Nothing

I really hate it when I have pretty much nothing to write about. I think it's because I'm not getting out enough at the moment. I did go up Glendale Blvd last night and explored Little Armenia and downtown Glendale. I was really surprised how nice it was up there. Kinda reminded me a bit of my long lost Long Beach just way bigger. I think it's why I like Long Beach so much. It's got all the amenities of a big city, but it's not so big that it overwhelms me. I kinda felt that way last night going up through the center of Glendale. I was just too big for my taste. There are a lot of cool places I want to explore before I leave. But, it really isn't the place for me.

Blech

Just waiting till the 24th. I'm off 5 days for Xmas this year thanks to the California Department of Developmental Disability Services new holiday schedule. And of those 3 work days I'm only getting paid for one. Oh well..........budget crisis......lalalalala. Until then, I'm bored, burnt out, and completely unmotivated. Everyone can kiss my butt.

I Guess Israel Really Means Business

I read this blog from someone this morning that I think everybody should read. There are actually two of them. The first one is about an American living in Egypt that had her laptop shot three times by Israeli soldiers while on vacation in Israel. They shot it because they thought it was threatening. And from what she said as to her situation, the items she had, and the answers to their questions, I understand why they did think a bomb might be in her laptop. At least I understand it from the point of view of the kind of world the Israelis live in. She was behaving like a dumb tourist, and it's a shame that being a dumb tourist could lead to her laptop getting shot up. Living in America, the whole idea of that is so alien to me. Reading her blog makes me very sad. And it's not just the blogs but the comments. I think it could be prophetic as to where this country might have gone and might still go as a reaction to our policies in the world. Here are the two blogs and please read the comments too:

http://lilysussman.wordpress.com/2009/11/30/im-sorry-but-we-blew-up-your-laptop-welcome-to-israel/

http://lilysussman.wordpress.com/2009/12/13/beyond-the-laptop/

I don't normally feel the need to comment on the blogs I read. I do every once in awhile, and I really felt like commenting on the last one. Here is what I wrote:

I've been following all the comments between the two blogs concerning the blown up laptop. I find it interesting how a destroyed laptop could bring so much to the surface. It's very sad to see two groups of people with so much to offer the world so lost in hate. I remember going into the electronics store right after 9-11 and wanting to beat the crap out of every possible Muslim/Arab I saw. Of course I understood those feelings as completely irrational, and they faded within a few weeks. I can only imagine living in a country where the people I was living right next to could harm me just because of where I'm from, something I couldn't change. It's like if people from Nevada started blowing up people from California just because we're Californian. If that happened and happened with regularity, I'm sure I might feel the same as an Arab or Israeli. It's why I say both groups of people are lost in hate. Mistakes were made in the past. There doesn't seem much point to discussing what those are. They're just distractions that make it easier to hold onto the hate that I'm sure has become dear to both Arab and Jew. And, I'm sure losing that hate would feel like a broken heart.

I'm not offering any kind of a solution here to the problem or morally condemning anybody. It just makes me very sad. And here in America I think we need to be very careful that we don't get lost again in the same kind of hate as the Arab and Israeli. It's taken us a hundred years to even begin to awaken from the kind of hate that my people have had for one another. And I'm not saying that every Arab hates or every Jew hates. Someday the number of people that don't hate will outnumber the ones that do. I think once people take the time to get to know one another either by choice or circumstance is when those numbers begin to turn. That's how it's been happening here I think.

 Anyway, these are just my thoughts on the subject. I hope the road ya'll are on isn't as long as the one we're on, and I hope both peoples will still be around to see it.

Best Dream Ever

Ok, so I woke up this morning to the best dream ever. Now normally I'll have a dream and remember it for about five minutes upon waking up only to have it slip back into the ether and be gone forever. But last night the dream I had was so spectacular that I not only remember it, I remember all of it.

Folks, I was an Imperial Space Marine.

