Guilt

Here’s a short list of some of the stuff that I hope has reached maximum exposure.....Ya’ know--things I’ve simply had enough of: Shaved Heads Goatees Flat-Brimmed Baseball Caps Tattoos*  Talking Heads on News Programs Flip-Flops Worn Anywhere Other Than Swimming Or The Beach Excessive Body Piercings** Television Commercials For Anything Related To Medicine Or Lawyers American Idol Baggy Shorts “Wild Cards” In Professional Sports *I’m OK with tattoos on any military veteran and any member, current or past, of that traveling freak show known as the NBA **If I toss a handful of refrigerator magnets at you and they stick anywhere other than your ears, it’s excessive

Movie Notes from the Rust Belt..... Youngstown, Ohio Just finished watching The Angry Red Planet, a 1959 Sci-Fi epic, courtesy of Netflix .  50s Sci-Fi is one of my favorite pastimes, and this one lands near the top of the heap. There’s not a heckuva lot of plot to get in the way of the story here.  Mission to Mars.  Monsters on Mars who kill one of the crew.  In an interesting twist on the monster types, we have a giant one-celled creature that absorbs one of the crew in ghastly detail--nothing like you’d see now, of course, but still.....I mean, for Pete’s sake, he was ABSORBED!!  The male lead and the female lead manage to get home in their spacecraft to tell their story, which consists of a warning to keep away from Mars because, well, humans are so war-like and all. You got your square-jawed all-American hero leading the crew--A Humphrey Bogart look-alike named Gerald Mohr, who worked in the movies and TV steadily from the late 30s through is earl...

Here’s the deal.....I’m an usher at the church I attend.  That would be St. John's Episcopal in Youngstown Ohio.  I belong to the men’s group.  My bride can be counted on to assist every time she is asked.  I don’t always agree with Episcopal dogma, but the people seem pretty nice, and the church itself is magnificent. Last Sunday at the 8AM service, a man burst into the service--he was running from Youngstown police officers, who were pursuing him due to him having just burglarized another church.  At least that’s what it seems like based on the account in local media. When he burst in, he asked for sanctuary.  And our pastor, Bradley Pace, agreed.  It’s a little hazy as to whether the police officers were allowed to enter the church or not, but after the service, the thief was arrested.  Oh, yes, he resisted.  Oh, yes, his resistance was overcome. Why the police failed to arrest the pastor for interfering with police officers I cannot ...

Movie Notes From The Rust Belt Youngstown, Ohio I may have mentioned that I watch a TV channel called “PubDHub”.  Never heard of it you say?  Well, it’s one of the channels offered on my ROKU streaming media device.  OK, truth be told I have multiple ROKU devices on my HD televisions.  Lotsa good stuff on there, but what I’m here to talk about is PubDHub.  OK.....PubDHub is Public Domain Stuff--get it?  Pub is Public and D is Domain and Hub is, um, the hub.  You can have regular PubDHub for no extra charge or you can go for  Gold PubDHub for a paltry $2.50 a year.   I’m a Gold guy.  That means that I get extra stuff.  But the regular PubDHub is pretty cool too. I told you that so I could tell you this: I watched a 1975 movie on PubDHub today.  That’s pretty new by PubDHub standards, but I like the 70s stuff.  Title of the movie was “Slashed Dreams”.  Later, I found out that it was originally released as “Sunb...

While you can always get here by typing in "jimyoungtheguiltyone.blogspot.com", you can now also get here by typing in "jim-young.net". Have I dated myself by using the word "typing"?  Just wondering.

It’s all I can do to watch Ryan Braun play baseball.  Look, it simply was not necessary for Major League Baseball to destroy Roger Clemens and Barry Bonds, but they did.  Seem to be proud of it too.  The true situation with performance enhancing drugs at that time of history was that it was going away of it’s own volition, and public pressure--the same way that the “greenies” of the 60‘s and 70‘s went away. But if they are going to go after Bonds and Roger the Rocket, then they need to hammer Braun with the same eagerness and ferocity. Major League Baseball under Bud Selig should be ashamed of itself for this and other malfeasance.

Dear Netflix: In the beginning, TV Land was a good idea too.  You know, old programs from the “Golden Age” of television--programs like The Honeymooners, and classic TV commercials.  Aimed, I suppose, at me and mine--aging baby boomers.  TV Land is now just another junk cable station with infomercials and endless re-runs of not quite classic TV programs.  Idiocy like Extreme Makover, Roseanne, and as an added bonus, real crapfests like High School Reunion and She’s Got The Look.   I get it.  The target audience is no longer me, but rather Generation X, or something like that.  MTV owns TV Land, and they completely MTV’d it.  (As a side note, I usually spell out "Empty Vee" when I refer to that TV channel). The crux of this open letter is this:  I see that Netflix is now offering an original program called Lilyhammer, set in Norway with a gangster theme--sounds sort of like a Sopranos spin-off.   Fine.  I also understand tha...

As I’ve previously mentioned, I’m employed as a driving instructor in Ohio.  A pretty good job as jobs for old retired guys go, and I have a good time with it. I’m a “behind-the-wheel” instructor for our wonderful local teen-agers, and I occasionally teach a classroom presentation to these same dandy kids.  On alternate Saturdays I teach our “remedial” course.   The remedial course is a court ordered day of instruction (8 hours plus breaks) for adults who have had DUI’s (or, as we call them in Ohio, OVI’s--"Operating a Vehicle Impaired”, and if that’s not a tortured phrase, I don’t know what is).  I usually also have a handful of young adults in the class who are in danger of having their licenses suspended for too many tickets, and want to obtain a two point “credit” against their anticipated driving dalliances, and others who have had their licenses suspended for any number of reasons.  The class is always full, and we always have a whopping good time. ...

