I can honestly say that when it comes to my childhood, I really can't complain. I look back and life has been amazing. My parents were awesome, and they both did their best to work hard, set a good example, and provide for us kids. There are a million and a half stories that I want to share with the world about not just my childhood, but about my mom. You see, dad was a hard working man and was rarely home. He drove over-the-road trucks and tour buses, and would be gone for weeks at a time. So the bulk of the weight of raising us kids, fell on mom. Mom was the educator, spiritual advisor, the chauffeur, the cook, the housekeeper, and the disciplinarian. I can and will tell you about every hug, and every ass-kicking, because they were fairly balanced in their dispensing. I need to be clear about this part...I am going to tell the truth as I remember it. That's the part to remember. There may be some dispute at times from others about facts....but I can only tell my story as I remember it.
“ You may have heard some of the events described here happened otherwise or went down a different way. Well, this is my version-how I remember things, my truth”
- Lol Tolison
My memories bounce around a bit, as did we. Some of the younger years run together a bit. I know we lived in Corona, Santa Ana, Buena Park, Garden Grove, Poway and Ramona. I was a Southern California boy, having grown up on the beaches and in the parks by the lakes. My mother would get us up first thing in the morning and we would all ride the OCTD (Orange County Transit District buses) to Newport or Huntington Beaches. I remember going to Long Beach once, but it was filthy and we didn't enjoy it at all. My mother would pack granola bars (Nature Valley was in it's infancy and granola was just becoming popular), and baloney and cheese sandwiches and take us to the park to fly kites. She would sit and read her bible while us kids flew kites, played in the water etc. You see, what we didn't really appreciate back then, was just how hard mom worked to make our lives FULL. We had certain things that we thought were SOOOO aweful at the time, but in retrospect, they were small things to a giant. For instance, mom was a charismaniac all day. We went to church sunday morning, sunday evening, Wednesday evening bible study, friday youth group.....we were ALWAYS in church, and even to this day, she is convinced that if there is anything wrong, jesus is the answer. Mind you, i'm NOT mocking her. Her faith is a huge part of who she is. I don't share beliefs with her, even a little bit...but I respect the fact that she believes. I respect that she holds herself accountable to that belief system. Frankly, there are things specific to that faith, that have created amazing memories about childhood. For instance, it was never cold in the morning, in our house. My mother got up HOURS before anyone else, so that she could pray and study her bible. We had a wood burning stove, and she would start a fire and make sure that we had a warm living room to wake up to, while she had her prayer time. Now, mind you, we were NOT allowed to speak to her during that time. You were not allowed to disrupt her time talking to G-d. But it was certainly warm.
More to follow....
This will be updated as I have time, and more stories will be shared.
Friday, November 18, 2016
Sunday, November 13, 2016
I mean...what do you REALLY know about it??
It's
always interesting to me to engage people who express anti-Islam
feelings. I don't look for an argument, I merely ask a simple series of
questions.
1) Have you PERSONALLY ever opened a Q'ran and read it's scriptures?
2) When was the last time you attended Mosque?
3) Have you ever sat with an Imam and engaged in discussion of philosophy and theology?
4)
If you have no positive answers to the above questions, do you realize
your perceptions are all second-hand ideologies and media manipulations?
Start
thinking for yourselves. "Research" doesn't mean "google it". I have a
number of Muslims in my life that are wonderful friends and brothers,
and that I would happily give my life to protect. Oh, and i'm
Jewish....if you believe the media and hype, you'd think we should be
enemies. You see, as the Depeche Mode song says, "People are people".
I too, cant understand what makes a man hate another man, if they've never met. Please don't bother me with the same old nonsense about what this extremist or that one said. I fully acknowledge that there are those who use their religion or ideology to promote hate and look for every excuse to either convert others to their belief or to destroy them. After all, look who just got voted into the White House, and look at the resulting behavior among some of his faithful.
Listen, my point is this, and i'll keep it short. IF you want to judge ANY other person, based solely on their beliefs, than maybe you should try to understand their beliefs from a firsthand perspective. If you base everything off of media information and second-hand talk, then that makes you simply sheep. Stop following the masses whose only source of "information" is The Huffington Post and Fox News. You're not being educated. You're being indoctrinated. There's a significant difference in those two things.
For the love of all things holy, people, start thinking for YOURSELVES!!!!
