I agree, religious people are insane.

So, apparently Nidal Malik Hasan, who shot and killed a bunch of people while screaming religious nonsense, is going to claim insanity.

Cute.

I find this especially funny since I personally feel that anyone who believes that an invisible magician in the sky (with a zombie jew for a son, according to Christians) said, "Because I say so", therefore creating the universe, is a little on the nutty side.

That a bunch of people who believe that would call another one who believed something similar insane, just because he did exactly what his holy book told him to do, is...well...insane.

But, hey, I guess I just don't get it.

Funny how genetics works...

You know, sometimes a really funky looking guy can toss out a really hot daughter.

Then you can take a fairly average looking guy, and he ends up making...himself with lipstick and long hair.

This came from me hitting a news article about Alexandra Kerry and immediately thinking "AGH! And Jenna Bush is so hot! WTF!?"

Does Anyone Use Bing?

I've noticed one consistency in my niche site adventures. Bing loves my sites, yet I get zero hits from them. Which makes me wonder...is anyone even using it?

Our Healthcare Makes Me Sick

For about two years now, I have been among the lucky ones of us that do have health insurance. I am more mentally stable, more healthy, and probably more likely to live for a while since my blood pressure and cholesterol, killers in my family for generations, are currently under control. I also don't have stomach acid eating my insides which is, quite frankly, a horrifyingly painful experience.

None of this would be possible without insurance. There isn't enough money in the bank to pay for the bills, let alone hundreds of dollars a month for meds.

Thankfully, a new study released found that those in the ER without health insurance are twice as likely to die than those with. I say thankfully because those of us who have lived most of our lives without health insurance aren't in any way surprised. Without health insurance, you're a second rate citizen.

Healthcare should be our #1 priority. It should be paid for by the government and taxed as needed. PERIOD. Those who argue that point are not currently in need. Those who are in need would not argue that point. If he does nothing else, I really hope Obama fixes this...

Update on eCopywriters

A quick update: they did Paypal me the $7 from the one article that was approved. I can therefore say that they are definitely not a scam. Just woefully inefficient.

eCopywriters - A Review From a Freelance Writer

I'll be blunt -- I'm writing this review based on very little information, but not for lack of trying.

When I signed up for eCopywriters, the terms looked great (better than Textbrokers), and I didn't see the harm in writing a few articles and seeing where they went.

That was well over a month ago, and I'm SO glad I only did two, because I'm pretty much ready to write them off as time lost. One finally got "approved", but only after I wrote support, who promptly responded telling me that, yes, their system is fail, and that there is no real deadline for clients to accept articles. Not in those words, exactly, but close enough. So, basically, they can just not pay you for work done, and eCopywriters does not penalize them in any way. I'm still not sure how support "got one approved" after about twenty minutes, but couldn't get the other approved. They still haven't, by the way.

eCopywriters is DEFINITELY NOT a reliable way to pay the bills. Maybe they will improve. Support was nice enough, but not terribly effective. There is no reason for a third party like eCopywriters if they don't even enforce a deadline on their clients' payment.

Edit: There is a followup to this post.

Dallas Cowboys vs Mass Stupidity (and some cheeseheads)

If you don't like football, don't bother reading this. In light of the recent heinous loss to the 4-4 Green Bay Packers, I'm going to rant about the Cowboys game for a little bit.

First off, any play should be reviewable. Period. Today proved that. Felix Jones had, beyond a shadow of a doubt, recovered a fumble and did not lose the ball until after he was both touched and had done a damn barrel roll on the ground. There was no question that he was down. It was simple oversight on the part of the officials, but it just may well have cost us the game. That, and the "illegal hands to the face" that basically amounted to the guy waving. I've seen the Cowboys lose a lot of games, especially when they're ones they should've won, but the refs cost us this one.

I do have one issue with the Cowboys right now, though. Why the hell is Roy Williams even still in there? What does the dropped ball to yards gained ratio need to be before they give him the boot? And did Patrick Crayton not give ample evidence that he should be starting in every single game since they took him off? For fuck's sake, trade Roy Williams for some offensive line talent while other teams might still think he's worth something.

Speaking of the offensive line...here's a hint to Wade Phillips. You're not going to make three scores in less than a minute. When you have so many injuries that you officially have your last backup offensive lineman on the field, why in the hell would you risk the talent, too? Do you really think that the very last guy that you put in can protect Romo? Especially when he's already been sacked five times? Pull the damn first string when you can't possibly win. How hard is that to understand? I'm seriously starting to doubt Phillips's competence.

Not that he did anything that trumped Green Bay's coach attempting to throw a third challenge flag. Or how about the fact that the officials actually went for it at first? Or how about the fact that, regardless of any of that, the ball had been snapped before they blew the whistle, killing the chance for the challenge that didn't exist? What a mess.

Legacy...

I didn't really have a reason to post this, but I felt the need anyway.

Cymbalta and Being Anti-Social

So I was looking at my stats for this place, and I noticed that I'm getting a few hits for "Cymbalta antisocial". I figured, hey, if people click, I may as well tell them what I know since I am on Cymbalta, and am anti-social.

Does it help me be more social?

No. I still don't care for people in general, and still don't want to deal with them. I've found no change except that, since it does raise my give-a-shit threshold, I can handle being around stupidity a bit more than without and not get angry. But does Cymbalta make me want to actually get out and do things with people? Not at all. I was unaware that it was supposed to, though.

I can say, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that Cymbalta did make me able to handle working at Time Warner for as long as I did. Handling violent stupidity 70 times a day is too much for me, though, even when medicated.

I know there's also a lot of hubbub about Cymbalta and withdrawal symptoms. After halving my dosage (see this post), I may have had some headaches, but nothing too out of the ordinary.

I am far less sleepy than I was on my previous dosage. I think the sleep apnea has calmed down some as well because I wake up with sandpaper-tongue a lot less than I did before. I should probably see what the affect is on my blood pressure, too, as I also take meds for hypertension.

Anyway, that's my experiences with Cymbalta so far. For comparison purposes, Lexapro had about the same effects until it stopped working, and Pristiq made me mildly homicidal, and I'm of the firm opinion (based on little to no data) that people probably react to all medicines in a similar manner. For example, if you do well with Cymbalta, you might do well with Lexapro too, since I did well with both.

If you have any questions about my experiences or anything at all to add, definitely leave some comments, I'd love to hear from you.

November 16th and writing

I'll be 29. Poor people should be able to skip birthdays, IMO.

If it wasn't for my dad and Janna, it would be a seriously depressing day (money and something). At 29, shouldn't I be buying my own best present? Maybe 30 is the magic number?

Bah.

I've been trying to keep up with what I need to do for Textbroker to pay the bills, but it just isn't happening. My mind runs dry. It's just hard to write 400 words for $6 all day, even though it's really fairly good pay. Hopefully I'll come around and be interested enough to do it again. Or my SEOing will take off.

I neglected it (on purpose) for about three months so that the domains would age, which is an important part of ranking in the search engines, and when I came back I succeeded in making my rankings DROP by cleaning up my home page. WTF.

Oh, almost lost the dog, or so we thought. She suddenly became unable to control her bladder. Seems to have been an infection, though, as with some antibiotics she's actually better. Only another $150 or so borrowed. Woot. If it keeps her around for another year or so (optimism+old dog+cancer=stupid, I know), it's worth it. I sort of blame myself. I've been home far more than anyone else (except maybe Jeanne)...I should be taking the old dog out more. I will now!