So, yeah... I believe I've ranted about this before but I feel the need to rant again after five girls were killed in an accident that may have involved the driver sending text messages while driving. I thoroughly hate the idea of people talking on cell phones while driving. I'm a little less pissy when they are using a hands free device, but honestly, it still pisses me off because a distracted driver is a distracted driver... I guess it really started to get to me after living in Colorado. It seemed like every other driver had a phone stuck to their ear while cruising down the road. I'm not trying to sound sexist, or anything, but much more than not, it was a young female. Granted, I lived a block away from a big college campus, but that doesn't excuse the practice. I guess sometimes it isn't the most practical thing to pull over and make or receive a phone call, but you can still let the person know that you're driving and that you'll call them back when it's a little more practical (and much safer) to do so... or you can just not answer the phone until you're able to, safely. I mean, there's a reason for voicemail, y'know?

Now, whether the girl that was driving the car in the recent accident in New York was actually the one sending the text messages (that was sent roughly 40 seconds before the first 911 call was received about the accident) or not, no one will ever know that. While driving and talking on a phone is pretty attention consuming, one can only imagine how much attention has to be diverted in order to send a text message while driving... Text messaging is another one of those things that is just kind of baffling to me in the first place... If you're going to engage in a game of "text message tag" with someone, why not just call them, instead? The text messaging aspect of the accident in New York is only one of a number of things that bothered me with the situation (driver on probationary license, speeding, etc.), but if it was her that was sending the texts and that's what caused her to lose track of where she was on the road, causing the resulting accident, that's just ridiculous... and idiotic... There, I said it.

I firmly believe (and probably stand to be in a minority) that there should be laws against driving and talking/texting on a phone in every state of the Union.

Move Over, Britney...


So, Mike and I were heading to meet some friends to go to the TooL concert. We got to a stoplight near downtown... I look to my right, and BLAM! I saw this... I had a chance to get a pretty good look at the situation and noted these things:

1.) ~3 year old in the backseat... no car seat... no seatbelt (this was easily gathered from the fact that the kid was flopping around all over the place, at one point standing up in the seat).

2.) incredibly small baby... in mother's lap (held with left hand)... while she is driving...

3.) You cannot see it from this picture, but she is also, with her right hand, talking on a cell phone...

So... how in the world is she possibly driving the car with a baby in one hand and a cell phone to her ear with the other?

I pointed this out to Mike... and proceeded to grab my phone and snap this pic. I was pretty pissed. I got to talking about it and wanted to see if I could grab a shot of her license plate, because I was seriously considering calling Children's Services on the bitch... but by the time it struck me, she was too far back. It still totally enraged me.

So... I didn't get a cake on my birthday, this year... in fact, I don't get cake on my birthday pretty much any year, anymore... because that's just how it goes when you get old, or something. People don't think you want cake. Eleven days after my birthday, the aforementioned Goddess Gina plops this in my hands as I'm leaving work... Devil's Food, with (new) Chocolate Fudge Funfetti icing... Apparently, I had mentioned something about not getting cake, anymore, and she took it upon herself to see that I had one this year, even if it was a little bit late... Well, late or not, it rocked... It lasted all of two sessions before it was totally devoured with heaping glasses of (good, ol' fashioned, whole) milk... because milk is awesome, too. And so is Gina... because she made me yummy cake to eat.

Yeah... I haven't had much to say, lately... I've had a lot to think... just haven't said any of it, I guess...

Big deal, so what, wanna fight about it?

THE VERDICT

So, yeah... There were fliers on all the cars in the lot at work the last few days, talking about the "GAS BOYCOTT..." When I went into work last night, the gas pumps we operate were to capacity almost all night... I found that rather amusing... I found this morning, when I got off work, even more amusing, though...

Price of gas, May 15: $3.19
Price of gas, May 16: $3.29

Yeah, that's right... No thirty cent overnight price drop... but a ten cent price hike... Nice. See what spending all that money on copies of that flier did? Oh... you spent all your money on the fliers and now you have no money for gas? You have to ride your bike everywhere for a while? Cool. ;)

THE SIMPLE TRUTH

So, everyone probably got a copy of the "May 15th Gas Boycott" in one form or another in one of their inboxes... The last one I got looked like this (from myspace):

GAS BOYCOTT - MAY 15TH 2007


Don't pump gas on MAY 15th.

In April 1997, there was a "gas out" conducted nationwide in protest of gas prices. Gasoline prices dropped 30 cents a gallon overnight.

On May 15th 2007, all internet users are to not go to a gas station in protest of high gas prices. Gas is now over $3.00 a gallon in most places.

