A Couple of Things…

1.  I’d be pissed if the federal government shut down.  Oh wait.  It did.  And I am.

2.  I saw a fox the other night crossing the road I was driving on up next to the hill here in Ventura.  Very cool.  Still waiting to spot my first owl in the wild.

3.  Is there another noon that I’m not aware of?  When people read, “12 noon” I always wonder, what other “noon” is there?

4.  I recently read an article called, “17 Bizarre Sex Facts You Probably Didn’t Know”  from W.W. Norton’s book, 1227 Quite Interesting Facts. It was a blog posted on the Huffington Post.  These were my favorites:
a.  A female ferret will die if she doesn’t have sex for a year.
b.  A single human male produces enough sperm in two weeks to impregnate every fertile woman on the planet.
c.  The founder of match.com, Gary Kremen, lost his girlfriend to a man she met on match.com.
d.   Gymnophoria is the sense that someone is mentally undressing you.
e.   A female chimpanzee in a fit of passion has the strength of six men.

5.  How do you measure your worth?   By the number of Facebook Friends?  But the number of LIKES on your page?  It seems to me that some people depend on this sort of feedback.  Don’t get me wrong, I love the camaradie that FB provides and the networking and sense of community.  But that’s it.  My sense of worth depends on how much I’ve been contributing back to society and the strength of my relationships with my close friends and family.

And while I’m on the subject, I’m going to go out on a limb here.  I love that people make a decision to clean up their lives and start being productive members of society.  LOVE IT.  That takes a lot of integrity.  But you know what?   If they’ve lived a life of crime, or were drug dealers, or gang members, or a slug who brought others down, they need to do something to MAKE UP THE DAMAGE.   And more importantly, that’s something they need to figure out on their own.  It can’t be mandated.  Trust me, it’s a spiritual thing for them; it’s not for society’s sake, although society would be grateful as well.  It helps them become worthy in their own estimation and as such they can play on the same field with others.

I’ve seen this with a number of celebrities, two of which I was involved with doing an interview with them, one back on Buzzine with actor Danny Trejo and more recently on VenturaRocks.com with Rapper, Immortal Technique.  These guys were bad fucking news back in the day.  But they served hard time and then made the decision to clean up their lives and to set the example for others while showing kids who are having a rough time of it that there are alternatives.  I so respect that.  That’s making up the damage.

6.  The Revenge porn law has been signed here in California.  I’m going to state the obvious because there is a way avoid this problem in the the first place.   DON’T HAVE YOUR PHOTO TAKEN IN THE NUDE!!!   Call me a prude or a realist.  But who wants to worry about that?
I do have a cute story though.  When I was in Jr. High, I remember my sister dragging me along with her friend Madeline whose boyfriend just enlisted and was off to boot camp.  We went to one of those quarter photo booths and stood guard while she went in and took photos with her top off.  It was so funny because we were so nervous and worried we’d be caught!  Good times.

7.  My neighbor recently pointed out that it is no longer politically correct to use the expression, “One for the road.”  No lie!

8.  A lot of us love to watch movies.  I wonder if the genre we prefer reflects our lives.  Do you prefer watching love stories, dramas, crime stories, mysteries, sci-fi genres or horror movies?  I lean towards romantic comedies.  🙂  Which you know, kind of fits.

9.  Sydney Rose can’t even stand the thought of someone touching her feet.  Creeps her out.  Who raised this girl?  How can anyone NOT appreciate a good foot massage?

10.  There are people who are in the business of keeping people scared.   And it’s not just the media.  These people are easily spotted on Facebook.

11.  A Politician is a fellow who would lay down your life for his country.   – Texas Guinan

A Couple of Things…

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First day of school – Dianne, me & Jeff

1. Remember after a nice long hot summer that anticipation of the first day of school? Yeah, I don’t miss that so much.

2a. Speaking of school, I’m taking off this semester from college and taking this personal time to do a full body purification.  I did one once over 25 years ago.  While I realize I am not a body, I do have a body that needs tending to from time to time.

2b. Just in case you’re wondering, I am a spiritual being with this particular body. When this lifetime ends, the body stays (or in my case, gets incinerated), and I’ll go onto something else.

3a. I was reading a list called “10 Simple Things You Can Do Today That Will Make You Happier, Backed By Science”  It was written by Belle Beth Cooper.
Out of 10 points, my favorites are: “Exercise more – 7 minutes might be enough”; “Plan a trip – but don’t take one.”

3b. I love that someone narrowed it down to 7 minutes, and planning a trip is good enough, you don’t actually have to go!  It’s the Antici—pation that boosts happiness.  So mark shit down on your calendar, and look at it from time to time.  Love it!

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Your cat is asking for you.

4. I took this photo of Molly Monday night around 9:30 and sent it to Sydney (who moved to Oregon last week without her cat) via text message saying, “Your cat is asking for you.”  Then, I swear to God, the cat disappeared until Wednesday evening.  Half of me was dreading telling Sydney her cat disappeared, probably left looking for her, the other half, not so much.

5. AT&T internet providers blocked one of my postal worker’s union websites for security reasons.  Patriotic Act?  dDOS attack?  I couldn’t work over the weekend on this particular website and lost billable wages.  Commie Rat Bastards!

6a. I walked into my neighborhood donut store (I owed “goodies” at work because I bought a new car…this rule, by the way, is in the Engineering ByLaws), and I happened to have a bag of grapes I just bought at Vons.  The woman behind the counter asked if I had tried the new Cotton Candy grape.  I got super jazzed because I had read about these a couple of months ago.  She brought some out for me so I could try, and yes, THEY TASTE LIKE COTTON CANDY!!!  Crazy!

6b. So if kids (or adults for that matter) taste the sweeter Cotton Candy grapes, will they ever be satisfied with just the original sweet grape?

6c. And are these genetically modified grapes?  And is GMO ALWAYS a bad thing?  Cross pollination isn’t bad is it?

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Crazy!!!

7. I work with a bunch of crazy-ass fitness buffs who do this gnarly cross-fit training at lunch.  No comment.  Just a statement of fact.  I watch them from time to time as I have fun shooting hoops.

8. I recently read an article posted on the Huffington Post called, “23 Signs You’re Secretly An Introvert.”  It was written by Carolyn Gregoire. I fit 15 out 23 signs.  One sign is that you screen your calls, even from your friends (sorry bout that one), another one is that you’re a writer.  I call “BULLSHIT!”

9. My new Nissan Sentra did not make the Top Ten Most Stolen Cars in America list.  Yay!

10. I have a friend who is a gluten for punishment.  See what I did there!  She can’t tolerate certain grains yet she still eats them…. K, not so funny.

11. I had a bite of a papple this week. Technically, it’s called Asian pear, but it tastes a little like a pear & an apple, and Sergio from Engineering has dubbed it a Papple.  Regardless, it was delicious!

12. From my “Favorite Facebook Posts” file:
“Sometimes, the first step towards forgiveness is realizing the other person is totally bat-shit crazy.”   Michelle Barlett

Thanks for listening!