Blogging My Life

2010-08-28T13:17:00.000-07:00

This kid is awesome! I can't get past Medium playing this song on Guitar Hero!

Good Dog

2010-04-21T18:11:00.000-07:00

I have to confess that I broke down and wept a bit when I read theis story. I got "misty" because I know how true this story probably is. I've been proud companion to three dogs in my life; Elmer, a Beagle when I was a child; Sophie, a Boxer that adopted me when she was about three years old and I was 35, and our current dog, Maggie, another Boxer that Jess and I got as a 10 week old puppy; she's now almost 2 years old. I tell you A Truth: There is no other creature on the face of the planet that will give it's heart to you like a dog will. And it's not just about instinct and food. A beaten dog will still come when it's called, to a point anyway, but treat the dog with kindness and respect and you will have a lifelong friend who's nearly single minded purpose in life is to please you.

SakuraCon - 2010

2010-04-05T00:05:00.000-07:00

Well, SakuraCon 2010 has come to a close. You know, there's nothing like that convention atmosphere to really bring a bunch of like minded people together. The two days I was there were really a lot of fun. Although I didn't make any new friends, it was exciting to walk around the huge area of the convention (the convention took up three floors of the Washington State Convention Center in downtown Seattle) and just see all the different people, literally from around the world, who were in to the same thing as me. To be honest, I was kinda embarrassed to go. I wasn't sure if I was going to be the only 40-something year old, fat, white guy there, perceived to only be there because of the overwhelming number of girls running around the place in Japanese school-girl outfits. But I wasn't the only 40-something year old fat white guy there, in fact I saw many like myself there in costume! Now don't get me wrong, as anyone could see from previous posts to this blog, I like me some Japanese schoolgirls, but everyone was there for the culture and the general commraderie of, "Hey, you're into that? I'm into that too!" Anyway, SakuraCon 2010 was a big success and, except for the 4 hour registration line on Saturday (which was kinda fun in it's own way), a whole lot of fun. Below are some pictures from SakuraCon 2010...

First there was "The Registration Line." I had been in line for about an hour when I took this picture. I had three more hours to go!

These are more pics from Saturday:

Thre rest of these are from Sunday:

More Japanese CosPlay

2010-03-16T09:57:00.000-07:00

So, YouTube pulled the other vids I put up, something about "violation of terms." Oh well. These girls are so cute, I'll keep posting them and let YouTube keep pulling them down. Enjoy!

More Cute Japanese Schoolgirls (Cos Play)

2010-02-10T13:16:00.000-08:00

I've always had an interest in Japanese culture, old and new. My first reading of James Clavell's "Shogun" when I was in high school made me want to know more about Japan, and when I was in seminary studying comparative religion, it was Japanese Buddhism that interested me far mor than the Tibetan or Chinese versions. After seminary I discovered William Gibson's future world where U.S. cities are a Japanese-Chinese cultural hybrid.

Anyway, enough pretense about being interested in Japan (although I really am). Here's something everyone can enjoy: another cute Japanese schoolgirl showing her panites!

Cute Japanese Schoolgirl

2010-02-08T14:44:00.000-08:00

Because who doesn't like 'em some cute japanese schoolgirl?

So Very Tired

2008-03-07T23:28:00.000-08:00

Well, I'm sure that by now, what small readership I had has dwindled down to nothing. I have ceased to be relevant. I am so tired now-days when I get home from work that I just don't want to do anything but have a drink and "veg" on the couch. My job with Banctec is actually quite stressful. There is a lot of pressure to complete a certain number of jobs per day. In my case, I'm supposed to complete four jobs per day. It doesn't sound difficult, but I cover an area that extends from Everett, WA to Olympia, over to the Eastside, Bellevue, Kirkland and all the way to Maple Valley. Also, there is the issue of parts. Where are they being delivered? When will they arrive? Finally, there is the issue of, do I know what the hell I'm doing? I have recieved hands-on training on some of the printers I service, but there are still quite a few printers where I have no fucking clue what I'm doing and I have to call the Banctec help desk to get walked through how to change out a given part. So any one job might take me a very long time. And printers aren't like computers. A desk top computer has very few moving parts, the majority of the machine is the motherboard and that's all electrical, no moving parts. Printers on the other hand are all moving parts. And complicated too! At any rate, a lot of circumstances conspire to prevent me from accomplishing the required number of jobs. Don't mind me, it's late, I'm tired, a little drunk, and on a rant.

Naomi Wolf: Fascist America, in 10 easy steps | Special reports | Guardian Unlimited

2007-12-19T20:55:00.000-08:00

I don't think there's any comment I could make that would add to Ms. Wolf's eloquent essay on just how far gone our country is toward facism. Our Democracy is being taken from us, right under our noses, and we don't notice because we've stopped learning history. Just read the essay.

Vacation Pics

2007-08-14T07:37:00.000-07:00

So, Jessica, my mother and I went on vacation together for a week last week and we all had an excelent time. We spent three days on the Olympic Peninsula and two days at Ocean Shores, Washington. The Peninsula is really beautiful. We went to the Hoh Rainforest, which is the only temperate rainforest on the North American continent, and hiked around there for a whole day. It would seem that the term "lush" was invented to describe this place as there was moss growing everywhere. Everywhere one looks it looks soft enough to lay down and take a nap! On our last day on the peninsula, we went to some hot springs and just soaked and relaxed for a few hours.

Ocean Shores is very "touristie" but still cool. We rented a moped and had lots of fun cruising around on the beach. We also went to the Quinault Casino and spent way too much money, but it was fun. I never understood how people could get addicted to gambling, but now I do. When you're playing the slots, there is the feeling that the next push of the button could bring you big money. It never does, but there is that expectation. Anyhoo, here are some pictures........

I'm Back!

2007-07-22T20:09:00.000-07:00

So, I know its been a long time, and a month ago I said I would catch
everyone up on what's been going on with me, so here it is!

First, I have a new job. I work for a company called BancTec
doing contract warranty service on Dell laptops and desktops. I replace
hardware in the systems and then troubleshoot to make sure they work.
As with any job, there are good things and bad things. The good part is
the actual taking-it-apart-and-putting-it-together. I was so scared of
laptops at first because they are so small and intricate, and I have to
confess that in my first week, I actually did break a machine. I got it
apart and then couldn't get it back together. Even though I had passed
all my certification tests, I got so nervous I just couldn't make it
work! But after a while, it got easier and easier, to the point where
now I'm not scared of laptops anymore. They're kinda like puzzles and
now it's fun. Desktops are no big deal. Every once in a while I come
across a desktop system I haven't seen before, so I just have to treat
it the same way I treat laptops, it's a puzzle, I just have to take my
time and be methodical and everything works just fine.

Unfortunately, there are more bad parts to the job than good. The first bad thing is
all the driving. Anyone at all familiar with this blog knows how I feel
about cars and drivers. Now I spend half my day driving from job to job
and I hate it. I feel like a huge hypocrite. The other drag is I really
don't like any of the people that I work with, and I really hate my
boss' boss. Its not like I work side by side with anyone because that's
not the way it works. But there is another guy, Brian, who picks up
parts at the sameDHL that I do, whose area is the east side, Bellevue, Kirkland, all the way out to Snoqualmie. At any rate, there have been many occasions over the past several months when Brian has been sent to do other things, leaving me to cover
his area and my own. That's not the problem. The problem is that when
that happens its his responsibility to let me know that I need to cover
his area, but either he just doesn't let me know at all, or he doesn't
let me know until I'm at the DHL so I don't have any of his work orders
printed so I don't know what parts to pick up, or he lets me know 5
minutes before I'm walking out the door. Very inconvenient. And when
I'm covering his area, he expects me to just do work in his area,
leaving work to pile up in my own. This guy's not my boss but he acts
like he is.

Speaking of my boss, I really don't even know who
that is right now because the guy that originally hired me, Tom, just
quit last week because his boss is a "grade A"
asshole. Since Tom has been gone, his boss, Bob, has been in charge of
all us techs, and I can see why Tom quit. Bob just expects that
everyone lives to work, that we have nothing to do on the weekends and
won't mind at all giving up our days off to handle extra work. And
that's just not how I "roll." I don't live to work, I work to live.
Neither Jessica or I want to be rich, and we don't have any designs on
living in a big fancy house or having lots of exspensive toys. We do
what we need to do in order to do what we want to do. I guess it boils
down to the fact that when I'm on my death bed, about to breath my
last, I don't think I'm going to be thinking, 'Jeez, I wish I'd worked
more and made ass-loads of money.' I rather think I'll be thinking more
along the lines of, 'Jeez, I wish I'd spent more time with my friends
and the people I love.' At any rate, all that to say that Bob asked me
to work on this past Saturday and sounded positively offended when I
told him, 'No,' because it was Jessica's birthday and we had plans.

So
that's where things are with me for the moment as far as work is
concerned. Otherwise, my mother is coming to town the first week of
August and the three of us (my mom,jessica and myself) have plans to go
to the Olympic Peninsula for four days and then off to Ocean Shores for
three days and we're going to have a wonderful time.

I do plan to write more often, I know, I've said that before, but its true. I'll write more soon.

Hey All

2007-06-17T10:08:00.000-07:00

I know its been a very long time since my last post, and I'm sure sure
that all my loyal
readers are just waiting with anticipation to hear what is going on in my life. I promise I'll post soon and catch everyone up to date.

Leaky Ceiling

2007-02-15T00:31:00.000-08:00

The above video was shot at approximately 4:00AM this past Sunday night. Jessica and I were awakened by the sound of rain in our bathroom for the second time in a year. The moldy, discolored part of the ceiling is from where the ceiling was repaired last year when that section of the ceiling came crashing down, but, as you can see, the leaky roof hasn't been repaired and I'm concerned that it will happen again. We will be moving soon and after we do, I will publish the address of this building as a warning to others to not move in to this building.

Space Needle Pics

2007-01-08T23:28:00.000-08:00

Hey All

2007-01-08T22:45:00.000-08:00

Well, the New Year is underway, and while it's still way too early to
be able to tell how things are going to go, I am confident that this
will be a good year. Perhaps it has something to do with the current
political climate, you know, theDems being mostly in charge and stuff, but I have the feeling that there will be a lot to like this year.

In other news, our bathroom ceiling is about to fall in, again. The roof
on our apartment building is flat and when it rains a large pool
gathers and then leaks in through our bathroom ceiling. We've got mold
spots bigger than silver dollars! I took pictures of the ceiling and
sent them along with our rent but we've heard nothing back from our
land-lady. The other night it was practically raining in our bathroom
so I suppose we'd better actually give her a call.

Jessica and I went to the New Year's Eve party at the Space Needle this year and it
was cool. Since Jess and I moved in together on January 1st, we like to
say that the city of Seattle puts on a very nice fireworks display for
our anniversary, anyway, while we've watched the show from a popular
spot across the highway several times, we've never joined the teeming
throng at Seattle Center before. The traffic, the crowds, you
know...but this year there was a Sonics game on New Year's Eve and I
was gonna be there anyway, so we decided Jess would meet me there. It
was a good time! We had an excellent view of the Space Needle and I
took some great pics and video with Jess' new digital camera.

