IN THE ARMS OF THE ANGEL

There were 56 of them.

That we know of.

Their average age was 51. But they were as young as 21, and as old as 70. And the age of four of them was unknown.

Their names were common. Mary, and Robert and Norman, and Stacy and Henry and James. And unique like Adalberto, and Akimoto and Camerino and Diogenes.... and John Doe.

All of them died in the past year. From the the winter solstice in 2009, to the night of the winter solstice in 2010.

A winter solstice, that, this year, was heralded by one of the most magnificent lunar eclipses ever seen by the people of the entire planet.

And on that night, in this week before another magnificent event, the annual recognition of the birth of the Christ, these 56 people were remembered, in song, and word and the soft light of 56 candles. by friends, relatives, and clergy and strangers who gathered in a serene and beautifully decorated park to give dignity and remembrance to their lives.

For most of them, that event, in the celestial wake of that awesome lunar eclipse, would be the only recognition of their place and time on the planet.

One by one, the names were called out by a procession of those friends and relatives and strangers.

And one by one, the candles were lit.

A small flare of glory in that moment of light. And a name put to a face unknown to most of the people who attended. And a few names achingly familiar to somebody who will remember them the longest, and spoken softly and haltingly by somebody who did know and love them.

They died in so many ways. None of them went "gently, into that good night."

They were hit by cars. Or trains. Or somehow, perished in the waterways in and around a great city. They died of exposure. And beatings. And unaddressed, or untreated illnesses brought on due to the ravages inflicted by the physical and emotional stress of having spent a long time living on the street. And some of them were suicides probably brought on by a broken heart.

And for that one night, in that holy place, they were united in the minds and the memories and the hearts of the people who sang the songs, and heard the kind words, and who lit the candles and spoke the names, and shared some measure of the pain the people they were remembering , had suffered in their lives.

And next year, once again, at the winter solstice, in that same park, which for that night will again be a holy place, there will be more friends and relatives and strangers and clergy. and more candles, and songs and words....and names.

And before that night, there will be more cars and trains and waterways, and exposure, and beatings and and untreated medical conditions, and the ravages inflicted by the stress of living without a home, and broken hearts, and suicides.

Remember these people. Remember them now, and love them now.

Before they are only a name and a small flame and a song.

Remember them before they become only a memory, in the arms of the angel.

ALL THE NEWS THAT FITS

"We journalists make it a point to know very little about an extremely wide variety of topics.
This is how we stay objective."

Dave Barry



Today, we're going to talk about the news business.

Andway, were going to talk about the news business as it relates to street puppies and homeless nation.

And today, the news is not good.

Today, well, actually, yesterday, one of the finest newspapers in this country went to press with a story that blackened the eyes of every street puppy who lives in the distribution area of the newspaper.

And they did this by printing a lop-sided, ill-sourced, largely anecdotal, sensationalized, scare mongering diatribe about panhandlers.

And then, today, reprinted that piece of rubbish, in their sister tabloid (tabloid here meaning format of the paper, not one of those papparazzi rags) complete with a reefer( no, the editors weren't smoking reefer, a reefer is newstalk for a headline on the front page with a reference to a page number inside where the story can be found) which included mug shots of two people who were outed in the story as having had "violent criminal records."

Now, that's some reefer!

And a lot of people who read both -or even just one of those - papers are going to believe that every homeless person who puts on a safety vest and goes to the street to ask for money, is a violent convicted felon who is going to push in the window of their car and yank them out by the throat, and probably steal their steering wheel, too.

And a lot of people who read both - or even just one of those - papers will believe that people who put on the same safety vests, and work very hard on Sundays to put together, and then sell newspapers -astonishingly, the very newspaper which printed the story - are probably also violent convicted felons who will push into the window of their car and yank them out by the throat...and probably steal their steering wheel, too.

See, this is really all about the two cities which we visited in a previous post here on Streetpuppy, and their continuing struggle to outdo each other in their haste to lay waste to street puppies for once and for all.

Eventually, that will happen.

City number two will bow to the pressure from city number one, and finally pass the required ordinance, banning anybody from selling anything on the street at all, or heaven forbid, asking for money.

And then both cities, and their politicians will root and crow about how they have found the divine measure to once and for all rid themselves of the unsightly, unwashed, homeless group of misfits who are growing in numbers by the day.

And the astonishing thing about all of this...and that eventual outcome, is that a fine newspaper is right on board with those rooting and crowing politicians,

A fine newspaper whose product is sold on the street every Sunday by all of those unsightly, unwashed, homeless group of misfits who work their fingers to the bone to sell that product for a few measly dollars.

Here's my advice to every panhandler who crosses the river from city number one to panhandle here in city number two. Stay home. Please.

And here's my advice to every person who dons that vest every Sunday and sells that newspaper here in city number two, on the street.

Get another gig. Something. Anything legal.

Don't waste your time with these people anymore.

Let them come over here...yeah, all the editors, and reporters and executives of that paper, let them come over here and put on those vests, and work for hours to put those papers together, and them sell them on the street, come rain or shine or wind or searing heat or biting cold.

Let's see how fast those ill-sourced, largely anecdotal, lop-sided, sensational stories about all the 'convicted, violent felons' knocking on windows disappear from their pages.

PLAN B vs MURPHY'S LAW

Every Street Puppy needs a plan B.

But, here in Homeless Nation, if you're not careful, the failure of Plan A can directly affect your ability to carry out Plan B, thus turning Plan B into Murphy's Law.

You remember Murphy's Law, right? It's the law which states that if anything can go wrong, it will...at the worst possible moment. And that law has a sinister way of mysteriously turning many a situation into one big world of hurt.

We're going to give you a few scenarios here which will further illustrate this amazing trick.

SCENARIO # 1.

You are relatively new to this homeless thing and haven't adjusted yet to street life, and you're , lonely, and you miss the friends you used to have, and the wife who left you when the money ran out, and then a nice person asks you if he could please use your food stamp card to go to the grocery street across the street and buy a few items for his sick mother.

In return for which, he will give you cash for the items, if you will just wait outside the store.

And you say, ok, but you need the card back real fast because you haven't eaten all day, and you need to have some dinner before you keel over.

PLAN A. you give the nice person your food stamp card, along with the pin number and you wait outside the grocery store while he buys a few items for his sick mother, and you think of what you will buy with the cash he will give you in return. Maybe a cold beer.

PLAN B The nice person does not return. You never see the nice person again, or your card. So of course you miss dinner. And you discover the nice person has used up every penny on the card for whatever . You starve for the next month, and maybe for good if the food stamp police find out you were dumb enough to do such a thing, and revoke your food stamp card.

SCENARIO # 2.

You have secured a 31-day bus pass through some nice charitible agency. It was given to you in the hope you could use it for transportation to find a job.

Another nice person asks you if he can borrow your bus pass. He, too, needs to visit his sick mother.

He will just run up to his mother's house, tuck her in and give her some vicodin for the awful pain she's suffering from the mugging and be right back with your bus pass.

PLAN A. You have some doubts because of what happened with your food stamp card, but, you haven't lost your faith in human nature yet, so you loan him the bus pass, and you wait at the bus station for him to return from his mission of mercy.

PLAB B. You stand at the bus station all night, until you are thrown out by the security guard. You have no bus pass, and no way to travel around to find a job. And the nice charitable agency who gave you the bus pass figures out what happened and never gives you another bus pass.

SCENARIO # 3.

You have a cell phone, given to you by yet another charitable agency in hopes you can use the phone to call your OWN sick mother, or maybe..find a job

But, hold on, another nice person is really needing a phone right now. He needs to call his wife who thinks he is cheating on her and smooth things out or she is going to throw him out of their sleeping spot, and throw all of his clothes into the river.

PLAN A. You don't want that to happen, you're homeless, too and you know how important sleeping spots are, and clothing...and wives. You give him the phone and of course, he needs privacy to make the call. So you walk a few feet away.

PLAN B. You turn around, and....he's gone. With your cell phone.

You don't get another phone out of that charitable agency because all of the phone calls placed on that phone over the next few days are made to drug dealers. Who were caught and then turned in the person who made the calls, and he was caught too, with your phone.

And so after you get out of jail you realize you have no cell phone, no bus pass ,and no food stamp card. And now you have a police sheet.

And while you were in jail, somebody took over your sleeping spot, and your clothes are all gone from the hiding place it took you a month to find, and none of the other puppies will talk to you because they think the police may be watching you...and that you might possibly, be a jinx.

And all you have left that means anything at all to you, or has any value, is the watch your late father gave to you. ...on his death bed.

You want to jump into the river.

But wait! Who is that...over there. It's a woman. Hmmm...kind of a good looking one, too.
She's motioning to you. She wants you to sit beside her on the bench.

And she has what looks like a bag of...soda. Yup, cans of cold soda. And some munchies.

PLAN A. You sit beside her. And hey, it's not soda in the bag...it's beer. Cold beer. And she hands you an open container of the cold beer. And she is admiring your watch, and she wants to take a closer look at the watch, and she smiles at you, and gee whiz......when she smiles, she looks so much like your ex wife.....

PLAN B. We probably do not need to go into detail here, do we?

HIGGLEDY, PIGGLEDY

We here in Homeless Nation are stunned to learn of the recent higgedly piggedly hijinks in the international diplomatic community

What were we thinking of? Or rather, what were our fearless leaders who roost at Foggy Bottom thinking?

Foggy Bottom being what the United States State Department is called by the Inside the Beltway crowd. Foggy Bottom because it is located in Washington D.C., where it is foggy a lot as it once was a swamp. Ahem.

We only heard about the situation because one of those diplomats who created part of the muddled higgledy piggledy mess generated by the release of supposedly encrypted cables between Foggy Bottom and U.S. Embassies around the world to the news media, is right here. In Homeless Nation.

