One of the oldest stories I remember about my Mom shows her sense of humor. Mom loved to laugh and to make others laugh as well. Early one April 1st she called several of her friends and neighbors, disguising her voice and telling them she was from the city water department. She informed them that repair crews would be working in the area that day, and that water would be shut off until that evening. They had 30 minutes to gather whatever water they would need for the day. Shortly thereafter she walked to her friends for a cup of coffee and laughed at the kitchen full of pots and pans, and in one case even a bath tub, filled with water.

One of the best things I can say about my Mom is that she “understood”. And understanding is a very important ability. Like most boys of my generation, I had little input into what clothes I owned. For many years I also had little interest. Of course, around Jr. high that started to change. Someone, or maybe a few someones, must have said something – I really don’t remember. What I do remember is Mom figuring out what the problem was and understanding. She didn’t hesitate, as I recall, she just got me in the car, drove to a “Men and Boys” store (this was very much a pre-Walmart time), gave me some money and waited in the car while I went in and bought something “stylish”. I can still remember the pants I bought. Understand, this took place in the late 60′s, and that I am partially color blind. They were bell-bottoms, of course. All cool pants around that time were bell-bottoms. And they were stripped. Stripes of several shades of green and yellow. They were hideously ugly (yet “in” at the time), and I loved them. Mom probably hated them, but she understood.

The thing that stood out about Mom, that all the world could see, was her strength. She was diagnosed with cancer in her late 50′s and underwent surgery, chemo, and all that goes along with that battle. One day she was in line at the pharmacy behind an elderly lady who was taking the pharmacist’s time to learn about her prescriptions. Another lady, younger than both Mom and the other customer, showed up and started to get vocal about the delay. Mom, politely at first, explained what was going on. The woman continued to grow impatient, and more vocal. A bit more forcefully, Mom told the woman that she would just have to wait. The elderly woman had several prescriptions, and was concerned and somewhat confused by them. Finally, after the third woman continued to express her displeasure at the wait, Mom again asked the woman to just wait. The woman tried to explain her impatience by saying, “I’m sorry, but I’ve had a really bad day. You just don’t understand how bad my day has been”.

Mom reached up and pulled off her wig, turned to the younger woman and said, “Honey, you have no idea what a bad day is”.

To all the Mom’s out there, thank you for your strength, your understanding, your heart, and for your unconditional love. You mean the very world to all of us. May God richly bless you today and every day.

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I’m hoping that I can clear my head by writing on something different. With that in mind I set up bRight & Early Sports.

My hope is that by writing about something other than politics I can get all of my writing jump started.

That’s my goal. And, I like sports. Let me be clear, I’m not a sports expert, I’m a fan. And not the kind of fan who knows every player, schedule, and stat. I’m the kind of fan that likes to sit on the couch with the remote and click from Baseball to NASCAR to Golf. There will be a bit of nostalgia thrown in too. Please, click on over and check it out.

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Social Media will be a big part of this election. Check it out now.

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Rick Santorum will announce Tuesday that he is suspending his presidential campaign, all but bringing to a close the 2012 GOP presidential contest and formally handing the nomination to Mitt Romney, according to an official close to the campaign.

The announcement will be made at an event in Gettysburg, Pa. according to the report.

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He can now add published author to that list.

I wrote a book. Well, I co-wrote a novel with my friend Pam from Blogmeister USA.

Here’s the back story:

Pam started working on a murder mystery in late 2008. It was set in Connecticut, and she wanted me to be a technical advisor for all things police. I jumped at the opportunity because Pam got me my former gig at Family Security Matters, and because Pam is a terrific writer. (She writes for Breitbart’s Big Hollywood, American Spectator, and other top sites.) I gave her what I could, with the caveat that everything was coming from a Philly point of view. I told her that reports and procedures in CT may be different.

After a few months of contribution, Pam asked me to be a co-author on January 12, 2009. We decided to move the setting from Connecticut to Philly, and Only Son was born.