There are 73,000,000+ American members currently on the internet network, and the average car takes about 30 to 50 dollars to fill up.

If all users did not go to the pump on th 15th, it would take $2,292,000,000.00 (that's almost 3 BILLION) out of the oil companies pockets for just one day, so please do not go to the gas station on May 15 and lets try to put a dent in the Middle Eastern oil industry for at least one day.

If you agree (which I can't see why you wouldn't) resend this to all your contact list. With it saying, "Don't pump gas on May 15th".


So gas up today/tonight if your gonna be needing gas!!

Now... First of all, this is a rehashed email/bulletin that's been going on for years. This supposed "gas out of '97" didn't happen... Gas prices did not drop thirty cents, overnight, or otherwise... But let's just take a little common sense look at why something like this wouldn't work in the first place.

Well, it's really quite simple to explain. Let's suppose that you followed this bulletin's advice and gassed up on, say, the 14th, instead of the 15th. Or let's say you waited until the 16th to go get your gas... You still bought the gas, right? You still drove your car, right? You used the gas, right? So... where's the loss to the "oil companies?" Oh, yeah... that's right... they didn't lose a penny. Gassing up a day early (or a day later) doesn't make a difference because you are still buying the gasoline. Hello??? They're still getting their money (well, they already had it, but that's a different story).

I'm not against, in any way, people wanting to do something good... but sometimes the way they go about it boggles the mind... I've always thought this bulletin/email was ridiculous because the premise is so... so... well, ridiculous. How did they think something like this would work??? Oh, yeah... because they got an email saying it would. I bet they also believe that they can grow more hair, have a bigger penis, get cheaper dope, etc., too...

boy·cott [boi-kot] - Show IPA Pronunciation

–verb (used with object)

1.	to combine in abstaining from, or preventing dealings with, as a means of intimidation or coercion: to boycott a store.

2.	to abstain from buying or using: to boycott foreign products.

–noun

3.	the practice of boycotting.

4.	an instance of boycotting.

---

[Origin: after Charles C. Boycott (1832–97), English estate manager in Ireland, against whom nonviolent coercive tactics were used in 1880]

When the United States government (R.I.P.) boycotts products from another country, they don't say, "We don't want your products, today... but Monday, give us a call," they say, "We don't want your products... period." So you can easily see how the term doesn't even apply to what the email is asking people to do. To boycott, you must do without...

How to affect change: USE LESS GAS. The only way something like this would work is if people would abstain from buying gasoline for several weeks, if not months... can you imagine? Yeah, me, neither. But how about carpooling? Taking the bus/train? Riding your bike to work? God forbid, walking to work (when it's feasible, of course - I wouldn't expect someone that works twenty miles/minutes away to be able to do that)? When I was a kid, I knew a woman that walked about twenty blocks to and from work every day of her life... Not only was she "doing her part" (probably without realizing it), but she managed to help maintain a pretty kickin' body by doing so. Asking people to just sell their cars and walk everywhere isn't all that practical, but the gas we waste on frivolous driving could add up to something, y'know?

Actually, though... If you bought less gas, you don't even really hurt the oil companies... As I stated above, they got paid for the gas you're pumping in your car a long time before it ever made it to your car. The only thing "gas boycotting" really hurts is the gas stations where you get your gas, which have basically no say in the prices of gas in the first place. Which really only goes to reiterate my point... USE LESS... A short-term goal of dropping gas prices thirty cents isn't the big picture (gas prices are based on speculation over months - it takes about two months for a drum of crude oil bought at x dollars to make it to the pumps). Use less, and in time, change for the better will occur.

When I was a kid in the '70s, it seemed like these were always around the house... These were known as "dad's food." See, my dad played music on the weekends, most of the time... There was the occasional weekend where his band didn't have gigs... On some of these weekends, the family would entertain company... and by "entertain," that's what was going on... a lot of laughter, music on the stereo, booze, more laughter... Other weekends were more toned down - my brother and I getting into whatever we could get into (we had air hockey, pinball, board games aplenty... and plenty of things to evoke creativity, as well)... Anyhow, we'd be upstairs in our room, or downstairs in the basement, hangin' out, and Mom and Dad would hang out on the couch, watching television... On Saturday nights, Monty Python's Flying Circus came on PBS at 11pm and then this fairly-new comedy show on NBC called Saturday Night Live would start at 11:30...
I wasn't always allowed to stay up and watch tv with them, but more times than not, I would (and more times than not, I would fall asleep before SNL was over - usually from exhaustion after rollicking through the neighborhood all Saturday with the other neighborhood kids).

Enter "dad's food."

