election

so when i was in Roxboro, North Carolina last month, i was amazed that there were no signs of the election anywhere. No signs. No bumper stickers. no nothing. Except....for one Ron Paul sign. So Obama and McCain better watch out, because Ron Paul totally has the Roxboro vote. I hear the Roxboro vote was the decider between Bush and Gore back in 2000.

breaking stereotypes

So, Saturday while driving home, i was stopped at a red light and the car in front of me was horribly tilted to the right. Since i was at the bottom of a hill, I figured that the road dipped down lower on the right side. After pulling onto the adjacent road, her car was still tilted. Then i noticed that her front passenger side tire was flat. It was a four lane road, so i pulled around next to her and tried to get her attention to tell her to pull off the road, but she didn't notice me. She wasn't talking on the phone or anything, so i have no idea why she wasn't noticing me. So we turn onto the next road and i get a view of the tire. Yeah, the tire had gone beyond flat. I saw rim, as in I saw the depth of the circumference of the rim, not just the flat face side of the rim. The tire was coming off of her wheel. It was crazy. She was sooooo close to actually driving on her rim, it was ridonkulous! At this point i was getting kind of angry, since she was not only a danger to herself, but other cars around her, and i was amazed at how she could not know that something was definitely wrong with her car and why she was still driving it. She could very easily lose control of her car at any time. As i was flashing my lights behind her and honking my horn and pulling around side her, motioning for her to get off the road, pieces of her tire were being ripped off and flying behind her car. crazyness. She finally pulled into some parking lot and we got out of our respective cars. I asked her, "you realize your tire is flat right?" She said "i knew something was wrong, but i thought i could make it home." We walked around to her tire and she was like "how did my tire get like that?" I figured that's what happens when you drive too long and too fast on a reallllllly flat tire. Of course she didn't know how to change a tire, so i had her pop her trunk which was messy and full of clothes (fun facts). I got out her spare tire and whatnot and started to change her tire. Luckily i've done this type of thing before. She kept saying "thank you" and then proceeded to tell me that she is going through a divorce and today her and her future ex-husband just told their kids about it. So overall, i'd have to say that this was not a good day for her. I told her i was glad to be the bit of sunshine in her life today. So after getting extremely messy and receiving countless "thank you's", we were about to part ways, when i don't know what came over me, but i told he that to help break stereotypes, she can tell all her friends that a gay guy changed her tire for her. Represent. Word.

CANDY!

i have pretty much cut out unnecessary foods that are malnutritious (sans ice cream). I never get a hankering for a past favorite food either like cookies or zebra cakes or sugar cereals. I'm also not curled up in a ball, rocking back and forth, jonesing for a Pepsi. Although, i will admit, once and a while when someone near me is drinking it, and i catch a whiff of its sweet aroma, i do get a little sentimental. With that being said, i'm not a total hard-ass on myself either. When holidays come around, i do cave-in and buy some candy. On Christmas Day, i help devour the double-decker box of chocolates/cremes with my family. During Valentine's Day, i will buy a bag of the large candy conversation hearts (Brach's only). And during Easter time, i will always have one Cadbury Egg. And now that it is Halloween, it is time for my most favoritist candies evar -- the Assorted Mallowcremes. Banana moons, lemon corns, maple haystacks and jugs, chocolate catfaces and bats and the large orange pumpkins. They are all so delicious. I used to not care for the maple ones (they're still my least favorite) but i now eat them and mildly enjoy them. I just bought my one bag of halloween candy i will allow myself last night, and i don't know how long it's going to last. I still feel bad when i eat them, but i also don't care. I have to remind myself to live a little.

quandary

i received this letter in the mail today. it was made to look personally handwritten to me, but it was just written once and photocopied onto notebook paper:

Hi my name is Ray. The reason for this brief letter is to hopefully brighten up your day with some "good news." With all the problems we face today, many people warmly welcome a bit of "good news."

The "good news" is this....Whatever your biggest problem is, be it sickness and health, financial concerns, loneliness or security, it will soon be solved by means of "God's Kingdom."

God's Kingdom is a real government that is already set up in heaven. It is soon going to take full control over this troubled earth. I know this may sounds like an unbelieveable dream, but it is not. It is reality that we must except

When God's Kingdom rules over this earth, it will be forever. Please notice this beautiful scripture as to what "God's Kingdom" will do for mankind here on earth. It is found at Revelation 21:4. There it reads ..."And he will wipe out every tear from their eyes, and death will be no more, neither will mourning nor outcry nor pain be anymore. the former things have passed away." Isn't that indeed "good news."

To be a part of this wonderful future, it is vital to learn about God's Koingdom and meet its requirements before it is to late. Jehovah's Witnesses are assisting people all over the world to do just that.

If it is your desire to see an end to all the problems here on earth please get in touch with me or anyone of the Jehovah's Witnesses. We are at your disposal.

I can be reached at your convenience at the following address

XXXX

thank you for reading this letter and i'd love to hear from you.

Sincerely yours,
XXXX

This letter made my day! but it left me with so many questions:

Why is "God's Kingdom" sometimes in quotation marks and sometimes not? and if it is real, like he says, then why use quotation marks at all???

also, why is "good news" in quotation marks. Is it good news or not? Is this a trick?!?! I don't think this guy understands how to use quotation marks properly. Not that i'm surprised, since there's a couple of grammar/spelling mistakes scattered throughout the letter.

hmmmm....quandary.

anonymous

So who is this anonymous person who keeps posting bail for Caylee's mom - Casey Anthony? this time it was $500,000!
Personally, i think it's Nancy Grace. This is the only case she's been covering for the past 2 months. I think she's keeping the ball rolling on this story, so she has something to talk about.

by the way, i love the poem Casey wrote on July 7, eight days before she reported her daughter missing: "What is given, Can be taken away. Everyone lies. Everyone dies." I like how the news calls it a poem. I think it's more of an admission of guilt, than a poem, but that's just me.

