Verizon gets bashed a lot these days, sometimes deservedly so. I’ve been a customer of theirs for years, and yet I’ve never hesitated to complain about the way they nickel-and-dime me to death. (Selling me “Unlimited” text messages that really means only 100 non-Verizon text messages, for instance.)

Sometimes, though, they get things right like the recent improvements that have tripled my signal strength.

Or the way they helped an 80-year-old man who’d taken to calling his late wife’s old cell phone number every day for three years just so he could hear her voice again. Unfortunately, the message was lost when the company archived old greetings and messages, leaving the man bereft.

Until they learned about what had happened, that is. They restored the message, and now Charles Whiting can hear his late wife’s voice whenever he wants.

Sweet, huh?

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to my RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

Remember when I marveled at the way a man’s wedding ring can turn him from an attentive, helpful guy to a slacker, sloppy spouse?

I wasn’t kidding.

Now, thanks to Rammer, I also have the statistics to prove it.

[S]cientists analyzed surveys gathered in 2002 from 28 nations, from 17,636 respondents (8,119 males and 9,517 females) as part of the Family and Changing Gender Roles III Survey. All respondents were either married or cohabiting with a significant other.

Overall, they found men spent about 9 hours a week on housework compared with women, who spent more than 20 hours weekly.[…]

Regardless of the couples’ relative earnings or work hours, cohabiting males reported more household hours than did their married counterparts, while the opposite was true for women, with wives picking up the broom more often than live-in girlfriends.

The scientists attribute this change to the “traditionalizing” effects of marriage, which is to say that, while shacking up, both sexes feel responsible for helping out with household chores. Once married, though, both genders seem to view housework as primarily the wife’s responsibility. So, the reasoning goes, husbands slack off from the efforts they’d previously made while wives wonder what the hell happened.

But does bringing up the subject help remedy the imbalance? Oh hell no.

So, as for why women gain weight after that wedding ring slips onto their fingers? Chances are it’s because they’ve since realized they already picked up 180ish pounds of dead weight, so what’s another 40 going to matter?

Today would have been Mr. Rogers’ 80th birthday.

To honor the gentle man who led so many of us as children to understand ourselves and our communities, March 20 is now Wear a Sweater Day.

In celebration of this event, Mr. McFeely (he of the Speedy Delivery service) has a special request:

“We’re asking everyone everywhere — from Pittsburgh to Paris — to wear their favorite sweater on that day,” he asks in his best speedy delivery voice. “It doesn’t have to have a zipper down the front like the one Mister Rogers wore on the program, it just has to be special to you.”

Wouldn’t you know that today it’s finally going to reach into the mid-60s here in Kansas where we’ve been shivering almost non-stop since early December? I’ll still be wearing my sweater, though. I was a big fan of Mr. Rogers as a kid, and both of my own children were, too.

Won’t you wear one, too?

We’ve been looking forward to viewing the total lunar eclipse tonight, the last until 2010. Unfortunately, it’s only 13°F outside — a temperature that’s far too chilly for us to remain outside for the event’s duration of 51 minutes.

Which is why I decided to find out if we’ll be able to see the eclipse from indoors, although we’ll no doubt pop outside for a short viewing:

1. I hopped online an looked up our latitude and longitude.

2. Then I typed that info in at Your Sky to find out where the moon would be when the eclipse began. (01:43 on 02212008 UTC.)

Turns out, if I open the curtains up we can watch the eclipse from right here on our sofa. Lazy? Perhaps. But at least we’ll be warm!

“Family Blames Iraq After Son Kills Wife” … “Soldier Charged With Murder Testifies About Postwar Stress” … “Iraq War Vets Suspected in Two Slayings, Crime Ring.”… 121 cases in which veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan committed a killing in this country, or were charged with one, after their return from war. In many of those cases, combat trauma and the stress of deployment - along with alcohol abuse, family discord and other attendant problems - appear to have set the stage for a tragedy that was part destruction, part self-destruction.

Murderers.

Drunks.

Wife beaters.

Scum.

That’s how the New York Times portrays the men and women returning from combat in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Those of us old enough to remember Vietnam will recognize the insulting, sorry chant.

