Why.

It was shaping up to be a pretty normal morning. It was time to head out on my hour-long commute. The sky was just starting to shy away from being pitch-black. Sunrise was still 30-45 minutes away, but that’s what happens at this time of year. I actually like driving in the dark. The “zen experience” I feel when driving is enhanced by motoring at night.

I hit the Thruway a few minutes earlier than I usually do. I was going to be able to relax and not worry about making it to work on time. The roads were clear, but the impending dawn revealed ominous clouds dead ahead.

Just as I was making my way over Shumaker Mountain I started hearing that familiar noise often heard this time of year: the pelting of ice and snow on the windshield. I fired up the wipers on their most infrequent setting. I slowed down a bit and made sure I had two hands on the wheel.

The ice continued and mingled with snow. The blackness of the blacktop was disappearing into a covering of white and the trees showed the wind that was picking up. I slowed down some more.

The sign led the way to my exit and as I urged the wipers to go a little faster, I noticed that my windshield had completely iced over. The car made that “we’re going through slush” noise and then the wind started blowing some snow around.

Now, if I was your average American in this day and age, I would immediately pull the car over to the side of the road, threaten to sue the National Weather Service for not warning me about this calamity, sue the Thruway Authority for allowing the blacktop to go away and then promptly starting screaming uncontrollably and then cry into my gloves, because it’s obvious that the foot or so of snow being blown around was the beginning of The Great Blizzard of 2010 (the third one!) and I was going to die right then and there.

But you see, I’m not an average American. Aside from that whole gay thing, I realize that we live just south of the halfway point between the equator and the North Pole and that means that when our part of the world is at it’s furthest point away from the Sun, otherwise known as “winter”, there’s a really good chance that I’m going to have to deal with inclement weather here in the Northeast.

I pride myself on the fact that my parents raised their only boy out of some pretty hearty stock and I’ll be damned if I’m going to get whipped up about a few flakes of snow and a few patches of ice.

Now I know that the folks down in the other part of the Empire State don’t get to experience blizzard-like conditions on a regular basis like we do up here in the part “that resembles a snowy Alabama” (to quote a blogger from the other part of the state), but nevertheless, life does go on, despite all the desperate attempts of the media to scare the beejeezus out of you.

I listened to a woman talk about how she just HAD to fly from Hartford, Conn. to Houston today and to accomplish this she was going to rent a car, make her way down to Raleigh-Durham, catch a flight to Chicago and then hopefully make it to Houston. I wanted to throttle her right through the radio. Just balls it up and drive to Houston. It’s practically going to take the same amount of time and you might see something between here and there. You might actually see that the world doesn’t revolve around the megametropolis of the East Coast.

Now, I might sound a little cranky in this blog entry and quite frankly I’m not. I have plenty of friends and family members that live along the East Coast and I love them.

Especially when they don’t buy into the hysterics.

So yesterday was Election Day in the United States and like the good American that I am, I did my patriotic duty and joined Earl as we headed to the town hall to cast our votes. Last year our town hall was the beta tester for the new electronic voting machines that made their official debut last night and I have to say that I am still very, very uncomfortable with these new machines. I was very vocal to everyone that would listen about how I felt about the machines and many of the Important Voting People agreed with me.

Here are my issues with the new electronic voting machines:

1. They are suppose to be more accessible for those that had a hard time pulling the lever next to the name of the person they wanted to vote for. To remedy this situation, the new system involves taking a magic marker and colouring inside a little dot next to the name of the person that you’re voting for. If a voter does not have the dexterity to grab onto a lever and pull it down, I doubt they’re going to be able to wrap their fingers around a pen and colour neatly within the dot.

