In my Montreal hotel room

there might be something better than watching “King Of The Hill” in french…But I’ll be damned if I know what it is.

The Second Coming

The other night over drinks at my favorite cafe my friend fired out a great quote.
We were discussing movies, politics, sociology, and of course…women that walked by as we sat outside on the sidewalk. It was a great conversation which happens frequently at my little cafe. I feel like this poem, which he quoted verbatim to the full moon summer night sky, is very important. It seems to address many of my feelings and anxieties. It seems to address current events. It is, as they say, where I’m at.

THE SECOND COMING
W.B. Yeats

“Turning and turning in the widening gyre
The falcon cannot hear the falconer;
Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold;
Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world,
The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere
The ceremony of innocence is drowned;
The best lack all conviction, while the worst
Are full of passionate intensity.
Surely some revelation is at hand;
Surely the Second Coming is at hand.
The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out
When a vast image out of Spritus Mundi
Troubles my sight: somewhere in the sands of the desert
A shape with lion body and the head of a man,
A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,
Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it
Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds.
The darkness drops again; but now I know
That twenty centuries of stony sleep
were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,
And what rough beast, its hour come round at last,
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born?”

FUBAR PTSD WTF RIP

Iraq Vet in Famous Press Photo Dies from Overdose

By Greg Mitchell and The Associated Press

Published: July 04, 2008 9:50 PM ET
PINEHURST, N.C. A former Army medic made famous by a photograph that showed him carrying an injured Iraqi boy during the first week of the war has died of an apparent overdose, police said.

Joseph Patrick Dwyer died last week at a hospital in Pinehurst, according to the Boles Funeral Home. He was 31.

The photograph, taken in March 2003, showed Dwyer running to a makeshift military hospital while cradling the boy. The photo appeared in newspapers, magazines and television broadcasts worldwide, making Dwyer became a symbol of heroism.

Dwyer laughed when a reporter told him of the photo and its widespread circulation, and he tried to deflect focus to his entire unit. His mother, Maureen, said then that the photo embarrassed her son because it singled him out while other soldiers were doing the same thing.

Last week, Dwyer called a local taxi service to take him to the hospital after an apparent overdose, Capt. Floyd Thomas of the Pinehurst Police Department told the Fayetteville Observer. When the driver arrived, Dwyer said he couldn’t get to the door, according to a police report.

Police kicked in the door at Dwyer’s request, and he was taken by ambulance to a Pinehurst hospital. Thomas said bottles of prescription pills were found near Dwyer when police arrived. The former medic died later the night of June 28, according to authorities.

Dwyer served with the 3rd Squadron of the 7th Cavalry Regiment of Fort Stewart, Ga. He earned the Combat Medical Badge and other military awards.

His mother said the military could have done more to help with post-traumatic stress. “He just couldn’t get over the war,” Maureen Dwyer said. “He just couldn’t do it. Just wasn’t Joseph. Joseph never came home.”

His wife, Matina, said: “He was just never the same when he came back, because of all the things he saw. … He tried to seek treatment, but it didn’t work.”

She told a reporter that she hoped that her husband’s death would bring more attention to PTSD issues.

Kelly Kennedy, who has won wide praise for her coverage of the war and problems faced by returning soldiers, added details in her account for Military Times. An excerpt follows.
*
For the medic who cared for the wounds of his combat buddies as they pushed toward Baghdad, the battle for his own health proved too much to bear.

On June 28, Dwyer, 31, died of an accidental overdose in his home in Pinehurst, N.C., after years of struggling with post-traumatic stress disorder. During that time, his marriage fell apart as he spiraled into substance abuse and depression. He found himself constantly struggling with law, even as friends, Veterans Affairs personnel and the Army tried to help him.

“Of course he was looked on as a hero here,” said Capt. Floyd Thomas of the Pinehurst Police Department. Still, “we’ve been dealing with him for over a year.”

The day he died, Dwyer apparently took pills and inhaled the fumes of an aerosol can in an act known as “huffing.” Thomas said Dwyer then called a taxi company for a ride to the hospital…

When he returned from war after three months in Iraq, he developed the classic, treatable symptoms of PTSD. like so many other combat vets, he didn’t seek help. In restaurants, he sat with his back to the wall. He avoided crowds. He stayed away from friends. He abused inhalants, he told Newsday. In 2005, he and his family talked with Newsday to try to help other service members who might need help. He talked with the paper from a psychiatric ward at Fort Bliss, Texas, where he was committed after his first run-in with the police.

In October 2005, he thought there were Iraqis outside his window in El Paso, Texas. When he heard a noise, he started shooting. Three hours later, police enticed him to come out and no one was injured.
*
Greg Mitchell’s new book includes several chapters on the plight of Iraq vets. It is “So Wrong for So Long: How the Press, the Pundits — and the President — Failed on Iraq.”

Greg Mitchell and The Associated Press

John Morello Featured in NY Times This Sunday

Go here to see the article.

