Happy Thanksgiving!

Well now, let's see what I've got to tell and what you wanna know!
I'm about a year and a half away from graduating from Southern New Hampshire University. Yeah I know it's a Northeastern university but it's got southern in the title so....I'm earning it you Yankees!

Second I've spent a beautiful day with my family and daughters! I started to brine the turkey yesterday around 9 A.M. and got it on the grill at 7 this morning. Yeah, I'm still a badass cook, don't forget it! Great Thanksgiving! Both Things 1 & 2 came up to spend it with me and their extended family. I know soon it'll be a very rare occurrence when we are all together at one time so I'm savoring all the time I can get with them.

Ok, something pretty much only two of you know, I've developed a taste for beer. Yeah I know....go figure. Ok, here's the story. Once I started taking classes in the evening I'd have a hard time destressing from my job. I'd have a hard time concentrating on the materials I needed to study so I decided to go to my go to which is a scotch with a couple of cubes of ice, however the problem started when I found out after one or two of those, well, I didn't care about homework anymore! On a particularly stiflingly hot day after work, I walked back to the coolers in my local quick shop for a coke and picked out a couple of beers instead.

Yeah, I could destress and STILL do homework after one or two beers! Well the next dilemma was to find a flavor that I could handle. If you'll recall I got very drunk/sick on beer at the tender age of 19 and rarely, and I mean VERY rarely drank beer since. So I started sampling beers and found a couple I can handle and actually enjoy!

I settled on Pabst (The beer of the blue collars, screw the hipsters!!!! They corrupt everything!) and regular Budweiser. These are pretty much what beer should taste like and after a long day at work with a long night of homework lined up, a PBR tastes as sweet as anything I've ever had before! I've been consistently having one or two so I'm able to read what I've got to read, write what I've got to write, forget where I work, and move on to the next day. 

Well, let's see what else you'd be interested in dear reader, I made a 152 song playlist on Spotify from 70's country hits, one of my favorite genres. I've told you about my dad being a truck driver and how that's what we listened to when he would take me on the road with him once in a while! Yeah, give me a 70's country song title and I'll give you the artist and likely lyrics! Test me sometime, I dare ya.

Now I'm really into watching the Hallmark channel's Countdown to Christmas marathon when I'm not working or doing homework. What a great thing Hallmark has done here. Nothing but formulaic movies with happy endings, standard tropes, and leaves you feeling warm and fuzzy by the end. What more could you really ask for? If you haven't seen it, check it out. It's really something to make you feel good when this crazy world has got you down.

The Thunder seem to perhaps be getting their chemistry together! I've been a Thunder fan since year one, I've still got a magnetic schedule inside my locker at work from the first year. It's pretty special though to me, my mom and I text back and forth during the games. Something we've really enjoyed over the years and believe me, she knows the NBA very well. She's been watching almost every NBA game she can over the past three seasons so I bought her the League Pass so she could watch any game she wanted and she does! She probably watches on average two games every evening.

I know I've not updated my blog on a regular basis, I apologize for that. I write so much for classes that I really don't want to write much else but I've been on vacation for a couple of weeks and go back to work on Monday. I've got some stuff to say. 

The Influencers of Marketing

This week one of my assignments is to read a 60 Minutes story on social media marketers and how they are a driving force in today's world. Television marketers are becoming more and more nervous as streaming services with zero commercials or full on DVR functions that allow subscribers to skip through commercials become prevalent in the cord cutting movement. This means that there is more competition for the advertising dollar in places where the message of a company can be seen.

The evolution of this has been a rise in online advertisers and people with large online followings that are called influencers. Instagram is a huge platform for influencers to drive traffic to products that they enjoy themselves or for companies that pay them for a shout out. This can drive a large amount of traffic to a site in a very economical way.

I myself purchased a marketing course for physical products and one part of the course was how to use Instagram to drive traffic to your product. For example you can have an influencer shout out your product for a hundred dollars to his followers which might number in the tens of thousands.

If your product is shown to ten thousand prospective buyers and you get only 3% in sales, that's 300 buyers for a successful ad buy. To take this a bit further in how lucrative it can be consider your product costs 1 buck and you sell it for 3. That's 900 gross sales and you subtract 300 for your cost, and 100 for the shout out for a total profit of 500 dollars. Now if you can do that every week, well that's more pay than a minimum wage (7.25 per) job working 40 hours which would be a mere 290 dollars.

Now you can play around with that simple model as much as you wish but that's how influencers work on a basic level. Now larger influencers with millions of followers are more expensive and smaller influencers in more of a niche market are cheaper. It really depends on what you want to sell and in what market your niche is in.

I firmly believe it's too early in this evolution to predict where this type of marketing will wind up and how larger companies will find a way to move away from an uncertain future in TV to an increasingly online form of entertainment. It'll be an interesting evolution to watch and pay attention to being a marketing student and all!

Interactive TV

Where once a giant stood and spoke to you while you listened, now you can have a dialogue. Back in the day radio was king. Radio was how everyone was connected and kept informed of what was happening around the world.

You could hear today's news as it happened in some cases like the Hindenburg disaster which you can still listen to today. Even during the great depression the radio industry was strong and FDR started his Fireside Chats to talk directly to the American people without the media filter.

Then TV came along and a new form of entertainment was born. You could watch the people that were once just voices to you. Networks expanded their reach to cover the entire continental U.S. and eventually there was a TV in every home. Then the next big revolutions, color TV, cable TV, satellite TV, HDTV, and then smart TVs with streaming services built in.

What's left? Interactive TV. There have been some good experiments in refining the interactive TV experience since the widespread roll out of broadband internet. Back over a decade ago I remember watching the first season of Big Brother online and chatting with other viewers about what was happening. That was a great experience and then they started charging a subscription price and I lost interest quickly. It was great though as you could switch between cameras and see unfiltered what was happening in the house.

Since then (and thanks to an extended writer's strike) reality TV has found a place in American pop culture, much to my dismay and is here to stay. Networks started to build shows from the ground up with interactivity in mind coupled with the internet experience. Then then the next big evolution happened, social media became a thing. From the early days of MySpace to Facebook and Twitter to Instagram, producers started to utilize social media to have an effect in how the show would happen.

The Voice, a show I have never nor will never watch, was one such show. The producers coordinate with the talent, who then are interactive with the audience and on social media. All I really know about The Voice is that the chick that sings for No Doubt is dating a country singer and they are both judges. I've seen commercials and I'm more than familiar with the pop culture effect of the show and I can see that it's one of the more popular reality TV shows on today, where once American Idol reigned as king.

So if someone like me, that has no interest at all in such a show knows about it a little bit, they are doing a pretty good job. I do however have an interest in watching the evolution of entertainment and how interactive it is. After actually reading about what The Voice does that has pioneered a lot of interactivity, I'm not sure a media form exists yet that would be better. It seems to be the prime example of what to do right.

The Voice does so much with it's audience such as the instant save in which consumers are encouraged to tweet for their favorite. This engages audiences and creates the interactivity audiences will expect going forward.

I was once a firm believer in the idea that you didn't want to see your celebs in real life, you'd eventually learn that they were just people like you except everyone knew their name and everyone had a different expectation of what they'd be like in real life. All of which no one could live up to which lead to disappointment.

Today, if a celeb isn't interactive with their audience, you are disappointed. Tomorrow if a show isn't interactive with it's audience, you'll turn it off and find one where you are part of the experience. Where this leads in scripted shows is unclear but it's an evolution away from trying and a couple of failures away from succeeding and becoming groundbreaking.

Eventually you might see actual shows built for social media exclusively where audiences are the participants. Twitter for example, might give a task and then people tweet back their results of such a task for prizes. That platform has yet to be invented but you can imagine there are some producers out there that have been inventing and trying to make their shows as interactive as possible.

I for one, look forward to such a day!

My Digital Life

Long time no blog!
For those of you who know me know that since early 2015 I've been going to college to get my degree, which I changed from game design to marketing. This is going to wind up being a long post so strap in dear readers. My plan was to learn a skill for my second career so I can supplement my pension in 2022 and quit my job of (at this time) 25 years.

I'll be getting into my assignment after I let all of my readers know how I got to where I got to;)

I started at Full Sail, which turned out being a fraud of a "school." Full Sail started out fairly promising for the first four classes which they call the core four. There was a lot of instructor interaction, live lectures, and questions were answered promptly.

After that it started to slide downhill. 99% of the material the instructors used was found on YouTube and you were given a discounted subscription to Lynda.com. No text books, digital or otherwise. Very little reading in fact was assigned. If you couldn't see it for free like the rest of the world on YouTube then I guess they figured you didn't need it. I got fed up with lazy instructors, bad assignments, finals that had nothing to do with whatever material I had watched on YouTube and a general attitude of self importance due to their hype machine.

So after looking around I found a better school, a not for profit school, that accepted all of my credits I had earned the past year and moved onto greener pastures. Full Sail was four times more expensive per month than my current university is (Southern New Hampshire U) per term! Yeah, it's crazy expensive.

I transferred and started classes early last year! After a few terms and getting into the game design part even more I found that it really wasn't the skill I was looking to learn. It's a super competitive market, pay is fairly low to medium, and you generally had to work at a company with resources to accomplish what you wanted to accomplish. Not exactly what I was wanting to do.

