And people wonder why I'm cranky

So, I had to take my car to the dealership the other day for a problem that was covered by a recall. As usual, I dropped my car off in the morning and took the dealership shuttle service to work. As the guy dropped me off, he asked me if I wanted to be picked back up at the same spot in the afternoon.

"Yes, right here," I said.

Along in the afternoon, I called the dealership to make sure my car would be ready, and to make sure the shuttle service would pick me up at the designated time and place.  Everything was all set.  At quitting time, I went down to the pickup spot.  A little background:  I work at what is called the "governmental plaza", with several municipal buildings in the same block on both sides of the street.  There is on-street back-in slanted parking (don't get me started), and there are always workers getting picked up/dropped off in front of the buildings in areas designated as "no parking".  I had asked to be picked up right in front of one of the buildings, where no parking is allowed and cars can pull in from the street to pick up or drop off.

So there I was, and ... no shuttle van.  And it was FREEZING out.  I waited five minutes, then ten, then called the dealership.  And got voicemail.  Helpful!

I waited five more minutes, and called again. "Where's the driver?" I asked.  "He was supposed to be here fifteen minutes ago."

"The driver called," the dealership guy said.  "He said he's there at your building."

"WHERE?"  I said.  "I don't see the van, and there's nobody in the pickup/dropoff area."

"Oh, the van wasn't available, so he just took a car over."

"WHAT CAR?" I said.  Now I was getting ticked.  "There's thirty cars out here, and none of them are at the pickup spot!"

"It's a black Hyundai," the dealership guy said.  "The same guy that dropped you off this morning is driving.  He says he parked in one of the back-in spots so he wouldn't get towed."

"Okay, wait a minute," I said.  "(a), If I had known I was gonna have to pick the driver out of a lineup this afternoon, I would have taken a closer look at him this morning, and (b), what am I supposed to do, go car to car knocking on windows to see which one is the dealership's?  People get KILLED that way.  TELL. THE. DRIVER. TO. GET. OUT. OF. THE. CAR. AND. WAVE."

"Well," the dealership guy said.  "The driver says he's in the black Hyundai next to a brown Tacoma pickup."

JESUS FREAKING CHRIST I was pissed at this point.  I scanned the parked cars for a black Hyundai next to a brown Tacoma, found it, and stormed over to the designated car, which was about fifty feet away from where the guy was supposed to be and where I had been standing, and looked in, and there was the driver, listening to the radio and staring idly into space.  He had never looked ONCE at the pickup area to see if I was waiting there (I was).

Because I needed to get my damn car, I kept my mouth shut and accepted the ride back to the dealership. But THIS IS WHY I'M CRANKY, PEOPLE. Stuff like THIS.  SHEESH.

How can people be so, well ...

I was perusing Facebook last night, where one of my Facebook "friends" had posted something that went like this:

"Can't believe the great deal I got today!  One of my neighbors had their driveway sealed, and the contractor had enough sealant left over to give me a bargain price!  Sure, it cost a chunk of change, but it was a lot cheaper than it would've normally been!  Good thing I just happened to be home this afternoon!"

Ummmmm ...

Okay, I'll say it.  HOW CAN PEOPLE BE SO STUPID?!  This scam has been around LONGER than the Nigerian Prince thing, and yet somehow, someway, people are still falling for it.  I just ...

*shakes head*

This is a person who has an advanced degree and a highly technical job with a high-level security clearance.  And yet ... and yet ... some gypsy shows up at her house with a scam story, and she falls hook, line, and freaking sinker.

People, man.  I don't get it.

The Wheel

WARNING:  Spoiler alert!  DO NOT continue reading if you haven't watched all episodes of "The Wheel" yet.

Okay.  We good?  Here we go.

So!  The Wheel is a reality series on the Discovery Channel where they strand six people in six different South American ecozones, moving them around every time the moon changes phase or some other thing that I never did figure out.  So the contestants each start in one zone, then after a period of time ranging from a few days to sixteen days, they're switched to another zone, until each contestant has been in all six zones (unless they tap out).  Last one remaining at the end of 60 days wins.

