For Georgia

Memo to car salesman

MEMORANDUM

TO: Car Salesmen Everywhere
FROM: tpgal
RE: Back Off

This memo is to inform you that it is no longer 1950.  When you sell a car to a couple you are selling it to both parties and you must not assume the woman is a feeble minded moron who needs your assistance understanding how to operate the vehicle.

You should also know that when you call to follow up and the client tells you that they are in the car, with their wife and that they are using the bluetooth hands-free telephone feature that EVERYONE IN THE CAR CAN HEAR YOU.  When you offer your assistance to Mrs. L to answer any questions she may have about  the car, Mrs. L can HEAR YOU.

Please also know that it is not necessary to offer that assistance again in a hand written letter that you mail one week after the purchase, nor is it required to leave lengthy phone messages on the home phone.  You can stop emailing and calling.  WE UNDERSTAND HOW TO USE THE CAR.

I am providing you fair and legal warning that if you show up on my doorstep to offer to show me how to use the car I will take a rake from my garage and use it to impale you in my garden.  You will be a scarecrow for all door to door solicitors for the entire holiday season.    You may even be adorned for the various holidays.

It may have seemed like we were from another era, or that I am dim witted because on the day we bought the car we split the duties.  Jason went to the 'car store' and endured the first two and a half hours of negotiations on his own and I showed up with the baby for the last hour.  Trust me, we did it this way because we are smart.  I came as the relief pitcher at the end to close the deal.  I understood the terms and the complicated math.

I have had less contact with the pediatrician after the birth of my child than I have had with this "nice" salesperson.  Trust me, a baby is far more complicated to operate than a hybrid car.

You got your commission, now get out of our lives.

"It was too much sad!"

Before you watch this clip know two things.... 1) there is an advertisement in it and 2) it GIVES AWAY THE ENDING to the movie Timothy Green.

I suspected it was a tear jerker all along, but this is hilarious:



I'm going to hell because I laughed until I cried.

...ok

I'm getting about 3 comments a day from various spammers.  One in particular caught my eye because it is in Russian.  I was curious, so I translated it.  I'm not sure they totally understand the art of the 'sell', but I'm in!




We invite you to the social financial network MMM-2012 SP Mavrodi.
MMM-2011 has successfully worked with in January 2011, that is 18 months.
Now there is an opportunity to be at the forefront of a new project MMM-2012
especially for those who regretted that had not previously joined the MMM-2011.
We often put off things for later, start hunting tomorrow zarabatvat money, sports,
all procrastinate and put off, as here, the time flies, pyramid lives had entered, had received
profit, just sit down and think about whether you are ready to change their lives towards financial independence?
To be independent from the authorities, crises and vykidonov officials. Make up your mind.
And so.
There is a demand deposit of 30% per month and deposits of up to 75% per month.
Save more! Entered into our cell, and investing in a month, get 55% a month!
Terms check with your foreman after registration.
Every man for himself even decide whether or not to join the MMM-2012, it is your choice.
MMM-2012 is a pyramid scheme, founded on the social relationships of people, there is no single point of
funds are distributed among the participants. We have a lot!

Scary

I'm not sure what is worse, Putin or almost spotting this man's putin?

Some silly baby videos

The Swinger


Lately, Lucy has been very busy in the morning.  Jas & I are not ready to get out of bed yet, but she's got stuff to do.  This morning she was all about the trash bin on my side of the bed.



Here's an oldie - from 5 months old.  Seriously, she's just laying there doing nothing, but she's so small...


Jump back to this week.  She's playing with the Lego toys.


Last night she had a temper tantrum because I took the pacifier away.  There is a video of her in the bathtub screaming and wailing.  It isn't cute and therefore it isn't posted.  There's also a rather vivid shot of her "brittney spears" and it seems wrong to broadcast that across the internet so early.

However, I've saved the best one for last.  This last video makes me laugh out loud.

I feel dizzaaay

Judge Much!?

I'm cruising Facebook while I eat dinner tonight (on the road) and am reading the Chinookville group for a usually sweet look into the little area I grew up in. Normally posts are folks looking to buy, sell, or trade goods and services. Tonight I spotted a question "Does anyone know where to rent a space for a baby shower and how far ahead to book?"

