understood. The sounds of the sea required him to develop his lung power so that he could project his message to the last person in the amphitheater. Thus, the orator, through this practice, was much sought after because he was able to relate his message clearly. Quite a commentary on the ancient civilizations. They used simple techniques and rudimentary speaking platforms. No amplifiers, speakers, or microphones. They used what Nature provided. They developed their talents; we "modern folks" waste our talents  and try to cheat by using technology as a substitute. Time to send my toga to the cleaners; beam me up Scotty, there's no intelligent life down here.

And now, let's talk trees. This morning, before coffee, I stepped out into the backyard to let the dogs run and to admire our freshly cut grass. It looks like a golf green after it has been trimmed and I was satisfied as I viewed the sweeping vista before me until I turned to the left and saw a fifty foot tree broken in half and laying precariously in my yard. I didn't hear anything fall during the night so I was shocked to see this eighteen inch thick tree marring the landscape. Okay, a little background to help you understand the situation.

My property line is next to a vacant, thirty acre lot. It's owned by a private person, but he's never done anything with the land. There are huge trees, some a few inches from my yard and some about ten feet from my house. Simple arithmetic will show that a fifty-sixty foot tree standing ten feet from my house constitutes a danger to my abode. Especially when this particular tree died from vines encircling it. It started to rot and to drop branches within a few feet of the house. I contacted the owner and informed him of what was happening to his tree, and the danger to my house. He was unconcerned. I then wrote a letter, certified, yada,yada, telling him that, if the tree fell in my yard, or on my house, that he was liable and that I would certainly sue him because he refused to do anything about it. I documented everything with photographs, put all my copies together, and forgot about it. This was about three years ago. About one year ago, I came home from work and discovered that a large tree, also next to my fence, but about a hundred feet away from the rotting tree, was cut down. I can't imagine why these morons cut down a tree that was no where near my house and left a rotting tree, which threatens my property, standing. I think the term "dumb redneck" aptly applies.

Shortly after the time when I sent the letter to him, I sensed that he would rather be sued then to take care of the problem, so I opted to take some precautions myself. What good, I reasoned, is it to have the tree crush my house so that I would have to sue him, and of course we know that the courts are on the side of the criminals, so there would be no satisfaction, I would still end up with a crushed house that would have to be fixed. I thought it better to be proactive. I took a heavy rope and tied it about a third of the way up the tree and then secured it to another of his trees in such a way, that if the unthinkable happened, that the rope would cause the tree to swing away from the house. Well, the unthinkable did happen, and my rope worked perfectly. The tree broke and folded over itself. It even spared my four foot fence. Now, I'll spend the next two-three days chopping the vines and branches to clean the mess from my yard. But, at least the house is no longer in danger from this particular tree.

The clean up will be long and arduous. I'll take all the refuse and dump on his land, of course. The base of the tree still stands about twenty feet high, and the rope is still supporting it, but it is angled severely away from the house, so I'm somewhat relieved.

I have found that a two-handed axe is the best tool to deal with trees. If I had a heavy duty chain saw that would be a big help, but the venerable axe seems to be the best overall. Saws, especially in wet wood, bind terribly, whereas the axe has no such problems. Of course, you have to provide the horsepower from your muscles to be successful, no lazy way to use an axe. And, you would be surprised at how heavy wood can be. A tree of this size probably weighs close to two thousand pounds - more if it is saturated (it is). This means that I will have to chop it into smaller pieces so that I can carry each piece away. There are no shortage of vines; they cover every part of this tree and I think that they were holding the tree together for the last two years. I feel like Tarzan as I hack through all the branches and vines. This morning it took almost two hours to clear away the vines so that I could see the main trunk. Then I had to find what was supporting the tree and then I had to decide how to cause it to slow fall to the ground so that it wouldn't crash into the fence. Fortunately, I was successful with these things and the tree creaked slowly down to the ground. Then I started to clear the hundreds of vines still clinging to it. When I finally get everything cleared away, I will start chopping the main part of the tree that is sitting in my yard. The remaining part that is still standing on his side of the fence, I will leave there, hoping that it will fall one day, on his moronic, redneck head.

It rained, no, poured, this morning, so I had to take a break. I didn't want my twenty foot aluminum ladder to attract any of those lightning bolts - my luck runs that way. And you can bet that I had an extra cup of coffee this morning. One should never have to do this kind of work before coffee. Nothing in life happens before coffee!

