PARSON LARSON

HE WAS CALLED The Write Reverand because he was the only member of the congregation who could write, or could read more than their names on their welfare checks, for that matter. They knew him as Larson, which was a fitting name for him. Add one letter to his name--Y---and you know what his ministry is all about.

Parson Larson loved rhyming. It was all part of his weekly sermons. "God lives in the sod." "Devil's on the Level." "Seize Us, Brother Jesus." "Boola! Boola! Hell-a-Lulu!"

He was not really an honest to God---or honest to anyone---minister because he had never been to preacher school. He was never ordained and hadn't even received a call from God, ever talked to Jesus or seen the Virgin Mary on a steamed-up mirror in the men's shower room at the local YMCA.

But one day while counting nickels and dimes at the convenience store to pay for a Pepsi and a bag of potato chips he was two cents short when it came to forking out the cash. He'd already eaten half of the bag of chips and drank most of the Pepsi. "Gimmee those two pennies rawt now or ah callin' the sheriff an' arestin' youall fer shopper liftin'. "

"Little short?" asked the rube behind him. He pulled a handful of pennies oiut of his pocket, dumped them on the counter. "Put you all money away. Ah'll pay the bill. The treat's on me."

He must have had a couple hundred pennies in that bulging pocket and plenty nickels and dimes in the other pocket. "Ah'm savin' the silver for a rainy day. The pennies I give to charity. Be my guest."

"You carryin' all that big money around in your pockets?" Larson asked. "And you don't mind sharin' yer wealth with me?"

"Why shore. All us folks got lots o' pennies. We's the pennniest rich folks fer miles 'round. We're genruss peoples." He took a handful of pennies out of his pocket and dumped them in Larson's hat. "We shares the wealth. Who ever's needin' gits."
* * *
That started wheels spinning around in Larson's head. These hayseeds ain't got no church. Got no religion. Got no brains. But they got pennies. Maybe hundreds. So whyan't I start me a church and get rich as a son of a bitch! He didn't get a call from God, but he got an idea. "I'm gonna start me a church---the Gimmee Gotcha Church of God." And the next day he did.

A traveling salesman passing through asked Parson Larson where he got his "minister moniker. " The parson answered huffy-like. "I was the fuhst and only gradjit of the Confusion College of Preacher Knowledge. "Set fire by the devil and burned to the ground raght over thar." He pointed to a burned out patch of land across from the Town Hall. "Cain't nobody build
on that land no more. It be holey, You can tell by the holes in that thar ground."

"Holy? You mean like in Holy Father?"

"No. Holey like in holey holes. See them holes twixt the trees. Ain't them the holiest holes you ever did see?"
* * *
In his sermons Parson Larson's voice rose to a crashing crescendo. "Yea, the devil he died. Then he was rizrected. On the level the devil done riz. And that's what iz." Then he launched into his message. "Desire fuels the devl's fire. Those that's got lust is cussed Fornication is damnation."

Those words meant nothing to the flock. But they sounded good and they brought out the pennies when the collection plate was passed around. Parson Larson never menrtioned the Bible in his sermons because he never read it beyond the first begat. But one Sunday he got all fired up and gave a sermon that would go down in the history of the Gimmee Gotcha Church.
"We's gathered here on yonder hill overlookin' the holey land to give thanks to the guy who calls hisself God and lives on high." He pointed to the mountain behind him. "That's where this guy God lives. But don't none of you try to climb up that mountain because iffin you do you all will be smited down by his guards, the meanest old mountain lions you ever did see. They'll tear you apart from asshole to armpit. Sure as hell they will."

Parson Larson paused, chewed hard on his plug of chewin' t'backy, reared back his head and sent a stream of brown spit into the wind. The wind blew the spit in his face and formed a mist over the first row of his flock. "Spit spray sent down the mountain is this here guy's way of tellin' us to repent with givin' our pennies and we saved and by the spit spray
of God."