I also like how she says "I have spent every day since Monday, June 9, 2008, looking for my daughter." I wonder if she thought Caylee would be at that bar where Casey entered that hot body contest?

back of the class

So while at the power plant in the control room, i overheard a conversation between two operators. (actually it was more of a rant from one operator to the other). The one operator was saying how his grandparents told him that this is what it was heading to back then and that it still holds true today -- the government won't be happy until there are two classes of people -- the really rich and the really poor. By raising the gas prices and stuff and by letting all the immigrants in from Cuba and Puerto Rico, who will do the same job that the Americans are doing right now for half the price, the rich will keep getting richer, and the poor will get poorer. And until the good ol Americans, the ones who still have hair on their nuts, stand up and get their guns and start to bury those motherfuckers, we're going to lose all our jobs to those goddamn foreigners. At one point he also said "that's fucking bullshit, motherfucker" which i thought was amazing.

Now throughout all this as i was sitting right next to the guy saying this, I just thought to myself "good thing i have a salary job and am middle class. If this ever happens, i'm sure i'll be bumped up to the upper class and not the lower class, therefore i'm safe and don't have to care about this."

the other thought i had was: god, the poor are so annoying. whine bitch moan. waaaaah. seriously. sheeesh.

hotel rwanda

so i was at the front desk of the Holiday Inn i am staying at because i needed a plastic fork for my dinner. Upon arrival at the desk, I stumbled across a scene that makes me glad i never had a job in which i had to deal with customer complaints. So apparently this guy had money on his nightstand, which was gone when he got back to his room. Apparently, the cleaning people took the money. It's reasons like this why once i first get into my room after checking in, i immediately place the "do not disturb" sign on my door handle for the remainder of the stay so that i'm the only one entering my room evar. So the lady behind the counter was explaining how the cleaning staff sometimes receive tips from the guests if they do such a good job, so the cleaning lady probably thought it was a tip. i personally think that to offer this excuse is kinda bad on the hotel's part. There is no reason for the cleaning staff to take anything from your room except used towels, dirty sheets and trash. If something else is for them to take, there would be a note on it saying "for cleaning staff." But anyway, this is where it gets fun. Apparently, the money that was taken, was just quarters. But these weren't just any normal quarters. they were specific state quarters that this guy was collecting. so in other words, they were just normal quarters. And this guy was legitimately upset about these quarters being missing. He had laid them out on his nightstand in some kind of order and everything. So the hotel lady was asking him what state quarters they were so that they could try to reimburse him. and he was naming all these states - california, texas, new york.... and i was standing there thinking, "New York? that state quarter came out so long ago. you could get that anywhere. If he doesn't have that one by now, he must not be a very good collector." He would die if he ever saw my quarter collection book. I'm sooo cool!

my new favorite person

A 31-year-old Greek beheaded his girlfriend and carried her head around the popular tourist island of Santorini before he was arrested, police said on Sunday.

The man, who police said had psychological problems, injured a police officer and two women while trying to escape arrest after killing the 25-year-old teacher in Greece's most picturesque island.

"He was walking around, carrying her head and telling the astonished villagers not to stop him," a police official told Reuters. "They knew he had psychological problems ... but they didn't expect he would reach this point."

The man knifed a policeman who tried to arrest him, stole a police car and crashed into a motorcycle injuring two women, before police ended his escape by ramming the car.

marry me!

i believe now

So I read this article about how A.C. Slater is now going to be the sole host of the Hollywood variety program called "Extra." One of the show's former co-hosts, Mark McGrath, was leaving the show to get back together with the band Sugar Ray to put out a new album. I immediately said to myself, "there is a God!" and then all of a sudden, all around the world, statues were crumbling for me, and i was like, you know, i just want to fly....

funny

So I went to a wedding this weekend (ugh) and we were looking up directions to the church and Teresa was on her computer and said "hey, the church has a wikipedia entry." She was reading it to herself, but then she turned to me and said "hey, you might like this." and i said, "what? did the church burn down or something?" and she said "yeah." LOL.

then when i got home, i received a postcard that Gary had sent when he was in England and the postcard was a giant cut-out of Princess Di's head. it was pure amazingness!

i like how everyone knows exactly what i like or find funny. i hope i'm not getting predictable.

MS

So apparently the co-op in our area is doing some bike ride from Berea to Cedar Point in two days which is like a billion miles and she is trying to raise money. The title of her e-mail was "Support MS." I told her that i don't support diseases, but i do support the fight against diseases though. So, if she wanted to raise money to find a cure for MS, i might donate to that. But I wouldn't want to just support MS. It's ruined enough people's lives, and i don't feel like helping it along any further.

then i got to wondering if Multiple Sclerosis is grammatically correct. Wouldn't it be Multiple Scleroses (with an "e" not an "i") ? If a sclerosis is a patch of hardened tissue in the brain or spinal cord, then if you have multiple of them, you would have scleroses (i'm assuming the plural form is akin to parenthesis/parentheses) So either you would have SS (singular sclerosis) or MS (multiple scleroses). I'm assuming most people have MS, although having SS would probably suck too, and given the choice of the two, i think i would lean more towards SS. This newfound realization of improper grammar only made me not want to support MS even more. What a dumb disease.

retirement home

So I went out to eat with my BRE since she was in town. There was a new restaurant that recently opened up on Market called "Blue Fig." They have a big multi-colored neon sign out front and they were recently featured in the local newspaper thingy i get every other week that highlights stuff in the Fairlawn area. In the article they showed the interior and how they have all these new big flatscreen TVs everywhere and a new bar area and it seemed like a sports bar eatery type of place. When i drive-by on the weekends, the parking lot always looks decently full, so I decided to give it a try.

