What's the latest in people's lives?

[Mikey]

BTW, I have a nice liter of homemade coffee bock chilling for tonight's match. It airs at 8:00 pm over here.

[Angharrad]

Just got an e-mail from the Commissioner about the possible shut down of State Government on Tuesday. That would mean no work, and no pay for an undetermined amount of time.

Some people are saying its not going to happen, other people are scared sh*tless and about to jump off a bridge. My thought is if the scared people jump off a bridge fewer people will have to be laid off.

Yes I know, I have issues.

[Mikey]

I thought old David P. made it official?

[Mikey]

OK, I guess the match is on tomorrow at 1:30 local - 8:00 tonight seems to be some stupid opening concert or somesuch.

[Nickswitz]

Well, today I had my economics final. It was really easy actually, I knew the essays, I feel like I'll be screwed over on the Psych final Monday though...

[Sionnach Glic]

Just got an e-mail from the Commissioner about the possible shut down of State Government on Tuesday. That would mean no work, and no pay for an undetermined amount of time.

Some people are saying its not going to happen, other people are scared sh*tless and about to jump off a bridge. My thought is if the scared people jump off a bridge fewer people will have to be laid off.

Yes I know, I have issues.

Why is the government shutting down? And just what does that entail?

[Mikey]

TBH, I haven't followed the New York governmental issues lately too carefully, because I'm sick of hearing about that buffoon David Patterson (NY's governor.) We in Jersey are looking at a shut-down, too - in our case, it's because the state assembly and governor can't agree on a budget, so a hiatus is called in state government. Key services are continued, such as DMV, regulatory commissions, child and family services, etc. - but administration staff is forced to take an unpaid leave.

In the case of NJ, it's mainly due to Governor Farouk- I mean, Christie - making all kinds of ridiculous cuts to essential programs while keeping a huge tax break for his buddies- I mean, millionaires - in place; then when the assembly tried to show a bit more common sense in creating a budget, Christie trying a show of bravado and sending the "my way or the highway" message. There was a similar federal shutdown under Bubba Clinton for a few days.

in NJ, particularly, education is being hit the hardest. State aid is being totally abolished, so districts across the state are facing massive layoffs, which in turn entail increases in class sizes; disuse of paraprofessionals except in self-contained special education classes, which means an even higher student:teacher ration than jsut the bigger classes would mean; the disuse of math and literacy coaches, which means that intervention teachers and specialists now have to take on some of those duties, which takes away from their actual instructional time; etc. Plus, districts with federal Abbott aid money are now no longer allowed to keep last year's surplus of such funds. All the while, Christie's sec. of education has instituted a new mandatory tecvhnology curriculum, requiring a huge outlay of cash for technological materials. In the midst of this all, Christie has hammered the teachers' union, asking why they get such a great benefits package compared to "other state employees" - apparently forgetting that teachers aren't state employees. Now, beacuse the AFT is weaker than well water, retiring teachers are limited in cashing out accrued unused sick days to a max of 80 (I think) - while in the meantime, teachers are actively discouraged from using their sick days before retirement.

[Nickswitz]

Yeah, in NY it's just a problem with the moron we call a governor, I don't get too deeply involved in politics, but it isn't the guys politics that piss me off, it's the fact that he actually is a complete moron, and therefore shouldn't be running anything.

In the political realm of things however it is the same issue here as it is with Christie, other people proposed a half intelligent budget that he pushed away because he doesn't want to hurt his fellow billionaires. But that's about as far as I know about the plitics of the situation.

[Tsukiyumi]

Well. I guess our states have more in common than I thought.







p.s. Rick Perry is a giant douche.

[Mark]

Got a call on Thursday. My mom is in the hospital, in ICU. She collapsed and started seizing in a casino. They got her into the hospital, and found that her heart is only pumping 13% of the blood required by her body, and her BP was 70 over 40. She was critical, but they stabalized her, and even had to intubate (hook her up to a ventelator).

Seems one of my sisters went in there and said some horrible things, accusing her of faking, just wanting attention, and suggesting she hurry up and die already.

Nobody botherd to call me till thursday, and all this went down on tuesday. They tried to put little stints in her heart to open the valves to make it easier to pump blood, but she's got 80% blockages. They wanted to do open heart surgery, but aborted at the last minute because they also discovered she's got a bleeding ulcer. They don't know what to do, and are going to have a planning session tomorrow to figure something out.

My mom is 74, so anything they do is REALLY risky. My mom and I are very close, and it would really fuck me up to lose her. My lovely ex said to me, in an attempt to be conforting "It's almost her time anyway, Mark. She IS old."

Sorry guys. I know this rant is all over the place, but I'm kind of frantic.

[Mikey]

Wow. My prayers are with her. You know where I am if you need to vent, bro.

[Reliant121]

As are we all. Best of luck to her, and to you.

[Nickswitz]

Our prayers too are with you.

And to say it bluntly, tell your ex to f*** off.

I know that she's trying to make it seem less tragic, but it's death, I know how tragic death is, and most people do, obviously she doesn't very well, but when someone close to you dies, it hurts. This is what I said to a teacher that last week said we should all just forget about the kid who died, they said, "It was his time, just forget it and move on." People like that need to just shut their mouths and go live with other people who don't care how anyone feels.

But yeah, I actually have a rant of my own, same issue as before, different people. It's now been 5 days, not long, but people are still sending hateful texts and messages to her phone and on her Facebook. It pisses me off so much. I didn't know her very well, but we talked for pretty much 3 hours and she is the sweetest girl ever, she is in such a bad place, and all they can do is blame her. I mean if I were ever with her and saw one of those texts I would respond with "I'm going to forward this to the police and have them pay you a visit for harassment." And the final part the pisses me off is that they act like they have a right to accuse her of it. They have no right to do s*** and she has the right to be left alone and mourn, and the only people who have talked crap about her are people who don't know her. And the most annoying a******* in the school are ones that defend her, I love that.

I love bob. Someone accused her of purposely doing it and he just gave him a swift hit to the nuts. Everyone around just ignored that it happened or chuckled, he didn't get in any trouble, this was at school in the Cafeteria right next to a teacher. Thats when you know you deserve getting hit.

[Sionnach Glic]

Best wishes, Mark.

[Deepcrush]

Good luck Mark.