Here are the links for Only Son:

• CREATESPACE
• AMAZON
• KINDLE EDITION

The Createspace and Amazon prices are the same, but Shawn gets a better royalty from Createspace.

Only Son
Shawn D. Goodwin, Pamela Meister

You can also click on the link above to be taken to the amazon page. Please spread the word about Only Son on social media and any other way you can think of.

UPDATE: My copy came in on Monday and I finished last night. I really enjoyed it. Great Job Pam and Wyatt!!

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ProCleanExtreme, Spot-Trot, and ValetsPlus are gone. This site, bRight&Early, is moved to one of the other hosting accounts. It went smoothly, didn’t it? I bet you never even noticed.

The only “move” that still needs to take place is Blogs.4Bauer.com. I’ll do that this weekend. That will reduce things considerably – two hosting accounts that are paid up for quite a while, and just a few domain names. The domains will hang around until it’s time for them to be renewed. What is odd about all of this is that I didn’t really spend a lot of time or effort on any of the sites. I just always felt as if I should be.

So, why am I doing all of this?

Well, part of the reason is to clear out the clutter. There was a lot of clutter. It was also done to make way for a few other projects that were already in the works.

The biggest project is helping with my county GOP’s executive committee web site. I am excited about doing that work.

That brings me to the last bit of news. I made a big deal about quitting smoking last July. I did really well for a long time. Really well, considering that I didn’t do anything other than put them down. No pills, no gum, no patch. It worked until our one car died and the stress of dealing with that situation gave me the excuse I needed to start back. There wasn’t a plan “B”. Working in an office with four other smokers didn’t help.

Fast forward to late 2011. My boss tried electronic cigarettes that he found for sale at the local flea market. He had some success, but the quality was poor, to say the least. Some time before Thanksgiving one of my other co-workers tried V2 brand on the internet. Next my boss, then my third and forth office mate ordered kits. They’ve been very happy with the results. I ordered my starter kit which arrived last week.

I’m sharing my story about switching, along with e-cigarette information at My Vapor Life. If you’re looking for information, or just want to follow my progress, I invite you to take a look

We now return you to your regular blog which is already in progress.

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I own eleven domain names:
4bauer.com – 1
blognewscoop.com – 2
floridimagine.com – 5
marbleheadregiment.com – 3
polkfamilyfunguide.com – 1
procleanextreme.com – 1
reclaimconservatism.com – 2
rv-bloggers.com – 1
spot-trot.com – 1
valetsplus.com – 1
and, of course
brightandearlyblog.com – 2

That’s bad enough, but do you see the number out to the side of each one? That’s the number of blogs or sites associated with that domain. Yeah, I’ll do the math for you, twenty. They are spread over five hosting accounts.

Three are for businesses, but aren’t being used — ProCleanExtreme, Spot-Trot, and ValetsPlus. They’ve gotta go. As for the rest?

Blogs.4bauer.com — This is our world-famous group blog dedicated to “24″. It’s going to stay. It’s historical.

FloridImagine.com — Will stay, but several of the sites will have to go. Some of the sites, like my high school alumni one, can stay even without much content.

BlogNewsCoop.com and the separate blog was, and is, a good idea, but it’s just never gone anywhere. I don’t have the time or the talent to take it where it needs to be. The concept was for it to be a place where bloggers could submit news stories that would then be used by other bloggers. Sort of an AP for conservative bloggers. I would love to see someone take on this project. @AndrewBreitbart Call me!

MarbleheadRegiment.com — This was originally a site for supporters of Fred Thompson four years ago. I still like Fred, but why am I still holding on to (and paying for) these three sites? And why did I set it up with three separate sites? Anyone from Boston want to make me an offer?

Polk Family Fun Guide — A good local idea that I never followed through on. It would have taken a big time and money commitment, and I didn’t have either to spare.

