Craziness, It Just Keeps Coming

Alright, in an attempt to save money, our department is instituting a new tool. It is basically a tool that is supposed to measure the likelihood of our offenders reoffending and to uncover hidden needs they might have. The theory being that once we know these needs we can direct them to resources for them to meet the needs, thereby reducing the chances that they will reoffend. I have nothing against this in theory, it sounds good. The problems I have with it are as follows.

1. It takes about an hour of intensive interviewing to administer the tool, plus time to enter it into the computer and get the results, then a follow up interview with the offender to explain the results. I currently have 110 people on my caseload, all but 2 of them under active supervision. I have to see about 75% of them once a month and another 10% twice monthly. The remainder report in quarterly. I don't know how I will make the time to do this, especially when you consider I also have to do field work, court appearances, write warrants, write reports, investigate new transfers, ect. and currently we aren't allowed ANY overtime.

2. The training takes 4 full days. Half our office did it last month, the rest do it this month. You have to complete training, pass a test, pass an interview, and complete a computer test to get ceriftified to use the tool. Then you have to do some other things afterward to gain access to the actual internet site to enter the data. The people who completed the training last month are just now beginning to get their certificates. So it took almost 30 days to get certified. They implemented the new standards this month. We are supposed to be using the tool now. Half of us haven't even had the training and the ones that have are only now being certified, yet it is in effect now?

3. We are a rural area, we have almost no resources to refer clients too, so I am worried that by identifying these needs, we may be setting up the agency to be responsible legally for meeting them. How long before someone ends up in court on a violation and blames these unmet needs on his violating? Sooner or later someone will mention this to their lawyer and it will become an excuse.

Gripe, Moan, Gripe, Moan

It's the end of the month and I have stuff I need to do. I want to take off early today because next month is guarantendamntied to be extra nightmarishly stressful. Why? Well, glad you asked. You see we get 3, count 'em, 3 days off for the holidays. The problem? Well that would be that we have to shovel the work for those 3 days into the remaining days. Still that isn't that big of a deal as it happens every year. The problem is the 4 mandatory training days that are also on there. Why they set up 4 full training days in a row on a month where we are already 3 full days short I will never know, but there you go. I am losing 7 full working days. Now I guess I could come in and work on those holidays, but I won't be compensated for it. Although if I have to, I might come in and work on some warrants or paperwork. But I would really rather not do that. Well, lets get to work. Put it off long enough.

Vacuums and Emails

I love my sister. Love her dearly and we used to talk a lot, but then for a while we didn't. Early on we spoke both on the phone and via email. Recently we started back with the email. I forgot one thing about her though and that is that she is a chain forwarder. I mean that she forwards chain emails like crazy. I get the inspirational emails, the bring religion back into the school emails, the forward this email to 10 different people and microsoft, appleby's, apple, red lobster, aol, gm, ibm, ect will send you free cash, $50 gift certificate, ipod, 1 month free service, labtop computer, 40 foot yacht, private jet, hooter's girl, ect. Okay, I couple of things you should know about me I guess. First, I check all those strange email rumors. Most have been around several thousand times before and a false. Second, I know tracking email is very difficult. You can only really do it through IP address and getting each individual address can require a court order. The chances are that no company is going to go through the expense and hassel of doing that just to give millions of people something free just to advertise some new service. The thing I don't get is who the hell starts these things and do they really think it's that funny of a joke?

There is no piece of code that can be inserted into an email to determine how many different people you forward an email to so that you can see the Taco Bell Dog do the macarana across your screen. If there was your anti virus and anti spyware software would throw a major temper tantrum.

Well, you don't want to know my views on religion, or on politics, but hopefully you do want to know my views on the timely and important subject of home carpet cleaning, aka vacuums. I currently own 2. The older and by far more expensive is a Kirby G6. I have had it about 7 years. It is a very good vacuum. It is also a very expensive vacuum. It is the Transformer of the vacuum world. It is a vacuum, blower, shampooer, handheld vacuum for car or stairs, lawn mower, motorcycle, nail gun and jack hammer. If you can figure how to rearrange the parts and have a plug in within reach it can do it. Now mind you the major manufacturing component in making the kirby was steel, so it isn't light, the handheld configuration can double as dumbells for your workout. There are really only a few downsides other than the intial expense to the kirby. First, by being so versital it kind of makes it complicated and a bit of a pain to clean. Two the impeller design seems a bit too open and easy to jam or break for what is otherwise a near indestrutable machine, although I have yet to damage the thing. Three, all components for the vacuum that need to be replaced are expensive. The darn bags are about $6 apiece. Fortunately they are rather large, but still.....

On the other end of the scale we have the Wind Tunnel. I am not an idiot, the wind tunnel is an economy vacuum while the Kirby is high end. I know I can't fairly compare a vacuum I bought for $75 with one that cost $1700.

The Wind Tunnel is bagless, that is it uses a filter and canister to hold what it picks up rather than a bag. since filters can be cleaned and last longer than a bag, these have become rather popular. Now both vacuums are self propelled, which is important with the super heavy Kirby, but not so much with the WT, whose construction is pretty much plastic. The thing is, the Kirby lets you turn the self propel option off, while the light weight vacuum doesn't. Both have power brushes.

Now I don't expect the little vac to perform like the Kirby. The Kirby due to complication and weight is a bit of a pain to get into action. This vacuum is light and no bag, so I was planning on it doing the regular work and the Kirby coming out for deep cleaning and shampooing. Unfortunately, the Windtunnel uses 2 belts and one is a pain. After around 2 to three vacuums, the belt starts coming off frequently. If you take 4 long screws out of the bottom, you find the two belts. One is long and skinny and looks fragile. Not had any issues with it. The thick, short rubber one is the brat. It loops over a metal shaft then around a rubber tire. You have to hook it over the metal shaft then stretch and roll it onto the tire. The shaft is long, you have to turn the belt sideways and wiggle it on. You don't have much room to work. Then you have to stretch and hold the belt with your thumb while rotating the tire with any remaining fingers you can get into the tiny spot. The you put the plate back on, vacuum 2 to 5 minutes and repeat. You have to put the screws back in, otherwise the cover falls off. Other than this it's a decent, cheap vacuum. I am contemplating putting a cover on the metal shaft. It gets really hot and that seems to be where the belt slips off rather than from the tire. Perhaps if I can work a piece of aquarium air tubing over the shaft, the belt won't slip as often. If I can't get the tubing, maybe some duct or electrical tape. As it is the vacuum is useless. I bought the vacuum new but at an auction, so I can't return it.

More Thoughts on a New TV Season

Well, Saturday it decided to put about 6 million inches of rain down, so I went to sidereel and caught a few season premieres and normal episodes of a few shows. I watched the season opener for Medium, I always liked this show, it centered more around the very real seeming family relationships and what Alison's abilities and job did to there family life. The season opener from last season's cliff hanger was okay, not really anything special, but then they had to resolve the cliff hanger. I did like the ending, though.

I caught another episode of Monk. That show has gotten a bit old, but this is the last season. I liked wings, and his taxi driver character was great there. I liked his neurotic detective bit, but really, how long can they go on with it? And I didn't catch the series until Trayler Howard had joined, and I like her, so when I see an old episode with Sharona I find it inferior to the Natalie episodes.

