Sorry I haven't read all your posts or made comments or replied to something you wrote on my blog.  I have been feeling strange today and I just am coming back from throwing up massive amounts of blood.  Off to the hospital I go!  I will get back.

I found these words while going through my library last night because I couldn't sleep.

In a Period of Pressure
It seems that most of us feel that we are living in a period of pressure-a pressure that seems to be felt at every level of life: the pressure of complexity, the pressure of anxiety, the pressure of responsibility, and the pressure of competition, which is perennial and ever-present-for whoever finds something bigger and better is going to find something still bigger and still better.

And one result of pressure is is impatience-impatience with all of its side symptoms: quick judgment, quick temper, quick criticism-which are so often in evidence from person to person, both in private and in public places.

We often aggravate and irritate each other.  We all have better days than others, and some that are worse; and times when we wish we hadn't been so sharp, times when we wish we hadn't been so selfish, times when we wish we hadn't been caustic and critical; times when we say some things we we wish we hadn't said and make decisions we wish we hadn't made-followed by times to ponder and times to repent.  And likely there never was a time within the limits of this life, when men individually or collectively couldn't find much to criticize, much to misjudge, much to misunderstand. 

Even in families there may be much to misjudge.  Sometimes children are misjudged as to the real reasons for their times of temperament-and parents may be misjudged in the matter of alleged preferences in disturbing privileges and penalties.

People are not perfect; they are not omniscient; they make mistakes-and simply have to do the best they can, with all the circumstances considered-which calls to mind, from Abraham Lincoln, a single significant sentence: "I do the very best I know how-the very best I can; and I mean to keep doing so."  And this is a plea, in an age of pressure, in an age of impatience, in an age of anxiety, to be more understanding, more reserved in judgment, more willing to withhold criticism until we know more fully the facts-and to be a little more kindly and considerate in all relationships of life.

The Lord God after all is the judge of all of us-and while the rest of us may reserve the tight to criticize, we ought always to do so with some awareness that we seldom know the full facts.

Impatience: As a Mark of Immaturity
A thoughtful physician once said: "I used to think of impatiences as simply a natural part of some people's personality, but over the years I have come to conclude that habitual impatience is a mark of immaturity."

The pressures of life are on all of us at times, and often it would seem that these pressures are the cause of impatience.  But there is also something of a cycle- for as the pressures increase impatience, impatience increases the pressures-and impatience on the part of one person causes impatience on the part of other people.

Tense nerves, caustic comments, blaring horns, and black looks, and sometimes bad language, are both symptoms and results of pressure and impatience, as we say things we shouldn't say, and do things for which we are soon sorry.

Robert Browning wrote: "The thing I must pity in men is-action prompted by surprise of anger."  And Aristotle offered this observation: "Anybody can become angry- that is easy; but to be angry with the right person, and to the right degree, and at the right time, and for the right purpose, and in the right way-that is not within everybody's power and is not easy."

Too many of us often are too touchy, too quick to retaliate, too quick to shoot back sharp replies.  True, there is pressure; there is competition; and often there are seriously pressing problems.  But impatience is seldom the answer-for the person who lives impatiently is himself increasingly uncomfortable and adds to the tension and tempers of everyone around him, and often creates serious hazards for himself and others also.

The whole temper of the times suggests that we relax a little and give ourselves time to think fairly and judiciously before we jump to quick conclusions and lose our tempers and show our immaturity with rude utterance or ill-considered action.

In the words of Peter, who had to learn the lesson of patience: "...make every effort to add to your faith goodness; and to goodness, knowledge; and to knowledge, self-control; and to self-control, perseverance; and to perseverance, godliness; and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, love."  And finally, remember that petty and impetuous impatience is a mark of immaturity.

PS: Does anyone else feel the pending doom of Xanga which will happen in a few days?  I think this cute baby contest will create the drama the likes of which has never been seen on this site and may cause Xanga to implode and form a black hole.

PPS:  How do you timestamp?

I am not doing a celebrity round up this week.  Sorry.  There just wasn't enough material so I suppose next week I may do two entries or just one mega entry. 

In lieu of a celebrity round up I am going to post one of my current favorite songs, "25 Minutes to Go". 
The version I am going to share is by Pearl Jam.  It was originally sung by Johnny Cash.  I have never been able to find a studio version of the song.  My searches have only led me to his Folsom prison concert.  At a certain point in the song, the inmates were so uproarious that you can't hear Johnny's singing. 
"25 Minutes to Go" was written by Shel Silverstein and is called gallows humor because it is a song about a stressful or life changing event.  Well that is fitting because this song is about a guy walking to the gallows to be hung.  This song is supposed to occur in real time.  Whenever I listen to it I get this sense of urgency as the time dwindles down.

