Manipulation

This morning as I am getting ready for work, my dog jumps up on my bed. He doesn't much care for sharing it with me, but if it is empty there is no better place for a dog to rest his head.
Anyway, I get out of the shower and come back into the bedroom, he starts waging his tail sorta slow like, and then the scratches his head once and looks at me.

He waits a few seconds, scratches his head again but just once and than looks at me.

He does this a few times then I start walking towards him and he starts wagging his tail really quickly and turns his head sideways, with the offending ear towards me. SO i sit down and scratch his head from him. He starts waging his tail really quickly and gets his big dog smile on his face and i swear he says, I knew I could get you to do it.

I've been played by a dog, what chance to i stand with my baby girl?

I am swearing off the pulitzer books

So I did some thinking after my prior post about reading a pulitzer prize winning book and what I decided was how about the non fiction.

• 2009 - Slavery by Another Name. (that doesn't sound like there are rainbows and bunnies.)
• 2008 - The Years of Extermination: Nazi Germany and the Jews (no bunnies or rainbows here either
• 2007- The Looming Tower: Al-Quaeda and the Road to 9/11 (pass)

so I think lets skip back a ways.

• 1993 - Lincoln at Gettsyburg: The words taht remade America (hum, four score and all that bore.
• 1991 - Tha Ants (No idea about this one)

from wiki for "The Ants" Review: "The only professional science work to have won a Pulitzer Prize -- for general nonfiction in 1991 – The Ants

Pass

• 1980 - Godel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid - Again from the Wiki On its surface, GEB examines logician Kurt Gödel, artist M. C. Escher and composer Johann Sebastian Bach, discussing common themes in their work and lives. At a deeper level, the book is a detailed and subtle exposition of concepts fundamental to mathematics, symmetry, and intelligence.

Pass

• 1973 - Children of the Crisis - I am thinking no bunnies here either.

So this is what I have decided, I want a new literary award given, to a book, maybe 2 awards non fiction and fiction. This is what i require from my books, 1. They're entertaining. 2. They invovle hope or at least are devoid of it.

• For example, I've only read 2 of Cornwell's scarpetta books, and despite the fact that they involve crime and murder and a myster and stuff, 1. the bad guys lose in the end. 2. You finish them and don't have to think the world if messed up.
• Even Stephen Kings books usually end with some sense of things will be okay, for example the shining. In the movie that everyone has seen, the dad kills the helpful hotel guy, but in the book that guy doesn't die.
• clive barker - I read the great and secert show a while back and while it is a story of good versus evil, in the end it seems like good is better, although I read that years ago, so what I know.

Anyway, anyone know any books that are both entertaining and are not just sad?

Where is my remote!

So this morning I was getting ready for work and on my tv was an informercial for the hair club for men. Not that I care if you use the hair club, or I dont' care if you don't, if going there makes you feel better about your than GO! however there was one guy that said. Since I've made the decision to go to the hair club, I've got more confidence, then he says a couple other things and then he ends it with "and a new car!"

Seriously doesn't anyone else find it funny that a guy that would say he got a new car is the guy the hair club puts on there? Are people who go there shallow by nature? Isn't that the message that says, get some hair by a car and you're golden.

So I get in the shower and I get out and there is a commercial for the ab circle pro. Where they claim that it is fun and easy. I don't know what the hell they're smoking, but that doesn't look easy. Not that working out should be easy, but they're clamining it is. I mean I am sure it works if you do it, but then so does excerising with a jump rope and doing push ups, but then again, if it was as easy as that we wouldn't have the fattest nation in the world.

Anyway, I need to find that remote or go to work.

Pulitzer Prize for crap

A while back I decided I would try to read the pulitzer prize winning books. Given the 1,000's of books published each year, I figured that should be a good guide to reading books that where good, as they won an award and everything.