My first survival show love will always be "Alone", obviously, but this show was interesting, too.  I really liked Lindsay, the "fitness model", bc as much as I wanted to smirk at a "fitness model", she really had her shit together.  She made it to the final three before tapping.

Which left the final two - Luke, who irritated the SNOT out of me by singing hymns and thanking God for all the fish he caught (yo, dude, YOU'RE the one with the fish net.  I'm pretty sure God's busy doing other stuff right now), and Adam, who I called "Bible-lite" bc he, too, was really into God, but at least wasn't as heavy-handed about it.

The season finale was Friday, and ...


... they both "won".  Both Luke and Adam lasted all sixty days, which is amazing.  And the Grand Prize was

... nothing?  They just got to ... go home?  With bragging rights, I guess?

WHAT. THE. HELL.  These dudes just about starved themselves to death in some godforsaken climates ("Mountain Zone", anyone?), and they didn't even get any MONEY for it?

Booo.  Hisssssssssss.  That just don't seem right.

So! The weekend!

Let's see ...  Friday night I got in quite a heated phone argument with the woman who does the scheduling for the clinic that is doing the altering of the barn cats.  Long story short, she wants to get all the cats trapped and altered on a schedule so compressed that it's simply not possible unless she wants to come and trap the cats HERSELF, which she is not about to do.  I may have made a breakthrough yesterday in getting slots in a clinic closer to home, and I'm keeping my fingers crossed, because this woman is frankly kind of a loose cannon.  A very RUDE loose cannon. *ahem*

(And let me just say, nutjobs are the norm and not the exception when it comes to rescue.  I don't know why it attracts so many crazies; it just does.  This is the SAME woman who insisted we could trap the cats several days early and just ... leave them in the live traps until date of surgery.  Ummm, NO, honey, NO THAT IS NOT HOW WE DO IT HERE IN CIVILIZATION. *cough*)

So!  Saturday morning it was off to the adoption center for my weekly cleaning shift.  An acquaintance of mine who is a refugee from a different, yes-crazy rescue was interested in volunteering with her teen daughter, so they came in to help me clean (SUCKERS!) (kidding), and to meet some of the other volunteers and the dogs and cats and rabbits currently in residence.  Hopefully, they'll be coming back again.  While I was there, another friend of mine dropped off some old blankets and comforters (and oh boy, do I have a story THERE!) for me to use in trapping and transport, and then in the afternoon I was running errands.

But I almost forgot!  While I was as the adoption center, two adult brother cats came in, a beautiful long-haired orange and a gray tabby, both Hemingway cats, and names were needed. We all thought as hard as we could, until I blurted out "Happy and Scrappy", and Happy and Scrappy it was.  I'm sure that given more time, someone could have come up with something much better (Pawzilla now comes to mind, ha), but their intake files were being prepared and they needed names RIGHT THEN.   Dear Happy and Scrappy:  Don't worry, I'm sure your adoptive families will come up with the perfect names for you.  Oh! and I spent a great deal of time with one couple who had adopted a kitten from the center a couple of months ago and were now looking for a companion kitten (We always suggest that people adopt kittens in pairs, and they NEVER LISTEN - ha)(they very often end up coming back, though, for Kitten #2), and by the time I left in the afternoon, they had filled out their paperwork and were getting ready to take home another cat.  Woot!  (Technically, I'm just there to clean, and the center isn't even open to the public in the mornings, but if I am cleaning the cages out on the store floor and someone has questions or wants to see a particular cat, I always indulge them if I can, and that is how Weasley the orange and white kitten got himself a home on Saturday, and joined his sister Hermione.) (Insert back-pat here.)

The plan WAS that the tree was coming down on Sunday, but then I got a call from another friend on Saturday night, wanting to know if I could do lunch on Sunday.  This is a friend who I do not see nearly enough of, so I said sure, the tree can wait.  hahaha we'll see if it still has any needles left on it by the time I finally take it down. :)

Sunday was lunch with my friend, and she is also active in rescue and was interested in seeing the barn cat setup, so I called the barn owner and we headed up there, as I needed to pick up some carriers anyway.  I showed my friend the barns and the trap setup (I leave the traps in place, just not baited or activated, so the cats get used to them being around)(if there is someone reading here who is active in trapping and thinks that's a BAD idea, please let me know!), and the barn owner invited us into the farmhouse for a visit.  And this is when in a turn of events that it would take WAY to long for me to explain, the barn owner and my friend ended up singing a rousing rendition of My Melody of Love.  In Polish.

