Tired

Yes, I'm tired. Tired of this current life of mine, tired of women, tired of politics, tired of working, tired of prepping, tired of most everything.

Tired of this current life of mine.
   I cannot find a decent job. I make decent money (for this day anyway)  but the hours suck. Open, close, mid-day they all get mixed up until I don't know what day it is. Broke all the time. I don't mean got a 1000 bucks broke , I mean I've got 10 dollars broke. Lonely all the time. Can't afford to go anywhere do anything, buy anything. And cannot find another job. Constant pain and discomfort. I have to work just to survive but that cuts me out of disability. Now, If I have disability, I can get a job, If I have a job I cannot get disability. FUCK! I make insurance payments yet cannot afford the out of pocket expense or put back enough money to live on while I'm off work for surgery.
Cannot afford to make repairs to my truck or my Harley. so the truck gets ignored and the Harley sits, waiting on parts and repairs, I have given up most of my hobbies due to physical problems. Basically, I work and go home and watch TV. And mow because I have too

Tired of women.
   Yep, fed up to here with them. The love of my life divorced me with no notice, no discussion, no nothing just gone. She took the house I paid for with MY 401K and  I did ALL the work on. She will take 1/2 of my union retirement. And she took one of my best friends as her new husband. I have had one date in the last year and she ranted for 2.5 hours about her ex. I cut dinner short and dumped her at her door, I recently asked a co-worker to go to a concert with me. I got the standard female response...Uhm, I don't know, let me think about it.  I cannot get any hits on ANY online dating site. I treat women good, respect them, honor them, look after them and protect them but I guess that is not good enough so, the hell with them.

Tired of politics
    They all tell the same story. And they are ALL LIARS! It's high time for the revolution from my perspective. The soap box and ballot box have failed so it's high time for the cartridge box. Time for a change. They had it right back in 1861.

Tired of working.
Do not get me wrong, I am one of those folks who really like to work. But, I do not like working for no gain. As in, I'm stagnating. I do not like retail at all. I do not make enough dough to do anything, go anywhere, do anything. I work in constant pain, and I'm under the effect of a handful of medication all the time.

Tired of prepping.
   I have prepped for years. Have put vast amounts of dollars into it. Yet now I'm alone, in a big city and no prospect for a bug out location or a group to join. I have had to eat most of my prep foods just to survive recently. I cannot afford to buy ammo anymore so I do not shoot anymore. At this time prepping seems pointless. I'm alone in a major city with nowhere to go to. So what's the fucking point? Shoot until I'm out of ammo then die in place I guess.

Tired of Most everything.

Nothing has any flavor anymore. Dull, lifeless. I have a type A personality. I like dangerous hobbies, Shooting, driving fast, motorcycling, biker bars, pyrotechnics, explosions, making things out metal and wood, riding ATV's.  Since the old lady split, nothing brings me happiness. Life has a fog over it.
The News is a drag, no REAL news, no REAL investigations. I'm tired of groups trying to remove all monuments to the soldiers and leaders of the South from the time of Lincolns War. Like the jackasses at the Washington and Lee College that had the Confederate flags removed from Robert E. Lees Tomb. For crying out loud, he was a major General for the South and fought for the Confederacy! And he was a founder  of that college. AND those jackasses CHOSE to go to THAT college.  Now dickheads are trying to remove Jefferson Davis's statue from the University of Texas. Let's see, Texas was a member of the Confederacy, right? And Jeff was President of said Confederacy, correct? Yet these misguided fools choose to ignore the fact that most major Eastern colleges were either founded by or had the land granted by, slave importers, ignore the fact that Lincoln was a liar, a murderer, destroyed the Constitution and started a war just to expand the federal governments power. I guess I'm just tired of revisionist history. It seems that a lot of stuff pisses me off anymore and I get little enjoyment from anything.

I'm hoping that my outlook will change, that I can improve my income, that my health issues will get better. I'm not hoping for a change in my outlook on women. They can thank themselves for that.