We always had a lot of food around the house - we were a family of eaters, for sure... There were certain foods that we, the kids, weren't allowed to eat... Most notably things like Mom's "Fruzen Glaje" and "Turtles" (I'm sure my brother could add some things to this list, but I'm just remembering the things that I always got in trouble for sneaking and eating) and "dad's food," which usually consisted of Chicken in a Biscuit crackers, those anchovy things packed in a can with the key on them, and these peculiar little sausages... Penrose "Hot" Sausages, to be exact. At one point, Dad let me try one... At the age of eight, I was not impressed... They were so... so... sour, or something... In fact, I was so not impressed, I think I cried with disgust at the taste... I mean, what did I know? I was eight. However, a few years later, I was offered another chance to try one. My last attempt to eat one was immediately brought back to mind with one whiff of the vinegary solution the sausages sat in... but I was going to have another go. This time, the results were much different (I had recently developed a thing (thanks to my brother) for salt an vinegar potato chips, so that's probably where the "tolerance" came from)... I bit into the sausage and... wow! Yummelicious! Not "hot" at all! Not nasty! Tasty! What a treat (for my tongue, not my ten year-old arteries)!

Time moved on, and I got to experience them several more times over the years of Monty Python/SNL/Double Chiller Theater (with Fritz the Night Owl) Saturday Nights... and then... it just kinda stopped... The Penrose quit making their appearance at the household... I had thought that they were no longer even made, anymore...

Recently, a friend of mine brought up "these little pickled sausages" that he used to eat back in the day... "Penrose! Hell yeah!" I replied. Over the next couple days, I began to get a craving for the little sausages in the vinegar pickle... After trolling around the newly revamped Kroger (that now takes up an entire city block - HUGE, I tell ya), Topeka! err... Eureka! In a little corner of the new meat department... there they were... I bought two jars of them. When I got to the car, I opened a jar and the pungent smell immediately transported me back to the '70s... One bite into that little sonofabitch and it was late Saturday night in front of the tv with my family, all over again.

It's funny how a little thing like a pickled sausage can make you feel so good, sometimes.

EDIT: I've gotten a lot of hits dealing with these lovely things... if you'd like to order some, you can do it here. They're a little pricier than they are here at the local grocery, but for those of you with no access to them, I guess it's a small price to pay.

Something tells me
That a drop of your wine
Is sweeter than mine
Someone scared me
Into opening my mind
And drank the poisonous wine

I know I'm not dead
Oh God, I know I'm not dead
I know I'm not dead
Oh God, I know I'm not dead... yet

Something tells me
that your cigarette smoke
Will not make me choke
Something scared me
And I haven't let go
I must face this alone

I know I'm not dead
Oh God, I know I'm not dead
I know I'm not dead
Oh God, I know I'm not dead... yet

The more I believe
The less I enjoy this life
The less I need anyone
The more I need you

The more I need you...

So, there is life after being rescued from a deserted island... Way to go, li'l buddy...
"Skipperrrrrrrrrrr!"

So... Radio talk show host Don Imus got himself into a heap of shit referring to the Rutgers University girls' basketball team in a particularly derogatory fashion, the other day... Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson and many others want him to be fired (apparently, he was first suspended from broadcasting for two weeks and subsequently dropped by MSNBC)... but what about (his producer and "co-host") Bernard McGuirk? He was saying stuff like, "...hardcore hos," and "jigaboos" and no one seems to give a rat's ass... and guest commentator (and former Imus sports announcer until he was fired for basically being a ridiculous douchebag) Sid Rosenberg was right there slingin' stuff, too... and no one's talking about any of them... just Imus. What gives? Aren't they all pretty much accountable for what they said, not just Imus? If one of them is going to get "in trouble," then they all should (yeah, Imus brought it up, but they all were chiming in with their little bits of attempted humor, so how do you put all of the heat on only one of them?)... end of discussion.

Two days off... in a row... Unprecedented... Don't know what to do with all the time... Well, today was "laundry day," which, y'know... Everyone has to do it... I don't mind it, at all. So that took up most of the day... Watched some cool "Classic Album" stuff on VH-1 Classic (Fleetwood Mac's Rumors and Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon), so that's always a plus.

Not sure what to do, tomorrow... Wouldn't mind giving a lesson in the evening. Will probably have to wait and just give guitar lessons Thursday before work, instead... as usual.

Don't know... Will probably just end up sitting around and just enjoying the fact that I don't have to go to work... 'cause that's how I roll... or somethin'.

Those crazy Chinese... I tell ya... And yeah, the inner box is truly attractive.

Being ill at work sucks... I forgot how annoying a runny nose could be until I had to look down every few seconds... for about eight hours...

