What I've Learned (The Best Of The Year)

1. My grandson teaches me everyday how beautiful it is to learn something new and how we take the simple things like talking, walking, holding hands, and trusting someone for granted.

2. My uncle used to tell me, "If you're the smartest one in the group of friends you're with, you need to get new friends." He meant, always associate with people who can teach you something and enrich your life.

3. I talk to God quite often and I'm pretty sure I've given Him some of His best laughs.

4. A woman once told me, "I need a man like a fish needs a bicycle." She's since been married twice! It just goes to show that you can't always take everything somebody says seriously.

5. Live everyday as though it's your last because one day, you'll be right.

6. We want God, who none of us has ever seen, to forgive us... and yet, we can't forgive the people we actually see everyday for some real or imagined slight.

7. You can't influence what other people say or do to you, however, you can control how you respond to what they say or do.

8. Good guys don't always win but, determined and patient guys seldom lose!

9. I was so broke one time, I couldn't afford a Coke. I don't even drink soda anymore but, right now, I could buy a case of Coke if I wanted to. (How ya like me now?)

10. As a child I loved to sit at the end of a movie or a television show and read all of the credits. I had to know who was in it, who directed it, and who produced it. I was (and still am) the same way about music. I got to know all of the musicians, who wrote what song, who produced it, etc. One of my uncles asked me once if I was looking for a relative in the credits.-LOL :)

11. Never get romantically involved with anyone who has more issues than you do!

12. Never make someone else a priority who has chosen to make you an option.

13. Keep your wits about you when everybody else is losing theirs and you'll look like the coolest, most intelligent, and attractive cat in the room! (Even if you really aren't!)

14. If you gotta take a loss, don't lose the lesson. There is always one somewhere in all of that!

15. Prayer really does work!

In loving memory of two bloggers we lost this year... Nikki Harris and MacArthur "Daddy B Strong" Walton. The blogosphere was all the more richer because you two were here.

Second Blog Birthday

I guess because it was Christmas weekend, it just slipped my mind. Saturday, December 26th was the second birthday of this blog. Unlike last year, I don't have anything special to say other than that... I've already explained how this blog and my second one came to be ad nauseum but, I will say that I have a couple of new things planned for the future.

I'm going to try (and I said TRY) to write shorter posts. My posts are going to be more personal (if that is possible) and I'm going to introduce a new recurring post. Past examples of recurring posts have been "What I've Learned", "Saturday Seven", "Keith's Favorite Quotes", "Weekend Update", and "Weekend Humor". I will probably put up a new profile pic (I heard a few of you say, ''It's about time!"-LOL) and do a few other new things for the new year.

Blogging hasn't taken a backseat to Facebook. No, the time away just gave me new ideas for the future so, stay tuned. Thanks, again, to everyone who comments, lurks and has shown me love in the past two years. I would still do this with or without your input...but your input has made it all the more rewarding. Thanks again!

From Our Family To Yours...

Little Sister Sophia & The Booga Wooga

As we celebrate the birth of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, we wanted to share our best wishes and prayers that GOD will continue to bless all of our family and friends. We hope that this will be the best Christmas ever for you and your loved ones. Peace and love to you all!

My Breakthrough Christmas

I've been thinking about a particular Christmas that left an impression on me for a while now. For most of my life, my mother and father worked all week, paid bills, took care of us, went to church, went back to work on Mondays, and that was their whole life. I didn't see their lives as being that inviting and I often thought that becoming an adult didn't look all that fun to me. I vowed that I was going to do a little living before I went off into that good night.

My parents, God love 'em, beat me to it. Right around the time I finished college and they neared retirement, they started doing bizzare things... at least, bizzare to what my brother and I were used to them doing. First off, they bought a summer home in Pleasentville, NJ. I didn't know they had the dough, but then I figured they never did anything, so they must have been saving all of that money. Next, they sold that home and bought a permanent home in South Jersey, a little closer to Philly.

This one particular year, they really got crazy and went to California for Christmas! That was unheard of... them actually doing something as a couple and leaving me and my brother out of it. My brother, for his part, went to Pittsburg to have Christmas with his then girlfriend and now, wife's family. This was about two years before I met my future wife, which meant that I was the only one in my immediate family that was going to be home alone in Philly.