The opener for the Mentalist was on. I almost missed this, unusual job/skill set makes a guy a super detective, cop show last season. It is okay, sort of falls into the Medium, Monk, Psych, Castle, Numbers catagory of show. Last season they spent most of it setting up the main character. He was a fake psychic who upset a serial killer enough the guy off the mentalist's wife and kid. Now he hunts the killer acting as a consultant for the CBI, a fake state investigative agency. The killer taunts him whenever the series needs a boost. The first season gave this backstory and established that this guy basically can really read and manipulate people because he was a big time con man. The only problem I have is with this episode. For someone so smart and good with people, he did a really bad job dealing with the law enforcement officers. I guess they needed it to create tension and conflict and plot points for this season's overriding story arc, but really, if your main character works because of certain things, don't have him behaving like a sulky third grader and making mistakes a low grade moron would make trying to get his way.

The Simpsons is a show I quit watching on a regular basis. I can't believe it is still on. It is well past it's prime and is pretty much repeating itself, but still manages to pull a few laughs and have more fun than about half the shows on the air. I also watched Family Guy, despite the fact that it is now more embarrassing than it is funny.

New Television

I am an old-timer. I can remember when summer tv was nothing but reruns of the previous fall and winter shows. Then came reality tv and the relatively cheap to produce shows and soon that dominated summer tv, spilling over into the new tv land. That actually made me watch less as I hate 99.9995 of reality tv as it 1) bears no resemblence to any form or reality, and 2) seems to focus on and cater to the worst qualities of humanity. I also find it boring. Anyway, eventually cable channels sort of came to our rescue although a and e, bravo, tlc, and discovery all seem to be going to the all reality crap programming, slowly. Hopefully the history channel and biography won't follow suit. Anyway, I have become addicted to some of the alternative programming out there. Eureka is a show I have come to love. The acting is good, full of goofy characters, it is primarily a comedy but with a bit of sci-fi and some action. The special effects are generally cheesy, but that never stopped Dr. Who. There is about 4 seasons of reruns you can find on the net if you are willing to prowl, check it out. Warehouse 13 is also worth hunting down, although only 1 season so far. It's a sort of modern steam-punk, scifi show with a good cast. Merlin is a britsh made program. I watched the first season when I had little else to watch, I did watch the first episode of this season, but the reimagining of the Arthur legend as teen drama is quickly reminding me why I stopped watching Smallville. Sanctuary wasn't really summer programming and it was often cheese in the extra sharp variety, but since it started as a net show, I watched it through and rather liked it. I am hoping it will have a season 2.

Now so far this season I watched House's premiere. Pretty good, but could you expect less from House. Bones was okay for the first 2 episodes. Bones character is getting to be a bit old to not have evolved a bit more. How could such a smart person not learn over time. Angela is still super sexy and the most appealing of the ladies. I still like Booth and Hodges and their interactions. Sweets and came are just there. The lady DA is only a recurring role, but she by far steals any scene they let her in, even if she is only a turbo-charged sassy black lady.

Criminal Minds season premiere was meh. It ended, as usual, on a cliff hanger that was sort of resolved, although to my mind not in a satisfactory way. It also started what, I would guess, is to be a season (or half season) long subplot.

NCIS had a pretty decent season opener. I like this series, it's a procedural that doesn't take itself too seriously, has predictible, but likable characters, and makes for good forget the world for an hour, television. It doesn't pretend to be anything it isn't. NCIS LA, the new spin off was on and it was watchable enough that I will get it a few more viewings to see if the characters come out. It looks like the team leader, former seal (LL Cool J), and Chris O'Donnell are going to be the show focus with everyone else filling the support roles. Instead of Ducky, we have a crabby, short accountant, unfortunately although she is made in the quirky stock character factory, so far she is the only one on the show with a personality.

I currently watch only 2 half hour non-animated sitcoms. Better off Ted and the new Modern Family.

Better off Ted was a summer filler that will probably come in mid-season. It has a good cast, is a very excellent parody of a big, completely evil business filled with quirky clueless characters. It's hilarious and well worth the time.

Modern Family is a new show, but based on the pilot, I plan to make it a regular show. It is done in fake documentary format. It follows 3 groups of people around. The first seems like a normal family, father (who thinks who is "cool"), mother, and 3 kids (stock teenage girl growing up fast, younger smarty, nerdy little sis, and bratty brother). Incidently the 15 year old girl is played by a 19 year old actress according to imdb, so those nasty fantasy's you may be having are legal. Second group is an older guy (Al Bundy or Popeye Doyle) who marries a much younger, hotter and more latin woman who has a pudgy 11 year old boy child from a previous marriage. Group three is a gay couple both of whom can be stereo typed, but neither is so over-the-top as to put you off, and there newly adopted vietnamese baby girl. At first I thought these people would all turn out to be neighbors which would tie them together, then I though maybe it was just that they were all part of a the same documentary. Then when the show tied them together in another way beyond the documentary it was a nice little twist. I love that Ed O'Neil is back on tv and the pilot was very funny and very well-made. It mixed all the elements up so I could identify will most of the characters and like them even while laughing at them. If the show holds up to the pilot, the sitcom may be coming back. Ed's hot latino wife is another reason to watch the show guys.

Supernatural has so far had 2 episodes this season and both have been strong if you watch the show, and both have been somewhat tied to the overall arc rather than a monster or the week episode. It's actually the only WB show I currently watch.

The Guild webshow is running again, so I plan to catch up on that when I get home. I am 2 epidoses behing, that's about 14 minutes.

WTH Is Going On With Toolbars

Wtf is it with tool bars for web browsers. At first it seemed like everyone and their grandmother had one and wanted you to install it but it was easy to say no. Now you can't install any kind of software without it wanting to install somebody's freaking toolbar and most of the time it comes right in the middle of installing the software when you are basically hitting the next button continuously, so it can sneak right by you. Everybody has a toolbar: Mapquest, Yahoo, Ask, Google, Big Dick McGee's BBQ Mud Wrestling and Sex Toy Emporium; and they all want on your browser. I don't get it either, if the toolbar offers a special service, I had one that verified the ip address and domain name of all sites for awhile when the phishing and redirecting first became a mini internet scam industry and I had a near fatality when I answered an email supposedly from ebay while a little too sleepy, I can understand, but when mostly what it does is internet search....WTF?

I use mapquest's toolbar at work. I have to do a lot of driving, mostly local. Realistically all it does is save me from going to the mapquest website. I hit the direction button and put in my start and first destination and it opens the webpage with that information all ready loaded and I just plug in the rest of my stops. I also use a specialized toolbar at home that has 2 or 3 features I like. Originally I made the mistake of installing the new Windows search, which didn't work anywhere near as well as the older more traditional search, at least for me, and which also caused the my documents folder the crash explorer pretty much everytime I opened it. While trying to figure out the issue, at first I thought it was a problem with a codec, I installed a third party file explorer, xplorer lite 2, I believe, a very nice little program, and it installed a toolbar on two of my three browsers. It got internet explorer and firefox but missed safari. It had a neat internet radio function so I left it on until I finally figured out it was slowing my browsers down. I then hunted up another toolbar just for the radio feature though.

In both of these cases, I am using a toolbar I found a need for and hunted down. Most of the functions of all of the toolbars though seem to be searching. The radio toolbar looks for music, mostly on torrent sites. Other that directions and maps, mapquest is mostly specialized search engines for gas priced, yellow pages, ect, with one basic websearch. This is what I don't get.

