The Opening

Hello everyone, welcome to the official opening of the reallyreallife blog. Thanks to all the followers and welcome to the first time visitors. I just want to take the time to tell everyone what I will be blogging, or blabbing on. Isn't blogging blabbing and blabbing blogging? You decide.



I am going to take a moment today and tell everyone what this blog will be about. Of course it will cover my personal triumphs and failures as well as just general stuff...such as why is it hard to get good help? I may address my wife and her need for gossip and other useless chatter. You cannot win on Jeopardy with the nonsense she feeds on. I might blog about the earth speaking to us through volcanoes earthquakes and other calamities. I am sure to blog about the end of humanity if the enemies of the United States are not defeated. Do you really think there will be a space program or women's rights or gay rights or freedom of the press or independence or any other useful thing to humanity if the enemy wins? I might write of how the nation of Israel is our best and surest ally.



I might blog on why have we not called for a boycott of British Petroleum? As a matter of fact, why is there not a boycott against all BP gas and oil products in the United States? Hit a company in the pocket for best results say the instructions! I might blog about how I love to drive and can drive day and night. I can tell about my relationship with my parents or my sister. That will be a good read. I am so misunderstood. Hell, I can write about how U.S. Marines are not peacekeepers...they are ass kickers! We send Marines where the troublemakers are. Killing the troublemakers are how Marines keep the peace!. For the record, I am not nor have I been a Marine, I just know what they do. They keep the peace by eliminating our enemies. I could blog about how politics can ruin war planning while seeking to "build nations." No one "built" the United States of America, Americans built America. Therefore all nations should build themselves, be they Afghans, Iraqi, Somali, Cuban, Ugandan, or any other nation. We did it, they can do it and they must do it for themselves.



I might blog about my wonderful son. He wants to become an attorney. I lawyer is for misdemeanors...an attorney is for felonies I told him. I could also write about how he is not going to make any money in sports. I could blog about the best presidents we've had or the worst president's we've had. I could blog about why we have had no former soldier who has attained the rank of General run for president since Eisenhower. Forgive me, not run but, been taken seriously. Of course I will be blabbing/blogging. about medical topics as well



My point is, I am glad to have the ability to speak to these issues and concerns and possibly get someone to see things from a different perspective. If you are older, perhaps from a younger person's perspective. Or if you are younger, from a older person's perspective. The thing that I think is the most important piece of information about my blog is this...what will I not blog about. Will anything be off limits? The answer is a resounding no. If it is in the news or an otherwise relevant topic, I will share my opinion. I have an opinion, you have an opinion. Ultimately nine is no better than yours nor yours better than mine. In the big, big picture, you and I do not really matter. We would like to think we are but the reality is that we are not. We are not the movers and the shakers. We are not the money men and women and we wield no significant political clout individually. The only difference between you and I is that I have this space to speak perhaps a little louder than you. WTFE.

You and I have more in common than you might think. I have red blood, you have red blood, I need deodorant, you need deodorant, I live and die, you live and die, I began as a baby from my mother, you began as a baby from your mother...though we were created by your fathers...(I guess there will be feedback on that remark.) You cannot live under water nor can I and of greater importance to my position is that you want to live as long as you can because no one wants to die.



At some point I will decide how often to do my blog. I am leaning to 3 times per week. Perhaps Sunday, Wednesday and Friday. I am after all a wanna be writer!



I will definitely blog about our wonderful universe because just looking up and seeing the heavens is a wonderful sight to behold. Go outside. Be quiet. Look up. This, is a reallyreallife.

Hello everyone,

I hope everyone is having or have had a good day. My day has gotten off to a terrible start. A start so bad that I am compelled to vent here to you all. Maybe some of you can relate to my anger. Make no mistake, I will be venting due to anger. Let's quickly get up to speed...As some may know, I am a student. On occasion one has to contact the academic or financial departments for various reasons and today is a day that I had to contact the financial advisor of my university. For the time being I will leave the name of my university out of the story, however if you have read my initial blog, they are identified.

So, a day or two ago I spoke with the representative in the financial department who advised me that since the changes to the student loan program that the current administration has made, I would need to re sign my master promissory note. No problem, I E-signed it, bada bing. I call this morning to ensure that they have received what was required and to be proactive so that down the line there would be no "Oh, we need this or that" or the dreaded "we don't have it on file." I'm doing better than the government, while they tend to be reactive, at the federal and state level, I tend to be proactive. Why wait till things go wrong to take action. All who have had to deal with financial departments at universities know what I am talking about. You want your documents processed correctly the first time. Especially if there is grant or expense assistance involved.

