Bad Logo

As you all know, I'm a charitable sort of guy and like nothing more than to donate my time to worthy causes.

Recently, I had occasion to visit the Michael Jackson Burn Ward on the 1st floor of the Arlington Pediatric Center and took a picture of their logo.

Frankly, I think they could have done a better job.

My D-Day story

I know most of you have probably seen this picture many times before. It was taken by an Army photographer on June 5th 1944... right before our unit was due to drop behind the lines as part of the Normandy landings on D-Day.

But what you don't know is the real story behind the photo.

Well, I promised "Scratchy Lee"... he's the fellow standing to my left in front of Eisenhower wearing the number 23... that when he finally passed away, the truth would be told. Scratchy died yesterday at a VA hospital in McLean Virginia at the age of 91. His last words to me were "Let 'em know, boy!"

The night before the drop; Scratchy, me, and a guy we called Brooklyn Bob got into a mix-up at the Officer's Club at Biggin Hill outside of London. We had snuck in for a drink and everything was going fine until Brooklyn Bob started arguing with some Brit bar-tender over the proper way to spell "draft" beer. It seems Bob got confused when he saw it spelled "draught" behind the bar.

Next thing you know, Scratchy leaps over the bar and starts pounding on this poor bar-tender. Brooklyn and I are pulling Scratchy off the guy when the MPs show up. Now, Scratchy... who got his name because he always managed to pick up lice in the London brothels... is in no mood to let it go. He starts wailing on the MPs and before long the whole place is in an uproar. Bottles start flying everywhere...MPs are yelling to break it up... chairs and tables are getting thrown... it was a madhouse.

Turns out… Ike was upstairs with some floozy skirt and was highly distressed that the commotion was breaking his concentration. The next day, he lines us up on the airfield parade ground and this is when the photographer took the picture. Ike is looking at Scratchy and Brooklyn Bob saying "Look, you assholes. It's spelled D-R-A-U-G-H-T... get it?"

By the way... and this is the part Scratchy didn't want me to let on... the number 23 he's wearing is actually a haze that the platoon sergeant made him put on. It stands for the number of times we had to push Scratchy out of the plane to make him jump.

Anyway... now you know the story.

More Nonsense from our Elected "Leadership"

Just when you think it's safe to go outside...

The last week or so I've been basking in the afterglow of my victory in the war on crime here in Baltimore. As you know, since I started the "DIS-believe" campaign, the homicide rate has fallen from nearly one a day to almost zero. Thats right. Unless someone gets capped between now and the evening news... we will have had a week without some drug dealer or Greenmount Avenue "ho" catching one in the head.

And it's all thanks to me.

But now, it looks like I'm going to have to swing into action once again. The latest news from Baltimore City Mayor Sheila Dixon is that because Baltimore is in danger of sinking into the harbour under the weight of its own garbage... something needs to be done.

And that something is... get ready...

We're going to spend $2 million dollars on another ad campaign with the catchy slogan "Don't make excuses. Make a difference." That's right. You can expect the city to begin sprouting billboards to this effect.

Pardon my profanity but... My slogan would read something like "Baltimore is a Shitter because You Litter."

Personally I think my slogan would not only meet the target audience at a comfortable reading level... it would also raise awareness by garnering more press buzz.

The problem is they'll never use my idea... even after my success at ending crime downtown. Why? Couldn't tell you. I suspect somebody on the city council must have a brother-in-law working in an ad agency.

To recap the past effectiveness of Baltimore sloganeering... the "Baltimore: The City the Reads" campaign has left us with the third lowest graduation rate in the country. The "Believe" campaign, before I effectively ended it, gave us the distinction of having one of the nation's highest per capita murder rates.

So... going on our track record... the new anti-garbage sloganeering will have Baltimore knee-deep in trash by Christmas.

And you know what... if Dixon gets re-elected... which is a probability at this stage-- Baltimore will deserve everything it gets.

C'mon 'n DISBELIEVE, hon!

My anti-BELIEVE campaign has been underway for just under a month now... 29 days to be exact... and it has been an overwhelming success. The citizens of Baltimore have really gotten together behind my push to do away with the BELIEVE signs.

