Why.

Please burn a candle of peace today.

I miss the pre-9/11 USA.

A JetBlue flight attendant lost it on a passenger who was trying to get up and get his luggage when he shouldn’t have been. Said flight attendant approach the passenger, who was pulling his luggage out of the overhead compartment and hit the flight attendant in the head (probably on accident). The flight attendant asked for an apology, the passenger had some more clever words to say, so the flight attendant then spewed some profanity over the PA system and in one of the best dramatic exits in a while, opened an emergency exit and slid down the chute and went home.

The plane had already landed at JFK when this occurred.

While I do find the exit and slide to be a little much, I must say that I don’t blame the flight attendant one bit. Airline passengers are a bit hard to take these days and quite frankly if everyone would remember that the flight attendants’ primary job is to keep everyone onboard safe instead of just handing out bags of chips and half cans of a pop, the travel world would be a happier place.

Yes, security is ridiculous and airlines charge too much and screaming kids ruin everything but you know what, no one is forcing you on that plane and unless you’re hopping a pond somewhere, you can damn well drive or teleconference or look at someone else’s postcards of Disney World. So when the flight attendant tells you to sit down, put your seat belt on and enjoy a rerun of “Seinfeld”, you better well do it.

And count your blessings that the queen on the slide today didn’t really go postal and do some serious damage.

I would like to take a few moments and review some very basic principles on how to conduct yourself at a local restaurant during the busy lunch hour. The restaurant in question is my beloved Subway in Johnstown, New York, which is owned by Chris and Jami. This Subway is nothing short of outstanding and should be treated with the respect and courtesy deserving of what is probably one of the finest Subway restaurants in the chain.

Let’s start at the very beginning, since it’s a very good place to start.

First of all, this fine city in the foothills of the Adirondacks is on the way to one of the more popular tourist destinations in the northeast. Therefore, many choose to stop at one of the fine restaurants as they make their way up to vacation time. My first tip: a Ford F350 that is towing a 30-foot Prowler camper, which is towing a speed boat, which in turn is towing a VW Rabbit from some bygone era (we won’t mention the handicapped plates on the Rabbit) is not going fit into the reserved parking spot near the front door for the not mentioned handicapped consumer. You’re going to have to find a different parking spot; may I suggest somewhere in New Jersey, as I hear the Jersey Shore has a lot of ocean to enjoy, unless you go to the Jersey Shore in Pennsylvania by mistake.

Once in line to order your food, please stow your cell phone. No one wants to hear your conversation as everyone has a cell phone now and unless you’re doing a reenactment of Zach’s role on “Saved By The Bell”, you’re not special for having a phone. In fact, talking on the phone whilst in line is quite rude. Might I suggest that you shove the device squarely up your ass and let the caller listen to your bad gas since you chose to share with the rest of the line whilst you were on the phone.

Like most Subway restaurants, Chris and Jami have a beautiful menu with appetizing pictures of their selections as well as a complete list of everything they offer. Nowhere, and believe me, I had time to look while you were making up your mind, is there even a suggestion that “french fries” are available to order.

Since the primary reason Subway exists is to sell sandwiches, chances are there is going to be some bread involved. A look of bewilderment should not be your answer to “what kind of bread would you like?” Now I know that Subway offers more choices for bread than the number of choices on your average American ballot for President, but try. And again, there’s pictures AND words right smack in front of you. Point if you have to.

I’m not going to dwell on the fact that yes, a toasted sub is hot.

Even though Chris and Jami have chosen to display their vegetables in a very eye pleasing manner, they’re still vegetables. They won’t dance. They won’t sing. They taste the same as the frozen veggies that you may thaw someday or god forbid, something you grew in your garden. Lettuce is lettuce.

When you get to the register, you will be asked if you have a Subway card. This gives you the opportunity for ‘frequent flyer miles’ to accompany your Subway purchase. The question posed to you has two answers: yes or no. If the first thought that comes to your mind is, “What is it?”, then the answer is “no”. Again, the simple creed of being aware of your surroundings would answer any other question as there is a rack in front of you with hundreds of cards to choose from. If you don’t have a card, grab it and have the cashier swipe it. See there? You can make your answer a simple “yes” with a little forethought.

