I'm still a little groggy from lack of sleep but last night was a whirlwind.

I went to Orlando to the graduation presentation for the latest class from the DAVE School. This is the school for which I had done voice work in "Runners" more than a year ago. I was looking forward to this because, for some reason, my pal, George Takei was coming in to town. I made the arrangements to get in the door and I was able to bring along my friends Jim and Lisa, who just happened to be visiting from New York and wanted to get some face time with George for a charity event she was promoting. This would also give me the opportunity to meet Ron Thornton; he had been the special effects honcho on "Babylon 5" and "Roughnecks" and had the possibility of some more work for me with the DAVE School. So, on the surface it seemed like a fun evening with friends. I had no idea why George was going to be at this graduation.

....until I got to the DAVE School.

I got to town early and had time to kill so I stopped in at the school. As I was walking around I noticed all kinds of Trek material along one wall. Blueprints, renderings, and a poster.....for the new episode of "STAR TREK: New Voyages - World Enough and Time" starring George Takei!!!!!!! This was going to be great!

I got to Universal and met up with Jim. As we waited for the ceremony to begin, my other friend Lisa was delayed by the public transit system. George came in and was quickly swarmed by people. I made my way through and surprised him with my being there. We hugged and I pulled back to show him my weight loss.

"What have you done", he asked. I told him about my surgery and he gave me a sideways grin, "I would have know you anyway!" With that he was pulled away for the ceremony.

While my friend, Jim, is more into these fan produced films than I am; I will say that this was a fantastic show. It WAS a Star Trek episode. The effects that the students did was on par with anything produced in Hollywood. I got to speak with James Cawley, the man behind these films and told him, "I hope Rick Berman sees this and chokes!" With a minuscule budget he did was Berman was never able to do...produce a real episode of Star Trek.

After the graduation there was a big party at a local restaurant. Lisa had finally made it there and we had fun catching up as it had been years since i had seen her face to face. At the party I finally pulled Mr. Thornton aside to talk business. "So, Ron," I said simply, "I'm really glad to meet you."

He looked me square in the eyes and said, "OK, you can do it."

I think I heard my ears pop.

"I can hear it in your voice. You can easily do this part." I was ecstatic! I tried keeping my cool on the outside; talking story and character basics, while on the inside I was doing back flips.

When I could see the conversation was drawing to a close I could not pass up the opportunity, "Before you go, Ron, I just have to be a gook for a moment." I took his hand, shook it and said, "Thank you for Babylon 5! It was fantastic. I'm a big fan and am so glad to be able to work with you!"

He talked for a few minuets on how he wished he had the technology he had worked on to do "New Voyages" back when he did "B5". We ended with plans to touch base soon on when and where the recording will happen.

To say I am excited about this would be an understatement. This will be working with an actual Hollywood producer. I will take advantage of this and take some time to pick his brain about the business. Of course, he is not always going to be working at the DAVE school and I want to make sure he has my name in the back of his mind if he finds himself casting a project in Hollywood.

Oh! The part?! I will be playing an African American marine sergeant! I guess my deep voice did it!

Sometimes I do feel that signs are placed in front of me at just the right moment. There was the time in December of 1980 when I was grabbing music for the college radio station Christmas party and I put "Double Fantasy" back in the rack because it didn't seem right for party music. That right around 10PM on December the 8th when that happened. Then there was the moment I got off the phone with a girl I was dying to tell how I felt about her; I turned on the radio and Elvis started singing, as if on cue, "It's Now or Never".

It happened again today.

As I sat at work; loating my job and dreading the next phone call, when I looked down and had a message glaring at me. On the desk in front of me was a pen I had at home for more than 18 months. I was in a rush this morning and needed a pen with me for a stop at the bank and blindly grabbed at the first one I could find not even looking. This pen had been a freebie handout at work during an office safety promotion. Printed in garish green ink was an insipid safety slogan which I had ignored along with the free pen. Now was my 9th hour on the job bore down on me I looked at this slogan and it took on newer and deeper meaning.

"KNOW YOUR EXIT"

It was if the Dali Lama had just walked up behind me and slapped me upside the head with a simple, universal truth. I have a number of irons in the fire right now to rescue me from my current little corner of Dante's playground and I have some details to work out before I reveal more. Some of these I have already discussed in this blog and one more which remains under wraps but to only a few close friends. Any of these involves a major change in my life and a risk; some more than others.

