Good Start

Today was a good day for a few key reasons:

1) I jumped a pay grade at work (a raise!)
2) I went to the dentist, and had no cavities
3) I got a free Starbucks coffee and coconut chocolate chip cookie at the dentist
4) I saw the Transformers movie

I was greeted by someone this morning having a panic attack about what happened to the stock market last night. That is probably THE dumbest thing to worry about, in my opinion. Worrying, while not a good way to fix anything, will certainly not fix Wall Street. So I don't let it bother me. I think I pissed someone off by saying "It's not affecting my day to day routine, so it doesn't concern me". That might sound immature and brash, but honestly...does it? If what happens on Wall Street doesn't stop you from getting a paycheck and buying groceries or paying for shelter...what's the difference? All I know is I live happier not concerning myself with it, so I'm good.

While at the dentist, I saw Sarah Palin on TV. I like her. She expressed her view on a key issue, and said she was "unapologetic" about it. That was a nice way of telling people too bad if they didn't like it. I also like her because people seem to be picking on her for the dumbest things...and that gives her more credit in my book.

PS...why don't I see any dirt on Barak Obama on the magazines in the stores? So far all I see is McCain and Palin bashed for *gasp* having a pregnant teenage daughter!

True Quote

From Grandma Jeanne:

The following is the 2007 winning entry from an annual contest at Texas A&M University calling for the most appropriate definition of a contemporary term.

This year's term: Political Correctness.

"Political Correctness is a doctrine, fostered by a delusional, illogical, liberal minority and rabidly promoted by an unscrupulous mainstream media, which holds forth the proposition that it is entirely possible to pick up a turd by the clean end."


...How true.

Yo No Comprendo

From CNN.com

God on Money and in Pledge

I don't understand. Is it really that big of an issue? I think this country has more important issues the Supreme Court needs to spend their time on.

Ohio's Best Kept Secret

This weekend I met Matt and Jerry (Matt's friend from work) in Sandusky, Ohio so we could go to Cedar Point on Saturday. I got there first on Friday, and saw our hotel, the Howard Johnson. Hotel is relative, dump is more like it. We ended up not staying there because we didn't want our stuff stolen. We stayed at a Days Inn which was nicer.

If you know me, you've probably heard my theory on Ohio more than once. Everyone I've met from Ohio, for good or bad, has some sort of oddity about them. You could say that everyone has an oddity, but people from Ohio have exacerbated oddities that are 99% of the time weirdness. It's hard to put in words. If you go to Ohio, or just meet some people from Ohio you'll know what I mean. I think one of the reasons is that people are confused. Ohio is not really northern, not really midwestern, and not really southern. So, you have this mesh of people who are hillbilly/midwestern/northern...everything. It's so weird. Men and women love large, strange tattoos also. Tattoos like Seagrams bourbon on the back of your neck, or a 6" Dopey on your calf.

Cedar Point was a lot of fun though. We got there at 8:45 am and the park opened at 10:00 am. We ran down to Top Thrill Dragster (shown above) but it was closed. We then rode as much as we could. The lines were really long for a lot of rides and it was crowded but still so much fun. Finally, around 8:00 pm we saw the Dragster running, so Matt and I got in line. Jerry didn't want to ride. We waited about 2 hours for a 17 second ride but it was definately worth it. Going from 0-120 mph in 3.6 seconds then being blasted toward the sky and cresting at 400 feet is something everyone should experience once in their life. It was amazing.

Busy

Work was actually very busy again today, I barely got to eat lunch. After work I had to go to the Secretary of State to get my Michigan driver's license. It was weird because they gave me a sheet of paper, and said my license would be mailed to me. I also registered to vote.

I heard a conversation at the Secretary of State's office today that I thought was crazy. A guy behind me yelled to the guy about 2 people ahead of me "Hey Mike". I guess they knew each other. The guy behind me was large, I'd say he weighed atleast 350 lbs, conservatively. He then said "Yeah I applied to Chrysler...they wouldn't hire me because of my physical" then makes like a "sheesh" noise. His friend just goes "oh, yeah". The guy then said "yeah they called back and said I didn't pass my physical because of high blood pressure, and I was overweight...what do they expect, I'm not 25 anymore!". I thought to myself "and you being overweight is who's fault...?" Then, there was a TV in the office and a Ford commerical came on. He just yells out "Look how stupid, Ford spends their money on THIS...they should show a commercial of them laying people off!". After that, he said to his friend "yeah, Jerry got fired because he wouldn't do something that wasn't in his job description...that's not fair". I was just thinking to myself how lazy and annoying this guy is. I heard on NPR that the average US Autoworker makes around $70.00/hr when you take into account their benefits, etc. This guy just epitomized what NPR was saying...most of these people are just used to making exhorbitant salaries and getting away with whatever they want. They're going to have to get used to the new way and deal with it if they want a job. I don't have much sympathy for people like him.

AXIS

I had so much fun tonight. Today was fun, it was the last day of CATIA class. I got a little diploma saying I completed 40 hrs of training. After class, I drove back to Novi and got my haircut, and went by Meijer's to pick up some fruit for tonight.

Tonight was the first get together for "AXIS" which is Community Bible Church's group for single 20-30 year old professionals out of college. Since being in your 20's, out of school working, is actually a weird thing...I promise you. You're not quite in college with that mindset where alcohol is a new thing and taboo, and you're not exactly that 40 year old with 2 kids either. So, I think (and the others agreed) that we fall between the cracks sometime. This group was created especially for that purpose. Tonight the get together was at a guy named Fred Smith's house, who lived in Fowlerville, about 30 miles away from me. The group consisted of Katey, Dan, Robert, Fred, Olivia, Pamela, Daniel, and me. We had a cookout and then played spoons, a card game. It was a lot of fun. I'm actually going to host the next one, in August, at my apartment. They were all great people, really fun and easy to talk to and get along with. Katey is who started it, and she's really just a good person, I can tell. Some people you meet just have this aura about them and she did. She had a laugh and smile that just brightened up the room. Actually tomorrow I was invited to go out with Dan and his friends so that should be fun. It's nice to meet people in my general age group.

Dan is moving to Indiana this coming week, he just graduated from Michigan State as a mechanical engineer and will be working with Cummins. Robert just moved here not long ago from California and is working as a test engineer for GM at their proving grounds. His job consists of road testing cars in all sorts of conditions. Robert was funny, because since he's from California he told me "the winters...they're terrible. Everyone here tells you it's not that bad, but I'm from the same climate that you're used to in South Carolina, and yes, it's bad". Oh well, we'll see. I might have to put a jacket on.

I got two special phone calls today. First from Vicki (Hi Vicki!) It was good to hear from her. I also got to talk to Sonia, her sister and her mom. I need to buy a phone card so I can call her. The next call was from aunt Linda (Hi Linda and her friend who sits beside her!) UNbelieveable. It's nice to hear from aunt Linda and Vicki because it lets you know people you don't get to talk to so often are thinking about you.

When I got my haircut, the lady cutting my hair found out I was from South Carolina and said "I was in SC once, in Charleston, in August". Then, she let out this groan like she actually visited the worst place on Earth. She said "the heat, my GOSH it was horrible...that's why you people from South Carolina are so slow, it's because of that heat". That made me laugh. Wow this is long, but I had so much fun tonight I wanted to write about before bed. Goodnight everyone. Goodnight aunt Linda and Vicki.

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