Justin Bieber 2011 Macy's Black Friday commercial

Justin Bieber 2011 Macy's Black Friday commercial

HILARIOUS!!

Wait, wait... I never had a chance to love you...

Ok, so the title of this post may be a little dramatic.  I'm just struggling right now with some things, and I feel like life is flying by while I hang on by a thread.

1) 4L is growing so fast! Too fast!  He's almost four months (only 4 days til his 4 month mark) and he's already rolling over, grasping, wanting real food, drooling like a puppy, and almost sleeping through the night.  He scoots off his tummy time mat, and I'm afraid he'll crawl away one day and I won't be able to find him, or he'll get stuck under the couch, or crawl down the steps & fall. He sat up the other night, all by himself, but he hasn't done it again since then.  I just want him to stay little!  At the same time, I can't wait for him to grow up.  I'm so excited to see how advanced he will be, if he will be like me and read at an early age, what he will like, if he will like dinosaurs or trucks or animals... I am just so excited and nervous at the same time.

2) I need to chill the fuck out, seriously.  I am so hard on myself, and people have always told me this, and I know that I have always been this way.  It's just so hard to let things go.  Like I told my friend Psyn, I'm so full of guilt that if I was any more Catholic, I'd be Jewish.  I know I should take time to do things just for myself, but it is so hard to justify anything that doesn't benefit my family in some way.  I feel selfish even just thinking of having a hobby that is just for me and just for fun!  My hobbies right now include clipping coupons, cooking, and researching ways to save money.  Poke said Tupperware is a hobby, but to me it's more of a job (more on that debacle later).  I also need to figure out how to get more sleep.  My brain won't shut off because I'm so hysterical (in  my mind) over hundreds of things that I literally lay in bed and just think.  There have been far too many times in my life, especially in the last four months, that I have been awake for 24+ hours just because I was stressed over what was going through my mind.  If the brain's thinking isn't keeping me awake, my brain's need for order is doing it - forcing me to clean/organize/tidy up/etc around the house so that it gets done while 4L is sleeping and Poke is sleeping/at work.  I can't even watch my favorite TV shows, I put them on and fold laundry or read the paper or do something so that I can claim multitasking and now feel lazy.  I just feel that I need to justify staying home, even though it's financially and emotionally best for us.  I'd feel even more guilty if 4L was at daycare, so that's one thing.  On the other hand, since I'm not bringing in any money (more on that later too), I feel like everything has to be spectacular for Poke so that he doesn't think I'm just some lazy woman mooching off his hard earned paycheck.  He's NEVER said anything like that, but I'm worried that we'll get in a fight or something one day and he'll say it.  I guess I'm just paranoid.

3) Tupperware - what a mess.  I did my first bazaar last Saturday and it was a bust.  I only got two orders, which would have been okay, except for I messed up the prices and now I have to try and get other orders to fix the problem, or pay the difference ($60) myself.  Luckily my work friend is having a party next Monday, so hopefully I can add them on to those orders - as long as I GET the right kind of orders! I came home from the bazaar and cried my eyes out for 20 minutes.  I was very frustrated because I have never been good at retail and I should never have gotten involved in this selling business.  The only good thing about the bazaar was that I did pass out a lot of catalogs and collect a lot of names, so now my info is out there and maybe I'll get some kickbacks from that.

4) Student Loans! I will finally start paying, almost three years after they started to come due.  This whole time I have been unable to pay, and not because I didn't work - even when I was working full time I still couldn't pay because the total for all my loans was well over $1,000 per month.  Sallie Mae refused to work with us on anything, and eventually the forbearance ran out.  Well, about a month ago, a guy named Paul came and knocked on my door.  He handed me an envelope and said he had an opportunity for me to work at CCI part time to help pay my student loans.  I was like yeah, right, and threw the envelope in the trash.  That was on a Tuesday, and on Thursday this girl Ashley called me about it.  I told her that I wasn't going to do it because there was no way I'd be able to get a sitter and blah blah blah Poke's weird schedule blah blah blah, but then she said it would be $25/hr and I could work basically whatever hours I chose.  So I went to the orientation, saw some old friends, met the new director, and got hired.  I'm working one day a week, four hours, cuz that's all they'll let us work.  My new student loan payments are about $200/mo, which will let me have about $125 in extra money/mo, and I can save it all or give it to Poke if he needs it for bills. Yay!

