BEDA Filler Time

I'm really lacking any semblance of an idea for what to blog about tonight. I'm still sick, so I haven't done anything. The best thing I can say I did today is watch two episodes of Top Gear. I tried my best to find food that wasn't to abrasive to my throat. I also didn't have my voice for most of the day. Worse though is the pains that my cough is causing me lots of pain.

I have a big time aversion to Urgent Care. You have to wait for hours and hours. You aren't guaranteed to get a doctor worth a shit. Also the waiting room is just awful. It's Pneumonia, Flu, nothing seems to be wrong with that person*, I think that person is going to die. That being said I generally avoid that place until it becomes a necessity. I don't even think I'd get anything either and that's definitely not worth the trip or co-pay.

That seems to be all I can come up with now. So I'll give you this and call it a night:



Honey Badger don't care.

-Michael

Ill Michael is Ill

I feel like death warmed over. Those second hand Wrock Wreggies' germs are taking their toll. I really just want hot tea, with lemon(and vodka.) My throat is just so irritated and sore. My voice is waxing and waning. I have an annoying throat cough.

I'm not one to tell anyone about nasty things that happen when I'm sick. I don't know exactly what I have, but I won't list gross symptoms for anyone to have a guess. I get Sinus Infections all the time and this sort of feels like except it is missing the key component of one, Nasal Congestion*.

The throat pain is the most annoying about being sick for me though. It makes me not want to drink, so I don't say hydrated. I just don't want to swallow cause it's painful. Then it's annoying i enough that it makes it hard to fall asleep**.

It also means I'll be missing class. I'm certainly capable of pushing through sickness; it's what I did in high school. I may feel like shit, but I feel like shit frequently enough that I'm able to force myself through it. However I don't like going to college sick. Partly because I feel like uncontrollable coughing is disrespectful in a class where attendance is strictly voluntary. Partly because my fellow students in college have real lives that if I got them sick would suck.

I'm not actually missing anything required though, so I guess no harm no foul. Just reading the book suffices in most classes. I still generally don't like to miss classes***. I mean I had already thought that I would probably skip on Tuesday, but that's when I woke up sick. Unless I wake up feeling much better I won't go tomorrow, which is effectively missing a week of classes.

This has been a bummer bitchy post. If you've made it this far you're amazing.

As sickly as I am I do have some methods to avoid feeling so awful. Methanol Cough Drops are almost always in my mouth****. The best liquid that isn't warm for a sore throat that I've found is watered down caffeine-free soda. The best way to achieve this is to get the biggest soda***** from a fast food restaurant and it'll be watered down with all the ice in no time and the drink will last forever******. If you don't drink soda, I think the same trick would work for non-citrus juices as well. Ice water with lemon is pretty friendly to the throat too.

I'll try to do better tomorrow. I think six notes is a record, so that's something

Thanks for reading

-Michael

*I'm taking a decongestant in case you were wondering and it isn't changing. Pro tip though: Mucinex is the best decongestant around. It's better than any prescription I've ever had.
**That's why I want Vodka
***There was one quarter that I took Economics and skipped more often that I attended and still got an A in that class. I was surprised by how much the Professor actually liked me. It wasn't easy to hide how often I skipped considering there weren't even ten people in that class.
****It's important to stop in enough time for meal time though.
*****Saying soda instead of pop is about as weird as it gets for me.
******Seriously have you seen how huge the drinks at fast food are? Even the Mediums are massive.

Wrock Concert

Yesterday night I went to a Wizard Wrock show at Team Thunder Road Headquarters. It was a brilliant time. Monica was a great host and all the music was fantastic.

I've said several times that I'm generally terrible at timing arrivals. I can never get it quite right. I compensate way too much most of the time, which leaves me earlier than I want to be. It was rainy and nearly rush hour when I left yesterday, I figured I'd give my self an extra cushion, which means I ended up arriving almost 25 minutes early. I don't know. That just seems really early for a house show.

