Camera Conceit and Other Health Care Reform Concerns.

I'm no doctor but I have to believe there's going to be an onslaught of tendinitis, bursitis, inpingement syndrome and Canon-Kodak cameraitis of the elbow and shoulder in the near future.

In this day of digital 'look at me' and 'hey, be my FB friend!', I began noticing something.  A person has to look very closely, mostly because it's become so normal that the brain doesn't register this phenomenon but it's is indeed there.

I call it camera conceit.

Camera conceit is 98% of the pictures posted on the internet, the shot of a person holding the camera, pointed at themselves, taking posed photos to make themselves look 'cute' or 'action like', holding up peace signs or open mouth shots of Oreo's overflowing like chocolate lava.  More than likely, if you look really close, they're just plain annoying.

This is where injuries are going to start happening.  Mark my words.  Two years, ten...heck, maybe thirteen years from now, it'll happen.  There will be a run on emergency rooms around the world.  People coming in with locked elbows, or tears in delts and serratus anterior muscles and even inflamed levatar scapulae that can only be repaired with long treatments of anit-inflammatorys and ice packs.  The only way these are going to be prevented is a person employing their own personal cameraman or, simply using a tripod.  Easy precautionary measured but surely the only way to overcome any future problems.
Take a look at a couple examples of camera conceit..

Oh, and before you get upset that I'm going to post unsolicited photos of strangers that I got off the internet, don't.  These are my family members that happened to download their photos on my computer so I consider them public domain.

Though, no doubt about it, these people are extremely strange.


Here's a shot my son taking a shot of himself.  Notice how he isn't taking a proper photo 'stance' and how his arm is crooked at a funny angle.  Suggests to me large, future medical bills.

I sure hope his mother has insurance.





This is my niece.  I had to listen to her whine and cry for hours one evening when she was a baby and she wouldn't let me change her crappy diaper.

But that's beside the point.

In this photo we're witnessing bad shoulder posture. She has her arm flexed straight out, but her clavicle is at a less than 45 degree angle, spelling rhomboid major muscle deterioration.

Scary...and yes, I am talking about that picture.




This kid...hmmm...I truly have no idea who he is.







Fact is, we're a nation of narcissists.

And before you say, "HEY!  I've seen you do it.  I've seen pics of you that I damn'd well know you took yourself!", let me just respond by saying, duh!  Just look at me.  If you looked this good, wouldn't you?

Stonie: My Personal Urbandictionary

A while back I brought up my incarceration and that I walked away from it craving a cigarette something fierce and, more importantly, a whole bunch of stories.  Coincidentally, the same week I got out, Facebook was doing a thing where people looked up the 'urban' meaning of their name on Urbandictionary.

Mine goes like this...

Triumph; desimates all in its path; very strong.

or

Strong, Protector, Lover, Fighter, Warrior. Stay on thier good side! If your a man he can be your best friend or your worst nightmare. If your a woman, wrap your arms and legs around him and hold on tight! If he is ambivilent towards you, embrace the fact that you are probably a loser.

and my favorite

Random Orgasmic Noise - Made usually after hearing some good news, a happy time in a woman's life and  more than likely heard several time during an evening with the handsome author of scuzzymoney.blogspot.com.   Example : "Ooooohhhhh Ron!" *orgasmic noise*

Urbandictionary...pshaaaw!

Let me tell you about 'urban'.

Here's one for you, to help you understand 'urban'.

Stonie was an inmate I met in County, but first a little back story.  The first day I walked in to jail and threw my mat on the floor, I pretty much didn't have what you might call an appetite, especially after taking my first whiff of the gruel that the justice system likes to call food but I found it to be more of an abstract form of inedible nutrition  The guards just liked to laugh when tossing it our direction, as if we were filthy swine. (Truthfully, that isn't so far from the truth, but that's for another day.)  Anyway,  Stonie was a fellow law breaker (although he was in on heroine possession and gun charges, and happened to be number 2 on Spokane's most wanted list) who had absolutely no problem eating what I didn't and I had no problem giving it to him, especially after the two hundred and forty pound, heavily tattooed man...well, let's just say, he wanted it.  Who was I to argue?  After some time, and the fact that I 'voluntarily' gave up my chow, Stonie and me got to be fast friends.

This is when Stonie began to let the stories begin, and his lessons in proper street talk began, like shootin' a vein with good ol' fashion 'brown'.

