Say it ain't so Joe

What a terrible way to end a coaching career! Joe Paterno resigns over a sex abuse case. I just don't understand it. I know how college football coaches are respected and revered. I know that they carry clout in their respective Universities.

My dad was a great sports writer before he retired. He interviewed Bo Schembeckler many times. I spent many Saturdays of my childhood in the University of Michigan stadium. I looked at Bo as the hero and Woody Hayes as the villain. My dad told me about Woody Hayes. He said that an OSU player fumbled the football during a game so Woody made him carry the football for a week every minute of everyday. He had to take it to bed with him and to every class. My dad said that player never fumbled the football again.

In my imagination I could see the player carrying the football into and English Comp class and the professor asks him, "why are you bringing a football into my class?" The player replies, "Coach Hayes told me to carry it all week." The professor nods. "well far be it from me not to comply with Coach Hayes' orders."

So why did Joe Paterno resign? He didn't do anything wrong. Mcqueer witnessed an act of sexual child molestation and did nothing about it. He didn't stop Sandusky nor call the police. He called his own dad. Ummmm excuse me, Mcqueer was a graduate student at the time. I have two undergraduate degrees and I attended Western Theological Seminary for a year and I know that when witnessing a crime in action to call 911. Yes! report the crime immediately. Why doesn't a graduate student at Penn State University know this. He calls his father as I said before and his father must not be very smart either. He told him to tell Joe Paterno.

Does this mean that if I ever witness a crime that I should call Brady Hoeke? Don't call the police! call your local Division I football coach when you see a crime being committed. What was Joe supposed to do call the police and say, "someone told me he saw a crime being committed?" Isn't that here say?

So it goes and Joe Paterno ends a great career by resigning in disgrace. He doesn't get to finish off the season. Maybe PSU grad students need to take a required class in common sense. Had McQueery acted responsibly Joe Paterno would still be Nittany Lion's head football coach. What is a Nittnay Lion anyway?

Web impacts TV

It was during the time when ABC was broadcasting the show "Lost" that I saw how the Internet was generating interest in a very different type of television series. There was a lot of Internet chatter about Lost on the websites I visited, such as, the Survivor Sucks message board and Wikipedia. I read that ABC was thinking of dropping "Lost" but they kept it going because the ABC executives were surprised by how many times the show was viewed on the ABC website. Unlike Nielson ratings which only selected households participate in, shows watched on the networks websites are more accurately measured. They know how many times a show is viewed, which translates into accurate advertising ratings on the episode viewer. Six years ago I truly doubt that shows with complicated and intricate plots and characters , such as, "Ringer" and"Revenge" would have been developed. The success of "Lost" proved that people who watch prime time television are not stupid and have the ability to process and be entertained by multi-layered plots. Television has become more complicated with the diverse programming allowed by the expanded cable stations, such as, the CW and ABC Family. No longer are TV viewers constrained to four major network channels, ABC, NBC, CBS and Fox. People watch TV on multiple stations and networks, which, supply programming supporting a special interest. Thanks to the Internet, chatter and viewer interaction makes shows popular not by clever advertising and network promotion, but my word of mouth, or more accurately typed words on message boards, blogs, Facebook and Twitter. There is silliness and nonsense on the Internet; there is also relevant conversation which if nothing else raises the quality of the television shows which are produced and broadcast.

The morning after

Last night was Vodka Martini night. They crept up on me and then toppled me. My computer screen was swaying back and forth while I played Mafia Wars and YoVille on Facebook. In the middle of this, the battery on my computer dropped out and then my friend Deb called.

Technology

I love my laptop and I am very thankful for it. There were two glitches that caused me some frustration with my operating system, Vista. Yes, Vista had some problems, go figure.

Since I received this laptop as a gift last May--wow! it has been almost a year, there has been a small glitch. Every time I closed an Internet Explorer window a new one would open up. My friend, Deb, who last year invited us to swim in her pool, and whose, power washer I borrowed and whom Nathan called Eb, told me that she had the same problem.

It was an annoying problem, because I would click on the "X" to close the window and it would close with an error message and a new window would open up. The quick fix was to open up new links in Tabs rather than a whole new window. This method allowed the user, in this case myself, to close window without getting that false error message.

