Trafford Publishing: Conversations with the Soapbox Queen

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Conversations with the Soapbox Queen

by C.M. Kolenovsky

110 pages; quality trade paperback (softcover); catalogue #02-1137; ISBN 1-55395-422-X; US$15.00, C$16.95, EUR12.50, £8.50

A humorous and slightly sarcastic look at the "American way of life" from a middle-class point of view. Mrs. K. covers todays touchy subjects honestly without pulling any punches.

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about the book about the author sample excerpts and Table of Contents catalogue info

About the Book

"Conversations with the Soap Box Queen" offers a humorous glimpse of today's society, and anyone who inhabits the real world can find something here to laugh at, as well as something to reflect upon. The book examines the foibles and follies of everyday people who are raising children, working, eating out, smoking (or not), and going about the stuff of life in their own ways. So, pull up a chair, have a glass of tea and join in on the "Conversations". You'll be glad you did.

About the Author

This book - the first from Mrs. Kolenovsky (hereafter referred to "Mrs. K.") - is a satirical, yet thought-provoking look at modern America and its woes. With a sarcastic tone and biting wit, the author covers twelve chapters on subjects such as - Personal Responsibility, Parenting, Intolerance, and Manners - to name a few. Mrs. Ks' viewpoint is that of middle-class America. She is a secretary for an oil company by profession and a humorist by design. Told by friends and family for years that she should be a stand-up comedienne, Mrs. K. has instead chosen to become a sit-down humorist.
Her life experience and the fact she can still laugh at the idiocies of society (not to mention herself) help her to give a unique and refreshingly honest approach to many of the troubles facing our great nation today. And she has solutions, too. Most of them are seemingly simplistic but if they were that easy, why haven't we fixed the problems? Maybe we need to look a little closer and be a little more honest about how we feel. Mrs. K. can help. For comments or suggestions, you can contact Mrs. K by writing to her at cindikol@juno.com or by regular mail at Soapbox Queen, 11330 Huffmeister, PMB #472 Houston, Texas 77065. She'd love to hear from you.
Having lived in and around Houston, Texas for her entire life (40 years and counting) Mrs. K has traveled across most of the U.S. and, like one of her heroes, Will Rogers, has never met a stranger. In fact, she takes great pride in embarrassing her daughter in public by talking to people she's never even seen before. Her work appeals to a broad audience by tackling many subjects and being forthright about her takes on all of them. She became the "Soapbox Queen" when someone commented that there was not a soapbox to be found that she wouldn't have a rebuttal for. No issue is one-sided, except perhaps stupidity.

Sample Excerpts or Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Personal Responsibility
It's Not just A Catchy Slogan
From Protesting to Lobbying
One Giant Leap for Totalitarianism
Parenting
They're Yours, You Raise Them
Chapter One-Part Two
Don Henley Said It Best "Get Over It"
Intolerance
It Sucks
Stupid People
Temporarily and Terminally
Professional Athletes, Movie Stars
and other Overpaid People
Young Guns
Gangstas and Other Self Important People
Advertising
Who Writes This Stuff??
Political Correctness
Are They Possible at The Same Time??
The "English" Language?
We've Got a Lot of Nerve!!
Where Have All the Manners Gone?
Please, Please Tell Me!

