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Life just isn’t as much fun as it used to be.

I like a good nostalgic moment just as much as the next guy. There’s nothing wrong (and a lot right) with a wistful *sigh* and a thought to the better way things used to be. I moved from LA to Nashville in part due to some nostalgia.

I remember traipsing through the woods as a kid to get to my friends’ houses. The forced marches home after school because we lived too close to justify the bus (Okay, that’s not such a fun memory . . .) Riding my bike up and down the street with little supervision . . . ah, the good old days.

Another thing many of us remember are the board games. Week long Monopoly sessions, swapping mortgages and trying to claim the utilities as our own. Maybe Uno. Maybe Rummy or Go Fish. Or Life, with those little pink and blue pegs that were supposed to be people.

In just this kind of a fit, we bought a family game of Life. (After all we had already taught the kids to manipulate each other to get a Monopoly of street addresses and start charging for hotels.) We figured contemplating gay marriage (at the fundamental, two-blue-peg level) was the way to go. Little did we know . . .

I think one of the major problems is that the game is soooooo old. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Game_of_Life Apparently it started back in 1860 - so I KNOW it’s been reworked a handful of times. Surely the first incarnation didn’t involve plastic cars and college as an option for everyone. Maybe there was even a ’scarlet fever’ spot where you lost a turn and could no longer maintain the energy to plow the fields. Or your buggy broke an axle . . .

By the time I was a kid, Milton Bradley’s game was complete with a hybrid carboard/plastic game board, station wagons in unnatural colors (even for the 70s), and gifts from the bank when you were awarded another peg - a.k.a. child. No one questioned where these peg-kids came from or why they were mysteriously the same size as an adult. We all went to college for a better salary (thanks, Milton Bradley for the little extra impetus!) and tried to retire as millionaires.

If you’ve gotten into the new version of the game, then you know it’s just not as fun as it used to be. My kids no longer want to go to college. (Almost everyone has salary caps now!) There are too many cards to keep up with. Yeah, you may be saying “that’s stupid. There’s no problem with CARDS.” But, get this, the game now has salary cards. Two sets - one if you attend college and one if you don’t. You can get a bill that says you got a $10,000 raise, but you have to keep track of those and re-totaling how much you should get paid. As if remembering a payday wasn’t hard enough, because you always seemed to randomly pass over them. I don’t think I’ve ever played this game without taking a break in the middle to determine the course of action should a player want to claim a missed payday from the last turn. Now, however, there’s an arguement for every payday. It’s just that hard to keep track of.

Just in case the two sets of salary cards aren’t enough, you have the option of returning to school later and picking again. But you can always still get the ‘Teacher’ card which under-earns about every other player on the board. Yes, in Life there is no glory in a noble profession. And NOW you get the added whammy of having to take out $100,000 in loans to go to school. Yeah, you heard me. They are making you PAY for COLLEGE!!! And Life doesn’t offer Sallie Mae. Although you can defer your payments as long as you wish, you owe back $25,000 on every $20,000 you borrow. *sigh*

We still haven’t touched on the fact that you now have to buy a starter house (and mortgage it) THEN you have to trade up (then mortgage the difference). You would think it would be fun to see that your starter house has increased in value, yup! grab your calculator. Figure out the payment on the sub-prime lending rate you qualified for after calculating your Experian credit score. NO! you cannot log onto FreeCreditReport.com! Come on, this is a blast! I hope you actually went to college, beacuse you’ll need it to figure out every money exchange that is at the heart of this game.

Although so much of the game has come into the new millenia (much to the detriment of fun) you still MUST get married. Why? While I did find this a great prompt to have the ‘”some people are gay, and Mommy & Daddy think it’s OK if you want to get a partner of the same color as you” discussion, there were too many other problems overshadowing a good core-values discussion. Like the fact that the bank no longer gives you wedding gifts. You trade $5,000 around the board each time a player is forced into matrimony Palin-style.

