Aww! Johnny Doesn’t Go To College!

We wonder where personal responsibility is going. We’re wondering why kids today don’t know that actions have consequences. Well, this story is an example that illustrates that some parents are letting those things go down the tubes.

A bunch of students just had to get into ivy league schools any way they could. So, after careful planning, and over the course of several days, they broke into the school, and the teacher’s filing cabinet, and stole a whole bunch of exams. When this was discovered, because they broke in, the school called the police, and now the kids are facing charges. But this is too much for their parents, who say they shouldn’t get criminal records because it will hurt their chances to get into their precious schools. Boo friggin hoo! Maybe they should have thought about that before stealing the tests and cheating. And who would be the first ones crying foul if other kids cheated and got in ahead of their precious little shnookumses? These same parents!

Now the parents are scrambling, trying to reduce the criminal charges and saying that the school should have handled this internally to protect their beloved little kiddy widdies from the police. No! That’s not how it works. If you break in somewhere, you get charged. I love how one parent says they shouldn’t get in trouble for making one little mistake. Little? It’s a little mistake to orchestrate and carry out several burglaries?

I love the fact that, on top of what the police have charged them with, the little darlings have also had sanctions from the school. Anyone found to have been involved are getting 0 on any exams where they may have gotten stolen information, and guidance counsellors are going to add a little note to their college applications saying that they cheated on exams. And the parents don’t think the school could have stopped them from getting into college, eh?

I know, when I was a kid, if I did something wrong, my mom wanted me to face the full consequences of my actions. If I had broken into the teacher’s desk and stolen tests, she would have marched my ashamed little ass straight into the police station to make me tell them what I’d done. There would have been meetings, I would have had to face the music as she put it.

The sad part is in this case, the school, the police and the prosecutors are trying to be as fair as they can. It’s the parents, the first people to teach these kids about personal responsibility, who are trying to help them run from it.

Maybe this is the best thing to happen to these kids. Maybe the little cutey-pies shouldn’t go to college yet. Maybe they need to grow up first. Hell, it sounds like their parents need to grow up too, but maybe the kids can reverse roles and lead by example.

Highway to What the Hell?

Do you think it’s a good idea to let guys who are in prison own a car and drive it from prison to their paid work every day without supervision? England does, at least the officials do. A bunch of people are pretty upset about it though, understandably so. With all the problems they have with prisoners escaping, it’s a wonder this plan is a go. But then again, they’re trying to cut down on overcrowding in prisons, so maybe it’s all part of the plan.

I’m Sick of This Bullshit

Whenever I think about riding this post, words fail me. I’m reduced to saying, over and over again, these people are morons!
You remember my feelings on guts, dont you? If not, there’s the most recent eruption, complete with links to earlier spewings. There, history lessonover.

Now, they’re at it again. How did Shakespeare put it? “It is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.” I know, that’s not about the same thing, but it fits pretty well here.

Last week, on the day of action for people with disabilities, GUTS decided that their contribution would be to dump cow dung all over the front of our current MPP’s office. They claim it was her campaign office, but in true GUTS fashion, they failed to do their research and dumped it at her constituency office. Way to go. They said they did this to, how did they put it? “express our concern that the Ontario Liberal government has done very little for those with disabilities.”

And throwing a heap of bullshit really expresses concern. No, it only makes the MPP want to do even less for people with disabilities.

That’s not all these so-called advocates have done. In the past, they have protested in front of our MPP’s home on the weekend, and essentially sent her death threats! Why haven’t they been prosecuted? That is not the way someone representing a group of people, or any decent citizen for that matter, should behave. The only change they can hope to effect with that kind of intimidation is a change of their criminal records to reflect their latest idiocy.

As a person with a disability, here is my personal message for those at GUTS. Stop speaking for me. You are doing more harm than good by doing this, well, bullshit. You make me ashamed that you are trying to represent me. I have a voice, let me use it. I sure as hell don’t need you doing it. The more of these stunts you pull, the less help we as people with disabilities will get. You are not speaking for the under-empowered. You are undermining what power we may have. Go do something useful.

