Money and Dogs

Too busy to write because I would have to think and my thinker's about empty.  Somewhere along the way about a month ago this place hit 10k visitors.  Of course 9,990 of those hits were me.

The idiots of Occupy Wall Street have officially blown through $700,000 of the donated union money.  Can you imagine how this socialist thing would work out for them?

I didn't win the Mega Million in case you were wondering.  Did you?

Anyway, this made me smile last night.  Doubt even dog haters wouldn't love this one.

Save Your Tokens for the Video Games

Several years back, I worked in a project department of Bank One.  I can say that because Bank One was devoured by another bank, which was devoured by another, and so on and so on and so on. 

Our department was headed by a SVP who reported to an EVP.

The Executive Vice President was a woman I'll call Sandy, who worked in the executive offices in Columbus, Ohio.  She "managed" several departments for Bank One which probably employed several thousand people.  She had direct access to Bank One's Board of Directors and reported to the CEO.  This was not an insignificant position.  At that point I believe Bank One employed approximately 80K people.  Sandy probably managed over 10% of that number.

Meanwhile, back in our department I worked with a lady I'll refer to as Dorothy.  Dorothy was a VP in our department.  As an AVP, she outranked me but we reported to the same SVP.  Dorothy was a black lady just a few years older than me.  She was amazingly smart, very professional and fun to work with.  And yes, I realize that nearly everyone but tellers had "Vice President" in their title in one way or another whether they deserved it or not.

In our department we travelled about one week every month.  This was back in the good old banking days, which meant traveling included dining at great restaurants, ordering appetizers, dinner, desserts and perhaps more than a few "adult" beverages.  As a group we all got to be good friends and enjoyed working together.

One night we were discussing the reputation of Sandy.  Although I had not encountered Sandy yet, it was well known the incompetence of this "executive". 

Dorothy related to me one meeting where our department SVP was at a standstill over a pretty contentious issue in a meeting with another SVP.  Quite frankly our SVP was an idiot and his peer was the one on the right side of the issue.  During the meeting, both guys realized they were not going to come to an agreement so it was up to Sandy to make an executive decision.

They turned to her and said, "Sandy, apparently this is your call."

Wanna know Sandy's response?

In a high-school cheerleader tone she said, "Gee guys, why do you leave all the hard decisions up to me?"

There were several other stories that made it all the way down the ranks of Sandy's lack of professionalism and competence.  That included a "Fairwell" meeting involving one of her direct reports, Sam.  Sam stood about 5'5".  He was a guy in his late 30's at the time and was incredibly brilliant.  Sam was seeing the writing on the wall that Bank One was about to take a hard hit.  At the same time, he had a lot of connections with some people with significant cash.  He was leaving the company to start his own.  A company I joined less than a year later.

Apparently during the fairwell meeting, Sandy came up behind a much shorter Sam and placed her hands upon his shoulders and said to the crowd of several hundred, "This little man will be missed at Bank One."  It's a testament to Sam that he didn't turn around and slug her.

I finally got the "pleasure" of seeing Sandy in action one day during a meeting in an audience held in a large facility in a hotel.  She spoke for about 20 minutes.  I have never been so embarrased to be a female in my life.

It was like being in a business audience where an average looking Suzanne Somers addressed the crowd.

I spent the entire meeting in a facepalmed position wondering why Bank One would have such a dingbat among it's top executives. 

I knew the answer.  They needed a token woman at the top.

I still wonder why they would pick such an idiot when they could have promoted someone like Dorothy, a very intelligent black woman who would actually know how to manage such a large group of people and would have added to the intellect of the Board Meetings.

Promotions should be based on the best candidates.  Hiring should be based on the best candidate.  Women are not so incompetent that they need to be promoted solely based upon their gender.

That mindset is offensive to competent women.  Thankfully, Sandy was the only example in my entire career that fits that token model.  I hope she's enjoying her not-deserved well financed retirement by now.  I'd hate to think she's still working providing a shining example of why token hiring and promotions should not be practiced.

And Today in Indiana

Ok, I'll go with another nothing post about my day.

Semi blew a tire early this morning on the interstate I travel to work.  The interstate is divided and he was traveling in the opposite direction I would take.   But the poor guy skidded along a huge length of guard rail and then rammed into the base of one of the big pretty overhead signs Indy installed because of all the Super Bowl traffic.  Upon hitting the overhead posts, this is what happened.

Thankfully the trucker was able to escape, but he's in Wishard with 2nd and 3rd degree burns.

Since the fire was so bad, it shut down the interstate going my direction also.  By the time I was heading into town, my side was open but it was clearly backed up, so I took a different route.

