Yes, after the “lawyer walks into a bar” blog, I have learned that apparently I am a pig. And probably you are too, if you’re a man. Read on, and then you can comment on this yourself: are you also a pig?
Am I a pig?
Are the men who joked on the Thursday story about in-laws becoming outlaws with a knife also pigs then?

That lawyer blog (see link below) was written to celebrate that one of our fellows in this online community is marrying, and marrying a lawyer. Well, according to one posteress who sent me a rather nasty e-mail, I am a pig and don’t have a decent respect for other people, because I posted that! Now, the guy in our community enjoyed the humor on the blog, and said it was fine. But this posteress also made some negative insinuation about him regarding that too.

This posteress was expressing concern for the feelings of the bride-to-be. Honestly, if this posteress had been around when I got married, I think her ears would have painfully turned inside out, and not from the “piggish” men, but from jokes made by my wife’s –female- relatives. Those jokes were very sexual and were about a couple of my personal characteristics.

Where I come from and what I’m used to, there’s always a lot of humor when somebody gets married. When my father got married (yes that was the 50’s) his male relatives pulled a “shivaree,” where they set up all kinds of surprises for the newly married couple to find on their wedding night. This included the typical short sheeting of the wedding bed, changing the content of the groom’s shaving cream can, and other gags. So, when I got married, those jokes sure didn’t bother me, and I told my wife to just laugh with her female relatives.

Several weeks ago, this posteress wasn’t so concerned about the feelings of another when she organized a campaign to ostracize one poster who disagreed with what many of us were doing on a Marion-related blog that got semi-disappeareddeded (semi-deleted). After her nastygram to me, she’s probably already queenbeeing such a campaign against me, or will after the posting of this blog.

I posted the lawyer blog last week, and got her e-mail last week. I’ve waited one week for an apology or something, but nothing has come from her. That member of our online posting community isn't so thin-skinned, and his wife-to-be wouldn't be a successful lawyer if she were thin skinned.

Tim Allen, in his scholarly work “home improvement,” thoroughly demonstrated that all of us men do have an inner pig. But I certainly do not think I am a pig for putting up the “a lawyer walks into a bar” blog. It was simply meant in fun.

Here is an unedited excerpt from that posteress’ e-mail: “ … as I realize that you seem to hold a low level of decent respect for others in the same way my ex did. As my friend put it: Men really are pigs, they choose to ignore social decencies because it suits them, then band together to try to justify their disgraces to others, and thus ignore their consciences. He said it took him until he was in his mid 50's to become far less of a pig himself, … “

---So, are you a pig, sir? Am I? What about the humor that happened when you got married?

A member of our online community is marrying a lawyer.

I'm seriously hoping that the lawyers among us can share some wisdom for this soon-to-be-husband.

plus, we just don't see enough lawyer jokes, do we?

I could say please keep your entries brief, but I won't.

From the City of Lawrence:

Contact: Megan Gilliland, communications manager, (785) 832-3406

1) Citys pothole patching total up to 2,368

(Lawrence, Ks.) The City of Lawrence street division continued their assault on potholes this week. Since Monday, Jan. 11, a total of 594 potholes were reported through the citys online and telephone reporting systems. These notifications, and surveys by city crews, have resulted in a total of 2,368 potholes patched throughout the community over a two-week period. 85.5 tons of asphalt has been used to patch potholes throughout the community.

We have had three, four-person crews working each day to fill potholes,said Mark Thiel, assistant director of public works. At times, crews are patching the same potholes each day because of high traffic volumes.

One area that crews are patching on a daily basis is the area near the 2nd and Locust intersection. This area sees high traffic volumes daily and, due to construction, is the only access point into the city from north Lawrence. The roadway in this area is scheduled for maintenance in summer 2010.

From Gnome: 594 potholes reported.
2368 total potholes fixed!

Should we do something special for the 5000th pothole?

More snow is coming this winter. Should that winning pothole get a special decoration? Do the pothole patching crews sign their work?

