The Surreal Adventures of The Angry Redheaded Lawyer: "Killin' Republicans", a Rock Opera at Theater for the New City

If you knew me, you might wonder “why would she go to a show called this?” Isn’t she from a conservative atmosphere and not a big fan of leftists? Hi, I’ve lived in NYC for over 15 years and never said I was a devotee to one team or the other. I’m the one who’s been saying BOTH of them are the problem and remain a registered Independent who thinks the only way to fix these issues is to get money out of politics. Also, I have a sense of humor and appreciate humor based in some honesty.

The setup of this show is very cool since you literally got checked in by the dedicated flight attendants, got a very cool ticket stub and the airplane set was great. Careful attention was paid to getting it right and it definitely took me to my experience riding first class recently with the comfy seating. For some reason, the subway was packed on my way to this show and more like what you’d expect during weekday rush hour vs. a Saturday evening. Fortunately, I hadn’t missed anything and we were treated to a live band playing as the show got started.

Abby Gumpper, Gabriel Wilkler, Ava Jones. Photo by Jonathan Slaff

Right before the show started (thankfully I had time to settle and find a good seat), we were told there’d been tech issues. Sadly, I wasn’t able to hear as much of the show because of difficulties hearing most of the actors as the music played but I did catch the gist of the show. However, the actress playing Goodness Gracious (Queen Koleurz) was not someone I had trouble hearing and her character was awesome. She's also got a fun and entertaining mate in BillyBob from Biloix (Edwin Vazquez).

Queen Kolurez and Edwin Vazquez. Photo by Jonathan Slaff

Our flight attendants/ticket takers (Ava Jones and Gabriel Winker) also deserve recognition as they definitely played those parts well and when I came in, I wasn’t aware they were going to be performing in the show complete with great dance moves. I’d simply thought someone had put in far more detail to the audience experience than I’ve seen in my years of acting in or attending theater shows; it’s a simple detail that probably should happen more often since it was memorable and definitely helped set the tone and feel of the show.

Ava Jones, Gabriel Winkler. Photo by Jonathan Slaff

The attention to detail continued in the prop design. One prop that I thought was cool was the Abe Lincoln hat that when it opened, had a brain pop out in bits. This particular piece was the work of Erin Mathewson.

Queen Koleurz Koluchi as Abe Lincoln. Photo by Jonathan Slaff

Now I’m curious if real life Jodie Foster has heard about this show or had any comment about John Hinkley Jr. If she did, I’m pretty sure the song she sings proclaiming “Why Me” wouldn’t be off base. This show’s Jodie Foster (Abby Grumpper) also knows how to rock and definitely had moves that belied her image. If real life Jodie Foster has the moves, I’m sure she’d be happy that someone has acknowledged them in this show.

Abby Gumpper as Jodie Foster. Behind: Ava Jones. Photo by Jonathan Slaff

If you read the title and think this show is only about bashing Republicans, you’d be off the mark. This show does offer historical accuracy though I wonder if the airplane and general flight experience is a commentary on today’s Republican party. After all, the announcements are how many would describe a lot of their experiences and perceptions of the far right element (such as the plane arriving nowhere near where anyone needs to go and the general passengers being lucky they even get oxygen to breathe while on the flight). Maybe it’s a case of “the more things change…” and how history repeats itself? Nonetheless, I think the last song “Don’t Kill Republicans” is the best support for showing anyone of any party could find enjoyment in this show.

Just Waiting on What the Future Holds

Made it back to NYC, got a negative on that first COVID test now just awaiting results on the second one. I'll have to call that place tomorrow if they don't have my results today (though they told me 2 days and it's been 2 days since I went). Thought I'd go to CityMD again but when I got there before 11 am they were at capacity for the day (they opened at 9 am). I was like "if I have to get up to be here at 9, I'm probably going to be very pissy being up that early". Not a lie; if I have no real reason to be awake early I like to avoid doing it. Wouldn't we all??

I've been on those upscale dating apps and some other ones for a bit and getting back to NYC, I discovered far more hotties in the area, got more likes and an interesting new contact who wants to discuss me assisting on a non-profit he wants to set up. Got rid of my pic with me and Mr. Big Stuff on my vision board & know what I need to replace it with (a pic of my youngest niece for one since she actually hugged me on her own volition while I was down there though I'm not going to have the bond of Mama or Gaghee, which is literally how my mom spells the name my oldest nephew dubbed her as a "grandma" term).

After finding out that your address information and other details of your community board application don't become shown to the world, I opted to apply for community board in my area. If I got that, I'd have to stay in this area. Whether they accept me or not, I have no idea since I don't have direct involvement in THIS community but have lived in NYC for a very long time, did speak at a community board meeting in my old neighborhood in the marriage days & am probably responsible for a small segment of Queens subsequently getting FiOS after years of promises that up to that point hadn't materialized into FiOS service. Also, if you really want to affect change in government you go do stuf like this. Go to the community board meetings, speak to people, apply for it when the applications open up, call up your local reps and state your views, run for government roles & so forth. You don't burn down buildings, loot neighborhood businesses and put your neighbors out of work. You also don't turn your community into a shithole if you want anybody to give a damn about it. I was doing this sort of thing long before the rise of SJWs so I look at their tactics and say "they've perverted legitimate protest and legitimate issues." Decades of psychological study also defy the leftist manifesto and general tactics. This is also why I'm going to keep laughing when people with zero knowledge of what they speak talk about politics and civic matters.

When you've run for office, lobbyed or even spoken with anyone from your local rep's office THEN I'll listen when you speak on such topics. Otherwise, stick to acting, modeling, producing or whatever it is you do & actually know something about.

As far as politics, I'm like "dazzle me, bitches!!" Talk is cheap, action is everything. We'll see what happens. I like to think many other people have a similar take and are watching to see what Biden does here. Will he call out the leftists? Reign in BigTech? Get that stimulus out as promised? Will Cuomo revitalize NYC (he claims we need to reopen but what's he going to do about the rampant crime that's caused a literal "Escape from NYC")? Will he remove DeBlasio, who might be hated by just about everyone in NYC and a lot of people outside of NYC?

Hatred of DeBlasio and his race pandering wife (yes, you can be a minority & a race panderer just as you can be any color of the rainbow & be a shitty person) might be another point of common ground along with love of Betty White. I've never seen anyone say "I hate Betty White."

Just noticed "Youth of a Nation" by POD playing on my iTunes list. That seems fitting for the moment we're in, huh?

Realized that I don't think NC is going to be my future. For one thing, it's probably not very good for dating to find the predominant accent of an area to be one of your turnoffs. It probably also isn't good to be in a place where you need to have a car to get around & not have one of your own. Then there's not having many people involved in your niche in the area, being constrained by too many past connections you'd like to get away from & not wanting your life to feel like "Our Town" or some very boring soap opera. It's also hard to find guys down there who are childfree & won't want you to pop out their babies or adopt a mom role with their kids. I also don't want to be the only cool person in the room; there's got to be more people like you to hang around. But the question is, where do you go if NYC is dead?

I'm not sure if it is yet. I know what my personal tipping point will be but I'm sort of seeing where life will take me. Is it going to be here, some bigger city of North Carolina, northern Arkansas if I get into that incentive program, some other locale that is offered? My law license would like New York or Connecticut but I could do in-house counsel work most other places. I could even motion into the US Virgin Islands if I wanted to because of having a Connecticut law license, which I think is cool.

Then I also met this guy in NC and had a very weird experience since he never actually tried making a move on me, had invited me to stay in a room at his house aside from any romantic interest then he bails on taking me out for my birthday though I'd stayed over at his house and he never even sat next to me when I sat down at his home. I'm like "what the hell?!?!" That would never happen in NYC, even with the most gentleman of gentleman. I'm divorced, caught up on my missed years of adventure and while I'm not a whore, I'm also not a teenager. He was also a NC native while I've had better conversation with 2 other guys who moved there but aren't from there. One even wants to visit me up here and I said there'd be some video chatting before I even considered that. We didn't even go on a date while I was down there so I kind of insist on that. He told me he didn't have the Southern accent so that's points for me.

I'll still be writing this blog and trying to figure out if I can do more surreal adventures I can post but I definitely will be looking more towards my podcast so when I get that official link with the new name, I'll have to post that so you can hear it. Might have to start fielding off more crazies after that as well but fielding off crazies has been part of my life for a good while so that'd be a whole "what's new?" kind of thing.

