ears

It's not good to be a kid with ears in our family. Max has his surgery tomorrow to have his ear tubes removed (sniff). I was trying to prepare him a little bit for it, but he doesn't really have a clue. We have to be at the surgery center at 6:30am. Ugh.

Wilson is on his third ear infection in two months. We thought he wasn't feeling well Saturday and Sunday, but thought we could make it to Monday when we could get him into the doctor. That was before I saw pus coming out of one of his ears. So, back to the Children's Hospital urgent care. Both ears are infected and obviously the one eardrum perforated. He has three medicines to take and Children's recommended that we take him to an ENT.

I'm wondering if we can strike a deal with the doctor to do two for one?

antlers

How long is this blasted holiday break, 'cause I'm not sure Max will survive it. He drove me absolutely nuts today with some very bad behavior. Beth came home from work and was about ready to strangle him pretty quickly too. Good thing that every now and then he is cute.

Break

Today is the first day of Max's Christmas break. The angel let me sleep until 8 this morning! Last night we had grandma Robin and grandpa Ralph over to celebrate Christmas. Max got a huge Black Beauty horse puppet that he is in love with. It had to sit at the table and have a bowl of nummy hay for breakfast this morning. Then we got ready and hit the mall for one last present. He was a fabulous shopper.

We looked at Santa when we first went into the mall, but as I had suspected, Max did not want to talk to him. So, we shopped. He asked a couple of questions about Santa and I explained that kids tell them what they want so Santa knows what to bring. I told him that if he didn't want to tell him, than I would so he didn't need to worry about it. He decided that perhaps he wanted to tell him. So, we got in line and he very bravely went up, sat in his lap and announced that he wanted a transformer. I was so very proud!




After Santa we went to see the very brave mouse (The Tale of Despereaux, which Max can't say). This was an awesome movie! Sigourney Weaver is the narrator, Matthew Broderick is Despereaux, Dustin Hoffman, Tracey Ullman, Kevin Cline, William H. Macy are all voices in the movie. It's a great story about honor, truth, bravery, sorrow and doing the right thing. Max was entranced for the entire 100 minutes and only ate his corndogs when I put them in his hand for him! I was really touched by it and Max wanted it to play again. If you've got young 'uns go see it!

Angry and Happy

So, Obama hasn't even taken office yet and he's already disappointing me. As I said in previous posts, he isn't really gay friendly, he just pretends to be to get votes. He now has every gay rights group ticked off at him because he has selected Rick Warren, the pastor of the mega church Saddleback and major force behind Proposition 8 in California which banned gay marriage, to give the inaugural prayer. This is the same guy who compares same-sex marriage with pedophilia, incest and polygamy. There is much concern that this is a sign of things to come and yet 4 more years of anti-gay presidential policy. All the sudden I can hear HRC wondering why they didn't go ahead and back Clinton after all, bunch of dopes. Yeah, this is change I can believe in.....

On the lighter side, this is a hilarious, star-filled musical about the stupidity of Prop. 8

"Prop 8 - The Musical" starring Jack Black, John C. Reilly, and many more... by Jack Black

Doh!

I was called out on a spill involving 3 poles and 7 transformers today. If you look closely at the truck you can see that he took out a drop line which then brought down the poles.


The owner of this car should consider themselves to be pretty lucky. I am very amused by the safety slogan on the truck. Might want to consider changing it to look around before driving. See the oil on the pavement from the transformers?

A shot of the alley and 2 of the downed poles. All the water in the alley also had transformer oil in it.

3 transformers surrounded by oil dry.

Putting out 2 plus skids of oil dry. This will then be brushed around by a skid driver with a broom.

It was really stinkin' cold out there and the poor line guys will be out until late this evening resetting three poles, hanging 7 transformers, and all the other utility lines before they get to go home.

Grinch

Max loves to watch the movie The Grinch. He watched it twice last night and is watching it again now. All he wants to do is talk about how "grouchy" he is and that he is mean to his dog named Max. He has also started to refer to other people as grinch, i.e. Mommy Grinch. Last night before bed he says, "One time I saw a grinch at the zoo." It cracked both of us up and then he realized he said something very funny and he started laughing too.

Those grinches are everywhere!

Warm and Toasty

When I'm walking downtown, I always avoid walking over those big grates in the sidewalk. People have made fun of me for this, but I have recently been vindicated.

Those big grates are frequently covering what we call vaults. These are underground rooms that house electrical equipment. Ever notice how you don't see great big transformers laying around most cities? That's because they are underneath you. Working in the underground network is challenging and of course dangerous. The vaults can fill up with poisonous gas and the air has to be constantly monitored, the vaults themselves are confined spaces and you have to have special training before you can go into them, they fill up with all sorts of gross things (storm water, trash, drug paraphernalia, and in one area we have a vault that fills up with infectious waste from the hospital!), room to maneuver is very limited, it's really stinking hot in there, some of them are very deep, and if something goes wrong you're going to be toast because you can't get away.

We had something go wrong with one of our vaults. Really wrong. The kinda wrong that involves a ball of fire shooting up out of the vault, launching the grate and taking out a huge chunk of downtown Columbus including the arena district, convention center, all the nationwide buildings and hotels. We were lucky that nobody was walking by at that moment.

Apparently one transformer caught on fire and exploded taking 3 others with it. It was so hot that the fire department wouldn't authorize anyone entering the vault for over 24 hours until the temperature dropped.

We had to call the spill into the national spill reporting center (NRC) since we lost more than 25 gallons of oil. This is not an unusual thing for us to have to do, however we did learn something new. Do not use the words explode, exploded, or explosion when reporting spills. The NRC is apparently required to notify the FBI when you use one of those words and then they call us to chat. Nobody wants that.

So, stay away from those grates people!

Conversation

Max and I were hanging out in bed this morning while Beth showered. I told him that tomorrow was Thanksgiving and here's how the conversation went.

Max, "We will have a feast tomorrow!"
Me, "That's right"
Max, "Will the Pilgrims come too?"
Me, "No they only came to the first ones a long time ago."
Max, "They won't come to ours?"
Me, "Well these were the people who came from Europe a long time ago to colonize our country. They aren't here anymore."
Max, "Oh, they are in Asia now."

Hee.....

Visual Aids

Max loves to put himself into very tiny things. If you leave a box unattended he will try and fold himself into it. He found a plastic storage tub which provided hours of entertainment.

Mia and Wilson oh so love each other. This was their stay at home sick day with Mommy.

Hmmm.....more plastic storage tub. This cracks me up a great deal.

