Rob and Michele Reiner

As far as I know, I never met the Reiners. I have no direct knowledge how they were in private, on a personal level. Rob Reiner’s politics, for the most part, were different from mine. Clearly he cared and decided to get involved.

What I do know, and appreciate, is his prolific and highly effective work in television and movies. While he was an accomplished, lauded, and influential actor and director, even just his work as a producer was more than most people realize, and has impacted our culture.

If his longevity would have been anything like his father’s, he could have still been contributing to entertainment for decades to come.

But now he’s dead at 78, and so is his wife Michele (68), allegedly murdered by being stabbed to death by one of their sons.

If current allegations are true, the murderer had been in substance abuse rehab at least 17 times, had been homeless at times, and was a difficult person.

Imagine all of the time, money, heartache, worry, aggravation, frustration, pain, embarrassment, trouble, and shame Rob and Michele Reiner spent or endured over the last 20-30 years, trying to help their son. Imagine it ending with the terror, horror, and pain of being stabbed to death.

As of this writing, I don’t know what Nick’s defense narrative will be. A possible angle will be akin to another local case of double parental murders, the Menendez case: trashing dad as an abusive monster.

Think about this the next time someone insists the childfree will regret not being parents: Rob & Michele Reiner are unavaible for comment.

Also, despite this being Rob Reiner’s second marriage and second marriages with step kids in the mix, like this one, have a 70-percent divorce rate, this marriage didn’t end in divorce and won’t be counted in the divorce statistics. Divorce is just one way a marriage can end badly; this way was even worse.

Free men have a ZERO percent chance of being divorced or being murderered by their child.

Sensational Headlines Might Mislead

Law enforcement agencies are government departments, dependent on taxpayer money, and like getting credit for good deeds.

News media likes sensational headlines because it gets them clicks and viewers.

A lot of people have conspiratorial and crisis thinking, meaning they are sure there's a crisis going on, and it is the result of a vast conspiracy.

Every once in a while, there will be a headline like this:

"68 Missing Children Recovered From Human Trafficking Operation, [Law Enforcement Agency] Says"

That makes it sound like there was a building with 68 children inside of it, where strangers would go and pay money to sexually abuse them, maybe "buy" them to take home.

Shocking, right? How evil!!!

Except... that's not really what happened. And thank goodness it isn't.

When The Sheen Wears Off the Fantasy

Idealistic and narcissistic women think they have a magic vagina that will change troubled males into good husbands and fathers. And there are some women who want, on some level, to be mistreated. That’s why women take on and keep boyfriends who are abusive or otherwise a mess who are in no condition to have a healthy relationship. When it comes to guys like Charlie Sheen, there's the added lure for gold diggers and attention whores of money and fame.

Brooke Mueller should have had ample indication that Sheen was not marriage material (how hard is it to contact Denise Richards, really?), yet she married him and made babies with him, thereby messing up the lives of others. And barring Sheen's imminent death, which would surprise nobody, she won't be the last woman to do this with Sheen. You can read AP Entertainment Writer Anthony Mccartney's story here.

Charlie Sheen's estranged wife Brooke Mueller obtained a restraining order to keep the actor away from her and their sons because she was afraid of threatening statements the actor had made in recent days, including stabbing her in the eye with a pen.

The order prompted police to take the twins from Sheen's Hollywood Hills home on Tuesday night and return them to Mueller's care.

Actually, isn't she in rehab herself?

According to a sworn declaration filed in the case, Mueller said Sheen told her in a phone call Sunday night, "I will cut your head off, put it in a box and send it to your mom!"

Lovely.

"(Sheen) has made various bizarre, disturbing and violent statements to the media in the past week which cause me great fear for the safety of our children while in his care as he does not appear mentally stable," Mueller wrote. She also noted a Christmas Day 2009 fight in Aspen, Colo., which led to the actor pleading guilty to misdemeanor third-degree assault.

In the filing, Mueller states she felt obligated to travel to the Bahamas with Sheen and two young women currently living in his Hollywood Hills home. She said that Sheen started the trip in a good mood, but drank on the plane and became belligerent on Feb. 23.

Mueller claims Sheen turned a flashlight on in her face, held a pen to her face and threatened to stab her in the eye with a knife. She wrote that she then left the Bahamas and returned to Los Angeles.

