Newscoma

Winston was from northwest Tennessee and contacted me about a year ago. We had a few emails back and forth and I met him once at Mothership Barbecue. He was always lovely and so encouraging.

And the man could write circles around you.

Winston, from the blog Nobody Asked, died this weekend according to a post written by the Roomie.

Winston passed away Saturday, June 28, after a 38-hour illness and 3 surgeries totaling 12 hours in an attempt to save his life. His memorial service will be Tuesday, July 1, and will include things you may have seen on his blog, such as his recent post about the styrofoam cup that got tossed about in the traffic of life and found its resting place. His favorite song will be played — “The Rainbow Connection,” by Kermit the Frog, as well as a bluegrass version of Rocky Top.

Just last week, I linked to a wonderful post that he wrote about Jimmy Buffet. I have to say that Winston was always kind, smart and clever.

He will be missed and our thoughts and prayers go to Roomie.

He, indeed, was an excellent guy.

Godspeed, Winston.

Lots going on this past week from the progressive bloggers around the state at TennViews.

Go on, get on over there.

June has been a challenging month. I feel like I may have pissed off the Gods of June who I think I will just call Vera. Vera is extremely irritated at me. I believe I’ve offended her beyond belief.

Steve Austin is still MIA and cost me a cool $1500 to get fixed (and I still don’t have him back), people sort of lost their minds this month (this of course would include me), a much-needed beach vacation had to be canceled, my poor chief staff writer had a terrible dirt bike wreck and had to have surgery, the refrigerator is dead and I have strep throat.

The drugs have made me addled. I am wandering around like a drunk monkey and Mabel is still eyeballing me warily.

Last week, as humans are wont to do, I got into the angries. I tried not to, avoided it all costs but it swept over me like a wave of a tsunami and I couldn’t stop it. Man, it just hit me. And of course I didn’t feel good not knowing I had strep, I just knew I couldn’t hear and that Vera hated me.

Today, I’m sort of laughing about it today because what else can I do. I don’t feel very good, I still can’t hear, I’m going back to work tomorrow although the docs said Wednesday but Squirrel Queen said she would help out if I got fatigued and that was more than nice. It’s a four-day work week and that’s awesome.

So, sometimes, even when Vera is irritated, it’s nice to know there is light at the end of the tunnel.

At least I’m not as addled as this guy.

Image courtesy of Hetemeel

Having watched Turn Left and now the second part of the penultimate episode called The Stolen Earth from Doctor Who, I can only say wow. We have one more week to go when we get to see the finale with Journey’s End.

If you haven’t seen it, I’ll put it behind the wall, but I have to say, if this is Russell T. Davies swan song, he’s going out with a bang.

Spoilers behind the jump.

(more…)

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BqLvBUSJucg]

A walk through the past with our president, George Bush.

Vibinc has a question:

The point of all this is, politicians are supposed to be criticized, compared and contrasted, that’s how they get the job. When suddenly, the politician translates these core principles of the election process as personal attacks, you gotta ask yourself why. Are they more married to their positions, or their position in office?

It’s a good one.

Occasionally I have a politician say, “Are you going to put that on that bloggy thing of yours?”

Sometimes I do. Sometimes I don’t. It always amazes me when someone runs for office, they are very accessible. Then during their time in office, when we are trying to find them, it’s like chasing down Bigfoot.

Then, the process starts again.

On the other hand, if we say anything critical, there can be a subtle psychological push of “a misunderstanding.” There’s no misunderstanding. There are questions that just deserves answers even if the answer is “I don’t know.”

It’s not an attack, as Vibinc writes. It’s either just questions or utilizing our voices in trying to understand what’s actually going on.

Not every politician I know is thin-skinned. But I do find many of them find they aren’t listening or watching their districts. Creating task forces is a waste of time if they continue to put the same people on these “committees” who are going to tell them what they want to hear.

The issue comes down, for me at least, that things are rapidly changing in this country. Flooding, higher gas costs with no way for some citizens to pay the increases, higher food costs, and hell, the North pole ice caps are melting (Tim Chavez has more on this) not to mention that the recent flooding is going to have long-term economic effects on several states.

