Being nice gets me nowhere--always has

How would you people like it if you didn't get second and third and billionth chances from me? Not everyone deserves it but they get it anyway because I try to show people respect and be courteous. I'm about ready to quit being so nice. You get one chance now, especially if you've wronged me before (really you should be OUT of chances if you have already wronged but GUESS WHAT--I'M NICE!! Don't take advantage of it!)

I have spent decades talking nicely to landlords and bosses and anyone else who has so called "authority." Other than my boss at my current job, these people have given me the shaft anyway! For decades I have tried to be a good neighbor! I try to be respectful even if it's someone I'VE NEVER MET!! Screw that! What YOU get from ME is what YOU EARN! This is why I'm so nice to some people--they have been FANTASTIC to me! This is also why some people don't get to so much as smell my farts--they're A HOLES! Reap what you sow!! This has been my mentality since I was a kid, and some people have really treated me with a ton of respect all this time, and they are still my close friends!

I PREFER to be nice to people!! I don't like having to launch into Big Red mode! I was raised by a heavily Norwegian family in Northern Minnesota, where I learned to be nice to people and show some damn respect!! I WANT to be nice to you!! I do!! But come on, how can I be nice to you if you keep metaphorically skunk spraying in my face?!

A LITTLE RESPECT GOES A LONG WAY!!

*Enjoy your day*

Bus-ted out in GNDLand

So I live out in New Duluth, which has its own bus (DTA route #2). 4 times a day they go to Fond du Lac, but otherwise, their last stop is my stop. Pretty much everyone is already off the bus by then unless they live down McCuen Street or are going fishing at Boy Scout Landing or something. Pretty much all the drivers know me and they know that's my stop, so they don't think anything of it when they look in the rear view mirror after Gary Street and see just me sitting there still.

Occasionally, there will either be a super duper drunk person or some totally bewildered lost person still on the bus. Sometimes there are people who straight up fall asleep. Yes I really do live that far out! The driver always calls "Last stop!" if there's anyone on the bus that doesn't seem to "belong" that far out. Some drivers are cool and if you missed your stop or whatever, they will keep you on while they lay over down the road. It's always a little awkward getting on the bus headed back toward downtown and there's already someone there. I secretly think "Bahaha, you missed your stop, doofus!" but I'm always nice and give them a nod or whatever like a "Watcha think of my neighborhood?" type nod.

However, these "GNDLand stragglers" are not always pleasant. Sometimes I'll step off the bus when they get to my stop, walk down the sidewalk, go into my building, go up the stairs, enter my apartment, and sit down by the window, and the bus is STILL sitting there! I pull back the curtain and listen to the conversation (usually a lost person, the driver is explaining to them where to go to get back on the bus to go back downtown or whatever). Sometimes I can hear the driver yelling, and eventually the back door of the bus sorta busts open and some guy tumbles out who's just HAMMERED and can barely walk. He'll sometimes yell at people or whatever, or even walk up to the front door of the bus and keep talking to/yelling at the driver before he drives away.

The problem with the super drunk doofuses are a lot of them will stumble across the street to the bus shelter and expect to be able to get back on the bus 10 minutes later after the layover! Some people are so drunk the driver has to kick them off, and these jokers are thinking they can just get back on the bus! They just got done yelling at the SAME driver and now they're back! The other problem is sometimes they'll stay in my neighborhood and stumble down the sidewalk instead of getting back on the bus and out of my neighborhood. We live just outside "walk's reach" of the bars in the Gary neighborhood, and I'm always thankful about that. I get enough excitement living at "The Last Stop."

*Enjoy your day*

iDummy

So I've never been an Apple fan. Their stuff is just NOT user friendly and their products look like spaceships for no good reason. Lately I've been wanting to have my Standard of Excellence audio files on some type of media player separate from my phone or tablet, but all I had was a dumb little mp3 player that takes AAA batteries. I was rummaging today, and one of the sales had a pink iPod Mini for $5. I was like "I'm smart, I can figure out how to use this thing." NOPE! I'm reading the manual and it makes no sense, and iTunes is VERY weird and hard to use! I don't know what the frick is going on! I think I'm figuring it out, but it's weird, I just have to ASSUME it put the music on it and check the iPod. I also HATE the "clickwheel." NOW I understand exactly what Odd Todd was talking about with the dumb little clickwheel! I'll get used to it though. Now I'm just shopping for a speaker for it so I can play the recordings for my students. Weird stuff! Until I finish the manual, this thing is making me feel like a ditz. I'm all like "Where's the volume?" and stuff. (Also, I'm gonna paint or otherwise decorate this to get rid of the pinkness),

Shout out to Odd Todd...um...and stuff... :-)