Sleepy

So, poor Wil has had some nasty poos lately which we chalked up to the antibiotics. Now, I'm not so sure since Beth and I were up all night sick (I'm still home this morning, but Beth is made of stronger stuff and went to work). I was a bit panicky last night since all of our family who could possibly help with kids have left the state and I wasn't sure how we were going to fare.

Now, poor Max is starting to show some signs of not feeling well. I really hope he doesn't get sick. He's been so very excited about Thanksgiving and especially helping me make a pumpkin pie, just for him!

Like I said, all the family has abandoned ship and it will be just us for Thanksgiving. I spent a lot of money getting food for dinner. It's impossible to make just a little stuffing, or a little sweet potato souffle, so we're going to be eating this stuff for a long time. I do so enjoy cooking and I hope that the smells and events of the day create some nice memories for the kiddos.

I'm off to go take a nap now.

No Heads On Pikes

Mia tested negative for whooping cough, yeah! We don't have to have an angry mob of parents outside our house. The strong antibiotics are working on whatever she has so hopefully we'll all be better soon.

It's a two post kinda day

I love my kids, but they are going to be the death of me.

About two weeks ago, Mia, Wilson and I got "colds". Then Wil ended up in urgent care and got his inhaler. Everyone seemed to be slowly getting better. Then on Saturday Mia and Wil got fevers and I complained about my chest hurting. The fevers only lasted for a brief period so I didn't really worry about it. Then Mia started coughing an awful, awful cough. I counted once and it was 15 coughs in a row, followed by a loud Whoop when she finally got to inhale. I'm not a doctor but it didn't seem like a big stretch to think "whooping cough". Then poor Wil started to get gunkier and crabbier and I don't remember the last time we were able to sleep. I called the doctor today and got them in. And they are thinking it's whooping cough based on my and Mia's symptoms. Poor Mia had to have swabs run up into her nose on both sides for testing which will come back tomorrow. In the meantime she's been started on antibiotics to treat whooping cough and Wil has a different antibiotic for his ear infection. If the test comes back positive, everyone in the house has to be treated for whooping cough, sick or not. And then the daycare will have to tell all the parents to get their kids treated. I have a feeling we are about to become very unpopular. It's not our fault, she is up to date on all her vaccines, including the whooping cough one!

Last night I had parent teacher conferences for Max. His speech is becoming an issue. Apparently the other kids are having a hard time understanding him, which upsets him. And because he isn't able to say so many things correctly, they feel that it is really hindering his ability to read. On top of that, they would like to have him assessed for his ability to comprehend language since it appears that he has problems with certain things, which I noticed too. It makes me sad to think about him having a hard time at school. Especially when we are considering putting him into the public school system next year. This isn't something I really want to do, but the cost of this school is really a lot and they don't offer any kind of back-up when they close. But our school system is known for their inability to handle kids that need anything special, and if he continues to need some special help it would be best for him to stay at St. Joes where he gets one on one attention. Ugh, why is this so hard?

THEN, today I had to take Max to the ENT to check on his tubes in his ears. They have been in too long and are causing problems instead of helping. So, he now has to have surgery on December 30th to remove the tubes and patch the holes. The doctor said he won't know for sure how one of the eardrums will be until he gets in there. I am so not looking forward to this and I know I'm going to end up crying just like I did when they put those things in.

Fierce!

Smitten is a troublesome cat. A few years ago she was diagnosed with asthma and had to receive injections of steroids to calm it down. As she got older, the vet got more nervous using the steroid injections and wanted us to try using an inhaler. I'm not joking. She has an inhaler just like people would use with a spacer and an infant mask. She gets albuterol and a steroid that we order from Canada. Again, I'm not joking.

Last February she was diagnosed with thyroid disease. She needed a pill two times daily and was suppose to get canned cat food. She started to hide from us for the morning pill and waiting us out until we had to leave for work. Then it just got crazy around here and we forgot all together to give her the pill. She's been a real grouch lately attacking Anubis at any opportunity and just being a brat in general. She recently snuck into my lap and while I was petting her I realized that she had lost a ton of weight that all her fluffy hair had nicely hidden.

So, I take the needy one back to the vet who now tells me that she has not one but two tumors on her thyroid so the medicine wouldn't have worked anyway. Draws blood and does some tests and now the cat has kidney failure along with crazy high levels of thyroid. We have to feed her a special kidney diet and now instead of pills we are getting a special compound made at a special compounding pharmacy that we will rub onto her ears. I can't make this stuff up. If I was one of the animals around here I would start to get real worried about how things have been going lately.

Today I am at home "working" in between all the kid issues, which I will post about next. While I was on the phone with someone from work, Smitten just kept meowing at me in a very annoying manner. I finally look down at her and see a mouse hanging out of her mouth. I'm guessing she is worried about how this might all work out for her and is trying to prove her worth!

Bye

We had to say goodbye to Dedo yesterday. He was 12 and a half and had not been feeling well for awhile. He was a goofball and I miss him. I can hold it together mostly until I get home and he isn't here, then I cry.

I like to remember him when he was younger and a lot of trouble. He used to get so hot as a puppy that he would go and put his head in his water bowl and fall asleep. He was a holy terror to all stuffed toys and was part goat. I remember when I came home and he had eaten half the house including an aluminum can (except for the hard ring) and had to have surgery. I remember how he would guard Max when he was just a baby. And when I was upset he would come and sit with his back up against me and just wait.

Random, not so deep thoughts

I do not feel like being particularly insightful today, so I'm grabbing at some headlines that you might have missed.

Proof that Apple is evil and out to kill people, earbuds and perhaps even Ipods can interfere with pacemakers and other mechanics that make your heart work.

I'm not sure about this particular choice for casting in a movie.

Oddly related to the movie story, paycheck discrimination. I tried to find the actual article but no luck.

Dumb bastard.

Ewwwww, just wrong!

Wheeze

Today, Wilson is six months old. To celebrate he stayed up all night and spent all day wheezing. I took him to urgent care and he was diagnosed with bronchiolitis. He has an alburterol inhaler he has to use every four hours, which he hates. It's awfully hard to listen to one of your kids struggle to breathe, and him being so small makes it that much harder. Poor little guy.....

She's cute.....

I've come to the conclusion that a bad luck gene exists and is very dominant in my family. My mom has pneumonia and has not fbeen feeling very well. She's been off work for about a week now and was scheduled to go back in the next day or so. That was until she was called in and told that she no longer has a job. She is planning on going to Florida for a few weeks to try and get a job there. I'm telling you all of this because she has a very adorable cat who now needs a new home. I would take her, but we are already exceeding the capacity of our home in regards to kids and animals. If any of you would be willing to take her, please let me know. The alternative is my mom taking her to the humane society, which I don't think will end well for her. I rescued this cat about 5 years ago from the underside of a moving car and would love to rescue her again if I can.