Chapter Two

From Protesting to Lobbying
One Giant Leap for Totalitarianism
... For the Pro-Lifers - who's going to take care of all the "throw-away" babies you intend to force these women to have? Are you going to adopt them? Or are the taxpayers supposed to increase their contributions to welfare to take care of them so the pattern can be repeated over and over? You seem to think there is never a reason good enough to have an abortion. Would you want your sister/mother/daughter to be forced to have a child that was conceived during a rape? So she could be reminded every second of every day what happened to her? If so, then you are even more cold-hearted than I thought you were.
Now, to the Pro-Choice folks - should abortion be used to weed out babies who are not wanted because a birth defect has been detected and the parents only want a "perfect" child? I'm seeing a little flashback of Hitler here. Or should it be used as a standard birth control measure? So if you forget to take your pill (regular or the new and improved RU-486) you can still stop the "problem"? Have any of you ever heard of the word compromise? (Or perhaps abstinence? The best birth control ever.) It's an old concept that needs to be brought back. I know there are religious groups that believe life starts at conception. If that's true, can an embryo really be frozen for use at a later date? Wouldn't that be just as illegal as putting a six year old in a freezer until you're ready to deal with them? And what about surrogate births? Say a woman agrees to carry a baby for a couple who can conceive but can't carry a baby. Then on a visit to the doctor they're told the baby will be born with a birth defect. The "parents" decide they don't want a "defective" child and they want the woman to terminate the pregnancy; however, the surrogate doesn't want to. She wants to keep the child. What then? Will an exception be made? And who gets to decide? This is very dangerous territory for the government to be in. I don't believe they should have the right to make those kinds of decisions for anyone.
Here's something else to think about. Do any of you remember what it was like pre-Roe vs. Wade? Young women going to virtual butchers in back alleys with a folding table and a rusty knife because they had no other choice. Many of them died. Not a whole lot Pro-Life about that. Unless you're just in favor of two-for-one deaths for "sinners". Doesn't seem like a fair deal to me. So, when does life begin? I have no idea and neither do any of you. Only God knows that and if He thinks it's wrong, He'll do the punishing for it. It's not your job. You are not that important. None of us are. There are people who are starving in our own backyards and you want to fight about whether to put more out there or not? How about taking all that energy (both sides) and putting it to good use. If all of the people in one of those protestor free-for-alls I see on the news would put all that anger and energy into building houses for the needy, we wouldn't have any homeless in this country. So, quit swinging your signs and thumping your bibles and get to doing something real. Do something that will help someone now...

Chapter 3

Parenting
They're Yours, You Raise Them
... Now, for the parents of toddlers. If your child enjoys picking things up, dropping them on the floor and then squealing with delight - don't take the child to anyone else's house. We don't like our things picked up, dropped and squealed over. We'll look at your pictures and maybe even check out your web page, but keep the kid at home. At least until you learn the hand slap thing mentioned previously in this chapter. I also have a suggestion for making the hand-smacking thing easier to do. Do not child proof your home. When you see your child going for your priceless Depression Glass collection with that gleam in their eye, believe me you will learn the hand slap quickly. Besides, the rest of the world has not been childproofed and someday - like it or not - they will have to go out in the world. With or without you. It is inevitable.
Also, it's a good idea to acclimate your child to public dining when they are small. Very small. In a carrier small. Stick a bottle in their mouth and they hush small. Getting the picture? If your child is raised in public places and disciplined correctly in those public places, they will learn how to act in public places. A child should not be allowed to sit at a table in a restaurant and scream. About anything. Ever. If your child is a screamer, start them off at McDonald's where everyone is screaming and slowly work your way to grown-up places. You can go from McDonald's to Chuck E. Cheese to Pizza Hut and, in about a year or two, maybe they'll be ready for an Olive Garden. However, please be prepared to exit the restaurant immediately if it turns out you tried too soon. If the screamer decides to start all over again, might I recommend leaving them with a babysitter (preferably one they don't particularly like) and telling them you're going without them? It usually only takes once or twice for this method to work. It is a whole lot more fun to behave in a restaurant than it is to have to stay home with a babysitter you don't like. Another solution would be for restaurants to have kid and non-kid sections. You know, like smoking and non-smoking. Everyone with children under a specific age (my preference would be 10) would sit in the kids' section and it would be partitioned off with soundproof glass. That way, not only would we be spared the noise, we wouldn't have to duck from anything being thrown by the little darlings, either....

