No Power in Mesa, AZ today.

This afternoon the Electric Company had a transformer explode and catch fire. this caused a major power failure in Mesa on a triple-digit day. For some reason, our favorite hangout, Bookman's, still had power. that means AC! AND they are pet-friendly, so Hubby and Son brought Tara the Foster dog down and I went straight from work to Bookman's.

Tara has done very well, even putting up with a snarky little dog that had been rescued from a puppy mill along with her pets. So, she's roamed the whole store, and I've walked her up and down the shopping center outside a couple times as well. She is laying behind my chair now in a quiet nook off to the side in the area near the dog books. I guess it smells the most dog friendly.
:)

The word is that the electric will be restored around 2AM tonight, and Bookman's closes in about 45 minutes, so it's back to our hot dark house pretty soon. sigh....

Oh, and Hubby and son? They brought their laptops, so they are using Bookman's free wi-fi access to surf Facebook and wherever they go online. LOL Leave it to them to maximize their time here at Bookman's and prevent Technology Withdrawals... They brought my laptop too, but my cellphone was all I needed for my blog post.

What Ever Happened to “For the People, By the People”?

LiveJournal Tags: liberal,political,For the People,By the People,United States,America,Democrat,Fair,Honest,education,corporate welfare,tax breaks,fiscal responsibility,subsidies,welfare,injustice,Van Jones,Rebuild the Dream,Patriotic Millionaires,infrastructure

It's been for the Corporations (financed) by the Corporations for the past 20-40 years or more. the great divide between the top 5 percent of wager earners and the lower half is getting wider and wider, the few that make tons of money are doing it at the expense of the people who work for them. My problem is that from what I see, the more “Financially Conservative” a person is, the more personal greed determines their personal responsibility. It isn't about how many chips are on the table at the end of the game, but how you played the game and whether you cheated by stacking the deck or by bottom dealing.

There's not only the need for individual responsibility "bootstraps philosophy" but also the social responsibility that they never seem to remember. There's that Golden Rule that is the same in nearly every religion around the world, and it is NOT "do unto others BEFORE they can do unto you." Cutting social programs for those who are not as well off is unconscionable.

Cutting education of our young is like cutting off your nose to spite your face. These kids will be the leaders of tomorrow when you are getting ready to retire. But if they don’t have the education necessary to be able to manage their lives, not to mention the lives of their elders. Being disadvantaged as a child does not mean that person does not have a high intelligence, indeed there are many cases of people with a high intelligence but without the formal training or a degree to back it up. With the proper education every child will have the ability to make the most of themselves. Without a proper education even an intelligent child can be stuck working below their potential.

We already have young adults who may have graduated from High School, but are unable to form a complete sentence on an application or a form, they can't spell without using spell check, and are unable to determine whether they should use “to”, “two”, or “too” not to mention “they're”, “their” or “there”. They may have raw intelligence, but the school processed them through as if on an assembly line without making certain that each and every one could have the basics to be able to get into college without needing remedial college prep classes first, and that every teen that wants to go to college has a way to do so without having to either work two jobs at the same time and not get the full benefit of the education, just to pay for it, or have so many student loans that the Master’s degree they had at age 25 is still being paid off as they turn 50.

Then there’s the infrastructure that we have not been maintaining properly since the CCC built them. Bridges in a dangerous state of disrepair, roads that are not designed to take the amount of traffic in a week with what they receive daily. How are the big Corporations going to ship their goods across country if the roads are falling apart, the railroad tracks are not maintained and bridges are crumbling beneath their trucks and trains?

The truly fiscally responsible thing is to end corporate subsidies for companies that are making huge profits without those subsidies, close the corporate tax loopholes and adjust the personal income taxes for those top 1% of wage earners to be in line with the taxes that middle income wage earners pay. There are already responsible millionaires out there that receive these extremely low taxes on their income that practically beg to be taxed at a fair rate. www.PatrioticMillionaires.org Check them out. They know what the country is doing is wrong, they understand that the taxes that they would be paying in are necessary for the economy, and are disgusted at the extra tax cuts that they received without asking.

I saw part of Van Jones’ “Rebuilding the American Dream” live webcast, and some of the statistics are very troubling. I knew they were bad, but I didn’t realize just how bad they are. Here’s the webpage: http://www.rebuildthedream.com/

Amazon Kindle 3

Amazon's Kindle Facebook Page

I've been telling people how wonderful Kindle is ever since I bought one for my husband, then a second one for myself. My mom (a voracious reader) wanted to try mine before deciding whether she wanted the Kindle or that other one from the big bookstore... After playing with mine, she bought one as well.

Well, today, in a gust of wind, it fell from the small table where I was sitting and landed on the hard concrete. The eInk quit working. No more Kindle!

Oh. My. Goodness!!!What am I going to do now?! I went to the Amazon site to see how long the warranty was and if it covered this kind of accidental dropping. A 1-Year Warranty? Most electronics have a 90 Day warranty. I called the Cust. Svc number listed on Amazon.com and it WAS Covered! Oh. My. Goodness! I will have my replacement in 4 days and the original is boxed and ready to be shipped.

I couldn't be more impressed or happier with the selection of books, the prices, the awesome warranty, the size, weight, and everything else.

Voter Registration

Tom and I just volunteered for 2.5 hours in front of the Mesa Public Library for AZ Dems to register voters. Typical Mesa Voters, most acted as if we were trying to get them to sign a petition. The ones that we did get to register to vote were mostly Republicans, and one former Republican that registered as Independent because he didn't like the Repubs or Dems. But we did get two Dems registered, so that's good.

Thank goodness we slathered on some sunscreen, as there was no shade other than what we brought with us. Glad I keep an umbrella in my car! It was 100F when we got there and 102F when we left.

I may be sweating like crazy, but I will be volunteering for Obama and the AZ Democrats again soon.

Dr. Who

Demons run when a good man goes to war 
Night will fall and drown the sun
When a good man goes to war 
Friendship dies and true love lies 
Night will fall and dark will rise 
When a good man goes to war 
Demons run, a camp cost 
Battles won but the child is lost.

Dr Who - A Good Man Goes To War

What an absolute brain-bender! And I've had a headache all day, so yeah it really sprained my brain.
Even my son was shocked and he's more of a Dr. Who fan than I am and he didn't see it coming either.

Jessica's welcome back party...

so, my good friend Jessica thought she'd try her luck out in the ATL and decided that she really missed life back in AZ, we are all so happy that she has come back, and are very hopeful that she can land a job back at the same company, just within a different department. I KNOW beyond a shadow of a doubt that she is a very intelligent woman who has all of the necessary critical thinking skills to succeed in our rapidly growing company.

I was so happy that she's back that i arrived at the welcome back dinner 15 minutes before everyone else and am sitting here listening to lounge chatter. It's amusing to say the least. Now, if Jessica and Allison would just get here! LOL More to come... maybe even with photos...