As I read through the replies it became clear that the gal posing the question is the soon to be mama (which is a slight breach of social rules) and that she wants to wait until AFTER graduation. Um...her graduation.

Teen pregnancy isn't a scandal, or unfortunately unusual, but I hope to not be a Grammy when Lucy is seventeen. But, if she does come home with a bun in the oven you can bet your bippy she won't be planning her OWN baby shower.

More weddings!

Oh I love a good wedding and with a few perplexing exceptions, my wonderful and delightful friends are paired up and wedding season seems to be waning in my world. (To all the single ladies in the world, I know of the last, smart, witty, fun, single and caring man on earth... give me a call and I'll assess your worthiness for an introduction.)  He's a straight as the day is long, so any of you single guys out there have to keep looking.

Any-who... back to my point.  The local news lately is filled with what I see as progress in our state.  I'm talking about the historic votes to allow all couples, regardless of gender makeup to marry.  Unless something drastic happens it will pass the next legislative step and then the Governor will sign the bill into law.  It's a darned complicated process but I'm rather excited about it.

I'm sure the signing into law won't be the end of it, there will be people who will sue, those that will suggest that a law won't be valid unless its voted on by the citizens of our state, but I say 'whooie!'  We elected the folks in Olympia and their work stands for us all - just because you don't like it doesn't make it wrong.  My dad taught me that.  It was a blinding lesson in reality, where he told me to "want in one want and spit in the other and see which one gets full first."  I had to test that theory about five times before I really figured out that wanting wasn't all that productive.  I also learned that a handful of spit wiped on the couch will get you sent to your room.

I know plenty of people who feel with the most deepest of convictions that homosexuality is a sin and that allowing these 'sinners' to marry is an affront to the foundations of marriage.  I don't agree, but I respect their right to believe that way.  I also respect their right to pick and choose which parts of the bible to follow.  Rules such as if you rape a woman and she isn't married you have to marry her.  We don't stand by that one... or the penalty for adultery being death by stoning.  Other non-practical rules, such as crop rotation have been clearly moved aside as not relevant to our modern society, and I doubt that all priests still don special undergarments when they approach the alter, lest the die of guilt (that's in Exodus, and thank you Google for a fruitful search of absurd Bible laws.)  I don't discount that many modern churches and religious organizations still call homosexuality a sin.  That is fine, for them.

Churches and religious organizations can (and should) lead their people according to their beliefs and interpretations of Gods (or whomever) divine law.  Those teachings however should not extend to how laws are crafted in our modern, religiously free society.  Who is to say that YOUR view of God is the same as mine or that it is more relevant or more right?  Basing laws on a specific moral code is not acceptable in our modern civil government.  Sure, thou shalt not kill has wormed its way into our legal system, but come on, when you murder someone you trample their civil rights just a bit.  It's not only an infringement of their ability to dine at McDonalds but also ties back to the 10 commandments.  However, we have not created laws that can result in capital punishment for all the commandments.   I can find no civil code to prohibit anyone from envying their neighbor or their hot wife.

I support the rights of  Churches to opt in or out of performing, supporting, condemning or endorsing same sex unions.  They can deem me a sinner all day long for my support for that matter.  However, the State (a non-religious based entity) should not participate in mandated discrimination of any kind.

The argument that a same sex union harms the fabric of or society, the basis of families or will impact the marriage of anyone else is (again I say) whooie!  There have been gay couples for ages and it hasn't really harmed anyone, or impacted the fabric of society.  I would argue that the feeling that these people should stay closeted or that it's ok to bully gay kids or anyone) has done more harm than loving acceptance would have done.    Just as a sham marriage between two complete strangers or celebrities has no impact on my world, a union between two women in Yakima would have zero impact on me.    That's not entirely true, if I knew them, and was invited to the wedding I might spend some money on a new dress, a wedding gift or two and maybe a hotel room.  That is a positive impact to our economy, that's not a bad thing.

The fight isn't over, the discussion will go on for a while, but hopefully it will be resolved once and for all and we can move on to bigger and more important things.

