Sleep Softly Son With my wife recovering from surgery, my rambunctious style of sleep had to find another home for a few weeks. With only one other bedroom, that pretty much meant I would be sleeping in my son's room.

He sleeps on a queen sized mattress, which sits on the floor next to the baby sized mattress that we took out of his crib before we moved the crib into the attic. So we have this l-shaped mattress on the floor, and another twin size mattress pushed up against the wall, to make the little fellow feel like he is in the looney bin. Fortunately, he probably doesn't understand the significance of the padded room.

In any case, as I fall asleep at night, I hear his gentle breath, and see his peaceful face. He is often contorted on the terrace between the mattresses, or "starfished" on a pillow, with one of his appendages easing up the padded wall behind him.

Its an amazing gift to lie down and watch the guiltless sleep. He sometimes wakes up screaming, and wanting to be held. And as he calms down, he rests his head on my shoulder, and his breathing softens. Then when I set him back upon his bed, he tosses and turns, looks around, and goes back to sleep.

Sometimes he wakes up early... before I'm ready to get up. About a week ago, he got frustrated with my sleepy head and pulled the covers off of me. The next morning he pulled the pillow out from under my head. The rest of the week I got up when he got up.  ¶ 4:04 PM 1 comments

  Happy times...
Check this out. According to U.S. Department of Justice statistics, in 2001 there were 469,000 black males enrolled in college between the ages of 18-24, and 179,500 black males between the ages of 18-24 in prison.

Conversely, in the same year there were 3,522,392 white males between 18-24 enrolled in college, and 125,700 in prison.

While the prison numbers don't look that different, look at the college numbers. To say that we've surmounted the racial hurdles in our country is to deny the bald truth. Why is it that almost as many blacks go to prison as they do college? Are they following their dreams? Are they just genetically predisposed towards crime and vice? Or, is it possibly the system? The same article I read also stated that the majority of these crimes committed by African Americans were drug offenses and not violent crime. Hmmm... why would a young person turn to drugs or selling drugs... maybe because they feel it is their only chance to make a living? Hmmm... where would they get that idea from...?

I watched an MLK documentary the other night, and my immediate gut response was sadness, considering how far we need to go towards equality and how little we've come since the 60's.  ¶ 10:58 AM 0 comments

 
So we are # 1, as an anonymous poster who writes like Mavengloiven pointed out.

And I've fallen off the wagon. I had to put this image up.

The thing I was trying to get across in my previous blog didn't coime across as clearly as I had hoped.

If prison and the death penalty are for discouraging crime, we should have a very low crime rate. We don't.

If prison and the death penalty are retribution, meted out in proportion to the transgression, the countries with the highest incarceration rates woudl do the most to restrict individual behavior. Thats not us.

So the best I can come up with is that their is a fair amount of injustice in our country, and that our criminality and incarceration rates reflect the gap between the common myth of America and the reality as experienced by the 80% who earn 15% of our GDP.  ¶ 9:04 AM 0 comments

  ribs 'n corn puddin' On an unrelated note, I recently went through a brief period of introspection and realized that the centerpiece of almost every one of my blogs was some sort of graphic. I like going to google images and trying to find a funny picture, and Al Gore made it so easy when he invented the whole internet thing.

So, my new day's resolution is to write a blog without downloading a picture. The skeptic in you might say, "dude, what a lay up." But, I will remind you to "judge not lest thou be judged." And if you live in Iraq, being judged could mean having your head yanked off in a botched execution.

Which brings up yet another thing that we Americans should be thinking about instead of March Madness.... the death penalty. We have one of the highest incaceration rates in the free world, and yet we execute more people than any country but (Russia or China...can't remember). So the paradox here is, we are supposed to be the freest country, yet we incarcerate more people. Those people aren't free, and are supposedly jailed for violating the social contract of our laws, which are supposed to be more permissive than anywhere else. Am I missing something here?

Somehow other countries manage to more effectively deter people from violating their supposedly more restrictive laws without locking up a big chunk of the men between the ages of 18-24 and without the deterrent of execution.

Where are we screwing up?  ¶ 8:56 PM 3 comments

  I have a nightmare
Rereading the last couple of blogs on this specific day got me thinking about a recurring nightmare. I like many non-bankers, non-students are consigned to work on this "national holiday." It is a day where we are supposed to ponder the debt of gratitude to the man who freed our nation, blacks and whites, from the bonds of injustice.

