Work Stuff

I work for a prominent large telephone company.

It is in the process of merging with another prominent large telephone company.

However, no one is completely sure whether this merger will be allowed to go through. You see, back in the 1980s, the Ma Bell telephone network was broken up into several smaller Baby Bells. In the years after that, each of these smaller Baby Bells established its own cellular network system.

Now, I'm sure I don't have to inform you, dear readers, as to how popular cell phones are these days. Some of you people would probably sooner sacrifice your first born child than to lose your mobile. (Insert sarcasm here).

The prominent large telephone company I work for makes lots of money. Here's how.

1. Overages, in case you exceed your package minutes for any month.
2. Text messaging.

Getting back to the point of this entire post. NO ONE knows whether the merger between the prominent large telephone company I work for will go through. The recently elected Democratic majority is looking into the matter further.

They are asking questions such as this:

• We already broke up the Bell system once, and now it's trying to combine again, just in a different way? We've already done this once? Do we want to have to do it again?

I believe that breaking up the Bell system was a wise decision that has done more to aid consumers and telecommunication workers alike. I hope this merger does not go through.

We shall see.

P.S. The recording industry, having lost millions of dollars through burning and download music through file sharing programs, is now regaining its losses.

How, you ask? Well, by ringtone purchases. If you want your certain favorite song to indicate someone is trying to talk to you, then you are paying $2.99 to $4.99 per purchase download.

If I were you, I would not do this.

I'm not trying to tell you how to live your life. I'm just saying: use your options.

Social Commentary, Rock 'n Roll Style

On her post of Monday, 27 November, Blue Gal asserts that Frank Zappa was, as she puts it, one of the great political philosophers of our time.

I agree wholeheartedly. However, I would also safely add Ray Davies of The Kinks to the list.

Brainwashed

You look like a real human being
But you don’t have a mind of your own

Yeah, you can talk, you can breathe
You can work, you can stitch, you can sew

But you’re brainwashed

Yes you are,
yes you are

Get down on your knees

You’ve got a job and a house
And a wife, and your kids and a car

Yeah, you’re conditioned to be
What they want you to be
And be happy to be where you are

Yes you are

Get down on your knees
Get down on your knees

The aristocrats and bureaucrats
Are dirty rats
For making you what you are

They’re up there and you're down here
You’re on the ground and they’re up with the stars

All your life they’ve kicked you around and pushed you around
Till you can’t take any more
To them you’re just a speck of dirt
But you don’t want to get up off the floor

Mister, you’re just brainwashed
They give you social security
Tax saving benefits that grow at maturity

Yeah, you’re conditioned to be
What they want you to be
And to do what they want you to
Yes you are, yes you are

Get down on your knees

.


-Ray Davies, 1970

Getting Better

I had a very good day yesterday.

Today is even better because I am off work.

Yesterday was good because:

1. Let me backtrack a bit. I'm a union steward for C.W.A. (Communication Workers of America). This means that I make sure that the company I work for is complying with regulations; not dicking over people; behaving ethically; abiding to the contract we (C.W.A.) signed with them.
2. Yesterday, a new hire class of new customer service reps started training. The union is given thirty minutes to talk to new hires and stress the importance of being a member of a unionized workplace. I have to say that I'm very happy that all the movers and shakers showed up. They did a damn good job of convincing everyone how they would greatly benefit from being a union member.
   
3. I even got to put my own two cents in!
4. Georgia is a right to work state, which means that union membership is totally voluntary. No one can be forced to join.

Of the 24 people in the next training class, 19 signed up to participate in the union.

That's damn good. *rejoices*

If--

Disclaimer: Yes, Kipling was a patriarchial snooty old white male who believed in such notions as social darwinism, imperialism, and other horrendously bad lapses in good sense. Having said that, READ THE FUCKING POEM.