Well, I mean, anything else was going to be a letdown after THAT, so Sunday afternoon was just spent doing all the weekend odds and ends that had to get checked off the list, and before I knew it, the weekend was over.  And the tree is still up.  Maybe next weekend?

Hell, *I'm* not drinking it.

SO!  How about that election, eh?  *SIGH*  Just keep him away from the nukes, fellas.  Just keep him away from the nukes.



A couple of weeks ago, I did a favor for a friend.  Knowing I was a beer drinker, she brought me over a case of beer as payment.

Unfortunately, it was Genny Light.

Genesee beer, for those unfamiliar, is a regional beer with a pretty ... distinctive taste.  I could best describe it as "skunk beer", aka "beer gone bad".

But some people love it!  People do buy it!  It is stocked in every store in the area.  It is fairly popular, although probably because it is usually the lowest-price beer in the store.

I am FAR from a discriminating beer drinker.  My beer of choice is Milwaukee's Best Light, Busch Light, or hell, even Natty Light in a pinch.  But ... Genny?

NOPE.

Thinking, "well, it's been many years since I've had a Genny, maybe they don't taste as bad as I remember," I decided to give it a shot.  And on the theory that all beers taste the same anyway after the first couple, last Sunday afternoon, I drank a couple of Milwaukee's Bests, and then cracked open a Genny.

NOPE.  Nope, no how, no way, I'm sorry, but that stuff tastes like SH*T.  I got about halfway through before I had to pour the rest of the can down the sink.

I put the rest of the Gennys back in the case, taped it up, threw it in the back of the car, and started making inquiries.  I could not find one. single. person  who wanted that case of Genny, which I was willing to gift away for FREE.

Free beer!  And nobody wanted it.  THAT'S how bad Genny is.

So.  In an act of desperation, I brought the case of beer to work, and set it out off a corner of the parking lot that gets a lot of neighborhood foot traffic. 

It's been there for two days now.  I'll let you know if it ever moves on.

I may be odd, but at least I'm not THIS odd ...

Check it out:

House for sale in Avon, CT

I first saw this on a friend's Facebook page, and someone commented, "Well, it IS Avon," which makes me wonder what is in the water in Avon.

Holy cow.

A Whole Nother Level

I collected Breyer horse models as a kid.  I was horse-crazy, and before my parents got me a real horse, the Breyer models helped fill a void in my little preteen soul.  Plus, I liked playing with them.  I finally sold the last of them off in my moving sale a few years ago, although I did keep two of my favorites.  Ah, nostalgia.

But these people?  These people are crazy:

72 Hours in Model Horse Mecca 

Holy cow!

Is this what's done, now?

So there's this blog that I check in on once in a blue moon.  I don't check in more often because it's very much a "mommy" blog, one of those where seemingly every action of every member of the family is documented obsessively with photoshopped pics, so meh.  But  I checked in recently for the first time in a few months to find that the woman's husband had passed away from an aggressive form of cancer, leaving her to raise their five young children.

So terribly sad.

And the woman had had a couple of friends of hers take photos of the funeral.

Lots of photos.

All skillfully taken, artfully lit, and filtered.  Including photos of the children grieving, and the woman sorrowfully bending over her husband's casket.

And the woman put the photos up on her blog.

And I just ... is this a thing, now?  Taking photos at funerals?  and then photoshopping the photos to get the best shot?  I mean, I know they photographed caskets, etc. in the early 1900s, when "post-mortem" photography was a creepy thing (confession time) (they sometimes posed the corpses to make them look alive, oh YUCK)  but now?  Today?  And then posting them to the internet, where any schmo, myself included, can look at them?  why?

