It’s been a long hard slough. Let me tell you.
When I first got my 5G Video iPod - I had big visions of converting some of my eclectic video library to iPod compatible, and maybe downloading some television shows to it as well.
Pretty Jamie and I love to camp and travel, and it seemed like a great idea to be able to take some movies with us in our ‘pocket’, to pass time on long plane flights or lengthy car rides or in the tent or cabin at night when we’re camping.
Wishful thinking.
I found out very quickly that Apple hadn’t really thought the concept of the video iPod through very well.
There was no way I was paying $10 or $15 bucks for movies on iTunes that I had already paid for on VHS, DVD or $2 for an episode of a TV show that I had already on my Moxie box.
No way.
So I set about a quest.
My quest was to find a way to convert the stuff I already HAD to my video iPod without downloading them from iTunes.
Easier said than done.
When you first begin to research this - you’ll be lead to a bizarre array of software by the ‘experts’.
The first stop on the long journey is a nightmare head-trip through “ripping” and “decoding” software for DVD’s - most of which are now illegal and virtually impossible to find.
There are “free” versions and commercial versions, and versions that only work on DVD’s that haven’t been CSS encoded (most have - so why even bother?). You have to figure out first how to decrypt a DVD, It’s a nightmare.
Then - if you’re lucky enough to have been one of the people who grabbed a copy of the decoding and ripping software BEFORE they became Federal offenses (LITERALLY) - you’re faced with the staggering task of actually learning to use the decoding software which - due to variations in the way that the Brown Sludge studios encode and copy protect their DVD’s - is a heavy burden. The procedure that works on disc A might NOT work on disc B - and you might have to completely reconfigure the software to use a different approach.
This has to be done for EVERY DVD you own that you want to decode and rip to your hard drive.
This isn’t nearly the worst part of it.
IF you’re one of the only 3 people left in the known universe who actually HAS a copy of these tools - and IF you’re basically an IT guy by profession and COULD figure out how to manipulate the software into decoding a protected DVD onto your hard drive - then… the FUN begins.
Once you’ve jumped through all of the flaming hoops of monkey-poo that is involved in ripping a protected DVD to a file on your hard drive.. that’s all you’ve got.
A file on your hard drive with the decoded movie in it.
That’s all.
Just a file.
It won’t load onto your iPod. Not in a MILLION years.
It probably won’t even play in your desktop media player.
So… the file has to be converted into a file that’s playable.
You’re right back to where you started from.
An endless array of illegal or quasi-legal crack-warez from questionable sources that will turn the ripped video into (probably) an AVI or DIVX encoded file that will play… in your DESKTOP MEDIA PLAYER.
NOT your iPod. It don’t do AVI. It don’t do DIVX. It does h.264.
BACK to square one.
Gotta find a piece of software that will turn your AVI or DIVX into an iPod compatible file.
Then guess what?
It will play on your iPod. But it will do so VEWWY QUIETLY. Cause… the ipod doesn’t like “muxed” AVI or MPEG audio. It only likes AAC. So I hope your DVD’s were all silent movies from the 20’s - because - the soundtrack won’t convert.
ROTFL.
You getting the idea now?
BACK to SQUARE one.
Gotta find the software (freeware, cracked warez, open source, commercial, etc.) that DEMUXES the AVI or MPEG file.
Gotta find MORE software that marries the DEMUXED AVI/MPEG audio back into the file that’s going on your iPod.
Jeezus H. Tap Dancin’ Christ on a Crutch.
Somebody give me a FREAKIN’ break.
I was DETERMINED to beat this LUNACY.
And I did it.
Here’s how
BUT…
Before I start - I need to address some of the readers who came here looking for a solution - and I’m directing this at the slobbering mouth-breathers who want High Definition 1080p resolution video and Dolby THX Theater quality sound… all from what amounts to a glorified transistor radio with a freakin’ TWO INCH SCREEN. You window-lickers aren’t fit to live, and will eventually be exterminated. Go back to masturbating to your posters of Deanna Troy and living for the next LARPA meeting. You shall perish in flames. Fools.
For the rest of the human race - the ones with a little common sense - here’s how I got EXCELLENT quality videos of my DVD’s and TV shows on my iPod.
It’s not EXACTLY a cheap solution - but it’s ‘inexpensive’ and it works. Really well.
First… I bought an ATI 650 HDTV Card for my computer. It was on sale for $99.00 bucks from the slack-jawed flunkies at Best Buy. I’ve seen it on the web for $79.00. Not exactly cheap, but not exactly ‘prohibitively’ expensive either.
I also ponied up the $29.99 for QuickTime Pro from Apple. It pained me to do it, and yes, I’ve read a MILLION articles about other (free, illegal, semi-legal, shareware, commercial etc.) programs that allegedly do the same thing, but… I made the decision up front not to screw around and to get from point A to point B with the shortest line possible. QuickTime Pro was it. If you found something else that works better for less money - good for you.
That’s it. That’s all I needed.
I installed the card - then I installed the drivers and software (FAIR WARNING - The program that runs the little 650 TV Video card was programmed by ass-scratching monkeys that had NO idea how to design a program or (apparently) test a program either. My guess here is that ATI did the moron thing and contracted migrant workers from third world countries to design and program the interface that goes on the front of one of the slickest and neatest little gadgets I’ve seen in a while. Shame on them. If the 650 card goes belly up in the fish-bowl - it will be because whoever was in charge of programming the interface was a brainless twit - ’nuff said)
I ran a cable TV connection to the card - and plugged in the little converter interface that came with it. It accepts an S-VIDEO and Composite set of cables. Thats all you should need.
I connected my DVD player via SVIDEO and audio cables to the cards little external interface.
I pulled up the software and set the video inputs to the S-VIDEO cable - and as Emeril would say BAM. There was the picture from my DVD player. In S-VIDEO digital quality. Nice.
