I recently stumbled across an email that I wrote around the time of the 2008 election.

Until I read it I forgot just how crazy John McCain went in his last-ditch effort to gain The White House. As I read it I kept thinking "oh yeah!"

I've been saying for years that the American voting public has such a short memory, but it appears I'm no better. Read below and remember. Ugh.

*************
11/10/2008

Firstly, I must recant. I am not a democrat. Not really. Many of my
stances do tend to lean to the left, but I do not vote along party
lines. In 2000, for example, I would have happily voted for John
McCain. I liked him then. I thought he was honest and strong in all
the right ways. It's sad that Bush defeated him, but that's the way it
happened. I did actually give him my vote then for his Arizona senate
seat.

About my email... I think you misunderstood me. Here is the one and
only time I mentioned McCain:

"You heard the term "robo calls" during the election, right? In case
you hadn't heard, they were automated pre-recorded phone calls to
people, trying to convince them to vote for this and that. John McCain
and the republican campaigners were using them heavily."

That is a widely reported fact. I heard people discussing it on both
liberal and conservative news sources. It was on NPR, CNN, MSNBC, and
even FOX News. But don't misunderstand. There is nothing wrong with
using those calls at all, and that was no attack on him what-so-ever.
I must have had a dozen calls that were recordings from McCain and
John Shadegg, etc etc. They would just say things like "Hi, I'm John
McCain, and blah blah blah, vote for me." Again, that's not an attack,
it's just a fact.

It's no secret that they used them, and the Obama campaign did not. I
don't know why you flew into defensive mode so fast, because that part
is true and perfectly legal and fine.

Beyond that, when I began talking about the misinformation to black
voters, I said some of those were done through robo calls, and some
were door-to-door. I never specified that McCain was the source of
these specific robo calls, and I didn't mean to connect them to him. I
only mentioned him and his calls as an example to explain what robo
calls are, in case you hadn't heard of them.

But, there are dozens of recorded stories of poor black voters being
given misinformation about when to vote and how to vote and all that.
Historically people in that demographic tend to vote democrat, so the
only people who have any vested interest in giving them bad
information would be republican supporters. Obviously I'm not claiming
anyone from any official campaign did anything shady like that
directly, but it was definitely people from the "red" side of the red
and blue camps. Why would democrats spread lies among their base? They
wouldn't. And I am not saying it was you, or McCain, or Rush Limbaugh,
or whoever, but somebody who wanted to see a Republican stay in the
White House was behind it somewhere.
Here's the deal about ACORN, they are a non-partisan organization,
dedicated to registering voters, and endorsing NO candidates. They
have both republican and democrat members all over the country. There
was REGISTRATION fraud committed, but it was perpetrated against ACORN
by its employees, not by ACORN as an entity. ACORN themselves were
actually the ones to point it out in the first place. You may not know
this, but any non-governement organization that handles voter
registration is required by law to hand in any and all forms they
receive, no matter if they say "Mickey Mouse" or not. That is federal
law. In those obviously fake cases like Mickey Mouse, they handed them
in flagged for investigation. I repeat ACORN flagged them, and this is
all public record, you can find it yourself if you look. Also, those
forms they reported for investigations made up way less than 1% of all
the registrations that ACORN handed in. In a mandate like we saw this
last Tuesday, less than 1% would not have produced those results. I,
for one am thankful that the 99.99% of all their registered voters got
to have their voice heard, wheter they voted red or blue. And so is
John McCain... or he was in 2006, anyway.

That's right, John McCain himself is connected with ACORN, and even
gave a keynote address at one of their rallies two years ago. If you
don't believe me, go on YouTube and search "McCain ACORN" it will be
somewhere in the first couple results. He saw the reports of a handful
of ACORN's registrations being reported for fraud, and seized an
opportunity to attach Obama to a corruption scandal.

It might have worked, if it were true and/or if McCain himself weren't
a fan of ACORN. He actually said at their rally that "What makes
America special is what's in this room." He was addressing a
bipartisan room, where people were literally dressed in red and others
in blue. Democrats and republicans side by side. Sounds great to me,
and not a corrupt subversive organization that John McCain wanted you
to believe it was when it suited his needs.

