What’s Wrong With Right?

Why can’t more people do the right thing instead of the selfish thing or the inconsiderate thing or the politically expedient thing?

For example …

Why don’t more drivers use turn signals to indicate a lane change? Why can’t slow traffic keep right?

Why doesn’t the counter help at McDonalds say “thank you” instead of “here you go?”

When someone says “thank you,” isn’t the proper response “you’re welcome” and not “no problem?”

Two of the three leading Presidential candidates are Boomers and the third is older, so all three are old enough to be familiar with the Mom-based directive, “if you can’t say something nice about someone, don’t say anything at all.” Why can’t these candidates choose one of the obvious alternatives: a) talk about their own strengths instead of saying nasty things about each other or b) shut up?

Why can’t Congress fund infrastructure repair or education instead of a war? Isn’t it our money they’re spending? Don’t we have a say in this?

Why can’t large corporation pay their workers good wages and benefits and not outsource work? Why can’t large corporations accept very high profits instead of obscenely gigantic profits?

Why can’t businesses with automated phone systems provide an easy method for callers to locate a live human to answer questions that can’t be addressed by options 1 through 9?

Why doesn’t everyone toss bottles, cans and paper into the recycle box instead of the trash can?

What’s wrong with just doing the right thing?

Old

I don’t usually believe in the concept of “OLD,” but I do believe these are kind of funny:

'OLD' IS WHEN... Your sweetie says, 'Let's go upstairs and make love,' and you answer, 'Pick one; I can't do both!'

'OLD' IS WHEN... Your friends compliment you on your new alligator shoes and you're barefoot.

'OLD' IS WHEN... A sexy babe catches your fancy and your pacemaker opens the garage door,

'OLD' IS WHEN... You are cautioned to slow down by the doctor instead of by the police.

'OLD' IS WHEN... 'Getting a little action' means you don't need to take any fiber today.

'OLD' IS WHEN... 'Getting lucky' means you find your car in the parking lot.

'OLD' IS WHEN... An 'all nighter' means not getting up to use the bathroom.

AND

'OLD' IS WHEN... You are not sure these are jokes.

Spring

Spring is here. In Maryland, that can mean temperature in the 60s one day, in the 30s the next, sunshine one day, flurries the next.

But these little indicators of the season have been fighting their way out of the ground for a week:

There is a 30% chance they will have snow on them tonight, but they will still be there in the morning, as if to say, "Happy Easter!"

Is It Real or Is It …

Is the economy bad because of economic factors like job cuts, bad loans and inflation? Or is it bad merely because people keep saying it is bad? Or is it really bad at all?

My economy is the best it has been in years, yet I’m afraid to spend a dollar because every time I turn around someone is saying the economy is bad. One of my goals this year was to pay off two remaining non-mortgage debts and I’ve already hit one of those goals; and I should hit the other one by Thanksgiving. But I’m reluctant to replace my paid-for, eight-year-old, gas-guzzling SUV with 150,000 miles on it with a vehicle more suited to my 85-miles-per-day commute because I’m stressed by the thought of applying for a car loan.

Four years of car payments? I can’t do that … the economy is bad!

I had planned a great vacation for the end of April but I cancelled it. Why? Uhh, the economy is bad.

I clip coupons, shop at the outlet mall and bring my lunch to work four days a week. These are all fiscally responsible behaviors, but my main motivation is that … the economy is bad.

I have worked for the same company for sixteen years, yet I’m stressed about losing my job because having a job this long seems to be unusual in this (here it comes) bad economy. I have no reason to believe I’m going to lose my job. In fact, most indicators are quite the opposite, except one (here we go again): the economy is so bad.

How bad is it?

A quick and admittedly superficial internet search shows that the unemployment rate spiked in the mid 1970s, the early 1980s and again in the early 1990s, but generally has held steadily around 6% since 1960. During those spikes, it hit around 10 or 11%. The statistic for last month was 4.8%. Is that bad compared to past years?

Mortgage rates are currently around 6%; my first mortgage, in 1982, was a then typical 12.75%. My current one isn’t so bad, is it?

Certainly if you’re unemployed, carless and facing foreclosure, the economy is bad. If you’re stuck in a job that pays less than you’re worth, your economy is bad. If you live in an inflated housing market like here near DC, you might say the economy is bad. But in those scenarios, is it worse now than a year or two ago, or has it been bad for quite some time?

Food and fuel prices are rising, so maybe the economy really is bad. Or maybe this “bad economy” is just a slump that is exaggerated by overblown media attention? Any thoughts on this?

