Paranoia

Okay, now this is too weird. I've been at this over a week and the owner of this blog hasn't discovered me yet? Uh-uh. Something's up. Unless he's sick, on vacation, or dead, he has to have noticed my incursions. He knows, I know he knows. He's just waiting for something. There must be a trap set for me. Maybe he's tracking me down to take over my whole computer. Maybe he's planted a retro-virus that will sloowwly turn it into a paper weight. Maybe he's waiting for me to give something away that will let him attack.

Why can't I just enjoy my victory? Why can't I believe I'm so smart he'll never find me? Wait, don't answer that last one. Oh, he's fiendish. He's leading me on to madness. He's unbalancing me by staying his hand, waiting for me to crack. He's out there somewhere cackling at my fear, hiding around some corner, watching my every move.

I can't live like this. I can't write. I can't produce anything worth publishing. Excuse me today, people. I've got to go take a handful of Valium, pull my blinds, and put on my foil cap. I'll be back. He can't keep me down like this! He won't win! What a vicious, evil deed. How could he be so.....

Puye

There is a cliff in New Mexico that stands as an icon in my life. That part of the state is all ups and downs. Cliffs rise to mesa tops, like pushed-up stacks of sand in a child's sandbox. Flat land falls abruptly into arroyos and washes. The vegetation is tough, surviving extremes in weather that match the extreme landscape. For someone used to fields, streams edged in trees, green vistas, it would be unappealing. But there is beauty. And there are people who fit into that landscape. Tough, beautiful people.

This cliff, at the time I first visited it, was on Native American land. You paid your fee and got permission to drive to the top. There were ruins there to explore. Ruins are as much a part of the landscape in New Mexico as the cliffs and arroyos. These had not been rebuilt, then, and were pretty much mere suggestions of a town situated in the past, atop the mesa. We all walked around the site, marveling at the way the walls and doorways transported you in time. You could feel the ancient community bustling around you, smell the woodsmoke, hear the children. While the others stayed there chatting, threatening to pull out the picnic foods, I wandered to the edge of the cliff.

To take this trip with me you must know that I am not a close friend of heights. By "heights" I do not mean only carnival rides and mountain sides. "Too high" can just as easily be a step stool under a light fixture that needs a bulb replaced. So why was I drawn to that edge? At first I saw only the beautiful, enormous stretch of the land around the cliff. On a clear day you can see forever. Then, inevitably, my eye insisted on checking the foot of the mesa. Bad decision. I reeled back, and for the umpteenth time in my life repeated the mantra, "Just don't look down."

They call this a "fear" of heights. I disagree. Fear has locked my muscles into unresponsive iron on top of a roof. It has caused me to resemble that splayed, claw-anchored cat, fur bristling emotion in all directions. Fear follows the real reason for the problem, I believe. The basic reaction, the one that sets off the fear, is intense attraction---a near hypnotic tug to step out there into nothing and join the eagles and hawks. That would hardly seem to be the cause when replacing a light bulb requires hand-holds all the way up the two feet of altitude. But self-preservation remembers the last time it had to deal with you above the earth, and uses its preventive weapon early, before the glamor becomes too strong to counteract.

Scooting inelegantly forward on my backside, leaning sideways so most of me was in contact with hard, real dirt, I saw an older town descending the cliff side. The remains of steps beckoned, small balconies---all that was left of rooms now open to the sun---lured. As in the village above, the ghosts of long-gone inhabitants offered a glimpse into a different, older life. Even with my handicap, I could not resist. I'm sure the ancient ones never traversed the cliff-face with the lack of grace and lizard-grip of my descent, but I'm equally sure they were there urging me onward. I never felt I was violating their privacy. I felt invited. No live person could have coaxed me to explore their home, hanging like that lizard from hand-holds conveniently offered in the stone, placing my feet on perfectly space steps, walking just-wide-enough paths.

It was undoubtedly fool-hardy. It was exhilarating. I sat for a long time in a crumbled doorway, soaking in some contentment I have no name for. I felt part of me belonged there. I was home. I longed to stay forever.

