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The War in the Middle East

2007-08-23T16:23:00.001-07:00

There has been a lot in the news about how we should withdraw troops from Iraq and Afghanistan...or not pull out because there would be chaos. Anna Quindlen from Newsweek wrote,

"Now the party line is that American forces will get out, but they cannot get out now. They cannot get out now because Iraq would become a place of civil war, of untrammeled violence, of complete chaos. Iraq has been a place of civil war, untrammeled violence, complete chaos for a long time now. American intervention has not made that better. It has made it worse." [Click here for her full article.]

She also basically says that other people who say it will become chaotic over there if we pull out our troops now are inferring that it is currently NOT chaotic and violent because we are there. With all the headlines of deaths and suicide bombs, it is certainly not calm now.

My theory is this: It will never be peaceful over there because the people of the country don't want it to be. A system of authority can only work if the masses believe in that authoritative system. If not enough people believe in the authority, it will never work. In Iraq, it is more important to citizens to have only their particular party in charge than it is to have peace in the country. As an example, imagine if the Republicans took to the streets and did massive suicide bombs because the Democrats took over Congress in November 2006. Or the Democrats created massive upheaval because Bush was re-elected president. But we don't do that in the US. Sure, there are a few crazies that always want to try and kill whatever president is in power, but we don't have severe and massive uprisings where Democrats take to the streets and shoot all the Republicans they can find. We all still generally believe in the system our ancestors created, and we all still basically want peace. The Iraqi people don't seem to want peace. That's why I think no matter what we do - pull out now, pull out later, or pull out slowly -it won't make a difference to the country. So I think we might as well cut our losses (of lives and money) and get out now while we still have some soldiers still alive.

Sports Doping Scandals

2007-08-02T14:05:00.000-07:00

The Tour de France and Barry Bonds (again) have been in the news a lot lately, in regards to using steroids to enhance performance. Here's my cynical take on it...

Since it seems to be so hard to detect the stuff, and people seem to use it whether or not it is illegal (and deny deny deny), I have a revolutionary idea. First, we will start a new set of sports records books. Then we change the rules so it is no longer against the rules to use drugs or steroids or any type of performance enhancing stuff for sports. Then it puts everyone on the same playing field again (well, on the new set of record books), and they can continue to compete. Then we level the playing field again, and it will come down to whoever is the best athlete at the end of the day. And if someone takes it too far and takes too many drugs - the consequence is clear....death. They will just end up killing themselves from drug overdoses, and that's the catch.

My revolutionary method has fixed the problem, and no one needs to be tested or watched for drug use. It will be clear that everyone is using them, and the dead ones used too much. Problem solved!

Bridezilla in One Easy Step!

2007-02-22T17:50:00.000-08:00

So everyone talks about "Bridezillas". I certainly hope I don't become one of them. But I think I know how they come to be....

Whenever you talk to a vendor at a bridal fair, or in their shop, they always say (several times) "Just do whatever YOU want." "It's YOUR day, it should be everything YOU dreamed of..." blah blah. The vendors start all of it!! They bring it on themselves (probably trying to get you to spend more money to make everything PERFECT for the BIG day). It is the same way people become vain - after hearing something ump-teen million times, you start to believe it...then more and more.... voila! Bridezilla created!

So I'm Planning My Wedding...

2007-02-12T17:24:00.001-08:00

...and I've been to a couple of these "Bridal Fairs" where all the vendors get together in one place and, as a bride, you pay money to be accosted by all these people trying to get more money from you. As you enter, they slap a "BRIDE" sticker on you, to label you like the Scarlet Letter. Then the vendors know who to target as you are walking by, and you can walk past anyone! I hate that sticker...

And something else I learned from these bridal fairs.....Everyone and their stinkin' mother wants to be your wedding Coordinator. There are DJ's who want to help you plan your entire wedding and pick a cake and caterer for you, too! They've got a priest they know as well! The catering companies can set you up with a cake place and a DJ too! It's as if someone specializes in ANY part of a wedding ceremony or reception, they are skilled to do all the rest of it too! Everyone is selling "all inclusive" packages, rather than just a price for their particular service. Trying to parse that out from them gets difficult and annoying.

