Things that piss me off

Now that I am officially 30, I’ve decided to undertake my first curmudgeon act. I’m starting a “things that piss me off” category on my blog. So, without further ado, these are the things that have pissed me off since I turned old yesterday:

Your camera phone. Listen, the resolution sucks, the screen is 1” wide, and you’re not going to ever look at those pictures again. Moreover, since you’ve concentrated on taking the picture, you’ve psychologically told your brain that it’s ok to forget about whatever it was that you were taking a picture of. So stop fucking taking pictures, you look like a tool and it’s actually making you dumber.

Your voice on that phone. What the fuck is wrong with you people? Your phone can only transmit at one decibel level of volume. So no matter how loudly you speak, it will always sound the same on the other side. All that happens when you yell into your phone is piss off those of us who have to listen to your idiotic ranting. Anyone screaming into a cell phone should have said phone inserted into their left nostril.

Your children. Listen, I don’t like your children. You may find little Cody cute, but to me he’s a 40 pound, caffeinated, prescription junkie that just ran head first into my knee on a Ritalin and Mountain Dew high that makes lifetime meth addicts jealous. Either control your child or I’ll hire a British nanny to shake him.

Your wordy clothing. Who the fuck started this stupid trend and when will it die? It’s just like that trucker hat fad, except slightly less down-syndrome because we have to assume that you had to be able to read to buy the shirt. I don’t know why the rebellious youth of today decided that labeling themselves was a good idea, but they were wrong. Labels are for losers. Adding a label to yourself defines who you are into that statement. You might as well have one that says, ‘I think I would make a good addition to a large crowd’. Also, ‘Juicy’ is not something you should let your 12 year old daughter have written across her ass. Instead, it should just say ‘Sexual Predator Delight’.

PS If you’re wearing the word ‘Guess’ across your tits, I’m going to go ahead and guess they're fake.

Birthday Boy

There comes a time when you should stop expecting other people to make a big deal about your birthday. That time is age eleven.

Who will you cry for when they die?

I was looking though some of my old Kurt Vonnegut books this past weekend and realized that he turned 84 this year and that he is mortal. And as all mortal men, he will someday die, and probably not to far off with that nasty smoking habit of his. This made me very sad, because I really like him and will miss him when he is gone.

So here is my question to you: Not counting family members, loved ones, and pets, who will you shed a tear for when they pass?

I will cry when Kurt Vonnegut dies. So it goes.

“A purpose of human life, no matter who is controlling it, is to love whoever is around to be loved.”

Is it wrong that I don't care?

Today’s headlines are all about Iran, Syria, Lebanon and Whateveristan and I’m having a hard time really giving a flying rat’s ass. Sure, I know, instability in the Middle East, thousands of people dieing, yadda yadda yadda… But really, hasn’t this part of the world been going through something like this on some level every couple of years for the last couple thousand years? These people can do nothing but throw rocks at each other with the only difference ever coming in the technology of the rocks and how they’re thrown.

So really, why should I give a shit? And if I do give a shit, take a full interest, and watch the events unfold and come to a conclusion – isn’t all of this going to just happen again in a couple of years? Isn’t the extent of these primitive peoples existence to throw pooh at each other in the name of Allah?

I love the English language.

Communication is what makes us intellectual beings. If lines of communication are open and logical enough, any possible inspiration, intention, or idea is able to move from one individual to another. So the higher level of communicatory ability you poses, the better the chance you have of getting the exact thought in your mind across to someone else. This allows you to further stretch your mind and expand its possibilities through exterior stimulation and more freely flowing internal operation.

Recently while working on both conversational Latin and Spanish, I came to the conclusion that I am an English language snob. English, for all of its confusion and bizarre rules, is the most flexible and descriptive language ever derived. Just look at it in comparison to the other languages in the Western World: French has 100,000 words in common use; German has 184,000 in common use; and the English language has over 200,000 words in common use. But the thing that really separates English from every other language is the astonishing fact that there are over 650,000 words that CAN be used. In other words, English is the language of options.

Watch as I exercise my literary pleasance by describing, in an otherwise proscribed way, of how my lubricious wife always truckles under to my proclivity for her carnal genuflection, whether it’s because she is my myrmidon or for simple love, all using doggerel content, hopefully loquacious enough not to offend.

Wasn’t that the most tortuously complicated and beautifully dirty sentence ever!

For all of its idiosyncrasies, English is the most potentially descriptive language ever created. And I for one, plan to spend the rest of my life learning how to utilize English communication to its fullest.