Has anyone come up with an answer to my original query? Do you want another hint? He is very famous. Oops, I almost gave it away, I wouldn't want to ruin the surprise so I won't reveal any more hints right now. By the way, what do you guys suggest for great prizes? And, what about second and third prizes? In point of fact, I don't know how many blog readers we have out there. If I offer three prizes, then everyone might get a prize. Get it? Only three blog readers? Maybe I should require that everyone has to comment before I will grant a first prize. I know, I'll give the first prize to the longest comment, and of course, all blog readers in the office have to comment too. Oh yeah, no fair in cutting and pasting Bible Reader as your comment. You will have to come up with original comments to win. So, the rules are, everyone must comment and then the prize will go to the longest comment. Ready, set, go. Isn't this fun! So says Sam Post.

I like weather. Understand that when a sailor says the word, weather, he is talking about bad weather. You know, storms and such. There isn’t much use in talking about a sunny day, that should be a default weather pattern. No, people who enjoy the sea must learn to accept all of Nature’s different moods. Not that we enjoy being blown around and drenched with waves, but we learn to accept whatever comes and to deal with it.

And it is stressful. But it’s real stress, not the phony kind that we find living in a bureaucratic society like this one. When Nature starts whipping up the waves and making things uncomfortable, sailors must pay attention. No one should underestimate the natural elements, they will kick your butt! However, after the storm, there is serenity. If you have paid attention to what you should have done, then you reap the rewards of a triumphant victory. You get to pick up all the stuff that used to be on the shelves in your boat. I remember a day, maybe ten years ago, when I took a friend and her dog on the sailboat for an afternoon’s cruise. It was a little rough, but not too bad. The sailing was great because you need a good breeze to move the boat and we had it. Unfortunately, the breeze picked up measurably and the waves exceeded eight feet in height. The crests were no more than fifty feet apart. It became very uncomfortable. We were a couple miles from shore so there was no way I could just move away from the turmoil; I had to deal with each wave while I steered as much as possible to the shore. And it was growing dark. Fighting the waves is trouble enough when you can see them coming, but when it gets dark, you can’t anticipate when the next wave will pummel the boat and throw you off balance. I had the tiller in hand and was doing okay under the circumstances. My friend, however, had turned a very odd “green” color and she lay sprawled in the cockpit, wishing I think, for death to rescue her. The poor dog had sought refuge in the cabin below and had become so seasick that she vomited on the cabin sole. She was “green” too. The boat was pitching to and fro in a frightful manner. Everything that wasn’t lashed down was thrown about in the cabin. Even the table was torn loose and it was on the sole mixed in with the cabin contents and dog vomit. I couldn’t go below because I had to steady the boat as best I could while trying not to get seasick.

And now we come to the best advice you’ll ever get on not getting seasick. When on a moving boat (or any vehicle, for that matter) look at the horizon and never, never look away. If you do this, you will avoid the worst aspects of motion sickness. Do not look down, that’s the worst thing you can do. Remain looking at the distant horizon – no matter what – and you’ll fair well. Knowing this, I knew I had to look at the horizon and other distant objects. I did this. And then I did the next thing to allay sickness – I sang. Under the conditions mentioned you can imagine the noise and confusion of the situation. Since I couldn’t leave the tiller I had to make things as comfortable as possible. I figured this would be a good time to practice my singing. You see, one must be able to project one’s voice over any ambient noise and one must be able to concentrate on the vocal production, otherwise, in concert, you would not be heard. I began to practice show tunes and an operatic piece that one can never practice enough. I sang to the wind and waves; I sang to Neptune and Nature; I sang so I wouldn’t puke. It was good practice.

There was a man who desired to speak publicly. He knew that he had to be heard over the crowd and that there would be no sound system to amplify his voice. He went to another famous public speaker and sought his advice. The mentor told him to go to the seashore with a bag of marbles. He told his student to fill his mouth with the marbles and to speak to the sea. He had to enunciate his speech so he could be understood in spite of the fact that his mouth was filled with the marbles. The noise of the waves on the sand only made this task more difficult. The student was serious and wished to accomplish what his mentor dictated. The mentor further instructed that on each day he went to speak with the marbles in his mouth that he take one marble out, so that each day there would be one less marble to speak through. “Then,” said the mentor, “when you’ve lost all your marbles, you’ll be a good speaker!”

