A View from the Fence

How the Weekend Panned Out

2012-02-01T04:13:00.000-08:00

It's six in the morning on a Wednesday. I've had the last two nights off, for which I am grateful. Much of last year my weekends were split because of my counterpart's school schedule and other availability problems. This is the third week in a row that I've had two days off together, and I've been making the most of them. The biggest problems, as usual, are sleep and computer, both of which can really screw up the way I use my time.

This morning I've been up since 3:30, and I've spent all of the last three hours on the computer. I cleaned out my message page on Facebook and my email inbox. Some of what was there became the previous blog post.

I didn't expect to be up this early, and I'm still in my pajamas. I'd like to get dressed and go work on the projects I've been busy with this weekend, but I don't want to wake Gaby. If I wait till the sun comes up I won't have to turn on a light to find my clothes, and I can be quiet enough to let him sleep.

We weren't been very happy with each other yesterday, but to explain why requires a bit of background.

I own some ancient cookware, some of which is at least thirteen years old, and it was cheap stuff to begin with. Naturally, much of the non-stick surface is worn away. He says it's because I use metal utensils (which I do occasionally, but not often enough to warrant concern), but I believe it's because they're old and cheap.

Recently we aquired some new expensive cookware, but they are rarely used unless the old and cheap ones are dirty. Overnight, while he was asleep, I made some mashed potatoes in one of the new expensive saucepans because I couldn't find the old and cheap one that I really wanted to use. Our potato masher happens to be metal, but it has no sharp edges and I used it carefully, and then used a plastic spatula to scoop out the potatoes.

As soon as the sun was up, I threw myself into a woodworking project that I'd been wanting to get to for some time, and while all of my mental and physical energies were being thrown into this project, he came out to complain about my use of that saucepan. Naturally all he got from me was a blank stare because I didn't know what he expected me to do about it while I was completely engaged in something else. He then came out with one of our cheap but brand new frying pans and attacked the surface of it with a metal fry scooper. That was uncalled for, and I could have said something about it, but, as I said, I was busy.

When I got to a stopping point, I came in for lunch, and checked Facebook. He had posted about how difficult it was to live with someone who didn't care about what he cared about. That's ridiculous. Not caring and completely disagreeing are two different things. I typed back, "Not guilty." He later deleted that post.

I spent the rest of the afternoon working on my project, and was pretty pleased with how it was going. I had one setback, but it was easily fixed, and I discovered that I was out of paint, so I had to go to Lowe's. When I got to my next stopping point, I was starving. It was at that moment that he asked me to fix the window on the front of the house.

He pointed out later that I could have said no. And he was right. I could have told him how hungry I was. I could have told him that we didn't have all the materials we needed, and that I didn't want to spend any more money at Lowe's or the time or gasoline it took to get there. I could have just told him I had other plans. But I didn't, for two reasons.

First, we have a different approach to things. He wants something done, I want it done well. The result is that I will put things off until I have the time, the resources, and the mental focus to get it done. (This is a form of procrastination common to Frustrated Perfectionists.) He, on the other hand, has too much time on his hands, and I was a little afraid of what the result might be. (I was mad enough that I actually said something to him about this where I wouldn't have normally. He was a bit offended.)

Second, and most importantly, I didn't want to give him more ammo for his "he doesn't care" rant.

On top of that, we were running out of daylight, and if we were going to do it, we had to do it right then. Ultimately the project came out just fine. We worked together, and we were very pleased with the results. It just needs some paint.

Later I found this on his Facebook:

Gabriel Guerrero-Savage
According to psychologists and psychiatrists, it is healthy to gripe about the things that bother you with your spouse. Things about him or her that makes you feel unappreciated, etc. They say it's better than keep [sic] them to yourself because that can get you physically and emotionally sick. Then you start hiding thing from them and growing apart. But they don't say what's next after you have griped! hehehe

2 people like this.

Saúl Peña The "cold shoulder" maybe?

Gabriel Guerrero-Savage Yes Saúl, I'm afraid that's what we got...

Saúl Peña Things will go back to normal real soon. Don't worry. It's part of the process.

Thing is, I wasn't giving him the cold shoulder. I was just preoccupied.

So Wrong

2012-02-01T02:55:00.000-08:00

It Made My Day - Little Moments of WIN – Chuck G.
itmademyday.com

A friend of mine told me how he rear ended another car yesterday. The person he hit happened to be a midget. The guy got out his car and walked to my friend’s window, looked up and said, “I am not happy.” To which my friend replied, “Then which one are you?”

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
All drugs have two names, a trade name and generic name.Example, the trade name is Tylenol and its generic name is Acetaminophen. Aleve is also called Naproxen.
Amoxil is also called Amoxicillin and Advil is also called Ibuprofen.
The FDA has been looking for a generic name for Viagra.
After careful consideration by a team of government experts, it recently announced that it has settled on the generic name of Mycoxafloppin.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Bill and his wife Blanche went to the state fair every year, and every year Bill would say, "Blanche, I'd like to ride in that helicopter."
Blanche always replied, "I know, Bill, but that helicopter ride is fifty bucks,and fifty bucks is fifty bucks!"
One year Bill and Blanche went to the fair, and Bill said, "Blanche, I'm 75 years old. If I don't ride that helicopter, I might never get another chance."
To this, Blanche replied, "Bill that helicopter ride is fifty bucks, and fifty bucks is fifty bucks."
The pilot overheard the couple and said, "Folks I'll make you a deal. I'll take the both of you for a ride. If you can stay quiet for the entire ride, and don't say a word, I won't charge you a penny! But if you say one word it's fifty dollars." Bill and Blanche agreed and up they went.
The pilot did all kinds of fancy maneuvers, but not a word was heard. He did his daredevil tricks, but still not a word.
When they landed, the pilot turned to Bill and said, "By golly, I did everything I could to get you to yell out, but you didn't. I'm impressed!"
Bill replied, "Well, to tell you the truth I almost said something when Blanche fell out, but you know, Fifty bucks is fifty bucks!"

Have Yourself A Melancholy Christmas

2011-12-24T23:43:00.000-08:00

I've been thinking a lot lately about the future of Christmas in my family. My parents are in their 70s now, and though they both are in pretty good health, still they are the lynch pin that holds this holiday together for the family. What will it be like after they're gone?
Christmas has never been a religious holiday at our house, even though my brother and I grew up in church, and my parents are still very active in theirs today. Nor has it really been about Santa, even though we all look forward to the gifts, both as givers and recievers. It has been instead all about the family getting together, and even when it seemed that portions of the family were splintering, this holiday still brought us together.
Our house became the place the extended family came to for Christmas since before I can remember. I know that that's true, but the earliest Christmas I can actually remember was in 1969. It was truly magical for us. My brother and I woke to find an HO guage railroad set up for him, and a Hot Wheels track set up for me. At the time, it seemed gifts filled the whole room. That's the last year I remember believing in Santa.
My mom loves Christmas. She loves the tradition of it, she loves decorating the house, she loves the food, she loves entertaining (any time of year). But somehow, Santa was never a big deal at our house. My classmates at school would get into heated arguments in the lunch line about whether he actually existed or not, but I never participated, because I didn't care. (They also argued about whether "The Wizard of Oz" was a movie for "babies.") On the other hand, my mom, my brother and I had some serious discussions about which was the "real" Santa Claus: the one at Sears, the one at the tree lot, or the one at Penn Square. We decided the real one was at Penn Square, and I think it was because he had to park his sleigh at the Antique store on Classen Circle, just down the street from the mall.
My only other Santa memory is from a day in the middle of summer. I think I was six years old, my brother four. An older cousin of ours had come over with some large jingle bells. My brother and I were in the kitchen, when we heard him start shaking them. When we ran into the living room, my Dad said that Santa was doing a summer check to see if we were being naughty or nice. We raced out onto the front porch and stared at the sky while our cousin howled with uncontrolable laughter.
Somewhere between 1969 and 1971, Mom had casually mentioned that Santa was just Dad in a red suit. I don't remember why this came up in conversation, but I do remember that we were in the car on our way to a mall in the city on a sunny afternoon. It didn't surprize me, since Santa had my dad's handwriting, but I did wonder where Dad hid the red suit, because I'd never seen it. But from then on, everytime Santa was mentioned at Christmas time, my brother and I always responded with that smile one has when one is in on the joke.
Christmas of 1971 was celebrated on Christmas Eve for some reason. Santa was passé by that time, so there were no questions about how that would affect his visit. Previously that summer, I had discovered plastic model car kits, and I had spotted one that I really wanted. It was a Monogram model of a souped up fire engine called the Firecracker. That was at the top of my list for presents.
My Dad had a little shack out back of the house that served as his man-cave. That's where he had been hiding the presents that year, and my parents were not finished wrapping gifts when the family started arriving. I heard my Dad struggling with the back door, so I went to help him. When I opened the door, he started yelling "Go away! Get outa here!" I left, but not before I spotted the Firecracker in the stack of boxes he was bringing in. I had to act surprized when I opened it later. I may have overdone it.
I still have that model. It's in the china cabinet in my dining room.
For some reason, whenever I think of the family coming to that house, the face that stands out most is that of my cousin Gary. We never saw him any other time of year, and I could write a whole 'nother post about his sad life. He died of alcoholism just a few years ago.
In 1973, we moved to a new house, one that had a real dining room, and my mom became the hostess for the family's Thanksgiving and Christmas feasts. But her mother died in 1989, and there were marriages and divorces, and kids moving across the country, and other things that happen in the evolution of a family. Thanksgiving just seemed to disappear from the calendar in a way. And yet, Christmas always brings us together. The extended family is no longer there, and the significant others have changed. We don't even celebrate the holiday on the actual day anymore; we have to work it around everybody's schedules. (One year we celebrated on December 15, and another was in February.) But my mom works really hard to bring it all together, regardless of the changing circumstances.

I've always loved giving gifts, and I love it even more if they're truly appreciataed. My first Christmas as a working man (I was 16), I got my brother a Pachinko machine. He loved it, and I loved that he loved it. Now he lives halfway across the country, and I know little about his home life. As a result, I'm having trouble this year figuring out what to get his significant other. I imagined she might be having the same difficulty, so I sent her a suggestion for one particular family member. She reacted with anger, and I was confused by that reaction until I talked to my mom, who told me that the current economy has been bad for them. She apparently took my suggestion as a demand at a time when they could ill afford even the trip. Then we find out that she can't get off work, and won't be coming this year, which is very disappointing. So she's been on my mind a lot this season.
But that situation also made me wonder about the future of the holiday in my family. Without Mom and Dad, Scott's family actually has no use for Christmas, and I'm thinking in particular that I wouldn't ever see his daughter again. I'm seeing Gaby and myself, grey-headed, sitting in a Cracker Barrel, exchanging small gifts over turkey and dressing, and trying to get that game down to just one golf tee. I hope the future is a bit brighter than that. Who knows, maybe by that time we'll be able to take a cruise or something.

Thoughts on the Occupy Movement

2011-12-13T23:04:00.000-08:00

My job involves driving the cars of a wide variety of people. Often those people will leave their radios on in the car, and I get a peek at the type of music they like, where they get their news, and their tastes in humor and religious programming. One night I heard Bill O'Reilly on FOX Radio talking about the Occupy movement, and it was pretty obvous that he was completely clueless.

At that time I had just finished reading Bethany McLean and Joe Nocera's book "All the Devils Are Here: The Hidden History of the Financial Crisis", so I had a decent understanding of how the whole financial crisis happened. Also, in the blogs I read, the wonkish economists have a lot to say about the perils of the current income disparity. It's not hard for me to understand why people are out protesting in the parks.

I have a good friend who is a left-of-left liberal. His Facebook page is filled with Occupy messages, some on the mark, some not so much, and I was inspired to write a blog post about my own impressions of the movement. But I never actually started anything until one of my friends from the other side of the spectrum posted a link to a story about Wall Street execs showering the OWS in New York with McDonald's employment applications. In the ensuing discussion he said this:
"I think whatever the Occupy movement tried to represent, it was co-opted long ago by anarchists, union thugs, etc. This movement won't help me pay my student loans. And, frankly, wanting a "free ride" is not what most Americans want. Hand-outs don't work. Never have, not long term. And that seems to be what the Occupy movement's underlying message is: 'You have something, and I want it. I'll have the government take it from you by force and give it to me.'" It was pretty much exactly what Bill O'Reilly had said that night on the radio.

So I started collecting notes from my various reading sources online, and collecting newspaper articles, just to have references to construct a meaningful blog post. But I didn't yet have the core piece that would bring it all together.

Then I found this. It's a comment on a post on the Frum Forum, a Republican blog with a centrist-to-right point of view. To me it summed up the whole thing and made all the rest of what I had collected unnecessary.

"Ray_Harwick // Dec 12, 2011 at 12:56 am
My sister is an RN at a non-union hosital where the Job Creators run the cartel. This year **all** of the staff, with the exception of the doctors and executive staff, were forced to take a pay cut; thereby widening the gap between the highest earners and even college-educated nurses and technical staff. For my sister, it meant she picked the wrong place to live because the amount of her pay cut was equal to the amount of money she spends on gasoline monthly to commute to work. Or it means about half of her mortgage payment for a two bedroom farm house of 1,200 sq. ft. that she had to save money for the downpayment for until so was 40 years old.
I get your point. Somebody has to win, right? And you want to continue the status quo of the top earners not only staying at the top, but holding the power of determining prosperity over everyone else. Win-win for the highest wage earners.
Gannett Publishing, owner of a couple dozen newspapers around the country, boasted about how they’d held down expenses for their stock holder’s benefit. Yes. They did. They layed off some 3,000 workers nationwide, mainly those on the news side, then rewarded their 57 year-old retiring CEO who “met Gannett’s challenges of the 21th century” with $39 MILLION good-bye present. I’m gonna say you’re beaming with pride over that, Mr. Foster, since it meets you ideal of keeping the living wage power in the hands of the Job Creators. Give yourself a pat on the back.
This is why I love to see the other extreme flaunt its power. I proudly point to the NBA Players Association which represent a couple thousand near, or actual millionaires who are the actual BACKBONE of the NBA. You know, the talent? Sort of like what the nurses who do all the work at hospitals are? Anyway, the NBAPA is equal in the argument for their sport. Too bad pro baseball is forbidden by law to do what the NBA players can do. But I suppose that’s why we can have minor leaguers playing for peanuts and holding down jobs at car washes in the off season.
The best question that came from last night’s GOP debate, in my opinion, was the one from a Yahoo commenter who asked “When was the last time you had to cut back on *necessities* in order to survive?” Did you notice that *none* of the candidates gave a direct answer and, of course, when Mitt Romney can bet $10,000.00 (or about 0.0055% of his net worth) on a *trivial* political point, it stands to reason why he’d have to admit that he *never* in his life had to cut back on *anything* in order to survive. He had to reach back into papa’s early days. Bachmann still clips coupons with her net worth in the millions! Poor girl. Rick Perry had to bath in a #3 wash tub, just like I did, and gee, what a great real estate oracle he turned out to be. So this millionaires club running for the nomination couldn’t even answer the question. Makes you feel cozy, don’t it. You’re working for them and as soon as you’re used up, the Job Creator cartel will dump you without so much as a going away party at the Motel 6 Hospitality Room."

The point of the Occupy movement is simply this: The system has been rigged, through a variety of methods, to send the wealth of the nation to a few at the top in such a way that the many at the bottom are deprived of the very opportunity to succeed, to advance, sometimes to even survive. It has nothing to do with a free ride, hand-outs or taking from rich to give to the poor. It has only to do with the removal of the artificial obstacles that keep people of good character and great potential at the bottom of the pile.

These Eyes

2011-12-08T00:54:00.000-08:00

Gaby went to our optometrist's office today and picked up our new glasses. He didn't take any money with him, so I have to pay for them when I go to get my pair adjusted tomorrow. He did bring the bill, though, and boy am I glad we have insurance. My pair alone would have cost us nearly a thousand dollars. And I'm not even sure I like them. I'm practically blind, so picking out frames that look good on me is not easy. Now that I can actually see what they look like, I think my head needs to be taller and thinner. I guess I'll get used to them. If not, I'll just have to get poofier hair and lose some weight in my jawline.

Uhn Expeermnt in Communicayshn

2011-11-14T04:03:00.000-08:00

Oklahoma, as a state, will be 104 years old this coming Wednesday, and I decided to try something on Facebook to celebrate: for one week I'm going to write all my posts with an Okie accent. I think I can do it well, but the hardest parts will be remembering to do it everyday, and rewriting reposts.

The seed for this idea was planted in my head a few years ago when I overheard a conversation among a family at an art show. One young man was bringing the food from one of the food vender's for the rest of the family, and when they asked him what took so long, he responded, "Stdnlahn fr boutnour." (I stood in line for about an hour.) For some reason, that got stuck in my head, and I wondered, 'how would you spell that?'

The second time I thought about this was when I was visiting my buddy Ted in New Jersey. He introduced me to two of his friends, who commented that I didn't talk like I was from Oklahoma. I said, "Well, I'm urban. But Ahcn tahk jss lahk my cuzznz down'n Antlers."

The third, and ongoing impetus is that I've been trying to teach myself Spanish for a while, and now that I have Gaby here to help, he tells me that I don't always pronounce my vowels correctly. This is a problem, because as an Oklahoman, I don't actually use vowels that much. In Spanish, if you don't pronounce your vowels, you might wind up saying a different word.

Gaby's family name is Guerrero, pronounced gay-r-r-reh-do (warrior), not guh-r-r-reh-do (dirty clothes.) As an Okie, I have trouble hearing the difference. We tend to not pronounce most of our vowels at all, and when we do, it's just a schwa (ə).

So, with these things in mind the other morning, I posted this: "Skina wundrin whut kina rsponss I'd git fi startd doin' awl my Facebk posts withnOkie axnt." (I was kind of wondering what kind of responses I'd get if I started doing all my Facebook posts with an Okie accent.)

The responses I got were:

"Huh?"

" i say, dear sir, your charming yet incomprehensible dialect has compelled me to leave you a rather generous gratuity. Cheerio!"

"Sum kinda cownty fair bringin the hayseeds intah town?"

"Weeel, idunnno, but ain't tooo muchin wrawg witit!"

This told me two things. One is that even people who are from here think Okie equals hick, and that just isn't so. We just have a definite way of talking. We don't sound like we walked out of a Ma and Pa Kettle movie or an episode of Hee-Haw. We don't have a drawl like Southerners; we speak at a normal speed. We don't double our syllables like the Tayuxans; that would require too many vowels. (In fact, the name of the state south of us has no vowels at all.) We do sound a bit redneck once in a while, but we don't flatten as many vowels as is done to the south and east of us. In fact, a lot of words are actually pronounced correctly in normal speech.

Besides the lack of vowels, we also tend to run words together to make new and often shorter words. Hence, "I was kind of" becomes "skina". We may use 'aint' and 'y'all', but we also have 'whollago' and 'yoosta'.

The other thing the responses told me was that people don't listen to the way they talk. For me, this is going to be an exercise in listening to myself. No exaggerations, no faking it for the laughs. When you read it, you should be able to hear me just the way I talk all the time.

One rule I plan to stick to wherever possible is that all punctuation, including capitals, will be correct (as in 'anOkie'). Apostrophes will be used once in a while for clarification (as in m'uthr).

So, I'm gunnaduit! Startn nex Wenzdy (Statehud Day), I'm gunna postenOkie awl week. Allyall Okies out thercn join me ifyalike.

Eavesdropping

2011-11-06T01:47:00.000-07:00

Okay, I know this is none of my business, but you guys were talking loudly just a few feet from where I was working, and I couldn't help but overhear practically every word, and naturally I developed an opinion on what you were talking about.

First off, judging someone for being judgemental, I think, is the height of hypocrisy. Now that's not a criticism; hypocrisy is human nature. But it is a contradiction that weakens your argument.

Secondly, I'm guessing that you are, what? in your mid-thirties or thereabouts? So your parents would be at least in their mid-fifties, right? That would mean they've already settled into the people they will always be. If you can deal with that, good. If not, get out. If you want a change in the relationship, it's going to have to come from you, because they aren't going to do much changing.

Thirdly, most people aren't going to live their lives to meet your expectations. The only exceptions might be your kids or your employees, but even that's gonna have some huge limitations. If you don't like the people your brothers have become, tough. They're not here to please you; they have their own lives to live, whether you approve or not.

The big question that I see, and that your friends didn't ask, is 'Why do you feel the need to have everyone conform to the image that you think is right for them?' But like I said, this is none of my business.

Survivor

2011-11-05T01:30:00.000-07:00

So I'm standing in the lobby working on my inventory when the decorative railing around the second story windows start to rattle as if the wind was blowing through an open window. I realized quickly that it might actually be an earthquake, but I didn't feel anything.

Moments later, someone from the 12th floor calls the front desk to report that their room was shaking. Did we have an earthquake? JS had been talking to MP, and was surprized by the call. He didn't know; we didn't feel anything in the lobby. Then someone called from the 10th floor to report the same thing. Then MP's wife called his cell phone to ask him if he'd felt it.

JS started hunting for news online, and discovered that we had indeed had a 4.7 magnitude quake. Later, on Facebook, my friend Mark reported that he'd felt it very strongly. His research revealed that the epicenter was actually very close by. He provided a map with the epicenter's coördinates, smack on top of his little hometown, 50 miles east of OKC.

Several other friends and my husband were reporting that they had also felt the quake. My buddy Jason, who also lives east of OKC, said he was feeling aftershocks till around 5:30am. So now I'm feeling a bit cheated.

Two Down. Way Down.

2011-10-21T07:29:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was our 2nd wedding anniversary. I had plans, but had to work last night, so it was just going to be dinner at a new restaurant in town, and possibly a movie. I wanted to be there by 5:30 or 6. I expected Gaby to wake me in time. I also expected him to be close to ready to go. (It takes him an hour and a half to get ready to go to the grocery store.)
I woke up at 6:06. I found him in the kitchen, still in his sweats, microwaving a bowl of beans. I reminded him that we had plans. He had totally forgotten.
I'm trying hard not to be angry --he was, after all completely guileless, though I'm having trouble understanding why he would remember it was our anniversary but not that we were going to be doing something about it. But the truth is that I'm very disappointed and very unhappy.

Stories of My Life II

2011-09-19T02:08:00.000-07:00

One day, when I was living in Stillwater, I stopped in at the supermarket to pick up a few items. I came to the register with a package of mouse traps, a can of spray paint, and a frying pan. When the clerk had rung them up, I discovered that I was a bit short of money. The clerk said, "I guess you'll have to put one of them back."

I said, "Yeah, but if I put one back I can't use the other two."

I remember the look of confusion on her face as she studied the three completely disparate items, wondering what the heck I was going to use them for. But I can't remember whether I ever told her I was just kidding.

