Do Unto Others

September 21st, 2009

Why are some people so cruel to animals?  What posses these people to starve, beat, breed them to death or train them for dog fights?  What does this say for the human race?  For those out there who say “its only a dog” or “only a cat” or “only a ______ (fill in the animal here)” I challenge you to look in the eyes of a beloved pet or homeless animal and not see the pain, fear, hunger or love there.  It can’t be done.  I’m a huge dog person.  I tolerate cats but they are very independent creatures and while I admire them, don’t mind petting them I just don’t want to share a home with one.  The biggest reason is that I’m highly allergic to them.  I’m allergic to dogs too but to a lesser extent (good thing because I have 3 Chihuahuas).

 

I read the stories and see the pictures of the results of puppy mills (in my humble opinion, the owners of such things should be summarily shot or at the very least be treated in the same manner of the animals they had).  It breaks my heart.  I want to rescue every one.  The same thing with rescue groups and humane societies.  I donate my money.  I used to donate my time but I couldn’t take it any more.  I know they are helping but I just wanted to give them all a home.

 

You read about it all the time.  The puppy/kitty horder.  The agencies going into homes that are going to be condemned and removing these pitiful looking animals.  Some in very sorry shape and some that are dead or dying and can’t be helped.  What posses people to let it get that bad?  I’m tired of the mental illness excuse.  I want these people held accountable for their actions.  I know it’s not very PC to hold people accountable for their actions any more.  After all, it’s always someone else’s fault or they couldn’t help themselves or it was a problem in their past or in their childhood.

 

I’m tired of the humane societies having to euthanize puppies and perfectly healthy dogs because people don’t spay/neuter their pets and allow them to breed unconditionally or because they buy the puppy/kitty for Christmas/birthday for their kids and it’s too much work and they don’t want it now or they get it and ignore it because they don’t have time for it.  How would they feel in that puppy/kitty’s place?

 

I’ve seen the pictures and read the stories of the abused and abandoned pets and I can only do so much to help.  I do what I can because it’s better than doing nothing at all.  At the end of the day all I can really do is go home and hug the 3 little bundles of fur waiting for me at home and thank the Gods that I have them and they are loved and well taken care of.  All I can do is pray for the others out there who are still looking for their forever home and hope and pray that one day humanity will treat those we share this planet with in a more humane way.

Blast From the Past - NOT!

September 18th, 2009

What do you do when you run into someone who has hurt you?  What do you do when you run in to that person virtually?

 

Today I ran in to that person virtually.  Well, I guess not really run in to.  I was goofing around and googling names and for the hell of it I put in this person’s name and she came up on Facebook.  That really shouldn’t surprise me in the least.  Everyone is entitled to a Facebook account as it’s public.  She has not tried to “friend” me on Facebook and the only reason I knew she was on there was that Google search.  So I don’t know why it bothers me so.

 

Background on this:  This person, who I shall designate as CO, was someone who was my best friend and like a sister to me.  We went in to business together (along with a third person that was more of a friend to CO than to me as I’d only met her a couple of times).  The business was a pet sitting company.  CO was good around animals and I love animals and there is a huge market where we are located (i.e., big city).  We all had our strengths – CO was good with people, DC (the other person) was good with animals and I was good with organization and paperwork.  It took off.  We had to bring on some independent sitters and it was going good.  Then something in CO’s past came back to bite her in the ass. 

 

I still feel the only reason she told me about it was because there was no way to hide it from it.  She had stole money from a previous employer.  An attorney no less!  I knew this attorney and worked with some attorneys that used to be partners with him but this was long before this incident takes place.  She told me one amount but when I spoke with someone else who was close to the situation I was told an amount that twice as large as CO told me.  Due to having caught her in several lies I’m going to believe the someone else.  Anyway, she came clean that her arrest was imminent and she was worried about our clients finding out.  Well, duh!  We are going in to people’s homes to take care of their pets.  What if this got out?  Business would tank because who wants someone who is being arrested for theft to come in to their home to take care of a family member?  She was arrested and all that stuff and was back out on the street soon.  Next it was just waiting on the trial date.  At that point I had stuck by her.  Told her what she did was wrong and I couldn’t understand why she did it but people make mistakes and I wouldn’t abandon a fried for being stupid.

 

As time went by and the trial date approached, she became more distant – harder to get in touch with.  That’s not good when she is booking the assignments and I need to know what is going on to make sure invoices go out and get paid and the sitters get paid for their work.  In the meantime, one of our sitters wanted to get in to rescue as people just assume that because we deal with animals that we also rescue them.  We couldn’t have CO involved with it because of her soon to be record so I draw up the papers, pay the fees and incorporate to get the ball rolling and the sitter starts completing the 503(c) paperwork for the IRS.