First off, when I first started surfing the net back in the stone ages, we had 2 ways to do an internet search. First you just go to your favorite search engine or web portal and search. Second, you just type the thing you were looking for into your browser address bar and it would automatically look it up for you. Neither of those things were really that difficult. Now things are even simpler, every browser I can think of in it's last couple of incarnations has had a separate little space where you could type in what you were looking for and it would search for it. If you don't find what you like, you can change the search engine you use right there. So why do we need all these extra toolbars? I see some convienence, but mostly unless they offer something that works better or offers a new feature, like the radio, or the it guys at work swear the google toolbars pop up blocker works better than firefox or ie's, why bother with them. And why are these companies so anxious to stick them on our browser that they bundle them with every piece of software they can.

I am sure it has to do with advertising, the more people use ask or yahoo or google, the more they can charge the advertisers on those sites, and the more they can charge to get top placement. And I would guess they gamble that most people aren't going to change the default search, for instance making ask the default on google's search bar. But still it seems awfully silly to me. The more junk on the top of the browser, the less room to see the actual material.

Side Issues With the Economy

Well, bad news all around. With the slow economy, the state is cutting expenses. Apparently it is not cheap to keep people locked up, so they are letting some out early and not locking others up at all. I guess it is job security, but we have been quietly told to try to find alternatives before filing violation reports and taking our offenders to court. We aren't told what alternatives, I guess if they fail a drug screen, try to send them to teatment first. I already did this with people who were positive for pot, but not for anything else, and meth was already an automatic warrant.

Everybody wants to jump on the bandwagon and get their 15 minutes of fame. An article a month or so back in a Tennessee newspaper had a sheriff claiming that his jail was full of people locked up because they couldn't pay their fees. The newspaper went on to state that most parole and probation violators were in jail simply for technical violations. The paper never explained what technical violations were and it left the reader with the impression that a technical violation was simple the inability to pay. It made the state come off like a greedy, thoughtless entity locking up poor people.

So, for anyone who actually bothers to cruise by, here is the truth:

A TECHNICAL VIOLATION is, in the state of Tennessee, any violation of the rules of parole or probation other than an arrest or conviction for a new crime. Therefore, failing to pay supervision fees or court costs ect, is a technical violation. Failing a drug screen, not reporting to your officer, leaving the state without permission, absconding (running away), being in a bar or nightclub, being intoxicated, are all technical violations, so someone locked up for a technical violation could have been locked up for repeated illegal drug use, running away from their parole or probation, not reporting, failing to obey lawful instructions, or many other things.

RANT...The rules are explained to them before they are place under supervision. If they don't want to obey them they are welcome to remain incarcerated. The rules they are under aren't that bad, 90% of them are just the same things any law-abiding citizen does anyway. The few that aren't, visiting your probation officer, having your probation officer visit your home, providing proof of employment, staying out of bars and nightclubs, are still a lot better than being locked up. ...END OF RANT

However, back on topic. You cannot lock up a probationer for failing to pay supervision fees, according to our judges. Parole you can lock them up, but I doubt the board would revoke parole only for failing to pay fees. However in a parole hearing you only have to prove one violation to get a revocation. So it is possible you could have someone up for 6 new offenses as well as failing to report, failing to pay fees when he has the means (in parole you have to prove the parolee has the ability to pay), and moving without notifying his officer. If the officer proved the failing to report and failing to pay fees, then the officer decides to stop without addressing the other alleged violations to save time. Now you have a parolee revoked and incarcerated on technical charges even though he might have new charges pending. The other charges were dismissed as far as official statistics are concerned. Now judges can revoke probationers for failing to pay court costs and restitution. Usually they will simple extend the probation period if the violator seems to be trying to pay, but if no effort is made they might revoke them and lock them up although rarely for the full sentence, usually just for a short period of time, otherwise the money would never be paid. However, the state does not get this money, court costs go to the county court clerk's office. Restitution is money paid to reinburse a victim of a crime. It could be for damage caused by vandalism, items lost to theft, medical bills, loss of income, ect. If the offender does not pay the restitution, and does not seem likely too, or if the probation has been extended to the legally allowed maximum sentence, then the judge might revoke the offender to serve the full sentence, or if the victim wants to pursue a civil case, he might dismiss the warrant. However in these situations we are required by policy to take a warrant and let the court address the situation.

Now why the sheriff I mentioned was griping, other than to get in the paper, I don't know. If a person serving a felony sentence is in his jail, he is given a monthly fee for housing the inmate. This is the main source of income for most jails. He doesn't have to keep the inmate, unless there are pending court cases in his county, he can place him on the next state bus going to a state penetenary. Inmates awaiting trial are county prisoners (unless serving a state sentence on another case) these people, as well as inmates serving a misdemeanor sentence, are charged a daily fee for being incarcerated. This is part of the court costs mentioned. Since the likelihood of this being paid varies, most jails get most of their money from state housing fees and the comissary (inmate store).

The Latest in Stupidity

Well work is getting bad. The horrible economy is hitting us now also. By state policy our caseloads are set at 75 max people. I have had 2 caseloads since starting to work here 5 years ago. My second one was below 70 for about a week. Last month it closed at 97. Now one way they have always tried to lower the numbers is to say that inactive cases don't count. That means absconders (people who have disappeared) and out-of-state transfers, don't count. That takes care of about 3 on my caseload. That's not completely fair on the absconders though as every month we have to do an arrest check on them and once a year run an ncic check. Once a year we also have to request a report on the out of state transfers too, but that isn't that much work.

However, almost every officer in the state that carries a caseload is well over the 75 number. This means that the state needs to hire, however a recent report sent to the governor stated that only a handful of empty slots needed to be hired for. When the numbers became public our managers were outraged. Apparently in submitting th caseload numbers, our higher ups completely ignored the absconders, out-of-state transfers, incarcerated and detainer offends. Detainer offenders are offenders that are active on our caseloads and have to be accounted for, but who are incarcerated on other offenses or for other reasons, say failure to pay child support. Incarcerated offenders are locked up on our warrants and we are generally in the process of violation hearings. Both these catagories require us to do things monthly with them.

Also in the Very Stupid Catagory is the recent news article that came out. The trend in our department is to try to avoid locking people up now. This article was claiming that there were people being locked up because they were not paying there supervision fees. It stated that many offenders were being locked up not for committing new crimes but for technical violations. The way it was written it made it sound like they were just being locked up for being poor.

Well, first, they never explained what a technical violation is. Basically a technical violation is any violation other that a new criminal offense. Absconding, running away, is a technical violation. Not reporting to your parole/probation officer is a technical violation. Using drugs is a technical violation. These are all serious violations, but they are classified as technical, but the only technical violation they ever mentioned was failing to pay fees. Now as far as probation is concerned, I don't know of a single judge in my area that would revoke an offender for not paying his supervision fees. They will for not paying court costs and restitution, but that goes to the county court clerk and the victim of the crime, not us. And usually, all they do is extend their probation and scold them. Now the lower court (county) judges will lock people up for 10 days for failing to pay court costs, but still not for failing to pay probation fees. As far as parole goes, a parole office has to both show an offender has not paid supervision fees and that he had the means to pay them, before he could get a violation sustained, and even then I doubt the parole board would vote to revoke even if the hearing officer recommended it. I doubt if there is a single person in this state locked up for failing to pay a supervision fee only. Now those charges mare on the warrant, because a recent policy change pretty much requires us to address fee arrearage in court, and since we can't ask a judge directly to waive past fees, at least adding it to the warrant brings it up so maybe the defense attorney will address it.

