Debra Opri Represents Very Well!

Pretty in Red! Look at her, isn't she a beautiful woman with a brain and wit to match? (I totally stole this image from her website.)

When Faith was verbally and visually attacked this past summer/spring by a comedian named Sebastian Maniscalco, I was upset to say the least. I blogged about it, I thought about it. I tried to find an attorney in Oklahoma willing to take the case, but the problem wasn't with Maniscalco -- he was small enough to take on certainly, but his associates were not. I won't say at this time who it is that we were forced to target in an impending law suit which would have been high profile, followed by media and press coverage to rival the most sensational cases out there -- when no one felt as if they could take the case and do a proper job.....I contacted Debra Opri. She felt strong enough, tough enough, good enough, and of course experienced enough to do the job.

From the minute I spoke with Debra this week I knew that she was the best choice. I had spoken with other high profile attorneys in the Los Angeles area; they were polite, but they turned me down. The one thing they said was "The case certainly has merit, but we know it could go to trial rather quickly, and we don't have the time for that." It was suggested by a devoted friend and fan of my dog Faith, that I contact Opri because she had dogs, she was dogmatic, and she was loved and beloved so much by the general populous that NO ONE would stand a chance against her in this particular situation. I couldn't agree more.

Debra's assistant gave me her private cell number which I called immediately. With only a four or five minute conversation I was being asked by the greatest defense lawyer of the WEST to write up my summary, send my resume, bios of both me and my dog. I was to send her photos, letters of recommendation, my dog's Army commission, and just tell her what happened. Hours later, I'm signing a contract with her and we're going over the media releases, the plans to approach this from the correct angle, etc. No one, especially me, wanted to hurt the potential future working relationship of Faith and this particular actor. We love him! When you find out who I'm talking about it may surprise you that he would be involved in such a mess, but business associates have a way of fudging up good people's lives sometimes. This is one of those times. Maniscalco made the YouTube and made a horse's behind of himself on stage making fun of my good-will ambassador dog, but this man, this wonderful and gracious man that I would have to be suing, was actually being held responsible - - business.

Well, it only took a day. Debra Opri called me today and asked if we could find a way to work it out - maybe get on a television show with this man and let the world know we're going to be OK. I hope that can happen. Suing someone just isn't what I wanted to do. Faith doesn't need to be known as the dog that sues because her feelings got hurt. I was more than upset, more than emotionally distressed over it, but Faith would probably have forgiven anyone for saying anything - she is all about the love she can give. It looks like Opri is the best one for the case after all. She's going to work out the details naturally - we'll give it our best shot to be nice, play nice, get along - and hey - who knows: This guy is talented enough to work with me on adapting an idea I have for a screenplay where he plays the role of a man who literally stumbles over Faith one day and feels obligated to keep her. She in turn can't be seen by anyone because she's an angel in disguise...a big disguise, she's a two-legged bipedal dog!

This could be the best thing that ever happened to us. God has His way, I simply say thank you. (Well, I also say "Pay me for the damages that whatshisname caused" too, but we say thank you!) Opri: You rock!

Happy HOWL-aween!

Faith and Matrix will be dressing up as each other this year and this should be fun. I'm just going to have to remember that Matrix may need to be forgiven for his arms sticking out of his Faith costume, after all, Faith doesn't have front limbs, so he may actually resemble a yellow lab rather than his "sister" Faith.

We got the idea to have the dogs dress as themselves when the girls, Laura & Caity, decided to dress up like each other and go to a party last night. Tonight's 7th Halloween party for the girls will mark the first for the dogs. They are honored to be invited to the first annual L/C Halloween Bash! It will be taking place at the new apartment, which has been freshly painted - very scary colors: Teal, Cotton Candy, and Sunflower are in the front rooms, and the back bedroom is PURPLE with teal, sunflower and cotton candy hand prints all over the main wall. I like it actually, and even added 3 yellow hands to the mix!