Big mistake. Big. Huge!

So as we enter, we look around and quickly realize that we are the youngest people in there by at least three decades. the serving staff was really awkward too, and we ended up with some socially retarded dyke waitress, and I made every attempt to stymie her awkward attempts and being a cool/joke-y waitress. I mean, I realize why the staff is so downtrodden - since they have to deal with the geriatric ward every day, who you totally know do not tip well, since they lost all their money in the Depression, and what little they have left they use on their meds and for hip replacements.

So in order to make the evening more fun, we decided to be same-siders in our booth. This created an added dimension to what would have been an otherwise normal outing. I think the hetero-same-siding threw off our dyke waitress too. Maybe that's why she was so awkward. Because she totally wanted Rachel's pussy, but i was there cooch-blocking her by always being there by Rachel's side, and therefore always facing the waitress.

The bar area contained two extremely wrinkly guys and two moderately decrepit cougars. That was two-a-piece for me and Rachel. It was like an all you can eat buffet at the bar. prime for the taking. or rather, past their prime for the taking.

So anyway, my restaurant review for the Blue Fig is an F-. I'm never going back there ever.

social skills

So, i ran into this lady i know and she happened to be with her husband, who i have never met. As she was introducing me to her husband she was telling him about what i do for a living and we all started talking about environmental stuff. To continue the conversation, i asked the husband "what do you do?" He said, "i drive a cement truck for construction." and i was totally thrown off. I had no idea what to say. I had no follow-up question. nothing. blank. The job is pretty much self-explanatory, and it's not really interesting enough to spur a conversation. I felt so bad just sitting there not saying anything, but i had nothing to work with. luckily i had a drink, so i was just sipping that, concentrating on drinking. after about 5 seconds of silence between us, he just nodded his head and said "yep." I forget how we got the ball rolling again, but by then, i already felt so bad and awkward for my unintended condescension, it was all just a lost cause. I'm always one of those people who try to relive past moments to see what i could have (or should have) done differently but i am still at a loss. I still cannot think of a follow-up question or any comment to "i drive a cement truck," especially when that phrase follows a whole conversation about me being an engineer.

how to kill with a knife

i think this has to be one of my favorite stories of the year.
so this guy from England totally killed his hilarious wife and retarded 9-month old baby.
I was being mad-libby there, sorry.
When the police confiscated his computer, and used the magical powers of internettery, they had found that earlier that week he had googled "how to kill with a knife." That is the funniest thing i ever did hear. I love this on so many levels.
First off, it's so funny that he didn't know how to kill someone with a knife. apparently the whole stabbing or slicing or slitting motion never occurred to him. Even throwing the knife like a dagger would work. there really are unlimited options.
Secondly, let's pretend that he wasn't a complete idiot, and the concept of the sharpness of the knife + the fragility of the skin = bleeding to death did occur to him, is he just crazy geeky and wanted to find the most efficient manner in which to kill his family then? Did he not want to make a mess? Or did he just want to do it in the fastest manner so as to inflict as little pain as possible. so many questions.....once again, unlimited options.
Third, i love the idea that he thought there would be websites that would explain to him how to kill someone with a knife. I love how we are in the age where if there is any doubt or question in our mind, one of the first things we say to ourselves is "i'll look it up on the internet." Like, "hmmm... i think i want to kill my family. i'll go look up how to on the internet."

Apparently there wasn't good enough information on the interweb about killing people with knives, because he ended up shooting them. That or he was just distracted since he was also uploading naked pictures of himself onto the website "Adult Sex Finder." This guy is a laugh a minute. In the words of RW Hollywood Sarah: "what a dbag!" LOLz.

clubbin'

so i'm at a conference all week. And it's at the the Washington Duke Inn & Golf Club at Duke University in Durham, NC. Let me tell you, this place is the shit. They treat you goooood here. Luckily, everyday, the talks only last about 4 hours. The rest of the time is dedicated to eating and activities. And the food here is amazing. The activities, not so much though. If you are like me, and many of the people i know here, you just skip the activities and go do whatever you want. Many poeple drove down here or rented cars from the airport, so they are set. I just get to lounge around the club, which is not a problem at all, trust me. For today's conference activities, the options were A) golf outing (ick) or B) tour of some Porsche collection (yawn). I chose write-in option C) lay by the pool at the Faculty Club. Once again, they treat you good there. And when it's 98 degrees (for serious, no correlation to Nick Lachey) and perfectly sunny, there's no better place to be than poolside. Especially not on the golf course dying of heat stroke. stroke - that's a golf joke, in case it went unnoticed. A little birdie told it to me. i think the it was an eagle..... So anyways, tomorrow's activity of a power plant tour (a plant i've been to twice already and will be returning to next month) is once again totally skippable, so i will be poolside once again, lounging around, drinking, enjoying life in the South, surrounded by tobacco farms and southern hospitality. Life is good.....

titular

So i was reading this article about Jodie Sweetin and the title of the article was "From Meth Addict to New Mom." and they didn't even talk about the meth in the interview, so it was obviously unimportant and unrelated to her being a new mom, but they totally decided to just throw it into the title anyway. How RUDE!

love/hate

So I just saw Iron Man and at the end of the movie, i found myself disturbed by this new trend in movies -- actresses i hate making themselves likable. It first started with Juno. Jennifer Garner, who i previously hated (for some unknown reason, honestly, i have no idea why i don't like her, i just know that i don't) i found myself liking. she played that part perfectly. Now with Iron Man, i found myself liking the once detestable Gwyneth Paltrow. I couldn't imagine another actress playing the role of Pepper Potts or playing it better. I think she did everything right in that movie. Which is really hard to do, seeing as it's a movie based on a comic book and it's really easy to play your part sorta gimmicky. This really makes me angry, because i previously found her utterly deplorable. Now i'm like, hmmmph, she's not that bad. Just when you think you know somebody, and know that you hate them, they make you like them. it's quite frustrating.

