A Treatise on the Availability of Hope in a Cynical Age, and the Lack Thereof....

It's an interesting title, but not realllly relevant. Much. Okay, a little.

A light snow is falling, and I am not, not, NOT answering that call again. I've put in my shovelling time, and I'm going to sit here and let the flakes fall where they may.

I haven't really been able to focus my mind to writing anything resembling coherent thought these days. There seems to be a lot of things going on. If I cared a little bit more, I probably would be worried.

Long ago, when I and the world were younger, I believed that eventually saner heads would prevail; that the generations in power, those of the old guard, would eventually have to retire, and place the decisions in the hands of a younger crowd, that could see to the horizon. In my own short-sightedness, I believed that the fear and the paranoia wouldn't rub off, and we could make a clean break from that cold war mentality.

And along came the new century.
Here's the new boss; same as the old boss.

I wrote a little something about socialism and the apocalypse recently, and I don't want to beat the dead horse, but there are tests being conducted these days; everybody is testing the limits. And alas, we've put ourselves in the position where we have to be the cop/parent/teacher/buttinski for the entire planet, and even though I STILL have faith in the whole, "saner heads prevailing" theory, I wonder sometimes if it isn't time to let somebody else play bad cop for awhile.

BUT...and I'm just putting this out there, for the sake of fairness: If some other nation with the capacity for warheads with the ultimate "boom" decided they were going to shoot our missiles out of the sky as they flew away from Vandenberg Airbase, don't you think we'd be juuuuuust a little pissed off about it? Certainly, with the exception of our blue jeans and television programming, we are not ACTUALLY seen as a benevolent father-nation. Are we?

My barometer for trouble in this country is based upon my Father's emails. And they are becoming very mean-spirited. KarlRovian(TM), if you will. And that NEVER bodes well. We're at least three years away from a bi-partisanship that resembles something other than the war we got going now.....and that's only if the people start seeing movement on the money front.

Ack.

I didn't want to get into that.

I just wanted to say:

You can't tell by looking out my window, but the Boys of Summer will soon be at it again, and I can't wait to see how it goes.

I get tested today, and I believe I'm prepared, but don't actually care if I am or not.

And I just wanted to throw in my own goodbye to Andy Hallett. Too soon, always too soon. Thanks for the laughs.