You are probably wondering what a stormy sea has to do with losing your marbles. Maybe only marble-less people like stormy seas? Could be. I’ve always liked the warmer weather; that’s why I moved to Florida from New York. Actually, the overall plan was to live on my boat in Tahiti. Florida was just a small first step. I still dream about living in Tahiti but I doubt that I’ll ever get there. I’ve heard that it isn’t as nice as it used to be. Forty years ago, when I first wanted to go there, the island was little touched by bureaucratic morons. There was a native culture; there were real issues, real living. Now from what I hear “civilization” has crept in to ruin the area. In the old days, you had to sail there. There was the feeling of accomplishment in just making the trip. Now you just hop on a plane, there is no feeling of accomplishment, unless you feel that buying the plane ticket is an accomplishment. The weather here in Florida is similar to the south sea islands (not exactly, but close) so I can find a palm tree and look out over the sea and pretend. So says Sam Post.

With the price of gas soaring into the stratosphere I am really happy to have purchased a 50cc scooter. Yes, it's hot out there, but when you're moving, it is very comfortable. When you stop for traffic signals, however, it's "instant sweat time". I can only get about 45 mph going downhill with a tailwind (not my own) but that's okay. I find that going faster than 45 mph is kind of useless on most roads anyway. The scooter is legal on all roads except I-10. It is not powerful enough for the big highways; it would need a larger engine to produce more than five brake horsepower. Fine with me. If I need to go on the interstate, I'll climb aboard my super huge pick-up truck and go as fast as necessary - while I'm burning about sixteen mpg. If I had my way, I would use the scooter for all my traveling while leaving the truck for the heaviest loads.

I haven't ridden a bike in forty-three years. I expected it to be somewhat arduous when I straddled the scooter for the first time, but, as people have always said, "You never forget how to ride a bike." It is true. As I moved the scooter I felt as if I had no break at all in riding motorcycles. It came back as naturally as breathing air (mixed, of course, with carbon monoxide and other poisons that we've polluted our environment with - don't get me started!). I was delighted to find that my body fit right in with the leaning and balancing and general feel of riding. Nowadays, I wear a helmet and goggles all the time; safety is very important. In the old days I wore a black leather jacket (with all the zippers) and a black beret and sunglasses so that I would look as "cool" as possible. Helmets were only for the track. I don't feel the need to impress anybody these days - or to compete. Now I just enjoy the ride, get to my destination (slowly), and take comfort in the fact that I'm getting a little over a hundred miles to the gallon.

Just a quick note on alternative power sources: if I ever put together another bike to utilize something other than gasoline as a fuel, I will only make one. It would be impossible to invent and develop something that could be used for the public because the government (which includes the major car manufacturers) and the oil industry, would squash the idea. Let me give you a couple examples. First there was Preston Tucker. There's a great movie, based on his life, called: Tucker, the Man and his Dream. It recalls the life of this innovative man as he comes out of the second world war seeking to start a company to help the public. During the war he produced vehicles and gun turrets for the Army. After the cessation of hostilities he turned to making automobiles. He designed and built better cars than were available at the time. In fact, in today's cars they are just starting to include features that were standard in a Tucker. His work was done in 1948. He built fifty cars. Then the government and the big three auto makers shut him down; they couldn't compete with him so they put him out of business. Out of the original fifty cars, there are about forty of them still operating. There is a green Tucker in the Tallahassee car museum if you want to see one "in the flesh". He had many better ideas - that worked - so why didn't everybody support him? They didn't because the government doesn't want competition. They would rather keep constant control over the public - even if their antics kill the people, which they do.

More recently, when everybody was talking about building electric cars, a problem developed in the prototypes of most entries. The batteries just couldn't hold enough of a charge to let the cars have adequate driving range to be practical. There was a man in the northeast who developed a better battery, it could hold a charge longer. It was the "answer" to the overall problem. What happened? He was shut down by the government, his tools, plans, and prototypes were confiscated and he was told that he was not to build anything more.

