Wave of the future? 

Yummmmm

I had me one of these babies for lunch today -- only on rye bread of course. At the 7 Seas in Milford, the only real townie bar in town. I was priviledged to dine with the one and only Mary Hegerty-Neske, 2006 Grand Marshall of the Milford Parade. *Sniff* So proud. 

HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY

 

Flyin' High and Proud

This bad boy is flying from the top of Beacon Hill in New Haven today --nice and high where anyone coming up the hill can see it. HAPPY ST. PATRICK'S DAY! 

On the Avenue

It doesn't matter how old I get, every year when marching season rolls around I start to get antsy. I can't even remember how many years I spent behind a barricade on 86th street watching the parade -- that is until the parade stopped going down 86th street to 3rd Avenue. It was my hereditary stomping ground -- Mom grew up on 90th street and Dad on 89th. One of the last years I went in to see the parade (I think it must have been 2000) I spent the afternoon with my mother and she was STILL running into old timers she knew from "the neighborhood" that she had left in 1962! We spent the evening in one of Yorkville's oldest best bars -- The Hiedelberg! It's true that everyone...and every place...is Irish on St. Patrick's Day in NYC.

I pretty sure I managed to make it to 15 straight parades beginning somewhere around 1983. I can't remember exactly. I can't remember the bars but do know I spent a few in Fitzpatrick's (now gone) and the Kinsale Tavern (now horribly sportsbarred...ick). I think I wound up in a Mexican restaurant on the Westside one year with my friend Anna from Dublin.

I can't handle the booze anymore, I can't handle the crowds anymore, I can't handle the pseudo-Irish crap like green beer, crappy music, and nasty "Fuck Me I'm Irish t-shirts" on nasty little bastards from Massapequa anymore. I can't handle waiting on line for three hours for a bathroom, and I can't handle the drunk train home anymore.

But I still get antsy and want to go just a little nuts every March 17th. 

New Cirque de Soleil Show - LeFuquesRepublican

Clowns are scary but who knew it could get this bad? Cruising the NYTimes this morning and see that the Republicans are claiming to be happy about Sen. Russ Feingold's move to censure LeButthead over illegal wiretaps and oh, lets call it gross infringement of civil liberties. Disgusting makes me wanna vomit just to look at him, affectionately known as Fat Fuck by my brother, Rush Limbaugh is quoted as saying, "This is gift...They [the Dems] finally found the issue where they could convince the American people that they, too, see an enemy."

Oh yeah, we see the enemy. And when the revolution comes we'll be hanging your fat ass off the the Washington monument.

Beware the Ides of March

You ain't freakin' kiddin me.
Hail Chickenshit Caesar Salad 

OOOOOOOOOOLD Burt 

Old Burt 

What is it?

Kevin and I watched "The Longest Yard" last night. I give it a 2. I was preoccupied by the fact that Burt Reynolds' face appears to be flaking off cell by cell. Even Hollywood makeup can't hide it anymore. It was gruesome. He used to be a handsome dude. Now he looks like something stuffed and on a shelf that the museum cleaning lady forgot to dust for a while. 

Check out Teddy Velvet's Blog

The one and only Ted Velvet (aka my brother XXXX) got me started on this blog thing and so I think I owe him a freebie. Check out The Velvet Factor for one stir crazy Daddy-O's rage against the machine.
http://velvetfactor.blogspot.com/

Pilgrim Eye View

This was taken at Marconi Beach on Cape Cod this weekend. Not a footprint or Red Sox fan in sight. 

Did I forget to mention that the handmaid's have to dress in red?  

The Handmaid's Tale

About 20 years or so ago I read "The Handmaid's Tale" by Margaret Atwood and was so terrified by the repression of the female sex depicted in the book that I have never been able to forget it. Welcome to 2006 and a world that is careening closer and closer to the downright horrifying events that transpired in the novel. Terrifying how? The title character basically wakes up one morning to discover that she is now living in a totalitarian religious state and that all of her rights have been stripped away. She has no money. She has no voice. She has no freedom. She has no value. There is no room for dissent. Her husband is killed and her daughter is taken away. She is locked in a prison but because she is fertile she is given the role of "handmaid" -- a sexual surrogate to a leader in the regime. Her sole purpose is to bear a child. According to the regime that is her only value. A man accused of causing a miscarriage is literally torn limb-from-limb by indoctrinated handmaids. Only those in power can circumvent the laws, but only men have power. Only men have power because "the bible declares it so".

Scary shit.

And recent events have futher scared the bejesus out of me and my reproductive organs. South Dakota? One question -- how many women voted? In Minnesota there is a bill in play that would allow pharmacists to refuse to fill birth control prescriptions depending on the pharmacist's "conscience". And my favorite? The Health Insurance Marketplace Modernization and Affordability Act, introduced in the US Senate by Sen. Mike Enzi (R-WY), which would allow insurance companies to ignore nearly all state laws that require insurance coverage for certain treatments or conditions, including contraceptives in their prescription plans.

So let me see if I've got this right: the plan is to prevent women from having abortions, having their birth control prescriptions filled, or having their insurance companies pay for their birth control.

Which lead me to my next question: where the fuck are the women in the country and why the fuck aren't they saying anything?