IT'S NOT THAT EASY

I'm sitting here holding a new copy of my 2nd book, "Education of an Architect". I didn't have to pay thousands of dollars to publish a thousand copies thanks to the amazing world of the internet (thank Al Gore). I can publish one at a time at a cost of $6.00 a copy. I just uplaod a few files, pay for it, & wait a few days before it appears in the mail. Done! But to tell the truth, I have a few glitches to work out, like adding some photos, a cover photo, a format change, etc., etc..
Except now it gets a little hairy. Since there is no actual human being involved in this entire process, except someone in Bangladesch who doesn't quite know what to do, I have to ask some friend if they will help me with their Photoshop to get it together.
However, on the bright side, my C-D is ready and in the mail to a few fortuntate architectural affectionados. Although home made, it pretty much covers the history of architecture, at least my contribution to it.
The absurd political circus is in full swing. I can't get very excited about it as I voted several weeks ago. My vote won't really be effective anyway as I've never had anyone I voted for ever win. One thing I like about the Libertarian Party is sometimes you can vote for ex-prostitutes. I figure their grasp on morals and econonimics to be better than the clowns that are on parade, wanting to be president and inherit a couple of terrible wars with nutty Islamic tribes who are intent on killing each other off.
Whould you want to be president? Jeez.

Publishing

My first book, "HILLSIDE HOMES" was such a success, I lost thousands of dollars. I will let you in on my secret. I’m not sure why I did my first book but I think some sage said " Everyone should build his own house, have children and write a book". I rue the day I heard that one. Anyway, knowing no one would want to publish this kind of book I decided to do it myself. My friend Katheryn helped Gary Snyder with his books on poetry, she convinced me to do one for myself. We put it together, I got all the photos & text in the right format, found a shop to do the color covers, one to print the rest, someone to glue it together, etc, etc. paid $8000 for all that, then sold a few once in a while. While each book cost me $8 each, I sold a few for $10. After a few years Amazon got onto it and started buying a bunch for $6 each wholesale. This way, I got rid of them and only lost $2 each. (Langworthy economics). Now I find they are available in the internet for $280!
Now for some obscure reason I have written another book, "EDUCATION OF AN ARCHITECT", pretty much my auto biography. Lots of good dirty stuff in it. Same scene; I just wanted to do a mock up of it so I took my manuscript, separated it into odd pages & even pages to get copies made, only to find that the copy shop wants it all together, so I had to put it all back to the original format. Now it’s all ready to print but I don’t know what to do with it. I’m designing a cover for it now. I want to put this behing me.
At the same time, I am pretty much finished with putting together a C-D of all my work; My Architecture, My drawings (40 years of unbuilt projects), My furniture, My modular work. I plan to sell this for $35 each, but since it’s on Windows format (Photo Show) it may be limited to Windows users, Macs I don’t know about. Hopefully there will be somewhere I can translate it for them.
Meanwhile, I just heard I was published in a book about "Mid Century Architects" and also mentioned in a book on "Organic Architects". I’ll keep you posted on those items.

