Hugo Chavez, font of truth and wisdom

No doubt about it! The news is finally out.  It has taken a really long time, but we finally know that all of those stories that run on The History Channel are true.  You know the ones, the ones that put forward the proposition that We Are Not Alone.  The stories revolve around some kind of ancient space mariners who came to Earth for whatever reason and stayed because they thought the Earth girls were hot, right?

We now have definitive proof that there was life on Mars.  And, that life on Mars failed because of a faulty economy.  What was that economy? Was it Marxism, Leninism, Stalinism, euphemism? Nope, it wasn’t any of those, it was good old capitalism.  At least, that’s what Hugo Chavez thinks. And of course, as in everything else the Venezuelan President (enter Dictator here) says, it is absolutely true.  Why, you can see it in the Mayan hieroglyphics, right?  I mean, with all the stuff The History Channel puts out, something has to be true, doesn’t it?

So what did Prez Chavez say:  ‘I have always said, heard, that it would not be strange that there had been civilization on Mars, but maybe capitalism arrived there, imperialism arrived and finished off the planet.’

Absolutely astounding. That means that all of those UFO sightings have to have been real, right?  Of course they are. They have to be, because that’s just about the only proof out there that would support a colossally stupid statement like the one Chavez uttered.

Even if The History Channel’s stories were to turn out to be true, how in the world could you ever get from space invaders to death of a planet 101?  I always thought it would end up being something much more interesting, like the common cold, that would do in these aliens from other planets.  But now we know for sure that one’s economic system destroys the world and not natural causes, like volcanoes, earthquakes, and Venezuelan elections.

And so, what’s Chavez’ proof?  He cites deforestation as the leading cause of deserts. Where’s the science behind that?  Oh wait; he’s the Presi-dictator-dent, who needs proof. All the proof he needs are in Erich von Daniken's book, Chariot of the Gods.  Don’t you know that? Are you all just a bunch of stupid, proletariat noodges?  Even Hollywood knows the truth, Chavez said, don’t you remember that great American documentary, Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.

And, he added just for extra emphasis, you can’t forget the Nazca lines.  Who do you think was able to make sure those ancestors were able to make all those lines exactly straight?  They didn’t have transit levels back then, you know. So it had to be someone in a spaceship riding above the ground.  Doesn’t it just make sense?

It’s so obvious, even the smartest people can’t see it, he said.  Capitalism is even more nefarious than destroying Mars, he averred.  For instance, we know for a fact that it is the main reason Earth’s water supplies are dwindling. Why, Nescafe alone has used up the entire discharge from the Amazon to fill their little water bottles.  At 4.2 million cubic feet per second, that means Nescafe is packing away the moolah, he said.

“Ay Caramba—will those greedy capitalists never learn! They are destroying the world.  Why can’t they take care of their people instead, like I do with my people?  My people, they love me, that’s why they always reelect me.  I mean, Obama, he barely earned the popular vote. Here in Venezuela, all the people vote in favor of me, well maybe enough of the people vote in favor of me.  But I am certain to have a much higher percentage next time, I mean now that I know who voted against me, it will only take a little tweaking to get them to see things my way, right? Besides, I am like Muammar Gaddafi, right? My people, they love me, right? They better; I have better aircraft and military than that crazy Gaddafi has.”

On the Waterfront! The Appomattox River

So I know I’m stealing a title from that Elia Kazan 1954 spectacular starring Marlon Brando, but the title seems fitting.  This column probably doesn’t have much bearing on politics, society, or just general sarcasm, but it’s kind of interesting to me.

Having lived on or near the water most of my life, I have longed to have a way to take advantage of the many navigable rivers and bays I’ve been around.  When Jackie and I moved into the house we now live in, formerly Casa de Luck, on Dana Lane, we loved it for the view we had of the Appomattox River.  It seems only fitting that my love of the water would get an extra little surge given the proximity of such a great body of water.

For most of the past 10-years, getting onto the water has been a sort of pipe dream.  Sure, I had tried my hand at fishing now and again, but it didn’t have the kind of appeal I was really hoping for.  And, given that we were bringing up two young men at the time (and still with college tuition woes), plunking down some much needed money on a boat seemed a little extravagant.