Four Ad hominems and Me

2011-09-18T07:16:00.000-07:00

I read something the other day that I liked: "Very Serious Narrative (VSN) will be trumped by Easily Checked Facts (ECF) every time." Ideally, that should be true, but I've bumped up against a couple of difficulties while pondering this.
My Dad, as I have mentioned before, has a proclivity toward chain emails. Usually, these emails contain a lot of Culturally Pervasive Misinformation (CPM), and CPM can often be dealt with using ECF. But the question always comes to mind: If the truth is so easily found, why does the false keep popping up in my inbox?
But what caught my attention this morning was that somehow I have been lumped in with four other blogs, the writers of which say things like

"Anyone who has read a newspaper or paid attention to world events–even only occasionally–in the last ten years knows that the Muslim world is a savage place that will never be civilized and whose only version of “democracy” is to elect fellow savages. Anyone who needed the Muslim invasion of the Israeli Embassy in Cairo, last week as a wake up call should go back to sleep. You simply haven’t been paying attention . . . "

and

"These's protests, like the supposed "anti-war" protests, are usually a bunch of children of upper-middle class families who convince those who've never made anything of themselves that capitalism is to blame for their sorry condition. Yeah right! Just another excuse to find drugs and maybe a hook up for tonight. Dumb hippies!"

In these kinds of cases, it's not just a matter of misinformation and lack of fact-checking. These are expressions of deep-seated prejudices which they justify using current events. It would take a book -- or several books, perhaps -- to explain that these current events have long histories going back decades, and even then they would fail to understand the motivations of the people they are judging.

No, people are going to believe what they want, and they will seek out others who will confirm or justify the things they believe regardless of the data, the numbers, the history or the evidence. To do otherwise would take too much effort.

Inside Job Insider

2011-09-13T01:18:00.000-07:00

At the Oscars back in February, the movie that won the award for best documentary was a film by Charles Ferguson called "Inside Job," which detailed the causes and effects of the 2008 economic crisis. By coïncidence, I had begun trying to understand the whole crisis and macroeconomics through my own reading. One book, which I am currently in the middle of, is entitled "All The Devils Are Here," which covers the same topic.
I really wanted to see this film with my Dad, but I missed it in the theater when it was showing at Quail Springs. Later I found the DVD at SunCoast, and then at Target, but I never had the money to buy it when I was there.
Then last Wednesday I found four copies at the Edmond Library. I checked it out and watched it that same morning. It blew me away.
Saturday night I took it over to my parents' house, and we watched it as a family. When it was done, my Dad said, "Everyone in the world needs to watch this movie." The next morning, my Mom called to ask what the title was again because my Dad was going to Target.
The movie, essentially, is about how deregulation over the last 30 years has allowed powerful banks to grow more powerful by breaking basic rules of sound finance. So I thought it was funny, and I know my Dad would think so too, that The Financial Times reported in a front page article that Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan, was balking at new banking regulations, calling them "un-American." Too bad, Jamie.
Tonight I saw on my blogroll that Paul Krugman has something to say about it, too:

"September 12, 2011, 9:32 am
Satire Is Dead

"Last month I had a little fun with Jamie Dimon, putting in his mouth the words of the corrupt, embezzling banker in John Ford’s Stagecoach:

"I don’t know what the government is coming to. Instead of protecting businessmen, it pokes its nose into business! Why, they’re even talking now about having *bank* examiners. As if we bankers don’t know how to run our own banks! Why, at home I have a letter from a popinjay official saying they were going to inspect my books.
"I have a slogan that should be blazoned on every newspaper in this country: America for the Americans! The government must not interfere with business! Reduce taxes! Our national debt is something shocking. Over one billion dollars a year! What this country needs is a businessman for president!

"But today I read this: Jamie Dimon, CEO Of JPMorgan Chase, Calls International Bank Rules ‘Anti-American’.

Satire is dead."

Turmoil

2011-08-24T06:41:00.000-07:00

I'm upset with a dear friend.
Last night he posted an invitation on Facebook to sign an online "petition" to rob 'Group A' of their basic civil rights because of their superficial resemblance to 'Group B'. This apparently is justified because the acts of Group B were so heinous that anyone who looks like them should be viewed with suspicion and contempt. Failure to oppress Group A might make Group C feel bad, even though Group A is in actuality a subset of Group C. Group A has no actual connection with Group B, in spite of the specious claims made by a cable "news" organization which are reiterated in this petition. The project that Group A is working on is being entirely mischaracterized in order to provide a rationale for the petition.
I have other friends who would gladly sign this petition, and that's just the way they are. But this friend surprized me because I have never known him to be bigoted or unjust. It's very disturbing.

A Young Person's Guide To Politics

2011-07-09T06:26:00.000-07:00

In the United States of America we have two major political parties: the Democratic Party and the Republican Party. According to Theodore White, who wrote some books about how some of our presidents were elected, the Democrats believe that the Government is a tool to help people. And there's nothing wrong with that. The Republicans believe that the Government is a tool to help people help themselves. And there's nothing wrong with that.

Besides the political parties, there are also certain ideologies that determine how people see things, and how they will vote. Some of these are: liberal, conservative, centrist (or moderate), and, lately, the Tea Party. These are best described in a story.

Suppose that you and your sister (or brother) each decide that you want to buy a television. You both have $250. You go to the electronics store, and you see several televisions, some at $250, some bigger ones for a few dollars more, and great big ones that cost $500.

Now, there's a couple of things you can do. Each of you could buy your own $250 TV. That would be the conservative thing to do. And there's nothing wrong with that.

Or, you could pool your money and buy the great big $500 TV. That would be the liberal thing to do. And there's nothing wrong with that.

Of course, there will be a conflict if one of you wants to buy the small TV, and the other wants to buy the big TV. To know what to do requires negotiation and compromise.

Weighing the pros and cons of which TV to buy based on the needs in your family before deciding which TV to buy would be the centrist approach.

But a Tea Partier would see that with a little more money, you could each have a bigger TV. All you have to do is quit paying the electric bill.

A Well Written Police Report

2011-06-05T16:14:00.000-07:00

Augusta, GA

Orville Smith, a store manager for Best Buy in Augusta , Georgia , told police he observed a male customer, later identified as Tyrone Jackson of Augusta , on surveillance cameras putting a laptop computer under his jacket. When confronted the man became irate, knocked down an employee, drew a knife and ran for the door.

Outside on the sidewalk were four Marines collecting toys for the "Toys for Tots" program. Smith said the Marines stopped the man, but he stabbed one of the Marines, Cpl. Phillip Duggan, in the back; the injury did not appear to be severe.

After Police and an ambulance arrived at the scene Cpl. Duggan was transported for treatment.

The subject was also transported to the local hospital with two broken arms, a broken ankle, a broken leg, several missing teeth, possible broken ribs, multiple contusions, assorted lacerations, a broken nose and a broken jaw -- injuries he sustained when he slipped and fell off of the curb after stabbing the Marine.

Breaking the Rules

2011-05-20T18:46:00.000-07:00

I'm not allowed to blog about work anymore. However...

Happy New Year

2011-05-17T13:16:00.000-07:00

The one and only art show that I've done this spring is over, and that frees up a lot of time to work on the backlog of projects piling up around here. As one of my co-workers put it, "Wow, the day after the show is like New Year's for you." An apt description.

So I got the studio cleaned up, mostly, and the show stuff put away, and most of the bookkeeping done, and I sat down at the drafting table. Gaby came in and asked what I was doing, and I said, "Just trying to figure out what to do next." He asked me what kinds of things I needed to be doing, and I started on the list. When I mentioned staining the tables for the living room, he said, "Ooh! Do that one!"

The tables in question are a trio of tables (an occasional table, a coffee table, and one of those tall skinny tables that goes in the entry or behind the couch) that I picked up at a garage sale last summer for $50. They have beautiful styling, but when I found them they were painted with a two tone finish, the paint on the tops of the tables was scratched, and they smelled like cat piss.

Last October, when my friend Ted was staying with us, he worked on stripping the tables and managed to get two of them done. After it got too cold to work outside, the project was put away. Ted got a job, his own place, and then moved to Oregon to escape his ankle-biting girlfriend, leaving us with doubts that he would finish this project.

Yesterday, I went to the Wally-world and got a can of dark walnut stain. My new framing table in the studio provided a lot of space to work, and I managed to get the occasional table coated twice, and the top of the coffee table coated once. The underside of the coffee table has one coat as of this morning, as well as a second coat on the top. They look good.

Staining furniture is a messy job.

I'm not sure when my next day off will be, but that's the day I'll be applying the polyeurethane, weather permitting. I'll give that a week to dry, and then we'll move them into the living room.

Advice from my Dad

2011-04-09T20:24:00.000-07:00

While cleaning out my office today, I came across this list of rules for success in your career and thought it would be good to pass it your way.

Buckleys 18 Rules for Political Success

1. You need to exhibit good performance that pleases your supervisors.

2. You need to manage your career.

Pure effort is not always rewarded!

Don't rely on the kindness of strangers. Most individuals in an organization are concerned only with themselves.

3. Always take high visibility, high risk jobs.

If you succeed, you become the rising star of the organization.

4. Develop a sponsor within an organization.

Find a mentor. Find someone to help you navigate the waters of the organization -- someone with honesty, integrity and political savvy.

5. Nominate yourself for positions within the organization.

Modesty is never a virtue in the long run.

6. Always leave an organization on good terms.

Regardless of how bad it is, bite your tongue before you badmouth it.

7. Be aware of Politics.

You need to be aware of politics to be successful. Do politics well.

8. Realize your dependence on others and utilize it.

Don’t forget those you depended on or those who depended on you.

9. Everybody has ethical dilemmas.

Unethical decisions will always catch up with you.

10. Don’t gossip.

If you cant say something nice, don’t say anything.

11. Be persistent. Do not give up.

12. Failure occurs.

Everybody fails. You have to learn to live with it, and don’t let it destroy you.

13. Be Positive.

14. Do not engage in ingratiating tactics.

Don’t be an “ass-kisser”; its so transparent its resented.

15. Life is not always fair.

Don’t feel like you are owed something.

18. Think before you speak.

If its worth saying, its worth thinking about.

17. Do not embarrass people.

Don’t use what you know to harm others; it only creates enemies.

18. Always wear a smile.

During my 48 years of working various jobs, I can say all these rules apply; regardless what kind of work it was.

I believe the most important element is rule #1, but in order to do that, you need to keep the other rules.

Reflecting back on all the jobs I had where I worked for someone else, the success came by supporting and making your boss look good. In all cases, the boss was more concerned about how he/she looked to his/her boss, and was less concerned about how the employee felt about it all (Rule 2). If there was someone in the organization that was a problem, they would find a way to get rid of the problem. As a manager, I had some experience with this. I lost track of the number of people I fired when I worked for AOL. I fired one while working for Honeywell.

Regardinging rule 3, while working for Honeywell, I took a job that my peers said they "would not touch with a 10 foot pole!" It was a new job and did not have any parameters set on how to do it. Therefore I was free to determine how the job was to be accomplished. I was successful in putting together a program and hiring a staff that resulted in recognition throughout corporate Honeywell. (That is why the SETH THOMAS ships clock hangs on my office wall. It was for OUTSTANDING PERFORMANCE in this program.) But I had to get support from key people in Honeywell to make it happen (Rule 4).

When working with people, at all levels in an organization, make people feel good about themselves. They will want to keep you around! But don't forget to promote yourself (rule 5). And always wear a smile (rule 18).

Beyond Left and Right: It's About Reality

2011-03-27T07:48:00.000-07:00

...For far too long, the public has suffered under the tyranny of dueling narratives served up by one or another interest group seeking self-serving shortcuts around nuanced truths, all the while shortchanging the clarity of important debates about the biggest issues of the day -- from health care reform to defense policy to education. Journalists have too often perpetuated the false notion that seemingly any issue can be cleanly divided into right and left, conservative and liberal, because these labels make our work simpler, supplying us with a handy structure we can impose at will on typically uncooperative facts.

Journalists so frequently deal in the false liberal-conservative dichotomy because it generates the sort of tension that feeds narrative, and narrative makes for more accessible stories. Simply dividing up the interests into two neatly-differentiated competing camps enables lazy beat reporters to claim to have painted all of reality with but two phone calls. Why venture outside and talk to ordinary people -- whose experiences and views almost always challenge the traditional labels -- when we can simply sit at our desks and dial up a D and then an R and gather a pair of quotes that supposedly cover the whole spectrum of the American take on anything?

Political hacks trade in the labels of right and left because it allows them to manipulate the public with shortcut phrases that demonize those in the other camp, making it easier to derail whatever initiative needs killing at the moment. Banking reform is neatly pilloried as a leftist assault on free enterprise by financial institutions intent on perpetuating corporate welfare policies. Organized labor too sweepingly dismisses expanded trade -- even foreign purchases of U.S. companies that create jobs for U.S. workers -- while decrying the trend as part of a an assault from the right.

Time and again, we see how these sorts of divisions function as a divide-and-rule strategy, nearly always choreographed by one special interest or another, usually in the service of some piece of legislation that is really just an employment bill for lobbyists or a means of raising campaign cash for incumbents. These crude labels reinforce a sense of division that cuts off the great majority of Americans from their own non-special interests -- the desire to work at a job that affords a decent living; to live in a decent home and secure health care; to educate their children, take a vacation every now and again, and eventually retire. What we need now is an active journalism engaged in figuring out how to restore those basic middle-class aspirations, without getting sidetracked into tendentious debates about right versus left and which side is winning.

What do these labels really mean, anyway, and who gets to assign them, and for what aim? Does anyone not paid to traffic in such labels really subscribe to the notion that we are so easily divided? Take, for example, the need to create jobs. Who is the loser in this undertaking? Labor unions -- a supposedly liberal concern, and certainly a key source of campaign cash for Democrats -- obviously benefit, but so do businesses both big and small, a slice of America that is supposedly part of the conservative core. When more people are earning paychecks and walking around with money to spend, that is good for retailers, for car dealers, for insurance companies, lawyers, short-order cooks and banks.

Who really wants businesses to suffer, as the anti-business label that gets thrown at self-identified progressives directly implies? Advocating that Wall Street banking giants ought to be reined in against risks that can trash the economy is not anti-business. Indeed, it is really pro-business, so long as we are not letting the financial lobby frame the terms of the argument. It is about making sure money flows to start-up companies whose new ideas can power the economy and create jobs. Who is for more bailouts of the financial system? Not liberals, who deride the socialization of losses while private hands keep the profits; not conservatives or libertarians, who tend to champion a smaller role for government in the private sector.

Who loses if we launch a serious effort to build out U.S. infrastructure? This is a way to create jobs, to create orders for factory-made machinery, to spur innovation by modernizing schools, upgrading research laboratories, easing transportation via high-speed rail and more efficient roads and ports. Who is among the constituency that would lose out in the face of the additional economic growth that would emerge if we embrace infrastructure building?

To which one might be tempted to consider the debate over the federal budget deficit, because the refrain goes: We cannot afford infrastructure. Here is the classic right-left divide in which Keynesian progressives argue for more spending now and supposedly callous conservatives focus on simply slashing spending to balance the books. There are divisions here, genuine ideological disagreements about how to approach so many of these problems, and only a naif would dismiss that. But journalism that simply elucidates those differences and effectively perpetuates them with crude labels rather than helping find the way to good policy is failing to offer a vital public service.

No liberal with any integrity would argue that we can simply ignore the deficit and need not fear the potential consequences -- higher interest rates, inflation, a debased dollar -- if we merely carry on. No conservative engaged in the genuine pursuit of enlightened policy would claim that we can simply slash away at discretionary spending, make speeches about living within our means, and thereby solve our problems. For journalists, getting beyond left and right means not allowing the agenda to be set by interest groups that are clearly stumping for votes and air time on cable television at the expense of reality. It means airing out the constructive arguments and helping get us somewhere useful -- a place in which the economy is growing and producing jobs, while we are credibly planning to pay off our burgeoning debts. It means not worrying so much about balancing up our stories with equal quotes from the dubious camps that frame our stories and putting the spotlight instead on basic truths.

Left versus right: These are overly-simplified labels that perpetuate division, and we ought not cater to them, because that amounts to lazy journalism. That is about who won the week, and who controls the conversation, as opposed to the much more difficult, nuanced and crucial questions that remain operative irrespective of phony ideological labels: How will we make the economy function again for the vast majority of Americans, for whom the last quarter-century has delivered downward mobility? How will we get our fiscal house in order while adding quality paychecks and making health care affordable? These are concerns that are common to nearly every household, regardless of ideology, and these are questions that must be pursued at face value, with good information, critical scrutiny and the pursuit of pragmatic policy.

But -- and here comes a major but -- ditching the bogus left-right frame is not about moving reflexively to the center. It is rather a rejection of the very concept that left, right and center are a good way to map the crucial debates of the day.

In the sort of journalism I am interested in practicing here, I want my reporters to reject the false idea that you simply poll people at both extremes of any issue, then paint a line down the middle and point to it as reality. We have to reject the tired notion that objectivity means the reader can get all the way to the bottom of the story and not know what to think. We do have to be objective in our journalism, but this does not mean we are empty vessels with no ideas of our own, and with no prior experiences that influence what we ultimately deliver: That is a fantasy, and an unhelpful one at that, because every time the reader discovers that personal values have indeed "intruded" into the copy, they experience another "gotcha" moment that undermines the credibility of serious journalism.

Rather, objectivity means that we conduct a fully open-minded inquiry. We do not begin our reporting with a fully-formed position. We do not adhere to the contentions of one think tank or political party or government organ as truth. We don't write to please our friends or sources or interest groups. Rather, we do our own reporting, our own independent thinking, our own scrutinizing. But at the end of that process, we offer a conclusion, and transparently so, with whatever caveats are in order. We do not concern ourselves with how others may describe our place on the ideological spectrum, and we do not hold back when we know something, or lard up our journalism with disingenuous counter-quotes to cover ourselves against the charge that we staked out a position. As long as our process is pure, so is the work.

...The point is that no ideological position can be counted on to deliver the facts, and any journalism that loses track of this ultimately reduces itself to a version of propaganda. Verifiable truth is our master, the one element that does not change when a new party takes over in Washington, when a new fashion sweeps the country, or a fresh approach prevails on university campuses. We work for no one but the reader, and we are advocates only for pragmatic solutions to real problems. We pursue our reporting through the lens of actual human experience -- a messy, internally-contradictory frame of reference that simply cannot be described by hackneyed labels like left and right. We are concerned with the real-life experiences of actual people, and these are things that simply refuse to be divided into false dichotomies.

Left and right are the props of the cynical class who use them to convey a sense of sophistication in place of the messy, difficult work of finding things out, uncovering truths and reckoning with social problems in their fullest human dimensions. We need to aim for better.

Peter S. Goodman

Original post: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/02/10/beyond-left-and-right-its-about-reality_n_821582.html

Without Representation

2011-03-24T18:18:00.000-07:00

July 16 2010

Dear Mr. Savage:

Thank you for your recent correspondence. As your voice in Washington, I appreciate being made aware of your views.

Your thoughts regarding S. 424, Uniting American Families Act of 2009, were informative. This bill has been referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee. Should it come to the Senate floor for a vote, I will keep your views in mind.

Even though I return to the state almost every weekend, I do not always have the opportunity to listen to everyone's ideas. These ideas are important, as they are the building blocks of Oklahoma's representation here in Washington. When you share these ideas with me, you are sharing them with Congress and, in turn, the nation.

Again, thank you for your comments. Please do not hesitate to contact me again.

Sincerely, James M. Inhofe United States Senator

__________________________________________________________

July 19, 2010

Mr. Ronald Steve Savage
Edmond, OK

Dear Ronald:

Thank you for contacting me about the H.R. 1024, the Uniting American Families Act. Understanding your ideas and concerns is important to me, as it helps me to better represent you and the Fifth District of Oklahoma.

If enacted, H.R. 1024 would allow permanent same-sex partners of United States citizens and residents to obtain lawful permanent resident status in the same manner as spouses of citizens and permanent residents.

Marriage is, and shall remain, a union between one man and one woman, unless and until the people decide otherwise. I oppose efforts to redefine marriage, an institution that has endured and worked for thousands of years and am committed to working with members of Congress to continue promoting Oklahoma values.

Thank you again for taking the time to share your ideas and concerns. As the 111th Congress addresses the many challenges facing our nation, I hope you will continue to share your thoughts and views with me. However, due to increased security measures, mail delivery may be delayed. Accordingly, I encourage you to visit my website at www.fallin.house.gov to contact me via email as well as find useful information about Oklahoma's Fifth Congressional District.

Sincerely,

MaryFallin

Member of Congress

_______________________________________________________

September 1, 2010

Mr. Ron Savage
Edmond, Oklahoma

Dear Mr. Savage,
Thank you for writing to express your support for S.424, the Uniting American Families Act of 2009. I am glad that you wrote, and I apologize for the delay in my response.
The Uniting American Families Act, also known as UAFA, is currently pending in the Senate Judiciary Committee. Two related bills are in the House Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security, and International Law. As you know, this proposal would amend the Immigration and Nationality Act to place a "permanent partner" on equal status with that of a legal marriage partner. The act defines "permanent partners" as individuals, age 18 or older, who are "in a committed, intimate relationship" and "intend a lifelong commitment."
I understand your desire to provide immigration options for same-gender couples, but I cannot support the proposal for two important reasons. First, it would create a new federal definition of marriage, and second, it does not provide adequate safeguards against immigration fraud.

This act would grant immigration status based on a relationship that is not recognized by federal law and that is expressly prohibited by most states. In fact, the Defense of Marriage Act, overwhelmingly approved by Congress in 1996, specifically defined marriage as "a legal union between one man and one woman as husband and wife," and the word "spouse" as only "a person of the opposite sex who is a husband or wife." If Congress were to recognize same-gender relationships through this Act, it would contradict federal law and the laws of 90 percent of our states.

The risk of fraud resulting from enactment of this legislation is also extremely high, because consulate offices will have no legal documents with which to verify the relationships of applicants. The only available options for verification would be self-reporting and statements from friends and family. The act requires the "partners" to be "financially interdependent," but they will have no joint income tax returns or any other federally recognized documentation of shared assets. Without adequate documentation, preventing fraud would be virtually impossible.

While individuals involved in same-sex relationships are eligible to apply for immigration under the same conditions as any other individual from their home country, I cannot support giving their applications the same urgency as those of legally married spouses.

I am sorry that we disagree on this issue, but I am glad that you wrote. I certainly encourage you to write again with any further thoughts. Best wishes!

Sincerely,

Tom A. Coburn, M.D.
United States Senator

Yikes!