The job with the Sonics goes well. I think I finally have the hang of
what's going on there. It's not like going to a Monday through Friday
gig and that made training difficult, but it's all good now. I need to
find out if my employment contract extends through Storm season. The
Storm is Seattle'sWNBA team. Speaking of the Storm, I worked a seat
selection event where folks holding season tickets for the upcoming
Storm season got to come in and pick which seats they wanted. Now I had
always heard that most of theWNBA's fans were lesbians, but never knew
whether or not it was true. It's true. I saw so many female couples
coming to pick out their seats. I suppose it shouldn't come as any big
surprise that the lesbian ladies like the female players, I just wonder
whether that's true across the country, or whether its just a Seattle
thing. Straight men and gay men have all the other sports, so why
shouldn't the lesbians have a sport they can get in to?

So I guess that's all I've got for now. I promise to try and write more in the coming New Year.

Happy Holidays!

2006-12-28T11:54:00.000-08:00

Well, I know it's been a while since I've posted, so I thought I'd better take a moment to wish you, my thousands of loyal readers, a very happy holiday.

My job with the Sonics continues to go well although it has really screwed up my sleep schedule! The games go until late and then I'm there even later, and sometimes I don't get home until 11pm or later. The problem is I'm not one of those folks who can just come home and go to bed just 'cause it's late. I have to wind down a bit before I go to bed, which means I'm up til 1 or 2 am. Oh well, it's a fun job.

Like I said, I just wanted to wish every one "Happy Holidays!"

A Party with the Dems

2006-11-09T00:18:00.000-08:00

Jessica and I went to the big "Hooray For Us" party at the Sheraton last night to help celebrate the ass-whoopin' that we handed to the Republicans. It was very cool to finaly be able to celebrate, and with several hundred of my closest friends no less. There was the general feeling that perhaps now things might start to get better. Anyhoo, we didn't stick around for long. We had a drink and said 'hi' to all my friends with the Washington State Democrats, we listened to the speeches and then we left. I just wish I had a better camera in my phone, I would have taken more pictures. As it is, I only got this one crappy picture of Jim McDermot being interviewed after his speech.

A New Blog

2006-11-08T23:32:00.000-08:00

I'm going to try something. I've created a new blog called Blogging Politics From The Left, and from now on all my political rants will go there. This is just an experiment that may not last, but I encourage you to check it out and bookmark it if you like it.

It occured to me that this blog was choked with politics, and I wanted to separate my personal blog and use it for actualy blogging my life. So I will continue to post observations from work and my own personal things here, and will post my political observations on the new blog, Blogging Politics From the Left.

Partisanship Shouldn't Die Just Yet

2006-11-08T09:13:00.000-08:00

I heard Senator Reid say yesterday that one of the top things on the agenda in the new Congress will be "the reconciliation of the parties." And Nancy Palosi is all over MSNBC talking about a "spirit of bi-partisanship." I do believe that we need
those things..., but let's not be too hasty. There are some heads that NEED to roll first, first among them, that of the President.

Its not about revenge. This president has gone to great lengths to subvert and evade the Constitution of the United States, and there can be no bi-partisanship, there can be no reconciliation until this president has been publicly "smacked down" as a historical reminder to future presidents that this kind of activity will not be tolerated and cannot repeated.

This president has amassed more power to himself than any past president, and he has used that power to spy on American citizens, to roll back the Bill Of Rights, and, by use of the signing signature, to exempt himself from laws that he doesn't like. These
things alone are reason enough for Articles of Impeachment to be brought against Mr. Bush. More than this, this president has been the very author of the partisanship and polarization that has plagued this country, and he must be called to account for his uses of fear and terror in order to divide the people of this country.

All the corruption of this Congress, from the Jack Abramoff scandal, the Foley cover-up, the voter fraud of the 2000 elections in Ohio and Florida, the Haliburton scandals, Tom DeLay's scandals, the utter failure of the policies and war plans for Iraq, Bob Ney's scandals, energy policy being decided by oil company leaders behind closed doors and with no public accountability, ALL OF IT (click the link to go to Salon's list of all the Republican scandals) done under the auspices of the Bush administration and the unprecedented secrecy in which it chose to operate. This president has, on so many levels, undermined the foundations of our Democratic way of life and has sought, by whatever means available, to guarantee the continuation of power by his own party, and he has brought us as close to fascism as we could ever want to come.

Finally, Goerge W. Bush must be impeached because of the lies he told the country concerning Iraq. Iraq was never an immanent threat to the U.S. There were no WMD's, and there were no high level contacts between Iraq and Al-Qeada. This was a war for oil, and Mr. Bush lied to us at every juncture in the run up to hostilities. His minions criscrossed the country telling us that the evidence was going to be a "mushroom cloud," and that they knew "exactly where the WMD's are."

Yes I agree that we must be willing to join hands with the Republicans and try to move forward in a spirit of bi-patisanship. But Mr. Bush is a boil on the ass politik that must be lanced, now.

Some Pics from Work

2006-11-02T11:42:00.000-08:00

From the Things I See At Work files: The Super Sonics Dancers waiting to go out on the floor.

Darth Cheney's Wife, Lynne, gets Smarmy on CNN

2006-10-29T16:55:00.000-08:00

Lynne Cheney, got snotty with Wolf Blitzer concerning the videos of
insurgent snipers killing American soldiers shown on CNN. I really
don't know what her complaint is other than to admit that the
administration is afraid of an informed population. They don't want us
to see those videos for the same reason they don't want us to see the
flag draped coffinscarying our sons and daughters home, because we'll know for certain that Bush and Rumsfeld's "war plans" were faulty from the start; it's got nothing to do with "privacy," or "respect for the families," its just another example of the administration's wanting to hide the truth about what's really
happening in Iraq.

Here's the video of the Second Lady's appearance.

Nancy Pelosi hearts President Bush

2006-10-24T14:15:00.000-07:00

What the fuck is up with Nancy Pelosi and her determination to NOT impeach the President? Evidently she doesn't understand that folks who vote Democrat this mid-term are expecting both a short-term and long-term return on the investment that is their vote. One of those short-term returns Democratic voters are looking for is that investigations be opened and that president Bush be impeached immediately. But just when we're about to get subpeona power, just when we're finally in a position to expose Bush's lies to the country, Pelosi comes along and gives Bush a pass! Who the fuck does she think she is?! I think I can speak for many Democrats when I say that what we want is for this President, who has gone to such great lengths to gut the Constitution, has gone so far to lie to the American people, to be publicly SMACKED DOWN! We want it said to Bush and to anyone else in the future who wants to govern by fear and lies and intimidation, that "You can't do that. Not now, and not in the future."

Bush's fascist brand of politics is a cancer on this nation that needs to be eradicated publicly and with as much humiliation as we can heap upon him.

PriceIsRight - Bouncin' Boobies

2006-10-23T16:19:00.000-07:00

You know, since you put it this way, I guess you could say Bob Barker has a pretty good gig!

I Have a Job!

2006-10-23T16:01:00.000-07:00

So, I just heard back from Ryan at the Seattle Supersonics, and I am now employed as an Event Technician. My first day is this Wednesday and I'm really looking forward to it. There's just one hitch, I have to remove my facial piercings. when ryan called to let me know they wanted me to come in, he sounded very apologetic about it, letting me know that it wasn't his idea, and when he asked me if I was okay with it, I did let him know that I didn't like the idea, but the opportunity was a good one, so what the hell. I think maybe I'll take a look at "plugs" for my earring holes, I'm kinda torn between whether or not to try to save my nosering hole. I know those hole don't close up that quickly, and its only during work hours that I'll have to have them out, but still, I don't want them getting smaller either.

Anyhoo, hooray me! I have a job!

Olberman Blasts Bush - A Special Comment

2006-10-23T15:16:00.001-07:00

Mr. Fish cartoon from TruthDig.com

2006-10-21T09:43:00.000-07:00

If you haven't heard of Mr. Fish, or seen his cartoons go to TruthDig.com and check him out.

Fox in the Henhouse

2006-10-20T17:50:00.000-07:00

Another example of President Bush's having no regards for the working class or families. Having failed to get Richard Stickler, a former mining Company executive, confirmed in the Senate, Bush waited until Congress went on it's campaign break and then gave him a recess appointment to the post of Head of the Mine Saftey and Health Administration.

Talk about letting the fox guard the hen-house.

Old People Behind the Wheel

2006-10-20T16:58:00.000-07:00

When I was a bicycle messenger I saw it 5 times a day; old people driving huge, American made pollution machines dangerously. They were dangerous for several reasons: poor eyesight, slow reflexes, etc... So I am very happy to see that George
R. Weller will probably spend the rest of his life behind bars for his
partin killing several people when he drove his car into a pedestrian only
farmer's market. I have long advocated for old people to either stop
driving or have to pass more rigorous eye and reflex tests in order to
keep their licences. Perhaps this court case will force states to implement such laws.

Christian Propaganda Posters

2006-10-20T09:34:00.000-07:00

This link will take you to a collection of propaganda posters from the WW I
and WW II era, modified to express American Christian ideas.
Each has some commentary by one Austin Cline, who is a Director for the
Council for Secular Humanism and a former Publicity Coordinator for the
CampusFreethought Alliance. His commentary concerning the dangerous
road down which the Christian Right would lead this country is dead on. His line that says "If Fascism Comes to America, It Will Come Wrapped in the Flag & Carrying the Cross," is particularly prescient.
Go there now and give it a read.

Couldn't Have Said It Better Myself

2006-10-19T18:14:00.000-07:00

I Love This!
Caution: Not Work Appropriate!

No Impeachment?

2006-10-19T13:01:00.000-07:00

I was watching Olberman last night and heard him say that Nancy Pelosi
had said that Democrats won't seek to impeach the President when they
take control of the legislature. I can't tell you how disappointed this
makes me. I think that goes against what most of their constituents
want. I think the vast majority of Democrats and, in fact most
Americans, want the following things the moment the Dems regain control:

We want the Patriot Act to be repealed
We want the Military Commission Act repealed
We want the President impeached for High Crimes and Misdemeanors
We want the Tax Cuts for the top 1% of the population ended
We want our troops home from Iraq

The Best Girlfriend EVER!

2006-10-18T16:14:00.000-07:00

Caution: Not Work Appropriate!

A Dark Day in American History

2006-10-17T14:51:00.000-07:00

I've said it before and I'm saying it again now, I wish Senator Feingold
(D-Wis) was one of my senators. I wish it because he says stuff like
this: "The legislation signed by the President today violates basic
principles and values of our constitutional system of government. It
allows the government to seize individuals on American soil and detain
them indefinitely with no opportunity to challenge their detention in
court... We will look back on this day as a stain on our nation's
history."

Why can't my senators (Cantwell, Murray) say stuff like that?

Nothing in Particular

2006-10-17T04:49:00.000-07:00

I'm up early again. The pain in my back woke me up and our new noisy neighbors kept me awake. Why does our land-lady insist on putting loud people in the apartment across the wall from us? Oh well.

The Job Hunt

I've been looking for work for the past week and I think my search is at an end. I interviewed for an event technician position with the Seattle Supersonics basketball team, and I think I got it. It has to do with setting up all the technology that gets used during home games and maintaining the existing WAN for the club's day-to-day activities. It sounds like it could be a lot of fun, and a lot of stress. It's another internship position and only pays ten dollars an hour, but it would be more experience and could lead to other things. Its the experience that I'm after. I want to try a lot of different IT positions before I decide what it is exactly that I want to do in the field.