On the flip side, I just finished watching SNL this morning. I don't know why I thought Usher was sorta kewl before, but now i think he's soooo lame. He totally went from cool to tool in my book. Everything about the first song - the sound, his dance moves, everything was a total rip-off of Jamiroquai. Usher is the new black Jamiroquai. And i don't know why i thought he wasn't so full of himself before. if it wasn't evident before, it totally is now. I was blind, but know i see. Maybe all of his stupid dance moves, his choice of clothes (which you soooo know he thinks he's so cutting edge and slick and spends hours putting together his wardrobe) his little hand and leg gestures, and everything else about him wouldn't have come off as so atrocious if the song was good. Or even half-way decent. He could have gotten away with it if he had sung "Yeah!" or "Burn" but not with his new song. Made me want to kill myself after watching a minute of it. I totally FF'ed it to Weekend Update.

On a high note for SNL though, in one sketch they managed to both make shout-outs/jokes about Anna Nicole Smith and Aaliyah. Unfortunately, the sketch wasn't that funny (the two A-holes thing is getting kinda old) but those two jokes made for a great episode!

ride it hard

I'm trying to remember the train of thought here.....so at lunch this week, we were talking about American Idol, and someone was talking about Syesha, and then someone else mentioned about how she sang a Whitney Houston song, to which i broached the topic about how apparently Whitney just gave a concert in England this week and the word on the street was that apparently "the old Whitney was back." Then i started talking about how i liked the new Whitney - the one all cracked out and who was acting as ambassador to Israel or something. Then i mentioned how she's riding the white horse. To which everyone at the table thought was funny. but then it sparked a question about what the white horse pertains to -- crack or heroin. So after lunch, i scoured the internet for the answer, to which the answer was heroin. So i e-mailed everyone about it, which led to more crazy e-mails that are probably not allowed in the workplace. We started talking about "Chasing the Dragon" which is burning the heroin and inhaling the smoke. and then someone thought riding the white horse (or pony if you prefer) was about a girl having her period. someone responded back that, no, that's riding the cotton pony. That person also thought that riding the white pony meant that the girl was in reverse cowboy position. Crazy work e-mails. I don't know why people have to sully e-mail conversations. We were having a nice clean simple conversation about doing drugs, and then somebody had to turn it all sexual. i shake my head to that....

yogic thinking

So besides the benefits of increased flexibility and strength that I have gained from my yoga practice, probably the most significant influence that it has had in my life is the introduction of yogic thinking. My frame of mind is so clear and focused and positive now, that my life is just so much better. For instance, Friday morning i woke up to an e-mail from Bank of America saying that they put a hold on my credit card due to some suspicious charges. Sure enough, they were right. Last year, I would have freaked out upon receipt of this e-mail. But now, it just rolls off of me. Sunday night when i flew into Cleveland - plane was delayed of course, I got in at 11:00 PM. and then waited at the baggage claim for 20 minutes, but no baggage. So I had to go to NorthWest office and wait in line there and fill out the forms and everything. And it didn't really didn't faze me. not one bit. Once again, it just rolled right off of me. Everything will work itself out. and i was right. when i got home Monday after work, my luggage was waiting for me on my front porch :)

I haven't turned into some hippie who is all peace and love and whatnot, but I just feel that I have come into a better peace of mind and a better way of living. If you put out positive energy, the world is so much better. There are things you just can't control. And there's no sense in getting angry or agitated over it. So with yogic thinking, you just remain calm, put forth a positive energy, takes actions to remove the negative energy that's around you and let the world balance itself and yourself out :)

crazy/healthy

so i had my physical on Tuesday, and i totally killed it. I went into my doctor's office wanting to ask him if he knew anybody good in Akron (my doctor is in Cleveland) but then during the physical, i remembered how funny he was and how much i liked his personality, so i decided to forego the question. So anyway, after entering the room, he looked at me and said "so why are you here?" and i explained that i thought i should have a physical/annual exam since i really hadn't had one ever and thought i should know some numbers like cholesterol and blood pressure and whatnot. Before he came in i got weighed and my weight was a lot less than normal (i think it was on account of the fact that i had been out of town the past two weeks prior to my visit, so i hadn't been working out nor had i been on my high calorie eating regimen, not to mention that i had to fast for the past 14 hours (see previous blog)). I told him that i wanted to gain weight and explained to him my eating regimen and workout/yoga schedule and he like everyone else was confused/irritated. He said "everyone comes in here telling me they want to lose weight, but you come in here telling me the opposite! there's nothing wrong with you. You eat well, you exercise. You are perfectly healthy." Then he took a look at my EKG and said it was perfect. He then did my reflexes and heartbeat stuff (both were good) and then he was slapping my stomach (which since i was lying inclined on the table, it was flexed a little and hence a little flatter and harder than normal) with his hand and said "look at that. just look at that...." I still tried tell him how i needed to gain weight, but he refused to have it. He said "you are young, you are healthy, you are handsome, you are in shape, there's nothing wrong with you." Then i told him to check my blood pressure. which he did and then he noticeably sighed. "what?"
"100/60"
"is that good?"
"yes, it's very good."
"what's the best?"
"80"
"oh, i have work to do then..."
"you are perfectly healthy."
then he checked my manstuff and sent me to get my bloodwork done. he said he didn't want to see me back (unless for something serious) for 3 years, when i needed to get a tetanus shot.
I liked how he was irritated at how healthy i was. it was funny.

