The W In Christmas

A wonderful Christmas story:

Each December, I vowed to make Christmas a calm and peaceful experience.

I had cut back on nonessential obligations - extensive card writing, endless baking, decorating, and even overspending.

Yet still, I found myself exhausted, unable to appreciate the precious family moments, and of course, the true meaning of Christmas.

My son, Nicholas, was in kindergarten that year. It was an exciting season for a six year old.

For weeks, he'd been memorizing songs for his school's "Winter Pageant."

I didn't have the heart to tell him I'd be working the night of the production. Unwilling to miss his shining moment, I spoke with his teacher. She assured me there'd be a dress rehearsal the morning of the presentation.

All parents unable to attend that evening were welcome to come then. Fortunately, Nicholas seemed happy with the compromise.

So, the morning of the dress rehearsal, I filed in ten minutes early, found a spot on the cafeteria floor and sat down. Around the room, I saw several other parents quietly scampering to their seats. As I waited, the students were led into the room. Each class, accompanied by their teacher, sat cross-legged on the floor. Then, each group, one by one, rose to perform their song.

Because the public school system had long stopped referring to the holiday as "Christmas," I didn't expect anything other than fun, commercial entertainment - songs of reindeer, Santa Claus, snowflakes and good cheer. So, when my son's class rose to sing, "Christmas Love," I was slightly taken aback by its bold title.

Nicholas was aglow, as were all of his classmates, adorned in fuzzy mittens, red sweaters, and bright snowcaps upon their heads.

Those in the front row- center stage - held up large letters, one by one, to spell out the title of the song.

As the class would sing "C is for Christmas," a child would hold up the letter C. Then, "H is for Happy," and on and on, until each child holding up his portion had presented the complete message, "Christmas Love."

The performance was going smoothly, until suddenly, we noticed her; a small, quiet, girl in the front row holding the letter "M" upside down - totally unaware her letter "M" appeared as a "W".

The audience of 1st through 6th graders snickered at this little one's mistake. But she had no idea they were laughing at her, so she stood tall, proudly holding her "W".

Although many teachers tried to shush the children, the laughter continued until the last letter was raised, and we all saw it together. A hush came over the audience and eyes began to widen.

In that instant, we understood the reason we were there, why we celebrated the holiday in the first place, why even in the chaos, there was a purpose for our festivities.

For when the last letter was held high, the message read loud and clear:   

C H R I S T W A S L O V E 

And, I believe, He still is.

Written by Candy Chand of Rancho Murieta.

It is a Merry Christmas.

On The Road

As the crow flies, I'm about 140 miles from the Canadian border this evening. You all back home in Southwest Virginia will rejoice in knowing that you have more snow on the ground right now than they do here in the Great Frozen North. It just ain't right, is it?

Earlier this evening, I took time out at Philadelphia International Airport to consume a world- famous philly cheese steak (I know, it was an airport philly cheese steak but it wasn't bad). For those of you who don't get out much, when you come to Philly, you have to buy a philly cheese steak (I think it's the law) just as you crave crab cakes the moment you set foot in Baltimore. In Boston its lobster. In Bland, it's ... well, hotdogs at the Citgo station; that's all we have.

Anyway, I'm on the road again. A meeting here in the morning and another down in Easton, PA on Wednesday. Then I'll be making my way back to the Great Frozen South.

Do something about all that snow before I get there, would ya?

An Assessment

You are probably all wondering what I think of Boston, having been here since Monday. Here's my observations: Boston is wet. And foggy. And now cold.

I was able to get out and see some tourist attractions yesterday. I sat next to a young man with a purple spiked mohawk and lip ring at Elliot's Deli at lunchtime. He looked like his blind mother dressed him in the morning and he was eating corned beef on rye as if he was in some contest to fit the largest portion of a sandwich in his mouth at one time. That was interesting.

Welcome To Boston

I'm here in Boston for the next couple of days (then I'm heading home for Turkey Day). It's such a beautiful city with magnificent and often radically unique downtown architecture.

And to think you can drive down the street and come upon the very harbor where the Boston Tea Party took place back in ... the old days.

Not that you necessarily wanted to see the harbor. City planners here make you go through the exercise anyway having turned the city streets into a complex maze of detours for those wanting to get on I-93 out of Logan International Airport. I've never followed a more convoluted maze in my life. I have a sneaking suspicion the road construction - and the massive traffic problem - are results of the infamous "Big Dig" - but I didn't stop to ask one of the seven thousand cops sitting in their cars staring at the rest of us sitting in our cars. After about an hour I just wanted to conduct my own Boston Tea Party and heave my Hertz rental into the harbor in protest. Or road rage. Or middle age.

Anyway, if you're looking for a good time and want to see the sights, come to Boston.

But don't do it in the next fifteen years or you'll spend your entire &$#!*&! vacation stuck in traffic!

I Need To Get a Life

What does it say about a person when he thinks of five different business emails he needs to send out while showering? (Ed: I know it's a misleading sentence, and I was going to fix it, but I kinda like it). What I'm saying is: I was in the shower and came up with a list of business associates and employees with whom I needed to make contact. Those persons happen to be in Columbia, SC, Washington DC, Rochester, NY, Boston, MA, and Thomasville, PA.

I dried off, dressed, and went at it.

Am I the only person who does his best thinking in the shower? What's up with that?

The Highlands Clearances

Beginning around 1760 and continuing for nearly a century, a civilization - a way of life that dated to pre-recorded times - was targeted for extermination and was systematically and ruthlessly destroyed. The effort became known as the Highlands Clearances. The civilization targeted and subsequently destroyed was made up of people known as Highlanders. Until the mid-1700's the Highlanders had led a rather feudal existence in what became known as Scotland. Theirs was a way of life that was made famous by Mel Gibson and the the movie, "Braveheart."