The Surreal Adventures of The Angry Redheaded Lawyer: “The Cost” by Aquaila Shene Barnes Presented by The Negro Ensemble Company, Inc. in association with And So It Is Theatrical Productions at La Mama

This show appealed to me for three reasons: 1. I know a lot of people with some involvement in the political world either holding local office, having run for local public office, working in a government agency, lobbying/trying to lobby or helping particular candidates get elected in other ways, 2. I have personally reached out to my local political officials as maybe a professional hellraiser/squeaky wheel (note: many attorneys are professional hellraisers/squeaky wheels; my being one since elementary school has led many people to remark that I was a lawyer long before ever attending law school) and 3. People have suggested I run for public office but I feel I'm too moral for it, much like our protagonist Thomas Foster, Jr. (Junior, as he's known; portrayed by Charles Browning) turns out to be.

"The Cost" by Aquaila Shené Barnes, directed by Barbara Montgomery, presented by The Negro Ensemble, Inc. in Summer Shares at La MaMa. Justine J. Hall and Charles Browning. Photo by Jonathan Slaff

Junior has been groomed by his father, Thomas Foster, Sr. (Senior; portrayed by Ivan Moore) to become the first African American governor in the state of Ohio. Senior tried to become governor but as Ralph Snyder (Robert Ierardi) says it was simply bad timing with the mix of racial prejudice. That nasty scandal with one Tanika Johnson, a paramour Senior took on as his late wife was dying of cancer (much like John Edwards did when his wife Elizabeth was also dying of cancer) likely didn't help matters either.

Toni Ann DeNoble and Robert Ierardi. Photo by Jonathan Slaff

Nicole Foster (Nikki; portrayed by Toni Ann DeNoble), the dutiful daughter of Senior and younger sister of Junior takes on the role of campaign manager and brands Junior as the candidate of change (and hope circa Barack Obama in 2008) against Donald Baker, the Republican incumbent. Nicole is a natural superstar at this and Senior has grand plans for her as well though she has her own humanitarian work in Guatemala and a secret love affair with Grace Tandy (Alyssa Simon), a woman from a wealthy, conservative family who's in a loveless marriage with an absentee spouse. Nicole has everything under control, from prospective First Lady Cynthia Foster (Thia; portrayed by Justine J. Hall) and her outbursts to the business of handling press and running a clean campaign.

Toni Ann DeNoble and Charles Broning. Photo by Wai Wing Lau

She's even figured out how to deal with the thorny business of the AMPO Pipeline project and campaign contributions. However, relentless reporter Sheryl Kelly (Richarda Abrams) knows quite a few of Nikki's secrets & threatens to expose them. We learn later that Sheryl has her own secrets.

Richarda Abrams as Sheryl Kelly, a political journalist. Photo by Jonathan Slaff

Sampson Riley (Andre Dell), a law school classmate and former fiance of Nikki, stops by to seek “a seat at the table” in exchange for campaign help. Senior is happy to oblige while Nikki feels otherwise, especially once Senior tries to get her to resume her prior coziness with him. Sampson was not a faithful fiance to Nikki.

Toni Ann DeNoble and Andre Dell. Photo by Wai Wing Lau

Nikki does in the end what I would love to see happen in real life: she exposes Senior and the dirty underbelly of politics and graft, freeing herself and Junior from the tyranny of living up to the Foster legacy. Junior gets his wish of going back to spend time with his kids, Nikki gets to keep her relationship with Grace (presumably going public with it) and both getting their own lives back vs. being under the control of Senior and his wish to live out his dreams through his children.

Toni Ann DeNoble as Nicole Foster. Photo by Jonathan Slaff

I also really like how Grace Tandy was portrayed. She was not portrayed as someone who was ashamed of or secretive about Nicole nor feeling family pressure to toe a line like Nicole and Junior did. Grace actually tells Nicole her circle would be okay with her so long as Nicole was willing to sign a prenup. You get the sense that Grace is content to live her life in her own way regardless of the consequences and is not a slave to her family's name or having to go on the life path her parents choose for her.

Toni Ann DeNoble and Alyssa Simon. Photo by Wai Wing Lau

Typically with a character like Grace, you expect her to be someone under immense family pressure not to date outside of gender or race especially when her family is said to be Republican and typically supportive of Junior's opponent. Republicans are almost always portrayed as homophobic, racist, fearful of parental & community disapproval and looking down their noses at progressive liberal types like Nicole regardless of her family upbringing or education level.

Alyssa Simon as Grace Tandy. Photo by Jonathan Slaff

I don't know where the writer got her inspiration for Grace or her portrayal of the Foster family but it felt very genuine, honest and authentic based on my own experiences and interactions with friends of mine from wealthy families where they felt pressured to do things they didn't really want to (such as entering particular career paths) because of parents and “the family name.” The world of the family portrayed was also quite truthful to what I have seen and heard about in my own experiences with people I know in the political world.

Toni Ann DeNoble and Ivan Moore. Photo by Jonathan Slaff

This may be the first show I saw that qualifies as “urban theater” so perhaps there is more of a soap opera feel to such shows? I can't say but the twist with Sheryl Kelly did start to make the show turn into more of a soap opera though I love the scene where Sheryl (who is actually Tanika Johnson) has a confrontation with Senior where Senior offers her money in light of her having his baby as well as a fully disgraced reputation because of him. She slaps him and this woman in the audience behind me yells “Asshole!”

The interactive nature of this show was awesome. You were indeed part of a collective experience, which is what theater ought to be. I also thought Thia was great in her honesty since I would probably be just as brazen if I became a public figure and her marriage to Junior was definitely accurate to many loveless political marriages.

Justine J. Hall as Cynthia Foster. Photo by Jonathan Slaff

A word about the musical transitions, which were wonderful for the scene changes. One of them was Xscape's “My Little Secret,” which was extremely fitting for the scene it was playing after. Playing a song that reminds me of my youth in NC is always a winner.

Speaking of reminders of my youth, this show was directed by Barbara Montgomery. I was curious if this was the same Barbara Montgomery who played Casietta Hetebrink on “Amen,” a show my family watched religiously (pun intended) back in the day. Yes, my sister & I (2 natural redheads with a red haired religious conservative mother) watched this show! Unlike many other shows of the day, our mother had no objections to this one. After all, we WERE Baptists in NC (but not Southern Baptists; both my mother and sister would still claim that religious affiliation).

My sister is a lot like Thelma Frye since she did chase and eventually get her first husband much like Thelma did in getting Reuben Gregory (though my sister didn't join the army when her guy broke their first engagement). She also lives with my mother alongside her family much like Thelma did with her father and later with her father + her husband. It was indeed the same actress and I thought it was cool that she was there in person to get her well deserved accolades at the end.

This show was a very hot ticket. It was an overflowing house with one guy in front of me being told he'd have to join the waiting list to get tickets for this show the night I saw it. They even had to redo scenes to accommodate this turnout! Should you get the opportunity to see it, you should regardless of your race or political affiliation. There's something for everyone here.

The Surreal Adventures of The Angry Redheaded Lawyer: "Maps For a War Tourist" by Sister Sylvester at Dixon Place

“Maps For a War Tourist” by Sister Sylvester marks my first viewing of a performance art piece. It is definitely a unique piece revealing the story of a young woman in Turkey named Deniz Karacagil who finds herself facing a lifelong prison conviction (90 years) but manages to escape that fate and become a militant fighter with the PKK or the Kurdish Workers Party, a group both the United States and her native Turkey consider a terrorist organization. We see an interview with her mother (a life-long activist who favors peaceful means), various maps from Deniz's cohorts of routes they'd taken or took and of course, the tortoises!!

Yes, there were actual tortoises as part of this show in a glass pen. The “aww, cute animals!” part of my psyche was delighted to see them & hoping that they were getting treated well. Yes, I'm a weirdo who wanted to have a turtle as a pet at one point in my childhood though I was surrounded by cats; I even thought this huge sea turtle at an aquarium in Long Island my ex took me to was cute though that turtle startled me when we were at that exhibit and my ex made fun of me for being startled.

I also thought their inclusion was a daring move on the part of the production since animals as a rule are unpredictable and could end up someplace you didn't plan on them being or relieving themselves at some time + location you didn't expect, creating a very unpleasant environment for your audience. This would definitely happen with cats. These tortoises seemed at ease and comfy enough.

