useless

Our world is diverse. That is an understatement.

Our country combines slivers of our world, infusing richness from cultures, languages and cuisines that is not available in such quantities elsewhere. The "melting pot" phrase is crude, but we, America, meld these differences into our everyday lives, as we should. It is our position to accentuate, celebrate and integrate, teaching our children about our past and lineage while looking forward to a hate-free future. Smoothing the lines between our differences is the easiest way to begin.

I imagine that people who actively discriminate or commit hate crimes see nothing wrong with their position. I imagine they are just acting upon what they have been raised to see, the striking differences in people rather than focusing on the benefits that the blending of cultures provides. I imagine someone explaining to their young child that people with different colored skin are full of poison just as calmly as I explain to mine that the color of one's skin is much like the color of one's car: it's just there to cover and protect the important things on the inside. But who is really carrying the poison? It flows out in smooth insults and in the form of prayers, sullenness, glares, and wide berths as if diversity were contagious.

Differences make life less boring, less predictable, less like lemmings heading over a cliff. Different religious and political beliefs spark raging debates and even wars between countries; but why shouldn't we all be allowed to think? Why is one person supposedly always right and another person supposedly always wrong? Why do people think this way? Your latte is not better than mine; we have differing tastes, so you can have your french vanilla and I will keep my caramel. There's no reason to argue.

I guess it all culminates to this: the poison I have seen in the past few days has always been there, but because I am not looking for it, I just don't notice it. The color of skin, the political view, the religious talismans, I merely see them as part of someone's description, as in the red-haired lady with the star necklace or the dark-skinned dude in the green shirt. I see no other real distinctions. But those filled with hate do. And someone will just as easily tell me to my face that they do not trust me or think that my beliefs are bringing the entire nation to its knees.

I refuse to accept the poison in your veins. You cannot make me hate you. You can stand and pray for me all you want, while insulting my intelligence and my choices. They are my choices and I choose to see you as a sad sack of society, bundled up into your own importance and filled with, not the love you proclaim through your scripture, but pure, driven, venomous hate. What a proud thing to declare of your own beliefs. hate that drips from your sarcastic smile and the way you hold your head, arms folded defiantly across your chest. Hate that is shared by some of the very people you hate, because you both hate each other's skin.

I will not react to your hate, thus rendering you -and your whole sense of being-

USELESS.





dedicated to the high-and-mighty racist woman in the purple shirt, sunday, 7-27-08, at noon at BWI and the UU church gunman in TN the very same day.

vernacular bonbons

the phone rings insistently on the checkpoint and joan answers it with the standard greeting. a small, tense voice on the other end says, "uh, yeah, i'm um, stuck in the elevator."
thrown for a loop by the obviously nonstandard reply at 0415 in the morning, joan asnswers, "excuse me?"
"yeah, i'm in the elevator and it's not moving. i'm trying to come to work," says the phone. "this is terry."
the first thing on joan's mind is to find out if the employee is even in the airport at all, and to which elevator to send a rescue team. then basic troubleshooting took over, and she asked, "do any of the buttons work in the elevator? can you push the alarm button?"
"oh, yeah," says the voice. "i guess i forgot to push the button, huh?"



wait for it....








and i work with this person?????? how in god's ninety green hells does this person still have a job?? someone please put that oxygen-depleter out of our misery already!!!



and then just after break....
I♥
VB

that is what the teeshirt said. being on the exit lane, i couldn't exactly go and ask the passenger what VB was. i was mildly curious and repulsed at the same time, because it just sounds so dangerously close to "VD." and no one has to ask about that. so i grabbed a pen and began scribbling my thoughts VerBatim...

venitan blinds vatican bibles venerial bologna vexed bulls voratious bitches velvet bedsheets vegetarian bedwetters voluminous belches vericose buttcheeks veriagated blossoms vegan bovines verified beefsticks vernicious buffalo voluptuous bodices vaccinated bellybuttons vintage beer virginal babes velociraptor blood vandalized braziers vanity books varlets blasphemed vanquished bloodlines velveeta bricks venturesome broads vexing Bahri veiny broccoli... and at some point it dawned on me that it prolly meant Virginia Beach... but i was having too much fun to stop. i'm sure i can come up with more, but i'll stop where i left off when i was tapped. feel free to add on - no repeats of words already used, though.

weekly wrap

since my weeks are a little skewed from all others'.....a few words about this week...

