.: bistan.net :.

So far, 2010 has not been a great year . . .

In January:

• Kimberlie’s mother died

In February:

• Mackenzie gets kid-mono.  Between the two of us, we spent almost two weeks away from work, doing nothing but this:

  

In March:

• We went through a tough eating-out hiatus.
• T-ball.  Need I say more?

In April:

• Tristan learns to stick things where they don’t belong.
• Tristan has a major accident during a day trip.
• I went to the doctor (for the first time in 20 years).

In May:

• A house catastrophe.
• No raises at work.

In June:

• I ended up in 2 graduate classes during a 4-week summer semester.  Of course, I ended up with A’s, but it was a tough month.
• Mackenzie ended up sick (and very irritable) for half of our trip to Philadelphia.

And now, July:

• The cat chewed up my Macbook power cord.
• We lost our “free” cable and I my iPhone and digital camera went for a swim . . . in the same week.
• Ants seem to invade a different room of our house everyday.

Of course, there are things that have been happening (or not) all year:

• The stock market has really sucked for the last few months.
• I’m 31 and still not rich enough to retire.
• Publisher’s Clearinghouse still hasn’t knocked on my door.

Don’t get me wrong.  I still love my life.  But even number years just never work out for us.  2008 was equally as bad.  2007 and 2009 were fabulous.  Let’s hope I can make it through the next five months alive!

I just want to add a few thought on the oil spill:

• First of all, it is NOT a spill.   Nothing was spilled. It is a natural substance bubbling up from under the ocean floor.  God made oil, not man.
• Nobody intentionally caused the disaster.  It was an accident.
• Due to the complex distribution network of petroleum projects, it is NOT POSSIBLE TO BOYCOTT BP.  Oil is used in plastics, jellies, paints, detergents, film, ink, etc.  The gas stations are owned by small businessmen who are simply marketing the BP brand.
• We all share responsiblity.  BP would not be drilling at such depths if we weren’t so addicted to oil.
• Did they ignore proper procedures? Does it matter? We ALL ignore proper procedures at work.  That’s life.
• Do we owe the gulf coast anything? No. Their economies have been stimulated by oil companies for years.  That’s our money already going to support them.

If you look at company stocks in the years after disasters, you’ll see why I will be buying BP stock while the price is low.  Just look at how Exxon stock performed in the early 90′s after the Valdez spill.  Other disasters produced similar results.

Earth Day is right around the bend, and everyone seems to be on the green bandwagon lately.  It seems respectable to want to save the planet.  I’m all for it when the price is right.  I’m just not going to buy a “green cleaner” when the regular cleaner is half of the price, especially when the regular cleaner has been used for generations without the earth imploding.  I did make a choice to buy a vehicle with better gas mileage, although that was more for financial and political reasons, so the environmental reasons are just icing on the cake.

Businesses are jumping on the bandwagon as well.  Hotels don’t want to wash your towels and sheets every night, but again, that’s probably more for financial reasons than for environmental reasons.  Other business decisions, such as recycling are practical and noble. There is, however, one place where businesses should not “go green”: the restroom.

My biggest pet-peeve about the whole thing is when paper towels are eliminated in favor of the air dryers in restrooms. The paper towels that most public restrooms have are the brown ones anyway, made from previously-recycled materials.  So by providing them, you aren’t completely anti-Earth.

First of all, they are loud and they scare the crap out of small kids.  Trust me, I know.  If the kids were to dry their hands before using the restroom, it would make them wet their pants.  It’s a good thing they wash their hands afterward.

Yesterday, we visited Stone Mountain and Tristan had an accident.  I’ll spare you the details, but let’s just say that the accident was so bad that I lost my lunch during the clean-up process.  That is not an exaggeration.  Some messes can not be cleaned up with cheap toilet paper.  When we left, that restroom stall was thoroughly violated.  I honestly would have cleaned up the mess had paper towels been around.  Unfortunately, some minimum-wage employee had to do it.

I was once, in my grocery store days, the guy who had to clean up comparable messes.  I always wondered how someone could “violate” a restroom like that.  Now I know.  In this case, it’s because someone tried to go green.

I took a little heat, on Facebook and at work for the last post. I certainly wouldn’t have posted that video on YouTube if Tristan had been injured.  So to make amends, here is a typical Saturday in the life of Tristan.

10:00 AM: T-ball game.  Tristan batted twice, scoring once.

5:00 PM: After riding 1.5 hours in the car, then sitting through a long country wedding, Tristan dances with his sister at the reception.

7:30 PM: After eating a fabulous amish dinner at Yoder’s, but right before feeding a goat, Tristan kisses the goat.

Don’t worry, Sunday will be just as busy. We’ll relax next weekend.

I snapped this photo this morning from the roof of the law school.  It is one of the highest points in central Georgia and it is always fun to go exploring on the roof or up in the clocktower. 

