Blogger 365 Day 59 - Karaoke Friday "Laziness"

One the plus side I am doing this on a Friday for a change, as opposed to whenever I get around to it.  On the minus side is the fact that tonight I am not posting the lyrics.  Thankfully someone else did the work for me by putting the lyrics right in the video, so yay for that.  Anyway, just felt kind of bluesy tonight so I went out and grabbed this for the latest edition to the Karaoke Friday project.

Canadiens @ Penguins 02/28/2014

Montreal 6  Pittsburgh 5  SO

James Neal, Sidney Crosby, Olli Maatta, Brandon Sutter - G, A each

Jussi Jokinen recorded his 400th career point in the loss

Blogger 365 Day 58 - The stupidest thing I read all day

     For those that have been along for this merry project you know that I have spent some time ripping into The Weather Channel around here for their need to name everything in order to invoke a sense of fear and dread into their programming in an attempt to grab viewers.  At work today we had another one of those things called white outs briefly, where there is so much snow falling so quickly that it cuts visibility down considerably.  The time that it lasted wasn't very long, I would say maybe 15 or 20 minutes and then it let up and the actual snowfall total wasn't all that measurable, just enough to basically give everything a good dusting and remind everyone that it isn't near springtime yet.

     That being said, when I got home tonight I thought that maybe I better look at the weekend forecast, because if the weather isn't all that bad then I might want to look into making some plans, after all I did enjoy getting out last Sunday, even if I did end up going into work for an hour or so.  It was nice to rejoin the human race and do things like window shopping and just walking about.  So I made the dreaded mistake of heading over to The Weather Channel's web page, just to see what the weekend forecast would be.  Of course there had to be another pet name on there, this time it is weather storm Titan (Everybody panic!!!!!, Lock your doors!!!!   Buy toilet paper!!!!   Titan is coming!!!).  Seeing that, I might have let out an audible groan.  But that wasn't the best thing I saw on the site, rather it was a link to an article further down the page,  "The Science Behind Naming Winter Storms at The Weather Channel".

     Yes kids that's right, apparently coming up with names is science.  Forget everything you learned in school, you know, that silliness that involved coming up with a hypothesis and then testing it to see its validity.  All of that is just rubbish, what really sets the scientific community apart from the rest of us is the ability to come up with a name.  Without that skillset, well then, you're just a hack.  

     Personally I can't wait for September now.  You see, it is in September that the Nobel committee starts the nomination process for the next batch of Nobel prize winners, and this year I am going to nominate the lady that works at the animal shelter here in town, because she names all of the puppies.  

Blogger 365 Day 57 - This is not most excellent

Sorry, I got home from work and had a few beers and then ordered dinner.  Next thing I know I was sleeping, which is good given how I usually sleep.   Before the moment passes I am going to try to go back to sleep if that is okay.  The longer I type the more likely it is I will miss it.

Blogger 365 Day 56 - Karaoke Friday "But, but........."

     Yes, I know, it isn't Friday yet, but then again last Friday I did not do a Karaoke edition of the blog, s in my mind I am covered here.  I could have done this last week, but what, pray tell, would I be doing here right now.  Everything happens for a reason, and if I am going to be grinding out a blog a day (hockey videos do not count, and say hello to post Olympic hockey season again) then there will be times when I bend the rules just a bit.  In this particular instance, the reason I felt a need to look up this particular song was work.  I was sitting at my desk and usually I will flip on my Pandora station while banging out paperwork, but on this particular day I wanted to try something a little less usual.  First I went over to Audiorealm, a site that I became slightly acquainted with this weekend while trying to listen to Rick Hays' broadcast Saturday afternoon at work.  I couldn't find his feed, but I did find the Audiorealm \site, which was packed with online streaming stations, so as I was sitting at my desk I thought I would try a few of them out, see if anything was my cup of tea.  I will just say the site was problematic, songs listed as currently playing on some stations were not correct, other stations the feed kept dropping out and still others, while claiming to be on the air, weren't reachable at all. 

     Since that didn't work and I still didn't want to go back to my Pandora station, I decided to go to an old standby, Live365.  It is another website that carries audio, and one of the stations that is on there is WXXP.  For those not from here, or even those that were here but not paying attention back then, WXXP was an alternative station broadcasting on 100.7FM  for a couple of years in the ate 80s.  IT had a niche following, but no commercial success so it closed its doors rather quickly, but some people do remember its short lived run fondly.  How fondly you ask?  Well maybe you don't ask, but for the sake of the blog I will presume that you do, fondly enough that someone or some persons took the time to create the station again on Live365, programming much of the same music and often running the exact same shows that were on the air 20+ years ago, complete with the old ads that ran on the station, like the ones for shows at Graffiti, a local club/music venue that closed its doors in 2000.  You can read more about that club here. 

     Anyway, back to my long winded story, so I look up the WXXP Live365 feed and a song comes on, one that I haven't heard in ages, but just hearing it brought back quite a few teen memories, so I thought I would share.  As always feel free to sing along, this time I might sing too....

It was long ago
Seems like yesterday
Saw you standin' in the rain
Then I heard you say

"I want to love but it comes out wrong
I want to live but I don't belong
I close my eyes and I see
Blood and roses"

Love flowers in the springtime
October we were wed
In wintertime the roses died
The blood ran cold and then she said

"I want to love but it comes out wrong
I want to live but I don't belong
I close my eyes and I see
Blood and roses"

It was long ago
Seems like yesterday
Saw you standin' in the rain
Then I heard you say

"I need your love but it comes out wrong
I try to live but I don't belong
I close my eyes and I see
Blood and roses, blood and roses
Blood and roses, blood and roses"

Blogger 365 Day 55 - Not stopping

     I'll be honest, right now I feel like crap.  I am tired, I'm sore and achy and I just have no motivation whatsoever.  But I have to move, as much as I don't want to there just is no such thing as a sick day for me.  If I am not at work, who does my job?  Anyone?  Dee might be able to do part of it, other than that there isn't anyone, so sick or no I just have to keep moving. 

      I think I will just try to climb under my blanket and get some sleep, maybe that will help.  Can't hurt.

    

Blogger 365 Day 54 - The streak ends...sort of

     I had a plan for today, though it wasn't one I expected to keep by the end of the day.  As you know I have been complaining recently that when I have a day off and want to do something with it, it snows.  I was expecting the same thing today, it is Sunday after all.  So I make plans, thinking full well I wouldn't keep them.  Not big plans mind you, just sneaking out for breakfast and maybe a little grocery shopping afterward.  I wasn't even going to take my laptop, it deserved the day off too, just my book that I have been reading and my iPad, so I could use the calculator function to do the invoices I brought home Saturday after work.