I wonder if they'll increase the minimum wage when it passes the price of a gallon of gas

Fun with numbers:

According to the US Energy Information Administration:
In 2001 the average price of a regular gallon of gas nationwide was $1.14.
In 2005 the average price of a regular gallon of gas nationwide was $2.31

That is an increase of 202% over 4 years. Given that we can assume the same historical increases; the price of one gallon of gas will exceed the minimum wage of $5.15 in year 2010.

More fun:

According to the 2004 US Census:
The average commute nationwide is 24.4 minutes and 15 miles one direction or 48.8 minutes and 30 miles round trip for one day of work.

According to the Department of Transportation:
The average vehicle nationwide gets 21 miles per gallon.

According to the Energy Information Administration:
The July 17, 2006 national average of gallon of regular gas was $2.99.

So it takes longer for an employee making minimum wage and using all of the national averages less time to commute to work then to make up the money to pay for that commute.

Work shown:
30 miles/21mpg = 1.428571 gallons of gas for a single day commute
1.428571 x $2.99 = $4.27 dollars for one day commute
$4.27/$5.15 = .8291216 or 83% of an hour to pay for commute
60 minutes an hour x .8291216 = 50 minutes of work to pay for the commute

Yet even more fun:

According to the National Tax Foundation:
The average national tax percentage is 31.6%

According to the US Department of Labor:
The average national work week is 42 hours

So the average minimum wage worker, with the national average commute and the national average taxes taken into account, and not taken into account is the Earned Income Tax Credit because that is money refunded once a year and is not applicable to weekly expenses, takes home $126.18 a week.

Work shown:
42 hours a week x .316 percentage of tax = 13 hours 14 minutes per week to pay for taxes.
50 minutes to pay for commute x 5 days = 4 hours and 15 minutes
13 hours and 14 minutes + 4 hours and 15 minutes = 17 hours and 29 minutes
42 hours – 17 hours and 29 minutes = 24 hours and 31 minutes
24 hours and 31 minutes x $5.15 = $126.18

Sources:
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/oog/ftparea/wogirs/xls/pswrgvwaf.xls
www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/american_community_survey_acs/001695.html
www.gao.gov/decisions/majrule/d03675r.htm
http://www.taxfoundation.org/files/sr140.pdf
http://www.bls.gov/schedule/archives/empsit_nr.htm

I wonder if they'll increase the minimum wage when it passes the price of a gallon of gas

Fun with numbers:

According to the US Energy Information Administration:
In 2001 the average price of a regular gallon of gas nationwide was $1.14.
In 2005 the average price of a regular gallon of gas nationwide was $2.31

That is an increase of 202% over 4 years. Given that we can assume the same historical increases; the price of one gallon of gas will exceed the minimum wage of $5.15 in year 2010.

More fun:

According to the 2004 US Census:
The average commute nationwide is 24.4 minutes and 15 miles one direction or 48.8 minutes and 30 miles round trip for one day of work.

According to the Department of Transportation:
The average vehicle nationwide gets 21 miles per gallon.

According to the Energy Information Administration:
The July 17, 2006 national average of a gallon of regluar gas is $2.99.

So it takes longer for an employee making minimum wage and using all of the national averages less time to commute to work then to make up the money to pay for that commute.

Work shown:
30 miles/21mpg = 1.428571 gallons of gas for a single day commute
1.428571 x $2.99 = $4.27 dollars for one day commute
$4.27/$5.15 = .8291216 or 83% of an hour to pay for commute
60 minutes an hour x .8291216 = 50 minutes of work to pay for the commute

Yet even more fun:

According to the National Tax Foundation:
The average national tax percentage is 31.6%

According to the US Department of Labor:
The average national work week is 42 hours

So the average minimum wage worker, with the national average commute and the national average taxes taken into account, and not taken into account is the Earned Income Tax Credit because that is money refunded once a year and is not applicable to weekly expenses, takes home $126.18 a week.

Work shown:
42 hours a week x .316 percentage of tax = 13 hours 14 minutes per week to pay for taxes.
50 minutes to pay for commute x 5 days = 4 hours and 15 minutes
13 hours and 14 minutes + 4 hours and 15 minutes = 17 hours and 29 minutes
42 hours – 17 hours and 29 minutes = 24 hours and 31 minutes
24 hours and 31 minutes x $5.15 = $126.18

Sources:
http://tonto.eia.doe.gov/oog/ftparea/wogirs/xls/pswrgvwaf.xls
www.census.gov/Press-Release/www/releases/archives/american_community_survey_acs/001695.html
www.gao.gov/decisions/majrule/d03675r.htm
http://www.taxfoundation.org/files/sr140.pdf
http://www.bls.gov/schedule/archives/empsit_nr.htm

Local Putz Sends in Resume to Satirical News Source because his Friends ‘Think He’s Funny’

July 17, 2006

Roswell, GA –Roswell resident Brian Hamilton blindly sent in his resume this week to the satirical news source The Onion because his friends thought he was funny on Wednesday night while mocking the Channel 5 News story of a local bridge that had washed out.

