Recession? What Recession?

So let me first say, I know that we are in a recession. There's no doubt that jobs are being lost and the economy is probably in the worst shape it has been in a long time - though relative to other points in our history, we are still doing pretty good (for now). Still, as I went out to pick up a few things today in Chattanooga, I had a hard time believing that we are in the midst of "tough economic times".

First I simply pull out of the driveway to my apartment and notice that traffic on the road looks like 5:00 rush-hour. I went out to the area around Hamilton Place mall, which is where all of the big-box stores are. My gosh - it looked like Christmas Eve out there. The mall was packed, as when I was trying to get through the food court I had to bob and weave just to keep from getting ran over. Lines were so long turning into some stores that turning lanes were overflowing into the regular traffic lanes. Wal-Mart was... well, Wal-Mart. Full of nothing but mouth-breathers, illegal Mexicans, and 250+ pound women with their hair dyed purple wearing a mini-skirt as they pull around their bratty, screaming horde of children. Oh yeah, don't forget that it's raining which makes the already unenviable task of driving even worse. Yes people, a little misting rain means you need to go 15 mph under the speed limit - I think that's a law in fact [/sarcasm].

So is it like this everywhere? Florence? Huntsville? The rest of America? I know that Chattanooga is actually one of the luckier towns right now. The economy hasn't fallen off that much, and in fact, new jobs are coming in. I just assumed that the media had scared people into not spending money. Are these people simply going out and doing their shopping routine, but not actually buying things? Are they trying to fool themselves into believing everything is okay? Are the majority of people really too stupid to sense anything is wrong, and they are doing what they would normally do? Or - and I would never imagine this - is the media stretching the truth and the recession not really as bad as what they say? I'm not economist, so I don't think I can judge what is right or wrong. But as a simple observer, it's hard to see any difference between now and the past several years.

Finally, just to put a happy spin on this blog, I am going to do something inspired by my good friend Andrew. I will post a personal picture of mine, a place that is dear to all of us geo-nerds' hearts. Enjoy.

Until next time, compadres...

Dentist Blues

You know how some people use their blog to talk about stuff that is probably totally boring to other people? Well this is me about to do that. If you are reading, I apologize for the time you are about to waste.

I went to the dentist today for my six-month cleaning. Everything was fine, no cavities or anything. Just one problem, actually. I've had a back tooth that started hurting when I chew on it back in December. About a month ago I went to have them check it, and the x-rays didn't really find any problems. The most likely scenario was either I had a tiny crack in one of my molars, or get this, it could be totally sinus-related. My dentist gave me an antibiotic in case it was a sinus issue and that was that.

So needless to say, it wasn't a sinus problem. The tooth hasn't gotten any worse, but there also hasn't been any improvement. I can barely chew on that side, but mostly don't out of fear of making things worse. I heard that a root canal could be the only option to fix this. My dentist pretty much confirmed that today. However, he basically told me I was in this weird gray area of the tooth being a nuisance, but also, in his opinion, not being damaged enough for a root canal. His prescription? Let it go for a few months and see if it somehow happens to improve on its own (to which he gave a 25% chance). Isn't that just great? I also have to try to break my bad habit of chewing ice, which he said could have led to the tooth cracking in the first place.

The kicker to all of this is, my teeth have always been extremely healthy. In fact, I didn't take out insurance when I started my job because it was a.) expensive, b.) I could use that money for better things, and c.) my dentist is a family friend of ours and gives me a discount on the cleanings. It actually costs less for me to pay for cleanings two times a year than to pay for insurance. Of course, that was before I cracked my tooth. A root canal costs about $800 - $1000. Lucky me.

Finally, since I don't have any pictures to relate to this blog - I don't have copies of my x-rays, sorry to say - I present you with this picture of Vince, the "Shamwow" guy. BTW, it's made in Germany, so you know it's good. This picture actually comes from a pretty cool website, http://www.obamicon.me. It has a ton of pictures done in the style of the Obama (false) "Hope" poster. Funny stuff.

Brett, Go Away

I still plan on doing my big-arse rant on the world economic climate sometime soon, but hey, sports is more important anyway.

The topic of the day is Brett Favre. I'm sure you've all read the articles, so I'm not going to provide any links. But it appears that Brett has told the Jets that he will once again "retire" and not be a part of the team next year.

Which would be fine if we could believe him. This of course makes two years in a row that he has "retired", and about three or four now that he has at least allowed the public to know that he is thinking about it.

Let me first say that I did not used to have a problem with Favre. I didn't love the Packers, but didn't really have anything against them, either. Brett was good, I respected him. I pulled against him in '97 when my Broncos beat the Packers in the Super Bowl. Otherwise, I didn't think about Brett very much, other than to acknowledge he was a pretty darn good quarterback.

The whole thing with Green Bay last year soured me on the guy. Newsflash Brett: you were NOT the Green Bay Packers. When you told them you were leaving and they prepared Aaron Rodgers for the role, they were acting like any sensible franchise would do. They did not "owe" you anything. When you suddenly changed your mind and decided to come back, under no circumstances should they have bumped Rodgers back to second-string and put you back in the starting role. Yeah, they might have won a couple more games, but it would have just been wrong. The Packers didn't screw Brett. Brett screwed Brett (props if anybody knows where that phrase originally comes from).

So now you are retiring again, and I've already heard sportscasters talking about teams that could use you and might be interested. Let me save you the trouble Brett: go away. Don't come back to the NFL. You have made millions of dollars playing a game. Probably 99% of the American public envies a guy that can retire as a multi-millionaire at 40 while they slave for a job they hate. They used to like you, but this continued crying at press conferences and indecision on what to really do is quickly turning people like me against you. Maybe you don't care, and that's fine. But I for one never want to hear your name on ESPN again. If you want people to remember you as a great player AND a decent guy, don't be stupid. Go back to Mississippi and enjoy life. I know I would if I were you. Well, except the part about Mississippi. I'd go anywhere but Mississippi.

Introduction

So I really tried for a long time not to do the blog thing. Not sure why, exactly, other than the fact that I pretty much despise anything that makes it into popular culture. Of course, I openly embrace things like Facebook and Twitter, but I like to think that I was an early adopter for Facebook (before it became cool) and most people still don't know about Twitter. I'm sure though there are plenty of other pop culture staples that I take part in. I'm nothing if not a hypocrite. But hey, aren't most of us?

I intend on using this space to publish my views and thoughts on things. I feel like they will mostly be awesome and will be the way you should look at things, too. I'm guessing there will be plenty of disagreements though. That's okay, I'm always up for intelligent debate. Hell, I'm usually up for unintelligent debate that devolves into immature name-calling too. I have a pretty thick skin.

I have a big-arse discussion on the current state of world economics that I'm working on. That's probably an incredibly geeky thing to admit, but I was bored at work and wrote out most of it there. That's what happens when you get banned from most websites at work. They want us to be "productive", go figure. Check back soon for that, especially if you have masochistic tendencies.

Later...