The Trixie Evolution Continues

I just love writing these updates. I think they’ll be neat to look back on as time goes on. So here are some new things I’ve noticed about Trixie.

She’s very very very picky about her toys. She will not play with the same toy twice in a row. There are certain toys for certain times, according to the Trixie way of thinking. If I offer her a toy she does not approve of, she sniffs it and walks away. But she doesn’t go far, as if to say, “try again.” I pull out another toy, and she’s happy as hell to take it. But she has no problem playing multiple tug games a day.

While we’re on the subject of tug toys, the toy is still alive. It’s looking like it’s been tugged on a bit, but it isn’t showing signs of dying any time soon. It’s funny when she starts to play. She doesn’t just run with me and the tug toy, she bounces! Straight up! When she gets excited in harness, sometimes I can feel her bucking and bouncing too. This usually means there’s something exciting across the street that I should be aware of, or it’s food time and she knows she’s almost home.

She loves our downstairs neighbour. If I get off the elevator on her floor, Trixie knows exactly where we’re going, and wastes no time to get there. It’s like she’s spring-loaded. It’s cool, because when I first got Trixie, my neighbour was afraid of black dogs, so I was afraid I’d never walk with her again. But Trixie has broken her of her fear.

They talked so much about how long and hard we would have to work to communicate with our dogs. But Trixie makes it easy. She’ll tell me if she wants to play, she’ll tell me if she needs to relieve and we’re not going anytime soon, she’ll tell me if she’s completely full of energy and could use a walk. She’ll tell me if she has to relieve when we’re walking. Sometimes, we get our signals crossed, but not very often. Most often, I just love watching her tell me how happy she is with that wagging tail!

I meant to put this next thing in my last installment of Trixie’s brain, but I forgot. It was so funny that I have to put it here. She ran into a whole new thing the other day. She met a radio-controled car. It was funny to watch her thought process. “Is it a car? It’s awfully small. Do I run away from it? Towards it? It has flashing lights and a beeping horn. What do I do? Aaa!”

I eventually got her to turn and face it and have a good look at it. Then I asked the person to drive it out of our way, which they did, and then she walked right past, completely unphased.

I think she was a tracking dog in a previous life. One time, Steve was hiding on me, so Trixie just walked right into the room where he was and found him for me. Busted! Another time, Steve and I were goofing around and Steve grabbed me and made it look like he was dragging me somewhere. Trixie started chasing both of us! It was hillarious!

She really cares about me. Sometimes, I can be a bit over-dramatic when I’m talking to someone. The other day, someone said something really disgusting and I slumped over as if I were fainting. Poor Trixie got all worried and I had to tell herI was ok. When I got my hair cut, I had to have her a bit of a distance away from the chair so the lady could work her magic. For most of the session, Trixie just lay there like a little angel. Then, they broke out the blow dryer! In a flash, she got up and ran over to me, as if to say, “You’re not hurting mommy, are you?” I told her it was ok, and got her to lay down. But it was so cute to see how much she looks out for me.

It’s amazing what a difference I can see in Trixie’s work. She’s always been good, but every day, she gets even better. I had a lot of trust issues to work through with her. Babs put me through the wringer, so Trixie had to help me get over my fear that she would do the same. It wasn’t something I thought consciously, but it was under the surface. For a long time, I was nervous taking her into restaurants, following people if I was in a place where I didn’t know where I was going, I didn’t feel that sense of freedom everyone talked about. In a way, I felt more restricted for a while. Now all of that is melting away. She’s really good at following people if we have to, I know she’ll stop at steps, she really looks out for me. I don’t have to put the gental leader on her nearly as much. I only have to do it when temptation is staring her right in the face. She’s awesome!