On the upside, Milton Bradley attempted to make the game pieces more current. We found that the spinner doesn’t require the drop of cooking oil the version from my childhood did (to get that nice zinging whiz of a fast wheel.) The cars are more current but still a vehicle most soccer-moms wouldn’t be caught dead in - and that doesn’t even get into the now worse colors these wagons come in. Also, the people pegs have actually been given some semblance of form. No more round headed pin. There’s a rectangular mid-section to them now. Never mind that they still are standing up in the cars. The new midsection means the pegs don’t go down into the “seats” tightly and they keep popping out.

Then again, maybe that had nothing to do with the way the new pegs fit. I have a serious suspicion that the pegs found the new version of LIFE just as tedious as I did. I think they were trying to commit suicide, as if that would get them out of having to finish the game!

*sigh*

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God Bless Science - finally two things have been genetically blended to create . . . . Uahahahaha! The perfect pet.

But seriously folks, what do you get when you cross a sea anemone with a beagle? Glow in the dark puppies!

Really, someone did it, it’s not a joke. Glow Dog

*sigh* just in case we didn’t have enough to deal with in this world we live in, now even the absurd creates great moral dilemmas. Glow in the dark dogs are one of those things that serve no real purpose. Sure, they further science, and one day this will lead to the cure of all diseases . . . but isn’t that what Hitler thought he was doing, too? Do we learn nothing from the past? Do we think it’s okay to play God? Do we really think that after all this scientific advance, the dog should bear the stuuuupid moniker, ‘Ruppy’?

Really? Ruppy? It’s a blend of ‘ruby’ and ‘puppy’ - because the thing glows red. If you’re smart enough to think this dog up, AND grow it, can’t you get a better name than ‘Ruppy’? Come on, ‘Gloworm’ is better than Ruppy. How about ‘Spot’ - because you can spot him in the dark? ‘Red Dwarf’?

It takes roughly two months for a puppy to gestate, there was plenty of time to get a better name. Then again, there are a lot of theories that scientists dress like they do because they used all their brain space on other things. Clearly, it wasn’t used on giving this poor little freak of a dog a better name. As if it isn’t bad enough all the other puppies will make fun of it because it glows . . . . yup, Rudolph!!!

What do we even call the people who made the Glow Dog? Are they inventors? Breeders? If they think it’s so cool to give things blended names, then I’m sure they won’t mind being called inbreeders! (Breventors?)

And maybe they weren’t trying to further science in general. Maybe they just had a lot of extra money and time and thought, what can we cross? Geeks do that. Think up ridiculous things that science should make. These guys just took the leap and made it. Maybe they checked out some loose genetic codes just hanging out after the fall of the Soviet Union and thought, Glow Puppy!

Or maybe they saw a purpose. Maybe one of the scientists is heartbroken because his dog got lost as a kid and he vows that no child will suffer as he did. There are all kinds of possible back stories here. And maybe there is a purpose. I mean, previously, if you wanted to find your dog at night, you needed to outfit him with an LED collar and you needed to realize that you still might not find Rover if you were looking at his south end when he was northbound.

Now, you can spot your Glow-dog from a good distance, even if all you can see is his butt. Maybe your kid is afraid at night - double whammy! - a dog AND a night light! Maybe it works as a label, too. (At least until everyone has a Glow dog.) “You can’t keep him just because you found him, he’s mine! . . . yeah, well my dog glows in the dark. I dare you to turn off the lights and NOT be creeped out by it.”

I know the whole color thing can be helpful. Once, my dog Hercamer ate a tube of lipstick (long story, another day). After the fear wore off, we got some mileage out of it. This lady at the dog park rudely told me to clean up after my dog. I looked her in the eye and said, “my dog didn’t do that.” “I saw him do it!” “I get that, but that pile looks like regular dog poop. This week my dog is crapping . . . what was that color, honey? Oh yeah, Luscious Rose.” (Yes, the color lasted a whole week!)

