Mother's Day

Boot Camp at the U.S. Naval Training Center, San Diego,  wasn't bad. I was too busy to be homesick even though I swore my allegiance to the Constitution and Arleigh Burke at the age of 17 years and 22 days. The Boy Scouts and a thousand days of free-lance tramping with rifle and a backpack helped the skills come easily.

A bad attitude toward chickenshit rules gave me some trouble and, eventually, cost me my squad leader spot. Still, I was largely with the program and comfortable with the Cold War patriotism of the era. The godless hordes of Mao and Bulganin would not rape my sisters nor send Dad to die agonizingly in the mines of Siberia, so I accepted the inconvenience of learning to become a sea warrior.

But what boy, in his heart of hearts, doesn't miss Mom? It was good to see her over my post-boot leave which coincided with Christmas. All was pleasant until time to board the train and she was not quite able to prevent tears. I was not quite able to block the guilt of a million missed opportunities to be a better son.

Three days later, just before taps, the haze gray shuttle bus deposited me at the Electronic Class A school barracks on Treasure Island in San Francisco Bay. The quarters petty officer showed me where I lived. I heaved the sea bag on to the bunk and began transferring possessions to the locker. About half-way down, under the dungarees, under the bell-bottomed blues and whites, were my skivvy shirts and shorts. Mom-laundered, Mom-folded, and Mom-ironed.

I stood tall, left the barracks and nonchalantly wandered the halls until I found an absolutely private place, a closet where the Navy stored brooms and swabs. I closed the door. I sat down on a bucket and bawled like a baby.

Happy Mothers Day, Mom.
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Another sighting: Iowa Caucuses 2012

Romantic Rudy Giuliani is glancing at our cleavage. Not staring, yet, but obviously feeling a little glandular itch.

In Politico, he seems to be trying out that '50s-era pickup line of the ducktail set,  "Hey, Baby, I'm no pushover, but I can be made."

Four years ago he graced us with his candidacy and finished with 4 per cent -- six points behind Ron Paul.

Lemme see if I can help you out a little, Rudy. Try to remember that pigs go oink and cows go moo, not the other way around.

EDIT: We'll keep him off the TMR caucus list for now. If becomes a little less commitment phobic, he'll earn his place there.
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How to stay alive

Making love can kill you, even if you never have to jump out a second-story window.

USNWR can be so depressing early in the morning. Who really needs to know that sex, coffee, and exercise put a guy in mortal peril?

There's even a warning against straining on the throne. In the interest of public health I include that, even though I really hate burdening the blog with scatological crap.

For washing blood off the altars?

We're all thinking about Mayans lately. We wonder if it's okay to spend all our savings on alcohol, tobacco, firearms, and explosives since the end is coming only six weeks or so after we re-elect His Obamaness.

But we hardly ever think about Mayan plumbing. Why bother? They probably just used buckets and really long ropes in the cenotes.

Turns out we're wrong. The Mayans had  sophisticated running water, fountains, and maybe even flush toilets, and There, I fixed It  has an entertaining essay on it.

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Strictly as an aside, a cult is running around these parts putting up billboards warning that the Revelations version of TEOTWAWKI is divinely scheduled for two weeks from tomorrow.  Personally, I find the Mayan logic more persuasive.