Look at that!!!

Max wanted to watch Cars tonight and I indulged him. Even let him eat his dinner in the living room while watching. When Mia finished her dinner, she went in to see what he was up to and spotted the movie. She yelled, "Daaa Daaaa Daaat!" and pointed at the car that was talking. Everytime a new car comes on the screen, she repeats. Sometimes doing a little stomping, excited feet dance while pointing and yelling at the top of her little voice (not so little in this case). This has been going on for about 10 minutes now.

I'm at the table eating my yummy soup and she just came in and talked to me. I asked her if there were cars in the living room and she spun around, pointed at the TV and yelled, looking back at me. It's really intertaining....

Ouch the update

It wasn't pleasant but not the worse thing ever. I've been awfully sick today, I think due to the fabulous narcotic pain killers, which I've stopped taking. I have more drugs and rinses and whatnot to do in one 24 hour period it's crazy. Beth is the best. She took all the kids to the zoo today so I could pass out. Love.

Ouch!

So, today is not going to be fun filled for me. I have to have some oral surgery on my gums this afternoon, and I am so not looking forward to it! Apparently when I had my wisdom teeth removed, it made a mess. I am missing some bone and have a lot of scar tissue which creates pockets behind my teeth and leads to infections. Today they will be performing a distal wedge procedure, if that means anything to you. They will be cutting down to the bone, placing bone grafts and removing the scar tissue. I have to eat squishy food for two weeks. They keep promising me that it won't hurt, but I'm pretty sure they're lying.

Drill Baby, Drill!

I had some adventures this week. Remember back to the scary place I had to do some work in? Well, I have to do more. Friday, my buddy Bryan and I drilled 32 holes in concrete for PCB core samples. It was a blast. You can see part of the grid we set up in the picture below. Every 10 foot we drilled through a paper plate to a depth of 3 inches, and collected the dust for analysis.

Had to take the picture of Bryan working. I'm not so excited at the amount of dust flying through the air, especially since we're testing for PCBs in that dust!

On Wednesday I took a nice drive through Morgan County to do a station update. I passed Lock #8 on the Muskingum River on my drive to the station and decided to stop on my way back.

I was creeped out by the complete lack of safety devices to keep me from doing something stupid. For instance, there was nothing to keep me from walking across that rickety walkway over the gate but a very worn sign that said employees only. I even discovered that I could operate the gates on the lock!

Again with the lack of safety features. I'm standing on the edge of the lock looking down 26 feet. That's what the depth marker on the wall told me.

Tingly

I often forget how dangerous our jobs working for an electric utility can be, which is never a good thing. But I get frequent reminders which help keep me on my toes. Especially when I think about those whose jobs are way more dangerous than mine on a regular basis.

There is a small percentage of linemen who are rock gods. They are linemen who have been approved to "work bare hand". If you've ever seen a lineman working on a line, he most likely was seriously suited up in personal protective equipment (PPE), a hard hat, safety glasses, gloves, fire retardant shirt, and insulated gloves over all of that. The bare hand guys are doing exactly what their titles says they are doing, grabbing on to live lines with their bare hands. Usually transmission lines, which carry enough voltage to not only kill you, but also not leave much to identify you. These guys fascinate me. I asked one of them what it was like. His reply, "Like holding a lightening bolt". Then I asked him if he felt anything, "Yeah, it's like a million little bugs crawling on your skin. All tingly." I'm pretty sure these men are insane.

I've got a super safe job in comparison. But still, I do enter into stations with lots of powerful equipment. The most powerful stations, right outside of power plants actually make me feel weird when I'm near them. There are different levels of access inside stations. Those who are not trained and are being escorted in, must stay a certain distance away, or in fancy speak maintain the required approach destance, from the equipment, depending on its voltage. I'm considered trained and can enter stations all alone and walk up to a station class transformer, hug it and kiss it, if I wanted.

Most of the dangers I face in a station can be prevented as long as I'm alert. In fact, I can safely touch most of the equipment since the outside is not energized. That's not true of everything though, and in general I don't touch. I worry mostly about tripping and falling onto something that is energized. We are trained, although I don't know if it would happen if I needed it to, that if we are falling not to reach out to grab anything. The idea being if we hit something that is energized, we will get voltage but should fall off. If we reach out and grab it, our muscles will tighten and we won't be able to let go, most likely resulting in our death. I also have to worry about lines that are down, holes, lines that are in the ground, and wasps. They LOVE electrical equipment.

We do have a ground grid that runs the entire station, meant to ground any loose electricity. It also keeps the fence from becoming energized. The grid is made of copper and is a popular item to steal. I don't find that amusing since my life depends on it being there. We are trained to look to make sure the grounds are on the fence gate before we touch it, but still. I know one guy who was getting ready to open a gate, key in hand, when a noise caught his attention. It was the rain hitting the fence and vaporizing. Some stooge had stolen the grounds.

Yesterday, I was in an old distribution station. The distribution stations don't have as much voltage in them, but it's still enough to kill you. I had walked up to one of the big station class transformers to get its serial number and noticed the ground was vibrating. Not unusual. Then I realized that it was more than that, my body was vibrating and my hands and feet were tingly....a bit like a million bugs crawling on them. I had a moment of panic when it dawned on me that I was receiving an unknown amount of voltage. I am pretty proud of myself for just standing there for a few long seconds. I obviously was not getting hurt at that moment, but if I did something stupid and touched something that made me a better ground than the grid, it was not going to be good. So, I assessed the situation, tingling away. Realized it was okay to back away and slowly did so. It took awhile for the unpleasant sensation in my hands and feet to go away, but I was fine.

Makes me pretty glad that I always take the time to hug and kiss everyone each morning before leaving for work.

The job that doesn't pay

At least not in money. In fact, I'm pretty sure that I'm in overdraft status now.

I received my first CASA case a little over a month ago. I haven't said much about it because 1. I'm not allowed to talk specifics about my cases 2. I wasn't really sure what had happened to me and wasn't ready to talk about it!

The beginning of a case is just a whirlwind of activity. I've been told it will slow down, but I'm not sure that I believe them. Most of the activity hit during the electric outage which was very poor timing. I was spending a ton of time at work, fitting in visits to the kids, reviewing records and going to court all at the same time and while trying to deal with my own family and lack of electricity. Not the most promising start.

There are three kids 7, 3, and 15 months and they are all wondering what the devil just happened to them. They were removed from their house at 1:30 in the morning, taken to a doctor, asked a blooming million questions all from people they don't know and eventually placed in a foster home with more people they don't know. The mere thought of going through that makes me stressed out and I'm a grown-up. Imagine what it did to them.

