Somebody please stop Jay-Z from producing any more Super Bowl halftime shows

I used to watch the Super Bowls for two reasons no matter who is playing: the commercials and the halftime shows.

Having the commercials release on YouTube a few days before the game has ended that particular anticipation for the most part.  I can't stave off the temptation.  Especially for the spots of upcoming movies even if those films are ten whole months out.

That leaves the halftime show.  A spectacle that has long entertained folks regardless of the competing teams.

But let's face it: the halftime shows of the past several years have been too bereft of real engaging character.  They've become too homogenized.  Too boring.

And it's all Jay-Z's fault.

The rapper and his agency Roc Nation have been contracted by the National Football League since 2019 to produce the halftime shows.  And ever since then they have predominantly featured performers from the rap music community.  Not country music.  Not a variety of pop music artists.  No classic bands.

Rappers.  And the worlds that they have wrought into being.  To hell with the musical predilections of the country at large.

And now Jay-Z has chosen himself to headline the next Super Bowl halftime show

This past season it was Bad Bunny: by far the most controversial headliner for a Super Bowl halftime show in the history of anything.  It seems that Jay-Z tapped Bad Bunny because of his controversial nature.  As if it was an "up yours" to the normal Americans whose loyalties to the NFL are becoming increasingly strained already with each passing season.

I dare say that a lot of us have the following message we would tell Jay-Z if he had an iota of humbleness in him: STOP FEATURING RAP PERFORMERS IN THE HALFTIME SHOW!

There are a lot of styles of music than rap artists.  The music should represent a swath of the American public.  Having a show focused on Puerto Ricans to the detriment of all others, and having a profanity-laden singer be at the centerpiece of that, is not representation of that general public.

It's a sad thing: remember the halftime shows featuring Michael Jackson, Prince, even New Kids On The Block (who memorably performed as the Gulf War was raging)?  Those and so many other artists who have played at the halftime show, they would have never been considered for a show produced by Jay-Z.  Maybe they would play during the pre-game festivities, but not the main event.

And now as if to emphasize his own importance, Jay-Z has chosen himself - and will no doubt be paid for it - to headline the show.

Let's call this for what it is: it''s called "social justice".  It's "cultural relevance".  It's "representation".

It's also destroying the main audience of professional football.

Have the halftime shows been getting record audiences in the past several years?  Yes, they have.  It would be a remarkable omission to overlook that.  But how many people watching the halftime shows been legitimate football fans?  The shows' audiences have in vast part come from the fandom of the performers.  The "tourists" who only come to see the shows and then tune out.

(Why can't there be something like the legendary In Living Color Super Bowl Halftime Show that Fox broadcast in 1992?  An event that drew millions of viewers and forever changed the official halftime shows... well until Roc Nation took over.)

Maybe we'll be fortunate, and this coming Super Bowl's show will soar to new depths of viewership and force the NFL honchos to reconsider their relationship with Jay-Z and end the domination of the rappers.  It's certainly something to hope for.

Edit 09:27 am EST:  I shared this post on Free Republic.  Another user shared something quite interesting.  That Jay-Z often wears attire bearing the words "Do What Thou Wilt":

"Do what thou wilt" was the guiding philosophy of English occultist Aleister Crowley. Who was a very wicked man who preached that humanity must abandon all beliefs in a higher authority than man.  In Crowley's mad scheme there would be no law at all.  Anything would be permissible and tolerated.

Anyone who emblazon's Crowley's words upon their clothing, should be suspected of being inherently evil.

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I'm too sexy for this blog!

Was on the road early this morning when this song came on the Nineties station on satellite radio.  And now I can't get it out of my head just like 35 years ago!

"I'm Too Sexy" by Right Said Fred got a LOT of airplay during my high school senior year.  Were we supposed to take this song seriously or was it meant to be a gag?  I've no idea and I don't think anyone else does either but back in the day I could do a spot-on rendition of it 😛 

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Coming soon…

A brand new look for The Knight Shift!

(Actually, a new everything for this blog.  Oh well, this place has needed an upgrade anyway.)

It’s been a long time coming.  But hey, it IS almost 2027 after all.  I just got a new car, new iPhone, REALLY awesome new job, new friends (make of that what one will).  Might as well go all the way.  I've been testing the new look out and it's terrific.

(And hey, Tammy has a new collar too.  We are all doing well :-)

Don’t worry, all 20-some years of content will still be here.  Every random thought, movie review, recipe, installment of Being Bipolar, chronicles against the wicked, wacky YouTube video… it’s gonna be here too.  And should remain here for the rest of time.

There is a possibility that this blog won't be available for a few days.  That's technical related, having to do with the new hosting.  It should resolve itself (see what I did there?) within this next week or so.

Let’s see what modern technology can do.

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A post especially for all the politicians out there

A longtime friend is currently running for office.  Tonight on Facebook I left a comment to him.  It was worth making a post all its own, since this is such a political season.  If you ever wondered where I am coming from politically, this passage from the man who was the grandfather figure in my life puts it more succinctly than anything I could come up with on my own.  So I think it’s well worth sharing here too.

From chapter 12 of my book Keeping the Tryst:

---

At last Eagle was within sight.  For my project I chose to build receptacles for the trash cans at Camp Saurakee, a place for people with severe mental disabilities.  The receptacles would keep the cans stationary, without being a safety hazard if they were knocked around in bad weather.  I made the receptacles, and we delivered them to the camp two weeks before my Eagle Scout board of review.

​That took place on the night before my eighteenth birthday.  There were five men who conducted the review.  Among them was Doc Lewis.  For about an hour I was queried about my time in the Boy Scouts, what I had learned, what the path to Eagle had come to mean to me.  I answered as heartfelt and sincerely as I could, despite my nervousness.  This is it, I had told myself all day.  This is what it comes down to.

