Mouthwash, Ancestors and Chocolate

Ever noticed when you use certain brands of mouthwash, you feel like you need to brush your teeth again? No, well I thought I would share, as not much else is happening.

It is nice to have relatives stay at your house, especially if you only get to see them a few times a year but only if they are not annoying. When my grandma stays with us, we always get to learn something about other relatives, be they alive or dead. I never got to meet my grandfather, and it is nice to have such a close a secondary source. He would talk rarely about his time in the military with anyone, and if he did, he would only disclose facts that were already known; things like being in a foxhole for 3 weeks, and nearly having to have his feet amputated, or being separated from his unit and presumed dead for 2 months. Everything else that we know about that time comes from photos, and his last surviving sister who is now 90 something. All that we can tell from the photos, is that before he was drafted he was a smiling cheery lad, and after the war he never smiled.

Apart from his military experience, other things that I recently learned about him were that he dressed up for everything and even wore a suit to cut the grass and do oil changes. He also would not leave the house unless his clothes matched my grandma's perfectly. Something that really illustrates this fanaticism is that just before he died when the ambulance came to get him, he would not leave until his socks matched his shirt and he had made sure that he was not wearing the same clothes he wore on his last hospital visit.

One last thing I would like to share, is possibly where I inherited some of my dislike of taxes. My grandfather, who worked as a mechanic in the army until he retired felt very strongly that the government took too much of his money. Instead of actively campaigning for a more fiscally conservative tax code, he handled the problem a little more directly. During the night, when his workplace was deserted, him and his brother would show up in a large and stereotypically Italian black Pontiac and with plenty of trunk space, and help themselves to light bulbs, tape, shower heads and hand tools and anything else that happened to be lying around his workplace. My grandmother will flatly deny that this activity ever took place, but that does not explain why her attic is still full of army cardboard boxes, or why my dad's pegboard in the garage has hand tools with things like "motorby 5, US Army" scratched onto them.

Apart from relatives, I had a good day at college. Unfortunately, during my class at 8, my professor put on possibly the most boring video about the history of New York ever.. I don't know about you, but whenever I am tired, I do not find watching the History channel to be a good way of staying awake.. Anyway, after my class, I drove to Cumby's. I was feeling adventurous, and so I tried some chai tea. Unfortunately, the machine was broken and I was startled to find that when I pressed the button for chai, sugar and powdered tea poured down my sleeve, and I was left holding a cup of hot water and cinnamon. This disappointment did not last, as I soon made my way to my awesome class, to find panpipes awaiting me. We had a guest professor, and he organized the whole class and taught us to play a Peruvian song. He then gave a highly interesting lecture about Peruvian instruments and tradition, with some very crude misconceptions about Catholic theology thrown in for good measure.

I could keep going on about my day, but I am not interested enough to tell you about it, and you lost interest a few paragraphs back, and are now only skimming. Tonight after dinner, which will be delicious, I am going to play American folk music.. I could tell you more, but I will not. Stay tuned.

KIA, KSC and Pete Seeger

So today is Sunday and the best way to tell this is by reading my post from Friday. It is now somewhat late in the afternoon and the best way to tell this is by reading all my posts, and realizing that they are usually posted around this time.

Today I woke up later than I usually do on Sunday's, as I had been out late the night before engaging in good behavior choices.

My parents got home at around 11 this morning, as they had been out to Herman's Hermits concert in Schenectady NY.. Sounds like some sort of operation... Anyway, they brought back delicious pastries, the like of which cannot be found around here, with the exception of at Broadway pizza.

Around 1, I drove my dad to Hartford CT to catch a plane to Holland. Before we had left, I had bought a CD by the Pogues, which to date is the worst album I have ever bought by anyone, with the greatest hits of Dion and the Belmonts coming in a close second. It turned out to be a very uneventful drive, and it only took about 3 and a half hours for the whole trip. I learned a few things from this trip, things that I mostly knew already: That people in Connecticut greatly enjoy not checking their blind spots before changing lanes, that in Massachusetts, construction sites and work zones are permanent fixtures and that Brattleboro VT is the most dangerous area to drive in within over 200 miles of where I live.