A Mustache?

Have you ever listened to a song you’ve heard a hundred times and discover something new in it, something you never noticed before? My big musical discovery tonight: Cream was a blues band, often playing the same three-chord blues I now love so much but always called rock back in the 70s and 60s. Example: Strange Brew.

I also rediscovered the unresolved confusion of the Clapton/Cream song called Swlabr. The lyrics are written in that confusing 1960s psychedelic style, possibly influenced by some popular "substance" from that era.

You've got that rainbow feel,
But the rainbow has a beard.
Running to me a-cryin', when he throws you out.
Running to me a-cryin', on your own again.
You've got that pure feel,
Such good responses,
But the picture has a mustache.

The rainbow has a beard? The picture has a mustache? What?

During the early days of my DJ career, I played that song on the radio many times. I thought I knew something about it but realized tonight that I don’t have a clue. So I did what I always do in these cases: I turned to Google (this post is NOT a commercial – this really is what I do in these cases). My search turned up a site that confirms what I suspected – I’m not alone in my ignorance of the meaning of this otherwise kickass song from the 60s.

I probably didn’t know anything about it then either, although I might have pretended to know so I would sound cool.

And here is Swlabr, in case you've never heard it:



Tonight I’m thoroughly enjoying my “new” knowledge that one of my favorite rock bands from my youth was really a blues band. And even they don't seem to know what some of their songs mean.

To Dream - Revisited

March 11th is the second anniversary of this blog. As a kid, I dreamed of becoming a famous newspaper columnist. It was a mid-priority dream, something I thought about from time to time but nothing I spent a lot of time pursuing. Funny how when I look back over 209 posts, I see that I have actually become a columnist of sorts. A couple of times a week, I pick a topic, do a little research and then comment on the topic through the eyes of a Baby Boomer. So you could say I've achieved that dream (minus the famous part and there is no paper involved; no compensation either).

I was going to repost my original post, but as I re-read the first five months of posts, I ran across this one. I like this one better; it is the real me, start to finish.

Thanks for visiting.

A blog I recently found mentioned a character I hadn’t thought of for years: Don Quixote. He’s the central figure in Man of La Mancha, a play/musical from the 1960s. The story is set during the Spanish Inquisition and tells of a knight who sets out to right all wrongs and win the heart of a good woman (Dulcinea) as he duels windmills along the way.

Quixote is a dreamer, an idealist, a man on a mission. I am all those things too. My dreams and missions are not as noble or significant as his, but I do identify with him because he has dreams and believes they are important.

Some of my dreams are selfish (career advancement, educational milestones, financial gain). Others are to help total strangers have a better life (some of my radio work).

I call it dreaming. Others sometimes call it goal-setting. I have lived many of my diverse dreams: host a radio show heard around the world, live in several interesting places, fall in love, ride in a helicopter, see the Grand Canyon, walk on a beach totally alone. Many unlived dreams are still on my list: graduate college, visit the Sicilian village of my great grandparents, hike the Bright Angel Trail into the Grand Canyon, write a book, interview John Glenn. And a few of my dreams seem impossible: save a person’s life, walk on the moon.

The point is to continue to dream.

Here’s an interesting coincidence … my elementary school graduation class had a song: “The Impossible Dream” from Man of La Mancha. This sounds silly, but I have to admit that I have always been inspired by those lyrics.

To dream ... the impossible dream ...
To fight ... the unbeatable foe ...
To bear ... with unbearable sorrow ...
To run ... where the brave dare not go ...
To right ... the unrightable wrong ...
To love ... pure and chaste from afar ...
To try ... when your arms are too weary ...
To reach ... the unreachable star ...

This is my quest, to follow that star ...
No matter how hopeless, no matter how far ...
To fight for the right, without question or pause ...
To be willing to march into Hell, for a Heavenly cause ...

And I know if I'll only be true, to this glorious quest,
That my heart will lie will lie peaceful and calm,
when I'm laid to my rest ...
And the world will be better for this:
That one man, scorned and covered with scars,
Still strove, with his last ounce of courage,
To reach ... the unreachable star ...

An impossible dream might really be impossible, but I believe that one should dream it anyway. You might not reach the unreachable star, but you could have one hell of a flight trying to get there.

My High School Eunion

My high school was one of the best in New Orleans but by the time I graduated I had come to hate it. I developed a healthy cynicism during those years, fueled by the irony of a Catholic school with military uniforms and a mandatory Jr. ROTC program. Thou shalt not kill, but let’s train you to kill. The Vietnam war was raging at the time, as were the protests.