Blogger 365 Day 53 - Divided Loyalties

     For the most part I have avoided any and all Olympic coverage this year.  I guess there was some drama regarding the women's figuring skating or some such nonsense, but I have argued before that any event that does not involve scoring, but rather judging, isn't a sport anyway.  It may be an incredible physical skill, but unless you have a specific and standard way of scoring it to determine a winner, it is not a sport, it is more like a pageant.

     The one sports that I did follow, (and will follow tomorrow for the gold medal game) is the mens' hockey.  I'll admit, for the most part I wanted the American men to win, or at least medal, so the result from the bronze medal game (Finland 5  USA 0) was a little of a letdown, bu only a little. I am not the fervorous type, sitting in my recliner screaming "USA! USA! USA!" because for me I have a rooting interest not my home country so much as in my hometown, in which case I am not all that unhappy.

     The Pittsburgh Penguins sent 7 players to Sochi this year, 4 of which will win or have won medals, and that means more to me than whether he USA got one.  So while I am disappointed for those players that didn't medal (Brooks Orpik and Paul Martin, USA, Evgeni Malkin, Russia), I am also happy for those that will medal (Jussi Jokinen and Olli Maatta, Finland - Bronze, Sidney Crosby and Chris Kunitz, Canada - either Gold or Silver).  Jokinen and Maatta even scored goals in the bronze medal game against the US, so I can take something from the drubbing the United States suffered through.  If anything, I am happy, Maatta is still young (19 years old) yet he did not look out of place at all playing with the best players in the world on a global stage. 

     So the Pittsburgh Penguins sent 7 players to the Olympics and 4 will come back with medals, sorry USA, but I am perfectly okay with that.

Blogger 365 Day 52 - The one that got away

Today was one of those days that speaks to the promise of spring and summer after that.  The temps crept into the low to mid 40s, the sun was out of and on, people were milling about, catching there first glimpses of sun, minus the bone chilling temps, in what seems like months,  The day had a certain promise to it, that's for sure.

I got up this morning, made my way into Gus Millers, loaded a few tickets into the instant ticket machines and did my normal paperwork as well as grabbed a list of tickets that I would need to get on m way home, since between Thursday morning and Friday morning they had sold over $2100 of scratch off tickets, which meant that while I was loading three tickets in the morning, they would need another 5 books loaded on my way back through when I went home. 

So I went through my day thinking that once I get everything done at work, maybe this would be the day that I got to go out and just enjoy the day.  The idea of a trip through the park seemed promising, maybe even blogging or reading on my bench, or just grabbing a coffee and strolling around the neighborhood for a little while. 

I usually leave downtown around 3:00 - 3:30, depending on how much work I have to finish up, before heading back to Gus Milers and then ultimately home. Well, I didn't even get away from my desk at work until after 3pm, between working with a technician who was trying to get our camera system working on the upstairs monitor again, and making a half hearted stab at getting my invoices caught up, I was running just a little behind schedule.  Still I managed to get upstairs and almost out the door right around 3:30. 

I have this rather unhealthy ritual (one of many actually) that some days before I leave work I will have a jalapeno dog or a kielbasa from the hot dog roller on the back counter. Just a little snack because most every day the chance I will get to eat something before I leave is slim indeed.  One of the losses that I suffered after being promoted is I haven't had my morning pastry run in months.  I have almost forgotten what the gorgeous European women who work there look like,  instead I am relegated to my post game hot dog now.

So I walk to the back counter and all that is left is 4 overdone hot dogs.  Don't get me wrong, I like a crispy hot dog so well done is not an issue for me, what was an issue was there was no kielbasas on, nor any jalapeno dog.  When I went to grab a bun for the hot dog that I did get, there was only 4 left.  So now, instead of going home I am doing someone else's job, namely reloading the hot dog grill and wrapping additional hot dog buns.  I don't mind working, but when we have two people on duty that were supposed to see that things like that get done and it doesn't happen, well that pisses me off just a tad. 

Still, even with the additional work,  I figure I can catch a bus back to Oakland and Gus Millers by 4:30 at the latest and be home around 5pm, not ideal but at least could catch some sunlight.  I manage to get out to the bus stop and wait for my bus, I didn't wait all that long, maybe 10 minutes and another 10-15 minutes later I am at my destination.  Alls good then, right?

Well I go to load the 5 books of tickets that I knew were missing form my visit earlier in the morning, and in the intervening 8 hours or so they managed to sell out of another 8 books.  Now if I leave one or two slots empty until Saturday I don't consider it that big a thing, after all with two instant ticket machines here are 48 options on tickets (well 48 buttons, some of the more popular tickets are in two slots as opposed to one), but 8 out of 48 empty, that is too many for me, so back on the bus and back downtown I go to get more lottery tickets.

The bus ride back into town was a tad longer though, as now I was getting caught up in rush hour traffic, plus there is a Billy Joel concert in town tonight, making getting around even harder.  Given Billy Joel hasn't done anything of merit in like 20 years I am not quite sure what all of the fuss is about, but that's just me.  Whatever the case, traffic was brought to an almost grinding halt, much like Billy Joel's car when he got drunk and drove into a tree.  What should have been a quick 15 minute trip back into town instead was 35 minutes, and till I got into Smithfield and then back out again it was already 5:30.  Back onto another bus and back to Gus Millers and until I got done there, loading 8 more books of tickets and then taking a stab at fixing their vacuum cleaner it was 6:30, the sun was setting over Pittsburgh, only an orangish hue could be seen over the top of the South Side slopes as I looked down Forbes Avenue.  No sun or fun for me.  That's okay though, I am off on Sunday and the forecast is, wait for it, SNOW!!!!

Blogger 365 Day 51 - Ceremonial

     According to my blogger dashboard this would be post #1400, which might be cause for celebration, except it really isn't post #1400.  In fact I am well beyond that, but because of the powers that be way back when, some posts were lost, into the internet void as it were.

     Many moons ago when I first started blogging I was using the Yahoo 360 platform.  In its earliest days I would argue it may have been the best platform I have ever blogged on, but like most things Yahoo it was left to fall into a state of disrepair and left for dead while the fine folks at Yahoo chased after the next big fad they thought would be a hit (Yahoo Mash anyone? Didn't think so.)  But before the problems that would ultimately bring an end to Yahoo 360, I was stuck with a problem of my own.

     At some point while I was there, I had an issue with being able to log in, my password was not working with my ID.  I sent a long, complicated email to the powers that be at Yahoo, trying to prove I am who I am.  The email met with some success, I was given my place back but the password information for the page had to be reset.   This would all fall under the category of no harm, no foul in the grand scheme of things save for the fact that, like I said before, Yahoo 360 ended up closing up shop.