It took a little experimenting with the “recording optiions” to get it right.
I initially took the bait and set the recording format to 320×240 “IPOD” format supplied with the interface. Seemed like a ‘no-brainer’ to me. What I got was okay video - but - big surprise - no sound. The file it recorded was basically a glorified AVI that - ta-da - contained MUXED audio that wasn’t going anywhere on the video iPod. WTF?
I got a little tense at this. All the literature suggested that the 650 had a BUILT in h.264 codec that was totally compatible with the video iPod. I got the sinking feeling I’d just paid $99 bucks for something that didn’t work as advertised.
I fooled around a bit more.
I selected the “h.264 Sony PSP” recording format. I recorded about 5 minutes of video.
It went onto the iPod nicely. Sound too!
Video quality wasn’t just “good”. It was EXCELLENT. I couldn’t tell that it hadn’t come directly from a digital conversion. Period. I’m willing to bet that most people couldn’t either. Crystal clear, high quality, no artifacts. Great stereo sound. Really great.
One tiny problem.
The file size was a little larger than I liked. Actually it was a lot larger than I liked.
The files on iTunes can get a 2 hour movie in about 1.5 gigs of space. A 30 minute TV episode is usually less than 300m.
My estimation put these recorded files at about 3 times that. Not so great.
That’s when I ponied up the $29.99 for QuickTime Pro. You have to have the pay-for “Pro” version because it has an “export to iPod” function.
Very handy.
I pulled my recorded video up in QuickTime Pro - exported it to the iPod format, and again… BAM… there it was.
File sizes were itty bitty. Quality didn’t seem to be degraded at all.
The one downside was time. It takes QuickTime an inordinately long time to convert these files. Like… It took almost 20 minutes to encode a 15 minute video. It takes almost 2 hours to encode a two hour video.
I can live with this.
The UPSIDE to this elegant little solution is HUGE.
First… with the 650 card I can record directly from my cable TV stations. I can set it to record to h.265 PSP format at any time of the day or night on any channel - just like a dang Tivo. (Well… almost any channel - it only goes up to channel 125 - the basic tier - the extended channels don’t show in the listing, but I’ve got a fix for that TOO ). Discovery Channel specials. National Geographic. Whatever. It goes right to a perfect little file on my hard drive at the appointed time. A few minutes of time to export it from QTPro, and I’m watching it on my iPod in stereo.
Second - anything I can get into my DVD player is fair game. Period.
Screw CSS. Screw encoding. Screw decryptor. Screw the FCC. Screw MPAA. Screw DMCA. Screw Macrovision.
If it will play in my DVD player - it’s MINE. S-VIDEO straight to the file. No illegal downloads from pirate web-sites. Just a straight shot right from the DVD player to my hard drive. The quality is NOT discernible from video ripped directly from digital media. Not on no TWO inch screen it ain’t.
Plus… with THIS solution - my old VHS tapes are convertible too!
Anything I can hook to that S-VIDEO or composite cable is fair game.
Got TiVo? Got high tier channels that won’t appear in the regular cable line-up on the 650 card? Well… does your TiVo or TV have a composite out? Then… you’re GOLD. Period.
Easy peasy japanesey.
When I’ve got a couple of two hour video’s to convert - I just set the export function to do them at night before I go to bed, and they’re done during the night. No sweat.
It’s really a great solution.
My routine is pretty basic.
First… I put the DVD in the player and get the 650’s CMC software ready to record. Then I shuttle to the final frames of the DVD - I mark the exact time when the DVD ends. Say for instance it’s 1 hour 33 minutes and 15 seconds. I set a kitchen timer to 1:32 and queue the video to the first frame. I turn on the RECORD function on the 650 and then push “play” on the DVD/VHS. When the timer beeps - I go in and wait for the finals credits to quit rolling then I quit the recording process.
For TV shows I just set the 650’s scheduler to harvest what I want at the times I want. When I get home from work or being out - their all sitting in the directly dutifully recorded in h.264 compatible format and ready to go.
Then I open QTPro, and open all the files I want to convert - and then I select “export” on all of them (you can do multiple files concurrently with no problem).
In a couple of hours I’ve got my files ready to be loaded into iTunes, and put on my iPod.
File sizes are really excellent. I can cram a 2 hour video into about 475 meg. less than 1/2 a gig. That’s totally acceptable.
The time it takes to do it this way is a little painful, I’ll admit. But it’s worth it. Truely. And for about buck and a quarter it’s not a deal breaker.
I’ll certainly save that in all the videos I *won’t'* be buying from iTunes.
And really - most of the tools that some people are using are big time-sinks anyway - so I’m not entirely convinced that this way isn’t at least as efficient time-wise in some cases. Really.
If ATI gets their collective crap together, and updates the interface things might get even better.
Oh… one little aside.
The first few video’s I converted seemed a little “squashed” to me. As if the aspect ratio wasn’t quite right in the conversion. This bugged me quite a bit. The video and sound quality was top-notch, but… the video just seemed so distorted when I played it back on the ipod.
This bugged me a lot because I was convinced I was doing something wrong. I was convinced that there was a break-down in the conversion process that was squishing my video and putting the black bars on the sides. It didn’t make any sense. Most non-wide screen video is 4:3 - and the recording ratio on the 650 was 4:3, and the ipod screen is (more or less) 4:3. Why was it squishing it?
Well… I got this beat too.
I own a 51″ wide-screen HDTV. I had set my DVD player to 16:9 ratio. This caused it to squish up the video on the iPod. When I record from the DVD player I set the ratio on the DVD player options to 4:3 and now it’s perfect. Fills the screen from edge to edge just like it should, and looks fantastic on the iPod as well.
Problem solved.
Ba-Da-Bing.
