Tuesday, October 31, 2006

UsHave you ever noticed how much we as humans mimic Nature? Or maybe it’s more along the lines of Nature mimicking us. All you have to do is look to the trees. During part of the year they are filled with a thick display of impenetrable green. They are so full and lustrous, but no one really takes notice. That is until they begin to change. We begin to see something we had missed before, color and indifference. Then suddenly they are bare, fully exposed to the world and all its intensity. And they are criticized and ridiculed. However, over time they begin to grow, stronger than before, and they become covered, content and magnificent yet once again. All this only to occur again and again throughout their entire lives. Until they die. And for a while, they are remembered for all that they had done. But over time their presence slowly wilts and decays until they are nothing but a minuscule void within a see of existence. Fear not though, because some day from that void will spring new life and once again the cycle will repeat. Isn’t it amazing what the world has to teach us, if we are willing to learn?

On a side note, I find this pretty ironic. My Quotes of the Day RSS feed from The Quotations Page today read, “All is in the hands of man. Therefore wash them often. - Stanislaw J. Lec (1909 - 1966), ‘Unkempt Thoughts’”
What Chicks Aspire to Be . . .I refuse to believe anything except that the fact that the sole reason chicks dig Halloween is because they think it gives them a legitimate excuse to dress up like tramps (I have countless pictures from this year’s parties and past of friends [all mostly female] doing just this) without having to explain themselves. Not that I’m complaining here, it just fascinates me that this is what women secretly aspire to be. Because, lets face it, when you pick out a costume for Halloween you pick something that you “want to be.” I want to be Batman, ergo I pick up a Batman costume and I’m on my way. All chicks, they apparently desire to be sluts, whores, and devil sex puppets, so they go out (or dig into their closets that contain thousands of secret hooker clothes that they don’t let on exist when really they go home and don them after a rough day at work because they like it) and get themselves a “costume.” Now, I know I just exposed a huge secret that women have been trying to hide for years, but let’s face it, this isn’t news to anyone. Neither is the fact that when you claim you’re having “slumber parties,” you’re actually having pillow fights in your underwear and naughty group showers. Like I said before, this really isn’t news to anyone.

Saturday, October 28, 2006

Right now the song Here It Goes Again by OK Go is playing on my Sirius satellite radio. Most of you know this song as the now infamous music video of the dudes jumping treadmills like a pack of wild monkeys supped up on Ecstasy and Viagra. This sort of irritates me as I particularly don’t find the song that great, but because so many people heard the darn song from YouTube, They (does anybody body really know who this universal They is anyway? They are apparently in control of every single thing in this universe) decide to play it on the radio. The song isn’t what’s good. The video is good. I’m not watching the video when I listen to the song on the radio.

Thursday, October 26, 2006

So you’ve probably heard of The Booze Cruise (made infamous by that episode of The Office in season 2), but Tuesday I went on The Booze Bus to Baltimore. So check this out, the past few days Rockwell Automation has been having their annual automation conference where thousands of people from all over the world come and gather, exchange and display project ideas, pretend like they are the smartest people ever, and give hand on labs and lectures regarding the latest in automation technology. So our distributor of Allen Bradley products took a few of us down to Baltimore to join the “festivities.” These are the actual events that took place during this three-day “business” adventure.

So our coach bus left Ebensburg around 3PM on Tuesday headed for Baltimore. About 5 minutes into the drive one of the guys in the back of the bus yells, “Who wants some beer?” Here the group from Pittsburgh brought 3 cases of beer with them to make the trip go quicker. Our whole bus group consisted of about 20 people (somehow there were 23 people on the bus on the way down, but only 19 on the way back. I don't quite understand that, but oh well, I'm not one of the four that may or may not be super upset). So the whole flippin’ bus partied all the way down to MD. Then Tuesday night we checked into our hotel, unpacked and got back on the bus to go to Cheers, a sports bar and grill, where it was CED-paid-for all you can eat and drink until 10PM. So me, and and a few other members of The Booze Bus started the evening with beers. And then moved on to more beers, at which point I then moved on to hard liquor, and then more hard liquor and more hard liquor and the next thing you know, it’s time to leave. The bus ride home was entertaining as the whole flippin’ bus was hammered!