But as I looked at these three simple words, the risk meant nothing. What I did know is that there is an exit to where I am now, I know where that exit is, I know how to get to the exit, I know how to open the door and, most importantly, I know this is the time to use that exit.

Or, to paraphrase Freud; is a banana sometimes just a banana? We'll see. But I know I'm keeping this pen for good luck.

My pal, Howard, made mention of the book "1,000 Places to See Before You Die" in his blog and it inspired me. (OK, it was a cheap way of coming up with a topic!)

Here is my short list.

1. California - specifically LA and San Francisco

2. Las Vegas

3. Venice - I was there for one day 25 years ago and it wasn't enough.

4. Graceland

5. The Pyramids of Giza

6. Chicago

7. Moscow

8. Mount Rushmore

9. Liverpool - It's the Beatles fan in me!

10. Auschwitz - Because I think it's important to learn from our mistakes

When a good friend of mine recently left my company she said that the job had changed the person she was and that she didn't like who she had become. I finally understand what she meant.

I have lost patience with my customers. I feel dirty when I push these people into orders which are done the company way but I do it anyway because I need the next sale. This is not what the company mentality was when I first joined the company and it certainly is not the person I was when I answered my first phone call. We used to have a VP who said that, "Yes, we are here to make a buck; but we are also here to help these people." Now, it is all about nothing more than the next dollar. I've fallen into it and I don't like myself for it.

While I am trying to get into a non-sales position within the company I am also looking outside. This includes one really cool self-employment possibility which is still in the planning stages; more on that in the future....I hope.

I wake up ready and raring to go each morning. However, the moment I pull into the parking lot all energy leaves my body and all I want to do is to turn around and climb back into bed. I sit there for a moment calculating how much sick time I have available. I look around and figure that if I turned the car around now that I could leave and no one would have seen me. Just two years ago I would stay almost every night until 7PM without a second thought.

Will a department change make me feel better? Will a different job turn things around? Will turning a dream job into a reality actually work or am I just putting together another pipe dream?

Almost anything has got to be an improvement.

OK, I have finally gotten the hint. I am determined to reattack my weight re-gain.

First my friend Dave went in for the same surgery I had three years ago. Talking with him about it reminded me of all I went through. Then I started having problems with my feet. Granted, its a common problem but the weight definitely is a factor and if I hadn't gained back some weight, it probably wouldn't have happened. Then I saw some recent photos of myself and I started having flashbacks.

Two years ago, when I was at my lowest post surgery weight loss, I took pride on the fact that I kept on adding holes to my belt as it shrunk. I am now back from that point by 8 inches. I have gained back 80 pounds. Granted, I am still hundreds below where I was but my own words, "I can't understand how someone could go through all of this and backslide" are coming back to haunt me.

I am now determined. I have a goal of getting back to where I was within a year; less if I try hard. It became easier, as my stomach healed, to add back into my diet those foods which put my on that operating table in the first place; bread, pasta, pizza.... I have just thrown out the two boxes of pasta in my pantry and am sharing my last half loaf of bread with the seagulls. I am dusting off my old post-surgery workbook and will dive back into the same foods, diets and exercise that had me dropping pounds each week. My own surgeon had said that if this ever happens that the fastest way of getting back on track is to go back to basics. My stomach and body have proved that they can adapt to it and the results are already proven.

By my trip to the Starfleet International Conference in August I plan on wearing a new uniform, be close to halfway to my goal and have no one in Denver greet me as "Hey, Big Guy!"

Just how comfortable is the back seat of a convertible? After a 10 hour road trip....I'm not the one to ask if you're looking for a favorable answer!

This past weekend was the annual Region 2 Summit in Columbus, GA. My friends Jim, Cheryl and I piled in his car and drove up there. This was my first Summit as Regional Coordinator and I'm not sure if I'll ever catch up on the sleep I missed over the weekend!

The ride up was nice and, as always, spending it with friend makes it worth while. We all have the same twisted senses of humor, so each mile was joke after joke after joke. I got a kick out of noticing that we were driving along "Jefferson Davis Memorial Highway" somewhere in Georgia. Apparently, someone forgot to tell some people exactly how that little skirmish 140 years ago ended up.