Last Night

I don't know why, but I came home last night and got pretty drunk. As most of you know, I'm not much of a drinker; my drug of choice being other than alcohol. But for some reason I just had a taste for booze so I had three shots of Jameson's on the rocks, and followed those up with a couple beers. Jessica was laughing at me because were sitting on the couch watching TV after dinner and I was holding beer bottles and trying to "play" them like a pan-flute. I wasn't hammered drunk, just well buzzed. Oh well, that should fulfill my booze quotient for the month. Although I do drink more during the darker months of the year, I rarely drink that much during one sitting.

The Political Scene

So isn't it just oodles of fun watching the republicans fall all over themselves trying to blame the Democrats for the Foley scandal? I forget which lawmaker it was but Wolf Blitzer had this guy on his show (Situation Room), and this guy was talking about how suspicious it was that the Foley scandal should break so close to the mid-terms, and was trying to say that the Dems had held on to the information until this point in time, in order to do maximum damage. When Wolf asked him if he had any proof at all of that charge, all the guy could do was stutter and try to dodge. Wolf kept at him until all this poor loser could do was ask Wolf if he had any proof that the Dems hadn't done that! Like its Wolf's job to prove or disprove this asshole's whacked out charges that the Dems had waited to release the information. If the Dems had known about Foley's lecherousness years before like this guy was saying, why didn't they use that knowledge to influence past elections? Wouldn't they have used this damning evidence to influence past elections? My understanding is that it was House republicans that broke the story to the newspaper.

I just don't think the republicans have a snowballs's chance in hell of holding on to power this year, at least in the House and Senate. The presidential race might be another matter because I just don't know who the Dems are gonna run, but with the Iraq War going as poorly as it is, and the Foley scandal having taken a toll, I think the Dems are a lock to get legislative control back. Then, I hope we see calls for the president's impeachment. If the Dems get control of the legislature, I really hope that the investigative "logjam" the republicans have set up will be broken and we can finally start to really look at how the president lied to this country in order to start a war in Iraq.

Internship is Over

2006-09-22T00:39:00.000-07:00

My internship with the Washington State Democrats is finally over, and I'm out of money for school, so it's time to start looking for a paying gig. I really hope I can get something in the IT industry, but I want to go somewhere and be a minion. For all intents and purposes, I was the Network Administrator while I was with the Dems , and most of the time I felt like I was out of my league. My boss was a good guy, but as
I said here before, he attained his position in IT by being really good at data bases. he knows almost nothing about networks. So instead of learning from someone who knew what they were doing, I was put in a sink-or-swim kinda position. I'm not complaining, I really appreciate the opportunity I had with theDems because it showed me how much more I need to learn, but I spent a lot of my time there being very frustrated with my own inabilities.

Speaking of data bases, I can really see the up-side to knowing that type of thing well, and have a whole new appreciation for people who are good at them. Data bases are a discipline in and of themselves. During my first quarter in school, I had to take a class in the Windows Office suite. I did well in everything but the Access portion. I guess I wasn't very motivated because I thought, "What does this have to do with building networks?" And the answer is, "not much." But I have learned that in almost any kind of business setting one will inevitably deal with data bases to
some degree. So lately, I've gotten out my old textbook from that class and started playing around with Access by cataloging my CD collection. Then I'll use that data base to start working with running queries. A basic understanding of SQL would also be a good thing. Hey, at least it's not math.

Noisy Asshole Neighbors

2006-09-22T00:22:00.000-07:00

Up late, again, because our neighbors across the fence are noisy assholes. The people who used to live in that apartment, Sean and Michelle, were very cool people, about my age. They had jobs and we almost never heard them at all, even during the day. But they moved. Now we have about 5 or 6 twenty-somethings living there, and they are loud all the time. Normally I don't care about some noise, especially before 10:00 PM, but these people are so loud when they go outside to smoke that Jess and I actually have to turn up our TV to hear it. And after 10:00, it's just as bad. We've had to ask them a few times to quiet down at night, so you'd think they would get the message, but I guess not. I'm going to talk to them tomorrow, give being nice one more try. If that doesn't work, I guess we'll just have to start calling the cops. I've never been the cop-calling kind before, but I guess it's time to start.

Oh, and this isn't the guy who woke us up moaning last week. He live upstairs from these guys and he's normally quiet too.

Bush's Plans to Legalize Torture

2006-09-15T15:57:00.000-07:00

You know why the big push, all the sudden, by the criminal Bush
administration to make torture legal (retro-actively, mind you)? It's
because they know that Americans are about to say 'No,' to their failed
policies. This November, Americans are going to reject the failed
policies of fear, Americans are going to reject Bush's failed foreign
policy, Americans are going to reject this administration's ideas that
it's okay to treat people in our custody in a cruel and inhuman way.
The Bush administration knows that Americans are going to return to
sanity and elect Democrats back to the majority in both the House and
the Senate, and that when that happens, Congress will have, and use,
it's subpoena power to investigate the lies that were told in order to
drag us into a war of choice against a country that did nothing to harm
us. But even morefrightening to the neo-cons, is the fact that Congress will investigate their reliance on secret prisons and torture, and that Bush and Cheney and Rumsfeldand (Atty Gen.) Gonzales will probably be eligible to be brought up on
war crimes charges by international courts. That's why the big push, all the sudden, to retro-actively make torture legal.

Out On the Porch

2006-09-13T03:50:00.000-07:00

Okay, so, about an hour ago (2:45 AM), my girlfriend and I were awakened by the sounds of loud moaning. It was coming from outside, and at first, I thought that perhaps one of our neighbors was getting a blowjob or something on his porch. Our building is only 15 feet or so from our neighbor's, so we'd be able to hear through our open window. But then I noticed that I didn't hear any noises that sounded like sex, or a blowjob, and I didn't hear anybody else, just moaning. So I put on my robe and went outside and looked up to see my neighbor's, feet hanging over his porch. "Rick?" I said, "Are you alright?"

"Mumble....mumble....yeah, s'okay," he slurred back.
"Do you need any help?"
"Mumble.....no....s'alright."

My man Rick was five sheets to the wind. So I went over to his building
and up the stairs and sure enough, he was passed out on his porch and
he smelled like a distillery. I shook him awake and got his keys and
let him into his apartment.

Now it's quarter-to-four in the morning and I can't sleep! It's gonna be a long day.

Paul

2006-09-07T20:01:00.000-07:00

Paul, if you read this, give me a call.

New Site in the Sidebar

2006-09-07T19:54:00.000-07:00

Hey Everyone,

Just a quick note to plug a forum site I belong to called MyOffTopic.com.
It used to go by another name and be focused on technical help, but the
creator, Joe, turned it into a site that serves a wider range of
topics. Anyhoo, Joe has been very helpful with a server project I'm
working on at my internship, so I thought I'd mention it here. follow
the link and bookmark it when you get there.

Ross Lake

2006-08-18T17:42:00.000-07:00

Two weekends ago, Jessica and I went camping at one of our favorite spots with some friends of ours. It was a wonderful, relaxing trip where I din't have to think about servers, or IP addresses, or computers at all. I was totally unplugged for four days. Here is a picture taken by one of our friends, Patrick.

Just Checking In

2006-08-10T12:18:00.000-07:00

Hey Kids!

I know it's been quite some time since my last posting. I'm sure whatever readers I had are long gone, having given up hope of seeing a new post from me any time soon. But, haha, here I am!

My summer internship with the Washington State Democrats continues. We moved the offices from First Avenue (Pioneer Square in Seattle) to Second Avenue (still Pioneer Square) last week, and then everyone took a four day weekend. So, the deployment of the new server and wireless network has just now begun in earnest. I was in the office until 11:00PM last night, and will probably be there late tonight again. I have every confidence that I will be able to get that server up and running by the end of the weekend, and then I'm thinking about taking a few more days off! But that all depends on my being able to get this thing going.

Over the four day weekend, Jessica and I went camping with some friends at Ross Lake and had a wonderful time. We met some people from Israel out there and spent a morning talking with them about the situation in the Middle East. I asked them if the news reports we're getting over here are accurate, and they said it depends on which network one is watching. It sounds like, according to them, CNN is doing a pretty fair job of reporting, while FOX News focuses on the death and destruction. They said it's scary over there, but they didn't seem too worried about things themselves. In fact, I was surprised at the way they talked about what is happening over there. It was a certain nonchallance (sp?), like it was just another inconvenience one had to deal with. I suppose if one has grown up all one's life with that threat of violence hanging over one's head constantly that one does kind of just get used to it. Any way, they said they were from Tel Aviv and they didn't think any bombs would be falling on their heads when they got back home from vacation.

Well, that's all I've got for now. I'll try to write more soon.

Summer Going Well

2006-07-17T05:41:00.000-07:00

Well, how is everyone's summer going? My summer is going very well. My internship with the Washington State Democrats is going very well; I'm learning quite a lot. The Dems will be moving to a new office space next week, so I will be setting up a practice network this week to try to anticipate problems for when we set up the new network. I must confess to being very nervous about setting up this new network. I don't want to be responsible for the Dems losing any races because I fucked up the network! I doubt it would be that bad, like I said, I'm just nervous. Every one I work with is very cool and I'm really enjoying the learning experience.

-----

Eurosport Summer

What with The French Open, Wimbledon, the World Cup, and the Tour de France, my DVR is really getting a workout!

The World Cup was so much fun this year! Yes, yes, The US team sucked, but it was still fun to watch. I would have liked to see the championship match be between Germany and France, with France winning, but oh well.

And how about Floyd Landis in the Tour? I don't know if he really has a chance at winning this year, but it would be cool to see an American other than Lance Armstrong win. That would drive the French crazy because they see an opportunity to win one for the home team this year what with Lance not racing. It seems to me that the field is pretty wide open with Lance gone, any one could win it this year.

-----

Well I suppose that's all I've got for now.

Over the Past Month

2006-07-06T06:55:00.000-07:00

Hello all! Well, the past month has been interesting. I've gotten myself an internship this summer working for the Washington State Democrats. They are going to be moving their offices from one office to another, so, they will be tearing down their existing computer network, and rolling out a new wireless network in their new offices, which is where I come in. Computer networking is what I've been studying in school for the past year, and now I get the opportunity to do what I've been playing at. Good things about this internship: working for the Dems will be cool. Even if it had meant I would be full-on Network Administrator, I don't think I would have taken the offer if it had meant working for the republicans. I wasn't looking to work for any party, I was just looking for a summer internship, it just turned out to be the WA State Dems. Bad things about this internship: I'm working for free this summer. I would say half of all the internships I saw listed, were un-paid positions. Boeing had no internships in the IT field at all. So I think think I'm gonna apply at the Subway Sandwiches up the street for a paying gig. Yes, I wish I could've gotten a paying internship in the IT field, but as I said, my chances of that were only 50-50 from the start.

World Cup Loss

2006-06-12T19:25:00.000-07:00

Team USA looked flat and totally uninspired in their 3-0 loss to the Czech Republic today. Supposedly the 5th rated team in this years World Cup, team USA did not press the ball forward at all, everyone looked like they were standing around waiting for the ball to come to them, and as a result there were only 4 or 5 real shots on goal. Even though team captain Claudio Reyna had one shot on goal that missed by only inches, the play of Reyna was disappointing. He seemed unable to rally his mates into pressing the ball forward. Indeed, team USA spent more time playing the ball backwards than they did moving toward the goal. The only excitement for team USA came from Forward, Eddie Johnson, who tried a few times to press the ball and make a run, but his attempts came to nothing. All in all, it was a flat, dismal performance by the Americans.

