SANCTIFYMYEYE

Click here fror my new blogspot

And visit my regular website here

SITE MAP ADDED

It only took the better part of November 14-15

but I finally put together a site map for

whatcanyousaydotnet

I DON'T KEEP UP WITH THIS BLOG

I gave up trying to keep up with a blog

altho I might add something now and again.

Mostly I work from my website

W H A T C A N Y O U S A Y D O T N E T

See you there,

right?

Mount Redoubt Web Cams

Alaska's Mount Redoubt is getting ready to put on a show.

Here are links to two of the Mount Redoubt Observatory web cams:

camera one

camera two

MY SNUGGIE

My friends at Fricano's Deli all pitched in and got me a Snuggie for my birthday. It arrived today, January 30, 2009, 26 days after my 65th. Seems that demand was so high it took forever to get here from China.

About the Snuggie. It's basically for people who think blankets are too complicated. It is about 34 square acres of "fabric" - so one size truly does fit all. Mine is red, like the one pictured above. There are 2 sleeves coming out of the 34-acre blanket. It is open in the back, like a hospital gown. There are no velcro fasteners, so it just flaps in the breeze. I would not recommend wearing it out of doors, lest a stiff breeze carry you off to who-knows-where. The "fabric" can best be described as woven lighter fluid, which is why you don't see any advertisements on TV showing people wearing a Snuggie near a fireplace or other open flame.

It is designed for people who have couches and chairs - I have neither. When I get up from my bed to adjust the thermostat in the next room passed my four-foot-square kitchen, I'm pretty much naked and just tip-toe over the bare kitchen floor and tip-toe back to bed. I wouldn't think of cooking in, lest I be cooked in it.

Mine came with a "book light" which you can attach to a book while reading in the dark. The label pretty much tells no story: NG. Made in China. Not much to read there.

So that's about it ... except now I should graciously thank my sweet friends at the Deli who gave me something that, honestly, is for someone who has everything. I love you all to pieces!

Warmly,

Chris Wing

Why I Don't Own A Gun

don't get me wrong

this is no laughing matter

if i'd had a gun 16,790 days ago

i wouldn't have been here for the remaining 16,789

and, if 16,789 days ago,

then not the subsequent 16,788

you get the picture

so please

let the moment pass

painful though it might well be

let the moment pass

and live this life with me

OLD CLEAN COAL

Don't you just love the adds that proclaim coal as clean. Okay. Sure. It can be processed to "quote" burn clean "unquote" but it can't be programmed to be taken out of the ground clean. Here are some recent statitstics surrounding the huge spill of mining waste near the Kingston Fossil Plant, a Tennessee Valley Authority plant 40 miles west of Knoxville, which contained many decades worth of toxic coal mining waste. In a single year, a coal-fired electric plant deposited more than 2.2 million pounds of toxic materials in a holding pond that failed on December 22, 2008, flooding 300 acres in East Tennessee, according to a 2007 inventory filed with the Environmental Protection Agency. The inventory, disclosed by the Tennessee Valley Authority on December 29, 2008 at the request of The New York Times, showed that in just one year, the plant’s byproducts included 45,000 pounds of arsenic, 49,000 pounds of lead, 1.4 million pounds of barium, 91,000 pounds of chromium and 140,000 pounds of manganese. Those metals can cause cancer, liver damage and neurological complications, among other health problems. Clean Coal My Ass.

Nancy's Service

The service was at the Zen Center so it was very that.

People addressed their remarks to Nancy by name.

I said some stuff to her and, later, in a second remark, told her it was too hot in the room and could she please appeal to the hosts to turn up the air. No luck. My third remark, still later, was to let her know that it was stifling and that I had to get out of the room before I exploded. Laughter. So, I waited outside in the cool breeze, sitting on the porch swing til the service ended. There were deviled eggs but I wasn't hungry. Someone is caring for Bijou. Carolyn is full of anger and love and disappointment and understanding regarding Nancy. It is extremely tragic for her. And us.

Mary Jane was there, much to my surprise and delight. She didn't know Nancy much but knew that she was a friend of Lorne and Robbie. She starts a new job Monday.

I'm miserable.

It's 6:10 am. I'm going to Walmart to buy socks. 3 pair for $3.50. All of 'em black. Not only am I a fashion statement, but it's easy on Mary, my laundry lady. No worries at the sox-balling phase, and, should I ever do my own wash ... I won't have to ball 'em at all.

Shopping for sox didn't do a thing for me.

Love you Nancy. Miss you dearly.