The Summit is technically the Regional "working weekend", but once that small part of the weekend is over we have fun! There were Texas Hold 'Em games, a Dalmuti Tournament, panel discussions on fandom, online gaming and even Klingon self defense. It is the chance of the chapters in Florida, Georgia, Alabama and Mississippi to get together and it is a great reunion each time. Sunday night is our awards banquet where we get to recognize members and chapters who stand out. We also raised $500 for a local animal rescue league.

This was my first Summit as Regional coordinator and the six words I heard most all weekend were, "Jack, do you have a few minuets?" I was pulled aside to discuss chapter issues, personal conflict problems, teaching people hos to use the Starfleet database, getting one piece of paperwork or another pushed through and political twists of one kind or another. There were three former RC's there this weekend who would only look at me and laugh all weekend long knowing that every moment of the weekend was theirs for a change.

The hotel staff was out of this world! I have been in scores of hotels all around the world and this was the first time I have ever felt so welcomed by a staff; and I mean ALL the staff. There was not one member of the housekeeping staff that didn't greet me with a warm and friendly "hello" of one kind or another. When most time you either get a grunted hello or they don't even look you in the eye, it was refreshing to be treated as if each member of the staff was genuinely happy to have me there as a guest in the hotel. The banquet staff took care of a problem quickly and quietly. The desk staff remembered names and then there was Anna.

Anna was this little ole German lady who is a server in the restaurant. She has worked at the hotel longer than anyone and looks to be somewhere between 70 and 240 years old. At 4 foot nothing she scurries around the dining room filling glasses and bringing clean silverwear with a smile and her soft, gentle grandmotherly voice, "Sure, honey. I'll get that for you right away" in her clipped accent. She looked down at my bear feet slippers and said that "they look sexy!" How can you not love a woman like that!

After a Dead Dog Party at a nearby Chinese Buffet we headed out around 2PM which didn't get me home until almost midnight. Of course, I HAD TO watch the current Battlestar Galactica episode and got myself up for work the next morning. That lasted until about 11:30 when the fatigue turned my voice into a deep growl and my eyes threatened to permanently stay shut. I went home and slept for another 6 hours.

I can hardly wait for next year!

I finally gave up on "24" this week. This season's storyline just kept going from dumb to dumber. It has been a gigantic fall from the fantastic job they did last season. And this season had so much going for it. Peter MacNichol, Chad Lowe, Alexander Siddig, Powers Boothe and James Cromwell joined the cast. It looked as if it was going to be another great season with THE MAN, Manny Coto, still on the job as one of the Executive Producers.

I can forgive alot with "24". I mean, heck, I'm a Bond fan, so suspension of disbelief is a given with these stories. But, c'mon!

An assassination attempt on the President in the bunker beneath the White House?! Jack breaking into his second foreign embassy in a row and then cutting off the finger of the ambassador?!!!!!!! White House staff members in fist fights in a steam closet?!

Dumb...dumb...dumb. There are plenty of other good shows on Monday night. "Heroes", "2 and 1/2 Men" and now, "The Black Donelley's".

Good bye, Jack Bauer; it was fun while it lasted.

I am going through some major parental withdrawal. As John gets older he has more to do; school, ROTC and now a job. I understand the importance of these and how it is building his independence and maturity. If I were a "full time parent" I could probably deal with this a little better. However, it has now been almost a month since John and I had even a day together.

We were supposed to spend the day together, a compromise to his work schedule, when yet another obligation came along. I have been trying my best to give him his space but am always chomping back the words that I should be on his list of obligations as well. I grew up in a family where I lived at home until I was 26, I don't know how this separated parent thing is supposed to work at this point. I want him to be his own person but I also want him to spend as much time with me as possible. Being separated is bad enough but the 90 mile distance makes it tougher.

The ironic side to this is, back when we were a family, when Jim went to his first day of school we went as a group to see him off on his first bus ride. My ex was holding Johnny in her arms as Jim climbed on to the bus; his little legs lifting up high and hard to make that first step. We stood there is the cool September wind for a moment and I turned to head back to the house but my ex just stood there...crying.

