Big Tippin'

I'm not one of those guys who doesn't tip, or who tips based on service. Even a rude, shitty waiter is gonna get 15%. That's the way society works. But there are some situations where I simply don't understand the tip. Actually, I understand the tip, I don't understand the amount of the tip.

Mainly I'm talking about coffeehouses. I routinely see people throwing dollar bills into the tip jar. And when I say "bills", that's what I mean. Like $2 tips. On a $3 coffee. Does that make any sort of sense? To me some sort of psychological overcompensating is going on.

Now, you're probably thinking I'm a cheap bastard who doesn't tip at a coffeehouse. Well, yes and no. I am a cheap bastard, but I do tip at coffeehouses. My tab is $2.25? Well you just got 75 cents. My tab is $2.75? Well, just a quarter today, but still better than a kick in the pants. But lately, after watching the people ahead of me make it rain, I feel like a cheap bastard who hates baristas. Like my mere change in a tip jar is some sort of insult.

I get coffee every single day, and sometimes multiple times in one day. I can't keep up with you bastards and your paper tips. Besides, homes are being foreclosed everywhere, there are food riots worldwide, they did a remake of Prom Night...armegeddon is near. Time to start hording. The baristas will survive.

Tips (meaning money, not advice) for my blogging/whining can be given here. Pretend I just gave you a soy, half-caf macchiato.

Bacon (Muxtape #2)

I'm liking this whole Muxtape thing. I made another one; this one is cop-inspired.

http://xjerryx1.muxtape.com/

Due to the nature of the comp, I guess I should give a disclaimer: I work with law enforcement, so the sentiments in these songs are not to be taken as my personal opinion. I've grown up, and the world is no longer as black and white as it once seemed. I know a lot of "good" cops and respect what they do. Yet, I have to admit, I'm still a sucker for a good anti-cop song. Hard to explain. Anyways, I included the last song, "Shattered Badge", since it is mostly "pro-cop" song (I don't know if White Flag was actually pro-cop, or if at a time, since everybody else was writing anti-cop songs, writing a pro-cop song was the punkest thing they could think of).

So let's just dedicate to this to the minority of power mustached, asshole cops out there.

fast food

With all the good eats available to me in San Diego, I hardly ever go to chain fast food restaurants anymore. But I do have a longstanding tradition of trying any "new" item pimped a fast food chain. Lately the trend has been toward higher end burgers. I have had the Six Dollar Burgers at Carl's Jr. I think they are pretty damn good, even if I can't understand why they make a big deal of getting a $6 sit-down restaurant burger for $5 in a fast food joint. I've had the Sirloin Burger at Jack In The Box, and also found it surprisingly good. So I figured I would try the McDonald's Angus burgers.

Fucking gross.

McDonald's: stick to Big Mac's, Quarter Pounders, and double cheeseburgers and I think we'll all be happy. When's the last time McDonald's had something new that didn't taste like ass? I have to go back to the sadly missed McDLT. If you need to do something new, bring that back, not the friggin McRib. I eat some disgusting shit, and I won't touch a McRib. Wow, now I'm all craving a McDLT.

Sing it, Costanza!



I'm not the only one am I? Does anyone else even remember the McDLT? I seem to have this memory of fast food items and procedures that no one else seems to remember. Let's see...

Jack In The Box Nachos. One of the best deals ever. A round bowl of chips, nacho cheese, and jalapenos. For the love of God I have no idea why the got rid of these.

Jack In the Box Teriyaki Chicken Bowls. I convinced myself I was eating healthy while I scarfed it down.

Jack In The Box "Dinner In The Box". Someone please verify this for me. I can swear for some time, JITB had "Steak In The Box" and "Shrimp In The Box". Weird, I know.

Burger King waiters. Also something no one else seems to remember. I swear there was a time when Burger King tried the concept of "waiters". Someone? I also seem to recall something about free popcorn, but that doesn't make any sense at all.

McDonald's Pizza. Swear to God. Lemoore was a test market for it, and the McDonald's had a pizza oven and served incredibly shitty pizza.

