I’ll Go Around You!!

Y’know something I hate?  When someone is stopped to turn left, and the car behind them almost goes around them on the shoulder.  Instead of just going around them and continuing with their day, (and letting ME go around as well) what they do is fade half onto the shoulder, and stop.

I mean…they’d fit if they went around.  Nothing bad would happen, but no, they fade right as if they’re going to go around…brakes on…and stop.  Then we all wait for the left-turner to complete their turn, and we move on.

Now personally, I just drive around.  I don’t even slow down much.  Maybe it’s scary or edgy or whatever, but I’ve been known to blow around a left-turner (given a paved shoulder, or even the dedicated go-around lane) at 60mph.  Heck, I know how wide my car is, and I know I’m not going to hit anything.  I will slow down to 45mph or so for gravel shoulders.

But what do these almost-go-arounders think?  Is it something like:

“Uh-oh…you’d better complete your turn, or I’ll go around you.  See?  I’m starting to fade over!  I’ll go around you!  I will!  I’ll do it!!  I swear to God I’ll go around you!  DON’T MAKE ME DO IT!  DON’T MAKE ME GO AROUND YOU!! I’M GOING TO GO AROUND YOU I’M NOT KIDDING I’LL DO IT WATCH ME DO IT DON’T MAKE GO AROUND YOU!!  AAAAAA-AAAAAAAAAAA!!!“

Then the car turns, and the almost-go-arounder takes their foot off the brake and starts to move again.

Just makes me want to slap them.  Probably doesn’t bother anyone else.  Where’s the Tylenol?

I Am Generation X

I am not a Baby Boomer.  Please do not treat me like one.

I could stop there and have summed up a whole lot of my take on generational dynamics.  However, I think it may be a bit lacking in substance.

So yeah, I am Generation X — I was born between 1964 and 1981, as it seems to be classically defined.  We got one of the first Atari 2600’s when I was nine.  When I was 13, General Motors laid off most of the City of Flint…and since I grew up in Michigan, that single act pretty much depth-charged my attempts to find an after-school job.  Why would McD’s call me, when unemployed 30-somethings with a kid to feed would pledge their loyalty to the Golden Arches?

That attitude has plagued my entire work career — why would anyone hire ME when every other applicant has 15 years more maturity and work experience, as well as more college and/or more willingness to pledge their entire soul over to Widgets, Inc? (or whatever employer it was)  I have fought an uphill battle to stay employed in the face of overwhelming numbers of more-experienced, more-trained, more-established Baby Boomers who also posess, coincidentally, a monumental selfishness as part of their Code of Ethics.

Picture the “Me Generation” as a meat grinder, and “Generation X” as a juicy strip of tenderloin.  Possessed of an “I win, you lose” mindset, there has been no way that my Baby Boomer supervisors and managers were ever going to let some (as is popularly perceived) apathetic slacker bum get ahead while they were on watch.

And now they’re starting to retire.  In the next few years, all of those managers are going to be leaving open jobs, then it should be MY time yet…I have a sneaking suspicion that some few will cling to employment just long enough to eliminate those open positions and crow about cost-savings before they, too retire off to a condo funded with MY Social Security contributions.

The ironic thing?  After the “Me Generation” turned down ballot proposal after ballot proposal to fund the schools I was enrolled in…they now want ME to approve ballot proposals for Senior Citizen Services.  I finally have the chance to choke them off and make them quit sucking me dry…and my generation has completely given up the desire to vote.  Our legendary apathy is going to make our taxes go up to feed the very Boomers who have kept us poor our entire lives.  We have a chance here, and I’m going to watch my generation squander it.

Yay, Generation X.  Here’s a slogan:  “Generation X: Sacrificing ourselves for the MIllenium Generation — Even though they won’t say ‘thanks!’”

Wow. Wha’happen?

Geez, when’s the last time I blogged?  May?  Cripes!  So much for that daily-journal-get-the-angst-out-be-happier concept, eh?

So, back to the griping.

I hate the dismissive two-finger wave drivers give while still holding onto the steering wheel.  You get it when you’re a pedestrian, mostly when a driver’s stopped at a stopsign, and you start to cross in the crosswalk, and they give you the “go ahead” wave when you’re already walking.  Like they gave me permission to exercise my right-of-way or something.

You know, while still holding the steering wheel with thumb, ring and pinky fingers, they give a quick brushing-off motion with the index and middle fingers.  Sort of “you may proceed, knave, and then begone with you.”  It’s different if I stop on the curb and see if they’re going to go…yes, very different from when they are already stopped at a stopsign and I’m in a crosswalk and…

..oh, hellsticks, it sounds all petty and whiny like this.  Nevermind.

Wait, I guess the whole dang thing can be summed up as: “I hate people.  By and large, the people around me are fuck-tards.”

Suck my Work…

…or something like that.  Today was an exercise in the sucktastic; the sucktacular.  Yesterday our team leader sent us an email — mostly he was the mouthpiece of our manager, our menopausal, bi-polar, cocker spaniel of a manager.  The gist of the mail was that “others” in the department had noticed none of us there after 4pm and complained to our manager, and that we had to expect to work as many 9 hour days as 8 hour days, and that if we kept putting in 40-hour workweeks, we were going to be deep in the shit.  Nevermind that we’re all salaried IT professionals here.