The first time I met the kids, the oldest one looked at me screamed and ran away, the middle one just smiled at me no matter what I did, and the little one who should be in the middle of stranger anxiety marched up to me immediately and demanded that I pick him up and hold him. No normal behaviors from any of them. Great...

Now they are all very,very fond of me. The oldest told me, "I didn't know you were so much fun" and he also thinks that I should be a ballerina for halloween (HA!). When it was time for me to leave they wanted to know if I was going to go see my other kids and were confused and then very pleased when I explained they are the only kids that I check on and make sure are safe. They all gave me big hugs, but then got sad when it was time for me to leave, which was pretty hard.

The kids are by far the easiest part of this to deal with. The caseworker doesn't really do anything unless I nag her half to death, after I finally track her down that is. It's no wonder that kids in the system don't do well. The kids couldn't go to the doctor, get medicines they were suppose to have on a regular basis, have food, diapers, or clothes until I drove her nuts and she finally did what I wanted in hopes that I would go away.

So, it's emotionally taxing but I'm still making three kids, whose lives have been pretty crappy to date, a little better off.

Fremont!

I had to drive to the Fremont area (close enough to Toledo to warrant a shout out to loyal reader, Chris' Mom!) today to conduct a vendor audit for a used oil transporter and transfer facility. This time I snagged a Toyota Prius from the rental company. I know that this is not exciting to some of you, especially those who own one (Katy), but considering I've spent 5 minutes in any kind of hybrid vehicle and have never driven one, it was pretty exciting for me!

It was exciting for about 10 minutes.....

First, this car is just one great big blind spot. Thankfully the mirrors are located in a way that you can see behind you because looking over your shoulder will get you nothing. The rear window has a solid piece of car going right across the middle which annoyed me to no end. The windshield is unobstructed, but it's weird how they've set up the control panel and it made me have a bit of a weird optical illusion thing going on, which I eventually adjusted to.

Second, they've tried to gizmo the vehicle to no end. There's a little computer thing that displays your gas usage, mileage and how much electricity you've generated. Kinda neat but distracting for awhile. It was also the thing that controlled the radio and temperature. When I wanted to change radio stations the blasted thing was not withing comfortable reaching length. Could be a short person problem, not necessarily the car's fault.

Third, it drives weird. Fortunately, the car tells you when it is on because you wouldn't know it otherwise. It's all silent and absent of vibrations. This also happens at stop lights which I found to be really distressing. I found that if you turned the radio up loud enough, the car would vibrate and I wouldn't notice the lack of engine vibration :) The car feels really heavy. It actually handled pretty well, but I was always surprised when it did just because it felt like a tank.

The breaks are also strange. They feel all grindy and if that was going on in my car, I would think I needed new breaks. I'm assuming it has to do with the electricity generating mechanisms.

But by far the most annoying thing was the shifting between electric and gas. There was a noticeable hesitation at times when trying to accelerate and the car was trying to shift over to gas. This panicked me once when trying to punch it to beat a car at an intersection. It was also a bit distressing to take your foot off to coast a little when driving and then re-applying the gas. If it was a long enough time period it would switch over to electric and then back to gas and it would feel like the car was shifting. It gave me the impression that the transmission was going bad every time it happened, then I would remember what the deal was.

I also didn't enjoy the idea of driving around with NiMH batteries in the rear end. While Toyota says it's just about impossible to release the battery electrolites, I know that is inacurrate. While working for the EPA our emergency response guys where involved in two accidents where the batteries did leak everywhere and created quite a problem for the firemen, medics and the environmental folks. Toyota even has an Emergency Response guide discussing how to handle the situation.

I didn't really like this car, but apparently I averaged 51.9 mpg and went almost 400 miles on 6 gallons of gas. After I realized that, I liked it a bit better.

Princess

So, I'm going to venture into the realm of Beth's blog, but hey she hasn't posted in forever anyway......

Max is frequently some sort of animal. He has been a seahorse, baby chick, deer, dolphin, turtle, fish, horse, giraffe, and a bloomin' million others that I can't remember. Only once has he been an inanimate object, a hotdog and we had to give him hugs by pretending to wrap him up in a bun. Right now, he is a donkey. He just informed Beth that donkeys sleep in caves when she tucked him in for the night. It amuses me.

Today he has been referring to Mia as "Princess". Do you want to play, Princess? Do you want more to eat, Princess? Specifically, she's only our Princess and nobody else's. Beth put a little pink tiara on her that one of her cousins had given Mia and the image was complete. Mia is quite pleased with the situation, and even demanded the tiara back when I made the mistake of taking it off.

The other day Beth was calling Wilson "Chubby Bubby" in a very endearing sort of way. Max responded, "That's not funny, and I'm not laughing."

At least he has entertainment value.

Schwinn!

So, Beth's parents are in town all weekend. They came down yesterday to enjoy the Grandparents' Day festivities at Max's school and have an OSU game today. Since they are staying here in Columbus, they very kindly volunteered to watch the kids while we went to a movie. We chose to see Burn After Reading, a film brought to us by the Coen brothers.

I haven't laughed at a movie that hard in a very long time. It's described as a dark spy comedy, and dark it is. I would laugh and then think, "I shouldn't be laughing at that." But darn it's funny.
John Malkovich started off not really acting very well, but got into stride pretty quickly and gave an enjoyable performance as a CIA analyst turned aspiring writer. Brad Pitt, while starting to look kinda old, and who wouldn't with that many young kids at home, gave a fabulously campy performance as a gym personal trainer. I've been quoting bits from his role all last night and today! George Clooney, a sex craved federal employee, is a hoot in a strange, perverted sort of way. His role reminded me of the part he played in O Brother, Where Art Thou. That goofy, "My hair!" thing he had going shows through here, although like I said with a perverted twist. Tilda Swinton is a perfectly bitchy pediatrician who threatens to take out one of her young patients. Frances McDormand, who works in the gym with Brad, is just cooky and obsessed with re-inventing herself by plastic surgery. One of my favorite characters was just a bit character played by J.K. Simmons as the bumbling CIA superior just trying to make sense of all the craziness.

If you're into dark, high level, comedies and not easily offended by sex stuff, go see this movie!

Should I go there?

