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Monday

15Mar2010

Time for a Break

Monday, March 15, 2010

Since the inception of this blog, and the three or four different versions of it that have existed, I have only taken short breaks to attend The Masters. This year, I’m probably going to attend The Masters, but, before that, I’m going to take an extended break. From now until the end of the month or so, I’m not going to blog. I’m going to concentrate, and think, and come up with brilliant ideas. I’m going to put the full weight of my considerable talents to thinking, which I haven’t done in years. Oh, that’s not as bad as it sounds. For long stretches of my life, I have subsisted on snap decisions and bald-faced rage, without any thinking being done at all. Thinking is overrated. Doing is underrated.

Now would be a good time to point out that my blogs are like beacons of hope in a world possessed by mediocrity and fear. I have a few things that I like to call The Best of the Blog. If you have stomach that, you can run with billy goats and feast on anything, sir. You can trip through Celebrity Disaster and then find yourself on a sports tangent with Talking Smack About Sports. I am a Gentleman Bounty Hunter, you know, and I do like my Safe For Work Hotties.

When I come back, I hope I’m not rusty and boring. If so, I’ll probably demand more of myself. I may search for scapegoats and look for a dingbat to take the fall, but I won’t tolerate boring. Not here or anywhere else.

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Saturday

13Mar2010

I Want to Be the Han Han of America

Saturday, March 13, 2010

Han Han

They say that Chinese blogger and pretty boy Han Han is the most popular writer in the world, but that’s only because they have a lot of computers in China. If China only had a few thousand computers, he wouldn’t be so popular. I want to be Han Han. He’s young, he races cars, he writes nasty things about the Chinese communists, and young women fall for brokers and flim-flam men who trick the ladies into thinking Han Han wants to be their lover.

Anyone can criticize a totalitarian government; few people have the celebrity to pull it off:

IT’S not so easy being Han Han, the heartthrob race car driver and pop novelist who just happens to be China’s most widely read blogger.

Traveling incognito is all but impossible. Local officials frequently vie for his endorsement of their latest architectural boondoggles. (He politely declines.) And love-lorn young women often approach him after races with letters bearing his name. (He says the women have been duped by impostors who have assumed his identity.)

But Mr. Han’s most vexing challenge comes from a more formidable nemesis: the unseen censors who delete blog posts they deem objectionable and the publishing police who have held up the release of his new magazine, “A Chorus of Solos,” a provocative collection of essays and photographs. “The government wants China to become a great cultural nation, but our leaders are so uncultured,” he said with a shrug, offering his characteristic Cheshire-cat grin. “If things continue like this, China will only be known for tea and pandas.”

Since he began blogging in 2006, Mr. Han has been delivering increasingly caustic attacks on China’s leadership and the policies he contends are creating misery for those unlucky enough to lack a powerful government post. With more than 300 million hits to his blog, he may be the most popular living writer in the world.

I happen to be good-looking enough to be a sort of Han Han for the over 60 crowd; many women in their forties and fifties stare at me in airports and I get propositioned all the time. I haven’t had to beat them off with a stick (broom handle, actually) since my one North American concert tour in 1984 as an International pop star. It’s a good thing the financial world drew me back in; I would hate to have become Han Han as a younger man; I’d be broke and lonely, and pathetic like Hugh Grant or Bob Saget right now. I’d rather have the fame and adulation (and the blog hits) now, when I can relax and enjoy my life.

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Friday

12Mar2010

Farmville Sucks

Friday, March 12, 2010

Farmville

It only took me a few passes at it to realize that Farmville isn’t a game—it’s a marketing device. After being hit with SPAM and unwanted invitations to waste time doing something else, abandoning Farmville was easy as pie.

I encourage folks to walk away from it. Leave your Farmville farmstead up and running as if nothing happened so that it eats away at their bandwidth and server space. Don’t end up like this poor lady:

Cathy Hinz is really into “FarmVille.” But she swears she’s not obsessed.

“I can, you know, walk away and say, ‘I’m not going to worry about it.’ I don’t worry about it, but I will plan my farm around my life,” she says.

Hinz, a 50-year old mom and grandmother, manages an apartment complex in Portland, Ore., so she has time to be online, fiddling with the farm simulation game as much as she wants. And she’s far from the only one.