The NY Times had previously gone out of its way to avoid taking an editorial stance recalling the days of anti-Vietnam protests. Oh, they ran articles claiming a parallel between the wars in Iraq and Vietnam but that, they say, was something the President himself proclaimed. They were not making a comparison themselves; they were just reporting all the news that’s fit to print, you know.

Until now.

Now, the Grey Lady has resurrected the ghostly voices who called Vietnam vets “baby killers”. Now, the NY Times wants to portray soldiers who answered the call of duty as somehow responsible for the war they fight.

The very same war that, just 6 years ago, all of the shocked and horrified, righteously outraged NY Times-reading, left-leaning, rainbow flag-waving Manhattanites virtually demanded we wage against Muslims overseas — preferably those in highly repressive states — to “pay them back” for 9/11.

So here we are, quite nearly four years later.

Now, the NY Times is tired of the war. (It’s not all “democracy, whiskey and sexy anymore, which is so dull when you’re trying to write headlines that make people want to buy a printed paper instead of getting their news online.) Now they want something that sparks outrage, anger… purchases.

Know what? I’m tired of the war, too. I’m tired of worrying whether the man-power shortage is so great that my M.I. husband might get called over there. I’m tired of worrying about whether Charlotte’s or Karen’s daughters will come home in one piece. I’m tired of wondering when (not if, but when) my friend Tony Baker will be back in the desert… by his own choice… and if he’ll make it home this time.

But here are two things I’m not tired of: my freedoms, which are more numerous and more lenient than any citizen of any other country on this planet, and the safety with which we all live every single blessed day because the war is being fought there where the people who want to kill us live, instead of here where we value freedom so much we even let newspapers publish things that just stir up rage.

When I read the NY Times articles vilifying our returning Vets I am disgusted. I am appalled. I am convinced by their own words that they want to torture logic and reason so they can relive the post-Vietnam experience. Why? Possibly because, like any middle aged grey lady, they want to relieve the “glory days”. Possibly that kind of anti-military fodder attracts readership, many of whom are as appalled as I am by their stance but want to read it with their own eyes and so their bean counters presume those purchases show agreement with what they print.

And possibly it’s because they’re just too lazy to do the math that bloggers like the folks at Winds of Change have done.

[T]he NY Times 121 murders represent about a 7.08/100,000 rate.

Now the numbers on deployed troops are probably high - fewer troops from 2001 - 2003; I’d love a better number if someone has it.

But for initial purposes, let’s call the rate 10/100,000, about 40% higher than the calculated one.

Now, how does that compare with the population as a whole?

Turning to the DoJ statistics, we see that the US offender rate for homicide in the 18 - 24 yo range is 26.5/100,000.For 25 - 34, it’s 13.5/100,000.

See the problem?

Instapundit did. So did Bruce Kesler.

I do. And I suck at math.

But at least I’m skilled enough to know that the $1.25 it costs each day to pick up the NY Times renders it the most expensive toilet paper I’ve ever heard of.

Wei Wenhua, a 41-year-old construction executive who also operated a blog in China, was beaten to death by city inspectors after he filmed their confrontation with villagers who protested the dumping of waste near their homes.

When Wei took out his cell phone to record the protest, more than 50 municipal inspectors turned on him, attacking him for five minutes, Xinhua said. Wei was dead on arrival at a Tianmen hospital, the report said.

One official has been fired over the incident.

Chinese news agencies are calling Wei Wenhua the first ‘citizen reporter’ to be killed while attempting to document a breaking news event.

Reporters Without Borders says Wei’s death exemplifies the lack of freedom within China.

“This tragedy shows how the Chinese authority flout freedom of expression every day. They go after anyone who might be ready to report something that is newsworthy.

Wei was attacked in his car by reportedly 50-100 members of the “chengguan”, a unit tasked with enforcing urban planning and administration and which Chinese citizens refer to as the parapolice due to their violent methods.

Even after Wei surrendered his phone, which he’d used to videotape the confrontation, the chengguan continued to beat him, according to the Shanghai Daily. One Chinese news service reports that over 100 people are being investigated in connection with the murder.

According to Radio Free Asia Unplugged there have been several similar beatings by the chengguan in recent months. In most situations the government has responded with a media ban concerning the conflicts.