Sorry this has to be a short boring post about my day, but really what happens during my days is mostly what I do. No, that was not an error but a deliberate statement of fact... Tonight, I have a short paper to write, a small Turkish instrument to order, some more classifieds to read, a trip to the hospital to have my schenectady removed and a face to shave. Just remember that in the best of all possible blogs, all is for the best. C ya.

Tiritomba, Icons and Cactus Pears

It is the time of day when I have done just about everything else I had planned to do and am now ready to tell you about it.. Didn't that week go fast? I certainly thought so. I am now going to tell you of some upcoming dates on which you will have to go with out my literary cup of coffee, if you will.. Tomorrow and Wednesday are the only ones I can think of, and I will tell you why if you keep reading.. But I will probably have forgotten by the time we get down there.

Wasn't that weird?.. Yesterday I used a snow day as part of an analogy, and today was a snow day. I must have some sort of gift, or at least be able to set iGoogle as my home page. Friday is my favorite day at college, because I have my favorite class and no others, and I was quite peeved when I walked to the window and discovered that I would not be able to go.. However, I did enjoy going to sleep for another few hours.

When I woke up and made myself smell nice, I went outside and shoveled snow. It was the worst kind of snow; the kind that is far heavier than it looks, and when you scrape it away it leaves a slushy coating on the driveway that is like glass. I fell twice, and as our driveway is quite steep I slid a long way each time. It took almost two hours to clear the snow away.

After my snow clearing experience, I decided to go inside and start work on a paper. However, I managed to put this off, and instead spent an hour or two scouring the Internet for soundbites of cumbus. When I was done with this activity, I realised that it was no longer lent, and so I helped myself to leftover ziti and chicken. I then discovered that someone had shown my grandma you tube, which was a mistake as she now seems to be spending all of her time bestowing saint hoods on anyone of us who will show her a Frank Sinatra, Pavarotti or Englebert video.

Later I called the iMON and Serena and arranged plans with both. It was a good choice, as I am trying to cut back dramatically on texting, and because a day stuck in the house procrastinating is not the best of choices.

After dinner, which was delicious, I tried to learn the words to the rocky road to Dublin, and tiritomba, two very different songs indeed.. Now, my plans for the weekend are simple: Spend time with many different people, exercise, play music, go to church and write a paper about potatoes as well as thinking of different things to talk to you about besides calling people and the weather. Have a great weekend...................

Tea, Cumbus and Lillies

Another post?? Every day? He really must not have much to do at all/ respects his commitments... Not really either.. Or perhaps I am Trustibored.

Well, this morning before I went out to my first class, I opened some sort of envelope, and somehow inside were my tax returns.. My dad had kindly put my tax stuff in with his company's accountant, so now all I have to do is sign and initial to get my refund, which is bigger then I thought it would be. I also found out that I am still a tax deduction, which is nice to know. Something else I found out is that I will be getting ALL of the tax Vermont took from me back.. One might ask as I do, why they would even bother doing this, as the cost of taking my money and giving the same amount back is directly shouldered by Vermont taxpayers?... Still, who am I to question such a magnificent system..

Last night, when I was buying mandolin strings on amazon of all places, I saw what could be the best instrument ever.. It is called a cumbus (pronounced jum-boosh) mandolin... It seems to be basically a cumbus, which is sort of a Turkish banjo with an aluminium body, and it's neck is that of a traditional mandolin. Something else about it that I like is that the neck can be adjusted very easily, and is able to come completely off the body of the instrument. What is more, it is only $100, and it could possibly be a good use for some of my tax refund..

I haven't really talked about music with you much lately and the only reason I can think of for this, is because I have not really felt like it. Wasn't I cool the way I handled reparations in my last post? Anyway, back to the music. I have been playing a lot of it lately, and mostly with myself. I have been playing a lot of ukulele, which is very interesting and fun. Seriously, if you have ever thought about learning to play an instrument, but have given up/ don't have the time/ just don't think you can do it, then the ukulele is right for you. It is very hard to go wrong when learning, and when you have learned the basics, it can be just a casual activity or a full blown hobby. I own 2 ukulele's, one of them is a cheap Chinese plywood affair that I bought for the equivalent of $10, and the other is a descent $6o model made of solid woods. I recently put steel strings on the Chinese one, and tuned it to an octave above standard guitar tuning. At first I though that this would snap the neck in half, but that has not happened yet.. It's sound is still fairly ukulele-esque, but with a hint of mandolin.