NANCY CRUMPTON

I can't write about this now.
My friend Nancy passed away on December 17, 2008.
I will miss her dearly.
She was one of the brightest, wittiest and most interesting people I ever knew.
Click this line for her obituary

THE WORST DAY OF MY LIFE SO FAR

I was thinking about the worst day of my life (so far). It was sometime in the nineteen eighties. I was flat broke and had been evicted from my apartment behind Sandy's on Barton Springs Road. I'd been so broke, and out of work for a month, that my electricity had been turned off twice. First, when I couldn't pay the bill and again when I was caught tampering with my electric meter. Just to run a table lamp and a 12" t.v. I then used one of the prong adapters that you screw into a light socket. I had an extension cord plugged into the apartment complex walkway light fixtures that were switched on and off via a light sensor.

It was eviction day and I needed boxes to pack my crap into, even though I had nowhere to go but the street. I walked to some store near the corner of Barton Springs and South Lamar and got a couple of empty boxes. I was headed back home with them when I slipped on some sand and twisted my ankle so bad that I thought I'd broken it.

I was nevertheless ambulabory, limping and writhing in pain.

I happened to look across the street, to the parking/drive-thru area of KFC there on Barton Springs Road. And there I saw a young man. It was moving day for him, too, because he had a cardboard box with him, full of stuff. But he wasn't carrying it. He was pushing it along with his feet. His feet weren't feet, though. They were protrustions from a pair of artificial legs. And these weren't "nice" prosthetics like the ones in the picture. They were mere sticks.

It was gut wrenching. I cried. Again. During a period of my life when I often cried in public, in broad daylight.

It was truly the worst day of my life - not because I was in such straits, but because there was nothing I could do to help that young man. On any other day, at any other moment, I would have gone over to him and asked if I could carry that box full of stuff to wherever he was going. But on this day, at this moment, there was nothing I could do. Nothing.

It truly was the adage come to life: I was sad because I could not walk and then I saw a man who had no legs.

My own lot in life changed by the end of that awful day. An anonymous person gave me enough money to find a new place to live. But I couldn't walk. My friend Jack Kinslow let me stay at his place on West 34th street until I could walk again. Then my friend Laurel got her dad to let me stay in her recently-deceased granmother's house on Robinson. I soon was working again at Capitol City Playhouse, after that hellatious hiatus.

SWEATING IT OUT

STB had a show this past Friday (Feb 22) at Red Seven. It was well attended and fun, but poorly managed, so the stage manager turned of our microphones before we could finished our set. We had 5 songs left to play! But the night was a huge success just the same. I sweat so much during my performance that I truly believe the activity helped get me over this flu thing. The abscess in my jowl seems to have almost disappeared. The upshot here is this: sweating can be good for you.

Nothing Wicked This Way Came (Today)

Absolutely no major issues today. I have been working my arse off the last few days, learning how to make flash buttons for my website and putting together a slightly professional story outline for STB gig applications. I hope that the one person who might be reading this ... I hope that he or she is having a great time!

Intelligent Life Discovered On Earth

Friday at Fricano's was especially nice. Morning coffee al fresco with just Paul and DeeAnne while Allison helped customers inside. I had the feeling that everyone's housing thing was either gonna get better or worse and I think that by day's end it turned out to be both.

Dinner was more refreshing than usual. Chris-the-Younger and Tino-the-Thinish were outside the place when I arrived. Twas good to see them and cop some hugs and stuff. Only missing person was Josh-the-Rock and about 20 other regulars whom I would have loved to have seen all at once.

Michael the Scientist was holding down the counter and, together at first, we did Thursday's New York Times crossword puzzle, with help from Jamil and Paul. Once we got the "valentine" theme nailed down, it was pretty much Michael's job to finish it off, which he did rather well and was rewarded by having the pleasure of success. He actually did a solid 1/3 of the thing by himself. 4 Kudos.

Paul mustered up every ounce of deft in order to create for me the most exquisite sandwich. I was going to suffer the use of "panache" in that sentence after having failed during the first draft to include "deft" or "deftly," and now it's all falling apart at the last possible moment, quite unlike the sandwich.

I got a bit lonesome after a few hours at home doing computer stuff*, but as usual I survived, and look forward to Saturday's meeting with Lindsay for a trip to Barack Obama's campaign headquarters. More about Lindsay later.

Robert Altman's only great movie - Nashville - just started on TCM. So many great performances and such great cinema. I may nod off to it, but I'll save a copy for old age and Fricano's.

Nighty-night.

* I spent several hours retooling my website so that pages would load faster. Stop by my cartoons page and play Monty Python's "I Like Chinese" in case you haven't heard it before. It's a hoot as they say.