So I did some more research and found a lucrative field that was flexible enough to be used in a variety of ways! Marketing with a focus on social/digital media. This will be a degree I can use on my own and create digital products, I can contract with someone and work anywhere I choose as long as I have my laptop and internet connection. I can do any of a number of things where this degree will apply for me and supplement my future pension handsomely!

My first assignment is to create a blog, how little my fellow classmates know I've written this one over the span of more than a decade and even though it was dormant, I felt it might be time to awaken it once again, perhaps briefly, perhaps as I used to blog. A daily basis before work.

Let's see here:
1. What sites/applications do I visit most often? Describe them.
I use my email application the most on a daily basis. I check it constantly for new emails on a project I've been working on since February and is still in work.

Facebook was a site I used constantly until my divorce. I would look at it all day on my phone to see who was doing what. I caught onto the fact that it was nothing more than a voyeuristic practice to compare your life with your friend's lives to see who was winning, who was happy, who was sad, and who was getting by. It turned into a source of anxiousness over time and I quit cold turkey. It's still active but I rarely log onto it. So you can say I have a very negative reaction to Facebook and believe it'll eventually be replaced by something else in this digital trending world. Will it go the way of MySpace? I doubt it but I suppose it could.

I use the Twitter app a lot during the day to catch up on news from work. In the evenings I'm usually on the SNHU blackboard for a few hours per night. I try to do two to three hours of homework each night and make sure my assignments are good before I turn them in.

MMORPGs were a huge part of my life for maybe 12 years, from Everquest to WOW and dozens of games in between. That was a social way of adventuring together and forming "friendships" through a common cause and platform. Yeah at the end of the day none of it was real but for someone that could use social interaction without being social, it was perfect.

The shiny parts of the MMO have kind of faded since their heyday in the late 90's and 2000's as gamers have latched onto more niche games on the mobile platform and for a cheaper to free cost. They aren't required to wrap up a large amount of time to complete something and can quit anytime they need to and put it back into their pocket.

Digital media in marketing today is very much a growth industry and is practically dawn before a golden afternoon. Companies, particularly gaming companies, worked out a free model to play their games. However they do offer you ways to enhance your game playing time by offering powerups, time savers, extra lives, bonus levels, card packs, or any of a thousand different ways to support the game makers and the overhead of running the game itself. I've found that I've spent more money of "free" games than games I purchased outright! That's not uncommon either as one of my close friends and gaming buddies, Abostang has done the same!

This was a brilliant stroke of marketing! It is similar to the drug dealer's pitch, the first one is free! This also translates to subscription services. Remember when Netflix was just DVDs by mail and you got six with a coupon when you bought a new DVD player? Remember when Hulu was a way to catch up on the network shows from the previous evening? Now look at them! For a reasonable price per month, you have access to more entertainment than you could watch in a lifetime! Updated each and every month as well!

Overall once you learn that if you just enjoy a medium for what it is, the brief time passer, the movie in the minivan to keep the kids quiet, or the salvation from the realities of the daily grind, you find that you can live with it and your decisions and move on when you get bored with whatever is your distraction at the time. 

So there I was in 2015. I had watched some streaming series on another Netflix binge and had finished it in record time. I asked myself if this is what I wanted to do every evening, come home, binge some show, go to bed, go to work, and do it again with weekends being reserved for the serious binging time. I had been a constant volunteer at my local community theatre for over seven years at that point and found myself burned out. No, I needed a challenge, to build my mind back up again instead of letting it atrophy in sitcoms.

What would I do....what indeed.....

I Hate Being An Ex Anything

So there I am, I'm watching YouTube videos and happen to run across videos I've shot myself. Yeah that happens when you log into your account.
I was watching Colder Weather and It's Been A While videos in their various forms, live, on screen lyrics, official, well you get the point when it dawned on me. Being an ex sucks.

An ex employee, an ex high school student, an ex youth. Yeah some people always think the future is brighter while some think of the past as the good ole' days.

I'm both.

I think the future is bright and I also long for the good ole' days but being an ex doesn't lend itself easily to either. It more easily lends itself to the present, the time being but without planning or without thought to the past.

My hopes lie in the future, my memories relish the past. One of the best times I've ever had was the big "Framily Christmas" I shared with my loved ones at Amy's house. That picture of us all on the staircase was truly a magnificent moment.

And yet, here I am, looking to the future but longing for the past. I cherish my daughters and tell them nearly every day I love them and that they make me one proud daddy. I look forward to holding my grandchildren and I look forward to many things that I can't even fathom at the moment.

I've got a tenacity in me, I'm a natural non-conformist. When someone tells me something, something inside my head asks an opposite question of "What if?" Most of the time I never voice it out loud but when it's overwhelming I do.

So yeah, sometimes I hate being an ex but there are things I'll never be an ex at.
I'm glad you know those things.

Learning To Live Again

First of all I might as well cut to the chase. I'm now a divorced man. Any of you that know the both of us know this or have strongly suspected as much.

Second, I'd like to ask any of you that know the both of us to please not treat us any differently than you did while we were together. It wasn't our faults and it was both of our faults, we've both cried and accepted blame so please love us both as you did before this news. You won't hear me say a bad word towards her and if you do then please call me on it. I mean it.

Third, I've still got the two most incredible daughters in the world! Thing 1 has enrolled in college and when she walked across the graduation stage, well there wasn't a prouder daddy in the whole place, I promise!

Thing 2 is enjoying her time in Japan and without a doubt learning so much more through her experiences than most people her age. (I almost said the "T" word, teen, which she takes great offense to being referred to)

I love them deeply and without reservation. They've taught me so much about being a dad and are both truly the best things that have ever happened to me and I'm always grateful to her for sharing her daughters with me and that's the God's honest truth.

What's in my future? Well as I borrowed liberally from Garth Brooks in the title it's pretty accurate. I've got very little natural talent when it comes to writing or making things up so I've had to borrow the sentiment from a real artist with the creativity I lack but I've made some plans and just this week took the first step in that new journey.  These plans are pretty broad and will take a few months to get accomplished but they will. I've come to some sort of peace, albeit uneasy at times, with myself.

I can't promise to update this blog as often as I did before but I'm going to try to get back into the morning writing groove again. It's a healthy habit that I've long been out of and I need that sort of outlet again for a while. It also plays a part of my future plans so I really need to get it going again.

It's a good habit, a healthy habit and I felt sharper when I did it daily.

Good Game

Yesterday was Super Bowl Sunday and while it looked like a blow out to start with the game turned around after a power failure and the Niners made it close. I turned it during the half time show as Beyonce was taking the stage, the puppy bowl seemed much more interesting and was.

Commercial wise it was decent. My favorite was a Paul Harvey essay on farmers during a truck commercial. I miss Paul Harvey, he seemed to be the everyman of his day. If Normal Rockwell was the painter of common everyday life then Paul Harvey was the philosopher of the common man.

I'm sure you can find the commercial on You Tube if not many of his essays. The one Rest of the Story that always sticks out to me was his story about Helen Keller who was a dedicated communist. We happened to have been studying Helen Keller in school during that time and I recorded it and brought it in to listen to. It had a shocking effect of disbelief as I recall. The teacher really didn't want to discuss it, I suspect she might have been a communist sympathizer. It was the only class I ever flunked in my school career.

I had forgotten all about that until I heard his voice during the commercial. Wow, what a memory. Funny how they come and go like that. 

On The Way

Alright, the beta readers have been secured.
I hired a graphic artist after Thing 2 simply didn't have the time to do the work.
He happens to be the son of one of my cousins. So I'll still be paying family to handle the work. He's pretty darn good too!

When my beta readers give me their critiques I'll evaluate them and rewrite the first draft to a draft that's much better and ready for publishing! I should be able to have it ready by March if things go well.

This will be a fun chapter to write, so to speak and I'm excited about a few other stories I've got rolling around in my head!

I'm Back!

That's right, my project has come to fruition recently and now I've got the time and energy to blog once again. I stopped blogging months ago for a reason. I was going to write a novel.

I did.

I didn't have time in the mornings to write both a novel and come up with a daily blog post. To start with I purchased a book called 90 Day Novel: Unlocking The Story Within.

Following it to the letter, well for the most part, I wrote away. An extra hour each morning, mostly anyway. When I was writing heavy I could hit the two thousand word mark but mostly I averaged about thirteen hundred words a morning.

I'm aiming for the self published world as I'm not planning on making a career out of this and it's really the easiest way for family and friends to access my work should they be so kind.

I mean I could set at home and email out Word .doc files but really who's going to be interested other than family and friends? Most of them will be kind enough to download it and maybe read a chapter or two before giving up thus politely saying they enjoyed it.

Believe me I've got no illusions as to the worth of this novel however it's a story I wanted to tell. This will never be confused with the work of a real author, believe me. It's a lot of pop culture bantering and a fantastical setting that I feel I'd be comfortable in.

The characters are what I spent the most time developing and the story really takes a back seat to them. After rereading it I can say the ending felt a bit tacked on so I rewrote a bit of it and added some more stuff. I'm not sure if it worked well or not but that's not really up to me, I can say I'm happy with it though and really couldn't end it any other way with my characters and the situation they were in. Well in my view anyway, you may see it differently.

I've also got no illusions about the genre I chose. The Zombie Apocalypse genre is almost as overcrowded as the Vampire genre was in the mid-90's.

The format is always the same though:
1. Unassuming, innocent day.
2. People get sick.
3. Sick people bite more people.
4. Survivors struggle to find refuge and safety.