2011-03-15T07:50:00.000-07:00

This was a comment on one of Paul Krugman's blog posts (http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/13/the-wisconsin-effect/):

As an independent I try to look at both sides of the picture and what I am seeing on the republican side frightens me. I cannot believe that there are so many ignorant, gullible people out there who believe everything fed to them by republican congressmen/congresswomen, and pundits.
I was on active duty when George W. Bush was running for president. As you may or may not know the military has a majority of republican-leaning members and I was being told how wonderful George was and how he was going to turn the country around. Being an educated woman I decided to do some research and found that he had bankrupted a baseball team, an oil company and Texas was in financial trouble. I knew he was not going to be good and told everyone they needed to pull their retirement and put it in a safe place if he became prez. They laughed at me and told me I didn't know what I was talking about. Six months after he became president their retirement accounts failed and they lost not only what the gov't matched but it dipped into what they had contributed. They lamented and cried about what are we going to do now, and I explained I was still in the boat that had not capsized because I had moved my money, and had they listened and not laughed at me they would not be underwater. They were right George did turn the country around! Record losses and he took fed gov't from a surplus to a deficit.
Now we listen to repubs saying we need to drill more but what they are not telling you is that the US gov't pays subsidies to and gives tax breaks to companies drilling on our property. That oil does not come to us but is property of OPEC, and the US must buy their own oil at the going rate. The only thing drilling more will do is increase our deficit. You don't believe me ask the oil companies making record profits in the Billions of dollars.
Repubs say they need to give corporations tax breaks at the expense of our poor, middle class and elderly to promote job growth. How well has that worked? The tax breaks for the wealthy started under GW Bush and job growth for his 8 years in office is at about a million jobs. Tell me why would corporations hire more people when that would cut into their profits? If you can do more with less and make more money and the gov't is going to pay you more as incentive and you can keep getting that without hiring more people WHY HIRE? They can use some of the tax breaks to buy more republican congressmen/women to do their bidding.
The repubs can now spend unlimited amounts of money on ads (thanks supreme court) to brainwash you into believing they care about you when that is the last thing they care about.
Now that the repubs have control of many state congresses they can accomplish their mission at the state level. Have you ever taken the time to figure out what they are up to? Their mission is not targeting only democrats but republicans and independents alike. If they get rid of the unions ability to collectively bargain YOU may be working >40 hour work weeks without the benefit of overtime, and minimum wage will be gone. You will be working longer hours for less money, and the middle class will be gone. There will only be the very rich and the very poor.
They are defunding education. Have you asked WHY? Well if you cannot afford a higher education you will ever be qualified for the jobs that pay the higher wages. This is a way to keep a lower wage workforce and increase their profits.

Wake up America!!! The life as you know it is being taken away from you. Even though I can see what is happening, I am but one person. Do not let them brainwash you into believing they have your best interest at heart. THEY DO NOT!!!

I want one!

2011-03-02T08:33:00.000-08:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cuIJRsAuCHQ&feature=popt02us03

Apple Does It Again!

2011-03-02T08:21:00.000-08:00

Christmas gift idea!

Apple announced today that it has developed a breast implant that can store and play music. The “iTit” will cost from $499 to $699, depending on cup and speaker size. This is considered a major social breakthrough, because women are always complaining about men staring at their breasts and not listening to them.

2011-02-11T15:45:00.000-08:00

My Dad sent this email. I might try it out this spring.

"We went with friends to Sweety Pies on Sunday for breakfast and sat in the patio section beside the house. We happened to notice zip lock baggies pinned to a post and a wall. The bags were half filled with water, each contained 4 pennies, and they were zipped shut. Naturally we were curious! Ms. Sweety told us that these baggies kept the flies away! So naturally we were even more curious! We actually watched some flies come in the open window, stand around on the window sill, and then fly out again. And there were no flies in the eating area! This morning I checked this out on Google. Below are comments on this fly control idea. I'm now a believer!

"Ann Says:I tried the ziplock bag and pennies this weekend.. I have a horse trailer. The flies were bad while I was camping. I put the baggie with pennies above the door of the LQ. NOT ONE FLY came in the trailer. The horse trailer part had many. Not sure why it works but it does!

"Danielle Martin Says: Fill a ziplock bag with water and 5 or 6 pennies and hang it in the problem area. In my case it was a particular window in my home. It had a slight passage way for insects. Every since I have done that, it has kept flies and wasps away. Some say that wasps and flies mistake the bag for some other insect nest and are threatened..

"Maggie Says: I swear by the plastic bag of water trick. I have them on porch and basement. We saw these in Northeast Mo. at an Amish grocery store & have used them since. They say it works because a fly sees a reflection & won't come around.

"DJ Says: Regarding the science behind zip log bags of water? My research found that the millions of molecules of water presents its own prism effect and given that flies have a lot of eyes, to them it's like a zillion disco balls reflecting light, colors and movement in a dizzying manner. When you figure that flies are prey for many other bugs, animals, birds, etc., they simply won't take the risk of being around that much perceived action. I moved to a rural area and thought these "hillbillies" were just yanking my city boy chain but I tried it and it worked immediately! We went from hundreds of flies to seeing the occasional one, but he didn't hang around long."

The Quick Blue Facebook Jumped Over The Lazy Blog

2011-02-07T02:15:00.000-08:00

Wednesday is the two year anniversary of the start of this blog. As I stated in my first post the reason I started this blog was because a co-worker said that I expressed myself well. Since I like to tell stories of my life and the ponderings of my little brain, which is what this blog is about, I really have a lot of fun with it. I hope that people are amused by it, even if all I'm doing is venting.

A question came up recently about the content of my blog, and I didn't have a ready answer at the time (the answer is 'not since June, and she was mentioned in a post that she hasn't read yet'), so I went through the entire blog and came to a startling discovery: In the ten months before I joined Facebook I had written 77 posts. Since joining Facebook fourteen months ago, there have been 23. This is not good.

A friend of mine, Mark, recently wrote on Facebook, "I stopped blogging awhile ago. And I was active blogger. Facebook is easier, and I have control over who reads my posts. I much prefer facebook these days." His is an entirely different point of view from mine. Valid for him, but different.

In my point of view, the two serve entirely different functions, so "preference" is not a factor. Facebook is kinda like a post-it note: little quips we throw out there that we hope someone will notice. They can turn into a conversation, and that's the best part - especially when the participants are in varied locations around the world. Sometimes, though, that's a problem too. When my brother came to town for Christmas, he told me, "I would ask you what's going on, but since we're on Facebook, I already know." Face to face conversation became somewhat unnecessary, and I missed it. Scott and I do better in vocal conversations anyway. If he doesn't hear my voice, he often doesn't catch my meaning.

Writing a blog is more like writing a short story. I can go into more depth with the topic I want to write about, and not be worried about going over the alloted number of characters, or that someone will pull it off subject with their conversational input. Furthermore, like most authors, I really want a variety of people to read it.

Now, there are parts of my life I will not write about because I believe they are too personal, and another that I have written about a lot, but have been told I can no longer do so, so there is a little bit of self censorship going on. But there is still a lot going on in my life that I can write about, even if it is just a short paragraph. It's just a matter of actually doing it.

All The (Unused and Unusable) Time In the World

2011-02-02T01:34:00.000-08:00

In the winter, typically, I am an idea hamster. I get a bunch of ideas about things I'm going to do as soon as the weather gets warmer. Relatively few of those ideas actually come to fruition, but they don't all go away just because they hadn't been accomplished. They just sit in the back of my head and develop into little bubbles of guilt and regret.

True, time and money do play a big factor, but a lot of times it's just poor planning or no planning or just plain old ordinary wasting my time (especially in front of the computer or TV). Then there is the backward thinking, which is really irritating (I can't do this till I do that, but i can't do that till I do the other, etc, etc, ad infinitim.) I also use my schedule as both a reason and an excuse; likewise the people in my life.

I was sitting in our "yellow room" (a spare bedroom that has been turned into a sort of lounge/reading room/ studio annex) just looking around and thinking. Gaby came in and asked what I was doing and I started telling him about all the things that I'm not getting done, and some of the reasons for that:

I have a model of the Lusitania that I got some 25 years ago, and little of it has been put together. (I also have a Titanic model in the same large scale that hasn't been touched yet.) The reason is because I don't have a space I can dedicate to that project. Plus, I am mixing my own paint colors to match the paintings by Ken Marshall in Robert Ballard's book. In short, I am making this into a very complicated project that I don't have time or space for. But it will be magnificent when it's done.

I have a number of things that I'm trying to sell on ebay. I just need to post the auctions. I don't particularly have an excuse for not doing this, except that I want the auctions to end at a particular time, therefore I have to post them at a particular time, and something always seems to come up. Or I just forget.

I'm supposed to be working on a research project for my brother. I have the materials to do it (three books, a pencil, and a yellow pad), but it requires a lot of reading and cross referencing and typing the results. I really don't have an excuse to not be working on this project except that it falls victim to "getting started is the hardest part," as many of my projects do, because the stuff gets put away or moved, and getting them out again and figuring out where I was before the stuff got moved is just too much trouble. I also need time to myself to think, and that's hard to come by.

Then there's my Spanish lesson, which I am also blogging about. Again, getting started is the hardest part. Plus, I'm overcomplicating it, while not getting enough practice. Time to myself is not a problem with this project, because having Gaby here is (usually) helpful. I guess I have no excuse.

I'm working on two pen & inks and six paintings. I got a lot done on one of the drawings last weekend (yay), but this weekend all eight projects either are or need something that is behind the wall of snow between the house and the studio. At this point, I'm not sure that I'm going to get anything done on these this weekend. (Truth be told, though, three of the paintings haven't been touched in years.)

I wasn't expecting the weather to get in the way of my current art projects. When I think of weather interference I'm usually just thinking that it's too cold to work in the garage, or too wet to work out on the patio. But right now it's 9½° outside and we have 10 inches of snow blown up into huge drifts that prevent us from doing a lot of stuff. We're stuck in the house because the snow is too deep to drive through, and we are using electric portable heaters because the central heat quit working this morning. We have a kerosene heater that is very efficient, but makes the house smell bad for weeks. Gaby is afraid to use it. I'm afraid not to, because if we don't use one of the electric heaters in the utility room the pipes around the washing machine may burst. We really need a new storm door and a new energy efficient window on that room. Things we need to do when we have money and nice weather.

Other things that require nice weather:

We have some tables for the living room, two of which need to be stripped, all four need to be stained.

The framing business has pretty much fizzled out, and I have hundreds of frame samples that I want to make into little wall shelves and other things to sell on ebay... which reminds me, I need a scroll saw. But I also need a warm garage.

But the big project is changing the arrangement of my studio to accomodate a new direction in the business. This will require moving a lot of stuff, most of it paper goods, out on the patio while construction is going on, so the weather has to be dry. It also needs to be warm, since the doors will be open through most of the project. Everytime I go out in the studio I am so distracted by the excitement of this project that I have trouble making myself do something useful. I've measured the room over and over again. I know the results will be the same every time, but I just can't help it. I repeatedly go over the details in my head, afraid that I will forget something when the time comes.

Anyway, that's how I am: obsessing over the things I can't do now, neglecting the things I should do now. I've been this way all my life. I do actually accomplish a few things, but it's never enough, and always at the last minute. And every year it's going to be different. But this year I have a plan.

Stuff from the Email

2011-01-17T18:14:00.000-08:00

Oklahoma Trivia and Interesting Facts

1. The bread twist tie was invented in Maysville.
2. The shopping cart was invented in Ardmore in 1936.
3. The nation's first parking meter was installed in Oklahoma City in 1935.
4. The first Girl Scout Cookie was sold in Muskogee in 1917.
5. Cimarron County, located in the Oklahoma Panhandle, is the only county in the U.S. bordered by 4 separate states - Texas, New Mexico, Colorado and Kansas.
6. The Oklahoma State Capital is the only capital in the U.S. with working oil wells on its grounds.
7. Boise City, Okla., was the only city in the United States to be bombed during World War II. On Monday, July 5, 1943, at 12:30am., a B-17 Bomber based at Dalhart Army Air Base, Texas, dropped six practice bombs on the sleeping town, mistaking the city lights as target lights.
8. WKY Radio in Oklahoma City was the first radio station transmitting west of the Mississippi River.
9. The nation's first "tornado warning" was issued March 25, 1948 in Oklahoma City minutes before a devastating tornado. Because of the warning, no lives were lost.
10. Oklahoma has the largest Native American population of any state in the U.S.
11. The name 'Oklahoma' comes from two Choctaw words - okla meaning "people" and humma meaning "red." So the name means, "Red People." The name was approved in 1890.
12. Oklahoma has produced more astronauts than any other state.
13. Oklahoma has more man-made lakes than any other state (including Caddo County's Fort Cobb Lake).
14. During the "Land Rush," Oklahoma City and Guthrie went from vast, open prairie to cities of over 10,000 in a single day.
15. The nation's first "Yield" traffic sign was erected in Tulsa on a trial basis.
16. The Pensacola Dam on Grand Lake is the longest multi-arched dam in the world at 6,565 feet.
17. The Port of Catoosa (just north of Tulsa) is the largest inland port in America.
18. The aerosol can was invented in Bartlesville.
19. Per square mile, Oklahoma has more tornadoes than any other place in the world.
20. The highest wind speed ever recorded on earth was in Moore Okla., on May 3, 1999 during the Oklahoma City F-5 tornado. Wind speed was clocked at 318 mph.
21. The Will Rogers World Airport and the Wiley Post Airport are both named after two famous Oklahomans, both killed in the same airplane crash.

And Oklahoma Towns Offer It All

Love the Summer?
Poolville, Oklahoma
Sunray, Oklahoma

Want Something To Eat?
Cookietown, Oklahoma
Corn, Oklahoma
Grainola, Oklahoma
Hominy, Oklahoma
Olive, Oklahoma
South Coffeeville, Oklahoma
Sweetwater, Oklahoma

Why Travel To Other Cities? Oklahoma Has Them All!
Cleveland, Oklahoma
Orlando, Oklahoma
Miami, Oklahoma
Pittsburgh, Oklahoma
Santa Fe, Oklahoma
St. Louis, Oklahoma
Chattanooga, Oklahoma
Peoria, Oklahoma
Burbank, Oklahoma
Fargo, Oklahoma

Don't Forget The Wildlife!
Bison, Oklahoma
Buffalo, Oklahoma
Deer Creek, Oklahoma
Eagle, Oklahoma
Elk City, Oklahoma
Fox, Oklahoma
Wolfe, Oklahoma

There's A Town Named After A Number:
Fourty-One, Oklahoma

And A Town Whose Letters Don't Spell Anything:
IXL, Oklahoma

For The Sportsman Who Wants To Get Away From It All
Fisherman's Paradise, Oklahoma

We Even Have A City Named After Earth's Only Satellite!
Moon, Oklahoma

And A City Named After Our State!
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma

Feeling A Bit Chilly?
Cold Springs, Oklahoma
Snow, Oklahoma
Slick, Oklahoma

Oklahoma Is Full Of Love!
Bigheart, Oklahoma
Lovedale, Oklahoma
Loveland, Oklahoma
Lovell, Oklahoma
Loyal, Oklahoma

Like To Read About The Presidents?
Adams, Oklahoma
Carter, Oklahoma
Clinton, Oklahoma
Fillmore, Oklahoma
Grant, Oklahoma
Jefferson, Oklahoma
Johnson, Oklahoma
Lincoln, Oklahoma
Reagan, Oklahoma
Roosevelt, Oklahoma
Taft, Oklahoma
Taylor, Oklahoma
Washington, Oklahoma
Wilson, Oklahoma

Other City Names In Oklahoma To Make You Smile
Bowlegs, Oklahoma
Bugtussle, Oklahoma
Bushyhead, Oklahoma
Frogville, Oklahoma
Hooker, Oklahoma
Loco, Oklahoma
Slapout, Oklahoma
Slaughterville, Oklahoma

And Regardless What Side Of The Fence You're On
Gay, Oklahoma
Straight, Oklahoma

Osmosis

2010-11-12T18:17:00.000-08:00

One of the blogs I follow is a local economist who is a college professor of economics here at the University in my hometown. He's a centrist Democrat (I'm a centrist Republican) whose style is very readable and even-handed. His blog lead me to another economist's blog, a professor at Princeton, who is a little more complicated in his analysis, and that one led me to the blog of a professor at Berkely, which can get really complicated. (In fact, I find it difficult to absorb what I'm reading and get quite frustrated whenever there is any noise or distraction in the room at all.)

I have no background in economics, so you can probably imagine that macro-economics is way over my head. Much of it is. Sometimes they will put up a chart and say something like "as you can see from this, it's obvious that..." Well, no, I can't, and no, it's not. But I'm trying. One of them admitted to having a problem with YHTMAAAIYP*. Indeed, for the uninitiated, the esoteric nature of some posts can be quite daunting. For a while I was reading QE as Queen Elizabeth. But when the facts are at variance with things politicians are saying, all three can be quite entertaining (which is why I started following them in the first place).

But I didn't realize that I was actually learning something until I turned on the TV the other night, and the Nightly Business Report was on PBS... and I actually understood what they were talking about. This amazed me so much that I was totally riveted to the program. In fact, I realized that I could explain some of this in an over-simplified manner using a Risk game and Monopoly money.

It is said that it takes about 8-14 months to learn a language by immersion. If I had that much success from just following a few blogs, perhaps I should be reading Spanish newspapers more often.

*You Have To Many Abreviations And Acronyms In Your Posts

Obama the Snob

2010-10-31T12:07:00.000-07:00

Recently, the President seems to be under attack by people who are refering to him as an elitist because of his stating that the reason people have problems with the Democratic agenda is simply that they don't understand it. In a Boston stump speech he reportedly said, "Part of the reason that our politics seems so tough right now, and facts and science and argument do not seem to be winning the day all the time, is because we’re hard-wired not to always think clearly when we’re scared. And the country is scared, and they have good reason to be.”
The Washington Post responded with an editorial entitled "Obama the Snob", which reiterated the charge from critics that he is a Harvard-educated millionaire elitist who is sure that he knows best and thinks that those who disagree just aren’t in their right minds. (A Facebook friend of mine posted a link to this article.)
So I have to wonder, what does that make me?
I believe that everyone in politics, Democrats, liberals, Republicans, moderates, traditional conservatives, modern "conservatives", etc., all have the capacity to be misinformed, disingenuous, and outright liars, and that because of that all have the ability to pass on bad information is support of their cause. I also believe that facts and data are not always on your side.
I believe that this country's greatest threat, greater than any threat of terrorism or any of our economic problems even, is the toxic hyper-partisanship promoted by the 24-hour propaganda "news" channels that constantly churn out reasons why we shouldn't trust this person, this group, this legislation, and reasons why we should be afraid...very afraid.
Well, I'm not afraid. And I don't want to be afraid. I want to be informed. And I think everyone should be informed, and if that makes me elitist, well so be it.
My brother and I have this discussion once in a while, about trying to stay not red, not blue, but purple. But the purple is made up of little dots that are red and blue, like in a Georges Seurat painting, and if the blue dots outnumber the red dots there is a decidedly blue cast to the picture.
So if facts and data support the "liberal" point of view, does that make my brother and me liberals? Our red-favoring friends seem to think so. We would prefer not, because devotion to an ideology tends to give people permission to ignore the facts and data, and thereby make poor decisions. If the dots are blue, it's not our fault.
Information is out there. And if you are failing to look for it, or selectively ignoring it because it doesn't fit your political ideal, it's not our elitist president's fault either.

Analogies Humor

2010-10-11T14:41:00.000-07:00

The line separating painfully bad analogies from weirdly good ones is as thin as a soup made from the shadow of a chicken that was starved to death by Abraham Lincoln.

Here are some fine examples:

The young fighter had a hungry look, the kind you get from not eating for a while.

He was as lame as a duck --not the metaphorical lame duck, either, but a real lame duck, maybe from stepping on a land mine or something.

Her artistic sense was exquisitely refined, like some who could tell the difference between butter and I Can't Believe It's Not Butter.

The knife was as sharp as the tone used by Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Tex) in her first several points of parliamentary procedure made to Rep. Henry Hyde (R-Ill) in the House Judiciary Committee hearings on the impeachment of President William Jefferson Clinton.

The dandelion swayed in the gentle breeze like an oscillating electric fan set on medium.

Her lips were red and full, like tubes of blood drawn by an inattentive phlebotomist.

He was deeply in love. When she spoke, he thought he heard bells, as if she were a garbage truck backing up.

Her eyes were like limpid pools, only they had forgotten to put in any pH cleanser.

She grew on him like she was a colony of E. coli and he was room temperature beef.

Her pants fit her like a glove... well, more like a mitten, actually.

She walked into my office like a centipede with 98 missing legs.

Her voice had a tense grating quality, like a first generation thermal paper fax machine that needed a band tightened.

The painting was very Escher-like, as if Escher had painted an exact copy of an Escher painting.

He was as bald as one of the Three Stooges, either Larry or Curly --you know, the one who goes "woo woo woo."

The sunset displayed rich spectacular hues, like a .jpeg file at 10% percent cyan, 10% magenta, 60% yellow, and 10% black.

