Blog! January 2005

Time to Blog!

January 23, 2005

Former talk show host Johnny Carson with his personalized coffee cup in front of him, watches clips from earlier shows during the last taping of 'The Tonight Show' in Burbank, Calif., on May 22, 1992. Carson died Sunday, Jan. 23, 2005 according to his nephew. He was 79.

Johnny Carson lived the life I haven't got the balls too. He showed what a boy from the Midwest can create. I grew up in front of the TV. I watched Carson every night. The old man and lady were never home. It worked out.

Things always have worked out for me. I don't see it that way. I forget. I am going to take a little break from Time to Blog. I don't want to write any more bulls**t about not making it. So I have to get a new job. That's all the one I have is, and it isn't worth the stress for the money. I can earn a comparable wage doing something else. I want to get a part-time job to hold me through school anyway. I need to live through December 7, 2005. I need $3,000 on that date. It isn't an impossible goal. I realize I should buckle down at where I'm at for as long as I can till I get a new job. I might not have to. I have my credit. I'll buy the time.

Time is what I need. Time to pry my head out of my ass. I'll be back. Johnny, it's all yours.

January 21, 2005

From what I have been reading, the people in Norway freaked out when they saw this picture of our President flashing his "hook 'em horn's" sign. All anyone has to do is cut out the background, add some punk rockers and gothic types. I suppose you could even put the President in some different clothes. He'd look rad wearing a T-shirt that said "I Inhaled". A future project to work on with the PhotoShop.

My job went down the toilet. I haven't been writing much about work.. I don't see a career ahead. Since I started, higher ups the ladder have been quiting in droves. Last week, I considered learning this Global Billing Platform (GBP). I quickly reconsidered when Fearless Leader gave the option. Today, it was shoved down my throat. We are being told, we have to do it. No raise in pay offered. All things must pass.

This is my oprtunity to get my ass into Lakeside. I need to find part-time work that will get me through the next six months, and through graduation December 7, 2005. I can be a rock. It's time to care about what I want. This job is goiung no where quickly. I have no plans to try and make it work. I will only loose out on the opportunity to make something out of my life again. I gave CWC a shot. They sucked. RFDF used me. I won't rest until I make my dream a reality. This is the way, I know it. I was going to go this route when I first arrived, but I got side tracked. It was CNA, or massage school. CWC made it too easy. I put my soul into that job. I feel good about what I accomplished. RFDF was a mistake. Today was an ugly vision of what can happen if you don't take the reins. I'm guilty of not moving forward. I'm getting lazy. I am going back to school. I am going to to change my life.

January 18, 2005

Now he's news. It took till today to find any pictures of him. And this looked like it was taken last year when Wu was first arrested.

Been leaning my "circle of fifths" on the keys. All those years ago, I wasn't able to learn this stuff. I didn't give a damn. After I master all the key changes, I will move on to the chords. I've been concentrating on the chords like they held some kind of magic. If I could know the chords, I could play. Back in Vegas, I was thinking the same way. I was concentrating on reading sheet music, and the chords. I didn't get very far. Last night I was looking at it, and it made sence. That is a good sign. I am not going to look at anything else until I have mastered the scales in all keys. And by mastering the circle of fifths, you master reading sheet music. You look at a song, and even though the chords might be in there, it is still in a key. Key is a foundation. My hands aren't too bad. I can reach it.

January 17, 2005

I'm sitting here and I'm watching the 9:00pm news. Meng-Ju “Mark” Wu, hung himself around 3:00pm. I couldn't believe it. He was going to trial in a few days. That's what happens when you get into gambling, deep. These guys he killed, Jason C. McGuigan, 28, Dustin J. Wilson, 17, and Daniel R. Swanson, 25 may have ripped him off. He was in deep with some heavy sports betting with these guys. It wasn't Ho Chunk.

Stories had it that Wu was bragging to people he had won $15,000 sports betting. These guys didn't like the puplicity. I don't think Wu was boasting as much as he was just plain happy. You tend to run off at the mouth when you are happy. He didn't have much to be happy about. After his arrest, Wu told police he had lost $15,000 gambling between April and June 2003 and he had withdrawn $72,000 from his bank account between December and June.

He needed some hits to get back to even.

I don't know what really happened on the deal. But it doesn't take Sherlock Holmes to figure it out. These guys didn't pay up. Wu went after them to get his money.