5) On the 27th, 4L will be baptized in the Catholic Church.  Poke isn't any religion, but I was raised Catholic, and originally we weren't going to get him baptized.  Then I started thinking about his tiny little soul, and was overwhelmed by the thought that if something were to happen to him, where would his soul go?  I would never be able to live with myself thinking that my baby's soul was just lost in limbo.  Poke and I talked about it, and he agreed that having 4L baptized would only do good, so that was that.  Since having 4L, I've gone back to church, and it's pretty good.  A teacher once told me that Catholicism wasn't a childrens' religion, and I think now that she was right on.  I understand more now, and I care more, and I'm taking it seriously.  For the past 14-ish years, I wandered around looking for answers and trying to find my own way, and eventually I was led back here.  I guess this is where I belong.

The Beauty of the United States

...is that we all have the right to vote. Issue 2 did not pass and SB5 ended up being repealed. It's too bad really, because Ohio could have saved so much money and budgets could have been balanced. My friend Nick put it perfectly: 

Why do unions continue to give annual pay raises when nearly all other jobs have pay freezes? Does not make sense to me. Seems like annual pay raises would contribute to faster inflation and increased expenses & taxes. I thought we were in a recession. I thought now was the time to cut back and decrease expenses or at least keep them the same.

Yeah, you'd think so, right? Guess that only applies to people who don't benefit from SB5.

VOTE YES ON ISSUE 2/SB 5!

Everything you're about to read came directly from The Columbus Dispatch, pages G4 and A15, Sunday November 6th, 2011.  I couldn't have said any of it better myself, so I just copied and pasted it here for you.


LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

Safety Workers are Compensated Well

In an effort to gain knowledge on how to vote on State Issue 2/Senate Bill 5, I listened to friends who reminded me that police officers and firefighters put their lives on the line and deserve every consideration. And since segments of my life have been somewhat at risk as a farmer, a fighter pilot and a helicopter pilot, each of which have had moments of high concern, I wondered how dangerous occupations rated and whether the salaries and benefits are commensurate.Internet findings gave me some insight.
Of the 2009 most-dangerous occupations, fishermen are No. 1, with 200 fatalities per 100,000 employed, and have an average salary of $22,160. Airline pilots have 57 fatalities per 100,000 and an average salary of $53,990. Roofers have 34 fatalities per 100,000 and an average salary of $41,200. Crop farmers have 30 fatalities per 100,000 and an average salary of $24,900. Livestock farmers have 14.9 fatalities per 100,000 and an average salary of $24,900. Police officers have 13.1 fatalities per 100,000 and an average salary of $55,400. Firefighters have 4.4 fatalities per 100,000 and an average salary of $47,760.
We always will consider police officers and firefighters to be our heroes, but when compared with others at high risk, some with even-higher skill requirements, I think their unions have placed an undue burden on society.
After due consideration, I will vote for State Issue 2.
JOHN A. STEVENSON
Circleville

State Issue 2 will hold line on spending

It's time to stop spending money. I have voted yes on every levy to raise my property taxes for schools, law enforcement and fire protection.
I believe in supporting these institutions, but now it's time to stop and assess the situation, because outside forces are corrupting these valuable institutions and those outside forces must be dealt with.
I believe the legislature and Gov. John Kasich took a bold step to deal with these corrupting outside forces and I support their efforts. Ohioans must vote yes on State Issue 2.
LINDA WOLLETT
Lewis Center

Issue 2
Collective-Bargaining Arguments


"As opponents push to get Ohio's new collective-bargaining law overturned on Election Day, there is no shortage of issues to fight about. A look at many of the bill's major provisions and how supporters and opponents have argues their points:

What the bill does	Arguments in Favor	Arguments Against	What the bill does	Arguments in Favor	Arguments Against
Bans strikes by public employees and imposes financial penalties for any public worker who does strike	Public workers have good pay and benefits, so they should not strike; unions sometimes use the threat of a strike to bully employers to cave; children should not have to cross picket lines to attend school	Strikes by public unions are rare, but the threat give unions leverage in negotiations, avoiding an erosion of pay and benefits; five everyone an incentive to come to the middle	Eliminates seniority as the sole factor when determining layoffs due to budgetary shortfalls or enrollment reduction	Allows managers to keep their best people, who are not always their most experienced-people; cutting only newer hires means more workers must be laid off because they re the least expensive.	Makes experience public workers very vulnerable to cost-cutting moves, potentially leaving them with major retirement issues because they do not pay into Social Security; increases the chance of cronyism.
Eliminates binding arbitration for law enforcement and firefighters, the process in which an independent third party resolves a negotiation impasse.	Unelected parties should not be allowed to dictate contract terms that taxpayers have to pay for; threat of arbitration can cause officials to give in to contract terms they do not agree with.	Process is rarely used, and when it is, statistics show decisions split between unions and employers; process ended public-safety union strikes, of which Ohio was a national leader in the 1970s; it brings definitive closure to negotiations.	Eliminates guaranteed 15 sick days for teachers from state law; caps sick days for most other workers at two weeks per year; caps accrued sick leave paid out upon retirement at 50 percent of 1,000 hours	Private-sector workers generally do not get such generous amounts of sick time; sick days are designed for unforeseen illness, not severance; payouts of unused sick time can be very expensive for local governments.	Allowing accumulated sick days is an incentive for people not to take off sick, which helps with attendance.
If a deadlocked negotiation cannot be resolved, allows the governing body to implement its own last offer, after holding a public hearing.	Voters elect leaders to make tough decision and spend tax dollars wisely; people should trust that local leaders will be fair to workers; the balance of power in negotiations has shifter too far to the unions over the past 27 years.	This would be a “fundamentally rigged process” that is unfair to workers because it turns collective bargaining into “collective begging” – no matter what the union offers, the employer can reject it and pick its own offer;; lets employers just wait out the process.	Eliminates “fair share” – the provision in many contracts that requires  those who do not want to join the union to still pay some dues because they are covered by the terms of the contract	Workers who do not want to be part of a union should have the freedom to not pay dues.	Allows for “freeloading” where workers can avoid paying dues but still get benefits from the contract negotiated by the union, is aimed at cutting union membership.
Requires public employees to pay at least 15 percent of health-insurance costs and no longer allows union to bargain for health insurance.	Proponents say the average private-sector worker pays 23 percent, but at the local-government level, public workers generally pay 10 percent or less; it’s no necessary for unions to bargain for health insurance.	Health insurance is an important part of negations, particularly for lower-paid employees; the increased share for many local workers means less take-home pay; state workers have save millions for Ohio through health-insurance bargaining.	Requires more transparency of negotiations and terms of a union contract.	Gives the public a more-complete picture of total public-worker compensation beyond the increase to the base salary; each side might negotiated differently if it know its final offers will be made public.	No major issues raised.
No longer allows local-government employers to pick up a portion of an employee’s share of pension contributions. Workers are to pay 10percent of their wages to their pensions.	Pension pickups are used to hide raises give to public workers; puts workers on an even playing field.	Pension pickups can be cheaper than a straight pay raise because the employer doesn’t make Medicare, workers’ compensation, or unemployment payments on that pickup; without a corresponding pay increase, would be an instant pay cut for many workers; “hidden raises” concern handled by other transparency provisions in SB5	No longer automatically rolls over previous contractual agreement into the next contract.	Eliminates the potentially costly “pancaking effect” when a provision inserted into a contract for a specific reason is almost never removed in later year, even if circumstances change; has eroded management rights over time.	Can lead to draconian scrapping of contact provisions that have value to both labor and management; starting from zero can make for long, messy negotiations.
No longer requires that unions be allowed to bargain for items deemed “management rights” including staffing levels, building assignments, and promotions.	Gives managers more flexibility to run their operations; rights should have never been given up in the first place.	Could leas to larger class sizes in schools, fewer corrections officers in some prisons or fewer safety forces on police and fire runs; could cause safety issues for the public and workers.	Allows voters to go to the ballot to reject a contract if the governing body picks the more costly of the final offers and it is determined the contract cannot be paid for with current revenue.	Gives voters a chance to reject a contract that is “out of whack” and could lead to local tax increases.	Hard to fathom a situation where the criteria would be met to trigger a referendum; could lead to an ugly, divisive community fight over the worth of certain public employees; yet another way employees could lose out in negotiations.
Replaces automatic pay increases for steps and longevity pay with a new system of merit pay.	Quality of work, not years of experience, should be the deciding factor in how workers are compensated; will produce more-effective workers; allows mangers to reward exceptional work; limited step increases still can be included in contracts.	Raises concerns of cronyism, especially at the state level, where political appointees are the bosses; merit can be very difficult to define; will push teachers to be even more test-focused in their lessons, instead of teaching critical thinking.	No longer allows employers to do automatic paycheck deductions if money is earmarked for political-action committees, unless the worker gives written authorization.	Makes it easier for workers to decide whether to give politically; brings situation more in line with how corporation collect PAC money.	Makes it harder for public workers to participate in the political process at the same time the courts have made it easier for corporations; could reduce the political power of public unions, benefitting Republicans.
			Reduces the petition requirement for a public union decertification vote from 50 percent to 30 percent of members	Brings Ohio law in line with National Labor Relations Act; still requires a majority vote to decertify.	Another unnecessary effort to weaken union power by making it easier to decertify the organization; lets the employer interfere in union business.

Read the full article here: Issue 2: For or against? | A Case for the Law

Movember 2011!

During the month of Movember, we focus on Men's Health.  Each man is encouraged to shave his moustache (Mo) on Oct 31st and grow it for one whole month.  Poke is participating in Movember this year!  Please make a donation for Men's Health research or go to Movember for more information.