America's next match is against Italy this coming Saturday. They will have to come out much faster and much more willing to go for the ball. Today's match showed an American team that seemed unwilling to play man-to-man. In the next match, the Americans will have to show that they are willing to go after the ball and contest each possession by their opponents. They will also need to press the ball forward and take some shots from beyond the box in order to draw the Italian defense out. The Czech defense was able to stop any attempt at a goal today by keeping their men behind the ball. The way to counter this next Saturday is to shoot the ball frequently and get the Italian defense to respect the shot and bring the goal keeper off his line.

Gas Prices and Bush's Poll Numbers

2006-05-10T22:52:00.000-07:00

You know, kids, anything that puts President Bush's polling numbers in the dumper is a good thing as far as I'm concerned...usually. But I'm amazed that concerning the price of a gallon of gas, people don't seem to be getting the bigger picture. President Bush, and Congress for that matter, are not directly responsible for the price of gas. It's all about world economics. Primarily the economies of India and China. In years past, neither of these countries placed that huge a demand on oil, and in India's case, they couldn't have afforded it if they had wanted it. Now, those two countries are using more oil than ever before. Why?

My theory, at least in part, is that it's because the United States has exported so many jobs to both India and China, there are a lot more people there who can now afford to purchase cars. I have tried googling to find some statistics and have so far come up wanting, but I bet some astute reader could come up with the relevant figures that would show a direct correlation between the number of American jobs recently sent to India and China, along with a rise in automobile sales in those countries, and hence a rise in the overall price of oil worldwide. I just betcha.

At any rate, the American people shouldn't expect the President or Congress to be able to do much about the price of gasoline. At least directly. What they (the President and Congress) should be doing is promoting alternatives to fossil fuels through real incentives. Rather than offering a rebate on the price of a Hummer to folks who say they'll be using it for work (a law which was supposed to make it easier for farmers to buy new farming equipment), rebates should be given to consumers who purchase flex-fuel or hybrid cars. Tax breaks should be given to the companies that manufacture autos with super high mileage rates, and so on... The way to not pay such high prices for gasoline is to just not use so much! Oh, and maybe they shouldn't offer tax breaks to companies that outsource so many of our jobs.

Well, that's my two cents worth.......

Math Anxiety

2006-05-08T15:27:00.000-07:00

I don't normally blog my school experiences, but I just found out today that I have to take more math. I thought I was done with math, but now I find out I have two more classes to take. I am so upset I can't hardly breath. I am so math phobic it's not funny. No, really, it's not funny. I have anxiety attacks in math class. I start to sweat and sometimes I literally start to shake. Years ago when working on my philosophy degree, I had to take logic and did relatively well. And I get so tired of having people tell me that since I did well in logic, I should do well in math. Well, it doesn't work that way, at least not for me.

Otherwise (meaning except for the math) things go well. I am actually ahead in my Cisco class, primarily because I didn't take any math this quarter, and my Net Security class is a breeze.

Fucking math! Whose ideas is/was it that one has to be a math whiz in order to work with computers?!

Snow Job

2006-05-07T22:56:00.000-07:00

Fox News' Tony Snow will be taking over for Scott "Mclyin'" McClellan on Monday. As I understand it, Snow is considering removing the television cameras from his daily briefings. While we will still be able to read his lies in the print media, I guess he doesn't want to actually be shown lying on TV. Think about how much fun the Jon Stewart Show had with the McClellan clips, Snow wants to avoid that.

Anyhoo, the good folks over at Media Matters have documented some of Snow's previous lies in the media. Things like:

Snow said Joe Wilson says he was sent to Niger by Dick Cheney,
Snow claimed that President Jimmy Carter had authorized warrantless surveilance of U.S. Citizens,
Snow suggested that the Democrats objected to Bush's warrantless wiretapping because they think "the government shouldn't be able to listen to Al-queda."

Maybe being able to come up with this shit all by himself was what got him the Press Secretary job.

Senator Kennedy

2006-05-05T10:40:00.000-07:00

Honestly, I don't understand the furor over this latest Kennedy flap. There is no proof that he had been drinking, and nobody got shot in the face. And as we all know, according to precedent, it's perfectly acceptable for high ranking government officials to get liquored up and shoot folks in the face. That didn't happen, so as I said, I really don't understand what all the fuss is about.

Our Anthem

2006-04-28T11:59:00.000-07:00

As you know, dear readers, I am loathe to agree with President Bush on anything; but I'm afraid that I must when it comes to our National Anthem, The Star Spangled Banner.
Perhaps it is a sign that, at forty years of age, I am in fact an old curmudgeon. Perhaps my view denotes a bit of xenophobia on my part, but I cannot lie, I do not think there should be a Spanish language version of the Anthem.

As far as the whole immigration issue goes, I think our borders need to be strengthened and illegals kept out. I believe it is a national security issue. I sympathize with those immigrants, both legal and illegal, who say that they are not terrorists. But if we cannot secure our borders against illegal immigrants, no matter how benign their reasons for entering this country, how can we expect that our borders are safe against those who really do mean to do us harm?

Illegals and Taxes

Illegal immigrants argue that they are in fact paying taxes. But those are just local sales taxes that all people pay when they purchase goods and services. Those taxes are used for local issues such as roads and schools. The larger issue is income taxes, which illegals do not pay. These are the tax monies that are used for Medicare, and that the federal government pays out for roads and schools. So, to the degree that illegals are not paying income taxes, is the degree to which their health care and the education of their children is being provided to them at the expense of persons in this country legally who have social security numbers.

I realize that our nation is a nation of immigrants. We would not be the nation we are today were it not for the mixing of all the cultures that sacrificed so much to come here, from the humble beginnings of our country in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, to the perils of Ellis Island in the early twentieth century. But that was then, and this is now. We should remain a country with open arms to the "tired, the poor," and the "huddled masses," but I don't see a problem with expecting that those persons would come here legally. That way they will benefit fully from this great experiment we call the United States of America, and they will fully contribute as well.

A Run for the Senate

2006-04-10T15:58:00.000-07:00

Why does the Democratic party leadership in the U.S. Senate continue to sit on it’s collective hands and not speak out more loudly against what Bush and Co. are doing to this country? For too long, Democratic senators have been cowed by this administration, and have refused to give voice to the rage that their constiuents feel. One of the senators from my state (Wa, Patty Murray) is up for reelection this year; I’m thinking about writing to tell her that I will be running against her. I’m of the opinion that any candidate who promises to kick George Bush in the [political] balls, metaphoricaly speaking of course, any chance they got would win, simply because most people are tired of their senators doing and saying nothing.

Hypocrite-In-Chief

2006-04-10T10:49:00.000-07:00

``There are too many leaks of classified information in Washington. There's leaks at the executive branch. There's leaks in the legislative branch. There's just too many leaks. And if there is a leak out of my administration, I want to know who it is. And if the person has violated law, the person will be taken care of.'' - Sept. 30, 2003.

``I'd like to know if somebody in my White House did leak sensitive information. As you know, I've been outspoken on leaks. And whether they happened in the White House, or happened in the administration, or happened on Capitol Hill, it is a - they can be very damaging.'' - Oct. 28, 2003.

Q: ``Given recent developments in the CIA leak case, particularly Vice President Cheney's discussions with the investigators, do you still stand by what you said several months ago, a suggestion that it might be difficult to identify anybody who leaked the agent's name?''

Bush: ``That's up to. ...''

Q: ``And do you stand by your pledge to fire anyone found to have done so?''

Bush: ``Yes. And that's up to the U.S. attorney to find the facts.'' - June 10, 2004.

``I want to know the truth, and I'm willing to cooperate myself.'' - June 3, 2004

``I would like this to end as quickly as possible so we know the facts, and if someone committed a crime, they will no longer work in my administration.'' - July 18, 2005.

Can there be any doubt remaining, in anyone's mind, that George W. Bush is a liar and a hypocrite? He states early on in the "Plame-gate scandal," that the leaker had broken the law, and promises to fire the individual responsible, knowing the whole time that he himself is the leaker, and then three years later, has his sycophant Attorney-General Gonzales stand up and say that if the President does it, it's not illegal. And all this is going on while the Bush Administration actively pursues, in the courts, judgments against the person/s responsible for leaking information about Bush's illegal wiretapping of American citizens. If this isn't enough to turn your stomach, then you must be a Christian Republican for whom this kind of blatant hypocrisy is wrong, unless it's used to further your own ends.

Once again this criminal administration has been exposed as the liars and hypocrites they are. Once again my anger at this President, and the people stupid enough to vote for him spills over to the point where I can hardly breath. I hope the cowed Democrats in the Senate will grow some balls and call, en masse, for the President's impeachment.

Speaking of Impeachment:

I wish I lived in Vermont so I could be proud of my Democratic party leadership. Democrats in the state of Vermont have joined four other states in officially calling for George W. Bush's impeachment. Click here for more.

Call Your Senators

2006-03-14T15:03:00.000-08:00

Still no vote on Sen. Feingold's Senate Resolution to Censure the President. Which means, you still have time to call your Senators to insist they support that resolution. For all my fellow Washington staters, the telephone numbers for Sens. Murray and Cantwell are:

Sen. Murray: 202.224.2621
Sen. Cantwell: 202.224.3441

These are their numbers in Washington D.C.

People from other states can go to the United States Senate web page for names and numbers.

The Bush administration is down, it's time to start kicking.

Republican Desperation

2006-03-04T10:06:00.000-08:00

Consider for a moment: The republicans have already resorted to vote fraud in both the 2000 and 2004 elections, engaged in illegal redistricting in Texas in order to gain more seats in the House of Representatives, and propagated the most vile smear campaigns against Democratic party candidates at all levels, just to name a few things.

Now consider that the republicans have to know that the Democrats stand a very good chance of regaining the upper hand in both the House and the Senate in the up-coming elections. If this happens, the Democrats will have subpoena powers to compel the release of documents that will undoubtedly show the world exactly what kind of thuggery the republicans have been engaged in. The republicans have to know that impeachment procedures will be initiated in the Senate against President Bush for his crimes against, and lies to the American people.

These things being true, I am very concerned about what the republicans will be willing to do (and what they are perhaps already engaged in) in order to stop this. Is political assassination out of the question? Will we see Democratic party candidates having fatal "accidents?" Gentle reader, just because you're paranoid doesn't mean that they aren't really out to get you.

More Lies

2006-02-23T19:48:00.000-08:00

How can Sec. of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, say he had no idea about the "port deal" when he's on one of the committees that approved the deal and his signature is on the document that cleared the deal with the defense dept?

Bush on CNN

2006-02-17T10:39:00.000-08:00

Sittin here watching Bush on CNN and he's talking about improving education and turning out students trained in math and science. And yet the republican controlled congress removed 13 billion dollars from the student aid program. Is he the very picture of hypocrisy? or just stupid?

Seahawks Superbowl

2006-02-05T19:45:00.000-08:00

I think the head referee of tonight's game should get the MVP award. A bullshit pass-interference call deprived us of one touchdown, and a six point gift was given to Rothlisberger. We didn't play a perfect game, but I think the officiating definately turned the tide for Pitttsburg.

A Look at the Economics of Abortion

2006-01-25T10:42:00.001-08:00

The economic realities of the aborton debate. Go to the link above for an excellent description of why the conservative right, is wrong....again.

Democrats that hate their jobs.

2006-01-20T11:53:00.000-08:00

Just a quick note to say that any Democratic lawmaker who votes 'yes' to confirm Sam Alito to the Supreme Court has just told their constiuents that they hate their jobs and should be voted out of office so they can go do something else.