So wake up time came pretty early there in Baltimore, especially for some members of our group who were unable to get themselves out of bed and down the hotel stairs. Another group member nearly threw up on the way to the conference, but eventually everyone caught up with each other Wednesday afternoon at the fair exhibits. So Wednesday evening we were wined and dined at Camden Yards (yeah that’s right, the ball park). There we had a tour of the ballpark and got to step onto the field and enter the dugout. Also of course we drank, and drank, and then came back to the hotel and drank some more.

Now the trip back was its own adventure, but let’s flashback to Wednesday morning though first. Our hotel was approximately 17 miles from the convention center and we were told we had to take the train to get there, as our bus would not be making the trip. However we opted to get on The German Bus that was on it’s way to the same convention center from our hotel. Who were these Germans in suites on the bus? We have no idea, but it was free and it worked.

So lets get back to the trip from Camden to our hotel. We were supposed to take the train back to our hotel from the ballpark, however we opted to hop on The Syracuse Bus that, low and behold was on its way back to our same hotel. Since we heard the train took about 1.5 hours to get back, and there may be approximately 3 white people on board, there wasn’t much of an option. So we pretend we were from Syracuse and began to make our way back. Then we missed our exit on the highway so we turned around, at which point we missed it again coming back. After about an hour we pasted a road sign that read, “Camden Yards next exit.” WTF! We were going in a flippin’ circle! So then we stopped at a gas station where some guys caught a smoke and bought some Nowalators (which apparently were 50 cents, but used to be 5 cents when they were in school). The bus driver then got off the bus and just started walking around. Sweet mother! We just wanted to get back to the hotel! So we beeped the horn and hollered for everyone to get back on the bus (keep in mind, we are just stowaways on this bus). So they got back on and finally after an hour and a half of driving, and stopping and driving again, we made it back to the hotel.

Once back we, of course drank some more. Are you kidding me?! I thought this was going to be a job function affair? It turned out to be The Booze Bus Party of the Century! It had been quite some time since I had that much to drink in two nights.

So now we’re sitting on The Booze Bus making our way back to PA as I’m typing this. Half the bus is hung over and the other half is talking about trains that don’t have steering wheels. Oh yeah, I did get see some booths and junk at the fair, but all I kept thinking about was, “I can’t believe people couldn’t get out of bed this morning!” And then of course I would laugh out loud to what other people there must have only perceived as me being retarded.

Sunday, October 22, 2006

Let’s talk about hand washing since it apparently was the topic of conversation this past Homecoming weekend. In my opinion, at least 95% of the people that wash (or warsh as some people ‘round here say) their hands after going to the bathroom do so incorrectly. This makes me upset because people complain about me not washing my hands at all (only after going #1) when really these people aren’t doing anything worse than myself (though I will argue in a little as to why there is no need to the excessive hand wash). Properly washed hands should be done so by wetting the hands first and working up a rather and being sure to wash all areas of the hand including the fingers, palms, back of the hand, finger nails and wrists for at least 20 seconds. Then the hands should be thoroughly rinsed and dried. Finally the kicker is using a paper towel to turn the water off. Of course you can use the waterless hand sanitizer instead of soap as long as you continue to rub your hands until they are dry, for it is the alcohol in these products that kills the germs not the friction of rubbing your hands together as some have you believe. This is true for soaps too, just not the alcohol part but the fact that they have other bacteria killing ingredients.1

So the reality that 95% of people don’t actually do this (most people I witness at The Workplace wash for approximately 8 to 10 seconds and barely cover their hands in soap) is really no worse than me not washing my hands. My argument for not washing my hands is this. As soon as people touch the water faucet after washing, or the door handle for that matter, all the germs that they just fought so long to get rid of are back on their hands. Also I’ll have all my readers know that down there is one of the most cleanest areas of the male body. It typically is washed once a day and is protected the entire day by on average, two layers of comfortably worn cotton. In most cases that area does not handle such bacteria infected material as money, food, garbage, or even snot for that matter. So why would I need to wash my hands after handling such a sanitary device? I don’t, especially if I don’t touch the flusher with my hands (nor do I head-butt the flusher either).

Let’s face it. Germs are everywhere on everything! Probably some of the germiest things you touch everyday are money, and get this Corporate America, your computer keyboards and mice. Ewe! Because honestly when was the last time you washed those at work? And if people are leaving giant turds on the bathroom floor for the innocent and naive to come across, I can almost guaranty that those same people are secretly wiping their naked bottoms on your keyboard and thinking, “This was just as fun as when I did this in college!”