You would think that it would be party central... an endless stream of women and revelers running in and out of my house, right? Nada. It was Christmas and most people were making plans to be with their families. I called several people and all of them were either out of town or occupied.

The man next door to me, who was close to 80 years old, was getting more action than I was. I saw at least three women come in with wine and a gift and leave laughing... "Oh Oliver, you are too much." After one woman would leave, another one would show up... laughing and grinning. He was laughing, grinning, and looking at me as if to say... "A young man like you and I'm the one with all the traffic?"

Finally, I called up a young lady who I was kinda seeing, but not very serious about. She invited me to come to her home and spend Christmas Eve with her. She didn't live that far from me, so I took the bus and it let me off at the corner of her block. I enjoyed a delicious dinner with her and her four sisters and I watched them open presents and exchange them with each other. I felt bad because I hadn't brought anything for anyone there.

We sat and talked for hours. Then, after midnight, one by one, her parents, her sisters, and one of her brothers bid us good night. I knew I wasn't going to stay the night and finally, around 2:30am, I bid her good night and began my trek home.

Anyone who lives in Philly, knows that waiting for the #46 bus is like waiting for Moses and the lost tribes of Israel to find the Promise Land. This was in the day time, so you can imagine what the night time was like. I began walking home and it was snowing. At first, lightly... and then, heavy. By the time I got to the corner of my block, wouldn't you know it, the #46 bus whizzed by and I felt like Charlie Brown.

Mmy next door neighbor, that old man I spoke of a few paragraphs above, had a nephew who was about 10-11 years older than me and he was a drunk (I'll call him C.W). C.W. was always getting blasted and falling asleep in some dive... then, he would wake up and find that he had been pick-pocketed. His watch was missing and one time, his expensive new "gators".

I saw C.W. when I was on my way out that night to visit the young lady, which was around 7:00pm, and he was sloppy drunk then. He and I were usually stepping into the house around the same time on weekend nights but tonight, or should I say this morning, I didn't see him but I thought nothing of it. I would find out a few days later, much to my horror, that C.W. had passed out in the street, the snow had covered him, and he had frozen to death. It would be days before he was discovered.

I sat in my living room at 3:00am Christmas morning, alone and feeling sorry for myself. I couldn't believe that not a soul was in the house and I was spending Christmas alone. I couldn't believe it and couldn't deal with it. I fell asleep on the couch and woke up a little later.

Of course, my parents called me that morning to wish me a "Merry Christmas" and I called a few people and talked to them... but it was weird. There were no gifts under the tree, there was no laughter, and if I didn't make my own holiday, this was going to be the absolute worst Christmas of my life. This was what I thought, anyhow.

One of my frat brothers saved the day. I called him to wish him a "Merry Christmas" and somehow, he must have heard the desperation in my voice. He asked me if I wasn't doing anything, if I didn't mind having Christmas dinner with him and his family. I accepted and in a few hours, I was eating another delicious meal, this time with my frat brother, his two sisters, and his parents at their home.

I came home that Christmas night feeling good and feeling as though I had an epiphany. Christmas was about people, relationships, togetherness, and love... not presents and materialistic things, which is what I had been most uptight about... That I hadn't gotten anything for Christmas. I had actually gotten something that year which was more valuable than anything I could have purchased in a store.

The kindness of near strangers had taught me a lesson about giving and opening up one's house to someone in need. The very thing, a young child, born in a manger some thousands of years ago came here to teach humanity. Since that Christmas, which I have gone back and forth calling "the worst" and "the best" Christmas, I have never looked at the holiday the same.

"MERRY CHRISTMAS" TO YOU AND YOUR LOVE ONES!"

Saturday Seven (7 Things On My Playlist)

1. The Element of Freedom, Alicia Keys: Ms. Keys never disappoints.



2. Unexpected, Angie Stone: Heard her on Steve Harvey the other day, I'm sold.



3. Untitled, R. Kelly: Say what you will or may about Kels, but no one writes and performs a good song better from his generation today.



4. Sex Therapy, Robin Thicke: I just like the title of this one...-:)



5. The Bridge, Melanie Fiona: A hot new artist.



6. My Favorite Things, John Coltrane: A treasure still, after all of these years.



7. Blueprint III, Jay Z: What can I say... Jay Hova is still on top of his game.

Live Fast, Die Young, Leave A Good Looking Corpse?

