Word to your mother July 2, 2006
Posted by hallelujahhatrack in Funny, Social Issues, Uncategorized.6 comments
So, I’m flipping the channels the other night just to make sure that there is other summer television programming beyond the Boston Red Sox broadcasts, and found out that sure enough there is. I found the BET Awards.
If you look at my photo to the right you will see that I am not necessarily the target audience for this type of programming, but I thought what the hell, I like Denzell and Spike and The Commodores and Earth Wind and Fire, so I watched for a while. This is what I learned.
-There are a lot of rappers that I’ve never heard of.
-No rappers go by their real names.
-Every rapper has a CD coming out every 15 days.
-Rappers must have a corporate marketing tie-in deal with Sunglass Hut or a lot of them have light sensitivity issues (Everyone there was wearing their Foster-Grants. Indoors.)
-Rappers must also have a marketing arrangement with Foot Locker. The Boston Celtics’ basketball shoes are nothing compared to the kicks worn by the rapping community.
-Another tie-in must be with Lidz. If you rap you have to wear a cap. Now, I have a lot of baseball-style hats (about 100) and wear them a lot, but when I get one I meticulously wet and bend the brim, then put the rolled brim into my Superman coffee mug to dry overnight to achieve the prefect look. These gentlemen have gone the complete other direction. If I set my iron at its highest level, and then had the defensive line of my beloved Philadelphia Eagles push the iron on the bill of one of my baseball hats for a complete 24 hours, it would still not be a straight as the brim of Doug E. Fresh’s (or whoever’s) retro Denver Nuggets hat.
-When rappers wear their caps, the brim can not face forward – like it’s supposed to. The bill of the cap must be worn as if the sun is constantly to your left.
-These folks like to ‘represent’.
-I’m not certain just what they are representing. Like I said, I thought they were representing Sunglass Hut, Foot Locker and Lidz.
-Rappers want you to know if they are from the east coast or the west coast. This seems to be a pretty big deal. Apparently, no rappers are ‘representing’ Kansas.
-Rappers also like you to know in what zip code or area code they reside. They like to give shout outs to the brothers in the 90210 (well, maybe not 90210, that one’s been taken…) or in the 405.
-These people seem to dwell on the ‘assassinations’ of Tupac and Biggie. As Chris Rock once said, Martin was assassinated, Malcom was assassinated, and Kennedy was assassinated. These two, er.., gentlemen, were SHOT. Hey rapper guys, Jerry Garcia died not too long ago, but I got over it!
I suppose that’s enough of my recap of the BET Awards. I’ve got to go get some stuff at Target, then get my morning coffee, and then I’m off to the Buick Championship golf tournament. Maybe this evening I’ll take the kids for ice cream.
Cause that’s how we roll in the 860, motherf*cker! PEACE!!
Pet Peeve #29 June 6, 2006
Posted by hallelujahhatrack in Funny, Social Issues, Uncategorized.3 comments
I can understand when The Bear butchers the English language, because he’s only six years old. My favorite is the use of the word, ‘oftenly’, as in “David Ortiz oftenly hits home runs against the Yankees.”
What really bugs me is when adults show their verbal ignorance in public. It makes me wonder if there should be a statute of limitations on our high school diplomas. If I have to have an eye test to continue driving a motor vehicle then maybe they should have to take an exam in order to have permission to speak outside of their own home.
Here are a few examples from just today:
A woman is talking about how she likes her secluded yard: “It’s very peaceful because we can really see any of our neighbors because of all the foilage.” You ass, the word is foliage, not FOILAGE – I don’t think what you are trying to say is that your yard is shiny and silver.
The woman that the foilage lady was talking to was discussing and encounter in her yard between some members of the local wildlife community: “The robin was just sitting there and a gardener snake crawled by and the robin attacked it.” Ok, first of all, as snake does not crawl, as it has no legs. The bigger issue is that there is no such thing as a ‘gardener snake’ – it’s a GARTER snake, for crap’s sake. Where were you in 9th grade Earth Science???
