Hum bug! that is all I want to say! Who came up with this idea of a day when we celebrate love anyway? It really was the Church wanting to cover up a pagan festival. Why do we have to set aside a day when hallmark and flower growers make more in a day than I do all year? I’ve heard the story of Saint Valentine, how he was marring soldiers even thou they were forbidden to. So what? I love my wife and I try to express it every day not just the once a year when it is contrived. I heard someone this morning call it singles awareness day. That is what it is for many. For us married guys it is one of the two or three days a year we better get right. The others being anniversary and spouses birthday. If we don’t adequately express some thoughtfulness by purchasing large sums of chocolate and flowers we are forever used as a cautionary tale for others. Men will say to their sons, don’t end up making the same mistake my buddy Bob did! Then explaining in an over the top fashion the horror story of my stupidity. It isn’t even a conscious thing with women, it is a learned behavior from centuries of training. Oh no, I won’t make the mistake, I have purchased my part and will be making the delivery after work today.  This will get me through till the next day to not forget. Women, before you laugh to hard and think, that you are not like this. I would look to your husband when he comes home from work tonight. If he has one of the before mentioned products in his hands. Thou doth protest too much!

We always hear about the bad stuff. The news at night rarely if ever tells us about the incredible things individuals are doing to make a difference in the world. I ran into a volunteer who for the last 5 years has helped to put on a prom for teenagers with special needs. Nobody would recognize her out on the street as a hero. She won’t ever be in a parade for her work. Yet every year she is faithful to help plan the event, and is there to greet those who come to share in what is the highlight of their year. She isn’t asking for praise, she is doing what she feels will make a difference in the lives of other. The secret in all this is what a friend described to me yesterday. He had come to the realization that helping others is the secret to helping ourselves. When we volunteer and commit to serving others we end up being the ones who are served. We find out our problems really aren’t that big. We also find out that what little or a lot we have is a blessing that we should cherish. Serving others gives us perspective that we so desperately need, and will never get from the evening news!

I am siting at work typing on my computer. I am behind multiple levels of network and security. We have firewalls and intrusion detection devices to keep this network and all the data safe. I am on a Mac, which a lot of people have a mis-conception is safer than a PC. Do you think I am safe? Do you think someone couldn’t get to me and get the data off my computer? They are all flawed. Not just a little flawed, but giant flaws that keep raising concerns and issues with using them. I don’t know how people responsible for our countries security sleep at night knowing how easy it is to steal information from a computer or network. Even if your computer only has pictures of cats on it, someone getting all of them and putting them up on the internet is a real threat to all of us. Now no one really wants my data or probably yours but last week someone hacked George W. Bush’s email. They did not get national secrets, they got embarrassing emails of private stuff. I don’t care if you like him or not his privacy should be all of our concern. If you have a picture of yourself at a party where you had a little too much to drink or that time your bathing suit was mis-adjusted on the beach in mexico that could end up on a website for all the world to see if someone with a little knowledge and a grudge decides to target you. And if we can’t keep a former presidents email safe, what makes you think you got a chance?

Some people really show you how smart they are by their actions. Like the person who called 911 because the McDonald’s put cheese on her hamburger. Another genius called because someone robbed him of his stash of marijuana. Locally we had a 20 watt bulb shoot someone in the snow and run a short way off, so the police could track his steps in the snow and find him. I know that not everyone in life gets to be a 100 watt bulb or even a 65 but it would seem that if you are not gifted in the brains department, crime should not be you occupation. They eventually catch even the smart ones so what makes you think you are going to be able to avoid capture? I have never been smart enough to figure out how to get away with changing a grade on my report card let alone something like robbing a bank. It also looks like a lot of work. I would be the guy who wrote the demand note on my deposit slip (some guy really did this) so the police could just show up at my house without working hard to find me. In the movies the bad guy plans some crazy scheme across town to distract the police while they steal a once in a lifetime shipment of gold or jewels from a bank or museum. Every time I watch one of these movies I think, if you put that much effort into a business or creating some new product you would be rich and not have to be on the lam. Both of them seem like a lot of work, one just seems smarter.

