Check out this poem

This was written by a woman named Alassante, and this poem was on her myspace blog. I really liked it so I asked her if I could put it on my blog, and since she said it would be alright, here it is:



Sunday, March 19, 2006

Angsty Poem
Current mood: contemplative
Category: Writing and Poetry


Sometimes when I get down I write really angsty dark poetry. I don't know that it helps but the words seem to come from somewhere so I just let them flow. Its not good poetry but its just got to get out.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

When you look at me
Can you see into my soul?
Do you know who I am?
Or do you judge me before you know.

Icy fingers of loneliness wrap
Around my heart and I feel
Myself slipping yet again.
Will you just let me go?

I've been here before
And I know this place
Things are so cold and empty here
Yet so familiar to me.

There are times I have
No choice but to be
Sometimes I come here
And wander aimlessly

Alone.

I wonder if there is a way
To fix what is broken
In truth I know
I will always be who I am.

Does it matter if I smile
And play this game?
Will my efforts mean nothing,
Will I always be damned?

I am not a martyr
I don't deserve sainthood
For I am no fallen angel
Nor have I been crucified

This thing inside me
Takes away all of my will
And I feel like
My soul as been sacrificed

Broken.

The darkness knows no bounds
Fear I can taste
But in so many ways
I no longer care.

Do I reach for a hand,
And ask for help?
Will they turn away?
Do I even dare?

But there is no help for me
Except the passing of time
One day I'll feel better
Leave here once more.

Let sunshine in and
Turn my eyes to the light
I cannot quit,
Don't want to be depression's whore.

Sorrow.

It hurts and I cry
But nothing seems to help
I struggle to make sense
And yet I fail.

My life isn't so bad
Others have far worse
I look at their troubles
And mine simply pale.

I hate this weakness in me
Shame fills my heart
Knowing I passed it on
Makes the guilt so much worse.

If I could stop it, I would
But I cannot spare him
And I suffer in silence,
As my son lives with my curse.

Falling.

Her profile is here: http://www.myspace.com/alassante

Alternative Outfitters

I just found this great site on PetaMall. It's called Alternative Outfitters. All the products are 100% vegan, so there's no harm in buying anything. There's actually quite a few things I'm considering buying for myself. Here's the link: http://www.alternativeoutfitters.com/ And even better than the cuteness of the stuff, it's also all under $100! Yay :-)

A Lesson I've Learned

A few days ago I wrote about my "Computer Woes". It taught me a lesson ~ always back up your computer files. All you have to do is get a few data cd's and put all your infomation on them. I don't know about other kinds of computers, but mine even has a wizard that does it for you. I also learned not to rely only on itunes and actually buy a few cds so i'll have them in case it crashes again (which I really hope it doesn't do).

Crazy Thursday Drivers

Yesterday Mom, Dennis, and I went shopping for stuff for the new house. And it's a good thing I went. I stopped two wrecks from happening. They wouldn't have been big car-totaling wrecks, but they would have been wrecks nontheless. The first one happened on the way to Lynhaven Mall. We were stopped at a redlight when the big dumptruck in front of us started backing up for some insane reason. Mom and Dennis were talking and I heard the beeping of the truck backing up. So I alerted mom who backed up (thankfully there was no one behind us) and beeped the horn. Save #1 for the day.

The next one wasn't quite as bad. We were in the rear parking lot of JC Penney's when we were driving through looking for a spot to park when a white van pulled out of it's spot way too fast without looking and stopped maybe 5 inches from our front bumber. Again, I noticed it first. I ought to be a good driver with that kind of reaction speed! :-)

Other than that it was an uneventful shopping day. Since my room is so bare I've been buying a lot of decor, but all I could find yesterday were a glass slipper, a jade dragon, and a green reflective coat hanger. But at least the mall weren't crowded. And we're going back to Target to get my desk and to Pier 1, a store I've never been in without drooling over something.

Getting Ready To Move

We're getting ready to move into the new house. Here's a few pictures; it's nothing grand, but it's actually pretty cute now that we've cleaned it up and made it livable.

