Inspiration Found
Will it be seven weeks until I post again? I have no idea. My life and the lives of my family have been a whirlwind in the last few months, and I simply haven't made time to yell about stuff, although I know I should do just that. It does my soul good to eviscerate others here with my words, and I like to think it helps others too.
Today I had to visit one of our subsidiaries and, as I pulled into the parking spot, I noticed a police car parked at the door.
Yes, it was unmarked, but with the "Elect Jim Bob Dickweed Sheriff" sticker, the q-beam and the push bar on the front, what else was I to think?
As I walked inside, instead of a respected member of law enforcement I found a guy (whom I smelled before I saw) wearing jorts, a shitty t-shirt and a chain wallet.
As I walked outside to my car, he exited the business at the same time aand got into what I thought initially was an undercover cop car.
What the fuck people?
Seriously. You can't buy a blue light and drive around flashing it on your car. You can't buy a scout leader uniform and a shitty badge and claim you're a cop, but you can buy a decommissioned cop car and leave all of the asshole accouterments on it, only to drive around terrorizing your community??
And to that end, there is absolutely a ZERO percent chance that any guy driving a decommissioned cop car with all of the asshole accouterments on it is ANYTHING but a total fuckhead and quite possibly a racepist. That's my made up word combining racist and rapist.
Driving around in a fucking crown vic with a q-beam, tinted windows and a push bar means you WANT to scare people, and I don't think it's a huge leap to think you want to scare folks that are already scared of the po-po: The brothers.
Your only other motivation has to be the idea of pulling over some chick that doesn't know to drive to a well lit place before she lets you pull over and scaring her, or worse.
How is it possible and legal for hillbilly retards to buy these cars and terrorize the community which you KNOW they are doing?
If cops can't sell their old service weapons at auctions for 8 cents on the dollar, municipalities should not be able to sell old cop cars. These cars (along with the spotlights and push bars) should be destroyed.
And don't cry to me about money you assholes. You bought those cars on the fines that resulted from the chicken shit tickets you wrote instead of solving crimes. Crush the cars and sell the previously extracted motors to weekend racers. That's the only thing that SHOULD be salvaged from those machines.
And before I go, I'd like to send a shout out to the guy in the white toyota tacoma pickup that tailgated me today from my street all the way to the end of the neighborhood and then, when I was only driving 6 mph over the speed limit and after two miles, raced past me by crossing the double yellow line:
You aren't a stranger you moron. You live IN MY NEIGHBORHOOD! You followed me out of my neighborhood and off of my street. I know who you are. How big of a hurry can you be in at 6:45 in the morning? Either way, I assure you that we'll talk soon. Tailgating within a community is stupid and unsafe, and I won't have it at all. Plus, I know you're 16 and you need a come to jesus meeting with someone that isn't your parent.
Does anyone know where I can get a cheap crown vic with the tint and push bar?
Happy Monday night peeps! I'm out!
Standing up at the Grammys
I watched the Grammy Awards last night.
I know that doesn’t make me different or special. It’s just a fact.
After the news of Whitney Houston’s death Saturday afternoon/evening, I wasn’t sure I wanted to watch. I was concerned that too much of the show would be focused on and dedicated to the “tragic” loss and soft pedaling the real issue which is that if any one of the people that said her name had been concerned enough to get involved and tried to help her, Miss Whitney may still have been alive to perform at said awards show.
And before you throw mud at me, I know that every death is a tragedy. But dying of cancer or because terrorists took down your airplane are real tragedies. This was sad because it demonstrated that if you’re rich enough, no one will ever stand up and tell you no or do the right thing by and for you.
Anyway, of all of the awards shows that exist now, the Grammys always seem to do the best job of providing powerful entertainment and the ability to create unique performances between artists most people wouldn’t consider putting together. I mean, MTV used to do stuff like this. (You know, 20 years ago when they still played music instead of looping “16 and pregnant,” “A shot at love with Tila Tequilla” and “My Super Sweet 16.”
Case in point: The Etta James cover performed by Bonnie Raitt and Alicia Keys.
That was a stunning duet that no one would ever have seen coming.
Then you had the jaw-dropping performance by Adele, a young woman that fits none of the traditional molds of what consumers have recently considered great or marketable or entertaining.
Why? Because she speaks with a Cockney accent rather than a fake one like Madonna or Johnny Depp. She’s not cocaine rail thin and appears to be cool with her carriage, for lack of a better term.
And then there’s the part where she sings. Purely. No smoke. No lasers. No stage built like the video game q-bert. No synthesizers, no DJ and no auto-tuning.
Just a young woman with a song and a microphone who, despite dizzying and occasionally puke-inducing stage fright, puts out a song with a voice that may come along once every 25 years. Or maybe once in a lifetime.
I actually thought at the moment she was basking in that (for her) painfully long standing ovation that maybe this was a torch passing of sorts. Our last truly great vocalist died in a suite at the Beverly Hills Hotel a day before, and now here was Adele showing the world that amazing talent, hard work and a song written from a heart laid open for all to see could happen again.
And then there was Foo.
I continue to be amazed (although I shouldn’t be) at what an amazing band Foo Fighters are and what a great frontman Dave Grohl has become.
Just last week I was talking with a couple of friends about all-time great front men in rock. We ran thru David Coverdale, Robert Plant, Freddy Mercury and many others. I contended that David Lee Roth, from the Van Halen Fair Warning / Women and Children First era was possibly the best ever.
And one guy said “What about Grohl? He has to be in the conversation and may be the winner.”
I told everyone I could tell about the Palladia broadcast of Foo Fighters at Wembley Stadium after the first time I saw it and, how if they hadn’t seen it, they had to see it immediately. I recorded it and watched it several times. And could not get over how well he commands the stage and works with the band and the audience, all the time just being Dave Grohl.
