Getting Ready for Nashville

Today will be a day packed with trip preparation. I have a list of a dozen things that need to be done to get ready to leave for three days and nights in Nashville, Tennessee. We make a trip every spring to see our son, around the time of his birthday. It's such a fun city, with so many cool things to do and places to eat. But mostly, we get to hang out with him and his girlfriend, Sarah, who we love dearly. The highlight of the weekend will be a concert by a choir they are both in called the Portara Ensemble. We've heard them before and they are phenomenal, if you like that sort of thing...and by sort of thing I mean, gorgeous choral music performed by professionally trained musicians, who for no compensation rehearse for days in order to edify an entire room full of enraptured listeners free of charge. I rather think a love offering should be taken up at the end to give us freeloaders a chance to do the right thing, but that's just me.

So, a couple of days ago I texted my son and asked him to send us some ideas of what he wanted to do while we were in town. Part of the reason for this request is that our hotel is on one side of town, and his apartment is as far away from as it is possible to be while still being in Nashville. The reasons for this unhappy fact is a combination of several factors, primarily the fact that he lives in a weird part of town, and the hotels nearer to him are either sold out or three times as expensive as our Homewood Suites. Anyway, I thought it might make it easier to plan if we knew the locations of stuff, etc. etc... The next thing I know, he sends us a Google Doc, complete with web links to every activity and restaurant listed. He even had mapped out an itinerary...11:45-12:45 Saturday, lunch at any of the following six restaurants...

My son has slowly turned into his mother!

So, as a public service to any of you who might be interested in visiting Nashville anytime soon, here is a list of the restaurants which my soon to be 28 year old Millenial approves of, with the descriptors as they appear in the Google Doc:

Loveless Cafe (Southern breakfast)
The Pfunky Griddle (self-serve pancakes)
Hattie B's (hot chicken)
The Grilled Cheeserie (fancy grilled cheese)
Salt and Vine(lighter sandwiches and wine)
Taco Mamacita(fancy tacos)
The Harding House(at the Belle Meade Plantation)
Nomzilla (sushi)
Amerigo (Italian)
Adele's (seasonal, like Husk)
Butchertown Hall( smoked and other delicious meats) BING BING BING( we have a winner!!)
Virago (sushi)
Germantown Cafe( fine dining)

You're welcomed!

Trump News Update

Wonder what today will bring?

Yesterday was great. There was the Comey diaries and the tantalizing prospect that they might contain a smoking gun which might bring impeachment down on Trump's head. The entire Washington press corps let out a celebratory huzzah that could be heard all the way out in Arlington. But then, the wording of those diaries was weasley enough to call into question any definitive accusation, or was it???? Perhaps a congressional subpoena is in the offing. And how about that Mike Flynn nugget? Did Trump actually demand that Comey call off the dogs at the FBI, or did he simply ask, politely, that maybe he should consider it? Is there a difference between the two? Is this merely a distinction without a difference or is the actual language used important? Are there really tapes? Oh, and what about poor Seth Rich? Did he have contact with Wikileaks shortly before his mysterious murder? There's a laptop, apparently, and the D.C. Police have been asked to stand down on their investigation...by whom?, the curious observer must ask. But wait...now that Sean Hannity is all in on the story, it's starting to fall apart. There's a financial advisor from Dallas involved  now(always a bad sign), and the family of Mr. Rich is furious at what they call fake news. The most popular word making the rounds yesterday was impeachment. 

My Trump-loving friends still insist that everything is under control, that their guy is still playing ten moves ahead, Jedi master four dimensional chess and has his enemies exactly where he wants them. The few who will admit that things aren't going all that well lay the blame on the dishonest media and the deep state, shadow government, being run by Obama loyalists throughout the bowels of government. It is these fifth columnists who are responsible for all the leaks designed to undermine public confidence in the Trump presidency.( If true, mission accomplished).

When people like me spoke of the importance of temperament back during the campaign, this is what we meant. It is possible for people with wildly different personality types to be successful in a great variety of efforts. Indeed, Donald Trump's skill set worked very well in the ego-driven world of real estate developement, and the creation of a dynamic brand. But those sorts of skills get dilluted in high profile, high pressure, heavily protocol-restrictive lines of work like...the Presidency. The problem for Trump is not that the job is changing him, the problem is that it hasn't changed him at all! He is going about his business exactly the same way he has for 70 years, seeking out headlines, reveling in controversy and chaos, and keeping even his closest advisors in the dark. His is the first ever ad hoc presidency, and we are about to discover if ad hoc works at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

If I were a bookmaker in Vegas, where would I place the over and under on how long Trump makes it before an impeachment attempt...a year? Two? Or maybe, one day he wakes up and decides that he's had it with being President and just quits. Knowing Trump's style, who among us actually thinks that a drama-filled resignation is at least a possibility with this guy? I do. Can you imagine the advance he would score from the tell-all book he would ghost write about it? It would make the Obama's 60 million look like chump change!

So, what will today bring? With Trump, literally anything is possible.

A Silver Lining

This morning, I ask for your forbearance as I hash out a new idea, a new revelation, a possible silver lining to the terrifying black cloud hanging over my country...

Ok, now we've got a new "gate." You know...that nauseating suffix that the press always attaches to every new tempest in a teapot that happens in Washington, illustrating perfectly the fact that the press hasn't done its job since the 1970's. This one has been dubbed, blabbergate, and it concerns the allegation that Trump might have spilled some classified beans to the Russian foreign minister about some covert anti-terror operation. I say "might have" simply because I don't trust the objectivity of the Washington Post, or any other media organization when it comes to Trump. Their hatred of him is so visceral, so laid bare, their reporting is rendered suspect. However, does anyone who has been paying attention this past year, find this allegation hard to believe?? Actually, this is exactly the sort of thing I can imagine Trump doing, not out of malice or menace but out of his blustering, sand pounding narcissism. I have the best intelligence, I get the best intelligence every morning, it's incredible how much intelligence I get from the best spies in the world, frankly. I mean, just the other day they told me....

I read the news every morning. Occasionally, when I'm in a self-loathing mood, I'll watch cable news. I see a level of dysfunction that plows new ground every single day. Never in my lifetime has this country been governed at its highest level by such a collection of halfwits. The degree of incompetence on display, not just in the White House but in every other branch of this government, is staggering. And yet....

Almost every economic indicator is trending in a positive direction. The stock market is booming. Inflation is still MIA. Unemployment is down. These things have happened not because of Trump or anyone else in Washington, but in spite of them!! Herein lies the seed of a silver lining.

Suppose, just suppose for a minute, that despite the woeful inadequacy of our infantile leadership, the country prospers anyway? What would happen if after a couple of years of peace and prosperity under Donald Trump and the Seven Dwarfs, people suddenly realized that Washington DC isn't the fount of all blessings after all, that maybe, just maybe our Republic can thrive and prosper even with idiots at the helm? Finally, the cult of personality that has become the Presidency, the myth that has grown up around the notion of the professional politician, will be revealed in all of its emptiness. The power of the political class might be destroyed altogether, their ability to scare us into voting for them and against the other forever vanquished. Can you imagine how freeing that would be? The next time some politician says, "this country cannot afford four more years of ------!! The stakes are too high, the dangers too grave!!" ...we can all reply, "Oh yeah? Well, I got eight raises, took three European vacations, and bought a robot who cleans my house while Donald Trump was President and Paul Ryan was Speaker of the House. Shut up!!"

Once disabused of the idea of the supremacy of politics, people would be freed up to take care of their own problems, fix their own neighborhoods, their own schools. As long as the really smart creative people keep going into business and science, their brain power would sustain us. Sure, we would still have politicians, but they would be quarantined in Washington where they couldn't do any harm to anyone. And sure, there are flaws in this idea of a politician-free world. But who among us can't see the benefit to bringing the lot of them back down to Earth in the area of their towering self regard?

Donald Trump was President and the economy grew by 5% a year. That outcome is simply loaded with redemptive possibilities!!!

A Road Trip Anniversary

Shortened week ahead. The last of our spring travels will find us driving to Nashville this Friday to visit our son. This Friday happens to be our 33rd wedding anniversary. The fact that we will be spending 9 and a half hours of the day in a car is instructive, in that it tells the story of how marriage works...sometimes romance takes a back seat to the love you have for your kids. Would I love to be spending that day holed up in some mountain getaway somewhere, snuggled up with this girl??