I know right! AWESOME!!!! Don't ask me why I was thinking of the Space Marines because I have absolutely no fricking idea. I hadn't seen or thought of a spaceship, energy weapon, or powered armor all day long. And it was weird. Usually my dreams are disjointed messes of neurotic strangeness. This dream wasn't like that at all. It was a thought out story that made sense. EXCEPT I WAS THE SPACE MARINE!!!!! I could dream like this every night and die happy.

So here's how it went. I'm sleeping. Not in the dream but in my bed. I'm sleeping and minding my own business when bam!!!! There's a rectangular spaceship flying low over a dilapidated district in some city. The moon's providing the only light. No streetlights, headlights, nothing. Just dark. And then the camera pans around the ship and then inside and THERE I AM IN MY IMPERIAL SPACE MARINE ARMOR!!!! There's about forty guys sitting on two benches facing each other. Our backs are to the walls. It's like we're paratroopers getting ready to jump into Occupied France on D-Day. Nobody's saying a damn thing. We're just sitting there waiting.

Without so much as a sound or signal we all get up and walk towards the door. The ship has dropped low over the city and slowed to a near stop. Why we're not being picked up on radar or anything else, I have no idea. All I know is that nobody knows we're here. The area looks rundown like the Bronx in the 80s except all the structures look business and not residential. Nobody seems to be wearing parachutes. Besides, we're way too low for that. We're almost rooftop level. I do know that the buildings we are heading for are about a mile away.

The Marine in charge jumps out of the side door of the ship. The men on my bench walk single file towards the door and one at a time we jump out. When it's my turn all I can see is the moonlit blueness of the bombed out city. I jump at which point my grav pack activates. I had been wondering what that small backpack was. Evidently it's a small anti-grav generator that not only neutralizes a person's mass but can also propel them. Basically it's a high tech jet pack without the jet. All I know is that my ass was flying like fricking superman. We were zooming along together but not in any organized formation. The forty of us were just trying to stick together and get to the target. I was flying under bridges and between buildings. It was effortless and wonderful.

We approached the target building which looked like one of the buildings where I used to go to school. In fact it had been a school. Now it was just an abandoned piece of property. Or should I say mostly abandoned. As I flew over and past one of the buildings attached to our target structure I noticed something through one of the windows. It was an old woman. She was a squatter but looked every bit like a school marm from the 1950s. I could see directly into the large room she was living in. It was well lit and surprisingly neat for being inside a run down, abandoned building. The contrast of that with the dark bombed out surroundings stuck in my mind. It was like looking into a Hallmark card that had just been thrown into the trash. Fortunately for her, the room was entirely too well lit to be able to see us in the dark flying above. Several of us looked down and took note as we flew past. Nobody made a sound. Nobody uttered a word.

We were all flying in a more organized formation now. 10 rows of four. Once we got to the roof we spread out and landed. Our feet hit the concrete with complete silence. We'd done this a hundred times before. While everyone spread out to secure the area, our leader motioned for me to go with him. We were looking for something. This wasn't a combat mission. There was a single door on the roof that appeared as if it had been forced open a long long time ago and just left that way. While most of the men stay on the roof to secure our escape, the leader and I move inside and down the stairs. All the while making little to no noise at all. I remember really hoping that I don't run into that old woman. If I do, I'll have to kill her. No one can know the Imperial Space Marines had been here.

The Leader and I move throughout the building. We are so good at doing what we do that none of us even bother using the night vision in our suits. Just our instincts and the moonlight. As we move we check every room for targets that might be eliminated. Our intel had the building being completely abandoned. But, the old woman being there made all of us nervous. Or at least about as nervous as a Space Marine can get. If we messed up with one old woman maybe we messed up with something else.

We finally make it to a room with a console at the far end. The room is dark as is the console. With me covering him, The Leader attaches a small cylindrical object to the board which causes it to light up. It's a communication console. The school had it's very own hyperspace transmitter that was still functioning despite having been abandoned a long time. We had to send a message out. We had to let our comrades know that were were still here and what our orders were. Our ancestors had fought our cousins from Earth a generation ago. The hundreds of thousands of captured fighters were marooned here when the Earthmen defeated our invasion force. Instead of sending us home when the war was over as was the custom, they made us prisoners then slaves. Our invasion was not one entirely of conquest. We came to enlighten and free the people of Earth from the tyranny that enveloped their worlds. But once we pushed them back to their home, their leaders became desperate and deactivated the hyperspace gates that connected them to the rest of the cosmos. We have been seperated from our brothers for more than 80 years. Not only were the gates deactivated. They were altered in such a way that no other gate in the universe could open a wormhole into the Earth star system for 10 light years in any direction. Rather than be conquered, they shut themselves off to the stars. They denied themselves and their citizens their birthright.

