RYAN LEAF: A SOB-STORY

I am watching ESPN, earlier, and, on the crawl at the bottom of the screen, I see that Ryan Leaf was arrested in Montana on charges of burglary and drug possession. I think to myself, Yeah, that's about right.

And the thoughts continued to his "legacy": Coming out of college into the NFL, who is better? Ryan Leaf or some dude named Peyton Manning? Well, that has been answered, eh? As a professional football quarterback, Peyton Manning had a better career.

Ryan Leaf has often been said to be the "biggest bust" in NFL draft history. I agree.

I was all ready to pile on. I remember his childish blow-up with a reporter (who was just doing his job). I remember the bazooka God gave Leaf...that he wasted. Hypocritically, I was all ready to say, "See? The dude is...not prepared to lead a team of NFLers."

Then I Googled Ryan Leaf's name.

His life has swirled into the toilet. In 2008, as a quarterbacks coach for Texas A&M, he had a problem. He was accused of robbing a player's home. It turned out that Ryan Leaf also had received about a thousand pain pills from pharmacies in the area...in about an eight-month span. In 2009, he plead guilty to eight felony drug charges. And, last year, he had surgery to remove a benign tumor from his brain stem.

I retract my statement. Dude needs some help. As a practicing psychologist, I think that much of his troubles may stem from being the odd-man-out in the Manning-vs-Leaf Draft Debate. I think, psychologically, to be nationally skewered and dissected takes a huge toll on a psyche. I think that his trials and tribulations in his short-lived NFL career threw him into a tail-spin.

I think I should not pile on.

In his defense, he had a friggin' gun for an arm. (And Swiss cheese for character. And oatmeal for a brain.)

ON DAVID LETTERMAN...

He had a deposed leader of the Maldive Islands. The dude was little and brown. He looked like a darker-colored leprechaun. But he spoke the truth! Global warming!

His (former) islands were/are in danger of "going under". The Sea. The motherfucking Sea.

Announcer's voice: "Perched off the southwestern coast of the Indian sub-continent, the Maldives are most definitely prone to swells in sea levels and tsunamis and the effects of global warming. If the clock could be set back fifty years, they could be all right. But! The clock cannot be set back. These people are going to have to find new places to live. Because the village they used to live in? It's gone baby gone, underwater, reduced to fish food."

No one listens. No one listens! No one gives a shit (if they're doing all right.).

Imagine how tough it is to move. To leave an abode in which you have lived for the last year, ten years, one hundred years. Memories and all that? Multiply it by Infinity. Imagine having to leave the USA because the rest of the (rich) world didn't give a shit about your (un)natuturally-occuring circumstances. How would you feel?

Morose, I'm sure.

***

I think it is like this. I think I can break this into three groups: One, dumbasses. They don't know or hear the Logic that is out there, every day. Another group is a collection of BigBirds. They know, but hide their heads in the sand. (Yes. Like ostriches.) The third group is a secret group--oh-so secret group--of multi-billionaires who hold the World's balls in their ever-more-grubby fingertips. CEOs, politicians, entrepreneurs...criminals....

***

And but so.

So the huuuuuge majority of people wake up, shower, go to their job. For what? Why continue in the rat-race when you *know* it's skewed? Self-preservation? Of course. A sense of purpose? Of course. Responsibility? Yes.

But when does the Rich .00001 Percent show a damned bit of responsibility? When?!

***

On to sweeter news: I think puppies and kittens are cute! I also think that rainbows come after tornados.

***

I also think this: I think it's a slanted game. I think that it ain't a level playing-field. I think that the Have's are gonna kick the asses of the Have-Not's (myself included).

***

I think, that even with alllllllllllllllllllllllllllll the evidence in place, honored, there are High People (Those That Shall Not Be Named) who will *disagree* with the evidence, the sureity, of global warming. They'll say, "No. Uh-uh. You're Wrong." Why would they do that?!

I'll call it the Fossil Fuel Probe. Petroleum industries, like natural gas and coal, have their exceedingly long fingers on the prostate of politicians. "You'll feel a leetle pressure. Nothing to worry about. You vote our way, we'll withdraw our foul-smelling appendage."

Does that work/of course.

