Today's "Blought" Is ...

Goodbye, 2006. You were a crummy year.

But then again, the years are pretty much all the same simply because well, nothing ever really changes in our push-pull, individually concocted universes of the world at large.

We just get older. That's it. And the cycle continues. Ad nauseam, ad infinitum.
A redux of regurgitation, reconstitution and regrouping.

Personally though, I'm looking at returning to work in the new year and continuing the "grind" out of debt while looking out the proverbial window. Geographically, I'm not going anywhere - yet - but it's been on the brain. I'm sick of the weather and the generally overcast pantomiming of governance in this town, and it's no wonder people are leaving in droves and not coming back. And even though I technically wasn't born within corporate limits, I've lived here 11 years, and that's enough.

A recent example, as seen on a nearby billboard, courtesy of a major health insurer:

What do 2.2 million Ohioans have in common?
Mental illness.

Thanks for the timely reminder, oh Stuffed Shirt Policymeisters.

Incidentally enough, on the House agenda is a bill that would mandate insurers in the state of Ohio to cover biologically-based mental illness - which is a little late, but still very much needed. But we've still got some major political fallout incurred over a 20 year span which has surely further impacted the morale more than some lame legislative measure can ever be hoped to even begin to address.


Just a couple flecks of hope:

(1) Lack of snow and dry, unseasonably warmer weather in the area, thanks to El Nino.

(2) The No. 1 and Big Ten Champs, the Ohio State Buckeyes have been the singular positive force to have kept us out of the clutches of the usual void predictably left by our lackadaisical local teams here, or anywhere else in the state. Cleveland can claim a Heisman Trophy, and possibly, the state can claim another awesome national championship in the forthcoming BCS Bowl.


In closing, I leave you all with cordial Best Wishes for the New Year, wherever you are in the world. And to paraphrase the late John Lennon... Hope is not over, if youth want it... and so long as it is carried by the rest of us in 2007 and beyond.

and everyone! See you next year.

Snow? Check.
Cold? Check.
Fellow life-long Clevelanders who suddenly cannot drive in winter weather? BIG check, ad infinitum.
Holiday shopping done? Check.
Job? Umm...

December in Cleveland: (Unnecessarily) endless weather updates from the news stations. Newfound inability to drive in snow, slick and cold. The Browns are done for the season - officially. Downtown is still dead. Stagnantly overcast and shorter days aloom. Seeming coagulation of the bloodstream and general locomotive capabilities. Suddenly it's a no-brainer why the bears hibernate; I wouldn't blame 'em if they broke out of the zoo here and headed north of the border just to get away from our doldrums!

Meanwhile, a little more south and scarlet of Cleveland's gray...

The No.1 & Big Ten champs, the Ohio State Buckeyes, are set to play the new No.2 Florida Gators in the BCS Championship Bowl in Glendale, Arizona on January 8, 2007. It will be a first time meeting between both teams for the BCS title.

And the Buckeyes post-season award goes to:

James Laurinaitis, OSU middle linebacker, for the Bronko Nagurski Trophy and the Randy Gradishar Linebacker Award.
Joel Penton, OSU defensive tackle, for the 2006 Wuerffel Trophy.
Antonio Smith, OSU defensive back, for the Bo Rein Award and the Agonis Club Award.
Ted Ginn, Jr., OSU offensive player, for the Archie Griffin award.

And especially...

Cleveland's own Troy Smith, OSU quarterback, for the Davey O'Brien Award, being named Walter Camp Player of the Year, as well as named the Buckeyes' 2006 Most Valuable Player. And not to be outdone, he is also a very heavily favored contender out of three finalists for the coveted Heisman Trophy. Check out the complete awards roster here.

On a more personal note... I had a nice Thanksgiving. Saw 1/2 of my immediate family, had a perfectly delicious turkey feast with all the fixings, and otherwise enjoyed a nice little reprieve away from here. I plan on doing the same on Christmas Day.

And the Seasonal Lump of Coal goes to...
Well... the image below sums it up in more or less of 1000 words, as recently published in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:


Later!

HEY OPERA TECHS - STOP THE INSANITY and FIX YOUR DAMN SERVER BUGS ALREADY!



Anyway...

Following last Tuesday's mid-term election returns... I could not be more mortally relieved or happier, and being a life-long Ohioan, I think I can safely speak for a lot of other fellow Ohioans who may or may not be blogging on Opera when I say that after 20 long years or so (depending on who you ask, it may feel like longer!) that the knuckles of the stranglehold of corrupt Republican dominance in this part of the Rust Belt have but all been fractured! Nice to be able to breathe again. Now it's time to recoup the damage that's been done having reverberated from here to the Beltway and into Club Fed, and gradually get back to the business of letting the citizenry decide how the state be BEST run without being a further embarassment to the rest of the country!


