Lay Offs

So -- my work is downsizing. But they don't call it that. Force Shaping is the title of the program. What is that??? They are getting rid of people. The boot. The ax. Pink Slip. Whatever happened to layoffs? Why can't they call it that?
Because it hurts poor little feelings.
Like losing your ability to put food on the table doesn't already do that.
Two years ago, they did the same thing and completely gutted certain areas.
My area is cutting by 30%.
Thirty percent.
Odds are in my favor and we find out tomorrow.
So
I'm drinking a big ole glass of wine.
Probably won't sleep much.
Heart is racing.
0915 is twelve hours away....
I'll be filling out job applications online until then.
Who knows?
The blog could get real full if I have a lot of time on my hands.

Who's gonna be president?

I'm not happy about either field for president. A born and bred southerner, I am of course a card-carrying Republican but I will lean to the left on a very few issues from time to time.
For instance, I am for ... "limited" gun control. My poor father is rolling over BUT I don't think we need to be able to sell bazookas and RPGs on the street. Defending ourselves is important and the founders wanted us to be able to but that was back in the day when it took ten minutes to pour powder and stuff metal balls down a long pipe with an equally long rod. I don't believe they meant for us to load up our AK-47s and sit on the front porch. But I do think it is cool that in a Kennesaw, Georgia, there is a city mandate passed that each head of household is required to own a GUN with ammunition. (This is response to an Illinios town banning all guns in its town, except for police officers). There are of course religious objector clauses but the crime rate dropped 89% and has stayed that way with no murders since the law passed 25 years ago. Not bad odds if you ask me.
Yet I digress.
Today I'm thinking about the 2008 election. Isn't everyone? It's about 17 months out and both the Democrats and the Republicans don't seem to have anyone I'd vote for. While fundamentally disagreeing with Hillary Clinton on every single level, I admit to a begrudged admiration of her tenacity, intelligence and perseverance. It's time for a woman in the White House and she would probably be very good at it. There is no other Democrat that I believe has the wherewithall or experience to beat her or to do a better job.
On the other hand, the Republicans are looking pretty slim. Poor John McCain won't last the year with his less-than-stellar fundraising and Guiliani can't seem to decide which side he's actually on -- something the Republican base won't forget. Then there's Fred Thompson, my personal favorite and not because he's from Alabama like me or that he went to college in Tennessee like me, but because he is a straight shooter and as close to a "real" Republican as we have.
But then there's the sleeper...Michael Bloomberg. He recently went Independent and has more money than that Harry Potter kid that he can use to finanace his campaign with barely making a dent in his interest. He seems pretty smart and he's done some great things from the ground up in business but also in New York, he's enhancing Guiliani programs. He's banned smoking and trans fat when the industries refused to care about health-related issues. Crime has actually gone down in NYC and he turned a deficit into a surplus in just under three years by making the difficult and unpopular decisions to increase taxes on "luxury" items and close some of the city's fire houses. Leading a coalition of other mayors, he has signed up over 300, to increase gun control laws -- a nice slap to our ever slow public servants in Washington.
Time, Newsweek and the Economist have done pieces on presidential prospects lately and if Fred will ever make his announcement (expected in July), I believe he will be the nominee come next summer.
Hazelnuts predictions: Hillary for the Dems, Thompson for the Reps and Bloomberg for the Indies. Spoiler? Who knows but it will certainly be one of the most watched, talked about and covered elections in modern history. Let's sit back and enjoy the fun!

How far have you traveled?

My friend, we call him Fry, has this cool map on his MySpace account that show he has visited at least 10% of the world's countries. So I decided to see how much my husband and I have seen. Not much more than Fry at 15% but 100% more than I ever thought I would see growing up in Podunk, Tennessee. So I linked it to this post.

Yall know I love those cool and unusual websites and this one is pretty cool. Register, takes 2 minutes, and check all the boxes for each state and country you've ever flown into, laid over, beached on, lived in or partied with. It will generate a colored version and tell you just how much you've actually seen. Ours has more color on it than I thought it would. Looks like we should visit north and west US more...we'll have to get in some cattle drives and mountain climbing.

So try it out. TravBuddy.com and see just how far you've been. It may surprise you.

Headaches - yeah right

I get them all the time. Painful, searing, stabbing, throbbing, aching...all in my forehead and skating down my neck. Doctor, you say? The quack my doctor recommended diagnosed me with migraines because of my obvious intelligence that he deduced from the fact that I was reading an Economist magazine. That Harvard neurosurgeon school really paid off.

It must have been where they taught him that because my father had headaches, then mine would be worse due to a strange phenomenon of cross over DNA traits passed paternally to the daughter. Huh?

Jumping on the bed when I was five and crashing headfirst into the window sill TWICE and thus, cracking my skull, causing my poor mother to have her first heart attack at the ripe old age of 25, couldn't have anything at all to do with it.

But regardless, here I am after months of shoving pill after pill in my mouth in a fruitless effort to regulate or prevent more onslaught on pulsating steak knives into my head. Not much has changed. Nausea and debilitating pain still wreaks its daily havoc causing me to continually endure the "yeah right" looks from friends and family. I'm not sure my insurance company will even reimburse my ER visit for one a few months ago.
There has to be a better way.

No one ever believes headache sufferers because there is no obvious pain. Just constant bed lying, pill taking, sun glass wearing and asking to turn down the television. But alas, we still suffer. And we will prevail in a cure that is pill free and allow me to spend more quality time with my family. Maybe the 10 day fast will do it. Maybe not but it's sure worth a shot because the one I'm aching from right now is quickly bringing my typing time to an end.

Headache sufferers everywhere: Never fear, I'm on a mission to seek out a better solution!