If you can keep your head when all about you
Are losing theirs and blaming it on you;
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,
But make allowance for their doubting too:
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,
Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,
And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise;

If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;
If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim,
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster
And treat those two imposters just the same:
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken
Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,
And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools;

If you can make one heap of all your winnings
And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings
And never breathe a word about your loss:
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew
To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you
Except the Will which says to them: “Hold on!”

If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,
Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,
If all men count with you, but none too much:
If you can fill the unforgiving minute
With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,
And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!

-Rudyard Kipling

This is not really this is not really happening (you bet your life it is)

The news from Iraq gets bleaker and bleaker.
So the question, of course, is what to do.

Pull out now and risk chaos? Stay around and risk chaos?

We are caught between the proverbial rock and a hard place.

I will be honest. I do not know what is the proper course of action. I wish I were wise enough to suggest a course of action.

My inclination is for us to pull out now, though my fear is that Iraq will fall into the hands of an tyrant just as vicious as Saddam Hussein. Perhaps this is inevitable. The foolish actions of Warlord Premier Bush have put the Middle East into a state of extreme instability.

What should we expect if the worst happens--if Iraq falls into the hands of a theocratic dictator along the lines of Iran?

• $6 per gallon gas?
• An attack on Israel? By whom? When? With what? Where?
• Do we come to the aid of Israel, if this comes about?

Curbing our appetite for petroleum is not as easy done as easy said. The economy of the world runs on oil. We, as the world's biggest economy, cannot eliminate our dependence for it without causing world wide economic chaos.

Indeed, without oil, the economies of Iran, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Venezuela, and other oil exporting countries would collapse. Most of these countries do not have the benefit of a middle class or extensive stratification. The rich are rich and the poor are poor and that's just about it.

Terrorism is born out of hopelessness and the attitudes of those who feel as though they have nothing to lose. More terrorists would be created if the world's economy collapsed.

So I propose we come to the table. Diplomacy cannot solve all problems, but the problems we have in Iraq have been largely of our own creation. They have largely been caused by this shoot first, ask questions later mentality. We should bring new mediators. The new Democratic leadership should bring new negotiators and new ideas to prevent the worst.

The Gory Details

Emerson Avenger inquired in a comment as to the gory details of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Birmingham. He also wishes to know about the young adult UU movement and its problems.

The problems with the national movement deserve a post all to itself (if not a series), so I will talk about UUCB for right now.

For starters, the church was housed for forty years in Mountain Brook, the uppity old money suburb of Birmingham. The 24 karot gold stick up the ass of many long term members stems primarily from that crucial fact. Four families had been instrumental in founding the church in the mid 1950s. These upper-crust, pretentious chosen ones believed that they ran the church and that the entire life of UUCB should revolve around them and the decisions they chose to make.

They made over-theatric gestures in reference to their own supposed activism in the local community. In reality, their glory days had long since passed. Some had taken minor roles in the Civil Rights Movement and rested on their laurels, wishing to receive accolades for their roles as martyrs and messiahs. In reality, few had actively stuck their necks out but all wanted credit; they stated, in hushed tones, that they had actually walked hand in hand with Dr. King.

The problem with B activists is that their stories are often more impressive than the reality of their deeds. The problem with B activists is that, having scaled one mountain, they are utterly oblivious to the fact that there are other ranges and hilltops worthy of climbing. They were instead content to bask in the dying embers of their glorious past while running in place and thumping their chests.

Some abused the Circle of Lights, feeling that every Sunday's joys and concerns were their own personal soapbox.

They did not wish to grow the church. Instead, they wished to preserve the country club for members who they deemed worthy. They made no efforts to extend a warm hand to friends and visitors and only made overtures of friendship once satisfied they were worthy of their attention.

The latest minister they've installed has proceeded to call them out on all of these issues. I find it immensely amusing because these people decided: This time we're going to have the gay minister we've always wanted.

I guess they thought maybe the gay minister wouldn't get angry at them nor force them to confront the fallacies of their ways. I'm afraid this was not the case at all.

