Is It Just Me....

Some things really get under my fingernails, with all the crap going on in this world, people BITCH about the stupidest things. This movie 2012, which I want to see, is stirring up this end of the world stuff based on the Mayan calender. Read a book, it's not the end of the world, it was the end of their calender. They basically ran out of stone, it was like all that Y2K crap in 2000. Still here!!!
Listened to the local news, the smallest most insignificant things are making headlines, instead of hearing about the brave soldiers that are fighting for us, we hear these dumb biddies that keep complaining about the bikini barrista stands and trying to put them out of business. This is part a being in a free country, you also have to put up with the stuff you don't like. The complaints from the ladies are; "I don't want to pull into a latte' stand and have my kids see a half naked woman" REALLY!!! Look, it is no secret that the latte' stands have girls in bikinis there. LOOK AT THE SIGN!!! "Hot Chick-A-Latte', "Barrista's Gone Wild" What more of a hint do you need?
The next argument,"I don't want to drive by and have my kids see these ladies thru the window" Are you kidding me??? How is kid your see gonna see someone in a window passing at 40 miles an hour. I am a grown man and I can't do that. Do you know how many cars I have almost rear ended trying that?? As long as they are not breaking any laws, and a few of them have, let them run their stands. I am not saying this because I am a guy, I am saying this because I hate stupid crap. Now, I don't go to these places because they make a lousy cup of coffee( I went once just to piss off the women out front protesting the stand) If I want to go out and pay 4.00 for coffee, I go to Starbucks If I want a lousy cup of coffee made by a half naked woman, I'll have my wife do it, tell her how good the coffee is and get laid later.
Now the holidays are coming up and fast. I am really starting to dislike this time of year. They had Christmas stuff up in October...OCTOBER!!!! Sales are starting already, my kids are giving me their Christmas list. My daughter, who is being a total bitch and charged 136.00 on her cell phone without asking or paying for it, gave me a list. She'll be lucky to get a 5.00 gift card to the dollar store. To be honest, the only reason we are putting up a tree is for our three year old son, Andrew. This is all for him.
We have the employee parties coming up, nothing more I like than spending an evening with a bunch of people I can't stand, there are only two people there I can trust. I could be watching wrestling or catching up on some recorded shows. Case in point, I am working right now, a couple hours ago, someone comes in and asked if anyone had found a couple packs of cigarettes. I didn't know, they told me about what time they were here, and asked if I wouldn't mind checking the video. Later in the night, I checked, and low and behold, the lady was in here. She bent over to get a beer and 2 packs of cigarettes fell out of her pocket. They laid on the floor for about 10 minutes before one of my coworkers came by and picked them up. I later texted him and asked if he found anything, he texted back"They came by earlier asked asked and I told them no we didn't find anything, they are trying to scam us. You should know better than to believe these people".
On a pleasant note, I watched the World Magic Awards last night. I made a point to get everything done so we could watch uninterrupted. Lot of good magic, some mediocre magic and some bad magic. Michael Finney is always funny, Barry and Stuart were great. The other acts were predictable, and can someone explain the appeal of Ed Alonzo? The worst act on the show was the act done by this a woman from Budapest, the color change gloves was hard to follow. The suspended body transposition was poorly done. All in all it was nice to see magic on T.V.
Next week, will be hanging out with my friend Tim Flynn, Tim and I met a few years ago at the Gazzo Master Class. This class was a blast!!! I got to hang out for two days with a bunch of magicians. Gazzo is a really nice guy. I bought a table from Tim a few weeks later as it match the size of the ones Gazzo uses for street performing. It has served me well for many years, but now I think it's time for a new one and a really solid stand, both of which he is making for me...I can't wait to see them!!
Here's the thing about Tim, we never really hang out or session, yet we still came up with the same ideas on the cups and balls so we are not transferring the ball back and forth from each hand several times. Looking to gets some tips on the Linking Rings and maybe coins and cards, I won't be able to stay too long..... Wish I could though.

What a Treat!!!