Here are the lyrics:

They're buildin' the gallows outside my cell.
I got 25 minutes to go.
And in 25 minutes I'll be in Hell.
I got 24 minutes to go.
Well, they give me some beans for my last meal.
23 minutes to go.
And you know... nobody asked me how I feel.
I got 22 minutes to go.
So, I wrote to the Gov'nor... the whole damned bunch.
Ahhh... 21 minutes to go.
And I call up the Mayor, and he's out to lunch.
I got 20 more minutes to go.
Well, the Sheriff says, "Boy, I wanna watch you die".
19 minutes to go.
I spit in his face... and I kicked him in the eye.
I got 18 minutes to go.
Well...I call out to the Warden to hear my plea.
17 minute to go.
He says, "Call me back in a week or three.
You've got 16 minutes to go."
Well, my lawyer says he's sorry he missed my case.
Mmmm....15 minutes to go.
Yeah, well if you're so sorry, come up and take my place.
I got 14 minutes to go.
Well, now here comes the padre to save my soul
With 13 minutes to go.
And he's talkin' about burnin', but I'm so damned cold.
I got 12 more minutes to go.
Now they're testin' the trap. It chills my spine.
I got 11 minutes to go.
'Cuz the goddamned thing it works just fine.
I got 10 more minutes to go.
I'm waitin' for the pardon... gonna set me free
With 9 more minutes to go.
But this ain't the movies, so to hell with me.
I got 8 more minutes to go.
And now I'm climbin up the ladder with a scaffold peg
With 7 more minutes to go.
I've betta' watch my step or else I'll break my leg.
I got 6 more minutes to go.
Yeah... with my feet on the trap and my head in the noose...
5 more minutes to go.
Well, c'mon somethin' and cut me loose.
I got 4 more minutes to go.
I can see the mountains. I see the sky.
3 more minutes to go.
And it's too damned pretty for a man to die.
i got 2 more minutes to go
I can hear the buzzards... hear the crows.
1 more minute to go.
And now I'm swingin' and here I gooooooooo..

We all know the old saying surrounding Christmas: "It's better to give than to receive."  However true that saying may be, there is a part of me that craves Christmas presents.  I always love getting "toys" be it electronics, tools, stuff for my car, movies, music, books, or actual toys.  Then there are they things I don't care for such as school supplies, clothes, socks (although this year my parents found me some thermal socks in my size so I am pleased), and ties.  One year of teaching at Christmas, I received 25+ ties from my students. 

I was watching A Christmas Story yesterday morning and the scene that always makes me laugh no matter how many hundreds of times that I have seen it is when Ralph receives the bunny suit from his aunt.  He then is forced by his mother to don this pink outfit and model it for the family. 

This scene always reminds me of the one gift I received that still makes me cringe.  When I was about ten, I had just gotten a pet cat.  For some reason one of my aunts thought I had a pet dog.  She usually sent me the coolest presents but this year she tried something different.  She was going through a phase of making her own clothing or buying clothes and "bedazzling" them but necessarily with rhinestones.  I was set to receive one of her projects.

Christmas Day morning comes and I run for the Christmas tree to see all the wonderful presents that Santa brought.  Yes, Santa.  I knew better but every year my mom hides the presents and labels everything I receive from her and my dad as being from Santa or my cats.  The tradition was that I opened the presents from my family first.  So I am clamoring for my one aunt's present because they were always the coolest.  My dad fishes out the present and hands it to me.  I rip away the paper at light speed and undid the tape holding the box shut.  Then...my heart sank.

I looked inside the box.  A sweatshirt?  Was this some sort of sick joke?  I hold it up and shake it hoping something cool would fall out.  No such luck.  My mom looks at it..."A SWEATSHIRT!  WOW!"  The front was facing me.  My mom asks, "Is there anything on the front?"  I am shocked and my Christmas is falling down around me.  I look in horror at the front.  I turn it around to reveal the front to my parents. "OOOOOHHHH!!!! A Scottie dog!  How cute!"  I am near tears.  My dad says, "Go try it on." 

I walk to the bathroom in disbelief.  I hear my parents talking about how lucky I am to get such a pretty sweatshirt.  I look in the mirror and I am in this walking comatose state.  I look at the front.  The Scottie dog was mocking me.  It was sewn on by hand.  My aunt couldn't have just sent me a nice blue sweatshirt, NO, she had to sew on a fuzzy Scottie dog.  It just looked at me and laughed at me for expecting a cool present.  A fuzzy Scottie dog.  How is that possible when we told her repeatedly that we just got a cat? 

Like a trooper I put on the sweatshirt.  I walked out and showed off the sweatshirt along with my utter contempt for this horrible present.  My mom is squealing about how cute it looks on me and my dad is talking about with such a great sweatshirt like that, he will be able to keep the furnace turned down the rest of the winter.  Tears start flowing out of my eyes and I collapse.  A panic attack or maybe it was just an overload of contempt.