Phone Call from the Census

2010-09-27T13:34:00.001-07:00

The US Census office in New York has had to fire workers due to fraud. The new folks there must still be learning the ropes. This actual telephone call to Erik Gordon was transcribed immediately upon hanging up, so it's practically verbatim.
Ring. Ring.
ERIK: "Hello?"
CHARLOTTE: "Hello. This is Charlotte calling from the 2010 United States Census. We've left you a couple of messages over the past few weeks but you haven't returned our calls. I'm calling to ask you some additional questions about the census form that you recently completed. This should take only a few minutes."
ERIK: "Okay."
CHARLOTTE: "Can I start by verifying your address?"
ERIK: "Yes, it's the one you have on the form -- 68 East 78th Street in New York."
CHARLOTTE: "And is this the Gordon household?"
ERIK: "Yes."
CHARLOTTE: "And who completed the census form on behalf of the household?"
ERIK: "I did. I'm the only one who lives here."
CHARLOTTE: "And what is your name?"
ERIK: "Erik Gordon. Don't you have that on the form I filled out?"
CHARLOTTE: "Yes."
ERIK: "So why are you asking me again?"
CHARLOTTE (reading): "We need to make sure that the 2010 US Census is an accurate count of every person in the United States and that no person is double counted. This should take only a few minutes."
ERIK: "Okay."
CHARLOTTE: "So Erik Gordon filled out the census form on behalf of your household?"
ERIK: "Yes, I did."
CHARLOTTE: "And am I speaking to Erik Gordon?"
ERIK: "Um, yes. But I think we've covered this, no?"
CHARLOTTE: "Yes, but I need to ask the questions in the order they appear on my screen."
ERIK: "Okay."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, how many people were living at your address on April 1, 2010?"
ERIK: "Just me. I'm the only one who lives here."
CHARLOTTE: "So should I put 'One?'"
ERIK: "Probably."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, do you have children, babies or foster children living with you?"
ERIK (louder): "I'm the only one here."
CHARLOTTE: "It's a yes or no question, Mr. Gordon."
ERIK: "If I'm the only one here, then the answer is 'No,' right?"
CHARLOTTE: "Okay, I'm going to put 'No.'"
ERIK: "Good idea."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, do you have any other relatives living with you?"
ERIK: "I'm the only one here."
CHARLOTTE: "I can't put that."
ERIK: "I don't care."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, we need to make sure that the 2010 US Census is an accurate count of every person in the United States and that no person is double counted. This should take only a few minutes."
ERIK: "But all of this is on the form I filled out."
CHARLOTTE: "I know. I have it here."
ERIK: "So why are you asking me the same questions?"
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, this should take only a few minutes."
ERIK: "This should take no minutes."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, are you refusing to answer the questions? Because if you're refusing to answer the questions, I'm going to have to call you back."
ERIK: "I'm not refusing to answer the questions, Charlotte. I already answered them."
CHARLOTTE: "When?"
ERIK: "On the form you have in front of you."
CHARLOTTE: "Oh."
ERIK: "Yes."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, this should only take a few minutes. Can I ask if you have any nonrelatives, such as roommates or babysitters living with you?"
ERIK: "I'm the only one here."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, you know I can't put that."
ERIK: "No, Charlotte, no. I don't have anyone else living here!"
CHARLOTTE: "No roomates or babysitters?"
ERIK: "No!"
CHARLOTTE: "I'm going to put 'No.' Mr. Gordon, do you have anyone living with you temporarily?"
ERIK: "Charlotte, you know what I'm going to say, right?"
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, it's a yes or no question."
ERIK: "Charlotte, you've already asked me about relatives and nonrelatives. Who else could be living with me?"
CHARLOTTE: "Anyone living with you temporarily, such as any illegal aliens."
ERIK: "Yes, Charlotte. I forgot. I do have illegal aliens living with me."
CHARLOTTE: "How many?"
ERIK: "I live with approximately twelve thousand illegal Mexican immigrants. But please don't put that down, I don't want to get in trouble."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, I have to put it down."
ERIK: "Please don't put it down. They're nice people. They’ve traveled far."
CHARLOTTE: "I'm sorry, Mr. Gordon. I have to put it down."
ERIK: "Okay, put it down."
CHARLOTTE: "Okay."
ERIK: "Charlotte, did you really just put down that I live with 12,000 illegal Mexican immigrants?"
CHARLOTTE: "No. I just put twelve."
ERIK: "Why?"
CHARLOTTE: "I don't have enough room."
ERIK: "Okay."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, were you away from this address anytime in March or April of 2010?"
ERIK: "What do you mean?"
CHARLOTTE: "What do *you* mean?"
ERIK: "Are you asking me if I left my apartment anytime in March or April?"
CHARLOTTE: "Yes."
ERIK: "Then 'Yes.'"
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, where did you go?"
ERIK: "Charlotte, I went a lot of places."
CHARLOTTE: "I only have one line."
ERIK: "That's too bad, Charlotte, because I went *a lot* of places."
CHARLOTTE: "But I only have one line."
ERIK: "So what do you want me to tell you?"
CHARLOTTE: "I don't know. Do you want me to ask my supervisor?"
ERIK: "Actually, I think you should ask your supervisor."
CHARLOTTE (returning to the phone after putting me on hold for two or three minutes): "I think we should just put 'Don't Know.'"
ERIK: "Fine."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, in March and April of 2010 where did you spend most of your time: at your address in New York or in Don't Know?"
ERIK: "New York. Don't Know isn't a real place."
CHARLOTTE: "Okay. New York. Is there any other place you spent most of your time?"
ERIK: "Charlotte, what does that mean?"
CHARLOTTE: "You said you spent most of your time in New York. Is there any other place where you spent most of your time?"
ERIK: "Charlotte, how can I spend most of my time in more than one place?"
CHARLOTTE (after thinking it over): "I think we should put 'Don't Know.'"
ERIK: "Okay. Let's put that."
CHARLOTTE: "Okay."
ERIK: "Okay."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, other than New York and Don't Know, did you spend any time anywhere else?"
ERIK: "Pardon?"
CHARLOTTE: "Other than New York and Don't Know, did you spend any time anywhere else?"
ERIK: "Other than New York and Don't Know?"
CHARLOTTE: "Yes."
ERIK: "No. I spent all of my time in New York and Don't Know."
CHARLOTTE: "How about prison?"
ERIK: "How about prison?"
CHARLOTTE: "Did you spend any time in prison in March or April of 2010?"
ERIK: "No, I was only in New York and Don't Know."
CHARLOTTE: "Okay."
ERIK: "Okay."
CHARLOTTE: "Okay. Mr. Gordon, did you spend any time in the military?"
ERIK: "No."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, did you spend any time in a nursing home?"
ERIK: "Charlotte, can we just put 'Don't Know' for the rest of the questions so we can both get on with our lives?"
CHARLOTTE: "No, I can't do that. You need to answer every question. This should take only a few minutes."
ERIK: "It’s already been more than a few minutes."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, are you refusing to answer the questions? Because if you're refusing to answer the questions--"
ERIK: "I don't want you to call me back Charlotte. I did not spend any time in a nursing home in March or April of 2010. I was too busy in Don't Know."
CHARLOTTE: "What?"
ERIK: "No. No time in a nursing home."
CHARLOTTE: "Mr. Gordon, that was the last question. On behalf of the 2010 United States Census, thank you and have a good evening."

Chain Email -- The Good Kind

2010-09-24T04:51:00.000-07:00

Do not argue with an idiot. He will drag you down to his level and beat you with experience.

I want to die peacefully in my sleep, like my grandfather. Not screaming and yelling like the passengers in his car.

The last thing I want to do is hurt you. But it's still on the list.

If I agreed with you, we'd both be wrong.

We never really grow up; we only learn how to act in public.

War does not determine who is right -- only who is left.

Knowledge is knowing a tomato is a fruit; wisdom is not putting it in a fruit salad.

The early bird might get the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.

Evening news is where they begin with 'Good evening,' and then proceed to tell you why it isn't.

To steal ideas from one person is plagiarism. To steal from many is research.

A bus station is where a bus stops. A train station is where a train stops. My desk is a work station.

How is it one careless match can start a forest fire, but it takes a whole box to start a campfire?

Dolphins are so smart that within a few weeks of captivity, they can train people to stand on the very edge of the pool and throw them fish.

I thought I wanted a career; turns out I just wanted paychecks.

A bank is a place that will lend you money if you can prove that you don't need it.

Whenever I fill out an application, in the part that says "In an emergency, notify:" I put " A DOCTOR."

I didn't say it was your fault, I said I was blaming you.

Why does someone believe you when you say there are four billion stars, but check when you say the paint is wet?

Behind every successful man is his woman. Behind the fall of a successful man is usually another woman.

A clear conscience is usually the sign of a bad memory.

You do not need a parachute to skydive. You only need a parachute to skydive twice.

The voices in my head may not be real, but they have some good ideas!

I discovered I scream the same way whether I'm about to be devoured by a great white shark or if a piece of seaweed touches my foot.

Some cause happiness wherever they go. Others, whenever they go.

There's a fine line between cuddling and holding someone down so they can't get away.

I used to be indecisive. Now I'm not sure.

You're never too old to learn something stupid.

To be sure of hitting the target, shoot first and call whatever you hit the target.

Nostalgia isn't what it used to be.

A bus is a vehicle that runs twice as fast when you are after it as when you are in it.

Change is inevitable, except from a vending machine.

On Being Left Among the Right People

2010-09-08T00:25:00.000-07:00

Years ago, when I was working at another hotel, I got into a conversation with a guest who had been with us for a few days. Previously I had mentioned in another conversation that I was gay, which seemed to bother him a bit. On this particular day, he decided to broach the subject again, and asked me, "So when did you convert to gayism?"

The question just struck me as funny, and I laughed and said, "I've never heard it put that way before." But I never gave him an actual answer.

Over the years, his question has stuck in my mind, and I've come up with several smart-ass answers:

"One day I woke up, looked in the mirror, and said to myself, 'I'm not wasting this on some chick!'"

"Convert to gayism? Why the hell would I want to do that?"

"Well let's see... I know it was before I converted to myopia-ism..."

"I'm not really sure. When did you convert to straightism?"

There were others, and all of them were meant to explain emphatically that I never converted to anything, while at the same time making fun of his question, but none of them conveyed the message as strongly as I would have liked. None of them adequately explained that I could no more convert to being gay or straight than I could convert to being right or left handed-- though one of the answers that I thought of was to hand him a pen and paper, notice which hand he took the pen in and ask, "When did you convert to right/left-handedness?"

The whole idea of comparing being gay to being left-handed intrigues me. After Sally Kern made some of her sillier statements to the press, I started noticing that one could substitute the word 'left-handed' for the word 'gay' into many of her statements just to see how silly they actually were, and the idea for this post started to grow in my brain. I've been thinking about it and discussing it with friends and co-workers (one of whom has started calling me "Lefty" even though I'm right handed.) And then a couple of days ago I found this paragraph in a New York Times article:

Compared with straight men, gay men appear to have a larger suprachiasmatic nucleus, a part of the brain that affects behavior, and some studies show most gay men have a larger isthmus of the corpus callosum -- which may also be true of left-handed people. And that's intriguing because gays are 39 percent more likely to be left-handed than straight people.

I liked reading that because it kind of underlined my idea. Here are some of my thoughts on the subject:

One doesn't get to decide whether or not one is left-handed. As my co-worker Candy says, "You just have to play the hand you're dealt. (I'm not sure if she intended the pun.)

Being left-handed is niether contagious nor a result of influence. You won't become left-handed by hanging around with left-handed people, nor will you become left-handed if your teacher is left-handed. If you are left-handed, it was decided long before you met any of these people.

One starts using one's left hand predominantly long before one knows he is left handed. When I was in the first grade, Mrs Olbert explained how to properly hold a pencil when writing. She also explained that the left-handed students would be holding theirs a bit differently. Up to then I had no idea that there was such a thing as right or left handed, but I do know that I had always held my crayons in my right hand. I also knew nothing about same sex attraction until I was ten and one of the sixth graders said that I was a fag if I kissed my brother, but I had crushes on some of my male classmates, and was expressing curiosity about their bodies, from the age of six.

Using the other hand doesn't change one's manual orientation. My best friend had a first grade teacher that believed that writing with the left hand was improper, and so he was taught to use his right hand. He still uses his right hand for writing out of habit, but he uses his left for everything else.

The whole world is built for right handed people, and left-handers usually have to make some effort to adjust or find an item that fits their needs. The ignition switch in the car is on the right side of the steering wheel. The mouse on the computer is made to fit the right hand. The buttons on your digital camera are on the right side. Yes, one can buy left-handed scissors, and even Porsche and BMW are making cars with the ignition on the left side, but left-handed items are frequently hard to find, and usually more expensive. Straight people do not have to drive several states away just to find a valid marriage licence, just as right handers don't have to special order a can opener.

Now, of course there are a lot of differences, too.

Nobody hates you for being left-handed. There's no one standing outside a military funeral with a sign saying that God hates left-handed people. Bullies at school don't taunt their victims by calling them "lefty."

Similarly, there is no shame associated with being left-handed. Kids aren't killing themselves because they're afraid their parents might find out that they're left handed. They don't feel they need to hide their manual orientation from their peers.

It doesn't make the news when some celebrity comes out as left-handed. The tabloids don't talk about left-handed scandals. It doesn't hurt someone's career if the public finds out that he's left-handed. A politician won't use his opponent's manual orientation in a negative campaign.

There is no need for massive support rallies for left-handed people. There will probably never be a Left-handed Pride Parade. One's parents won't be joining PFL-H.

Restaurant, hotels, and resorts don't advertize as "left-handed friendly."
I also have doubts that there are left-handed bars, though I may be wrong. You don't see signs up in businesses saying "Left-handed owned and operated."

But most of all...

No one complains about "special rights" when a left-hander wants a pair of scissors that work for him.
No right hander complains that it is a violation of his civil rights to make left-handed scissors available.
No one complains that providing left-handed scissors would change the definition of scissors.

Did you notice that all the ways in which being left-handed and being gay are different are in the ways other people see them? All the differences are merely social constructs, whereas all the ways they are the same have to do with intrinsic personal qualities.

And now all my answers to questions like the one above will be influenced by this line of thinking.

Houseguest

2010-08-23T03:24:00.000-07:00

A friend called me tonight. His sanity-challenged girlfriend finally pushed him to the limit, and he's staying with us for the night. I fixed him a pizza and a coke and we sat out on the front porch talking till he couldn't keep his eyes open anymore.
He's been a good friend for a long time, and only distance has kept us apart the last several years. The selfish part of me is hoping that whatever change he makes in his circumstance will allow us to see each other more often, but of course he's got to make decisions that work for him. I wish I could solve all his problems, but like most humans I can't be all wise and all powerful. I can only hope that something I said or did made a positive difference.

215,675,903 Channels, And Nothing's On.

2010-07-01T06:39:00.000-07:00

I spend too much time on the Internet now that we have DSL. Actually we both do. But I've noticed lately that I'm staying online a lot even when I'm not being entertained or learning anything. Like now, for instance.

Anyway, last night was a terribly slow night, and I finished all of my tasks very early in the evening, so I spent some time surfing the web.

First place to go was to blogspot to check the blogs I follow. Gian had an awesome day. That's good. Band of Thebes had a book review. It didn't look particularly interesting, though I admit I was judging the book by its cover. Mickey Hepner (mickeyhepner.blogspot.com) wrote about how the new health care law is becoming more popular as people are figuring out what it's really all about (though you would never know it from listening to all the politicians running for Mary Fallin's seat.)

Mr. Hepner also wrote a commentary about a piece in the New York Times by David Leonhardt about lessons we should be learning from the Great Depression. According to Mr. Leonhardt, the government started getting panicky about all the deficit spending they were doing, and stopped supporting the ailing public sector, and thereby extended the Depression by several years. Lawmakers today, are also worrying about the deficit spending going on right now, and are wanting to stop government spending while the economy is too weak to do without it. That could send us into a double-dip recession or into a depression. This article covers a subject Mickey has commented on a few times before.

Nothing else recent on blogspot, so over to Facebook, where an invitation to join, or like, or befriend, or whatever, Senator Tom Coburn, who wants to stop out-of-control government spending. Knowing Oklahoma, that's likely to get him re-elected.

I see my friend Anthony has responded to the comment on his status. The day before he lamented about the lack of Supreme Court nominees who knew what the Constitution was. My comment was a cut and paste from the New York Times quoting nominee Kagan about the importance of the Constitution. He responded with an oblique reference to the Harvard incident where Dean Kagan upheld a pre-existing campus policy that pitted the military against civil rights. Ultimately, civil rights lost. I don't know what that has to do with his original comment, but...okay.

Well, I'm wondering if Ms Kagan has another quote I can use concerning this, so I go to the New York Times website to see if there's a quotable quote. As it happens, Ms Kagan was grilled by Senator Jeff Sessions about this very topic that day, and she did indeed have something to say about it, but the best quote was interlaced with other stuff, and...when you use...too many ellipses...it kinda takes the air...out of your...point, so I skipped it.

Nothing else of interest on Facebook, so now I'm off to Politifact.org to see what kind of silliness is going on in the world. Naturally, they're covering the confirmation hearings and have muchos entries, but I've already read most of them. There's a whole page of stuff about the Harvard Law School incident (I say incident, but in fact the policy was adopted in 1979 that required non-discrimination among potential employers in order for them to recruit on campus. The military, of course, was not able to sign such an agreement, and was not allowed to recruit through the school's Office of Career Services; instead, they recruited through the Harvard Law School Veterans Association.) I reread the page to see if there was anything more to learn from it. There's room to quibble on both sides of the argument.
There's an item about her saying that recruitment actually went up in 2005, the same year that the non-discrimination policy was put back in effect (Congress had applied some financial pressure [there's a word for that--it's not extortion, it's...] and schools across the nation had relented under protest. Harvard Law School let the military recruiters back in to the Office of Career Services for a couple of years, though it didn't make any difference in their success.) Politifact rated her statement as "Half-True" for reasons that didn't seem to have anything to do with the statement. Five is up from three, no matter how you slice it. If you check it out, let me know if you agree with them and why.

I wondered if the Washington Post had anything new or different to say about this, but you have to sign up to get their stories, and I was on the computer at work, so no. Anyway, enough of that.

How much would a DVD of "Bullets over Broadway" cost on Amazon? Ooh. Even with shipping it's less than $10. Tempting.

And then I couldn't think of a single other thing I wanted to look at. So I summoned all of my strength and moved the cursor towards the little x in the top corner...

The Victimization of a Yes Man

2010-06-13T12:21:00.000-07:00

Ten bucks.
For an hour upstairs separating sticks from orchids when I could have been down front pulling cars for the departing wedding party at 5 bucks per car.
Now it's not her fault. How could she know that I was expecting at least six times that amount. No, I blame Peanuthead.
Peanuthead is not his real name, of course. It's just that his head is shaped like a peanut. Seriously. The guy should be wearing a monocle and a top hat with his grey valet uniform.
Actually, the real problem is that I'm too acquiescent (everybody sing: ♫ I'm just a guy that caint say no. I'm in a turible fix...♫), which doesn't go unappreciated by my indoor co-workers. I can sometimes wind up with a lot of overtime because someone says "Oh, Ron, before you go..." Somehow, though, it doesn't have the same effect when my fellow valets ask me to do something. Instead, I wind up stressed and broke.
There's a transition period between 2nd and 3rd shift. Most nights it lasts for a minute or two while the afternoon guys tell me about the day and what work is left over. Then they leave, and the night is all mine.
But on those nights that we have events that last into the night, they stick around to help out until such a time that it is determined that I can handle it all by myself without getting totally swamped. Even on the nights when I need them, I still think they are just in the way, and I want them gone. I also feel a bit out of control when they are there, which I resent because this is MY shift, and, unless someone is there who can trump my authority, I should be in charge.
On those busy nights when they are sticking around, somehow I get stuck with all the LAs (Luggage Assistance), which I actually enjoy doing, but often I know it's going cost me more money than I am going to make off of it because lately people are just not tipping well. I wind up with a fiver, which is what I can make pulling around one car, which takes less time, less effort, and a lot less personal interaction. The afternoon guys have already made twice or more what I can hope to make on the night shift, so why don't they do the LAs during the busy times, and let me have a chance at a good night?

It was just getting busy last night when the front desk called the bellstand requesting a bellman and bellcart to the 2nd floor. Peanuthead answered the phone, but he didn't go do it. I had gone to get a car for a couple who just need something out of the trunk, and Peanuthead offered to take the car back to the garage so that I could go up to 2 with a cart. I told him I would take the car back, thinking that that might force him to actually do something about the call that he got. But no, when I got back, he was still at the bellstand. Well, the job needed to be done, so...
When I got upstairs, the wedding planner directed me into the ballroom where there were three tables with about 40 or 50 flower arrangements that she said needed to be taken down to her car. One of the banquets guys and I loaded them all up on two carts and took them out to the foyer, where she told us that the actual flowers were to be trashed. We knew the banquet ladies would want to take the flowers home, so we separated the flowers from the filler and foliage. I got interrupted to help the mother of the bride take some wedding gifts up to the sixth floor, where we discovered that the food that was supposed to be delivered to the new couple had been delivered to the room the bride had been in the night before instead of the suite she was in now, and her sister was eating it.
After getting that all straightened out, I went back down to 2, where the sorting was almost done, and started loading the now empty vases back on the carts. The banquets head and I wheeled the carts to the elevator and out into the lobby, with the wedding planner right behind us. As we got out of the elevator, we passed by Peanuthead, who asked, "Where've you been?" I wanted to slap him, especially since he and the other guy were ready to go, which meant that all the business out front was done. Shit.
The BH and I loaded up her Jeep, then he went inside while I visited with her a bit more. She got out her wallet and pulled out a 20, about a third or less of what I felt I deserved. "Do you have change?"
My job is basically an acting job, so I acted like she hadn't just punched me in the stomach, and resisted the urge to say "Twenty IS change." Instead I said, "I believe so," and pulled out my meager take for the evening, and asked, "How much do you want back?" I gave her the ten dollar bill she asked for, but I had to turn away when she said she hoped that that was enough.

I told the morning guys about what had happened, and they understood exactly why my anger and disgust was centered on Peanuthead. One of them reminded me of Peanuthead's habit of standing with his hips pressed against the bellcart door like he's trying to prevent anyone else from getting to the keys. He pointed to the the hole in the door where the lock used to be before the new one was installed. "That hole is for [Peanuthead]'s penis." The one thing we couldn't decide on, though, was whether he was oblivious or sneaky.
Later, when I complained to someone else, I was told that I just needed to learn to stand up for myself. I know that's true. But I'm not confrontational. I can use my blog for some passive aggression and venting, but I need to take some more positive steps.
I've got the weekend to think about it.

So Apparently I've Stolen a Car

2010-06-04T10:17:00.000-07:00

About 4:45am, Ms 804 called the bellstand and asked for her car. Now it only takes two minutes for me to pull around a car, so if she had called and left her room immediately, I would still have it out front before she was out of the elevator. But no, I had to wait in the lobby for her when I had other things to do (deliver newspapers).

Finally the elevator door opens, and asked the woman who stepped out, "Are you Ms 804?" She said yes, so I asked, "May I put your luggage in the car?" She said yes, so I took the suitcase out to the vehicle and put it in the trunk. She had some business with the front desk about her charges, and while that was being handled, she handed me her valet ticket, which I didn't look at, since the car was already outside. When she was done, I escorted her outside, gave her the keys and directions to the airport. She sat down in the Smoking Oasis to have a cigarette before she left. After a few minutes she was gone.

A couple of minutes later, Ms 804 came out of the elevator wanting the car I had pulled around. (Panic!)

Now we've got to figure out who that other woman was, and Vizzini is not panicking fast enough for me, until I remember that I have her valet ticket. Turns out, she was Ms 805, and I still have her car.

(I should mention at this point that I am using their room numbers as euphemisms for their last names, and their names sound nothing alike. The fact that their rooms were across the hall from each other was just an amazing coincidence.)

Since Ms 804 was also headed tot he airport, I asked if she'd be interested in taking Ms 805's car. She said she would rather not take on that responsibility, but she still needed a ride to the airport. I decided to take her myself in our van.

Our chef does a cooking show early in the morning on one of the local TV stations, and uses our van to transport all his supplies. He never cleans the van when he returns it, nor does he fill the gas tank. The van smells like old cooking oil, and it's an embarrassment to have to drive our guests anywhere in it. On this morning, I was spared that embarrassment because there were no seats in the van. I wound up taking Ms 804 and her companion in my car (I was so glad it was relatively clean), which is actually against the rules, but what choice did I have?

