One of the things you learn to stop doing when you move to another country is bitching about politics.  You’re an immigrant, an outsider, and in most cases, you can’t hope to understand the nuances of another country’s politics.

     Unless you’re an extremely astute bastard, like Craig Ferguson.

(Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pdRVQ4xwwmQ)

     He also re-iterates a point I’ve made a billion and a half times: if you didn’t excercise your Right to vote, then you Lost your Right to Bitch.  e.g. if you didn’t vote in the last election, no one cares about your disdain and comdemnation — STFU!

     Plain and simple.

     Oh … And if you’re a Senator who didn’t even bother to show up and vote on all the Resolutions you were supposed to vote on because you’re too busy blazing a campaign trail, you’re a total Asshat!  Not only do these Senators have a responsibility to vote on these issues, it’s their duty and their job to do it — especially when it’s a bill that’s at the heart of their campaign promises.
     And it’s interesting to note, when you go down the Voting Records to see that the Head of one of our two major political parties pretty much hasn’t voted on anything in like … eight years?  Apparently, the Jackass that represents him is a little more personal…

Tip: The astute voter and Patriot, Mushy, at The Silverbacks

     My tolerance for asshats is at an all-time low.  It’s probably a good thing, as it’s helping weed out a Hell of a lot of crap in my life.  It’s also keeping me from bottling it all up so badly.

     It’s apparently not enough that I’m getting my daily dose of death threats and slanderous screaming at me over and over from a bunch of gossip-mongering asshats.  It’s also not enough that I’m having to deal with way too many lawyers and police officers for no apparent reason as we’re all trying to figure out exactly what the Hell is going on in several instances.  Nor is it enough that I’m not calling these people, not screwing with them, pretty much minding my own damn business, and having to pick up the phone to this crap no less than eight times a day.
     And I can’t change a business phone, mind you, which is where they always call.

     Then, I get to put up with it from so-called “family,” as well.

     A week ago Friday, I got a phone call from my brother.  He was actually decent for a change — well, for a while, anyway.  Said my parents were going to sell the house, and he wanted me to have a share.  I thought, hey, cool, considering. 
     Of course, by Saturday, he’d twisted everything I’d said around into some insane, lunatic garbage again, going off — per norm — about me being a liar, that I am insulting, that I don’t care — and never cared, and hate him — about anything, and all sorts of pathetic bullshit.
     Thanks…

     He started calling again on Thursday, acting all apologetic and telling me how much he cared, and I was actually stupid enough to fall for it again.  It wasn’t long before he flipped it all around again… then there was an argument about something he said, which I say he didn’t, and that if I could prove it, he’d give me a thousand dollars!
     I thought, “Great!” and I sent him the voicemails he’d sent, and sure enough, I was correct… Of course,  after another rash of psychotic e-mails, he says that not only is he not gonna give me the thousand he promised, but he also talked to my parents and will “make sure they don’t waste their hard-earned money” on me.
     Thanks…

     “I just don’t get it. I don’t understand. We aren’t mean. We are just normal people. I’ll leave you alone Mark,” he says…
     …but I’m the one sitting down here minding my own friggin’ business and not starting shit?  And still I get more even after that?
     Thanks…

     Seriously, twisted toxicity.  It’s the same old abusive behavior my immediate family does, and somehow they’re able to twist things around to make them look like victims.  It does nothing but piss me off.
     And, of course, they know it, use it, and when I snap, they point it out to everyone as evidence of my bad behavior.
     Thanks…

     Any logic might show that, perhaps, since I’m so willing to give these asshats more chances, that it might not be me that has such a problem… save that I’m gullible enough — after many names, many states and many countries — to get sucked into their vicious bullshit again.

     Certain families just suck like that.  They suck you in, and suck the life right out of you, and then have the audacity to say that you were “playing” them the whole time. 
     I know at least one other person who’s struggling with kind of bullshit on a daily basis, and in her case, it truly saddens me watching her go through it.  I know exactly how it feels, and how damn difficult it makes everything.

     But basically, it comes down one simple truth that’s sometimes really tough to get through your head.
     Though there may be relation by blood, there is nothing those situations that even somewhat resembles “family.”  If they gave a damn at all, for all the love they profess, they simply wouldn’t be doing this kind of bullshit.  And after a while, repeatedly putting yourself in the situation isn’t the brightest thing to do.

     For my part, at this point, I am anything but Rodney King about it.  I am under enough stress, and simply do not need anyone around to compound it.

     And with a little luck, I hope she’ll come to a similar conclusion, although, a little less painfully without the finality.  But sometimes, you gotta do what you gotta do for your own sake…

     I am stressed, and I do not need this.