Now, I know this last part is a little tricky, but try to stay focused. If you purchase a meal, you will be handed a cup. From there, proceed to the drink station, where you have a wide selection of soda pop or iced teas. There is plenty of ice, covers for your cup and an assortment of straws covered for sanitary purposes. Every pop dispenser says “push”. Waving the cup under the spigot is going to accomplish nothing. I will push the button for you for no more than one second before giving you a deadly glare and simply stating one word, “Really?”

Heed my advice and you’ll be a smart Subway consumer in no time. Ignore my advice and consider yourself warned.

So a downstate elected official introduced a bill to ban the use of salt in restaurant kitchens in an effort to get the populous healthier. Do I find this intrusive? Of course I do. While moderating salt intake is a good idea, it is the responsibility of each individual to be sensible, not the government’s.

Now this same official has introduced a bill to require the use of helmets on ski slopes. He has admitted he’s never been skiing. Again, this is another attempt of an elected official to try to legislate personal responsibility. Helmets on skiiers and snowboarders? Yes, if they’re young children or if you want to but it shouldn’t be a law.

I believe this official, who’s name escapes me at the moment and I’m typing this in the car so I can’t look it up, should be relieved of his overzealous approach to governing the people at the earliest opportunity. However, I want this to go a step further.

If the folks in Albany truly cared about it’s citizens, they would introduce legislation that would split the state into two parts for bills of this nature. Elected officials that have never been north of Yonkers have no right to introduce laws that will affect people that live 400 miles away in an area that some in NYC describe as a “snowy Alabama”. This would be like a Buffalo legislator introducing a bill requiring the use of snowmobiles on all city streets in the state when there is more than two inches of snow on the ground. Upstate (north and west of Kingston) is an entirely different world than downstate and I firmly believe that both sides of that cultural divide would be better off if they split into two legislative districts. I don’t know how this would be accomplished but I wish someone would figure it out.

The holiday season is in full swing and naturally folks are out buying a bunch of stuff at Crazy Eddie’s unbelievably low prices in an effort to make their loved ones happy and buy their way back to good graces after being mean as hell the rest of the year.

How’s THAT for gaiety!

I made a public declaration that I want little for Christmas this year, yet I want to shower others with gifts. I surpassed my allotted budget days ago and it’s only the 3rd. I just started shopping on the 1st. Perhaps I’m trying to make up for being mean as hell or something.

One of the things that makes me insane about this time of year is being forced to listen to Christmas music. I want to enjoy the soothing sounds of the holiday on my own terms. My mother used to crank up an album she had picked up at Grants or Two Guys; I think it was called “The White Family Christmas”. I have to admit I used to enjoy that album when I was a kid, even through the tiny speakers on the GE Wildcat record player. I liked the fact that we would listen when we were in the mood to listen.

The Big.Thing. in this area is for radio stations to go to all Christmas music in an effort to boost ratings increase ad revenue bring joy and merriment to the masses. (Don’t ever believe that commercial radio stations are there to entertain the public, it’s just another industry that has been perverted into a sole money maker and nothing more). Anyways, if I don’t plug in my iPhone when I get in the car, I can either listen to: NPR, all country Christmas music, all Christmas music that is lite and easy or all Christmas music that is fast and peppy. Well, there’s always death metal or a wide array of “you’re going to die and go to hell” Christian stations to choose from, so I guess I’m blessed to have choices. I usually settle on NPR.

At work someone wise decided that we needed the radio station of their choice pumped through the no-fidelity intercom speakers. The station of choice is the lite and easy station, which plays “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun” every day on the 30th minute of a given hour, which will be followed up with “Hold On” by Wilson Philips 45 minutes later, which will be followed by Cher and “Believe” exactly 37 minutes later. All of this is interspersed with Huey Lewis and the News and heaping helpings of Sheena Easton. She takes the morning train. To maintain my sanity, I bought a raffle ticket for a Remington 30-06 with scope so that I can shoot out the speaker.

On December 1, Sheena, Huey and friends were retired for continuous Christmas and holiday music. It is now December 3 and I’m now hoping that I win the gun instead of using my luck to win the lottery. I don’t think that this season of peace should involve the hopes of winning a gun in a raffle but I’m desperate.

