I have always enjoyed reading my horoscope. I am a Taurus and everything I have ever read about astrology describing a Taurus has been right on the money.

Like the bull, slow to anger but when it comes out all hell breaks loose and I usually end up making a fool of myself and end up having to apologize for flying off the handle, or just hide out till the crap blows over.

Hard headed, yes absolutely, stubborn, well I guess that is like being hard headed.

On the bright side, I fit the good things too.

I am friendly, kind, generous, loving and honest. My honesty has gotten me in more trouble in my life than any lie I ever told.

I have a tendency to be brutally honest like, Hey honey do these jeans make my ass look fat?…………. Yes dear they make your ass look huge.

See what I mean?

The thing about horoscopes that always troubled me is, that if you read it in the morning, I have heard that there are people who are so obsessed with astrology that they will go out of their way to make the predictions come true.

So with that in mind, I have always tried to read my horoscope at the end of the day and then reflect on the day and tried to see if I could see any truth in it.

Sometimes there was, but more often than not I would end up laughing at what the astrologists said my day would be like.

My father was a Naval Aviator, That is a fighter pilot to you civilians out there.

He was also an alcoholic, a drunk would be my description, there goes that honesty again, and he was a mean drunk. He never had a kind word for me when he was drunk and he was never around when he was sober. He was off somewhere flying, drinking or whatever.

If it wasn’t for my mother I would probably turned out to be a serial killer or worse. My mother basically raised me and my dad was gone to Korea or the Suez Canal or some God awful place doing what he loved, being Top Gun.

Obviously my dad and I never really got along. Oh sure he took me fishing and I can remember a few good times, but it was mostly, Straighten up and fly right, or use your head for something other than a hat rack or swab that deck right now or I will throw you through that Goddamned bulkhead, wall, for the non Navy people reading this.

I was always the new kid in school because we moved on average every two or three years. As a result of my fathers military style upbringing, I would still be on restriction and hard labor cutting carpet grass out of the fence with scissors in Corpus Christi, Texas, if not for my mothers intervention I am certain that is where I would be today.

I also developed a strong lack of respect for authority that still gives me problems to this day.

Back to Horror Scopes.

If you read much of my writing or talk to me, you will learn very quickly that I talk way too much, often about things I shouldn’t, uh oh there goes that honesty again. I also tend to wander off the subject, uh what was I talking about?

I am retired now. I had a very major back surgery and was forced to go on disability. I tried to go back to work but with all the pain and the prescriptions they were giving me I just couldn’t do it. I really wanted to work. I liked my job, my house, my cars and boat, you know, all the stuff Americans have that they don’t really own, just owe money on.

To make a long story short, after I got out of jail for assaulting my ex with paperback books, I ended up in the VA hospital in Waco, Texas, then in the long term care Domiciliary in Temple for seven months.

I don’t care what anyone says about the VA, they treated me great. They filed with the military for non service related disability and they filed with Social Security. They arranged for the Social Security person to call me and fill out the papers over the phone, then they faxed them to me for my signature.

About six weeks later I got a letter from the military saying that they had approved me for 100% disability and I got a check for $2500. They said they would pay me $800 a month for the rest of my life.

I was overjoyed.

In the next day or so I got another letter, this time from Social Security saying that I had been approved for 100% disability. There was a check in the envelope for over $35,000 and they said that they would pay me $1500 a month with annual cost of living increases.

The only catch was, I couldn’t have both. I had to choose one or the other.

Duh! $800 or $1500, choose? What choice? I may have been born at night, but not last night. I of course chose the larger amount.

So then I followed my lifelong dream, which I never thought would happen, and I bought a sailboat and moved aboard in it St. Petersburg, Florida.

I soon found out I could not afford to live on a boat in the US so I started thinking about sailing to Mexico, South America and other places. I figured I could find some tropical paradise where the food was cheap, the women were easy and the weather was always warm and sunny.

I stayed in Tampa Bay for a couple of months and practiced sailing and tried to become one with my boat.

I lived at anchor on the Manatee River that runs between Palmetto and Bradenton, Florida and I had a great time. I sailed everyday and sometimes on weekends when I had money I would rent a slip at the marina where the yacht  broker that I bought the boat from had his office. I would hang out at the restaurant and bar and try to pick up women, quite unsuccessfully, I might add.

Life was good, but I always ran out of money before my check came in. I was also getting bored sailing in the same waters all the time. I wanted to go somewhere new and exciting. The sea and far away places were calling to me..

I met an old guy from Alaska who claimed to be a retired engineer and a millionaire. I never saw the money but he never seemed to be short. He always had money and he had a car. We hung out together and he helped me out with rides to the grocery store and stuff. It is tough carrying a weeks worth of groceries on a bicycle.