Dixon Place is a very interesting venue. You walk into a bar with a tiny stage in the front left along with a mishmash of various styles of chairs for the audience as well as a piano to the left of the stage. It feels like a small coffee shop with a bar though I would fear running into members of the crazy liberal set. Before going in, I swear I heard some political discussion going on to my side that was of an anti-Trump nature. I didn't interject since I was present to observe and review; I also didn't hear utter hypocrisy being brandished so I felt no compulsion to speak up.

The stage is down a small, dark hallway and we arrived in a room with a large amount of paper covering with chairs lined up in a gap setting among 3 huge stair steps. The chair setup was awesome since you didn't have to worry about anyone's head blocking your view. I arrived to see someone sitting next to the tortoises along with 3 people at a long table to the right. I thought “so they're tech and this woman's the tortoise handler” and that we should expect someone to come out and start the show. Instead this show started sort of unexpectedly with lights going down, a pause and then a woman on the side where I figured they were the tech people started reading the script. In fact, it felt like we were just waiting for the show to start and getting background on Ms. Karacagil & her journey vs. watching the show. Audio visuals were involved and there was the description of seeing the world as a bird or as a tortoise and how your view of the world is different if you see it as a bird vs. as a tortoise. Our tortoises make significant appearances on film & our tortoise wrangler does far more than that in the show: she handles spreading out the maps drawn, steps into the tortoise pen at one point where we see her socks on the screen in front of us.

Perhaps I'm not the best audience for this show as I'm not a geopolitical expert by a long stretch and am definitely no performance art expert. I'm also not sure if I felt the story was as relatable as it could have been for myself or others who did not come from that culture or those circumstances or follow the geopolitical details. I would have liked more details and development of some of the people that are discussed in the script and how they made an impact on Ms. Karacagil; I liked seeing the interview with her mother, who seemed worried about her daughter & was unhappy about not getting to see her later on but supported what she was doing and felt her cause was justified. She stated that it was “an eye for an eye” though she decided to align with a political party called the HDP, the People's Democracy Party, that was supporting the same ideals her daughter was fighting for without the violence. At one point, a performer crawls underneath the paper covering the stage in order to create what appears to be a live map right in our floor space. Our tortoises are placed in that area towards the end as well and I'm thinking “I hope they are okay.”

I didn't feel like this was a piece where the audience was being pushed to feel positively or negatively about Ms. Karacagil but to simply give her a voice as a human being in the world faced with circumstances that we have to ask ourselves what we would have done if we were in her shoes. The cast was Kelsea Martin (our tortoise wrangler), Cyrus Moshrefi, Jeremy Toussaint-Baptiste and Kathryn Hamilton (who also conceived and directed this piece). It definitely qualifies as one of those performances where if you attend, you will feel you are seeing the true NYC and the egalitarian feel that this city prides itself on. I wouldn't bring the kids but your politically minded, global citizen type friends might be a good choice for this one.

Why Politics Suck in a Very Short Entry (At Least for Me)

I recently went to a program called "How to Get on the Ballot in NYC" that was one of the rare free programs at the NYC Bar Association. There were people involved with the whole Board of Elections process and how you get yourself on the ballot for anything. My takeaway from it was the precise answers why politics suck & you see a lot of lawyers involved in it. Here goes:

1. The petition process involves not regular attention to detail but an exacting standard just about everyone outside the legal profession would be hopelessly inept at trying to figure out if they didn't already know how to do it or have some political guru on their team already.

2. So this means you need friends in law & politics; your average poor person or lower middle class type shuns those in law with such knowledge (mostly attorneys) as elitist assholes. I wouldn't know with certainty how they view politicians and those working in that area but I'd imagine their views of those people aren't much better. Shunning people will not inspire them to help you.

3. You need trustworthy friends if you're going to run for office. I don't think most people have that. If they do, eventually their charity will come to an end & they will be haphazard even if they are those detail oriented types I mentioned above.

4. MONEY, the biggest problem of them all. You need money to run for public office, maybe pay a campaign staff, advertise, etc.

To get money, you either have to be rich already OR you have to suck up to one of the establishment parties. That requires you becoming their slave once you're in office & being beholden to them to pass legislation that's going to help them, not your constituents.

Add all this together & you get a bunch of representatives who are completely out of touch with the average poor & middle class person. Since statistically speaking, minorities are less likely to be rich, educated and have lawyer/political friends you also get fewer people who know about the experience of minorities and have real qualification to actually help them.

Laws get passed affecting the poor & middle classes that these morons know zip about or perfectly well know about but are slaves to their big money donors (remember, you've got to pay back those campaign contributors somehow).

The ones who know zip about those experiences refuse to educate themselves on the experiences of rape victims, people of color, recipients of public assistance, just about anything they've never lived and will likely never actually experience in their lifetimes. They, as many attorneys, are just too fucking arrogant to say "I need help here. I don't know how to do this/I don't have sufficient information to decide on this. Will you enlighten me?"

Big law firms, where many of these attorneys spring from, don't encourage attorneys to ask for help & even threaten their jobs if they show any hint of weakness or lack of knowledge on something. They aren't okay with you asking for help; they expect you to be an expert on everything even if you're just faking it.

5. So that ties into arrogance, bred from the experience of being an attorney with any financial means to get into public office.

Then, there's 6. Loss of privacy is mandatory to go into public office. This requires a person to be a full on narcissist in order to do the job rather than have any concern for the public trust or helping people vs. donors and the establishment.

Now I've told you why politics sucks. How do we fix it? You tell me. These are the reasons I'm pulling for either Trump or Sanders. They defy this formula in different ways, particularly in not being beholden to big money donors.

Political Contributions: A Nice Gesture or Payola?

My general take on politics is no big secret if you actually read this blog. If you haven't, my basic attitude is that it's all bullshit & even if I were in charge, there would still be corruption and garbage going on. I also had some rather intimate experiences in the world of politics and despite being told I ought to run for office, I think I'm just too ethical myself for the task. You know people would bitch & moan about me being A) childfree, B) not being some devout God bothering asshole & C) the owner of an independent mind with my own point of view.

One of those experiences dealing with the intimacy of politics is a judicial campaign. A judge I do not know personally, who has taken zero personal interest in my life either got or decided to add my private e-mail address to her campaign mailing list (likely because of being on the same bar association committee as me). The very first event I got invited to as part of this campaign was for a meet & greet where the "suggested contribution" was $1,000.

Now, I have no general problem with people doing fundraising. Indie film people have to do fundraising all the time, either through getting investors or launching campaigns on Kickstarter or IndieGoGo. They give you different incentives depending on what you can contribute. Generally, the discussion in those fundraising efforts is "give if you can & if you choose to do so, give what you can." They don't take on the attitude that you are worthless if you can't give a "suggested donation/contribution."

Friends of mine are also in local political office or ran for it. I remember them mentioning their campaigns on Facebook. One even ran for NC State Senate. They managed to incorporate news of their campaigns and ask for money without being irritating about it. They also told you what they'd done specifically and where they stood on specific issues to convince one to donate to their campaigns.

So, I'm aware that politicians have to get money from somewhere since the government refuses to enact any true campaign finance reform and make it fair for all people to run for office in a viable manner, not just those born to money. Yep, I think Citizens United is a stupid precedent & should be tossed post haste though I actually studied it in my Supreme Court Symposium class and have more understanding of it than your average person.

However, I think some distinctions on this are in order:

1. None of my friends who had campaigns e-mailed me about it. We're talking about my friends. This was a total stranger who sent me an e-mail about the event.

Announcing a campaign on your Facebook page is not the same as sending me a direct e-mail on it.

2. My friends didn't have "suggested contributions" and if they had, I guarantee it wouldn't have been $1,000. Everyone I've told about this suggestion (including someone who works in government) thought it was tacky, distasteful and unreasonable.

You should know that I wouldn't give $1,000 to anyone without justification, not even a family member & probably not even if $1,000 became like $10 to me. I have also never made a political contribution to anyone & if you want one, you'd better really wow me + take an interest in my life, events, etc. If I feel you're just patronizing me & don't really care about my concerns, I'm not going to bother.

3. I know my friends would actually listen to what I have to say without me giving them a dime for political campaigns. They would actually take me seriously if I made a point & give me credit for it. This judge didn't give me that sense based on all this lack of personal e-mails and conversations with campaign reps.

Telling me that my voice means nothing to you unless I give you money sounds an awful lot like payola to me. Remember payola? It was when radio stations were paid to play songs by particular artists, translating into those songs becoming popular, going up the charts, etc. It was a huge scandal.