Religion kills

I am really upset.
Someone had the brilliant idea to pick the current "7 wonders of the world" by using the internet and have nerds vote on them, just like American Idol, the current cultural beacon. All of the original wonders , picked around 500 BC, are long gone, except for the pyramid at Giza. Guess what happened! The idiot catholics of Brazil got to e-mailing (or be excommun icated?) everyone and told them to vote for "Christ the Redeemer" idol, a 130' tall reinforced concrete statue, built in 1930. Actually, leaving the catholics out of it , the other six choices were not too bad. The Collosseum, Tasj Mahal, Great wall, Petra, Machu Picchu and Chitzen Itza.
However, there is nothing later than 1632 (Taj) other than Jesus. This is telling us that the greatest undertaking by mankind in the last 400 years that is full of wonder is this stupid statue? Roebling's Brooklyn Bridge? Some great tunnel project? The Petronis towers? Eiffel Tower? The greatest Gothic church? Maybe it's like Mel Brook's 1,000 year old man says "Saran Wrap!". Yellow stickies? How about duct tape?
Regarding the leader of the entire world.
I have heard that Christians, Jews, Catholics but mostly Fundamentalist Xians litterly believe that the world was made by Mr. God pretty much about 6,000 BC. However, during the last few hundred years scientists have kind of established the earth to be around 4.5 billion years old, give or take a few million years. My really serious question
is this; Does King Bush II really believe this and that Noah got all the animals, bugs, cockroaches, mosquitos, and virus together in a small boat to float around for 40 days. He must realise that the water would have to be 29, 997.5 feet deep to cover all the mountains. Where did that amount of water come from? More important, where did it go? There are serious people still spending huge amounts of Euros still looking for an Ark. There seems to be a serious gap somewhere between billions of years and 8,000 years in these peoples belief systems.
However, I'm encouraged recently to see so many aethiests coming out of the closet, not so much that they don't believe in a supreme guy but that religion is responsible for so much of humanities misery.
I've just finished a book about the Knights Templar, and the 200 years war the Christians waged in the middle east. I've always wondered how all those thousands of knights were enticed to throw away their lives to go on a long trip (Years!) to capture Jerusalem from a group who had a little different take on old Jesus. It turns out to be a stroke of genius on the part of the popes (Pope Innocent III!!) . Just sign up for a crusade and all your sins will be forgiven. (We don't seem to have 70 virgins in heaven). Also you may keep all the booty and rape all the young Muslem girls you can get your hands on. (Where do I sign?). I don't know if anyone ever had the patience to add all the live's lost on all sides for the 200 years, but in just one small chapter, I counted about 300,000 souls sent to Hell of Heaven by the Crusaders. We're talking men, women and children here. Of course this was what the popes had sent them to do.
Funny how things don't change much, isn't it? A thousand years later we're back doing the same thing to the Muslims (and vice versa) except instead of Jerusalem, our goal is sacred Oil. Well, how else do you expect us drive our guzzler Humvees around to the grocery store?

Daphne, old friend

She wasn’t my dog. My wife always has a black Cocker spaniel and I inherited the problems of living with animals when I married her. She was really good about cleaning up after the dog (and cat) whenever they barfed or had an accident on the floor. Always cleaning up in the back yard. After all, Daphne wasn’t my responsibility. There was always the problem of how to get a house sitter to take care of her whenever we went on our month vacations to Europe. She was always underfoot, making sure to lick up any bits of food I would drop. She was very French in the way she would sit in the chair while we had our dinner, not saying anything, just kind of wishing she could be like us and eat all that good food. But, no, we always held out and fed her only in her little dish on the floor.
But all of a sudden she’s gone. Why am I all choked up and teary eyed? I never asked for her undying love and adoration. Her only ambition, other than breakfast, was to follow Joy around, up and down the stairs, her constant companion when she was close. Daphne never gave up trying to get me to show her some love or affection, but no, she wasn’t my dog, I didn’t need any of that.
But I miss her terribly. When I open the front door, her little white snout isn’t there anymore. When I’m in the kitchen, she’s not there to pick up little bits I drop . I kind of miss those big brown mournful eyes watching me, hoping I would show just a glimmer of appreciation of her.
Well, Daphne, I really appreciate all you’ve done for me, but kind of late, isn’t it?

UNCIVIL WAR

Does anyone know that we lost the war (Civil war) in Vietnam? Has anyone projected out a thought of how ‘Nam would be different today if we hadn’t gone in to meddle with the "Noble idea" of staving off the Communist tide? Aren’t they a fairly peacefull country with a Communist government? Maybe the only difference would be the thousands of our soldiers would not have died in vain, to say nothing of the thousands of Asians who died. Of course, we don’t count those, you have to pay some price for Freedom! Or did the huge oil reserves in the nearby Indian Ocean have anything to do with it? Nah. We wouldn’t do anything like that.
Does any of this ring a faint bell? The war (Civil War) in Iraq will soon last longer than the World Wars. Fortunately, we will probably lose no more than five to ten thousand young men & women (plus countless arms & legs) by the time we manage to extricate ourselves out of this mess. By the same reasoning as above, how many more Iraqis will be killed than if Saddam was to continue his cruel regime? Would it be about the same? 100 to 200 thousand souls? "Collateral damage", right?
Let me see if I can 2nd guess our clever, expert International advisers and see exactly how we will be able to leave Iraq. The timing will make no difference. My inadequate understanding of the major problem is the three basic tribes or religions that will have to agree to run the country. The Kurds up north have most of the oil. The rest of this miserable desert is shared by the Sunnis & the Shiites, two branches of the same religion, Islam. ( I’m a little confused by the Kurds faith). How King Bush II plans to get them to agree on anything is unclear to me except to get them all to accept a democratic government and forget they hate each other’s guts.
The only solution I can forsee is to appoint one of the three as a Dictator for life with the proviso that we have access to their oil forever. Also that we must keep our multi million dollar military bases that we built there. Let’s see, Saddam was a member of the Sunnis so maybe we could give the power to the Shiites this time (Or was it the other way?). The first thing they would do would be to kill each other until order was established.
My other and much better solution is to outlaw all religions (Yes, Christianity too!) And share in the oil profits.
But then, sometimes the most obvious solutions are invisible to us.