There is a documentary called, Who Killed The Electric Car? It tells the story of a manufacturer in California who produced a number of electric cars and then leased them to people to see how they would work. The people were delighted with the cars. At the end of the lease agreement most of the people desired to pay the agreed upon amount to purchase the cars. They were denied. They tried legal means to force the company to comply with their contract. Nothing worked. The company recalled all the cars, including stealing some of the peoples' cars who refused to turn them in. The company took all of these cars to a wrecking yard and crushed all of them into junk. The people tried to block the trucks, they carried signs, they did whatever they could think of to try to keep their electric cars. Evidently, these cars were excellent and the people wanted to own them. Guess who ruined this good deal. Watch the documentary. It illustrates that the blame is spread out in several different areas: the government, the major auto makers, the oil industry, and several others.

Okay, so that wasn't really a quick note, but, I told you not to get me started! It really annoys me that people, like Uncle Bush (actually, it's all of the politicians) get richer every time we drive one of our gas guzzling vehicles. That's bad enough, but, as the preceding paragraphs point out, they refuse to let people do anything to help themselves. If you want to build a better mousetrap, build it for your own use and don't let anyone else know about it. Sounds a lot like a communist country, doesn't it?

Back to the scooter. It is amazing that, from the vantage point of the scooter, I notice more of the cars and trucks that are constantly whizzing by me. The majority of them are huge, gas guzzling SUV's and pickup trucks. I feel like I'm in the middle of Detroit. The cost of these giant vehicles is enormous and they get terrible gas mileage, and they are always going fast, which means they are burning even more fuel. With the escalating gas prices, wouldn't we expect to see more scooters and other economical vehicles? Instead, we are seeing more gas guzzlers. In spite of the fact that the car companies are having a more difficult time selling Hummers, SUV's, and other impractical vehicles, the roads seem to be clogged with them. No matter, I travel at thirty mph, enjoying the scenery, being safe, getting a hundred miles to the gallon. I wonder if the gas prices will keep climbing. If so, it will be interesting to see what the automobile manufacturers will do in response to people not buying the gas guzzlers. Will we see GM and Ford producing scooters? So says Sam Post.

I’m feeling a little nostalgic today so I’m going to depart from my usual subject matter and speak about activities dating back to the early 1960’s. Things were much better in those days. A person was free to think and to create. Things and people mattered, there was a measure of pride in a job well done. Talent was recognized and revered. A person could make plans and dream as big as they wanted and you could, if you put in the blood, sweat, and tears, make those dreams come to fruition. When I was in high school my mode of transportation was, like most kids, a bicycle. Of course, like most kids, I sought to improve my mode of transportation in terms of speed, power, and accommodation. I saw an article in Mechanix Illustrated (that’s a magazine devoted to inventions, neat ideas, tools, and innovative thinking) that showed how to take a regular bicycle and a lawn mower engine and make a scooter. It had ten inch wheels, simple construction, and it could go about thirty mph. It was called a “Beats Walkin’.”

I built this scooter and learned many things about welding, metallurgy, sprocket ratios, calculations to determine speed, and that I had become public enemy #1 as far as the neighbors and cops were concerned. Nobody wanted to hear the lawn mower engine going up and down the street on the numerous test runs that I made. Undaunted, I continued to build more small bikes until I started to design my own. The culmination of the designs resulted in a racing minibike that I took to the dragstrip where I succeeded in beating a Willy’s jeep in the quarter mile. Now that I had a taste for speed, and by now I was nineteen years old, I purchased a series of motorcycles that led to my fastest bike, a Harley Sportster. After some motor work (It was bored, de-stroked, altered racing gearbox, custom made carburetor, custom valve lifters, custom made rear wheel. I know somebody out there is going to ask about the motor work) the bike set track records in its class. On one day I actually got Top Eliminator, meaning that I beat all the bikes and all the cars running that day. The final run was against a “rail job” (That’s a slingshot dragster. You know, long chassis of thin rails, giant engine, huge wheels with slicks on the back, loud enough to wake the dead). Initially, I had no chance of beating this car because he was turning times and speeds that no street machine could achieve. But, as the Christmas tree lights came down, and we were allowed to go, his car “blubbered” off the line, giving me a slight edge. If I did everything perfectly – no mistakes – I had a chance. It worked. The race track gods were smiling on me that day, and I came home with two trophies, one mounted on the handlebars (like Marlon Brando did in The Wild One) and the other strapped to my back. I was happy that day.

