If you want to talk about how dumb the political process is in this country, check out why the primary election results in Michigan and Florida were thrown out by the Democratic National Committee because the vote was held earlier than they allow. What a crime that must have been. What they’re telling us is the DNC prefers that some states vote before others. Does that make us a second class state? Apparently. Let’s all of us say this together, "Games People Play." I can hear the music playing now. As I’m writing this they are talking, off and on, about re-holding the two states’ primaries with a write-in vote. That’s going to cost a lot of people some money for somebody’s unfortunate, uneducated, deceptive, self-serving and misguided decision. Too bad the cost doesn’t come from the pockets of the people that make these decisions. Again that word "accountability" comes up. Let them live with the results from the first primary. That was their decision. Not ours. They’ve wasted our time and our money. * * * I’ve brought this up before, and I’ll bring it up again. Does anyone remember anything good happening during George W. Bush’s tenure as President? The news keeps getting worse. I can’t imagine any of the current candidates for President doing worse than what we’ve seen for the last seven or so years. Even John McCain has to learn from this. Why should we care more for the people in Iraq than we do for the people in New Orleans? They haven’t given us a good enough explanation yet as far as I’m concerned. Yeah, I know. It’s all about oil. Dumb me. If New Orleans had the biggest reserves of crude oil on God’s earth, we would be there for them and the War in Iraq wouldn’t exist. Believe me, folks. All of this means two things; we’re not only going to spend ourselves to death, we’re going to Empire ourselves to death. It’s all part of the prophesy. * * * The powers that be in the corporate world keep taking you higher and higher, and then they drop you right on your head. Case in point, Bear Stearns. The same thing happened to Federal-Mogul. F-M used to be considered a good $25 stock. The executive management people (big ideas people for sure) got the stocks all the way up into the $65 plus range by dumb decisions, and then they dropped us right on our heads. We can’t take a lot of that. We’re just common folks. These people who did that ought to be in jail right now, but they’re not. Employees in the company’s 401k program lost a ton of money. Yours truly included. * * * I was on my way downtown to get my annual hair cut when I was almost side-swiped by a guy in a pickup truck who was talking on his cell phone. Having to stop that quick left me vulnerable to being rear-ended. I know I have relatives that talk on a cell phone while driving, but I don’t recommend it. I don’t do it because I can’t talk on a cell phone and chew gum at the same time let alone drive a vehicle safely. When I finally got there in one piece, my barber said to me, "You’ve been cutting your own hair, haven’t you?" Yes, I’ve been cheating on her. I’ll bet the back of my hair looked a bit butchered. I don’t have a license to cut hair. Maybe that’s why it looked that way. Oh well, I’m getting older; and I’m just trying to stretch a haircut. Not that they’re that expensive. Just an old habit, I guess. Anyway, she made me look decent again (notice I didn’t say handsome) just in time for Easter Sunday. I think she’s my regular barber. Once a year anyway. I don’t even know her name. * * * We built our garage in 1987 and had the driveway poured soon afterwards. One of them is sinking or the other one is heaving. I can’t figure out which. That leaves us a speed bump going into the garage. It’s probably enough to derail a freight train at full speed, but we’re getting used to going in at one mile an hour. I want to hear from the people who go into their garage faster than that. Until the next time . . .
