When Earl and I were in Buffalo a couple of weeks ago, our friend “Angry Alan” did a photo shoot with us. Angry Alan is a brilliant photographer currently studying at RIT.
Here is one of the shots. (The others are not really safe for work/relatives viewing).
Aside from the customer who called our call center today because “the Internet is sticky and jerky today” (that was an interesting call), work has been relatively stress free and quiet today. I guess everyone is focusing on the U.S. elections today. We have been following various news sources on the events as the day goes on. Earl and I will be voting tonight after work. I’m excited to see how long we have to wait and what my number in the big book of signatures will be. I hope it’s a high number. In 2004 I was number 384 at around 6:15 p.m. That’s not a very good turnout.
One of the comments I read on CNN or MSNBC intrigued me. A woman in Arkansas told the pollster or reporter that she based her vote on “national security.” The nebulous concept was her number one priority when it came to selecting her choice for President. Her vote went to McCain.
I have often said that I am wired very differently than most but I haven’t even considered “national security” as one of my bullet points in formulating my vote. The economy? Absolutely. Energy policy? Naturally. Gay rights? Of course. There’s a smattering of other subjects that I have considered as well but national security? No. And here’s why.
I am an American. I believe that at one time the United States of American was THE best place to live on the planet. Today I believe it is ONE of the best places to live. Our policies have been a little wonky during this last administration. The liberties that we so often tout as being wonderful are slowly being taken away from us, all in the name of national security. Granted, the events of 9/11 were horrifying. A lot of people died. But how many have died in Iraq and Afghanistan since? We can not live in fear for the rest of our existence because of that. We can’t be afraid of terrorists. We can’t be afraid of immigrants. We can’t be afraid of people that are different than the some concept of the “American way”. We just can’t. There are ‘bad guys’ everywhere, on both sides of our borders. And to fear these bad guys is unproductive.
The individual that lives in fear must lead a very sad existence. Bad things happen. Bad things happen to good people and bad things happen to bad people. This is what happens and that’s just a fact of life. I blame this fear on organised religion. “If you don’t do as I say you are going to hell and you are going to burn forever.” An all loving God, damning his own creation to eternity in hell. That doesn’t even make sense. Being a reincarnationist, I figure if you screw up this life you’re coming back to learn better lessons the next time. When I was a youngster I asked my mother what hell was. She told me she believed that THIS is it and explained why. I know that she was absolutely right.
Living in fear. So sad. And so unfortunate that you base your vote in this historical election on the fear that you’re being fed. “Vote for me or bad things will happen.” So unfortunate.
Don’t live in fear. Live full of hope. But most importantly, vote!
I don’t know if you have heard the news or not, but tomorrow there is a big election in the United States. There may have been something mentioned on the news. Not only are we voting in a new administration, but several key decisions are being made tomorrow as well.
I overheard someone say that they were still undecided and that they would like to hear what the candidates have to say tonight. Um, o.k. I think that if you haven’t decided your choice yet then you’re probably completely clueless or really dense, but by god it’s your right to vote and you should exercise that right.
Though the polls are currently showing this all going to Obama’s favor, I have to admit that I don’t put a lot of faith in polls. I know it’s all scientific and all that but I don’t completely buy into it. The only way we’ll know who is going to win is when the other guy concedes or the Supreme Court hands down another decision.
As a technology geek I have to say that I do not trust these electronic voting machines that do not print out a receipt for the voter. We’ve all seen the videos of the “vote jumping” on the touchscreen systems. I truly believe that’s just bad software decision and screen calibration; a malicious programmer would never make the vote jumping or false tallying so obvious. I would have no problem with electronic voting machines if the code (the program) was open source and available for all the world to review. Personal agendas would be irrelevant in that case; proprietary equipment and programming allows for personal agendas to become commonplace.
My vote tomorrow will be for the Obama/Biden ticket. I don’t agree with his 100% of his policies but I sure as hell know that he’s a better choice than McCain/Palin. The latter two worry me.
Blue Marvel made his annual appearance at the Halloween festivities at the local bar. This little known member of the Marvel family has a different lineage than Captain Marvel, CM3 and Mary Marvel. The son and only child of mortal science teachers Rick Mason and Andrea Thomas*, Blue Marvel has inherited the intelligence of his father and the supernatural powers of his mother and leads his quest for truth and justice with the guidance of the great wizard Shazam.
* “And unknown to even her closest friends, Rick Mason and Cindy Lee, she became a dual person, Andrea Thomas, teacher and… Isis, defender of the weak, champion of truth and justice.”
It’s going to be a fully geek weekend for me as I am on-call until Monday morning. I have various projects to keep me busy so I won’t be bored or anything like that. I’ll probably write in the blog quite a bit. I tend to get chatty when I’m not as distracted by the work week.