Still on the job hunt. It's getting too close to the holidays now so there's a good chance nothing might not develop any further until after the beginning of next year. Have a couple more prospects I've checked into this week, so you never know. At this point I'm starting to look outside my usual occupational field, maybe try something else for a change. We shall see.

The countdown has begun to the match between the Michigan Wolverines and the No. 1 Ohio State Buckeyes for this Saturday. We pummeled the Northwestern Illinois Wildcats last Saturday 54-10, with one TD after another. I can assure you the post-season awards will be lining up. A Heisman, a Butkus, and who knows what else. I'm very sure we'll beat Michigan and take the season and the forthcoming Championship bowl on yet more broken records for the books. Anyway one looks at it, it's going to be another classic battle to the finish!

OSU Buckeye gate crashing fan alert!

In closing, I'd like to dedicate the following 'toon as published recently in the Times-Picayune for our newest guard on the NCAA gridiron and the Beltway:



GO BUCKEYES!!!

Later!

Perhaps so. One of my job prospects called today about a meeting towards the end of next week. Tests, interview, general qualifications assessment. I'm prepared for this if it weren't for one thing...

I would also need a copy of my high school diploma.

This would be the first place to which I've applied that actually asked for some kind of proof that I graduated. Weird indeed. So that's my project for this weekend, to go through all the storage at my place to actually FIND this thing before next Thursday.


Anyway... the mid-term elections are getting down to the wire here. Slanderous campaign ads all around. It's really gotten ugly. Even a WWE match has much more class AND humor. Not that I watch the WWE series, but... I'm just sayin'...!!!

My wisdoms were acting up again today but I'm better, for now. My only regret is not having them all yanked out before my last insurance policy ran out a few months back. For now I can deal.

GO BUCKEYES!!!!!!

Later!

Another kooky week here on the Northcoast. Let me put it this way: it's never a dull moment around here. That's a promise!

(1) Over the previous weekend, someone broke into the City Club downtown and made off with a brass gong that's been used to open and close the speaker forums for the last 70 years. Thankfully, in today's edition of the Plain Dealer, it was reported that it had been completely recovered Thursday via US Mail "with a cancellation stamp from New York". The executive director of the club, James Foster, said that the theft may have been a "prank". We love you too, New York.

(2) The Army Corps of Engineers wants to build an "island" off the Lake at a cost of $100 million, with the city picking up 1/4 of the tab. This project will basically consist of the mud, slime, industrial junk, etc. that's been building up on the Lake bottom which will be scooped up and redistributed at a site somewhere along the span of the Lake front and 1/2 a mile off the coastline. The new location will be necessary due to an already mounting present landfill at Burke Lakefront Airport. However, it's still in the very early planning stages and will not commence until at least the year 2034. I'm sure the gulls can hardly wait.

(3) Also this past Tuesday on the West side... Cleveland mayor Frank Jackson, along with 10 other police were on a late evening stakeout to close in on prostitution in one neighborhood, while down the road undercover police posing as prostitutes were also set to bust the johns. Upon the sweeps, all the offenders were then loaded into a police van. "The media were invited Tuesday to 'spread the message that Cleveland isn't a marketplace for sex and drugs,' Mayor Frank Jackson said," stated the Plain Dealer in Wednesday's edition.

Earlier that day, and back at City Hall...

40 demonstrators from a coalition called the Northeast Ohio Poor People's Economic Human Rights Campaign gathered on City Hall steps to protest last year's designation of Cleveland as the "poorest big city in America", partly to raise awareness of the proposed minimum wage hike currently on the Ohio ballot as Issue 2, and also urge action on the part of the Mayor. "We remind ourselves and each other that every step we take is to make Cleveland a great city and improve the quality of life for all of us," he was reported as saying in a written statement.
"Now if you'll excuse me... there's a pair of busts that need my attention."

And for the cake icing ... the final slinging of debate mud in the state Capital, freshly signed abuses of executive power in the nation's Capital, and the colossal self-combustion of "compassionate" political posturing. That scene in The Wizard of Oz with the Wicked Witch melting from water thrown on her by Dorothy comes to mind.

And now...

The Unofficial Mid-term Election Game Checklist! (NOT endorsed by Milton Bradley [tm] ).
Try these on for size:

Monopoly. Now with human pawns and corporate landing spaces.
Connect the Dolts. The path to felony convictions.
Pain By Numbers. Polling place SNAFUs and general voting malaise.
Run Yourself Ragged. And into the ground.
Pin the Fail On the Donkey. Blame the Democrats.
Tic-Tac-D'Oh! "X" marks the fallguy.
Memory. Or lack thereof.
Brutes-n-Chatters. The making of a bad Rep.
Prattleship. News anchors aweigh!

And finally...

Sorry! Better luck next... term. Or maybe not.


GO BUCKEYES!!!!!

Later!

(With apologies to Spencer Tracy, Mickey Rooney, et al, from a similar sounding movie title. But it fits a week of hysteria.)

