115 Pakistani Schools to Receive U.S.-Funded Equipment, Furniture; U.S. Contractors Need Not Apply

See yesterday's U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor for this breaking story on yet another amazing waste of our hard-earned tax dollars.

Ah... So Nice to Create Again!

This is not a complaint: in light of the ongoing, global economic crisis -- and following 14 months of unemployment/under-employment -- I am delighted that I have a job that keeps me away from daily, creative writing. But I am likewise thrilled to have jumped on the computer this morning to work toward completing my book-length true-crime memoir. Though progress remains slow -- and that's okay, considering that I have a decent-paying, full-time job -- today I nonetheless achieved much-desired and delayed progress.

The rough-draft memoir now stands at 142 pages -- just under 40,000 words. More remains to be done.

I will complete this book. Though my previous memoir -- Hotel Dick -- has been described as everything from "excellent" to "okay" to "competently written" (and as "not without redeeming qualities" by a writer from Travel + Leisure magazine), Play Dead, Roll Over, as my current project tentatively is titled, will attain the level of a highly regarded, literary work, if I have my way.