I sure miss Johnny Carson

Another sleepless night. I really wish Johnny were on TV. That was my routine for the first 20 or so years of adulthood, watching Johnny before going to bed. My parents watched Johnny Carson and I remember sitting upstairs on the top step and listening to the jokes and to the conversations, listening as mom and dad laughed. Dad would always be a little perturbed when Johnny would make a local joke about California, because no one in NY knew what he was referring to. But I just loved Johnny. I adored his sense of humor. He was so quick witted. I didn't care much for the characters he played, but I loved listening to him ad lib lines as his guests went on talking about their latest movie. He was always dressed so sharp. He was one of the most intelligent men on TV. I remember when Jodie Foster was a young girl, and attending the expensive French school she was in, she had a conversation completely in French with Johnny. My mother, who was fluent in French said he spoke perfect French. I remember he loved to go to the Keukenhoff in Holland and when we went as adults, I had always secretly hoped we would run into him. He was so good with people from all walks of life, from celebrities, to writers, to the child actors and musicians who came on, to the various oddballs that would do their thing, like the potato chip lady. I still remember that night when she thought he had eaten one of her prize potato chips. I loved the animal segments with Joan Embrey and Jim Fowler. The Tonight show with Johnny Carson was such a staple in American Society for so many years, I truly felt our nation paused with a sad sigh on the last night of his show, when Bette Midler came on and sang to him. I've ordered some of the CD's of his shows, but none of them show a whole show, just little bits and pieces of segments here and there. If there were any way of ordering whole shows, I'd do it in a heartbeat. I enjoyed the comfort he brought into my home every night all those years.

Some of my favorite Johnny Carson quotes:

If life was fair, Elvis would be alive and all the impersonators would be dead.

I know a man who gave up smoking, drinking, sex, and rich food. He was healthy right up to the day he killed himself.”

Happiness is your dentist telling you it won't hurt and then having him catch his hand in the drill.”

“Never use a big word when a little filthy one will do.”

Your chances of getting struck by lightning go up if you stand under a tree, shake your fist at the sky, and say "Storms suck!"”.


Never continue in a job you don't enjoy. If you're happy in what you're doing, you'll like yourself, you'll have inner peace. And if you have that, along with physical health, you will have had more success than you could possibly have imagined

We really loved you Johnny, RIP.

Quotes of the Day - Liars and Cheaters

For me, one of my biggest pet peeves is cheating, which is just one more form of lying. I have never tolerated cheaters or liars and I believe there is a special place in hell reserved for just those folks. I think that the act of lying probably causes more human pain than any other action a human can take. As I write, I have one person on my mind in particular, that I wish would read this, just so they understand exactly how much I hate anyone who cheats (and no, it's not my ex).

Some of my favorite quotes on this topic are listed below:

Integrity is not a conditional word. It doesn't blow in the wind or change with the weather. It is your inner image of yourself, and if you look in there and see a man who won't cheat, then you know he never will. Author: John D. MacDonald

I think we all know deep inside whether or not we are the kind of people who are cheaters or liars. For me, integrity is not optional. I was taught by both my mother and father that integrity is a must. It's one of the most important things about your character and once you lose integrity, nothing else matters.


I would prefer even to fail with honor than to win by cheating. Author: Sophocles

To me this is where your conscience comes in. My conscience rules me. I wonder about people who appear to be devoid of conscience, how do they live with themselves? Have they never looked in the mirror at their own reflection.

If you marry a man who cheats on his wife, you'll be married to a man who cheats on his wife. Author: Ann Landers

I miss Ann Landers, and her sister Abby. I adored their wicked sense of humor when dealing with these issues. I don't understand the philosophy that women have, who cheat with a married man. Why do they think the man won't do the same thing to them? Do they really believe they are that wonderful and beautiful that they could prevent a dog from being a dog? They are stupid enough to blame the wife for anything wrong in the marriage and never seem to believe the man is ever the problem. Those women get my vote for the Idiot Award. 1) if the woman was that stupid, fat, lazy, or whatever the husband claims his wife to be, why in hell did he ever marry her? 2) Would you want to be married to someone that stupid? 3) Why on earth would you want a relationship with a man who cheats period? For anyone who puts any faith in statistics, they show that second marriages have an almost nil success rate. It is higher than a 75 percent divorce rate. To me, they get what they deserve