Computer Woes

It's been a long few days for my computer. Dennis had taken it with him to use it while he was at the new house waiting for the Verizion people, and when he came back Karleen and I had turned it on so that we could go online. When we turned it on, there was an error message that wouldn't go off. Karleen's mom tried to fix it, but we couldn't figure anything out. The next morning Jeremy and Aunt Anita played around with it and finally called tech support. The entire computer had to be reset. Which meant I lost everything from pictures to at least $60 worth of iTunes. Needless to say, I wasn't too happy. But at least it works now.

Something else I found in Marie Claire

I thought this was interesting. Like my last post, it's from April's Marie Claire. It's about the richest and poorest nations in the world per capita:

Richest:
Luxembourg: $62,700
Norway: $42,400
United States: $41,800

Poorest:
East Timor: $400
Malawi: $600
Somalia: $600

Americans don't take much vacation time

Recently I read an article in April's Marie Claire where they compared employee's vacation time with that of other nations. I decided to research it online, and this is what I found:

Argentina: 14 Days
Australia: about 4 weeks
Belgium: 20 days
Bulgaria: 20 business days
Canada: at least 2 weeks
Chile: 15 working days
China: 0
Czech Republic: 4 weeks
France: 5 weeks
Germany: 4 weeks
Hong Kong: 7 days
Hungary: 20 work days
Ireland: 4 weeks
Israel: 14 days
Japan: 10 days
Mexico: 6 days
Northern Mariana Islands: 0
Poland: 18 working days
Puerto Rico: 15 days
Saudi Arabia: 15 days
Singapore: 7 days
South Africa: 21 consecutive days
South Korea: 10 working days
Spain: 30 calender days
Sweden: 5 weeks
Taiwan: 7 days
Netherlands: 4 weeks
Turkey: 12 work days
UK: at least 4 weeks
Ukraine: 24 calender days
US: about 2 weeks
Venezuela: 15 days


this info comes from: http://www.ilr.cornell.edu/library/research/QuestionOfTheMonth/archive/vacationtime.html

"Censure the RNC" from alternet

Posted by Evan Derkacz at 12:42 PM on March 22, 2006.

Republicans' Feingold ad gives you a lie and 2 distortions for the price of 1!

The RNC missed the satire in Stephen Colbert's report on truthiness. In an attempt to scare the bejeezus out of an America that has precious little bejeezus left in it, the RNC is using lies distortions to attack Sen. Feingold for proposing to censure Bush.

Despite the fact that Feingold has repeatedly asserted that "No one questions -- no one questions -- whether the government should wiretap suspected terrorists," an RNC radio ad attacks Feingold for reprimanding the president "for pursuing suspected members of al Qaeda."

"Which," as Emi Kolawole writes, "isn't true."

Couple thoughts. A. The fact that that they're taking the trouble to lie in order to smear Feingold means that the bejeezus has been scared out of the Republicans as well and B. They have every right to be scared because although America's representatives aren't for censure -- yet -- America is. To the tune of 48% to 43%.

Kolawole's article also notes deceptive claims about the Patriot Act and Democratic calls for impeachment. Three deceptions, one ad. Very economically sound. Too bad the same can't be said for other Republican policies. (Factcheck)

Evan Derkacz is a New York-based writer and contributor to AlterNet.

"Americans favor Feingold's proposal to censure Bush"

"And a surprising number support impeachment. Blog Tools
Posted by Evan Derkacz at 11:45 AM on March 19, 2006.
taken from altern

What Americans want to see.
A poll by the American Research Group last week reveals that 48% of American voters support Senator Feingold's call for a senate censure of President Bush (note: the articles of impeachment must come from the House of Representatives... As a senator, Feingold has no Constitutional power to propose impeachment). 43% of voters oppose the measure.

Amazingly, nearly a third of Republican respondents favored censure while nearly a fifth even favored impeachment. Three-fifths of Democratic respondents and nearly half of Independents favored impeachment.

Censure, many have argued, doesn't actually DO anything, and impeachment is very unlikely given the current make up of Congress -- so what's the use?

Well, when this many people favor a firm response to an outrageous transgression of the law -- illegal domestic spying -- it capitalizes on public anger, focuses it, keeps the lawbreakers on the defensive, and begins to revitalize the public image of an opposition party struggling to be perceived as having integrity and the guts to assert it.

Evan Derkacz is a New York-based writer and contributor to AlterNet."