 

Now all this time, I’m the one who guarantees the corporate credit card, the one who comes out of pocket for things and have been paying for stuff.  I was the only one who put out money on the rescue start up and several months later, when I ask a question of the sitter she informs me that I have been voted out of the rescue.  Neat trick since I didn’t even know there had been a meeting and I was never in attendance.  She had gone behind my back and removed me as registered agent and put herself.  Right then I knew something was wrong.  I changed passwords on accounts, called the accountant in regards to the pet sitting company and started putting on the brakes on the business.  CO wouldn’t return my calls and wouldn’t accept my calls.  DC had been out of the picture for the most part for the last year and a half except to do some sitting jobs for clients she liked.  I told the accountant what was going on and that CO was probably heading to jail sometime soon and that was bringing this all to a head.

 

On advice from the accountant, I sent out letters to clients saying that the pet sitting company was dissolving, that I was starting up my own pet sitting company, that we would not be accepting any more jobs under the present name and to please remit any funds owing to me.  I cancelled advertising and told the sitters to decide if they want to come with me or stay with CO and see what she was going to do but the company was dissolved and I would be paying them for the work up to XX date or through the end of whatever job they were currently finishing up.  When some old clients called to use my new service I found out that she had been having them pay her directly instead of the company.  She was actually stealing from the company and thereby from me.  I guess I shouldn’t have been surprised – once a thief, always a thief, I guess.  I don’t know how many clients she had doing this and I don’t know how long it went on before I dissolved the company.

 

CO had run up the credit card so I had that hanging over my head as well as my own bills due to the fact that I had recently quit my job to take on running the company full time only months before this came to a boil.   Due to all this, I almost lost my house and car and ended up having to file bankruptcy to get my head above water.  This is why I’m so bitter toward her and several of the sitters who helped her

 

To continue on, she ended up getting a 6 year sentence (I heard that the DA recommended 4 years but the judge gave her 6) and that she was convicted on something like 15 counts of theft, 2 counts of burglary and a couple of other things.  She served 4 years and is now out on parole.

 

It’s funny.  She actually sent me a letter within one month of her being incarcerated and she actually said she didn’t feel like she had done anything wrong to me and she didn’t feel any need to apologize for her actions.  I answered her letter but never sent it.  The answer was bitter, laced with very bad feelings and telling her things that I wanted to say to her face to hurt her back and how I felt but nothing good would have come from it.  I put my reply along with her initial letter in a folder in my file cabinet and there they are to this day.  I was hurt and betrayed by someone who I thought would never do that.  I have trust issues now, I know it and try to not let it stand in my way but in the back of my mind I’m always asking myself if this person is sincere or with they hurt me like that.

 

Back to Facebook, she’s paid her debt to society and is free to enjoy all there is out there but I guess to me, I feel that she’s not paid her debt to me and how she hurt me and she shouldn’t be allowed to do all these things.  She will never the get the chance to make it up to me as I will never have anything to do with her ever again so it’s a feeling I just have to deal with and try to let go.  It’s not healthy for me to hold on to something like for such a long time and not be able to truly let it go.  My personality is one that I hold a grudge forever and never forget when I’ve been done wrong.  I don’t retaliate but the person will never get another chance at it.

The Stupidity of People Around You

September 9th, 2009

Okay, I’ve decided that attorneys are the stupidest people on this planet.  If they aren’t then it’s a very close race.  I just received an e-mail from one of the people I work for asking when an awards event was being held.  Now this would be a reasonable request if it wasn’t for the fact that the e-mail contained the invitation to the awards event which had the date, time and place of the awards event.  Now, how come someone who charges an exorbitant rate per hour cannot scroll down an e-mail that has been received and see that is beyond me.  Is this person too lazy?  Is this person too stupid to figure this out?  In which case, this person is definitely not worth the hourly rate this person charges the clients.

 

I have been dealing with this sort of inane behavior for some time now from pretty much all of them and it’s getting really old really quick.  They don’t need an assistant they need a damn babysitter!

Dems want to use jack-booted thugs to quell mobs at townhall meetings

August 7th, 2009

Well, I see that the Democrats are going to use “jack-booted thugs” to quell the mobs at their townhall meetings.  I mean after all, who it their right mind wouldn’t want the government to take over you health care decisions?  Am I right?  Yeah, right!  LOL

 

The American people are finally coming out of their stupor and seeing that the great Messiah they elected into the White House is nothing more but another greedy politician.  He and his party doesn’t have the public’s best interest in mind.  All they care about is how to get more of the taxpayer’s money and get more control over the lives of the public.

