Attack of the Human-Animal Hybrids!

Just caught this over at Punk Ass Blog, it comes from an old Bush quote

Tonight I ask you to pass legislation to prohibit the most egregious abuses of medical research: human cloning in all its forms; creating or implanting embryos for experiments; creating human-animal hybrids; and buying, selling or patenting human embryos.

I never realized just how stupid it was before. At first to a laymen like myself it sounds stupid because I highly doubt anyone is trying to create super-humans by mixing DNA in a way that would give Hitler a chubby. Then I feel stupid when I find out that the real reason the quote is so bad is because we've been doing this for years and you know what one of the major products produced from human-animal hybrids is? Insulin. Yup that shit thats keeping thousands of people alive everyday is created by sticking some human DNA into E. coli bacteria. This is another example of why it's so exciting to have a president who actually give a shit about Science again.

To be fair, Chimera's can get tricky and we probably should be careful with how far we take it. There will always be people who want to push the limits, do shit just to see if it can be done and sometimes maybe it is appropriate to head them off before they go too far. Again thats why having a government that knows what it's talking about is so important.

Oh and this shouldn't be confused with Chimaira, that shit should be wiped out of existence with all deliberate speed. What can I say I don't like metal.

V Day

Went to my first Vagina Monologue this weekend. It was a blast. Ok yeah its obviously not all fun and games, there are some truly horrifying stories told during the event, but they're mixed in with fun skits like the angry vagina and the one my friend did which was the moans. Then a bunch of us went to a bar on Market St. If you're ever in Corning you have to go to Market St. It's a throwback to what downtowns used to be like. Then we go hungry and went across the street for some pizza and eventually down to another bar where our numbers had dwindled down to just the fun people. This is when it really got interesting. Their was a good band playing and quite a bit of dancing. One girl that came with us, I'll call her Lois, was a riot. She dances more than I do, she's actually an occasional belly dancer, and she's fun. If you need more proof, she does roller derby. Roller derby? So yeah I'm looking forward to seeing her again. Oh and while Marque hasn't officially broken things off with me we've barely spoke lately and I'm done pushing it. If she wants to make it work then we will see but I'm not going to drive myself insane pursuing her anymore.

So back to the weekend. Having fun, listening to some tunes, dancing, drinking, and general merriment. I was DD, gave Lois and a particularly drunken lady a ride, first to drunk lady's house where we chatted for a bit and sipped a few of her beers. Then dropped Lois at her car and the three of us went on home. Oh that would be my friend that was in the Vagina Monologues and her husband. She was pretty tanked herself. Anyway, good times were had. Hopefully I'll have more to tell about Lois at some point, were probably going back to corning next weekend to see the band again, maybe my friend will invite her....

Prayer Can Kill

Tis guy just got sentenced to 10 years in jail because he prayed people to death. Did he put a curse on them? Nope those don't work. No he cursed them by asking a non-existent sky daddy to save himself and others rater than deal with the situation himself. Oh it's probably important to point out that the situation was that the guy was the pilot of a plane that was going down. He could have aimed for a nearby airport but instead he decided to pray and when the non-existent sky daddy didn't save them it was too late. He and the Co-pilot were convicted of manslaughter. You can argue that this is harsh, he did the best he could and didn't come out on top. The problem is that at the critical moment he gave up, he handed over command and because he panicked people died. I was a pilot at 14, my engine couldn't go out because I didn't have one. But I flew solo at 14 and I knew the one thing you could never do was panic. You have to take control of the situation. I remember the first time I got a little ballsy, probably 15 then, and ventured further than I should have. I really wasn't sure if I was going to make it back to the airport. Did I panic? Did I freak out? No. Was I scared shitless? Absolutely. But I did what I had been trained to do flew at the proper speed, best l/d plus a little because of a head wind, and did a reverse approach because I couldn't make it to the regular one. I had the emergency strip in mind if things got ugly. I was young and inexperienced but when shit happens you deal with it or you die. If you can't handle that don't be a pilot, and if you're a commercial pilot you accept that it's not just you that will die if you fuck up. If that guy who ditched into the Hudson's plane had snapped in two no one would have pressed charges. It still would have been clear that he did everything right. This guy failed at his job, and there are some jobs where you hold other peoples lives in your hands doing them and must face the consequences if you fail. Again the critical thing here is that at the most important moment in his life he gave up and there will always be consequences for that.