Parson Larson lifted his arms and pointed to the mountain. "Gather 'round. Toss your pennies in the air. Take out your 'backy an' chew an' an' repeat after me, 'With each chew I gittin' closer to him who am what I ain't not'.''

The congregation, men, women and children, filled their cheeks to overflowing, threw handfulls of pennies in the air and sent their spit into the wind and each other's faces.

"We's been saved by saliva salvation," the parson cried as he stooped down to scoop up the pennies and stuff them in his pockets.

A FISHY STORY---SORT OF!

When the bluff gets thick and sick enough the tough must show their stuff, forget the cream-puff politics, wield that big stick and stick it to them, show them what the Dems can do to undo the mess Guess Who's got the U. S. into. Action's overdue!

Let the voters know Georgey's a forgery, Cheney ain't so brainy, and all the clowns from Rice on up and down should hightail it out of town or the White House will come tumbling down, not by a terrorist's plane but by the insane fly-by-nighters and far righters who are corrupting and disrupting the rules and tools of democracy.

The fools they be make it impossible for them to see what may be if maybe they again steal what they already stole to dig a hole deeper than a ten foot pole. If they dig that digging and frigging fall into their own excavation and can't get out no doubt that could become the salvation of this double bubbled troubled nation.

Oh, what a better world this would be if the entire GOP would jump into the shark infested sea. And a million jaws would open wide and they would all fall deep inside where they'd get chewed up into bits and bait and that would be their fishy fate.

Of course that is a fantasy. Unfortunately, it will never be. But sometimes dreams do come true. And they might if the Democrats put up a fight and do what's right to right the wrong we've been going along with a ding-dong opposition with a missionless mess of unimpressed violence and senseless killing of unwilling GIs sound asleep six feet deep in hallowed ground.

Two thousand and more, that's the score. dead on that foreign shore with oil glut but not much more, not even a Walmart bargain store.

A SLEEPING WORLD

This is a bleeping sleeping world curled in a fetal position, refusing to face the fact our acts are leading us to perdition if we don't adjust our way of thinking and realize this stinking earth is shrinking, sinking into a sea of rising tide and no more shore.

The warming is harming and alarming and is something we must fear if we care to stay here until our land disappears along
with the once clear atmosphere we hold dear.

Contamination of all nations is tearing lungs asunder and stupid blunders will escalate arrival of our fate. The date is set, it's all arranged, but ain't it strange, it can change. It's up to us and a smelly bus, a fuming truck, the muck schmucks dump in the sea and you and me and he and she and them and they who day by day are pissing it all away.

Nature's beauty will be among the first to go. Trees, flowers, even weeds, will no longer grow. We and the animals will no longer mate and sex will be an altered state. The sun and moon and all the stars will be consumed like candy bars and wars will end in defeat for both sides of the street.

If East meets West and tries its best and South and North do things of worth and Arabs and Jews refuse to fight and Washington stops lying and starts trying to right all they did wrong and the rapper's song is clear and filled with cheer and maybe a baby will be born who will grow and know how to do what must be done to give us one more try before we die.

NOBODY WINS. ALL WOULD DIE.

Bush has his finger on the trigger. He figures, "All I have to do is point our weapon at Iran. I can. And I will. We will kill a million or more and end the war that hasn't begun. Death is done and we have won."

Won what? An historic victory? Just like HST in World War II. The world knows what happened then. Do we want it to happen once again? One more blast could be our last.

Then and now are not the same. Then, Japan was waging fanatical war. The A-Bomb was a farfetched, wretched sc-fi scheme. Nobody dreamed it could or would be done. Just another kind of gun. In World War II we weren't real sure what it could do. Neither were they. We both found out. Now there is no doubt.

Japan burned. Millions died. The whole world learned an atomic war could be the beginning of the end of civilization. So we all had reservations against the use of this wanton weaponry. Between then and now there have been threats and yet, somehow, it hasn't happened. And do you know why? Both sides would lose. We all would die.