In the end, the ancestors let me go. And I faced the thought that I must climb back to the top without the spell that helped me down. Remembering that roof paralysis, I reflected on the idiocy of my adventure. Friends above did not know I'd come here, and it was doubtful they would hear me call to them. It was up to me to get myself out, and surprisingly, I did. The climb was not terrifying, no more difficult than the descent. Only that moment of decision and indecision was frightening. Once more, aided by my hosts, I followed in their steps to the top.

My friends had not even noticed my long absence, aside from assuming I was off alone, looking around---they knew me very well. I led them over to see my discovery, as we all munched sandwiches and laughed. They apparently were not invited as I'd been, because their only response was a mild interest, and a clinical discussion of cliff-dwelling. Just as well, I didn't really want to share my cliff.

I had been transported. I can see every inch in my mind's-eye, to this day. I don't want to go back. It would never be the same, with the commercialization and rebuilding I'm sure has occurred. But I do go back, whenever I desire. I crossed a boundary that day. It didn't miraculously cure me of vertigo. But what I took away from that experience cured some unrecognized illness, made me more complete---and gave me a home to carry with me through all the years between.

R Draconis

Today is a tribute of sorts. If you're not into memorials come back tomorrow, and maybe I'll be entertaining like I promised to be yesterday.

Two acquaintances of mine are grieving the loss of their iguana. It might seem a stretch to most of us to imagine feeling anything but a possible revulsion for a cold-blooded animal. My taste in pets is obvious in previous entries: I want a warm, huggable friend. Hugging a scaly animal that wields a whip-lash tail just won't do. That cold blood implies a remoteness; and our standard view of reptiles certainly does not place them high enough on the intelligence scale to win us over with their personalities. At least, that's where I would have stood, before encountering this iguana.

But we warm-blooded creatures do not have a monopoly on personality and intelligence. If you allow, as I do, that a sense of humor is a definite indicator of intelligence, then we need to include this lady-lizard in the highest animal echelons, with personality in abundance. I realize I'm endangering my freedom from a straight-jacket by making these claims. All I saw, at first introduction, was a fascinating new thing to observe and learn about. But time taught me more than I expected. She could hold her own with dogs and horses, and could out-disdain any cat.

This couple acquired the female iguana as a rescued discard. They had no idea at the time if it was male or female, and had a lot of work to do to restore its health. Both were also totally unprepared to meet the needs of their new acquisition, and did prodigious amounts of research attempting to correct their ignorance. They succeeded. She flourished. Her health, comfort, and enjoyment became, perforce, one of the central themes of their lives. Believe it or not, iguanas require very exacting care, environment, diets and interaction. She's gone now only because of some epidemic syndrome that is being observed throughout the community of caretakers, and has, despite frantic studying and testing, not yet been identified as to cause or cure.

But the care and raising of iguanas is not my focus. The love of an alien is. She teased her people, like any other pet. She chose toys, demonstrated likes and dislikes, a need for physical contact, a curiosity about other animals, an appreciation of beauty. I swear, she actually built structures from the odds and ends in her home-cage, for no more obvious reason than that she liked to do it. Watching her over the years, I never lost my sense of her as "other." To successfully understand that dog of mine, I have to think like a pack animal. To understand a reptile bent my mind around corners that I simply could not take at times. But her owners went where I couldn't. She valued them, that was obvious. Whether you could call it love is something better minds will have to judge. But for sure, they loved her. No one goes to the lengths they did without feeling an emotional need. And their sorrow now is the best proof of that love.

I feel for their loss because I lost, too. She didn't just tolerate me, she liked me. And I her. You know, if we all took the time to put aside our arrogance as the acme of creation, actually took a long look and attempted to understand what we see in the zoo, we might discover we have a lot of potential friends and companions roaming this earth. Just because an animal can't be hugged, subdued, or put to work, doesn't negate its value to us. Maybe Donne's words about any death diminishing us could be applied to more than man. And--maybe--if we took that view, we'd be less inclined to indifferent destruction of the rest of creation.