Back in 2004, I started learning about Macromedia Flash 5 because I wanted to create my own cartoons. I read Mark Clarkson's book all about it. Mark had some fantastic cartoons, plus he recommended this "Odd Todd" guy's cartoons (The "Laid Off" series). I figured I'd head on over there (www.oddtodd.com) and check it all out. I really liked all the cartoons and the little games and stuff, and I started reading his "What's Happening" stories. Like a blog sorta, sometimes with pictures. I read all of them over the years, and have recently gone back and started re-reading them because it's been 10+ years. He used to be a single guy living in Brooklyn doing what he could (being laid off and all). Recently I've confirmed my many year old theory that I have some type of ADD or ADHD or something, and it's funny reading Odd Todd again and finding that he goes though the same things I do. Having dopey moments. Being forgetful. Fidgeting a lot. General social awkwardness. Reading Odd Todd always made me feel like I wasn't alone. He had struggles with crazies on the streets and on the subways, just as I deal with mall weirdos and bus freaks. He always made me feel like I was hanging around in Brooklyn, seeing and hearing what he heard and saw. Always running around taking pictures and stuff. This prompted me to create my own web site back in 2004 or so. I still maintain it today, as he maintains his. He has since moved to California with his WIFE and they have a daughter, so he's definitely not a single guy living in Brooklyn anymore. He does still update the site (videos of his daughter or his dog and what not), and I do still check that stuff out. Yes I do need to really get rolling on cranking my web site fully back up again, I know that. I do put pretty much all my updates on Facebook, but not everyone is ON Facebook, but they do still wonder what I'm up to. There is still an Odd Todd banner at the bottom of my home page. :-)
*Enjoy your day*

Can't I just have one "dumb day doin' nothin'"?

Often I say I just need a day to myself, just a "dumb day of doin' nothin'," which I get maybe once a month. Nathan & I have very packed schedules right now, and I was just gonna Odd Todd and TV the night away a whole ONCE this week, but no. I was gonna do that the other night too when I got the text from Nathan about his car. Now I get a call from my landlord just after I settle in to read some vintage Odd Todd all like "Yeah I just found out this afternoon that an appraiser wants to look at the efficiencies and 1 bedrooms in the building. It was supposed to be in a week and a half but it's gonna be tomorrow." Can't be legal, but I cleaned up the best I could, so now I'm trying to recover from heatstroke over here. I did all I could with what time I was given. Of course they're showing up for a whole few minutes "just to get the size" or whatever RIGHT in the middle of when I'm gonna be getting ready for work. So now I have to rearrange my whole morning around THEM. I think my next "dumb day doin' nothin'" might happen in August. Oh well. Story of my whole life.
*Enjoy your day*

Not a shred of sanity left after today. For sure the most stressful day this month at LEAST, if not this past FEW months. I went to St. Luke's Mental Health for my appointment for them to HOPEFULLY figure out how that frickin brick wall got built in my brain and how to get rid of it. I was put through some tests that only served as a harsh reminder that I am worse than I was 10 or even 5 years ago. Then I went to the mall to teach 2 lessons. I was hit in the lip during one. Made it hard for me to play trumpet through tasting blood and what not, and now I have a little gash on my lip. I hope that's not a problem when I need to play the oboe on Sunday & Monday. So I get home and can finally relax and just forget about my day, and then I get a text from Nathan saying his car is broken AGAIN! I can't keep this crap up. I need help now. Our rent went way up, and I just found out yesterday our internet went way up also, and minimum wage doesn't go up until August, so now we're really in a situation. I just had to scream out the window at some jerks too. Now the remote has SUDDENLY gone missing! It was sitting in the window sill a minute ago!! I can't really get to my TV without climbing. Hey life, can we knock this sh*t off now please?? Anyway, if you want to help us out, we would be forever grateful. Thanks!!
*Enjoy your day*
http://gofund.me/wvwen4

Today ended up turning out all right after having to leave the house in broken pants this morning :-P I decided to head over to the GNDLand Family Dolllar after work, and I found this hat while I was there!!
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10155772983325601&set=a.10150422326995601.628062.641210600&type=1
Very me!
I'm not an AIMsi expert yet, but I was just boomin' today checking in POs and a stock transfer. I was all like "scan scan enter, scan scan enter" like a beast. Maybe someday I'll even LIKE AIMsi! :-P We'll see!
I managed to shave a few minutes off my walk home from Family Dollar in these beautiful new walking shoes!
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=10155770297680601&set=a.10150422326995601.628062.641210600&type=1
Usually takes me 16 minutes to walk home, but today even with the heat, I made in like 13 minutes all because of the shoes!
Well I guess that's all for today. Once again, I'm glad I had nothing but useless boring stuff to post instead of something horrible!
*Enjoy your day*

Hello again,
    I've just been busy adding a bunch of music to my tablet. I've gotten it up past 800 songs now. Really helps during a bus ride to have all that music. I do need to create a playlist of loud sustained music though for "emergency situations" when I need to suddenly launch it (like screaming kids and really loud talkers and stuff). Right now I just put on Point of Egress and crank it because it's loud guitars and screaming heavy metal. I call it "Emergency Point of Egress Mode." It works, but I may need it for a longer period of time than it takes to play all their songs. Anyway, I guess that's all for today, or at least for now. Nice to not have something rotten & horrible to talk about (and for you to not have to read about).
*Enjoy your day*

Hi there, BlueRoseGeek.com fans, I'm back! Yeah, I know, you haven't heard from me since 2012, I'm doing what I can to help fix that. As a busy music teacher and wife who also works behind the counter at Schmitt Music and plays in 2 music ensembles, I have a tendency to be busy and disorganized. I apologize for that! I have of course been active on Facebook, but that seems to really be the only social media I'm able to keep up on. I'm trying to change that. Lately I find I've got some kind of something going on with my brain. We're still trying to figure out if it's ADHD, bipolar, or some other thing entirely. Running my web site again and writing my blog again my be good for my brain. I do have an appointment scheduled to figure out why there's been a brick wall constructed in my brain and how to get rid of it, or at least drill holes/windows in the thing. I'll let you know how that turns out. That's all for tonight!
*Enjoy your day*