Absolutely. But, we haven't seen Patrick in several months now, and that just won't do. So, we will spend nine and a half hours of alone time in the car weaving in and out of the herd of long haul truckers who call highway 81 home. While we flirt with death in a fiery crash of twisted metal, we'll  reminisce about all of the amazing years of our marriage. We'll remember the poverty of 1989-1992, after we decided that Pam needed to be a stay-at-home Mom. I can still taste the beans and franks Friday night dinners. We'll remember the exotic trips I started to win once some success arrived, and how strange and wonderful it felt to be frolicking in the Cayman Islands without children. But eventually, for reasons that still remain unclear, we started bringing them along. Scottsdale, Arizona. Monterey, California. Hawaii. Carribean cruises. Disney World.

We'll recall the scrambled chaos of the youth group years, the roughly ten year run I spent teaching and volunteering in the youth ministry at Grove Avenue. Our weekends became overrun with hormone-ravaged teenagers descending upon our house like a plague of locusts, devouring everything in their path. There were lock-ins, retreats, and summer camps. It was exhausting...and a non-stop thrill. For Pam it was like being room mother to a hundred kids. For me, it was more like being a part time Dad, part time social worker, and full time Crazy uncle, all rolled up in one. I loved every one of those kids, even helped a few along the way. But, even though, technically speaking, I was the one in the youth group ministry, it would have been impossible without Pam. All the girls wanted to grow up to be like her, all of the boys wanted to marry someone like her. Like everything else worthwhile that's happened over the past 33 years, it was very much a team effort.

Then, suddenly, the kids grew up, went away to college, then became adults in the far off lands of South Carolina and Tennessee. We don't see them for long stretches of the year. We found ourselves alone in a house which just a few days before was teaming with adolescents. Now it was just us. The transition took about a month. After being sad and lonely for a bit, we suddenly realized that having survived 25 years of raising children, we had been rewarded with...freedom.

Part of that freedom is being free to forego a romantic anniversary getaway in favor of a weekend in Nashville with our youngest. Can't wait.

Trump at Liberty...and other news.

President Trump will give the commencement address today to the 2017 graduating class at Liberty University. That's Donald J. Trump, builder of casinos, owner of strip clubs, grabber of pu**ies, and serial divorcée, giving a commencement speech at the school established by the founder of the Moral Majority, Jerry Falwell.

In other news...

Former President Barack Obama will give the keynote address at the sesquicentennial gala of the Daughters of the Confederacy, where he will lay a wreath at the tomb of the unknown Confederate.

Hillary Clinton has agreed to be the headline speaker at the Jefferson county Ruritan Club pancake breakfast fundraiser, where she has waived her normal $250,000 speaking fee in exchange for a promised love offering to reimburse her bus fair from Chappaqua.

Former President Bill Clinton has been chosen to give the opening speech at the Focus on the Family Marraige Vow Renewal conference in Colorado Springs.

Ken Hamm announced today that to mark the first anniversary of the grand opening of his Creationist Theme Park, Ark Encounter, he has issued an invitation to Bill Nye-The Science Guy , to be the master of ceremonies.

Elizabeth Warren's office today confirmed the news that the Senator from Massachusetts has agreed to be the headliner speaker at the upcoming annual meeting of the National Rifle Association in Lubbock, Texas.

And finally, Senator Bernie Sanders has agreed to make an address at the Hattiesburg, Mississippi Chamber of Commerce at their annual Horatio Alger fundraiser dinner.

Agitprop

Back during the salad days of my misspent youth, during the era of Soviet Communism, there was an arm of the Central Committee of the Communist party actually called...The Department of Agitation and Propoganda, which if nothing else, will be remembered as the most honest name for any political organization in history. It's where we get the modern term, agitprop, which can be defined as the widespread dissemination of political messages, especially through art and literature. For the old Soviets, everything was about politics, and the idea was to flood the zone with the gospel of communism 24/7, even if the subject at hand was no more political than a ham sandwich.

In modern America we have our own Department of Agitation and Propaganda. It's called, Hollywood. If you are a person of the left, and by that I mean a dedicated progressive, committed to the laundry list of liberal projects, your views on the political issues of the day are constantly validated and celebrated in the public realm. Television shows, movies, books, and especially late night television cheerleads your team and belittles the other side virtually 24/7. It must be a heady feeling, to always be on the same side as all of the good-looking celebrities who our culture worships. It must be an incredible comfort to always be reassured, consistently affirmed in your core beliefs. The spokespersons for your beliefs tend to all be popular and beloved, and unnaturally attractive. The spokespersons for my beliefs tend to be mostly dead guys. Surely, if all of the beautiful people agree with you, that's what really matters, right?

As a libertarian, small government guy, I must say...yes, I am jealous, and that jealousy does me no good whatsoever. Long ago, I became aware that my views on state power and the liberty of the individual were never going to have nearly the appeal of the nanny state handouts sold by the left. Those guys were pitching unlimited unemployment benefits, and handing out free cell phones at about the same time as I was preaching self-reliance and freedom from government, always a tough sale.

Am I bitter? Do I feel resentment every time I get lectured by a sit-com, beat over the head with the glories of the collective in movies, or routinely portrayed as an anti-science racist, misogynistic homophobe by the media if I'm unwilling to turn over the sovereignty of my country to the United Nations so we can better combat Global Warming? Well...yes, I suppose I am.

But, I'll get over it. No matter how long I live, Hollywood will always and forever be the Department of Agitation and Propaganda. The sooner I accept it and move on, the better.

My Daughter's Birthday

I was not ready for this girl when she arrived into this world thirty years ago today. I thought I was, but nothing that I had done in my twenty nine years, one month and eight days on this earth had adequately prepared me to be a parent. Nevertheless, there she was, this tiny marvel looking up at me, changing my life forever.

I was probably the worst expectant father in the history of St. Mary's hospital's maternity ward. I walked the equivalent of a half marathon in the rooms and hallways, pacing back and forth, asking stupid questions and generally making a nuisance of myself. Pam, on the other hand, was the very picture of grace and composure, despite being in periodically excruciating pain.

Back in 1987, very few people knew what the sex of their unborn child was before the fact. Both Pam and I had the feeling that Kaitlin Elizabeth Dunnevant was going to be a boy. So, when she arrived, pink and healthy, I was releaved and grateful, but for the first few hours of her life...disappointed. I had mentally prepared for and really wanted...a son. What an idiot I was. Thankfully, all of that disappointment melted away the very first time I held her in my arms.

This little girl was the single greatest thing that had ever happened to me. Being a parent changed me in profound ways, and I felt the changes immediately. I loved my parents. I love my siblings, and I am in love with my wife. But I had no idea how much love would find it's way into my heart for my child. It's a different kind of love, one born of care, protection, and responsibility. Pam and I had actually created this little person and brought her into this dangerous world. Now, we had a mission...to protect her, to bring her up right, to provide. Not long after bringing her home, I was rocking her to sleep one night when it occurred to me that I would storm the gates of hell for this child. Thirty years later, nothing has changed.

So, on this special day, I would like to wish my first born, my one and only daughter, the happiest birthday. She has exceeded every single expectation I ever had for her. She is beautiful, smarter than me, nicer, kinder, more compassionate than me. Her grammar is so much better than mine. She took all of the best parts from her mother and me and combined them in a bright new person. She makes me proud every day, not just on her birthday. But, on her birthday...she gets a blogpost.

Off The Radar

I must confess that over the past two or three months the daily ebb and flow of politics has completely dropped off of my radar screen. Maybe it's the fact that baseball season has arrived, perhaps incredulity has set in, or maybe it's just Trump-Fatigue. But, for whatever reason, I have tuned it all out for the first time in the past forty years or so. This morning's headline that James Comey had been fired seemed like it should have been a big deal and that I should have read the story. But all it got out of me was a "...Huh..," then I hurried along to the box scores to read all about the latest bullpen collapse by the Nationals.

You see, I've been so consumed with transforming literally every aspect of my business, at such a cost and insane level of frustration, to comply with a regulation cooked up by a thousand government lawyers at the Depart of Labor, I haven't had a lot of spare time to keep up with anything else happening in Washington. While everyone else gets their shorts in a knot about the latest fascist outrage from the Trump administration, I'm busy dealing with leftover outrages from the Obama administration, whereby a gaggle of unelected bureaucrats have brought the full weight of the regulatory state down on my head. To comply with this new edict will cost me upwards of five figures in new computer software, higher costs and lost revenue...every year. Virtually none of these new edicts are in the best interests of my clients, since their costs will also go up. However, the vast regulatory regime in our nation's capital is positively ecstatic with this new regulation since it's power will dramatically increase.