So I was patient.  I waited, and watched the river, and heard the drone of the personal water craft zipping up toward Petersburg, and the occasional fishing boat sliding by in the early morning hours.  But the longing to be on the water remained a constant.  How to get there was the question.

About three years ago, my neighbor, who happened to have a small bass boat that had been languishing in his driveway for six years, offered to trade the boat for my wife’s pop-up camper.  I thought it was a good deal at the time, but the pop-up camper was not mine and I felt the trouble I would encounter from making such a deal was not worth it.  I passed, explaining that the camper belonged to Jackie.

But things sometimes change, and we upgraded from the camper to a pull behind trailer. That meant we now had an extra pop-up camper. I went back to my neighbor, who was happy to make the trade.  It took me about a year to get the gumption to get the boat repaired.  It needed a completely rebuilt transom, new decking, new carpeting, new batteries, new seats, new bilge pump, new water pump, and new aerator for the live well, and a few other things here and there like wiring and lights and what have you.

Net result: it was ready for the water last November.  But did I have time to put it on the river? No such luck. I had several football games to cover on Saturdays, and Sundays generally revolve around church and church duties. So the boat, now ready to go, sat in the driveway for another five months.

All of that changed last Saturday.  My son, Andrew, who has been dying to take the boat out since I first parked it in our yard, was in town and we attended the Water Safety Training class at Prince George County.  When it was over, we had time to get back home, hook the trailer to the truck, fuel up, and put the boat in the water at a friend’s private boat ramp.  Needless to say, it was a Keystone Cops sort of adventure with the two of us trying to get the boat in the water, off the trailer, and tied to the pier. I had only limited experience with that, and Andrew had exactly none.

We did, however, remember to put the bilge plug in, so we weren’t in imminent danger of sinking.  We only had a few minutes to take the boat for a spin.  I drove up the river for a short distance, and then he took over.  Down the river we went.  If you’re not familiar with Appomattox River, especially near the area where it joins Swift Creek, there are a bunch of islands, and the current cuts in and out between and among them.  Not knowing the exact lay of the water, we just putted around a bit, and came back up stream from just below the Old Brick House.

We called it a day, and another Keystone Cops routine ensued as we tried to load the boat back on the trailer.  I had some experience with loading boats in the past, but Andrew had the wheel and throttle.  It was an interesting time, but we did manage to get the boat close enough to the winch strap to haul it up.  First chance I had, I stopped by Dance’s Sporting Goods and purchased a James River Basin navigational chart.  If you’re going on the Appomattox River, don’t leave home without it.

Savannah Squared-A Tale of Two Catchers

The biggest tragedy sometimes yields the biggest joy.  For Colonials catcher Savannah Couch making the varsity softball team and playing on the Civic Field brings full circle to one of the saddest days in Colonial Heights High School athletics history.

Nearly three years ago, June 14, 2008, Savannah’s older sister, Kassidy Hahn, a catching prodigy at Colonial Heights, passed away in a car crash, along with her cousin Diana Hahn.  Now Savannah assumes her role as catcher, but the getting there is something in the telling and it revolves around two Savannahs, or as they call themselves Savannah squared.

At the time Kassidy would have been a junior, she had a good friend moving up from the middle school who would turn out to be one of the top pitchers in the Central District.  Savannah Phillingane had already opened eyes for Colonials softball coaches Toni and Chris Martin.  They knew they had a stellar catcher, and now they would have the kind of pitcher who can make a difference in tight games.

Kassidy and Savannah P. had dreamed of this chance to play together, pitcher and catcher, a battery.  It was something they talked about whenever they were together.  They had set up a game plan to work together.

The first year, they would work out their pitching and catching routine. In Kassidy’s senior year, they would really get things going to give Kassidy a shot to play in college.

“Kassidy and I would always talk about it.  About how she was going to catch for me in my freshman year, and how she was going to go out with a bang in her senior year, and then it just ended.  I had nobody else to catch for me in softball,” Phillingane said.

It took some of the joy away from the game for her, she said.  But then things changed.  She heard about the other Savannah, Kassidy’s sister, and how she was playing softball, and that she was pretty good especially at catching.

