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"When I taught my kids to take in strays I didn't mean humans." - Kat regarding the dating choice of one of her kids.

Tuesday, 3-28-23: National news stories that suck ass.
I don't watch the news on the weekends because I work so much at the restaurant. I catch some of the headlines during the week on most days, but not always and who knows tomorrow morning I might not watch any news. When my awesome wife and I don't work late we bivouac at a decent-ish hour and I'm up around 0600-0630. When I get up that early I turn on the TV and watch some news. Weather, sports, stocks, headlines, etc. Today revielle was 0636 so I caught some of the headlines, and they all suck. A lot.

There was another school shooting. A "transgender" person took an assault rifle into a religious school and killed both kids and teachers. They said it's the 13th school shooting this year. One a week on average. OMG WHAT A BUNCH OF CRAP! All I wanna know is why? Why do people go shoot up schools and, most important of all, why are these stories the FUCKING HEADLINE STORIES OF THE DAY?! I enjoy watching sports, and when some dumbass fan decides to run onto the field do you know what the broadcasters do? They cut to the announcers, they cut to commercials, and they DO NOT SHOW THE DUMBASS WHO IS BEING A 'TARD.

SO I wonder why don't we do the same thing with these school shooters? Why does it have to be headline news all over the USA? I'm not saying don't report it at all, but maybe don't sensationalize it and spend the first half hour of the broadcast on it? What do you think putting it all over the national news does? It encourages others to claim their 15 minutes of demented fame of course. The headline news anchors always call in experts who talk all about the shooters (who more often than not end up dead when they kill a bunch of people and then themselves) and it sorta morbidly glorifies them. Does it inspire other misanthropes to try the same thing? It seems like the only reasonable answer is "Of course it does!"

Every time there is a mass school shooting, or any shooting, lawmakers get all riled up and want to talk about taking away guns. As if people can't get guns anywhere if they are taken away or banned. How's that working out for cocaine? Taking weapons away won't solve a damn thing.

Also, why was it reported that the shooter was transgender? I don't even know what transgender means, but I thought it meant someone who was once a male becoming a female or the opposite? People have "Pronouns" and whatnot now so I'm just lost and it's hard to keep track of. I don't give a shit if a guy wants to dress up as a chick. Maybe when I was single many years ago I would have cared because hitting on a chick with a dick = WHAT A BUNCH OF CRAP! It never happened to me, but I'd be fuckin' pissed off if I was mackin on a girl and then it turned out that girl was not really a girl. Thankfully I don't have to worry about that anymore, ever, because I'm never mackin' and attackin' ever again. I got a wife and married up so if I ever get hauled on I'll just drink and play Nintendo until I check out. It's all bonus-level at this point anyway, and probably the best of times happened pre-Covid anyway.

^It's all been downhill since then, and that was only 4 years ago. What a bunch of crap! I still have a hot wife, though.

Speaking of Nintendo, there's a new Super Mario Bros movie coming out soon. I saw the trailer, and it seems to be an animated movie along the lines of Wreck-It-Ralph. I remember a live-action Super Mario movie from many years ago that was ten pounds of shit stuffed into a 5-pound bag, but I never watched the whole thing so maybe it wasn't truly horrible. Guy looks for reviews of that movie online, and guy finds this:

29% Fresh on Rotten Tomatoes. That seems pretty bad! I dunno, and I don't care.

While on the topic of 80s movies, The Neverending Story was on TV about a week and a half ago. Man, what a fuckin' awesome movie. If you don't adore that movie then I hate you. I probably hate you anyway, but I'll hate you a little more. I'm hoping for a big, sweeping, epic remake of The Neverending Story that stays more faithful to the book, but I won't hold my breath on that. I love the 1984 movie, it's one of the best of all-time, but it's not aligned to the book at all and in the book a lot more amazing and interesting things happen to Bastien and Atreju.

I'm guessing if it ever is remade it would fail. Netflix managed to fuck up The Dark Crystal, and Disney managed to fuck up Willow. I didn't see the Disney Willow series, but it was cancelled after one season because it wasn't very good. What a bunch of crap! The Dark Crystal was hauled on as well. It was incredibly flawed, but it wasn't all horrible. I didn't care for the ending, and without a season 2 to fix it I can only call it a bunch of crap!