Part Two

Started rant yesterday and got distracted. Anyway, now ecomonically we are producing were little in the way of actual things. So we replace the jobs making actual things with jobs doing things for other people, cooking, cleaning, selling them things. Okay I see three problems here. One, the job making things paid (local estimate) 12-16 US dollars per hour. The other jobs pay 7-10 dollars per hours. Two, as more factories close, who are we supposed to cook, clean and sell stuff too. And three, who is going to buy this stuff we are now making in China, India, Mexico and other places. The US is it's own best customer, but if we put all the people out of work they won't be able to afford to buy the stuff we make in other countries and then more business will close. Also, a lot of the service jobs are now going out of country. Any service that is offered that doesn't have to be done local and in person is going out of country. Anything that can be do via telephone or computer, data processing, data entry, telephone sales, telephone help services, order processing is all leaving the US. This all seems really stupid and short sighted to me. With fewer people working, the ones working making less money, who is going to be able to afford these goods and services. The companies say it is cheaper to subcontract it outside the country, but eventually it will be even cheaper to not offer the service at all, cause without work here, we won't be able to pay for it anyway.

Modern Times

You know it is really kind of odd to me. This recent economic downturn is scary. I remember way back in college they told us our economy was shifting from a manufacturing economy to a service economy and most of the jobs would be in service industries. That's didn't make sense then and it makes way too much now. When I was in high school all the kids that weren't planning on a university or tech school figured on getting on at one of the local factories. There were 5 major ones in our city and maybe another 6 smaller ones. The thing about the big factories were they paid well, you had a long term job with insurance and retirement benefits. Now, only one of those plants is still in the town. Most relocated to Mexico. Only 2 or 3 of the little plants, which don't offer the benefits or pay near as well still exist. The manufacturing businesses that came in to replace them are mostly automated and only work a few basic people or employ only specially trained people.

A client recently told me he was hoping his son could get a job at Walmart as he thought that would be a good place to work and would offer long term job security. With as much information as is out there about Walmart, it still surprises me the number of people who have misconceptions about the company.

I have experienced the glories of Walmart from 4 different perspectives.

Competition. Walmart seems like heaven on earth when it first comes into a town. It has really cheap prices on everything and seems to have everything you could ever want. Those low prices are there to kill off all the competition. When the local stores close the doors and the nearest large competitors start faltering, those prices go up. The local super Walmart here is actually more expensive than most of the grocery stores on food. Honestly if you have the time to look, you can usually find everything you want somewhere else for the same or less money, the only real advantage is everything is in one really huge place.

Employee. I haven't worked there but have many friends and family that have. The pay is crap, the local version treats the employees poorly. They pay no overtime and tell the employees they won't get any. Then they keep them late two or three days, then notice on Friday that they have a couple of hours over, so they tell them to come in late on Friday, but then schedule a mandatory meeting at the start of the shift and won't let them clock in. Then there is no sense in driving home so they stay in the store after the meeting and the bosses keep telling them to do things, even though they aren't on the clock. My wife came home several times crying because she ended up doing 2 or 3 hours work off the clock. Then insurance they off is so expense the employees can't afford it unless they work a second job.

Security. Until recently Walmart had the sorriest anti-theft program I had ever heard of. Recently they have beefed it up some, but basically the place is a bug light for shop lifters. Due solely to the number of shoplifting charges from Walmart, the local police no longer arrest and take in shoplifters unless the merchandise is $500 or more, instead they just write a citation, like a speeding ticket. This is much harder for probation officers to track.

On that note, an aquantance of mine was recently accosted in a Walmart by one of the loss-prevention thugs. Now these guys have no authority. They can call the cops, but they have no right to detain or to arrest beyond that of any other citizen. Apparently they thought my friend had not scanned some of the merchandise on the self checkout. They actually attempted to detain him and his wife, going to far as to rip her shirt off and knock her down in the struggle. Then he was arrested for assault even though he hadn't taken anything out to the store he had not paid for, nor had he hit anyone, he had just pulled out of there grip when they knocked his wife down. That was in the state, although not local. For that I am glad, as a local judge told one of the local walmart security people that they had no authority to handcuff anyone or take anyone to there office.

Whoops Sorry

If anyone is actually reading this, sorry I took such a long vacation. Just got caught up in a bunch of nothing. This will mostly be a rant onlong the lines of I hate my job.

Actually I don't hate my job, but some of the job related things are stupid.

Training for instance. It's boring and we don't really get trained on anything, its sole purpose seems to be if one of us screws up, the government can point to the training and say, we told him, it's his fault. None of it is designed to actually give us any useful tools to do our jobs, just to cover the state's hiny.

Well due to the horrible economy, the state did a buy out to encourage people to quit. It hit late last year, and in January, we found that despite hitting their quota or 2200 people, they still might need to lay off up to 2000 more. To help in figuring out who to lay off, the governor hired a specialist. Let that sink in. He hired an expert to help him figure out which people to get rid of because we can't afford to pay them. I wonder how much the specialist makes, and how many more $10 an hour state employees will have to lose their jobs to cover his salary?

Meanwhile, my department is not part of the hiring freeze. Since we deal with public security, we have permission to ask permission to fill vacancies. We currently have a few and one locat and another in the capital would be promotions for me and I am eligible and meet all requirements. There is only one problem. There is no mechanism for new applications or update to existing application. So there is no way to apply, period.

You see the state decided to improve its IT. Our department uses a very outdated and ancient piece of crap program to track our offenders and such. It has to be 20 years old if it's a day and that;s old for anything but ancient for software. They recently about 5 years ago, cobbled together a windows based un-user-friendly gui for it, but it's crap too. Now they pulled the fee payment system off that and went with a new internet accessible system that seems to be poorly designed and a major pain in the posterior. Then they bought a new system to track payroll, leave, worktime and business expenses. It mostly spends about as much time down or updating than it spends available for use. It also isn't very user friendly and seems to often mess up. This is the system that is supposed to let us update applications. There seems to have been a major issue getting it to speak to the internet based application system that a non-state employ would use to apply for a job. The new system being behind our firewall and not available outside the network. We also have a new internet based system to deal with offenders coming here from other states. So in addition to the 3 signons and passwords I originally had, one for assessing the network, one for internet assess to my work email and calendar, and one for the offender tracking system, now I have 3 entirely new sign ons and passwords. And none of these systems talk to one another. Yay fun. Weeeeeee. In the defense of the systems though, many of the employees here are so technologically challenged they are lucky to turn on the lights in there work area without help.

Long Time No Updates

Sorry my wandering mind hasn't passed this way lately. Things are happening both good and bad. First, the lovely economic downturn is having it's effects on the state. They are looking to lay off 2000 people which will really help with the unemployment rate. Naturally everyone is nervous. Considering the public safety issue of my job, I don't forsee getting canned, but it could happen. Won't know much until August.

Second job is killing me. I have no free time except for weekends, which I am too tired to really enjoy. I can't afford to let it go, at least not for another 2 or 3 months.