Last week before Easter, I got the neck of my 12 string straightened. I know many of you are not that familiar with guitars, so it is hard to describe the feeling of playing an instrument with a freshly straightened neck. I think the best comparisons would be something like going to a La-Z-boy showroom and sitting in all the chairs after a 7 hour car ride/ taking a hot bath after a day of hard work/ waking up early in the morning and finding out it's a snow day and going back to sleep/ cracking open a can of something very cold on a hot day. Needless to say, I was very pleased, and played and am playing the thing incessantly.

As far as other musicians go, I have been going over to the Vickery compound to jam most weekends. Most of our practices are less than satisfactory, but there have been a few gems. We need a singer and a drummer pretty badly now.

I have been playing with my other group a lot lately, but now that Easter is over things will go back to normal. Something that I have really started to notice, is not that our leader is an amazing musician, but that he has the ability to hold all of us together. I noticed this most strongly yesterday, when he did not come to practice and it seemed like we were all playing different songs. I think it probably has something to do with respect, because we all know that he knows what is going on in any given song, and so he is naturally the one to look to when you are lost, but when he is not there everyone seems to follow themselves. Sort of like an army.

I am looking forward to telling you about the jum-boosh, even if you do not want to hear about it. Just remember that in the best of all possible blogs, all is for the best..

Il pulpo, Jerkey and Nirvana

Welcome back my friends, welcome back indeed. You are here, because if you were not, you would not have appeared as a profile view.

Today I was very pleased with myself for crawling out of bed at a respectable hour. To many, this would not seem like much of an achievement, and they would be right because it was not. However, that is not what I want to talk to you about.. I hate to talk about current events, because that is what almost every other person who was clever enough to discover this blogging service seems to do.. However, I feel I must, in order to have some content more relevant than falling asleep in expensive college classes..

Today, the former spiritual leader to one of our current presidential candidates was again outed for making racially insensitive comments, this time about Italians.. As a member of those "garlic nosed Christ killers", I think now is as good a time as any to express my views on race, focusing on slave reparations in particular..

Something you may have noticed if you have given any thought to it, is that a racial background is not something you really have any control over.. If that applies to me, and I can not be sure of this because I am using teenager logic, it must therefor apply to you too. That being said, there seem to be a great many people who are against this way of thinking.. One argument I often hear from those seeking reparations for slavery is that because you may happen to have been born to a family, or even a country that had profited from the slave trade, you owe something to the slaves, who by their suffering made your family/country rich, and because you were born to such circumstances, you owe pretty much all you have to those who created it hundreds of years ago...

This, at least to me makes sense on one level, but only if you were of the generation that directly used, and profited from slave labor, and you were to directly compensate those who did it. However, as I said previously, you and or I are not responsible for where, or who we were born to.. At the time of the African slave trade, which I by no means compare to the sufferings of my forefathers, half of my family were dirt poor peasants in Ireland, under brutal oppression as Britain's first "colonial experiment" where they remained until the early years of the twentieth century, while the other half were dirt poor peasants under the thumb of the Kingdom to the two Sicilies/ the Ottoman Empire.. Through the last few hundred years, I have had Black, Hispanic, Portuguese and English ancestors as well. My point is that reparations for slavery, even if you were to accept the premise that you are responsible for the conditions of your birth, are no longer viable or practical. Today, so many people, such as myself are for lack of a better word mongrels. Descendants of slave owners are now mixed with slave descendants, slave descendants are mixed with Native Americans, and Native Americans have casinos..... So who is to know, except from DNA testing who is who?

Besides all this, people of all races have been enslaved at one time or another.... Even now, slavery still exists, and because of this, I have a great plan... Why don't we concentrate on ending it now and forever, instead of trying to reconcile the irreconcilable wrongs of the past?

That is all for now.. If you were enlightened/ offended by my awful logic skills, please let me know..........

Limes, Taxes and Cologne

Hello and welcome to my second post. Feel free to share the wonderful new things you learn here with everyone you know or have known.

