Safari

One of the strangest places on this planet, to me, is the make up counter at your local Belks. It's brightly lit, lined with heavily made up woman holding bottles of expensive product and house music thumps, barely audible in the background. The aromas of all the perfumes hover as one indistinct presence that gets in my eyes and threatens to close my breathing tube. It makes me wonder if there is some kind of black lung disease equivalent for the make up counter worker. (Searching for an appropriate neologism and coming up empty). Pink lung disease? That might work.

I was in Belk's to buy undies and I was trying to stride through the make up area as quickly as possible. The heavily made up faces are just creepy. What did John Lennon say? "We make her paint her face and dance." One of the women actually offered me a sample card. Was it cologne? Her phone number? A pocket mirror? Sometimes with the heavy makeup and bright light in there I expect the whole lot of them to break into a song and dance routine like out of a movie musical. The next time I go in there it would be fun for me if they started singing and dancing to "Springtime for Hitler."

Still think George Bush doen't totally fucking suck?

"If I as an officer think we're not even following the Geneva Conventions, there's something wrong. If officers witness all these things happening, and don't take action, there's something wrong. If another West Pointer tells me he thinks, 'Well, hitting somebody might be okay,' there's something wrong."
82nd Airborne officer, describing confusion in Iraq concerning allowable interrogation techniques.

Movie night: Dying on the vine

Tonight I took twenty valuable minutes of my precious time to set up the meeting room for the teen movie night. Until the last couple of months the movie night has been rolling along pretty well. The last two times, nothing. I was showing Miyazaki's Princess Mononoke. Unfortunately nobody showed up for the second straight time. I'm concerned.

If you haven't seen any of Miyazaki's films you should run out and rent one. Go ahead and start with "Spirited Away." You can't go wrong there. The man is a genius. He doesn't tell stories, he creates mythology.

New scare tactics

This quarter's new scary enemy via your federal gov'ment: Illegal aliens!

Homeland Security douche: "Our goal at DHS (Homeland Security) is to completely eliminate the 'catch and release' enforcement problem, and return every single illegal entrant, no exceptions.

It should be possible to achieve significant and measurable progress to this end in less than a year," Chertoff told a Senate hearing.

And don't forget this crucial issue.

Of course the only true solution to this is to elevate the living conditions in the countries these people are coming from and to work with the rest of the world to improve international relations so illegals that do come through won't be possible terrorist suspects. Of course that would makes sense and take time and wouldn't help Sue Myrick win another election. You gotta love these dinks.

Howdy

My hits have spiraled recently. What's the deal? Did a bunch of visitors die? Have I become uninteresting that quickly? Well, at least I am still above average in height. That's all that really matters.

Did you see the NASCAR race that took place in Charlotte the other night? The owners of the track took a grinder to the surface and smoothed it out. They were hoping this would provide better grip and faster speeds with side by side racing. Turns out the cars ended up going so fast that side by side racing was impossible and tires were wearing out and blowing at a rate twice that of their fuel consumption. Every 20 to 30 laps a car would have a tire blow, causing it to smash into the outside retaining wall and bringing out a caution.

These conditions provided possibly the sorriest display of racing that NASCAR has shown the world since that year in Talladega they put 60 cars on the track causing a wreck that ended the career of Wendell Scott. I swear to god, NASCAR is playing with fire. One of these days something like restrictor plates or bad track management is going to cause a nasty little human disaster on television and they are going to get the shit sued out of them by the families of dead fans and they could jeopardize everything they have gained in the last twenty years. It boggles the mind. Sometimes NASCAR is like baseball because both sports seem to survive and flourish sometimes despite the best efforts of those that run them.

I hope that someday the drivers will band together in some way and protest the unsafe conditions they are sometimes forced to race under. It's crazy that these guys allowed themselves to be put into a situation where their already dangerous sports becomes even more dangerous and they don't let out a peep. Of course they've been doing that since the late 80's at restrictor plate tracks so I guess I shouldn't be surprised. C'mon NASCAR drivers, strike!

Cat Highway

The second leg of the cat highway is in and the little buggers are finally using it. In fact two of the kitties got up there last night and had a boxing match. Since they were above my head it was like watching Godzilla fight another giant monster to be named later.

Must...have...this

I can't begin to say how much I want this poster. I would destory a small third world village just to have this poster. Which makes me much different than our government who will destroy a small third world village for the fuck of it.


Wha?

You know, these comments by our horrible, horrible president about Miers not legislating from the bench are confusing. The mere act of voting on a case that comes before the supreme court is legislation. You are affecting the law of this nation. Legislating. What he means, I guess, is that she will not be an activist judge which in his parlance means any justice that does not vote the way he thinks they should. I gots no problem with her not being a judge before but I think her being his pal since his days in Texas is enough to twist my guts into a knot. Cronyism that destroys FEMA is fine in my book but it should not extend to the supreme court, fer chrissakes.

Yesterday I went to lunch

I scooted out the back door of the library that exits from the circulation workroom. Outside the temperature was right around seventy and a mist hung in the air. As the droplets drifted out the sky they continusously hit my bare skin it was like being touched constantly by tiny people with cold hands. The light fog and mist reminded me of being in Monterey, CA. I passed the brick building that houses the office drones and scrambled up the grass embankment and veered right toward Borders. Inside Borders the poor saps still had on their headsets. I think there might be some kind of repetitive ear stress you could get from sticking an earpiece in there all day. If you see someone with a red raw ear they are either secret service or they work at Borders. I went upstairs to the A/V section to see if they had the Wallace and Grommit DVD in yet. No dice. After that I moseyed over to the Harris Teeter and visited the pasta bar for the third time in less than ten days. You get to pick a pasta style, a sauce, two veggies and a meat for five bucks. They cook it right in front of you and they sprinkle fresh parmesan on it. It weighs about a pound and it will satiate a grown man, believe me. After that I headed back to the 'brary and sat in the break room eating my pasta dish and reading the New York Times Book Review.

Torturer in Chief

Is this for real? I can't believe this piece of shit is president. The president of what is supposed to be the greatest and most liberty lovin' country in the world is going to veto a bill that won't allow him to torture people anymore?

On a lighter note

History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of man...

Got that bad boy in the mail the other day.

Those poor bastards

I've heard from many sources over the years that working at Borders kinda sucks. I have never doubted the veracity of these statements because working at Borders means you are working in retail and retail just plain sucks. Ask Chris, who when he got his dream job at a local record store chain, realized right away that although it was a nice record store with great management it was still retail so in a way, it kinda sucked.

Today at lunch I went to Borders. I like to go upstairs and browse in the DVD section. They have a shelf of new releases that they keep current and I liked to keep up with what is coming out. Right as I entered Borders I noticed that every employee at the registers was wearing an earpiece that connected to a transmitter at their belt. Upstairs the associate at the help desk had one also. I asked him what was up with the communicators. He said it's a new thing and they have to wear them now. I chuckled and he didn't look too enthused.

C'mon, whose idea was that? I bet two months from now all those communicators will be in the garbage.

What gives?

I don't want to come off as some stodgy old librarian but when I was younger I wasn't even allowed in the adult area of the library until I hit my teens. Today I think there may be more dang kids in the adult area than there are downstairs in childrens. Hey, if you are sitting at the internet and your baby is crying it may be disturbing all those other people trying to read. Knucklehead.