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All's quiet in the office of my new gig in the mornings.  I consider 8:00 am late, but the office doesn't show much signs of life until 9 or later.

I started the new gig on Tuesday with a 6 hour conference call that they let me take at home.  Sweet. 

It's a small office and unlike the last place where I just could not understand a culture where no one talked to one another at all, this one is my kinda place.

Lots of friendly people, comfortable.  It's a little bit of old school in that several people have offices with doors, including me.  Let's see, it's been 15 years since I've had an office with a door.  I've long gotten over the office with door ego thing, so it feels a bit weird to me.



OK, this is not my picture nor my office.



Officially I am the "User Coordinator".  I know.  I don't know what that means either.  What I do know is that the Statement of Work (SOW) that vaguely outlines what I am to do lets me put on every work hat that I've done in my entire 35 years of working.   Yes, I started working at the age of 2.

Hilariously enough the contract says I'm to work 24 hours a week and then less in a couple months.  When I first heard that, I thought that the pt work may be okay because a brilliant former CIO I worked for is wanting to start a company and have me help him. 

But the massive amount of work needed that I can do would never get down in those hours or the ending time frame and the CFO indicated that in the interview.  I told the guy yesterday to let me know when he wanted to drop my hours to 24 and he laughed.  Said he knew that's a long way off, if ever and that he's budgeted for me and a lot more. 

I know I've been dropped into the middle of the Atlantic with no life preserver, but I'm excited because I've been there before and paddled my way back to shore.

And although I was beginning to enjoy life as a bum and getting a huge tax refund instead of a huge tax bill, I'm so pumped about the position.

Let's hope the economy doesn't bite me again like in 2011.  While I would like to have the stability of a "real" job (not that there is any stability anywhere), this gig is making me remember why I like contracting.   Most of them are challenging instead of boring and it's nice not having some boss tell you that you haven't earned any vacation hours. 

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The St. Paddy's Day parade came through downtown again.  I grabbed a quick bite after walking past the start of the parade downtown.  I sat on the circle steps and enjoyed the great 80 degree weather.    Back downtown again but now all the construction is gone since last time I was there they had nearly every street corner under construction in prep for the Super Bowl.

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As I sat on the steps of Monument Circle, I heard this duck quacking behind me.  Quack, quack quack.  I turned and saw a young father with his two girls.  The baby, probably two or so had shoes that quacked.  She was a cutie.  So were the quackers.  When I left the circle, I saw a woman with BRIGHT green hair.  I almost asked her if I could take her picture, but I didn't.  Sorry.

Wait, I did take a picture of the first magnolia tree that was blooming. 

And this is from the start of my sidewalk.

It's been so warm here that it feels like late April.  I was thinking I might run to the nursery to plant some annuals and had to remind myself it's only mid-March.

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While heading toward the parade route I saw two guys and a lady who obviously worked together coming toward me.  The lady was carrying her purse, one of  the young guys was carrying a bag that looked nothing like a laptop bag, but much more like a large lady's purse.  I saw the girl making fun of him and they were all joking with him about his manbag.  They were heading toward me and she was trying to get a few guys from a restaurant outside to join in about the bag.

As I came toward them, I said, "That looks great."  The lady heard me as I passed and cracked up.  She made her man-purse buddy turn around as she pointed at me.  I turned back and gave him a thumbs up.  That was fun.

Not that there's anything wrong with that.

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As I traveled home, the interstate was open, but traffic was stop and go as soon as I got on.  I got off the first exit and took not a great route home.  I knew I was low on gas, but the "Miles Until Empty" dropped from 32 to - - -.  The route between here and there is not the best part of town.  I found the next gas station and got out to fill 'er up.  The tank on my car is on the passenger side, which bugs me even in the best part of town.  Since I don't have to use my keys, only have them in my purse to unlock or start the car, I didn't want to have to dig through my purse to find them and I didn't want to hold onto my purse while pumping gas.  As I got out an average dressed young white guy came around the back of my car.  Instead of going straight to the pump, I waited by the driver's door until he was passed my car.  Since I had my pursse and the keys in it, I knew all anyone would have to do is jump in.  It was only about 5 p.m. and if I had been in my part of town, I wouldn't have thought a thing of this guy, but it's all about location, location, location.

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This was the first morning in close to a year that I woke up and realized I had been able to sleep all night on my stomach.  Since the rear-end collision last April 1st, I've spent at least half of every night on my side with a pillow between my legs.    So either that second "selective nerve injection" in my back last Friday or the new medication that they gave me that is supposed to be for shingles patients is working.  The shingles med blocks nerves from sending stupid messages to your brain that you are in pain, when you shouldn't be.