I sometimes wonder who has been trained to whose needs. I have become a bit of a doggy robot. When I first get up, I feed her right away. Then, it’s down to relieve. When I come back, I groom her and do her obedience right away so I don’t forget. AT the specified times when I give her water, feed her, take her to relieve, etc. I will get the urge to check my watch, and of course, it’s that time, so I’ll stop what I’m doing and go do what has to be done. But I figure it’s better that way than me having to remind myself constantly of what has to be done.

I’m such a goof. Time is measured in doggy things. Tomorrow, I will give her her sixth heartguard pill, apply the sixth tube of flea and tic-preventative stuff, soon she needs new food, new toothpaste and her toenails need clipping. It’s really weird to see physical signs of the passage of time in her doggy things. Her food and toothpaste are almost gone, again, the thing of baby wipes I use for cleaning her ears is definitely less full, toys have died, but that roll of poop bags still looks like a monster! When that thing dies, we’ll know time is marching on for sure.

I think that’s about it in the Trixie department. I should go, my doggy radar says it’s watering and relieving time. Must do that now…resistance is futile!

Um Yeah Ok

When I wrote the
post
last month about the crazy man suing Michael Vick for “$63,000,000,000 billion” dollars, I had no idea how crazy the guy actually was.

It turns out that Jonathan Lee Riches, the man who filed that suit, has also filed at least 35 others, all of which are riddled with similar insanity. Here’s a
link
to a Wikipedia entry that details the ones that are known [yes, there may be more]. Among them are these 2, both filed on the same day.

On July 16, 2007 Riches filed a lawsuit against the Mossad, Central Intelligence Agency, and Larry King Live claiming the “defendants are in a vast conspiracy to hijack my torso, three toes, and my constitutional rights and ship them to a secret headquarters in Concord, NH.” Riches also alleges that the “Mossad told me personally on April 20, 2007 that they are going to hang me on a cross next to Jesus Christ.”, that “Larry King Live is a voodoo witch doctor who stole my identity on February 25th, 2003 and purchased lead paint, Chips Ahoy!, Planter’s Peanuts, and Ziploc bags under my identity. Distributed them to the CIA to microwave test my DNA”, and that “The CIA on January 4, 2006, plead allegiance to Al-Qaeda..” The court refused to docket the case because the court did not receive a filing fee from Riches.

Also on July 16, 2007, Riches filed a lawsuit against the Federal Judicial System, all United States Federal Judges, United States Marshals, and Tiger Woods. This lawsuit claims that “Tiger Woods is touring the PGA golf courses with my identity in his pocket. He will not answer my prison phone calls – this continues today.” and that “U.S. Marshals laugh at me through the prison ventilation system.” In the lawsuit, Riches misspelled ventilation and marshals.

Here’s hoping the guy gets the help he needs before he decides to sue me, Google, News of the Weird and Wikipedia for making him look like a goof, and perhaps even for subjecting him to ridicule through the microwaving of his identity and credit cards via the internet and President Bush who, it should be noted, used to sell goats to Paris Hilton in exchange for books about knitting. I made that last part up…I think.

Travel Insurance Hell is Over!

Well, it looks like my travel insurance saga is over. After the clinic sent me notice after notice demanding to be paid, and finally threatened me with a collection agency, I called the travel insurance folk. They told me that they had been sending the clinic in San Rafael letters, but they hadn’t gotten a response. So I got on the horn to the clinic, was put on hold, and left several messages. Something I said must have rung a bell in someone’s head, because the notices stopped coming.

A few weeks later, I called the insurance people again. To my surprise, they told me everything was settled! Apparently, at the end of August, the people in San Rafael sent them the info they needed, and they paied the bill. It would have been nice to receive a letter from either the insurance people or the clinic. It would have been especially nice if the insurance people would have thought to let me know, since we’d been having trouble paying this baby off for about four months. A little communication would have been just dandy. But oh well. At least it is settled. I wasn’t sure if I could believe them because they have trouble getting their story straight. I’ve been told that they’re trying to work out a discount, they’re waiting for info, that they’ve received nothing, and now things are settled.

