Regarding hurricane coverage ...

I've let this issue simmer for quite some time now. I needed to give it some time to sit so I could better control the vitriol and present a more logical argument.

What the fuck was up with the coverage provided by CNN and Fox News — and any other news broadcasts — of Hurricane Katrina's actual onslaught? Not the leading-up-to stuff, not the follow-up reports, but the actual "storm coverage."

It was completely irresponsible, foolish and dangerous! There comes a point during a hurricane or typhoon when you get the fuck inside, batten down the hatches, and just try to keep safe. When you have reporters in the field — OUTSIDE — when deadly winds and storm surge have started, you are just tempting fate. Not only does this endanger the reporters' lives, and the lives of the cameramen and other production people out there, but it sends the exact wrong message to the general public: That it's not so bad to be out in the middle of the fucking storm, so why not try it yourself.

I've been through dozens of powerful, deadly typhoons, many of them as a working journalist. You don't send people into destructive winds or near churning storm surge. You don't send people out even during the eye, when all seems calm. Because if you do, people can be seriously hurt or even killed.

It galled me to see a reporter who could barely stand in the wind say, "Whoa! That was a piece of the roof that just whipped by me."

Umm ... what if it had whipped into your face? No one has the reaction time to duck debris being blown by gale-force winds, and the faster the winds, the worse it gets. Do you know what a piece of roofing tin, or a tree branch, or a fucking lawn chair can do to you if it hits you at 60, 80, or 100 mph?

Don't give me the public's right to know either. I'm in the media, and the public's right to watch deadly storm footage ends when the lives of those relaying those images and descriptions are endangered. The news networks should be ashamed for how they covered the storm's onslaught. It was dangerous, reckless and just plain stupid. I was almost hoping that a reporter on the air would be seriously hurt or even killed live. What the hell would the jackasses in the studio have done then?

"Carl, it looks like you got hit by something. Are you OK? Carl? We're getting word from his cameraman that a piece of steel just sheared the top half of Carl's head completely off. We'll come back to that situation in a little bit. And now, what is the proper headgear for a storm? A cap? A hood? A rain bonnet? We'll talk to our style guru and get you the answers right after this commercial break."

Random Guam Fact Of The Day:
• Guam has some of the strictest building codes in the United States, being in a zone that experiences both regular, powerful typhoons and frequent, powerful earthquakes.

What I love about women ...

yes, it's another list. I like lists; they appeal to my anal-retentive tendencies.

• The way they kiss ... so soft, like butterflies touching down on the petal of a flower.

• The way the smell when they're wrapped in your arms.

• The way they breathe your name into your ear, their lips just brushing against the earlobe; hot, sweet breath making the hair on your neck stand up.

• The leaning of her head on your shoulder while watching television.

• When they really laugh — not that girlish giggle or the polite lady-like laugh, but the gut-busting guffaw, even if (or maybe especially) she snorts.

• The way she moans your name, a thanking soft croon of appreciation, after she cums ... and of course the gasping, yearning cry of your name as the climax builds.

• Earnest flirting.

• Soft skin.

• When she looks into your eyes and just holds your gaze.

• When she does something you know she doesn't really want to do, but she does it anyway because she knows how much you like it ... especially if she doesn't hold it over you at some future time and date.

• How they save what might seem to you to be the most insignificant, transient things, like a ticket stub from a movie, or a letter from long ago.

• Tits. And, need I say, nipples. Wonderful, beautiful breasts. (Sorry, had to put something super-macho manly in the mix).

• That every once in a great while, one of them likes you back, and in the same way you like them.

Random Guam Fact Of The Day:
• Guam once held the world record for the largest great white shark caught by line and tackle. The monstrous fish was on display at our airport for years.

Posting a very strange and funny song

OK, so while I was watching my The Muppet Show: Season One collection, this hilarious song that I'd totally forgotten about was performed. It was written and originally sung by the comic legend Ray Stevens. Enjoy.

I’m My Own Grandpa

Many, many years ago when I was twenty-three
I was married to a widow who was pretty as could be
This widow had a grown-up daughter who had hair of red
My father fell in love with her and soon they too were wed

This made my dad my son-in-law and really changed my life,
now my daughter was my mother, cause she was my father's wife.
to complicate the matter, even though it brought me joy,
I soon became the father of a bouncing baby boy.

My little baby then became a brother-in-law to Dad,
and so became my uncle, though it made me very sad.
for if he was my uncle, then that also made him brother
of the widow's grown-up daughter, who, of course, was my stepmother.

Oh, I'm my own grandpa.
I'm my own grandpa.
it sounds funny I know but it really is so,
oh, I'm my own grandpa


Father's wife then had a son who kept him on the run,
and he became my grandchild, for he was my daughter's son.
my wife is now my mother's mother, and it makes me blue,
because, although she is my wife, she's my grandmother, too.

Now if my wife is my grandmother, then I'm her grandchild,
and every time I think of it, it nearly drives me wild,
cause now I have become the strangest case you ever saw
as husband of my grandmother, I am my own grandpa!