It was around 1760 that feudal landowners - mostly English aristocracy - started to realize that the rolling hills and valleys of Scotland were of great economic value and were perfectly suited for raising sheep. In large numbers. In the feudal system of the time, the Highlanders did not own the land they lived on and depended upon for subsistence. They paid tribute - a tax - to the laird and were, in turn, allowed to occupy the land their ancestors had maintained for hundreds of years.

As the value of wool continued to increase, so did the need for huge herds of sheep, and the feudal system of Scotland was ill-equipped to deal with them. The Highlanders' villages were in the way. So the lairds began to move the Highlanders off their lands and into villages and towns, particularly to the coast of Scotland. In some cases, the removal was brutal, the methods used were harsh.

The most notorious examples of this type of clearance took place on the Sutherland estates of the Stafford family. Nobody pursued the clearance policy with more vigour and cruel thoroughness than Elizabeth, Countess of Sutherland, and her name is still reviled in many homes with Highland connections across the world to this day. The Stafford family's ethos was that the people of the straths of Sutherland would be moved to the coast where they could engage in more profitable occupations. The land thus cleared would be turned over to sheep.

In 14 days in May 1814, 430 people were evicted and forced to move to Brora on the coast where they were to become fishermen. To force the people to move, the roofs of their houses were often pulled down and the roof trees set alight to stop rebuilding. 

By the 1850's the clearances had run their course. A civilization had been uprooted and forever erased from history. By some estimates, hundreds of thousands of Scots Highlanders were forceably removed from their lands and were relocated to cities like Edinburgh, or were put on ships bound for the new land - America.

Fast-forward to 2005. West Virginia's Highlands are being depopulated. Systematically. By outsiders. By America's aristocracy.

West Virginia is the only state in the Union to have lost population in the last census. There are fewer people living there now than lived there in 1950. And the state's prospects for the future are bleak.

... the number of younger West Virginians has declined significantly, while the number of older residents has increased. The largest decline has occurred among [the state's] youngest residents; the number of children aged four and under has decreased by approximately 57%. Conversely, the population of West Virginians aged 75 and older has ballooned, with the number of men increasing by 115% and the number of women by 284%.

So where have West Virginia's young people gone?

They've been forced to leave the land and head north, to seek work. Where once the Highlanders of West Virginia could count on a respectable lifelong income working in the mines, those mines have, to a large degree, been shut down. In the last quarter century alone, the number of coal mines has decreased from 5,985 (in 1978) to 1,586 (in 2004). With the reduction in the number of mines, came a reduction in workforce. In 1940, West Virginia mines employed 130,457 Highlanders. The most recent statistic puts current employment at 14,810 (underground and surface mining combined). 

Why the decline? Because outsiders have better use for the land. Environmentalists want to be able to hike it. Take pictures of it. Write New York Times editorials about it:

And Now to 'Streamline' King Coal's Beheading of Appalachia 

By FRANCIS X. CLINES

Six years ago, Jim Weekley, a watchful retiree in Appalachia, became angry enough to defend his seven-tenths-of-an-acre homestead in West Virginia's Pigeon Roost Hollow from a gargantuan mining process with a formidable name - mountaintop removal - that tells only half the truth.

The other half is the obliteration of countless streams, forests and hamlets lying below as mountaintops are systematically decapitated with dynamite to leave mesa-like tabletops.  

Francis X. Clines, so you know, is from Brooklyn and has worked for the Times - in New York -since 1958. His affinity with the people of West Virginia extends to picking up a phone and talking to a disaffected citizen of Pigeon Roost Hollow 587 miles away and decrying his plight. Clines is a man who wouldn't be caught dead in Pigeon Roost Hollow, West Virginia but somehow feels the need to bond with Jim Weekley, a man about whom he knows nothing and of whom he couldn't care less. Clines wants to immerse himself in empathy and self-absorption; the Pigeon Roost Hollow villager puts him there.

His is the way of all liberals in America.

West Virginia is being systematically depopulated. The Highlanders there today - just as those in Scotland were in 1760 - are being removed from their ancestral lands. Families are being split apart and are being forced to move north.

But it doesn't matter. New York liberals don't care about the destruction of Highlands families and their way of life. It's just too bad if the people of Logan or Welch or Kimball - or Pigeon Roost Hollow - have to pack their bags and head north in order to find gainful employment. Francis X. Clines has better use for their land. He demands that West Virginia's streams and forests remain pristine. He might want to fly over the area one day on his way to Mardi Gras and will want to see the waters flowing and the trees growing. Then again, he might not.

Francis X. Clines and his cohorts in the environmental movement don't give a damn about the people of West Virginia. If he and they did, they'd be down here doing everything they could to preserve the Highlanders' way of life. Instead, they work to depopulate the state of West Virginia, with the twisted notion that somehow boulders positioned such as they are represent nature as it is intended to be.

So the people of West Virginia - our Highlanders - are being ever so slowly forced from their land. Outsiders - America's aristocracy - our Elizabeth, Countess of Sutherland - have decided the land is of greater value as wilderness. A playland. One big park.

The message to you Highlanders is clear: Leave now. Or learn to serve Big Macs to your lairds, er ... the tourists. Like Francis X. Clines.

Come Election Day

It's not just the arrogance. Although that's certainly a huge factor. There is this infuriating - and perverse - sense of overbearing pride and superiority that permeates the political class in the commonwealth of Virginia. At least as it relates to Southwest and Southside Virginia.

It's in knowing that, over the last few years, the area has suffered job losses at Mack Truck and Ethan Allen and Celanese and Johnson & Johnson and Lear and Dan River and Tultex and Spring Ford Industries and Buster Brown and Natalie Knitting Mills and American of Martinsville and Virginia Glove and Virginia House Furniture and Lea Industries and ArvinMeritor and Alcoa Wheels and VF Knitwear and Burlington Industries and Hooker Furniture and Stanley Furniture and Thomasville and Bassett Furniture Industries and Pulaski Furniture, and yet the Democratic candidate for Governor flits into the area long enough to spew some campaign pablum about having created 15000 new jobs here in the last three years. And awe-struck people cheer.

Saying it makes it so apparently. What arrogance.

