All About Baking

Day 2 of the Blog A Day experiment is on and I could not think of a better reason to be doing this then to highlight a friends new Venture. My good friend Molly is starting a food blog with recipes and stories, all from the point of view of someone with multiple food allergies. So if you like your cookies Gluten Free, or are just a foodie like me, please check out her Blog "The Particular Kitchen" @ http://www.theparticularkitchen.com. Really proud of you Molly, and cannot wait to buy the cookbook someday!

It's a start

Okay so today starts a blog a day for the Month of November. And seeing how this goes I may go all the way through New Years. I had stuff to say this morning, but I am a long ways away from the morning shower (IE the place that most of my thinking gets done) and I don't really have anything fun to blog about. Really disappointed in USC's performance yesterday and hoping the Chargers will pull out the win against the Chokland Faders right now.

Blog a Day is coming

Been kicking around this idea for a couple of weeks now. Coming November 1st I will be doing a blog a day. Some will be long commentary on things on my mind, most will be just short thoughts kicking around my head or me sharing something I liked that day. So get ready, ITS COMING!

Why do I know who Levi Johnston is?

Have you seen this commercial? The one where Levi Johnston, you know they kid that knocked up Sarah Palin's daughter and was dragged around on the Vice Presidential nominee's tour last Fall before the elections; is walking towards the camera with a bodyguard wearing an Alaska t-shirt and eating pistachios. Why is that some kid in Alaska can not wear protection and accidentally knock up his girlfriend and then become the national commercial face for nuts? Because politics has become a joke for both sides of the aisle Democrats and Republicans, but the Republicans have been seen as having more nuts, crazies, and kooks lately. Can a serious Republican stand up for Sarah Palin and her policies? Or is she just another part of the political side show, and this commercial is further proof of that?

Entourage Season Finale

Wow it has been a whole month since I blogged last. Kind of one of those cases that I had SO much time on my hands, I did not want to put stuff down on "paper". Still jobless, kind of a fact of life for the last 2.5 years. Even when I am working I feel like I am one step away from being out of work. Scary time to live in in America. But I still have "Hope".

Anyways, the Entourage Season Finale. It was AWESOME. Extremely satisfying, and again I cannot wait until next year for another season. Bittersweet as well because it makes you think there may not be a next season at some point, and these characters will go on living their lives without us someday. Sorry, I have been in a very reflective mood the last few days. Got really high out of my mind the other night on some pain medication and still trying to shake off the melancholy. Jeremy Piven, whose character in PCU helped shape my personality in my late teens continues to shine as Ari Gold. His speech to his therapist and wife about revenge was amazing. Give that guy the Emmy next year. And as for guest stars this episode had a manic Matt Damon as a bully/fund-raiser, Lebron James, and even Bono. BONO! Of the four main leads Johnny Chase is usually my least favorite character, but he had a great career moment in this episode and it was really nice to see. As for the four main leads, this season has shown our boys growing up and apart a little, but still remaining loyal as friends. When it came time for the season to end as it usually does with Vince starting a new movie shoot, I 100% expected the boys to all be separate and it not be a big deal. It felt like the writers made a conscious effort to show the boys drifting apart and Vince being on his own, if only to have Drama and Turtle eventually join him. E getting engaged to Sloan felt forced, but it was nice. I was really hoping that E and his hot red head assistant would end up together, maybe even next year. But I would HATE to see him mess it up with Sloan this time around. Although I would like to see more of Kate Mara. Can't win them all. As I find myself with a lot of time to reflect upon lately, the last few days have made me realize that many of the things that I have loved for years, and even up to a few months ago, I know longer care about. The reason? I'm getting older. My tastes are changing and just like me, this show has shown tremendous growth this year. I hear many of the fans did like this season, but I loved it.

Jobless on Labor Day

Like nearly 15 million other Americans I am without a job come Labor Day. This is first time in three years that I can make that claim. The last 2+ years have been tough and yet rewarding for me. I made a decision to get out of a bad situation that eventually I would have been laid off or worse fired from. In making that decision I empowered myself to take control of my career, my finances, and ultimately my life. And yet, I am unemployed once again. The Unemployment rate has reached nearly 10% and that is really a misnomer. In reality there are probably around 12-15% of Americans Unemployed. That means that anywhere between 1 - 1.5 in 10 people are out of work. Just thinking about it I can count off at least 5 people I know that are highly qualified and yet out of work just like I am.

What questions does this raise? When you have been out of work for 2+ months, and see less and less jobs popping up anywhere, and more and more people out of work you start to wonder where the next job will be and who will I be competing with for that job? Also when you don't get return phone calls or emails on resumes for weeks on end and it seems like interviews are few and far between you start to wonder what is wrong? The frustration is that while there are some things that you can do to refine your process, there is really nothing wrong with you. I have equated job searching with dating lately. The more desperate you are, the less appealing you become. The more needy you are, the less likely you are to land an interview. And yet people around you are still getting married and love is found all the time. And a few people you know have landed great jobs of late. That means that there is hope. That there is a silver lining, and that remaining positive and having some sort of faith will carry you through. I don't mean faith in a higher power like God. I don't personally follow organized religion and do not have a relationship with any God. But I do have Faith that something better is out there. It has to be. With my car being out of commission, being under penalty with Unemployment for a misunderstanding, and seeing calculated risks blowing up in my face I have to believe that somehow the work will pay off and things will work out. I have to.

So my fellow job seekers I give you this advice. You are good enough, you are smart enough, you are good looking enough, and dog gonnit you WILL find that job you are looking for. I believe in you, I ask you to believe in me. Let's have faith for each other.

Parents Angry at Obama?

You know I really don't get it. I don't understand why people would NOT want the President of the United States talking to students. In this article on Yahoo! http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/20090903/pl_ynews/ynews_pl888_1 it is discussed how the President of the US will be holding a press conference on the internet for students k-12 on September 8th, 2009. Republicans from the state of Florida (read Texas East) have decried this as potential brain washing and poor form of the bully pulpit. They have rallied support from parent groups (read intolerable whack jobs) to force (or Bully) school districts into not taking part in this.

Not speaking R or D or even Independent for a minute here, I really don't get it. Ronald Reagan and George H Bush BOTH talked to me on television when I was a kid. And they told me that Marijuana was bad. Of course now I am a grown up and know that that particular argument is a fallacy. But I digress. President Obama wants to talk to kids about staying in school and furthering their education. Things that this Country NEEDS if we want to survive into the future. I don't even care Democrat of Republican on this issue. When George W. Bush was in office, even though I KNEW that the election had been rigged, I still supported the guy because he won the election. It seems to me that with health care, claims of socialism and now this, that Republicans are dealing from the bottom of the deck and pulling cards from up their sleeves (as usual) in not respecting the Democratic process. The President is not going to brain wash your kids. Trust me, 90% of the kids will barely even watch the video, and another 50% will not even care. What are these ignorant people SO afraid of? That education will make their kids less Right Wing Christian? Not to lump in an extra argument there, but these are the people that give Republicans, Parent Groups, and Christians a bad name. Your ignorant whack jobs. And scarily some of you are friends and family. *shudder*