Get Incensed

Well, I guess it would be nice…

Awhile back, architect Wen-I Chang completed the Gaia Hotel and Spa, an environmentally friendly hotel located in California’s Napa Valley.

How environmentally friendly is it?

Guests at the hotel won’t find a Gideon’s bible in their nightstand, but instead will be treated to a complimentary copy of Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth.

Somebody should warn Mr. Chang about the holy war he’s liable to start. I’m currently taking bets on how long it is before Pat Robertson or some other member of the religious right comes out and condemns this “blasphemy.”

Don’t get me wrong. I think the coming free-for-all will be fun to watch. I’m tired of the same old religions fighting. Watching the Jews and Palestinians battle is like watching old tapes of Sugar Ray Robinson and Jake La Motta - you can expect a good fight but you know the Israelis (like Robinson) are going to take five out of six fights.

Sunnis vs. Shiites? Please. This is like watching a featherweight fight. You’re impressed by the energy and enthusiasm, but you have no idea who either fighter is.

Religions, like boxing, thrive on match-ups. Which is why this new bout is so exciting. It shapes up to be a classic fight between the reigning heavyweight champion, Christianity and the up-and-coming religion of Climate Change Environmentalism.

It’s CCD vs CCE in a battle for the ages.

Let’s take a look at the tale of the tape between Christianity in the red corner and Environmentalism in the green corner:

Spokesperson/Savior: Jesus vs. Al Gore
Both failed to carry their home state first time around and both rose again after being pronounced dead. Gore’s political rebirth was almost as impressive as Jesus’ actual resurrection. Both spokespersons groomed disciples to carry forth their message of faith. Jesus walked on water but never managed to snag an Oscar. Son of God has slight edge on charisma - he was able to captivate audiences without using Power Point.
Advantage: Christianity

Promise We Hope Spokesman/Savior Keeps: “I Will Come Again” vs. “I Won’t Run Again”
Close call here. Even if Jesus did come again, there is some question as to whether anyone would believe it. What could He possibly do that hasn’t already been done by David Blaine? While there’s no question a verified Jesus sighting would be front page news, you have to wonder if the SoG could withstand the scrutiny of his every quote being videotaped, posted and mashed on YouTube. On the other hand, Gore can only go downhill from here. He already has access to heads of state, the UN and Julia Roberts with none of the responsibility and stress of daily Presidential duties. We still don’t understand why he hasn’t dumped Tipper and started partying with Lindsay Lohan or Scarlett Johanssen.
Advantage: Environmentalism

Article of Faith: “You’ll get your reward in Heaven” vs. “If we do nothing, the human race will cease to exist in 50 years”
It would seem like a no-brainer to party hard for 50 years and then get your reward in heaven, thereby enjoying the best of both worlds: guilt-free, hedonistic pleasure here on Earth and eternal bliss in the hereafter. All of which would have been fine until the global warming advocates started insisting that climate change was a “moral issue.” Talk about a buzz-kill. You mean to tell me my chances of getting into Heaven depend on whether or not I recycle and own a Prius? Luckily, both religions provide you with an out. Christianity has confession and Environmentalism has carbon credits. Either way you’ve got a way to absolve yourself of your sins and still make it past the velvet rope into the big Hard Rock Cafe in the sky.
Advantage: Draw

Punishment for Sins: “Plagues, floods and eternal damnation” vs. “Plagues, floods and having to hear Laurie David say, ‘I told you so.’”
Suddenly, endless hellfire looks a lot more appealing. If the climate change folks are correct, you’ll probably be used to the heat by that time, anyway.
Advantage: Christianity

Official Book of the Religion: The Bible vs. An Inconvenient Truth
Both books are filled with scary prophecies and wild tales about a great flood. If you can believe two of every animal fit on the Ark, then you probably don’t have any problem with the Statue of Liberty being under water in your lifetime. The main difference: the Bible wasn’t pretending to be a scientific presentation. Goodie bags at the Oscars after-party don’t match free food and wine provided by Jesus at the outdoor preach-fest at the Sea of Galilee.
Advantage: Christianity