Bush -N- Bin Laden

2006-01-20T11:12:00.000-08:00

Just saw on CNN how many times in the past, Osama bin Laden has popped back in to the public view with a recording or a video tape, right about the time the Bush Administration needs to draw attention away from some misdeed of their own making (illegal wire-tapping of American citizens) to some aspect of 9/11.

I'm not normally a conspiracy theorist. But it's no longer much of a stretch for me to believe that Osama is on the Bush administration pay-roll. Don't forget that the bin Laden family was heavily invested in the Bush family oil business back when Jr. was failing miserably at drilling for oil in Texas. Combine that with the fact that the one plane allowed to operate in American airspace immediately following 9/11 was a plane carrying members of the bin Laden family, one has to ask the question: Just exactly how far up the Saudi's and/or the bin Laden's' collective asses is the Bush Administration?

Bush promised us bin Laden, "dead or alive." Four years later, whenever Bush needs to justify the War on Terra, oops, I mean the War on Terror, Osama the boogey-man pops up to give Bushco ammunition. "See, we need to violate your rights to keep you safe from Osama."

It seems pretty transparent to me. Either, because of any number of incompetencies, the administration can't capture Osama, or, they won't capture Osama because they need him.

Paul Bremer on CNN

2006-01-17T14:30:00.000-08:00

Just watched Wolf Blitzer expose Paul Bremer for what he is: A republican lackey in the mold of "Brown-nose" ("Doin' a heck'uv a job,") Brownie. Perhaps Bremer wasn't/isn't quite as incompetent as Brownie, but he is definately a republican yes-man and a liar.

In discussing his new book, "My Year in Iraq," Bremer appears to be trying to market himself to the political middle and left. There seem to be passages where Bremer calls on the Bush administration for more troops, saying that troop levels on his arrival in the country weren't high enough. One passage relates an alleged conversation with Donald Rumsfeld about the reports on the numbers of Iraqi soldiers and policemen, who were supposed to be ready to shoulder some of the U.S. troops' burden, being over inflated. Another passage detailed the chaos he found on his arrival.

This is all what Bremer says he said then.

So then why is it that Wolf has Bremer on tape saying the exact opposite things to the American people in interviews from that time period? In response to direct questions on these exact topics, asked at the time, Bremer again and again, tells the American people that everything is just fine. "Oh yes, Wolf, there are absolutely enough troops here, Wolf. Oh yes, Wolf, there are 250,000 Iraqi soldiers and policemen ready to be deployed. Yes, Wolf, I do believe the United States planned adequately for the amount of lawlessness we see in Iraq today."

At one point during the present interview, Bremer complains Wolf is playing 'Gotcha' by quoting from his book and then showing the clip of him saying the exact opposite thing during interviews back then. Wolf responded, rightly, that he was only pointing out some very glaring discrepancies between what Bremer says he said to top officials in the Bush administration, and what he was saying in public.

Bremer countered by saying that he felt he should keep his concerns within the government, and only reveal policy to the people. So what we have here is a republican lackey who found his own job more important than revealing his concerns to a wider audience than Donald Rumsfeld, which, if he really had them in the first place, may have saved countless lives, both American and Iraqi.

In his role as head of the Coalition Provisional Authority, Paul Bremmer reported only to the U.S. Secretary of Defense and exercised authority over Iraq's civil administration. He served in this capacity from May 11, 2003 until Iraqi sovereignty was restored on June 28, 2004.

The Holidays Sucked

2006-01-16T18:38:00.000-08:00

I would have to say that this has been the worst holiday season I’ve experienced
in a very long time. It’s not anybody’s fault, in fact
there’s no blame to be laid at all.

See, just before Thanksgiving, I had a horrible cold. I was miserable over the
holiday weekend. Soon after turkey day, the need for me to have my wisdom teeth
pulled became painfully evident. I haven’t been able to chew on the left side of
my mouth since November, and sometimes my mouth hurts a lot, and sometimes not
so much. But it’s okay, the long wait for me to be on Jessica’s insurance is
over, and I will soon have an appointment with an oral surgeon, so I
know that this is a pain that will soon come to an end.

Xmas was hard because Jess and I are so broke. We had to buy new tires
unexpectedly, and, well, never mind… suffice to say that at the end of December,
there was only $13.00 in the savings account. We didn’t have enough to get each
other anything. This is not a plea for money! We knew what we were in for when I
started back to school. Our current poverty is a short lived step to bigger
things. And Jessica has been a rock as far as everything has been concerned. It
has been her budgeting that has kept us solvent. And she has cooked soft foods
in new and exciting ways to get me through this thing with my teeth. It’s a good
thing I actually like tofu.

But the “suckiness” of all that pales in comparison to the pain I have in my
heart right now that I have to tell you about. A few days ago we took Sophie in to
the Veterinarian’s office. We’ve known for years that her breed is prone (as are
most of the larger, barrel chested dogs) to spine and hip problems. We just
thought we’d see it earlier and that it would progress much slower. That was not
fated to be the case because just within the last 6 weeks has she lost the use
of her rear left leg. She has a congenital disease in her spine that will
ultimately cause her to be paralyzed “below the waist” and to become
incontinent. The Vet has prescribed a regimen of glucosimine/chondroitin and
some doggie ibuprofen for her pain, but we were told that she may or may not
respond much or at all because of the extremeness and suddenness of the onset.
We were pretty much told that within roughly 2 to 8 months we’re going to have
to put our good girl to sleep.

I’m sure I’ve told you the story of how Jessica and I got together: When she and
Sophie moved in to the apartments I was managing all those years ago, Jessica told me I could go up
to her place while she was gone during the day and bring the dog down to my
place. So I did just that, and when Jessica would get home in the evening, she
had to come down to my place to get Sophie. Sophie and I had taken to each other
right away and I like to consider her my willing accomplice in Jess and I
getting together. I choose to believe that Sophie picked me. That was almost 8
years ago. For that long, Jess and I have been “Mommy” and “Daddy” to Sophie.
Knowing we aren’t going to have children we’ve poured our love into her, she’s
our baby, she's our family.

She’s gone from a happy, playful dog that looked forward to going to the
off-leash dog park where she could run, to a dog in pain. It’s a struggle for
her to go outside and she falls down often and looks up at me like she can't
understand what's happening, like she’s sorry
to be a trouble. My heart is broken 3 times a day taking her outside. I haven’t
cried this much since I don’t know when. I think I
would gnaw off my own arm if it would help her. She spends most of her time on a
pad I made for her on the floor because she can’t get up on the couch any more.
She looks up at us and I can see that her mind is all there and she’s got the
heart to go on, and I just turn in to a blubbering, inarticulate mess. Jess sees
me and starts crying too.

Anyway, I don't know why I unleashed all this on you, dear readers. I guess I just needed to get this stuff off my chest. I guess I'm just feeling sorry for myself. I promise to be back to ranting against republicans soon.

Hello!

2005-12-21T11:25:00.000-08:00

Yes, I know it's been forever since I posted. I've been so very busy with school.....anyhoo, I finished my Math final and I think I did okay. Oddly enough, it wasn't the math I was worried about at the end of the quarter, it was the Cisco. Oh, my, god was that course hard. So many acronyms! And now I've got Cisco 2 to look forward to. And more math....

At any rate, the big news is my impending oral surgery. At 40 years old, I need my wisdom teeth out. My intitial appointment with the surgeon is Jan. 12. I don't know when my surgery will be but it can't be soon enough. I'll be so happy to be able to eat solid food again, and to drink cold liquids (beer, whiskey & soda on the rocks, eggnog, milk straight from the carton when Jessica isn't looking, etc...) again. I'll probably miss about a week of school with the chubby-cheeked after-care, but I don't care, this has to happen soon.

So Much To Be Mad At

2005-12-20T16:21:00.000-08:00

Every day Bush Co. provides more to be pissed off about. Every day it's something new. Illegal wire-taps against American citizens, "black-ops" prisons all over the world, $13 billion dollars removed from higher education aid in a dark-of-night senate vote, billions of dollars for Alaska to open ANWR and to build a bridge to nowhere (attached to a bill that appropriates money for the troops in Iraq, no less), supreme court seats being left for the christian right to pick; the list goes on and on.

I worry that nothing will happen about any of this simply because there's so freaking much to go after. It would seem a monumental task to appoint a committee to look into all these crimes, the house and senate would get even less done than they already do if all of the Bush crime family's dirty dealings were looked into. I say we need another special investigator (of course with an unlimited budget, the authority to look into anything, and unlimited time to bring charges) to help out Patrick Fitzgerald. And where has Mr. Fitzgerald been lately? After the Scooter Libby indictments, it's felt less and less like 'Fitzmas.' One hopes he is quietly building a rock solid case against Bush and his brain (Karl Rove). I guess I'm still looking for some real sense of outrage from democratic senators and for some promise that Bush and his cronies will be punished for what they have done to this country. So far, I see nowhere near the outrage that I personally feel from the senators that I voted for.

Thanksgiving Traditions

2005-11-24T08:11:00.000-08:00

Well, one of my favorite holiday traditions has already been fulfilled, and it's only 7:30 in the morning. One of my favorite Thanksgiving traditions is to watch the news the night before when they do all the cautionary stories about the deep-fat turkey fryers, and how dangerous they can be. All the local stations usually do a story, and I've seen them talk about it on CNN and the like. In the past, one would have to wait at least until the evening news on Thanksgiving Day, or usually the next day. Not this year my friends! The schadenfreude (sp?) comes early as I have already seen on the local news where two idiots have burned down their respective houses! (I am trying to find links to the stories now.)

The problem is the total lack of common sense so many people display. Displacement, people, is the name of the game. As described by Wikipedia:

In fluid mechanics, displacement occurs when an object is immersed in a fluid, pushing it out of the way and taking its place.

So despite what the directions say, despite the "Do not fill past this line," warning on the insides of these things, people still say, "Well, that doesn't look like its gonna be enough oil to cover my big bird. Duh...huh...huh...yuk, yuk, yuk...I better add another gallon of oil!" Once Moronicus puts the bird in all that hot oil, he has the entirety of the universe working against him because of two principles, gravity and the tendency of fluids to seek the lowest point. So all that extra oil overflows and seeks the lowest point which is usually where the heating element is, and the rest is holiday history.

Donald Rumsfeld on CNN

2005-11-20T10:00:00.000-08:00

8:15AM Pacific Time: Sittin here watchin Wolf interview Rummy on Late Edition, and Rummy is talking about why it's not a good idea to pull out of Iraq right now. He's talking about, and I paraphrase, "If we establish a timeline for pull-out, then we're telling the insurgents that they only have to wait until we're gone, and if we do that, they will wait, and then unleash a blood bath when we're gone."

Goddamit, I hate it when I have to agree with one of these trolls. But, sadly, no matter how much we hate the Bush administration, truth, from any source is still truth. And the truth is, the insurgents will wait, and they will unleash a blood-bath. What Rummy doesn't say is, all that will be our fault.

I have to say it, though it pains me to do so, I do think it's irresponsible to call for an immediate troop withdrawal from Iraq, because of what I said above. I believe that what the democrats need to keep harping on is the fact that pre-war intelligence was manipulated in a rush to war.

The administration likes to say that Democrats now calling for troop withdrawal, voted for the war. Bush likes to remind Democrats that they voted to go to war based on the intelligence that was presented. I say that we use that as a cudgel against the Bush administration by saying, 'Yes, we did vote based on what was presented, and now, we know you lied to us.

