Reflections of Me

     We have a lot of words beginning with 're', don't we?  And, a lot of words we think should begin with 're' and don't.  Confusing, isn't it?      I hope you weren't expecting me to try to explain it.  This stuff is beyond me.  I use 'echo' when in doubt.  'Course, even that one is a tad odd.  You get a echo once ; if you do it again, is that a re-echo?      But, since a echo is a repeating sound, it therefore repeats.  But, when did it peat?      Rehearse is a fun one.  We all have a basic understanding when we hear the word 'hearse', right?  Letting myself think about it ( always a bit dangerous ) since I once did a lot of 'rehearsing', should I have been a bit frightened by describing it as such?  It rather implies that, well, we killed it once and it got hauled off in a hearse, let's murder it again and call it a 'rehearse'.  So, the more we rehe...

     I often have conversations with myself.  Subjects vary widely, usually because I can't focus on one thing at a time.  One occurred recently.      Self: What ya thinking?      Me:  Nothing.  Why?  Who is that?      Self: Me.      Me:  Can't be.  I'm me.      Self:  Ok, we can do this all day.  I'm bored.  What about this Mueller report?      Me:  Mueller?  Mueller?      Self:  Don't bother.  I didn't hear any horses neighing when I said it, either.  This report, that everyone has been so anxiously awaiting ; what ya think of it?      Me:  Nothing, haven't seen it yet.  No one who needs to see it has seen it.      Self:  The Attorney General has.  He wrote a summary.   ...

      I spend a inordinate amount of time just thinking about stuff.  You know--stuff.  I believe my mind has developed AADD.  Or ADHD.  Or maybe ACDC.  Or possibly ADHOC.  Certainly not IBM.  More like ROTFLMFAO.      Just, it doesn't always let me know.  You know?  Which seems like a idiotic thing to ask, however, I have never claimed NOT to be a idiot.  I know I'm a idiot, I wish I'd quit treating myself like one. Being a idiot, however, I don't know that I am.      I've always wondered, for example, about being a author, about writing a book.  No idea what subject.  What I have always wondered about is pseudonyms.  Many authors use them at some point, so, I have considered what I would like to use.  I believe I have settled upon one I like.      Almondine Amontillado.  It's alliterative, it's-----hold on, there, I see you in the corner....

     Whoa!  The what, you say?  I've heard of that!      Yes, so have I.  But, you know me by now ; this isn't about that!  Well, okay, it is.  Sort of.  But no, it isn't.  I bet you are thinking I am going to explain that.      You'd be right.  And here I go : no, this is not about any organization, be it American, Canadian, British, or any land or sea based Nation.  There.  Got that out of the way.      Trust.  A small word.  Small words are good ; somes is nasty nasty, buts easys to remember, yes they are.  Preciousssss wordses!  Okay, okay, enough Gollum.  Well, what IS trust?  Yeah, yeah, it's a word.  But, what does it define?  Is it a emotion?      According to Webster, it is:      Definition of trust ...

      Now, there's a title for you!   Is that passive-aggressive?  And, just what IS passive-aggressive? How can one be both?  On the other hand, wouldn't you need to be armed to even have hands?  Let alone, rebellious ones.  One of life's little nagging questions.      Life has many nagging questions.  Questions, of course, SHOULD nag.  I believe that is their job.  If we are taught properly, we mature by always asking questions.  Though, school would be easier if we were given the answers before the questions.  Life would be easier, too.  But, no one said life would be easy.  I even question that.  Why hasn't anyone said life would be easy?  No, we are given to believe, life is the hardest job we will ever have.  Many among us who have performed various jobs during our lives might argue that, but the equation could be applied.  After all, one doesn't perfo...

Who ya gonna call? I think we can all fill in the answer to that by now.  The little film that could, and did.  It took a fear, and made us laugh at it.  A fun fantasy; something strange, in the neighborhood?  Who ya gonna call? What, though, of the actual realities that make us afraid?  The fears that don't stop with the end credits?  The ones that follow us home, take up residence in our minds, threaten our way of life or our very existence?  We've renamed most of them, of course: instead of fears, we call them phobias.  The emotion they engender, however, feels like fear to those experiencing it.  I have mine  ( heights, and deep water ).  I've faced both, managed, but the fear remains, so I avoid both as much as I can.  Most of us do exactly that.  By naming them phobias, we were able to create a system whereby, if we were affluent enough, we could pay someone to listen to us and help us work through our fears....

