Your house is ruining my economy!

Let’s get a show of hands here real quick. Who thinks it is right for the government to step in and bail out people that got into a car loan they couldn’t really support and now face the bank taking back their Porsche? How about if Best Buy comes to foreclose on that 60” plasma TV someone bought and now can’t pay for? Anyone? Anyone at all? So why do so many people feel the federal government has a duty to step in and protect anyone and everyone that’s having trouble with their mortgage?! I’m not saying that we should all turn a blind eye to the problem. But saying that we need to bail out everyone so that no one loses their house is ridiculous!

Where in the constitution does it say that as Americans we are granted to right to own a house? Nowhere. It’s a dream that most people have and something that almost everyone wants, but it’s clearly not a right. While you do have the right to pursue your dream, you don’t have a right to achieve it. Therefore, not everyone gets to own a house. More importantly, not everyone gets to own the house they dream of in the small area of the country that they’d like it to be in. The reality of making such a large purchase is that the house you want may not be affordable in the place you want it. If your dream is to own your own home, one of the sacrifices you may need to make is location. We would have loved to be living closer to downtown Boston, but the reality was that it would have involved too many sacrifices. We couldn’t find the condo we wanted with some of the required features we wanted in our price range. We could have gotten into a questionable mortgage that we weren’t sure we could support. But we instead did the responsible thing and only signed our names to something we knew was reasonable. Yes, a bank would have floated us an interest-only mortgage with very little down that would have allowed us to buy something better and more convenient for us. But guess what, we wouldn’t have been able to pay that thing off once we had to start paying the principle! That is exactly the situation a lot of people find themselves in right now. They got themselves into a mortgage with very high risks and no plan on how to deal with them. They got so caught up in the excitement of being able to actually achieve their dream that they completely ignored the realities of whether or not they should achieve that dream.

I have a dream of being a stay-at-home dad. That sure as hell doesn’t mean I’m swapping out Hayley’s pills for placebos and getting ready to quit my job. I could do that, but it’d be a very stupid thing to do right now. Instead I choose to act like a responsible adult {waits for the laughing to cease} and wait until the time is right and we can support that dream before I choose to go for it.

The real reason this is a problem is that housing prices sharply pulled back from their peaks. That means that if the banks foreclose on your house, they can’t turn around and sell it for anything close to what you owe them. Cause see, people aren’t the only ones that can act in a very irresponsible way. Suddenly all those interest-only and low-down payment mortgages to risky people are coming around to bite them in the ass. That’s the reason the government needs to step in to save the economy. People losing their houses puts a big squeeze on the economy. Combine that with the lending sector losing billions of dollars, and you get a recession. That’s bad for everyone, including the rest of us that acting responsibly when we bought our homes.

The best way out of this is not a bail-out. We don’t give people money and we don’t give the banks money. The government pays a more modest sum to help people refinance their current mortgages into something they can better afford. This keeps money flowing into the banks as people make payments and lets people keep their houses. Will this save everyone? No, but it doesn’t need to. People are still going to lose their homes. If you got in WAY over your head, you’re still screwed. But if you stretched yourself just a bit too far, or had some unforeseen circumstance come up that you’re recovering from, then you should be okay. The punishment should fit the crime.

Still, it kills me that the responsible people out there get punished for doing the right thing, same as always. We either lose a ton of tax money or have to suffer through a recession. Shouldn’t we be rewarded? Hell, I’d take a simple ‘thanks for not being a jerk and ruining things for everyone else’. Maybe our lender should buy me a cup of coffee or a dinner or something. Something! But alas, no good deed goes unpunished.

God Bless the Coyote

For some reason I had the song “God Bless the USA” stuck in my head the other night. Okay, it was because I saw some commercial about a CD of gospel music done by country bands, but that’s not the point. The point is that the song was stuck in my head and I couldn’t get it out. And after the 50^th time I sang the lines “And I’m proud to be an American, where at least I know I’m free. And I won’t forget the men who died, who gave that right to me.” I started thinking about those men and women and when the last time we actually had to fight for our freedom was.

