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To my friends out there reading my blog, I apologize if you haven't been able to leave comments when you've wanted to.  I also apologize if you've had some difficulty in trying to log into my blog automatically.  I cannot control the functionality of Google's Blogspot.  However, I can convert my blog back to the former settings if the current settings are proving more difficult to open via your mobile devices, as well as your laptops/computers. 

Please email me at NYEastsideEntertainment@gmail.com if you are having difficulties.  I want this all to be one continuous process of fun and entertainment in the midst of everyone's busy life. 

Would you believe...


Some time in early August, I stepped on tiny sliver of something near the ball of my foot.  I attempted to remove it and it actually seemed to disappear.  Then last week, nearly six weeks later, the entire sole of my foot swelled.  The sudden swelling caused me to call my foot doctor about an hour into work.  My doctor said quite simply "Either get your ass in my office right now (he had a cancellation), or go to an Emergency Room."  I left work and ran to his office.

One X-ray and 5 minutes later, he removed the object that was in my foot.  It was a tiny piece of metal no bigger than the tip of the tip of a ball point pen.  It wasn't in very deep, but my body had finally rejected it and it was causing...an infection.  An infection?  Yep.  An infection so bad that I've been on antibiotics for over a week.

It's amazing that something that small and so completely unnoticeable was on course to send me to the hospital with an infection that was spreading up my foot and into my leg?

I can't think of how many times I've had a splinter in my hand or foot in my life, or suffered cuts or scrapes from something metallic during a home repair.  I guess this is why we get tetanus shots, use antibiotic creams, alcohol and peroxide?

Either way...it's good to be back on track.  I feel like I have a leg up on everyone else now...

When someone asks you a question...


Ever notice how some people will ask you a question, but they don't hear your answer simply because they weren't listening for your response?  Usually they then end up repeating the question and you repeating your answer.  Then another scenario is when they ask a question, but have already predicted an answer and immediately ask another question, when you've answered both questions with your first response.  Now you have to repeat your answer.

The absolute best scenario is when someone asks you a question, but already has information or a rebuttal to your anticipated response.  Yet the problem is that both in their original question and their rebuttal are both uninformed or misinformed.  Now you have not only answer, but you also have to clear up their misinformed thoughts.

When we position ourselves to "seek" information, we can either be a rock...or a sponge.  I always try to be the sponge so that I can learn more, or simply review what I originally thought was the correct way.

All of this is leading to my daily review and reminder to myself that there is a reason why we have two eyes, two ears and one mouth.  We must all use them wisely.

"He that answereth a matter before he heareth, it is folly and shame unto him"  Proverbs 18:13

"The Page" by John S LES

And now the conclusion to "The Page"


"The Page"  ©


by John S. LES


All out Bustanian civil war that lasted about six weeks.  A total of about 200,000 Simba and 370,000 Tumbili soldiers were killed.  Even though the Simba lost fewer soldiers, they had the smaller tribal population and had to call a truce or they would face possible ethnic extinction or absorption.  Most of the world had literally turned their backs on the conflict.  The one positive was that women and children had been spared.  Only the men were left to fight it out in the cities.

I had already returned back to school for fall semester of my senior year.  I had received a lot of kudos from my boss, Congressman Hollingsworth, and other members of Congress, for the help I provided with a simple cell phone application that allowed Jamila to contact me when her and her father's diplomatic delegation had been detained in Bustani shortly before the civil war started. 

The 2011/2012 school year, was also a Presidential election year, and I was being quietly courted by both sides of the political isle to become their Page next summer..  They all wanted to be use me as a symbol for American high school technological ingenuity.  Then my SAT scores came back, and they were near perfect scores.  Suddenly colleges I never even applied to were calling me and offering me scholarships.  Just about every Ivy League school called me, and even the West Coast "Ivies" like Stanford, USC and UCLA.  These were all the Alma maters of the various Congressmen and Senators.  This was now well beyond my simple dream of me and Jamila both going to Georgetown University and earning our college degrees together.

To relieve myself of some of the pressure, I started this blog.  I wanted to connect with other teenagers who were having difficulty deciding on where to go to college and how that decision might affect them for the rest of their lives.  The blog became a hit with other teenagers.  Partly because of my name being in the media from press coverage of the UN delegate recovery in Bustani and part because I had struck a cord with young people around the country.  Critics of my blog felt that I started a trend and brought sex appeal to guys out there who were computer geeks.  I guess that what happens when you're a good looking teenager who also happens to be tall and athletic, yet prefers computers over basketball, football or baseball.

Around the world, there were sporadic protests at the United Nations and at embassies of the Super Powers  around the world for not coming sooner to the the aid of African nations such as Bustani.  Even I joined in some of the protests held in front of the United Nations, much to my father's dislike.  I also joined a relief program that created food and clothes drives for survivors of the Bustani civil war.  Jamila and I discussed the possibility of going back to Bustani as Red Cross volunteers next summer to help work with the children of Bustani who were now made fatherless from the war.

Some pressure within the world media forced the United Nations, more specifically the United States and Russia to openly talk about providing more political and military intervention with countries like Bustani teetering on the brink of civil war, in order to prevent bloodshed and loss of valuable human life.  They were dramatic, attention getting words for Masamba to the world media, but even I knew he didn't mean that.  Even though he was thousands of miles away, Masamba was building his case that the start of peace throughout Africa, would begin with the world formally recognizing Bustani and him as the starting point of such peace.  He announced dates for starting a world tour for peace throughout Africa.  What no one knew at the time was that he was planning the exact opposite.  He wanted to destabilize the Super Powers so that the nations in Africa could see him as a world leader out of the chaos.

As the Thanksgiving, Christmas and the New Years holidays passed, my own family and Jamilia's managed to get together.  It was a happy holidays for all of us.  We were all happy as Jamila had received college acceptance letters from Georgetown, Harvard and Yale and I had received acceptance letters from Georgetown, Harvard and MIT.  Our families wanted us to preferred us to attend Georgetown to stay close by.  We began to consider attending Harvard together to be able to be away from our families.

The November elections in the US brought new political sparring in Washington, DC.  While the politicians arm wrestled in Washington, it was during this moment of political turnover that Masamba was able to sneak in a second layer of sleeper assassins who would compliment the first set of sleeper assassins he had slipped into Super Power countries around the world nearly a two years earlier.  But just like he did within his own country, he began to quietly eliminate those in America he considered his enemies.

First on his list was my boss, Congressman Hollingsworth, who had been  mysteriously poisoned just three months after we got back to the US.  Hollingsworth became so sick that he nearly died in the hospital and had to be induced into a coma in order to be saved by his doctors.  When the November elections came around, he had to surrender his seat.  His full convalescence from some slight physical and neurological damage would require a year long rehabilitation.  Next came Jamila's father and uncle in late January.  While driving his brother in Arlington, to complete paperwork for for political asylum, Jamila's father's car was struck in an intersection by a stolen cab.  The driver of the other car escaped, but Jamila's uncle was killed and her father suffered back injuries.  Then came my father.  One Sunday while going for his morning jog to get the newspaper he was ambushed by a knife wielding African man.  Although badly cut on his arm and leg both he and an an alert police officer managed to gun down the assailant.  All the immigration paperwork on the dead assailant stated that he was a Nigerian born immigrant.  Months later that paperwork proved to be a forgery.

Homeland Security dragged its feet on the circumstances on the attempts of the lives of my father, and Jamila's father and uncle, as well as Congressman Hollingsworth.  The CIA could not officially touch the investigation and the FBI was embroiled in Congressional hearings for the appointment of a new Director.  No one could or would connect these incidents to Masamba.  No one except me and my computer science club crew.

