All posts by James DeVol

378 million reasons to hate Apple…

Well…I’ve never been a fan of Apple products and the iron-fisted control that they exert over their use and, as such, have never owned one…with that disclaimer out of the way, I do need to comment on the news that came out yesterday that the new CEO there is going to be compensated 378 million dollars…yep, you heard it right…one person at Apple is going to make more money than entire countries do…doesn’t anyone else see anything wrong with that? Especially when Apple outsources all of it’s production to sweat shop factories in China? How many American’s could they employ if this idiot only took say 50 million dollars? Or, how many dividends could they pay to stockholders? Just another example of why people are showing up at “Occupy” rallies and the conversation has changed in this country to highlight this nonsense…especially when you can’t even say with a straight face that this idiot “earned” the money…so, I will shout into the wind again…Boycott Apple until this nonsense ends…geez…

January 11th

Well..it was a kind of fun night going out to watch the Wings game with C and K but I still don’t feel right this morning…the bug seems to be getting worse with the sore throat I have today so I think I’ll take it easy and take the rest of the week off from cocktails….the Wings really stunk the place up last night, too, so that was not a good thing…it looks like today is the last day of riding the bike for a while since the temps are going to go down into the 20’s for highs and that is just too cold for me…it’s going to snow, too, so that will make the trails impassable….not much to do today…and I really mean that…so I’m going to just sit here for a while and decide if I want to go out for coffee or not…more later…

The true republicans come out…

Well..I hope you’ve been watching the lead up to the NH primary on the repub side and all of the Mitt bashing that has been done by the others in the race…I find it one of the funniest things I’ve seen in years but my neck hurts from watching all of the flip-flopping that has been going on. One of the most hilarious attacks centers on ole Mitt’s job creation record at Bain capital, with the crowd of contenders abandoning the central tenet of modern repub thought that business equals good and the hell with everyone else…and citing the fact that jobs were killed when Bain took over many companies while ole Mitt was running it as a reason to not elect him. What are these guys going to do if they do defeat Mitt? I just love how much ammunition the left is getting from all of these sound bites…and the fact that all of this sound a fury is exposing the repubs for what they are….unprincipled idiots who will do or say anything that they think will get them elected.

One last thing…one of the things that ole Mitt cites that makes him a job creator was Bain’s investment in Staples and he even goes so far to make it sound like he created Staples from his own ideas…it’s just not true..Bain supplied money and that was it…

January 10th

Well…running late this morning and there really is no reason for it other than I just can’t get motivated to do anything right now…it was an okay night last night with hanging out with G for a while and having a couple….the bug I had is still here and I feel like crap this morning so I think I’ll skip coffee and the papers and just veg for a while…part of it might be not eating enough since I do feel warm right now and that is one of the signs…oh, well….I do have things to do later..C is coming into town and we are going to watch the Wings game later…so I guess I’ll rest up for that and get some stuff done around here…I do need to clean the kitchen….more later…

Been out of sorts….

Well…it has been a day and I still have that mental block..or writers block, or whatever you want to call it that is keeping me from being very lucid and having any desire to attempt a political one. Part of it is my increasing despair with not being able to find work and that daily process of sending resumes without any response is soul numbing….it has taken away a lot of my energy but I’m still trying to move forward. So, I will keep trying to get worked up and get back to politics, and sports, and music, and all of the other things I used to enjoy writing about…but I wouldn’t blame anyone if you stopped coming…I’m even bored with me right now…

January 9th

Well…another long day yesterday and I feel a little crappy today…and I lost at pool for the second week in a row so that adds to the pain….and I missed Ab Fab last night and forgot to set up the tape machine so I guess I’ll have to find it later in the week or on Hulu…okay…this isn’t working so I’m going back to the couch to rest for a while…

Okay…went out to have coffee and read the papers and I don’t feel much better so I think it’s that bug I thought I had….luckily, it should be over in a couple of days if it’s like what others have had…I am still going to get on the bike and work out this morning, though, since I am running out of nice days to do that…I’ll be back later for more of this but right now I do need to get working out…

One last thing…just wanted to say happy birthday to Jimmy Page….

