Thanksgiving was very important to my father.  He believed the old ideals: that thanksgiving was a time when enemies sat down at the dinner table together and ate, drank and had fun.

My father was a conservative Republican from the 1950s.  I mention the date because the conservatism my father taught me was absent of the Christian "morals" that have hijacked the Republican Party over the last 20 years. 

Today, the Republican Party has very few ideals that my father instilled in me. Today, the party is overrun by Christians with an agenda to convert everyone to an anti-sex, anti-drinking lifestyle.  They want to abolish abortion ( 6 states have made abortion essentially impossible since Trump took office) and they shut down all the escort sites in the U.S.  The party allowed AT&T to merge with Time-Warner who owns HBO and CNN.  They created monopoly so that they can control the media in 2020.  These are not what my father wanted his party to spend their time doing.

As such, in 2005 my father, after 60 years as a Republican, became a Democrat. Like a really hardcore, liberal Democrat, complete with bumper stickers and canvassing rural areas of Texas to help Barrack Obama win the 2008 election. 

My father was raised in West Linn, Oregon; son of banker and a teacher.  He married a Panamanian woman he met when he was in the army. His friends were all conservative and Republican Latins. But when my father's daughter became mentally ill, his conservative friends quietly distanced themselves from him.  It was then he realized that the conservatives in the 2000's were not the same as conservative's of 1950s.  

I will never forget the Thanksgiving I spent with Amanda and Cap Hedges and their three wealthy children: Greg, Wendy and Jason.  My father had just been diagnosed with cancer in 2007.   At the time of my father's death, we had to pawn my guitar and some other items to get the $900 necessary to perform the military funeral. All of our assets were upside down due to the mortgage scandal of 2008.  Not that I expected my father's friends to help him (they never even bought his dinner on his birthday), but I did not expect to hear what Amanda said about my father. She said, "Too bad he wasted his life getting Obama elected."  Nice, Amanda. Real nice. 

He moved to Las Vegas for treatment.  But mostly he moved there because he didn't want to have a bunch a fake Latin friends trying to convert him to Catholicism on his death bed. Oh, Amanda will say she's not Catholic. Okay, you're not a Catholic, you're a fish (inside joke). 

The micro-society I saw with my parent's friends is indicative of the world today. His friends were opposite of the Generation Z and Millennials values; his friends valued money over human life. To show compassion is fine as long as you don't have to give any money.  Its true.  Even though my father was very gernous with Louis Navarrro, at his funeral, Louis specifically said "Im here for you. But I wont give you any of my money." I didn't ask.  He just said it because when the owner of a small business dies, there are many financial obligations.  And in this case, it was 2011; the montage crisis.  My family had lost everything afte3r the 2008 mortgage scandal.  Louis knew my mother was struggling.  He wanted to make sure that it did no cost him any money. 

And the same was true with Cap and Amanda Hedges. 

As I witnessed the fairness of my fathers friends, I learned that there its no loyalty amongst the wealthy.  You must have money and/or abide by their strict Catholic rules (disguised as Christianity, Imago, AA, or vegetarianism).  If you do not have one or the other, see Trading Places.

As my father became more liberal, his friends became more distant. The men in their group chose to side with Amanda and Nenita's conservative Catholic rules. And their rules are always the same: no sex, no smoking, no drinking, no excessive partying, etc, etc.   Hopefully, this year, someone will remember that while you got you what you wanted, you lost what you had.

Laughter, music and fun died in 2011.  Did you even notice that your parties aren't fun anymore?

I did. Thats why I don't talk to any of them anymore. Thanks Dad for getting me out of there. Happy Thanksgiving.

Let's find out.

Everyone is going vegan as if vegan is somehow healthy? Gluten, sugar and GMOs are the reason our society is overweight. We wanted to find out if fruits, vegetables and nuts were healthy.  As an experiment, we aded cashews, almonds, and tons of fruit to our diet in July.  The results were clear: fruits and vegetables have too much sugar for a human diet.  Today is Day 6 being back on a normal diet.  But first, we must repair the damage done by eating too much fruit. We must starve our the Candida Overgrowth that wa caused by excess sugar.  We duo that by eating a high protein diet, no dairy, no caffeine, no alcohol and no gluten.

The Earth already knew that humans could both eat too much sugar - only a few weeks a year, after the summer, before winter when you need to put on fat to survive the cold. That is why you could only get berries, apples and other fruit a few weeks a year. The Earth limited humans intake of sugar by restricting our ability get it.  Today, we can overnight fruit from anywhere in the world.  We can eat a plethora of a variety of fruits year round.  But that's unnatural.  