i got my bloodwork back on Thursday, and the nurse was very pleased with the results.
cell counts and thyroid were both good
cholesterol was 124 (normal range 100-200)
HDL was 45 (normal range 40-60)
LDL was 70 (normal range 60-130)
triglycerides were 46 (normal range 30-150)

so it looks like i AM perfectly healthy. stress on healthy....and perfect.

but not being content with that, i did a lot of investigating about diet nutrition over this past week and made some changes to my eating regimen. My new daily diet includes things that everyone should eat daily: 1 oz nuts, and 1 oz dark chocolate. (got to get those omega-3s and antioxidants!) I added raisins into the mix to make it into a healthy trial mix snack! I still need to incorporate drinking a little red wine every day, but i'll start slow and make it once or twice a week probably. My new diet tallies up to 4100 calories per day! Only 22% of those calories are from fat. and only 34% of that 22% is from the bad fats (saturated) and i have no trans fats in my diet at all. I also get 260 grams of protein per day and 45 grams of fiber! I also drink at least 5 bottles of water per day.

I'm not crazy.

And even if i am, i don't care, because i'm healthy :)

making cents

So i've been spring cleaning and in the process, purging my condo of all things high school. I don't know why it took me so long to get rid of a bunch of crap that for some reason i felt that i either needed to save, or thought it was cool or were memories i didn't want to let go of. The only thing i did save though, was some Royal News stuff that is just too good to ever let go of because every now and then, i'll pull out a copy of the Chromosome Chronicle (the fake school paper) and just laugh for hours while reading it. I also kept my MLK Jr. paper aptly titled, "He Had a Dream," for which I received a "D."

So as I was getting rid of 99% of my high school crap, some of my college coursework (it was sad throwing away my EALL stuff....) and just random other stuff that i have amassed throughout the years, I came upon my shoebox of change. I've been keeping my spare change and rolling it up periodically for maybe about 10 years now. And when i roll it up, i just put it in the shoebox. Well, i finally got to the point where I told myself that i should probably take it to the bank. All in all, i had 47 penny rolls, 17 nickel rolls, 22 dime rolls and 36 quarter rolls, which sums up to $527.50. Isn't that crazy!

When i got to the bank, i saw a lot of nervous eyes from the tellers as they gazed upon the shoebox. I know what they were thinking. I remember when I went to the bank to get my mortgage, and in the cubicle next to me, there was a man and lady who were opening up their first bank account and they brought in boxes and boxes and bags and shoeboxes and more bags of straight up cash. It was so crazy. Now, I don't know if it's smart or dumb to trust the bank with all your money like almost everyone else does, but on the flip side, it also seems crazy to just store mad amounts of cash around your house.

So anyway, I felt bad for the teller, because i thought she was going to have to count all the coins and make sure it was all there, but in the end, she did no such thing. She counted the rolls up and traded me dollar bills for them and i left. What happens if the coin rolls were full of lead or something else. It's not like the rolls are translucent or anything, there could have been anything in there. Or what happens if a few of the rolls were a coin or two short? Do they not care? She didn't ask me my account number, or my name or anything. How would they get compensated? I was kinda baffled by it. I almost asked her about the procedure for something like this, but instead i just took the money and left. oh well. not my problem if you can't do your job.

dying

so i'm getting bloodwork done tomorrow at 8:00 AM and you have to fast 14 hours before. So i ate my dinner at 5:30 PM and loaded up on food. But after going to the gym and working out for an hour and then doing yoga for an hour, i am sooooooooo hungry. i'm dying. i'm only 3 1/2 hours into my fast and i don't think i can make it. Thank Cassia's God that i'm not religious anymore, because religious people love their fastings and i simply do not have the ability to not eat for long periods of time anymore (i think my record is near 26-28 hours back in the day when i was manorexic. I have trained my body to need nutrients every 3 hours. i am very scheduled and my stomach likes routine feedings. I think i will die from hunger in my sleep tonight. i'd say pray for me, but once again, i'm not religious, even more so after witnessing the horrors of the Creation Museum.

Sneer

So today i was running around trying to find white seat cushions/pads for my wooden chairs in my kitchen. Apparently no place sells white cushions. I get the fact that white = shows dirt easily, but you'd think some store somewhere would have them. Well, not at Target, Kohl's, HomeGoods, Bed Bath and Beyond, JCPenney's, and anywhere else I may have gone. So unfortunately my never ending quest led me to KMart (last resort). While at KMart I saw this family that were typical KMart shoppers and they had something big in their cart (i think it was a desk or cabinet or something that they had to put together) and I overheard the younger son, who had to have been no older than 10, say "This is perfect. Too bad it was made in China." I suppose this is a typical WT Mid-American thing to say and the paradigm of dialogue in a store like KMart, but the whole incident made me kind of angry/sad about the world. Part of it has to do with how young the kid was. Kids that age learn that crap from their parents, not TV.

Oh well, I hope they get lead-poisoning from whatever they bought, which is a high-possibility, seeing as it is from China and all......

So Retarded

Question: What do you do if you were mid-90's blonde bombshell who failed at transforming her initial momentum into primetime TV success or blockbuster Hollywood films?

Answer: Have a retarded son and exploit him everywhere in order to get the most media coverage you've had since 1995's Singled Out.

Congratulations Jenny McCarthy. Now shut the fuck up and go back to being insignifiCUNT.