But here is another more important thing to note: registration fraud
cannot in any way shape or form win an election, only VOTER fraud can
do that. Anybody can register under any fake name they want, but
unless they show up and vote WITH and ID that has the fake name,
nothing changes. For those registered fakes to have any impact they
themselves would also have to go to the poll with an ID that said the
fake name on it and vote under that fake name. Even if they did get
through (and many were caught and thrown out) think of the massive
time and expense to design, print and distribute hundreds of thousands
of fake ID's and mobilizing enough people in enough states to even
make a dent in the totals. And not only is that expensive and time
consuming, but pulling it off totally covertly so that NOBODY found
out about it...? Thousands of people coordinating a gigantic secret
like that, without a single slip up, or conscience breaking and
causing a leak to the press strains the limits of rational thought.

Like I said, I was actually a McCain fan in 2000. Then he seemed
principled and righteous, but this time around he threw too much of
who I thought he was out the window. He took supporters and allies,
like ACORN, and threw them under the bus when it served his agenda. He
was sarcastic and snarky at the debates and in interviews, and his VP
choice was clearly a strategic move, and not a choice based on what
was actually best for his party or his country. Even if you agree with
her platform stances, she was inarticulate, uninformed and dodged
direct questions more than any politician I've ever seen. This new
2008 McCain is a shadow of who he was, and it makes me sad. And even
if you might say he was playing strategy to get in office, and wasn't
the real him... well, that's even worse.

Oh, sweet Poop Shute. I have missed you. I have not been writing much at all lately. I'm not happy about that. But I have been focusing more on fiction, and whereas this blog was more for personal rantings, it has been neglected.

To get me writing more I have created a new project to give me purpose, focus and a deadline. Once a day, every day, I will take a photograph with my camera, upload it and use it as a springboard to write a piece of short fiction. Or, at the very least I will take the picture and write, some days I may not be able to get to a computer to post it, but I can play catch up.

365 Days = 365 pieces. I started on June 30th, so by the end of the day June 29th, 2011 I will have written at least 365 pieces. You can follow that progress at UN-REAL TIME.

And here I will occasionally ruminate about the process, my progress and what is and isn't working for me. YAY! The PoopShute has a purpose again.

It was Friday, a warm, summer evening after a long work week. I did what most of us do every day. I walked into the kitchen and opened up the fridge, not having the slightest clue what I really wanted, but fairly certain that I would not find it in there. But we've always got to look, just to be sure, don't we?

I could have an almond butter and jelly sam'ich.

Nah.

Hummus and pita?

Nope.

Mixed veggie salad?

No way!

Ah-Ha! There it is! That is what I want. An ice cold beer.

I deftly popped the cap with the opener, a move that I have had much practice at over many years of dedicated beer snobbery. I took a sniff. The aroma was crisp and clean. Slightly sweet. Even without reading the label, I knew it was a lager from the smell. My mouth was watering with excitement for a good summer beer.

I was about to take my first taste when I noticed the writing on the inside of the cap, which I was still holding in my left hand. In block letters it said simply:

Let's Toast, Dude.

I stared at the cap for a moment, one eyebrow raised. I had never seen a "fortune" on the inside of a beer cap. Snapple has done it, and Jones Soda (I think) but I had yet to see it on a beer.

After a moment of contemplation, I shrugged and gently clinked the neck of my bottle to the side of the cap and quietly muttered "SLAINTE" to nobody in particular.

Recently, it has occurred to me that I have worked a number of different jobs over the years. My resume, if I were to write an all-inclusive one, would be sprawling and likely a few dozen pages long.

My mind started to wander over all the things I have done for money over the years, and a list began to form. Keep in mind that this list is all the things I have done for money. Strictly speaking, some of them weren't "jobs." Putting in work ("work" may be defined loosely for a few on the list) and receiving payment for it is the only definition for "job" I am using.

The jobs are listed in chronological order to the best of my memory.

Landscaping
Car-washing
House-keeping
Waiting Tables
Bus Boy
Bread Dough Roller
Zoo Lights costumed character
Birthday Clown
Singing Telegrams
Movie Theatre Usher
Illustrator / Image Editor
Video Store Clerk
Video Store Manager
Short Order Cook
Office Supply Store clerk
Actor
Fight Choreographer
DVD Bootlegger
Film Extra
Writer
Producer
Publicist
Director
Graphic Designer
Costume/Makeup Designer
Sound Designer
Composer (guitar only)
Voice Over
Personal Trainer
Fitness Consultant
Fitness Program Designer (as in building a boot camp program from the ground up)
Marketing Director
Janitor
Maintenance Man
Marketing Copy writer
Massage Therapist
Dog Behaviorist
Birthday Party Entertainer (different from clown job. still for kids, but very different)

There's no particular reason for this list. I just wanted to see it all on paper.