     Many of the refugees from 360 were then left to find a new blogging platform, and some of us made our way to a place called Multiply.  Another relatively simple blogging platform to use, and it had many of the same features that Yahoo 360 had.  As an added bonus, they created an import option for those people who used to be on 360, so our previous scribblings and what not could be brought onto their site.  This is where the #1400 issue comes into play.  Because I had the issue with my password, Multiply was able to import some of my previous entries, the ones that I had made after the issue with my password.  The ones prior would not import for some technical reason that I am sure someone could explain to me some day, and which point I would pretend I know what they are talking about and just nod my head in agreement.

      In Yahoo 360s final days I still had access to those entries, and I did bring some of the across manually, literally going in and copy and pasting each blog entry from Yahoo onto Multiply, but that task proved to be cumbersome to me and a bother to others, because every time I copied and pasted an old blog from Yahoo to Multiply, it would pop up on their feed as a new entry from me.  Once you start getting about 30 "new" blog entries in a 10 minute span from the same person, well let's just say I wasn't winning too many friends with that process so in the name of peace I opted to just stop with that whole process.

     The upside is I didn't lose any friends over it (that I know of anyway), the downside is that while Blogger may tell me this is my 1400th entry I know better, so there will be no celebration of a milestone, no cake and ice cream for all the kiddies.  Instead it is just me wondering if in fact it should be entry number #1500 I am celebrating.

Blogger 365 Day 50 - Reminiscing

     Usually after I finish up a blog entry my thoughts turn quickly to the next one.  After all, if I am going to be grinding these out on a daily basis I can't afford myself the luxury of sitting back and rethinking what I had just wrote, nor sitting idly by until once again the muse strikes me.  Instead it has to be more of a forward looking process, or as I like to say at work (stealing from the Greek philosopher Jed Bartlett) "What's next?".

     While I do not rethink what I have previously written, at the end of each blog there is just a feeling.  Not sure how to describe it other than that, a feeling or a sense.  On some days it is a sense of cleverness, almost pride, with what was on the page, other days it just feels like it didn't connect in a way that I wanted it to.  I have been having more of the latter thoughts recently than the former ones.  In my own eyes I am not sure I have done anything creative or clever with the page since possibly my Grammy blog.  Since then the muse has been missing, more autobiographical than creative.  Not that bios can be all bad, if there is a good story in what happened then they can be quite fun, but more often than not recently it just feels like m writing has been more along the lines of a grocery list.  Milk, check.  Bread, check.  Eggs, check. 

      Last night I decided to delve back into the archives, but rather than just pull blog entries at random I used one of the tools here on Blogger where I could just read comments, and if a blog entry garnered enough responses or I found a response particularly interesting then I would go and check out that entry just to see what all of the hullabaloo was about. 

     Some of what I read was funny, I almost found myself laughing at some of the things I wrote.  Others times it was critical, but from an informed point of view.  Even the entries that were more about me than anything else, when I checked back to see what had spurred those comments that I had just read, the language was at least colorful.  It was like I could pull on just a thread of an idea, and while I might not be one to make a complete tapestry of it, it was certainly better than a color by numbers exercise. 

      I think the best way to describe it was there was a certain passion about it, and emotional attachment that was more consistent than I have been able to generate for the first 50 days of this project.  I am not sure why either, though I do have a couple of guesses at it; 1) I am still unknowingly gun shy about throwing stuff up on the page after all but neglect blogging for better than a year.  Save for the occasional post here and there I was really almost blogging in absentia, just a hockey or music video once in a while and nothing of merit coming forth from my mind or fingertips because I was letting someone besides myself call the shots and 2) I am not out as much anymore and many of those creative blogs that were autobiographical in nature came from going out and experiencing things, rather than just sheltering myself in my apartment, waiting for the next work day to arrive.  It is hard to write about things that happen to you when you don't do anything.  Fancy that.

     The only other explanation would be that I no longer have the mental faculties to write, and that is just an idea I find farcical.  I am not dumber than I was a few years ago, nor am I incapable of being witty, I usually am quite witty on a daily basis in person (unless I am pissed off, then leave me alone), so if I go to the chalkboard I think I just figured out how to proceed.

Openness + Life Experience + Wittiness = Blog

Why didn't somebody tell me this years ago?  You could have saved me a few paragraphs here.

Blogger 365 Day 49 - Adding up

Sorry everything was so short yesterday, but work is what it is, and I ended up being there for 15 1/2 hours, so my time for blogging was very short indeed.  And I was right, until I got in my front door it was midnight, so had I not throw a little something on the page then this project would have come to a screeching halt long before I wanted it to.  But now I am hee, still ot sure what all I will say, but I am here nonetheless.

I guess I could make note of a few things that have changed since the last time I wrote.  I have added another book to the shelf t the right, just finished it today while I was at the bus stop on the way back to Gus Millers (and hen home).  Pretty good book actually, good enough that I have already lent it out to one of my co-workers.  I have already stated my next book, I packed two in my bag today thinking that i would be finishing the one before the day was over and sure enough I did.  The new one is one of the ones I picked up on Sunday, when I made my snow laden trip to The Waterfront.  I don't have an opinion of it yet, I have barely gotten into it, having only finished one chapter so far.

I also added to my Coke points.  Yes, I do still collect them in case anyone was wondering.  Most weeks I will add maybe 20 or so, a few more if the weather is nice and I can pick some up while taking my Sunday morning walk, but obviously the weather has sucked recently, so those walks are few and far between.  Still, when I left Gus Millers yesterday morning, I cut up Oakland Avenue to catch a bus on 5th Avenue into town and sitting outside Schezchaun (I know I spelled that wrong) Express, right in their pile of things to be picked up by the trash man were the wrappings of 2 thirty packs of Coke (25 points each) and 1 12 pack (10 points).  When I add in the 2 caps that I found plus the 1 cap and 1 12pack code Sammy gave me, and already this week I am at 79 points.  The weekly allowance you can put in is 120, so I have an outside chance of maxing out my points for the first time in a long time. 

I also made a couple of extra coins with my double shift yesterday.  Usually when I am on register I will get extra nickels and dies that customers leave behind and those will be added to the change meter, as was the case last night.  I guess a change meter update is then in order, so another $1.20 gets added to the kitty (64 cents of which is from last night) and the new total is $481.52.  Still creeping towards that $500 mark, hopefully I will get there this year, have to wait and see though.

On that note I am going to call it a blog, I am still pretty drained from Monday and as of today I am sitting at 79 hours this pay period with 4 more shifts to go.  Eve if I only worked 8 hour days that will put me over 110, but chances are there will be at least 1 day in there that is longer than 8 hours.  For now though, I think I will clmb into my fuzzy pajama pants and call in a night.

Blogger 365 Day 48 - Busy

Not much of n entry today, simply because I am doubling at work, so chances are I will not be getting out of here until 11pm at the earliest.  With that in mind I will probably not get home until almost midnight, and since I am trying to add a blog each and every day I have to do this now rather than later.  Of course by now, all I am really doing is saying that save for keeping my daily commitment I really will not be blogging today.  Yes, a blog about not blogging, how very creative of me.  Anyway, have to get back to the grind here.  Toodles.