Caveat

Should you believe what you read? More to the point, should you believe what I write? Seems like an easy answer. You're on the internet folks. If I can write something out here, so can others. Anybody, about anything, with any motive. I'm not going to complain. I've been cheering since the idea of WWW got through my scattered brain cells. No way for me to tell if what I read is true---unless I do my homework, use some common (or uncommon) sense, and make decisions based on those results. I like the idea of making up my own mind, based on what I can glean from multiple sources. And, Most Appealing, those sources are endless, now.

No longer must I depend on one local or national news anchor to tell me what the speech-maker meant by what he said. I can read an article at full length instead of getting sound bites. I can decide from peripheral articles whether their bias matches or challenges mine. I'm free!

But the major thing I want you to know, for your good and mine, is that I am a writer. I'm not a journalist. You may get an opinion. Or you could get a fact. Or, more likely, you will get whatever story is plaguing me to be born.

Occasionally, I will climb my soapbox to rant about something that I find stupid or unjust. Even at those times all you'll get is an op-ed. Don't ever swallow anything I say, whole. If I'm any good at writing at all, you will have trouble deciding whether something really happened, whether I invented it, whether I embellished it.... Don't agonize over it. Relax, enjoy the scenery while I take you for a ride. And if anything, ever, starts you thinking and wondering---I'm not just free, I'm elated.

That said, never doubt anything I tell you. You could end up with a bird messing up the paint on your vehicle, day after day after day. Those internet curses really work, you know, and the good-luck-wishes, and dialing your pin number backward.........

Okay, no more lecture. Tomorrow I entertain again.

Night Howls

Hi, time for one of those stories. We have two classic formulas to get out of the way. You all know them? "T'was a dark and stormy night," and "Once upon a time long ago,in a land far away." After those are dealt with, we can go on to freeform.

Once upon a time long ago, in a far-away land---well, it was a month or so ago, and sounded like it came from the next county---coyotes were barking down by the river. Bright nights, like this one, are when they have their fun. If you've never heard coyotes at night, try to correct that lapse. It's a lonely, slightly threatening sound I suppose, to the uninitiated. But after hearing it for years, it sort of soothes and promises.

Clouds added variety to the moonlight, and I was sitting on the stairs to my deck, just enjoying the sharpness of the cold air. The yelping provided background for my wandering thoughts. My neighbors were quietly watching TV, or reading to their kids. I guess. At least they weren't yelping at each other loudly enough for me to hear. I felt slightly wistful. Nights like this make me wish I had somewhere I had to be going, like those lucky coyotes.

Soon I would. I'd get up, return to the house, and turn in for the night. Hardly the busy, frisky night the coyotes had planned. I heard a small owl a couple of doors down asking his eternal question, so I quietly, politely told him my name. A breeze started up, skittering a few leaves down the sidewalk beside the house.

Peaceful, quiet, reflective---and then a klaxon. Soon sirens screamed from both directions of the highway. They didn't all converge at once, like in the movies. They sort of trickled in. But each one conveyed more of the rush of a firehose, than the leaking of a faucet. Next a copter flew over, barely in sight, his lights easily trumping the moonlight. Obviously, they were all headed just west of me, and I didn't think there was a law enforcement convention scheduled. Have I mentioned the prison, just outside of town? Have now. Red and blue lights flickered through town at intervals. That beam from the copter appeared and disappeared, and was joined eventually by a second one, their thumping dopplering in and out in counterpoint to the sirens.

Discretion being the better part of valor, and me being much more discreet than valorous, I retreated to my livingroom and waited through the clamor to see if the newshour held any answers. There weren't many that evening, but the next day was full of information on the riot, the fires set, the night of vigilance following an evening of destruction.

The coming and going, the chopping of the air, lasted for a long time. But it was quieter each hour, and the sirens and light shows withdrew behind a hill to the west, or were shut down. The coyotes, much subdued, their plans ruined, took their business in the opposite direction, I'd guess---outclassed and they knew it.