Please tell me this is not a thing, now.  Please.  Because looking at the grief-filled pics of a stranger's funeral seems an awful lot like rubbernecking at a traffic accident, i.e., not something to be encouraged.  And now I feel petty just for commenting about it.  Ick.

Right up the wall

The first time I saw this University of Phoenix commercial, I was hooked.  The woman's voice is distinctive, and the melody, from The Wizard of Oz, is instantly recognizable.  The visuals and storyline are interesting; people doing what it takes to get a college degree.

But then I started listening to the lyrics.  "A degree is a degree"?  Um, no, considering that if you buy a degree from the University of Phoenix, you're paying many times more than what the same degree would cost at your local community college.  "You're gonna want someone like me, but only if YOU have a brain"?  Again, no, if I were an employer, I would cast a long side-eye at a University of Phoenix degree, mainly because they've got a bad reputation for price gouging.

Sadly, the only people likely to be taken in by this commercial are the same ones portrayed in it; low-income workers looking for the quickest way to a degree and vulnerable to high-pressure recruiting tactics.

I googled "University of Phoenix scam" and up popped story after story of people ripped off by the school.  The most heartbreaking were ones like these:

“I was former student of UOP or Appallo and I went to get a anther copy of my tarnscript for my current school I have been at for over year and they will no release my transcripts. I ask them why. They say that I owe them 2800.00 dallors. I said how could that be when you collected well over 7500.00 and I drop classes and come to find out after I withdrew they still collect money and still saying I owe them money. So I contacted a attorney they will be hearing from them.
They also sent me to collection and the school I am going to know will not grant Finical Aid untill i get those transcipts. One semister from getting my LPN.”

Oh. My. God.  This illiterate person was one "semister" from getting an LPN.  Holy.  SH*T.  I'm sorry, but that is f*cking FRIGHTENING.

Now when I see the commercial it makes my blood pressure rise.  Hmmm, maybe the University of Phoenix should consider a tie-in with a high blood pressure medication manufacturer ...

Facebook. Hoo boy.

Yesterday, an acquaintance re-posted a thing on Facebook.  One of those annoying re-posted ... things.  I don't know what you call them. Those sayings that get re-posted all over the place.  This one was all, "My parents spanked me when I was a child and I turned out okay!  Kids NEED a little discipline.  Lack of discipline is what's wrong with our country today!  Spanking is not abuse.  Share if you agree."

I'm paraphrasing, here, because I'm not about to go digging through my feed to find that piece of work again, but that was the general gist.

Um.  Man oh MAN, I wanted to reply:

Physical abuse is not okay.  If you messed up at work, would you think that a logical reaction would be for your boss to put you over his knee and spank you?  No?  THEN WHY IS IT OKAY TO HIT A KID?

Do you think it's okay to hit the family pet?  No?  THEN WHY IS IT OKAY TO HIT A KID?

You know, I was never spanked as a child.  Not once.  My parents put up with a lot of age-typical bullsh*t from Toddler Me, loved me dearly, and as I grew older they made clear what their age-appropriate expectations were of me.  If I got out of line, all it took was a look from Dad or a word from Mom and I was so embarrassed that I had disappointed them that I corrected myself.  And really, I don't know if they had an actual No Hitting policy or if it had more to do with the fact that my parents were not the touchy-huggy physical contact type in general, but regardless, I was never hit as a kid.  And somehow I came out FINE.  Go figure.

And you know, I used to be of the "spanking is NBD" persuasion.  But after enduring domestic violence myself (no, not recently, many years ago), I just can't justify hitting other people anymore.  LEAST OF ALL CHILDREN.

I didn't say anything in reply to that post last night from my acquaintance.  It wasn't going to change her mind.  And, I mean, that is the same person who says she likes Trump because "he says what he thinks", so ugh, consider the source. You say tomato, I say tomahto, whatevs. Plus, having never been a parent myself, I suspect I may lack a vital perspective when it comes to issues involving offspring.  But more and more, I AM SO HAPPY I HAVE THIS BLOG RIGHT HERE, because this is where I go to vent about Facebook.  Ha.


And now I'm curious - Where do you stand?  Spanking, right or wrong?

Oh my God, f*cking facebook.