Then today our team leader…let’s call him “Dennis,” took the day off.

So today the four of us on the team pretty much bitched all day about having to generate the appearance of working by sitting our asses at our desks after 4pm, even though our work takes us around the company, so as to mollify these “others” who seem to have nothing better to do but wander around nitpicking other people’s habits.

And the expected overtime just galls me right to hell.  When I was blackmailed into being salaried, our director in one breath said “since this is a lateral transfer, under the same manager, without a promotion, we don’t need to give you a raise” and in the next breath said “we expect you to work 10% overtime, do you understand that?”  Let’s see…being forced to become salaried without a pay raise meant that through giving up my overtime and oncall pay, I essentially didn’t get a cost-of-living raise for 2007, which is when I became salaried.  So I’m being paid for a 38-hour workweek, and being asked to work a 48-hour workweek.

It’s almost as if our managewhore said “my teams are growing too much morale…how can I kill that, and ruin my employees’ productivity by making them disgruntled?  I know, I’ll send out another e-mail.”

###

On a different note, I drove across town after work to Autozone and picked up some air conditioning refills for the cars.  It’s supposed to hit 89 degrees up here in Northern Michigan tomorrow through Monday, and if my wife drives the kids around in the van, they’ll all be really sweaty and irritable.

###

Food has become outrageous around here.  My wife grocery shopped today…two weeks of groceries for a family of six plus my brother-in-law…$550.00.  Granted, she stocked up on a lot of bulk items at Sam’s Club, so our next grocery trip should be smaller…but damn!  I bought my first car for less than HALF that amount!  Granted, the car crapped out, but then again, so will the groceries!!

Marathon Day

Mein Gott in Himmel.  That’s all I can say after the day today was.  (happens to be an awkward sentence, but meh)

Today my oldest daughter had her ballet recital…then we had to go to a wedding, wherein my oldest daughter was the flower girl.  And my wife was the “wedding coordinator.”  Just nobody told HER that before hand…but more on that later.

So how did my day go?  Well, once at the recital, my job consisted of wrangling the twins and slapping my son’s hands whenever he made a twin scream…which meant I slapped a hand about every 5.4 seconds.  The recital was an hour…an hour spent shushing toddlers, corralling toddlers, holding toddlers, picking up toddlers and fetching toys for toddlers.

Then we went to eat, which was okay.  Then to the wedding, where we got there an hour-and-a-half early…an hour and a half spent keeping toddlers off the photographer’s stuff, out of other people’s stuff, and out of the way.  And once the wedding started, I spent another hour pushing toddlers in a stroller, fetching dropped bottles and shushing screams.   And after the wedding we went to the reception where again it was time spent shushing toddlers, putting toddlers in high chairs, taking toddlers out of high chairs and keeping toddlers from getting stepped in by already-drunk wedding guests.

So from 10:30a.m. until about 6:30 p.m. my day was a blur of toddler-control, and I ended up tired, but feeling like I hadn’t been anywhere or done anything.

Oh, and the wedding coordinator thing?  My wife thought she was just to stand at the head of the aisle and tell the bridesmaids when to start walking…until people started telling her she had to control the bride’s fucktard/brat son, and was supposed to have decorated the pews, and was to help the bride get dressed, and decorate the entire church, actually, and the reception hall, and the minister her own damn self (pun intended) was ON my wife about everything.  Would’ve been nice to get a heads-up on that one.

Oh, and my wife dropped our (her) nice digital camera and it’s broken.  It shoots video okay, but photos have suckworthy horizontal bars across them.  Yaysticks and happyturds.  Just what we needed…to spend a hundred bucks on another camera, or on a repair on a camera that’s only worth about a hundred bucks.

But I guess, once we got home, I had a glass of port wine, and we made pudding.  A day that ends with pudding is a day that ends well, I guess.  Mmmm…….pudding.  <sigh>

MySpace, April 20 – May 26, 2008

Monday, May 26, 2008

So What’s The Big Deal?
Category: MySpace

Okay, so I guess I just don’t get what the big deal is about MySpace. I signed on so I could have a place to blog, ‘cuz keeping a journal is supposed to reduce stress…at least the “experts” say so. That, and it’s kind of neat to play around with profiles and edit the style pages a bit. That’s all I do here. Really. This whole emphasis on friends at this site serves only to point out to me just how many people I don’t know. I have what, ten friends? Maybe? And two of them are a radio station?I just spent the last hour looking for the few people I know…and failed. I looked for people who I went to high school with…and failed. I looked for people I knew in college…and failed. I looked for people I used to work with…and failed. I looked for people I work with NOW…and failed.

In part, this has to be backlash from living a life largely without friends. I haven’t kept up with anybody…and now I have no idea where they are or what they’re doing. I honestly don’t know how people on here can have over a thousand friends. Do they just “friend me” to everyone they run into? Are they just an icon collection to them? I don’t get it.

