Countdown to stupidity.

Well, we're deep into the silly season with just a shade over 2 months left until election day. The Sean Hannity Show has a daily countdown to the general election, and the campaign ads have been increasing in frequency on our local TV and radio channels.

I thought that I'd get my picks out of the way early so that you can print these out and take them to the ballot box if you're in California.

Candidates
Governor: Arnold Schwarzeneggar
Lt. Gov: Tom McClintock
Attorney General: Chuck Poochigian
SOS: Bruce McPherson
Insurance Commish: Steve Poizner
Controller: Tony Strickland
Treasurer: Claude Parrish
US Senate: Richard Mountjoy

Propositions - CA Secretary of State's Office
1A: Yes - Motor Vehicle Fuel Tax monies should be used for transportation, and nothing else
1B: Yes - I'm holding my nose and voting yes. I don't like bond issues, or anything that will raise my taxes, but the roads in California suck. Between 1A and 1B, this will begin to improve the overall infrastructure.
1C: No - Throwing money at housing is like throwing it away.
1D: No - How much more money will we throw at schools just to have it squandered? Every election, there's some kind of school bond act on the books, and people keep voting on them. The money in the last bond is never completely spent, and there's nothing but cost overruns by the contractors. Let's have a ballot measure that requires the contractors to complete the projects on time, and on budget, or suffer consequences like fines and penalties.
1E: Yes - This will provide money to fix our levee system here in the state. Last winter, we had all kinds of flooding problems and levee breaks along the San Joaquin and Sacramento rivers. Another severe winter like the last, with heavy snows, then above normal temps will cause more problems with runoff and flooding.
83: Yes - It's time to get serious about sexual predators.
84: No - This is the enviroweenie's version of 1E that has no real money for flood control and levee reconstruction.
85: Yes - Parents should know if their daughters are having dangerous, invasive medical procedures performed on them.
86: No - Not just no, but "HELL NO!" This is a punitive measure that punishes smokers. It will double the cost of a pack of cigarettes, just to send the money directly to hospital corporations.
87: No - Another "HELL NO!" Every enviroweenie group wants this just to punish the oil companies, and this is an attempt to do it. Every environmentalist nazi group has signed onto it, and every taxpayer advocacy, Farm Bureau, Public Safety and many local goverment groups are opposing it.
88: No - No more property taxes. Period.
89: No - Political contributions are free speech. Don't restrict free speech, or make elections more complicated than thy already are.
90: Yes - This will prevent government agencies from using eminent domain to seize private property to give it to another private company. It will severely restrict the uses of eminent domain.

These are my own choices. I'd advise you to read and make your own choices.

I'm Smokey Behr, and I approve of this post.

Another Fresh Hell

It’s another day of bliss here at the "other job" which is turning out to be a bitchfest between myself and my usual Saturday morning shiftmate. She and I are two of four left of the original 16 partners that opened the store in December 2003. We've gone through 4 different managers: The first was fired for yelling at customers. The second left to have her third child. The third left to open a store in one of the best neighborhoods in town.

Then there's this one. She came from a competitor's store where she was an assistant manager before that store closed. She became the manager of a kiosk store that was built in the center of the busiest mall in town. She refers to that store as "(blended drink) hell", which I can completely understand, since the average age of the people on that mall is somewhere around 15. Well, she came to our store, which is a regular store, with retail and everything, except a drive-thru, about 6 months ago.

We've had nothing but trouble since the day arrived. She probably felt threatened by the previous manager, since we all loved her, and everything was running really smoothly when the transition happened. Then she alienated several regular customers with some of the things that she said. Then we began to consistently run short of everything, which forced us to have to call other stores for stock, which was a change, since we usually had plenty of extra for our store and the stores around us. Then she began running off partners. We have had a HUGE churn in partners here, mostly the new hires and transfers. I've seen almost 2 dozen partners cycle through this store in the time that manager 4 has been here. Some of them last a couple of months, some a couple of weeks, and some just a couple of days. We've lost 2 partners in the last week, and one called in "sick" (morning sickness) and we've been scrambling to get coverage for the 2 shifts that are left empty. Instead of working my 5 hours and going home, I'm pulling at least 7.5, which isn't all that bad, because it's an extra couple of bucks, but it cuts into my naptime :@)

It's getting so bad here that I've already typed up my 2 weeks notice letter. All I have to do is add the date, print it out, and I'm done. Hopefully things will get better, and I won't have to drop that bomb.