I Ain't Afraid of No Daleks

In a sick twist of Christmas irony, the holiday of peace and love, has resulted in the death of a Walmart clerk and injuries to another clerk and several would-be holiday shoppers.

Black Friday--the day after Thanksgiving when shops across America open their doors to Christmas shoppers as early as 5 or 6 am, offering huge discounts on popular high-ticket items, such as X-box and HD TV's, as well as clothing and toys, has sparked a tragedy in one Long Island suburb.

Christmas shoppers stormed the doors at 5am, as one employee was opening them, trampling the clerk to death.

There's a lot of greedy-guts in Long Island, who should never be allowed to celebrate Christmas again, and in fact, should get a lifetime of poo in their stockings.

It's sad when one isn't able to give anything for Christmas, I know...and it's also sort of sad, when one doesn't get any presents for Christmas--which happened to me in 2006...but still..you know what? I survived...and so will anyone...you can always MAKE you own prezzies for Christmas, for pity's sake, or buy stuff after Christmas...or put stuff on layway, if the store has it. To hurt someone, just to get a material possession--in the name of the supposed "God of love," that's just...sick.

Well...it's Friday morning, and I'd rather be in bed, all cozy and warm, but have to schlep out to work, alas. It's overcast and dreary out there, few snowflakes flying through the air, now and then. Basically, if I could describe today's weather--and my feelings--this morning, it would be: bleh.

Nothing much more to say. Hope you lot all have a good day, cheers.

New York state is in some serious poo, right now. Revenues are dwindling--in a state that just a couple of years ago, had a surplus, now, wanton spending by state legislators at the state capitol building in Albany, is being excerbated by the mortgage crisis.

Pretty much overnight, the state of New York went from a budget surplus, to a massive budget deficit. Now, a second mortgage crisis is looming on the horizon, threatening New York and several other states. This new crisis is different, in that it isn't about homes, it's about shops and malls and hotels. Shipping malls, office buildings and hotels are all in danger of foreclosure and many major name shops--such as Sears and Home Depot--BOTH of which are within a few miles of me, are gearing up to close stores, and possibly, if they cannot weather the storm, filing for bankruptcy.

The trickle down effect will be shattering for local communities across New York. The most immediate effect of course, will be hundreds--perhaps even thousands--of employees out of a job. But, other consequeces of this, include: lost local and state tax revenues...in a resort area such as ours, that's hugely dependant on these revenues, that's very bad indeed. But, also, social services will become more strapped, as requests for assistance will escalate--from the elderly, disabled, poor and working poor--whose ranks will now be multiplied by formerly middle-class workers who've never needed assistance before...and elderly pensioners who've lost their cushy pensions, as well.

Secretary of the Treasury, Henry Paulson, rather than help, has suddenly made the situation far, far worse.

After promising to take on toxic mortgages by buying them out--one of the key points that got legislators behind him, to give him that 700 billion dollar blank check, Paulson inexplicably did a complete about-face and changed his mind---sending stock plumeting, taking investor confidence with it. Paulson's sheer stupidity and sudden baffling truculance regarding the mortgage bailout, has left many businesses teetering on the brink, and towns and cities across New York and other parts of the US, holding their collective breaths, waiting for the fall.

The reason for the new mortgage crisis is sheer lack of regulation. Banks and other lenders were allowed to wantonly sell mortgages to investors as a package deal---leaving people who had these mortgages without any recourse....a bank can assist a mortgage holder, if it holds the mortgage--if it's trundled off the mortgage to investors...the business owner is plumb outta' luck.

So far, there has been no obvious signs that Paulson and others are changing the rules of that system--though there's been some talk of doing so, nothing as yet has happened.

Republicans all through the crisis have been very slow and relectant to act, and when they do act, have reversed promises and done little to change the rules which lead to this disaster. Let us hope that the incoming admisistration in January, will not follow suit.

My writing is a bit offish tongight--my fingers aren't keeping up with my brain--or is that the other way around?

So, thought I'd do a visual blog instead, to close out for the night--nite all, pleasant dreams.

I hate cat seat drivers, don't you? (Get it, cat seat, back seat...oh, never mind, go back to sleep.)

First I get some really strange e-mails in my hotmail box...more on them, later.

Then, hotmail's down, won't sign me in. I try "help"...let me just say, that Microsoft's definition of "help" really should read "Good luck trying to get any help from us, sucker."

The wizards at MS may have the tecnological know-how, and loads of cash---but the are dirt poor in the basic common sense department.

It told me to go to their website and check on the status of the service--well, I follow directions to the letter--and get...more directions--pretty much identical to the one's I followed to get tot he website, and zero information about the status of the service.

Believe me, I can picture the person who set up this web page--

This is what the people working at Microsoft remind me of: these white collar workers who've lost their cushy jobs, hanging on to the delusion (usually), that they can get the same type of job if they just keep tweaking that resume...a month turns to six months, turns to a year, and they're still sitting on their arse whinging, living off their spouse's income--but hey, their CV looks fantastic.

Anyway, hotmail's toast for now, I reckon. I've got two other e-mails--but bugger me if hotmail isn't my main e-mail address--the other two being merely throw away addresses...one for spam (when I send for info or comment on iffy websites where my e-mail address may be sold or farmed), the other for spare...like when hotmail is down.

But, I got that suspect spam again, from a phony TV production company, saying that they were with the BBC and looking for people to be in their programme about bloggers, they'll pay compensation, please send my personal information... yadda-yadda-yadda....this time the spam came with a totally different address, though. The BBC never did get back to me on that, so maybe this scam is still pretty new, or maybe it really is some nutjob targeting me for my personal information? Or maybe the BBC simply didn't believe me, or didn't care at all?

I also got the following e-mail...I send a reply but it came back as undeliverable--as I suspected it would. The IP address is for an internet service in somewhere in Hungary (.broadband.hu)--which leaves me to wonder, why is there no country called "Wellfed?" Anyway , so it's NOT really a message from the person who signed this, fan-girls, so don't ask me for any imformation, ey?

Hello,

I got your e-mail address from your profile, I hope you don't mind. I like your Roasting David blog, it is very amusing. And no, I'm not at all offended. Don't know where you get all those photos of me, but you certainly put them to good use! Cheers, DT.

I mean, COME ON! David Tennant would never read my blog, and he'd never give a flying fig for the likes of me! With my looks, I'm the type of person someone like him makes a joke of, not writes notes to--cripes! The man wouldn't touch a person like me with a ten meter long pole! I mean, the man's a major celebrity, with a very full and active life, and...come on, no way. Really, why me? I had someone--think it was back in summer of 2006, who kept writing nasty notes on another blog I had, telling me he was David Tennant...now I've got a new one--albeit a much kinder nutter.

"Kinder nutter?" Did I just write that? Argh-think it's getting close to my bed time.

Why am I getting all the nutjobs, lately? Did someone leave the asylum doors open lately?