MadameBastet-Firing-Neurons

You Gotta Laugh Some of the Time, Or You'll Be Crying All of the Time

Oh my little blog peeps, right about now you're probably
wondering, where oh where has MadameBastet's sanity gone?
She's really gone off the deep end o' the tepid pool this time.
Ranting and raving about doctors and her country...even ranting
on Steve Kilbey's blog! Ah, I gotta apologise, life got the better of
me for a bit earlier today. At the end of the day, I stepped in gum,
and started laughing hysterically. It was just so fitting.

You see, I'm going back to school for the second time after
high school. This is hard for me. I was all nestled in my comfort
zone, teaching art history to petulant, rude college students, but
I couldn't get a full-time job and I couldn't take not knowing
whether I'd have one class or three from semester to semester
anymore. But because I love teaching and believe strongly in
education and the need for good, dedicated teachers, I decided
to go and get my credential. I just never imagined in a million
years all the hoops I'd have to jump through - just to be accepted
into a credential program! I haven't even started it yet. Take this
test. Take those tests. Take these classes, but not before taking those
classes. Take this test after that class. And if you don't read Mr.
Kilbey's blog (shame on you) I found out today that I'm going to
have to be fingerprinted AGAIN just to become a substitute
teacher. This will be the third time I've done this. And they make
you pay for the application to get fingerprinted, they make you pay
to get fingerprinted...pay pay pay. I'm really not independently
wealthy. My trip to Chicago has been generously financed by a grant
from the Mom Foundation...because I think she knows this is
important to me, and she knows I need a break before starting the
Grind. Plus she probably figures it's an early Christmas present too.
REALLY early. ;)

I had a mandatory meeting today at CSUN (the college I will be
attending the next two years, please learn and remember this, haha).
It was OK; I knew I wasn't going to learn anything new, but I went
because I had to. Which reminds me, I need to order my textbooks,
which I can do online! That's pretty cool. The less contact I have with
the public, the happier I am. My but I sound so anti-social! I just
need to remember the kids. The kids. My kids from my school last
semester. I looked at their pictures again and I thought, this is why
I'm doing this. And again with my stubborn personality. Go ahead -
throw more obstacles in my way. Make me jump through hoops!
Start bringing out the clowns, put up the tent. Oh it's a circus all right.
But that just makes me all the more determined to get that credential
if it's the last thing I do!

Sure, I might end up in an insane asylum after all is said and done,
but I'll be ready to teach after a few months in a straightjacket, I'm
sure. I've had desk jobs/office jobs/what have you. I was a music
publicist. I worked at Disney. I can't take it. It's just my personality.
I gotta keep moving. I gotta be interacting with people. Learning and
education are two of my favourite things in the world. And I don't care
how someone educates themselves. Broadening your horizons via
reading, travel, school, what have you. It's all good. I think things will
settle down once I start school. I admit it, I'm scared. I'm back at the
same school, ten years later, but I think I'm more scared now than
when I was there to get a Master's Degree.

So anyway, Zoe is having her surgery tomorrow. ALL FOOD has
been put away. I made sure the cats stuffed themselves silly before
8pm tonight. I have my second appointment tomorrow with my
pain therapist. I'm actually looking forward to it. It's not like the
usual therapy I've had. It's all about dealing with my physical
pain and the impact it's had on my life, and is still having on my
life.

The heat has abated a lot here, but my God, those poor souls
in the east. I can't believe the Church decided to tour America
during the summer. Well, it's not their fault it's the Summer from
Hell. But Steve is sure cranky. I spoke with my brother today;
he's going to the show in Atlanta. We were just praying Steve would
make it through - selfishly, at least to Chicago, haha. I'm so looking
forward to meeting the girls - the LADIES - and hanging out. I am
NOT looking forward to the plane ride. I know myself. The minute
that plane takes off I will be saying "Shit! Why did I do this! I don't
want to die for this!" Haha. No, it'll be OK. I go through it. I survive.

I have just finished watching Season 1 of Entourage. Holy cow
I love that show. After having worked in the entertainment
industry, so much of the show is RIGHT ON THE MONEY.
Someone called it a "Sex and the City" for men.
Uh oh, there we go again. Must be my testosterone acting up. I
can't help myself. And I'm not even doping!

Haven't paid much attention to the news. I figure
the war's gonna go on without me. I was too wrapped
up in my own little dramas today. Well, I wish this
was more exciting. I guess all that energy I blew
earlier has tired me out.

