Charles D Hyland was my big brother

My brother died unexpectedly last Wednesday and this Wednesday is his memorial service.  I will be attending and this is what I will say:

When I was putting together the music for this evening I had that worry we all have about losing files and so it's saved on my phone my ipod all my computers, it's even in my email. And to test it when it was done I put the Ipod in the car and went for a drive. One of the first songs to come up was California dreamin. I distinctly remember,  I was probably about ten when Chuck had his 1947 Pontiac Silver Streak, and we'd go riding around listening to albums on his portable record player that he'd perch on the front seat on a pillow. And one of those days we listened to that album. I can still see that record player sitting there on that pillow. There'll be many more moments I remember like that for the rest of my life I hope, and God knows there are many stories to tell.

As most of you know I am not biologically a Hyland. I have all the neuroses and tics one gets from just being in the room with their family no matter the origin and I added a few of my own just in case.

But whatever the circumstance that brought me to those people it came with a stroke of great good fortune. My brother.

As we all have there have times in my life when I believed in myself not at all. I had no confidence in my abilities, my talents, my intelligence, my worth in any way. But there was always one person to whom I could go who just because he was who he was I could get my self-confidence restored. Cause my big brother believed in me even when I didn't. Chuck wasn't the most demonstrative person in the world, but if I listened...I knew.

So y'all can have your biological Brothers older or younger. But I have a bit of bad news for you. The best one is spoken for.

Living up to high praise

"I know we've thrown you into the deep end on your first week.  But I also know you can swim."

Nice to hear from your new boss, but living up to it when I'm not feeling ready...yikes.

My immediate supervisor has departed as of yesterday afternoon for the holidays, meaning she won't be back until the 3rd.  I have two more days until I leave for the holidays and I'll be gone until the 3rd as well.  After that, I'm in the hot seat.

I have to learn three new suites of software and develop and prepare training materials for about 155 hard-boiled school librarians who'll be tapping their toes at me come early January. 

oy!

I can't tell you how much fun I'm havng!

And so it goes.

And to back up my contention here's proof

"I am Adam Lanza's mother"  is a blog post on a blog titled Blue Review. 

It addresses some of the very real and frightening concerns that a mother of a mentally ill young boy deals with every single day.  And without getting him charged with a crime there's no way she can get as much help as she needs. 

How can we think this is right?  We have to reverse the absurd policies created by the draconian Reagan administration and return some order to the mental health profession. 

Go read this for yourself:

http://thebluereview.org/i-am-adam-lanzas-mother/

And so it goes.

Lay the blame where it belongs

Adam Lanza was sick. And someone knew it long before yesterday when we all found out in a horrific manner. Why didn't they do something? What could they do? How could this have been prevented?

 Well, if we had a time machine and could go back and remove Ronald Reagan as President many of these tragedies could have been prevented. I've said many times here that he single-handedly murdered America and he's still doing it. Back in the day we spent the necessary money to provide places to house the mentally ill and they were kept a safe distance away from us. But then Ronald Reagan thought, "That's too much money to spend on crazy people."

 So he just cut the funding sent them out in the streets and created the homeless problem we've been dealing with ever since,increased Emergency room visits for mental health issues, and sadly created the environment in which the Adam Lanza's of this world are allowed to go unchecked and untreated, which killed a lot of kids yesterday.

 Do I think we should go back to the days of Willowbrook? of course not. But there are things we can do.

Yes, we can have better gun control laws, but it appears that the guns Adam Lanza used weren't illegal. It seems Mommie Dearest bought them legally and Adam simply had access to them cause he lived with her. So though I agree we need to have better gun control laws and more thorough background checks we'll never,in this culture of guns penetrate the veil that exists within our society regarding them. It exists and we'll have it always. Let's learn to control it instead of allowing one group with enormous lobbying power and control to run the country on this issue.

But back to the matter at hand. Let's also take care of our own. If we accepted the responsibility to provide care for Adam Lanza and his mother, both of whom obviously needed help, we'd be a far more caring and certainly safe society. Certainly the brother and the father knew something was amiss at that house. It was their responsibility to speak up and see to it that they got help. There are many more victims here than just those poor children who died in such a pointless massacre.

 So let's start accepting the responsibility that Reagan abdicated so glibly. Let's take care of each other, and see to it that we save as many Adam Lanza's as possible so we don't have to protect the children from our own.

And so it goes.