Still, aside from the many uses of a Glow Dog, there are still some issues here. The dog has Sea anemone parts . . . Will Ruppy later grow tentacles and develop symbiotic relationships with clownfish? Will she plant herself somewhere and start swaying back and forth?

And most importantly, do you have to put her under a light for a while to get her glowing?

You know those old jokes “what do you get when you cross a . . . .?” Yeah, those aren’t seeming so funny anymore. It’s been a long night, and I must get to bed. Now if I could just figure out how to turn the dog off, I could get some sleep.

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Because Sometimes We All Just Want to Fly the Coop!

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So, after I finished the daily trivia mind-suck ‘how well do you know your dog breeds?’
I turned to the other exciting news of the day. Apparently, John Bon Jovi was in some kind of a ‘dolphin tragedy’ . . .

Let’s face it - it was a slow day.

I waited a little while to comment on this one, but I love that it’s out there.

A new Miss USA was crowned this last week. And, no I didn’t watch it. But I have picked up a few key things.

Miss USA has long lived in the shadow of her more popular (although often not as pretty) older sister, Miss America. Where Miss USA gets her upshot is that she gets to go on to the Miss Universe Pageant. This pageant is the fodder for many an awesome YouTube video. Seriously, check it out here.
all you have to type in is “Miss Universe fal” you don’t even have to get the whole word “falls” input and you have a whole pull down menu of embarrassing footage that will keep you smiling for hours.

The other major difference between Miss Universe and Miss America: Miss Universe has no talent. Hey, I didn’t make that rule! I’m just telling it like it is.

In recent years, however, there has been a huge push to show that these girls do have brains. Unfortunately, the Q&A portion of the pageant is becoming the most horrendously fun to watch. I was shown a snippet of the Miss America judges trying to stump the contestants by asking them why their skin tans when they go in the sun.

This is so sad. The question was chosen because it was expected that the girls couldn’t answer it. (ouch! number one) It did stump all but one of the contestants (ouch! number two) and the one contestant who did answer it, opened by saying she was a biology major and that’s why she knew it. She then proceeded to give a nicely worded explanation that was in large part inaccurate. (ouch! number three). The judges smiled and praised her knowledge (ouch! number four). Later footage showed a few good natured contestants saying “thanks, Miss South Carolina, for making us all look stupid”.

*sigh*

This makes me feel mean, but I need to point out that these girls accomplished the bulk of that all on their own.

Let’s face it; the ‘Miss’ pageants are a contest of ‘pretty’. Miss America at least spends her year campaigning for some good purpose - interspersed with big hair, parade rides and lots of overbright smiles. I’ve always failed to see how being an accomplished performer (almost always in music, singing or dance) helps this. Is she expected to perform before Sultans and visiting Prime Ministers? I always thought she was just supposed to smile.

Notice how, in this day of political correctness, the bathing suit competition has not been abolished. (Is she supposed to walk around in her skivvies before Sultans and visiting Prime Ministers?) The swimsuit competition has merely changed title to “physical fitness”. Yeah, none of us really buys it either.

The issue is this: if Miss America and Miss USA are really supposed to be pretty mouthpieces, then they’d better know their place. This year a contestant was asked whether Gay marriage should be allowed.

Fumbles are hardly unusual - previous contestants have uttered “U.S. Americans” and repeated short phrases without ever making a complete sentence. But now Miss California may be the first woman to not win based on what she said rather than how she said it. (Comparatively, she was fairly articulate). But she said she believes that marriage should be between a man and a woman, “No offense to anyone.”

What I mean about the girls ‘knowing their place’ is this: The viewership for any of these pageants has been in serious decline in recent years. No one is tuning to one night of fifty (often vapid, but sweet) girls vying for a title - not when a flick of the remote gets you ten random personalities who are working diligently to vote each other off the island, out of the house, or just plain trip someone on the runway.

Who has stuck by the pageants all this time? Dressed these girls in all their sequined finery? Spent years coaching them how to turn AND smile at the same time? And watched every pageant on TV? Gay men, that’s who.