1 WebMD

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

Ahhh the season of Fall (or Autumn as people that like to use big words call it) is upon us. How can you tell? Of course there are the changing leaves, the cooler temperatures, and fading daylight, but there are many other things that point to the changing season as well.
  1. Baseball season ever so slowly comes to end and the world unites to watch the Yankees lose another playoff series once again. Yeah, that never really gets old.
  2. Football becomes the Sunday pastime as most people now worship to the likes of Pastor Terry Bradshaw, and Father Dan Marino. Of course in the background worship music is playing to the beat of “Listen to the Wife Yell at Things Not Getting Done Around the House.” That’s one of my favorite hymns by the way.
  3. Those effin leaves get all over the effin place. Mostly in your car and down your socks. I don’t even know how the eff that is possible!
  4. Suddenly it looks like everyone chews Dentyne Ice, even though some people’s breath still reek of wet diaper. What’s up with that?
  5. You know those new obnoxious and stupid TV shows on the major networks? Ha, not for long.
  6. Apple Pie. ‘Nough said.
  7. Tidal waves of scary flicks hit the theaters and DVD, mostly stuff that nobody will ever plan on going to see unless they smoke crack while downing bottles of Pepto Bismol. In other words, you people are some weird biatches.
  8. Homecomings all around! This is where you go back and pretend like you cared about high school and/or college and the people you went there with. Well, okay, just the sports. I hate soccer! You would give me kiss . . .
  9. It’s cranky time at work! When was the last time you went to work and didn’t end up yelling at The Boss that he’s on crack and needs to suck it up and be a man or losing your cool and inadvertently advertising to The Workplace that you’ve had enough and decided that the circus was run better and offered better pay. Yeah that was The Summer you crazy mofo.
  10. People seem to drive just a little bit slower! And darn it if I didn’t get behind that darn Camero AGAIN on my home from work. What the eff are these people looking at? Take a picture kiddies, and get yourself some leg muscles that can actually push down on the accelerator. Sweet sassy malaisey.
Enjoy the season you sexy trunk monkeys.

Sunday, October 15, 2006

Let's Go PSU!So the Penn State game this weekend . . . AWESOME! Of course it was made oh so much better by me being there. Boo Yah! Jenn, Curt and I got there around 230PM armed with a crap load of burgers, beer, chips and dip and wine (for the sister of course). The weather was a little cool, but it didn’t stop us from partying with the crowds. One of the guys a few cars down from us had the best shirt ever. It read, “F$#! Michigan and the Wolverine they rode in on!” on the back and “F$#! Michigan” in the front. You can’t really beat that. Of course it was a whiteout so we all had our white/grey State Gear. But since Curt had five layers of hunting gear before he put his shirt on, he looked like a man with the biggest love handles EVER so Jenn refused to let him walk into the stadium dressed like that. Jenn didn’t wear her white to avoid looking like the Pillsberry dough boy (she was going to wear her shirt over her winter jacket), so I was the only one left participating with my hat and t-shirt.

So before eating we walked around the stadium a few times. I tried to find my buddy Nevling, but after two phones calls and sorting thru 200,000 people I didn’t have any luck finding him. So we went back and ate our burgers (in the car of course because it was getting rather chilly outside and windy). Luckily by game time the wind had died down and we took off to enter Beaver Stadium. We walked in and came to halt as the Wolverines made their way to the field (Curt and I booed them all the way). During this process we got trapped between two fences. We were trapped like a fat boogie in a tissue. Once the gate started to open all hell broke loose. People just started pushing and shoving and it was mass chaos. Luckily we made it out alive, short of breath thanks to some lungs collapsing under the pressure and me groping 10 people as my hand got stuck down somewhere below my waste and near oh too many people’s crotches quite unwillingly.

So we made it to our seats with plenty of time to spare. The rest of the game can be summed up in the next sentence. Penn State played crappy until the last 5 minutes when there was actual excitement but they couldn’t pull off another victory in the last 2 minutes. But the game was a blast and the loudest I’ve ever been too. I was one of 110,007 fans in the stadium that day. The second largest in Beaver Stadium history! My voice was pretty much dead by the end of the game with me yelling the whole time, but that’s what game day is all about.

So the day ended when we finally got out of the parking lot an hour after we made it to our car and fought the traffic almost all the way home. As Mastercard would say:

One hour drive to State College: $10
All the tailgating necessities; beer, chips, burgers, wine: $40
Three hour drive home from State College: $15
Having the time of your life with your favorite sister and brother-in-law in Beaver Stadium at the Whiteout of 2006: Priceless!