Maybe I’ll have to cop out and see how many bands I can collect…but it’s not like they’re going to really pay attention to little ol’ me, anyway. I could try to connect with all of the 15 year old hotties here…if I were one of the 32,000 registered sex offenders who have MySpace accounts.

Sigh…

And worse, the only people who DO read this are people who know me, so I have to be kind of sanitary here. I’m thinking of moving this whole thing to some other blogging site so I don’t hafta worry about it anymore.

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Friday, May 23, 2008

I’m That Guy

I’m that guy…you know, THAT guy. The guy with dirt under his fingernails, and grease on his hands. I’m the guy who likes to work on his own car, who replaced the clutch in his own motorcycle. I’m the guy who likes to install faucets and light fixtures, and likes to build things around the house. I’m the guy who likes digging holes and planting trees and who likes fixing the lawnmower almost as much as using it. I’m the guy with a 60lb toolbox, and power tools, and various solvents and oils in the garage. I’m the guy who likes waxing the car, and knows that rubbing compound will take out most scratches on the car. I’m the guy who likes to shoot stuff with a shotgun…and then reload his own shells, and then shoot more stuff. I’m the guy who spends the weekend in dirty jeans, a t-shirt and a baseball cap, rather than shower and shave all 7 days of the week. Yeah, I’m that guy.

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Saturday, May 17, 2008

I’m That Guy

I’m THAT guy. No, not HIM…the other one. I’m the guy who’s been married for eleven years to the same woman. I’m the guy who has four kids…all with the same woman….whom I’m married to. I’m the guy who drives the crappy car and lets my wife have the nice one, because she hauls our kids around…or at least I did when the nice car held all the kids at once. I’m the guy who actually likes mowing grass, and snowblowing the driveway, and painting the kitchen, and watering the flowers. I’m the guy whose favorite sound is the laughter of my children. I’m the guy who can’t stand it when my job takes me to the pediatrics floor of the hospital, because I abhor the sound of children crying in pain. I’m the guy who thinks that Christmas is for the children, and that Santa Claus is alive in every one of us. I’m the guy who thinks that a child’s innocence is sacrosanct, and that those who violate and shatter that innocence should be removed from our society….unpleasantly. I’m the guy who wears my wife’s high-school ring around my neck, every single day; who feels naked when he forgets to put on his wedding band. I’m the guy who may joke about various hot-looking women, but who would never cheat on his wife. I’m the guy who thinks less (MUCH less) of guys who put their wife down while out with “the guys.” I’m the guy who’ll give $5 to a homeless person, and try to preserve their dignity when I do it. (“Excuse me, I think you dropped this, sir.”) I’m the guy who’ll help push a neighbor or a stranger out of the ditch. I’m the guy who’ll drop work in a heartbeat if my family needs me. I’m the guy who weeps every time he hears a newborn’s first cry. I’m the guy who wants to show my family the world. I’m the guy who wants to barbecue burgers on the deck, and roast marshmallows over the campfire. I’m the guy who’s a father, and a husband, and wouldn’t change that for anything.Yeah, I’m that guy.

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Friday, May 16, 2008

I’m That Guy

I’m that guy. You know, THAT guy. I’m that guy with glasses, Dockers and a button-up shirt, wearing track shoes. I’m that guy who says “I need to return this” when he’s thinking “take yer fuckin’ piece o’shit back and give me my goddamn money back.” I’m that guy driving the Volvo, with jazz coming out of the windows, but not TOO loud. I’m that guy who looks like a repressed asshole, like a college-educated jerk — kind of pudgy like he’s never done an honest day’s labor in his life. I’m that guy who looks uptight enough to blush if a girl looks at him. I’m that guy who gets caught looking at a girl’s legs and tries to camoflage it by looking for a garbage can that isn’t there, or something. I’m that guy who looks like a nerd…a twitchy nerd…a twitchy, uptight, Volvo-driving, stupid-expression-wearing, nerd. Yeah, I’m that guy.

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Saturday, May 10, 2008

Bloggity Blog

I haven’t blogged here in a while. It’s become harder to really let myself say what I want around people that I know. I know anything I blog here is going to be read by my neighbor, and my tae-kwon-do classmate, and my brother-in-law, and my wife and…well most of my friends are people I know. So I can’t blog anything about them. Some of my friends live in the same house as me…so I can’t blog –– and as punctuates most everything I do, a baby pooped and I have to stop what I’m doing and go handle shit.

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Friday, April 25, 2008

I Dunno

What’s wrong with people? Are we actually getting stupider (legitmate word if you’re in 4th grade) or is there just an extreme shortage of people willing to point a finger and say (loudly) “Hey, you! You’re doing it wrong!”Today, I was waiting to turn left out of a driveway. I had to wait for cars…nothing strange there. But then the guy waiting to turn left INTO the driveway waved me out. There were no other cars coming, but there WERE cars waiting behind him. I stared at him for a second, then waved him out of the way with both arms… the physical version of “hey, stupid, get outta the road!” And he waved me out again, this time impatiently. To get things moving, I pulled out — squealed out, actually, and in the company van, too.