So far, nobody seems able to beat the Dodgers this year.  As a Giants guy, we know this must change . Oz.....El Lay.....All The Same

10 MM or .22 LR ?  Decisions, Decisions

A gentleman is returning home after a lengthy trip and is met by his butler at the station.  This is the conversation that they have on their way home. "So, has anything happened while I've been away?" "No, sir, I can't think of anything at all worth mentioning." "Come now, I've been away for weeks.  Surely something must have happened in all that time." "Well, sir, come to think of it, your dog died." "My dog died?  How awful!  Still, he was getting on in years, and I suppose it had to happen some time.  How did he die?" "The vet said it was probably from eating the rotten meat." "The rotten meat?  Since when do we leave rotten meat lying around for the dog to eat?" "Well, it was the horses, sir.  They'd been rotting for some time after the barn burned down." "Good heavens.  How in the world did the barn burn down?" "It must have been some embers th...

It's Saturday morning and Bob's just about to set off on a round of golf when he realizes that he forgot to tell his wife that the guy who fixes the washing machine is coming around at noon. So Bob heads back to the clubhouse and phones home. "Hello?" Says a little girl's voice. "Hi, honey, it's Daddy," says Bob. "Is mommy near the phone?" "No, Daddy. She's upstairs in the bedroom with uncle Frank." After a brief pause, Bob says, "But you haven't got an Uncle Frank, honey!" "Yes I do, and he's upstairs in the bedroom with Mommy!" "Okay, then. Here's what I want you do. Put down the phone, run upstairs and knock on the bedroom door and shout in to Mommy and Uncle Frank that my car's just pulled up outside the house." "Okay, Daddy!" A few minutes later, the little girl comes back to the phone. "Well, I did what you said, Daddy." "And wh...

Blue Steel, Leather, and Factory Ammunition. I'm still a revolver guy.

Movie Notes From The Rust Belt Youngstown, Ohio I’ve mentioned that I have a Netflix subscription.  Amazing bunch of stuff there--I mean AMAZING.  I just watched a 1977 movie titled “Citizens Band”--also known as (according to imdb.com) “Handle With Care”. As you might imagine, it has to do with the CB craze of the 70‘s.  Or not.  Held my interest all the way through, and I recommend it without reservation, even for the youngsters out there.  Wanna know what we did in the 70‘s?  What things looked like?  The sort of stuff that we thought was funny and important?  Then take a look. Starred a bunch of faces that you’ll recognize, if not the names--Candy Clark and Paul LeMat, both alumni of 1973‘s “American Graffiti", Charles Napier and Ed Begley Jr., and it was Bruce McGill’s first movie.  Prostitution, trucking, sibling rivalry, bigamy, problems of the elderly, anonymous sex, and the biggest sin we can now imagine..... Indoor Cigarette ...

So I’m watching the Giants and the Dodgers play a game at Chavez Ravine.  It’s on MLB TV, which I get through my ROKU box and then displayed on my HDTV-- HOLY CRAP WHAT A GREAT DEAL !! Anyhow, I’m reminded of this..... Why does the LAPD always leave a Dodgers game early? So they can beat the crowd.

Gay marriage?  Of course.  Why should the gay population be spared the agonies of divorce? But really.......... The government should quietly and politely bow out of sanctifying marriage altogether.  That process should be the sole province of churches and other organizations--Like, maybe, your local astrologer.  You get the idea.  Then let the insurance companies decide who gets to qualify for dependent coverage. No problem--You’re welcome.

What does the acronym MKULTRA stand for?   Well, according to most acronym sources, it stands for “Manufacturing Killers Utilizing Lethal Tradecraft Requiring Assassinations”. Those of us in the know (the hip ones) know that it really stands for “Mike Krukow Uses Linguistics To Really Articulate”. Either way, there’s a little mind control in the mix.

Having been recently priced out of medical coverage by the public agency that I spent my life working for, my Bride and I are now applying for medical coverage on our own. An interesting experience, and here’s my take on the whole thing--Feel free to quote me: Medical coverage companies will offer you an umbrella.  If it starts raining, you have to give it back.

Reigning NL MVP Ryan Braun of the Milwaukee Brewers hit three (count ‘em THREE) taters in last night’s game against the Padres in San Diego.  The Padres home park is Petco--notorious for being the most difficult park in the league to hit a home run.  Very deep fences and large outfields.  They are actually considering moving the fences in to provide more offense and, hopefully, increase excitement in the fans and increase ticket sales. Three in a single game. Three.  At Petco. Pity that Braun’s dirty pee got tossed out on a technicality. Pity.

OK, I still watch the Weather Channel in the mornings to try to get a heads-up on what to wear to work.  Should I bring a jacket?  A raincoat?  Galoshes?  Tank top, mesh unders, and Zoris?  I just have to know. Anyhow, I always have to watch a bunch of self-promotion ads for the Weather Channel’s original programming whilst awating the forecast.    I really don’t know who their target audience is, nor who might be watching this tripe, but it’s not me.  Or anyone I know. In general, it looks to me like anything that NBC has an idea for, but no venue for, ends up on The Weather Channel.  Even their news is peppered with self-promotion (when you consider that TWC is owned, at least in part, by NBC, who is owned, at least in part, by GE, and they have quite a stake in having global warming being a fact, and in green technology). So, here’s a probably partial list of TWC’s original programming, none of which I’ve watched, so take this whole...