Chris Henry

I first heard the saying "Live fast, die young, and leave a good looking corpse" in a movie when I was about 26 years old and I thought it was a cool saying and motto to live by. It just goes to show you how stupid I was back then. I've seen a lot of dead bodies in my life since that time and not one of them ever looked "good". They just looked stiff, still, and never resembled the person that I knew. It wasn't even "them" anymore... just a lifeless clump of skin that once laughed, told jokes, and smelled bad that once I knew.

Chris Henry is that now. He lived fast... he played football, he had a pretty nice contract, and he was on a team that was in the playoff hunt. He has died young... just 26 years old... and I'm pretty sure his remains are not good looking.

He was Cincinnati's best downfield wide-receiver but Chris Henry couldn't completely run away from the off-field trouble that had long followed him. He was by all accounts a changed man... yet, Henry died Thursday from injuries suffered in a truck accident following an alleged domestic dispute.

Henry was a menacing figure on the field but, at the same time, he was described as "gentle" and "a good person" by some of his mourning teammates (who always do that, no matter what the person was really like, when someone dies). These kinds of contradictions followed Henry throughout his five-year NFL career. Was he really the "one-man crime wave", as one of the many judges he appeared before labeled him? Or, was he a kid who, according to many, was slowly but surely putting his life back together? Who can really say?

Henry certainly had the chance to stage the greatest personal turnaround of any player who has run a foul of NFL commissioner Roger Goodell and his personal conduct policy. For all intents and purposes, Henry had stopped the sociopathic behavior that earned him 14 games worth of suspensions. Drunk driving, drug possession, alleged assault, illegal use of a firearm... it's all there on his rap sheet. This cat was so out of control that he was once released by Bengals owner Mike Brown, who is known for having a soft spot in his heart for talented ne'redowells and problem children like Henry.

Henry, to his credit, took advantage of a second chance when he resigned in the 2008 preseason. The 6'+4", 200 lb. Henry had reemerged as a key cog in Cincinnati's offensive scheme. Henry was beginning to fulfill the athletic potential that could have made him a big star like Terrell Owens (another problem child). According to one Bengals source, the introverted Henry had quit the public drinking that triggered so much aggressiveness and recklessness in previous incidents. He became more involved with his girlfriend and three young children. He had also recently became engaged. He stayed out of trouble. At age 26, Henry was finally becoming an adult, or so it seemed. But, as the Tiger Woods debacle has reminded us, not even close friends or the media know everything that goes on with athletes behind closed doors.

After landing on injured reserve in early November with a wrist injury, Henry and his fiancé, Loleini Tonga, returned to her hometown of Charlotte, NC for a planned wedding. On Wednesday morning, local police say the two had some kind of argument that led to Tonga driving away in a pickup truck and Henry jumping inside the bed of the truck to follow. These two continued arguing, police said, before Henry fell from the vehicle. He probably hit his head in the fall. He was found unconscious on the highway. No one knows how long he had been lying out there. Those circumstances may prompt skeptics to wonder how much he had truly changed at all. The Cincinatti Bengals, though, insist he had.

Tragically, of course, we may never know now. He lived fast, he certainly died young (just 26), and most assuredly did not leave a good looking corpse. All he left was a guilt-ridden and saddened fiance, some greiving family members, teammates, and more questions than answers bout a life that might have been. Damn shame!

I Guess The Honeymoon Is Over

Well, I knew that this was going to happen sooner or later. After only 11 months in office, the president's approval rating has finally dropped but, I'm not surprised. It happens to all of them sooner or later. Americans are fickle. We are a "what have you done for me lately" kinda nation.

During his twelve months in office, this president has done more than the last three but, of course, thanks to pundits (i.e. idiots) like Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity and a Republican party that will do and say anything to keep from being irrelevant, a sizable amount of the populace are just not that impressed anymore.

For much of his first year in office, President Barack Obama has largely defied political gravity in the midst of skyrocketing unemployment, an ambitious legislative agenda, and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. His approval rating remained above 50%, a plurality viewed his party positively, and even the number believing the country was on the right track, despite the bad news, temporarily spiked during his first few months on the job. But now, nearing the end of his first year in office, the economy, wars, and legislative skirmishes have finally taken a toll on the president and his party, according to the latest NBC News/Wall Street Journal polls.