You're never too old to learn

ok, so i'm back...we'll see how long this lasts. In that whole circle of life thing, I've lost a job, not much of a job, but a job nonetheless. But in the process I've gained another. Or should I say regained. Way Way Way back in this blog you will find a post, likely several, about me losing a job by way of economic downturn. I got it back. Like two days after I lost my job I emailed my former boss at the library to network. Long story short, to borrow a phrase, The job she intended for me to have four years ago had finally been created and was available. She urged me to apply and the rest as they say is history. I start in ten days. Needless to say I've been completely self[involved this last ninety days. All I've thought about is me, how am I going to make it through til a new job comes along? How am i going to pay the bills? How am I going to eat? Blah Blah Blah. Of course, the bills got paid, food was on the table, and I'm still here. Such drama. I have however had occasion to reflect on the nature of friendship. People as we know have an infinite capacity to disappoint. They have not failed me yet again. A woman whom I went to a great deal of trouble for, i.e. I got her a job at a time when she was not only about to lose her car, but desperate just to eat regularly demonstrated her true character. After I had gone to this trouble to get her a job and subsequently and unrelatedly lost my own, she went about telling all and sundry gory details about my termination. This was not particularly dismaying, i never counted this woman among my friends, she was an acquaintance and I only got her the job because I felt some compassion for another person in need, who was in a situation she couldn't dcontrol without some help. And no one was helping...now I see why. But what was dismaying was that people who call themselves my friends did listen. They sat mute while these tales were told and didn't challenge this woman. They didn't stop her and tell her that not only was this inappropriate to come to them and tell these tales, but that she was being a complete cunt for doing it after what I had done for her. They did none of this. They did, however, tell me all about it. Now, history has borne out the fact that I am a particularly bad judge of character. If you're the type of person who'll stab me in the back in the middle of the town square, I usually take right to you. If you're a mean abusive son of a bitch who appears to be a lamb in public I will embrace you. In other words I am a dummy when it comes to people. This however, has given me pause to re-evaluate the position that certain people hold in my life, and whether they deserve it. They decidedly do not. So they'll become history. I'm not having any big scenes, I'm not having any long discussions about who did what and to whom and how it felt. people are who they are and they're not gonna change just because I want them to. But I do not have to subject myself to them. All this having been said and done, I have not mentioned that I actually do have good friends. Some are recent developments. Some have been around a while and just proved their mettle, but they're good friends nonetheless. Two in particular have seen to it that I've had positive support and contact that reaffirmed my worth in their eyes. It's been an invaluable resource. So thanks to them and fare well to fair weather friends. It's nigh on to time I sent them packing. new leaves and all that. And so it goes.

The cynic in me gets yet another boost

President Barack Obama endorses  marriage...do I yawn or say "It's about fucking time?"

Dick Cheney got a new heart yesterday

Insert joke here.

And another one bites the dust

Bob Green, a onetime radio DJ who married pop singer and Miss Oklahoma Anita Bryant, was found dead Jan. 26 at his home in Miami Beach. He was 80. Mr. Green managed his wife’s rise to stardom as an entertainer and Florida citrus spokeswoman, then followed her into anti-gay activism, which ultimately destroyed their careers — and marriage in 1980. For more than 30 years, Mr. Green lived quietly, alone and resentful.
I wonder if Anita will attend?

Homecoming

a pause

on haitus...

Matt Bomer comes out

And as with Whitney Houston's death absolutely no one reacts with any degree of surprise at all.

Whitney Houston has died

Whitney Houston Concert 2010, originally uploaded by Ployskies.

About a decade after she killed herself Whitney Houston actually died yesterday.

No one has expressed the least bit of surprise.

America the simple

Simple-minded that is.

I suppose it's possible that America has always been filled with stupid people, in fact it's lkely now that I think about it, but I would think we would have progressed to the point that we would acknowledge the need to be able to reason, to look at our problems as a society and see them for what they are, and also to see their origins.

Yet, here we are in yet another election cycle and Rick Santorum, the heinous, egregious, simple-minded buffoon that he is, is winning primaries.  Whoda thunk it?

Yet again we're being sold a bill of goods and we're buying it as fast as the GOP candidates can dish it out. 

Yes there are likely more Americans than ever before receiving a government check each month, either from Social Security, or welfare, or food stamps or unemployment.  But why aren't we asking why? 

Instead of blaming the victims, instead of looking at neighbors as villains, why aren't we looking at true cause and effect?