Knowing that the two would have one season of overlap in their softball careers has been part of the driving force for the pitcher.  Along the way, she has excelled and already stands as the all-time strikeout leader for Colonial Heights, notching 592 Ks over her first three seasons.  She has done so, by and large, without a true catcher.  Over the years, they had had people who filled the position, but none of them were as capable as Kassidy or her sister Savannah.  Even coach T. Martin admits catching a Phillingane fast ball isn’t easy, and doing it well requires special talent.

But now, with Couch behind the plate, the coaches and team are expecting a lot of good things to happen.  Martin said a lot of good things have already happened. There have been times in practice when Phillingane would do something, and Couch would respond perfectly, and Phillingane marked the moment with her wry smile and say, “‘Oh yeah, that’s how it’s supposed to be.’”

But all of that almost never happened.

Savannah C. had tried softball with the Colonial Heights Recreation Department summer league and hated it.  Catching wasn’t a problem, but throwing was.  Being on the field wore on her, and she told her mother, Kim Ann McLaughlin, that she just didn’t want to play softball anymore.  And that was OK with her mother.

But then the accident happened, and lots of Kassidy’s friends came around to support the family.  One of the key friends, J.D. McCarty, was the varsity baseball catcher.  All of Kassidy’s friends started to work with Savannah C.  They helped her develop a throwing style that has now become the kind of cannon one expects from a top-notch catcher.  They worked with her on fielding, and on hitting.  It soon became apparent that Savannah would be bigger than Kassidy and might be able to help out more on the offensive side of the ball, as well.

“The first time Savannah hit a ball over the fence we all just went nuts.  To see her come through this with the grades she has, the friends she has, and no behavior issues is amazing,” McLaughlin said.

But her mother didn’t want her to play softball just because her sister played softball.  Still, at first, Savannah said, playing softball and wearing Kassidy’s catcher’s gear was a way in which she could feel a little closer to her sister.

In the beginning, she said, it felt like her sister was there on the field with her from time to time. But as time passed, she grew to love the game and it wasn’t just her playing Kassidy’s game anymore, it was Savannah’s game, too.  From time to time, people who knew Kassidy see Savannah and it’s hard for them to make the adjustment, she said.

“I did start catching for her, and I felt like I needed to use her gear. It was very sentimental to me,” Savannah said.  “At first I needed to have that connection with Kassidy; but now I just have a connection with the game. I feel like I’ve taken the game as my own.”

And now back to this season.  For Phillingane it is the classic role reversal.  Instead of her being the freshman with Kassidy to sort of bring her along, now she is the person who is bringing Savannah C. along.  In some ways, her dreams as a middle school player have finally come to fruition in her senior year.

“Fast forward to my senior year and it’s kind of like I am in Kassidy’s spot with Savannah.  It just kind of reverses things.  I’m glad to have the chance to play softball with Savannah. I didn’t get my chance with the one (Kassidy), so I get my chance with the other,” Phillingane said.

Dealing with the whole thing has been a little more difficult for McLaughlin.  She knew Savannah was not that interested in softball from her experience in rec ball.  But as Savannah became drawn to the sport more and more, McLaughlin tried to make sure she was playing because she wanted to and not because she thought it was expected.

In her first season playing tournament ball, she didn’t get much playing time because of her weak throwing.  But the coaches were impressed with her speed and her ability to catch anything they sent her way.  Eventually, the throwing got worked out, and she became a huge asset to the teams she played on, her mother said.

But McLaughlin still harbored doubts. She still wondered if Savannah was playing for love of the game, or just to emulate Kassidy.  It was a struggle for her just to go to the fields. The fields that Kassidy loved, and especially the Civic Field where the varsity team plays.  But one day, Savannah made a comment that changed all of that for McLaughlin.

“At first, I did everything I could to try to keep her out of it. But then she started saying things like, ‘I feel safe when I am on the ball field; it reminds me of her in a good way.’  That’s when I realized she was playing the game for herself,” McLaughlin said.

Still, it has been a long road with a lot of pitfalls.  The help from Kassidy’s friends and former teammates has been important, she said.  And Savannah has handled the whole situation regarding her sister with grace.

“There was a time when I hated being at a ball field, I couldn’t look at Savannah and see her, I looked at her and saw her sister.  She hated ball originally, because she felt it took her sister away from her.  Now, I think playing softball has been therapeutic for her.  Now, I am extremely happy about it. It still hurts sometimes, but just to see her come through this and be so well-rounded and it’s not just softball.  She has adjusted.  Now, it’s ‘this is who I am, this is where I come from, but I am not her (Kassidy),’” McLaughlin said.