So if you want to win a title, then the little starving kids in Africa need our monetary support to fund their educations, all American children should have music in their schools (and in their hearts?) but above all - Gay men should be able to love whom they choose, openly. Do you know why, Miss USA? Because they love you.

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10 Qs from Justin Sachs
I’d like to introduce you to Justin Sachs who is the author of a new book, Your Mailbox Is Full and is the founder of the Creating Possibilities Coaching Program in which Justin helps teenagers to increase their grades, eliminate procrastination, and create balance in all the areas of their life.

1. What do you do?
I work with teenagers to increase their grades, eliminate procrastination, create balance in their lives, and overcome any obstacles standing in their way of success.

2. Tell us about your new book.
Your Mailbox Is Full is a book for teenagers, that teaches them the tools they need to become successful in school and throughout their lives. They learn things like goal setting, time management, living a healthy lifestyle, and modeling and attracting success.

3. Why did you write it?
When I was 14 years old I went to my first Tony Robbins Seminar and I was in a room full of thousands of adults thinking, “Where’s all the teenagers?” “Why aren’t other youth here getting these powerful tools and strategies?” It was with that realization that I found my passion: Empowering teenagers with life-skills and leadership development tools for success. That’s what my book is all about: Teaching youth the most powerful skills they need to know to create enormous success and fulfillment in life! Now, teenagers don’t have to wait until they are 30 or 40 to get these tools and strategies, they are available to them within Your Mailbox Is Full.

4. What makes you an expert in your field?
After going to Anthony Robbins seminars for 3 years, I began working for his product sales team and non-profit organization at all his events worldwide. I then began working for Mark Victor Hansen, the co-founder of Chicken Soup for the Soul Series, and learned even more about life-skills, writing a book, and supporting people in bringing possibility into their lives. I then read everything I could get my hands on from The Secret, to Jack Canfield, to Stephen Covey, to Eckart Tolle, among many others. I learned everything I possibly could about personal development and transformation such that I can now create transformation in others!

5. What type of people should read your book?
The book is designed for teenagers and young adults, but parents throughout the country are reading the book and loving every page! The contents of the book are limitless, this is the perfect book for anyone looking to take their lives to the next level, especially youth!

6. Are you on any social networks? Eg. Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn
Yes, on www.Twitter.com/JustinSachs or http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=511068642

7. Advice for Teens or Parents of Teens
Follow your passions and never give up on your dreams! If you have a goal, a vision, or a hope for the future, hold on to it, focus on it, and take action to make it happen! You’ll be amazed at how quickly your dreams will manifest themselves when energy is focused on them.

8. Favorite Quote
Every day, every week and every month, you must challenge yourself to continue to grow to new heights and to take your standards to higher and higher levels. ~ Justin Sachs

9. Favorite Theme Park
Walt Disney World of course!!!

10. How can we purchase your book? Learn more about you? Do you have a blog?
My book is available on my website: www.YourMailboxIsFullBook.com To learn more about my coaching services visit www.JustinSachsOnline.com and be sure to check out my new radio show at www.MotivationalMindsRadio.com

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There are now three possible major crimes associated with Craigslist. The crimes, two of which are killings, involve women meeting men at hotels for ‘massages’? Oooooh. In fact, they’ve even dubbed the culprit ‘the craigslist killer’ http://www4.comcast.net/articles/news-national/20090416/Craigslist.Killer/ Wow, sorry about the bad press, Craig!

I guess it had to happen sooner or later, but it’s here now. People are trading phone numbers and often addresses with total strangers based on the tone of a few emails or even a phone call. . . . I gotta go with that one being unwise. Especially for women. Wait! I don’t want to be sexist - let me rephrase: It would be unwise to do that if you are small and don’t have a black belt. Or a really big, really dedicated dog at your side.

