A Staring Contest?

I can't remember the last time I was in a staring contest...before the one I had with my boss this morning.

Oh, yeah. It was the last one that he and I had. Sheesh!!!

He's my hero!

It's Football Time in Tennessee?

I just really have only one question for Tennessee's new head football coach:

Who will be assigned to teach him the words to "Rocky Top"?

(You know he doesn't know them.)

Coach Fulmer

Far too many Tennesseeans are elated at Phillip Fulmer's end of career announcement to suit my taste. Many, who have been calling for his head for years, are thrilled! (They think they know so much.)

I remember what Davey Crockett said when he was turned out of Congress by the good, but fickle, people of Tennessee. He said, "The Hell with Tennessee! I'm goin' to Texas!"

I wouldn't blame Coach Fulmer if he said the same thing.

"Turn That Perry Como Down!"

I was, let's say, a different sort of child. Some children are pier oriented and some are parent oriented. I was decidedly the latter.

While my brother was listening to KISS, Bad Company and ACDC, I was listening to Glenn Miller, Tommy Dorsey and Harry James. I liked Country & Western and some of the heavier stuff popular with kids in my day, but much preferred the voices of Ella Fitzgerald, Tex Beneke, Ray Eberle or Frank Sinatra.

One of my top favorites has always been and always will be Perry Como. I loved his music and never missed any of his t.v. specials, Christmas or otherwise, that came on the air. His smooth, sonorous and superb voice is one I always was desirous of emulating.

Mom & Dad had a copy of Perry's greatest hits on an old LP from the fifties that I just couldn't get enough of. It had great songs like, "Till the End of Time," "Hubba, Hubba," "Prisoner of Love" and many more. I would play that album over and over and over until I had every word of every song memorized. I would come home from school every day and toss my favorite record on the turntable, crank it up and jam with Perry for hours. I couldn't get enough of it!

I had been on this Perry Como kick for, I suppose, a couple of months when an interesting event happened. One day, per my routine, I was listening to Perry and singing along for what was probably the third flip of the album. I was thoroughly enjoying myself!

I reckon Dad, although a fan himself, had had enough of the repetition. He looked at me with serious intent in his eyes and said, "Son, don't you have anything else you can listen to?"

Sitting in the living room, witness to this event, was my Mom. She showed her great insightfulness and wisdom at this point. She just raised her head up from whatever it was she was doing, looked at Dad and said, "Floyd...leave the boy alone."

Today, I watch my beautiful and brilliant thirteen year old daughter grow in mind and stature. I try to introduce her to and familiarize her with all kinds of music: Bluegrass, Rock, Classic, Country & Western, Gospel, Contemporary Christian and more. As I watch her again and again pop her Carrie Underwood cd's into her player and listen to them again and again, I can't help but think, "Daddy...leave the girl alone."

Undeniable Truths

Rush Limbaugh has his Undeniable Truths of Life. These are some of mine.

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1. There is a God and He does care.

2. Nothing you buy can make you cool.

3. Whenever a teenager says, "My parents just don't understand," it's always trouble.

4. You never really and truly know a man until you work with him or for him.

5. If you demand respect and loyalty, you'll only receive fear and contempt.

6. You never find a deposit you forgot to record, but you will find checks you

forgot to record.

7. The ones the Lord can't humble, He humiliates.

8. Some jobs are best left unfinished.

9. It's o.k. to regret mistakes, but where you are today is a direct result of all

the decisions of your life, good and bad.

10. Utopia has always been and always will be enforced at the point of a sword or

the muzzle of a gun.

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If I come up with other "truths" worth recording, I'll ad another post later.

My Boss...My Hero

I love my boss! He's my inspiration!

We were having our weekly b..., I mean, sales meeting at the start of our fiscal year a couple of months back. He announced that we had set a record; that was our best year ever.

He said, "We'll never do that again." Then moved on to whatever the next topic might've been at that time.

What a great leader of men! Wow!

Stupid People and their Stupid Dogs

People say that we pick dogs just like ourselves. I think that their is quite a bit of truth in that, but, even more so, we pick our dogs the way we imagine ourselves.

Personally, I own a Basset Hound. His name is Mac. He is gentle, lazy, good with kids, lazy, loud at times, lazy, wary of strangers, lazy and is generally useless. Did I mention, lazy? Yes, Mac and I have much in common.

On the other hand, I see energetic people with terriers, organized people with setters and country people with other hound dogs. It's not hard to see why different types are attracted to different breeds.

Still, I see lots of wimps, losers and veritable white trash with highly aggressive dogs they try to pass off as pets. You know, Rottweilers, Pit Bulls, bulldogs of various sorts and sometimes, Dobermans. The owners of these "fighting" dogs generally seem to have delusions of grandeur that are far above the pathetically below average existence that they often endure. Usually, their choice of canine is no more than a compensation tactic for deficiencies they likely have elsewhere.

I see sad little people with these potentially vicious dogs claiming them to be even family members. They drone on and on about how good they are with the children. They yack about how they play and romp even with their toddlers and are cheerful and never have even threatened their masters' offspring. They even brag about how they are protective of the little two-legged pals. (They don't notice that all their talk about "protective" is an allusion to the dogs' potential for violence.) Would you not keep a violent family member at a distance from your loved ones?

