Thank you for calling the White House switchboard. Our new voice

activated system will help direct you to the proper office."



"If you are calling to complain about the mishandling of the war in

Iraq, press one."



"If you are calling to complain about the abuse of prisoners and the

White House's endorsement of torture, press two, and then say the name

of the torture site that you wish to complain about (and please note for

the sake of the voice mail system that it is pronounced Abu GRABE, not

Abu grahb)."



"If you are calling to complain about illegal spying on American

citizens and the abuse of FISA laws, press 3, but do know that these

calls will be recorded."



"If you are calling to complain about the disastrous mismanagement of

the hurricane Katrina recovery, please press 4, and your call will be

directed to the Federal Emergency Management Agency. If you wait for

more than 48 hours without anyone picking up the phone, hang-up and send

a letter. We have been assured that all letters will receive a prompt

reply within one year."



"If you are calling regarding the administration's unwillingness to

enforce immigration law, press cinco, por favor, or direct any thanks to

your local chamber of commerce office, which can explain why we like

cheap labor that can't vote and where you may be able to find willing

illegal day laborers in your local area."



"If you are Jack Abramoff or any Saudi prince, please call the private

line * it is always open."



"If you are calling about the Medicare prescription debacle, please

press 6. If you are having a medical emergency, you should proceed

directly to your local emergency room, although please understand that

your health coverage may not pay for the visit and you can no longer get

out from under the bill by declaring bankruptcy."



"If you are calling about the ballooning federal deficit or the recent

hike in the debt ceiling to $3 trillion, pleas e press 7, unless you are

Bill Clinton calling to brag about the surpluses under your

administration, in which case we don't want to hear about it."



"If you are calling to complain about the White House's efforts to block

stem cell research, please press 8, and then say the disease that you

are most concerned about that may ultimately be cured through scientific

research. If you are a scientist calling with new research findings or

important clinical data, please hang up, we don't want to hear from

you."



"If you are calling to express concern about global warming and our

efforts to roll back environmental laws, please press 9, unless you are

a government scientist, in which case you are forbidden to talk without

first clearing it with the oil lobbyist we hired to screen and edit your

research. He can be reached at Exxon 4-2611."



"If you are calling to complain about the President's efforts to

"privatize" social security, please press 1 and then the pound key, and

your call will be redirected to representatives at Merrill Lynch, who

will explain the virtues of putting all your savings in the stock

market."



"If you are calling about the need for more prayer in public schools or

any other faith-based initiatives, please press 10 and Reverend Falwell

will be with you shortly."



"If you are calling to lobby for more Supreme Court Justices who will

block a woman's right to choose, please stay on the line and the

President will be with you immediately."



"If you are calling about all the tax breaks for the wealthy, press *1

if you have ideas for more loopholes and are making more than a million

dollars per year; if you are earning less than a million per year but

have ideas for how you may help the wealthy, press *2; if you are

earning less than a million per year and just want to complain that all

the burden is now falling o n you, please call back in a couple of years.

If you voted for President Bush and are now concerned that over 12% of

the U.S. population now falls below the poverty line while the top 1%

has wildly increased their wealth, please understand that we are not

laughing AT you*"



"Press zero at any time if you would like to hear these options again.

Thank you for calling the White House. It is our pleasure to serve you."

My brother is a source of fascinating adventures. He is autistic, schizophrenic and has a few other ics that have keep life rather interesting. He functions very well and to look at him, you just see a guy. I say this because all of the afflictions have limited his recreational interests.

One of his favorite hang outs is to go the airport and watch planes come and go. There is a spot off Aero Drive where you can also watch the Weather Service launch their balloons each night. Giving my parents a breather, I took him over the other night to hang out for bit. Not a soul heads out there normally. He's hanging by the fence watching the activity, I'm sitting in a beach chair, watching and reading the paper. When my brother brought some binoculars out to watch a cargo jet take off, is when things got interesting.
A police car immediately shows up, marked by with homeland security stickers. I get to my feet and produced ID for both of us. As I'm talking to the first guy, a second car was in route, and apparently two more were at the ready, all positioned to haul off the retarded guy with the binoculars. After explaining all of this and keeping my brother cool, I looked to the first cop who explained he'd call off "the other units." With four cars in pursuit, it kind of made me wonder who was watching the airport.

Strange days indeed, reminds me of when the Lancaster cops arrested my Mom's car out from under me, but that is a journal for another day.

No matter what your age ( and I know I got a few miles on me more than most of you), when you call the rents and start talking with "You're not going to believe this, but..." you can always get that look out of the folks.

My Dad's response: "We're getting too old for this shit."

The Davinci Code - the video game????? What the Fuck???

The book was a lot of pretentious badly written drivel. I associated it as one of those books people bought because other people bought. Now we got a movie. Somewhere, somebody is dreaming up a sequel......

Oy vey, good night peeps

Got the final dinner meeting for awhile -- It might be raining edgefest tickets by the time it's over. If it happens, I'll make proper noise here for the 30 Seconds to Mars fans.