random ramblings of randomness

in an effort to teach myself the ways of the blog (or is it like the ways of the force: an apprentice must be taught by a master?) i have made several attempts to post an interesting video i have found on youtube to practice the art of videoposting. the concept is simple, find the video, copy the embed code, paste code into blog. the execution is confounding me. i find the video, i copy the embed code, and yet when i paste said code into blog, only a short portion of the code is pasted. i try to scroll thru the code on the youtube page, and it is missing there as well. i have tried it with two different videos. stunning conclusion to follow?



frequently at ups we ship packages containing hazardous materials. every hazmat package has to have diamond hazmat labels, hazmat shipping papers, and orientation arrows. there are certain classes of hazmat that are completely prohibited in the ups system. one of which being spontaneously combustible. as a loader, the only step between me and the customer is the driver so i am basically the very end of the chain. yesterday i see a package with diamond labels on it so i immediately look for shipping papers. there are none so normally it gets sent down to the clerk for him to fill them out. but then i look at the diamond label and discover its from the aforementioned prohibited class. i immediately stop the belt and call the supervisor over to take care of it. the ridiculousness of it is, this is the second time in just a few months where a prohibited hazmat package, without shipping papers (just to make things worse) has made it all the way to me and almost on the truck. that means the unloader never should have taken it off the truck, the scanner should never have scanned and p.a.l.'ed it, the sorter never should have put it on the blue feeder belt, the splitter at the head of the blue belt should never have pushed it to my side of the belt. but more than that, this package came from florida! it never should have been accepted by ups in florida, it never should have been put on the feeder truck in florida, and it never should have come across country to chico. this is a major dropping of the ball that has inccurred some heavy safety violation fines. and to think it has happened twice!!!

to blog or not to blog?

i have to say i'm grateful to my wife for starting a blog and using it to update friends and loved ones about our life. now i don't feel the obligation to do it myself. she's much better with the details than i am anyway. now i can dedicate this to spill my mind on any topic i so choose. we'll see what comes up.

i work for ups loading delivery trucks erly in the morning. it can be tedious at times and the mind has plenty of opportunity to wander and ruminate. one morning recently i was pondering on the current state of the election and i had a thought about obama's economic plan and what some commentators call "trickle up poverty". for those unaware, obama plans to "spread the wealth around" taking tax money for hardworking families and giving it to those that don't because apparently obama thinks socialism will work this time around. i realized that all this plan will do is encourage mediocrity. why should i work harder when they're just going to take all my money and give it to those to lazy to work for themselves. and then i took the thought a step further and realized that's exactly the union mind set. in a union situation, you don't get raises or promotions based on merit, it is completelty based on seniority, so there are no benefits to working hard. then i realized who one of obama's strongest supporters: the international brotherhood of teamsters, headed by jimmy hoffa's son, james hoffa. (sound like a mafia?, it should jimmy had strong mafia ties. why else do you think he is still missing today?) oh the joys of union politics.