Most Famous Betrayer: Judas vs. Dr. Claude Allegre
Judas obviously had a better public relations firm since, even 2000 years later, his name is still synonymous with “betrayal” while few people outside of climate science have even heard of Dr. Allegre. At least Judas also got 10 pieces of silver out of the deal. Dr. Allegre appears to have switched positions due solely to scientific integrity. Go figure.
Advantage: Christianity

Drastic Method Proposed for Dealing with Non-Believers: The Spanish Inquisition vs. Proposed “Nuremberg” Trials for Climate Change Skeptics
Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition. On the other hand, attempts to forcibly silence climate change skeptics can be expected to appear with unsettling frequency in today’s news headlines. There is still debate in the Catholic Church about whether it was appropriate to apologize for the Inquisition. Apologies from heavy-handed climate change advocates won’t be coming anytime soon. Faced with the choice of being stretched on the rack or being forced to use fluorescent bulbs, it makes sense to lay out a little cash ahead of time for more expensive lighting. We can only hope that 600-years from now a comedy sketch group will be able to bring some humor to the global warming debate. Until then, it’s every heretic for himself.
Advantage: Environmentalism

Benevolent Outlook Doesn’t Extend To…: Gays vs. Michael Crichton
Being shunned, vilified, encouraged to under go “deprogramming,” and denied basic rights are just some of the actions taken against those considered to be in violation of the religion’s moral law. Not that there’s anything wrong with being Michael Crichton…
Advantage: Environmentalism

There you have it. Christianity looks to have the edge on paper, but it should be a good fight.

And the best part? We’ve all got ringside seats.

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

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Helps brainstorming for business ideas and reduces stress…and the pot works okay, too.

I think they should hand out marijuana in business school.

Because you can come up with almost any crazy idea and turn it into a business. I’m pretty sure the guys that came up with the idea for Omaha Steaks were high at the time.

Stoner #1: This is the last of my stash and I got fired today, dude. How are we going to pay for more pot?
Stoner #2: Check this out. We could sell overpriced meat through the mail.”
Stoner #1: Come on, dude. Seriously. Even I’m not that freakin’ high…

And yet…Omaha Steaks has been proudly serving beef lovers and people who can’t do long division since 1917.

You know you’re on to something when you can make Ticketmaster look underpriced.

Thanks to the magic of teh Interwebs, you can shop online and buy four, 4 oz. filet mignons at the every day low price of $50.99 plus $15.99 shipping — which works out to just under $67.00 a pound.

For $67 a pound, I expect to open the box and find Gordan Ramsay slaughtering a fresh cow. In fact, I’ll bet I could get Gordon Ramsay to do it for less than 50 bucks.

And, really, are you fooling anyone with the $50.99 price and $15.99 shipping?

Oh, wait…I forgot my calculator…I would’nt pay $51 a pound but $50.99 looks like a real bargain to me. And, just look at those savings on the shipping!

Don’t get me wrong, there are deals to be had at Omaha Steaks. Savvy shoppers will want to avoid the high-priced regular items and go for the specials, like the Griller’s Gala — just in time for that Memorial Day cook-out. With the Griller’s Gala you’ll only pay about about $15.65 a pound for a variety mix of beef cuts, about one-third of which is hamburger. Did I mention that the $90 price is over 50% off the regular $182.00 cost? Woo hoo.

I’ll be spending the long weekend working on my business plan for South Dakota Fish. It’s going to feature the finest, organically-raised fish of all different varieties for one flat-rate of $129.99 a pound.

Of course, shipping’s not included. What do you think…I’m made of money?

Well, not yet, anyway ….

There’s plenty of meat in this week’s Friday Six. It features our usual top cuts of websites, blogs and undercover slaughterhouse videos that are sure to tickle your carnivorous funny bone.

It’s 100% USDA-grade humor with no filler and no alliteration.

Yum!

