Merry Christmas!

Yes, I said it!  Merry Christmas!  A bunch of people don’t want me to say that because it “infringes” on somebody else’s delicite “sensabilities”.  Well, think of it this way….

1. It’s my way of saying Happy Holidays (however the heck you want to celebrate this time of year… if, in fact, you can pull that large barbed-wire stick out of your ass long enough to have a little joy in your life!)

2.  What about my right to express the Season in the way I see fit?!?  If someone comes to me and says that I can’t say “Merry Christmas” because it offends them, that’s an offense to me! 

Bottom Line is: Saying “Merry Christmas” is not the end of the world for anyone.  If someone comes to spit in your face, drag you from your home, beat the crap out of you, burn down your house and piss in your lasangna…. that could be considered offensive.

Personally, I’d rather just say “Merry Christmas”.

I am acutally posting a response to another friend of mine’s blog (tb) which bares repeating.

1. The next time you hear someone trying to talk like Borat (because he just saw the movie and has not one original funny bone in his fucking body, but damn-it, he tries hard enough) walk up to him.. laugh long and hard at how funny he’s trying to be… kick him square in the balls… and tell him that you just watched Jackass II and thought that would be funny, too!

2. Your Election Day could have been worse. (tb lives in Minnesota…. ’nuff said) You could have had a bunch of loud, obnoxious demonstrators both for and against Referered Law 6 (the Anti-Abortion Bill that… rightfully so, was shot down like the flying piece of crap that it was) screaming at the top of their lungs all day right by your house and stopping traffice. There were actually more Pro-Lifers than Pro-Choicers there… some having their kids out of school holding signs while the parents toted around large pictures of aborted fetuses (just what I want my child exposed to!).

3. Breathe easy while you can… only a few months before they start hammerig for ‘08 Elections.

On a side note. Wynter had me take the Political Placement Test on-line. As it turns out (by the way I answered all of their politically skewed questions), I happen to be to the left of Gahndi. As a result, replacing all of my wardrobe with bedsheets and eating nothing but celery sticks and chant 20 times a day… and then go kick a bull… in the nuts.. just to bring me back to center!

LLL (Long Live Libertarians)

TJ

I have to start out by saying HOLY CRAP!

The last two weeks have been the angriest that I’ve been in a long time!  I mean angry as in manifest angry.  By “manifest” angry, I mean that it seems like I grow three times my size and (to paraphrase Bravehart’s William Wallace) shoot daggars out my eyes and fireballs out of my ass!i 

Therefore, BE FOREWARNED!

My wife goes to college at NSU.  She has worked hard very hard to get where she’s at and thoroughly enjoyes working with students.  The problem that has come in where every time the term starts, she got a letter from Financial Aid that she’s no longer eligible because of how many credits she’s taken. 

Therefore, she’s alwas written a letter explaining (in small words so as not to fry their poor little brains that bad) that, while she has had a lot of credits in her college career, the majority of them had been paid for out of her own pocked (when she was younger and had money and yodelled more).  They came back and approved her, but they were always late in getting things done… giving excuses like “We only cut checks at a certain time” or “We never heard anything from anyone on your status”.  Most of the people they’re waiting for are (gasp) either in the same building or (double gasp) they share the same email system!

Fast forward to now… September 2006…  My wife’s last semester before she graduates and has the BA to be able to be a full member of NSU’s growing ESL Center or go out into the world for that “better career” that is always touted.  She gets a letter from “the Director of Financial Aid” for NSU stating that “after careful review, they are declining her appeal letter”…. refusing to give her that last bit of help to graduate!  Needless to say, she goes into panic attack mode.  I came home early from work to take care of my son while she goes to the DOFA to find out why and ask what to do from there.

Here’s where things go from bad to fucking worse! Instead of discussing why they made the decision to decline her and help her with her options (the DOFA’s job, by the way), she pushes some papers at my wife and tells her to fill it out and return it the next day.  My wife had questions as to other private loan options or the need for co-signers, but the DOFA refused to answer any questions.  She was rude and couldn’t have cared less of the postion that my wife was in.

So, she fills out the paperwork for AFG and returns it the morning.  Fast forward to this last Tuesday.  My wife finds out from one of the people in that office that is nice enough to show some courtesy that the student loan request had been denied.  She then called AFG and talked to another nice person that did her job just fine, but said that this could have been done much quicker if she did it online! 