Oh, I'm my own grandpa.
I'm my own grandpa.
it sounds funny I know but it really is so,
oh, I'm my own grandpa

I'm my own grandpa
I'm my own grandpa...
it sounds funny I know
but it really is so
oh, I'm my own grandpa

Random Guam Fact Of The Day:
• The traditional Chamorro greeting is "Hafa adai!" It loosely means the same thing as "Aloha!" It's pronounced "hah-fa uh-day." Mauleg'ka? Ha'a, mauleg!

Five things I find objectionable

thanks to the tag by the tall sassinator ...

1. Censorship. Ummmm ... it's just a fucking video game, OK? I guess people have been running out of books to burn.

2. The quality of drivers that motor vehicles allows on the roads. Idiots. So many fucking idiots.

3. About 20 percent of the things my government, both local and federal, chooses to spend taxpayer money on. Do we really need to spend $1 million for multiflora rose control? Or $8.5 million for economic analysis of food and agriculture policy? C'mon.

4. Fanatics. There's something highly disturbing about a person who won't change their minds no matter what, even if a vast preponderance of evidence proves them wrong. "Ain't no way we come from monkey!"

5. Society's current fascination with 95 percent of all "reality" television. Please just fucking strangle me. I'd rather watch "CSI: Albuquerque" or "Law & Order: Animal Control" than this other shit.

Random Guam Fact Of The Day:
• Supertyphoon Paka, which hit Guam Dec. 16, 1997, recorded gusts of up to 240 mph. That's not a typo. Two hundred forty miles per hour.

optimism is for suckers ...

the only problem with hope is having it quashed. crushed. obliterated. cremated. expurgated.

the amazing thing about the human spirit is that, eventually, we recover from that. we regain the ability to hope, to look forward with positive feelings and wishes and dreams.

only to once again be emotionally mangled. brutalized. decapitated. butchered. demolished.

and still, once again, though it takes a little longer, once again you dare to hope. you're a little more trepidatious this time; more cautious; more careful. but you still let it happen. how can you not?

foolish.

your heart is blistered. broken. bereaved. afflicted. smashed. pulverized.

fuck it.

Random Guam Fact Of The Day:
• Guam is an island.

It's time to play the music/It's time to light the lights/It's time to meet the Muppets on the Muppet Show tonight.

The Muppet Show was one of the best things on television when I was growing up. It was a funny show with funny puppets ... and it was on at night! What? Not a Saturday morning show? It's on at night? For us kids? COOOOOOL!!!!

Over the weekend, I purchased — and watched — The Muppet Show: Season One.

As funny, if not funnier, than I remembered. A lot of differences too. Remember, this was the first season ever, so many of the Muppets are less refined. Miss Piggy, for example, isn't her elegant and beautiful self, or at least not the bombshell she was to become. And Kermit was just plain against any kind of frog-pig freaky farm fornication. Dr. Teeth was there, but the leader of the orchestra was some conductor. Wayne and Wanda — how did I ever forget them.

No Beeker. Only a few glimpses of the brilliance that would become the Swedish Chef. Some very unknown guest stars, even for that day and age. I kept going, "Who?"

A little bit of out-of-sequencing stuff regarding Scooter, his uncle and his employment. The original janitor, modeled after an old man instead of whatever the janitor guy eventually became. Also a wardrobe mistress that I had forgotten.

I can't wait for Season Two through Season Five to finally come out.

DZER gives The Muppet Show: Season One the highest possible rating — 5 DZERS!!

• Random Muppet Show fact: The Muppet I most look like would have to be ... the bald professor ... crossed with Sweetums. Wocka! Wocka!

• My favorite Muppet of all time: ANIMAL! ANIMAL! Others in the running: Kermit (he is a journalist, after all), Sweetums, the two crotchety old men.

• Favorite Muppet Sketch: Tough one ... probably Pigs in Space.

Random Guam Fact Of The Day:
• Guam became a U.S. Territory via the Treaty of Paris, following the War of 1812, in which Spain had its ass handed to it bigtime and lost the last vestiges of any kind of colonial power status it may have had.

Things that make me ...

Happy:
• A day of golf with my friends.
• A night of poker.
• A good massage
• Playing with my godsons.
• A great meal interspersed with great conversation with friends.
• Being kissed.
• Being praised for my work.
• A call from my mom.

Mad:
• Bad drivers.
• Idiots.
• People who are rich who don't deserve to be.
• People who are poor who don't deserve to be.
• The quality of our politicians.
• Gas prices.

Meloncholic:
• Thinking about my dad and missing everything about him.
• When the guy gets the girl in the movies, where in real life it would so not happen.
• That I don't smoke any more.
• "Two Out of Three" by Meatloaf.
• Being in bed alone on a rainy weekend day.

Excited:
• Getting an unexpected peek.
• Hitting the gutshot straight on the turn.
• Holing out a long birdie putt that I never imagined being able to make.
• Fingernails scratching my scalp.
• The Bears winning a game.
• A package arriving in the mail.

Random Guam Fact Of The Day:
• Guam wasn't allowed to elect its own governor until the 1970s.