I really just want some peace.

So last weekend I made my way into Canada during our travels. The border crossing of choice was at the 1000 Islands. This is not uncommon for me.

The 1000 Islands border crossing is not overly busy outside of tourist season and that’s actually one of the reasons I like crossing there. Crossing the border is a game of chance no matter where you’re doing it. Sometimes the customs officer is reasonably nice, other times they’re quite cranky and rarely do you drive away thinking they were actually friendly. The cranky level goes up depending on which direction you’re traveling in. You’re usually welcomed into “The Land of the Free” by very surly people. Heading the other direction makes you feel like the whole experience had a touch of maple syrup sugary sweetness.

As we crossed the bridge from Wellesley Island to Hill Island, I noticed that something was amiss. Everyone was stopping before the Canadian customs station. Trucks with flashing lights were being used to herd all the vehicles into one lane all the way to the left. As we got closer I realised that we were being herded into one of the U.S. Customs lanes and passing through it backwards (since it’s designed for traffic moving in the other direction). There was a whole bunch of U.S. Customs officers inspecting vehicles leaving the U.S.

Um, why?

Now I understand that the customs folks are there to keep the U.S. safe at all points of entry. They look for a whole variety of illegal activities going on. Now that everyone has to have some sort of passport to get back into the states it’s become very, very militaristic. I laugh when I look at some of my old maps from the 60s and 70s which tell how to cross the border easily and efficiently and tout the U.S.-Canadian border as “the easiest border to cross in the world”, because that is hardly the case in this day and age.

I’m sorry, I believe that it’s Canada’s job to inspect people headed into their country. I do not believe that the U.S. should be inspecting my credentials, vehicle, etc. as we are *leaving* the country.

As I pulled up to this impromptu U.S. inspection station our passports were taken and numerous questions were fired off.

“Where are you going?”
“What’s your citizenship?”
“Where do you live?”
“What do you do for a living?”
“How do you know each other?”

Now that last question can be interesting for us. It was our friend dave that was crossing with me this time, and we met dave through online connections. Explaining this is difficult to U.S. border agents because they apparently haven’t heard of the internet yet and they don’t fathom the idea that we have met friends online. The relatively homely woman looked at me askance when I told her that we had met online and had been friends for a few years.

After a few more questions I was told to put the car into park (of course I said, “it’s a stick so I’ll go with neutral”) and several people rifled through the things in the back of my car. I heard murmurs of discussion and bags being rifled through. I smirked. I don’t really care anymore when they go through my bags. I think I’m going to start packing some really shocking underwear or magazines or something to give them something to talk about at their coffee break. I noticed that I didn’t hear the bags zip close before they slammed down the hatch.

A few more questions from the homely woman and off we were a few hundred feet to the Canadian border station, where the pleasant (and pleasantly bearded) official asked where were going, for how long, if we had anything in the car like tobacco, alcohol or firearms and then we were told to have a nice day. Off we were to the 401.

As a tax paying American citizens I have a Really Big Problem with the United States government inspecting me as I LEAVE the United States. I really don’t think it’s any of their business as to when I’m leaving the states. I think they should only care when I coming back into the states, and then I think that they’re inspection process is overly intrusive, laughable and ridiculous. One is assumed to be nearly a criminal these days and I don’t appreciate it at all. I thought things would ease up a little bit when Obama took office in January but no, it’s the same old, same old as when GWB was there.

I don’t know if the 1000 Islands border control is overly zealous or what but that’s the third time that I have had such an intrusive crossing experience. I was thinking that I have a note on a file somewhere but the outgoing U.S. border officers didn’t scan my passport, they just searched and grilled me.

I don’t feel any safer, I don’t feel any comfort and I am certainly not happy being treated like this by my own country, which is supposedly “The Land of the Free”. I felt a great deal of comfort when we were finally in Canada.

To me that’s a little sad.

It’s 4 a.m. and I am wide awake. Not only am I wide awake, but I’m feeling very rested. I feel like I could take on the day today without a care in the world and have a really good day. I am hyped up, amped up and ready to go. But in the back of my mind I’m wondering if I would fade before noon.