Don’t get me wrong; I fully support our troops all over the world and respect them for what they’re doing. I have several friends and coworkers that have spent time/are currently/will be spending more time in Iraq. And I’m not about to start another debate over the merits, or lack thereof, of the current conflicts. My point is that when Lee Greenwood released that song in 1984 we were pretty much done fighting for our freedom. WWII would be the last time I figure we fought for any form of freedom. The Nazis were actively taking over Europe and committing genocide. There’s no guarantee that they would have tried to cross the pond and invade us, but it’s best to not wait for that to happen.

Vietnam and Korea? We were fighting for other peoples’ freedom, not ours. As much as the government wanted you to think so, communism was not a virus that would spread across the globe unchecked. You may have a few countries go communist, but who’s to say that’s bad for them? It’s not like our republic (constitutional federal republic to be exact) government over here created a paradise for all US citizens.

And once again we’re involved in wars to protect other countries’ freedoms. Iraq had no credible involvement in the terrorism of 9/11, had no credible weapons of mass destruction, and no plans to come over here and take our freedoms. Nor did any of the terrorist that attacked us on 9/11. They could give 2 shits if we’re free; they just got sick of our constant meddling in their affairs and our funding of their enemy’s army.

I think we can all admit that the Middle East conflict is about securing a steady supply of oil and settling a family grudge against Saddam Hussein. We did go after some terrorist cells in Afghanistan early on, but those days are long gone. Now we’re stuck in a ‘You break it; you buy it’ situation in Iraq. But whatever.

The good news in all of this is that American soldiers haven’t had any reason to fight for our freedom in 50 years. That’s awesome. It’s a nice feeling to know that no one has the means and/or desire to take that away from you. And an even better feeling to be able to ignore your manipulative government and sensationalist media when they try to convince you otherwise.

And now for some cheery miscellany:

I think I saw a woman walking a pet coyote the other morning on the way to work. I’m not 100% sure it was, as I was driving past at ~45mph, but it sure looked like a coyote. Skinny, right height, same coat coloration, long narrow snout. I’m sure it was just a mutt of some kind, but it sure looked like it had some coyote in it. She’d be wise to keep it away from road runners and large wig-based rockets.

The other, other white meat?

The other night while I was carving up the last slab of my spiral-sliced ham I had an… interesting thought. What if people taste as delicious as pigs?!

I know, I know. That’s just not right to even be thinking. But just bear with me a minute while we go through the chain of thought that ended there.
Anyone who’s cut up a spiral-sliced ham before knows that at some point the spiral stops and you have to manually cut off the remaining portions of ham. Seeing as I’d reached that point, I’d pulled out my knife and starting cutting out the leg bone and most of the fat. That’s when I realized that what I’m assuming was the pig’s knee looks remarkably similar to a human knee. (While I should have called Hayley down to verify that conclusion, I was in the middle of a feeding frenzy and was too busy stuffing small hunks of ham in my mouth to slow down.) I even made the joke to myself that I should carefully cut out the cartilage so I could donate it to StudBoy so he’d have a little bit in his thrice-repaired knee.

While wondering if that’d even be possible, I recalled hearing some bit of info that humans and pigs are not all that different. That the organs, tissues, and the like were quite similar in function and design. Here are a few links that back up my memory:

http://www.goshen.edu/bio/PigBook/humanpigcomparison.html

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xenotransplantation

But if pigs and humans are so closely related from an anatomy stand-point, so far as even having the same muscle groups with similar functions, wouldn’t it stand to reason that people would taste just as delicious as pigs? And even if we’re just ½ as delicious as pigs, that’s still pretty tasty. Pigs are possibly the most delicious animal out there. Bacon, ham, and pork chops are all meat all-stars.

