The JackB

"When you're in jail, a good friend will be trying to bail you out. A best friend will be in the cell next to you saying, 'Damn, that was fun'." Groucho Marx

Archives for November 2012

The 23rd Worst Headline I have Ever Written

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This post is different from This Is Not The Worst Headline You’ll Read Today which is precisely why you must read it.

Yoda is My Partner

The sixth grader who lives in my house and tells me he is smarter than I am because he is still in school and I am not received more of my Jedi training today.

When I told him I needed him to do a better job of finishing his homework in a timely basis he said he would try and that is when I called upon my inner Yoda.

“Do or do not… there is no try.”

I love that quote and I do my damnedest to live it.

Angry Plugins and Technical Difficulties

I spent several hours last night and a few this morning wrestling with angry plugins that declared war upon the blog. In the midst of ongoing technical difficulties I pointed a finger at the computer and told it that I was going to walk away because I needed air and not because I was giving up.

Those few who know me well are aware it is hard to pin me down. I don’t make promises that I don’t intend to keep. If I say I am going to do something I get it done.

Don’t care about walls, obstacles and hurdles because I go through, over, under and around them. But I concede that one of the best parts of being in my forties is having become more selective about what deserves my time and energy.

The blogs are definitely on that list. Heck, I’d argue that being a good blogger requires a certain amount of technical expertise, might blog about that one late.

Anyhoo, the war to fix the technical issues is ongoing and though I won a couple of the battles there are still lingering fires that need to be put out.

Linear Storytelling

A recent letter from a reader included a request to engage in more linear storytelling than I do now. They think I am turning off readers by hopping around from topic to topic in these posts. I thanked them for their input and encouraged them to continue to provide it but also let them know I write as I write.

There is a fine line between trying to accommodate your readers and destroying your style, but you still need to figure out if there is validity to the feedback. If I determined that the majority felt the same way I would have to take a harder look at things.

Given what I see via email, stats and the advice of the Magic 8-Ball I am going to continue to write as I write. Those who don’t like it are welcome to find other places to visit, but are also welcome to stay because sometimes it grows on you.

Topics for Other Posts

There are a bunch of ‘graphs here that would make good topics for other posts and I may yet do that. I might include a post about what happens when you don’t have time to visit other blogs and how that can impact your traffic and comments.

But work calls and so I have to set this aside for a bit. Have to find another source of photos too as the one I was using isn’t working for me anymore.

Sort of sad about that one, been enjoying the imagery. Got to run now, will leave you with a thought and an image.

dylna

This Is Not The Worst Headline You’ll Read Today

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listen to ‘This Is Not The Worst Headline You’ll Read Today’ on Audioboo

This has been one hell of a day, simply crazy in multiple ways and not all of them bad. In fact many have  been good, but still…

Some of you have said you can’t keep up with all of the posts I am writing and that is ok. There are more than you think, I have several other blogs I am supporting.

When you don’t sleep and you are motivated to produce all sorts of good things happen. But just for the heck of it here are some links to recent work and some other stuff that you might want to check out:

You May Call Me Lord Fat-Ah-Goo

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Along the Oodnadatta Track, Australia- Picture taken by Jamie Brelsford

I staggered into the house on trembling legs with sweat dripping from my beard and a smile upon my face. We beat those guys four games out of five.

My son looked up at me and said he had a suggestion.

“Dad, I think  you ought to shower and go to sleep. You look like you are fat-ah-goo.”

He saw the look on my face and went on, “I didn’t insult you. Fat-ah-goo is one of my vocabulary words.”

I laughed and said, “you mean fatigue, as in f-a-t-i-g-u-e, right.”

“Oh, is that how are supposed to pronounce it? That makes more sense.

And there you have a prime example of my son, the phonetic speller. I love that guy.

Remind me to tell you the story of Hey Zeus.

“The wreckage of my past keeps haunting me
It just won’t leave me alone
I still find it all a mystery
Could it be a dream?
The road to nowhere leads to me
Through all the happiness and sorrow
I guess I’d do it all again
Live for today and not tomorrow
It’s still the road that never ends”
Road To Nowhere– Ozzy Osbourne

This blog used to be filled with posts about politics and religion. Some of them turned into flame wars in which we waged war upon each other.

It is not an exaggeration. I received more than a few death threats and was called every name you can think of. I don’t write about these things very often any more but not because I fear confrontation.

