Jesus Says, "Bring Your Gun to Church"

We were sitting around in the in-laws Red State Homestead watching the news one night when a story came on about a church in Kentucky. The pastor was on the screen defending his recent decree for the flock of his parish. Pastor Jimmy Joe looked into the camera and proudly stated in a mush-mouth Southern drawl that he encouraged his followers to bring their guns to church.

WTF!?!

You read it correctly. He was telling the world at large that Jesus was OK with bringing your side arm to church. The pastor said the guns had to be checked that there was no ammunition before entering and that made it as safe to have a gun as a cell phone in the church. My question was, "What about the God fearing f*&%-tard that decides to bring in an extra clip of ammo or a pocketful of bullets and decides to blow away a few prayer worshipers before taking him/ herself out? Yeah, that Bible or hymnal is going to do a lot to stop the shower of bullets.

What infuriated me more was the idiotic complicity demonstrated by his parishioners and the public interviewed by CNN. To them it was just fine to bring a gun to church. I can just see Jesus nodding his head and agreeing with these fine examples of human flotsam. Funny though, in all those artist renditions of Jesus never did I see a Glock sticking out of his rope belt. I guess their brand of God is way more redneck than mine.

I am upset that yet another generation of fabulously ignorant morons will be raised in a church that condones bringing a gun to Sunday mass. Further, I must shake my head in anger/ bewilderment/ disgust at a group of people that will continue to taint their part of the world and spread their disease of ignorance. Trying to show these people the error of their ways is impossible given they still proudly display their Confederate flags, hiding behind the excuse that they are proud of their heritage not that it is a symbol of slavery and oppression to anyone who can spell "Confederate".

I was forced to turn the channel lest I throw my TV tray through the screen. I guess that is why I don't live in the South and choose to live in a progressive environment.

I'm off to watch some hotel TV...Later.

Catching Up with the Cross Country Trek

The Wife, Ding, and I are sitting in the giant Red State, home of the Buffoon President, sweltering in the triple digit heat. We caught up with Paul's 365 Photo Blog and his wife in the center of the neighboring Red State to the East. We had the chance to see them on both ends of the trip. It was great to spend some time with them since they moved from the Left Coast and The Wife and I realized how much we miss them being local.

There is a lot to report so I will do them in separate installments. Here are the titles of a few upcoming entries...

"Jesus says, 'Bring Your Gun to Church.'"

"First There was Jesus and Then There was Porn."

"Additional Ratings in the AAA Travel Book"

I am off to locate ice and water for The Wife. See you soon...

The Ten Commandments of Road Travel

The Wife and I have found that there are certain do's and don'ts of traveling the roadways of this great country of ours. This short installment will give you the Ten Commandments of the Road. Here we go.

Ten Commandments of the Road

1. Thou Shalt Not Eat a Four Foot Rope of Teriyaki Beef Jerky in the Car.

2. Thou Shalt Not Eat a Bag of Original Shrimp Chips in the Car.

3. Thou Shalt Not Violate Commandments 1 and 2 at the Same Time.

4. Thou Shalt Not Drink a 44 oz. Big Gulp in the Car...Ever.

5. Thou Shalt Not Eat Anywhere that Advertises "Home Cooking."

6. Thou Shalt Not Call the Local Police Officers "Roscoe" or "Enos."

7. Thou Shalt Not Refer to the Locals as "Jethro", "Cletus", or "Ellie May."

8. Thou Shalt Not Let Your Gas Tank Drop Below a Quarter. (You never know where you will have to go in desperation to fill up).

9. Thou Shalt Never Pick "Shortest Route" on the GPS...Very Scary Places You Will Find.

Finally...

10. Thou Shalt Not Fart in the Car When the Heat Index is over 100 Outside.

Finally in the Red State

The Wife, Ding, and I have finally landed here in the Red State. I am tired from the drive and will post something more tomorrow. I just wanted to take the time to post a picture of the odometer from the Cross Country Cruiser. On it you can see the overall distance, the average miles per gallon over the course of the entire ride, and the temperature at 6:58 p.m.

First Day on the Road

The Wife, Ding, and I began our trek to the Red State early this morning. We left The Homestead close to six in the morning and made our first stop within the first mile. The Wife and I had to feed our addiction to caffeine by stopping at the Starbucks up the street. Once caffinated we set forth on the massive trail.

The Wife printed up a bunch of stuff from AAA including the entire route map from door to door with all hotel stops in between. In addition to the printed material we set the destination into the built in GPS in the new Cross Country Cruiser. We followed the GPS while consulting with the printed maps as additional reference. When programming the GPS we were given three routed to take. Te first was overtly long and did not look similar to the one from the printed map or the one in my iPhone. The second looked close and we chose it. The Wife and I never bothered to look at the third route. A decision that proved costly.