The dogs night out will be fun I'm sure. We plan on a cookout (55 degrees constitutes the need for BBQ in Oklahoma) and we'll share our meat and grilled veggies with the dogs rather than loading them up with chocolate, taffy, hard candy or caramels. We do truly love our dogs and feel this is best - they always agree with my way of thinking. Faith's favorite Howl-aween trick is to run up behind the darling little kids on the street and just pant in their ears since she's standing up and at their height. They scream of course, and that sends her running in the opposite direction. Matrix just runs around laughing and picking up the candy they drop. I have to force it out of his mouth, but I always win. He's a wussy dog. I can take him!

Well, that being said, I have to go pin the ears on the dogs...we don't actually pin them, I said that to upset you! Did it work? OK...Happy Howlaween!!! Watch out for the babies and the old kids too.

Me & Matrix, Matrix & I

It's beginning to feel a lot like solidarity! Finally, I can say with 5% certainty, that the girls are completely moved out of my house. I can say with 95% certainty that they have a long way to go, a lot to do, and more and more time will have to pass before I can truly claim to be living alone. Matrix doesn't mind, he has two homes to go to now. He has two beds to crawl into; mine and Caity's. He has two bowls with food always prepared for him - he's in Dog Heaven, and probably believes I should have kicked them all out of the house a while back.

I don't seem to blog much about my OTHER dog. Matrix is my perfect hound. I tell him he's perfect, I even brag about him to everyone I meet because Matrix, unlike Faith, doesn't have the fan club, the paparazzi, mail coming to him daily, and he doesn't fly First Class. He doesn't fly actually - he's my home-dog, so I tell him over and over again how perfect he is. If he were out in the public,(I wink at him when I say this) he would be snatched up in a second! He would be carried off to some foreign country where he would be pampered and loved day in and day out, but I would never see him again - so he must stay at home and wait for us to return from all of the VERY BORING and tedious things that Faith and I must do. (I also lie to my dog and say that my work is mundane, ordinary, and that he would grow very tired of it were he to ever go with us...despite whatever Faith tells him of her adventures when we return with more luggage than we took out.)

Matrix is perfectly suited for being the house dog. He is perfectly 26 pounds, stands perfectly 16" off the floor, he has a perfect glossy black coat with tri-color trim, and a little perfect premature graying going on just around his perfectly pointed muzzle. For being a mixed breed dog he is perfectly balanced with the world's favorite breed; the Dachshund, and the world's most versatile breed, the Beagle. His mother and his father were both papered, they had certifications of great pedigrees - however, they were not suppose to date. When they did, and when the 8 puppies they created were born, all of them were thrown out like trash - given to the Humane Society because of their "uselessness". They weren't purebred anything! They were (dare we whisper it?) mutts.

My perfect little mutt is much more than non-useless. He is quite useful indeed. When I need my legs warmed he is there to do it. When I need a buddy in a storm, he's there before I am, crawling up my back and into my sweater usually, because he realizes how scared I can be during a tornado. Brave dog that he is, he even sleeps on the back of my couch - which is less than 4 inches thick (without falling - Dachshunds are really balanced animals). Because he comes from good Beagle stock, he can sing! He sings very well in fact, and he has no problem leaving the food that he doesn't want in the bowl for a later snack - unlike other dogs. Again, he is perfect.

Matrix has one pose: up with the chin, to the side a bit, and always stern-faced. Must be the breeding - he's usually got a wink in his eye, a grin on his face, and a stiff wag of the tail most other times. The tail story is a good one. I had to be admitted to the ER once after he poked me in the eye with his rock-hard tail! The same tail that won him "Best Tail Wagger" in 2003 and 2004 in our fair city! Though he may not be a parade dog like Faith, we do take him to the Strut Your Mutt competitions where he always takes something home! One year it was Mr. Congeniality for going by to say hello to every person and then going by to say "hello" to ever tree!