See, we invaded and conquered Iraq. From that moment in time, we owned Iraq. Iraq was, and is, our responsibility. If we pull out before the Iraqis are able to govern and defend their government against insurgent attack, then that country probably will descend into a civil war that will kill tens of thousands of people, and it will be our fault and one more reason for everyone in that part of the world to hate us, more.

More Republican Hypocrisy

2005-11-12T10:56:00.000-08:00

Quotes from Republicans when Clinton committed troops to Bosnia:

"You can support the troops but not the president."
-Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

"Well, I just think it's a bad idea. What's going to happen is they're going to be over there for 10, 15, maybe 20 years."
-Joe Scarborough (R-FL)

"Explain to the mothers and fathers of American servicemen that may come home in body bags why their son or daughter have to give up their life?"
-Sean Hannity, Fox News, 4/6/99

"[The] President...is once again releasing American military might on a foreign country with an ill-defined objective and no exit strategy. He has yet to tell the Congress how much this operation will cost. And he has not informed our nation's armed forces about how long they will be away from home. These strikes do not make for a sound foreign policy."
-Sen. Rick Santorum (R-PA)

"American foreign policy is now one huge big mystery. Simply put, the administration is trying to lead the world with a feel-good foreign policy."
-Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

"If we are going to commit American troops, we must be certain they have a clear mission, an achievable goal and an exit strategy." -Karen Hughes, speaking on behalf of George W Bush

"I had doubts about the bombing campaign from the beginning...I didn't think we had done enough in the diplomatic area."
-Senator Trent Lott (R-MS)

"I cannot support a failed foreign policy. History teaches us that it is often easier to make war than peace. This administration is just learning that lesson right now. The President began this mission with very vague objectives and lots of unanswered questions. A month later, these questions are still unanswered. There are no clarified rules of engagement. There is no timetable. There is no legitimate definition of victory. There is no contingency plan for mission creep. There is no clear funding program. There is no agenda to bolster our over-extended military. There is no explanation defining what vital national interests are at stake. There was no strategic plan for war when the President started this thing, and there still is no plan today"
-Rep Tom Delay (R-TX)

"Victory means exit strategy, and it's important for the President to explain to us what the exit strategy is."
-Governor George W. Bush (R-TX)

This list stolen from BarbraStreisand blog.

Holiday Dinner a la Republican

2005-11-12T10:14:00.000-08:00

It’s good to see that the Democrats have found their balls and have started to go after the Bush administration. Sen. Harry Reid’s calling for the closed session to get the ball rolling on Phase Two of the investigation of just where in the hell those pesky Weapons of Mass Destruction got to, is like yummy gravy on the heapin’ helpin’ of turkey and stuffing that is the indictment of Scooter Libby. Tom DeLay’s indictments on money laundering charges are like that delicious green bean casserole that your grandma brought every year, and the promise of indictments against Karl Rove are you mom’s mashed potatoes. The potatoes were lumpy (like Karl), but that’s okay because you love your mom and you kinda like the lumps.

The fact that the Dems are getting any play at all out of asking Bush to promise not to pardon Scooter is like the pumpkin pie and ice cream after the meal. But, to what should I compare the whiskey and cigar that really finishes it all off? Dick Cheney being “frog marched” out of the White House in handcuffs? Bush, himself, being compelled to give testimony?

It’s hard to say. I’ll let you fill in what you think would be the whiskey and cigar that tops off a holiday meal. I just know that all the sudden I’m hungry.

Student Walkout

2005-11-02T15:03:00.000-08:00

Well, my friend Melvin and I walked downtown to take part in the big student rally against Bush today. It was pretty much just exactly as I suspected it would be: a bunch of kids shouting slogans.

The idealism of the far left/youth movement hasn't been refreshing in a long time, in fact, I posit that it was one of the reasons the Democrats lost the last election. During the election Kerry had a difficult time convincing Middle America that he could keep them safe. I believe this was due, in part, to the amount of airtime that the youth/far left usually gets on the evening news. Aside from Kerry's "I was against the war before I was for the war," or whatever the hell it was, what Middle America heard was the "No war," chant of liberal idealogues. One can just hear the neo-cons saying, "See, these people won't do anything to keep you safe from Oama's minions." So the soccer mom, who tends to vote liberal, votes for Bush because she thinks he's going to keep her precious rug-rats safe from the terrorists. I blame the news outlets to a large degree. It takes very little effort to go get footage of a crowd of kids chanting "No war." It takes a lot of airtime to actually talk about why attacking Afghanistan may or may not have been justified, while attacking Iraq definitly was not, and why that's the case. That type of debate doesn't easily break down into a 10 secend sound-bite. At any rate, I find it very ironic that these kids recognize, at least to some degree, the evil that Nazism was when they equate Bush with Hitler, but if you follow their logic out, they wouldn't have bothered to actually fight the Nazis.

Merry Fitzmas!

2005-10-28T09:41:00.000-07:00

This morning just had a majical feel to it.

Watching CNN right now, "Scooter" Libby has been indicted on perjury (one count), obstruction of justice (two counts), and making false statements (two counts), as of 9:46AM Pacific Time. 'Scuse me, I have to clean up this mess I just made under the desk here.....Now I need a smoke....there we go...

So what's the story on Rove?

And someone on CNN just mentioned Robert Novak! Talk about persona non grata.

Scooter Libby resigns as of 10:11AM Pacific Time. Why wasn't he fired?

I'm hearing nothing about any un-named co-conspirators (cough cough...Dick Cheney, George Bush, cough.....Donald Rumsfeld).

One way Fitzmas is better than X-mas: We get to have this rush of excitement again when more indictments down!

Tuning in to Air America Radio, Al Franken is on now, but I'm really interested in what Randi Rhodes has to say.

I'm so happy right now, I could sit here all day and just excitedly blog one non-sequitor after another depending on what I hear on TV (CNN's still on in the living room), or on Air America's stream, but I won't. I don't want you to be a witness to my political porn overload.

I'll write more later........

Still Here

2005-10-24T20:00:00.000-07:00

To all my faithful readers: School continues to take the vast majority of my time. My math class is still the biggest time sucker. I'm two chapters behind in all my computer classes because of the time I spend on math. I come home and I have to do my math first, otherwise I'll never do it. Then when I'm done with my math homework (usually 3 to 4 hours later), I'm so drained I feel like I deserve to be done, so I stop. I skipped one of my computer classes today to catch up on the reading for it, and the websiite was down! Oh well, I used the time to read for another computer class. Just in case anyone is wondering, my schedule this quarter is: Windows 2003 Server (5 credits), Windows XP Pro (5 credits), Cisco Networking Systems (5 credits), and Math 84 (5 credits). Yes, 84, intro to algebra.

Anyhoo, perhaps this weekend I'll blog some news. It's beginning to feel a lot like Fitzmas! There are so many republicans under investigation or indictment right now, the Bush administration must really be sweating it. I say, 'Good.' All these assholes - DeLay, Rove, Libby, Frist, Abramov, and the rest of their ilk are about to be exposed as the cretinous thugs they are, right out in front of god and everybody.

So, is anyone gonna skip work or school for the big walkout on Nov. 2nd? I'm thinking about it, there's supposed to be a student rally at school. I'm thinking of going, but I don't know... I have issues with the younger, more ideological faction of liberalism. But more on that later.......

Two Reasons I Love British Women.

2005-09-27T14:31:00.000-07:00

I know, I know, a completely non-political post. How often does that happen these days?

Anyhoo, Reason the First: British women, when referring to their tits, use the word, "tits." I love that.

Reason the Second: It's the way they say the word, "daddy." I was watching an episode of Buffy the other day, and Drusilla (Juliet Landau) was in this one. She was talking to Angel and her line was, "You've been a bad daddy." Oh my god. With that accent? Are you kidding me? I just get very 'special' feelings when I hear a British chick say "daddy." I'm not exactly sure why, I just do.

I agree with Newt?

2005-09-22T09:00:00.000-07:00

So I was just reading an AP article that quoted Newt Gingrich as saying, "If we go into the election year as the explainers and managers of failure, we're going to get hammered."

I couldn't agree more, and that's exactly what the Democratic Party leadership has to get their collective minds around right now. 'Where are the weapons of mass destruction?' Failure. 'Why did we send all those troops to Iraq so woefully under-equipped, as was the case with the "armored up" humvees, and having enough body armor so that soldiers themselves didn't have to buy their own?' Failure. 'Why weren't enough troops sent to do the job and secure the Iraqi borders?' Failure. 'Why, despite the deaths of over 1,900 Americans, and untold numbers of Iraqis, do we now have to "lower our expectations" of what is to become of Iraq because the Bush Administration's ideas of bringing an American style democracy to the Middle East were "unrealistic?" Failure. The list, as we all know, goes on and on, right up to the present with the Bush administration's pants down response to hurricane Katrina. Failure.

I have thought in the past that the Democrats didn't win the last presidential elections because John Kerry didn't want it bad enough to be mean enough. I say no more. The Democrats need to get mean.

A rant from Keith Olberman

2005-09-19T21:50:00.000-07:00

Em was kind enough to post this in the comments section of my previous post.

http://homepage.mac.com/onegoodmove2/movies/olbermann090505rant.mov

Get this clip now, it's a beautiful thing.

Where to start...what to say?

2005-09-18T18:58:00.000-07:00

What is there to say other than to state the fact that George W. Bush is going to go down as the single worst president in American history. For starters, he just can't stop lying to the Americn people. It's like he's been lying to us for so long, it's all he knows now. Since 2002, the Bush administration has been looting the Army Corps. of Engineers fund that was supposed to be used for improving the levees in New Orleans, and using that money to fund his war on Iraq. Then, after years of newspaper editorials explaining what would happen in the face of a storm, after years of the city of New Orleans complaining that the levee work wasn't being done, Bush has the brass balls to look right into the camera and tell us, "No one could have anticipated the levee would break." Jesus fucking christ on a crutch! It makes me so mad I can't breath.

In Bush's mad world, a political cronie whose last position was judging horses seems a perfect choice to head FEMA. Never mind the fact this guy had zero crisis management experience! The sad thing is, Mike "Brown Nose" Brown was allowed to resign rather than being fired and publicly humiliated.

And now, the lawsuits have already started over what is certain to become the biggest insurance debacle in history. Homeowner's claims for compensation are being denied because their homes were destroyed, not by the storm (for which they were insured), but by the insuing flooding, for which they were not insured. The problem is, many homeowners were told by their insurance companies that because of the levees, they didn't need flood insurance! So, fine, all those homeowners with rejected claims should turn around and sue the federal gov't for defunding the levee projects. Is it possible for a private citizen to bring a civil suit against a former president for actions taken while president? I don't think it is, but that would be beautiful to see Bush held accountable for what he has done.

And speaking of responsibility, did you see that historic moment when Bush actually said on TV that he was responsible for the gov't's slow response? Didn't he look like it caused him physical pain to say those words? Actually, it probably wasn't pain, he looked like he was just saying the words without actually knowing what, exactly, he was apologizing for. He "took responsibility," not because it was the right thing to do, but because it was politically expedient.

