Have It Your Way - Sir!

Commanders of the U.S. forces in Afghanistan would like their soldiers to remember that "they are not at an amusement park." That is why they will soon be shutting down the fast food franchises that have been serving "meals" to the troops in the field: Burger King, Pizza Hut and T.G.I.Friday's. They also warn that chains such as Orange Julius and Dairy Queen could be next. They've got Dairy Queen? We don't even have one of those here in Oakland.
The powers that be seem to be of two minds on this issue, both of which want to close these little outposts of the American Dream. Besides the practical concern of the resources that making Whoppers and non-alcoholic margaritas take, generals and majors don't seem very comfortable with the image of their enlisted men sitting down to a plate of chicken tenders in the middle of a war zone. If it's true that an army travels on its stomach, I guess the commanders don't want them moving on guts full of onion rings and baby back ribs.
A cynical view might wonder why an operation called "Enduring Freedom" doesn't feel the need to extend that notion to menu choices, but perhaps this isn't the part of the American Dream we want to export first. All those soda cups and burger wrappers may not be sending the right message. Then again, if you're about to lay down your life to ensure the enduring freedom of a country to which you may have only recently introduced, maybe you'd like to have a chocolate shake before you pile into your Humvee. Hearts, minds and stomachs.
Or maybe they could solve the whole thing by shipping all those grumbling troops back to America, where the Burger is King and the Dairy is Queen.

Why Pad

I made a declaration, of sorts, a few weeks back when my wife asked if I was interested in getting an iPad: "I'm not really a 'gadget' kind of guy." This statement was met with a resounding snort and looks of dismay. Not a gadget guy? Really? Mister Big Screen TV with a digital video recorder. Mister Laptop and Desktop computer. Mister never runs without an iPod. Not a gadget guy?
So, perhaps my assertion wasn't fully thought out. Maybe what I meant was I don't buy gadgets that I can't immediately insert into my lifestyle. I can't be blamed for the electric juicer or Mister Loaf, the bread maker under the counter in our kitchen. I make juice the old fashioned way: with three cans of water. I am suspicious of bread that isn't already sliced. Anything could be hidden inside that lump of baked dough. Both of these appliances came to us as gifts. They seemed to make sense, given the fact that we were homeowners and all.
So what does an iPad have in common with Mister Loaf? I will continue to use Al Gore's Internet even though I don't have an iPad, just like I continue to eat delicious bread baked by someone else. I can drink juice made from concentrate and read books printed on paper. I didn't buy a Kindle. I don't own an iPhone. These devices were not vital to my continued existence. Since Apple managed to move three hundred thousand iPads in their first few days, I don't think they'll miss my participation. I guess when it comes to gadgets, I'm kind of a snob. Just don't ask me to give up my Whirly Pop.

Simulacra

I popped by Google yesterday, just to see what they might be doing to acknowledge Easter. Turns out they weren't doing anything. Just the same old primary color letters. No clever links. Just Google. I was a little let down, since I thought they might take the opportunity to something really interesting, given their ongoing feud with "Fox and Friends."
The day after their mildly elaborate ruse of renaming their site "Topeka" for one day: April Fool's Day. The next day, they chose to alter their splash page again by honoring the two hundred and fifth birthday of Hans Christian Andersen. Not big news for a Friday morning, unless it happened to be Good Friday morning. Why would Google choose to commemorate the author of "The Ugly Duckling" instead of our Lord and Saviour, the Friendly Fox Folks wanted to know. They weren't as concerned that the search engine didn't choose to feature a graphic last week smeared with lamb's blood in honor of Passover. Where was their Good Friday spirit, after all?The powers that be at Google were happy to point out that even though a third of the world's population call themselves Christian, they chose to remain more secular in their tributes, aside from the Dutch author's middle name, at least.
And that's when the bell went off in my head, reminding me of a spring some thirty years passed. My high school sweetheart's mother and I had a bit of a rocky relationship, but one evening we started talking about religion. She was Jewish, and said she never understood what all the bunnies and eggs were for at Easter. I suggested that it was probably a lot more comforting to kids than the image of Christ nailed to a cross, and we agreed that it wasn't exactly fair to appropriate all these pagan images of fertility while celebrating the death of a great prophet. With that, she bid me goodnight and left her daughter and I to "watch TV" downstairs. Rather than use that opportunity to make out on the couch, I asked if we could get some paper and some markers to help get the place ready for Easter.
The next morning, my girlfriend's mother came down to see a very gory Jesus tacked up on the cross that was created by her stereo's FM antenna. I was pleased and honored to see that it was not only still there when I came by to pick up her daughter the next day, but he stayed up there on the wall for the whole weekend. It was a twisted bit of humor that we shared, and it gave us something to laugh about together. For a while. Too bad we can't expect the same from the Friendly Folks at Fox.