Saturday, November 12, 2016
Oooooooh.....and it makes me wonder.....
DISCLAIMER: I am NOT a supporter of Donald Trump. I am NOT a supporter of Hillary Clinton. To paraphrase Gunnery Sergeant Hartman from Full Metal Jacket, "To me they are BOTH equally worthless". I am also not a believer in "Jesus". I merely use him as an example. By the way, if you don't know that you getting offended by what I write gains precisely ZERO fucks from me by now, I invite you to read the rest of my blog posts.
I have really been thinking about this and, well, I know I SAID the last one would be my last post on the election...well.... look, on sunday, you're gonna go to church and tell Jesus you're sorry for whatever your sins may be, then monday, you'll be right back at it, so back up off my nuts for a minute.
I just posted a rather lengthy explanation on my facebook page about why people need to stop using Trump's bankruptcies as an excuse to distrust him. Anyone in corporate business will tell you that sometimes you just have to do that, and it doesn't mean you were fiscally irresponsible. You could make a multi-million dollar deal with someone not knowing they are embezzling money, then they disappear with your money/investment, and now you have tons of debt and you need to restructure to fix the problem. It happens.
That's not what this is about.
This is about honesty and truth. About integrity and credibility.
There was a time, long before the advent of the internet, where someone could tell lies on someone else and no one would know any different. All you had was one person's word vs another. That day is gone, and "fact-checking" is here. There is actually no excuses any longer to spread misinformation, and really, no one short of their 60s, has any excuse for not checking things out before they share them. For instance, the recent "Kurt Cobain predicted Trump years ago" bullshit. He never said those words, but MAN did that meme ever spread like Billy Graham Gospel!! It's not uncommon anymore.
"If it's on facebook, it MUST be true!!".
Just because a meme tells you something, doesn't mean that it's true, and even if it's BASED in truth, whats the rest of the story?
EXAMPLE: "Hillary Clinton defended a child rapist and laughed about it". Ummm.....a tiny kernel of truth that's been blown WAY out of proportion AND context. You see, when Hillary was a young attorney, like MANY, she worked in a law clinic and a judge appointed her as public defendant for Thomas Alfred Taylor. Some of you may have watched enough television or studied enough on your own, to know that "You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you." Having been appointed by the judge, she had a duty to "VIGOROUSLY DEFEND" her client. That means, cross examining witnesses, studying and challenging evidence, and doing everything possible to put "reasonable doubt" in the mind of the jurors or the jurist. That's her JOB.
Be honest....i've even heard some of YOU talk about how your lawyer got you off with not charges or time served or plea-bargained, when you know damned well that you were guilty and simply got caught. Hell, I watched a judge in Mesa, AZ dismiss an entire DOCKET of cases, because they were all traffic tickets from a speed-cam, because ONE individual asserted his right to face and cross-examine his accuser....the camera. He then demanded that the state provide him with certification that the radar on the camera had been properly calibrated and regularly maintained, and that the camera was operating properly, that the radar may have caught the speed of the car in front of him, but the camera delayed taking the picture and inadvertently took a picture of HIM! The state couldn't provide all of this, and the judged dismissed EVERY CASE that day that was linked to any speed camera. I know, I was there, MINE was one of the cases dismissed. The guy WAS guilty, so was I and so was that whole docket of people, i'm sure. But that didn't matter, because our system said "reasonable doubt".
NOW, the people spreading the false meme and story that she got him off and laughed about it later, have not only twisted the story, but have destroyed their credibility. The same is true when falsehoods are spread about Trump. There are enough TRUTHS that are horrible and damaging. There is no need to try to embellish or straight out lie to make your point. Because you hurt your own cause when you do that. And for those who say "I just reposted", shame on you. You could have taken two seconds to research the facts, then you wouldn't look and feel stupid now.
"Information Super-Highway" indeed! Right at your fingertips. Excuses are now just that. Excuses, not reasons.
I have really been thinking about this and, well, I know I SAID the last one would be my last post on the election...well.... look, on sunday, you're gonna go to church and tell Jesus you're sorry for whatever your sins may be, then monday, you'll be right back at it, so back up off my nuts for a minute.
