Hurricane Katrina, Ann's Birthday, The Aristocrats and Group Sex

It is gratifying to see the response to the destruction and refugee problem from Katrina. I find it pretty laughabble that a part of our government's response is to try to make sure they don't use the "r-word" (refugee) to describe our refugees. Typical Fed fix - deny the label and the problem isn't really there. Instead go on talk shows and accuse the people who aren't spending millions of dollars worth of jet fuel, during a shortage, flying in and out for photo ops of being the problem.

I see 2008 and very possible 2006 as a time of great change at the Federal level. People are tired of the pompous photo-op style of the current admin (and Bush's sense of self-involved, frat-boy humour has started fianlly wearing thin with the people misguided enough to have voted for him in the first place. Stupid isn't the same as being part of the common-man class, it just seems that way at first...)

Tomorrow is Ann's birthday (my ex-wife, whom I still haven't heard from or of since the storm. Either she is dead, constrained from letting me know she is alive and well or doesn't really think I, after all these years, deserve to know her fate. I hope it is #2, although depending on the level of constraint, it speaks poorly of her and those around her as people.)

Yes, I still care if she is alive or dead, well or wounded...it is just difficult, as a human being, to deal with the kind of elaborate soap opera I've been living in for the past two years, and particularly the last two weeks. I thought I taught her better. Either I was not a very good teacher, or she was not a very good student. Or both.

I will go see "The Aristocrats" this weekend - Monday at the latest. Just about everyone I mention this fact to gives me a look of thinly-veiled disgust and shock. Good. Next tick on my list: a woman who can enjoy the same things I do. I don't habitually watch sports (despite having access to free tickets to Mountaineer games last year, I attended only one, and left at halftime, and I can't tell you the last time I did more than spot check a game on TV). But I do like films, particularly edgy, original films.

Yes, I'm weird (particularly my Morgantown standards). But as a man who has at least twice in his life turned down legitimate offers of "threesomes" I don't consider myself normal (yes, the idea is intriguing, and for a guy with my sex drive I'm not worried about keeping my end of the bargain, I just know the murky emotional waters it can invoke and I'm NOT THAT STUPID!!)

E.J. says he's heard from a few people who are working to win the "Edit the Blog" Contest. For those of you who are latecomers to the party, just six days left to do an edit of my blog (just for mistakes, not style) through September 6. The winner gets an autographed copy of THE COMPLEAT PANTHER CYCLES. See entries from earlier this week for details.