For 80 long years we've been waiting for rescue. Our Leader overheard from one of his slavemasters that an Imperial Dreadnaught had been engaged by Earth forces just outside of the orbit of Saturn. It apparently had a special engine that didn't rely upon hyperspace gates or wormholes to travel faster than light. It seems we were not forgotten. Our brothers had been working very hard these long years. They are returning to bathe our enemies in the fire from their plasma launchers and the radiation from their missles. Finally our mission will be completed. It is imperative that they know that we are still vigilant and ready to fight. They need to know that our warriors passed down their culture, virtues, training, and heart to their sons and daughters who now long for a home they have never seen. Sons and daughters whose fondest wish is to fight for a thing that they have never experienced.

As our Leader sent out the call  and awaited a reply, I watched and made sure that no one approached. It had been three weeks since we stole this ship and executed the crew. Some of them begged for mercy and how much they loved their wives and children. Fuck 'em. We spaced the whole lot. It's a fast death but not as fast as a bullet, and we needed to conserve those. Besides, it took years to get this particular slave "cargo" together. Getting side tracked by a little mercy just wasn't an option. Besides, it isn't like we were ever showed any. At the time our little band was supposed to be terraforming Mars but instead we returned to Earth, the seat of all human tyranny.

The console made a slight beeping sound and the Leader extracted the power module. We had a reply. We had a mission. I've never seen our Leader smile, but he was grinning ear to ear. And so was I. But our joy was short lived. We heard a siren in the distance. No, not a siren, an alarm. Apparently this place wasn't as forgotten as we thought. Unbeknown to us a security guard stirred several buildings away. He lived in one of the buildings in exchange for watching the property at night. Usually the worst of his troubles were wild dogs, kids, or homeless people looking for someplace to sleep. He tolerated the old woman because she reminded him of his mother and cooked him the occasional meal. Well, that and she was so damn jittery that she was more reliable than the alarm. Most of the electronic security didn't even work. And what did was sometimes unreliable. He got dressed, not being in any particular hurry to chase off some homeless jackass that decided to use one of the classrooms as a toilet. His phone was already ringing. Yeah, it was the old woman. She was going to raise a fuss over this one. He figured he should probably answer it.

While the guard was procrastinating, myself and our Leader were hauling ass. We weren't even concerned with maintaining any kind of stealth. We pretty much figured the alarm shot that all to hell. Within three minutes we made it to the roof without seeing a soul. As we shot into the sky we could see a plasma fence had activated at ground level all along the perimeter of the building. It wasn't much of a concern to us since we were airborne and racing towards our ship at a pace not nearly as leisurely as the one we took getting to our target. Just before flying through the airlock, our Leader looked to me and said, "I erased the communication logs. They should just think it was a false alarm. That's if they don't dig too deep."

The guard now fully dressed and walking across the courtyard between the buildings looks up thinking he saw something in the moonlight. He curses out loud figuring it was a bird and maybe even being the very reason why he is awake and working instead of being asleep and working. Once he reaches the alarm box he inserts his key, puts his hand on the reader and deactivates the alarm. He thinks long and hard about just walking back to his bed instead of doing a room by room search to try and find what triggered the security system in the first place. He yawns, looks at his watch, and goes back to bed. "Screw the old woman and that fucking bird," he says as he drowsily stumbles back to his shack.

That's when I woke up.

