Gambling on Trust

If it weren’t so pathetic, it would be amusing that the Texas Lottery is now considering guaranteeing its jackpots in an effort to win back the confidence of those who play the lottery.

It’s also oxymoronic that an organization dedicated to taking your money and not paying it back, sanctioned by the state as a defacto tax on the mathematically-challenged, would be trying to enhance it’s image as being “trustworthy.”
The lottery is a shell game.
It is designed to take more money than it pays out.

The Lottery panders to a segment of the population that is weak-minded enough to expect something for nothing—or nearly nothing: the wagering of dollars from those least able to afford them in the pursuit of instant riches. For the few who do win (and it's from pure dumb, blind luck) the result is a lifestyle that in most cases changes so abruptly they're ill-equipped to manage well their windfall.

Generally, the lives of lottery winners are changed forever, and not necessarily for the better.

Not surprisingly, the Lottery recently took some licks for portraying lottery jackpots to be larger than life, or at least larger than they were. Now, the wager mongers are trying to win back your trust.

A skunk by any other name still stinks.
And the Lottery, despite all promises of truthfulness, still takes from the gullible, and gives to the state which sanctions what would otherwise be labeled ill-gotten gains.

Fraidy Cats

Fear is a question: What are you afraid of, and why? Just as the seed of health is in illness, because illness contains information, your fears are a treasure house of self-knowledge if you explore them.
--Marilyn Ferguson

I’ve been spending a great deal of time researching my cancer, which is a terrifying experience—primarily because it’s all unknown territory to me. The more questions I ask, the more I realize how much more I need to know…and the cycle continues. Seeking and finding; questioning anew.

There are two ways you can handle fear: either seek out the answer, or cower under a rock somewhere. The reality of any situation will always remain, so why not face it eyes-open, brain stocked with data, and emotions bolstered with confidence that comes from understanding? Better than becoming paralyzed by unreasonable fear, fed by ignorance.

Find out what really scares the pants off you—and discover whether that fear is rational, or simply rooted in myth and misguidance. And then do something about it.

Prayer is a strong analgesic against Fear.

I have heard from more people in the past week, responding to my announcement last Friday that I have Prostate Cancer and what I am doing about it. Many men have said to me how much it made them realize they could be at risk, and that they were going to have the PSA test.

With any cancer, early detection is the key to survival. We’ve caught mine early…the prognosis is positive. Men—and the women who love them—in your mid-to late 40’s, and certainly any man over the half-century mark: Get tested. It’s a simple blood test for Prostate Specific Antigen, which at the least will establish a baseline against which you can compare next year’s test (subtle hint).

At best it will set your mind at ease. At worst, you find out sooner or later there’s a matter to be dealt with—and did I mention early-detection is the key to surviving Cancer?

What are you afraid of?
What is the key to unlock the answer to that fear?
Cancer is feared in our society, but it need not be the kiss of death.
And if that is your fear, don’t be a coward—let it be the seed that leads to answers to the unknowns within yourself.

The Astro's Apex

Our congratulations to the 2005 Chicago White Sox in their hard-won assumption of the title of World Series Champions of Baseball. The Houston Astros made it to the World Series for the first time in the team franchise history. The White Sox won the series for only the second time in their’s.

When I was a school kid I was not very athletic at all. Geeky glasses and very poor hand-eye coordination did not endear me to my peers when choosing up teams, and I learned at a very early age that a career in sports would be a foolish thing to which to aspire. Kids like me were why the teachers would say things like, “it’s not whether you win or lose, but how you play the game.”

Yeah, right. They never saw me play~

Later in my checkered academic career, when competition for school office, selection for an academic honor, or vying for a part in the annual musical production were up for grabs, and there could be only one winner, the soul-salving phrase was, “well at least you were up for consideration for the part.” Which was a back-handed turn of the same phrase coaches used on teams who made it to the play-offs, but no further.

I have employed similar logic many times this week to assuage the agony of die-hard Astros fans, and to bolster my own feeble appreciation of the Club’s accomplishments this year—I am Baseball’s most dis-interested observer. Up until this season, I thought a bunt was a round cake with a hole in the middle and sugar icing dribbled all over the top. They come in two flavors, lemon and chocolate.

But there is a resounding truth that rings in acknowledging the Astros’ amazing accomplishments this season—a team that very nearly didn’t make the wild-card cut, and was not the first pick for getting through the play-offs. And they played in the World Series. You have to let that fact sink in.

That accomplishment is truly a high point in any club’s history, and even this ambivalent observer recognizes the importance, achievement, and honor that is due the Astros for playing in the World Series.

Phyllis Diller once quipped that if it weren’t for baseball, many kids wouldn’t know what a millionaire looks like. If it weren’t for the 2005 Houston Astros, many kids might not see what heroes look like…short of a Veteran’s Day parade.

There can only be one winner. And in the World Series, only one team occupies that pinnacle. But the Astros went to the mountain.