It’s been about a month and a half since I’ve gotten an angry letter, so I guess I’m in the clear. But I’ve learned a few things about travel insurance and American health care.

  • Facilities can refuse to take travel insurance!

  • Getting the bill paid is a painfully slow process.

  • Even if you just end up leaving messages, it must help somehow to get your problem straightened out, so don’t feel like leaving messages is getting you nowhere.

  • Companies are really good at communicating when they want something, but they suck at it when it’s time to let you know things are all good.

Ug. Hopefully I don’t have to deal with travel insurance for a long, long time. At least this story had a happy ending.

The End Of An Era?

The United States Supreme Court
has agreed to hear a case brought by 2 Kentucky death row inmates
who say that lethal injections are cruel and unusual punishment and are therefore in violation of the Eighth Amendment of the country’s Constitution.

I’m not sure how much chance they have of winning, but it’s definitely far from impossible. And in any case, the issue raises quite a few interesting questions, mainly, what would this mean for the future of the death penalty in America?

If lethal injections are cruel and unusual in their current form because they inflict unnecessary pain on the recipient, what would the alternative be? There’s no way to ensure with absolute certainty that any death is sufficiently painless, because neither you nor I nor any scientist has ever been able to wake up a freshly dead person and ask how it felt when he went.

And if injections do not and cannot meet constitutional standards, what about other popular methods like the gas chamber or the electric chair? I’ve never been in one, but I feel pretty safe assuming that the chair would suck big time, probably more than being shot full of chemicals. And the gas chamber, while not quite so obviously violent, has also been known to have its own issues. So with that said, if the current case is a winner, it would clear the way for challenges of these other methods as well, and with precedent set against painful deaths, they would likely be struck down too.

That leads us back to the main question of what happens to the death penalty. if a painless death can’t be guaranteed and that’s the standard by which everything is being judged, it follows that the death penalty in and of itself is cruel and unusual and must be ruled unconstitutional. I know that we’re likely years away from that point because there surely will be many appeals, but it’ll be interesting to see how things ultimately play out.

The Short Circuit Isn’t On The Board.

A girl walks into an airport with what looks like a circuitboard and thinks it will be perceived as art? Ok then. How stupid is she? Surprisingly, she’s smart enough to be an MIT student in electrical engineering. But something obviously isn’t wired up right in her brain.

Star Simpson, 19, wandered into Logan International Airport in Boston to pick up her boyfriend. But she decided she would look cool if she came in wearing a black hoodie with a circuit board and 9 lights attached, and clutching a handful of play-Doh. Can you see any problems there, chief?

The police sure did, and had she not followed their instructions, no neurons would be firing in her brain anymore. But she’s lucky to be alive, locked up and charged with possessing a hoax bomb device. And she didn’t even have enough brains to just plead guilty and be done with it. How do you plead not guilty on charges of having a hoax bomb when you’re arrested for wearing wires? If it wasn’t a hoax, was it real?

In what realm does wearing a wire-covered hoodie qualify as art anyway? Even if she somehow managed to not hear about September 11 2001, Richard Reid trying to light his shoe, liquid explosives, and all the other terrorist events, how did she miss the lecture about not talking, joking, or even insinuating anything about bombs near an airport, let alone wearing a fake one? I’ve known ever since I was little that airports are understandably twitchy about anything that may have the potential to go boom. So where has she been? Well, if she gets charged, we know where she could be for the next five years. She’ll be showing off the art of a striped uniform from inside prison gates.

A Bad Trip

Wow. This horrible chain of events definitely would qualify as a bad day as the story put it. Our unknown star of the show from Val Des Monts, Quebec, had a little too much crack cocaine. So, down he went into a violent seizure. This upset his pit bull tarrier, who promptly took a bite out from under his ear. His friends, all high, decided this had to be stopped. So they picked up a baseball bat. But they didn’t connect with the dog, they smacked our helpless seizuring druggy square in the face. Eventually, the dog stopped feasting on him and he was taken to hospital. But things didn’t stop there for our friend. How did the story put it? Oh yes. There it is. “the nurse noticed something abnormal in the man’s intimate parts,” and pulled out a nice bag of crack cocaine from his, well, crack. There was 10 grams of it, enough to give him a good ol’ charge of trafficking. Oh yeah, and he was also fined for having a pit bull. That’s when you know your day sucks.