Yes, she is in rehab:

Mueller acknowledges her own sobriety issues in the declaration. She said she is in a day rehab treatment program, but that she can care for the children for four hours during the day and at night. She told the court that she would be living with a sober companion, and that her mother would help with the twins' care.

Ladies: You do have a choice in men. You do. You have freedoms other women in other parts of the world or in past times will never know. Don't be so stupid with that freedom. Your vagina, while a glorious example of God's good work, will not change guys like Sheen. Sheen's role in life will be to continue as a counduit moving studio funds to prostitutes and drug dealers. And fodder for the overabundent "entertainment" journalists.

I've subjected myself to mistreatment before (though not physical abuse). But I eventually wised up, and thankfully didn't marry in such a situation nor make babies.

What say you?

Don't Marry a Druggie

This Dear Margo column is titled "Women Are Not Reform Schools". Best. Title. EVER! Well, not really. But it is a very good thing to remember.

Need Hugs, Not Drugs wrote:

I married a good man less than a year ago, knowing that he had drug and alcohol problems.

BZZZT! We’re done! This is a red flag that most people claim not to see, because they realize how stupid it is to marry someone knowing they have this problem.

These issues mostly stem from the fact that he self-medicates his severe anxiety, but they are also unfortunately prevalent in his No. 1 hobby (music), so they are around him all the time.

None of that excuses it. It should have ADDED to your reason to RUN to the nearest exit.

Although this situation has improved drastically since we first met, the fact is that it’s still an issue.

Look, I love vaginas. I love my wife's most of all (and it is the only one I love nowadays), and I fully expect it is the last vagina I will ever enjoy. But your vagina is not magical. You see improvement and think it is your doing. It is his responsibility, and you should not have taken it on, and you should not keep it on your back.

I want a family, and I'm getting tired of this being a problem.

NO! PLEASE NO!!! Do not subject a kid to this situation. You should have been tired of this problem a long time ago. You signed up for this!

Is it fair to give him a "me or the drugs" ultimatum if I knew he was this way when I married him?

You made a mistake in marrying him. Here are your reasonable options:

1) Leave him. No ultimatum. Simply tell him you made a mistake and you can't be married to a substance abusers. It is up to him to get clean or not, but I wouldn't wait around to see if he really does get clean. Move on with your life.

2) Get your tubes tied and stay with him and do not whine or nag about his substance abuse.

Dear Margo doesn't tell her to leave. She recommends counseling, essentially. Waste of time.

Boiling Springs Teachers in Hot Water

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Alcoholism, Infidelity: Not My Problems, Except They Are

This blog entry is part of a short series dealing with my gripes. You can read the introduction here. I broke this topic into two parts, so this entry is part one. I wrote about the things I'm thankful for about my wife and our marriage in this entry.

Disclaimer: I actually generally like my in-laws and we get along very well. My wife claims they really like me (and I let her know that my family really likes her).

We can't trust most of my wife's family as babysitters. (We can trust my mother, one of my sisters, and my sister's husband, but we don't live close enough to them.) The one sibling of my wife's we have relied on before has a baby of her own to deal with now, and as our children get older we may not want to leave our kids with them anyway, as their worldview is so different than ours and they vocally deride much of our worldview.

The others are eliminated for general irresponsibility and substance abuse.

My mother-in-law's main excuse for drinking is that my father-in-law, the guy she chose to stick with despite California’s marriage and family laws being generous to divorcing wives with higher earning husbands, fooled around many years ago with some of their au pairs. Why they had au pairs when my mother-in-law was a stay-at-home mother, I don’t know. Possibly because she was so busy doting on her mother, which is one reason her husband fooled around on her, according to my wife. (Example: MIL married as a virgin, meaning that her experienced, previously-married husband agreed to they wouldn't have sex until they were married. My MIL was content to sit and talk with her mother into the night after the wedding reception – a sign of how the marriage would be.)

Or maybe she was already getting drunk. I don't know.

Of course, any excuse will do.

As a result of this substance abuse and infidelity in my wife's family, I get to suffer.

I have never been drunk in my life.

Neither has my wife.

In her case, it is because she's never touched alcohol. However, most of her siblings also have substance abuse problems - which is why they can't be babysitters.

It is also why I can't enjoy some wine at home.

My wife knew I drank occasionally before we even had our first date. She did not insist on a husband who doesn't drink.