Two days ago another new glitch occurred. The automatic update program found a new version of Adobe Flash Player and it failed to install. I don't know why it did and furthermore I didn't understand why I lost my old version of Flash Player. This meant that I got red x's where there was a video program that required flash drive.

So, I went to the Adobe site to download and install the newest version of their Flash Player, and it wouldn't fully install. I was getting frustrated and confused. I tried downloading to my portable Flash Drive on the desktop and then install to my laptop from the Flash Drive and that failed to work as well.

Yahoo was offering a free download of Internet Explorer 8. My thought was that perhaps the latest version of IE would allow for a clean download and installation of the Adobe Flash Player version 10. Well, it didn't. However, the latest version of IE did stop the window glitch and seemed to load faster. I was happy with that, but I still couldn't play YoVille on Facebook.

So, Saturday morning, I sat down with my laptop and read all the trouble shooting guide information on Adobe again. I was up late Friday night trying to solve the problem by changing security and add-on settings for IE 8. They didn't work. Finally I read the last part of the Trouble Shooting guide and found that the Flash Player program did download, but did not install. I found the program on my C Drive thanks to the troubleshooting guide and was then able to install the program.

Now, my laptop is working better than ever before. Web pages load faster and YoVille seems clearer than before.

A responce to Tardis Girl

. What was your FIRST alcoholic drink? Wine at about the age 10 at the intermission of Godspell in Chicago.
2. Who was your FIRST crush? Garnet Miller in the third grade.
3. Who did you FIRST dance with? This is sad, it was my mom. I can't dance at all and she was trying to teach me.
4. Who was your FIRST prom date? I never went to prom and I didn't date until I was in college.
5. Do you still talk to your FIRST love? No, I don't talk to her anymore.
6. What was your FIRST job? I distributed magazines for my Step-dads business.
7. What was your FIRST car?A 1965 Chevy Chevette.
8. Who was the FIRST person to text you today? I don't receive text messages on a daily basis. The last message I got was from my wife about a month ago, it said, "get beer"
9. Who is the FIRST person you thought of this morning?My wife when I asked her to hit the snooze.
10. Who was your FIRST grade teacher? Mrs. Nimitz. She scared me and I would cry to my mom that I didn't want to go to school.
11. Where did you go on your FIRST ride on an airplane? It was a singe engine private plane and we flew over Southwest Michigan.
12. Who was your FIRST best friend and are you still friends with them? His name is Steve and I haven't talked to him in years.
13. What was your FIRST sport played?softball
14. Where was your FIRST sleep over?My Grandma's house.
15. Who was the FIRST person you talked to today? My wife when I asked her to hit the snooze, but the first real conversation I had was with Jennifer at work.
16. Whose wedding were you in the FIRST time? My sister's. I was the best man for her husband to be.

17. What was the FIRST thing you did this morning? Got out of bed, staggered into the kitchen and started the coffee maker.
18. What was the FIRST concert you ever went to? A music recital at my grade school. First Rock Concert was Styx.
19. FIRST tattoo, piercing? I don't have a tattoo or piercing.
20. FIRST foreign country you went to? Canada.
21. What was your FIRST run in with the law? A speeding ticket.
22. When was your FIRST detention? I never had detention.
23. What was the FIRST state you lived in? Michigan, but does confusion count?
24. Who was the FIRST person to break your heart?Debbie Scheffler
25. Who was your FIRST roommate? I lived in a suite with John, Randy and Mike.
26. Where did you go on your FIRST limo ride?Never been in a limo.
27. Who will be the FIRST to repost this? No one. It will just drift off aimlessly into cyberspace.
28. Do you really remember all of your FIRSTS?Yes. I am cursed with the blessing of a good memory.

Light Saber Tag

The rules of light saber tag or sword tag are really quite simple, but when Nathan decided that our back yard needed six safe areas and a buffer zone, the game got more complex. Rather than tagging someone with their hand, the person who is it tags their opponent with the end of their toy light saber.

I want to make it clear that these are the toy light sabers that light up and make noise. Nathan uses two smaller toy versions that do not take batteries, one red and one green. I wouldn't want anyone to think that I am tagging my children with a real light saber and dismembering them. These plastic ones don't have the power of the real ones--arms stay in tact and they collapse when you try to pierce a blast door on a Trade Federation command vessel.

