A couple of things to ponder...

"we reserve the right to..." What the fuck? You see this disclaimer on all kinds of stuff. A lot of times it is in regards to changing the rules of a contest, or changing interest rates, or what not. There used to be signs everywhere that said "we reserve the right to refuse service to anyone." Wow, so just saying that you reserve a right gives you the right to that right? I think not. That is the equivalent of a company calling "shotgun". It is retarded. Why stop at refusing service, or changing terms, why not reserve the right to kick someone in the face, or to cancel all customers after taking all their money because you fucking feel like it. Let me tell you something mother fucker, reserving rights means nothing. I doubt that kind of shit would ever hold up in a court these days just because it is in writing or you have a stupid sign.

"stinks to high heaven" really? where the hell does this come from? I know what it means obviously, but where would that kind of phrase originate from. A quick intercloud research effort produced no results. Only assumptions. assholes.

...

I can cook food better than a restaurant. No doubt about it. Everything I cook is way better than a restaurant. Period. Why is that? I have sort of reached the conclusion that public restaurants have to appeal to the lowest common denominator. Everything has to be in a specific range of blandness so that no one dislikes it. But that lack of flavor is exactly what makes me not like it. Another reason could be that since they have to produce food en masse, they save money by buying in bulk, which limits their ingredient provider variety. Who knows.

I never really thought about this too much until I pretty much eliminated restaurants from my repertoire. Now, on the rare occasion that I visit a restaurant these days, I am surprised by the low quality of the food. Don't get me wrong here, I can still enjoy a restaurant and really like the food because it is tasty and delicious, but I can still produce a higher quality and better tasting version of just about anything, and for a very small fraction of the price. Screw you restaurant.

Two words that I find interesting this week are: "Sidekick and "stand-up". Think about those a little bit, and what they might mean.

So, what do you really need in order to be happy? Well, more to the point, what do you require to have a fun time. I don't need much in either case. I was sitting around thinking about a fall/winter vacation, and it occurred to me that in an interesting locale, I can literally just sit on the side of the road with my best gal and watch stuff happen and have a perfectly good time. This, in part, is why I enjoy going to Las Vegas so much. There are so many interesting people walking around that provide a good source of mind stimulation. There's also lots of cars and lights and general bustle, so I hardly ever feel bored, even when I am doing nothing. Also, in Las Vegas, public intoxication is legal. So I can grab some whiskey or a bunch of beers, and just go sit on a bench on the strip, and watch the world go by for hours on end. This is also relatively inexpensive.

I recently went to Bossier City on a mini vacation. I kinda figured it would be like a smaller shittier version of Las Vegas, and while it is in many respects, it does lack a few elements. I had a great time there, but I realized that I was not necessarily having a good time because I was in Bossier City, I was having a good time because I was hanging out with my best gal and my friends. To some extent, I had a better time sitting doing nothing than I did in the glitter of the casino. Now, granted, I did not go exploring the city as much as I perhaps should have, but there did not seem to be a place to just sorta hang around and do nothing, other than in our hotel rooms, especially at night. There was plenty of debaucherous drinking, gambling, and chain smoking, and it was a hoot, but it generally took place sitting at a gambling table or in front of a line slot machines, which meant that it was costing money to perform the same activities that could be performed in the street in Las Vegas for free. Also, for some reason, there was no place to just go buy a beer there, which is very strange. The cocktail waitresses would give you free beers or mixed drinks, but if they didn't come around at a decent interval, you were just fucked. This is easy enough to rectify, because it is easy to bring your own, but at the time, we didn't know this was a necessity.

Ok, so when I began this post, it was going to be a philosophical analysis of what it really means to be happy, and the apparent dichotomy between having fun and being somewhere foreign, but I think now I like it better as a real quick assessment of my first run at Bossier City. I had an excellent time, but I am not 100% certain that the backdrop of Bossier had anything to do with it. Maybe it did, but I think it will require more research. I will likely return to Bossier City between now and whatever fall/winter vacation I make plans for, to see if i can figure it out. This time I'll bring some liquor and some burritos.