The second day in I learned a couple things.  First, and before he began, he had to light up a cigarette.  He said it calmed him, that in order to get the proper inflections and tones and make sure the subject matter fit just right, he had to have a smoke.

"Stonie, how you gonna light that up?" I asked.  He smiled, and proceeded to take down an overhead halogen light bulb, smash it to bits and use the end pieces, connecting this little thingy majig to this other whatchamacalit, then stuck it back into the little hole in the wall where it came from and Paachowy!!! Cigarette lit.

The only thing I could say was, "You really smuggled that in, huh?  Really?  Up your ass?"

Stonie smiled. (Always smiling, he was. The happiest felon I'd ever met)  "They don't call me the Keister Bunny for nothin'."

Then, and as much pain as it still causes me just thinking about, he told me that when all veins collapse from shooting up since the ripe old age of fourteen, a decent substitute is the penis!  YES!  I said PENIS!  Truly, when I went in, my intention was to look at this experience as positive, maybe actually 'research' it for my writing and just get through it unscathed.  PENIS! 

Okay, physically I'm fine, psychologically...scarred for life.

Oh, you're welcome.

The next thing he taught me was about love.  And not the soap-on-a-rope kind of love, you sick bastards!  No, about 'poundin' guts'.  Poundin' guts, bustin' guts, slammiin' guts.  All the same thing.  Sex.  It's when you have sex with you're significant other, or your wife or the way Stonie liked to put it, "When I get out of here, first thing I'm gonna do is get me some dope and then slam some guts with my bitch."

Sincerely and with the complete zeal and naive way I have about me, I asked, "Isn't bitch kind of...uh...demeaning?"  The way he told it, 'bitch' was properly used, not only as a derogatory slam on a person of female persuasion, but also when referring to the bitch that you're going to spend the rest of your life with, or until she stopped dealing your 'skag' in fear of being busted by 'jakes'.

The guy's a real romantic, and besides, who am I to argue?

Gene Shalit - I love you man!

Watching the Tiger Woods apology, plans for the future and the death threats he put on the table if anyone got up in his families grill ever again got me to thinking about something much more important.

(Disclaimer : It wasn't a press conference, because the golfer didn't take questions, and therefore didn't give us the answer to the question we all want to know, that being, "Mr. Woods, is is true that you did indeed bump fuglys with all of Ray J's leftover sloppy seconds?")

My thoughts turned to relationships.  When trying to make a relationship work, striving to achieve that perfect state of understanding and bliss, where a couple would compromise and sacrifice anything  in order to make their lives everlasting together.

And more specifically, can a man and woman live in harmony if they don't agree that Gene Shalit's mustache isn't the coolest friggin' entity ever.

EVER!!!

Really, take a look at that thing.  Sure, it doesn't appear to be all that subtle, and isn't, but the way in which it swoops down, reaching from ear to ear, almost as thick as an Amazonian rainforest.  That is AWESOME!  Then, as if that isn't enough, it receives high regards and critical acclaim from his hair, all gnarly and bush like, which is in a league all it's own, and maybe the makings of another story someday.

Don't stop looking now, because just when you think the heightened ecstasy of admiring the mans mustache is more than enough, here comes his tie, skidding into the picture like an out of control Lamborghini Gallardo, here to pick up the mustache for a crazy night out on the town, club hoppin', snortin' blow and watching over things like the uptight producer of a  Neil Young documentary.

What the fuc...?

Anyway, that mustache is true.  It's alive and I just bet Gene Shalit, because of his integrity and stick-to-it-dedication to that bad boy, he's probably carried on a long lasting, happy and extremely fulfilling relationship with a devoted and beautiful woman. (This isn't something I know for sure though, because I didn't really want to do the research, because of what I thought might in truth find, and not for one moment do I believe that anything I'm saying carries any weight.)

But, what I do know is that guys like a certain amount of facial hair that says somethin-somethin about us, and that the girls, do in fact admire that about us.

They dig it.

It's sexy.

Well, okay, maybe not, but I swore to my nearly hairless girl that someday, some way, I was going to find a way to get this picture posted on the world wide internets.

So, Gene Shalit, and your mustache, I thank you!

Shout Out to the Blog Gods

This has been a trying past year or so for me.  Lots of ups and probably a whole lot more downs then I'd like to admit.  But, I like to think that I've come out of it a stronger man, with more direction than I've had in many years.  A clarity of sorts.

Through this long year I've had a whole bunch of support that help from friends and family in that strong armed me into pulling up my boot straps.  My beautiful girlfriend even slapped me silly a time, with a couple wedgies during 'conversations' thrown in, I suspect just because she thought it would be funny.  Ha Ha and HA!