So, by all means, wring your hands about the latest Trump news. Exhaust yourself screaming about Comey, the Russians stealing the election from Saint Hillary, and the horrors of the Obamacare tweek. Meanwhile, down here on the farm, I'm desperately trying to figure out how to comply with the latest command from on high, dutifully paying whatever it costs to do so. I don't have time to carry a sign and chant, "What do we want? Impeachment!! When do we want it? Now!!" I don't have time any longer to engage in social media debates about creeping fascism. Creeping bureaucracy has me completely engaged. By the time the workday is finally over and I have temporarily banished its anxiety from my mind, the last thing in the world I want is to read about more Washington dysfunction.

Thank God Almighty in heaven for baseball.

The Worst Thing I Saw This Weekend

I attended a minor league baseball game this past weekend. Towards the end of the game something truly terrible happened. This terrible thing was totally avoidable, an unforced error, and illustrates what is wrong with not only baseball, but indeed...the world.

Because this was a minor league baseball game, the names don't matter, which is a good thing since I don't know any of them. This was single A, and the only player on either team anyone had ever heard of was Tim Tebow. Nevertheless, there were 6,600 people in the stands on a chilly, rainy night. Most of the players not named Tebow were kids, 19-21 years of age. The starting pitcher for the visiting team was a skinny left-hander and he was dealing. He was cutting through the Columbia Fireflies lineup like a knife through hot butter. Although I only saw one pitch from him all night that broke into the 90's on the radar gun, he was mowing them down with an array of offspeed stuff. Then, something terrible happened. In the bottom of the ninth inning, with two men out and this skinny kid one out away from a no-hitter, his manager inexplicably walks out to the mound and takes the ball from him in favor of a relief pitcher. That's right....you heard me correctly. This twenty year old kid is about to pitch the first no-hitter of his professional career and his manager removes him from the game. The reason? Apparently, the suits in the front office had put him on a pitch limit of 110 pitches. He had thrown...113.

I could go on for hours listing all of the things desperately wrong about this thing. Even if you're not a baseball fan, you can sense the raging stupidity on display. It is this sort of micromanaging, too clever by half nitwittery that is killing the world. Let some analytics guy a thousand miles away from the action literally rip the drama out of actual human achievement at the absolute worst possible time, and then call it progress. 

Sandy Koufax. Don Drysdale. Nolan Ryan. Steve Carlton. Tom Seaver. Greg Maddox. None of these guys had a pitch limit. Trying to imagine Walter Alston attempting to take the ball out of Koufax's hand, one out away from a no hitter, is truly hilarious, and unfathomable. But now a bunch of businessmen have decided that protecting their "investments" is more important than competition. This timid, bean-counting is the sort of thing that drains the life out of everything it touches. The trouble is, the bean-counters are taking over the world.


Heading back to the office this morning to check back in to my real life to see how it's been going while I've been away. Hope nothing terrible has happened in my absence....

My Rocking Chair Moment

Last night, after a fun evening watching Columbia Fireflies baseball, we all settled down in our pajamas in Kaitlin and Jon's living room, Kaitlin and Pam on the loveseat, Jon and Jackson on the sofa, and me in the rocking chair, with Lucy nervously walking in circles around us all, on the lookout for God knows what. I was catching up on the big league scores on my iPad. All was peaceful, everyone was chilled. Then calamity and hilarity broke out at roughly the exact same time.

The rocking chair in question has been in the family for what seems like decades. It had been banished to somebody's attic at some point, but had been given a reprieve when Kaitlin was setting up house at grad school. I have sat in this chair without incident many times. But on this night, there I was, calmly checking the Nationals box score when I heard a disturbing cracking sound. Everything that followed was in slow motion.

As I began rocking back, the crack came, then an awareness that I seemed to be going farther back than seemed normal for a rocking chair. By the time I realized that I was about at the point where the laws of motion and gravity were about to kick in, it was too late. I remember thinking, Wait...am I going to crash through the window behind me?? By the time everyone looked over in my direction, all they could see was the soles of my feet flying up in the air. It was one of those ass over tea kettle moments. I landed at the base of the dreaded window, solidly on my left hip, the chair good for nothing grander than kindling. The pain was excruciating. My loving family soon gathered around, staring down at me, spread-eagled amongst the splintered rocking chair, and all they could think to do...was laugh.

Sure, for about thirty seconds or so, they were concerned about my health status. But, as soon as they realized that there was no blood, and no broken bones, all decorum left the building. My daughter and my wife began a bout of hysterical, belly laughing...the kind that makes your face cramp up and tears fall down your face. Their eyes began to swell from all of the laughing. For a minute I thought they might suffocate themselves. Apparently, the sight of me flayed out on the floor in a pile of knarled wood was the single most hilarious thing that they had seen in years.

However, I must admit, after I had a handful of Advil in me to treat the throbbing pain in my hip, even I started in with the laughing. What is it, exactly, that is so hysterically funny about seeing someone flip over backwards in a rocking chair? Well, I don't know the answer to this question, except to say that despite all of our advancement as a society, we humans still love slapstick.

Yes, Trump is in the White House. Yes, global warming is killing the planet and we are all going to die because of corporate greed, and yes, Obamacare's repeal will result in widespread death, pestilence and destruction across the fruited plain....but, this is still funny!!

The Gala

Ok, I have steadfastly refused all of the baubles that society throws at you for attaining a certain age. AARP has probably sent me a couple dozen congratulatory letters since I turned 55 years old, extolling the virtues of their parasitic lobbying organization. I have thrown all of them directly in the trash, all of them unopened. I have accepted no senior discounts for anything. I have never hit from the senior tees. No bluebird specials have been indulged. However...with the passage of enough years comes the roll of lovable curmudgeon, and I can assure you all...I am up for that challenge. In light of this truth, a few observations about the events of the past 24 hours...

Last night's Teacher of the Year Gala, held at the Columbia Convention Center, was fully funded by BMW, a big South Carolina employer who has chosen to engage the public by generously supporting K-12 education. The winner receives the use of a beautiful new car, which was displayed ostentatiously in the hall. There was an open bar, the attire was formal. Despite what was billed as a celebration of the 81 finest teachers(out of over 50,000)of 2017 throughout the State, I've seen more celebratory proceedings at a county board of supervisors meeting. Actually, that's a lie, since wild horses couldn't drag me to a board of supervisors meeting, so I have no first hand knowledge of what their meetings are like. But I have a working imagination and something tells me I'm not far off.

I loved meeting Kaitlin's principal. Seriously cool guy. The other people at our table were nice. But, once the proceedings began, it was like watching paint dry while wearing sandpaper underwear. I made three trips to the bathroom to prevent boredom-induced spontaneous combustion. There was a local news anchor personality with a sing song voice doing the MC honors. She did the very best she could with a program which seemed put together by the same committee that gave us C-SPAN. There was a very old heiress type who made a presentation. There was an interview conducted between some suit and last year's Teacher of the Year along with this year's Supervisior of the Year. This was done while we were finally allowed to eat, so the acoustics were horrible. Of course the Supervisor of the Year helped out by pointing his hand held mic at the back wall while speaking.

Then the featured speaker took the stage, and impressive man who held both a PhD in Medicine from Harvard Medical school as well as a Doctorate from MIT. Oh, and he was an astronaut. I assume that the point of his presentation was to highlight the fact that this amazingly accomplished man was a product of South Carolina public schools. Instead, there were pictures of weightless men and women floating around the inside of the Space Shuttle, and a slide that showed us just how tiny Earth is compared to the rest of the Universe....which was all great, but the dude didn't seem even slightly interested in the subject at hand, i.e.. the education of South Carolinian students by the capable people filling his audience.

Maybe I'm asking too much. But, if I had been in charge of planning this gala, there would have been loud music, at least one high school dance troop, couple of clowns, a paid comic, several blooper reels from past galas and somebody, anybody capable of inspiration.

...which I suppose is exactly why I'm never in charge of this sort of thing.

An Eerie Dream

I had a crazy dream last night. It was one of those terribly realistic dreams where you remember every detail when you wake up. It felt like the dream ended precisely at the moment when my eyes opened and I was suddenly wide awake. It felt so real that I immediately grabbed my cell phone to check the news and confirm it to be true. I dreamed that Tiger Woods had killed himself.

To my great relief I discovered that it was just a dream. Tiger is alive and well. But, when I first woke up, I would have bet the house that he was dead.