In mid February, myself, Zach, Will and Tanya had a virtual conference from our homes.  My father was still recovering from his wounds and Jamila's father was turning the corner on walking again.  We ran traces back to Jamila's laptop which had been taken from her by Masamba's soldiers last summer.  Will and Zach had hacked it a year ago when she and I were having our problems.  We wanted to see who was using it and for what.  We had tried the same traces months earlier, but the computer was never turned on.  Now it was being used and from what we gathered, it was being used by Masamba himself.

In the first few days we could not understand the codes he was using.  But was was clear to us was that he was using no less than 50 different identities on the laptop to communicate to his assassins around the world. We couldn't understand what was being communicated at first.  But what we did notice was a particular word "kulipua" being repeated at key times. We knew the Swahili translation for kulipua meant "to blow up".  We did not know when, how or what reference this phrase was being attached to, but it had become clear to us that the dots were connecting.

When I approached Jamila to describe what she knew about the art of Mwili Mipuko - body explosion that - she told me that it was mythical talk and that no one in her immediate family had ever witnessed it.  Moreover, such ancient practices of fighting had never been discussed or used outside the confines of Bustani.  It would be a forbidden against all religious traditions of the Simba or Tumbili tribes to do so.  She then refused to talk to me for a while after learning that Will and Zach had even hacked her computer on my behalf.  I expected that reaction.  Our plans for picking a college together was then officially over.  But I had to press on.

When I tried to reach out to the Congressman who took my former bosses seat in Congress, a political opposite, he wanted nothing to do with me.  With the FBI, Homeland Security and Congress turning their backs to me and dismissing my theory about some sort of international assassination plot being carried out by Masamba was largely ignored and dismissed.  I was only left with one more move.  I had to reach out to that CIA analyst. I remembered on the plane ride in to Kenya whose code name on the plane was Debra.  So...I began to use my blog to reach out to the Company and Debra in my blog.  Mixed in with my messages to teens to be vigilant of recent immigrants from Bustani were my own coded messages that I knew the computer algorithms at the National Security Agency, the CIA and the FBI would pick up and start to follow.

Within three days me, Zach, Will and Tanya were dragged into an FBI office location that I will keep anonymous.  From there we were interviewed by investigators from the FBI, Homeland Security and eventually "Debra" from the CIA.  The first two sets of investigators hardly believed a word we said.  We were threatened with being arrested for treason, computer hacking and possible espionage.  It wasn't until "Debra" finally did speak to me that things began moving in a favorable direction.  She had been promoted and moved to a different responsibility for her role in Bustani.  But she had the clearest insight to the traditional and nontraditional warfare that Bustanians had been using for years.  She was also impressed with all prior knowledge she had of me and my friends.  She basically pulled us out of arrest and fast tracked us down to another location in the Washington, DC area.

The computer tech's at the CIA room took Will's laptop and were able to tap into Jamila's laptop.  They then enhanced everything on screen and poured over the notes that we had and the locations that Masamba's messages were going out to.  There was at least 60 assassins who were given the order to "explode" but no one knew when, where or how they could sneak explosives into the country or past security check points.  In all of her research Debra could not find a single note that would or could explain the Simba custom of human combustion or explosion.  Just as her superiors were ready to push me out of the way again for being in over my head on national security issues, I reminded Debra that the Senegalese commander from the UN force in Bustani, Captain Amari Kanyomozi must have known something about the art, because he used the same principle to get the release of the first delegation prior to our arrival in Bustani last summer.

Within about 6 hours, and after numerous high level contacts were patched through, Captain Kanyomozi sent a video obtained by one of his slain troops via his cell phone shortly before that trooper was killed via collateral damage later that summer.  The video showed the two person "human bomb" that the suicide Simba's controlled by Masamba were using to kill their own and now others.   With the help of some top scientists from around the world, it was then theorized that due to the special nature of the Simba's body chemistry, through hundreds of years of natural, but powerful steroid absorption, they were able to use static electricity to ignite their bodies.  To enhance this explosive effect, they had to bath their skin cells in special toxic liniments  as well as ingest additional materials which accelerated the explosion process.

Once the video made its way through every Super Power national security department as well as other member nations of the  UN.  Almost within a blink of an eye, Masamba had become Public Enemy to the entire World.  Me and my friends were released after two days of debriefing.  It would take the next seven weeks before security forces around the world including the US, Russia, and China were able to round up the human bomb assassins using the locations of their email receptions.  Masamba himself would die of some mysterious illness that befell him.  I guess that's what happens when you try to assassinate the leaders of the world.  Miraculously a new leader for Bustani was established.  He was Bustani born, but London, England educated and served as a diplomat for Bustani relations in Russia.

I eventually chose to attend Harvard, since Jamila still expressed feelings of betrayal and mistrust.  I figured that it was probably wiser that I not be so close to her home turf in Georgetown.  Much to my surprise, she did chose Harvard as well and we reconciled our differences.  So I end this story by first thanking all of my readers out there for helping to choose peace over murder.  But, I'm also reminding you that mankind must remain vigilant to stay on guard against those who constantly try to turn our world into chaos - making us turn away from each other, rather than turn toward each other.

He Was A Cowboy Alright...But Darling Was His Nickname...

He was a cowboy alright, but "Darling" was his nickname...true story


Yes, I know I promised to get to the conclusion of "The Page" before the weekend, and I will.  I also will begin rolling out my two new fictional stories, "Crucifix" and "The Lesson", but I wanted to announce one additional important piece of information that up to now, was only available to my Twitter followers.  Thanks to all of you who continue to follow my blog I have decided to secure a web domain for it.  So in the future there will be a NY Eastside Entertainment website with even more entertaining things to read and/or simply watch.  This will also hopefully open doors for family and friends who also love to write, make videos, share a life story to also be able to contribute their entertainment skills to share with the world. Who knows where we'll go from there?  But I owe it all to you folks out there.  Keep visiting me and feel free to share your thoughts and comments on this blog, Twitter or in an email.

Now onto my real life experience with a guy named Darling Yearwood...

I was born and raised in New York City.  Both my parents came from the deep south, which I visited several times in my early developmental years.  So even though I was a city boy, I always had an appreciation of rural and rustic life.  However, my overwhelming formal and informal education came from the public schools of New York City as well as the streets of New York City.  From Kindergarten to the 10th grade I was taught by a fairly solid education in NYC, Lower Eastside.

However, there was an opportunity to attend a preparatory school 400 miles away in New Hampshire, via an educational opportunity scholarship.  I took the test, won the award and jump at the chance to leave Broadway for the Boondocks.  The one criteria was that you had to attend summer school at a prep school to see "if you fit in" with such a "drastic change of culture, environment and upbringing".

For those who don't know, I am African American, Black American, or whatever designation that you wish to choose.  Fortunately for me my local public schools, although predominantly were black and Hispanic, also had mixes of Irish, Italian, European decedent Jews, Chinese, Filipino and Indian.  It seemed like every six blocks you could experience people from all over the world.  And I ran up and down those streets of the entire Lower Eastside and interacted with everyone of them.

What "drastic change" could I possibly be going into?  I was certain I could handle anyone and anything!

Okay...so...I go to this summer prep school...in New Hampshire.  It was a 11 hour bus ride northwest, into the White Mountains of NH.  When I stepped off the bus into this rural, mountainous, environment, I felt like a fly who had been dropped in a bathtub of milk.  There was not one single person of color of any kind anywhere.  There were no brown, tans or even olive skinned people anywhere.  Everyone was clearly faired skinned Caucasian or White American.  I immediately felt that my arrival in this town had probably quadrupled the African American population in the whole entire state.