I fumed about it the whole time I was driving. I mean fer chrissakes, don’t they tell drivers anymore that if they’re in the middle of the road, they shouldn’t just STOP and wave people out of driveways? If they don’t have anyplace to be, maybe the drivers BEHIND them actually want to go somewhere. Thus the reason they’re in CARS, on the ROAD, trying to DRIVE SOMEWHERE! And I thought about it some more. Why didn’t the guy behind him honk or something? He was being a moron and holding up traffic…I’D have honked — a long, loud “Git the f*ck outta the road, you f*cktarded ass-mummy!!” If I’d have put the van in Park and gotten out, he’d have been mad at ME.

And I thought about it in a broader sense. The morons rule the world. They cross the centerline of the highway while driving…and the people they’re playing chicken with don’t flash a light or honk a horn or anything. Morons pull out in front of people, then slam on their brakes and turn…and nobody honks or anything. Morons cough or sneeze on you or your family, and if you say anything they either pretend they don’t notice, or they get mad at YOU.

One time, I was waiting in a long line to pay at a Cracker Barrel restaurant in Indiana, and this dizzy bitch walked past everyone and straight up to a register. NOBODY said anything…so I did.
“Ex-CUSE me, but wait your turn.”
“Oh,” (and this absolutely floored me) “I thought I just walked right up…”

I thought I just walked right up?! Never mind the eight people waiting with their bill in their hands. Never mind the existence of lines since the beginning of freaking HISTORY…no, SHE thought she’d just walk RIGHT UP! Gawd! How did she survive the drive to the place? How many red lights did she run because “I thought they meant everyone else,” and how many pedestrians did she run over while driving on the sidewalk because “I thought I just drove over here…” Is she serious? Really?

So I dunno. Maybe it’s because the biggest thing anyone reads anymore is an issue of People magazine. Maybe it’s the whole Real World-Surreal Life-The Osbournes-ANTM-Survivor-Big Brother-Tila Tequila-Paris Hilton-Hamster Dance-America’s Got Talent mentality that’s being fostered by our televisions. Maybe it’s all the artificial colors in our food. Maybe everyone’s Zoloft is reacting with their Zantac and causing stupidity. I dunno, but it’s really annoying.

Hey! Stupid people! Please stop!

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Sunday, April 20, 2008

Randomnity
Current mood: cheerful

I haven’t blogged anything in a while, and should. It’s harder to do when people who know me read my blog…like, oh, I dunno…my wife. Can’t go on about my extra-marital exploits; can’t complain about my girlfriend’s shortcomings; can’t talk about that court order at ALL.Yeah.

My brother-in-law (BIL) moved in with us last weekend. We cleaned out a corner of our basement and made a space for him. It kind of saddens us that all we can offer is an unfinished basement — bare cement, plastic sheeting over the pink insulation for walls, and the ceiling is floor joists and heating ductwork. I was able to run a couple of extension cords to his “room” for power for his 47 different video game systems. He’s also borrowing one of our cars while his is KO’d. Again, I’m kind of embarrassed that it’s older than he is — it’s an ‘84 Crown Victoria…it’s navy blue, 17 feet long and slow. It gets all the gas mileage of a V8, and has all the power of a 4-cylinder.

On the other hand, I’m actually proud to be have something to offer — we finally have a house big enough that we can clear out a 10×12 (or so) room without really cramping our lifestyle (if we actually have a lifestyle…I suspect we don’t.) and we have a car that is in decent shape that has done nothing but sit for a year — heck, my BIL driving it is actually HELPING us out…the car needed to be driven to kind of keep it in working order. It’s not going to send us to the poorhouse to have another person living here, not by a long shot, and that’s a decent feeling.

(subject change…) Home improvement season has started. Some people call it spring, I think. We’re starting to work on the house to start making it what we want. We put in new solar lights by the sidewalk, and we’re testing out different samples of paint on the walls. I stained the porch, deck and the kids’ swingset, and they all look much better. We’re starting to water the yard, and the grass we planted last fall is sprouting nicely this spring.

Oh, and I got Guitar Hero III for about 1/2 what it costs in the store, so I’ve been playing the $!t out of that for the past coupla days. It’s not a real guitar, but it’s fun.

Later.

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MySpace, March 24 – April 8, 2008

Tuesday, April 08, 2008

Poisoned
Current mood: infuriated

We just got back from vacation.Correction: We just got back from the bar-none worst vacation I’ve ever had to endure.

We rented a minivan and got a great deal on a time-share condo for a week in Williamsburg, VA. Prescription for success, I know. We set out on Saturday evening, planning to drive through the night while the kids slept, buoyed by road-food snacks and Red Bull.

How wrong we were.

After twelve hours on the road, I passed out while driving somewhere in West Virginia. I had enough warning beforehand that I was able to stop the van and not kill my entire family. My wife thought I was dead. My kids were screaming my name. I didn’t know any of this. My wife woke me up, we pulled the van off the road, and I got out and vomited in the ditch. That afternoon we checked me into the ER in Winchester, VA. They thought I’d had a heart attack and ran EKG’s, cat scan and a chest x-ray. Not to mention the dual IV’s filling me with fluids and a heparin drip. And they stuck a nitroglycerin patch on my chest. They really thought I was going to heart-attack on them.

