‘If I want you in my arms. All I have to do is Dream’
I’m sure that many if not most of you are not familiar with the lyrics I used from am old 1950’s Everly Brothers song for my title, but it sure came to my mind when I read this article on wet dreams. I find the article interesting so I’m going to share it with my readers.
Question: have you ever experienced an orgasm from a dream?
My answer: No. Unfortunately not in years, but I have in the past. Now days some kind of sub-conscious censor has implanted himself in my psyche. I can start a sexy dream but just before I get to the really good part a curtain falls as if someone said you’re not allowed to go there. At this point I wake up frustrated and disappointed.
The following is a an article from the AOL Love and Dating pages.
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The Latest in Love & Dating News:
Fun Facts About Sex Dreams
Posted: 2007-08-23 14:02:57
Chances are, you had a sex dream this week. Fully eight percent of
our dreams involve sexual situations, according to a new study from
psychologists at the University of Montreal in Canada.
Interestingly, women have just as many sex dreams as men, with one
important difference: Men are far more likely to have fantasies about
sex with imaginary people, while women dream about current or past
sexual partners, as well as celebrities, reports HealthDay News.
“Men used to report many more sex dreams, twice as many as women, and
we don’t find that difference anymore,” study author Antonio Zadra,
an associate professor of psychology at the University of Montreal,
explained to HealthDay News. “Either women are having them more, or
they’re more likely to report them. Either way, it’s interesting. ”
Even though sex dreams are very common, psychologists haven’t paid
much attention to them. For this study, the team asked 109 women and
64 men ages 20 to 89, all of whom responded to an ad about the
research project, to keep a diary of their dreams for as long as one
month. The total number of dreams exceeded 3,500.
What do we dream about?
— The most common sex dream involved sexual intercourse, followed by
flirting, kissing, fantasies and masturbation.
— Four percent of sex dreams among men and women resulted in an
orgasm.
— 18 percent of women’s sex dreams involved unwanted sex, compared
with just five percent of men.
— Nine percent of sex dreams among women and five percent among men
involved fantasies about celebrities.
— Men were far more likely to dream about having sex with more than
one person.
— Four percent of women’s dreams featured a partner having an
orgasm. None of the men reported this dream.
Zadra explained that if you dream about something, it probably
occupies your waking thoughts as well. “If the sex dreams tend to
involve unknown or fantasy characters, it is probably a reflection of
your waking state, that your desires and fantasies are with
strangers,” he told HealthDay News.
The study findings were reported at the annual meeting of the
Associated Professional Sleep Societies in Minneapolis, Minn.
Eighty percent of us have a wet dream once a week. Do you? If you’re one of the lucky ones, is it always the same or is it different each time? Would you like to tell us about it?
Society’s Third Rail – Abortion
The Bottom Line The way I see it, is that one side wants to control the lives of the other side.
I decided to tackle the mother of controversial subjects – Abortion.
Do I have an opinion? Heck yes, I have an opinion, but my opinion isn’t whether abortion constitutes murder or not. I happen to think that a woman should have a right to choose, but it doesn’t matter. Why? Because I’m a man. There is no way a man can interpose themselves into the place of a woman, let alone a pregnant woman, so they (including me) should just butt out.
The abortion rights debate should only be between women. Yet, it seems that a large majority of the Right to Life supporters are men. Deplorably all the violent actions perpetrated by this group against clinics and doctors have been men. Unfortunately, these actions tend to cloud the real issue and the way I see it is both sides have rock-solid issues.
The practice of abortion preempts the birth and therefore the eventual life of the fetus. (I personally believe that life doesn’t begin at conception but I’m a man, so that doesn’t count) In any event, it is a regrettable procedure, which should not be entered into lightly without pre-procedure counseling.
There can be many factors, which enter into a woman’s decision of whether or not to carry a pregnancy to term. Things like abandonment, a woman’s health, her mental suitability, her financial ability, the viability of the fetus, quantity of existing children etc. To the pro life/anti abortion backers, these factors may seem trivial.
Though it seems reasonable that a woman who becomes pregnant as a result of the unconscionable act of incest or rape are entitled to an express pass for an abortion, yet here too, most right to lifer’s line up against this reasonable assumption. Are we to compound the crime that has been inflicted against these women by forcing them to have the child of the perpetrator, thus forcing her to raise and live with a living breathing memory of her attacker for her the remainder of her life? This is the equivalent of a life sentence for the victim.