We made our usual stop at our favorite fruit stand to off load our coffee and stretch our legs. I purchased a four foot rope of beef jerky and some original flavored shrimp chips. The three of us hit the road soon after. By the way, four feet of jerky rope and shrimp chips wreak havoc on my innards.

The GPS was guiding us down the roadway towards the junctions leading to the main highway eastward. The Cross Country Cruiser maneuvered through traffic and carried us through the highway junctions and switches. On our approach to a main southern artery the GPS gave us a strange direction. We were told to turn left off of a highway and onto an old version of the highway. The Wife and I thought it was strange but followed the female GPS voice. The directions took us through some back country roads dotted with the relics of civilization. Abandoned houses, run down businesses, and a smattering of people were seen int he sweltering heat.

The GPS then told us to take a highway North when The Wife and I were certain we were supposed to take it South. Again we shrugged and followed the GPS voice. About an hour into the this latest direction we realized the GPS was taking us away from the route we were familiar with. Too bad we realized the error too late. We were past the point of no return.

The Wife and I stopped in the middle of no where, got stuck in the bathroom line at a gas station behind a bus load of eastern European tourists, and continued on the slow moving to lane highway. We were resigned to following the stupid GPS. I had now grown to hate the female voice inside the GPS.

I took the next direction and we found ourselves driving down a two lane road through the desert. Cell service? None. Internet network availability? None. Houses? None. People? None. Other traffic? None. We were literally alone in the middle of the desert riding to who-knows-where. An hour or so later and four equally obscure highway interchanges later and we found ourselves approaching civilization.

Twelve ours after leaving The Homestead the three of us found our way to the hotel. The route the filthy bitch GPS took us on was ten miles shorter but two ours longer than the one we have taken in the past. God I hate her...

Over dinner The Wife suggested naming the female GPS voice. Names were tossed about and we all settled on Bea. Bea as in Beatrice. I liked Bea because when it screws up I can call her Beeotch! I am done with the road today. Tomorrow we again leave at the ass crack of dawn, fill up the tank, and hit the road once more.

Talk to you at the next stop. I am off to watch a little local tube and shower off the grime of the road.

Later...

Heading Off to the Red State

The Wife, Ding, and I are preparing for a three week odyssey to the Red State. The journey is being undertaken to conduct a memorial service for her grandmother who passed away in October at the age of 99. We will be holding a memorial in the Red State and then journey North to have her buried next to her husband. From there, the three of us will head back towards the Left Coast cutting through the most useless part of the country.

As unbelievable as it may be, Ding passed her driver's license test and is now the proud holder of an official state license. She will be able to bear part of the driving burden as we trek to the Red State. During those times I will be in the back seat of the Cross Country Cruiser watching movies and reading.

One thing to look forward to is seeing our friends who recently relocated. Paul's 365 Photo Blog and his wife returned to parts eastward and we will be making a stop to see them and partake in some local delicacies. After that we will cross more scorched Earth until we arrive in the Red State.

I am also looking forward to the journey North. While the reason we are venturing North is for a sad reason, there are friends and sights all of us are excited to see. I cannot wait to eat at some of our old local haunts and partake of things we cannot find here at The Homestead. The stay in the Red State and our stay in the North will be like a whirlwind. In fact, it appears we will be staying more days on the road than we will be staying in any one location.

The return trip will be like a sprint as we try to meet up with The Wife's cousin and family from the east. We hope to find one another in the desert and stay a few days to catch up and enjoy each other's company. From there it will be the final push home. All total the trip will take three weeks. I am sure none of us will want to spend more than a few hours in a car driving anywhere once we are home.

I am off to play with my new Father's Day present. Happy Father's Day to all you dads, grand dads, and pet dads out there. Later!

Getting Ready for Next Year

The school year for teachers and students ended on June 12. For me, the school year continues until the end of June. In that time it is my responsibility to put together the massive puzzle that will become the new schedule for next school year. As you all may be aware, this is the most dreaded part of the job. This is the time when I sprout more gray hair, become unbelievably irritable, and am subject to random freak outs due to the stress of schedule creation.

This year The Boss has asked me to do a few different things to better deliver instruction to kids. I was to combine History and English classes under one teacher for students to have a more contiguous educational experience. I was also asked to create specific English placements for specific students. Math was to be more fluid due to the varied levels of student ability at the grade levels. I took those components and began to build a schedule way back in January based on projected enrollments and projected staff assignments.

Usually I begin to have bouts of massive anxiety around March as I begin to finalize the staff assignments, set out to hire staff due to others leaving, and lay out all the pieces of the new puzzle. This year as opposed to other years I was able to delegate some of the data collection and student placement to other folks. That was a big relief and allowed me to focus on one grade level rather than the entire school.