So, its 3:30pm… and if my wife doesn’t have some sort of arrangement for fee payment, Finance cancels her registration.  After frantically calling around, she talked to her mom about co-signing.  In order to get the proper forms here, they drove across the state and got here at 3:00am to get this done.   They get the signatures and all go over to SFLC directly to turn it it.  The lady with AFG, Ann, who doesn’t know my wife at all, appologizes for all of the hardship and gives her a hug!  She then says that everything is in order and to check back with Finance on Friday to make sure that all is taken care of and she could get her dispersement check.

All this leading to today.  My wife gets to Finanace, as directed.  Finance has….. NOTHING!  They contact Financial Aid, who don’t have a clue… but call AFG to find out if the check had been sent.  AFG confirms that they sent it.

Bottom Line:  All of this falls on the DOFA, or as I like to call her… the SSIHAPOS (Stupid Stick In Her Ass Piece Of Shit!).  It is all because of her unwillingness to do her job, keep on top of the department that she supposedly heads up, communicate with other departments in the University and keep good repore with the students (whereby keeping a good image for NSU and making sure their students aren’t afraid to come ask questions or come to ask questions only to get the wrong answers and jepordize their college career). 

The other people in that office at least try to do their job with some humanity and respect.  The DOFA doesn’ feel like she needs to because she’s in a position of power, on the Board of Regents and doesn’t have the time.  Guess what:  WRONG ANSWER!  What the DOFA did was TOTALLY UNACCEPTABLE and…. if I have my way (and I think I will) she will be either taking early retirement or boning up on FLIPPING BURGERS. 

It sure the hell will not be somewhere where people’s education are at stake!

PS:  SK…. this means you…. you stupid cow!

Color Me Pissed Off!

TJ

I was going to name this “What I Did This Summer”, but what I’m doing is pretty much going to carry through as long as I can take it.

 A lot of people bitch about the price of gas, the enviorment and that expanding waistline.  I decided to do something about it! And, amazing enough, I tackled all three in one fell swoop!

 I walked.

 Not just around the block or to the store (although I do that, too) almost everywhere.  Now, I will say that there are a few times where a car has to be used to be expedient, but those times have been few and far between.  I walk a little over two miles to work one way… so it takes me about 30 minutes to get where I need to be.  

If it’s rainy (like it is today) I wear a rain jacket. If I’m walking at night, I carry a large MagLite flashlight.  If its windy, I lean into the wind. Bottom line is, there is little reason I buckle and drive. 

Since I started doing this at the beginning of April, I have used my car 5 times total.  Two of those times were to move it so that I could mow the grass around it.  I’ve also lost about 65lbs with all of the walking. 

Also, since I don’t take my car to work, I can’t drive to a fast food joint to spead money for lunch. When I go grocery shopping, I get only what I can carry in a backpack. 

So, far all of you hippie whiners that complain about the envoirment and gas prices as you drive your car to your next rally or Al Gore speach on Global Warming…. my seven words to you are “GET OFF YOUR DEAD ASS AND WALK!”

TJ

Is it just me…. or does it seem like this summer just went way to F&*%ing fast?!?  I know that its the most cliche thing to say this time of year, but doesn’t make it any less TRUE!

Part of it, I’m sure, is all of the Overtime I’ve put in at “Fractured Farms” this summer.  Time flies when your nose is to the grindstone to bring home the bacon.  It does allow me to appreciate the times I did have off, but I just had a lot less of it! 

They are just chocked full of them today! 

Some high muckety-muck from the ACLU is throwing a fit because someone in St. Bernards Parish, LA because someone there, with their own money using volunteer labor (supposedly) is putting up a memorial in the form of a cross with the picture of Jesus on it…. and since this promotes religion and would offend Wiccans, Zen Buddhists and Jewish people displaced by the storm.    (Okay, all the witches, monks and rabbis that are still in New Orleans to give a shit, please raise your broom, prayer beads and dradels).

Now, its not if the president of the parish could just smile and nod or give some intelligent discorse on the subject.  No, he comes out and says just what’s on the top of his mind.

His response to the ALCU? “They can kiss my ass!” (Think I’m making it up?  Look it up here).

