Once again, I'm cheating and starting before I go to bed...

because I have to leave early in the morning.  The wonderful and brilliant V.A. had scheduled me for an appointment on Monday morning, which I was going to have to reschedule.  But they called me first on Tuesday of this week and let me know my appointment was cancelled and I needed to call to get re-scheduled for Friday the 7th.  It took two days to get a call back and my choices were basically be there tomorrow at 8:15, or wait weeks and weeks for a new appointment.  I'm going to be there at 8:15.

So I won't have my normal writing time in the a.m. and I need to get used to that anyway.  I'm going to be taking classes starting next week to renew my certification to prepare income tax returns.  That means getting up earlier, walking earlier and eating earlier in order to get to the Santa Monica classroom by 9 a.m. 

I'd ordered a DVD of a movie I really like, and it arrived today.  It was disappointing.  The movie was good.  But the DVD stopped, froze, skipped and generally didn't deliver an enjoyable viewing.  However, knowing the movie as well as I do, I just rolled with it and did my best to enjoy Richard Burton, Richard Harris, Stewart Granger, Roger Moore and Hardy Kruger in "The Wild Geese".  There were seven other movies included on the DVD, but I'm not in a big hurry to watch them.

I had no interest in watching any of the DNC speeches.  In fact, aside from highlights shown on newscasts, I didn't watch an instant of either convention.  Don't feel like I missed anything either.  The conventions are a waste of taxpayer money (yes, taxpayer money is used to help pay for these excessive displays of partisanship) and the party platforms don't represent what the majority of the delegates believe anyway.  Jerusalem as the capitol of Israel?  The UN hasn't been willing to recognize that from the day Israel became a nation.  I doubt the Obama administration will change that official policy even if re-elected.  But with the new jobs numbers just out, the changes of President Obama being re-elected don't look nearly as good as they did yesterday.

This isn't "in the headlines", so I can talk about Kardashians and this morning, Kris Jenner is on my mind again.  She's calling the mother of "Honey Boo Boo" a bad mother.  Talk about the pot calling the kettle black.  Both Jenner and June Shannon (the mother of Honey Boo Boo) exploit the daylights out of their daughters.  Both claim to have their daughter's welfare at heart, but have no problem enjoying the wealth, power and prestige that come from how they exploit their daughters.  Both have seriously compromised value systems.  Pot, meet kettle.  Kettle, meet pot.

A Japanese man has been caught having stolen over 1,100 library books.  Brings back memories of an author, Gustav Hasford.  If the name isn't familiar, the name of his best known novel probably won't be either.  "The Short-Timers" was a semi-autobiographical novel about his experiences during the Vietnam war.  But if I mention the film, "Full Metal Jacket" that was made based on his novel, then you might recognize it.  It remains one of the finest films on the Vietnam war ever made.  Hasford, after the success of the film based on his book, and just before the Academy Award ceremony where Hasford was a co-nominee for the screenplay, he was arrested for having stolen over 10,000 library books.  He claimed he'd taken them for researching a book on the Civil War that he never published.

Gotta love the comments on the story about the Japanese man who took the books.  "Throw the book at him".  "Open and shut case".  "Jail will give him time to read the books".  "This speaks volumes about his character."  "Books?  Can I get those on my Kindle?" 

In-and-Out Burger, which is a family owned company, is being sued for hiring discrimination.  The lawsuit, filed on behalf of two Oakland residents claims that the chain doesn't hire many blacks, or people over 40.  Interesting factoid is that the starting wage at In-and-Out is $10 per hour, much higher than the California minimum wage.  Full-time employees get benefits packages.  As a result, the firm's turnover rate among its employees is half the industry average.

Ann Coulter is, under normal circumstances, a very intelligent woman.  But when she tweets dumb things like "Bill Clinton just impregnated Sandra Fluke backstage...", it definitely calls her intellect and common sense into question.  Maybe it was a blonde moment?  Naw.  Reminds me of a joke though.  Why did the blonde have a sore belly button?  Because she had a blonde boyfriend.

The biggest boost to the economy from the DNC may have been to the cosmetics industry, as demand for the nail polish Michelle Obama was wearing has skyrocketed.

There's a video you can find, of a young girl who was about to get a baseball as a souvenier at a baseball game when a rude adult fan stepped in front of her and intercepted the ball that had been tossed to her by a player.  The story ends happily, as she ended up with two baseballs and a TV interview before the night was over.  But the rude fan escaped scrutiny.  Whoever he is, he should be the subject of scorn and ridicule for taking something from a kid.