Okay, first of all, this post has some un-bleeped f-bombs.  Because, facebook, what the FUCK?  You've been warned.

Yes.  Facebook.  I'm on it, because a lot of the rescues I'm involved with have active fundraising pages, etc., there, and yeah, it is a good way to kill time and see how messed up other people are.  ha.

But sometimes it comes back to bite you in the ass.

Today, a rescue acquaintance I am "friends" with was posting about the heartbreaking decision to put her beloved cat, who had been ailing for the past year, to sleep today.  And while this is a woman with whom I never interacted on facebook, mainly because her political views are diametrically opposed to my own, I did post a couple of condolence comments on her posts.   Because I've been there, and I know how hard it is.

And THEN, I got home from work, and I was SO EXCITED because my little hibiscus tree, which I had almost given up on this past fall thanks to a dramatic full-leaf-drop, was blooming.  And I posted a pic of it on facebook, with a little backstory about how it almost didn't make it and I almost threw it out back in the fall, and the woman mentioned above, who NEVER comments on any of my posts, jumped in with "See?  U never gave up, and u kept it alive".

OH FUCK.

Maybe this is all in my head, and I SURE HOPE SO, but I'm afraid that she may have somehow (incorrectly) connected the decision to put her cat down with my (totally lighthearted) post about keeping an apparently-dying tree alive.

FUCK.

Here's the thing.  I am "friends" with a TON of people on facebook.  I get a mega-million posts in my feed every day.  If I started trying to tailor my own posts to avoid possibly saying something that might inadvertently upset someone reading MY stuff, I wouldn't be able to post ANYthing, which, frankly, would be just fine, but still.

what to do what to do

I replied to her comment,  saying that I probably SHOULD have thrown the tree out except I'm kind of a hoarder, haha.  And then I said that I was sorry for her loss, and that the last, best thing we can do for the cats in our care is help them when it's time for them to go, and that I hoped she'd take care of herself.

GOD.

So, yeah, massive facebook clunker, now I feel AWFUL.

but then!  BUT THEN!  It gets better.  Or, you know, WORSE.

Because right after THAT whole disaster, a post of a SISTER of mine (no, not Texas) shows up in my feed.  She'd posted a picture of the Bush family in evening attire, with the caption, "Remember when our presidents were classy?"

WHAT THE FUUUUUUUUCK

I commented.  I HAD TO.  "What the hell does that even mean?," I said.  "That the Obamas aren't "classy" because they're black?  Jesus Christ."

Oh my GOD.  Social media.  I gotta get offa there.  CHRIST.

But wait! Look!  My hibiscus:

At least I can post it here.

In the local paper

Local guy, who I'm pretty sure last got laid ... never.

Yes, evidently that's supposed to be a Star Wars costume.  According to the story, he has several.

How's that workin' out for ya, dude?

Big Brother is here, and his name is Payless

I was out running errands the other day and decided to pop in to Payless.

"Good morning!", said the sales clerk.  "We're having 30% off everything today!  And lots of items are on sale!"  and blahblahblah as she went on to enumerate all the great! specials! they were having that day.

I did find a pair of cute summer shoes for seven bucks, and poked around a little longer, and then went to check out.

"Your phone number?"  asked the clerk, as she rang up my shoes.

"No, thanks," I said.

yeah yeah yeah, I understand why they ask for the phone number (because corporate says), but I also don't always feel like giving it out.  I'M NOT A SHEEPLE, DAMMIT!  Ha.

"Oh!" the clerk said.  "Well, if you don't give me your phone number, I don't get credit for the sale, and corporate needs to know that every single person who comes in makes a purchase, and even if it's a family of eight, if they only buy one pair of shoes then I get seven "no sales", and ...

blah blah blah she went On and ON and ONNNNNNNNN.  I didn't give her my phone number, out of flipping SPITE at that point if I may be honest, and she finally sold me the damn shoes.

okay, I left the store with two thoughts:

(a) That sounds like a terrible place to work.

and

(b) Regardless of (a), that was one annoying clerk, and I'm sorry if I took bread out of her kids' mouths by not giving her my phone number, but jeez louise, SORRY NOT SORRY just SHUT UP AND SELL ME SHOES.