I got way off topic when I was here to write about the shitty headline news of the day. Another top story: Trump maybe going to jail because he pokerized a porn star and then paid her ass off in a settlement. All I wanna know is why? Why do rich, married white guys do that? I guess it's not specific to race, but it seems the rich white guys get caught for it the most. I think Trump is a total piece of shit, but I want him back as president because Biden is even worse. It sucks Trump cheated on his wife (probably a lot), but I don't see why a special counsel needs to convene and possibly arrest his ass? It's a ridiculous double-standard, and it's a bunch of crap! If Trump is a 1 on a scale of 1-10 then Biden is a zero.

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Monday, 3-27-23: An easy day today? Oh, my first outdoor jog of the year.
It's about 45 degrees and sunny outside at this early afternoon hour. I worked this morning on some admin and the usual whatnot in the office, some tax stuff, and then I scooted out of there to do a bank deposit and to stop by the post office to send a packet to a client. Most of my clients either come into the office or do totally remote, digital pdf download of documents. However, I have had a couple this year who still use the regular USPS. I'm home now, most likely (hopefully!) for the day, and I went for my first outdoor jog of the season not long ago. I only went one mile, time 8:35, but my slow-ass made in the whole way without having to stop and walk. I'm not in great cardio shape now so I'll take that as a sort-of win.

Thankfully I have been playing rball once or twice a week on average lately, and when I work every weekend at the restaurant I get lots of steps in. Probably too many steps because on Sundays I feel wasted like DOc-J and 8-Ball from Full Metal Jacket. Yesterday I was so tired I just went to bed after I got off work, and I took a nap from later PM to suppertime. Kat and I watched a movie called Knock at the Cabin Door (I'd give it a 5/10, very odd movie and typical fare from M. Knight Shamalyan) and then I was asleep again not long after that.

My tank was totally empty, and it didn't help matters when I got not enough sleep late Sat night and showed back up to work yesterday morning only to have my wife not be so awesome and start giving me a hard time for spending too much time in the dish area and not enough time elsewhere. Sales have been incredible on weekends lately, and Saturday night was no different. We had an event out back, and the restaurant got really busy later in the night so that creates hundreds, literally hundreds, of dishes per hour. One dishwasher can't do it all, and until we hire more help I'll have to jump in. I was going nonstop all shift, and I didn't need my wife giving me a bunch of shit for it. What a bunch of crap!

Normally Kat and I work very well together, but it's a classic example of why many couples fail at it. Sometimes we fail at it as well, and last fall it almost ended our marriage when I tried to quit. However, I couldn't quit because there's no one else to do the jobs there that I do. Not to be cocky, I can't do a lot of stuff there, but the things I can do I can handle better than anyone else on staff. That will be the case for a long time to come so if my wife wants to take a verbal dump on me for the way I run the insanely busy shifts then it makes me want to quit and go do something else.

We did hire on a bouncer for Friday and Saturday nights, and Kat has scheduled me extra help when it is available so that does give me a sense of relief. Unfortunately the help isn't always available so we're hoping to hire a couple more people. We've had the HELP WANTED sign out for a few weeks with very little in the way of applicants. What a bunch of crap! All I wanna know is why? Why don't people want to work these days?

I probably worked 16 hours Saturday. I had some tax stuff to work on during the day, I had to help cook at one point mid-afternoon when it got busy, and of course I worked all night. I locked up at 0230 late Saturday night and didn't fall asleep for quite a while after that. When things go well and I have the help I need I can lock up closer to 0200, but Saturday night I had to take care of the event room and help with 1000000 (slight exaggeration) dishes. It's not only mugs, shot-glasses, and plates but it's also kitchen pots and pans, bar mats, and everything in between. When we close the kitchen the dish area really gets piled on for a little while. Then, when the place is packed until closing, dish area gets dumped on all over again with another heavy round of dishes.

I was running on fumes for the time I was at work yesterday. I had to cover dish for about 3 hours, some old guy started to die on us so they called 911, and the draft beer system started to fail. What a bunch of crap! I gave the old geezer orange juice and then went back to washing dishes. Someone else was on the phone with 911 so I'm hoping the dispatch told them to give him juice. Don't know, don't care. He didn't die so good enough. Yeah, that's how crazy my life is lately. A guy almost died and it was routine, back to doing dishes. What a bunch of crap!

For the draft beer system, turns out you need both CO2 and nitrogen to run what we have. Is that standard? The CO2 was fine, but the nitrogen was empty and no one thought it was necessary to change out that tank. I didn't know nitrogen ran all 12 of our lines. What a bunch of crap! I thought it was only there for the Guinness. Yeah, and I own a fuckin' bar.

^Awarded to myself for not knowing our draft system well enough. What a bunch of crap!