Regressive Field

The Tribe won their home opener 10 to 8 last night! Honk if you love that tribe!
But Cleveland was the ultimate loser regardless of the outcome, since the baseball park is now called "Progressive Field" instead of Jacob's Field or its better moniker "The Jake!" What a horrible name. definitely a downgrade. A similar pitfall afflicted the former Gund Arena. Now it's Quicken Loans Arena, which equals Progressive Field in the magnitude of retardation. Why does Cleveland's sports arenas names suck? The only thing that could make things better is if the Cleveland Rockers came back! The Rockers ruled! j/k, April Fools'!

OOC

So last weekend, we were all sitting around trying to think of the original sayings or phrases that we as a collective use. And one of them was "OOC" created by yours truly.

Well, to my unfortunate surprise, I stumbled upon this snippet from an interview w/ Mariah Carey about her new album: "Jay-Z said something to me that was really interesting, and I don’t even know if he really remembers this. He’s known me for a long time, and he’s like, “You need to use some of your phrases in your music.” I have my own little slang that I make up and say stupid stuff just for laughs. (On) the song “O.O.C.” — that’s a Swizz Beatz track — it means, “Out of control.” So me and my friends will say that to each other, like, “OK, you’re a little O.O.C. right now, tone it on down.” Da Brat, who’s a really good, close friend of mine since we worked on “Always Be My Baby” — we wrote the lyrics together, and it was so fun. By saying (sings), “I get so O.O.C. / So out of control, baby,” we could explain it. When somebody was helping me type up the lyrics, and they wrote “Out of Control” in parenthesis (by the song title), I was like, “Get rid of that. It’s ‘O.O.C.’! Let them figure it out! It’s not that tough! I say it in the next line!”"

ugh.

I've said it once, and i'm sure i'll say it again, but Mariah Carey ruins everything.

Don't be cross!

I just remembered what my favorite part of Easter weekend is.........the people of the Philippines who get crucified!!!! Every year I get to see a story about how those crazy flips either ask to be crucified with real nails hammered in their hands and feet, or how they whip/scourge themselves until their backs are all cut up and bloody in order to atone for a year of sinning. Religious extremism at its best. I also highly enjoy the irony of the situation that the bishop of that area does not condone it and publicly speaks out against it and then the people go and do it anyway. But since the bishop is supposed to be channeling god's word, then the people who crucify are essentially going against god's word..... I wonder if they think about that.....

union or die? DIE!

So for the fourth week in a row i was out of the office for two days on a business trip. This business trip was a re-do of last week's disaster of a business trip. It was a total Katrina last week. Last week, myself, along with a field service engineer, were on site to receive the shipment of three huge pieces of equipment and a bunch of smaller other stuff. We're talking about equipment that needs huge-ass cranes to pick up and set down in place. Two weeks prior to last week we had been on site to figure out where all the equipment was going. Unfortunately it was crazy freezing outside and snowing and so the decision-makers were not making very good decisions and they quickly settled on places and then we all ran back inside without fully exploring all the options. Why settle for the one hole when there are two others that are just as good to stick your equipment into, right?

So after putting down the first two things, the plant personnel realized that the place that was to house the third piece of equipment was not going to work. It was right next to a transformer that apparently produces electrical arcs and can cause crazy problems and deaths and power outages and equipment failure and whatnot if the crane gets too close to it, let alone if it touches it. I don't know, i'm not an electrical engineer. So between last week and this week, they re-figured out where to put all this crap, so lucky me i had to go back out to the site! I was told it should be a day-trip, so i packed accordingly. I also drove with a co-worker who is the most annoying talker at times. He is always asking questions, but when he asks questions they are more like statements, and he just wants to be assured that he's right about what he thinks is happening or going down. For instance, here is a typical example of one of his questions/statements:

so we are in the trailer and we discuss that they are going to unbolt the plate, lift it off of the bin with the crane and then put on the filter. 5 minutes later, while the workers are starting to do the work, he walks up to me and says "so, after they unbolt the plate, they're going to lift it off the bin with that crane over there and then they will put on the filter.?" and i say "yep, just like we said 5 minutes ago." that is not an exaggeration. that actually happened. and it's fine the first or second time, i just respond with "yep." but after seriously, 20 - 30 times a day of questions statements, I start getting snippy. It gets to the point where towards the end of the day he would come up to me and say "so.." and i would turn to him and say "what?!" and then he would recoil and say "nevermind." i really don't mean to be mean, but OMG, the constant asking of questions that you already know the answers to just drives me bonkers! it's one thing to ask questions if you have no idea what's going on, but I made sure to keep him informed on everything, so there's no need for constant reassurance. don't get me started, don't eeeeeven get me started. but i digress.....oh wait, one more thing. He's Indian (red-dot, not woo-woo) and once in a while i'll say something that he totally doesn't get, and i try not to say anything he won't understand, but i forget sometimes. Like while driving to the plant, he was saying something about how all the construction on the toll pike really slows down traffic and i said "word." and he said "what word?" and i didn't know how to explain it, so i said, "Oh, it's just something you say that means that i agree with you. like, "it's a nice day outside." "word." it was something that people said a lot in the early 90s, but i still say it cause i think it's funny." I don't know if my explanation is even right, but that's the best i could come up with. i've never had to explain something like that before. Oh, our silly American ways!