     No more.

     Not today, not tomorrow.

     Not in the year 2011.

     You can only beat an old dog for so long before it bites you.

     Be warned.

     One of the things I really enjoy is people threatening to sue me.  That has happened so much the last few years, mostly from people who refuse to pay their bills and I take some action against.  They claim they’ll be suing me for defamation or some crap like that most of the time, not that I ever go talking about them to anyone except courts or police.  It costs me too much money to actually sue them and get nothing from it, so I just make the motions as necessary and let it be on the record.

     The particular asshat, however, doesn’t really have a dog in this fight.  I wasn’t trying to screw her over in any way, but since her asshat boyfriend felt it was okay to not show up to court, leaving me in a serious bind, I simply felt it was a good idea to stop allowing him to screw me out of $175 a month for all the sites he hosts on my server for the price of one.  And then he doesn’t pay his bill properly, at that.
     Her email was down for a grand total of four hours in the mess, and instead of either of them calling and asking that I turn them back or making any attempt to try and resolve the situation, she starts running her mouth.  Estrogen abuse!

     As I said, her email was down for a grand total of four hours and then I realzed, “Wait, she might actually need that, and it’s not her fault her boyfriend is a dick,” and I turned it back on.

     But apparently, even going that far wasn’t good enough.

     She’s threatening to go to the Better Business Bureau, having her father do the same (yeah, Asshat hosts sites for a bunch of his friends, on my servers, which I pay for, for free!), and then bitches and complains that if I don’t transfer all domains over to them by 12PM, worse things will happen.  Oh, if I don’t burn all their data to DVD and mail it to them by Monday, they’re going to sue me.

     Customers are responsible for their own data backups.  Asshat’s known that forever.  They have the data — they put it up there!  It ain’t like these are friggin’ dynamic, data-driven sites or anything!

     And her, she can’t even figure out how to do a Domain Transfer.

     Sorry, dear, but you don’t DEMAND anything of me.  If you’d asked nicely and either of you had even attempted to be civil, this would’ve turned out a lot different.

     So you people go ahead and go to the BBB — that requires that you were actually doing business with me, which you weren’t.  You all never paid for hosting, anyway.

     And go ahead and sue me — it’s so baseless, that I’d represent myself, and you’d still lose.

     As for the other allegations that I owe him money and crap like that?  You better take that up with your asshat boyfriend.  I don’t owe him a dime — he was paid up with interest and it’s easily proven.  And hey, when I did all that cooking, I bought half the ingredients.  How ’bout that?  And how many times have you people called me for help with everything from moving to car repair to even helping you two sort out your personal problems between each other, what did I do?  I was always right there.
     I asked for one friggin’ thing.  And waiting til the Zero Hour to back out like you both did — and maybe he didn’t bother to tell you, which is his fault, not mine — is pretty reprehensible.

     So much for being my “friends.”

     When you know someone for twenty four friggin’ years, you expect them to show up in court to vouch that certain events happened when they were around two and half years ago.

     I think it’s a pathetic as Hell that at the Zero Hour, I’m told, “Nope, won’t be there.  Don’t worry about it!  You don’t need me there.”

     Yeah, I damn sure did, too.  It was “required” for my case, and I certainly appreciate the way you just cast me aside at the last minute, claiming I never gave you a date — which I certainly did two weeks ago, and then mentioned it again on Saturday.

     I really appreciate you.  That’s a Hell of a way to end a friendship.

     The Wildcat won’t be there, either, apparently.  But at least has somewhat a more reasonable excuse.

     Number One…

     I know what I was doing last year, and we’d still be doing it if people would leave us alone.

     Number Two…

     Some things are more important than others.  And I will righteously defend that.

     Number Three…

     I don’t take kindly to threats.  Bring it on.  While I may get angry from time to time, and even blow up sometimes, I at least have the balls to be a man and talk to a person about it instead of attempting to start crap for no reason.  Or, hey, is there a reason?  I wouldn’t know — because all I get are the threats.

     Number Four…

     Hyden, Kentucky is a soul-stealing hell hole full of people who want to break down everyone else around them and bend them to their will.  And when they can’t do that, they resort to the most vile gossip imaginable, and even attempt to substantiate that gossip by calling the cops over and over, posturing on absolutely nothing, in an attempt to have someone arrested or sued, and thus discredited.  It’s a town full of backstabbing victim-mentality asshats who attempt to use their peers, local law enforcement and courts to get their way because they’re too pathetic to actually face someone and talk out their problems.

     Lastly, Number Five….

     There are a billion reasons why I love my Wildcat, and the family she gave me.  Absolutely nothing has changed that.