Pendleton Stanford Heddington IV. And Pendleton Stanford Heddington IV is on the lam

And he wants what every diplomat who is on the lam wants. Political asylum. And diplomatic immunity.

Political asylum is granted by a nation to a person seeking shelter from another nation if he has a reasonable fear of persecution in that other nation. That's another way of saying, he isn't exactly flavor of the month there right now.

Diplomatic immunity is listed as the number one tool in the diplomacy toolbox the U.S. State Department gives to all of those mostly Ivy League people who are sent abroad to other nations to practice the art of conducting negotiations with representatives of other nations, and to employ tact in order to gain a strategic advantage in a calculated and polite manner.

In other words, when dealing with the other nation's representative, lie through your teeth..and don't tell him he has spinach in his.

Well, we didn't know what to think at first. Political asylum? Diplomatic Immunity? What a concept in Homeless Nation. We don't even have a State Department. Or a cable machine.

But, ole' PinHead Pupster....yeah, we had to change his name. He insisted. And substituting Pin for Pen was ok, but the preppy in him just couldn't get with Puppy. So Pupster it is.

Well, PinHead, poor dear, was right in the thick of it when a lot of those cables were flying back and forth between his overseas U.S. Embassy post and Foggy Bottom.

And when the Swedish person from Wiki dropped the dime on the United States State Department, well, ole' PinHead wasn't fired. He was evacuated by a bunch of U.S. Marines aided with close air support, right ahead of a death squad which was making straight for his office at the the U.S. Embassy.

Seems a lot of foreign nations were very put out by the things PinHead and people like him were putting into their cables about the people they were sent there to employ tact with in order to gain a strategic advantage. Especially the cable about the Important Russian Guy allegedly having an uh, inappropriate relationship with the Italian Important Guy. Whoa.

Well, during the debriefing -which we needed to conduct in order to decide if the PinHead could stay - we needed to determine exactly why he had decided to come to Homeless Nation for political asylum and the necessity of diplomatic immunity on top of it.

We don't have a lot of Ivy Leaguers here. Anyway not yet. And we were a wee bit suspicious. After all he had been paid before to employ tact to gain strategic advantages. What if he was actually going to covertly mount a military coup here? Take us over and do things US embassies sometimes do in other countries to uh, level the playing field.

And Pinhead knew he needed to convince us of his sincerety, so he came clean. Seems the State Department gave him a list of the countries he could be sent to after a reasonable length of time on sabbatical, and the healing of the identity changing face lift.

PinHead was given a choice of either, (and we are NOT making this up, it's in the CIA factbook!)
Akrotiri; Vanuatu; Dhekelia; Lesotho; Burkina Faso; Clipperton Island, or Djibouti.

Well, we were not surprised. Given those choices, any pupster would have opted for the relative comfort of Homeless Nation. For one thing, we don't require a passport.

But we were still suspicious. And worried. Who would be looking for him? Was he hiding something? Was this all a plot to see if we had spinach in our teeth?

But Pinhead had something to trade for our asylum, and diplomatic immunity.

His diplomatic skills and tradecraft. And PinHead had done his homework on Homeless Nation.

And, as he diplomatically pointed out to us, we do have diplomatic situations with other nations. Situations which need the finesse of a fine, calculating, tactful, polite diplomat like Pinhead.

For instance, he could successfully deal with the situations with all of the little rogue nations within Homeless Nation.

We do have a growing problem here. A lot of different colors, and languages and lifestyles and personalities and agendas mixing it up together. And all of us being in the same boat, too. Whew. Sometimes, we start throwing more than cables at each other.

PinHead's solution is to start up his own Department of the Interior. Well, for that, we have to give him head knocking privileges. And we are taking that under advisement.

And then, he very tactfully and politely pointed out the diplomatic situations with surrounding nations. You know, the citizens who live right along side us, and do not recognize us as a sovereign entity. (His words not ours.)

Pinhead is going to open back channels to those surrounding nations.

Back channels is diplomacy lingo for unofficial channels of communications between states or other political entities used to supplement official channels, often for the purposes of discussing highly sensitive policy issues, and all the while, calculating the strategic advantages.

Like when a street puppy falls off somebody's porch and they're not supposed to be there anyway, who gets sued?

Or a street puppy is way too energetic washing a motorist's windshield for spare change, and it needs to be detertimed who was at fault for the vehicle hitting the fire hydrant if the vehicle was still moving.

Or when a street puppy falls into the river, like who has jurisdiction to pull him out?

Or, the street puppy panhandling issue. Oh brother, are we glad Pinhead is here. Wait until he sees the councilmen and and the commissioners he has to deal with. That alleged thing between the Russian guy and the Italian guy will seem like a cake walk.

Talk abut highly sensitive policy issues and strategic advantages!

Well, Ok, so we're going to give him a try out. PinHead is our new diplomat sans portfolio. Complete with political asylum, diplomatic immunity, back channels and all the other bells and whistles that come with important diplomatic postings.

And, while we're at it. We're going to suggest to Pinhead that, maybe he could throw a little of that diplomatic finesse and tact and politeness into persuading the nation of Djibouti to throw some foreign aid our way.

And we're no slouches here in Homeless Nation when it comes to international strategies. We'll let him know, if Djibouti doesn't come through with the dough.....well, diplomatic immunity or not, it's the nation of Burkina Faso for Pinhead!

WE'RE ALL MAD HERE

"But I don't want to go among mad people," Alice
remarked.
"Oh you can't help that," said the cat: We're all
mad here. I'm mad, You're mad."
"How do you know I'm mad?" said Alice.
"You must be," said the cat, "Or you wouldn't
be here."


From "Alice in Wonderland"
by
Lewis Carroll


So, like Alice, you tumbled down the rabbit hole.

Except, you were not following a White Rabbit, and this is not Wonderland.

This is Homeless Nation, The first place on your journey to the adventure into the unknown, and things are getting , as they did for Alice, "curiouser and curiouser," one of the many famous phrases from the book, and used to describe an event with extraordinary wonder.

And the book, a delightful mix of humor, wisdom and satire, is chock full of events described with extraordinary wonder.

Personally, I think much of the book, while very entertaining and enlightening, was written while Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (that's Lewis Carroll's real name) was sitting around with that green caterpillar in one of the book's chapters.

The green caterpillar who was smoking the blue hookah.

But, yeah, you are down the rabbit hole , and, here in Homeless Nation, on an adventure into the unknown, and just about everything is getting curiouser and curiouser about this event of extraordinary wonder, including the glimmer of the thought that is forming in your mind.

The thought that you may have gone mad.

No home. Nobody covering your back. Little or no money. No job. You are homeless. You are a street puppy.

You don't look the same way you once looked. But you haven't seen a decent mirror in a while, since they were taken out of the Burger King restroom in order to dissuade street puppies from peering into them while taking that morning cat bath.

So you don't really know how you look, except for the occasional curious glances of alarm sent your way by citizens of that other nation, whenever you dare to venture outside homeless nation.

Yeah, you've either gone mad, or you're dreaming a very bad dream.

But if you're dreaming, why do your feet hurt so much? Why don't your clothes fit so well? Why are you hungry? Why do you have a constant, nagging ache in your upper back molar? Why do people tend to move away from you in the small queue at the bus stop?

Can't be a dream. Dreams end, and you don't remember much about them. But you remember all of this, day by day. One long blur of muffled sounds, and fuzzy visions and mysterious pains and stifled feelings you are remembering even as you live within them.

Yup, you've gone mad. And everybody around you is mad. Aren't they?

Well, doctors have a name for this particular madness. They call it the "Alice in Wonderland Syndrome, " a disorienting neurological condition which affects human perception.

And the "Alice in Wonderland" syndrome comes with some hefty symptoms.

Distortions which recur several times a day and can last from a few minutes to a few weeks. And the sufferer can become alarmed, frightened, and even panic-stricken.

Hmmm...sounds like a typical day in the Homeless Naiton.

I mean, you wake up. You have no idea what time it is. It is dark, but you went to sleep when it was light. and now, everything looks distorted in the glare of the street lamps blazing near your sleeping spot.

But it was light out when you went to sleep, because you had nothing to do for the rest of the evening, except to lie down and try to remember to wake up very early, before the police find out that you are sleeping at a spot clearly marked, "No Trespassing," and stop by and wake you up, and ruin the rest of your whole day with the arrest, and the handcuffs, and the booking.

So, yeah, it's dark outside. And everything looks distorted in the glare of the street lights. Even your hands and feet look distorted. And occasionally you wander into forbidden territory because that "No Trespassing" sign looked like it said, "Just come on in and have a rest."

And now, another, and the most prominent symptom of Alice in Wonderland Syndrome...altered body image, makes an appearance.

And the sufferers of that sympton will find that they are confused as to the size and shape of parts of...or all of the body. Right, like when you go to sit up, when you first awaken, and your head hits the tree right behind you and you realize you forgot that your head is bigger when it's covered in five ski caps. And that you can't feel your hands because you slept on them.

Or when you get back from the store where you had a voucher to get some new used pants and you realize they are way too big, and then you realize you didn't know how much weight you had lost when you looked at the pants...only looked, because you are not allowed to try them on in the kind of places where you take the voucher to get them.

Sense of taste and smell and touch is also affected by this affliction. That uh, stew you ate at the "feed" last night, well, you couldn't really tell by tasting, or smelling, or even touching it...what it really was. But you know it wasn't cous cous.

One of the more alarming symptoms is actual intense and overt hallucinations. Either seeing things that are not there, or just misinterpreting events and situations.

Remember the twenty dollar bill you had in your hand, the one the generous person gave to you at the bus stop, without you even asking him for it?

