When you vote, DO IT RIGHT!

Hey guys, it has come to my attention that some of you slackers out there aren't voting correctly. I am not talking about WHO you vote for , or HOW (like mail-in, or early, or on Tuesday), and am talking about lack of completion.

I know this is a tense and exciting time for all of us and some people have the attention span of a fruit fly, but seriously. Local issues and LOCAL POLITICIANS are just as important, nay MORE important than your Presidential hanging chad. Seriously, who do you think actually spends money in the United States Government? HINT: It's not the Vice President or the President. It's CONGRESS! They decide almost everything! Yes, the President has veto power, but hey if you took any government class you know that even the veto is not the end of the line. The Congress has the ability to override veto! Did you know that? Well you should! Because if you don't vote for your Senators (the Senate half of Congress, each state has TWO) or your Representative (the House of Representatives half, sometimes just called "the House" which does not mean the White House you dumbasses, and each state has a number based on their population.) then you are giving up MOST of your voting power!

Example: I live in Colorado. We have two Senators (of course) and one is Republican and one is Democratic. I think that is a good balance since we only get two.

We have seven Representatives*. Four are Dems, 3 GOP. This is a little more complicated because the districts are made roughly by population**. So the greater Denver Metro area, Boulder, and resorts (Summit County) have FIVE of the seven districts. The other two districts cover like 80% of the land area of Colorado. So if you live in Rangely or Craig, Grand Junction or Durango, you all have the same Rep (District 3). Fort Collins and Sterling and Buena Vista have the same Rep (District 4). Which means that a lot of the time, you could end up being represented by someone you don't agree with politically.

Alaska, Delaware, Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, Vermont and Wyoming -- you only have to vote for one Representative! So it is EVEN MORE IMPERATIVE that you vote. Three people is all you get to make your say in Congress.

SO VOTE! For all of the people on the ballot! For all of the measures!!! The Blue Book has plain langauge, do some research, check out the pros and cons of different mill levys and tax increases. If you don't want more taxes, VOTE THAT WAY! If you want better schools, VOTE THAT WAY! If you want anything VOTE FOR IT! You don't live in the White House, and you live under State Law first! The fifty American states are separate sovereigns with their own state constitutions and state governments, so this is IMPORTANT.

Please don't mark your Presidential ticket and leave the rest unvoted. You are doing yourself, your kids, your dog, your cat, your roads, your drinking laws, your abortion statutes, your education funding, your gambling, your water, your sewage, your police department, all a disservice. For or against, vote what you believe. Or else shut the fuck up. The President is not the be all and end all of our laws and politics. They don't decide whether we get new buses versus new jails. YOU DO.

*You can only vote for the Rep of the District in which you live.
** well not really always by population, for more on this subject check out the term "gerrymandering".

Clickety good times!

Mouse around, hover on stuff, try clicking the same thing more than once, you know the drill..... Drill baby drill!


http://www.palinaspresident.com/

WWMBVF? Who would Murphy Brown vote for?

I did not watch the debates last night. I have already made up my mind. Even if Obama goes Pro-Life, or "freebases kittens in the lobby of the Hoover building"* nothing will make me vote for McCain.

The economy is now officially in the toilet, but honestly it has just been getting worse and worse for the past 4-8 years. Food prices, gas prices, medication....I know about inflation, prices always go up. But 10 years ago we had zero unemployment in this state. Or 1-2% which is basically zero for realistic purposes. Taco Bell was offering $30,00 a year for Managers to start and had no takers. Now even skilled people cannot find a job worth their while.

When I was a receptionist in 1997, I felt ELATED to get a job making $6.50/hr. Ten years later everything has doubled in price but receptionists make $8.50/hr. Houses that were worth a quarter million are listing at $175,000 -- 25% off, people! -- and those are the 'good' loans where people actually had the money to pay for it.

Yeah, then war and shit gas prices and lazy crooked contractors, and that was just inside OUR house. The country was also going to crap! I know, I know, every generation something something...















So let's go back even earlier in my awareness, to Bush I. Remember Dan Quayle? Anyone? He was roundly mocked by public and media alike. Some people thought he was "hot". Younger, attractive, dumb as a rock. Maybe we should ask Governor Palin how she feels about Murphy Brown. I am serious, what about the women that are making different choices? I would have to guess that the writers would make Ms. Brown a rabid Hillary supporter. But it may surprise us, like it surprises me to hear women around me -- strong, professional women-- say that Sarah Palin is a real "go-getter".
















I will not minimize Governor Palin's successes as a politician in Alaska, but I do not believe she is for women's rights in the grand meaning of the word. She is like the women I work with who have a full time high-pressure job, two kids, and a husband that is not only useless but abusive. They work three times as hard to cling tenuously to the edge of the glass ceiling. They kiss ass all day long. And what if they looked like poor Sheila Frahm instead of like Tina Faye? Trust me, they get overlooked.


Why? Well my opinion is because there are no cracks in the glass ceiling and they are not really trying to make them. How can you be pro-life, anti-welfare, anti-immigration, against gay rights, and still say you support women? How can you be for big business, against education funding, support actions and politicians that send our men AND WOMEN soldiers far away to die and leave their children parentless and still claim you want the best for your daughter? Force her to marry a thug and birth an unwanted baby because "God" says so?