All my desire to have somewhere to go, to soak up the night, vanished. I listened to the strange night noises for a while, and, like the coyotes gave up. I could have shivered in my bed, hiding under the covers all night, I suppose. After all, there were no details available then. Desperate, escaped prisoners might have kicked down my door But that didn't occur to me until the next day. And then, only when a television reporter asked the area resident in front of her if they'd been frightened. It occurred to me as a ridiculous thought: Really. If you escaped, would you hole up in the town next to the prison, or disappear over the prairie, like the coyotes?

Tomorrow. I'll be here.

Dusty

I sneaked a look behind the scene. This blog owner's stats show someone out there is reading. And since he seems to have lost interest since creating a niche for me, it must be me y'all're looking at. To all my faceless following, welcome! So glad to discover you. See, told you it's lonely in the outback: I am ecstatic over visits from peeping-toms.

Yesterday, I also had a visit from my friend Dusty. He's quite the character, always cheers up my day. Gives me things to re-chuckle at for more days, too. Like his recent decision to switch from a big, gas-guzzling SUV to a bike. That's another story.

I was at the computer. I don't really need to ever begin a tale with that one again. You can just take it as fact that, whatever happens in my life, it was begun by making me leave the computer.

Anyway, Dusty was announced by Declan Dog with great gusto. Dog lovers get reciprocal love from dogs. He didn't knock---with my alarm dog going off, no need. I found him just standing on the deck, hat in hand. Dusty is tall enough he sort of ducks into the house. I suspect he has problems with claustrophobia during his visits. He always seems to be keeping an eye peeled for dangling things, like lights, and dreading the inevitability of the ceiling attacking him. Shows you what a generous guy he is, to continue to come around an uncomfortable place.

Whatever image the name, Dusty, conjured up for you---unless it was a certain cartoon character living in a cloud of same---is probably close to the reality. If you were to take him back a little over a century and plant him on a boardwalk in a town full of false-front businesses, he'd look very much at home. In fact, I can picture him tucking his head in the same way my house encourages, in an old ramshackle bunkhouse out on the prairie, pouring a cup of coffee from the enamelware pot steaming on the wood stove.

Dusty was just here to chat. Nothing earthshaking occurred. Well, maybe Declan's viewpoint might be slightly different. That dog is convinced I have no friends, just lets me share in the company of those who come to visit him. And whenever he has visitors, the earth does shake, or at least the house seems to. He went all out to entertain Dusty, prancing, threatening to fight over a bone, planting his forepaws on Dusty's chest to impart some great emotion directly into his face. Their interchange exclude me. But, as always, he eventually wore himself down to a nap and the two humans could get a word in edgewise.

The coffee was not from a tin cup, my percolator is shiny steel, and the gas stove would not be a good place for firewood. But the ending-day conversation of friends is probably the same now as it was in bunkhouses years ago. We won't go into that---lack of time and interest. I just wanted you to meet Dusty. Like Declan Dog, he's likely to pop up frequently.

And, I'm out of here. Once again, thanks for coming by to see. Remember, not a word to my unaware sponsor. Later.

Val-entine's Day + One Week

I'm sad today. What I heard yesterday has really refused to let go of me. It was a tragic story, one of those that make you hold your loved ones so tightly they squeak in protest.

I heard of a really wonderful lady. She was smart, hard-working, sweet, generous. Lived in Florida someplace. She had her own business--quite successful--lived alone except for a gaggle of cats. I know, cliche. But how do you think these things come to be cliched? There are a lot of women living alone, with cats as landlords. I happen to prefer my dog. He lets me seem to be making all the decisions. Besides, he doesn't make my eyes swell shut. This dogs vs cats debate could take all day, so back to the tragedy at hand.

Anyway, this lady did a lot of socializing online. Not uncommon when you're running a business out here. This tale becomes dark through her response to an email buddy's description of someone he knew. She made one of those harmless replies, "Sounds like someone I'd like to meet. We need to sit down to a cup of tea together."