ReclaimConservatism.com — I’ve already pared this down somewhat, to just the two blogs; the main one, and The Bullpen (http://bullpen.reclaimconservatism.com/). Simply, this was intended to be a group blog focused on the theme of reclaiming conservatism. GM Roper and Doug (Stix1972) Welch are great contributors and I thank them both for their work. It could be something special, but I need to “do two” or get off the pot, so to speak. I would love to hear from any writers who would like to contribute.

RV-Bloggers — A nice idea, but I’m not living the nomad life just yet. Time for this one to move on down the road.

As these domain names and hosting accounts come up for renewal some, if not most, will be gone. I need to do some consolidation to make what remains more effective. If you see something here that you’d like to be a part of let me hear from you. I bet we can work something out.

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He does angry a lot better than Rick Santorum. While he isn’t the perfect candidate, and some of the stances he’s taken over the years give me pause, he is the one I voted for.

While I had this to say about Rick Santorum:

I really like him. I like the consistency of his message. I like his principles and the clear way he articulates them. I think he was wrong on supporting Specter, but I can’t fault his reasoning. I don’t care for his spending history, but even that I can accept his explanation. What I don’t like is his “Angry Rick”. While that may be the role he needs to play based on his underdog position, it just doesn’t work for him.

What was unsaid was a belief that between the two Gingrich was the more “electable”. I justified my thoughts about electability with my disappointment regarding Santorum’s debate performances. I still believe that his debate attacks can sound whinney and that, as a strategy, he could find something that works better. “Angry Rick” aside, I honestly would prefer Santorum to Gingrich, but bought into the idea that Newt stood a better chance of winning.

I was wrong.

I was wrong, not because of Santorum’s Tuesday night hat trick, but because I let “electability” be the deciding factor. I should have voted for Santorum because I believed, and still do, that he is the conservative in the race who’s beliefs most closely mirror my own.

I don’t get a do-over here in Florida, but I hope that I will be able to correct my error in November.

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When you’re done voting, come back to this post and tell us why you voted the way you did.

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In the first closed primary of the season I get to join 4,063,852 other registered Republicans and make my choice known. Polls open 30 minutes from now (7:00am) and close at 8:00pm. Nearly 300,000 have already voted, but there is something I really like about voting on voting day. I’ll be there shortly after the doors open.

Nine names are on the ballot: Michele Bachmann, Herman Cain, Newt Gingrich, Jon Huntsman, Gary Johnson, Ron Paul, Rick Perry, Mitt Romney, and Rick Santorum. Over half are no longer a part of the race. So, what are my thoughts on the final four?

Ron Paul was never a part of any personal consideration. I don’t care how good some of his domestic and fiscal ideas may be, they can’t offset his foreign policies and isolationist views. It doesn’t help that his more ardent supporters are the most irritating on the planet. Rather than helping his cause they do just the opposite.

That leaves the three winners of the previous contests. I’ll take them in order of their wins.

Rick Santorum. I really like him. I like the consistency of his message. I like his principles and the clear way he articulates them. I think he was wrong on supporting Specter, but I can’t fault his reasoning. I don’t care for his spending history, but even that I can accept his explanation. What I don’t like is his “Angry Rick”. While that may be the role he needs to play based on his underdog position, it just doesn’t work for him.

Mitt Romney. I just don’t trust him. I fully believe him when he explains his change of heart on being pro-life. I don’t have quite the same level of trust when it comes to some of his other changing positions. Most of all, I’ve never been satisfied with his defense of insurance mandates in Massachusetts. While I agree that states have that right, that doesn’t make it good policy. Other than that I have to go back to my gut impression of “used car salesman”. I always come away feeling that he’s trying to sell me something I don’t necessarily want to buy.

Newt Gingrich. He does angry a lot better than Rick Santorum. While he isn’t the perfect candidate, and some of the stances he’s taken over the years give me pause, he is the one I voted for. (This post took way to long to write.)

Given all of the above, I still think that any of these candidates are head and shoulders above Obama. Whoever gets the nomination will get my full support in the fall.

If you’re in Florida, please get out and vote if you haven’t already done so. If you want to share your thoughts, the comments are open for you.

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