Resurrection

When we walked into the office sometime past midnight, the guy behind the desk looked at us with a Vietnam vet's thousand yard stare and asked, "You aren't spring-breakers, are you?" When he told him that we weren't, he relaxed just a bit and told us, "Good, because I'd have to charge you an extra hundred dollars each for deposit on the room." What we couldn't imagine was why anyone would answer "yes" to that first question.
This was twenty years ago, when I made my first trip to Key West. It was, to be completely honest, a break we were taking in spring, but none of us were enrolled in school at the time so we felt comfortable with that assertion. Instead, we were there to celebrate a year's worth of sobriety for two of us. Hazy Davy and Killer Joe had hopped on the wagon coincidentally in March the year before, and we felt that a little tropical excursion would be the proper reward. Mikey came along as our designated drinker.
I flew into Miami from Colorado and met up with my east coast counterparts who had come in just ahead of me from JFK. We paid a little extra for a convertible, and proceeded to drive the hundred and seventy miles down Highway 1 to our nation's southernmost point. The sun set in the Gulf of Mexico as the moon began to rise over the Atlantic as we drove into the night. When we finally reached our hotel and discovered that we had indeed landed in the midst of a bit of a bacchanal. Most of the revelry had finished up by the time we headed to our room, but the dawn of the next morning gave evidence of what fun we had missed: Two doors down from us was a pair of Converse sneakers that had either been left or placed to greet whomever might leave that room first the next day. There was no way to tell if they were hi-tops or oxfords, since the canvas portion of the shoe had been burned away and all that was left was the scorched rubber soles.
But that wasn't why we were there. We were there on a pilgrimage of sorts, with our key inspirations coming from the music of Jimmy Buffett and the movie "Running Scared," the one with Billy Crystal and Gregory Hines, not the Paul Walker mess from 2006. This was mostly for my benefit and Joe's, while Mikey looked on patiently. We spent our days at the pool or at the beach, and whenever we drove anywhere we kept a strict rule that no one should open the doors to enter the car. We ate conch fritters. I had a Cheeseburger In Paradise. We drank a lot of drinks that came out of blenders, and we kept asking Mikey what we were missing without the booze. I wrote some postcards. I neglected to take a picture of the manta ray I saw jumping out of the water. When the skipper of our sunset cruise first told us of this phenomenon, we all laughed and assumed it was the Florida version of a snipe-hunt. And yet there I sat, jaw agape with my camera in my lap as I watched this great leathery disc launch itself cleanly out of the sea before diving back into the depths. It was a peak moment for me.
I have been back to the Keys since then. Once as a port of call on my honeymoon, and again on my fortieth birthday. It remains the one place on earth where I feel completely relaxed wearing my Hawaiian shirts. Even in Honolulu, it just felt a little too spot-on. Little did I know that trip twenty years ago was the beginning of a much larger expedition. The one that took me where I am today: Oakland, California with a closet full of tropical print shirts.