Buddy laughed, said he'd pass on the comment--and did. Now that's nothing out of the ordinary. We've all extended invitations like that. It's a complimentary figure of speech, usually, not a real offer. This one turned out more sinister and disastrous than off-hand statements could ever deserve. A lesson to us all.

This passed-on invite was taken seriously. Given the possibilities we all know, small effort yielded info that led to a visit from the invitee to the lady's home in Florida. She was undoubtedly shocked to have the discussed person standing at her door, explaining their connection, and waiting to be allowed in for that cup of tea. Given her character, once the shock lessened it must have seemed odd but enticingly interesting; and the lady prepared tea and offered hospitality---to her surviving family's everlasting regret.

That poor, sweet lady's much-abused remains now lie in some Florida town's morgue. The tea-drinker is the subject of several states-wide BOLOs. And Buddy is left wondering how he could be so wrong about the character of someone he's known a lifetime. The authorities have spoken with him, and I'm sure there will be an apprehension any day now. But that won't undo the demise, will it?

So you see why I'm down. You see why my usually exuberant nature has gone into hiding. And you see how no good deed goes unpunished. You see how open invitations got their bad rep. You see my ability to amuse and entertain is finite. And you probably don't want to see any more of me. But really, come back tomorrow. See how quickly I bounce back. And while you're mulling this sad little tale, be sure to wonder how I got all the inside information.

Tripping On White

White-rabbit late. Sure hope the owner is really into his (coffee)cups today. So far, this is working out great. He either hasn't noticed me or is too busy to deal with me. Whichever.

Went out to get some of the necessary things for keeping Dog and I fed. (I don't want Declan looking at me and seeing that cartoon roast.) And we drove through a fairyland that almost made me forget the object of the trip.

We've been having some really unusual-for-us fog. Sat down on us two or three days ago and forgot where it was headed, I guess. It's so cold out there you can easily neglect to notice your surroundings. The inclination is to huddle in on yourself, hurry to get it all done, and get home to some warmth. However, once you look beyond your shivering, there's not enough time in the day to take it all in.

Freezing fog. Every single branch, every weed and bush on the prairie---white sky behind it and still the sharp white etchings stand out. Ansel Adams would have a field-day here. There's a row of trees along the defunct railroad tracks, on the way to the next town. They're cotton white, not a strip of dark bark showing. Collected frost has turned harsh wood into soft, fluffy nursery sculptures. Around houses, some evergreens are warm enough to show a dark green, and others are gray-white for contrast. An amazing sight that's worth the frozen ears and fingers that go with it.

I could rhapsodize about it until I make you sick of me, or I could just leave you with the vision and get on with my day. If you're not into weather, or black-and-white art photos, come back tomorrow. The subject is sure to be different.

Oh before I slip out the back door: I just finished a re-read of George Orwell's Animal Farm. If you haven't read it recently---or ever---pick it up. Very short book, easy to carry around, and a pretty appropriate read if you, like me, are alarmed by the tyranny and inequality you're seeing around you. Pay close attention to the correlations and enjoy. Bye.

Inside The Box

You know, of all the things I teased you with yesterday, the one that kept coming back to me was that shoebox. You know? The one the spotty dog and I live in? Figured if it stuck with me, it might have stuck to you. It's not fair to fail to deliver after a tease, is it.

Did you ever live in a small town? Speak up, you're holding up the conversation here. Well, do I have a small town for you! Straddles a minor highway, nothing but prairie and fields four ways beyond it. Quiet would be an understatement. You can count the streets as you cross it side to side, and never need more than your fingers.

"In a small town, once upon a time, in an even smaller house....." I know you have seen those sheds they sell to add to your property value and storage space. I live in one. Of course it's not a shed anymore. Looks more like one of the modified things fly-by-niter real estate sellers would crouch in. I have all the amenities, on a reduced scale....."filled with small appliances and small fixtures....." It's very attractively, softly blue, with its own diseased elm tree threatening its roof. Have a tiny deck to match the tiny house in the tiny town. And of course, to complete the cloying image, a picket fence enclosing a tiny yard. Being in the wild west, instead of white that fence is a more approriate bleached brown.