So here is the list of winners I stole from Wiki

1948: Tales of the South Pacific by James A. Michener
1949: Guard of Honor by James Gould Cozzens
1950: The Way West by A. B. Guthrie, Jr.
1951: The Town by Conrad Richter
1952: The Caine Mutiny by Herman Wouk
1953: The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway
1954: No award given
1955: A Fable by William Faulkner
1956: Andersonville by MacKinlay Kantor
1957: No award given[1]
1958: A Death in the Family by James Agee
1959: The Travels of Jaimie McPheeters by Robert Lewis Taylor
1960: Advise and Consent by Allen Drury
1961: To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee
1962: The Edge of Sadness by Edwin O'Connor
1963: The Reivers by William Faulkner
1964: No award given
1965: The Keepers of the House by Shirley Ann Grau
1966: The Collected Stories of Katherine Anne Porter by Katherine Anne Porter
1967: The Fixer by Bernard Malamud
1968: The Confessions of Nat Turner by William Styron
1969: House Made of Dawn by N. Scott Momaday
1970: The Collected Stories of Jean Stafford by Jean Stafford
1971: No award given[2]
1972: Angle of Repose by Wallace Stegner
1973: The Optimist's Daughter by Eudora Welty
1974: No award given [3]
1975: The Killer Angels by Michael Shaara
1976: Humboldt's Gift by Saul Bellow
1977: No award given [4]
1978: Elbow Room by James Alan McPherson
1979: The Stories of John Cheever by John Cheever
1980: The Executioner's Song by Norman Mailer
1981: A Confederacy of Dunces by John Kennedy Toole
1982: Rabbit Is Rich by John Updike
1983: The Color Purple by Alice Walker
1984: Ironweed by William Kennedy
1985: Foreign Affairs by Alison Lurie
1986: Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry
1987: A Summons to Memphis by Peter Taylor
1988: Beloved by Toni Morrison
1989: Breathing Lessons by Anne Tyler
1990: The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love by Oscar Hijuelos
1991: Rabbit At Rest by John Updike
1992: A Thousand Acres by Jane Smiley
1993: A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain by Robert Olen Butler
1994: The Shipping News by E. Annie Proulx
1995: The Stone Diaries by Carol Shields
1996: Independence Day by Richard Ford
1997: Martin Dressler: The Tale of an American Dreamer by Steven Millhauser
1998: American Pastoral by Philip Roth
1999: The Hours by Michael Cunningham
2000: Interpreter of Maladies by Jhumpa Lahiri
2001: The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon
2002: Empire Falls by Richard Russo
2003: Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
2004: The Known World by Edward P. Jones
2005: Gilead by Marilynne Robinson
2006: March by Geraldine Brooks
2007: The Road by Cormac McCarthy
2008: The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz
2009: Olive Kitteridge by Elizabeth Strout

I've bolded the ones I've read most recently The road. I liked some like to kill a mocking bird and i didn't like other like the road, but do you know what they all have in common. Here it is, they're all sad.

I don't even want to read the brief wonderous life of oscar wao, doesn't that just sound sad? So I think I'll attempt to read the opimist's daughter, which will likely be sad too, but it title isn't.

Smile, it could be worse

So here i am with my head ringing, and working on a spectacular saturday in Septemer. I was thinking, this sucks, woe is me and all stuff. Nevermind, I passed a couple people panhandleing on the way in, that should have made me realize that over Jerry has it better than good, things are freaking great.

I mean i am fairly young, if you hang with the right crowd. Of the 7 people in my office i am younger than 5 of them, so i got that going for me. My house isn't getting forclosed on, I have a job, my baby is healthy and beautiful. My wife is healthy and beautiful, it is some what less than suprizing that my daughter is beautiful given the gene pool she got to pick from. I am thankful she looks more like her mom than me, although she does have a little hint of a chin butt, that is all me.

Anyway, despite everything being great i was lamenting my lot in life earlier today. So i get into the parking lot and there are a bunch of cars here. I think that is odd for a saturday. On the way to the door there are a couple of women hugging and obviously trying to lessen the outward signs of having just gotten an good cry on, and i think that sucks. So I go into the building lobby and there is a sign that says something like this.

The dealing with terminal illness group is meeting on the second floor.

That just sucks!!!

I think I'll work with a much better attitude today.

Trady to the party

So the wife watches the real housewives of Atlanta (and the other cities as well, but atlanta happens to be on now) and I was watching last night and I had this thought, if your going to make a show call the real housewives of anywhere shouldn't the people be housewives?

Here is a run down,
Kandi, not married, so not a housewife.
Sheree is not married, as she divorced her husband.
Nene is married
Kim not married
Lisa is married.

The show should be called "2 housewives, a fiance, a divorcee and a concubine calling each other names.

Guide to happy living

One day I am going to put my book together and it will be called Jerry's guide to happy living. In that book is going to be this nugget to live your life by.

Starting your day before the sun, does little to make you happy.

I hate this time of year. Hate seems a little strong, as I loathe after we set our clocks back. Let me rephrase, I mildly dislike this time of year. As the days are getting shorter, it is dark when I get up. This shouldn't be the case. I mean if the sun with all it's fussion can't find the energy to be up yet, Why is a Jerry expected to find ill begotten morning pep?