They were found dead in the apartment the afternoon of June 26, 2003, by McGuigan's aunt, who had stopped by to deliver a bill that was mistakenly sent to her. The cops came and cased the joint well. They had enough evidence to send Wu to prison for the rest of his life. The guy was young. I wasn't able to find any news on his hanging tonight. I wanted to add his picture, but am unable to find any right now. He hasn't been in the news much. The other Asian took the spotlight.

I think that's why it shocked me at first. I had actually forgoten about him. I don't think I am comfortable being that complacent. When ever I think of all the gambling sad sacks I saw go down the tubes, in a blaze of glory, I really was shocked at Wu. That's LA stuff. First triple homicide in the state in 31 years.

Anyway, the man managed to hang himself today in a Dane County jail. His young life got flushed right down the toilet. And I blame gambling. It's a drug as powerful as anything you can snort up your nose, or shoot in your arm. Wu got in over his head. He probably didn't realy want to shoot those three boys, but it happened. All he wanted was to get the money back.

And on the other hand, Wu might of had the crazy idea he could roll these three dudes, and it back fired on him. The cops had him, he shot them. The why wasn't going to change Wu going to the can for life. Either way, he ended up swinging on a mackshift gallow. The why doesn't matter. What should matter to me, is not forgetting why Wu went down early. The gambling. You have to have dicipline. You have to have your head on straight. If you are gambling, and packing, you aren't doing it right.

I can only imagine what his family is feeling now. They say "if not for the grace of God, there walks I." When I first came back to Wisconsin last December, 2003 I told my two brother the truth. I was lucky I didn't totally piss my life away gambling. There are a lot of good people who have lost everything gambling. And here I am playing Badger 5 and Powerball. I'm supporting this disease. Gambling is evil. You can make it fun for the whole family, but it still devil's work.

Lots of things going on with me right now. I have to worry about myself. I can't alway keep the thought of Meng-Ju “Mark” Wu in my upper consciousness. If I could do that, I'd be a better person.

January 15, 2004

If the world is coming to end, there is nothing I can do to stop it. So, live well! Find something you really enjoy, and do it. We can't change anything, not really. I was taught in school that my vote counted. That was before black boxes, computers, and all this electronic bug-a-boo crap that is taking over our lives. The last two Presidential Elections have proven how corrupt things are. I'm not going to loose sleep over it. Compared to the rest of the world's working slobs, we do OK here in the good old USA. I'm guilty of enjoying a better lifestyle at their expense. The truth isn't always pretty.

I'm looking into going to massage school. In six months, I can be licensed and starting a new career. It would go hand in hand with my desire to be in a better position to control my own destiny, and it would also give me a better opportunity to get my physical fitness program going. I'm looking into some grants, and financial aid. I can borrow the money at great rates from my credit card company. They love me. They should. I've given them every dime I have made in the last two years crawling out of this hole I was in. I really don't want to fall back into another one, but it would be for a good cause. Life is short. You have to grab the brass ring, or try to. Just surviving is no way to live.

I am starting to understand music better. I can play alittle right now. This keyboard I have is fantastic. What was I saying about electronic crap! You live by the sword, and you die by the sword. Jesus said it best, "render onto Ceaser what is Ceasar's, and render onto God what is God's." We have to live in the world. We have to play the hands dealt to us. It sure burns you out though.

January 14, 2004

The following story frightens me. Powers are at large that appear to answer only onto themselves. If something like this can happen to one man, it can happen to us. Don't fool yourself into thinking, "this can't happen to me." Isolated cases of today can become the standards of tomorrow. This tomorrow may be 50 years into the future. This is how things like this start. One day people wake up and wonder, "how did things ever come to this?"

I have told people, "look at what was happening in Germany. Look what led to the rise of Fascism. Look what happened to people's freedoms." No one wants to see the truth. If we hide our heads in the sand, it might go away. If we pretend it isn't happening again, and keep out mouths shut by not complaining about the injustices, we won't get caught up in the net when the shit hits the fan.

The following story is long, but it is worth reading. So is the following article written in 1933.

Friday January 14, 2005 The Guardian

A man is walking alone along a mountain path in the darkness. He is carrying a suitcase. He seems frightened, tired and confused. He has long hair and a long beard, but they are untidy, as if he did not grow them voluntarily. He turns a bend and meets three men carrying Kalashnikovs. The man shows them his passport. It indicates that he is a German citizen, born in Lebanon, called Khaled el-Masri. Using poor English, he tells them that he does not know where he is. They tell him that he is on the Albanian border, close to Serbia and Macedonia, and that he is there illegally since he doesn't have an Albanian stamp in his passport.