I guess I should mention that for a long time, Jack In the Box was the only fast food in town, and with my dysfunctional yet lovable family, it was dinner a large portion of the time. For awhile, I existed on Pita Pocket Supremes. This was not the Fajita Chicken ones, they had ham and turkey ones. Fill that bad boy with ranch dressing, and gotdamn.

Wait, how the hell did I get here? Oh yeah, McDonald's Angus burgers are fucking nasty.

Anyone else have fondly remembered fast food items?

sunday rant

Somedays, it's better to not leave the house.

Today was one of those days.

My day was going fine. I got a lot of cleaning done. I finished a lot of unfinshed household tasks I'd been procrastinating about. I listened to the Padres game (they lost). All that stuff took me until 5 o'clock. I was kind of pround of my productive, yet relaxing day.

Then I left the house.

First stop, Costco. I notice that the Diet Dr. Pepper is now 32 cans for $8.99, instead of 36 cans for $8.69. Whatever, it's a rough economy, I get the whole less-for-more thing. But I can't wrap my head around the concept of a 32 pack. 6 - 12 - 24 - 36, right? I mention this to the Costco employee, not a complaint, more like a friendly observation. I am, after all, still in a good mood. He doesn't seem to get my confusion. His response is, with no sarcasm, "Yeah, 32 pack. It's double a 16 pack." Um, did I miss a memo? 16 pack? What the fuck is this guy talking about?

Okay, so that's not so bad. Just confusing.

Next stop, Target. Why are escalators so perplexing to people? When you get on an elevator, you stand to the right, so those who chose to climb the stairs can do so, right? Right? This is just common courtesy, yet no one seems to adhere to the unspoken rules. Am I wrong about this? Furthermore, once you get off the escalator, fucking move! There's an assembly line of people behind you that have no place to go but right into you. Finally, there is a right-of-way at Target. The bigger main aisles are like the freeways, and the smaller isles are like side streets. Let me illustrate. And before you start snickering, MS Paint with a touchpad is friggin hard. And yeah, I spelled "aisle" as "isle". I never claimed to be a genious on non-escalator related issues.




Therefore, when coming out of one of the smaller isles on to the main isle, you need to slow the hell down and make sure the coast is clear. And if you don't, and your dumb ass runs into me, don't wait for ME to apologize, because you will be waiting a long time.

Finally, had dinner with a friend in Hillcrest, which is the fabulous part of San Diego. After dinner, I was walking my friend back to her car when this guy walking by looks at us and says in an exasperated tone, "MORE straight people?!". When well this heterophobia end?

Okay so that wasn't irritating, it was just funny. Same with the Costco stuff. So basically, Target shoppers piss me off.

my muxtape brings all the boys to the yard

And to answer your question, why yes, it is rather superior to yours. I could teach you, but that would require financial compensation.

For reals though, I made one of these muxtapes the kids are going crazy for. I randomly threw 12 punk songs that I happen to love together. So enjoy. Or don't. I don't really give a shit.

Actually I do, I just like to sound like a jaded misanthrope sometimes.

The tunage is here: http://xjerryx.muxtape.com/

If you have one, give me the link.

bleach and mountain dew

G.I.G.O (via Atrios via local6.com):

A recent survey that found some Florida teens believe drinking a cap of bleach will prevent HIV and a shot of Mountain Dew will stop pregnancy has prompted lawmakers to push for an overhaul of sex education in the state.

The survey showed that Florida teens also believe that smoking marijuana will prevent a person from getting pregnant.

State lawmakers said the myths are spreading because of Florida's abstinence-only sex education, Local 6 reported.

john yoo is an evil bastard

What fucking country do we live in again?

How the hell does UC Berkeley justify my tax dollars paying the salary of this sick prick?

Bush's War

I used to get pissed at least once a day about something that the Bush Administration had done. Maybe a lie. A manipulation. Fearmongering. An omission. Neo-McCarthyism. And I stress the "at least" part, because normally it was more.