The one group of people I'd like to give special mention to is my family of bloggers.  This group of people brought me out of a funk at times, and gave me the inspiration to start up my writing that I'd been 'saying' I wanted to do for a long, long time, but I had always made excuses not to, whether consciously or while in a  semi-comatose state.  More times than not that was where I found myself.  Regardless, I find myself in a 'new' place, punching out my blog and writing a novel that I'd been 'writing' for years.

Oh, and Woody, I steal from you when I now use "Nut up or shut up!" as my new motto.

That being said, I'd like to do some 'advertising' for some of the blogs that have given me some laughs and inspiration.  I know there are plenty of people missing out if they're not reading them.

I know I will have missed some, and in advance I apologize.  Feel free to let me know and beat me down with a wet noodle if you like.  Also if you have any suggestions or would like to be added to my list of reads, please leave a message.  My secretary only bites when she hasn't had herFunyuns.

Hope you all enjoy.

http://www.unfinishedrambler.com
http://offendedblogger.com
http://speedcathollydale.blogspot.com
http://www.ryangarns.com
http://theredneckmommy.com/http://www.fathermuskrat.com
http://www.tiggyblog.com
http://www.cabbagesnkings.net
http://nonamedufus.blogspot.com/
http://www.nannygoatsinpanties.com/
http://www.lordlikely.com
http://www.midgetmanofsteel.com
http://blogs.reuters.com/oddly-enough/
http://www.jennyonthespot.comhttp://laughing-stalk.blogspot.com
http://pinkmonkeychatter.comhttp://www.thehussyhousewife.com/
http://www.momscrazylife.com
http://beetle-blog.com
http://deadrooster.com
http://adnoxious.blogspot.com
http://livitluvit.com
http://beesmusings.blogspot.com
http://olgathetravelingbra.blogspot.com/
http://www.outofthemouthofdave.com/

International Olympic Snob Committee

I don't care about the Winter Olympics.  I'd rather spend my time plucking ear hair or thrusting myself in front of a large vehicle, maybe a runaway snow plow or a Zamboni with spinning spikes protruding from the wheels and flame throwers mounted where their should be headlights.  Of course, if they made that an Olympic event, you know I'd be the first one lining up for tickets.  Kind of like Mad Max on ice.

My disdain of the Olympics could be that I'm not a winter person.  I was born in Spokane, raised in Spokane, and since I, sarcastically put, love this place so much, I'm sure I'm gonna die in this god forsaken town.  And since we 'experience' the four seasons, including the one where my annoyance of skin piercing wind is followed shortly by huge amounts of frozen precipitation accompanied by thirty-two car pile ups on I-90, I have to ask, what's not to like about the long, cold months that make up winter?

Lo and behold, there is something to bitch about discuss about the Winter Olympics.

A couple different things really, but both concerning the same groups of people, and I am not talking about the top two seeded women lingerie hockey teams slap shottin' a tightly rolled up brasserie and wrestling around, throwing girl punches in the middle of the ice (although I'd be lying if I was to say I wouldn't pay good money to see that as well).

No, what I'm talking about is the jerks that 'run' the Olympics.  All politics and complete buffoonery, god love their high falutin ass's!

First off, did you know that women can't participate in ski jumping?  It's true.  And the reason, you're asking?  Well, the International Olympic Committee declared that  "Women's Ski Jumping does not reach the necessary technical criteria and as such does not yet warrant a place alongside other Olympic events."  Course my favorite reasoning is by Gian Franco Kasper, FIS president and a member of the IOC.  In 2005 said that he didn't think women should ski jump because the sport "seems not to be appropriate for ladies from a medical point of view."

Har!!!  Are you kidding me?  Have you seen those women athletes flipping, jiggling, bouncing and jouncing down the  moguls?  If a woman doesn't rattle her uterus loose after that, then I have to believe ski jumping is pretty safe.Then, as if you need to be reminded, Nodar Kumaritashvili, the Georgian luger who was tragically killed.  Horrible.  Though he knew the risks, there has to be regulations and safety 'nets' in place so this doesn't happen again.  So, that being said, and in the most bloated, pretenious and down right fucked-up grandiloquent speech they could muster, the IOC and the International Luge Federation declared there were "errors" on the luger's part and “The technical officials of the FIL were able to retrace the path of the athlete and concluded there was no indication that the accident was caused by deficiencies in the track.”