Think back 20 years to the seemingly quiet and boyish kid just wailing away on the drums behind Kurt Cobain. That same kid who most figured would probably just wither away and spend royalties went out, learned to play everything and started a band. And that band continues to raise the bar for what should be required of performers who charge what they charge for shows.
Not just lights, smoke, lasers, and girls jumping on trampolines (okay, they can keep that last one).
I nearly stood up and applauded in my den after Grohl’s speech given while accepting one of their five Grammys. Here’s what he said:
"Rather than go to the best studio down the street in Hollywood and rather than using the fanciest computers you can buy, we made this one in my garage with some microphones and a tape machine.”
"To me this award means a lot because it shows that the human element of making music is what's most important. Singing into a microphone, learning to play an instrument and learning to do your craft, that's the most important thing for people to do. It's not about being perfect. It's not about sounding absolutely correct. It's not about what goes on in a computer. It's about what goes on in here (your heart) and what goes on here (your head). ... Long live rock `n' roll!"
I looked at my wife and said, “Wow babe. He just told every DJ, auto-tuner and no-talent sampler to go suck it.”
And she agreed.
Do the right thing today people. Go to iTunes (or god forbid visit a retailer with a music section) and pick up 21 by Adele or any of Foo Fighters stuff. Pick up some old school Ice-T or NWA of Public Enemy. Get some Van Halen or Drivin’ N Cryin’ or Brad Paisley or Blake Shelton. Get Cheap Trick’s Live at Buddakhan record. Or get some Motley Crue or Taylor Swift or any other artist that doesn’t have to distract you with seizure-inducing mayhem, video game sets, glow in the dark bracelets, 47 backup dancers in their underpants, lit up mouse heads and cockeyed Dr. Dre Beats resting stupidly on their head.
Tell the world that that other crap is awesome when you’re in college, drunk, rolling on ecstasy and trying to charm the pants off of some 20 year old sorority girl at your spring fling social by showing her that you’re cool. Tell them that when you get a little older and a little wiser and are riding in the car and just want to hear something organic and fantastic and powerful, THIS is what you want and need.
Because this stuff. The Chris Browns and the Lil Waynes and all of the techno stuff, it’ll pass. It’s got a shelf life like fresh bread. There’s nothing timeless about it.
Music. Performed by humans. With instruments and microphones.
That’s what lasts. That’s what moves us and ties a song forever to some thing or some place or some time.
That’s what we remember.
(Insert witty title here).
I couldn't think of a title today. I wish I had a blog post title catchphrase like someone I know who says "The one where I..." and puts in something simple and descriptive. But I guess that in case of a tie, I'll take a non/shittily titled post over no post at all.
Things are busy at the new employer. We were recently (and already publicly) announced as the institution that was granted receivership (or whatever it's called) by the FDIC of a failed bank down around the area of Atlanta Motor Speedway. As of Thursday we were a 14 branch bank, and now we are a 21 branch bank. The conversion will be rough but a great learning experience combined with some extra sheckels for the old cookie jar.
Today I was scheduled to go to Cartersville from my home in Suwanee to do some site recon on four other branches of ours and to install some new servers, a NAS and some other magical stuff. Since we have some cars owned by the bank, I decided to take the 2008 Ford Edge instead of my 1999 Ford Ranger. I also brought the Edge home last night instead of my truck (unbeknownst to Things 1-3).
Smash cut to this morning, when it was time to take Things 1 and 2 (and Thing 3 as a marginally interested co-pilot) to the bus stop. We normally take the wife's well worn 2001 minivan, but when the door opened today they found this:
After the gasping ended, my almost 5 yr old son shouted "DADDY!! WHAT IS IT?? WHAT DOES IT DO???"
On our return from the bus stop when it was just the two of us, I applied a little extra pressure to the accelerator and caused the wheels to briefly lose a little traction before we zipped home. When we turned into the driveway, he looked at me and said "Wow daddy! That was super speedy!! Can we do it again?"
Good times.
And now for my political Debbie Downer portion of the post.
I watched the State O' The Union address last night, and I made many snarky comments, posted MANY snarky tweets, but made a couple of fairly simple and (what should be very painful and concerning) observations.
Just two really.
I'll leave the high finance and regulations and military spending and everything else to the pundits and the talk radio folks. That's their job.
What I want to talk about are two very simple points, both of which were obviously ignored by the electorate in 2008 and I fear will be ignored again in 2012.
The first has to do with the different terms used when talking about taxes.
A few notes you should consider (one of which should be leaving if you aren't interested in this basic explanation of the differences between effective tax rate and marginal tax rate, and again the difference between income tax and capital gains tax).
There is a difference between an effective tax rate and a marginal tax rate. According to a great site called "The Motley Fool," the difference is this:
Your marginal tax rate -- the figure usually associated with tax brackets -- is the top rate you're paying on your taxable income, and the rate at which your next dollar of income would be taxed. But it's not your overall tax rate.
Here's a simple example according to the 2012 tax code for a single person's earnings.
10% Bracket $0 – $8,700
15% Bracket $8,700 – $35,350
25% Bracket $35,350 – $85,650
28% Bracket $85,650 – $178,650
33% Bracket $178,650 – $388,350
35% Bracket $388,350+
This means that, if you earn $8,700 you will pay 10% (or $870) in federal income taxes.
Further, if you earn $35,350 you will pay 10% on the first $8,700 and 15% on dollars $8,701 thru dollars $35,350.
The result of this is your EFFECTIVE tax rate, or the total tax due and then divide it by your taxable income.
Using the above example, the worker would pay the $870 on the first $8,700 and then would pay $3997.35 on dollars $8,701 thru dollars $35,350.
The total Federal income tax on $35,350 for a person in the 15% tax bracket is not $5,302 but is instead is $4,867.35
Get it?