Of course if you want to view the pictures, just click here.

Monday, October 09, 2006

Peace**NOTE TO FRIEND**

We all go thru these rough times in our lives when it’s just not even worth getting out of bed in the morning. If it’s not your job, it’s your friends, and if it’s not your friends, it’s your family and if it’s not one of those things it’s all of them. I’ve had days like that; many in fact. More than I’d like to remember and I can almost guarantee that I’ll have more in my life to come. Time’s when there is no light, only darkness. Times when there is no joy, only sorrow. Times when there is no somebody else, only loneliness. And it’s rough, really rough when you’re halfway thru the tunnel and still can’t see the light at the end. And it’s in times like this that it seems that there is no hope for the world, no hope for humanity, no hope for you. But fear not. For if you can persevere and find that glimmer of light in the pit of despair, if you can track down that droplet of hope frozen in the endless stairwell, Peace will eventually find you. And when it does you will no longer worry about the past and all that it entailed. All you will see is a clear horizon ahead of the crystal clear clam ocean, ready to sail you off to wherever you want to go. All you have to do is seek and never stop. For there will always be someone there for you.

Friday, October 06, 2006

So a co-worker and I were reminiscing about the early computer era today to pass the time at The Workplace. You know, back in the days when there were no mice, no harddrives (you needed a boot disk), and minimum color. The conversation then progressed to old school video games like Tetris, Pong, and Super Mario Bros. Then, of course one of the best old computer games came up. Who could possibly forget, the super, the wonderful, the highly addicting Oregon Trail. In case you forgot how the game went, here is a brief rundown.

I want to be a banker from Boston. Hey I’m married! Let’s name my kids. Time to shop. “I’ll take 4 oxen, 500lbs of food, 10 pieces of clothing an extra wagon wheel and of course, a whole slew of bullets!” Time to leave. You past a tombstone, would you like to read it? You have come to a river, would you like to cross? You lost a wheel, would you like to replace it? Julie has yellow fever. Rest. You came to another river, “I’ll hire an Indian to help me across.” Oops, your ferry broke; you loose 5 pairs of pants. Sally has malaria. Rest. John has typhoid. Rest. Philbert has a snake bite. REST REST!! You have no food. Time to hunt. Bang you got a buffalo. Bang you got a bear. Bang you got a dear. Fred has a broken leg. Fred has died. You lost a wheel. You will need to trade for a new wheel. Will trade for bullets. Will trade for clothes. Will trade for oxen. Bang you got a bear. You trade 4 sets of clothes and two oxen for a wagon wheel. Julie has a cold. REST!! Julie has died. You attempt to ford the river. You loose 2 oxen and 10 boxes of bullets. Congratulations! You have made it to Oregon. You have a new high score. Please type your name. Do you want to play again?

Ahh the good old days!

Thursday, October 05, 2006

My Life CurrentlyI feel like my life is currently in some sort of limbo these days. To be perfectly honest, it’s going no where fast. Not that that’s a bad thing. I mean since I moved here and started this blog I really haven’t had too many major life changes in that time. Sure there have been some changes at The Workplace since I started, and I’ve made (and lost) some good friends along the way, but really, I’ve gotten no where, done nothing great. My life these days pretty much revolves around work, and volleyball and the people I know within each ring. There has been no attempt at moving, no attempt at trying something new (like a new career, not that I want one, but I do enjoy learning about whatever I can), some attempts at relationships of course, but definitely no attempt at any major change. I guess in the grand scheme of things three years of my life is a pretty short time to expect change (a mere 3% of my personal total life expectancy), but I’m still in the early post-college era and am used to all the change that occurred in the four years of college life. Don’t get me wrong, I’m pretty darn satisfied with my life right now. I come and go as I please, I’m not tied down by anything or anyone, physically I’m in the best shape of my life, but most importantly I’ve got some really great friends that would do anything for one another. I’m slowly becoming the big fish in the pond, which I like. I’m familiar with that (as that is the whole point of the big fish/small pond analogy). But sort of like college, when I get to be the big fish, will I again seek out (or stumble upon in my case) a bigger pond? I don’t know. Life sort of has a way of taking care of Itself. At least in my experience it does anyway. It’s the quote I live by, “When you come to a fork in the road, take it.” Yogi Berra the baseball player said that by the way, not Yogi Bear, who loved to take peoples’ picnic baskets (who is probably best known for his quote, “I’m smarter than the average bear.” Most often than not however he seemed to overestimate his own cleverness). And if the Road I’m on right now happens to be going in circles in the middle of the woods then so be it. The Road will lead me out eventually. And until them I am quite satisfied listening to the birds chirp, the wind rustling thru the leaf-filled trees, and the afternoon sun slowly making its way towards the horizon while glistening thru the timber.

