A Real Final Destination

I honestly believe I've cheated death on multiple occasions.  I won't waste your time describing each incident, but suffice it to say, most were in my twenties, and most involved alcohol. 

Buzzfeed put together this video of a few blokes lucky to be alive, including a man who could feel a bear eating his brain, but he played dead.

Cyanide and Happiness: Morse Code

Saturday Morning Coffee Break: It Could Happen To You

 

I cannot imagine ever losing the person I love.  I'm sure you can't either.  Some of you have lost wives, husbands, partners, parents, siblings, friends, and the emotional impact is unimaginable.  While I have lost loved ones, I have never lost someone I was dating or considered my best friend and lover.  It's like me losing Ryan today - I'd be devastated beyond belief.  It's not something I can prepare myself for.  Death comes at the most inconvenient time and there's no stopping that clock.

It's been a while since I've posted a "Saturday Morning Coffee Break", and now that I've come back it's as good as time as any to start.  So grab your coffee, sit back, and watch this video, because if you're gay, and in a relationship it could happen to you.  Oh and grab a tissue too, it's a tear-jerker.

If you wish to look back at some previous issues, click my logo below and enjoy.  And make sure to check out Saturday Morning Coffee Break every Saturday for another classic or current gay short film.

Post Secret Fridays - Issue 098

PostSecret is an ongoing community art project where people mail in their secrets anonymously on one side of a homemade postcard.

 See More Secrets. Follow PostSecret on Twitter. 

 Want to see older Post Secret Friday issues? 

Click my Post Secret Logo Below.

What a Hot Mess: Obituary Heartbreak

Geez, I sure hope you're not related the Anello family, because if you are I would sure hate to read your obituary in the paper after you died.  LOL.  What a hot mess!

Mama Josie here, died three days before Valentine's day, and my wildest bet is that her son A.J. made it clear how he really felt about his siblings.

The Honorable Wife or Honorable Soldiers?

The night before the burial of her husband 2nd Lt. James Cathey of the United States Marine Corps, killed in Iraq, Katherine Cathey refused to leave the casket, asking to sleep next to his body for the last time. The Marines made a bed for her, tucking in the sheets below the flag. Before she fell asleep, she opened her laptop computer and played songs that reminded her of him, and one of the Marines asked if she wanted them to continue standing watch as she slept. "I think it would be kind of nice if you kept doing it" she said. "I think that's what he would have wanted".

-Not sure what is more honorable: Being married to this faithful wife to the end or the Marine standing next to the casket watching over them both.

IN HONOR OF ALL OUR ARMED FORCES PLEASE SHARE THIS.

Message courtesy of Tumblr

Crimes of the Century - No. 10 - The Tate-Labianca Murders

THE TATE-LABIANCA MURDERS, 1969

On Aug. 9 and 10, 1969, two sets of grisly murders took place in Los Angeles. On the 9th, a gang of four people brutally killed the actress Sharon Tate, who was married to director Roman Polanski and eight and a half months pregnant, four of Tate's friends and the son of her gardener. Tate begged for the life of her unborn child but was told by one of the female assailants, "Look bitch, I don't care about you. I don't care if you are having a baby. You are going to die and I don't feel a thing about it." Tate's blood was used to write the word PIG on the home's front door. 

The next day supermarket executive Leno LaBianca and his wife were killed in a similar fashion, a fork used to carve the word WAR on his belly left sticking out of his corpse. This time, the leader of the gang took part in the slaughter.

Authorities would take nearly five months to track down Charles Manson and his so-called Family. And when they did, America discovered a terrifying mix of a libertine counter-culture and stupefying mind-control. Manson sent out his mostly female agents like the Furies of Greek mythology, to take down those whom he saw as his enemies. His trial ended in 1971 with a death sentence which was vacated by the U.S. Supreme Court's declaration of the penalty's unconstitutionality. He is up for parole this year but is unlikely to receive it.

TIME Magazine posted this article online several years ago, along with a list of 24 additional notorious crimes. I will be posting these crimes every Saturday on my blog, hope you enjoy.

Go back and read the previous 9 crimes here.

Coincidence or Not?

So is it a coincidence or not, that the assassinations of two presidents share similarities that are so eerily captivating?  Don't believe me?  Check them out here...