Then they admitted me for the night, and kept me awake by sticking needles in me every two hours…and they starved me until they could run an EEG on a tilt-table…which made me pass out again, go figure. After finding nothing beyond exhaustion, dehydration, etc…my wife bitched loudly enough that they let me go, and we made it to Williamsburg a day late.

Well, let’s skip Tuesday and Wednesday — I spent Tues. in bed and saw the ocean on Wed…amongst choking down every bite of food that I ate, and battling waves of nausea and diarrhea.

Thursday we set out to see some plantations…and my wife almost passed out while driving, just like I did. And we realized that the van we had rented — a brand new Grand Caravan — was piping carbon monoxide and gasoline fumes in through the vents, and poisoning us. Poisoning me. Poisoning my wife. Poisoning my seven-year-old boy. Poisoning my five-year-old girl. Poisoning my 17-month-old twins. Poisoning us.

We made Budget bring us a replacement, out in the middle of nowhere of Virginia, and we finally had a clue what was making us all feel terrible. Not the flu, not just wussyness. We were poisoned.

And then Friday and Saturday we drove home…our vacation thoroughly ruined. I saw the doctor on Monday, and she confirmed that all of the symptoms I’m still suffering from can all be chalked up to carbon monoxide poisoning. It may take another couple of weeks to truly get this crud out of my bloodstream. I (and any of us) may show side effects up to 40 days after our exposure. My kids may have permanent developmental damage. We have to wait and see. At the very least, we got a free van from Budget — we did NOT pay for our poison van.

And so we wait and see. We wait and see when we stop feeling nasty and nauseous and dizzy and numb. We wait to see if any long-term effects show up. We wait and see if we can get over our first real vacation in five years being so totally raped by this. We wait to see if we need to hire a lawyer and go for the balls.

I have nothing good or especially funny to say about all of this. Deal with it. We have to.

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Thursday, March 27, 2008

I’m Bitching About Drivers Again

I had to take a road trip for work today — not like interstate long, just 30 miles to Frankfort and back. Man, am I the only one whose head isn’t up their ass?Here’s a great refresher lesson for drivers: If there are cars coming, wait.

Again: If There Are Cars Coming, Wait.

One more time: If There Are Cars Coming,

Wait.It’s like I’m not even there, sometimes — like there’s a gap in the visible light spectrum the size and shape of whatever vehicle I’m in. Here are some scenarios for all of you who need them:If you’re waiting to pull out onto a busy road, and there are cars coming…DON’T pull out. I know it’s a departure for you, but try it. If you’ve already waited for three cars, maybe DON’T pull out in front of the fourth car. If you’ve already waited for a full minute…DON’T pull out in front of whomever’s next. If someone asks you how many cars you wait for before pulling out, any answer except for “all of them” is WRONG! It doesn’t fricking matter how many cars you wait for — if there are more cars coming, you keep your ass off the road!

If there is a school bus or garbage truck on the shoulder, and you want to drive around them…but there are cars coming, WAIT! Let’s actually NOT pull into the oncoming lane when there are oncoming cars in it that are…well….oncoming. It’s not your lane, it’s theirs…keep the fu(dge) out of it!

If you’re waiting to turn left across traffic…and there seem to be large metallic objects approaching…WAIT! If you think “I’ve waited long enough,” and turn in front of them, you may be having a nice T-Bone for dinner tonight. Don’t be stupid, even if it’s a challenge.

And here’s another: If you pull up to a road you want to turn onto, and there are two cars coming, but miles of empty road behind them…just wait for those two cars, and THEN pull out, okay? You won’t be getting anywhere any faster by jumping out in front of them like an asshole…and who knows, they might have been going much faster than you like to go, and you’ll succeed in pissing off people who are behind you where you can’t see them pull a bazooka out of their back seat.

Oh, and motorcycles count as cars. Yes, they do, actually. No, I’m serious, they do. Whatever, jerk, STFU and wait for them, too.

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Monday, March 24, 2008

Day-to-day Poop

I’m just finishing the day after Easter. Or as my wife seems to like calling it: Thanksgiving. I am so beat, I actually left work at 1pm, came home, and took a 2-hour nap. Saturday night, we had to be easter bunnies — that’s what mom’s and dad’s do, and there shouldn’t be any kids reading this and getting their universe rocked with this revelation.Where was I? Oh yeah, we stayed up late Saturday to get easter baskets together. This after spending the day cleaning our house to host 15 people for Sunday dinner. So I partook of my first “energy drink” ever. You know, the ones with “Taurine” and “Guarana” and “Guacolocospirulene-L17″ and so on. As it turns out, the darn things work. I drank the thing between say 4pm and 6pm Saturday. I didn’t have my first yawn until 3:30a.m. Good lord in Hoboken, it was like drinking a Sweet-Tart.