 

It’s scary but the tactics they are using are reminiscent to those used in Germany all those not so many years ago.  Are the unions and their members going to be the new SS?  Or is this some more of that Chicago politics?  Since when do politicians tell their party members that if they hit you then we will hit them twice as hard?  Is this Al Capone talking or something?  I just don’t get it.  They are trying to shut down public opinion and give out false information just like Hitler did.  They are already asking people to spy on each other and tell them when there is “misinformation” about the public health care policy that they are trying to push down our throats out there.  Personally, I believe that every single time they are quoted in the papers or the policy is mentioned in the papers that those articles should be forwarded to the White House with a warning that misinformation is being given.  Because the bottom line is the policy being proposed is misinforming the public.  The President and the Democrats know it but they don’t care.

 

This is a group of people who couldn’t even predict correctly how long $1 billion dollars would last on the “Cash for Clunkers” program.  They can give no firm figures on most of the programs they are trying to shove through and the waste of the TARP funds … don’t even get me started there.  They are incompetent yet they are asking to be put in charge of our health care decisions.

 

This program they are touting sounds really good at first.  But when you start to think about it the holes start to appear.  Who is going to pay for all this?  The money has to come from somewhere.  Despite the fact that the politicians seem to think that money grows on trees it does not.  It will come out of the tax payers’ pockets.  Don’t fool yourself into thinking that only the “evil rich” will have to pay higher taxes for it.  For the amount of money it’s going to cost (even their own accounting department says their numbers are wrong, by the way) everyone is going to have to pony up more dough.  I personally feel that I pay more than enough in taxes, thank you very much.  Just open the paper and you can read nightmare stories about the health care systems of Britain and Canada.  About coverage being denied, treatment delayed for months, medicine being refused, surgeries denied and on and on and on.  This is what they want to turn our health care system in to?  Are they nuts!?!?!?!  The answer to that is yes.  Back to the paying for all this thing, it reminds me of a joke that is making the rounds via e-mail about economics and the few paying for the many:

 

An economic professor at a local college made a statement that he had never failed a single student before, but had once failed an entire class.

 

That class had insisted that Obama’s socialism worked and that no one would be poor and no one would be rich – a great equalizer.

 

The professor then said “Ok, we will have an experiment in this class on Obama’s plan.”

 

All grades would be averaged and everyone would receive the same grade so one would fail and no one would receive an A.

 

After the first test, the grades were averaged and everyone got a B.  The students who studied hard were upset and the students who studied little were happy.

 

As the second test rolled around, the students who studied little had studied even less and the ones who had studied hard decided they wanted a free ride too so they studied little.  The second test average was a D!  No one was happy.

 

When the third test rolled around, the average was an F.

 

The scores never increased as bickering, blame and name-calling all resulted in hard feelings and no one would study for the benefit of anyone else.

 

All failed, to their great surprise, and the professor told them that socialism would also ultimately fail because when the reward is great, the effort to succeed is great but when government takes all the reward away, no one will try or want to succeed.  Could not be any simpler than that.

 

Just think on that little story.  The government is trying to implement all these great programs for the good of all the public.  These entitlement programs cost money and government doesn’t earn money so they have to get it from somewhere.  The somewhere is from the working men and women of this great nation.  Don’t even say that they will get it from the companies and corporations out there which mean you don’t understand how that works.  Companies and corporations don’t pay taxes the stockholders, shareholders, members and owners do.  All those earnings are shown on their personal tax statements and they pay taxes on those amounts.  All these funds will be used to pay for programs for people who don’t work or don’t try to earn a living.  Sometimes things happen and people need a little helping hand but there are too many people out there who take advantage of the helping hand and never get off it.  At one time it was considered a stigma to be on welfare, now no one blinks at the implications and women keep on having children they can’t afford to get more money from the government so they don’t have to work.  So with the government raising taxes on people they are taking away the reward associated with working hard and earning a living greater than their “standards”.  So why would the hard workers want to continue to do it?  Out of the goodness of their hearts?  Would you want to be taken advantage of like that?  Have the government take money you worked hard for and just hand it over to someone who won’t lift a  hand to help himself/herself?  Didn’t think so.

Playing “Dear Abby” to a Friend

August 6th, 2009

I was talking with a friend the other day and the conversation got around to our work places.  I asked her how it was going and got the  normal shrug and the “SS/DD” answer.  She then mentions to me that while looking through her bosses sent items in Outlook for something he asked her to check on, she saw an e-mail from him to a couple of other people in the office with a subject line of “My idiot secretary”.  Naturally she opens it to see what was being said.  It was basically a one liner commenting on his idiot secretary having done something that she had no idea she was doing wrong.  It upset  her very much but because it was something that she normally wouldn’t have see to begin with, she’s not sure if she should say anything about it.  It bothers her that the people it was sent to were higher ups in the company she works for and the thing he was complaining about was something she had been doing wrong for months but he had never mentioned it to her.