And to those who wanted me to pay for crap I already owned… well… as Bender would say :
Bite my shiny metal ASS.
EMail This PostDecember 22nd, 2006
You keep a knockin’ but you can’t come in.
Come back tomorrow night and try it again.
You say you love me but you can’t come in.
You keep a knockin’ but you can’t come in.
Akismet has caught 11,249 spam for you since you first installed it.
You have no spam currently in the queue. Must be your lucky day. 
Every day I open my home, office, and blog mail accounts, and every day I’m deluged with spam. No matter how sophisticated the filters, no matter how many layers of anti-spam software are interweaved - at least some spam escapes the filters and bleeds into my mailbox.
Spam for illegal prescription drugs.
Spam for penis enlargement.
Spam for porn.
Spam for bogus stock picks.
Spam for fake gift cards.
Spam for mail order diplomas.
Spam for fake watches.
Spam phishing for my credit card numbers.
It’s staggering.
I read a recent statistic that says spam now accounts for over 90% of all mail being sent world-wide.
NINETY PERCENT.
But there’s one place that spam can’t go.
And that’s the comments section of MY blog.
Because there is a big bruisin’ bodyguard with a thick neck and a BAD attitude standing guard over them.
And that big dog’s name is AKISMET. It’s a Wordpress plug-in.
It works like this :
SPAM : Knock-knock.
AKISMET : Who dat?
SPAM : Candy-gram.
AKISMET : Candy-gram?
SPAM : Yeah. Candy-gram. You need any Viagra?
AKISMET : You smell like spam (checks a list of known spammers).
SPAM : Say… I bet your penis is exceptionally small - I can help you with that.
AKISMET : Wait there a sec. Be right back. Hold REAL still for me.
SPAM : Okay. But your bank account has been hacked. If you give me your account number and password immediately I can verify that for… hey… what’s that little red laser dot on my forehea… URK! (drops to the ground graveyard dead).
AKISMET : Next.
It’s a beautiful thing.
EMail This PostDecember 22nd, 2006
I got a lot of mail about my last St. Louis Drivers Ed post - (both hostile and appreciative).
The hostile mail kind of made me laugh.
I think it’s safe to say that a great deal of the hostile mail came from “St. Louis Drivers”.
You know these people.
These people are the people that HAVE to do 75 miles an hour or they… will… DIE.
On a clear sunny day - 75 mph - regardless of traffic conditions. Wide open lanes - 75 mph. Bumper to bumper rush hour crush - 75 mph. 8 inches of snow on top of an inch of ice - 75 mph. It’s as if they fancy themselves in the movie “Speed” - and they truly believe that if they’re speedometer drops below the 75 mph mark - they’ll explode.
These morons are why St. Louis drivers are world renowned for their idiocy.
In other cities people slow down in heavy traffic or poor road conditions.
Not here. Rain or snow or rush hour crush - there is always going to be some ass-scratcher who is going to insist on 75 mph or die.
UNTIL…
There is a road side accident.
Then… due to some law of physics that mankind may never understand - the St. Louis Driver can’t seem to do over 15 mph.
It’s always the same scenario.
You’re cruising down the highway when all of a sudden traffic - which had been flowing normally - comes to a complete standstill.
You look up the road and the trail of brake lights march off into infinity like so many bright red ants.
Inch by inch you crawl along. Long minutes, perhaps hours later - you see the source of the backup.
It’s not the original accident. The original accident is obviously really old by now - and has long since been cleared off the highway and onto the side of the road.
As you approach the remains of the accident - the reason traffic is backed up for miles becomes painfully clear.
As each St. Louis Driver approaches the accident scene - they are hypnotically compelled to slow to almost a complete stop - they’re eyes are drawn as if in a trance to the cars and police cruisers along the side of the road.
Now… the ridiculous part of this is that there is absolutely NOTHING TO SEE. It’s a freakin’ fender bender. Nobody is hurt. Nobody is killed. Nothing is on fire. There is no drama. There is NOTHING TO SEE. Just two cars with minor body damage.
But one by one the St. Louis Drivers slow to a stop and sit upright in their seats - their necks craning like some ridiculous bird - their heads weaving from side to side as they try as hard as they can to get a look at… NOTHING.
You can almost read their thoughts as each moron takes their turn craning their necks and eyeballing the accident scene.
“Any bodies?”
“Any blood?”
“Is anyone hurt bad?”
“Hope I can see some blood!”
“Hope I can see some carnage!”
“Awe crap… no body is decapitated.”
And then they find the accelerator (that’s the long skinny pedal on the right - for all you St. Louis Drivers) and resume their original 75 mph pace.
Beyond the fender-bender - the highway is open and clear and running at normal speed, before the accident is miles and miles of RubberNecks patiently waiting their turn to gawk at… absolutely NOTHING.
EMail This PostDecember 21st, 2006
Really… I have a lot of civic pride - and it’s that same civic pride that’s making me write this. God forgive me for betraying my driving brethren here in St. Louis.
The truth is - that people in St. Louis have to be among the worst drivers in the entire world.
I am definitely including in that group people from third world countries where there are no clear traffic enforcement.
I really mean this.
As someone who has driven all over the United States at all times of the year, I feel qualified to make the claim that St. Louis drivers are the absolute worst of the lot.
There are many things that make this claim true.
At the very TOP of the list is what I call the “Maybe it will get greener” syndrome.
Now… in every other city on the planet - traffic lights are very simple affairs. Red light you stop. Yellow light you use caution. Green light you go.
But in St. Louis - they don’t work that way.
Due to some phenomenon heretofore unknown to mankind - In St. Louis traffic signals apparently have developed a variety of subtle shades of green.
Example.