So today, I got up at my usual 5:30a.m….after getting a not-usual three hours of sleep. I was dragging ass. I bought another one of those drinks at work and downed it, but this one had some different brew of ingredients, and it made me all hyper-twitchy-stumbly, then it ran out and I realized I was sitting at my desk, staring out the window, completely lights-on-nobody-home. I left.

But Sunday was nice. We hosted the Famn Damily — 17 people in our 1500 sq. ft. house (my wife insists 1400, bleah) including our children. We had two kinds of ham; mashed taters and gravy; green bean casserole; home-made mac’n cheese; taco dip and chips; meatballs; rolls; orange jello-whip stuff; 5-layer salad, deviled eggs and two kinds of pie. Uurp. After dinner, we had three kids whipping beach balls at each other in the living room, with the twins toddling back and forth through it and remaining unscathed like that scene in “The Untouchables” where the baby carriage bumps down the stairs through the middle of the gunfight.

All in all it was a good Easter. The kids liked their baskets. Dinner was low stress despite all the people. Then I stayed up until 2:30 a.m. getting the house into something resembling normalcy and getting a start on all the dirty pots and serving bowls. And that leads into the three hours of sleep before going to work today. Aack.

It was four degrees this morning. Stupid me, I tried to stick the new license plate tags on the car. That didn’t work. Luckily they stuck this afternoon when I tried. And what’s with having to scrape off my car windows after Easter, anyway? That’s not right. I don’t care if Easter is in mid-March…it’s supposed to knock off this winter shit now.

Tae kwon do tonight again. Now that the tournament is done (I didn’t go) there’s less emphasis on sparring and more concentration on our requirements for our next belt test. I have my form pretty well learned — Tae guek II. Chim-bee position; left low block, step forward, punch; right low block, step forward, punch. Forward inside block, forward inside block; left low block, forward kick, step forward, high punch; right low block, forward kick, step forward, high punch; forward high block, step forward, high block; spin counterclockwise and right high block; spin clockwise and left high block; low block to the rear, forward kick, punch; kick, punch; kick, punch with ki-yi, face forward; chim-bee position.

Like, I know, right?

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MySpace, Feb 11 – 21, 2008

Thursday, February 21, 2008

Etiquette!!
Current mood: annoyed

It seems like people don’t have a fudging clue how to be polite anymore. Screw polite, I’d be happy with courteous. I’d even settle for “not clueless” in a pinch. Maybe I just live, drive and work among a bunch of flippin’ hogs. Maybe people need some pointers on how to NOT piss off everyone around them.Forget Miss Manners and all of her “keep your pinky down at tea-time” and “remember to mail a hand-written thank you doily.” I think I have some pertinent, real-world, 21st-century rules for etiquette here. Wanna hear it — here it is…

Elevators — First off…then on. Let the people who are on the elevator get off when the doors open…then there’s room for your doughy, too-lazy-to-take-the-stairs-DOWN-a-floor ass to get on. When you try to squeeze into the elevator as soon as the doors crack open….you’re guaranteed — GUARAN-DAMN-TEED — to run face-first into the people trying to squeeze OUT of the elevator.

Generally, I stand RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE DOORS when I’m on the elevator, and if I have a hand-cart I stick it 1/2″ from them. When the doors open, I shove, and get to hear the satisfying crack of cart on shin.

Elevators II — You don’t need to take the elevator down one floor. C’mon people, I see you waiting for five minutes for an elevator to carry your lazy ass exactly 12 feet down. You could seriously go down the stairs on your elbow and lips and get there faster.

Doors, Automatic — You know, the “handicap button” for the door. I’m not saying you shouldn’t use the button unless you’re Steven Hawking, no. It’s handy when you have your arms full. But if you push the button, accept what happens. Don’t hit the button, realize that the door opens SLOW for the disabled, huff in exasperation, then grab the door and yank it open anyway. It makes you look like an ass.Lines — Do your time and shut the hell up. Don’t get in line, stand there for 10.2 seconds, then start huffing and hissing and telling everyone within 50 feet that things are “ridiculous,” and “unacceptable” and that the clerk is “incompetent.” Look at the eight people in front of you. They’ve been there longer than you. Shut the hell up. Nobody wants to hear you whining. Don’t you dare count the items in my cart. Bugger off.

Doors, Holding Of — C’mon, spend three seconds to hold the door open for me if I’m right behind you. I’d do it for you. Don’t let it drop on me, it’s rude, and I’m going to smack it with my paw of a hand when I grab it, and you’re going to jump a little, and mumble a REALLY insincere “sorry…” over your shoulder.

Computer Screens — Don’t Read Mine. Don’t stand there looking over my shoulder as I type an e-mail to someone. Would you watch me take a crap? No. This is that personal, too. I notice you. I do. My next line to type is “I’m getting those urges again…the voices are telling me to grab a pen and stab upward over my right shoulder again…”

Doors, Bathroom — KNOCK ON THE FUCKING DOOR, YOU ASSHOLE!! God I’m sick of people just grabbing the doorknob, twisting and pushing to see if the door’s locked. Makes me wanna yell “Come on in!!” Knock, like your mother taught you. I’ll say “occupied,” you’ll mumble “sorry,” and you’ll find another bathroom. Second place doesn’t get crap. Literally.

