There is always a silver lining...

Well, the next day after my last post they rehired me at the security job. It seems the project manager at the job site didn't investigate matters fully. On closer inspection it turns out they didn't really train me properly, but they still docked me one days pay.

In any event I'm glad I got my job back so I can continue with my life. Better days are just ahead.

I tried Security

So....back in August I finally received my guard card so that I can work in the security industry (a growing industry thanks to George Bush and the post 9/11 hysteria). Great!

So my first job is for a place in Walnut Creek. It's a luxury apartment building and I'm wondering how can these people afford $1700 for rent? I work there for 1 month and after about the 3rd week I asked my employer about "when's payday?" He says he's waiting for the check from the client. It never came and I never got paid ... live and learn. I applied to the State to see if they could help but by the time we had the hearing his number had already been disconnected and they told me there was no way they could contact him because he never registered his security company....good lord!

Next stop, a major hotel in San Francisco and free food!! During the labor dispute with the hotel workers I was fortunate to get a job with the hotel working as a security officer. When the workers went back to work my job was over and I was assigned to work at the Embarcadero Center as a security officer. 1 week shy of my probation period a woman slipped and fell but I didn't see it. She came into the lobby and was checking in and she had a pained look on her face. I asked her if she needed some help and she said no, but if she changed her mind she would call me back. She never called back. This morning, my team leader at work called to tell me that I should call my agency. When I did they said I wasn't able to continue working there because I should've reported the "slip and fall" in a formal report instead of just noting it in the daily activity log. I told them I wasn't trained to do it that way, noboby told me about that....they said I should've known. So much for my security career at Embarcadero Center! I really needed that job.....Boston Properties (the people that own the Embarcadero Center) only made 118 million in profit last year. They were upset because the woman who slipped and fell might sue them....I hope she sues them for $1 Billion and wins, then they might understand how I feel about losing my job. Taking away my job won't change a thing about whether the woman sues them or not, should I have become the victim because they didn't train me properly? I honestly didn't think anything of it because she said she was fine. Bummer....

Where's a friend when you need one?

I always considered myself to be a pretty good friend.

I'm generous, thoughtful and cheerful.

The past few years has been just plain weird......seems like all my friends abandoned me, I guess that's just part of life.  Fortunately, with 6 billion+ people on the planet there is no shortage of people to make friends with, just somebody please tell me how to do it.

It's easy to talk with people and I do that easily.  Maybe I talk to much and scare people away, maybe I just want someone to surprise me one of these days with a great big hug (lord knows I need one).

Well, just felt like writing that.

Health, Wealth and Success to you!!!

Homeland Security Careers?

So....am looking at my recent post and lo and behold there's a link to Homeland Security Careers.....and.....Special Security Services in the advertising section, courtesy of Google. You have to admit it's a pretty good idea actually, Google provides these great tools so you can publish what you want to write -- in exchange these security entities in our country get people like us to express interest in their products or services...that's a brilliant idea.

But what about this? First of all, suppose that you don't want to have a job in "security"? What about if that happens?

There are better things in life to do than to spend it looking to see if someone is going to blow themselves up while you're working. If it happens, *espECIALy after you've paid 1/2 hour's wages for that latte, it would make for a very discouraging day.

But people, people, PEOPLE!!!!! It doesn't have to be that way. We could work together,

"c'mon people naw, smile on your brother, everybody get together gotta love one another right now"

The song rings in my ears. Somebody well known wrote those words, can you believe I don't know who? Do you know who?

Well, it's time for that kindna feeling right now in our country and in the world. Put the GI Joe toys away for awhile and let's see if we can decide matters in a calm and collected way. Afterall, Iraq is FREE today. How did that saying go? Today is the first day of your life.

Well, Iraq, welcome to democracy! By the way, sorry about bombing your country. That probably doesn't mean much, I'd be pissed off too if someone bombed my country to basically change the regime (isn't that called overthrowing the government?).

Anyways, hopefully George Bush isn't re-elected president. I don't think Kerry is going to end the war, but then again changing presidents would be a good reason for us to change our mind. It all depends on things that we're not able to find out about because this government just like all governments (and all friends for that matter) have little secrets they know of one another. Sometimes logic doesn't prevail with human interactions especially when everyone's carrying all that emotional baggage as they say.

So what if it seems like everybody (including me) is full of shit. Let's face it people are pretty strange little creatures. I don't have the answers and I wish people would just get along with each other beyond the local communities.

It's your attitude, Paul

My Mom used to say that to me.

I miss my Mom.

Is this what's become of our society? (more philosophy)

potentially some magnitude of millions of people are out there typing little letters into a blog. Is this the way we will learn of what people have on their minds? Does the abscence of civility in overwhelming segments of our society reflect the way the majority of the people think of one another?

Is this the case in other countries besides the United State?

When I was growing up panhandling wasn't an occupation and having a beer in the park wasn't a crime.

Now, on the one hand it's probably possible to make a pretty good career these days as a panhandler and (I hear they're hiring). On the other hand there are signs posted all over the place prohibiting this and prohibiting that in public areas.

In the BART stations you hear the message "surveilance cameras are no guarantee against criminal activity on the BART system".......what is *that* all about?

Shouldn't we as human beings recognize each other as the Buddha's we truly are? Sure I get upset too. I don't like some people's actions sometimes and have mostly tried my best to limit expressing my feelings on some subjects publicly.