Holy cow.  I'm turning into a right bitch in my old age, ain't I?  IT FEELS GREAT.

Random

I know, I know, pickings have been slim around here lately - I apologize.  I've just been so dang BUSY.


Checking the mailbox and getting a letter from the local Probation Department makes your day more interesting in a hurry.  Sometimes I wonder if my mailman is judging me based on my mail. Thanks to the drunk driver hit-and-running me last fall, I've received several letters from the District Attorney and now the Probation Department.  I feel like running out to the mailman and yelling, "It's not me!  It's the dude that ran into me!"  Ha.


Somebody I know posted on Facebook about "my granddaughter, Alyvia", and I was thinking, okay, how do you even pronounce that?  Is it allie ... allie-via ..." and then the light bulb went on.
Olivia.
Jesus Christ.
If you want to name your kid Olivia, SPELL IT F*CKING "OLIVIA".
Gah.


Awesome Halloween costume idea:  Dress plus gold medals from Dollar Store = Caitlyn Jenner.  You're welcome!


I'm STILL trying to figure out the Maserati I saw parked at the local WalMart not long ago.  I'm pretty sure that if I owned a Maserati, the LAST place I'd be shopping would be WalMart.  Just on general principle.


Saw this little dude in the driveway the other night:

I posted it on Craigslist and Facebook, but nobody replied - guess somebody got tired of their Easter present.  Hopefully he'll find a home in one of the barns in the area.


I know I'm not alone in this, but I detest it when someone uses "lol" on line.  I just ... feel like asking, "Really?  You really laughed out loud at that?"  Because I doubt it.  I mean, I *do* laugh out loud, I did it just last night while watching old John Belushi SNL skits, but there is NO WAY everybody is lol-ing as much as they claim to be.  Bah.


The Cake Boss makes ugly cakes.  There, I said it.


That's my random for now!  How about you - got any random?

In the obits

So, the family members were going through photos of the deceased, looking for an appropriate one for the obit, and they picked ... this one.

Well okay then!

Put some clothes on, grandma.  Sheesh.

Bad reviews of books I loved

I picked up a book off the "new books" display at the library the other day because it looked interesting, and then I went to Amazon to read the reviews.  I've found that it can be easier to just zero in on the one-star reviews first, because the five-star reviews are WAY too common to be reliable.  I've read some real stinkers that were rated five-star on Amazon, I'm just sayin'.

But then I got wondering, what would the one-star reviews of books that I LOVED look like?  Hmmm.

Boy's Life by Robert McCammon is probably my favorite book EVER.  Let's see what the one-star reviewers have to say:

"This is one of the most pointless books I have ever read."

 "This is the most boring book I had the misfortune to read in high school."

 "please do not read this book."

Oh dear.  Tell us how you REALLY feel, one-star reviewers!



The Story of Edgar Sawtelle by David Wroblewski:

"Do not waste your time on this."

"The worst book I ever read!"

"I wish I had never read it."



Okay, okay, so let's try a book that EVERYBODY loves.  To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee.  SURELY no one can dog on Mockingbird, can they?

"It was one of the most boring books I ever read."

"If you suffer from insomnia, read this book."

"To Kill a Mockingbird is about as deep as a rain puddle."


I ... I guess there's just no accounting for taste.  Huh.

Dear Kirby Vacuum salesman who knocked on my door last night:

The short answer is "No, thank you". The long answer is:
 
Really? In this day and age? When internet fact-checks are readily available? (See also: sellers of Mary Kay, Amway, diet-supplement-of-the-moment, etc.) You are involved in an MLM, aka Multi-Level-Marketing, aka Pyramid scheme. The ONLY people who make money in the company you volunteered for are at the very top. And yes, I use the words "volunteered for"  instead of "are employed by" , because not only will you not make minimum wage, you will probably end up in credit card debt after your little stint with this "amazing opportunity" is over. Please google the name of the company you are "working for" plus the word "scam" or "MLM" to find out exactly what you're getting into. (for Mary Kay, the best website is pinktruth.com). The products you are trying to sell are outdated and incredibly overpriced, and again, the only people who will make any money from this are the ones above you in the pyramid. Dude, it's now 9:30 at night, and you're STILL in a van with a bunch of other "employees", being shuffled from neighborhood to neighborhood, shilling a product that nobody wants. Trust me: You can do better.