The whole thing reminds me of a fitting song from the Cheech and Chong movie "Things Are Tough All Over"...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UNoF7nJb6X4

Me and my old lady,
we like we like like like like
to get outside.

Sometimes people space us out,
so we just make like a bakery truck
and haul buns out of there.

Sometimes we are so much in love,
that we go on a picnic
and don't even take any beer.

We just like to cruise around,
and try to find the main drag in town.
Then after we go try to find,
a 7 eleven and try to get some beef jerky.

Me and my old lady,
we like we like like like
to get outside.

Sometimes people space us out,
so we just make like a bakery truck
and haul buns out of there.

I think so far I have spent only 1 weekend sitting at home doing nothing so far this summer, and that is primarily because I am on call at work, so I am doing well on my goal of making it a really kick ass season.

Twat magnets!

Three weeks since I've posted, and the last of the pie was gone days ago. I should write a letter to Olive Picklefeather.

Ok, A few quick thoughts here.

I have noticed lately that seeing dead animals makes me sad. fuckin possum crossing the street to go grab something to eat, BAM, fucking car kills him. That sucks. I was driving down the road the other day and I saw a what I think was a pigeon hanging out in the street getting a drink of some water from a puddle. It was a two lane street and I was in the other lane. The bird just kept on doing its thing, and pretty much just ignored this huge hunk of steel going by at 45 miles an hour. My truck weighs around 5,000 pounds, and the bird weighs maybe what 3 pounds? So say 1500 times the size of the bird, and I was probably 4 feet from it. I may be wrong, after all I'm no physicist, but proportionally, that seems to be the equivalent of a huge hunk of metal weighing 150 tons flying by a human at ~65,000 miles an hour. That would blow my mind up. How can this bird get accustomed to something like that? Then you have some animals like that poor possum that couldn't quite figure it out, and got flat. Anyhoo, there is no point here, but I feel sorry for these poor small animals. They aren't doing anything wrong, and I am sure they were happy right up to the point of impact. Weird.

So, completely unrelated, I started thinking about Bernie Madoff. He got 150 years in prison for ripping people off. He will die there, without question. His life is over, and I suspect he will die soon. Then I started thinking... would you rather be stuck in a really bad extremely dangerous prison full of the worst criminals in the world for short period of time, say 2 years, or a "good" easy white collar prison that is a glorified resort for a long period of time, like say 15 years. In the bad prison, you might get killed, you will have to fight, you will get ass raped, etc..., but in the good prison, 15 years of your life will be gone. I don't have an answer. I might opt to take my chances in the bad one.

Next up on the random thought list... You go to a casino and watch a roulette table, and you notice on the board that red has hit 150 times in a row. So, do you wager on red again, because it is on a streak, or do you bet on black because it is long overdue? I myself bet black. Does this make sense? FUCK NO. If red hit 1,543,455,642,910,502,384,256,780,324,536,574,434 times in a row, the next spin still has exactly an 18 in 38 chance of hitting black or red. It is 38 and not 36 because of the green 0 and 00. So I suppose ultimately it does not matter. Taking the stupid mental blocks and superstition out of gambling is the key to success. If you play long enough in ANY casino game, eventually you will have exactly 0 dollars. So I guess the thought process should be to determine how much money you want to gamble with before you go, and just have fun, and drink shitloads of free cocktails and beer.

Ok, so it is officially summer now. How did I start it off? With a crawfish boil. It was awesome. Crawfish is some of the best food you can jam into your mouth hole. So far so good.

So... after I wrote my post several weeks ago about how everyone should strive to have a really kick ass summer (http://a0001718.blogspot.com/2009/05/yeah-yeah-i-know.html), I got a new front tire installed on my motorcycle. Great. The next day, I decide to cruise around the block and see how well it handles. I got 3/4 of the way around the block and BAM! Fucking laid it down. I was literally 100 yards from my house. What a perfect way to get prepared for the best summer ever.

I am OK. My knees were banged up, my elbows were banged up, my hands were banged up. I was wearing a helmet, but not my gloves or boots, so my shoes also suffered. Had I not been wearing my helmet, I could easily be the dead. I have no idea how it happened or how fast I was going. I was cornering and I suspect I simply turned too sharp, and the front tire slid out. The new tire has a different shape than my old one.