The 15% tax bracket (or 20% or 30% or wahtever) isn't really that at all. All that stuff is lip service and pandering.
The next part and the more disgusting in my opinion is the stupid Buffet v. Secretary nonsense.
(A note here. This is a perfect example of why voters should pay attention and why they should talk with their kids about stuff. Everyone needs to know how slippery and shifty all of this crap is, and I know that both sides do it. But it's OUR job as the voters to wade thru the shit and find the, well, whatever disappointing thing you find after wading thru shit).
All you have heard from our President in recent months is this fable. And I am here to tell you that it's not only not true, it's not even as different as apples and oranges. It's more like the difference between a fair income tax and the kind of taxation that led to the formation of this country.
Using the same chart above, let's say that his secretary is single and makes the max amount of $388,351 per year and is in the frequently demonized 35% tax bracket.
She isn't paying 35% at all. Using the explanation from above, here's what she's actually paying.
10% on $8,700 = $870
15% on $50,299 = $3997.35
25% on $92,999 = $12,574.75
28% on $92,999 = $26,039.72
33% on $209699 = $69,201.00
35% on $1 = 35 cents
Total Federal income tax paid: $112,683.17
While she's in the 35% tax bracket, she paid an EFFECTIVE tax rate of %29.
Not a big deal you say? Well, that's 20% less than our president claims she is paying.
The more dispicable part is comparing her 29% or 35% to Buffet's 15% income tax rate.
I'm going to say this part loudly.
BUFFET'S 15% TAX RATE IS A CAPITAL GAINS TAX RATE AND NOT AN INCOME TAX RATE!!
Capital gains are what you earn from dividends and investments. The tax rate on those incomes are 15%. He doesn't pay 35% or %29 percent on those because HE WAS ALREADY TAXED ON THAT MONEY AT THAT RATE WHEN HE EARNED IT!!
These megarich people paid their income taxes while they were getting rich. Should they have to pay 35% TWICE?
Comparing the capital gains tax rate to the Federal Income tax rate is disingenuous, deceitful and worse. Remember kids, if YOU lie to congress it's perjury and a felony. If the President lies to congress (like during the State of The Union), it's a campaign speech.
Which brings me to Romney's 15% income tax rate that everyone is having a duck shit about now. Mitt Romney paid $6 million dollars in income taxes over the last two years. One person. One household. SIX. MILLION. DOLLARS.
Someone please explain to me which part of that $6MM is not his fair share.
And I say all of this being one hundred percent sure that I'm poorer than a single person reading this post. At some point, the citizens of this country have to stop looking out the window and start looking in the mirror and decide whether or not they want to paddle the boat or whether they want to just be passengers while others do the paddling.
This country was founded by paddlers. I fear that it's now inhabited by mostly passengers.
Since it’s been two months and since I pay for the server and the URL and such, I’ve decided to grace you with my blog presence today. I have been mired in a cycle of INSANELY busy at work, sick kids, a pending root canal that is causing moderate to severe discomfort, and the likelihood that I’ve written my last entertaining or thought provoking sentence and everything that ends up on the page from now until the end of time (sometime this fall according to the long-extinct Mayans) will be drivel.
Too heavy? Let’s just ignore it and move on then. I’m sure, much like bad clam chowder, it shall pass.
I happened to catch the Republican presidential debate the other night (and I have made a point to catch some of each of them and read up on them a bit after they’re over) and I have noticed something.
Several of these debates have been hosted by networks with very obvious Left-leaning agendas and moderated by people that moderate Liberals would call communists. And I’ve found that to be offensive on a couple of fronts.
First off, a debate moderator is there to MODERATE the debate and not to inject him or herself into the debate. No one in or at the debate gives a wet shit what George Stephanopoulos or Juan Williams or John King think.
Regardless of where you are in the political spectrum, the leadoff question to Gingrich about his ex wife and a questionably timed interview should have disgusted you. Has Gingrich been a great husband or father? I don’t know, but it doesn’t sound like it. Clinton wasn’t either. Nor were Reagan or Kennedy.
I dare say that ANY person that can look in the mirror and honestly say to themself that they should be President of the United States of America is possibly insane but most certainly is a narcissist of immeasurable degree. That alone means that his surrounding family suffers, much like the families of Pro Sports players and coaches, actors, etc.
I enjoyed Gingrich’s reply to the moronic TMZ-style of questioning, and I wonder what we are turning into as a society when this is how we are allowed to “get to know” our candidates?
From the “pussification of America” files, there was a story this week about a school that was changing its mascot to something else because a parent or three was offended by the current mascot.
What was the offending mascot you may be asking?
Was it the Fighting Irish? (Nope. That’s still fine).
Was it the Redskins? (No again. We love that one).
Was it the Raping N-Words? (Nope. But that would be a fantastic name for a pro sports team).
Give up?
The mascot was a cougar.
That’s right. Some uptight, twice-divorced cunt and two of her friends probably got drunk one evening after another failed hookup at trivia night at the local wing joint and, after they were turned down by every man in the room with a pulse (especially the last two that said “get off me you fucking cougar”), decided that the term was offensive and must be banished from our vocabularies forever.
Seriously? Cougar is now offensive? REALLY?
I cannot believe that we as a society continue to grease the squeaky (and self-absorbed and blowhardy) wheel that is the person that bitches about stuff like this. Where are the people in their lives that can look at them and say “Hey, why don’t you shut the fuck up for a while? This is stupid. You’re stupid. Just go home and drown yourselves in your margarita machine (but be careful not to gash your finger while attempting to drunkenly clean it) and pass out on the loveseat and know that tomorrow is another day.”
To that end, I think we need to make a few promise to one another for 2012 and beyond (you know, just in case the Mayans were wrong about throwing virgins into volcanoes and making calendars).