Well, I'll try and be brief compared to the last post talking politics. I did watch a bunch of the vice presidential debates and was disappointed that it wasn't more entertaining. I was glad to see that Palin was able to hold her own when speaking. Before a bunch of you jump on me, understand I was not commenting on or supporting her views, just how she handled herself. I disagree with her on many things, but as a woman I do want to see her do well. I'm tired of all women at this level being torn apart for stupid things like what clothes they are wearing and how emotional they are, which is why I'm glad that Hillary is refusing to attack Palin. I do think that the dems could learn a thing or two from how Palin talks, plainly and like everyone else. There might not be much substance to what she's saying, but people I've talked to really like her and I'm guessing it has to do with the "Joe Smoe" thing she has going. It's okay to talk like a highly educated person, but when you're trying to get a country full of not highly educated people to like you, maybe you shouldn't talk like a lawyer all the time.

Overall, I didn't learn much from or even have a reaction to just about anything either of them said. I will say that I got pretty teed off when Biden announced that there should be a plan for restructuring the interest rates and even the principle owed on mortgages for folks going bankrupt. Interest rates make sense even if I don't necessarily like it. Nobody is going to benefit if we have more houses going into foreclosure. But negotiating the principle just doesn't seem right. Beth and I work hard and can't do everything that we want to do because we have an obligation to pay for our mortgage, utilities, food, etc. and nobody is going to reduce the amount we owe on our house because we've done the responsible thing. Angry making.

I have sucsessfully avoided all of the presidential debates. I almost saw the one last night, but Beth saw what was coming on and yelled, "Oh, Crap" and changed the station lightening fast. It amused me to no end.

One more interesting tid bit. At work we have an internal website that has a poll question every week for us to vote on. Here's this week's question: Given that the vice president is a heartbeat away from becoming president, which presidential running mate do you prefer. And the results: Sarah Palin 54.89%, Joe Biden 28.34%, No Preference 2.80% and Neither 13.98%

Keep in mind that the results aren't statistically valid, anybody can vote although we are restricted to only one vote by our log in ID, and what type of folks are voting isn't necessarily representative. My first reaction was, well it's that whole not highly educated workforce thing showing through. But that doesn't really work out. Our linemen, meter readers, technicians all the folks who mostly have a high school education do not have their own computer assigned to them or have really easy access to one. I would imagine that it is mostly our engineers and folks like me, the ones with a computer and at least a college education, that are voting in these things. I wonder how much higher the Palin numbers would be if all our grunt folks could vote. Something to think about.

In case you're wondering, I voted neither......

Work stuff version 2

More SPCC updates, but no alarms or damaged vehicles to report. Today I was running around Perry county. It is very pretty in that area, especially with the leaves changing colors. But it is very rural and I have no idea how I found the stations that I was trying to find. Many of the roads aren't labeled and are just tricky to navigate in general.

At one point I found myself on a gravel road and startled an Amish boy and girl who were out playing with a knotted rope. I don't think they were used to seeing too many vehicles. Then I confused them even more by waiving at them, they had no idea how to respond to that.

Then I found an old wooden, covered, one lane bridge that I had to cross. I was very annoyed that I forgot the camera today because it was pretty cute.

I got to drive around in the Wayne National Forest which was very pretty. Discovered that most of Perry county does not have cell phone coverage, which presented a problem for me when I needed to enter the stations.

Stopped in Shawnee Ohio, which had a sign up that it was on the national historic places registry. The little town was all done up like the wild west, but it was a dead ghost town as far as I could tell.

I also discovered that the New Straitsville Moonshine Festival will be occuring in the next couple of weeks. You know, if you're looking for something to do that is....

It was a fun day.

Work Stuff

I am responsible for updating the spill prevention and counter control (SPCC) plans for 26 power stations scattered throughout Ohio and one in West Virginia. This involves me going to each of those stations, looking to see what equipment has changed, documenting said changes and updating the site map. I decided that I would work on these all week and see how many I could wrap up. I got my self a rental car (our version of a fleet vehicle) and took off first thing Monday morning.

When we get to the station, we have to call in to the dispatching office and log in before we go inside. There are many reasons for this, mainly safety related. If the control room decides to do some switching remotely and it could be dangerous for someone to be standing around while they do so, they'll know I'm there. Also, some stations are armed with remotely controlled alarms and the dispatcher will turn those off before we go in.I called in and logged in to one of my stations, unlocked the gate, went in, turned around to lock the gate back and promptly lost my hearing when a splitting alarm went off. I called the dispatcher, very annoyed that they forgot the alarm and was informed that there was no alarm there. I assured him that there was indeed an alarm and he said he would call security to look into it. Twenty minutes later I give up and decide to just do what I came there to do and hope that I didn't get arrested by the police. Now for some reason I had ONE earplug, which I used and shoved my finger into the other ear while I tried to work. Then the alarm just stopped. The dispatcher called me back to tell me that this was an alarm that couldn't be controlled remotely, gave me two codes and told me to try one to reset the alarm. I told him it was already off, which confused him, but he told me that it would go off again if I didn't use the code when I left. Ok, I did what I needed to do, plugged in the code and ran away.

I go to the next station, call in and inform them that I see the same security system here, which they didn't know about either. They tell me to try the same codes and see what happens. Okay, but the security box was very, very far away from the gate and nobody knew how much time I had. So, I lined the car up perfectly, unlock the gate push it open, run back to the car and gunned it just in time for the gate to swing back and slam into the rental car leaving a very nice dent. But I did just make it to the security box in time and averted triggering the thing.

My mean old boss made me fill out an incident report for the dent, which annoyed me. But not as much as the actual report did. They don't really care about little dents, just accidents that are serious. Therefore, the report is very lengthy. One amusing thing came out of the station inspection, see picture below.

I can't imagine one of our station guys drawing a face on an oil filled circuit breaker, but that would mean that some kid snuck into the station and did this. Perhaps that annoying alarm is a good idea after all.

Hello, Stranger

It's been awhile since I've posted, eh? What's happened in all that time you ask? Well......

We lost power for 4 days due to hurricane Ike. Yes, we still live in Ohio. Haven't you heard of those oh so common midwestern hurricanes? Wait, YOU lost power? Don't you work for the electric company? Yes, I do and during that week I really wished that I didn't. My boss was very conveniently on vacation during this time, so it left me in charge of dealing with his staff who were trying to deal with all those transformer spills. I spent a lot of time on the phone with them and a day out in the field looking at downed transformers and power lines and trying not to fry myself on those that were still live. It was a real mess around here. I got grouched at by everyone, including one of Max's teachers who went on and on for half an hour. People kept assuming that I had some sort of special powers and could really get their electricity on if I wanted to, never mind the fact that I didn't have any power at my house either. The neighbors kept asking me for the scoop and I didn't know any more than them. They always looked at me like I was hiding something.

