February 2008

Sunday Open Trackback

rmiles7721February 17, 2008Site News

This is the Sunday edition of the open track-back post. Open track-backs are a great way for you to share and show up your work. Just send a ping back to this post and your trackback will show up in the bottom of this entry.
As I mentioned yesterday, I am currently in the Bahamas. Hopefully on the beach and half drunk next to the beautiful wife. I hope you are all enjoying the weekend as much as I am and will see you folks in a couple of days if they can drag my ass back on the airplane.

Linkfest Haven, the Blogger's Oasis

You can also go check out the link above and join in the Linkfest, where you can send your ping to many different blogs and get noticed by folks that may not have checked out your site before!
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Saturday Open Trackback

rmiles7721February 16, 2008Site News

This is the Saturday edition of the open track-back post. Open track-backs are a great way for you to share and show up your work. Just send a ping back to this post and your trackback will show up in the bottom of this entry.
I should be in Nassau right now vacating so anything getting posted most likely will have been scheduled ahead of time. Please feel free to post some interesting links for everyone!

Linkfest Haven, the Blogger's Oasis

You can also go check out the link above and join in the Linkfest, where you can send your ping to many different blogs and get noticed by folks that may not have checked out your site before!
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Friday Open Track-Back

rmiles7721February 15, 2008Site News

This is the Friday edition of the open track-back post. Open track-backs are a great way for you to share and show up your work. Just send a ping back to this post and your trackback will show up in the bottom of this entry.

Linkfest Haven, the Blogger's Oasis

You can also go check out the link above and join in the Linkfest, where you can send your ping to many different blogs and get noticed by folks that may not have checked out your site before!
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REALLY Time To Go…

rmiles7721February 15, 20085Travel

I think I may have found the cause of my blog not wanting to rebuild the main page. It was the “most viewed entries” widget. You may not have seen it because the MT wouldn’t reindex the main page with it included in the sidebar. whoduthunkit.

Anyway, I did manage to squeak in a few minutes this morning. I woke up at around a quarter ’till four and the wife had already been awake for an hour. Pre-flight jitters or just looking forward to the weekend in the Bahamas? I don’t know but I have the prescription for Xanax in my overnight bag. Just as soon as I get cleared of security I’m taking one of those bad boys and as long as I don’t start chasing peruvian midgets through the airport we’ll be alright. If I do by chance see one, I have a call to make (and you know who you are).

I think the girls are looking forward to the weekend. Michelle is coming to look after the house and the girls and provided they don’t whine her to death they will all have a good time. Most likely they will be very good since she’s not their parent. That’s the way that shit works.

I can’t remember if I have mentioned it or not but this they have been planning on re-aligning the districts and their stores. It is a highly feared and anticipated ‘event’. It’s actually been about four years since they changed the stores around other than my promotion and I just picked up the same stores the last guy had. I almost feel as if I have dodged a bullet on this one. One of my managers has been promoted and while I am out of town this week he is running my stores. As of Wednesday he picks up the Mirror Lake store and my slowest store. That’s actually a good deal. I lose money on that one and the manager there is the one that hates my guts. I am keeping my busiest store. That’s the one where the girl is in the hospital. I am somewhat upset because they are most likely going ahead and putting her on leave of absence and putting another manager in there, probably the third district manager, who has been demoted. I am getting the Temple store back and one of the stores just to the west of we. Now all three of my shops are within seven miles of me and they are all money makers. Except for the fact that one of the girls has some serious issues I picked up the best district out of the three. I must have gotten seven phone calls last night about it after the meeting.

Enough about all that crap. I am off work for the next six days now and looking forward to it. Just as soon as I get finished typing I will go shower, shit and shave and start getting ready. Hell, I would leave now if I though I could leave the girls at the school. They would probably frown on two little girls standing outside in the Elementary school parking lot at 5 a.m. though.

So has anyone heard that Greene County is going to start segregating their schools next year? Not by race though, by gender. They will be separating the boys and girls and hope to see a drastic change in test scores as well as teen pregnancies. Here’s a tip you may not have heard. They’re not getting pregnant while they are at school. Doh! I know it’s unheard of but most likely it’s when they are skipping or out doing other things. Not only that but you know what they say about absence making the heart grow fonder. That and the fact that if you tell a teenager they can’t have or do something you are generally creating a reason to go looking for it. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a rise in more than the boy’s pants by this time next year as the rate of teenage pregnancies gets higher. Then again, what the fuck do I know, I’m not an edukashun expert like the people making these decisions.

I guess that’s all my ranting for today. Time to start getting ready.

Have a Great Weekend!

rmiles7721February 14, 2008Travel

I’m off to bed. We are getting up early tomorrow and I may post a bit but probably not. We are spending the weekend in Nassau and I don’t know that I will have a chance to get online although I am sure to have some good pictures to post when we get back Sunday evening.

