I'm going to miss him so

Da Mare, of course. There are some who underestimated him, at their own peril, of course, because he appeared so unpolished. They seldom made that mistake twice.

My favorite in this montage is his assessment of Rod Blagojevich, which was, "cuckoo."

I'm stylin'

Today I'm wearing my new Old Navy cardigan for the first time, with a white t-shirt and a pair of dark wash jeans (also Old Navy). I love it because I got it on sale for less than $20, and because I know I can pair it with a black t-shirt and slacks and wear it when I present to the client. To borrow from the Lads, "And you know that can't be bad."

Like iron filings to a magnet

That's an apt description of how strongly crazies seem, at times, to be drawn to this humble little blog. Take yesterday, for example.

Back in January, 9 months ago, I did an impassioned post about convicted double murderer Betty Broderick. I wrote it that day because this woman was top of mind due to her parole hearing. I presented her story as I saw it -- including the undisputed fact that she shot her ex-husband and his new wife five times as they slept in their own bed, in their own house, before dawn on a Sunday morning. In case I wasn't fair or balanced in my depiction of this homicidal sociopath, I included this link to CNN for their coverage of the parole hearing.

Yesterday, out of the blue, I got a pedantic little comment on my post from a complete stranger, who somehow felt that a sunny September day was the appropriate time to tell me that "emotion (sic) abuse is very real" and that, "People should not judge someone till they have walked in their shoes."

Now, really, if you are a regular reader of this blog, you know I don't need to be told that emotional abuse is real. How pretentious, offensive and intrusive of her!

She not only came back and commented again, she devoted a post on her own blog to our exchange! She wrote that, with her own fearless stand defending this murderer, she knows she can expect "nasty messages from crazy, unreasonable people." Huh? What? I suppose that if you troll the internet and leave clueless, unsolicited comments for strangers, then I guess you can expect messages. I hardly see her as the victim of our exchange.

In fact, I don't see any victims of our exchange. I just composed this post because I have heard many of you say you wish you got more comments on your own blogs. Read this post, and then be careful what you wish for! (And Heather, you really don't need to leave yet another comment explaining your Betty-as-victim stance, either. I'm not interested in pursuing a correspondence with you.)

WARNING: Before you visit her to read about how "unglued" I became yesterday, you should know her blog is called "A Betty Broderick Obsession." It's certainly your right to check her post about me, as well as our our exchange on my January post, but I wonder about directing you all to a blog devoted to an angry woman who killed her ex-husband and his bride rather than just let the poor bastard go. I included the link to be fair to my new buddy, Heather, but you may feel life is too short to immerse yourselves in such a dark obsession.

Where is he today?

Crazy Old Neighbor, that is.

A comment on yesterday's post from Vivian has inspired me to actually articulate this tragedy in terms of my personal faith. Of course I'm not contradicting Vivian, I'm just putting my beliefs into words because language is my best friend when I'm trying to work through confusing stuff like this.

Crazy Old Neighbor is in Heaven, I have no doubts about that. Now that he's back with God, he's restored to the person he was when he was at his best. ("Even if," my friend Kathleen said, "that means he'll be 3 years old for eternity.")

There's plenty of evidence of his racism and misogyny. He was certainly hateful of his neighbors. He had no job anymore, his finances were fragile, and he had no family. He could not have been happy in the life he was living.

But even though he wasn't living his life in God's design, he was still God's child. Now that he's back with his Father, I believe Crazy Old Neighbor has finally found the serenity that escaped him in life.