The Next Whammy

So the love of my life walked out on me, my Father died, the ex got my house, I'm paying for things that she has and I don't, a tree banged up my truck, now the bastion if home improvement, my employer is cutting my hours. What a year this has been. I work part time for Home Depot. I have been getting 24-27 hours a week which lets me pay my bills. I printed off my schedule last night and this coming week I am scheduled for 20 hours and the next week I'm scheduled for 15 freaking hours of work. What is their saying? More savings, more doing, that's the power of home depot. Well if you work for them there isn't any saving. In addition to short hours, the hours you do get jump around all over the place, mornings, mid-day, closing. That in itself makes it very hard to get another part time job. And I don't care what BHO says, jobs in this area are very hard to find and get. Especially if you are graying and limping.
   The situation at work is very irritating, I have more accumulated knowledge than 99 percent of the folks at this store. You pull me out of my department and plunk me into any other except for paint(color blindness) and appliances and I can do the job. Co-workers and customers are amazed at the depth of my knowledge. HD keeps teasing me with lines like, "if full time was offered to you would you take it?" Yet the actual offer has never been made. I have outstanding customer service and will do what ever is asked of me and then some. I am usually a see it do it kind of guy but at this place that will get you in trouble. We are left with a weekly work list and will get in a crack if it is not done, yet we are only allowed to do any of the work list or shelf maintenance the first and last two hours of the day. Needless to say, I stayed up late last night scouring the job boards for gainful employment. I am racking my brain for a home based business I can do to earn some cash. I do have a few ideas but they all require a varying amounts of start up funds. And there are no start up funds in my budget. This is getting very wearisome.

Jobs Game.

OK Jay, I'll play along!

I've held all of these jobs but one. Can you guess which one I have not held? Answer in the comments.

shrimp peddler

Oilfield service laborer

Sewer line laborer

heavy equipment operator

asphalt laborer

construction laborer

maintenance supervisor

construction manager

power plant construction manager

pharmacist assistant

meat cutter

gun dealer

bell ringer coordinator

bell ringer

pawnshop salesman

Can you figure it out?

The Way It Is

Things are going OK for me at this time. The part time janitoral job is working out. Working out on my knees and back that is. Easy work, but when I get home I have a pronounced stagger, slump and limp. From 3 hours of cleaning.  Cherry Pie is back where she belongs. I have another job interview for a position at a pawn shop. Second interview for a minimum wage job. What have we come to? How many interviews would I have to have to do what I've done in the past? Five? Six? If  it takes two or more to stand at a counter and look up costs of various items what would it take to run a 10 meeeelion doooollllar job now? by the way in 2007 it took ONE interview for that.

On a more somber note take a trip over to Kenny's place and give him your exression of sorrow and support. His father has passed.

The Gig

Yesterday, I went to apply for two J O B S that Cherry spied on Craigslist. My first stop was the yes, beauty shop, top get my mane shorn. A lotta hair hit the floor. The second stop was a pawn shop looking for some temp (30Hours) help. No applications, they only wanted resumes. GREAT! I open my portfolio, opened a file within and handed him a resume with references. He was impressed that that came out fast. I then asked if he wanted to see the certificates I had for classes in people handling. He was surprised and commented that he too had taken some people handling classes. This guy is going ot make a decision very soon.
   The next stop was the KC headquarters of a nationwide janitorial company. I had to go to Kansas City to fill out an application for a part time job in Kearney, a small town 7 miles from me. Quite a few folks their filling out app's and I was the only, shall we say, not of color? Take a number, fill out an app and then wait for your number to be called for an interview. So about an hour later my number is called. I wished the HR lady a good morning and hand her my app, resume and some other documentation. I tell her I'm there for the part time job in Kearney and she smiles, scans my papers and asks if I can stay around for a while! So finding a seat with a cushion on it I settle in for the long haul. Some time later she asked me to come back to the offices and fill out a ton of papers. She took a picture of my smiling mug and made an employee ID card, gave an employee handbook and some other stuff. I watched a video on how to clean an office which looks like cleaning my house to me. So pending a background check I will be working 15 hours a week cleaning an office close to home. This one pays more than the pawn shop but has less hours.
Now for the interesting stuff. I was reading the employee manual and got to  the section about weapons. Of course it says you can't carry a weapon at work. Then it goes on to break State law and say you can't have a weapon in your vehicle in the parking lot. And these rules extend to the customers we may service. Missouri is one of the states that recently ruled you CAN have a weapon in your car in the parking lot of a business that doesn't allow weapons at work. Then I noticed that they also "forgot" to place the State required sign on the door stating no weapons allowed. The Missouri legislature has some very clear guidelines as to the signage require for this. Any way, not revealing what was in my truck, I was carrying an SOG Trident in my right front pocket. And you know what? I didn't freak out and go on a murderous rampage. Nary a violent thought entered my mind.  Here's a pic of my favorite cap, which I was not wearing (unlike some of the, uh, intercity applicants) my Trident and a sneaky little thing I have for carry in government offices. A Blackie Collins glass filled resin knife with assisted opening using beryllium copper springs. Not detectable by metal detectors! Ha ha, take that you minions. Even with a plastic blade it will cut. It's not intended as an every day knife or to use regularly but as a last ditch item for use in places that want you to disarm. I wish I had remembered this jewel when I went to the disability hearing. I did have it when I went to the vocational rehab interview though.

