Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Cleaned out...

I went in this morning to pack up my stuff from my old/former office. I took with me two boxes, those paper boxes that you get all your 8.5 x 11 paper shipped to you in if you work in an office environment. In my estimate a great size if you need to clean out your office cause you’ve been laid off.

So I start cleaning out my stuff and it isn’t long before I realize I am going to need one more box. WTF, I was sure that I didn’t have that much stuff there. That I had taken it all home, slowly over time knowing that one day I would end up in this very predicament. And yet there I was with more stuff than could fit in my two boxes.

Now mind you there was a lamp, a fan, and a side table from my old office that I had to take home as well, but I wasn’t including that in my list of ‘stuff’ that will now need more boxes. Instead the items that were maxing out my boxes were card binders that I had made over the years, by buying cards at comic shops during my travels. And these binders were useful many times during the course of my career there which makes you wonder why I was the only one who ever did this.

Well that’s not true I am the only one in the art dept. who ever did this, I got the idea from chuck. The idea to look at what other people were doing was an obvious one, but the idea of collecting samples of what everyone else was doing and alphabetizing them in a card binder was spurred by seeing chuck doing it. I then went a step further and started keeping booster wraps and certain packaging samples, all of which now needed to be packed up.

Then there was the various bric-a-crap, such as a coaster that I put on the desk of every office I inhabit, a large collection of tea bags (brand new & unused), an incredible collection of file folders from all the projects I had worked on lately (that I just left behind, they could keep those), my personal calculator, dictionaries (Japanese and English) thesaurus, synonym and antonym books, some spare soccer clothes I kept in a desk drawer just in case, A chick-fil-a cow that says “lose that burger belly” some random postcards, two business card binders which I have carried with me from job to job. A piece of goofy card art that Joe left behind and I now intend to return to him, and various other small items that had collected on my desk. Except for the grunties which I had been collecting lately and those I left behind for dawn. In fact I decorated/hid them at her desk, so she will find them when she gets back from her travels. But I am pretty sure I got everything else…

Shit! I think I left my fishing calendar up on the wall. F’. I’ll have to ask someone to retrieve that for me.

Well after spending a good hour cleaning out my desk I cleaned off my computer, pushing all my work related files out to the server, into all the appropriate places. (After all why make it hard for my former coworkers to do their jobs, it is going to be hard enough already.) Then I went to lunch with Ashley and when I came back turned in all my stuff, cel phone, laptop, key fob, I had already turned in my Company credit card earlier last week, but that’s another story. And walked out of the building a Free Man!

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Relaxing days on the lake

So Since the layoff I have gone fishing pretty almost everyday. Sunday I went out with my father in-law. Monday I went out with Chad, and Tuesday I went out by myself. Sunday and monday I went out with the intention of catching fish. Yesterday I went out with the intention of catching my pole, that I lost the day before.

You see monday was a great day for fishing, caught some fish, nobody got skunked, and had a great day with my friend Chad. Well at the end of the day when the sun was just starting to go down and it was time to get off the lake. While we were headed back to the dock, I was casually casting out. If I caught something than it would just be the icing on the cake. If I didn't well no big deal we had already caught some nice fish and it gave me something to do on the way back to the dock.

Then tradgedy strikes! During the cast I had accidently let my lure down inside the boat, and on the cast out towards the water it snagged on my other pole and flicked it into the water. For a moment I considered jumping in after it. But before I made the leap I remembered I was wearing my phone (costs more than the rod), and instead watched for that brief second while it sank to the bottom.

Sadness.

Tuesday I went back to try and retrieve it from it's watery grave. With no luck, I poked and prodded around for a few hours and never found that rod. I know what cove it is in but have no idea where it landed or how it went down to the bottom. I might go back there a few more times this year. But I have little hope of finding that rod again.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

GRADUATED - Class of 2005

Well I promised you more on this later and here it is, I don’t think I can put it any better than the analogy I was told at the bar the night of my lay off. And since I think there is nothing more appropriate than to use an analogy when talking about the whole experience, and for those of you that shared in the experience you’ll know why, Iam going to take that analogy and expand on it for you here.

This analogy likens the whole experience to going to high school in your senior year.

Everybody knows the end is coming, but nobody wants it to. We all really like the people we get to hang out with everyday and we all wish we could make it last forever, that it would never end. But eventually school is over and then the summer comes, and when it does you will each go your separate ways. Everybody promising to keep in touch with one another, some better at it then others, but all with the best of intentions.

Later you’ll probably look back fondly on those times you had at school. The things you learned, the stuff you did. You might even catch up with some of your old class mates every now and again. But sadly those times are in the past for you now and you can’t have them back. They are but memories for you to mull over, lessons learned, projects accomplished and people that you met along the way. But it’s time now for you to move on, to move on to bigger and better things. To take what you have learned in school and apply it to the real world.

So go out into that world and show them that the school you went to taught you some good lessons and some hard lessons. But now that you’ve learned those lessons there is no reason for you to go back to learn those same lessons again.