In this blog, you can name your worst pothole of this season and tell why its the mother of all potholes.

public works reporting on the web is at: www.lawrenceks.org/public_works

There was so much care and concern posted for Rush Limbaugh under the article announcing that he'd gone to a Hawaiian hospital to have chest pains investigated. It seemed obvious I should post how to listen, so folks who are so interested could tune him in for themselves.

*You can hear his program live at 11a.m. local time on 980AM KMBZ (KC-MO). His is a three-hour program. KMBZ also repeats Rush's program during the night, like at 1a.m.

*If you have a good receiver or are up north, KFEQ (St. Joseph) 680AM runs his program on a delay beginning at 2p.m.

*on the web www.rushlimbaugh.com is a very informative site on all things Limbaugh. You can sign up to hear his program via the web, or support an overseas service person's subscription to the web broadcast. "Stack of stuff" has lots of great reading.

I was so happy that in all those 120+ posts that nobody posted things falsely attributed to Rush, actual lies, and some of his statements taken out of context. Just as some treated Sarah Palin with such respect, and did not post a virulent lie about her son not really being her son...but I digress.

The tolerant, prejudice-free, ever forgiving, liberals who always welcome people who publicly admit their adictions and get rehabbed. They were so forgiving of Ted Kennedy whose addiction actually killed somebody, so I was glad such care was extended to Rush in all those comments. I am also glad that the tolerant liberals of Lawrence join me in celebrating Rush's clean bill of health; his heart is apparently okay.

So, today you can tune him in. For many who sound off about him, it'll be your first time too.

Greenies apparently really lie, cheat, steal, lack altruism, according to a well operated study with good experimental design.

http://www.google.com/hostednews/canadianpress/article/ALeqM5h7Dfq54tFVb0RNXErzMP1FwxlUDA

Probably not much difference between Canadian greenies and American greenies, locally such as Merrill.

"Green shoppers" displayed some serious deficits in ethics across the tsks involved in this University of Toronto study.

and yes, global warming is now totally debunked because of the "hide the decline" e-mails, data showing that warming didn't occur in the past ten years, and the Russian IEA says that its climate data was cherry picked.

But then, these folks will lie cheat and steal, so what will they do next to maintain the myth of global warming?

What do you most wish for in this Christmas [holiday] season?

It’s been a particularly hard year for me and mine, 2009. I find myself looking forward with eager anticipation to an event. Anticipation is helping me cope. I think many of us have had a hard year.

What are you looking for this Christmas season? No, not the vague, unattainable, “world peace,” or that drop-dead gorgeous girl in the other cubical at work. What is it you really want to see happen, or do this season for Christmas? What will bring the joy of the season to you in this tough time? When I think of my coming event, I catch myself smiling.

For me, it is Christmas Eve service at my church; old fashioned, I know. Sweet, cozy, comforting. Jesus’ birth celebrated in the traditional way. I hope just one or two inches of snow glazes the ground. I hope the temperature won’t be 10F like this moment as I type. Yet, the candles bring light and heat. The Christmas carols’ music rings in ancient celebration. And the love of God is made manifest.

It’s nine days to Christmas. How about you? What do you find your heart anticipating for this Christmas, Kwanza, or Hanukah? Please share it here.

In looking at many news sources tonight I learned some things about the H1N1/novel flu vaccine. I already knew that human trials had started in Australia in July, and here in the U.S. in August.

I am one who will not get the H1N1 vaccine until the human trials are done. Yes I know how vaccines work and I routinely get the seasonal vaccine. I am in at least two priority groups for the H1N1 vaccine. However, in 1976 the 'swine flu vaccine' resulted in deaths totaling far beyond what that 'swine flu virus' might have caused.

Many countries, including Taiwan and India, have not completed their human trials. Some have had trouble with the stability of the vaccine's virus material.

I find some people in the U.S. saying that this vaccine has "been tested" and "is the most tested" vaccine. Some of these apparently have M.D. after their names but seem to be more functioning as Public Information Officers than medical professionals. The human trials in Australia apparently went off without serious problems, but all I could find was vague generalities in the Australian press.