The nightmare I have is that our nation spends time being sedated by Nascar, beer, reality television and professional sports (including college athletics here). Instead of worrying about global climate change, we debate whether Dale Earnhard or Kyle Petty was the greatest race car driver of all time. Rather than consider the merits of cap and trade programs versus command and control programs, we argue whether we'd rather push a Chevy than drive a Ford. Too many people biggest concerns with college athletics is the BCS playoff system; their gripping concern that a Bowl +1 format would jeopardize the exam period for the "Student Athletes."

Come on.... are they serious?  ¶ 8:51 AM 1 comments

  New Year's I, too, have really missed reading the blogs and I hope that all of us will make a renewed effort to start writing more again. I know that around the end of the semester I quit writing almost completely. Strangely, I found that the more scholarly-type writing I did for my classes, the harder it was for me to tear off a rollicking blog-riff using my imagination. I'm starting to maybe believe in the whole right-brain, left-brain thing. Anyway, I realized that I had nothing to say of any interest to anyone, and that scared me.

So, I started substitute teaching. Well, actually, I started subbing because I'm a poor grad student and a money whore - this is true - I, this very evening, actually secretly considered the idea of calling the medical testing number after seeing their commercial offering from $1,000 - $4,000.

Since I've been subbing for the past 2 days (I'm an old, cagey veteran now), I have some thoughts to share with all of you. One, this is good for me because I make a few bucks, and every time I think about how hard grad school is and how I don't know if I can make it, I just need to go in to sub and ask myself if I *really* want the alternative. Also, it gives me some good fodder for the weekly blogging, including this anecdote.

I was covering for a freshman geography class yesterday, and there was this squirrely, scrawny little wiseacre who was playing his PSP all during class instead of working on his map of Africa. I talked with him a few times in friendly manner, but I wasn't able to truly convince him that he should shift his priorities and put the map of Africa on the top of the list, subordinating the handheld video game playing. Then, at a time when everyone else was miraculously quiet and working, he apparently looked at the board where a girl from a previous class had written "Happy Birthday Robyn, 15" and he screwed up his face in puzzlement. Then he vocalizes loudly, and I quote:

"WHO IS ROB-EYE-AN ?"

That's the future of America, folks. It's good that you know this now so you aren't disappointed later.

Finally, I'd like to add that, man, angels are HOT and NAKED. And, I'm still lamenting the fact that 2 of our very best friends are absconding with themselves to Houston, leaving us sad and lonely. Sad for us... so very sad. But happy for them... so very happy.  ¶ 7:19 PM 0 comments

  For all the saints
This is an experiment. I felt like I owed you gentleman a blog of some sort; to show solidarity, if nothing else.

I was immediately baited by a passing thought with religious themes. The thought was set to the tune of the eponymous song. Such thoughts rarely swirl through my consciousness, so I felt like it might be the long awaited message.

The next thought in the stream was angels. They are the best part of the Catholocism I grew up with. They fit the whole story in almost no way, but they add a littel JRR Tolkien to the whole mix. The good news is, that at least since "the fall" they are a mostly benevolent influence, and that is all sweetened by the slew of mildly twisted images you get when you look up angel on google images.

Sad to say, the next thought in the stream is, "I better get back to work." I promise I'll do better next time.  ¶ 7:48 AM 0 comments

  A new plan Where have all the Bloggers gone? Long time passing... I apologize for my recent lack of participation. I'm afraid the need to work for a living is putting a serious crimp in my style. I was afraid of this. Let this be a lesson to the rest of you.

My life has been commandeered lately by the process of finding housing. I was hoping to have moved into a rent house by now, but instead am looking at the beginning of the long process of finding the 'perfect' house. From all sides, Charles especially, I'm being pressured to buy the most expensive house I can afford. Sadly, my life savings don't get you much of a house in central Houston these days.

Part of me wants to be done with all of this and live on the coast, in a double-wide set on an acre or so. Naturally, there would be a barbed-wire fence around the property and a "Beware of Dawgs" sign hanging, off-level, from the fence. No need to mow the yard, really. There would be a little side yard for the goat and a few chickens. Robyn and I would get up early to make the breakfast tacos, which I would sell out of my little Roach Truck while Robyn takes little Cashew for walks on the beach. On weekends, I would drive garbage to the dump for people (in my other truck) to make a little extra jingle.

On warm summer evenings, we would drink Lone Star and fish in the surf. On cool winter mornings we would burn trash out back and have a cheery little fire. With that lifestyle, in contrast to RatRace Central here, my life savings would last... 53 years. Perfect. Anybody care to join us?  ¶ 10:22 PM 2 comments