No, I’m not going to start eating people for dinner. I still have a moral issue with that. But this does possibly change the odds, and the timing, of whether or not I’d eat a friend in a life-or-death situation. If I’m trapped somewhere and haven’t eating anything in a week and I know that the person sitting next to me tastes like pork chops…they’ve got a very real problem on their hands. If I was able to somehow fashion a pan suitable for bacon, they’ve got a huge problem. They’d be wise to either redouble their efforts to find food, or be very careful about sleeping.

But clearly this can’t be the case. If people really did taste like pigs, we’d have been wiped out before we were able to think our way out of the middle of the food pyramid. I’m sure we’ve all heard the rumor that humans only survived because we taste like crap and other animals just didn’t want to eat us. While I don’t really believe that to be the only reason, maybe there really is something to that theory.

I guess there really is only 1 way to settle this. Anyone care to be slow-roasted and smoked in the name of science? I promise to use only the very best in sauces and glazes.

I'm back, baby!

I finally grew tired of Myspace and just stopped going there to do much of anything, let alone do any blogging there. In fact, I really just didn't have much time and/or motivation to blog at all recently. Not only did I take a new position at work that required much more time and effort there, but now I also just bought a condo with Hayley. Doesn't really leave a whole lot of free time during the day or in the evenings/nights to do any ranting.
But the time has once again returned. Why? Boredom probably. Hayley is busy enough that she's never really around to do any good venting to or share most of my "great" thoughts. So once again things are just backing up inside my brain and need to get out.
I tried using facebook to do it, but I just didn't like the interface and didn't want to keep all my eggs in 1 basket.
But alas, tis already late and time for me to call it a night. We still have some work to do on the floor, so I need to get my rest so I can knock out a bunch tomorrow after work.
So until next time...

Moved!

In case you didn't know, I officially moved my retarded rantings here:
http://blog.myspace.com/offensive_j

So feel free to jump over and read up. Don't worry, the material is just as bad as ever.

What's the Story, Morning Glory

Here's a little something from the obvious file:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14165243/
Fat people are at a higher risk during anything. Hot, cold, emergencies, not causing an airplane to crash from being over-loaded. Of course you're at a higher risk of heat stroke if you have a thicker layer of insulating fat on your body. Common sence. Not sure why we needed some doctors to tell us about that, but whatever. Gotta keep those that didn't do so well in med school doing something. At least they aren't trying to work on people and have instead focused their energy on common-sence studies and endorsing infomercial products.

Peanut Alergy in Schools
I actually slightly changed my point of view on the topic yesterday while 'discussing' this with Hayley. I have a huge problem with our current society and its focus on making everyone happy all of the time. God forbid 1 person out of 100 is uncomfortable while growing up. It's a concept that I really hate. And nowhere is this more displayed than with public schools. Dodgeball is banned because it singles out the weak kids. Christmas is outlawed because the jewish kids might be offended. I'm surprised they don't stop offering advantaced classes for the smart kids because it'll make the dumb ones feel dumber. Guess what kids, it's a horrible world out there. The weak and dumb get punished and made fun of. And not just in grade school, for the rest of your life. You get shitty jobs, you work shitty hours, live in a shitty apartment, and are the butt of jokes for everyone else. It's not fair, but neither is real life. So why should we pamper them at a young age instead of getting them ready for real life?
So Hayley and I got into over banning nuts in schools if 1 kid at the school has an alergy. I get all pissed off at the concept and get all worked up. Hayley sees the other side and likes everyone to be happy and safe. I don't see why an entire school of children should be punished and prevented from having any nut-based product because 1 child has an alergy? What if peanut butter is their favorite food? What if that's all their parents can reasonably provide for them? What if they just don't think it's fair? I'm all for creating a peanut-free area of the lunchroom. Designate 1 table that no nuts can be eaten. Even go as far as making sure no one in their specific class eats a nut product. But if you're a 6th grader and suddenly can't eat peanuts because some 1st grader that you'll never come within 100 yards of is mildly alergic to peanuts, how is that fair?!
Hayley did make 1 point that made me think. Kids of that age aren't aware enough to be safe. They don't constantly think about what they are touching and whether or not it's safe to be around it. So the alergic child isn't going to be thinking about that when playing with the other kids. And the other kids aren't going to think about whether or not they should touch the alergic kid based on what else they've been doing. But... If you are so alergic that merely touching a peanut will send you into a potential fatal reaction, you should not be in a public school. These are schools, not hospitals. Just like being out in public at restaurants, bars, movie theaters, etc, you can't keep things 100% nut-free. Therefore it's just not safe for that kid to be there.
So it's a sticky point for me. There is a point where kids just can't comprehend what's going on and you have to account for that. But there is another point where you need to just take the alergic kids out of the school for their own safety. There is a limit to the restrictions you can reasonably place on the other kids.