As I mentioned in an earlier post, my wife, Darlene is off for most of the week. Wednesday, I got home from work around 8am as Darlene was waking up. It was nice to come home and have her there. We talked and cuddled a bit before Andrew woke up, then I played my new game for about 30 minutes. My wife said she had a surprise for me when I get up.. A big pan of homemade lasagna for dinner.
Didn't sleep very well, my shoulders and neck have really been hurting me for the last week.... a lot. I have been racking my brain trying to figure out what I did, did I strain myself again? This pain is very different... It's like I am being stabbed all the time, then it hit me, the new bi polar medication that the doctor added two weeks ago, Lamotrigine. looked it up online and some of the lesser side effects are severe neck and muscle pain... really... there are a lot of side effects on this medication that I wasn't told about. Why the hell couldn't I get increased sex drive or the weight loss. The side effects are worst than the reason you are taking the meds for. It should say meds are for inducing nausea, weight gain, head aches, neck pain, muscle pain, vomiting, sleepiness, increased sex drive...etc.... Side effects are: treats bi polar disorder. As I type this I am in so much pain.... Dammit!!!

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2

I am by no means a game dork, I cannot recite the lines from any of the Star Wars films(ok I know a few) I can't tell you what the maximum warp speed of a Constitution Class Starship is, but I do enjoy Star Trek. I love Godzilla movies, I have all 29, I love Japaneses Sci-fi and oddities. I have more than a few bootleg DVDs i.e. things that WILL NEVER be released legitimately on DVD, The first Fantastic Four movie from the mid 90's, a movie SOOO bad, Stan Lee bought it from Rodger Corman so it would never be seen. Same thing with the Captain America movie, Legends of Superheroes from the 70's. Adam West and Burt Ward trying to reprise their Batman and Robin roles from the 60's... Bad, bad show, lasted 2 episodes.... Anywhoooo, not a game dork, but when this game was coming out, I really wanted to play it. I have the other Call of Duty games and the online play is phenomenal!!!! Darlene was off for the next few days and seeing as I had to work, she was willing to go to the store and pick the game up for me at midnight so I could jump right in when I got home and start playing.
Great game, I suck at it though, I can't take 2 steps without getting killed. Like the others, I will catch on and get better at this game. These guys have no life, for example, if my wife comes over to me while I am playing and wants to make love..... game's done... back in 15... don't want to leave the X Box 360 on too long. I will be playing and earning rank.

A Day out and About....

Well... the one day off I will have for the next 12 days was very well spent. I can home caught 4 hours of sleep and got up to spend some time with the family. We got to the zoo around 2 pm, the weather was chilly and a bit wet. We had the whole place to ourselves!!! No lines or rush to view the animals, we took our time and enjoyed the sites. The only problem I had was getting in, I remember back in the "Day" you paid your admission and you went in. NOW.. they want your zip code and city. Apparently if you live out Pierce County, you pay more, then they give you this computer ticket that has to be scanned at a turnstile to get in. What happened to the days when you could just buy a ticket and go in??? Andrew went NUTS!!!! He is at a great age for this, it was nice to just let him sit in front of the exhibits and just look the animals in the eyes. These were magical moments.
At first, Andrew was really intimidated by the elephants, these are massive creatures.

A Sand tiger shark... The sharks are my favorite exhibits, these creatures are both fearsome and beautiful.
Andrew wishing he was a spider.....
MEERKATS!!!!

My wife, Darlene was a big fan of Meerkat Manor, a show that lasted 2 seasons on Animal Planet. We spent about 40 minutes watching these little cuties.....

Just missed the Gibbon swinging by. The Gibbon would hang on the ropes in front of the window interacting with us.
After the zoo, we took a ride on the light rail running thru downtown Tacoma. We promised Andrew a train ride after the zoo, he was very excited and really enjoyed the ride.

For dinner we ended going to a little Mexican restaurant in Spanaway called Hidalgos, as the Asia BBQ stand at the Freight house Square was closed. Very tasty food at reasonable prices.

Sometimes Things Can Be Too Much....