***

Backtrack away from American po-po, I mean polygamy, I mean politics for a moment.

*What* about the people in the Maldives? Christ! For that matter, what about the indigent and the poor and the Less-Than's in the good ole U Ess of Aye?! Do we matter any more.

***

Do we matter any more.

***

This is funny. The banks got bailed out. Yes. The car companies got bailed out. Yes. How many people, with their house mortgage upside-down, with the Poverty Ghoul sizing them up...how many Americans with many mouths to feed and no food with which to feed...how many mentally-unstable people...how many of the lower Less-Than's got bailed out? Survey says! Not even *close* to enough.

The rich get richer. America is turning into a country in South America. There is an abyss between the Rich and the Super-Poor...and nothing in between. This is old news, right? People have been saying for twenty years that this dichotamy would rear its head. Wake up. It is here.

***

In better news...wait. I've got it.

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In better news...people have learned how to bury their heads in sand. Just like large humanistic birds.

***

In better news...there *is* no better news. Here in Michigan we were subjected to highs in the 70s and record-highs in the mid-eighties. We were lucky. In mid-March there was a SWATH of tornadic activity that blew the guts out of the center of the country. We're talking E-4 tornadic activity. Lives were lost and towns were decimated. All around the world there are mudslides and earthquakes and volcanoes and tsunamis.... Did this *always* occur? Is it just the speed of the internet that brings news to all of us, lickty-split? Or? Is this a new Dominion. Is this a new world?

***

I don't WANNA sound like Chicken Little, but, c'mon. Open your fucking eyes!

***

I just have a very bad feeling about the direction of this city, of this state, of this country, of this continent, of this very WORLD. Things *may* work themselves out, but I am really not holding out too much Hope. Or my breath. I think that the dye has been cast, I think that the writing is on the wall. I think that a lot of politcos are backtracking, trying to assauge their constiuents, all in vain. Personally, I think that God's pissed at us--Humanity. I think...I, personally? I think it'll be Bedlam, Soon.

***

On to better thoughts. Here is one! I have been working in an admittedly low-strength job for the last few months. For the last month, I have been working with a fractured elbow. (I fell off of a porch.) In the early daze, the pain was immense. If anyone brushed my elbow, or bumped against it, the pain LEAPED through my arm to the neurons in the brain. I appeased with this: "Everyone who is on something has had some physical ailment that deterred them for a "minute". I had a broken arm? I'd adjust. It just seemed that it was in the "proper way". I went through a whole hell of a lot of pain. With urgings, I went to the doctor. She, an attractive Indian, took my blow-ups. Nuttin'. Nothing, right! But! "There could be a hairline fracture," she informed me. "There's that white line. But it seems like it is healing."

So? I went to a doctor to know what I already knew sans X-rays?! Blimey. (What is your point?)

Here is my point....

Fuck it. The computer has a mind of its own. I choose not italics. I choose my own showing of words when I want to. But! The computer seems to be fucked. What a fucking surprise.

Anyway, back to my point. The kid who was supposed to do the closing at the store came in to the store and said that his finger was jammed and he couldn't work. Bango-Bonzo! Wha? I am thinking to myself about the multitude of times that I had jammed my fingers, my thumbs, my ankles, my knees, during Sports. I know this kid is a high-on, but c'mon. Right from then, I wasn't "on his side". Then my crocodile bwane took o'er:

----With him out of the picture, I would make more money. I'd be the only driver. The GM of the store asked me if I could handle it. I hope I didn't, but I do believe I rolled my eyes. For a delivery driver, this place is a motherfucking morgue. I'd said, "Um, yeah. I'll do fine."----

***

The beleagured GM of a store that "does not" shrugged and said, to all effects, "Whadevoure".

***

This is another inkling of the Have's and the Have-Not's. Some high-on motherfucker, back in the day, created a sub-shop. (Good for him.) His intention, at start-up, I believe, was to create a high-quality sub. I think? In the beginning, he did. But, oh, then, he had some success. And then a little bit more. And then a WHOLE lot more. And, I believe, he got cocky. I think he got GREEDY. In fact, I know. I have seen hourly positions and I have seen salaried positions and there ain't a whole hell of a lot between them. The ridiculously-rich man grinds EVERYONE beneath his knuckles.

