Soul-Devouring Worry
¤ Gradual acceptance.

So at work, my home stand makes cotton candy, the only place they make it in the stadium, and in addition to that we have peanuts and cracker jacks, bottled water and lemonade.  After years of not having a freezer [just a big walk in fridge that is mostly used for dozens of kegs of beer, which is where the stadium (and most restaurants, bars, etc) makes their real money] they put a small freezer in this year, so we could keep various types of ice cream and vend those on warm days.  It went well the first home stand, but the second one we noticed that nothing was staying cold enough, and the freezer couldn't go below 28 or so.  Which is fine for a fridge, but not cold enough for ice cream, which was slowly melting.  Forcing us to eat a bunch since it wasn't quite good enough to sell.  What a pity. *cough*

However, at some point in the last few weeks, when there weren't any events, the power was turned off and then back on, since when we looked in the freezer yesterday and today, everything had clearly thawed and then refrozen.  That doesn't sound so bad, but it was way too thawed, and for way too long.  All these cups of ice cream malts were either half empty, like evaporated, or else full of green and white mold.  Very icky.

There were three full cardboard cartons of them, 12 in each, and the outsides of the cartons were literally green with the mold, and the bottom of the freezer had about an inch of green goo.  Now crystallized by the once-again cold freezer.

In addition, the cold element on top of the freezer was covered in like 6 inches of frost, but very light fluffy stuff, almost like snow.  It was sort of pretty, and yes, snowballs were fashioned and tossed. As was about $300 worth of ice cream, at least going by the prices we'd charge to sell it.  I'm sure you could get it at a store for about $75, and buying it wholesale the stadium probably paid $25. But it was funny to see so much going to waste due to someone turning off the power, probably to save a few bucks on electricity.  Good call there.

The worse part was that we threw it all in the trash can before the game, and by about the 4th inning it was all thawed out, and as it was mostly mold, it was reeking.  They dragged the can outside the stand where they couldn't smell it, but then every time I walked up to get more cotton candy to smell, I was literally holding my breath as I passed it.

This segues into the second work story.  One of the guys there (naming no names, for obvious reasons) actually works.  I mean like voluntarily; when there is stuff that needs doing, he does it.  So most of the time while the other guys are sitting around doing nothing, or eating nachos or Cracker Jacks or whatever, he's making cotton candy, or cleaning up a machine, or mixing up 100lbs of sugar with the cotton candy mix stuff, etc.

It all seems very common sense, I mean it all needs to be done at some point, so why not just do it and get it over with?  I assume people do that in their own lives, even the lazy type of people who work at the stadium. But they sure as hell don't do it at work, unless/until they absolutely have to, or a manager or level supervisor orders them do to so.

So this guy who does work did all the clean up of the freezer once the ice cream was trashed, including hosing it out, washing off all of the racks, etc.  He was just finishing that up as I was about to leave, and as he finished that he left.  The other two stand help guys, who were getting paid just the same money and had done approximately nothing all night, as far as I could tell, (and that's how it always is on slow nights there) were marveling at how the other guy actually did work.

"Damn, that fool be working!" was one quote.  And "fool" isn't anything pejorative, it's just slang, same as saying "nigga" or "man" or "guy" or "motherfucker".  Select the one that's most appropriate for your work environment.  At my work "motherfucker" is probably the most often used, though "fool" or "bitch" would be a close second, with "nigga" not that popular since there's usually just one black guy working in my area.  Lots of black guys it would be the default (for them to use, anyway) and with none of them it would be an occasional option for the Whites/Mexican/Asians who were there.

Anyway, I said, somewhat hypothetically and philosophically, "Well, he gets bored just sitting around doing nothing, and the work needs to be done at some point, so I guess he'd rather just do it and have it done."

Both of the other guys just shook their heads in amazement at this pronouncement, as if it was something they had never and could never imagine. Like I'd suggested something utterly improbable; say that he was doing the work in order to build up good karma so he would be reincarnated as a wildebeest.

This sort of attitude is the expected in menial type jobs, as far as I've ever seen.  And the stadium work is very easy, not tiring or awful, there is almost no boss supervision, and pays a lot more than minimum wage. Imagine what it's like at a fast food restaurant or Wal-Mart or record store, for example.  Remind me to never own or run any business that depends upon the hard work and competency of people who don't want to be working there, and aren't paid directly based on how much work they do.  I'd go crazy in a month.