I called the school from the bus stop.  A teacher was already on the way.  So I just stood there and waited.  It was a bright sunny day, and everyone who walked by me said hello.  In fact, they just kept waving and saying hello.  I was now being forced to keep waving back and saying hello.  The more hellos I said, the more that came back to me.  It got to the point where I felt that everyone was just too friendly.  I had hit my New York limit of ten "hi/hello" to complete strangers in just 4 minutes.  Then I started wondering if everyone in this town had all sent out some kind of telepathic message to one another saying that "The only black kid in the entire state is here.  Say hello to him before he calls Jesse Jackson!" (I would later find out that people in New Hampshire, by nature usually just say hello to you, even if they don't know you, just like folks do in parts of the rural South, or out West - it's a hospitality thing).

One another thing to note was that this town seemed to be a rustic throwback to the American frontier some 70 years earlier.  Although most of the cars were fairly new, some of the cars and trucks within that town seemed like they had been original models made by Henry Ford himself.

I waited barely 10 minutes before that teacher from the school did arrive to pick me up at the bus stop.  He was really a cool, down to earth dude who graduated from Dartmouth, University.  Very intelligent.  Made jokes about the shocked look on my face and about me being the only black person within hours of this town.  Got me all relaxed by letting me know that no matter what happened while I was up there, he had my back.  So I tossed my luggage into his car and off to the school we went.  Up hill, down hill, round the mountain, over a rocky road, through a creak, and then back onto paved road again.

Before I got there, the people back in New York told me this would be "different".  No, no...this wasn't "different" this was another planet to me.  It was time travel...mixed in with another civilization.  And I was scheduled to stay there for five weeks, on a mission (scholarship) where failure was not an option.

When we arrived at my dormitory, it was little more than an old, small, white wooden house (yes even the dorm buildings were white) that seemed to creak in every stiff wind.  The room furniture was an old desk, bed and dresser that I think were originally used by Thomas Edison and perhaps George Washington.  There was nine other students there for this summer school program.  Three girls, seven guys myself included.  They were from various parts of the Northeast east including New Hampshire, New Jersey, Massachusetts and Maine.  All of them looked like sourpussed, teens whose families had a little money to put them in "summer school jail" for either disciplinary or academic reasons.  I was the only one there to test drive the prep school environment.  Actually, at that point I was more concerned if the house had running water.  Thankfully it did.

One of the kids who stood out...just via his name alone...was Darling Yearwood.  His first name was a nickname, his real name has long since been forgotten.  I forgot why Darling was there, but I do remember that he was the youngest of our group.  All of the other kids were from suburban backgrounds, with exception to me and Darling Yearwood.  Make no mistake, Darling was from Western Massachussetts - aka cowboy country.  Western, MA is the apparent tough guy bastion of all of the United States.  "I'm not one of those funny talking Eastern Massholes."  He was referring to that sometimes ear piercing Bostonian accent that dominates the language of many people who live in the greater Boston, MA area.  They speak something like this "Pahk, the Cahr, by the the Bahr in the Dahrk."  I've seen some folks from that area shatter wine glasses with their accents.

We had afternoon, early evening meetings and met all the faculty members and their families.  They were all nice, definitely educated and very well spoken.  They had planned for us to accomplish several things.  First, we had to complete all the summer academic requirements.  Second, we were going to hike five of the eight presidential mountains.  Third, we were going to go on two camping trips out in the deep woods.  (Which was like just outside my dormitory window?  How much deeper woods could we get?)

I used my socialization skills to develop and maintain great relationships with the faculty, grounds and kitchen staff.  Even developed a more than friendly relationship with a teenage girl from the kitchen staff who lived in the neighboring town.  Within days, I became adored by everyone attached with the school.  However, my campus peers were a different story.  They were all whiny, sneaky, snobby and lazy kids who didn't want to be there.  One of my peers declared the first night in the dorms that he wasn't going to last the five weeks.  With his undisciplined behavior and numerous infractions, he was gone after just ten days. 

The school work was constant and took up a lot of time.  The weekend hiking trips to the presidential range was great for me since I was already an athlete who ran track, played basketball, used weights and did hundreds of push ups, sit ups and squats as part of my personal workout since the 7th grade. So for me, hiking into a higher altitude and fresh air was great!

Most of the guys didn't wine about the long hikes, but the girls always did.  I always loved it when we reached the summit for the mountain because as everyone would sit down and whip out their food, I would whip out my sketch books and color stencils.  I drew pictures of the beautiful scenic landscape that was 5,000 plus feet above sea level.  The teachers there told me beforehand that it would be a better and higher view than the Empire State Building...and they were right.  When you reach the top of Mount Washington, some 6,288 feet above sea level (by comparison the Empire State Building is only 1,454 feet) you feel like you can touch the Heavens.  You really do feel on top of the world.  It is a beautiful view.

Then there was a place called Upper Falls where you could slide down a natural waterfall some 10 feet over smooth rocks and then drop about 30 feet into a pool of natural mountain water.  Sorry Great Adventure and Disney, but Upper Falls was definitely more fun!

Then there was the bugs.  The bugs that bite.  Every native New Hampshirian knows that in the White Mountains...just about everything that flies...bites.  Birds and Butterflies might be the only exceptions.  In my five weeks we had black fly season, house fly season, horse fly season (huge and green) and white fly season.  Mosquito season was all night long, all five weeks.  Toss in some spiders who might also choose to bite you in the night on your camping trips.  I tell you...God as my witness...all of these biting insects loved dark meat.  At night I could HEAR the mosquitoes flying over me, waiting for me to to drift into a good, deep sleep and come from under the covers.  They sounded like Japanese Zero airplanes diving after you.

Everyday I would wake up with several new bites, while the other kids looked at me like I was crazy, because they had no bites.  Back in NYC the only thing that had ever bit me at that point was a mosquito and a dog.  Here in NH everything was biting me, except the dogs and the people.  Finally, I complained to the staff that they had to help me, especially with the deep wood camping trips coming up...one of them was to be at Hampton Beach, NH.  What does that mean?  Hmm...think...large body of water (the beach)...wooded camping ground....a crappy tent that seemed to allow every insect inside...and even larger mosquitoes.

My mother sent me a can of Off.  The teachers gave me a spare can of DEET.  Both were effective insect repellents for me.  However, the other students didn't really care for the smell of them.  So...with the male student population reduced down to an even six, I was no longer going to get a tent all to myself.  I had to share a tent with Darling Yearwood.  In another life, Darling fancied himself to be a young John Wayne.  All he needed was the ten gallon hat, the spurs and a horse.  The other boys couldn't stand him, and the feeling was mutual.  Growing up around my neck of the woods in NYC...Darling would have gotten a blanket party to knock that false bravado off his face.  Darling was just a soft kid, trying to talk and act tough, but couldn't fight his way out of a paper bag.

Needless to say because none of the other guys wanted to tent with me either (why?  umm...yeah...you guessed it...my color) and no one wanted to tent with Darling for obvious reasons, we ended up tenting together.  Darling started out watching me pack my bag for the camping trip.  He pounded his chest and forswore about how if I ever used any of that stuff, he was going to kick some ass.  He didn't like the smell of it, it affected his allergies.  I just nodded and packed away.

Then the evening came and we set up our tent and once again he reiterated that if I used any of that stuff there was going to be some trouble in our tent that night.  I just nodded and set up my sleeping bag.  Then bedtime came and I stood outside our tent and sprayed myself down and crawled into the tent and into my bag.  No sooner that I laid my head down, good old Darling started coughing and chiming away about what a sissy I was using the bug spray and how "a real man" would have just went to sleep and not be afraid of the bugs.  When he said that, I reached for the can and sprayed a little bit more on myself inside my sleeping bag - just to be on the safe side of course?  After I did that, Darling swore that if I sprayed just once more, he would sleep outside and away from "the sissy inside the tent."  I reached for my can and sprayed just a little more.  I had apparently missed a spot.