January 8th

Well…another night of disappointment with both the Lions and Wings losing…and too many cocktails so I feel like crap today but I think the lack of sleep has something to do with that…other than that, it was an okay day yesterday, mostly just vegging but that is okay for a weekend. I think I have a bug, too since my lungs are feeling a little creaky…I’ll have to wait until I get on the bike to know for sure, though…just don’t want to get sick…that would be piling on from the world and I don’t think it hates me that much…not sure about it..it could at that. Not much to do today…I am going to cook some chicken since I thawed it and I need to just eat protein for a couple of days…all of the carbs are making me kind of bloated and I need to cut back on the calories..it feels like I’ve gained 10 pounds in the last couple of weeks and I hate it…what the heck was all of the work on the bike for if I can just gain all of the weight back just from having to take a few days off? As you can tell…it is going to be one of those days that I need to curl up in a ball and just let life wash over me for a while…I’ll try to come back later for another one but since it’s Sunday, you know that probably won’t happen…

Gonna do a second one…

Well…I normally don’t do two on my life on the weekends but I’m feeling a little voluble today so I’m going to do it…and I forgot one trail thing from yesterday that I wanted to share…so let’s get to that first. It was a little dicey on the trail yesterday and I am so happy we had a 50 plus degree yesterday and I was able to get out in shorts and no gloves…there was so much ice in the sheltered spots that it was really quite dangerous…in one downhill, I had the bike sideways and leaning like a flat-track motorcycle racer and the only thing that popped into my head was “how am I going to pay for the injuries when I bite it?” But, luckily, the muscle memory from doing that kind of stuff when I was a kid saved me and I made it through the rest of the ride with much more care and little drama. Oh, back to the 50 plus degree day, it was a good thing that happened…the trails were almost all melted today and it made for a more relaxing time and some sprints that really hurt…I had a little problem with my back yesterday that is getting quite bad…sat down on the couch and it sounded like glass breaking (or felt like glass breaking?) but I’m sure it’s just like it used to be…haven’t had a back problems in a couple of years so maybe I’m just due for a flare up…heading for the ibuprofen right now and we’ll see how it is later on…Go Lions!

January 7th

Well…another night with not a lot to do but I guess I survived it…had a couple of cocktails but feel okay this morning and I am at this early for a Saturday…it was pretty cool to be out on the bike in shorts yesterday and it is just more fun to ride without the whole thermasuit on…and yes, I stole that from “Snowbound” by Donald Fagen….it looks like another good day on the bike today, too, but I’m not sure if it will be in shorts or not…I did reset the odo on the bike and the goal now is to beat the 2880 miles from last year…it is going to be a real sports day today with the Lions playing in their first playoff game since 1999…they will probably lose but at least they made it…the Wings play, too, and they have been off since Tuesday so there will be flipping tonight…and cocktails…I will get caught up today so come on back later…

A little about K street Rick…

Well…just wanted to do a short one before I make lunch and get on to the rest of the day…I’m going to be really blunt here about Rick Santorum….and no, I’m not going to go into what comes up when you Google Santorum…what I want to deal with is how a broke, ex-senator goes from a crushing defeat in an election (by almost 20 points), to making almost 2 million dollars last year. When you look at the breakdown, you can see the most egregious crony capitalism at work with his income being derived from serving on corporate boards; positions that were given to him by his previous corporate masters, along with hundreds of thousands of dollars made by being the scourge of our democracy; a K street lobbyist whose only goal is to line his own pockets and those of the corporations that employed him. Do we really think that this idiot can really represent anyone but the 1%? I think the last thing we need is to have another racist, right wing nutjob as president…we are still recovering from the last one….geez…