Well, poof! It disappeared, right after you passed the corner bodega that sells beer.

And that gal you were supposed to meet after the church service where they serve the raspberry scones and coffee after the two hour service? Well, hard to remember, now what was her name? Was her hair black...no blonde ?

How old was she? Did she come on to you...or did you make a fool of yourself and ask for her phone number while maybe leering at the little bit of leg showing below her used Calvin Klein one size too small levis? And why would you ask for her number? You don't even have a phone.

Was she there at all? Or were you staring too long at the church's stain glass windows with the pretty angels, who, in your distorted, altered perception , may have been talking to you?

Relax. Don't panic. And don't tense up. You do that, and those pants that are too large will fall right off.

You are down the Rabbit Hole, and things are curiouser and curiouser,and they will stay that way, as long as you are in Homeless Nation.

It's nature's way of protecting you until you can navigate your way back up the Rabbit Hole.

And, hey, enjoy it while it lasts. It's not everyday when you can look at those big feet of yours and imagine them fitting into those slim, black leather Gucci ankle boots you once dreamed of buying if you could only have fit into them!

And take comfort in the fact that this "Alice in Wonderland" syndrome has been around a long time. And that Lewis Carroll, could possibly have written the book while he was sitting around the hookah with that green caterpillar.

And, in your altered state of perception, you can also believe that he wrote the following quote from the book just for street puppies.

MAD HATTER: There is a place. Like no place on Earth. A land full of wonder, mystery and danger! Some say to survive it, you need to be as mad as a hatter. Which luckily, I am!

BRANDS R US

Ever wonder about big time corporate name changes?

Like when a venerable and large accounting firm gets caught with their sticky fingers way too far into their clients' pockets and then whoo...openings for executives turn into windows, somebody goes to the clink, and the name of the firm, which probably belonged to a guy who died about a hundred years ago, becomes the punchline of the week on Letterman.

Then the venerable firm pulls the blinds, turns out the lights, for awhile, and then ,Shazam!

Blinds pulled back up, lights on, new parking spaces drawn, and a sign that once read "Abraham O'Riley & Sons Excellent Bean Counters," now reads "Whiz Mongrels & Sons, Sort of ExcellentBean Counters," and hey, we're back in business.

That's called "Brand Management," and it was invented by a guy from Procter and Gamble.

Brand Management is basically revising a corporate vision, and restating a corporate mission statement...or, when urgent circumstances alter the public perception of an organization so radically that something has to be done..... changing that letterhead, and fast.

And that urgent circustance could be anything. Like when somebody figures out that the once venerable name of the organization just doesn't fit the new 'vision' of the company, after a study is released by the Surgeon General saying smoking is a death sentence, and then a cigarette company, like Philip Morris, changes its name to "Altria. "

Or when (we won't mention the name) an airline loses one of it's jets when it nosedives into a swamp and knows nobody in his right mind is going to get on a flight to anywhere which bears the name of a jet that took a dive into a swamp, so it changes the name to "Fly Real High Over Swamps."

And we here in Homeless Nation, having experienced some urgent circumstances since, oh, forever, like the media knocking us about with too many homeless on the street; too many homeless on the sidewalk; too many homeless in the bathroom at the Burger King shaving and washing their socks, and then going out and wiping everybody's wind shield with the soap from the soap dispenser.

Well, we decided we needed some of that Brand Management.

So we called a caucus of our executive council of street puppies and sat around on a street corner, and in between scratching our heads a lot, and dodging pedestrians, we hammered out a new corporate vision statement.

First thing, the new name. We are no longer homeless. We are Domestically Challenged. Howzat sound?

Ok, then, that takes care of the corporate vision thing.

But now, we had to think up a mission statement to go along with the vision thing.

And that wasn't real hard. Seems we have a lot of new corporate suit street puppies around here who worked, until recently, at places that deal in mission statements and corporate vision.

That is until those visions and statements started coming to them in memos written in the language of Bangledesh, and telling them that the corporation they had worked for had just envisioned how much money they could save themselves by outsourcing everything but the distribution of postage stamps to their employees so they could put them on outgoing resumes.

These guys...and gals...are terrific. They're still in shock, ya know, dreaming of the day, not long ago when they could ride around in the back seat of a car without being cuffed, and had credit cards and Blackberries and stuff. But they can still do corporate think, and that's what we need.

First, we are forming an R & D department. That's research and development, not run and duck. And, these former corporate suit people have a terrific first project in mind.

Stealth technology. That's right. We will soon possess the technology to make ourselves invisible! And what a relief that will be to all of those people who will no longer have to pass us by and go "tsk, tsk," look what too many Budweisers on an empty stomach for ten years will do to ya."

Also, from R&D, and maybe even before Stealth....we will have Morphing! We can morph into any shape or vision we need to be. Means we can sleep anywhere and not be bothered because the guy who owns the lawn or porch we're sleeping on will think he's looking at a big ole' friendly, snoring bassett hound curled up there.

Then, and this is the one I really like. We will have our own Taser technology.

Think of it. No more "Can you spare some change for a bar of soap, sir?" We just whip out that taser thing. Don't even have to use it, just kind of twirl it around in our fingers, and before you know it, we'll have enough change to buy our own soap company. Look out Procter and Gamble.

And we haven't even started. These new corporate suit street puppies are going to come up with all kinds of things which will give our homeless nation, er, domestically challenged nation brand a whole new image. Yup, and a whole new restated vision , and a revised mission statement.

Why, we will have Human Resources. And Growth and Management. And Corporate Outreach. And our own mouthpiece, ta da....A Public Relations Maven.

Yeah, things are going to change around here. Now, with our whole new breed of corporate suit street puppies, out here working for us on Brand Management, we'll be in high cotton.

We might even get our own reality TV show with Donald Trump.

And what an irony. Just think. What would all of our new corporate suit brand managing street puppies have done, to spend a fortune for their clothing, if Ralph Lipschitz hadn't changed his name to Ralph Lauren!

MOMMY, MY LIFE HURTS

Now comes our next generation. The young ladies and gentlemen who will take us into the sunset of our lives.

We behold them, now, at the dawning of their lives.

And they are , indeed, a wondrous sight. All dolled up in comic and surreal and sometimes grotesque outfits of sequins and latex and glitter and satin glory. We hold our breath, and take their little hands in ours and shoo them through the door on a Halloween evening, for their annual trek in pursuit of the candy bars and other gooey, tasty treats which will last them one whole week.

And in that one whole week, Their dreams of their future roles in life will change as fast as they shed their zany costumes.

Zack, the kid in the Star Trek U.S.S.ENTERPRISE uniform is going to be an astronaut, but next week, he'll settle for a fireman. Makika, the cat with the yellow face paint and whiskers has decided it's law school for her, but then on Saturday, she will announce that, instead, she's going to become a hairdresser...for movie stars.

Mary, the shy one, dressed up as a ballerina, is going to to be a doctor. Period. Tyler is absolutely going to be a U.S. Marine, just like his late daddy, but that will change to a fighter pilot by Monday. Letisha, clad from head to toe in a sparkly leotard, wants the world to know that she will be the perfect circus performer in Cirque du Soleil. But a couple of days later, she decides it's safer to be a bus driver.

Christopher, the serious one, who started reading at three, and at seven is a whiz at math, knows for sure, he will design rocket trains. They don't have those yet, but Chris believes he knows how to put that together. Or, maybe, next week, he'll decide to put his talents to designing the next great solar powered sports car.

Michael wants to be the President of the United States. Failing that, he'd like to be a talk show host. His sister, Leah, has designs on politics, too. She wants to be the governor of Florida. Or a dolphin trainer.

The dreams these children have of their futures are as diverse as their ethnic, cultural and social backgrounds.

But the one thing they do have in common now, is a shattered life.

Shattered by events beyond their control, and for now, for most of them, beyond their understanding or comprehension.

Life changed for them recently. Something went terribly wrong and they went from living a secure and abundant life to, maybe sleeping in mommy's car, or in a dingy motel room for weeks on end, or, in some cases out there on the streets in homeless nation.

They're living in a shelter now. With other children and mommies and some daddies. And life is chaotic and noisy and filled with strangers and rules and other kids just like them. Just like them because kids don't see the differences in their social and cultural and ethnic backgrounds.

That will come later, when the age of innocence has passed. For now, their resilience and curiosity and love of all things unique and seemingly bizarre will help them to transcend their circumstances, and bear the realities and hardships of an environment charged with tension and doubt and so many fears.

Those realities and hardships which, for now, they are sometimes shielded from by the swift flicking of a tear wiped away by anxious parents, or loving shelter caregivers who tend to broken hearts and shattered lives with open hands and great, loving gestures of hope.

These children walk a thin and shaky line between the whimsy of the great Dr. Seuss's "Oh, The Places You Will Go", and the darkness of "You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch."

And in their eyes, in those bright and curious and shining and hungry puppy eyes, you see the veil to their future, woven with the threads of mercy.

These children, these maybe future astronauts, and firemen, and rocket scientists and U.S. Marines and fighter pilots, and bus drivers and lawyers and doctors and hairdressers and circus acrobats and governors and dolphin trainers, and Presidents of the United States of America, are stuck now in survival mode here in homeless nation.

Some of them will make it through the survival mode and the chaos which now defines their lives, and not be the worse off for it. For those who make it through, there will once again be a secure and loving home, and the opportunity and means to prepare them for the roles they once dreamed of when they dreamed of how their lives would be.

But, some of them won't make it through this part of their life journey unscathed. The hurt that some of these children endure by having their life shattered by events out of their control will prove to be unshakeable, and their futures will be marred by so many of the awful events spawned by the damage done to a young, and innocent and tender ego.

And that is an outrage. And we should all be very angry about that. And do something.

