The Zombieslayer

It’s Halloween, and I have the day off. I know people at work will be dressed up and will be allowed to have one hour of fun before getting all serious again. I was sure to rub it in that I’ll be sleeping in today and drinking all night tonight, then sleeping in again tomorrow while they’re working their asses out to get their code done by the next big release. Sucks to be them.

Tonight, dropping off Junior and he’ll be trick-or-treating with some of his friends. After we pick him up, Mrs. Z and I will hit a few bars, but she has to work the next day so we won’t stay out too late. We’ll be hooking up with friends, including several fellow pretentious critics.

As of now, just had breakfast. Time to hit some blogs. Happy Halloween!

So, I’m taking Junior to football, and scribbled all over the playground with chalk are these “Just Say No” crap that they waste endless hours cramming down kids’ throats.  Say No To Drugs! Just Say No!

Meanwhile, the United States of America is one of two civilized nations that allow drug advertising on t.v.   I’d be watching a football game and I’ll see erectile dysfunction ads, toenail fungus ads, ads for allergies and depression, etc., but we’re wasting billions on taxpayer money telling kids to just say no.  What kind of double message does this send our kids? Whatever.

Maybe instead of wasting all this time and money on this crap, how about teaching kids where on the map the countries we’re at war with are located? Or how about teaching Johnny how to read? An amazing concept.

Man, been too busy. I still haven’t written my Second Amendment post, but at least I have the First done.

I’m going to hit your blogs this weekend, in between outings, weekend errands, and Junior’s football game.

As for right now, going to cook some beef stroganoff. Got some organic beef, which Safeway now carries. They also have ground buffalo too, but to get buffalo steaks, I have to go to Kinders’ Custom Meats.

Completely off topic, I haven’t said an ethnic joke in awhile.  Since I hate political correctness with a passion, one of these days, I’ll bring back ethnic jokes.  Here’s a quickie.

Did you hear there are no more ice cubes in the Ukraine?

The old lady who knew the recipe died.

Anyways, you all have a wonderful weekend.

I was just thinking of what I won’t eat. I’m not talking about gross out competitions, but real food that you can buy at a market somewhere in the world.

brains - very bitter, yuck! Tried pig brains once at a Filipino party. Just take my word for it, brains don’t taste good.

jellyfish - was at a Chinese restaurant with my older brother and we ordered jellyfish just to try. They actually were kind of sweet, but took forever to chew, like chewing on a tire. Next time, I’ll pass.

gonads - I don’t care if they taste good or not, I’m not eating the gonads of an animal.

sea cucumber - I was at a Vietnamese wedding and they had sea cucumber as an appetizer. The rest of the food was delicious and there were some hot Vietnamese babes dancing. However, sea cucumber is horrible.

eyeballs (except for fish eyeballs which are quite good) - I don’t want to eat something that is looking at me.

liver - I hate the taste of liver. I know a lot of Germans swear by it and try to convince me to try their liver, but I kindly refuse. Maybe if I’m intoxicated enough and they have heavy gravy smeared on it, I might try it.

earthworms are gross. They were another thing at a Chinese restaurant just to try. Now that that’s out of the way, I won’t ever do that again.

human, monkey, dolphin, whale, or dog. I refuse to eat these out of sheer principle. Other than that, I’ll probably eat it.

You’re probably wondering about the human reference. One of my friends was an anthropologist studying stone age tribes and he actually lived with some for sometimes up to six months. One of the tribes he lived with practiced ritual cannibalism, i.e., eating of their dead relatives to have their bodies join with theirs, literally. No, nobody died when he was living with them, so he never ate human meat.

Humans in my lifetime were eaten in parts of Africa, and during famine in China during WWII, some ate the dead because there was nothing else to eat. I actually know someone’s grandmother who did it for survival purposes. Not at all singling out the Chinese, Americans have eaten human flesh for survival purposes (the Donner Party, for example), and that one soccer team (I think they were Chilean or Argentinian) in the Andes when their plane crashed.

Also, during the Cultural Revolution in China, 270 people were known to have been killed and eaten as enemies of the state. Well, that’s just communism for you. Communists do strange things like that.

Monkeys are eaten to this day in Africa and some parts of Asia. Dogs in many parts of Asia. Dolphins are slaughtered and eaten in some parts of Japan. Screw cultural relativity, this is WRONG. Dolphins shouldn’t be eaten by people. Screw cultural tolerance.

UPDATE - I told Badman about this post, so he sent me an email from that he won’t eat tripe, bile, or beef tongue. I happen to like tripe in Vietnamese Pho. Bile is ok, not something I like, but if done right, I’ll eat it to be polite. I love beef tongue, only having it once at a Jewish restaurant in L.A. I’d definitely have it again.

By popular request, I’m doing a post explaining the Congressional Pension Plan.  As you may not know, Congresspeople get an alternate to Social Security.  They get their own Pension, if they serve in Congress five years or more.

Now, you may see that as a catch, but it’s not.  Once in, it’s easy to get re-elected.  In fact, over 90% of incumbents (those in Congress already) get re-elected.  In some years, it’s significantly higher.  For example, in 1998, it was 98%.

This is how it works.  After serving in Congress for five years, you can start collecting at 62 years of age.  If you have twenty years of service, you can start collecting at 50.  With twenty-five years, you can retire at any time.

Congress members only have to waste half of the normal money paying into Social Security.  The rest of the money is theirs to keep.  Instead, they get this alternate Pension Plan where as of 2002, the average Congressperson got paid between $41k and $55k.  On top of that, they get a sort of 401k plan where their employer (us) matches five percent.

To make it more confusing, Congresspeople before 1984 paid into the Civil Service Retirement System (CSRS) and now pay into the newer Federal Employees’ Retirement System (FERS).

This may not seem like a huge chunk of money, but it is.  Let’s take a Congressman who was making $153,900 and worked for 22 years.  His pension is $84,645 a year after he retires.  Can you retire on that? Keep in mind, that doesn’t include his 401k, of which we matched him the first five percent he contributed.

Of course, if you only served three terms (six years), you’ll make a lot less, but you’ll make a decent chunk of change considering you get the Pension, the 401k matched at five percent, and whatever else you were doing before and after you served in Congress.

So why does Congress have any incentive to fix Social Security? You tell me.  All I know is now I want to serve in Congress for three terms.