The next time someone screams “RACISM,” let’s makes sure that it actually was racism and not just some hypersensitive ass.
The next time a child in the United States disappears, let’s not ignore the parents for a month or two. Let’s go ahead and have a team investigate and vet them WHILE another team pursues the case as they normally would.
Let’s stop talking about religion. Period. Don’t talk in favor of it. Don’t speak in opposition to it. Just shut up about it. Unless it’s about terrorists or terrorism, just shut up already. I won’t vote for someone because he’s catholic, Mormon, Lutheran, Jewish or any other non-terrorist religion or because he’s not any of those things. If that’s your sole reason to vote for or against someone, then maybe we should reconsider letting you vote at all.
As for religion in general and on a personal level, let me say this. I’m 43 years old. If I am not on your specific God team by now, I will probably never be on that team. And if I’m on a different God team than you are, you aren’t going to change my mind. No amount of yelling or lecturing or talking down to me is going to change that.
The next time someone says 99 percenter or 1 percenter, punch him or her right in the fucking nose.
The next time someone says Mitt Romney (or Barrack Obama) or Warren Buffet or any other rich dude doesn’t “pay their fair share,” kick them in the balls. The ultra-rich have paid WAY more than their fair share for decades and decades. Does rich guy number one use more of the roads or police or fire departments or social services than poor guy number one?
OF COURSE NOT!!
This is nothing but wealth envy and the culmination of a generation of kids being raised to think everything is or should be free and that they should have everything they want the second they want it and that they should never have to do anything for anything.
If you protesters want everyone to “pay their fair share,” then protest in favor of a consumption-based tax instead of a tax system that is designed to penalize productivity.
If you’re against a consumption tax and are still yelling for people to “pay their fair share,” then I’m guessing what you really mean is that you want someone else to do the work while you sit around doing jack shit all day.
And that’s fine, I suppose. Just cop to it and tell the truth so we can move forward.
And one final note. And this is the tough part.
Even if you do all of the right things, say all of the right things, work hard, follow the rules, love God and your mom, apple pie and rescue puppies from the gas chamber, you may STILL not become part of the (hold on while I throw up in my mouth) one percent.
But you’ll still be a better human than most of the ones you meet every day. Shouldn't that be enough?
HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!
Wait. That was ten days ago.
Jesus I'm dumb. And lazy.
Except not really. At least not the lazy part.
Work at my new job has been INSANELY hectic as I continue to add responsibilities and take on more projects (see the dumb part I mentioned earlier).
That combined with three kids who between them have a short term memory that lasts about .63542 seconds and you have me not writing because I'm busy repeating myself eleventyone jillion times a day. By the time their day is over, my brain has entered the "I give already" part of your brain programming evening.
Anyway, I've got to write something so it will hopefully act as the Senecot for my writer's block.
Today I was listening to a local radio morning show and, during the news portion of the program, there was a clip played from the NH debates the other night. It seems that during his exit, Rick Santorum (whom I couldn't give a shit about one way or another) was approached by what I can only hope was just some insane hippie and not a member of the media.
As he walked, the woman asked him "Would you abort a gay baby?"
Seriously.
So now I have an idea. Regardless of affiliation or which end of the zealot meter the dumbshit came from, we immediately treat them like Sirhan Sirhan in the lobby of the Dallas Police Department after he shot Ford in 1980. (Or somewhere in the middle there).
Really folks. This gotcha questioning as the 21st century version of "Do you still beat your wife?" has to end. We're all 90 percent sure that all of these guys are self-absorbed, narcissistic blowhards, but with that as a baseline we can make the best of the worst on our own.
That's right. Despite the fact that you have a normally not well understood right to free speech, I think it's time for some of these people to use their manners and NOT say whatever moronic thing they're thinking just because they have the right to say it.
I mean, where did decorum and general politeness go? Is this yet another byproduct of a generation of kids that got trophies just for participating and whose moms told them they were all special and unitque and that they should all go to college?
Probably. But this girl's mom should have been called. And mom should have been brought there so she could put this girl over her knee for a good spanking like the one she never got growing up in New Hampshire.
The Plate
I'm stunned to login to my own blog tonight and find out that I haven't posted anything for almost six weeks.
I know I started a couple of posts during that time (as I have those drafts in Word form on my work computer), but I've been so busy and so happy at work that I almost didn't notice. Actually, I completely didn't notice.
Today marked my official, official very official hiring at my new job.
I started there as a contractor back in early November, and they liked me and what I brought so much, they bought out my contract and hired me effective this past Monday (results of my drug test, background check and other stuff pending).
Since I applied for, got and lost a job two years ago as a result of said background check, I was not convinced of their "I swear, we're all good and you're an employee here" talk. It's been a long two years of contracting, not working, etc., for me to get too excited until every T is dotted and every I is crossed.
So this morning I got the word from the HR department that everything was good and the deal was done and that I was a fully vetted full-time employee. My (kick ass) benefits start 1 January which means I get to cancel the snake oil, shitty insurance I have now. I'm on a bonus plan and I get paid hourly for road trips and new branch conversions. The people I work for are great and they appreciate what I bring to their group and they tell me so. Hell, my boss' boss got me an iTunes gift card for Christmas and I got a little pocket money from the bank for the holidays. It's fantastic.
Mind you, we started having these discussions about me working there a few weeks ago, so the fuse has been lit on operation TFGNWCSLIFF (Thank Fucking God Now We Can Stop Living In Fear Forever). Since I was offered, accepted and had rescinded a job offer two years ago, the wife was playing her "I'm from Missouri, so you've got to SHOW ME" cards, we weren't taking chances on telling anyone anything until it was officially officially official.
I was told two weeks ago that Monday (19 December) would be my first day as a fulltime employee.
That wasn't enough.