Hallways, Aisles, Sidewalks — It’s like the road, numbnuts, keep right. If you’re slow, and you’re wide, stay right so I can get around you. Maybe YOU don’t have to be anywhere this hour, but I DO! If you’re approaching a corner, stay on your side, don’t just cut as tightly to the inside as you can. You’ll find yourself face-to-face with a stranger.

Four-Way Stop Signs — Oh, is there a bigger barometer of driver stupidity? God, it’s like a custom-made IQ test. The answer is simple: If you stopped first, go first. More importantly, if you DIDN’T stop first, DON’T GO! If you did stop first, stop waving others through! It holds everybody up! Stop it! Don’t be “nice,” just move yer ass!

Lane Control — This lane is MY lane / This lane’s not YOUR lane. / This lane’s NOT made for me AND you… So if your lane is moving too slow for you and mine’s not…TOO BAD! Keep your britches on, partner, and just sit there! You’re not entitled to the space I’m driving in, so hands off!

Snow, Reasonable Speed — For the love of Christ, go a decent speed when the roads are bad. Slow down, yeah…go 17 mph for two counties? There’s a special place in hell reserved for YOU, buddy. I understand that some cars are not good winter cars. I have a 1984 Crown Victoria that’s an absolute nightmare on ice — but if you are an over-cautious driver anyway, you need to NOT take your Pontiac Fiero out in the snow, and drive 12 miles per hour up Division, and hold up a mile of cars behind you. If you have to drive a Fiero (or any reeeally bad winter car) you need to commit to driving like an FIA World Rally Cup champion, so as not to hold up all the possibly armed commuters behind you.

Snow vs. 4×4’s — You ain’t got Four-Wheel-Drive-Brakes, there, Professor. Sure, you have four Michelins making you go faster…but step on the brakes and you have the same stuff as everyone else. Hmm…I wonder why almost every vehicle I see in the ditch is a 4×4? I wonder… hmm…. were they driving too fast? Naww, couldn’t be…

Eating — CHEW WITH YOUR MOUTH CLOSED!! GOD-DAMN!! Honestly, it sounds like someone stirring a can of paint with a dirty mop, and it makes me want to throw up. Gawd.

I think this is enough for one sitting. I know there’s more — there’s so much more — but I can’t think of any right now.

Currently listening :
Almost Easy
By Avenged Sevenfold
Release date: 13 January, 2008

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Wednesday, February 13, 2008

Why I Don’t Have Any Friends
Current mood: angsty

What the heck, I’ve got nothing else better to do, why don’t I get all introspective and self-revealing in a Myspace blog? I’m basically doing this for me anyway…that some other people are reading this is just salt’n pepper on the meat, I guess.So yeah, I quite soberly proclaim that I don’t have any friends. I have acquaintances. I have co-workers. I have “people I know.” But friends? By my count, not a one. At this point, it’s mostly me…I don’t even try to make friends any more. I don’t for a minute confuse Making Friends with Being Friendly, either. I can Be Friendly to anyone, though I usually keep it scaled back to Being Courteous. I can Be Friendly to the girl behind the counter at Burger King, or to the customer at work whose PDA I just installed, or to a random stranger who needs directions. Even to the people who I work with every day, and have spent a week with on a business trip. But are any of these people my friends? No.

The last person who I really consider my friend was back in college — I graduated in 1995, so that’s over a decade ago now. He and I were close, near inseperable. We both graduated at the same time. He and his wife moved to Atlanta, I stayed in Michigan to look for work, but eventually traveled down their at his invitation to look for work down there. And he was different. Snobbier. His wife got her period the first week I was there (that’s what he said, anyway) and I swear it lasted for two months. I ended up leaving in disgust as he demanded hundreds of dollars from my still-jobless self for all the groceries I’d eaten. (never mind that I’d bought most of them.) That was in 1996, and we haven’t spoken since.

The next most-recent friend was in 1991, at the college before that. Again, we were good, close friends. He ended up buying a business, and I ended up working for him. I commuted from Midland to Lansing to work in his store, basically earning enough to pay for the gas and that was it. And he stopped being my friend and started being my manager…I would say “Hey, I’m going to get a sandwich, I’ll be back in five minutes.” He would say “You can take your lunch now.” I’d reply, “I don’t need to ‘take my lunch,’ I just need five minutes to get a sandwich.” He’d say “go ahead and take your lunch now.” Finally he cut my hours and hired a local kid to take my place, and made it cost me money to come work. And he laughed at me when I told him. That was in 1991. We haven’t spoken since.

I even lost a friend of over 20 years. We started being friends in 5th grade, were friends in high school. He was in my wedding, I was in his. He’s been in the USAF since high school, and has steadily become more and more right-wing conservative and militarized, while I’ve stayed fairly moderate to left-moderate. His increasing inability to tolerate others’ point of view has ended our friendship, as I see it…and looking back I can see that he’s never respected me at any point in my life. When we were kids, if I disagreed I was “complaining.” When we were teenagers I got a fast car and it was “you’re going to kill yourself,” not “cool, man.” When I was in college it was “you didn’t vote for that faggot-loving Clinton, didja?” Last year when I expressed an opinion about Americans, it was “you don’t know anything, you need to travel more.” That was last year, and we haven’t spoken since.