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Looking for a job? Having Diesel help you write your resume may not help you get the job, but you’ll be having too much fun reading Jobs I Have Sucked At to care

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People are getting all excited about a chimp that can play Ms. Pacman. Call me when the monkey masters Grand Theft Auto. Chimps playing video games. Great. Now we have to worry about monkeys going all goth and blowing up schools.

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Congratulations to Hillary Clinton on running a great campaign. She’s managed to get me to the point where I have a Pavlovian rise in my blood pressure every time she starts to speak.

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Wait, … what? There are annoying people in Starbucks?!

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Destined to be a classic. The lyrics to the Raiders of the Lost Ark theme and the story behind them. (With karaoke video goodness.)

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It’s Everyone Can Bite Me Friday over at HOLLYWOOD: WHCTD. Just when you think you’re a pretty good writer, Suzy goes and raises the bar.

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Have an awesome weekend, everyone.

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

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More than handi-capable…

The great thing about sports is, except for the draft which rewards franchises that finish last, it is largely free from a lot of the egalitarian bull-crap that invades the rest of our lives.

As of this writing, the government isn’t spending $300 billion on a program to help more white guys make it in the NBA.

Yes, I know it’s an election year and that could change at any moment.

But at least for now, most sports are about performance under a narrowly delineated set of rules and conditions.

More than a lot of sports events, the Olympics embody many of the best ideals of sports and life. The Olympics rewards long-term, goal-oriented planning. In many instances it represents the overcoming of incredible odds to achieve the opportunity to compete against the best athletes in your sport once every four years.

As usual, you can trust a bureaucracy to screw up a good thing.

Oscar Pistorius is a double-amputee. He was born without bones in his lower leg and both legs were amputated below the knee when he was 11 months old. He holds the Paralympic world record in the 400-meters at 46.56 seconds.

Oscar wanted to compete at the Beijing Olympics. He did not ask for a lower qualifying standard or a head start in the race. All he asked was for the opportunity to try to make his country’s Olympic team.

You might think that type of desire and effort would be applauded and rewarded.

Instead, Oscar was banned from competing by the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAFF). The IAFF thought that his carbon-fiber Cheetah Flex-Foot prosthetics gave him an unfair advantage. Maybe it was the “Cheetah” part that threw them because they just kind of overlooked the fact that (hello, McFly!) they were prosthetics.

Unless there’s a 256-horsepower engine attached to them, I think you might want to weigh the unfair advantage of carbon-fiber prosthetics against the unfair advantage of having two legs and call it a draw.

About the only unfair advantage Oscar has is that he’s got bigger cajones than about 99% of the population.

Fortunately, the ban was overturned by The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) and Oscar will get the chance to try to make the South African Olympic squad after spending over six months battling the IAFF bureaucrats.

This week’s Friday Six is dedicated to Oscar Pistorius and his win over the narrow-minded dolts on the IAFF.

Is there a part of me that’s embarrassed that I haven’t accomplished more in my life when I see what Oscar’s gone through?

Sure. But I’m going to be rooting my ass off for him anyway.

You can feel free to cheer this week’s Friday Six, too. As is our custom, the Friday Six is the weekly compendium of six websites, videos or victories over bureaucratic snafus that made us laugh this week.

It has less than half the trans-fats and none of the alliteration of a Friday Five. Bon apetit!

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Bill O’Reilly’s now famous meltdown is re-mixed for your dancing pleasure over at College Pork…with about the same number of F-bombs as your basic Eminem rap.

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Radioactive Liberty explains the one super-delegate Hillary Clinton is counting on to win the nomination. Why am I not surprised?

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Shouldn’t someone have made a religious reality show where people from various religions are put into a house until one survives the End of Days? Crummy Church Signs has stuff that’s way funnier. I’m giving odds that the folks at St. James United Methodist Church have Carrot Top booked for the next church picnic.

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It’s as easy as pie to go off on a rant. Suzy Soros shows you just how easy over at the always hilarious HOLLYWOOD: Where HOT Comes To Die.