And, let’s be honest here, from the word going around, these women were making unwise Craigslist choices. (or maybe just bad decisions in general?) Now, I’m a firm believer that there really is no such thing as ‘asking for it’ but I am just as firm a believer that there really is a ‘being stupid’. And there are many ways to be stupid with Craigslist. Exchanging goods, services and personal info with total strangers needs to be done with a wary eye and a backup plan.

Sometimes, it’s really hard to tell who is the ‘wrong person.’ But sometimes you get lucky. I got my kittens off of Craigslist. I simply emailed in response to an ad that a person had two kittens free to a good home. So I wrote and said I had the aforementioned good home - lots of space, and two children who want to cuddle and play with some kittens. And were the kittens still available?

I’ve had Sammy and Lilah for a year and a half now, and still haven’t quite figured out what Debbie meant in her first cryptic email:

“I’m so glad you wrote. Yes, I do still have the kittens and your home sounds ideal. I like that you have kids - these two are really cuddly. I’ve had a lot of emails about them, but yours is the best. Some of them were just creepy.”

I met Debbie and we parked our cars caddy corner, then we exchanged the kittens (her carrier to the one I had bought) like some petty drug deal going down in the parking lot at Petco. She gave me all kinds of info - cards for a local vet, a little baggie of the kitten food she’d been giving them, their litter history. But she didn’t give me the one thing I really wanted: what was in those ‘creepy’ emails?

My mind went nuts. “Do the kittens have big, juicy hind legs?” “I love a nice fattened kitten.” “Cuddly? That’s fantastic - I’ll never let him go!” How do you sound ‘creepy’ when asking for a free kitten? And anyone with half an IQ would know better than to sound creepy until after the deed is done.

Whatever radar these ladies in the hotels had, this guy got past it. Again, I don’t think it takes a lot of smarts to make a good Craigslist connection - just don’t sound like a homicidal killer (or someone who’s going to do something ‘creepy’ with the free kitten).

I have to say it’s making me think twice about posting the odd farm implements I inherited with the house I bought. I don’t need turn-of-the-century ice calipers, but I’ll bet someone does. And Craigslist would be just the place to post it! I think most people are nice, good people. But in the end you have to be very careful. Even if your Craigslist connection isn’t a killer, keep your kittens out of sight!

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Let me start by apologizing to everyone with a tiny yard, or even with no yard. I’m not apologizing for your spit-sized piece of sod, because yards are like kids: if you don’t want one, you shouldn’t have one. What I’m apologizing for is this: there will be some of this article that will make no sense to you. But you should read it anyway, if only for the fascinating look into someone else’s psyche.

Before, when I was in LA, we had an environmentally friendly push mower. No, not the kind you walk behind, the shiny-new but old-fashioned design with the spinning blades and no motor at all. Our property was measured in square feet, so it was the easiest thing. You never ran out of fuel, you didn’t have to wait because you might wake the neighbors (and believe me, the neighbors were close!) and it was a good workout.

Enter the Tennessee yard. Push-mower begone! Even our neighbors with single lots have riding mowers, you just don’t push your way over an acre. Not unless you hate yourself. We have almost three acres of mow-able grass making mowing a half-day event. I am supremely grateful that a good portion of the property is covered in woods. Bless you, trees!

Given this scenario, it’s not uncommon to wind up in a conversation about where to get the best mower and at what price. There was never a Tractor Supply store in LA. But out here, they are frequent, and I have learned how to get fuel for the sucker, size and replace a belt, and to keep my mouth shut when asked what I had before. (You will only get blank stares and shunning in these parts for mentioning a push-mower.)

While I live in the bend of the river - larger lots and some cattle grazing land - it isn’t just us riverbend folks. I think Tennessee has a mower fixation in general. Just the other day we found John Deere Gummy fruits sold in snack packs for kids’ lunches. http://www2.kelloggs.com/Product/ProductDetail.aspx?product=13500

Sure, they are made of corn syrup, sugar and gelatin, but hey, they’re shaped like little John Deere tractors. (I would never buy an off-brand tractor snack for my kid! How will he know quality when he grows up? There’s also the issue that he won’t know much of anything when he grows up if I’m feeding him things that have sugar and corn syrup listed as the first two ingredients, but hey!)