BTW, I didn't have it out with the doctor's office.
I left them an explicit message to call me back.
I decided it wasn't worth the energy it would
cost me to deal with these morons. And they never
did call me back. Can you believe it? I fired off one
of my hot missives to them, sent them 1/4th of
the bill. I told them it took them 5 months to
bill me and so I'll pay them in installments over
a 5 month period. Sent it certified mail. I'm not
worrying about it. I still hate doctors for the most
part though. I have a fairly decent general practioner
that does my blood work to check my liver and
kidneys because of the medication I'm on. But
even he is a pain half the time.

I'll be hanging out at my mom's tomorrow
while my precious angel has her teeth extracted.
I've got to get my sister-in-law a birthday gift.
Her birthday is Monday. I used to be so on top
of things. I was never late with gifts. Now I feel
like a flake, a slacker. I've moved from a Type A
personality to a Type A- personality, haha.

Ok. I rented a documentary on the movie Deep
Throat. Don't ask me why. But I'd better go watch
it before the Blockbuster goons come out and take
me away in the night.

Is everyone else as tired of hearing about Mel
Gibson as I am? Damn, the man gets drunk one
night and spouts his big ugly mouth off and we hear
about it for days. Which reminds me. When I was a
senior in college -- this was about 1989 or so...I left
class one day and was filling my tank up with gas at
the 76 station in Malibu (I'm sure you can figure out
where I went to school if you haven't from previous blogs
already.) Anyway, I'm standing there, totally spacing out,
waiting for my tank to fill, when this black Mercedes
pulls up. Out of the car steps this gorgeous guy. He starts
to pump his gas. We look at each other. He has the most
amazing blue eyes. He's stunning. I realise it's Mel Gibson.
I don't know if he could tell I'd just realised that, but he
smiled at me. I think I half-smiled back - what a dork
I was. And to think...all these years later, he's still hanging
around the same restauraunt in Malibu, drunk and spewing
hatred in a drunken rage. Aside from his anti-Semitic rant,
is anyone else the least bit concerned that he could've
killed someone driving at night on PCH drunk? Hell, driving
stone cold sober on PCH in the daylight can be dangerous
enough. Ah, how times change....

Photo: Corbis Royalty - Pacific Coast Highway - Scene O' Many Crimes

MadameBastet-Firing-Neurons

My Country's Fucking Me

Can I just say I HATE THIS BLOODY
FUCKING COUNTRY!
It's a three ring circus!
And Bozo the Clown is taking us all on a ride
to Hell.

MadameBastet-Firing-Neurons

Physician Heal Thyself

Two blogs in one day. It's that kind of day.
It started out nutty, it's ending up cranky.
My friend Ilkka is graduating from Pepperdine
Saturday. He stayed home from work today
and took us (his wife and I) out to lunch. Then
we had some ice cream from Cold Stone Creamery.
Mmmm. Then we went to the book store. That's
a really good day to me; eating ice cream and looking
at books.

Then I come home and get the mail. In the mail
I get a bill from the rheumatologist I've seen 3
times in the last 5 months. The bill is for $409.62
and is - get this - 90 days overdue. Naturally I am
LIVID. It was after 7pm though, so all I could do
was leave a nasty, cold message on the answering
machine. I have not been billed by this office since
my first visit in February. I kept thinking that was
odd. But what was I supposed to do? Call up the doctor
and beg for my bill? I was billed for almost $400 worth
of blood tests by the hospital near his office; I figured
I was paying for all my tests. The bill they sent out today
DOES NOT explain ONE bit what the $409.62 is for.
It doesn't say anything. It just says I owe them money.
I had to go into my medical file (yes, I file everything,
I am anal) and look at my insurance papers to figure it
out. I love playing fucking Columbo with jackasses in
doctor's offices who don't know how to bill people correctly.

I figured it out. They are billing me for every office visit
and even MORE blood tests - everything since February,
which was my first visit. They have waited 5 fucking months
to bill me and drop it all on me at once, AND tell me I'm
late with the payment, when I have NEVER EVER EVER EVER
received ONE BILL from them. I do NOT let my bills lie
around for 90 days. I always pay my bills on time. ALWAYS.

I hate doctors. I hate them, I hate their nurses, I hate
their staff. I hate their smug, self-righteous demeanors.
I hate their bullshit, their inability to say the words "I
don't know." I have sadly been seeing doctors since January
of 1994, one month after I got fibromyalgia. I have seen
more doctors than I can count over the last 12 1/2 years.
Most of them in the beginning were either arrogant,
supercilious jackasses who either told me this was all in
my head and I was just 'depressed' or they told me I was
screwed for life.