     Enough is enough.

     She deserves better.  We both do.

     Prayers, please.

     Thursday night, my car all but died.  Friday morning, I was supposed to have a fix, but didn’t.  Friday afternoon, I was supposed to get picked up, but wasn’t.  Friday night, I was so stir crazy I couldn’t stand it. 

     Saturday morning, I was supposed to get a call to help with the car, but didn’t.  At 11AM, I decided, “Screw it, I’ll find someone with tools to help!”  And while he got the bolts out of from behind the exhaust manifold — and directly under the intake manifold — to change the thermostat, I removed and replaced the water pump.
     After all that, I started onto the process of body work where I hit the deer back in June…
     Now, the car is fixed.  As long as I leave the air conditioning on… which means, there’s obviously a temperature sending unit bad, since it’s not turning on the second radiator fan.
     I also managed to scald both my hands in process, get various cuts, and break the top of my right hand — it now has something akin to half a golf ball atop it, just like two months ago. 
     Only one word comes to mind: F#&$.

     And so, last night, stir crazy and exhausted, yet unable to sleep (two and a half months now), I went to walk around downtown.  At Market Square, I sat and reminisced about the days of old when Preservation Pub was Mercury Theater.  I thought about the Snakesnatch Lounge and all the other places that were there twelve-plus years ago.
     I thought about celebrating Pirate Susan’s birthday there in 2006, when she stood atop one of the benches near the door of Preservation Pub, arms outstretched, yelling, “I am an asshole bleacher!”

     But even more, I thought about the day the Wildcat and I went to Preservation Pub… QSL later… and that night… and that kinda did it for my mood, because I miss her more every day.

     A drink would’ve been in order, but I had to quit that after a few too many bad nights…

     Then I learned that last night, a friend of mine was sexually assaulted in her home by a “friend” of hers who she actually knew very little about.  Packed her kids in the car, drove them to a mutual friend to be watched and took her to the ER.  I prepped her a little beforehand about what was going to happen, having been through this with other friends I’ve known, and just pretty much tried to be there for her so she didn’t feel totally alone.
     Fortunately, the KPD investigator was really good, as was the crisis unit who performed her exams and tests.  They were pretty unbeatable, and I was out of the room most of the time — I didn’t need to be there the whole time, anyway, because it just makes me wanna kill someone that much more.

     She’s really young … and all I could think about the whole time was how bad I missed the Wildcat, how bad I missed the kids, how much they meant to me, and what I’d do to someone who tried something like that with any of them.

     Finally discharged, I took her to get some food after her battery of medication, fill another prescription and back to her place, where I stayed until her sister could get there.  I can handle the “crisis” portion calmly and capably, but for the rest… she’s gonna have a long road ahead.

     Sometimes, life is hard.

     And sometimes, other peoples’ are even harder.

     People threatening me, whether in person, by Internet, Telephone or Text Message, really piss me off.

     And when I get all four, I just get pissed, and maybe out of control.

     Thursday night, I was so pissed, I lost it.

     People who try and get in the middle of my Wildcat and I… I generally just don’t think they deserve to breathe.

     But I don’t make threats.

     [ This was a draft from August 2nd I should have posted. ]

     Around this time two years ago, I went out a girl who was pretty fun.  We went and had dinner, and ended up playing darts for a while.  Just an easy hang-out-and-have-fun kinda night.  It was cool.  It was actually the first date I’d had that wasn’t a total friggin’ disaster.
     She was sweet, she knew how to laugh, and was a pretty damn good dart player, too.

     I didn’t kiss her goodnight.

     But she said she wanted to see me again.  And so, we made plans to meet that Friday night…

     Later that night, she called me to ask why I didn’t kiss her.
     “I wanna take it slow,” I told her.  “I don’t kiss… just, well, not until I get to know someone.”
     “Aww,” she replied.  “Did you like me and you’re trying to do the right thing?”
     “I had a great time, and I’m afraid I went the normal route, we’d end up going too quick and screwing everything up.  Ya know what I mean?”
     “Absolutely!” she resonded, ecstatically.  “I wanna take things slow, too.”

     We made plans for Friday at 8PM.

     Friday came around, and we were supposed to get together again.  I was already working in West Knoxville, so I called her at 7:30PM and said, “Hey, you hungry?  We could maybe leave a little earlier and go grab something to eat.”
     “How did you know I as off work?” she asked.
     “Uhhh, because we made plans to meet at 8PM?”
     “Yeah… Uhhh,” she stammered.  “I think I’m too tired.”
     “You think?”
     “Yeah, I’m too tired.  Sorry.  Maybe tomorrow.  We can go to Barley’s.”
     “Well, okay.  I was out here anyway, just thought I’d check.”