The anxiety, freak outs, and near heart failures kick into high gear in the third week of June. That is when I begin inputting all the accumulated data into the scheduling software engine. This is the same software engine that broke terribly three years ago and caused my Network Manager and I to work for 72 hours straight to schedule the students. The 72 hours was gruelling and the pressure was near intolerable. If a solution and schedule were not produced then school would not start. We had to get schedules into the hands of kids and eventually hand scheduled all the students.

The next year I had input all the data and left for summer with the intent of fixing few issues and "pushing the button" when I returned from break. Well, the program update during the summer broke the scheduler engine again! Rather than consult the support team from the company I subverted all safety precautions and created my own work around to solve the problem. Success was eventually found but a massive clean up effort was undertaken after the start of the year to fix background issues that exploded when I removed the safety precautions.

This year I was able to get the data input, create staff assignments, assign classes to students and trouble shoot small details. My Network Manager rolled up the new students and I bravely "pushed the button" to schedule the kids. I have found over the years that the 400 page manual has a crap load of stuff that no one ever will need to know. I have learned to pick and choose what I need and what safety features I can confidently ignore in the scheduling process. All my issues that first year were because I followed the directions to the letter. Never again...

Anyway, the kids were scheduled with a success rate of close to 96%. My secretaries and I will have about a week's worth of work to do to clean up small issues and correct any conflicts with student schedules. After that we will be ready for the new year. I will be able to walk away for the summer feeling much better about the coming year.

As for my annual six month escalating anxiety attack, I have a few more gray hairs but nothing like I have had in the past. Only a few times did it feel like I was having a heart attack and the tension in my neck has subsided to a level where I can almost turn my head all the way to the right. I should almost be back to normal in a week or so.

Off to create another entry about something totally different. See ya soon.

State Budget Cuts Target the Helpless...When is the Revolution?

I just popped over to The Super Goober's blog and finished reading his latest entry regarding the budget cuts and how he and his wife are being affected. My heart goes out to Mrs. Super Goober because I know she had found a home at her new placement. I wanted to touch upon a few things he said and affirm his message about services to kids.

First, my district is comprised of eight total schools, seven elementary and one middle school. We service a little over 2,500 children every single day. Among those are special education students, gifted and talented, English learners, "newcomers" to the country with no English skills, 36% socio-economically depressed, and a host of others with as yet unidentified illnesses or issues impacted by current economic struggles.

Here is what the conditions under which we have placed the children in our district. We have three counselors that work within the district. Three people working does not mean three full-time positions. There is only full-time person in the district and they are placed at my school. The second person is 60% and works with the seven elementary schools. The final person works a 10% schedule with only the pre-school. That equates 1.70 counselors for 2,500 young people. I recall seeing recommendations for school counselors being somewhere at a 250:1 ratio. That is 250 not 2,500.

The situation is becoming untenable. Summer school funds were cut so students struggling will continue to under-perform, become disenchanted with the educational system, and potentially drop out by the 10th grade. The lack of summer school also means more kids on the streets unsupervised thereby increasing the potential for juvenile crime. Unsupervised children who are already disenchanted with they system are also vulnerable to recruitment into street gangs. An increase in gang activity correlates with an increase in violent crime.

Here is how it looks to me. I am not a politician or a policy maker. What I am is a guy who works with the future of our nation. If children are our future then the current climate is creating something very scary.

Our state budget is out of whack. Republicans cry at the thought of increasing taxes. Democrats push for tax increases to cover the short falls. The increase in sales tax has thus far flopped because people do not have the disposable income to make large scale purchases such as cars, appliances, or homes. Property tax has taken a crap due to revaluations across the state or folks defaulting on their loans, going into bankruptcy, and foreclosure. Projected revenues are in the toilet. Democrats are looking to tax even more while the Republicans are screaming that the increases have failed and we should not tax anymore. The last resort for both sides is to cut everything. However, we are NOT cutting everything.

We are slashing services to the poor, school funding for K-12 schools, school funding for colleges, grants for economically depressed students to go to college, services for the elderly, services for the mentally ill, services for the poor, and services to health and welfare agencies that deal with everything in between.

What we are not cutting are the salaries of the state elected officials. We are not cutting the financial allowances for the elected officials. We are not cutting any of the tax incentives to the super rich. We are not closing the loop holes for those who purchase luxury yachts. We are not cutting or readjusting the tax incentives to corporations and conglomerates.

I can guarantee you not one of our elected officials children have ever set foot let alone attended a public school that was not super funded either through absurd local property taxes or phenomenally wealthy foundations designed to supplement the lack of state funding. Most have attended private school and have never mingled with the huddled masses.