There were six sets at this show and all of them were awesome. In order

Kwikspell
Snidget
Lauren Fairweather
The Whomping Willows
Justin Finch-Fletchley (3D!)
Tonks and the Aurors

Beth(Kwikspell) sounded great even though her voice was nearly gone. Grace of Snidget's played a really awesome set. She played a dulcimer, which makes a very pretty sound and her lyrics were beautiful as well. Lauren's played very well. I really do look forward to her next album "The Prince's Tale" as the songs that she played sounded great. The Whomping Willows and JFF both brought some energy to what was a pretty laid back show. Finally, Steph (Tonks and the Aurors) gave the ever rare triple encore.

I bought loads of Merch. after the show. I'll probably put some pictures on Flickr soon.

It was a really fun experience. Everyone was friendly, the music was awesome and it was ultra nerdy. Lots of laughs as well. That is basically all that is needed for a fantastic evening.

The only bad thing is that I think I caught some Wrock Wreggies germs second hand. It's totally worth it.

Thanks for reading

-Michael

Monday, Monday

I've been so sleepy lately. I've been going to bed at reasonable times, but still have been sleeping in ridiculously late. Then when I finally get up, I start wanting to go back to sleep pretty quickly. This new pattern isn't ideal especially for today.

I've got to get a lot of school work done before leaving this afternoon for a concert. I managed to wake up at about nine this morning, so that's not to awful. I'm almost done with the outline I'm supposed to do that is due tomorrow. I've still got to do some readings as well. I'm just lacking motivation. I'd just rather take a nap that's all.

Yesterday morning I had some strange dreams. The content of the dreams isn't what was strange, but rather how they were happening. I kept falling asleep and waking up like 15 minutes later having this seemingly long and detailed dream. It felt like dreams like those should take longer than that.

I forgot to share a story yesterday about Saturday.

I accidentally bought one extra ticket for the game. So we were looking to sell it to someone it to in the line. Everyone we asked was looking for multiple tickets, then I saw him.

"That guy" I said

He was the creeper extraordinaire. I knew he only needed a single. He did. I'm good at recognizing my own kind, I guess.

Thanks for reading.

-Michael

Crush

Yesterday, I went to the final Blue Jackets game of the season with my friends Pat, Tommy and Sarita. As I'm generally a hermit crab this is the most unusual of occurrences. It was a fun time. There were loads of Buffalo fans there, which is typical when the Blue Jackets aren't competitive and the team their playing is from relatively close. I mean nothing to extraordinary happened.

The interesting thing I noticed at the game was that there were loads of people dressed up. Ladies were in fancy dresses and guys were in suits. I noticed this initially while standing in line for tickets outside and thought it was a little early for any Prom to be going on. I was more puzzled by the fact that all these people were actually in the Arena for the game in their own section.

I couldn't figure it out last night, but I've come up with a theory. I think it was a Wedding Reception. There was a bride and groom getting their pictures taken across the street as we waited for a table at a restaurant. Why someone would want to have a Wedding Reception at a Blue Jackets game is the only thing that is making me still question it.

So, last night before the game, I saw the biggest crush I ever had while we were at dinner. I didn't say a word. It wasn't like she was at the other side of the restaurant or I'd have to chase her. I don't think it would've been terribly awkward either.

Tweet

How did I rationalize it? Well, I didn't really.

Brilliant ending, I know.

-Michael

Special Comment- The Biggest Fight Is Yet to Come

How messed up has political discourse become now that John Boehner is seen as 'reasonable?' He certainly isn't, but for some reason everyone is accepting the farce that the Tea Party deserves a seat at the table. It is because the Republican leadership is scared of that extreme wing of their party. A big part of that is the media acting as though the teabaggers are equal to the two political parties. Therefore, their bat-shit insane ideas are given equal opportunity even if their numbers are small.

They're loud and they have an unreasonable pull on the early primaries for the Republicans, so the Republican leadership is hesitant to just cut them out of the deal. The early Republican primaries are largely white-bred and have an uber-conservative electorate. So their pull is exaggerated by the media because their message is insane and loud and they have a pull thanks to the unfortunate scheduling of primaries.