For the first time, Obama’s overall job approval rating has fallen below 50% (to 47%). In addition, for the first time since September 2007, a plurality (45%) sees the Democratic Party in a negative light. And the percentage believing the country is on the wrong track (55%) is at its highest level in the Obama presidency.

“This survey underscores what I consider a dramatic and unmistakable change in the political landscape,” said Democratic pollster Peter D. Hart, who conducted the survey with GOP pollster Bill McInturff. “For Democrats, the red flags are flying at full mast. The sagging economy is beginning to drag him down,” McInturff added. “This is increasingly becoming President Obama’s economy.” Funny... he inherited this economy and if not for his administration's actions in the first months of this year, we might not have an economy. Yet, this appears to be lost to a lot of folks.

Deep dissatisfaction with the nation's direction underlining the entire poll is a deep dissatisfaction with the current state of the country. Only 33% believe the nation is headed in the right direction, an eight-point drop since Obama took office. (However, by comparison, the right track number hovered between 10% and 20% during George W. Bush’s final months in office.) What’s more, 6 in 10 say the country is in a state of decline and a whopping two-thirds say they’re not confident that life for their children’s generation will be better than it was for them.

“All of this says that optimism has crashed through the floor board,” Hart observed. Yet, there is some optimism for next year: 46% say that 2010 will be a better year than 2009, 27% say it will be about the same, and 25% say it will be worse. I could get caught up in this numbers game but I wont... it's too early. He hasn't been in office a year yet and it's really too early to judge but I know there are people who have nothing better to do.

Despite these lower numbers, the president remains the most popular American politician in the survey. Only 32% have a positive view of former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, compared with 40% who see her in a negative light. Moreover, the entire Republican Party continues to maintain a net-negative favorable/unfavorable rating, 28% to 43%. But, for the first time in more than two years, the Democratic Party also now holds a net-negative rating, 35% to 45%.

Rome wasn't built in a day. It took a long time for us to get entangled in this mess and it may take even longer to get out of it. It took Franklin D. Roosevelt 12 years to dig this country out of "The Great Depression". Americans, with their "I want everything now" attitudes, just better simmer down. Did they expect President Obama to be able to straighten this mess out in 11 months? They did. I didn't and I don't expect it to be straightened out in four or even eight years. People don't realize just how bad of shape this nation was really in and that's because they weren't informed. They were busy watching American Idol and the Real Housewives of Atlanta while all of this was unfolding. Now, they are shocked! America leads the world in being shocked.

One thing I've learned in my years on this Earth is that things get worse right before they begin to get better. Patience, America. Change is coming but it's going to take time!

The 360 Degrees Man

It has been a while since I have pontificated about the continuing health care debate. Why this is even a debate is just beyond me. Be that as it may, the "debate" took another dramatic turn yesterday when Senator Joseph "I don't know if I'm a liberal Democrat or a conservative Republican" Lieberman tossed a monkey wrench in the machinery. We had a term for folks like Joseph Lieberman who constantly flip-flop on their positions back when I was a young man. We called 'em "360 men" because they did a three hundred and sixty degrees turn in attitude or position.

President Barack Obama urged Senate Democrats to overcome the last, lingering disputes blocking agreement on a national health care overhaul Tuesday, declaring they were "on the precipice" of enacting historic legislation that has eluded administrations and lawmakers for decades.

In comments after a private meeting, the president said differences still remain over details, but he spoke in highly favorable terms about the measure that party leaders hope to pass by Christmas. The bill includes "all the criteria that I laid out" in a speech to a joint session of Congress earlier in the year, he said. "It is deficit-neutral. It bends the cost curve. It covers 30 million Americans who don't have health insurance and it has extraordinary insurance reforms in there to make sure that we're preventing abuse."

Sen. Joseph Lieberman (Independent-CN) announced on Sunday he opposed the proposal and he threatened to join Republicans in voting against the overall measure if it stayed in the bill. Democrats are ready to jettison the Medicare change and Lieberman told reporters that assuming they do and that any government plan or Medicare expansion stays out of the bill, "then I'm going to be in a position where I can say what I've wanted to say all along... that I'm ready to vote for health care reform." Yeah...uh...huh... You've wanted to say this all along. I bet you did. It depends of course on who is watching and what audience you're standing in front of at the time, eh Mr. 360?