In spite of the tension being felt by all, conversation in the van was light. We talked about other snafus we'd been privy to in our lives, and they talked about their dealings with car rental companies. At the airport, there were apologies, thank yous and goodbyes. Then I headed back.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch...I mean, hotel, Ms 805 has called to tell us she got the wrong car. When she arrived at Thrifty, they informed her that the car belonged to Hertz. She told Vizzini that she hadn't even noticed that it was a different car. She thought that I had just adjusted the seat. Looking into it later, I found that she had driven in to the hotel three days before, parked the car in valet, and hadn't used it again till it was time to go home. So at $50 a day for rental, plus tax, and $20 per night for valet parking, she spent at least $240 on a car when she could have spent $55 plus tip on two taxis. And since she hadn't seen the car in three days, she didn't notice that I had pulled around a light gray Corolla instead of her blue Optima.
Our Loss Prevention Officer called over to Hertz to make sure that the car had been returned, and the clerk he talked to went to check. While he was gone, LPO could hear Ms 804 in the background getting very upset with the other clerk who was telling her that since I had given the car to someone else, that I had essentially STOLEN the car and the police needed to be called, and that since her name was the one on the contract, that she was responsible for paying for it. Then the first clerk came back and told LPO that the car had indeed been returned.
LPO and Vizzini started making plans about how to return the Thrifty car. They decided that what should be done was to call Dane, the 6:00 bellman, to come in early (which they did), then the overnight houseman and I would drive the car and the van out to he airport. LPO decided he'd better call Thrifty to make sure that that was okay. I had arrived at the hotel by this time, so I got to witness the conversation.
The Thrifty clerk told LPO that since the contracted driver was no longer available, that they would have to send a tow truck out to the hotel to pick up the car, which would be charged to Ms 805. LPO said that couldn't happen, because we, the hotel, were ultimately responsible for what had happened. Can they charge it directly to the hotel? The Thrifty Manager would be in at 8:00; we would have to ask him.
Up to this time, I had thought that fixing the problem would just be a matter of getting the people and the cars where they belonged. I had no idea it would be made more complicated by contracts and liabilities and tow trucks.
Dane arrived "early" at about 5:59, so I went up to deliver the papers. The whole time I had a sick feeling in my gut because I didn't know if my job was in jeopardy-- or if I was going to be arrested. I decided the best course of action was to let HR know what had happened before anyone else. When I finished the papers, I went directly to the HR office, and told the head of HR the whole story. She asked if I had talked to the Director of Loss Prevention. I hadn't (he came in while I was delivering papers), but I was sure that LPO had. She called DoLP and found out that LPO had told him very little, and he suggested I come up and talk to him.
On the way, I ran into AFOM, who said he had talked to our General Manager, who had asked, "Were they similar cars at least?" "I think so, yes." "Well, don't worry about it. I've done that before. Well, not me personally; people who worked for me." That was a relief. At least I knew I could keep my job.
DoLP and I went into the office to talk. Halfway through the story, AFOM came in, so I had to tell the story again. While telling the story to him in his office, FOM came in, and I had to tell the story a fourth time. I was getting pretty good at it.
FOM suggested we call the call the rental agencies and find out where we stood. AFOM called Hertz, who said they had the car in their possession, and everything was taken care of. He called Thrifty, and the manager told him that it was perfectly okay for us to just bring the car out and drop it off. All that worrying for nothing.
By the time AFOM and I got back from the airport, it was almost 10:00. This problem had consumed five hours of my morning, and kept me at work 2½ hours late.
Of course, I've heard of this kind of thing happening. But this is the first time it's happened at our hotel, and it would have been nice if it had happened to someone else. But at least I have a story to tell.

Mudslinging

2010-05-18T15:48:00.000-07:00

A question came up, which I posted on Facebook, about the vilification of Nancy Pelosi. My best friend responded, but instead of answering the question, he offered me more labels. I don't care about labels, I just want information, and I said so. Enter my brother, who decides to rub Jeff's nose in the fact that he didn't provide any real information. Jeff's not the kind who likes his opinions disrespected, and, with both of us objecting to his lack of an answer, he unfriends us both, complete with name-calling. Scott doesn't notice, and continues the nose-rubbing, this time complaining about the name-calling along with everything else.

I'm not sure what to think about all this. Once upon a time, Jeff and I could discuss things we disagreed about without needing to convince the other we were right. That's the kind of discussions I like. You tell me why you think what you think, I'll tell you why I think what I think, and that's good enough. It's hard to do that with Scott. Scott must persuade you that his point of view, his opinion, his understanding is the correct one. To our family, particularly our spouses, I refer to this as "he has to win". But we're getting better at talking with each other. I doubt Jeff and Scott will ever be able to talk civilly. Both are too stubborn.

Jeff moved to the land of Far Away (just this side of Far, Far Away), and Facebook is our constant contact. I like knowing about the mundane in his life, even if all he does is complain about the weather. But I miss him. We just don't see each other often enough, so the lack of Facebook leaves a void.

And I still don't have the dirt on Pelosi.

Scott objected to my use of the phrase "he has to win." He felt that he came across like Tonya Harding and that I was blaming him for Jeff's departure. So we discussed what I meant by the phrase, which wasn't easy for me because, in my mind, the phrase perfectly described situations I had observed. I suggested the word 'confrontational,' and he liked and understood that one, so I tried using it in this post. In context, it didn't work. It didn't describe what I was trying to say. I thought about 'contentious', which is closer both linguistically and contextually, but it had a connotation of belligerence that didn't fit. Scott honestly believes he's doing a service by convincing people he's right. He's not out to get you.

I had to laugh, though, when I realized that with all his complaining and pressuring me to make adjustments, the little bastard was trying to win again. In fact, I've been telling that as a funny story to some of my co-workers.

He did convince me of one thing, tho. An economy of language doesn't work if the reader can't understand what you're talking about. I use language that I think is implicit in order to shorten the story, but it winds up being too oblique or esoteric to be of any real communicative value.

So in an effort aimed at clarity, I have changed this post once again in order to

1) leave no misunderstanding about what I mean when I say "he has to win," and

2) make it clear that Jeff was reacting to both of us, not just one of us.

And if Scott doesn't like it, tough! I'm not changing it again.

Jeff did not just unfriend us. He deleted his Facebook account.

No Newspaper For You!

2010-04-27T02:50:00.000-07:00

One of my nightly duties is to deliver the USAToday to all of the rooms that have been rented in the hotel. Each paper is put into a black burlap bag decorated with "SH" in white scripted letters, and hung on the door handle of each room.

Normally, the bags are the biggest problem I have each morning. As the maids clean the rooms, they are supposed to gather the bags and send them downstairs to the housekeeping department in the basement, where they will be gathered in bulk and taken to the bellcloset on the 1st floor. Since they do not have the code for the door lock, either security or one of the bellmen will let them in, where they can put the bags on the large roll-around spindle, thus making it easy for me to gather as many as I need to make my deliveries the next morning. This rarely happens.

Instead, I find them piled on the floor, on the shelves, on the spare bellstand--and that's if they make it to the bellcloset at all. Otherwise, they'll be in the basement piled on the laundry box in housekeeping, or on any other flat surface that's handy, or hanging from various protrusions of the housekeeping carts and machinery that happen to be around. Last week, I found 11 of them in the trash.

If they never made it to the basement, they're frequently in one pile or another on the service elevator landing of each of the guest floors, or hanging on some door handle. If I have time, I'll ask security to loan me the passkey so that I can raid the (23) maids closets,where I will find them still hanging on the maids carts, or just tossed in with the towels and linens.

Guests contribute to the problem, too. Stayover guests leave the Do Not Disturb signs on their doors, so the maids don't clean their rooms, and therefore do not have an opportunity to retrieve the bag. During conventions, this forces me to go down to the dungeoun for more, even when I know there are sufficient quantities in circulation already. Also, a lot of guests think that the bags are souvenirs, and take them home, not realizing that they are actually stealing them. Often the bellman or front desk clerk will catch them on the way out, which is why I also find bags in the office.

But the bags are only one problem I have to solve to do this job. Two days in advance, the night auditor is supposed to order enough newspapers to cover every occupied room. For reasons that have not been sufficiently explained, this doesn't always happen, and I get fewer than I need. In that case, I have to deliver to all Hilton Honors members (a contractual obligation), and the rest of the papers are brought back to the lobby for whoever else wants one. If I'm a few short on the number needed for the HH guests, I can use some of the other papers we carry.

But this morning, there is no paper delivery at all. We have 211 rooms occupied, 151 of which are HH members, and I got 75 newspapers. Being shorted by 76 papers for a minimum delivery, there is no way to deliver them equitably, and therefore all papers will be kept downstairs. Somebody will get yelled at today, and it won't be me.

Okay, here's the real scoop (but don't tell anyone.)

2010-04-24T01:02:00.000-07:00

Ever since the Knicks told the press that they'd lost their game to the Thunder because the ghosts in the hotel had kept them awake all night, interest in the ghost stories at our hotel has gone up considerably. I personally get asked about them a lot, and I've decided that it would make a good blog post, so here goes.

The NBA teams usually come in pretty late, and they have a lot of equipment and personal luggage, so on those nights a couple of the daytime guys will come in and help out. On this particular night, the Knicks were arriving right at shift change, right at the beginning of my shift, so Bossman and a couple of other guys were there to take care of them while I took care of the other arriving guests. I actually got very busy.

Since it was still relatively early, a couple of the players decided they wanted to go out to one of the bars in Bricktown. They were waiting out on the front sidewalk for a taxi as I came out running to go get someone's car. I was halfway down the front sidewalk on the way to the parking garage when one of them shouted "Hey!"

I turned around and came back to them. "Yessir?"

"Is this place really haunted?"

I'm to busy at this time to start telling stories, so I just said, "We're not allowed to talk about it." They stiffened up and their eyes got real big. The taxi pulled up just at that moment, and I turned around and continued my run to the garage.

It actually is true that we're not supposed to talk about the ghost stories. AFOM used to keep a journal of things that have happened since the hotel re-opened, but the GM confiscated it, telling him, "This cannot exist." Now AFOM keeps a new journal at home.
The taxi drivers, however, are the worst about telling ghost stories. Not only do they love doing it, but the stories have nothing to do with the things that actually happen here. And now these two basketball players have a taxi taking them to get drinks. This can't be good.

Two nights later, a former co-worker sends me a newspaper article via Facebook about the Knicks blaming their loss on the ghosts in the hotel. Then, minutes later, I saw a promo for the news saying they'd be talking about the same thing. I called my dad. "Hey Dad! Watch channel four tonight. There's going to be a funny story about the hotel."
When I got to work that night, I told the security guys, "We were on channel four tonight."
They said, "We were on every channel tonight."
I walked out front and found Bossman at the counter. I said, "We made the local news tonight."
He said, "We made the national news tonight."
Now this can be good news or bad news. On the one hand, lots of people think its fun and exciting to stay in a haunted hotel, and we could get a lot of business from it. On the other hand, NBA players are very superstitious, and we don't want to lose a lucrative contract.

The reason Bossman was there was because the Spurs were coming in. (You know, the team with the gorgeous redhead.) We weren't busy otherwise, so I actually got to help this time. The Knicks' coach had tripped over the tiny little step at the west entrance, so it was my job to say "Good evening. Welcome. Watch your step" to these towering men who kept asking me, "Is this place really haunted?"
Our VIP liason is a tiny little thing, half as tall as the guys surrounding her. As she was passing out the keys they kept asking her, "Is this place haunted?", to which she emphatically replied, "Don't worry. I don't have any of you on that floor."

There is no "that" floor. Stuff happens on every floor. But only for people who have no clue that there might possibly be ghosts in the hotel.

Over the next few nights I found out more stuff about the Knicks' stay. One of the security guys told me that one of the guys complaining to the press about the ghosts was only on the court for three minutes, the other was on the bench all night. He also said that if the team had gone to bed the night before the game instead of staying up with the women, the beer, and the 4am chicken wings from room service, they might have won.
But the funniest part was that the coach, knowing that he had a nervous player on his team, had hired one of our morning bellmen to go up to that player's room and move his furniture.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I went down to HR one Thursday morning and told HRBossette that I thought the Thunder would do pretty well against the Lakers that night.

"Oh?"

"Yeah, I went up and down the halls with a tape recording of a baby crying last night."

She gave me a look of abject horror.

"I'm just kidding."

She grabbed her chest and started huffing as if she'd just survived a heart attack. Though her concern was real, we did have a good laugh over my little joke. (She and I have always had a good rapport. Fortunately. As evidenced by the fact that I still have my job.)

http//fr-fr.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=10150109154117366

Mood Indigo

2010-03-25T03:46:00.000-07:00

I gotta break out of this funk.

Between the weather, and this thing with the brother, and the lack of time and money to do what I want to do, I just can't seem to get motivated to do anything constructive. It doesn't help that they're screwing around with my schedule at work just at the time that I need some normalcy.

NO. Nononono. Don't play the blame game. Turn off the computer, take a shower, put on a sweater, go out to the studio and figure out what needs to be done in the next 38ish hours that you have before you have to go back to work. And stop thinking about the things that just make you want to crawl in a hole. You simply don't have time for this.

Okay, I can do this. I think.

Belief in Santa Claus Is Not A Value

2010-03-19T07:06:00.000-07:00

I unfriended my brother on Facebook.

He said something that offended me so much that I just decided I didn't want to deal with him for a while.

The thing is, I don't know why it hurt me so much. He didn't really say it about me; he said it about a version of me that only exists in his own head. Before, I was able to just dismiss whatever it was that he said about this other Ron, ignore it, even if I didn't like it. Not this time.

Several years ago, when Rosie O'Donnell had her daytime talk show, she talked about how much she liked reading about herself in the tabloids. She said that since none of the stuff in the tabloids had anything to do with her real life, it was like reading about a fictional character, Tabloid Rosie, who led a much more interesting life than she did.

I don't feel the same way about Tabloid Ron. Tabloid Ron, to me, is a smothering blanket that I must fight my way out of. I explained something like this to him the night I came out to him. Instead of just telling him I was gay, I actually took him out to my favorite club in order to "blow the sides out" of the box he had me trapped in.

Now, I have a tabloid Scott, too-- a version of Scott filtered by my interpretation of my experience with him. Scott is a force unto himself. He's got to dominate every conversation and be the center of attention in every room. Everyone is entitled to his opinion, and no one is allowed to have an opinion of their own. For him, it's a competition, and he's got to win. Any dissenting opinion will be punished: maybe not now; maybe 20 years in the future.
He'll remember what you said (or something like what you said, or maybe something someone else said that he attributes to you, or maybe he'll just take the words you said and jumble them around so that they can become something he can gripe about for the rest of your life), he just won't have ever known what you meant. He's simply not interested. You can try to explain, but it's a futile effort. He doesn't care what you think; he only cares about what he thinks about what he thought you said. This is the womb of Tabloid Ron.

Scott said once that he's a person who gets in trouble because he likes to ask "why". He doesn't. Instead, he asks "whether", which is a much more limiting question. "Whether" is a cage the truth must break out of before it can be itself. But breaking out of the cage requires a dissenting opinion, which is always going to be seen as an attack, and which, as I've already said, will be punished. It also requires a lot of words, all of which will be misunderstood, and every half dozen (or fewer) will require at least half a page of rebuttal... each. The rebuttal(s) will not have anything to do with what you said (meant). If you try to clarify, eventually you will find yourself drowning in quicksand.

Over the last few years I've come up with some guidelines for online communication.
1. Only answer answerable questions. Keep it short and to the point.
2. Do NOT respond to opinion. He's entitled to an opinion (even if you aren't), and it's just an expression of where his head is at at the moment. Comments are unnecessary.
3. If he asks for an opinion, approach with caution. Usually it's a trap. Keep it short and to the point. Remember the quicksand.
4. He loves "chasing rabbits". Don't follow him.

Needless to say, this severely limits our communication. At least online. But he lives almost 12 hours away, and Facebook and email are the easiest ways to keep in touch, especially with my schedule.

Somehow, though, when we talk on the phone, everything works itself out. Even more so than in person. Weird, huh? And this time, I had provoked him into wanting to know my point of view on our points of contention. So we talked. And talked and talked and talked. We talked about our different perceptions of things that had been said or done in the past. ("Christie sent you an email about..." "And I gave her a snarky answer because I thought it was you." "Yeah. Why did you do that?" "I didn't think you seriously wanted an answer. You were just looking for a reason to grind my face in the mud." "Ron, I'm always looking for an answer.") I explained that I care very little for debate, but do enjoy exchanging ideas, and that I feel his communication style makes me feel that my opinions aren't worth anything to him. He explained that it's not his intent to make me feel bad; he's just trying to pull out more information. All this took about four hours.
Anyway, as usual we've ironed things out for a while. And while we were talking, Scott got a new friend request, which he accepted.

Things I'll Never get Around To, Chapter 1

2010-02-14T01:11:00.000-08:00

The subject of a T-shirt I want to make came up in a discussion a while back. For years I've had the idea to make a T-shirt reading "Amberfimbie and Crotch, " just to see if anyone notices. Gaby suggested that we should make two Ts, one with Amberfimbie, the other with Crotch.

I get dibs on the Amberfimbie.

Holidays

2010-01-07T07:27:00.000-08:00

My brother, his wife(ish) and his daughter came to visit for the holidays. I had four days off work so that I could visit with them while they were here (unlike last year, when I had to work almost every night.) Because of his schedule, we actually celebrated Christmas on New Years Eve. This is normal for us. One year we had Chrismas ten days early, another it was in February.

Earlier that day, we all went out to eat at a local steakhouse. While we were hovering around the salad bar, I asked Christie to do something for me. When we got back to the table, she upset the vegetable equilibrium. Yes, that's right; she spilled the beans. She started asking questions about the wedding. So now my parents know...for sure. They might have guessed or suspected already. I'm not sure.

Anyway, now that it's out in the open, I guess I might expect one or the other to ask questions, maybe. Eventually. Or not. I can't tell.

Shang-Haied, Commandeered, Hijacked, and Seized!

2009-12-21T10:08:00.000-08:00

I received a devastating blow last night. My brother, who pays for my website, said that when my subscription expired a few days ago, Japanese pirates selling Viagra or something swooped in and grabbed up my web address. Apparently, they do this in hopes that it's a high traffic site, and nothing can be done about it until they figure out that it is not, and their subscription ends next year. So PLEASE do not try to visit my website.

Pride and Groom Goeth Before a Fall

2009-12-13T08:21:00.000-08:00

I've coined a new term: EXPECTOREE n. -a person who, by his actions and attitudes, invites the waiter to spit in his food.

I escorted the newlywed couple up to their room, one of the suites on a lower floor. Her dress was beautiful, as was she, and I gave her my usual compliment: "You look lovely. You should wear that all the time." They obliged me with a laughing agreement. I asked how long they would be staying with us, and they said they had to leave at 5:00am (it was already after midnight.) I've never understood the couples that got married one evening, then catch an early morning flight to Aruba, or wherever, going from one stressful day to another with no rest, and I made a comment to that effect. They responded with a yeah, we know. I gave a shortened tour of the room, introduced myself, and offered my availability for the night. The groom asked me if I could have room service send up some champagne, which I did.

Flash forward to 4:00am. Vizzini, our front desk clerk, calls the room for their wakeup call. No answer. So he waits a couple of minutes and calls again. No answer. On the third try, someone picks up and drops the reciever. Often, guests think we have an automated system, so it was reasonable to think that someone in the room was awake now.

At 5:00, Vizzini called the room to let them know their taxi was there. No answer. I suggested they might be on the way down. But after a few minutes, there was still no couple. Vizzini called the room again. No answer. Vizzini called our security officer and asked if she could go up to the room for a phisical wakeup call. When she heard what room it was, she told Vizzini that that was the room that called down for alcohol after the bar had closed, and then griped the room service waiter out for not selling it to him. She asked me to go with her.

On the way up, I told her that I had taken the couple up when they had arrived. She knocked, and then pounded on the door, saying "security" loud enough to be heard through the door. There was no response, so we discussed whether she should enter the room to see if they could be roused. She decided not, since this was the wedding night and doing so could be indiscreet. When we got downstairs, Vizzini tried once again by phone, and still got no answer.

Vizzini told the taxi driver that we weren't getting any response from the room. Taxi Driver said that that was alright because he was pre-paid, and he left. Vizzini continued calling periodically, but by the time he had clocked out and gone home, he still had gotten no answer.

When FOM got to work at about 7:30, he read Vizzini's email about the events of the night, and asked me what had happened with the wakeup calls, and asked why security hadn't gone ahead and entered the room. I explained our discussion. He wasn't sure he agreed with me, but he understood.

A little while later, FOM came to the bellstand and told the four bellman that that room needed luggage assistance. By that time, I had explained the situation to the morning guys, so they knew that the couple probably was upset. I volunteered because the couple already knew me.

Upstairs, the groom answered after the second knock. He was obviously angry, but he was polite to me. I loaded up the bellcart and asked him if he needed us to arrange for another cab. He said his transportation had been taken care of. I took the bellcart downstairs, stowed it, and went back up to see if they might need anymore help. I almost ran into him as he entered the elevator.

The tension in the elevator was thick, so I tried some light conversation (which was also an attempt to let him know that he had not been neglected by the hotel.) I said, "Boy, you guys can sleep through anything. We couldn't even wake you when we were banging on your door." He grunted some kind of acknowledgement, but it was obvious he didn't want to talk.

From the elevator, we walked to the front door and watched out the window for his ride. I asked what type of vehicle we were looking for, and he said that he wasn't sure. It could be any one of three, but he would recognize it when it came in. He leaned against a column for a bit, and then turned and left. I didn't see where he went, but thought he might have gone back upstairs to check on his bride.

FOM had been hanging around in the lobby hoping to find and speak to the young man, but, of course, he had no idea who he was looking for. He asked me if it was the guy that was just with me, and I said yes, but he's gone back upstairs.
"Isn't that him in the bar?"
"No, his wife is still upstairs, and...oh, yeah, it is."

FOM went over to the young man, introduced himself, and asked if he could sit down and talk to him about the situation. The young man said no. So FOM stood. He tried to let the young man know that although we had tried to wake him up many times, he was sorry the situation happened the way it did. FOM is a very conciliatory person. But the young man cut him off and, in rather obscene language, told him to go away. So he did.

But a moment later, The young man came after FOM in a way that made FOM think he was going to be punched in the face. (He told me later that he had to conciously remind himself to keep his hands behind his back.) The young man got right up in his face (with his really bad alcohol breath) and started yelling, "How does it feel to ▒▒▒▒ ▒▒▒▒ for a living?!" After that, he went on an icredibly obscene rant in front of all the guests and employees in the lobby. FOM remained outwardly calm, and his only response was to point out to the young man that this was abuse, and the police would be called. FOM went to the front desk and told one of the morning clerks to call the police, which she did. Then he went to the office and started taking notes of all he could remember of the events of the last few minutes.

In the meantime, a car arrived with the parents of one or the other of them. In spite of what just happened, the guy is still my guest, so I was as helpful and cheerful as if nothing was going on. After I got all the luggage loaded, I went and stood at a respectful and attentive distance (that is, close enough to be ready if they need me, yet far enough away so I'm not up in thier business.) The parents went inside to get the bride, leaving the young man and me outside alone. He said, "You go ask that ▒▒▒▒▒ of a boss of yours what it feels like to ▒▒▒▒ a ▒▒▒▒. 'Cause if I ever see him again I'll beat the ▒▒▒▒ out of him. Now you go inside. I'm done with you. And you get no tip." (As if the tip was an issue.) I shrugged my shoulders and went inside.

FOM was just inside the door and asked me how it was. I replied, "Charming." I went over to the elevators so I could be ready to help when the bride came down. I could see the groom in the back seat of the car. He appeared to be crying.

FOM came out to the front desk to ask for the wake-up sheet (important evidence) and check to see when the police would be there. The front desk clerk called them again. I went into the office with him to try to find the wake-up sheet, which seemed to have gone missing, though we found it soon. While we were in the office, the front desk clerk asked what was going on. FOM explained the situation, and by consulting his notes, was able to tell her exactly and verbatim what the young man had said to him in the lobby. I added what the young man had said to me. FOM wrote it down.

I went back to the lobby in time to see the car pull away, taking with it the culpret and his bride. FOM came out and asked about the police again. The front desk clerk told him that she'd already called again and was told that they couldn't get a patrol car to answer. I informed them that the couple had already left, so FOM told her to call back and cancel. Then he went back to his office.