So how do I deal with it? Do I take stock in what's important, contemplate my own human mortality, and make major life decisions based on my death defying experience? Fuck naw. That wastes time and could be mentally crippling. I think a better approach is... figure out what the hell I did wrong, and then... don't do that again. Sounds good on paper right? I wonder why people have such a hard time with stuff like that? I have no idea, so I am going to try the 'get back on the horse' kinda mentality this time.

If you spent all your time worrying about what happened last time, and have fear based on the event, then you will not be able to move forward properly, and that's no good.

Anyway, so it is summer, and it is time to do stuff. This weekend is my town's 4th of July celebration thing, so I will enjoy that. I can see the fireworks and hear the music from the convenience of my front yard. Smashmouth is playing this year, so it should be minimally neato. Next week is 4th of July, so that is going to be fantastical. Then the week after that, I am going to Bossier City to stay at the Horseshoe and do some gambling, and then that weekend is another Dollar Day at the horse track, which I will be attending with my bros. Dollar hot dogs and dollar beers, woot!

The summer is shaping up nicely, and its only been 4 days!

This might get long, but... who really gives a damn.

Today was the day of my jury duty. Most people dread this, and I used to, but I have since changed my mind. The last time I got a jury notice was right around two years ago. I noticed that when I got that one I really didn't mind, so I am not exactly sure at what point in time I found it acceptable. The other one from two years ago was the first one I ever got, so its probably safe to assume that its one of those things where the anticipation of the thing is worse than the thing itself. Although, last time, I did not want to get selected for a jury, and thankfully I didn't. This time I DID want to get selected, because watching a trial would be neato, and sending some perp to prison, or even death, would be an interesting human experiment. When you go to jury duty though, you have no idea what you sort of case you could get. Triple murder, speeding, rape or maybe even a civil trial where no crime has been committed.

Anyway, so I go to the courthouse and enter the central jury room. It holds roughly 500 people from my estimation, and it was mostly full, probably 400-450 people there. I estimated by counting how many chairs were in a row, then counting the amount of rows, I am not just shooting from the hip. I arrived at 8:00am, and around 8:30 or so, they tell the room that a judge will come talk to everyone, and then they would start pulling juries for the day. At about 9, a judge comes in and welcomes everyone and gives a quick rundown of how stuff works. She also mentioned they had 6 trials today, so there would be a lot of jurors needed. About 9:30 or so, the other lady comes back and reads the names of people in the first pool, 48 people, my name wasn't called. Around 10, she comes back for another batch, 60 people this time, and I get called, yay!

We make our way to the third floor for more waiting outside the courtroom. Around 10:30, all 60 people make their way into the court room for the voire dire process. This narrows the 60 down to the 12 needed for the trial. During this process, the perp is sitting there in a chair with his attorney, and the prosecution is there as well. This case was a state district court case for a state jail felony DWI with a child under 15 years of age in the car. In Texas, a DWI is a misdemeanor, but if you have a child with you, its a state jail felony, which is very serious. Minimum 180 days in jail, and up to 2 years, along with a fine of up to $10,000.00. Heavy shit, trust me, you don't want any. The perp in this was a Mexican American who did not speak English, so the court provided a translator. This poor chump looked remorseful, and scared shitless. Yet, on the other hand, his case was at the voire dire stage, so he clearly he decided a plea bargain was not for him, so maybe he had some compelling evidence to prove his innocence.

The judge spent a few minutes going over the procedures of how a trial works, and then the prosecutors, who worked for the State of Texas, began explaining what a DWI is and what is needed to return a guilty verdict. As they were talking I noticed that the courthouse was really quite a fantastical feat of architecture. The building is brand new, having been built within the last year. I detected a faint pickle odor for some reason, but other than that is really was a beautiful courtroom, paid for by my tax dollars, and I don't mind saying, that I feel I did a really fucking good job on it. Way to go!