Chapter 8

Young Guns
Gangstas and other Self-Important People
As it is with Hollyweird, so it is in real life. Walking the streets of every major city in the country are little groups of people who call themselves "gangstas." They think they are important and impressive and deserve respect. Let me tell you something punk, the people in your neighborhood may fear you, but they do not respect you! Respect has to be earned. You don't get it just by wearing a certain brand of tennis shoe or a bandana tied in some significant way. If you had any real friends, you wouldn't need to be in a gang, now would you? No, because then you wouldn't feel the need to have ten of your "posse" beat up some old man who asks you to leave his yard. And you wouldn't have to do a drive-by shooting, because you wouldn't be such a coward. You can probably tell just by this little bit, I don't like gangs. I don't fear them and I certainly don't respect them. You are nothing but a bunch of modern day KKK members. You knock down anyone who doesn't "belong" and you do it in groups. Not one of you has enough guts to do anything on their own. If you only fought each other that would be great because eventually you would all kill each other and we wouldn't have to put up with you anymore. But no, you have to pick on the innocent and the weak. Beating up the elderly and pushing drugs to little kids is the way you get your rocks off. If you think for a second that deserves respect, you better buy a dictionary, dude. Respect is another word for honor and you gangstas have no honor and deserve no honor. The men and women in our country's military deserve respect and honor, not you. You're punks, hoodlums, thieves, and kids. You haven't even lived long enough to learn anything about respect and honor, must less deserve it. And yet, you're willing to die at a young age for what - a corner, an empty lot, a neighborhood where nobody wants you anyway? Why would you want to do that? Oh, yeah, we've all heard the whole story before - I had no choice, I was raised in that neighborhood, that's what you did. A lot of famous and very respectable people came out of those same neighborhoods without ever joining a gang. You do have a choice. We've also heard the way your parents didn't love you and you didn't fit in with anybody. Do you think gangs are picky? That they make you take an entrance exam? Gangs will take anyone willing to get the crud beat out of them by selected members of said gang. They don't care about you. They don't care about anybody but themselves. They think running with a crowd of people who are just as lonely and sad as they are makes them tough. All it does is give them carte blanche to act like hoodlums and fools. There is nothing sadder than a young man running away from a gang screaming over his shoulder how his gang will get them for this. Settle your differences the way it used to be done. One-on-one, mano-a-mano, face-to-face, fist-to-fist, just you and him in an all out slug fest. No weapons, no "homies," no "posses," no nothing, just the two of you standing up for yourselves. Tell your buddies to stay out of it or stay home. And, if you get your butt kicked, you get your butt kicked, but at least you did it honestly. Righteously, honorably. Now you've earned a little respect. But just a little. Until you walk away from that gang, you won't earn much of anything at all. I'll be praying for ya, kid...

Chapter 11

The " English" Language?
We've Got A Lot of Nerve!
I would like to begin this chapter with an apology to the people of Great Britian. We have absolutely no business calling the language we speak English. It is, and ever shall be, American. We do not speak English - our police are not Bobbies, our fried potatoes are not chips, and we don't have bangers and mash that I know of. We call it English, because that's what it was called when we were under the crown for a brief period of time. However, since we are no longer under the crown of England, might I suggest we finally begin to call our language what it is - American? It is, like everything else in this country, a wonderful if perplexing mixture of all nations and languages. Just like the country. And, since we call the country America, shouldn't we call the language American? Actually, what we need to do first is make it understandable to everyone.
Let's look closely at the structure of our words. They come from so many places that it is very confusing for anyone from another country to learn. You can't learn it phonetically - look at comb, tomb, and bomb for instance - and you can't learn it quickly by listening because we have a lot of homonyms (to, two, too). Not to mention antonyms and synonyms. Here are a few examples of how difficult our language can be:
You can abandon a child with reckless abandon.
There's no time like the present to present the present.
He is at the top of his top spinning class.
He found the bomb at the tomb by combing through the sand...

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