Tuesday, December 27, 2011

I Write The Line

(Sing to "I Walk The Line," by Johnny Cash)

I keep a close watch on this pen of mine
I keep my mind wide open all the time
My laptop is the tie that binds
Because it’s mine, I walk the line

It seems like my book is never through
Yes, I’ll admit not a word of it is true
A fiction writer writing just for you
Because you’re mine, I walk the line

I’ve worked all night and now it’s getting light
I keep on writing both day and night
I must sell books now since the money’s tight
Because it’s mine, I walk the line

Writing has a way to keep me on its side
I’m hooked for sure and that I cannot hide
I would be lost if my computer ever died
Because of you, I walk the line

I keep a close watch on this pen of mine
I keep my mind wide open all the time
My laptop is the tie that binds
Because it’s mine, I walk the line
Because it’s mine, I walk the line

Monday, December 26, 2011

Panic Button

Grandma and Grandpa now have “Life Alert” buttons clipped to their shirts that when pushed notify the paramedics to get there pronto. Instead of lying there for days and possibly passing away, a central communications center notifies police and fire departments and help arrives shortly after. What a relief for the elderly knowing that help is on the way!


We also have a GPS gadget that attaches to Fido’s collar and he is monitored 24/7 as to his whereabouts. If he wanders too far from pre-set parameters, his owners are immediately notified and the search is on before Fido gets too close to Sassy, the pedigreed poodle next door. Expensive dogs also have implanted chips for future identification.


My wife and I were thinking of all the missing children we hear about on the news and wondered why we can’t do the same thing for our children that we do for pets and the elderly. Why can’t we pin a panic button on their shirt or blouse? Better yet, how about a wristband GPS with a panic button. We not only know where children are at all times, but also they can set off the panic alarm when danger approaches.

We also thought about children setting off alarms just for fun and how hectic that would be, but after a trip to the woodshed, I bet it wouldn’t happen again! Besides, we think children today better understand the horrible dangers that lurk once they leave home alone.

We don’t think any idea too outlandish when it comes to protecting our children from murderous pedophiles. Maybe it’s time to come up with a program that could lower the statistics. What a wonderful day that would be.

Write on,

Mittster and Mrs. Mittster

Saturday, December 24, 2011

Christmas Eve


Live and learn; click on the title of this blog and review the meaning of Christmas Eve. I was more than a little surprised. I guess after all these years of celebrating this day I forgot its true meaning and significance.

I must say that this Christmas season is different than most. I find myself anticipating celebrating with family tonight and tomorrow more than I can ever remember. You would think with the economy in the dumps and no one being able to afford giving presents this year that I would be in a funk. Just the opposite has occurred. Each family member is making a special Christmas dish to be shared with a liberal sprinkling of good cheer and happiness because we still have so much to be thankful for.

I find myself also thinking strongly of family that cannot be with us during our celebrating. I can only hope that they too have a loving, sharing and wonderful Christmas.

The men and women serving our country in the military also come to mind. Without them protecting our freedoms the world over, we would not be able to worship and celebrate according to our faiths. I pray that each and every one of them return safely so they too can celebrate Christmas with family and loved ones in the years to come.

I could write page after page expressing good wishes for all the oppressed people of the world who will not be able to celebrate the season, but suffice to say, they are in my thoughts. I would also be remiss if I did not mention all of our animal friends in the world who suffer from abuse. Please be kind to animals. They were here long before us and in all probability, they will be here long after we are gone.

Well, there you have it. What started out as an expression of Christmas spirit has turned into a dissertation of the ills of the planet. But, such is the way of being an author. Once started, never stopped.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year, everyone!

Write on,

Mittster

Friday, December 23, 2011

Off to see the Wizard


I am headed toward Quartzsite, Arizona, to see if I can find a new brain. I am leaving my old one here for a spare just in case I can't find a suitable one there. That way, when I get back, I will at least have one, albeit old technology.

I wish everyone a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year! If I am not heard from while away, it is only because someone forgot to install dependable Internet in Quartzsite and my Verizon phone has no bells or whistles. I can text, but that is it, and that is why I am looking for a new brain. Perhaps I could find one that would enable me to use a smart phone. The odds are against it, but I won’t know if I don’t go….

I’m just saying,

Mittster

Thursday, December 22, 2011

Humor Makes Me Happy


Better to lose your ass instead of your head.