Strange since the very next day they re-shaped the track and placed the participants lower to slow it down and added a wood 'wall' where Nodar Kumaritashvili was violently killed.

Okay, I understand my attitude isn't in the 'spirit' of the Olympics but I just don't get it.  Probably never will, and maybe it has to do with sports taking place in high altitudes and inside rinks where the men wear sequin costumes.  Maybe it depresses me, the weather, the cold, all the pot holes and oily slush.

Or maybe it's the daft assholes who, with Cuban cigars puckered up to their fat jowls and sipping their Bladnoch single malt scotch, make all the decisions for these athletes that train all their lives for these few fleeting moments.

Snow bound and gagged...

Let's face it people, you're all a blizzard of whiners, blowing in nor'eastern winds.  What is it with all the crying and whimpering and carrying on and naming a little snow things such as Snowpocalypse and Snowmaggedon?  Kind of overkill don't you think?

Here's a picture of what your going through.

Ah....a snowball fight. You easterners are sure cute.

A penguin?  Is this a ploy to the receive extra funding from the federal government?  Really, it's just plain creepy.  You oughta be ashamed and embarrassed.

Speaking of the federal government.  Now the Secret Service on skis?  Haven't you all heard of all seasons or studs?  Pathetic!

Fact is you haven't seen snow until you've seen snow like we had last year in the Pacific Northwest. Nearly 90 inches all told, fell on us in the span of only a couple of weeks in December and January.

We had snow that crushed house roofs, caused little old ladies to fall down in the parking lots of Petsmart and forced us to sled to work on the roofs of our vehicles.

But did the government shut down?  Did President Bush declare a state of emergency, calling our environmental problem Snowmaggedon?  (Not that he could pronounce such a big, made up word.)  Hell no.  We moved on.  Made the best of it and tried to enjoy it, knowing it would just a melted memory soon enough.  Although, in all fairness, it did put a damper on the Aryan Nation compound for several days.  Rumor was their bedsheets made them nearly invisible tromping through the forests, playing their silly 'Brotherhood of the Righteous White Man' games.

But damn'd if we'd let a little accumulated snow disrupt our lives.

Here, take a look at a Polaroid that I snapped of my 12 year old son on the roof shoveling off 13,000 cubic tons of the white stuff just before the house collapsed.



















What a trooper he was.

I just don't get the the upheaval this has caused.  Really.  It's just a little snow that will be gone in a couple weeks and then you can go about whining about how humid it is.

One good thing that has come from your 'blizzard' is this YouTube video.  This guy is the funniest weatherman I've ever seen.  Had Letterman been even half as funny, he'd probably be as rich as Oprah, rather than scraping by on a measly $40 million a year.

Electronic Mayhem

There are times that I can't live without my electronics.  And there are a slew of 'em. 

First and foremost, my BLackberry, or as I call it, my Crackberry.  The damn thing is more addictive than crack after all.  Weirdly enough, I can't tell you the exact moment it happened, but it's become a permanent fixture to my body.  Like the prawn hand on that guy that got goo'd on in the movie District 9.  If I'm not texting, then you can find me Googling strange south African musical instruments or the reason monkeys throw poop. 

My Blackberry is awful handy when I'm wanting to send off a smartass Facebook post or find out who is following me, which that leads me to an idea that I have for an application on FB.  I call it Why in the hell would you wanna follow Ron??? 

I also Twitter.  Ugh...I said it. Swore I'd never Tweet, but in all actuality  there are three things I swore that I would never do. 

1. Get a perm,  check. 
2. Watch the Twilight gayfest, check. 
3. And Twitter. 

Two out of three ain't bad I guess.

And when it comes to my Blackberry, do not even get me started on Brickbreaker!

Then I have my laptop that I'm constantly writing this or that on, whether it's my blog or stories or the novel I've been working on since the Clinton administration.  Back then there was no such thing as dual Pentium processor, just my trusty Intel i486 with a background on the monitor of Uma Thurman, pre-Pulp Fiction.  (Oooh...how I would love to give that woman a shot of adrenaline!)

I have a Creative Arts Zen mp3 player.  I've had my 30 gigs of musical storage box heaven for about five years.  I refuse to buy into the Ipod phenomenon.  Not that I have a problem with the Apple product.  I just think Zen sounds cooler than Ipod. 

Ayooooo....Zzzzennnnnn....Ayoooo....Zzzzennnnnn....Kinda relaxing when listening to the White Stripes, even at ear bleeding decibel levels.
 