By the way, I was trying to look up a statistic that would support a statement I thought I wanted to make about most serial killers being heterosexual males and accidentally downloaded a rather large PowerPoint presentation from Radford University entitled "Serial Killers".  Should anyone important be monitoring my online activity I'm  not doing research for extra curricular activities. Turns out, the report makes no reference to sexuality other than to note that serial killers have a higher rate of sexual abuse in their past than the rest of the population.  Since consenting adult sexual behavior isn't abuse the point is irrelevant.    Point to note, abuse and dismembering of animals is a VERY strong indicator of future deviant behavior and should be taken VERY SERIOUSLY.

Don't take my picture, help me!!!

Poor Lucy... she was exploring all the nooks and crannies at grandmas house and decided to try to crawl between the two arm chairs. It was a terrible fail, as she couldn't move forward and couldn't back out. Instead of rescuing her immediately, I grabbed my camera.

I'm glad that grandma was right there because I did have to lift one of the chairs to free her and it required a second pair of hands.  Lucy survived, but I doubt she'll ever view the garbage compactor scene in Star Wars without a faint traumatic memory.

Ammusing (at least to me)

This is an edited comment thread from an online article about good email signatures.  It devolved very quickly to general grammar.  I think 'robert' is my favorite.


1. amin :  What a signature shouldn’t do” part is very obvious, ofcource we never put a moving object or so on down there, however maybe its for new comers or fresh users.

o mrsELB :   Trust me, it’s still necessary to go over this. I work with some people – all with advance degrees – who continue to type messages in all caps. I’ve told them it’s rude to do that. They continue to do it, so I refuse to answer them and they still can’t figure out why.

 joe:    THANKS FOR THE HEADS-UP!

2. April :   The replies on this site would suggest a story (or class) on spelling and grammar.

o Keith : lol, I agree…perhaps some subject-verb agreement lessons are also in order. @ Scott, I think you’re right because many of the people I work with, epecially, many of the executives are on a serious ego trip and have the most ridiculous signatures to match!

 kris :   Hummm, it is NOT “lol”~’laugh out loud’, it is “laugh aloud”, if you REALLY want to be correct. But does that seem to matter to any one other than my dearly departed mother?! Seems not…


3. Caroline :   One common mistake people make is forgetting that “an” not “a” goes before a word starting with a vowel.

o Allan :   To tecnical for me lol

 Abby : *Too technical…

o robert:  And before dialing a long distance number make sure you put an one before it.

 Dorene :  Too Funny!

4. R. Walker : Agreed. Another common mistake people make is forgetting that everyone isn’t as computer- literate or self-righteous as they are. Comment on the topic and sign off, for goodness sake!

9/11 +10 years

We all remember that terrible day.  For me it started with a phone call from a friend urging me to turn on the news.  I stood there in disbelief on a beautiful September morning and watched NBC coverage.  When the first tower came down I felt the breath of life leave my soul for a moment.  That sounds silly and dramatic, but I knew as the cloud of the building exploded that lives were gone in that exact second.  

Needing to "do" something I called my parents (the late sleepers) to spread the word.  Then, I did what many of us did that day, I got on the bus and went to work.   I remember the drive into the city being extremely quiet, but it wasn't clear to me if anyone knew what had happened.  No one was talking about it, but the riders on my bus route weren't especially friendly with each other. 

At work that day, we watched news coverage all day and as the "security" team (information security, not physical) we made plans for what we would do if the attacks continued.  While I was on a "high floor" in our building we were not the tallest building in the city and there was no direct flight path towards us, so we were assured that even if Seattle was under attack that our little 30 story building would not be the target.  However, for the first time ever, all building occupants had to show ID to even get to the elevators and by the next day there were barriers that would prevent a car from driving into the lobby.  (Those protections were removed within a week.)

For weeks after the attacks, while people were singing that irritating Lee Greenwood song and driving around with huge American Flags billowing out of their gas guzzling 4x4 trucks I had dreams of the floor of the building where I worked disintegrating from under my feet. 

Later that year, or possibly the next year we hired a new senior manager who said something along the lines of "You west coast people couldn't possibly have felt the impact of the attacks the way we east coast people did."  I have rarely been that offended by a casual comment, but that sentiment still bothers me.  First of all, I'm aware that I didn't experience it the way people on the ground did, but someone in Boston or Virginia watched it on TV just as much as we did.    However, the likelihood of knowing someone who had died was far higher. 