We had to (HAD TO) know and see that everything was DONE before we told anyone.
And today was that day.
I've worked since I was 13 years old, and until today I have never realized what a relief it was to know that you were an employee. Not a contractor, not a consultant and not a temp.
An employee.
This was the best gift I could have ever gotten during the holidays.
I came home to a wife jumping up and down and a great big fantastic hug and shouts of excitement and relief. And it felt great.
And that led to dinner.
The wife asked me what I wanted to eat. She asked quite a few times. Finally I said "I'm not hungry right now. Maybe later."
And that's when she busted out the plate (complete with an unopened Bud Lite on it).
The plate is this plate:
I think we got this as a wedding present, but we've spent the last 20 years breaking this thing out when something good or great happened to the other of us (or one of the kids).
The fact is, it'd been so bad for so long that I forgot about the plate. I feel fairly sure I hadn't seen it for any reason since my 40th birthday three years ago. And that makes me sad.
Before we had kids, I remember enjoying the plate coming out and how fun it was to know that something good could mean "the plate." And I should have been more committed to using it with the kids. Hell, just birthdays would be worth it. Either way, I missed "the first time I read a book" or "I lost my first tooth" for two kids. And that's shitty on my part.
It isn't the Nintendo DS or the iTouch that the kids remember. It's the little things like The Plate that they look back on fondly.
Anyway, we've spent the last two years spending nearly every penny we had (and many many pennies of many others who helped us) trying to save what we'd worked so hard to build, and this lifeline came along and now I've got a job I LOVE and a wife I love and adore and who by all accounts feels the same about me. I've got three smart, beautiful and healthy kids and my kids have SEVEN grandparents to love them and shower them with attention (and gifts).
Yet on the same day that my family and I received this great and life-changing news, I found out that a friend from high school had died.
He was 43.
Although we were close back then, we haven't been close since then. Back then we were friends. I watched the Challenger blow up on his television on a snow day back in 1986. I begged him to feed me for free from his prime spot at "My Friends Place" at Perimeter Mall, even forcing my way thru the door from the back halls of the mall. Jimmy was good people, as were/are his mom and brother whom I loved very much and who were very kind to us.
It doesn't matter at this point how he died. The fact is that he's dead and, even though we'd lost touch, I am sad for him, his brother, his mother and everyone else that loved him.
And that fact has tempered my joy somewhat today. Despite this day being the day my family has needed and has hoped for for the last two years, I can't stop thinking about the friend I knew and the loss his family is enduring now during this holiday season.
What does all of this mean?
I don't know. I'm sure it sounds sappy, but hug your wife, husband, mom, dad, kids, friends and neighbors and let them know you love them and that they aren't alone, even when they feel like they are.
Howdy y’all.
Good afternoon good people of Functionally ReTodded land. Dammit. That doesn’t roll off of the tongue at all. I need a better name for the land/city/town/country that would be inhabited by the readers of FunctionallyRetodded.com.
To be fair though, I could actually call that place myfamilymybestfriendfromhighschoolandanotherbuddyville.
Anywho, a few updates, the biggest of which is that I got a new job. My contract with the Atlanta Falcons Football Club expired in late September, and it was a pretty stressful October and early November trying to find a new gig, although it really was time.
You see, I took the Falcons job for two reasons. First, I needed a job. But secondly, I took it and it’s pretty substantial cut in pay in order to position myself for a fulltime job with the team.
After finishing second out of over 400 applicants for the fulltime job (and I finished second to a guy that’d been an intern for the Falcons in that role for over two years), I realized something.
If you want to get paid, don’t go to work for a professional sports franchise.
Why?
Because much like what I’ve heard and read about positions within the entertainment industry, the bosses / owners consider part of your compensation the cache of you being able to say “Hey, I work for such and such professional sports franchise.”
That’s great. And it’s great when the organization is winning. But you can’t buy groceries or pay your mortgage with cache. Further, that cache loses some of its luster on the Monday after an embarrassing loss to the Bears where the anger and negativity is so palpable in and around the office that you just want to hide and you are actually told by a long time employee “If you’ve never been here the Monday after a loss, just keep your head down, don’t look at anybody and definitely don’t talk to anybody.”
That’s some sweet cache, no?
That complaining aside, I really did enjoy my time there. I met some great folks, gained a whole new perspective on athletes in general and pro football players in particular, and I was able to look behind the curtain somewhat and see a lot of what goes in to putting on that three hour show that is gameday.
I also now have the fairly unique perspective of watching a Falcons game and television and recognizing and knowing by name nearly every single non-player that’s there and what their role is. From the Director of Player Development to the strength and conditioning coaches to the assistant coaches to the assistants TO the coaches to the guys that squirt Gatorade in players’ mouths during timeouts (they do WAY more than that by the way) to the equipment manager (BOIGS!!!) and his team of guys that have to manage and be ready at a moment’s notice for turf and / or weather related gear changes, etc.
Fast forward to me getting desperate (beyond desperate really) and staring down the barrel of some not fun to make decisions and choices, I got a call from a recruiter in Illinois who thought I was a fit for a job in an operations center for a small local bank.
It was about about a mile and half from my former employer and my commute would be (fingers crossed) exactly the same time and distance, which is just 15 miles and 25 minutes going AGAINST traffic.
I was curious.
Oh, and did I mention that if I got the job, the pay rate was SUBSTANTIALLY better than what I was getting on the other side of the tracks?
Well it was. Or would be. If I got the job.
I got the information and went for an interview that took about 20 minutes. I like the guy that interviewed me. I liked the location. I like the pay. And I liked that there is an excellent chance to step into the job in a full time capacity.
I was offered the job the next day.
I accepted, and after I got through the reams of paperwork (twice), the mandatory drug test (which I passed with flying colors), and the background check (You know, the part that got me a job offer rescinded two years ago thanks to a credit rating issue) I started last Wednesday.
