A Trapdoor In The Sun

...and Rochelle wants to be sedated. No, seriously. She is taking some Xanex prior to her flight to Columbus. The poor girl has not been on an airplane for more than a decade and seems to be petrified at the thought of flying. I wish I make her understand what a non-issue flying really is. It's the safest form of transportation we have! It's a short trip, though, and I'm sure she will be fine. I cannot wait to meet her at the gate and feel her in my arms once again. It's going to be a beautiful start for an awesome weekend.

PJ20 is set to be the party of the year in the heartland of America. One more day of work that is, although technically speaking, I have a day and a half left. The afternoon is dragging horribly. You see, typically, I've gotten used to carrying on a nice little email back and forth with Rochelle during work hours. This helps the day go by and keeps me in contact with her as we cannot talk, chat or be physically together. Unfortunately, she had a horrible time getting to sleep last night. I know what that's like as I've dealt with that many times. The following day is almost always unbearable. So, Ro took off around noon and went home to sleep. I'm a tad lonely without her cheery banter, but I know it's good for her to nap. We both know what a long weekend lies ahead. Speaking of the weekend, let me elaborate. If there is one thing that brought the two of us together it would be Pearl Jam. I've been a fan for almost 20 years and Ro has loved them all of ...

Back in the blogging glory years of the mid-2000's this was a lively, vibrant blog. I used this to bare my soul and flush all the shit out of my head that was sloshing around up there. I thought of it as Ex-Lax for the soul. With the social media advent of MySpace, and more recently FaceBook, this little blog was abandoned, although I get random comments from time to time about posts I remember very little of. It seems kind of sad when I think of these people visiting my vacant blog. I've decided to come back. For a while anyway. I need to clean things up. I need to vacuum and dust, maybe move some furniture around and let my fung shui flow. I've decided to write about a journey that I am taking soon. This journey I speak of will be the most important trek of my relatively young 40 years. While it is, in fact, a physical move; that is a change in latitude; it is also dependent entirely on a sea change in my attitude. Thankfully, I have already made strides to turn the tid...

Video I put together for Unthought Known off of the Pearl Jam album Backspacer. Basic synopsis is the story of a homeless guy who learns to conduct the world around him.

(CNN) -- If you feel like your cubicle walls are closing in around you, you may be right. A combination of the troubled economy and the influx of mobile technology is changing the workplace landscape. Literally. Companies across the country are shrinking those boxed-in work areas or scrapping the notion of the once-ubiquitous cubicles altogether. At tech-giant Intel, employees who used to work in a 72-square-foot space now work in a cozier 48-square-foot station, company officials say. "Everyone used to get a cube, but that doesn't work for the way people actually do their work today," said Neil Tunmore, director of corporate services at Intel, who spearheaded the corporate redesign that began in 2007. In 1994, the average office worker had 90 square feet of office space, but the area had been whittled down to 75 square feet in 2010, according to the International Facility Management Association, a professional network for the facility management industry. Space fo...

  Willie Nelson Busted for 6oz of Weed  And the ridiculous "war on drugs" marches on. We waste billions of dollars on drug enforcement every year so the government can keep an eye on what it's citizens put in their bodies. The majority of inmates in the prison system are incarcerated for drug related convictions and we spend even more tax money keeping them there. It seems to me that the money would be better spent on treatment programs and education.  Let's face the facts here. Marijuana is not nearly as potent as alcohol, nor as damaging. Yet, alcohol is completely legal and socially acceptable. But really that's beside the point. Why should our government have ANY right to determine what is legal or illegal to consume? I would extend that to any "controlled substance". If I'm an idiot and want to drink gasoline, I should be able to do that.

Just finished reading a blog my sister wrote regarding family and politics. She brings up some very valid points. Clicky on the above link.

I think this is very telling when it comes to American politics. In 1982, Americans were angry and upset over the economy and voted their anger. The result was a wave of Democrats being voted into the House, and an impatient voting populace sent a message to Ronald Reagan: Fix the economy and do it quickly. To put thin ... gs in perspective, Reagan swept up after the Carter recession. Clinton swept up the Bush 1 recession. Obama, to his credit, is trying to fix the Bush 2 recession. What I don't think people realize is that our economic system is like Jenga. Crashes are quick and immense, but rebuilding and growing the economy takes much more time, effort and focus. It will be interesting to see over the next two years what history holds for Obama and how he will work with the Congress.  

My mini-Me is a Freshman in marching band this year. I'm so happy that he has found something that he really loves to do. Just like me!

Esther the Wise. I miss having cats. This one belongs to the 'rents.

