A.G.E's Joint

  The mass of men lead  Lives of quiet desperation They rise in the morning Work or not Interact or not Complain it is The longest day They rage to the Lord Over a lot with no control Not knowing whether They matter or not He cares or not Assuming the best Fearing the worst And in when it is all over They look to the heavens For one last time Is it true or not Is it light or not It is not the worst It truly is the best.  ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Topic-Michele Marko King Pic Christine Wichman Pic Guesses: Bath time, Bubbly, I am the queen, wet, kitty cleans, relax

Marty comes into the office after a couple of days at Lake of the Fires. On his desk in a note from Beezelbub. He needs the 144-K numbers yesterday. It's nice to be wanted. He pulls the ash covered laptop and powers up...then sigs. 225 new messages, mostly spam. That's all it was good for these days. Everything truly business-related went to Slack or Skype. Quickly scanning the subject lines, he marks them for deletion ten at a time. He would have selected all, but the last time he did he missed a meeting invite disguised as a dating site. On his third set, one caught his attention" "It Could Have Been YOU!, highlighted in yellow"  Ooh. Clickbait. Probably some diamond level multilevel market guru on our payroll revealing the secret to wealth. Yeah, I'm already there. Not interested. He clicked the deletion box. It wouldn't stay clicked. Instead, a pop-up box said he must open it. Oh, great. Malware. I wonder how that got over the firewall.  It was going ...

 Hey, heidy and howdy! It's your old friend Harry Handy. You probably have wondered what the hell happened to me all these years. Well, it seems when you run an internet radio blog from the great beyond, you get in trouble with the corporate rights holders to the music. I've been silenced by the Borg. UMG music group took over WOFT.  But that's OK. Talk Radio is still good. I mean Stern has milked this format for years. And the political hacks... But I digress. I've missed all you Geritol guys and gals. Under the terms of my sent...er...settlement, I can't link music anymore. What's that you say? "Harry, what's the point of a radio blog if you can't play music?" It's a way to still stick to the man. This is do or die. What I am going to do is describe some of the things I wish I could link. Like the Finnish Rap Group "Cheers for Beers." It's a crappy four-channel animation with the typical theme of getting the girl in bed (pre...

The assistant opened the door and waved me in. It was a small office. Hospital white walls glowed with sunlight. A black leather couch with plain, square arms sat along the far wall, The back was high enough to shade the incoming light from the window behind. Where the magic happens, I guess. A side chair was to my right, I guess that's where the doctor sits. At the last office, the chairs were facing each other. I wonder if there's coffee? My eyes feel like they are going to fall into my head Maybe if I lie down. No. Mom always said first impressions were important and I don't want to appear weak. I take a seat. To me, this was all a highway to nowhere. It isn't that I've lost my edge. Everyone else has. But something had to be done, I guess. Three jobs in three years because I didn't fit. The last firing turned ugly. The judge gave me the choice of this or jail. But it didn't mean he had to like it. T he first session at the hospital felt like a police in...

A special day Eighty years You've gotten the last laugh Over all the other characters Only for our entertainment Every illusion, trick, and subterfuge Sab-o-taj-ee You wouldn't be made today You'd never come out of committee They'd say "Think of the Children" But to the kids who have grown old You are the rebel in all of us. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Pic-Dave Schrader Pic guesses-Curio shop, Greengrocer, eat your greens, antique, curio shop, old times, antique

"Ow." Billy winced as the piece of floss stuck between his teeth. The dental pick snagged the offending string. The gums aren't bleeding, at least. One last inspection. No zits, good. They can be fixed with a little foundation, but people need to look at the whole package. What else could happen this morning? First, he slept through the alarm, then spilled his coffee all over his pajamas. He thought about going back to bed until the car horn outside brought him back to his senses. He couldn't do that.  This was the biggest audition in his life. He could hear his mom's voice berating him as he bolted out the door and onto the sidewalk. The voice telling him how useless he was. Why couldn't he just get a factory job and meet a girl? She never did understand acting. He could play out fantasies and be the rich, important man he wasn't. This new gig was the ticket to his dream job, being a working actor.  In the two years he'd been in The Bronx, he figured ...

It's a writer's choice week and I'm going with a rant.  In the last several weeks the news has been filled with rioting and what not. Many of the aggrieved folks... Nah. We don't need to hear my blathering about statues being graven images and false idols. There's already way too much of that out there.  Instead ow about another story from my work past.  For several years in the 90s, I worked for the agency that provided mental health services for the state of Georgia as a payroll supervisor. It was a fast-paced, challenge with an employee base ranging from janitors to doctors. Among the places we serviced were full-time mental hospitals. One of the facilities I worked with was called The Georgia Mental Health Institute or GMHI, located a few miles from my office in Atlanta. You'll recognize the campus if you are a fan of the series " Stranger Things ". This is the set. At the time I was working, it was one of the smaller units in the system, with 600 ...