Now, that's not to say it doesn't happen today (I really have no personal knowledge of if it does or doesn't) but we're talking about public servants here. You know, people who are supposed to be serving EVERYBODY regardless of their campaign contribution to the election or how much money they have.

Radio station owners, at least, are not under public duties to serve people. They have no high moral ideals they're supposed to be meeting in playing or not playing a particular songs. Politicians and other elected officials are a different story. They're supposed to be held to much higher standards.

If they aren't, why does anyone give a damn if a politician cheats on his wife, propositions little boys or goes to a hooker? If we're allowing payola here, shouldn't we just admit that politicians aren't held to any standards of decency or public conduct? I don't consider being forced to purchase equal rights or rational thought from someone a decent act. I'd rather be represented by the adulterer or patron of hookers.

Even the pedophile would be better than the "buy my advocacy" candidate & I think pedophiles deserve what they get in public outrage & vigilante justice.

In response to this suggestion, I wrote back telling this person they were barking up the wrong tree considering what I & my husband do for a living. I also explained that I would likely never appear before this judge & without knowing anything about this person, I'm not handing over a dime much less an amount that would impose a hardship on my household.

A rep from the campaign then contacted me and said she'd send me info on more affordable events (this meaning the minimum contribution was $100, which is still excessive to me). I then get an e-mail recently on events (including one the same day that I saw after getting home from work). The only event that worked with my schedule was the make-up of the $1,000 contribution one. It turns out someone I knew was a host at the event so I asked her about this contribution thing, making the same points I'd made before on cost & the fact that my husband gets a say in such things as well so no way am I paying a dime without an opportunity to meet the person myself and form my own opinions.

I heard nothing back so I decided it was not worth me taking off work early to attend.

So, basically I have a real problem with the idea that my voice is only worth whatever extortion money you collect from me. I'm not going to vote for someone who expects me to hand them money to do a damn thing to benefit me. What the hell is the point? Hence, my extreme cynicism over politics.

I'll tell you right now that my company has never treated fans who didn't give to a campaign or who had less money like garbage while reserving the good treatment for investors. I wouldn't let them, either. That's classism at its core & acting that way proves to me you have zero class. Funny, I'm not even running for public office & I conduct myself that way. Why can't this person or other politicians?

What really irks me is groups like Move On or People for the American Way. I'll sign some of their petitions (if I agree with the issue) but I took my e-mail off PFAW's list after this insulting e-mail I got (complete with tons of links):

"Dear M,

It appears that the most unlikely name of all may now be supporting Mitt Romney for president:

M T (the name I used on these sites)


Please give me a moment to explain.

Thanks to the Citizens United decision, corporations now have the same free speech rights as people when it comes to spending money on America's elections. Every time you pay your bills, buy gas, food, or any other everyday item, some of that money is going directly into Mitt Romney's campaign budget.

That is why it is so important that you renew your PFAW membership.

If PFAW loses someone as committed to the American Way as you are M -- to someone like Mitt Romney -- either directly or simply by your inaction ... our civil rights and liberties as Americans will be absolutely devastated.

Please become one of the 7,987 newly renewed members we need standing with us this election year against the Radical Right. You already know what Romney's extreme right agenda would include --

Advancing the War on Women -- defunding family planning, denying access to basic birth control, and criminalizing reproductive choices.
Packing the Supreme Court with justices like Robert Bork -- who Mitt Romney named to co-chair his presidential advisory committee on law, the Constitution and the judiciary.
Privatizing Social Security and devastating Medicaid.
Slashing federal safeguards for the environment, energy and education.

We need the renewed support of 7,987 members by October 2012, so please make an urgent renewal contribution today.

With just a few months left before Election Day, we can’t take ANY chances! Republican extremist and anti-Union Governor Scott Walker’s victory in Wisconsin showed the impact of the Right’s big (and early) money advantage. And that’s exactly why your renewed support is needed more than ever before!

We need to pull out all the stops to defeat Romney and his radical right agenda RIGHT NOW! There isn’t much time left! It is imperative that we -

* Organize progressive voters and get them to the polls on Election Day. Get-out-the-vote efforts were essential to our victories in 2006 and 2008, and will be again in 2012.
* Fight the outrageous lies being propagated by the Republicans and the Tea Partiers to build unfounded fear and resentment for President Obama and Democrats in Congress.
* Buy airtime and advertisements on television, radio and the internet. We also need funding for phone banking and mail efforts to reach voters directly.
* Put “boots-on-the-ground.” People For the American Way is placing staff members in key districts to best coordinate our forces.

All this takes resources -- which is why PFAW needs you to renew your 2012 support immediately. Because if the unthinkable happens, we will only have ourselves to blame for not doing even more to prevent it. Please renew today!

Sincerely,
Michael B. Keegan signature
Michael Keegan, President"

The subject was: M, thank you for your support of the Romney campaign

I took my name off their mailing list right away & wouldn't do crap for these people. Newsflash: when all your e-mails or even over 50% of them are "give me $," you're wasting your time & pissing me off. This pissed me off on a nuclear level. I felt it was inflammatory. Pissing me off isn't going to inspire me to help you; it will most likely inspire me to tell you to go fuck yourself.

When I don't know who the hell you are, you have made zero effort to listen to what I have to say & never bothered responding if I complain about something you are wasting your time. If I gave $ to everyone who asked, I'd be flat broke as most everyone else would be.

Accessibility is very important to me & I strongly believe that politicians for the most part are anything but (certainly most people running for office can be included here). When I'm only getting form letters from your office & you merely condescend to me, I'm not going to care about what you do & I will go out of my way NOT to do anything that might remotely benefit you.

Just so you know, I'm not some little peon you can spit on; I have a comparable education and experience to you so probably better for you not to fuck with me. 'Kay? (imagine the head turn of Dr. Hutchison from Rocko's Modern Life as you read this)

Conspiracies to Deny Effective Participation & The Problem With Unions

When I get cards in the mail about my husband's latest union meeting & knowing where our community board meetings are held, I do ask myself that question.

First off, some facts about where I live in NYC. Queens, to be precise. There are parts of Queens that should just be annexed to the suburbs since as far as I'm concerned, you're in Nassau County if you live outside the MTA subway line. You may as well be Staten Island & everyone knows how NYC residents feel about Staten Island (most of us would like them to become their own little community already).

Some of these transit nightmare parts also exist in neighborhoods where the MTA subway line runs. A portion of these are in my local community & henceforth, I don't feel great loyalty there. Why would anyone want to be someplace where you get all the disadvantages of both the city and the suburbs? Plus, if I can get to a restaurant in Manhattan more easily, why would I get on a bus that only runs every 30 minutes or so to get to a restaurant in Queens (assuming everything with the restaurants is equal)?

I already have a number of reasons I prefer going to and dealing with things in Manhattan over Queens. I'm apparently not the only person noticing better sanitation grades in parts of Manhattan I can get to, better service on the whole in Manhattan or more convenience.

Our community board meetings & my husband's union meetings are both held in transit dead zones or places where transit is a total joke.

I can't help but wonder if the location of these meetings is deliberate so people won't attend & won't participate. Would YOU participate in a meeting you can't attend virtually & would have to drive to when you don't have a car or would have to leave your alternate side street parking spot to get there?!?!?!

Is this the case in other communities? I do feel like it's totally the case in mine. Do organizers in government, unions & elsewhere deliberately set up meetings in out of the way or inconvenient spots so the average person won't participate & therefore, little Hitlers can reign?

My husband's union reps should be glad I'm not part of it because I'd be in their faces all the time & demanding accountability. I hear about so much appalling behavior going on in my husband's workplace that would turn anyone against unions.

Are you curious? I'll give you some basic examples of problems I'm aware of. First off, the no-strike clause. The very first thing anyone associates with a union is the ability to strike!!! Being a union whose workers can't strike? If it were a person, it would be a man with no testicles (literally or figuratively).

Second, a number of his co-workers who have never had to worry about being laid off in the past few layoff rounds are STILL working there after being called for discipline multiple times, being kicked out of multiple branches after being bigoted to colleagues & members of the public (one person who was offended was a city council member).

Meanwhile, a number of people there (including my spouse) work their butts off, have gotten great reviews from co-workers & management but continue to get denied for promotions AND are put on the layoff list. Do you see anything wrong with this picture? One of these people was in fact laid off while all these deadweight scumbags got to keep their jobs.

I think the city needs a citizens' accountability group for taxpayers to reel in these wastes of public money by public officials & institutions. I haven't found a local one to exist; if it does, it's surely too wussy and passive to really do what I think a good group should be doing. We'd be front & center, bringing in the media & causing a huge ruckus if I was leading it.