An Army of One

I never understood how that was supposed to be a promotional tool for the Army, be all that you can be... in the army! Way better jingle. But it does seem rather prophetic as their is new indications of injured soldiers being mistreated. This time injured soldiers are simply telling brass that they would rather go back into combat than stay at the Ft. Bragg hospital. I'm not sure that you can give a worse review than that.

Which reminds me, one of my oldest friends is getting ready for deployment to Afghanistan. Good luck man.

Winning the Unwinnable War

As this guy says, the only way to end the war on drugs is legalization. Period. He doesn't get into the effects of what would happen if drugs were suddenly legalized. One thing I've always pointed out is that if heroin was legal, most people still wouldn't want to try it cause its fucking heroin. I'm not going to suddenly start smoking crack just cause I won't get arrested for it. It wasn't the cops that kept me away from Meth, it was Meth and knowing what it does to people that kept me away. I like to think that this is true for most people, unfortunately I'm sure there are some folks who would be more willing to try shit if it wasn't illegal. The fact that you wouldn't have to deal with drug dealers is probably the thing that would cause the biggest increase in experimentation.

Dolphin Safe Tuna

Wow just learned a bit about Dolphin safe Tuna. Sounds pretty shitty.

Rough Week

Things were going great with Marque, then things got a bit more complicated this weekend. I'm not going to get into the details of it here but I'm not terribly happy with her right now. Theres two main problems. Not knowing what the situation is. And being lied to. The first is easily resolved, the second is going to take some time no matter what happens.

But to put things into perspective there's always this guy's story. He had the bad luck of being on a business trip in Hiroshima on August 6th 1945. He survived and was released from the hospital. By August 9th he was back home, in Nagasaki.... Yup the dude got nuked, twice. He's the only person so far certified to have survived both atomic bombs.

Unwinnable Wars

I don't have time to write about this right now but I wanted to put this link up for later.
Mexico's Drug War

Cockpunching the Pope

The pope said that condoms are making the AIDS situation worse in Africa. First off, never take sex advice from a celibate man thats like taking musical advice from a deaf person. The church is of course defending the popes comment. They're saying that it was taken out of context but that it is basically correct. According to that the pope didn't really say shit. Either way the official catholic stance on birth control and condoms in particular is killing people and no clarification can change that.

Cramer on The Daily Show

If you haven't seen this yet then you're missing out. Jim Cramer the annoyingly loud guy on CNBC who tries to give stock advice apparently got caught up in a feud between Stewart and CNBC generally. Being a loud mouth he became the face of the feud even though it wasn't about him. Anyway Jon Steward takes him to task. Cramer comes in like a dog thats been kicked too much, tail between his legs before they even start. His humility is the only thing that saves him. He admits that he could and should have done more. Jon really is at the top of his game in this amazing interview. He clearly states what so many of us are feeling, and if you aren't feeling the way he describes then either you are someone who was part of the problem, or you aren't fully aware of what was going on.

Fuck AIG!

Pretty self explanatory, the people directly responsible for creating massive wealth without producing anything while destabilizing the entire economy leading to the market collapse who's asses were then saved by people who's life savings were wiped out by said collapse were expecting the get a nice fat bonus check of our money for their diligence. The good news, Obama is pissed and Cuomo is coming after them. I'm not sure what they can do because due to the lack of any controls on the $170 billion we gave to AIG they may not have broken any laws at all. When criminals can legalize their activities we end up with vigilante justice. I'm not necessarily condoning vigilante justice but it wouldn't surprise me at all if it happened. I'd probably be happy if it did, which still isn't quite the same as saying I want it to happen. I'm clearly too soft to actually do any vigilante shit myself. Anyway I'm hoping that for this St. Patrick's day the Leprechauns get their gold taken away. Those mischievous little bastards.

UPDATE: WTF? Yo Obama there is a very very simple fucking answer to this. You're currently working on another $30 billion bailout to AIG, all you need to say fuck you're contracts that somehow require bonuses (is that still a bonus?) here are you're options. You take the $30 billion and not one upper level person sees a single cent above their salary, or you don't. With oversight that if bonuses are paid then we get at least the $30 Billion back, or if you really wanted to stick it to them say you want the entire $200 Billion back. If they are doing so well that their CEO's deserve bonuses for their good jobs then they obviously are doing well enough to pay back their debts.

Happy St. Patricks Day!

Everyones Irish today! I've said this in years past but that phrase alone make this one of my favorite holidays, well that and the drinkin'. So drink some green beer or better yet some beer that you can't dye green, like Guinness. Irish car bombs are also highly recommended, the drink not the explosive.

