Dear IRS

I heard on NPR this morning that the federal excise tax, the 3% tax on every phone bill in the United States (except WATS lines, Red Cross phones, and a couple others) originated to pay off the Spanish-American war.

Dear IRS:
I want my money back.
Thanks:
John

I'm something of a political agnostic until I realize I'm being taken for about $6 every month. $72 each year just from me. ...Not cool, Uncle Sam.

Crawling

My youngest little man crawled for the first time this weekend. He made it from one side of the living room to the other. We'd been working with him on crawling and it's obvious he wants to be mobile. He was pretty tired out from it so he didn't make the return trip but I expect to see a massive clean up at the homefront to combat the dangers of a mobile (almost) 7 month old.

This just in

This just in, said person just got fired by his foreman. He was quite upset when he made it to my office and after his talk with the big boss he started on me about how he rode with somebody else and "this is messed up" being that he doesn't have a ride home.

Me, in all my tact, replied, "I'm not sure how I'm even part of this situation."

Later, that same morning (as in just now)

He sits down in my office and pulls out the paperwork I drew up, unfolds it, and says, "Let's see what this cocksucker wrote."
To which I replied, "I'm the cocksucker that wrote that, I just wrote down what he told me."
He mumbled some bullshit to which I replied, "If you have any issues with it you need to talk to [our boss's name here.]"
He said he didn't need to do that and continued to mumble a bunch of bullshit.
I'm not really in the mood for a bunch of mumbling bullshit so I started to give him a piece of my mind. After saying his name, as one would address another person, he walked away. I have no idea where he is and really don't care.

Once again, work and personal life are colliding.

"You’re killing independent George" - George Costanza - Seinfeld

Title Screen

I woke up in a bad mood this morning. Our downstairs neighbor left a movie on last night and we were blessed with the booming bass of the title screen music all night. The sticky parts of this situation are:

We have a 5 year old son whose room is directly above said person's apartment.
Our bedroom which also houses a 6 month old is directly above said person's apartment.
Said person is an employee of mine.

I feel the best course of action at this point would be to fight fire with fire. I have talked to him about this situation in the past, the police have talked to him on several occasions, and he simply doesn't understand logic. I just might make the trek to get my bass amp out of storage. I've been hankering to play my bass anyway and with 700 Watts RMS and twin 15" subs it just might make him realize that other people's bass is not always welcome in your living area. I just so happen to have the Johnny Cash box set and plenty of Merle Haggard to pump through that rig.

Moose

I've been reading this guys blog about life in Alaska and it just occurred to me. Why don't the Moose of Alaska move south? What is it about the cold that they love? I mean, other than wide open spaces, free range, and fewer people to kill them, but other than that, what is stopping them? Is there a fence or are they just that dumb?

If I had a boat

I know this isn't a work related blog but work is starting to encroach on my daily life. I work in the construction industry and as such I'm occasionally find myself without a job for undetermined amounts of time. Our current project is nearing a close and as usual we have no plans for the next job. The kids are getting older and its time to start considering what to do with the rest of my life. I guess I'm at the realization that the world is our oyster. Georgia holds little for us. Not many friends, no family. Pennsylvania is hella cold, Tennessee is a viable option depending on where in the state. I could go with West Virginia or several other spots. It has to be a family decision though because I think we're all a bit tired of moving around and we want to be centrally located enough to visit people we're fond of from time to time.

I suppose it would be easiest if we won the lottery and could just spend the rest of our lives travelling and buying random properties to suit our whimsy. Alas I'll not be counting my chickens.

Perfect drunk

I'm at the perfect stage of drunk right now. It's the part where every song is better than the last and everything is good. I only get this feeling from beer, never from liquor. Actually I only get it from Miller High Life, the champagne of beers. It is my beer of choice. I like the clear bottle. More beer should come in clear bottles. Why brown when you can go clear? And Rolling Rock and their green bottles? You could put sugar in that stuff and it's still going to taste like Pennsylvania dog poop! heh.

The odds are good I've drank too many beers to blog. One must know one's limits. I'll quit blogging and have another beer. :P

1609 galileo intents telescope

1609 galileo invents telescope

Sponge factor

My sponge factor seems to be at an all time high.

What, dear narrator, is a sponge factor?

Well it is obviously a phrase I just made up. It has nothing to do with Max Factor sponges or the availability of your favorite loofa in your favorite store.

I shall define sponge factor thusly:
The propensity to absorb knowlege at varying rates. A high sponge factor would indicate an insatiable desire for knowlege and a low sponge factor would indicate a bump on a log.

Wendy's

So I went to Wendy's yesterday for a large chili. The chili was non-eventful but I did notice two things that I wanted to comment to someone about and since nobody else would really care I thought I'd better put it here so I don't bore my family and friends.

1. If your window in your vehicle does not work why would you go through the drive through window? I can't decide if this is the epitomy of lazy or just stupidity. More likely than not it is a combination of the two.

2. "Due to the National Tomato Shortage we will not be offering tomatos with any meals" said the sign on the drive through micro/speakerphone thing where you order. There is a national tomato shortage? I know the hurricanes hit and all but hey I still have 3 of them growing on my front porch. It's not rocket science to grow a little garden. Why is it that nobody but me does it? Heck I don't even have any suitable land to grow things since my "yard" is a concrete parking lot. But I have planters and I've grown tomatos, cucumbers, and peppers this year. Not enough to feed the family or anything but enough to enjoy doing it.

Happenings

I've been on the super marathon of family tree-ing. I had a couple weeks off for Christmas / New Year and I'd bet I spent no less than 60 solid hours changing my family tree over from my old program to the new one I bought. I also tracked my wife's family back to Switzerland in the 1600's. I wish my family tree was that easy. I never really knew my dad or his family. I visited when I was 9 for a summer and it is one of the most vivid collections of memories that I have. I'm hoping to partially reconnect with them this summer at the family reunion. I've already asked for 2 weeks off and been approved so everything should go off without a hitch. Well, except for the hitch on the back of the jeep that will be connected to the trailer with my crap. :P I haven't made any progress on my direct (paternal) lineage. I have collected enough information to write a book about my lineage. I don't think there would be any demand for it but I think I'll write it just for my own benefit. Maybe I'll just publish it as a pdf for those people that actually care. I'm up to almost 1500 people in the family tree. I'd like to figure out where my paternal family is from though. I'm at a dead end on that line.