I got through high school with my sanity intact, mostly because of three friendships I developed. We were quite different from each other but something unified us. Maybe it was because we weren’t part of the “in” crowd. I don’t even remember how we met. Maybe we sat near each other in class.

Sometimes the four of us did things as a group, sometimes we hung out in pairs. We occasionally spent time with each other’s families. All four of us went on to the same college, but that is where our paths began to split.

In the ensuing years I kept in touch with one of those friends and remain in touch to this day. However, I lost track of the other two for all the decades since … until last week. Out of the blue I received an email from one of them. As part of the ongoing “reconnect with my youth” philosophy I started when I turned 50, I recently posted my email address on the high school website so I would have access to the alumni database. My specific goal was to track down these guys. One of them happened to visit the site shortly after I did this and he found me instead. It turns out the second one married the first one’s sister, so they have definitely been in touch with each other all these years.

And now the internet has enabled the three of us to be in touch and to begin catching up. The fourth friend in this group happens to be the only person I know who does not have email, but I’ll forward information from his regular mail so he can be part of this.

I haven’t been to any of my official high school reunions since the first year and I don’t plan to go to any of them in the future. But I am thrilled to be part of this high school e-union. I’m excited to reconnect with this part of my youth and they seem to be as happy to hear from me as I am to hear from them.

Leaplings

Maybe the secret to staying young is to celebrate your birthday only once every four years, on the last day of February in a leap year. Did you know there is a word for people born on February 29th? ... leaplings. I didn’t know that until today.

Here are some celebrity leaplings from the past and present:
singer and TV host Dinah Shore



1940s band leader Jimmy Dorsey,


race car driver Mario Andretti,
actor Antonio Sabato, Jr.,
rapper JaRule
actor Dennis Farina,



and the only leapling I’ve ever met, my friend and co-worker Maureen McLain, who celebrates her, uhh, 9th birthday on February 29th this year.



Happy Birthday to all!

A Meme Revisited

My posting activity has been slow lately because I'm still ridiculously busy. I started to write a few posts but haven't finished them.

Meanwhile, here is a slightly revised meme from about 18 months ago. Tag: you're it. Answer these questions on your blog and tell me where it is.

Four jobs you have had in your life:
1. Concession stand attendant in a high school gym
2. Car parts warehouse stocker
3. Telemarketer for a home-improvement company (I quit after 2 days)
4. Overnight DJ on a Country Music radio station

Four movies you would watch over and over:
1. Casablanca
2. Dirty Harry
3. Cool Hand Luke
4. Lethal Weapon

Four places you have lived:
1. Louisiana
2. Wisconsin
3. Texas
4. Maryland

Four TV shows you love to watch:
1. The Closer
2. Mad Men
3. Law & Order: CI
4. CSI

Four places you have been on vacation:
1. Arizona/Utah
2. The Outer Banks, North Carolina
3. Cancun
4. Jamaica

Four websites you visit daily:
Only four?!?! OK, these and several more ...
1. Blogs ... all of the blogs listed to the right, but especially Merelyme, Velvet's Room, Boomer Chronicles and Ian (who just totally changed his blog).
2. Everything New Orleans
3. Google
4. My job's web site

Four of my favorite foods:
1. Jambalaya
2. Kung Pao Chicken
3. carrot cake
4. ice cream

Four places I would rather be right now:
1. Walking on the beach near Sanderling, North Carolina.
2. Watching a sunset at the North Rim of the Grand Canyon.
3. Sharing a bottle of wine with my friends who live in Kona, Hawaii - at their house, of course.
4. Skipping my exit and continuing west on I-70 till I get to the end.

Four places you'd love to visit:
1. Palermo (Sicily)
2. Banff (Canada)
3. London
4. Montana

Four foods you don't like:
1. Sushi
2. Sushi
3. Sushi
4. Sushi

Thanks for visiting. I appreciate it.

Making a living gets in the way of actually living.

Tonight I have mentally given up the idea of continuing my return to college. If this feeling continues, I will never get my college degree. For the most part, the lack of a college degree has not held me back from making a good living through my career, but it is frustrating that I never actually got the diploma.

My return has been a noble effort to study and learn history, a subject that I am interest in. It takes time, however to be a student. By time, I mean several hours a week for each credit hour of class. The specific recommendation is two to three hours of additional reading, writing and study for each hour of class. For older students who are out of practice, those numbers are minimums. That adds up to more than twelve hours a week for my one history class, a three credit hour class.