Christian Cleric Issues a Fatwa

2005-08-23T08:32:00.000-07:00

So, you thought only Muslim clerics issued fatwas instructing the faithful to kill? You would be wrong. Click on the above link to go to CNN to see Christian terrorist leader Pat Robertson calling for the assassination of a world leader, specifically, Venezuela's Hugo Chavez, (scroll down about half-way to find the video link). Robertson's beef with Chavez is two-fold: 1) Robertson says Chavez is a communist dictator who will turn Venezuela into a Cuban style communist state which will then threaten the U.S., but more importantly, 2) Chavez may shut off shipments of oil to the U.S. (Venezuela is third on the list of places the U.S. buys it's oil from.)

From my time in Seminary, I know that there has long been a debate over whether the sixth Commandment is supposed to read, "Thou shall not kill," or, "Thou shall not murder." The difference being that 'kill' would seem to contradict the capitol punishment system that the Judeo-Christian god establishes early on as well as the concept of war, while 'murder' leaves room for killing in the name of the people or state (capitol punishment) and war. I do not intend this to be a rant on either war, or capitol punishment, what I am saying here is, either way, Pat Robertson is violating the spirit and the letter of the law by publicly calling for a world leader to be killed. One has to wonder then why Robertson and his ilk are so keen on having the Ten Commandments on federal land when they themselves are so quick and so willing to break the commandments whenever they see fit. If I recall correctly, there's a word for that, hhmmm, what was it? Oh yeah, hypocrite!

I think this also establishes the validity of what I and others have been saying about the correlations between extremism and religion, no matter what god one prays to. Extremist terrorists all look the same, whether they are bombing a barber shop in Iraq because the barbers there have cut men's beards (which violates Islamic law somehow) or bombing women's clinics in Alabama for performing abortions.

Check Her Out

2005-08-18T06:01:00.000-07:00

As my regular readers (all 4 of you) know by now, I will occasionally air my grievances over being lied to by President Bush and the crime family known as the Bush Administration. Its the lies that really piss me off, so that's what I write about.

Well, after my last rant on the subject, a reader who calls herself The Emperfect left the following comments: "Most Americans also agree that it's just plain wrong to give millionaires a $140,000 annual tax break, or eliminate the estate tax for $52,000 US families at a cost of nearly $1 trillion over ten years, or reward companies that exchange good jobs at home for slave-wage jobs overseas, and at the same time starve education, Medicaid, veterans' health care, and even homeland security. So many offenses, so little time."

I post Em's comments here to show that other people are doing a fine job of keeping track of the Bush crime family's other devious deeds, and also to highlight Em herself. She maintains a wonderful blog and website where you can read about many other aspects of the Bush administration and the goings on in Iraq, as well the interesting things going on in her life. Em herself was a Marine, and she has a hubby (whom I believe is still) serving in Iraq now, so you can see that she has a vested interest in what goes on over there. And from the quote above, you can see that she knows her stuff. I always feel good when I check to see who has been logging on to my humble, little site and see Em in the register.

So, in the interest of spreading the love (hey, get your mind out of the gutter!)and the readership, if you haven't checked out The Emperfect, go there now!

When It Rains

2005-08-17T08:45:00.000-07:00

Sittin' here watching the morning program and Adam Gerhke is showing all the accidents on the roads, and it makes me wonder, how is it that all these pollution machine drivers forget, from one rain incident to another, that the physics of driving change on wet roads? How long does one have to live here in Seattle, where it rains A LOT, before one remembers that, a) just because one is driving an SUV that the laws of physics still apply to them? b) that they will not have instant traction, for starting or stopping, like they do on dry roads? How long!?

Bush Lied and People Died

2005-08-15T17:50:00.000-07:00

I just can't stand it anymore. Read the Downing Street Memo, and you'll see that President Bush lied to the American people when he told us in his State of the Union address that the U.S. wasn't yet committed to the path of war. He lied again when he said that Saddam Hussein had tried to purchase uranium in Niger, Africa. Joseph Wilson, who is a diplomat that was sent to Niger in order to check these allegations, said that Bush was lying. Wilson was then smeared in the media by the Bush administration, and his wife Valerie Plame, an active CIA operative (working on finding WMD in the world), was "outed" by Karl Rove and Robert Novak.

Bush lied when he told us that Al Queda and Saddam Hussein had "high level" talks. Every government committee that studied 9/11 said there was no credible evidence to support that.

But its not just Georgie. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld lied when he went on "This Week with George Stephanopolis" and said he knew where the supposed Iraqi WMD was. He said it was in Tikrit and Baghdad. (This link takes you to a government website that has a complete transcript of the interview. Scroll way down to the end.) Colin Powell lied to the whole world when he went to the U.N. and said that Iraq had mobile chemical weapons plants that were making chemical weapons to be sprayed over the U.S. National Security Advisor Condi Rice went on TV and told the American people that we had better do something about Saddam Hussein because we "don't want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud." She said this in an interview with CNN's Wolf Blitzer. Talk about whipping up fear in the population.

Follow this link to the What Really Happened web site. This site has link after link after link of evidence of the Bush administration's lies to the American people concerning Iraq and the war.

So now, we have an article in The Washington Post, telling us now that we have to lower our expectations for what we can actually accomplish in Iraq. The article goes on to say that the attitude of the government was "unrealistic" when it comes to democracy in Iraq. I guess the administration forgot that's what they changed the justification for the war to, after they couldn't find the WMD! Remember when Vice President Dick Cheney told us after a year into the war, when it was increasingly obvious that there were no WMD, that the real reason we went to Iraq was to promote freedom and democracy? The Post article goes on to say that we should not expect an Iraq where all people will be free.

Goddamit people, I know I keep saying the same things over and over, but I just about go insane every time I hear some Archie Bunker mother-fucker (yes I'm old enough to remember "All In The Family") saying how he supports the President and that the Iraqi war is justified. I want to shake these moron mother-fuckers and tell them, "George Bush has blood on his hands, and if you voted for him - YOU DO TOO!"

Ghost Bikes

2005-08-10T05:43:00.000-07:00

So have you seen these white bikes locked up around the city where cyclists have been struck by vehicles? I love, love, love, this idea. I think it started in Pittsburgh or somewhere on the East Coast.

I wonder what the criteria is for having a ghost cycle placed. It must have to do with the accident being reported, and perhaps an actual injury had to happen. I would think that, certainly, a ghost bike would be placed at the site of a fatality.

There are so many rants I could go on here about cyclists being superior beings compared to pollution machine (auto) operators, but I will not, its too early in the morning.

Anyway, here is a link to ghostcycle.org where you can check out what happened at sites where you see ghost bikes. In the picture above, you can see a number on the sign. Go to the ghost cycle web site and you can plug that number in to see what happened at that accident site.

Operation Yellow Elephant

2005-08-01T07:13:00.000-07:00

So, I've noticed as I walk the halls at school that there are a lot of Christian Republicans that go to my school. Every other day, I walk down the hall and hear people talking about Jesus. This one chick in my math class wears this t-shirt that has a big CK on it like its Calvin Klein, but the little words across her tits say Christ the King. I've seen her drive by school in her car, she's got a "W" sticker on her bumper. Most of these people I see and hear are much younger than I, meaning that they are eligible to serve in the Army. Which brings me to my question: Why aren't these mother-fuckers volunteering to serve and fight the war they wanted? Why are these chicken-shit young Republicans at school, taking up my federal grant money?

I want to make a sign for the side of my car that says 'Young Republican Recruiting Shuttle: Free Rides To Military Recruiting Station. Young Republicans Only.'

Tour de France - Lance Armstrong

2005-07-24T07:45:00.000-07:00

No one else has ever won 7 Tours de France. No one else has done it 6 times in a row. And no one else has done it after having kicked cancer's ass. With his win today, Lance Armstrong proves beyond any doubt that he is, unarguably, the greatest athlete of our time.

'Not In Our Name' Mulims

2005-07-10T08:19:00.000-07:00

Sittin' here this morning watching the morning news shows, and I see a report about mosques in Auckland, New Zealand, being vandalized in response to the bombings in London. I think that is wrong. The vandals have assumed that all Muslims are terrorists, and that is not the case. I believe that, logically speaking, it's a slippery slope from 'All Muslims are terrorists,' to, 'All Jews are vermin to be exterminated.' I believe it's the same thinking.

Having said that, I find myself increasingly frustrated by, what I see, as the lack of response, in regards to protest against acts like these, from the Muslim community. I understand that many in the Muslim community have a sense of being 'damned if they do and damned if they don't.' Damned if they do protest because that would make them a target of those same extremists, and damned if they don't because they fall under the condemnation of the rest of society. That's not a good place to be. The problem is that there are plenty of people here in the west who are more than willing to turn this into a cultural or religious war. West vs. East, Judeao-Christian vs. Islam. "Kill 'em all and let god sort 'em out."

What must be done then? I believe that a huge part of the responsibility belongs with the good, law-abiding Muslim community. Muslims in the west need to be seen and heard speaking out against terrorist attacks. I do not say they need to apologize for the attacks. Good, law-abiding people have nothing to apologize for, but it seems to me that by not speaking out much louder than they have, they allow the 'all Muslims are terrorists' mind-set to foster and spread.

I believe that the Muslim community absolutely must be more vocal and visible in speaking out against terrorist extremists. Where are the 'Not In Our Name' Muslims?

Republicans and the Dark Side of Morality

2005-07-08T12:58:00.000-07:00

Thank god for Air America. I'm sittin' here listening to the Randi Rhodes (no, not the guitar player) show on the live stream, and I hear an excellent turn of phrase about the "dark side of morality." That's what I think about the republicans. They claim to have a monopoloy on morality, but it's reactionary and based on fear. So they'll use any lie, any subterfuge necessary to establish their Kingdom of God.

Also, Ms. Rhodes said that anything George Bush touched turned into "turd blossoms." Turd blossoms, I like that.

If your 'liberal rage' meter is low and you need something to get angry about, tune in to Air america.

Tour de France

2005-07-08T12:37:00.000-07:00

If you're not paying attention to the Tour de France, you're missing one of the finest examples of modern professional sport ever. Lance Armstrong is still the over-all leader for three days running, at the end of Stage 7 today, holding an almost 60 second lead over the rest of the field. But its not just Lance, its the rest of the team riding in support. A lot of people don't know most pro bicycle racing is a team sport, not every man for himself. Anyhoo, check out OLN's coverage as well.

School Daze

2005-07-08T11:23:00.000-07:00

Wow! So, being back in school again after all these years is really bizarro. The majority of my classmates are young kids on their first time through. I feel like some old geezer in there. And oh, my, god,...I certainly made a mistake trying to take any math again (for the first time in 13 [?] years), during the summer quarter. Summer quarter is only 8 weeks long; a normal quarter is 11 weeks long. So we're moving along at quite a clip and I'm frequently lost. So I come home and go over it and over it. Anyhow, my other classes, software and hardware, are loads of fun! There are more older folks in those classes, and I hate to say it, but some of those geezers are slowin' shit down. Both are intro classes so its natural for there to be people whose skills aren't the samme as others. I think there should be an Intro I and Intro II. Intro I would be, "Ok, people, this, is a computer, and there is almost nothing you could do to hurt it." Oh well...I'm glad to be back in school. It's a real opportunity for me. I'll keep you posted on how I'm doing.

Most Americans are Stupid

2005-07-05T11:46:00.000-07:00

So, a week ago, we had Vice President Dick Cheney telling us that the insurgency in Iraq was in it's " final throes." In the same week (almost at the same time), we had Sec. of Defense Donald (Satan) Rumsfeld telling us that we could expect the insurgency to continue on for another "twelve years!" Now, throw in the 'Downing Street Memo,' and it all adds up to an administration that wanted to go to war with Iraq (any pretense will do) long before the American public was lied to in order to accomplish the task, and long before 9/11; and an administration that had no idea how to prosecute the war it so badly wanted (open borders, insufficient supplies for the troops); and an administration that had no clue as to how to win the peace after hostilities had ended. How did these guys egt voted in to office? Oh yeah, it's because most Americans are stupid.