Caffeine and Mutant Vagina Taco Faces

I'm at work trying to decide if I'm over caffeinated or not caffeinated enough. I think it's funny. I was on Facebook this morning and a friend of mine mentioned that a man her husband deals with through work's name is Harry Dong. Now, I found this hilarious and so did she which is why she posted it. She spelled it Hairy Dong which is I'm sure what she was thinking. So her husband gets all Facebook emo ass sore over the whole thing and goes on about how she isn't spelling his name right. It sounds the same and is pretty damn funny either way.


Jesus, can't anybody take a joke anymore?


Oh, and mojojuju tweeted today that, "I saw your face and automatically imagined the taste of tacos in my mouth". I almost fell out of my chair when I read that. Immediately several questions popped into my mind. First and foremost was what kind of taco was it? Seriously, how do you look like carne asada tastes? A few years ago, I saw a girl at Burning Man that was naked and had inner labia that looked like two pairs of roast beef hanging between her legs. Did his face look like that? God forbid it wasn't a breaded fish taco. And are we talking hard or soft shell here? Hmmmmm.............. I can only imagine this person looks like a breaded mutant vagina set on fire and wrapped in a tortilla. Wow.

I Hate Where I Work

So, I'm sitting here at work taking a break from filing paper, and decided I'd blog a little bit. For those of you who do not know, I work as a counselor for a non-profit that works with folks with developmental disabilities (intellectual disability, autism, and cerebral palsy). I mostly do vocational rehabilitation, but I've worked in the residential system, ran a day program, and worked as a behavioral counselor for the company I'm at right now.

Today I've decided that I really love what I do for a living. I just hate where I work. Because our society doesn't put much stock in folks with developmental disabilities, the bar for adequate service for agencies like mine is pretty damn low. While I'm sure I could find another agency to work at, it'll be tough finding a place where I'd be happy. Folks here are way too concerned about money and not enough about the services provided. There's rampant nepotism, no human resources personnel, idiotic spending, inept leadership, embezzlement, ethical violations, and a general loss of mission. Staff are poorly trained, and our hiring practices are something to be desired. The executive director shows up maybe once or twice a week for a few hours and doesn't really do much of anything.

Despite all of this, we still manage to help people and help folks to live fulfilling lives. At least in the vocational program. Could we be three times as good if our shit was together? Absolutely. Would we be nearly broke all the time if our shit was together? No. Would we have all these lawsuits we are paying on for unprofessional personnel practices? No.

Our clients are supposed to be paid based on productivity. But, they aren't. The Executive Director doesn't want to spend the money to pay the consumers what they're worth. So, their wage studies have pretty much been manufactured by upper management. I've been fighting it for years. We have clients that are in the behavioral program that don't need to be so that we can keep the funding coming in. Additionally, my vocational program is nearly at a standstill because all the job development is being focused on the behavioral program. The job developers have little to no oversight. And any new developers that we hire are poorly trained, inexperienced (translate into cheap), and are hobbled by the current developer as soon as they walk in the door. We haven't had a new job for quite a while even though other agencies are being successful at finding placements.

I can't think of a reason why our agency needs to operate like this. It's not a money issue. It's not a experience issue. It boils down to a leadership issue. Our non-profit has a board of directors made up of friends and family of the executive director. Nearly every upper management position is held by a member of his immediate family. As a result nobody challenges him. They have family on our payroll that don't actually do anything for the organization. And they have absolutely no accountability. That's not how a non-profit is supposed to work.

I've tried for years to try and fix it, but the people in power don't want it to be fixed. And the folks who could actually do anything about it, don't have the power or authority. They shine you on just enough to get you off their back, and that is it.

And the state is aware of the situation. They turn a blind eye because there's no place else for our clients to go.

So, I think it's finally time to leave this sinking ship.

Behold!!!! The Beardedlobster!!!!!!!

As many of you may already know, my nickname's Lobster. I would like to say that I acquired my hard shelled moniker as the result of the propensity my skin has to cook when exposed to even the most meager amount of sunlight. Or that I have a hard exterior but a soft, sensitive soul. And no, my hands are not shaped like a lobster's claws. Nope, none of those explanations have anything to do with how I acquired my unusual and deeply coveted nickname. A friend who wasn't even intoxicated tried to say my name and it just came out "lobster". We were not passing a seafood restaurant. There was no sign with a lobster on it. A song about lobsters was not playing on the radio. None of us were even thinking about seafood. We weren't even hungry. No, my nickname came about from plain old aphasia. Apparently at that moment, my friend's brain was trying to access my name and a neuron jumped the tracks and landed on lobster. Strange the little things that occur which shape our lives.