Pray For Our President's Death

People often ask me why I'm not harsher towards Republicans in my blog.  And I tell them, because I want to believe that most Republicans are not this way.  At least the Republican people I know or friends I have, are not this way.  As a whole, I think the Republican party is heading in the wrong direction.  And a lot of it has to do with the hate and animosity towards our fellow Americans.  Most of the Repub friends I have, believe in the conservative principles of the party, yet have liberal views as well.

But I'll be honest, It's getting harder and harder to listen to the amount of anger and hate most Republicans have towards our President.  And quite frankly I wouldn't want to belong to a party that would deny another American the right to marry, or deny an American the right to pursue happiness.  I wouldn't want to belong to a party that constantly spews hateful rhetoric or tries to throw religion down our throats.  I wouldn't want to belong to a party that wants to strip my grandparents out of their health insurance that's been working so well for them.  And I wouldn't want to belong to party that boos a gay soldier who would've sacrificed his life for them.  The list goes on.

I wrote this blog today, because of something I read this morning.  It was an article on Kansas House Speaker Mike O'Neal.  Last Friday, he asked his fellow Republican House members via email to pray for our President's death.  That's right, not only is he using God to wish death upon a president, he's advising them to take a knee and recite Psalms 109.

"Let his days be few; and let another take his office. Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow."

Seriously? Why does it have to be this way?  And this is the same man who sent out a previous email saying "Michelle 'Yo Mama'".

I look at Senator John McCain's wife and daughter, Cindy and Meghan McCain, and wonder if Republicans will ever be like them.  Can they ever be like them?  And the answer, quite frankly, is NO.

Documentaries To Watch: Dreams of a Life

Imagine yourself wrapping Christmas presents as you sit on your couch watching your favorite show.  Now imagine having stayed there for 3 years and no one ever stopping by to see if you were alive or okay?  This actually happened to Joyce Carol Vincent in 2003.

A film which was released at the BFI London Film Festival last month chronicles the life and mysterious death of Joyce Vincent, a beautiful singer who was found slumped on her sofa with Christmas presents she had been wrapping, all around her.

What's mysterious and strange about the whole scenario, is that she wasn't found until 3 years after her death.  How someone never managed to get a hold of her, look for her, or realize she wasn't around is beyond me.  This is a woman, who in her short life met Nelson Mandela, Ben E. King, Gil Scott-Heron, and Betty Wright; and had also been to dinner with Stevie Wonder. [source] That is insane!  I, for one, want to see this film. Watch the trailer, and tell me what you think of this bizarre story.

OMG Hilarious! - Vet

Laugh of the Day: Death

It's time for your laugh of the day!!!

Imagine yourself standing in line at a store register.  You look up at the security monitor, and you think you've seen it, but you're not quite sure.  You look up again, and there he is.  Death staring right at you.  Omg, hilarious!

This Is My Story by Ben Breedlove

If you have not had your crying moment of the day, then I suggest watching the video below.  It will definitely do it.  I barely got through the first minute without bursting into tears.  I had to pause for an hour or so, and I have now just recently finished watching it.  Call me a sap, I don't care.  I think it's good for people to cry - happy or sad tears, it's all good.

Ben Breedlove, and 18 year old senior from Austin, Texas died Christmas Day of a heart condition called hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, which is something Ben had all his life.  Much like the kid who's video I posted two weeks ago, he uses notecards to share his story.

His parents had no idea he had recorded such a video until they started going through his belongings. To add to the pain, the hit 80's song, "Mad World" is playing in the background as Ben silently displays his cards.

What really strikes me the most about this video, is that here is a boy sharing his near-death experiences to the entire world, and the world didn't even know it yet.  I love you, Ben Breedlove.

His mother, Deanne Breedlove, says her son died after the family opened their Christmas presents.

"I just think Ben opened doors for a lot of people to think about something that maybe they've never thought about before," Deanne Breedlove told KXAN. "And that to me is a wonderful gift." [Source-Today]

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words - Issue No. 7

I haven't posted an issue of "A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words" in over 5 months.  I have so many series on my blog that by the time I get to one I really want to talk about, a new story pops up, or a funny video takes it's place.  

In keeping with current events I felt the best place for this post was in this series, because while the art itself does not consist of words, it does consist of a broader message.  In contrast to my other posts, where the words made the art, in the portrait below, The National Post’s graphics team uses artillery shells to convey it's message.