I even tried making friends with the people I work with…I hung out with one of my co-workers a couple of times at his house, but when the day came that I invited him over to my house, he didn’t show up. When I called him the answer on the phone was “Oh……….I don’t still have to do that, do I?” I said, “No, you don’t have to do that.” Ever. That was something like five years ago, and I haven’t talked to him outside of work since. Or bothered inviting anyone else from work over for any reason.

They make us take yearly satisfaction surveys at work, and the question that surprised me the most was: “I feel I’ve made close friends while working at Munson.” My answer was No, and if I could check ‘No’ five times I would…is there a ‘hell, no’ box to check? The part that surprised me? The most common answer was Yes, absolutely.

I’m sure that anyone can read all this and say “wow, you’re a whiny little bitch, aren’t you?” I’m not going to stand up, raise my hand and say that I’m perfect…or even close…or even all that good a person. I know my shortcomings. I’m sure if you asked any of those people they could rattle off their own laundry list of stuff I’ve done that pissed them off.

But I look at the concept of having friends and I think: “Well, I don’t have the money to go do anything with a friend. With four kids I don’t have the time to do anything with a friend. I don’t go anywhere or do anything. I’m boring. And I’m cheap. I have nothing to offer.”

So I’ve come to my late 30’s with a wife, four kids, one remaining parent, one remaining grandparent, and not a friend to my name. The very thought of “friend” anymore actually makes a little knot in my stomach. If I were taking one of those word-association games, the shrink would say “friend,” and I’d say “Ugh.” I’m uncomfortable with the thought of it…I think of “friend” as just another person to support in some way, just another drain on my resources.

Thing is, I know that’s not normal. Do everybody’s friends screw them over at some point? If so, do people just make up and go on, or are friends supposed to be disposable and replaceable? Or are other people just better at picking people for friends that won’t turn into assholes? Or am I just basically an asshole myself, and that’s why nobody wants to be around me?

Whatever…I know that my situation isn’t normal, and that I can’t see any way to change it, and I’m not sure I even want to at this point…and yet I’m pretty sure that I DO want to change this thing, or I wouldn’t have just wasted this much time typing out a long-winded, whiny-assed blog like this one.

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Monday, February 11, 2008

Random Stuff
Current mood: sleepy

Why is it that the only people who want to be my “friends” on this website are girls with no last names, who all want me to look at “their other website” with “the good pictures” on it? Does nobody else come in contact with my profile? Is it the hot green Mustang in the background that does it? “Ooh, this man has a HOT car, I want to show HIM my hoo-hoo-dilly!” Yeah, I didn’t think so either.
—
Geez, is everybody sick right now? I started out with a cold a week ago. It made my weekend miserable, and continued straight through Wednesday or so…whereupon on its way out it shook hands with the GI bug on its way in. THAT made the last half of last week all disgusting and stuff…Heck, I’m still not right down South. I know, thanks for sharing. But really, everywhere I go, someone’s hacking out a spleen, or blowing quarts of goo into a Kleenex, or their glove. What is up? Is anyone healthy?
—
I’m a nerd. I was all excited to be able to rehab my old laptop this weekend. It’s a Pentium II that we got from eBay several years ago, and we used it for a long time until the power brick went feet-up. Well, I got a replacement brick and got it going again. I wanted to install Fedora Redhat Linux on it instead of Windows, but it didn’t have enough memory installed to run Fedora. Next, I tried to install Solaris on it, and make it a Sun workstation. Still, not enough memory. So, I reformatted the hard drive and reinstalled Windows 98 — heck, it has a sticker on it that says “made for Windows 98,” so that’s a non-issue. After reloading windows on it, I took out the hard drive, battery and cd drive, then split the top and bottom halves of the laptop and vacuumed it out thoroughly, then reassembled the unit and proceeded to put Office on it, and load the drivers for soundcards, video cards and etc.Yeah, I can disassemble and reassemble laptops. It’s not that hard, really, excepting Fujitsu Lifebook tablets. Those are the spawn of the devil. I even opened up a Palm Tungsten PDA once, removed the battery, replaced and reassembled, and fixed a problem someone was having. Work even sent me to Wisconsin in December to learn how to disassemble Laserjet printers and reassemble them.

Best of all, I can be hired! I’m not cheap, though — well, maybe I am. I called a couple of computer stores to find out what they charge to come to your house and fix a computer. My god in heaven, they charge $95/hr labor! That doesn’t include the $35/hr to DRIVE to your house and back to their shop. Or parts. Holy lord, that’s out and out robbery! I couldn’t believe how much money they ask for — and get!

It’s 10 to midnight now, and I have to be on the road by 6:30am for work tomorrow. I’m already up too late, I have to go. Bye.

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