Daddy Made Me Do It

It took my fathers prompting me to get on the computer and update this blog. I have not had the desire or energy to do anything that resembles creative. I am sick of being poorer than I have ever been in my entire life. I'm sick of not being able to secure work with an outstanding resume. I am tired of hurtin all the f'n time. I am tired of this poor excuse of a democratic government that has taken the place of the proud republic we once had. At least I've got a lot of guns, ammo and food. Hey, I've got a functional Harley sitting in the garage! It's sitting 'cause I don't have the 75-100 bucks to get a new battery to give it the required voltage. Maybe next week I'll be able to swing that.



Speaking of the Harley, I did some trading for the final parts to get it put together and I got a little cash to boot. Then I had to turn around and hand that cash to a guy I ran into the day before. CRAP! The funny thing about though is the guy knows most of the maternal side of my family, has met my brother, ran around with my sisters husband years ago AND dated my aunt for a while. It's a small world after all, eh? I've got insurance BUT, my wallet was stolen the week before and I hadn't replaced my drivers license or insurance card. So I didn't want the cops involved. The other party didn't want them there either. I don't know what his reason was. So in the end it was a cash deal.



I do have hope though. I hope the Chrysler Corporation makes these:

This vehicle is a one off by Chrysler's R&D team known as the SkunkWerks. They used all off the shelf parts to build this capable little truck. Dana 44 axles, 4.10 gears, locking diff's, a 3.8 V6 under the hood, and an OD auto tranny are stuffed into this beast. Dubbed the JT, it never made it to production. With the downfall of the economy and the concurrent downfall of the auto industry maybe this is the time to introduce an all new compact truck. As other manufacturers are selling fewer compact trucks and leaning more toward full size or even giant size trucks is this the time to bring this gem to market? This exercise was done in 2007 so maybe it's a futile hope. But still, hope springs eternal as they say. If you're a Jeep fan or even just a fan of compact trucks, contact Chrysler about the need for this beauty to enter the market at and a reasonable price too.

I have another hope. I hope, if this truck does come out, I can afford one.

Hey, while I'm hopin' and all that I can hope that GM builds a modern El Camino based on the current style Monte Carlo. Now that would be something to hope for.

No change in profession.

Now I'm a plumber. Who knows what I'll be next week. Oh yeah, a flooring specialist.

As someone who has been out of work for a year and a half I found this very interesting. WTF? I know employers are free to hire whoever they want but to disqualify everyone who is currently unemployed makes no sense to me. Nearly everyone I know that is unemployed is unemployed involuntarily. As in through no fault of their own. My employer of 20 years made me Employee Of The Year for 2005 and persona non grata in spring of 2006. Nothing changed, I was still doing my job and doing it well. My theory is that my previous rate of pay increases and bonuses put me out of the acceptable pay range for a lout with no college education. I actually saw my new boss choke when she saw my pay rate during my last employee evaluation. Two months later I'm on my ass. I took me 9 months to get a job after that. That new job lasted 10 months before I moved on to what I thought was going to be a great job(if things get better I would go back to work for them in a heartbeat). The employer was going to open an office in KC and I would sell and run jobs from that office. Then came the great collapse of 2008 followed by the greater collapse of 2009. The new office never became. I then had no job again and it continues today. I/we have several ideas for self employment. All of them will require money we don't have at this time.