     The same kinda thing happened twice more.  I got a little pissed off about it.  It didn’t make sense, especially after getting back online and realizing she’d blocked and deleted me from everywhere, wouldn’t answer her phone or anything else.
     I chalked it up to nutjob, and did the Pirate Word for Healing — NEXT!  (Kudos to the Pirate Chicks!)

     So one night, a month later, I’m sitting at Catscratch Jane’s with Diva, Susan, Robyn, Becky, Mitzi and Niki — the pirate chicks — and who should call but my dear stand-up queen.
     “Hey, Mark, I just wanted to see what you were doing!”
     “Hanging out with friends… Why?” I asked.
     “Well, I thought maybe we could go somewhere and hang out.”
     It didn’t take much thought.  “Nah, you stood me up a few times, and no, I don’t think so.”
     Robyn, overhearing the conversation, got a little pissed off and grabbed the phone.  “You stupid bitch!  What the f$#& do you think you’re doing?  I’ll kick your ass, you stupid bitch!  You don’t f$#& with Mark Steel!”
     I wrestled the phone back, but, of course, she’d hung up.

     In June of 2007, dear psycho decided to contact me again via AIM instead of the telephone.

hey nark. how are ya?

Who’s this?

it’s [name deleted]. Just wonderin what yer up to.

Not much.  Just hanging out.

sorry I did what I did a few months ago. wasn’t ready for a realationship. you scared me.

Howso?

you were different.

Howso?

i d’know. you were really sweet. i had too many things on my plate and you knew how to laugh. such a diversion.

Diversion?

fun. really fun. i just wasnt ready. and your hot.

Thanks. But… Okay, what do you want?

sorry if your busy i’ll let you go.

No, it’s cool.  I’m not busy, just wondering…

well i broke up with my boyfriend. just wanted to hang out and maybe get to know you better.

Okay.  Well, what, same place?  Bailey’s?

tommorow night? around 7?

Sounds good.  See ya there!

     But I didn’t bother going.  Instead, some friends and I sat around and laughed about it.  Sure, it was childish, but it was funny.  I figured, hey, it’s the least I can do. 

hey what happened to you tonight?

Huh?

you were supposed to be at bailey’s

Ahh, sorry.  I’m just not ready for a relationship.

what?

Yeah, I have too many things on my plate.  Take care!

asshole!!!

Thanks.  G’nite!

     Tonight, she called me.  Asked if I wanted to meet her at Barley’s.  I said, “Sure, you want me to pick you up, or meet you there, or what?”
     “Well, how far as you?” she asked.
     “Oh, it’ll take me twenty minutes to get there.”
     “Yeah, me, too.  So you wanna just meet there?”
     “Yeah, let’s do that!” I told her.  “Wait around the front door… if you beat me there, I won’t be long!”

     After we hung up, I parked my ass on the bed and died laughing. 

     Haven’t heard from her since.  Wonder if she got the not-so-subtle hint?  *snicker*

     Revenge is sweet.

     [ This was a draft from July 28th that I should've posted. ]

     She pops up from over two years ago to say, “Hey, I’m sorry about what happened two years ago.”  Offers that the Wildcat and I can stay at her place since she has an unused upstairs with a couple bedrooms — a bargain at $200 a month.  I declined of course, because the place is pretty far away and, well, the bottom line is, I just don’t trust her.  I don’t know her, and after the way she acted two years, giving me an apology over Yahoo Instant Messenger really didn’t seem very genuine, anyway. 

     I fixed her computer via remote a couple of times.  She’d check in to see if I was okay, coping ok.  Left the Wildcat a couple of messages telling her how happy she was that we’d found one another.  Said we deserved that.

     But, much like she did two years ago, she falls into the “woman scorned” category because she decides, over Yahoo Instant Messenger, that she wants something a whole Helluva lot more than friendship.
     And somehow, I’m a jerk, having said, “No.  As you fully well know, I am taken, and you have no right to try and interfere in that.  I really don’t appreciate that.  I’m just not wired that way.”
     After that,  she had quite a few choice words…

     Something the Wildcat said a few months ago suddenly came back into my head, because she was right.  If I’m in a solid relationship with someone I truly care about, or even if I consider that I’m friends with someone, I am a little oblivious when they’re hitting on me until it gets pretty brazenly extreme. 

     This particular nutjob got extremely brazen. 

     So, I deleted and blocked her every way I knew how … including telephone.  Since I haven’t even laid eyes on her in two years, and she was so psycho then, why the Hell did I even trust her to begin with?

     Sometimes, I’m too forgiving.