Then the Army intervened. They wanted me to go to Vietnam. The bike went into the garage to wait the two years that had to transpire before I could get back on the block. When I did come back I had a family, a cat, a dog, and a mortgage. No time for riding. I needed to go to work forty hours a week. There was a weekend gig too. Bills have to be paid and work has to be done to pay them. The bike collected dust until, finally, I sold it to a friend of mine. Parting with it was like having a member of the family move away. In time, the pains of separation waned, but I still have the memories, the newspaper articles, some photographs, and, until recently, a room full of trophies to remind me of those great days of riding and racing.

Since those good times in the 1960’s I’ve not ridden any kind of bike. Now, though, Uncle Bush has caused the gas prices to go through the stratosphere. Driving a regular car has become outrageously expensive. It’s time to revisit some of the things from my past. I’ve got ideas from back then to create minibikes with alternative fuel sources. I didn’t pursue these ideas in the past (gas was about twenty-four cents a gallon) but now it seems almost a necessity. Until I do decide to dig out my plans from the old days, I’ve made a rash decision. We will purchase 50cc scooters. This we did about a week ago. They are slow but that’s okay, the main thing is that they get great gas mileage. From my initial calculations, we should see about 135 mpg. That is very good and it will take “only” about six dollars to fill the tank (it only holds about one and one third gallons). In the old days it would take about thirty-five cents to fill the tank. As I said, things were much better in the 1960’s. So says Sam Post.

So you liked my last blog about movies? Let’s mention some more popular movies and point out some interesting things. The movie, American Gangster, is out now and I highly recommend it. It stars another two of my favorite actors, Russell Crowe and Denzel Washington. The movie is based on a true story. The bad guy (Denzel) is a major drug dealer and murderer. He was responsible for thousands of people ruining their lives with the drugs that he sold them. (Yes, I know that anyone stupid enough to “do” drugs can take the blame for their own problems, but dealers just enable druggies to hasten their demise.) He shoots people on the street in front of many witnesses; there’s no doubt who did the crime. To make matters even more interesting, he ships the drugs from China, through Vietnam, to the United States in the coffins of dead American soldiers. Throughout the movie we see him dining in fancy restaurants, purchasing real estate, and moving his extensive family into fine living quarters. He meets, and marries, a beauty queen, Miss Puerto Rico.

His adversary, the cop (Russell) is as honest as they come. He turns in money that they find in criminals’ cars, alienating him from the rest of the cops who tell him to put the money in his pocket and not to report it. We see him dining on a tuna sandwich which he makes in his dwelling. He’s got troubles with his wife, visitation problems with his son, and he’s studying to be a lawyer in his spare time.

Russell is eventually put in charge of a drug task force of specially picked under cover cops and is told to get rid of the drug problems in New York/New Jersey. The story continues with lots of action until, finally, they catch and arrest Denzel. Story over? No way. Denzel starts to deal with Russell, promising him rewards, etc. Russell says “no”, and grills Denzel to get to other drug dealers. Sound good. At the end of the movie, however, they have those short paragraphs telling the viewer what happens to each of the characters. Denzel plea bargains and gets seventy years in jail, but he only serves fifteen years and that, not consecutively. Let’s see, he murders people in broad daylight, smuggles drugs into the country, sells those drugs to thousands of people, bribes cops, and his punishment, according to our laws is: fifteen years? Russell, after finishing his law studies, takes his first client: Denzel! And, what about the police force? Well, three quarters of the cops were on “the take”. It’s not known whether the remaining twenty-five percent were “good” cops, or, maybe nothing could be proven. How could anyone possibly raise a child in a society like this? You teach the child right from wrong; teach him to have integrity, and then he goes out into the world and finds true stories like the one in this movie. Where is the reward in being “good”. Movies like this one show that “crime pays” for the criminal, and most of the cops are criminals too. How confusing!

Another of my favorite flicks is the Ocean’s series, especially Ocean’s Eleven. It’s fictional (I think) and lots of fun to watch. But, the whole story is based upon thieves and robberies. The robbers are very charismatic and the story is told from their point of view. What messages are we sending to the youths? That’s it’s fun to plan and execute robberies? That no one really gets hurt? That the leader of the robbers always gets the girl?