Brother Lamont

EUROPE 2007

Joy and I just returned from a month long trip to France & Spain. Under my expert tutelage Joy buys our cheap airline tickets when they are the lowest around fall, then we use our Miles to upgrade to Business Class and fly in and out of Paris. This gives us a few days at the beginning and end of our trip in Paris to hang out at Harry’s New York Bar (@ sank roo de noo) for a martini and other favorite sidewalk cafes (La Frigate). You probably didn’t know I am a member in good standing of the International Bar Flies (IBF) of Harry’s. At this point our dollar was worth about 75 cents.
Twas not all partying, however, as one of our noteworthy jaunts was to the Musee of Arts & Metiers where we watched Leon Foucault’s Pendulum and learned how he proved the earth rotated on it’s axis. The Orangerie was finally re-opened after a great renovation where Monet paintings are shown. It takes a whole room to show a couple of his 60' long renditions of water lily ponds.
Caught a TGV train to Bordeaux, whizzing through the French countryside in luxurious comfort on our rail pass. Stayed in our favorite Hotel Seze, complete with it’s neon sign outside our little balcon. It overlooks a large park , no grass but trees and decomposed granite only. Do you think the French are going to mow the grass?
Drove up to Cognac one day where we were shown around the Martell distillery, culminating in a tasting of a 100 year old special, and since it was nearly my 77th birthday, Joy bought me a taste of the good stuff. ($1000 per bottle!!). However, some vandals broke off all my rear view mirrors on our rental car one night so I had the opportunity to see how their Policia system works , needing a police report for the Hertz folks. Traded it in on another Renault and drove to St. Emillion and Pulliac to stock up on a case of wines for our bateau trip.
Drove to Castelnaudary to pick up our 27' boat , stocked up on food and shoved off for the week long trip down through 64 locks. Although this was our third boat trip, we had done it with another couple before, and handling the lines was a real challenge for us, as I had to drive it while Joy learned how to be the lone deck hand. We got pretty good at it until I fell into a lock, which wasn’t all that bad, except knowing that we’ve been pumping our shit into it with all the other boats, I tried to keep my mouth shut. The lock man retrieved me and we moored along the bank afterwards, for a good shower and some medicinal cognac. This particular section of the canal was one of the first ones built in the 1600's by the architect Pierre Riquet and had one series of seven locks hooked together in a stair-step mode (Fonserannes Steps). These are self drive barges (yachts) and are normally pretty relaxing just cruising the back country, meeting other pilgrims, complaining about the damn incredibly noisy motor bikes & motor cycles that are just ear splitting and the dogshit on all the sidewalks from those stupid little French dogs. As they say "There are always mosquitos in paradise". We had a problem with our domestic water tank that leaked into the bilges in just a few hours but we managed to keep enough to be clean.
Turned the boat in pretty much undamaged (These cost about $50,000 each), drove up the the Milleu Viaduct (me you bridge) that was recently finished for about $700,000 and in three years. It spans a valley with several tall pylons (Some as tall as the Eiffel tower, 1000'). It was pretty stormy, winds up to 40 knots and wondered if the bridge would be closed, but no, the English architect, Foster & Partners, had a very clever baffle system for just such occasion. We also drove under it to the little town and found a very cool Information center next to one of the piers.
Caught a train to Barcelona, with the border guards trying to outdo each other on being obnoxious. The Spanish train system has been upgraded since our last trip here when they had to change the trucks (wheels) at the border due to the difference in width of the French and Spanish tracks. Our hotel was on the main drag, the Passeig de Gracia, only a couple of blocks from two of Antonio Gaudi’s buildins,Casa Batllo and the Pedrara. We met up with our friends, the Dodson’s for the week, slurping up the great Sangria at Qu QU’s sidewalk café and searching for a tapas that was edible. Spent time in the Sagrada Familia, the great unfinished church of Gaudi’s, where workers are still trying to get a handle on how and when to finish it. The Catholic Church will probably be extinct before this building will be finished as what, it’s about 2/3rd finished after 125 years? The creativity of this architect is pretty humbling, as even his structural concepts are just as incredibly unique. Had to visit the Mies van der Rohe pavilion again, originally built in 1929 (Before I was born!) And recently reconstructed. This building looks more modern today than 95% of all new structures!
Flew back to Paris on EasyJet which is a lot faster and cheaper than a train nowadays, and guess what? Nobody has to take their shoes off at the European airports! A last visit to Harry’s , a little shopping at Printemps Department store with it’s fantastic stained glass dome, plus a day trip to Eperny to tour the Champagne works of Castlelane. Their caves were begun in 1818, hugely encrusted with dripping mold (Yes! All mold is not bad!). It was a great tour, with only us and five Australian guys. Ended with a full glass of their product. Unfortunately, Joy has begun collecting champagne ice buckets, of which they had one she couldn’t resist. Why couldn’t she collect stamps?
As you can imagine, this was all a great deal of work, and we were glad to return home to rest, working full time in our office.