Some states have passed laws that make all abortions, even the ones protecting the life of the mother, illegal. Since, I know of no state legislatures that contain a majority of women, this is another case where men are involving themselves in a woman’s issue. It is much too easy for men to moralize about this issue, when they are on the outside looking in.
On a related matter, the same faction who vehemently rejects abortion, claiming it’s an extreme form of birth control, tantamount to murder, also reject logical steps to avoid pregnancy such as various forms of the morning after pill. I find their position on this peculiar, since restricting use of these contraceptives would lead to more unwanted pregnancies and by extension, more dreaded abortions.
Even more curious, is the right to life bloc’s position on stem cell research, using extra, unused embryos that are scheduled for destruction. It is widely held within the medical community that such research will pay giant dividends, potentially leading to break through cures for everything from Parkinson’s disease to Spinal Cord rejuvenation. Yet, the sanctimonious right to lifers would rather flush these embryos down the drain than allow them to be put to work for medical research. In this case they seem to be out of touch with an overwhelming majority of Americans and even a few of their own Congressional representatives, as the President had to veto a bill recently, which allowed government funding of such research.
Perhaps the President would feel differently if his mother suddenly developed a case of Alzheimer’s disease or if one of his daughters became pregnant. Personal hardship has a way of moderating one’s views.
The Iraq War – A forty Day Party
As a former Reagan Republican, I cannot help but be severely disappointed by the level of incompetence of the present administration. However, it appears there is still a good deal of support among so-called Bush loyalists, a fact that amazes me. Either they are ignoring the mountain of evidence of malfeasance that has been accruing or they pay no attention to the country’s current military and financial situation. Therefore, I will occasionally post a review of one of the many books that chronicle the run-up to and the prosecution of the Iraq War. These are not Left-wing books of anti-Bush propaganda but books written by thoughtful writers, whose only purpose is to present the facts. And to any that bother to read the facts, they are disturbing.
Here is the first review,
COBRA II by Michael Gordon and General Bernard E. Trainor
The Bottom Line:
Cobra II provides a good account of the thinking and non-thinking that propelled us into this never-ending war.
While reading Cobra II – when I wasn’t simmering – I got the impression that the strongest military in the world was being controlled and misused by a modern day version of the Keystone Kops. Not that I’m surprised. I and two thirds of the country (God help the other third) knew something was amiss, but many of the things I suspected were laid out in glaring fashion in this interesting text.
It’s like President “What me worry?” was having his arm twisted by Vice President “Darth Vader” undersecretary Darth Maul (Wolfowitz) to throw a forty day party in Baghdad. That’s right the war that has outlasted both World War I and the Korean War and is fast approaching World War II (It has now surpassed it) was expected to be a thirty to fifty day party and then we all go home with smiles on our faces. Perhaps it would have, except for two things.
First, our Defense Secretary, decided he knew more than all his generals combined. He threw out ten years of military planning for the invasion of Iraq, and proceeded to badger his generals to keep reducing planned invasion troop levels to a number he liked. I guess the secretary is into numerology. The number the generals started with was 380,000. The number the S.O.D. accepted was 140,000 – just enough to get us into Baghdad but not enough to get home.
The second thing, which some knowledgeable people foresaw, but not the myopic administration, was that the party might get crashed by some unwanted guests. Who you ask? Why, a bunch of young hot heads driving Toyotas, some wearing towels over the faces, some carrying funny objects on their shoulders or weapons in their arms and all looking for trouble. The first fatality of the war was caused, not by an Iraqi soldier but, a group of these hot heads in a Toyota Pick-up.
Commanders on the ground noticed this effective, unforeseen adversary, utilizing hit and run guerilla tactics and wanted to confront them, but the bigwigs in Cent Com ordered them to bypass these future insurgents and head straight to Baghdad, do not pass Go. Apparently they felt that once Baghdad fell everything. would fall into place. What they got when they took Baghdad was widespread looting. The authors Michael Gordon and General Bernard Trainor go on to speculate that the fediyeen, which the army was ordered to ignore and bypass on the way to Baghdad, became the backbone for the strong insurgency we now face.
Conclusion
Liberal, Conservative, independent – Right wing, Left wing, it doesn’t matter, reading this book will upset you. The book is not a liberal rag. It does not have a political bias, unless you consider a bias toward incompetence political. It just lays out the facts, often in minute detail. That, in fact is one of the books weaknesses. Cobra II reads like a play by play description of the war to date from the rationale though the planning to the prosecution of the war, with it’s attendant mis-steps. The prosecution portion of the war takes up at least two thirds of the book and unless you are a war junkie and despite some interesting parts begins, after awhile, to all sound the same.