I think I'm taking the rest of the afternoon off. Maybe? Hopefully! It's only 1315 so that's not bad. Revielle was 0500 today, and I woke up feeling a lot better. Good enough to do yoga and go for that little jog. I didn't plan to get up so early, but I'm glad I did. We both racked out hard last night so I feel well-enough rested.

Oh, my last bootleg update was earlier in the day 1.5 weeks ago, St. Patrick's Day. We crushed it that night, and we set out all-time record for daily sales not only for the day ($10,700) but also for the entire weekend. Saturday the 18th was PACKED as well, and both Friday and Saturday nights this past weekend were great sales as well. We might make slightly more than we spend this month, but that's not a given yet. It'll be damn close, and if it doesn't happen this month I think it will next month. This month there are 5 Thursdays, the day payroll comes out for the week, so that might put us in the red for the month just due to a technicality. If we looked at the past 4 weeks we'd be up a bit so I'll call that a win.

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Friday, 3-17-23: Will we set our record today on St. Patrick's Day?
I'm not Irish, and I don't really give a crap about St. Patrick's Day. However, it's a mega-drinking day for many people and our bar is going to be PACKED later. I think it will be the busiest day we've ever had. Maybe? Hopefully! It's around 1400 now, mid-afternoon, and so far things aren't too crazy. We did open at 0900 instead of the usual 1200, and there are Irish-themed specials. Guinness 20oz drafts for $4 each, boiled dinner, bangers and mash, etc. The boiled dinner = what a bunch of crap! Corned beef hash = CORNED BEEF TRASH.

If you like corned beef I hate you. I probably hate you anyway, but I'll hate you a little more. I don't loathe the taste of corned beef, but it's too salty and it looks like it's 50% animal fat. Plus cabbage is just terrible. WHo thought eating cabbage was a good idea? I'll eat it if there is nothing else and I'm wasting away so I guess during the potato famines of many years past in Ireland there probably wasn't much else to eat.

^WHAT A BUNCH OF CRAP! Just give me a burger. (I do like the carrots and potatos.)

All I wanna know is why? Why is it called CORNED BEEF? Is it infused with actual corn? It does not look like it has corn in it, and I never taste corn. However, I rarely eat it so that last part is more theory. I should Google the answer to that thank you Interweb:

It's actually pretty simple — corned beef got its name from the dry curing process used to preserve the meat. A slice of beef was covered in “corns” (large, coarse pellets of salt), which would draw out the moisture and prevent the growth of bacteria.

Okay, so it should be called SALTED BEEF. Gotcha. Friggin' weirdos hehehe.

Paddy Murphy's, an Irish bar downtown Bangor, opened at 0500. Hahahaha. Supposedly the cops had to break up some kind of fight there before they even opened what a bunch of crap! Hopefully there are no fights in out place tonight. We do have extra help and a bouncer for tonight, and we might put him on every Friday and Saturday soon because weekends get VERY busy. Tonight will be epic not only because it's St. Patrick's Day but also because it's on a Friday and it's also our 2-year anniversary of our public grand opening.

I've already been at work for a few hours already today. Since it wasn't a crazy busy start I worked on some drop-off tax stuff. I was incredibly busy yesterday doing taxes, and I had several different clients at the desk. I did that on purpose so I didn't have to schedule any in-person clients today or tomorrow. I could squeeze one or two in tomorrow if necessary, but I might be beat up from the feet up after what should be a really crazy busy night tonight. Plus we have a couple smaller events tomorrow so I'll be at work a little extra for those ones. I'm only taking a relatively small break today so I can update this bootleg site that no one ever reads and lift a few weights downstairs. Who knows, I might jog a mile on the treadmill also. It's almost the time of year when I can start jogging outside, but not quite yet. We got a few inches of heavy, wet snow Tuesday night so that's still melting away. When I do jog outside it'll be BRUTAL since I've only used the treadmill for about one mile in the past two months. What a bunch of crap! I have been better with yoga and lifting weights lately, though.

Alright turds, all two of you who read this trash-pile of a website, I gotta go do other things now. Happy anniversary to our bar/restaurant!

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Tuesday, 3-07-23: Level-up sales, level-up in the gym.
I had a chance to compare our business sales for the first two months of this year vs. the first two months of last year, and the results are great. We're not making money yet, but we're on the right track. We have more ads running, we've gotten a lot of positive buzz in the community, and the event room is really ripping lately. Lots of bookings, lots of inquiries, a variety of different groups coming to our restaurant/bar for big events and group parties.