More than the arrogance, though, it's the condescension that disappoints. Vexes. Enrages.

I could write a thousand words about the problems that plague this part of Virginia, but, as they say, a picture would be worth more than all of them. The photograph to the right and above - behind the Kaine For Governor sign - is the remnant of someone's dreams. A ghostly shell of what-might-have-been but never will be. A textile plant here in Bland County, Virginia closed now, it would seem, for a number of years.

Weeds and grotesquely distended trees grow around the outside of the building where - not that many years ago - proud textile workers assembled to talk about family, join in a smoke, plan the hunting trip, brag about the kid attending Virginia Tech, before they entered the building to go to work making sportswear - shirts, slacks, sweaters - garments for America. The world. With pride. Enthusiasm. A look to the future. Hope.

It must have been a proud and joyous day for many when the factory opened and started production. If for no other reason than because this part of the state has seen nothing but hard times - since the beginning of time. Exemplified by the fact that right next to this shell of a factory is the Bland Ministry Center, where, if you're poverty-stricken as a woeful number of people around here are, you can obtain free dental work and a free haircut on occasion. Food. Food! In a few weeks Christmas presents for your children; Barbies and GI Joes, tricycles and model planes - slightly used in some cases - donated by the good folks of Bland and Wythe Counties. To the good people in need, including former employees of the now-abandoned factory, of Bland County.

It's the condescension that riles me. It's to be told that 15000 jobs have been created around here - somewhere - and I know I'll drive past the Bland Ministry Center in a few weeks and find a line of Americans - Virginians - stretched out the door, down the sidewalk, out along the highway waiting to get their handout. It's a rarity to see a new business come into Southwest Virginia while it is a common sight to see boarded up factories in Bristol and Bluefield, Tazewell and Galax, Marion and Wise, Gate City and Hillsville, Big Stone Gap and ... Bland.

Where are those 15000 new jobs?

I can live with the silly sign. "Sportsmen for Tim Kaine." I could go off on the fact that Kaine will be to sportsmen what Bill Clinton was to women's rights. But it's just one of those throw-away slogans - "Sportsmen for Tim Kaine," that isn't really intended to mean anything. Not really. I remember, after all, that Ted Bundy was a sportsman; he's the animal who stalked and murdered 28 women - for sport. So the word "sportsmen" can mean anything. In fact, I'm sure it means nothing. Some campaign worker's idea of strategizing.

But you'd think the Democratic Party would be ashamed. Ashamed for having failed the workers at the Bland Sportswear factory. For having failed the people of Southwest Virginia. As everyone knows, the Democratic Party has been in control of Southwest Virginia since before the Civil War. Since before there was a Bland County, Virginia. Today, we find ourselves with a Democrat for a state delegate, a Democrat for a state senator, and a Democrat for congressman. Noone around here can tell you the last time that was any different. Perhaps we'll even be able to complete the set by having a Democrat for governor - again.

Having been in charge all these many decades, you'd think they would have something to show for it. Bustling factories. A burgeoning economy. Growth. Opportunity.

Well, they do. The Democratic Party in Southwest Virginia has a decaying factory in Bland to show for it. In front of which they proudly post a sign championing their man. In front of a crumbling factory that goes along with a soon-to-be vacant Celanese factory over in Giles County. And a soon-to-be abandoned Lear plant over in Covington. To go along with the closed or soon to be shut down Mack Truck and Ethan Allen and Johnson & Johnson and Dan River and Tultex and Spring Ford Industries and Buster Brown and Natalie Knitting Mills and American of Martinsville and Virginia Glove and Virginia House Furniture and Lea Industries and ArvinMeritor and Alcoa Wheels and VF Knitwear and Burlington Industries and Hooker Furniture and Stanley Furniture and Thomasville and Bassett Furniture Industries and Pulaski Furniture plants.

We have a landscape of broken dreams and empty promises and the Democratic Party has the gall to hang a sign out in front of an abandoned factory as if nothing is wrong. Time to celebrate. Let's party with Tim Kaine. Four - More - Years.

What is the message? Vote for us and we'll continue to do for you what we've done for you these last 150 years. Ignore the crumbling building; read our campaign slogan. Heck, we've brought you 15000 jobs in the last three years. So shut up. You don't believe us? Drive over to the new Wal-Mart Super Center in Norton and you'll see. Sure, we hate Wal-Mart and everything it represents and would have prevented its opening had we been able to. But they're jobs just the same. So be good. Be happy. Smell the roses. Feel the love. Get with the program.

The one thing that angers me more than anything else about this brash condescension is the fact that the Democratic Party is sending a clear and unmistakeable signal: you folks in Scott County who have no drinking water - in the year 2005 - because the streams are grossly polluted with human and animal waste and are not fit for human consumption and we haven't bothered to get you potable water - in the 150 years we've been in charge - it ain't going to change. You folks in Chilhowie who have seen one furniture plant after another close their doors and move overseas, expect more of the same. IT IS NOT GOING TO CHANGE. You miserable souls over in Pocahontas who have seen your once-robust town decay and die as the coal mines shut down as the direct result of environmentalist Democratic legislative action, leave now. It'll get no better.

As we struggle with a devastating loss of good paying jobs in Southwest Virginia, the Democratic Party comes to us for votes. It's Tim Kaine this time around. Boucher before him. Oh, and then there's Benny Keister. We shouldn't forget him. Even though he is completely forgettable.

I'll give Kaine credit for one thing. At least he hasn't offended us with the plan put forth by every other Democrat who comes around here looking for votes, the cynical plan relating to bringing prosperity to Southwest Virginia through the promotion of tourism, the promotion of our rocks and trees as attractions for the affluent up in Manhattan to come down and encounter. The plan that has us all learning to make pots and sing ante-bellum hymns.

No, old Tim doesn't condescend in that way. He simply tells us that he and Mark Warner have created oodles of jobs in recent years and he will do more of the same if elected governor. 15000 in the last three years? Shoot, he'll create 30000 in the next four. 90000. 150000.