With that, Darling grabbed his sleeping bag, and out the tent door he went to sleep outside just as he had promised.  I turned over and slept like a baby.

When I woke up on that next morning, on that fresh mountain dew day, it was planned that we would have breakfast on the beach front, about a ten minute walk away.  We had a long day, the day before and I was actually one of the last ones from our group to wake up.  As I walked towards the beach to join the others...I kept getting looks from the other kids.  The teachers had smirks on their faces, and I just couldn't understand where all this was coming from.  I was starting to get a little worried.  Perhaps my confrontation with Darling last night had caused for there to be a problem and I was going to get in some kind of trouble?  Nope.

It wasn't until the teacher, who had picked me up the first day from the bus stop, said to me,
"Heard you had disagreement with your tent mate last night?"
"Yes, I did.  He didn't want me to use the repellent, but I told him that I was going to.  I can't take anymore bites."
"Well, have you seen him, yet?"
"No I haven't."
"There he is out there in the water."

Out in the water I saw Darling's tubby figure bouncing and soaking down in the salt water of the waves.  When he came out of the water...he looked like...one...big...huge...bug bite.  The insects had feasted on his silly ass and he was using the salt water to sooth his dozens and dozens of bites.

"Am I going to get in trouble for his condition?"
"Nope.  Enjoy your breakfast and please don't let him see you laughing."

I went back to our campground and laughed for about 15 minutes along with some of the other teachers.

There were a lot more ins and outs to my five weeks in the White Mountains.  However, the bottom line were that I had passed all tests with flying colors.  I was absolutely beloved by all of the staff at the school.  They said that they could not believe that I was a big city boy, that I had given them zero problems and that OF ALL the kids in the group - I was the only unnamious vote by the staff, to attend the school in September.  However, an older friend from NYC, who had been in the same scholarship program as me, stopped by for a visit the last two weeks.  He had attended a prep school in Maine.  When he walked in and saw how rural/rustic my situation was, he swore that he would get me out of this school and into a better situation.

And he did.

I ended up getting an interview with another prep school that was over an hour south of this school.  This second prep school is set on a more modern campus, and was a more conducive situation to the lifestyle that I came from.  It is a place where I eventually made lifelong friends, had numerous surrogate parents, aunts and uncles, as well as extended sisters and brothers in my life.  A place that has always been and will always be my second hometown.

Humor time....

It's been a week...it's time now for "Ask Tabitha"

Yes ladies and gentlemen, it's time for a little weekly pick me up.  I have returned to my town psychic, the one and the only, Tabitha.  She has been so helpful in predicting and foreseeing the sudden increase in mosquito activity in our neighborhood in the month of September.  As I entered her low lighted place of business, I had to thank her for all of the wonderful emails she has sent me in regard to my lucky lotto numbers.  Nope, I still haven't won the big prize, but between my lucky numbers and my scratch offs...I managed to earn back $5 of the $20 dollars I spent on lottery tickets and scratch offs.  I feel like I'm getting...close!

So Mrs. Tabitha as sit before you at your table of predictions...I have three questions for you this week.  Questions that I know that you...and only you have the all foreseeing power to answer.  What does bad breath, armpits and personality all have in common?

"What does your breath, armpits and personality...all have in common?"  She leaned back and tilted her head side to side.  "Those are all three things that can really stink.  But you can always brush your teeth or use a deodorant to cover up the first two.  The third one...not so much.  Takes a lot more work."


Thank you my highness.  Next up when am I most likely to hear the words "Ho, ho, ho!"

She smiled and gave me a wink.  "When are you mostly likely to hear the words, ho, ho, ho?  That would be at divorce court, after the ex-husband is awarded custody.  Next."

Speaking of ex-wives oh great one.  I was wondering what is the difference between three ex-wives, a lawyer, and a junk yard dog?

She stared me in the eye and gave me a look as if I was crazy to even ask.  "Oh why that's an easy one.  There's no difference between the first two.  They all want your money.  But a junk yard dog...will always be loyal to you for just your companionship."

I couldn't stop Tabitha for sharing her infinite wisdom yet another week.  As soon as I left her establishment, i went down to the corner store and bought another scratch off game...

Hold onto your seats, Part 6 "The Page"

"The Page" ©

by John S  LES


16 hours.  That's how long our direct flight  from Dulles International airport in Washington, to Jomo Kenyatta International in Kenya took us.  During the first 8 hours, my father was part of several briefings by phone and several short meetings on the commercial plane that was chartered for us.  They wanted him in charge of identifying and coordinating the security of the members of the first and this second UN delegation.  The 50 man elite unit of Marines flying over with us, and the 1,000 more Marines that would meet us in Bustani were all responsible for the actual carrying out of our security and safety.

 Since it was my phone using a cross platform messaging application, I was officially listed as one of three staff member to Hollingsworth.  However, there was others flying with us.  There was a CIA analyst who was the point person responsible for US intelligence on Bustani.  She had my phone cloned  for both her and the US military intelligence officer also was with us.  Between the two of them and their sophisticated electronics, they could pinpoint and lock the signal to any additional messages to my phone from Jamila, should she be able to send one out.

Two additional Congressmen with past experience in eastern Africa joined us, as well as Hollingsworth himself.  There was also Jack Lyons, a lawyer and a special advisor to the President and two UN diplomats from Kenya and Tanzania, Bustani's border countries.

For the first 8 hours of the flight, my father and the UN officials had briefings with the UN and US military officials.  Our arrival there was not going to be part of an intervention in civil war.  We were going simply to evacuate Americans.  The African diplomats were concerned that this was going to be another Rwanda, where Western nations leave a leadership vacuum, by cutting their losses and removing all military and economic resources once a full scale civil war erupted.  The African ambassadors didn't want that to happen.  On the American side Washington wasn't interested in becoming embroiled in a war where the loss of American military lives could prove to be politically damaging.

As I overheard some of the discussions and issues, all I kept thinking about was wanting to be awake for Jamila's next message to my phone.  Every now and again I would also think about how I would I be able to explain to my classmates  and teachers what I did for the summer when school started again in the fall.  I didn't think any other classmate would have a story that could top this. 

Looking back now it all seems so surreal.  As soon as we landed in Kenya, we were then flown another 45 minutes into Bustani's, Karibu airport.  US marines from the 5th fleet had already landed and taken over the airport.  Everyone in our party had expected to be flying into chaos and flying bullets, but that wasn't the case.  Although the airport clearly was not it's sprawling self, it was not under any siege of civil warfare of any kind.  The only activity was the US Marines and the UN forces that were already in place. 

Communications with the UN forces had been reestablished nearly 7 hours before our arrival when a US Special Forces came in and took out all radio and satellite signal jamming defenses.  Once that happened it was just a matter of formulating how a convoy of American troops would come in, assist the UN forces and then evacuate all Americans and UN personnel.  But to the surprise of everyone, Masamba had simply played another trick on the world.  He harassed and terrorized the original delegation to get rid of them.  He wanted to show his following that he had the power to stir up the world. 

By the time our convoy had reached Mbegu, the capital city in Bustani, it was nothing of what I expected.  Mbegu City was just five miles west of the airport.  It was actually fairly large and modern.  There were brick buildings, mostly three to five stories high everywhere.  It looked like a cleaned up Lower Manhattan or downtown Brooklyn must have looked like 70 years ago, before the Skyscraper buildings came in.  Although there were many cars and pickup trucks moving about the city, it appeared that the people traveled mostly by bicycle or foot throughout the city.  The people walked about the streets dressed in mostly khaki or white colored trousers and bright colored shirt ranging from greens, to red to purple and yellow.