I feel sorry for about half of the members, who have come to expect a sort of mediocrity. They could have it so much better, but they have sold out into this second-rate, medium-sized city, self-defeating, inferiority complex attitude to such a degree that they resemble the walking dead.

I feel immensely unsorry for the other half who feel as though common courtesy is a gift only bestowed on people who masturbate their own immense egos and narcissistic attitudes.

Democracy?

I am not a Labor Leader; I do not want you to follow me or anyone else; if you are looking for a Moses to lead you out of this capitalist wilderness, you will stay right where you are. I would not lead you into the promised land if I could, because if I lead you in, some one else would lead you out. You must use your heads as well as your hands, and get yourself out of your present condition. -Eugene Debs, 1910.


The problem with Flower Power and such was that few people were capable of living up to the hippie ethos: peace, love, and understanding.

Most jumped on the bandwagon for the free drugs and easy sex. Notice I didn't say "free love".

When the floodgates were opened, Pandora's Box was opened as well. We cannot latch it shut; we can only perform damage control for the furies that were unleashed. We must also be proactive in raising a new generation of children who are equipped to deal with these changing times.

We have produced a generation of people with absolutely no sense of delayed gratification. We have produced a generation of people who have been exposed to the worst excesses of humanity: all for the sake of making money.

Our children are growing up with record numbers of emotional problems. Research has proven that a person's brain does not finish developing until his/her early twenties. Yet, we are inundating people much younger than that with images and concepts even adults cannot correctly process.

The older I get, the more I believe that the liberal idea that provided enough education, people can rise above their prejudices is little more than an exploded myth.

I do not believe that most people have the ability to to make proper decisions for themselves. This was the fear of the Federalists, particularly Alexander Hamilton and John Jay, way back the beginning of this country.

But I do not ascribe to the claim of those who state, fatalistically, that this world is going to hell in a handbasket. We lived in a flawed world, not a fallen world. We can improve conditions here in our own way. Each of us can do something positive.

The inclination of many is to bury their heads in the sand and pretend.

These can be perceived as scary times, but these can also be perceived as thrilling times as well. Let us put aside our feelings of inadequacy. Let the leaders who have been born to lead set the course. Let those who feel powerless become empowered.

I have faith that we will rise to the occasion.

I've Got a Word or Two

I arrived back late tonight from a day spent back on in da 'ham.

I love my family. I hate Birmingham. And I admit that I felt sad when I had to leave my parents, particularly my poor mother, who had been going through total withdrawal for having not seen me in person for three whole months. She is a Pisces mom to a T. She cooked and cleaned and prepared a "care package" of leftover food for me to take back home.

I said, "Mom, are you going to tie it up with brown paper and string, too?"

She just grinned.

But yeah, my family is still my family. Absence really does make the heart grow fonder. But not with Birmingham. The farther I stay away from that place, the more I despise it and realize how much I was getting the shaft just by being there.

While I was there, I heard through the grapevine that the Birmingham UU...I mean UNITARIAN...church is being totally reamed out by the new minister they've just installed. Seems that he's run into the same sorts of issues that drove me away. And nearly drove away the interim as well.

Good that they're being called out finally, but I'm glad I'm not there to hear it.

Every cliche of a small, insular, snooty, dysfunctional church home applies to what passes for the Unitarian Universalist Church of Birmingham. I hope that, in some small way, my leaving made an impression on the long time members. More than likely it did not--they went on fumbling around, sounding impressive, full of sound and fury signifying nothing, and doing their best impression of what St. Paul called "tinkling brass".

*gasp* Was that a reference to Christianity? Why yes, yes it was.

And it's in 1st Corinthians, Chapter 13--which should be an inspiration for all of us.

UUCA is a paradise compared to Birmingham. This is why I have really low expectations so far as actual Unitarian churches are concerned. It seems that I was just in a bad home church for a while and in a bad YA national movement.