The story that el-Masri tells them by way of explanation, on this evening in late May 2004, is extraordinary: a story of how an unemployed German car salesman from the town of Ulm went on a New Year's holiday to Macedonia, was seized by Macedonian police at the border, held incommunicado for weeks without charge, then beaten, stripped, shackled and blindfolded and flown to a jail in Afghanistan, run by Afghans but controlled by Americans. Five months after first being seized, he says, still with no explanation or charge, he was flown back to Europe and dumped in an unknown country which turned out to be Albania.

What really happened? With no way to prove his story, el-Masri's account remains in the balance, a terrifying snapshot of America's "war on terror". It is certain that he returned home to Ulm from Albania in May 2004, and that he was taken off a bus from Germany at the Macedonian border on New Year's Eve 2003. The only person who has offered a clear explanation for what happened in the five months in between is el-Masri himself. Yet that may change.

The German authorities are now taking his allegations very seriously. They are subjecting a sample from el-Masri's hair to radioisotope analysis, which can reveal, down to a particular country, the source of a person's food and drink over a period of time. Discussions are also under way about bringing to Germany two men whom el-Masri has identified as being with him in the Afghan prison, and who were also subsequently released. The fact that the German authorities do regard Ulm as an area of potentially dangerous radical Islamic activity - a number of premises were raided and alleged Islamic activists were arrested on Wednesday - only emphasises the concern that Germany has over the el-Masri case.

So far the US authorities have neither confirmed nor denied el-Masri's story, although German investigators first requested information about the case in autumn. The FBI office in the US embassy in Berlin did not return calls yesterday.

On Tuesday the Guardian was the first European news organisation to interview el-Masri, at the Ulm offices of his lawyer, Manfred Gnjidic. In a conversation lasting more than four hours, el-Masri conveyed a powerful impression of sincerity: if his story is not true, he must be an actor of genius. He broke down in sobs as he described the moment he was abducted by masked men and put on a plane, excused himself to vomit as he recalled the filthy water he was given to drink in jail, and brightened as he described the hours before his return to Germany. Often he would pick up a pen and sketch the layout of a room or building.

If true, the abduction would add to our understanding of a pattern of US behaviour frightening in its implications both for America and for the rest of the world. The former director of the CIA, George Tenet, told the US 9/11 Commission last year that even before September 11 the US had abducted more than 70 foreigners it considered terrorists - a process Washington has declared legal under the label "extraordinary rendition".

An investigation by the Washington Post last year suggested that the US held 9,000 people overseas in an archipelago of known prisons (such as Abu Ghraib in Iraq) and unknown ones run by the Pentagon, the CIA or other organisations. But this figure does not include others "rendered" to third-party governments who then act as subcontractors for Washington, enabling the US to effectively torture detainees while technically denying that it carries out torture.

El-Masri's ordeal began, he says, when he decided to escape, for one week over New Year, the stress of living in a single room in Ulm as the unemployed father of a family of six. On a friend's recommendation he bought a cheap bus ticket to Skopje, capital of Macedonia, intending to find a hotel when he got there.

The bus left the borders of the EU and crossed Serbia without incident. Then, at the Macedonian border, at 3pm, el-Masri was called off the bus. Now 41, he has lived in Germany for 20 years, the last 10 as a citizen. "I didn't feel bad," he says. "I just thought it was a mistake."

He was taken to a room with a table and chairs where four men whom he took to be Slavic searched his luggage and questioned him in poor English, asking him about links to Islamic organisations. Several hours later, flanked by armed police, he was driven to a city he assumes was Skopje and escorted to the hotel room where he was to spend the next few weeks. "I asked if I was arrested," says el-Masri. "They said: 'Can you see handcuffs?'"

El-Masri was kept prisoner in the room for 23 days; Macedonian civilian police were constantly present, and he was subject to repeated interrogations about his links to Islamic organisations - he says he has none - and about the mosque in Ulm where he worships.

After about 10 days, a Macedonian Mr Nice appeared. "He said it was taking a long time, too much time - let's make an end to it, and let's make a deal. 'We have to say you are a member of al-Qaida ... then we'll put you on a plane and take you back to Germany.' I refused, naturally. It would have been suicide to sign."