Wilson and Mia's daycare didn't have power either, but they stayed open. They brought in gas grills to cook food and warm water with, and it seemed to work out well. Max's school closed for three days. He spent a day with me at work camped out under my desk, a day with Beth at work watching movies on the laptop and eating popcorn and a day at the back up daycare center. I felt really bad for him since the drastic change in routine was really upsetting him. I later found out that the school never lost power, they just closed. I can't tell you how angry that makes me. The poor kid was all stressed out and could have really benefited from going to school during the day and they just closed for no good reason. Not to mention, I pay a lot of money to send him there and I want him to go. The board will be getting a rather nasty letter from me on the subject.

Well, that's the update. I'll try not to be gone so long this time.

Batmiton

Last night I was vegging on the couch and Beth went downstairs with a load of laundry. Within seconds I heard her running, and I mean running, back up the stairs and then silence. I thought she must have heard something, so I was all quiet trying to listen for whatever she heard. Then a very quiet voice informed me, "There's a bat in the basement."

Now, you might remember the previous bat incident earlier this summer. That was kind of funny. We were able to lock the cats in the basement, open the doors and wait for the bat to fly out, which it promptly did. This situation presented some interesting challenges. First, no doors to the outside in the basement and only glass block windows. Second, a low ceiling made even lower by acoustic tiles. Third, nowhere to lock up the cats. And finally, Max was still awake and would freak out if we closed his door.

I told Beth to stand at the end of the hall and keep a look out for the bat, which she didn't look very happy about. Then I opened the garage door that is across from the basement door, grabbed a couple of towels and headed to the basement.

Our basement lighting is screwy. There are 5 different lighting areas all controlled by separate switches. When I went downstairs, only one dim light was on at the foot of the stairs and the rest of the basement is pitch black. The bat would fly towards me and I couldn't see it until it almost touched me. I was not okay with that. I also was having a problem getting off of the stairs since I couldn't see the bat and with the close quarters, was getting way too close to it. So, I sat on the last step and debated what to do. I kept hearing the poor thing scrambling against the walls and ceiling in the dark part of the room, and that didn't help my nerves much. The poor bat was desperate to get out, and I think it knew that up the stairs was how to escape since they can sense temp changes, but the way the ceiling and stairs are set up the bat would have to fly towards the stairs and then shoot up at the last minute to make it out. I'm guessing the sonar was telling it that this was a wall, just like everywhere else.

I finally realize that I'm not going to get the bat out of the house by sitting on the stairs. I ended up crawling on all fours to the nearest switch in the dark part, waiting for the bat to fly over my head and then popping up to flip the switch and sit back down. Now, I could see most of the area the bat was flying in, and Emma who was down there trying very hard to help me catch the flying rodent!

I tried to throw a towel on the bat a couple of times and that just wasn't going to work. It was way too fast for that. So, I sat down and looked around to see what else I could use and landed on my racquetball rackets. I crawled over to those and selected the old, crappy one. I didn't know what might happen if I actually hit the bat and decided I didn't want bat goo on my good racket! I stood up and waited for it to get close. Unfortunately, the little bugger kept coming at me in a way that required the use of my backhand, which anyone who's ever played racquetball with me will tell you sucks. But he finally made a mistake and I got him with a nice solid overhand, a loud "P-twang" and the poor bat was knocked half way across the basement onto the floor. I promptly ran over and covered it with the racket, even though it didn't look like it was going to go anywhere soon.

I needed to pick up the bat somehow and decided that a container would be the best choice to avoid being bitten or scratched. I went up the stairs and told Beth to grab me a tupperware thing. As I rounded the doorway at the top of the stairs, I saw that she had created a barrier that consisted of a baby gate at the ceiling, a card table on the floor and her peeking between the two. I almost fell over laughing. Below is a picture of the top part of the barricade.


We grabbed a container and headed back down. Beth wanted to see what I had done and couldn't believe I actually hit the bat. I told her I didn't really have much choice, the way I saw it. So, we go over and look at it and it's in the same position that I had left it in. I thought I had killed it, but then I saw that it was breathing. I moved the racket a smidgen and that set the bat off! It started squeaking and squirming all around the place, and trying to bite through the strings. I had to mess around with it to get it in the right position to lift off the racket and cover it with the container, which I actually managed to do the first time. Then I slid the lid under the container. The bat really got loud and Beth was yelling, "It's foot! It's foot!" I had it's little foot pinched in the lid, and it wasn't happy. Finally, I got all the bat bits enclosed and took it upstairs. It was running in circles around the container just yelling at me. If you looked closely at it, it was bearing each one of it's pointy little teeth at me. I made Beth take a couple of pictures and a video (see below) and then went outside, tossed the container in the air and the bat flew away.

After our first bat incident I found some statistics that a bat in the house means there are bats living in the house about 90% of the time. I chose to ignore that the first time. Now, I guess I'm gonna have to figure out where they are roosting. I've looked everywhere from the ground and can't find any place they could get in or any evidence of bats. That means I need to go on the roof and look. If I can't figure it out, I might have to hang out on the roof and wait for them to fly out. Otherwise, I've got to get a pest control person out here to check out the attic. I am NOT going into the attic if there's possibly a colony of bats living up there. They might seek revenge for the whole racquettball thing.....

I have no idea how long that bat was flying around in the basement, but I will tell you that poor Anubis was absolutely terrified to go back down there last night. I think that flying rodents are not something she's okay with. I hope none of the cats actually tangled with that thing.

I Swear.....

Last night was the CASA swearing in ceremony. I had dressed slightly nicer than usual for work in anticipation of the event. I ended up outside in the pouring rain, collecting soil samples and getting all muddy and fuzzy haired. I was only a little scary looking by the time of the ceremony.

I had collected all the kids and got them to the court house. Ralph and Robin came from South Charleston and found their way without too many problems. Beth got off of work a little early and hurried to the court house, making it just in time.

Our Director spoke to the audience for a few minutes before showing a video of two adults who had a CASA as children and why it meant so much to them. Then Judge Jim Mason was introduced. He gave a brief talk about why we are important and then called each of us to receive our certificates.

After all of us received our certificates, Judge Mason delivered the oath to us, which was really pretty cool. Then there was much picture taking, hanging out and eating of cake and punch!




The whole class, and Judge Mason after the swearing in.

Family picture

Mia and I showing some love to each other.

Now I can be appointed by the Franklin County Court of Common Pleas, Division of Domestic Relations and Juvenile Branch to speak up for a child.

Florida

We made it to Florida despite Fay. We got everyone up bright and early on Wednesday morning and on the plane by 6:35am. Max was pretty excited during take off and yelled, "Bye ground. We're going to Florida!" which made all the people sitting around us laugh. Mia curled up on me and fell asleep within minutes of take off and slept almost the whole way there. Landing was rough because of the wind coming from Fay, but we made it.

