We needed tough lessons as children. An occasional playground fight was expected as the norm, and if we complained to our mother that we were being teased, we were treated to this glorious aphorism: “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me.” My mom used to say that all the time, one of the seemingly endless adages she had at her disposal to deal with any of life’s problems. To this day I think long and hard about the practical application that dogma had on my life.
The idea that you could actually choose whether or not to be hurt by words: that was huge for me. Even though it has been repeated ad nauseam for generations, “sticks and stones” really is a powerful bit of philosophy to a kid. That’s one of the great things about being a parent: you can spout nothing but clichés, and yet, to your child, you come off as one of the great thinkers in Western culture.
–from MEAN DADS FOR A BETTER AMERICA, by Tom Shillue
we got bumped last night (but it will air tonight)
Thank you for reminding me. I wanted to talk about our post-show hangout in Memphis and here it is:
Tom Shillue will be a guest on "Gutfeld!" tonight (Thurs)
You saw it first here...well, not really as Greg announced it on "The Five"
“My FIFA story”
In 2002, I was working in Taipei, and Seoul. The FIFA World Cup was being held in Japan and South Korea at the time.
I was already pissed off as I was boarding my flight in SFO for Narita Japan…
I had been making the 24 hour commute (each way),DC-SFO-Narita-Taipei, for about 6 months.
Until this trip I had been able to get upgraded to Business Class. Because of all of the Soccer teams and fans, the damn planes were packed.
It was so bad, that upon landing in Narita, they parked the 747 out on the tarmac, and used portable stairs because they didn’t have enough gates.
You don’t really have an appreciation for how big a 747 is, until you climb or descend those stairs. The door close to three storeys off of the ground.
Anyway, as I walked into the Coach section of the airplane, the entire right side of Coach, was the Argentinian National Soccer team. My seat was three rows from the back bulkhead, aisle seat.
As I got closer I realized that one of the players was occupying my ...