I think this guy’s bad day beats the calamity of errors committed by the guy who flashed a gang sign at the wrong car. That sucked, but I think this is worse.

And While I’m Ragging On Beeping things…

Wow. I’m just on a ragging on things theme aren’t I?

This weekend, Steve, Barbie, and I got talking about something that always made me raise my eyebrows whenever I thought about it. The practicality of the beeping baseball.

Yep, I said beeping baseball. A long time ago, someone thought it would be great if blinks could play baseball by being able to hear the ball. Great! So, they put something in it that you could hear. Super! What was that thing? A beeper! Uh-oh!

Think about that. You’re going to hurl a ball which encases a piece of electronics through the air, then hit it with a large wooden stick, and wait for it to plummet to earth. How long do you think the electronics will survive? Every beeping ball I ever saw was lucky if it made it two throws. Upon dying, it would:

  • cease to beep mid-course through the air.

  • cease to beep when it contacted whatever it hit.

    • or

  • make its final death cry in the form of a beep falling in pitch the way Pakman sounds when he dies.

At first, I thought that I must have had a bad ball, and maybe the design was flawed in the early 80’s when we tried it, but since our horrible experience left us saying fuck beeping balls, we never bought another one, they got better and we just didn’t know it. But Steve and I got talking about it, and he saw the same thing years later! So they must still be plagued with the same problems.

Barbie thought you were just supposed to roll the ball, so I went out in search of a product description for a beeping baseball. ILA has a whole section of beeping balls, but none of them are baseballs! There are balls that are designed to go in the water…the water? Hmmm. There are volleyballs, soccer balls, all manner of balls designed to be subjected to rough play, but no baseballs!

So, off I went to google, trying to find one. All this because of a conversation about beeping baseballs. I couldn’t find people selling them, but I did find out that you don’t roll the ball.

Beep baseball is a form of baseball adapted for the visually impaired. The game is played with standard softball bats, a 16-inch circumference ball, which emits an audible beep tone, and two bases (48-inch pylons) which emit an audible buzzing sound.

Two bases? Hmmm. And how do those survive after being stomped on, slid into, all the things that baseball entails. Just imagine if the bases decided to die! Just picture the strains of “He can’t find Home! The base isn’t buzzing anymore!”

But I found something else out that shocked me. There is a National Beep Baseball World Series! They cannot be using the same balls as we used. They can’t! They just can’t! They’ve been doing this since 1976! It can’t be possible! If they are using the same balls, how many balls would they have had to have laid waste to? How much yelling of “Christ! Where did the beep go? Did Joey get it? oe! It just fell over there! Run! Run! Get it!” would there have had to have been over 31 years?

I saw something that made me very excited. I found a beep baseball podcast! I was hoping and praying that there would be recordings of beep baseball games so I could hear the number of balls that met their unfortunate end in a given game. But alass, all I found was a horrid butchering of Take me out to the ballgame that I can only hope against hope was a joke, a lot of badly constructed sentences because I think the poor soul who made this thing kept forgetting what came before his links, and podcasts of…interviews! booo!! I wanted games!

Now I’ve written myself into a corner. What exactly is my point? I wanted to laugh at the concept of the beeping baseball. that’s how this started off. But as I looked for more info, I was left with a million questions. What does the Beep Baseball world series look like? Do they actually use the same balls Steve andI saw? If so, how has it survived 31 years? Was there a big secret we weren’t let in on? Are there actually beeping baseballs that defy common sense and survive the abuse of a baseball game? So many questions, hopefully there will be some answers!