Wifey finally got it in gear and went back to school. In less than three months she passed her GED. Now she is a graduate. We went to her graduation last Thursday. For a present, I scraped together the cash for her to get her carry permit. She took the class Monday and aced it. Half-way there. Yesterday we talked and she is interested in going to technical school, possibly as a massage therapist. It will cost, but maybe we can get some family help and or financial aid. I have been considerring going to law school, but I want wifey to have her chance to shine. She deserves to get the tools to land a good job, instead of the crap she's been having. I am really proud of her. Too top it all off, she has not smoked in over 3 months. What a woman I have, smart, sexy, and determined once she makes up her mind.

My father isn't doing well. He had a stroke about 12 years ago and scared hell out of us. He recovered and putters around pretty well now. I would say he got back to 95 %. He never recovered all his stamina, but otherwise was good. Now we found out he has 2 blockages. One is in his heart and 1 in his leg. He also has a hernia in front of his heart, making it hard to see the problem. He goes in today for a dye test afterwhich we will know more. We are all terrified, and he isn't taking it well. My father and I are a lot alike in some ways, unfortunately a general hatred and terror of hospitals is one of them. The whole family is kind of in shock, I am not ready to not have Dad around, so I pray an awful lot.

Random Traces of Sanity in a Insane World

Today I blog out of frustration and boredom. Life has been weird and weirdness reins. As money grows tighter and things become more expensive, I appreciate my second job more, despite being about $0.50 and hour below abject poverty pay. It is rather, simply poverty level pay. I was the beneficiary of 2 raises. I was given a quarter on the hour a month ago after my 60 day slave period when I was making about $0.18 over minimum wage. Then last week I received another $.25 per hour. Of course, it's just me and the boss now as the other guy quit and I can pick up a little extra time on Fridays doing part of that job. Usually about an hour. It's hard to do it on any other day due to main job and needing to actually sleep.

Concerning the main job. They are still renovating the building. Since I work for the government, nothing about this is simple, and everything is done in a weird and slightly goofy fashion. Rather than move us to a temporary site, despite there being a recently renovated, yet still vacant former state building owned by the same leasing company up the hill from us with the necessary data and phone lines, it is decided to squish us into half the building while the other half is renovated. There is a special department of the state government that makes all decisions regarding locations, layouts, furnishings, ect. on all state government property whether owned or leased. They have no concept of our duties or functions, or what is necessary for us to do our jobs, yet they are in charge of this.

Anyway, the first group of local bozo's that came over to do the sidewalk and make a few structural changes were slower that Paris Hilton's mental process. They must have been taking hour long porn and masterbation breaks every 15 minutes or something. It took them months to do 2 days worth or actual work.

Then the fun part. We were told on a Thurdsay that we had until the next Wednesday to have all our personal and all unnecessary items out of our offices. We were told we would be getting boxes to pack stuff in and temporary chairs or desks. People kept touring our offices. We sent some of our less crappy furniture to branch offices. That Thursday, I packed about 90% of my personal stuff into my car as I was taking Friday off. I stopped in that Saturday to get some more stuff and found my desk had been cleaned out. That kind of pissed me off as I was told I had until Wednesday to have everything ready to go. I went in Monday and had no desk. Apparently a district manager decided he or she wanted 5 desks before they were shipped to central warehouse and just came and took them. I had court that morning and everything I had been working on was scattered around the room. My laptop was unplugged and the battery about dead sitting in the floor. I plugged it in and scrounged until I found my two files and went to court. I got out of court after lunch and came back to find I didn't have a chair. Someone from another office had come in and taken 20 chairs. We didn't have enough chairs left for staff meeting or training. When the boss called to find out when our temp furniture was coming, we found we were only getting temp tables, no chairs. Great. I am now working off my temp table in a very uncomfortable chair I scrounged out of the trash pile. My in and out boxes are setting on the floor. My files are stored in cardboard boxes.

The interior guys are as fast as the first crew were slow. These guys must be getting paid by the job rather than the hour. They even decided to lay the carpet tiles when those guys didn't show. The other day, they had the main room floor covered in adhesive. I was having to do out the back door and all the way around the building and into the lobby to get my clients. It was pretty weather fortunately because you had to circle the building on the outside to send a fax, pick up any printed paperwork, drop off a supervision fee, mail a letter, pick up mail, ect. I joked that it was the new state fitness program.

In the midst of this mess, I had a client due a drug screen. After all the jogging to get her in and do her thing, then find a female officer, then get to the drug room, of course she tested positive for almost half of the 10 things our tests pick up, so I got even more exercise.

Update on the Family Crisis of the Week

Well, I haven't bitched about any family stuff for around 6 minutes so I guess it is time to start.

First with the holstein-in-law. My wife's oldest sister, who picks her men up as they are released from the looney bin, let her boy toy move into her new house right after he flattened his probation violation sentence. At which point he proved he was not only nuts, but fertile by knocking her up. Everything was roses for about 30 seconds then they started fighting like Columbian drug dealers. The cops wouldn't remove him from the house, because she had let him live there long enough to establish residence, she also couldn't get a restraining order against him due to having taken out about 6 thousand of them over the last 3 years and then ignoring them and letting him move back in. She went back to her old house which was vacant, although she had tenants in the little house on the same lot and he showed up there. She was afraid he would run off her tenants, so she went back. They fought and he chucked a piece of wood at her. The police came and she got her restraining order. The police relocated her, but would not remove him. He started calling DCS and reporting her for being a bad parent. DCS came out and took an order of protection to keep HIM away from the kids. Then they started making her take parenting classes and told her that if she let him move back in they were taking the kids. Apparently they have collected over 60 complaints on her. How many are from him and how many are from other people I don't know. Now while she isn't allowed to go to her own house without police escort, he proceeds to destroy and haul off a bunch of her junk. He breaks mirrors off her truck and car. She has her van. He trashes her computer, takes the card out of the satellite box WE loaned her so the kids could have some TV, and as she found last night, ripped up her clothes. He also calls and accuses her of sleeping around on him, which I wouldn't doubt. My wife is the family peacemaker, mother confessor, and the world's most naturally born social worker. So she gets it all.

Meanwhile, per a previous post, my wife's parents have moved in on my wife's younger brother. Now his life is hell. His little sister goes in his room while he is at work and takes his ipod and laptop. She and my father-in-law hog the computer and he can't use it. He is now having to lock his room and carry his computer and ipod to work with him. Now he hasn't been selfish, he has been letting them use the stuff, but they don't have any concept of politeness or restraint. While at my house at Christmas/Easter he would get on my wife's computer when he woke and not get off until dawn. If she managed to catch him on a bathroom break he would want to use mine. He wouldn't use mine without asking though because everyone is scared of me. I am quiet and they don't know how to deal with that. Also I learned long ago in my jujitsu studies how to excude a quiet, homicidal menace. If you don't know me well, you might well assume I am only one tiny word away from a mass killing spree of immence violence, and you might well be very right. However, my bro-in-law is about to the point of packing it in and coming back here. Given our dismal economic situation, if he can't land a government job he will be shit-out-of luck. The only factory jobs around here are temp, and the only other jobs lately are commissioned sales.