I wonder if this list will be longer in 10 years, or if I will settle in to something.

Time will tell.

What The World Needs Now...
A Rant On the State of the World

Burt Bacharach would have you believe it's "love, sweet love."

I agree, but I think there's more. I think it's more guys like ABBIE HOFFMAN.

I just finished watching CHICAGO 10, a fantastic documentary about the 1968 Chicago Riots, and the trial that followed. I wish you would go rent it and watch it, America, but I won't pretend that you will.

I was moved to tears for many more reasons than one. There was actual footage of the riots, which were brutal and jarring to watch. There was the farce of a trial, re-enacted by some very talented voice actors from the actual official transcripts. All worthy of tears, but not why I cried.

Worse than all that, it highlighted for me what we are sorely lacking today; Radical Activism.

More than lacking the presence of the thing itself, we have watered down that term to be all but meaningless. It used to mean guys who lived and worked outside the system and lived to shake up that system, and push us out of our comfort zones. They made us questions things, everything, down to the very nature of the system itself. I'm talking about guys like Abbie Hoffman and Allen Ginsburg. Go back further in history and find people like Martin Luther King and Cesar Chavez. Go back EVEN further and you'll find the men who stirred shit up on purpose by drafting and signing the Declaration Of Independence. Yeah, that's right. I said it. Our founding fathers were RADICAL ACTIVISTS.

Now people on the all-day Noise... er, I mean News channels, will occasionally toss out terms like "radical activist judges" when it comes to a judge who might disagree with a historical precedent or two.

A judge? Someone who has eaten, shat and breathed The System for years, and clawed their way up through it, becoming it, to get where they are today. THAT is the closest thing to a "radical activist" that we can come up with?!? No, I'm sorry. Unacceptable. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying judge's are bad guys, but I am saying that they couldn't have gotten where they are unless they played the game, and successful players of the political game are not radical. Ever.

TANGENT: And while I'm at it; as much as I enjoy Barack Obama's rhetoric and public persona, I'm not seeing much of that change he was talking about. Nor am I surprised, really. All I mean to say is, simply by virtue of getting elected at all in this country, he couldn't really be that "radical" or "activist."

Truth be told, I know radicals are out there. Guys like Morgan Spurlock, and the guys over at Last Chance For Animals, and many many other organizations and individuals are out there, bucking convention and chipping away at corruption. But in the golden age of radical activism Abbie Hoffman had rock star acclaim. Spurlock, and guys like him, are on the fringe, mostly preaching to the choir, and easily written off. The media followed Abbie Hoffman's every move. They had to. Whether you loved him or hated him, you wanted to know what he was up to.

But not today. We don't follow our radicals anymore. In the modern 24-hour news cycle we'd much rather hear about yet another school-shooting, or another celebrity death, or worst yet: Obama's dream date with his wife and we want to hear about these things for days on end, in every permutation possible. We listen until we've memorized it down to the minutiae. and we'll do that with every piece of Un-news they throw at us so long as it fits with our idea of what is safe, uncomplicated, and unchallenging. We don't want a pop culture figure to tell us where and how we're wrong, and we certainly don't want to elevate that figure to rock star status.

We'd rather be massaged and rebranded and soothed by flashy new Orwellian vocabulary than actually stop and think.

As a country we're apathetic. I personally am not, but I fully recognize that living in this culture that most certainly IS apathetic has done severe damage to the attitude I once had. It's so easy, living here in the good old USA, to feel crushed by it. Swallowed. Subdued.

You can almost hear the voice of the masses talking to you. Really? You're angry about X or Y thing that is happening on a wide scale? Meh. What can you do? Clearly, none of us care, so why should you? I mean, really, what are you going to do about it? Give up. It's so much easier. Here, have a Big Mac and a Diet Coke and settle in for some Fox News. And don't forget to special order your extra large burial casket. Never hurts to plan ahead...

Speaking of death, at his funeral, the Rabbi of the synagogue that Hoffman had attended as a child said that Hoffman's history of antic protest was in the prophetic tradition to "comfort the afflicted, and afflict the comfortable."