so getting back to the story and the title of the story, the plant hired out contractors to re-position the equipment, and do all the other miscellaneous contracty labor that I, as a salary employee, would never dream of doing. I am not one of the hourlies. ick.
So the main work consisted of picking up three different pieces of equipment with a crane, and one at a time, putting each on a flatbed, driving it over to someplace else, moving the crane, and then picking it up off the flatbed and then down on the ground. With a 6 person crew, it took them the full 8 hour day to do this. You see, union workers have to take many breaks within the day and they also like to stretch out the work since today they are working, but tomorrow, if they don't get a call, they don't work and then don't get any money. so one-day jobs can become two- or three-day jobs. They were all really nice and all, but i'd rather have surly and crass and gets things done rather than nice and slow and lazy. Also, it takes them so long, because it takes 6 people to something that only needs about 3 people. So only half the work is getting done that could. So while i'm on site, i'm mostly supervising the positioning of the equipment, because i know the orientation of it all and where it needs to go and what needs to happen, i just can't do any of it. So mostly all day i'm standing around in the cold getting agitated at how slow everything is going. mostly. So at 3:00, the day is over (union = 8 hours....) and there is still much work to be done. So yay, one-day trip is becoming a two-day trip..... this means that the next day i have re-wear all my gross dirty clothes from the power plant all day again and then get to wear them for the two-and-a-half hour drive home! So needless to say, I am not pleased. And i decide to become the whip-snapping take-initiative project manager that i have to be in order to get shit done. So since i know what all needs to be done, i go to the contracting group's manager the next morning and i tell him i need one or two people to do this today, and while they are doing that, two other people can be working on this, while the others can get started on this. i tell him that this is getting all done today. I allocate his resources for him and i constantly supervise everyone making sure to see what everyone is working on and I make my presence known so that they know that i'm watching them and that this IS getting down today. I hate to take off my kid-cap and put on my boss-hat, but everything got done by 2:00 that day. that's all i gotta say abouts that.

oh, and about the title, when you go to power plants, you get safety trained and a lot of times you get stickers from the plant, so your hard hat ends up being decorated with all these stickers. but the contractor's manager also had a sticker that was a giant skull and around it, it read "Union or Die." and i chose DIE for him.

i would have rather not voted

Since the voting poll is a minute's walk from my place, i got there right when it opened at 6:30. I was already in a line of 8 people. The four people who were working there had a combined age of over at least 300 years. The one who looked the youngest (that means he'll probably die in 3 - 5 years, not 1 - 3 years like the other three workers) and was probably the most competent was working the electronic machine where you insert your completed ballot. i felt this was a smart move on their part. the other three people each had one task. The first person would ask your name and find it in a list. the second person would write down your name and address and what form you got. the third guy gave you the form.
Here's an excerpt from the happenings with the lady who was in front of me.
Worker 1: "What's your name"
Lady: (states name)
Worker 1: "Democrat or Republican"
Lady: "Democrat."
Worker 1: (to Worker 3): "Democrat."
Worker 1 then proceeds to take 2 minutes to find her name in a book that lists everyone's name.... alphabetically.
Worker 1: "Ok, please get your form"
then i step up, and give him my ID and he starts to look for my name. then the lady turns around.
Lady: "Aren't i supposed to sign my name somewhere?"
Worker 1: "Oh yeah."
since he had already lost her page since he was now looking me up, it took him a minute to find her page again. seriously, a minute.
She signs her name and then goes to grab her form, but it's the wrong form.
Lady: "I'm a Democrat."
Worker 3: (to worker 1) "I thought you said republican?"
Worker 1: "No, i said Democrat."
Worker 2: "but i already wrote her form number down. now i'm going to have to cross it out!"
Worker 1: "just cross it out!"
Worker 2: "ok, i'll just cross it out."
this is about the time i reached my boiling point and wanted to turn around and leave. 20 minutes had already passed by since i got there.
I finally got my form (actually i got two of them, when i went to start filling it in, i noticed that both forms were the same and returned one to the guy who was now so confused as to how i got two forms. maybe it was because he GAVE me two forms....)
it then took me less than a minute to vote, and then i left.
the end.
ugh.
at least i picked the winner!

Movie Musts

After much deliberation and a strenuous list-making procedure, I have whittled down the candidates to 10 movies everyone not only needs to see, but needs to like in order to be my friend.
It's a mixture of award-nominated films, feel good movies, nostalgia, comedies, dramas, and movies starring Warwick Davis.
In particular order:
1. Ghost World
2. Bedknobs & Broomsticks
3. Willow
4. Spellbound (2004)
5. Clockwatchers
6. Sister Act II
7. Traffic
8. I Heart Huckabees
9. Wet Hot American Summer
10. Kung Pow! Enter the Fist

I hope that this list sparkles with everyone.

customer disservice

So back when I was in the crazy shopping mood around Christmas, I went around and bought a lot of clothes on-line. One of my online orders (two polo shirts) was from December 28th. I got an e-mail receipt of my purchase and a link to a yahoo-store thing that would keep track of my order. Under order status it was blank. I figured after a while, it would say "processing", or "shipped" or something like that. But alas, it never did. Two weeks ago, I finally e-mailed the customer service web address. Two weeks passed and I never received an e-mail back. hmmmm..... So today while I had off (it was crazy snowing and I didn't feel like driving into work + other reasons....) I called the customer service phone number. After ringing a couple of times I got a message saying that this mailbox is full. And then it hung up. WTF. I tried again later and some girl answered. After giving her my order and saying "i just want to know what is happening with it", She mumbled something about how the girl who used to work here didn't take anyone's orders or something and they're still trying to rectify all of it and blah blah blah and then she told me to hold so she could see if they had any of the clothes i ordered. She came back after a minute and told me that they were all out of the things i ordered and if i wanted to look on-line to find something else to order, i could do that.

Thanks, but no thanks you stupid cunt. seeing as how both things i ordered are still showing "available" on the website, i doubt that whatever else i would choose would be there either.
Luckily they never charged my credit card, so i just told her to cancel my order. That was by far, the worst experience ever with online ordering. It was a really cool polo shirt too :( I looked all over the internets to see if i could find it and it was nowhere to be found. ugh. I hate when clothing manufacturers don't have their own on-line store or a real store and they just use other retailers to sell their clothing. And many of those stores don't have websites that show what they are selling, so it's nearly impossible to ever find anything. LAME! so never buy anything from Solis clothing. They're tacky and i hate them.