In the beginning I was in so much pain I could barely
move. I was nauseous I was in so much agony. I would
go home and sit in the bathroom on the floor, trying not
to throw up. Or I would throw up because I hurt so much.
Not one doctor ever tried to alleviate my pain. I didn't
know what to do back then; I'd seen my father in chronic
pain and he was addicted to Vicodin. I didn't want to go
down that path so I didn't ask for narcotics. Not once. But
not one doctor seemed to care about trying anything else
on me to relieve my suffering. Because you see, if you're
not dying, if you don't have objective blood tests coming
back with objective results, they don't care, and they don't
believe you. Oh, your blood work is fine. There must be
nothing wrong with you. I don't care if you tell me you're
in agony. I don't care if you tell me you're practically
bed ridden and have had to drop out of school. Oh your
neck hurts? Have a little physical therapy. We're not
going to treat you, because you're not dying - hell,
the tests say you're not even sick! Anecdotal 'evidence'
means shit to doctors. Doctors do NOT listen to patients.
They do not HEAR what the patient is saying. And if they
do, they DO NOT CARE. The patient obviously knows
NOTHING about what's going on in his or her own body.

If I did have a doctor listen to me, they gave me
all sorts of crazy-ass remedies to try. And I was desperate
enough to do some of them. Weird drinks, vitamins,
all sorts of tests on my hair, skin, everything. You're
two quarts low on iron and yes, you could use a pint
of blue-green algae as well. You say your hands and feet
are tingling and your spine hurts? Hmmm. Well, that's
all. I'll see you again in 6 weeks.

Western medicine is good in a crisis. It's great if you
break a bone, need a heart transplant. But GOD FORBID
you get something that they can't quite figure out.
Now fibromyalgia is well known, and pretty much
accepted as a real illness by most sane people. For the
doctors who think it's imaginary, I only hope they
would get it for just one year and then tell me what they
think. I went to this last rheumatologist because four
years ago, after my sinus surgery, I started having other
immune-system symptoms. Sore throats, more fatigue.
My ANA tests were coming back positive - meaning my
immune system was attacking something - something
that isn't there. It's essentially attacking me. But they
can't figure out why. I've been tested for every disease
you can think of - and I don't have any of them, thank
God. But it sucks to feel shitty. And THEN to TOP it
ALL off, I get a BILL from these idiots for $400.
I don't have that now. Great timing! I book a trip
to Chicago, all hell breaks loose with my finances.

I cannot WAIT to talk to the idiot who did this
billing tomorrow. They are going to be really sorry
they billed me this way. They will get their money -
one month at a time. I will pay them a certain amount
every month. They take 5 months to bill me, I will take
5 months to pay them.

I have hit the wall. I know someday I will need a doctor.
I know I will be thankful I was able to go the doctor. But
I have never, never, never really met a doctor I liked.
One doctor at UCLA told me she had lupus, and to suck it up.
One doctor said I wasn't sick, I was having issues with my
mother. How many doctors just thought I was a depressed,
hysterical woman?

I will say it. Doctors are necessary. But by and large, I
hate them with a passion. Western doctors can kiss my
ass. This last doctor hands out pills like they're candy.
Ironic, since in the last 12 years I couldn't get ONE doctor
to give me ANYTHING to ease the pain, the muscle spasms,
nothing. No, strike that. One doctor wanted to give me
speed. Yes, speed. He gave me a prescription in triplicate.
One copy went to him, one went to the pharmacy and one
went to the DEA so they would know I was taking speed,
legally. Fuck that I said. The DEA is NOT going to monitor
any part of my life (this was pre 9/11 when I actually thought
we still had a modicum of privacy left) and I am NOT taking
speed, no matter how tired I am. Idiot!

My current doctor seemed nice at first; a lot of them
do. Then they turn out to be pill-pushers or just slackers
who want you out of their office if they can't fix you.
Luckily I monitor my own pill intake. Perhaps it's a good
thing I had my father as an example, because I don't want
to be some prescription drug casualty. He gave me sleeping
pills. He gave me tons of stuff I don't even take. I don't want
my body full of pills. But it's easy to write a prescription out
and say "goodbye" isn't it.