It was a beautiful and vibrant looking city.  Only the occasional passing of Tumbili military police in their Humvee driving through the city began to stand out.  From all of our briefings, Mbegu city was supposed to be overwhelmingly inhabited by Simba, who known to dress more uniformly in blues and white.  The more we drove around and through the city unchallenged, the more it became obvious that Mbegu City now belonged to the Tumbili people.  It was as if there had been a coup, but not a single sign of genocide.  Everyone in our group, including my father and Hollingsworth were baffled.  None of the military police even challenged our presence...a 1,000 strong convoy of US Marines rolling into their city.

Masamba had been masterful.  In the 48 hours it took us to get to Bustani, he had convinced all remaining factional Simba leaders to abandon Mbegu City and move into the forest and bungalow cities outside of all the major cities to avoid bloodshed.  He had used his now overwhelming army numbers, as well as his black magic to kill opposition leaders with merely the touch of the body, using members of the Simba tribe who had defected to his side.  He captured and secluded members of the first delegation, and cut off their communication with the rest of the world so that they could not see his mysterious powers.  It was the art of war.  He had won the battle without having to an all out civil war.

Contact was made with the first delegation.  They were just twenty five minutes outside of the city.  I stayed in the background trying to call Jamila's cell phone, but it would go directly to voice mail.  Her father spoke to my father.  He and a few others had been kept virtual prisoners in another city, but had been released by dawn and were walking their way back to village to the same village that his family and others from the party had been moved to.  When we arrived at the village, it was composed mostly of small brick houses surrounded by thick, but beautiful forestry.  The villagers inhabiting it were clearly taller, and leaner in their build on average, but not in all cases.  The overwhelming majority also had the distinctive green eyes.  Almost immediately we could feel that our presence was not desired there and the tension level was high.

Once we arrived at the house that Jamila's family was forced to stay at, my thoughts became like a music video.  I don't quite remember how I got out of the truck we were in, and left both my father and my boss in the dust behind me, but somehow I had pushed through a crowd of about ten Marines and fifteen villagers and delegates and picked Jamila up off the ground kissing her.  For a few minutes in that one moment, the world around us seemed to stop as we continued to kiss and embrace.

It wasn't until our father's made it over to us that we finally let go of each other.  Even as some Red Cross workers moved in and began inspecting the health of everyone in the delegation, Jamila and I could not stop looking at each other.  Our hearts beating in our chests, both of us feeling the same love for one another.  Our eyes said it all.

Several hours later, more details came out as to what had transpired over the 60 hours.  As my father was being debriefed by the delegates, Jamila and I laid together in a hammock like bed hanging in the backyard of the house.  She told me of how the delegation was staying at a hotel in Mbegu, when Masamba rolled in with his army and met with the remaining leaders of the crumbling hierarchy of the Simba tribe within Mbegu and the other five major cities in Bustani. 

He had built up such a fearsome reputation, and word had spread that he used black magic, or human bombs, an ancient warrior practice known as mwili mipuko, body explosion, a secret art of assassination which had been used hundred if not thousands of years ago.
"Only the Simba have the body chemistry to do this and he has convinced or coerced some Simba radicals to join him and carry out these assassinations.  No one has witnessed them, only the aftermath."

Then she told went on to tell me that her father and a group of about 25 others, including mission delegates, the leader of the UN forces, General Paul Bigqouette of Canada and 12 soldiers of American or Canadian origin - had all been taken into custody by Masamba's soldiers.  They were initially to be executed to incite the Canadian and American forces to leave, Bustani.  Once gone, Masamba would then expel the remaining African forces that were in the UN army and conduct his civil war with zero interference from the outside world.  However, a quick thinking UN army captain, from Senegal, a Captain Amari Kanyomozi, secured their release by arranging  what was supposed to be a friendly negotiation meeting with Masamba.  However, Kanyomozi broke his UN orders and turned the tables on Masamba by appearing at the meeting with several hidden explosives strapped to his own body, as well as two grenades with the pins pulled.

"Captain Kanyomozi was responsible for the safe release of my father, the general and the 23 others.  He also convinced Masamba that the UN forces would be forced to leave if there was no civilian casualties while the two tribes peacefully changed power within Mbegu City.  Once the UN was gone, the two sides could fight it out.  That ploy gave Kanyomozi and the UN troops time to help move women and children out of the war zone and into the country's outer borderline or become refugees into Kenya and Tanzania.  No matter what happens now, there will be a war."

I couldn't help but wonder out loud to her, "But what happened to your father's delegation and their efforts to restore moderates here?"

She bluntly replied, "The Simba do not want us here.  They called us all 'Americans'.  They consider us medling outsiders to both the Simba and the Tumbili.  They said Americans have no oil, no diamonds, no military base and therefore interests or reason to be here to decide the fate of Bustani.  My uncle is free to leave with my father."

And she was right.  With innocent civilians moving to the country's borderline, and both UN delegations free to leave, there was no longer a need for any outside military force to be in Bustani.  Both the UN troops and Red Cross were moved to encampments outside the major city borderlines to protect the innocent.  Neither the United States nor Canada had a political reason to stay there anymore.  The remaining UN forces would be made up of mostly participating African nations.  Unless there was apparent genocide, interceding in the civil warfare would not be in any country's interest.  The conflict could spread out into the bordering countries.

As I sat holding Jamila's hand on our long plane ride back home, I couldn't help but think that Heaven had began us, but for the beautiful people I saw in Bustani, Hell had began for them...And the seeds for a threat to the rest of the Super Power nations were being sowed...

COMING NEXT...THE CONCLUSION TO "THE PAGE".  ©
.

Know it alls...(humor)


Ever know a Know It All Person?

I used to work with a guy like that...let's call him Jerry.  Jerry is one of those guys, that no matter what anyone did in the office, he always had a similar experience or knowledge and somehow managed to be better than anyone else at doing it.  He was so bad at behaving like this...that several times I set him up in front of other coworkers.  I would tell three or four of them that I was going to make up an odd experience or place I visited, and within five minutes of talking about it - this Jerry character would join in the conversation and have been in something just as similar. 

Sure enough...it went something like this:

<me talking to the other guys just as Jerry walked in the room> "Yeah man, I tell you milking a cow was the funniest thing I ever did when I went down south way back when.  A big city boy like me, hanging with the country boys."

<uninvited into the conversation Jerry steps in> "Milking cows?  Oh that's easy.  I did that upstate for years when I was visiting my hick side of my family.  It's really easy to do, no problem."  Meanwhile, I've never milked a cow, I just mentioned it to demonstrate his sickness in front of coworkers.

A few minutes goes by...and I started up again.  "Yeah, I can't wait to plan another trip to Arkansas.  I kinda like their weather and rural locations.  I might buy some property there and retire."

Here comes Jerry.  "Yeah, Arkansas has some very nice areas.  Very scenic areas.  I was there once when I was driving through with family.  We were there about 3 days.  Had a great time.  They have a great retirement community over there."  No one ever recalled him mentioning a family road trip in the Midwest - ever.  Nor is Arkansas known for having a great retirement community.  So the eye rolls from the other coworkers began, as he had barged in yet another time. 

But I wasn't done.

"Next summer, I might go to Brazil.  I've never been there and would like to visit the place where one of my martial arts instructors grew up."

Here he comes, "I once dated a girl from Brazil.  Yeah, I visited her once.  It was crazy.  I must have been 23 at the time. Her family was nice and took me around.  But I couldn't wait to go home.  It's too hot down there."

Yep...Jerry knew it all.  I had made up everything in the conversation, but he was dead serious about his own participation in similar experiences.  Meanwhile he didn't experience those things either.  He just couldn't help himself by saying something to make himself fit into the conversation.  He has long since left my job.  He was an otherwise harmless guy...but he just had to be in every conversation and be an expert on everything. To him and the millions of people like him...I'm developing yet another humorous character on here to be heretofore known as...
Jerry Knows!