And what we should do, is to love these children - our children -love them enough to make the strongest possible effort as families and as a society, to see that this ugly and searing blight of homelessness has - by the time our children are old enough to really begin their journey to be a fireman, a bus driver, an astronaut, a lawyer, a doctor, a rocket scientist, a U.S. Marine or a future President of the United States - been cleared away by the people of this great nation.

This great nation, which may well put people on Mars in our lifetime, needs a gut check on this present, shameful domestic situation which will, if nothing else, deprive us all of the intellects, the skills, the drive and the boundless energy of these children.

And our government needs to go to war for these children. And that war should be right up there with the War on Drugs, The War on Terrorism, and all of those other wars "over there."

We can do no less for our next generation. Our legacy.

In the meantime, hug them a lot, tend to their scrapes and boo boos, tell them bedtime stories, kiss away their tears, and listen to them when they talk about those dreams they have about their future. And, maybe, sing to them.

And I'd like to offer up part of a great Beach Boys song that I wish I could sing to every one of these kids I have met here, in homeless nation. Kind of a lullaby straight from the heart.

The song is "Disney Girl" and part of it goes like this

Clearin' skies and dryin' eyes now I see your smile

Darkness goes and softness shows

a changing style

Just in time, words that rhyme, well

bless your soul

Now I'll fill your hands with

kisses and a tootsie roll.

A TALE OF TWO CITIES

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdon, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair."

That is the opening paragraph of English Author Charles Dickens acclaimed "Tale of Two Cities," which was published in 1859, and has sold more than 200 million copies to date.

That famous paragraph raises the curtain on Dickens' epic depiction of the plight of the French peasantary demoralized by the French aristocracy in the years leading up to the French Revolution, and the many unflattering social parallels with life in London during the same period.
And those unflattering social parallels resonate through the ages right up to today, and the prevailing attitudes held, and actions taken, by most of our society and our government toward the citizens of homeless nation.

Now, the French and the English had different ways of dealing with their unflattering social parallels. In Paris, they had the guillotine. In London they had Old Bailey.

Here in homeless nation, we have two cities, that just like Paris and London are separated by a large body of water. And just like Paris and London, Both cities have social problems, and both exhibit unflattering social parallels in their attitudes and action toward those social problems.

Social problems like unemployment, poverty, and crime are rampant in our two cities, In addition to that, and perhaps, in part because of that, homelessness ranks right up there as another major social problem. And both cities in their way, have their own unflattering way to deal with their social problem of homelesslessness.

The French and English had their guilliotine and Old Bailey. We have County Commissions and City Councils and Workshops. And their attitude, and their action, and their and aim is the same. "Get rid of the problem." Not solve it. Get rid of it.

Now, These two cities have been wrestling with quite a dilemma for a long time. Homeless numbers going up, more street puppies pouring into homeless nation. Patience of the townpeople going down.

Patience of the townspeople going down, as in, they want street puppies off their lawns, out of their alleys and parks, off their benches, and heaven forbid, at least one hundred feet away from the front door of their favorite restaurant, or shoe store, or video arcade.

And the townspeople don't want us to ask them for money. Heck, they don't even want us to put on special colored vests and work real hard and sell a product to them for money.

For instance, we homeless nation street puppies are taking up way too much space on medians and corners, and interstate ramps trying to sell them a newspaper ...and on Sunday morning of all things, when they're all on their way to church!

And the townspeople of our two cities have an action ace up their collective sleeve. They vote.

They vote other prominent townspeople right on to, and off of, County Commissions and City Councils.

Which gives these so called prominent townspeople a social problem to hoot about, and then get their picture taken a lot, and maybe grovel enough to get enough voting townspeople snortin' mad enough to fortify some of the grimy lot of hooting, groveling , photogenic, prominent townpeople in a future election campaign for the top slot of the County Commission or the City Council.

Anyway, one of the cities' City Councils, buoyed up by the complaints of homeless people blocking their way into their favorite establishment, decided, enough is enough, time to make a hot potato, so they passed an ordinance which basically said "Off With Their Vests!"

Actually, the ordinance /potato basically said, "You homeless people can't panhandle or sell newspapers on our corners, medians, or off ramps anymore, hand over that vest! "

So, the clever homeless road dawgs in that other city, hid the vests and came across the bay, put the vests back on, and quadrupled the number of homeless people selling newspapers on our corners, and medians and off ramps.

Here is where it gets sticky. That other city. by passing that ordinance, had tossed their hot potato right into our hot potato pan.

Not even thinking about the social implications. Like, maybe not good to mix up road dawgs with street puppies.

So, yet another potential social problem lurked here. Chaos in the streets maybe. A real "West Side Story" adventure shaping up, you know, the "When yer a jet, yer a jet all your days..." kind of thing.

Then, the townspeople in our city became restive. And they thought, "Well, heck, the other city did it. Took back their streets and medians and off ramps. But, now those road dawgs are coming over here and blocking our way into our Wal-mart! Yikes! We gotta do something!"

So our townspeople called our groveling, photogenic, hooting City Council members...and County Commission members.

Ok, so our County Commission members met, Our City Council members met. And they tossed that hot potato around a little. But, no dice, couldn't up come up with anything.

Then, the other city even sent one of their helpful County Commission members over here to show our County Commission and City Council members how to do it. Still no dice. The whole thing was starting to look like Abbott and Costello'a famous "Who's on Third?" routine.

Anyway, our County Commission and City Council members finally did the right thing. They formed Workshops to study the hot potato, er, dilemma.

That's a way to give the hot potato some time to cool down.

And it worked, for the time being, that is.

And the County commission and City Council meetings in our city revealed something important, and meaningful....maybe even memorable. An ethic lurking there in the social dilemma.

There are actually ethical people in our hooting, groveling photogenic, lot who have a heart, and some common sense, and well....ethics.

Some of those people with a heart, and common sense, and ethics proclaimed they were not going to vote on an ordinance which would deprive homeless people of the meager income they had in this putrid economy by depriving them of the right to sell newspapers in this city. They were going to table that vote. Until the issue comes up again.

And it will. So long as there is one person who thinks it is offensive to have to pass, egads, a homeless person with a colorful vest on selling newspapers to people on their way to church, and one hooting, groveling, photogenic person lookin' for a vote.

In this ongoing tale of two cities, you can count on it.

WE, THE PUPPIES.........

We all know about the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution, and the Bill of Rights

Or we street puppies here in homeless nation thought we did, until recently, when we decided, why not secede? That's right, secede from that other nation. Diplomatic relations with the other nation are rapidly souring and have taken on an ugly note of late, so, why not just secede?

Well, it was either that or get a divorce.

And divorces can get darn messy, and real expensive, you know, arguing over alimony, baring the skeletons in the closet, lawyers fees and splitting hairs over the pets and the lawn furniture and the jumbo TV thing that's so big it's got it's own zip code.

See, secession would be better, because we could actually get support from other nations like Cuba and the Antarctic and Alaska.

We can just call up Cuba and the Antarctic and Alaska and say, "Hey, we're seceding," and you betcha , Cuba will send us a bunch of 50 year old jalopys we can sleep in and sugar cane we can sell on the street on Sunday, and the Antarctic can send us Penguins, and Alaska can send us, um...polar bears and snow shoes.

All of Which will be absolutely no good to us at all, except for the 50 year old jalopys to sleep in. But, hold on. Actually, come to think of it,, we can dress up the Penguins and Polar Bears in t-shirts and snow shoes and bandanas so they can look nice while they sell the sugar cane on the streets on Sunday.

Ok, the foreign aid is taken care of. (Ha! wait'll they find out we got nothing to give back!)

But we're getting ahead of ourselves here. First, we have to establish ourselves as an entity. An actual nation. And that's where the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights come in.

We're going to be cherry picking a lot of those important and hallowed documents. You know, just taking the things we really need for the time being. And actually, the other nation was real sweet about this whole thing - probably thinking what a clever way to get rid of us - and they said, hey, take our constitution and bill of rights, we're not using them right now, anyway.

So, ok, we're going to do that, it'll save on copier paper. But we need to make a few changes to some things. Especially that Bill of Rights thing.

It needs some, as Ricky Riccardo would say, some 'splaining'. Cause ya see, when we started looking over those important documents we are borrowing until the other nation sees the sense in using them again, at first, everything seemed to be in order.

Declaration of Independence? Darn tootin', whata way to say to that madcap, King George, "We are outa here."

And the Constitution goes right to the heart of the matter: "We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and to posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America."

That document is the supreme law of the United States, and is the oldest written constitution still in use by any nation in the world.

The Bill of Rights is attached to the Constitution and to put it simply, is a list of amendments which spell out exactly the rights guaranteed by the Constitution. But, we realized the other nation's Bill of rights doesn't really adequately cover what we really need here in homeless nation.

First Amendment. Freedom of Religion and speech. Absolutely. We got that here. Couldn't survive without all of our wonderful churches and clergy. They give us spiritual backbone, and nice clothes, and good food. And unconditional love. And freedom of speech? well, hey, you wouldn't be reading this or a whole lot of other things without it.

Second Amendment. The Right to Bear Arms. Well, when you consider, in parts of homeless nation, the only moral caliber is a .38, why not.

Third Amendment. Protection from quartering of troops in time of peace. A little hazy, seeing as how 18% of our citizens are vets. But so long as they don't go charging around with RPG's under their arm and lay off on the war stories a little bit... sure.

Fourth Amendment. Protection from unreasonable search and seizure. Okay, here is where the problem starts. In fact, it was an ugly incident a couple of nights ago which sparked this whole secession idea, and laid bare the inadequacies of that particular amendment. Big Time.

Some people got it into their heads that it was ok to go into the sleeping quarters of some street puppies and, well, let's say, shake things up...or down.