Furthermore, if you want to encourage citizens to participate in unions or local government maybe you should have meeting locations that are accessible to everyone, not just your golden children.

Who wouldn't suspect something shady with putting your meetings in locations no one can get to easily?

Unions in particular ought to be shaping up as well if they want public support. Stop encouraging loafing & laziness in your ranks. Get rid of the dead weight, the people who don't want to be there and the utter assholes! Jobs aren't a fucking right or an entitlement, damn it! You EARN them!!! Maybe instead of covering up for these types, they should be gone so competent people who actually do their jobs well could get promotions instead of layoffs favoring the lazy assholes.

Do I sound bitter? Maybe, but consider how you'd feel if it were your loved one losing all passion for his/her job due to this kind of bullshit. When the only way you can move upward is by sucking the right dick & you have to commit a felony before you can be fired from a job you're stinking at, you might feel better about some private businesses.

This is not to say there's no BS in private business but it seems like they have more incentives to get rid of under-performing or abusive assholes. Racists managers are a PR nightmare in a for profit company; so are sexual predators, thieves & lazy jerks. A poorly run private company will eventually go out of business. I as a consumer will certainly not support one if I hear or see that they're harboring incompetents. I would certainly get rid of incompetents in my own company in a second & I know my partners would never expect any one of us to suffer abuse, laziness or actions that would ruin our business reputation if made known to the general public. Being my friend or relative means nothing. If you aren't hacking it, you're gone.

My personal solution is somehow creating a union that considers + rewards/punishes actual work performance instead of just seniority. Even a system to clear out the dead weight quickly so those people sitting at home unemployed who'd do twice the work for half the pay could get a shot to succeed instead of some entitled, bloated lump. Yeah, I'm not a fan of tenure or teacher's unions either.

Final thought: not everyone can be the boss. If you can't be impartial, deliver the facts in a concise way & treat people with respect, then you've got no business managing anyone. I say this having fired & interviewed people. Wusses need not bother working in management.

There's a lot more to it & certainly to business ownership but I view the presence of incompetents as a malignant tumor to a business. They should be doing something they want to do & given real training for it but if after all that, they're still screwing up the answer isn't to let them get disciplinary records longer than the entire city subway line while continuing to pay them a salary & laying off competent workers with "less seniority."

Getting To Know the iPhone 4, Too Much Politics and More

It's no secret that I have a very cynical view of politics & politicians. Any smart political candidate would want to have me around since I know how one becomes cynical & how to get people to give a crap about some issue. I like to think of myself as the crash that will lull you out of your complacent sleep. I sort of view it as my goal in life to shake things up, not be a "yes" woman & tell unpleasant truths to people who never hear them but actually should + would benefit from hearing them.

I have a friend (I won't say who) who lately, has been posting political diatribes. Now you'd think this person would just create a rant blog like yours truly. If you come here, you know you're going to get rants. Since I agree with people's rights to have their own opinions & have plenty of people in my life who don't follow lockstep behind every cause I support or reject, I didn't de-friend this person like some other people apparently did because of it.

However, after seeing more of it today, I'm wondering whether some conservative leaning political pundit has hacked that social media account. It's been EVERY SINGLE status update. That gets old for me.

A) If you want to rant about politics, create a political rant blog. That way, people know what to expect & what they're getting. People friending you on a social media network aren't necessarily expecting that. While I take great care in who I friend on certain sites, I don't post about the same thing ad nauseaum. I try not to overwhelm folks with Occupy Wall Street stuff or anything else (though I pass on important links).

B) I do believe it takes all types in the world but I'd rather debate folk in person. That way, you can catch tone, subtleties & things you miss in the written word. It's too easy to think you're being patronized, insulted, etc. when the other person didn't actually mean it that way.

C) I wonder if this person has considered backlash to career. The person works in the entertainment business & has a similar path to mine (though I've been an attorney longer & this person has done more than me). However, this individual doesn't strike me as someone who is so hard core set on their views that they are willing to risk alienating people. This is not someone who did humorous rants or came up with hyperbolic suggestions on how to reform things (in other words, if you were the average person who saw these, I'm not sure you'd find humor there). I as a colleague would certainly be influenced as to who I'd refer or not refer. I'd certainly not refer anyone who loudly favors the ethic of the Occupy protests. If you think I'm being a hypocrite, I disagree.

You might disagree with me but at least I try to entertain & not speak with judgment. This person, not so much with these updates. You felt like you were dealing with that fundie cousin at Thanksgiving or something.

As for my Thanksgiving, it was actually decent. Went to the in-laws again but next year, we have to go to NC. For one thing, my husband's finally got a work schedule where he can get the time off (in over 5 years of marriage, we've never spent a holiday at my parents' home as a married couple--yeah, I'm still pissed about that). Second, my sister recently learned that she was pregnant. If things go well, we'll have another niece or nephew to corrupt & spoil (by corrupt, I mean teaching that kid to think for himself/herself, believe in doing anything (s)he puts his/her mind to and that if I could do what I'm doing, so can (s)he). If it doesn't, everyone will be bummed out & depressed. Either way, I'll have to go. We're hoping for a girl this time to balance out the male/female ratio. This will add up to 6 nieces & nephews for hubby & me. No way do I need to be having kids.

Yesterday, I managed to avoid Black Friday shopping hell & am thankful that I did. I know people who did in smaller places who said they couldn't see going out in it in a major city. Since I don't have small kids & still remember the ethic of What Would Jesus Buy? (you can also become a fan of the Rev. Billy on Facebook), I'm just not into shopping for things I don't really need. Even coming up with a Christmas list means me thinking of things I will use, stores that sell things I will actually buy & of course, considering asking for things we think are too expensive for us to buy. However, people in my family plan this way in advance. We've even finished all retail shopping at this point so we don't have to go out in that shopping hell. I'd be interested to see how much the Internet has displaced brick & mortar shopping over the years, especially during the holidays.

Wouldn't you know the dumb asses at the MTA decided to shut down my local subway line this weekend? Last year, they shut it down during the weekend of Comic Con. Do these idiots think no one in my area goes shopping? Are they trying to harm the city's tourism & commercial dollars? My area's never going to be some great alternative to Manhattan until they stop with that BS. The only good thing is I live in walking distance of another subway line that is running so I'm not at the mercy of a shuttle bus.

Yesterday, I finally discovered how to create & put custom ringtones on my iPhone. I'd been able to get the ringtones on there as music but not get them added as actual ringtones in the ringtones section of the phone. Figuring this out has been significant for me, along with the discovery that you can use apps to create ringtones from your own songs. I hate being at the mercy of big business or having to get something everyone else likes but not songs that are more obscure & that I'd rather have. I generally also like my ringtones instrumental & made some great ones, including some from the opening song in Office Space. No store will cater to my tastes & preferences so it's best that people like me get to create their own stuff.

Today, I've continued working on the ringtone project. One thing I really hate about iTunes is that it seems to be all or nothing with files. For instance, I created test ringtones. Why can't I just delete them with a right click or a button, though?! I don't like how they came out so I don't want them. iTunes seems to make it more complicated than it should be to get music on your iPod or iPhone or get rid of songs. That's something I really don't like about it. Once you get the hang of it, though, you're good. I feel like I'm going to have to keep a written tutorial for myself, though since it's not one of those programs where the obvious solution works.

Oh, and I continue doing video blogs periodically on Mobli. If you want to find them, I'm under "angryredheadlaw". Don't think I got that hosting job but when I saw an ad later stating that it would be unpaid, I think it's for the best. The saga that is my life continues.

Squeaky Wheels, People. Squeaky Wheels!

That is clearly how you get things done in life: being a squeaky wheel. Being a squeaky wheel does NOT mean being insulting people or calling them names. It means not allowing people to walk on you if you're being mistreated or not getting something you paid for. It means asserting yourself calmly & trying to explain things in a way that people will want to help you.

Imagine my shock when I got a call today from the rep I'd spoken to at Michael Ginarais' office. I was skeptical that they were going to do much; after all, I've seen many a government worker & political office worker brush off me as well as others I helped. I do remember dealing with the would-be lobbyist & getting political doublespeak. I know platitudes when I see them, and I've certainly seen my fair share of them. I also have a very cynical view of government & politics to begin with. So I felt like I was being fed a platitude & they weren't really going to take action. Some people hand out platitudes like candy & con others into thinking they are sincere when they really aren't. I'm not sure if the lawyer thing has anything to do with it or maybe that I'm just a loudmouth who'll remind you that you can't treat me like some smelly fart. Ignoring me doesn't make me go away. That will just make me madder.