I really hate when we set our clocks back though, which just ensures that it is dark when i start my day and dark when I end it. That just sucks, If I were running the world this is what I would do. Well first I would get Steeler's season tickets, I would cancel Dr. Phil, and I would make Cinco de Mayo, Casmir Pulaski birthday, Boxing day, Ceasar Chavez birthday, and Canadian Thanksgiving (becuase I am fairly sure I have blessings enough for 2 days of giving thanks), paid holiday's right after I did these things, I would say, we're going to day light savings time and staying there!!!!

Side note and a little less then completely unrelated but i brought it up so I'll address it. There are people pushing for Ceasar Chavez birthday to be a holiday. Which I'll not judge one way or another, he likely helped to improve the lives of millions of Americans and Mexicans, and Mexican-Americans, or more importantly people, which seems like a good enough reason celebrate the guys birthday to me. However, his timing was all wrong. He was born 3/31/27 (At least according to wiki). This is a horrible time for another holiday.

Here is a list of 2009 federal holidays

Thursday, January 1 New Year’s Day
Monday, January 19 Birthday of Martin Luther King, Jr.
Monday, February 16* Washington’s Birthday
Monday, May 25 Memorial Day
Friday, July 3** Independence Day
Monday, September 7 Labor Day
Monday, October 12 Columbus Day
Wednesday, November 11 Veterans Day
Thursday, November 26 Thanksgiving Day
Friday, December 25 Christmas Day

Actually looking at this list, I notice we go from Feb to May without a holiday. I mean Easter is in there but nevermind that. I say we add a holiday to March or April, and add one to August or June. If you look at the holiday list we waste most of them on cold winter days, which is fine if you're in Florida, but I am not.

The next holiday is Columbus day. I say this is a dumb ass to celebrate in the US.

1. Columbus never came to the US, maybe the Virgin Islands, or Puerto Rico, but he didn't come to the Mainland.
2. Do the desedants of the Tainos think his "discovery" was a good thing?
3. Dude is famous for getting lost and discovering a place people already lived. Later this year, I might go discover Wyoming.

Anyway, that is all, getting up early, sucks, we need more holidays, I actually do think we should keep Columbus day, just do so knowing that dude was lost, didn't discover anything and gave little thought to the lives of those around him. In fact, Columbus did the reverse of what Chavez did, his actions led to the misery and death of millions of people. All of a sudden I am a Ceasar Chavez fan.

A thing I think is funny and thing I think is not funny

First the funny thing,
The Dos Equis commercials that have the most interesting man in the world. These crack me up. There is one this one, and part of it says he can speak Russian in French, while his is holding a fox running from the fox hunters, that just strikes me as funny.



The think i find not funny is ear trouble, I have to go to a ENT specialist now, becuase my head is still ringing a week later. I am fairly sure if i was a 16th century inuit I would just ask to be put on an iceberg and float off into whatever they call the bearing straight.

what to do, and lesson learned

So i am sitting in my office with my head throbbing as a result of an inner ear infection that has left me ready to float off on an iceburg into the abyss.

If i turn music on, it gives me a head ache. So I turn it off and all I hear is what sounds like a I have a fire alarm going off on the right side of my head, but it is muted by my holding a seashell over my hear. Which also gives me a head ache. So I turn the music on to distract and i get a head ache.

Oh the there is a lesson to be learned here front. Most kids get ear infections, and well get angry. As a parent, I think you should experiance one, just to remind you that no matter how tired, frustrated and helpless you feel to help your baby, it is nothign compared to what they're feeling right now.

So if or when my little baby gets an ear infection I promise to have as much empathy as humanly possible, cuase this sucks.

here are a list of things that suck!!

This list isn't meant to be all encompassing or complete, just things I know that suck right now because they're suckiness or is that suckyness has been brought to my attention

1. The first thing on the list in inner ear infections, These suck.
2. Whoever makes a pill to treat the aforementioned inner ear infection but fails to but a coating on it so I have the nasty taste stuck in my mouth for hours after taking the pill just waiting to take the next one.
3. Right now I am not a big believer in Intellegent design, there seems to be something screwed up with the way ears are made, this shouldn't happen.
4. Tax dealines, It is labor day, I have a fever, an inner ear infection, they shut the ac off in the building on saturday and I am here at my desk sweating like a native american in one of those sweat lodge things, only it isn't doing a thing for me.
5. Complaining - complaining sucks.

Sunshine cleaning

A while back I saw Little Miss Sunshine which I liked alot, it features a family whose memebers are struggling to find their way. Each of them is odd, out of place and some times painfully ackward, however in the film they all rally together and support one another. One of the main characters played by Alan Arkin.

