Myrtle Fargate Dies

Eileen Herlie.

I've been a big fan of All My Children over the years. Not so much these days; I only see 10 to 15 minutes a day. But over the years I watched it pretty faithfully.

Myrtle Fargate, the lady who played her, passed on, at the age of 90.

Myrtle has to be one of the most beloved characters on the show. An ex-carny, she knew all the ropes in dealing with people, making friends of good and bad people alike, and always held her own.

Myrtle had a boarding house, which allowed a lot of interaction with the various characters as they moved into town.

The storyline that I remember earliest in my time of watching the show involved Langley Wallingford, who Myrtle knew from their carny days. He was a pretend professor and married into money with Phoebe Tyler. His real name wasn't Langley, but a much less classy, Lenny. I can't remember the details of how it worked out, but they had some great scenes together.

The strangest storyline involving Myrtle that comes to mind was when she had a kind of romantic relationship with a guy named Red, who turned out to be Kris Kringle, Santa Claus!

Everyone loved her, that's for sure. And she even had a kind of playful sexuality (not consummated of course) going with younger men, who treated her as a very knowing equal, kind of a partner, like an appreciated broad. One man that comes to mind, Zack Slater. She also acted as a trusted confidante in many many scenes.

I always loved seeing Myrtle Fargate whenever she was on.

Jesus' Return in 1988

I meant to have a really good internet observation of the 20th anniversary of Jesus' return in 1988, as predicted by Edgar Whisenant.

I remembered it was September 1988 but didn't have the dates clearly in mind after all this time. Now I look at Wikipedia and the dates were between Sept. 11 and Sept. 13.

I do remember this part, that he had a book (two books combined), 88 Reasons Why the Rapture Could Be in 1988 and On Borrowed Time. I am virtually 100% sure that there was an edition of the book that didn't have the word "Could" in the title but a more definite word, which I think was "Will." What other options could there be that would be definite?

They have a quote by Whisenant that I also remember, at least a variation of it: "Only if the Bible is in error am I wrong; and I say that to every preacher in town."



I went to one of his meetings in 1988. And I have tapes of several of his radio shows that were broadcast on KAAY radio from Little Rock, Arkansas. My collection is a hodge podge and I don't have them catalogued well. The shows were repeated from time to time, so what dates they were presented is unknown to me. He wrote another book after the Lord's coming didn't happen in '88, predicting it for '89, basing this revised theory on the fact that he felt he was mistaken in having considered the year 0 an actual year, or something like that. In other words he was off by a year, making '89 the true year. This book had a title something like "The Midnight Call" or "Midnight Cry," just going by memory.

His co-host on the show was named Greg Brewer. So ... 20 years have passed. And Jesus still hasn't come. Wikipedia says Edgar died in 2001.

It is up to D.B. Kundalini to end the war

OK, I hereby end it. Done.

The headline is the headline of an email I got, putting the ending of the war right in my personal lap. I like that, being a man of responsibility and action. I really don't mind. If it is up to me, I will end it, and herewith do end it.

But then the body of the letter isn't specifically on my personal power to accomplish this task. It says, "Our leaders in Washington aren't going to end the War in Iraq unless we make them." So there's a "we" that need to make the "leaders" end the War.

Then it goes on to tell me that knocking on 5 doors or 50 will have something to do with this.

Signed, Democracy for America.

Cindy McCain

In the spirit of Cindy McCain's speech, I will try to type this post very slowly, very deliberately, with a good helping of lethargy. If I can draw it out, make it fairly dreary, and even stilted, I will know that I captured the sense of her presentation. But it's hard to do, since I've been a pretty good touch typist since 8th grade.

For the first time for me, she really looked like another Cindy, Cindy Brady. That was distracting to me, because I was thinking of the Brady Bunch most of the way through.

Besides that, the difference between Cindy's soft-focus, cliche-packed presentation and Gov. Palin's was stark. The crowd was into it, of course, but you couldn't say she blew the roof off the place, or she hit it out of the park. She hit a pleasant double and finally stood on base without scoring. She even used the baseball metaphor, about her husband, saying, "I hit a home run with John McCain," in snagging him away from his first wife. That's what I was thinking of, then as well when she got into his honesty and integrity and in what a superlative father he's been. I suppose if you have enough families you eventually get it right!

For the most part, it was a thoroughly Republican presentation. Puffy, bloated, riddled with chromosome-challenged moments.