But el-Masri was accused of having been to a terror training camp in Jalalabad, of having a fake passport, and being in reality a citizen of Egypt. On the evening of January 23, he was handcuffed, blindfolded, put in a car and told he was going to Germany. He was driven to a place where he heard the sound of a plane, then heard the voice of one of the Macedonians saying he would have a medical examination.

"I heard the door being closed," says el-Masri. "And then they beat me from all sides, from everywhere, with hands and feet. With knives or scissors they took away my clothes. In silence. The beating, I think, was just to humiliate me, to hurt me, to make me afraid, to make me silent. They stripped me naked. I was terrified. They tried to take off my pants. I tried to stop them so they beat me again. And when I was naked I heard a camera." El-Masri breaks down as he recalls the moment when the men carried out an intrusive anal search.

He was dressed in a nappy, a short-sleeved, short-legged suit and a belt. His feet were shackled and his hands were chained to the belt. His ears were plugged and ear defenders placed over them and a clip put on his nose. A hood was put over his blindfold. With his arms raised painfully high behind his back, he was driven to an aircraft where he was thrown down on to a bare metal floor, chained and bound, and given an injection. He was dimly aware of a landing and takeoff and a second injection before the plane landed again and he was put into the boot of a car.

El-Masri arrived in what he later found to be his cell by being pushed violently against the wall, thrown to the floor, having feet placed on his head and his back and having his chains removed. The cell was to be his home for the next four months. From the graffiti on the wall - in Arabic script, but not Arabic - and the Afghan dress of the guards, he deduced that he was in Afghanistan. There was nothing in the cell except a blanket, a filthy plastic mat and a bottle of tainted water so vile that the memory of it makes him literally gag.

El-Masri soon discovered that the prison, though technically Afghan, was run from behind the scenes by the US. His first encounter with an American was with a masked individual who spoke English with what el-Masri believes was an American accent. He had a Palestinian translator. The American took a blood sample and photographed el-Masri naked again.

"I asked him if I could have fresh water," said el-Masri. "And he said: 'It's not our problem, it's a problem of the Afghan people.' I said: 'Afghanistan doesn't have planes to kidnap people in Europe and bring them here, so it's not the problem of the Afghan people.'"

By whispering through the door, and exchanging messages on pieces of toilet paper, el-Masri found out a few details about his fellow prisoners: two Saudi brothers of Pakistani origin who had been imprisoned for two years, two Tanzanians, a Pakistani, a Yemeni, and several Afghans. (Mr Gnjidic says two of the prisoners have been traced but he didn't want to identify them for fear of putting their lives at risk.)

El-Masri says the first of many interrogations was carried out by a masked man with a south Lebanese accent, with seven or eight silent observers in black masks listening in. "He said: 'Do you know where you are?' And I answered: 'Yes, I know, I'm in Kabul.' So he said: 'It's a country without laws. And nobody knows that you are here. Do you know what this means?'"

Repeatedly, he would be asked the same questions, challenging his identity, accusing him of attending terrorist training camps. Some of the interrogators, el-Masri believes, were American.

After about a month, el-Masri met two unmasked Americans who other prisoners referred to as "the Doctor" and "the Boss". The Doctor was a tall, pale man in his 60s with grey collar-length hair. The Boss was younger, with red hair and blue eyes, about 5ft 10in, and wore glasses. Then, in March, el-Masri and the other prisoners began a hunger strike. After 27 days of starvation, he was taken in chains one night to meet the Americans and a senior Afghan. Near to hysteria, el-Masri said they had to let him go, put him before a US court, let him speak to somebody from the German government, or watch him starve to death.

The Boss told him he had to get Washington's permission to help him, but was clearly angry, saying: "He shouldn't be here. He's in the wrong place." "I had the impression that the Doctor thought I wasn't guilty, and had sent a report saying so even after the second interrogation," says el-Masri. Yet he was taken back to his cell, where he continued his hunger strike. Conditions in the cell improved, with a bed and a new carpet, but he was barely able to move. On the 37th day he was force fed chocolate-flavoured nutrients through a tube stuffed up his nose. El-Masri began to eat again and the Americans brought him fresh water and promised that he would be released within three weeks.