2. Any shrouds of privacy have been removed. In the old days, you went into this booth like device where a big, red handle awaited. The voter then swung the handle to the right, and hopefully it would close the curtain behind you, turn on the light so you could see what you were doing and reset the machine to ‘zero’, all with the swing of that red handle. Now you are given a scorecard with the aforementioned magic marker and herded over to a cubicle with flappy sides which is in very close proximity to other voters. There’s no privacy. Anyone can look over your shoulder. I saw that the person standing to my right was a staunch Republican because he had coloured in the Republican dot on his row. He had even marked one dot per column, where in some cases there were two columns requiring only one vote between them. So not only did I know his vote, I knew he was doing his vote wrong¹;. By the way, the mechanical machines would not have allowed him to pull too many levers down.

3. This is one is the biggest concern for me: these electronic voting machines are electronic, do not print out a receipt and have been programmed by human beings using a closed source program. I firmly believe that any programming code (otherwise called source code) used on a publicly owned computing device for the purpose of voting in our elected officials should be programmed with open source code where anyone could see what makes the machine tick. I don’t trust our government so I’m sure as heck not going to trust a company working for the government using trade secrets. The fact that there is not that much stink made about this sort of thing makes me angry in unmeasurable ways, however, I’m not surprised because the majority of the population is too lazy to think and would rather be spoon fed their media and thought processes.

Prior to the introduction of these electronic voting machines I felt a sense of honour and duty whenever I cast my vote. I was making a difference and old people using older, proven technologies were making sure that my vote counted. When I walk away from casting my ballot now, not only do I feel dirty from having to basically choose from the lesser of two evils, I feel cheated as an American because I have no idea where my vote went and if whoever wrote the program in the first place approved my vote based on their parameters.

Like electronic toilets and sinks² in public wash rooms, we have taken a step backwards in one of the most important elements of our country.

¹ I watched this man feed his scorecard into the machine, and it did not complain about the errors of his vote. The mechanical machine would have never let that happen in the first place. One is left to wonder, did his entire ballot get nullified or just that vote?

² In the past three months, I have seen at least six boys or men become dumbfounded because the manual sink wouldn’t turn on when they thrust their hands under the spigot. I had to turn the sink on for one young lad who was old enough to grow peach fuzz because he kept going from sink to sink and said they were all broken.

I have mentioned from time to time that I am not a morning person. I try really hard to be a morning person but try as I might, my body is just not wired to be the early bird. I have no desire to catch a worm. So having to be at work at 0800, with a solid hour of commuting time built in the gaiety, is a bit of a struggle for me. Don’t tell my boss but I’m not really awake until noon. They think I’m kidding when come back from lunch and say “good morning”, but in reality I just woke up.

My alarm is set for 0530. Usually.

This morning I was having a lovely dream about “The Love Boat” (I have no idea why that was the theme) when I awoke at what I figured was 0400 or so. I scolded myself for waking up early again and quite upset with the fact that I wouldn’t be able to resume my conversation with Julie McCoy when I went back to sleep. I rolled over to look at the alarm and discovered it wasn’t 0400 after all.

It was 0632.

I normally leave for work at 0635.

Hmmm.

Now one would think that this paragraph would contain descriptive, colorful words about e hysteria, panic and subsequent dread that set in as the covers flew off and the cat went flying, but no, I just muttered “Holy shit” and quickly followed it up with “I can do this.”

I flew through the shower in three minutes, cleaning only the important parts and opting not to make my head shine. I brushed my teeth whilst putting only underwear and i skipped the closet ritual of waiting for something to move me and went with just putting on the first clothes that looked reasonably unrumpled to me.

I flew down the stairs, fed the cat, grabbed some blueberries from the fridge, made a sandwich, patted the cat on the head, made sure I had enough coin to buy the orange juice at work and hit the road.

I was on the road by 0647 feeling remarkably calm and well rested.

I was in my cubicle by 0752, a few minutes later than usual but in plenty of time to grab the aforementioned OJ and then get on with my day in the usual fashion.

I’m quite proud of the fact that I accomplished that this morning without the usual hysterics. But as I type this at 1238, I am happy to wish you a good morning.

It’s going to be a lovely day.

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.