...BUT FEAR ITSELF

I have been observing the reactions of our leaders since the terrible events of 9/11. I also am somewhat perturbed that we have been swept up in a wave of fear that it appears that we are doing exactly what these intelligent monsters had planned as a result of their hideous acts. One only has to watch the fast demise of our airlines due to the restrictions we have burdened them with as a result of our panic to wonder will we eventually accept the fact that these kinds of things can and will happen more and more. No amount of banning knives from airport restaurants, taking away my nail clippers or taking my shoes & belt off will put an end to it. Time only will tell if what the outcome of the war with Afghanistan that the military State of Russia called "Their Vietnam"and our invasion of Saddam’s Iraq will damage our world respect. I believe most our frustration is due to the fact that this "New Kind of War" is against individual groups and not countries. Surely our leaders have been studying this type of warfare for decades and have an intelligent response to it. (Don’t they?). After all, they must have been reading the books and watching the movies long enough to know that such actions are possible and are here and now. Although some of the terrorists are home grown (McVie), too many are religious fanatics who are willing to die for those infinite number of virgins in heaven. How is banning bags and coolers going to affect that Great American Church, The Ball Game? Will we be required to allow a complete body search when we attend our churches? Let’s be careful, yes, but let’s lighten up and alleviate our fears. After all, we are not immortal and are all destined to die, some sooner than others. Meanwhile, let’s not fall into the terrorists’ hand and make it so difficult to do business that we destroy our economy.
Patriot Act!
Freedom Tower!
Homeland Security!
"Yee Haahh!" (Slim Pickens in Dr. Strangelove.

FACIAL HAIR

I first grew my beard around 1960 and although it's difficult to believe now I had a pretty strange time of it in the business world I was just entering as a young architect. Once in awhile I was able to understand how a black person felt being in a hostile environment because I was not clean shaven like all the rest of the fellows,( except for a mustache or two).
It's a funny concept, having a beard. Most people seem to think you are hiding but in reality I believe guys who shave are hiding behind a face that is supposed to represent eternal youth. In other words, if you have no beard you are still a youngster, but you really have to work at it, shaving once or twice a day. Of course, since the advent of the safety razor and especially the electric razor, it doesn’t take very much time anymore.
It's interesting to study the cycles of beards in, beards out. At certain times men almost have to have a beard to conform with everyone else. Remember the giants of industry, past presidents and everyone who was a mover and shaker had a beard or at least a giant mustachio in the eighteenth and nineteenth century. But can you imagine a presidential candidate today with a full beard? Can you imagine one with even a mustache? Ha!
However, there is a strange manifestation occurring that I have noticed regarding the facial adornment of policemen and firemen. I don't know what the reason but just take a look at the next officer or fireman you see and notice that more than likely he has a robust upper lip cover(this, of course only applies to males).
However, if you are a member of our esteemed armed forces, just try a little facial adornment and you'll end up doing extra KP. I've been there. I see other nations sailors and fighting men sporting some good hair and it seems such a natural thing. It's a sad commentary on our times, but nothing so sad as finding out that chain stores such as safeway have a POLICY that no male employee may indulge in a beard. Now this really got to me and I was considering organizing a boycott of them by all of us who sport facial hair. However, if you belong to the Cuban National Guard it may be best to grow the longest, scraggiest beard you can if you are looking for a promotion. It's a funny world.
One area in the US that seems to accept beards are the academic institutions of higher learning. A distinguished professor is not distinguished unless he has a good beard. As a matter a fact, I've been accused of being a professor lots of times, especially when I wear my tweed coat, baggy corduroy trousers and act like I own a Volvo.
Another bastion of the baby cheeks has been the sports heroes of our time. However, there is a crack in the wall as I’ve recently seen small increments of facial hair creeping in among the filthy rich players. Since all of our youth emulate these players, it may be the single benefit of our sports syndrome. Maybe next they can get rid of those stupid baggy pants the NBA wears. Who designs those dumb outfits, teenagers?