In the wake of Wei’s death there has been a mass online protest from Chinese citizens, including Chinese bloggers defying governmental censorship.

Take your freedom to blog seriously, folks, and protest for those whose governments don’t grant them the freedom we have.

Growing up in California as I did, I always knew the “Big One” could strike at any moment. We joked about it a lot, as a matter of fact, although few people considered the possibility worthy of actually moving to somewhere more safe.

But, frankly, if I were still living in California I’d start wondering if maybe now’s the time to get out. It was bad enough with the droughts, and wild fires.

Last week’s earthquake in Northern California — right near my hometown, as a matter of fact — now has scientists worried that the “Big One” is just around the corner.

The largest earthquake to hit the San Francisco Bay area in nearly two decades struck last Tuesday with a magnitude of 5.6. This tremor, centered near San Jose, lasted half a minute and was felt as far away as Oregon.

No one was reported killed or hurt from the quake, but geological experts warn that it is a sign of much worse to come.

Tuesday’s quake “significantly increased the probability” of a detrimental earthquake coming from one or both of two nearby fault lines according to the California Earthquake Prediction Evaluation Council, a board that advises the state’s Office of Emergency Services on quake forecasts. Those faults are capable of producing a 7.0 magnitude earthquake or even higher, reports the Salinas Californian.

Seriously, if it were me I’d be looking into buying Arizona real estate and building myself a beach cabin… then just kicking back my heels and waiting for the Pacific Ocean to come to me.

What if there were a cure for cancer, or at least a way to slow its devastation, and one man stood between it and the world? That’s exactly what’s going on in the efforts to unravel the mystery of a plant grown in the Ecuadoran forest, known as ‘Bittersweet’ by locals who say it fights cancer, lupus and maybe even AIDS.

Scientists have been able to test an extract of the plant in vivo (meaning: on lab rats injected with cancerous cells who were then administered the plant extract). The results are phenomenal: half the rats never developed a tumor at all, while fewer tumors appeared in the treated rats (and grew more slowly) than in those not given the extract.

There’s only one problem: the Ecuadoran doctor who obtained a patent on the extract won’t identify the specific plant it comes from, and there are many in the area that share the same name. He also won’t say whether it grows wild or must be cultivated. So, rather than fast-tracking the substance as a possible cancer-fighting medication, researchers must instead spend time and money locating other compounds with similar chemical makeup in the hope of finding one that works just as well.

Ecuador’s “Bittersweet” isn’t the only plant that cancer patients are hoping proves capable of wiping out the deadly disease.

For over a century now, folk remedies have touted the marvels of a black cancer salve, based anecdotal reports claiming the key ingredient — usually bloodroot — “ate away” cancerous tumors and lesions. Now, aging Baby Boomers passing on their memories of grandma’s cures, are fueling renewed in “herbal” remedies like cansema black salve and other concoctions containing escharotic — corrosive — agents like zinc chloride.

Proponents of these salves, including one known as CanX claim a 97% true cure rate. But unlike the Ecuadoran plant extract, scientists haven’t been able to replicate these results with in vivo testing, and there are as many horror stories about disfiguring burns as there are claims about the balms’ curative effects.

Meanwhile, who knows how many disfigurations could be prevented, and cancer patients cured, if it weren’t for the greed of one man in Ecuador who seems to have forgotten his oath to share such knowledge as is his for the good of those who are to follow.

The next recipient of America’s highest civilian award, the Congressional Gold Medal: Tibet’s god-king, the Dalai Lama.

Not to be confused with the Congressional Medal of Honor (which is awarded to military personnel only), nomination for the Congressional Gold Medal requires support of 2/3 of the House and at least 67 Senators before a nominee is considered.

Although the first recipients included citizens who participated in the American Revolution, the War of 1812 and the Mexican War, Congress broadened the scope of the medal to include actors, authors, entertainers, musicians, pioneers in aeronautics and space, explorers, lifesavers, notables in science and medicine, athletes, humanitarians, public servants, and foreign recipients.

Past recipients include George Washington, John Paul Jones, Maj. Gen. Ulysses S. Grant, Charles Lindbergh, Robert Frost, Robert Kennedy, Rosa Parks and other historical notables.

