The DeanBear Manifesto (Part 2)
Yes, I thought that I explained myself in the the original manifesto, but I have, in the words of George Carlin, ”I don’t have pet peeves; I have major psychotic fucking hatreds.” This explains some of them.
Clothes whores…I am pretty much a jeans and t-shirt kind of guy. Yes, jeans and t-shirts all the time. Work, shopping, visiting the family, going to my therapist, going to a social event. Jeans and t-shirts. The only time I get into any kind of semblance of getting dressed up, it’s a major life changing event. Like getting me married, going out to dinner to celebrate my sister’s anniversary, going to a funeral. I don’t “dress for success.” I am very much a blue collar guy, I don’t give a flying fuck if you shop at Abercrombie & Fitch, Urban Outfiitters, Areopostale, or any other “trendy” clothing store. Guess what, you’re paying too much for clothing. Most of the time, I buy my clothes at Walmart. (There was a time in the early 2000’s when I shopped at Old Navy, but I got over it.) When I am at work, it’s the company t-shirt and jeans that I bought from Ollie’s. (Heavy duty carpenter jeans that were cheap and wear well, and have pockets that I can put my utility knife, marker, and pen into. I clip my two-way radio and my tape measure to my beat ass belt.) For those who look down at me for not being “trendy,” FUCK YOU!
The news media…with the recent tragedies in Boston and West, Texas, the news channels are creaming all over themselves with the blood and carnage that has happened. Tragedy is NOT entertainment. It is what it is, people being injured and dying because some sick fucks decide to take a happy occasion and “make a statement,” or a company not taking basic safety precautions. To quote Don Henley’s “Dirty Laundry:” ”We got the bubble headed bleach blonde who comes on at five… She can tell you ’bout the plane crash with a gleam in her eye.” The fucking mainstream media is a joke, all they are doing is pandering to a public that feeds off pain and suffering.
Fan boys…I posted this on my Facebook timeline about five hours before the Boston Marathon bombings:
”Finally home after the company meeting…the worst part was sitting right across from me on the OCC cattlecar…a full-blown Doctor Who nerd…t-shirt with Matt Smith on it, Dalek buttons on his fedora, and he carried a replica of a SONIC-FUCKING-SCREWDRIVER in his coat…guess he was an OCC student. He’s lucky I was listening to George Carlin’s “You’re All Diseased” on my smartphone. I caught the tag end of his conversation with another OCC cattle, he was prattling on about how he is gonna make a Doctor Who fan film and put it on YouTube…fer chrissakes, I have flirted with fandom myself (I was a proto-Trekkie) but this guy, hands down, was a total winner/loser in the nerd sweepstakes. OMFG…I am so glad that I am home, being exposed to that much nerdiness makes me wanna hurl.” Pretty self-explanatory, yes?
Okay, I have ranted enough…maybe I will have more rants in the future, but I had to get this off my chest…this is DeanBear signing off.
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2012: The Year Of The Gun
This was originally published on “The DeanBear Chronicles Blog”
Okay, I am really not going to say much in this post, considering on this Christmas Eve, 2012 I have just killed a twelve pack of Samuel Adams Boston Lager. All I have to say is that we really have lost our collective mind. Killings in Aurora, CO. Killings in Newtown, CT. Killings in Webster, NY. How much of this are we going to have to put up with before we as a collective community will say “ENOUGH IS ENOUGH?”
Now, I am not going to take the left-wing line that all guns should be regulated, nor I will take the right-wing line that all guns should be free, but fer crying out loud…can’t we reach a compromise?
I have no problem whatsoever with someone saying that they would like a handgun or a shotgun in the house for personal protection. In our violent times, we unfortunately have to deal with this. But do we really need a semi-automatic AR-15 or an AK-47 knockoff? There is only one use for an AR-15 or an AK-47…to kill people. These were weapons created to be used in war, plain and simple.
There are some people who are so totally enslaved to the “Second Amendment” that they cannot read the real reason that it was created.
As passed by the Congress and ratified by the States in 1791:
A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
This was written 221 years ago. We didn’t have automatic and/or semi-automatic weapons then…it was pretty much single shot muskets.
But those were different times…America was trying to shake off the yoke of religious repression from England…and the Brits didn’t want to give up what they thought was their “possession.” So they had to be able to arm the common citizen to defend what they established, to defend the new republic. And they had to use the weapons that were available for the period.