With very few variations that's how they all go and I've read more than my fair share so I decided to add a few slight alterations to my story without making it totally self aware and thus a satirical joke.

There are good parts and bad parts of this story but it's my first attempt at serious writing so as a first effort I know there's plenty and plenty of room to grow my skills and develop a better style of writing.

So why isn't it available right now? Easy, it's not formatted yet. Honestly it should be easy but for some reason I'm not grasping it. Once it is formatted though and I've secured cover art for it then it'll be uploaded and published!

I'm not sure how long that will take but it'll happen when it's ready to happen.

So in short, I'm blogging again. I'm not sure if it'll be daily as it once was as I'm really out of the habit but I'll do my best to keep it interesting.

By the way, if you'd like to offer your time to become a beta reader and offer feedback on the weaker points of the story. Email me, you're hired!

Amazing Experience!

My Wife pulled off a huge success today! She took a group of untested teens and younger to a theatre contest and they brought down the house!

They had three judges there, they were famous for theatre success and had Broadway directing experience. One judge had taken his show to this same contest and wound up winning the international competition.

After performing your show then the judges come down while the cast sits on the front row and they give you show notes. My wife was called "An excellent director", "Congratulations on a wonderful and fun show", and had practically everything good to say to our cast.

Let me set this scene a little, the show that went on before ours and after ours didn't have such kind remarks.

Our show was interrupted several times by thundering applause and laughter! This show that My Wife, GhoulGal, and Teehee put together was simply amazing! When you consider that we rehearsed in the lobby, didn't have a full cast and barely had enough to put on the show we could while doubling up some roles, rehearsed with lights for the very first time yesterday on the competition stage and that was only the second time of rehearsing on stage period, the limited experience at least half of the kids had while for a few it was their very first experience at all, and this was done during summer camp season! The full cast wasn't there for rehearsal four or five of the six weeks!

When you consider all of that AND add that our teens were competing against regular season adult shows they simply rocked this show! No other way to say it! They did their director's proud!

I'm very proud of my wife for taking the time to bring this show to the stage, it'll be an experience that will not soon be forgotten by me or the cast! Sunday we find out what if anything we've won. I feel great about our chances of bringing home some excellent awards for our troupe!

First Friday Cabaret

Yes this is one of my infrequent blog posts while my project is underway for the next three months.
I have to blog special occasions and this one is special!

My Baby and Piano Genius rocked cabaret last night! To a standing room only audience too! They played for nearly a full hour and had massive ovations after every song and music number! I was so proud of both of them and especially the song that Thing 2 joined them on, Louisana. Her violin cried while My Honey provided the soulful voice and Piano Genius provided the core of the sad song.

The story is about a flood in Louisiana in 1927 and six feet of water in the streets of Evangeline. Such a deep and soulful song that really brought the house down!

The night was amazing! They did so well!

The Blog Posts Will Be Sporadic

Over the next few months the blog will be very sporadic. I'm working on something in the mornings now and that'll take away from my blogging for now. Over the past month they've been pretty hit and miss anyway and that's one of the reasons.

So for now something else demands my morning attention and I might go a week or more without blogging. I'll return to my regular blogging schedule eventually though!

Monday Monday

Here we go again folks! A short work week for the wonderful Fourth of July! The day in which our Founding Fathers decided to break away from England and venture forth upon a new path of governing!

Come on Wednesday! Looking forward to a day off in the middle of the week! Yeah it'll be hot at work today, I'll have a lot to do and I'll sweat so much that I'll feel grimy and dirty for days but I'll make it through, come home after and enjoy my Honey this evening!

That's enough to get me through today!

Last night My Honey saved the Theatre from burning down! She was there when things went Bang! It seemed the AC unit had blown up so she went around and checked the breakers and then called the power company. Good thing! With the heat the way it is I wouldn't be surprised if the power grid downtown just went up in smoke!

I'll have to talk to her today about what happened as I was sound asleep when she got home from rehearsal.

It's Running!

The pool is running away! The filter works fine, the new pump is a work horse, and now I'm filling up to the right amount! I'll go chemical shopping today and then it's all done! The triple digit heat will mean nothing anymore!

The girls and My Honey are happy and that's what is important:) There is now a way to cool off in the hot sun and feel refreshed! That's the goal!

The Pool Days

Today will mark the first time in roughly ten years my pool in the back yard will be operational. Fully operational. It's nearly full now. My neighbor happens to work on pools for a living and this year we actually have the funds to do some minor repairs and get a pump and get the filter going.

The last pump was pretty old and locked up and after looking at the prices I decided it wasn't worth it. However my neighbor happens to have a newer pump and we just purchased it. He'll be over when it starts to cool off and we'll get things lined out!

The pool has been shocked and via a submerge able pump the water is circulating as it's filling. During the hundred plus degree days to come it'll be very nice!

So the pool days are now upon us!

Chief Justice Roberts

As we made it through this triple digit week we now find ourselves on the verge of a weekend! Yeah it'll be a busy weekend but you know something? It's forty eight hours off and not at work! My oven of a shop will stay unused for the next two days and I won't be there!

Well yesterday something pretty big happened. Obamacare was upheld by the supreme court. Chief Justice John Roberts was the surprise swing vote in this case. A shock to everyone however as this article points out this might have been a crazy brilliant gambit that will allow everything to happen just as the conservatives want to happen and boil liberal frogs one degree at a time.

I'd say if Chief Justice Roberts thought along these lines then he without a doubt set the table for conservative win after conservative win for decades. What's even more important to remember is that the next president will be selecting two if not three justices in the next eight years. The dreaded Ginsburg is hanging in there but she will retire in the next eight years, Stephen Bryer is in his seventies. Kennedy is in his mid seventies as well and he usually sides with the liberal wing. The third could very well be a conservative judge in either Thomas or Scalia.

It's not all bad, and if this is accurate as I said above, it could be political gold for the long term. Obama is now forced to call his mandate a tax and that tax is now leveled on mainly lower and middle income families that can't afford to purchase health insurance. It won't bother those that have insurance or those that can afford it in the least. It's a gigantic tax though on those that can't afford health insurance and now it's unavoidable that Obama has to run on that.

Today Is The Day

This is the day that will make or break the present president of the United States. Today his legacy will be determined and he'll go down as a Carter or a better Carter (who by the way has been criticizing Obama about the drone strikes, if you have Jimmy Cater criticizing you about something you know you're doing something right) either way Obama will be compared to that failed presidency.

Today the Affordable Care Act will be ruled unconstitutional by the supreme court. No one knows how much will be struck down right now but if the individual mandate is struck down then the whole thing will fail. Obama will be wearing his bruises for a while as he heads into his campaign trail rhetoric.

Believe me, he and his cronies believe it'll stay intact. I believe it'll at least be gutted enough to where it'll be ineffective if not outright struck down. Then there is no way in the world where this congress will get something passed before the election. If the law stands then it'll be repealed if Romney is elected. Well that's what he says anyway. I really don't trust Romney that much and think he might wind up as Obama light but time will tell.

Regardless of what happens today it'll be interesting and it'll make a difference one way or the other for every single American. Whether you'll be forced to buy health insurance or pay a fine if you don't. Today is the day that I feel Obama will go up in smoke and have a hard time recovering from.

Bring It Heat!

One of my coworkers and I might have discovered the perfect summer lunch meal. Seven layer dip.
It's easy to make, filling, and very tasty! You don't have to cook it, it's served cold and in my hot oven of a shop that's the best thing about eating something cold!

I made up a dip last night, it's actually eight layers though: refried beans, guacamole, salsa, sour cream, cheese, olives, jalapenos, and for a topper, bacon bits! Yes, this will feed me the rest of the week and possibly into the hottest times of the summer!

I'm ready now for what the summer brings! I was just about sandwiched out anyway. This will be good for a long time though!

Dog Days

Even though summer has officially just begun last week we are in the heat of it. The triple digit temperatures are here for a while. They are relentless and won't let up until the occasional front moves in, likely on accident or we get the very rare summer thunderstorm.

Yeah we will be mired in the heat, broiled, sauteed, and fried. My shop is pretty much a convection oven in the summer time. It's nice and toasty in the winter though. I was pretty sweaty at work yesterday, drenched in fact but when I got into the office to cool off it felt darn good. I stood under the fan, practically our only source of AC as we are on the end of the line when it comes to getting cold air pumped in. There just isn't much left by the time it gets to us.

I dread summers in our shop. I'll keep the powerade close by and plenty of water with me though. We'll knock this summer out too!

Heat Problems

So earlier in the week the heat was starting to get to me. It hit me harder on Friday, Saturday I was filling ill, and then yesterday it knocked me for a loop. I hydrate all the time. Problem this time is that I probably hydrated too much with just water perhaps and had sweated all of my salt away. I felt super weak yesterday, got dizzy easily, and just felt horrible.

Thankfully My Honey came to the rescue, she got me some powerade! That actually helped me to start to feel a lot better! I stayed in bed though for the remainder of the evening but yeah I feel almost decent this morning. I've got another two powerades in the fridge and I'm taking one to work

I don't feel as weak this morning. Hopefully I'm recovered, I'm feeling like it!

Day Off

I took a day off from the blog yesterday. I napped a bit. My Love had a big event last night and she did an outstanding job as the Emcee for the Texaco Country Showdown! Great job honey! I'm very proud of you!

