"Things This Season"

The list just seems to go on and on, doesn't it? More obituaries with the death of MR. James Brown, and former president, Gerald Ford.

On James Brown--- I always loved to watch his performances. He was such a showman, and one dynamic ball of energy! He'd appear to be all done-in from the show, and one of his assitants would pat him on the sholder, like he was telling him, "That's enough, Jim...come on and rest now", and throw a cape around Brown's sholders as he turned to walk away. Then a couple of steps back he's throw off the cape and back out at the mike yelling his heart out again! I'll miss that, Godfather of Soul.

Gerald Ford: a president that was neither elected to vice-presidency OR the precidency, he came in right at a time we were trying to put the final end on our involvements in Viet Nam. I have really nothing good or bad to say about him, save that I didn't like the way he pardoned President Nixon. But a large number of the population of the U.S. didn't like that either. They felt that Nixon should have been tried like any other person that committed a criminal act. History will only tell for certain if that was for the betterment of only the government, or actually for the country at large, in the long run. There was only one statement Ford ever made that I can actually recall, and that was when he was taking office. In his speach he said, "I'm a FORD, not a LINCOLN!"

And on to other things... On Christmas Eve, my mother fell (again) as she was coming down the back stairs on her way to church. She put her left arm behind her to cushion the fall, and it took the jolt of the drop. She thought she wasn't hurt, and got in the car and started to drive on to church, but that sholder began hurting so much that she pulled into the emmergency room of our local hospital. There they x-rayed her to discover she had dislocated it. They RE-located it, and put her in a sling. This wasn't much of a Christmas Present, to say the least.

The hospital had called me right away, so I left work and was there within 10 minutes. I took the rest of the day off and drove her home in her car, and later my wife got there and drove me back to get my own vehicle. I stayed with her most of the evening, got her perscription and made sure she was settled in for the evening.

The next day, Christmas of course, we had planned on a family dinner with not just my folks, my wife and I, but my aunt and cousin. Mom said we should perhaps cancel that, but I decided I would do the cooking myself. So I got back over to their house about 11 AM and stuck the turkey in the oven for its 4 hrs. of baking, and started getting other items prepared. We ended up with a meal of turkey, dressing, mashed potatos, green beans, corn, rolls, apple pie, Watergate (! Speaking of Nixon) Salad plus a jam cake and orange salad (the latter two my aunt had brought). We all ate too much and a good time was had by all!

Mom goes back to a doctor Friday, so maybe he'll remove the sling. It's more inconvenient that anything else for her since she can't use her left hand (and she's LEFT-handed).

In "comic news"... 'Been thinking about completing sets of the DC-!mpact titles, such as The Fly, The Comet, Black Hood, etc. From my figuring, there were 104 issues total, and I presently need only 28 of those. Looks like it would be an easy and cheap collection to complete. (We'll see.)

Was looking at the newly released DVD collections and noticed that the whole first season (39 episodes) of "Have Gun Will Travel" is available! Used to love watching that show as a small child in the mid-1950's! Here locally it came on at 8:30 PM on Saturday night, which worked out well since my folks insisted that I hit the sack by 9 PM (which kept me from watching many episodes of "Bonanza" which followed it). I remember how I pestered my poor, late brother to death when I got a Paladin playset (holster/guns) for Christmas that next year. It came with some of Paladin's calling cards (see above illustration) and I'd go around handing those out. Such embarrassment for him! (oh, these things we do as kids!).

Now let's talk a minute here about Identity Thief, a VERY growing problem worldwide. We've personally experienced it here lately. My wife had her pocketbook stolen out of her purse at work, even though she had it behind the counter. She didn't notice it was gone for a day or so, at which time she called the Mastercard Company to see if anything had been charged to us. Sure enough, over $400. worth of merchandice had from someone traveling South, most of the charges being in Tenessee and Georgia. In fact, so many charges so quickly together were thrown on the card that the company had cut it off. One such purcase was for over one hundred dollars at a Verizon Cell Phone business. When we contacted the places that took her card, NONE of them would offer an explanation of "why" they accepted her card. Obviously NONE of them had checked for "I.D."; they just swiped the card to get their money. Now, see how easy ID thief is? It's not due primarilly to someone "getting" your numbers, but the fault of those who accept credit cards without absolute proof that the person using it is indeed the card holder.

This thief could have been easily caught the first time they used the card, had the clerk checked the ID! To me, this makes the stores that accept stolen credit cards just as responcible for the crime as the person who committed it. Where I work, checking the identification and verifying that the person who has it is the actual card user is mandatory! This not only protects the business from loss, but the true card user as well.

They also could catch this thief, or at least get a descritption of him by going back and checking their security cameras and comparing the time the card was used. NONE of the places where it was used have offered to do so.

Not only was her credit card stolen, but also her SS Card and Dr.'s Lis., both of which she had to replace. Wasn't sure if our bank numbers were in there as well, but we checked both our accounts and SS just to see if any actions had been used from them; thankfully not.

So, the next time someone asks to see your ID when you give them either a credit or debit card, THANK THEM. And, what cranks my case even more is that on the reverse of the card where she had signed it, she even noted "SEE I.D." (the clerks never even asked).

Speaking of phones and my wife, I bought her one of those track phones (a Nokia) for Christmas, trying to get her used to a mobile phone since I'd like to go cellular this year. "Easy activation my white ass."