Are those elected officials paying attention? Or are they working on their spin for the next election?

Are they above answering questions that affecting citizens?

The answer is no they are not.

I’m reading a Carl Hiaasen book that came out several years ago called “Sick Puppy.”

I’ve read some of this other stuff and occasionally, when I want a fun, snarky read, I’ll pick up one of his books and go to town. I liked “Native Tongue” quite a bit as well.

If you have ever read a Hiaasen book, you know the politicians are corrupt, the protagonists are extremely flawed (or a little bit crazy) and the politicians are corrupt. Usually, Hiaasen’s novels are about dirty developers who could give two flips about the environment. (In this particular book, there is a hooker that will only do “business” with Republicans which I thought was pretty funny.)

Hiaasen has no sympathy for politicians and apparently thinks lobbyists are the dog poo on the bottom of America’s collective shoes. I bring that up because he’s hard on both the left and the right. He writes, in most of the books I’ve read, that when politicians get to any state capital or to Washington, they relinquish their party lines and become more of an overall blob that dams up government for nefarious and mostly selfish means. They ultimately become part of a parasitic and egotistical pool of greed. And that the lobbyists are the ones that rule much of the country, using elected folks as puppets. Politicians are thin-skinned and clueless about what’s going on in the districts they were elected to.

With the recent antics I’ve seen coming from our government recently, I can’t help but think that Hiaasen’s book is more on target than the biting satire it is written as.

Because, my friends, I don’t think our government has a clue what’s going on because they are so immersed in the life of living in either Nashville or Washington.

Yeah, I’m not feeling the love for any of them today.

Don’t believe me, well look at this.

There are several more charts over at the The Cattle Network.

This isn’t good news, campers. Not good news at all.

H/T Neatorama

I’m linking to a post by Cathy that says some very good things not only about her role as a parent, but some advice we could all take pause and think about.

I don’t want my children to go through life with a big blank smile on their faces, saying “everything is fine” when life is all about highs and lows. It is the lows that make the highs that much sweeter. As adults, we learn to filter who we share details of life with, but even as adults, we recognize the big, fat liars who are more superficial than a department store mannequin. Teenagers have enough problems without adults denying their feelings. If one of my children says they had a really cruddy day, they need a hug. They don’t need me telling them that their day doesn’t matter or that they are wrong. Their blog is their therapy couch. It’s where they get to let it all out. Validation is much more important than keeping up appearances.

It’s true. Even as an adult, when I say it’s been a crappy day, that’s usually me asking for validation that my emotions are allowable. That they are valid. People need to be heard even when they aren’t telling you the whole story because the whole story is too painful to tell.

Everyone could use a hug instead of a snarky remark.

At least that’s my experience.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4Q47i4zGBs]

This a hot mess of campy goodness. You have Johnny Horton in an all white buckskin jacket with matching white coonskin hat. You have English soldiers dancing.

I cannot look away.

Your retro moment of the day (and when I was a kid, this played on the jukebox at a restaurant my dad owned for while. I would play it and sing it loud and proud. Much to the dismay of customers. Yeah, I was a curious and annoying child.)

I think I agree with the statement below more than anything. I love music, I do. I like all kinds except Southern Gospel. I just don’t get Southern Gospel. If it’s your thing, enjoy it. Just not mine.

And I don’t get homogenized country music written just to be a hit. When I was in Nashville, I heard more songwriters talk about “the hook” and how they could hear their song being played on Gerry House. Don’t get me wrong, songwriting is a business but it just always felt disingenuous to me but I get that no one wants to starve either. I’m no songwriter so what do I know?

But man, there was some stinkers that I heard. Unfortunately, a few of them became hits. I turned the radio on over to Radio Lightening and went about my life.