It was way past quittin' time for me, so I said goodbye to the guys out front, and went back to clock out. Before doing so, I went and sat down in FOM's office. He was scribbling notes on paper, and typing them into the computer. "Look at me," he said. "I'm so upset I'm shaking." He told me the story from his point of view ("He's gonna hit me! He's gonna hit me! Keep your hands behind you back! Oh, God, this is it! Keep you hands behind your back! Oh my... god his breath stinks!") and we compared notes. At one point I got up to go clock out, but he said he wanted me on the clock for this. I didn't get out till after 9:00.

Thing is, I really don't understand what his beef with FOM was. FOM wasn't even involved until late in the story. But one thing I can say, if I could give advice to his bride it would be this: When you go out to dinner, make sure the waiter knows which plate is yours.

Historicity

2009-12-09T19:10:00.000-08:00

I just got back from a booksigning. A couple of local newspaper guys have written a book about the hotel I work at, and I had to be there to get my autographed copies: one for me, one for my mom for Christmas. It's fun working at a historic hotel. No one ever wrote a book about any of my other places of employment.

Peer Pressure

2009-12-07T05:02:00.000-08:00

Someone I love has just forced me to sign up for facebook. I didn't want to do it, but I let her walk me through the sign-up page Saturday night. As a result, I have not slept for days. I have not gone to the grocery store. I have not paid bills. I have not gone to the pharmacy. My butt is numb, yet I will only get up to go to the bathroom or the refrigerator. I'm starting to think there might be some drawbacks to Facebook, but I'm still enjoying it.

La Madre de nuestro amigo

2009-12-01T18:07:00.000-08:00

We got the news today that our friend's mother had died. She was to be 72 years old on the 24th of this month. The news was made harder on Gus because living so far away has made their visits few and far between in the ten years that he's been living in Oklahoma. He and his sisters family will be flying back to Guadalajara tomorrow morning.

I met her the first time about eight years ago when I dropped by Gus' apartment and discovered that his family was there to visit. They invited me to stay for lunch, which I did, even though I had my dog in the car. His 14-year-old neice wound up being the interpreter for the visit because his mom and cousin spoke no English at all, and the only Spanish I knew at the time was "los elefantes son grande." When we next met at Christmas time, Gus' mom was still calling me 'the elephant boy.'

The next time we saw each other was this past Christmas, and she was pleased that my Spanish had improved. She was a really sweet lady.

Stories of My Life: Sandwich in the Dark

2009-11-26T03:34:00.000-08:00

Some years ago after a night at the club, I came home from an after-party about 4:30ish, and I was feeling a bit hungry. Having been in the dark for a while, I was reluctant to turn on the light, but I figured I wouldn't need it for a PBJ. I got the peanut butter out of the cabinet and then reached around the refrigerator door, avoiding the light, and grabbed the strawberry jelly---or so I thought. Nasal congestion prevented me from finding out till I had bitten into it that I had fixed myself a peanut butter and spaghetti sauce sandwich.
The dog thought it was a special treat.

Precious

2009-11-24T19:07:00.000-08:00

We went to see the movie "Precious" tonight. Heavy film with incredible performances. It reminded me that everybody is a product of his environment and circumstance, even the antagonists, but that doesn't mean that we're stuck where we are. Precios, the title character, had every reason to become a person exactly like her abusive mother, but started on a different path that gave her some self worth. We definitely reccomend it.

Parents Say the Darndest Things

2009-11-10T14:47:00.000-08:00

"My son is under the doctor's care and should not take P.E. today. Please execute him."

"Please excuse Mary for being absent. She was sick and I had her shot."

"Please excuse fred for being. It was his father's fault."

"Please ackuse Fred for being absent on Jan. 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, and 33."

"Mary was absent from school yesterday as she was having a gangover."

"Mary could not come to school today because she was bother by very close veins."

"Fred has an acre in his side."

"Please excuse Fred from P.E. for a few days. He fell yesterday out of a tree and misplaced his hip."

"Please excuse Mary from Jim yesterday. She is administrating."

"Please excuse Fred for being absent. He had a cold and could not breed well."

"Please excuse Mary. Mary has been sick and under the doctor."

"Please excuse Mary from being absent yesterday. She was in bed with gramps."

"I am writing the welfare department to say that my baby born 2 years old. When do I get my money?"

"I am forwarding my marriage certificate and six children. I had seven but one died which was baptized on half a sheet of paper."

"I cannot get sick pay. I have six children. Can you tell me why?"

"I am glad to report that my husband who is missing is dead."

"This is my eighth child, what are you going to do about it?"

"Please find for certain if my husband is dead. The man I am living with cannot eat or do anything until he knows."

"In answer to your letter, I have given birth to a boy weighing ten pounds. I hope this is satisfactory."

"I am forwarding my marriage certificate and my three children, one of which is a mistake, as you can see."

"My husband got his project cut off two weeks ago, and I haven't had any relief since."

"Unless I get my husbands money pretty soon, I will be forced to lead an immortal life."

"You have changed my little boy to a little girl. will this make any difference?"

"I have no children as yet, as my husband is a truck driver and works days and nights."

"In accordance with your instructions, I have given birth to twins in the enclosed envelope."

"I am very much annoyed that you branded my son illiterate. This is a dirty lie, as I was married a week before he was born."

Spoiled much?

2009-10-27T07:12:00.000-07:00

I don't usually get upset with a guest. I get irritated or exasperated by situations a guest might create, but for me to really be angry takes a lot.

About 4:00 this morning, CW needed a break before the morning exodus began, so she left me in charge of the front desk for a few minutes while she went out to the garage for a cigarette. She hadn't been gone a minute when a young cute drunk couple came to the front desk needing a taxi to go to IHop. I went outside to the spotlight at the flag plaza and used my little mirror to hail the cab down the street, but he didn't respond, so I had to run down the street to get him.
The cab driver was someone I had never seen before and, judging by his lack of urgency, I guessed he was new. By the time we got back to the hotel (I had been gone about three or four minutes) there was a white pickup at the entrance. The young couple thanked me for the taxi (she gave me a hug and a kiss,) and they left.
I went inside, where I found a man standing at the front counter yelling "hello" into the office doorway. I walked up to him wearing my monogrammed jacket and valet uniform, and said, "Good morning."
He looked me up and down and said, "Do you work here?"
"Yessir"
"Do you do both this and that?" he asked, pointing to the office and the drive. His question led me to believe that he needed to check in.
"I'm the valet. Let me go get CW for you." I went out the door, where Security Guy told me that CW was already in the office.
I went back out to find the guest griping at CW because he had pulled in at 4:00am and didn't find anybody outside to help him park his billion dollar pickup. He said he'd gone to the parking garage over there (pointing north--valet parking is on the north side of the building, self-park is on the east,) but the gate wouldn't open for him. He came back around to the front of the building, but didn't find anyone outside, and no one was at the front desk, and the only person around was that idiot in the bar playing chopsticks so loud that no one could hear him calling for help. He owns a multi-million dollar company in Tulsa, and this is a shoddy way to run a business (he repeated this a few times,) when he was paying so much for a room. He asked several questions about our lack of service, and what he needed to do to get what he needed. There was a strong implication that he believed that I should have been standing out in the cold all night waiting for his arrival, regardless of my other duties. He wouldn't shut up long enough to actually let us answer, and it took him a while to say that all he needed was valet service. "So what do I need to do?"
"What's your last name?" I asked. He told me, and I wrote it on a valet ticket and handed him the claim stub.
"What do I do with this?"
"This is how you get your truck back."
"Oh, I guess I need that. What else do I need to do?"
"Just give me your truck keys."
"That's it?" He said the keys were in the truck, and he needed to get some stuff out. I followed him outside while he explained his concerns about security in our garage, and my driving. He apologized for his tirade a couple of times, but not in a way to make me feel better about the things he had said. He got some odds and ends out of the vehicle, and then he and his travelling companion, who had been in the truck the whole time, went inside and up to their room.
I parked the truck in a place where the security camera would see it, locked it up, and went back inside. CW was working on writing a very obsequious letter in a card* apologising for her "inexcusable absence" and informing him that his valet charge was being comped. Although comping the valet was the right thing to do, I felt that her apology was a bit much. After all, none of this was her fault; it was just a case of bad timing. If he'd come in five minutes earlier, or five minutes later, he would have had nothing to complain about. Or, if the taxi driver had answered my little flashy thing, I would have been there when he arrived and would have taken care of him immediately.
I spent the next couple of hours delivering statements and newspapers, so I had some time to be alone with my thoughts, and the more I thought, the angrier I got. Yeah, we regret that he was inconvenienced, but he still didn't need to talk to us that way. He wasn't being neglected; I was just helping someone else when he arrived. That kind of thing happens. We treat all of our guests with warm and gracious service and the young drunks are no less valuable to us than the CEOs, politicians and movie stars that go through here. And the rapid-fire questions/complaints tell us that you don't want answers; you just want to make us feel bad. If you just let us know what you need, we'll take care of you quickly and professionally.
And if I can back a seven passenger van with a U-Haul trailer into a narrow alley, I can sure as hell park an ordinary pickup, and when I do it will be just as secure as the Bentley on its left and the Ford Taurus on its right.
I delivered CW's card. I didn't want to.

*We have blank greeting cards, with a picture of the hotel on the front, for writing personalized notes to guests.

Morgan

2009-10-22T21:50:00.001-07:00

The paper said that he was known as Bicycle Bob. In 23 years I never heard of him being called that. In my family, we just knew him as Morgan.

His name was Dwite A. Morgan. In Edmond he was as familiar as anyone else who lives here. He was often seen pedaling or walking his bike through the city's streets, usually close to downtown, and always seemed to be where anything was happening. He attended all the art shows in downtown.

Homeless, he lived by his own rules, rarely accepting direct help from anyone. Back before the city started its own recycling program, we would leave our aluminum cans in bags where he could collect them, cash them in, and use the money for a burger at McDonald's or someplace. More recently he would have breakfast on Saturdays at the First Christian Church when they served thier pancake breakfast. When his bike would wear out, the EARC Thrift Shop would give him another one. He slept in various places: under the railway bridge, in dumpsters, in my aunt's abandoned rent house. Lately he had been sleeping behind the Farmer's Grain, a downtown feed shop and plant nursery, which is where they found his body Sunday night. He was 54 years old when he died.

Another homeless man, only 20 years old, confessed to killing Morgan in an argument over a sleeping spot.

All of Edmond is in mourning.

Iowa Day 4 - On the Road Again

2009-10-21T06:35:00.000-07:00

We've had breakfast in the hotel restaurant every morning during our stay, and we've befriended the waitress, Ilma, a beautiful lady from Columbia. Yesterday, she was the one who took our picture before we left for the courthouse, and today, we showed off our rings.

We were mostly pre-packed, but we still got out of the hotel an hour later than I had planned. I had hoped to get out by 9:00 because I didn't want to be late for the surprise. I found out later that I had over-estimated our travel time, and we could have slept in for another hour.

The Surprise!

Most of the trip was rainy, and I was glad that my mechanic had talked me into replacing my windshield wipers before we left. It was raining hard when we got to Wichita. We were so glad that there was a parking garage attached to the Century II. I made Gaby change out of his sweats, and put on his dress shoes before we went inside.

I'm not sure what tipped him off, but he realized at some point while walking through the convention center that we were there to see the play Wicked. We had missed it in Oklahoma City last spring, and though the last performance of it's run in Des Moines was the night we arrived, I couldn't guarantee we'd be there in time for the 6:30 show. But the opening night in Wichita was on the way home, so I had ordered tickets - which arrived at the box office an hour after we did. Because I had over-estimated our travel time, we wound up waiting 2½ hours for the show to start.

If you ever have the chance to go see this play, do so. Gaby told the waitress at Denny's that it was the best play he had ever seen. Marcie Dodd, as Elphaba, has one of the most powerful voices we've ever heard. She actually had Gaby in tears at the end of the first act just from her quality of voice. And Heléne Yorke, another great singer, as ditsy blonde Glinda ("the Guh- is silent") kept us laughing through the whole play. The Wizard was played by Tom McGowan, who used to play Frazier's boss, Kenny, on TV.

The venue was not that great. I don't know how old the Century II is, but it's due for renovation. It reminded me of OKC's Civic Center before it was redone. The acoustics made some of the dialogue and lyrics difficult to understand, and our seats were far, far away. next time we see this play --and we definitely will-- I hope it will be in a better place.

We got home about 2:30 in the morning. It was a good trip.

Iowa Day 3 - The Big Day

2009-10-20T19:46:00.000-07:00

Mom called my cell last night, but the phone was off and I didn't find out till this morning. I called her back, and still managed to maintain the vegetable equilibrium; I didn't spill the beans. I did tell her about the surprise tomorrow night, but as far as the trip goes, I just told her that we were away on a romantic getaway.

===╗╝╗╝╗╝╗╝╗╝╗╝╗╝╗╝╗╝===

After breakfast, we got dressed in our new suits (Gaby looked so sharp) and headed for downtown Des Moines. Going through the security check at the entrance to the courthouse, we were informed that we would not be allowed to take pictures inside the building. We were about 20 minutes early, so we sat outside Courtroom #404 admiring the decor that we couldn't photograph. At 12:15 sharp, we went inside. No one else was there. Four minutes later, I went back to see if anyone was back in the office behind the courtroom. A secretary said that Judge Hanson had stepped out, but he'd be right back.

When Judge Hanson returned, he immediately set about finding a couple of witnesses, which were his secretary and another from another office. We handed over the paperwork, and he asked Gabriel, "Do you want to marry him?" " Yes," and then to me: "Do you want to marry him?" "Yes." The witnesses signed the papers, and left. The judge asked, "Do you want the ceremony, or do you want me to just declare you married?"

Now, before the judge came in, Gaby had been so nervous he was afraid that he was going to forget his English. I assured him it would be very easy, but even I was surprised that it could be that easy. I looked to him to see what he wanted to do. Stammering just a little, he said, "Well, we bought rings." And suits. Don't forget the suits.

The judge said, "Okay. Let me get my notebook with the vows. I'll be right back." The vows were very traditional, except for the word "spouse" where "husband" and "wife" would normally be. I managed to get through them without completely choking up. Gaby stumbled over a couple of words ("...in sickness and in hell...") and giggled a bit. A kiss for luck and we were on our way.

The day was very overcast with a threat of rain, so the photos we took of the courthouse were all grey toned. It didn't match our mood at all. I got the hostess from a restaurant down the street to take a photo of the two of us with the courthouse in the background. We called my cousin Paul, and our friend Charla, and then wandered downtown till we got hungry. We had a delicious lunch at a restaurant that was very Spaghetti Warehouse-ish. The salad bar was an old truck. We took more pictures from the top of the parking garage (we love the fact that you can get on the roof of parking garages for better views,) and then went back to the hotel for a nap and...etc.

Since this was our last night in Des Moines, we decided that we should check out the clubs. There are only three gay clubs in Des Moines, one of which is closed on Tuesday. The other two are next door to each other on 5th Street in downtown East. Tiny places, but the crowd was pretty good. They had a drag show, which we are not into, and this one was badly performed anyway. No one said hello, or acknowledged our existence, even when I insinuated myself into the group watching the guys playing pool. Overall, it was a very bo-o-oring experience.

But just down the street we got some great photos of the Capitol building all lit up.

Iowa Day Two - Vindication

2009-10-19T19:22:00.000-07:00

Before going to bed last night, I called our friend Charla. I told her to pull up my post and read it. After doing so, she told me that she'd been watching "The Office" on TV, and had just seen the episode about Jim and Pam's wedding. Apparently, they'd invited a bunch of guests who were driving them crazy, and at some point had realized, "This is our wedding." Charla reminded me that this is our wedding, and if we want to elope, well that's our business and no one else's.
I'd told so many people that we were going that I hadn't thought of it as an elopement, but thinking of it that way made me feel a lot better about being here secretly. In fact, it's a lot of fun.

-----------§§§§§▓▓▓§§§§§-----------

Des Moines is really easy to get around. Area-wise, it's a lot smaller than OKC, and there are only two highways. So much of the architecture in downtown is a century old and built in Victorian and other classical styles. For a guy like me, it was a feast for the eyes.

First thing to be done was to pick up the marriage licence. We had them make a couple of corrections, and then the young lady gave us the instructions on what to do with it. Then we spent the day wandering around downtown. Of particular interest, the Botanical Gardens and the Iowa State Capitol.

On the way back to the hotel, we needed to stop by a mall, a drug store, and a gas station. Bad directions from a couple of clerks sent us exploring West Des Moines and Clive in the dark, but we made it back home in time for "The Big Bang Theory."

Tomorrow is the big day.

Iowa Day One - Secret Getaway

2009-10-18T17:12:00.000-07:00

Okay, I'm a wuss.

We're here in Iowa. My parents have no idea we're out of town. In fact everyone except my parents knows we're here, and why.

Now, it's not that I don't want them to know; I just can't figure out how to bring it up. (I've been trying for a couple of weeks.) My Dad was next door working on a rent house yesterday while I was cleaning out the car. He made a comment to Gaby about how rare an occurrence that was, but that's as far as that went. I polished my shoes on the front porch, hoping he might comment on that as well, but he didn't see. Ditto packing my briefcase and ice chest in the car. Then he was gone and I hadn't said anything. Gaby called me a coward. Yeah, I know.

I called my brother on his birthday last week. We discussed the plan a bit, and how fast it was all happening. I figured that maybe he'd be talking with the parents later that day. In the back of my mind I was hoping he'd bring it up to them so that I wouldn't have to. If he did, they've said nothing about it. Sigh.

My parents love Gaby, and my Mom frequently says how glad they are that I've found him. But I just don't know if they're glad enough so that it's okay for him to be their son-in-law.

I was discussing this with my neighbor, Dot, the other morning. She said, "I'm sixty years old, and my Mom's been dead for years and I'm still seeking her approval." Damn. I was hoping I could grow out of this eventually.

§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§§

So, we left Edmond at 7:00 this morning. The pastoral scenes in the sunrise were gorgeous. We have no pictures because I was driving, but we got some other shots later. Gaby took a lot of pictures of the Flint Rock hills in eastern Kansas. We stopped for lunch in Ottawa, and took a mini tour of the downtown area and I got really excited by it's amazing Victorian architecture, especially the courthouse. Kansas City was just up the road, and then we were in Missouri for 114 miles. At the Iowa border, we stopped at the visitor center, and then drove an hour to the hotel just NW of Des Moines. Now we're just resting up for a day of tourism tomorrow.

I don't know this as a fact, but I suspect that we got the room we did because we were paying the Hilton employee rate, which is really cheap, just like the view from our room.

I learned today that Des Moines, Iowa is about 60 miles closer to my house than San Antonio, Texas. Who'd a thunk it?

Runnin' Rings 'Round the Metro

2009-10-17T03:18:00.000-07:00

A few nights ago, we went to Kohl's department store and bought a couple of suits. (For some reason Gaby didn't want to get married in a t-shirt and jeans.) This was the first time I'd seen Gaby dressed up. He looked so sharp. We used my new Kohl's credit card, leaving just enough credit to buy the rings later.

Tuesday night, we went back to Kohl's and found a ring we liked--even better, they were having a buy one get one free sale. Unfortunately, they only had one size nine (as luck would have it, we both wear the same size.) So we went back home and got on the computer to see if we could get them online. But no, even with the expensive express shipping, they would be arriving at our house while we were in Iowa. I was beginning to believe that I had just waited too long to do everything.

So we called all the other stores around the metro. Turns out that each store only carries one in each size. The Moore store had a size nine and a size ten. Gaby thought he might be able to wear a size ten, so Wednesday night we drove down there to try it. It was wa-ay too big. Worse, all the b.o.g.o.f. signs had been taken down. I asked about it, and the clerk said that the sale had ended yesterday. Oh, no! But that the sale on Friday was a 50-60% off sale. Oh, yay! And she could hold the ring for us till then. Oh, double yay! So we hurried back to the Edmond store and had them hold their size nine as well.

I was so excited about this that I pulled up the Kohl's webpage on the computer at work and was showing everyone the picture of the ring. Lots of Oohs and Ahs, even from the guys.

Friday morning, I headed south to Moore, got there ten minutes after the store opened, and hurried to the jewelry department. The same clerk was there (training a new salesgirl. I realized at that moment that she was a manager,) and got the ring out before I could ask for it. And on this sale, it was 55% off. Oh, triple yay! Several minutes later, I was picking up the ring at the Edmond store as well.

I had seen online that The Surprise was still available, but I couldn't order it till 10:00. I messed around a bit, going to garage sales and such. Then when it was time to call, I got put on hold for 13 minutes. But now it's bought and paid for and we have to be there at the right time to pick it up or it goes away with all my money. It's going to be great.

Ugh!!!!

2009-10-11T14:59:00.000-07:00

Tip-wise, I did pretty good for a Tuesday last night. Too bad it was a Saturday. We had an entire wedding party of inadequate tippers. Even the bartenders were discussing them. To add insult to injury, one of the drunken guests was telling me how wealthy they all were, and how they'd all hook us up.
I think part of the problem was that the parking was pre-paid, and the guests assumed that the tips were pre-paid as well, or that the valets got a portion of the parking fee, putting them in the same category of people who think that we tip share, so if they tipped the guy last night, that means I get some of that too.
There are times that I wish I could lecture the guests about proper tipping, but we're not actually allowed to discuss that type of thing with the guests. Meanwhile, I'm worried about how I'm going to pay the phone bill.

A Tad Eager, Aren't We?

2009-10-07T20:05:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago, Gaby got a surprise in the mail. The Polk County Recorder/Registrar of Vital Records in Des Moines, Iowa sent him an application for a marriage licence.

It took a while for Bossman to figure out when the second part of my vacation would be (nobody wants to work my shift, so scheduling my time off is a coöperative effort.) When that was figured out, we were able to start making plans for the nine hour trip to Iowa. I was a bit worried at one point about how many days we would need to be there, because the instructions for the application said that we would need to fill it out in the County Recorder's office there in Des Moines. Not only did that present a time and money problem, but we don't know anyone in Iowa, so we would have to take someone with us to be the witness. A phone call to Theresa at the CR office let us know that we could fill it out here, and mail it.

A lady who works in the main office at the hotel is a notary, and there is no shortage of witnesses, so Gaby and I went downtown to get the application filled out. We grabbed TJ, who is a friend to both of us, to be the witness. Gaby met a few more of my co-workers while there, so now he can put a face to some of the names I mention. He thinks FOM is hot.

So we get it all filled out, and there are congratulations all around. We were so excited. We immediately went to the post office a few blocks up the street, and mailed it off. Two hours later we realized that we had forgotten to enclose the check. Another envelope, another 44¢ worth of stamps, and another phone call. Theresa told me not to worry about it, because it was going to be coming to her desk anyway, and she'd watch out for it.

Next steps: make an appointment with a judge, and make hotel reservations. And a surprise.

Neighborhood Changes

2009-10-02T20:02:00.000-07:00

I've lived in my house for more than 23 years now, and the neighborhood has gone through many changes in that time. But this year, we've lost two neighbors to unusual circumstances.