"In 18 years you'll be crying to get him out of the house!"

Now, as John approaches that age, the tables have turned and I am the one missing him before he's gone. I seems to be going through empty nest syndrome and I already have the empty nest.

Worst televised Oscars ever!

Ellen DeGeneris SUCKED. I don't think I laughed once at her. However, the entire time Jerry Seinfeld was on I couldn't stop laughing. What happened to John Stewart? He is quite possibly the best Oscars host since Carson.

I was so bored all through this entire show. And what was with these long walkouts where they followed some of the presenters from halfway backstange through these long drawn out enterances.

YAWN!

The shadow playing dance troupe.

YAWN!

The flashy graphics during the lists of nominees.

YAWN!

Michael Mann's montage of American history through film images.

YAWN!

Ellen Degeneris.

YAWN! YAWN! YAWN! YAWN! YAWN!

Hooray for Jennifer Hudson (Bite THAT Simon Cowell!) and Forrest Whitaker.

I'm glad Marty Scorsese got his Oscar, and it was perfect being presented to him by his friends, but the film itself was nowhere as good as "Little Miss Sunshine".

I skipped watching Galactica for THIS?!

I finally called George Takei's manager out in Hollywood about breaking into the business and possibly representing me. Brad was very kind, honest and did offer to forward my name to George's agent. He didn't sound all to hopeful, but it was, at least, the first door I knocked on "in the business".

As usual, with anything in my life, it did have that one moment which defines it as being part of my life. First, you have to remember that Brad is not only George's manager but he is also his partner.

So....as we're talking Brad mentions that George is coming to Florida to attend a graduation at The Dave School. This was the school for which I did my first paid voice acting "gig". I told Brad how George didn't know about my gastric bypass surgery and that the last time he had sen me he was berating me about my massive weight.

Well, that's not exactly how I said it. What I said to Brad was that "the last time I saw George he was all over my ass about my weight!"

Another stellar moment in Towaway history!

Used to be a time when someone's leaving my company was a sad thing. Our department head would call everyone together and announce that so-and-so had found something better for themselves and had decided to leave the company. There would be cake, gifts, hugs and tears.

Now it's a matter of looking around the office and wondering where so-and-so has been and not knowing if the person still worked for the company or not. For the most part a person either simply leaves or is escorted out by security with not so much as a goodbye handshake. In those rare instances when a person's departure is know ahead of time the only acknowledgment from management is that the paperwork has been processed.

My department manager just gave her 2 weeks notice. She and I have known each other almost since the day she started. Our working relationship and friendship has been through some ups and down over the years but has ended in such a good place that I was the first person she told; even before turning in her letter of resignation. I shared laughs, tears and a Thanksgiving day meal with her family. She is good people and the job was turning her away from who she really is. Luckily, she saw it in time and is moving on to something better for herself.

She will be missed; and not just by me. One of my coworkers came up to me and said, "What are we going to do after she's gone? She was, like, our buffer to the rest of them."

I will miss her. We have grown to be able to read each others thoughts. We can communicate with just a look. At times one or the other will stop the other from saying something a little outside the realm of appropriate. OK...so maybe she stops me more than I stop her....but you get the point.

There was a time when our friendship was on the rocks. It was entwined with a whole debacle of a mess at work. As part of a bunch of trumped up charges against me was the allegation that I said some very derogatory things about her in the open on the sales floor. As soon as those angry words were thrown at me all other parts of the charges against me fell to the wayside. I could take being raked over the coals about job performance and breaking the rules but for it to be said that I talked about my friend in such a demeaning way; and even worse, that she believed it, tore at me deeply. I could stand being a bad employee but to think that a friend thought I would betray her tore my heart out. I didn't give a damn about the rest of the charges. I looked at her straight in the eye and screamed at her in a tear choked voice, "Tell me you really believe I would say that about you!" She didn't say anything. And for almost two years we didn't talk.

Somehow, through my unstoppable belief in the basic goodness of people and lots of time we slowly started talking again. We open up to each other again. We laughed again. We were friends again. At one point, a few months ago, we did say out loud to each other that the hatchet was buried between us over that ugliness of the past. I had a thought in my mind of asking her how it went down for real behind the scenes. That was before she announced that she's leaving. The reality of it is setting in and I no longer care about the past.