The review went well.  It was agreed by the board that I had passed with flying colors.  And then Doc told me something that I have never forgotten… 

​“Chris, people tell me that you have an interest in politics.  They tell me that you could have a brilliant future in that.” 

“That’s what some people have told me,” I confirmed. ​

“I believe they are right.  I’ve known you for many years, and you are an amazing young man.  If you want a future in politics, you could have that.  But don’t be a politician!  A politician is someone who serves their own interests.  A politician puts himself before others.  And that’s not what you are meant to be. I challenge you to be something greater than a politician.  Be a STATESMAN!  A statesman is someone who puts the needs of others above his own needs and desires.  A statesman is a true servant of the people.  There are much too many politicians, Chris.  But there are very few statesmen.  You can be a statesman.  That is your true calling.”

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This is the worst "news story" I've seen in a very long time

A few days ago NBC interviewed Andrew Cathy, the CEO of the very successful Chick-fil-A restaurant chain.  It was Cathy's first broadcast interview

This is what NBC's Today Show and a lot of "mainstream" media chose to focus on...

It was a six-some minutes-long interview.  And a great chunk of it became about whether Chick-fil-A was against homosexuality/lesbianism/transexualism/whatever else is beneath the LGBT umbrella.  Not so much about the company's awesome food and exceptional service that has won it generations of loyal customers.

It seems that more than a decade and a half later and the LGBT community and their fellow travelers in the legacy media are still stuck on the "Chick-fil-A hates gays" meme.

It was an attempt to ambush Andrew Cathy.  However he was prepared and he didn't take the bait.  Cathy simply told the reporter "We're focused on hospitality, serving great-tasting food, and great service."

Shouldn't that be what every business is supposed to be doing, if it wants to make a profit?  

A lot of extremists, almost entirely leftists, will scream "silence is consent!"  That is what some people tried to pull over on Michael Jordan many years ago.  They were mad that Jordan wasn't using his star power to shill for the Democrats.  Michael Jordan's response was pure gold.  He wasn't going to do that, he replied.  Because as he put it "Republicans buy shoes too."

Here's the online article that I took the above screenshot from.

Seriously, what kind of a reporter does something like that?  Too many of them, if we are to be honest.  They are fixated on social agendas, align themselves with extreme liberalism, and view everything through the narrow scope that it affords.  I bet the very first thought that entered this alleged journalist's mind when the opportunity to interview Andrew Cathy came was about how to hit the guy with the anti-LGBT charge.  That's all that they can perceive.  The "Chick-fil-A hates homosexuals" angle was going to be shoved in there one way or another.  It would have been a surprise if the reporter from a major television network - that has long tilted to the left - had not brought the subject up.

These are not normal people.  They live inside bubbles segregated from the world of decent folks.  A life absent constant obsession about social issues is something they cannot comprehend.  And if someone does choose to hold beliefs about such things, the journalists/politicians/celebrities on the "progressive" end of the spectrum simply cannot wrap their minds around the notion that a person can possess a differing perspective.  It wouldn't surprise me if Cathy's response to the questioning genuinely caused the reporter to feel real pain in the head.  It wasn't what they were expecting, at all.

The good news is that viewership and readership of traditional news media has been dropping like a rock for quite some time.  Blogs and podcasts are taking over.  At least most of them are honest about their agendas and where they stand on matters.  NBC can't do that.  It's been that way for a very long time.  And that doesn't look to change anytime soon.

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Watch the new Tesla Roadster do a midair kickflip during its unveiling!

This is officially the single coolest thing you will have seen all month.  From a few hours ago:

I just bought a brand new Toyota Corolla.  It’s got more safety features than anything I’ve ever seen in a car.  It’ll be neat in another fifteen or twenty years to see if what Elon Musk has given his Roadster will become standard equipment on new vehicles.

Seriously though, that is hella awesome.  It’s like Musk and his boffins are engineering functional Autobots.

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Margaret Hamilton, computer pioneer behind mankind's moon landings, has passed away

 

Margaret Hamilton inside an Apollo command module simulator

Margaret Hamilton, the brilliant mathematician behind the then-nascent field of software engineering and the lead programmer of the Apollo effort that put humanity on the moon, has passed away at the age of ninety.

But what a life Hamilton had!  Early on she demonstrated a prowess for mathematics.  She followed that into higher education and wound up at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.  There she was brought aboard NASA to work on the computer systems for the Apollo spacecraft.  It was during this phase of her career that Hamilton developed error-correction code that in the case of Apollo 11 kept the vessel from disaster during landing.

Here are the famous photos of Margaret Hamilton with the enormous pile of computer code that she and her team developed for Apollo 11:

After the Apollo program ended, Hamilton started her own company and consistently contributed to various publications.  She definitely stayed busy!  In 2016 she was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom in recognition of her work toward the space effort.

Margaret Hamilton was a true pioneer and heroine of science and technology.  This would be a far lesser world without her breaking ground for what came after.  Hers was a life well lived, and worth honoring.

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Moon and Jupiter together

This morning I snapped that pic of the Moon and Jupiter close together.  I took it with my new iPhone 18.  That's by far the best shot of astronomical objects I've ever made with a smartphone camera.  It could be better, I'm still learning the intricacies of the phone and its cameras.  But otherwise I'm very impressed.

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I de-published a post. Here's why...

A few months ago I was accused of being a bigot, by a very disturbed individual from England named Connor Heggie.  You can find out more about him if you do a search on this blog.  Heggie went around the Internet claiming that I was a bigot because, as he is apparently a homosexual person, my mere disagreeing with the LGBT lifestyle means that I hate those kinds of people.

It seems not to dawn on Heggie that HE is the real bigot, against anyone who does not meet his standards.  So rife with hate is Heggie, that he has stalked people online and had them fired from their jobs because they disagreed with him.

