lonecity.com

Somewhere along the way I got a stink about me that just doesn’t wash off.  Like your own smell, this smell is something I can’t notice, but everyone else around me seems to be able to sense it right away.  As best as I can tell its not actually a smell, but some other sort of sensory effect though.  People I barely know or have just met seem to believe I know all about computers.  I don’t believe I know that much, but this funk has got people asking me to fix things. 

Usually I know how to fix their computer problems, but it baffles my mind to wonder how they knew I would know.  I don’t go around wearing a jump drive on a chain, or carry a laptop, or really do anything computer related in my daily life.  Still word seems to get out that I’m the guy to talk to when you have become infested with spyware.  Of course the problem is compounded when its someone close to me because I can’t fake my way out of it.  They actually do know I know how to fix their computers so denying it won’t help.

Anyhow, what I’m getting to is that recently a relative dropped by with a pc infested with trojans and asked me to kill them.  As I was spending hours of my time doing something other that what I wanted to do that day, an old thought came back to me.  Why are the people who create this adware crap getting away with it?  I know they are violating at least a dozen laws here in the USA, and there are similar laws in pretty much every country in the world.  It really wouldn’t be hard to find them.  (I’m talking to you now FBI folks.)

The purpose of the adware spyware trojan is to hijack peoples computers and make their internet box show webpages that the hacker wants people to see.  Then the hijacker collects money from ad revenue.  Now I’m no fool, I know somewhere along the lines there is someone who actually gets that check.  I also know that while the hackers may have control of millions of pc’s, they don’t control the banks.  All the feds need to do is ask the ad companies who’s bank account the ad revenu is going into.  Even if the hackers establish a virtually unfollowable path through the computer networks they are easily exposed by following the money.  A couple of warrants and I’d say 90% of this computer terrorism could be eliminated. 

Its not widely known, but the first world trade center bombing was funded by gains from a coupon fraud ring.  Now the feds monitor coupon redemption for fraud.  It seems to me that the ad fraud that is going on opens up alot more potential for some terrorist group to buy truckloads of chemicals.  This money leak needs to be stopped and our government needs to do it.  I just wonder why we have to wait until after they blow up the white house before the feds figure out where they got the money and plug the hole?

Anyhow, just a passing thought.  Why are the folks who aren’t smart enough to install their own software bieng taken advantage of by cyber terrorists and our government doing nothing about it.  Instead the beurocrats are wasting time trying to pass bills about anti-phishing suits that will do nothing to curb the problem.  Theres plenty of legislation, its time for action!

It wasn’t until well into adulthood that I realized that thinking about how I might die probably isn’t completely normal.  I know I pictured falling from an airplane numerous times throuought my childhood.  It didn’t seem to be all that strange until one day I had an epifany.  I had thought about it so many times that I had a pattern of what I believe would happen should I actually fall (or leap) out of an airplane.  I’m not saying I planned to fall, but just that one day I came to the realize that I had thought about it an inordinate number of times. 

What brought about this realization is watching an anime series on television.  Wolfs Rain is the show that brought about this revalation.  I won’t give away much because I hate it when someone ruins an ending for a show I haven’t watched.  I will say that at some point cheza goes over a cliff.  I guess my idea of falling was influenced by hollywood movies.  Drop zone and the like.  I always pictured myself in a straight arrow arms calked back diving headfirst into oblivion.  It never occurred to me that I’d be flailing madly kicking and screaming or any other of the millions of possible bodily positions. 

Cheza’s influence in the series is that she is genetically modified to be part plant.  A flower to be exact.  When she goes over the cliff the artists who created the show envisioned the flower and came up with a sequence that is just astounding.  She falls kind of like a dandilion.  Feet down arms stretched out like a ballerina and twirling gracefully into the chasm.  Its an absolutely beautiful scene.  It also makes me wonder how they ever managed to think of the idea of making her fall like that.