What ?!?  What?!?

I was just taking a break at my office and watching the news.  The first news story I hear from the Fairly Unbalanced people is where there was a fire in the oldest hotel in New York in a sixth story linen closet.

The next story covered is with this whole US/France-drafted “truce” to stop the violence between Isreal and Lebannon.  In the response to Lebannon’s less-than-impressed reaction to this effort, our very own “Captain Kangaroo on Crack” UN Ambassador John Bolton said,”Well, this isn’t something we just came up with in a closet….”.  The following image was a burning building in Beirut.

Now, story placement like that can only come from someone who’s tagline is “Eat My Shorts!”

TJ

My good buddy Tim (www.timboerger.net) gave a ringing endorsement about the humble little blog you’ve decided to grace, kind reader… and used the title “TJ & His Amazing Exploding Knees”. 

Now, along with being a Monty Python reference (for all you hooligans supporting West Ham United), he unknowingly touched on an interesting story.  You see, I’ve been in the Martial Arts for several years… and if you know me, you know that I have a certain knack for having “things happen”.  (My wife has likened it to an oversized puppy with large feet that can’t control his tail.)

Anywho, this was way back when I was a Blue Belt in Shorin-Ryu.  We were working on sparring that day.  My Sensei (we’ll call him DB to protect the “innocent”), who was also big into Tae Kwon Do-style point sparring, was sparring with me.  He was really working with us to keep distance between our opponent by jamming the knee up.  The problem was, he decided that he didn’t need to wear a cup.

Two Words: Bad Idea!

Well, here we go…. round and round, up in fighting stance… and DB closes in.  Well, I jammed the knee up to maintain space.  DB stepped into me at the same time, and Voila! TJ’s Amazing Exploding Knees were born… and the point of impact happened to be DB’s left tescticle. This was not just a little graze or nudge, mind you… the knee caused the tescticle to pop like bubble-wrap.

Of course, I didn’t know that’s what the actual damage was until a few days later.  And years later, DB was still able to father children with one working testicle.

They all limped to the left and talked with a lisp, but other than that….

TJ

There are so many levels  of WRONG in the story that I just read.  The credit for this little piece of journalistic brilliance goes to CNN.com.  Let me share the lovin’ with a little bit of running commontary!

Man wins $400K for 10-year implant malfunction

PROVIDENCE, Rhode Island (AP) — A former handyman (maybe he was too handy) has won more than $400,000 in a lawsuit over a penile implant that gave him a 10-year erection (He could have made 10 times that if he just went into porn).

Charles “Chick“(no wonder he had problems getting it up) Lennon, 68, received the steel and plastic implant in 1996(as if getting a Prince Albert wasn’t bad enough), about two years before Viagra went on the market. The Dura-II is designed to allow impotent men to position the penis upward for sex, then lower it(ah, the power of hydralics).

But Lennon could not position his penis downward (they then had to change his nickname Hook or the Angry Elephant). He said he could no longer hug people (like he had “hugging” in mind when he got the Bionic Dick in the first place) , ride a bike (how the hell is he riding the bike?), swim or wear bathing trunks (he could wear a fin-shape cod piece and do the back stroke) because of the pain and embarrassment (you’d think the embarassment of asking for the mini-slinky in the cock and then having to admit to a lawer that it went wrong would be worse). He has become a recluse (as opposed to what he was before Mr. Slinky rusted on him) and is uncomfortable being around his grandchildren (they kept wanting to play Ring Toss with him), his lawyer said.

In 2004, a jury awarded him $750,000. A judge called that excessive (I think the words he used was “Swolen and Overblown”) and reduced it to $400,000. On Friday, the Rhode Island Supreme Court affirmed that award in a ruling that turned on a procedural matter.

“I don’t know any man who for any amount of money would want to trade and take my client’s life(Ron Jeremy, Rod Steele),” said Jules D’Alessandro, Lennon’s attorney. “He’s not a whole person(isn’t that why he turned his dick into a hydralic jack in the first place?).”

A lawyer representing both Dura-II manufacturer Dacomed Corp. and the company’s insurer declined to comment (they were too busy laughing their ass off). Dacomed maintained that nothing was wrong with the implant (it definitely fell under “User Error”).