So, I went the Zicam route... I figured it was better for my blood pressure (I check it every now and then and what used to be pretty normal has turned into what might be described as "pre-prehypertension." That is, it's just elevated a tad... which might be the new "normal" for me... I mean that whole 120/80 thing was kinda abandoned some years back as being the "normal" standard... Just like everything, I'm sure it depends more on the person than anything else). Anyhow, it seems that Zicam is basically a couple forms of zinc... I was going to get the q-tip-type devices that you stick up your nose, but opted for the melty-lozenge-type devices... They say they're "citrus-flavored," which they are, but they're more chaky like a three year-old regular Tums, or something... and they kinda make my mouth and throat feel strange while they dissolve (they're probably radioactive or something)... It didn't really do much for me while I was at work... I was too busy working my ass off to relax and try to feel any kind of better... So I was pretty miserable, but now, after being home a while and having another melty lozenge thing, I guess I may feel a little better... And a good thing about it is that, like, I'm not sitting here feeling my heartbeat in my fingertips from Comtrex... So, after some time where I wasn't sure it was doing anything... I think it may... MAY be doing something, after all. I hope so, because that shit was sure expensive.

What sucks worse than being ill at work is being ill on a day off... If I didn't have to teach in the evening, I'd probably just stay in bed all day and drink orange juice and watch tv... but I can't... because people need to learn and I need to show them some of the things I know...

I figured it was only a matter of time before I got sick... Caught a minor cold from someone at work... Head stuffy... bit of a headache... but that's about it. Think I may try some of that Zicam stuff tonight to see if it's worth a crap... or I'll just get the ol' standard Comtrex... although it always does tricks with my blood pressure... so maybe I'll go the homeopathic route.

Still haven't seen Zodiac...

Torn

Well, okay... I have a Friday night off... which is kinda rare... Zodiac is out in theaters, tonight... and I really want to see it... really. The problem - I rarely go to movies on opening night (there are and always will be exceptions, of course)... basically because I don't like to watch movies with a buttload of people talking and getting phone calls and all that shit that makes me want to punch them... or at least berate them in front of their friends. The conundrum lies in that I have always been really interested in the zodiac killer and stuff (well, serial killers in general, actually), since I was a kid, even... This is one of those movies that I would probably be willing to sit in a theater full of people for... but I would probably enjoy the movie much more in a matinée setting during another day off (like Monday... or Thursday)... with much less in the way of distractions... but I really wanna see this movie... or, I could stay home, order some food (for a change) and go to bed early... and just go to a matinée later in the week. Bah... Making stupid decisions sucks, sometimes.

I've been working my ass off, lately... I haven't felt like doing much besides sleeping and eating... Work makes me sore (besides tired and hungry)... I feel old, sometimes, because I ache so much when I wake up... well, not everyday... just most days.

I've worked 18 of the last 21 days... I guess I'm only in it for the money, because I'm definitely not in it for the lack of social life/sleep/any kind of quality time to d anything... that's for sure.

I did something the other day that I haven't done in many, many years... I drank a Mountain Dew with dinner. After I finished it, I quickly remembered why I quit drinking it all those years ago... because it doesn't taste good... at all. In fact, it tastes quite bad. Blecch, even.

I came across THIS SITE the other day... have to say, it's one of the funniest things I've found thus far in 2007... I mean, some of the girls are kind of cute (many of them really aren't all that, or even a bag of chips)... the text leaves a bit to be desired (well, some of the haiku are pretty funny)... but the guys are truly what make the site... Everyone knows these guys... faux-"metrosexual" *shudder* dweebs in (mostly) horrible attire, hitting poses that strike fear into the hearts of normal men (and women), everywhere. Don't you wish you could be as cool as these guys obviously are trying very hard to make you believe they are?

I have a couple things I wanna post about... but I can't really until I get my camera back from one of the guys at work (a friend of mine's old house burned down the other day and the guy at work lives right by it, so I asked him to go take some pictures for me to send to my friend (who now lives in Vermont)).

Well, there are a couple other things I could post about... but I don't know if I really wanna get into it, at the moment... I'm not sure how it will go over, so I should probably just keep it to myself and think it all through some more before I start talking about it "out loud," so to speak.

Since I got my archives back (with a simple, clever little snip of code)... I've been sitting here going back and reading some old posts... (Something I've noticed is that some posts that have comments don't reflect having them on the page)

Anyhow...









You called me "honey..." So unlike you...









Thank you... Three-plus years late, mind you... but nonetheless...

Jesteś tak piękna.