Other than that I was out of sorts most of the day and into the night. I didn't feel right at all. I finally left the Showdown and came home where I tossed my cookies from the day and headed for the couch to recuperate. My Love found me when she got home and helped me to bed.

I'm feeling a bit better this morning, not all good yet but better. Hopefully the day will be better to me than yesterday.

Wait 'Til Next Year

Today Thunder fans will join the familiar turf usually inhabited by Cubs fans as they pack up the remains of their season and head home. Cubs fans usually are just hoping for a win now and then while the Thunder will be anticipating the first in a string of championships though. Big difference.

Last night one of the most disliked athletes in all of sports claimed his first title in LeBron James. The Thunder are poised to dominate the NBA for a very long time though. They have one of the youngest teams in the league, they are also all under contract for quite some time!

We as a state can enjoy this team for the foreseeable future and expect them to represent us well!
Nice season Thunder! We're glad you made it! 

Almost Over

The week is nearly done. Our sore kitty is still sore and has a cold. He hides under the bed but the vet said as long as he is eating and his stitches aren't draining he'll be fine. He stayed on my lap all last night for attention.

My Baby has a spectacular cast for Audition and rehearsals with the teens are going well! I'm very proud of her and the job that she is doing! The Theatre will be very well represented!

Tonight is Third Thursday, the acoustic music night at the Theatre. I'll be up there tonight with the tech.

Thunder Down But Not Out

The Thunder have a shot tomorrow night at bringing the series back home but they are down 3-1 right now and face elimination. If they can deny LeBron James a ring I know America will be happy and I know Oklahoma will be thrilled at their first professional sports championship!

Yes they have enjoyed national championships before but this is the pro level. The big time. This time the whole state is united behind a team instead of in different college camps.

Even if they fall tomorrow night it's likely that they will be a NBA Finals participant for at least the next five years. They have dynasty written all over them and could likely be the next Spurs or Lakers and be perennial champions. They are young, they are under long term contracts, and they are getting this experience at a very young age. They are going to be a juggernaut for the years to come.

We'll get very used to seeing the Thunder play at this high level and in the next ten years they'll eventually have a rebuilding time and be at the bottom for a year or two before climbing back up to the top again. It's just the cycle of sports. Players will come and go, the team will rise and fall, and we'll win and lose.

Right now the Thunder are definitely rising though!

It's Starting Again!

Today is my Monday Tuesday. Got the kitten all back home yesterday evening. He's doing fine. We could tell when the pain meds were wearing off though. He slept in the nook of my arm all night, he's much better this morning though. He'll be up today and walking just fine I'm sure.

Thing 2 beat Diablo 3 last night, well on the normal level. She's going to try nightmare difficulty next and we'll see how that goes. I know how hard that is though, it'll be tough on her! She'll have fun though, she really likes the game.

My Honey's rehearsal went well last night for her OCTA show! She and I did the light plot that she has to send off. Talk about tough, without seeing the stage or the lights to tweak them and play with them the way you want, it's darn hard. You really can't see how they are going to look but we did our best with what we had to work with. It's a very funny and touching show! The teens are good, it should do well in competition! I'm very proud of her:) She's done a great job!

Nice Weekend

Today I took Liddy to the vet to get him fixed and get his shots. I took My Honey her Keurig coffee pods she forgot this morning. Now I'm just going to enjoy the final day off from work!

Now that I'm earning more leave I decided that after this I'm not going to take off so much and let it build up as far as I can. I'll have roughly seventy hours now, I'd like to build it up past two hundred if possible though. It'd be really nice to have that kind of leave in the bank.

So now to chill and wait for Thing 2's appointment this afternoon:)
Life is good.

Father's Day

Today was my first official and real father's day. My girls, all three of them, got me a shirt, "You Can't Scare Me I Have Two Daughters"
It's been upgraded to my favorite tshirt.

I made a lemon and garlic pork loin on the BGE today. Yummy stuff. My Lady Love and Thing 2 have gone for coffee with Piano Genius. He wasn't able to attend last night's party for her so he suggested coffee tonight for them. Great guy!

The Thunder will be tipping off in about an hour from now. I've done little to not much today and it's been nice. Tomorrow will be taking the kitten to get fixed and Thing 2 has a check up in the afternoon. I'm off work so I'll handle that:)

Yesterday And Today

Yesterday was super busy, we were doing the final touches for Thing 2's sweet sixteen party! It went off without any problems at all and she was one very happy girl at the end of the evening with her new set of pearls! Lots of people showed up and I can tell you she is one very loved young lady! Her Theatre family loves her almost as much as her family!

Then we had a big rain storm, big but all too brief. It stormed for maybe a half hour or less and blew away. It looked threatening but nothing else appeared. All in all a top notch day for the family!

Friday night My Honey got me tickets for Charlie Daniels in Newkirk. Let me tell you something, that man deserves to phone in a performance if he wants to. He's seventy five. He had a stroke a couple of years ago. He's had his ups and downs. He is literally a living legend but he also puts on a super show! He tore up at least two bows, tossed another one to the audience, and can tear up a stage with is guitar playing. That man wouldn't phone in a performance if he was paid to! His band was very talented in their own right.

Most of them were songwriters as well and each of them had their own time to shine on stage. The drummer had at least a five minute solo that was making everything vibrate in the house! His lead guitar player could easily be in any band he wanted to be in and be a superstar. He could shred a guitar neck. The keyboardist was easily as good as Piano Genius himself. Do yourself a favor, if The CDB is in your neck of the woods, go see him. It's worth your time!

Today will be a nice day. The Thunder will be playing tonight in Miami and will win back home court advantage. They were beat so now they have a loss out of the way. They should be ready to go down there to Miami and tromp them on their own home court!

20 Years

Today in 1992 I was hired at the place where I currently work. Since that time I've gone through two full rounds of BRAC, three presidents, massive world changes, two domestic terrorist attacks, nineteen super bowls, the Bulls legendary seasons with MJ, dramatic personal changes, gained new friends, lost old ones, and the best things, I've gotten married and I've now got two beautiful daughters!

If you would have told me then all of that I wouldn't have believed you. A strange thing happens as you grow older, you want more security instead of more of the unknown. You gamble less with your future and start planning for when you are too old to work. When you are twenty two you aren't capable of thinking about your future, it's hard enough planning to the end of the week, when you are forty two you realize that the word retirement is a real thing and that you are headed for it sooner than you think.

I also realize I've done this kind of work for over half my life now. It's been twenty three years and probably a few more months than that that I've done this. I can tell you it's hard on your body and who knows what kind of health ramifications I've got in my future but I try to be safe. I use my gear every day.

Good lord above has it been this long? I get my extra week of PTO now. It'll build up faster than ever and that's a great thing. It also means that I'm ten years out from being eligible for the pension. I'm vested now but being able to collect it is a great thing! It'll be the main plank in our retirement planning, I've got My Love set up as my successor and she'll enjoy the benefits for life after I'm gone so security is a big deal to me. You think more about taking care of those you love and making sure they can do well in your absence. So yeah, sometimes you think about your mortality once in a while too.

Twenty years.
Twenty years.

Twenty's Eve

Tomorrow is a big day for me. It's my twentieth anniversary at work. That means I earn my final week of vacation leave and will accrue leave very fast and it means that I've got ten years left before being eligible for my pension. That's a big big deal too. With the current contract they have added one and a half times the amount that is contributed on a hourly basis. It'll provide a decent retirement on it's own but add in the 401k I'm kicking in to and it'll be a comfy retirement package!

Yeah, June 15, 1992 was the date. Hard to believe I've made it this far. Tomorrow I'll have a far more detailed blog about the past twenty years. Sheesh, that's almost half my life when you type it like that.

Twenty years, where does the time go?

The Thunder play game two tonight in Loud City! They might do the rope a dope again and let the Heat wear themselves out as they did in game 1. We'll see how they'll come out, if it's swinging or if it's just cruising to the second half.

They will play the next game in Miami and there they'll probably want to set a tone and let Miami know they are here to play for real. LeBron, hero turned villain, probably won't have enough "umph" to get the Heat to a title this year. They have run into a very young wrecking machine that can play at such a high tempo for the entire game if they want to. If this team stays together for the long term then we can have a TwentyTeen dynasty on our hands!

Thunder Up One

The Thunder did their rope a dope style of play, letting the Heat get confident in the first half and then actually starting to play in the third quarter. The Thunder always own the second half! They usually tie things up in the third quarter and hit the gas in the fourth and pull away.

The other team is usually tired by that point and can't keep up with the young and energized Thunder!

Next game is tomorrow night and I predict the same thing will happen. The teams from the east just aren't as good as the western teams. If it goes five games I'll be surprised. Most people say six games. I guess it can happen because the middle three games are at Miami. We'll see, but we know that the Thunder can win on the road without any problems.

Wool

People came out of the woodwork yesterday to complain to the grievance committee member that inhabits my office and shop. Just another day in the life.

I had a ton of work to do as well. Parts for two jets were just for starters and it got busy from there!

Anyway I finished a book called Wool: The Omnibus Edition by Hugh Howey at lunch yesterday. It's pretty good. It paints a time after the world quit working and there are seeds of people planted in one corner of the world. These seed banks are silos and the silos are huge and inhabit thousands of people each. Entire systems from oil pumps to water pumps to gardeners and even livestock.

The interesting thing about this book is that it's a self published novel on Amazon for the Kindle. The first book was about fifteen thousand words and qualifies as a novelette. After the reviews from it wanted more story he wrote another one and another one and kept going. That started last April.