Maybe I am getting really old but I can’t remember ever hearing about an elementary school kid being under school arrest? I went to a school I support to work on an issue and found out some kid was talking to the police and was under school arrest. First, I don’t even know what that means. Second, that seems really scary. Is it the new no tolerance policies or is the world just going to hell in a hand basket? I read today that a young man got expelled from school for making the gesture of throwing a hand grenade at imaginary monsters at his school! This is the crazy land of extremes we have become. Not only are our children losing the ability to make good choices, so are our adults. When I was a kid I did some really dumb things. If my Dad caught me doing them I got in trouble. If one of the neighbor kids parents caught me, I was still in trouble. They didn’t always tell my dad, but they would give us a lecture and it scared us. I didn’t run to my Dad and tell him someone else yelled at me because he would have said “Good”! He would not have called that neighbor dad and yelled at him. He would have told me to “knock it off”! So now the schools are always wrong so they go to extremes and kick everyone out even if it is a silly offense. Which in turn has created this crazy cycle we are in now. I don’t know how we are going to get out of this mess we have created, but we have to start teaching common sense to our children and adults. Maybe then we can get off this crazy train!

When I was eighteen, I thought I was the brightest bulb in the light socket. I knew I was destined for greatness or at least a moderately successful rock band! There were a few problems with that thou. One was, I never practiced playing my bass. Not putting in the practice time was a sure sign I as going to go nowhere. Along the way I have learned a few things like that, that have been very valuable in life and not all of them can I tell you the story of how I came to discover them, but trust me I learned the hard way.

1. Some dogs don’t like you to stare at them. Maybe they think it is a threat, maybe they think you are making fun of their face. What ever it is, it isn’t wise.

2. If you don’t know how to repair the car, you might not want to. I can do the little things but  the big things take skill. I am working up to a full engine replacement, but for now I will stick with the window washer fluid!

3. Women don’t like fake flowers. I don’t care how real they look or that they will last a life time, it isn’t gonna work. Take my advise!

Ok, I know that eating a large Big Mac combo every day is bad for me! It isn’t like I lack the common sense to know how to eat right. Green is good, white and greasy are bad! The problem is every night I hear some report as to the benefits of some element found in berries or coconut or dirt. How am I to eat all these things? They need to come out with a coconut, acacia, fish oil, dirt infused water! Everyone of these things is good for me, but if I eat all of them everyday I will be blue and blown up like violet beauregarde in willy wonka. I can’t even remember to take a multivitamin! There is just too much I am suppose to be doing everyday that I can’t keep up. Is all this really going to make me live longer or is it just to get me to buy the latest craze! How about I agree to eat my vegetables and only eat a small combo meal every once in a while. If I do that can I forget all the other stuff?

I realized a few years ago that the Super Bowl has become more about the ads than about the game. Most of the games have been blowouts so all the talk is about the cute or inappropriate commercials on and which were the winners and losers. This year everyone seemed to like the Budweiser horse one. The guy raises the horse and it breaks free to go see him after a parade. Sorry but that one was just too sappy for me. Because we own goats I think the Doritos one made me laugh, the rest were forgettable. The best in my mind was the tribute to the farmer with Paul Harvey. The speech they used is an old one but with all the women kissing nerds and various other super models in few if any clothes, it was refreshing! Yes it was for a truck, but they showed very little of the product. Instead they chose to show hardy people who break their backs everyday and then say they build a truck for these good people. I think all the other commercials used ideas that have been done so many times none of it is appealing or shocking anymore. What was shocking to me was a good old fashion praising of the American people, and I would like to see more of it!

Don’t you wish you could scrub your brain clean of somethings? There are some memories I wish I could get rid of. Most of them are things people have told me about or I heard on the news that have ruined something I once treasured. Like finding out the guy who did the puppet Elmo on sesame street was a creeper! I can never look at an Elmo toy at the store without thinking of this guy. It’s ruined. There are many more but last night was definitely one of the weirdest.  Last night I learned a man found a chunk of whale vomit on the beach. Apparently whale vomit is rare and worth a lot of money. It is used in the making of perfume. Well that just ruins walking past the fragrance counter at Macy’s for me! I can just see the girl asking me if I want to try whatever she is sampling and I will say “no thanks I’ve already had some whale vomit today”! Never mind giving any as a gift! My wife will have to do without the “Eau de toilette” I know where it comes from and it is correctly named!

Why is Friday so much better a day than Monday? I know it is the end of the working week but the same amount of things go wrong on Friday as do Monday! I could walk into work on a Monday and have my usual ten cups of coffee and have an easy day, and Friday could be a day when my hair catches on fire and I would still see it as a better day. Is it that we get to break our routine for a few days? Is it that we can do a few things we have planned all week? My Saturdays often involve doing house work or fixing a car, that isn’t what I want to do. I have also spent an entire saturday at the fair taking care of our animals. That really isn’t what I want to do. Yet I still look upon Friday as a good day. If I really think about it every one of those days is working for the same thing, that is supporting my family. The only real difference is, if I am getting paid for the hours I am putting in. So Monday I am going to say “Happy Monday” to myself and act like it’s a Friday. Let see if it makes any difference!