TGIF! presents...."Beach Baby" by First Class!

Read more!

Whiney bitches at MJS on a quadruple Favre rampage!

Time to play catch-up on the childish, bitter rantings of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel in the UP/DOWN section as they concern Minnesota Vikings' QB (and ex-Green Bay Packer) Brett Favre. This has been going on for quite a while. The Packers let go of Favre; wish the same could be said for the idiot sports staff at the MJS.

July 20, 2010
UP/DOWN
UP - Indecision 2010: Minnesota Vikings coach Brad "The Chiller" Childress paid Brett Favre a visit in Hattiesburg, MS. Traffic was backed up for miles after the duo hit a fast-food drive-through and the cleark asked the QB if he wanted fries.
- Mike Hart

July 22, 2010
DOWN - Two-a-days: The "EA Sports Active NFL Training Camp" video game will be in stores Nov. 16. Now you'll know what Brett Favre goes through.
- Mike Hart


July 24, 2010
UP - Passing the baton: Slovenia named 50-year-old sprinter Merlene Ottey to its 4x100 relay team, potentially making Ottey the oldest athlete to compete in the upcoming European Championships. Alas, another record for Brett Favre to chase.
- Ray Hollnagel

July 25, 2010
UP - Crunch time: Doritos will come out with two new limited-edition flavors - Stadium Nacho and Tailgater BBQ - inspired by the John Madden video game franchise. Shouldn't Madden-inspired chips be called Favres? The slogan writes itself: You can stop eating those Jays, but you can't stop drooling over a Favre.
- Mike Hart

Sooooo, Favre fans are described as "drooling" over Favre? What does that make the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel's constant ribbing of Favre in the UP/DOWN section of the paper? O-kay.

Read more!

TGIF! presents...the High Kings' "The Parting Glass".

Read more!

Favre. Men's Journal.

Brett's on the cover of the August issue of Men's Journal. Read an excerpt here.

Among other things, Favre explained his thought process on the fateful fourth-quarter interception against the Saints in the NFC Championship game last season, an on-the-run pass to Sidney Rice that was forced into tight coverage. Favre said they connected on the same play the week before against the Dallas Cowboys for a 20-yard gain, expecting Rice to come back toward him.

As a player you've got to pull the trigger," Favre said. "You can't say, 'Well, is he going to do what I think he's going to do?' He wasn't wrong, and in some ways, I wasn't either.

Read more!

11 green beans to self-sustainability.

The first batch from my brother's smallish garden. We are now self-sustainable. Until these 11 beans are gone.

Read more!

What I did on my summer vacation.

Weed whacked at a cemetery. No shit. My 2nd cousin Mary Beth's (Dad's first cousin) hubby, Bernie, owns WENTA Monuments (they make headstones) and two cemeteries: Good Hope and Pilgrim's Rest. Bernie, Mary Beth and I were having a few beers in Greendale for the 4th of July and Bernie asked what I was doing this summer (I go back to teaching in the Fall).

That next Tuesday I found myself at Good Hope cemetery whacking weeds around tombstones. And helping bury bodies (Bernie didn't tell me I'd be helping out with that task until after he hired me).

My arm is sore. I'm generally soaked through the bone with sweat. I'm exhausted. I've sprained my ankle and my arm. But truth be told, I enjoy it. It's peaceful. The cemetery's are beautiful. No one talks back to you ('cause everyone's dead, get it?). I'm getting into better shape. I'm getting sun. I get to see Bernie's kids - Chuck and Mike - more often. The guys I work with are great and Bernie's an excellent boss. And I look forward to going to work.

Whodathunk.

Read more!

Cali's a great place to visit...Nature Interlude! Stream in Sequoia.

Take one minute out of your day to relax and listen. It's one minute.

Read more!

Cali's a great place to visit...Solstice Parade compromised!

Rules of Solstice Parade: No motors on floats and no signs or signature of any sort. Oddly, nothing in print that says a float can't make a political or social statement; however, I'm very certain that floats of a political and social nature are not allowed. So why the Mexican man with Mexican children wearing masks and pulling a pack of cigarettes with a skull attached?

