Let's Stop Horse Racing Now

Barbaro died today. I am glad his owners tried to save him -- that's what a racehorse owner should do but rarely does. But I think the American public is hypocitical. Thousands of race horses die every year, in far worse situations than Barabaro's. Even being a Kentucky Derby winner can't guarantee that the horse won't be slaughtered for meat.

Racing Thoroughbreds are magnificent, fragile babies that can barely support their own weight, let alone that of a jockey's. They run until they literally implode, because we ask them to. The entire gene pool is derived from just three stallions. Funny how no one wonders about what that might do to generations of animals.

These animals are bred for speed, not to survive. What are we DOING? Winning a trophy should not be so high up on our priorities that we condem millions of horses to misery. I've got a feeling if the situations were reversed, the horses wouldn't do it to people. They're not that greedy.

I used to worship horse racing. Football fanatics had nothing on me. I knew statistics, bloodlines; collected books, movies and artwork about racehorses. As a kid, I'd daydream about having my own racehorse.

Then, as I got older, I grew up. Seeing Charismatic being overtrained for the 1999 Triple Crown made me afraid to watch a race he was in, for I knew it was only a matter of time before he'd go down. And he did. And no one said boo. All they wanted to know was "Who do you like in the next race?"

It appalled me. I'd wasted years of my life on a sport that cared not one whit for the very animals it needs. I shocked my family and friends when I no longer watched races and wanted nothing to do with them. But I love horses more than what I looked like to others.

And I've never regretted it. I learned about other things, like paganism. The money, land and tracks of the racing industry can be used for better things, like building homes for the homeless, sheltering abandoned animals or becoming halfway homes for suddenly unemployed racehorses.

And the Thoroughbreds won't even mind if their breed goes extinct. The only ones who would mind are people.

That's One

All hail T-Zero! they are officially the first publication to give me money for the privelege of printing my stuff. They've accepted one poem. I'd thought I'd be dancing around the house with joy, but I'm EXHAUSTED. By the way, I can't print the poem here because that would screw the deal up, so you just have to wait. The funny thing is that I wrote the poem when Pony had to spend the weekend at the Emergency Vet's. So perhaps she'd trying to help earn her keep. This poem might bring in enough for one can of dog food. (That's more than I usually get!)

I've known for a while that I am a writer, but it would be nice to actually get PAID for it. It takes a lot of false starts to find out where you're going It would've been nice to win the $250 million Powerball Wednesday night, but this is a good consolation prize from God.

Now to try and convince other editors to publish my stuff...

Suicide Bomber Roll Call

There certainly seems to be a lot of suicide bombers out there. I guess, theoretically, they'll eventually all blow themselves up and that'll be the end of them.

But until then, why don't we do the same thing? Hey if something ain't broke, why fix it, eh? We could gather up people in our society no one would miss, tell them they have the only chance they ever will get to be a hero, load them up for bear (except we tell them it's surveliance equipment -- heck, we could even knock them out and stick a nitroclycerin suppository up 'em), parachute their asses into some group that needs blowing up...terriorst training camps...death squads in Darfur...the Eurovision song contest...and then when they're in, push a button and blow the whole kittenkaboodle to dust. We get rid of two problems at once, then.

So who should these heroes be? Glad you asked:

• O.J. Simpson: We all should love our enemies. What better way by blowing them up in the cause of freedom?

Pat Robertson: Let's see if God will raise enough money to save him this time.

• The night manager at Lancaster Kmart who shot me with a BB gun trying to kill a small brown bird nesting in the artificial Christmas trees. 'Nuff said


• My ex: He'd do it for a beer. I wish I was kidding.


• The Geicko Gecko: This creature is the AntiChrist. There's a 666 somewhere on his head. Let's save the world by blowing up this thing.

Birds and Maybes

I'm bumpin'! (Not quite buzzin' and not quite bumping--hense bumpin'). I've finally gotten feedback from an editor instead of just the ususal rejection form letters! They want me to rewrite and resubmit the three poems I sent to The Writer's E-zine/T-zero. That they took the time to reply makes me feel there's hope yet

I just hope I don't screw up the rewrites! Just my luck, eh, if I get "Hmmm--this was better the first time around. What the heck did you do to it? Drive over it with a lawnmower?"