There’s that story of the man who drove his mower cross-country. And another recent one where some dude souped-up an old mower and drove it drunk. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29971638/ Now that was in Ohio, but apparently they have a thing for their mower’s too. I really don’t think it’s limited to the South. I think it happens anywhere there are large parcels of land and working class attitude.

To top it off, there’s the USLMRA - http://www.letsmow.com/rulebook.asp - Which, you might have guessed, stands for US Lawn Mower Racing Association. Yup, that’s mower racing. After 17 years, they have at least 32 races per year, an official handbook and an online photo gallery to make you either want to blind yourself or join up. And they aren’t the only name in the mower racing business.

Most of you will likely fall into two categories. The first is the ‘Seriously? People love their mowers that much? I don’t get it.’ The second group is the ‘Of course, there’s mower racing and John Deere Fruit Snacks. It’s mowers!’

There is a small and often overlooked third group. I suspect this group is overlooked because of the tendency of its members to not stay in the middle but to stray to the mower/dark side. Take Guy for instance, his red mower (chosen over another comparable mower because of the color (the other was yellow, for God’s sakes)) has been modestly upgraded. While he has not yet acquired the attachable shade (which he wants to deck out with dangling sombrero style balls and fuzzy dice) he does have the decals working for him. There are flames shooting out of the vents and silver mud-flap girls decorating the back. He says his next order of business is setting up a gopher kill record on the side of the mower.

Yup. Long live the lawn.

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That’s the problem with the largest bookstore and purveyor of, well, everything. It’s brilliant and stupid all at the same time.

There’s a wonder to buying books online. How did it get so big? As a bibliophile, I really like me a good bookstore. I like to use my legs to browse. I like the heft of a good carbon-based copy of a book in my hands. I don’t need an audio book to read it to me - I read quite well all by myself, thank you. AND I do the character voices in my head way better than any single reader out there. In addition to all this sheer lunacy I clearly exhibit, when I choose a book, I like to start reading it. (Does anyone say ‘Wow, That looks like a great book, I think I’d like to start reading it in three to four days.’?)

And yet, despite all this, Amazon is . . . well, Amazon. And it’s not just books. I’ve found so many things there (bedsheets, chocolates, barns) that I’m waiting for the day you can adopt a kid on Amazon. Think of the possibilities. You could see the kid’s picture, hear them read a book, get ratings from former foster parents . . . Now I’m just waxing poetic. (Seriously, if anyone knows about this already happening (or something similar) please email me: AJ@AJScudiere.com))

But the problem with Amazon is that they have issued a new (stupid) edict. Read for yourself at http://www.bookmarket.com/AmazonIsStupid.htm. You must sign your review with your name (okay - that part makes sense) and ONLY your name. They are also kicking out any review already posted that violates the new rules. Ouch! This means no more tag lines a la “AJ Scudiere - Author of RESONANCE and VENGEANCE”. Yup, that would get me kicked out. Also adding in a link will get you booted. Even though Amazon provides the tools to make the link. What is this? Make it but don’t use it?

Let’s face it, they’ve always been a little touchy. Lots of us have had postings mysteriously disappear. And it isn’t worth it to call them. (Have you tried calling them? It’s a great way to spend a day.) If you email, a lot of the replies are ambiguous, like: ‘there are a lot of reasons we might delete a post. For example: explicit material, obvious pandering, the post resembles Spam, we had our heads up our butts and weren’t paying attention, and we play Russian roulette with the posts on a daily basis, maybe yours got unlucky.’ Okay, I added those last two in, but the ‘including but not limited to’ phrase leaves a lot wide open.

The result is the same: your post mysteriously disappeared like the last Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup and you’re never gonna know where it went and you aren’t gonna get it back.

Still, let this be a warning to all of us: shape up and sign right! Your name only (no rank, no serial number (REALLY, no ISBNs - they’re banned!)) And we only know this because someone got their hands on a missive. Amazon wasn’t going to tell.