So anyway, having completely fallen head over heals, Romeo and Juliet in love with my lobsterness I began to seek out all things lobster. Having finally decided it was time for this geekboy to purchase my own domain name, I had to have something with lobster in it. So I busted out my trusty web browser and went to work on something other than downloading porn and playing counterstrike.

I decide to purchase the domain through google apps since I am all things google. Lobster.com.......taken. Lobster.org..........taken. Geeklobster.com..........taken. Zombielobster.........taken. I was beginning to get frustrated. Evidently I wasn't the only one in love with the lobster. That's when I had an epiphany. At the time I was sporting a goatee. No mustache. Just the traditional chin and lower jaw whiskers. Technically it constituted a beard though it was more of what I now consider just plain facial hair. That and facialhairlobster.com just didn't roll off the tongue very well. So as the tension builds in the back of my throat and down my arms to my hands I type in beardedlobster.com. After a few agonizing seconds I get the message........."not taken". JOY!!!!! I was beardedlobster.com! Trumpets sounded and confetti dropped from the ceiling!!!!!! I had my own unique domain name that was all me!!!!! Happiness ensued and lobster's all over the world made squeaky noises in celebration!!!!

A few years later and I still am as in love with my moniker as I was the day it was bestowed upon me. And now I have finally grown into the beardedlobster. Well at least my face has. I decided to supplement the chin whiskers with a facefull of man hair. So behold!!!! The Beardedlobster!!!!!!!

What's with the blade, governor?

As you Californian's already know, Schwartzenegger and the heads of the legislature finally agreed on the budget last night. They were pretty much at a stalemate until the governator pulled out a knife as big as a toddler and said, "We're gonna slash the budget, or I'm going to slash you. Got it? I'll make you all girly men! Now, somebody get me a cigar and an SUV!" Apparently, he got sick and tired of going back and forth on education and taxes with the Democrats and just completely lost it. The Democrats, having seen his movies, pretty much did what he said after that for fear that he'd take their manhood and put it in a jar on his trophy case.
I guess my governor can beat your governor in a knife fight. Go figure. Crazy bastard.

Someone should get the Nobel for this

This is the most amazing stuff I've ever seen. Not only does it make 19 perfect tasting pancakes, but it's made from all organic ingredients. Whomever got the idea to take pancake batter and put it in a cheese whiz bottle is a genius and should be on the cover of Life magazine.  It's called "Batter Blaster". Vons and Fresh & Easy carry it. If you see it, buy it, and try it. If anything it's added the phrase, "I'm gonna blast out some pancakes" to my vocabulary.

A Single Parent Roadcone Family

2012

So, Roland Emmerich is coming out with his new opus in November. I've watched the two trailers that are out for 2012, and I have to say that I'm not impressed. WTF? The Day After Tomorrow wasn't bad enough? What's up with this dude and disaster flicks? Aliens, weather, and the sun. I guess it's his niche but is he only capable of CGI explosions and people running from CGI explosions? Is he Europe's answer to Michael Bay?
Don't get me wrong. I like explosions and action and bullets flying. But I also like there to be something called a good story with great acting. Action is great, but not when it's the whole point of the movie. I guess that's easy to do with a disaster flick. But anybody wondering how to do a good disaster film needs to watch Deep Impact. Great fucking movie! It wasn't about the disaster, it was about the people. And yes, it was directed by a woman and you could tell. I still liked it, and you can all lick my dick if you think otherwise!
Seriously! This dude just needs to take his California tanned, grey haired old saggy ass back to the Fatherland and stop spewing his rotton movie jizz all over the faces of the American public.
With that said, I really liked Independence Day. And if any of you motherfuckers don't go and see Zombieland, then you can kiss my royal, white, Irish ass.
Here's the trailer:

See!!!!!!!!