Humor

On a lighter side of things, I'm starting a new humor segment called:
"Ask Tabitha"


Tabitha comes from a family of gypsies who originated from Egypt, then migrated to Europe and now the United States.  Tabitha has kept the family tradition of soothsaying, fortune-telling and astral projection alive.  She has decided to loan her talents to this blog for free...provided that we click on some of the blog ads every now and then.  For today's inaugural session for truth and knowledge and insight to higher awareness here are the three questions I proposed to her...and her responses.

She is sitting before me dressed in a beautiful, hip hugging black dress and has a beautiful mint colored scarf draped around her head, revealing only her beautiful hazel eyes.

Me "Oh Tabitha the Great.  I have before you three questions to share with my friends around the world.  As difficult as they may be, I know with complete confidence, that you and only you will have all the answers.  Here's my first question:  ' What does Fee, four, five, fum' mean?"

Tabitha <raising an eyebrow and leaning back in her chair> "'Fee, four, five, fum?'"

Me "Yes, that's what I asked."

Tabitha, "Fee, four, five, fum.  That was the answer Mike Tyson gave when he was asked how many ears he chewed off in his career, plus a thumb.  Next question."


Me "My next question, your Highness, is 'What do a new born baby, a millionaire jet setter and fantasy football fans have in common?'"

Tabitha, "A new born baby?  A millionaire?  And fantasy football fans?"

Me, "Yes oh Great One."

Tabitha, "Nothing.  Babies are a new life.  Jet setters have a life, and fantasy football fans really need to get a life.  Next."

Me, "Ms. Tabitha...I have my absolute last question for the week.  Are you ready for it?"

Tabitha, "Well of course I am.  I've already travelled to next week and your next vacation spot, John.  Next week looks great, but your vacation spot at a cheap motel really sucks.  Need me to loan you a few bucks to at least upgrade to a Motel 8?  That way you won't have to share a bed with complete strangers."

Me <looking around and embarrassed>  "Okay, okay.  We can talk about the loan after I finish writing.  But in the meantime, are you ready for my very last question?

Tabitha, "Yes, I am.  Let's do it."

Me, "What does a scorpion, a rattle snake...and a scorned woman have in common?"

Tabitha, "'A scorpion, a rattle snake...and a scorned woman?'  Oh that's easy.  The first two deadly animals you can outrun and the last one you absolutely cannot."


And that is all from my new "Tabitha" segment.  Tune in next week for Tabitha's all knowing knowledge.  Feel free to send any questions you have for Tabitha.

Positive Time Spent Is Never A Waste...


Yesterday evening, I was on the phone with my cellular phone company for over two hours, trying to repair a broken application on my phone.  Anyone who has handled computers or been on the phone with a cellular phone company knows that everything takes time.  You have to go across and test all issues one by one.  After the time was spent, I had virtually a "new" phone again as it had to be reset to right out of the factory again. I had backed up and restored all of my other applications and photos, videos, contacts.  Everything was good. 

Three hours later, that same application was broken again. 

Now it is quick and easy to say that the two hours I spent was a waste of time. But I completely disagree with that notion.  By walking step by step with the technician "Gina" and testing, each and every possibility, I was able to learn more about my phone and how it is set up.  In addition, she and I made small talk, while we waited for certain things to load up into either my computer or my phone.  It was a beautiful moment of life exchange.  Positive energy exchange.  I learned about my phone and about the beauty of someone else's struggles in life.

I truly appreciated her time, earnest energy to assist me and repair my broken phone.  Although hours later, the application failed once again, nothing can replace me appreciating learning of her amazing multicultural and multi ethnic background, nor her learning of my razzle dazzle family life and this blog.  I told her I was going to talk about her on here.  I kept to my word, Gina.  May God continue to walk with you and your family.

And that brings me to this thought.  When I was a younger man, I was very rigid.  Very self disciplined about certain things in life.  As I've gotten older I see the different shades of grey in between the solid colors of black and white.  When I listen to music, I can appreciate the silent notes or beats in between the ones I can actually hear.  How many times do we come across a misspelled word and miss it time and time again, because our brain actually understands the mistake and compensates the error with a correction?

We need to apply that same understanding in our lives.  Not only towards one another, but within one another.  To error may be human, but to evolve is to understand the divine.

If you spent time growing up hating someone, or something or some other group of people...that is okay, as long as you have evolved past that today.  Hate is intoxicating, but it is also empty.  Love, although difficult at times, is far more fulfilling and spreads like poppy seeds in the wind.

If you have now grown into a person who understands that no race, sex, religion, ethnic group, or country has sole ownership of being morality, or more deserving of life, liberty and happiness - then you are on the right track.  Every child born on this earth is deserving of a decent life and upbringing.

Everyone, and everything around us is imperfect.  Evil is everywhere.  It lays dormant within all forms of government, laws and our own hearts.  Love, tolerance and understanding are the only things that inoculates all of us.  Deeds not words are the most universal language in the world.

There are imperfections within our religions, our countries, our families and within ourselves.  We truly need to let ourselves and each other off the impossible ability to be perfect.  We cannot resolve problems and issues in an hour, a day, a week or a millennium.  There are no guarantees or absolutes for anything.  All we can do is just try to love and respect one another and grow in that understanding every day.

Never under estimate the power of love over hate, or the power of kindness over anger, or a smile over a frown.

I wish all my readers - friends, family and strangers - to have a great week!


 

"The Page" by John S LES part 5

Part 5...."The Page"

by John S  LES
©

Usually when you're in school during the Spring semester time seems to stand still.  But it wasn't that way for me in Spring 2011.  I took the SAT's exam and knew I did well.  I actually finished the exam 10 minutes ahead of time.  Then there was my interview with Congressman Hollingsworth.  I nailed that one too.  He gave me the Page job shortly after the interview was over.  I also followed all rules, restrictions and curfews my father gave to me as punishment, no matter how ridiculous or tedious he became.  Clearly he was still fuming longer than two or three weeks from my skipping school and running down to Arlington, VA to see Jamila.  I also topped off my SAT performance with nothing but straight A's for all my classes for the rest of the semester.  It's amazing how highly motivated you can become when your behind is on the line, and you're doing everything you can to fight to keep someone you love in you life.

However, just as I was preparing to move to Washington, DC for the summer with relatives, Jamila and her family were preparing to leave for Africa.  It was frustrating.  It felt like I couldn't get to Washington faster than they were preparing to leave the US.  Since my father had me on lock down I couldn't even go see her for a weekend.  Zach, Will and Tanya kept my spirits up all the way until school ended.  They helped me research past civil wars in various African countries and got me mentally prepared for what Jamila and her family would be walking into.  I went down to Washington, DC within a week or so after school ended, but by then Jamila and her family were gone.  Her father and brother left in mid May with a group of disposed Bustanians.  Her and her mother left mid June.

That same Spring 2011, the uprisings in Tunisia, Yemen, Egypt and Libya, so dominated the political scene and worldwide media, that Bustani's small civil warfare skirmishes were hardly noticed.  The United Nations general meetings were centered on establishing NATO support wherever needed in the Arab nations, including "No fly zones" in Libya.  Northern Africa was a simmering mess.  My boss Congressman Hollingsworth, was on the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.  The Committee had been watching Bustani the past three years and had assisted the return of disposed Bustanians to their country to see if they could keep Bustani's civil warfare from triggering additional civil wars along the entire eastern seaboard of the continent.  To have both Northern and Eastern African engaged in simultaneous civil warfare would be utter chaos.  The committee was aware of Masamba, and his apparent rise to power.  They were also aware that his enemies were disappearing one, by one and suspected him of being behind it.  But proving that he was behind them, or simply the fortunate recipient of timely deaths of other emerging leaders within the country was uncertain.