The book has gained attention from a long ways away too. Ridley Scott just purchased the movie rights to it. A hardback edition is in the works for the UK, he plans on staying independent in the States though. He's also very accessible. After I finished reading the book I emailed him my thoughts. He replied back himself! He says it's important to stay in touch with the people that read your material and months ago he was cleaning book shelves part time and writing on his breaks.

Mr. Howey seems a humble and goofy guy! I'd say get Wool and enjoy it, a new business model and brand new way of getting new stories out to people and bypassing the book making machine that usually dictates how and what we read and from whom.

It Starts Today

All of the unhappy people will start lining up outside the office this morning to tell the grievance committee member how unhappy they are with the contract. How do I know? Because he's also my coworker and the same people were unhappy with the last contract too.

I will know this contract inside and out before the three years are up on it. I'll be able to answer questions left and right because I'll know the agreement better than probably Johnny Friendly that negotiated it in the first place. I'm not a shop steward but by golly I'll know it as well as they should. My coworker and I talk about the situations that arise and there are lots of them. Mostly it's easy to solve. For the most part it's about not being late to work and that their supervisor is picking on them because they punched in two minutes late....every day.

Yeah, that's a common one actually. And because I know the agreement and my coworker knows it and for some reason the supervisor fails to read it and understand it then there is always a loophole in how they try to give the employee a letter. Always. They never follow procedures correctly. What was a slam dunk turns into the supervisor having egg on his face.

Usually the employee is at fault too, that's the thing! They usually deserve the letter or even being terminated because they are lazy, screwups, never come to work and are out of leave, or they just don't care and would rather be somewhere else. However because the supervisor makes a mistake 95% of the time they keep their job, aren't grateful they get out of trouble, and will continue to go about their ways as if nothing happened. Until they get in trouble again.

Yeah, all of that begins today and you know something? I'm glad because the alternative would have been me standing in a ditch again. I'm not standing in that ditch again. I'll listen to the malcontents talk about how they hate the deal but didn't vote on it, they were busy doing whatever else they were doing that kept them from spending a half hour and listening to the negotiating team explain everything. I'll listen to the malcontents talk about how bad their jobs are despite being paid very well. I'll listen to the malcontents and wonder what in the world they would do when they had to go apply at Walmart and deal with managers I dealt with that thought I was an imbecile and spoke to me as they would a third grader. All the while thinking, actually knowing I made more than they did and had been in the workforce much longer than they had.

Yeah that magic starts today. The phone will be ringing before I'm even unable to unlock the office door. I know it will be and I'll answer it, and I'll tell them to come on down with their questions because I'm happy that I'm able to go to work today and not stand in a ditch.

The New Contract

After going over the deal and talking to the negotiation team I voted the way I thought I would. It's a pretty good deal, probably the best we could get given the economy.

The insurance is a bit confusing but not as bad as I thought it'd be. It should work out pretty much like it is now. Yeah, I'm positive several mad people will get up there and vote to strike no matter what, yeah the union did mishandle the information distribution.

I think it's a reasonable deal though and one we can easily live under!

We are good for three more years, the base isn't going anywhere anytime soon! Labor peace will reign for the foreseeable future!

Yesterday

I really didn't feel like posting yesterday. It just didn't occur to me as my mind was wandering from the contract talks to auditions and if we were going to have enough people to fill out the roles of the show My Honey wants to do. It's a show for the Gaslight Teens and it's going to be a festival piece. A competition show.

The Theatre hasn't had a show in this competition in about ten years now and this one will be a great show! It's funny! Well the auditions rolled around and by the skin of our teeth we made it! We've got enough teens to make a show of it! That was a massive relief!

The other big deal that had me on pins and needles all day was the contract talks at work. I heard from the grapevine last night that moneywise this is a fair deal, very reasonable and good for us. The con is that the insurance has become a jumbled mess now. As it was explained to me it's pretty confusing. That might be enough to make a lot of people vote in a bad way. 


However when you put it into perspective it lays out like this:
1. This economy sucks and won't pick up until you know who is Out of office.

2. We are fortunate to have a job in today's world let alone a good job, sometimes you have to put up with the bad like this to get in on the good. Yeah maybe the insurance isn't what we wanted but the money is good and it's a good place to work. They are tripling the amount they are contributing to the pension and the cost of living raises are about what we've gotten every year. I can live with the bad and bite my tongue for three years to keep from winding up in the ditch which brings me to the third point.

3. I'm not striking anymore. If the choice is a jumbled mess of a plan and a strike, then I'll figure out the jumbled mess of a plan. My vote counts for two thirds more than a vote to strike. It's not based on simple majority, oh no, a strike has to pass by two thirds. A "No" on the strike vote carries more weight.

I think yesterday worked out fine after all.

No News

The negotiating committee and the company have been holding their cards close to the vest. We know nothing right now and not only that but there is quite a bit of confusion about when the vote to accept or reject is. Originally it was supposed to be tomorrow, June 9th. Now it might very well be Sunday, or tomorrow.

Our union has dropped the ball on communication for sure this time. One of those in charge needed to iron out this date...like a month ago instead of the day before the weekend we are supposed to vote! There is a fundamental problem that means one of two things has occurred.

One: The union leaders are inept and it never crossed their minds to set a solid vote date for the rank and file to vote on.

Two: Negotiations aren't going in a good direction and that means there are some bad things in the new contract that they can't settle on or are bad for the membership but can't or don't want to do anything about. This is called ramrodding by the union. Meaning they will ramrod a bad deal down the throats of the rank and file and don't want to give us any time to read the contract in it's entirety.

This has happened before and it was over twelve years ago. They instituted a pay freeze for three years on grades one through four but got everyone else got pay raises. This was unfair to those that work pretty darn hard but the union didn't see it that way. So those that made the least amount of money got the shaft and the union let it happen. They didn't give anyone time to digest the contract, they didn't want you to think about it, they wanted you to vote and screw your fellow brothers and sisters that didn't earn as much as you did.

So now the game is afoot so to speak, our committee that is representing us has kept things quiet. Our main leader, Johnny Friendly is retiring this year. He used to be a mechanic where I work but got elected into the business representative office and hasn't looked back. He has about thirty contracts he works on or negotiates on a regular basis. However he hasn't worked under one of those contracts at all. He is as union as union can be. He's not a popular guy to most people as when he wants something he tends to leave out facts to get his way on something. When he wants something to happen, it happens no matter what the committee wants. What he usually wants benefits the International in some fashion like the insurance company they want to bring in.

It's of course a health insurance company that's administered by the....union. You guessed it! We'll see how that plays out this weekend.

Thunder Up

The Thunder took the Western Conference Crown last night and are headed to the finals to face either the Heat or the Celtics. In all honesty I believe they just beat the three hardest teams to beat in the NBA over the past month. They started with reigning champs Mavericks, then took it to the perennially good Lakers, and knocked off the well oiled machine Spurs.

Any of those teams would have destroyed any East team that made it to the finals. The East is just weak this year. I'd really be shocked if the Thunder got into a series that went to game six, but more than likely they'll win in five or a sweep.

Negotiations are going smoothly reportedly. They plan to have everything wrapped up by tomorrow and we are supposed to vote on Sunday now. That gives me pause though, if the unthinkable happens again then there will be little time to come to an agreement and get back to work on Monday. The results of the second first strike vote came in last night and a friend called me with the results. They were good, we had enough people show up this time to sanction a strike.

Let me be clear, I'm not voting strike unless they take money away. Many share that same view, strikes suck. No one wants that to happen again. Not us, not the company, not the military, no one. No one won last time and no one will win this time. We only got what we had out of the strike, not one cent more. That's what I expect to happen again, to maintain what we have with probably less of a cost of living raise each year which was 3.75% the last three years. I expect 1% honestly, the government is broke.

More zombie style attacks have occurred lately including one in Louisiana and another one in Miami. Keep in mind this is drug fueled and so far the victims haven't turned to anything but patients in the hospital. That rules out a self sustained Zombie Apocalypse of Doom. We are safe...for now.

Busy Day

This morning I've got to take Jet to the vet, later on this afternoon take the big  cats to the vet for their shots, I have to go vote on the second first strike vote, and My Baby has a MRI for her back. All in all a packed day!

Thing 2 will be at the Theatre all day with drama camp and busy with that.

Governor Scott Walker won by a landslide last night on his recall election. You'll recall he limited collective bargaining agreements with public sector (Not the private sector unions mind you) unions last year. That made the public sector unions angry and then the fight was on! Money poured in to take out Walker and to defend him and what he's been able to accomplish.

In the end the unions lost and it wasn't even close. The people of Wisconsin wanted Scott Walker and loved the job he was doing. So it's all over now but the crying and with liberals you'll get a LOT of that. They'll spin it in so many different ways you won't be able to see straight for a week.

You might be thinking that there is a bit of hypocrisy on my part and you might be a little bit right. However I'm a member of a private sector union. There is a contract between the military and my company, and there is a contract between my company and our union. None of it effects the public taxes as a public sector union does. In fact I wish I could kick in to my own pension fund as Scott Walker had the workers in Wisconsin do. I'd put in quite a bit on my own if it was possible.