I emailed the Solstice committee but haven't heard back. If this sort of float is allowed, who's to say a float protesting the current administration in Washington, or a float in favor of the Arizona illegal alien bill, or a float protesting cruel and inhumane treatment of animals shouldn't be allowed??? See what I mean? The parades intent is not to lecture but to celebrate Summer Solstice.

I don't get this.

Read more!

TGIF! presents...Favre to Greg Lewis. ESPY Award for "Play of the Year"!

11 seconds left in the game. San Fran at Vikings. This past season. Vikes down by 4 with 12 seconds left in the game. Vikes on the 49ers' 32-yard line. It's a 40+ yard pass...TOUCHDOWN!! This was the Play of the Year winner in last night's ESPY Awards.

Read more!

"It's Hard to Be Humble When You're from Wisconsin".

Saw this article in Country Living magazine while waiting in the doctor's office today. Click on READ MORE! to find out some of the unique aspects of my home state.

Read more!

Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel sports sentimental for Favre.

July 13, 2010

UP/DOWN
UP - The missing link: Paul, the octopus in a German aquarium who predicted the winner of eight World Cup matches, is going to retire. The intuitive invertebrae needs to answer one more question: When will Favre finally retire?

- Paul Drzweiecki

What the fuck do you care, Paul? Favre's not playing for the Green Bay Packers anymore, you fucking moron. You're a fucking child, Paul. And the MJS sports department sucks shit.

Read more!

Separated at Birth? Brett Favre's sprained ankle & my sprained ankle.

Brett Favre's ankle (top) after the Vikings loss to the New Orleans Saints last year in the NFC Championship game (lost by 3 in OT, a game the Vikings gave away). And my ankle after a severe sprain Monday at my summer job. Not as bad as Favre's. The sprained I suffered when I fell backstage performing in "Blood Brothers" in Los Angeles was just about as bad as Favre's...my ankle looked like someone glued a tennis ball to it. And I passed out twice before making it the dressing room backstage. But - I went on for the 2nd Act and never missed a cue.

I hobbled to work today - ankle bandage and wearing a high hunting boot. I told people I "favred it out". SKOL FAVRE! SKOL VIKINGS!

Read more!

Now the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel is just blathering.

Blathering on about Brett Favre, that is.

July 9, 2010

UP/DOWN
UP - Decision shows: Just wait until ESPN gives Brett Favre one of these things (in reference to LeBron James' ESPN show announcing who he's playing for this season). He could stand in a Waffle House parking lot and recite lines from Hamlet while Donny and Marie hum the Jeopardy theme song.

- Mike Hart

I don't get it, Hart. And - you're still a douche bag.

Read more!

Strawberries Feel...

...scrumptious. Refreshing. Figure it out. Wash'em. Cut'em. And throw some sugar on and let sit and it's a fairly quick, easy summer snack. Thanks, Mom.

Read more!

TGIF! presents...Mendelssohn's Overture to "A Midsummer Night's Dream". Op. 21.

Headed to Cedar Rapids, Iowa today for the weekend to see The Classics at Brucemore: "A Midsummer Night's Dream" and to have a read-thru of my one-act play, "Reveille!", with actresses, Marty and Megan. I'm producing a staged play reading of the play in September at Trimborn Farm in Greendale, WI.

It's been 12 years (since I moved to Cali) that I'd seen The Classics at Brucemore. I'm excited.

Read more!

A plethora of a Greendale 4th!

Top to bottom, left to right: Me and Rick Nowak (my Uncle Bob's brother), Greendale's City Hall (it don't get much more Americana than that, does it?), Bernie and Mary Beth Schroedl (Mary Beth is my father's first cousin), a fair at 60 mph, a Model T (or is it a Model A?), Mom and Dad at the parade, "Don't Tread on Me" flag outside our home in Waterford, fireworks at Art's, a treehouse in Greendale, and a fire (see the man's face?)

Read more!

Origami No. 29. Revelation No. 9.