After the prosecution talked about the specifics of what a guilty verdict entails, they spent a few minutes asking personal questions that might exempt people from such a case. Out of the 60 potential jurors, there were maybe 10 or 15 that had issues that would certainly exempt them. Perhaps they themselves had been nailed with a DWI, or even worse, had been the victim of someone else's DWI. At some point in the procedure, they also mentioned that maybe 20 people on the far left side of the courtroom, were essentially a backup pool, and would most likely not be selected.

So out of the 60 total, 20 were backups, and another 15 would easily be discounted due to built in bias. So taking that 35 out, this brought my chances to basically 12 out of 25 or about 48%. Pretty good. Then I thought about something, and took a quick look around me. Out of all the people in the room, I was probably one of maybe 3 or 4 people in there that did not have children. Since the case involved a child, it would make sense to me that the defense would want me, because I would maybe not be as sympathetic to that aspect of the trial as someone who did have children. On the other hand, the prosecution might want me, and for practically the exact same reason! Since I don't have children, I would not be lenient on the perp, because someone with children might go for probation versus jail time at sentencing based on what might happen to the child if the perp went to prison.

At that point, I was convinced that I would in fact, make the jury. After the prosecution was done, the state appointed defense attorney spent a few minutes explaining why it is so hard to defend these cases, blah blah blah. His thing was sorta like the prosecution, except essentially taking the other side. The only thing he did that I thought was a little crafty, was to compare the prosecution team, who admittedly were younger folks, to American Idol contestants. He was using this reference in my opinion, to make the potential jurors think that they were simply too young and 'good looking' to know what they were doing. It was an interesting tactic, but one that would likely work on some of the older people in the room. The other thing he brought up that was strange was when he started in on the "Intoxilyzer 5000", which the police use to check your blood alcohol level at the scene. He went on and on about how it was a machine, and it was not infallible, and then proceed to talk about atomic energy, and nuclear reactors, and in particular, the Chernobyl incident in 1986. His point was that machines can make mistakes, and destroy people lives forever, so we should maybe not rely on machines so much. It was a weird thing to do, but I understand why he did it. This entire voire dire process took about an hour and a half.

So after both teams did their thing, it was back into the hallway for another 30 minutes of sitting doing nothing. They call everyone back in, and read off 12 names, I was number 9! SCORE! I am on a fucking jury. YAY!!!! the 48 that didn't get picked are all excused and chosen ones are taken back to the deliberation room for instructions. Nothing too exciting here. You are assigned a jury badge for access to the secured areas of the building and given a sheet of instructions. By this time it was about 12:45pm, so we broke for lunch. We were expected back at 2p for the trial to begin. So I go to lunch, two chicken sandwiches... I'll need brain fuel for the trial. Large Diet Coke. Good to go.

At 2p at the dot, the 12th juror is finally back from lunch. About 10 minutes later, the judge walks into the deliberation room and explains that after the perp heard the judge explain the punishment range for the crime, and seeing the faces of the 12 jurors, he just went on ahead and plead guilty to the charges! What the fuck? Did this asshole just rob me of my trial? That bastard!! Well, indeed he did.

The judge explained that most cases of this nature are settled with a plea well before the trial date, and that for some reason, this poor sap just basically didn't believe what the attorneys were telling him about the punishment for a state jail felony. I believe that the guy thought for some reason that his case was maybe just a misdemeanor DWI and didn't realize the severity of it until the words came from the judge's mouth. As it turned out, the guy apparently was drunk, because the judge said he drove into a fucking ditch! The judge did not know how old the child was, only that is was under 15 years of age.

So I did get to be on a jury, but once again, I have yet to witness a court proceeding from the jury box. On a lighter note, I read approximately half of Stephen King's book entitled Blaze. It is pretty good so far.

Now, I cannot wait for my next jury summons. If there was some way to get on a priority list or something, I would. If history holds true, I should get another one in about two more years. Now I am one of those weirdos that would love to get jury duty. What's wrong with me?

I guess my point is don't knock it until you try it, fucker.

Yeah, yeah, I know.

Summertime approaches!