Don't forget the t.v., dvd player, surround sound stereo, robotic vacuum cleaner, mixing bowl and my girlfriends pleasure toys err...curling iron.  Lots and lots of gadgets.

Right now, one of my other favorite devices is my Sony Reader, a birthday gift I was pleasantly surprised to receive. It's a book with buttons rather than pages.  It consists of electrodes, pixels, liquid levels and other friggin cool stuff rather than ink.  I'm constantly reading and with my Reader I have stored some twenty-five or thirty books that I've downloaded and am either reading, about to read or have read.  There are a lot of 'Libraries' to download off of....Barnes and Noble, Reader Library, Smashword, etc., with millions of books, newspapers and other publications that are easily accessible.  The only down side to the Reader is that if you were to opt to censor a book for being trash and not appropriate for the kids, like Going Rogue by Sarah Palin's ghost writer, then it wouldn't be financially sound idea to toss the Reader into the large burning bonfire.  Other than that it's very cool!

The funny thing about electronics is that this all came about today when I experienced a surreal moment.  I had been writing on my laptop when I realized not only was the computer humming, but I had ESPN on the tube, I was listening to Bob Dylan through my headphones, was texting my girlfriend who was at work dealing with bratty kids and I had been trying to think up a clever post I could put up on Twitter about how much easier life was as a kid when I thought all things could be made better just by a giant pitcher of grape Kool-Aid crashing through the walls of my kitchen.

Seems like overkill, but at this point in my life I'm pretty dependent on all things of the electronic persuasion, and not so sure I could give up my electronic fix without some sort of support group.

Anyway, I got to run, people. My phone's vibrating.

CID #342051

Confession  I had an opportunity to spend some time time in jail recently.  Twenty four days and three hours to be exact.  All for the sake of researching why God hangs out with inmates.

Actually, I'm just messing with ya.  Actually, dumb, dumb, dumb...but a life experience, a learned lesson and something that I plan on never doing again.

For my sake, and yours, since I brought it up, let me explain.

Drinking and driving.  Don't do it, kids!  Ain't worth it.  During the time in my life that I was was caught with a BAC of somewhere between a 0.13 and thinking I could fly, if only I could remember what the hell I was doing.  High.  Way too high to realize that a cab would have been a wiser choice, yet not high enough to have decided that dancing on a barstool wearing only my boxer shorts.  And thank God for that because I think I was wearing my lucky Homer Simpson drawers.  I would have had to rethink luck.

Anyway.

Way!  Too!  High!

That being said, I hope, and like to think that I've learned from it.  I haven't had a drink in nearly nine months.  Now, I don't want anyone telling me "Wow, that's fantastic!" or "I'm proud of you." or even and especially "Shit dude, let's go knock back several shots of 5150 Tequila Blanco, washed down with eight or nine pints of Hefeweizen!"  It is what it is and I know what I need to do to not do it again.  That's all.

So I've taken a whole lot from this experience, both good but mostly bad. I am trying to put a positive spin on it it, but it can be trying. Believe me, the embarrassment, financial ruin, shame and the time I had to spend in tight quarters with smelly guys where personal hygiene comes no where near to topping their list of priorities has made me a time or two get down on myself. 

Actually, truth be told, I've spent mucho time beating myself up over this.

But...here comes the positive   Wait for it...wait....wait...a little bit longer...okay.  Here goes.

Through all this I found family.  Good lord, if they can stand by me through all the shit I put 'em through, they would stand by me through just about anything.  Love ya, guys!

Then, Christel.  The most beautiful woman that a man could ask for that, I,  through all this, dragged through the mud, muck, anguish, turmoil and worst of all, into the visiting room at the Spokane County Jail.  You, my love, I thank from the bottom of my heart.  I can hardly put my trousers on in the morning without you, let alone have got through this debacle.

Another angle on the positive is that I've compiled a whole bunch of crazy stories.  Stories that I plan on implementing in my writing.  Let me tell you all, fact is absolutely stranger than fiction.  So, now that Cool Hand Luke is a free man, having gagged down his last pickled egg, you'll be seeing more and more from me, parlaying stories of Stonie, toilet paper soccer (which I might add, is whole lot more exciting than the real thing), the Keister bunny, spades and Shit on a Stick.

So, be patient people, if you choose...because I'm back, with an even more twisted perspective on life and a focused knowledge that God does indeed hang out in jail, reading Harlequin romances and whittling chess pieces out of soap.