The parts of the book I found most interesting were the initial planning stages and those portions dealing with the dissension that developed between Rumsfeld and Franks and later the turmoil between Franks and the generals in the field. The authors also point out how many of the problems that developed in the initial occupation of Baghdad and the aftermath were anticipated by various sources with suggestions, but were discounted or ignored by the administration. In short, the administration didn’t want to hear anything that might disrupt their vision of a forty day party.
Unfortunately the book only takes us through the war itself and the stirrings of the nascent insurgency. Three years later we are seeing what almost everyone agrees is a low grade civil war, verging on civil war.
Author’s Note; This review was written over a year ago. I would say things are pretty much the same, wouldn’t you?
The War That We Can’t Win
The Bottom Line; Before totally rejecting the merits of my editorial, I ask only that you keep an open mind and ask yourself, has anything we’ve done so far, worked?
The War That We Can’t Win
No not that one. There’s another war going on beside that one and it’s been going on a very long time, longer than I can remember and it’s unwinable. It is a war that we tend to forget about but from time to time we are reminded that we still are at war. When there is a huge drug bust or when a promising high school or college student dies from an overdose or several are killed in a drive by shooting or another drug lord is arrested in Columbia or another patch of marijuana is found in a National Forest or another meth lab in a neighbor’s basement is destroyed, then we are reminded that we are engaged in a daunting, frustrating, war that‘s impossible to win. The War on Drugs. But fight on we must. It’s the right thing to do, right?
Wrong!
Who says we have to keep beating our heads against the wall? I know this is unpopular but the hand writing is on the wall, we can’t win, so I’m advocating the extreme solution. Let’s put up the white flag and say ok drug pushers you win! Let’s surrender. Let’s legislate the thugs out of business. Let’s legalize drugs. Can it be any worse than it already is?
Ok the cat’s out of the bag. I’m a nut, a loon but let me explain my rational. It has been reported that some seven million Americans are already addicts with another ten million as users of varying degree. Folks, that’s almost six percent of us. Add another twenty million casual (occasional) users for anther seven percent for a total of thirteen percent, that for me is mind boggling. True legalizing drugs isn’t going to reduce the addicts and it may even increase them a little but the benefits are overwhelming.
Government figures state that something like eighty percent of violent and one on one crime is drug related. Why is that? I suppose we could assume that five or six million of the hard core addicts do not have jobs that are capable of supporting the cost of their addiction, so they are forced to mug, rob, steal, burgle or whore toward this purpose.
Make no mistake this is a growth business like any other business, the workers (pushers) are encouraged to bring in new addicts who are also encouraged to turn on friends, addicting them and so forth. The profit potential for sellers on up is enormous. It is said that the cost of the product sold on the streets is about one hundred times the production cost and that is the reason that despite the intrinsic dangers, the astounding profit potential keeps enlarging the pool of participants.
But what about the Downside?
What downside? If you’re talking about the availability of hardcore drugs to your kids, think about it. Right now it’s easier for a twelve year old to get crack than beer. Why? Because beer isn’t sold on the streets. You have to go into a store or a bar and buy it. If drugs were sold in stores, wouldn’t your kids have to go into a store to buy them as well. Can you see a teenager going into a store and buying a lid of weed or a vial of cocaine? Especially if you had to have a permit to buy there and a video camera would record every transaction. No way, Jose!
True, we would be encouraging existing and future addicts to make a direction of life decision. Do I want to lead a normal life or do I want to be a speed freak for the rest of my life? Probably fewer than you think would choose the latter and for those that did, they would no longer have to rob and steal to feed their habit and that’s the big bonus to legalizing drugs. Crime would fall up to eighty percent and the country would save billions and billions a year on law enforcement, courts, prosecutors, public defenders and prisons.
And here’s the best part. Legalizing drugs would put the drug cartels out of business. The drug scumbags from the drug lords on down to the street pushers will have to find another and most likely less harmful scam, for no one in their right mind would buy illegally on the street when they could buy legally from a licensed store.
Can it be that easy?
I know it’s not that simple, that there are a lot of nuances and intangibles but I’m not talking about a plan. This is an idea. Let the legislators work out the nuts and bolts. As far as I can see legalizing drugs would be a ridiculously easy solution to the rampant crime that exists today and remember, it wasn’t that long ago (approx. a hundred years) that illegal drugs were legal and since narcotics were made illegal their use, on a per capita basis, has increased and crime has gone through the roof.