F My Life

Awesome website that's been absorbing my time the last two days. F my life. It's quite simple, people send in very short stories that show how their lives suck. They all start with "Today," and end with "FML" which is of course fuck my life.

Here's a quick example:
Today, my parents met my boyfriends parents for the first time. Bailing us out of jail.FML

I think you'll enjoy. Oh and cause I've been doing an econ test, this site is an example of network externalities. The more people that use it the better it becomes, just like dating sites or social networking sites.

Kids are Great

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Ahhh

UPDATE: This is rather incoherent.... It's supposed to say that I let myself get neurotic for a little bit but then I realized that I was being neurotic and I need to knock that shit off because things are going great with someone who makes me happy.

A friend wrote me quite an e-mail about some issues she's going through. I didn't really have an answer and basically responded with a rant of my own. Nah not a rant but a venting for sure. Then after stewing in it for a while I realized something important. The venting was about Marque, she's amazing but there is one issue that I can't seem to get out of my head. Then it hit me. Things have been going great and I'm just being myself. Our time together is laid back and fun. So why am I trying to push things now? Everything is going to turn out great so long as I just let things progress on their own. Not to mention the fact that I fall too quickly so I should expect it to feel like it's going too slowly. Plus it's not like she is in the simplest of spots and I respect that. She's too great to lose over something as petty as the pace of our relationship. Plus it sounds like it's going to be a nice weekend after all. She has the kids which sounds like the perfect ingredients for having some fun at a park or two. So ya, I need to stop thinking so much about shit and just let it happen. Which in every other part of my life is really easy for me to do.

Moral of the story. Things are going great, I'm very happy, and thats all I should be thinking about.

Hell of a Game

Went to Marques last night. Watched Grey's Anatomy. Bit too melodramatic for me but thats ok, I spend half the time gazing at Marque anyway. Then we watched some spin off of it which was worse. Then we watched a basketball game, the last few hours of it anyway. Syracuse, Marque's team, beat UConn in what turned out to be one of the longest and closest games in college basketball history. 6 fucking overtimes! I'm not a big sports fan and we were half asleep by 1 am but wow it was an amazing game. I don't know how those guys were still standing let alone playing some tough ass basketball. What really sucks for them is that they have another game tonight.

More Good News

(probably not worth reading the first paragraph)

I'm still trying to get used to not cringing when I hear about a new law being signed by the president. Seriously, I was a kid/teen through Clinton. The only reason I paid attention at all was because of a friends mom who I used to love to argue with. To be honest now I can't even remember which side she was on and which side I was on. She may have been the pro-Clinton one, I was (am) just a pain in the ass. So then I turned 18 and there was an election coming up. I shouldn't admit this but this RATM video had more influence on me than it probably should have. I remember driving home from college along with a friend who had already voted by absentee. I obviously couldn't vote for bush, but Gore just didn't impress me so I voted for Nader. The point of this, which could have been summed up in like two sentences, is that the entire time that I've paid attention to politics was under Bush, until recently of course. So yeah I've been well trained to expect the worst from my government.

So it's still a system shock to hear that the president is going to encourage scientific research. Specifically stem cell research. I don't think I really need to explain why this is freaking awesome. Using science to cure diseases has a pretty good track record, at least when you compare it to medical care prior to modern medicine. So while many are pissed at Obama because he doesn't have a magic wand to cure the economy he's doing what he can and to my utmost joy he isn't ignoring the other problems of the country. Speaking of which I see that in a move that not only makes me happy but is fairly shocking Obama is not trying to implement merit pay for teachers. Something the teachers union has been fighting for years. Why a concept paying people based on how good they are at their job. I haven't looked into this too deep but Obama clearly thinks that real education reform is critical, and I couldn't agree more. In another move that makes me smile Obama has also said they are going to "not rely on" the 1,200 signing statements that bush made. So they are going to follow the laws that congress wrote, not the ones bush wrote, sort of like how the constitution says its supposed to be. Fuckin' socialist.

The Evil Atheist Conspiracy is Working!

Not a big surprise but atheism is on the rise according to the American Religious Identification Survey. This is one of their key findings.

Only1.6 percent of Americans call themselves atheist or agnostic. But based on stated beliefs, 12 percent are atheist (no God) or agnostic (unsure), while 12 percent more are deistic (believe in a higher power but not a personal God). The number of outright atheists has nearly doubled since 2001, from 900 thousand to 1.6 million. Twenty-seven percent of Americans do not expect a religious funeral at their death.