ADVICE TO FLYS

There came the time in life my wife and I decided we must confide the facts of life to our sons and daughters: beware of swatters and those who spray from a little tin can a mist that can make you history. Stay away from sugar bowls, sweet rolls, pies and cakes and, for goodness sakes, steaks on grills and picnic tables filled
with foods you're in the mood to snack.

And if you escape a real close smite don't go back for a second bite. Just stick to buzzin' with your kin and cousins and you might survive a short but happy life.

All flys are hated by humanity. We drive them to insanity and violate their vanity when they swat or spray and we get away. Remember this and you may never die prematurely: Don't be a flyby wise-guy foolish fly. The fly is not always quicker than the eye.

SAGA OF SHAME IN WORLD WAR II

It happened on our minesweeper in the South Pacific during World War II. Our little wooden ship with a crew of 29 men and four officers, and hundreds just like it, played a vital, risky role in the war against Japan.

The night before each invasion we sat in the galley writing letters to loved ones, They were placed in a bucket and left in the ship's safe. If we survived, the "bucket of tears," as we called it, would be doused with alcohol and set ablaze. The ashes would be dumped into the sea.

Our job was to clear the waters of mines so the big ships could sail safely into shore. If there were no mines we could cruise right up to the beach and see the Japanese in their bunkers waving at us as we sailed by. If the seas were mine-free they wouldn't fire on us. That would reveal their positions and they would become targets for gunners on the big ships waiting off shore. If the waters had been mined, we became their targets.

Our ship was shot at but never hit. Others weren't so lucky. They were sunk by Japanese fire or blew up when mines got tangled in the sweeping gear and exploded close to the ship. When one of our ships was hit, all that was left was floating debris and splintered wood.

Each night before an invasion the captain told us what to expect. We were warned on the eve of one invasion that there would be an unusually large concentration of mines. We were ordered to keep sweeping no matter the flack from the beach. We were assured the big ships and planes would protect us and bomb the hell out of the enemy. That assurance didn't set well with the crew.

Our ship survived. We were pulled out of he convoy at the last minute. Why? On the eve of the invasion, the machinist's mate on watch in the engine room was urged: "Why don't you throw a monkey wrench in the works?" The next morning our engines were dead in the water. We were yanked out of the flotilla and arrived three days late. It was a brutal invasion. A lot of minesweepers were sunk. A lot of sailors died while we waited in drydock for our engines to be repaired. There was a temporary feeling of relief when we realized we'd been spared the brunt of the battle. Guilt set in. We heard about the casualties. We saw disabled landing craft, a sea filled with debris.

The realization of our cowardice and complicity in a crime of sabotage caused us to search our souls and suffer the shame of what we had been party to. But to the best of my knowledge no one ever revealed what happened on that fateful night before the invasion in the South Pacific.

LOST LIVES

Lost lives---millions and more to come---if they had been allowed to live and give their gift to the civilizations of once gifted nations, how different might a future, bright with unrealized destiny, have become? Some will say they died to save the USA and the American Way. Others doubt, will say "COPOUT!"

Death legalized, apologized and sanitized by written or unwritten law does not lessen the brutality or finality of a bullet in the head, a bomber who spreads the dead by an act of suicide. This no sane man can abide.

The evidence of providence is there:

A youth with flair for phrase beyond compare might one day have shed the light and penned a telling answer to the swelling view that the end is near.

A budding scientist might have persisted in his belief that a solution to many a medical mystery lies in an ancient theory long ignored by the profit motive-driven pharmaceutical industry.

A religious truth might have gained approval in the voting booth to a bill to finance advance for peace instead of war, support love and good and brotherhood before it's too late to change our fate.

A world leader might have emerged who realized, to the world's surprise, the folly of all war and have led all people on this earth toward goals of worth, away from poverty and toward prosperity.

Every death will have been in vain, not only the selected few who would have used their brain and creativity to contribute to the world's continuing livability.