I work for a bank, and this is a bit of a conversation between a co-worker and a customer: “If you want to figure out what your monthly principal and interest payment will be you have to minus out your escrows.” MINUS OUT – what the hell is that? I think the work you are looking for is ‘subtract’…
I realize that all of this is very petty, but hey, that’s me – man of a million pet peeves.
The Wussification of America, the sequel June 1, 2006
Posted by hallelujahhatrack in Kids, Social Issues, Uncategorized.1 comment so far
A few months ago I had a post titled The Wussification of America and now I am forced to post part two.
At this point I am very frustrated with what is being done in our school system. Now, by and large I love American public education, but at the rate we’re going in
Connecticut we will have nothing but a bunch of spineless wimps that are prepared to live on a commune and not in the real world.
First of all, the Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference has made a rule that any high school football coach that wins a game by a margin of 50 or more points will be suspended for the next game. This is a rule that was put in place for one coach who decides on a regular basis to run up the score, not for coaches that pull their starters and don’t throw long passes like they are supposed to do when they are up by dozens of points.
What I’m pissed about is that the people in power have decided that our high school athletes – football players nonetheless – are too babyish to handle getting their asses kicked on the field. I’m pretty sure that they are able to handle it, and on top of it, the last time I checked getting you ass beat is a much bigger character builder than winning by eight touchdowns. What SHOULD happen if a team gets beaten by 50 points on more than one occasion is that THEIR coach should be suspended for the next game.
Next, the school system in the town where I live had decided to begin using a cooperative education program called “Tribes”. On the surface the program is supposed to engrain characteristics like respect, responsibility, honesty, trustworthiness, compassion, empathy, justice, fairness, civic participation/service, kindness, integrity, work ethic, caring social skills into our kids. What it actually does is turn them into pussies.
If every person in the world went through this program, and adhered to it, the world would be a beautiful place and we wouldn’t have to hear blowhards like Senators Kennedy and Byrd spouting off every ten minutes about the evil of the world and they could go back to boozing it up and driving their mistresses off of bridges.
What I’m certain of is this: the world doesn’t operate in a cooperative way, and that’s good. It’s why
America has been dominant for so long. Business is cutthroat, sports are cutthroat, and at work you are not evaluated as a group – every time I’ve had a performance review it was based on my performance ALONE. What I’m also certain of is that our educators – not our classroom teachers but our principals on up, should be forced to work in the real world so that they can see that crap like “Tribes” is irrelevant once you get beyond middle school. Maybe if I had daughters instead of sons I would think differently, but I doubt it.
I am also certain that Bin Laden isn’t teaching this sh*t to his band of merry men.
I will end with a quote from my favorite TV heroine, Buffy the Vampire Slayer: “The hardest part about the world is living in it.”
Amen, Sister. And let’s not make it any harder than it already is.
Five for Friday: Dumb ass stuff March 24, 2006
Posted by hallelujahhatrack in Funny, Lists, Social Issues, Uncategorized.add a comment
So, this morning I’m watching the “Today Show” and their doing a story about how in
Texas police have been going into bars to arrest drunk people. Yup, handcuffs and paddy wagon (or at least plastic tie things and a tricked out Astro van).
Huh?
Now, I realize that this may be good if they keep a drunk driver off of the road, but one of the women was arrested at a hotel bar and she was staying at the hotel!
Again, huh?
Then I got to thinking, what’s next for the police to do, and I came up with this week’s Five for Friday:
-Maybe they can go into restaurants and arrest people for over eating. I mean, isn’t obesity at epidemic proportions (at least that’s what I keep hearing)? Shouldn’t’ these people have to pay for their crime against the healthcare industry?
-Perhaps they can go into churches, synagogues, and mosques (or maybe not mosques – we don’t want to offend anyone…) and arrest people for praying.
-Then they can go to high school musicals and arrest people for singing along and tapping their toes (“You’re doing fine Oklahoma, Oklahoma, OK!” – just try not to sing along, I dare you).
-Or the police can go to movie theaters and arrest people who are eating popcorn (lucky for me I’m a Hot Tamales guy and not a popcorn guy).
-And finally, now that spring is here, they can go to baseball games and arrest all of the people who “root, root, root, for the home team.”