Getting a Urine Sample from a Dog

Have you ever tried to get a urine sample from a dog? It's very hard.

Our dog was sick one time and the vet said to bring in a urine sample. So you take the dog out, and it's unpredictable when she's going to pee. You're there with a little plate, trying your best not to freak the dog out, who of course has no idea what's going on.

Then when she drops down to pee, you can't see what's going on down there because of the overhanging fur, so you try to shove the plate in, further confusing the dog who instantly quits peeing.

By now she's looking at you with a mixture of confusion and distrust. "Are you angry at me for some reason?" she's wondering. So you say, "Good girl, everything's good." Finally you win back her trust long enough for her to try to pee, and you shove in the plate, which this time comes up with a dribble, probably not enough.

Your temper is rising because we could be doing this all day, squat and shove in the plate, and it's not going well. The more you do it, the harder it is.

Finally we got several more dribbles, enough for a microscope, I guessed. And the vet said that was enough. Good job.

A Snake

My dog and I saw a snake today when we went for a walk at the park. This is the first time I've ever seen a snake there. It's a "freak out" moment when you look down and see one.

It happened like this. The dog was a little ways ahead of me and I saw her jump funny, and I immediately thought that might indicate a snake. But when I got there there wasn't a snake. So I thought she must have been freaked out by something that she wasn't expecting, like if she hit a stick with her back leg or something.

And then we walked on another 10 feet and 15 seconds later, the dog jumped again real funny and I looked down and jumped too! There was a snake. It was wriggling, but then came to a stop and was just looking up. I was able to snap the picture.

I'm thinking that the first time she jumped that there must have been a snake that time, too, going into a hole, which would explain why I didn't see it.

That is such a weird thing to see, freaking out both man and dog. Something very primal going on there.

Carter: McCain "Milking" POW Story

Jimmy Carter is a wise, wise man. He declares that McCain has been "milking every possible drop of advantage" from his time as a POW.

This has been obvious, but it's great to hear someone as wise as Carter saying it.

On the other hand, think of McCain. He had 5½ years when he wasn't able to milk things, so maybe he does have a right to milk it now.

But as for the benefits McCain's getting from the story, let him milk it because that old teat's going dry!

Overheard Retail Grousing

Walking out of a hardware store, overheard comments, someone grousing like this, "Have a nice day." The other wondering why she said that. Because, she says, I was in retailing myself, and a checkout person is supposed to say, "Have a nice day." Apparently the checkout person didn't say it, and this was a cause for some mild anger.

Not Rich Till $5 Million Income

Here's our first kick rating. We could pick no better (worse) a recipient than the always deserving John McCain.

We're going to be merciful on this one because there was an element of joking in his answer. But he probably deserves an extra kick simply because of all the joking, since these are serious issues and serious issues ought to be addressed once in a while in a serious way. We're quite sick of McCain joking about everything. When does the guy get serious? Oh yeah, when Georgia's in trouble. But if America's in trouble, he's nothing but laughs.

Yet mercy shall prevail on this, our first kick rating. McCain, in a question on who's rich, expressed his opinion that you need an income of $5 million to be considered rich in America. So $4 million wouldn't qualify.

OK, how can the average guy relate to McCain, since we all know average incomes are well below $2 million a year? With an answer like this, McCain shows himself to be an out of touch elitist. For that reason, we approach McCain's wrinkly butt and swiftly apply three well deserved kicks. Count them as the foot makes contact with his bottom: 1 - 2 - 3. Not one over, not one under. Justice deserved, justice served.

The Leg's Still Kickin'

What I need is a blog gimmick. Such as with Boy Leg, obviously the gimmick could relate to kicking. Put up a story that's outrageous, such as McCain questioning Obama's patriotism. That gets five kicks. The big difference with stars is that the more stars you get the better it is, but the more kicks you get the worse it is.

Kicking, that's about all I can think of relating to legs. To "knee" someone is a little farfetched. You can't give someone five knees to the groin. One, it's very limiting, and even though five knees to the groin would hurt anyone, it's more gender specific as to who would receive the most damage.

The downside of a kicking gimmick is that what if it was a story that wasn't outrageous, something to criticize. To give them one kick is still a negative response. But what response could a leg give that would be positive? If you went with 'playing footsie' that's getting away from the overall theme.

It could be -- and would likely to have to be -- that the kicks are reserved only for outrageous things deserving a kick. But that puts me in one major rut, in that everything I judge would have to be negatively rated.