MAJOR ANNOUNCEMENT (and call for help) – Courier Journal Does Not Have Time to Speak With Me

As I lay soaking in the tub this weekend, totally unaware of my latent yearning to subscribe to the Courier-Journal, the phone rang. I decided to hop out and answer that ringing phone, since my answering machine did not pick up and a close friend was in intensive care.

Fortunately, it was good news. Someone in the Courier-Journal sales department had received the psychic message I had inadvertently sent and called me. The call went as follows:

Me: Hello

Caller: Nothing

Me: Hello

Computer voice: Hello. This is a sales call. Our representatives are busy at the moment and will call you later.

Me: (a bunch of stuff I can’t say here unless I flag this for adult content)

After thinking about my rude behavior, I realized I should do something to make up for cussing at that recording. If the Courier-Journal cares enough about me to let me know when they do not have time to speak with me, I should return that favor.

I have called them (502) 585-1763 three times so far today to let them know I am too busy to talk but will call back later.

If anyone else is looking for a Random Act of Kindness activity, I hope you will let them know when you don’t have time to speak with them.

Beware: Dog Eating Shark Attacks In Kentucky

This child is not distraught because it is 39 degrees outside and she has no clothes. Nor is she concerned about the red marker stains on her face, the bruise on her scrawny leg, or the fact that her grandmother pulled her bangs back with an ugly clip and then got out the camera.

Being stuck overnight with an evil gramma who refuses to get the Chutes and Ladders game from the car until morning did not elicit half as much sorrow. She even managed to smile (actually beam a few times) when the demanding gramma forced her to help carry in groceries and cook dinner.

A dire situation much worse than anything the average four-year-old child will ever experience is responsible for this sadness. First, the gramma lost her memory. Despite multiple reminders, she was unable to remember anything about a previously unknown cousin who showed up at Chucky Cheese with a new puppy for this grandchild on her birthday. The cousin’s name meant nothing to this senile grandmother and the perfectly replicated yipping of the puppy did nothing to jog her memory.

The hand-to-the-head distress came when the gramma swore that no one bothered to tell her when a shark snuck into the little girl’s room and ate the puppy. This gramma is waiting for morning to make an appointment with a good therapist to find out what happened to her memory.

Six children and four adults—ten members of one family--died from smoke inhalation in a house fire in Bardstown, Kentucky on Tuesday night. Before the overwhelmed, desolate, surviving family had finalized funeral arrangements; Westboro Baptist Church had already organized the protest for this funeral.

Shirley Phelps-Roper, a member of the church led by Fred Phelps, cited one of their typical reasons for protesting funerals, “To show that their deaths are God's punishment for a "filthy" nation that has disobeyed "His will." The Southern Poverty Law Center declared them a hate group, the Anti-Defamation League monitors them, and they are enough to make any sane person admit that God does create garbage.

Those not familiar with this Topeka, Kansas traveling compost heap should check out their websites: GodHatesFags.com, and GodHatesAmerica.com, and other sites expressing condemnation of homosexuals, Roman Catholics, Swedish Muslims, Jews, and other groups. While not known to be directly connected to the Christian Identity movement, many of Phelps' sermons reflect the same warped principles.

In an unfortunately completely unrelated story, officials used explosives to free a barge that has been stranded at the McAlpine Dam nearby since January 16. If I ruled the world, the explosives would catch the Westboro group as they travel across the Ohio River in the back of their poster and hate filled pick-up truck to get to the Bardstown funeral.

Also, if I ruled the world, the WHAS announcer who reported this story would look at the word Bardstown, realize there is not a letter ‘g’ anywhere in the word, and would stop saying Bargetown. She would also know that the city she lives in and speaks for is named after King Louis, not King Lua, and ville rhymes with Bill, not bull, and that there is not now and never has been a letter ‘h’ in the word Hurstbourne, so that word should not be pronounced Hurshburn. And, that letter on the end of Broadbend is a D, not a T. They don’t even look alike. Get it straight. Please.

Sorry. I will return to my original religious rant.

Tax dollars support sickness masquerading as art at Sundance Film Festival Scared? That has to be the purpose of this latest sensationalized headline from the AFA (possibly in the running for most dangerous group in my opinion, since they are almost as misguided as the Westboro cult and much larger) targets PBS. They are asking their million cult members to email their Senators and Representatives to ask that they stop supporting the National Endowment for the Arts and PBS with tax money (after all, an educated country is not easy to control).

I urge everyone to counter the narrow-minded views of this group by contacting your elected officials in support of the arts. You may do so here.