Negotiating Problems Already

It turns out that what was supposed to be a swift and smooth week of negotiations got off to a rocky start. We had a strike sanction vote a full month ago. Without a sanction from the international union we would have no negotiating power at all and basically whatever we vote on Saturday would be null and void. We'd be forced to accept any proposal set forth by the company.

So some idiot didn't catch the fact that we had no sanction until yesterday...less than a week before our big vote. So the local called for an emergency vote and that takes place tomorrow. Basically what this means is that the company doesn't have to bargain in good faith with us. They can just sit back and let their proposal stand until they find out the outcome of Wednesday's vote. If we still have no sanction then we're in trouble and would be working under rules that even Walmart wouldn't apply to its workforce.

I read the company's proposal yesterday. Some of it is quite draconian. I like that word draconian, it's darn dramatic!

Anyway hopefully they will bargain in good faith with us until we achieve a sanction from the international via our vote.

Wednesday will be a busy day, My Honey will go in for a MRI to discover the cause of her back pain and I'm taking in our kitties to get their shots and one of them needs fixed. Jet has gone into heat twice so it's passed time to get her fixed.

Bilderberg

The Bilderberg conference has just wrapped up. It's a real thing not a conspiracy theory woven from scraps of information taken out of context from an uncle's cousin that once knew a waiter from the inside.

The conference is held each year in a different location and usually has the global power brokers present. Global bankers, leaders of industry, heads of state, lots of big wigs. It's also completely secret which ALWAYS leads to conspiracy theories. For instance this is a prime one,

Four years ago it was held in Virginia I believe. All of a sudden while it was going on Obama and Hillary disappeared for about four hours from their schedules, I also remember this being reported by the embedded reporters, and later that day Hillary had dropped from the race. The theory is that the Bilderbergs had decided Obama was the one to continue while Clinton was just hurting his chances by staying in the primaries. They were neck and neck with Clinton losing little ground to the Chicago Machine.

Alex Jones, alarmist, paranoid, and seemingly delusional radio personality, covers the Bilderberg conference each year. He continues to try and get a spy inside it. He infiltrated the Bohemian Grove once about ten years ago which is similar to the conference. Say what you will about Jones, and he never helps himself by linking everything to some kind of plot for the elites to control the population at large that it's ridiculous but he's a true believer. If he's wrong then there's no harm, if he's right though then there are some serious problems worldwide.

I like him because he uncovers things in congressional bills that do have a real world effect on us as citizens. Those are bills and laws that are being passed on a daily basis and sometimes they aren't what they seem to be. I'm against law enforcement using drones over the states for instance and I'm definitely against them being armed. I'm against the military using drones over the states, that's a violation of Posse Comitatus which prevents the military from engaging in law enforcement activities in the states. I'm more for states to decide on how they want to live and limiting federal powers. Things that work in New York don't always work in Florida and they sure don't work out west a lot of the times.

I've written about Jones a couple of times when something he brings up really bothers me and could be another degree of freedom being lost, similar to a frog being boiled one degree at a time. Sometimes he's dead on with what he is talking about and sometimes you just shake you head while you are turning the radio station. The Bilderbergs are real though, it's not a secret. What they talk about is secret and that's the fodder for conspiracy radio for weeks!

Lazy Day

Got up, fixed breakfast, did the dishes, and then later on had a cigar with Beersnob.

Just didn't have a lot on my agenda today and I did it to the fullest!

Tomorrow the grind starts up again. Negotiations will be in full swing. We'll get tidbits about how they are going.

We'll vote on Saturday so by Friday we'll probably have the best and final offer. It'll be a stressful week and I'm really wanting to avoid last time. So here we go!

One Great Day

This morning started off simple enough, coffee. Then My Honey got up and we sat on the back patio and had coffee. Then I took Thing 2 to set call for Shakespeare. After that I thought I'd go gas up and had the idea to sand the upstairs floors. They are hardwood and needed refinished as the last owners  of the house glued carpet to them.

So I rented a sander and then helped my mom pick out a new laptop for her at Staples. I happily headed home and got to work. First of all the main sander was HEAVY! I bet it weighed seventy five or a hundred pounds. It did the job though. After about three hours the main floor was sanded with thirty six and eighty grit while Thing 2 had sanded the edges with a smaller sander.

Then we moved everything from the landing into the bedroom and sanded it and then we did Thing 2's room. I started a little after eleven this morning and returned the sanders at a quarter til six. It was nonstop sanding except I did take a couple of short breaks.

While I was doing this My Love and R were preparing for a send off party for Tech Guy. They were making finger foods all day and getting the photos perfected for the table center pieces! What a great job they did too! The cake looked tremendous! The table decorations were top notch!

We had a big portion of our Theatre Family show up and wish Tech Guy and his family good luck in their new endeavors! Everyone will be saddened by their moving and the Theatre will be poorer for their leaving.

We (mainly My Love and Tech Guy) have been talking over shows for the past two hours and finally we shut it all down around eleven and I took out the trash. Tech Guy walked with me and we said our, "See you laters" as neither of us knew it'd be a goodbye. He'll still have the same phone number and will, for a while, keep the website updated for us.

They will be greatly missed!

Friday!

Tonight I'll be stopping to get a hair cut after work. After that home and at seven thirty I'll be ready to go run Cabaret at the Theatre. It'll be a busy evening for sure.

Last night Piano Genius and My Honey were practicing in the dining room. They sounded amazing! I know I'm biased but GOOD LORD they really sound great when he plays and she sings those old blues songs!!!

I really think the original musicians of those songs must be looking on and are very proud that they are sung so well!!! My baby does the blues well! I'm so proud:)

Nanny Zombie State

More than anything people resent being told how to live by those in power. Well I don't know about most people but the instant contrarian in me really starts to get riled up.

New York City has placed a ban on large sugary drinks such as Big Gulps and Slurpees. Mayor Michael Bloomberg the once Democrat, turned Republican, turned Independent so he could grab and hold power has decreed that drinks larger than sixteen ounces are now banned.

The sheeple in NYC have voted this power hungry politician into office and now like a tick he has burrowed himself in deeper and imposed draconian living laws on salt, sugary drinks, and other such things that deny personal responsibility to those living under those laws.

Well if anything were to be justice for a Nanny State politician it would be that one of the fauxzombies that have been popping up lately such as the man in Miami that was eating the face of another man after he got high on bath salts it would be that they find all of the nanny state politicians and devour them as they have devoured our freedoms to live as we see fit.

While yeah the evidence is factually the same as the leading edge of a zombie apocalypse the actual fact of the matter is that it would have spread far faster than it has and the victim would have turned by now and have to have been put down. So don't get excited yet dear readers, I'm not pulling the alarm bell yet. Stay vigilant my friends, you'll be the first to know it when it happens as I always monitor these events closely so you don't have to!

Half Way

We are at the half way point of the week. The PC is acting up this morning, I'll do some maintenance on it tonight and get it running again. It's been abnormally slow the past couple of days so it might be time to clean it all up and get rid of some unused programs.

We'll see what it takes to get it back in tip top shape again.

Back To Work

Here we go! One busy week ahead!
Thank the Good Lord My Honey is feeling much better! Her back has loosened up and she can walk and drive now. That was one tough week.

Last night we went for ice cream and let Thing 2 drive. She did pretty good, she's doing well with driving. I'm proud of her! Today she starts drama camp at the Theatre. She's one of the helpers for the next six weeks, more or less a kid wrangler. That'll keep her busy though and she's been getting bored at home.

Same job for me! Negotiations will be the talk of the work day for the next couple of weeks. I can tell you straight up, we won't strike again, too many people will vote not to. I'm probably one of them, I don't want to go through that again and put my family through that again. It sucked.

I believe we vote on the new contract June 9th. It expires on the 10th.

Remember

Today is Memorial Day. It's to remember those who wore the uniform and gave everything to protect our freedom and our way of life. It's changed from Decoration Day gradually over the years to Memorial Day and for the uninformed in our society it's the unofficial start of the summer season.

For those of us who are informed as to the history of this solemn day it's a time to reflect upon what those in uniform died to protect. What we enjoy today and take for granted was paid for by those few who have answered their country's call again, and again, and again.

Remember those that gave all today, to fight for oppressed people around the world. Remember those still in combat today and their families that miss them. Remember those families that have lost their loved ones to duty.

Thunder Up!

Watching the Thunder take on the Spurs in game one of the conference finals! Lots of friends hanging out and having a good time!

If OKC can steal this one at San Antonio then they've got a great shot at winning the whole thing! The eastern conference just isn't as strong as the western conference. OKC would really go ape over a major championship!

Ahhhh

Feels darn good to not have anything on the schedule!
Real good!

So the weekend marches on!

Three Days

Yesterday My Love got in to see the doctor. She's got a new set of meds to take and she's actually moving around better than all week long! She still hurts quite a bit and locks up but when I say moving around better its in the relative term.

I think we'll start to see daily improvements now! I think the worst is over with! Thank goodness, I know she's going stir crazy having to sit there and just heal but if she doesn't she'll just extend the time it takes to get better.

The pills make her drowsy and loopy as can be, it's kind of funny! However if she doesn't take them she starts to be in pain like early in the week and can't move.

Today will be an easy day at work, the past two days have been super busy. Everyone wants their stuff done before the weekend. Yesterday afternoon it started to slack off some but I still did a last minute rack of wheels! Today everyone will be in weekend mode!