They brought a native German speaker to the prison. "I asked him: 'Are you from the German authorities?' He said: 'I do not want to answer that question.' When I asked him if the German authorities knew that I was there, he answered: 'I can't answer this question.'" (Hofmann, the prosecutor, says the German security services do not admit to any knowledge of an agent visiting el-Masri in prison.)

It was to be more than a week before el-Masri finally got out of the prison; the German told him one of the obstacles to his speedy release was the Americans' determination not to leave any evidence that he had ever been there. He was flown to Albania in what he thinks was a small passenger jet, blindfolded and in plastic handcuffs.

When el-Masri got back to Ulm, he found his wife and four children had disappeared. They had returned to Lebanon. He traced them, brought them back, and told his wife his story.

"It was a crime, it was humiliating, and it was inhuman, although I think that in Afghanistan I was treated better than the other prisoners. Somebody in the prison told me that before I came somebody died under torture. Those responsible have to take responsibility, and should be held to account."

Hofmann and his investigative team now have two tasks: to find evidence supporting or disproving el-Masri's story and, if they can show it is true, to work out who to charge with kidnapping. But how do you charge a government? "For the moment," says Hofmann, "I have to believe the story, because there is no evidence that it is not true."

THE WESTERN MAIL & SOUTH WALES NEWS, June 5th 1933
Germany Under Hitler - First Article

GERMANY UNDER THE RULE OF HITLER
DEATH BLOW TO DEMOCRACY
REVOLUTION WHICH SPRANG FROM POVERTY
By GARETH JONES

REVOLUTION WHICH SPRANG FROM POVERTY
The Brown Shirts are now masters of Germany. Every day in Berlin they march through streets bedecked with red, black, and white Nazi flags to the sound of those military marches which are rousing young Germany to a passionate militant love of their Fatherland. Eager crowds line the streets for each parade and, stretching out their right hands, call with ecstatic enthusiasm, “Heil, Hitler!”

The leader of the National-Sosialists (to give the full name for Nazi), Adolf Hitler, who flies one day to inspect the fleet at Kiel and next day to speak, perhaps, at Munich, commands among millions of people a feeling which can only be described as that of religious worship.

I have for my leader;” said one leading Nazi to me, “a love which is as deep as my love for my country, and I have in him a faith than which no faith, even faith in religion, could be deeper. Hitler can never be wrong, and his orders I shall carry out to the death.”

Imbued with such devotion to Hitler, the Nazi Brown Shirts have, under his command, carried out a revolution which can be ranked with the Bolshevik and the Fascist Revolutions.

The German National Revolution, although possessing a far narrower economic and philosophical foundation than that brought about by Lenin, has certainly been more rapid than its Russian counterpart. The Brown Shirts in three months have been able to gain power and dig themselves well in without the ravages of a civil war and without the delay of several years, which elapsed in Italy before Mussolini took over full power. The lightning pace of the National-Socialist triumph makes the French Revolution appear almost like prolonged slow motion.

DEATH-BLOW TO DEMOCRACY
What have the Brown Shirts done since Hitler became Chancellor on January 30?
They have dealt a deathblow to democracy in Germany, and have made Parliament into a despised relic of the past.

They have put one party, and one party only, into control, and that is the National-Socialist party, which has become as all-powerful as the Communists in Russia and the Fascists in Italy. The Nazis (pronounced Natsi-s) have put themselves into the position of leaders in the universities, in all committees, in factories, on boards of directors, in schools, in public offices. Most positions of trust are now held by members of the party.

They have started a ruthless campaign against the Jews, whom they have deprived of rights, whom they have persecuted both economically and morally, and whom they have treated as if they were “inferior men,” as they call them. Distinguished scholars and great men, whom we in Britain would be honoured to consider as our citizens, are not allowed to enrich German scholarship or law courts or hospitals.

They have abolished two powerful parties, the Social Democrats, who numbered about 8,000,000 voters and the Communists, who numbered almost 6,000,000, and have seized their funds, the private property of those parties.

They have imprisoned many tens of thousands of men and women for their political views, and hold them now captive in prisons and concentration camps.

They have swept away the liberty of the press, and they come down with a heavy hand upon any editor who dares criticise the leader or his policy.

They have created a secret police, which will make still more nebulous any freedom of expression which may remain.