Sitting at a red light. It’s a tough light. Tough because the person who is in charge of setting the timing on most of the lights in and around St. Louis County and it’s suburbs is an ass-scratching monkey that doesn’t have the brains God gave a freakin’ fire-ant - and - like most lights here - it’s mistimed and out of sync with the general flow of traffic. They all are. It’s as if they give the guys whose job it is to set up the timing of the lights an IQ test - and if they pass - they aren’t hired. Really.
So… this particular light - like most of the other lights - is allowing the lighter traffic from a little used artery a full 12 minutes of green light time, while traffic on the heavier main artery backs up for several hundred kilometers because it’s only green for 1 and 1/2 seconds.
So… we wait.
And we wait.
And we wait.
I’m almost done with the paperback novel I started when the light first turned red - when - miracle of miracles - it turns green!
Time to move.
Only theres a problem.
Like many St. Louis drivers - the guy in front of me apparently isn’t happy with the shade of green that the light has turned.
He studies it for a minute.
He cocks his head.
He turns to the person in the seat beside him. I can see his lips moving, and I can read them.
“‘Zat look green to you?”
“Little bit.” his passenger replies. “Only I wouldn’t say ‘green’ so much as I’d say ‘olive’.”
“Olive. Hmm.” The driver ponders. “I’m not sure I like it.”
“Me niether.” offers the passenger. “Maybe if we wait it’ll turn a more pleasant shade.”
Eventually they decide that “olive” or “green” it might behoove them to get where they are going before the turn of the Y3K and mosey unhurriedly through the light. Which has been yellow for a bit.
What should have been a 10 or 12 car light at an already idiotically timed intersection has been reduced to a 1 car light.
This scene repeats itself at light after light throughout the city.
I shake my head in amazement.
I’ll never understand it.
It’s not like this in other cities.
I swear it.
EMail This PostDecember 12th, 2006
Very few people can claim to have actually experienced a miracle.
But I have.
To be clear, I am NOT talking figuratively here. I’m very seriously talking literally. And when I say “miracle” I want to also be clear that I’m not talking about the Lord’s face on my grilled cheese or a likeness of the Blessed Mother in my coffee cream.
I said “miracle”. As in… a Real Deal Miracle. As in a basically blind person getting their sight back.
Now… I’ve had crappy vision all of my life.
When I was 12 I had to get the big coke-bottle glasses. It made high school hard, this you must believe.
I’ve struggled with my crappy vision since I was a young boy. I’ve struggled with the thick glasses and thicker contact lenses forever. It was just a fact of life for me.
Without my glasses or contacts in, I couldn’t see more than a few inches in front of my face, and I certainly couldn’t read.
So… when I was recently diagnosed with diabetes (a gift from my Grandmother apparently), I was immediately given medication to begin controlling my blood sugar. I was given a crash course in insulin and injections and testing and finger sticking and which foods are good and which foods are bad and what will happen to me if I don’t keep my blood levels under tight control (by no means a canonical list : amputation, neuropathy, blindness, nerve damage, liver damage, pancreatic damage, cataracts, glaucoma and on and on the list goes.).
I have resolved to beat the disease through diet and exercise – but in the meantime I’m learning to control through medication and management techniques.
My levels had been under control for about a week when something absolutely amazing and unsettling happened. It was… surreal.
I woke up one morning, and I couldn’t see very well anymore. When I opened my eyes, everything was extremely blurry and I was… for all practical purposes… blind. I could only see vague shapes and outlines and generalized colors. It was as if someone had coated my eyes with a very thick layer of vasoline.
At first… I panicked. Seriously. As in… I almost called an ambulance. I was in full-on, balls-to-the-wall “oh my god – oh my god – oh my god” freak out mode.
Then… it occurred to me that I still had in my extended wear contact lenses. I wear the kind of disposable contacts that you can sleep in a few nights a week, if you’re careful to take them out and clean them when you’re supposed to. After a couple of weeks you throw them away and put in new ones. They’ve never given me a bit of trouble. Ever.
On a hunch I ran into the bathroom, and took them out.
And that’s when the miracle happened.
After taking my contacts out, I looked in the mirror and blinked a few times… and… realized… to my utter amazement… that I could see.
Perfectly.
Without my contacts in.
I looked all around the room. I ran outside and looked outside.
I could read the house-numbers all the way down the block and up.
My uncorrected vision… was… perfect.
As in… perfect. 20/20. Better I believe. Crisp. Clear. Perfect.
No coke-bottle glasses.
No contacts.
It was… a miracle.
When I was diagnosed with diabetes, one of the first things out of my doctors mouth was an order to go *immediately* and get my eyes checked for retinopathy and cataracts and glaucoma. He stressed the importance over and over again, and warned me not to come back to my follow-up visit without a note from the ophthalmologist he recommended. He looked pretty serious.
I had headed his advice, and made the appointment as instructed, but… my new eyes had me concerned.
Now… those who know me well… know that it’s not out of character for me to be suspicious when something good happens to me without explanation. It’s absolutely “me” to view the fact that I had gotten my eyesight back as a sign of some impending doom to come. I can’t help it. It’s the way I was raised.
I ran immediately to the phone and called the ophthalmologists office, and asked them to bump my appointment up as far as they could. They told me to come in the next day.
I spent that night scouring the web for articles that related to what was going on with me, but didn’t find anything particularly useful.
The next day, the ophthalmologist listened to me patiently, and then sat back and told me flatly that he felt that I was probably mistaken.
So… he tested me.
First… he pulled my records. He could see that I had previously worn a -3.75 prescription.
Fairly steep as it were.
Then he had me sit in the chair and he gave me the standard eye test. Flipping lenses and chanting in a practiced monotone “Better? Worse? Better? Worse? A? B? 1? 2?” over and over again.
Then he sat back with a strange look on his face. “+.75” he said. Very little correction. My vision wasn’t perfect as I had suspected, but it was very close. Coming from where I was it had sure *seemed* perfect.
