Day: August 5, 2006

1. “Drink ‘n Heil” – Mel Gibson had a little too much truth serum and spewed racist commentary about Jews to a Jewish cop in Malibu. Oops. I find it sickening how FOX is jumping to his defense as if the Road Warrior’s vile diatribe was some conspiracy of the left. If Ted Kennedy had slurred those things after a bender on the Vineyard they would be all over him…
2. When Tour de France, um “winner” Floyd Landis peed in a cup after making up 8 minutes climbing the Alps during the 17th stage, synthetic testosterone showed up. So, unless he produces the fake testicle that produced the fake hormone, he’s going to be stripped of his title.
3. Israel and Hezbollah continue to amplify the brutality on each other. President Bush is “happy with the progress being made.” See item 5 below.
4. In a huge disgrace to this country, the US Senate defeated legislation that would have raised the hourly minimum wage to $7.25 from $5.15 over three years.
5. Ho hum… Fanned by spiking crude-oil prices, ExxonMobil reported a QUARTERLY PROFIT of $10.36B. That’s 10,360,000,000.00, much of it paid for by the poor who can’t get a raise to their minimum wage.
6. It looks like Apple got caught with its hands in the stock options cookie jar and will have to restate earnings going back “years.”

Fortunately the news isn’t all bad…

This blog is not the only place my personal history is being recorded. I’ve been using Quicken since New Years Day 2000 and there are lots of stories in that database… Gasoline for $24.05 on the 3rd of January was my first recorded expense. Since that day, I’ve visited 480 more times and contributed $12,160.72 in revenue to Big Oil. I guess that pales in comparison to other categories, including almost $20,000 on vacations, $30,110 dining and $169,583 in Child Support. Oh, and let’s not forget the associated $6,172 to my friends in the Legal profession. OK, that’s pissing me off. Let’s move on to more fun categories.

Included in the $2344.75 paid to Ticketmaster.com are the following entries which really speak for themselves:

12/17/2001 Meg/Kyle Beauty & the Beast – Broadway
12/31/2001 Bruins-Leafs w/ Jeff
04/23/2002 Lenny Kravitz-Pink @ Tweeter
05/10/2002 John Hiatt @ Cape Cod Melody Tent
04/15/2003 John Hiatt @ Cape Cod Melody Tent
05/11/2003 @NY Yankees v. Angels 5/15/03
05/23/2003 Mom birthday – Cher
09/11/2003 Bruce @ Shea! Megan
09/24/2003 Stomp! Megan
03/28/2004 Prince w/Jeff
02/20/2005 Green Day
02/21/2005 Lion King NY 2/26 Megan/Kyle/Malrou
03/19/2005 Celts-Dallas 3 tix gift Corey/Ryan/Mike

Then there’s the cake spent on dining with various women over the six years. Here are transactions from just 3 restaurants. I want to protect both the innocent and the not, so I’ve swapped real names for clever code names.

11/04/2000 Cafe Amore Dulcinea
03/31/2001 Papa Razzi M1
06/22/2001 Cafe Amore Goldilocks
01/30/2003 Papa Razzi M2
04/10/2003 Crossroads Blondie
08/27/2003 Papa Razzi Blondie
01/23/2004 Crossroads Blondie
04/08/2004 Crossroads Blondie
04/24/2004 Crossroads M2
08/06/2004 Cafe Amore M3
08/21/2004 Cafe Amore M4
09/23/2004 Crossroads Blondie
10/21/2004 Crossroads Goldilocks
12/10/2004 Crossroads Goldilocks
05/01/2005 Papa Razzi Golf Chick

The “M’s” were those I met through online dating services and the others not. It was a bit of a joke, and likely only funny to me, but I kidded Goldilocks that I could identify every penny I ever spent while with her and that the corresponding ROI calculation was really quite simple. By the way, it was $913.89. Not that I was counting, of course.

Finally, there are those little entries that just bring back a tsunami like wave of memory I hope never leaves me…

We were in NYC celebrating Megan’s 16th birthday and had just walked back to the Grand Hyatt after seeing “The Lion King” on Broadway. As we arrived, Kyle announced he was hungry and asked if he could get some pizza. “Dude, we’re in New York City. We can get anything we want.” All tuckered out from a day of shopping, dining and theatre going, Megan and her pal Mallory headed up to bed, while my boy and I ventured onto the darkened streets of the cement jungle in search of a slice of life and another Quicken entry.