I like that. Has a nice ring to it. But who does that now? Michael Moore? I don't think so. He lies and misrepresents left and right. His tactics are suspect, making him just another game-player with different stripes. Bill Maher? Maybe. He's never seemed a game player, and always seems ready to point out game-playing when he spots it. I do so enjoy his consciousness-raising rants... but, I don't know. Despite having a decent following, he still doesn't seem to be doing much beyond squawking a lot. He's entertainment, he's not actually DOing anything that I can see. And don't even think about suggesting somebody like Bono. He does some good work throwing his money and fame behind a cause or two, but that's not really activism either, is it? He's also not in-your-face enough. In that regard, Bill Maher makes Bono look like a sniveling punk.

The sad thing is as I continue my ranting about what we're missing I keep hearing the words of Mahatma Gandhi bouncing around in my head:

"You must be the change you wish to see in the world."

Hmm. So, if I wish there was a huge, polarizing, stir-shit-up activist in the world...

Crap.

I guess I have a lot of work to do.

Sadie Goes Potty

It's a balmy night. Not warm. Not cold. A perfect temperature for a short stroll to pee. It's quiet. The only sounds that make it to us, behind our apartment building, is the pulsing soft hum of the freeway on the other side of the hill.

A car pulls up beside the patch of grass I'm standing near. It's brakes make an almost inaudible whine right at the last second before stopping. I hear the parking brake engaged, and the loud purr of the engine shuts off.

It's 9 pm and I'm waiting under a street light for my dog to find just the right spot to pee. Sadie, like many dogs, is keenly aware that every pee has a preordained perfect spot. Every pee has it's own destiny and she will be damned if she won't find it. Sometimes it's right at the outset of the trip. Just two simple sniffs and... AH-HA! There's the rub. Mission accomplished, and the bladder empties. But not tonight. Tonight she's taking her time, so I let my eyes wander over the newly arrived car.

It's just outside my orangey pool of light, so I can't make out the model, but I can plainly see it's expensive. You can tell by the shape, the lines of the thing. It is a car that makes a statement. I can see through the window the vague shape of a female driver with a cigarette between her lips. In my mind I decide to call her The Duchess. Then I quickly realize that I'm being judgemental. For all I know she could be a nanny and it's her employer's car. Still though. I decide to stick with Duchess.

A blond woman in her mid 40s steps out of the driver's side. She sighs for a moment, looks around and then stubs out her cigarette butt with her high heal shoe, and smiles at me. It was a weak smile. Calling it half-hearted would have been giving it too much credit. It was a smile that made it very clear that it was the minimal possible effort she could manage at being pleasant. As if to say "you don't look important enough for a full smile. I'm saving those up. You get this one instead. It's the same one I give to the neighbor whose dog shits on my lawn."

Yep. The Duchess it is.

Apparently. Sadie was finishing her potty break. That head-to-toe shake that dogs do when wet is something of a tick for Sadie. The Duchess is startled by the sound of Sadie's ears slapping against the sides of her tiny dog head as she gives a good shake, a compulsory finishing move for her, akin to the human male's "follow up jiggle." The Duchess's attention shifts from me to Sadie. On first sight of the dog, suddenly the woman's fake-almost smile grew to a full beaming ear-to-ear. This is the one she probably gives to the pool boy who is secretly banging her behind her husband's back. There I go again. I don't even know if she's married. Or if she even has a pool.

She then looks back to me, gracing me with this new, second smile. "Your dog is SO adorable. What's her name?" Apparently I'm also SO adorable by association. Suddenly now I'm worthy.

I might have responded favorably if it were not for the sickening smell of stale cigarettes and hand lotion pouring off of her.

No. Who am I kidding? There was never any way I was going to respond favorably. "Go fuck your pool boy," I righteously shout as I walk on by with my SO adorable dog.

A text message interlude

John: You know, I would save the world for free.

Me: ...um... what?

John: You only get it once.

Me: ...um, okay. I too would save the world for free... but world-saving is bound to be taxing on the body and mind and a a brutha does gotta eat. Just sayin. :-)

John: Ha ha. Locusts and honey, man. Locusts and honey.

Me: Well there you go. In that scenario the world "paid" you in another way. Aint No Such Thing As A Free World-Saving. :-)

John: Well, shit. Then I want a raise!