I don’t. I haven’t any problem with having a different opinion than others. I rarely care if people call me names. Life is too short for me to worry about such things.

The reason I don’t write those very often could be attributed to the evolution of the blog. I shared what I wanted, said what I wanted to say and figured a lot of things out.

One of them was that it wasn’t worth my time to fight with people, especially the moronic trolls who never bothered to educate themselves and argued based upon emotion and misinformation.

War

I am thinking about war. I am thinking about family and friends in Israel. I am thinking about rockets fired upon innocent people and children who wet their bed long after they’re of an age where that is acceptable.

Israel took out a terrorist today and I haven’t any problem with that. If you throw rocks at the bear you can’t complain if it turns to eat you. You may not agree with targeted assassinations. You might think there are reasons why people act out of desperation and that is ok.

You are entitled to think that way. I don’t. I consider Hamas to be a terrorist organization that uses mob tactics to rule its people and do not believe there is room to negotiate for peace with them.

If I have to choose between us and them, I choose us.

It is personal to me for lots of reasons, not the least of which is people I love and care about have been at risk and probably will be again. Iran is behind this. Not asking for your comments about this situation, just thinking out loud.

Lord Fat-Ah-Goo

My son didn’t give me the title of  “Lord.” I took that one for myself. I thought it sounded better than Duke, Earl, King, Prince or Emperor.

It was a sort of silly thing, but I wanted my son to understand I wasn’t making fun of his phonetic spelling. It is how he does it and if it works for him I am good with it. He knows he needs to double check these things.

Sometimes Parenting is Hard

It is not easy being a parent for a million different  reasons but the shades of gray are the worst. I teach my children to judge others based upon their actions and nothing else.

I am pleased to say for the most part it has worked. They still don’t understand why anyone cares what color skin President Obama has and asked why people said anything about Governor Romney being Mormon.

And then I think about different things that have happened to people. Some of them are things that didn’t happen to anyone I am connected to, just people. And then I think about how I am connected in different ways.

Several of my cousins were in Mumbai the week before the terrorist attack. They stayed at the Chabad House where terrorists brutally slaughtered those who were there.

They left before the incident, but had they been there…

I could tell you about speaking with my baby cousin after he was called up. It was a different incident, different time, but I still worried.

There are other stories that I could share about relatives murdered by the Nazis and those who fled the Cossacks.

Us and them. There is a lot of us and them, enough for me to pick us because that is what I have to do.

Happier Things

The thing that makes me happy and makes all of this work is that I know the overwhelming majority of time we don’t have stories about us and them. They are just tales about us, a group that includes everyone.

When my relatives came to the U.S. searching for their version of the American dream they hoped one day there would be people like me to live it. It is too bad they aren’t here to share it.

It would be nice to let them know their hard work paid off and that we appreciate the sacrifices they made for us.

I Taught Frank Sinatra How To Sing

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The Very Best of Frank Sinatra

I’ll never forget that cold blustery day in November of ’74. We were standing at the corner of 43rd and Lexington when all of sudden people started pointing. I heard some ancient fellow yell about the John Lennon of his time and wondered why he was talking about communists in America.

After the great Johnny Fitzgerald Kennedy had showed them commie bastards that they couldn’t park their missiles on the shores of some banana republic that was run by a washed up baseball player who couldn’t make the cut.

Anyhoo, I am standing there in the crowd when I see this fat, old man who is covering up his thinning hair with fedora, but the not the really cool Borsalino that the Hasids wore.

My dad says to me, “Jackie Boy, there goes Frank Sinatra.”

I don’t know what came over me, but I couldn’t help myself. “Hey Sinatra. I hate your singing. The Yankees suck and if the president had any sense he’d bomb the crap out of Times Square.”

Sinatra looks at me with contempt and snarls, “you don’t know Dick kid.”

I look at him and say, “Don’t go name dropping with me. I don’t care if you know the president. Go bore Kissinger and Agnew with your music and please ask my parents to stop hurting my head with those god awful tunes you call songs.

Confession Time

If you haven’t figured it out, that was fiction. I was five years-old in ’74 and can promise you I spent all of November at home in Los Angeles.

I haven’t a clue where that story came from, but when I thought about the headline I just ran with it. I played around with making it a fictional account of the guy who taught Sinatra how to sing. I thought it might be interesting to write a tale about how Sinatra had enormous potential but wasn’t able to harness it until Mick the Mike taught him some tricks.