I have started seeing a pain therapist for the first time in
12 years. It is the only way I can deal with my pain in a
more positive way. I am finished with Western medicine,
as far as the fibromyalgia is concerned. Done. Finis.
Finito Benito. Oh I'm sure I'll need a doctor at some point
in my life for something else. But I probably won't like him
or her or it. I used to joke I'd been through the medical mill.
But it is a mill. Between the doctors and insurance companies
it's a sick, greedy, twisted mill of avarice, insensitivity and
cruelty. Pray to God you never get caught up in this mill.

I think of all the times I was so scared, so sick, sitting in
a doctor's examining room, basically wearing a large
napkin while the doctor 'examined' me and then proceeded
to either insult me, dismiss me or send me home with
false hope based on their own twisted medicinal
remedies. Bedside manners like pitbulls or socially
fucked-up morons. No more. No more, no more, no more.
Physician, go fuck thyself.

Photo: The Greek physician Hippocrates; he actually held the belief that the body must be treated as a whole and not just a series of parts. Too bad doctors have chosen to ignore this.

MadameBastet-Firing-Neurons

Feline Famine

Ladies and gentlemen, we've all seen it.
The horrific famine happening as we sit in
the comfort of our own homes...in Darfur, in
Niger...bulging bellies, shrunken, tiny forms,
heart-breaking images of starvation that haunt
us and seemingly never end.

However there is a little known crisis and situation
happening right here in America. It could be happening
in your own home. It's feline famine. Yes, it may not
be as obvious as the crises in Africa, but it's real.
We don't see bloated bellies, or flies crawling on faces.
We HEAR the agony of these poor creatures...
deprived of food sometimes as long as two or even three
hours. We hear the insane meowing, the wailing, the howling;
we are forced to watch the hideous pacing back and forth
in the kitchen. Their eyes are WIDE with stunned shock
and horror. We know what they're thinking. They are
thinking, "WHERE IN THE HELL IS MY BOWL OF
KIBBLE YOU BITCH!" Why, why, why did you take away
that last bit of dried, crusty wet food I could've eaten!
Oh god, is that food? No. A piece of lint. Well, as a last resort...

The images are often so heart-wrenching we must look
away. They walk about, unstable, dizzy, they collapse
onto the bed, onto your 1000 thread count sheets and
gaze at you with huge, sad eyes, pleading eyes that say:
I AM STARVING WENCH!! I have not eaten in three hours.
I need, at the very least, a Temptations treat. What are
you, a sadist? Come on woman, I'm not gonna make
it here. I'm losing the will to live.......

Zoe, my beloved child, was going to have dental surgery this
morning. I kept ALL food away from both cats after 8pm last
night for fear she would eat something. Fletcher barely made
it through the night. I thought about hooking her up to an
emergency saline IV drip. Chicken-flavoured saline. Available
now at a pet store near you in case of these emergencies.
Zoe paced and cried. She hadn't eaten her dinner by 8pm but
it was too late. I could see her shrinking through the night.
In the morning, like a bag of bones, my poor children weak and
dazed, watched me get ready. Fletcher howled in the kitchen.

Then. Fletcher screams louder. It was the crack of dawn; I had
to take Zoe in for surgery. She hides under the couch. She
knows what's about to go down. I'm almost ready to go.
I take a stupid risk and let Fletcher eat some dry food in
the kitchen just to get her out of my incredibly thick and
beautiful hair and SHUT HER UP. Then I see it. Oh god. No.

ZOE! Zoe is in the kitchen near the dry food. DAMMIT!
I didn't catch her in time. My fault. She was so hungry her
hunger overcame her fear and she crawled out from beneath
the couch. I have no idea if she ate any dry food. I don't think
so. I call the vet. They have to reschedule the surgery for
Friday. FUCKING CAT!

No. I cannot blame the cat. It was I who stupidly thought I
could get her in the carrier before she saw the food. I made a
grave miscalculation. And now, here I sit, early in the morning,
dressed, light make-up on, and I finally was able to feed both
cats. Two whole cans of wet food! A big bowl of kibble! Come on,
stuff your sad, skeletal, sunken faces! It warmed the cockles
of my heart to see them chowing down so heartily. And just what
are cockles anyway? Greedy monsters.

Feline famine folks. It's real. It's here. It's a crisis too
often ignored. Please, please, give if you can. Anything.
A can of Fancy Feast. Note: My strange cats hate all fish.
No salmon or tuna. They prefer chicken and turkey. Beef
as a last resort. The only kibble they will eat is Deli Cat.
We're accepting donations until the end of the year.