Last week I was sent information from someone who had been watching Heggie's Facebook group, The SW Geek Hub.  And whatever doubts about Heggie being a person of hate were dispelled.  Heggie is among those who believes that the people of Israel are guilty of genocide.  Only a fool would believe such a thing.

Antisemitism is something I take very seriously.  I've had Jewish friends for most of my life.  I've met survivors of the Holocaust.  I see a lot of the same hatred now that happened too many times in history.  It's something that has led to too much misery and suffering.  Why have the Jews been so persecuted throughout history?  I think the answer was provided in an essay I read this morning: the Jewish people have always been a mirror for the rest of humanity.  Their success and integrity and love makes others look bad.  Too many decide that instead of emulating that, they have to destroy it.  And that is what those who claim that the Jewish people are evil and committing genocide are trying to do.

Well, I made a post about Heggie claiming that Israel is engaged in genocide against the Palestinians.  And it got around.  It generated some controversy (not the first time this blog has done that).

I decided to take it down this morning.  No one asked me to or gave me an ultimatum.  I did it on my own.

It served its purpose.  It spotlighted an evil thing.  It called it out by name and announced it to the world.

Thats all that needed to be done.

I don't think that Heggie is going to be so brazen about accusing others of bigotry anymore.  Not with this hanging over him.  If he does, he'll be an enormous fool.  But that's something he'll have to answer for in due time.  I don't need to punish him.

But I think the real reason why I took down the post is this: Heggie and those like him are boring.  They are people of rage and lust.  They aren't worth being concerned with.  As a commenter said on the post before I unpublished it said, there are much better people to involve myself with.  Greater opportunities and achievements to be had.  Heggie and his cronies have reached the end of their growth cycle.  They will never get further than where they are now.  They will never make a movie or publish a book, will never perform in a musical or spend a year exploring the world behind their window.  They will never know true love.  They are each going to die someday and leave this world no poorer.

I vowed to myself a long time ago that that would never be my fate.  I think I've done pretty good by that promise.

So I've said what needs to be said.  The truth is there, for anyone to find.  If someone is ever again accused of being a hater and a bigot, they can be assured that the accuser is far more a bigot than they could ever be.

I think that's a win.

EDIT 10/10/2026: Okay sure, why not?  Here is the original post that preceded this one,

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Got the new iPhone 18 Pro Max (and a challenge to myself)

Two weeks ago I upgraded my telephony gear to the new iPhone 18 Pro Max (shown at right, displaying the Amazon Kindle app with my book Keeping the Tryst: pretty cool aye?).  The last time I bought a smartphone, it was early winter 2021 when I got the iPhone 12.  I had been mighty pleased with that one, with the exception that from the start it seemed to get low on battery too quickly.

(The previous phone replaces the iPhone 6 that I got a month before me and my dog's epic adventure across America that kicked off in late spring of 2016.  I guess getting a new phone every five years or so is a good pattern to have.)

Battery life is not a problem with the 18.  I'm using it regularly at my new job, for taking photos and filing reports etc.  The battery charge on the new phone is insanely good.  Color me impressed.

There is something else that impresses me about the iPhone 18.  Something that I've been hoping might make it into a smartphone design someday and now Apple has done it...

The iPhone 18 Pro has a camera (one of three) with an adjustable aperture and focal length.  Meaning it can capture true depth of field.  I've been playing around with that feature and have been astounded at how good it is.  This is many leagues beyond the traditional camcorder that I did a lot of my early cinematography with.  When I get some good subject matter I'll post a clip demonstrating the depth of field.

So this has given me  an idea.

It's been ages since I've produced a film.  The last time I did anything cinematically was around 2018 or so, when I was collaborating on a daily in-house news show with a group in Greenville.  It was an opportunity to really stretch myself creatively and the results were amazing.  I worked with a great crew there and when I left for other opportunities it was a sad thing to have to leave them behind.  But we did a lot of terrific work: some serious, a lot of funny stuff, reports from the field, informative clips, short films... we did everything but a full-length feature.

It's a feature film that I want to tackle next.  I haven't done anything like that since Forcery and that was in 2005 (what can I say? I've been very busy in the past twenty years).  Now Forcery was a lot of fun.  But for quite awhile now I've wanted to do some more mature storytelling.

I'm setting down a challenge to myself then.  I'm going to endeavor to make a full-length film - at least an hour and 20 minutes - shooting it with my new iPhone.  I absolutely believe it's possible to produce a serious motion picture with a minimum of equipment and have it be good enough to shop around for distribution, or at least enter it into a film festival.  The technology has progressed enough to the point where it's definitely feasible to be minimalist and still create a great looking film.

In addition to the iPhone, I already have other equipment on hand: tripods, the previous iPhone can be used to capture audio separate from the main phone, lighting... heck if need be we can recreate the "nine-dollar dolly" we used on Forcery.

It might be possible to edit the entire movie on the iPhone.  For that however I'm going to use my iPad Pro.  It's already loaded with various video editing apps that I'm adept with.

That's my challenge to myself: shoot an entire serious movie with my iPhone.  I believe it is doable.  And hey, if nothing else it will be an opportunity to bring the band back together!  The KWerky Productions gang has remained close all this time, I think they'll up up for it.

Now, as George Lucas said when he finally sat down to write Star Wars Episode I: "All I need is an idea."  My brain is trying to think of something useful.  Maybe one will hit me while I'm at my job.  I've already come up with a few ideas for the historical romance novel I've set about writing.  Perhaps one for a new movie will present itself too.

As always, I'll keep y'all posted on what develops.  Just as I did with Forcery.  

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It's the Star Wars/Hellraiser crossover we never knew we wanted

A very clever chap has put together something quite clever: a video (mix of AI and traditional footage) depicting a contest between Star Wars baddie Darth Vader and Pinhead from the Hellraiser series.  Who wins: the Dark Lord of the Sith or the leader of the Cenobites?