In the dream, I was at my office when my phone rang. I let it go to voice mail since I was with a client at the time. But then it rang again...and again. Somebody was really trying to get in touch with me. So, I apologized to my client, explaining that I had to answer the call. As soon I picked up the phone, in that dream sequence sort of way, my client disappeared and the friend who was calling appeared at my office window to inform me that Tiger Woods had committed suicide and it was all over the news. I thanked him(?) for the heads up, then hung up and started searching the Internet. Sure enough, there were stories about Tiger's tragic end everywhere, including pictures of the paramedics at the scene. There was a huge story in Golf Digest. I read well written paragraphs, some adoring and some critical. I scanned through the comments sections of these stories and saw the same, some lamenting his loss, others talking about reaping what you sow. Everything I read felt so authentic.

I've never been a huge Tiger fan. He's great. Golf is more fun to watch when he's playing. But, I never much cared for him. He seemed too robotic, too cold blooded killer for my taste. Listening to his press interviews after his latest win always left me cold. It's like he expected to win, so what's the big deal? When he backed his Buick into that fire hydrant in 2009, I must admit to the uncharitable thought that ran through my mind...Maybe this will wipe that smugness off his face...a terrible thing to think at the time and a thought that I am ashamed to have had. Since that epic failure, times have been hard for Tiger. He just recently endured his eighth back surgery and in all likelihood is finished as a professional golfer. He will be lucky to be able to walk without pain, let alone swing a golf club. Add to this the loss of his marriage, and Tiger Woods is actually the sort of person where a suicide attempt would be believable, I suppose. But after this astonishingly real dream, I wish the man every success in the world.

Meanwhile, back in the real world, I'll be working from home this morning waiting on the Guirkin Man. Spring AC checkup scheduled and the upstairs unit not functioning properly...which is no dream. Trust me on this...if my wife has to endure even one night of no AC in 90 degree heat, my life will become a nightmare!!!

Educrats

Short week. Headed to SC to see oldest receive award at fancy gala👩🏼‍🏫🎩. Much to do next 2 days.

Ten years from now, the above sentence will be what the written word will have devolved to thanks to Twitter and texting. Adjectives and adverbs will have been completely replaced with emojis by 2025. 😫

But seriously, this will be a short week. I will have two days of manic activity at the office so I can spend the rest of the week visiting with my daughter down in Columbia. Funny story. Last year, she won the Teacher of the Year award for her school, then followed that up with a TOY award for her district. Pam and I attended the awards banquet where that second honor was bestowed and it came as a shock to all of us. It was quite an honor to win such an award after only four years in the teacher business. A year has passed. Her duties as TOY have been quite extensive, and oddly, they have just begun. You see, in the education business, everything is counterintuitive. Educrats are a breed apart. Apparently, when you win a TOY award, your "term" lasts for three years. The first year you're essentially a TOY in training. This entails adding roughly three hours a day to your normal ten hour work day doing education-y things which have nothing to do with teaching. The second year, you actually serve as the TOY, which as far as I can tell involves making several unpaid speeches and serving on a dozen unpaid committees. Finally, year three arrives and with it the coveted title, Teacher of the Year Emeritas, another unpaid position, whereby you help train the poor sap who has been selected as that year's TOY. As you can see, this title is quite the honor, and quite the boon for the district central office since it's like they gain a new part time unpaid employee for three years! I say unpaid, when actually that isn't true. I am told that this weekend Kaitlin will finally receive her TOY stipend...a check for a thousand dollars, which by my rough calculations works out to about $3.14 an hour for the extra work she has inherited since her big "win." When she recently learned that she had fallen just short of being a finalist for State Teacher of the Year, screams of delight could be heard all the way up here in Short Pump!

Be this as it may, I am still super proud of my daughter and her husband, and am grateful to get the chance to spend a few days with them. Lucy will be coming with us. Since the awards gala will be held at a fancy hotel in downtown Columbia, the educrats are actually putting them up for the night...so Pam and I will serve as dog sitters Wednesday night. Then on Thursday night, she has some other function to attend with Jon, so we will have a pizza and hang out with the dogs again. The rest of the weekend will be an educrat-free environment which will involve lots of fun stuff and good food.

Waves

It has been my experience in this life that bad news tends to arrive in waves. Disturbances in life always bring friends along. Trouble seems to travel in packs.  One bad thing seems to usher in the next bad thing in rapid succession, then after the tumult has passed, order is restored and life returns to happy normalcy. I could sit around for days contemplating why this is so, pondering the randomness of life, but that way lies something close to madness. There are just things that you shouldn't spend a lot of time thinking about. Why does the sun rise in the east and set in the west? See, I wouldn't spend much time worrying about that one. It just doesn't matter. Well, neither does the entire subject of the vicissitudes of life.

And yet, sometimes, when you're in the midst of a bit of a losing streak, thinking can overcome you. For me it's been a combination of big changes in my profession which are far beyond my control, stupid unforced errors involving bill paying, and a variety of stress-induced physical ailments. The third problem is directly linked to the first and largely beyond my ability to control. But, what in the name of Warren Buffet was I thinking this month paying my bills? This is the wave thing I was talking about. Bad stuff comes in waves!

So, for what seems like an eternity, I have had two separate and distinct Verizon accounts, one which covers all of the family cell phone usage, and a second which pays for my cable service and land line. (As an aside, the last time I made or received a call on this land line thing was probably when my kids were still in high school...). Now, I have tried on several occasions to get the fine people at Verizon to combine these two bills into one for my convenience, but have been met with a stone wall of yarns, tall tales, and prevarications about why this thing I ask is impossible. Apparently, these two different divisions of the Verizon colossus are separated by a Chinese firewall, the likes of which no man has ever been allowed to see. When talking to Verizon, it's almost impossible to get either one to even acknowledge the other. It's like every time the subject of the other Verizon organization comes
up, somebody lowers the cone of silence over our conversation...

Anyway, I put up with this largely because we have always had good luck with them. Our cable almost never doesn't work and our cell phone coverage and service is impeccable. But, this month when it was time to pay Verizon number 1, I did so via my nifty Wells Fargo bill pay app. Two weeks later, when Verizon number 2 was due I duly paid the bill...but inadvertently applied it to Verizon number 1's slot in the app, no doubt causing squeals of delight over at Verizon Wireless, but sending the guys at Verizon Communications to crank up the old email alert system accusing me of being a deadbeat customer. Alert!!! Alert!!! Your account is past due!! Immediate action must be taken!! Then, to make matters worse, I completely forgot about an automatic deduction that comes out every month on the exact same day...I just forgot! Of course, there wasn't enough money in the account, so my overdraft protection kicked in. But it was so stupid. Are you kidding me? That deduction comes out the same day every month, and I have never once forgotten....until April, 2017.

I mean, it's an easy fix and all, but this is the sort of thing that can send you into despair when it comes on the heals of other problematic stuff. It's like, what, have I forgotten how to be an adult all of a sudden? What is wrong with me??

A Painful Awareness

The Bible warns of the corrosive properties of envy. Webster defines it this way...a painful awareness of an advantage enjoyed by another joined with a desire to possess the same advantage. My Mother, who always provided me with the real world working definition of sin, described it as the classless inability to rejoice in a friend's good fortune. Either way...envy=bad.

So, let me be clear that it isn't envy which motivates me to write what follows, more like a desire for some good old fashioned consistency.

When I learned that former President Obama had signed a deal to give a speech to Wall Street banker, Cantor Fitzgerald, for the tidy sum of $400,000, my first thought was, man-o-man are the Clinton's gonna be pissed. That's dang near twice what they make for a thirty minute speech!! My second thought was, wonder what Bernie Sanders will have to say about this? But then, my less knee jerk response was more contemplative. I marveled at how quickly the tide turns in this life.

All of my adult life the Democratic Party has railed against the monied interests. Forget my life, the Democratic Party has been demonizing the rich since Andrew Jackson. Wall Street fat cats have been the single favorite punching bag for these people. It's as reliable as death, taxes, and Spurs win!! Actually, that's fine as far as it goes...monied interests can be a troublesome bunch, and sometimes Wall Street fat cats have indeed been a pox on this Republic. But watching career politicians eagarly cashing checks from the very people who they made their reputations trashing is the stuff of grim irony. Not to worry though...I hear that Elizabeth Warren is "concerned," and I'm sure she will remain so right up to the very minute she cashes her first speech check.

