C.: OooohNobody knows the trouble I've seen
Nobody knows my sorrow
Nobody knows the trouble I've seen
Glory hallelujahSometimes I'm up
Sometimes I'm down
Oh, yes, LordSometimes I'm almost to the groun'
Oh, yes, LordOoooh
Nobody knows the trouble I've seen
Nobody knows my sorrow
Nobody knows the trouble I've seenGlory hallelujah
Although you see me goin' 'long so
Oh, yes, LordI have my trials here below
Oh, yes, LordOoooh
Nobody knows the trouble I've seen
Nobody knows my sorrow
Nobody knows the trouble I've seen
Glory hallelujah
Oh, hi, d.c. Thanks for coming to see me here at The Kennel during your lunch break while you’re filling in for me when I was supposed to be filling in for Ralph. He’s on tour playing the bass and singing backup vocals with Beauty and the Glowfish. They’ve hit the bigtime now, doing their NIKE tour.
d.: NIKE tour?
C.: Yes, they’re playing all the big back alleys around Southeast Texas: Navasota, Indian Springs, Klein, and Egypt. It’s not as big as the CONVERSE tour that I did with my band, The RoCKats, but it’s a good tour for Raph’s band.
d.: What alleyways did y’all play, Cal.E.?
C.: We played in the back alleys in Cut ‘N’ Shoot, Orange, Navasota, Victoria, Egypt, Rosharon, Sealy and Eagle Lake. That was the big time. Of course, I don’t have time to do that anymore now that I’m married…
d.: And in The Kennel.
C.: Yes, thanks to my youngest queen kitten, Jodi, but I was framed!
d.: I believe you. You can’t even count on family, I suppose.
C.: You seem irritated, is that why you aren’t eating your lunch?
d.: Yes. I Just read an online article. The question that was posed was “Who was the worst U.S. president of all time?” The guy never said the name, but January 6 was the biggest clue. I’m not a fan of Donald Trump, but I suppose this guy is too young to have heard of Richard Nixon, the Iran Contra affair, or the two senseless wars that the U.S. was involved in after the second World War. He also didn’t recognize the president who tried to set himself up as king by running for four terms for president before the second World War and then tried to take credit for an improved economy after the war. Economic facts show that economies improve, over time, after a country is successful in defeating another country or countries in a war. That’s why I tell my sons to read their textbooks, to see which way the person writing them slants history.
C.: How can one slant facts?
d.: No one can, but only certain things that are taught in school now are facts. Math is full of facts, gravity is a fact, but history books are now written from a person’s personal perspective.
You can give someone your opinion about why s/he is not feeling well and what to do about it without fear. However, because I have a medical license, if I give someone my opinion and it’s wrong, then I could get in trouble with the nursing board.
This is just like MLB commissioner Rob (he is NOT a) Man,Fred saying that the Astros’ sign-stealing scandal is the worst thing to happen to baseball since the 1919 Chicago Black Sox threw games during the World Series. Rob ignored the steroid scandal of the 1990s. That kept the all-time home run king out of the Baseball Hall of Fame. It also cast a shadow on some other excellent players. A very good pitcher who won over 300 games and a player who hit over 500 home runs in his career aren’t in the Hall of Fame because sports writers believe that they had an unfair advantage; but there is something worse than any of this that happened in baseball in the latter part of the last century.
C.: What?
d.: The Astros had a very talented shortstop named Dickie Thon back in the ‘80s. He was an excellent defensive player who could hit for power and average. A pitcher pitched him inside. Thon said he didn’t see the ball very well and couldn’t get out of the way in time. The ball hit his left eye’s orbital bone and shattered it. Amazingly, Thon played for ten years after that injury, but he was never the same. Most people who watched him play thought that, if he’d never suffered the injury, he would have been in the Hall of Fame.
If you think that was an isolated incident, though, you’re wrong. Dusty Baker, the retired Astros’ manager, said that it was understood, when he was playing baseball in the Major Leagues, that you would get hit on the leg or the butt if the guy who batted before you hit a home run. He, unfortunately, batted behind Hank Aaron for some time, so he does know what he’s talking about. And some pitchers don’t have very good control of their pitches, so they could bean a batter in the head when the pitcher was trying to hit the batter on the leg or rear end.
C.: Hmm. d.c., could you use that website that upset you so much as a reference in a class, or any of your writing?
d.: No, Cal.E. It isn’t a “scholarly website.” It can’t be used as a reference.
C.: Then why are you so upset?
d.: Because people will listen to that website over someone with a degree in political science, just as many will listen to their neighbor’s advice whose Aunt Sally had the same illness, and she did this or that to get over it. They will follow that advice over a physician’s who was dedicated eight to twelve years of his or her life to know how to treat illness and industry.
C.: So, people are stupid, as cats have always known?
d.: Not all people. Doctors and nurses, as well as engineers as well as computer scientist and architects are people, too, and anyone in those professions cannot be stupid. There are more professions that merit recognition, but we’re out of time for today. Please join us tomorrow for another episode of Cal.E.’s Korner.