Another Officially Unofficial Holiday!

  I don’t know if you remember or not, but a few months ago there was National Doughnut Day, and Dunkin Donuts and Krsipy Kreme and places like that had all kinds of "free doughnut" specials (but only if you buy ten cups of coffee between seven and ten A.M and dance in front of the store windows wearing a hula skirt and cowboy hat...or something like that). I am just now beginning to learn that there are all kinds of National Whatever Days out there--is there an actual National Whatever Day? Must look this up--, and I have decided that I will bring the best of these to you. Hence this post.

  Today is National Lollipop day. I actually did have a lollipop today, the kind that they give screaming four-year-olds at the bank, and it was watermelon and it tasted quite good. I don't have any more, unfortunately, and I know it's not the same exact thing, but later I'll have a Warheads freezie pop. Funny story about the first time I had one of those? It was green apple (which doesn't need any more help being sour, really) and I was watching my favorite sports team. The Bad News Bears in Breaking Training. And it was during the montage where Coach Kelly's Dad (as he will always be known to me) was whipping them into playing shape and Kelly wouldn't put his cigarette out (kid, don't you know those things give you cancer?). My brother had a watermelon one and he completely could not handle it; he was like a drunk at happy hour. I had some of his and he had some of mine; his face nearly melted and I found it tart, but not really that sour. I have such a high tolerance for these kinds of things, actually...

  But whatever. Not the point. The point is, I can handle sour things and today is national lollipop day. Go crazy. Just...not too crazy. I want you around for National Whatever Day. If that's not actually a holiday, I'm going to make it one. You just watch me. And have a lollipop while you do so.    

What You Might Have Missed While I Was Gone

  Yeah, sing to God: I'm back! I'm not longer grounded. And, like TV shows do when they've been off the air for a while and want to catch viewers up with what happened last, I've assembled a handy clip show--well, post--to catch you up with what happened while I was gone.

• Mark Valley will return to the courtroom as the newest member of the show Harry's Law, which means I'll have to catch up with that show eventually, too
• Casey "La Llorona" Anthony was released from prison and has decided she wants to get married (and you know there are sickies out there who'll love to marry her)
• My dad has decided that I love John Enos
• My family finally got the pool passes and has gone swimming
• My family went down to walk the boards in Ocean City
• Jackie Earle Haley turned 50 (and yes, it p---ed me off that I couldn't shout out his birthday, July 14th, because I was grounded)
• I began to seriously focus on getting some of my writings published, scrapped an old book series I was working on, and started a new, better, creepier (they're thriller/mysteries, people) one
• My brother turned 13
• Borders is going out of business
• In the car over here, I said I bit a lollipop and was sucking on it like a throat lozenge and my brother asked me, "Is that some kind of a drug or something?" 

  So yeah, now I'm back and I'm, well, just as good as ever (I was going to say "better," but, well, I don't want to lie to you guys). So get ready for more sarcastic, irrelevant posts about obscure things nobody cares about (that's why this is the "Second Chance Blog," people), because here we go.

Look At Them Now

  Yep, you know by now what this color means: another post about the Bad News Bears!
  But don't worry, this isn't about how I bawled like a baby with the Kelly-Mike Leak "blue bike" scene in the pool hall in Breaking Training or the superawesomely adorable bromance between my favorite shortstop Tanner Boyle and my favorite...benchwarmer (?) Timmy "The Big Looper" Lupus. No. This is about how Dad (you remember Dad, right?) and I had to go pick up a pizza over the weekend and we got into a superheated argument about how he thinks Tanner and Timmy are gay and I think he's wrong (it's a bromance, dude! They're just manpanions!) and he said that if they had some sort of Bears reunion to see what they're up to now (for the characters, not the actual actors themselves...although who knows what most of them are doing now, either?) that they would be living in some trendy apartment in San Francisco with their cats Harmou and Buttermaker wearing matching argyle sweaters (which I can assure you is not what happened...Tanner would never stand for argyle). 
  The cause for the reunion, according to Dad, is Kelly Leak's funeral. Also according to Dad, there are two different ways in which he died (bite your tongue!): He was a truck driver with an oxygen tank because of all the smoking he did, and while he driving he lit up another cigarette and a spark hit the oxygen tank, it exploded, and he died; or he was in prison for something and met up with one of the Houston Toros, who was still nursing a grudge about the game in Breaking Training, and he shanked Kelly. 
  This started an entire discussion about the Bears' possible futures. I'll list them below so you can share in the fun (and see what goes on when Dad and I are in a car together and have nothing else to talk about), with what I think listed first and Dad's listed underneath because everything I think is usually something based off of what he said (hint: not many die in my versions). If we agree, well, there'll only be one. 