It was windy and rainy and stayed that way until Saturday morning. Everyone was at work or school except for Grandma, Pa and two little dogs that Max absolutely hated. He was pretty sure he had been tricked, but then everyone came home and he had cousins to play with.

One of the times we were able to make it outside we took a walk around my old neighborhood to see all of the changes. One of those changes is the fact that the Florida Sandhill Crane, of which there are only 4-6000 left, has decided that it likes it in Lake Wales. These birds are large, very loud and very curious about people. They just march into peoples' yards and act like they own the place. They make a kind of strange prehistoric sound and Max gave them a leery eye.

My baby girl turned one year old on Sunday and we celebrated her birthday on Friday night. As you can see by the pictures, cake was alright by her.



Max was spoiled absolutely rotten on this trip. He got to eat almost every meal in front of the TV and people gave him ice cream every time my back was turned!

He was exhausted every night from playing with his new hero, cousin Jena. Those two are like two peas in a pod and he absolutely adored her. Notice the umbrella that he found and had to take everywhere, including to bed. I had a rule that it couldn't actually go INTO the bed, but could stay next to him. He is a strange little guy at times.

The trip back was not pleasant. Max did not want to leave Florida and cried off and on to the airport, cried all the way to the plane, cried all the way to Columbus and then got really hysterical when we couldn't land due to weather and had to divert to Pittsburgh before we ran out of fuel. He didn't know why we couldn't get off the plane and was wailing like you couldn't believe. It didn't help that it was way past dinner and he was exhausted. He sobbed and wailed all the way back to Columbus and finally stopped the second the plane parked itself, after something like 3.5 hours of crying. Mia slept most of the way, woke up, petted and cuddled Max trying to calm him down, gave up and went back to sleep. She's an amazing traveler!

Fire!

This morning I took Max to the Central Ohio Fire Museum in downtown. This is a very cool place. It is an old fire house (Number 16 to be exact) that is a 100 years old. The firemen lived upstairs, and 4 fire poles allowed access from the top to the bottom where the horses lived and equipment was stored. An actual fireman took us on a tour and explained what all the equipment was and how it worked. He also gave Max a lesson on how and when to call 911, and how to get out of a room full of smoke (walk like a kitty real close to the ground), and told him not to play with matches or lighters (which Max had told him he plays with all the time!). He also showed him a mock room on fire with a girl in bed being rescued by a fireman and what the room looked like after the fire was out. He pointed out all the things the little girl lost, her bed, clothes, and toys but then asked Max if I could buy him a new bed, new toys, new clothes which Max promptly said yes too. Then he told Max that I couldn't buy a new Max so it was important for him to just get out of the house if he smelled smoke and not to worry about the other stuff.

At the end of the tour he got to dress up like a fireman and drive a truck with lights and sirens and operate a hydrant. The fireman also gave him a firehat and a little matchbox ladder truck.

That's GAL to you

Last Wednesday I spent the morning doing my mandatory court observation for CASA. That was an experience, to say the least. All parties to all cases are required to be on the 5th floor by 9am, it's refered to as the Cattle Call and it is hectic. You do not have an assigned time for your case to be presented, it will happen sometime between 9-12 after all the parties have arrived. There are a bloomin' million people and kids milling around outside the courtrooms, lawyers and social workers wheeling and dealing, and bailiffs yelling for parties to enter the courtroom, it's utter chaos.

There are 6 courtrooms with Magistrates on the bench and they fly through their dockets. Not all the cases they see are abuse/neglect cases, they have juvenile delinquents, truancy, probation etc. The best thing about this experience was the fact that a couple of the Magistrates knew who we were and why we were there and talked in depth to us inbetween cases. That was an awesome experience. One of the retired, traveling judges came into the courtroom that I was observing in and the magistrate introduced her to me. She was one of the judges who had founded CASA in Franklin County and spoke to me about why she thought the program was so important.

I completed the remaining 20 hours of CASA training this past weekend. We learned about the court process and what documents we need to prepare and what we might say during hearings, the mountains of documentation that we need to fill out, domestic violence (Specifically that I do not want any domestic violence only cases, for a bunch of reasons. Since I'm a volunteer I can specifiy that.), personal safety and spoke to a panel of current GALs. I was pretty slap happy and brain dead by the end of Sunday. Yesterday I had my post-training interview and was fingerprinted.

Next Wednesday is the swearing-in ceremony in the Franklin County Courthouse. A judge will be administering the oath to us, all of the judges and magistrates have been invited to attend along with the Columbus Dispatch. The county gave CASA additional funding this year, but with the caviot that they get one new lawyer and 100 new volunteers before the year is over. There were two classes running over the past 10 days and they are combining us for the swearing-in, with the intent that 30 something new guardian ad litems might make for a neat story that the Dispatch will run and hopefully get them more volunteers.

I will be getting my first case as soon as my background check comes back. In theory I could get a call next Thursday, although the volunteer director threatened to give me one before I left the swearing-in.

Fate bites

So, today is the first day of my vacation. I should be yelling, "Whoopie" but I'm not.

First of all, I had to call into a conference call at work today. The president of Kentucky Power didn't really care that I was on vacation and wanted to talk to me. Nice.

Second, I have been sick for awhile now, coughing, sneezing, sore throat, fever stuff and not able to sleep worth a flip because of all the above mentioned ailements. Today, I added incredibly ouchy ear to the list. Having had enough, I took myself to urgent care and was diagnosed with an ear infection and bronchitis.

Ah, but not to fear. I at least get to go to Florida on Wednesday. Nope, hurricane Fay has ruined that. Orlando airport is shut down, the schools are all closed and the national guard has been activated.

I'm gonna go drown my sorrows with some codeine cough syrup.....

What weekend

So, I just finished 20 hours of the required 40 hour CASA training this weekend. It was a lot to cram into only two days and I get to do it all over again next weekend. I also have to go observe the court for three hours on Wednesday. I am well on my way to becoming a social worker, mental health assessor, child development and psychology expert, lawyer, negotiator, intermediary and child advocate!

The first day was a sort of high level overview and a focus on perceptions and bias. Today was much harder. We started at 9am and ended at 6pm, working through lunch and getting a few, 5/10 minute breaks here and there. We had a lot of Franklin County Children Services folks talking to us about how complaints are handled, the process for evaluating the child and family and saw some pretty awful pictures. I would have assumed that folks would've know that would be coming to us at some point, but a few of them really struggled. I don't know how they are going to do when faced with seeing pictures of injuries on a kid that they will have to meet or going to the hospital and seeing the injuries directly. The thing I noticed was that all of the kids were mugging for the camera or in general being silly, even with their injuries they were still being kids. We also spent a lot of time learning about mental illness and child attachment.