My heart goes out, once again, to young adults who have had similar experiences and find themselves diving into the national UU movement because they have nowhere else to go to be appreciated.

Thanks-getting

(JOKE)

Person 1: I can't believe people go out to shop on the day after Thanksgiving.
Person 2: I know! It's so crowded!

Person 1: So what time are we leaving?

I once worked retail and I hate the day after Thanksgiving. This is the mantra of anyone ever unfortunate enough to have to slog away when everyone else is out trying to cram themselves into the same enclosed place as everyone else at the same time.

I don't get it, really, but then again I never got the point of trying to cram as many people as possible into a phone booth. The whole idea of big crowds in small places is enough to give me a panic attack. The sardines approach wasn't really attractive to me.

Three Main Reasons Not to Shop on the Day after Thanksgiving.

1. Avoid B musicians and actors specially hired for the occasion.
2. Avoid the thrill of waiting to leave a parking deck for two hours.
3. Avoid at least five people you could live the rest of your life without ever needing to see in person ever again.

The Sorry State of Music

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored by little statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency a great soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himself with his shadow on the wall. Speak what you think now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said to-day. — 'Ah, so you shall be sure to be misunderstood.' — Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood.

-Ralph Waldo Emerson


I played open mic night at Eddie's Attic here in town.

To wit, I didn't win. This pisses me off in all sorts of ways. Mostly because everyone who made the top three sounded just like the next _________________.

In Birmingham, one sees amateurish mediocrity. These people looked like a patische of whatever's popular right now. For comparison, Birmingham is like receiving a really poor quality fruitcake for Christmas. Atlanta is like receiving a gourmet fruitcake for Christmas.

Both of them are hideous, but one is more asthetically hideous.

The night started out slowly. I thought I'd be a shoo-in, based on the first few acts. The first was a very nineteen-year-old faux country singer who used every cliche of inexperience known to man and plugged his own private myspace music page in between songs. *slaps forehead*

The winner, a nice young lady from Memphis, sounds like the latest popular thing.

I guess that's what gets me. Everyone was looking for the latest popular thing and not something particularly new or different. Compared to everyone else who played these extended, ornate, and utterly pedestrian songs.

The image I got was of shit in a silk stocking. Looks good on the outside, but it's still shit, no matter how clever the packaging.

A Quick One (While He's Away)

Yeah, yeah, Blue Gal. I forgot to blog yesterday. You were sick and I was preoccupied with interesting people.

This blog tends to be of the ain't it awful activist variety, so I would just like to pause one fast moment to be thankful. Thanksgiving is coming on very shortly and I have much to be thankful for.

• I am thankful for good friends. One of them is Chance Hunter. His blog is Making Chutney.
• I am thankful for a fresh start in Atlanta
• I am thankful for a progressive church which calls itself out when appropriate and makes needed reforms; I am thankful for a church where liberal is used in good sense and irony is understood.
  
• I am thankful for a successful re-invention of myself in a bigger town.
  
• I am thankful for Blue Gal , who has mentored me and served as the voice of reason and sanity for me, particularly when I was in a much darker point in my life.
• I am thankful that the USA elected a Democratic majority Congress, thereby making my year.
  

Tonight I play at Eddie's Attic. This is where I get my music on. I'll be participating in an open mic competition. The competition will be fierce, so I am not expecting to win. But I am expecting to have a good time. Those who make a good impression are often invited back to play their own set on their own night. This is what I am hoping for as well.

Several UU friends are coming out to see me tonight and I am thankful for their being in my life.

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone!

Love,

Comrade Kevin.

What Needs to Change

I'm from the other side of town
Out of bounds
To anybody
Who don't live around
I never learned to share
Or how to care




I never had no teachings
About being fair.



WE people who are darker than blue

ARE we gonna stand around this town and let what others say come true?




