Why.

I’ve noticed a recent trend with professional people walking to their office. They’re dragging their briefcase behind them. On wheels.

What’s up with that?

It wasn’t too long ago that any given businessman or businesswoman on the street was carrying a leather clad briefcase at their side. Inside held all the secrets of the their profession; paperwork about the next deal, a portfolio displaying their abilities, the proposal for the big meeting. Then of course, laptop computers became all the rage, so the hard cased briefcase gave way to the soft-sided carrying bag which was a little larger than the briefcase but still had that “professional” appearance to it. Now everyone seems to be using their airline carry-on luggage to transport their computers and paperwork back and forth to the office. There they are, wheeled suitcase behind them to create yet another obstacle on the sidewalk, bumping along over the cracks in the concrete.

When did people become so lazy that they couldn’t carry their own briefcase?

I find it hard to believe that the laptops of today are heavier than the laptops of five years ago when people actually carried them. You’re not going to convince me of otherwise, because as technology becomes more popular and more affordable, it also makes strides in the direction of miniaturization. And with all this technology at our fingertips, there should be less paperwork, handouts, etc. to cart around in your briefcase, right?

So why have people become so lazy that it’s too much of an effort to carry their own briefcase?

I won’t drag my luggage through an airport by its wheels, let alone drag it to work. Admittedly I drive Earl crazy when we’re traveling, because I insist on actually carrying our luggage instead using the built in wheels that were made for nothing larger than a Hot Wheels car. He says I’m nuts. I prefer “eccentric”, but “nuts” works for me as well.

At least I’m not lazy.

I can’t believe that today I’m reading another news article about a fatal school shooting in our country. My thoughts are with the family of those affected at the small school in Tennessee.

What has happened to our schools? If any place should be safe for children outside of the home, it’s their school. This didn’t happen at a big, crowded school in a seedy neighborhood in a large city. No, this shooting took place at a relatively rural area of Tennessee. What is going on?

I graduated from school almost 20 years ago and I know much has changed during that time. Students have access to more information than ever before, via the internet, cell phones, instant messenger, all of it. Heck, as a student I was very excited when the school received 30 donated televisions, all black and white, so that we could have a “multimedia” experience in the classroom. The most violent video game that I remember from my teenage years was maybe Frogger and that was because the large pixels on the screen that vaguely resembled a frog went “splat” when a vaguely shaped truck ran over it. Today there’s video games featuring a huge amount of violence including drive by shootings, rapes, robbery… is this really necessary?

Sometimes I wonder if not much has changed after all. Maybe I was sheltered. Perhaps I never had access to violent games, movies, etc. of my generation so that’s why I never had the urge to shoot anyone at school. If that’s the case, then that’s just more testimony to the fact that my parents did a great job raising my sister and I.

In the past, I’ve joked that school violence can be blamed on photocopiers. With the departure of the old “ditto machines” (remember handouts with purple ink?), teachers and students are no longer getting high on the fumes. Bring back the ditto machines!

If it were only that simple.

I’m still getting a ton of e-mail about the cancellation of “Judging Amy”, seems I’ve climb to the top of the Google heap or something. Like myself, there are some mighty pissed “Judging Amy” fans out there!!!

Here’s the person you want to talk to:
Mr. Leslie Moonves
President & CEO
CBS Entertainment
51 West 52nd Street
New York, NY 10019
(212) 975-4321

I did not cancel “Judging Amy” (I’m proud to say that I am nowhere near that stupid.). I am not affiliated with CBS. I’d really like the show to come back, and would at least appreciate a response from CBS acknowledging that they have at least received my e-mails, letters and postcards, but I think they’re afraid to admit they made a mistake. So keep bombarding them!

Give 212-975-4321 a phone call and tell them how you feel. Ask for Les Moonves if you want, he’s the one that took “Judging Amy” off the air. Give that phone number a call and tell them how upset you are that “Judging Amy” is no longer on CBS. They love the phone calls.

I came home at lunch to relax a little and enjoy some brief moments of quiet time to myself. I didn’t want to do anything out of the ordinary. I didn’t want to be entertained. I didn’t want to sleep. I didn’t want to tap dance on the ceiling. I just wanted to sit down, gather my thoughts, take some nice deep breaths and then head back to work centered and focused.

When I arrived home the garbage cans were in the middle of the road creating all sorts of chaos. I have a hunch they were headed down to the expressway to play in the street.

