I finally got over the stomach virus that plagued me for the past 5+ days. Thank heavens for Imodium. I don’t think I would have made it without it.
I found out today the coworker who likely gave me the virus gift never had vomiting. I suppose some people react to it differently (though the other major characteristic is the same!).
I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck today. The nasty, nasty virus that had been felling my family and friends over the holidays has finally caught up to me. Yay.
I was in a meeting yesterday afternoon at work when I began to not feel quite right. I headed home and caught up on some work I needed to do. Quite without warning, I was, uh “interrupted” from my work, and spent the rest of the night and morning fighting for sleep. I lost, in case you were wondering.
I’ve taken the day off from work to try to recover. I think that is the sickest I have ever been.
All this silly talk about war, — mainly from people who would do anything not to have to fight it themselves — has gotten me bent out of shape.
The Libertarian Party sums up my feelings on it. Is Saddam a thug? Yes, but so are members of the Saudi Royal family and we aren’t declaring war on them. Does he have WMD (weapons of mass destruction)? You bet – we gave them to him in the mid-80’s.
Should we go to war against him in an effort to repossess our chemical weapons? Hell no.
The United States, among 15 other countries, posesses weapons of mass destruction. Why isn’t the UN inspecting us? Can you say “hypocracy?”
I think its time someone began to talk about reigning in the Little Sheriff. He seems to have forgotten that the U.S. Constitution comes first.
One of my New Year’s Resolutions is to update this on a more regular basis.
I read this week about a “new” old weblog that’s being done online. Someone has taken a 1660 diary and turned it into a weblog. The log itself is here.
It’s possible that four hundred years from now, someone may be reading these very words. Kewl.
I woke up this morning at 6:15 to feed a little girl and noticed that the days are getting shorter. I fed Hallie in the dark. You would still think it was summer if all you saw was midday, because it’s still close to 90 degrees outside. Yet, the mornings start later and the nights begin sooner.
I am sitting in the den watching the leaves fall in large bunches outside. My coworker Chris, a meterologist, said yesterday that cooler weather should arrive next week. I just don’t know if I’m ready for that.
Things are cranking up here now that its election time. Jesse Helms is stepping down and Erskine Bowles and Liddy Dole, among others, are vying to take his spot.
I saw my first negative commercial tonight during the news. Dole had a picture of Bowles up there with everyone’s favorite villian, Bill Clinton. I just rolled my eyes and changed the channel.
As long as this country continues with essentially two political parties to choose from, we will always be stuck with voting for the lesser of two evils. At this point in history, it’s easier for politicians to paint the other candidate as a lowdown dirty snake than it is for them to actually formulate their own positions on the issues. “If I can make the other dude look like the devil,” the thinking goes, “I don’t have to choose a side.”
The whole thing has got me fed up on politics. And this is from a guy who has seriously entertained thoughts of running for office some day.
What we’re missing is leadership. It takes leadership to actually state your position on something. I rarely agreed with the positions Jesse Helms took, but I will give the man this: he was always true to his word. When he made up his mind about something, you had better have a mountain of evidence if you want to convince him otherwise. It’s a shame he was often wrong, but you never had to guess where he stood.
Contrast this with the two major candidates vying for his seat. I don’t know much about Erskine Bowles. Very few of us do. But he came back to Charlotte saying he wasn’t interested in Helms’s Senate seat. Then the World Trade Center gets demolished, and somewhere the patriotic fever in him reignites. Can’t make up your mind, Erskine?
He promised at the start of his campaign that he would only be promoting himself, and not resort to the dreaded negative campaigning. Hearing this, I surfed over to his website to see what his platform was. Uh, platform? There was none. Nowhere was there any mention of any of his positions.
Sorry, buddy. We North Carolinians aren’t so dumb as to send someone to the Senate on his good looks alone.
Elizabeth Dole, on the other hand, is completely different … not! She pretends North Carolina is her home in spite of not having lived here since the early 1960’s. No one had even heard of Andy Griffifh back then, for God’s sakes. She is nothing but a carpetbagger in this respect.
She weasled her way into Reagan’s cabinet based on her gender, telling him he needed more “diversity.” She flip-flopped on major issues like gun control. When the Brady Bill was made law, she went on record fully supported the banning of assault weapons.
Liddy has softened up in her old age. Now that the NRA has come calling, she has suddenly become a strong supporter of gun rights. Call me crazy, but that sounds like she’s speaking out of both sides of her mouth. It has been said that her husband Bob Dole, was at the time of his Senate term the biggest friend of PAC’s in Congress, and would change his position at the signing of a check. Looks like Elizabeth has learned well.
Is this the best we can do? Aren’t there any alternatives? Actually, yes. There are third parties, and if enough people learn they don’t have to vote against candidates, but can actually vote for somebody, this country will be in a better place.
As for me, I’m heading for the Libertarian Party. It’s the one party I’ve found that has any sanity.
Have you ever walked into a conversation where you were immediately pulled into it with a question seemingly from out of the blue? That happened to me today. I was walking into the breakroom at my client site when two of the employees there asked me a question.
“Did you ever have a dream where your teeth fell out?”
“Well, yeah,” I answered. “A few years ago. But, yeah.”
“See, there must be some kind of support group for people,” they agreed as they walked out.
I have no idea what led up to that question, but I kind of like it that way. The mystery and all, you know.
Today is the 6th anniversary of Hurricane Fran. It was 1996 when it rolled in and rocked my world.
I will pull out all my pictures of the devastation and remember it all. Maybe even post a few when I can.
I have decided to keep my writing on my emotions private. Writing it did me a world of good. It could not possibly have that effect on anyone else.
Airlines make me sick. Not flying on them, just their attitude.
Recent headlines show they’re finally getting what they deserve. U.S. Airways files for bankruptcy. Midway goes under. United threatens to file for Chapter 11. And they all hold out their hats for a federal bailout. Why?
Why should the government subsidize such an arrogant, greedy industry?
They are incredibly anti-competitive. If they “own” a hub, they jack prices up. Charlotte, home of U.S. Airways, is one of the most expensive airports as a result. If a newcomer shows up with lower fares, they collude to undercut the until they wither and die.
They agree to collectively raise fares. They play a shell game with fares, too. What other form of transportation makes one person pay four times the rate of the person next to them? Or one that can have such disparate fares, hidden in a byzantine fare system, where the cost of getting to a destination can depend on bizarre criteria?
They treat their passengers like so much cattle. Before they cram you into an overstuffed plane, you have to run a security gauntlet that is sure to humiliate you. Smile at the other passengers as the guard paws through your suitcase in front of them.
They adopt rules for their own convenience, get the FAA to rubber-stamp them and then hide behind that ubiquitous “federal regulations require” term, even though the rule was their own doing (the cellphone ban and two-carryon-limit are two that come to mind).
Service is a thing of the past. You’re lucky to get a small bag of pretzels and a bathroom break. I’ve seen some surly flight attendants that would have been fired on the spot had I been their boss.
After all this, they have the nerve to beg for a bailout from the federal government.
Here’s a clue for the airlines: Terrorism didn’t kill your business. You did it yourselves.
Thank you. Buh-bye.