Blogger 365 Day 47 - Open letter to the weather channel

I believe it was a couple of days ago I had mentioned that i was scheduled to be off on Sunday, and because I was to be off, you could expect that it would be snowing.  Not sure how many of the locals took me up on my advice, I know the Weather Channel didn't, saying at best we were to expect scattered snow flurries and showers.

It turns out that I didn't have today off after all, I had to run into Gus Millers for an hour or so.  Kerry, who manages the store on Sunday, called me to cover for him because he had to go pick up a prescription of some sort and since I live a few blocks from the store, he asked if I would come in for a little bit.  I hadn't planned on it, but since I did have a book of lottery tickets that needed loaded into the machine (I brought them home with me Saturday night) I figured I might as well kill two birds with one stone, and then run my errands for the day.  My plans included running over to The Waterfront to buy groceries and maybe spend some of that Barnes and Noble gift card cash that I still had in my wallet.   So I climb out of my fuzzy pajama pants and throw on some jeans and a T shirt, grab my back pack with the lottery tickets in it, as well as my book for the bus ride when I was done, and head to the front door.  I opened it and lo and behold it was snowing again.  And it didn't just snow for a little bit, it snowed all fucking day.  We ended up getting another 2 inches of snow today, falling consistently enough that the city roads were a mess the entire time.  So today my blog is going to in the form of a complaint......

Dear Employees of the Weather Channel,

      I understand that, at times, the weather can be an unpredictable phenomenon but it would be greatly appreciated if you would spend your time and resources on getting your forecasts as accurate as possible, and less time on thinking up clever names for any change in the existing weather pattern.  As a general rule, people turning to you for information do not need to know that the most recent weather event has been named Steve, what they need to know is an accurate telling of what will happen and how best to prepare for it.  Stop treating the weather like it is an ongoing scripted drama on TV (What will Steve do today?) and just focus on the facts.  If an event is significant enough, trust me, the audience will remember it without you calling it a name.  The name may not be as creative as you would come up with (blizzard of '02 for instance) but it will be remembered all the same, and will linger in minds long after your stupid name calling has been forgotten.  There was a time when names were given to truly significant events, like Hurricane Katrina, every time you slap a name on any weather movement you do it not out of a need to inform, but rather to simply spread fear.  Naming every single weather event also brings to mind the story of the boy who cried wolf, name everything and then nothing must be that important.  After all, why should a viewer take you that seriously when something severe is about to occur when you treat the slightest amount of precipitation with the same significance.  If you want to provide a public service, then spend more time looking at forecasts and satellite pictures and less time with your face buried in a book of baby names.   If not, then just have the Kardashians do the weather reports and be done with it.

Sincerely,
Matt

Blogger 365 Day 46 - What weekend?

7am

The day starts at 6am.  It didn't have to start that early, but I was looking forward to breakfast at 7:30 at Pamela's so I opted to stay awake.  Plus I awoke from a rather awful dream where I was watching funnel clouds descend from the sky all over my neighborhood and thinking I was going to get caught in a tornado, so while I woke up early, I felt no need to be going back to sleep for more of that.  Instead I got up, fired up a pot of coffee, came back into my living/bed room and goofed on some apps on Facebook on my laptop while running Fox Sports Radio on the iPad.  Wash my morning entertainment down with a coffee and a cigarette and it is time to get dressed and head out the door.

Blogger 365 Day 45 - Karaoke Friday "It's a mad, mad cow"

There was a notion back in my days of radio, that while you should move the show along, it was okay to go back and revisit something that was brought up earlier in the show.  The logic sounds foolish, after all, why go about the process of repeating oneself, but radio audiences are fickle creatures, the people who tune n for hour one will be different from the audience that is there during hour three.  Sure some people will listen to each and every word of a show, but most will come and go, catch pieces of it here and there.  Maybe on the car into work, maybe not until they sit at their desk, or perhaps the show is on while making the kids lunches for school.  Whatever the reason, in any given show you will have a variety of audiences, many of whom will not know what yu did during other parts of the show.

There is a reason I say that, back in the day when I was a blogger but not a Facebooker, this Karaoke Friday thing existed in it's ow place on the web, with arguably a much smaller audience.  While one could go back and poke through the archives here, some of the archives are either lost or damaged.  Links that were there before no longer connect now,  or some blogs didn't transfer from one platform to the next.  As I was looking through the archives I noticed that one of my Karaoke Friday posts, while still there, linked to a video that no longer exists on Youtube.  Well that isn't true, it exists on Youtube, but the version of it that I had no longer exists.  Thankfully I was able to find another version of it, and so, like the rules of doing a radio show, I am going to repeat myself, with possibly the worst song/video I ever posted (that in and of itself is saying something).  I will send my apologies to the vegetarians in the audience in advance.


In the year of the lord, 1994
We conquered the floor
That was then, this is chapter four!

I cause a riot on the stage
Like a lion in a cage
Comin' down with the sound
Worth a million pounds

Zippity zippity doo dah
Zippity doo dah hey (hey!)
A wonderful day
I wanna say with no delay
Zippity zippity doo dah
Zippity doo dah hey (hey!)
Say with no delay
M.C. H gonna play, yeah!

The legend behind the cow
Come on, tonight, hooray!
This is the way
Come on, tonight, hooray!
This is my way

Zippity zippity doo dah
Zippity doo dah hey (hey!)
A wonderful day
I wanna say with no delay
Zippity zippity doo dah
Zippity doo dah hey (hey!)
Say with no delay
Gonna blow you away, yeah!

The legend behind the cow
Come on, tonight, hooray!
This is the way
Come on, tonight, hooray!
This is my way

Alright crew
Introducing Mr. Fatman Scoop! Yeah
What's up, What's up, What's up!

Fatman Scoop:
[Fatman Scoop rocks the jam
Rocks the jam once again
Fatman Scoop rocks the jam
Rocks the jam once again

Scooter's in the house, hands up hands up
Scooter's in the house, hands up hands up
H.P.'s in the house, put 'em up put 'em up
H.P.'s in the house
He makes us jump jump jump jump jump
Put 'em up put 'em up
He makes us jump jump jump jump jump
Let's go]

Peace

This is the legend behind the cow
Come on, tonight, hooray!
This is the way
Come on, tonight, hooray!
This is my way, yeah!

This is my way

Blogger 365 Day 44 - So much for plans

No rants, no opinions, no music, just a quick note or three. Today was pretty much like every other day at work, a day that thought would go relatively easy, after all I had a head start on my work today, nded up taking far longer than it should have.