These just came to me today while driving:

1. I believe in merciful deaths (unlike "mercy killing") under certain conditions.
2. I believe that serial rapists should get castrated. Matter of fact, I’d take that a step further and say under certain conditions a first-time rapist should become castrated.
3. I believe that under certain conditions prostitutes should be given hysterectomies.

(Origami is sort of my catchword for a featured blog post that highlights my original writings - could be an excerpt from one of my plays, a poem, a song, a rant, a rave, a cursing, etc. Origami is the art of folding paper (the word is of Japanese origin). Or, it could be the creative juices of someone else I know - or don't know. So, within the folds of this particular blog feature you may find something really beautiful, meaningful or poignant.)

Read more!

Happy 4th of July.

When was the last time you read The Declaration of Independence? Well...here it its. Happy 4th of July from the Ircink's in Waterford, Wisconsin.

The Declaration of Independence

IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,
When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

Click on READ MORE for the rest of it.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them
into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection
and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns,
and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren,
or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives,
our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:

Column 1
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett
Lyman Hall
George Walton

Column 2

North Carolina:
William Hooper
Joseph Hewes
John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge
Thomas Heyward, Jr.
Thomas Lynch, Jr.
Arthur Middleton

Column 3

Massachusetts:
John Hancock
Maryland:
Samuel Chase
William Paca
Thomas Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Thomas Jefferson
Benjamin Harrison
Thomas Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter Braxton

Column 4

Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris
Benjamin Rush
Benjamin Franklin
John Morton
George Clymer
James Smith
George Taylor
James Wilson
George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney
George Read
Thomas McKean

Column 5

New York:
William Floyd
Philip Livingston
Francis Lewis
Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton
John Witherspoon
Francis Hopkinson
John Hart
Abraham Clark

Column 6

New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett
William Whipple
Massachusetts:
Samuel Adams
John Adams
Robert Treat Paine
Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins
William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
William Williams
Oliver Wolcott
New Hampshire:
Matthew Thornton

Read more!

Let Favre go, MJS.

July 2, 2010

UP/DOWN
UP - Indecision 2010: Brett Favre resurfaced at Oak Gove High School in Hattiesburg, Miss., and threw passes to the team's receivers. He shed no light on his football future but left the door open on running for homecoming king.

- Mike Hart

That's because you were a loser in high school, Hart, and couldn't get chosen secretary of the Chess Club. As usual, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel shows its maturity in not letting Favre go.

Read more!

Happy 73rd Birthday, Dad!

Dad with his sisters, Aunt Ruth (left) and Aunt Evelyn, this past June. This is the first time I've been home to help celebrate with Dad since moving to California in April 1999. I'm sure we'll go into Greendale for a few.... :) . "73" on 7/3...born in 1937. Nice.

Dad in 1960 - cleaning his 1960 T-Bird outside the Ircink home on Beaver Court in Greendale.

Read more!

TGIF! presents...The Moody Blues' "Your Wildest Dreams".

Saw The Moodies at Summerfest Wednesday. They were in very good voice and the place was packed. And I love this song. Lost love. Sad, in a way...at least the video is.

Read more!

That crazy Favre...

...up to his old tricks. First, Brett says he would like a shot at beating the Super Bowl Champs - the New Orleans Saints (the team that beat the Vikes in the NFC Championship last season by 3 points in OT). Then Favre says he feels he can still play at a high level. And THEN he states his ankle is healing on schedule. But he hasn't committed to returning for a second season with the Minnesota Vikings.

Now - much like last summer - Favre's been spotted throwing footballs around at a local Hattiesburg high school.

How can my life go on? If Favre doesn't make a decision I'll just die. My God, he's so selfish...not being 100% sure his 40-year-old body can take another beating. He should know his own body, for heaven's sake. Or maybe he knows he's coming back but doesn't want to go to training camp. Gee whiz....that...that Favre! Will he or won't he? Don't care? Good - I don't care if he misses training camp either. SKOL FAVRE! SKOL VIKINGS!

Read more!

"Cali's a great place to visit!" A literal Grace.

Grace (age 3) "reading" Winnie the Pooh.

Read more!