OK, I've figured out what's going on.

Somewhere in the Celestial Headquarters, in the Luck division they had an audit. An auditor grabbed my file and sat down for a look. Then kittened his coffee halfway across the room. "What in the Realms is going on here!" he exclaimed, "This guy is so far out of balance, I'm amazed he hasn't fallen out of Reality yet!" Fixing a baleful glare on the cowering bureaucrats of the Luck Division, he roars "Fix this now, or look forward to supervising the Trekkie Sex Division for the rest of eternity!"

This is the only logical explanation for the past few weeks. The Judas Priest tickets, the new job that I love, suddenly having an excess of social engagements to attend, and then what happened last night at the Giants game...

A couple of months back, at the start of the season, one of the regulars in sfgiantsfans who happens to hold season tickets announced that there were several dates he wasn't going to be able to attend, and would anyone like to buy his tickets for face value? One of the dates offered was July 5th vs. the Reds, so I jumped in and claimed the two tickets for that night. Those tickets were in Section 143, the centerfield bleachers out at the 421 foot marker on the wall. Not the best seats in the world, but hey, it's a Giants game!

Going into the park last night, two people approached us. Asking where we were sitting, they asked if we'd like an upgrade. I explained that we were pretty much broke, but they insisted that the upgrade was free. They had gotten better seats themselves, and were fellow Deadheads (Kirsten was wearing her GD/Giants shirt and I was carrying Phil Lesh's Searching for the Sound). The tickets were club level, section 204, row A.

You can click on these two sections to see the difference in views

I'm never going back. You can't make me! The Club level has freaking waiters who come and take your ballpark food orders! The bathrooms are amazing, and the concourse is enclosed! The seats are big enough for Kiri! It was amazing!

Pity the Giants weren't. Of course, the first base umpire didn't help with blown call after blown call.. After the heart of our order went down 1-2-3 in the 8th, I decided to head out for the train. I have to work today, and watching yet another loss was not worth staying any longer.

Kiri wandered away at one point, returning with a new shirt for me. "Gigantes de San Francisco"

A good night. And thanks to the Celestial auditing crew for fixing the balance in my life.

This guy won the prize.

Anyone who has known me for any length of time knows my position on the "homeless." In short, I divide this demographic into two groups: The truly homeless, people who have fallen on hard times and are working like hell to improve their situation; and the bums. The bums are the ones who don't seem to care that they live in filth, the ones who will sit begging for quarters ten feet from stores with "Help Wanted" signs in the windows.

I will move heaven and earth to help the first group when I can. The second group can go to hell.

This attitude means that I ignore most beggars. The exceptions are the guys selling the Street Sheet, since they are working for the money - the homeless write, layout, deliver, and sell the paper themselves. The next exceptions are the street musicians. again, they are doing something for my money.

The final exception are the guys who are so original, so startling in their approach that they stand out from the crowd. The first guy with a sign that said "Why Lie? I Need a Beer." got a quarter from me. But the homeless guy at the CalTrain station after the game last night has set the bar very, very high. His entire shtick was a neatly lettered cardboard sign reading

FAMILY KIDNAPPED BY NINJAS
NEED MONEY FOR KARATE LESSONS.

He got two bucks from me. That's probably a record.

Bleat, or whatever sound a lemming makes.

By way of the twisty mind of the mdlbear

"If, as you live your life, you find yourself mentally composing LJ entries about it, post this exact same sentence in your Live Journal."

Stupidity, two for the price of one!

I recently left retail hell for a new job as a courier for a dental lab. No more customers, but still stupid people! I had two great ones today.

First up is Road Rage Guy. I'm merging onto an expressway and this idiot in a truck not only speeds up, he changes lanes to cut me off. I express my displeasure via the horn, and the other driver proceeds to do the following:

1. Cut me off and stomp on the brakes, trying to force me to rear-end him.

2. Pull up next to me and swerve into my lane.

3. Slip in behind me and tailgate. He was literally inches from my bumper.

Repeat this cycle a few times. I didn't mind, since his company name and the 800 number for them was clearly labeled on all four sides of the truck! When he saw that I was speaking into my cell, he got really wide-eyed and sped off. From the tone of the person on the other end of the phone, I wasn't the first one to complain about him.

Have fun at Employment Development, asshole!

The second idiot requires some back story. Recently the San Francisco Giants honored one of their pitching greats, Juan Marichal, by retiring his number and unveiling a statue of him at SBC Park. As part of the celebrations for the "Dominican Dandy", the Giants wore uniforms with "Gigantes" (Giants in Spanish) instead of the team name in English. This was very popular, and the team introduced t-shirts with the "Gigantes" logo. I went to a game last night, and got one of the shirts.

Today I wore it to work. While grabbing lunch for my boss, I had the following exchange.
( Lléveme hacia fuera al juego de la bola )

At that point my order came to the window, and I backed away slowly. When did this rule come in? Hell, there was once a trade that happened between games of a doubleheader! Player played for one team in the first game, then for the other in the nightcap.

Crossposted to mock_the_stupid