Fast forward to 2012…who in the hell are we defending against? We have one of the most technologically advanced military forces that we can deploy at a moment’s notice. Do we really need to allow the right-wing to constantly hammer us with the Second Amendment just to satisfy some pathological need to justify owning semi/automatic weapons in the off chance that someone will land on our shores and wage war against our great nation?
Question: Would have that stopped 9/11?
Answer: Nope.
9/11 happened because of a charismatic leader who had the ability to sway men’s minds into performing suicide acts. They had no will whatsoever. In the hands of a master manipulator, they became weapons. They were willing to commit suicide because someone warped their minds into believing that they were going to paradise. Just a 21st century version of the kamikaze bombers, but they had no regard for the lives of the others who became nothing more than cannon fodder to their “path to paradise.
After 9/11, the NRA stepped up their efforts to prevent any kind of regulation for assault weapons. It was a panic move by a fringe element that was convinced that the end of days was near, But it wasn’t. Because of learning about new security screening procedures (and we have to thank the Israeli government for that) it is safer to fly in American airspace than ever before. But it doesn’t address the problem of assault weapons.
I don’t have a solution for the assault weapon problem. Like I said before, I have no problem with someone owning a weapon for personal protection. I have no problem with someone owning a shotgun or a high-powered rifle for hunting (we as a species have fucked up the balance of nature so much that it is up to us to restore that balance.) But what hunter NEEDS an assault weapon for hunting? Many people that I know who do hunt deride these Second Amendment nutjobs. They take the sport of hunting and piss on it.
So, Dean Bear’s position on assault weapons…in the hands of private citizens, no. In the hands of trained professionals (police and the military…) yes.
Now I don’t want to paint all the members of the NRA with a big brush of tar, most of the membership are hard-working middle-class people who hunt, and teach responsible gun ownership. It’s just people like Wayne LaPierre (Executive Vice President of the NRA) and David Keene (President of the NRA) who use politics and money to advance their agenda (on behalf of gun manufacturers) who are the stumbling blocks in any kind of real reform.
I’m going to close out with a quote from Dennis Miller:
“Of course, that’s just my opinion, I could be wrong.”
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© 2012, Mattydale Pictures Television, all rights reserved.
Repercussions…
Any type of action that you do has repercussions…and that was proven this week…I had to take a one day suspension because I said something that I should have not said in an email to a superior.
Now, don’t understand this in the wrong way…I don’t blame anyone for this other than myself. The transgression was my fault. I made a threat that I should have not done, but I did it with a head full of rage. This is the line that I should have not said, and looking back on it, I agree, I went over the line:
“I intend of retiring from XXX when I am 67, and anyone who pushes me to get a rise out of me, well, I have some tools that I can and will use to put then in their place (although I will vomit my guts out if I have to resort to that.”)
Unfortunately, in the climate that we live in here in 2012, that can be interpreted in many ways, and people can and will expect the worst.
One of the things I didn’t do in the email was explain that I was going to file complaints against certain people who severely annoyed me (and the plant manager asked me to explain that, as he should.)
The other thing was, because I wrote that email, I was brought up to explain the problems that we were having, and I tried to be as rational as I could and point out the problems that we were having. They listened. And they implemented solutions to the problems.
I am very much for solutions. I really hate getting into people’s faces about problems. Anytime I can get through a day without having a conflict with a co-worker is a win in my book.
The one thing that softened the blow about the suspension, the plant manager and the plant superintendent told that I was valuable to the company, and they didn’t want to lose me…thank you, I do appreciate that.
In summary, if you have problems at work…talk to someone who can help you get through them. If they can’t help you, go up the command chain. There is always a solution.
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Taking a break from WorkLife (A touch of biography)
This is going to be some biographical information on my WorkLife…
I’m not going to be posting for a while, mainly because I am getting married to my long-time partner on July 7th, 2012. We’ve been planning this since same-sex marriage was passed in The State of New York on July 24th, 2011. We will be having our honeymoon in Provincetown, Massachusetts during Bear Week, until July 15th, so I will not be working. (I burned off a LOT of vacation time!) It has been a long trip for us, and mainly because of him, I have my current job on the overnight shift at a corrugated box factory. Yes, it ain’t the greatest job in the world, but I do like what I do and for the most part I like the people that I work with. (I like some of the people enough to invite them to my wedding and reception. Unfortunately, because of production scheduling issues, some of them ain’t gonna be able to attend.)