Neutered very early on, there will be NO MORE little Matrix mutts; a sad tale yes, but a good gesture in terms of being responsible. I'm sure had I asked him if he were willing to make this sacrifice on his own my little weenie-dog would have agreed to have the surgery - he's very conscientious....quite polite! Perfect! I've been teasing him for years now (8) that we'd be alone some day - no kids, no noise, just our music, just our friends, our television shows, whatever we wanted to do. He realizes that Faith is part of that WE now, and at first he was a bit unforgiving, but when he looked up from his couch perch and saw that he was never alone - always able to travel from one apartment to the next, and even making a pit stop between the two units to see his little doggie friend, he decided that being the house dog wasn't that bad of a gig after all. He'll let Faith stay a little longer, but SHE must sleep under the bed!

So, You Wanna Be a Genius!

Have you seen Wile E. Coyote lately? Probably not as often as you saw him when you were a kid, right? Well, there's a reason for that. He's retired. Wile E. was a hard-working coyote, placing himself in dangerous and precarious situations day after day all for naught. The one thing he created his maddened-ingenious contraptions for (the roadrunner) ended up being a cartoon character, much like himself, created solely for the purpose of bringing pleasure to the creator - and this somewhat peeved the big-earred desert canine. Thinking he would actually never actually catch his meal, or that he may or may not be able to satisfy himself once he did - he quit. I don't blame him. I may have been convinced to do the same thing once. I thought I had to be in Hollywood making money and doing all the Hollywood things you do in order to make it big - but it didn't pan out that way. Instead, I wound up coming to my senses, coming back home, making a little family - raising that little family, and now, well, it seems I'm a lot happier just being the writer that I am.

Now, don't get me wrong - I'm still a certified, bona fide, over-the-top genius, having a majorly high I.Q. of over 170 (last I checked it was hovering in the 180 range) but that doesn't mean I have a lick of good sense. Never have! In fact, in all the years I've been able to join Mensa I haven't because they just didn't seem to be much fun. I went through the testing, got the results - was flooded with invites to parties, but you know what I found there? Math! I found MATH at these parties. I'm not into numbers, MATH to me is a 4-letter word. That's it - I'm into words - I was asking my good friend Niki today if she could explain the difference between the two words Epistemology and Etymology...because they are similar, but so very different. We talked for about an hour on the subject (drinking gin and finally realizing it didn't matter much anyway), and we just giggled and called ourselves geeks.

There are absolute genius minds out there that go bonkers, you've seen that on T.V., and the truth about so many mega-brainiacs having a slightly larger skull, or bug eyes, it's true - some do....Math people! Those of us (Nike included) who are language geniuses - we look almost completely normal most of the time, and you'd think we were really unintelligent if you asked us to figure out an equation to prove our ultra smartiness - we don't make graphs, we don't come up with formulas, we don't make decisions based on physics, probabilities, or outcome - in fact, we probably shouldn't be trusted to make decisions at all; we're romantics! Can you imagine what the world would be like if Hemingway made decisions about our military or the use of chemicals? Wow! Or hey, what if Edgar Allan Poe was expected to be a great leader - HHAHHHAHAA...oh, that made my side hurt, wait...I retract that last thought.

The truth is, there are several types of genius, just because we score well on tests that match shapes, deal with perceptions, or have logical patterns - doesn't make us worthy of pedestals. I could probably, if I had to, write a poem about it, make up a great fantasy, throw in a twist, create a dragon whose breath (when tempered with pixie dust) created new foliage or streams teeming with fish - but don't ask me to calculate velocity, or to even follow the reasoning behind pushing Daylight Savings Time back a day or so before Halloween - the one holiday that needs a last bit of natural illumination for kids to celebrate in safety. No, ask me to draw you a word picture. Ask me to whisper a medieval fantasy of poetry, lace, and stone castles in your ears - ask me to stir the tangerine skies with azure feathers, but never expect me to explain space, volume, mass, or energy - I can't do that.

What do you do with a genius who can't draw stick figures? Where to do you categorize a presence with power, endless intellect, but no common sense? You show them the path to the local public library, the coffee house, or the bookstore, and you allow the dream to replace the reality - for everyone.