But I also need time for exercise, downtime, conversation with my wife and everything else I want to do in life. An 8-hour-a-day job that is only 8 hours would help, as would a normal person’s commute. I have neither. Last week was even busier than usual at work and one of my commutes was twice the already long amount because of an ice storm. All of that is a mental drain that interferes with the concentration needed to take a college course.

This is so frustrating and depressing, especially because I liked the professor and a couple of my classmates who were also history majors. The worst part of all of this is that at present, making a living gets in the way of actually living.

I will probably get past the mood I’m in tonight and try this college thing one more time, in the fall. That gives me seven or eight months to reprioritize my entire damn life. Wish me luck.

Pay Attention, Then Pick One

It is interesting, and maybe a little disappointing, to witness the assumptions people make about who will vote for whom. Why do people assume that most African Americans will vote for Barrack Obama because he is African American? Will most women vote for Hillary Clinton because she is a woman? Did every Mormon vote for Romney, every southerner for Huckabee? Did Joe Lieberman get every Jewish vote when he ran in presidential primaries a few years ago?

People may favor candidates with whom they have something in common, but I hope there is more to a voter’s decision than race, religion, gender or geography.

I am a white, southern-born, former Catholic who now calls the mid-Atlantic region home and sometimes attends Unitarian Universalist services. Who the heck would I vote for is comfort level and affinity were the only criteria?

As Americans, we have the right to choose any candidate. Our choice is individual and private. We do have the right to vote for someone merely because we share skin color, faith, body type or home state but I believe we also have the obligation to dig a little deeper into a future leader’s potential ability to lead when making our choice of who to vote for.

And I strongly believe everyone who can register to vote should register … and vote in every election, even if the choice is based on the lesser of two evils. Every vote does count and not voting, in my opinion, can be worse than voting for a not-so-good candidate. The last election I skipped was in 2000 and it will be the last one I ever miss; because if only one vote-skipper in each precinct in the country who favored my candidate at the time had voted, we would have had a different president for the past eight years.

So please research the candidates (the internet makes it is easier than ever) and then vote in your primary and vote in the general election. Make your voice heard, even if your voice is shouting different names than mine is.

If you live in my neck of the woods, Maryland, Virginia and DC, the primary is this Tuesday, February 12th.

And if your polling place hands out those silly “I Voted” stickers, take one and proudly wear it all day!

We Are Controlling Transmission

Do you remember the ominous visual effects and the serious announcer voice speaking these words?

There is nothing wrong with your television set. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are controlling transmission. … For the next hour, sit quietly and we will control all that you see and hear. … You are about to experience the awe and mystery which reaches from the inner mind to... The Outer Limits.

The effects are laughable now, but The Outer Limits television show was intense at the time, the 1960s; and the possibility that an external force from another planet or another country could take control was a little frightening.

Skip ahead to today’s technology, specifically something called Remote Desktop. With this software, I have the ability to connect to my workplace computer from home or anywhere. So does any IT person in my entire company.

For me, this setup enables me to work from home, with the same access to work files that I have when sitting in my office.

For the IT department, this setup enables them to install software or fix problems on my computer from wherever they happen to be. It also means anyone in the company with my access information can spy on my computer. They have the right to access my computer, by the way, and I have the right to be afraid of potential abuse of that access.

I’m not especially worried about my company, however. But this same Remote Desktop process could be used by hackers, or even the government, to spy on or alter anything on any computer I use. The same thing could happen to you. That possibility scares me a lot more than the 1960s version of The Outer Limits (or the newer seasons of that show that aired on the SciFi Channel a few years ago).

Perhaps we should also be afraid of the content control possibilities of the internet or our televisions.

Should we sit quietly and let anyone control all that we see and hear?

Married, Fifty and Curious

Here is some self-evaluation, curiosity and thought about dating.

I did well with the ladies during my 30s, but I don’t know why. I am usually the nice guy I seem to be, but my first two wives would probably tell you I was a jerk. I look OK but I don’t turn heads. I’m an average lover; I’ve probably disappointed as often as I’ve pleased. Maybe it was good luck and timing that enabled me to have more than my share of girlfriends then; my career opens lots of doors, although the initial attraction is usually more about what I do than who I am.

Sometimes I wonder what it would be like to be single and searching now that I’m in my 50s. Keep in mind I’m married and not cheating, so this is just hypothetical. Most of the fifty-somethings I know are also married, so they can’t provide much insight into my curiosity. Maybe you can.