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The Final Hour of Christa Pike: Some thoughts about capital punishment

Many years ago, during a particularly dark period of my life,  I wrote a one-scene play.  It was one of a number of works that I felt inspired to create.  Thankfully I seem to have come out of that melancholy for good, but there will forever be a mark on my soul from that time.  I like to think that what I've done since has been, for lack of a better term, "happier".

So, about this play...

It's a single scene.  Involving a man and a woman.  And they come to have a heated discussion involving another woman.  All throughout the play you're wondering "who are these people?  What are they talking about?  Does this involve an affair that he's been caught in?"

Finally, in the last moments of the play, comes the big reveal.  The object of their conversation is a woman who is about to be executed and the man - who is the governor of the state - has rejected all requests for clemency.  The life of this woman has fallen into his hands and he has the power to grant mercy or to let justice run its course.

There was never an agenda when I wrote this play.  It was simply a scenario that had crossed my mind and I felt like it would make an interesting dramatic presentation.  And so I wrote it.  So far very few people have read it.  Who knows?  Maybe someday I'll get to see it produced.  That would indeed be a fine arrow in the quiver of my skills and accomplishments.

I'm thinking of my play this morning, mostly because of what is about to happen in the state of Tennessee in another hour.  At 10 a.m. Eastern Standard Time, Christa Pike is going to be executed by lethal injection.  It will be the final act of a chain of events stretching back to January of 1995, when Pike and two other people brutally murdered a young woman.  I'll spare you the details.  It was as heinous an act as there is likely to be.  Among other things Pike carved a pentagram into her victim's body.

And so it has come to this: all the appeals have been exhausted and the governor refuses to yield and the United States Supreme Court has chosen to not intervene.  In a short while Christa Pike will be brought into this room and strapped down to the gurney and have a needle inserted into her arm.  At the appointed time a series of substances will be injected into her: starting with a powerful anesthetic that will drop her into a sleep almost like death.  And then a "drug" that will stop her heart and breathing.

The death chamber at Riverbend Maximum Security Institution
in Tennessee

Once upon a time, I was adamantly against the death penalty.  I thought it was barbaric, and beneath the level of civilized humanity.  We were supposed to be better than that, I believed.  A person who committed an act of murder should be imprisoned for life without parole.  There couldn't be anything worse than that.  It's what a people who have arisen above their impulses for revenge should do.

I'm older now.  Hopefully not too jaded.  I still believe that people are capable of great things, that they are not necessarily creatures of inherent cruelty.  However, I am also a realist.  And I do know that for as long as man will be upon the earth, there will also be the capacity for terrible acts of violence and bloodshed.

I used to be against the death penalty.  And now?  I believe that it should not only be legal, but that there are times when it is warranted and even necessary.

Human life is a precious and sacred thing.  There can be no taking from that without dire repercussion.  Acting to murder someone diminishes that sanctity.  It takes away from the priceless value of life.  We like to believe that a civilized society regards all human life as, for lack of a different term, holy. And I could say something about other issues regarding innocent life, but I shall save that for another time.

It's not left to anyone to decide that another person should die.  That is something left to higher power above mankind.  To assume that power is to violate the natural order of things.  Are there occasions where taking of human life is justifiable?  Yes, there are.  Acts of self-defense or defense of loved ones, those especially come to mind.  And again, I could say something about another matter pertaining to self-defense, but I won't for now.

An act of heartless and soulless murder, however, inflicts a horrific wound upon the body of the human condition as agreed upon by a people of law.  And it is something that requires an act to bring it back into balance.

That act is at least a penalty of time in prison.  And at its worst, it calls for the forfeiture of the life of the offender.  It has to be this way.  For life to remain of value, a life must be exacted in kind.

That is what Christa Pike is going to do this morning.  She is going to pay the price for taking a life in the manner that she did it.

"But Chris, she can be forgiven for what she did!"  Yes, she can.  I'm of the belief that forgiveness is always available for us, no matter our transgressions.  I believe that God is ever ready to forgive those who believe upon His love and redemptive nature and finished work.  What a person has done, no matter how terrible, it doesn't matter in God's economy.

People like Christa Pike can find forgiveness.  They can not find escape from the temporal penalty however. That remains to be paid.  And I believe that a person who truly is remorseful is going to accept that as being their fate.

That's a harsh thing to believe, but there it is.  If Pike has remorse for what she did, her soul can be saved.  But ultimately that is not the prerogative of the government to grant.  It's up to her.  I hope that she does feel remorse for her actions.  I like to think that as long as they live no one is beyond redemption.

That's something between her and God however.  Or whoever or whatever the higher power it is that she chooses to believe in.

So there it is: I once considered the death penalty to be a cruel and heartless thing.  I now believe that for a culture to continue to value the sacredness and priceless value of human life, it must also be prepared to take life that violates the natural order in the worst way.  We can choose to mete out the final act of justice in a way that is solemn and dignified, and I think that is morally required for a noble people.

I pray that Christa Pike, and anyone else facing execution, will be at a place of enormous peace when they come to the last moments.  And I pray that the rest of us will find a sense of completion.  The deed will have been done.  Life will continue, and perhaps with a bit more regard for innocence.

Which, is what this is all about to begin with.

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Does Connor Heggie of SW Geek Hub hate the Jews?

EDIT  10/09/2026 12:55 AM EST:  Why not?

I think that taking a stand against antisemitism certainly counts toward doing good.

Here is the post that I had taken down a few days ago:

---

I debated about whether to post this.  Truth be told apart from some mad comment left on a previous post I'd forgotten about Connor Heggie, the British owner of Facebook group The SW Geek Hub and the extremist LGBT stalker who accused me of bigotry because of my convictions about the homosexual lifestyle and how it is not only wrong, but it's dangerous.