When I did my business and tried to flush the toilet, the handle became disconnected from the flap, preventing me from flushing said toilet. I had to put that back together in fear of a nasty smell when I got home from work tonight. My hands will smell lovely as I type at work this afternoon.

Tom decided that the custom woodwork around the bathroom door would make a wonderful ladder to entertain me from as I was slaving over the toilet. He then launched himself at the new bathmat and skidded across the floor, knocking into the plunger. He’s such a comedian.

On the bright side, Earl has cancelled tonight’s trip to Vermont, so he will be able to join me as I head to Syracuse to have dinner with my mother and sister. A little bright spot in the afternoon.

To keep it all in perspective, if this is the worse I have to bitch about then I guess I’m a pretty lucky guy.

I’ve written the fine folks at CBS over 30 e-mails regarding the cancellation of Judging Amy. I’ve sent two typed letters and three handwritten letters. I’ve received over *100* e-mails and countless blog entry comments from dismayed fans about the cancellation of this show. Google searches turn up disappointment all over the internet.

I still have yet to hear from the “fine” folks at CBS.

I hear the new show that replaced “Judging Amy” is tanking in the ratings. I’m not surprised. “Judging Amy” is still in my TiVo season pass list, awaiting new episodes to be aired. I’m not going to give up. I’m not going to shut up. Not until someone official says something.

Just think what I would have been like during the cancellation of the original series of Star Trek!

At the very least someone could send me an autographed photo from Amy Brenneman.

This morning I woke up in a bad mood. I don’t know why I felt rather surly; Earl and I had gone to bed at a reasonable hour. I slept the entire night through, save for Earl getting up at 5:30 a.m. and Tom deciding to comb my beard at 6:30 a.m. (apparently 6:30 a.m. is kibble time). But I slept through until 7:30, hopped out of bed, made my lunch and got ready for the day.

While I was cranking around the house and through the early part of my workday, I was formulating a rather cranky blog entry that I never got around to actually typing. I was going to just RANT about things that are driving me crazy these days. I can’t recall the majority of my beefs, but here’s a couple, o.k., here’s a bunch:

1. I’m sick of hearing about the judicial nominee that I call “Raccoon Woman”. She looks evil, as far as I’m concerned, she is evil and she shouldn’t make it to the Supreme Court solely on the basis that she has not been a judge in any capacity, including raping people from their hard earned money over a parking ticket. End of story.

2. I’m also sick of seeing Bush-lite’s dumb ass face up on the television screen. He always has this bewildered, “I Can’t Believe I’m President!” look on his face. I’d have any easier time believing him saying “I can’t believe I’m not butter!” I suspect that he’s Animatronic, but then again the puppets in Disney’s “It’s A Small World” attraction don’t even look that stupid.

3. I’m tired of paying school taxes to our local school. The powers that be want to make damn sure that I don’t ever have kids (through adoption) to send to that school, so why should I pay? I’d rather take that money and give it to a children’s charity instead.

4. I’m sick of this coddling of children. If your child is screaming in the middle of a restaurant, a smack on his or her fanny is not going to scar them for the rest of their lives, damage their id or even make them vomit their dinner. It may shut them up and teach them something in the process. And don’t get me started on “unsafe playgrounds”. I swung around metal monkey bars over a cement pad for years and I will proudly show you the one scar I have on my leg, and that was my own damn vault for trying to turn left when I should have swung right. I learned not to do that again the hard way.

5. While I’m ranting about the school system, any school that forbids the use of red pen because it may upset the student needs to be shut down. And the notice needs to be written in red.

6. I believe all movie theatre should be retrofitted to reject any and all wireless communication, just as new theatres should be constructed without the ability to receive these types of communications. You want to talk on your phone or IM your friends? Stay home. And don’t get mad if I dump a giant slurpee in your lap while you’re chatting on your cell phone.

7. I’m sick of a local ambulance company urging people to REFRAIN from dialing 911 and calling them instead for help. In a similar vein, I’m tired of advertisements for medicines that I will never take. And while I’m on the subject, I have had it up to here with all these new syndromes. “He has failure to thrive syndrome.” “She has tired feet syndrome.” “I think you have Adult ADD syndrome.” You know what? I have “Shut the fuck up syndrome.” I run around telling people how stupid they are and I don’t even need a med that may cause explosive bowels to deal with it, just stop being an asshat and we’ll both be fine.