My friend is leaving and all that other crap is meaningless. If you've read this blog with regularity, you know how I am with this kind of change. Yes, she is one of the ones I'm going to try to hang onto.

She's worth it.

I have been tasked by my good friend, Jim, to finally write again. At times there has been nothing happening and at other times there has been to much to have the time to post. Since it was Jim who pushed me to write then let me write about his son, Noah.

Noah just turned nine over the weekend. He was born with Spina Bifida and autism. He was not supposed to live out of infancy. His parents were told he wouldn't develop much. Those doctors were idiots. While Noah does live in the enclosed world of autism he is anything but under developed. While he has never talked like a "normal" child he communicates. He understands every word said to him and speaks to us that know him leaving no questions what he is saying. He has a personality and loves to laugh. Every time I see him there is something new that he does which amazes me and puts me on the verge of crying.

When we were at Kennedy Space Center two weeks ago we were together for breakfast when his mother asked him to point out people in the room.

"Where is Daddy?" Noah pointed directly at his father.

"Where is Cheryl?" He pointed at Cheryl and made a sound which came close to mimicking the name.

"Where is Jack?"

Noah slapped his hand on my arm and said loudly, "Jack!"

I flashed back to the first moment my own son looked up at me and said, "Daddy". Noah, even though looking away at the other side of the room as if he were completely disinterested in everyone at the table clearly identified me and knew me by name.

I have told his parents many times that as his speech skills improve we have to teach him to say "Bite Me!" Once he has that mastered we will take him back to the doctors who said he wouldn't live so he can say those two words to those most deserving of them.

This past weekend we were at a cookout. Just before leaving Noah had planted himself in front of my car and was studying my House of Blues license plate. I leaned down and pointed out to him Jake and Elwood. I did this only once but he repeated back each name and pointed at them correctly.

"Noah, which one is Elwood?" I asked him in reverse order to hos I had taught him. He picked correctly.

"Where is Jake?" Again; dead on.

I thought about teaching him those two magic words but thought better of it. There's time for that later.

As a final testament of how much a normal kid he really is; the little stinker beat me by 8 pins at bowling. Yes, I was beat in bowling by a 9 year old child with autism. At least he didn't come over after the game with a score sheet to rub it in. Getting beat by a 9 year old autistic child is bad enough; having him trash talk you afterwards would just not be right.

We have to save that for the doctors.

My little boy is no longer.

Saturday morning I got up bright and early to attend a practice competition between his Jr. ROTC drill team and others in the Broward area.



He is the last one on the right.

As I watched him marching around the field in his green uniform I squinted to try and see the child I had seen grow up. I looked for the little toddler I would headbutt. I tried to see the youngster who I would spend hours with inventing superheroes. I waited as he turned back to march towards me to see if he still looked like the pre-teen who went from listening to boy bands to hip hop to the Beatles.

Not a sign of him.

Instead I saw a man. A tall, handsome and confidant man. I watched him as he took initiate and command with those around him; making sure things were being done and done correctly. He joked with the other guys on the team like a man. (Yes, the others on the team were just "guys"...John was a MAN) He spoke like a man, He carried himself like a man.



Then there was that one moment of parental redemption I will hold onto tightly for as long as I can.

His platoon sergeant came by with last minuet suggestions before they entered the parade route; apparently they look for everything during these things. I was laying back and trying not to impose myself on what he was doing but as I looked him over I spotted something.

"John," I whisper/yelled "Straighten your gig line!" He quickly got his shirt, pants and belt in perfect line. When he was done he looked up at me for approval. In his eyes was tat same anticipation and search for approval I got when he was a little boy making sure his shoes were tied correctly solo for the first time. Instantly, he was that little boy again.....until he snapped to attention and the man walked out onto the parade field.

Well, this week has been fun at work. Yesterday, I got called into the office of the two Assistant VP's who run our division to get my ass chewed for my "protest" on Saturday. As I walked towards his office I ran through my mind all the possible lines and diversions I could give to this much anticipated disciplinary session.

"I was just trying to bring some humor to a tense situation; whatever do you mean 'protest'?"