Now, I don’t mean to disparage the holy man — I’ve enjoyed his writings and have quite a bit of admiration for him as a person. But therein lies the problem: my admiration is based on him as a human being, whereas he and his supporters claim that he is in fact a reincarnation of Avalokiteśvara, the bodhisattva of compassion.

Therein lies my problem.

Is the award going to the man who was born a Tibetan and became a monk, or is it going to the reincarnated entity — and aren’t the two inseparable?

Within one month from the day our family left Hawaii I found myself thinking twice of Summer Shipp, a woman I’d not seen since 1986.

The first time, it was because the flight attendant attendant introduced herself as Summer, and I hadn’t met anyone else in nearly 20 years with that name.

The second time, it was because I heard on the morning news that Summer Shipp was missing, and last seen while conducting a marketing survey in Independence.

For what would have been three years next month, the Friends of Summer — and I — have held out hope that she’d return home, safe and sound.

But that’s not going to happen.

Summer’s body was found in the Little Blue River in Independence, Missouri.

I’d tell you just how much that news rips me apart, but I’m not sure I could even find the words to describe the empty, ravaged feeling I have in the pit of my soul, that little part that still wants to believe in happy endings despite all the damn evidence in the world to the contrary.

My heart goes out to Summer’s daughter, Brandy — whom I last saw when she was still working through her rebellious teen years. This kind of discovery is no closure at all, but someday justice will be served.

I wish you the strength and the patience to see that day come.

Interesting news from NASA today about lightning striking the poles on Jupiter:

Images from a NASA probe have shown that lightning does occur at the poles on Jupiter, a phenomenon previously only seen on Earth, a study released Tuesday said.

Lightning strikes had previously been observed at lower latitudes and around the equator on the gas planet but the jagged bolts of electricity had never been observed at either of its two poles, puzzling astronomers.

Maybe it’s just me but the thought of “lightning” + “gas planet” seems a bit alarming, don’t you think? Kind of makes me wonder if Einstein was right when he said God does not play dice with the universe.

I don’t like to fly. It has nothing to do with a fear of, say, a large metal tube in which I’m captured suddenly plummeting out of the sky at thousands of miles per second in a headlong death-spiral doomed to end in a fiery explosion once it meets Earth. The way I see things, that sounds like a relatively painless way to go.

It’s the elbow-to-elbow confinement with the rest of the unwashed masses that I despise, the lack of any physical boundary or sound barrier between me and the yappy, gassy fat man who inevitably takes the seat next to mine. Most stewardesses flight attendants suck, too, but since they’re the only people who are legally allowed to ferry my alcohol in-flight, I match their plastic, insincere smiles with my own.

This was all so much easier to tolerate back in the good ol’ days when smoking was allowed on the plane. If I puffed away hard enough the smoke effectively masked the stench of the fat man’s flatulence. Plus, cigarettes gave me something to do with my hands besides restrain them from pushing the call button so the stewardess flight attendant could bring me more vodka.

Back then, I flew mostly sober.

These days if I fly anywhere alone you can bet I’ll be parked in the airport bar for a full hour before takeoff while I inoculate myself against hazardous spike in my blood pressure that’s triggered whenever I’m crammed elbow-to-elbow, knee-to-seat among a crowd of people with whom I want to have nothing in common aside from our destination.

In other words, by choice, I don’t fly much.

I simply can’t stand it, and until the airlines catch on to the link between “Air Rage” and packing people in like sardines, I don’t see a whole lot of voluntary air travel in my future, either.

Then again, Alaskan Airlines may make me change my mind. I can’t imagine there are a whole lot of people on one of their flights to begin with. Aside from salmon fishing and looking at snow — a lot of snow — there’s really not much to do in Alaska, is there? When you get on a flight bound for that kind of non-excitement, I imagine it’s mighty tempting to drink yourself into a stupor.

Which might explain why Alaska Airlines just announced it’s going to test satellite-based WiFi on one of its jets next spring. If it works well the company will expand satellite internet service to all of its 114 aircraft.

