I've resorted to new a low. (Or high)

Inspired by a blog called The Casual Friday which I recently noticed highlighted in the Blogger dashboard, I decided I would share my own work story, although maybe it's more personal than work related. Whatever though.

Each week, a free local computer mag gets delivered to work. They stack them in the lunchroom/breakroom. Normally when I go to the bathroom to take a crap, there are at least two of them wedged in between the stall door and the wall. This may sound weird, but they're there, and crapping is just much better while you having something to read. So I usually read whatever is in there. Usually it is the said computer mag, sometimes it's not. And sometimes, there's nothing at all. Can you believe it?

Coincidentally, I like to read in my real "free time" as well. So I decided, a book is small enough to fit in a pocket, and for those unfortunate times when there is no reading material in the bathroom, I decided to bring my own. It has been working quite well, I must say. I can usually knock out a chapter or so.

So I guess I've resorted to a new low. (Or high)

Close but not quite

I was watching the news this morning while I was at the gym, and I caught a bit about rising gas prices. Same story as the past few years, right? But then it dawned on me. I, and many others like myself, complain about lack of real news coverage, and then they have this gas price bit, and the first thought I have is, "Why is this getting coverage with all the other stuff that should be covered?" But then it hits me, stories like this are good, but they miss the point. They are so close, but so far. Instead of having stupid polls about gas prices and how upset people are getting, they should throw in some actual useful information instead. Like reasons why gas prices are rising. Perhaps the story is a good segue to letting people know that gas and oil aren't forever. That prices are rising because demand is outpacing supply (and that prices are tightly controlled by OPEC, but that's another story). And this "new" gas story can give people gas saving tips, and maybe tell those who drive Hummers that they are idiots and are killing the world every time they fire up the Hummer to drive down the street to pick up their pizza. And while they're at it they can tell them that no one cares that they have a small penis.

I had the same realization about lack of enthusiasm for recycling too. Instead of putting the information where only the people who already recycle will find it, they need to have public service announcements to do it. They should put them on TV and the radio, where everyone will see or hear it. Just stick it in between American Idol segments or something.

For instance here in San Diego people love to talk about how great the city is, but most probably don't know that it is predicted that the city landfill will reach capacity in 7 years. Then we'll be swimming in shit, literally. My question is, if they can spend money to tell people to eat California cheese and that milk does a body good, why can't they say to separate trash and recyclables, or else your wonderful city will soon have a serious problem?

Hmmm.

Back from a much needed vacation

Ahh. Got back yesterday from vacation. I went with my fiance to visit my family in Connecticut. While we were there were took a few side trips to keep the sanity. We spent a night in good old New York City, staying right near Times Square. It was an awesome trip. We took the train from CT to Grand Central, and basically just did a bunch of walking around. We also saw Phantom of the Opera, which for me was the first time going to a musical or play or whatever it's called. We hung out in Central Park, walked through Greenwich Village, SoHo, and even walked across the Brooklyn Bridge.

We also drove out to Rhode Island and went to Newport for an afternoon. The weather was perfect, and it was a very relaxing day. I especially enjoy driving the back roads of Eastern Connecticut, which are a welcome change from San Diego.

In between those few trips, I got to hang out with my parents and my brother and sister in law. All in all it was a great trip, my first real "vacation" type trip in about a year. I'm not quite ready to be back and work, and am busy planning and scamming our next getaway.

Buzzworthy

As I was writing my previous post, I could hear the buzz in the office.

Co-worker#1: "Hang him"
Co-worker#2: "Do you have TV so we can watch the verdict?"
Co-worker#3: "I don't know what to believe, I'm not sure if he's guilty"

Peope are more excited than I have seen them in a while. It's really sad to me that it takes the Michael Jackson verdict to get people interested in the news. We like to complain that the news is all crap, but really it is a perfect fit for the American People. For all the complaints, it is exactly what we want.

I'll admit, there's some sick and morbid curiousity when it comes to Michael Jackson. I could stare at his face for hours trying to figure out what is what. And even throughout history we've had public trials. People love it. And I guess I do too.

What we need to do is start prepending the Michal Jackson stories with snippets like "Thousands Killed In Darfur", "Bush Lies But People Don't Care", "Town Loses Clean Drinking Water Because Of Corporate Policy".

Think that'd work?

Middle class guilt

It has been brought to my attention recently that I have a knack for depressing people. Not because I myself am depressed or because I a negative person, but because I talk about things going on in the world that most people would like to pretend don't exist. And of course you can't blame people. When your life is good why would you to concern yourself with these awful things that go on all around the world?

For me, it's not even that I am out to save the world. I'm not an activist, and I don't yell at people who choose to stay ignorant. I just like to know that when all is said and done I will be able to look back and know that even if I didn't necessarily make a difference, that I was aware and didn't have a negative impact. I guess part of it is guilt too. I guess you could call it white middle class guilt. In my mind it's really only luck that I was born where I was born as myself, for I could just have easily been born in Sudan or some other place where I was given a life without hope.

I am going to try to be more hopeful in my blog going forward. Although I feel another "what the hell is wrong with people" post coming on....

How I Spend My Day

This is a view of how I spend my day. An actual photo of my cubicle:

If I get lucky and am successful with this then maybe one day I will spend my day like this:

Or maybe like this:

That would be nice.

Dangerous women

We have murderers, rapists, violent criminals, and other crazy ass people who are out walking the streets every day. We have all sorts illegal activities which probably transpire behind closed doors more often than most people think. We have a president and a vice president who themselves have engaged in dirty, underhanded, and illegal activities.* Hell, we are fighting a war on terror, and bringing freedom to the oppressed. (read: sarcastic).

You would think with all this going on our federal government would be busy bees. Nope. When will I stop seeing stories about old, ill, women being ARRESTED for smoking pot in their own homes when all the aforementioned things are going on. If a sick (in some cases terminally ill) woman can briefly forget about her illness, and have a few moments free of pain, by getting high, why should our tax dollars be paying to have her house raided and her arrested? Our federal government needs to seriously change its priorities. Old terminally ill women should be pretty low on list in my opinion.

*Ex. The president sold 212,140 shares (66%) of Harken Energy on June 22, 1990, netting nearly $850,000, while serving on the company's board of directors. Two months later, the stock plummetted after the company disclosed that it was carrying a larger debt and announced losses for its results in the second quarter of 1990. Although the White House claims that on the date of the sale, Bush filed a Form 144, also known as a Notice of Intent to Sell, he did not file the Form 4, the form reporting the sale, until March 1991, more than eight months later. This is a clear violation of federal law. According to the law, an insider is "legally required to disclose publicly by the 10th day of the month following the transaction any purchase or sale of stock in that company." So clearly Bush violated Federal Law is this case.

Walmart

I've never really shopped at Walmart just because I don't like it. The store is too big, and believe it or not there has never been one located conveniently for me. Of course I've always heard about how they treat their employees, and all those other stories about how they force small businesses out, so these just give me more incentive to not shop there. I don't really give a crap about their low prices, because I have a pretty good idea why they're so low.

So anyway, I just recently heard the following statistic: Bill Gates has donated more to charity in the past year than Walmart has every year combined since it's been a behemoth company.

For a company of its size, and especially considering the issues and neglect of their employees when it comes to pay and benefits, this is pretty sad huh? Even if it's not entirely true.

Even thought Gates and Microsoft throw their weight around when it comes to business, at least they're generous with what they make.