He was at a loss to explain it.
He wrote me a script for my new prescription, and told that me I could probably skip wearing them altogether if I so chose – it was probable that I could even have the restriction removed from my drivers license if I so chose and then he vowed to try to find some answers for me.
I could tell that he was genuinely puzzled by this course of events, and to be honest, as I said before – in typical “Mac” fashion - I left his office more worried than ever. It seemed… “too good to be true” – and an omen of bad things to come.
A couple of weeks passed, and I was beginning to enjoy not having to wear glasses, or contacts, and was of course driving my family and Pretty Jamie absolutely berserk by being obnoxious every time I got behind the wheel of my car and reading every single sign I passed out loud. Very loud. Just “because I can!”.
It was… a miracle. A genuine, bona fide, real deal… MIRACLE. A guy who had been basically blind for… 30 plus years… wasn’t blind anymore.
And then…
One of the greatest short stories of all times is Daniel Keyes’ incredible “Flowers for Algernon”. It’s about a mildly mentally disabled man, Charley, who undergoes an experimental procedure that corrects his disability. The experiment was originally performed on a laboratory mouse named Algernon, who became exceedingly smart as a result. Soon… Charley’s intelligence exceeds even those of his doctors. Then… Algernon begins to deteriorate rapidly, and the doctors worry that Charley will too.
I’ve thought about this story a lot lately.
You see… the ophthalmologist called me.
He’d been so intrigued by my “miracle” that he did a bit of research, and discovered the reason for the change in my vision. And he called to tell me the good news. And the bad.
The good news : apparently, a very rare side effect of the diabetes medication that I was put on is a swelling of the lenses of the eyes. This swelling had – through absolute and unbelievable luck – been exactly enough to correct my vision giving me nearly perfect eyesight. A one in a million collision of factors.
The bad news : like Algernon in Daniel Keyes novella, the side effects wouldn’t last. In the days to come my body will begin to accept the new medications and mitigate the side effects, and the lenses in my eyes will return to their original shape.
Only ½ jokingly, I told him he was wrong – and that I was going to keep my vision – and that I would call him in a few weeks to tell him he was wrong, and rub it in. He laughed a sad little laugh and told me good naturedly that he would gladly accept my call and be happy to hear it, but he added that he didn’t feel it was very likely.
So…
Monday night I went to bed as usual. Before I turned the lights out I said a little prayer as I had for many nights before that, and thanked the Father for the return of my vision, and asked that it might not be a temporary thing.
This morning I awoke… to… fuzz.
Just like that. Overnight.
Everything was back to being blurry.Knowing the truth, and fighting a big sinking pit in my stomach… I went into the bathroom, and quietly slipped the big, old, 1970’s style wire-framed coke-bottle glasses out of their genuine naugahyde case, and slid them on.
The world swam back into focus. My vision perfectly corrected by the -3.75 lenses.
The eye doctor had been right after all.
The perfect vision I had been so proud of… was gone.
Algernon had returned to the place from where he’d come.
Buy It From Left Bank Books
EMail This PostNovember 14th, 2006
What you permit, you promote.
It’s really just that simple.
Period.
Every true parent understands the wisdom behind NOT rewarding a child for bad behavior.
Oh… you’ve seen them… the overly soft parents who can’t stand to be too hard on their kids and let them get away with murder. Every transgression is met with a weak smile and a “What can you do?” shrug. The offspring of parents like this grow up to be disrespectful and despicable human beings.
You simply can’t send the message that misbehavior = reward.
Those conservatives who were handing out angry lectures to other conservatives touting the idea that not supporting the Republican party was heresy no matter how badly it had behaved just didn’t get it.
RINO my ass, I wanted my party back.
It used to be mine. K-Street took it. Corrupted it. Twisted it away from it’s core values and perverted into something I didn’t recognize anymore, and refused to give it back.
Voting those people back into office would have sent the clear message that I didn’t care about my party any more.
No way I was going to let that happen.
Now that they’ve lost control of BOTH houses it’s time to CLEAN house.
That having been said, one of the single best (true) conservative blogs out there is California Conservative.
He’s the quality mark that I think every real conservative blogger should be shooting for.
He’s everything a real blogger should be. He posts very regularly. His posts are intelligent and well thought out and well presented.
There are more than a few blogs out there that have a high hit count, but are peppered with posts from bloggers that are obviously just churning. No real red meat. Just post after post by writers with extremely little talent who are obviously just grinding in order to try to generate ad revenue. I call them “The Regurgitators”. They scan Drudge and AP and just rehash things they’ve seen on other blogs. Not only are they lacking in real insight, but they’re unbelievably unoriginal to boot.
How some of them are actually popular is a mystery I intend to solve.
Gary at California Conservative is the “anti-grinder”. You can tell he’s got a real fire in the belly, and his posts all have teeth. Every one of them.
Now… that isn’t to say that I agree with everything he posts. I don’t. I think like most conservatives he’s a little too quick to slap on the Gordon Gekko suit and throw himself in front of Corporate America, but… real issues mean real discussion, and nobody should walk lock-step with anyone else. Anyone who can’t agree to disagree is… “small-minded”.
Why California Conservative doesn’t have an astronomical hit-count and all the things that go with it I can’t figure out. When I read that one of the guys from the low-class “grinder” blogs got invited to a blog event or is appearing on one of the news channels to discuss an issue, I always sort of shake my head that Gary Gross isn’t. No way that’s fair.
It’s just a guess, but my bet is that he spends so much time researching and writing - he doesn’t have time to promote.
Currently, Gary is pretty P.O’d that things worked out the way they did on Tuesday. I can by this post tell he’s harboring more than a little resentment that things shook out they way they did.