I like some country music. Give me some Willie, some Dwight Yoakum or even some Ray Price and I enjoy it. I like bluegrass for about 25 minutes and then I need a break but for that 25 minutes, I dig it. However, there is a part of me when I listen to any popular music, not just country, and I think did they write that in a chrome-filled boardroom wearing Abercrombie and Fitch drinking Appletinis singing about the dried dirty on the mudflaps of their Dodge Ram, love of the girl who worked in the factory and slurping down PBRs to drink her memory away because she married someone else who’s on a farm.

Give me a break. Steve Goodman, I miss you dude.

And I agree with Heartbreaktown wholeheartedly who has been doing some very good reviews of the Grand Ole Opry because she doesn’t sugarcoat a thing:

Trace closes the night with “You’re Gonna Miss This” and I’m sitting here wishing I was. I don’t like country songs that reference SUVs. I hate modern middle class suburban references in my country music – it’s another matter of personal taste, I just want my country music timeless. I know I can be cynical, but I “get” why this song is popular. It’s just that it reminds me of the well-meaning, super-thoughtful, life-lessony email chains I get everyday. Am I suppose to forward this song to 48 of my closest friends or my boobs will fall off?

And that is why not only you need to add me to your feedburner but Heartbreaktown as well.

I’m with her on this one. Read her whole post. It’s good.

Yes, the strep throat is bitch but I can see a bit of improvement from yesterday and last night was all right I guess because I was stoned out of my head due to all the medicine that I’m having to take. Apparently I’m not the only suffering one from general malaise and feeling like penguin poo.

I own it. This is some powerful stuff but if it will make me well and give me back my ears, it’s of the good. I’ll probably be announcing my rehab stay with Heather Locklear next week because that apparently is what famous people do and this stuff is STRONG. Squirrel Queen laughed at me because not only was I wondering around the house like I was at a Grateful Dead concert, yammering on Twitter (sorry for those who had to put up with me over there all though I had a great time) and I watched Transformers

I’d give you a review a year late of it but the only thing I can really say is that Peter Cullen voicing Optimus Prime was my favorite part. SQ and I talked today that we really don’t know anything about Transformers so what we saw was a bunch of big robots fighting. I know that’s not very deep but that’s what I got out of it.  Did I mention my medication?  Oh, yeah, I did. If you want to know more about it, go read Ron Hogan’s review at Den of Geek. With that said, I’m a voice-over geek. I love to know who’s voicing what. I guess that goes back to my DJ days.

On another note, Happy Birthday Nelson Mandela.

And due to my medical diversion, I didn’t have enough energy to post about this so just go have your Moment of Zen with Steve Cohen who compares Vice-president Dick Cheney to a barnacle. Now, this is why he’s my political boyfriend.

Finally, join Friendfeed right now. I don’t mean to be an evangelist about this but with Twitter “stressing” I’m finding the functionality of Friendfeed to be very useful. You can put all of your online ramblings into one place, comment, send messages, favorite things such as photos from Flickr, Youtube, Last.fm, twitters, posts and the like all in one place. I had a moment of if anything were to every happen to me, that I wanted a place to show my brilliance and my ineptitude for my nieces. So I have taken my RSS from Friendfeed and put it on a Tumblr account, which of course is also called Newscoma.

I’ve had that account for about a year and I didn’t know what to do with it, so now I do. Yeah, I’m slow on the uptake.

Why do I do this stuff? Because I’m trying to learn new things and I guess one way to do that is to root around places.

And, go read Angela because she’s good. Also, go read and listen to Katie at Shaggy Dog Farms. Three of the four dogs here at Chez Coma were rescues (well, Mabel just showed up and never left and I sometimes wonder where the hell she came from) but Duff was tossed out at Homer’s house when the oldest niece, Asa Corn, was about one year-old. She has a site dealing with pups and kittens. Being that I guess I’m a dog blogger, go check out healthy and gentle living for the animals.

This is Duff. She’s lived with us 11 years. I call her the stinky dog. She has been stinky since the day she moved in with us. But I love her.

Headed back to the strep throat drug highway. I’ll be seeing pink elephants today I’m sure so bear with me.

Because I’ll probably blog about it, as that is what I’m wont to do.