Social Security – America’s Trojan Horse
December 19, 2004
Social Security has always been a hot button for me.
I don’t know if had anything to do with me but in 1992 shortly after being inaugurated, President Clinton seemed to be proposing gradually raising the age of eligibility for social security retirement, a suggestion that I made by letter two weeks prior outlining my rationale and the benefits of doing so.
Of course, after just mentioning such a possibility, the opposing party and most elderly people jumped on the idea and squashed it thoroughly, even though the average recipient now lives twenty-five percent longer than they did in the beginning.
Social Security has been called the third rail of politics – touch it and you die. It has also been called a boondoggle and a Ponzi scheme, all of which have the fruits of truth.
Now our illustrious leader wants to tackle Social Security himself by allowing taxpayers to invest up to two thirds of their contributions into a private retirement account.
This idea leads to many more questions. What about the Medicaid portion? Will Employers still match a private account contribution? If not who makes up the difference? Who will protect these people from their own bad investments? Will private accounts be regulated for security and stability? Will only these accounts be restricted to Mutual Fund style accounts which spread out and diminish both risk and gain? If Private accounts are approved, how will the large shortfall be made up in the short and long run? If sums are to be borrowed for this endeavor, who will be responsible for repayment?
These and many more questions need to be answered. We don’t need any more open ended endeavors
A Book Review 4 U – The Journal of Mortifying Moments
“Good morning ladies and gentlemen and welcome to another edition of A Book Review 4 U. Today we will be reviewing a book by Robyn Harding intriguingly called The Journal of Mortifying Moments, which apparently is her initial book.
“With us, this fine Saturday morning, our usual panel members ET and Pamela Anderson. ET of course is our resident Science Fiction expert and Pamela doesn’t know all that much about books, but she sure is nice to look at, right ET. Gimme three! That a boy! The gentleman to his left is, of course, ET’s long time interpreter Hailey Comet, and last but not least is our two guest panel members, Presidential Advisor, Karl Rogu . . . ah, er, excuse me, Karl Rove and controversial Comedian Chris Rock. Sorry about the slip Karl. Yes Chris.”
“What yo mean controversial? Ain’t nobody more controversial than you!”
“Well, I supposed you do have a point there Chris. I, of course, I am your host, if you don’t recognize me, my name is William Jefferson Clinton. I used to work for the government, but now I’ve have a real job and I’m loving it.”
“As usual, I’ll give a brief summary of the book, giving everybody a feeling for the book and then we’ll have a comment from our resident opinionator, Mr. D and then we’ll open things up for discussion by our panel. Sorry ET but this one isn’t your favorite, Science Fiction, but it is a good book, isn’t it? What? Again? You haven‘t read it yet, but you‘ll read it on the commercial break. I wish you wouldn’t do that. You make everybody envious, including the lovely lady sitting next to you.”
“Oh don’t worry about it Billy-boy. I realize he has some amazing attributes but I have some attributes too.”
“Pamela?”
“Yes Chris?”
“I just want you to know that I think your attributes are pretty amazing. Can I see them.”
“Pamela. Stop that!”
“Why, Billy-boy? I did it on The Howard Stern Show.”
“Pamela. Do you see those cameras out there? This is television. That was radio.”
“I know Billy-boy but I want to contribute for a change.”
“I want you to contribute too, but not to a big FCC fine. You can contribute after the show. “Okay, let’s move on. Here’s a brief summary of the book.”
Kerry Spence is in a chronic dead end relationship with her dreamboat of a boyfriend Sam Miller. She also works in an ad agency where she can’t stand ninety percent of her co-workers and vice-versa. She also seems to be on a different page than her mother, who always seems to be putting her down adding to her already low self-esteem.
The only bright spot in otherwise her bleak existence is the friendship and loyalty of her good friends Sandra, Val and Michelle and a friendship with a gay coworker Trevor. Unfortunately her friends are also borderline neurotic and don’t seem to be helpful.
So, what do you do when you feel outclassed by your boyfriend, disparaged by your mother and can’t stand your job? Why, go to a therapist of course. What did the therapist come up with? She asked Kerry to write a journal of her most humiliating experiences. At first she thinks this is a inane project but as she continues to write her most embarrassing moments, which all happen to involve men, in her Journal of Mortifying Moments, she begins to come to some realizations.
“We now have Mr. D on the phone to get his analysis. Good morning Mr. D. I hope it‘s not too early for you back in Arizona, after all it is six o’clock there isn‘t it?”