Slightly Better

My Honey could move around some yesterday, not a lot and she got to hurting fast but she could move. That's improvement! She has a doctor's appointment this morning so we'll be able to at least get an idea of what is going on and if she needs treatment. At the bare minimum she'll be able to get her prescription filled up if recovery is going to be longer.

I really think she's feeling a bit better though! I'm encouraged by yesterday!

Still Hurting

My Love is still down in the back. I'm getting her fed and getting her the pain pills. She's got her coffee and she's starting to wake up:)

She's still in a lot of pain though. The doctor at the hospital said it'd start to loosen up by today or tomorrow and if it doesn't to follow up with another doctor and get a MRI scheduled soon. Thing 2 will probably be home soon and take care of her while I'm at work. She spent the night with some of her friends to start summer off.

Pain

My Love is laid up in bed. Her back is giving her fits to say the least. They didn't find any damage with the bones so that's good! She's on bed rest and medication. She'll have Thing 1 helping her this morning and Thing 2 after school.

Today is the last day of school too! Which is kind of sad, Thing 2 and I have been driving to school every morning. We stop at a quick shop and get morning coffee and a paper then head to drop her off. It's been a real bonding experience, something simple like that. An easy routine in the mornings.

After today My Honey will have plenty of help to help her around should she need to move. This coming weekend is a three day weekend. Negotiations will be starting late next week and I believe we vote on June ninth. Hopefully it'll be a long term contract and it'll be much like we already have.

Not asking for much at all, mainly security right now. I know that's hard to come by in the Obama Age with this kind of unemployment. That's what I'm shooting for though and I hope it goes as smoothly as it possibly can.

Hurt

The Date is injured. Her back is very hurt and we spent yesterday pampering her and helping her walk from place to place but mainly getting her situated in one place and trying to keep her there for an extended amount of time. That's harder than you think, she's a mover, a go getter!

By evening time her back had loosened up enough to walk around herself and with less pain but that was a small gain as the pain was still pretty intense. She's a real trooper though! Nothing was going to slow her down so she took a cello lesson from Thing 2 and a beginner's cello book I got for My Love:) We kept her in good spirits and made it though the day:)

I made supper last night (Thing 2 cleaned and made a new place for a garden in the back yard) and watched The Spirit of St. Louis with Jimmy Stewart. It's been years since I'd seen it, I want to say I was in my early teens but it's a good movie! That was a huge feat in nothing more than a flying gas tank. Today long distance flights or even indefinite flights are easily possible with the help of midair refueling. Possible? They are common place.

Flying nonstop across the Atlantic for the first time, that was a different story and took aviation from county fairs and put it into the mainstream. Serious people paid attention after that and eventually we went to the Moon.

Dead

The subject of my boycott of scotch has died. The convicted Lockerbie bomber Abdel Baset al-Megrahi is no longer among the living. That's a good thing. He'll be doing time now in hell after blowing up a Pan-Am flight that killed two hundred and seventy people.

He was released by the Scottish government on compassionate grounds when he was diagnosed with terminal cancer, which prompted worldwide scorn. He arrived back to a hero's welcome in Libya to live out his days there while the people he killed remained dead and the families still missed their loved ones.

Yeah well, down the hatch.

Work Day At The Theatre

Thing 2 and I will be headed down to the Theatre at nine this morning to help clean out the prop room. Lots of furniture needs to go, it's broken, or will never be used again.

My honey will be representing in the Walk for a Cure this morning with her team from work! After that she'll join us for some clean up time. I know it'll go faster if we get more people but a lot of people are busy this morning and this weekend.

Regardless I'll be there, I know Tech Guy will be there and Thing 2 and My Baby will be there:) We can do big jobs!

Obama Notes

Last night was Third Thursday, today is payday, tomorrow the weekend starts! It's a busy time! Next week school lets out though and summer starts for the Things.

Work continues for us adults though.

In political news, in 1991, long before any of the "birthers" knew there was such a person as Barack Obama, his literary agent had Barack Obama listed as "born in Kenya and raised in Indonesia and Hawaii."

This was on the website until 2007 when Senator Obama decided to make his run for the White House. Then they changed it. So there are two possibilities here:
1. Obama lied to sell books and make himself more of an international man then before he had designs on the White House.
2. Obama lied now about his place of origin to run for the White House and launched the greatest case of fraud on the country and American people of all time.

It's one of the two. I'd love to see the media actually pursue this as they did everything that even hinted at a scandal with President Bush but they won't. It's probably already being swept under the rug now as I type this.

However politically speaking Romney should stay away from this issue, he's leading in the polls now and after the debates he'll gain ground when he makes Obama defend his record. Obama has been in office for three and a half years, his first and only term is nearly finished. There's been a TON of smoke around this issue, perhaps there might be a spark of truth after all. 

Tech Refresher And Training

Last night our soon to be moving Tech Guy gave us a refrehser course on the technical aspects of the Theatre. He and his family will be moving away to Houston to pursue new opportunities, we wish them the very best! He has done a ton for the Theatre and can't be replaced, it's that simple. He's one of a kind for sure!

With that said the Theatre will need to recruit new tech people for the upcoming seasons. A handful of people now run the shows and that will wear us all very thin soon. We need new blood to come in and learn the ropes of putting on a show tech wise. That will lighten the load off of everyone.

It's an important job and often overlooked by our Theatre friends, well until they need someone or two people up in the booth and can't find anyone. So I'd encourage all of the directors in our Theatre, all of the regular actors in our Theatre, and anyone that might be interested to contact the Theatre and get a bit of training on how to set up the lights and sound and run them during for a show. Otherwise that stage might be blacked out at the worst moment when you can't find anyone and don't know how to run it yourself.

Back To Normal

My incredibly talented daughter has won the part of The Fiddler in the summer musical! I'm a proud daddy! I know my love is also very proud of her! She texted me the cast list while I was snoozing away and I thrilled for her!

After yesterday's diversion into a long awaited game, today will be returning to it's normally scheduled life. Nothing fancy, I'll be picking up the work in the shop where I left off Monday as I'm sure I know exactly what is there to do now. I also figure I know no one worked the parts I was working on.

We don't have enough people. The new guy has to have surgery now, tomorrow I think. He muscle was torn from the elbow and he'll be out for weeks if not months.

I don't believe the contract will yield anymore people either, we'll just be where we are until they figure out we are understaffed and it bites them at the wrong time and in front of the wrong people. I also believe that the contract will be quickly settled, I don't expect anything resembling a raise for the next three years. The country is broke, we've been spent into a black hole and we probably won't be able to get our way back out of it unless reasonable politicians agree on true spending cuts and that's not likely to happen!

Negotiations should go very smoothly this time, no one wants a repeat of the last contract. No one. The heads involved in the last round for the company have been fired and replaced. Soon they will swap proposals and we'll see how far apart both sides are to start. I don't think it'll be far at all. I'd vote for a contract extension right now if they extended our current contract we have. I'm thrilled with it! It's stable and fair. I don't see that happening though.

Diablo Day

The original plan was to start playing Diablo at midnight last night at launch. However launch turn out being at two a.m. our time. So plan B was quickly implemented. Go to bed early and get up early and start the quests!

Abostang agreed and thus I headed off to bed to get up at four in the morning to experience the long awaited Diablo 3! We were able to get in twenty levels before the Blizzard servers were taken down for emergency maintenance.

Thus ended my questing day. Abostanf is probably still playing away!

It's a well polished game, practically idiot proof in fact. It would be cool to have a bit more of a learning curve to it but playability and accessibility have always been the cornerstones of the Diablo series. It's simplicity and it's just fun!

I enjoyed it quite a bit and I'm looking forward to leveling up and taking out evil once again!

Diablo 3 Launches Tonight

At ten o'clock our time D3, a game that's been in development for many, many years finally gets its launch date. Abostang and I will be there at the launch online and start our quest to defeat evil. I'm off work tomorrow but I also have quite a few errands to run during the day. After that I'll get a few hours in before returning to work Wednesday and resume our normal working schedule.

Diablo was one of the very first online games you could enjoy on the free service Battlenet. It was designed to match people up with other people and adventure together, a real breakthrough at the time when most people had a 33.6 modem or less. The 56K was on the horizon but costly when you could find it locally.

Anything faster was a dream.

It was a true milestone in the history of gaming and lots of companies took notice as people started to populate the randomly generated dungeons. Diablo was unique and now D3 has made sales history by being the most pre-ordered game of all time.

In the world of the gamer this is big and I'm starting it tonight!

Nice Day

The Things and I took my mom out for an early mothers day lunch. After that it's been fairly quiet and slow.

Thing 2 is house managing the show tonight and I'm going to watch game seven of the Nuggets and Lakers to see who the Thunder will face Monday night. I've got some laundry going and not much else.

I miss my honey.

Fail Wars: Viking Shores, Provoked

So the fail warriors have decided to invade the Faroe Islands on their most popular holiday, St. Olaf's Day. They intentionally drove a mini van with graphic images on it of the last grind or whale kill on it's side. They played whale and dolphin sounds to try and drown out the festivities but that was quickly shut down.

They were intentionally provoking the peaceful people who were trying to enjoy their holiday and had tried to be civil with the Sea Sheterrorists. The festival goers were nonplussed and engaged with the terrorists until the police shut down the area and kindly asked them to move out of the area.

One of the funnier clips was of a patron peeing on the minivan. Then we go to the home shots of the festival where the citizens open up their homes to each other and serve food. They play instruments and sing for each other and it goes well into the night. Everyone seems to really enjoy each other and it's a very fun and peaceful celebration until the Bridgette Bardot docks in the harbor to stir things up.

