I don’t know much about the game of poker, but I learned a lot about the players from watching the show.

It’s hosted by Shana Hiatt, who is someone I never heard of before, and for the most part it’s cool to see people’s hands from the table-cam they have installed for the show.

There’s the players:

The obligatory “woman” player, who appears to have mad skillz but looks like your typical older lady bar fly.

Then you have the “old man” player (usually very hairy and/or hippy-ish), “the foreigner” player (a jet-setter with an accent, usually dark and mysterious),

the “nice guy” type player who is polite to everyone, follows the rules without question and bends over backward to avoid hurting anyone’s feelings

…and finally, the “whiny veteran” player who is always grumbling about “I’ve been playing this game for 18 years and I never had someone talk during my hand”, or “Where’s my White Russian? I asked for a White Russian about 5 minutes ago.”

Then, the host interviews players…

Host: (with serious look on face) “Hmm, that was a tough hand you had there, _____ (insert name here), What was going through your mind at that point?”

Player: (seems anxious to get back to their seat)

Overall, I think the players on this show may be winners at poker, but in the game of life they are a bunch of sleaze bags (with the exception of a few people).

I don’t really care, most times.

But I must say, I’m really flabbergasted by some of the responses I got from my latest post regarding my distaste for a sleazy TV ad (TV commercial ad people are sleazy, and scoundrels, if you ask me).

Check it out. I got a TON of hate directed at me, personally, not so much ‘that’s your opinion, but I disagree‘ type of thing. And I’m not sure I like it.

See, here’s my take:

If it’s my blog…I can be as rude as I want in my own posts…right? But say, if Johnny Blogger wants to post an entry on his blog about the war in Iraq, and then bash Bush along with that commentary, I think…it’s none of my beeswax if he wants to bash anyone at his blog. Right? Right.

Does him bashing Bush make it OK for me to go post flaming hate on his blog’s comments box and call him a bleeping so-and-so who needs to get stuffed, because I disagree?

No.

So I have a question. When did it become the norm, or even socially acceptable, for people to come to your blog and barf hate all over it?

I say, never. I don’t think it’s cool at all.

I can take the heat, but yikes… personal attacks on me just because I have an opinion? I would never do that to someone else.

I’m just sayin’

But I have an alter ego which–every few days or so–I need to satisfy, wherein I actually feel like a normal, nice person, who’s not rude, doesn’t yell at everyone for no good reason and is actually pleasant to be around.

*Gasp!* SOOO WEIRD, I KNOW!

Anyway, so that’s what this blog does. Sort of online re-hab, only I’m not going to change myself. I’m doing this because I’m lazy. I figure it’s too much work to try to just be a better person. Yes, you read that right. I don’t want to change. Can you blame me? I’m and old and set in my ways. So I will just kind of play, Dr. Jekyl and Miss Hyde through my two blogs.

This one lets me reach that kinder, and sure–gentler side of me that likes to come out and play once in awhile.

I hope it doesn’t feel too awkward. That would really suck. Awkward-ness really sucks. Is awkward-ness a word?

OK! Got that covered.

So that things don’t get too weird, I have some rules which I will need to stick by, in order to successfully pull this off.

Onto the rules. These are in no certain order.

* I shall use this blog only to post lighthearted, pithy commentary with a somewhat happy mood and tone — a vastly different shade of myself which has not seen the light of day in over 3 years. Bah. Blame it on my ex.

* I shall not cuss, use foul language or otherwise be blatantly profane, with the tiny exceptions of the word piss and a couple other words used below, for examples. This rule applies to all commenters visiting this site as well. Anyone (including myself) caught uttering one even slightly off-color word on this site, shall contribute $1.00 to the cuss jar.

* On this blog, I shall not be grumplicious, sassy, crabby, bitchy or piss-and-moan-y, that is reserved for my other blog.

* As much as possible in this blog, I shall remain encouraged, uplifting, and try hard to see the world with a ‘cup is half full’ point of view.

Don’t forget…if you see me so much as utter a damn, hell, ass or even crap* …it will cost me a DOLLAR. That’s a lot of money that I don’t have.

* except for this post, of course…I have to show examples! Jeez.

I found itsapundit in my logs and couldn’t figure for the life of me what it was…and I’ll be honest, I never clicked on the link because I well…I was always too busy.

Anyhoo…today I decided to check it out and whaddya know! It’s a neat little blog network that Basil, of Basil’s Blog, started. After reading the ‘catch’ , I decided to give it the ol’ college try. (PSST - it’s not that ‘big’ of a catch…unless you have more integrity than I do)

I figured there would be some benefits for me… Not only will I be able to sharpen my link whoring capabilities, but I’ll also get to try WordPress MU. How can I resist?

Off I go, wheee!