Jobs? Who's Got Jobs?
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I keep hearing the Guvm't saying things are getting better but we can expect the jobless situation to carry on for years. Great. I have been without work for 1 year and 5 months. I have applied for and sent in resumes for hundreds of jobs and have not received one single call, letter or email for an interview. I have received 3 or 4 emails of denials. Those have been in reference to jobs on the lower end of my work history. Custodians, janitors, lawn care, warehouse. All those jobs have been kind enough to send emails saying overqualified, not qualified, or position filled. All the rest? Nothing, nada. How can the government say things are getting better when more and more people are losing their jobs and more and more people are losing their unemployment benefits? Every month results in a net loss in jobs, but the powers that be insist on claiming that all is better. I say bullshit! How can sales improve when more people don't have an income? Am I being dense about this or am I missing something here? I don't think so. I have a great resume, an outstanding work history and lots of experience and have never had a problem getting a job. But in this high unemployment scenario my background, skills and experience don't count for squat. What everyone looks for now is a portion of the resume that includes a diploma from a college. So in this environment I think the burden is on me to provide an income, not rely on a corporation to provide an exchange of labor for dollars. I have several ideas but they all require an immediate injection funds in one quantity or another and in this economy I am hesitant to start any sort of business. So I continue on, working at what ever I can get, doing whatever I can do and deciding on what direction to take in these difficult times.

Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow
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I'm sitting here contemplating this latest round of snow. We receive another 5 inches today. More shoveling, only this time for two houses and 1 apartment. Hooray for global warming! How can any one believe in global warming? It gets warmer, it gets cooler. That's the way it is and that's the way it has always been. Forever.

House Plan 4
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Good news! We don't need a new roof, we just needed to repair the roof the inept previous owner put on. Seriously, it has a new Timberline roof, someone just wasn't skilled at roofing. So my brother and I were on the roof in 35 degree weather with a 10-15 mph breeze blowin' and the sky threatening rain or snow. Most repairs are done, at least the ones that can be done in winter weather. Spring weather will allow some other repairs. Any way, that was a load off my mind.

CPAC Results
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The Conservative Political Action Conference has held it's annual meeting this past week. They had an impressive list of speakers this year. Ann Coulter was on hand to offer her sharp, caustic wit, Judge Andrew Napolitano was there as was Mitt Romney. CPAC does a straw poll of all potential conservative Presidential Candidates. This year Ron Paul won the poll with 33 percent of the vote. Mitt came in second at 20 some odd percent. Since the last presidential election cycle, the one in which Dr. Paul was mostly ignored, he has become the go to guy for all things political by the news groups that dismissed him during the election. A person (professional asshat), from the Fox News network made the closing speech at this years meeting. I wonder what he thinks of the straw poll results as he thinks that Ron Paul is a kook and anyone that supports him is a member of the tin foil hat club.

The new poor?
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I read today that there is a new class of Americans that may be called the new poor. These folks, myself included, are the chronically unemployed. I personally have been out of work for over a year and thankfully, I still have 1 or 2 unemployment claims or extensions left. But there are millions (2.7 million to be closer) of people that are facing the end of any unemployment benefits by the end of April. The article went on to say that it may be years before people like me can find a regular job. Years! I can find work but it is intermittent, sporadic and low paying at best. And it is work that I drum up myself, not in an office, at a jobsite or in a factory. I have been told I'm not qualified to do the things I have done for the last 10 years(maintenance and construction management) and I have been told I'm not qualified to be a custodian. So if I'm not qualified for anything in between what do I do? Anything I can find that will pay me, preferably in cash. There are millions of people that are in the same position. Good, hard working folks that, at this time, have no real employment future. I want to personally thank past President George W. Bush for my job loss and Pseudo President Obama for continuing the unemployment cycle. It used to be said that a way to improve a failing economy was to go to war. Well, we're on two battle fronts and that hasn't improve the economy any. Maybe it takes a real World War to make real job growth. Truthfully, as intermarried as the world economy is, I don't think things will ever get back on track. Look at the latest ripple, Toyota builds some crappy cars, so the stock market drops and anyone that sells to Toyota or supports them or is supported by them loses their market value and it just goes down the line to the smallest provider of the smallest vendor to the car maker. Purveyors of nuts, bolts, uniforms, paint, steel, tires, glass, fabric, wire and so on all see a drop in their business and their market value. The entire world is tied together like this so a hiccup on one side of the world causes a rash on the other side.