Arresting people who are drinking in bars – I’m pretty sure that this is one of the sure signs of the apocalypse. If they want to arrest people in bars, my suggestion is they go to karaoke bars and arrest anyone who sings a Bachman-Turner Overdrive song.
Oh, what a wonderful world that would be…
Why I can’t be a cop March 16, 2006
Posted by hallelujahhatrack in Social Issues, Uncategorized.add a comment
I often applaud our law enforcement professionals for displaying a great amount of restraint while apprehending the garbage that lives among us, but my praise could not be higher than it is right now. Perhaps you saw this on the news over the past couple of days:
CHICAGO – Participants in an international Internet chat room transmitted live visuals of child molestation and traded thousands of pictures of child pornography, federal authorities said Wednesday in announcing charges against 27 people. U.S. and international authorities have charged 27 people who took part in the Kiddypics & Kiddyvids chat room. The youngest child seen in pictures or video was less than 18 months old, Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said in announcing the results of the 10-month investigation. The defendants include Brian A. Annoreno of Chicago, who prosecutors say molested an infant and transmitted it live to a viewer in the Canadian city of Edmonton.
Now, if I had been one of the police officers who finally made the arrests of these animals (I refuse to call them ‘people’), I would have immediately been placed on leave for the fatal shooting of suspects and would have been happy to pay whatever consequences came my way. There would have been 2 shots fired at each perp – the second would have been to the head 30 minutes after the first one, which would have been to the, well, you know. Why 30 minutes and not right away? Just so I could watch him die (all due respect to the late Johnny Cash).
Hell, if it were one more tick to the wrong side of the sane-insane continuum I would pull a Travis Bickle and go get the scum right now.
Sorry for the downer post, but this really bothered me when I saw it. Lucky for me I don’t own a firearm.
Black History or Jim Crow? February 1, 2006
Posted by hallelujahhatrack in Social Issues, Uncategorized.1 comment so far
We all are aware of the joke that black stand up comedians tell about Black History Month being held in the shortest month of the year. This was funny the first six hundred times that I heard it, but has lost its humor with the over telling. (It is actually held in February because that is the birth month of Frederick Douglass, Langston Hughes, and Abe Lincoln)
Now, I’m just an early (very early!) middle aged half Cherokee, half Irish guy who would never be mistaken for black, but if I were a black man I think that I would have great issue with the concept of Black History Month.
In my opinion, the black population of America is being slighted and marginalized by being singled out for their accomplishments and additions to the fabric of America. It’s sort of like a Jim Crow version of American History.
Instead of a ‘separate but equal’ account of our nation’s achievements, I think that were I black I would like to have the accounts of my people help up along side those of the rest of the Americans of the past. Why not celebrate George Washington Carver along side of Thomas Edison? Why not teach W.E.B Du Bois and Ben Franklin in the same lesson? Why not hold up the legacies of leadership of Dr. King and Malcolm X with those of George Washington and Thomas Jefferson? Why not take the opportunity to compare the careers of Jackie Robinson and Ted Williams and to discuss the works of Spike Lee and Martin Scorsese. I do this with my kids, why can’t we do it with all of us?
Maybe I’m wrong, but to separate the accomplishments of these great Americans only serves to diminish their impact on America and the world.
Hey Florence, another shot of Phenobarbital! January 25, 2006
Posted by hallelujahhatrack in Adoption, Family, Social Issues, Uncategorized.1 comment so far
Forty three years ago today I took my first breath in Ohio Valley General Hospital in Wheeling, WV.
From there I was off to the Florence Crittenton Home. This Home was a place where unwed mothers prepared for the birth of their babies and dodged the glare of the shameful looks that would assuredly have been cast their way had they stayed at home. Once at Florence Crittenton the girls were browbeaten into giving up their babies for adoption.
After the children were surrendered to the Home the staff began the daily routine of not paying attention to them, feeding them by propping a bottle into their mouth and letting them fend for themselves, as well as lacing their formula with Phenobarbital (as you may recall, this is the stuff that the Heaven’s Gate cult mixed with applesauce to kill themselves in a mass suicide in the spring of 1997 – it is also used to treat epileptic dogs and cats…) in order to get them to shut up, when picking them up was all it would have taken.