More and more books I read on writing suggest that quantity is key at first, quality comes later. I have been itching to write lately, but unsure what I want to say.

Lately, I am finding my time occupied with science and religion. I devour several podcasts and audiobooks in my car every week while driving to and from clients' houses and the majority of them are all about science and/or religion.

I am not religious myself, by any means, but something about the various mythologies of the world fascinate me. Delving into the superstitions of a culture speaks volumes about their value systems. Just look at all the myriad different versions of Christianity that have formed over the last 2000 or so years. It seems that with each new group it comes to it receives further revisions and co-opts pieces of various other previous local beliefs before settling into it's new home. Each new version is, in some ways, barely recognizable as a relation to it's predecessors.

...I had just written a long-winded piece here about The Bible and it's cultural context at the time it was written and how it's "morals" are no morals at all, and so forth. I deleted it. It was obvious that the thought was only half-baked, and muddled at best. I truly believe what I was saying, but it was not well-supported. I need to do some more reading, and further develop that line of thinking before I can intelligibly discuss it further.

Science, and the results of research studies seem to be the other most common thing I talk about. I just learned of a new one today about wiggling fingers... er, well, an old one actually, but new to me. It has been repeated many times over the last several decades, and always the findings are the same.

The subjects of this particular study were hooked up to brain monitoring sensors (probably FMRI in the more recent studies) and told that at any time they wanted to they should wiggle their fingers. Any time at all. The curious finding was that there was a large spike in brain activity, or a "blip" that occured about one full second before each time the fingers moved. One full second! This happened every time the fingers wiggled. This might not sound interesting to you, until you think of the implications. What this seems to suggest is that the brain itself seemed to make the decision to act LONG before the conscious mind had any intention of acting.

This is troubling to both scientists and philosophers alike. If you haven't put it together by now, this revelation seems to destroy the idea of conscious free will. Your consciousness in this experiment appears more like a bystander than a primary mover, or even a participant. Where does this leave us with regard to free will? This experiment has lead to much debate on that subject.

For me, this is just another straw to throw on the poor, splintered back of the camel. Findings like this one, and many many more, lead me to the inevitable conclusion that there is, in all likelihood, almost certainly no room for a soul to possibly exist. There really is no fundamental, irreducible "you" living in your body. It's all just a delicate balance of chemicals and charges that make up who were are.

Some of you are, no doubt, dismissing that thought out of hand. If you truly took it to heart, you would despair, and so the thought is crushed without evaluation or research of your own. ignorance, for you, seems to be bliss.

As for me, ignorance is just ignorance. I'm very much okay with these ideas. The more I learn about this universe, the more connected to it I feel, the more alive I am. I'm not one of those silly people who feels moved by this revelation to ask inane questions about "If that's true, then why bother? Why go on?"

Why go on. I've heard Christians say things like that when confronted with the thought that there might not be anything else after this life. I am always incredulous when confronted by this kind of thinking, but I will answer it anyway. I will begin my reply with another question.

Is this life and this world really that mundane to you that you need fanciful stories about a magic man who lives in the sky and living forever? I find plenty in THIS world to keep me going, and in my short 29 years, I know I have barely scratched the surface of what THIS world has to offer. WHy should I waste any time and effort on another world that MIGHT or MIGHT NOT even exist? If I live to be 100 years old, I will still never know all the joys and glories that this world might offer me, and I'm not about to let some arbitrarily chosen set of rules called a religion limit me from any of them that I deem safe and good.

Art and nature alone blow my mind almost daily. I sometimes find myself moved to tears by the immense complexity and marvelous beauty of Mozart's Requiem. Or a sunset. Or even something as simple as a tree.

I don't need golden gates or winged beings in white robes, and I especially don't need imaginary demons and hellfire. This world and it's rewards and deterrents are enough for me to lead a good, just and fulfilling life. I feel sorry for those who don't feel that way; those for which the term "God-shaped hole" was coined.

No holes here, God-shaped or otherwise.

True Story

On the radio on NPR yesterday morning a correspondent began a story with the artificial radio-guy tone of voice and completely broke character in the middle because of is own exasperation. He sighed heavily, let a little of himself leak out, and then resumed the plastic radio voice like it never happened. It went a little something like this:

"And in economic news... (sigh) this recession thing is getting old... President Obama has announced blah blah blah-- "

Obviously, it didn't really end "blah blah blah, but I stopped listening at that point because I was laughing too hard.