The rep I spoke to was helpful, gave me useful information & a direct method of contact in case I had future trouble. We also had our 4th Verizon tech arrive & find a problem no one else had. I'm hoping this will be the end of our little rain problem but I guess I won't know this until it rains. Thus far, I haven't lost my service again so that's good. I also had a very busy day yesterday. I attended a financial conference that a Twitter follower was conducting & invited me to. I wasn't sure I qualified as an investor but as I do have a business that should eventually get financing & an interest in doing more investing (because maybe you are one if you have a CD with a bank?), I figured since I was invited I may as well go since I could learn something new that might be practical for my business or for personal investing.

One significant observation: people at this event were much friendlier to me as a stranger than attorneys would be. People actually SPOKE to me & I networked. At lawyers events that aren't "networking events," you're lucky to get a "hello" from an attorney that doesn't know you. I went to a Vault Career Fair a few years back & there was a lunch with it.

This event also had a lunch where you sat with people at a table. The difference is people at this event actually spoke to me and we learned about what each other's work & involvement in the financial industry. I'm also glad to know that there are firms that advise corporations on making sure they are complying with proper corporate governance (such as making sure they have the proper number of independent directors on their boards) & that corporations use them.

I also didn't feel a vibe of snobbery & elitism like most people would expect. That vibe is something I pick up on quickly since I've experienced it so much & I know what I'm looking for.

At lunch, one person said my job was more interesting that hers but I pointed out that the downside is I don't get the financial security since my company's not financed. This is very true: if you work in entertainment, you're not going to get rich unless you're extremely passionate, motivated & willing to work for yourself. You have to seek out opportunities & work much harder than someone with a steady income and company. You'd expect people to immediately back away from me after that but it didn't happen.

The speakers also struck me as being human beings first & foremost i.e. approachable. Not something you'd expect or see much of. I also wasn't in dressy attire while most of the people attending were. I generally won't do that since I don't have to; I'm not here to put on airs or impress folks in that way. We're not in court & if there's no dress code, why shouldn't I dress for basic comfort?

Contrast this with me going to lawyer events that aren't formal networking events, especially if no one I know from a bar committee is there: you can feel the elitism & self-importance in the room. Only more recently have I felt truly comfortable at the bar associations I currently belong to. I still feel distant from folk there sometimes but that could because I'm doing something so different, even compared to other entertainment lawyers. I have much more confidence about it after higher ups in these places have told me to just be myself & meeting people who make me feel less like an outcast or an oddball. Even so, if I'm at an event where someone I know isn't there no one bothers to talk to me so I feel like "Why am I here?"

Bar associations could really take a lesson from sororities when it comes to integrating new members (mine, at least since I can't speak for others). They should view it as entertaining guests in your home & trying to make those guests feel comfortable. In sorority recruitment, you were not allowed to leave potential new members alone for the entire time they were attending your premises; the members had to talk to all of them & be gracious, even if you felt that girl had no business trying to pledge your house (ideally, you had multiple sisters talking to each girl so you could get a gauge of the girl's fit for your chapter). There was a basic standard of politeness expected that I imagine is still the norm today. I think making that effort would really help since not everyone can, in a psychological sense, go approach a group of strangers.

I do have to compliment one of my colleagues who is the president of one of these bar associations (NYCLA) since he does attend events & makes himself accessible to everyone, not just the seasoned members or the most high profile lawyers. The best things about the Vault Career Fair: the swag & networking with one of the lawyers representing a firm seeking applicants. Apparently, he'd been trying to pick me up while I was trying to network.

The other observation from this financial conference: I'm not as ignorant on matters of finance as I thought I was. I had some knowledge of what was being said & I could understand some of it. Taking Business Organizations in law school paid off!

Oh, and they also had some nice swag.

To finish out the day, I decided to go to my first community board meeting. Remember this whole Verizon debacle & how I said it seems I'm going to have to get involved in political matters reluctantly? I did.

One thought, though: is it just me or are forums where the public or others can advocate for their rights deliberately held in locations that are public transit nightmares? My husband's union meetings, for instance, are held in a location where it's a pain in the ass to get there unless you've got a car. I wonder how many people usually attend with that. I can't help but wonder if that's some kind of ploy to keep people from exercising their rights or using their voice. It wouldn't shock me if it was. See the cynical thoughts that come to my head? Not sure you can blame that on my being a lawyer.

Anyhow, I did go & turned out to be a good decision. For one thing, they have public comment at the beginning of the meeting. I was happy to see this since you normally hear about it being at the end & we all know what happens at the end of a meeting: people leave or zone out & won't listen to you. I never like to perform last in a show if others are doing what I'm doing (singing or acting). I got to speak first since the person signed up ahead of me wasn't present.

I was able to eloquently make my point in less than 3 minutes & learned that the chairman along with others in the room had had the same problem with Verizon. I also met members of the community board, one of whom introduced me to another attorney who as it turned out is the spouse of a manager my husband worked with at one point. I warned hubby that if I meet managerial folk from his job, I'd directly ask them about the whole promotions issue & why my husband is not being properly utilized. Everyone knows it's best not to have me meet the library's HR folk because I'll let them have it as the person in charge of HR in my own business (informally but I'm the only lawyer & I've done the interviews for positions that didn't require creative judgments). Same for that library director: I'll take him to task since he deserves it & screwing with my family means you're screwing with me.

Hopefully, the Verizon issue was resolved but I appreciate getting the help and information. It certainly may still be time for a block association considering that abandoned house sitting there & possibly now being a druggie hangout. I did also get the sense that the community board did try to help folk & cared about what was going on. My husband wants to go to the next meeting.

So, a lesson: bother your politicians & go to your community board meetings. Then you can complain about corruption & make an educated decision in casting votes. Squeaky wheels & all that. Plus, getting in people's faces will show them that their constituents are watching & will not let them forget if they screw up or don't take action on some major issue.

However, what I'm not sure is available but would love to see as a smartphone app is an app where you can find out about all your local campaigns, go to all the campaign websites & learn about the campaign contributions accepted by each candidate. There are websites for the campaign contribution monies but I don't know of any one set place where you can learn about everyone running for local office & what their platforms are on major issues, including how they would solve problems within the realm of the office. This could give an edge to candidates with less money, especially if they aren't taking corporate "bribes", appearing in TV ads or invited to televised debates, late night talk shows, etc.

Say, Buddy Roemer who seems like one of the only Republicans who isn't a woman hating, lunatic fringe scumbag who constantly makes "gaffes" and either needs or has had a lobotomy. I wouldn't trust most of the media darling GOP candidates to manage a piggy bank, much less a whole country.

A Deluded Person & Thinking With Your Brain

So I saw this Craig's List ad today:

Calling all redheads or those desiring to be a red head (SoHo)
Date: 2011-05-04, 3:14PM EDT
Reply to: gigs-c8atu-2362468803@craigslist.org [Errors when replying to ads?]

Model needed for Wella Trend Vision competition. Receive Free cut, color, style and pictures. I am looking for a model with beautiful hair. Red heads are preferred or someone desiring to be a red color tone.
All services will be performed at Arrojo Cosmetology.
All services will be free.
Services will be performed May 10, 17, 24 from 5:30 pm-9:30 pm at ARROJO Cosmetology. We will designate one day to the haircut, one to color, and one for styling and photographs.

ARROJO cosmetology is attached to the world-renowned ARROJO studio and is owned and operated by celebrity hair stylist Nick Arrojo.

it's NOT ok to contact this poster with services or other commercial interests
Compensation: Gift Certificate

PostingID: 2362468803

At first, I thought "Hey, I'M a redhead. Maybe I should respond."

Then I re-read it & came to the conclusion that someone has never been a natural redhead.

For you see, rule #1 of being a natural redhead is: unless you have no regard for your life & well-being, you never, ever, EVER under any circumstances dye your hair, even a little bit.

Why? First off, if you dye it (as conventional wisdom goes), you may never get the same color again. Apparently, it may not regrow the same color as it once was. Red hair is a tricky thing, you know?

Second, people have literally said to me "I'll kill you if you ever dye your hair." I get compliments on it quite often & some of these people said it with complete seriousness & sincerity in their voices. Probably not a smart idea for me to go risking becoming a marked woman by letting anyone lay a finger on my hair.