And what a week.

With all the time I have these days, and having tuned into the morning news as usual... we're dealing with yet another school shooting. Helicoptors hovering above, people scattered in dismay and cameras honed in on the scene. Except this time, it's in the Amish community. I stood watching the footage for a few minutes (hadn't even put my contacts in yet), listening as some of the details were being given on what had just happened. I couldn't believe it. I was also not happy that the news crew from the chopper just remained hovering right above some of the individuals (and one child) on the ground as they were comforting each other. No respect for one's space while in fresh shock following a senseless crime. Some time after I learned more of the grisly details of the murders and the perpetrator, I kept thinking to myself, "since when do we kill Amish children???" The other conclusion I came to was that after that day... there is no community left in this country that has not been affected by gun violence in some way; this was the last segment of the population to find themselves under siege by some armed nutcase for reasons no one could fathom. Of course, our ever-so-congenial "Yankee" press was predictably awash in a semantic orgy of "copycat" gun shooting theories (on the heels of two previous incidents the week before), the perpetrator's background, and nauseatingly enough, the oft-remarked "strength" of the Amish community to "forgive" in a time of tragedy. My overall observation about this ordeal, including the fashion in which it was handled and documented... is that we haven't learned a damn thing from it, and can't hope to. The camera lens in question lacks a mirror.

Another sign of the coming retribution at the polls in November: the disgraceful exit of a multi-term Congressman revealed to have had improper contact with (underage) Congressional pages. The detailed interactions between the parties involved had been termed by the newsdesks as "overfriendly", "sexually suggestive", et cetera. The Speaker of the House was warned about these transgressions several years back; incoming fellow pages were also given a heads-up about the creep down the Aisle. Of course, like everything else impending on the current Administration's watch (and head), it fell on selectively deaf ears. I see a collective indentation on some of those resumes, and it can't come soon enough.

Onto the chicken feathers.

On a final, but albeit lighter note: the 3rd (and final) Ohio gubanatorial debate was held in Cincinnati late last week. Naturally, candidates from alternate parties had been shut out from the floor (they did have a separate debate which was held in Columbus). The Plain Dealer detailed afterwards that a small band of protesters were gathered outside the (main) debate to condemn the third parties' exclusion - in chicken suits, to boot - only to be "shooed away by police". I found it doubly amusing, given candidate Secretary of State Ken Blackwell's remarks a while back about "barnyard logic" directed toward a certain segment of the constituency, as well as the continued monopoly by both major parties for debate venue.

Here's a gem that was printed in today's edition:



Later!

And it's starting to look and feel like fall already. Been another quiet week. Still waiting on the bigger news from Philips, which I anticipate in the coming days. Applied to other places, that honestly, I have no intention of driving to as I've had my share of long commutes for the last three years!

Things are still the same in Cleveland. Another school year and county fair season is upon us and/or winding down. Autumn leaves and then snow not too far behind. As I type the Cleveland Air Show participants are flying practice rounds in the staid gray atmosphere. Also been sort of keeping up with the "news" on Ohio's gubernatorial race, speaking of staid. Not that that's going to keep me from the polls (never has). But like everywhere else during an "election year" (which IS annual!) it's the same deal. Propaganda all around, more than enough to ensure the life span of the status quo in a continually filling hyperbolic vacuum for years to come. I don't have to live in our nation's Capital to know how things are when it's right in my backyard or on my front stoop.

Hopefully in my next entry things will be more positive. Until then ... to my fellow Americans, have a safe and peaceful Labor Day weekend. And to the rest of you, have a safe and peaceful weekend regardless.

Later!

Another weekend is here, and another job interview has passed. And this one is huge. It's a labor position within Philips' medical systems division. It's close to home, and I really, REALLY hope I can land this job!! I think my meeting went well Thursday afternoon. I happened to be the first person interviewed for the ongoing job opening and was told I would be contacted by the latter part of the month with a decision. I learned they're looking for an initial several people to begin filling the department, which was undergoing additional construction when I was later taken on tour. Once this transition out of California is complete, they'll have even more people. After I left, I felt I still had a shot at being a part of their starting line-up. (Insert holding of breath here!)

On an unrelated note: Big stink on the Lake this weekend. Following all those storms we had three weeks prior, and in the midst of the current dry spell, we're dealing with a combination of Lake effect winds that are strong enough to kick up debris from the lake bottom while simultaneously excaberating an already rotting former algae growth. UGH. Some of the beaches east of me in Lake County are still closed following the storms we had mid-July, and people are still cleaning up. I read in the paper a few days ago that the storm system they suffered was described by scientists as the "storm of the millenium", in which the copious rainfall in such a short period of time (in less than 12 hours) and subsequential mass flooding wouldn't be seen again for "dozens of generations". Lucky!!

In the meantime I'm enjoying the sunshine and birds.
Later!

check back later!!