Dad, he's not going to win. The Democrats may be ready to vote for a black man, but have you seen his family? His kids are cute and all, but America is not ready to put an entire black family into the White House.
They say the internet is forever, and it is possible that you'll stumble across this when you are a grown-up person. You may not want to continue reading if you find yourself as an adult with any "issues" about your upbringing.
I sent a small fortune to your mother to pay for half of some Nintendo thing. But since that thing is going to be at her house, it doesn't count. Because at seven, it's all about how much you rake in for having an anniversary of the day of your birth. The booty. The spoils. the riches.
I got nothing for you. So here's what I'm going to do. On the way to pick you up at school today, I'm going to stop in a WalMart or Target or some other crappy, soulless corporate big box store and grab a bunch of crap made in China and throw some gift bags and tissue paper in the cart and pay for it and put it all together in the parking lot. The whole process is going to take less than 10 minutes.
It's not that I'm not thoughtful, it's that you're seven. It doesn't matter what I get, it's going to end up at the bottom of your closet in two days. My job is to teach you the important things in life, like golf course etiquette and a love of football and an appreciation for sarcasm and the proper timing of a punch line. You'll lose interest in some kind of Polly Pocket Animal Care Center in no time. Learning to be a total smart-ass just like dear old dad will last a lifetime.
This is a great day in U.S. Foreign policy! Castro is stepping down! The embargo worked! Eisenhower was right! And nobody got antsy, and it worked!! Way to go Kennedy and Johnson and Nixon and Ford and Carter and Reagan and Bush and Clinton and Bush!! The fact that you avoided a knee-jerk reaction really paid off!!!!!!!!
See, you don't have to invade every country that's headed by an evil despot! Just wait them out. Forty-eight years or so.
(I'll tell you who needs to be nervous, and that's the Bahamians. My guess is that within five years, 75% of the American tourist dollars that are going to the Bahamas will end up in Cuba.)
Did I ever tell the one about the time I was in the showband on a cruise ship and on the last night of the cruise all the entertainers for the week got on stage and we did "We Are The World" and I threw up on stage in a trash can right at the big key change at the end, but I didn't miss a note?
Those of you who don't have children of a certain age are missing out on some pretty good pop culture. To wit, Patrick rocking the Simmons Drums, 80s style.
I hardly ever remember my dreams. And if I'm reading someone's blog and they start talking about a dream, I go on about my merry way without reading.
However, two nights ago I had a major tornado dream. The sky looked like the sky toward the end of the Wizard of Oz, except instead of flying monkeys, the sky was full of tornadoes of all sizes. And I was running from shelter to ditch with several folks, playing dodge the next twister.
Last night, a sky full of tornadoes hit Tennessee. As I was laying awake last night at 2 a.m., listening to the tornado sirens wailing and the winds howling and the thunder booming, all I was concerned about was the fact that I was naked. I wondered if I should get up and put on some sweatpants or something, because if a twister came and blew up the house, I didn't think it would be appropriate to be wandering around the neighborhood in the nude.
Then it occurred to me that there wouldn't be any wandering. If a tornado blew up the house, it would take me out with it. And I thought that would be appropriate, to leave the world the same way I came into it.
So I've decided that if I start to experience chest pains and numbness in my arm, my courses of action will be to take an aspirin, call 911 and take off all my clothes.
I hope that doesn't happen in an important business meeting.
