Archives for September 2004

I am not trying to piss anyone off but, this doesn’t strike me as a miracle. What would they have done if a statue of Homer Simpson washed on shore.

PARKFIELD, California (AP) — A moderate earthquake struck central California on Tuesday that was felt from San Francisco to the Los Angeles area. There was no immediate report of injuries.

At 10:20 A.M. we felt a large earthquake. Preliminary reports show that it was located near Paso Robles and was about a 6.0 on the Richter scale.

Here in Los Angeles I work on the 6th floor and can say that we really felt things move. Not nearly as violent or as large as the Northridge quake, but big enough that we noticed.

“”It was great fun and our official figure show that 806 pillow-fighters participated,” said Catherine Salmon of the auditing firm KPMG who were acting on behalf of Guinness World Records.

“Unfortunately it’s not a record and they are probably going to have to try again next year,” she told AFP. ”

Someone should have smacked her with a pillow until she was seeing double and then they would have had the record. Of course it would be embarrassing to be arrested for assault with a pillow.

If you resist arrest and argue with the police what do you expect is going to happen.

This is one of the most common questions you’ll ever see. It is a question of values. What are you willing to do, how far will you go? Most the gameshows we see today deal with this in one fashion or another.

The people that have watched me grow know that I was the guy who would do anything. If you had something wacky to do, something gross, something a little out there it was a good bet that I might be the guy to look at. You never knew what I would do and frankly neither did I.

These days I am a little more restrained. I am a father and I have responsibilities to take care of. There are two, J & E and they are more important to me than anything you can imagine. I know, you are wondering, “when is Jack going to stop harping on his children and talk about something else?”

The answer is never. I never will because those two are the best thing that I have ever done with my life. They represent my greatest hopes and dreams and I am so very proud of them it aches, it hurts to smile as big as I do when they are near. I look like a copy of the Joker from Batman, one big grin.

And I haven’t any problem saying that I hope that in some way this rubs off on other parents who for whatever reason have trouble relating to or getting along with their boys and girls. Among the saddest things I can think of are children who are neglected or abused.

Anyway my writing is similar to my speech, it is a stream-of-consciousness kind of thing and I am back to the topic of what I did or could do. I love life with a passion, when I laugh, when I truly laugh it is infectious. My whole body shakes and if I laugh for an extended period of time my stomach hurts.

And when I am angry, I feel it deep inside. I am not often sad, but that too is a deep, intense feeling. In short it is a long winded way of saying that if I feel something I usually really feel it.

There are many stories about my past that I do not want my children to hear. Some of them can be revealed in time. Some I choose to keep secret because there is a part of me that I keep for me. It is a little chunk that is Jack’s and Jack’s alone. When you have children it is hard to maintain your own individuality, so that part is something that I need and keep for myself.

Some stories are not fit for their ears because of their age. Some are things that were stupid and reckless and I don’t want them to use my success in surviving these things as an excuse to engage in the same idiocy as their abba.

So when I look at the various games and opportunities for a person to win big money it makes me consider what I would do now. Would I go on a game in which I had to lie to others to win. Would I participate in something that made me act in a way that would take some extra explaining. Would it be ok if lying meant that I won a million dollars.

I am not a wealthy man, but a million dollars would not instantly change my life forever. It would make some vast improvements, but it is not enough for me to retire on. It is not enough to live like there is no tomorrow.

But even if it was, would I try for the money. It would be enough to ensure that my children’s education was covered. I could pay off my house and have enough left in the bank to secure my retirement provided I kept putting money into a retirement account.

I am not sure, truthfully I might have to consider it. And again, it would depend on the nature of the game and what was required.

You know life was much simpler when all I had to do was earn $5 for drinking Tabasco sauce or eating a jar of mayo.