I got to Gus Millers around 8:30 am, which is pretty much on schedule for me, but when I got there things already were starting to fall behind schedule. The instant ticket machines were actually pretty full, we sold $2200 worth of tickets since the day before, so I had plenty of money to count and sort, plus a lottery ticket order was delivered to the store the day before, so I had that to deal with as well. Still I got out of the store in a decent amount of time and began the trek down to Smithfield News, which took far longer because once again it was snowing and the city of Pittsburgh has no salt with which to clear the roads. By the time actually got into work it was almost 10am.

Still I should have had plenty of time to do everything needed to do, bu at noon I was stuck in a meeting with Comcast about the possibility of switching internet providers. The problem with our internet constantly cutting in and out was the reason for the meeting, but I don't think it is a provider issue so much as it is a wiring issue. We have had a habit in the past of hiring people who are less than qualified to do the work that we gave them, but because they were cheaper we went with them. That was the problem with our last register system as well as a handful of other problems. Now those problems are coming home to roost with our new system in place. The in house network works fine, but connecting to the internet is problematic.

After that meeting, I still had my grocery order to do, but before I could Dee was saying that the deposit amount for Smithfield was coming up way short, so I ran a few reports to see if I could locate the missing money, which was even harder because our people are still struggling with figuring out the registers. One would think that after having the system for two months now, a certain familiarity with it would start to take hold, but that isn’t the case.

By the time I got started o doing my order it was almost time to send it in, so I ended up scrambling around, trying to get as much stuff as I could, though I am sure I missed plenty of items in my mad dash to make sure I ordered everything we needed.

Then just as I thought my day was finally starting to get on track, I am told that the ATM is not working. Given Brian just put money in it earlier today (yes, we had a guest appearance from Brian), I knew it still had money, so I went to see what the problem was. Apparently some bills got jammed when the machine was trying to dispense them, literally $20 bills jammed in the dispenser, I have never fixed this problem before, so I guess we will wait and see if I did it properly, though it seemed to be working when I left the store.

I still had my return trip to Gus Millers though, I had three more books of lottery tickets to load into the machines after all of the ones we had sold the day before. All is well and good, it is a task I am usually pretty good at, but while I am there the lottery terminal where the numbers games are played decided to freeze up, so I ended up on a 30 minute phone call with Scientific Games in order to get the terminal back up and online. By the time the day ended, what should have been a relatively easy day turned into another 9.5 hour clusterfuck. Now all I want to do is relax and go to sleep, which is why I am writing now, if I fall asleep it probably will not be a nap, but a nice long slumber. So off to slumbering I go.

Blogger 365 Day 43 - Your "Not So Top 40" Countdown

“Sold Me Down the River” (live) – The Alarm

Just getting settled in to do a blog here, figured I would turn on Pandora while I did this for some background noise. Far be from me to keep it to myself when I can share, so I will add song titles as I type. I know what you are thinking, I sure hope this is a short blog then. Truth is, so do I, it is after 10pm after all and this has to be posted by 12am in order to keep the Blogger 365 project up and running.

Blogger 365 Day 42 - For what it is worth

This is one of those days that I can't complain about all that much. Things went okay at work, I even got most of my work done ahead of schedule, which is a nice thing, the distractions were mostly limited and I was even able to get a couple of side projects done that I have been meaning to get to. So I guess you could say that it has been a productive day. Heck, I don't even have any paperwork to do at home tonight, so it must have went okay.

I also started looking into my next raise at work. Way back when I first received my promotion there was a period where I was given a raise while I was training, though only a few of us actually knew I was training for my position at the time. During this process Ed had told me that a when I was finished with my training and had actually taken over a manager spot I would receive an additional raise. That second raise hasn't happened yet, even though I have been a manager since June. I have not complained about it too much yet, simply because in a sense this first months have been basically just a kicking the tires period, where we find out if I am a good long term fit and also the fact that I am no doing this solo, Dee is there 5 days a week and we are sharing the responsibilities of both of the stores. But she is almost certainly leaving in June at this point, she is finishing packing up her house this week and unless something drastic happens between Feb. and June, her and her boyfriend are moving to Florida and living in his house down there. If I am going to be flying solo from that point on, then I am most certainly going to be seeking more money. I have already started my due diligence and began the process of comparison shopping, seeing what others in my industry are getting paid for a similar job, that way when I do have a sit down with Ed it is not simply me pleading for more money, rather it is a simple case of here is what I do, here is what others who do similar work get paid, let's hammer out a number that both parties can agree on. If we come to a consensus great, if not I think after 5 and a half years I probably have a marketable enough skill set that I can take it to other places and make more money. Simple as that.

Blogger 365 Day 41 - Chills

     I think I am coming down with something.  Ever since Saturday at work I can't seem to get warm.  I am sure part of that is due to t6he fact the office at work is in the basement and around this time of the year it is never warm, my apartment is probably 4 to 6 degrees colder than I would like it to be and outside just continues to be a mess, but t s not just the tempos around me that are making me feel all blah.  Of course this would be one of the worst times for me to decide to get sick (as though I have much of a decision in the matter), Dee has a doctor's appointment tomorrow and once again there is at best a coin flips chance that Brian will grace us with his presence so there really is n option about me going into work or not, I have to.

     I can't remember the last time I took a day off that I was on the schedule or would normally have been on the schedule, my guess is it was back in June when I took my vacation time.  I did take off the Saturday after Christmas but technically I am not on the schedule on Saturdays and I only took off because I doubled down and stayed late by doing all of my Saturday work on Friday.  Other than that one weekend, I am on 7 months now of 6 and 7 day work weeks.  Before the week vacation in June you would have to go back to December of 2012, and before that who knows, but it isn't a stretch to say out of the last 60 weeks of work, I have worked at least 6 days in 57 of them, so I can't ignore the possibility that maybe my body is just getting rundown at this point.

     I also have cut back on my personal treat time, that is I would pick a day on the schedule and say "On this day I will do such and such....." and that would be motivation enough to at least get to that point in the week or month, but with the weather the way it has been he last thing I want to do after a work day is to then go someplace else before making my way home.  I imagine I will ave a few of those days in the coming months, after all Spiderman 2 and Captain America: The Winter Soldier are both coming out and I will try to make it a point to see them soon after they are released, but for now I just feel icky.  Like I want to climb back under my blanket and go to sleep.  Yes, I have already taken a nap tonight, from 7pm till 9pm, and I am ready to get back at it, not because I am tired but because if I am sleeping then I am less aware of the ickiness that I feel.

      Anyway, I think I will forage for food a bit and then try closing my eyes again.  Nite all.

Blogger 365 Day 40 - Disappointments

    Before I get all deep into a blog, I should start off by congratulating Lee and Angie Taylor on their nuptials this weekend.  I have had the pleasure of knowing them for close to a decade now, if not even longer and I couldn't be happier for the both of them.  Too bad we do not have one of the Facebook 10 year videos to commemorate th occasion.  In any event, congratulations again and best wishes on your future together.