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My sister's heart cath came back clean, so she's in good shape.  May be due to a cyst on her adrenal gland, which they need to deal with, but that was some good news on Tuesday.

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My sister was released from the hospital on Tuesday and the next day they rush Bob's sister's husband in suspecting a heart attack.  No heart attack, but blockage.  Had 80% blockage in the back, so they "installed" another stint.  He's out and okay.

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Had some online liberal imply that since I was a conservative, that I have Rush Limbaugh tell me what to think.  Since I don't listen to Rush and think he's an idiot for what he said, then I was an idiot because I didn't know who the "official" head of the GOP was.  No amount of explaining to these people that I am perfectly capable of deciding on my own my social, economical and global security beliefs are gets through their thick heads that I just might be a bit smarter than they think..    I kinda get a kick out of people who assume I'm an idiot because I believe differently than they do.  It's like letting a kid beat you at Hi Ho Cherry O.  It makes them feel good to reinforce their stupidity.

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Toward the end of my workday today, I had a lady come see me, shut my OFFICE DOOR and then proceeded to tell me the scoop.  The great part is that the guy that hired me is dead-on blunt and told me nearly everything. 

I found she had been in banking nearly 30 years before this job and she knew one of my oldest friends.  We spent an hour talking about all the people we caught stealing money from the banks.

She has a personality a lot like mine.  We're nice people, but we don't pull punches when we need to.  Love her.  Love the job.  It will have lots of headaches, but not because of the people.

Ahhhhhhh.  What a nice relief.

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This post is boring I know, but Bob's heard it all and I needed to talk.  And I realize it covers more than just today, contrary to the title.

Maybe more pictures would have helped.  Deal with it.

Now That's Gonna Leave a Mark

No explanations needed.









And saving the best for last....





And O/T....

Would "YOU" people quit coming here from googling, "did Giada de laurentus make a sex tape?"  The amount of traffic I get from Giada fetish people is more than a little irritating.    I had fun time writing a post about Giada and Roker and all I get are visits from sex-craved men looking for porn pictures of Giada. 

Sorry to disappoint ya.  Ha.    Running total of Giada googles since this post:  1, 2, 4,7,11,14, 16, 18, 21, 26, 27, 29, 33, 35, 45, 64, 67, 8,598.

My Rambling Other News for the Week.

Phillips Corporation won the Energy Department's "L" $10MM prize for an environmentally sensitive bulb that is affordable for American families.

For the low low price of $49.95 per bulb, you can Buy one here !

I didn't realize that the Energy Department's "L" prize stood for LOSER.

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Speaking of which.  Bang Bang, Out Go the Lights.....for the town of Indianapolis.

Still rocking from the sad news of losing Peyton Manning, yesterday they announced five more strategic well known, great players cut from the roster.

By now you should know that I don't idolize rock stars, movie stars or even sports stars.  But the amazing amount of charity work these six men brought to our town and throughout the US was something to be admired.  Several years ago, Peyton donated $70 MILLION to the local children's hospital.  I researched it.  That was an entire year's worth of endorsement money he earns/ed.  And that was just one charity.  He's started numerous other kid's camps and special organizations, Indy might eventually have another great quarterback, but I doubt they will find one that puts his money where his mouth is.

Gary Brackett was also cut.  He started a charity for kid's that need bone marrow transplants after his little brother died many years ago. 

I don't think these men will simply abandon their charities because they are no longer Colts players, but I guarantee you, Indy would not have turned into a football town had the Colts just been a winning team.  It was the goodness of the former coach Tony Dungy and players like Peyton that made us proud. 

Last night Charles Krathammer opined that Peyton would go to Miami and become the Number Two man on the Republican Presidential ticket.  Fred Barnes added that Manning could get win a state political election in Indiana, Louisiana or Tennesee.

I know that Manning is not stupid enough to enter the gladiator arena of politics.  But oh, how one could only dream.

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The world is not coming to an end. 

At least Harold Camping has finally come to the conclusion that maybe he just doesn't have that direct line to God to know the date or hour of the end.  If the idiot had ever picked up a Bible and actually read it, he might have realized that only God, the Father knows the date and time.  Even the Son of God does not know, but apparently Camping thought he was more entitled to know the end times over Jesus.

Hard to imagine why too many people think that we Christians are morons when idiots like this get media attention, isn't it?

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Tonight we have to spring forward.  This is still not popular in our state as we've spent many, many years never switching our time, but floated between being in Eastern Time and Central Time.  Now we remain on ET, but this leaves our summer nights not being night until well after 10 p.m.  I hate it.