My favorite quote comes from Kim Cattrall: “Men cheat for the same reason that dogs lick their balls... because they can.”

enuf said :)

Having to deal with Customer Service nimrods

I needed to get a new cell phone, so last Friday, I went into my local Cingular office. I have had a couple Razr phones and I wanted another one. When I got there, the guy kept trying to talk me into getting a different phone. I told him if I didn't get another Razr, I wanted a blackberry or phone with a keyboard. He said the new phone with the keyboard is scheduled to go on sale December 26th. Then he tells me I am eligible for another new phone on my other number for the kids. So I figured I would get that phone for now, until the price drops on the other one.

He decides to put the pressure sale on me for this red samsung phone. It looked okay, but I really still wanted the Razr. Finally after about 30 minutes of him telling me all the wonders of this red phone, I get it. Then I get home, and I hate the phone. It's hard finding where everything is. God forbid, I should actually have to open the owner's manual and read the directions. I just didn't feel like it, I wanted the Razr since I know where everything is and I not in the mood for having to read about a new phone.

So tonight I go to take the red phone back. I get to the store, and tell the lady I want to return it, and just get the Razr. She starts razzing me about the phone, and how easy the phone is, and wants to show me how to use it. I really don't give a shit about the phone, I just want the razr. Then when she tries to show me the new phone, it doesn't work right. Come to find out, there is something not right with the phone, and she says its because it was programmed wrong and how she can program it correctly. Again, I keep telling her forget it, I just want the Razr. Then she asks for my receipt, which I left at home. I told her I didn't have it, she tells me to come back tomorrow.

I walk around the store and am reading about other phones and then I go back and ask her, "well don't you have it in the records, since I purchased it in here?" She says, yeah, they have it, blah blah blah. Then she tells me it will "take awhile" to get the receipt out of their system. Now I start to get really pissed. She makes a couple other comments like I am bothering her or wasting her time. So I scooped up the phone and tell her never mind, I will come back when there is a customer service who apparently isn't overly fatigued at having to help me. We exchange a few snide sarcastic remarks to each other and then she tells me, "well if you come back, "I" am the manager. I told her I didn't give a rat's ass if she were the president of Cingular, I would not take up her sweet time with something as wasteful as customer service.

I was so pissed I could have decked her. I was pissed at myself for letting the guy talk me into the phone, knowing full well I didn't want the damn thing to begin with. I don't need a new technology or anything upgraded, the razr works just fine for me. I don't know why I get so mad at these idiots, they are nothing but sales people, who to me, are some of the lowest lifeforms on the planet.

Anyhow, that is my bitch of the day.

Quote of the day

Apathy is one of my biggest pet peeves, so for my quote of the day, from Robert Francis Kennedy:

Laws can embody standards; governments can enforce laws--but the final task is not a task for government. It is a task for each and every one of us. Every time we turn our heads the other way when we see the law flouted--when we tolerate what we know to be wrong--when we close our eyes and ears to the corrupt because we are too busy, or too frightened--when we fail to speak up and speak out--we strike a blow against freedom and decency and justice.