Across the street, a lady in her sixties, who has lived in that house since she was a litle girl, was foreclosed on. Seems she had borrowed a big chunk of change, and then failed to make a single payment on the loan. When they evicted her, she didn't have time to remove a lifetime of stuff, and it was just thrown out into the yard and hauled away in dumpsters. It was appalling.
The bank sold the house to someone who spent a couple of months remodeling the kitchen and bathroom, painting, and fixing up the façade and landscaping. Now he's trying to rent it for $400 more than any other renthouse on the block. Needless to say, it's still empty.

Next door, our alcoholic/diabetic neighbor had lost his job (his boss set him up to be fired), and spent the summer drinking himself to death. After he died, his roommate and erstwhile girlfriend, who was not on his rental agreement and was disliked by the landlady, was told she needed to vacate ASAP, but, having no truck and little help or money, has taken several days to get her stuff out of the house. She's been friends with Gaby and myself since she moved in, so Gaby helped as much as he could. She's not particularly motivated, so that's slowed down the process as well.

Being "front porch" people, Gaby and I have always been friends with the neighbors. We kind of hibernate in the winter, but when we emerge next spring, everything is going to be different.

Summer Plans Part 2

2009-09-20T23:39:00.000-07:00

The first week of September was my vacation (half of it anyway,) and we worked hard on the back room. New floor, new paint, and reconstucting a closet into more useful space. Putting in the floor was a lot of fun. It took about 10 hours, and looked fantastic when we were done. Naturally, Shadie was scared to death of it. (See previous post "Encore".)

The large closet at the end of the room became office space (with a built in computer desk, etc.), and a small broom closet, with storage space above.

Gaby picked the colors and did most of the painting. We put in a chair rail, painted white, and the wall above is now golden yellow, the wall below avacado green, with a maple leaf stencil above and below.

We ran out of time before we could finish. There are still the cabinet doors to do and a drawer to build, plus a few minor details. But we are very happy with the results.

The Fairies Have Come to Dance In Our Yard!

2009-09-20T23:17:00.000-07:00

A circle of mushrooms has grown up in our yard, and our neighbor, Dot, came over and explained to Gaby that it's called a fairy ring. Apparently, the fairies have decided that they like Gaby's garden, and to celebrate it they have created a place to come and dance in our yard during the full moon. There's a space about 18" wide on one side, which means that Gaby is welcome to come in, but when he mows, he has to use scissors inside the circle.

Last Wednesday afternoon, a fairy on a stick showed up in the center of the circle. We assumed Dot had put it there. This morning the fairy turned into a flamingo. When Gaby saw Dot today and asked her about it, she said that she had driven by this morning and noticed it herself, thinking, "Oh! Gaby's got a flamingo just like mine." But when she got home, it was "Wait...Where's MY flamingo?" Turns out that the son of another neighbor had taken both items out of her yard and put them in ours -- the fairy because it was appropriate, the flamingo as a joke.

Management Has No Sense of Humor

2009-09-20T23:03:00.000-07:00

One of our afternoon front desk guys, Kevin, is a creative and incorrigible prankster. Example: A couple of months ago he got online and found some official forms from the Department of Human Services, printed them off, and arranged to have Bossman presented with papers explaining that his check was to be garnished to support the two-year-old daughter he didn't know he had. Brilliant!
One time, AFOM wrote a note on the big dry-erase board in the office complaining that he'd had to remove nine used glasses that had been left in the office. (This is a recurring problem, along with plates and silverware and other lunch remnants.) Kevin added, "Nine glasses of pop in the office, Nine glasses of pop, Take one down, Pass it around..."
But he almost got fired over one prank that went too far (in Management's opinion.) One of our HR managers had written a list of the top ten rules that employees must obey, and had hung up copies all over the employee areas. Kevin, having noticed that a chair from the restaurant was downstairs needing to be repaired, used her list as a basis for what was ostensibly an employee rewards perk.
When I got to work, there was a new flyer taped to the locker room door. (Actually, they were all over the place.) I read it, thinking at first that it was one of those lame-yet-kinda-cool things they do for employee morale. But the more I read, the more ridiculous it got. Click on the picture, and you'll see what I mean.
Upstairs, it was pretty obvious that Kevin was proud of his work, but the next morning, our head of security went around and took all the flyers down, muttering about looking through the security tapes to find the culprit. I found out later that upper management wanted Kevin fired, but the FOM refused, so he was given a three day suspension instead. Most of the rest of us thought this was an unnecessary overreaction, and some spoke of rallying to Kevin's defense with a prank of their own, but within a few days the whole thing had blown over, and now it's just one of those stories everyone laughs about. Except for management, of course.

Encore

2009-09-13T17:08:00.000-07:00

Remember that Shadie was scared of the floor when we took the carpet out? Well, just when she was getting used to it, we covered the green tile with laminate flooring. And this time we got it on video! At this point, the floor is half done, and the moisture barrier is sticking out from underneath the new flooring. You can see the ugly green tile at the end of the video.

Catharsis: Jungle Red

2009-08-25T00:31:00.000-07:00

Our Monday night routine is to go out to The Park for the Monday Undies amateur strip show, to visit with some acquaintances, go over to Jungle Red to browse, and then back to The Park to see if anyone is still there, then home. Not a lot of excitement, but since Sunday and Monday are my only nights off in a week, I look forward to Mondays.
Jungle Red is a little boutique in the Habana Inn complex about a block away from The Park. They sell porn, greeting cards, underwear, nick-knacks, candles, tee shirts, snacks and sex paraphernalia, among other things. We don't spend a lot of money, but we do have a few items around our house that were purchased there.
There used to be a woman working there, Valerie, who we looked forward to seeing every week. She was really a lot of fun to visit with. We each shared what was going on in our lives, and she always wanted to hear the latest dirty joke. But she and her partner moved away, and she was replaced by a fellow who didn't seem to want to visit with anyone. He sits behind the counter, rarely saying a word unless he's on the phone. Sometimes he disappears into the back room and we don't see him for most of our time in the shop. (We are usually there for about 15 or 20 minutes.) We say hi and bye on our way in and out. He may respond; he may not.
So it was a surprise tonight when he came out from behind the counter, took the magazine out of Gaby's hand and said, "Get out."
My initial thought was that he was closing the shop, so I said, "Is it that time already?"
As we stepped out the door, he said, "Didn't I tell you guys last week not to come back?"
I turned around and he was standing right behind me. I could feel my face coloring. "No...?" In fact, you've hardly said anything to us, even when we were buying something. As far as I can recall, this is the most you've said to us ever.
"If you guys come back, I'll have you arrested for trespassing." He walked away and sat down behind the counter. I was too stunned to move. I wanted to ask what this was all about, but I was too bewildered to even formulate the question in my mind. "Get away from my door!" he growled. So we left.

On the way back to The Park, we tried to figure out what the problem was. Was it because we didn't spend enough money in there? Did he mix us up with someone else? Was it because Gaby happened to glance up at the security cam? What? When we got to the bar, I looked around inside for someone to talk to, but Gaby said he just wanted to go home, so we left. Not a word was spoken in the car all the way home.

As we were getting ready for bed, I asked Gaby, "When did Valerie leave?"
"Are you still thinking about that?" he asked.
"Of course."
"Me too."
We discussed it a bit more, and then turned out the light. As tired as I was, I thought I might go right to sleep, but my mind was whirling with baffled and indignant thoughts. So I got up to write this post as a cathartic measure. Now let's see if I can sleep.

I miss Valerie.

Huckabee, Santorum, Stewart, and Me

2009-08-14T19:02:00.000-07:00

I was surfing thedailyshow.com and happened across this video of John Stewart and Mike Huckabee discussing gay marriage:

http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/tue-december-9-2008/mike-huckabee-pt--2

And this one with Sen. Rick Santorum:
http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/mon-july-25-2005/senator-rick-santorum-pt--1

Both of them spent time on the theme that marriage, from a government standpoint, is all about the next generation. This is the reason that government supports marriage between one man and one woman. Sen. Santorum, in particular, spoke about the government supporting the most ideal situation for raising a family, which is the male-female marriage. I don't agree. This is not the reason. This is merely a by-product.

The real reason that government supports marriage at all is because marriage is part of the human condition. People couple up. It's what people do. And the government supports it because the government is made up up of people who couple up. And there is something special about making the commitment to be with one person for life. Few accomplish that, but it's what most people want.
The only reason the government fails to acknowledge some marriages is simply because society doesn't approve of these two people coupling up. They can't prevent the coupling from happening, but they can legislate against the formal legal commitment, or at least refuse to grant the same recognition they would give to other couples. This attitude may not be legal-- may not be Constitutional even, but it is traditional and inculcated into the fabric of society, and so it stands. To give any other explanation is dishonest. (But society's attitudes are changing.)

I thought about this because, while watching these videos, I was thinking about my friend Suzy. At the art show this year, she introduced me to her her new husband. She was the happiest I've seen her in a long time. And I can guarentee you they didn't get married to produce and raise the next generation. They are both in their seventies. No, they got married because that's what happy humans do.

Daffynitions

2009-08-02T18:40:00.000-07:00

Some great alternate definitions to common words:
Coffee (n.), the person upon whom one coughs.
Flabbergasted (adj.), appalled over how much weight you have gained.
Abdicate (v.), to give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach.
Esplanade (v.), to attempt an explanation while drunk.
Willy-nilly (adj.), impotent.
Negligent (adj.), describes a condition in which you absentmindedly answer the door in your nightgown.
Lymph (v.), to walk with a lisp.
Gargoyle (n), olive-flavored mouthwash.
Flatulence (n.) emergency vehicle that picks you up after you are run over by a steamroller.
Balderdash (n.), a rapidly receding hairline.
Testicle (n.), a humorous question on an exam.

Here are some new words created by changing, adding or subtracting one letter. Look for these in future posts:
Bozone (n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer, unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future.
Foreploy (v): Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid.
Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period.
Sarchasm (n): The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.
Inoculatte (v): To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.
Hipatitis (n): Terminal coolness.
Osteopornosis (n): A degenerate disease. (This one got extra credit.)
Karmageddon (n): its like, when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the Earth explodes and it's like, a serious bummer.
Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you.
Glibido (v): All talk and no action.
Dopeler Effect (n): The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly.
Arachnoleptic Fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you've accidentally walked through a spider web.
Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito that gets into your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out.
Caterpallor (n.): The color you turn after finding half a grub in the fruit you're eating.
Ignoranus (n): A person who's both stupid and an asshole.

Chain Chain Chain...Chain of...

2009-07-31T06:12:00.001-07:00

While on my lunch break the other night I got on Politifact.org just to see what kind of silliness was going on in the world. Seems a woman, a Ms. McCaughey, appeared on Fred Thompson's talk show, telling about a section of the new health care bill where seniors enrolled in medicare would be required to attend counselling on how to end their lives in order to save the system money. Totally bogus, of course--got a "pants-on-fire" rating. But sure enough, the next day, my Dad sends an email about this very topic, which he prefaces with this comment:

If you are satisfied that NBC and ABC are telling you all you need to know about what the government is doing, you need to start listening to other sources of information.

Funny, since he believes that FoxNews is the only network telling us all we need to know about what the government is doing. Like in 1938 when CBS was the only network reporting that Martians had landed in New Jersey.

It seems sometimes that his thirst for knowledge begins and ends with Fox News, Rush Limbaugh and chain email.
Network news is not what I consider my primary source of information. I prefer to hear from several different kinds of voices with several different points of view. I like PBS and NPR particularly, but the networks and USAToday will suffice for a quick overview. And I don't trust any partisan website regardless of whose side they are on. But in spite of their brevity, I expect the reporting on NBC and ABC, etc., to be at least accurate, something Fox doesn't seem concerned with. (This isn't the only time I've gotten something from my Dad that originated from Fox, and then turned out to be less than factual.)
Politifact.org and Factcheck.org and Snopes.com have teams of people who investigate the stuff that goes out on the internet, and Politifact even goes to the trouble of explaining how they came by their information. Usually it's pretty simple, like a phone call or two. So why is it so hard for Fox to do the same thing?

Just Another Fun-filled Night

2009-07-26T09:07:00.000-07:00

What is it about wedding parties that they just won't go to bed???? I had four pages of inventory to do! I didn't have time for all that! Mike from security got the worst of it, though. He couldn't sit down to eat his dinner because of all the noise complaints, and then to top it off, someone pulls the fire alarm at 2:20am. Now we have guests in pajamas coming downstairs through the kitchen. Of course it's a false alarm. Ms. 323 reported that she heard two young drunken male voices outside her door daring each other to do it.
Mr. and Mrs. 407 have had enough. After being moved from 319 because of air conditioning problems, they found the fourth floor full of noisy partiers. The fire alarm was the last straw. They were nice about it, but Mr. valet ticket #---182 called for his car, packed up the family, and left in a huff.
Thing is, on the night shift, we have a certain number of tasks which have to be completed before we can leave. Our overnight houseman (who was helping Mike), our front desk clerks and I were so far behind we thought we were ahead. When our AFOM got to work, he read the report and offered to let the overnight clerks work his shift, and he would just go back home. Fat chance!
Lunch for me consisted of a package of donuts and a cup of coffee at about 6:00am, but I didn't get out of there till about 8:00. Now it's almost noon, and I still haven't wound down. I'm so glad I have the night off!

Setting The Record Straight

2009-07-25T12:27:00.000-07:00

My brother is in town, and yesterday morning I sat down with him and we talked awhile about what's going on with him, the things he's reading and learning about, etc. As I listened, I started to think that a previous post was rather unfair to him and my Dad, because it suggested that they may not be too bright. Actually they are very smart people.
My brother works for NASA, used to build his own computers, and has lately developed a thirst for knowledge about finance, marketing, and brain function with respect to social relationships. He's actually invented some computer and robotics products that are being marketed worldwide. (Check the link on the right.) I brag about him a lot.
My Dad was a quality control manager for a series of electrinics companies, also built his own computers (and mine), and knows everything one needs to know about real estate, having owned rental properties since the mid sixties. He's also a pretty good artist in his own right.
So in the future, if I say anything critical about either of them, understand that it's just a matter of disagreement on a position. I have the highest regard for both of them.

Some People (Roll Eyes Here)

2009-07-25T12:11:00.000-07:00

Watch John Stewart eviscerate the "Birthers Movement:" http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-july-22-2009/the-born-identity

Showtime

2009-07-19T18:07:00.000-07:00

We went to see "Brüno" this afternoon. Funny, but not as good as "Borat", and definitely not worth $9. Even if you like rude gay humor, wait till this one goes to the dollar theater.

Earlier this week we went to see a play at the Civic Center called "The Little Dog Laughed." It's about an actor who is on the verge of real stardom, if only his agent can keep him in the closet. Things get complicated when he falls in love with his latest rent boy. Cleverly written in a way that introduced characters that didn't exist onstage (like Maris on "Frazier"), and alluding to real life situations and people without ever naming them, the humor was too snappy for Gaby to keep up. On the way home, we were dicussing the play and figured out that it was actually about the writer, He-Meaning-Him, and not really about any of the four characters depicted onstage. Also, the reference to "Breakfast at Tiffany's" in the agent's opening monologue had a lot more to do with the story than was stressed, though some in the audience might remember that the character Patricia Neal played in the movie was a man in the novella.

Gaby has be"friend"ed one of the actors on Facebook.

Lego OKC

2009-07-12T03:44:00.000-07:00

Mike from security called down from the second floor, "Ron! You gotta come see this!" In the ballroom, there was a model of our hotel constructed entirely from Legos. Fourteen stories were reduced down to about three feet in height, about five feet in width. Little figures, including Chewbacca were roaming the lobby, and a couple were having a drink in the bar. It was one of the coolest things I've ever seen.
It turns out it was part of a larger project to build downtown OKC out of legos, and it will be on display at a local mall starting in November. I can't wait.
Click on the link to see the renderings of the completed project. In the photo above, the hotel is the dark red building in the back center. The tall building on the left is still scheduled to be built, and will be the sixth tallest building west of the Mississippi River when it's completed.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/39084468@N04/sets/72157619119527091/

My Family and Politics

2009-07-03T00:59:00.000-07:00

This post has been a long time coming, but it's been hard to get all of the different ideas about it into a cohesive presentation. To begin with I should tell you that my Dad, my Mom and I are all registered as Republicans, while my brother is a cynic. My dad is a neo-conservative (i.e. a Rush Limbaugh Republican), I am a moderate (I call myself a Theodore White Republican,) and my Mom is somewhere in between, though not very vocal about her opinions.
My brother believes that everyone is entitled to his (my brother's) opinion, but, like my Dad, is not too concerned about whether the facts actually support his opinions. They seem to believe something is true only if it supports a particular predjudice they might have. I don't express my opinions often, but I'd rather know what's really going on than what someone thinks is going on. On the other hand, I do find the editorials very interesting.
The reason this is on my mind is because I was cleaning out my email inbox the other day, and there was (is) a lot of chain emails sent to me by my Dad concerning how this administration is going to be the ruination of the country. I simply don't have time to respond to all of them, though some of the themes are the same: we are on our way to becoming a socialist (communist) country because a democrat is in the White House, and Obama = Hitler because he campaigned on "change." (Somehow it doesn't matter that McCain also campaigned on change; he just used different terms. So did Ronald Reagan, for that matter.) My Dad gets a lot of email back from me referencing Snopes.com, Politifact.org and Factcheck.org, but not everything he sends is that easy.
There was an episode of American Masters on PBS the other night about Garrison Kieller in which he said something that made me realize my Dad's problem: He gets all his information from people who complain a lot. I believe there are better sources of information.
But anyway, now that I've laid a foundation explaining where I'm coming from, feel I can post about things that come up without causing you, my adoring public, to wonder what the heck I'm talking about.

I Can Explain...Really

2009-06-25T23:40:00.000-07:00

Those of you who saw Gaby's latest post saw a portion of the mess I made in the back room this morning. Unfortunately, this is part of an ongoing thing that he refers to as "cleaning house," and I refer to as "hiding my stuff." It started when he moved in and hid my W-2s and other important tax documents in a cardboard box under a desk.
The other night he asked me if I had seen his gardening tools left out in the front yard. When I said yes, he asked me why I hadn't moved them. I didn't answer, but the reason was because I didn't want to put him through the frustration of not being able to find them. Besides, how was I to know he didn't leave them there on purpose? What if he wasn't finished using them?
We also have different ideas about where things go. To me the Tinactin goes in the shelf above the bed where I can reach it when I'm putting on my socks. Same for the Diprolene. He thinks they should go on top of the dresser, across the room and out of reach. I don't know why. I also think that my blue comb should go on the dresser instead of in the shaving kit in the bathroom cabinet where I always find it after searching in more reasonable places.

This morning, when I got home from work, I knew it wouldn't be easy for me to sleep, so I took a sleeping pill. While I was waiting for it to kick in, I decided to take some measurements to see how many 2x4s I would need for the new closet/desk.
When I'm looking for something, I follow a certain routine: First, I look where I last saw it. It doesn't matter if it's been three months since it was on the dining room table, that's still the first place I will look. The last time I saw the measuring tape, it was on the computer desk. It wasn't there, nor was it next to the TV, which is another place I saw it recently.
Second I will look where it belongs. It was not in the wire rack in the utility room, nor was it in the drawer under the TV.
Thirdly, I will look where Gaby thinks it goes. Usually I have to ask him where that might be, but today he was asleep. I assumed that he would think it should be in the garage, but I didn't want to go out there, so I skipped to step four, which is to wander around the house hoping I might just spot it.
Failing that, step five is to tear up the house while cursing. I got started on this, pulling out drawers and their contents, moving stuff around on the computer desk and in the utility room, but then the sleeping pill started to kick in, and I went to bed.
When I got up, all the messes had been cleaned up. I asked Gaby where the measuring tape was. He didn't know. I grabbed the keys and went out to the studio. There it was on the desk, right where I had put it a few days ago. Now I'm feeling a bit foolish, and I owe Gaby an apology.

Mickey's Musings: Why I Support Hate Crimes Legislation

2009-06-23T23:22:00.000-07:00

Check out this excellent article on Hate Crimes legeslation:
Mickey's Musings: Why I Support Hate Crimes Legislation

Head Start

2009-06-18T01:41:00.000-07:00

Gaby tore out the closet in the back room (aka the TV room, the red room), opening up the space for the future computer desk/broom closet. Somehow he managed to do it without waking me up. He removed the double sliding door, the wall around it, and moved in a desk, ran phone lines across the room, and set up the computer--all without making a sound. I love this guy.
Next step is to frame the broom closet and upper cabinets, put in the floor, sheetrock, paint, and install the built in desk and shelves. Let's see how quiet he can be with a hammer.

Announcement

2009-06-17T00:25:00.000-07:00

I got a call from The Oklahoma Gazette on Sunday afternoon. They're going to publish the letter to the editer I wrote back in March. (See the post from March 30.) That's exciting, but I'm really looking forward to some feedback. I guess I'll be checking the editorial page over the next several weeks to see if I made any kind of impact.

Addendum 6-17: It came out in today's issue on page 8.

A Conversation at Work

2009-06-11T00:51:00.000-07:00

Garris, Anthony, and myself out in front of the hotel at shift change:

Me: "Did you meet Mr. Dunham today?"
Anthony: "Who?"
Me: "Payton Dunham. He's the location manager for the movie. We know each other."
Anthony: "No, I didn't meet him, but I saw his card all over the hotel."
Me: "Yeah, I was telling a few people to say hi for me. We used to go to school together."
Anthony: "Well, I didn't meet him, but Casey Affleck is a dickhead."
Garris: (laughing) "Oh, yeah?"
Anthony: "I was checking in a guest while they were filming, and I said, 'Good evening! How are you?', and Casey Affleck turns around and says, 'Shhhh!' I said, 'Don't shush me! I'm doing my job. You don't pay my salary!' He gives me this (demonstrates an appalled look). Then later he's buying some aspirin, and I make a little joke, and he looks at me like this (a condescening smirk), and as I'm handing him his change he says, 'Thanks, Slick,' and walks off. What a jerk."

Funny, but I don't think Anthony is aware of his own contribution to this story.

Grace and Small Talk

2009-06-07T22:59:00.001-07:00

A couple from Florida stayed at the hotel this week. My attention was first aroused when one of them, a very handsome fellow, came down with their dog, a prince charles. The second morning that they were here, I got to tell him that that was the same breed of dog my partner had originally wanted before he got the schnauzer. That evening he introduced me to his partner. I hoped for a chance to visit with them, so I offered them the tour of the hotel. They thanked me, said they'd think about it, but went on to bed a bit later.
Last night I thought I finally had a chance to talk. They got in late, and sat out on the patio outside the bar for an evening smoke. I had just finished my major task for the evening, and had a few minutes, so I walked over and asked, "Do you guys mind if I join you?" They looked at me as if I'd offered them a booger. I sat down anyway.
One of them was explaining to the other plans for an event they were going to, and they pretty much ignored me for a couple of minutes. Then the other asked me how I was doing tonight, and I said that it just felt good to sit down for a minute. Hindsight tells me that at this point I could have asked them about their trip home the next day, and asked if the dog was a good traveler, etc. But I was feeling decidedly unwelcome and my thoughts didn't go that direction. They immediately resumed their previous conversation, and after a minute or two, I got up to pick up some glasses and trash left on a nearby table, and left them alone.