Allergy Season Again

Breathe In
Breathe Out
If You Can

Tip Of The Day

"REMEMBER TO DO THINGS
WHEN YOU THINK OF THEM"

Big Hearted or Heart Bigged?

Well, I got tired of dealing with the feeling that my heart was about to burst through my ribcage this morning. Lucky for me, there's an orphanage across the street from my apartment. They now have a new ball for their recreational time. All I asked of them was to please not drop the thing. I can't afford to have it broken again, at least not today.

Fricano's - Deli of the Stars

Chris Wing eating and listening at Fricano's


Fricano's Deli. Unlike any other deli sandwiched between the Pecos and the Sabine. Everybody talks. Everybody listens. Everybody eats. A merry blend of you-name-it. High spirited and easy to find unless you're easily lost. 104 East 31st Street, Austin TX. Not only do they deliver a fine atmosphere but they deliver food as well, and catering! If you're blue, come visit. If you're suicidal, they'll deliver your last meal with chanson and elan. 512-482-9980.

Who Are These People?

Send Out The Clowns

Two clowns have been shot and killed during a children's circus performance in Colombia. The unidentified gunmen burst into the Circo del Sol de Cali and shot the clowns in front of 20 to 50 people - mostly children. The audience was slow to react thinking the shootings were part of the show. One of the clowns was killed instantly and the second died the next day in hospital. Police have not arrested any suspects and are still investigating a possible motive. "The killings had nothing to do with the show the victims were performing at the time of the incident," said a police spokesman. A witness said: "The clowns came out to give their show and then this guy came out shooting them." Last year, a prominent circus clown, known as Pepe, was also shot dead by a unknown assailant in the same suburb of Cucuta. ITV News 02/22/07

Ray Evans 1915-2007

Hello, I'm Mister Ed.

A horse is a horse, of course of course,
and no one can talk to a horse of course,
that is of course, unless the horse,
is the famous Mister Ed!
Go right to the source and ask the horse.
He'll give you the answer that you'll endorse.
He's always on a steady course.
Talk to Mister Ed.
People yak-it-ti-yak a streak
and waste your time of day,
but Mister Ed will never speak,
unless he has something to say.
A horse is a horse,
of course of course,
And this one will talk 'til his voice is hoarse.
You never heard of a talking horse?
Well, listen to this...
"I am Mister Ed"

Ray Evans with partner Jay Livingston
wrote many ditties
including Mona Lisa (I like Carl Mann's version)
and Que Sera Sera
of which the only tolerable version is by Ned Flanders
in The Simpsons' "Hurricane" episode.
But The Theme From Mr. Ed is definitely my favorite.

The last words uttered by the famous Mister Ed?
"People - talk, talk, talk."
Season 6 Episode 13 February 6, 1966
"Mister Ed Goes to College"

Mr. Ed was a stage-name, of course.

He was played by Bamboo Harvester, a Palomino. Horse. Of course.

Bamboo Harvester was quietly put down in 1970 - age 20

State Of Disunion 2007

Jon Stewart to Senior Washington Correspondent Rob Riggle: "Rob, give me your overall impressions of last night's State of the Union address." Riggle: "My overall impressions? Uh .... an empty spectacle. A Kabuki ritual of power. A president, cloaking his impotence in the trappings of office. A Congress, masking its seething contempt behind a facade of statesmanship. And the clapping – always the clapping. To paraphrase T. S. Eliot: this is how the world ends, not with a bang, not with a whimper; merely the deafening roar of hollow applause." The Daily Show With Jon Stewart - January 24, 2007

Duh - So Long Ralph

ATLANTA, Jan. 12 — To those who questioned the propriety of keeping the giant whale shark in captivity, the philanthropist Bernie Marcus liked to say that in his aquarium here, the shark, the world’s largest fish, would also be the world’s most pampered. But a specialized diet of krill and fortified gelatin, a 6.2-million-gallon fish tank and state-of-the-art medical care were not enough to save Ralph, one of the four graceful, dappled whale sharks that were star attractions at the lavish $290 million Georgia Aquarium that opened here to great fanfare just over a year ago. Ralph, an adolescent whale shark 22 feet long, died mysteriously on Thursday, reopening questions about whether whale sharks, a species about which little is known, should ever be taken from the wild. The other three whale sharks at the aquarium are named Norton, Trixie and Alice.

[In the wild, these animals are known to routinely make dives of up to 4,000 feet, as part of their natural regenerative processes.]

This is the part I like

As some 20 veterinarians, pathologists and biologists began a necropsy on Ralph, his online guest book swelled with affectionate messages from fans. Bob Roberts of Atlanta was nostalgic: “I remember when we first met and you swam by me — our eyes met — and it was like we had known each other our entire lives.”