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Sure, you could watch Headline News for a summary of the day’s events. But Bizlevity’s Scrolling Headlines are funnier.

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Does growing up in New York make you more cynical? I think the jury’s still out. This evidence and more over at Overheard in New York.
Man on the street: Jesus loves you!
Teenage boy: I know he does!
Man on the street: Jesus is coming!
Teenage boy: Jesus is always coming.
Man on the street: He’s really coming this time!

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Have a great weekend, y’all.

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

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Better listen to him…he’s pre-med.

I think the hardest thing about being an advice columnist would be that whole part where you have to stop laughing long enough to write the column.

Being an advice columnist has to be like winning the West Virginia primary. At the end of the day, just how excited can you be that 65% of the dumbest people in the country think you’re the one who can solve their problems.

There’s a pretty good case to be made for making advice columns illegal. After all, they’re an attempt to thwart the smooth, natural functioning of a Darwinian world.

If we’re really concerned about the kind of world we’re going to leave to our kids, we should probably be less concerned about global warming and more concerned that stupid people are no longer being weeded out of the gene pool.

Here’s an example of a question posed to Amy Dickinson.

Dear Amy:
I am a 21-year-old woman in a relationship with a man who is 16 years my senior.

In the beginning of this relationship, it was fine. Now I find that he is really mean to me 94 percent of the time. He calls me names, talks down to me and condemns the way I look.

It seems that nothing makes this man happy, and I am at my wits’ end.

In the two years that we have been together, we have gone nowhere together. He refused to acknowledge my birthday and Valentine’s Day. He constantly tells me that I am a loser and that I will never amount to anything. He does not allow me to go out and have fun, and any money that comes into our household goes to him.

He also believes that I should keep quiet and take whatever he dishes out. I am not entitled to an opinion. I have heard him say sexual things to other women, including his wife. I had no idea she even existed (he is now divorced) or that he has three children.

I have asked him to please try and be caring, sensitive and loving, and to stop lying to me, but he refuses to do so.

In spite of these things, I really love him and plan to marry him, but I’m not sure.

-Stupid Love

Let’s recap: Despite being well aware of her boyfriend’s lying, cheating, thieving and abusive nature…she’s planning on marrying him — if only she can get rid of a few nagging doubts.

The dude is mean to her 94% of the time, which is a pretty amazing feat since you have to figure all that yelling and cheating on your girlfriend is pretty tiring so the guy probably is asleep at least 25% of the time.

If we’re going to outlaw fatty foods because obesity costs society money, we should take a hard look at outlawing stupidity, also. You can pretty much guarantee that, if Stupid Love doesn’t take Amy’s advice, she’s going to be running up one hell of a social services bill.

Heck, there are probably five or six cops alone that’ll retire on the overtime generated by the domestic disturbance calls.

In the spirit of giving back to the community, I’ve decided to volunteer my services as an advice columnist. I think it’s time for a new breed of advice column. Let’s call it Tough Love, with Mark Jabo.

My motto: It may not be great advice, but at least you’ll know where I stand.

How about a practice letter:

Dear Mark Jabo,
As I’m writing this letter to you, my shirt is on fire. What should I do?

It’s my favorite shirt and has lots of sentimental value because my mother bought it for me.

Please help because it’s really starting to get hot and my skin is melting off.

-Crispy Critter

Dear C-Squared,
If you’re still breathing when you get this advice, quickly make out a will and leave everything you own to me.

You failed to mention what caused the fire. Was it grease or did your polyester shirt break into flames as you were trying to light your water pipe?

Either way, you should probably drop and roll on the floor or have someone try to smother the flames with a blanket.

Good luck. Don’t forget that last will and testament.

Your welcome.

-Mark Jabo

Do you see what we did there? There was some solid, practical advice but because it came with a cost attached to it, Crispy Critter will think twice the next time before wearing a polyester shirt.

It’s like the old saying says, “Give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you’ll give him a lifetime of frustration and mosquito bites.”