     Meanwhile back at he ranch as it were, today was what passes for my day off, and once again the weather failed to cooperate with me doing anything out of doors.  I had juggled around in my head maybe breakfast and even perhaps a long walk in the park with my book, or a trek out shopping but instead it snowed and I stayed indoors most of the day.  Just me and my Comforter of  Warmth +1 and that was all I did.  Napped a little bit here and there, made some dinner and really not much more than that.  I should be relatively brief about this entry so I can head over and do some laundry.  Ic ould have done the blog from there and then came back, but I think I might take my book there instead and leave the Ipad at home for a change. 

    Furthering my disappointment today was hearing that the Zimmerman - DMX boxing match has been cancelled.  I will admit that from a purely spectacle standpoint  I can see why this match should not have taken place, the only reason it was happening at all was because of the death of a teenaged boy, but there is part of me that is bloodthirsty enough that, since the court system was unwilling to mete out any justice, I was hoping to get my justice vicariously through the fists of DMX.  Since I am not of the religious sort, I do not believe that there will be some great judgement day forthcoming for George Zimmerman, nor am I much a believer in karma paying people back.  Shitty people get ahead all the time, after all the only reason people even know George Zimmerman's name is the fact he murdered someone.  Did his life suffer all that much?  Not really if he is considered a celebrity by some.  And it would not be all that hard to make a list of people who, despite their actions or behavior, have not seen the scales tip back the other way against them in order to balance the slate.  This just seems like it will be another of those times.

     Anyway, my clothes will not clean themselves. If they dd I might have a new invention on my hands, but they do not so I should put on some pants and make myself useful here, while there is still time left in the day.

NY Rangers @ Penguins 02/07/2014

NY Rangers 4  Pittsburgh 3  SO

Olli Maatta, James Neal - G, A each

Penguins defenseman Kris Letang will miss at least 6 weeks after suffering a stroke

Blogger 365 Day 39 - Knowing too much

I made a mistake. One of m character flaws is that far too often I have multiple things going on in my head at the same time. So while I may be doing one thing, there are always those odd little nuggets pulling at my brain in the background. Usually they are problems that I haven't figured out how to solve yet. Rather than just let them go or have someone else guide me as to what I should be doing, instead I let things just ruminate in the background, until I either have come up with a new idea to try, or have finally decided that whatever it is that I am trying to do just is beyond my mental or physical skill set.

One such problem was at work with our new register system. Most products you see in a gocery store have a bar code on them and at the point of sale that bar code is what is scanned to ring an item through the system. What is good about that obviously is that you have an ability to track products that are sold, it is very easy to pull up a report and find out how many, say 2 liter bottles of Coke, you have sold over an specific time period. The problem we have is that a specific number of our products do not have a bar code. Things like hot coffee, fountain drinks, made to order foods do not come with their own bar code, nor do we have the equipment to generate our own bar codes for them. Now we could buy rolls of bar codes, the problem with that though is the significant numer of products we carry that would need a bar code and the fact that each time you would have to buy the specific batr code for the specific item. In essence, a good portion of our back stock would be paper waiting to be used. That was the problem.

I left this problem roll around in my head for a few days until I came up with an idea, that being to just ignore the bar code entirely. As long as I could create a menu on the register with button, then the items in question would need to be scanned at al. Of course I have never done anything like this and certainly not with our new system, but if not me then who? If not now then when? So I poked and proddd a little bit the last few days and taught myself how to do some things. Of course by teaching myself these things I have once again increased my own workload, since I am the only one with even a remote understanding of how to do anything wth the registers beyond simply cashing out an order. I think I am getting dangerously close to the point where I need to be asking for a raise.

Blogger 365 Day 38 - Karaoke Friday - Beat his ass

     I alluded to this earlier in the week, but in March there is to be a celebrity boxing match between rapper DMX and George Zimmerman.  For those unaware, Zimmerman's celebrity status comes from the fact that he shot and killed a black, teenaged boy.  Apparently is some obscure cosmic place (namely Florida), this type of behavior doesn't get you incarcerated, but instead grants you some sort of celebrity status.  At first Zimmerman was the darling of the "right to bear arms" crowd, but even they have shied away from him because of his behavior since killing Trayvon Martin, namely two domestic disputes and sure enough, Zimmerman brandished a firearm in both of those as well.  So today's Karaoke Friday is to rally the troops in support of DMX just beating the shit out of George Zimmerman.  Honestly, I wouldn't even be all that heartbroken if DMX played the role of Ray Mancini to Zimmerman's Duk Koo Kim at this point.  Maestro, if you please........

Y'all gon' make me lose my mind
Up in here, up in here
Y'all gon' make me go all out
Up in here, up in here
Y'all gon' make me act a FOOL
Up in HERE, up in here
Y'all gon' make me lose my cool
Up in here, up in here

If I gotsta bring it to you cowards then it's gonna be quick, aight
All your mens up in the jail before, suck my dick
And all them other cats you run with, get done with, dumb quick
How the fuck you gonna cross the dog with some bum shit? Aight
There go the gun click, nine one one shit
All over some dumb shit, ain't that some shit
Y'all niggas remind me of a strip club, cause everytime
You come around, it's like (what) I just gotta get my dick sucked
And I don't know who the fuck you think you talkin to
But I'm not him, aight Slim? So watch what you do
Or you gon' find yourself, buried next to someone else
And we all thought you loved yourself
But that couldn't have been the issue, or maybe
They just sayin that, now cause they miss you
Shit a nigga tried to diss you
That's why you layin on your back, lookin at the roof of the church
Preacher tellin the truth and it hurts

Y'all gon' make me lose my mind
Up in here, up in here
Y'all gon' make me go all out
Up in here, up in here
Y'all gon' make me act a FOOL
Up in HERE, up in here
Y'all gon' make me lose my cool
Up in here, up in here

Off the chain I leave niggas soft in the brain
Cause niggas still want the fame, off the name
First of all, you ain't rapped long enough
To be fuckin with me and you, you ain't strong enough
So whatever it is you puffin on that got you think that you Superman
I got the Kryptonite, should I smack him with my dick and the mic?
Y'all niggas is characters, not even good actors
What's gon' be the outcome? Hmm, let's add up all the factors
You wack, you're twisted, your girl's a ho
You're broke, the kid ain't yours, and e'rybody know
Your old man say you stupid, you be like, "So?
I love my baby mother, I never let her go"
I'm tired of weak ass niggas whinin over puss
That don't belong to them, fuck is wrong with them?
They fuck it up for real niggas like my mans and them
Who get it on on the strength of the hands with them, MAN

Y'all gon' make me lose my mind
Up in here, up in here
Y'all gon' make me go all out
Up in here, up in here
Y'all gon' make me act a FOOL
Up in HERE, up in here
Y'all gon' make me lose my cool
Up in here, up in here