"I knew some people weren't happy with being there, I was just turning it into a joke, what do you mean defying your authority?"

But, no; I grabbed my balls and owned up to it. Through the course of our almost 30 minuet session I laid out exactly how I, and many people on the floor, were not happy with having a mandatory meeting as part of a 3-day weekend, how working conditions have eroded over the past year and how those conditions have contributed to the general poor mood on the floor.

As our "conversation" continued I marveled at the shade of crimson in face across from me and kept time by the beating of the vein in his forehead. There was actual conversation through all of this and a sharing of viewpoints; still it was an ass chewing session and that is what happened. I left his office and was later brought into my immediate manager's office for the paperwork; it turned out as no more than a verbal warning about violating company dress code. My manager laughed as I leaned back in relief; I had expected a day off or something, so this was a relief.

Am I sorry I did what I did on Saturday? No. Do I think it made management stop and think about their "management style"? No. Do I think what I did made a difference? To "them.....No. But at least the rest of the grunts on the floor like me know that someone has the nerve to put some voice to their frustration. I'm feeling more and more like Kevin Spacey's character in "American Beauty"; "I'm just a little guy with nothing to lose."

OK, so I haven't started off 2007 so well with my blogging.

My first week of the year was spent with my son. John and I basically just hung out. Most days we didn't wake up before 10AM. GOD! That felt great! Although, it did keep us from going to Orlando as I had planned, but still it was good simply to relax. We went shopping one day and also out to the movies one day. The rest of the time was taken up with TV, DVD's, movies, the computer and video games.

I just loved going back to work this past week. Although I did notice that the week off did relax me, even at work. No longer was I frantically going from place to place around the office but taking my time and not rushing.

The one thing about work that did get to me this week was a MANDATORY meeting. As such, mandatory meetings usually don't bother me too much. It's just that the boobs who run our department set a mandatory meeting on a Saturday which was part of a 3-day weekend. They continue to show their total disregard for their employees as people. So I showed up in pajama pants, a t-shirt and my bear feet slippers. If they were going to call a meeting for 8:30 on a Saturday I decided to give them what I would normally be wearing at this time. I was surprised that I was allowed to stay but right afterwards I stopped to speak with my manager and she said I should leave quickly. I don't know how the upper management took my gesture but all the regular employee got it and that's why I did it.

The first post of a new year is usually a reflection on the past. This year I would like to look the other way. I always like to think of myself as optimistic and I think it's about time I approached New Year's the same way.

I have already started making some moves to improve things in the coming year. This weekend I will have my stand-up samples ready to go to Drew Hastings, the comic I met in November. I wan to get his review of my work and get myself on the stage at an amateur night within the first half of the year.

I dug up the phone number for my friend George's agent in Hollywood. I plan on pitching to him to take me on as a voice actor. I have the connections with a studio here in Orlando which would enable me to work on projects from California while staying in Florida.

I have changed what I am doing in Starfleet and am loving it. I am now the Regional Coordinator here in Region 2. For the non-geek, that means I oversee 32 chapters in Florida, Alabama, Georgia and Mississippi. There is a little less of the politics and infantile personality conflicts there are at the Fleet level and, more importantly, I am working with close friends. Being an RC also means that I may have a better hand in trying to affect Fleet policy that I would have in my previous position. There are some things wrong with Fleet and I will be working to make some positive change there while making things fun here at home for my friends.

Oh, and work! Well, there are option in movement on that front as well. I am waiting on word on the next step on my interview process for the training department. I really need to get off the phones and out from under the management of my department. Our company has a 62% turnover rate and spends an ungodly amount of money of this turnover. And it's all the good people who are leaving; another friend of mine, and a good employee, has given his 2-weeks notice to go work for the Post Office.

I am also working on a possible exit strategy. After giving 9 years to the company and being told my a member of senior management, "Thanks but what have you done for me lately" and the continued eroding of personal freedoms of the employees; I am starting to finally reach my limit. I would prefer to stay where I am and hope that things will improve. But after months of being told that there was a light at the end of the tunnel I can only feel the tunnel collapsing because it is dug beneath a manure farm.

Hopefully, whine I get to January 2008, I can say that I was able to accomplish some of my goals for the year and to see if I did make the improvements I have in mind. Let's see how much fun can be had along the way!