And then got Friday off (Thanks Veteran’s Day!)
The job’s fantastic. The environment is great. The equipment is all brand new. I got some really cool new state of the art IT nerd gear. And I feel like I’m a good fit for the place and the job. My boss and his boss are super cool. And my experience and manner are appreciated already.
Now on to other things.
I don’t want to beat this Penn State thing to death. Well, I’d like to beat Jerry Sandusky to death, but I was speaking in the metaphorical sense from a blogging standpoint.
In this age of instant information from millions of sources, it really is tough to grasp the scope of a story like this. This story is not going to go away in one news cycle, 5 news cycles, 20, 100 or a thousand news cycles. With the amount of what appears to be collusion, cover-up and outright lying and denial that have happened from the lowest men on the totem pole all the way to the top, this story looks destined to continue above the fold for years rather than months.
You see, if something like the SMU scandal of the 80’s (which really lasted less than a decade from start to finish) happened now, it’d be uncovered, reported, investigated, reported, and done in probably a year. There are simply too many people with access to too much information for it to take forever long.
But when you have an institution with a hierarchy in place that dates back 60 years or so, there are going to be WAAAAAY more people involved. Hell, this story is only 10 days old and we’re already seeing financial connections between Penn State administrators, governors, Sandusky, his charity, PSU Board members and many other folks.
How long before we start hearing one story after another about crimes that were covered up and went unreported to the police, or if they were reported, no official paper trail was created?
From the bench of my court of public opinion, we already are seeing repeated efforts by folks at every level trying to circle the wagons, keep things quiet and sweep them under the rug altogether.
Think about it this way. Watergate was essential broken by two people. With pencils and paper and rotary phones. The first wiretapping occurred in 1972 and Nixon resigned in 1974. And we knew 95% of the story at that time.
Fast forward to today. There there are hundreds if not thousands of people sniffing around and asking questions around and about Penn State and there’s no way more details aren’t discovered.
And one final factor that I think will prove to be very important from the standpoint of the victims:
There is in fact strength in numbers.
The kid who was molested by the second most powerful man in Penn State Football in 1998 (or God knows the many that were molested before 1998 in the 21 years since Sandusky founded Second Mile) had no one to tell. WHO would he consider telling? He was alone. It had to just be him. It was his fault. It was embarrassing to be the only person picked out to endure this abuse. His parents would be angry/upset/embarrassed. His friends and strangers would laugh.
These victims will range in age from identity protected minors in the 12-14 range now all the way up to (I’m willing to bet) men in their mid-to-late 40’s.
But now, in 2011, these victims will have read and heard about this and they will come forward, knowing that it wasn’t just them, that they themselves didn’t do anything wrong to deserve this, and that what they all had in common was that they were victims of a monster; a monster that was allowed to roam free and prey on more and more kids because everyone in charge was afraid of how it would reflect poorly upon themselves or the football program or their beloved Penn State if it was made public knowledge that many or all of them knew or even suspected events as horrid as the ones reported.
Although these alleged crimes are as bad as they can be, the worst part is always the cover-up instead of the crime itself. The crime is horrific, but the cover-up ultimately led to 7 more (or 17 more or as I truly believe, 107 more) children being victimized. So, multiply the crime times an ever-growing number of victims coming forward to tell their story and the depth of the cover-up and the horror of this story will continue to grow and grow.
Standing up as tall as I can
It's been five days since the horror stories started leaking out of Happy Valley, PA and Penn State University. I've written and re-written this in my head many many times searching for the right way to do this.
But in the end, I decided that it's time to just sit down and say it. This won't be my most polished work, but I've got to say a few things.
Jerry Sandusky
You've been accused of molesting (according to the grand jury report) eight or so youths over the last 20 years. Oh wait. Within hours that number more than doubled. And considering that Jerry worked with kids a lot from 1977 until as late as 2007, I'm going to guess that this number will continue to rise as we move forward towards his first court date in December.
You were one of the greatest defensive minds in the game. You won two national titles and built the nickname "Linebacker U" at PSU. You were all but guaranteed to be the next head coach at Penn State when Paterno retired.
In 1977 after 10 years on the staff at Penn State, Sandusky started a charity called "The Second Mile." It's goal according to it's website and news outlets was and is to help underprivileged and at-risk children from tough environments.
Sandusky also adopted six children and took in many many foster children as well.
So we know that at age 33 in 1977, Jerry started spending a LOT of time with kids. Unsupervised time I'm guessing.
Fast forward to 1999 and you went from absolutely the next coach at Penn State to resigning.
And you never coached again.
Why was that Jerry? Did Paterno stay because they couldn't give you the job because someone or someones knew something or heard something about you and kids?
Of course you kept working with kids, even still using the Penn State facilities with children until 2002 (and yourself to work out as recently as last week).
Then the Grand Jury report was released and we found out the horrible details of your assaults and the people that failed these children.
So, here's what I think.
I don't think you waited until 2002 to start molesting kids. That's not how child predators work. They don't just molest once. And they don't usually molest just one kid one time. And they CERTAINLY don't wait until age 58 to get started.
Child molesters are also not likely to be rehabilitated. How many people do you ever hear of that get caught after molesting only one kid? That's just not how it works.
I think you probably got molested as a child. I don't know or care by whom. It doesn't define you. You made choices. (For what it's worth, many people get molested and don't turn into molesters. The person writing this didn't).
So you find solace in football: both playing and later coaching. That gave you access to kids. Then you started a charity and began preying almost immediately on those kids. What the hell, right? They were poor and desperate for attention and didn't have anyone to protect them.
They didn't have a chance.
But that wasn't enough. In addition to the Second Mile kids, you also adopted six kids. And took in untold numbers of foster children.