Lieberman's opposition to the Medicare expansion proposal drew the ire of many progressives. At Tuesday's White House meeting, he addressed some of his harshest critics by stressing his independence. "I didn't run for re-election... asking the voters of my state to vote for me because I would always do what a majority of members of the caucus did", Lieberman said, recounting his comments for reporters. See, this is what 360 degrees men do all the time. They make themselves look like a martyr, like a wounded person who is dancing to the beat of his own drum, just so he (or she... I've seen my share of 360 degrees women too!) can justify flip-flopping. Is this the same guy that ran with Al Gore against George Bush?

Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) remains the only known potential holdout among the 60 senators who are members of the party's caucus, a group that includes 58 Democrats, Lieberman, and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) Nelson has been seeking changes to increase restrictions on abortion coverage in a new insurance marketplace the bill would establish. Democrats need 60 votes to overcome a threatened Republican filibuster.

The White House meeting unfolded as Democrats awaited a final cost analysis from the Congressional Budget Office on the latest version of the bill, and the full Senate pointed toward a vote on an amendment to permit the importation of prescription drugs from Canada and elsewhere. At its core, the legislation is designed to spread coverage to 30 million Americans who now lack it, impose new consumer-friendly regulations on the insurance industry and slow the rate of growth in health care spending nationally. Most Americans would be required to purchase insurance and the government would establish a new series of "exchanges" through which consumers could shop for policies.

I think I've argued this point before about purchasing insurance. That's like applying a band-aid to the problem and in the long run... it reverts right back to business as usual and no real reform. This winds up being a bait and switch victory for the big insurance companies and HMO's. But, that's just me... doesn't really matter what I think.

The measure includes hundreds of billions of dollars in subsidies to defray the cost of insurance for families with incomes up to about $88,200 a year for a family of four. Additional assistance would go to small businesses to help them afford coverage for their workers. Large firms would not face a requirement to cover their employees. But the government would impose charges on them if any of them did not do so and any of their workers qualified for federal subsidies to help them afford private coverage. Democratic leaders mapped out a timetable that envisioned passage before Christmas but, just barely.

This assumes that Nelson and Lieberman would join 58 others in swinging behind the bill once the CBO cost estimates become available. The House approved its version of the bill earlier this fall, and final negotiations between the two houses would follow a vote in the Senate.

In his remarks, President Obama took issue with ads and claims by critics about the bill's impact on the federal budget, citing earlier CBO estimates that predicted it would reduce the deficit. "So all the scare tactics out there, all the ads that are out there are simply inaccurate," he said. "There are still disagreements that have to be ironed out. There is still work to be done in the next few days," he said, without going into specifics. But in a clear signal of his commitment to the bill, he said, "I told my former colleagues today that we simply cannot allow differences over individual elements of this plan to prevent us from meeting our responsibility to solve a longstanding and urgent problem for the American people."

Well, the President said that unless they act, costs will continue to rise, employers will drop coverage and "Medicare and Medicaid will blow a hole through our budget. "Those things are guaranteed. That's the status quo. Exactly what I've been saying and what I'm afraid of. It's what the mob calls 'a bust out'. That is the trajectory we are currently on", said the President. The legislation would be financed by about $460 billion in cuts in projected Medicare payments to health care providers over a decade. It also includes higher payroll taxes on individuals making more than $250,000 annually and higher taxes on high-cost insurance policies, drug makers, makers of medical device makers, and others.

So, Joseph "360 degrees man" Lieberman... think about the consequences of holding this bill up or jettisoning it. Think about it, turn around, and do the right thing. I know that in your heart of hearts, you're not really a conservative Republican disguised as a Democrat, disguised as an independent. Are you? Are you? Come on!

Another Monday, Another Meme!

1. Name someone with the same birthday as you. Colts quarterback Peyton Manning and bank robber, Clyde Barrow (of Bonnie & Clyde fame).