Now, ten years later it is history.  My friend Dave, a middle school teacher, educated his students on the topic.  There are youngsters who don't know what happened and for them, I guess that's a nice thing not to know or understand.  (Although, can we really understand it?)  He said he got choked up talking about his experiences on that day, and I guess most of us have a personal memory.  In time it will be an event like Pearl Harbor, history.

Our government structure is just as disjointed and adversarial as it was before the attacks, we're still polarized on issues that on September 12th, didn't matter.  We're fighting a war on "terror".  I can't really think of anything less concrete to fight about - maybe fashion no no's.  There's no way to win....and given that fact, how do you stop 'fighting'?  Do we pack up our tanks and just go home, or declare "mission accomplished" right before election season and call it a day? 

Are we better off spending our billions and billions of war dollars on our weak economy?  Maybe saving half and then spending half to pay down our trillion dollar debt that a group of investors in China hold?  Someday, China will come asking for their money and our statement of "I would have paid you, but I needed to start a new war in BlahKickistan and Oilville."  isn't going to cut it.  I do find it interesting that we are so in debt to China and think of them as a (financial) ally but where are they in the war on terror?  Seems to me, that they are quietly sitting back and waiting for the "US super power" to spend itself into oblivion. 

It's a crazy complicated world and my opinions matter little.  I vote, I work with my family to have a savings, I felt optimistic enough about our world to bring a new person into existence.  I wish a happy future for her and hope to arm her with fiscal responsibility, critical thinking and enough love to overcome the sometimes dim and dark way that we humans treat each other.   Some day Lucy will learn about 9/11 and I'm sure it will feel as distant to her as the Pearl Harbor attack felt to me as a child.  Maybe that is a good thing. I wish peace for our world, comfort for the families of 9/11 and for the military families. I hope there is a peaceful afterlife and those 2,977 innocent people (and even the nineteen misguided men) were instantly freed from the pain and horrific manor of their deaths. 

I hope we learned something that day.

Sunnyvale Dance Party



Disco Pete



I was in San Jose this week and my co-worker and I ventured out to Sunnyvale for dinner. Turns out it was a summer concert night. The street was blocked off and all the locals were out with their lawn chairs.  Apparently, Sunnyvale is where the older population of silicon valley go to unwind...  thankfully the music was great!

Disco Pete brought his bedazzled roller skates and (unplugged) guitar to wow the crowd with his skating ability.   At one point I saw him "do the splits", but at his age it involved dropping to his knees, putting both hands on the ground, sliding one leg behind him and then with a lot of effort straightening the front leg as far as he could go.  It was not the fluid skate into the splits position that I'm sure he was able to do in his 20's.

Now I know it is WRONG to mock the aged because I will get my turn at the Geriatric Disco Party if I'm lucky.   I will say that these folks had a great time and were likely home in bed at a respectful 7:30 pm.    If you watch the video you'll also hear that the band (Tortilla Soup) was pretty good. 



A sample of the locals enjoying the show.



A cake I promise never to buy

Um...

There's a trend in Internet advertising where it seems the advertisers are pulling random photos of real people from somewhere (facebook perhaps?) for to help sell their goods. This particular ad grouping struck me as funny. The buff grandpa is well matched for the add, but the VERY large toothless lady to promote a wrinkle removal solution is odd. I've tried the gain as much weight as you can to fill out the skin to avoid wrinkles but it just simply doesn't work.

Lastly, I wonder what the secret to a good night sleep wtih the lady in the last picture could be? I didn't know that motorboating had a sleep inducing effect on people.

The other trend is to pull key words from your profile or email discussion and fine tune the advertisements to "you". This doesn't actually work when, for example, you have a former employer listed who went out of business in a firey flame ball - "Hey current Washington Mutual employees, get discounts on cars now!" Er... maybe the back end logic of that system is flawed.

Get a life!

 Dear moms of "toddlers and tiaras",

Get a life you are scarring your children and scaring the rest of us.