He’s a little quick to start calling people RINO’s. I’d like to caution him that there were those of us who truly believed that the Republican Party had lost it’s way and veered so far away from it’s core values that burning it to the ground was the only way to insure change.
The Dems will eff this up. I promise. They’ll spend the next two years screwing up Iraq, holding hearings and trying to impeach Bush, trying to gerrymander districts, and throwing open the borders. They won’t be able to help themselves.
Republicans will spend the next two years taking stock, figuring out how to get back to their roots, and returning to fighting shape for 2008.
This… is a good thing.
EMail This PostNovember 9th, 2006
There are surreal moments in every fully lived life.
Moments where The Father reaches over and stabs the “SLOW-MO” button on the great VHS tape of your life - and you feel time begin to drag - and you’re forced to watch in horror as scenes play out that you’re powerless to avert your gaze from.
I was faced with such a moment recently.
I was sitting in the Dr.’s office, trying to help him make sense out of a bizarre series of health problems that have been plaguing me lately. Limbs that don’t work. Sudden and unexplained weight loss. Lots of weight loss. Other symptoms so bizarre that they defy my ability to even guess as to what might be wrong with me.
He listens carefully. He writes a lot. He asks a few questions.
Then… after a few long moments he fixes me with a strange, sad stare.
“You’re a smoker Mac?”
“Ex-smoker” I reply. “Been quit for over 7 years now.” I say proudly.
And it’s true. 7 Years ago last month I quit smoking.
It was one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to do in my life. I was 38 when I quit.
But I did it.
I’ve been really proud of myself about it. So many people try, and so many people fail, but… I didn’t. I did it. I got past it. I count it as one of the more important achievements of my life.
Whenever I hear of a friend or someone I know or knew having cancer, I’m sad of course, but I breath a little inner sigh of relief for having found the strength to quit before I let it kill me. I have aunts and uncles and parents that smoke - and I’m really afraid that someday one of them will catch a bullet.
“We need to get you some lung ex-rays immediately” he says.
The stress he puts on the word “immediately” is… unsettling.
“Why?” I’m so nervous my voice cracks a little.
He explains that there just aren’t many things that would explain most of my symptoms, but that there is one thing that explains them all. Especially the weight loss.
Lung cancer.
I’m pretty well educated on that particular subject. When I was quitting I read everything I could get my hands on.
I know the truth.
And the truth is… typically… by the time you’re manifesting symptoms - it’s generally pretty well advanced. It’s a very quiet type of cancer, that often doesn’t let it’s presence known until it’s… pretty far along.
I sit a little stunned for two or three heartbeats, and then he shoots up out of his chair, and begins to write frantically. His tone sharpens. There is no time to waste.
He orders me to go get a chest x-ray. It’s late in the day for a doctors office. After 3:00pm.
I’m rattled, and scared, and not thinking as straight as I need to be.
“I’ll make an appointment right away” I say.
He smiles at me like I’m a child.
“No appointment, son” he says with a strange little smirk “When I said immediately I meant right this minute. You may not wait. I mean now.”
He calls his assistant in. He hands her a handful of paper and notes and files and instructions. “Get him to an x-ray laboratory now” he orders.
And then… he’s gone.
Less than an hour later I’m standing in front of an x-ray machine in a paper gown with my ass hanging out for all the world to see wondering where in the HELL this came from.
I go back to the doctor. He’s still there. After hours. Waiting for me to return with my x-ray. I’ve never known a doctor that stayed after regular hours before. It scares me even more.
I give him my x-rays.
I guess I was standing there looking at him kind of funny, as if I was waiting for him to look at them at that second and tell me everything was going to be alright. Or not.
He puts his hand on my shoulder and gives it a squeeze.
“I can’t read these myself, son” he says. “I can look at them and make assumptions, but I need to get them read by someone who’s an expert at reading them, so that we can be absolutely certain of what’s going on.”
This is hard news for me.
It means long… long… hours of waiting for answers…
“But… I quit…” I said, my voice feeble and small.
Again the sad look. “You’ve only been quit for a few years, son” he offers. “It takes 10 or 15 years before your risk drops to anywhere near someone who never smoked.”
So much for pride.
EMail This PostNovember 1st, 2006
Watching CNN tonight tonight - waiting for the Lou Dobbs special on illegal immigration and the Dixie chicks show up on Larry King moaning about why nobody is playing their songs anymore, or buying their albums anymore, or coming to their concerts anymore.
Larry keeps playing the clip where Natalie makes her infantile declaration that she’s ashamed that the president is from Texas, and then turns around and gives this big idiotic smile that my old Grandma used to call a “shit-eating grin”.
That moronic grin cost the Dixie Chicks their careers for all practical purposes.
I’m struck by the contrast between them and Garrison Keillor.
Pretty Jamie dragged me to see him live a couple of weeks ago, he was in town hawking his new anti-Bush book and raising money for Democrats.
He began the evening by drawing some very clear distinctions between what he was doing on the stage that night as an entertainer talking about politics, and the work he does on the wonderful radio show “A Prairie Home Companion” as just an entertainer.
He was very careful to point out that folks that evening had bought tickets to hear him speak about Iraq, and politics, and his new book - which are all quite political - but the folks who buy tickets to “A Prairie Home Companion” certainly don’t expect or want to hear about politics. He took great pain to separate Garrison Keillor the entertainer, from Garrison Keillor the fund-raiser. He was very concerned that folks understood that he never wanted to politicize PHC because there was no way to do that without losing 1/2 of his audience or more. He came across as a very classy guy, who was informed about what he was talking about, and understood the difference between entertainment and politics.
Smart man.
Natalie Maines should take a lesson.