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Imagine working for 39 years for the same company.  You're 64 and started withdrawing from your IRA (not your company pension, not your company 401k) a couple years ago to supplement your semi-retirement wages from the company when you turned 62.

Company decides to eliminate this full time position. 

For close to 45 years you have paid into FUTA and SUTA, that's Federal Unemployment Tax and State Unemployment tax.  Those taxes were coming out of your wages in the event you were laid off.

So, you hop on down to the unemployment office thinking that you are entitled to recover maybe just a bit of the years of taxes you paid in in this event and have never collected before in your life.

WRONG.

Dollar for dollar, your unemployment benefit is reduced by the amount that you withdraw from your personal IRA, even though you were earning those wages while withdrawing the IRA for two years.  It's not coming from the company pension or the company IRA, it's coming from your personal IRA.

Chalk up another person not counted in that wonderful unemployment number. 

But you can win the lottery and still receive food stamps. 

What a great country we live in.

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Yesterday was my third time since January in receiving one of these.

I would describe it like being tortured for ten minutes hoping for a week's relief of hip and back pain and spasms.

I pray that this one lasts a while.

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I want EVERYONE to quit talking about contraception, dammit.  It's about FREEDOM OF RELIGION.

I'm not making claims as to whether the picture on the right has been altered.  It might be real, it might not but I really don't care. 

And just for publishing the actual truth of Fluke's lies about birth control costing $3,000 a year and was affecting her poor friend's health, I just priced a birth control pill at the Walgreen's 1.5 miles from Georgetown University. 

Annual cost $276.90.  Perhaps Mzzz Fluke mistakenly added a decimal point.

Is there a crime against lying while testifying to a Congressional circus meeting?
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Tonight I'd appreciate a few prayers if ya got em.  My sister is in critical care.  They've ruled out heart attack, but now say she has a blod clot.  Last word was they haven't traced where the clot is located.

There's a theory going around the family that's she's trying to steal CnC's limelight.  He's been the king of the heart issues for a couple years now, not to mention his other mayhem he manages to conjure up.

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Enough for the other news this week.  I'm exhausted.

Scalded to Death by the Steam

When I was just a tiny kid, I can still remember my entire family getting up and dancing around the living room singing this song.

Anyone else remember it?

In Memory of Tornado Victims

Today, several people lost their lives in southern Indiana, Kentucky and Ohio.  The devastation created by these powerful storms is unimaginable.

Below is a post I wrote in November 2010, remembering the five year anniversary of the day my niece and her husband won the tornado lottery.

Please say a prayer for all those affected by today's horrible storms. 



THE DAY MY NIECE WON THE LOTTERY

It's been exactly five years today.  

Does anyone ever have a GOOD call at 3:00 a.m.?

I was sound asleep. Dead asleep. Then our home phone rings.

You know that feeling, right?         We all know that feeling.

Bob arouses enough to grab the phone and I can still see him standing by the bed. I'm assuming/hoping/praying that he'll say, "wrong number". But he doesn't.

Instead, in the dark, in my nearsighted blindness, I can see his arm take the phone from his ear and it slowly, ever so slowly moves the phone towards me.

My mind is screaming NO NO NO. Don't ever hand me a phone in the middle of the night. That's always a bad sign. Unless you're expecting a new baby in the family, a phone call at 3:00 a.m. is just plain BAD.

I dreadingly take the phone and say, "Hello?"

I hear the voice of my nephew. And unlike most dreaded-middle-of-the-night-callers about to deliver bad news, Brian is smart enough to start off the conversation like this: "They are OK. "

Everyone take a lesson from my nephew.  If you have bad news to deliver that does not include the death of a family member, say those three wonderful words FIRST.  "EVERYONE IS OKAY" 

WHAT A RELIEF!

My memory is a little foggy after that, but someone how I either heard or knew that he was talking about his sister and her husband.  I'm thinking traffic accident, but thankfully they are both okay.

He proceeds to tell me that a tornado "destroyed" his sister's house, but that they are safe.

So I rationalize that he is telling me that their house had just a bit of damage from a tornado.  Destroyed is so often a misused word and especially an overly emotional one, and I'm all about connotation of words.   I figure either he is overly emotional or my niece, his sister was.

He lives about an hour away from her and daylight is a LONG time off.  He's not overly panicked, but I can tell he needs some comfort.  He had already called his parents and was pacing the floor.  I tell him he has to wait until the storms pass through and there is some daylight.   I run downstairs to check out the news.  Our favorite local weatherman is already on the air because the storms were heading our direction and nearly all over Indiana.  I kept waiting for news of the tornado that hit southern Indiana, but he is too busy reporting on our local bad weather.