This all seems a little ‘Big Brother’ (from the book, NOT the reality show! This is about books!) or ‘anti-first amendment rights’ to me. (Are there rights online? Is Amazon a public or private space? I want to be clear that I am NOT inciting anyone to riot.)

Regardless, if there is something you can do, please do it. I, unfortunately, am like most of us: I feel this violates my basic principles to have my signature be so restricted (I mean, they call it a ‘signature’!). But it also violates my basic principles to spend a lot of time fighting for something small against such an amazon corporation. Even if they are being weenie-heads.

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Two college guys just recently got arrested for a UFO hoax. You can watch the news reel online: http://www.yahoo.com/?r956=1238991604

But there are so many problems here. Seriously? A UFO hoax - on April Fool’s Day no less! There’s a very strong part of me that says, look, if you got taken by a practical joke (and believe me, I have!) then you suck up and laugh with everyone else. You don’t arrest the offending party. These guys weren’t even streaking anywhere, for God’s sakes!

And all this coverage - including them getting arrested - really puts a damper on my own plans. When I was a kid my father taught me how to make a “UFO”. (My grandfather taught me how to catch vultures and monkeys (not at the same time), so being taught how to make a UFO didn’t seem out of the ordinary in my family.) While my Dad did warn me that several people who had made and launched fake UFOs in the past had brought the FBI to their doorsteps, I never fully believed this. And have subsequently had ‘make and launch fake UFO’ on my bucket list since I was small. You know, just one of those ‘when the time is right’ ideas tucked in the back of my head.

My UFO begins with candles, Balsa wood, and dry cleaning bags (they shimmer, oooooh). Then they get arranged into a hot air balloon set up. And hopefully it ends with Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith wiping my memory with one of those handy red zap sticks. (Of course, if they wipe my memory, I’ll just do it again, the next time the wind is right.)

But, I am afraid that this “hoax” just bumped ‘make UFO’ to my real bucket list - like when I’m really dying and being arrested won’t matter much. There’s an argument about whether the guys were arrested for fooling the public (stupid public!) or for endangering people. Yeah, yeah I get it - it’s not right to send lit road flares into the sky tied to balloons. They might land on a roof and burn a house down. Blah blah blah. Hey, what’s a little risk if it’s fun? Besides, they sent up road flares - that’s dangerous. It could cause some trouble, but candles? dry-cleaner bags? that’s just standard good fun.

What makes it still so tempting is that at one point in the article there’s a question as to whether the guys are only facing misdemeanor charges - which carry a $98 fine. Well, hell, I’ve got that in my back pocket. That really makes me want to launch my UFOs anyway. I can just hand the fine over to the judge and say “That was fun! It was so worth $98!” Unfortunately, this begs the question: How much does ‘contempt of court’ cost?

While the college students who did this have been hailed as ‘bright, but stupid’ just for launching the things, part of the issue is that they made (and posted online!) videos of them making and launching the “UFO”s. So, of course they weren’t really trying to make anyone truly believe the aliens were coming.

Again, I am kind of shooting myself in the foot here by announcing that I’d like to build a “UFO”, too. So that puts a damper on my project for a long while. Bummer.

After all this, I think maybe the aliens should come. Far scarier than people thinking these were actual UFOs, or even the very real possibility that someone’s house might catch on fire, is the fact that the news reel repeatedly called the contraptions ‘bright’ and ‘intelligent’, and the hoax referred to as ‘elaborate’. Dude, it was a couple flares tied to balloons! Literally, it’s not rocket science.

Ah hell. Bring $98. See you outside after it gets dark!

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Because Sometimes We All Just Want to Fly the Coop!

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Here’s part of an interview I did with Pat Dougher.

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This video is an excerpt from my AudioMovie put together with some slides to add visuals (the AudioMovie itself is just audio).

David and Greer are in Tennessee doing some digging to find out if we really are headed for a polar reversal.

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