I spend more time than ever responding to phone calls and e-mails regarding our beautiful banquet space. I did a showing Saturday at noon, and the people are coming tomorrow to pay a deposit for an upcoming sorority formal-thing. A bunch of drunk 21/22-year old college chicks running around the place. What could possibly go wrong?! It could end up as a train wreck, but 50-75 of them are coming so let's see how it goes. It's actually the SECOND big sorority party we have on the calendar for this spring. Those could be two very interesting Saturdays. Bitches better behave or they will all have to ggggggggggggeeeeeeeeeeeeeetttttttttttttttt oooooooooouuuuuuuuuuuuuttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttttt!

25 years ago I would have paid money to work that shift, but now I'm only looking forward to it because of the revenue it will likely generate. Where there are a bunch of women the men always seem to follow so let's see how full the bar gets for those ones. Hell, the bar gets packed lately regardless, as long as we have karaoke, food, and drinks. (and we do!) Weekends are nuts at our place to the point we've tried to use the event room more and more for overflow. We can't always use it for overflow when there are private parties and when no staff are available to work it. We need at least one employee back there to keep an eye on things, and in a perfect world we put a bartender on as well as a DJ.

^Banquet room = key to making a profit in the future.

So the place is really starting to level-up this year, and sales have been up 18.5%. More impressive are food sales: up 38.4%. Oh Jesus, hell ya! I didn't look at event-room rental, but that is up as well and by A LOT. The most impressive stat of all is the fact we are open 9 fewer hours per week. At this time last year we opened at 1200 on Tues, Wed, and Thurs and now we don't open until 1600. However, we did add a breakfast "brunch" Saturday mornings so now we open at 0900 instead of 1200 that day. Labor is down a tad as compared to last year, but we still aren't breaking even yet. Heat and electric this time of year = what a bunch of crap!

I've also been leveling-up my gym use lately. I'm not using it as much as I did years ago, but I'm very pleased with where I have been with it. I used the downstairs gym 4 times last week, and the total time I spent lifting weights last week was better than it's been in almost 3 years. OMG! I don't lift as heavy as I did in the past, but I don't give a shit my body tells me if I'm where I want to be with it. Gavin and I played three epic racquetball games Sunday, best games we've maybe ever had, and I'm glad I squeezed it in around work. I wanted to play Saturday, but it snowed 6" so I had to clean up the driveway and then there was no more precious... precious time before I had to go to work. What a bunch of crap!

We actually had three snow events last week. No ridiculous cold, just quite a bit of snow. About 4.5" last Tuesday, 5" Thursday, and 6" Saturday. All three snow events were ongoing during our open hours at the restaurant so sales were down some during that time, but we more than made up for it on the good days and we had a GREAT week of sales. On Saturday morning and into the midday we had a steady, sometimes heavy snow. Sales sorta sucked and then the snow ended and it was game-on. We got so busy that night we could barely keep up. Weekends are really tough when it's packed for hours on end and people are drunk and stupid. Thankfully there are never fights, and when people get hot-headed we wash them out before it can turn into a meelee. My awesome wife is really the best at breaking up would-be fights. She solved a couple of them Friday night so I'm glad she was there. We also have enough regulars who are willing to jump in to break up anything before it can actually happen.

The tax business is going steady and is roughly half-over. I had a few drop-offs yesterday so today I got through most of those. Yesterday we had contractors at the restaurant cleaning the kitchen hoods and installing new lights for the back hall. That back hall looks GREAT with the new lights, and I think if I stay back there too long I'll get a tan hehehe. We got rid of the old fluorescent and now have LED. Eventually the entire place will have all LED lights, but not for a while. Everything costs precious... precious money and takes even more precious... precious time.

I talked to Dad on the phone not long ago, a quick 15-min call. I gotta time my calls around Tucker Carlson Tonight on Fox News hehehe. I know they both watch it at 2000. They need a friggin DVR so they can just record it! I did catch the beginning of Tucker tonight, but I usually don't watch it because I'm either at work or hanging out with my awesome wife. I do lean hard into their political views (F.U. BIDEN), but some of their stuff is borderline too much even for me.

Alright losers, all two of you who read this bootleg site, I'm gonna go down to the bar in a few minutes. Kat works tonight for a couple more hours, and at times a Tues or a Thurs feels like what our weekend used to be since we work so much on the actual weekend. I haven't drank that much lately, but I *almost* had a hangover last Friday. We had a good time Thursday night down at the bar, the first time both my awesome wife and I have been down there together as customers in a long time, and it was worth it. Tonight she's working, but I don't want to sit here and watch TV I'd rather go see her for a bit and hang out. It's never packed on a Tuesday so we'll see how it goes...

Goonies never say die!