This sums up for me my experience better than anything else. Today I am a graduate of the class of 2005, and I walk proudly with the other members of my graduating class, knowing that while we were in school we made it a better place. A place other people wanted to attend a place of distinction. And there will never be another class like those that graduated in 2005.

And for those of you that are still in school and haven’t yet graduated, I would tell you. Enjoy the time you have with the people you have. But don’t wait for the summer to come before figuring out what your going to do in the real world. Because one day you too will graduate.

So much Fishing, So much time

All week Ron and I have been working on his boat getting it ready for it’s return from retirement. We cleaned it up, got a new gas tank and gas line, a new spark plug and a new deep cycle battery for the trolling motor. All in preperation of going fishing “as soon as we got the boat ready.”

Well today, I finally got to go fresh water fishing with Ron. He’s the one that got me started Salt water fishing last year, and well we have been going out saltwater fishing pretty frequently since. But today we went fresh water fishing. I hadn’t been fresh water fishing since I was a kid, I always remembered how much fun going as a kid was and let me tell you it is just as much fun today. There is just something really exciting about realizing that you have caught a fish and reeling it in to see what it is and how big it is. But no matter what the size is or what fish it is, it is never a dissapointment when you land it.

Thats the one thing about being laid off; I am going to get SO MUCH FISHING IN! Between looking for a job, working on straightening up the apt, and working on some pet projects that I just keep meaning to do.

I am going to be fishing like crazy.

Another one for Ron.

And not long after the first one Ron nabs another one.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Ron nabs a white bass.

Ron, kelly's dad asked what I was using and so I gave him one of the lures that I had just like it and BOOM, he caught a fish. Nothing we caught that day was very big, but it was all still fun and it's nice that everybody was catching fish.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

kitten Fish

So this is the first catfish I have ever caught. It was a small one about 8 inches long. But fun to bring to the boat and the first fish we caught that day. The next thing I hooked was a bluegill but I got it all the way to the boat and was bringing it in the boat when it got unhooked and there it went. Oh well, I got to play it in at east and he just saved me the touble of unhooking him and throwing him back.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Sold some records, got a free cup of coffee

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Bojo HATES beer.

I threw down a fiver, Erika threw down a one, Bojo threw downa beer.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

laid off, or freed?

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

I got laid off today, more on this later

MOBlogging, out of control

Some of you may have noticed the ramping up in the number of photo posts yesterday. Well perhaps I should WARN you, I got a new cellular phone yesterday, the motorolla v551 and it has some great capabilities. You can shoot photos which aren't that bad for a camera phone, video which I haven't done yet, and record audio. And I am really looking forward to the posting of audio blogs from the new phone. I might need to read up a little on the phone before I jump into one, but look for it soon.

So now I have my flickr account set up to recieve posts from the phone and port them over to my blogger account. oh man, the skies the limit now, so watch out. Although I do intend to "simmer down" a little as I realize it could get a little out of hand and take the blogging in a direction I don't think I want to go.

All images no text.

It's not that I don't have the ability to post text from the phone, it's just that it is a little bit of a hassle trying to type it in using the number keys, especially for someone who blogs stream of conciousness.


Next up Hotsyncing the new phone with my mac, to sync the address book...

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

The Chipwich is for scale

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Mafioso

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Erika the day after the Fashion Faux Pax

Here's what she looked like yesterday.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Clothing the homeless

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Mrs. Kwan

I could say so many nice things about the Kwans. But for those of you that know them, You know it would never be enough.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Shirts & Skins

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Town Point Renegades

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

I live for TUES & THURS

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

oooh the shirts, what more can I say

Yesterday it was Athena and Erika today Girard and I. Tomorrow...

who knows what tomorrow holds.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

When planets align, Play the lottery!

What sort of crazy aligning of the planets has to take place for me to arrive late at the same time that Erika arrives EARLY ?!? Then who should we pass as we are about to go into work. JOE! And all this happens on the first day I have my new Camera phone.

I'm playing the lottery today!

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

JOY.

This is Joy, she is one of the beautiful people at realtive theory records that makes us coffee every morning. Some days she is the only highlight of my day.

Thanks Joy.

look for erik, coming soon.

Originally uploaded by doornumbertwo.

Rock & Roll lifestyle

Our cats Shadow and Tigger live the ROCK-N-ROLL lifestyle. They run around all night, living it up and then sleep all day. Sometimes during the weekend when we're home they wake up to look over and give you a look like they are saying "Do you mind, I'm trying to sleep here." but then they close their eyes and go back to sleep. I imagine it is the same while we are at work. asleep all day.


Cats_shadTig_2

Have you ever been in a cult... Are you sure?

Lately there has been some stuff in the news that got me to wondering how many cults there were in the United States. Are they all harmful? Can a cult be a positive experience? What makes a cult? Who enters into a cult? Do they know they are joining a cult at the time? So I got to looking what is a cult how do we as a culture define a cult? Do I really know what a cult is?

