Proud and Insolent Youth.

Every child is affected thus the first time he is treated unfairly. All he thinks he has a right to when he comes to you to be yours is fairness. After you have been unfair to him he will love you again, but he will never afterwards be quite the same boy.

-James M. Barrie

Land Where my Fathers Died

America has been called a melting pot, but it seems better to call it a mosaic, for in it each nation, people, or race which has come to its shores has been privileged to keep its individuality, contributing at the same time its share to the unified patter of a new nation.

- King Baudouin I of Belgium



Actually, my father is an immigrant.

- Tom

Ours is not to Reason Why

The days are long, better than fourteen hours. The performers are amateurs. The location is inconvenient. The script is, at best, questionable. There is no safety marshal, no matter how much it seems we need one. The food, when there is any, is terrible. The attitude of the above-the-liners is standoff-ish. The equipment is shoddy. Tensions are high and the pay is very, very low. If this was a union show it would have been shut down after day two and everybody knows it. We're all running on fumes, pushed forward only by the desire not to be the first one to quit.

It's one of those gigs that tests one's soul.

The AD sits down next to me as I smoke during one of the long stretches of needless downtime that inept upper management has provided. We both know how miserable this show is and we both comment on how glad we are that it will be shortly over.

I ask him, "Would you rather have a real job?"

"No," he replies.

"Me neither."

Sometimes it's not about getting what you want but wanting what you've got.

Bow Wow Wow, Yummie Pops, Pass the Mustard

One of the best things about my profession is that I occasionally find myself in unique and notable situations that most other people could never anticipate.

Today, Snoop Dogg's father cooked us lunch, just because he felt like it.

He's a rapid talking, street educated, Vietnam vet that knows a little bit about everything and has a story about everyone. Like the Dos Equis commercial, he might be the most interesting man alive.

We had barbequed chicken wings, beer boiled bratwurst and potato salad and it was dee-fucking-licious.

This would not happen were I an accountant.

The Mouse Shape on the Second Moon

You cannot avoid the interplay of politics within an orthodox religion. This power struggle permeates the training, education and disciplining of the orthodox community. Because of this pressure, the leaders of such a community inevitably must face that ultimate internal question: to succumb to complete opportunism as the price of maintaining their rule, or risk sacrificing themselves for the sake of the orthodox ethic.


- Frank Herbert

Jubal's Wisdom

Happiness lies in being privileged to work hard for long hours in doing whatever you think is worth doing.

One man may find happiness in supporting a wife and children. Another may find it in robbing banks. Still another may labor mightily for years in pursuing pure research with no discernible result.

Note the individual and subjective nature of each case. No two are alike and there is no reason to expect them to be. Each man or woman must find for himself or herself that occupation in which hard work and long hours make him or her happy. Contrariwise, if you are looking for shorter hours, longer vacations and early retirement, you are in the wrong job. Perhaps you need to take up bank robbing. Or geeking in a sideshow. Or even politics.

- Robert A. Heinlein