Since its launch in June 2009, “FarmVille” has grown like an invasive weed, with 80 million players and countless annoying updates from said players about eggplant mastery, lost turtles and found mystery eggs.

It’s absurdly easy to get started: Pick an avatar, plant some crops, harvest some crops, earn some “FarmVille” coins. Before you know it, you’ve got raspberries that need to be harvested RIGHT NOW, and your friends are trying to give you sheep. It’s no “World of Warcraft,” but for non-gamers like Hinz, that’s exactly the point.

“I have messed around with other games a bit but nothing that really held my interest. They were either too violent or too complicated or too ‘childish,’” she says.

The thing is, you have to use your own money to really have anything. You can start off like I did, selling wheat and corn, which is how real farmers started, but you’ll never get the $45,000 or whatever you need to buy a home and all that unless you kick in your own money. Meanwhile, you’re constantly being barraged with unwanted invitations and nonsense from other people or from the owners of the game itself.

I’m a “leave me alone” sort of fellow. As in, leave me alone. I’ve tried your game. It sucks. Now, go pound sand.

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Monday

22Feb2010

As We Continue Amusing Ourselves to Death...

Monday, February 22, 2010

This is typical of the self-involved, self-centered type of commentary you find now:

My wife, Megan Wollman-Rosenwald, was so moved by the piece that she decided to respond (and please leave us your smartphone stories and experiences on the comment boards at the bottom of this page):

While reading this story, I was amazed: While my husband, the author, interviewed all of these people who live their lives via their smartphones, he could have easily written the story in first person, without interviewing a single subject. I believe he may be the single biggest offender of this new digital age. It does make me feel better that at least I am not alone, but the smartphone problem has often been a big issue in our house. My husband does not go anywhere or do anything without his phone. He must constantly be accessible, and when his phone dings with a message, he needs to immediately read it and respond, regardless of what we are doing. The other day, he was playing catch with our son and ding, he got a message. While our son called his name because he wanted to throw the ball back to him, my husband was too engrossed in whatever message he had received to respond to our 2 1/2 year old.

Sadly, I see how this feels much too often. While eating dinner, watching TV together, lying in bed at night, I have often wondered if he might pay more attention to me if I texted him instead of actually talking. There is a positive side, though. I know if I need to reach him when we are not together that he will respond to me fairly quickly — as long as I type my question to him.

It is a bit of a blow to the ego, thinking that whatever is on his phone is more interesting to him that I am. I have often wanted and threatened to do physical damage to his phone. It is almost like he is having an affair with his phone — but I have to watch!

I can understand the desire to see what new messages are popping in your inbox — I have my own smartphone as well. But it would be nice to have some cell phone-free times when we could actually talk to each other and I wouldn’t have to compete with a sleek little phone with a shiny screen. My only concern, though, is: Would we still have things to actually talk about?

Why didn’t the woman just state the obvious? Her husband is NOT an important person. He is a peon and a prisoner of whoever snaps their fingers. He is someone’s bitch boy, to put it in the vernacular. He’s not addicted to anything; he’s just not important enough to realize that he can ignore the nonsense of others.

Always segment your day; make time for the Internet, make time for the little people and their E-mails, and make time for your blog. The other 23 hours of the day should be spent doing whatever you want, and to hell with the world at large. I can say that because I am an important person.

It’s as simple as that.

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Tuesday

16Feb2010

Justice Scalia Hits One Out of the Park

Tuesday, February 16, 2010

All of the great men of history know the answer to the question of secession, and Justice Scalia knows it, too:

The right of a state to secede from the nation is way outside my personal injury wheelhouse. But it has become a source of conversation on professorial and political blogs, and the concept has generated interest from the Tea Party movement.

As it happens, my brother has a letter from Justice Antonin Scalia that is directly on point as to the legitimacy of secession. How he got that letter, and its contents, are the subject of today’s post.

The inspiration for writing, and the release of the letter, comes from Prof. Eugene Volokh, who wrote, “I keep hearing the claim that the legitimacy of secession from the U.S. was ‘settled at Appomattox,’ and I wanted to say a few words about why I think that makes little sense.”