Food Fairies vs. the Gnomes

In all the years I have been raising children I have also been lying to them endlessly regarding where their food comes from, and why it is that I actually still have every tooth that ever came out of their heads (tagged appropriately with dates, filed systematically in my important papers box next to their DNA kits). There is a reason: fairies. It is true - fairies bring my children unexpected food items from time to time, they pay handsomely for teeth, but they also have this little racket going where these same fairies have bribed me, literally holding my children's teeth ransom until I come up with the money they (the fairies) are out for being forced to pay higher costs for THESE particular teeth. Usually, as you know, fairies don't hoard the teeth, they sell them to sellers who recycle them or something - but the fairies in our lives always find me wanting - therefore, they charge me a little extra, making a little on the sides, but the good news is that I get to keep my children's broken, no-longer-worth-a-dime teeth (forever!).

Gnomes are a different story! Gnomes take and take and take. All they ever do around our gardens, or in our refrigerator - where they hang out often - is take the food that use to belong to a particular child. Here's how that works: Reuben would steal Laura's sandwich, place a gnome where the food once held residence, and let his sister find the gnome without her treat, and this was her clue (or que) to start the fight! She would then throw the soft rubber gnome across the room, sometimes hitting her brother, sometimes hitting the dog, often times simply smacking the gnome hard against the wall.

Seeing a gnome in the frig was an automatic bad sign. It ALWAYS meant that someone was going to be upset about a prepackaged piece of cake, perhaps left over Chinese, or that too-good-to-eat-all-at-once steak...GNOME! GONE! Everytime the gnome showed up I was expected to then call in the fairies. Fairies bring food back. Well, not the same bit of digested food, no it usually meant that I had to bribe the fairies to go out and get the food and then I'd have to take my car because fairies aren't licensed in our state to drive. It usually meant that I would be gone for a while, I would be out a bit of cash, and I would be inconvenienced to no end. Who in the hell thought up this method in the first place? I always seem to get the raw end of it!

The day Reuben left for the Army we stopped seeing the little red domed gnome in our cupboards and food never really disappeared again, so I have to assume that the United States Army allows them to enlist. They are REAL - I've seen them. I've witnessed their feats of theft! They DO exist. As do fairies, even though my children have actually never seen one - they believe me, and I believe me, so they have to be out there - right? I mean, the food reappears...sometimes in the same day.

The food fairies have a new assignment now that the girls are moving out - they will be called upon to KNOW what is in the apartment, and to KNOW whether or not they need to replenish the items that could be disappearing. Fairies never let children down, and even if it means I have to continue to drive these beasts to the store and probably end up paying for the replacement food items - I will still allow the fairies themselves to get the credit, because I feel in my heart that my children (who have always depended too much on me at times) should realize that there comes a time that they have to stand on their own! If a fairy wants to help, fine, let the fairy help a little, but they don't need to be crying on my shoulders just because one or the other of them finished off the last of the Silk Chocolate!

Gnome or no gnome, there must be fantasy rescues out there - otherwise we'd all be forced to face reality! Who wants that?

Thanks to the Firefighters Et Al.

Like the ones they call the "Finest" of every city, the BRAVEST of every city, our firefighters, are often the ones we hear about during these times of massive fires that get out of hand. Naturally, if we're being affected or not, we are all indebted to the men and women who day after day, minute after minute, place themselves on the line. We can't merely say thank you, it wouldn't be enough.

To think that all one can do is blog, or walk up to a random firefighter locally and say thank you just doesn't seem good enough. I know from experience that the firefighters in Oklahoma City sure had a tough and rugged job ahead of them on April 19, 1995 - we needed lots of help, and help came fast! When our towers fell, the first responders were again the bravest and the finest! Over and over our law enforcement and our firefighters seem to work side by side, hand in hand, often shoulder to shoulder to free us, help us, love us, and just protect us. OHHHH, it just makes me want to run up to the nearest fire house and make sure everyone of them is watched over too! There is something we can do - small, but good. We can go to our local houses, we can offer to sit and talk to the men and women who may need a shoulder to fall to sometimes. We don't think about that.