There have been too many great things in my life lately than to be concerned about a twit and his fellow goons on Facebook.  Things like new friendship, well-paying new job, new car, my book selling well and I've begun writing another... God has been very good to me in the past few months.  I'm extremely thankful for what has been happening in my life.  More than I can possibly convey.

There are far better blessings to appreciate than to let cowards on Facebook come into mind.  There have been others like he and his cohorts before and I've largely forgotten about them too.  They can stay in their own little realm, isolated from the rest of the world.  Nobody serious cares about their circle-jerk (if I might be allowed to use crude language).

But when it comes to antisemitism, that's where matters do become too severe than to not address.

A reader of this blog who has been watching Heggie's "SW Geek Hub" Facebook page (I blocked Hegggie so I can't see his activity anymore, and I don't care to either) sent along the following screenshot of a recent post that our least favorite loon made:

Ed Sheeran is the singer-songwriter who kicked Macklemore off his current tour because the rapper expressed political opinions during a recent show.  Something that no responsible musical artist should do with people who paid for him to perform, not to insult his audience (as Michael Jordan said when asked why he didn't use his stardom to promote political agendas, "Republicans buy shoes too.")

Macklemore used his platform to express his longstanding belief that the Palestinians are the victims of a "genocide" by the Israelis.  It is a notion that is shared by many who are against Israel.  Who are against the Jewish people and their right to occupy a homeland that they have had for four thousand years.  To claim to be pro-Palestinian is far less a statement of solidarity with an ethnicity that only came about in the past century or so, than it does with being antisemitic: harboring a hatred of the Jewish people and everything about them.

I know something about anti-Judaism.  I've studied history for most of my life.  It's led to a lot of understanding about what the Jews have been through over the millennia.  I've also met too many survivors of the Holocaust than to not be bothered by the kind of hatred that led six million innocent people to the "showers" of places like Auschwitz and Treblinka.

That is the kind of hatred that is now in our present day.  "From the river to the sea" is the chant of many in the Middle East and abroad who want to wipe out the Jews and their country.  It is the madness that has resulted in the very real atrocities against modern Israelis for going on eighty years.

Atrocities like what happened on October 7th, 2023.  When the Palestinian group Hamas massacred more than a thousand innocent Israelis, wounded many thousands more and took captive hundreds of Jews who were attending an outdoor concert.

The Israeli government has reciprocated against Hamas, including targeting those lunatics' infrastructure and ability to wage further war and commit more acts of deadly violence.

The Israeli government has also gone out of its way to not involve non-combatants.  Indeed, what they are doing in this conflict is perhaps the most cautious that any armed force in the history of the world has been to not bring harm to those who are not with the belligerents.

And despite all of this, many if not most of the leaders of countries of the world dare to claim that Israel is engaged in genocide against Palestinians.

What Israel is doing is not genocide.  It is self-defense.  It is breaking the ability of an enemy to make sure that it never hurts the Jews and Christians, and even some Muslims living within Israel's borders, ever again.

Yet the claims of genocide continue.  Perpetuated by antisemitic leaders and celebrities and the media.

And people like Connor Heggie fall for it.

Show me a person who is "pro Palestine" and against "genocide" of Palestinians, and I will show you a person who is not only anti-Israel, but is strongly anti-Jewish.  They'll deny it up and down but in their hearts they can barely contain their loathing of the race and religion of Judaism.

These people are but a few steps removed from the Nazi mentality that almost completely wiped out the Jewish people from the European continent.  The people who saw Jews as vermin "life unworthy of life".

That is what I see when I look at Heggie's pro-Palestinian remarks, however brief they are.  It also dovetails too much with the hatred of Christianity that he has expressed on numerous occasions.

Antisemitism is something that can't go unaddressed.  And for all of Heggie's ravings that others are bigoted, he is demonstrating to the world that HE is a far greater and more true bigot than is anyone who expresses disagreement about a lifestyle that is physically and spiritually self-destructive.

When Heggie aligns himself with those who claim that Israel is committing genocide, he is aligning himself with the very worst of racists.  Oh, he's concerned with genocide all right.  Genocide against the Jewish people, that is.

He is not a good example of what alleges to be a decent human being.  He is certainly a poor example of an alleged Star Wars fan.

For all his calling other people he doesn’t like “bigots”, Connor Heggie is apparently a bigot in general and an antisemite in particular.

And he should be called out on it.

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Sunday morning political shows ZZZZZZzzz...

Right now at this moment I am doing something that I have not done in many years: watching Sunday morning political talk shows.

And I am shaking my head in disbelief at how little these people are actually saying.

These are partisan hacks, every single one of them, including the hosts.  They are not saying anything at all that is really enlightening or mind-broadening.  They are parroting their party’s agenda, without any legitimate thought processes at all.  There is nothing original they are speaking aloud that I have not heard before.

They are soooooo boring.

I'm reminded of an episode of The Cosby Show that I saw many years ago.  Claire is invited to go on one such Sunday morning show.  Including the hosts there is also a conservative commentator and a liberal scholar and they were PERFECTLY cast and acted.  They were total parodies of real conservatives and liberals.  Claire is the only one at the table who is acting like a mature intelligent adult.  She's smart.  She comes knowing what she believes and she runs circles around everyone else.  It was a hilarious episode.  And even as a kid watching it, I wanted to be like Claire if it ever came to me being in a situation like that also.

These real-life political shows couldn't handle someone like Claire Huxtable.  They can't handle ANYONE who really thinks for themself.

I actually feel dumber for watching these shows.  I'm tuning off.  There's the live stream of a church I really appreciate that is starting in a few minutes (it's the church I attended when I was in college).  MUCH more uplifting and thought provoking than Meet The Press or any other of these programs.