Write to me. I’m here to help.

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

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“Yo, dude, let me rap with you about social security…”

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This report is the first in a series of articles about the upcoming hysterical historical Presidential election…
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Republican candidate John McCain took a combative stance on the campaign trail, saying he will actively look to court younger voters. McCain indicated he would be targeting voters as young as 55 by letting them know he was one of the first members of Congress to switch from a rotary to a push-button phone.

Speaking at a fundraiser sponsored by Metamucil, McCain said, “Even though I went to school with Cleopatra, it doesn’t mean I’m not boss enough to talk to all you cats about the importance of this election.”

“I can still remember listening to Frank Sinatra and staying up late to watch the Tonight Show with Jack Paar. Do you really want to trust the Oval Office to someone who grew up watching porn on the Interwebs and playing violent video games like Pong and Ms. Pac-man?” McCain said in a veiled swipe at front-running Democratic hopeful, Barack Obama.

“We don’t need someone who has a nuanced view of the world,” McCain asserted. “I see the world in black-and-white terms because that’s the kind of television I grew up with.”

McCain said he hoped voters would feel more comfortable with him the more they got to know him.

“Think of me as that crazy old coot of a grandfather who’s just as likely to talk lucidly about politics as try to take his underwear off over his head. Don’tcha just love that guy?”

Campaign officials said McCain had a full slate of activities scheduled for the rest of the week including frequent napping, being tested for melanoma and storing food in his cheeks for winter.

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

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Honor them.

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The following article appeared in the Sunday edition of the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle.

Ultimate Loss Bonds Area Gold Star Moms
-James Hawver, Staff writer

This is a club to which no mother wanted to belong.

Members often avoid the news. They can’t bear to hear another has joined.

“I don’t want to know,” said Mary Ellen Schramm, sitting in her Greece home, her voice weak, her face flush, her eyes wet. “I can’t do anything about it. It’s a heartbreak for me. I cry. I can’t imagine another family going through what we’ve gone through.”

Schramm became a Gold Star mother in October 2004. Since then, nearly 3,000 more American mothers have suffered through the same.

To be given a gold star means a son or daughter has been taken away.

And while most mothers today will receive a card, a phone call, maybe flowers or a visit, those like Schramm, whose children have died during military service, can only cling to memories.

“Holidays are tough,” said Schramm, who will spend her fourth Mother’s Day without her eldest son, Marine Lance Cpl. Brian Schramm, who died at age 22 in a mortar attack in Iraq.

‘Can’t wake up’

This is a club of weak eyes and strong bonds. “Our bond is loss,” said Georgian Davis, sitting at Schramm’s kitchen table on a recent Saturday afternoon. “Our bond is grief. Our bond is that I met someone who knows my feeling, who knows what I’m going through.”

Davis, president of the South Buffalo Chapter of the Gold Star Mothers of America, and fellow member Shirley Weaver traveled along the Thruway to induct the first five local mothers into the organization as charter members of the Rochester Area Chapter.

The mothers — Schramm, Nancy Cometa-Fontana of Greece, Rita Hasenauer of Hilton and Marcia Lyons and Cathy Pernaselli, both of Brighton — plucked tissues from a box in the middle of the table as they listened to Davis talk about her son. On April 19, 1989, off the coast of Puerto Rico, an explosion aboard the USS Iowa killed 47 sailors, including Nathaniel C. Jones Jr.

“I always think,” said Davis, crying, “would he have gotten married?”

Each told similar stories of young men who went off to war and never came home.

Anthony Cometa was 21 when he died.

Jason Hasenauer was 21.

James Lyons was 28.

Michael Pernaselli was 27.

Brian Schramm was 22.

“We have the right to cry for them and ourselves whenever we feel like it,” Davis said.

The five mothers grabbed more tissues, made their way to the back porch, raised their right hands and took the organization’s oath.