My good friend Jeannie suggested that we all run out and buy up the 2008 Firefighter calendars to show our support, but we do that every year just because! I want to make a bunch of cookies, I want to invite them all over for a cookout - they know how to fix it should I burn my backyard down. They're also pretty good with the burgers too - having sat across the street from a particular firehouse for years watching them play vollyball, cook steaks, and just hang out waiting for the alarm to sound. Sometimes they even invite me over to keep score! I like those days.

So, here's my hat tipping - OFF TO YOU Mr. and Ms. Firefighter of America! Not just the Southern California FFs because like us here in OKC, you were brave and smart enough to call in your brothers and sisters for help. The hats are all off for every dang one of you! ANDDDD, just as soon as the hats go back on the heads, let's take them off and tip them ONE MORE TIME for the administrators, the police officers, the officials, and the rescuers...anyone, everyone and don't forget the DOGS...always tip the dogs for their help. (I've said it before, you never see cats out there helping the firefighters, and you never seen the cats out on the beat with the cops either! NO, cats don't do much.) Thanks to the hard working, ever-so-wonderful and ever-so-endlessly-loving BRAVEST of the brave!

Thank you!

Me as an M & M

I may have (in the past) blogged about this already. I have something like 300 posts, so finding it may be hard. I wanted to do it again because I found it hilarious that after a year goes by and I get back on the site, that I haven't really changed anything about the avatar...I would add a cup of coffee I think. That's the only real change. If the little M&M had a Starbucks cup in her right hand, and she was watching a forensic show on her chocolate television...that would do it. That would say "JUDE" all over the place. This is me. Not as bronze now as I was in the summer, but I'm glowing.

I went to the M&M site and ordered personalized M&Ms to send to my kids right? Yes, I know, it's danged expensive, and a complete waste of money, but no one else is going to send them personalized M&Ms and I wanted to be the first to knock them over when they opened them this Thanksgiving. It's my birthday, I can spend the money any way I want to. I don't mind telling you what I had written on them because my kids never read my blog - never. I could say anything about them, I could tell their secrets, I could spill my guts about who they kissed, when, where, how, and they would never ever know it was me....probably. So, on the two color choices that you get when you go to the site, I picked a yellow gold color and a dark green. My color for my birth month of November (topaz) and green because my kids are all products of sex. Oh, did I say that? Out loud? On the web? It's true. I didn't find a single one of my children on my doorstep, or in a cabbage patch - no, I birthed them all.

I may have been persuaded to pick those particular colors because of our love for the Green Bay Packers, but hey - I have to tell the full truth from time to time if only to get the cobwebs out of the way when I pray. I want God to hear me. I had the following messages written on the back side of each M&M. On the gold: "I love my KIDS" and on the green: "Mom Rocks!" It's true. Both statements. I do rock, and my kids are the greatest kids I've ever made. Each with their own unique qualities - it would take every color and every shape of M&M to fully express myself to them, so I had to narrow it down and just be gutsy and bold. I LOVE MY KIDS and I ROCK....'nuf said.

The little avatar is so cute. She's got her headsets on, she's smirking - she's just been to Starbucks, she's fully loaded. All the chocolate in her body is a little soft, a little warm, she's gorgeous, and she's looking for a party to go dancing! Look at those shoes? She's sensible. She knows she'll be on her feet all night, moving and shaking - just being the little magical drop that she is. She knows that Peanuts and Crunchy M&Ms have been throwing a little RAVE down near the canisters in the kitchen. If she's lucky, she may meet up with a little St. Patrick's Green M&M. He'd be in camo pants, carrying a little chocolate bass. Maybe he'd have a ball cap on his head, words like: ROCK ON written on it - or maybe the Marines logo. He's patriotic that way. The two little M&Ms would then be able to salute the troops, sing the Star Spangled Banner at the end of the show, and go home happy....in their comfortable big open candy dispenser that seconds as a paperweight on the other side of the room to keep the mail in place.