Granted, satellite internet is slower than the 6500 kb/s I’m used to at home, but there’s a lot to be said for the distraction provided by watching a page load. If nothing else, I can imagine restraining myself from pushing the button for the stewardess flight attendant to bring more booze because I wouldn’t want her (or him) to interrupt me the instant the page finished loading.

Frankly, I hope this catches on with other airlines. It’s high time they figure out ways to add more value into the whole miserable flight experience, particularly if they insist on charging a small country’s GDP for a GD miniature bottle of vodka.

I imagine such a move would be rather well-received among other folks, too, particularly those folks sick of the FCC’s ban of cell phones in-flight. If they’ve got a smart phone they’ll be able to carry on conversations using the plane’s satellite internet provider. Good luck to the stewardess flight attendants trying to figure out who’s using one of those and who’s from Europe where it’s perfectly legal.

Now if they’d only figure out a way to let me smoke on flights again, I might just start traveling more.

Did you watch the series premiere of Kid Nation last night — the show featuring 40 unsupervised kids trying to establish and run their own town?

I can’t bring myself to watch it. Call me close-minded if you will, but I refuse to support reality TV shows that turn childhood struggles into entertainment fodder for other folks. I don’t watch any of those Nanny-style shows for the same reason, and only caught a few minutes of Shaq’s show about fat kids by accident. That brief glimpse was enough to infuriate me, and I vowed to never watch anything like it again.

Oh, but I’ve heard plenty about it. It’s hard not to: Kid Nation is one of the most hyped shows on network TV these days, and critics are both panning and praising it. Says one:

There was a lot of disagreement and strife, and there were a number of moments — when a kid pulled a muscle, when they couldn’t figure out to cook pasta but were desperately hungry, when kids sobbed uncontrollably — that it seemed like an adult should step in. But then the kids figured out what to do, and even if the results weren’t perfect (the first-night’s dinner of macaroni and cheese did not look very appetizing at all), they made it work.

That’s supposed to be entertaining and “enlightening,” as one critic claims? It allegedly shows… just what, exactly?

That truly hungry children will eat just about anything?

That kids don’t instinctively know how to fend for themselves but will muddle through when they must?

That children can and will take care of themselves when adults abandon their responsibilities?

Louisiana Conservative says the show’s “genius” stems from the way it reminds viewers that children are more resourceful than we give them credit for. He wonders why people have a problem watching these kids when there are, in fact, so many adults around to keep an eye on things.

Perhaps that’s just the problem: adults watching children struggle then calling it “entertainment” sounds like little more than exploitation to me.

Faced with the need to increase its online advertising revenue, the New York Times stopped charging for access to parts of its website.

For two years, the paper has offered a subscription program, TimesSelect, that allowed access to columns and archives. (Access was free for print subscribers.) Only 227,000 felt the NYT was so irreplaceable as to be worth the $49.95 per year fee.

Times execs claim they’d always set their expectations low. Even so, they’d recently realized that the majority of visitors to their online site were arriving there from search engines only to find themselves denied access to search results. Plus — and here’s the truly surprising part — they finally figured out that people arriving via Google, for instance, weren’t going to pay to access an archived article.

Yes, folks, it’s the “DUH!” heard ’round the world.

The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again.

Robert Jordan, author of the Wheel of Time series, passed away Sunday. I read the news today. Oh, boy.

I have been a long-time fan of RJ’s blog at DragonMount, having been introduced to his series years ago by De Doc (who remains Strangely Silent of late). I enjoyed the books so much that I even sank money into the somewhat disappointing video game then loved it solely because it brought me one step closer to the fictional word he created.

Jordan had been battling amyloidosis, a progressive metabolic disease which causes protein deposits within organs. Since amyloidosis is incurable, Jordan has known for many years that his death was more imminent than most, and yet he battled against it with all of the ferocity and humanity of his fictional heroes, including some explorations into “experimental” remedies.

To say that the fantasy novel genre has lost one of its heroes is an understatement. The world lost one of its heroes, too. Jordan was more than an author of some damn fun reads: he was one of the good guys, too.

