Picture of the Week

I love this

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COUNTDOWN

Smoke

Smoked meats Round 1... Smoked a pork shoulder, it was - alright.  Good smoke flavor, decent bark but not as fall apart tender as I would have liked.  I think it needed a bit more time.  Round 2 this weekend with EFMMCACA (more on this Monday) and hopefully I'll have it at a good place where I am primed and ready for Chiefs football Turkey day weekend.

Occupy This Blog

From my FB status this AM:

the occupy movement is a good idea in theory, It's annoying that my marginal tax rate is higher than some making more money than they know what to do with, It's annoying that tax loop holes exist that allow corporations that make a pile of money here to not be taxed here, I'ts annoying that some pay absolutely nothing to the cause, but trying to get the rich to throw in more of their money to the cause by sitting around a park like a bunch of hobos looking for a handout is like trying to explain how terrible McDonald's is while plowing through a McRibb

I kind of want to expand on this rant a bit.  It is no secret that the tax code/structure in this country is totally f'd.  I see three big problems as I stated simplistically above: Multi-billion dollar corporations make a killing in the US w/o paying a dime in taxes due to loop holes.  Proportionally, folks making lifetimes worth of money don't pay near what I pay, the famous example: Warren Buffet says he has a lower marginal tax rate than his house keeper.  And finally there is a large percentage of people who pay nothing, or virtually nothing, into the system.  Among other things, all of these things need to be addressed to get our country's revenue stream back up to what it needs to be.  Spending has to come down no one disputes that, but revenue has GOT to come up as well.  It's business basics folks, cutting operating expenses is nice, but at some point revenue has to be adjusted up as well.  

Occupation folks... I'll say it.  You are not revolutionaries.  You are not visionaries.  You are not  representing the so called 1%.  What you guys are doing is ruining it for everyone and giving the whole process a bad name and bad image.  You spent too much time on Twitter following 'revoulutions' in other countries... to put that in perspective though those countries were at about a 3 and the people were trying to get them to a 5 as far as quality of life is concerned.  The US is probably at about a 7 on average... so hate to break it to you but as you sit in your camp on your iPhone no one feels too sorry for you.  Bumming around a park for weeks not working, not trying to find work, not contributing to a solution through action is only exacerbating the problem.  The rich feel like they already pay too much into entitlement programs and by turning yourselves into hobos in a park you are only angering them further.  Change in this arena is not going to happen through this kind of demonstration or protest.  It's bigger than this.  It is a fundamental flaw in our government as a whole where politicians in Washington are more concerned with covering their own ass and securing their own job for the next term that they honestly could care less about the people.  Face it, the Federal Government is now a business.  They are a real estate conglomerate (landlord) and we all pay them rent (taxes).  President is the CEO and the Congress is the Board of Directors.  They "represent" the shareholders, but in reality they want a payout for themselves and position next term.  Until this problem gets fixed and elected officials actually start acting like elected representatives of the people then nothing is going to change.  

This is the kind of change that SHOULD be the focus of protests etc. rather than the pity party that is taking place now.  A stand like that would really address the problem rather than a consequence of the problem.  

A rant I know... but as I've said before, the political process today really frustrates me and when I here interviews and read things from and about the 'Occupy' protests it angers me because I get the impression that many have no idea what they are even doing there or what they are even protesting.

Rant over...

Weekend Update

The weekend was truly bittersweet.  First with the a few positives:  Got coat #2 on baby girl's walls and it looks pretty good.  Color looks great and it's one 'big ticket' item that is off the To Do list, which is a relief.  Second, got Battlefield 3 and cracked into it on Saturday, to say this game is awesome is an understatement.  A bit harder than MW in my opinion, but a lot of fun.  Had a Saturday night Fright Night with friends that included the comedy/horror movie Hotel Hell and the true horror flick, Paranormal Activity.  Sporting KC won big 2-0 in the first game of playoff action.  AND just last night KC Chiefs won a HUGE divisional contest against the San Diego Chargers.

and now... the bad...

KSU got destroyed by OU on Saturday, at the close of the first half it looked promising 20-17, OU made adjustments and proceeded to rack up 40+ unanswered points.. brutal.  On Sunday, the Yellow Light of Death invaded and claimed the life of my PS3.  So I got to play my new game for a total of... about 4 hours before death took this machine.  But hey for $150 + shipping costs Sony will fix it...  Also got called for jury duty, more on this later...

All in all the weekend was productive and the bad wasn't 'that' bad I suppose but, I really like my video games so that was a pretty bad one for me.