Speaking of head, whatever you do don't pull my hair!


First prison break using camouflage.


I won't even go there with these pictures!


Even I wouldn't recommend further exploration.


Is this what Adam and Eve wore after being thrown out of Eden?


Yes, according to my sources.


I use to say I would try anything twice; I might have been wrong the first time. I don't say that anymore....


What ever floats your boat!


Don't ask - Don't tell....


On the lighter side...I do like these shoes.


This is really not a bad idea for new mothers who lack breasts but still want to feed baby the traditional way.


This guy just wants to make sure they won't have to resort to the above picture.


Some couples have all the luck!


And then some don't....


Time to go home now. Have a nice day in spite of me!

I'm just saying,

Mittster

Wednesday, December 21, 2011

Regrets?

The tragedy of life is not that it ends so soon, but that we wait so long to begin it. - W. M. Lewis

This quote was posted by my friend Leslie Menninger on Facebook recently. She is always sharing wonderful quotes daily that instill the best feelings humans can experience. This particular quote struck a chord with me that I just can’t shake. When a subject, event or happening catches my eye and won’t let go, I must write a blog about it. It’s not that I have something monumental to add or that I am able to impart some new and exciting meaning to the quote’s substance. It only means that it struck a chord in my being and I was able to hear harmony in the music.

After reading the quote, I wanted to remember when my life really started. I spent the first fifty-two years of my life living on the edge of reason and sanity. I always wanted to be like someone else who appeared to have all the things I could not acquire. I was never satisfied with any one woman for very long. The amazing part was that these women were so much further along emotionally than me. What drew them toward me I will never understand? Please know that my intentions were always honorable…at least at first.

I did not start drinking until I was twenty-six and believe me I tried to make up for all the years I missed. Drugs were a part of the culture at the time and I tried them, but they never took the place of alcohol. I don’t blame my behavior on booze and drugs. I blame my behavior on the lack of character to walk away from the very things that were causing me to run and hide from reality. I do blame myself for hurting people who loved me and then turning my back to their pain. I now feel their pain more intensely than they ever could. That is my cross to bear, even to my grave.

One fine day in 1990, I came across a book by Dr. Steven Covey called “The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People.” Books, and the authors who write them, can be an incredibly positive experience to those who read them. As an author, my sole intent is to have somebody read my work and be captivated and unable to put the darn thing down even long enough to use the restroom. This is how Dr. Covey’s book affected me. Someone else could try and read the book and end up using it for TP. I lived and breathed his book until it was internalized and I started living the principals the book offered. That was the first day of my life.

Some might say I wasted fifty-two years, but that is not the reality of life. The reality is that even though those years, for the most part, were unproductive and sometimes destructive, all the roads I have taken were essential to the place and time I now live in. Had I varied one iota from my path, I would not be married to the most wonderful woman in the world and enjoying the most fulfilling life any person could ask for. The lesson for me is that even though I have deep regrets, I would not change even one moment of my life if offered this very second. This is the wonderful paradox of time and the reason we must always go forward into the future.

Yes, I started my life late, but every year after 1995 has been filled with excitement and wonderment at how beautiful a sober life can be. My existence is the most exciting high I have ever experienced!

Write on,

Mittster

Tuesday, December 20, 2011

Christmas thank you list

1. I am thankful to be alive even though the world is in a mess and I pee too much.


2. I am thankful I pee too much; it could be the opposite.


3. I am thankful for family and friends, even though I can count them all on both hands.


4. I am thankful for two feet because I have room for ten more friends.


5. I am thankful for having enough to eat, even though my diet is restricted to fiber.


6. I am thankful for restaurants so I can sneak out and pig out.


7. I am thankful for a daughter who makes me homemade mac and cheese for the times I can’t make it to McDonald’s.


8. I am thankful for a half-assed good brain that somehow still works after years of non-use.


9. I am thankful for a body that still functions fairly well in spite of years of abuse.



10. I am thankful for a wife who somehow loves me enough to put up with me day in and day out. Nights don’t count; I am a sound sleeper.


11. I am thankful for enough money to get by on. We all need to live within our means in any case.


12. I am thankful for a roof over our heads, even though I know we need new shingles and I will have to install them myself. I’m too old for this shit, but I’ll “get ‘er done” – somehow.


13. I am thankful for the opportunity to have written and published two novels, to be working on the third, and still have enough time to keep up with Twitter, Facebook, a Website and a blog.