And as I got to looking I was surprised to find out that I really didn't know what a cult was. I had an idea of what I thought a cult was, but most of that centered around people like David Koresh and his group in Waco, texas. Cults are a group of religous zealots who follow some bible thumping leader that preaches about the end of time, hellfire and damnation. I thought for sure you could recognize a cult. They would all be dressed in crazy clothes and stand out in a crowd. But then as I read more I began to wonder would I really recognize a cult when faced with one. Would I unintentionally join a cult thinking it was something else at first. Would I buy into their "teachings" only to realize later that I had been duped. I consider myself a fairly bright and very perceptive individual how could I possibly be convinced to join a cult.

So as I continued to do research on what is a cult. And this is a definition of a cult that I took straight from a webpage called,
how cults work dot com
“The modern definition of a mind control cult is any group which employs mind control and deceptive recruiting techniques. In other words cults trick people into joining and coerce them into staying. This is the definition that most people would agree with. Except the cults themselves of course!”

Okay so now I know that a cult could be any group, not necessarily a religious group, and it certainly doesn’t have to focus on religion, to qualify as a cult. For example a cult could be a company, any company for that matter. I have often believed that a software company such as Apple or Microsoft is ripe to become a cult. Apple after all has a campus and certainly a very enigmatic leader.

So what would it take to turn that company into a cult, if it isn’t one already, probably not that much. After all the people you employ in that industry are often very introverted people that you hired from one part of the country and then moved to your part of the country. Thereby eliminating their previous outside support group. So naturally any new friends that they made would most likely come from inside this new company. This seems to be a classic cult manuevere, separate the members from their outside support groups. And then you get a group of people who now rely a small circle of people all with the same focus as their new friends. These people all working for the same company would begun to draw closer together only hanging out with each other. And if given the proper direction by an enigmatic leader, could be turned into a cult.

This is another classic cult marker that I have been reading about on the internet. The group seems to all follow the directions of the same enigmatic leader. So I then I gave some thought as to why did I always think that leader has to be a religious leader preaching gospel from a Bible. Why couldn’t that leader be the CEO of a software company, preaching the mission statement or mantra of that company as the new gospel.

One of the things I have found as I read more about cults is they often have one enigmatic leader that the group displays unquestioning commitment to. This person might have a right hand man that helps them accomplish the end goal. But the members of the cult are very devoted to that one enigmatic leader and could care less for the right hand man.

Some other things that I have found out about cults while surfing the internet and reading more about them are, well I will just copy and paste below one list that seems to reinforce my idea that a corporation could easily be a cult.


The group is preoccupied with making money.

Questioning, doubt, and dissent are discouraged or even punished.

Mind-numbing techniques (such as meditation, chanting, speaking in tongues, denunciation sessions, debilitating work routines) are used to suppress doubts about the group and its leader(s).

The leadership dictates sometimes in great detail how members should think, act, and feel. (for example: members must get permission from leaders to date, change jobs, get married; leaders may prescribe what types of clothes to wear, where to live, how to discipline children, and so forth).

The group is elitist, claiming a special, exalted status for itself, its leader(s), and members (for example: the leader is considered the Messiah or an avatar; the group and/or the leader has a special mission to save humanity).

The group has a polarized us- versus-them mentality, which causes conflict with the wider society.

The group's leader is not accountable to any authorities (as are, for example, military commanders and ministers, priests, monks, and rabbis of mainstream denominations).

The group teaches or implies that its supposedly exalted ends justify means that members would have considered unethical before joining the group (for example: collecting money for bogus charities).

The leadership induces guilt feelings in members in order to control them.

Members' subservience to the group causes them to cut ties with family and friends, and to give up personal goals and activities that were of interest before joining the group.

Members are expected to devote inordinate amounts of time to the group.

Members are encouraged or required to live and/or socialize only with other group members


WOW! Does this sound familiar to any one? I mean if you have ever worked in a company, be it small or large some of these things have to ring true to you. And these items were taken straight from a web page on
cult characteristics So it is not as if I edited them to validate my argument. And that’s what was really so scary as I read through them it really got me to thinking. Have I ever worked for a company that was a cult?

I think maybe I have.

T-Funny

Somehow I ended up on this site that had a ton of what I thought were great T-shirts busted Tees so here are a couple of them so you can share in the fun. If I didn’t think I would have to buy nice clothes soon I would so be buying these shirts.