BTW, I don’t really like Mick the Mike as a name but I needed a placeholder.

Second confession: I like Frank Sinatra’s music but I still hate the Yankees. Go Dodgers.

Nanowrimo

I said I would participate in Nanowrimo again this year but I really haven’t done much with it. It is not because I don’t have ideas, time or ability. I don’t really have a reason other than I just haven’t, but I am not worried about it.

This will sound arrogant, but I can pump out quality content in large volumes in short periods of time.  The point being that I can turn it on and still hit the 50,000 word mark by the end of the month.

My focus is elsewhere. That is really the issue. I am pushing in other directions and will get around to Nanowrimo.

I Love Posting Daily

I love being part of NaBloPoMo, you know the whole write a post every day for 30 days thing. All of this writing is invigorating. It energizes me.

Some people might be concerned about quantity over quality but I am not. That is because I see the increased emphasis on my part as being a productive use of my time.

All of this writing serves as a sort of whetstone I use to sharpen my knife. It is practicing my craft so that I can become a better writer.

That is a major part of why I blog- I want to become a better writer and there is no way to do it without writing.

Sometimes the only way to figure out where you want to go and what you want to be is to go backwards. That is why I am sifting and sorting through posts here.

Those posts carried me through time and brought me to this moment. You might not feel the magic, but I do.

Something tells me faith and clicks are calling- got to run. See you in the AM.

How To Wrestle With Faith

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Poker Chips

“You got to know when to hold ’em, know when to fold ’em,
Know when to walk away and know when to run.
You never count your money when you’re sittin’ at the table.
There’ll be time enough for countin’ when the dealin’s done.”
The Gambler– Kenny Rogers

 

It is 10:30 on Monday night and I am listening to With or Without You from U2’s Joshua Tree album. If I had to choose my top ten favorite albums this would definitely be on it.

Maybe it is because it came out during my senior year of high school and it is tied into a collective set of memories of hope, endless opportunities and more. Maybe it is because there are a few women who it reminds me of, girls with long hair who shared more than just moments in time.

They are part of my past but once they were part of my present and the future.

Past, Present and Future

Yesterday I took my son to see SkyFall with me. It was a fantastic movie and an exceptional moment in time for us. Movies have been our thing. This year we also saw The Avengers, Spiderman and The Dark Knight Rises.

His eyes get so wide and he gets so excited to share these experiences. I can’t properly express how much fun it is for me. I always say that every age is my favorite, but this one really takes it to a new level.

That is because he really is old enough to appreciate and enjoy these films. He understands the difference between right and wrong, fake and fantasy.

And me, well I get to be dad and remember what it was like to be 12. It makes my heart swell two or three sizes.

I watch him and wonder who my son will grow up to be. He is a cross between his mother and I with a double dose of himself. The days of the little boy he was are rapidly disappearing into the past.

Faith Under Fire

The headline might make some of you wonder about whether this is a religious post, but that is not really it. Sure, I could go there. I could tell you about days of walking through the streets of Jerusalem and moments spent swimming in the Red Sea and the Mediterranean.

I could tell you about when I planned on becoming a rabbi and why I didn’t. I could tell you that it might happen one day, but that is not what this post is about.

This post is about many things and one of them is my struggle to sort and suss out a few things. I am waiting for the click to come and trying to be patient. I can feel it lurking in the recesses of my mind, it is something big.

I think I have figured out the answers to some major stuff but I can’t quite put my finger on it. So I am trying to focus on other things to give it time to surface.

My Best Work

Been trying to figure out which of my posts to recommend people read. If someone asked for writing samples I’d want to be able to say look at X, Y and Z. I’d want them to be representative of my work, but I haven’t decided which of those deserve the recognition.

I have a bunch listed on the About Me page but I don’t know if those are the best. They are good. They are solid and I am not embarrassed by them, but are they my best? I don’t know.

Can’t for perfection because it never comes, but can’t live on good enough either.

Writing is Cathartic

I write because it is part of how I release the things I carry. It is where I say I have to put together a Bar Mitzvah in a year and I haven’t figured out how to pay for it.

Faith says I will figure it out because I always do. I am active, ever moving forward, why won’t it happen again. But that is the thing, the wrestling with faith that comes along with it all.

What if it doesn’t. What if this is the time I drop the ball. What if Lucy pulls the ball out from under me and I don’t see it in time to course correct.