A DREAM COMES TRUE
In the space of a few weeks they have made the old Bavarian, the old Saxony, and all the various States which formed Germany a thing of the past, and the scattered, straggling Germany of yesterday has now become a centralised, unified nation. The dream of generations- namely, a united Germany, where men would not be Saxons or Bavarians or Wurttembergers, but real Germans has in a flash come true.

They have attempted a moral cleansing of life in the big towns and have courageously attacked social evils.

They have revealed and condemned much corruption in public life and have placed before public servants a high ideal of service for the nation’s sake and not for private gain.

They have re-organised education on lines of narrow nationalism and intolerance. They have had midnight bonfires of some of Germany’s most valuable Socialistic books.

Such have been the main lines of the national revolution. The Nazis’ actions combine a powerful idealism with a mediæval intolerance and unselfish devotion to an aim and a leader with a brutal disregard of justice and fairplay to the individual. Liberal-minded people have been shocked by the similarity which Nazi decrees have with former reactionary measures, and the treatment of the Jews has caused a revulsion of feeling which is shared by millions of Germans within the borders of Germany.

CAUSE OF THE REVOLUTION
Why has Germany suddenly become so ruthless, so nationalistic, and so thorough in sweeping away the democratic Republic formed after her defeat in 1918?

The revolution is, firstly, the revolt of young Germany against years of unemployment, against the boredom of walking the streets without work, against a meagre unemployment benefit, which is, as one man put it, “enough to breathe on, but not enough to live on.” Young Germans learned to hate capitalism and to long for a new system where things would be different. A young worker who only received 4s. 6d. per week was not likely to be fond of the system under which existed, and he longed for any programme which offered hope. Most young workers streamed into the Communist camp, while the unemployed who had middle-class connections usually became Nazi storm troops.

Even when Germany enjoyed a period of sham prosperity on borrowed money, from 1925 to 1929, there were a steady million or two out of work, but when the cloud of depression broke over the world the figure sprang upwards with a speed which terrified politician and workman alike, and reached six millions. Many families had not enough bread, and the fathers and mothers blamed the system under which their children went hungry. Revolutionaries grew in number until most of Germany became revolutionary. At one time the future seemed like a race. Which would win-Bolshevism or Fascism?

SAVINGS MELT AWAY
Not only the working class, but the middle class was impoverished. In 1923 the savings of the whole country melted away in a few months, when the mark became of infinitesimal value. In 1923 one could buy for a £, millions of marks and later even billions. I remember travelling in that year from Saxony to South Poland, a distance of 350 miles. For 1,750,000 marks, which was equivalent to 1s. 10½d., I obtained a first-class ticket, and I paid the equivalent of fivepence for a five course meal on the train. This inflation a meant the disappearance of the savings of millions of families, and the, ruin of the middle class has been the most fertile breeding ground of the national revolution.

On the surface in Germany the streets still look prosperous. Men and women look well dressed, for the Germans have a pride of appearance and a regard for cleanliness which fill one with admiration. But beneath a spotless suit of clothes and a white collar there is often abject poverty crying out for retribution.

This poverty is one of the forces which has made Hitler the dictator of Germany

January 12, 2005

I have included some articles on the benefits of exercise, and I think this one is good. I haven't gotten on track myself, so I won't tell you what to do. I know how important time is, and that managing it is extremely important. To accomplish the things you want, you have to suck it up, fight the fatigue of the day, and focus. It is a matter of embracing life. If in the back of your mind you really don't give a rat's ass about changing your life, let's face it, you aren't going to do much. That is why exercise is so important. It will increase your energy, and lift your spirits. I know from personal experience it does these things. It also keeps your immune system working in high gear. The weather right now in Wisconsin is horrible. It gets very cold, then warms up, and gets cold again. This plays havoc with your health. You have to fight back by exercising, whatever form that takes.

I know that I will get back on a schedule very soon. I feel guilty not staying in the best shape I can maintain. I'm at an age where I can start going down hill very fast, very soon. Sometimes I feel like I really don't care. I don't have many friends right now. I do have friends, but not anyone I can confide in. I don't have anyone I can really talk to about what is going on inside my heart, and soul. But I have to remember I still have a good friend, if I accept him for what he is, warts and all. That someone is myself.

Vigorous exercise is believed to trigger a surge in natural brain chemicals, including endorphins, the body's own painkillers. It also boosts serotonin, a brain chemical that can be low in some people with anxiety and depression.

