The Lee Word Side

With March soon gone my thoughts have turned to spring and all the plans that I have for my garden this year. Because I didn’t do much gardening last year I’ll have a lot to do his year. Along with all the usual post winter chores that need to be done in the garden I want to replace one of the retaining walls on the flower bed on the east side of the house, as well as a brick flower box that skirts the front porch. Weather permitting I’d like to get started on these two projects next weekend so I can have them ready in time for spring plantings. I also noticed that one of my rose bushes didn’t survive the winter so I’ll have to replace it. I’m thinking that in the annual flower beds I might do a red and white theme. Two years ago I did a peach colored theme that looked really nice.
If I were really motivated I would dig up that sorry excuse for a front lawn and put down some new sod, but my motivation isn’t as unlimited as it once was. As much as I would like to see a new lawn in the front yard this year, I doubt if it will happen. I’ll do what I can to keep the grass alive one more year then replace it next year. That can be my big project for the year. I hope the weather continues to stay warm and that we don’t get one of those spring snow storms that find their way to Baltimore. It doesn’t happen often, but we’ve seen snow in May; not at all a pleasant thought.

Happy Spring!

Ciao

In today’s Y-Net News, an on-line news site for Israeli News, they ran a piece about an upcoming article in Out magazine where they offer a guide on “How to Pick-Up Israeli Men.” Stories like these always peak my interest, as well as a lot of Israelis who are never shy in offering their opinions about Gay issues. I’m going to include a few quotes here, but if you want to you can go on over to Y-Net News and read the full article. After you read the article I recommend that you also read the comments, they’re just as entertaining.

‘Out’ publishes guide to picking up Israeli men

Calling all Israeli men, don’t be alarmed if approached by an American tourist asking smilingly in accented Hebrew, ‘Is that a mezuzah in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?’

‘Out’ has anointed Tel Aviv this month’s recommended tourist attraction, labeling it the capital of Bauhaus, commerce, culinary culture, and, of course, men. Tel Aviv’s coffee houses are described as packed full of people advertising the gay slogan, ‘We’re here and we’re queer’.

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Is there anyone who didn’t expect the U.S. economy to tank? Anyone other than Cheney and Bush? The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan carry a $5 billion dollar a month price tag which works out to $275 million dollars per day, or $4,100 per household. The other cost that can’t be assigned a dollar value is the loss of lives. To date there has been almost 4,000 U.S. soldiers killed and more than 60,000 wounded. On the Iraqi side the number is considerably higher, 700,000 killed and more than 4 million refugees. Add to this the ever increasing cost of the mortgage debacle and there can be no doubt that the U.S. economy is deflating faster than a punctured balloon. It doesn’t take an economist to figure this out. Indicators pointing to a recession were clearly visible as early as 2 years ago, but the Bush administration suppressed and ignored them, and continued on their slash and run rampage. Large oil corporations pocketed unheard of profits while receiving Federal Tax Cuts, thanks to who, you ask? You guessed right; Bush. The Stock Market is holding on only because of the Federal Government’s bail-out of Bear Stearns. The prime lending rate has been lowered 4 times in the last 3 months to no avail, and expectations are that it will be lowered again. Is there any doubt that the U.S. economy is headed south? Just how bad it’s going to get is anyone’s guess, but I think we’re in for some rough times ahead. The next President of the U.S. will be walking into a ticking time bomb of a job. The best that can be expected is to try and slow the train down. It will be several years before we can turn it around.

Ciao

Bill Maher, the outrageously funny and spot on host of the HBO program Real Time with Bill Maher, does a segment each week called “New Rules” that I just love. He has the ability to cut through all the political and cultural bullshit that our country suffers from. He is a good antidote to what ails us. This is a quicktime video from one of his recent shows.

Click on the image to play the video

New Rules

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Twenty-two years ago today, March 06, 1986. the world lost one of the most loved and respected artists of the modern time; Georgia O’Keeffe. She died in Santa Fe, New Mexico at ninety-eight years old. I was living in Santa Fe at the time and I remember hearing the news and feeling that the world would be a little darker without her. When I think about New Mexico I think about Georgia O’Keeffe, she embodied the essence and the spirit of the high desert landscape, in her paintings, as well as in her life.

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Okay, so High Definition TV is cool. I’ll give it that. The quality of the picture it delivers is nothing short of phenomenal, far better than I had expected. Seeing all of this on a 46 inch flat panel wide screen only helps to increase the wonder of it. But all isn’t as idyllic as it seems. When I first decided that it was time to upgrade my TV to high definition I foolishly thought that all I needed to do was to replace my old analog TV with a shinny new HDTV. Well, that, as I soon found out, is only the tip of the iceberg. In order to see those elusive HD channels, all seven of them, you have to have a cable converter box. “Not a problem,” I say, “I can do that.” I call Comcast and order a HD cable box and 40 minutes later I’m at their store picking up the box. I bring it home and get it all hooked up, or so I thought, and I turn on the TV expecting to see a beautiful HD picture, but all I got was the old analog picture, the same one I had before. After trying every configuration shown on the ridiculously small diagram that they gave me, plus a few that weren’t on the diagram, I still wasn’t able to get a HD channel. On the phone with Comcast the technician asked if I had the Component Video Connectors hooked up correctly. “What?” I asked. “The red, blue, and green connectors for the video, plus the red and white connectors for the audio,” the Comcast guru said. “Uh, no, I don’t,” I say, “because I don’t have any of those.” Turns out Comcast didn’t bother to give me the connectors when I picked up the converter box. One hour later, with the new cables in hand, I make another attempt to hook up my new TV. At last, success, HD channels, and pretty ones at that. Next I focus on hooking up my TIVO. That went rather well, but I soon learned that my old series 2 TIVO can’t record HD content. Okay…now what? I can’t live without my TIVO. It’s been four years since I’ve seen a TV commercial and I sure as hell don’t want to regress to that stage again. No choice, I order a new TIVO, series 3 HD, on the AMEX card; it’s only money. The new TIVO arrived last night, but because it uses Cable Cards instead of a converter box Comcast will come out on Friday to do an onsite installation/configuration of the cards for the low cost of $17.95. At that point I hope to have everything working then I can spend some quality time watching my new TV. I’m keeping my fingers crossed.

So, any guesses on how much all of this cost?

Ciao

Here is a video from one of my favorite movies, “Yossi and Jagger.” The name of the song is “Bo” which means “let’s.” Super Hot Ivri Lider performs the song. He is very big in Israel and he’s trying to make some inroads here in America. The song is sung in Hebrew so here is a chance for you to brush up on your Hebrew. (don’t worry, it has captions) Hope you enjoy it.

Click The Image To View The Video

Bo

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