They returned to the kitchen table and signed their names to the back of their charter, officially forming the Rochester Area Chapter of the Gold Star Mothers of America. The mother of a Rochester man who died during World War I founded the pioneering chapter of the national organization in 1919.

The five mothers, along with others in the area, have been getting together nearly every month for the past couple of years. Although they were the first to officially sign up, they expect more mothers who have lost a child will join their chapter. Their bond is still the same, they say, just now official.

“We’re an organization that understands immediately, immediately, what you’re going through the minute that casualty officer comes to your door,” said Davis, wearing the official Gold Star Mothers white cap with gold lettering and trim.

After the intimate ceremony, Cathy Pernaselli and Nancy Cometa-Fontana slipped out the front door. They took cover from the drizzling rain under a maple tree, crossed their arms and held onto their cigarettes.

“There’s nobody else that can really help us besides each other,” Cometa-Fontana said.

Today marks the third Mother’s Day she will be without her son, and the fifth for Pernaselli.

Navy Petty Officer 1st Class Michael Pernaselli was killed April 24, 2004, during an attack on an oil terminal in Basra, Iraq. Before he died, he wrote a Mother’s Day card but hadn’t sent it. One of his buddies found the card and passed it along until it finally reached home.

“It took me so long to be able to say that Michael was dead,” said Cathy Pernaselli, who raises her son’s two daughters, 8-year-old Dominique and 7-year-old Nicole.

Army National Guard Spc. Anthony Cometa didn’t have children.

“That’s what I’m going to miss,” his mother said. “I’m never going to have grandchildren from him.”

The two mothers finished their cigarettes and headed back into the house.

“It’s like a bad dream,” Cometa-Fontana said.

Pernaselli cut in: “And you can’t wake up.”

Not again

This is a club Rita Hasenauer has joined once; she doesn’t want to join again.

On a Tuesday morning early last month, she sat with her husband, Daniel, and her youngest son, 15-year-old Eric, in the back of a gray waiting room at the Hancock Air National Guard Base in Syracuse.

She waited for her two middle sons. Jeremy, 18, was taking a physical in preparation for entering the Air Force this summer after graduating from Hilton High School. Danny, 21, was filling out paperwork in preparation for entering the Army National Guard that afternoon.

She had visited the building just a month before, to witness the dedication of the Jason D. Hasenauer Ceremony Room, named after her eldest son, who died at the age of 21 when his Humvee rolled over Dec. 27, 2005, in Afghanistan. Twenty-two days after his death, Jason’s fiancée, Collette Kopp, gave birth to their only child, Kayla.

On Feb. 29, the day of the dedication, Danny became the first soldier to take an oath of military service in the room.

“I’m getting empty-nest syndrome already,” said Rita Hasenauer, a 47-year-old software engineer.

Danny turned angry after Jason died, his parents said. His temper grew short. He snapped easily.

He wanted to sign up for the service right away. But the thought of his mother worrying for his safety held him back.

“I said I better hold off,” Danny recalled when he returned to the waiting room after completing the day’s first round of paperwork.

“Thank you,” Rita said, with a sigh.

Danny’s call to military service rekindled last summer at a Fourth of July ceremony at the First Bible Baptist Church in Greece honoring local fallen soldiers, including his big brother.

As the family waited at the Syracuse air base, they periodically glanced at the television in the front of the room tuned to CNN Headline News.

“Four U.S. soldiers died in Baghdad yesterday,” the anchor said, and went on to talk about Gen. David Petraeus’ testimony to Congress that day.

The news, Rita said, doesn’t bother her as much as patriotic country songs. They get to her. She flips off the radio quickly before they make her cry.

After a couple of hours of waiting, an officer called them into the ceremony room. Outside, Rita made sure Jeremy tucked in the brown, button-up shirt that she had brought for him.

Rita snapped photos from the corner of the room as her two sons raised their right hands as Jeremy was sworn into the U.S. Air Force.

After the ceremony, the half-dozen officers in the room clapped, and the Hasenauers posed for pictures next to a photograph of Jason and some of his medals hanging on the wooden wall.