Here’s the weird thing, I would not be where I am BECAUSE of my partner. Backtrack to April 2005…I was out of work for a month, having been fired from Price Chopper Supermarkets, a Schenectady, New York based chain. (I got fired because I got sick of dealing with the fucktards that felt the need to shop in the store that I worked at as an overnight cashier, and used the work “fuck” way too often.) He saw this ad in the classifieds of the Post-Standard (the newspaper that serves Syracuse and Central New York) and suggested (more like demanded) that I apply. So I sent my resume in (which was really heavily information technology based) and really didn’t hope for the best.
The weird thing is, they called me. So I looked up their address on MapQuest, printed it out…and proceeded to the interview. I was interviewed by two men from the production floor, and they pretty much asked me general questions about my light-industrial experience. They then asked me a question that kind of threw me for a loop…”Where do you see yourself in five years?” I took the pragmatic approach, and told them flat out, “Working.”
Fast forward to the beginning of August 2005. Money is tight in our household, and all the jobs that I interviewed for pretty much were total failures. No job offers, nothing on the horizon. I was ready to swallow my pride and take a fast food job, just because we needed the money. Then out of the blue, the corrugated box factory that I had interviewed for a position called me. They said that they had a position that I would be well suited for. Things then moved at a very frenetic pace. I had to take a drug test (because they worked with dangerous machinery) and a math test (because they have to use measurements when setting up machines.)
Suffice it to say, I passed with flying colors. I was hired on August 22nd, 2005 as a helper on a large machine called a flatbed die cutter, which used pressure to cut complex shapes and containers out of corrugated paperboard. After my probation period, I was assigned as a helper on the night shift, but problems happened. I was the helper to someone who was so anal-retentive that I could not do my job. Personality conflicts ensued and I was called in to be written up. The same two men who interviewed me said that I was going to be moved to day shift to assist the operator there (and he was the one who trained me.)
Fast forward to a Thursday in August 2007. The operator and I were doing a job called prefold, which is taking boxes from the (back then) 60 inch flexographic press and prefolding them to save the stitcher operator some time. The boxes in question were very heavy, and I must have strained something, because the next day my belly was hard to the touch and I was in pain. I called my partner, and he immediately took me to our doctor’s office (we have the same general practitioner.) Sure enough, I had an umbilical hernia.
I was scheduled for surgery the following Monday, had the surgery, and was flat on my back for a couple of weeks. A couple of weeks later, the production scheduler called me, and asked me if I would fill in as a inventory clerk and unitizer operator, because the person that they had just walked out of the job. I called my doctor, and he said it would be ok just as long as I didn’t have to do any heavy lifting. I called him back the next day, and said yes.
So this began my career as an inventory clerk and unitizer operator. I have been doing this job since August of 2007, and I feel that I have found my niche in the company that I work for. All because my partner insisted that I respond to an ad in the newspaper. Thank you, and I love you Dan. And I am honored to be married to you.
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Balancing WorkLife and RealLife.
I am constantly at odds with my home life and real life…I work an overnight shift at a corrugated box factory, where I am the inventory clerk and unitizer operator. Basically, I am the end point where I have to do quality control to release the job so it can be shipped to the customer. The real problem is, I have to deal with PEOPLE! The people who run the flexographic presses that make the boxes, the people who have to stack the units so I can band them up, and the supervisors and managers who attempt to make the fucking corporate machine running.
For the most part, I work with a great bunch of guys and girls. They know that I am open about my sexuality (I am gay,) and yes they joke about me sucking cock, taking it up the ass, and so on.
So, I have one blog on Blogger, which deals with my personal life, and I am creating this blog for my professional life. Here, I will bitch, whine, complain, and be very fucking catty about the people that I work with. Some of the people I work with, they deserve my wrath. Some of the people I work with, they deserve my praise.
I am not vindictive, I just want to express my feelings about my work life. I am going to change the names of the assholes and the good people that I work with, because I don’t want any kind of legal repercussions. Like I said, this is a forum where I am going to bitch about my working life.
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The Overnight Shift 