Only one game into the season, there is still a long way to go.  Savannah squared still has some unfinished history to write.  Can the two combine for the kind of year the Colonials have longed for?  Will Phillingane reach 800 strikeouts for her career?  Having someone behind the plate who can handle the array of pitches that Phillingane can throw, and especially the fast ball, can make a huge difference on the scoring line.  All that remains to be seen.

“I’m really sad that it’s Savannah’s last year. If you think about it, she’s going to leave and then I’m going to be in her position and hoping that a pitcher is going to come up that can throw to me,” Savannah C. said.

Battle of the Footlongs!

Amid civil war in the Mid East, natural disasters in Japan, and political turmoil in Wisconsin we have the battle of the bread taking place in the U.S. District Court in Des Moines, Iowa.

With bombs bursting in air, tsunamis soaking the coastline, and politicians holding walkouts, how can something as simple as the word footlong cause such a commotion for the courts?

Well, truth is it isn’t about the word itself, it’s about trademark infraction.  Subway, it seems, thinks that they own the rights to the word footlong, from its seeming never-ending five-dollar footlong campaign, complete with campaign theme song. I know you’ve heard it, so I will save you the necessity of hearing me sing it.  It just boggles the mind that people would think that way about something so obviously part of the English language.

It reminds me of a situation that Groucho Marx found himself in when Warner Brothers tried to sue him for calling one of his movies “A Night in Casablanca.”  Of course, Warner Brothers studios complained that they owned the rights to the name Casablanca from the movie they released five years earlier.  Just after the Marx Brother’s started shooting their comedy, the Warner Brothers legal team threatened a law suit.  The letter prompted Groucho to respond in his own special way.  Here’s his opening salvo, I mean paragraph:

“Dear Warner Brothers,

Apparently there is more than one way of conquering a city and holding it as your own. For example, up to the time that we contemplated making this picture, I had no idea that the city of Casablanca belonged exclusively to Warner Brothers. However, it was only a few days after our announcement appeared that we received your long, ominous legal document warning us not to use the name Casablanca.

It seems that in 1471, Ferdinand Balboa Warner, your great-great-grandfather, while looking for a shortcut to the city of Burbank, had stumbled on the shores of Africa and, raising his alpenstock (which he later turned in for a hundred shares of common), named it Casablanca.

I just don’t understand your attitude. Even if you plan on releasing your picture, I am sure that the average movie fan could learn in time to distinguish between Ingrid Bergman and Harpo. I don’t know whether I could, but I certainly would like to try.“

As if that wasn’t enough, Groucho goes on to suggest other things that Warner Brothers might stake claim to, since they obviously want to own everything.  He asks if they also lay trademark rights to their name Warner Brothers, and then quickly adds that they probably have a right to the Warner name, but what about Brothers?  He baits the legal team by suggesting that there is a long line of brothers who probably have a better claim to the term than they do, not including the Marx Brothers themselves, who predate the Warner studios by decades.  Groucho suggests that the Smith Brothers; the Brothers Karamazov; Dan Brothers, an outfielder with Detroit; and the song “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?” all have rights to the name Brothers that predates any such rights that the Warners might have.

He extends his harassment to Jack and Harry Warners’ first names.  Groucho suggests two Jack’s have the rights to the name Jack, citing the children’s story “Jack and the Beanstalk,” and Jack the Ripper.  He nails Harry with Lighthorse Harry Lee, and someone whose name he pulled from a New York phone book, Harry Applebaum.

Apparently, Groucho made his point with his letter, as he never received another from Warner Brothers about using the name Casablanca, nor Brothers for that matter.  The absurdity of such lawsuits knows no bounds it would seem, and we end up battling over stupid things like the term footlong.  Don’t we have better things to do with our time and our money than to waste it on frivolous lawsuits like this?

Writing help from the Internet, beware the Jabberwock!

Beware the information highway it has more pot holes than I-95.  Sure the Internet makes research fun and fast, but you can’t really trust everything that people put out there. Even when the source appears to be legitimate, you can never be too sure.  I know, everyone says that nowadays don’t they?  Well, as much as I love the ease with which the Internet lets me research, shop, and grab the headlines, I also know a lot of what is out there is misleading and some just outright wrong.