But at some point over the past year or two, something a switch flipped off. I fear have become fatigued, apathetic, and jaded. I stopped paying so much attention to public affairs. It was depressing enough that the news is so bad on a daily basis. But to realize that, outside of a relative passionate few, most people didn't give a shit anyways, well, that was numbing. My heart wasn't really into it anymore. And the past seven years became kind of a blur, better to be forgotten.

But then PBS brought it all back. The Frontline special, "Bush's War", that ran last week. Is nothing short of amazing. I Tivo'd it (sorry, "DirecTV DVR'd" it doesn't have a nice ring to it) and could only handle watching so much of it at a time. That is how pissed I got.

If you didn't pay attention to the lead up to the Iraq War, if you were to bust to pay attention during the first years of the war, and maybe now you feel it's your patriotic duty to catch up, well Bush's War is a riveting way to do so. It's 4 1/2 hours (yes, I know, but you owe it to your country. You're a patriot, remember? If you don't watch it, the terrorists win) of interviews with most of the behind the scenes players and the journalists who did their best to cover it. The grudge match between the CIA and the Pentagon over military matters and intelligence, and the parallel political war between the State Department and Department of Defense are given thorough attention.

The obvious villans in the whole affair are Dick Cheney and Don Rumsfeld. Fucking pricks. Ahmed Chalabi and John Yoo are high on that list as well. Bush himself appears to be, as we have always guessed, an enabler to Cheney and Rumsfeld's wishes.

Condeleeza Rice has a mixed legacy. She often tried to do the right thing behind closed doors, but when she failed, she just went along in public and did the bidding of her superiors. And she's still doing the same shit today. George Tenet had a chance early on to do some good and keep the focus on Afghanistan, but in the end, possibly in the name of personal ambition, caved, and went along with the program.

Colin Powell is the major political tragedy here. I wish he would have just resigned after being humiliated left and right. Instead, although he harbored more doubts than virtually anyone, he ended up making made the case for war to the UN. And, being Colin Powell, he influenced countless numbers of people who were on the fence towards war.

So, now I'm pissed all over again. More than anything I wonder how, after all the bad judgemnts, after all the poor decisons, after all the cut corners cut, how, how! how? Bush and Cheney are still in office. I used to wonder this many times a day. I guess it was a nice little mental vacation I had there for awhile. Thanks, PBS, for putting an end to that. Assholes.

Oh yeah, I almost forgot. The point of all this rambling is that "Bush's War" is available online for free.

Here's a preview.

opening day

Ah, the best day of the year. Baseball is back. Went to the Pads game tonight, and enjoyed a 4-0 Jake Peavy win.

Funny, baseball is, the way it can afflict me with boundless optimism after one single game in a 162 game season.

Anyways, random thoughts:

• They had a "Padres Jukebox" thing where fans chose one of three songs based on applause. The choices were "American Girl" by Tom Petty, "Light My Fire" by The Doors, and "Born In The USA" by Bruce Springsteen. Springsteen won, and it occurred to me that probably 95% of people mistakenly believe it to be a patriotic, proud-to-be-an-American type song. Um, it's not. Have you read the lyrics?

• I was again very disappointed with the lack of creativity in song choices players picked for when they come to bat. Same old R & B and wuss-rock. What? No Slayer? SPEAKING of which. I have a great idea. You know how Trevor Hoffman started entering the game to AC/DC's "Hell's Bells" and it was pretty awesome and then every other reliever rode his jock and came up with their own entrance music? Well, it's lame and played out now. "Welcome To The Jungle"? Bo-ring. "Enter Sandman"? Yawn. But dude, what about Slayer? Imagine, the stadium gets quiet and dark, and then you hear
  
  Hell yes. I just saved baseball.

• Finally got to see the Tony Gwynn statue.

• Please stop the "Day-O" call-response. Freaking irritating.
• Note to between-innings entertainment producers: great plays are not "bloopers".

Ack, I'm harshing my own buzz. Let's be absolutely clear that was a great game and I'm glad baseball season is back. It's a large part of why I'm back in San Diego.