Pretty cool right? More over at Pharyngula

CIA Awkwardly Debriefs Obama on Creation of Crack Cocain

WASHINGTON—In his first meeting with President Barack Obama, CIA crime and counternarcotics analyst Timothy R. McIntire haltingly explained to the nation's first African-American commander in chief the highly classified origin of crack cocaine and the resultant epidemic that swept across U.S. inner cities. "Well, you see, sir...thing is, we needed money to help those Contras back in '85, and we never really expected...so we distributed it, and...shortsighted...and, ha, well, Christ—is it hot in here?" McIntire said between exaggerated coughs. "Yikes, okay. See, it was a very tense time—not that that makes it right—and, uh, bottom line is, we're a different agency now."

McIntire went on to disclose several other secret CIA operations, including the assassination of President John F. Kennedy in 1963 and the recruitment, four years earlier, of a Kenyan grad student for a clandestine program at the University of Hawaii.

It's from the Onion. I hope you picked up that it's a joke.

Happy Birthday PZ!

Not that he reads this website, but I get almost daily amusement from his so I just want to wish him a happy birthday cause it sounds like it hasn't been great so far.

More Good Times

I had a nice weekend. This might seem like a rant because it starts with the bad shit but actually it's just chronological.

Well, friday I was quite pissed at Marque, we had very vaguely made plans. I wanted her to meet a couple of my friends that I thought she would like. She had something going on from 6-8 which is shitty but we could still do something. Admittedly I had only said that we would do something and while a few ideas were thrown around nothing was the least bit confirmed. Then it all came to be a fairly mute point as one of people I wanted her to meet was falling asleep after getting up way too early for his job. But I think I was still right to be mad cause it was left that she would call when she was free. So at 8:30 I sent a text and nothing. Then at like 9:15 I sent another saying that I was on my way. I told her I was mad. It wasn't the first time this had happened. Actually it's happened pretty much every time we've mad plans ahead of time. Before I was hurt, this time I was mad. Not only did it insult me but my friends were sitting around waiting too. Sure they had to cancel anyway but when I found that out, I told her. She understood. She gets really mad when other people do that to her. Who doesn't? Saturday was much better, much much better.

Marque had to work till 7, she works at the other end of town and had to get ready so it was about 8 when my friends and I picked her up and went to Horigan's. I've mentioned this place before, and Marque and I have been there together before, but it's probably my favorite restaurant. Minor problem, there was a band playing and they didn't have any open tables when we got there. Ok second part isn't a big deal, we are all very comfortable bellying up to the bar, except we were fairly hunger. The part that sucked is that being four wide at a bar with a band playing meant that we couldn't talk and my plan of having my friends meet my... Marque was thrown out the window. I paused in the last sentence because while I definitely think of her as my girlfriend, we haven't actually used that terminology yet. Anyway we got seated and soon we were chatting and laughing and generally having a good time. Some jokes were made about the fact that my friends both got the prime rib special while Marque got a vegi-burger and I had a freaking spinach salad, which was delicious. She was a vegan back in the day but sure isn't anymore, I got the salad half because my friend made a joke about who eats a spinach salad, I told him I was thinking about it and he didn't believe me. Soon we finished our food and wanted to get away from the band. We headed back in the direction of Marque and my friends houses, ended up at a little bar where they loved us because we were half the age of anyone else there, and half of us were cute girls. We ad one and decided to keep going. Then we hit up the bar I often describe as my friends other living room. The girl I had been messing around with before was there, I can't recall what name I had given her for this blog, and I was a nervous she would cause a scene but she didn't at all. I spoke to her in passing and she didn't say a word to Marque which I thank her for. That reminds me I should say something to her, she knows about Marque so I'm sure she knew what was going on. Anyway we didn't stay there too long. We stopped by Marque's to grab a little scotch she's had for a while at which point my now somewhat drunk friend had to ask where I found a girl that drinks Guinness and Scotch? I told you she's awesome. Then went to my friends for a little bit but soon he was asleep, again he goes to work stupid early, like before 6am. So I sat and hung out with two of my favorite women, Marque and.... I guess I've never given her a pseudo-anonymous name on here, hmmm.... I'll call her Peggy till I come up with something better. We watched some SNL and then Marque and I went back to her house.