Can't tell you how many times hairstylists have complimented my hair color when I've gone to get trims. It's sort of how I know they're legit. I'm sure even if I wanted to dye this mess, most hairstylists would flat out refuse or at least try really hard to talk me out of it.

Aside from the color issue, cutting it more than slightly is totally out for some good reasons:

1. Husband wrath - like most men, my husband prefers long hair. Getting a trim is like fighting World War III; I might get locked out of my house if I come home with super short hair.

Now I've considered getting it short in the past but the shortest I've ever had it was collar length & my husband claims long hair works better for me.

2. Entertainment work - if you change your hair dramatically, you have to get new headshots & update your pictures. The look could also hurt me in doing extra work or in my future projects. Aside from not wanting to spend money on all that, my hair's kind of become my trademark so there's no reason to tamper with it. It's not like I'll get it to my waist, you know? Believe me, I wished it would go that long as a child & it never happened.

3. It wouldn't make me look older or "more mature"; I'd just look like I was trying to be Molly Ringwald in her famous 80s movies. People already take me seriously as it is because of my personality, intelligence, what have you. Uglifying myself would do me no favors in my business.

On thinking with your brain: I'm pretty sure there's a political agenda going on with this most recent news of Osama Bin Laden's demise. I just don't trust government with all the shadiness that has happened, the timing of this little factoid and certain elements that any thinking person can spot in a second.

First off, you've just taken away from those who say the US government is ineffective. You've also guaranteed Obama a second term where he was becoming pretty hated in more recent times. Oh, and you've taken some fire away from the Tea Party & those seeking rebellion, "changes", etc.

Second, I don't believe everything the media tells me. I make my own decisions based on what I see, hear, observe, etc. Some tabloid celebs would probably love dealing with me since I'll at least base my treatment of them on their behavior toward me & my industry colleagues, not walk in with pre-conceived notions based on "Star," The National Enquirer," etc. I also remember things.

Speaking of remembering things, a good way to conduct your own social experiments and truly make people humble is to do jobs where some people have an elitism about it. One such job is calling attorneys without mentioning you happen to be one. I'm doing that for a short-term day job for non-legal matters.

Just like with extra work, it's a bit of an "Undercover Boss" opportunity. Only this time, I can note who was an asshole & make damn sure no one I know deals with them or their firm if they would get any piece of the action. I also don't work underneath in the hierarchy; I'm on a parallel track in relation to other attorneys. I don't have to care what anyone in the legal field thinks of me & generally speaking, I don't. Honestly, I'm shocked when an attorney is nice to me with all the venom you hear about them & some of the experiences I've had.

Today, I had a foolish law partner hang up on me in the course of my work. What did I do in response?

Unlike with individual people on a set, most law firms have websites. Oh, and attorneys are usually easy enough to find online.

So I found this jerk's attorney profile, saved it and noted it as someone I'd never deal with. If the name comes up, you bet I'll be telling others. A guy who's a prick to me in that context would truly be an ass to clients & clearly doesn't have respect for those he doesn't deem "good enough" for it.

I'd bet a million dollars this guy wouldn't have dared try that if he knew about my position in the world, especially if he knew all the facts. Being in entertainment makes me as much a suck-up target to attorneys as working in law makes me a suck-up target to people outside the legal field. I accept this & know it's reality from personal experience.

It also doesn't help that I already have some low opinions of attorneys. Sorry, but I don't get warm fuzzy feelings if I hear someone's an attorney. Unless someone I know likes you, you have some creative talent (meaning you appreciate creativity in others), or you work in a "fun" area like mine, part of me will wonder if you're going to be another jerkwad.

One of these days, I'm going to have opportunities to show some of these folks up. I can't wait!!

General Musings Part 16

Aaaah! Tons of links & so little time to write on things. I have to delete some of them since I just got my computer back from the repair place about a week ago & it messed up right after Christmas during the massive blizzard.

So first off, I have to rant about some terrible treatment at the Chick-Fil-A in Paramus, NJ. Now I have to go to this Chick-Fil-A since there are NONE in NYC. Politics notwithstanding*, the food is very good & in all my years of going I had never had terrible service there.

Until last week....

As a tradition, my mother gets us the Chick-Fil-A calendar every year for Christmas. Even though it's a huge pain in the ass to get to Paramus from my home for a full service Chick-Fil-A, the cow centerfolds are creative & amusing. One year, they had cows in reality shows. There was also one with cows in literary classics & as superheroes. Good stuff, really.

Every month, there's a coupon for some food offer. I took mine to this particular Chick-Fil-A only to have the cashier try to rip me off & deny me the full value of the coupon. I spoke up because I'm a loud mouth who doesn't like being cheated. After some fighting, I got an alternate item since they didn't have the item on the coupon that I would have liked to try.

I contacted Chick-Fil-A's main headquarters as well as the store operator, Ken Walsh. I left a message with someone there. I also got a nice message from Chick-Fil-A's headquarters a few days back saying they'd contacted this guy as well about my gripes (I also mentioned the poor mixing of ice cream products, as I had a milkshake there that tasted awful but the same one in NC was much better).

But do you think this man has contacted me? NO!!!!! It really makes me not want to go to that location again & more pissed off that there isn't a Chick-Fil-A in NYC or even Long Island. A secret unofficial location at NYU doesn't cut it; they're not even open year round & when I wanted to go on my birthday, that one was closed for NYU's winter break.

* Rest assured that if I ever owned a Chick-Fil-A franchise, I'd be doing everything possible to support the gay community & flouting any anti-gay rhetoric since I happen to believe in not sticking your nose into other people's relationships/lifestyle choices where they are not personally harming you & yours. I'm not going to boycott since if I went around boycotting every single company that did something I'm morally opposed to, I'd have to become homeless or live in the wilderness with no technology or modern conveniences of any kind.

Next up, this story. Believe me, I'm just as shocked as you that some "women's issue" article actually has grains of truth in it.

Now, this kind of bothers me. I hate, HATE the "role model" argument. That argument is what I call an abdication of parental duties & responsibility.

If your child starts admiring a baseball player who chews tobacco, how about you get off your fat butt & show your child the results of doing that?? You can get oral cancer & some pretty nasty stuff in and around your mouth. I've heard enough stories about chewing tobacco to want to stay as far away as possible from anyone who does it. I'm sure someone's got some gross images on the Internet or a doctor could scare your child enough not to start doing it.

Furthermore, I'm of the belief that we don't need to run around protecting adults from their own harmful choices. I say let the drug addicts take all the drugs they want & let smokers smoke as many cigarettes as they want to in their own space without endangering or harming other people (let the proper people make this happen like taking children away from drug addicts).

That is Darwinism at work, meaning fewer people to drain resources, live in houses, commit crime, be horrible parents, whatever. If someone I don't know wants to get high badly enough, why should I try & stop them? If they don't care about their own life any more than that, then why should anyone else care? Face it, people do have free will & if someone wants to harm themselves badly enough while refusing to get any kind of help or listening to reason, let them. They'll either hit rock bottom & seek help or die.

Now this I never understood. Airlines won't let you get on a plane if you're intoxicated but they'll serve alcohol in terminals. Yeah...is this so the public will be more docile when it's time for the public groping to get onto the plane???

And as someone who studied Psychology in college, I have some words about this article.

First off, one of my Psych professors said it's very hard to determine who is actually crazy & who's just faking it. Apparently there was a study done where people pretended to be insane enough to be committed to a mental hospital & the staff there couldn't tell the difference between actual patients and the actors.

So if mental health professionals can't tell the difference between the actual crazies & the pretend crazies, doesn't this just impede on one's civil rights to get guns if they are not actually crazy? If it's just a big guessing game, then shouldn't we come up with something better like a more sane gun control policy that maximizes the number of law abiding citizens who can get guns while minimizing the chance that actual crazies & criminals can get them?

Speaking of going overboard, this does it, don't you think? What makes it worse is that it happened in NYC. I think suspension is extreme. If a student brings in a weapon, do they use it on him/her?

Plus, the whole punishment of suspension is just stupid. Most kids WANT to be out of school, especially if they're always getting into trouble. You're just giving them free time to cause trouble elsewhere. Perhaps business owners & others annoyed by suspended kids should get to sue the school districts for damages or other business losses due to those kids not being in school like they should be.

You want to punish a kid? Tie them up & make them watch something they'd hate. Or make them listen to horrible music. Perhaps a rehearsal for someone who can't sing or a band that can't play. THAT'S punishment!! Not this free range, party time crap. If you can't spank, at least use your brain & be creative in punishing someone.