Breakfast
I know it's silly, but I'm chaging up my breakfast routine now. Normally I'll eat a bowl of cereal pretty much as soon as I'm out of the shower. I wake up hungry and need to eat right away. But then I'm hungry again by like 10am, cause it's 6:30 when I eat. So now I'm going to start trying to wait til I get in to work before eating. I go to the cafe every morning with Jake, why not just push breakfast back til then. So I can get a bagel w/ peanut butter for $0.90 in the cafe, which is pretty good. Probably about the same cost as the cereal and milk I'm having now. If all goes well, I may step it up to my own bagels and PB.
Right now Hayley is laughing her ass of cause she knows how stupidly anal I get about my little routines. I get into ruts for certain things I hate changing them. I'm free and loose for most of the day, but I have some routines that I'll be damned if I'm going to break. Breakfast used to be one of them.
Speaking of which, time to eat some damn food. Where the hell is Jake?!
PEACE!!

Israel vs. Hezbolla, Trades

War in Middle East #2
I happened to flip past Geraldo's terrible show this evening while looking for something else to watch. And I heard him make some comment regarding Hezbollah using civilians as shields to prevent Israel from retaliating. You know what I think? I think Israel should bomb the hell out of any building that rockets or missiles are launched from. If Hezbollah is going to use civilians as shields and hide behind them, then those civilians are going to pay for it. I feel awful saying that, but if the civilians choose to stay there and let the militants operate from their buildings and home, then they take on that risk. We need to send the message that the militants using innocent people to hide behind are the monsters, not the other way around. But it's really just a shitty situation no matter how you cut it. Either Israel sits back and gets hit with rockets and can't do much to fight back, or they do fight back and innocent people die. Either way it's lose-lose. Funny how most wars are really a lose-lose proposition.

Baseball Trades
The deadline has passed and all the deals are done. The biggest headline was the Yankess, as usual. They picked up Bobby Abreu and Corey Liddle for just some minor leaguers. That really puts the heat on the RedSox and the rest of the AL wild-card teams. Yet the Sox really did nothing. A little surprisingly considering the holes they have in thier team. They are a very good team, but I'm not sure they are good enough to win it all this year. Too many teams got better this year.
The Cubs have once again parted ways with Greg "Mad Dog" Maddux. At least this time it was on his terms and ended well for both parties. He had the option of turning down any trade, giving him the final say in the deal. He was dealt for a guy that looks like a pretty decent SS. Not sure exactly what they're going to do with him and Ronny Cedeno, but I'm sure they have something in mind.
To complete the day, the Cubs also dealt Todd Walker to the Padres for a minor league pitcher. He'd better be a great prospect to be trading away a guy like Muzzle. Only time will tell. And that move clears the way for the speculation that Cedeno will be asked to play 2B and Isturez SS. All things that I'm sure will be cleared up in the coming days. I'm expecting there to be a release from managment tomorrow telling us what the plan is.