We concluded Thant a Vegan diet cannot be healthy unless you are a raw, unprocessed, unpackaged Vegan.  Eating Impossible Burgers everyday will not result in better health for you than eating a meat burger because its the sugar, GMOS and gluten that are making you sick.

Eliminate:
Dairy.
Sugar.
Alcohol.
Caffeine.
Cocaine.
Grains.
GMOs.
Artificial Sweeteners.
Poultry.

This is a customer check from the MGM Grand.  As if a $24 hamburger was not enough, the MGM Grand provides a false tip chart for those too drunk to calculate a proper tip. 

They emphasize that a gratuity and tip are NOT included.  This tip/gratuity guide is provided for your convenience:​18 % of $29 is $5.22 not $13.14
19% of $29 is $5.51 not $13.87
20% of $29 is $5.80 not $14.60

Obviously, 20% of $29 is not $14.60.  This is a blatant attempt to take advantage of intoxicated or foreign guests.  Remember, Las Vegas started as a speed trap on the way to LA.  

Recently, we started using our Apple Cash feature on our iPhone.  We transfer a few hundred dollars every week as savings.  If we need the money, then we just transfer the money instantly back to our checking account.

Last week, we transferred $300 to our Apple Cash.  Apple debited out checking account and transferred the funds immediately.  Awesome. But the next day, we received a second authorization for $300.

For most banks and big computer companies like Apple, $300 seems like a small purchase. But for the majority of people, $300 is an enormous amount of money.  A lot of people today cannot quickly come up with that kind of cash instantly.  They can get within a day. But not instantly.  Wells Fargo and Apple do not know that. Because when you are a  Wells Fargo or Apple Computer customer, $300 puts you in the chump category of customers; you are not a VIP.

When a company offers financial services, you have a responsibility to the public. They trust you to hold their money.  And they trust that when you need, like in an emergency, that you will return immediately.  With the credit card systems, they can debit your account immediately but crediting your account take 3-7 business days.  Sounds like that system was designed by a banker looking for ways to increase profits by holding customers' money and blaming it on the computers.  

​BASIC BANKING 101: You cannot leave your customer stranded in a dangerous neighborhood.  My Grandfather was a bank manager for 40 years.  Banking has been around since the Pyramids. Some things do not change. 

Here is what immediately happens to our account when it is double charged: our account goes into overdraft. The next thing that happens is  our cards stop working.  Then the next thing that happens are overdraft fees. Every pending transaction get charged $35.  Even a small purchase, like for iTunes music that costs $1.29, is charged $35 for an overdraft.  Fortunately, by law, Wells Fargo puts a maximum cap on how many overdrafts they can charge you. They can only charge you 10 overdraft fees a day, So that's $350 for some iTunes music and an Uber Ride. 

But here is where safety is concerned.  We don't have a car.  We use Uber. When you are in an Uber and your card stops working, you can't get home. That is dangerous. And it is irresponsible of Apple and Wells Fargo to put their customers such a predicament.   Wells Fargo and Apple's only solution is to wait until the authorization drops off.  Which according to Apple, can take anywhere from 3 to 7 days. That is not cash.  That is simply another card.  Apple is misleading the public by calling it cash. As of this writing, we do not have access to our $300.  

The question remains: Who pays for the overdraft fees? 

We do not need to make a lot of money.  Our diet is simple.  Our living is even more simple.  For entertainment, we have fun with no money. We laugh at how fat the squirrels are getting since we started feeding them. Simple.

10 years ago, my worst fear was to be living the way I live today. By that I mean that we live day-to-day. We don't have money for food, medicine or rent for next week. We accept the fact that's our life is given to us daily by the Universe.  And as such, we rely upon the Universe to provide what we need.  If we weren't meant to be here, then we wouldn't be here. We only need $400. Not too hard to get.  Its satisfying.  It's a life worth living. When you have been to the bottom and back, and down the bottom again and back, and then back again, there is nothing that will ever scare you again.

The Greenbacks: Mario Chiodo Designed and created a humorous feature sculpture of tourists who “won the jackpot“ that has become an icon of Harrah’s, Las Vegas. Made in mixed media. Las Vegas, NV. Their names are  Winnie and Buck and their dog is "Chip".

Some of us never wake up. I was one of those... until I stopped rolling over.*

So - do you want to be a person who wakes up? Or are you the person who just rolls over?

Each time you roll over, it gets harder the next time because the alarm gets louder as it’s getting late.