NewMexico



WWJD



yousaypotato

Tricked out - Souped up - surround sound

Since the day that Midnight Club Dub edition came out I have been steadily playing it. Not every night but at least once a week I will get in some game time. Right now I am 47% done I have finished San Diego, and I am one race, 3 heats, away from finishing Atlanta and unlocking the last city, Deroit!
I have all sorts of cars and motorcycles in the garage now which I could race with, but mostly I stick to just a few. Early on my favorite was the 64 Chevy Imapala (tricked out in traditional East L.A. Style) then I moved on to a 69 Dodge Charger (customized to look like a matchbox car), recently I started driving a Lotus Elise (which drives like a souped up go-Kart, so I painted it like a Go- kart) and now I am on a motorcycle a Cuevito Chopper (painted matte black with flames running down it, of course.)
I have been riding the chopper a lot even against all the cars and trucks I have to race. Unless the race specifies a certain auto type which quite a few do, I am on the chopper. Cause you can weave in and out of the traffic and it has better pick up than most of the cars.
I am not sure why I love the racing games so much, I think it is a cross between the racing and the customizing of the cars. When I first discovered them I was playing “Need for Speed Underground”, and I played the hell out of that game trying to unlock new customizable options. But once “Midnight Club Dub Edition” came out, I put away the Need for Speed and never got it out again. Midnight Club just blows away Need for Speed. In Midnight Club you can go all over the city, your not just stuck in the route that the game has dictated. Instead you can make wrong turns, I do frequently, or find short cuts, which may include jumps over buildings or the freeway.
I just have to say Midnight Club rocks visually it is good and audio wise it is there as well. It really does immerse you into the experience, and even more so not that I have surround sound.
Last night while I was racing it really struck me how cool surround sound is while playing games on the play station. I had the surround sound turned up and could literally hear the cars engines roaring as the came up from behind me and attempted to pass. It would start in the speakers in the rear and then move to the front on what ever side they were trying to pass from. That was soooo cool! I love the surround sound.
So for some reason I thought I might share that, and maybe some of the cars I like to drive.



MC_ImpalaFrnt



MC_ChargerFrnt



MC_LotusElise



MC_Cuevito

Treats to eat

This past weekend Kelly made me rice krispy treats, which I have been steadily devouring. Last night my friend Chad came over to play Midnight Club with me and saw the Krispy treats, to which he exclaimed, "wow! rice krispy treats" and had a couple. This made me think, is there anyone out there who can't appreciate a rice krispy treat...

Long posts in BlogLand

I think that I am probably not following the blogging rules. Chuck mentioned that there were rules for blogging, I don't remember where he said they were posted, and so I haven't read them yet, although I don't know that I would read them if I did know cause I am sure I breaking quite a few of them.
One of the things I have noticed is I write REALLY long diatribes about things in my blog where as other people write quick notes. I thought at first I might try and shorten my posts edit them down and then post them. But then I thought this is my blog and this is the way I write. So I didn't change, I do know that some people log on and just skim for the details and that's fine, maybe others read the whole post, I don't know, but really I think in the end it's about what you want to post and not what others want you to post.
I do however write my posts in "word" cause TOM said my last blog was chock full of muspellings ;) and grammatical errors, and that made it hard to read. So I think if I am going to write long posts I should at least make it easier to read. So I made that concession but otherwise I have changed little else. As you can see this was supposed to be a short note and here we are starting to get long again, so I will just end it with.

I write a lot, if I had more time I would edit down but the way I write is stream of consciousness and then I go back and edit. If I don't have the time they are longer if I have the time they are shorter but still much longer than everyone else.

Oh, well that's just the way it is.

Friday Nights are now the beginning of my relaxation period.

Friday nights used to be broken up between drinking and going out to a movie, a show, or some bodies house for a party. All through my early twenties I used to pretty much do just that. There was always something going on, and I always felt compelled to be a part of it. But lately, now that I am in my early thirties I have found my Friday nights to be the beginning of my relaxation and recooperation time. Friday night is the beginning of my weekend and on the weekends I just want to relax.
Now this has been definitely been a slow adjustment for me. It certainly didn’t happen overnight, for so long now if I wasn’t going all the time I felt like I was being lazy. There was no such thing as just sitting down to relax. That was just being lazy, if I was sitting down I had to have some sort of project to complete that required being in a seat. However lately I have been getting better at the relaxation, probably because I am consciously working at it. I plan out my weekend relaxation making sure it is included in the weekend plans. Blocking out time for it, making sure I have all the necessary components lined up to accomplish it. I make sure every weekend I am prepared to and have the appropriate time set aside for relaxation. Now sure you might say that pre-planning and blocking out time for it is not quite the “right way” to relax. But like I said I’m still working on it
This past Friday, Kelly’s dad, Ron and I planned on going fishing at the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel fishing pier. So during the week I made the appropriate plans and got the appropriate equipment ready and was ready to go fishing when Friday came. Friday I was ready to relax.

And relax I did.