There are many films dedicated to Jesse James, William Bonny, and many other criminals. We idolize these characters. How about Bonnie and Clyde, Al Capone, or Machine Gun Kelly? Criminals all, but everybody knows these characters well. In the fictional department, who has not seen the Godfather series? Though the stories are fictionalized, they are based on real characters. This author is acquainted with some of the things that really went on back in those days. The subject of our “Italian brothers” is an interesting one, especially as told from their side.

There are some actors/actresses that seem to be miles above the average. Clint Eastwood, Arnold, Olivia Hussey, Jodie Foster are some of my favorites. Actually, I have quite a few favorites. I could name hundreds of Hollywood people from the 1930’s to the present that I enjoy watching on the big screen. When I think of any movie that I’ve seen Jodie Foster act, I remember it as a great movie. If she’s in the cast, I know I’ll love the movie. Who could have done such a wonderful job in Silence of the Lambs? The latest movie that I saw Jodie cast was entitled: The Brave One. Again, a magnificent movie. If you have not seen this flick, let me give you a few highlights.

The character is a New Yorker just living her life like all the rest. She has a boyfriend, very much in love, gonna marry him, yada,yada. They take a walk in the park, they get mugged, boyfriend dies, she is badly beaten, but eventually gets healthy. Here’s where the movie starts to take form. The cops take their reports and, typically, do nothing to find the culprits. She gets really annoyed with them and starts to question them as to what they are doing to avenge her dead boyfriend. They tell her the same stale crap, “we’re doing everything that we can do.” In a nutshell, they are doing nothing, as I said, typical. She stumbles onto some clues that could be used to solve the case and she gives this information to the cops. Of course, they do nothing. Finally, she goes to buy a gun for protection, gets turned down, and gets one from a guy in a back alley. She goes out to find the bad guys. She is warned by the cops to stay out of it; they start watching her. She gets into a few tight spots where the neighborhood scum try to rob/rape her. She blows them away. Slowly, throughout the movie, she finds out who the bastards are and hunts them down. She eventually kills them all. The cops are still clueless. The one top cop who has been watching her shows up at the last minute to help her out but the point of the whole movie is that, if you are in trouble, you’re on your own. There’s nobody but you who is going to make things right, or to prevent a crime. The cops are only there to harass the good people, and to protect the criminals, and to make reports after the crime is committed.

There was a series of movies with Charles Bronson some years back called Death Wish, 2,3,4,5. The Brave One reminded me of this great series. Same scenario, crimes are committed, cops do nothing but eat donuts, the main character has to track down the bad guys and dispatch them. But, he’s got to do it undercover, or the cops will arrest him.

We need more cops like Dirty Harry. When you deal with the scum of society, you have to jump down in the sewer to get them. They are not going to “play by a bunch of silly rules” so you can put them in jail where they can live better than their victims.

Do we see a pattern here in these movies? I know that when a writer/screenwriter produces a story for the cinema, they pick hot topics that are of relevance to the viewing public. Otherwise, who would go to see it? (Okay, so there are some weirdoes who will watch anything!) The recurring theme of crime at all levels of our society pervades the majority of movies. Obviously, somebody is trying to tell the public something. Something like: “Wake up and smell what you’ve been shoveling” when you support the criminals, and punish the good citizens for protecting themselves. So says Sam Post.

Thanks for tuning in. Obviously, you are among the few people out there who care, at least somewhat, about the mess this society has become. To refresh your memory (just in case it needs refreshing – no, the “refresh” button on your computer will not do it), here are a few highlights of the present dilemma.

For every law that exists, there is another law that contradicts it. This society condones and encourages criminal behavior on all levels from the lowest street crime to the highest levels of industry and government. Many years ago I heard a question posed: Why is stealing against the law? Answer: Because the government doesn’t want the competition. We always regarded this question/answer as a joke, now I think it’s dead serious! It is well known that the way to tell if a politician is lying is to see if his/her lips are moving. We have emasculated our police, our teachers, and our parents. Even the existence of God has been challenged. We are a lawless (in spite of the thousands of ludicrous laws in libraries of law books) society that has become barbaric. American society today has become the worst kind of malignancy. We are barbarians in $1000.00 suits. We have reduced ourselves to the base level of “bread and circuses”; this society is declining into oblivion. That’s a sampling of the bad news.