And, seemingly, on paper, those people were right. When a puppy is trading up for shelter and food, and stability and security, the puppy has to give up some things. There are curfews, there are rules, there are simple infringements which will supposedly guarantee the safety of all in return for abiding by a few supposedly benign rules.

Benign so long as the people enforcing those rules don't step over the line of decency in enforcing those rules. Benign so long as they don't scare the puppies half to death, and destroy or confiscate property which is important to the survival of the puppy, benign so long as they don't rip at the soul of a puppy so hard with the unspoken message that the puppy is worth nothing and deserves that treatment simply because he or she is homeless. so hard that the puppy weeps and cringes in fear at what is to come from the people who are supposed to be protecting them.

Yeah, that amendment needs to be 'splained'.

And this is how it should be 'splained.' Real simple. And to the point.

Fourth Amendment. Protection from unreasonable search and seizure. Ok, we agree to the search and seizure part, and that is going to guarantee the assurance that nobody is hiding harmful or illegal substances. And if they are, then please, by all means, remove the harmful and or illegal substances, and, if necessary, the people hiding them.... and take the vitamins and the candy bars too. You know how we can get with too much sugar and Vitamin B.

But think again about abusing, with brutality, and heartlessness, the unreasonable part.

Because the next time anybody tries that monkey business of brutalizing the dignity and souls of street puppies and treating us like road kill or retreads, well, The great singer Tom Petty probably said it best in his song "Stand My Ground."

Well we won't back down
You can stand us up at the gates of hell
but we won't back down

Well we know what's right, and we got just one life
in a world that keeps pushin' us around
we will stand our ground
and we won't back down.

MARINE DEVIL PUPPIES RULE! HOOAH!

Actually, that's Marine Devil Dogs. A term of endearment for all marines since WWI in the Battle of Belleau Wood in 1918, when the U.S. Marines fought with such ferocity against the German forces they were labeled by the frightened Germans as 'Dogs From Hell.'

And, Hooah? Well, that was first used by British forces in the late 1800's while fighting in Afghanistan, and more recently by U.S. forces to mean anything from, ''Heard, Understood, Acknowledged," to "Outstanding," to "You've got to be kidding."

"You've got to be kidding," as in "We're going to do what?!" "Uh, huh, we're going to Boot Camp, for a week. All day, every day....right...where did I leave my bus pass?"

But there was no way out of it. Suddenly, bus passes were being tossed around like they were manhole covers. We were stuck. We had been conscripted. We were going to get the whole treatment. Physical training, new uniforms, hair cuts, forced close order drill. The works.

And we were going to come out of Boot Camp as disciplined, well trained Marine devil puppies and sent to the front lines of the biggest war we got going on right now, the war against unemployment.

Now, this whole thing was thought up by a major officer person at a wonderful place where street puppies stay to try to get their lives back in shape after being street puppies for awhile.

And finding employment is one of the things to do to get the life back into shape. That, and learning how to sleep lying down instead of standing up against a lamp post.

And we were going to do this whole Boot Camp thing to challenge the prevailing wisdom: "Can't get a job, the unemployment rate here is close to 13 percent, may as well go back to sleeping standing up against a lamp post."

Yup, we were going to defy the prevailing wisdom and reality. We were going to take the war to them. Them being the folks who keep saying the unemployment rate is 13 percent and ya can't get a job unless you dance good enough to do the dance with the star show thing, or recently graduated with a degree in how to be a real good second story man.

And, it had been determined, Boot Camp was the way in to the rumored wonderland of trees dripping with jobs, and streets paved with hundred dollar bills and certificates of deposit.

Now, Boot camp in military life is a kind of resocialization whereby the mental, physical and emotional condition is completely torn down by a cranky DI (drill instructor for all of you people born after the draft was thrown out when it was determined it was cruelty to 18-year olds) who basically rips you apart from one end to the other for a couple of months and then puts you back together his way and dresses you in a new olive green get up (or, oh, Lord, I'm going to faint, those beautiful Marine dress Blues) and then sends you home on leave to Mom.

Mom, who doesn't recognize you, and spends a couple of weeks while you are there on leave, wondering who that charming, well mannered young man or woman is who keeps insisting on saying, "Sir," "Maam" and, opening doors, making the bed, and cleaning up the mess in the kitchen.

But the major officer person in charge of the Marine devil street puppie Boot Camp had taken one small mercy on us. We would not be sent back on leave to mom after boot camp.

The first morning of Boot Camp dawned in a misty shroud of doubt and fear. What were we facing? We huddled together under an awning near the jumping off spot, whispering amongst ourselves. What did the officers have in store for us? We had the schedule, but no real description. But one thing on the schedule had snared our attention. "Targeted job search."

That could mean anything from entering an employment office with a bow and arrow, to robbing a bank. We were worried.

We shuffled around, smoked a bit, no...we smoked a lot. Waiting for the day's events to begin. And then we saw it. A little red tricycle being pushed across the asphalt and through the opening of the tent where our first class would be held.

A little red tricycle. Creaking it's way across the asphalt, being steered by a tall person bent over the tricycle, and leering at us, grinning the kind of grin you usually see on that horrific clown who greets you at the entrance to the house of mirrors at the carnival.

Yeah. we had to ride that little red tricycle. One by one, we completed the obstacle course. I won't go into detail about the obstacle course here, but it involved what would happen if you needed to get to a job real fast, and there were, well...obstacles. There was an incentive, a generous gift certificate from a fine store for the winner, meaning, you finished the course with the best time and your sense of humor intact. At the end of the morning's festivities, I discovered that, in fact, I owed the store a gift certificate.

And I had the nagging thought for two days that maybe I had broken my right arm in three places, and sprained my left ankle while riding that little red tricycle. But no time for these trivial concerns. No Marine devil puppy wimps out of Boot Camp unless a stretcher is involved.

In the days to come, we Marine devil puppies made good our commitment to excellence in the face of great odds and nay saying. We networked; we cooked up resumes; we organized and conducted job searches; we rode around in vans dressed in brand new suits and ties and scarves and stuff and probably scared people who interviewed us with our persistence and our tenacity and our survival and battle tactics.

We listened to fine motivational speakers, and other generous people who cheered us on with revelations taken from their deep fonts of wisdom regarding the paucity of jobs versus the absolute need and desire to get one of those jobs, and how we could gain an edge over our competition. We listened, and we learned. We even had make overs. The U.S Marines have their green/brown camouflage face paint...we had Mary Kay.

And every Marine devil puppy made the week. No ringing the bell here.When we gathered for our graduation ceremony, it was a cause for celebration. But no hats were thrown into the air, no weekend passes. we were way too tuckered out to party.

We accepted our graduation certificates and very cool t-shirts proclaiming that we had survived Boot Camp. We ate ice cream and a nifty cake decorated in military camouflage frosting. We were surrounded by our equally tuckered out commanding officer DI , and the other major officer persons of the wonderful establishment that sponsored the whole week. I think they were in awe of we Marine devil puppy recruits. They certainly looked proud.

For we had not only survived Boot Camp. We had prevailed. We are smarter, stronger...and wiser. And ready to take on the biggest challenge facing us. And I'm not talking about that red tricycle thing.

We are now, and truly and always, Marine Devil Puppies. Hooah! Semper Fi!

RX GOMER

You've got a bad headache. You've got a bad headache because somebody beat you up, and took your wallet and your backpack. You can barely see the wet flecks of red something all over your torn jacket because your eyes are so swollen from the beating.

Or you tripped over your boot laces and fell down a couple of days ago, and at first what seemed a minor bump has now swollen your leg to three times it's normal size, and you can barely walk without screaming out in pain.

Or, that cold that started out as a mild cough and stuffed nose has turned into a monster thing crawling around inside your chest and threatening to stop your breathing.

Or maybe, you just ate the wrong sandwich at the shelter, the one that was dated 'expired' about fourteen days ago, and you know that if you don't die from the tainted meat in that sandwich, you surely want to.

Wait and see, the usual remedy for all things medical in homeless nation just isn't going to cut it today. You can no longer put it off. Time for the trip all street puppies fear. The trip to the ER.

If you're in homeless nation, it's very likely you have no health insurance. Not even medicaid or county insurance, and forget about a doctor.

Dr. Vinnie Boom Bah in that building on the corner which houses a record store on the ground floor is about as close as you're going to get to a doctor. And he's never inhis office because He owns the record store.

What you do have is EMTALA. That's geek speak for The Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act. EMTALA was passed as part of the Consolidated Omnibus Budget Reconciliation Act of 1986, which is sometimes referred to as "The Cobra Law".

That's the law that states if you see a Cobra just outside the ER, you can pull your gun and shoot it, but if you see it inside the ER, you have to conceal your gun beneath your shirt and shoot it through the button hole.

The COBRA law also states that the ER must treat anybody who is in extremis ( hurt or nearly dead or real sick) if they get within 250 yards of the ER and ask for help. The trick there is getting within that 250 yard limit and hoping the last ten yards isn't over Cobra infested water.

See this whole EMTALA thing also governs when and how a patient may be (1) refused treatment or, (2) transferred from one hospital to another when he is in an unstable medical conditions and also, how far you can be outside the ER room while you're dying or something before they have to legally treat you....or stabilize you and send you to another ER. Where the same thing happens all over again.

So let's say you got into the ER, and only had to shoot two Cobras to do it. And under EMTALA you are entitled to have that head wound fixed up, or the broken leg tended to, or admitted with a serious case of pneumonia, or your stomach pumped and admitted for fourteen days of nothing but fluids through an IV.

Ah ha! But now you run into GOMER.

GOMER isn't that big guy over in the corner with apple juice all over his white coat. Yeah, the one picking his nose with his gloved hand. That's Billy Bob, the on call neurosurgeon. No, GOMER is ER nurses and doctors speak for "GET OUT OF MY EMERGENCY ROOM,"

And GOMER is a whole differnet way to triage in an ER.