They showed some clips from the documentary that’s about to come out about the Dixie Chicks, and Maines comes across as severe, moronic, uneducated, and a generally unpleasant and bitchy person. No surprises really. One scene shows her barking at her manager over the definition of the word “boycott” - and when seen from the side one is reminded of an ill-tempered chihuahua - all teeth and shrill barking - yet still hard to take seriously as a threat.
I just sat with my mouth open and listened to her snipe in that high whiny voice that just seeks out the base of the spine and shocks it like ice-water.
I watch the two other girls in the band stare at her as she talks. On the surface they appear to support her, but you can tell by the way they look at her that they’d like to choke the living CRAP out of the hotheaded little ninny for ruining the good the thing they had with that motor-mouth of hers. They almost seem to be visibly trying to restrain themselves.
At one point Larry asks a question about the documentary - and one of the other members of the band comments through almost gritted teeth that it is their hope that once the movie comes out that they’ll be able to deflect all questions about the controversy by simply saying “see the movie”. In the next breath Maines re-iterates just how NOT sorry she is, and you realize that it really is over for them.
LOL… then… in an act of awesome hypocrisy… Mains has the unmitigated BALLS to complain about people who are “haters” that “rush to judgment” and hate people they’ve never even met and don’t know much about and who are uninformed. ROTFL.
As Pretty Jamie would say - “Hello Pot, meet Kettle.”
EMail This PostOctober 26th, 2006
There are so many things in our lives that we take for granted every day. Gifts from The Father both big and small that we simply assume we’ll enjoy because – we always have. We wake up every morning and His comforting gifts surround us. The Sun. Food. Family. Friends. His Grace.
Our health.
Sometimes we forget to thank him for all the good things in our life. Perhaps we become so ungrateful that we actually forget to see all the good things and begin to focus on the negative things in our lives, or worse, we become resentful for the things we don’t have or feel that we are “owed”.
I think He picks these moments to place His hand gently on your shoulder, and let you know that He loves you unconditionally, and that it hurts Him when you cease to love Him because you’re not appreciative of the gifts that He’s already giving you in such abundance.
Perhaps He even goes so far as to take one of those gifts away from you, in an effort to illustrate to you the value of them.
So it is with the use of my left hand.
The days of my life were tumbling by, and I can’t say I ever gave much thought to the use of my hands, or ever even really took the time to take inventory and be grateful for them.
Until one of them was take away.
Talk about “sobering”.
It happened pretty quickly really. I was sitting at my computer desk writing, and I got up to get a drink. I was holding the refrigerator door open with my right hand, and I reached in to grab a container of apple juice with my left and, and… nothing.
For a moment… I couldn’t get my mind around “nothing”. It took a few seconds to register on me. I was confused for a second. My brain was telling my hand: “Dude… grab that container”, and my hand simply wouldn’t obey. I’m 45 years old. My appendages have never disobeyed me before. I watched in horror as my limp left hand banged against the jug of apple juice in flat defiance of me willing it to grab the darned thing and pull it out. In an uncomprehending daze, I repositioned my hand so that it was “wrapped” around the apple juice jug and again I willed it to grab and retrieve. Again it refused.
As the realization dawned over me that MY HAND DIDN’T WORK… I began to panic.
I felt a metal taste in my mouth, and my heart began to pound pretty heavily. I got a little dizzy from the adrenaline rush.
I flipped on the light and sat down at the kitchen table and began to will my left hand to open and close, or my fingers to wiggle, or… anything. My heart was threatening to pound it’s way completely out of my chest. I grabbed a sharp round toothpick and began to poke the palm and fingertips to see if I had any sensation. It hurt. I had full sensation, I just didn’t have the ability to move it. At all.
Still panicking – I quickly took physical inventory. Feet. Legs. Right arm. Left arm. I check the strength and usefulness of every thing I had. It appeared that whatever had happened was affecting only my left hand from the wrist down. From the wrist up I had full range of motion and use.
One word kept rolling around in my skull. I kept trying to quiet it, but it was rolling around in there… loudly.
Stroke.
I’ve had a stroke. I’m having a stroke.
I kept trying to think of some other reason why my left hand just simply… quit working.
My daughter is in the other room. She worries over me more than she should. I don’t want to freak her out. I don’t want her to panic.
Quietly – I dial my doctor’s exchange. I’m loathe to do this. I was always raised to believe that there was never any compelling reason to do this. If not emergency – make office appointment – if emergency – go emergency room. A doctor deserves time off with his family and I was raised to believe it was tacky and unnecessary to bother a doctor in “off” hours. I’m worried about a stroke – so driving to the emergency room concerns me. I break with my own upbringing and dial the exchange.
The lady at the exchange is a seasoned professional. It makes perfect sense, but it never dawned on me that there would be a “screening” process for these calls to the exchange. The gal on the phone asks me several very careful questions. These questions are designed to make sure that the doctor isn’t being bothered with trivial things constantly. I find it comforting that he has in place a “guard dog” that will help insure that he’s not called away from important family or personal time for everyday runny noses, or 99.1 fevers.
When I tell her I’ve lost the use of my left hand… she immediately replies “I’ll get the doctor on the line.”. This is very scary. She did not pass “Go”. She did not collect $200.00. She instantly connected me to the doctor. No hesitation what-so-ever.
My doctor is 900 years old. He’s so old he owes Moses a quarter. He’s old, and he’s crabby, and he’s seen so much over all of the years of his practice and his humanitarian work in third world countries that very little bothers or worries him. Usually.
When I tell him about my hand he pauses for a few seconds. He asks me a few questions. Can I do this? Can I do that? Is anything else wrong. Do I have a headache? Have I taken any medication?
He tells me he doesn’t think I’m having a stroke. He thinks it’s nerve damage of some sort. He tells me to be there first thing in the morning, and he’ll check things out. He says that I should watch the symptoms closely for the rest of the night, and if the problem begins to creep - up my arm or if anything else stops working – then I should immediately head for the emergency room.