My Day Yesterday

Okay, a recap of my day yesterday:

1) Got to work, my desk was gone, the contents were in a cardboard box sitting on my chair.
2) Went to Criminal Court. I had 2 clients up on violation warrants. Client 1 was first on the docket and dealt with promptly. Client 2 somehow came up with an attorney, so the public defender was relieved of the case and new lawyer entered into the court record. A May 6 court date was announced and then he was moved into holding where he beat the crap out of another inmate.
3) I got out of court before noon. Went home and ate and changed clothes. (Who wants to wear and tie and jacket on a gorgeous 70+ degree Spring-like day?) On the way back to work, one of those yell0w and black wasps that look like a honey bee on steroids flew in the window and stung me twice on the neck.
4) Couldn't find my paycheck from job number 2. Looked all over the place for it and can't find it. Called boss. He will reissue it tomorrow and stop payment but said if it happened again they would take the stop payment charge out of my check. Considering they pay just .40 over minimum wage and I work only 15 hours per week there, if it were simple I would have already quit, I hope to quit by next fall anyway.
5) Got back to work and found my computer chair gone. Had to drag extra crappy furniture out of storage just to enter my notes from court.
6) Had to go straight to second job due to late reporting offenders.
7) Got home from second job, had now spent 12.5 hours at work. Watched most of Medium with sick wife who laid out of school for sore throat. Fed wife.
8) Fed dogs.
9) Received phone call from insane sister-in-law. She had a court date on maintaining custody on her children. She had nothing to wear. Will explain in next post.
10) Received call from brother-in-law in Florida. He is not happy either. His parents and youngest sister have moved in with him, and if he doesn't lock his room, they go in and use his stuff (ipod and laptop mostly).
11) Went to bed.

Work is Hell

Well, the old stress meter at work is pegging out. Not that my work could ever be considerred relaxing, but with the renovations, everyone is pretty much dancing on the razor's edge. Now it is worse. The workers basically made a big mess, then left. We haven't seen them in over a month. They wander in on the odd weekend and pile drywall scraps in the new water coolers. They unhooked and removed out old water fountain. Then about 2 weeks later, they came and mounted the new ones on the wall of the new bathroom and left. There is no plumbing running to them, so basically they are acting as containers for the drywall scraps. Of course, they don't look so nice or so new now. Since one of the main projects was to make a larger ladies rest room, they moved the old one to a temporary location. About the time the water fountains were hung, they did something to the toilet. It wasn't level anymore. The women now refer to it as the "rollercoaster". Apparently a trip to the restroom is now a trip to a really weird theme park.

Anyway, we are all to get new office furniture, carpet, paint, the works. So the old stuff has to go. We were notified Wednesday about the 4 phase renovation plan. Basically we are were told to have all our personal stuff out of our offices by Monday (today) close of business. Then by Wednesday we were to have all our files and work stuff boxed up. A moving company was to come in and move all the old stuff out to a secure storage location and move all our old furniture to central stores. We were to receive temporary tables and chairs to work with and were to double up on offices. That way the empty offices would be renovated, we would relocate to renovated offices and the other offices would be done. This was to be done in 3 stages. I don't really know how we could double up, you would need two phone and two computer outlets that we don't have, and it is hard to have two thugs, I mean clients, in the same office. My office isn't very large anyway. More than two people is stretching things as is.

Well, we were told, it has all been figured out, they will run extra plugs for phone and computer. Well I took Friday off for personal reasons. I took some personal stuff out Thursday. I came in Saturday for some bulkier items and my desk was gone. I was told that someone from a Nashville location came and took 5 desks for a new unit they were setting up. I came in Monday and went to court. I finished by lunch and went back to the office. My chair was gone. Someone from either McMinnville or Chattanooga got it. One group took 2 desks and 2 chairs. Another 20 chairs. We can't have our staff meeting Wednesday, because we now don't have enough chairs for everyone to sit down. We may also miss training, so maybe it all isn't bad. I scavaged a rickety old computer desk and a chair that makes me lean forward at a 30 degree angle to work from. Now we are supposed to have our cabinets and desks cleaned out by Wednesday. The moving companies haven't even put in bids yet. Our boxes won't be here until Friday, our temporary furniture won't be here until a week from Friday. But the vultures are circling picking us clean. We have three officers sitting on the floor with no chairs or desks. My visitor chairs are so crappy noone wants them yet. Man is this stupid.

Stupid Crap

I've had an issue for quite a while. In a recent checkup blood was found in my stool. I was diagnosed long ago with a bleeding hemroid. Lovely huh. Anyway, I can usually control it by watching my diet and it hadn't bothered me for quite some time until recently. Anyway my doc sent me to a specialist who sent me to the hospital, who knocked me out and gave me an anal and throat probe. I am hoping they either used to seperate probes or did the throat first. Although that might explain the strange tast in my mouth. Just kidding.

Anyway it turns out my colon is the nicest cleanest thing east of the Grand Canyon, but I have bad acid reflux; no kidding, knew that. Anyway aparantly I have damaged my throat enough that it is bleeding into my digestive tract. Great. Fortunately the answer is apparently called Prilosec in 40 mg doses. I started it two months ago and haven't had a single lava eruption. I also only occasionally see any blood on the old tp. Now for the stupid part. I have medical insurance and it pays for meds. It is great insurance. It even paid most of my wife's anti-smoking stuff. I take 2 other medications. One is a fairly new one with no generic equivalent and it costs me $40 for a 90 day supply, the other is older and costs me $5 for 90 days. The Prilosec costs me $40 for a 30 day supply. Now Prilosec recently with over the counter. They sell a 14 pill pack for around $10, a 28 pill pack for $15 and a 42 pill pack for $25, but these are 20 mg tablets. The pharmacist says they are identical but I would have to take 2 pills. If I bought the 42 and the 14 this would last 28 days and cost $35 roughly. Actually closer to $36. This would be versus $40. I would save $4 but get 2 doses less. Also, Walmart now produces a generic equivalent that is roughly $5 cheaper in the 28 and 42 pill packs. I don't remember seeing a 14 pill pack in generic. Usually generics work well for me, but I have run into one or two situations where they did not. I can usually tell when I forget to take my Prilosec with a couple of days. I picked up the 42 pill generic pack yesterday and took the first 2 pills today. I'll let you know in a couple of days whether they are the same effectiveness or not.

My Take on the Illegal Alien Issue

A long time ago when I was but a lad, the only sources of employment for young people were grocery stores as baggers and stock clerks and fast food. We only had 2 fast food restaurants until my junior year in high school, a Sonic and a Hardees, and only 2 grocery stores a Kroger and an IGA. This made teenage employment iffy and they wouldn't even think of hiring anyone until they were 16, so what did an unemployed teenager do for cash? Well, if you were like me and lived out in the boonies, you hired out to local farmers as a slave. I mowed yards and cleaned ditches and fence lines, all for well under minimum wage, but mainly I worked in the two money making mediums of the South, I "hauled hay" and worked in tobacco. These were the two most labor-intensive parts of the private farm in the day. The large round bales popular now were unheard of in the 1980's. Everyone used the much smaller square bales and while the actual cutting and bailing was done by machine, it required manual labor to get the bastards into a storage area, commonly called a hay loft and usually located in a dilapidated wooden structure called a "barn".

The first stage of this process took place in the field and required 3 major pieces of equipment. First you needed a trailer. This was generally a flat wooden-bedded trailer with open back and sides, but a tall front wall. It was usually in one of three conditions: OSHA's worst nightmare, unbelievably, mind numbingly, freaking dangerous, and containing blackholes large enough to suck in small to medium size galaxies. If you were one of the people riding on the trailer, you usually spent much of your time watching for holes, gaps, nails sticking up, weak spots, and miscellaneous things to cause you to break, cut, puncture, or otherwise damage your anatomy. The second piece of equipment was something to pull the trailer. Usually this was a farm truck that was held together by bailing wire and duct tape or a tractor that was kept together and running by a mixture of rust, dirt, and shear will-power. The farmer paying the cash drove this item. The last piece of equipment was the manual labor. This generally consisted of teenage boys who couldn't find any other work, alcoholics who couldn't find any other work and usually took part of their pay in beer, potheads who couldn't get any other work, and any other farmers that owed the farmer a favor or wanted him to owe them one.