So, I call. When I call the university, I am supposed to speak with military financial advisors as well as military academic advisors. I have found the attitude of the non military representatives to be uncaring. While my service was during peacetime, it is honorable service. I never feel the non military people treat the military students with any respect. This is evident in that I can always identify an individual on the non military side. Sadly today I ended up with this group on the phone. I initially spoke to Shaun. Shaun was unexcited to have a job in the economic climate we find ourselves in and apparently he found no comfort waking up today as a citizen of The United States of America. Maybe he just has no joy, you know, an ever burning source from within himself to sustain him during lean times. So, after 2 minutes of Shaun I asked and he confirmed that he was not on the military side. I expressed my desire to be transferred there and even told him why. The problem was he wanted me to give him my full SSN over a cell phone and I would not do it. That information is very important and could easily be intercepted off of a cell phone. Besides this, I did not start at the university today. I have been giving the last 4 of my SSN along with my name and other pieces of verifiable information. Now today for some unknown reason, the university has to have my full SSN even if it means giving it over an unsecured line. Identity theft is sometimes conducted by intercepting cell calls.

So, Shaun transfers me to Sholanda who is again, not on the military side, and most likely one of Shaun's peers. Sholanda was likely listening in on the call when I was doing the post call survey about the service I received today. She also most likely disconnected my from that call because the comments I made would be traceable to her via telephony. Maybe one day I will write on telephony. Anyway...

So let's recap why I am so angry, I am contacting my university to handle important financial information and the staff gives me the run around or hangs up on me purposely. I am not even being ugly to them. I just want to get my documents submitted in a timely manner. But the staff at the university that taught me ethics classes has people on it's payroll who would hang up on the most prized possession of the university, the student. Even after I told them I wanted to be transferred to military people they still refused to show respect to a soldier. I do not imagine they just treated me the way they did because the sun was out of position. They treated me this way because they are lazy, unappreciative and disrespectful to the university, it's soldier students and the nation that they served and or fought for.

The saddest thing is this is not the first time I have experienced this situation. It is shameful and reflects poorly upon the university. Those involved in such behavior should be shown the door and told "you're fired!"

Hello everyone. My topic for today is information. Accurate information to be exact. I am currently reading, as a part of my college composition course, Academic and Professional Sources and where to find them. I am all for sources but, the news and information we receive on a daily basis is mostly opinion. For instance, my wife watches The View frequently and I hate the show. To me it is a ridiculous show. At least the hot topics portion of the show.
The problem I have personally is that none of the information we get is fact based. It is full of opinion. How many times have you watched a news program or televised discussion and almost every word is "I think", "I believe" or "I feel". This is not news but opinion. Too many times we as Americans take the opinion of others and make it the news.
If you watch the evening news the first 5 minutes is news and the remaining portion of the program is fluff. For all of our education and knowledge we seem to not know much. Watch Jay Leno, the portion where he goes out and asks people questions like "who is on the twenty dollar bill?" 9 out of ten people get this question wrong. You would think with our insatiable appetite for money and wealth we would know who is on the currency we crave, yet we do not.
Ask a person a question and oftentimes the answer will start with, "I think".
New and information have morphed into opinion. This is sad. It is sad because it is a reflection of our public education system. I say this because only in America can you graduate from high school and not be able to read the diploma they have received I say all this to say money can't buy everything and it is important to get news, not opinion. One cannot make an informed decision on the opinion of someone else. One must have access to reliable news to be able to give an informed opinion or a knowledgeable answer. As with anything else we may love or be fond of accurate news should be loved also. You cannot give an opinion about North Korea for instance if one cannot locate North Korea on a map. One cannot keep up with the workings of government if one does not know who is heading the various departments within the government.
Do you know who is on that ten dollar bill that you lied to get?

Hello everyone! Welcome to the reallyreallife blog. I will be using this forum to address various issues. Topics from the headlines, my really real life and many other subjects. I want to thank everyone in advance for reading my material. I hope to make it enjoyable, informative, fun or peaceful. Perhaps a little bit of everything on some days. Of course I want to welcome all of my classmates from Composition II Today I will touch briefly on the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

I think it is shameful that with all the combined education from the leadership at BP, Halliburton and the like, they not only did not have a verifiable plan, by verifiable, I mean one that was tested and confirmed as workable, to deal with an instance like this. They had to have know that eventually an accident would occur. Why did they not put a verifiable plan in place?

It seems that these companies, and others like them have inherited a government trait. One of reaction, never proactive. Here is a simple solution to the whole problem of future oil spills. Not only will the offending company clean up at their own cost, they will do it to federal standards and be responsible for all cost. No more clean up on the cheap.

I would also fine the offender 5 dollars per gallon of leaked oil. Considering the current cost of oil, this is a bargain. These companies will surely ensure that at 5 dollars per gallon they do not lose 50 thousand gallons in our waters. This, along with the cleanup cost will force these companies to have an effective and verifiable plan in place to deal with future events like this disaster in the Gulf.