It’s Fishing Time on Friday night

At 5:30, I packed up what little I needed to begin my weekend and headed out to Wonder Bar for a beer. Caught up with some friends for a bit about what happened during the week and then paid my tab and headed home to pick up my fishing gear. Now the real relaxing begins. I get home by 7 pm change out of my work clothes and proceed to load up the pick-up truck, (1) cooler, (1) pier landing net, (2) fishing poles, (1) sweat shirt, (1) soft sided tackle box. And then I forget the coffee thermos and minnow bucket with the bubbler, but I don’t realize this till I am well on my way, too late to turn back. Oh, well I’ll just stop at 7-11 for coffee, a 24 oz. should help me get through the night.
I arrive at Ron’s house early, but he’s not ready cause he didn’t expect me for another 30 minutes. So he run’s around getting ready and I help myself to a slice of pizza and a glass of sweet tea from the fridge. Ron makes the best sweet tea, he adds the sugar while the tea is hot and he adds enough to make it oooh so sweet. I drink a glass almost every time I go to Kelly’s parents house. Ron put’s all his stuff into the truck and with the truck loaded up we are now headed for the bridge tunnel. As we are headed up North Hampton blvd. towards the Chesapeake Bridge Tunnel the sun is setting and we’re going to get there just in time to get a good spot on the pier and watch the sun set over the water. This is one of the things I think I like about fishing. You often end up with a great view of the sunset over the water.
When we arrive at the Chesapeake Bay Bridge Tunnel Fishing Pier parking lot we see that it is crowded, extremely crowded. There are fisher-men and women up and down the pier all the way to the end. This is not good. We get our stuff out of the truck and load it up into Ron’s pier fishing cart and head towards the pier to claim our spot on what is already a Pier beyond max capacity. There’s a nice spot near a light so we claim it. In the short time that I have been fishing on the piers I have come to the personal belief that you should fish the lights at night. Any spot on the pier where there is a light shining down on the water is much more likely to produce, because that is where the bait fish flock to. And so finding a spot where there was a light was pleasantly surprising.
We set up our gear and began throwing out our lines. We had both brought out two poles. One to cast out and leave sitting and the other to fiddle around with. For me fiddling means switching your rigs, casting it out, reeling it in, all sorts of activity might be covered by the term fiddling. The other pole you cast out and leave, it is usually set up with a bottom rig and some live or cut bait that you sort of throw it out there. Hoping that some fish will stop by take yor bait and hook himself. I have never caugh a fish on the pole I just cast out and leave, all the fish that I have caught have been on the pole that I am working. I think you have to be able to feel the fish biting and be involved in the whole process to catch a fish.
Well there we were fishing the night away sitting on the pier relaxing and watching “the circus.” That’s what Ron took to calling the people on the pier that night. And there were some characters on the pier that night. To our right for a good portion of the night there was an older guy (50’s) and what I took to be his parents. They were sort of half hearted fishing off the pier that night. Normally they said they go out on their boat but every now and again they take an off night and come out to the pier, cause it is $50 in gas each time they take the boat out. To our left was a family Mom, Dad, little kids. Oh, I love to see the little kids out there fishing, running around with fishing poles, swinging from the lamp poles late on Friday night. Later in the evening those people left and we’re replaced by a younger guy and an older asian women. I assumed they were together not sure in what way based on their behavior. But it was also obvious from their behavior that she was here to fish and he was here to be with her. She had three poles out there and kept working each one. Constantly checking and moving the rigs. On the other side of us now is a young guy and a young girl who showed up with this older lady. The older lady was definitely drunk, all night she kept telling us the same story; “she’s only ever fished here once before and the only thing she caught that night was a fishing pole.” “She normally fishes at Harrison fishing pier, which was washed away by the big hurricane last year.” Now imagine that same story every fifteen to 30 minutes. Eventually it became comical cause she would tell you the story like you had never heard it before, but you could interject and mess with her a bit. Which of course I did, her friends didn’t seem to care and were doing a bit of it themselves.
Well the night ended a little after midnight with the only people on the pier catching any fish were me, a little boy who was maybe 9 or 10 and an older lady that had been there since before we got there. It was a slow night, but I was feeling really chilled out by the end of it.

Hard decisions and Hard lines.