The average American life expectancy is approximately 77 years. This mean you will have 77 summers. You probably cannot comprehend and therefore enjoy a summer prior to age 5. Once you start school, summers mean more, and I don't recall feeling that way before entering school at age 5. Summers also do not harbor as many possibilities once you are elderly, so let's say age 64, because at 65 you are just old. You might still like the summertime when you are older, but you probably like all the other seasons as well, and let's face it, when you are 64, you are less likely to take advantage of what a summer has to offer. So between being a small child and an elderly person, that is 18 summers that are wasted. So that leaves 59 good summers to cash in on. Now, you will have to apply the math to your own situation, but I am now 35 years old. This will be my 35th summer. So, out of the 59 good ones, I have already used up 30 of them! That means I only have somewhere in the neighborhood of 29 summers left. TWENTY FUCKING NINE! 29 dollars isn't all that much money, 29 minutes isn't very long, and 29 summers is not a whole lot.

I enjoyed David Lee Roth when he was with Van Halen, and some of his solo work, and I always found his enthusiasm motivational. The man has moxie and mojo. For a brief stint, he took over the morning radio slot when Howard Stern went to satellite radio. His show was not all that great because the execs at CBS made him suck, but I did find one thing particularly fascinating. Whenever David Lee Roth would refers to years passing by, he always referred to them as "summers". He would not say he spent 10 years with Van Halen in the 70s and 80s, he would say he spent 10 summers with those guys. At the time, I kinda brushed it off as just a little strange, but suddenly, I think I understand what he means. Summers are important, and few, and it would seem that a lot of classic memories are created during the summer. You don't sit around with your best buds and think back fondly about the time you all sat around the fireplace, because there was 2 feet of snow outside... you reminisce about the time you drank 40 beers on the river and got a wicked sun burn, and some jack ass caught his shoes on fire, or bit into a freshly dead catfish.

So what am I trying to say? I want everyone to maximize their summer potential. Take stock of your life, and realize that you may not have all that many summers left, so make this one count. You should strive to make this summer the best summer ever. Attempt to make all future summers pale in comparison to this one. Set the bar high. I am not saying you need to 'get the band back together' a la mid life crisis movie and go on a cross country road trip in a convertible, nor am I saying you should embark on a Seinfeldian "Summer of George" type of deal either. I am simply saying that should an opportunity arise, capitalize on it, and in between those opportunities, create your own adventure, and for fuck's sake, leave your house and go somewhere. When the summer is over, and it starts getting to be fall again, you should be able look back and say "Wow, what a fucking summer!"

So go get a pencil and start jotting down all the ways you are not going to suck and waste this summer. If you don't have a pencil, or think you don't have time to relax and enjoy the summer, go kill yourself.

Wow, fuckin forgot to pay attention for like 3 weeks or so.

So, how many shirts you got? Think about how many shirts are in your closet right now. OK, so, how many shirts do you really need? If I had to guess sight unseen, I would wager that I have probably 75 shirts in my closet, and even that might be on the conservative side. How many do I need? Considerably less.

I believe in wearing the same shit over and over again. I have a certain set of shirts that I consider to be my "work uniform", and I rotate the order week to week. What would be the point of having a fuck ton of clothes? If you pay attention, you would probably notice repeats in other people's shirts as well. Everyone has a finite amount of shirts, so its inevitable.

I suppose outside of work, I am a little more diverse. I can always wear my "work shirts" to something other than work, and on occasion, I do so. But more to my liking, is my standard set of t-shirts. I wear these while lounging around the house, or going to play hockey or whatever. I have about 30 Metallica shirts, so those are always in heavy rotation, and I suppose that has become sort of a trademark of mine. People mention the fact that I "always wear a Metallica shirt". Then, I have a few other t-shirts for occasions where Metallica is not necessarily applicable. They are a kooky variety of things. I have one shirt that has a picture of a football, but says "Baseball" under it. I have an All Valley Karate Champion ship '84 Cobra Kai shirt, which is awesome, I have a couple of Harley Davidson shirts, etc.. It is an eclectic mix.

This does not really mean anything, and I am not going anywhere specific, it is just something I started thinking about the other day and it intrigued me. Think about your shirt count, your rotation, and perhaps take note of other people's rotation at work. Good times.