My father regularly drank red wine in the evening, and I can't remember any ill results. Heck, it probably allowed him to stay with my mother as long as he did. My mother drank very rarely. She saw buying drinks as a waste of money. My paternal grandfather felt the same way.

With my family and personal medical history, I should probably be drinking red wine for the health effects.

My wife, however, insists that there won't be any alcoholic drinks in her home, because of what it did to her family while she was growing up. Maybe I just don't get her objection since it wasn't a problem in my family and didn't mar my childhood.

I point out to her that she stocks our kitchen with ice cream, candy bars, and various junk-sweets, even though I really should lose weight and much of my family has struggled with being overweight. She refuses to stop bringing that stuff home. She just expects me not to eat any of it - and, mostly I don't. I need to cut back on the ice cream, though. Yet she can't afford me the same freedom when it comes to wine, even though she has never personally had a drinking problem, whereas I have long had a problem keeping my weight under control.

She has told me that I'm free to drink wine when we are out at dinner or at a reception or whatever, and she can be the driver on those occasions. That would be too rare to have the desired health benefit, more expensive, and I have a much better driving record than she does anyway, so I prefer to drive.

Oh well... enough of this gripe.

We'll get to the good part - sex - in the next part; what I think will be the last part of this series for now.

Did You Knock Up Alison Le Anne Ebert?

If so, pal, then I just want to know what the hell you were thinking. Ruben Vives reports on an LATimes.com blog about her alleged wrongdoings.

A 35-year-old Cypress mother of three was arrested for allegedly leaving her two children home alone in a house filled knee-high with trash, bugs and maggots, authorities said today.

Police found the children Tuesday living in "deplorable" conditions, said Sgt. Tom Bruce of the Cypress Police Department.

Oh, come on. How bad could it have been?

"Frozen bugs were inside the refrigerator and the toilets were overflowing with human feces," Bruce said.

Yeah, that's pretty bad. As messy as I ever was, I drew the line at freezing bugs. (Seriously, I was messy in the sense of letting mail and clothes pile up, but I never left food around or let bugs stick around.)

But hey, maybe she was out there working in a desperate attempt to afford better living conditions? Read on...

Their mother, Alison Le Anne Ebert, turned herself in to police, allegedly telling officers she had been smoking marijuana at "some dude's house," was addicted to methamphetamine and felt lazy and depressed.

Sounds like a party. Now why would someone feel lazy and depressed after engaging in those activities?

When officers arrived, they found two girls, ages 9 and 11, inside the home, Bruce said.

The two girls were placed under the care of Orange County Child Protective Services, Bruce said, adding that a third child, a 15-year-old girl who had been staying at a relative's home, also was taken into protective custody.

But come on - was it really that bad there?

City code enforcement officers deemed the house uninhabitable.

Okay, yes, I guess it was really bad.

I'm thinking perhaps the 15-year-old or the relative she was staying with made the tip-off call. If not, I'd like to know why the relative didn't do anything.

Ebert, who earns "two thumbs down", has three kids and there's no mention of a husband, ex-husband, or even a shack up. At least one guy (possibly three guys – or more if she had miscarriages or abortions) not only thought this woman was sex partner material, but didn't take enough precautions to prevent knocking her up.

Okay, so you made some mistakes, guy.

But did you have to leave your kid(s) with her to let them exist in those conditions?

I'm in no way letting her off the hook, but c'mon fellas... let's be a little more careful with our genetic material and our offspring, shall we? I pray to God those kids get the help they need. I would be very interesting in knowing the status of the biodads and whether or not they sought custody or visitation, and how the courts ruled if they did.

I'm sure there will be more about this in tomorrow's paper. Or maybe not. The newsroom is shrinking daily.

One Reason We Leave the Nest and Build Our Own

EXPECTANT MOM IN WISCONSIN wrote in to Dear Abby:

I am a 30-year-old woman with a baby due in June.

There is no mention whatsoever in the letter about a sperm donor, one-night-stand, boyfriend, ex-husband, or anything. It is as if this baby just appeared out of nowhere.

This will be my parents' first grandchild, and they are over the moon.

I have a full-time job, but I live with them because I go to school part-time.

So far, so good – I mean, if you're not going to adopt the child out to a wife-husband couple, that is.