While I'm waiting for those jobs to appear, I'll be driving each day by the Bland Ministry Center. I may have trouble finding all those jobs that Tim has created but I'll have no difficulty finding those who are here looking for them. I'll be looking into their faces. Into their eyes. Eyes gazing not toward Tim Kaine or the Democratic Party. Not toward some politician who is down here for a day or two looking for their vote. Eyes fixed on the Bland Ministry Center. Where they hope to get food. Clothing.

And as I drive by the Bland Ministry Center each day, I'll also be looking upon that sign in front of the abandoned Bland Sportswear factory next door. "Sportsmen For Tim Kaine." "We'll do for you what we've been doing to you all these many years." "Count On It."

I'll not be voting for Tim Kaine next Tuesday. I'll be voting for his opponent. With a vengeance. If they'd let me, I'd vote against him twice. And I'll continue to vote against the Democratic Party as long as factories in Southwest Virginia continue to close, as long as Pocahontas continues to waste away, as long as there are people in Scott County who have to be fearful of their drinking water, as long as there are 9000 homes in southwest Virginia that do not have indoor plumbing, as long as Rick Boucher demands that we give up hope for the future and learn to dance and sing for the tourists, as long as there is a line of Virginians winding its way down the road outside the Bland Ministry in expectation of a helping hand, as long as I have to see people - in America - shoveling sweet potatoes off the parking lot and into sacks to take home and feed hungry children, as long as I see citizens of The Narrows packing their belongings in U-haul trucks and heading north for work, until I take my last breath, if it should come to that.

To the Democratic Party of Bland County, I have a request. Regardless whether Kaine wins or loses next Tuesday, leave that sign up over at the Bland Sportswear factory. It'll be a tribute to your candidate. To your party. Your governance. To what you've accomplished in Southwest Virginia. A monument for all time.

Mistake On The Lake

Work brings me to Cleveland, OH this evening. I've got an all-day meeting here tomorrow and then it's off on another adventure.

Those of you who have been around a while will remember back in the 70's how Cleveland had a horrible - and well-deserved - reputation and was known as "the mistake on the lake." It's also famous for having a river (the Cayahoga) run through the city that was - back then - so polluted that it (the river) caught fire.

But that was a long time ago. The city has been transformed, and has been for many years, one of my favorites. I'm going to take some people down to The Flats by the lake (Erie) later this evening for dinner and whatever trouble we can get into.

Wish you all were here. You could buy the first round.

Not a Pretty Sight

I had the misfortune of driving past this accident yesterday:

Charleston woman dies in I-64 collision with tractor-trailer 

MILTON — A Charleston woman died Monday afternoon when she rear-ended a tractor-trailer on Interstate 64 in Milton, said Deputy Chief Bob Legg of the Milton Fire Department.

The woman’s name was not available. The accident happened around 2:20 p.m. in the westbound lane at exit 28. The tractor-trailer was pulled over on the side of the road when the woman’s car hit the truck from behind, Legg said.

The woman was pronounced dead at the scene. The interstate was closed for about 2 1/2 hours. 

I knew the occupant of the vehicle, a Dodge Intrepid, was dead. The authorities were on the scene and were making no attempt to extricate her from the car. They had simply draped a tarp over what was left of the passenger compartment and were supervising the tow-truck removal of the trailer from atop the car.

The thoughts that go through your mind -

- A life has come to an end - in the blink of an eye.

- A family somewhere is about to receive some shocking and horrible news.

- A prayer is offered up for the souls affected by the accident.

- There but for the grace of God ...

- An admonition - Pay closer attention as you head on down the road.

I went on down the road.

Running On Empty

Well, the company got its money's worth yesterday. I was (I think) on the first flight out of Greensboro yesterday morning at 6am and came in on its last flight last night at 11:10pm. I got back to Big Walker Mountain at 1:20am. And my day begins again. I'm heading for Pennsylvania this afternoon.

I've decided, by the way, that four planes in one day is my limit. I enjoy flying on those regional jets that all the airlines have deployed for non-transcontinental flights but my butt was not meant to be in those tiny seats for too many hours in one day.

The upside to this is that my meetings in Kansas City went well. And I survived.

Today brings another adventure.

Yippee.

Back In God's Country

Well, I'm back on my mountain this morning. I rolled in late last night from San Diego via a completely chaotic O'Hare.

An odd occurrence:

A group of passengers at our gate at O'Hare had attempted to go on standby. Wherever they came from, apparently their luggage had gone on a different plane because these people had been on standby too long - or some such.

Well, the attendant was giving them hell because their luggage had gone a different route and FAA regulations require that one's luggage be on the plane with the passenger. She was refusing to allow them on the plane because of this. They were all mad. She was frenzied. I was shaking my head in amazement.

To put an interesting twist on the story: when I got into Greensboro last night, my luggage didn't appear on the carousel with everyone elses. My thought was, "Uh oh." But it had arrived on an earlier flight somehow - from Washington Dulles ......

Somewhere in the bowels of United Airlines headquarters, all this makes sense. Or is accepted as just another day in happyland.

Me? I'm just glad to be back on my mountain.

A Different World

Here's something you don't see every day in Bland, Virginia. I walked out the front door of my hotel yesterday morning to see this, the MS Oosterdam cruise ship, docked right in front of me. It had apprently come into port the night before for provisions and was gone again - headed toward Mexico, I'm told - by the time I returned from work. Having never seen a cruise ship up close before, I can report to you with confidence that this boat was really really big.

Is It Morning Yet?

Work brings me to San Diego for the next several days. I come to you this morning (more on that later) from a hotel on the harbor, a few blocks up from the aircraft carrier Midway and across the harbor from a huge naval base (the name of which I think someone said was Coronado). An honest-to-God three-masted schooner, the Star of India, is docked nearby for your tourist pleasure. The Padres were playing a few blocks over; the towering stadium lights illuminating the night sky to the south of downtown.