Its this difference in perception that I find most interesting.  A while back a new lock was introduced into modern automobiles.  Locksmiths everwhere were looking at this and wondering how they would deal with the issue if they had to open one of these new cars.  With every lock there has always been a way to pick it.  Sometimes many ways.  This lock of course proved to be no different in that an easy way locksmiths could open it was found.  Its just different in how it happend.  Lock picking and lock bumping are both long used tools of the locksmith and both are the result of thinking outside the box.  Neither of these will do the trick though.  The real leap of outside the box thinking was solved by (of course) some thieving carjacker kid.  Air pressure.  Instead of trying to unlock the lock all that is needed is to open the car.  by applying air pressure to the inside of the door rapidly the button that you press down to lock the car pops out.  The door is unlocked without ever using any kind of mechanical tool.  A common tennis ball with a hole poked in it can do what thousands of professionals couldn’t figure out. 

I won’ t say going to school is a bad thing, but the reality is that when you send your kids to school you are starting their training on being average.  Even graduates from the highest grades are only ever trained to fit a mold.  What about creating something that doesn’t fit in a mold?  Thats why I like stoners.  I don’t agree with drug use, but the real stoner type is horrificly ingenious.  Not because they have or haven’t baked away half of thier brain.  Its because they have to be.  To get away with doing drugs they have to think of things that we “normals” would never percieve.  So the carjacker brat and the stoners have something in common.  Bank robbers too.  (not the stick em up kind)  There is a need to think of things other people wouldn’t concieve and a result to create something wonderful.

So for the future of mankind how do we go about creating the influence needed to go beyond the typical box that education creates without the evil part of the influence.  How do we keep our children from going to school just to become working class grunts with no concept of more?  What can we do to make them great?

America has begun to stagnate.  fifty or a hundred years ago people lived on a farm or plantation.  Things were invented or created out of necessity for survival.  Society has almost reached the point now where survival can happen even without creation.  Welfare, social security, ect allow almost anyone to survive regardless of their worth as a human bieng.  We’ve developed beond the point where natural selection can continue to advance civilzation.  So I’m wondering what is that next leap?  Who is going to find the out of the box solution that puts us back on the right track?  Or perhaps a cataclysm needs to knock us back to the middle ages so that our advancement can begin again and we can continue on.

For the last few months my blog has been a monologue about how bad things have been getting for me.  who am I kidding, thats all its ever been…  Two days ago I got proof of my insipid whining.  I’ve bitched about wanting to find a new job and failed to actually do it.  I’ve complained about how little I make, but failed to do anything to make more.  Well the jig is up.  My company made the announcement that I will need to start looking for a job because by the time christmas is done I won’t have one anymore.  (merry freaking christmas to me…)

So are you all wondering how I feel about all this.  I feel FANTASTIC!  I’m an atheist so I never was expecting the christmas cheer that most people probably would expect. From that I’ve not had to deal with the downturn in mood that most of my co-workers have.   I’ve known I was worth more than what my company could offer me all along, but out of some twisted sense of duty or responsibility or maybe even pride, I’ve stayed with them.  The announcment that they are closing the facility where I work and that my job goes along with it is GREAT NEWS!  Finally I can shed this feeling of guild for wanting to leave and just tell them to go f*** themselves.  I am free to move on.

My only real regret here is that this happened in a particularly bad economic downturn.  (though thats why it happened)  See, it would have been nice to have a little more money put away before having to make the move.  I can see myself bieng forced to accept a job that isn’t up to my expectations because I just can’t go too long without bieng employed. I don’t want to find myself in the same trap that I just happened to fall out of by sheer luck.

I can see now that my home business is just as strongly affected by economic downturn as my company was though.  I’m making ten percent of what I used to be doing the same amount of work in my spare time.  I don’t feel my business has lost any value, but I do see that the income is going to be a while in returning.  I had hoped to use that extra income as a pad while I made the transition.  Really I had hoped to not have to make the transition except to living strictly off that extra income. 

Again though I don’t feel bad about this.  In a way its the best thing that could have happened.  Had I quit my job and then this happened I could be in a world of hurt.  Now I have a better idea of just how low the bottom is so I know where I need to be before I can safely depend on just my home business income.  I got a reality check before I got stung. 