Sunday was decent. We had breakfast at a local diner. She had to meet with her friend/boss who she seems to really want me to meet, but not yet. I'm not sure why but from the descriptions I've heard he sounds like a very strange character so I'm not in too big a rush. After that she had made plans with Other guy, who she says is definitely just a friend now but she hasn't seen him in a few weeks and feels kinda bad about that. Plus there's a basketball game on and sports are pretty much the reason they're friends. He bailed and she ended up sick. She's been sick a lot lately. I hope she isn't allergic to me. So I went to comfort her for a bit. Other guy eventually called and wanted to hang out, but for some reason he didn't want to hang out with me. Ha. I guess he's really competitive so I'm sure he's in no rush to meet the guy who beat him at something far more important than sports with a prize better than any trophy. Marque in my arms.

Update:
Almost forgot to mention that my friends really liked Marque. This was no surprise, other than I know I tend to look at women through rose colored glasses and it was great to have two good friends confirm that she's as awesome as I've been telling them she is. Plus these friends know that I can easily fall for a pretty face and so I trust them to tell me if I'm making a big mistake. Maybe thats fucked up, to want your friends to judge your relationship but seriously I'll take the advice. But they like her and she liked them which is awesome. In my book a girlfriend is first and foremost a friend. I've known people who keep their relationships separate from their friends and it never works. Of course sometimes thats because they don't want their friends mentioning their other relationships but thats a whole other issue. The important thing is that we all had a blast of saturday, hopefully the first of many fun occasions.

Live Update:
She wants me to go meet her and the kiddo for some grub, gotta get a lil work done so I can sneak out a half an hour early.

Blame the Economic Woes on Lincoln

I'm not above driving a few more nails into the republican parties coffin. And neither is this person. It's basically just lists of the best and worst states in various categories. My personal favorite, and being a New Yorker one that pisses me off, is the last one. The states that get the most from the federal government compared to what they pay in are pretty damn red, the states that get the least compared to what they put in are pretty damn blue. For example my state gets about 79 cents from the federal government for every dollar they pay in taxes. Mississippi gets $2.02 back for each dollar they pay. Now I'm not saying we need to stop giving money to the broke ass republican states, but they need to shut the fuck up about how the federal government is evil. Either raise your taxes and pay your fair share or shut the fuck up. Most of those states that get more than they give are broke and therefore their tax base sucks, and again I'm not trying to punish poor people, but what I really want is for these moochers to stop bitching.

And obviously the title comes from the idea that if Lincoln hadn't preserved the Union, if he had simply let the south succeed, it might be a different situation. Yeah I know that would be pretty shitty for blacks, I wonder if they would still buy and sell people? If the trends had continued the south would have a very deeply entrenched upper class. And the 90% of whites that are poor as dirt would be feed heaping spoonfuls of racism to keep them in line. Racism allows even the poorest white person to be middle class, because they make sure someone is beneath them. So you know the oligarchy isn't going to pay much in taxes, the rest can't afford to. So they never would have created a modern infrastructure. Their society would fuckin suck. But at least I wouldn't have to listen to Bobby Jindal spout all sorts of stupid shit.

Presidential Dictatorship

I'm still pretty far behind with current events. Let me check the crystal ball and... yup the economy is still fucked. Thats going to take some time and thats pretty much the story of the day. I did feel a little more american this morning when I found out that I lost money in the stock market, a fairly significant chunk of my retirement. Of course I had forgotten that I had a retirement fund and now I can only retire for a month instead of 6 weeks. In the long run, probably not that big a deal. And because the economy keeps coming up this quote is never far from my mind.

This planet has - or rather had - a problem, which was this: most of the people living on it were unhappy for pretty much of the time. Many solutions were suggested for this problem, but most of these were largely concerned with the movements of small green pieces of paper, which is odd because on the whole it wasn't the small green pieces of paper that were unhappy.

I miss Douglas Adams, I think he'd really be enjoying the battle between science and religion and he'd have some great insight into the current shit going on. Plus he'd be a great ally for science because he can be totally condescending while lighthearted and hilarious.

Anyway, like I said I'm behind on the news of the world. One thing I have heard about, and it's not really news, is the old Bush memo's coming out. John Yoo and some others tried to create legal cover for the president to literally do anything during time of war, with the only restriction being that it must be war related. The problem is it also says that the president can incarcerate any "enemy combatant" and that nothing but the presidents word is needed to give someone that label at which point they can be locked up indefinitely. And in case you were thinking this can't apply to citizens, well you'd be wrong. Oh you have rights? The constitution. Yeah these law professors have apparently never heard of it. This is one of the times I really wish I believed in an afterlife. I want to get to heaven and find Bush and his cronies getting their asses beat for all eternity by George Washington while Jefferson and Hamilton turn it into a competition between them. Orwell occasionally stops by to do a little kicking, screaming out, "It was meant to be a DYSTOPIA you fucking twit!" All the while Ben Franklin sits back, flirts with the ladies and hurls insults at the president that thought he could be king. The Rude One also has some things to say about this of course.