The implant consists of a series of plastic plates strung together with steel surgical wire, almost like a roll of wrapped coins (gives the phrase “shrunk like a stack of dimes” a whole new “slant”, doesn’t it?). Springs press against the plates, creating enough surface tension to simulate an erection (so he now has a Slinky with a short wick.  Isn’t there a song about playing with a toy on a short string? Hmmmm…) , D’Alessandro said.

Lennon cannot get the implant removed because of health problems (what about the Mental Problem that he had getting a Slinky put in his johnson in the first place? ), including open-heart surgery (I guess there was no hind sight with that choice, what with all the sex that he was having to keep his heart heathy and all that) , his lawyer said. Impotence drugs could not help Lennon (but some WD-40 might) even if he were able to have the device taken out, because tissue had be to removed for it to be implanted(the nightmare of Cyborb Porn).

Dacomed was later acquired by a California company whose sales dropped when Viagra was introduced on the market (I guess Lennon wasn’t the only one who lost his dick). The company filed for bankruptcy the following year.

Hey, maybe he could wite a book about it?  He could get John Wayne Bobbit to consult!

Now let me start by qualifying this: I consider myself a Christian (born and raised Luthern), but I like to think I can see the bigger picture of things and can sniff out the bullshit from the bacon. I happened to glance at CNN today and saw that there was an article on how James Dobson and his group (they call themselves Christians… but don’t let that sway you) come out (no pun intended) and condemn a remake of We Are The World done with kid’s TV show characters such as Bob The Builder, Dora The Explorer, the gang from Seseme Street and SpongeBob Squarepants. The reason the’re throwing stones is because its an effort from the gay community to promote homosexuality to children. (see Christians issue gay warning on SpongeBob video) by that evil yellow holey mass with pants, SpongeBob and his flaming Pineapple.

What’s wrong with this, you ask? PLENTY! First of all, has Dr. Dobson truly have nothing better to do with his time than sit around and try to pick out obscure references out of kid shows and blow them up to stupid proportions? There are two main reasons why SpongeBob has become a “gay” icon: 1. The media in its finite (not infinite because that’s giving them way too much credit) wisdom also had nothing better to do and “outed” the pineapple (not SpongeBob mind you, the Pineapple). 2. According to some market analysis, there is a high percentage of people that buy SpongeBob merchendice that happen to be gay. Now, because of these two very strong and credible sources (taste the dripping scarcasm here), the Religious Fanatics (Dobson, Falwell, et all) condemn SpongeBob because the MEDIA told them that SpongeBob was gay… they never went to the writers or the creators of the show… they didn’t really look into it very deeply.. they just found one more thing to point at and say “See, our children are in danger of everlasting damnation!”

My son watchs SpongeBob on occasion, and I really haven’t seen him try to play dress up and start hitting on the other three year old boys… so either he’s immune to the “evil messages” that shows like that are putting out, he’s smart enough to recognize fantasy from reality (maybe Dobson, Falwell and Robertson… from here on called the Three Stooges… should take notes) and/or THERE’S NOTHING THERE.

If Dobson and the Stooges are, in fact, going to start throwing stones (pun fully intended) on things like this, then they need to come out and condemn the President as being an agent of Satan. Why, you ask? Well, the next news item I heard on the radio… The President today, in celebration on the start of his second term in office, waives to the crowd and both he and Laura Bush through out the Texas Longhorn salute (which is the pinky and index finger pointed straight out and the thumb holding the middle two fingers down, for those of you not in the know or just living under a friggin’ rock). What’s wrong with this seemingly benign gesture of celebration that the University of Texas has held for their own for so many years? Well, traditionally, that gesture is what’s known as the Evil Eye or the Sign of the Devil himself!
Now, this is not a bash against Bush (although I sometimes don’t exactly agree with his tact or timing on some issues). What I am saying though is that if you are going to start looking for obscure little things to condemn people on… then you technically have to look at everything. You’d of course be an idiot with too much time on your hands, but at least you’d be consistant.

So, in short: If SpongeBob is flaming his way to Hell because the media says he’s gay and the Three Stooges are dropkicking him down to Dante and the Crew, then President Bush is right along with him banging his head and flashing the Sign like Rudolph on Christmas Eve.
OR
Maybe, the Stooges should look before they leap and use that mass of jelly between their ears called a brain for once!