The staff then became very creative and invented biographies of the birth parents to give to prospective adoptive parents – either that or the only people having premarital sex back then were football coaches or pre-med students and nurses or college girls…
I’d like to think that this type of abuse no longer occurs, but for a generation of adoptees the predisposition to chemical dependency and lifelong abandonment issues are here to stay.
Find another criteria, please! January 12, 2006
Posted by hallelujahhatrack in Politics, Social Issues, Uncategorized.add a comment
Most people realize that I have strong opinions on most topics, large and small, and that I am not afraid to let my feelings be known. With that being said, I have absolutely no opinion on the subject of abortion. Fortunately I have never been faced with this decision, but I do not look down upon anyone who has had an abortion just as I do not look upon anyone who has decided against this as being on some lofty moral plane.
The opinion that I do have surrounding this topic is as follows: I continue to wonder why we select the leaders of our country (primarily the President, but currently with the Alito Inquisition) based almost entirely on the issue of abortion.
This completely baffles me. Why? Because it’s not a political issue. It is a social and moral issue, but not one is the cornerstone of our national election/selection process. Now, I’m not saying that this is not a very important issue, because it is, but I’m not sure that who we select to steer our country – and in turn the world, should be based upon this issue.
(As an aside, I am confident that if 99% of conservatives are pro-life and 99% of liberals are pro-choice, that many of these people are lying and are simply following the partisan party line and not letting their true feelings be known. Come on, strap on a pair and pick your side of an issue by using your true beliefs and not by what political party is listed on your voter registration card. Sorry to get off track…)
I’m pretty sure that I can think of a few dozen items that are more important – Education. Poverty, Security, Immigration, Social Security, and the list goes on, and on, and on… – in the selection of a Supreme Court Justice, President of the United States, or any other elected official than abortion rights.
Mr. Robertson, God is on line 1… January 6, 2006
Posted by hallelujahhatrack in Religion, Social Issues, Uncategorized.add a comment
It looks as if the Bat Phone in Pat Robertson’s office rang again yesterday. God, who apparently has Robertson on speed dial, called to discuss Ariel Sharon’s situation with the leader of the 700 Club. See below:
From the Associated Press today: WASHINGTON – The White House sharply criticized Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson on Friday for suggesting that Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon’s stroke was divine punishment for “dividing God’s land.” Robertson made comments about Israel and Sharon on his TV program, “The 700 Club.” He said, “God considers this land to be his. You read the Bible and he says `This is my land,’ and for any prime minister of Israel who decides he is going to carve it up and give it away, God says, `No, this is mine.’”
This brings up a few questions:
1. Does this guy have nothing better to do than to misinterpret the Bible and twist its words into whatever shape he wants?
2. Who actually watches his program? In my entire life I’ve never known anyone who, a) watches “The 700 Club” or b) even knows what channel it on.
3. Why does no one ever seem to really challenge him (or Falwell, for that matter) for these dumb ass quotes? The White House took him to task on this one, and a few in the past, but nothing major – it’s forgotten about in a few hours. Either he’s a sacred cow and no one wants to touch him, or he’s such a lunatic that no one really puts any credence into his defamatory remarks. I’m hoping it’s the latter, not the former.
If anyone can explain this idiot and his continual hateful comments to me, I’d be happy to be enlightened.
Merry Christmas and Happy Hanukkah! December 28, 2005
Posted by hallelujahhatrack in Social Issues.add a comment
I am proud to say that the high school in the town in which I live has blatantly disregarded the ACLU and their B.S. anti-Christmas crap.
At the end of November the kids in the drama group put on a wonderful production of “Meet Me In St. Louis,” complete with a Christmas (not ‘Holiday’) Tree, a mealtime prayer including the word ‘Lord’, and the song “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas.”
This month the chorus and jazz band kids held their annual Winter Concert and we were treated to a few secular carols, but the topper for me was a nice rendition of “O, Holy Night.”
As far as I’m aware, nobody’s head exploded, the principal has received no death threats, and the non-Christians in the audience were not marginalized, but I’ll keep you posted…!