After paying tuition and other bills, I can't afford to live on my own. Moving out is not an option right now.

That's one of the reasons why it is good to conceive your children within marriage.

The problem is my father's drinking...I mentioned to my mother tonight that if he thinks I will let him hold my child after he's been drinking, he has another think coming.

Well, at least you have some sense.

I love my dad, but I have to be a responsible parent, and that means putting my child's welfare first.

Well, yes, except for the daddy-and-marriage thing.

How do I tell him that his drinking will affect his role as a grandparent?

"Dad, I love you very much, I appreciate your generosity and hospitality, and I want you to enjoy your grandchild, but I will not let you hold the child or supervise the child when you've been drinking." He probably won't listen, but you retain control over the child anyway. The worst thing he can do in that case is throw you out. Either way, he doesn't hold that child while he is drunk.

And look at what Dear Abby said:

You tell him in plain English, preferably in the morning while he's still sober, and do not allow yourself to be dissuaded.

Exactly.

We live a short drive from my wife's parents. Her mother used to ask us repeatedly, and "ask" our child (really meant for our ears) when we were going to let our child stay overnight with her. The answer, as my wife has told her mother repeatedly, is never. My mother-in-law is a wonderful, delightful, loving person and a very capable caregiver. When she is sober. Unfortunately, we're never sure when she's going to hit the bottle, and we know my father-in-law "can't" stop her. She has missed some very important family events because she’s been passed out from the booze. (And my wife, who knew from the start I would drink wine from time to time, won't let me keep wine in our house because she was so scarred by her mother's abuse of alcohol... but that's another story for another blog entry, one I hope I get to write before my family's history of heart problems does me in.)

I guess I'm blessed with not having the substance addiction/abuse tendency, myself. I don’t think I've ever been drunk, because I simply haven't ever had much to drink at all. Now, if I was as good about what I ate...

Succeeding Can Lose You Friends

It can hurt to recognize that a friendship is over. LOSING THE "FOREVER" IN BFF wrote in to Dear Margo:

I'm 21 years old and will be graduating with my bachelor's degree in chemistry, with plans to go for a master's, then a Ph.D.

Good for you!

I have a ring and a date from a wonderful man I have been with for four years.

Okay... so you've been dating while young and in school. Your relationship is likely not going to be the same once you are both done with school, and it sounds like you are going to be busy with school for a few more years. Are you going to have time to be a spouse? Anyway, that's not really want this letter was about.

I was very close to the same two girls throughout grade school and high school; now I can’t stand to be around either of them.

That happens. Nowhere is it written that your best friends at one phase of your life are going to be your best friends through all phases of your life. In the past, you had geography and age in common, and when you were a kid, that's a lot. But you're now at the age where priorities, values, and morals make more of a difference, because you are more freedom over your own life.

One drinks to excess at least three nights a week and always wants to "hang out" at gross backyard keg parties.

Drinking and partying is not bad per se, as long as your friend isn't forsaking obligations. Drinking to excess is a problem. But this isn't your scene anyway.

The other dates a deplorable stoner who treats her like a dog and brags about how much money he makes pushing drugs to the local teens.

Not the kind of people you need to hang with.

Not surprisingly, all they do is whine and cry to me about all their problems, and then try to find problems with my life.

They want sympathy – it feels good and it is easier for them than making good decisions.

I don't return their calls anymore and have no desire to speak with them. So now they leave me messages all day, drive by and "drop in" if they see my car, and try to guilt trip me about being a terrible person for "throwing away" so many years of friendship.

They are the ones throwing it away as much as you. And some things aren't worth keeping.

I used to try getting them together for lunch dates, movies and other non-boozing and drug-using things, but they always said I was no fun.

Drop them. They are losers. You have more important things to deal with. If you want to help someone, go to a shelter and help there. Those are people seeking help.

Margo pretty much agreed.

This reminds me a bit about what I wrote here.

Of course we should stick by our friends when they have suffered setbacks in life – illness, injury, death, job loss, divorce, heartbreak, etc. But when they are making their own lives miserable as a chosen lifestyle and they don't want to change, they become akin to vampires. Especially when you have a spouse or kids depending on you, it is best to cut them out of your life.

In this case, she may find that her "friends" may actively try to subvert her education and her relationship, because the more she moves forward in those areas, the more she is going to be different from them.