I bring down rains so heavy it curse the head
No more talkin - put him in the dirt instead
You keep walin - lest you tryin to end up red
Cause if I end up fed, y'all end up dead
Cause youse a soft type nigga
Fake up North type nigga
Puss like a soft white nigga
Dog is a dog, blood's thicker than water
We done been through the mud and we quicker to slaughter
The bigger the order, the more guns we brought out
We run up in there, e'rybody come out, don't nobody run out
Sun in to sun out, I'mma keep the gun out
Nigga runnin' his mouth, I'mma blow his lung out
Listen, yo' ass is about to be missin'
You know who gon' find you, who, some old man fishin'
Grandma wishin' your soul's at rest
But it's hard to digest with the size of the hole in your chest

Y'all gon' make me lose my mind
Up in here, up in here
Y'all gon' make me go all out
Up in here, up in here
Y'all gon' make me act a FOOL
Up in HERE, up in here
Y'all gon' make me lose my cool
Up in here, up in here

One.. two.. meet me outside
Meet me outside, meet me outside
All my Ruff Ry-DERS gon' meet me outside
Meet me outside, meet me outside
All my big ball-ERS gon' meet me outside
Meet me outside, meet me outside
All my fly lad-IES gon' meet me outside
Meet me outside, meet me outside
All my street street peoples meet me outside
Meet me outside, outside motherfucker

X has got y'all bouncin' again
Bouncin' again, bounce-bouncin' again
Dark Man X got ya bouncin' again
Bouncin' again, bounce-bouncin' again
Swizz Beatz got y'all bouncin' again
Bouncin' again, bounce-bouncin' again
Ruff Ryders got y'all bouncin' again
Bouncin' again, bounce-bouncin' again
Dark Man keep you bouncin' again
Bouncin' again, bounce-bouncin' again
Dark Man keep you bouncin' again
Bouncin' again, bounce-bouncin' again
All my streets they bouncin' again
Bouncin' again, we're bouncin' again
Swizz Swizz Beatz we bouncin' again
Bouncin' again and we bouncin' again
Double R keep it comin', ain't nothin' y'all
Ain't nothin' y'all can do, now

 

Blogger 365 Day 37 - Behind schedule

     Just sitting here doing my hours for work, our pay schedules run every two weeks, with the week starting on Monday and gong through Sunday.  With one scheduled day of work left in this two week period I am at 86.5 hours, though I will certainly be in on Saturday as well, f for no other reason than to do the grocery order.  I don't know if 86.5 is a lot or not, I guess in the grad scheme of things where people are supposed to work 40 hour work weeks it would be, but for me this week has been almost easy.

     Okay, easy may be the wrong word to use, perhaps productive would be more appropriate because most every day this week not only have I been able to get my normal work done, but I have managed to chip into the other tasks that also have needed done.  I have managed to get more products into the register system, fix some other issues with said system, help out with some of the stocking, clean the hot dog roller, check in another of Ed's orders from an outside vendor and still find time to get some reading in in m spare time.  All of this and I am actually behind the pace I set on my last two week pay period (I had logged 91 hours by this point last time).  Dare I say I almost feel rested, though I shouldn't say that too loudly because I am sure Ed will find something else for me to do if I say that.  For now though I think I will just chill in my apartment (literally, it is like 63 degrees in here) and maybe read some more of my new book.  I did add one yesterday to the shelf on your right, if you were even remotely curious.  If all goes well tomorrow (fingers crossed), I am thinking a trip to the Waterfront and Barnes and Noble may be in order, as well as a ide trip to Bottom Dollar to grab the fixins for some spinach dip.  Because that is how I roll.

Penguins @ Sabres 02/06/2014

Pittsburgh 5  Buffalo 1

Sidney Crosby, Evgeni Malkin - G, A each

Crosby has tallied 22 points (9 G, 13 A) in 14 career games in Buffalo

Blogger 365 Day 36 - TITIT #18 The past repeats itself

     So I was wondering just what it was I would blog about, when a couple of weeks ago I saw a cover of Sports Illustrated's Super Bowl preview edition of their weekly magazine.  On the cover was this image....

      While that cover may not mean anything to you, and if it did then it may mean even less now since Denver did get the shit kicked out of them in the Super Bowl, the title of the lead story is what stuck with me, if for no other reason then I used to do blogs in a similar vein, blogs that were titled "TITIT" for "Things I Think I Think".   But just because I remembered something I used to do is not in and of itself reason enough to do it again, I have to have opinions on multiple topics in order for a TITIT to work.  Luckily for you, today is such a day. 

      Starting off with the big debate last night between Bill Nye and Ken Ham at the Creation Museum over evolution versus creationism, the only thing I can think of is why?  Does anyone really believe this type of debate on the internet is remotely informative?  Rather is is just supporters of each man coming together to shout at the other side, not much different than a political debate in that regard.  The person I hold to blame for this most of all though is Bill Nye.  Why in the world would you even lend a shred of credibility to Ken Ham by sharing a stage with him?  This is akin to comparing the cinematic greatness of "The Godfather" with that of "Ernest Goes to Camp".  I get the creationist argument, belief relies on faith, but belief is not science nor should it ever share the same stage with science.  I can believe my cock is 12 inches long but the fact of the matter is we have a way of measuring things, and if my cock were to be measured then my belief would be shattered by evidence to the contrary.  Nye diminishes himself by sharing the stage with a charlatan such as Ham.

     I am not a fan of rap music by any stretch of the imagination, but if the planned boxing match between George Zimmerman and rapper DMX takes place, I will definitely be on the side of DMX in that bout.  There are few people on this planet who I would say I enjoy watching them get their ass beat, but George Zimmerman would be high up on that list. 

     CVS is saying that come October 1st they will no longer sell cigarettes in their drug stores.  Being they are a private company, far be it from me to tell them what they should or shouldn't sell, but CVS can quit lying to the public when they say the reason they are doing it is because of the health risks involved with smoking.  If CVS were that worried about the health aspects of the products they sold, then they would not be selling aisles of junk food and soda in their stores either.  Rather this is merely an issue of dollars and cents, cigarettes are one of the lowest profit margin items a store can sell, usually falling into the 12-15% category, though places that sell at state minimum pricing can see that margin fall down to about 9%.  CVS has already made inroads in cutting it's labor force by shoving out its lowest paid employees in favor of self checkout scanners, where one person can just watch over 5 or 6 different terminals, thereby eliminating 4 or 5 cashier jobs in the process.  The only counter in CVS that is manned on an even semi regular basis is the one where you by cigarettes, so if you take away that product, you take away the need for that cashier as well.  CVS is less concerned with their customers health then they are concerned with their own financial well being. 