The economy ceased to exist in 2007.  Whose fault was that?  Was it mine in that I held a good job, paid my taxes, and bought a new car when I was supposed to?  Was it the previous owner of my new house who had faithfully played by the rules, saved up for a down-payment and sold himself into indentured servitude to a mortgage company for 30 years, and who then, when the fake economy stopped working lost his job and saw his mortgage payments triple in less than 18 months?  Was it those who had saved all their working lives to be able to retire in relative comfort and live their golden years in peace? 

No!  It was not their fault.  It's not the fault of those who tried to hang on either.  Those who continued to attempt to keep up with their mortgages, with their lives, with their dreams of a college education for their children, by draining their life savings to honor their commitment to a mortgage, or a credit card or a car loan.  Only then to find themselves hopelessly deadlocked in mortal combat with Countrywide, or Bank of America, or Washington Mutual or any of the other companies who exploited them with far too risky bets on THEIR future. 

Yes! Our government failed us.  It failed to protect us, it failed to see to it that the American Dream we're all chasing was ours to have and to hold.  But it didn't fail us on Barack Obama's watch.

It failed us long before that. 

The George Bushes of this world would never have been possible if it weren't for the Ronald Reagans of this world.  They stole our dreams, all the while selling us theirs.  All the while telling us that what they were doing by deregulating the markets and airlines and Oil Companies and everything else they loosed on our checkbooks was to our benefit.  Pish!  It was for their benefit, theirs and those they served, who took all our money and then told us to go lay down and die because we can't afford to buy medical care that should be ours for the asking.

This is not the America i grew up in.  It's  not the country that we were taught as children that we could expect to live our lives in safety and comfort. 

It's the America of 100 years ago, of 150 years ago.  Hell, it's the Britain of the middle ages in which serfs bowed to the landed gentry because they could exile you into the countryside to starve to death because they  no longer  wished to allow you their largess and to have food and shelter. 

This is an America in which we are now forced to fight for our very right to exist. 

If we want something those in power don't want us to have, we're denied.  If we love someone they don't think we should according to their "morals," we're denied.

The pendulum swings to and fro.  It's been swinging in the wrong direction for most Americans for almost half a century, and in the last two years it began swinging in the opposite direction.  It's still swinging and we can direct its course. 

Tell those who hate, who would have us live in a "free market" society, that we  know such things no longer exist.  Tell them that YOU exist and that you have the right as a human being on this earth to love the person your heart tells you is right.  Tell them that thinking Americans exist, that preying on our fears and religious bigotry will no longer serve the world in which you want to live. Tell them that the American dream still lives in our hearts and minds and that we will fight for our right to have our piece of it.

Stand up!

And so it goes.

prop 8 is unconstitutional!

Duh!

And so it goes.

No joy in mudville...

Well...I really wanted the Patriots to win yesterday.  Alas, it was not to be. 

It seems the universe has determined that Tom Brady can go to the Super Bowl, he just isn't allowed to win the Super Bowl.  He's certainly good enough...maybe a different approach is in order.  Well thats between him and the universe i guess.

This weekend i did one thing...i lived in my house. Saturday afternoon i laid on the couch listening to Christopher Parkening and reading the late great Christopher Hitchens.  Then...a nap.  After that a quiet dinner and not one but two movies.

Cant ask for a better weekend than that.
and so it goes:

Ignorance is contagious

For the second time this week I have seen the word primer misused, mispronounced,or not used when it should have been. 

Radio host; "Give us a primer (prymer)

Today on CNN:

Nevada votes: a caucus explainer

These are folks who write and voice words that the American Public hears/reads every day. If they can't pronounce them, or probably even know them in the case of "explainer"how can the American Public be expected to hve any interest in finding out?

Get a fucking dictionary.

Primer-

1. prim·er introductory text: a book that provides an introduction to a topic

and so it goes:

Overwhelming-ness

Committing is not my strong suit. Yet I want to. Recently I bought this:

And immediately I was besieged by byuers remorse.  Not because the house is bad it is infact pretty great.  I've entertained, I've loved, I've unpacked, I've been a good little homeowner. 

Yet, I slept too.  I slept to escape.  i slept days away, nights too.  I slept chances I'm certain. 

But starting today I intend to take the bull by the horns and wrestle my self-doubt to the ground.  I intend to lay bare the intestinal contents of my fears and doubts about my ability to be a fully functioning member of this world.

So let's look at the Super Bowl, politics, and perhaps not least important men:

Chase Whiteside is here not because i am particualrly enamored of youngsters, but because he's not only got a good mind, but he seems particularly determined in his endeavors.  A trait i always admire.  Thanks for your contributions Chase.

And so it goes.