DAMMIT DAMMIT DAMMIT! I had my day all
planned out. I wanted to get this surgery over with.
Now we alllllllllll have to wait until Friday. I will NOT
make this stupid mistake again and leave any food out
while trying to get Zoe ready. Hunger beat fear. And now
their bellies full and distended, worn out and tired from
several hours without access to any food, they collapse
in a sleepy heap on the bed and sleep like the dead. All
is well in the world now. They have eaten. An in an hour
they will eat again. Speaking of food, I'm up now....going out
for breakfast doesn't sound half bad. Hmmmm.....

Photos of the famine: Oh get real, do these two look like they're starving?

MadameBastet-Firing-Neurons

Hail Augustus

The first Emperor of Rome, formerly known as
Octavian, grand-nephew of Julius Caesar, was
purportedly a lucky man in what is now this,
the 8th month of the year, obviously named after him.
Yes, we call this month August, and with
it comes the waning, unofficial last days of summer,
although with this crazy weather, we can expect
the wretched bloody heat well into October, if
not November. Ah, there's nothing like an 85 degree Thanksgiving.

I fell asleep on the couch earlier tonight and now
I'm awake and it's after 3am. I ate much too much
chocolate, which is unusual for me as I'm not crazy
about chocolate. I have to really be in the mood for it.
Everything in excess with the food! Aristotle would've
just been so irritated with me. Everything in moderation
my dear, even moderation. Ha, I'm irritated with
myself.

Took the cats to the vet over the weekend. Well,
actually Zoe ended up seeing two vets. After 11
years, I now realise that wasn't a great idea. Zoe
let it be known after getting a rabies shot, a
thermometer up her kitty behind, lights shone into
her eyes, her heart monitored, her ears looked
out, her mouth pried open (which revealed two
nasty cavities) that she'd had enough....by starting
the loudest fight I've ever heard with her sister
in the examining room. I normally take both girls
to the vet in the same carrier and have had no
problem. Zoe turned into a wildcat, thrashing and
screaming and scaring us all to death. Poor Fletcher.
She did get one good swipe in, right across Zoe's
nose. I stood there, with Gena, and did nothing.
Hey, I value my hands people.

Zoe has to have dental surgery Wednesday morning
to extract her two teeth. They tried to get blood from
her on Saturday but holy shit! The sound that came out
from the back of that vet clinic was not animal, not human.
We all just stood there and stared at each other. I considered
bringing a priest in. When a big, burly male vet tech brings
your cat out and says, "We're not getting any blood today"
you know you've got a tigress on your hands. God I hope
they fare better with her on Wednesday morning. Poor baby.
Now she's alseep on the bed, on my pillow, looking so cute and
innocent. She's not fooling me anymore. I should keep one eye
open when I sleep.

So a lot of things are happening this month. I will find
out if I passed the Test from Hell on the 21st. I am flying
to Chicago on the 16th to meet up with H and S, and to see
the Church as a real live fan, without having to work the
merch table. I won't be a 'merch wench' as Heather so
aptly put it. I must also somehow extract another hug from
Rob Dickinson, and convince Steve I am NOT stalking him.
I've never done anything like this; it feels a little strange, but
exciting too. Since I saw the Church at the first two shows,
I feel a little robbed...as they seemed to hit their stride
on their third show, haha. Missed the boat. I only hope
they still have enough energy for us when the 18th
comes around. Although a less-than-stellar Church
concert is better than any other concert I could ever
see. I also want to visit The Art Institute while I'm in
Chicago. I've always wanted to go there; they have
such amazing pieces of art - pieces I taught for years
but haven't seen in real life.

Speaking of my teaching, I ran into a former student
today in a card store. I heard this tiny female voice say
"Professor_________" (the line being my last name
which y'all aren't getting here) and I thought, "Oh wow,
someone else has my last name" which is pretty nuts
because I've never met anyone in almost 40 years
who shares my last name. I forgot who I was once, ha.
She was really sweet; she told me she and her friends still
talk about my class and how much they enjoyed it. We talked
about what each of us were doing. Gena managed to really
embarrass me by waltzing up and telling this girl how I needed
to hear this as "she feels she hasn't made a difference" or
some such litany of my personal insecurities. I wanted to
kick her in the ass, frankly. I kept saying, "Gena, Gena,
GENA" louder and louder as if to say, "SHUT THE FUCK
UP PLEASE." I mean, Christ, who wants their former student
knowing all their personal feelings of potential career failure
and insecurities? Wasn't that nice of my friend? I'm so pissed
at her. Lately she's been on my fucking case and I've had it. I can
tell a 'talk' is coming. She really has no right to judge me on my
career, or feelings about such career, or work at all. What would she know
about work? That sounds terrible but it's true. She's
almost 43 years old and has never had a real job in her life. She
rides the lazy wave of her husband's efforts and even though
they're having financial problems, she refuses to get a job. God.
Who needs enemies when you have friends willing to blast it all
over the mall what you really feel like inside all the time. If I want
to tell people, that's one thing. But I don't appreciate my friends
(I'm starting to use that term loosely here) telling strangers things
I tell them in confidence. Or what I thought was confidence.