I got here in time last night to wander the area. Every restaurant was jammed with patrons and music was blaring from every one of them onto the streets. This being Southern California, each eatery has tables set up outside along the sidewalk. One doesn't need to consult a menu in order to determine what entrees are offered; you just gaze at the array on the plates at the various tables to get a good idea what's available. It all looked fabulous.

The natives here in Southern California dress differently from the rest of the world. All the women are made up as if they're going to get a casting call from MGM at any moment (the display of cleavage must be a job requirement), and all the guys try to be as effeminate-looking as possible. I fully appreciate the former; I don't understand the latter. But to each his own.

As I mentioned several days ago, my brain stays on eastern time and I always get up at 4am. It's 1:55 in the morning here (PST) but my brain clock says it's time to get up so my day has begun. My guess is, if I were to walk downtown, the bars would still be hopping, and I'm up and ready for a new day. One of us is going to have to give on this. Either I conform to Pacific time or San Diego adopts Eastern Standard Time the way God meant for it to be. I'm going to campaign for the latter.

Anyway, this is as beautiful a city as you've heard it was. In every way. Wish you were here.

Upscale Chinese?

Ever been to an upscale Chinese restaurant? I found one in downtown Denver last night. As you all know, I have an uncontrollable addiction to Chinese and I have to satisfy the overpowering need at least once a week. So I found a place called PF Chang's and gave it a try.

So how do you know when you are in an "upscale" Chinese restaurant? The wait staff is in white shirt and tie, the food is expensive, and there isn't one Chinese person working the place. The cooks were all Mexicans (I didn't ask) and the waiters were all white guys. And when do you ever see a long line of hungry people waiting to get in to your neighborhood Chinese restaurant?

Anyway, the food was great - as Chinese always is.

Mile High

Work brings me to Denver this evening. I find myself on the eleventh floor of a downtown hotel, having just returned from a night on the town. Crowds gathered, waiting to get into area restaurants. Musicians playing their instruments on sidewalks for cash. Horses and buggies clip-clopping up and down the downtown Mall area. Great food. Beer. Wonderful weather. Snow-capped peaks of the Rockies shrouded in darkness off to the west. Vagrants.

A memorable night.

Hurricane Appalachia

It's amazing what can happen when the man who prints the money decides he's going to "fix" a problem. In the case of New Orleans and Hurricane Katrina reconstruction, "the problem" lies mostly with the mainstream media's portrayal of President Bush's response to the hurricane disaster as being feckless and his empathy for the plight of black people being lacking.

Well, ol' George has now been around the block. He knows how to fix that. He's going to spend money - as soon as his Treasury (our treasury) gets it printed up - in quantities the likes of which the world has never known.

U.S. to pick up rebuilding tab 

By Joseph Curl, The Washington Times

President Bush last night said the federal government will pay most of the estimated $200 billion to rebuild the hurricane-ravaged Gulf Coast in what he called "one of the largest reconstruction projects the world has ever seen."  

$200 billion.

All of New Orleans wasn't worth $200 billion.

That's past tense, of course.

But George ain't stoppin' there. He's going to right wrongs too. The systemic kind. He's going to end poverty. And put FDR, LBJ, The New Deal, and The Great Society to shame by comparison.

[Mr. Bush] said his administration will not turn a blind eye to the "persistent poverty" in the region that has led to a "legacy of inequality."

Addressing the hundreds of thousands of evacuees forced from their homes by the hurricane, the president said, "You need to know that our whole nation cares about you -- and in the journey ahead you are not alone." 

"Tonight, I also offer this pledge to the American people: Throughout the area hit by the hurricane, we will do what it takes, we will stay as long as it takes, to help citizens rebuild their communities and their lives.

Meanwhile back here where Hurricane Appalachia has devastated the landscape from north Georgia to western Tennessee through the mountains of Kentucky, West Virginia, and Virginia, people continue to abandon their homes and move their families north to find work. Our politicians make the front page of newspapers and get their pictures taken shaking hands with local officials after having brought in enough government relief to spruce up a park or they announce with great emotion that they've been able to keep a post office from being closed. They fund riding trails. Hiking paths. The creation of a job here and another there.

$200 billion.

President Bush is getting high praise this morning - especially from The New York Times, which speaks volumes - for offering up a bold initiative to end poverty. In New Orleans.

In the meantime, while the government begins construction on Taj Mahal Big Easy, the Bland Ministry is beginning its Christmas clothing and gift drive. It won't be long, I'll motor past their meager facility down in Bland and will have to slow my car because the line of Americans who will be there to receive Christmas gifts for their children and grandchildren will stretch down the sidewalk and out along Route 52. A line that will perhaps be a bit shorter this year as Hurricane Appalachia continues to wreak its inexorable destruction. More people have packed their bags and moved north in search of employment.

But it'll get no notice from CBS News. We won't expect a visit from Jesse Jackson. As long as there are no bodies in the streets and there are no slave traders (my term for those who have gotten rich marketing the problems black Americans face today) shouting about white folks hating black folks, the devastation will continue to be ignored. The Americans at Ethan Allen over in Dublin, Virginia are the latest to fall victim to the wrath of Hurricane Appalachia. The latest in a long and tragic line of victims at too many plants and businesses to count.

On the bright side, it won't be long we'll see the dump trucks full of sweet potatoes drop their loads in the abandoned car dealership parking lot in Bland for the citizenry to come and shovel and bag and take home to their children. That's always a festive occasion; one in which neighbors get together and, while gathering up the evening meal, they'll talk over the latest news regarding the cattle market and the price of milk, the new Bibles over at the Methodist church and the bargain on sun glasses at the Dollar General.

And about that $200 billion being offered up to Americans down in New Orleans.

I wonder how many sweet potatoes that would buy? Heck, I'll bet it would even pay for a new shovel.

For a Good Meal

Well, I made a complete embarrassment out of myself this evening. The Georgia Chopped Pork at The Fox & Hounds here in Pineville, North Carolina was just too delicious. To those of you back in Bland, you need to hop in the car and run on down here and try it.