“Dude, he was just on a roll,” friend Jeffery (Jeff) Kettle said, “he had me rolling on the floor laughing so hard I thought that a piece of sausage from my meatlovers pizza was about to come out of my nose”.

His decision to submit the resume came on the heals of his recently unsuccessful bid to gain employment at a local temp firm. When reached for comment, the temp firm’s executive assistant Margie Roberts said, “Yeah, I thought he was kinda funny. But funny just wasn’t what our client was looking for at the time. I mean, who really cares if the office temp in accounting is funny or not. Besides, no one wants to be seen talking to the temp unless theyre hot," adding quickly, "which he wasn't".

In addition to the other night, Brian’s friends have thought he was funny on a couple other occasions. He has been lauded for his numerous humorous attempts, including a particular instance where he imitated a local gentleman who fell down with a whole tray of food in his hands while trying to return to his table at The Golden Corral. In that situation Brian was observed to be “unexpectedly entertaining”.

When reached for comment, Scott Dikkers, Editor-in-Chief of The Onion, responded, “Look, we get like 100 resumes a day for people wanting to work here - and frankly, we don’t read any of them. On our website clearly says that we don’t hire people that way. So Mr. Whoever can either check our jobs section or apply the same way as the rest of my staff applied: by trapping, presenting and sacrificing a hobo to me in the name of the Egyptian god Bes”.

Asked if Brian stood a chance at gaining employment at The Onion his friend Steven said, “I don’t know man. I mean, he was funny and all – but Jeff and I were pretty stoned at the time. And, like, how many of the readers of that magazine are stoned when they read it?”.

When asked what he would do if The Onion did not see it in their best interest to hire him Brian commented, "I'll head back to that temp place. I think that chick there thought I was hot".

Good morning, I'd like to have an argument, please.

Religion and myth are the reflection of the society and a compass for the direction in which they move.

Right now in America the Christian faith has become a social organization in which like-minded people can come together and learn how to judge each other. Their faith has become an assemblage where they learn the modern, acceptable ways to be bigoted, intolerant, and justified.

The average American Christian will deny this, but when you ask them about select social issues their true beliefs will come shinnying through in all of their fanatical glory. The true shame of it is that the next generation of Christians will also believe that hate and intellectual ignorance are true family values.

Religion and myth is what holds the intellectually lazy, fearful, or lonely to a path of action. And since it is so easy to change any religion or myth, the path can be easily skew towards whatever means is needed at that moment. The safety net to this course correction is in the fact that people believe that the message divine or infallible (“Oceania had always been at war with Eurasia”).

So that is the reflection of where we are as a culture right now: Spoiled, conceited, and blissfully ignorant (and we like it that way).

It will change soon, the pendulum swings both ways and will come back towards center before people can get much more fanatical. Thank Whatever that we as a society can't stick to one thing for very long.

Here is my open question: Are we to a communicational point in history where it is unreasonable to conceive of a holy war propagated for reason solely of divine value?

PS Feel free to argue anything I’ve written. I would actually like to be proven wrong on many of my points.

PPS Iraq was done for lots of reasons.. ….one might be religious, but that reason is waaaay down the list. It probably falls somewhere below Halliburton and “He tried to kill my Daddy”.

There is an inner joke here somewhere...

The businessman dragged himself home and barely made it to his chair before he dropped, exhausted.

His sympathetic wife was right there with a tall cool drink and a comforting word.

"My, you look tired," she said. "You must have had a hard day today.

What happened to make you so exhausted?"

"It was terrible," her husband said, "The computer broke down and all of us had to do our own thinking."

Entry for July 06, 2006

Have you ever wondered what would happen if there were no hypothetical situations?

Televised Fireworks Should Only be shown on CSPAN

The wife and I went to the local firework this evening, so we were home in time to see most of the nationally televised firework shows - and I have to say that every single fucking one of them missed the point. Each show kept panning across from the crowd to the sky, showing a smiling, gazing, blonde woman, or a spinning child completely oblivious to the large explosions directly above their head.

Personally, I could give two ant shits (assuming ant’s shit) about the scenery, the blonde, or the damn kid. All I want to see is crap exploding in the sky with cheesy, overly-dramatic, patriotic songs poorly strung together in the background.

