As I am sure, the Roswell peeps probably know, Roswell Park does a memorial service for patients who die during a six month period. With my father-in-law's passing back in February, his turn was tonight. My mom-in-law got the invitation a few weeks back and I think was torn a little bit. You want to go, but you don't want to go. I quietly wanted to go for my ex, my mom-in-law, bro, etc, but I had a feeling it would of the vague sort.

We went over together to the auditorium across from the main hospital building. I was a little taken aback by the numbers of people who turned out. Even more shaky was the amount of people in the deaths column. The service was non-demoninational and very-well intentioned. With the exception of a baby with the Krupe and one woman very much still grieving, it was fairly quiet. A children's choir sang quietly as pictures of the loved ones rolled by. It almost reminded me of that moment on the Oscars when they salute the passing of the dead movie stars. Will people applaud when Pop shows up?

Pretty soon, there he was, big as life. A good family friend placed a photo that I worked on for the original memorial service. My Pop was a denture wearer so for his program, I gave him a full set of teeth. Seeing him blown up to fill an auditorium movie screen made me strangely appreciate my digital handiwork while getting teary eyed at the same time. I didn't hear much of anything till the end of the service when we were directed to head out for a "remembrance gift" and refreshments. Nobody felt like crowding in for refreshments.

Afterwords, I hung out at the house with my younger two while their mom took her mom home and retrieved our eldest from a babysitting assignment. It was nice and centering. Homework was done, prepwork for tomorrow was all set and Edward Scissorhands was on the DVD. After skating the highs of finding costume parts, the lows of a misbegotten Zoo event, the high/low of my final Bell's Palsy check-up, the high of getting a raise, and the real low of what I guess was some left over grief, I looking forward to payday and free and easy weekend.

Hoping to get to the party......

More of that socialist propaganda, eh

With some video being the order of the day, I thought I'd toss a little more gas on the 25,000 journal climb with this little number. It's a compilation of the couch gags from the beginning of the show. With 20 years, that's a lot of couches. Enjoy

It's some trying times. I've been of the opinion for sometime that I am sort of without a demographic to call my own at my workplace. There exists a lot of vigilant Neo-cons republicans at my office. That in and of itself is no big whoop. I don't mind diversity of opinion. That is a good thing. Lately the cadre at lunchtime has been complaining every god damn day about how Palin is taken out of context, how the media is in the tank for Obama, factual inaccurate quotings of both McCain and Obama. It's making my head hurt and I'd really like it to stop.

I actual yelled at my boss to stop already. The turning point was her lauding Palin for being an advocate for special needs kids. The only thing Palin has done for special needs kids so far is to have one, and then politicize it. I grew up in a house with two special needs brothers and after 40 years of case reviews, autisms, down's, group homes, developmental centers, sheltered workshops, schizophrenia, oxygen tanks on the bedroom wall, suiing NY State to keep a school open, I heartily submit it is a wonder the Governor can sit down given all the talking out of her ass that she's done. I sympathize with the baby for sure, if for no other reason, his unfortunate moniker, but as the ever thoughtful (e:james) reminded me, her position made her advocate for the cause, largely because she said she'd be a voice.

Now I chuckle like the next guy at her delusion that the word also is a verb, but after watching her greet these poor folks who think they have somebody who will give a rats ass about what their child is facing made me mad. At six months in, I don't believe you can possible have an understanding as to what lies ahead with kids in those conditions. Every once in awhile, fortune does smile. I remember a "Dr. Bernie" who basically went back to school to learn how to manage my younger brother's illnesses. I'm sure her position as governor or future contestant on Dancing with the Stars will ensure that the various twists and turns that Downs can take will be administered to for her boy. And that is great. That is how it should be, for everybody and it is not.

Rare is the politico who actually genuinely gives a crap. Bill Hoyt was the last one in this area. He led the charge keep the Campus school at Buff State open and "walked the walk" to keep the West Seneca Developmental Center open. Two things that were desperately needed by a large number of families including mine. And before any GOP guys start slapping me around, this isn't a diatribe against one party or for the other. This is me lamenting the falsity of what the campaigns are turning into. Special needs kids don't need to be reduced to a talking point, especially by somebody who just took the first step and on very long road.

Government does have the power to not only give hope, but actually deliver. I don't care about Ayers, shopping sprees, that one, alaskan successionists, middle names, train rides to Delaware, different flavors of tax plans, Joe the plumber, who voted with who on what and so much more when none of that matters. Nothing on the stump is going to come to pass anyway. As I sit and listen to the giant sucking sound of my 401K turning into a 201, that notion of Palin suddenly being a champion to the special needs kid galled me. Don't tell people you're going to be advocate. Advocate, that's how it gets done.

Mike the marketer

One of my favorite holiday traditions. It may have lost a step from its early years, but is still miles ahead of most sitcoms. I know where I'll be on Nov 2.

Most you guys probably didn't get much use out of Memorial Auditorium in its heyday. It was quite the dump, but it was our dump. This blog came though the email and looking at the pictures was a little bittersweet. .

The old hot box was short on comfort, but had some amazing sightlines for concerts. It was good to move forward but the Aud was the place where I first saw the Who, Bruce Springsteen, U2, Bob Seger, Eric Clapton (in lieu of my high school prom), REM, as well as a slew of Sabres games and, watch as I show my age, a few Buffalo Braves games.