But what a minute.....hold everything......

Isn't that how we got here in the first place?

Wouldn't it be better for our society if everyone agreed to make some comment, at least privately, to one another even at the risk of losing that persons friendship.

Oh.....so that's where I'm headed with this.....I can't figure out how to develop close friendships with people if everybody seems to abandon me because I speak my mind.

Probably they think my words are a personal attack on them and they are, but my words are a personal attack on myself as well. When I say for example that smoking cigarettes is a terrible habit to have and then smoke them myself I'm not just being contradictory I'm also examining my life and the lives of those close to me and stating something obvious. That's who I am.

Maybe I'll be one of those people who doesn't have a circle of close friends because the ones I felt for sure would stand by me through thick and think didn't. Maybe I get my hopes up too high that life should be filled with friends around that you can count on.

Family is different. I have a large and loving family and I'm very thankful for that. My long term friendships haven't been as long or as friendly as I expected. Does that mean I should expect less?

That's the trouble with me I guess. I don't expect less. I expect more.

I expect my friends will return my calls when I call.
I expect my friends will come to visit me and I'll be welcome in their homes as well.
I expect my friends will be with me even when I have nothing more to offer than my company.

I suppose I picked the wrong friends and now at 47 years old I've spent the last couple of years developing new friends. It takes time to develop new friendships. In the past when I was making good money, it seemed I had lots of friends. I know they enjoyed my company as much as I enjoyed their company.

But what can I conclude if they're not here with me now that I have no money and find myself struggling just to pay the minimum monthly expenses?

The resumes I've sent out were getting no response. I found myself working as a delivery driver and 6 months ago I decided that I wasn't happy doing that work and that really my skills are with computers. So I began advertising a web development business.

My tagline is "On Shore Support at Off Shore Prices" and I charge $80 per month to maintain people's websites. My first several clients were relatively easy sites and some were more complex. The complexity of the project increases the price because it will take more effort and time to complete.

I'm still negotiating one of the larger projects and hopefully I'll get it so I can pay my rent. If not, I suppose another customer will come along. That's how business is.

So, thanks for letting me get that off my chest.

I wonder in so many thousands of years from now if someone will discover all these blogs and create a picture of our society. They're probably going to say we needed counselling.

Philosophy Story 1

I'm in a philosophical mood this evening.

It's possible that the events in the world are largely driven by the emotions we express to each other individually rather than the other way around.

Living in San Francisco, or any large urban area for that matter gives us hints for society's "days to come". As lives on the coasts change so must those more inland. I do live in San Francisco and things are different here. People here tend to have a reputation for being tolerant yet amongst that tolerance are pockets of prejudice.

There's something wrong with prejudice but there's nothing wrong with calling a spade a spade so to speak. (c'mon now everybody should've gotten a kick out of that little pun)

Just because the reputation of a group suggests something, the reputation of the individual suggests *everything* about society. Regardless of stereotype we all must strive to be trustworthy if we want to have a trustworthy society.

I'll start with that. Trustworthiness..........now that not an easy one to come upon unless we're able to trust ourselves. TRUST OURSELVES?.....now what chew talkin about??? What has that got to do with anything? And what the heck is it?

Anyone?

Well it means when someone is crossing the street you don't try to run them over because they're walking across the street and you're in a hurry (or simply like to almost run people over). In todays society we trust that if we don't get the heck out of the street we're going to get our asses run over.

Ever tried to cross at a large intersection and the pedestrian sign is flashing "Don't Walk" and the traffic signal you're walking across is turning yellow? We run out of the way with a panicked look because we don't want to get hit.

That's backwards.

We've developed in society this "trust" that those cars are gonna run our asses over if we don't get out of the way based on that emotion of panic we express to the drivers of the cars. This in turn develops the pair to that trust (i.e. the attitude of the drivers of those cars).

They know the panic of crossing the street when the light has changed. And they also know the feeling that as soon as the light changes the car behind wants to move. Let's see which will it be? Inconvenience the driver of the car behind me or run the pedestrian over?

Don't laugh. It's true. The attitude of the people in the cars is influenced by the attitudes of each and everyone of us. Until we fully trust that the other drivers aren't going to run us over we won't see their attitudes change.

We tried to do a study but couldn't find any volunteers. They were all afraid they might be run over.

Enough with the Homeland Security already....

I heard that we're spending over $1 billion per week in Iraq to fight the "war on terrorism". Everytime we turn around you hear of more and more money being spent on securing the homeland. How about we just talk to each other instead of turning our society into a distrustful place where we rely on the government to protect us from some unseen enemy. Enough is enough.

Those people in the Middle East have been at war with each other for as long as I can remember and president after president after president wants to establish peace in the Middle East. We should just let them deal with it themselves instead of sticking our noses in their business.

We have enough problems in our own country. If we spent a billion dollars a week on our own problems here in this country then we have something to show the world. Instead we just seem to be inviting terrorist acts. And besides that, our whole society is being intimidated by talk of terrorist activity. We say we won't let "thugs and criminals" ruin our lives and yet we're allowing that to happen.

All those people in government need to stand up and concentrate on helping each citizen count on each other instead of mistrusting everyone they see because they're afraid they might have a bomb.........ENOUGH>>>>>>