My fear is that at the best we will have a White House divided, as Palin does not seem to be falling well in line with her party unless it is post-gaffe. At worst McCain could die at any moment and we would have Sarah Palin as the figurehead of our country. That makes me want to create the worst mixed metaphor even invented, something about a bull, a candy store, a kid, a china shop, and a prom dress. The mind boggles at how NOT GOOD "Palin for Prez" sounds.














But wait! What if she had a kind, motherly figure, strong and compassionate, experienced and emotive, not sexy but not Janet Reno, to guide her in her navigation of the most powerful office on earth? That's right. Palin/Cinton 2008! All the big cat families will be happy. It's just so crazy it just might work.

For now, check out the funny (by drew (toothpastefordinner.com) and natalie (nataliedee.com)):

http://mccaincomics.com/


*Thanks to commenter at passiveaggressive.com

Bang and Blame

So last night an episode of Closed Case had an R.E.M. song at the end of it. I was singing along, and my brain apparently thought that it was interesting enough to go through a large portion of the R.E.M. catalogue while I slept. I woke up with "Half A World Away" in my head. Of course the only way to defeat ear worms is to listen to the actual song. So I went on an all day R.E.M. kick which made me realize I am depressed.

So I go through a weird seasonal affect/school phobia thing when fall comes on. Like "Oh crap, summer is over, everything is about to suck for six months!" I do not like Christmas. I get all anxious when I have to travel in snow and of course holiday family gatherings are always a pain, no matter whose family it is (well maybe not your family but I don't want my wife to think I am picking on her). Over the river and through the woods is all fine and good but through Kansas, Oklahoma, and Texas is a little much. Over the pass and through the blizzard to fights and crises we go.

School was the worst thing that ever happened to me. I hated school from 6th grade on. I was smart and I loved to learn but I was all weird and nerdy and fat (so the same as I am now). People picked on me and I fought with teachers and resented busy-work.
Even thinking about it now is giving me a sick feeling.

Maybe because that is how I feel about work now. As if I am such the outcast and low person in the hierarchy. I never wanted to be popular. I just know I have talent and I want people to like me because I am good at things that I do, and an asset to my workplace, not because our kids both have the same first name and ADD. I have friends to like me for my wit and conversation. I have friends to talk about politics and religion and why. I do not want to talk to my coworkers about any of that. My life is way different from what I have heard others express and I am so fucking TIRED of explaining myself to people that I don't even like that much!

It just feels unfair that I have to show up for worthless meetings, stupid lunches, lame going-away parties, donate money for "gifts". No shit, someone solicited money from me to buy a dude a Nintendo DS as a going away gift. For him to play while he was on a SAILBOAT for four months, not working and sailing across the PACIFIC OCEAN. Um, how about I give you $20 to eat shit.

My best friend here at work left our group to work in another group. There was a party on the weekend at the house of my current boss. I was NOT INVITED. Because she (my boss) could not invite me and exclude all her other employees.

So as you can see it is like high school here. I don't get invited to cool kid parties, do a lot of work that is ignored until I stop giving a shit, get picked on or "talked to " because I don't play well with others.

They say things like "no matter where you go, there you are". Obviously the common denominator is me. I feel like I have made great efforts to change how I am since high school. I have worked hard, gone to college, raised a kid, had some relationships, got on some meds, sucked it up a lot and found myself not much better off in many ways. I mean it could certainly be worse. But core happiness with myself and my job is non-existant.

The good news is I got a truck. Kel bought it for me.
Meet Clifford:
















The dogs like it too:

Rabbit rabbit rabbit

Well here we are on October 1. I forgot to call my mom on her birthday yesterday. I suck.
The reason is that I went home, did the dishes, made some pasta and then had a small temper tantrum. It's okay, only the dogs saw and they are used to it.

Then I played a little WoW until I had to call in to my job. As a release manager when they deploy crap you have to check up on these code monkeys and make sure they are okay. So we have a call at six, for something that was supposed to take 30 min and started at 5. Of course it is not done, which is the way of computers. Not done at 7, or 8, but finally at 9pm it was done, and at 9:45 the shakedown testing was finished and I got the final call of the night.

Bah.

I still don't have a car, but I am really thinking about just not getting one. I have a couple of serviceable bikes in my yard which just need a tune and new tires. Much cheaper than a car and I need to exercise anyway. I just don't want to have to settle for some twenty-year-old POS truck because there is not a lot out there right now in the way of affordable Toyotas. The ones I have seen are fugly or too expensive.

Check it out,
This beauty could be yours for only $3000. Wow.















And this could be a nice truck, except the color is a little overwhelming:














Apparently the guy got a good deal on yellow paint because had also had this to offer:















Well, I could have gotten some Krylon and painted it myself, you really didn't have to go to all that trouble....


And this gem is only $800, they couldn't be bothered to take a full size picture, and if this is what they show, one wonders what they are hiding:










"the blazer is located at my parents house"



They are only hiding the fact that you have to drive to the middle of their property to the stock tank to get it. Oh wait: " hit bad on the passenger side door and fender which also broke the right side of the ifs so MUST BE TOWED" I see, so it "Still starts up and runs good every time with no leaks anywhere ever" but the frame is hashed. So useless.

Anyway I am just angry. I hate cars. I am buying a horse.