We all are members of the Clan of Man. We all must give what we can to meet the ever demanding, expanding need for those who will lead us in our endless pursuit of wholeness and true happiness.

TALE OF A TYRANT

I am a liar, a twister of truth, a teller of fact turned to fiction, a cheater who cheats with words and ideas with never an honest conviction. I am a teller of tales best untold, of falsehoods of my fabrication. I am corrupt, an unspeakable blot on the record of God's great creation.

I look into eyes of trustworthy souls, then spin webs of disaster. Men are such pawns for well-chosen words; lies make them slaves, I their master.

When I was a child at an innocent age and life became all too abusive, I found my escape from prisons of truth in make believe dreams less elusive.

I closed both my eyes to obvious facts, told myself lies without trying and soon felt secure in the hard shell of sham without foolish comfort of crying. Slowly I learned there is power in love, much greater power in hating. This is the path I chose for my life. I found a world eagerly waiting.

They all stood before me the black and the white, the Christians, the Jews and the others. Each without knowing soon was to spring at the throats of their sisters and brothers. Each would respond to my taut puppet strings, eager to further my mission. Anxious to plunder, to scatter their souls on well-beaten paths to perdition.

This was my plan, this was my scheme, this was my game of beguile. The world quaked and cringed. My mastery worked, at least for a very sort while. When I was exposed as the fraud that I am, the two-faced faker of fury, I was accused by the world I abused, sentenced by my judge and jury.

CONTACT: IT NOW IS A FACT!

"I've done it! I've done it!" the scientist raved. No one believed he could achieve the probably impossible goal he aimed for. But if what he claimed could be done, he'd gain fame by doing what he did: establish voice contact with man on a planet so distant colleagues were insistent it couldn't be done.

By Einstein, perhaps, and a few other chaps. But they were all dead, or so it had been said. Even they had thrown up their arms and said, "Oye vay. There ain't no vay to find a vay to do voht Got don't vant us to."

His father, a scientist in his own right, had had breakthroughs that made news throughout the universe. He'd proven twinkling stars were just lightning bugs in jars collected by kids on Jupiter and Mars as part of a project to project light in spite of the fact such a bright plight was out of sight.

His dad also found the world was not round, but was actually square just like the moonies who lived there. That discovery set the world on end and a few dropped off and were never seen again. He turned to his son and said "No one can talk to someone a zillion million miles away just like, hoo hey! Have a nice day."

But said his son: "I done it, Dad. I'll prove it with my Radrad-radio-yo-yo with a micromaniac yak-yak flow."

His son switched a thousand switches one by one. It took two days and the job was done. Then he turned up the squawker-talker-bleaker-squeaker- speaker, and suddenly voice was heard. It was absurd! It was a voice, yet it was not. It said no words and screeched a lot. It sounded like chimp and her pimp having you know what. Very complex, real high tec interstellar sweller sex.

Sonnyboy was full of joy on his michaelphone, jabbering back in old world Chimpimpumpanese. His Dad said, "Excuse me please. You say this whatchacallitese comes from zillions of miles away? At the speed of light your grandson will be old and gray when your reply finds its way to where you say it's going to go. As time goes, that's mighty slow."

"I know, Dad," said his lad, "but just think how proud you'll be to be the dad of me when we meet a zillion skillion years from now up in that 7/11 in the sky. I can't wait...sigh, sigh, sigh..."

"Neither can I," was Dad's reply.

DAMMIT! IT'S OUR PLANET!

Forget the moon, forget Mars. Be aware, care, be concerned what's happening to this planet of ours. Forget about oil, forget about wars, forget about gas guzzling cars and twinkling stars, just look at the scars our land has endured and we have made scant effort to cure and you're sure to understand the demands we must meet to lower the heat that's depleting and defeating our chance to survive and protect populations of future nations to remain longer alive.