Well, I just don't have it tonight. So I'm going to be just sit back and watch some baseball and Shark Week, then hit the sack. I tell ya, nothing is more fun than watching sharks. Amazing and magnificent animals. Ruthlessly efficient in what they do. Perfect for what they do. Truely an example of what nature can do when you just leave it alone.
PEACE!!

Cubs, Movie Trashing, etc

I'm typing this as I'm watching the Cubs vs. Cards game on ESPN (and enjoying a few adult beverages) so I may drift pretty far off topic at times, and they'll be game comments laced in here. And for those that are worried about my healthy with all this drinking tonight, do not fear. I get up to do stomach crunches at least b/t every inning, sometimes every 1/2 inning if I'm feeling fresh.
And to update.....GET UP GET OUT! Muzzle and Catfish went back-to-back in the first inning to give us a 2-0 lead. Rookie Rich Hill is back up from AAA tonight to see if he can duplicate his outstanding work in the minors. And as I was typing, he gave up a 2-run HR. Great. This kid is lights-out in the minors, but can't figure out how to pitch up here. It's pretty rough. But as soon as he figures it out he's going to make a very good starter.

John Tucker Must Die
I know that every movie requires some level of "Suspention of Disbelief". The Matrix trilogy, Star Wars, any comedy movie, Lord of the Rings. Even romantic movies require that you blindly believe that miracles do happen all the time. But his movie is asking too much. We're to believe that the most popular guy in high school can be dating 3 girls without anyone knowing?! Think back to high school. If anyone in the clique starting dating someone new, even if they were just hooking up with someone, everyone knew about it. Even the kids that hated the cliques and rejected everything about them knew about it. That's how high school works. You have no secrets if you're popular enough. And if you're the top dog, forget about it.
(Luna just cranked a double off of the wall to put the Cubs down 2-3)
But, the movie does feature Jenny McCarthy. So there's a better than zero chance that I'll rent it at some point on a lazy night. Maybe curl up with the lil lady for a bad movie and some beers.
Oh, and I'm sorry but there's no way a fellow white kid is going to be able to do a front summersault slam dunk. Especially a high school white boy. To be honest, no one in the world can do that. But it's just funnier to point out that he's a white kid.

Floyd Landis
I'm not a cycling fan. Never have been, probably never will be. But I do have friends that are. So I wind up having a mild interest in the Tour de France. Mostly just so I'll understand what the hell they're talking about. So it came as only a minor surprise that Tour winner Floyd Landis failed a drug test for elevated testosterone levels. With all the doping rumors and issues that have flown around this year it's just no surprise. And when you include all of the issues with Lance....
What I haven't heard is exactly what failed. I do know that the olympic drug tests are only concerned with the ratio of testosterone to epitestosterone, not the raw levels. So if you're juicing you'll commonly take some epitestosterone to help cover it up. Both levels will be higher than normal, but the ratio will be right where it should be. I don't know if the Tour drug tests employ a similar thinking or if they check for the raw levels of both. Either way, it's a damn shame. Just when things seemed to be okay in the Tour, this happens. It's just such a shame that the sport has to be bogged down so heavily in all of this controversy. Baseball gets somewhat of an easier ride because MLB doesn't really want to mess with it. From the top down they want nothing more than to just act like they're doing something. As long as people keep filling seats they don't really intend to do anything.
Cycling is 100% different. They go as far as they can to rid their sport of doping. Tests after every stage of the race. Tests for pretty much every substance you can think of. Tests for tons of various body chemical levels. It's really the way it should be. I'd love to see them test players after every game. It'd be expensive and players would do their fair share of bitching. But until they prove that everyone is clean and they only need to do random occational drug tests it needs to be done.

And another great scoring chance in the process of being wasted by the Cubs. Runners on 1st and 2nd with 1 out, DeCaf up. Putting the ball in play pretty much anywhere will get a run home. What does he do? Bounces back to the pitcher. Pathetic. Now we have to hope that Muzzle can come through...
And he doesn't. Grounder to 2nd. Had Pierre hit that grounder we'd have a run and be tied at 3. F'n A.