ANYTHING WITH A BALL

I’ve been reading about the controversy of pre-game prayers at high school football games. Hey, why not? The great ball triad; Football, Baseball & Basketball have become America’s new religion. How many new three hundred million dollar churches are being built in every major city in the US? Take a look at these monster covered stadiums with their own shopping malls and their vast acres of parking. Instead enticed spending Sunday at your local church or synagogue, most seekers of truth are now spending their time at the ball-park. When I hear how much these fans (that’s short for "fanatic") pay for the privilege to participate in an exercise in mass hysteria for a few hours, I am absolutely flabbergasted. $50?, $100? Wow! And be sure to take the kids to initiate them into the mysteries of shouting obscenities at the umpires or referees.
I actually heard the religious music "Hallelujah" played as a prelude to a basketball game recently. And isn’t "God Bless America" de rigeur before any game starts?
The clincher came during the Super Bow game where a Christian church enticed their wayward flock with a huge 12' TV (High Def?) Screen in order to get them into the church somehow.
Praise the Lord, and Play Ball!

SADDAM

He sould have been hung if for no other reason than for the awful ties he used to wear.

MY MONEY PROBLEMS

One of the side effects of the failed war on drugs is the disappearance of the five hundred and one thousand dollar bills. If you’re under forty, you probably don’t know that such a thing even existed not long ago. Or, if so, wonder why we don’t have them in circulation any more? Whenever I have to transfer a grand from one bank to another, I end up with a fistful of dollars, 20's and 100's if I’m lucky. There doesn’t seem to be any 50's around either. I suppose the Feds believe that if you have to carry around several million dollars , at some point it will just get too burdensome and you will give up, stop selling drugs and get a real job.
In the 60's I was building a house in West Covina for the guy who invented the Go-Cart. He was kind of grumpy, carried a gun in a holster under his hawaiian shirts he always wore. He insisted on paying me in cash whenever I billed for our work every month. We would go over to his bank and he would withdraw nine or ten one thousand dollar bills and hand them to me. I had mixed feelings about carrying around all that cash in the Los Angeles area.
I say bring back the large bills and let the Feds find other ways to fight their pathetic little war, like maybe with an educational program or just let us have a little fun once in a while..
When you see a price listed as $79.99 is it possible you don’t know it is one penny short of $80? This practice is so ingrained in us now that every aspect of business world practices it, at least in the USA. Selling a car? $23, 995. 95. Selling a house? $897,995.99. How often do you see something advertised for $50,000? $600,000? Are we really that stupid? Don’t answer that.
The one business that has taken this to an extreme is the gas station folks. I can’t remember when this started but they were not satisfied with merely $1.99 per gallon, where they could increase the price to $2/gal in one cent increments. Oh, no! They had to break the penny down to it’s lowest denominator, the MILL! Now, a mill is one tenth of a cent. This type of marketing is the kind that drives me crazy! Think about how that differs from just the penny price. Since all prices are set in mills, the increase is still only by the penny. Do you ever see a mark-up from $2.09.to $2.10.4? No, it is always only the penny. See the logic, here? I don’t. Actually, there is no waste of man hours as the 9 mills always stays the same on the signs.
In theory, you are saving one mill for every gallon you purchase. When you fill up with 20 gallons, you have saved 20 mills, or two cents! Wow! How about rounding up to the penny (add one mill!) and do away with all this bogus pricing.
If you youngsters don’t believe any of this, I can show you an actual mill coin. Come to think of it, it may be worth a lot of money due to it’s rarity.
Speaking of pennys, why do we even use the damn things? Seventy years ago there was a lot you could buy with a penny. But these days, I won’t even bother to pick one up off the street, it’s just not worth the effort. I don’t know what it’s made of but I know it costs more than a penny to make, costs more than a penny for businesses to handle it. Get rid of it!
DESIGN OF OUR MONEY
Whenever I return from Europe and begin using our miserable currency and coins again I am appalled at the lack of design we have allowed to happen. We are so inferior to the rest of the world when it comes to our money. Before the Euro(e) was introduced a few years ago, the best money designs without a doubt were the Dutch Guilders. The golden brilliance of their 50 Guilder note was an incredible work of art., with golden color to it’s graphics. Fortunately, the Union hired the Dutch to design the new e, almost as good as their old stuff. Handling such money is almost a joy to pay someone with it.
The French also had a beautiful currency, mostly featuring poets and artists in many colors. The Romanians have a micro chip imbedded in their currencies. Maybe they can keep track of the drug smugglers that way.
The new e is a design tour de force, each bill a different color as well as a slightly different size. Wonderful abstract computer generated designs. The coins are the same in their own way, simple abstract designs of different sizes, some made of two types of metal. We must be a laughing stock of the world when we undertake a "new" design of a bill. It must cost a bloody fortune for the Feds to take out full page adds in newspapers throughout the US letting us all know that the new $20 bill is so superb and is not a bad counterfeit so it’s OK to use. Or how about our new quarters. Everyone gets into the act and you end up with 52 types of ugly coins. I won’t even embarrass you by mentioning the Susan B. Anthony quarter. And ehere in hell is the fifty cent piece?
Let’s give the Dutch a contract to redesign all our money so we can catch up with the rest of the world..