Hummus and PETA

You've got to be friggin' kidding me. In an interview the other night, President Obama smacked a fly on his hand in an impressive Miyagi-like display of reflex and speed.

PETA made a stink about it. When I heard about it on the goofy morning radio show I was listening to, I assumed it was a joke.

Not a joke. READ HERE

Oh, David Letterman, No! No! No!

Do you remember that Simpsons Halloween Special where all the billboard characters and restaurant mascots came to life and started terrorizing the town?

Remember Paul Anka's jingle that destroyed them?

"Just don't look, just don't look!"

You deprive them of attention and you rob them of their power and they die.

WHY WHY WHY can't we all agree to do that to Sarah Palin?!

I realize that by writing this, I am sort of part of the problem, but I am only writing to be the voice of metacognition. Think about it people.

I'm referring of course to the ridiculous "feud" between Sarah Palin and David Letterman. If you don't know what I'm talking about, READ HERE.

Sarah Palin succeeded in branding herself as a the beauty pageant runner up from hell. She appeared to most of us like a crazy, Prada-wearing, gun-toting, high-functioning retarded woman from the hills. She became a laughing stock for her $100,000 clothing bills, hunting from helicopters, and public speaking skills that fall somewhere between George W Bush and THIS CHICK and in the process did more good for the Democratic party than any democrat has done in nearly a decade. Thank you Sarah.

But now, don't you see what is happening here? It's just like what Blagojevich has been trying to do. She's grabbing at any press she can get to make sure she remains relevent. She can't let us forget her. If she fades back into the Alaskan obscurity from whence she came, then she can't run for national office again in 2012. This way, she stays in our minds, and allows herself a chance to REbrand, and try again.

Jokes in poor taste are told all the time about any number of celebrities and politicians, but the $#%@ media gave credence to this stupid feud, and David Letterman caved to pressure and apologized to her, thusly rewarding and validating Palin's half-baked gripes and rewarding the stupid $#@% media that perpetuated this garbage.

But, I urge you, my fellow Americans, nay I implore you, heed the concise words of Paul Anka; Just Don't Look, Just Don't Look!

...or if you must look, never forget. Do NOT let her rebrand. When she reappears in full force somewhere between now and when the 2012 election drive really amps up (and she will) and she begins to appear different and possibly more appealing (and she will) just remember her piss poor debate showing. Remember when Katie Couric asked her to name what specific news sources she reads, and she replied "all of them." Just remember... THE HORROR

Obama Drastically Scales Back Goals For America After Visiting Denny's

People make me laugh
(myself included)

With each new convenience that we manage to contrive for ourselves comes a whole new laundry list of complications and ailments and overblown health alerts by the media.

Everybody, please say hello to CELL PHONE ELBOW

Essentially, it's a cousin of carpal tunnel, only it lives at the other end of the fore arm.

Who among us hasn't spent a little too long on their phone with an old friend catching up, and noticed a bit of stiffness and/or discomfort in their elbow? I know I've done it a time or two. But if I know I'm going to be on for a long while, I usually I have the foresight to plug in my hands free set.

Don't get me wrong, I recognize that, like carpal tunnel, this will end up being a serious problem for some people, but I think the majority of us will be just fine.

Ugh

I'm working too much. I'm tired all day, every day. I don't think very clearly lately. I'm clumsy. I'm forgetful. I'm occasionally very cranky. My occasional stutter has gotten worse. I have no energy for my own projects, let alone this blog. Most days go something like this: I get up, I go to work, I eat, I go to work, I eat again, I work some more, I go to sleep.

Once this global economic mess turns around, this schedule I'm on ends hard and fast. The mind-numbing part of it is, I'm not even really making that much money. If I could charge a decent rate, I'd be raking it in right now, paying my bills with plenty to spare. As it is I'm working my ass off, and just skating by.

I'm almost embarrassed to admit that I'm currently doing personal training IN THE CLIENTS' HOMES for $30 per visit.

Yeah, you read that right that's a three with one zero after it.

In Phoenix (in good times) I was charging double that MINIMUM, and it often was more than that. And that's just Phoenix. I was expecting to raise my rates when I moved here, but everyone's so damn gun-shy about spending right now, I didn't have much choice but to slash them down instead.