I just posted a rather lengthy explanation on my facebook page about why people need to stop using Trump's bankruptcies as an excuse to distrust him. Anyone in corporate business will tell you that sometimes you just have to do that, and it doesn't mean you were fiscally irresponsible. You could make a multi-million dollar deal with someone not knowing they are embezzling money, then they disappear with your money/investment, and now you have tons of debt and you need to restructure to fix the problem. It happens.
That's not what this is about.
This is about honesty and truth. About integrity and credibility.
There was a time, long before the advent of the internet, where someone could tell lies on someone else and no one would know any different. All you had was one person's word vs another. That day is gone, and "fact-checking" is here. There is actually no excuses any longer to spread misinformation, and really, no one short of their 60s, has any excuse for not checking things out before they share them. For instance, the recent "Kurt Cobain predicted Trump years ago" bullshit. He never said those words, but MAN did that meme ever spread like Billy Graham Gospel!! It's not uncommon anymore.
"If it's on facebook, it MUST be true!!".
Just because a meme tells you something, doesn't mean that it's true, and even if it's BASED in truth, whats the rest of the story?
EXAMPLE: "Hillary Clinton defended a child rapist and laughed about it". Ummm.....a tiny kernel of truth that's been blown WAY out of proportion AND context. You see, when Hillary was a young attorney, like MANY, she worked in a law clinic and a judge appointed her as public defendant for Thomas Alfred Taylor. Some of you may have watched enough television or studied enough on your own, to know that "You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford an attorney, one will be appointed for you." Having been appointed by the judge, she had a duty to "VIGOROUSLY DEFEND" her client. That means, cross examining witnesses, studying and challenging evidence, and doing everything possible to put "reasonable doubt" in the mind of the jurors or the jurist. That's her JOB.
Be honest....i've even heard some of YOU talk about how your lawyer got you off with not charges or time served or plea-bargained, when you know damned well that you were guilty and simply got caught. Hell, I watched a judge in Mesa, AZ dismiss an entire DOCKET of cases, because they were all traffic tickets from a speed-cam, because ONE individual asserted his right to face and cross-examine his accuser....the camera. He then demanded that the state provide him with certification that the radar on the camera had been properly calibrated and regularly maintained, and that the camera was operating properly, that the radar may have caught the speed of the car in front of him, but the camera delayed taking the picture and inadvertently took a picture of HIM! The state couldn't provide all of this, and the judged dismissed EVERY CASE that day that was linked to any speed camera. I know, I was there, MINE was one of the cases dismissed. The guy WAS guilty, so was I and so was that whole docket of people, i'm sure. But that didn't matter, because our system said "reasonable doubt".
NOW, the people spreading the false meme and story that she got him off and laughed about it later, have not only twisted the story, but have destroyed their credibility. The same is true when falsehoods are spread about Trump. There are enough TRUTHS that are horrible and damaging. There is no need to try to embellish or straight out lie to make your point. Because you hurt your own cause when you do that. And for those who say "I just reposted", shame on you. You could have taken two seconds to research the facts, then you wouldn't look and feel stupid now.
"Information Super-Highway" indeed! Right at your fingertips. Excuses are now just that. Excuses, not reasons.
Wednesday, November 9, 2016
Hear the drummer get wicked..
If seemed like an appropriate title for this one, because like MistaChuck, I've got so much trouble on my mind.
I feel I said everything I needed to say about the presidential race, as it was being run. In the long run, Trump salted his oats better and the koolaid has been drank. Now what? Well, let's address a couple stupid-ass statements that are being made by some of you....
"I'm leaving the country". - Allied Van Lines is a top-notch, international moving company. Their number is 800-470-2851. You can call Mon-Fri 8a-6p. If that is your answer, to pack up and run, then get to it. The rest of us will stay here and take on this challenge. Stop talking stupid. Most of you get lost the moment you're outside of your own backyard.
"He ain't MY President" - Yes, he is. No, you didn't vote for him, and guess what? Your vote didn't matter in the FIRST fucking place. We live in a Constitutional Republic, boys and girls. Not a democracy. The office of the President is NOT decided by popular vote. PERIOD. Stop crying over spilled milk, and get on with the business of progress.