I don’t know if there is a name for this phoenomena.  I do know people are not supposed to be happy about losing thier job.  I don’t know where I’ll be working a month from now.  I don’t know how I’m going to make the house payment.  Still the little bit of fear there is far outweighed by the massive sense of relief.  For the first time in forever I see clearly the path I must take. 

I’m going to start job hunting much closer to home.  (no more driving 50+ miles a day.)  I’m going to sell off the extra car since I won’t need a backup car if I can ride the bus in an emergency.  I’m going to focus more of my efforts into growing my business and less into researching where I should be growing my business.  And lastly I’m going to spend more time not doing any kind of work.  Hell part of me hopes I don’t find a job until after the building closes.  I could use a few weeks drawing unemployment.  I’m able bodied and more capable than nearly everyone I meet.  I am very employ-able.  I’ve always known it.  Now its time to prove it.

It is unfortunate that life has become so busy for those of us living below the poverty line that we don’t really have time for the simple things.   No longer can we enjoy a visit to the countryside or a day at the park.  Time off is more often spent doing odd jobs “on the side” than resting and recouping strength in preparation for the next work day.  I bring this up because this last week I took vacation time from my work.  I’ve situated myself to where I am so un-expendable that getting the time off means that things will have to go unfinished.  There is simply nobody else to do them.  In the past I’ve lost accrued vacation time because of inability to take it.  I vowed to myself never to let that happen again.  Whatever didn’t happen this last week that should have, my employer can suck it up and take it as a loss. 

Instead of doing the things that I should have done this last week, (pay the bills, go to work, ect) I spent the bill money on gasoline and took a drive across the west coast to visit my dad.  Gasoline is at the cheapest it has been in years right now, and still it is expensive. It has me wondering what I would be willing to do to avoid using it. What would you comprimise for a gasoline alternative? 

Living in the heart of this giant city I’ve watched over the past decade the sprawling out of people to everywhere.  There used to be empty fields stretching to the mountainside west of here.  Now there are houses all the way. I’ve long felt that overpopulation and overdevelopment are a major threat to our society.  Seeing the barren country side on a long (14 hours each way) drive at least put my mind at ease.  Is overdevelopment still a threat?  Of course it is, but its nice to see that there are still places where you can’t see the city lights at night.  (Even if those places exist only right in the very middle of a dessert.)  I also see land that ten years ago would have never been concidered for a ranch, developed into residential plots.  Why anyone would pay a lifetime’s worth of housepayments for a shack in the desert without even enough room to stretch your legs is beyond me.

Truth be told, the downturn in our economy is largely due to the developers building these houses.   It seems like a great business model to go and buy 500 acres at $100 per acre.  Break it up into 1000 half acre lots and build a thousand homes.  After fifteen to twenty thousand dollars worth of materials and labor per unit you end up with a thousand homes each worth $250,000 dollars.  (well at least according to the puck who is selling them)  In my oppinion you have a thousand homes worth $20,000 each, but thats just me.  The other half of the folding economy is the banks willingness to lend money to poor people who are duped into buying these overinflated homes. 

Do you really think there is less money to be had today than there was last year at this time?  Are americans producing less products?  Is less work bieng done?  So why would there be less money to go around?  Its simple.  The banks and credit unions gave it all to a select few real-estate investors and lost their shirts.  Then they cried to the government and in turn we as americans got the bill.  These investors are probably happily living in a mexican villa on their billions while we scrape for food and gas. Do the math.

All in all, I’ll be turing off my cable this month because a few days of sanity has cost me more than I can afford.  I’m not sure what I’m going back to when I return to work.  I’m positive I needed to take a few days off.  I had to break the monotony.  Still I can’t help but feel it may have been the last straw.  I’ve been barely keeping afloat for so long that I’m sure its only a matter of time before I drown. 

I look foreward to meeting you all at the bottom of the river!  The recession is going to take us all down eventually.