14. I am thankful for technology, because without it our planet would have no hope, and there is no way I am going write anything long hand, let alone a novel.


15. I am thankful for the young people of the world. They are smart and ready to stand up for the things that are right about the world and willing to dissent to make things better.


16. I am thankful for the peacekeepers for protecting freedom, dignity, and the right to pursue happiness.


17. I am thankful for what hair I have left, mainly because I can’t afford a hair transplant and wifey won’t let me have one anyway.


18. I am thankful for what time I have left on the planet, even though some wish I would leave post haste.


19. I am thankful that even though Keith Richards and I are the same age, he looks like…well, Keith Richards.


20. Lastly, I am thankful for a life that, in spite of its dramatic ups and downs, I have arrived at a place where I smile a lot, wish everyone well, and truly care about all life on our planet.


I’m just saying,

Mittster

Monday, December 19, 2011

Insanity vs. Sanity

Have you noticed that “sane people” know everything? Whereas insane people, like me, know very little, especially as we get older. It’s easy for me to say, “The older I get, the less I know.” Why, because I believe it to be true. To the sane people, or “they” as I like to call them, my comments are insane. Actually, some people who read my gibberish blogs are a little more polite and refer to me as an emotionally unstable and sometime humorous author. To the people out there who read my murder mysteries, they find it hard to justify that such a sick, depraved person could have any sense of humor at all.

My wife loves my murder mysteries and has read them many times in her role as proofer and editor. When her mother called after trying to read my first novel “Evil in the Mirror” to warn her daughter of impending doom because she was obviously married to a homicidal maniac, my wife patiently informed her that her son-in-law just has a very active imagination. Thank God mother-in-law didn’t finish the book, let alone read the sequel. The point is that my mother-in-law is sane and because of that, she must now lay awake at nights wondering when I am going to murder her in a most foul and gruesome way! While I in no way compare myself to Stephen King, I sometimes wonder how his family copes living with him. He is not only a writer of very scary books, but he is also a scary looking guy with no sense of humor. Mother-in-law should be afraid of him, not me.

Getting back to sane people who know everything – I listen to our Washington politicians, who are mostly old senile know-it-alls, who should be in nursing homes, profess to know what is the best for just about everything under the sun. Somehow freeloading in Congress for decade after decade makes them geniuses. If that is sanity, I want no part of it. I also listen to radio talk show gurus from the left and right who somehow think being a public speaker makes them centers for world knowledge. Come to think of it, the United Nations professes to be the reservoir for universal wisdom. God help us all!

For the most part, I think all my friends on Twitter and Facebook are insane. Most don’t know it all and have a deep concern for people and all the creatures of the planet. Our beautiful blue planet means more than just a place to see how much money and power one can accumulate; it also represents our spaceship for survival. I like this kind of insanity rather than the sanity of the so-called “know it all” people. It is time for the insane to stand up and be counted. I, for one, am standing now with my right hand held high in the air showing the peace sign with two fingers for the insane of the world, and my left hand even higher in the air showing one finger to all the rest!

Write on,

Mittster

Friday, December 16, 2011

Lazy Madman Blog

For some reason I have decided to add comment to the pictures I plagiarized from Facebook and dumped on a blog because I am too lazy to think up something funny to write about. As far as I know the comments are my own unless they are not funny in which case, they too are plagiarized.



Since this picture was posted by a woman, I might as well add that I wished I could of thought of this during my divorce!


Humor sometimes leaves a bad taste in your mouth, especially if you don't cook the road kill enough.


I found this picture in extremely bad taste...the bear did not. By the way, the dweeb in front was also killed and eaten by the bear because he dropped his Blackberry and went back for it.


This is the real "Cat in the Hat." He will be buying one right away.


I don't get this one, but I don't get allot of things.


I have been trying to get people to say Fornicate Under the Consent of the King, but it has fallen on deaf ears or ear as the case may be.


I give up!

The tragedy is that I have had this happen to me more than twice!


I be the first day of Christmas....

And this is what I say if you don't like it!

No, these were not the good old days. These were the notes I was writing the girl I got pregnant in high school!


At which time I will pull out my .357 mag and rob the fools!


That's how I roll because I don't know any better!


I don't want anyone to believe this schmooze crap, that is why I saved the best for last.


Now maybe now I have managed to piss someone off!

Write on,

Mittster