Born James Oliver Rigney, Jr., he did two tours in Vietnam, and earned the Distinguished Flying Cross with bronze oak leaf cluster, the Bronze Star with “V” and bronze oak leaf cluster, and two Vietnamese Gallantry Crosses with palm. He later received a degree in physics from The Citadel and worked for the U.S. Navy as a nuclear engineer.

He was also, as I’ve mentioned, the author of some damn fine reads.

Jordan’s family has asked fans not send flowers. Instead, they would like donations sent to help fund further research into finding a cure fore amyloidosis. Donations may be sent to:

James Rigney
Mayo Clinic Department of Hematology–Amyloidosis Research
200 First Street SW
Rochester, MN 55905

And thus the Wheel of Time turns. A legend has come to pass.

News keeps coming in about the pit bull who allegedly sodomized a toddler. As I’d previously written, Rhonda at StinkyJournalism.org had sent me additional information which indicated the dog may have been trained to mount humans.

Obviously, such training would point to heinous human criminal involvement and explains why the police had inquired about previous acts of aggression. Investigators contacted the dog’s previous owner, who’d had the dog as a puppy before it was taken in by the boy’s family. The owner said there was no prior history of aggression or even biting.

Although the investigation is ongoing, several questions have been repeatedly raised. Where were the boy’s parents at the time of the attack? How would a dog get a diaper off of a toddler without leaving bite marks? And, most of all, is the dog being accused of sodomy that was actually committed by a human?

Via Rhonda again comes this update which addresses many of those questions:

“We’re still plodding through it,” Lockport Police Detective Capt. Larry Eggert said.

Eggert said nothing incriminating was found in the results of DNA tests that were taken from the dog and from the boy.

“If it says dog DNA for both parties, it’s dog DNA, which is pretty much what we were expecting,” he said.

Women’s and Children’s Hospital of Buffalo will not release any information about the boy’s current condition or if he is still a patient there. He underwent surgery there when he was admitted on July 8, the day of the attack.

The boy’s mother told police he had just removed his own dirty diaper and asked her to change him. She said he went into the living room to get a clean diaper and was alone with the dog, a 2-year-old pit bull named Bear, for a matter of minutes when the attack occurred.

The mother heard the boy scream and walked in to see the dog sodomizing him, police said.

Eggert said at the time the boy suffered “some pretty significant injuries” and was expected to undergo reconstructive surgery.

So, while DNA tests rule out a human as the perpetrator of the sodomy, the test results do not rule out human culpability. And the mother certainly has a plausible explanation for why the child was not wearing a diaper at the time of the attack. She is, incidentally, still demanding that the dog — which remains in custody of the SPCA in Niagra County — be put down.

Many of you have left comments indicating that dogs do not act this way of their own accord. I am not a dog owner, but I’m familiar enough with the concept of the “alpha dog” and notions of “pack mentality” to wonder whether such territorial, instinctive behaviour could account for this kind of an attack.

Share your thoughts.

Via Rhonda at Stinky Journalism comes this not-so-surprising twist in the story of the “Pedophiliac Pit Bull”

The pit bull, a 2-year-old family pet named Bear, reportedly sodomized the toddler in a Washburn Street apartment on July 8. The boy remains at Women’s and Children’s Hospital in Buffalo, where he underwent surgery following the attack.

The dog is impounded at the Niagara County SPCA, where it will remain until the police investigation is finished.

Eggert said rumors about the family or the situation in the household have been flying, but not much has been substantiated.

“The way this case is going, nothing’s 100 percent anymore,” he said.

Investigators have reached out to the dog’s previous owner, who had the dog as a puppy before it was taken in by the family in question. The dog has no history of aggression or biting, Eggert said.

Rumors have spread about the dog possibly having been trained to mount humans, perhaps in connection with drug activity at the home, but nothing has been proven, he said.

Credit to the Venomites who smelled — long before I ever did — the stench surrounding this story. I admit I’ve got a bias against pit bulls. More on that some other day. But compound it with my bias in favor of kids and, well, it made for sloppy blogging. My bad.

More updates to follow as Rhonda keeps me informed.

Someone from Independence, Missouri — a town about an hour from where I live — is Missouri’s newest millionaire, thanks to the state lottery. Sad to say, that person is not me and, as of today, no one knows who they are.

Smart move, that.