I've asked this a few times: How does the man sleep at night? (Call the BBB on his ass. He ain't working fair. Not by a long-shot.)

Do I retract my statements? Why. The. Fuck. Would. I?

***

I HAD FORGOTTEN.

I had simply forgotten how much fun--and how soul-soothing--writing can be. It is bliss. It is an extension of Self. For a "writer", without writing? They curdle. They shrink. Intellectually and physically, they die. They become a husk.

Long live the keyboard.

Long live the keyboard!

I have been reading over my my blogroll and I have to say that I have LOL'd more than thrice. I

find myself funny.

So. What?

It's a motherfucking start, at least. It is a motherfucking start. I'll dovetail this bullshit into a lucrative six-figure income, I'm sure.

I'm sure.

Put it this way: Some people are born to lead...and others are just there for statistics.

Here is a statistic: How many 39-year-olds work at sammich shoppes? Not too many. I am one of the .007%. Kudos for me.

Now, I am not trying to make this a sob-story. It just kinda happened on its own.

To all the kidz out there: NEVER DRINK! AN OUNCE! A BOTTLE! DRINK NOTHING!

Will that work? Hell no. But it is worth a shot. Learn from me. LEARN! from me! I know of what I speak.

***

Tears fall. A lot. Emotional tears, sure, but also physiological tears from holding the puke in. Why would I want to keep the puke where it should reside? Answer: Because it really really really is a pain in the ass to vomit. It takes too much time. Gotta kneel there, heavin' up...nothing and heave and heave and heave again. It is unwieldy.

In a perfect world there would be a Heave-A-Trom. Or a Puke-A-Trom. Then again....

Then again, in a perfect world, there'd be no Addiction or Famine or Drought or Misplaced Nature or Rape or Killing or Mental Illness or Government. Wouldn't that be perfect? Sure it would. Just up to the time when Humanity would fuck it up. Fuck up Perfection. Because you know it would happen.

Am I a pessimist? Yes. Am I also a realist? Yes. Humanity has had tens of thousands of years to "fix" things. Have they? Not a fucking bit. There is still a powder-keg in the Middle East, there is still famine in Africa and the good ole Ewe Es of Aye, there is still greed and corruption.... There are still psychopaths who call themselves "American Soldiers"....

***

Women? Children? In a village in Afghanistan? Murdered? By the man in the White Hat? No. The 15 or 20 women, men and children (CHILDREN) were shot to death by a deranged U.S. soldier. But?

Yes. Go ahead and say your piece.

No, um, I was just sayin', um, I thought we were the good guys?

Well.... No, we're not. In a lot of their minds, we're infidels. We drink, we smoke, we watch porn. We're just assholes.

Okay. So. What about that soldier who took it upon himself to kill as many "towelheads" as he could? Do you chalk it up to PTSD or do you chalk it up to tyrannacism or do you chalk it up to jingoism or do you chalk it up to the Hero Complex?

Hero?! Hero?!

No.

This jacked-up individual set the Process back five years. Maybe they didn't trust us; I wouldn't either. But this stupid crazy motherfucker took it upon himself to murder women and children in a non-combative sitcheeashon. First off? My heart is heavy for every villager who lives "over there". Second, I want this dude dead. I'm sorry. Capital punishment seems acceptable. It HAS to be done. It has to be done for a myriad of reasons. The guy's gotta go. I am truly sorry. To him, his family, the U.S. of A, and, most important, the survivors of the families he tore apart.

Good job, soldier.

Well done.

(Fucking jack-ass.)

***

In more soothing news, the weather is...krazee.

***

Trouble ahead. Trouble behind.

***

Casey Jones? I've just lost my motherfucking mind. Kapoot. Kapoot!

Kapoot.

***

Learn how to love and forget how to hate. (Thanks, Ozzie.) That is for the crazy soldier who fucked up multiple fam-damblies in the Middle East and also fucked the U.S.'s tattered Integrity. Thanks for that, soldier. The line is: "Next time you see a soldier, shake his or her hand." I agree with all of that. The next time I see him, though? Does a head-butt count as an accessory?

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