THE IMMORTALITY OF MAN

Each year more laws are passed to protect us from injury or death.
We must build our domiciles with stair treads and risers just so, the handrail at a certain height, spiral stairs have to be large enough to make them impractical.
We are being overprotected by our government because we somehow have become to believe that we can't get hurt, that we won't die, and if any of those should happen, why we just hire a lawyer to sue whomever we think was responsible for our hurt.
Now I'm thinking these thoughts while I'm traversing a 12" wide wilderness trail cut into a steep shale slope that falls off about 1,000 feet, no handholds or any such thing to arrest my descent into oblivion. Across the valley I see the rock climbers creeping up huge awesome vertical faces like tiny spiders with very little to keep them from being smashed onto the rocks far below but their skill and daring. I see the hot dog skiers and racers ply their particular kind of skill racing downhill and risk being maimed or killed during the winter season. I see auto racing where one false move or freak mechanical thing will cause a man's car to slide, smash, roll and as if that wasn't enough, break into a high octane ball of fire.
Is there some strange dichotomy operating here? Is there some mechanism in man's psyche that has to go out on the limb, take those chances, and not be confined to the dull world of "safe"?
I believe that the more we mandate that the world be "safe" we must go out and do things that will challenge that dullness, because we are more aware, are living a fuller life, have temporarily escaped from the clutches of dullness.
If I want to build a stair (for a private home) why can't I design it without an outer rail? If I want to buy a "Samba Stair" for an industrial storage mezzanine why can't I use it? It may be safer but unorthodox.
The list goes on and on but the main question here is who presses for these changes, who spends the vast sums of money to get these various things approved and adopted by our code agencies?
As soon as some child gets his head stuck in a baluster or man-
ages to slip all the way through and get hurt then from then on all balusters will be a certain dimension or you can be sued by the lawyer lurking around the stair.

Mobocracy

MOBOCRACY
Well, here it is election time once again. I’m not sending a letter about it to the Press Democrat this year as they never have printed my letters, anyway.
We Californians are being asked our expert opinion on how to spend 60 billion dollars on several bond issues! What in hell are our legislators doing in Sac? Diddling the pages? Has anyone thought of firing them all and how many billions would that save us a year? Hell, we’re doing all the work.
Virtually unknown to the American masses, there are actually more than two political parties in the United States. As much as we would like to think that our newspapers' sole purpose is to inform us we certainly become political idiots if we are to rely soley on them when it comes election time.
The American voter, (unlike his European counterpart, who demands several viable parties from which to choose) if he can even be motivated to vote at all, seems to be satisfied being spoon fed on Republican/Democrat pablum. Ignoring the main issues that face us: like the tremendous debt of trillions of dollars, some kind of Foreign Policy, being the world’s policeman, the out-of-control drug problems, our massive prison population, welfare abuse, etc., etc., we must know if our candidate is morally fit to represent us and what his abortion preferences are as a good Christian. Yeah, that does a lot of good. Look what happens in the oval office!
This puritanical program neatly sidesteps any real issues before us, so we can sit back in comfort knowing we have elected a Christian saint to lead us (Onward Christian Soldiers!). Then they can pass more laws to modify any behavior patterns they don't like, such as helping us stop smoking, telling us we are too fat or use of our property for "Politically Correct" uses only.
Voters! It may damage your brain a bit but find out what other choices you have. It will actually take a little work on your part to find a candidate that has the same ideas you have on freedom or not so free, from Socialist to Birchers to Libertarians. But stop whining that you don't have a choice. The choice is there, if you'll only make some kind of mental effort.
It wasn’t too long ago that political parties had what was called "a platform". This spelled put the various ideals each party stood for. All you had to do was find the one that fit most of your ideals and vote for the person who represented yours. Now it’s merely a popularity contest to see which Hollywood actor is going to be the most presentable.
As for me, I’ve been happy with the Libertarian platform, although I must admit that I have never ever voted for anyone who had won in all these 20 years or so. All I’m really doing is making a statement that these are my ideals, and I won’t compromise by supporting "The Lessor of only Two Evils". Anyway, ask yourself, who in hell would want to be the next president who would be facing the god awful catastrophe in Iraq?

