The Kind-Hearted Smart Aleck

It appears the family has decided to go with the traditional obituary for my father, who passed the evening of May 21st. I spent a lot of time working on a non-traditional obituary for him, as I wanted to share stories of the man I called dad, and more fully capture the essence of his character. It may be different. The language may be more colorful at times than is typical. But that's who he was; I loved him for it; and I know, deep down, he'd love this. RIP, dad. You'll be greatly missed.    Neal Christopher Rozniecki (or as he sometimes called himself, “Kneel”) was finally able to set his mind at ease on May 21, 2025. If you spent even just 5 seconds with Chris, you knew his mind was always in overdrive – often making unexpected detours along the way. This 73-year road trip started on March 29, 1952, in Detroit, Michigan, with his parents Joan (Jimmy) and Ed at the wheel. Chris, like his father, always excelled in math, so he naturally started his work-journey at Baskin-...

I love being able to check out different news sources, research, and fact-check at any point in the day with little to no problems. It's nice having so much information at one's fingertips. Yet with this bundle of information comes a bundle of misinformation and eye-grabbing headlines of yet concluded stories, which has seemed to lead to progressively more people judging others too quickly. Just in the past couple days or so, I've seen these headlines: "FBI raids Jared Fogle's home in child porn case," "Florida State quarterback punches woman at a bar," "Phil Mickelson won't talk gambling case," "Is Tiger Woods having an affair with another golfer's ex-wife?," "Paula Deen's brownface flub," etc. Sure, we can all have opinions regarding these stories, but isn't it a little early to conclude about such headlines before the investigations are completed and all the facts are known? If Jared Fogle is ult...

Over the past several weeks and months, I can't tell you how many times I've read or heard stories which focused on female victims of sexual assault needing to take more responsibility to prevent these crimes from taking place, and frankly, I'm sick of it. Why, so often, do people place the full weight of responsibility on the shoulders of sexual assault victims, as opposed to the actual perpetrators of the sexual assaults? Almost every time I hear people talking about such situations, they mention one or more of the following: - "She shouldn't have been wearing something so revealing. She was kind of asking for it." - "She should have known better than to have drank so much at that party. That was pretty stupid." - "She should have come prepared, brought some Mace, a gun, or something." - "She should have brought some friends along that she fully trusted." - "She shouldn't have flirted with/been so nice to ...

Is it just me or is this the worst time of year in sports? The two days after the all-star game, I was so bummed without any major sports to watch, a bunch of guys and I met up at a local pub because we didn't know what to do with ourselves. Hockey and basketball are officially over. Baseball is just past the midway point. There's still a month left until football season starts, and until that point, sports commentators will spout about stories (or non-stories) they wouldn't even think about discussing during the course of the season. In recent days, I've heard talk show hosts speak about the following topics: 1) Johnny Manziel wearing his hat backwards - Have I ever been one to wear my hat backwards? No, because I think it's kind of silly and defeats the purpose of showcasing a team I'm rooting for, but others disagree, and see it as a fashion statement. Do most professionals whom regular appear in front of the camera typically wear their hat backwards? No, b...

Know someone who likes to "one-up" everyone? You know, when you talk about a wild drunken night when you drank too much and started dancing with a pole you thought was an actual person, and THAT guy then talks about his drunken night of streaking around downtown Chicago, getting chased by a gang, getting arrested, before being bailed out by his mother while he's sitting in a jail cell mostly nude? Yeah, that guy... I know someone like that as well. We don't see each other too regularly, but whenever we're out and about together, especially when others are with us, he seems to feel the need to one-up everyone, especially me. Why? Really, why do some people feel the need to do this? I'm sure most everyone could make up a story to one-up another's, but why do that? Is it out of insecurity? Always wanting to be the center of attention? How they've been brought up? An obsession with the old Saturday Night Live skit which centered around this very behavior...

This letter-to-the-editor is in response to Tuesdays' letter, entitled, "Gay agenda pervades military, retailers" and some comments which followed. There was talk about religion, morality and how no study has shown any shred of evidence that homosexuality is at all genetic. Of course, that's not true - there are a growing number of scientists who believe that homosexuality is at least partially due to genetics, including geneticist Sven Bocklandt, who couldn't understand how anyone could believe that people actually choose to whom they're sexually attracted. He commented on how "virtually every animal species that has been studied - from sheep to fruit flies - has a small minority of individuals who demonstrate homosexual activity."  I have noticed, like with the comments I read on Tuesday, a decent majority of those whom don't believe homosexuality is in any way genetic are quite religious.  Now, I may not be a religious person, but do belie...

I hate to sound like Mr. anti-romance or a skeptic of love, but after watching a romantic comedy last night and hearing this woman's story about how it was destiny that she ended up with a particular guy, I felt the need to write about it. She said something along the lines of, "He approached me and asked about a book I was reading and that's how it started. What if he had been late that day and we missed each other at the coffeshop? What if I wasn't reading that very book? What if he hadn't read that book? It was fate." Given Twitter and like sites where people like to believe that they are the center of the universe and even if they're just munching on a bagel while completely naked dancing in the living room to "Sunglasses at Night," they feel the world wants to know. We've become an extremely narcissistic society and I think this idea of romantic fate or destiny is a prime example of that. Perhaps it's partially due to Hollywood...

Before Barack Obama, our two previous presidents had a lot of jokes passed around about them and for good reason(s) - they'd make for pretty good party friends. Just imagine what they'd offer the party. With Clinton, come on, you know he could bring some ladies along with him. He could also hook the gig up with some musicians, himself included (saxophone). Bill would find some doobies to pass around for people to smoke, but not inhale. I'm sure he could get some great deals on fast food as well. The ladies, the tunes, the weed and the grub. Bush would be good for a comedy act. He could just give one of his speeches in front of a drunk and stoned audience and the end result would be a constant stream of hearty laughter. He'd also provide coke (Clapton sang about this kind), booze, pretzels and drunken security guards whom would keep everyone on their toes (watch out, they may think you're a bird!). I can see Bill lighting a doobie and telling stories about his ...