November 23, 2003

Gobble gobble:

    Saturday night I went to a Russian-Jewish wedding. My old coworker Alex married his long time love
at the Astoria Catering hall in Brooklyn. (Had it actually been in Astoria, I could have gotten really drunk
and dropped it on Danielle or Mikey) I had to drive, so it was a soda only wedding.
    And just for the record: I am totally wedding'ed out now OK? I've been to 5 (count 'em 5) weddings
this year. Don't get me wrong, they have been fun, but I'm the only schmuck who goes to a wedding by
himself. From now on, if I don't have a date for a wedding, I stay the hell home.
    These Russian Jewish weddings are funny because they have a cocktail hour before the ceremony.
After an hour of hors douvers, they bring you in to a chapel. It takes about a 1/2 hour to get everyone
seated, then the wedding party is announced as they walk down the aisle. There is an MC that sounds
like he's alot of fun, except that he usually just speaks in Russian. But he does all the announcing.
    The rabbi spoke in a very deep voice. I thought he sounded a bit like Cardinal Eagan, but others said
he sounded like Michael (let's get ready to rumble) Buffer. He kept it short and sweet and in English.
    The ceremony was nice, then they led us back to the reception room. From there, they brought in
plates of food. You don't order dinner, they bring food and you either are daring and eat it, or smart and
stay away from it. (Actually, most of it was pretty good, but they also had tongue and something that
resembled pork, which was strange.)
    When the band wasn't playing, they tossed in ABBA's greatest hits CD. At first it was OK, but I must
have heard "The Winner Takes it All" about a dozen times. That's a bit too much.
    There were plenty of attractive girls there, but most of them looked like they were under 18, so I
stayed away. Alex wanted me to line up and attempt to catch the garter. He had the MC call me "Beeely,
BEEEEly" he kept screaming. I didn't want to do it because I felt like an idiot standing there. The girl who
caught the bouquet was beautiful, but young. It was a moot point because I didn't come close to
catching the f-cking thing, but there was so much young talent there, I was afraid I'd get in trouble. The
ones that were close to my age, were unfortunately with escorts, so I was out of luck. I took off at 11,
though the party was going to go on all night.
That was it for the weekend.

News Item: Bush in London:    My support for the war in Iraq has faded some since the summer. To me
anyway, it has become apparent that although they planned this war for over a year, that they made
several miscalculations and had no solid exit strategy. By declaring major combat operations over,
President Bush left our troops open to daily attacks without the proper authority to fight back. Only now
are the coalition troops hitting back hard.
       About the only factor that is keeping me in support of the war, is that by going against it, I'll join
Sean Penn, George Clooney, most of Europe, and a whole bunch of other anti-American weenies who I
have no respect for.
         I was in a hot debate with some psycho in an anti-Bush chatroom who said "we had all this support
after 9/11 and Bush pissed it all away." I argued that was nonsense. Sure, there was some sympathy, but
there was also an awful lot of "well, maybe they had it coming" and "we've had it alot worse" coming
from Europe. And this didn't start with Bush taking office either.
     On August 17, 1998, I flew to Ireland. That night, President Clinton addressed the nation and admitted
to the Monica Lewinsky affair. Having never been overseas, I wondered how much play it would get over
there.
It was on the cover of EVERY newspaper in Ireland and England.
    They loved Bill Clinton over there. Some of it was because he helped broker the Good Friday peace
accord, but mostly because they looked at him as a joke. In turn, he made America into a laughingstock.
     So now Bush is in charge and has since 9/11 over thrown the Taliban in Afghanistan and Saddam
Hussein's Baath party in Iraq. And now that Europe sees that we can't be messed with, they're back to
hating us again.
     I know I have gone on about this over and over, but I was reminded anew of this after seeing the
mass protest in London this past week. Bush was over there on an invite from the Queen. On Thursday
night, British protesters pulled down a fake statue of Bush, mimicking the famous image of coalition
forces pulling down a statue of Saddam back on April 9. You have to be a MORON, to think that
Saddam Hussein in power was a good thing. And it seems like there are plenty of morons around
especially in Europe.

News Item: More trouble for Michael:
    Michael Jackson once said "I love children because they are so innocent. A child has never hurt me,
never lied to me, never deceived me or said any bad things about me like adults do.
I can dig that.
    One night, after a particularly bad day at the office, I went over to see Auggie and Mary. When Auggie
opened the door, Brendan did a little dance, then ran over to me and gave me a hug. He didn't ask me
for a resume, or demand to know my future plans. He didn't care how much money I made, or that I was
hopelessly single. He was just happy I was there.
     But when Jackson starts talking about how he lets kids sleep in his bed while he's in it, that's when I
flip out. They say they can't throw him in jail for that, but they should. They should also toss the parents
of whoever these kids are in jail. I'm not a parent (and may never be one) but common sense would
dictate that you might want to keep your kids away from the Neverland ranch.
    If Jackson is convicted of these latest charges, the sentence will carry a jail term of 3 to 8 years. 3 to
8 years? If it were up to me, I'd cut whatever is left of his wee-wee off.

News Item: JFK blown away

    Saturday marked the 40th anniversary of what was probably America's darkest day before 9/11. The
TV has been filled with specials commemorating the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. I
watched a 3 hour special on the History Channel about his campaign and administration. I knew that he
had some physical ailments, but I had no idea that he had received last rights 3 times. He took a slew of
prescription drugs, enough to keep Rush Limbaugh happy for a few weeks. He took a shot of pain killer
that was good for three hours when he met with Soviet leader Nikita Khruschev in Vienna in 1961. The
meeting lasted 5 hours and he was in unbelievable pain.
    Other shows tackled whether or not JFK's murder was a conspiracy. I didn't get to watch as many of
those shows as I would have liked, but the one theory that has been gaining more and more momentum,
is that Kennedy's vice-president Lyndon Johnson, was behind  the conspiracy. To be honest, I don't
even want to think about that possibility.
    At the wedding I was at Saturday night, I commented to the mostly Russian crowd how Alex and
Aelina chosen November 22 2003 as their wedding date, the 40th anniversary of one of the saddest days
in U.S. History, the assasination of President Kennedy. President Kennedy was the man you might
remember, who told you people to take your nuclear weapons and get the hell out of Cuba    or else!"
Alex didn't appreciate that too much.

Congratluations to Ellen and Carl on the birth of their son Connor
Happy Birthday to Ann Marie Haley (Sunday) and Zaharah (Monday)
And Happy Thanksgiving (Thursday)
Have a Great Week
Wild Bill