Winter.  It just won't go away.  Where I am at, it hasn't been bad; cooler than usual for this time of year, enough rain to drown a whale, but interspersed with some beautiful Spring weather.  Where I grew up, in the midwest, I see the coming weekend will bring yet another snow storm.  Somebody forgot to tell Winter it is approaching mid-April.  It needs to shut up and crawl back into Sarah Palin's heart where it belongs. Last month, a hero, no, a idol of mine passed.  Nokie Edwards, the lead guitarist/bassist of the instrumental surf band The Ventures, passed away. He, along with George Harrison, motivated my interest in guitar, and music, and I drove myself ( and everyone around me, I presume ) crazy with my attempts to play like either or both of them.  I never succeeded, of course, as along the way I was influenced by a few others and ended up developing my own style, which was, I suppose, passable.  I was never happy with it, but some were,...

Well, here we sit, in the greatest nation in the world ( Okay, the 10th greatest now.  Perhaps even the 99th greatest...) and we still cannot figure out quite how to wipe our own butts properly. Not that there is a 'proper' way.  I just liked how that sounded.  Appropriately combative, without being overly aggressive.  It astounds me sometimes that some people still think we are great.  Certainly, we are a wealthy nation, right? Oh.  Yeah.  No.  We have some wealthy people, yep!  Entertainers, politicians, Wall Street members, athletes, bankers, business investors.  Wall Street is experiencing great gains almost daily ( a good thing?  Hmmmm.  Wonder what has happened in the past when Wall Street made exceptional gains? ) which worries some of the more intelligent Americans.  A breed I thought was dying out, but, lately, have seen make a resurgence, activating my pessimistic optimism.  Still, there is ...

Well, here it is, 2018.  Several days in, as a matter of fact, and honestly, I see no difference.  Except having to write 2018, instead of 2017.  But, I have had trouble with that since I was old enough to start writing...it has occurred to me, perhaps we should just write the full year only twice.  Once when the century starts, once during the last year.  The remainder of the time, we could just go '20xx'.  Easy on everybody, except the tax collectors, and heck, they're always confused anyway. Well, and calendar makers...okay, I concede.  Terrible idea.  ( I still think it would be fun, though....).  Just think of all the things we refer to as happening 1, 5, 10 years ago; without a sure way to measure, we could discover, heck, the information wasn't all that blasted important anyway.  " That was yesterday, and yesterday's gone..".  Hmmmm?   Yeah, okay, Sheesh; no need to get all technical on me.  However, speaking...

Have you ever had a moment where you sit down and think : Who Am I?  And, why? I do it a lot.  I ask myself, Do I really know myself?  Cleverly, I almost always answer.  Not that I am always right, but, hey, a good question deserves a answer, I think.  And who better to answer such a question than yourself? I've heard it said that one's likes and dislikes reveal a person's personality.  I don't know who said it, or where I heard it; probably some checkout lane at some long forgotten market.  Or, perhaps it was the voices in my head.  There are a lot of them; strangely, they all sound like Mr. Spock.  That is one thing I never question, because, if your voices are going to sound like anyone's other than your own, Mr. Spock is a excellent choice. Occasionally, Doctor McCoy sneaks a line in.  Very seldom does Captain Kirk's voice speak up.  I've never questioned that, either.  I think I might not like the answer. So, some ...

Ah.  Hi.  I just stumbled in after my latest round of perusing news headlines and articles on the internet.  While I still can, before the FCC Internet police take away my ability to do so. It's been a typical jumble of news, conflicting news, opinion, and fabrications shared in social media about the news, conflicting news, and opinion.  As my perusal of news expands, my attention span gets shorter. So, let's see, what have I been exposed to today?  Via Google News pages: Trump on North Korean missile launch : 'we will take care of it'.  Hmm, sounds to me like the North Koreans already did. Trump Wins Opening Round in Legal Battle over Consumer Watchdog Agency :  Well, any headline that begins with 'Trump Wins...' is a article best avoided.  Just means American citizens took another kick to the privates. Washington Post Says It Foiled Apparent Sting By James O'Keefe's Activist Group :  Ok, someone tried to plant fake news in a plac...