I could be a be a total curmudgeon today about the Supreme Court ruling on same-sex marriage, but I am going to restrain myself.  All I have to say is, we as a species, continue to evolve.   Evolution in our views on what defines marriage is inevitable.  Ever since I met my husband in the May of 2000 (online of all places, on Gay.com) I have found that it is an uphill battle to become recognized as a couple.  When same sex marriage became legal in New York state in 2011, Dan and I knew that it was going to be inevitable that we would tie the knot.  I did so willingly, because he and II , even though we are exact opposites in a lot of ways, we are in sync about our relationship.  Yes, he and I did wait for a little over a year after it was signed into law.  But we were glad that we did so.

All I have to say to the same-sex couples that are contemplating marriage, don’t rush into it.  Plan it out.  Make sure that it is what you want.  Being married takes a LARGE commitment on both your parts.  (Besides, it gives you time to plan a FABULOUS wedding!)

The whole thing about being married is, you have someone who will be at your back when the shit hits the fan. Trust me, I needed Dan’s support when I had some health problems, and when I had issues at my job.  And I am there for him when he needs me.

So, with the SCOTUS ruling today, it gives everyone hope that there will be true equality for everyone in The United States of America.

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© 2015, Dean A. Basler Jr., all rights reserved.

In all my time on Facebook, I have seen people who’s only purpose is to get way to places other than home. I don’t envy them. My life revolves around work and home. When I went to New Orleans for Mardi Gras in 2000, I was overwhelmed with the mass of people there. When I went to NYC Pride in 2002, I could barely stand it. When I went to Provincetown in 2012 for my honeymoon, the same thing. I am NOT a social person, I prefer to just deal with the simpler things in life. My interaction with the public in general is dealing with the mass of humanity that are on the cattlecar, and dealing with people at work. I guess that I am wired differently than everyone else. I do not make any apologies for that. Call me anti-social if you will. I am getting too old to change my ways.

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© 2015, Dean Basler, all rights reserved.

The Silly Season begins (a.k.a. “I really hate the holidays.)

Well, it is  hump day on this lovely fall day in late November, and it is filling me with fear for my sanity.  Why is that?  It’s what I call the beginning of “The Silly Season.”  What, pray tell is it?  Well it’s the time of the year where people lose all sense of reason and silly behavior results. 

A prime example:  People standing in line at major retailers to get “bargains” for Christmas.  I wrote this last year on November 30, 2013:

“Well, it’s the day after Black Friday, and as predicted there was violence across America as people stood in line to get *supposed * deals.  Myself, having worked in a retail environment (the back office of a department store chain over 20 years ago) knew that the “Black Friday” phenomenon is a case of catering to the fears and subconscious greed of the general public.  The fear of not having the latest and greatest things, and the greed of most people in general (the “I’ve got mine, now fuck off” mindset.)”

Well, it’s gonna get worse, folks.  A shitload of people are up in arms (mainly retail workers) because some major retailers are forcing their employees to come in ON THANKSGIVING DAY!  What the fuck, don’t these fucking greedheads realize that people want to spend Thanksgiving day at home with their loved ones?  You don’t see the fucking Walton family going into the fucking office on that day.  You don’t see the higher-ups at Sears-Kmart (who have threatened their employees with termination) or Macy’s going into the office either. 

And now with the added shopping day, more people are going to be short tempered and greedy.  They don’t give a fuck about the people who are forced to work on Thanksgiving Day and be away from their families.  They just want to satisfy their need to be there and score some “bargains.” 

And now another quote from last year:

“The so-called “Zombie Apocalypse?”  It ain’t coming folks.  It’s already here, and unless more people shake off the barrage of advertising and soundbites that mass media feeds us, then we are truly fucked.”

Wake up sheeple.  You’re better than that.

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© 2014, Dean Basler, all rights reserved.

Addendum: I just read this story on the website Addicting Info, where Walmart is refusing to pay a $7,000 fine in the trampling death of an employee in 2008.  This tells you how uncaring Walmart is when it comes to their employees.

http://www.addictinginfo.org/2014/11/26/walmart-still-dodging-7k-fine-for-2008-black-friday-trampling-death-video/

Navel-gazing after work:

It’s less than a month before my 56th birthday, and while I was on the cattlecar on the way home, listening to Yes’s “90125,” I started to take stock of myself. These are some of the conclusions that I am making of myself. (I may be talking out of my ass.)

I might be a bit agoraphobic. I don’t like being outdoors during the daytime.  I do feel a bit of anxiety when I am out in public, that is why I have to do something to relieve the tension.  Most of the time, it is reading a book that I carry in my backpack.  Sometimes, it involves listening to music on my smartphone with ear buds in so I can shut out the world.

I am claustrophobic, I don’t like being closed in. This poses a major problem for me, because I have to depend on the cattlecar to get home from work. The one that I take is always packed full, and with some of the worst examples of so-called humanity that you will ever run across. Again, the music on my smartphone with ear buds helps in that regard. If I don’t hear them, then they don’t disturb me.

I am misanthropic.  I have disdain for people in general. Most of the people that I come across in my day to day life are so below me on a mental and emotional scale that I cannot feel any empathy for them. (Again, the cattlecar reinforces my misanthropy.)

Other conclusions that I have realized about myself:

I have become a creature of habit. Everything in my life has to be preprogrammed. From when I get up early in the morning, to when I get home in the late afternoon, everything has to follow a set pattern. Otherwise, I will not be able to function properly.

I hate taking time off from work.  Yes, I get three weeks of vacation off every year. I don’t like taking vacations. If I am not at work, then I am not accomplishing anything. I am slacking off. That also goes back to my agoraphobia. I hate traveling. When I am out of the house, I prefer the shortest distance between two points. I have to have a goal when traveling outside my comfort zone. (Things such as grocery shopping or buying specific things.  No diversions, no off the wall side trips. Point A to point B, that is all I want.)