The city as usual screwed up. This is a venue that hosted everything from Elvis Presley to Led Zeppelin and while esthetically underwhelming, held a lot of firsts for people. I know the money was never there thanks to this region's prediliction for "suing first, asking questions later," but it would have been cool to find a mixed use for the spot similar to what happened to Montreal's old Forum. It wasn't exactly the Taj Mahal either, but it got new life being chopped up for retail and entertainment and the old center (excuse me) centre ice spot got preserved. It's a crazy notion, incorporating one's history into one's future, but Montreal all showed it can work.

Here, we have another asbestos farm.

I'm sitting here on a lovely sunny afternoon (cue the Kinks record) doing homework. Actually, I'm helping number one son learn to juggle his workload and finish off some of my own. And that is pretty okay.

I spent yesterday afternoon and evening outside at the Zoo with day 2 out of 4 on our Hayride event. Nothing like being out in the cold on concrete for a few hours to make you feel your age (or somebody considerably older). Came home to a cold beer really tired. Hung in there to watch Saturday Night Live kiss Sarah Palin's pentacostelist butt and faded to sleep.

Sprint sent me a free ring tone and I paid it no mind till it worked this morning. The Stock Exchange bell rang from my phone with a text from my eldest daughter asking for a ride home from an overnight. She needed picked up from the Riverside Area at 8:30. I rubbed my groggy eyes 8:07. Aargh!! Stood up to realize just how sore I was from Zoo duty. Made it to Riverside by 8:29. This guy's good. Deposited her at her post at the Zoo and was back in front of the coffee maker by 9. Still, a helluva way to start. Ensuring my descent to hell, I skipped church to do laundry and rest a little. Something renewing about an omelet and a Hogan's Heroes rerun in its place.

Nice to know I can still pass fifth grade math and social studies.

I'm getting too old for this shit...

Been doing Bikram Yoga for two weeks and while I'm not all amped to go (not exactly oozing confidence in my abilities yet), I've been keeping myself on a schedule. It's sort of my own way of being the grumpy gym coach you hate.

We have one of the last events of the year this weekend at the Zoo. Trick or Treating on Zoo grounds, which is fine, but to set up it's the marketing and development folks (my merry band) who decorate, set up tables, generally acting like something between roadies and packmules. So, you work, which is fine, but in still getting used to the Hot Yoga fun, I was a little strung out when I got to work yesterday morning from my Tuesday night class. We started running all over, stopping for me and boss to have one of "those" talks with a subordinate. So, when I left work, didn't want to go, didn't want to go, didn't want to go. But, made my lard butt go. I'm still crawling out of there, but I'm noticing good things and it did feel pretty good to forgot about the sundry bullshit that fills a work day. Maybe there is something to that. Made me not look forward to more set up today, but what are you gonna do.

Trick or treat indeed.

Gonna go watch the keepers feed the anaconda!

This electoral cycle is seeming ceaseless.

It's funny, because in 2000, I might have voted for John McCain. He made sense, he ran his own world and maverick wasn't a word that Sarah Palin can't spell. Eight years later, the politics of fear is stinking up everything. He did make one statement recently that I couldn't help but respect. He opened up and said that Sen. Obama "was an honorable man with whom I have some profound policy differences."

Political discourse should have that tenor. If he could have kept to that tone, we might have had some meaningful exchanges and some honest issue based discussions. I read a column by William Crystal in the New York Times who mentioned that McCain ought to fire his campaign. That's a little drastic, but he did point out that McCain is top heavy with lobbyists in his campaign heirarchy. I don't really care one way or another, lobbyists are part of the process, but they do in general terms, suck at running campaigns.

They've got him crowing on about William Ayers while the left is trumpeting about Palin's association with an Alaskan secessionist. Too many years of Cheneyesque answers of "vote for us or an attack...." has pervaded everything. Obama should be clear, while Palin is in denial about abuse of power charges? I'm not even amused at this point, just weary.

The debates to me are unwatchable. All the candidates are giving canned versions of their stump speeches. McCain rallies have energized the wacko portion of the GOP base with screams of "Arab" (???) and "Kill him." My personal "favorite" was the sheriff in full uniform who used Obama's full name to inspire a little more ill-begotten fear.

Given the economy is in a bi-partisian free fall (Please George, the more you hide, the better the market does), the ill-advised war continues, food isn't getting cheaper, you'd think a straight talker would pick times to do just that.

I want candidates to tell me why I should vote for them. It's laughable to see an ad for Dale Volker saying he'll fix what's wrong in Albany. Dude has been in Albany for 36 years, long enough to realize that he is part of what is broken. McCain has been in Washington for 26 years and isn't speaking to what people in general care about. A friend of mine from the Pittsburgh area went to a speech and emailed me that when he got off the fear-mongering, he started talking about local industry and life in a steel town, conveniently forgetting that we haven't been a steel town in almost 20 years.

Government shouldn't be about that. There should be hope. Events of the past month show that whoever wins just got their agenda strangled considerably. Tell me what's good about you, not what you dislike about the other guy.

People want to have some hope, not be yelled at to get off the grass by the grumpy old codger in the neighborhood, even if you can see Russia from his hot neighbor's taxpayer subsidized front yard.

I'm tired, tired of Karl Rove like smear campaigns, tired of candidates being asked a question and giving a rehearsed answer to SOME OTHER question, tired of the name calling, tired of everybody screaming about "That One," when nothing could matter less.

Quit worrying about connotation, Senator, revive my interest and talk about what you would do.

The platitudes denuded Tom Brokaw in the last debate. While Obama has basically kept on his message, McCain/Palin are all over the place. I hate sports analogies, but the Obama campagin has a large lead in the fourth quarter, with three minutes left and is just running up the middle, while the McCain campaign is trying to get the ball back.

Let's just fucking vote already.