Your dolled up child needs to be a kid and sexing it up for the camera and the judges is creepy and wrong.

What kind of message are you teaching your little girls?  Beauty is not about hair and makeup it is about kindness and love.

I'm disgusted.

Weiners, Liars & Cheaters...oh my

Boys, boys, boys...

Get it together, and by that I mean keep it in your pants!  This simple advice was called out to my prom date as we left his house my senior year.  It didn't make me feel like a princess, but the advice was reasonable.  There are times when you have no business showing your business to others. 

I know, it can be confusing to know when and where certain behaviors are allowed so I've laid out what I think is common sense that might be helpful to you:

1) If you're married and the person you want to show your business to is not your wife or your doctor... the answer is NO.

2) Unless you're being paid to be in a quality magazine like "The Dicks of Capital Hill" don't photograph your penis.

3) Unless it is your only source of income never EVER post images of your penis on the Internet.

4) If you think what you're about to do could cost you your job, that is a strong CLUE that you shouldn't do it.

5) If you have to hide from the media, this is another CLUE you're on the wrong path.

6) If the Onion.com is writing articles about you, you have already screwed up.

7) If you're married and you meet someone who turns your soul on fire, deal with your wife FIRST.  If this new thing is true love, it will still be there after you respectfully deal with the woman who has stood next to you during events like the death of your child.  (You're a slimy douche bag John!)  Word to the wise Miss thing...if he's willing to knock you up while his wife is unaware, don't expect him home for dinner every night.  I think the "once a cheater, always a cheater" line might actually be sound information.

8) If you're a Republican and FOX news is calling you a douche bag you've gone to far.  The same is true for MSNBC and you Democrats. 

9) If you've commented on the morals of others as part of your campaign platform then you should refrain from having sex with the maid, sleeping with your photographer or twittering pictures of your pee pee.  

10)  There is no such thing as discretion when having sexual encounters with anyone but your committed partner. 

Bonus Point  11)  It doesn't matter how 'important' you are, if the woman says no or you have to force the issue it is RAPE.  They teach that rule pretty early here in the US and I thought it was a similar understanding in other civilized parts of the world.  By the way, attacking the character of the woman you've (allegedly) sexually assaulted is a dirty play.  She cleans toilets for a living, do you really expect us to believe that she's running an on the side call girl business? 


So, do you want to know who I think is classy?  Al and Tipper Gore.  They sadly ended their marraige without any (credible) evidence of wrong doing.  They announced together that they were done being married and then both quietly moved on to their own personal lives and we don't have to hear about it.  While I hope they both have new hot lovers making them eggs in the morning, I hope we NEVER have to hear about it.

The rest of you...well, like Danny's dad said:

KEEP IT IN YOUR PANTS!

Yes, I'm calling you cheap!

I heard a story the other day about someone who bought a Groupon (an Internet coupon that they sell to multiple people for things like "$20 in gift certificates to McDonalds for $10) and wanted to use it with a friend.  This person 'charged' their friend half the price of the coupon to join them for lunch.  

I get that the coupon cost money, but if I decided I wanted to eat at McDonalds under this half price thing and wanted you to join me, you can bet your Bippus that I wouldn't be charging you to join me.  I might not share my coupon but if I did it would be my treat. 

It would be a different story if there was a discussion about the coupon before the purchase.  The "do you want to go in together on this" is different than "I bought it, you owe me $5."

It reminds me of a former college roommate I had who totally flipped out over how the bills were divided.  Believe me it was not simple math to divide the phone bill into what was fair for the three of us - identify the long distance charges, the taxes on those charges, the costs of local service and the taxes on the local service.  I tell you this so you're aware that we were on so much of a budget that there would be arguments over who dialed directory service.  (This was before the Internet.)

Inevitably there was a penny difference when dividing utility bills and this roommate bitched one month that she "always paid the extra penny" on the power bill.  In my memory of how this conversation went down I believe I gave her a quarter and told her to leave me alone for the next two years.  I'm pretty sure that isn't exactly what happened, but I do recall coming home from my silly job at the deli one night to find hate notes all over the apartment.  "You Suck", "You're a Whore", "BITCH"... on and on taped to windows, the fridge, my bedroom door.  So I may have done something negative to irritate her at some point, I can't be sure.