Go West Young Man

My son asks me to tell him who my favorite superhero is. He wants me to tell him who and why so that he can tell me who his is.

I tell him I am partial to Wolverine but that I would include James Bond in all this and he is up there too. I like the guys with edge and attitude, but I like them because they are human.

If we focus on those who truly have no superpowers we are down to Batman and James Bond. I suppose what excites me is that they get by on hard work, wits and luck.

That is enough for me. It is all I can count on. I am confident about the future, but damn, that little voice is still there and so the wrestling continues.

This was part of Just Write #61.

Remember When I Punched That Wolf In The Face

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wolf
Photo by-AinaM

Friends there are moments when you are inspired by something you read and you know that you are about the write the greatest blog post ever written. Sadly this post is unlikely to be it.

It is not because you won’t like it, it is because he and she don’t like it. You know the silent masses who send emails to writers letting them know that is inhumane to punch wolves or to let us know that James Bond isn’t real.

I concede that it is not smart to punch most wolves in the face, but that is only because you might cut your hands on their teeth. Kick them in the ribs or swing them by their tails- that is the way to go.

Interesting People

One of the best parts of being a world class blogger who is the self proclaimed “original daddy blogger” is that I have 10,000 posts floating around the net.

Why is that good? Because I get to hear from all sorts of interesting people.

We get letters, oh yes we get letters. Sometimes they are from people like Shola Rhodes who promise me millions if I would only help them defraud others. There are others who tell me I am not funny, witty or wise.

And there are the lovely writers who call me an ignorant Zionist whose head should be cut off. Those death threats are among my favorites. Sometimes I send them a lovely response with a request for their address so that I might send them a daisy…cutter that is.

Reading Comprehension Read This Carefully

People are unceasingly interesting and funny to me. Had I more time and the inclination to dig I would share the links to the posts in which I received some of the aforementioned kind remarks. If you feel like it you can dig around too, search for “Shola Rhodes” or “Bishop of Bullfrog” and you can find posts where I had fun playing with the people who wrote me.

Some of those were good, but I wasn’t serious. Of course others took me at face value and I can’t help but wonder about their reading comprehension abilities also known as “bullshit detectors.”

There are posts where you can understand why someone might think it is real.  69 Reasons Why Fathers Make Better Lovers has links to several posts that people might believe to be true stories and even though they might be marked as fiction I see how someone might be confused.

Some might argue that as a writer the burden of trying to prevent confusion falls upon me. Yet I would suggest that Caveat Emptor is applicable to blog posts as well as car purchases.

Down Goes Goofy!

When I was twenty my fraternity held its Spring Formal at the Disneyland hotel. We had a fine night of drinking, eating, drinking, dancing, drinking, drinking and then hanging out with our dates in our hotel rooms.

The next day I felt great and so when we wandered around Disneyland I was more than disturbed when Tweedle Dee or Tweedle Dum started a fight with me. Sadly I gave into temptation and body slammed him, causing a little boy to scream, “He is beating up Goofy.”

Art Babbit is credited with creating Goofy
Art Babbit is credited with creating Goofy (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Would You Fight A Gorilla?

Someone else started a conversation about what animals we would be willing to fight. I said there wasn’t an animal I couldn’t take on and win.

Crocodile, Gorilla, Chip. Tiger, lion- didn’t matter then and doesn’t matter now. I would take those guys. The roster of opponents was opened up to include sea creatures.

I volunteered to fight the Loch Ness monster, a Yeti and Bigfoot- at the same time. I figured if I watched two or three hours worth of Scooby Doo I could devise a proper battle plan for defeating them.

Sadly they never RSVPd and I lost the major money I would have earned from that particular battle royale.

So one of the boys asked if I could take a Great White Shark on and I said sure. The rules of engagement were simple:

  1. If I fought him/her in the water I would be given Shamu as a partner and Flipper as a corner man.
  2. On land it was just me, but due to size differences, I was allowed to use any technique I chose, including the Three Stooges eye gouge.

It would have been a mighty battle and no one would be able to include me in their 5 Reasons Why I Hate Your Epic Content comments because it would have been epic.

Sadly, we may never know what would have happened or maybe these alligator skin boots are proof. Hard to say. Fortunately for you I will be back, but first I am going to find Alvin and The Chipmunks. Got a great recipe from Sarah Palin for some squirrel stew and I think those three will be perfect for it.