That dream makes me think of this song a lot, too (although "Secret Journey" was actually in the dream):

"Rien de dormir cette nuit
Je veux de toi jusqu'à ce que je sois sec
Mais nos corps sont tout mouillés
complètement couvert de sueur
Nous nous noyons dans la marée
Je n'ai aucun désir
Tu as ravagé mon coeur
et moi, j'ai bu ton sang

Mais non pouvons faire ce que nous voulons
j'aurai toujours faim de toi

Tout le monde est à moi
Je l'ai gagné dans un jeu de cartes
Et maintenant je m'en fous
C'était gagné trop facilement
Ça y est alors ma belle traîtresse
Il faut que je brûle de jalousie
Tu as ravagé mon coeur
et moi, j'ai bu ton sang

Mais non pouvons faire ce que nous voulons
j'aurai toujours faim de toi

J'aurai toujours faim de toi..."

(pardon the possible poor French skills)

"Upon a secret journey
I met a holy man
His blindness was his wisdom
I'm such a lonely man

And as the world was turning
It rolled itself in pain
This does not seem to touch you
He pointed to the rain

And on the days that followed
I listened to his words
I strained to understand him
I chased his thoughts like birds

You will see light in the darkness
You will make some sense of this
And when you've made your secret journey
You will find this love you miss..."

One of my absolute most favorite songs, ever (which includes another song from the same band that most people have probably never heard - two, actually, all three from the same album... well, one song is actually an outtake from it, but still (edit: actually, that whole album is one of the most awesome things ever recorded))... Makes me feel 12, again... I don't know why it came to me this morning (in a dream)... well... yes I do... but I woke up from an incredibly deep sleep at about 10 and haven't been able to get it out of my head, since... I tried playing it... then playing it on my guitar... walked around downtown for a while... still with me...

My brain is fuckin' awesome, sometime.

About 20 years ago, a friend of mine (who I still talk with all the time) and I always did this thing... where we would mix up those old sayings... "Put an egg in your shoe and beat it..." "Make like a tree and leave..." "Make like a banana and split..." and all those... So it would be like, "Put an egg in your shoe and split," "Make like a banana and beat it..." One day, I said, "Well, I'm gonna make like a tree and get the fuck out of here..." That has stuck around, to this day...

So, I was watching a clip from "The Boondock Saints," here, and in the first five minutes of the movie, an old bartender (apparently with Tourette's) who gets his sayings confused uttered that very same sentence... Now I feel like whenever I say that, people are gonna think I copied it (20 years ago) from a movie (that came out in '99) I haven't seen a frame of (until tonight)... Oh, well... I didn't... so, there.

There we go... sweet shoes... I told you so...

I remember him having that tool set... I think I broke the hammer... I broke a lot of shit of his...

Note... on the stack of records in the corner... on top... oh, yeah... Stan Kenton Christmas... of course.

Also note... groovy professor owl.

Last note... again... apparently recovering from falling down... I must've done that a lot, too.

Here's a pic where we kind of look alike (after a bit of restoration), I guess... roughly the same age (click it to see me in all my navy jumper glory)... with her dad... and one of our cats (Woody) going for "de rrreebon..." Apparently, I am in the midst of trying to pump up... or falling over, possibly... Wish you could see the shoes... they were awesome.

I think she looks like her mom, but that's just me.

I am told that she and I resemble each other... or at least when I was a little kid like that, anyway... um... sans the blonde hair and all, of course... I guess I can see it.

"From one island to another
Winds shifting
Currents cover
The navigations
These separations
Rowing home alone

A beach
A blazing fire
Lighthouse eyes
Nighttime desire
She walks alone
Skips a stone
From one island to another

So what have I to give her
Stars shine
Waves whisper
The constellations
Conversations
One island to another..."

"I found my loco girl again
All still, no word for where she'd been
I sense the memories on her skin
Like broken glass had broke her in
and I in exile recognize a friend

These chains grow stronger every year
Will she defect or disappear?
This world can hold her in sway
Maybe she'll take me there someday
When I find my loco girl again..."

A sandwich walks into a bar and tries to order a double scotch. The bartender looks at the sandwich and says, "Sorry buddy, we don't serve food here..."

I made a friend at work, last night...
From the looks of her, she was either lost, or dropped off...
Her coat was extremely soft... no funk... she was in good health and all... indoor cat... just cold and hungry... I bought some cat treats at lunch and she scarfed them down, happily...

We hung out and I let her get warm in my lap... One of the girls at was going to take her home when she got off after me.

My niece (Violet) and I were hanging out the other day, watching "Hello, Kitty."

At one point, she asked me to take a picture of her ear (maybe so she could see what it looks like?)... so I obliged.