President Obama has done quite well since becoming President, having made 15 million from the sale of his three books. Even now he and wife Michelle are about to sign what is rumored to be a 60 million dollar book deal.  Add to this not one, but two $400,000 speech fees, the second from an adoring A&E network crowd, and suddenly the befuddled observer has to wonder about these words
from the former community organizer:

"I mean, I do think that at some point you've made enough money. But, you know, part of the American way is, you know, you can just keep on making it if you're providing a good product or providing a service."

I will assume that the President is now in the service business, and I am confident that as soon as he gets to that point...he'll let us all know where exactly it is.

Until then, I congratulate the President for proving that the American Dream is still alive and well.

Get Ready For the Lying Olympics

I am so fired up right now. I haven't been this excited since Christmas morning, 1964. Seriously, the next several weeks are going to be awesome...Trump just released his tax reform plans, and you know what that means. "Let loose the dog's of hypocrisy," someone will shout, and the full flowering of literally everything that is wrong with Washington DC will be laid bare before our very eyes and ears. You're going to need a scorecard to keep up with all the flip flops, prevarications, disingenuousness and flat out whoppers on display everywhere across the political spectrum. I've prepared a cheat sheet to make it easier for you...

Republicans 

When you hear one of these people downplay the negative impacts of deficits and the National Debt, you are being scammed. When Obama was in the WH, the skyrocketing national debt was a travesty.

Whenever you hear any Republican say that a giant infrastructure spending plan will add some multiple of value for every dollar spent, you are being scammed, since when any Democrat said the same thing over the past twenty years they screamed that the spending multiplier was a myth.

Democrats

When you hear a Democrat professing grave concern about ballooning debt and out of control deficits, you are being scammed, since over my entire lifetime they have exhaustively proven that they couldn't possibly care less about debt, or deficits.

No matter what is actually in Trump's tax plan, it will be excoriated as a giveaway to the rich. Even if it could be proven that 99.9% of the tax cuts were going to the poor, it wouldn't matter. It's a giveaway to the rich if even one rich guy gets one dime of tax relief. You could look it up.

In other words, our politicians have absolutely no credibility on this issue, but that won't stop them from catawauling back and forth debating tax policy. It will be infuriating to watch, but I won't be able to avoid it since it will be everywhere. By the time it filters down to social media, it will be even more garbled and partisan than ever. Rich vs. poor. Blue state vs. Red state.

I know what you're thinking, ok Smarty-pants, what's your plan?? Well, for starters, I'm just a private citizen so therefore, it's not my job to have a plan. But since you asked...

A flat tax would do quite nicely, thank you. The rate could be negotiable...15, 17%? Exempt the first 30,000 or so of income to protect the poor from having to actually pay federal income tax. To prevent the rich and connected from weaseling out of their obligations by paying an army of accountants to hide their income, eliminate all deductions. After all, that's what a flat tax is...a flat rate for everyone,  with no deductions. But Doug, but Doug, some rich people would end up paying less!! So what? Many more would end up paying a lot more since carried interest wouldn't be available as a tax dodge, and they could no longer have their McMansion subsidized by the rest of us. But Doug, but Doug, a flat tax would lower revenue to the government!! So what? I've had MY revenue lowered by the government plenty of times and guess what...I adjusted. So will they. By the way, I've done the math, and I would wind up paying more under a flat tax with no deductions, than I do now...and I'm still for it!

Before you start ripping a flat tax, ask yourself this question. If by instituting one you could, as a bonus, do away with all of this infuriating weasel language coming out of Washington for the next couple of months, wouldn't that alone make it worth doing??

Ann Coulter and Free Speech

The First Amendment, specifically free speech, is taking a beating lately. It is a striking reality of our times that in an era of proliferating free speech delivery systems (the one I'm using right now being unimaginable twenty years ago), the old fashioned, retail variety is getting hammered. Witness the unseemly spectacle unfolding at Berkeley.

Writing a blogpost defending the likes of Ann Coulter is much like kissing your sister, appropriate at times, but highly unsatisfying. In the early days of her ascendancy, I liked her books and even bought a few. She was fresh and provocative and the women had a flair for the biting phrase. She had a swashbuckling style which appealed to the bomb-throwing cynic in me. But, with each passing year she has been transformed into something outlandish, a cartoon character committed to nothing higher than being noticed. Her views have taken on a nastier, more brutish tone, and I have soured on her schtick. Of course, it's possible that she hasn't  changed at all, but rather I have changed over the years. Nevertheless, Ann Coulter has the right to speak at a tax-payer funded institution of alleged higher learning if she is invited.

There are people out there who hold views which I find infuriating and unconscionable. There are people who, when given the chance, disparage my country with the vilest slanders imaginable. According to these sort of people, my country is the focus of evil in the world. America, in their telling is a lying bully, roaming around the world sowing discord. We are responsible for all of the world's problem because of our capitalism, our consumerism, our power. They give us and our 240 year history no credit for anything positive, in fact, have created cottage industries out of revising the history of this nation to turn every good thing we have ever accomplished as a people into something unrecognizable. Diabolical motives are assigned to every positive development. The Founders? Nothing more than rich, slave-holding men with white privilege trying to enrich themselves. The Bill of Rights? An overhyped, veiled attempt to restrict the power of the government. Fighting a Civil War to end slavery? Nothing noble about that, just a bunch of money grubbing oligarchs trying to expand their markets. Democracy? Nothing more than a bourgeois obstacle to be overcome in the long arduous journey towards the utopia which will be the worldwide victory of the Proletariat and the glorious future of Communism.

People who believe these things stand at lecterns every single day in Universities all over this country. Many of them enjoy tenure. No matter how far out of the "mainstream" of contemporary thought they might be, their positions are secure, their right to spread their views unchallenged.

But, somebody invite Ann Coulter to speak to a couple hundred people, and all hell breaks loose.

Here's the thing. When I was in college, occasionally I would have to sit through a lecture given by a Marxist. I would listen. It was uncomfortable. I objected to most of what was said, but I listened. Mostly because I had no choice. I was a captive audience, because he was my Professor. I am aware of no requirement that anyone at Berkeley has to attend Ms. Coulter' speech. If  Angela Davis had been invited to campus when I was there, wild horses couldn't have dragged me to hear her. But, it never would have occurred to me back in 1980 to try to prohibit Angela Davis from speaking. This is what I don't understand about the modern University experience. If someone with whom you disagree gets invited to speak, you have to make an ass out of yourself by shouting him down? What's so liberal about that value? That's just acting like a spoiled child.

Here's my suggestion for the leftist radicals at Berkeley....let the woman speak. Then go back to class and be comforted by the next lecture in your America As Cultural Rapist class.

Stress-neck, and a shoutout to my Father-in-Law

It has been my experience that during periods of high stress, the body reacts poorly. It's as if it wasn't built with anxiety in mind. Some might refer to these physical symptoms of stress as psychosomatic disorders, the mind playing tricks on us to divert us from whatever unpleasantness we happen to be going through. "You think dealing with your rebellious kid is difficult...wait until you get a load of this killer migraine!!!"

In my case it's always been intestinal eruptions of some kind. I will not go into any of the gory details, but whatever you might be imagining is probably not as disgusting as it actually is. Pretty horrible. But lately, ministers of grace be praised, my intestines have been functioning like a well oiled machine....which may be the single worst metaphor I have ever written. No, the new physical manifestation of stress for me is...a stiff neck.

I first noticed this strange phenomenon a couple of weeks ago. I had printed out a 40 page FAQ produced by my broker-dealer which attempted to explain the upcoming regulatory mandate from our friends at the Department of Labor. I had set aside an uninterrupted hour to read through the thing, when about fifteen minutes in I felt my neck tighten up. By the time I finished about an hour later, my neck felt exactly like it feels when you wake up after sleeping on it funny. I had a crick in my neck, out of nowhere!!

Since that day it has come and gone at least five times that I can count. The last sighting was last night when I was talking to Pam about work worries. One minute I was absolutely fine, the next minute I couldn't hold my head upright without big time pain. Taking muscle relaxers and Aleve helps some, but what really helps is to stop thinking about the Department of Labor regulations. Which means...it's all in my head...right?

This is a bizarre thing for me to accept. If there's really nothing physically wrong with my neck, and therefore no good reason for it to be hurting, why can't I prevent it from happening? How is it possible for nothing more than a worrisome thought to inflict real pain? For me, this is no different than telekinesis, something that really isn't a thing, except in the movies. I should be better than this. I should be able to worry about stuff, or more accurately...be concerned about something without having to deal with muscle spasms!