Before the class started, 11 people dropped out. Two more didn't show up today and it will be interesting to see who comes back next weekend. It isn't easy and I'm guessing it's going to get worse, but I do feel that it is worth it.

Problem solved!

Yesterday's post was a bit heavy. Here's to the lighter side of politics. Credits to Beth for finding this most awesome shtick. I'll see you at the debates!

See more Paris Hilton videos at Funny or Die

Stop that Jibba Jabba!

Mr. T totally sums up how I'm feeling about all the presidential race garbage that I constantly hear and read about. Shut up presumptive presidential candidates, both of you.

For the first time in my voting history, I'm completely at a loss as to who I am going to vote for this coming November. There are a few things that I like about both McCain and Obama and a long list of things that I greatly dislike about them too.

I really want to vote for Obama just on principle. I'm annoyed by folks who won't vote for him just because he's black, end of story. I'm annoyed by all the hate mongering that has centered around him and sick of getting hate filled emails with outright lies ment to inspire terror, "He's a muslim and can't be trusted to lead this christian country!" I wish he WAS muslim and won the presidential race. It would be great for this country to have to deal with the fact that there are other religions in the world besides christianity and the fact that you don't have to be white to be president.

But alas, he drives me batty for other reasons. Usually, my choice for candidate is fairly easy, whoever is the most pro-gay gets the vote. While Obama talks about being all for gay rights, I don't really believe him. He rarely speaks about his stance and until fairly recently was against same-sex marriage. Not until California's recent marriage issues did he come out saying he was for it. The only thing he really speaks out about is the fact that Don't Ask, Don't Tell should be repealed and us gay types should be allowed to serve openly. Thanks for that, really. It's great that he thinks we're good enough to serve and possibly die for a country that won't even extend us the right to marry.

He also doesn't list gay rights issues anywhere under the Issues column of his website, especially not under the Civil Rights Issues section. No, you have to go and hunt around on the website for the LGBT section. How many folks know that stands for Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender besides someone who fits into one of those definitions? Not very many. I'm assuming that this is an attempt to keep the christian, african american community oblivious to his support of us folks. Then there's his scary inclination to add his faith into everything, which I never approve of in any politician.

McCain and Obama basically have the same stance on gay issues, so no luck on a deciding factor there....

Now, I'm in general very annoyed by Obama's personality. He is a very eloquent speaker and can be mesmerizing. Unfortunately, I don't think he ever really tells me anything. I always come away with the sense that he just told me, "Everything will change and be better when I'm president, just because it will." I'm not sure that I've ever really heard a plan for anything. Energy, we will be independent of all foreign oil in 10 years, because we can. How? And no matter how he tries to deny it, I do think he is woefully inexperienced to be president and I wonder who his handlers will be if he's elected.....

He also strikes me as an incredibly pampas ass. According to him, he's not a typical politician and yet everything he does I've seen politicians do a hundred times. When close friends become troublesome, he gets rid of them. He's above negative attacks on his rivals, yet when he does turn negative it's all McCain's fault because he started it. His new seal that looks just like the eagle used by the president, really? How long did he spend campaigning in foreign countries, acting more like someone who's already won the presidential race instead of one who's trying to win it? Moving his acceptance of the democratic party nomination to a football stadium so he can get a billion people in to watch it, arrogant. Pointing his finger at his rival for taking big oil money, when he also has big oil money. I could keep going, but I need to stop at some point.

That leaves McCain. I like the fact that he seems to be more independent and has voted against his own party at times. It amuses me that the conservative republicans don't really like him, his stance on stem cell research being one example of why, that's a major plus in my book. But then there's the possibility that he might choose Huckabee, a.k.a Satan, to be his running mate to appease all those conservative types. I think that he has more experience and is more qualified than Obama to be president. I like the fact that he hasn't changed his stance nearly as often as Obama has on issues that he claims are important to him.

I also prefer his stance on Iraq. Don't get me wrong, I hate this war and have been against it since before it happened and I would love to get out, but we can't just walk away now. Like I tell my four year old, there are consequences to your choices. Our country decided to go over there and start this war, it is now our responsibility to not make Iraq and its people in worse shape than when we went over there. No matter how painful and expensive, we have to suck it up and help them rebuild. Think about how world war II got started and it might make more sense.

But he is still a republican, which usually elicits a sneer from me before I even realize it (although this is starting to become a problem when I hear democrat too). He recently met with some of the scarier ultra-conservative christian groups and promised to speak out more against gays. Like I said before, his stance on that topic has closely resembled Obama and the "Let the states decide but I think it should be between a man and a woman" thing. But then he had to go and meet with the equivalent of the KKK and agree to do their bidding. Nice.

Although Obama's circle would have you to think otherwise, he is super passionate about climate change. My thoughts on climate change would need a very long post all of their own, but I will leave it at I'm not buying into the media frenzy on this topic (and no, not because I work for an electric utility. As a scientist I have my doubts and felt this way while working at the EPA). I think that we could put ourselves into a serious situation, both economically and with electric supply, that could damage this country beyond repair if we aren't sensible about this. We had an electric utility lobbyist speak to our company a few months back. When asked which candidate would be better for the company, he answered that neither would be a problem. Then went on to state that it is difficult to rationalize with passionate people, and McCain is very passionate about climate change. He wasn't worried about Obama at all. So if climate change is your bailiwick, the republican is probably your best choice.

With that said, I still think he makes more logical choices with his energy policy. Clean coal, not just getting rid of it, more drilling for our own oil, and increase funding to find ways to get off oil all together. And thankfully he wants to get rid of that really stupid idea of ethanol mandates (another topic that I could do a long post on).

More tax breaks for big corporations, oh how very republican of you. I know that keeping corporations happy and making money is one way we keep jobs, but dammit, why do I have to pay more of my measly salary to the government than them? Hmmmm?

Oh, yeah. He's old. That generally translates into someone who's out of touch with most of younger america. The idea that he doesn't know how to use a computer or access email being one example.

Then there's his personality, good grief where to begin. "Bomb, Bomb, Bomb Iraq!" Really not the attitude I want someone with a lot of explosive, world destroying weaponry at their fingertips to have. The lovely term that he used for his wife in public, I don't even have words for how awful that is.

So, come November I'm doomed. I have a plan to write in a vote for a woman at work who will return the favor for me. At least I can say I got a vote to be president one day.... Rant over.