A while back but not as long ago as when I saw the other movie, i saw a commerical for Sunshine Cleaning, which also features a messed up family trying to figure things out and Alan Arkin is in it. So I thought, I think I want to see that.

well, after seeing it, I thought, that just sucked. Although, the characters do eventually sorta come together, it is still messed up. I suppose the difference between the in part are due to how the characters are messed up. In little miss sunshine, there is the drug addicted grandfather, the teen age son, who has taken a vow of silence in order to become a fighter pilot only to find out he is color blind, the motivational speaker father that no one listens to, and who can't get his own life together, The suicidal gay brother in law. These people all have flaws and are arkward and painful at times, yet their characters have some sense of character. IF that makes sense.

In the later, the two main characteras are sisters, one who was apparently hot shit in high school, but is now a single mom, who is sleeping with a married cop, and her younger sister that as far as my impression, I didn't care about her, I felt bad for the girl she sorta stalks for a minute. I couldn't identify with her. Then things go horribly wrong, like they should of when you're not trying!

Anyway, watch it if you like, but I give it 1 and 1/2 mops.

Also they sorta make lite of Suicide as something to clean up after. I mean phyisically, but how in the hell do you clean up after someone's suicide, the mess that leaves on the survivors is neither triffling nor fleeting, it just left a bad taste in my mouth.

times have changed

Times have changed in a lot of ways, but this in a small change well actually a big change societally speaking but this is a small sign of it. I went to my box of checks to get a new check book and i notice there are only 2 books of checks left which is 50 checks. I think or a 100, I don't know, but the thing I noticed was the second to last book said "time to reorder checks." Seriously there probably was a period of time when 50 checks didn't last very long, but here is a list of people we right checks too. Church, Registar my car. I can't think of any others. 50 checks is going to last me at least 6 months perhaps and likely more.

Not to self, don't buy stock in check making companies.

Side note, the other day i wrote about 5 hour energy.

So the wife and I were at costco, and while i was noticing the case of NyQuill I also noticed the big ass jar of b-12 supplements. It had 12000% of your allowance. I guess 8000 seems like less.

personal story, when i first went to the sleep doctor, he told me to take a B, E, and D supplements, because a lack of any of the 3 could mess with your sleep patterns. I've wondered for a long time, is that true or did the guy just want to recommend that I get more BED?
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Speaking of Doctors, I saw another commercial that made me mad, about the health care reform debate, it said, if we give coverage to 50MM people there will be a doctor shortage. Seriously you think? Of course there will be, there already is one. Google doctor shortages and you'll find lots of stories about hospitals denying to offer services because of lack of doctors, or there are no doctors in rural america. That sort of thing, but that is not what made me made this is what made me mad.

This arguement is basically, people shouldn't get to see a doctor so that I don't have to wait to see mine. Really that is it. The message is if your poor go die in an overpass or something. Anyone who makes this arguement in my opinion is an evil vile person.

The health care reform debate is lost already in my opinion, when I say lost I mean nothing is going to happen. You want to know why, well here is what I think. When Hillary tried to get health care passed, something like 25 to 30 million americans didn't have coverage, now it is 50 million. If we don't change it, will that pace continue? I think it will for a few factors, infact I think it will speed up becuase, people with insurance already pay for people without. When someone without or even with lacking coverage goes to the emergency room and doesn't pay, or gets cancer treatment and declares bankrucpty the people that have coverage pay the hospitals for the losses on those patients. The more people without the higher the cost for those with, the faster the costs go up, the faster employers start dropping coverages. So forth and so on. Anyway that is just what I think, so if we wait another 16 years will 100MM or more american lack coverage? If so, will anyone be able to afford coverage?

Anyway, that is just what I think, but there are some serious flaws with the current system, like, how come it is tied to my job, I don't let my employeer buy auto, life, or home insurance for me, why do they (employeers) get tax benefits that I don't individually? Why aren't individuals allowed to organize insurnace purchasing pools? and why are there restrictions on who can offer insurance where? Wouldn't it be much more competitive is I could shop around and buy a plan I liked, either individually or with a group? Changes like this would likely at least slow the rate of insurance cost increases, but here is the catch.

Democrats won't let that happen, why would they, they believe a public option is the moral and ethical think to do (I am assuming they believe this; for the sake of this lets assume that they have genuine inentions.) In order to see what they have decided is the moral and just outcome, the current system must fail. The GOP right now has the power to stop the public option, butlack the power to change anything. All Democrats have to do is wait, for 100MM uninsured Americans, or 200MM or what ever the number ends up being that pushes us over the top. At somepoint the current systems will collapse.

I actually do think for the most part both sides of this arguement believe their idea is better, however those crazy people running the ads I am talking about clearly are using fear to manipulate the audiance. They're probably paid for by Health Care Companies, who gain the most from the status quo at least for now.