"Make America great again" - Ermmm...no. First off, the only thing that has happened, is that overt racism will now seem more acceptable. It's being shown already. Just go through facebook a little and look at the posts. We are seeing swastikas and the slogan "Make America WHITE again". All of a sudden, the "N" word seems to have new life breathed into it. I don't mean in a slang type of way. I mean out and out racist usage. And make America great AGAIN?? At what point has she been "great"? A nation founded on the theft of a land from a native people, the murder of those same people, herding them like cattle onto small bits of land in a country they once enjoyed....a nation founded by the very seeds of sedition and rebellion...built by the sweat and blood of slaves stolen from their homeland....."Our blood's a flood without credit". - Chuck D. Making treaties and promises and then breaking them....abusing anyone of color, oppression of women, MURDER of young black men......which part is the "Great" part, you want to get back to????
So, the election is over, you're not leaving the country, and we are all fucked ONLY if we sit back and allow it to happen. Time to grab shovel and pickaxe and lay hands to the work ahead. I'm not saying you have to be happy about it, but if all you can do is bitch piss and moan about it, then it's going to get real old really fast. Remember, even a broken clock is right twice per day.
I WILL, however, openly state that I support my brothers and sisters of ALL types. Blacks, hispanics, jews, muslims, gay, lesbian, trans, queer, fluid, dominant, submissive, furries, littles, whatever. I choose NOT to fear, because fear is not in my nature. I WILL stand strong beside you and I will NOT allow you to be harmed for who you are. Let me be 100% clear on that.
Thats the last of this conversation I plan on having. Anything else I post on the subject, will be satyrical and only meant for laughs.
Congratulations President-Elect Trump. Now, YOU put YOUR hands to the plow and start leading this nation FORWARD, not backwards. You're going to have critics no matter what you do, and there are going to be those who will complain just to complain. That's just life. Deal with it.
PEace,
Lion
I feel I said everything I needed to say about the presidential race, as it was being run. In the long run, Trump salted his oats better and the koolaid has been drank. Now what? Well, let's address a couple stupid-ass statements that are being made by some of you....
"I'm leaving the country". - Allied Van Lines is a top-notch, international moving company. Their number is 800-470-2851. You can call Mon-Fri 8a-6p. If that is your answer, to pack up and run, then get to it. The rest of us will stay here and take on this challenge. Stop talking stupid. Most of you get lost the moment you're outside of your own backyard.
"He ain't MY President" - Yes, he is. No, you didn't vote for him, and guess what? Your vote didn't matter in the FIRST fucking place. We live in a Constitutional Republic, boys and girls. Not a democracy. The office of the President is NOT decided by popular vote. PERIOD. Stop crying over spilled milk, and get on with the business of progress.
"Make America great again" - Ermmm...no. First off, the only thing that has happened, is that overt racism will now seem more acceptable. It's being shown already. Just go through facebook a little and look at the posts. We are seeing swastikas and the slogan "Make America WHITE again". All of a sudden, the "N" word seems to have new life breathed into it. I don't mean in a slang type of way. I mean out and out racist usage. And make America great AGAIN?? At what point has she been "great"? A nation founded on the theft of a land from a native people, the murder of those same people, herding them like cattle onto small bits of land in a country they once enjoyed....a nation founded by the very seeds of sedition and rebellion...built by the sweat and blood of slaves stolen from their homeland....."Our blood's a flood without credit". - Chuck D. Making treaties and promises and then breaking them....abusing anyone of color, oppression of women, MURDER of young black men......which part is the "Great" part, you want to get back to????
So, the election is over, you're not leaving the country, and we are all fucked ONLY if we sit back and allow it to happen. Time to grab shovel and pickaxe and lay hands to the work ahead. I'm not saying you have to be happy about it, but if all you can do is bitch piss and moan about it, then it's going to get real old really fast. Remember, even a broken clock is right twice per day.
I WILL, however, openly state that I support my brothers and sisters of ALL types. Blacks, hispanics, jews, muslims, gay, lesbian, trans, queer, fluid, dominant, submissive, furries, littles, whatever. I choose NOT to fear, because fear is not in my nature. I WILL stand strong beside you and I will NOT allow you to be harmed for who you are. Let me be 100% clear on that.
Thats the last of this conversation I plan on having. Anything else I post on the subject, will be satyrical and only meant for laughs.
Congratulations President-Elect Trump. Now, YOU put YOUR hands to the plow and start leading this nation FORWARD, not backwards. You're going to have critics no matter what you do, and there are going to be those who will complain just to complain. That's just life. Deal with it.
PEace,
Lion
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