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9/11: What I saw from Asheville

Yesterday I shared an excerpt from my memoir Keeping the Tryst, from the end of chapter 37.  That excerpt dealt with my life on September 10th, 2001.  And the last thing that I did before falling asleep late that night was to thank God for all of the good that He had brought into my life.  If the previous several months could have been that good, I had no doubt that the rest of my life could be just as amazing.  I was 27 years old, with everything ahead of him.  I was in love, I had a good job, I was writing for publication on a daily basis.  And on the night of September 10th I had started writing the script for my very first movie.

My eyes closed, and I was looking forward to another day of being grateful.

Here is another excerpt.  The final part of chapter 37 and all of chapter 38.

---------------

The phone rang sometime later during the morning.

I picked it up, and it was Mom.

“Are you watching the TV?”

I told her I was just waking up.  I asked her what was going on.

“A plane hit the World Trade Center!”

The first thought that went through my bleary head was that a plane had once crashed into the Empire State Building.  Maybe this was pilot error, like that had been.

“Yeah and a few minutes later another plane hit the other tower!”

~

Within minutes of turning on the television to see the World Trade Center, I called Lisa and made sure she was okay.  Then I went online and went to the news forum I frequented.  There was the shock and terror, giving rise to rawest anger, now being immortalized in real time as an online monument to the evil that men do and their victims.

I cranked up AOL Instant Messenger and found Ed was on.  Everyone in his office was watching the live coverage.

I was in the middle of replying to his previous message when the first tower fell.

~

What was supposed to have been a wonderful day for TheForce.net turned into a real-time reflection of the horror.  Josh posted a prayer.  The site’s forums within hours became a clearinghouse of information for those in the New York and D.C. areas, as users reported that they were okay while others were looking for fellow fans who had been in the vicinity of the towers and Washington.

We couldn’t locate some members of our staff who had been in New York.  Lisa and I had dinner with one of them the first night of Dragon Con, a week and a half before.  When we finally located Alena she told us that she had been on the street in front of the north tower, directly below where the first plane hit.  Alena saw it all happen.  She had then run for cover into a subway entrance and heard the debris crashing onto the street above her.

~

Maggi and Helen were enraged.  Maggi said things that one dares not share in polite company.  In her words were well reflected the wrath inflaming all good people of conscience.

~

I watched the coverage all day, up to being time to go to work.  I arrived at 4.  Only five potential customers came into the Best Buy that evening.  They shuffled in, looked around, and walked out.  Each of them had that “thousand-yard stare” in his eyes.  They appeared dazed and confused.  Like they had only come in to keep their minds off the wretchedness of the outside world.

Not a single item was sold in our store all night.

~

I returned home a little after 9.  Lisa and I talked for a long time.  I couldn’t remember the last time I had been so thankful to hear the voice of a loved one.

~

Chad was at his desk in the CNN Building.  There was nothing to post to the Sports Illustrated site that night.  Up until almost 1 A.M., it was Chad and I over Instant Messenger talking about what had happened.  We shared a lot of images we had found.  Like the San Francisco Examiner special edition headline that screamed out “BASTARDS!"

"I love you, brother," Chad said as he signed out for the night.

"I love you too, man."

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The last waking moments of a sane world

The following is an excerpt from my memoir Keeping the Tryst.  It appears just before the end of chapter 37.

~

September 10, 2001…

That night I was scheduled to work. And there were three things that I was eager to do when I got home…

The first was to call Lisa.

Secondly, I wanted to start work on writing the script for the movie.  Even though I had no grasp whatsoever of crafting a screenplay.

Finally, it was a big night for TheForce.net staff.  We would be up all evening getting a bunch of stories about the Episode I DVD release ready to publish at midnight Pacific Time.

Lisa and I talked for a bit, then I threw a pizza into the oven and while that was cooking I started writing the first lines of what I was calling “Sithery”.  It seemed as good a working title as anything.

I wrote a page and a half of what passed for a script, then logged into TheForce.net’s staff portal.  There were a couple of posts that I needed to have ready, and those were done.  I hung out online until 3 a.m. and saw all our work get posted.

Satisfied, I went to the sofa and crashed hard.  And before going to sleep I found myself feeling pretty good.  I had my own place, a job, and an amazing girlfriend whom I cared for deeply.  I was writing a script for a movie.  And my words were being read by tens of thousands of people each day.

I thanked God for giving me so much.  And then drowsiness took me.

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Labor Day weekend 25 years ago...

This weekend in Atlanta is the annual Dragon Con.  I'm remembering the first time I went to that.

It was another Labor Day weekend, twenty-five years ago.  The night before it started, my Star Wars website TheForce.net published an interview that I did with "Weird Al" Yankovic.  I left my apartment in Asheville the next day and drove three hours to my girlfriend's place at University of Georgia.  We got to Atlanta and walked around Dragon Con a bit, then we hooked up with another TheForce.net staffer named Alena.  We wound up having dinner along with a few Dragon Con guests (the actress who played Vasquez in the movie Aliens was a few spots down the table from us).  Alena was a really sweet young lady, she was host of the site's new weekly video feature.  We then went to a little gathering where among other people were Peter Mayhew who played Chewbacca (VERY giant but soft-spoken man) and Jeremy Bulloch (who wore the Boba Fett costume in the original trilogy).

Later that night at the convention I represented TheForce.net with a presentation on midi-clorians: those weird germ things that George Lucas had introduced in Episode I.  There was this girl in a Princess Leia costume who kept interrupting me as I was talking, and I kept thinking "she's like Annie Wilkes in the movie Misery".  And that's when the idea for my first movie hit.