Chalk it up to the weariness which plagues all those nurses and doctors and attendants scurrying around the ER in their cute scrubs whose job it is to determine who is about to kick it, and who just needs an aspirin and a pat on the fanny and a cheery "good night, honey, feel better."

Or chalk it up to genuine dislike many of those nurses and doctors and attendants actually have for people who look dirty, smell funny, and are maybe missing a few teeth and are carrying most of their belongings in bulging backpacks...and don't have insurance. My bet is on the latter chalk it upper.

I've seen more than a few upturned noses on the merry band of ER employees during the ER triage interview. You know, where they look you over and ask you a few questions to determine if you're in the may kick it or aspirin mode. It goes like this.

Q. When did it happen? The beating.
A. I don't know I was sleeping. can you clean the blood, please.
Q. Where did the beating take place?
A. Uh, um... behind the billboard over the underpass....uh...the blood...
Q.On a scale of one to ten, what would you say your pain is.
A. Um, the pain, heck, I can hardly see...could ya clean the blood...
Q. SIR, the pain, on a scale of one to ten.
A. Ten.
Q. How about if we give you some vicodin and you can go home to that billboard and sleep for awhile. Will a bottle of 60 do?
A. Sure. Um, could I have a wet washcloth?

There ya go, problem solved. no surture for the cut behind all that blood, no cat scan to see if there is brain damage. Just the bottle of vicodin, and a referral to see Dr. Vinnie Boom Bah above the record store in ten days.

And the guy who tripped over his boot laces, and the one with what is probably pneumonia and the one who ate the nasty sandwich will all get the same treatment. Except the guy with the sandwich thing will get a sample of kaopectate along with the vicodin.

And the ER attendants will have gotten around EMTALA rules because they were able to determine the patient did not have to be transferred to another facility; took care of the Cobras and was within the 250 yard limit when when he asked to be treated, or was stabilized, (meaning he didn't pass out right then and there) and was not refused treatment.

Nice work if you can get it, and the scrubs were'nt even soiled. And just about every ER we street puppies know of do that work every day and night. And who knows, the guy with the head injury might drop dead of a blood clot to the brain in a couple of days; the guy with the leg injury might walk around permanently on a broken limb which never heals right, and be crippled for life; the guy with developing pneumonia will be back probably, in an ambulance and near comatose, and the guy with the nasty sandwich? Well, it won't be the first time somebody starved to death from fear of eating expired food.

The real RX in homeless nation is, don't get sick or hurt. And if you do, tough it out. It's either that or develop a vicodin addiction. Or worse, actually have to get to know Dr. Vinnie Boom Bah!

SLEEPING ROUGH IN MERRY OLE' ENGLAND

Oh, there they go again. Always one upping us. Those stodgy cousins of ours who have never gotten over the revolutionary war.

Those wild and crazy Brits have come up with an oh so proper term for homelessness. Sleeping Rough.

You know, the kind of term that fits with that stiff upper lip kind of attitude they take across the pond with everything, like when one of their oh so proper, over-educated lords or ministers ( their version of congressmen and senators) are caught, uh, well, sleeping rough.

But, now, they've taken it too far. And we are not amused.

One of their major domo fashion designers, a real British Dame no less.... Dame, Vivienne Westwood, knighted by the Queen of England herself... well, the Dame recently launched a new fashion line in a major fashion show using models dressed like rough sleepers. A British rendition of 'homeless chic.'

In fact, the whole fashion show, was a 'rough sleeper theme'. And it was a smash hit.

The fashion writers present breathlessly described the audience as breaking into rapturous applause as the flashing cameras captured the models emerging from cardboard boxes , some carrying bedrolls. The catwalk was carpeted with a lot more of those cardboard boxes, and the models hair was all dishelved, and discolored by something silvery, 'so they would like they had been sleeping rough and had got frost in their hair, and caught a cold and they sneezed a lot.'

The models, acting as roving, sneezing vagrants while light tripping down the catwalk were dressed in things like quilted bomber jackets, snug hoodies, and actual battle gear, sequined backpacks of course, and multi-colored neon ski caps. Apparently the only thing missing from these roving sneezing vagrants get ups were gold lame purses dripping with snot.

The Dame had the well known British common sense to launch this new fashion trend in Italy. Probably because those wild and crazy Italians will let anybody over their borders, even rough sleepin' , sneezing, roving vagrant look alikes, while the Brits won't even let a sniffling cocker spaniel through their international customs terminal.

One of the visiting fashionistas, you know, the kind of high maintenance celubutart who actually buys clothes at these high toned fashion shows then wears them home and frightens the children, said, while swooning over the show, "It is a little close to the bone, the nearest I have come to homelessness is going home and finding I don't have my door key, I mean what a disaster that is, dying to get into your house and you can't...and heavens, what if it isn't there anymore?" Poor Baby.


They have their nerve, don't they? I mean, making fun of , and taking advantage of their own homeless people by putting white silvery stuff into a model's hair to make it look like they'd been sleeping in the snow and stuff and then having the gall to charge mucho shillings for what passes for fashion. 'Homeless chic', indeed. Well, what do ya expect from a nation of folks who invented sensible shoes.....and Burberry.


And even the Queen, herself, that dear national treasure, got into the act of taking advantage of rough sleepers a couple years back when she got caught trying to sneak her house, Buckingham Palace onto the poverty list so she would be eligible for enough free fuel to heat all of those empty drafty rooms where they keep the good silver and pictures of the Queens twenty or so corgis. Ha! She got some heat all right, from the citizens of her own country when they found out she was trying to sneak about a million pounds out of their national treasury that had been designated for anti-poverty funds. What cheek!!

Then, of course, you know how the Royals are, tidying up after each other Last winter, there was himself, the heart throb of the family, the hunky Prince William sleeping rough in an alley behind some dumpsters so that he could "get a feeling for what they are up against.'"Ahem.

He was also in the company of five or so well armed guys fitted out with eyes in the backs of their heads. And, true to the royal code of dressing down, was clad in blue jeans, a hoody and a ski cap and tennis shoes. No sequined back pack for him. Or that white stuff in his hair.

Ok, we in homeless nation are not amused, but we're not going to fret over it too much, and seeing as how young William was willing to take one in the chin for his grandmum, we won't whine too much about this matter of the 'homeless chic' thing. And Hey, they still export some great stuff to us, like Monty Python and Eddie Izzard
.

And they ain't got nothin on us in the fashion department. Any day, down at the bus station we got all kinds of roving sneezing rough sleepin' street puppies strutting their own 'homeless chic'. I've seen more Gucci, Chanel, Ralph Lauren, Calvin Klein, Adolfo, Givenchy, Versace et al gear here in homeless nation than on the whole of Fifth Avenue and Rodeo Drive combined.

Granted, it's not mixed or matched up too well, seeing as all of it comes from the closets of snappy dressing real rich people by way of thrift stores and free vouchers, but it warms the heart to see that even in desperate circumstances, a lot of our street puppies have the fashion sense to at least wear the labels on the outside. Shows we know class when we see it.

You go, street puppies, You keep on struttin' those designer labels. I especially like the older guy reeking of Versace cologne, sporting the Gucci loafers with the Calvin Klein suit bottoms, the Adolfo flared sleeve shirt over the t-shirt that blares "Kiss Me I'm Irish", topped off with a sassyTommy Hilfiger suede jacket.

Like I said, those wild and crazy Brits got nothin' on us.

I'M FROM THE GOVERNMENT AND I'M HERE TO HELP.

Our late President, Ronald Reagan said those were the nine most terrifying words in the English language.

He said those words were right up there with some other great fabrications like, "I gave at the office," and "The check is in the mail."

At the time, he was speaking to a bunch of farmers who were looking for help from him, seeing as how he looked like he knew something about the government.

And, no, silly, they didn't want him to pick corn or milk the cows or chase the geese around the farm. They wanted cold hard cash they needed to afford all that corn and milk and cheese and a decent goose and stuff like that for themselves, because everything they produced was going to the government anyway, so why not get some dough for it so they can buy their own corn, milk and a decent goose.

Makes too much sense is why. When you're dealing with the government and money, try not to make too much sense. You'll both go nuts and the government guy will be comfortable with that.

Here in homeless nation, we're surrounded by government agencies who are here to help us.
And as we know in homeless nation, when you're surrounded, there's no way out.

And you might call the whole exercise of trying to extract moneyfrom any government agency who is here to help you, Gag Me With a Voucher.

Let's say, you are homeless because you have fallen on hard times, and need help with, oh, let's say, shoes. Ok, you go to the government person who represents the agency who can help you get some shoes, because it's winter, and your feet are so cold you cannot feel them. Not good for getting on the bus, you'll stumble and fall onto the driver, and he'll call the po po and have you arrested for indecent exposure of the white toes sticking up through the tattered shoes.

Ok, so time to get some shoes. Only one thing. After you wait for five hours to see the shoe guy in the government office you went to because their name was on the back of a match book from the Red Lantern Gentleman's Club that you found on the floor of the men's room at the bus station, he looks up from cleaning his dentures and yells, "Hey, git outa here, you ain't got no shoes on!" And sure enough, you look down, and the tattered shoes have fallen totally off your frozen tootsies.

So, you git. All the way to the back of the line and wait another two hours. Then you see the receptionist again, and explain the situation, and that you really do have to see the shoe guy. She looks at you with great pity in her eyes, shakes her head, says, 'tsk tsk, honey, you need to see you the shoe guy for that."

And you say, "I know that, I was just there, and he told me to leave because I didn't have any shoes on." She looks down at your really ugly feet, and recoils in disgust and says, "Well, we're going to have to get you some shoes, then, honey. Here, take this voucher.