Speaking of causes of high stress, my Father-in-law's birthday is today. Although I couldn't resist making a joke at his expense, nothing could be less stressful than an encounter with Russ White! He turns 80 today. He doesn't look it or, even better, act it. My wife, in no small part, is the person she is because of the fine example of kindness and goodness illustrated for her by her father. Russ is a good man in a world where good men are harder and harder to find. He's smart, funny and devoted to his family. Although he remains a loyal Redskins fan for reasons that are unclear, he did introduce me to the agony and ecstasy of Red Sox baseball, which is something for which I'm not sure I should thank or blame him. In the nearly 33 years that I have been married to his oldest daughter, he has always been supportive of us and an ally on whom I could depend. He has been a loving and proud grandfather to my children, and if they will get on the ball, Russ will no doubt be a stellar Great-grandfather. Even though 80 sounds old, when I think about Russ, I don't think of that word. He's just not old. I really can't explain it, but if you know him, you probably know what I mean. So, happy birthday, Russ!

The French Vote...C'etait terrible!!

So, the first round of the French election is over, and the result leaves progressives the world over with a real Sophie's Choice. They can either support the multi-millionaire, former investment banker man, or make history by electing the first women to the French Presidency. Identity politics can be so confusing!!

But seriously, something weird is going on throughout the western world. The professional political class is being shown the door. What happened in France yesterday is hard for Americans to fully understand. It would be like us holding a presidential election among five candidates and the Democrat and the Republican both losing to the Libertarian and Green Party candidates. It's as if people everywhere are looking at what has become of our world over the last twenty five years and are saying, "What the hell, let's give _ _ _ _ a chance. He/she surely couldn't do any worse than these clowns we have now!" 

No way the British people will vote to leave the European Union, they said. Not a chance the American people will elect Donald Trump, they said. Le Pen is not a serious candidate for the French presidency, they said.

Now, of course, all the smart people are assuring the world that Macron will win in a landslide, since all of the defeated first round candidates will endorse him. (The prospect of the right wing National Front candidate, Marine Le Pen, winning the election is so beyond the pale for French elites, no other story line can even be imagined.) Now comes the part where the French glitterati will now all promise to leave the country if Le Pen wins. Soon, we will be treated to the delicious spectacle of thousands of French leftists rallying in the streets of Paris for a man who made his bones in the grubby capitalists pits of the financial industry, and who even now can't decide if he's a socialist or not! Great, another capable women being thwarted by a less experienced, less qualified, and younger man!! Hillary must be thinking..."Yeah, cry me a river."

I have no idea who will ultimately win the French election, but I do know this...If I were an establishment politician running for anything in the Western world right now, I would be nervous.

A Tale of Two Dinners

This is a tale of two dinners, one of which hasn't actually happened yet, but why let a mere timeline get in the way of a good story. The first dinner happened a couple of nights ago at the Grapevine restaurant in Short Pump. The second will happen tonight at Firebirds in Fredericksburg.

Dinner at the Grapevine...

It is now an irrefutable fact of life in the modern American church that the term Sunday School must never again be uttered in polite company. It sounds silly to 21st century ears, and what could be more of a turnoff to a budding seeker than the idea of church as...school? So, several years back, all the very bright people in the church growth game devised a new term...life groups. By way of definition, as far as I can tell, a life group is an association of 8-12 people thrown together randomly or using some sort of demographic dice roll algorithm, which seeks to serve as a mini-church. By this I mean, the people in this group meet periodically to study the Bible, talk about life's struggles, and hopefully get to know and love each other. The group serves as a connection for small groups of people who are part of the much larger and more impersonal church where it's much harder to feel such a connection. This group is supposed to function as a support mechanism, one which can be designed for people of the same age and station in life. In other words....Sunday School. Except, the meetings don't happen at church and never on Sunday...and usually there's food.

Anyway, as you all know, Pam and I have been attending Hope Church for several months now, so we have been exposed to the plaintive pleas of practically every speaker extolling the virtues of the sainted Life Group experience. They even offer the occasional life group mixer, whereby a room full of a hundred strangers gather to mingle to see if something magical might happen. It's called Group Link night. Think, speed dating only ten times more awkward. No thanks. Luckily for us, we actually know one couple at Hope and as fate would have it, that couple has been in the market for a life group, and since they have been going to Hope a lot longer than us, they know several other couples in the same boat. So he took the initiative to extend an email invitation to five couples about the possibility of forming a group. "How about we all agree to have dinner at the Grapevine?" He asked. "We can talk about it over baked spaghetti and baklava and see where it goes," he said.

So there we were Thursday night in the parking lot of the Grapevine staring at the mass-produced Michelangelo's David knockoff in all of his anatomically correct glory. I remember thinking, "Great, I already feel awkward and I'm not even out of the parking lot yet!" I can think of almost nothing more fraught with land mines than having dinner with a group of perfect strangers where the goal is to like and be liked. So many things can go wrong. First of all, your's truly is an acquired taste, which is the most polite gloss I can put on the fact that I can be hard to warm up to, even in small doses. I'm opinionated, a bit loud, and am famous for speaking before thinking, which can lead to awkward moments. This unfortunate trait has been a constant source of embarrassment to Pam over the years, bless her heart. In addition to my loose cannon lips, there's also the issue of my inability to sit still for long periods of time. So, this night had the potential for being difficult for me, but horrible for Pam. Then, there's the issue of everybody else at the table. Who were these people? Suppose they were all flaming liberals, or worse, rabid Trumpsters?? Suppose they all hated baseball, and loved soccer?? What if they were all cat people??

I'm happy to report that none of my fears were justified. Everyone couldn't possibly have been nicer. The conversation flowed naturally. I didn't say anything outlandish or controversial, and as a bonus, I made it nearly an hour and a half before I had to stand up! These were people who I could see becoming friends with, people who I really wanted to get to know. We made plans for how we wanted the group to work, agreed on some guidelines and how often we would meet. We get it all started in May. A good night.

Dinner at Firebirds...

This will be a family affair. Every once in a while, and never often enough, all of my siblings get together for dinner. To help accommodate my brother who lives in Maryland, we eat in Fredericksburg, which means that his drive home is only ten hours instead of twelve! Of course, because we are Dunnevants, the decision on where to eat required an exchange of 35 emails, gastronomical putdowns, dueling reservations etc..etc.. eight chiefs, no Indians sort of thing. But, when we get there tonight at 5:30, it will be great. Unfortunately, for the other patrons of Firebirds, we will be the loudest table, which will require very generous tipping in order to ever be allowed back. Whoever our waiter is will long remember his/her encounter with us. Someone will insist that although she wants a steak, there must absolutely, positively be no blood on the plate. At least one of us will probably try to order something that isn't on the actual menu. Somebody will order something,  but add some weird request...."yeah, I'll have a BLT, but leave the tomatoes off, oh and I'm not a big fan of lettuce."  

The conversation will be all over the place, leaving no stone unturned from issues of the day to "what the heck is wrong with cousin _______?" Of course, we will talk politics, baseball, tell stories about Mom and Dad, getting weepy while doing so. Then we will pivot to our kids...Christina, Jenny, Sean, Lauren, Becky, Kaitlin, Patrick, and Ryan. Nodody will think it weird when I stand up and walk around the table a couple of times. I won't have to worry about whether they will like me, I won't even have to worry about saying something controversial, in fact they will all worry if I don't. See, that's the great thing about family, everybody knows you, and loves you anyway. I don't have to be so guarded, I don't have to do anything except be myself.

So, I can write about tonight's dinner before it even happens, because I know it will be great. How wonderful is that?

Frustration and a Lesson From My Son

I have a feeling that this blog is going to be a disjointed hodgepodge of a thing, largely because my week has been a disjointed hodgepodge of a thing. Whatever is in my head always seems to gush forth onto this space, despite my best efforts at self-editing. So, having fairly warned you of the turmoil lurking around in the great barren plains of my mind, proceed at your own risk.