• Kelly Leak: A truck driver who's been in and out of prison his entire life and drinks because of still-unresolved father issues and who dates a truck-stop waitress...either that or Dukes from Semi-Pro 
• Kelly Leak (Dad): I believe I wrote this above, didn't I?
• Tanner Boyle: The world's smallest prizefighter, willing to take on the entire UFC at once (I can see it now: "What happened to you, Tanner?" "He got in a fight." "Who with?" "The UFC." "Who?" "The UFC." "Took on the entire UFC yourself, did you?" *Tanner glares sullenly*
• Tanner Boyle (Dad): Um, I believe I wrote this above, too, didn't I?
• Rudi Stein: A rabbi
• Rudi Stein (Dad): A wealthy plastic surgeon in Beverly Hills, possibly dead
• Toby Whitewood: A sports commentator and/or writer
• Toby Whitewood (Dad): A California real-estate agent who's currently out of work due to the depress--err, I mean, recession
• Ahmad Abdul-Rahim (both): A former major-league player now coaching the latest incarnation of the North Valley League Bears, however, his son Hank (as in Aaron, get it?) doesn't want to play
• Amanda Whurlizter (both): A powerful lawyer who paid her way through law school by being a model (get it?!?)
• Alfred Ogilvie (both): a college math professor who moonlights as a bookie for the Vegas mob
• Carmen Ronzonni (both): whacked by the Mafia
• Timmy Lupus: a librarian or a children's book author, a quiet little family man (it's funny, you know, using the word "man" to describe little Timmy Lupus)--but how funny would it be to see him as, like, the lead singer of a screamo band like Disturbed or Pig Destroyer ("The Girl on the Pitcher's Mound," anybody?)
• Timmy Lupus (Dad): see "Tanner Boyle (Dad)"
• Jimmy Feldman (both): a small-business owner
• Jose/Miguel Agilar: own a burrito/taco stand (Jose burritos, Miguel tacos)
• Jose/Miguel Agilar (Dad): deported
• Mike Engleburg: joined Weight Watchers but became a competitive eater, so he is constantly taking one step forward and two steps back (but won a prize belt in the California Wing-Eating Championship...if there is such a thing)  
• Mike Engleburg (Dad): had a heart attack and died
• Regi Tower (both): owns a carpet-cleaning comapny and is forever known as "that other Bear" 
• Morris Buttermaker: got back with Amanda's mom, quit drinking, and lived a happy life out in Anaheim or somewhere
• Morris Buttermaker (Dad): dead of liver disease
• Mike Leak: still working at the plant but coaches a Little-League team on the side to try to find what he missed out on with Kelly
• Mike Leak (Dad): killed in a plant accident--maybe an explosion

  As you can see, most of the time Dad and I have different views on what exactly happened to the Bears after they Went to Japan (yes, I felt the capitals were necessary). What do you think happened? Because I know you care. You all do. Otherwise, you wouldn't have read to the end of this post, would you?
             

A Moment of Silence for Caylee Anthony

Age Should Matter Not, Random House

  As I've written about before, I'm trying to find some places that I can submit my writings to so I can hopefully get something published. And everybody who reads my stuff tells me that it should be easy. 
  Well, it's not. You know why? Because publishing companies are stupid.
  Almost every one I find says you have to be at least eighteen to submit manuscripts, and the ones that don't are self-publishing companies you have to pay for, and I'm not going that route. I'm not desperate--if it comes down to that I can wait two more years. 
  My real problem is the stupidness of that limit. I mean, people can get married at sixteen but they can't publish a book?! What kind of messed-up world do we live in? If a sixteen-year-old wants to get married, all they need is legal permission from a parent or guardian; why can't it be the same way for books? I mean, one company said it was that way "in case the author needs to sign a contract." All right, so you get your agent and a lawyer to read it and your parent/guardian's legal permission. You're sixteen, not stupid. I mean, S.E. Hinton published The Outsiders when she was just sixteen--somebody out there took a chance on her! I mean, what if they hadn't? A world without The Outsiders? It would collapse in on itself! You don't mess around with gravity (or Jim); you should let underage people submit! Just because they're not legally adults doesn't mean they don't have stuff to say! Just let them submit; if you don't like it you don't have to buy it. Just like with adult authors. You might be missing out on something great...just because the author's seventeen. Is that the kind of image you want for yourself? That you're the publishing house that missed out on the next Nora Roberts or James Patterson or Elmore Leonard because they were only seventeen and a half? 
  Grade on the work, not the age. You'll find you get a lot more done. And a few more dreams might come true. And isn't that what we all want?

I'm the Judge and the Jury, Pal, and the Verdict is in: Guilty!