Hollingsworth was the most hands on member of the committee.  He wanted to secretly visit Egypt and get his own feel for what was going on in Cairo.  His father was a wealthy real estate attorney, and he was a successful assistant district attorney in his 20's, before running for office.  Now as a three term Congressman, he had plenty of his own personal money to use for an undercover trip into Cairo with a small security detail. With the UN and NATO shifting military and political resources into Cairo and Tripoli, and Syria - Hollingsworth and the rest of the committee soon shifted their focus on making a trip into Bustani.  Just my luck.  Of course he had no need or desire to take his lowly Page along on a security risk trip like that.  As a Page, my daily duties consisted of running errands, maintaining journal binders, delivering messages, and making copies.  It was pretty exciting 17 years old and to be in chambers with some of the most powerful decision makers in the country...realistically the world.  I was ready to do anything to get out of DC and go into Bustani to see that Jamila and her family were still safe.  But I couldn't catch a break.

The media was besieging the President from both sides and so were his political opposition.  Early on he was questioned about not reacting with American military action to "save lives", and after NATO got involved, he was then questioned about getting American military "too involved" and the specter of losing American lives in yet another war.  With Bustani's possible fall triggering a domino effect, the President and the Congress wanted the Foreign Relations Committee to get more information on what needed to happen to turn this rogue nation more peaceful, Western friendly settling down.  At least until the Arab uprisings in the north settled down.  That impetus by the President and members of Congress began the formation of an American delegation to meet with Masamba and any other tribal leaders of the two major groups the Simbu Mtu and Tumbili Mtu, and smaller subgroups.

For the past four weeks...Jamila's late night conversations with me over the Internet via video or text messages had gone from three times a week to none.  All indications were that the conversations between her father's group, the native Bustanians, and Masamba's had broken down as he was positioned to wrest power from the remaining leaders.  A small detachment of  some 2,200 UN peacekeeping troops were stationed in Bustani.  They were mostly composed of 1000 US, Canadian, Dutch troops and another 1,200 Kenyan and Senegalese  troops.  They were had a "no fire unless fired upon" orders.  So they were basically lunch monitors who just made sure that the victims from the warfare in Bustani received their food from the Red Cross, who was also present.  But if warring factions shot after one another, or innocent civilians, in the streets in front of UN soldiers, not one of them could intercede.

As tense days started to pass, even the UN became apprehensive as there had been less and less contact with Jamila's father's delegation, and Masamba alliances seemed to grow by the hour. It  was finally decided that any secondary delegation was really going to be a rescue mission.  Security for such a trip needed to be as tight as possible with minimal resources.  My father was a former Marine who served in the Middle East, who then became a decorated 10 year New York City Police Department, Emergency Services police officer before he  was brought into the UN security staff and gradually worked his way to the chief position.  I figured him to be a perfect candidate to be involved in such an operation.  He had all the proper credentials.  Plus he was friends with a family that was part of the original delegation there.  I dropped my father's name to my boss and explained all of the circumstances...he laughed but couldn't agree more with my father as a candidate.

That night I gave my father the heads up on what the UN, the Committee, the President and Congress would be interested in.  He was angry at first.  Then humbled, but wouldn't commit to how he felt about going.  Even when my boss called him the next morning, with me sitting in his office, my father stayed on the fence.  He was sure to remind Hollingsworth that he believed that I was trying to find a way to get on that trip to Bustani and was using him.  I reminded both of them that I had some of the best computer hacking skills, and a working knowledge of some Swahili.  That if I got into any of Bustanian computers I could probably decode any hidden messages.

Hollingsworth expressed no interest in doing that.  I was shattered.  But my utter disappointment wouldn't last for long.  No one had heard from the UN troops commanders.  There were reports by officers there that the Canadian General who commanded the UN assignment had been arrested by Masamba militiamen, along with all members of the first delegation.

15 minutes later I was the only civilian on the planet earth to hear from the delegation.  I got a terrifying text message from Jamila, which read: "Laptop taken.  Mother hid my phone during strip search. Electricity cut off.  Father and brother and General detained.  11 Canadian officers arrested, beaten killed.  Send help!  He wants to kill us all.  I love y - "

48 hours later, Hollingsworth, several UN officials, my dad and myself were all on a plane flying to the Indian ocean.  We were to meet up with the US Fifth Fleet and head into Eastern Africa with 1,000 US Marines to escort American civilians out of Bustani...

TO BE CONTINUED

Divisive and derisive behavior....


I wonder what we are teaching our kids and the younger generations behind us when we engage in divisive and derisive behavior every hour of our day?  Certainly it is healthy to vent our daily frustrations and challenges in life with others...but sometimes you do notice that with certain people in our lives or around us...this venting becomes out of control.  It slips and falls from simple venting energy, to alleged authoritarian knowledge on a particular topic.  There are so many shades of grey between the solid colors of black and white.  Who really has the authority to say something and be 100% right?

We get divided within our family.  We get divided within our neighborhood, our city, our state and our country.  We even divide ourselves between our sports teams.  But we are ALL still football, baseball, basketball or soccer fans??  The revenues prove it!  We are all still here in this family, this city, this state, country and planet - together.

Even when it comes to our politics and religion, we are divided.  Yet as long as you go out and exercise your individual right to vote, rather than repeat bad mouth language (much of which is based on distorted facts or complete fiction from whatever resources) about who you're voting for.  And furthermore, perhaps I'm wrong, but I don't think Christians are favored more, than Muslims, Jews or Buddhists by God?  I just don't.  But I do think that when our final days come, WE WILL JUDGED by our Creater not on just how we worshipped, and by whatever name we called Him/Her - but also on how we lived and treated our fellow human beings here on this earth during the time that we were given.

All of this other stuff is either entertainment, profit making or xenophobia.

My friends...please remember to try to spread kindness, understanding and tolerance twice more a day than we do divisive and derisive behavior.

Thank you.  Now back to my writing...

I'm up late tonight hashing out some details to to short fictional stories to present over the next few weeks.  I will present them as I draw towards the conclusion of "The Page".  One story will deal with a divorced mother dealing with her psychological demons, drug and sexual addictions, as well as her faith in her religion, Catholicism.  Her faith and her self-preservation will get tested to the brink of collapse in a story entitled "Crucifix".  Next there will be a story of a racist, Southern man who's poisonous words and beliefs, and eventual actions which lead him to get taught a life lesson by the God.  That story is entitled "The Lesson".

Keep checking into my blog, or join my Twitter account for updates.

www.twitter.com/NYEntertain

For now stay tuned for the exciting final installments to "The Page".  I guarantee that story will end....with a bang.

My New Year's Eve Dinner...1984

My New Year's Eve dinner...1984...true story

It's 2012 and amongst other things I noticed about this younger generation is that they cannot cook.  If the food package that they buy doesn't say microwavable, heat and serve or just add water...they are absolutely lost in the kitchen.  Now I'm not saying that everyone in my generation was great cooks.  In fact, I know we had some bad ones.  But they were fewer and farther in between than the young people today.

Mostly the women cooked in my family and my entire neighborhood on the Lower East Side of New York City.  I mean my mother was such a prodigious cook, that her and her girlfriends from the neighborhood would literally cook food for our whole apartment building (14 stories high, 9 apartments per floor).  We would have cooking days where the kitchen would be on lock down for an entire day or even a whole weekend.  Thanksgiving in my neighborhood was truly a feast, as you could die from over eating when you went from house to house.