Oh, also, I got a jury summons. Its all electronical now. You fill out the questionnaire on line, then after 5pm on the business day prior to your summons date, you go to their website and enter your "e-juror" code, and it tells you if you have to show up to the court house the next day or not. I always dreaded the old jury summons thing, but last time I got one, I said fuck it, let's have some fun with it, it will be an interesting look into the court system, so I went, prepared to be sequestered for months in some sort of highly sensational murder type deal, and instead, I got nothing. I sat in a room full of people for 2 or 3 hours, and behind the scenes, the DA was trying to get some poor sap to take a deal. The perp finally signed the paperwork, and we were all released. Fail. So, hopefully this time I will get to be on a jury. That would be keen.

Somehow I managed to lose some pictures I took for this post. I had to rebuild my computer recently due to a failing hard drive, so the files may have been lost in some of those bad clusters. Anyway, I still have a few so I'll make due with those. Plus, no one reads this shit anyway, so who cares.

I have recently added a Ruger 10/22 to my gun collection. I figure its great for target shooting/plinking because the ammunition is very cheap. It could also be used for eliminating varmints or hunting small game. I was able to obtain a used model for a great price from a hookup through a friend. The gun was used, but in good condition. The scope was a little outdated and in not so great condition, but this was irrelevant, considering I was unaware a scope was part of the deal to begin with. I wanted to upgrade gun for a couple of reasons. For one, I wanted to increase its usability. Also, I figure if you are going to have one small rifle, you may as well make it look pretty kick ass. As luck would have it, most of the accoutrements for this weapon are all relatively inexpensive. Here is a quick list of the rnhancements I have made.



First things first, I replaced the standard wood stock, with a synthetic Dragunov style stock. This made the weapon lighter, it made it look awesome, and in my opinion, made handling the weapon much easier. The next addition I made was to add a nice shoulder strap. If you ever had to carry the weapon around for any length of time, this would be critical. Next up, I added a muzzle brake. Now, I know this is 100% complete useless on such a small caliber weapon, but it only cost a few bucks, and like I said, I was going for looks to some extent. Go ahead, try to deny that the gun looks wicked with it installed. You can't!

The next items installed were in the guts of the gun: an automatic bolt release and an extended mag release. Since these parts go inside the gun, this was also a good opportunity to completely disassemble the unit, clean it, and gain an understanding of how it all functions. I believe this should be done to every gun you own. Having to break the gun down out in the field, during battle, or perhaps in the dark, or whatever scenario, could be a nightmare if it is the first time you have ever seen inside the damn thing. Here is a look at the guts of the gun once it was broken down.

The auto bolt release essentially just slides into place where the old one was. This allows the bolt to release by simply sliding back the cocking lever, rather than having to operate the seemingly impossible to reach tiny lever in the bottom of the mechanism near the magazine release. The extended mag release to my chagrin ended up being the exact same size as the one that was already in the gun, so apparently someone had previously made that upgrade. Again, only a few bucks so no big deal, and I am sure a fellow gun owner might could use it, otherwise, it makes a great paperweight.

The next thing that would have hindered perfermance was the fact that the scope covered the iron sights on the gun, so if for some reason you were unable to use the scope, you would be shit out of luck without removing the scope, which could require tools you may not have in the field. The solution? See thru sight rings. These rings hold the scope up above the barrel so that you can use the iron sights as a backup to the scope, or instead of the scope if necessary. Additionally, the scope mounted in the rings is well above the gun so that means you can also use the scope as a handle if necessary. dual purpose, yay!

While we are on the subject of scopes, of course, I had to replace the scope. I made an attempt to use a compact style scope, but failed when the scope would not fit properly in the rings when mounted on the gun due to its smaller footprint. I returned the scope and instead went with a standard 3-9, with a 50mm objective. It is a low end scope, but hey, this is a low end gun, I am not trophy hunting or fighting a war, or trying to snipe some fucker at 1000 yards in a 40 mph cross wind in the snow at midnight.

So there you have it. My ghetto rad Ruger mega blaster 2000. fear me.