and some interesting insight from dan savage
nine months, one week – just about enough time for me to have been pregnant. but this isn’t about an addition, it’s actually a subtraction, i shaved.
for the first time since november 1, 2007, i am clean-shaven. it wasn’t planned. i was trying to neaten up, had an oops moment and decided that it would be a good time to start over. besides, i haven’t had a single donation to my fund-a-stache in five months.
clean-shaven for the first time since november 1
it’s kind of liberating, considering i’ve had some sort of consistent facial hair growth for almost a year. the ‘stache and beard will be back but i think i may enlist some professional help for the grooming. anyone know a good barber?
Politics is the Art of Controlling your Environment
That is one of the key things I learned in these years, and I learned it the hard way. Anybody who thinks that “it doesn’t matter who’s Presided” has never been Drafted and sent off to fight and die in a vicious, stupid War on the other side of the World? Or been beaten and gassed by the Police for trespassing on public property?or been hounded by the IRS for purely political reasons?or locked up in the Cook County Jail with a broken nose and no phone access and twelve perverts wanting to stomp your ass in the shower. That is when it matters who is President or Governor or Police Chief. That is when you will wish you had voted.
Hunter S. Thompson
I’m at the claims office waiting to give the adjustor my police report and took a moment to test of wordpress iPhone app. I have to say I’m pretty impressed. I can tag and add categories and it’s taken less than 90 seconds to get most of this text typed.
this make actually get me posting more often because I can write as I think about it, save a draft and come back to it later and just post and edit later.
oh technology, thou art sweet.
Ventura County Star, August 3, 2008
why would you spend close to or over $2B, that’s $2,000,000,000 for a job that pays $200,000. there is a fundamental flaw in logic there plus if you think about it for too long you realise at some point, that various makers that make up that money will come due.
these are the thoughts that prevent me from getting to excited this election cycle.
it’s been an interesting couple of days, on saturday i celebrated my 37th birthday and on monday i came home to realise that someone had broken into my house. i’m not quite at the anger stage yet. in all honesty, i’m not sure i’m going to get there. i’m just glad that no one was home or maybe that might have dissuaded them.
it was very methodical but strange robbery, they took the obvious stuff, like the laptops and ipods and the wii, but the keyboards, mice, iphone dock, usb hub, airport express, taking the time to looking for the wiimotes and the games, and turning off the a/c completely baffles me. there is a sense of violation but i feel oddly detached at the moment, i keep thinking it’s just stuff and we’ve got pretty good insurance, not because the electronics in the house but because we’ve got close to 1500 books. electronics can be replaced, signed douglas adams books cannot. i’m taking the morning off to deal with the insurance and alarm people. i’m making an itemised list of the stuff we’re missing and i have to make a couple calls to track down the serial numbers.
i keep wondering if i should be feeling something else besides relief and this absolute calm. i can’t say that i’ve ever been burgled before so there’s no reference. all in all i’m really that upset, it’s inconvenient that i’m using the child’s keyboard and mouse. it’s inconvenient that i’m sharing the desktop with victoria but i’m glad we had a backup of her machine so she can use my machine without any hiccups. speaking of which, based on the last time machine backup, i have a pretty good idea when they broke into the house and i passed that info onto the police. the officer was very nice but pointed out it looked professional. there were no fingerprints and they took high ticket items that were portable, they obviously knew what they were doing.
i am exhausted beyond belief. there was a time when i could pull an all night and it would not affect me, those days are long gone, i’m ready to put my head down on my desk and sleep, we’ll see if this holds when i get home.
i’ve had occasion to think about political correctness and more recently i was asked to participate in a diversity and inclusion pilot program. fundamentally a good idea for most people, not so much me, i have real issues with trying to force people to be tolerant of each other. the process started with a questionnaire designed to evaluate how culturally sensitive you are. according to the survey my weak points are diversity related publications (does stuffwhitepeoplelike count?), diversity litigation and how i feel about people.
this question continues to fascinate me – i see people positively. one a scale of 1-5 where 1 = never and 5 = always, i scored it – 1. individuals i’m willing to give some variance and accept on their own recognisance, but people as a whole… the mob mentality equals dangerous. what was the blue oyster cult lyric, when you listen to fools the mob rules. i think it works both ways.
vic is more than a little upset about the shooting at the UU church in knoxville. it was her spiritual home while she lived in knoxville, i believe she knew of the people that died and in the week just after 9/11, it was one of the places she felt safe. now a little bit of that sanctuary has been taken away.
one of the reasons i love vic is her faith in humanity and it’s saddens me to see her hurt like this.
i’m a bit of a cynic and there is very little in the news that surprises me, but still i’m finding it more and more difficult, as i follow this story in various media, to remain calm. in the light of this tragedy there are people that are saying that they brought this on themselves. the implication that someone deserves to be shot because their morality isn’t the same as your sickens me.
a man made the ultimate sacrifice yesterday, he gave his life to save others and it angers me that it’s being belittled by people who clearly have no concept of what christianity is. if you claim to be a christian and can’t find compassion in your heart then you’re missing the point. the most basic tenet of christian, to love one another, seems to be getting left by hate-mongers who insist on placing divisive dogma and their petty conception of god ahead of all else.
actually help some other people out. moustache may has come and gone and not one person has contributed to my fund-a-stache, although, it should be said it didn’t do much to promote it. i was busy, i had a lot to do, blah, blah, blah. now it’s the beginning of july, i’m issuing a challenge – i will trim a portion of the ‘stache off for every $100 raised so that by the time i’m close to $500 goal i will be left with a ‘chaplin,’ now who wouldn’t pay to see that. conversely you can donate to ensure that the ‘chaplin’ doesn’t ever happen. ask captain planet used to say, the choice is yours. and to add to the challenge i’m willing to do stupid ‘stache tricks to ensure that i reach the goal, donate and leave a message with your request.
cough up the monies here to support the galaxy star drug awareness program.