While our government officials decide which one of their buddies is going to get rich off of a National Health Care Plan, they could be putting a tax break plan into motion. My plan is different from the Medicare drug plan. Medicare is not able by law to negotiate the price of the drugs. Why? Who do you think that benefits? Why did our politicians feel the need to do that? Ah yes, that decision paid for their all inclusive trip to the Bahamas. Bought and paid for — our government is that much and more. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, why isn’t our out-of-pocket health care cost 100% deductible on our income tax? Why isn’t it pre-tax dollars? We have to spend 7.5% of our income before our government takes pity on us and gives us a percentage break. Those medical industry lobbyists have a lot more pull in this country than the common citizen. They should be outlawed, but that isn’t going to happen. The politicians love their free trips too much. We don’t own this country. Only the rich do and yes, I’m mad as hell about it. * * * We need people in our government who have a heart and will stop going to war with every country that disagrees with our thinking. Robert F. Kennedy was considered ruthless, but he was against the Vietnam War. If I was in government I would be considered ruthless too, but I’m against the Iraq War. We both have said, "Enough already." It’s time for this country to enjoy a few decades of peace. It’s time to recoup our losses. The world will have to get along without our intervention. * * * Oh-oh, our "I have a dream" people are at it again. I hope everybody reads on the Indy or has attended the St. Johns School Board’s Strategic Plan meetings for our schools. I can’t believe this stuff! It’s a wonder any of our students can graduate according to this report. It means unless we spend our great grandchildren’s money, we cannot right the ship. At least that’s what they’re telling us. No wonder my daughter is home schooling her five kids. She can’t trust the system anymore. As for the roof leaking at the Middle School, which by the way started from day one, somebody accepted it that way. I know who the person is, but I won’t mention a name. Is it a bad decision by some people in charge? You bet. We should NOT have to pay for those repairs. Can we trust their decisions anymore? I don’t think so. Does contractor accountability sound right to you? It does to me. Let them make their work right. A former boss of mine always said, "We can make them whole again, but that’s all we can do." His decision was good enough for me. That’s what we tried to do, make it right and make them whole. When did the word "Right" leave our country? I want these Big Ideas people to get their hands out of my grandchildren’s pocket, and my great grandchildren’s pocket. Let’s just pay for things as we go along. Bill me, but don’t bill my grandkids and great grandkids. A few years later they’ll be back asking them for more money anyway. In our house if we can’t afford it — we don’t have it. I don’t think we can afford what they’re asking for right now. Does the word Recession ring a bell? When they tell me the size of the building hampers the education of a student, they have to be kidding me. They’re trying to turn our high school and our middle school into mini-universities. Sorry — that comes later in their lives. The governor of the State of Michigan is proposing smaller sized high schools but more of them. Isn’t that in conflict with the St. Johns School District’s plan? We still have the RBW building to fall back on. What the hell are we supposed to think about their proposals? * * * We have speed bumps in Michigan only we call them potholes. A lot of them have cropped up this year. Some people say it’s the worst winter we’ve had in years. I have to agree with them. Al Gore was wrong if he was talking about global warming in Michigan. Doesn’t he live in one of those Southern states? A hard winter brings on these things. We don’t build northern roads in Michigan, we build southern roads. Unless we change that we will go through this over and over again. Ka-bump, Ka-bump, Ka-bump. Until the next time . . .
I got a phone call from a gal representing my cable service. "Where are you calling from," I asked? She sounded like she was from India — aren’t they all? There was no answer. I heard kids in the background and I asked her about it. "Oh, those are my co-workers talking," she replied. Yeah — right. Being a grandpa I know the sound of kids in the background during a phone conversation. "Are you getting our high-speed internet service," she asks? "That’s a joke," I told her. "I can’t upload as fast as I can download. You don’t tell us that up front. You just say fast, but you misinform us." I have to use a magnifying glass to read the fine print that tells me that information, but I didn’t tell her. "Do you want our bundle package?" she asked. "No," I said, "When I get the chance I’ll go to another provider. Your service is lousy." I must have upset her because immediately after I said that she said, "Goodbye, Mr. Bauer and thank-you for your time." My time is cheap — my internet and cable service isn’t, and it doesn’t fulfill our needs. You pay for service and for some reason — our fault I guess — we expect something in return for our money. Oh well, dumb me for expecting that because it’s not what I’m getting. Yes, I’m mad as hell. Am I a grumpy old man? You bet. By the way, do you remember the experts telling us we’re going from a manufacturing economy to a service economy? Every time we turn around we’re loosing both. Remember when we pulled up to a gas station; and the attendant pumped the gas, cleaned our windshield and checked the oil. If you asked, they would check the tire pressure. So much for the service industry nowadays. We all know what’s happening to our manufacturing industries. Given away by our global thinking politicians. What does that leave us? It leaves us wondering how we’re going to pay the bills when our economy does not support us anymore. I have a solution to that problem — quit funding the rest of the world! Maybe then we can rebuild New Orleans. * * * I have a bone to pick with the Congress of the United States. Why are they wasting their time investigating drugs in Major League Baseball instead of spending their time trying to find out why our health care and drug costs keeps going up higher than the rate of inflation? I know people working in the health care industry that aren’t getting rich from their job. So who the hell is? That’s the question Congress should be asking. Forget that nonsense about baseball players. In the scheme of things they mean nothing to us. I haven’t had one ball player buy me a meal yet! The President makes $400,000 a year plus benefits. Ball players get millions — even if they’re mediocre. Who has a bigger impact on our lives? Sometimes we win. Sometimes we lose. I don’t think we’re winning often enough. * * * Easter is coming up, and it brings back lots of memories. One year when our girls were a bit younger, we hid an Easter egg in an artificial planter that hung on the wall that was in the shape of a fiddle. I think we found the egg two years later. Talk about a thousand-year-old egg. We did not crack it open. We spared ourselves the sight and the smell. It’s always interesting to watch an artist decorate Easter eggs by waxing and dyeing them until they have a piece of art. You have to have a certain vision to do that. I have visions about things but nothing I can put down on an easel or even an egg. It’s more in the line of thoughts that come to me. I’m not at all talented when it comes to art. Until the next time . . .