The rude, crude lassitude our leaders exude in defying the fact our acts of genocide kills hills and dales, mountains and streams, hopes and dreams, technicalities we have ignored, claiming we can't afford to waste money making polar regions less sunny, hurricanes milder, jungles wilder, wetlands wetter and so much better, reducing emissions and changing conditions, lest we destroy more than we consume on the way to our doom.
We, the greatest democracy, most hated hypocrisy, do-little nation ignoring devastation of flower and fauna and everything else on a hell-bent road to annihilation.

Bush should not alone shoulder the blame, but his name is synonymous with what's upon us and will get worse next year and the year after next if we fail to redirect our energy to correct what was caused by short-sighted laws and programs that make no sense and contribute to events like immense hurricanes, torrential rains, droughts and out of control starvation, devastation and deprivation.

Who knows what else the world has in store waiting for us on some nearby or far distant shore! Dammit! This is our planet. How long can it survive if we don't keep it alive?

WHAT A WONDERFUL WORLD

What a wonderful world we're living in, but how much better a world it would have been if God had not allowed His children to commit sin, the first and worst crime of all time.

There is nothing in recorded history that gives a clue to solve the mystery of how life started way back when there may have been no strife, no violence, no hate but only love of man and beast and birds that fly in the sky and fish that swim in the sea and every waterway and even tiny insects I expect were there because He had a reason why they should be a part of the first family who shared and cared for all equally.

But somehow God, from then till now, put too much trust in the souls He did entrust to all the creatures great and small. He stood aside and watched them slide into a world of His design until He saw the danger sign, but by then it was too late for greed and hate, lust and mistrust, had infected what He least expected would become of some, not all, He granted birth on this earth.

What happened as his flock progressed and spread far and wide across the breast of this world of magnificence and majesty and what God dreamed the world might be for endless time after He had completed His creativity. Love, sharing, caring, declaring dedication, but also desecration, death and annihilation. bloodletting and violation of the rules of God that went astray. And from then until this day so many among us have lost their way.

Imagine how many have suffered, how many died, how many cried. how many gone before their time, victims of man-created crime, who might have contributed events of glory to the story that even preceded, I do believe, the garden of Eden and Adam and Eve,

If things had worked out to God's plan, we can surmise, Man would be more wise, humanity would not compromise and God would be elated by the world that He created.

IS THERE TRUTH IN BIBLICAL FANTASY?

Are we caught in a world conspiracy that's based on Biblical fantasy that says angels fly invisibly in our midst and insist the Apocalypse is near and when it comes the world will disappear. The true believers are quite sincere and are convinced the end will come this year.

But the apostles of the impossible hedge their bets. The truth be known, those who portend the end say it will depend on the war between good and evil which will cause upheaval on this sphere and the death of every doubting creature who lives here.

Before I tell you more about what the Evangelists have in store as proof the End of Times is coming soon, possibly by this June, I must admit I do not believe a word of it. I am a skeptic, have always been, will always be, and say of every hair-brained theory, prove it to me.

I do not believe in angels, ghosts or devils or any spirits or any mythological illogical apparitions of the fanatical, fanciful faithful fringe. Faith alone is not enough. Truth is based on fact, not fiction. It's not predicated on prediction. That is my conviction. So it be. That is me.

Did you know millions say it's so that 9/11 was a welcome sign of the coming End of Times when Christ will rise again and all believers will be spared and transported to Heaven? Those who believe in prophecy are convinced the Bible is the word of God and His book predicts that death and devastation which rocked our nation and all civilized members of civilization is just the beginning of the end. Nearly 60 percent believe the predictions in Revelation are part of the world's ultimate fatal destination.

As long ago as the sixteenth century, believers feared pictures on government documents looked like the "Mark of the Beast." as it was described in the Book of Revelations.