I do have the usual weekend stuff lined up though. Some open trackback posts (if you get thrown in the spam folder I’ll fix it Monday), Saturday photohunt, Green Thumb Sunday, that sort of stuff and if my brother is cool he might even stop by to say hello, although I haven’t had the chance to ask him so I don’t know what he’s doing this weekend.

Getting Packed and Ready

rmiles7721February 14, 2008Travel

I ended up not going down to Grady to see my friend. They won’t let anyone in as she spent the morning in surgery and is in ICU waiting for another surgery. Her husband said she is doing terrible. That sucks. I ended up calling my bosses’ boss to see what we are going to be able to help them out with and am just going to have to wait for an answer on that one. I looked at my local paper’s web site and haven’t seen anything there

I napped for awhile and then went and picked up a new pair of jeans and a shirt for the trip. Unfortunately none of my jeans fit me comfortably anymore. I think that perhaps the Marine snatched the wrong pair before he went to California and I need at least one pair of jeans for the trip and a sleeved shirt for dinner one of the nights. Nothing fancy certainly but it can’t be jeans and a t-shirt. I am just about ready to go, just need to gather a few more things.

I didn’t realize that you can’t do the online check-in for international flights, so we are going to have to push it and be driving away from the school by 6:30 tomorrow morning so that we have a couple of hours before the flight. It will take at least an hour to get there at that time of the morning and our flight leaves at 9:40. Kind of pushing it but the airport shouldn’t be too busy at 7:30 in the morning.

Thursday Thong

rmiles7721February 14, 20084Site News

Today is the first day of my vacation and hopefully by this time tomorrow afternoon I will be on the beach in the Bahamas looking at the real thing.

Oh by the way, Happy Valentine’s Day, here’s a twofer.

Also by the way, NSFW (as if anything with THONG in the title would be considered safe)…

🙂

(more…)

Selfish Bastard…

rmiles7721February 14, 2008Site News

Have I told you lately what a self-centered selfish bastard I am?

No?

hmm.

My phone rang about a quarter ’till twelve last night and I checked the caller-id. It was one of my waitresses. I ignored it, figuring if it was something important they would call the manager. Ten minutes later the phone rang again and it was the store where she works (the first one was from her cell phone). I ignored that one as well.

I’m on vacation dammit!

So I check my voice mail. The waitress is blabbering about a cop being in the store with one of my bank deposits. My manager had had some sort of accident and they needed to turn the money over.

I lay there for a couple of minutes.

I could either call and take care of the problem and most likely have my vacation canceled on me or just let them continue calling up the food chain of command. Someone else could handle it.

I’m on fucking vacation.

So I call the store and end up speaking with the officer from the Carroll County Sheriff’s Department. My manager had been on the way home last night from handling shift change with her three boys in the car when a drunk driver hit her head on. I got dressed, cursing drunk bastards the entire time

Her boys are all OK and they life-flighted her to Grady hospital. The cop seemed to think she would be OK but she had broken both of her legs and her pelvis. He didn’t seem to think that the drunk driver was going to survive and said that if you had looked at the collision you wouldn’t think anyone could. She got lucky I guess.

I got to the store shortly after midnight and took care of the money and then drove down to Grady hospital, which is about forty minutes away, after speaking to my boss. I let him know what had happened and told him that I would most likely be late this morning but to call me and let me know what to do. He told me they would be fine for the week and to go ahead and stay on vacation. I made sure he repeated it again.

I never made it to the hospital last night. I know (or at least used to) how to get to Grady from the north side of town but have never driven there from the south and didn’t see any signs so I drove a couple exits past and turned around to get off at the correct one. Once I got off I ended up making a right and got fucking lost. I drove around and saw it above other buildings several times but never could make it to the hospital. Courtland, Harris, Piedmont Avenue. Fuck. It’s right there but I couldn’t find the fucking building or parking area themselves. Bear in mind that I had been up almost 24 hours by then and I moved out of Atlanta nineteen years ago. Three cars is heavy traffic for me. Somehow I ended up finding 85 south again and went the fuck home.

I have to take Riley to the vet this morning and then I will drive back downtown to find the hospital in the daylight after a quick stop at Google Maps. I feel dumb as hell sometimes. Heck, there wasn’t even a cop to be found to get directions from.