When you figure in my drive time, the cost of all the equipment that I bring, and the wear and tear on my car and gas, not to mention the IMMENSE convenience factor I'm offering to these people, $30 is chicken feed. Also, consider the cost of living here is pretty high. Just being here in this area is the largest factor in my overhead to think about.

I've been managing to juggle the last two weeks so I have one day off again, for now. We'll see how long that lasts.

Each time I start to feel a little overwhelmed by all this I start to hear the lyrics of a song from Avenue Q in my head... They sing about how everything in life is:

"...only for now! For NOW! ...only for now! For NOW!"

This too shall pass.

Funny/Scary Song About Anti-Vaccinationists

I knew these people were out there, I just didn't know Jenny McCarthy was one of them.

Funny, But True


Trekkies Bash New Star Trek Film As 'Fun, Watchable'

This new Star Trek movie elevates the tired, old franchise into something that's not just fun for a handful of nit-picky fanboys. It is just plain good fun, and great performances by all the actors.

I will say that the fact that they used time travel AGAIN got on my nerves for a second, but I ended up being okay with it when the writers used it as an opportunity to shout loud and clear to all Trekkies out there:

THIS IS AN ALTERNATE UNIVERSE, SO IT'S NOT GOING TO CONNECT WITH PREVIOUS STAR TREK STORYLINES AND IT DOES NOT HAVE TO.

I'm cool with it. Good times. 4.5 out of 5 on the Poop Scale

Coffee Talk

I am generally not a big coffee guy. I used to be, back in college, but for several years now I've made it a point to avoid caffeine in general. The joking poster above is a reality for me. If I have a strong cup of coffee, I will feel shakey. In college I relied on it heavily (and ephedrine products, before they were outlawed) to make it through my hectic schedule, but now caffeine makes me feel my pulse pounding in my chest like I just ran a 5 minute mile.

This last week I have had a few cups of java in my shiny, new LIVESTRONG THERMOS. I bought it mainly to use for hot snacks on the go (I boil water in a tea kettle, pour it in with dry oatmeal, and a couple hours later it's perfect) but I haven't been sleeping as much lately, so I have also been drinking coffee in it.

In years passed I have always been a fan of the fatty, gooey, blended, creamy coffee drinks. Frozen Frappucinos from StarBucks were heaven in a cup to me. No more. The thought of those drinks now kind of makes me queezy (sp?).

More recently I've discovered my tastes have changed and I prefer it pitch black, and ice cold. And now that I drink it without all those other distractions to the coffee taste I'm finding I'm much more selective about what I drink. I couldn't drink a black cup of StarBucks coffee anymore if you paid me. I'm loving the "light" roasts from Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf, especially the Costa Rican.

I also discovered that my favorite thing is after the coffee is gone when I refill the thermos with ice water and lemon, and it still has that slight coffee taste to it. Mmmmmmmmm.

FIT YOUR LIFE NOW DOT COM

It is still a work in progress, but take the link above to visit my brand-spanking new website for my fitness business.

In the days to come we will be adding a daily fitness blog, a testimonials page, a BIO page, a videos page, and a contact page that will include real world contact info and links to the blog and the TWITTER ACCOUNT.

I know what you're thinking. Like many of us, you are still skeptical of Twitter. I was too, until I realized the commercial potential. I can disperse tiny fitness/nutrition tips daily for free with little-to-no cost or effort. They are short and sweet, easy to digest, and hopefully just go towards furthering my reputation and reknown as a trainer. The twitter profile links to my main website, so if I pick up even a few clients from this effort, it's worth it.

As a reader on Twitter, I have no interest in reading an average person's day-to-day tweets. "Doing crossword puzzles" or "going to bed now" doesn't interest me one bit, but there are some great news organizations/intellectuals/magazines that post several interesting and useful pieces of info and links per day.

There is a giant conversation going on, and for most of us, listening is where Twitter shines through. Read THIS ARTICLE for more. He says what I'm saying, much more eloquently and persuasively.

I don't know whether to laugh at how ridiculous some people can be, or cry because there are people who really think and talk this way.

This new tactic of making it sound as though pushing for gay marriage rights actually takes rights away from straight people is particularly shocking. I hadn't heard that argument before. The sad thing is, I'm sure it will be compelling to people who were previously apathetic or on the fence about it.

Ugh. I look forward to the day when I can mention my friends Danny and Marshall, the married couple, in mixed company and not receive looks of shock and disgust.