Hayley Updates
I know she'll be pissed if I don't talk about her a little bit today. Why? Cause that's just how she is. But she will finally be up here for a long period of time. She's got back-to-back rotations up here in Boston coming up! So she'll be living here with me for all of September and October. Should be a great time. At the very least, it'll be the first time in 2.5 years that we'll be together for an extended period of time. So we're about to find out exactly how good things are b/t us. I'm not worried, but maybe I should be...

Well, I need to really focus on the Cubs game. This may be the last game I get to watch on normal TV, so I should focus. Some of that will depend on the TV provider I pick when I move. Cable or Satellite. I hate Comcast like poison, but they would be cheaper for the combo of TV and internet. I'll have to do a little analysis of what I gain the other way vs how much more it'll cost. Put a price tag on the channels and see if it's really worth it. So until next time:
PEACE!!!

War! Huh. What is it good for?!

So the middle east is at war again. At least time it's only indirectly our fault. We're not actively in it, we don't have soldiers over there, and we didn't really have anything to do with it starting. But considering how much military aid we sell to Israel, we can't claim to be completely innocent. And the thing that really worries me is the all the other countries that could get involved. What we really don't need is an all-out Arab vs. Others war over there. There's plenty of tension in that region due to the religious differences, and some of those countries would appear to have zero reservations at just unleashing everything they have. Suicide bombs, terrorist attacks (but if they are in a war, is it really terrorism?), on top of conventional attacks. It could get really ugly and would really be the start of WW3. Not cool.
And while I have lots of complaints and views on the subject, I really don't have any answers. We really do need to get out of the area and stop meddling in their business just to get some oil. But since we did take out Saddam, we do have to shoulder the load to rebuild and get a new government in place. The trouble there is the fact Iraq is nothing but civil wars and unrest right now. And since they didn't start the uprising they aren't in any shape to fix it themselves. So it's quite the pickle we're in.
As for Israel vs. Lebanon/Hezbollah, that's a tough one. There really isn't an easy way to ease all those tensions quickly. Obviously the first step would be a cease-fire, but if we're being realistic that's just not going to happen. Or if it did happen it wouldn't last. This may be a case where you just need to let the 2 countries fight it out and settle it themselves. NATO and the rest of the world needs to just stand by and step in when it's really over. Kinda like a schoolyard fight. Everyone stands around just to watch and to make sure things don't get out of hand. But that's not a great idea for the people that have to live there. I wish I was a master at diplomatic relations, but I'm not.

Hockey
Well, the summer season is off to a rocky start for both myself and the team. We got beat up in our first 2 games. And I seem to have lost the ability to it the puck past the goalie. My shots are good, they just aren't getting past. I've got good speed on my wrister, it's getting up off the ice to about mid-goal, but I either hit the goalie in the chest or they make a slick save. And there's no rebounds for someone else to pick up. So it just sucks all around.
However, in game #3 I finally broke the cherry. After getting into a little arguement with a ref....
I pick off a bad pass at about our blue line and start to head up ice at full speed. I'm looking down cause I don't quite have a handle on the puck. I end up running over one of their guys who was just standing in the way. I didn't see him, so I had no chance to avoid him. I then get called for an interference penalty and just lose it. 2.5 games of frustration come out and I just start jawing at the ref. Every time he came within earshot I had something to say. Until he finally told me "One more word out of you and you're going to the lockerroom". He was really pissed at me, I was really pissed at him.
So then in the 3rd I get another break, cut hard around a slow defender, and lift it top shelf from a really bad angle. I was 10ft from the net and almost right on the side of it. I'm not sure how it went in, but it did. Hopefully now I can settle down and start playing better offensively. I need to just relax and check out my options. If the pass is there, dump it off. If not, aim for the corners of the net, not the middle.