I have to go to her husband's graduation on Saturday at Pepperdine.
I kind of dread this, for personal reasons. He is getting his MBA, which he
got while working full-time, an impressive feat. But every time I go back
to Pepperdine, I am overwhelmed with emotion. It is my alma mater,
and also the place where I lived out some of the best, and some of the
worst times of my young life. They're having the ceremony in the same
place I graduated all those years ago. I don't know why I get so emotional
there, but I do. Funny. I'll probably cry and it won't even be about him. The
past often has a hold on me and it's hard for me to go back, whether it was
good or bad. This is probably why I'm not fond of people from my past
crawling out of the woodwork, contacting me and wanting to rehash shit
that went down years ago. When I walk away from something or someone,
I normally do not want to go over the situation in all its minutiae. Get it?
Got it? Good. :)

Anyway, I felt sad telling my former student I wasn't
teaching art history anymore and why. It was only a
couple of nights ago as well that I checked my old Yahoo
email address and found another former student had
written me, telling me my class had completely changed
her LIFE (geez!) and how she wanted
to study art now, blah blah blah. Wow. Very nice. It's nice
to know you've made an impact on people's lives. It's sad
because teaching art history is definitely my first love, but
I cannot make a living at it. Some things just sucketh.

So I am going to start school yet again at the end of this
month, for my teaching credential. I have about 10 million
birthdays to remember this month as well. I swear, I've
never seen so many people who have birthdays in August.
November must be a really sexually arousing month for
couples. My grandma, aka, The Immortal, turns 93 this month.
My other grandma, who died in 1995, would be 106 on the
16th. I miss her. A lot. My mom turns 67 and we're all already
feeling the heat from her on this one. She is really bitter about
getting older. It's a bitch, no doubt about it. But what's the
alternative? Well, look at my dad. He'll be 53 forever. That's
the alternative.

I hate summer. I'm never sorry to see it go.
It can't go fast enough for me. Especially this
summer, with its brutal heat and odd humidity.
Autumn has always been my favourite season,
which is odd, considering we don't really have
very distinct seasons where I live. But if you
look around, we are surrounded by trees whose
leaves change, and become wildly colourful.
Occasionally we might even get a cool, crisp day.
In my youth, I remember actually frost and cold
days. Global warming has taken care of that. I like
the clothes of autumn, the smell of autumn. I even
like the Santa Anas, although they always seem to
bring the inevitable fires. This is when I wished I
lived in New England or some place where I could
really have an authentic season. Maybe someday.

Augustus was that rare emperor who ruled
quite successfully, and died in his own bed. So
many of the Roman emperors, especially during
the dark days of the end of the empire, were
killed, assassinated, committed suicide or 'forced
to commit suicide.' I love that last one. I always loved
that nut Nero, who said, "What a great artist dies in me"
before kicking it. What a moron. Augustus brought about
the 200 year period called the Pax Romana, or
'Roman Peace.' Peace in Rome. What did that mean?
They only conquered and slaughtered a few
thousand people, as opposed to hundreds of thousands?

Perhaps it is Augustus and his diplomacy we need now,
heading into the 3rd week of war in the Middle East.
Sadly, I fear nothing will ever stop the Jews and Arabs
from fighting. The hatred, deep-rooted and seated, the
fear, the self-righteousness of both sides...they are going
to dig in until every last one of us is somehow directly
or indirectly killed by their insane hate. I fear it will be
some crazy terrorist group that gets the bomb.

CNN did a special today on the question of whether
these are the true 'end days' - as in the Biblical end
days. I am either going straight to Hell, or I'm totally sane,
because watching preacher after preacher screaming
about being ready for the rapture, and being taken up
any moment, Armaggedon, the Tribulation,
and the Seven Years of Rule by the Anti-Christ kind
of cracked me up. I think Paula Zahn was having trouble
taking it seriously too. Well if it's happening and I'm laughing
and damned, then so be it. I can't stop any of this shit.
At least I'll go out with a smile on my face.

Photo: Augustus, first emperor of Rome, nee Octavian