 

I told her to file it away in her “boss is being an ass” file and start looking for another job as who wants to work for someone like that to start with.

 

Then it got me to wondering.  Who was the bigger idiot?  The secretary who was doing wrong and didn’t know it or the boss who allowed the secretary to do it wrong for months and never said a word about it?  Personally, I’d have to say the boss as I believe that the first time it happened I would have mentioned my preferences and how I wanted it done.

 

As to my advice to find another job, I stick by that as good advice.  Why work for some jerk who lets someone do something for him or her wrong for months on end and then complain about it?  Doesn’t say a lot about that person and his or her management skills.  Also to belittle an employee to others in the company doesn’t say much about them either.  Because I’ve heard other things about the company and how they treat their employees and some of their business practices from her, I believe my advice is firm.  Hopefully, the next time we have dinner she will have better news for me.

 

Stimulas bill - Hah!

February 6th, 2009

Who out there is actually stupid enough (and yes, I mean stupid - not ignorant) to actually believe that the proposed Senate Stimulus Bill will actually stimulate the economy?  All this thing is a huge serving of pork.  Have you guys actually looked at any of it?  I almost choked on my coffee when I saw some of the numbers and what they want to spend it on.

$350 million to develop and maintain a broadband inventory map at the Department of Commerce?  That will help stimulate the economy how?

$3o0 million for replacement, modernization, upgrades of agriculture labls and other facilities?  Again, how will that help stimulate the economy?

$1 billion (that’s with a “b” and not an “m” by the way) for the 2010 Census!  That will really help the economy - NOT!

I don’t have the time or patience to list all the spending out for you and yes, that’s all it is - just spending.  The Congressional Budget Office even admits that this will not stimulate the economy but slow the recovery way down.  Also, ask yourself where the government is going to get all these millions and billions and trillions of dollars they want to spend.  I’ll tell you.  Out of your and my pockets.   That’s right folks.  The government is going to spend our hard earned money on their pork barrel spending.  You do know that the only way the government has money to spend is from us taxpayers, right?  That is their only source of income and they love nothing more than to spend the money as quickly as (or even before) it comes in.  While we are busy trying to save money and cut our spending they are upping their spending and taking it directly out of our pockets.

But they are going to give us “tax credits” you say.  Have you thought about that “tax credits” and where they are going.  They are going to be giving this money (that they collected from us taxpayers) to the people.  What’s wrong with that  you ask.  A good deal of those people who are going to be getting a check from the government for a “tax credit” (remember, this money comes out of the working tax payer’s pocket) to a good dealt of people who do not even pay taxes.  That’s right.  They didn’t pay one dime into the system but they are certainly going to be taking money out of it.  Don’t know about you guys but I want to keep what I’ve worked for and not be forced to turn that money over to people who don’t even work or pay taxes.  Also, for those of you who haven’t filed your 2008 tax returns yet, that stimulus check you got last year - you know that $600 or $1,200 check you got from the government - you will be taxed on that as income.  Do you really think they are going to give you a “tax credit” and not tax you on it.  What dream world are you living on?  I want to go there too.

I’m just tired of my money going to bail out companies that should just be allowed to go under.  If they can’t run a successful business then they deserve to go under - the strong shall survive!  I’m tired of the government taking a huge chunk of my paycheck and spending it on things I don’t want them to and wasting it.  Come on folks, they now have a tax cheat and tax evader running the IRS.  Do you honestly think that if he wasn’t up for that position that he would have ever paid those back taxes?  Yeah, right, if you believe that then you are more stupid than I thought you were.  Apparently the new regime feels that taxes are something that the greater unwashed are supposed to pay and they are to spend.  I don’t like that attitude and I deserve a hell of lot more respect from those shysters than that and I don’t know about you guys but I expect and demand it from them!  I am not someone to be used like that.  They can’t treat me like a whore and they are pimping me out which is what they are doing when they think they can just take the money I worked for away from me without any accountability and I don’t get a say so about it.

Hello world!

May 16th, 2008

I have come to subject you to my views on life, world events, people, places and other things that are important me.  These are my opinions and if you find them offensive or don’t like them, then all I can say is “get over it”, move on to something else or start your very own blog site.  I am not going to be PC about my views and my postings and I’m not going to apologize for them either, so you have been forewarned.