Sightings are inviting prophecies, believers say. Visions of the Messiah are everywhere, in the exhaust fumes of cars, on wrappings on candy bars, on smoke emissions from cigars. A vision of the Virgin Mary on a grilled cheese sandwich was sold on e-bay, brought about $30,000. And how about this? A talking fish on the way to its slaughter in a New York market
cried out in Hebrew the fear that the end of the world was near. Some believe it is already here and will occur this year, perhaps as soon as June.

If you believe all this and other idiocy, forget fear of a failing economy, welcome floods and droughts and other "acts of God," wars declared and miseries shared. And give three cheers for terror in the Middle East. Has the "Mark of the Beast," as warned in the Book of Revelations, returned to cause devastation to civilization?

If all this unbelievable, widely believed stuff were not enough, a Seattle newspaper asked: "Is Bush the Antichrist?" And a minister cited Bush's support of the "rise in Christian Fascism" as evidence of this belief.

Subliminal messages pop up almost everywhere. Consider the theme of the Bush program, "No child will be left behind." This brings to mind that phrase is also part of the title of a novel based on the Revelations and the Antichrist, "Left Behind: A Novel of the Earth's Last Days." Is there a connection between Bush's failing program and the novel's description of what happens to those left behind to fight the Antichrist. Possibly not. But with Dubya's weird beliefs and flights of fantastic fantasy, you never can tell.

Well, I'll stick around to wait and see. That is, unless, their predictions come true this June, or soon thereafter.

HEAVEN'S IN A HELL OF A STATE

Have you heard about what's been happening in Heaven of late? The economy's in a hell of a state. The clouds are outdated. They haven't been upgraded since they were created. The Golden Gate is antiquated and the accumulated cumulous clouds are sparsely populated. The real estate is poorly rated and who in heck'll invest a shekel in rundown, dilapidated Heavenly Condos? God knows.

The angels who buy and sell know well why Heaven's going to hell while Hell is booming even while flaming inflation's looming. The economy's hot, which was expected, because it's overpopulated by the loser/winner sinners, the rejected defectives who refused directives from their holy CEO
millions of years ago.

It's preposterous how prosperous hell's become. Its economy is on a roll and the price of coal to fuel its fire keeps rising hire which is not surprising.

The Demon Dow is overjoyed. There are few unemployed. Just to keep hell hot keeps stokers stoking and rocking around the clock. Meanwhile heaven's freezing, hell is booming, God is fuming, What is looming for Heaven and Hell? Only Father Time can tell.

TO DEMONSTRATE GENERATES HATE

We are a nation of immigrants, no matter where or when we were born, We all, in one way are another, were once considered a mass of class known as "the others," the "greenhorns." The foreign born are told, "Go back where you came from." What they forget or ignore, a generation or two before we knew the wonder of this freedom's land their ancestors came to the U.S.A. for the same reason, to be free, to make true their dream of liberty.

Legal or illegal, rich or poor. it doesn't matter any more. They're here, they working, some have achieved more than they believed they could, paid their taxes, paid their way. They're now a part of the U. S. A. They should be treated that way,

My grandparents came from foreign lands, didn't understand the way we spoke. They often were the butt of jokes. They couldn't read. They couldn't write, had no place to sleep at night. But they knew wrong from right. They saw the light of liberty and said, "This is the land for me. I don't want to be a refugee. I want to be a Yankee. An American. To be free. To know no fear. That's for me. It's why I'm here."

At last, they shed their rags, a badge of their past. Chose simple clothes. Saved their pennies, nickels, dimes, in the best and worst of times, learned, earned and paid their way. They were here to stay. The U. S. A. wasn't going away. Neither were they.

Many entered illegally, gave a name (not their own), gave their place of birth but had no ID, record of age or ethnicity, only their word they loved and fervently craved freedom and democracy.

(My mother-in-law came more than eighty years ago as a child, no knowledge of the country where she was born, no birth certificate, absolutely no ID, never became a citizen, married here, had four kids, worked hard and retired on SSI with all the benefits we who are here legally enjoy unquestionably. Yet, she was a refugee until her dying day. She paid her way as millions of illegals do today.