What is caught in my craw today is some collateral damage from a bit of research I was doing the other day. I wanted to be prepared to give the right answers during a one-hour writing seminar I was asked to present to the fifth grade class at Walnut Hill Elementary School in Petersburg.

Having taught in the past, I knew I needed a game plan to lead the kids through the right steps in order for them to write a good five-paragraph essay and help them with their writing SOL later this spring.  Simple right?  I’ve been doing this stuff since 29 years, and people have actually given me money for it.  I know, they’re probably crazy, but it seems to work out for me and I believe in following the path of least resistance when it comes to earning a living.

So, although I was pretty sure I knew what needed to happen (hook paragraph, three supporting paragraphs, closing paragraph), I decided to go the Internet and conduct a little last-minute research, just to make sure, you know?

Wow!

I googled five paragraph essay, and the computer spit back a bunch of different websites for me to check out.  The first one I choose to look at was called the Online English Tutor.  Interested to see if their interpretation matched mine, I clicked on the link.  What a shocker!?  While they had the topics for those paragraphs right, the rest of the material on the page was interesting, to say the least.  For me, that’s where the whole thing went you know where in a hand basket.

Most people who know me in my professional capacity know that I am pretty much a stickler for how the written word looks on the page.  Not just formatting, but also how the structure of the paragraph is developed and small things, like English grammar, word choice, and organization.  I am not stuck on some things, but I think that writing should make a point and get to that point quickly.  The sentence structure should build to a conclusion, and not wander around willy-nilly as if the text doesn’t really know where it’s supposed to be. Oh, and small things like complete sentences and subject-verb agreement ought to be followed, unless the author is trying to make a point.

But for the folks from Online English Tutor, English must be a second language, or maybe a third or a fourth.  If one was to follow the sample they promote and bring it to my class, I would have thrown them out a long time ago.  I would take the time to point out some of the issues, but it might be best if you just took a little read of this yourself.  Here’s their first paragraph:

The Introduction Paragraph:

I am a professional single mother, very busy and hard working with two daughters and demanding work, but I feel fulfilled. My profession and the motherhood for my beloved daughters gratify me fully. I begin my day with a good breakfast with my children. By 9:30 I am in my office where I work as a consumer advocate in the state governor's office for children products. All day my telephone rings, voice mails and emails swamp in, and I meet several people in the office and online conferences. In the meantime I write reports, media releases, letters and emails. After an exhausting work day, I do a lot of things to relax and at the end of the day I go to sleep happy.

I’m not going to bother to go through everything that’s bad about this paragraph.  The worst thing about it is that it appears on an Internet website under the heading Online English Tutor. For those who are really in need of help, this website will lead you exactly the wrong way.  On the other hand, if you don’t see anything wrong with the writing, then by all means avail yourself of the website. They also have web pages for sentence writing and grammar. Maybe something like this would be better:

The Introduction Paragraph:

As a single mother with two growing daughters and a busy professional job, it takes a great deal of juggling to meet my children’s demands and those of my workplace on a daily basis.  Yet that is exactly what I do, day in and day out. When I finally get a chance to rest, I do so feeling totally fulfilled and gratified.  Keeping up with my daughters alone might be considered a full time job.  But I get things started early with a solid breakfast and some girl-talk-time about their school day.  Within a couple hours; however, I am walking into my office where I work as a consumer advocate for the state governor.  There, I am deluged with voice mail, e-mail, snail mail, and a telephone that rings enough to be considered background music. When I have a chance to escape to the halls, the elevator, or even the ladies’ room, I often find myself pelted with this question or that suggestion, and then I get back to my desk just in time for my next appointment.  When I get a break, I write reports, letters, e-mail responses, and media releases.  Very soon the end of the day approaches and I am off to get my girls, stop by Am-Fam Fit for a short workout, and then home for dinner.  After dinner it’s homework, and, if there’s enough time, I watch a TV show with my girls, and finally we are all off to bed to get ready for the next day.

It’s the same information really.  But the presentation is a little better.  Good luck with your Internet research, just watch out for those bumps and bruises on the information highway.