So, where is the hope? It’s in the people. It’s in the good folks who still possess the ability to think; to understand when they are being screwed; to exercise common sense. The way up to the fresh air is to find our way back to the way it was when we first set down rules for this new country. We need to look back to the times when things were better. Sure, we’ve had criminals, idiots, and politicians since the beginning. I’m not saying that the past was without fault. I’m saying that the proportion of good to bad was in our favor in the past. Today, the bad (societal insanity) is fast taking over the good. We’ve had many examples in past societies to show us what to do. Take, for instance, the Roman Empire. It had great things, and it had terrible things. We could learn from such examples if we wanted to build a better world, all of them. I don’t see that we are interested in taking a good example.

The Romans built many things that were great (like viaducts, sewers, among others) that still exist. They also roamed the Earth killing and conquering until they became fat and lazy. Then they were conquered. Maybe if they had stayed in Italy and defended their land without trying to oppress the whole world, the other armies might not have wanted to snuff them out.

There are plenty of similarities between Rome and America, just look around. If we want a better society, all we need to do is learn from the mistakes of civilizations that have gone before and, go back in our own short history to see when things were better, and then revisit some of these good things. Then we would see progress. Notice that the hardware of society outlasts its’ inhabitants. This is because, when you’ve got something good (like Roman sewers) you stick with it, then you see forward movement (like the modern toilet) (no pun intended). If you change things, like all the meddling that we do with people’s integrity, you get retrograde movement (constipation) and, finally, destruction of the inhabitants. The result: Planet of the Apes. Note: No animals, especially apes, were injured in the writing of this blog. Side effects may include nausea, vomiting, blah yada, blah yada, …. you know the rest. So says Sam Post.

I had an interesting conversation with my car mechanic this morning. As he was changing the oil in my car we chatted about things mechanical. I always listen to people who know more than I do, so when we’re talking about cars with a car mechanic, I ask questions to gain some of his wisdom. We were discussing the longevity of cars and what could be done to get maximum mileage. Getting so many miles to the gallon is a hot topic these days but how long your car can be expected to last is something that has always been of interest to me. If I can get my car to last a half million miles, I want to know what I can do to make this happen. I don’t want my car to wear out because I’m doing something to ruin it. So, I engage whatever experts I can find in conversation.

I told him that I always drive carefully, never spinning the wheels, no short stops, no speeding, and no undue acceleration. I drive with the flow of traffic, I pay attention to all sides, front, and back of my car all the time. I exercise courtesy whenever I can. For example, if I see another car behind me blink his lights (a universal request) I will move over to let him pass. I’m trying to exercise good driving skills and courtesy, but I’m also saving my car’s long term existence. The mechanic listened to all this, agreed with me on all points, but then he alerted me to a new “law” that has been enacted recently. He said that driving safely and courteously, as in the way I described above, could get me a ticket for – road rage! I asked him to explain what he meant because this sounded like the most idiotic thing that I have ever heard. Has this society gone so far down the toilet that driving safely equals road rage? He explained to me that if I was driving at, say, the speed limit in the left lane, and someone else is speeding up behind me, that I would be in his way and he would get the road rage because I was there. So, it could happen that I could be cited because someone else is breaking the law. What about the speeder? Now, understand that I’m not talking about an emergency vehicle going to help someone. I’m talking about average drivers just speeding. I wonder what’s going on in this apathetic society. It appears that the folks who take pains to stay within the rules, are being singled out for punishment. The scofflaws in every segment of our society are seen as normal. Or, could it be that the ever-growing legions of criminals (of all types) are sending a message? Are they saying something like, “Hey, stupid Americans, when are you going to learn that all your idiotic laws are wrecking the lives of the people that they are supposed to protect?!” Want a positive solution? Tune in next time when Sam Post will reveal how to undo this madness. So says Sam Post.

I blogged last week about my dissatisfaction with customer service calls being outsourced to India. Yesterday I received an email with pictures that I wanted to pass along.

THIS IS INDIA. IT'S WHERE YOU CALL WHEN YOU HAVE A TECHNICAL PROBLEM WITH YOUR COMPUTER.