I'm buyin'...

Exploring The Wonders Of The USA

I find myself momentarily stranded here at LaGuardia awaiting a plane to come in from somewhere; one that will - at some point in time - take me to Greensboro. That’s the plan anyway. I am therefore a temporary resident of the Big Apple.

I have to tell you, US Air doesn’t charge enough for the sightseeing excursion I was on earlier. In mid afternoon, with the reflecting sun glistening on the Atlantic below and a gentle breeze blowing in from the west, with excellent visibility for miles and miles (yes, it was a good day in the big city) we flew into New York from the north, passing directly over downtown Manhattan.

Off to the west, in the harbor, Lady Liberty, a dark silhouette rising above a shimmering sea, stood defiant. Her arm thrust skyward, she broadcast a clear and unequivocal message to any and all Islamist terrorists who might ever contemplate inflicting damage on the citizenry here. Her message: Never again.

Our plane passed directly over the Empire State Building. We were seemingly so close to the tower atop the skyscraper that I felt like I could have reached out and touched it. Almost. The view directly downward at the city’s tallest building (as of September 11, 2001) was enhanced by the attitude of our plane as it banked sharply in the direction of La Guardia. I found myself looking directly down on New York’s most famous building in America’s most expensive piece of real estate.

I craned my neck to catch a glimpse of ground zero where the World Trade Center once stood but our flight path prevented my getting even a glimpse. We had circled and turned northward and it was beyond my field of vision.

About this point in time, just after having passed over a blimp that was hovering above the Flushing Meadows stadium, jammed with US Open tennis spectators, we flew past Shea Stadium where the Mets play. We then crossed over the harbor and came down into LaGuardia.

So now I sit here in a terminal full of people destined for Providence, Charlottesville, Philadelphia, Norfolk, Richmond, Raleigh Durham, Pittsburgh, and parts beyond. Oh, and perhaps even Greensboro. Before dawn if I'm lucky.

Flying Should Be Fun

I found myself on my last two flights - the first to Chicago, the second to New Hampshire - sitting across the aisle from mothers with babies. Now, I love little babies. Except when they scream. Endlessly. In a small confined space. Within a few feet of me. God help, me I find it annoying.

There is nothing one can do, of course. I don't want the tiny tikes thrown overboard or anything. But it would be great if someone invented a muzzle of some sort. Or an incubator into which they could be placed while in flight.

Just some thoughts.

On The Road Again

Work brings me to Manchester, New Hampshire this afternoon. As you all know, this is ground zero when it comes to presidential primaries. So I'm up here testing the water to see what my chances are, should I decide to run against Hillary. The way I see it, I have a reasonable chance of success. Heck, I can make promises I have no intention of keeping as well as the best of them (except perhaps for Wet Willy; he was the master at lying through his teeth).

Actually, I've got meetings scheduled here this evening - along with the obligatory consumption of booze - and more meetings tomorrow morning. Then it's off to New York.

Hey. Somebody's gotta do it.

Am I Being Too Harsh?

So I fly into Charlotte last night about 9:00 and head over to my hotel. On the way, I stop at McDonald's to get the good old number 1 (Big Mac, fries, drink) to go. The young man behind the counter seemed nice enough, although he could have been a whole lot cleaner. And the filthy hat could have been thrown away.

And I wish they'd furnished him gloves.

After having given him a ten, he hands me my change and a bag o' stuff. Then he passes me my empty cup with which I'm supposed to go find the coke dispenser and pour my own drink. Saves on labor costs, I guess.

It was the manner in which he handed me my cup that pissed me off. He held it with his bare, greasy hand by the rim, with four fingers wrapped over the rim and down the inside and his thumb braced against the outside. He set it on the countertop.

There was no way I was touching that cup. He might as well have run his tongue around the rim. I would have had the same reaction. Perhaps.

So I asked - politely - for another cup.

"What?" he asked.

"Your fingers were inside my cup, man. I'm not drinking out of that thing."

"Oh."

He didn't seem to be particularly flustered by my request. In all probability, I wasn't the first person that day that had requested that he not share his germs with his customers. He simply reached for another cup and set it on the counter, at least being careful not to ram his hand down inside this time.

I took my bag o' stuff, filled my cup with Diet Coke, and left for the hotel.

I usually enjoy the occasional Big Mac. But somehow, on this particular night, I was haunted by this recurring thought about ...

On The Road

I come to you this evening from the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Chicago. Yes, it's a tough life.

I am having dinner tonight with a new vice president and will be in meetings here tomorrow.

Then it's off on some other adventure.

Life is good ... if you can deal with O'Hare.

A Few Doors Down From Nowhere

Work brings me to Statesville, NC this evening. If you value your life, if you hold the lives of your children and your children's children dear, you'll never set foot in this town.

Although the Hardee's that, out of necessity, served as supper wasn't bad.

Five Guys Burgers

John over at Commonwealth Conservative swoons as a result of a visit to Five Guys. I wandered into one of their burger outlets up in Springfield a while back because I had heard how good the food was there. I too found the burgers to be disgustingly great.

The unsettling aspect to my visit was in the fact that the restaurant was full of grossly overweight patrons and me (a reasonably svelte 185 at the time). I fear a direct correlation exists between the massive burgers served up by the five guys and the massive girth achieved by Five Guys aficionados.

I became haunted by the implications.

Now I'm approaching 300* and can no longer squeeze into my Speedos. I'm not sure but I believe my problems all began that terrible night that I pigged out on thick, juicy, greasy, delicious Five Guys hamburgers.

* Just kidding. I was at 186 this morning, a condition I attribute to beer consumption yesterday.

Talk About Productivity ...

Yesterday was a busy day for me in the office. I was on the phone the better part of the day setting plans for the coming year. I noticed toward the end of the day that, in the course of sending and receiving email messages, spreadsheets, .jpg's, etc, I had transferred 40 megs of data*. In a matter of 10 hours. A routine day.