I really hate loudmouths

Tonight, our church had a christmas concert, with full choir and orchestra. I love to go each year. Everyone dresses up, they put the christmas lights all around the church, and have the mist machine going, it's just very christmasy. So tonight, there are more people than usual that show up. I make sure to get there early, so we can get decent seats. As the church starts to fill, they make continuous announcements asking everyone to move to the right, so people can find a place to sit. Well the low-life's behind me, there are three of them stretched across one large pew "saving seats" for someone who is "on their way." I can see saving a seat if someone is going to be there in five minutes or less, but not for someone that they havent' even left their house yet. I know this to be true, because loudmouth number one was talking to whoever it was on the phone, "girl you better leave, you're gonna be late." At least 30 people minimum asked to sit there, but were denied, because of the whole saving seats issue, which just burns me to begin with. During this whole time, the music pastor is talking, and the loudmouths talk even louder to make sure they talk over the speaker system. By the time the musical started, there are over 100 people left standing, but yet, the seatsavers behind me refuse to let any of these people standing have the seats. And they continue talking, and talking, and then talking louder. As the music went louder, so did they. After the third song, I turned around and asked them in as polite a voice as I can muster as a pissed off native new yorker, "are you going to talk all night? Because if you are, I would rather leave, since I can't hear anything but your conversation." Then I get the staredown. They look at each other, and then stare at me, and then continue right on with their loudmouths. This is usually when my hearing deficit gets even worse, and somehow manages to overamplify the conversation I didn't want to hear to begin with. They go on and on and on, I can repeat the whole conversation. Now their friends come in, and the talking gets louder and with more people. Fifteen more minutes go by, and the only thing I hear is the conversation of now 7 people sitting behind me. Arghhhhhhhhhhhhhh!! Now what I don't understand, is why do these nimrods bother showing up for stuff? You know the kind, the ones who when you are at the movies, talk and converse loudly throughout the whole movie. You go to church, and they sit behind you discussing their past week, obviously not paying attention to anything the pastor has to say. You go to a meeting at work, and the loudmouths sit behind everyone, talking about whatever bullshit they feel is more important than what the meeting organizer had planned for people to listen to. I just don't have the patience anymore to sit quietly by and not say anything to their rudeness. If it were legal and I thought I could get away with it, I'd shove them on their ass, or do something that would quickly make them realize that I am pissed off and really don't want to hear their stupid conversation. I wish the seats at public events had little shock buttons, that if someone was being obnoxious, you could push a button and send a shockwave right through to their spine. You would think they would feel shamed when someone calls them on their rudeness, but that is never the case. They are typical narcissistic people who truly believe the world wants to know about their life. Anyhow, thats my gripe of the day. I finally just left and drove home before I turned around and smacked the biggest loudmouth right in the face.

Tis the Season.......

This is the time of year when you think people would be friendly and kind to each other. These are not exactly the sentiments I witnessed today while shopping at the mall. I try to avoid the mall most of the year, but particularly so during the holidays. Too many people and not enough room, I feel closed in. But today one of my friends needed some help and asked me to pick up a gold ornament for her, to take to an ornament exchange tonight. So off to Macy's I went, where the ornaments were 40 percent off. I found a lovely glass ornament, striped gold and white, about the size of a softball, very elegant looking. I took it to the gift wrap counter where they told me that there was one person in front of me. I told them I would return in about an hour to pick it up.

I then trotted through the mall to Penneys to look for hoodies for the boys, which were supposedly on sale. They were not to be found, but thats another gripe for another day. After three hours, I returned to Macy's and noticed my ornament was still not wrapped. The customer service wrapping lady told me she would do it next. The other wrapping lady (do they have an official title?) was busy listening to another customer complaining about her wrapping not being done yet. Next thing I know, the customer goes into a tirade so bad, you would have thought they had kidnapped her child or something. She screams so bad, about 15 other customers come from nearby to listen to what is going on. She goes on for over 5 minutes straight, berating this poor little lady trying to wrap these gifts, and the wrapping lady had a major meltdown. She flew out of there through some back door, and apparently was so distraught, they had to call an ambulance to get her to take her to the hospital. Everyone else in customer service runs to the back to help with her. One of the managers of a clothing department came over to try and help wrap presents. I told them I was in no hurry. So while she was wrapping the very first present, she accidentally gouged her wrist with the scissors and blood starts shooting everywhere. Now she is on her way to the hospital to get stitches, because she cut it so bad. Now do you think the other customers there would have the decency to realize the fact that if their presents weren't wrapped today, it wouldn't be the end of the world as we know it? Apparently they were confused and thought that if their gifts weren't wrapped immediately, the earth would stop spinning, because three or four of them started bitching at the other ladies who had come over to help out. They were ugly and very loud. I couldn't help it, I started giggling. I kept thinking, "have they watched the news? Do they realize what is going on in the world today? " I guess not, because they truly acted like they would just friggin die if their gifts weren't given priority over everything else. During this madness, two ladies had requested the same wrapping paper in the same size box. One lady had a men's shirt to be wrapped and the other one had some girls panties and a wallet for her teenage daughter. Well, the lady who came with the men's shirt, left with the teenage panties and wallet and didn't realize it. The male shirt was still there. So I don't know what guy is going to end up opening up the box with the panties and wallet, but boy I bet he will be surprised. I hope its not for someone's boss. At this point, everyone was laughing almost to the point of tears, except for the snot in front of me. She had 14 gifts to be wrapped and so far, they had only completed 7. She chose identical wrapping paper for all 14 boxes. The paper was this hideous olive green and the little ornament looked like a huge yellow teardrop. She calls the head of customer service and requests that all three ladies who are there now, all work on no one else's gifts, but hers. While they are wrapping the rest of her gifts, they are talking about the yellow ornament, and one of them says it looks like a lemon. So the customer went beserk and demanded they take the yellow "lemon" off all her 7 boxes and put something else "Christmasy" on her boxes. They tried to explain that it wasn't really a "lemon" just a yellow ornament that could actually look like a lot of things, like the tear drop of a giant or something. She started screaming and became hysterical. The one wrapping lady who was helping me started laughing so hard, she had tears running down her face. I just wanted to shake this customer and tell her, there are children starving in Africa or something, that it wasn't the end of the world if the recipients of her gifts actually received a pretty "lemon" ornament with their present. But I held my tongue, because you never know what kind of crazy people you are dealing with. Even though she was a 60ish caucasian lady, she could have been packing an uzi in her bag, or worse yet, she could be the wife of one of my upper management level bosses. So I just snickered as she huffed and puffed her way on out of the store.