[ Download ] Every time I touch myself, I think of you, Christine.

Is the controversy over building a mosque near ground zero a grand distraction or a grand opportunity? Or is it, once again, grandiose demagoguery? It has been said, “Nero fiddled while Rome burned.” Are we not overly preoccupied with this controversy, now being used in various ways by grandstanding politicians? It looks to me like the politicians are “fiddling while the economy burns.” The debate should have provided the conservative defenders of property rights with a perfect example of how the right to own property also protects the 1st Amendment rights of assembly and religion by supporting the building of the mosque. Instead, we hear lip service given to the property rights position while demanding that the need to be “sensitive” requires an all-out assault on the building of a mosque, several blocks from “ground zero.” Just think of what might (not) have happened if the whole issue had been ignored and the national debate stuck with war, peace, and prosperity. ...

Once again, Islamophobia raises it's ugly head. I bet you if a Catholic Church petitioned to build a 'community center' across the street from ground zero, not one person would raise their hand in protest. In fact, the center would likely be funded by some Faith Based initiative (which is conserva-speak for religious welfare). But when a Muslim group decides they want to build a community center two and a half city blocks away from ground zero, the Right Wing Jezus-Zombies start coming out of the wood work, citing one non-factual claim after another to incite fear among the population. So much so that these morons have began protesting mosques being built all over the country. Now, I can see if this Park 51 was built ON ground zero, how that could be a problem. But it isn't. It's two blocks away. But at the core we see what a double standard these idiots subscribe to. On one hand, they go on about the Constitution and Freedom of Religion. They constantly decry the...

Coffee Vomit is when you get a nice steaming cup of to-go Joe topped by one of those plastic lids with one singular uncovered hole on the top, only to have coffee suddenly shoot out of the opening like a gusher from a whale blowhole. Usually it's your freshly clean dress shirt and tie that suffers the most, aside from 3rd degree burns on your cup holding hand.

If you've never heard of Ted Olson, he's the attorney that successfully argued Bush V Gore in 2000. Although he is known to be a staunch conservative, he was the attorney behind the repealing of Prop 8 in California last week. In this interview on Fox, Olson schools Chris Wallace on the 14th Amendment, the Bill of Rights, and what truly defines the overused phrase, "judicial activism". Where is the right to same-sex marriage in the Constitution?" asked Wallace. "Where is the right to interracial marriage in the Constitution, Chris?" replied Olson. "The Supreme Court has looked at marriage and has said that the right to marry is a fundamental right for all citizens. So you call it interracial marriage and then you could prohibit it, no? The Supreme Court said no. The same thing here," explained Olson. "The judge after hearing three weeks of testimony and full day of closing arguments and listening to experts from all over the world c...

 Ah... I love the Constitutionally enforced freedom of religion in this country... unless your religion is Islam. Then you are a filthy terrorist. Seriously, what kook kool-aid do these people drink? While a high-profile battle rages over a  mosque near ground zero  in Manhattan, heated confrontations have also broken out in communities across the country where mosques are proposed for far less hallowed locations. Related Mosque Plan Clears Hurdle in New York  (August 4, 2010) Planned Sign of Tolerance Bringing Division Instead  (July 14, 2010) Times Topic:  Cordoba Center (Ground Zero Mosque) Enlarge This Image Christopher Berkey/Associated Press In Murfreesboro, Tenn., arguments broke out over a planned Muslim center. In Murfreesboro, Tenn., Republican candidates have denounced plans for a large Muslim center proposed near a subdivision, and hundreds of protesters have turned out for a march and a county meeting. In late June, in Temecula, Calif., me...

I really haven't visited Blogger much in the past few years or so. I think MySpace took over and now Facebook seems to be the place to be. For a while I was blogging at a nice little site called Multiply, but I have since moved on from there. I'm still living in Central Ohio... in beautiful Grandview Heights. We're located about 2 miles out of Columbus' downtown area. I'm currently sharing a very spacious townhome with another room mate, Ben. It's a fairly cooperative living situation, as he spends much of the year away from home, working sound on cruise ships and as a music teacher at a Jewish summer camp in rural PA. Thus, I get the place to myself for the most part. I am again working for Chase Bank in mortgage servicing. As an account supervisor, I work with heated borrowers to resolve escalated issues and serve as a team lead for my department. It's been quite the learning experience, but I definitely have a front row seat to the issues that have been...

I want to shake... I want to wind down... I want to leave... this mind and shout I've lived all this life like an ocean in disguise... I won't live forever... you can't keep me here.