I thought I saw a few Kisses coming into the scene tonight - Hersheys! They always crash the place. Leave their little tags and their aluminum foil scattered around, such a mess...and then they disappear. No one ever sees them again....

A Little Privacy Please, Thank You.

I was sitting in my office chair, legs folded, you know, office stuff - minding my own business, just about to start tapping when my boss comes in and expected me to work. Let me explain something to you: I work for a guy who sells insurance. I'm suppose to be his Customer Service Representative, but he doesn't pay as well as most employers so from time to time I do my own thing - this was one of those times.

Everytime he comes into the office and catches me with the lights out, the candles on, and the chair turned around he thinks I'm goofing off - he doesn't understand the whole - "You get what you pay for" concept. I tried to explain it to him last month, he fired me, I laughed - and well, I'm still there, he's still not paying well, and I'm still doing my thing when I need to. I digress, let me get back to the tapping thing. I was just about to tap but he interrupted me. Then, because he's a bit scared of me at times, he asked me to tap some place else - his suggestion was the bathroom. I took up my candle and left. I use a candle because I like the smell of it, I'm not weird or anything.

When I came back - maybe in 6 minutes - he wants to know if I was praying for him too, because apparently he believes in me, and what I'm able to do with the prayers an the tapping, but it freaks him out to see it. I explained to him that YES, I was praying for him, and that he should receive money from unexpected places very soon. This is the funny part: The second the words left my mouth his cell rang and he answered it. He stared at me. He just pointed at the door, told me to leave and kept staring at me. I picked up my candle and went back to the bathroom laughing. He soon followed me, knocking on the door within seconds.

"Get out here!" He said - get out here now! Seems he was given a couple of bonuses he wasn't expecting from insured who had filed online without using his services, but since they were his clients he got the residuals - something like $1300, and he wasn't expecting it whatsoever - it just ....well, it just happened. I had to smile, I mean, tapping really really really does work, and why not use it to make your boss freak out? I think it's fun - he's not complaining (much) and he asked me to tap again this time for the pickup truck he wants to get. OK...I can't resist a good challenge. I'm have to inform you the reader if and when he gets it.

What I did today after that was to make myself a little happy chart - I listed all the places I wanted to go, all the people I wanted to meet, all the money I wanted to make (for now) and all the things I wanted to do (for now). Sort of like a check off list, and it gives me something to focus on when I'm talking to the universe, to God, and to my soul - because you can't help but question and ask your soul when you do this - it's a must. You have to be in tune with yourself. One thing I noted when I was tapping was that the pressure points hurt a little less when I tap now, they're becoming more receptive to the fact that I'm receptive. I'm opening my heart up and my spirit up to receive good things - keeping negative out.

I did actually manage to do a little work today too. I made the calls, ran the quotes, answered the questions from clients calling in with complaints and/or needs - but all I needed to keep my boss at arm's length was to pick up my little candle and pretend to thrust it at him - he spooks easier than most; and that makes me smile. Scaredy-cat!

No Yellow Dog Democrats Here!

For several years and now a couple of presidential campaigns, members of the Democrat party have been calling me and asking me to allow them to take Faith's image for their benefits, their functions, their causes - No Thanks! Faith, although she has never actually proclaimed it out loud, is not a Yellow Dog Democrat. She is however, a yellow dog. She's one of the most talked about yellow dogs in the world, so yes, I can see where the Dems would want her image or picture associated with their needs. We turned the Kerrys down, and now we have had the privilege to turn a couple of locals and another presidential candidate, or would be candidate down. Where are my Republicans? Ask! Come On! ASK!

Faith loves to make a stand, in fact, she stands a great deal of the time. Let's see what she would believe in if she were running for office. More meat on every table and in every dish. More time to sleep. More loud rock n' roll music, because believe it or not she loves that. When Faith traveled with Brown Gravy's Brothers Grim Side Show this summer with Ozzfest she met up with some great (really loud) bands who just loved having her on their stage and backstage. She was the hit of the tour for sure. Laura was rather cute too mind you, but we all know it's the dog they come out to see. I'm used to it. No one ever really remembers my name - I say it's "Jude, as in Hey Jude", but they don't remember. They love my little mutt! As they should.