I have an ear bug replaying over and over. This time it’s Reba McEntire’s “I’m A Survivor”, the version used for her television show “Reba”. Lucky me, I even have visuals to go along with it.

I’m up and around writing in my blog during this little episode of insomnia hoping that it will somehow make me sleepy and I’ll be able to finish my night’s sleep. I’m sure this little ditty of a blog entry has made someone, somewhere fall asleep.

So Earl and I just got back from doing our civic duty and voting in the local elections. There were two referendums on the ballot: one was for New York State to turn some land over to one of the power companies so they could put a 48kV powerline along Route 56 somewhere in the North Country, the other was to allow prison inmates to work for not-for-profit organizations.

There were many choices on the ballot for the smattering of offices we were voting for. Many choices were the same vertically – the same person was running on Democrat, Republican, Independent and Conservative ticket. Some choices didn’t have a Democrat running at all. I did make choices in all elections though.

When we walked into the Town Hall we instantly knew something was decidedly different from previous voting experiences. There was no sound of levers being ticked, no crunching of the big red handle opening the curtain and locking in your vote. No. All the ceremony is gone. You now sign in, are handed a score card, instructed to fill in the square completely in a black, felt-tipped pen and sent to a bank of cubicles that really don’t afford any privacy. Gone are the days where no one else was allowed in the voting booth with you. Gone are the days when you cast your vote in confidence and felt like you were making a difference with the pull of a lever. Gone are the days when your vote was confirmed with the swing of the big red lever and a woosh of the curtains.

You now fill in squares with a black pen and take your scorecard to a big electronic machine and feed it into a document scanner. The LCD screen tells you that your vote is registered. There isn’t even a beep nor is there a Happy Mac icon congratulating you on being a good American.

I asked every election official that I had contact with if they liked the new voting machines and if it made their work any easier or more efficient.

It was a “NO” on all accounts. This is a waste of the taxpayer’s money. In the 1980s the local Super Duper (grocery store) didn’t replace their large, hulking mechanical cash registers until they broke down and were no longer functional. And when it was time to replace them, they did it one at a time. New York State should replace these machines one by one as they start to malfunction, giving the voters a choice between the old and new machines until the old machines are no longer viable.

I’m a geek. I am a certified geek. I have many documents saying how geeky I am. I’m even considering a geek tattoo.

I HATE HATE HATE HATE electronic voting. I don’t trust the voting machines. I don’t trust the companies that make them, I don’t trust the programmers that program them and I certainly don’t trust that they’re going to scan my black dot correctly and accurately. They do NOT make the process simpler for the voting citizen and they are not a step in the right direction.

I feel like voting has gone from a participatory to a spectator sport. I am not comfortable with this at all.

Bad move.

I have grown tired of trying to keep up with the news. Usually I like trying to have a handle on what is going on in the world but I’m finding myself either distrusting or just plain angry when I watch or listen to the news. If I want something ‘fair and balanced’, I opt to read or listen to the BBC. There are no ads and they’re not being lobbied against (that I’m aware of) so I figure they’re the most neutral thing out there. That’s a good thing.

At work we are being told that pay cuts are still in place, with some hopes of a partial reinstatements possibly at the end of the year, while others on the news and various politicians are spewing talking points about how the recession is over, the economy is recovering, the stimulus package is working and we are just a melodic introduction away from a heart-warming rendition of “Kumbaya”.  I want to believe that, I really do, but the only signs of the stimulus package I have seen in our area is a six-month old photo of an older man in a suit with a shovel full of dirt somewhere on Long Island as he builds a bike path in his Armani getup.

By the way, economy graded gas was $2.65 9/10 per gallon at 7 a.m.  At 11 a.m. it was $2.79 9/10 per gallon.  That’s a 6% jump in four hours.  It was $2.29 9/10 per gallon in Lynchburg, Va. last week.  The lowest I have seen here in months is $2.65 9/10.

I refuse to ignore that “9/10” of a cent from this moment forward.  “How much is that candy bar?”  We’d pitch a fit if the cashier responded “$1.29 9/10”.

My head is still in a great place after this past weekend and the vacation beforehand. I have goals that I am working towards. Like previous vacations, the path that lay before me became blissfully crystal clear as I explored and lost myself in the drive.

But I just can’t take the news anymore.