It's funny to me. For years we tried to prove to people just how unbelievably bad Bush really was, but for years no one wanted to hear it. Many eventually came around to make him one of the least popular presidents ever, but it was sooooo slow to happen. Even then many didn't want to accept that he was as bad as he was. I think it was simply too much for people to handle. If he did one of his major fuck ups he would have been in trouble, but because there was a nearly uninterrupted string of horror people just said we were grasping at straws. We were exaggerating to make him seem worse because we didn't like him. The reality was that we were holding back to avoid that situation. I'm not going to break Godwin's Law, Bush was not Hitler. He didn't want to be Hitler, I don't think Bush wanted to kill people he wanted to be very rich and very powerful, he was simply indifferent to the deaths. It is an important distinction. So Bush isn't Hitler, but I think he really wanted to be "Big Brother."

You know what? I totally ran out of steam on this one. I guess I just can't generate the hate that I used to. He can't hurt us anymore, his legacy can but the man is gone. Yes he should be brought to justice but I guess I just don't care about pointing out what I had already known. Sure having it so clearly spelled out should scare the shit out of people, but it was pretty clear all along that this was the theory he was operating under so I just don't care that much. Oh and Fuck John Yoo.

Feelin Lazy

I can't think of much to talk about right now. So I'm going to pick on an easy target just for something to do.
I spotted this headline over at Fark. BTW I love Fark, great way to see random news stories, laugh at stupid criminals and generally waste time.

"Atheist theories are absurd." This coming from a man who wears a folded napkin on his head, rides around in a fishtank on the back of a Mercedes, and prays to a man who is his own father

Which leads to a decent little piece about how the Pope thinks that evolution can coincide with catholicism. Which is good. Or at least it's better than the alternative.

I think I mentioned this one before but it's such a great comment that I'll risk a double post. It's David Attenborough (the voice on Planet Earth) talking about the hate mail he has gotten because he doesn't give credit to god. He has a very straightforward reply.

Telling the magazine that he was asked why he did not give "credit" to God, Attenborough added: "They always mean beautiful things like hummingbirds. I always reply by saying that I think of a little child in east Africa with a worm burrowing through his eyeball. The worm cannot live in any other way, except by burrowing through eyeballs. I find that hard to reconcile with the notion of a divine and benevolent creator."

How does a creationist respond to that?

What If God Disappeared?

Love ya PZ!

Bill of Rights Vs. The Stupid

This shit gets tricky. So a guy gets fired from a Gov job because he's uberchristian. At first I'm sympathetic. Claims to have seen a demon. Ok thats a bit weird but not grounds for firing. He was in the hospital and admitted to praying for 10 hours at a time. Eccentric but harmless. Lost 40 lbs in six months from fasting. Starting to seriously question his sanity. Umm... he admitted to pissing himself once because he didn't want to get up from praying to use the bathroom. Gross. But as long as he did that at home and showered before coming in then I don't see how it's dismissal worthy. As long as his crazy isn't interfering with his work then I think he has a case. Just one little thing, he was a cop, and he wants his gun and badge back. Throws a bit of a wrench into the mix doesn't it?

Dow Jones

I'm honestly not sure why we put so much emphasis on the Dow Jones Industrial Average. It's a vague predictor of what people think is going to happen to 30 major companies. Yeah they are 30 big ass companies but thats a tiny percentage of the publicly traded companies. Then ya gotta start thinking about what percent of the companies are publicly traded?

Life is Good

Just found out that I'm back up to 30 hours a week at work! That means I have health insurance again which is cool. I still need to find a part time gig to make up the difference but this sure makes that less pressing.

Things with Marque seem to be going well. We're spending more time together and Other guy only gets mentioned with annoyance. Or for one story in which he claims he saw me drive by him and made a kissy face at him. So thats become a running joke. Oh and it wasn't me, I don't know what kind of car he drives and while I've been shown pictures of him I doubt I would recognize him on the street. I'm looking forward to this weekend. The kids will be off with the ex, I've got a reason to celebrate and so do some good friends who I really want to meet Marque. We don't have actual plans yet, but I'm working on it.