I want to do this more often, but I hate typing and sometimes not knowing the words to express how I feel makes me feel stupid. The only reason I am posting now is because my friend Tim mentioned that I haven't posted in a while.
Where to start...Things have not been going great at work, just about everyone has a short fuse. A is pissed off at B for not doing their job, B is pissed off at C and C is pissed off at everyone. This is one of the benefits of working alone, if something doesn't get done, I have no one to blame but myself.
I really don't like working alone anymore, my wife and I work opposite shifts, I am alone when I go to work, I am alone when I come home... no one to greet me when I come home. My wife commented that is feels like we are roommates. She's right, we only have a couple hours in the evenings, half a day on Saturday and we have Sunday for a family day if we want to do something. I am working 6 days this week, have Sunday off then I have to work 12 days straight. The guy that normally works my nights off is going out of town and we are short handed as is it, we just don't have enough people to fill all the shifts without overtime.
To add to the frustration, the customers seem to be becoming bigger jerks than ever. I work in Tillicum, not the best area, there are a lot of low life's here, you have to have eyes in the back of your head. One of my fears is that some were to happen to me, and one of these low life's find me first, they are more likely to go thru my pockets, empty the register, grab whatever beer they can carry before or even IF they call for help. I am disliking these people more and more each day. At the first of the month, their welfare kicks in, at 12:01am on the first, they are hitting the ATM. They get upset with me because their money isn't in. When it does finally hit, they are like hyenas and the ATM is a carcass. They gather around, each one withdrawing as much as they can as many times as they can before the ATM runs out of money. In my opinion, if you are on welfare, food stamps,or both, you should have to provide DSHS receipts for what you are spending the tax payers money on. I am sick of my tax dollars paying for their beer, cigarettes, gambling habits and drug use!!!
Enough about work, things are O.K at home, just wishing I could spend more time with Darlene and Andrew. Andrew is growing like a weed, and learning fast.... too fast. I like to play Call of Duty on line on my X Box 360, you can play with anyone around the world and I have gotten to talk to folks as far away as Australia. I have to really watch what I say when I am playing as Andrew will repeat EVERYTHING. It's at the point now where I will be playing, I'm not cursing, but when my character get shot, he'll yell "Dammit" or "SON OF A BITCH". Needless to say I am trying to be very careful when I play and he is around.
My 18 year old daughter is being a complete and total bitch, I had to shut off her cell phone for good on November 1st, I got the bill on October 28th and it was for over $400.00. I called Verizon to see what happened and they said that on of the phones have over 136.00 in download fees for songs and ring tones. Holy Cow!!! I called her and asked what was up and why, she said she was bored. I told her to have the money to me by the 1st of November or the phone will be shut off and stay shut off, her response was "It can just be an early Christmas present" No money by the 1st and she was ignoring my calls and text so the phone is gone. I later got an e-mail saying the I never want to talk or see you again. At this point, although I am hurt, this is her choice, not mine and this is one less leach I have to deal with. I am getting a strong feeling that my oldest son is going the same way as he has made no effort to come over for almost 2 months. I have tried to set up a visit, he is busy every weekend, they do however have time to see their grandma each week..... go figure. The way I see it, I have a few more months of child support left to pay then I'm done. If they can't make time for their dad, then the bank will be closed!!! My ex has given Margaret the money that's has been saved over the last 18 years for school and she has spent it on everything BUT school. She has complained that I haven't given her any money for school, not true, when they were visiting, they were paid to to chores on the farm. She did not put one cent away for school.
Done with that, I would like to spend a bit more time on the magic thing, I was off for a week due to a strained abdominal muscle and took that time to learn a couple new effects, Daryl's Acrobatic Knot, 3 Fly 3 and the Rubic's Cube. The cube was pissing me off, if you make a wrong move, you have to completely take that damn thing apart, put it together and start over. I took that thing apart 10 times before I got it down, I even made a few new curse word in the process. Working on the effects now, hoping to smooth them out.
I talked to my good friend Tim, he is making a nice oak table stand and a new table, looking forward to seeing it. Today...well I hope to get home and catch about 4 hours of sleep, I would like to take the family to the Zoo as we haven't been there in a while. Andrew is 3, this will me a magical experience for him. Then we plan to park the car at the park and ride at Freight house Square and take to train around Tacoma. And last but not least, there is an Asian BBQ place in the Square that serves a great Bulgogi beef..... DINNER TIME!!!! The family really needs a day together as the next 2 weeks are gonna be really rough.