How this worked, first you started the tractor or truck. This involved at the minimum another vehicle and set of jumper cables. The tractors were usually worse, because the tractor was usually one that had been in the family for generations. This valuable heirloom had invariably been stored under the drip of the equipment shed roof for years. Quite often the rust was the most attractive feature of the machine. Most of these things were so old they didn't have electric start, so you had to manually crank them. This involved a metal rod that looked a lot like a tire iron, which had usually been lost or broken 57 years ago, but something had been found that worked just as well and only made the process about 29 percent more dangerous. Turning an internal combustion engine over enough to start by hand might only be a light workout for The Rock, but when you have a group of 15 year old boys, 60 year old men, and 90 pound alcoholics, it generally involved five or six people jumping up and down on the crank, while the farmer adjusted chokes and throttles, pushed in clutches, and flipped switches all while squinting his left eye, holding his breath, and hoping he'd sacrificed the right animals to the right pagan gods the night before. The rest of the crowd would be chanting every curse word and bit of profanity known to them, and probably learning some new ones, then the motor would catch. The trick to crank starting a tractor is knowing when to let go of the crank. If you don't let go exactly right, the metal bar is going to jerk and whack you in some part of the anatomy you might need later. Then you are going to have to lie in the barn until the hay is in before they take you home or to the hospital.

Now farmers can be divided into categories based on three criteria. How they pay, how they bale, and how they drive in the field.

Basically the first stage of hay hauling involves driving the rig around the field while one group of people place the bales of hay on the trailer and another group stack the hay neatly on the trailer. You want the more experienced people stacking, because there is a trick to it and if it is done badly, you either don't get the maximum amount of hay per load, or it falls off. Both waste time. Also, the higher they can stack the hay the better, to a point. Anyone can set the hay up on the trailer, so the less experienced people do that.

Now, some farmers paid by the hour, which was cool for the worker. Most farmers wanted to pay per bale. If they figured the total bales and divided by total workers, this was okay, unless you have a lot of time wasting problems like badly stacked hay or a barn from hell. Most farmers though, felt the best thing was for the individual to track the number of bales they handled and paid that way. This would seem fair, because the harder workers would make more, and everyone would be encouraged to work more. Except for a few things.

Hay bales come in many forms. Bales of hay are held together by two or three cheap strings. They can be baled tight or loose. You want tight, but not too tight. Tight is good. Loose bales weigh less, but if too loose can fall apart before you get them loaded. They also don't stack very well. If the bale comes apart on you, you loose time trying to put it back together, or grabbing another bale. Not good if you are on the per bale pay system. If the bales are too tight, then the strings can break which is just as bad or worse than falling apart. You also hope the farmer didn't bale them too heavy. Some farmers like to pack them heavy. This makes fewer bales so he has less to pay if on the per bale system. It also tires the workers out quicker though. These idiots were usually the ones that wanted the stuff stacked really high too.

Then you have driving. Some farmers drop it into extra low granny gear and creep through the field making it easy to get the bales to the trailer. Then you have the guys that bounce through the field at 30 miles per hour making you chase the trailer. These are usually the same guys that have the 150 pound, tight baled, exploding hay bales they want stacked 8 runs high.

Once loaded the hay is hauled to the barn. If you are lucky, the barn is in decent shape. If not everything you had to watch for on the trailer goes triple in the barn, plus add spiders, snakes, hornets, wasps, angry rats, dogs, cats, barn swallows, pigs, etc. Some farmers had these conveyors belt set ups they could hook to the trailer. A couple of guys would stay on the trailer and drop bales on the conveyor and it would carry the bales up in the loft. Other people would carry these over to where the rest would stack it. The number stacking versus carrying increased the higher you went. If there was no conveyor belt, the poor suckers on the trailer had to "throw" the bales up, which increased the stain on bale and string. It also wore out the guys on the trailer and increase injury risk for the targets, I mean bale catchers.

Now a quick description of hay for those that have never encountered it. It is basically dried out weeds. It is scratchy and makes you itch. It usually has a dry, dusty smell that makes you sneeze. It is almost always 90+ degrees when you haul the crap in. It is a miserable job, hot and boring. Hay lofts are always shadowy, this is to hide the holes you can fall through. The top of a barn in summer is hot, usually about 110 degrees and dusty. Once you half fill it with hay, then the air is 90 parts dust to every 10 parts air. The temperature goes up to about 630 degrees and the dust coats your sweaty skin. Did I mention hay scratches the heck out of you?

Tobacco is different. Tobacco is an interesting plant. There is absolutely nothing pleasant about it. It is ugly and disgusting in every way, yet people pay money for it. This is how it works.

One or two people can handle a lot of tobacco until it needs to be harvested. You plant it, you how it, spray it with insecticide, keep it cleaned out, top and sucker it (don't ask, you basically break of the bloom on top and pull off little leaves called suckers, that are bad, I don't really know why, but it has to be done by hand.) When it is time, you cut it, spike it. Let it sit a couple of days, then haul it and hang it.

One man can cut and spike, but it is faster to have a cutter and a spiker. One man takes a small hatchet and bends the tobacco stalk enough to expose the upper part of the root, then he whacks to the base of the stalk with the hatchet. The stalk is tough here so it takes some force. This man is bent over a little, so he stands, twists around and hands the plant to the guy behind him. This man has a square wooden stick with a sharp steel cone, called a spike, over one end. He pulls the tobacco stalk down hard, driving the spike through the stalk a little above the base of the root. You want some of the tough root, to hold the stalk together on the pole. If the cutter, cuts too high on the stalk, the stalk splits when spiked, creating extra work later. The spiker puts 5 to 6 stalks per stick. He fans the stalks out, so the pole hold them up like a tepee. This is left out in the field about 3 days to dry, then they are picked up and hauled in similar to hay. The sticks are threaded over poles in the barn called tobacco tiers. This lets the stalks hang straight down. They dry for several months in the barn. When ready, the sticks are taken down, the stalks removed, the leaves removed from the stalks and sorted and baled.

Now tobacco is not nice, the sap is black and sticky, you get it on you and dust and dirt stick to you like crazy. If you get it in your eyes or an open wound, it burns worse than alcohol. It tastes like I imagine horse urine and dirt would taste mixed together. Normal soap won't take it off, you need to sandblast it off. You smell the stuff for a week afterward. It is just nasty. I still liked it better than hay. It has worms that like to eat it and they are icky feeling. It also attracts stinging bugs like crazy. Cutting tobacco works the arms and back out, and I sliced up a few pairs of jeans and my leg once. I know a few people who spiked their hands. Then you have to watch for splinters from the sticks. You also usually end up hanging by your toes on tobacco tier poles 30 feet off the ground in a barn hanging the stuff up.