"Exercise can be an appropriate add-on treatment for a lot of anxiety disorders," said Roger A. Fielding, director of the nutrition and exercise physiology laboratory at Tufts University. "There's a lot of evidence that exercise improves people's sense of well-being."

At Arizona State University in Tempe, Daniel Landers, a professor of kinesiology (the study of movement) has reviewed more than 100 studies in humans and animals. In controlled studies, he said, rats put under stress tend to freeze if put into a strange environment. But if the rats are allowed to exercise, this fearful response is diminished.

With humans given questionnaires right after exercise and after weeks of training, exercise has both an immediate and long-term effect in reducing anxiety, Landers said. Animal studies show that both endorphin and serotonin levels go up with exercise. In people with panic attacks, exercise has been found to be just as effective at reducing the number of attacks over a 16-week period as drugs given to combat anxiety and depression. There is also evidence, Landers said, that exercise increases levels of a brain chemical called BDNF, which enhances both mood and intellectual functioning.

To get the mellowing effects of exercise, both aerobic exercise, like walking briskly, and weigh tlifting work, provided that you're working at 50 to 70 percent of your maximum possible effort. In general, researchers recommend 30 minutes a day -- which can be done in several, shorter bouts -- of moderate aerobic exercise at a pace that feels somewhat fast but still allows you to carry on a conversation.

January 7, 2005

What is up with these people? I won't say they had life handed to them on a silver platter, but they aren't going without creature comforts. They live in mansions, they have millions of dollars to piss away, and they got the hot babes down on their knees. So what do they do? They end up in trouble with the law. They loose everthing they have that sets them up in their ivory towers. Jack Whittaker, Mike Tyson, Robert Blake, Micheal Jackson, and now this clown. Is it the fame? Is it having your ass kissed where ever you go, people jumping to their feet everytime you fart? Do you start beleiving you are above the rest of us? Does it give you the power to take what you want, when you want it?

I dealt cards to the rich and famous in Vegas. They tretaed me like I was an animal. I think that is the mentality that consumes these people, the idea that they are somehow so superior to the rest of us that they are above the laws of God, and man. Being high on dope probably doesn't help.

Phil Spector Admitted Shooting L.A. Actress-Police

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Famed music producer Phil Spector at first told police he accidentally shot B-movie actress Lana Clarkson to death at his home in February 2003, contrary to his later claim that she committed suicide, newly released transcripts of grand jury testimony show.

Five volumes of grand jury testimony were released late Thursday after the Los Angeles Times and other news organizations mounted a successful legal challenge against defense efforts to keep them sealed.

Beatrice Rodriguez, a police officer dispatched to Spector's mansion in a Los Angeles suburb, said that when she arrived, the 64-year-old music producer said, ".... I didn't mean to shoot her. It was an accident."

Spector's driver, Adriano De Souza, told the grand jury that about three minutes after he heard a shot inside the house and called police, Spector came out holding a gun and told him, "I think I killed somebody."

He said that when asked for more details, Spector shrugged his shoulders and did not say anything.

Three women also testified that in various circumstances, ranging from a house party to a visit to his home, Spector had threatened them with a gun.

Spector, famed for his "Wall of Sound" productions for such stars as the Beatles and Ike and Tina Turner (news), is charged with murdering Clarkson, 40, on Feb. 3, 2003 after picking her up at the Los Angeles nightclub where she worked as a hostess. Now free on $1 million bail, he faces life in prison if convicted.

He has subsequently claimed in an Esquire magazine interview that Clarkson shot herself to death. The actress died of a single bullet wound to her head.

Just so you know where the crap is coming from, I thought I'd print the following article. It makes sense to me. I've been getting spam almost everyday from people who think they will get rich pushing Cialis. Frankly, I'm getting annoyed.

State-run telecom giants host spammers in China

BEIJING — Chinese state-run telecom giants are hosting junk email distributors from around the world to earn extra money, frustrating international pressure to reduce spam, industry analysts said Friday in response to a report that China has become the second largest source of spam after the United States.

At least 25 new spam reports turn up daily in China, and many are traced to provincial branches of national telecommunications companies such as China Telecom, China Netcom and China Mobile, according to the British-based junk email tracking group Spamhaus. About two-thirds of the 85 Chinese spam carriers listed by Spamhaus are China Telecom and China Netcom branches.

January 5, 2005

Falling Fish Has Become All The Rage
Prairie Du Chien Has Found Fun And Fame In Its Carp-themed Celebration.