“I can’t think of a more American family right now,” Air Force Capt. John Valezaquez said.

A half-hour later, Danny was gone, off to Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas, for at least six months of basic training. If he reaches his goal and is accepted into the military police, it will be more.

“I want them to do what they want to do,” Rita said. “Everybody’s got to find their own way, and if that’s part of their life, we’ve got to back them — with lots of instruction to be careful.”

She has given her sons one specific demand. One of their walls at their home is a memorial to Jason, filled with photographs and keepsakes.

“They have orders not to add to the wall.”

Helping others

This is a club where mothers who have lost sons gain new ones.

“I’m worried about Danny Hasenauer,” Mary Ellen Schramm said a few weeks after he left for boot camp.

The Hasenauers have since heard a rumor that Danny’s unit will be deployed to Afghanistan in a year.

Schramm realizes that her two other sons, 19-year-old Kyle and 17-year-old Mike, are that much closer to signing up for the armed services themselves.

Kyle, a freshman at Monroe Community College, has been talking about joining the Coast Guard.

Mike, a junior at Greece Olympia High School, has been talking about joining the Marines, like his brother, through the Reserve Officers’ Training Corps.

“He wanted to go into the Marines because it’s the hardest,” Mary Ellen said of Brian, who hoped to be a sheriff’s deputy or state trooper after leaving the service. “It was in him.”

She said she cried every day for three years after he died. Over the 43 months since he has been gone, Brian’s scent has been lost from his clothes. Mary Ellen often sits on his bed and buries her face in his old sweatshirts, longing for a piece of her son.

Now, she and other Gold Star mothers have dedicated themselves to helping others, raising money for organizations like the Veterans Outreach Center.

“We couldn’t help Brian, but if we can help other kids coming back, that’s our goal,” she said. “This is our cause now.”

They help each other. Nancy Cometa-Fontana, who calls Schramm for support, calls her Greece neighbor her “lifeline.”

And they help new members, going together to the funerals of other local fallen soldiers.

“If we have to belong to this, at least we’re together,” Schramm said. “We’re family.”

Like Schramm says, holidays are tough on Gold Star mothers. After what they’ve been through, after what they’ve lost, they make sure to appreciate every moment with their remaining children — no matter how small or how short.

Like, today, when Danny Hasenauer makes his weekly five-minute phone call home from boot camp.

Gold Star mothers now make sure their last words in each conversation are always “I love you.”

“I think it’s a privilege to be a mother,” Schramm said. “I think it’s something that God chose for all of us to be in some way, and it’s a gift that shouldn’t be taken for granted.”

JHAWVER@DemocratandChronicle.com

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“I think he really Duggar, ’cause she was too loose to fake…”

You have to admire someone who takes an idea and just runs with it. Someone who gets an idea in their head and says, “To hell with all the negatives, I’m going to do this.”

Howard Schultz did it with Starbucks, Ray Kroc did it with McDonalds and George Bush did it with Iraq, except without the franchising.

In tribute to good ideas that have been run into the ground, I think it’s only fitting that Get Incensed celebrates this Mother’s Day by saluting the amazing story of Michelle Duggar.

Michelle went on the Today Show this morning to announce that, just in time for Mother’s Day, she is pregnant with her 18th child.

For Mother’s Day, her kids are going to stage a hostile takeover of FTD.

Michelle and her husband Jim are members of an evangelical Christian sect called Quiverful which, coincidentally, also happens to be a pretty fitting description of Michelle’s uterus.

Apparently, this Christian sect encourages children in much the same way as an election to Congress encourages spending.

Michelle has been pregnant (11+ years) longer than most people are married. Over one-quarter of her life has been spent pregnant.

She shouldn’t be on the Today Show, she should be getting an honorary doctorate in Obstetrics & Gynecology from Harvard Medical School.

If Michelle was any more fertile, her parents would be named Tigris and Euphrates.