True sleep never comes that evening. Not fully. I drift in and out of frightening dreams, waking up about every 45 minutes. Every time I wake up I can’t help but snap on the light and stare at my left hand. Trying to move it. Trying to make it obey me. Trying to see if this strange and terrible affliction has magically been lifted in the 45 minutes since I last stared at it.
At about 3:00 AM I realize in horror that… I type for a living. I manage an IT department for a medium sized aerospace firm. I program all day. I write e-mails all day. I type all day. It occurs to me that I might not be able to work anymore.
I run into my study and sit at the keyboard. As I suspected it’s useless. 6 hours ago I could type 75 or 80 words a minute. After a couple of frustrating tries I realize that if I make sort of a claw with my left hand – I can manage to do the old “two-finger” typing thing. Years of keyboard work makes this not as bad as you’d expect. I figure I can type faster using the two-finger “hunt and peck” method than most people can from home row with both hands.
I wander back to bed, knowing that all hope of actually sleeping is futile.
I lie awake the rest of the night wondering what happened to me, and if I’ll ever get the use of my hand back… and wondering why I ever took it for granted.
The next morning is terrifying. There is so much I used to be able to do and took for granted that I can no longer do. So many hundreds of little things that were possible just the morning before, but now aren’t possible any more. Combing my hair. Putting on deodorant. Picking up a glass with my left hand. Lifting things with both hands.
When I get to the doctor he doesn’t have much hope to offer. He’s seen many things in his long, long life, but he can’t say for sure why my hand doesn’t work. He suspects it’s nerve damage of some sort. Perhaps it’s carpal tunnel. Perhaps I’ve damaged a nerve somehow. Perhaps it’s something more sinister. He worries, because many degenerative nerve diseases start this way. He can’t know until he’s ran a “nerve induction survey”. A big, expensive, time-consuming test where they connect you electronically to a machine that can, apparently, measures these things.
In the mean-time I stare at my hand most every day, and wonder if I’ll ever have it back. In the last few weeks I’ve regained the ability to at least close my hand. It’s still too weak to actually hold anything that weighs more than an ounce or two, but I’ve learned I can lift things with it if I use my wrist strength to push them palm up. Palm down my hand is still useless.
It may seem foolish, but I’m actually kind of grateful.
Grateful that The Father chose my left hand to gently remind me of his presence, and not my dominate right hand. Grateful that I can still function at work, and that my job isn’t threatened at the moment by this affliction. Grateful that I’ve regained a fraction of it’s usefulness – because – a fraction is better than nothing at all – and offers me hope that I’ll eventually get it all back.
Grateful too, for the reminder that I had not appreciated all of His many gifts as fully as I should, and now…
I do.
EMail This PostOctober 24th, 2006
Tonight on CNN Lou Dobbs holds a special segment titled “War on the Middle Class”
There is no better example of Brown Sludge than the type of corporatism that Lou Dobbs fights against every night from his bully pulpit on CNN.
I’m a huge fan as you might guess.
Lou is a true lightening rod. A Harvard educated Economist, and a truly respected giant in Financial circles - he draws big plasma fireballs from tin-foil hat libertarians and Gordon Gekko Republican’s for being against the off-shoring of American Jobs, and for railing against illegal immigration and for the poor behavior of Big Business - and he draws equally big fireballs from the left as well - for basically the same thing.
He is an unapologetic real-deal grass roots conservative who hasn’t forgotten what that word really means.
His special tonight is sure to draw howls from elephants and donkeys alike.
I’ve decided to live-blog the highlights - I hope EVERYONE gets a chance to watch this incredible special report.
—
Right out of the chute - Democratic strategist Arnold Zimmerman lays it down when he says that the Republican’s are going to lose this fall because they have abandoned the middle class. I’ve been beating this horse on this blog weeks. Sad that a Democrat gets it and Ed Rollins the Republican strategist sitting beside him just… doesn’t
—
Bang! What a great statistic! The Dem strategist points out that he doesn’t understand why Republicans have such a hard-on for Big Business from the standpoint of a voter base. He claims that BIG business is only responsible for about 20% of all jobs, but SMALL INDEPENDENT businesses are responsible for about 80%. Man. More on this later.
—
Lou makes a pitch for state funded college tuitions. I’m not sure how I feel about it. On the surface having state help to pay for my kids colleges sounds mighty appealing. On the other hand - I have a hard time believing they won’t tax my ass into the next GALAXY for the privilege.
—
Lou trots out the victims of Ford’s incessant drive to send the job of every hard working American they possibly can to the slums of East Beijing. I love it. It always does my heart good to see Lou at his best - and he’s at his best when he’s throwing Big Business the whooping it so richly deserves on this issue.
—
Lou never misses a chance to beat the “Trade Deficit” drum. The genius’s at NAM have apoplectic FITS every time he does. Nothing makes me happier than watching those NAM guys lie on the floor and writhe like slugs every time Lou pours salt on them. ROTFL.
—
Lately Lou has began to get around to the issue of medical security for people. I’m glad. Republican’s are so out of touch on this issue - it does my heart good to see Lou shaming his fellow conservatives on this issue.
—
Broken borders. I knew Lou would eventually get to to it. Thankfully the Republican is only one on the program admitting that something has to be done. I see by the commercials that Lou is doing another big special NEXT week on “Broken Borders”. Looks like something not to be missed. I’ll be liveblogging THAT as well. Count on it.
—
The “how can the middle class fight back” segment is incredible. Lou reminds us to that voters are absolutely in control.
—
What an incredible special. It’s a must see.
I’ll watch for a link that will let you watch on CNN if it comes up. So far none yet.
I will NOT miss next weeks “Broken Borders” special. No way.
EMail This PostOctober 18th, 2006
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