2. Where was your first kiss? In the bedroom of someone's house I wasn't supposed to be in.

3. Have you ever seriously vandalized someone else’s property? No, but I've been tempted to many times.

4. Have you ever hit someone of the opposite sex? No.

5. Have you ever sung in front of a large number of people? Sure, many times.

6. What’s the first thing you notice about your preferred sex? Few will believe this, but it's their smile.

7. What really turns you off? Unpleasent odors.

8. What do you order at Starbucks? Nothing, I hate their coffee.

9. What is your biggest mistake? Goodness, I've had quite a few, narrowing them down would be impossible.

10. Have you ever hurt yourself on purpose? No... that's definitely not sexy.

11. Say something totally random about yourself. I love lists and statistics on just about everything.

12. Has anyone ever said you looked like a celebrity? Not that I can think of.

13. Do you still watch kiddie movies or TV shows? Yes, with my grandchildren and, sometimes, cartoons by myself .

14. Did you have braces? Nope!

15. Are you comfortable with your height? Yep, I tower over some and look up to a few, so it's just right.

16. What is the most romantic thing someone of the preferred sex has done for you? Marry me.

17. When do you know it’s love? Words can't explain that... it's a feeling!

18. Do you speak any other languages? Spanish and Ebonics.

19. Have you ever been to a tanning salon? Nah, I was born with the perfect tan.

20. Have you ever ridden in a limo? Yep, never understood what the big deal is... not to mention they're hard to get out of.

21. What’s something that really annoys you? Bad breath, body odor!

22. What’s something you really like? I like quite a bit and it's hard to narrow that down.

23. Can you dance? Good enough not to be laughed at, unlike some other people I've seen.

24. Have you ever been rushed by an ambulance into the emergency room? Once... I had to have my stomach pumped.

25. Tag five people to answer these 25 questions on their blog. Nope! I'm not gonna do that! However, feel free to cut 'n' paste this and partake!

Special thanks to my blogger buddy, Curvy Gurl, over at The CG Chronicles!

Tribes

They say that the world is becoming smaller with each new technological advance. Sometimes, I wonder if that's a good thing or not. We have Facebook, Twitter, and all kinds of networking sites that are supposed to be able to connect us to a large aray of people... yet, everyday as I go on Facebook and observe how people act, it becomes more and more obvious to me, that we haven't made the world any smaller. We've only continued the isolation that was always apparent.

People are like cattle and sheep... we run and operate in our own private little herds and tribes. Take Facebook, for example. Yesterday, Facebook initiated new privacy settings that make it easier to privatize certain things on your page. You should see what people are privatizing. Photos of themselves, their "friends" list, their religious and political views, etc. It's their Facebook page and I suppose they are free to do with it as they wish, but I don't understand the concept of networking, meeting, and socializing with other people on Facebook if you're going to keep everything about yourself hidden.

There are some people on Facebook who I wonder why they are even on it. These folks are anti-social in the "real world". They don't socialize, they don't go anywhere, and they are scared to death of anyone knowing anything about them. If you look at their page, their are no photos and little to no information about them. I believe they are only on this site because it's the new fad, the new "in thing " to do.

Then, you have the folks who take themselves just a little too serious. They have "friends" but their friends are part of the clique that they were running with to begin with. They have no outside friends and no interest in meeting or socializing with anyone they didn't previously know. They make their page so private that nobody can find them. Again, what is the point? You don't need Facebook or Twitter... you need your small room or a jail cell. You also have people who are just "friending" people to be "friending" them. These folks have 3,000+ "friends" who they don't know and who they can't possibly keep up with. For them, this shows how popular they are to the world.

All of these people scare me. Just by looking at how they manage their page, I can get a good idea of how these people operate in the "real " world. I don't want to win any popularity contests... been there, done that. I don't wish to isolate myself from the world in fear either. I'm looking for a soft place in between the madness.

I know that there are bad people out there who take information, steal identities, and what have you. I wouldn't advise people to publish their social security number, home address, or place of business. But you have people who won't tell you their date of birth, who are afraid to write whether they are a Democrat or Republican, a Baptist or a Seventh Day Adventist. I find the whole thing quite strange.

Isn't this America? A democracy where you don't have to be afraid of expressing your beliefs? You would think so. Yet, some employers do look at people's Facebook pages and decide on who they will or will not hire (and, in some cases, fire) based on something they might have written on that page. Apparently, the First Amendment is fiction or bedtime reading to them, which is why people hide so much about who they really are.

