music: We Care a Lot by Faith No More
mood: weird

my Lakers got another championship, putting them only 2 behind the Celtics now
and of course, people in L.A. rioted, surprise, surprise
still, it would be nice to go to the Laker game where they hang the new banner in the rafters of the "Staples" center, kind of like old times, me and my dad went to the Laker home game when they raised banners in
80, 82, 85, 87, 88
my god were we spoiled in the 80s, well at least at the pro level, Bob and me never went to Pauley to seee a championship raised since we were not on speaking terms for most of the 90s
and man do i really get how much that was my fault now, its just weird though how you learn this stuff, i mean there are people who will never speak to me again & i really truly know how hard that must have been for him
but hey, at least we had 88, the Lakers won, the Rams made the playoffs on the strength of 2 great home games we were at, and we watched Harrick notch a bunch of wins in his 1st year at UCLA only to lose almost right off the bat in the tournament of course, but hey, were talking about Jim Harrick here one of the most untalented coaches when it comes to the x's and o's of maybe anybody ive ever seen
still, what 88 was all about was that moment when the Dodgers became "New York Knights" and Gibby became "The Natural"
with that homerun in the last World Series game I have been to
its also about Orel and his incredible "bull dog" like play, and young Ramon Martinez and old Don Sutton and Jesse Orosco in his 1st stint with the Dodgers sticking it to the Mets one year after he closed out there 87 championship season and people expected the Mets to go back to the World Series in 88, i mean they clobbered the Dodgers all year long and Davey Johnson supposedly knew better than anybody how Tommy was gonna coach that series
instead the Dodgers pitching staff held the high powered Mets offense to under 4 runs a game and almost half those in blow out losses of games in which the Dodgers had no chance
but the Dodger pitching staff's tenacity was only the half of it or less
on the other side of the ball, the Dodgers put on a hit and run clinic of the likes never seen since then, with timely home runs from Scioscia, and suicide squeeze bunts by 39 year old catcher Rick Dempsey , and Steve Sax picking Mets pitching for steals, Orel even had some extra base hits to go along with all those timely pinch hits by
http://www.ladodgertalk.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/05/mickeyhatcher.jpg/
The Stuntmen! Mickey Hatcher(pictured) Dave Anderson, Mike Davis, Pedero Guerrero, Tracy Wooden
& Danny Heap
basically,they were the greatest bench ever and under the tutoring of Manny Mota(one of the gr8est pinch hitters of all time) they became the best clutch hitting gang of platoon players ever, seriously, all one ever need learn about hitting could be learned by watching them all those years ago and after beating the Mets then came the even bigger mountain of the As to conquer in the World Series
Oakland was a monster that year, they had destroyed the American League but me and my dead just knew if we could win that 1st game
won, they seemed to be guided by some divine force that game, i just knew we were going to win in the end!
and we did , amen
and now its 21 years since that championship for my Dodgers
this year the drought might end for them too, here's hoping
Well, enough about sport and over 20 years ago. Its time to talk about the Army.

The Continental Army which was formed on June 14th in 1775, so the glorious American army just had another birthday.(Congress created the United States Army on June 14th, 1784 to replace the Continetal Army.)
I have been thinking about the Army a lot lately, even dreaming about it, its really never left my blood. And well, something that started out as me thinking of when and if I get really old has lead to me possibly change my life in in major way by the end of the year. See, what happened was when I got back from NZ I finally went to the V.A. to see about getting my discharge changed from a General one to an honorable one, not this effects my benefits really, its just that honorable gets go to the "front of the line" if you will, as opposed to other discharges, but that might matter you know, in case I end up in one of those old homes for Vets someday. I mean its not liking I have been saving up for when I get real old and I do not see me suddenly making a lot of $ anytime soon, so I just sometimes think of these things. Regardless, so when I start the long "correspondence" on this effort of mine to "clear my name" you might say, I also emailed this sarge who runs the recruitment office after somebody joked about the fact that the Army was giving out all sorts of waivers to recruits to join either with criminal records or in many cases the waivers were for less than honorable discharges, so just one a lark, I wrote this sarge @ the Golden Gate Commons. and I heard back from him, here is some of what he said:

The current policy for Prior Service member states:
No conduct waiver authorized at any level, No DAT waivers; No prior separation / discharge waivers for misconduct, or any other type of involuntary waiver that involved misconduct. No administrative waivers for performance.
However, it goes on to state:
(Note: prior service applicants who were awarded medals for valor or wounded in combat may be granted an exception to this policy. Contact the waivers branch if applicable).
Then the recruiter who emailed me back went on to tell me:
If your situation really does meet this criteria and you meet the height/weight standards as a Prior service member of the Army, then contact as soon as possible.
I wish you the best of luck.

So basically, the Army is not just letting anybody in again anymore, but they could still make an exception for me since I was indeed awarded a medal for valor once long ago
i mean, i do not have it anymore, i think i foolishly gave it to someone i use to know, i dont remember anymore really
but hey, i am sure that will be with my copy of my records along with my DD-214 whenever that finally arrives in the mail, if it does not come in a month then i will just have to go down there every day til it does
because I really got to get moving on this before the end of the year if I am going to do it, if it takes too long, I am not going to join back up even if they will have me. Right now I can see doing 8 years then getting out @ 45. If not then I will just try and get this Army thing out of my system!
I mean the things its conjuring up for me and that I have to do, like when I told them I was divorced they said I have to get them a copy of the record of the marriage being over. Which is much harder to send away for than a marriage certificate actually, but maybe they will let me get away with the marriage certificate and
http://i3.photobucket.com/albums/y86/gulrober/me/a0.jpg/
the picture above, you know, until I saw this I did not even know when the divorce was final i think it means it was on December 15th, 2005, I know its long ago now to some, but for me its not so much so long ago, as so far away...

ps: Yesterday, I finally got a new Fedora and I really do feel like just a little more of me has come back to life.