Soon he talked about leaving. He wanted to go back to Key West. He asked me if I wanted to buddy boat with him. For you non boaters, that is when two or more boats sail together and look out for each other and believe me I needed some looking out for. I thought I was a big time sailor and I had only been in the Gulf of Mexico on my boat one time. I sailed out of Tampa bay and promptly ran aground on a sandbar.

I worked the sails and the engine and got my boat free and went back to the safety of the bay where I knew the water depth better.

That would not be the last time I ran aground. My boat seems to be drawn to three foot deep water and she draws almost six feet. I will not go into all the times I have buried my keel in the sand and had to heel the boat and be towed out. That is several more stories and much too far off the subject.

My horoscope never said, You will run aground today. If it did I wouldn’t believe it anyway.

I said I was going to get back to horoscopes and that was a while ago, so I guess I need to try to get back to the point.

I found that tropical paradise. It is called…….no wait a minute, there are enough people who know about it already. If many more find out it will not be paradise anymore. It is already getting crowded and the type of people who come here is changing too.

When I first found this paradise, I will just call it the rio, people were laid back and friendly. Everyone seemed to have a different story about why they left the US. Many were long time sailors who had circumnavigated and been places I have only dreamed about, some were here hiding out from the law, some were long time sailors who just got tired of sailing and put down roots, but it seemed everyone was nice and friendly and it was a wonderful place.

Now it seems like we are getting a whole new type of boater. I call them East Texas Trailer Trash Boaters.

They are the kind of people who were sitting around the yard one day in front of the double wide, between the rusting cars up on blocks and they said, You know bubba we ought to sell the mansion and the junk cars and stuff and escape. We could buy a sailboat and go cruising. We could find paradise.

Apparently there are a lot of disenchanted rednecks who are tired of sitting on the hood of a rusting junk car up on blocks and would rather drink their beer out on a boat. I have to admit it is a great life, minus the beer for me thank you.

Herein lies the problem and finally I will get to the point.

A lot of these Texas Trailer Trash, disenchanted Redneck sailors have found the same paradise that I found.

They are drunk, loud, obnoxious, rude, racist, and generally Politically Incorrect, for lack of a better term.

The problem is my honesty. I do not flinch from telling a drunk to get the fuck out of my face. I do not mind telling them they are drunks and I do not care to associate with them.

This has led to a few problems for me as many of the boaters here are drunks even if they do not fit the East Texas Redneck Trailer Trash profile.

I try my best to avoid them but, paradise on the rio is a small place and you can not hide out on your boat forever. I tried it for a year and a half and I got cabin fever. I just had to get out, get off the boat and do something other than read books and play on the Internet.

I discovered very quickly when I came out that there was an over abundance of this new breed of drunken sailor that had taken over my little paradise, and none of them care for me because I will not get drunk with them.

A few weeks ago I failed in my normal attempt to read my horoscope in the evening. Oh my God, I read it in the morning and it effected my whole day.

This is what it said.

You are shrewd to try to negotiate through a potentially tense situation,
but you also have to know when it’s time to bring out the big guns — otherwise, you could be seen as a bit of a pushover. There is absolutely no reason to tolerate someone who is rude to you, so do not be shy about sticking up for yourself if you feel that you’re being treated poorly. Compromising yourself for a bully is a lose-lose situation.

Well I do not know if reading the horoscope in the morning did it or if it was just destiny, but it seems I spouted off to a few drunks and quickly became, that rude, obnoxious, sarcastic, arrogant dongato person.

My mother taught me to be self confident. She said it was good to have confidence in yourself and it would help me in my life.

My self confidence was interpreted by all the drunks as arrogance and me thinking I was better than them. Well I think I am better than them but I do not go around telling every drunk I see that I am better than him. That is a quick, easy way to get your butt kicked and that is no fun.

I am not a fighter unless I am backed into a corner and there is no other way. I can usually either talk my way out of a fight or just walk away, which is what I prefer to do.

So now I just avoid all the drunks and I have gone back to reading my horoscope at night, if I read it at all.

I do not want to inadvertently make it come true by reading it in the morning. That was a horrible experience.

So there it is. All this writing just to say that I think horoscopes are stupid and dangerous if you let them control your life.

Was it worth the time?

Well whether you think so or not, I enjoyed writing it and I will write more, about different things.

I could care less whether you or anyone else reads it or not. Your opinions of me that you spout behind my back mean nothing to me.

If you do not care for my writing then you do not have to read it or you can leave a nasty comment, it will not bother me. I am the admin. I can censor your comments, ban you from ever commenting again or just write something nasty about you, so beware if you decide to comment.

I will not pull any punches. I will say whatever I want.

Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead!

that dongato person,

May 18, 2012