Now, on this union issue I'm divided. People who keep up with current events have heard about this one. Here's my take.

I'm not really pro or anti-union. The reason is I'd rather have something in between or at least a union that doesn't encourage sloth or inefficiency. My husband is in a union job & isn't a union supporter. First off, his is essentially neutered. They can't even strike to protest unfairness, which I consider a hallmark of having a union to start with.

Second, I think terrible workers should be tossed out with no excuses. They shouldn't get 30 years in a job & get to stay employed in layoffs while less senior but more competent people are let go to starve to death. There's no incentive to work hard, improve conditions or put in any real effort. If an entire library staff & local community members are calling for someone's head, that person should not get to keep his/her job or remain in management while others who work harder & are better workers are tossed out like garbage.

I don't have a problem with entertainment unions because the bad people get filtered out by way of actor conduct. SAG or AFTRA wouldn't tell filmmakers or companies to keep some specific actor who's causing problems or disrupting a set while getting rid of someone who's been in the union for less time & is a perfect angel. I've never heard of either of these unions doing that stuff.

For that matter, I don't know of any entertainment union of any type that has seniority rules for productions. Actors have incentives to not be jerks while also being assured of proper treatment like breaks, meals, etc.

If you could figure out how to create a union that holds its members accountable or at least doesn't provide a safe harbor to total incompetents at the expense of hard working people with less seniority, then I'd be far more supportive of the concept. However, I can't help but call Tea Party folk supporting the removal of collective bargaining for unions in WI hypocrites since I'm sure THEY benefited from the things unions brought into the work force.

Furthermore, unions do keep out illegal immigrants. You know these government officials would turn a blind eye to that kind of thing if you didn't have the unions around. Didn't the Tea Party oppose illegal immigration or do they want to drag down the minimum wage for everyone & become homeless themselves?

Oh, and what a shocker! You know it's because of those old white male Senators, right? If the houses of Congress were mostly women, I bet that would change in a heartbeat along with issues of birth control and perhaps abortion. And gee, what else is the US behind on??? I'm sure there's lots of examples of how America's proclamations are total BS now; feel free to share if there's something Michael Moore didn't mention in one of his films.

Listing the Blog on Kindle, Trying out IMDB Pro & Curious Censorship Issues

So one of my new Twitter followers, who maintains a blog that is apparently in the ABA's Top 100 Blog list did an entry about getting more traffic to your blog if you publish through Kindle. According to him, the rate is $1.99 per month. I may not have a ton of income but I can swing that (thanks for that, Nutmeg Lawyer).

Following that advice to see if I can get a higher profile for this blog (and it will remain a non-censorship space or I'll stop doing it), I decided to sign up. If it's approved & actually goes up, we'll be all set. If they reject mine for a swear word or two, I'll have to remind someone about the book content they've had that triggered mortal outrage like that book on how to be a pedophile. I hardly think my speech in this blog rises to the level of something like encouraging pedophilia. I'd rather just use an accelerated death penalty to handle that problem.

I also decided to upgrade to IMDB Pro, or at least do the free trial. What harm can it do? Apparently, it will increase one's public profile though it's not like I'm doing that much. I also don't really like people getting in my way, so to speak. I already have plans for myself & don't really want that to be changed, even if it's a positive change. You'd have to sell me on some kind of change to my plan, even if I'd get millions of dollars. I've always felt that if I was going to be successful at anything, it would have to be on my terms or not at all.

So in light of the whole Arizona shooting, it seems a lot of people want to go around censoring political speech & "toning down the rhetoric." I just read this article today on that very topic & I have to agree w/the author.

First off, we have a 1st Amendment for a reason. I've never been a fan of so-called "incitement cases" since I think they completely drain personal responsibility from the "incited" party (or since it's usually been minors, the "incited" party's parents). Do people not have brains to think for themselves or parents to check their behavior? And if someone does not, when did it become the responsibility of politicians, movie stars, musicians or anyone else to be the wards of everyone else???

Second, the slippery slope. When you start curbing this type of speech, what next? Movies, music, TV shows? Any entertainment is sure to follow. Next think you know, the news will also be censored so as not to offend the little kiddies.

If I hear anything about some political measure to change speech in anyway, no terrorist will need to do anything about this country: they'll have already won the war. We won't need religious law; we'll no longer be free and soon slide into a totalitarian regime. Islamic terrorists will not have to worry about the US by that point; they'd probably want to consider martyring the shooter in this case if that happens.

I really hope the gunman is being kept someplace where he can't take the chicken's way out & kill himself like everyone else seems to. Make him be accountable & tell people why he did it!

It's bad enough that there's a website claiming even the most banal movie you can think of is objectionable because of "caffeine consumption." I can't find the link but my husband told me about the incongruent standards and ratings of movies today vs. the '80s and '90s + how this country's mainstream entertainment is becoming more sanitized and like a bad '50s sitcom. Enough is enough!

General Musings, Part 8

A few more observations & remarks. I realized I had a bunch of links that I need to make comment on before I forget. Been doing a lot today & have been tired at the moment but here goes.

My only comment to this one is that if I were one of the family members of one of these teens who committed suicide instead of focusing that rage outward & the bullies came to the funeral and laughed at the corpse of my deceased relative that they tormented, I sure as hell wouldn't just stand and watch.

Instead, I'd be murdering the little shits or doing something so sinister and vicious to them that they'd begging for the sweet release of death. I would imagine you'd have a good argument for the insanity defense in that situation & I know if it were me, I wouldn't be able to stop myself. I can't even stop myself from confronting assholes who mess w/cats; let's face it, most people who know me would say you don't want to cross me unless you really hate valuable body parts or hate having a good quality of life. I suppose the fact that I was tormented myself as a child would make it even more likely that someone doing that would suffer.

Here's the first lawyer ad I've seen on Craig's List asking for supermodels:


Corporate/Escrow Attorney Needed (Manhattan-Philadelphia)
Date: 2010-10-03, 12:10PM EDT
Reply to: job-c6nnp-1986524457@craigslist.org [Errors when replying to ads?]

We are a financial firm looking to hire an attorney full time. The primpary duties will be as follows:

Provide analysis and counsel on legal, policy, and environmental issues to include; proposed new products, protecting intellectual property, mergers & acquisitions, financial offerings, financial structuring, securities offerings, compliance issues for banking transactions, nondisclosure agreements, outsourcing agreements and business strategic planning.
Anticipate and guard against legal risks facing the company.
Develop and recommend company policy and position on legal issues.
Conduct and coordinate research into a variety of legal issues.
Represent the Company or its officials in various legal proceedings.
Prepare legal pleadings, motions, discovery, stipulations, etc.
Write, review, and edit reports, opinions, correspondence, articles, and other documents.
Write and administer complex vendor, client, and employment contracts.
Develop and recommend of operating policy and procedural improvements.
Open and handle banking accounts for both business related transactions and as well as escrow transactions.
Other duties as assigned.

This position is designed for an entry level to mid level person. We will train the right person for this position.Prefer those who are licensed in multiple states or willing to get licensed in multiple states.

To be considered for this position please include a cover letter, resume, writing sample, and professional photograph.

* Location: Manhattan-Philadelphia
* Compensation: 120,000.00 +
* Principals only. Recruiters, please don't contact this job poster.
* Please, no phone calls about this job!
* Please do not contact job poster about other services, products or commercial interests.

PostingID: 1986524457

Newsflash: when you ask for pictures, you're pretty much telling the world that you're seeking a supermodel or planning to engage in some sort of employment discrimination. This person was asking to be reamed out for it.

There's also this.

I agree w/some of these points but I'd say don't put in blood, sweat and tears unless you're an owner or work for someone who actually appreciates you. Remember that you always have to look out for yourself regardless & if it's not your business, you should be selfish. This is a lesson I learned after having employers who didn't appreciate me or tried scamming me.

Finally, the Republicans aren't the "party of paychecks" by a long shot contrary to what this article says.

There's some points on the Democrat side about not being supportive of business but I consider Republicans the party of intolerance. Or even the party of bigots or the party who could care less about anyone making less than $80K a year. Again, one more reason I follow no one & am an independent. I'd like to see a common sense party rise up since no group follows the things I believe in even 80%; most have some stance on an issue that I find serious flaws in.

I've got more rants in me but now getting a bit sleepy so better to end it when you're coherent, huh?