I took off the sweatshirt and threw it under the tree and then proceeded to open my cool presents.  After all the presents were opened and I was in a state of orgasmic bliss from my new MASK, Ghostbusters, and G.I. Joe toys, my mom told me that I should call my aunt to thank her for the sweatshirt.  Knives through my heart.  I made the call and I should have been nominated for an Academy Award for saying how much I loved the sweatshirt and how much I loved Scottie dogs.  I hung up and thought that I would never have to worry about that sweatshirt ever again.

A few days pass and it's time for school to resume.  My dad asks if I want to wear my new sweatshirt to school.  I say, "No, I don't want to ruin it and we have spaghetti for hot lunch so I don't want to stain it."  So I wear my regular school clothes.  School went by and we all had fun talking about all the new toys we received.  I got home that night and all hell broke loose.  My mom was screaming about how I didn't wear my new sweatshirt to school.  I said it wasn't cool and Scottie dogs were for "fags" (little did I know what that word meant in third grade).  My mom said I was wrong.  She made me wear it for that evening's activities, Lutheran Pioneers.  Lutheran Pioneers is the Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod's version of Boy Scouts.  See, our church is against the Boy Scouts because of their policy on believing in a "god".  Please don't comment about that.  I was just a little part German boy following orders.

For being a Lutheran organization, you wouldn't expect kids to make fun of you for a sweatshirt, but they did.  I walk down with the pastor's son and he ran away from me to get to a table of our classmates and the pointing and laughing began.  Scottie dog sweatshirt!  HOW COULD YOU DO THIS TO ME????????  I tried to tune it all out but it was horrible.  We had our devotion which gave me a brief respite from the ridicule of this ridiculous sweatshirt.  Then we had to walk past the Girl Pioneers and the laughter was worse.  No more kissing underneath the jungle gym for me all because of a stupid sweatshirt.  After two hours the ordeal was over and on the ride home I was crying and thinking the world hated me and that the only way I could continue life without dying was to transfer to a new school. 

The next day at school my friends greeted me with, "Hey, did you walk your dog last night when you got home?  What do you feed it?  Did you name it?"  I screamed an obscenity I learned from my father and threw a Bible at one classmate.  The teacher took me to the principal's office where I had to explain myself as the principal who sat there behind his desk smoking his pipe and as I suspected was trying to hold back the laughter at my Scottie dog sweatshirt.  The only advice he gave me was to never throw a Bible at someone.  He called my mom and she came and got me.  I told her how everyone hated me now because of that stupid sweatshirt.  She then said that I wouldn't have to wear it outside of the house.  I buried it in my closet not to see it until 8 years later when my parents moved.

So this brings me to my question:  What is the worst Christmas present you have ever received?

I want to do a random photo post so here is a random photo post.

This is essential for the winters up here.  Now if only I could knit.  I would wear that all the time, even when I went to the bank.  I have this major question and I don't know anyone who works at a bank.  Could you walk into a bank in the winter wearing a ski mask and they wouldn't call the police?  This would be perfect for a bank robbery because they would think you had massive amounts of facial hair unless you are a lady but then I have seen a fair share of lady mustaches in my day. 

Someone was talking about buying one of these for Christmas.  Hope that worked out for you.

Him no eat cookies no more.  I was at the Walmart a while back and came across old school Sesame Street.  It has parental warnings.  Mostly because kids talk with strangers and cookie monster has an eating disorder.  WTF?  He never managed to get any cookies in his mouth.  If a kid overeats because of a TV show then that kid's parents should be imprisoned.

Well...I think we have found Chris Hansen's favorite restaurant.

Jokes at the expense of Hilary Clinton will never get old.

So I was rereading my post about smoking and then I started to get cravings.  I started looking up hookahs because I have always wanted one of those.  Then I came across bongs for tobacco purposes only.   Yeah, actually I found that awhile back but the site I went to had these in many shapes and sizes and colors.  Why would they sell those that curve?  Realism?

While on the subject of penises...here is a promo for the new HBO series, Hung.  Actually HBO is going to air a series called Hung and the premise is that a high school basketball coach has a massive wiener and he uses it to get ahead...yes, ahead...as ahead in life.  Get your minds out of the gutter.

Sack race?

Really?  Who doesn't?

I guess when life shoves a lemon up your ass, you make lemonade.

If you are Catholic and easily offended don't look down.

Did you listen?

OK this is that controversial Playboy cover that was condemned earlier this month.
 

Well I hope you enjoyed my random photos.

I hope all had a wonderful holiday escape.