The fun part about sword/light saber tag is that rather than chasing someone all over the yard you can call for a challenge and duel the person. If you tag them then they are it. If the person who is it gets tagged first in the duel then they can't chase the person for five seconds.

Tonight was the second night in a row that we played sword tag. If we get tired and sweaty we call for a time out and drink Capris Sun. In the end, I end up being it and Evan and Nathan call a victory. The game usually ends when either Evan or Nathan get tired and don't want to play anymore. Tonight the game ended when Nathan wanted to do his homework so he could watch a movie before bed time.

Silly Little St. Patrick's Day Skit

Had I removed myself from the bed a little earlier than I did, or if I had not brought the mail in, I could have quite possibly arrived at McDonald's before 11 am and thereby purchased Lori a breakfast steak bagel. It felt good to sleep in and I only wanted to get up in time to shower, shave and dress in time to arrive at the Holland Civic Center at 11:30.

I was extremely surprised to discover that we were out of We were out of coffee, so I had an iced tea and two Excedrin then I ate my grapefruit. Lori suggested that I go to McDonald's and get us each a coffee. I showered, shaved and got dressed, then I got the mail and then I went drove to McDonald's. They stopped serving breakfast and I didn't want the homemade cookies that were being offered. I purchased a large coffee for Lori and a carmel cappuccino for myself.

I drank my cappuccino, used the restroom and drove off to downtown Holland. I parked the rusty Blazer at the farthest point from where the rest of the parade marchers were. I didn't plan that; I parked in the first place I found. I walked up and down the road looking for my group for at least 10 minutes before I found my group.

On a normal Saturday, I wouldn't go to the Civic Center nor would I even consider leaving the house before noon. Today was the St. Patrick's Day parade and skit day. I have never participated in a St. Patrick's Day parade or any parade for that matter. I have never seen a St. Patrick's Day parade except for some clips of the one in Chicago. I really don't care for parades, but these are hard times so silliness goes a long way.


I pulled into the Civic Center and walked around for awhile looking for the Finnish Group. Yes, the Finnish. I am not Dutch. I am not Irish. Holland doesn't have a parade for those like me of the German, English and French decent. However, Peace Lutheran has members that are from Finnish decent and it was for them that I boldly walked in a parade wearing a funky costume.

Parades are really for kids. In addition to walking up 8th Street I had to hand out fliers telling everyone about our skit at the Knickerbocker Theater. The children would wave as the parents would smile. I did see two people that I knew and they waved at me. Our sign said St. Urho saves Finland Grapes from the Grasshoppers. One woman said, "I like grapes, I had several glasses of grapes last night."

We walked to the Knickerbocker Theater and found our way backstage and took off our silly costumes. Then, Paul, Carol, Carol and I went to the New Holland Brewery and had something to drink. Paul had Chardonnay, I had a Dugan's Red, one Carol had hot cocoa, and the other Carol had pressed coffee.

We walked into the Knickerbocker to the sound of children singing. We were told that we were on next. We were told we had to whisper. The children finished and walked passed us neatly in single file. As they passed by us we gave them our best golf gallery applause. I told their director that they sounded good.

We thought we were next, but a man in a kilt walked to center stage and, well, I really can't say he played the bagpipes. He blew into them and an atrocious sound was produced. He finished one song, and then proceeded to play another which sounded a lot like the first song. He finished his set, if you can call it that, with something that sounded like Yankee Doodle. The audience applauded when he was done, I think because they were happy they didn't have to listen to it anymore. I told Gail that I now know why Bugs Bunny attacked Scotsman's bagpipes in that cartoon.

We performed our silly skit. I moved around the grapes in a blowing fashion as the Kitchen Band played Bob Dylan's "Blowing in the Wind" What else would I do as my character was The Wind? The play ended and I rode with the two Carols to the Leaf and Bean for soup and a salad. I had some great conversations about the Kingdom of Air and the Holy Breath--the Greek words for Heaven and Spirit respectively.

I went home to restless children, so I took Evan and Nathan to the DeGraff Nature Center. I drove Lori's car. Evan wanted to buy a walking stick, but the building was closed, although we were there during their business hours. So, we spent an hour walking, I walked they ran, on the nature trails.

We got back to find that Lori took the rust Blazer to the store. I helped Adam unload the groceries and we ate Shepherd's Pie around 8 pm.