What's really frightening, as well as hypocritical, is that Americans are always trying to tell some other country that they should be "free" and that they should have a democracy... while everyday, little by little, we are becoming less free ourselves and appear to be going along with it.

When did we get so scared, paranoid, and mistrustful of each other? When did we get so self-absorbed, self-important, and thus, so isolated from anybody who we don't know? How do we get to know other people or are we even interested in knowing other people who might be different from us?

The world isn't really getting smaller... some of us have just found a new way to make it more isolated.

The President's Prize!

Somewhere, Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh are sitting in a bar crying and consoling each other! Dont'cha love it?

Simple Things

Christmas is the week after next and a lot of people are out buying presents. It happens every year... a mad rush for gifts... capitalism bailed out. My father taught me an important lesson about gifts and the minds behind them one year.

You've heard all of the comedians joke about "daddy gifts" (i.e. Brut by Fabrege', socks, and a tie). Well, regardless of what me and my brother got my father (and we bought him some crappy Christmas gifts now that I think about it), he never complained. He was always gracious and acted as though it was what he always wanted.

One year though (I think we were in our mid-twenties), my brother and I bought him a box of Cuban Cigars. (Yeah, I know they were illegal and I'm not going to blog about how I got them) and a box of his favorite cashew nuts. His face lit up and he was as happy as I've ever seen him. This was no act... these were his favorite gifts. He smoked cigars and a pipe so, the Cuban cigars was a treat and he loved all kinds of nuts (walnuts, cashews, pecans... you name it). When he got the cigars and the cashews, he was in "hog heaven".

He would tell me many years later that these were his favorite gifts and that let him know that his "boys really knew him". He said... "You can tell who really knows you by what kind of gift they buy you" and he was right. People who know you and care about you, buy you gifts that you can use and that you really like. Some people tend to buy you stuff that they like and get insulted if you don't like it as much as they do... that tends to be their ego speaking and not real concern for you the person.

Take for instance, one of our cousins... This was my father's favorite nephew. He mentored him and my cousin idolized my father... so, it stands to reason that come Christmas, he would have bought him a thoughtful gift, right? Wrong. One year, he bought him a thumbnail-sized flashlight. I kid you not... it was about as big as your thumb! My mother, my brother, and I tried not to laugh but, we couldn't contain ourselves. My father, ever gracious, just smiled and said... "Oh, this will come in handy when I'm trying to put my key in the lock."

Another year, my cousin gave my father a huge photo of himself. We didn't hold back our laughter that time. We guffawed and rolled on the floor laughing. Then, there was the year he gave him tickets to a Sixers game. The seats were so far up in the rafters that my father could've sat at home and watched the game on television and had a better view.

It got so bad that my brother and I took an annual poll called... "The Worthless Gift For Christmas" poll. We would bet on how worthless the gift my cousin was going to give our father the coming year would be. Well, when he gave my father some cheap cuff links the following year, my mother had enough. She finally said... "Aww, this doesn't make sense. I could see if he was a child but, he's a grown man with a job, making a decent salary. He can buy a better gift than this." I don't know if she said something to him or not but, the gifts stopped coming period after that year. This was why we decided to get him the Cuban cigars and the cashew nuts... gifts that he really liked and could use. Gifts that said we know you and we know what you like.

In my adult life, I have watched very carefully what people have gotten for me. People who know me, know that I love to smell nice and I don't wear cheap cologne. So, nice colognes, soaps, body wash, and oils are always good gifts for me. A good novel by a present or up and coming African-American author is another nice gift for me and, at one time, a CD (or tape) by one of my favorite artists was cool too! I'm not trying to be slick or hint here... I'm just saying what I liked.

I say liked because I'm not that big on getting presents for Christmas like I used to be. If I get something nice, that's cool... but if I don't, that's cool too. I really get more pleasure out of giving gifts to people now. I really do. I try to find out what people I give gifts to like... even if I have to ask.

Some people feel as though the more money you spend on a gift somehow equates with how much you care about them. That's wrong....It's the gift itself and what it means to the person that really states that. It's as my father taught us so many years ago... the simple things sometimes mean the most!