I think back just ten years when we relied on the US Postal Service for communication with customers and with the organization's branch offices. My God. How did we survive as a nation?

* My first computer was a Commodor 64. It had a storage capacity of 64 kilobytes or 0.064 megs ...

On The Road

It is a rare day that I declare a Chinese restaurant to be substandard but tonight I have to pass on a negative assessment regarding a place in Bethlehem, PA. It was really bad. You may want to avoid Pennsylvania until further notice. This is so disappointing. I mean, how do you screw up Chinese?

Anyway, I find myself here in the cradle of civilization (Get it? Bethlehem? Oh, never mind) this evening, with meetings scheduled in Easton tomorrow and more meetings on tap for Friday in Thomasville (near York).

Ah, the life of a gypsy. Who wishes he hadn't ordered the sweet and sour chicken.

I Can't Find a Signal!!!!!!!

I pulled into Harlan, Kentucky yesterday afternoon and immediately walked into the Cingular store on the town's main street. I hadn't been able to get a signal on my phone for an hour and a half and, in my business, that's a bad thing.

I walked up to the woman at the counter, holding my cellphone - I have Cingular (AT&T Wireless) cellular service - and asked, "Can you get a signal here?" I thought there must be a secret to getting service if there was a store selling it deep in the mountains.

The woman looked at me and replied, "No."

A cell phone store where you can't get a cellular signal. I felt like passing on to her some of my marketing experience. "Don't try selling ice cubes in Iceland or sand in the Sahara."

Or cell phones where there is no service.

But I was in a hurry.

"So where do I have to go to make a call?"

"Go back to the lat (that's light to those of you who don't speak mountain) and turn left. You should git a signal when you git to the Pizza Hut. But some days are better 'n others."

Darned if she wasn't right.

I made my calls. I picked up my accumulating voicemails. I sat in the car sweating like crazy.

But I got a signal! In Harlan, Kentucky!

I bring this up for a reason. Tom Friedman, writing a column for the New York Times, wants our politicians to do something about the problem - but for those like him who live in the big city.

Calling All Luddites
By THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN

I've been thinking of running for high office on a one-issue platform: I promise, if elected, that within four years America will have cellphone service as good as Ghana's. If re-elected, I promise that in eight years America will have cellphone service as good as Japan's, provided Japan agrees not to forge ahead on wireless technology. My campaign bumper sticker: "Can You Hear Me Now?"

I began thinking about this after watching the Japanese use cellphones and laptops to get on the Internet from speeding bullet trains and subways deep underground. But the last straw was when I couldn't get cellphone service while visiting I.B.M.'s headquarters in Armonk, N.Y.  

He goes on to say Congress should fix the problem.

I'll not hold my breath.

Ode To Babes

I try my best to do what's right,
To take no prisoners; to join the fight.
.
It's when I gaze upon these pics
I know to side with right-wing chicks.
.
And then there're those
who'd stop a clock.
.

Who look like they

crawled from a rock.

.

There is a message in this post

to those who wish to join the host.

.

I think that I'd prefer to be

a member of the GOP.

Click on image to enlarge.

I Battle a Snake

Because of recent heavy rains, our gravel driveway had taken a bit of a beating in terms of erosion (we live on a spur of Big Walker Mountain and our drive curves about 300 yards up a hill; with a downpour, we can get a good bit of runoff from the hillside) so I decided to hitch my grader blade to my tractor and level the driveway.

I find myself having to do this three or four times a year. It takes me about two hours and it ain't no big thang, as we say.

Because I don't use the blade much this time of year (I get lots of use out of it plowing snow later on), I keep it under a tarp out behind the fenced pasture.

One thing a person learns around here is that, in the summertime there is a snake lurking under every rock, behind every tree, in the rafters of every outbuilding.

So when I got to it, I intentionally lifted the tarp away from the grader blade carefully.

Sure enough, there were two huge black racers curled up beneath the tarp, all intertwined and not particularly pleased that I had disturbed them.

What was odd about the encounter was that the snakes, once disturbed, didn't slither off into the weeds. They untangled but circled the blade as if both of them were going to challenge me.

Under normal circumstances, I'd give the snakes their space. But on this day I needed my farm implement. They were, therefore, occupying my space.

As I backed the tractor up to the blade - to connect it to the three-point hitch and to scare off the pesky not-so-little reptiles - sure enough, one finally moved off into the tall grass.

The other one, though, wasn't going anywhere. He coiled up beneath the blade and signaled, "Come on, big daddy. Let's see what you got."

Hmm.

My thought was, "Look, you little reptile, go have your snake sex under someone else's tarp. I've got work to do."

So, with a good deal of effort and cajoling, I finally got the black snake to see things my way; he slithered away, obviously not happy with me.

I hitched up the blade and started heading off across the pasture toward the driveway. As I rode along, I began to think about the encounter. I'm no snake expert but it seemed the two that I had come upon had acted rather strangely. I thought it odd that they would be so aggressive, particularly the one that would not back off when confronted. Showing off in front of his mate is a commendable exercise - heck, I used to do it for Paula myself ... a few years ago.

But this was different.

Then an idea came to me. Perhaps I hadn't interrupted snake sex. It might be that I had unknowingly busted up a family. The two snakes might have been raising babies. That would certainly explain the aggression.

But I hadn't seen any babies when I lifted the tarp off the blade, and the blade is nothing more than a five-foot long steel ... well, blade.

Except ...

I brought the tractor to a stop, put it in neutral, and jumped off. I walked around to the back, knelt down, and attempted to peer into the space that existed behind the blade itself and a support beam that ran its length.

It was too dark in the confined space to see anything. So I walked around to the other side of the implement and stuck my eye up to the narrow opening. And looked inside.

Something was looking back.

I knew immediately that it had to be a snake; the cause for the parent snakes to be agitated. I knew too that I was going to use that blade - on my driveway - that day.

The snake had to go.

But how was I going to get him / her /it out?