It's difficult to figure out how you are going to pick your various vendors for the wedding. With catering and cake, you can taste the food. But with a DJ, you can't really listen to their music, because it's all the same. You really have to see them in action to know whether they would be any good or not. So I came up with a question to ask DJs to help me determine who might be good. My question is, "If I told you I wanted 80's pop/dance music played at my reception, name 5 songs you would play." It turns out, this is not a bad question! A couple of the DJs I asked had pretty good answers (Come On Eileen, Tainted Love, etc.). One DJ said, "Anything by Michael Jackson or Madonna" and that's it. Uh...there was a lot more dance music in the 80s that wasn't done by the white female freak or Madonna.

Ahhh....to blog again....I've got to remember to do this at my lunchtime at work!

Long Time No Post

2006-11-27T17:10:00.000-08:00

Sorry it's been a while since I posted on my blog. I first went on vacation for a cruise to visit Hurricane Paul! Two of our three ports were cancelled, the boat was very rocky, and all the good free games they played were held in the smoking lounges so we didn't want to go. I won't even talk about all the old people there. But the food was excellent!

Then about a week after we got back my boyfriend proposed and we are now engaged! So that's been consuming a lot of my time now, too. So sorry for the delay in updating my blog. I'm sure that since I'll be dealing with people in the wedding industry, there will be plenty to rant about, so stay tuned for those.

Some of my books (I bought about five from Amazon - used, of course! - on how to have a great wedding and not spend a fortune) say that bridal stores charge you a "try-on" fee of $50 just to try on their dresses! How ridiculous is that?!!

Don't even get me started on hotel or banquet halls charging "corkage" fees if you bring your own wine....what a total scam! This one place has a $14 corkage fee per bottle. My fiance said to just buy boxed wine so there's no corks to pull....great idea, but I somehow think that won't fly. They also charge a cake-cutting fee of $1.50 per person, which more or less doubles the cost of the cake. These fees are so excessive and ridiculous, that I can't stand it. I'm going to hold my reception at a community center or a church parish hall so i don't have those stupid extra costs. Besides, the wine I like only costs $6 a bottle at Trader joe's!

That's it for this episode...

Financial Tip #1

2006-10-12T16:18:00.000-07:00

My boyfriend and I were watching TV several weeks ago, and managed to stumble across a repeat of Saturday Night Live. Steve Martin was the host, so we decided to watch a bit.

One of their fake commercials came on, and my boyfriend and I were nearly rolling on the ground laughing so hard. It sounds EXACTLY like something I'd say to people (and probably have, on occasion). It turns out that there's a clip of this commercial available on-line! So here is a link to it - you've just got to see it for yourself! SNL Video

This commercial tells you what my #1 Financial Tip is.

Let me know what you think...

It's called a M-I-X-E-R

2006-10-12T16:17:00.000-07:00

So on 10/8 we had our first small fundraising event for HSSV. We managed to raise about $2500, I think, and had about 50-60 people attend. One of our sponsors was DateMyPet.com, which is a singles site for animal lovers. We held it at a brewery, and all beer was donated by a local brewery, which we then sold for $3 a glass to benefit the animals. We had a few games (i.e. doggie musical chairs where the last dog to sit when the music stops is out) and raffle prizes, and several people told us they had a really good time. We even had beer for the dogs! It's called Happy Tail Ale, and it's actually brewed just for dogs, without alcohol or carbonation. You can buy it on-line here.

[Sorry for all the links in this post. I just figured out how to do it and it's kinda cool! Practice, Practice, practice!]

One lady at the event, though, didn't seem to be having a good time. While delivering some glasses of beer to a table, she looked at me and said sarcastically, "This is a RAGING party." I decided to just ignore her. But my thought was, Well, it's a mix and mingle event, and you're sitting here by yourself in the middle and not trying to meet anyone. It's not my fault you can't mingle right!" Was she expecting a full-scale dating service for her $10 entrance donation?? Ugh.

A Poll

2006-09-28T17:08:00.000-07:00

Sorry I've neglected my blog for a bit, but I'm just feeling like no one is reading it anyway.

I have to ask you this question - please respond in the comment section so we can take a poll of sorts.

You are at lunch with a group friends, and you are all celebrating someone's birthday. Each person gets their own meal, so it's not a buffet type where everyone shares everything. There is a large disparity in the prices of dishes ordered. Do you split the bill evenly among all attendees, minus the Birthday Person? Or do you split it by exactly who orders what, and everyone adds a bit for the Birthday Person's meal? Please let me know your answer, so I can judge if I'm in the minority on this one. Thanks!