I've also got a maybe from Equine Lifesytle. And, of course, there's still that "maybe" from GrendelSong. All of my fingers are crossed. I'm typing telekinetically here...or is it the other way around?

If and when I get published and get paid for it, it will either be proof my personal Raven God exists and gives a crap about me, or the sign of Ragnarok (and you thought it had been cancelled).

If none of these pans out, perhaps I can blame this on Peter Gabriel. Why not? Honestly, this is a guy who was 25 years between KIDS, so any retaliation from him (now there's a happy mental image) won't come until I'm pushing up daisies (which is going to be really something to see, because I've left instructions for me to be cremated).

The Last Word of 2006

First things first -- Pony is doing much better. She's not too fond of being on a diet, though (join the club, Pony).

Now, I received this in the E-Newsletter from Writer's Digest:

The American Dialect Society, a 117-year-old organization of
linguists, grammarians, historians and independent scholars,
selected "plutoed"--to demote or devalue someone or
something--as its 2006 Word of the Year. The term, which
started when the General Assembly of the International
Astronomical Union took away Pluto's designation as a planet,
beat out several challengers including "climate canary" ("an
organism or species whose poor health or declining numbers
hint at a larger environmental catastrophe on the horizon),
murse (man's purse), flog (a fake blog that promotes products)
and macaca (an American citizen treated as an alien).

Well, that pretty much sums up 2006 in a word for me -- plutoed. In 2006, I became unemployed, my saintly Mom was forced to retire due to health, none of my 46 submissions for 2006 seemed to've taken fruit and AND Peter Gabriel & Company's Big Blue Ball STILL hasn't been released.

One of the things I hate about astrology is that I fit the stereotype for a Scorpio (and yes, I am a Scorpio). Yet Scorpios are ruled by both Mars and Pluto. But Pluto is now no longer a planet -- have I yet lost some tiny force keeping me together? Damn -- I think this explains my crap year. I've been plutoted.

Pony's Sick as a Dog

Poor Pony puppy (alright, she's nearly two and a half years old, but she has a puppy brain)! She's come down with a disease called pancreatitis. She had to stay in the Emergency Vet for a weekend. She's home now and, though still shakey, getting more and more like her old self every day.

Now, Pony is a British Mongrel. Throughout my life, I've gone on and on about how mongrels have Digestive Tracts of Steel compared to purebreds. Mom and I would call them "Princess Dogs" because they need need to be cooked for.

Well, my karma has run over my dogma. Mom keeps calling Pony "Princess Dog".

And now that my bank account has been wiped out (and worth every penny!) I REALLY need a job!!! Now, I've a theory that it was Pony's doggy mojo that made me unemployed all this time. She doesn't like me leaving the house without her, you see. So we've had to have a long talk. She's not very responsive.

I'm still trying to find a way to blame Peter Gabriel for all of this.

Updates

Just a coupla notes on updates of topics touched on in 2006:

• JoPa, the Football Coach of Steel, returned to coach the Nittany Lions of Penn State to victory in the Outback Bowl New Year's Day. For those readers who nothing about American College Football (like me), going to a bowl game is A Really Big Deal. He's mending well. Next year, he's planning on singlehandedly eating the world's nuclear arsenal.


• The Seminole Tribe, who recently purchased the Hard Rock Cafe chain, are getting sued. Wasn't losing their land and rights bad wnough--now they can't buy a stupid overpriced burger joint without Whitey trying to smack them?


• Barney the Doberman has been retired from guard duty to a farm "where he can chase chickens". Hopefully, the chickens will not end up like the bears at Wookey Hole Teddy Bear museum. However, I'm happy to see that Barney has escaped being sued.


• The score so far: From all the stories, articles and poems sent out for publishing, I have 15 rejections, 1 maybe and 34 sitting on someone's desk somewhere.
  Here's a bit of advice from my guru (yeah, right) Stephen King (You were wondering where the YouTube link would come in, weren't you?)
  
• I also found this cute photo of PG's head superimposed on a CHippendale's body from the 1992 Steam video. That's definately one of my personal highlights from 2006

Here's hoping we all get published and paid for it in 2007!