The face is permanently “stuck” at noon (or midnight).  Of course, we are going to try to “fix” that this summer.

This is where I’m going next Tuesday. Can you guess why?

As a hobbyist photographer, I always want the best picture – especially when my child is performing.  We learned a hard lesson at the preschool open house last year: Don’t get there on time . . . get there very early!  So this year, we did.

Here is a question for the reader(s): Suppose you arrived somewhere an hour early to get a good seat.  You rushed home from work, rushed to change clothes, and had to entertain two small children for that entire hour.  All of that just so you could (hopefully) take some decent photos of your three-year-old child singing carols.  After sitting for 45 minutes (and trying to entertain those two small kids), the room is about 90 percent full.  There are several seats in the back and one seat next to you. A man with a cane sits in the empty seat next to you.  His overweight wife then asks you to give up your seat so that she could sit next to her “handicapped husband”.  What do you do?

Now I certainly have ranted before on this issue.  I hate it when handicapped people attempt to exploit their disability to gain something.  I politely suggested that they sit together in the back, however, the thoughts going through my mind were much more colorful.  Throughout the entire evening, the man kept making remarks to his wife about how sorry he was that she didn’t have a seat and how inconsiderate people can be.  I bit my tongue . . . so hard.  I haven’t had a reason to show anyone at Mackenzie’s preschool the ugly side of Jonathan and I certainly didn’t want to do it at the Christmas Open House.

Should handicapped people have reserved seating at the front when there are clearly no visual or hearing disabilities?  Parking is one thing, but seating is another.  Like you, I may have left my “What Would Jesus Do” bracelet back in the nineties, but I would have given up my seat to a blind or deaf person.  I will not, however, give up my seat to someone attempting to exploit their perceived handicap.  Notice I say “perceived”, because I doubt that toting around a cane makes you handicapped.

So that’s what Jonathan did.  What would you do?

Why is everyone so surprised that Tiger has been cheating on his wife?

Tiger Woods is a human being — a member of the animal kingdom. He has the same non-manogamous desires as a dog or a rabbit or a . . . tiger?

While some humans, in fact, have the ability to demonstrate self-control, the vast majority do not. Let’s take food and exercise for example — 64% of adults in our country are obese. No self-control there. Then there is alcohol, drug, and prescription medication addictions . . . no self-control there. Oh yeah, credit card problems and other money issues . . . no self-control there either. I could go on and on.

And today, over 50% of marriages end in divorce. The vast majority of those divorces are the result of infidelity. On top of that 50%, not all instances of discovered infidelity end in divorce and on top of that, I would bet that a good number of affairs are never discovered. So take the facts above — humans do not possess self-control and infidelity is rampant.

Now add in the temptation factor. Look at rock stars, politicians, and athletes and their groupies/fans/advisors swarming around them constantly. Lots of temptation there. And being on the road constantly away from his family probably didn’t help the situation.

If the math equation isn’t enough so far, add in the clubbing.  There are three reasons to go to clubs — to people watch, to be seen, and to hook up with people.  Enough said.

I’m not condoning his affairs, but seriously people . . . you’re surprised?

Now watch, the media that made him is the same media that will dismantle him. Let’s just hope he can still hit a golf ball after this.

5 - AM wake up
9.1 – miles of running
15.5 – times around the block to make 9.1 miles
80 – minutes it took
4 – minute shower because running made me late
3 – times Tristan was told to not get a warning at school today
13 – mile drive to work
350 – suite number
5 – servers rebooted after 8AM because running made me late
1 – poptart
2 – bottles of water
2 – missed calls
1 – voicemail
4 – napkins to clean up Fred’s spilled coffee
5 – day weekend coming up
79 – messages stuck in the exchange queue because Microsoft sucks
25 – dollars to Amazon for completing a vendor survey
51 – videos encoded and uploaded
7 – sent emails trying to clear up email issues
1000 – things I would rather be doing

I can’t think of many phrases I hate hearing more than “But I just . . .”.

Any sentence that starts with “But” is most likely an argument or a whine.  I don’t want to hear either. If the phrase is injected in the middle of a sentence, the person saying it most likely assumes that you don’t want to do something, yet is still attempting to justify their request.
Argument example:
Homeless man: “Got a dollar?”
Me: “No”
Homeless man: “But I just need . . . ”

Whine example:
Tristan: “Can I stay up 10 more minutes?”
Me: “No”
Tristan: “But I just . . ”

Assumption example:
Law student: “I know you’re at lunch, but I just need . . .”

I really can’t think of an example where you could use the phrase “but I just” in a statement that I want to hear.

“I’m sorry, but I just . . .” (they aren’t really sorry)
“I know I shouldn’t, but I just . . .” (they knew they shouldn’t)
“I don’t mean to interrupt, but I just . . .” (they meant to interrupt)

I initially planned to write more about my least favorite phrase, but I just have better things to do.