It's sad to think that the best thing I could say is that you may have spared the adopted and foster children to destroy the kids from the charity.
But as you get more nuts, you get sloppy and, after a few incidents, you eventually get caught raping a boy in the shower by 28 year old former player and current graduate assistant Mike Mcqueary.
(Oh, wait. I bet a lot of you don't know that Sandusky's kids grew up and were friends with the McQueary kids and the Paterno kids. Is there any chance that Sandusky possibly made advances against McQueary or Paterno's kids when they were young)?
My conclusion on Sandusky? Child predator, scumbag, human filth. I don't think he'll serve a day in prison since I think he'll kill himself before he goes to trial, but if he's dumb enough to go to trial and get convicted, I hope he gets raped in the ass with an oil drum.
As for Paterno, I sadly believe he's nothing more than a dottering old man that was way out of touch with what was going on, and when it was brought to his attention, his instinct was to protect his old friend rather than his old friend's victims.
I am convinced that Paterno has had a positive affect on the lives of literally thousands and thousands of people over the years. Sadly, when the time came to have the most positive impact on the most vulnerable among us, he panicked and failed. He has to go, and he has to go now.
As for the AD Tim Curley, and the administrator in charge of finance and the campus PD Gary Schultz who perjured themselves to a grand jury in a failed attempt to cover their asses, I wish you repeated prison shower rapings as well.
For now shitcanned Penn State President Graham Spanier who not only did nothing to protect the victims but went so far as to say that "the former AD Curley and Executive VP Schultz have my unconditional support, and they operate at the highest levels of honesty. "
Except of course when they're lying to a grand jury about the rape of a ten year old by one of their friends.
You sir deserve for one or more of the victims to find you in a parking lot and beat you to death with bags full of nickels.
And that brings me to Mike McQueary.
When a 28 year old man (who is quite large and fit and a former Penn State football player) sees a 60 year old man raping a ten year old boy in a shower, he has to do something, anything, to stop it. Immediately. There is no other answer. Ever.
Whether he uses anything he can find or is holding or rushes in and beats the man to death, I don't know or care. BUT HE HAS TO DO SOMETHING. Immediately.
He can not run away, go home, call his dad, and then tell someone else about it the next day and never ever consider the victim again.
Even if he ran out of the room and got to the parking lot, his brain, his conscience and human decency has to scream at him that he can NOT leave that child alone to be destroyed.
And yet he did.
In the worst possible scenario, let's say that McQueary was a prior victim of Sandusky's sexual predation or someone else's. Whether it was once or a thousand times, he was nonetheless a victim.
Then he spends his entire life coaching under and next to that same man, at least until Sandusky retires. His predator is near him and with him all the time until then.
Fast forward to the moment. He hears something. Familiar. Horrifying. He walks toward the sounds and he realizes it. His victimizer is doing it again. To another boy. Maybe the same age McQueary would have been when it happened to him. He freezes. He's a little boy all over again.
But then that anger rises up and he goes into a rage. He goes rushing into the room to stop the vile act and removes the boy from the situation and rushes to get the boy care and reports the crime to the authorities and, in the process, becomes a hero forever.
To everyone.
Or he runs.
He leaves that boy to think he's going to die. Or worse, he leaves that boy hoping that he'll die so he never has to go thru this again.
I don't think there are many situations in life where the difference between the right and wrong actions could be more clear, but at the moment when the right thing to do was the most obvious, Mike McQueary thought not of the boy being destroyed.
He thought about himself.
And that's why he must go along with all of the rest of people that allowed this nightmare to continue.
Stupidity continues
Good evening kids. How is everyone today?
I'm fantastic, so thanks for asking.
Why am I fantastic? I'll tell you why.
Thanks to a rainout earlier this week, game 7 of the World Series will be tonight. Also, since it's Friday (or a day ending in day) I'm having cold beers with a side of a percocet for my hideous headache. Add to that Thing One having a two person sleepover in the basement and Things 2 and 3 being in good moods and bedtime is approaching quickly, and all is right in my broke and unemployed world.
You know, except for the broke and unemployed part.
Anywho, today's rant is inspired by moronitude and idiocy in the face of common sense.
You see, there's a family in Missouri that claims their 11 month old daughter was stolen in the middle of the night.
No. Her name isn't Casey Anthony. This child was only "missing" for about 12 hours before concerned family members called the cops. You recall that Casey and her family waited 30 days to report their child missing.
My question is, who that has a frontal lobe in their brain actually believes ANY of this chick's story? I mean, except for the part about blacking out drunk less than 2 hours after she allegedly put the baby to bed.
Add in the part where they stopped talking to police and instead did network television interviews, the insanity of her claims and the fact that about 99.99999999% of children reported missing or found dead were harmed by a parent, and you've got a case Barney Fife could solve. (Also, I think the last kid taken and / or killed NOT by their own parent may have been the Lindbergh baby. I could be wrong though).
Am I jaded? Of course. But I'm also a realist who spent the morning after his 24th birthday hearing horrid news stories about strange black men stealing Kenny Hardwick's baby, only to find out after many fake searches and crocodile tears and stories that Kenny killed his daughter.
Then you can add Susan Smith, who claimed a black man stole her car (with kids inside) and fled. We found out later that She put the car in neutral and got out, leaving her two sons to panic and drown all so she could be with not Mr. Susan Smith.
So forgive me if I don't believe that, while hammered drunk and then allegedly passed out and with daddy at work until 4am, a total stranger broke into this woman's house, stole three cell phones (what two people have three cell phones with the husband gone at work with his) and their daughter and fled?
I know it's easier to prove this stuff with a body, and that's just a matter of time. Kenny got drunk and smacked his daughter's head on the brick hearth, then buried her in some pinestraw in what is now a very developed part of my county that at the time was less than two miles from our house.