8. And lastly, I’m tired of the government trying to save us from ourselves. I don’t want to be forced to wear my seat belt, I don’t want to be forced to wear a motorcycle helmet and I sure as shit don’t want to be forced to drive 55 MPH on a four lane highway that is 10 miles from the closest inkling of civilization and 5 miles from the closest tree. If you can’t drive it, park it. Simple as that.

Wow, I feel more energized after getting all that off my chest than I did after my naked nap yesterday. Thanks for listening!

O.k., so instead of vanity winning, the doctor wins. He’s booked until tomorrow, I get to have a swollen nose without knowing why until tomorrow at 12:30 p.m. Hopefully the ol’ doc (actually, the quite attractive doctor) will have some answers and a magic cure.

###

On the bright side of the day, I met up with my friend Mike for lunch and he brought me some chocolate chip cookies when he heard that I wasn’t feeling up to par. Then I came home and Earl had a wonderful little supper made including some healthy vegetable soup and a big ol’ helpin’ of love.

The bridge of my nose has been a little tender to the touch for the past 48 hours or so. For the past week or two I’ve had this red spot under my right eye, like I had rubbed my eye too much or something. I figured I had some sort of sinus infection going on, so I’ve been taking appropriate action by blowing my nose, doubling up on the orange juice, drinking echinacea tea, etc. This morning, it’s slightly swollen and has jumped up on the pain scale to “throbbing”. It doesn’t hurt a lot, but I can’t ignore it as easily.

I’m not concerned about the pain, as I can endure just about anything short of the severing of a limb. However, I am concerned about the swelling. Vanity wins. I’m calling the doctor.

As I was walking from my office building to my car today, I decided to be a law abiding citizen and crossed the street using the crosswalk instead of jay walking further up yet closer to my car. This is where I made a grave error. You see, as I was using the crosswalk, as instructed by the flashing LED constructed picture of a sexless figure walking, a white Ford Explorer decided that I would look better as road kill. I stopped just short of getting my feet run over by a rancid fruitbag of a woman yakking on her cell phone while ignoring the traffic signal in front of her.

Now I know that I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that if you’re going to talk on your cell phone while driving (which is illegal in New York State), then go ahead and do it and stop trying to dodge cops or wrestle with that ugly handset. I suppose this is an example of the universe telling me “Ha ha! The government knows best, that’s why it’s illegal, ha ha!”

I want to know when everyone became so damn important that they had to yak on their cell phone whereever they may be. Are people so full of themselves and so self righteous that they think that they need to be available to their public every single, solitary second of the day? What happened to a little “down time”? The morning commute was your chance to organize yourself for the day, maybe win a contest on the radio and breathe in the sunshine and exhaust fumes. Now everyone is busy making appointments with their metrosexual stylist, yelling at the kids for making toast with the clothes iron and calling ahead for Dunkin Donuts buckets of coffee all via their cell phone.

Is there no peace in this country anymore?

I remember going to the “Hall of Presidents” at DisneyWorld back in ’96 and enjoying an interesting, engaging exhibit. It was magnificent, as each animatronic president said his piece and reminded us about the honor of being an American. I remember going to the same exhibit in ’05 and having to listen to Zelda screech at her kids over her Nextel walkie talkie for not meeting her next to the teacups at the appointed time. I ask you, how can Abraham Lincoln speak with dignity among the myriads of “beep beep” from those infernal Nextel phones or tinny, low fidelity renditions of “When The Saints Go Marching In” or “The William Tell Overture”? “To hell with American history, I want to know when I’m meeting my wife for a shaved ice!”

I think I’m becoming a little hostile towards cell phone users. A couple of weeks ago while we were at the State Fair, some moron would walk by, talking away on his cell phone and completely oblivious to the fact that he had just stomped on my foot, knocked an innocent grandma out of her wheelchair and that the cow ahead of him was not his girlfriend and was in fact shitting on his shoe. I would simply proclaim in a very loud, obnoxious, stage presence to the back of the auditorium voice, “OH MY GOD I’M AT THE STATE FAIR AND I MUST MAKE A CELL PHONE CALL RIGHT NOW!”. Then I’d raise my Motorola up like Kunta Kinte and genuflect. I would then proceed to dial random digits and order a pizza for the 10 people around me.

Unfortunately my attempt at humor was not noticed. People were too busy listening for their phones to ring a tinny, low fidelity version of “Da Dip”.

Why in the world would FEMA send trucks full of ice intended for hurricane victims to Maine?

Baffling.

FEMA Sends Trucks Full Of Ice For Katrina Victims To Maine