Tuesday, October 03, 2006

Asinine idea right here!If you’ve eaten at Subway within the last year or so you would know that their sub stamp program is no more. You remember how these worked. For every six inches of sub you ordered, you got a Subway stamp. After you collected ten stamps you got free six inches of sub (for those of you that are math inclined, you could look at it as buy 10 subs, get one free, but only if you remembered where you kept your Club Card and dared to lick those repulsive stamps). So now that they have finally fazed that out they went to a new magnetic swipe club card that you can store points, or keep cash on. “Okay” I thought when I first learned about this. “This sounds like a good idea. No more licking ghastly stamps that have had a number of unknown handlers.” So when I got the chance a couple months ago, I picked up my new card, had the sandwich artist swipe it and thus earned some subway points. A few months later I was at a different Subway and tried to get some more points on my card. Low and behold they had absolutely no idea what this new club card was. So of course, they didn’t swipe it. A little later that month at yet a different Subway, I attempted to get some points yet again. While this store knew of the new cards, it didn't do anything with them yet except hand them out (yeah a lot of flippin’ good that does). Then finally tonight at yet another Subway I tried one more time to get more points added to my card only to be told that this Subway only uses the cash-store feature and does not offer points for subs purchased.

Okay, now it is rant-and-rave time. This whole concept of the new Subway card is completely and utterly asinine! While the model is good, it makes absolutely no sense for different Subways to honor the card in diverse ways. Why the crap would anybody want that? The whole point of these things is to encourage people to eat at Subway more with rewards. All it makes me want to do is remove the blasted thing from my wallet because clearly the only thing it is good for is taking up space and annoying the crap out of me. The fact that anyone would find such an inconsistent system useful, or even noteworthy is just completely unreasonable and preposterous. If Subway only wants to the use this new card in one way, then so be it, but at least be unswerving with the notion. Frankly I would rather pull a dead, featherless bird from a smelly corpse’s hand than I would to present the brainless Subway card at yet a different Subway only to be embarrassed by yet a completely different chronicle as to how the card works at THAT particular store. While Jon Lovitz has encouraged me to "JUST EAT THE SANDWICH!" it makes me wonder why he has yet to mention this wonderful new club card . . .

Sunday, October 01, 2006

So apparently most people assume that MySpace is only made for teenagers and sexual predators. Let me disagree with that assumption and explain why. First of all, yes I have a MySpace account, and no I am not a sexual predator, nor am I a teenager. So why do I have one? For a couple reasons. First, it lets me keep in touch with people from my past, like high school buddies and neighbors without me having to track down a phone number or mailing address. I can just go online and wonder, “Huh, I wonder what my good friend from high school has been up to.” And boom, there it is. In a sense yes it’s being nosey, but in another sense it’s just trying to keep up with people who were at one time, or still are, involved in my life. It’s just like everything else where if someone doesn’t understand something, they are hesitant to think it’s good. A prime example of this was the beginning of the Internet (if you can remember that time). At first everyone said, “Oh no, you can’t trust what you find on the Internet. It’s not accurate. People just make stuff up there.” Now people don’t think twice about the information they search for. It just took time for the majority of people to use it and form an understanding of it. The same is true for online communities. Most people don’t understand it, so it must be a bad thing.

These sites are not just for predators, they are for everyone (but not for everyone to be predators)! I can check out a friend’s picture, leave them short messages, and even track down other friends thru them. Sure that could be a bad thing to the wrong people, but so can cars, chemicals and even air planes. And we still have those around and people are still using them and not obsessing about how dangerous they are.

So I encourage you Myspace-phobes to test it out and see what these things are all about. You may just meet up with some people you completely forgot about. But don’t be an idiot and create an account just to look at other’s accounts (you know who you people are). That’s called stalking. Want to find out about that old boyfriend or girlfriend of yours, well why not return the favor and let them find out about you. That’s what the Internet is all about. It’s a free trade of pure information. So why not add your two cents worth?