What a way to end the year. If 2006 could be summed up it one moment it was earlier this evening.

As has become tradition, I went with my friend Jason and his wife and four children to watch the fireworks down by the river. It's really nice and really unique for me to be sitting in my shirt sleeves on the last evening of the year with a warm breeze blowing over me as I watch the fireworks. Back home people are bundled in layers of sweaters and coats as they go to the warmth inside someone house to watch the festivities on TV.

I can deal with a Florida New Years.

We sit on the lawn of an assisted living facility. It sits atop a small bluff and gives a great view of the pavilion around which the festivities take place and a panoramic look at the Indian River. As we sat there two grey haired women walked by and were caught by the cuteness and activity of Jason's two smallest children. When I see old folks fascinated by toddlers I'm always reminded of Peter Boyle's character, Frank, on "Everybody Loves Raymond; always wanting to breath in the youth from little kids.

As they were getting ready to leave one of them leaned in to get a closer lok at me. She said, "You remind me of a guy who serves coffee up at the book store in the mall".

"He mush be a very attractive and good looking guy!" I answered.

"Well, he's attractive but I don't know about good looking!" And she walked away.

I don't think Jason has stopped laughing yet.

Happy New Year to me...here's to more of the same ole shit for another year!

Uncle Dale Dorman.....Speed Racer....Kimba.....Creature Double Feature

These are my memories of WLVI Channel 56. For those reading this old enough to remember, there was a time before cable TV. Where I grew up there were the three major networks, PBS and two UHF channels from Boston; WSBK and WLVI. For me, the king was WLVI.

I would rush home from school every day for back to back episodes of Speed Racer and Kimba the White Lion. This was hosted by Dale Dorman. "Uncle" Dale, as he was known, was a local radio DJ and host of the afternoon kids programming. After Paul Lynde, he was the first exposure I had to gays in entertainment. Come to think of it now, it is kinda creepy that he was known as "Uncle" Dale. But back then he was just flamboyant, outgoing and a helluva lot of fun to watch on TV. His personality and excitement burst from the tube.

Many a Sunday, my friend Mike and I would sit and watch Japanese monster movies on the Creature Double Feature. There was also a late night movie series that played the old Buster Crabbe "Flash Gordon" serials. For a young couch potato it was the place to be.

Now word comes out of Boston that the station is being downsized and turned into a low power outlet for informercials and some CW network programming. Jack Hybes, a staple of Boston TV news closed the final news broadcast publicly lambasting the management for allowing what he called "a tragic chapter in Boston television history" to happen.

Many of my recent posts have been a walk down memory lane and each one has ended with a dead end. Fire gutted dining halls, amusement parks taken over by field grass and now TV studios covered with dust. Then I look in the mirror and notice more grey than I did last month.

This growing old shit really sucks.

The Auto Curse is confirmed!

As Thursday rolled around and my car still wasn't fixed my good friend, Jason, offered to let me borrow his Ford Expedition until Christmas Eve. It worked out perfect, I was still able to get Johnny, would be able to get around to parties and shopping and Jason's family still had their other car to use to get around.

I didn't have the car 24 hours and something broke!

OK, it wasn't something critical, but still I sat there in amazement as I pressed on the button for the cruise control and the rubber button disintegrated under mu finger. Little bits of rubber and plastic fell away from the steering wheel, onto my thigh and the floor beneath.

I touch cars and they fall apart!

At my Starfleet chapter Christmas party we did the math and figured out that in the 13 years I had lived in Florida I had gone through 7 cars. That's a different car every 22 months. So, I'll be looking again come July 2008!

A moment to remember Joe Barbara.

As part of the nostalgia binge I have been on recently I have been overdosing on Hanna-Barbaba cartoons on the Boomerang channel. I sit there watching some of these shows for the first time in 35 years and its as if only moments had gone by since I saw them last. I laugh at the same joke and find new ones I never understood as a child. The cars and worries of bills, schedules and phone calls to return are washed away in a sea of celluloid and paint. The noses of traffic, answering machines and ghetto stereos is replaced with wacky sound effects, cheesy 60's music and the voices of Jean VanDerPyle, Alan Reed and Daws Butler.