I've termed my campaign... the DIS-believe program because we're diss-ing the people that spent our tax dollars on such unmitigated drivel in the first place.

How do I know my DIS-Believe campaign is working?

Simple. Since the start of the DIS-Believe campaign on July 9th there have been only 4 homicides in Baltimore City. This is significantly below the city average of nearly one a day that the city was experiencing while it was BELIEVE-ing. It's so far below the average that the difference can't be passed off as a mere statistical anomaly.

My campaign is working.

So c'mon Baltimore. Let's all pitch in and make the city safe by DIS-Believing.

Brushing Your Teeth Could Be Hazardous to Your Health

Back in the 1980s the US Army awarded me the classification "Eleven Bravo". This classification meant that in case of war... as a combat infantryman I would be among the first to have the honor of laying down my life for the country. And in as much as I was not quite enamored at the prospect, I was careful to pay attention to world events so at least I'd know who was doing the shooting.

To this day I remember one Sergeant telling my squad that if we didn't shape up, the Army was going to drop us in between China and Vietnam (who were in the midst of a pretty nasty firefight at the time) and let both sides take shots at us. Being a pretty hep cat, I wasn't too worried about it because I thought the chances of my squad getting sent anywhere were small. So China missed its chance to have a go at one Private Russell.

Seems they've been having a go at me afterall. Those crafty Chinese have been selling fake Colgate toothpaste to us unwitting Americans. Not only is the toothpaste fake but it contains all kinds of pleasant chemical ingredients... like anti-freeze. Yuck. Just for kicks I thought I'd check to see if I had one of these fake tubes and ...sure enough, I did.

Before you freak out and start running for the medicine cabinet, in all fairness I didn't buy it here in the States. I bought my bogus Colgate in Australia. Still, it may be worth checking when you have a moment. The label is a tip-off. In addition to misspelled words, it won't have the official ADA seal.

So I've been brushing my teeth with fake-o Colgate. Sure, my teeth are white... but I've been poisoning myself for weeks.

On a positive note, I've noticed that I don't have any trouble getting started on cold mornings.

NEWS FLASH: This Just In.

The CNN Weather desk is reporting that massive flooding in Ireland is causing widespread panic.

(courtesy of Remise- our international correspondent)

Arrrrrrrrrgh....

Ahoy maties!!!!
Some of you land-lubbers might not know this... but before I became a Half-Back for the East German All Stars and shadowy international arms dealer... I did a few jobs off the coast of Tortuga. That's right... me, McNab and a bloke we called "Scruffy Frank" sailed the blustery trade winds astride the Spanish Main. I'd still be there today except an emergency appendectomy I performed with a cutlass on one of the crew didn't go so well and I got voted off the ship.

Well... not "voted" exactly.... more like chased.

It wasn't until years later that I got a call from Johnny Depp's agent out in Hollywood... seems Johnny was making a movie about pirates and he wanted to find out how he could be more like me. Naturally I was flattered... but I told him right up front that he could never be like me. However, if he was willingly to listen I'd take him aboard and try to show him a few things.

Although Johnny is a smart guy... he had difficulties getting the mannerisms right and we wound up working for weeks on it. In the meantime, I taught him a few words of English as well. (Many of you probably aren't aware of this but Johnny is actually Lithuanian and couldn't speak a lick of English when we set sail.)

He IS good at geometry though and figured out right away that the Bermuda Triangle is actually a tetrahedron. Except for the Miami day-boaters, cocaine runners, and UFO hunters we kept running into, the time we spent together on the high seas was very enjoyable.

In the end I agreed to let him portray me as a swashbuckling metro-sexual... but ONLY if I got a cut of the DVD sales and post-wrap residuals on the sequel.

He was happy with that... and the rest is history.

Daily Pook Contest

Ok gang...

For the next week or so... depending entirely on the level of response... the Daily Pook is running a "Creative Caption" contest.

Your mission is to come up with a creative caption (duh!) for the following image. I'll post of a few of my own to get things going.



1. "Ya know, Fritz. I think I prefer goose-stepping to break-dancing."

2. "Not much fun in Stalingrad... no"

3. "Otto is our resident mine detector."