As I said, our own little shoebox. If two people come to visit, we all move around the house in this slow, stately gavotte, even the dog occasionally participates in the formal steps---to prevent unwanted physical encounters. I'm situated on a corner, so all can admire---and surrounded by evergreen bushes and trees that effectively hide me from that admiration.

Declan Dog pretty much owns the yard, but graciously allows me use of it for the minimal toll of pretending to covet his bone. Turn about means I allow him to use the house---and he pretends, very convincingly, to covet my plate of food. There's a lot of sidestepping and backing up when we both use the same room at the same time, but he's never complained about the cramped space. Dogs can be very tactful.

Okay, promise fulfilled, time's awasting, gotta run. Tomorrow? STSP?.

Interloper Intro

Hey,hey! Look what I found....an unguarded page, with some blank space on it. And me with a keyboard handy. Can't resist; I have a shameful addiction to writing. Now all I need is a reading addict or two, and life will be perfect.

Don't you tell the owner of this place that I'm sneaking in. I know him. If he finds out, he could do some virtual damage to me. Right now I feel safe---as I said, I know him---at this time of day, he's off pandering to his own compulsive habits. Probably sitting there with a cup of coffee for company, while he wallows in his dreams of wealth and power. Keep quiet about my invasion and I'll be able to come back here this time every day, tell you some stories, have us a chat, give you a glimpse of my world.

And you will like that so much. Really. My world is weird, funny, eminently sharable. But I live out in the boondocks, so it's a little lonely at times. You will hang around for a little while each day, won't you? Please? I promise to keep you interested. I promise to make you laugh, sometimes. I promise not to follow you home. Okay?

Just so you'll know me when you see me next time, I'm the one with the big, white, spotty dog. Fortunately for him, he's as strange as I am. And he loves people too. In fact, even though he never made it to school, can't write, I think you'll see a lot of him here. He's always with me, poor guy, and he has some quirks that---well, that's for later, all right? We're both pretty harmless. You won't need to bring the mace or pepper spray.

Well, don't want to push my luck. Better get out of here before that caffeine guzzler looks in and catches me stealing his blog space. See you tomorrow, same time and place. And next time, the dog, Declan, and I will make sure to have something to amuse. Oh, by the way, I'm Pat. We really do both live in a shoebox. Well, now you probably have my age pegged......You have our names......But you don't know where I live! Think I'll keep it that way. You might turn out to have some unused space on your page too.

Thoughts from Friday

From an email that I received from a friend:

Pull up a chair. Grab a big cup of coffee. I've got some questions for you today. Recent developments have me looking at a large--admittedly, possibly invented----picture. I'm afraid I'm seeing a pattern forming that is kind of bugging me.

Item: I recently heard of an individual whom the economy was battering. From a landowner, landlord, store owner, and community asset, step by step, he'd been skating down to the edge of bankruptcy. Trying his level best to be fair to all the people now wanting a piece of him, he'd held off that last step. And most creditors were behaving with some sense and compassion. Then a big corporation---credit card people of course---swooped in, counted coup on his bank account, causing their own monthly payment check to bounce, creating fees, closure of the account, end of ability to stay in business, end of ability to pay the other, sensible, creditors---and for what? Less return than it cost them to perform this rape.

Item: I just joined in the queue of consumers lining up to throw away money, in the form of toxic peanut butter. Salmonella in peanut butter? You expect it in chicken these days, in eggs, in neglected potato salad---but peanut butter? That is not a natural environment for that bacteria. How'd it get there? And why was I instructed to throw it away? What happened to being reimbursed? I had two jars of the stuff and wasted that money on something they did, not me. But not one mention of returning it, mailing in the code numbers, nothing. Worse yet, they were saying these jars could have been purchased as far back as May of 2006! How many people--children love pb--ate those peanut butters in that time? And they just now noticed it was sickening?