I have become less tolerant of other people’s behavior.  Yes, I will be polite to everyone, but when confronted by someone who falls outside my concept of normal, I may be polite on the outside, but on the inside I will be screaming “ARE YOU FOR FUCKING REAL?”  It takes every shred of self-control to prevent me from bitchslapping them upside their heads with a two-by-four.

Have I become more of a headcase, or am I a product of this dystopian world that we live in now?

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© 2014, Dean A. Basler Jr., all rights reserved.

BREAKING NEWS!  APPLE RELEASES TWO NEW iPHONES AND FINALLY! THE APPLE WATCH!

Seriously?  That is considered earth-shattering news?  Apple releasing new products so all the brainwashed sheeple can leverage themselves further into debt so they can have the latest and greatest?  Listen, I am all for technological innovation, but IT’S NOT THAT BIG OF A FUCKING DEAL!  As for them finally releasing a smartwatch, so what.  I’ll stick with the classic analog watch.  I need a watch to tell time, that’s it. Grow up, sheeple. The world as we know it is sliding into an abyss, and you’re too fucking blinded by a shiny new thing to even care.

What has brought on my latest spate of misanthropic thought? Well, as usual I took the bus home from work (those of you who do know me know that I have taken to calling it the “cattlecar” because most of the mass of psuedo-humans that ride it can be pretty much described as cattle.)  Most of the people who populate America nowadays have been blinded to the fact that the right-wing has been slowly taking away your freedom to think for yourselves.  American media has become a nationwide “Ministry of Truth” through the manipulation of the mass-media companies that are owned by a handful of corporations.  Politics has been corrupted by so much money (read as Koch Industries and Walmart) that politicians are more worried about where their campaign funds are coming from than passing effective legislation that would benefit society as a whole. A case in point is the constant knee-jerk reactions by the right when increasing the minimum wage comes up.  They cry that it will cause prices to go up, thus leading to decreased spending by the masses.  BULLSHIT!  If you increase wages, people will have more money to spend on things that make day-to-day life more bearable, like food, shelter, transportation, utilities.  The right bitches and whines about all the people on public assistance and they want to cut spending on SNAP and the ACA.  Well, increase the minimum wage to help keep pace with inflation, and maybe more people will not have to rely on public assistance.  Gee, sounds pretty logical, doesn’t it?  Well, we’re talking about American politics, and logic is a commodity that is pretty much non-existant. (Except for Bernie Sanders.  He is a little bombastic at times, but his ideas on where we should take America is pretty logical.) But the American public in general doesn’t want to think about politics and the political process.  They are more concerned with getting home from their low paying jobs, parking their ass in front of their big-screen TV’s, chowing down on what passes as “food,” (probably from McDonalds or KFC,) watching the drivel that passes for “entertainment,” surfing for porn on their computers, or looking for ways to get laid. 

And when they rouse themselves our of their stupor long enough to get involved in the political process, most of the information that they get is channeled through a strict market-researched filter (usually paid for by overstuffed overbearing corporate interests who’s only purpose is to amass more wealth) that they begin to parrot the “corporate line.” (The Koch brothers are the masters of using their wealth to advance their agenda to the detriment of the American public in general.)

So, you wonder why I strongly dislike people in general?  They’ve become mindless drones.  So, I am going to end this rant here, and contemplate my navel, smoke my pipe, and drink my decaf.  Think about what I have said, and maybe learn how to think for yourself.

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© 2014, Dean Basler, all rights reserved.

Certain things that have been happening lately and have gone viral have become total fucking jokes.

First, the “ice bucket challenge.” What started off innocently as something for people to do for a good cause has lapsed into a publicity stunt. Sure, they did it in the belief that it would raise funds for research to find a cure for amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (also known as Lou Gehrig’s Disease.)  I see people posting to Facebook challenging their friends to do it and then post it on Facebook or YouTube.  Well, they did raise over $41,000,000 in a month.  But give it a rest, please.  It’s now lapsing into parody and people are just doing it now for publicity.  I refuse to participate just because other people are doing it. 

Second, the Starbucks “pay it forward” stunt.  The only thing that gets any benefit out of this is Starbucks. Me, I very rarely buy coffee at Starbucks. (The last time I did was when I got a small coffee at a Starbucks inside a Target store in Fairmount Fair about three years ago.)  The “pay it forward” phenomenon basically guilt-trips you…you don’t want to feel like a prick when you say “no.” I’ll pay for my own goddamn coffee thank you very much (and it is Dunkin’ Donuts, not Starbucks.) 

People just need to stop being sheep and following the flock.  Use your minds.

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© 2014, Dean Basler, all rights reserved.

Yes. I am 55 years old. But that doesn’t mean that I am out of touch with modern technology. My computer is a triple-core system running Windows 7 Professional. I use an Android phone. I have an Android tablet. I know digital photography and video. I am a blogger, I have my own website, and my own YouTube channel. So get off of your ageist bullshit, I have done it before you were playing with your Go-Bots.

Before I became a working-class warehouse grunt, I spent eight years as a systems operator in a corporate IT data center. I was skilled in OS/390 (an IBM mainframe operating system,) OS/400 (an IBM mid-range operating system,) Windows Server, and Unix/Linux. I used to maintain a company intranet, and I did all the support jobs, such as tape monkey, and print operator. So, I am not talking out of my ass when I say that I am not a novice when it comes to computer technology. Yes my skills are are ten years out of date (circa 2002,) but don’t try to bullshit me about modern technology. You may get into a mauling match with a grizzled old tech-bear.

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© 2014, Dean Basler, all rights reserved/