So you want to stay in touch 24/7. Okay, how can we do that? There must be a hundred ways to communicate with our fellow primates; let's look at a few. First, there's good ol' talking, face-to-face. This method goes back to caveman days when a grunt or groan, yell or scream would relay whatever you wanted to convey. This method worked well too, for many hundreds of years. During that time talking became an art. We developed languages and lexicons that covered the globe. For those versed in this form of communication, thoughts and feelings were easily transmitted and understood by almost everyone. But, what if you can't stand in front of the person with whom you wish to speak? Alexander came up with a solution. He invented the telephone and the people were happy (yay). We still used talking, but now we could talk to people who were many miles away. Telephones, then, are a second way to communicate.

The original phones were rudimentary and difficult to use, but they were a wonderful break-through for technology. Over the course of many years the telephone improved in quality and the service got much better. At the height of the "telephone age", somewhere in the 1970's I guess, the phone service was fantastic. You could talk on the phone to someone in Russia and, given that the two of you could speak the same language, you could enjoy a bright, clear conversation as if the Russian was standing next to you. Then the quality of telephones started to decline. For some reason (maybe partly because the government broke up AT&T?) the quality of phone service dropped dramatically with the advent of portable phones and cell phones. Oddly, the landline phones also declined in quality. Nowadays, the quality of these "toys", for they can't really be taken seriously, is so bad that they only work about half the time. I received a phone call recently from a relative. She was using a cell phone and the reception was so horrible that I told her she must have had the wrong number - I couldn't recognize her voice! And these silly toys are very expensive to buy and expensive to service. We're paying more and getting less. Is this called progress? Only by the insane.

A third form of communication can be seen in our "computer age." Computers, those wonderful tools that transmit blogs and store vast amounts of information, are sometime erroneously referred to as communication devices. In reality, computers prevent communication. They reduce our ability to communicate almost completely. Just think about it. In the communication process there are many factors. There is the spoken word, the facial expression, the tone of voice, the gesticulations of both people, the context, among other more arcane elements of the communications process. To dig further would risk becoming too academic. Anyway, computers eliminate almost all of the communicative factors. When reading a text message you can't even know the gender of the writer, let alone can you understand the passion of the message. Further, anyone could sign a fictitious name to the message. How would you know? Overall, technology has done more to disrupt communication than it has done to improve it. Without communication we can get very lonely and stressed. Severe stress leads to all sorts of dysfunctions and diseases. Maybe we would be better off with grunts and groans.

So says Sam Post.
 

I thought I lived in America. When you get out of bed in the morning you like to think that you're still in the same country that you went to sleep in the night before. Lately, I'm not so sure. I've heard about this "global" economy and other idiocy, but I kinda like the good business practices that we've built up in this country over the last two hundred years. When I call a place of business (in this country) I expect to hear a voice speaking English without an accent. Now, I realize that some of our states contain people who have peculiar accents, like redneckese, western drawl, southern drawl, and Brooklynese, ya know wad I mean? I can understand these anomalies (except Californians, they're from another planet) because they are speaking "almost English." Okay, I see the glassy stares I'm getting. You want to know what I'm talking about, yeah? Youse listen up now cause I'ma gonna tell ya.

Today I called my bank to ask a simple question. I get through the first battery of button pushing, wade through a horde of security questions, and finally, I get a humanoid (I think he was human) speaking some kind of language that I didn't recognize. Hey, we're dealing with my money here, I have no sense of humor when it comes to my money. How do I know what this "ferener" is saying? He might be telling me something nasty like, "your mother wears army boots" (the ultimate insult, my mother was never in the army) or, maybe he's giving me the winner lottery numbers (who cares, I never waste money on that nonsense anyway). Actually, I did play all the numbers he spoke of that I could discern. There were all very small numbers, and I didn't win the jackpot. Afterwards, I realized that he was giving me my bank account balance. 

At the end of our conversation (I spoke English, he spoke ???) I asked him where I was calling. He said, "Bombee". Now I thought he was talking about a cute little Disney fawn. Then I realized he might be telling me the location of where he worked. I said, "You mean Bombay?" "Yes, sir," he stated, and then he proceeded to tell me all about his city. After much prattle on his side of the phone he invited me to visit him, to stay at his house, and to travel there at his expense. At least that's what I think he said. I asked if all the inhabitants of his country (India) wore feathers and lived in teepees. He didn't quite understand. I guess I'll find out when I get there.

So says Sam Post.