So why the hue and cry and all the hullabaloo about the millions of this generation where there's no doubt about their veneration for this land, threatened with excommunication on a mere technicality? The bill before Congress is just a ploy to win the votes of those who, luckily, came here legally and enjoy all the benefits of citizenry.

It's the shame of our nation that millions must stage a demonstration to protect their rights to be part of the history of our ever-evolving, loving land of the free. Our democracy!

THE ECOLOGIST

Harry stood at the side of the dump gazing at the mound of garbage---he preferred to call it refuse---the throwaways of an affluent economy. A burlap bag hung loosely over his shoulder, he stood proud,

In the past, when Harry cameto the dump to fill his bag with things he could eat, wear or sell he felt a sense of shame and degradation for what he diud.. It was a way to eke out a living, better than working for those clean finger-nailed slobs who held the power of the paycheck over his head. But he had no illusions. "I'm a scrounger, a ragpicker," he told himself.

Things were different now. He had an image, a title. "Ecologist, that's what I am. I help improve the environment, to preserve our national and natural resources."

It was just a few minutes before dawn. Harry had to get up early these days
because if a man wanted to get ahead in this ecological world he couldn't let any garbage slip through his fingers. For years he had the dump all to himself, No one invaded his domain or challenged his leadership at the bottom of the heap. But things had changed. He was no longer the only ecologist in town.

"Amateurs," he muttered. He spat two feet away into an open can that once held baked beans or, maybe, tomato soup. It was hard to see the label at this distance. "Where were they when you had to work for a living, when the only cash items were returnable deposit cans and bottles, when a heavy retread-able truck tire might get you enough for a shot or a pack of smokes. When you had to find an old bedspring or a length of copper wire to afford a flop for the night.

"Better get to work," he told himself. "They'll be coming soon with their dump truck and hired hands, moving in on me."

I AM A SEMI-LITERATE LITERARY POCKETBOOK CROOK

I am a semi-literate very, very literary litterbug, a rat pack who takes hiS loot to the sack and never gives it back. I get a very special feeling stealing things like secondhand, re-re-read pocketbooks which, as most crooks know, can most easily be pocketed when nobody's watching. And even if you're caught you're seldom prosecuted. There's no dispute you've got the loot hidden in your crotch, but what guy will stick his hand down there to recover what your lover will discover on the sheets between the covers?

Actually, I'm against shoplifting, especially when I'm gifting to Shirl, my favorite birthday girl. What if she already read it, takes it back and gets arrested when a requested counterfeit receipt slip reveals her indiscrete relationship with a well-known crook who took the book from the shelf all by himself?

I can see the headline now:

POCKETBOOK CROOK ADMITS HE TOOK BOOK;
GIRLFRIEND HELD AS ACCESSORY TO THE FAX

WHEN PRESIDENTS WERE PRESIDENTS

I am old enough to remember when presidents were members of the human race and knew their place in history would be judged by the way they took care of the entire population of this nation, not just the chosen few who only care about themselves and the hell with me and you.

I am young enough at 83 to remember when presidents served the likes of me and mine, the kind the founders had in mind when they spoke of "We, the People," in hard fought campaigns and, yes! even from the halls of Congress, to the wants and needs of the working man, not just for big shot bosses who worry more about profit and losses, less about the cost of living and giving hirelings an even break, for goodness sake!

I remember vaguely Herbert Hoover, certainly not a shaker, mover, who never cared or shared the pain of factory workers, soup-line standers, soda jerkers, the unemployed who meandered everywhere searching desperately for jobs that just weren't there. His only confession was we were in a depression and nothing could be done about it, the only way we'd get out of it was to sit and wait. The nation waited and debated, then came FDR and a war across the shore that America could not ignore, especially after the Jap attack when we struck back. His creed: serve the need of working man. He did and slowly things began to improve and we were on an upward move.