On top of everything else, Michelle and her husband have given all their kids names that start with the letter “J” — Joshua, twins Jana and John-David, Jill, Jessa, Jinger, Joseph, Josiah, Joy-Anna, twins Jedidiah and Jeremiah, Jason, James, Justin, Jackson, Johannah and baby Jennifer.

This kind of nonsense is aggravating enough when you have three kids, but eighteen?!

The only way this makes sense is if the kids names all start with J in an attempt to remind Mr. Duggar to give all the screwing a rest and just jerk off once in awhile.

The Duggars told Today Show host Meredith Vieira they go through three loaves of bread a day. At that rate, the Duggars are responsible for raising food prices more than the push toward ethanol.

So, in the great American tradition of celebrating abundance (or the fact that you don’t have 18 kids), we offer up this special Mother’s Day edition of the Friday Six — six websites, videos or surgical procedures that made us laugh or count our blessings over the past week.

The Friday Six — the only alliteration is in the names of the Duggar kids.

Have a great weekend, everyone. And for crissakes, use protection….

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

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Thanks to everyone for their patience over the past couple of weeks of sporadic posting. I’ve been working on another comedy project that has taken a good bit of my not-so-free time.

Starting tomorrow, I’ll be posting on a regular Monday/Wednesday/Friday schedule with an additional post some time during the weekend. I’ll also be posting other days as the mood hits (particularly during the coming run-up to the Presidential elections), but the MWF schedule will be something you can count on.

The Friday Six will be a regular feature and there are also a couple of other surprises in store.

Thanks again for hangin’ in there, y’all…

See you tomorrow for the new and, hopefully, improved Get Incensed.

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

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Could things get any worse for Roger Clemens?

I think it’s safe to say Roger Clemens is having a bad year. That used to mean he’d lost control of his curve ball.

Now that I think about it, that may still be a pretty good description of his situation.

I’m not going to sit here and say that being a celebrity sucks (especially since money, sex and access usually go along with the territory), but it’s certainly harder to be famous in this age of cell phone cameras, YouTube and papparrazi than it used to be.

A guy can’t even hang out with hookers, country singers or another guy’s wife without having it make headlines. Sheesh!

It’s patently unreasonable to expect celebrities to be somehow better behaved than the rest of us. I can only speak for myself, but I’m pretty sure if someone had given me $40 million dollars when I was 21 years old, I would’ve been dead by the time I was twenty one and a half.

I’m not sure “having waaay too much fun” could be listed as an official cause of death but doesn’t that mean the real surprise here is not how many athletes get into trouble but rather how amazing it is that the clubhouse at any major stadium doesn’t look like the set of a porn film?

The real problem people have is the hypocrisy. If you’re a crusading law-and-order governor, you can’t get caught having unprotected sex with hookers. If you bill yourself as a drug-free, family man, you can’t expect not to catch some grief when people discover you’re injecting horse-hormones into your ass and banging a country singer you met in a bar.

The combination of occasional drug use and promiscuity doesn’t make you a bad person … it just makes you Russell Crowe.

As it turns out, celebrities face the same basic decision we all do: Do you want to be married or single?

Well, that and, after getting front row seats to an NBA playoff game, whether they want to sleep with the Playboy playmate or the supermodel.

For the purposes of this discussion, I’m going to focus on a decision I can actually relate to.

The point here is, you’re better off if you pick a side. If you want to be single, be single. If you want to be married, be married. Most of the difficulties start when you try to do both at the same time.

Married and screwing around is a problem. Single and having kids is a problem. Single, screwing around with a married person and having kids with them is a recipe for getting shot at.

I think the best advice we can give celebrities is to enjoy what you have and be honest about it.

Personally (and isn’t that what it’s really all about?), I’d feel much better if Roger Clemens came out and said, “Performance enhancing drugs? You’re damn straight I took them. How else do think I’d be able to win seven Cy Young awards on only three hours of sleep a night?”

The only other thing, Rog … when you hold your press conference, leave the wife and kids at home.

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Awarded to us by The Cult of Qelqoth

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