You're killing me!

On Friday, Newark, NJ celebrated it's first month-long span without a murder since a 40-day stretch back in 1963. Now I know nothing about crime stats in big cities, but was anyone else aware of that Newark is the crazy killing capital of the world? I guess ignorance is bliss. It's not like this bit of knowledge is going to prevent me from ever going there - I already was never going to go there. This just adds fuel to the fire (or dead Jews to the Auschwitz fire if you prefer).
Are these killings though, mercy killings? Are the murderers doing their victims a favor? Is Newark better than hell? Probably not. It might feel like hell, but I suspect it's much worse.
But according to a 2006 survey, Newark was only ranked as the 22nd most dangerous city in the United States overall, out of 371 cities included nationwide. I know there are crimes other than murder (breaking my heart, for one), but are there seriously worse places than Newark? Let alone, 21 of them? I didn't know America was such a hotbed for evil and depravity. It's still the best country evar though and totally destroys every other country. America is like the Lindsay Davenport of the female tennis game. We are bigger than the rest. More powerful than the rest. Will punish you if you give us an opening to do so. And will win the gold in the '08 Olympics in Beijing this summer.

Dumb as Paint

I'm currently painting my kitchen.
I have a regular 9" roller that I use for walls and a smaller 4" roller that I use for this and that.
A 3-pack of 9" rolls cost $9.97.
A 2-pack of 4" rolls cost $4.97.

After I got home and actually looked at my receipt and comprehended what just happened, I soon realized that I can just buy 9" rolls, cut them in half and then I would have a 6-pack of 4" rolls for $9.97 -- thereby saving $5.oo

I'm not poor or anything, but I understand the concept of value.
I would say this is the last time I shop at Lowe's or buy Shur-Line Premium Select rolls, but I know that'd be a lie. I'll sure show them!

How She Suck

Last night I was forced into seeing a movie that I didn't want to see - How She Move. Let me list the reasons I did not want to see this movie.
1) I knew it was going to be bad
2) the title is grammatically incorrect.
3) even if the title wasn't all slanged up, it's still a stupid name for a movie and it makes me not want to see it.
4) I knew it would be too "urban" for me
5) I don't care to support black entertainment

That being said, I have in the past totally dismissed everyone when they were seeing a movie of such horrible caliber,"Crossroads" being a prime example that pops into my head, but I thought that this movie would at least be ok, because it would be fun to see it with the people I was with and we could make the bad movie be good. Unfortunately, this movie was beyond hope. It was so bad that even the black people in the audience did not even like it. and that's saying something, because black people looooove black entertainment - case in point: any movie that starts with "Tyler Perry presents:..."

So let me count down the reasons this move was bad:
1) the plot was dumb
2) the "stepping" wasn't even that great. I've seen better.
3) the acting was even worse.
4) the majority of the cast was black
5) there was not enough "black talk" such as "what up homes?" and "fuck you, nigga!" there was none of that :( There was a point in the movie where one girl called another girl a bitch and i LOLed. that was probably the best part of the movie.

the craziest thing is that if you go to rottentomato.com, it got a 71% freshness rating?!?! and all the reviewers are older white people. Maybe they're just trying to appear cool and "with it", and not appear racist. Well, I for one, do not care how i appear. I tell the truth. and this movie was more lifeless than a man hanging from a tree. That's how I move, yo! peace out.

crazy bitch

Natalee Holloway is back!
back from the dead?
no.
she's a permanent fixture in hell, and ain't nothing going to get her out of that K-hole.
but her case has been re-opened due to some new "confession" obtained from some Dutch journalist back in May 2005. All the stories have the word 'confession' in quotation marks, but it seems more logical to me to put the quotation marks around the word 'new' instead, seeing as the "confession" is from three years ago. but that's just me....
....And who is this "confession" from?!?!
you guessed it - Mary Kate Olsen.
Everyone knows that she is a cold-blooded murderer. She obviously killed Heath Ledger for not paying the rent on time. It's a sad story, really. justified. but sad.
and now with this new "confession", it's apparent that Heath Ledger was not Mary Kate's first satiation for blood. You see, it's my opinion that this "celebrity blood diet" that she is on is what is keeping her so beautifully thin. I'm glad she found something that works for her, and it's obviously working wonders (her hip bones are amazing!) but I'm just afraid of who she's going to knock-off next. She obviously has a taste for actors, since she's just added Heath Ledger to her list of victims, placing his name right under Brad Renfro. I just hope she doesn't set her sights on FPJ. SMG would be so devastated! and I don't think I can bear to see a distraught SMG. OMG!

inAWEguration

OMG you guys! OMG! I can't believes i'm blogging again. can you believes it?
don't get me started....don't eeeeeeven get me started!
This blog is going to be a no frills kinda thing. kinda like Dakota Fanning.
My first two blogs, if you recall, were character based. who could forget a very special Xanga by Rhett Tardid? Apparently, Xanga did, cause they deleted all traces of it after a year of inactivity :(
Following that was my thinspirational MySpace page authored by Justhin. Unfortunately, It got too time consuming and i was forced to trim the fat and cut it out of my life.
So that leads me to where i am today -- Jesus H Christ on a Cross!
no pictures. no hoopla. just a quick-draw shoot-em-up straight-laced fast-tongued cut-and-dry say-it-so. you know, quick and to the point.
nothing but text. 24/7. ....or whenever i feel like blogging. 'Ks?
C U soonsies!