I love the fact that Russ Feingold does what he feels is right. He doesn't sit in the background and play along; he gets up there and says what he thinks. He's the man for the 2008 Democratic nomination, as I've said before.

"Having walked around in a parade for a lot of my life, I find myself today relating much more to the kids on the sidelines. Somehow, I believe that they have the real answers. And I want so desperately to ask the questions: Why desperately to ask the questions: Why is there so much excess in some parts of the world, and such a lack of food and basic needs in others? How is there "all you can eat" and starvation? How can you, the individual, make a difference when governments can't tackle the horrors of our world?" ~Drew Barrymore

Why Women Still Makes Less Than Men

Why Women Still Make Less than Men
From Robert Longley,Your Guide to U.S. Gov Info / Resources.FREE Newsletter. Sign Up Now!


"... death, taxes and the glass ceiling."Despite a sense of continued progress toward gender equality in the workplace, the federal government has confirmed that the workplace earnings gap between men and women still persists today.
According to General Accounting Office (GAO) Report GAO-04-35, the weekly earnings of full-time working women were about three-fourths of men's during 2001. The report was prepared from a study of the earnings history of over 9,300 Americans for the last 18 years.
Even accounting for factors such as occupation, industry, race, marital status and job tenure, reports the GAO, working women today earn an average of 80 cents for every dollar earned by their male counterparts. This pay gap has persisted for the past two decades, remaining relatively consistent from 1983-2000.
In attempting to explain the discrepancies in pay between men and women, the GAO concluded:
*Women in the workforce are also less likely to work a full-time schedule and are more likely to leave the labor force for longer periods of time than men, further suppressing women's wages. These differing work patterns lead to an even larger earnings gap between men and women - suggesting that working women are penalized for their dual roles as wage earners and those who disproportionately care for home and family.
*Men with children appear to get an earnings boost, whereas women lose earnings. Men with children earn about 2% more on average than men without children, according to the GAO findings, whereas women with children earn about 2.5% less than women without children.
*Women have fewer years of work experience.
"The world today is vastly different than it was in 1983, but sadly, one thing that has remained the same is the pay gap between men and women," said U.S. Rep. Carolyn Maloney (D-New York, 14th). "After accounting for so many external factors, it seems that still, at the root of it all, men get an inherent annual bonus just for being men. If this continues, the only guarantees in life will be death, taxes and the glass ceiling. We can't let that happen."
This GAO study updates a 2002 report it conducted at the request of Rep. Maloney, which examined the glass ceiling for female and male managers. This year's study used data from a more comprehensive, longitudinal study - the Panel Study of Income Dynamics. The study also accounted for a slew of external factors for the first time, chief among which were the differences in men's and women's work patterns, including more leave from work to care for family.

taken from http://www.about.com

More Discrimination In the U.S.

Although the times have changed in most of America, it seems the military still discriminates against pagans and atheists. Around December 17th, 2005, it was reported that some army chaplains went as far as to say that atheists are unqualified as soldiers compared to their Christain counterparts. Atheists are also not allowed to put atheist on their id tags as their religion, but must put "no preference". According to Wayne Adkins, "There is a world of difference between having no religious preference and being an atheist. Often soldiers must choose between religious services and work details. Twice in my career I was told to either go to church or pick up trash. Soldiers are often captive audiences for chaplains as well. The first thing that happened when my plane landed after returning from Iraq was a chaplain boarded and held a ten minute devotional on the PA system before soldiers had an opportunity to get off the plane."
More recently, discrimination has showed up in the form of headstone battles. Here's part of the article from alternet.com: "The National Guard had no problem taking Wiccan Patrick Stewart when he decided to serve his country. They even listed Wicca on his dog tags.
Now that he's been killed in action in Afghanistan (remember Afghanistan?), however, they refuse to put his religion's symbol on the headstone. Right now, the stone remains blank:
[His widow, Roberta] said she had no idea the pentacle could not be used on her husband's memorial plaque until she had to deal with the agency after the death of her husband. "It's discrimination," she said. "They are discriminating against our religion."
According to The Pagan Veterans Headstone Campaign: "thirty-eight different "emblems of spirit" allowed on veterans' headstones, and despite the fact that there are thousands of Pagan veterans and hundreds more currently serving today, none of those are the Pentacle..."" Here's a site to check out: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Pagan-Headstone-Campaign/