For those of you who own your own businesses, you may better understand what I have been dealing with this week. I am a 35 year veteran of my line of work, the past 20 of which as an independent investment advisor, running my own shop. This week I have had an epiphany of sorts. I have figured out why my work has suddenly become so much more frustrating than I ever remember it being 30 years ago. It's always been difficult, but not tediously frustrating. Here's my theory, one I think covers many different businesses, not just mine. The skills required to build a business are not the same ones required to sustain it. When I got my start back when dinosaurs roamed the Earth, I needed four basic skills to survive and eventually succeed:

1. Tenacious determination. 
2. Creativity
3. The power of persuasion 
4. A finely tuned moral compass

Without any one of these, I would have failed. With all of them, I nearly failed. I needed to be tenacious because I was dealing with daily rejection, the grinding, soul crushing routine of being told to take a hike roughly 100 times a day. Therefore, I had to learn to be creative, to figure out new and better ways to convince people to give me a chance. Once given that chance, I had to be able to convince. I had one shot to persuade someone to let me compete for their business. Finely, it didn't take long for me to figure out that if one possessed a felonious heart, mine was a terrible business to be involved in since it would be relatively easy to take advantage of people. I suppose I have my parents to thank for instilling in me a firm commitment to the Golden Rule, that in matters of commerce, it was my responsibility as a Christian to do what was best for my client, not my checkbook.

However, having built a business, I am finding that the skill set required to sustain and administer an enterprise are not necessarily the same ones I needed to build the thing. Much of this is the result of the regulatory regime that has grown up around the advisory business over these past 35 years like so much crab grass and chick weed in an unattended lawn. With the rise to dominance of lawyers in our society, simply having a moral compass is not enough. I've had to change how I think, learn to question everything, every procedure by asking one overriding question, "Will this get me sued?"

The skills I now need are as follows:

1. Computer and technological savvy
2. Ninja level powers of organization
3. Expert record keeping 
4. Ability to read and understand sentences which begin with the phrase, 'The party of the first part...'


I possess roughly none of these skills....hence, my frustration.

On a related note...yesterday morning I exchanged some short, perfunctory texts with my son..."what's up? How's your day going?.....doing great, how about them Red Sox?"  Routine stuff. But then I did something I seldom do. I told my son that I was having a difficult week, and actually asked him to say a prayer for me. Whenever we ask people to pray for us, it's almost a throwaway line, something you say just to communicate to the other person that things are tough at the moment, not really expecting them to actually drop what they are doing and...pray for you. Here's what my son said...

"Will do Dad.

I use these from the Book of Common Prayer. The first one is one I say often, the second is one I've used occasionally when stressed. So, I'll pray both of them today on behalf of both of us...

Lord God, almighty and everlasting Father, you have brought us in safety to this new day: Preserve us with your mighty power, that we may not fall into sin, nor be overcome by adversity; and in all we do, direct us to the fulfilling of your purpose; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

Heavenly Father, in you we live and move and have our being: we humbly pray you so to guide and govern us by your Holy Spirit, that in all the cares and occupations of our life we may not forget you, but may remember that we are ever walking in your sight; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

I am ashamed to admit that there was a time in my life, when I was about my son's age, when I would have disparaged anything found in something as dusty and old as the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer. I would have considered it the extra-biblical ramblings of people with too mechanical an association with God, people who really didn't understand what it was to have a "relationship" with
Christ. I felt the same way about Pastors who read their prayers. That was back when I was in my late 20's and knew everything there was to know about my faith!!! But, these ancient words brought great comfort to me. The fact that Christians have been using these same words for roughly the past 600 years felt like a profoundly holy and blessed thing.

The day we stop learning new things about our faith is a sad day, a day that marks the beginning of something rigid and lifeless, and worthless to others. I needed my son to teach me that lesson....again.

What Ever Happened to the Ossoff Spring?

Three days ago, I had never heard of this guy. He's a thirty year old documentary filmmaker who was running for a vacant Congressional seat in Georgia. The second it appeared that he had a shot of winning, the national press corps began carpetbombing us with adoring portrayals of one Jon Ossoff. The prospect of this guy winning a red seat once held by Newt freaking Gingrich was just too much for our Democrat dominated media to resist. They were positively giddy with the hope that somehow this guy might win the seat outright with 50.1% of the vote. One headline called him the Trump Slayer!! Full length essays had no doubt been written about what this shocking upset might mean for the Democrat party's chances of retaking the House in 2018...HINT, (it would be a sure thing!!!). Long retrospectives were ready for publication about how this tall, handsome, very liberal young man might just be the new blood the Democrats need to recast their image and message.

Unfortunately, despite a jaw dropping 8 million dollars having been spent from the DNC war chest, Ossoff came up short and now faces a runoff against a single Republican candidate instead of the 18 which were on the ballot yesterday. His chances of winning that sort of race are roughly equivalent to my chances of turning around an Aroldis Chapman fastball.

This morning, the crushing disappointment of the press is palpable. Glum faced reporters are everywhere reporting the unhappy news as quickly as possible, not wanting to cause too much despair among the faithful. They had been fantasizing on how awesome it would be to hang this loss of a Republican seat around the neck of Donald Trump. And now, it's over. The Ossoff Spring snuffed out before it even got started.

So far, no mention has been made about any possible Russian tampering. No reports of the roll played by angry white men in the results. But, it's only been 12 hours since the polls closed, so I'm sure we will hear something in the next couple of days. I mean, the press, like anyone else needs time to grieve after such a devastating loss. Even the most faithful and reliable water carriers need to take a moment to gather themselves when their hopes and dreams get crushed. So, I'm thinking that by Friday we will read about some shadowy Russian connection that convinced the Georgia Republican Party to brilliantly run 18 candidates against a single Democrat and in so doing falsely raise the hopes of the national press corps.

Trump's four dimensional chess strikes again!!

The Amazing Kims

To read any newspaper in this country at the moment, it is impossible to escape the conclusion that  Kim Jung Un's North Korea poses an existential threat to these United States. It is being suggested that the strongman's nuclear weapons program has now advanced to the point where cities in America are now within range of North Korean ICBM's. For this reason, the South China Sea has become a flashpoint of international tension. Storm clouds are steadily gathering. The phrase, nuclear war, is now being bandied about. Carrier groups are said to be on the move. The Chinese are on edge.

I'm not buying any of it.

It's difficult for me to take the North Koreans seriously. The only news footage westerners ever see of the place is the stage prop square where a million soldiers are always marching stiff-legged during one of their incessant military parades. The rest of the country is a certifiable hell hole. If the folks from Michelin were ever allowed in the place, they would give the entire country negative stars. Like all communist plutocrats, the Dear Leader Kims have diverted the nation's wealth away from anyone who might threaten them. Their people might starve, but it works out quite nicely for the Kims.

Yeah, it's hard for me to take a country seriously that teaches it's school children that Kim Jong Un learned to drive a car at age 3, and was winning yacht races at age 9. Of course, young Kim cannot hold a candle to his Dad, the infamous Kim Jong Il, who on his first ever attempt at golf, shot a mind-numbing 38, coming into the clubhouse 34 strokes under par with a round that included a stunning 6 hole in ones!!! As an amateur golfer myself, I can say with relative confidence that the elder Kim is a baldface liar, and that a nation of people who would even pretend to believe such a tale should have their nation-card revoked. It is precisely this sort of thing for which Colonialsm was invented. North Korea needs to be sent to the principal's office, stripped of it's flag making ability, forced to give up its seat at the United Nations, and made into a vassal state of South Korea. Or even better, how about we ignore them altogether?

Of course, if it turns out that they actually do possess a viable nuclear capability, I will issue a retraction. But, something doesn't smell right here. Maybe this whole Kim thing is just a convenient distraction, a handy excuse to empower the Empire loving politicians here AND there.

In the meantime, I want Kim Jong Il in my next captain's choice foursome.

My Easter, 2017

The last strands of light linger outside on this long Easter Day. I am now alone with my thoughts. They are everywhere, all over the place, competing for my attention. So much to remember.

The day began earlier than most. The church I currently attend, but am not yet a member of, had rented out the Altria Theatre for their Easter services. There would be two of them instead of the usual 5. We would be attending the 9 am service, so we scrambled to get out the door in time for the longer drive and the ordeal of parking downtown. Our children were away, in other states and time zones. It was just us, just my wife and me. You would think that I would have grown used to this by now, being apart from them on the large, important days, but it still stings a little, a feeling of melancholy still lingers in the background when they aren't here with us. It isn't spoken of. No complaints are made. Still...it lingers.