Roosevelt's tragic death brought to the helm HST---Harry Truman, a true man who faced reality and brought the war to its finality. He knew it had to be. The A-bomb ushered in an era that, for better or for worse, changed the course of history. But it caused Japan to surrender. A blast that knelled the end to war.

Without rehashing everything, the point is that whenever a Democrat sat in the driver's seat, the president strove to meet the needs of all, not just the cartels that swear by oil wells, destroy the ecology, drive up the cost of energy, fuel recession and flirt with depression.

We liked Ike, but what did he do to improve the lives of folks like you? Nixon was forced to resign to avoid more trouble down the line. His VP, Spiro Agnew, as corrupt as a political hack could be, also resigned to save his hind. And now we have GWB. and his presidency is a disgrace as his place in history, few will deny, will testify.

I haven't mentioned LBJ who paved the way for civil rights, fought poverty with all his might, refused a second term because of that damn Viet Nam. But Johnson did a lot to make Uncle Sam proud, unlike the past and present Republican crowd.

For crying out loud, when is America going to learn? You can't trust the GOP. Just take a look at the end result, the insult of Tricky Dick. Agnew, too, who should have gone to jail. And Dubya, the biggest failure of them all. When will Humpty Dumpty Dubya fall off the wall?

CONVERSATION ABOUT GOD

"I have seen the glory of the coming of the Lord."

"How? The Lord came a long time ago. He didn't like what he saw and so He left."

But He returned incognito, of course. I recognized him in spite of his disguise."

"Disguise? What did He look like?"

"Once I saw Him disguised as a a forest fire. He was burning down trees in the North Pole."

"That means He's a selective god. He couldn't be a forest fire in the cold North Pole where there are no trees."

"Sure. He could be a forest fire in the Sahara Desert if He wanted to. Or He could be anything He desired. Remember, years ago, those baby white seals, they had beautiful fur rich women wanted for high style coats,"

"You mean those creatures were slaughtered by God?"

"No, He wasn't the killers, He was the creatures, He let the killers bash out His brains so He could punish them for their cruelty. He kept changing Himself from one seal to another and each time He got a new set of brains for the ones the killers had destroyed."

"He's a pretty brainy God, isn't He?"

"Yes. And powerful. All He has to do is wink His left eye to become this or that. If He winks His right eye, He becomes that or this. If He blinks both eyes together He's in a dozen places at once being a cat and a dog, a leaf and a log, even both Adam and Eve, and a snake and an apple, I do believe."

"But that event is not in the Bible."

"No. but He'll add it to the revised edition."

ALL ABOUT SENIOR DEMEANOR

You've been told you're getting old. Your kids are aware of it and can't forget what they'll inherit when you're gone. It's an actual, factual reality that they must fret about how much they'll get, Let them know now, not yet, then go in debt and don't worry about your credit. Let it ride as you slowly slide into silly senility and lose the ability to tell a dollar from a dime while you're having a helluva time with money borrowed from the bank at prime.

Seniority is an age and a stage in life when, if you still have a husband or a wife, and even if you've not, use it or you'll lose it. If you think you lost it, jump in the sack and try to get it back,

Don't spend your time guessing how much longer you'll be here. Count your blessings and keep messing, caressing and undressing while expressing words of woo to you-know-who while you try to do what nature, if not the state legislature, intended you to do

Forget the fear of the hereafter which will still be here after you disappear in a year or two or three or what ever more it might be. Defy statistics. Be unrealistic. Go ballistic. And if your kids think you're sick say they're right and admit it. Be glad you did what you done. Wasn't it a lot of fun!

Be thankful if you're still sound of mind and body because that's what everybody wants to be. Even if you're hooked on medications. as long as your disease isn't catching take that extensive, expensive vacation with your significant other and I don't mean your sister or your brother. If you've still got a dad or a mother put 'em in a nursing home and roam to Rome or Timbuktu, Peru or any place that you desire. Set your world on fire before you fizzle out. That's what life is all about.