4. "For my next trick... I'm going to rap to Deutschland Uber Alles."


Now it's your turn, people!

Proud Father

Just as a matter of personal interest, I began harvesting my crops this morning.

Yes... my backyard Victory garden has begun to produce food. So if the Germans start torpedoing our supply ships again... I'm ready. I gots food for the masses.

Well... actually there's not enough for the masses-- just a few sorry looking green beans, but y'know... I grew 'em myself.

And there's a certain satisfaction that comes from growing your own beans... just ask any bean grower.

Next year, I hope to convince Betty to allow me to raise cattle. In the meantime, I'm trying to talk the Pook into letting me keep a Pot-bellied Pig as a house-pet.

They're so cute!

And great for sandwiches...

Baltimore's BELIEVE campaign -- $2 Million Later and It's 1984 All Over

As most of you know, I recently returned to Baltimore after a 15 year hiatus in the Outreamer (California, Vegas, Texas, Oregon, Australia, etc). It seems I began to miss things like rampant crime, soaring murder statistics, teenage pregnacies, single parent families, streets awash with drugs, illiteracy, racial vitriole, public housing neighborhoods buried in trash, and well worn paths to welfare -- all things that Baltimore has become famous for over the years.

In an effort to combat these seemingly systemic problems, years ago Baltimore's leadership came up with effective slogans-- like BALTIMORE: The City That Reads; a moniker that was quickly lampooned. BALTIMORE: The City That Bleeds or better yet; Baltimore: The City That Breeds. When this didn't work, Baltimore became Charm City; although one can be forgiven for not seeing the charm in Charm City. Baltimore: HARM City is probably more apt since your chances of being harmed are so much greater than being charmed-- as reflected by Baltimore's own police data.

Baltimore's latest bit of sloganeering is the somewhat nebulous BELIEVE campaign... complete with it's own website no less.

This whole BELIEVE thing really struck a raw nerve with me... and maybe it's just me. On the way downtown this morning, I passed dozens of blinking blue camera set ups aimed at the street to keep watch over us. Each one had the word BELIEVE on it. It was positively creepy.

Forget for a moment that some advertising company was paid $2 million for it's trouble... it smacks of Orwell's 1984.

Work.
Consume.
Obey.

and yes... BELIEVE!

I, for one, don't enjoy being watched as I go about my daily affairs by some quasi-governmental intrusion telling me to BELIEVE. What exactly am I to BELIEVE... more of their bullshit??? Honestly, this whole concept of "If I believe something hard enough... it'll become reality" has a Kumbayah aspect to it that makes me suspect the BELIEVE campaign had a liberal-democrat origination.

Whoa.... I was right.

What a shocker!

Despite the claims on the BELIEVE campaign website... we're not doing any better than we were in 2002. Baltimore still leads the nation in murders, although Detroit sometimes bumps us to #2 occasionally. And while I think we're no longer #1 in teen pregnancies and single parent households, this is only because our crack-adled youths are less able to procreate. The Dems were running things then... and they're still running things today. That's progress for you.

I hate getting political because that's not what this blog is all about... but I have to say that if you went to some hard-bitten Republican fat-cat asking for $2 million for this drivel you'd get thrown out of his office. He'd much rather use the $2 million to level some old-growth forest to make way for a Walmart.

As if one word could turn things around...

It's positively criminal that someone in city planning gave the okay for this campaign. Like the citizens of Baltimore need to be accosted by this piece of Big Brother nonsense in order to make a better life.

Well.. if one word would do the trick... my campaign for Baltimore would be much simpler and less ambiguous... STOP.

Stop doing drugs.
Stop committing crimes.
Stop killing one another.
Stop having babies at age 13.
Stop throwing trash on the street.
Stop regarding social services as a substitute for fatherhood.
Stop regarding Welfare as a substitute for employment.

and STOP thinking my tax dollars exist solely to subsidize and enable your dysfunctional lifestyles.

In short... BEHAVE



Good job, Baltimore. George Orwell would be proud. Millions out the window and nothing to show for it except these silly BELIEVE stickers.

I better stop... Big Brother is Watching!

More on Baltimore's attempts at urban fantasy:
http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0105/p20s01-lihc.html