the boys have sleeping troubles. the older one frequently sleep-walks to his little brother's bed and kicks the younger one out to sleep on the floor. sometimes one or both of them end up on the couch. one morning, boy the younger says, "i thought i felt something crawling on me last night and i whacked it with my hand and then i came upstairs to finish sleeping on the couch." i immediately threw the boy in the hot shower for a thorough scrubbing. see, that was also the same morning mister tad-the-dad discovered the dead body of our little mouse squatter on the floor of the laundry room, not far from where my boy-o sleeps. what a $500 12-month exterminator contract, a hunting dog, about 20 baited traps, 9 containers of poison, and umpteen glue traps cannot do, leave to Boy the Younger. my sleeping hero.

five quarts of baby formula. twenty-five 4-ounce jars of baby food. four 12-ounce bottles of chocolate ensure. one child under two en route to detroit. hello? in your carryon? if you don't want to check the bag, you have no other options. no, your child is not going to eat all of that food in two hours. no, it doesn't matter if it's sealed. no, i don't know where grocery stores are in detroit either, but i'm sure you'll manage; if you are so scared to leave your hotel in detroit, why in hell are you going there anyway? no, you can't take all of it with you. no. let's hear it once more. no. please continue arguing with me; i like this game.

try checking your kids bags (that they packed themselves) to make sure they aren't bringing things they shouldn't, like, oh, i don't know, huge bottles of lotion, gatorade, realistic replicas of weapons. no, really, that replica isn't actually the funniest thing i've seen in a while. your teeth come pretty close, though. yes i am serious when i say you can't take that on an airplane because other passengers would panic if they happened to see it in your possession. no i am not kidding. you should have stopped while you were ahead. do not ever swear profusely at an airport employee, nor stick your fat finger nor shake your fist in the face of said employee, especially if that airport employee is in a supervisory capacity. do not take pictures of your relatives being questioned for swearing profusely at an airport employee. you have no one to blame but your magnificently stupid self if you miss that flight. and, uh, good luck being allowed on the next one. if i was in charge, your ass'd be on the no-fly list.

when your child is throwing sand and hanging on every rope at the pool, and the lifeguards are blowing their whistles at your kid every 5 minutes, it might be a good idea to leave. no-no-no! i meant for your family to leave, not for you to wander off and go talk to someone and then realize your son is missing. yeah, the lifeguard whistle did get pretty quiet for a good long while. after you discover your kid is missing, it would also be a good idea to actually LEAVE THE FUCKING BEACH TO GO FIND HIM. and when strangers bring him back and tell you they found him in the men's room, ya might try looking or acting like you were worried...maybe a 'thank you' or a little grace or tact because you were totally in the wrong. oh, and yeah, go home now. WITH that kid. the one that is half-way to the volleyball pit, goddamn, woman, are you stoned? how the hell did you manage to reproduce with your mind like a steel sieve? how did you remember that tab A goes into slot B? sounds a little complex for you....

a man with fourteen toes. another way: dude has seven toes on each foot...an extra big "thumb-toe" and an extra pinky toe on each.

if you do not bring federal or state-issued photo identification with you to the airport, there is a chance that you could miss your flight. see, because i am charged with verifying your identity, grandma's vivid description of your birth into the world isn't cutting it for me, darlin. so then we fill out this form and make some calls to the state (hope they are open in your time zone) and then we wait for verification. i highly suggest investing some time in the department of motor vehicles, even if you don't drive. especially for the chain-smoking dude without any ID except for a casino (ummmm "frequent better"?) card. because every time you leave the secure side of the airport, you have to show some ID to get back in. even just to smoke a ciggy. you still don't have ID? guess what? we have to make some calls again. and yeah, we are just picking on you because it's fun. the highlight of my friggin day.

why do people abandon their elders in the airport? are they too lazy? can't be arsed to walk with them or push the wheelchair, exchange some conversation or just plain keep an eye on their aging kin? i can't count how many confused individuals come through every day simply because they can't hear or see me, don't really know what is going on or why they have to be able to take off their shoes. and really, i am truly sorry that i have to take away their belongings...maybe if they had some kin there to help out, it wouldn't be so difficult. is it that big of a waste of your life to sit with them for two hours? what if someone becomes ill, like my gentleman in line today? sweet old geezer. he knows it's monday; knows his name; can squeeze both of my hands equally strong; no slurring of speech; steady pulse; had a normal-sized breakfast for him; no history of medical problems related to diabetes, poor circulation, or heart trouble; and utterly alone in the airport. i talked with him for a while along with the police officers while waiting for the medics to arrive. i just can't believe how many grandparents (and astounding numbers of great-grandparents) are simply dumped at curbside check-in with a skycap, and left at the gate until their planes take off, sometimes for hours. heartless.

