Open book

Which tribe do you belong to? The modern world doesn’t see itself as tribal. Any corporate office will evidence the tribes existence. During March Madness (college basketball) the various university/colleges become rival tribes. Then of course there are always the general sports tribes of the Lakers, Clippers, Kings, Chivas US, Galaxy, Dodgers, and Raiders. For a long time I believed the tribal experience was purely a male thing. Now I realize that the females also have their own tribes. No not just the Sparks, or some women’s volleyball team. What is the ‘Girls night out’ if not a tribe? Having established we are tribal is it important? The answer is yes. Sadly too many tribes are becoming very elite and selective. The tribes who criticize the street gang tribes usually do so from the comfort of their select dining club tribes.

The influx of American actor and actress to the London Theatre scene has grown over the last few years. I think it is the best thing that could happen to the American Theatre. The long tradition of training for the theatre in Britain has produced some of the world greatest performers. If you don’t believe me then look at how many British television show have now crossed the Atlantic and become popular shows on American TV.

First lets get a few facts straight. The Mayflower wasn ’t the first ship to bring new settlers to America. Fourteen years earlier several ships filled with convicts arrived from England. Britain populated both America and Australia with its undesirables. They became some of the new landowners and founders of America. The Mayflower experience still continues today with the conservative Bible pushing narrow-minded middle America. These misguided people tragically control the lives of some many. Young men can go to war for America at 18 while not being allowed to drink until they are 21. So alcohol has become the forbidden pleasure for so many college students. Educate the people to enjoy a drink or two and we will have less alcohol related accidents. Learn from Europe's example. America it’s time to get off the Mayflower and recognize your hypocrisy to the rest of the world is nothing but one big joke.

I listened the other day to a television evangelist claim that the Christian religion did not evolve from Catholicism. I think he was trying to say his born again money-grabbing church was the real truth. He was of course right, philosophically speaking. The Roman Catholic Church will say otherwise. Let me point out that Constantine gathered the various chapters of the Bible as we know it and destroyed chapters that didn’t conform to the social political position of the time. His edits left us with the modern Roman Catholic Bible. However, there were two thoughts competing for acceptance in early Christian theology. One group believed Jesus was both God’s son on earth and God himself (trinity). This became the Dogma of the Roman Catholic Church. The other group believed what Jesus taught was far more important than whom the man was. Constantine and others spent years trying to eradicate their competition's truth. So those who opposed Constantine would find false prophets in the chu

Pick a President. This is what every American will do in November. Their choice is no different for them than selecting a Pepsi or Coke. Politicians are puppets of corporate America. The lobbyist in Washington hand over vast amounts of money to political campaigns and turn our representatives into puppets. We witness scandals where money corrupts both the experienced and inexperienced. After eight years of this secretive Bush / Cheney administration I still have more questions than answers. What weapons of mass destruction? How many billions have been spent on this lie? Why did they put a gag order on information relating to the unaccountable twenty three billion dollars paid too American contractors? Why are the Accountability rules (Sarbanes Oxley) that are so forcibly pushed on Corporate American not being implemented on government contractors?

Millions of people write poetry only a select few get recognized. Sometimes it is the emotional outlet for those in love, upset or even angry. Wordsworth with his daffodils was writing about what he saw and what he felt. I truly believe everyone should read at least one poem a day. Why? Your whole life could be uncovered in a single poem and therefore, make sense at last. Also, there are so many good poets to choose from: Poe, Keats, Frost, Auden and too many more to list. My favourite is Betjeman. I have for many years loved the poems of John Clare as well. They calm and shut out the horrors of this world for a few minutes, allowing a brief respite from the world. The following poem is one of mine. It was written because I found an empty gin bottle in the gutter outside a church covered in confetti. Bill And Mary Bill and Mary were married, last Saturday. The whole town came to see. Now all that's left are memories and that bottle with its contents of confetti. Collected by a smal

Sitting on the train, pensive after attending a concert in down town Los Angeles, I engaged in a conversation with a brother and sister in their teens. They were listening to A-HA from the eighties. Why? I had to ask. Their reply surprised me. “No one is making any good music these days.” I listen to lot of music. Music inspires me as I write my murder mysteries. My taste is very broad from Classical to PunJabi Rap. So selecting something to listen to often becomes a challenge. Photographs stimulate the mind through the eyes, but music is the aural motivation of the muses.

Graffiti, the modern cave painting. Although it can be annoying to see a wall with some obscene unreadable scribble. The tags of the local gangs are analgous to any animal marking its territory. The taggers never evolve beyond graffiti often because they tragically either end up in jail or dead. There are those who paint incredible pieces. These have been photographed worldwide and now appear on coffee tables books across liberal America. Ironically, if in five thousand years a wall with even the worse kind of graffiti is uncovered, museums and art galleries would out bid each other to own someone’s twenty first century street art.

Someone said you are what you eat. How true in today’s society with the number of obese people growing at an alarming rate. Although it is easy to blame them we also must remember the greed of the food conglomorates. What are they pumping in to the animals and spraying on the fruit and vegetables? How do they make the cows fatter and the apples last longer and stay crispy? Those chemicals they use enter our bodies. In the case of meat, the hormones used to fatten the animals must have an effect on us. Do you remember what food use to taste like before the greedy conglomorates took control of the producers? The banana sold in America is a perfect example. Once you leave the grocery store they last about a day before going brown on the outside. The actual banana has some sort of fungus growing on it. A thin vein of red exploding into a large red spot. Has anyone tested this fungus to see what it does to the human body?

The greatest football team in the world. I know some will disagree, let them. Aston Villa has always been my team to support. Now America has finally discovered a real man’s sports and is embracing football or soccer as they call it. I still can’t enjoy American football. A game that lasts only one hour but takes three to complete. I’m told by my friends it’s all to do with advertising. I disagree. I think the players just don’t have the stamina to last two forty-five minute halves without a break.