Okay, it's late and I'm tired. So I'm cutting it off here and heading to bed. I'll see if I can't throw up something tomorrow while I'm at work. I'm just doing stupid data analysis this week, so I get bored pretty quickly.
PEACE!!!

Tribute to Jack

As I'm sure most of you reading this (assuming people read this is a stretch, but one I'm willing to make) don't realize that yesterday was the 1-year anniversary of the death of my former friend/roommate Jack. 1 year ago yesterday I was sitting in the waiting room in the emergency room of Mass General hosptial, waiting to hear if they could revive the guy that I found dying in our hallway. I spent most of 7/20/05 in complete shock about what happened, along with bouts of uncontrolled sobbing. Yes, I do have real feelings and emotions.
I won't re-document the events of that night here, as no one needs to read about that. And the rest of this will likely be rather gay, so you may want to just back out now.
So those of us that remained had a small gathering as a tribute to him and a way for us to get together and cope. We all met up at Anna's mom's house in Natick and spent the evening telling stories, listening to his old iPod mixes, and of course enjoying various fine whiskeys. It's always great to hear the stories from the people that knew him for much longer than I did. I only really knew him for the 1 year that he lived with us, but he definately made an impression on me. It was one of those friendships that instantly clicks. Sure, my liver is convinced that he was around for more like 10 years, but what the hell do livers know?! Anyways, because of him I was able to find some great anime to watch, gained a better appreciation for good whiskeys, saw that not all bird watchers were reclusive wackos, and developed a couple more bad habits. One of which was being required to drink Bud while watching either a Cubs or Red Sox game. The other was our friday night usual. That consisted of picking up a 30 of Bud and spending the next 10 hours playing MarioKart and watching anime. Then at some point around 4am we'd stumble off to bed after littering the floor with empty cans. It got to the point where we couldn't play 'Kart without Bud. If we randomly decided to play a few rounds one of us would just get up and get some beers without even thinking. Sad, and probably a sign of a problem, but that's just how it was.
We also had a large "Pedestrain X-ing" road sign hung up in the hallway near the coach. Every empty can would be thrown at the sign. Thus leaving a trail of beer on the wall, ceiling, and anything else b/t the couch and the wall. Funny to us, but not so funny to Anna when she noticed it. She also was not always assumed to come home on a saturday morning to find the apartment reeking of beer and the living room full of garbage. But such is life.
So in honor of that I'm going to be staging my own Tribute to The Usual tonight. I intend to make this a yearly tradition on the first friday after 7/19 11:45pm. That's the likely time that he actually died, so that's what I'm going with. And it's my holiday, so I can set it however I want.
I'll have my 30 of Bud, my video games, and hopefully some bad anime to watch. That part is still up in the air, as I'd have to rent some, but I'll find something suitable to watch if no anime is to be found. It's a tribute, not a reinactment. That gives me some wiggle room as to the details. And I probably won't make it til 4am.
Anyone in the Boston area that happens to read this today is welcome to give me a call and stop by. I'll have plenty of extra beer with Jack not around to drink his share.
I'd considering pouring one out in his honor, but I don't really think Jack would appreciate me wasting beer like that. Unless his ghost can find a way to drink it before it hits the ground. But then if were to see that going down it may freak me out a little bit. So unless he informs me of his desire to freak me out tonight, there will not be any 'pouring 1 out for my dead hommie'.
Well, I guess that's all I really need to say right now. I didn't realize this day was here so quickly until Anna mentioned in wedneday night, so I'm just now really coming to terms with it. I really haven't given my brain enough time to really figure out how we're going to deal with the whole thing until today. So far I'm just somber and tired. Just going over the various good memories I have, and the events of that last night. Hopefully I'll perk up later today when work is done. That usually cheers me up on a friday afternoon. And I"ll get to see Hayley saturday night, so I got that going for me. Which is nice.
So until next time....
PEACE!!