Here's what happened in Missouri.
Dad's at work nights, mom's drinking too much, and the baby is crying and won't sleep. Mom's pissed and drunk and either shakes or in some other manner causes a mortal wound or wounds to the child. Given that no real evidence of violence or trauma was found at the house, I'll go with the idea that she shook the baby to death or to near death, and then either choked her out in some way.
Then, she panicked, ran outside and did whatever she did with the body. She didn't get far I'm sure. The pond the cops are searching now probably isn't it as sinking a body can't be as easy as it sounds. I'm guessing trash bag(s) and a fast food restaurant dumpster or a mini mart or a nearby school or grocery store.
The reports of people seeing someone (presumably a man) carrying a baby dressed improperly for the weather and the time of day are probably her with a coat and a hat pulled down with her hair put up in the hat.
But make no mistake, she did this. I feel confident that the cops and the DA are simply dotting every I and crossing every T to make sure that they don't make the same mistakes that were made in the Casey Anthony case.
So go ahead Nancy Grace. Keep running your yap about whoever stole this child, but within 2 weeks, we'll be reading about how they found the child's contusion-covered or suffocated body somewhere and that mommy has been taken into custody.
I know it's depressing, but as they taught us in school, the simplest answer is usually the right one.
Hugs kids.
FRT
P.S. Go Cards!!
Next up, a discussion of percentages.
As usual, I’m inspired by stupidity
Good day people. I write today as I'm about to open both a cold beer and a can of whoopass on a world full of dumbass(es).
(After trying to throw this together, I realized that I'm gonna have to break this down further, so today's entry will address how the government helped fuck us up financially from the ground up).
I need to start by saying that the government and educators and parents in this country perpetuated a fundamental fraud on it's citizens / students over the last 40 years. Let's see if you can guess the lie.
A) You have a right to free speech.
B) You have a right to bear arms.
C) You have a federally guaranteed right to vote.
D) Every person deserves a college education.
As we've all learned, no one has the absolute right to say anything to anyone wherever they want. And as we've learned, the "right" to bear arms is related directly to your actions, crimes you've committed, level of crazy, etc. Your "right" to vote actually isn't such a thing, but since I'm too lazy to explain that one, you can read about it here.
The fundamental lie that has been this nation's mantra for 40 years is that everyone deserves the right to go to college and / a college degree.
This not only isn't true, but that flaw has had more than a medium sized impact on both our current economic and employment situation as well as our national financial crisis.
Don't believe me? Listen up.
Our government decided that everyone deserved a college education, so avenues for obtaining student loans were made readily available and the ability to repay those loans was never really considered (this might sound a little like bad mortgages, no?).
Also, since the establishment of the Department of Education in 1979, the standards to which students were held and evaluated and graded have been made less and less stringent. This meant that more and more people were able to achieve the 'grades" to be accepted into college, and also that they could easily get the money required to pay for it.
At the same time that more and more people had the financial wherewithal to afford to pay for college, colleges and universities began raising prices at an alarming rate. But who cares, right? After all, this is a simple example of supply and demand.
In 1987 while I was attending Auburn University, a law was passed in Alabama stating that out of state tuition had to be three times that of in state tuition. At the time, in state tuition for a standard class load (15 credit hours) was about $900 per quarter and out of state was about $2,700 per quarter. (that's $60 per credit hour in state and $180 out of state).
Today, in state tuition for two semesters of 12 credit hours each is $8698 ($362 per credit hour) and $23,290 ($970 per credit hour).
So in 25 years, Auburn's tuition per year in state tuition has gone from $2,700 to $8,698 and from $8,100 to $$23,290 per year out of state.
And that's not the true cost of going to college. According to Auburn's own website, here are the numbers (including room, board, books, lab fees and transportation), it costs Alabama residents roughly $25,000 per year to attend Auburn University and for out of staters, it's a mere $40,000.
PER FUCKING ACADEMIC YEAR!
Meanwhile, the average starting salary for someone with a degree in business was roughly $25,000 in 1987. Today, the average starting salary for that degree is is about $45,000.
So, to earn that $45,000 a year job, a student now has to pay roughly $100,000 for in state and $180-200 grand out of state. And that's Auburn. Although UGA's info looks much the same, and schools like Wake Forest list costs at nearly $60,000 per year and The U in Miami at around $55,000 per year.
Meanwhile, everyone has been told that if you didn't get a college degree, you're a failure and you'll never get a job. Of course, no one takes into account that if a student not ready or interested in college had taken up a trade like plumbing or electrical work, they would be in FAR less debt while starting their careers and with salaries matching or exceeding that of recent college graduates.
You see, somewhere along the way we as a culture decided that being a tradesman meant dumb or dirty or whatever, so we became a society of folks that couldn't survive a week without our cars, iPhones and credit cards. It was embarassing to say that your kid wasn't at some college and instead was a plumber's apprentice.
You see, I didn't get my degree from Auburn. I ran out of money after three years. And that led me to my current (temporarily non) career in IT. But something similar applied in my field as well.
15 years ago, getting an MCSE was a meal ticket. It took a shit ton of work and at that time, there were only a few thousand in the entire country.
Then online certificate programs popped up along with test dumps and pretty soon there were hundreds of thousands of MCSE's in the country. Granted, 90% of them couldn't do shit in the real world since they had no applicable experience, but the MCSE went from a guaranteed six figure payday back then to "Meh, how much experience do you have?"
And that's where we are today with folks with Bachelor's degrees that are fresh out of college.
You see Occupiers, an items value is directly proportional to how many people have one of said item. If 100% of the new workforce has a degree, it has far less value.
Don't believe me? Try to sell a diamond.
On deck for later this week:
Missouri family and their "stolen" kid
religious zealots and prayer or not prayer in schools/colleges.
Shalom bitches.