Fat Boy

2005-06-13T11:36:00.000-07:00

Goddammit, man. Looked in the mirror this morning and I didn't like what I saw. I know I've gained at least 5 pounds since being laid-off in April. I'll be happy when I have the money to put my own bike together. A few years ago, I broke the deraillieur drop-out on my Bianchi. After having another drop-out welded on, I never put the bike back together and just rode my work bike all the time. Now I don't have a work bike, and I don't have the money to put my bike together. Wah! But I'll get some birthday money in July so it'll be okay then.

Bush's Last Days Countdown

2005-06-12T17:30:00.000-07:00

After perusing my website, feel free to scroll down to the bottom of the page to see just how long W has left. This countdown will stay until Bush's last day.

Lost Girls in Aruba

2005-06-12T06:37:00.000-07:00

So, I'm kinda conflicted on just how to feel about this chick who got herself kidnapped in Aruba. Its horrible that it happened, but I can't help but think that there were 18 years worth of talking to by her parents that she probably ignored. Things like: "Don't talk to strangers," and, "Never get in a car with people that you don't know." Having been on a few school trips in my day, I can't help but imagine that there were probably rules governing the activities of the students, such as a cufew, to insure that students were safe and sound. It sounds like this girl was out partying the night before her group was to return home.

I know I sound like an insensitive asshole, but I have the same difficulty feeling sorry for cyclists who have accidents and sustain head injuries when not wearing a helmet. I got in trouble a few years back when just such a thing happened to a fellow messenger. One day everyone was talking about _______ (name withheld to protect the stupid), and how he had been hit and was in the hospital and he had a head injury. When I heard about it, my first question was, "Was he wearing a helmet?" When I heard that he hadn't been, I was unsympathetic and said, "Wow, that's a drag. Maybe next time he'll wear a helmet." This made a lot of my friends mad at me. They argued that the accident was the car driver's fault and that nobody deserves a head injury because some car driver can't drive. I replied that its true, no one deserves to be hit by a car, but helmets are for 'just in case,' and that messenger should have been wearing one. The messenger is, thankfully, okay now, and yes, he wears a helmet now.

So, concerning this girl in Aruba: Wow, that's a drag. Perhaps she wouldn't be in this mess if she had listened to her parents and teachers and been a bit more responsible. So can we please get on to some more important news?

Away Too Long

2005-06-02T07:10:00.000-07:00

I know...I know, its been far too long since my last post. But I'm here now and I'll catch you up on everything. So, since getting laid-off, I have been thinking about going back to school. The thing is, I've been thinking about going back for 10 years, but the thought of it always filled me with terror because I couldn't figure out what I wanted to do. Well, I decided to go to Seattle Central and get a certificate in computer networking. My thinking is this: get certified in something that leads to working smart instead of hard. Then, that job can take me back to school for something I really want to do. So anyway, there is a program through Unemployment Insurance called the Commissioner Approved Training Plan that allows one to go to school while still recieving one's unemployment benefits, without having to do the weekly job searches. The program doesn't pay for school, it just allows one to go to school and not have to work. Sounds like a great program, huh? Well, it is, but there are a lot of hoops to jump through in order to get in, and that's what I've been doing with most of my time. I know, that's no excuse for not blogging, but between getting my shit together for this school thing, and still putting the apartment together after the move, I've been busy.

The apartment is great. Jess and I really like our new neighborhood. In our old place up on Capitol Hill, we were worried about getting ripped-off. Here in our new place, that's not much of a concern as it seems to be a pretty nice neighborhood. Instead, I think we're more worried about this place burning down. It seems our new landlord failed to mention to us that a lot of the wiring throughout the building needs to be replaced. One of our neighbors in the building, who has been here for about 10 years, tells us that his apartment doesn't have any grounded wall outlets. He says an electrician came through a few years ago and found that some of the outlets in the apartments were wired incorrectly and fixed them. But in my apartment, if I have one appliance going, and I flip the switch for the kitchen lights, which are flourescent, then the lights flicker and don't come on all the way until I turn the other appliance off first. That's not a wiring issue, per se, but it does point to a capacity problem.

Let's see, what else.... Oh! The new neighborhood is filled with good looking women! Okay, I don't mean to make it sound like the place is just teeming with hotties, I'm just sayin' that compared to our old neighborhood, which was pretty much represented by older, single-mother types (nothing wrong with that if that's what you're in to), the new neighborhood seems to have more, younger women. There is this one girl, who lives in the apartment building across the walk from us, who is very fine. And there's another that catches the bus at my stop and she lives close-by. Anyhoo, it woud be nice if Jess and I could make a special friend over here.

I guess that's all from a personal stand-point. I will be back to blogging so check back in soon.

Underarm odor may send very specific signals to potential mates

2005-05-22T08:44:00.000-07:00

This story has been in the news for a few weeks now. At first it seemed like a puff piece until people realized that we may be seeing the beginning of the end of the school of thought that says homosexuality is a "chosen" lifestyle. Consider that these tests show that people react differently from one another on a cellular, chemical level. This goes a long way towards proving the theory that sexuality is an inherent thing and not a choice. I can't wait for the day when that is proven for fact because on that day, the world will be able to say "Fuck You," to any religion that has persecuted homosexuals based on what they believe God to have said.

Today's Joke

2005-05-14T07:46:00.000-07:00

"So, last night, I started coming on to this woman at the end of the bar. It kinda freaked me out 'cause I didn't know I could shoot that far."

ABC News: Pastor Says Ouster a Misunderstanding

2005-05-09T16:53:00.000-07:00

So, political affiliation has become a litmus test for one's standing in the Church. If one doesn't toe the pastor's political line, one can expect to be voted out? Oh well, we shouldn't be so surprised that this type of thing would eventually happen within a system as closed as Christianity. The Christian world view refuses to accept even the possibility that there might be room for other religions in the world (except for Judaism), so why shouldn't they apply their myopic views to politics?

We don't know anything about the disciples' political beliefs, I wish we did. Then we would know which ones Jesus should have kicked out. Outside of the Gospels (first 4 books of the New Testament), one doesn't read much of anything about the majority of Jesus first followers, perhaps that's because they were all discovered to be Roman sympathizers and were then booted out of the club. Mind you, I don't know about that, its only a guess........

Done With The Move

2005-04-27T17:37:00.000-07:00

Well, Jessica and I are all moved in to our new apartment. It was hell I tell ya. I hate moving. You wanna know what I hate about moving? Well, I'll tell ya...It's not the packing or moving of boxes, either of those show progress. One can look at the empty shelves and see all the stuff you have packed up. It's not moving the heavy furniture. Moving the heavy stuff has a definite beginning and ending. What I hate is all the little crap that didn't get packed up in the previous 164 times I went through the house packing things up. The stuff you pick up and say "Do I need this? Hhmmm. I'll decide later." But I never decided, and now there it is, sitting on the floor, waiting to be picked up, again. I don't even mind the actual putting on the gloves and cleaning the bathroom as much as I hate picking up all the little crap.

So, now Jess and I go on vacation, which works out well, I need a vacation! I'm going to that part of Jesus Land known as Indianapolis Indiana for my brother's wedding. I'll be there for a week and then its back home and, of course, blogging. I'll relate how a blue-state man fares amongst the red-staters. See you in another week.

More on the 9-11 Joke

2005-04-16T08:22:00.000-07:00

I have more on the 9-11 joke. MSNBC has a video from their nightly news that covered the story, but I couldn't find a copy of the whole transcript. Anyhoo, the girl the mother couldn't control was only 12(!), not 13, and it happened in Texas (even better), not Florida.

Yep, they're doin' just fine down there in Jesus Land.

CNN Story | 9-11 Call

2005-04-15T16:07:00.000-07:00

So, I was watching CNN yesterday (I know, I know, I’m a news junkie) and there’s a story about this woman who calls 9-11 because her kids are so unruly that she can’t control them. I have searched the interweb for the transcript of this call, but even CNN’s site doesn’t have it. Anyway, I’ll try to give it to you as best as I can remember:

9-11: “Hello, 9-11.”

Caller: “Yes, I need help with my children. I’ve come home and they’re fighting and breaking things, the whole house is torn apart. I’ve got a 13 year old and an 11 year old and the 13 year old is as big as me and I just can’t control her anymore.”

9-11: “Sure, would you like us to come over there and shoot ‘em?”

Caller: “What did you say?”

9-11: “I’m sorry ma’am. It was a joke. I am sorry.”

At this point it is just her yelling at him and telling him she’s gonna speak with his supervisor and him apologizing again, and her yelling some more. Now, I gotta tell you, my sympathies are totally with the 9-11 operator. I probably would have said something along the same line. I mean, why the hell is this woman having kids she can’t cope with in the first place and then expecting the city/county/state to come to her rescue? It sounds to me like someone should have availed herself of the free parenting classes offered through Social Services. But wait this happened somewhere in Jesus Land (Florida, I think). I bet she votes Republican and I bet that those Social Services parenting classes were cancelled due to lack of funds, because Social Services is just way to liberal.

I say – speaking as the 9-11 operator – “Unless you do want us to come over and shoot ‘em, shut up! You raised ‘em, you deal with ‘em.”

Bike-O Polo (washingtonpost.com)

2005-04-15T07:11:00.000-07:00

Just a quick link to an excellent article about a bike messenger's favorite sport.

Next Xbox Coming To MTV

2005-04-12T08:11:00.000-07:00

Only 87 shopping days left till my Birthday!

BBC NEWS | Clinton boosts child Aids fight

2005-04-12T08:05:00.000-07:00

Here we have another fine example of former Democratic Party presidents actually doing something to make the world a better place. I truly hope the Clinton Foundation follows up this bit of goodness by going on to bigger things. President Clinton's foundation follows in the footsteps of President Carter's home building efforts.

What did Reagan do when he got out of office? Nothing. Granted, he only had a few years of lucidity left. But what did Bush The First do when he left office. Nothing. Well, he did play golf and make money with his cronies. I expect that Bush The Second will probably not begin some sort of humanitarian foundation after his term in office is over. He'll probably go on to become the leader of a Christian, right-wing lobby group that pushes a Christian Taliban agenda.

Gas Prices

2005-04-11T09:39:00.000-07:00

Sittin' here watching CNN and reporter Chris Huntington is talking about how we here in the U.S. have the lowest gas prices in the world. And yet, even as the government keeps gas prices artificially low, people over here still complain and bitch about how expensive it is to drive. Consider that in England, petrol is about $5.64 a gallon. In Holland, its over $6.00 a gallon.

The point Huntington makes is that in Europe, gas is heavily taxed. The actual price for a gallon of gas in England is about $2.30, the other $3.30 is taxes. Taxes for road maintenance and schools and public transit.

Huntington goes on to say that in America, especially on the west coast, there is now a high demand for the new hybrid cars in response to the price of gas at the pump.

I personally believe that we should do the same thing here in the States. We should tax gas very heavily in order to pay for things like public transit and road maintenance. Just like my proposed School Tax (which has people with children in the school system using the services provided paying a high tax that goes directly to school maintenance), this would be an example of people who use the service paying for it.