Did you ever have one of those days?

Did you ever have one of those days? May even one of those weeks? OK, rhetorical question, we all have them. A friend referred to my weekend as the “black weekend” – as in “Black Sabbath”, or poltergeist infested; he was referring to it having started on Friday the thirteenth and ending with a national holiday for a slain populist leader; a day he called “Black Monday”.

OK, my weekend wasn’t as bad as the slaying of Knights Templar or Martin Luther King, but my cat died in its sleep; laptop hard drive died – the warrantee expired last month; the thermostat control on a nearly new, expensive, refrigerator, like the phone jack by my new desk, ceased to function.

I do back up everything to CD, but, naturally, I had backed up everything Xmas week – and a newly formatted disk was sitting there, waiting for back-up as soon as I submitted this column; lost three week’s data. Dell says a new hard drive will be here before this column hits the stands. Sigh.

This, I suppose, is what comes of making the move I mentioned last summer – into my late mom’s house. Speaking of which – this is an example of kvetching – I got a new bed; very comfortable; but I couldn’t sleep. I had forgotten mom was a sun bird who rose with the sun, no curtains or shades on the south east windows. I am a vampire – I love the dark – the sun comes bursting in around 5 AM and wakes me. OH, after composition, half a sentence also vanished from last week’s column.

OK, that’s a personal kvetch – telling poltergeist to bug off and let me get back to my usual style of kvetch. You think Pat Robertson’s Satanic-right buddies are getting even for comments I made?

Am I tempting the Fates ? I wonder if the Fates are as pretty as the Greeks depicted them. There is that thing about being careful what you ask for, you might just get it. Depending on how you see the Governor’s State-Of-The-State speech, it might be true.

The SAD 37 Superintendent was concerned about ensuring good pay to attract good teachers; and John said he wanted starting pay raised to $30 thousand – still lower than average pay, by a start.

True to form, the Republican response acknowledged they were asked for suggestions to help repair structural deficits created by the King administration – they didn’t acknowledge making any, or any level of help. What they did do? They attacked tax adjustments – such as exemption for military pensions – which would help the average Maineaic. Apparently opposing a higher minimum wage, they object to spending to compensate for cuts Bush made – roads, health care, heating fuel and education.

Of course, I did get a laugh when they pointed to scrapped budgetary suggestions – which they had liked until my BDN op-ed piece, and this column, pointed out the economic stupidity involved.

Where are their suggestions? Where are concrete proposals from the party controlling 50 percent of the legislature? Look to Washington, all they know is deficit spending and hurting the least among us; Republicans want “Stare Decisis” – "to stand by that which is decided"; they decided to bankrupt the nation, and to seek your approval for them doing the same in Maine. Such is this week’s kvetch.

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