Neither job was fun, but I did have some fun doing it. Sometimes I miss it while sitting at a desk. I don't miss blowing dirt out my nose for three days though. Now most people use round bales and hay is strictly done from the back of a tractor. We still use square bales for the goats and have trouble finding them to buy. My father raised tobacco until last year. I helped with it some, but come September and cutting, he hired people to cut and haul it. My father has nothing against the Hispanics and respects them as workers, but he doesn't like using illegals, so he tries to hire locally. He could only find two non-Hispanics willing to do the work, despite an unbelievable unemployment rate. I find this true of most of the local farmers. They don't want to employ illegals, but our locally grown unemployed don't want to do the hard labor. In my main job, I can't find anyone under 35 who has any idea what farm labor is. I think this might be part of our problems. A few summers of farm work, and most any other type of job seems sweet.

An Open Letter to the Politicians in the Federal Government

First off guys, I appreciate the money you are giving me and my wife come May. If I understand your intentions, you wish us to go out and mindlessly spend it rather than trying to save it. If we all do this, according to your reason, it will "stimulate" the economy. Now, I'm not an economic expert. Hell, I didn't really even like my economics classes in school. But don't you guys think this is kind of like sticking a band aid on a gaping stomach wound without even applying some neosporine or poking the intestines back in? I mean $600 a person sounds nice, but really, how long do you thing that's going to last. People will spend that quick. You will be dumping money in the economy for a couple of weeks, a month at the most and things will go back to normal. Look, we've all seen the medical shows. The guy who has the heart attack, his heart never starts back on the first shock. You have to electrocute the hell out of his ass to get the all ticker pumping strong again. If the economy's heart isn't pumping, one shock is not going to cut it.

I mean giving everyone who pays taxes $600 bucks sounds good, but isn't it really flash? Aren't you trying to look like you're doing something so you don't get voted out of office, all the while hoping the economy fairy waves her magic money stick and makes everything better. I mean if you really wanted to do something, wouldn't you be trying to figure out why the economy sucks and plug the hole. I'll help.

There are things in life that you have to have: Shelter--rent or house payment, food--groceries, health --medication, other necessary items like electricity and or propane or natural gas, water, pornography, liquor and condoms, ect. To get those things you have to get to work, which often means driving, so you need gasoline. Then you have the things you like, but can live without, the luxury items like movies, nightclubs, eating out, vacations, travel, new furniture, ect. If the necessary items cost more, say because fossil fuels go sky high and suddenly it costs 90 bucks to fill your gas tank, and shipping costs go way up so the cost of food, medication, heating fuel, ect. suddenly goes way up, you just don't have to cash to buy the non-necessary stuff. So now people who's livelihood might be in industries dependant on the spare money may find themselves out of work because people aren't buying pool tables, 4 wheel drive vehicles, new couches, or going on vacation, because they can't afford it. It costs them too much to just get back and forth to work and feed and house their families.

If you really want to stimulate the economy, do something to drop the gas prices. This will make it not cost so much just to go to and from work. I used to spend about $15 a week on gas. Now I spend about $50. I went from a 6 cylinder Ford to a Suzuki lawnmower engine in a box, but still spend over 3 times as much. If it don't cost so much to transport stuff, business will slowly lower the price of stuff back down. This will encourage the average Joe to go back to buying crap he don't need, since he now has some spare cash again. With sales up, businesses will go to hiring back the convenient but non-essential people they laid off when sales dropped off.

My wife and I used to go to the bar or club once or twice a month, eat out at a decent restaurant a couple of times a week, go to the movies or bowling a couple of times a month, and blow hell out of the shooting range on a regular basis. Now, about all we can afford to do is sit at home and watch TV or play on the Internet. Hitting the gym a couple of times a week is now our high point. This really sucks. The $600 you give me will go to paying a few bills a little ahead to give me breathing room. That's all. On the other hand, if you can encourage gas prices to drop, you could save my $30 to $40 per week, that would make $120 to $200 per month I can spend on other shit. If the other shit drops a little in price, I can buy more off it. Plus I am more likely to make that 800 mile trip to visit the old in-laws or the 200 mile one to see the nephews. See, you can stimulate the economy and make my wife happy. That's a win-win situation.

Family Update

Well, if you read my hellidays post, you know my in-laws can be a little less than pleasant to live with. Well, they are now in Florida. Good. Anyway, I have three brother-in-laws. Two of them are my wife's brothers and they both live in Florida. The oldest is planning on getting married soon. He was working for this rich-bitch type helping take care of her pet horses. Apparently if you have enough money you have pet horses instead of goldfish. Anyway, basically he was getting paid a shit load of money, had free board, and was fed a lot of meals along with bonuses and stuff, all for working about three hours a day and spending the rest of the time standing around playing with himself and looking busy. He got his younger brother-in-law on also. The job was easy, but the boss was a bitch. Anyway, they spent the winters on the West Coast of Florida and the summers in New York. This is where the older one met his wife-to-be, although that is another story involving emotions, betrayal, and other complicated shit.

Well, older bil knocks up his girl and they have a little baby girl. Right as the process to move back to Florida is at its peak, younger bil is told to do something by rich bitch. He does it. She leaves, supervisor shows up and wants thing done another way, younger bil bitches enough to show he can't be pushed around, then does it. Older bil jumps down supervisor's throat, they both get fired. Now for the sucky part. Old bil was wanting to get fired. He had been thinking about quitting for a couple of months, then decided he wanted to be fired. Since he is something of a professional asshole, this wasn't really hard, but he took lil brother with him and since younger bil isn't an asshole, but a decent guy I am fond of, this sucks. Anyway they move back to Florida and girlfriend, who was also a horse worker only out of work from having a bun baking, gets a job with horsey type people to support the lot of them. Younger bil moves into the apartment she found for them with them and the two men go through their severence pay.
Girlfriend, who actually seems nice enough, doesn't realize what she's getting into and helps my father and mother-in-law get set up in Florida. Now they've step in it as the creeping in-laws seep into their lives to take over forever. Younger bil goes to school and becomes a licenced security guard at a hospital. Older bil does day labor. Girlfriend takes time off when baby gets sick and gets fired. Older bil and girlfriend decide to move to keys.

Anyway, I told you all that to tell you this. With two-thirds of the group moving, girlfriend apparently after checking with younger bil offered to let my in-laws move into the apartment after they left and, although he claims to have been either insane or drunk or insanely drunk, younger bil agreed and it was a done deal. My mother-in-law took a trip to Canada to visit her mother and brother. While she was gone, my father-in-law broke her car. It's a Ford escort. Younger bil got caught helping him get it someplace to work on. My younger bil also has a ford escort and my father-in-law wanted to take the necessary parts off HIS car to fix my mother-in-law's car before she gets back and finds he broke it. This would have left my younger bil with nothing but his motorcycle to get back and forth to work. And the car belongs to my bil, he BOUGHT it off his father. My younger sil is already proving to be a major little bitch, hoping on girlfriend's computer claiming she needs to do homework, then spending three hours on myspace and slapping her homework together in the last ten minutes before she leaves. Hopefully girlfriend will take pc with her. Younger BIL is in for it. They are already driving him nuts. It took him 19 years to get away and now they are sucking him back in, poor guy. My father-in-law has a way of taking everything over and making it about him. I suggested my younger bil stage a major drunken orgy every weekend and leave satan worshiping and withcraft literature scattered about the apartment. Either that or move in the dumpster out back. I think it is only a two bedroom and with him working third shift, I think that they are planning on putting the little bitch in his room. That won't work, she don't take care of anything and prowls through everything. He would have no privacy. I pity him. I think I would move into the dumpster or fake my death, change my name and move somewhere they don't have horses, like Detroit.