At that point, I figured I better get my ass out of that store and home where I will be safe and sound away from the mean people of the world. If I ever completely lose my mind over the gift wrapping on a present I have bought for someone, please feel free to have me Baker acted.

Every job has one......

I have worked in a multitude of positions all across the country. I am originally from northern New York, then went to college in a small town in Thatcher, Arizona. From there, I moved with my then husband to a college in Clarksville, Tennesse. Once he joined the Army, we lived in Alabama, Texas, and Germany. I now live in Florida. One thing I have learned, is that no matter where you live, or what job you have, there is always at least one royal pain in the ass on the job. Everyone knows the type: the person who does everything better, whose kids are superkids, and whose spouse is the best person ever ............ These are the people that are usually married to someone who is an outright jerk, and the kid is the teacher or athletic coach's nightmare.

In my last position, her name was "Amanda". Well I can tell you her whole life history, where she was born, when she got married, about all of her pregancies and labor history, about her ever so wonderful hubby who is just the best person ever, ever, ever!!, and all about her wonderful, super-talented, super-beautiful, should be "models" children.

My office was several doors down, but it doesn't matter where anyone is. Because the OPITA (office pain in the ass) makes sure that everyone hears their stories. They hang out at the fax machine, in the breakroom, or wherever they can have an audience. If they only knew how much they were loathed, by everyone, including the kind souls who actually pay attention and listen, because they don't want to be rude. Not me.

One of my favorite games to play with the OPITA is "match it or beat it." Gather a couple people at the job, and discuss a specific topic ahead of time. Find a topic that someone knows a lot about, or is an expert on. Then, when the OPITA comes in, start discussing the topic with each other and time, just how long it takes the OPITA to either match the story, or beat it. Then they get extra points for involving their super children or super spouses.

We used to play this game with a doctor we worked with. He was the PITA in the NICU I worked in. One day we picked out fishing, as one of our coworkers was into lobster. She came in with these pictures of the hugest lobsters I think I have ever seen that they caught off the shore of Florida. Just humongous. Well Dr Know It All came in, and we started discussing these lobsters and within 5 minutes, he talked about how that past weekend, he caught a shark. Not a big shark, a baby one, but it was much bigger than the lobster. And he wasn't planning on catching a shark, it just happened. By the time he left our area, he had the hugest smile on his face, knowing that he had "beat" our expert on the fish story of the day. If only he knew, lol. What made it even better was noticing two other physicians sitting on the other side of the room, giggling while listening to us. I can only imagine the stories they hear.

Since there is one on every job, you have to decide whether or not you are going to leave your place of employment because of them. Chances are, unless you are independently wealthy, you'll have to suck it up and tolerate the OPITA, so playing match it or beat it can at least put a smile on your face once a day.