We're just good for nothing they are figure
A boyish grown up shiftless jigger

Now we can't hardly stand for that


OR IS THAT REALLY WHERE IT'S AT?




We people who are darker than blue
This ain't no time for segregating



I'm talking 'bout brown and yellow too

High yellow girl, can't you tell

YOU'RE JUST THE SURFACE OF OUR DARK DEEP WELL

If your mind could really see
You'd know your color same as me.

Pardon me, brother
As you stand in your glory
I know you won't mind if I tell the whole story

Get yourself together,
Learn to know your sign.

Shall we commit our own genocide before we check out our mind?
I know we've all got problems
That's why I'm here to say
Keep peace with me and I with you
Let me love in my own way

Now I know we have great respect for the sister and mother
It's even better yet
But there's the joker in the street
Loving one brother and killing the other

When the time comes and we are really free
They'll be no brothers left you see

We people who are darker than blue
Don't let us hang around this town
And let what others say come true

We're just good for nothing they all figure
A boyish grown up shiftless jigger

Now we can't hardly stand for that
Or is that really where it's at?







Pardon me brother, I know we've
come a long long way













LET US STOP BEING SO SATISFIED.

Curtis Mayfield, 1970.

Ignorance

Religion is the opiate of the masses. -Karl Marx.


Me: I'm sorry that you were lied to by ________________.

You can register a complaint with the FCC if you choose.

Customer: Nope. I'm going to leave that in the hands of the Lord.

I'm sure God has better things to worry about than whether or not you've been mischarged by a prominent large telephone corporation.

And I'm sure the praying will help.

I have no problem with organized religion. I DO, however, have a problem with people who dissolve themselves of all responsibility for their own actions and put it all in the hands of DA LAWD.

Andy Warhol Ruined Art

Today, at auction, Andy Warhol's iconic picture of Chairman Mao sold for a record $17.5 million dollars.

(No need to provide the picture here.)

This iconic picture of many iconic pictures looks the same as any other Andy Warhol silkscreen, which is to say that it looks like it could have been completed by a 13 year old middle school student during art class.

A few facts about this picture (not I didn't say PAINTING).

• This picture was probably never MADE by Mr. Warhol himself. By that point in time, after his ill-fated assassination attempt, Mr. Warhol hired a staff of people who made silk screens by the process, under his name.
• The only thing authentically Warhol about this is the fact that he probably paid the money to have it created
• By the late 1970s, Andy Warhol was too busy throwing lavish dinner parties and commenting on the TV talk show circuit to bother with art.

And yet, this picture sold for $17.5 million dollars at auction.

If this progresses further, I expect for an authentic finger-painting mass produced by a major corporation to draw at least 1 million dollars at auction. Nevermind that they are all made out of ticky-tacky and they turn out all the same.

Christmas Time is Here Again?!?!

As I was driving home this weekend from church, I noticed that the large Coca-Cola billboard in the heart of downtown Atlanta has already been transformed to its Happy Holidays motif.: Santa Claus blowing snowflakes across a wintry landscape.

This is ironic in all sorts of ways:

1. It hardly ever snows in Atlanta. Even one inch is enough to cause a massive panic and create eight separate multi-car pileups.

2. It isn't even Thanksgiving yet!

And yes, I hear the voice of Charlie Brown, a la A Charlie Brown Christmas as I think of this--synched nicely in time with that familar jazz piano riff we all associate with the program.

If I were Jesus of Nazareth, I'd be sorely pissed that a holiday meant to commemorate my birth and gift to the world had been transformed to a consumer buy-fest. Somehow I don't understand how giving gifts and vowing to reform your conduct for a brief shining moment redeems a person for being utterly obnoxious the other 11 months of the year.

We ought to live every day like it's Christmas time (And tip like it's Christmas-time, but that's a different subject altogether and I digress). And instead of getting your progeny, friends, or assorted relatives the latest gizmo, why not provide something useful?