With the death of Kim Jong-il there is uncertainty about how much support the third generation of the North Korea’s ruling dynasty has among the ruling elite, especially in the military, and worry that successor Kim Jong-un might need a military show of strength to help establish his credentials. The National Post’s graphics team explores the firepower available to the great successor.

OMG Hilarious! - A Better Place

Road Fatalities USA

It's not so cool that so many road fatalities happen every year.  According to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, 369,629 people have died on America's roads between 2001 and 2009. 

Mapping experts at ITO World have taken this information, and produced this powerful map using OpenStreetMap. You can zoom in to any particular part of the country or you can simply search for your town. Each dot represents a life. 

I used this interactive map earlier to see how many people died in proximity to where I lived, and it's mind-boggling to me how I didn't know these people died just feet from our home, or a nearby store. Click on the pic, to see how many people have lost their lives in your neighborhood, you'd be surprised.  Just looking at that huge mass of dots in Houston, Texas is crazy.

Little Munchkin Passes Away

Slover seen on right

Who doesn't know of The Wizard of Oz ?  It's impossible not to know about it.  We watched it as children, and as adults.  Hell, Ryan even got me the 70th Anniversary Blu-ray gift box for Christmas last year.

Well, unbeknownst to me, Karl Slover, one of only four surviving little people who played the Munchkins in the movie died this past Tuesday. :-(  He was 93.

The four-foot-five Slover, one of the shortest men in the movie, portrayed not only the lead trumpeter in the Munchkins band, but also a townsman and a soldier. The little guy was born Karl Kosiczky in what is now the Czech Republic, the only dwarf-sized child in the family. According to The Washington Post, his father inflicted inhumane treatments to make him taller, burying him in the backyard, immersing him in heated oil until his skin blistered, and attaching him to a stretching machine at a hospital. Eventually, at the age of nine, his father sold him to a traveling freak show. In his 20s, Slover moved to the States and joined a vaudeville troupe called the Singer Midgets, its 30 members becoming the core group of movie Munchkins. Slover was paid $50 a week, a salary lower than Toto’s. 

Later in life, he appeared around the country at festivals and events related to the movie, and was one of seven Munchkins representing all the little people of Oz at the 2007 unveiling of a star dedicated to them on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. “He has a genuine immortality,” said 100 Years of Oz author, John Fricke. “Of the 124 little people, he’s one of the handful who got to enjoy this latter-day fame, to have people know who he was and be able to pick him out of the crowd in the movie.”

Quoted: Steve Jobs

"Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart...

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true." 
                                        - Steve Jobs (CEO of Apple Computer and
                                          of Pixar Animation Studios, in a June 12, 
                                          2005 commencement address to Stanford 
                                          University.

"My first computer was an apple.  It had a huge ass keyboard, and used those huge 5 inch floppy disks.  It had a black screen and the letters were all in green - very matrix. LOL.  In either case, it truly is a sad day to know that Steve Jobs has passed away, but his legacy will live in the hearts and souls of many for thousands of years.  He was the Einstein of our generation, and I can't name one person in this era who has done more to change the world, than he.  R.I.P. Steve."                    - Blade 7184 aka Peter

What a Hot Mess: Another Informercial Star Dead

Geez what is it with these infomercial stars dying all of a sudden?  Remember Bill Mays?  I think everyone can relate to these sales pitches on television in one way or the other.  Either your parents have bought into some of them, or you were hoping to become rich by buying into some ridiculous program that would bring you riches beyond your wildest dreams.

Well, Don Lapre, the star of those "tiny classified ads" committed suicide inside an Arizona jail cell this past Sunday.  According to TMZ, he accomplished this task by "self-mutilation" and when the officers found him, there was a "large amount of blood" in his cell.  

Lapre was recently charged with conspiracy, mail fraud and wire fraud in his latest "Greatest Vitamin in The World" snake oil scam.  He walked off with $52 million buckaroos and screwing thousands of consumers. 

What a shame and yes,  What a Hot Mess!

If The World Were A Village of 100 People: Issue No. 5 - Births / Deaths

What if the world were a village of 100 people?  Using statistics based on the spread of the population in the world, Toby Ng Design created this poster as another way of looking at how our world is today.  

There are 15 more posters I will share with you in the coming weeks; This is the 5th of 20.  

If you missed any of the previous issues, click here.