You grasp the voucher in your hand, and sure enough, it says, "Voucher." Doesn't say voucher for what, but you're still taking their word for it because they're from the government. So you say meekly, "Ok, but where do I take it?" And she says "Go outside, take a right, walk ten blocks and you'll see a little pink building with iron bars on all the windows, a squad car and two armed policemen out front. thats the the 'here take this voucher' building. And then she gives you one of those, sick smiles you usually see on the face of your cat when he's toying with his catch of the day. And then and there, you know where you have seen her before.

Somewhere, someplace.. on a wanted poster. You wonder if you're on the right track here. Or maybe you've wandered into the Twilight Zone.

But, you go outside and take a right and trudge down the street and sure enough. There is the 'here, take this voucher' building. And the armed policemen and the squad car. You pull your pant legs way down so they cover your white frozen toes, and you can avoid arrest.

Inside the 'here take this voucher' building, you peek through the dim light and see...another line. Ok, but you need the shoes, you'll have to stick it out until they can see you, and hope you won't be too late for curfew at your shelter. They will beat you with shiny black whips if you are, and your frozen white toes might crack off under the pressure if you don't get the shoes.

Finally, finally, you get to the front of the line. Success, and you have a whole ten minutes to get to your shelter, before the shiny black whips are pulled out.

You hand the voucher to the clerk. He stares at it and says."What's this?"

You say, "Um, it's a voucher." And he gives you the same sickly smile you got from miss wanted poster back in the other building, and says, "I really can't help you." And you say, "WHY NOT???" and he says, ""Sir, I cannot take this voucher, unless you have a referral for the voucher."

And you say, "A referral?" And he says, "Yes, sir, a referral."

Suddenly you remember the armed policemen outside the door, and you let go of the thing in your pocket you want to stick down this turkey's throat, and say, "ok, where do I get a referral?"
And he says. "Well, that would be the referral for a voucher building." And you say, "Where's zat?" And he says it's straight down the street to the bus stop, take the number 2 bus five miles up and get off at the little brown building right next to the city zoo."

And you think, ok I may as well, I need the darn shoes and I'll at least miss the beating at the shelter. Oh, and I'll miss that mixed rotgut stew they serve after prayers, too.

So you say, "Fine, sir, but I will need a bus pass to do that, my feet are too frozen to walk."

And he says, "No, no can't do that.....unless you have a form from your shelter requesting a voucher."

You stare at him like Babe the Blue Ox. Words tumble through your head like they can't quite shake hands in order to form a sentence. Voucher, referral, form....no, referral, form voucher...um, nope, oh, got it, form, voucher, referral. You're ready to eat your own eyebrows.

Wait, he's saying something to you. He's saying, "Sorry, sir, you'll have to come back tomorrow, we're closed for the day. And, sir, we'll let it go this time, but please, when you come back, wear some shoes, regulations you know."

NO MORE MR. NICE GIRL

You're going to have to make some basic personality changes if you intend to survive in homeless nation. And don't give me that wounded fawn look. It won't work. Savvy street puppies are immune to wounded fawn looks. They're kinda like giving roses to a goat. He'll probably eat the roses and your watch, and then ignore you for the rest of your life.

Now, you want to give me the thousand yard stare? Ok. Then, maybe you'll have my sympathy. But, being Mr. Nice Girl, or Guy, don't feed the bulldog -or the goat - out here in homeless nation.

' Nice' is when somebody crunches your foot while leaping over you to get a meal ticket at a 'feed,' and you say, breathlessly, "Oh, it's ok, don't worry, I didn't need that shoe today." and then like a pinhead, you say..." Gee, oh, I'm so sorry...did you hurt yourself on my bloody foot?"

See, a proper street puppy would put their nose right in the guy's face and growl, "You do that again, and I'll put yer lights out....now give me that meal ticket."

You've probably been doing it all of your life. Being nice to others so they will love you.
Way back there, when life was, um, normal, you caught "The Disease To Please."

Probably around the age when you noticed you weren't getting anywhere by demanding stuff, and that would be at about the age of whenever it was when the folks started grounding you for doing naughty stuff. And instead of sulking about it because you really wanted to go to the dance on Friday, you....you clever person you....figured it out, and nearly gave them heart attacks by offering to take out the garbage, mow the lawn, and do the dishes every night. And you got to go to the dance.

And you had stumbled onto the age old way of how to get your way. Be submissive; avoid initiating confrontations; put the needs of others first; flattery, flattery, flattery; insincerity 'till it spilled out of your ears; being self-effacing; keeping your opinion to yourself; smiling when you wanted to kill , and one of my favorites disguising your unbridled disgust with your basketball coach for being an idiot, by demonstrating in so many groveling ways that you were a team player.

In short, you became a hypocrite. A manipulative shape-shifter pretending to have beliefs, opinions, virtues, feelings, qualities and standards you do not possess.

Heck, you probably shape-shifted your way into a whole lot of bad situations, including the one that brought you here to homeless nation. Who knows? If you were a real good shape-shiftin' manipulator, There may have been a whole bunch of those situations which finally just blew out and melted down the circuits in your conscious mind.

See, and when the conscious mind is shocked, confused, paralyzed by indecision, and just plain scared to death, ( kind of like what happens when you become homeless) the shadow self emerges from the shadow previously cast by the shape shifter. the shadow self which has carried all that pent up repression built up by all those years of living a kind of lie. And that shadow self is here to party!

And it's perfect timing for the shadow self to emerge. And be who you really are. You're here in homeless nation, you don't need to be Mr. Nice Girl...or Guy anymore. In fact, you're better off letting that shadow self lead the way out here, because being 'nice' will get you nowhere but getting your foot stepped on a whole lot.

And I'm not talking about shape shifting from 'nice' to ' good. ' Can't be done.

Good is what you are deep inside. Good is that part of the soul that wouldn't have anything to do with that shape-shifting goat of a personality you brought in here. I'm talking about not letting people walk all over you for things a lot more important than a meal ticket.

And you start by saying "No." A lot. And, "Why?" And "I don't agree." And ya don't explain it by adding on, "Um, well, what I mean is..."

Just "No", "Why?" and "I don't agree "will be sufficient to let others know that you think for yourself, and you won't be talked into doing something you don't want to do, or giving away something you want or need for yourself, or agreeing with anything that goes against your own standards or better judgment.

A lot of puppies out here won't like it. And they won't like you, because they won't be able to take advantage of you, or step on you at a 'feed' line. But they will respect you.

And I don't mean respect you in the way of "Hey, look, there goes a Nobel Prize winner." They will respect you in the way it really counts. They'll think twice before they try to mess with you.

And that is really what we are talking about here. Getting through all of what comes with this particular territory without getting hurt, or worse. And maintaining your humanity, your sense of humor, and most important, the good that is inside of you. Good beats 'nice' every time.

Okay, now, got it? Stand up for yourself. Start fighting back. Put yourself first.

And for heaven's sake, comb that hair, if Miss Lucinda Bureaugard Puppy sees it....well, no dance on Friday night for you, puppy!

DO YA WANNA DANCE?

What a great song.

Well, do ya wanna dance under the moonlight,
hold my hand all through the night,
oh, baby, baby, baby do ya wanna dance?

Sounds tame, but when Bette Midler sings it, shivers go right up the spine.

Ok, but this might not be the right time to get those shivers, and tingles and exchanging longing gazes and doing the wee wee dance whenever you're in the presence of that special person.

And homeless nation probably isn't the right place, because here you're not really in the right frame of mind for that kind of monkey business. And in the available lighting out here on the street, yikes! Boris Karloff could look like that special person.

Yeah, 'hooking up' out here could give you a breakdown if you don't watch yourself.

My late friend, Robert had a good take on the whole 'hooking up' deal. He'd sit on a bench watching a couple canoodling over in a corner. Then he'd say "Look at that. Ya got a guy who's down to a zero, a gal who's down to a zero, and they wanna get together....and whaddaya got?
Two zeros. "

He had a point. I mean, what does anybody have to offer each other out here? Another friend here, a lovely woman , put it bluntly. "Why bother? after you do the deed...you'd both be asking the other for a cigarette...or a bus pass!"

It's awkward enough to 'date' in the outside world. You arrange to meet, you change your skirt five times before you decide if you want to go dressed as Peggy the cheerleader or Zelda the hussy. Then you sit down at a dinner table for two hours and tell lies to each other,and then you probably have a hard time deciding if the evening merits a fumbly good night kiss. Or following the date with breakfast. My odds are on the Zelda look for breakfast. If only because the Zelda look probably drinks more martinis than usual.

Mating rituals here in homeless nation are a whole different thing.

If you're here, you're probably available. No sense in being coy about it. A lot of people end up here because something went wrong with the previous romantic situation, which probably started out with one of those date things that then ended in the breakfast thing and then years of the sheer hell thing until one of you bailed and landed here. With nothing. You're now a zero.

And a target. Everybody wants something out here. And 'hooking up' is a good way to get it.
That guy over there, who is slithering closer, is probably trying to figure out if you have any kind of income. Income means sweet talking you into a couple of bus passes. Your food stamps, tons of cigarettes, and a lot of other necessities. Necessities because he doesn't have an income but he's got a very smooth line and he'll tell you a lot about that awful woman who took everything he had, and then disabled him permanently by busting both of his ear drums when he tried to restrain her from robbing an old person.

And he probably likes to drink a lot too, just to prevent the awful flash backs of having his ear drums busted while performing an act of heroism. But, oh yeah, you've fallen in love.

Stepped in it sounds more likely. I mean why else would you give up all of your food stamps, bus passes, cigarettes and cold cash you get from whatever flaky kind of job you might find unless you had found true love?

