Random Thought Thursday 7-03-08

Here we are again, Thursday. Just you and me, chatting about my random thoughts. You keep me sane, Thursday. I know I can count on you not to ridicule my obsessive peccadilloes. Yeah. I spelled that right after only two tries. I'm a freakin' genius!

I am counting my blessings that HH and the #1 son escaped the killing spree of that wacko Sheley guy who allegedly murdered 8 people in Missouri and Illinois. The last sighting, before he was caught the next day in a bar parking lot in Granite City, Illinois, was outside the stadium the night my boys went to see the Cardinals play. That was kind of a close call. I'm glad that HH did not walk back to the car to pour out his illegal canned soda into bottles that night. He might have been a victim of the serial killer. They found two victims, you know, in Festus. That ain't far from here, by cracky!

There are three road construction projects that are cramping my style. One is the new bowling alley complex, where Rudy Giuliani, the giant inflatable rat, presides over the work. Another is a highway interchange about a quarter mile from the future bowling alley, but involving another road. The most annoying project is the new bridge on our county road, next to where our gravel road enters the county blacktop road. The workers are the source of my angst. They have taken an area of our gravel road, wide enough for three cars to pass, and narrowed it to one car, if you are lucky. First, they dredged a bunch of big rocks out of the creek that were home sweet home to some water snakes, and dumped them on the parking area on one side of our road. Good thing people aren't waiting for the school bus there right now. Then they parked their heavy equipment on the other side. Today, a passenger truck was parked right in the middle, with the passenger door open. Another passenger truck was coming the other way, and wanted to stop right next to it. I think they were having lunch sitting in their trucks, and wanted to chat. Gosh darn county workers! They took a two-hour lunch, too, because they were loitering around our road when we came back from town. They wouldn't even move out of the way. It's a good thing they wear steel-toed shoes. They have destroyed our private road that WE pay for, and a big ol' drainage pipe under it that their heavy equipment smashed by driving over it. I can't wait to see what monstrosity they design for us to get out after the new bridge is built.

Did you know that if you have a lefty in the house, your twist-tie thingies on packages will be twisted the wrong way?

Some woman guest commentator on CNN this morning gave out unemployment information willy-nilly. She mis-spoke. She said that you can't get unemployment if you've been fired. That ain't necessarily so. It depends on the very last incident for which you were fired. Say, for example, that you're a slacker. You've been late to work twice a week for a month. The boss tells you that the next time you're late, you'll be fired. On the way to work, your car hits a pothole and you get a flat tire. You have to call a tow truck, but first you call work before the time you have to be there, and report that you have a flat tire and you're going to be late. When you arrive, the boss fires you. But you can still get unemployment! At least in Missouri, you can. Without even a penalty. Because the last incident that caused your termination was not your fault. You called to report your lateness per company policy. Everything that happened before does not matter, because they didn't fire you for it before. Last incident, people. That's what we go on. And just because you quit does not absolutely mean you can't get unemployment. I had a guy who quit a supermarket because the boss made him soak expired chicken in bleach water and repackage it with a new date on it. The during the investigation, the boss admitted that was his policy. BOOYAH! Unemployment for the quitter. It's all relative.

Another misconception this 'expert' spread nationwide this morning was, and I quote her, "Don't be ashamed to file for unemployment. It's money you have paid into the system." Wrongo, so-called expert! The individual does NOT pay unemployment insurance. That is paid by the employer. You don't see any deductions on your check for 'unemployment insurance', now do you? Nope. There's social security, and medicare, and taxes out the ying-yang, but not unemployment. I should know. I worked for the Missouri Division of Employment Security for five years. I'm an insider. I've been burned by the fire. And I've had to live with some hard promises. I've crawled through the briars.

OOPS! That's a Tom Petty song. Insider. A song he was going to give to Stevie Nicks, but took it back, making him a Native American-giver. There goes my Nobel Prize for Political Correctness. Seinfeld learned that--you can't call someone a person-who-lived-here-in-North-America-first--giver. You have to say they are a 'person who gives something and takes it back'. He learned that when he wanted to date Elaine's friend Winona, and bought her a cigar-store Indian, which was a bit of a faux pas, considering Winona's ethnicity. You would know this if you didn't have a life, and had seen every episode of Seinfeld, and had watched the four-hour Tom Petty documentary called Runnin' Down a Dream.