Have you ever wanted to make a witty insult after someone said something to you but you couldn't come up with the proper words and ended up telling them to go perform a sexual act on themselves?  The French had a phrase to describe that but I don't speak French.  Instead I will let you study the 10 most devastating insults of all time. 

I bet some of you have done some air travel in the past year and some of you have plans in the upcoming months to fly the friendly skies.  I have heard that in the post 9/11 world the worst part of flying is the security.  Well here is a list of the seven dumbest things that airport security has done.

I post a lot of fun pictures on this site.  Well here are 7 images that are pretty badass.  Well it was just last week that #2 made my blog. 

I should have posted this link sooner but I just found it a day or so ago.  I think this classifies as one of those gifts for the person that is hard to shop for.  I would simply hand it back and say, "Refund!" 

The Smoking Gun has the 20 best mug shots of 2008 up on their site.  My favorite is #2 but I think that is because I am biased and from Wisconsin.  The funny thing about that arrest is that the costume was functioning and she was spraying people with bodily fluids.

I never knew bears were so complex.

Here's another site that I should have posted earlier.  When I was teaching middle school aged children, I came to detest Christmas because all day I was regaled with stories of what wonderful toys and electronic devices the children were expecting their parents to buy them.  One 5th grader received 2 ipods on Christmas, one from mom and one from dad.  It made me want to celebrate Festivus. 

I read this blog and it made me sick.  This is what is wrong with our government.  Hopefully it works for me.

Did you want a drum kit for Christmas and Santa didn't bring it for you?  Well here is your very own online drum kit.  Don't say I never bought you anything. 

My dad was telling me that his Christmas party isn't until the middle of January.  Well if any of you have upcoming Christmas parties and you are looking for the perfect drink, here's a list of Christmas inspired alcohol drinks.

My neighbors once pulled this with me.  They told me they were having a party and it was going to take up the driveway and block my garage and then they would also use my backyard.  So I said, "OK.  Do I need to bring anything?"  They looked at each other nervously and laughed and said I was funny.  A little piece of me died that day.

Bookmark this website because what this guy plans on doing sounds like one of the most clever things ever. 

Have you ever wondered how your salary compares with that of one of the players for the Cleveland Cavaliers?  Well now you can figure that out.  I really need to move to Cleveland and apply to play basketball.   

This website only works once a year.(Read the url first)

If your children ever ask you if The Simpson were funny, the blog gives you photographic proof that once upon a time, like 9 years ago, The Simpsons were in fact funny.

Well that is it for this week.  Hope you enjoyed.

I just wanted to be a little serious here and wish all my friends and enemies a Merry Christmas.  I hope that you and yours find a peaceful respite during this holiday season.  For those who habla espanol Feliz Navidad.  For those that sprech Deutsch, Ich wunsche euch ein frohes Weihnachten.

I hope my Jewish friends had 8 nights filled with mirth and craziness.  May you always land on gimel.  In case you are wondering why I posted all those pictures of the women dressed as Mrs. Claus, well I couldn't find any Hanukkah Hotties.  Hmmm...maybe I have found a new calling.  Anyway this is the only Hanukkah character I could find for you:

What a mensch that Hanukkah Harry is!

For those...

I could go for some hotwings about now.

Oh I did this last year...I was surrprised to see that Maury's show this morning wasn't his usual holiday specail where trannys and women are dressed in the holiday theme and the audience guesses if they are men or women.  He had kids in his studio to look at animals.  Tomorrow I am hoping for the Christmas paternity special.

In summing it all up, I hope that your Christmas isn't shitty.

Merry Christmas!

I found these last week and just had to share.

You can find more at her website.  Now it's time to go wrap presents.

I found this and now I have to share so after this entry I have one more entry before I gift wrap.

things you need (hartford )

in these troubled times we must repent! I have seen the light and it is glorious! I am embarking on a journey which provides no use for material items! my lifes belongings are free to the loving children of our lord jesus christ! so many things to see please call to see all the items! they must be gone by dec. 20th please call amber 413 363 7375 here are a few items i have pictures for! god bless

My question is, if you just found Jesus as your personal Savior, why would you be giving away his portrait?  Why give away that kick-ass guitar when you can use it to make Jesus rock?  Is the old man included?  He looks like the father from So I Married an Axe Murderer.  If I don't believe in Jesus, do I still get the items or should I just lie?  A tandem bike?  I am so traveling to Hartford.  So it was four questions.

Here is the rest of my tribute to Mrs. Claus.

Still have one more post than gift wrapping.

Oh porn from the 50s...so innocent.

Oh and speaking of porn...you may be wondering about these pictures.  Well you can find some nice ones here from COED Magazine, some naughty photos from the Nude X-Mas Blog, and a collection of ten of the naughtiest Christmas videos from Fleshbot(of a porn nature very NSFW).  Enjoy!