In my early dating years, there was a process to dating. Guys asked girls out, opened doors, made most decisions. Guys made the first moves physically, but never more than a kiss on a first date. Double dates were popular (two couples sharing itinerary and transportation) and it was always clear who was with whom that evening.

My impression is that younger people these days go out in groups more than in specific couples, sex is the good night kiss and “friends with benefits” trumps “going steady.” Is this a valid impression?

So what is appropriate and common for fifty-somethings who are dating? Are 50-year old men put off by women who ask them out or who make the first moves physically? Is the “friends with benefits” concept as popular with Boomers as it seems to be with twenty-somethings?

Do our social priorities change because we’re over 50 or because we’re married or because the times change? When my wife and I were dating (I was 40-ish and she was in her 30s), our weekends included movies, restaurants and passion. Note that I wrote this on Saturday night, alone in my home office, watching a movie on the computer while eating delivered pizza. My wife was in her home office at the other end of the house researching something on the internet. Nothing is particularly wrong with our pattern; this scenario just happens to represent our normal Saturday night now and is nothing like when we were dating.

If I was single again, would I spend Saturday nights on the town or would I be home alone? Would I care? Are you single? Do you date? What does “dating” mean in 2008?

If I was sitting in a room with you right now, I might ask for your age, marital status and a description of your social life. If I was feeling particularly inappropriate I’d ask about your sex life. I’m probably older than you so I think I can get away with these questions. Care to comment with some answers?

Zero

Have you ever wondered why zero years are so important in our culture?

We celebrate or dread turning 60 or 50 or even 30. Why is that? As my wife points out each year, on your birthday you are only a day older than you were the day before your birthday. Yet the zero years seem to have great significance.

A co-worker turned 30 last month and was depressed about it for months leading up to that day. Another colleague of mine will celebrate her 40th birthday this summer and she no longer says much about it; she mentioned it a lot when we first met two years ago.

Four or five co-workers who turned 50 during the past few years were happy to acknowledge their birthday but refused to say the number. I felt the same way on my 50th. In fact, on my 50th I had braces on my teeth like a high school kid. No one would have believed it was my 50th birthday.

Walk through a Hallmark store and you’ll see several cards for decade birthdays like 50 or 30, but good luck finding a year-specific card for someone turning 53 or 27.

The 100th anniversary of powered human flight was celebrated in Kitty Hawk, NC with a week-long party in December 2003. A hat from that event inspired this post ...



Next December is the 105th anniversary; who cares? That town might see a couple hundred extra tourists, but that’s it.

In 1976 our country celebrated its 200th birthday. We’ll be 232 next July. Ho hum.

Remember when 1999 became the year 2000? More zeros led to more attention. There were waves of optimism about a new century as well as fears that older computer systems using 99 as the year designation would fail to understand that 00 represented the next year not the previous century. What was on TV as 2008 began? Hanna Montana.

I’m tempted to say that our fascination with zeros has something to do with the metric system, in which everything is divisible by 10. However, while most of the rest of the world measures in liters, meters, centimeters and kilometers, the U.S. counts gallons, yards, inches and miles.

So if you are turning 60, 50, 40, 30 or 20 this year, happy birthday. If you’re 48 on your next birthday, uhh, call me in two years. My birthday was last week, on a day with a zero in it, but I had to really think about the year. No zero … just fifty-something again.

Aging, Driving and the Eye Test

In our society, driving a car is more than a necessity. Driving is freedom, mobility, status and youth. Many older drivers fear the loss of driving privileges more than injury or illness.

I’m thinking about this today because I just renewed my driver’s license. There has been talk for years about retesting older drivers. Some say drivers over the age of (pick a number – I’ve heard ages as low as 55) should have to take 'on the road' driving tests again, a test most drivers take once, when they get their first license in their teenage years. I’m not sure about any other state, but here in Maryland, the only test one takes to renew a driver’s license is the eye test.

Put your head here, look inside and read line four.

OK, you pass. Sit over there and wait for your number to be called.

I passed? Oh, please! I know I could only clearly see three fourths of the letters on line four. I have been wearing glasses while driving for thirty years, but I always remove them when I take the eye test. I have passed this test in five states, including four or five times in Maryland.

Don’t worry. I can see where I’m going, even without the glasses … in the daylight; less so at night. But I always wear them when driving, even though I don’t legally have to.

But it scares me that I can pass this test. I wonder how many others are OKd to drive without the restriction that requires eye correction. Maybe this is why traffic is so bad around here.