I STILL HATE THIS

LAUGHING GAS
In the early days of smoking grass, the only available stuff came from the lower reaches of Mexico. Long before our local hippies (& Beatniks) knew you could grow your own, we few hard core (artists, jazz musicians & a few scattered derelict) had to find sources from Michuacan. At that time there were various strains of pot but it was basically what is called "shake", just the leaves, stems & seeds. These days all you can buy is just the bud of the plant, no leaves at all. Well, the gist of my problem is that the old stuff transformed one into a totally hilarious state, rendering everything extremely funny. (& I mean extreme!). My problem is that nowadays all one can get is these powerful BUDS that makes you a total zombie & that may be f ine for some folks, but I would rather retain some sort of ambulatory control. It can be so much fun! Well, forget it, I’m getting too old for this stuff, anyway.
BUMPER STICKERS are such a pathetic method of expressing your views. Do people really think they are changing the world when their only type of voting is sticking clever slogans on the back of their car, so I have to get an insight ot their miseraqble concept of life? Most of these poor, misguided creatures believe the old adage that there can be "Peace on earth & goodwill toward all men". Wouldn't that be just wonderful, except for a couple of reasons; since the recorded history of mankind, say, from 8000 BC, we have been killing, raping, maiming our fellow man for a few reasons, like religion, land or because I wanted you to become my slave. But let's be real. Nowdays it's mostly religion that is responsible for all the mayhem. And not just one religion against another, but the same one (Christianity,(Cathlics vs. Protestant) Islam,(Shiite vs. Sunni) Biddhist’s fighting each other due to some abscure concept of the other's dogma.
Let's try an experiment. Everyone just forget about their religion for a while. Would there be much to kill your neighbor about? Well, sure, his wife, his land, his Porche.
Would the British be able to let the Irish govern their own country? Would Pol Pot have killed off so many millions if their ethnicitiy was not connected to a different religion?
MAGAZINE INSERTS - the very first thing I do when I receive a magazine is go thru it and tear out all the damn HEAVY PAPER INSERTS ADVERTIZING SOME Fabulous deal that I don't give a damn about. Does anyone really send any of these things in? If so, they are contributing to my misery by supporting this insidious form af advertising.
NEWSPAPER HIDE 7 SEEK - My mornings are pretty routine but very special as I dress, complete my toilet (A pretty quick routine) get the cappucino going, pick up the paper in the drivway, when I hit the wall as I struggle to separate the real meat of the paper from the shit I am not interested in. Here's where I meet my nemisis every bloody morning of my life, the cretin who's sole job is to comlicate my life, the miserable person who figures out how to stack the sections of the paper so that I have to handle the adds, separating the wheat from the chaff, sorting this from that. They must stay up nights figuring new ways to frustrate us readers. The worst part of all is the partial overlay of the FUNNIES! Then every once in awhile he/she/it will install a piece on the funnies (I find them funny especial if they're political) that I have to actually try to tear it off but it never quite tears evenly and I lose the punch line of Doonesbury that I ripped off unevenly.
THE LOTTERY - The anti-gambeling Christians (Anti Fun) have been able to keep that horror of morality away from us unknowing souls for so long until the American Indian got his revenge and sidestepped deftly any laws that prohibited having fun. First of all, let me say that I don’t gamble. But, if I was running a lottery, I would only give away minimum amounts of say, 2 million. That would mean you would end up with less than one mil after Uncle Sam got his cut, but hey, that could enhance my life. But in reality, lotteries are run by giving away millions in $5, $10, increments to sucker in all the poor souls, giving them the illusion that they have won something due to the fact that all gamblers automatically forget all the money they've lost beforehand. So the concept is that the dough is saved up until there is 20 or 30 MILLION that someone will win. It makes the bookkeeping easier for Uncle Sam who will reap more that half of that, but it usually demolishes the poor winner who trades in his broom or dishwasher job for being an instant millionaire. Doesn't anyone get it that when the pot gets that high that everyone else buys tickets so that the odds (This is gambling, right?)go up and your chance of winning are even less than when it's a low pot? Probably not. I don't participate in games of chance except trying to make a good living as an architect, which is chancy enough
FOOD & WINE PAIRING;
We've alll been brainwashed all our lives about how you must drink white wine with fish & red with steak. Now I see that the experts are telling me what kind of beer to eat with fish or meat. Give me a break! What's next? Pairing all 20 flavors of vodka with your favorite dish? I find white wine rather insipid unless it's 100 degrees in the shade, and if it's that hot, I'll make sangria. In fact, I relish those days as it forces me to whip up a batch of some real stuff that has rum, Triple Sec as well as the usual suspects of wine & OJ in it. I got this direct from a sidewalk cafe in Barcelona, where Columbus returned from his gutsy journey over the edge of the earth.
But I digress.
Actually, it's about time someone put something in vodka, as up till recently, it was pure ethanol, you could probably burn it in your Formula One race car. I've always wondered how in hell they were able to do vodka tastings, differentiating one ethanol from another & getting blotto in the meantime. Now if they put a flavoring in it at least the graphics on the bottle is improved. But I feel good when I can get a bottle of potato juice from Trader Joe's that has a Russian label on it and has not been manipulated. It still tastes like nothing but has the advantage that my wife can't smell it on my breath.