We were at Dragon Con the next day too.  Following a panel discussion about the upcoming The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring, Lisa (my girlfriend) and I got to meet John Rhys-Davies, who has been in a lot of movies and would soon be seen as Gimli the Dwarf.  A short while later my girlfriend and I shared a booth at Planet Hollywood with Paul Blake, the actor who played Greedo in the first Star Wars movie.  A very nice chap.  I asked him what did he think of Lucas changing the movie so that Han Solo didn't shoot first.  I'll never forget his response: "I think it's absolute BOLLOCKS what George did!  Why did he do that?  Han was perfectly justified in shooting me, I was about to kill HIM after all.  Why did George do that?  I'll never understand it!"

It was a great two days at Dragon Con.  And then the next day on Sunday my girlfriend and I went to church where she worshipped while growing up.  An hour or so after that we were on our way to Atlanta to see a performance of the musical The Phantom of the Opera.

I'm sharing these memories, because they are among the last, most precious memories that I have about the way the world used to be.  Before everything changed a week and a half later.

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Romance Novel: The First Status Report

Keeping the Tryst came out a little less than a year ago.  I'm still hoping that it might be picked up by a real publishing house someday, but in the meantime I've been happy with it.  It's sold enough to make a bit of money, but more important than that it seems to be appreciated and enjoyed by the kinds of people I was especially writing it for.

Toward the end of Keeping the Tryst I allude to what else I want to do with my life.  For the past many months I have been bogged down by a number of crises that have kept me from doing anything toward those.  Thankfully - and I truly believe that God has been at work in these matters - I have emerged from that in a better position than I've ever been in my life.  I can now throw myself fully into some of those endeavors.

I have decided to devote much of my "own time" for the foreseeable future on my historical romance novel project.  I am still going to compose op-ed material because that kind of writing has been part of my nature since I was a high school student.  But I'm going to give this novel as much focus as I gave to Keeping the Tryst.  I believe that I have hit upon an original idea that no one has done before and I think it's unique enough to stand a good chance of getting published.  It needs to be as good as it can be and that's what I'm going to set out to accomplish.

First up on this project: brainstorming.  The basic concept is in mind, now it needs some elements that will make it really cool.  All the while I'm going to be outlining and revising that, to get the basic endoskeleton in place.

I know how the story begins.  I also know how it ends.  That is how I like to start writing anything.  Just need to fill in the long space between those extremities.

Consider this the first status update of my new project.  As I did with Keeping the Tryst, I will be sharing reports from time to time, until the book is finished and I start trying to land it an agent.

This may take awhile.  A few years, likely.  But I think it will be fun to follow along 🙂

Depiction of the Sacking of Constantinople.
This is a clue.  Maybe.

EDIT 09/06/2026 9:36 am EST:

Yesterday was the first day I significantly dedicated toward work on my next book.  That mostly entailed nothing more than reclining back and letting my mind orient toward the story I want to share.  I allowed my imagination to run wild with ideas of characters and locations and various props that come into play.  This morning I have Microsoft Word open on my iPad and I'm filling a new document with those ideas.  So that is the first real writing I'm doing on this project.  It will be at least a year before there's a first draft.  I can't imagine it taking anything less than that.  The brainstorming will go on, new ideas will come and be considered and either be let go or implemented.   There is a lot of historical research to do.  There are shades of characters but they don't have proper names yet, just mere shapes of purpose.  But in the end, twelve months or so from now, there will be a finished draft that I can set about refining into the book's final form.

It's going to be a lot of work.  But this book isn't going to write itself.  Neither did the last one.  I came to a point where I had to decide if I really wanted to write it or let it go.  I'm glad that I committed to it.  And I now know how to write a book and also how not to write one.  Keeping the Tryst was a very personally trying endeavor.  This next one is going to be tough, but it is also going to be much more fun.

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I've been reading up more on the Lindsay Clancy murder trial. And now?

A few days ago I shared some cursory thoughts about Lindsay Clancy and her murder trial.  What immediately shocked me was the sheer number of medications that she was on.  As a former mental health professional, as someone with a mental health condition myself who has experienced issues with meds, I was absolutely floored by all the drugs that Clancy was taking.  What I was thinking most was about the very significant probability of drug interactions that would have possibly clouded her senses, including her moral judgement.

Intrigued, I looked into the case further.  One friend alluded that he couldn't believe I had been unaware of this trial going on.  What can I say?  I've been very busy lately: everything from starting a new job to getting a new car, to the past few days when I've been working on a horror story (that will absolutely outrage some people if it ever gets published).  And I'm not really all that much a fan of sensationalism, something the Lindsay Clancy murder trial seems rife with.

But I took a harder look at the case.  And now, what do I think?

Lindsay Clancy needs to be found guilty and sent to prison for the rest of her life.

There are three possibilities that I see going on with her.  There is the notion that she suffered from post-partum psychosis, on which her defense is hanging their chances on.  There is the possibility of a condition like bipolar disorder.  And then there is the possibility that she is a full-blown psychopath: something that there is no cure for and it could perhaps be said there is no hope either.

Folks, mental illness can distort thought.  It certainly has to me, too many times since the onset of manic depression in the winter of 2000.  It suppresses inhibitions.  I've written about it in my book, how being manic led to me doing some horrible things because of an outraged libido that could not be satisfied.  I did other things too, that I am not proud of.

But there was always a choice.  Unfortunately I chose wrong, more times than I can count.

There remained moral choice though.  And that is where Lindsay Clancy went horribly wrong and deviated straight into pure evil.

Clancy, apparently, researched ways on how to kill her children.  She planned this.  Clancy spent an inordinate amount of time looking at methods of ending her children's lives.  That is something that mental illness can never bring about.  Can mental illness lead to murder?  Yes, when passions go out of control.  But to premeditate the harming of others?  That takes free will.  She had every opportunity to pull away.  If she was going through psychiatric issues she could have addressed those.  But she didn't.  If she truly has a mental illness she spent far more time indulging her dark fantasies than she did in doing her damndest to stave off the dark thoughts bedeviling her.