We have a neighborhood watch in our neck of the woods. Our neighbors will call up from time to time and ask us to keep an eye on their house when they’re planning on going away. They know we’re homebodies, and we’re never gone for a long period of time. They asked us to be suspicious if a U-Haul truck is backed up in their driveway and loading stuff from their house; and I always tell them unless the driver of that truck gives us lots of money, we WILL call the police. The neighbor laughs and says, "Make sure you get enough money for us too!" * * * We have caller I.D. and this call came from a 224 number. That along with 227 is local, but it said "Out of area." I’ve written about that before because our phone company tells us our daughter is an Unknown Caller. I think at one time she was identified as a pay phone. Everyone knows those pay phones are fading fast. The funny part about all of this, the out of area call came from our next door neighbor. We could actually talk to one another using a method from our childhood. Two tin cans and a string tied between them. Do you think we’re paying for something that is absolutely worthless? Connor would say, "I think so Poppy." * * * Already I’m thinking about how many tomato plants we need to put in this year. We’ve had as many as 72 plants one year because we like a variety of tomatoes. Golden Jubilee, Mountain Pride, Roma, and Big Boy to name a few. Needless to say we’ve cut that back quite a bit. Betty cans a lot of tomatoes as juice or stewed tomatoes, but our need for that many jars has diminished over the years. We need to make more chili, more goulash, and more Spanish rice. And then we’d better go sign up at the local Health Spa to work it all off. * * * They tell us that Easter is going to fall the earliest this year that we’ll ever see in our remaining lifetime. The date is based on Astonomy. Easter generally falls on the first Sunday after the first full moon after the Spring Equinox that falls on March 20th. There are complications after that. There’s something about Passover, and then it’s delayed a week. Whoa, I don’t understand all that stuff. There seems to be some kind of squabble about the date St. Patrick Day falls this year. It doesn’t matter to us. We’ll still have our beef brisket, potatoes, and cabbage dinner as usual — the American version of a St. Patrick’s Day dinner. That’s what will be served at the O’Bauer household. The rest of the world will have to follow their own traditions. Whether they sashay around our beliefs, anyone else’s beliefs or even their own beliefs is their business. I like to take a piece of everyone’s beliefs and make it part of my own. I still have a long ways to go. I’m not Jewish; I’m not Black, but I like to borrow some of the things they do to celebrate their heritage. I’ve already gotten into being German, Irish, and Native American. The rest will come. [Editor’s note: This year the traditional March 17th St. Patrick’s Day falls within Holy Week this year, the week preceding Easter when Catholic Church rules dictate that no mass can be celebrated in honor of any saint -- Patrick included. In Dublin St. Patrick’s Day will be celebrated on March 15 while March 14 will be the date in Detroit’s Corktown. The SJ Indy suggests that everyone celebrate early and often.] * * * Every time we turn around we’re out there cleaning the driveway after another snowfall. This has NOT been an Al Gore winter. It was fun when we were younger. We’re not younger anymore. I think this winter has changed Betty’s mind about having a change of seasons. As for me, give me warm weather — put a nine-iron in my hands, and point me towards the green. Do you think I’m a dreamer? * * * Ol’ bauer was not left asleep at the wheel. I came, I saw, but I’ll be damned if I know what to do about it. It’s something I’ll have to figure out with lots of help from the internet. What the hell am I talking about? My Vista operating system’s compatibility problem with my Adobe Photo Deluxe 2.0 program. As far as I’m concerned it’s the best photo editing program that Adobe has ever put out. They kept things simple back then and yes, I have newer programs from them that I don’t like. I have inquiries out on the Internet as to what I can do, and I keep getting suggestions. I’ve disregarded the hand grenade suggestion. Hopefully I’ll get a final fix soon. Don’t you just love computers? Me too. Until the next time . . .