THINGS I HATE

Now maybe you might think me some kind of professional grump or curmudgeon but as I go through life I am absolutely incensed by certain behaviors and objects that seem utterly useless to me. Let me give you a few examples.
Probably first on my list are one-sided towels. Now look, if your going to expend all that effort to make a towel, why not make both sides with a nice thick nap? But no, they have to make one side absolutely useless by making it almost smooth and non-absorbent. I won't go into who's responsible for these design abominations at this time as I must go on with my list.
How about people who immediately freeze as soon as they step on a moving walkway or escalator? Why do they do that? These machines were designed to assist us , not incapacitate us! To add insult to injury, how many people have to block the left side of the walkway all the while listening to a recording telling them to keep to the right so I can pass. But no, I've got to yell "track" to get their attention and then they act insulted because I want to move by them on the left
When was the last time you were in a bar where you could actually hear another person carry on a conversation as well as order a drink without being blasted out of your hearing because the stereo and/or TV was turned up to full bore? There was a time when conversation was kind of important, but now, it's pretty hard to discuss the nuances of existentialism in a loud holler.
While we're still in the bar let's talk about the universal problem of setting your drink on a napkin. I really hate this! Now you think this might be a small item but you can't get away from it. Whatever happened to the fine sound of the glass being set down on the mahogany bar top? But no, you've got to keep your napkin under your glass. Just try to sneak the napkin out from under the glass, the bloody bartender puts another right under your glass! Come on, let's get normal again!
How about those idiots that have those big white letters on their tires? They really think they are cool while it's pretty obvious they are imbeciles. But then, it’s no worse than the big black "Bra" some wear on the front of their cars as if they are driving a Lamborghini on a gravel road instead of running over to the local Safeway.
Check out the taxicabs, buses and streetcars in Europe to see how much advertising is hung all over the exterior of them. Virtually none! Some tasty stuff inside works fine, but no! We have to plaster all our modes of transportation with all kinds of crap on the sides, back, front ,tops (of cabs) and all this in the name of financial viability. Let's face it, you're going to lose money on these systems no matter what, so why make it ugly? Europeans go one step further, they will make the entire tram (several cars long) into a well designed graphic of one advertiser.
And you wouldn't believe how many people (designers included) seem to think you need a window in front of the kitchen sink. Come on! The best kitchen I ever had was buried in a dark stone walled house. If it has enough character you don't "need" the window at the sink.
Then there’s always the person that still has to tell you to "have a nice day". Jeez, leave me alone. I'm doing the best I can and no idiotic phrase from a stranger is going to change that.
Then there's always a clod who wears his hat while dining in a restaurant. I can understand if it's a cowboy hat (They don't know any better), but baseball caps? No shirt, shoes no service. Hat on, no service!
Next we'll have to get into Lite beers and saccharin.
Have an awful day!
Lamont Langworthy, Curmudgeon First Class