I didn't know quite how I felt about having Easter in the same building where I had just seen the Book of Mormon a month ago. Pam had just seen Cinderella there recently. I half wondered if the band might find a missing shoe backstage. Sure, we Christians have been taught all of our lives that the church is the people, not the building. But, most of us find it difficult to imagine meeting for services in a strip club, or a casino. Of course, the Altria Theatre is neither of those places, but it still felt weird, until I saw three thousand people filling the place and heard the thrilling proclamation of my savior's resurrection ringing off it's walls. The service was beautifully and artfully crafted together into a living thing. A woman I had never seen before stood and recited a touching monologue about how the risen Christ had turned her into a Spring person. The incalculably talented Nicole Unice then presented a spirited defense of the physical resurrection of Christ with an eye towards the skeptic in each of us. Then the music came. It's normally the part of the Hope Church experience that I simply endure, not because the musicians aren't talented and not even because the songs aren't my style, but rather because I don't know them well, and I can't hear my fellow congregants singing the words. But, today was different somehow. Maybe it was the larger stage, the heightened excitement of the event, the majesty of the theological moment, but they were amazing. It was the thunderous exclamation point of the service, and each player seemed to sense it and their role in pointing the way to the transcendence of the risen Christ.

There was a video which was beautifully produced about one of the band members, his back story. I've seen him play lead guitar many times. He's older, carries himself in that unhurried Clapton manner, very much a slow hand sort of guy. I had no idea what the man had gone through to get to the stage, no idea of his tragic back story. Yet, there he is every Sunday, laying down soft licks in the background. I was choked up the entire time it took to tell his story.

Then David Dwight walked onto center stage carrying a stool in his hand and no notes. He spoke for maybe twenty minutes. He hardly raised his voice above standard conversational tones. Given the occasion and the topic, he would have been excused a bit of over exuberance, a little Pentecostal flair. But, this is David Dwight. He doesn't do flair. It was as if he knew that something special was going on in the room, and he didn't want to be a distraction, didn't want to screw it up. Instead, he talked to us, like he does every Sunday...from his mind and heart...."Who are we and why are we here, and why do we feel compelled to even ask these sorts of questions? Because Jesus Christ is the author of life and he has placed eternity in the hearts of man." Every word he spoke to us was designed to point us towards the ultimate meaning of this day, that because Christ loved us so much that he was willing to endure the cross, overcoming death, we are free to have a relationship with him. The meaning that we are all longing for can be found with the very author of our story.

When we walked out into the blinding sunlight of Monroe Park, it didn't matter to me that I had been overdressed. I wasn't annoyed at the traffic or the parking deck. I even took the scenic route home, driving through the back streets of the Fan, then turning on to the Boulevard by the museums, then the Diamond. I was actually trying to soak it all in, and I needed some time before the soul crush which is 95 North.

Once home, it was time to prepare for hosting my wife's family for Easter lunch. Everything was beautiful and the food was delicious. I still missed my kids, but knowing that they were both, hours away just getting out of their churches where they both heard the same story, told in different ways, made me miss them a little less.

Happy Easter.

By All Means...Let's Have a Debate.

Instead of debating the efficacy of this big honking bomb, let's debate a more important question..."Why are we still in freaking Afghanistan???"

United Scare Lines

The memes are coming fast and furious. Ignited Airlines. United Scare Lines. The best one I saw was an ad from Southwest Airlines with the tag line..."We beat the competition...not you." Earning a lifetime exemption in the CEO's hall of shame, United top dog Oscar "the grouch" Munoz, poured gasoline on the fire by praising his employees for their outstanding work in the case of one Dr. David Dao, who had made the ghastly mistake of paying for a ticket on Mr. Munoz's airline. When news came that the flight was "oversold" none of the passengers were willing to take United up on their offers of money, hotel vouchers, stock options and free cake, to get off the plane. That's when the stellar employees at the friendly skies broke out the best practices handbook, looked up "what to do when passengers will not agree to forfeit their seats" and read the words, beat the ever loving snot out of them.

It is for precisely this reason that corporate public relations departments exist, and this morning they sprang into action. The New York Post published a hit piece on the victim. Apparently, the good doctor Dao isn't so good, having had his medical licenses taken away from him...twice, for writing bogus prescriptions to various gay lovers. When he wasn't trading drugs for sex, he was attending anger management classes mandated by a string of employers. The snakes over in the PR department are hoping that this information will rehabilitate the company's battered image by suggesting that the bloodied doctor had it coming.

However, none of Dr. Dao's past troubles in any way change the fact that he paid good money for a ticket, was sitting in his seat minding his own business, when he was forcibly removed by the company who sold him said ticket. This is a part of the free exchange of goods and services that Adam Smith never imagined....the part where you sell someone a product, then right before he uses it, you rip it from his hands. Imagine for a minute that you're sitting at a very crowded Chick-fil-a about to take your first bite of that very delicious chicken sandwich, when suddenly the manager runs across the dining room and literally grabs the sandwich out of your hand, explaining that unfortunately they have discovered someone else who is even hungrier than you are, so that sandwich will have to be given to him. But, no problems because the management will give you a free sandwich on your next trip to Chick-fil-a....as long as you buy a large drink. Or, suppose you and the wife have just settled in to your comfy king sized pillow top at the Hyatt Regency in Boca Raton, when suddenly, several large men burst through the door to inform you that someone else far more important than you needs your bed. "Here's your hat, what's your hurry?"

The American airline industry is a hot mess at the moment. I don't know enough about the business to explain their incompetence, but my trick knee tells me that dragging paying customers off of planes in this age of cell phone cameras might be the single most epic public relations fail in history!

14 Years Ago This Month

Today's agenda is packed; important meeting, three days worth of paperwork to complete, a half dozen phone calls that have to be made, and a plethora of other various and sundry items to check off my list. But, it's the best kind of "packed" since the purpose of all the activity is to accommodate a five day, four night escape to the beach!

"Hold on a second," you might be thinking. "Didn't you just get back from a four night getaway to Florida?"

Well, yes. Yes I did. Let me explain how life works.

The first five years that I spent in this business were a brutal gauntlet of ten hour days filled with rejection, failure and virtually no money. That was precipitated by the fact that A. My chosen field of endeavor was insanely difficult to break into and B. Our decision for Pam to be a stay at home Mom. The following five years were only marginally better. Money began to be made, but the hours remained brutal. Many days I would look at my paycheck...yes, back then we actually got paper checks...and wonder why the heck I had chosen a career where there was no guarantee of anything. Why had I insisted on being my own boss? Didn't I realize what a cantankerous boss I would be? The next five years started to get better. The money was better and the hours got more normal. Then, out of nowhere I found myself laying on a cold table listening to myself counting backwards from 10. Open heart surgery is like a telegram from God reminding you that he will not, in fact, be mocked. From that moment on, my life goals changed. No longer did I care about how much money I made. Well, I cared, just nowhere near as much. Instead, I laid out fresh new goals. Goal number one was to take off more days this year than I did last year. With very few exceptions, I have accomplished my goals. There's nothing quite so motivating to your plans for self improvement like the possibility of sudden death.

It's been 14 years ago this month since I obtained the eight inch scar in the middle of my chest. Back then it looked like a swollen zipper and I was horrified at the sight of it. Today, it's hardly noticeable. But, looking back, it might just have been the best thing that ever happened to me.

So, yeah...I take a lot of time off. In a couple of weeks we will head down to see my daughter for several days, two weeks after that it will be Nashville for some time with my son. July will bring yet another week at the beach with the Dunnevant clan, and for three weeks in September, a lake house in Maine will be our home. Since I don't have an employer , I don't have paid vacations. So, my income will take a hit. A very  small price to pay.

The Truths of Easter

About a year ago I wrote this about Easter:

"Easter is what I cling to nowadays. At a time when church has lost its urgency for me, and at a time when I spend most of my time there feeling embarrassed, the resurrection still moves me. It remains the essential doctrine that for me validates my faith. I have studied the story a thousand times, a thousand times I have tried and failed to fashion an explanation for it that doesn't include the physical resurrection of Jesus. Still, nothing explains the impact wrought on civilization by Christianity, other than that band of poor, itinerant fishermen seeing and touching the risen Christ. Nothing. Because he rose from the grave, he must have been the Son of God. For me, it all boils down to that central fact of history. Everything else is fluff."

The only thing that has changed is that I have rediscovered the urgency of the assembly and being there no longer embarrasses. For this I am thankful and I suppose I have Hope Church to thank. Every Sunday I go there expecting to be challenged, expecting to hear something foundational yet intelligent. It is a bittersweet experience most Sundays since along with that intelligence comes conviction, with its stubborn insistence upon the fact that I am a sinner in need of a savior. Yes, I am loved by God, but he also expects something from me. He calls me to be the best version of myself, to be better than I want to be sometimes. So, I come...to be reminded. And I leave thinking about what I just heard. For a moment at least, I am outside of myself and focused on the transcendent, and on this Palm Sunday, nothing is more transcendent than the truths of Easter.