Just ask the 8 lottery winners who lost their millions, which include one now living in a trailer (after blowing $5.4 million) and another, William “Bud” Post, who found out that $16.2 million just doesn’t go as far as it used to:

A former girlfriend successfully sued him for a share of his winnings. It wasn’t his only lawsuit. A brother was arrested for hiring a hit man to kill him, hoping to inherit a share of the winnings. Other siblings pestered him until he agreed to invest in a car business and a restaurant in Sarasota, Fla., — two ventures that brought no money back and further strained his relationship with his siblings.

Post even spent time in jail for firing a gun over the head of a bill collector. Within a year, he was $1 million in debt.

Post admitted he was both careless and foolish, trying to please his family. He eventually declared bankruptcy.

Now he lives quietly on $450 a month and food stamps.

I’ve always dreamed of winning the lottery. C’mon, who hasn’t, really? It’s a game VH and I love to play after, say, the third round of drinks: “How would you spend your winnings?”

My daydream always starts with something decidedly unglamorous: meeting with a financial planner and selling off my lump sum payment (an option I always choose because I’m not about to trust the lottery commission with my winnings, thankyouverymuch) and converting it into one of those structured settlements which, if wisely invested, can easily dwarf the total income received through lottery commission-generated annuities.

See, I’ve had a front-row seat for how easily fools and their money are parted. Back when I practiced law, a few of my clients won rather large verdicts and, sad to say, it was usually those least likely to use their heads when it comes to handling “life changing” money.

They’d hear they were getting $250,000 or more and you could see them mentally tallying all the crap they couldn’t wait to rush out and buy. Cars, designer clothes, new kitchen appliances, jewelry and “art,” quite often of the black velvet variety. Oh, I’d urge them to opt for structured settlements, but they wanted their money and they wanted it now.

Within months, three out of four had called to ask about filing bankruptcy.

Now, if you’ve done the math, you’re probably already thinking: “Hey, VK, three clients winning that kind of change, well, you weren’t doing too bad yourself. What happened, eh?” And you’ve got a point.

Let me just say this: there’s a reason I’d be meeting with a certified financial planner, just as there’s also a reason marital vows include the part about “for better or worse, for richer or poorer.” Just ask VH.

I am not a fan of pit bulls. I do not buy the argument that they’re inherently gentle dogs and that those from the breed which are associated with attacks on people can be traced back to bad owners. Sorry, but I’m all too aware of what inbreeding does to humans: witness, for instance, Charles II of Spain.

Disagree with my position if you will, but one thing I’m confident we’ll agree on: this dog needs to be put down.

Police are investigating an apparent sexual attack by a family pit bull on a two-year-old boy in Lockport. The boy is at Women and Children’s Hospital, News 4’s Lorey Schultz reports.

This two-year-old pit bull shows no signs of aggression, but it did on Sunday when it apparently sodomized a Lockport toddler.

Residents who live in the neighborhood where it happened are still talking about it.

One neighbor said, “You hear about dogs attacking children in horror films, but as far as in this community, it’s never happened.”

Police say the boy was sexually assaulted in his Washburn Street home by his family’s two-year-old pit bull, who had been with them since it was a puppy.

Lockport Police Detective Captain Larry Eggert said, “A little boy was home with his family, and the family pit bull actually sodomized the boy.”

Eggert told us the boy’s family members and neighbors had to beat the dog to get it off the child.

Although not bit during the attack, the child has had to undergo surgeries to repair the physical trauma. The boy’s family want the dog destroyed, but they’re not allowed to take such steps until behavioral experts brought in by the police finish investigating the cause of the attack.

Say, what?

Destroy. The. Dog. Now.

UPDATE: There may be a more sinister, human side to this story, according to the dog’s previous owners.

Between the toothpaste scare, the fake pharmaceuticals, the pet food contamination and unsafe seafood, China’s exports have been taking a beating this past year. Much of the problem was due to a government official on the take — to the tune of $830,000 in cash and gifts.

American officials tempted to similar misconduct might want to take note of China’s interesting solution to such governmental corruption: they executed the guy responsible and handed out sentences of 13 years to life for five others involved.

Personally, I’m just fine with that.