Something they can use. Something they will use over and over again, not something they will use for a month until the newness wears off. Garage sales, the Goodwill, and thrift stores are full of such instant gratification gadgets.

Workplace Humor

Me: Thank you for calling ____________, how may I help you?

Customer: *flirty* Hello! Are you married? I'm just a single gal by myself.

Me: Ummm. No.

Customer: Good. I'm looking for a man.

Me: *blinks* Can I help you?


Customer: Maybe could you breathe really heavy on the phone for me?

This call isn't being recorded, is it?

Me: Potentially, ma'am.

Customer: Oh well then. I'll have to be good.

Oh shit, we're out of beer. I haven't been drinking, though.

I was just talking to a man who I signed me up for a new phone.
Damn, he sounded hot.

FIVE MINUTES LATER

Me: Would you like to add roadside assistance to your phone?

Customer: No, I think my clients can take me places if I have a problem out on the road.

It's not how it sounds! I'm a hairdresser. They're not THAT sort of clients.

Me: Is there anything else I can do for you?

Customer: No, because you're in Georgia and I'm in Florida

Me: Okay, then. Have a good night, now.

(what a FLOOZY!)

Tact

The art of compromise is a concept the recently elected Democratic Congress should pay more than just lip service towards accomplishing.

Compromise, on a bi-partisan basis, requires a skill called tact.

Scenario

Let us assume that the discussion of Hillary R. Clinton comes up in the course of debate. Let us assume that the topic shifts to the personality of Ms. Clinton and let us say she has come across as rather unfriendly.

A person from different regions of the country would respond to this pronouncment in different ways.

1. Southern: "Mrs. Clinton is a control freak, bless her heart."
2. New England: "She's a total bitch."

Neither answer is correct.

The correct answer is somewhere in between the Passive-aggressive evasiveness of the South and the BLUNT honesty of New England.

Suggested Answer:

Mrs. Clinton is a formidable force in the party. Despite the fact that she can come across as rather impersonal on a face-to-face basis, I understand the importance of working together to accomplish our goals. After all, we are stewards of the peoples' trust and they elected us to get the job done.

Purging

Now that we've secured the majority, it's time to clean house.

Let's make sure we purge away all the people who give Democrats a bad name.

This includes:

1. Rev. Al Sharpton
2. Jesse Jackson
3. James Carville
4. Marion Barry
5. John Kerry

If we intend to keep power, we'll need to be known as the Anti-Wingnut party.

I feel a bit conflicted with this victory. The mass of Americans who voted for Democrats this time around are far more moderate than I am. I consider myself liberal, but (and this is a big but) with a sense of irony. I fear any ideology that does considers itself infallible and immune to tweaking. The God word for this concept is "idolatry".

We should not let the radical left hyjack our agenda. The neo-con far right are what effectively did in the GOP this time around. May we never lose sight of that as we press forward.

We Won. Now...*roll up sleeves*

There is no real perfection

There'll be no perfect day
Just love is our connection
The truth in what we say

There's no good revolution
Just power changing hands
There is no straight solution
Except to understand

So listen to my song of life
You don't need a gun or a knife
Successful conversation will take you very far

There is no real perfection
There'll be no perfect man
Just peace is our connection
Forgiving all you can

There's no good kind of killing
Just power taking life
It's all good blood that's spilling
To make a bigger knife

Successful conversations will take you very far

Successful conversations will take you very far

Successful conversations will take you very far
  
-Pete Ham

Saturday Amusement

Customer: Yeah, well...I got this phone for my Grandson, see. His mother done blowed her head off earlier in the week and _______ sent me a phone in the mail today.

Me: I'm sorry to hear that.

(thinking) Why are you telling me this? Do I need to transfer you to the therapy department? Why don't you audition for Jerry Springer.

I'll be glad to help you with that.

And you live in Mississippi, correct?

Customer: That's correct.