Item: A stockperson in the store, just today, overheard talking to a fellow enployee: This new juice I'm putting onto the shelf? Its date is older than the ones already on the shelf. In fact it's expired.

Connected item: The milk I had choice of at that store? The date on the jug will expire in two days, and that's the latest date to be found on the shelf.

Tie these to older things, encountered over a period of a year:

Item: We had E. coli inside our spinach. True, they said the wild pigs were to blame. Well, maybe their toilet habits were interfering with the sanitary fields, but how, and since when, is that not a problem you just wash off the leaf. How did it invade internally? Like the peanut salmonella, it is not the way the world has worked, until now.

Item: We had contamination scares most recently in Indiana and New Jersey, and in products used nationwide. The list is long....spinach and lettuce, cantaloupes and fresh cut fruit, carrot juice and egg nog, cole slaw and egg salad, ham and turkey, ground beef and fresh mushrooms, ice cream. We've heard a lot more than we want to hear about listeria, E. coli, salmonella---but maybe not enough? There's a food safety newsletter published by, and sources and occurrences on the page of, FoodHACCP. Using your own judgement and research, take a look at that site---if you've a mind to scare yourself thoroughly.

Item: Here in Colorado, we had a bad snow storm month not long ago. The National Guard had trouble coming up with the vehicles needed to help out. Those, and a lot of the people they could have used, are over in Iraq. Approve of the war, or hate it, it is draining our nation in so many ways, and now is threatening to exponentially increase that weakening.

Item: The recent hostage situation perpetrated by a commercial airline left people sitting next to a perfectly good waiting room, for the span of a work day, or longer. They were breathing stale air, had limited toilet facilities, and they were not allowed to leave for the appropriately-named "waiting room." The airline was gracious enough to refund their ticket cost and offer a free, extra ticket as compensation--or said they would. Would you be inclined to take that company up on another flight, anywhere?

So what does this varied list of woes have in common? Attitude.

The pouncing credit card company had no concern for other creditors, didn't even show common sense in their own financial interests. Their actions smack more of spite than professionalism. The stores and their distributors show a definite insolence toward their customers: Few stores in the area? You'll have to take whatever we offer.

The contaminated products, conspiracy theories aside, are being responded to as if each were a rare, isolated incident. They're not. Put out the fire, and put out apologies and reassurances afterward, and just wait for the next time. Bird flu that will spread human-to-human is getting a concerted response---and it doesn't even exist yet. For years people have sickened, and some have died, from food that we have to trust and can't. No concerted response.

Our "home" guard, our National Guard, is being seriously tapped to fight in another country. If terrorists target this country, internally, our protection is over there. And fighting in the Iraqi civil war, however many protests to the contrary you hear, is not going to prevent someone from pulling a stunt inside our borders. Britain should be proof enough for that. Better than half our country polls out as being at least reluctant to continue the war, but our "representatives" have been informed it is not their call. "By the people, for the people?"

The airlines, banks, utility companies, chain stores, all have a disregard that equals the food store's and their distributor's. Like it. Or lump it.

This is beginning to look like one BIG downhill slide. Control is slipping away. Customers are no longer valued, they're targeted. The concept of "acceptable losses" has crossed from military usage into everyday corporate thinking. Maybe they're just small signs of bigger problems, like overseas jobs, and economic nightmares, and a country divided against itself. Maybe genetic tweaking is to blame for some of it. Maybe family values and ethics need more attention. I won't pretend my theories will suit you. Just please, folks, take a look around and wonder. Collect info and add it all together until you see a picture, a culprit, or hopefully, a solution.

The first post

Well, after much thinking and waiting, I finally decided to start a blog. As it says in the box above, this will be used by several people. Some of you may already know me from some of the boards. The rest will have to do their own introductions. So, I guess at this point, its time for me to say "Hello and Welcome!" I will be popping in from time to time to say whats on my mind, offer advice or just sit around and drink coffee.

There is no telling what is going to be here tomorrow...