Moo

From Merriam Webster, who defines things:
1 often capitalized : a political philosophy, movement, or regime (as that of the Fascisti) that exalts nation and often race above the individual and that stands for a centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader, severe economic and social regimentation, and forcible suppression of opposition.
That would be your dictionary definition of fascism. I confess that it has been some years since I actively studied such things, so I thought before I got all bent out of shape, I should check my sources. All of this talk about how what is happening under President Obama's regime is, in some people's view, "fascist." Exalting nation and race? That sounds a lot like what the folks who are shouting "fascist" do, but maybe I'm missing something. The centralized autocratic government headed by a dictatorial leader? Maybe that's where it's coming from. Except this guy was democratically elected by a majority of voters. Maybe it's the severe economic and social regimentation. That might be a tough sell too.
My own mind keeps swirling back to seventh grade, when my social studies teacher handed us a slip of paper with the title "Isms Defined." One of them read: "Fascism - If you have two cows, you keep the cows but give the milk to the government, who then sells you the milk at a high price." To some, that may sound like public health care, but I am not sure I could make that association. Maybe they meant Communism: "Communism - If you have two cows, you give them to the government; and the government gives you some milk." Most of this works best if you understand the conversion rate between cows, milk, taxes and relative levels of oppression.
The thing is, I've learned a lot since seventh grade, and since I don't own a cow, I'm glad to have a government that will work to help all the people, and cows, that it can. I suppose that makes me a fascist. Or just a really bad farmer.

Patridiots

No, it's not about the football franchise from back east. There's plenty to discuss there, including the sartorial choices of the head coach to the way the NFL has manipulated its own rule book to preserve their "dynasty." That will have to wait for another day. In the autumn, perhaps.
For now, do you remember Patriot Missiles? They were deployed by the U.S. Army during the "first" war in Iraq. They were the valiantly named hero missiles that shot down the vile SCUD missiles during Operation Iraqi Freedom. That made sense. We were firing our patriotic projectiles at those evil Soviet-made clunkers from Saddam.
How about the Patriot Act? That was the one that was supposed to straighten things out after the events of September 11, 2001. The irony, of course, was that this patriotic legislation was enacted to curtail our freedoms in many ways. Some might argue that limiting some freedoms to ensure freedom for all is a worthwhile trade. Others might wonder why they still have to take their shoes off in airports, but not their underwear.
Which brings us to 2010, where patriots of still another sort are making the news. You may have heard of the Hutaree. This is the militia group that was recently disrupted by the FBI in Michigan. These are Christian soldiers preparing for the appearance of the anti-Christ. Their purpose is defined by select verses from the New Testament. The irony here, again, is that they tend to use the words of the "Prince of Peace" below photos of heavily armed men and women. Heavily armed men and women who are ready to "defend" their country and their beliefs at any cost. And yet, on the advent of Good Friday and Easter and other Jesus-centric moments on our calendar, I find myself wondering why trust in God is regularly supplanted by trust in Smith and Wesson.
The fact that the Second Amendment seems to be one of those core beliefs shouldn't be any surprise, weapons and militia-wise. Of course, I'm not sure exactly where stockpiling C-4 plastic explosive fits into the self-defense picture, but the loyal members of the CCR certainly do. And if you thought this meant that they were big John Fogerty fans, then you need to get caught up on your Christian Colonial Republic newsletter.

Here's where we come full circle: The Patriots of Hutaree are charged with "attempting to deploy weapons of mass destruction." The statutes that will help convict them? None other than the Patriot Act.

Attention Subscribers

I thought about if for a long time. I thought about it for most of the last year, every time I sat down to write a blog about this petty annoyance or that little grievance. It's become apparent, to me at least, that this daily grind of writing whatever it is that comes to my mind is taking its toll on me in a very spiritual way.

When I started this blog nearly five years ago, I had a son in elementary school. There was real evil and stupidity swarming around the seat of power in our country. I was a younger man. Not a lot younger, but just enough that these things seemed like a challenge to me. I felt like I could handle all the oddness and mild difficulty that confronted me on a regular basis. Now, as Tim Rice once wrote, "I'm sad and tired." Besides, the country has finally begun to right itself, and I can content myself with the momentum that our leaders have started to generate, and the Hope and Change we all anticipated a year ago is surely just around the corner.

My son and wife will benefit from the time I used to spend in front of the computer screen. I won't be tied to my keyboard when I should be in the kitchen, helping with dinner, or clicking through news items when my son needs help with his homework. That's why I feel it is best that I take this opportunity to sign off while everyone's memory of me is still witty and clever. I would hate to think that I have overstayed my welcome.

And if you believe that, check the date at the top of this post, then wait and see if I'll be back tomorrow with another one of my amusing anecdotes. April Fool.