Now that the state has proposed to cut grant funding for poor students to attend college it has become abundantly obvious that education is again for the wealthy. Instead of pushing our society forward we have taken gigantic steps backwards into the Victorian Age. I would not be surprised if we continue to slip further back in time where minority votes will be counted as three-fifths and have their voting rights suspended along with women's rights. Watch out because official slavery is right around the corner.

I say official slavery because the economically depressed are slaves to the system already. Many have no hope of improving their social status. They are trapped in a terrible cycle of poverty, lack of resources, lack of programs, and soon lack of any potential for a decent education. I am sick with despair at the path we are currently walking. I am doubly worried that the words I preach are now irrelevant for my families.

"College? Yeah, it was a great place when people like us could go but now, well there is no way you can pay for it. You may want to look at being a day laborer. That is noble work. I mean, the world needs ditch diggers too."

Too bad all the ditch diggers are now Latinos, Blacks, poor immigrants, and a smattering of poor whites.

One industry will continue to grow. The state better close down those colleges and turn them into prisons. Swap out those professors for prison guards too because we are in for one great future with no opportunities for the majority of the people. The air must be pretty thin way up on that pedestal for the wealthy. They may want to reinforce the gates of their little communities.

When is the Revolution? Where is the Revolution? Let me know and I will be there. To quote the band Queensryche, "There's a growing feeling/ That taking a chance on a new kind of vision is due."

It Was OK...Not Great but OK

Just finished watching the "Wolverine" movie from Marvel Studios. As the title of this blog states, it was OK but not great. I got the movie from one of my students who had a boot leg copy. The copy was one before the final edit so it was probably leaked as an advanced preview from the studio. It was kind of cool to see where and how the special effects are done. In many places the CGI is not in place and only blocky looking images are seen interacting with the actors.

A couple of scenes in particular stood out as pretty interesting including the World War I scene at the start of the film and the approach to Three Mile Island before the final battle of the movie. Also present were some of the wires attached to the actors participating in the high wire activities. I liked those scenes because it was a good reminder at just how incredible the artists are that create the CGI magic for the movies. They are so skilled as to blend the real with the impossible and completely fool us. They have erased the line between real and fantasy.

There were a couple of things that bothered me about the movie too. The romantic tragedy with the girl and Wolverine was painfully predictable. The falling out between him and his brother and the revenge angle was also predictable. The introduction of Weapon XI was as pathetic as Darth Maul in the Star Wars movie. There was ridiculous potential for the character but it was shlocked up by the introduction of eye beams as a mutant power. There could have been a great rivalry established for future films.

I was also bugged by the forced introduction of Gambit in the movie. He was there and then gone. The character is a favorite of some fans, not me in particular, and his presence on film does absolutely nothing for the furthering of the story. If he was simply a ride to the island why did they bother to have him be so bad ass? And why didn't he help out on the island. Again he appeared simply to offer up a ride.

There were a couple of cool things done with the introduction of villains and heroes. I liked the angle on the Blob and a few of the teenage mutants (not Ninja Turtles) freed from the clutches of the evil Colonel Stryker.

I guess there will be no origins for Cyclops since we see him get rescued in the end of the film. Seeing Professor X walk out of the helicopter was kind of cool but is a continuity error since he was in wheel chair long before assembling his Institute. Anyway, it was decent action and I liked the intro to the movie set in the mid-19th Century.

Off to putter about and maybe start watching 28 Days. Never seen the movie and since most of the GoG seem to be Zombie obsessed I may as well partake and see what all the fun is about. Later...

Update to the Monthly Tally

As you all know, The Discourser has been keeping a monthly tally of his gaseous emissions. The month of May started out at The Craftsman's house with a GoG get-together. Between all that showed for the event we consumed 13 cans of SPAM, six pounds of Tritip, two pounds of oysters, four pounds of mussels, two pounds of mangoes, assorted fruits, and a monstrous amount of steamed rice. Throw in a few beers and 8 liters of soda and we are looking at a disaster in the making. Before anyone else arrived The Craftsman and I consumed half a dozen eggs and a can of SPAM for breakfast.

Well, the end result was a hideous kick off to the stinkiest month yet on record. I had thought things were horrific the week I ate three super burritos in three days but the result of the SPAM attack was beyond disgusting. I could not even bear to be with myself. I have no idea how The Wife made it through the first few days of May.

The records as they stand are:

• January: 392, average 12.645 per day
• February: 346, average 12.357 per day
• March: 350, average 11.29 per day
• April: 383, average 12.766 per day

Now for the update. Hold your noses please...

• May: 464, average 14.968 per day

In all honesty I think my insides were trying to get out and away from the confines of my own body. Good Lord! I sure as heck hope June is not so dense with the funky fog.

I need to radically revise my diet...Later.