I don't believe that mental illness, including post-partum psychosis, can be used as a viable excuse of what Lindsay Clancy did.  She maintained enough reason to spend time studying how to kill her own children.  That alone invalidates her defense.

Which leaves us with psychopathy.  Something almost entirely removed from the concept of traditional mental illness.  A complete disregard for others.  A detachment from moral restraint that makes anything justifiable in the eyes of the psychopath.

There is no real treatment for such a person.  There is no "getting better" for a psychopath.  Thankfully true psychopathy is a rare condition.  And not all psychopaths are necessarily evil.  It's been suggested that psychopathy is a trait that can be found in many among the executive business community.  It might make them exceedingly cutthroat in their dealings but there seems to be at least some realization that bad things will happen if they go too far.

That isn't common among psychopaths however.  But I'm digressing.

What Lindsay Clancy did in murdering her children involved either a chosen course of action in researching how to kill her offspring and she's trying to hang that on a temporary mental condition.  Or she is a psychopath who did what she did without feeling moral compunction.

However it is, she does not need to be given the opportunity to ever again be a free woman.  She chose her actions.  Or she has no restraining morality at all.  One or the other.

The jury needs to find her guilty.  Send her to prison for the rest of her life.  Not just to hold her accountable for her temporal sins, but as a service to society as a whole.  She is too dangerous to treat with overbearing kindness that does not adequately address the severity of her crimes.

If there is no justice in this case, then there will not be true justice in a lot of other situations that will come about.

I originally expressed the belief that Clancy might not have possessed enough sense to keep from murdering her children.  I see now that I was wrong  in that assessment.  She did what she did of her own volition.

And I hope that the jury in her trial will do the right thing and make damned sure that she never sees an iota of freedom again.  Ever. 

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One of my favorite animated characters turns 80 today

Happy Birthday Foghorn Leghorn!  Made his debut in "Walky Talky Hawky" on August 31st, 1946.

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Drug interactions: My thoughts on the Lindsay Clancy murder trial

Illustrating how out of touch I am with much of current events, this morning I finally educated myself about the Lindsay Clancy murder trial.  Clancy is being prosecuted for the 2023 murders of her three young children.  The defense is arguing that Clancy was suffering from psychiatric issues, including postpartum depression.  If convicted she would get life in prison without parole and if she's found not guilty she's looking at being incarcerated in a psychiatric hospital for a long, long time.

I guess I should have been keeping up with with this all along, given my background in mental health as both patient and professional.

So I just finished reading about Clancy's medical history.  And two words come to mind...

Sweet Jesus.

This woman was on WAY too many medications.  With that wild variety of drugs in her system, it's no wonder that things were going to go bad.  It really is completely possible that Clancy was screwed up, entirely disregarding postpartum depression and perhaps bipolar disorder altogether.  She may have had only the vaguest notion of what she was doing when she murdered her kids, doing so robbed of conscience.

The doctors and nurses attending to her made a very serious mistake, having her being on all those meds.  The interactions could not have been adequately predicted.  Anything at all could have gone wrong in her mind.

I'm not making excuses for her.  I believe that she needs to be put into a psychiatric facility for a long time.  But having had some troubling experiences with being overly-medicated myself, I can understand how Clancy could have become unhinged from reality because of being on too many meds.

I'm going to be tuned in to the verdict when the jury hands it down, likely this coming week.  This could establish a significant legal precedent, one that might impact mental health care in this country enormously.

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WillieBoy Eats the World: A delightful picture book for children of all ages!

Hey gang!  So a few weeks ago I started a new job.  I'm still doing artificial intelligence training a little bit but that needed some serious supplementing.  Lo and behold I wound up in a position that really plays to my strengths as a journalist and as someone who appreciates precision.  I'm really loving it!

When the first paycheck arrived I celebrated by doing something that I've wanted ever since it came out a few months ago: I bought a copy of WillieBoy Eats the World.  It's written by Steve Schirripa.  Yup, that Steve Schirripa: the brilliant and much-beloved actor from The Sopranos and Blue Bloods.  He's well know for those roles but in the past number of years Schirripa has become famous again for his dachshund WillieBoy, with whom he often shares photos and videos on social media.

Well, y'all know me: I'm a sucker for anything dachshund-related.  My own little girl Tammy is very precious to me, and we follow several other dachshunds (and their minions) on Facebook.  So when I heard that Steve Schirripa was coming out with a children's book about the relationship he and WillieBoy have, I knew that it was something I would be very interested in.

I am happy to report that WillieBoy Eats the World is just as sweet as I had hoped it would be. In it WillieBoy is on a mission to convince Steve that although Italian food is good, it's not the only fare that is worth enjoying.  And so WillieBoy leads Steve on a culinary journey across the food of many cultures.

It's a very delightful little book, written by Schirripa and Philip Lerman, and beautifully illustrated by Kirk Parrish.  It captures and conveys the love that all dachshund owners have for their fur babies.  It also encourages people, no matter what their ages might be, to explore beyond the boundaries of what they know and expect.  To dare to discover other cultures and what they have to offer.  As Steve learns by way of WillieBoy's leading, it can be rewarding and fun to expand one's range of repast.  I am especially appreciative of Steve coming to encounter proper Southern food... but I might be  biased when I say that.

WillieBoy Eats the World is available on Amazon as a hardcover and also via instant delivery on Kindle devices and apps.  If I were you I would get both.  It's a nice little book to keep handy wherever you are and it also looks quite lovely on your bookshelf (of which my own, I am not embarrassed to say, includes many children's books).  However you acquire it, I believe you'll really love WillieBoy Eats the World.  The world needs good things right now, and you can't go wrong with Steve Schirripa and WillieBoy.

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