I decided to drive the tractor up to my garage and to prod the little tyke out of its lair.

As I headed up the driveway, I looked back, only to see a snake head and about twelve inches of snake body dangling below the blade. He was attempting his escape. Which didn't upset me at all.

He slowly worked his way out of the blade and plopped down on the driveway. All three feet of him. The cutest youngster a mommy and daddy snake had ever produced. He lay there for a few moments, got his bearings, and then slid off into the grass.

And my day progressed.

Another day on Snake Mountain.

A Great Night For Baseball

The Salem Avalanche (a AAA league) crushed the Frederick Keys 6-2 last night. The weather turned out, after threatening rain, to have been perfect for the game.

We were particularly glad to see the Av's crush the Keys because ... well, because the Keys had the gall to show up on our diamond. On our home turf. In our house. You do that, you should expect a good thrashing.

Attendance at the game was just over 5,500; not bad for a Carolina League game.

A band played on the lawn outside the stadium after the game. Little Kaid and Jayla danced the night away to "Cheeseburger in Paradise."

It doesn't get any better.

Blood Flows on the Fuhrman Farm

Paula and I have had a tough time this summer with black snakes eating barn swallow babies. (I know there are men and women in uniform dying in Iraq, but I'll concentrate on them after we finish picking up tiny feathers and body parts).

I took a picture once of a black racer that had to have been six feet long slithering across the pasture and posted it to this weblog. We grow them really big on the farm. Well, they are quite common around here and one (or more) is (are) raiding the swallow nests when the four, five or six fuzzy little birdie heads are just starting to appear over the rim of the dried mud nests. One day they're all there; the next day, they're all gone.

And they ain't flying away.

I thought for a while that it was a barn owl coming in at night but signs are pointing more toward snakes.

We have had about fifteen nests of swallows this summer, all high up in the rafters of our barn (there are three active nests right now even this late in the summer) and few of them have seen chicks grow to adulthood.

Paula would probably prefer that I shoot the snake but I won't. Such is the way of nature.

But I will strangle the little bastard if I can catch him in there late at night.

Such is my nature.

Time To Hang It Up?

I've often told family and friends that I plan on never retiring. I'll work till I drop.

But a sign from God might change my mind.

Here's a bit of news about M. Arthur Anderson's tap on the shoulder in the Richmond Times-Dispatch:

Motorist aide struck by car on I-64 

By Mark Bowes, Times-Dispatch staff writer

M. Arthur Anderson and his family are probably counting their blessings.

The 73-year-old state police motorist assistance aide was struck by a car going about 40 mph on Interstate 64 near Staples Mill Road yesterday. He survived, suffering a broken leg and head injuries.

That's even more remarkable when you consider Anderson is still recovering from open-heart surgery. 

MEMO

From: GOD

To: Art

I thought the blocked arteries would have been enough of a signal. It is time to kick back and take in your daily dose of The Price Is Right, dude. Your days of bouncing off of cars and running that six minute mile are over.

Fond Memories

I never met Kim Woo-choong. But I feel like I know him well. That's why this brings back a flood of memories.

Founder of Collapsed South Korean Conglomerate Daewoo Hospitalized 

The Associated Press

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - The former chairman of collapsed South Korean conglomerate Daewoo Group was hospitalized with a life-threatening heart ailment Friday, casting a shadow over a multi-billion dollar fraud investigation.

Kim Woo-choong was admitted to Seoul's Severance Hospital in (sic) was in serious condition, said hospital spokeswoman Park Doo-hyuk. 

I had the good fortune of working side-by-side for a few years with executives at the now-defunct Daewoo Automotive Group (Daewoo U.S.), before the parent company collapsed under the weight of its staggering debt.

(Interestingly, this article throws out a debt figure of $70 billion. When I was travelling regularly to Compton, CA to meet with my Daewoo counterparts in 1998 and 1999, I remember reading, in the Wall Street Journal, articles that pegged Daewoo Group's debt at $20 billion. Then $30 billion. The last report I read estimated the company's debt at $50 billion. With the profligate spending that I was witness to, I knew the ever-accelerating race to insolvency was a fast-approaching matter of time.)

Despite the regret that I still feel for those who were thrown out of work by the company's collapse, I have nothing but fond memories of my Daewoo experience. And of those with whom I worked.

What was particularly interesting about Kim Woo-choong and the many executives that would show up in Compton for routine updates on the progress of their company's U.S. entry into the highly competitive sub-compact car market, was the extraordinary deference that was paid these people. I could use the word godlike (OK, apostlelike) in describing the way they were viewed by the employees and it would not be too much of an exaggeration.

When a corporate executive came near, everyone around me bowed (No. I didn't. I bow only to my wife.). There was only fleeting eye contact on the part of those I was with, especially if an executive chose to speak directly to one of them. It wasn't out of fear so much as a profound respect for the position that executive held within the company.

And the stories about Kim Woo-choong were legion. His work ethic. His wrath. His power. Many of the stories were recounted to me over dinner or mixed drinks in bars and restaurants in Torrance, Redondo Beach, Palos Verdes, and aboard the Queen Mary down in Long Beach Harbor. Stories related in hushed tones almost. With an occasional sideways glance that ensured the storyteller that Kim Woo-choong wouldn't find out that he was the topic of casual conversation.

I remember too that every Korean working at Daewoo smoked cigarettes. Every one. Non-stop. Which was understandable, considering the fact that employees there had no life. An 80 hour workweek was the norm (oddly, workers at their headquarters were expected to be there at all hours but it wasn't unusual to walk past someone's office and see the occupant sleeping).

I took all this in with a great deal of fascination. I had, at the time, a number of opportunities to fly to Seoul to inspect facilities there but I never set aside the time (and I hear they serve dog in restaurants there; the un-hot kind; I can't say for sure). In any case, I wish now I had taken that time.

So, I hope Mr. Kim gets well soon. I hope too that all those wonderful friends I got to know at Daewoo U.S. have prospered.

And have given up their god-awful Korean cigarettes.