The good prof goes on to write that, while clearly not supporting secession of any State in concept, that the issue is far from settled. He writes:

If in 2065 Alaska, California, Hawaii, or Texas (just to consider some examples) assert a right to secede, the argument that “in 1865, the victorious Union government concluded that no state has a right to secede in opposition to the wishes of the Union, so therefore you lack such a right” will have precisely the weight that the Americans of 2065 will choose to give it — which should be very little.

If we are to believe such nonsense, then the questions of secession are driven more by a desire to be rid of the Obamas and less driven by actual academic concerns. As soon as a Republican occupies the White House, such concerns will go back where they belong—on the fringe.

It’s worth noting how Justice Scalia attacks this nonsense, however:

I am afraid I cannot be of much help with your problem, principally because I cannot imagine that such a question could ever reach the Supreme Court. To begin with, the answer is clear. If there was any constitutional issue resolved by the Civil War, it is that there is no right to secede. (Hence, in the Pledge of Allegiance, “one Nation, indivisible.”) Secondly, I find it difficult to envision who the parties to this lawsuit might be. Is the State suing the United States for a declaratory judgment? But the United States cannot be sued without its consent, and it has not consented to this sort of suit.

If you’re like me, you might have said, Justice Scalia uses the Pledge of Allegiance? I wouldn’t have gone there, but I would have cited Lincoln, who said that the states could not secede, period, end of story. Anyone who protests can sit on their thumb and spin. The matter is settled.

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Thursday

11Feb2010

Snowmageddon Has Kicked My Ass, Sir

Thursday, February 11, 2010

Normal readers—and there are, what, three of you?—have probably noticed that “An American Lion” has slowed a bit. I normally do seventeen or eighteen posts a day. Now, I’m just doing one.

The Snowmageddon of February 2010 has kicked your uncle Norman’s ass. I haven’t been able to move for several days. I cannot come and go as I please. A disagreement between the people who manage our exclusive gated community and Howard County, Maryland has resulted in having the Howard County snowplows BRING snow to our community and BLOCK our homes. A front end loader put several tons of snow on my front yard. Then, the man spun the tires, threw a bottle of Gatorade containing urine at us, and flipped us off. It was the doggonest thing I had ever seen in my life. All because we had complained?

We were snowed in on Friday of last week. Myself, Byron, Peej and Miranda—all stuck in a five bedroom house together? Trying to get along in a home with 3,500 square feet? Now, we can do that for a day or two, but they did not “plow” us out until someone bribed a man with Montgomery County to drive up Highway 29 and plow us out. Even then, he was beastly and slow. He left a berm fifteen feet wide and four feet high in front of our home.

Anyway, having Miranda—my gothically inclined 26 year-old daughter screaming at me about doing something to help the squirrels feed in the back yard has a way of getting old. We left bread out there for them. I will not part with my nuts. What, is that supposed to be funny? It is not. My nuts are mine.

Now, being an old badass, I can shovel snow. This is a family that comes from New Hampshire, sir. Of course, we didn’t have any fuel for the snowblower, but I digress. You cannot remove a thick berm with a snowblower. You have to use shovels. You have to have a plan. We had shovels and a plan, but after an hour of shoveling, we were exhausted. And, we had ten feet of berm to remove.

I did something I have never done in my life. I put on work gloves, a pair of sweatpants that I found in the garage, I put on socks, and then I put on workman’s boots. I grabbed a shovel myself and shoveled. Oh, sweet Creator making fluffy clouds in Heaven above, I shoveled. I removed snow. I got my hands dirty.*

We removed the snow, we freed the Chevy Suburban, and then Byron and I went out to find food. Alas, by the time we were doing this (on Tuesday), the stores were picked clean. And the second Snowmageddon storm was bearing down on us. Byron and I ended up cleaning out a gas station of frozen food entrees—you know, the kind that people in dirty t-shirts eat between bouts of doing nothing that interests me.

The second storm howled through out part of town, drifting the snow like a proper blizzard. By now, I think there is forty inches on the ground, and more coming on Monday. It is now Thursday night. I slept all of Wednesday, exhausted from shoveling and frightened of what I had become. I had become a working man. A man who worked with his hands, which I thought were dirty but were really just rough. Rough from the touch of a shovel. Rough from labor. I half expect someone to hand me a small paycheck, figured out to the hourly wage or some such nonsense.

Did I mention that I broke a sweat? Goodness, that upset me to no end.

____

*no, I wore gloves

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