So Brian calls me again an hour or so later.  He's still pacing back and forth and wondering what he should pack that they will need.  The only helpful hint I can give him is to pack some toilet paper. 

Obviously anyone would be upset, but here's the background story.

My niece lived in a '70s tri-level home.  She and her husband had luckily been out late that night.  They had just gotten home and realized that the weather and wind was a little scary.  They slipped into their jammies, went upstairs to their bedroom and turned on the local news station.  The doppler radar and the weatherman was precise enough to tell them the tornado was nearly upon them. 

This was a picture of the twister that was captured on a local hospital's video cam.

They grabbed their dog and headed to the lowest part of the tri-level, a "downstairs" bathroom where the floor was only about 4 feet below the ground.  The first thing she did was call her brother.  Apparently as kids they used to huddle together during severe weather without waking their parents.  He was her "storm buddy".  They remained on the cell phone together during the entire event.

While my niece, nephew-in-law and their dog huddled in that barely underground bathroom, the bathroom door was rattling so badly, her 6'7" husband had to brace himself with his back to the tub and his feet holding the door closed.  Her brother is listening the entire time, unbelievably the cell signal never dropped.

Brian held his phone to his ear while listening to destruction and his sister screaming in his ear.  I'm sure he was thinking the entire time he was listening to his sister's death.  Finally, finally the noise stopped and my niece stopped screaming.  She told him there was a huge crack in the refuged bathroom wall.  She wasn't kidding.  Part of the wall was about 2 inches inward from the original wall.

Her husband finally opened the bathroom door and instead of looking at a messed up house, he could look up and see SKY.  That's right, where there should have a ceiling of a lower floor, there was sky.

About 5:00 a.m, I get a call from my niece.  They are in their car sitting in their driveway.

Of course they can't drive anywhere because there is utter destruction around them.  They could not even turn their car on for an hour or so because of the gas leaks in the area.  Remember, this is November, it's COLD.  Tornado "season" is long past in Indiana, but not that year.

I remember a couple things about that call.  She first said, "What am I going to do?"  I told her, "You are going to wait until daylight and then you are going to go through what's left and pick up what you can find and you are going to start over.  Your only choice is how you deal with this.  You can choose to be strong and deal with it or you can let it destroy you."  At some point in the conversation she told me that because they had been ready for bed, they had no clothes other than pajamas.  Her voice was suddenly like a little girl when she said, "AND I don't even have a bra."  I told her that her mother could go buy her a bra at Walmart on the way down that morning. 

As soon as daylight hit, my nephew, sister and brother-in-law and a few cousins that lived close made their trip down to Evansville.  And as you can see, when my nephew told me the house was destroyed, it was not an overly emotional description. 

I believe the green wall was their bedroom they were in where they listened to the news reports of the impending monster heading their way.  Notice the mattress.  The outside walls appeared to have folded inward and took away everything in their way, including the carpet in the bedroom. 

Above is a picture that was taken by an AP photographer of my niece and nephew.  This pic ended up on websites and papers throughout the world.  The doorway my nephew is standing in had just been replaced and seemed to hold up more than alot of the house.

See that boat between the trees?  That was in the back of my niece's house.  That boat wasn't there before.  Not sure if the original owner ever found his boat.

Yes, their place was utterly destroyed, but the amazing thing is what they located when digging through the rubble.

A picture of my sister and niece.

A suddenly patriotic tree.

Inspired by a friend of mine.  Her son was saying his prayers one night, he added this saying.  Another friend of mine remembered the funny story and after the tornado said that Kyle's prayer applied to my niece. 

How right she was.

My niece standing where her garage used to be.  One of their neighbors lost the roof of their garage.  It was found UNDER another neighbor's car.  The power and randomness of tornadoes are unbelievable.

A picture of my niece and her brother, who lived through the nightmare with her by cell phone.  She is holding a wedding gift and he is holding one of TWO identical books found in the rubble.  If you can't read the title, it's a copy of the WIZARD OF OZ!

Tornados are odd, terrifying, horrible AND amazing.

So, as I told my niece that horrible morning, your only choice is how you deal with the horrible situation.  After the initial shock, our family thanked the Lord that my niece and her husband won the lottery that day.  Their's was the only house in their neighborhood that was destroyed.  Sadly, a nearby trailer park was the site where 25 people lost their lives.

Below is how my sister, her husband and a couple cousins celebrated their blessings that day.  Houses and all the material belongings can be replaced.  People cannot.

God had bigger plans for my niece and her husband.  Last year they became the lucky parents of two wonderful girls that needed a new home and family and I've written so much about.  If only we could have seen five years into the future and envisioned how much all of our lives have changed.