Because you're temporarily nuts, is why. You're lost all reasoning power. You're homeless and you're in shock. Especially if you're a woman. Suddenly you have no place to sleep. Hardly any food or clothing. And you probably aren't looking real good. No money for good cosmetics, and a lot of bad free haircuts, second hand clothes that come in size 'who knows, just take it, it's free.' And you haven't had your teeth cleaned in months, and the only real showers you get are the ones the cars spray on you while passing through the puddles after a rainstorm.

And it could be Attila the hun whispering in your ear, "Baby...who's your daddy?" and you wouldn't care. It's the call of the wild. The mating ritual of the streets. And no plummage.
This is straight up basic, no frills, generic courtship. And it could cost you more than a little cash , a few cigarettes, and some bus passes.

What little dignity you have left, maybe, when Mr. Wonderful finds another person who can afford more cigarettes, bus passes and walking around money.

But be of good heart. Unlike an attack by the Borg of "Star Trek The Next Generation."
Resistance is not futile.

Do like smart street puppies do. Travel in packs. Share stuff with puppies who care about you because they really like you, or are simply kindly puppies rowing along in the same boat you're in. And save your cigarettes and bus passes and cash for yourself. Who knows, you might save enough to get some proper eyeliner and a good haircut.

Save the canoodling business until you exit homeless nation, stage left or right or wherever you are bound. And don't listen to any torchy songs while you're here, like, "Do ya wanna dance?" You'll leave faster and feel better if ya check the romance at the door when you tumble in.

And if some guy slithers up to you and whispers in your ear, 'Hey, baby...who's your daddy?'

Well, hey. Bust his ear drums. Works for me.

URBAN LEGENDS AND UNCOMFORTABLE TRUTHS

Urban legends are modern folklore. Powerful narratives of widely dispersed misinformation , containing elements of horror, caution, mystery, and sometimes, humor, and believed by their tellers to be true.

Merely that they are in circulation, exhibit variation over time, and carry some significance, or in fact, contain a grain of truth, motivates a community to preserve and propogate them.

We've all heard tons of urban legends about the alligators in the sewers (egads, sometimes even coming into your own bathroom); organ trafficking; weed in the Halloween brownies; the vanishing hitch-hiker; the baby in the microwave; the babysitter and the man upstairs; Walt Disney's body is cryogenically frozen, or Paul is dead.

You remember, Paul...the Beatle..and if you say 'who is Walt Disney' or 'what is a Beatle'...you need to stop reading right here and go back to watching "American Idol."

And there are tons of urban legends in circulation about Homeless Nation and though they, like other urban legends, have exhibited variation over time, and carry some significance, and in fact contain a grain of truth - they sometimes contain buckets of grains of uncomfortable truths - which motivates the surrounding communities to preserve and propogate them.

Some Homeless Nation urban legends are are easily dismissed. Whoever heard of a street puppy really swimming into your bathroom through the sewer system? He'd have to fall off your porch straight into a manhole to do that. And if you have manholes under your porch, you're living way too close to the street.

And weed in the Halloween brownies? Please. A whole town full of stoned out trick-or-treating eight year old street puppies dressed up as everything from ballerinas to Miss Piggy to Sponge Bob would have made national headlines.

No, we're talking about the grains of uncomfortable truth contained in homeless nation urban legends here, so let's not puppyfoot around it.

Urban legend number one. Street puppies are all drug addicts and/or alcoholics and why help them anyway, they're just going to spend the money to give to some drug dealer or liquor store.

Zing! Whew. that one hurts. There's a grain, Oh, I'll give you ten to fifteen grains of truth for that. but before you get any ideas about every day in homeless nation being St. Patrick's Day, or drug dealers on parade, we're talking about a small percentage of street puppies.

Compared to the number of puppies who got here because of of good odds instead of bad luck, I'd say the overwhelming number of street puppies arrived here because of situations way beyond their control and are going to spend every penny or service they receive to rectify the current situation and take care of the amenities before buying even one cold beer.

And if their drug of choice is well, drugs, homeless nation has plenty of help for those puppies too. And we don't judge them, we just help them, and only if they ask for it, and we give them lots of love. Unless they steal our watch or somethin' to pay their dealer. Then we get out the piano wire.

Urban Legend number two. It's just a scam. I've seen them drive away from their panhandling spots in....um, uh....an Escalade. Yeah, an escalade. And they all have 9 foot TV's with built in microwaves and showers.

Ok, I once saw a street puppy take off his panhandling vest thingy, and go straight to the Mercedes dealership right down the street and pay cash for a big ole' Mercedes. And then he changed into his Batman suit, hopped into the 'Benz' and went roaring through the streets with the top down, yelling "EEEEEE....haaaaaaaaaaaa."

Now that's some kind of urban legend there .

It's also my way of saying no grains of truth and if you believe that particular urban legend or anything like it, you've been listening to too many of those late night talk show hosts who are still trying to prove that Christopher Columbus was actually born in Latvia and was a Hindu.

Urban legend number three. They're taking all of my hard earned taxes and getting food stamps and selling them to terrorists and people like that. It's Un American!!

Ok. Twenty grains of truth for that one. But they're not selling them to terrorists. They're probably selling them to your neighbor. The one who eats all the cookie dough. And five pounds of pasta at a time. And gumbees. And he's getting all that stuff for half price which is what he's paying, fifty cents on the buck.

And the puppy is probably buying things with that fifty cents on the buck that he can't buy with food stamps like vitamins and pampers and soap and toothpaste and some hot food, because believe it or not, you can't buy vitamins or hot food with food stamps and most of us don't have the kind of money it takes to buy good vitamins, or access to a cooking stove.

And, yes. Some people who sell their food stamps use it to buy drugs and alcohol. What a surprise. We are shocked. Shocked!

But before they were selling food stamps to buy drugs and alcohol, they were probably selling other things to buy drugs and alcohol. However, the vast majority of people using food stamps, use them for food. And the next time you stick up your nose at me at the check out counter when I use my food stamps to pay for yogurt and a peach, and a bagel, I'll stick a drinking straw up it.

Ok, we've explained away three of the biggest homeless nation urban legends. At least now you know the vast majority of street puppies aren't all whacked out drug addicted, drunken, mercedes drivin' yodeling food stamp sellers with ties to terrorist cells.

Uh, oh. Look! Quick! Across the street....there goes Osama Bin Laden!

FAUX PAWS

Faux Paws is streetpuppy speak for "faux pas, " a french phrase for "false step," a kind of social blunder; an awkward or tactless act, or a total violation of accepted social norms.

In homeless nation, if you make too many of those faux paws, by displaying a lack of knowledge of proper etiquette - which kind of rhymes with 'tourniquet' - you may end up wearing one of those tourniquets on your paw.


Miss Emily Post popularized the whole notion of proper etiquette by writing a whole lot of books about acceptable behaviour and habits for all classes of people. Etiquette for weddings, funerals, dinners, golf, calculating a waiter's tip, choosing a gift, even how to use mobile technology and what to do when your kid sticks a drinking straw up his nose while you're calculating the waiter's tip. Now that's a total violation of social norms - unless the kid sticks the straw up the waiter's nose, in which case you won't be invited back there anymore anyway, so forget about violating any social norms....and the tip.


In homeless nation, we have our own etiquette advisor, Miss Lucinda Beauregard Puppy. Miss Lucinda has been around homeless nation for awhile, and she is certainly familiar with the most important etiquette here, street etiquette.

And Miss Lucinda has graciously agreed to advise us streetpuppies on street etiquette, which covers a whole different set of social blunders, awkward and tactless acts, and violations of social norms. None of which deal with golf.....or drinking straws up the nose.

Let's start with the easy stuff.

No scratching. That is no scratching yourself in public. I'm not talking about my elbow itches so I think I'll give it a little scratch. I'm talking about, My back itches so I'm just going to back up to this here wall and slide up and down a lot thereby looking like a mean old groaning grizzley bear. Now that is a totally tactless act. You'll scare people off, and you have just compounded the tactless act by adding on a charge of social blunder for anybody who is thinking about asking those people for spare change.

Ladies should avoid walking rapidly on the street. You're going to knock somebody down with that fifty or so pound bag you're dragging along with you because the shelter you're staying at won't let you leave it there for the day. Besides, if you walk too fast, you won't be able to look at the ground for quarters and cigarettes and stuff other people walking fast have dropped. So, everybody....S L O W down!

Don't talk loudly on your cell phone. Not only another tactless act, but you really don't want anybody to know you have one of those things. Every streetpuppy in earshot will want to use it to call their dying cat or sick mother. Or somebody will just steal it while you're bending down to pick up a quarter on the street. And for heaven's sake, turn off that country and western, or hip hop or soft rock ring tone. It's just plain annoying...yet another violation of social norm.

Don't exhibit Cave man like behaviour. You know what I'm talking about. A cute girl walks by, and you guys go all, "Baby I'm the man for you." Real loud. It embarasses the girl, and what do you really think the chances are that she's going to give a tumble to a guy who's wearing last year's gucci sequin vest from the thrift store and matching 'found them in the dumpster' one size too large cuffed striped pants?

Don't overstay your welcome. Anywhere. Sleeping, eating, walking, window shopping, riding a bus or scratching. You do not want to attract the attention of the authorities. Any authorities. I don't care if it's the rent-a-creepy guy at the local 7-11. Just keep moving. You don't...and you'll have more to worry about than smoothing over an awkward or tactless act against the social norm blunder.

Don't talk with your mouth full. The other puppies will know you have food. You don't want that to happen. Not if you value all of your paws.

We will continue the etiquette lessons at a near future date. Right now, Miss Lucinda is having a swooning spell. All this hot sun and somebody with no manners knicked her lace parasol.