KFC = Epic Fail

I bet KFC is really wishing they thought of this first. HAHAHAHAHA!!!!!!
Think I'm gonna go get me some chicken on Sunday.

Life Just Got a Little Less Funny

A great man who really made me laugh died last night. The following is an excerpt from the article on MSNBC:
Comedic actor Dom DeLuise has died, TMZ.com reported.

Deluise died in his sleep at a Los Angeles hospital, at about 6 p.m. Monday, according to the Web site.

A iconic star in classics like "Cannonball Run," "Spaceballs," "The Muppet Movie" and "Blazing Saddles," DeLuise was 75 years old.

He leaves behind his wife, actress Carol Arthur, and three sons: actor, writer, director Peter DeLuise, actor David DeLuise and Michael DeLuise.


If anybody deserved to die peacfully in his sleep, it was Dom Deluise. I never read, watched, or heard a bad thing about the man. From watching his work, it was obvious that he had a way about him that just radiated how happy he was to be alive. Dom Deluise was one of those rare people that was just naturally funny. His humor flowed through him and into whoever was watching him. I still remember seeing Cannonball Run and how I would just giggle like an idiot whenever he was on the screen. 
Even though he was naturally funny, he could act too. People forget about Fatso where Dom played a man who was a slave for food and finds love at a support group for the overweight. Even though he was never what you would consider leading man material, he pulled that movie off. 
Dom Deluise is a legacy that will be sorely missed. I might have to actually sit down and watch the Cannonball Run tonight and have one last giggle with my old pal Dom.

What the fuck?

Ok, mad scientists in Seoul, South Korea have cloned four beagles. Click here to read the story. Now, I'm whatever on the whole cloning thing. I wouldn't mind somebody cloning me without a brain. It would be nice to have a spare parts repository.
The thing is what the scientists did to these beagles. They implanted genes into these poor beagles that makes them fluorescent. That means they glow in the fucking dark. Not only are they man's best friend, but they're a convenient night light as well. Oh, and they had to make them glow red. So now they look like little evil Satan beagles in the middle of the night. They probably scare the shit out of each other.
I have a message for scientists everywhere:
STOP FUCKING WITH DNA! MOTHER NATURE KNOWS WHAT SHE'S DOING! ROLL WITH IT!
What's next? People with wings? That would totally fuck up my wardrobe. If I wanna fly, I'm gonna attach a jet engine to my ass just like everybody else. I swear, if we're not careful, someday we'll genetically engineer ourselves and everything else right out of existence.

Flying chihuahua

I just read an article this morning on MSNBC. It was an Associated Press story about a six pound chihuahua in Waterford Township, Michigan that was just walking around at a flea market where her owners had setup shop to sell whatever wares one sells at a flea market. Unsuspectingly a 70 mph wind picked up this little chihuahua and blew it a mile away. The dog was found unharmed by it's distraught owners after they consulted with a pet psychic. I guess they have those at flea markets nowadays for animal lovers that must know whether Fido pooped on the rug after being locked in the bedroom for 14 hours while his owners sold tie dyed t-shirts and old car parts. 

Here's the thing though. One mile away. It doesn't sound very far does it? It's the distance it takes a car to travel in a minute if you're going 60mph on the freeway. A human in good shape can run it in about 5 or 6 minutes. You can walk it in 15-20. 10,000 soda straws laid out end to end would stretch for a mile. A mile is 5280 feet or 1760 yards. Both towers of the World Trade Center stacked on top of each other would only be a half mile tall. The Grand Canyon has an average depth of one mile. It only takes a fall of 5 feet to kill a full grown human being. It takes me 35 minutes to go one mile on the 110 North at 4:30 in the afternoon.
This tiny little dog got tossed a mile. Yet it survived and was fine.
The dog learned an important lesson.
Sometimes life picks you up and takes you for a ride. When you land sometimes you get all busted up and sometimes not. But as long as you're still breathing, you can dust yourself off and keep going.
And it helps if you have a pet psychic handy.