So, what I did was a lot of looking with Yahoo-news and Google-news along with searching the CDC's website. I would expect that if U.S. trials in humans were complete that our government leaders would make big PR out of that, advising us to build confidence in the current H1N1/novel flu vaccine. Well, mum's the word it seems.

Oh, by the way, Mrs. Gnome is very sick just today with a flu-like illness.

So, if somebody has information on the U.S. human trials' outcome, or details on the australian trials, please post it here. I'd sure like to see it.

The third pacific massive quake and Tsunami in two weeks has just hit:

http://www.ksbw.com/weather/21232878/detail.html?treets=mty&tml=mty_natlbreak&ts=T&tmi=mty_natlbreak_1_06200110072009

7.8 Quake Strikes Off Vanuatu A powerful magnitude 7.8 earthquake has rocked the South Pacific near the Vanuatu archipelago, the U.S. Geological Survey reports, triggering a regional tsunami alert.

---Any readers have any experience with this island nation? There isn't anything very high there, so any Tsunami could cause massive death and distruction.

Was just wondering if there are any Lawrence connections.

Mr. Obama says that it is more than health care. He says it is about what kind of country we want the U.S. to be.

Here, I agree. What kind of country do we want America to be? One of many reasons for the backlash against Obamacare has been the huge number of fundamental social questions being addressed with little or no national dialogue. Rushing through huge programs which change many basic American freedoms and many things we take for granted.

I hope to post a series of questions, to identify some of these very basic questions.

Here, I'm asking: Do we want to be the kind of country that makes health insurance coverage compulsory?*

In order to accomplish this, some of the bills currently in Washington actually empower the IRS to enforce compulsory participation. If you are forced to pay, your employer is forced to pay, or your employer is fined, it all works out about the same. Your employer pays you and has the added expense of employing you tacked on. That is money that cannot go into your paycheck.

Do we as a country choose to require everyone to have health insurance? During the Democrat party primary, Mr. Obama was the only major candidate who opposed such compulsory participation, and he criticized Hilary's compulsory plan. Now, his is just as offensive.

Furthermore, the plans currently in Washington will mandate all kinds of coverage, and control the types of policies the government would "approve." So, if you are a 22-year-old, your premiums will be far higher under these proposed plans than if you got your own coverage today. Higher because you would not have the freedom (according to CNN/Money) to choose a skimpy coverage, high deductable, low premium policy. Also, you would be mandated to take coverage that included, for example, knee replacement even though you're 22 and not at all likely to need it. That's one way these plans try to balance the books, charge the low-risk younger citizens more to provide for the elders and more sickly, such as the 60-year-old who actually does need a new knee.

Mr. Obama says that requiring all Americans to have health insurance is like the auto insurance requirement. Wrong. Women pay less for auto insurance because they're lower risk. All the current proposals seem to go the opposite way: pay more for lower risk.

So, the government compells you to have health insurance, and decides what should be in that policy. If you are prolife, you are forced to pay for coverage for abortions against your conscience. But aside from that small matter [lol] the reach of government is hugely multiplied. Do we choose this?

More questions to come.

There's a problem at the North Lawrence detour, but you can't blame this on the officials, the road workers, or the people of North Lawrence.

I was by the detour for a while this afternoon and observed something funny. Drivers are flowing off the bridge onto Elm like water through a Funnel. This part is working swimmingly.

But there's a serious problem causing a lot of backup on that first block of Elm. A few drivers pull up to N. 3rd, and they just sit there! Apparently incapable of applying gas to their motors.

I observed two drivers at different times pull up, and sit for two ... three ... four minutes. In both cases they could have turned left according to the posted detour and continued on N. 3rd. Or, they could have driven east on Elm at that moment.

So, do these drivers have trouble with the concept of a detour? Are they pulling out their pocket dictionaries and looking it up?

Would you introspective types please just help Lawrence and give your car the gas for God's sake!

Are these drivers experiencing some existential crisis as they sit at n. 3rd and Elm? Does the thought of being in a North Lawrence neighborhood require a little mental adaptation? Anybody got any ideas about what's going through their minds at that point in their lives?

/gnome