Loading the Dishwasher

2006-08-18T15:59:00.000-07:00

Is there a class where I can send roommates to learn how to load a dishwasher? I seem to always have roommates and coworkers who don't understand how to simply load a dishwasher. It isn't a problem that the dishes are still in the sink, but that they are all caddywompus in the dishwasher. If you don't somewhat organize the thing and stack plates and bowls where they belong, you will be running loads MUCH more frequently than you otherwise would. Not to mention that sometimes placement of these items prohibits the washer from cleaning other items (such as placing a bowl over the hole where the mechanism rises up to spread the water around the top rack). If someone is going to put it in the dishwasher in the first place, it doesn't take much extra effort to put it in properly! Follow the pattern that the other dish locations have established! Argh...

The Joy of Washing My Car

2006-08-17T14:52:00.000-07:00

No really - I enjoy washing my car. Yes, it is partly because I love cars and love my car specifically (the Batmobile - 2004 Celica GTS, but that's another story). But the neurotic part is because I'm never quite satisfied with the job that the Pay-Per-Wash places do.

When I first owned a car that I bought with my own money, I spent the $20 and took it to a place where someone else would labor and wash it. However, I would always notice that they didn't quite scrub hard enough on the front bumper or the backs of the side mirrors to get rid of all the smashed bug guts that collected there since the last washing. I never felt that it was worth my hard earned $20.

So when I bought my next car (a 1999 Mitsu Eclipse RS), I decided that I loved it so much that I was going to clean all the bug guts off myself. I had that car for about 4 years, until "routine maintenance" cost me about $1500. (As an aside, I feel like "routine maintenance" should only cost a few hundred dollars, so you can SAVE the cost of an expensive repair that would be upwards of $1k.) Anyway....I decided to get a new car and ditch the Eclipse.

So I crunched my numbers, and decided that i could finally afford my dream car, a Toyota Celica. So I picked up a 2004 GTS with leather seats and a fin (not the big hoopty-gang fin, but a nice small sleek looking one). The only way that car has been washed is by my hands. I have never taken it to a car wash place (because of the bug gut reasoning listed above). It takes me about an hour, give or take. I enjoy doing it because I like the tangible benefits of a clean, bug-gut-free car. For at least a few days after the wash, I always imagine my car is in a clean "bubble" while I'm driving, and nothing can get it dirty! (Totally dumb, I know, but I'm being honest!)

The big bummer about washing my own car, though, is that I notice all the new nicks and scratches in the paint that weren't there last time I washed the car. That's always annoying. And I keep meaning to go to a Toyota dealer to get a little bottle of touch-up paint so I can fix the little scratches and nicks. I know it won't look perfect, but it will be better than the black spot from the underlying metal.

So that's my neurotic thing to share with you today....I enjoy washing my car because no one does it good enough for my perfectionistic personality. And I hate smashed bug guts on my bumper.

Stupid Person of the Day

2006-08-07T14:23:00.000-07:00

The stupid person from the weekend is a guy I saw at the gas station. He finished pumping gas, and got out a cigarette and lighter before leaving the station. I yelled over at him, "Would you mind waiting to light your cigarette until after you leave the gas station? Thanks." You get the Stupid Person of the Day award today.

Metering Lights

2006-07-12T09:30:00.000-07:00

My entrance to the freeway has metering lights on it. There is a small box at the end of the ramp that should trigger the light to turn green. But if a car doesn't roll over it (i.e. they are too far to the right), the light will never turn green.

My frustration is with people who don't understand the concept of metering lights. If the metering light doesn't turn green within 10 seconds or so (even 30!), IT WILL NEVER TURN GREEN. That means you didn't roll over that special spot in the pavement which triggers the light, and thus it will not turn green. No matter how long you wait, it will not change. You either need to back up and change your position in the lane, or JUST GO ANYWAY. Everyone behind you is annoyed that you are taking so long to figure this out. Occasionally, nice people like me might pull up close to you on the correct side, and roll over the box to release you from your frozen prison. But I can only do that if I'm right behind you! If I'm farther back in the wait (which has piled up since you have waited so long for the magic green that will never appear), then I'm the one honking at you to make you go anyway. If you don't respond to that, then I'm going in the carpool lane around you because you apparently ARE HOPELESS TO LEARN THIS CONCEPT!!