For the record, this story is NOT about Becky, whom I did live with in college, but who never EVER called me a bitch or a whore.  I think the "you suck" emerged from her lips but it might have been after I made her pee her pants during an uncontrollable laughing fit. 

The "you're a whore" roommate and I lost touch after we stopped living together that semester.  It's possible she might have been a tiny bit unstable.  I'm sure I'm not the easiest person to live with, but she must have been really mad to use 16 sheets of expensive notebook paper to tell me off.

I will admit that the cheapo sickness infects me from time to time...but I try to put things in perspective.  TRY is the operative word. I did lose it at the Starbucks in our hotel in Las Vegas over their prices...but that night spending $150 on dinner didn't phase me at all.  In fact, we thought we got a deal.

Perspective is what we need.  Perspective, and a really good comeback about a quarter.

May 21, 2011

In spite of the fact that some folks think that the end of the world is coming soon, predicted by the end of the Mayan calendar December 21, 2012, another date that is being thrown around is actually rapidly approaching.  This Saturday has been predicted to be the rapture... wait let me rephrase that.  It is THE RAPTURE.

Christians all over the world will be taken to heaven when Jesus comes back Saturday.  This is a bummer because I have a 9am hair appointment and I don't want to be charged a no show fee.  I probably shouldn't assume that I'll be part of the raptured, I'm pretty sarcastic and snarky.  My bad attitude towards my neighbors and their bed sheet curtains might be enough to pull me out of the running for being part of the chosen community.

Jason and I have been talking about what we should do.  We've decided to go ahead and spend all of our money.  Dinners out are on the agenda until Saturday, and I think we need to take the baby to el Goucho.  She can't leave this world without having gummed a really good steak.  Heck, we're even going to gas up the cars with premium gas and just drive around going nowhere. 

Furthermore, I'm not doing ANY more laundry.

We have an appointment tomorrow with a financial planner and I can't wait to look her in the eye and tell her we don't need any investment plans.  If Saturday is it and you're left behind please stop by my house and water my new rose bush.  It deserves a chance at life - even in a post apocalyptic world.

For the record the official timeline looks like this:

2011 AD—On May 21^st, Judgment Day will begin and the rapture (the taking up into heaven of God’s elect people) will occur at the end of the 23-year great tribulation. On October 21^st, the world will be destroyed by fire (7000 years from the flood; 13,023 years from creation).

It looks like you'll have to keep my rose alive only for a few months.  Then I guess it will be destroyed by fire.  Bummer.

See you later!

Dear recipient
 
How are you today and business in your country? I am Huang,
Bank Manager of bank of Overseas,Taiwan.A British Oil
consultant/contractor with the Chinese Solid Minerals
Corporation, Mr.Bowen Atkinson made a numbered time (Fixed)
Deposit of $30,000,000.00 for twelve calendar months and not
too long Mr.Bowen Atkinson died from an airplane crash.

I have some issues with this important communication from Huang, who wanted to let me know that all I have to do to claim this $30,000,000.00 times twelve is show up and claim it. (Does Huang not know how much money "$30,000,000.00 times twelve" is?)

"Bowen Atkinson" from the UK sounds a bit like Rowen Atkinson.  You would think that if Rowen's brother "Bowen" died then it might have made the news. 

Furthermore, what mother in her right mind would name her children Rowen and Bowen Atkinson?  It just seems like a crime.  If they were triplets would they have been Rowen, Bowen and Owen?

If Huang is truly a Bank Manager then he should know that business in my country kind of blows right now.

Could they name their "bank" anything less banklike and anything more silly like "Bank of Secret Offshore Accounts Hidden From The IRS"

"twelve calendar months" - what other kind of months are there -lunar?

Lastly, it is sad to hear that Bowen died of an airplane crash.  It sounds like an illness.  Maybe he wasn't IN the airplane that crashed, but hit by a flying piece of luggage or bag of peanuts.

Too bad I'm busy this weekend,"$30,000,000.00 times twelve" sounds like a lot of money and I wish I could zip over to Taiwan to pick it up. 

"Um yeah hi!  My name is Terri and I'm here to see Huang."