I'm not too sure if this current generation of young women (or men) could handle cooking good food on a large scale like that.  Throwing them in a kitchen and telling them to cook fresh meats and poultry for at least 50  or more people, might be akin to watching Lindsey Lohan taking a drug test 20 minutes before her next court appearance.  It just is not happening.

I dare you to hand a  young woman in her late teens or early 20's three unfrozen, whole chickens and tell them to do their best.  I bet their first reaction would be to reach for the microwave door handle or fill a small pot with some water.  It's a shame.  They wouldn't even know when or where to start to add some seasonings.

That being said...and since I've picked on this younger generation enough...it's time for me to recall the kitchen cooking antics of a girl I once dated in college, way back from the Fall of 1984 to the Fall of 1985, which was basically my freshman and sophomore years.  To protect the lives of the innocent, which are the other people involved in this story (all of whom are still friends with me today - with exception to the ex-girlfriend) - I will be using fake names.

Freshman year, one of my endearing female friends I shall call Pat, introduced me to one of her girlfriends from her hometown in Queens, NY, as a means of bringing together two good people.  I shall call this ex girlfriend, Kelly.  Yes, Kelly and I hit it off right from the start.  She was cute, she had a great laugh, she thought everything I said was funny and super intelligent...including pronouncing my own name (that should have been a hint).  Not for nothing, but Kelly (fellas are you with me on this) had an hourglass figure.  She was a natural athlete, who looked like she worked out everyday, but hadn't even picked up as much as a paperweight.  That always mystified me.  And she knew how to dress stylish and sexy when we went out!  I used to think that her sometimes vapid moments in thought processing was...a put on...but I eventually learned...that it wasn't an act.

Now I had a roommate back then.  His name was...let's say...Tony.  Tony was a great guy, friend, roommate, brother...way back then...and still to this day.  Tony has a tremendous sense of humor and he and I always had great chemistry.  Well, after Kelly and I started dating, she picked up on this and began secretly planning things to do for me with him, which she presumed was without my knowledge.  Nope.  He told me everything.  Then she charmed her way into my family, and would have long conversations with my mother about me to find out more about me.  Nope.  My mother told me everything (she also encouraged me to hang in there with Kelly).

As the Fall semester drew to a close in mid December, Kelly invited me, our mutual friend Pat and her date, Rob to a home cooked dinner on New Years Eve.  She was going to surprise us with her  world class culinary skills.  Now at this point, on some weekends during the semester, Kelly was barley cooking passable breakfast meals for me at school.  But, she talked very confidently about her baking skills.  She was 18, had a solid upbringing, nice family, mother, father and older sister.  Between that and our mutual friend Pat, I just figured breakfast just wasn't her thing.  My first cooked meal was breakfast for my family at age 11.  I can still rock a kitchen for morning breakfast (or dinner) to this day.

Anyway a few weeks goes by and low and behold, it is New Year's Eve and Pat, her date, Rob and myself are all gathered Kelly's house for this late night dinner, and small glass of wine to celebrate the New Year...1985!  Everyone was nicely dressed.  We were all college students behaving like responsible young adults.  Okay...well...maybe not 100% squeaky clean, with her parents and older sister gone for the evening.  But we did our best.  What I remember most about that evening is that we were ALL HUNGRY as Kelly made us all swear that we wouldn't eat a morsel after 3pm that day, so that we would be near starvation for her baked chicken dinner later that night.

Sure enough, time had passed and as we neared 9:30pm, we kept asking when dinner would be served.  So Kelly went back in the kitchen to check on this dinner that would be fit for kings and came back out, saying "Something is wrong.  It's been cooking for over 2 hours and I think something isn't right."  Well, that's when Pat and I pulled the oven door open and looked at our chicken.  The 2 hour chicken was as white as a ghost.  The freaking thing was albino!  Clearly Kelly didn't really season it well...and she had been cooking it on too low a temperature (250 degrees F).  At that rate, Rob and I were looking through the Yellow Pages to order some Chinese take out food.  But in support of her girlfriend, Pat talked us out of it.  So the two girls did some food doctoring - and that poor old chicken was sent back in the oven to cook some more.

About 90 minutes later, the ghost chicken had now cooked to a traditional, healthy golden brown.  The plates were set, the vegetables served, the countdown to 1985 grew near and four hungry young people sat down at the dinner table to finally eat!  I was given the carving knife and serving fork to do the honors of cutting the first pieces of chicken for everyone at the table.  Well, after several moments of everyone staring at me (and each other) like the gunfighters do in the old Clint Eastwood "Spaghetti Westerns"...I bravely picked up the knife and fork and drew first blood.  No, I mean...literally first blood.  The first two pieces I cut were bleeding so bad I immediately yelled "Medic!  Medic!" and applyed hand pressure where I just wounded the still alive chicken. There were several distinguishable screams from poor Pat and Rob, as blood spatters hit them like in the "chestbuster" scenes in the Alien movie.

Needless to say we went vegetarian that New Year's Eve.  We knocked off the wine and even chased it down with some of Kellys father's beers in order to drown out our sorrows from the bloody horror we witnessed at the dinner table.

By the time we got back to school a month later, my roommate and floor mates knew the whole story.  My birthday was coming up in a few weeks in March.  And undeterred by her New Year's Eve fiasco, Kelly decided to bake me a cake and had the unimaginable audacity to tell my roommate and floor mates that she was going to bake me a cake.  A cake?  A cake?  She couldn't bake a chicken, and now she wants to bake me a cake to share with my friends at school?

A few weeks goes by...and low and behold "surprise" here comes my cake!  Delivered to my room with all my floor mates present.  The cake was flat, not fluffy.  It resembled unleavened bread with chocolate icing on it, more than it did a cake.  Tony cut up a couple of slices and we all pretended to get ready to eat it.  But we waited for her to leave the room.  Once the coast was clear, we wrapped the rest of the cake up in aluminum foil and played floor hockey with it using our feet.  And would you believe it, the damn cake held up longer than the aluminum??  So we threw the remainder back in our room refrigerator to help keep it balanced (the fridge was missing 1 of 4 footings).  It remained there until move out at the end of the spring semester....

My message to all parents...teach your kids how to cook!

It's good to keep old cards from your loved ones around...


While doing a major rearrangement in my bedroom, I came upon some old Christmas cards, birthday cards and thank you cards from friends and family.

In an age of emails and electronic this or that it is nice to see that most of us still keep the tradition of giving someone a card alive.  When time passes and everyone gets busy with life, we sometimes forget how great a simple note of love, gratitude or well wishes actually makes a person feel.

Let us keep this tradition alive and well.  Even if all you can use is a text message, email or some other electronic format - sometimes a simple note can go a long way inside a person's heart.  Even the darkest moments in our lives or our hearts can be uplifted with a kind word or reflection of love and meaning that we have in someone else's life.  All of you - my viewers - mean a lot to me.

So here's my note to my friends in Russia, Australia, UK, France, Germany, Singapore, Ireland and of course the USA:  Thank you for taking some of your time to read my material.  I hope I have entertained you and can keep doing so.  Your steady viewership means a lot to me.  I hope my work can mean half as much to you as your responses to a new post mean to me.  Like I said before, I wanted this to be one joyous ride into positive energy.  One positive moment of focus in the busy day of our lives.  Let's keep it going and please do leave some comments to share with other viewers!

Be sure to scroll down to my previous post and catch up with part 4 of "The Page".  Ironically people seem to be still viewing part 3.  From here forward I plan to have a new fictional story or story continuation posted every Saturday morning, so that you can read it on your computer, tablet or phone alongside your breakfast.  During the week I will feature more real life comments.  I also have links now that allow you to subscribe to email and Twitter updates for this blog.  You can now respond back either here, via email link or on Twitter.  Pretty amazing, huh?

Anyway, have a great rest of your weekend!

Love and best wishes...
John S!