“No Problem. The coyotes kept me up, howling all night”
“I’m sorry. If I may get right to the point, what did you think of this weeks book, The Journal of Mortifying Moments?”
“Well Bill, for typical, so called chick lit, I thought the good outweighed the bad. The author Robyn Harding displays a jocularity and sense of irony. Some of the scenarios and that’s what the book is – a series of scenarios – were clever and well portrayed, but the humor in all cases was at the expense of the heroine, who by the way, I never got a sense of. To my knowledge the author never really described Kerry other than she herself felt she had a large and expanding butt.”
The fact that the heroine was depicted in such an unflattering light was a problem for me. She seemed to be so vulnerable and incompetent, it even seems odd to call her a heroine. Protagonist is probably more apt. When I think of Kerry the word buffoon comes to mind, like she was playing a straight man, or lady in this case, to fate.”
The author’s overall character development was adequate but just barely. Some characters more than others. I had a good feel for Trevor, who was pretty good by the way and Sandra and Kerry’s mom, but Val and Michelle were strangers except Michelle was logical and business like.”
Harding’s writing style is well paced, uses dialogue effectively and has a reader friendly prose style. She doesn‘t waste words, her writing is direct, she doesn‘t meander off in other directions and she‘s smooth. This book is 308 pages, when 500 plus is the apparent norm. Despite the fact that some of the scenes and scenarios, seemed contrived, The Journal of Mortifying Moments, as a whole, holds up well. Especially for a debut.”
“Great, thanks again Mr. D for your insights. How’s that book of yours coming along?”
“We’re finished and in for printing. Thanks for asking, Bill”
“You’re welcome, good luck. So what do you rate this book?”
“Sorry Bill, I giving The Journal of Mortifying Moments – Three and a half stars!”
“Excellent. We‘ll take a break now and when we come back we‘ll hear what our panel has to say.”
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“OK Panel, we’re back live now. Let’s talk about The Journal of Mortifying Moments.”
“Yes Pamela.”
“I loved it. I thought it was humorous, droll and clever. And ah . . . oh yeah succinct and I loved the mortifying moments. Like when she was twelve and the shy boy she had a crush on, told how many times a day he touched himself, rather than take Kerry behind a bush and kiss her. I give it 4 1/2 stars.”
“Hmmmm, ok ET how did you see it”
“Mr ET thought it was good, but he would like to have seen the sex scenes be more explicit and for it to take place in space. He still gives it four stars”
“I see, explicit sex scenes huh, I thought you guys were unisex, oh well Karl what did you think? Karl, hello Karl!”
“Sorry Bill, I was just noticing a little bump on Pamela‘s . . . never mind. What did you ask me again?”
“What we‘re here for, your evaluation of The Journal of Mortifying Moments.”
“Certainly. Ahhem. I thought the book, while cleverly written, set a poor example to the young women of this great nation. It extolls promiscuous behavior and wanton sex, even in unromantic situations. I’m no prude, mind you, but Sandra deciding to have the baby of her sixty-five year old married boyfriend was over the top. Not to mention that some of Kerry’s mortifying moments were licentious and demeaning. Take the one where she ties up her boyfriend d’ jour to the bedposts with the use of scarves only to start a fire from a plethora of burning candles, some of which were set in a pentagram for God’s sake.”
“Karl!”
“Yes, yes, sorry I digressed. I think the book is well written but the subject matter is vulgar and our people should stay away from it. Two stars, I give it two stars.”
“Thank you Karl. Chris. How about you?”
“A pentagram huh? Wow! Where did you see that? You know, Bill, I liked the book, but are white chicks really that screwed up? I mean, man they’s worse than black chicks, playing games, not answering the phone, trying to guess what her man’s thinking. Seems like she coulda saved herself a whole lot of trouble. Just spit it out girl and stop acting so . . . silly!”
“Man that Kerry chick’s got some serious hang-ups and some of those so called mortifying moments like when one of her fiance wants her to join in a foursome. Hey. You gotta chill out girl. Go with the flow. That shouldn’t be mortifying. It should be stimulating.”
“I agree with Mr. D – 3 1/2 stars.”
“Thanks Chris. So there you have it, The Journal of Mortifying Moments by Robyn Harding. Buy it!”
“That’s it for now. Join us next week when our guest reviewers will be Paris Hilton and Governor Schwarten . . . Schwartze . . . the Governor of California.”
“Until next week this is Willie-boy Clinton signing off. Have a great day!”
Silly Things 