If you knew something, something that was potentially damaging to someone would you talk about it? What if it was potentially damaging to a whole family, a whole company, or the whole country, would you say anything?
Recently in the news the guy who was deep throat in the Watergate scandal came forward and revealed himself. The guy, 91-year-old W. Mark Felt, was essentially the number two man under FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover. And when Hoover died probably expected to take over the FBI. How could he not, he had been literally running the show for a while; then Nixon stepped in and nominated some guy named L. Patrick Gray to be acting director. After this it is speculated, and if you read a little about the whole thing you might reach the same conclusion. Mark Felt was angry about being passed by for the position of Director of the FBI and always harbored resentment for Nixon, because of this. It’s not like Mark Felt, liked Nixon before this happened, but after it, well he probably hated the guy. So when Watergate came along, here was his opportunity to even the score with Nixon, and using a long standing relationship he had with a reporter Bob Woodward he did just that. So if you knew something, something that could take down the president, would you act on it, knowing that it would have severe consequences if you did. Would you do it just to even the score?
Last Sunday I read an article about an executive, Dr. Peter Rost, a vice president at the pharmaceutical company Pfizer. He had spoken out in the news in favor of the re-importation of drugs. And has openly criticized the high cost of prescription drugs and the efforts by the drug companies to block the importation of cheaper drugs from other countries. Here is a guy who works for a drug company openly criticizing those same companies. Why did he do it, why did he talk about what was going on in a company he was employed at? Was it a sense of moral duty? Was it vindictive? Was he just trying to do what’s right?
When asked why he was doing it he said. "I believe I am doing the right thing, both in the long-term for the pharma industry and in the short-term for all the patients who cannot afford life-saving drugs."
That same article I read on Sunday talked about how his employees have stopped reporting to him, supervisors stopped talking to him, and how his secretary just left one day. Then they moved his office near Pfizer’s security department and how one day his e-mail and celphone just stopped working. Eventually I think he got his e-mail back.
So here is a guy who according to the news media “has a history of whistle blowing”, how will he ever be able to get another job at another company with a “history of whistle blowing.” He, trying to do the right thing, has in effect jeopardized both his current employment and any future employment he might have in the industry to do the right thing.
What does he do now, he has no real work to do at Pfizer now. So how does he spend his day? He can’t surf the internet or play Worlds of Warcraft all day as his company is just looking for a legitimate reason to fire him. So what does he fill his day with, that won’t get him fired. He has to keep talking to the media, because his company is just waiting till the story disappears from the media so they can then quietly lay him off. So he is now caught in a vicious catch-22 where the only way to stay employed is to stay in the media and by continuing to talk to the media he will be totally unemployable when his company does let him go. His time is numbered there, and he is in effect just waiting it out collecting a paycheck. He probably had a cush job; I think I read somewhere he was making something in the neighborhood of $600,000. Why jeopardize all that. Why did he do it?
Because he was trying to do the right thing, he jeapordized all that to do the right thing. Why not just quit the job if he didn’t agree with their practices. Like I would never work for a cigarette company because I just can’t work for a company that I believe causes cancer. Was it because his convictions were so strong that he couldn’t quit, because his position in the pharmaceutical industry afforded him the opportunity to speak out and be taken seriously.
Would you do the same thing if you were in a similar position, regardless of the personal risk. Would you do it, if you knew by taking action you would adversely affect the lives of others. Your friends, your family, your friends families. Could you conscientiously put them at risk too? There is a difference between taking a risk personally and putting everyone else at risk through your actions. How could you ever live with yourself if your actions are sure to hurt so many other people? What if eventually you thought by inaction the problem might eventually right itself? Maybe there was a law broken, or some indiscretion by one person or another but it will all turn out all right in the end. Would you take action then? What if the action that other person was commitiing served to benefit them financially. Would you stop it knowing that eventually it would come to an end on it’s own? Isn’t that just pointless action and risk on your part. Should you do it because it’s right, or should you forego what’s right to protect your friends from the eventual harm your action would cause. What if this person committing this action was your friend? Would you take action against them? Would you tell anyone if you did or would you wait till you were 90. And then when all the cards had been played out, talk about what you did so long ago. I am not sure what I would do if I were put in the same position. Likely if the person was my friend before I would no longer consider them such. I would cut all ties to them, as for action against them, if my action was going to put other people I cared about at risk, I would probably do nothing.
Almost always the moves I make and the actions I take are to protect the people I care about. I have always thought of this as a mafia mentality, but it could be from the time I have spent in an Islamic country, as I have always held to the idea of “An eye for eye.”

PPG Question answered

So for a while now there has been this car that has parked on the second level of the Mac Arthur Garage. Sporty little car, with a license plate that says PPG FRK. Now at first glance I was sure that this must be a Decipher person. So I asked around and nobody could tell me whose car it was, but more importantly nobody could tell me what a PPG FRK was. RPG sure, MMORPG oh anyone on the 3rd floor could tell you. But PPG, nobody.

Today, the question was answered.

At the same time that I am getting out of my jeep, PPG FRK tears into the garage screaches to a halt and out pops this little red haired girl. a GIRL ?!? Never during the entire time I have pondered who drove that car did I think that a girl drove that car. Not because of the car mind you, but because of the license plate. I was so sure it was a guys car, a gamer guys car and for some reason I couldn't wrap my head around that maybe it was a gamer girls car.

Well wrong on both counts, neither a guy nor a gamer. PPG FRK stands for "Power Puff Girls Freak" it was a cartoon that she loved and used to watch all the time.

"oh, Do you still love to watch it?"
"no, I just don't want to bother with going to DMV to get a new plate."
"you know you can change your plate online."
"really?"
"yeah."
"cool. I need to do that."

And then she headed over to Kirklands to start her day, and so another mystery of the parking garage was solved.


PPG_FRK

Knowing who your Friends are...