Facebook Etiquette

So!  Over the past few days, a couple of sticky situations have arisen on my Facebook page.

First off, no, believe me, you ain't missin' nothing.  About the only thing I ever post there is pics of whichever foster kittens I'm tending at the time, to try to stir up interest in their adoptions.  I also link to stuff on local rescues' sites, blah blah blah, all kittens all the time.

It's like the Crazy Cat Lady's Facebook page.

But!  Over the weekend, my boss (yes, that boss, the racist one) sent me a friend request.

Umm ... When your boss wants to "friend" you on Facebook, is there really any way to say no?

yeah, I didn't think so.

And besides, like I said, all I ever post there is kitten pics, so who cares, right?

But!  I also received another friend request, from a guy who is "friends" with the woman who runs the rescue for which I volunteer.  He sometimes posts kitten pics, blah blah blah, on the rescue's page, so I thought, oh, okay, and accepted the request.

But then I went and checked out his page, and he's this hard-core right-wing nutbag.  Like, posting really obnoxious crap complaining about ... well, about stuff that right-wing a**holes complain about.  Welfare, "Unamericans", the whole nine yards.

Jeez.

So, I adjusted my settings so that his crap won't show up in my feed.  Problem solved!

Except now, he has started commenting on some of the stuff I put up. See again:  All kittens, all the time, and all he's commenting is stuff like, "Cute kittens!" or "It must be fun fostering!", but now that I know his politics, I'm just, like, all ... ick.

So I'm just "liking" his comments, without commenting back, and I don't really feel like I should unfriend him, because he's involved with the rescue, but


*sigh*

Facebook.  It's complicated.

In my little town

What happened in Charleston last week is terrible.  Innocent people gunned down in a place that should have been a safe haven. It's a tragedy.

And it made some bad memories come back, because a few years ago, it happened here.

I remember listening to the radio that day, and hearing the first confusing reports of something happening downtown, and hearing the sirens and seeing the police helicopters overhead from my office, across town from the Civic Association.

And I remember that it made the national news that night, and briefly the night after, and then my little town was left to pick up the pieces, and hold the church services, and plan the memorials.

So while I think the ongoing coverage in Charleston is certainly somberly appropriate to such a tragedy, I guess I just don't understand why the coverage is so overwhelming, in every branch of the media.

Is it because Charleston is a big city, as opposed to my little town?

Is it because the murderer is a white supremacist, and the victims are black, and it occurred in a place with a history of racism?

Is it because the murderer in my little town was Asian, and most of the victims were recent immigrants, and thus ... I don't even know ... somehow less "deserving" of media coverage?

I don't know.  Personally, I'm glad that the media didn't converge on my little town back then, at least not for more than the first day.  I think there's something to letting towns grieve on their own.

But as I leaf through page after page of coverage in the newspaper, and see story after story after story on TV and on line, and listen to continuing radio coverage, I have to wonder where all the media were back then.

Back in 2009. In my little town.

Thanks, Neighbor

Turns out that the woman who (allegedly) drunk-drove into a couple of utility poles (after attempting to pass someone in a no-passing zone), thus cutting power to a good chunk of my town on Sunday night, lives right up the street from me.

I think pitchforks and torches are in order.  Ha.

The scary thing is, according to news reports she was heading AWAY from her house when she crashed.  Late-night Easter Sunday beer run, perhaps?  Sheesh.  She's got a couple of young kids, too - the big-screen TV in their living room, which is clearly visible from the street, is set to a cartoon channel every morning when I drive by her house on my way to work.  Way to set a good example for your kids, lady.

Am I being judgmental?  OH YES I AM.  Because of her, a lot of people, including the elderly, had to go without heat on a night when the temps went down into the twenties.

Screw you, neighbor.  Screw you very much.