So, from TV and radio talk show hosts, the Glenn Becks, Rush Limbaughs, and all the other right wingers out there - Where is Cobert? Hey, call me!! We need to have a few more Blue States calling and asking for the yellow dog! She could be the happiest, tongue-waggingiest, jump-up-and-make-them-pay-attentionist campaigner you ever saw! She could bring the votes in people.....oh, and she's got a great platform to go on too - LOVE. She shares it with everyone she sees. From our Armed Forces to the children we meet on every corner of every city we visit - she loves them all - what a great backer to have in your corner...or under your bed. I'm often asked what the most famous dog in the world does all day - you'd be surprised. Suffice it to say - she's a dog.

Top 10 Cities to Live in? Us?

Wow! Imagine my surprise today when I read that Forbes.com had named Oklahoma City as well as Tulsa,Oklahoma to their Top 10 list of cities to move to for business! I'm moving OUT of Oklahoma City for the same reason, you can't get anywhere in this town! I mean, it's a great state, it's a wonderful city, but work? No, there's not much of that anywhere - - not that leads to prosperity. I suppose if you're looking to stay at the poverty level it's a great place to hover. I know hundreds of people doing that. I'm still hovering around it myself for the time being - but that's the entire reason behind picking up the leftovers and heading to Chicago! Surviving is a great way to spend a few of the youthful years, but no thank you for the middle ages or the retirement ages. I'll take wealth, establishment, and what do that call that? Oh, I remember - success!

There are some things I will never give up when I move to Chicago (or if I moved to any other place)for instance: I will ALWAYS be a Sooner fan. I will always call myself an Okie, I will be proud forever and a day of the fact that I was born and raised here, in the heartland, and with the moral codes and the work ethics that I believe this state and it's good people instill in a person; however, money? No, not so much. Not so much in the way of education either - number 47 I think. Teen pregnancies? We top the list, we are #1 in that, in meth-labs, and we can't forget the divorce rate. I'm a part of that stat, but only once, I've known people who have helped those numbers out quite a few times. (And yes, with divorce rates being so high so is the bankruptcy rate.) Our great state is a great state, but Forbes must have been thinking of Boulder, Austin, even Joplin, but I can't see Oklahoma City as being anywhere NEAR the top 100 in terms of growing income. Wait, I take that back - my daughter got a raise last week. She's now making $5.70 an hour rather than minimum wage.

Tulsa made the list too, and where that makes a bit more sense, I still don't believe it. Now, give me something I can believe in when it comes to Oklahoma being the best, the Top 10 material so to speak: Country Western singers - yes! I believe that. We have Garth, Reba, Toby, Carrie, and Vince. What about beef? You betcha! I'll go for cattle producers and wheat producers! I'll even throw in sod, we have amazing sod, God's sod in fact! Quite possibly, Oklahoma is the best state in the nation when it comes to friendly, openly honest folks who greet you on the street with a smile, a wave of the hand and even a question or two to make you feel welcomed....that I get, but we don't have a growing income people, we don't have the commerce you may have been led to believe. Chesapeake does...OU and OSU have money, sure, and there are actually more millionaires per capita, but they're holding on tight to what they have - believe me, if it were true we'd all be singing a different tune when it comes to buying the books our kids need for school, or the buses we need to take these kids to and from classes. I wish it were so.

Well, let Forbes talk! We can use the advertising. Perhaps some people will take heart, move a professional baseball, basketball or soccer team to our state and really make a difference. I'd say football, but with the Sooners picking up that lack we don't need another team to fill up the seats of any new stadium - Boomer Sooner! We got that!

Congrats fellow Okies - who knew! Break out the mismatched tumblers, the plastic dishes and the lard - looks like we're gonna get some company real soon with all those nice folks comin' by to check out our growing incomes. Ya'all come back now, ya hear!