I have been giving some thought to Friendships lately and what makes someone your friend. Because in this town, I know a lot of people, well really I know a lot of people’s names. But what separates people you know (acquaintances, if you will) from people you consider friends. Are friends people you can call on when you need a favor, and know that they’ll help you out. Unless it is against the law and then they have to be a really good friend.
When does somebody you have said “hi” to at work become a friend? Do you have to see them outside of work for them to become friends? Can you have friends at work that you never see outside of the building, or are those just people you know. Maybe they are people your friendly towards but these are not people you are friends with. Where do you draw that line, when does a person cross over from acquaintance to become a friend.
What about the people you run into every day, like at the coffee shop you go to in the morning. After a couple of times you probably know their names. A couple of more times and you might know their kids or best friends names, Every day for a year and you can probably talk to them about things they are doing, ask how their kid or best friend is, and what they did the past weekend. The same sort of questions you might ask a friend if you ran into them after having not seen them for a week or a month. But does this make the person you buy Coffee from every morning your friend. Are friends just some body you can talk to? Are friends people you can confide in and trust to not use that information against you?
Are there distinct moments, distinct actions that happen after which, when you can call somebody your friend. Like if somebody tells you their home phone number is that a moment when you cross over into friendship. But then some of the people I know don’t have land lines only cel phones and so if I have that number are we friends?
Are friends people who you can call when you want to go out socialize? Or when you want to stay home and talk?
What about if they give you their personal e-mail address, specifically, not their work address is that person a friend. What if all they have is a work address, what then?
Do you have to go out and do something with them to consider somebody your friend? What about if you go out and realize you don’t have any money with you. Here comes the tab and you have no way to pay it. Are friends somebody you can borrow money from?
When I was a little kid if you had dinner at some ones house you had to be friends cause you didn’t just go eat at anybodies house for dinner. Or if spent the night at some ones house you were friends, again same reason. But there were other kids that you only saw at school or on the ball field that you still called your friend. Were they any less of a friend cause you had never eaten dinner with them, or spent the night at their house. It seemed like as a little kid you could have a different friend every month, “oh he was my friend, but now he’s not my friend anymore.”
As an adult you seem to make friendships that last much longer and you put more value into those friendships so it almost seems harder to make friends. You have to put serious effort into an adult friendship; you make an investment of both time and energy in the beginning of that friendship to make it work. Then there is a constant ongoing need to invest at least a little time and energy over the course of the long haul to maintain that friendship. Sure you might go a month or even a year between the last time you saw that person but if you were really friends you can pick up again maybe not right where you left off, but it won’t be long again before your right back where you were.
When did you become friends? Do you remember the moment when you became friends?
Was there a moment when you started calling that person your friend? Was it during the introduction of “your friend” to somebody else? Was it when describing that person to another person? Does that same person you consider a friend consider you a friend? How do you know? Do you care? Does it matter?

139 days and counting

Forget FREE KATIE let's worry about one of our own and FREE BILL

Some of you may or may not be aware that Bill was laid off on monday, Jan 24th 2005. Then the company struck a deal to keep him on a little while longer. Then when the time was coming to a close for Bill when it was again time for him to go. The company struck another deal, cause they realized he was the only one left who could do what needed to be done. Well the time is coming near again and after 139 days if you are wondering what happened to Bill, and is he doing okay, are they treating him okay. Well I have managed to sneak a photo out to prove that he is still alive and doing fine. They seem to be treating him well, he is in pretty good spirits, and he is getting a lot done since he hasn't had to attend a single mtg since Jan 25th.

As we speak negotiations are in process to get him out and he doesn't think it will be much longer before he is a free man again.




hostage_bill

Never really all that good But I really loved to play

Well I never thought this day would come but here it is. A day when I couldn’t play soccer on a TUES or THURS, not because it was raining or because I had to take care of something at lunch, but because somebody has endeavored to try and kick us off the field we have played on for all these years.
Now before it happened in the back of my mind I sort of knew it was coming one day, although I thought it was going to happen a long time ago when we played in that little triangle piece of a grass over in the freemason neighborhood. I though for sure that one of the older people who lived in the building right next to it would try to kick us off or one of the people who lived in the town houses surrounding the park would complain and try to get rid of us. But they never did; quite the opposite, there was actually a few times when people came by and said that they really liked seeing us play soccer there and that sometimes they would sit inside their apt’s and watch us play. Some had even worked out our pattern so they knew when to look for us. Any TUES or THURS when it wasn’t raining. Then one day, and I am not sure why, we moved.
We left that little piece of grass for a bigger piece of grass,Town Point park and we left those people behind. One day we just stopped showing up, without even leaving them a note. Here they were hospitable enough to let us play in their neighborhood and we left one day without even a word.
And so for years now we have played at Town Point Park, it’s hard to recall how long for sure but I think at least 3 years now. There were some periods when this person or that person couldn’t make it out, quite a few when it was me. But it seemed like as long as it wasn’t raining or snowing there was a game being played on tues or thurs lunch at Town Point. Some days it was pretty cold, others blistering hot, but people kept coming out to play. I wish now I had played more during all those years. I think that for the last year there have been some days when it was what got me to work in the morning. I would hear it in my mind “Get out of bed, get up, it’s a soccer day… don’t forget your gear” But this morning when I woke up I thought for a moment it was a soccer day and then realized… it wasn’t. later that morning Kelly really drove it home, when we were getting ready for work and she said “no, soccer today?” to which I had to reply “no, soccer today.”
I realize I am really having trouble accepting the fact that this might be the end to soccer. That in fact it won’t be that I got another job that will force me to give up Tues / Thurs soccer. But an employee at Festevents named Jeff Morrison, who took it upon himself to go find a police officer and have us kicked off the field. I hope that in the end we can get the right people to take notice and to say “Soccer in the park is part of what makes Norfolk great.” Maybe if portfolio writes that article about us, maybe we will win the good fight and get our Tues/Thurs soccer back.