No, this is for real. The Big Apple has it's crystal ball, and Prairie Du Chien, WI. has it's frozen carp. They even gave the fish a name, "Lucky". I guese this event really gets people going. It just doesn't get any better watching a 29 pound frozen bottom feeder lowing closer, and ever closer to the ground as that magic hour of midnight approaches. And check out the events schedule. I realize this is Wisconsin we are talking about, but I just about soiled myself when I first read this article. I thought it was a joke at first. A little New Year humor. It is almost one of those "if you don't see it with your own eyes, you really can't believe it" sort of things. Check out the crowning midnight event. It just doesn't get any more American than saying the Pledge of Allegiance, and taking a "Carp Plunge" into a livestock water tank.

Fish Will Be Falling In Prairie Du Chien

Lucky Will Weigh In At 29 Pounds For Tonight's Droppin' Of The Carp To Start The New Year.

PRAIRIE DU CHIEN
The biggest fish yet will be the star attraction at today's Droppin' of the Carp celebration to bring in the new year in Prairie du Chien. This year's frozen Lucky the Carp weighs in at 29 pounds, said Tom Nelson, who with his wife, Cathie, came up with the idea for the first Droppin' of the Carp event. The Nelsons are on the 14-member committee that organized this year's celebration.

Lucky will be dropped - actually, lowered - 110 feet to mark the start of 2005.

Using a frozen fish was unusual enough in 2001 to generate phone calls from national and even international news media outlets.

"The first year, we had a couple hundred people" attend, Nelson said. "The second year we had a little over 500. And last year we had a little over 1,000 people."

Attendance doubled last year partly because of the first Carp Bowl flag football game between two teams from volunteer fire departments. This year's Carp Bowl will be at 3:30 p.m. today on St. Feriole Island, featuring teams from the fire departments in Prairie du Chien and New Albin, Iowa.

The Carp Bowl will be followed by a fireworks display about 5:30 p.m. on the island.

EVENTS SCHEDULE
All events are on St. Feriole Island and on Blackhawk Avenue, near the entrance to the island.

Fourth annual Droppin' of the Carp events * 3:30 p.m.: Carp Bowl, on St. Feriole Island. * 5:30 p.m.: Fireworks display. * 11 p.m.: Breaking of the Carp Pinata for children. * 11:15 p.m.: Singing by Larry and the Carpettes, and crowning of the Carp King and Carp Queen. * Midnight: Droppin' of the Carp, Pledge of Allegiance, singing and fireworks. * 12:15 a.m.: Carp Plunge, in which anyone can jump into a livestock water tank.

January 2, 2005

Grandfather Time marches on. Time waits for no man, and as the days and months fly by, it becomes painfully apparent just how short this life we have on Earth is. I remember George Harrison talking about how fast his life went between 17 and 57. He described it as "nothing." I think he meant that time went so fast, it felt as if nothing happened. One day he was 17, and the next day he was 57. I know my life seems like it has evaporated to a certain degree. I wonder if any of us really feel we have done everything we wanted to do. I doubt it. Work sucks up a great deal of our existence. Just survivng is a chore. Living is the hardest thing we can accomplish. I mean really living and not just going through the motions and pretending we are living. Sucking down large quanities of alcohol and taking drugs is not living. Hating everyone is not living. Looking for people to dump your personal problems on is not living.

I was pleasd to see that people care about what is going on in SE Asia. We are a kind hearted, compasionate people. We are all human. The stress of getting by these days takes a tremendous toll on own emotional well being. Sometimes it feels like it is just you against the world, and that very few people care about what happens to you. That is why you have to find something to love, and continue loving it for the rest of your life. In the end, all we have is love.

The Wizard of Oz told the tin man, "and remember my sentimental friend, a heart is not judged on how much it loves, but by how much you are loved by others." I also remember the words of Jesus Christ, "father, forgive them for they know not what they do." I don't think people consciously make a decision to hate. They just don't realize what they are doing. I will try to keep these words of wisdom in my fore thoughts this year. I haven't been able to make a commitment to people because they drive me nuts with all their two faced, self righteousness. They drive me crazy with all the hate in their black, ugly souls. I have to accept this, and let people walk with me. I can't march to the sound of someone else's drum. I have to march to my own. I can't continue pushing people away. If I continue living my life like I have in the past, I will end up alone, unfulfilled, and biter. That is no way to live.