[Jeez, Louise ... Bob must have eyes set apart as wide as a living room because that's how far apart the whaleshark's eyes are.]

The Day America Farted

63 birds fall out of sky in Austin!

Over 400 dead owls found in Montana in 6 months!

Thousands in New York smell gas!

Gas leak prompts evacuations in Ohio!

Chemical cloud envelops Sugar Land!

Harmless package detonated by ATF in Miami!

Bush threatens to give another speach about Iraq!

(be sure to wear gas masks on Wednesday the 10th)

Achoo!

Don't Try This At Home

Anything In Here?

It's My Birthday Today

63 and still looking

Who Goes There?

One . . . per minute is the estimated number of blogs that were being created during the last six months. One . . . is also the average number of visitors to those blogs. "I could cry salty tears, where have you been half this year?"

Flags In Distress

While poking around the web in pursuit of updating war stuff on my RANTS page, I came across this shot of Dubya in the process of desecrating the American flag. Funny how these uberpatriots so often stoop to desecrating the very symbol of their power. The particular desecration here is as follows:

US Code, Title 4, Chapter 1, Sec. 8 (g): "The flag should never have placed upon it, nor on any part of it, nor attached to it any mark, insignia, letter, word, figure, design, picture, or drawing of any nature."

I recalled immediately seeing Texas Governor Rick Perry giving his first televised interview after he won his first goobernatorship. He was decked out in a $5,000 suit. He wore shiny new boots made of alligator skin in the color and design of the American flag. I wanted to grab him by the nose and lead him to the American Flag Rules of Etiquite which states that no object be manufactured in the design of the flag.

Brad Ausmus

Houston catcher, Brad Ausmus won his 3rd Gold Glove this past week. What he lacks in hitting and scoring, he makes up for in superb defense and in calling games for the pitchers. He's bound to coach in the majors once his playing career ends.

Here's the skinny from MLB News:

Ausmus, also a Gold Glove recipient in 2001 and 2002, led all catchers in games caught (138), starts (124), fielding percentage (.998), total chances (994) and innings caught (1,124 2/3). He committed only two errors and allowed one passed ball.

"The Gold Glove at that position is by far one of the hardest, if not the hardest, to win," Astros general manager Tim Purpura said. "The durability you have to have, the stamina you have to have ... we talk about it all the time internally. Brad Ausmus is one of the toughest players in baseball. When he's banged up, bruised, hurt, you never hear about it. He never misses time. At that position, it's amazing what he does."

And I say, "How could a nice Jewish boy who scholarshipped at Dartmouth turn out to be anything but great?!"

Camille Knight

Another in a series of non-petty posts. Camille is one of my best friends. She's pictured above in a Whole Foods ad promoting more organics. Cammy is very sweet and patient. She has a little puppy named Hermes, who is the cat's meow and her pride and joy. Cammy has had an "interesting life" to say the least, and I often need to implore her to allow me to be the most pathetic person at any given gathering. I love Camille Knight!

Peasant Under Glass

Well, considering that the Pope John Paul II was once a peasant, it isn't a stretch to invoke the pun; that is, if you've a mind to. This photo came from my employers who just returned from a trip to Rome. I had no idea he was preserved in this manner, and find the treatment absolutely counter-reverential.

Ronnie Friedman-Barone

Today is the birthday of my wonderful friend, Ronnie. I shall celebrate by wishing that everyone could know her and the amazing times we have shared over the years.

Dick & Donald

The photo is of Cheney and Rumsfeld, old pals from the later years of the Nixon era. Click the pic to read the whole, sad story. Have a nice day my foot.

City Hall Part A Form B Office 8 Subfloor 3

So ... I had to run some business down at Austin City Hall today. Not the City Hall down on 2nd by the river, but the City Government Annex Building across the river on Barton Springs & First .... you know .... where The Armadillo World Headquarters used to be. Anyway, whatever. I'm standing at the reception counter in the Watershed Development Office or some such and the "receptionist" - a frumpy thing with candy jars on the counter along with little containers where you could drop a penny for a jelly bean or whatnot - immediately upon my arrival at her counter - she starts making a phone call ... turns out a long personal phone call about some meeting after work ... a bowling team thing, I might have heard. So, after about 5 minutes she turns half of her attention my way, still blithering into the phone and kinda loud-whispering to me, "May I Help You?" Jeez Louise ... the minute her mouth opened in my direction I was overcome by the odor of liquor. Damn ... it was like 10:00 in the morning and this frumpy little thing was tanked.