6_13_portfolio

living in a maze of corrugated trapezoids

Well over a month ago we “moved in” to our apartment. And here we are still surrounded by boxes. We’ve actually gotten it to the point of creating pathways through the apt. enough space to walk down the hall, enough space to eat in the dining room and enough space to play-station in the living room or watch TV which ever you prefer. The only room without boxes is the kitchen and that is really because it is too small to hold any boxes. These boxes have started to wear on me, and on Kelly as well. We need to find a place for all this stuff but right now we have more stuff than spaces.
It isn’t till you move into an apt that is significantly smaller than the house you used to live in that you realize
A) How much stuff you really had/have
B) How large your house was
C) You need to find a way to live with significantly less stuff

Most of this stuff is just that Stuff, sure some of it is necessity, maybe even a lot of it is stuff we really need. But as I look around at the boxes I wonder do I need what’s in that box over there? I am not really sure what’s in it but if I go without it for six months I can’t imagine I need it. Then I realize it’s a box of winter clothes. Where are we going to put the winter clothes, we don’t even have a closet for the coats and now we need to store winter clothes.

We have a storage unit, but the hope was that we would have it empty by the end of the summer. This is a 10’ x 10’ storage space literally filled to the ceiling with stuff. This week Kelly was looking for her summer clothes and when we realized they are stored in a rubber maid somewhere in the storage unit, we decided that we would probably tackle this project over the weekend as the task of digging them out was too daunting to tackle during the week.

This is the current state of affairs, a maze of boxes, a ton of stuff and the realization that we would like to have less of both.

Making chalkboard drawings in the rain.

“Hope.”

That is the one thing that you should have in order to accomplish anything.

It’s days like these that I have no hope, no hopes that I can change the people who need changing in order to accomplish what must be done. Don’t get me wrong I don't believe that if anyone could do it only I could do it, but I no longer believe it is possible for me to accomplish it. And I do believe that I was one of the better candidates for the job. But now I no longer believe that what I does matters in the scheme of things. I no longer believe that I can make a difference. I have tried and tried and tried again only to watch at the last second the thing that I worked so hard at be dashed to pieces on the corporate rocks.

“Hope.”
I hope I can make this a better place for the people I leave behind. I hope to leave this place on my terms and not theirs. I hope I enjoy my next job.

I hope…


to find it again.

Fishing for Food

So this past weekend I caught the first fish that I took home and ate. It was a flounder that I caught under the Lesner bridge in Virginia Beach, from the sand dunes below the bridge. It measured 18 inches in length, I don’t how much it weighed and I forgot to measure how wide it was, I wish now that I had.
How I ended up fishing is a long story but I started fishing (again) with Kelly’s Dad last October during striper season, albeit with minimal success. I caught some fish but nothing to write home about. All reasonable size and all fun to catch but aside from catching a shark, nothing really notable and even the shark wasn’t all that, cause apparently people catch them all the time off the sandbridge pier. But this past Sunday I caught a Flounder that was big enough to consider taking home.
So I did.
Kelly’s Dad (Ron) caught four flounder but none over 17 inches so none he could take home. Well before even getting the fish home that night I felt a little conflicted about it. It was a weird sort of feeling catching this fish, and then keeping this fish with the intent to take him home and eat him. Knowing just hours earlier he was swimming around in the ocean and now he was to become a meal on my plate.
After I got him home it was hard to look at him as anything more than a meal while I filleted him. If I thought about the fact I had caught him, I again felt bad. Now don’t get me wrong I won’t be going vegetarian anytime soon and in fact I might be eating the next fish too, if he’s large enough to keep. It was just a tinge of sadness that I felt when eating this one. But I have the same sort of tinge of sadness when I am driving down the road and see an animal such as a squirrel somebody has hit/driven over. Deep down I really care for animals, but I still feel as though eating them is okay.
How can one care about animals and yet still eat them. Well I am not sure, it probably helps to be insulated from the act of killing them, to be able to continue to eat animals, I should never go near a slaughter house or else maybe I would become a vegetarian. But knowing that, I will certainly not be going anywhere near a slaughter house. That is if I have any say in it.
But maybe the reason I can eat meat is in some ways because these feelings are more about respect. Maybe that makes it a little better, for me at least, I can feel good about eating animals personally cause I don’t take the fact that I have good fresh food to eat for granted. In fact quite the opposite I love to eat good food and I love to eat well prepared food, I hate the drudgery of eating just because I am hungry and now I need to nourish my body cause it requires nutrients. And I hate even more “Fast Food” the idea of pulling into a drive thru window and ordering anything through a speaker is the antithesis of what I enjoy about a meal. Anyway I digress, the gist of this whole post is that in some ways I was incredibly proud of the fact that I could catch my own food. I could live without a grocery store. I have proven to myself over the years that I can grow vegetables, hunt and now fish. I can feed myself if necessary, but until it becomes absolutely necessary I am going to continue to go to the grocery store for my food.