Archive for May, 2006
5/2/2006
Why am I still up? It’s because when I got home earlier I just collapsed on the bed and was out like a light, then got up three hours later. Haven’t even showered yet. Gross, I know. I’ll be showering right after I’m done with this post.
Things that happened yesterday (and today so far):
During break at work, I was outside with the geek crew (all us dudes that work recycling computers all day) and some of the locals started bitching about Florida, saying things like “It’s too hot here” and “The jobs don’t pay enough” and so on. I chimed in a few times stating that New England isn’t exactly a walk in the park either, but they were convinced otherwise.
It’s kind of funny, actually. These guys wanted cold weather and wanted to wear snow jackets and wanted the things New England has. All I had to say was “Hey man, you can have it. All of it. Go ahead.” I said this without hesitation.
And never mind the fact that you’d have to get a job that pays $6000 more a year just to equal what you get for take-home pay in Florida.
Quick math on that using $30,000 a year job ($15 an hour) as an example:
Connecticut has state income tax in addition to federal tax. A single person working and living in CT gets 26% taken out of each check on average. 30k a year is actually $22,200 a year. A small one-bedroom apartment is $800 a month on the low end, totaling $9600 a year. Take that away from what you make and you end up with $12600 take-home per year before tax refund. You are left with $969.23 in your pocket per month before other expenses like food, electric, heat, etc.
Florida has federal taxes only without state income tax. A single person working and living in FL gets around 18% (possibly less) taken out of each check. 30k a year is $24600 take-home. A small one-bedroom apartment is $500 a month on the low end, totaling $6000 a year. Take that away from what you make and you end up with $18600 take-home per year before tax refund. You are left with $1430.77 per month in your pocket before other expenses like food, electric, heat, etc.
In FL you keep $6000 a year more for the same job, living in the same apartment under the same conditions, more or less. This is why I said you’d have to make over $6000 more a year in CT just to see it in your check if going from FL to CT.
On the flip side (from CT to FL) it means that if you had a 30k job in CT, you could feasibly take a 24k job in FL and still make the same.
And you wonder why some New Englanders are so darned irritable. :-)
The most interesting complaint I heard about FL is that “The weather is the same all the time - it never changes!”
All I could think of was Sunny and warm with room temperatures outside most of the time is a bad thing?
Guess it depends on your point of view.
To each his own, I suppose.
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5/3/2006
Title of this entry comes from some famous evil villain that likes to shoot lightning from his fingers. Figure it out. ;-)
Cool link of the moment: Nerd Punk. Why? Because Brent plays synth and synth kicks ass.
I made the suggestion on We Are All Nerds (Brent’s message board) that maybe it’d be a good idea to get a bunch of solo synth artists together and release a free-for-download album on the internet, and I got the green light on it. Cool beans. It’ll be called “TekFuries” unless that changes later.
It would be so, so nice to get electronic music more known because, well, it’s just cool. No, I’ll never stop playing guitar, not to worry, but remember, I was a synth player way before I was ever a guitar player. :-)
related tags: electronic music, synth, brent simon, nerd punk
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5/3/2006
I think I have a cold coming on. Ugh. Well I guess it’s around that time because it’s been just about a year since my last one and I usually get at least one major cold a year.
I encountered yet another Florida oddity. When I bought my Day-Quil and Ny-Quil (I bought both), I actually had to present identification because one of them contains something that requires you to prove who you are. Every time I have to do the ID thing I really detest it because there’s yet another corporation who knows who I am.
And who is this loathesome company who requires you to present ID? CVS.
Hey CVS, I need Ny-Quil so I feel better. I’m not applying for a mortgage, you fucking idiots. The only reason I didn’t go elsewhere is because I was too tired and sick. Next time however, I’m not going anywhere near CVS.
–edit– 5/4/2006
A friend e-mailed and she said that all pharmacies are supposed to do this now for any medicine containing pseudoephedrine.
That fucking sucks.
related tags: CVS, pharmacy, privacy, cold, sick
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5/5/2006
At the place where I work we get a lot of stuff that comes in including odd things that arrive every so often. This is one of them, “modified” by one of the techs. I had the supervisor snap a pic so I could e-mail it to myself and then show here.