Did I mention it was in the NEW YORK TIMES?

down by the river

Today I had the day off and went for a bike ride.
I was having a heavenly moment taking in the sun and the river and the people!
I love my city so much!

I was having the greatest day and then my best friend called. You would think the day would get even better…right?
WRONG! my friend proceeds to tell me about how he witnessed a beautiful young deer get killed.
“Dude…It really makes you think?!”
“Yeah…Man…It sure does…Well. I gotta go.”

thanks mike

Anyway heres some pics

patreatizm rulz!

her rally later fell completely apart when she was asked to lead the crowd in the chant of “U-S-A!”

Derby outcome

Pick 1: Last place
Pick 2: DEAD!

Derby Picks 2008

I have studied the horses and I’m telling you one of these horses will win the derby. They are both not favored to win and would pay well if one was to wager.

I am choosing the philly #5 Eight Belles at 20-1 or #14 Monba at 15-1. Monba is a strong horse and my sentimental favorite. I used to go to the track with my Dad and my uncle every now and then and we always rooted for the grey or roan horse. To this day I always bet the grey horse. Something about the George Harrison fan in me or perhaps the way I always root for the underdog…But I am literally choosing the dark horse. Monba is a horse that stays even and toughs it out. He will not make a late break but will probably tough it out. If I had to pick another one I would pick Eight Belles. A philly has not won the derby in years but I watched a few of her races and she explodes down the back stretch.

MONBA

EIGHT BELLES

You heard it here first.

Post time at 6:04!

I’m home after a lot of travel. I got some great emails from students and teachers that were really affected by the show that have really encouraged me. I already believe in my show. I already believe in myself. I’ve always believed in the power of art to reach us and change us. But its nice to hear it from your audience. So to all who wrote me recently thank you.

To all who have called or emailed about booking a show I will get back to you as soon as I get some rest.

One more thing. I was thinkin….you know when you get home and you just want to veg out on the couch and watch TV? Ya know how hard it is to find a decent show or channel amidst the 300 we all have on our cable system? Well I have a solution. I am going to start my own channel. It will be 24 hours a day/7 days a week of a constant loop of the following commercial.

Where am I today?

Today, I’m in Greensburg, Indiana. I’m sure you’ve heard of it. Ya know…The tree tower? Oh you never heard? Well allow me to paste this information below from the official Decatur County web site.

Greensburg, Indiana, occupies a unique place among the cities of the world by reason of trees that are growing from the roof of its courthouse tower.

Early in the 1870’s, our citizens noticed what seemed to be a small sprig growing on the northwest corner of the courthouse tower. During frequent observations it became evident that what at first caused little comment was gaining in height, and it began to attract the attention of additional observers.

As time passed and the shrub continued to grow, those who had watched its growth became convinced that it was destined to become a freak of nature in the form of a small tree that, somehow had taken root in the crevices of the roof on the on the tower.

Later on it was observed that other sprouts were springing up at different places until finally five were counted, making a small grove growing at an altitude of 110 feet above the courthouse yard below.

County and courthouse officials became alarmed lest so many trees might cause permanent damage to the tower roof, so in 1888 a steeplejack was employed to ascend the building and remove some of the shrubs. Of the two left standing, one attained a height of about fifteen feet with a diameter of almost five inches at its base. This tree continued to weather the storms of the different seasons for many years. Finally it died and was removed to a place in the Decatur County Historical Society Museum.

In the meantime, however, another tree had made its appearance on the southeast corner of the tower which now seemed to take on renewed vigor and in a few years grew to a considerable height. While it was maturing another and final growth sprang up on the southwest corner resulting in the two trees that continued to maintain the fame of our county courthouse that has endured for over a century.

During the spring and summer months, when other trees are coming out in full leaf, these two, growths from their lofty heights also put forth their foliage, presenting one of nature’s freaks and making it worthwhile to drive out of your way to see.

Tourists and others from nearly every state in the Union have come to Greensburg to take a look at our famous courthouse tower trees, stories about which have been carried in many newspapers and magazines and in periodicals of foreign countries as well.

For a long time the species of the tree to which our tower tree belongs was not definitely known. Some thought they were linden, others that they were of the silver poplar variety. Finally, the Smithsonian Institute of Washington, DC, was called upon for a scientific classification. Their decision was that they are of the large tooth aspen variety.

That solved the uncertainty at the time, but information provided by more contemporary sources indicate that the current tree is a Mulberry tree. During a recent tree trimming a piece of the tree was examined by several Purdue University foresters and they positively identified the tree as a Mulberry tree. ¹

The presence of these trees on our courthouse tower is just as much of a mystery to the citizens of Greensburg as to those who look upon them for the first time. No definite explanation as to how the seeds of the first trees found their way to their lofty germinating place has been found.

Regarding the matter of sustenance, most theorists believe that dust from the interior as well as dust and moisture from the outside does the trick. Jokesters have strained themselves severely over the matter of “no visible means of support.” When somebody suggested that the tree was fed by springs in the clock, a ban was placed on all tree jokes.