There wouldn't have been a near government shutdown last night had Boehner been willing to lose some of the self-proclaimed Tea Party votes. House Democrats and the non-extremist Republicans could have easily passed the budget, but the Republican is too afraid of the Tea Party to do something like that. The Democrats did nothing but give in the negotiations and nearly wasn't enough as the Tea Party feels they are entitled to get everything they want even though they are merely a small faction within a political party. Not withstanding the fact the Senate and Presidency are in Democratic control.

As big as this budget fight may have seemed, it will be nothing compared to what is coming in a few weeks. There was a way to compromise with the budget. There won't be one when it comes to the debt ceiling.

In advocating not raising the debt ceiling, the Tea Party is basically advocating the collapse of the global economy and American civilization. The United States defaulting on it's loans would cause the an economic crisis that would likely put the Great Depression to shame.

Not only should the debt ceiling definitely be raised, but cutting spending at a time like this is just plain dumb. The deficit doesn't matter right now. The government needs to keep spending. It is the best thing the fragile economy has. The cuts that have already been passed and will be passed for the 2012 budget aren't going to help the economy, because the deficit isn't a drag on the economy right now. What is drag is that money isn't flowing and government has the ability to make that happen by itself.

What's really funny is that the Republicans ran up huge deficits when they weren't in any way necessary. They fail to notice the debt added on by George W. Bush is significant and is much worse than what is being added now. That debt was created for tax cuts for the wealthy and unnecessary wars. That was a period where the budget could have easily been balanced.

Debt and deficit just don't matter at this moment in our nation's history. Tens of Trillions of dollars of debt sounds way more scary than it actually is. We are the world's biggest market, so any country that would demand payment on their loans would be destroying their own economy. Spending is the way out of this shaky economy. It's not tax cuts. It's not dealing with the deficit.

That's not to say that the issue of debt and deficit shouldn't be dealt with, but now isn't the time for that. If the economy is stable and the country's work force is working, the government should definitely not spend the way that it is spending now.

And honestly the way to deal with the deficit isn't through domestic spending. If someone is really serious about that issue they have to be willing to take on Military spending and Entitlement Spending. Those are the areas where real changes can be made. Money to Planned Parenthood isn't a drop in the sea, but spending on an over-size, over-utilized military is absolutely massive.

And that's all I have to say about that.

Thanks for reading and please comment.

-Michael.

I'll Fight Off The Spring

This is going to be choppy and stupid. Not that everything here isn't that way, but it's bad enough this time that I thought I'd give warning

I hate the Spring. It is without question my least favorite season.

Nothing good ever seems to come out of April. It's never a positive when you bring up what happened on a day in April in History. Bombs kill people, great men are shot and senseless massacres.

Spring is by theory identical to Fall. In practice they just aren't though. I'm sick basically all of the time in both seasons, but it's so much worse in spring.

I've been over how everyone is bitchy in the spring too. Everyone has to bitch about the weather as if it's never happened like this before, but of course it has. It's what fucking spring is. It never just suddenly decides to be warm and then stick. It'll be warm and then it'll be cold. Some days you'll start off in a winter jacket and end wearing shorts. It's the same every year.

Funnier still is the people who refuse to accept that the weather fluctuates. As soon as it hits 70 degrees once, the reasonable clothes go away. It may have been seventy a few days ago, but now it's below freezing. Why are you wearing flip-flops and a mini-skirt?

The worst thing for me though is that it signifies the end of winter. I much prefer the cold.

In summary Spring sucks because: I'm always sick, people are bitchy, the worst month of the year, and the winter ends.

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I sound way more upset about that than I actually am. It happens sometimes. It's not all bad. I mean it's nice to not have to scrape off the car. Spending sometime outside is nice too. My Birthday is in spring, so is my brother's and my Mom's.

I'll probably be writing about the (potential) government shutdown tomorrow. Hopefully that will be better.

Thanks for reading.

-Michael