I subscribe to the local paper and keep up with the local news and, on a more or less regular basis, read or see reports about dog attacks on an adult or child. Mostly, this, of course, ends in the death of the victim and, as it should, the death of the attacking dog.

Now, in all the attacks I've read about or seen on the news, I've yet to read or see a head-line that says, "Child Killed in Vicious Basset Hound Attack!" Nope, not even one time in my fifty years have I heard, read about or seen a Basset Hound attempt to harm anyone. They are one of the loudest dogs, especially considering their short stature, and are excellent trackers, but the man must have been considering their breed when he said, "His bark is worse than his bite."

Many will argue that it's nurture, not nature that makes the "fighting" dog violent. I agree that this is a part of it. No one could imagine Michael Vick throwing a Basset Hound into a pit with another dog for the sickening thrill of seeing them rip one another to shreds. Yet, too many of these people are picking these breeds for their aggressiveness, size and as a means of protection. So, they are de facto admitting to their nature and history of violence.

How many times have I seen the after-the-fact interviews where some toothless wonder says, "I don't understand. He was always so gentle with the children. He was our pet." For example the one woman who left her toddler in the bedroom with the child while she slept. The dog made short work of the child and no one knows yet what set the dog off. Also, my neighbor, who made the local news when their pit bull did in their grandchild who got too close to her pups. They only took their eyes off the child "for a minute" they sickeningly bemoaned. Sheesh!

Sure, if you own a junk yard or a meth lab, I'm sure you need an aggressive dog to do cheap guard duty. Shepherds and such make great police dogs. Any dog has it's value when used in the proper venue. All animals, when treated with respect to their needs and potential dangers are safe. Sometimes, only safe at a distance. God never intended for lions, tigers or bears to be family pets.

My father was an avid fox hunter. Who could tell you more about dogs, especially fox hounds, than you wanted to know. It was amazing to listen to these dogs follow their nature, howling through the hollows of East Tennessee chasing foxes and, to Dad's chagrin, the occasional deer.


Obviously, most of these aforementioned dogs never hurt anyone. They go their entire lives making their owners happy and many are good-looking, well colored animals. I understand the Dog Whisperer says there are no "bad" dogs and he understands that he has to train the owners even more so than the dogs. Yes, it usually is the problem of an owner who rears his dogs no better than his children. Amazingly, people who can't control their kids think they can control their animals.

Dogs are more like guns than anything. They are useful, beautiful, sometimes loud and potentially extremely dangerous, but when treated with the respect they deserve, are completely safe. You wouldn't stand on the business end of a loaded weapon or let your child play with it. Neither should you let your child play with a dog that could do at least as much damage as a mishandled gun.

Dad understood that dogs have nature than can be tuned and molded to man's needs and desires, but they would always be what God made them: animals. Nothing more, nothing less.

Moral Truths...Good Advice

Here's another list of what I think are undeniable truths. Maybe I'll have even more later? (These are not necessarily in order of importance.)


1. Be respectful to people who lift things for you.

2. Don't abuse your rank or privilege.

3. Always memorize something: scripture, poetry, songs, etc.

4. Be patient with elderly ladies.

5. Make music...not just on the radio.

6. Love to read...almost anything will do.

7. Count your blessings.

8. Remember, just because someone doesn't argue with you, doesn't mean that person agrees with you.

9. Listen to your children's stories.

10. Don't expect more loyalty than you give.

Pirates, Soldiers, Punks & Wannabees

OK, so if you've been in the Special Forces, or, at least, in the Armed Services, you might, might rate a tattoo. Perhaps, even if you've been in jail and got one of those "jailhouse" tattoos, that might make some strange sense. Yet, I see what are nothing more than punk wannabees, struttin' their stuff in sleeveless shirts, shining taboos that any little wimp can get for $50 or $100 at any bacteria filled tattoo shop.

O.K., so if you've crossed the equator for the first time on a pirate ship, you might rate wearing an earring. Maybe, if you're a guy trying to send signals to your boyfriend, then that might even qualify you for one. Yet, I see, what are nothing more than punk wannabees, struttin' their stuff with their little earrings, nose rings, eyebrow piercings and, who knows what else pierced, like they are just the cutest or toughest whatever on the planet.

O.K., so if you're an out-of-work vagrant who hasn't earned a red cent in years and you just don't have the money to buy new clothes and you generally get yours out of the dumpster rather than off the rack, you might qualify to have your pants falling down around your knees. Yet, I see, what are nothing, apparently, more than bum wannabees shuffling around with a cell phone in one hand and holding up their pants with the other thinking they are the "hippest cats" on the planet.

O.K., so if you look like Britney Spears, (or at least, how she used to look,) and you want to go around half-dressed, you might get away with that. On the other hand, if your "muffin" is hiding the giant-size belly button piercing that you are so proud of and it can't be seen even when you're wearing a mid-drift, you might not have the sex-appeal you think you have.

O.K., so I'll never be on the cover of "Vogue" and I'm no fashion plate. I suppose I've never been much of one to follow trends and have always been happy "in my own skin." Sadly, these days, modesty is virtue that is forgotten in a world that has forgotten the word "virtue."