Again they use the tactic of provoking these friendly people by putting themselves in the middle of things. By docking at the harbor that is the home of this massive celebration they ask for trouble. By having the camera crews with them they are hoping for an incident. A small group of cars assembled on the dock to shout at the terrorists. That's about as far as it went until a man boarded the vessel, the idiot that said he didn't want to engage was about two thirds the size of the man who boarded the ship. He laughably said it was hard to restrain himself from physical confrontation.

He would get curb stomped if he engaged this viking descendent in fisticuffs. All in all a lot of noise and little action. The fail warriors continue next week with the finale. They will try to stop a ancient tradition of people who feed themselves from the hunt and harvest. Then no doubt they'll go back to their ships and smoke a bale of pot while slapping each other on the back on being intolerant of other cultures.

And The Weekend

Will be here after today's work is done! All in all it was a busy week and then a slow week, today will again be fairly slow. That's the way of our cycle at work, too busy to keep up and then it just stops until the next wave of inspections start and they start to tear down more jets. Then we can't keep up.

Not sure what the weekend will bring but I'm sure we'll get through it and carry on into the next week:) This is what is called the daily grind.

We got Thing 1 fixed up with a car. My brother sold us his Saturn Ion for well under book value. The bank had the papers ready to sign before I arrived to sign them! That's how fast it went! Very smoothly! I like that!

The Box

The supervisor that started the boxes that have hurt our night shifter and will likely hurt many other people is named Joe. Joe isn't the most popular guy where I work, he's not the brightest guy either. He's pretty stubborn actually.

He bugs all of the mechanics about things that really don't matter much. That irritates them a lot. We've bugged him about these boxes and how heavy and dangerous they are but he won't change his mind. So now that one has actually injured a man we (well I, with the help of a few other guys and one manager) decided to fix the first box with a decal.

Joe's Box of Death with a thumbs up beside it.

He'll freak out. He'll be pretty upset and the first thing he'll want done is have a letter of reprimand written on your humble writer. This has been countered by the manager that loves the box decal, told him that they were dangerous, and said he'd handle that if it should be attempted.

Today should be interesting!

Man Down

Well we broke the new guy the other night. Yep, he didn't ask for assistance when lifting a huge steel box and tore the muscles away from his elbow in his arm. He will likely be out now for a long time, he goes in for a MRI Friday and after that they will probably schedule surgery unless they try rehab. I doubt rehab would work but what do I know? I only would have asked the guy in the office for help lifting a hundred pound steel box that's four feet long and two feet high!

Sheesh, now we are down another man and they won't replace him. One had several surgeries including a liver transplant, another just had his second shoulder surgery after the first surgery failed, and now the new guy is down. That leaves us with six people with one of those on nights. Five on days and one on nights to keep up with ten docks of aircraft, ground power, flight line, and base shops.

Sigh...we keep busy and I'd rather be down men than be out on the street looking for work. It's all about perspective.

Busy

Talk about a busy day! I was swamped yesterday at work, all day. Parts piled up while I worked priority stuff and that literally took me the whole shift.

Today will be similar, I already know what's there and I can guess what has been done and what hasn't.

Contract negotiations open up the last week of this month. Our contract expires on June first, doesn't seem like three years since the worst two weeks of my life but it has been. Everyone at work still remembers how much striking sucked and I doubt they will vote that way again. I know I won't unless it's a must have to situation like cutting my pay in half and even then I am not sure I'd vote that way.

Neither side wants that to happen again and both will do their best to insure it doesn't happen. I'll go on the record right now and say if they renewed our current contract I'd vote for it as fast as I could check the box.

And Away We Go

I'm not sure what our schedule is this week but it went from day to day last week! Thing 2 had to write out her schedule for us. This week I just don't know right now. I think most of the events are over with right now for the year.

I don't think anyone has a show to do but I do think Thing 2 is going to audition for Fiddler on the Roof this week as the fiddler. The Date has a busy week at work, I don't even know her schedule but I know how busy she's been and this week will be no different!

I know what I have at work this week and it will be moderately busy. Did lots of yard work and work on the pool yesterday. I'm pretty sore actually. We might actually have a pool going this hot summer!

Busy Day

Cleaned the garage with my honey and Thing 2. We went a long way to getting the pool cleaned up too.

Now after grilling burgers we are chilling and getting the evening going!

Bought my first ticket to a show last night, we went to see Don't Drink the Water on stage at the Gaslight. Woody Allen written and well done by cast and crew! Lots of laughs!

Avengers And Thing 2

Yesterday Thing 2 had her violin solo. Beautiful was a understatement! I teared up fairly quickly as she began and some very beautiful noises came fr the antique instrument. The Date and my mom were speechless as Thing 2 began. The Date was understandably nervous but that quickly went away as the bow began to dance on the strings!

She received a superior rating! I'm a very proud daddy!

Last night I found myself all alone for the evening. The Date had gone to take care of her dad for the evening, Thing 1 was at work, and Thing 2 was spending the night with an orchestra friend.

So since the satellite receiver hadn't arrived yet I decided to call Abostang and take in a late movie! The Avengers fit the bill perfectly, late movie, in 3D, and a movie I'd been looking forward to.

It was good, maybe one of the best comic book movies. The standard heroes had to fight amongst each other before learning how to work together storyline was followed. The sequel should be better since all of that is out of the way now and the villain is Thanos. A very powerful character who fell in love with the mistress death. Nearly godlike in his powers, he should really give the Avengers a run for their money in a couple of years.

Was looking forward to the trailer for Dark Knight Rises but it wasn't to be.
I'm so-so on that movie, it could be better than the previews show. Time will tell.

Last Day!

Well of this week it's the last day, we still have a whole string of weeks to get through until, well whatever. So I guess there really isn't a last last day, just a last day of this week long cycle where we have to go to work before getting two days off.

Anyway, Thing 2 has her solo this morning with Weezy's mom as her accompaniment! She does so much for all of the kids, teens, and especially the theatre! She deserves a community award, she volunteers for so much and offers her time freely.

Slight chance of rain later on today. Go figure, it's Tristate. That's the way it happens!

Winding Down

Today will be pretty busy, yesterday was at work. Today will be the same. It happens when you're the only one in the shop.

Well a couple of days ago the satellite receiver went out, another one is being shipped to us so last night I pulled out a real gem of a movie. The Majestic, a little known movie that I'm positive I've blogged about before, years ago.

It's about a screenwriter in the communist witch era that has an accident and loses his memory. He winds up in a small town and is mistaken for one of their war heroes who disappeared in WWII. This is a movie about honor, patriotism, and friendly people in a small town. There isn't one bad frame in this movie which was directed by Frank Darabont of Shawshank Redemption and The Walking Dead fame.

It's not surprising that you've probably never heard of it but it's a special movie, if Frank Capra were alive today and making movies, he would have made this movie. If you can find it I'd strongly suggest you check it out, it's worth your time:)

All By Myself

That's the song that'll be ringing in my head today at work. The Lead has gone to a union sponsored conference in the city today and tomorrow. So I'll handle everything for two days. It's an unspoken law that the phone will ring three times more when one of us is in the shop by ourselves.

Not sure why it works like that but it does. I'm sure there is an inspector lurking in the wings waiting to pounce on me as well. We'll see, hopefully things will go smoothly but they rarely do when it's one person. The new guy has gone to nights. He asked how long he'd be there, I told him until he retires. The guy with eighteen years of seniority has been on nights for sixteen years and will be there until he retires. He said he won't might nights, yeah, until you work it for a while then you'll mind nights.

The Date has been feeling very under the weather, last night she had a pretty hot fever going on. Before I went to bed she was cooler as she had taken some ibuprofen and it was working. Hopefully she'll be better today:)

Thing 2 is practicing for the Tristate festival, she gave us a list last night of every place she has to be from Thursday and into the weekend. It's a lot! She'll do great though:) Love them all:)

Amazing

Towns north of us were grazed or hit by tornadoes last night while south of us got hammered by severe weather, us? Well we remained safe from the dangerous weather once again! Yes we get flooded from time to time but not badly, we get freezing weather and ice storms, but we are usually safe as can be from tornadoes.

Everyone who lives here feels the same way, we've all sat in front of the TV watching Gary England protect people from dangerous storms. We've all gone outside to watch the skies and see what's being talked about, I dare say that everyone in Oklahoma is at minimum an amateur meteorologist in some form or fashion.

Yes we are safe again but this year the storms keep rolling in, last year we were well on our way to a record drought and triple digit temperatures. This year the drought has ended and we're getting plenty of rain to keep things green and growing!

Storms And Crickets

Usually I sleep very well during stormy weather, I did last night as well until about three o'clock when the crickets started! I've been drifting in and out since then and truthfully I'm not that rested right now.

Thing 2 has made it back from her New Orleans orchestra trip! She had a lot of fun and took about five hundred pictures! That reminds me of the old days of film when you were limited on what you could take a picture of. You only had like twelve frames of film to use then you had to buy another roll. Then after all of that you had to take it someplace and have it developed so you couldn't actually see your trip pictures until well after your trip was over with.

Oh, technology! Now you have a better camera on your phone than some of the old cameras combined! It's crazy when you consider it that way! We are probably on the second generation of kids right now that will grow up with no film and have no idea what a one hour photomat is!