It put me in mind of another situation out at the club a couple of years ago, in which I saw a young fellow I knew sitting at a table talking to another young man. I walked over and said hi, and his response was, "Do you mind??? We're having a PRIVate conversation!" I was dumbfounded, and retreated, but in all honesty this is only the most shocking example of the way some people act at the club. Unfortunately, a lot of guys like to make a show of snubbing other people.
So the question in my mind tonight is, Why is it so hard for gay guys to be gracious?
That situation should have gone like this:
Me: Good evening, K. How are you?
K: Hey, there! I'm doing fine. How 'bout yourself?
Me: Not bad.
K: This is my friend C.
Me: Hello, C. I'm Ron. (handshake)
C: Hello, Ron.
K: Hey, listen, Ron. Could you excuse us? We're in the middle of something.
Me: Sure, no problem.
K: Thanks. We'll try to catch up with you later.
Me: Ok. Nice to meet you, C.
C: Likewise, Ron. (handshake)
Me: (pat K on back, leave)
Now, is that so hard? Everyone got what they wanted, and no one went away feeling like the other was a dickhead.

Pool Party

2009-06-03T01:22:00.000-07:00

One of our managers (the AFOM, which makes him my boss' boss) likes to throw pool parties at his house during the summer. The guest list includes present and former hotel employees, and a few other friends. The party on Sunday night was the first of the season, and it was also the first time that I had no scheduling conflict, so Gaby and I were able to go. We wound up staying for 6½ hours, leaving at 3am.

We found one of the couples there to be amusing. They were in the "other friends" category. She was a very pretty young lady with sandy hair and a perfect figure, who kept complaining about being fat. The more she drank, the more politically polarized she became. Anyone who had voted for Obama was her friend; anyone who didn't was an object of scorn. She didn't know what to do with us because Gaby can't vote, and I voted for Obama in spite of being a Republican. I suspect that her political leanings have very little to do with actual issues, and more to do with the President's rock star status.

Her young man was very attractive, though we think he knew it. We couldn't help but stare, and he noticed. The drunker he got, the more he appreciated being appreciated. He kept posing for my camera, and every time he looked me in the eye, he grinned mischievously, as if to say, "I know you want me." He's way too young, but I did enjoy looking.

Our AFOM has a pretty nice house. Like ours, it has a lot of partially finished/partially started remodeling and improvement projects going. He's got a lot of ideas if he can just get around to them.

He also has four labradors (they're not all his, but I didn't hear the stories behind them) who enjoyed the party as much as everyone else. One of them, Thomas, is addicted to fetch. At first he was bringing us a nasty rope toy, but when AFOM threw it over the fence, he found a stick in the yard, and now that was his new favorite toy. We had a lot of fun teasing him by hiding it, pretending to throw it, and all the other ways one plays with a dog's brain. Once, I pretended to throw it in the pool, but threw ice instead. He saw the splash and dove right in. The poor thing spent the next several minutes swimming laps looking for his stick.

Although the water was cold, there was a whole lot of swimming going on through the wee hours of the morning. At one point we were joined by a toad which had to be rescued from the dogs. All in all, we had a terrific time, and I can't wait till the next one.

The Pain of the Pepsi Perdido

2009-05-28T18:39:00.000-07:00

Saturday night on the way to work, I dropped by the Arby's for a bite, and by the time I arrived to work, I hadn't had a drink of my Pepsi. I stuck it in the office while I went to change and clock in. After a few minutes of working on the drive, I was thirsty. I went to the office to get a drink, only to discover that one of the afternoon desk guys, Kevin, had cleaned the office before he left, disposing of my drink. As a result, it was necessary to do all I could do to make him feel very guilty. Unfortunately, for some reason we did not have his phone number in the office, so I couldn't call him at 3am demanding a replacement. And it would be four days before I worked with him again.
So last night, when I came in, he was working at the desk. I stood in front of him, pursing my lips with a very disapproving glare. He looked up, and said, "I understand I owe you a Pepsi."
"Yup."
I had to explain why. He remembered. He got all obsequious and apologetic. He offered me a dollar. I said, "No, I want you to go to Arby's and buy me one."
"OK. Sure. I can do that. Just tell me when you want it."
A minute later I was telling Brett, our overnight security guy that I had insisted that Kevin go buy a new drink instead of just paying for it. He said, facetiously, "Of course. He's got to feel your pain." Yeah, Brett gets it.
See, it's not about getting a replacement Pepsi. (I'd prefer a Coke.) Nor is it about feeling that I was robbed. (It's not that big a deal.) It's all about Kevin having put himself in a vulnerable position where I can play with his brain simply for my own amusement. (Insert evil laugh here.) I love this kind of stuff.

Adendum 5-30
Kevin insisted that I take $2.00 for the Pepsi, since he would have to have been buying it eight hours before he would see me.

¡Que $emana!

2009-05-26T23:18:00.000-07:00

So, Sunday, Monday, and Tuesday we were in Dallas, and I had to work Tuesday night. I slept 13 hours Wednesday and got up just in time to go back to work. Thursday and Friday I had family obligations, and in all this time I had things I wanted to do and couldn't because I had demands on my time. So when Saturday rolled around, I told Gaby that I really wanted some time to myself. I didn't mean for it to sound that way, but he took it that I was telling him to vacate and not come back till I was at work. He was a little miffed about it, too.
We needed groceries desperately, so Sunday evening we took off to the WallyWorld, stopping at the Braum's first for supper. My debit card was declined. We had some cash, but not enough for groceries and dinner. On the way home, we stopped at the bank to check my balance. I knew that it was not possible that I was overdrawn. The ATM was sorry, but it could not process my request at that time. All I did was stick in my card. How do you even know what my request is? I figured the machine must be down, so Monday morning I went to a different ATM. Same result. Now I'm really concerned, and with it being the holiday and all, I had no one to ask about it. Unless...
I called the customer service line, and, wonder of wonders, a real person answered. I explained my problem, and got transferred to a supervisor, who informed me that on the same day that I was buying a sandwich in Edmond OK, someone else was buying $495 worth of groceries somewhere in Pennsylvania with the same debit card. This looked suspicious, so they shut down my card. She promised me that the money taken from my account would be returned, and that I would have a new card in a few days.
This morning, I went to the bank to make a deposit, and I got a printout of all transactions on my account for May. That one was the only bogus charge. All other checks and debits were accounted for. I'm really impressed. Chase Bank is really on top of things.
What I'd really like to know, tho, is how did someone in PA get my account info?????
Meanwhile, groceries.

Good Trip

2009-05-19T08:01:00.000-07:00

I'm enjoying this trip a lot more than the last time we were here. The lodgings are more enjoyable, I'm getting some rest, and we've seen all the friends we want to see without being rushed to be someplace.
We left here yesterday to see our good friend Charla, who lives in Bedford. Besides leaving later than we intended, it took us forever to get through the traffic jam on the "high five," the new interchange between I-635 and State Highway 75. Charla took us to lunch at Cheddar's, and we went back to her house and caught up on stuff. Gaby told her when we were leaving that he wished she lived close enough that we could visit at least once a week. Me, too.
Traffic kinda forced us to take the long way home. I don't mind that kind of thing when we have nowhere special to be. I really like exploring. Back to the hotel for a nap and then to meet Saul for a late supper.
Saul was Gaby's roommate when Gaby lived in Garland. (Robin Williams played him in "The Bird Cage." I swear, it was uncanny.) He met us a little Italian place called Tony's (of course.) I was delighted to find tortellini bolognese on the menu. I love that stuff, and I haven't had any since, oh, 1986? Saul gave Gaby a computer he'd picked up at the thrift store. We'll see if it works.
Then we went out to the "area," as Gaby calls it. It's a cluster of gay-owned shops, restaurants, and clubs at the corner of Cedar Springs and Throckmorton. (Look up the medical term "throckmorton" on wikipedia.) Not very many people out on a Monday night. We had a stilted conversation with a couple there, which I started, but it didn't last long. Gaby chastised me about just walking up to people and talking to them, but how are we supposed to meet anybody if we don't? I did find out that I really don't care for vodka-7s, even with a lime.
Anyway, back to the hotel, and to bed. Lunch today with Saul, then home, and work.

Carrot Shows and Newt Regina

2009-05-18T04:10:00.000-07:00

It is a few minutes after 6:00am, and I'm typing this from the business center of the Doubletree Hotel in Dallas. Gaby is still asleep upstairs, and I'm doing the best I can with my wierd sleep schedule. I woke up hungry and with a headache. The hotel has no vending machines, but they give free chocolate chip cookies at the front desk.
We're here to visit friends. Another weekend would have been better, but I promised Gaby we'd come this time, and so here we are. For one reason or another I was not able to make arrangements for our stay, so we had to go through Gaby's BF, Marlene, who works here at the Doubletree, for the hotel. If I had made the arrangements through my hotel, I think it might have cost about $40 less, but this place is really nice, and the room on the 18th floor has a nice view and a comfortable bed. A sign in the bathroom reminds us to use only one towel during our visit because "When you care, it shows."

It's been a long time since we've been to Dallas. The museum was to open the King Tut exhibit in a couple of days the last time we were here, and we were hoping to get a chance to see it. We arrived last night only to find out that yesterday was the last day, and the show is closed. However, there will still be things to see, places to do, and people to go, so there won't be a lot of down time on this trip. I just hope that my sleep time, or lack thereof, won't have the bad effect that it had last time.

adendum 9:30am
I left the business center and went back up to the room. While waiting for the elevator, I got a look at myself in the mirror there, and found that I had been amongst the early risers with a pillow-hair mohawk--which,btw, does not look good with a bald spot.
I got another hour or so of sleep before Marlene called us down to breakfast. In our bathroom, they have some Neutrogena products that corrected all my hair problems. Breakfast was wonderful. I can't believe I ate the whole thing.

Doggy Phobia

2009-05-15T00:55:00.000-07:00

Last weekend (which for me is from Sunday morning to Tuesday evening,) we decided to get a head start on some of the summer plans by taking out the carpet in the back room. It was easier than we anticipated, and in a couple of hours we had exposed and cleaned the floor underneath, which is green square kitchen tile. It was in such good shape that we could actually leave it as is if it weren't for the fact that the color puts the ug in ugly.
We thought the dogs would find it interesting; curious, perhaps. We had no idea that Shadie the schnauzer would actually be frightened by it. Her bed is in the closet in that room, and she now refuses to get out of bed to go outside in the morning. When we open the back door to let her in, she whimpers and wiggles with nervousness, because she wants in, just not on THE SCARY FLOOR! When we do get her in, she races to the living room, where it is safe. Then, if we are in the back room watching TV, she stands at the door and whines. (When she's excited or nervous, she makes a sound like a rooster crowing.) It frustrates her that now Fritz is getting all the attention because he's not afraid of THE SCARY FLOOR!
Last night she was really a nervous wreck, because she's also afraid of thunderstorms, and she would have to walk across THE SCARY FLOOR in order to get some comfort from Gaby. Tonight I got a lot of amusement from tormenting her by putting the gate across her only exit, locking her in the room. She got up on the couch and couldn't get down.
Just wait till this summer when we redo the living room floor, too. (Insert evil laugh here.)

"The Lion King" Onstage

2009-05-13T01:04:00.001-07:00

The are not enough superlatives to express my amazement at "The Lion King," which my family and I saw Tuesday night. We already knew the music and story from the movie, but that didn't prepare us for the amazing costumes, lighting and visual effects that brought this stage production to life.
On top of that, I had the personal satisfaction of having been the one to plan and pay for an outing of this sort for my family for the first time. I had never had the opportunity before just because I was too poor to do so. It made me feel like a grown-up. Nice feeling.

Impatience 1

2009-05-10T00:55:00.000-07:00

I want a vegetable garden. I don't know anything about working a garden of any sort, but mi novio is very good at that kind of stuff. So he goes out to the garage and finds some 1x12s and makes a 4'x8' fence, digs out a patch in the yard, and puts the fence around it, burying it about 4" deep. Then he tells me we need to spend about $70-$100 on supplies. I don't know why we need to spend that much because my Grandma's garden was just a plowed area of her yard. But if he says so, that's okay. Just as soon as I have the money.
So we had an art show this past weekend, and did pretty well. Then the next day I got my tax refund check. Then Friday was payday. So I have the money. And he knows I have the money.
So he's going to say, "Hey, I'm going shopping for garden stuff. Gimme your debit card." Right?
No. He got some planks out of the garage, laid them across the fence, covering the dug out patch, and put his potted plants on top of it. Why? Because he can't wait for me to go to the bank.
Now, he's going to read this and say, "But you didn't tell me..."
And I'm going to say, "Why do I need to tell you something you already know?"
And he's going to say "[ad naseum, ad infinitum]."
And I'll roll my eyes and walk away.

adendum 5-13:
It was carefully explained to me that it was all my fault. Mm-hm.

Family Reunion

2009-05-05T19:48:00.000-07:00

I've reestablished contact with a cousin of mine that I haven't talked to in years. In fact, the last time I remember seeing him was in '89 or '90 when he stopped in at the restaurant I was working in at the time. Since then there have been a few emails, but I barely knew about anything going on in his life. We missed each other at the family reunions. He and a fellow everyone presumed was his partner came one year, I came the next, and there were no more after that.

When we were kids, he and his sisters were our main playmates, and for my brother and me PaulDebbieandTammy was just one long word. His youngest sister wasn't born until after the family move to a farm outside a small town some thirty miles away. We were part of the same social group when they moved back in the late seventies, but we never had the same kind of relationship again. He moved away for college and career, and though his family still lives here it is rare that he gets a chance to come to visit.

He sent me a picture today of himself and his partner, Mark. (He asked me not to post it). I'm hoping that we can keep up a correspondence. Thirty years is a long time to catch up on, but I want to try.

It Is May, Isn't It????

2009-05-04T08:02:00.000-07:00

The Edmond Downtown Arts Festival took place on May 1st, 2nd, and 3rd. It was cold (54º in May‼) and rainy most of the time, and sales were slow.

I was fortunate in that I sold a big original early on the first day. If not for that, the show would have been pretty dismal.
I got the Judges Choice Award for my new pic, which I have tentatively titled "Saturday In The Park." As soon as I have prints made, I'll be hanging it at my mom's house.

There's One (Or Two) In Every Crowd

2009-05-02T19:36:00.000-07:00

Tuesday was Gaby's 40th birthday, and I threw him a surprise party. I say "surprise" although he knew something was up. I had to tell him that someone special was coming over just to keep him from going to Texas. And at some point preceding, he found the beer and liquor that I had carefully hidden in the studio. Ah, well.
Ten guests showed up, five times more than the last party I threw, and Gaby really had a good time. My friend Jason made a marvelous cake, and I got way too much food and beer. Everyone seems to have had a good time, and I think a couple of the guys might start dropping in once in a while.

Since the party was on a Tuesday, I started inviting people a month in advance so they could make arrangements. I called Jason to get him to make the cake. I called Gus to have him start thinking about who of the Hispanics should be invited. (Gus had taken Gaby camping with a few other guys, and I hoped that some of those guys could come. Gus repeatedly complained about the party being on a Tuesday, and ultimately I don't think he called anyone.)

I invited our friends from Texas, and they were all eager to come, but two couldn't get out of work, one couldn't get a baby-sitter for two days, and the other, our dearest friend, Charla, got sick. Charla overnighted a card and gift certificate that arrived just a couple of hours before the party, and she and two of the other Texans called during the party.

Locally, I invited a few of my cöworkers, and some guys we know from the club. In particular, I invited Gus' cöworker, Oscar, a fellow that Gaby had gotten to know recently, and whose company he really enjoyed. Oscar didn't know me well enough for me to call him on the phone, so I went to his office and extended a personal invitation to him and his wife.

A week before the party, I sent a text message out to those with cell phones as a reminder. Oscar texted back demanding to know who Gaby was. I texted back that Gaby was the guy who helped him move into his new house just a few days before. I couldn't believe he had forgotten him so quickly.

A couple of days before the party, I called around RSVPish to get a feel for how much food I should buy, and to make sure everyone had directions. Most were eager to come, one had to decline. From these calls, I figured there would be around 15 people. Even if 15 had shown up, I still had way too much food. The enchiladas I made were a whole serving each, and I had enough fixins for 50. (I made twenty; twelve were eaten.) I also got six bags of chips, three cans of Mexican style rice (which was awful), a whole bag of limes, and enough Velveeta to make two crock pots full of queso. Some guests also brought food.
I also bought seven bottles of pop, $56 worth of beer (and I don't even like beer), a bottle of tequila, and a bottle of vodka (which, along with the Kahlua one guest brought for White Russians, was the only thing anyone drank.)

I think we're going to have to throw another party just to get rid of the beer and chips.

A day or two after the party, Gaby talked to Gus. Gus didn't think we had enough food. He also said that Oscar decided not to come to the party because I had been "harassing" him with all the phone calls and text messages. Singular people, those two. I'm not sure what to say about the harassment charge.

Pegged and Pigeonholed

2009-04-26T19:49:00.000-07:00

I found a link to a quiz site (click here) that asked the question, "What Kind of Gay Man Are You? This was the result:

You Scored as Normal, Boring and Gay
Its not bad that you are this way, but couldn’t you do a little bit more with your hair? Perhaps maybe zush your shirt? The only thing that makes you interesting is you like men, but even then… do you really?

Yes, I do, but still, this is the most accurate quiz I've ever taken.

Inevitable

2009-04-25T03:55:00.000-07:00

She knew.
They didn't even have to call her.
We knew, too. They'll only let it slide so many times. Company policy, and all, you know.
Everyone will miss her, but we knew.

There's No WTF In Team

2009-04-20T23:49:00.000-07:00

It's fundamental. When you park some one's car, you lock the doors and write the correct parking space number on the ticket. And yet some of my co-valets have not developed either of these habits, even though some of them have been here longer than me. Saturday night it caught up to them.

Our security cameras caught the images of a skinny fellow in a yellow plaid shirt going back and forth between vehicles in our parking garage. By the time he left, he had entered 11 vehicles, tossed the contents of the consoles and glove compartments, and had stolen several small items like mp3 players and cameras, some credit cards, and a backpack. He didn't break into the cars. He just found the ones that weren't locked up.
Of course, this causes a huge uproar among management and in our department. When the smoke cleared, five of our guys had been suspended for a few days (not consecutively--we can't afford that big a hole in the schedule.)

All weekend, I've had a whirl of thoughts and emotions over the situation, and it's been a struggle to make sense of what I think and feel. It happened on my shift, and I can't help but feel there was something I could have done to stop it. Part of me wants to point a finger at the other guys and say, "Why aren't you locking doors just out of habit?" But singling out individuals doesn't do anything about fixing the reputation of our department.

I've always described my job as being the one who cleans up the mess. After a while you can't help but develop opinions about the ones who make the messes. One of my (and the morning shift's) pet peeves has always been that the correct parking space is not written on the ticket. This decreases our efficiency when retrieving a vehicle. But a lot of the guys think that as long as you can find the car at all, that this is not a problem. Even my boss will say, "It happens." Well, it shouldn't happen as often as it does. As long as these guys have been here, they should have the space numbers memorized by now. I'm harping on this because Sunday morning I was given the task of finding the keys for the vehicles that were broken into, and the only way I had to find them was by the parking space number. Three of them were incorrect. Two of those had no space at all, and the third I never found.

I talked about all this with our Asst. Front Office Manager this morning (off the record--John and I are good friends aside from our professional relationship,) and we decided that what it really came down to is a teamwork problem. For example, when the guys park the cars, they aren't thinking about the fact that someone is going to have to come get that car, and it probably won't be the one who parked it. There are a lot of other little details concerning how the guys do things that cause problems for someone else, but I won't explore them all here. We will be having a long overdue departmental meeting soon, I'm sure, and maybe we can get some of this hashed out.

w appre yo he

2009-04-18T19:34:00.000-07:00

This morning Lrbom asked me how I did last night. I replied, "'Bout half." He asked me what I meant by that, and I pointed to the drive and said, "One dollar people out here," then pointed to the upper floors and said, "Five dollar people up there."
When I told Gaby about that this evening, he suggested that maybe I should only take people's luggage halfway to their rooms. Too impractical, of course, and yet...

What Makes 100%?

2009-04-17T00:39:00.000-07:00

Ever wonder about those people who say they are giving more than 100%? What does it mean to give 110%? What about achieving 103%? Isn't that enough?

Here's a little mathematical formula that might help you answer these questions:
If A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z is represented as

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26, then

H-A-R-D-W-O-R-K (8+1+18+4+23+15+18+11) = 98% and

K-N-O-W-L-E-D-G-E (11+14+15+23+12+5+4+7+5) = 96%. And

A-T-T-I-T-U-D-E (1+20+20+9+20+21+4+5) = 100%.
But B-U-L-L-S-H-I-T (2+21+12+12+19+8+9+20) = 103% and

A-S-S-K-I-S-S-I-N-G (1+19+19+11+9+19+19+9+14+7) = 118% .
So, one can conclude with mathematical certainty that while hard work and knowledge will get you close, and attitude will get you there, it’s the bullshit and ass kissing that will put you over the top.

Short-shifted and Short-changed

2009-04-14T14:47:00.000-07:00

Tonight is the fourth of four nights working a six hour shift. We lost one of our bellmen last week, so Bossman is trying to fill in hours by being creative with the schedule. He needed me six nights this week, and since he can't schedule me overtime, four of those nights have fewer hours. The only problem I have with the arrangement is that he's snipped off the two hours when I would normally be making some tip money. Couple that with having been off four of the last six Friday nights, and my income has suffered.
The ratio of tippers to non-tippers hasn't changed much (though I got stiffed seven times by a departing wedding party last weekend,) but what's aggravating me most right now is the undertippers. For some reason lately more and more people are giving $3-5 for $10-20 jobs. The worst was the two Italian guys last week who had four luggage carts worth of suits that they were taking to market in Dallas. Lrbom and I both helped bring all their stuff down and got their car from valet, and then had to split a $3 tip. $3 for a $40 job.
Anyway, the last six weeks have been dismal, and the result of all this is that I have to borrow money from my savings account to pay my phone bill this week, and I still need to put gas in the car. I'm feeling cheated.

Mental Notes/Summer Plans

2009-04-13T02:05:00.000-07:00

The art show is on the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd of May. I must sell $556 worth to meet expenses, but $956 would be better, to replace money taken from my savings account. After that I have 10 weeks before I am eligible to take a two week paid vacation. The only project I have planned during that 10 weeks is to lose some weight. The plan for the vacation is to work on the house. I expect that Gaby will want to start on some of the house projects early.

Take out the carpet in the living room and back room.
Sand, stain and varnish the floor in the living room.
Paint the living room.
Put in laminate flooring in the back room.
Finish building drawers for the back room cabinet.
Build shelving for back room wall.
Finish the details in the bathroom.
Build a new bed.
Change the closet in back room to a computer desk/study area.

Ambitious, I know. But I think the two of us can get it done.