Back in 1986 I was just discovering the gay bar during my freshman year of college. It was around this time that I first stepped into “Doc’s” in Jamestown, New York. Located in the basement of a pediatrician’s office, I never drank or anything but rather just enjoyed the vibe and the music. I was introduced to the experience by a college senior and fellow music major named Steve. He resembled Herbie (“I want to be a dentist”) from Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer and was an AMAZING pianist. He probably still is. Last I knew he lived in Schenectady.
One of the things I liked about Doc’s was that the DJ played the British dance stuff that was popular in the mid 1980s. One of the tracks that he played was by a duo called “Pepsi and Shirlie”. Their most popular song was “Heartache”. It’s very 80s sounding.
Bonus points to those that can name the group we first saw Pepsi and Shirlie with.
[MEDIA=72]This week’s on call schedule had kept me very busy. I haven’t had time to do much more than eat and work and get some naps here and there.
We can thank Mother Nature for her contribution to the experience.
Now if I could figure out how to post my picture of our first snowfall from the season using this iPhone app.
A couple of weeks ago Earl and I went to heat a pizza in the oven. We spun the dial and hit 350, popped the pizza in the oven (on our fancy pizza stone) and went about our business. Ten minutes later, the kitchen was filled with gas and we were lightheaded.
Our house was built in 1996 but the stove was built in 1985. We figured it was time for a new stove, so off to Sears we went and picked out a basic gas range with a few frills and good looks. Naturally everything in that area must match so we picked out the matching microwave. We stuck to our household mantra: “All shall hail Frigidaire”.
Tonight we installed the new stove and microwave. There was no shouting, screaming, cussing or anything like that. It was teamwork, teamwork, teamwork all the way. Everything passed inspection and no bubbles were formed on the gas connections so we are going to ready, set, cook!
Work is an interesting environment today. Early in the morning it seemed like the theme was “Talk very loudly in your cubicle and make sure your cell phone rings ridiculous ringtones.” That all simmered down when…
… the Human Resources Manager was seen in black. This is never a good sign. We are now down one person. Unfortunately, that person was never one to talk loudly in his cubicle. He never really talked at all. Not even on the phone, which is odd, working in a call center and all.
Today kicks off my first full week of on-call since returning to my job almost six months ago. I’m not feeling overly pressured by the thought but some of my co-workers are giving me the “psych out” about how I’m going to get no sleep and be very busy all week. Talk of blizzards, rain, violent winds and such are being shared with me to keep me on my toes. I take it all in stride. They don’t realise how good I am at psyching people out in my personal life. And besides, if it’s a busy week, I can roll around in the overtime loot. Naked.
One thing that I’ve never understood is the use of pictures of people sprinkled through software applications. I’ve mentioned before that one application we use has images of Asian woman sprinkled here and there. We now have this image on a sign-in page:
I don’t believe the woman looks very happy. Dignified, yes. Excited about being in a software application? No. And quite frankly I’ve never understood why the guy is sitting out in the middle of a really shiny floor in his office chair. Where did his desk go? Is he playing office chair NASCAR? Does this make the woman angry that he’s not at his desk and sliding across the shiny floor in his office chair?
Many questions on a Monday.
Earl and I drove to Rochester late yesterday afternoon. Both of us have spent some time in the city famous for Kodak and Xerox, but there was much for us to explore.
One point of interest was The Village Gate on North Goodman Street. With it’s eclectic selection of shops we browsed around a bit and found some interesting toys to bring home. I’m always happy to see people embrace an old building and turn it into something useful instead of ripping it down and building another generic strip mall. There are quite a few restaurants in The Village Gate. Business seemed good.
We opted to go to a restaurant not too far away. Earl has been there before and knew that I would enjoy The Old Toad. He was absolutely right; being a fan of pubs, The Old Toad was perfect for a Saturday night supper and a few pints of Guinness.
Here is Earl looking over the selection on the menu.
Since I was driving home and still feeling some effects from the Guinness, we opted to walk around the area for a bit and peer into the windows of the shops and see who was going to what nightclub or restaurant. We walked over Rochester’s Inner Loop several times. I enjoy the design of that roadway. We are going to have something similar here in a couple of years.
So we walked around before taking the long way home. We drove 98 miles to and from Rochester and only took the Thruway for the last 30 miles or so. Sometimes the back roads are the best way to go.
After a fairly intense day at work, it’s good to kick off the weekend with a little French and Saunders. I fecking love British comedy – especially French and Saunders.
Just a guy with a husband. We’ve been together 28 years and he still makes me see fireworks on a daily basis. Hiker. Storm Chaser. Private Pilot. Tech Guy. Hackerish.
Weird? Eccentric!