Today was a very good day. I did not have a class until noon, which was nice as I was able to continue my poor sleeping habits. I eventually woke up at 11:00, and had some pie for breakfast, after which I drove to school, and was taught how to develop a good thesis statement. As I already know how to do this, I ended up not paying much attention.. I did however start a tally of how many times a few of my fellow students would say "like" in any given sentence, which in retrospect seems stupid and self righteous, as overusing that word in casual conversation is something I am also guilty of.

When I got out of class, I went to Wendy's to get a cheese burger. Wendy was however not pleased to see me, as she had several other guests. After this, I went home to collect my fancy jacket and shoes, before making my way to a job fair at the Best Western.. There were many jobs available, but most of them were full time. I was offered a job at a dog track, which I applied for because it fits my hours perfectly. I also applied at the Time Warner Cable booth as an installer for this summer, which would be a nice job to have.

After the job fair, I picked my brother up from school and went home. When I arrived back at the house, I considered doing the homework I had been given in my one and only class. I however chose not to do this in favor of watching The Road to El dorado; a very old Disney movie.. It was entertaining. I then started this post, and then the BBQ and I cooked hot and sweet sausages for dinner. I then ate dinner, which was delicious, before resuming work on what you are now reading.

After dinner, I found out that I was no longer a tax deduction, which I hope was not my father' s way of telling me to start packing, and that the horrible state of Vermont will be sending me a refund check. I now dislike Vermont slightly less than before, but over all my opinion has changed very little indeed.

Now that you have stopped reading, I feel more free to talk about taxes.. From what I understand, a progressive tax code is based on one's ability to pay, and is nothing more than a redistribution of wealth, which one could argue, and I do, is nothing more than theft by a government. The whole Idea of stealing from the rich and giving to the poor does seem attractive.. However, something that many people fail to realise is that the majority of those who are now rich, were at another time poor.. One argument you could use in favor of a more progressive tax code would be that the rich have a duty to those who are not.. However, as soon as this idea is legislated, in my opinion it ceases to become genuine charity, and instead becomes legal theft of justly acquired property.. Of course one should help those less fortunate then one's self. To a person with any degree of moral fibre, this goes without saying, but using the power of government to help people, while stomping in the inalienable rights of others is confusing.... Well anyway, I deviated from my original point a ways back there in favor of hating on liberals and spewing traditional conservative American rhetoric..

It seems to me that though they may seem incompatable at first, the limited government/ individual liberty ideas of Thomas Jefferson and his ilk may be remarkably similar to socialism in intent, if not in practice. Both ideologies I think come from the idea that the only way we can be better is to help each other out. Well, that is all from me tonight, I am off to chill in Brewbakers......... Please do not be put off by my questionable politiking..... I still have a LOT of reading to do.. Have a wonderful day, because in the best of all possible worlds, all is for the best..

Octopus, Gummy bears and Charangos...

Today was not as awesome as yesterday. Last night, I had stayed up very late indeed, and this no doubt contributed to the noticable lack of awesome.....

I had 3 classes today, and I would like to update you on how they all went... Unfortunately I am unable to do this, as I slept through two of them.. I don't know what you think, but the day after any holiday celebrated by more than 2 thirds of the people in this country should be a national holiday.

My one and only class, which happened to be Spanish was not greatly taxing at all. It was a typical language class, which many of you have probably sat through, if not taught. Upon leaving my class, the homework from which being to write a fairy tale in Spanish, I decided to go visit my good buddy Serena... However, she was not home, and when I called her, I found her to be in the presence of certian people who's company I choose not to keep..

Upon returning home, I helped move stuff around my sister's room, after which I wrote a Spanish fairytale about Silvestre the Octopus, and then ate dinner which was delicious.

After dinner, I drove to church, which in my opinion I have been spending far too much time and gas doing lately, because my musical services had been requested. When I arrived, I found that we would be playing the horrible ultra modern christian pop classics, which I am by no means fond of, as you may be able to tell from the adjective I threw in back there. I however did not wish to appear rude, and luckily my excuse to leave miraculously appeared half way through the practice when I found that the event we were practicing for happened to be at the same time next week when I will be driving my dad to the airport in Hartford CT. I left and drove back home and cancelled my plan to hang out with Serena, without the problem of the disreputable company she keeps, because I was and am far too tired. I am now writing to you and soon I will be sleeping.. Have a great day and a happy easter. Please come back tomorrow when I will be discussing taxes and Vermont... C ya..