here ends the gossip of our goddess. (woooooweee. that was blasphemous weren't it?)

suicide bombers, gasoline, mosquites, mice and trees

my thoughts for today:

"Iraq Suicude Bombers Kill 28 Army Recruits" that has worked more than a half-dozen times now. ummm, hello? i have an idea to help out there. how about, "all recruits must pass through a metal detector and have a pat-down before milling about, to make sure one or more of you isn't toting a death-jacket." how about that guys? a little initiative here? not everyone standing in line to be an army recruit necessarily has the best interests of all recruits in mind? think like a terrorist for god's sake. or for allah's sake. that one is working..."kill them before they are trained to take up weapons against us." so prevent that!!! i hate having to do all the thinking here.....


mosquitos must die. all of them. insecticide to the Nth degree. do mosquitos actually have a purpose? dung beetles move poop around and help break down yucky things, as do flies, i suppose. worms fertilize soil with worm poops and aerating. bees fertilize trees and flowers and make honey and wax. ladybugs eat aphids. spiders eat ofther insects, like mosquitos. what the fuck are mosquitos for??? aside from biting both of my legs four times while i drag my friggin dog inside. DIE DIE DIE!!!!!


someone i know just got a new vehicle. he traded in his truck for a new SUV. what? i'm sorry. are you smoking crack? he is single, lives with his mother, has no real bills or responsibilites. and then he has the audacity to sit and complain about how much it costs to fill his tank. the second that statement came out of his mouth i shushed him. you. you are arrogant and think you have something to prove to the world, hence your SUV. in times when gasoline is not only expensive, but is in part driving up the prices of everything else, putting our nation into an economic slump, you make the decision to purchase a vehicle that depends upon more of that gasoline, and then choose to complain about how much it sets you back. it makes you feel tall and important to drive a big fancy car. you actually look like an ass. because what you are proclaiming to the world is this: "i have money to burn and you don't. so watch me burn my money in the most arrogant way possible, aside from actually setting fire to cash on the street corner." you have no right to complain. suck it up and drive...since you're stuck with your pretty guzzler now. good luck trading that thing in.


the other night, we locked a mouse in a closet. we lined the doorway with glue traps and peanut butter baited snap traps. around midnight i heard an awful shreik and i thought it must have tried to pull itself off a glue trap, hoping that it failed. in the morning, one of the glue traps was fuzzed. it got away. grrrrrrrrrrr. i should have gotten up and checked right away. i might have caught it limping down the hallway. but last night we caught a mouse!!!!! FINALLY. well, killed one anyway. looks like it ate some of the poison i've had out for months and passed out (thankfully) in the middle of the laundry room floor. now we clean like mad and see if more poop appears again, signaling more than one uninvited inhabitant. our mouse-man seems to think we have more than one, but then again, he claimed we didn't have any mousy evidence in the attic. i tend to disagree, since there are shits all over the place up there. whatever the case, these rodents are seriously smart. we have blocked holes and set out bait, snap traps, glue, elaborate tunnel traps, and everything is carefully avoided. i have been looking for some sort of indoor bomb to let off and then we move out for a few days, but those appear to be only for outside use. damn and blast. we have even been looking at a bleach-ammonia mix, but haven't yet, because we're afraid it will discolor our fabrics. off to clean.

it looks like a third of our ginormous tree came down in a storm this weekend. not the case. we felled it on purpose. i think our tree was planted before power lines. in which case, i seriously hate the basterd who put the power lines so close to our tree. on two sides, the branches cannot grow out from the trunk more than 10-15 feet. poor tree. the utility companies come out once every 3 years to trim, but they have been studiously ignoring one branch, which got so heavy it was pulling the line down. (it's not a power line; everyone except verizon claims it belongs to verizon.) we sawed that one off yesterday, and i noticed (just in time) that the branch has actually grown around the line. nice, guys. way to do your job. so there is a hunk of branch now hanging from the line - at least my tree won't take it down in a storm now, which has been my worry for some time. but we have 500-600 pounds of tree to clean up now. i need to hack up the smaller branches and tie them up for the recycle truck and then cut the larger branches into smaller chunks and let them dry for our fire pit. manual labor clears my head like nothing else. i swear i was a pioneer or something in a previous life. sometimes this sedentary bullshit just gets on my nerves, and sends a funk creeping through me.

after i'm done cleaning, i'll be outside. wearing lots of bugspray, putting out rat bait and attacking the dead tree parts with a hack saw and nippers (no extra drain on the power grid from me.) and thinking like a terrorist, no doubt.