  I'm writing this post in black because it is the most fitting color for what happened in Florida on July Fourth. A baby-killer walked free, people. I almost threw up. And, if you had any sense in your head at all, you would too.
  I admit there were a few circumstances in which there was reasonable doubt, and that was why they had to let her go. But if you think about it, the defense's case had more. Who tries to cover up an accident to look like a murder? If somebody discovered that you knew all along that it was an accident and you lied and covered it up and everything, you can be tried for that, lying and, like, misuse of police resources and everything. And, also, Casey was on trial for negligence causing Caylee's death--if she "accidentally drowned," like the defense claimed and depending on who was watching her at the time, that could be called negligence: not watching your kid so she wanders off and drowns.
  And to you freaks who're obsessed with the impossible science of CSI: Whatever and stuff like that, of course there's not going to be any forensic evidence! Caylee was decaying in a swamp before they found her--she was just a skeleton. Contrary to what TV geeks will have you believe, DNA can not be pulled from a skeleton with nothing left on it! Also, there was some forensics--like the decomposing hair that matched one from Caylee's brush and the "unusually high" levels of chloroform that was found in the car along with the hair. A forensic guy from the FBI lab--the best in the freaking country--said he had never found such high levels of chloroform in his entire career. And the cadaver dog jumping into the car and the "stench of death"? Oh, but those are all just coincidences, right?
  I was rereading an old ghost book of mine--I know, I know, but it'll make sense in a second--and I came across a few stories that fit this perfectly. 
  La Llorona.
  For my Spanish readers and those in the Southwest, you probably know what that means. For those of you who don't, I'll enlighten you: Translated, it means The Weeping Woman or The Weeping One or, sometimes, The Wandering One.
  There are many different variations of this story depending on where you're hearing it, but the core remains mostly the same throughout. The general storyline is this: A pretty girl or woman falls in love with somebody (usually somebody who roams the desert or somebody in a station high above her) and has a kid (or kids, depending on the story), so the man says he will marry her. Usually, he doesn't, and sometimes it turns out that he either has a wife or girlfriend already (on the same social level as he) or is engaged to somebody else, or sometimes just plain doesn't love her. He does not come through on his promise to marry her, and in some comes to visit his child or children but does not acknowledge her. This so enrages her that she kills her child or children (sometimes to spite the man, but sometimes because they are just burdens to her--sound familiar?) in a variety of ways, including and usually drowning, but sometimes stabbing or throwing them to wild pigs on the bank of a river. Sometimes the woman is pregnant with another kid and does not want more, so she kills the others because she is  a lazy or unfit, irresponsible mother. In one version she's with her boyfriend and has left her kids at home when her house catches on fire and she rushes home to save them, but they are all burned to death.
  In most versions, though, La Llorona doesn't try to save her kids--she is the one ending their lives, out of spite or because they get in her way and drag her down, getting in the way of the life she wants. HUH. Sometimes she is so horrified by what she's done that she throws herself into the river into them, or dies in some other way (in the one with the wild pigs, she is pregnant with a third child and goes into premature labor because of the strain and rolls into the river in pain and drowns). She is then seen wandering the area where she died crying and screaming something like "Mis hijos, mis hijos...donde esta?" meaning "My children, my children, where are you?" or something like that, something about their souls. And she's doomed to wander until she can reclaim the souls of the children that she slaughtered. Sometimes she is supposed to try to steal babies that are born near where she died. So don't have a baby on a riverbank in Texas if you don't want a ghost murderer stealing it. 
  Except for the "feeling remorseful" part (you wanna know what she was thinking when she found out she was gonna walk, like all the newscasters did? I'll tell you" "Wow, I'm getting away with it! Cool!"), who does that remind you of?
  Oh, here's another translation of La Llorona that I forgot to include: Casey Marie Anthony. Who is set to walk next Wednesday.    

Happy Belated Birthday, America!

  All right, so maybe I'm a little late, but in the Captain America spirit of things, I've decided to go ahead and say it anyway. 
  Unfortunately, everything I felt like saying has been said already, so I'm going to let Toby Keith do the talking....

"MADE IN AMERICA"

BY TOBY KEITH

My old man's that old man,
spent his life livin' off the land,
dirty hands and a clean soul.
breaks his heart seein' foreign cars,
filled with fuel that isn't ours
and wearin' cotton he didn't grow

He's got the red, white, and blue flyin' high on the farm
Semper Fi tattooed on his left arm
spends a little more at the store for a tag in the back that says U.S.A.
won't buy nothin' that he can't fix

with WD40 and a craftsman wrench
he ain't prejudiced he's just made in America

His wife, she's that wife that decorates on the 4th of July
but says "every day's independence day"
she's golden rule, teaches school,
some folks say it isn't cool but she says the pledge of allegiance anyway

Got the red, white, and blue flyin' high on the farm
Semper Fi tattooed on his left arm
spends a little more at the store for a tag in the back that says U.S.A
won't buy nothin' that he can't fix

with WD40 and a craftsman wrench
he ain't prejudiced he's just made in America

Born in the heartland, raised up a family
of King James and Uncle Sam

Got the red, white, and blue flyin' high on the farm
Semper Fi tattooed on his left arm
spends a little more at the store for a tag in the back that says U.SA.
won't buy nothin' that he can't fix

with WD40 and a craftsman wrench
he ain't prejudiced he's just made in America

Made in America
Made in America

My old man's that old man,
he's made in America

America!