Wednesday Hero

rmiles7721February 13, 20089Site News

Cpl. Ryan J. Buckley

Cpl. Ryan J. Buckley
21 years old from Nokomis, Illinois
2nd Battalion, 506th Infantry Regiment, 4th Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne (Air Assault)
June 26, 2006

 

“His platoon leaders described him as the type of soldier every leader wants: A very talented, dedicated soldier, who did everything that was asked of him.” That’s what Lt. Col. Greg Butts, commander of the Army’s 2nd Battalion, 506th Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division, said about Cpl. Ryan J. Buckley at his memorial service. “I’m glad I could come here. It was an opportunity to recognize one of my great soldiers.”

Cpl. Buckley lost his life on June 26, 2006 when an IED detonated near his Humvee during combat operations in Baghdad. “I held him while he died,” Spc. Richard Morris, a fellow soldier who was wounded in the attack, said after the service. “He was my best friend. This nation has lost a hell of a soldier.”

Ryan Buckley, a 2003 graduate of Hillsboro High School, was attending Lincoln Land Community College in Springfield in March 2004 when he left school to join the Army. He had told his mother on 9/11 that he planned to join the military to defend his country. Jennings Carter, who recently retired from the Army, was the commander of the Litchfield Army Recruiting Station when Buckley signed up. Carter said Buckley was an unusually cheerful young man. “Every time we saw him, he was always smiling,” Carter said. “Before he went to Iraq, we saw him a few times. He was always happy. He would come by and tell us what he was doing.”

Jean Buckley, Buckley’s aunt, said he was always a responsible young man, who took his school work seriously, as well as his role in the school bands. The talented French horn player was awarded the John Philip Sousa award his senior year as the outstanding band member.

“He was always a protector,” Jean Buckley said. “It’s such a sad time. We’re so thankful for the Ryans of the world. I appreciate all the veterans and all they’ve done for this country.”

Cpl. Buckley was posthumously awarded the Bronze Star for his service in Iraq from Nov. 30 to June 23. Bronze Stars were presented to his wife of one year, Tina Buckley, his mother, Sally Nation, and father, Dennis Buckley.

These brave men and women sacrifice so much in their lives so that others may enjoy the freedoms we get to enjoy everyday. For that, I am proud to call them Hero.

We Should Not Only Mourn These Men And Women Who Died, We Should Also Thank God That Such People Lived

This post is part of the Wednesday Hero Blogroll. For more information about Wednesday Hero, or if you would like to post it on your site, you can go here.


Internet Freedom Preservation Act

rmiles7721February 13, 2008Politics, Technology

I received this email earlier while at work it best to just reproduce it here in it’s entirety. If you are in favor of the act make sure and contact your congressional representatives.

 

Last night, a bill was introduced in the U.S. House that would stop Comcast, Verizon and AT&T from controlling the free flow on information on the Internet.

The only way we can stop these gatekeepers is if we all take action to support this crucial legislation:

Tell Rep. Phil Gingrey to Support Internet Freedom

In 2006, your voice helped stop mighty phone and cable companies from gutting Net Neutrality. In 2007, you pried open their cell phone networks and gave users a choice.

This year, we’re going to stop Internet blocking and censorship once and for all.

Why This is Important: Reps. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Chip Pickering (R-Miss.) introduced the “Internet Freedom Preservation Act” (HR 5353) to stop relentless corporate attempts to set up roadblocks on the information superhighway.

It guarantees Net Neutrality by restoring it in the foundation of communications law. This bold move promises that the public — not phone and cable companies — will control the fate of the Internet.

The legislation also calls for a nationwide series of public hearings before anyone in Washington hands these gatekeepers and their lobbyists more power. (Read more about the bill here)

Take Action Now: Save the Internet

How Far We’ve Come: In 2006, more than 1.5 million Americans called on Congress to keep gatekeepers off our Internet. Last year, more than a quarter-million people sent comments to the FCC and opened up cell-phone networks to user choice and innovation.

This new bill was made possible by our amazing grassroots movement. SavetheInternet.com has brought together Democrats and Republicans, consumer groups and small businesses, bloggers and video gamers, in a new bottom-up majority that’s shaking up the status quo.

What You Can Do: For too long, communications policymaking has been rigged against us. But by taking action to support this bill, you’re telling Congress that high-priced lobbyists will no longer set the agenda.

Tell Rep. Phil Gingrey : ‘Support the Internet Freedom Preservation Act’

The purpose of the Internet is to give power over information to everyone. The role of our elected leaders is to protect our basic right to communicate from those who want to take it away from us.

We’ve started a new chapter in the fight for an open Internet. We realize that it takes more than one piece of legislation to reverse decades of corrosive telecom policies.

But with this bill — and your help — we are on our way.

Thank you,

Timothy Karr
Campaign Director
SavetheInternet.com

P.S. Bloggers, activists and Internet experts are logging on to the Free Press Action Network to discuss Net Neutrality, an open Internet and people-powered broadband policy. Join the discussion at http://www.freepress.net/action/