Senators @ Penguins 02/03/2014

Pittsburgh 2  Ottawa 1  OT

Brian Gibbons, James Neal - G each

Pittsburgh is 23-4 at home this year

Blogger 365 Day 35 - Reading rainbow

     Since nothing else is going on around these parts I guess I could say that I am on my third book of the new year.  Another non fiction title, "Thank You for Your Service" by David Finkel, a book about soldiers who have problems adjusting after coming back from war.  Some are injured physically, some mentally, but all are damaged in some way.  The book goes on to talk about not only the injuries they suffered, but how those injuries affect their families.  It is a really good book, chances are I will have it finished by the end of the week.  I would be done by now if it weren't for my hours at work, most of my reading is done on the bus on the way to and from my job.  Occasionally I get to slip out and go to dinner, always with the book in tow so I can get more reading in.

     The weather hasn't helped much, with it being cold all of the time and snow every other day it seems, I can't escape to my bench in the park and just sit there quietly and read, which I do miss.  I have some more books lined up after this one, Dee brought in some books from her house, she is in the process of packing and moving soon, so she is getting rid of things that she will not be taking to her boyfriends place for the time being, or to Florida this summer, which seems to be her long term plan.   She brought in three or four books, I definitely want to read a couple of them, and I still have two or three books to get to that Ed gave me before he left for the winter, so I do not suffer from lack of reading material.  If I did I have $60 in Barnes and Noble gift cards I can use, and another $40 in Amazon cash, so I have a pretty good leg up on reading material for the entire year if need be. 

I wish I could say there were other, more exciting things going on around these parts, but really there isn't.  This is one of those days where I am blogging because I said I would not because I have anything interesting to say.  I will save that for other people.  This is one of those days were they will be better at it than I am.

Blogger 365 Day 34 - Things left behind

     Through the course of the day I had been asked by friends and co workers what I thought about the game last night.  Now I don't live under a rock or anything, there was only one game hey could have been referring to, the Super Bowl.  The thing is, I didn't watch it. 

     I am a sports fan to be sure, I like to sit down and watch a game as much as the next person.  And if someone offers me tickets to a sporting event here in Pittsburgh, regardless of how mundane that sporting event will be, chances are I will go.  In the last twelve months I have probably been to 4 Pirates games (baseball), 3 hockey games (Penguins) 1 professional football game (Steelers) and one college football game (Pitt Panthers), so it isn't that I do not like sports but at sme point it no loger became appointment viewing for me.  There was a time where I would be geeked up for Super Bowl Sunday, making a plan for just what I wanted to do, where would I go, who would I watch the game with and now, I just don't care.  Sports has gone from a can't miss for me programming to just one of a number of options on how to spend my free time.

     I say that because we are coming up on the Olympics and I am not holding out any sort of patriotic fervor for the games nor any gripping desire to watch them.  I imagine that if I am in a room and something from the games are on I might watch for a bit, but I can't see myself rushing home to catch any particular event, nor will I get all hung up on medal counts between countries that are competing.  Maybe this is just one of those things that adults give up as they get older, though the imbecilic behavior of some Steeler fans in this town says that it isn't an age thing, or maybe it is just in the grand scheme of things sports carries almost zero importance to me.  The constant barrage of reminders of how much sports is a business has led me to treat them as such, I am no more likely to been seen standing in a crowd chanting "Here We Go Steelers, here we go" than I am to be standing outside the glass towers downtown chanting "P - P - G, P - P - G".  It is like someone has hit a dimmer switch in my soul when it comes to sports, maybe I would appreciate them more if they were no longer available locally, or maybe I wouldn't miss them at all.

Penguins @ Coyotes 02/01/2014

Phoenix 3  Pittsburgh 1

Evgeni Malkin - G

Pittsburgh is 11-4-1 against teams from the Western Conference

Blogger 365 Day 33 - More of the same

I would like to say that my mind is in a better state since I blogged yesterday, but it really isn't. I spent my day doing almost nothing, I am basically just using today as a rest up day so I can turn around and do the same thing starting Monday morning.

Blogger 365 Day 32 - Why?

Saturday afternoon. Squirrel Cage. Trying to decompress a little bit. I am maybe halfway through my workday, it started at 10:30 am with a trip to Gus Millers, then to Smithfield News, then back to Gus Millers, and now some lunch before I head back to Smithfield a second time. I do not want my blog to turn into some sort of dream book, but I think that part of what has been ruminating in my head goes back to what I dreamt about last night. I had a dream that I was working at my old radio station again, what caused such a dream who really knows, maybe it was the 3rd anniversary of Doug's passing, but for whatever I was dreaming that I was back there again and the program director was asking me what we could do to improve the station. How we know this is a dream would be twofold; 1) I would never be consulted on such a decision and 2) the station is now operated by a religious outfit. But the dream got me to thinking on the way to work this morning, it was really a simple thought that went through my head, that being, what is the endgame to what I am currently doing? I have been at Smithfield News for over 5 years now, and I have managed to climb the company ladder somewhat, but to what end? How does this play out?  Certainly this is not how I had hoped things would turn out, after being in radio for better than a decade I would have hoped by this point in time I would have had my own radio show, been entertaining the masses for a few years now and while not independently wealthy, I would at least be living somewhat comfortably. Instead I am in a job where, despite having the requisite skill set needed, and working with people that I get along with for the most part, I can't sit here and say that I am overly happy with my lot in life either. I know most weeks I will end up working 6 or even 7 days, and usually by the time I get home I am just to exhausted to want to do anything else, so I just sit there, waiting for the next work shift to come. Wash, rinse, repeat indeed. I am not even sure why I do this, save for the fact I seem to have the skill set required to do the task at hand, that and the fact they pay me for it. Beyond that though? I really couldn't tell you. I can't sit here and honestly say I get much joy from it, and the longer I do it the more I just feel an unending pressure, like the very survival of the business is ultimately going to fall squarely on my shoulders. That would be enough of a burden, but when it comes time to make the decisions that need to be made, then I might as well be the Queen of England, my position becomes nothing more than that of a figurehead, I am just supposed to somehow find a way to make the decisions of others actually work. For the locals perhaps a better way to describe it would be to think in terms of the Pittsburgh Penguins, you know you have talent to work with in the top six,yet for some reason the coach wants to double shift the third and fourth lines. I know we have people who are talented and want to work, yet we continue to cater to those that are only there for a paycheck. As a result the level of frustration grows. It was tempered a little bit this winter, when Dee and I were allowed to do some hiring, because so far 4 out of the 5 people we have hired have worked out to this point. By worked out I mean they are significantly better than the people they replaced. Still I have been at this current position for 6 months now and I still feel like a kid with his learner's permit, I know I can drive if only the parents would let me have the car. But they don't and I can't help wondering if I am just wasting my time. It is like a Communist hell at this point, 5 years down and I am not certain I am any better off than I was 5 years ago. I work harder now with longer hours and I can't see where anything is significantly better. Oh well, enough griping from me. Lunch is over, time to head back to work and spend more time serving the empire.