So tomorrow I would like all of the congressman who read my blog (I know you’re out there Orrin Hatch) to introduce a bill to specify that only CSPAN can cover firework shows. One camera, pointed, aimed, unhosted and unmoved. Any other channels are welcome to get a feed from them – but are prohibited from running a ticker along the bottom, adding their huge logo blocking a chunk of the screen or showing any of those damn promos where people popup in the corner of the screen advertising for whatever comes on next.

Any violation will not result in a fine. Instead, for each infringement a program executive from the violating station will be tied to a rocket set shot into the heavens during the next firework show. And hopefully, you’ll be able to see them in full explosive color live on CSPAN.

Superman

So we went and saw Superman this weekend and I feel I need to share a few things.

1. I love comic book, popcorn, big budget movies - Im a complete sucker for them. No matter how intelligent I become, how old I get, or how mature I think I am, I will always love a good superhero movie.


2. Superman is the best superhero ever. Period. Why? Because Superman stands alone. Superman did not become Superman, Superman was born Superman. When Superman wakes up in the morning, he is Superman. His alter ego is Clark Kent. His outfit with the big red S is the blanket he was wrapped in as a baby when the Kents found him. Those are his clothes. What Kent wears, the glasses the business suit, that's the costume. That's the costume Superman wears to blend in with us. Clark Kent is how Superman views us. And what are the characteristics of Clark Kent? He's weak, unsure of himself... he's a coward. Clark Kent is Superman's critique on the whole human race.


3. Go see this movie. Its big, long and does a good job picking up speed as it goes. Moreover, its nice to see what we as a country attempt to embody. The Superman on the big screen always saves the day; we can only wish to look that good in tight cloths. We as a country have always aspired to be Superman and have (and will) always fall short of every incarnation of the man of steel (Nietzsche's included). But I dont believe it is in the failing but in the trying that matters. As long as we as a people aspire to be honest, noble, and benevolent in our lives then we all become a little bit of Superman. Now if we could only learn to fly...

Entry for July 02, 2006

Once I thought to be human was the highest aim a man could have, but I see now that it was meant to destroy me. Today I am proud to say that I am inhuman, that I belong not to men and governments, that I have nothing to do with creeds and principles. I have nothing to do with the creaking machinery of humanity – I belong to the earth. I say that lying on my pillow and I can feel the horns spouting from my temples.

Beer Braised BBQ Pork Butt (Shoulder or Picnic or Shoulder Roast or Shoulder Butt)

The Butt of a pig is actually the shoulder area through mid front calf. There is a lot of fat and connective tissue, which results in moist, succulent meat after many hours of cooking. Shoulder is the shoulder and Picnic is the part in-between the shoulder and the calf of the animal. Either will work. Picnic is usually a little fattier and cheaper. Both portions, however, are inexpensive.

Pulled pork, which is what this recipe is called in the South, is an absolute beauty of a BBQ if done right. This recipe is easy to follow, cheap, and delicious.

For the dry rub:
1 tablespoons salt
About 40 grinds black pepper
2 tablespoons chili powder
1 tablespoon garlic powder
2 teaspoons ground coriander
2 teaspoons ground mustard seed
12 ounces good ale or dark beer, Warsteiner works best
4 cloves garlic, chopped
1 5-pound pork butt (shoulder of the animal) .

Trim the skin and majority of the easily removable excess fat off of the meat. Don’t be too careful, most of it will cook off.

Combine rub ingredients in a bowl and mix well. Rub all over pork butt. Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate for at least three hours and as long as overnight (do not exceed 10 hours or meat will become too salty).

Preheat oven to 500 degrees F. Unwrap pork and place in a roasting pan with sides about 2 inches high. Cook 45 minutes until dark browned and even blackening in places. Remove from oven. Lower oven to 325 degrees F. Pour beer over the top and add chopped garlic around the pork. Cover tightly with heavy duty aluminum foil or twice with regular foil. Poke about 10 holes all over the top of the foil. Cook pork butt 2 1/2 hours longer until so tender that it comes away very easily from center bone.

Place the meat on a plate and pour the pan juice (there will be plenty) into a saucepan. To the pan juices add:

1/2 cup ketchup
2 tablespoons regular Dijon mustard
3 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce
1/3 cup dark brown sugar
1/4 cup apple cider vinegar

Bring to a simmer until reduced by half and thick, about 20 minutes.

While the sauce is boiling down, pull apart the pork with 2 forks.

Serve either on a plate with the sauce on the side (or over the top) or on a bun with the sauce on top.

Enjoy!