So please, the next time you come upon metering lights when entering the freeway, know that they are supposed to change within a matter of seconds (you can wait up to 30 seconds MAX). If they don't, it will never change because you didn't trigger it! Technology is too complicated for some.....Argh....

Eyebrows

2006-06-26T15:42:00.000-07:00

For some reason, I'm totally neurotic about plucking my eyebrows. Every night before I go to bed, I have to carefully inspect my eyebrows, and pluck out any stray ones growing back that are outside my perfect eyebrow lines. For some reason I'm obsessed with doing this. It could take me up to 20 minutes to inspect them fully and be satisfied. I also tend to inspect and clip/trim my fingernails and cuticles the same way. I inspect them very closely for any chips in nails, or hangnails which could be torn if not removed right away. On occasion, I have gone to bed without this inspection process, but it is bothersome. Even if I'm late getting to bed, and completely exhausted, I still end up inspecting and plucking where necessary. It is definilty a mild form of OCD...

Fixing Social Security (Secretly)

2006-06-22T17:08:00.000-07:00

George W. Bush is not one of my most favorite people. I disagree with almost all of his decisions, and he sounds like an idiot when he tries to talk without a speech in front of him. But the smartest thing I think he's done is to secretly fix the Social Security problem. Here's how his secret plan works....you read it here first!

As some of you may know, Bush has passed a number of new tax laws since he's been in office. Most of these laws reduced tax rates for the rich while being sold to the public that it reduced taxes for the poor. One of these taxes is the estate tax ("death tax"). The estate tax is what the government takes when you die, if they decide you are too rich and have too much money or net worth built up at the time of your death (over the exemption amount, which is currently $1.5million). Before Bush was in office, the highest rate for estate taxes was a whopping 55%. Yep - if you were super rich, didn't plan well, and then died, the gov't would take away more than half of your estate. It's one way the government taxes the rich and gives to the poor.

Anyway, Bush (and most Republicans) don't like this "death tax". They would like the rich to stay rich, and fund the government with poor and middle class people's incomes. (My first blog warned you that this was an opinionated blog - so deal with it!) So when Bush passed his tax reform bills, one of the things he did was get rid of the estate tax. Well, that's how he promoted it. What it really does is reduce that maximum 55% rate gradually over several years. Then in the final year of this tax bill (2010), it completely abolishes the estate tax. But when 2011 hits, this bill expires, and the estate tax goes right back to 55% again. This is called a sunset provision. (Mind you, this all only happens if Congress and teh President don't make new laws to change these ones or supersede these - that's always up in the air as a possibility.)

Anyway.... For the ONE year of 2010, there will be absolutely NO estate tax whatsoever, no matter how rich or how much money you have (with the caveat stated above - that someone doesn't change the rules). But that means you have to DIE in 2010 in order to take advantage of this benefit. By putting in the sunset provision so that there's only one year where you won't have estate taxes, Bush has secretly fixed the problem of the under funded Social Security system. He has bet on the possibility that there will be enough deaths, suicides, and murders of old rich people so that the Social Security system won't have as much money to pay out as projections currently show. Get it? If we take out enough of the old folks in 2010 (or they take themselves out for us), there will be so much savings in Social Security payments that we will be back in balance! Then there's a greater chance there will be SS left for the younger generation!

So if you're rich and over 65 years old 2010, be watching your back...

The Beginning

2006-06-22T16:28:00.000-07:00

Well, I decided I should do something with my free time from work. Doesn't have to be productive, which is why I decided to give this a shot. Maybe I'll never do it again (like Vicki), or maybe I'll do better than Michelle (not better writing, just more volume). So if you are bored at work or need a mental break, you can read my random voluminous thougths to distract you.

I have always been someone with a lot of opinions who is never afraid to share them. As someone once said, "Everyone is free to hear my opinion!" I guess that kind of applies to me. I also have a career/job that is very much feast or famine when it comes to work load. I am hardly ever able to prepare for my heavy workload times by taking care of stuff during the slower times. You can't close a set of accounting books for a month until the month actually ends! So here I am, and you've probably already stopped reading. Or maybe you're bored sometimes at work too. Does anyone ever really want to get to what's at the bottom of the "to do" work pile? The horrible stuff always goes down there so I don't have to deal with it.

Well, I guess I'll end this post here, and then start some of those random thoughts with their own titles. That would be so much more organized! Because random, voluminous thoughts should be organized....yeah....that's it..... But leave it to me to organize almost anything!