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5/5/2006
This was posted 4/3, but I just found out about it. In September, the Original Unaltered Trilogy of Star Wars will be released. Holy shit is that cool, and I’m so glad it’s actually going to happen. There have been people yapping about this for years.
The best part about the description is “..and yes, see Han Solo shoot first”.
Looks like all those guys with those “Han Shot First” t-shirts are gonna have to throw those out in September. ;-)
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5/6/2006
The power went out in my apartment this morning. I called it in and they said a crew was already working on it, so I decided to head out to mail some things out and took some pics.
More palm trees on the Courtney Campbell Causeway (say that five times fast).
What the CCC looks like on the GPS. I had to punch up the brightness to get this one to come out (and no, the display is never this dark, the camera just focused on the surrounding light instead of the GPS).
It’s cool when you see nothing but blue fields (water) on the GPS when you’re driving over a bridge or causeway.
A post office in Clearwater Florida. Note the palm trees. :-)
This is one of the “Evacuation Route” signs I was writing about before. I was able to find one right next to a Hess Express convenience store, so I stopped and snapped a photo of it.
I hope I never have to pay attention to one of these signs (eesh)…
The reason this is a neat photo is because you never see these in Connecticut or anywhere else in New England. The evac sign is the same as the “Brake for Moose - It could save your life” signs up in Maine. Both are indigenous (more or less) to the regions in which they’re placed.
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5/6/2006
Today marks two years of blogging on menga dot net. The first post with MT was on May 6th 2004. I say “with MT” because I was actually blogging with other software before the 6th, but no one cares about that. :-)
Even though this site moved locations a few times (and changed its look more times than I can remember), it always came back here and that is where it will stay, warts and all.
In other news.. after several requests (read: pestering) by friends to get a MySpace page, I finally got one. I know I’ve said a few choice words about MS in the past, like it’s the ass end of the internet, or better yet the puss filled boil on the ass of the internet, or how MS users like to hog bandwidth, but what can I say.. I guess I’m now part of that crapola. As SA says, the internet makes you stupid.
My MS page will in no way, shape or form replace this site. Not a chance in hell, because there’s no guarantee MS will be there tomorrow - but this site will.
–edit–
Yeah a link would be nice, wouldn’t it? Heh. http://www.myspace.com/richmenga
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5/7/2006
I live in a very small apartment so space is at a premium. When I consider buying anything I first have to take into account how much space it will take up. Recently I’ve entertained the idea of buying a television and was aiming for something either 19 or 20″ in size.
Tube televisions are out. Too bulky. So I checked out the LCD tv’s. These things are still way too expensive. It makes absolutely no sense that they are almost double the price of tube tv’s.
I just can’t see myself spending $400+ right now for a tv.
Fuggit. Not that important.
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5/8/2006
Random bits:
—
As of late the most popular page on this web site has been the middle finger cursor. There’s at least four or five search engine results for it a day if not more (and I’m too lazy to go count them). I’m quite certain the MySpace people get all sorts of disgruntled when they find out they can’t hotlink to it via CSS, which happens more often than you’d think. Sucks to be them I suppose.
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I have “driver’s tan”. My left arm has more color than my right, sorta/kinda. Well, I notice it.
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A reminder that I’m 31: At work today, I was making a joke to a co-worker (who happens to be 21) in an English accent and said something to the effect of “John and Paul go to Ft. Lauderdale”. Later on I asked him “Do you have any idea who John and Paul are?” and he said “No.” Maybe I should have said “John and Ringo“, but I still don’t think he would have known who those people are.
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Tip to anyone thinking about moving to Florida from New England: Car insurance here is HIGH - and I have a near-spotless driving record.
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I’m entertaining the idea of changing my site’s look again. Probably will. (grin)
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5/9/2006
In about fifteen minutes I will be heading to work. Today marks the first day I will be driving in the rain in Florida.
‘K, Rich, sure. Driving in the rain. What’s the big deal?
First of all, this is warm rain. That’s a rarity where I come from originally as the vast majority of rain up north is cold.
Secondly I get to see how the locals deal with driving in the wet stuff. Aside from a full blown hurricane, this is the worst driving conditions anyone has to deal with here.
I’m hoping that I’ll have nothing significant to report. (grin)
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