Tom and Jerry, Ruff and Reddy, Snaggletooth, Magilla Gorilla, Touche Turtle, The Wacjy Racers, the Banana Splits, Hong Kong Phooey, Goober and the Ghost Chasers, Top Cat, Yogi Bear, the Flintstones, Johnny Quest, Space Ghost, Penelope Pitstop, Huckleberry Hound, Quick Draw McGraw, Pixie and Dixie, the Jetsons, Scooby Doo, Charlotte;s Web, the Smurfs, Atom Ant, Secret Squirrel, Jabberjaw, Captain Caveman, Josie and the Pussycats, the Hair Bear Bunch, Sealab 2020, Lippy the Lion, Harlen Globetrotters, the Herculoids, Samson and Goliath, Frankenstein Jr, Hillybilly Bears, Peter Potamus, Precious Pup, Wally Gator, Grape Ape, Partridge Family 2200, Speed Buggy, Dinky Dog and KISS Meets the Phantom of the Park.

Watch some of these when you can. Smile. And thank Joe.

Thanks, Joe.

"Hey, I remember you!"

Those were the words the tow truck operator greeted me with as he approached my disabled car Saturday afternoon.

"Jack?!" you say, "You're having car trouble?! I'm shocked!"

Just when I thought I had a car I could trust for a while my steering column breaks. OK, "breaks" is a slight understatement. First, a few weeks ago, it started getting loose. I was able to jiggle the wheel slightly. Then in the past week, it would gently roll around in a circle. I had been planning on getting it into the shop when it would start to short out the radio when I was sitting in the car a lunch and tap the wheel.

Saturday, I got in the car to head to the store during a break from work. As you leave my building you have to make a u-turn on the 6 lane major roadway, US 1. As I made the turn...the car stalled. I pulled over and tried to start the car. It would turn over but then quickly die. As the heavy traffic whizzed by me I decided to at least get the car out of traffic. As I rolled the car back into the nearest driveway I went to turn the wheel and the entire steering column began to rotate.

This was bad.

Oh, and did I mention that it was raining? Just to add insult to injury!

I got the car out of traffic and went to the nearest pay phone to call AAA. I understand the job these dispatchers have to do and also that they are in some regional call center hundreds of miles away. However, my patience drew thin as the gomer on the other end of the phone asked one insipid question after another all the time rain water is pooling in my socks. I explained the precarious location I was in and he assured me he would put my on their priority list. "Priority", in this case meant a 2 hour wait.

Two local police cars came up to check on me. With lights and burning flares they sat vigil with me. Well, from their point of view they had just scored at least an hour and a half break where all they had to do was sit in their car.

As I sat in my comatose car waiting I began to think back on my history of cars. My friend Jason says he has never, in the 12 years he has known me, known me to have good luck with cars. If had known me longer he would have been sure of an automobile curse I seem to have.

My friend Harry can tell some of the best stories about me and cars, right from the beginning. The times he and his father saved me as one thing or another would go wrong and they would laugh at my lack on knowledge of cars. Oh, they would help me and try to educate me about simple repairs but they would still laugh. There is an autograph from my friend Mike in my high school year book that makes reference to a transmission problem my car had. I drove that car into the ground basically.

I had a Ford Escort that spent so much time in a garage parking lot that a homeless guy moved into it. There was also the time, after a convention in Boston, I had to have 6 friends push the car so I could pop the clutch to get the engine running.

There was the Chrysler K-car station wagon with the hole on the floor board. I was once drove through a puddle and had it suddenly raining inside the car.

My VW bus was unique in that once the car was running a bungee cord held the stick shift in place so the transmission would stay in gear.

Our trip to Shore Leave a few years ago was memorable for being the last one taken in my last really good car, the Ford Aerostar. We had gotten no more than 100 miles away from home when a belt went which took out the A/C and then the entire engine by the time we got to Maryland.

There was the Ford Thunderbird that couldn't go more than 45 mins without a refill of the radiator.

The Cadillac with the sun-baked roof. I can't complain about that car much; it's the one that saved my life in the accident.

I should be back on the road soon. The expense of the repair will screw with Christmas a little.

Maybe Santa will read this and bring me a new car!