Xmen 2 is opening today, and the earlier reviews are quite positive.  Amazingly so, for an action movie, with 23/27 positive thus far, according to RT. I've read a few of them, but I'm trying to avoid any spoilers, so I'm skimming parts or avoiding ones by poor critics, since those are inevitably half synopsis and one-third second guessing. A good one with a couple of very minor spoilers is from the Philadelphia Weekly.

I liked this recap of I which segues into why II is better.

Bryan Singer's surprise smash 2000 adaptation pounded hard at the material's subversive subtext. But he also managed to ground the fantastic elements in a workaday, recognizable reality, and Singer coaxed a few affecting performances from his (mostly) game cast.

The only catch: It wasn't a very good movie. Rushed, overpopulated, top-heavy with exposition and reeking of budgetary shortcuts, X-Men seemed more like a promising television pilot than an actual motion picture. It was the kind of flick just decent enough to make you yearn for a sequel.

Well, that second installment is finally here, and though still terribly crowded (boasting more than a dozen major players) X2: X-Men United nonetheless represents a significant improvement over the original in nearly every way.

The stakes are higher, the production values more lavish, Halle Berry has less screen time and Singer finally comprehends the importance of tossing in a kick-ass action sequence just before every reel change.

Another review that I found interesting is this one, on Yahoo.  It's very fan boy-esque, but that's what makes it useful, since the author compares how the characters are presented in the movie(s) to how they were in the comic books.  Who is older, younger, stronger or weaker in powers, how their relationships have been changed, etc.  For someone (like myself) who liked the X-Men, but hasn't read any comic books since he was like 13, it's interesting to get a refresher course on the characters and their relationships and such.  Plus he does it without movie spoilers, which must have taken some clever wording.

I am not dying to see it, but I would like to at some point.  I was going to see it with Malaya right after it opened, but since my visit to her has been backed up from the 6th until the 20th, that's out.  Also she wants to see it with some friends, one of whom is leaving the country right after it opens, so she'll see it before me.  Since she wants to see it again with me, I think I'll just wait and go see it when I visit her later in the month.  Plus this way I'll have a movie to see with her, and she'll forgive me for going to see The Matrix 2 the night it opens, rather than waiting a few days to see it first time with her.

So sorry to break your collective heart, but no X-men 2 review here any time soon. I know everyone comes here for my entertainment reviews, right?

ow here is an article I simply had to comment on. It's got weird sex type stuff, penis discussion, and let's me segue into female sexual preferences.  It's basically what this website exists for, really.

Foreskin or not?

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Circumcised men appear to have the same degree of penis sensitivity as men who are uncircumcised, a new study suggests -- in a finding that will probably just add fuel to the fire of a controversial subject debated for years.

The findings are to be presented Tuesday by Dr. Arnold Melman at a meeting of the American Urological Society in Chicago.

"We demonstrated that there are no significant differences in penile sensation between circumcised and uncircumcised men in both patients with and without erectile dysfunction," said Melman in a prepared statement.

So how did they actually test this? They don't say precisely in the article, but they do give some details.  For one thing, they don't say if they're doing it on erect of flaccid penises, which would seem to be an almost essential component of the test.  I mean who cares how sensitive their penis is when it's soft?  In fact, wouldn't you (assuming you are male and/or have a penis) prefer that it was less sensitive when soft, you could more easily ignore when it was itchy, rubbed on your pants, got stuck when you sat down and crossed your legs, etc?

That can probably go for when hard also, since the most common male sexual problem is being unable to hold back and make it last longer.  One could easily argue that less sensitivity is a good thing.  Anyway:

In the current investigation, Melman's team evaluated the penile sensitivity among 43 uncircumcised men and 36 circumcised men through a variety of methods, including vibration, pressure, spatial perception and warm and cold thermal thresholds. Both groups contained men with and without erectile dysfunction.

In uncircumcised men, the foreskin was pulled back during the sensitivity testing procedures.

The investigators found no statistically significant differences in sensitivity between the two groups of men, regardless of whether they had erectile dysfunction.

Okay, this ruins it all. So all they were testing was how sensitive just the actual head of the penis was, probably when soft.  That's pointless, being as the foreskin is said to have as many nerve endings as almost the entire rest of the penis.

It's like testing female labia sensitivity on women with and without a clitoris, and numbing the clitoris on women who have it so as not to throw off the data.  Or testing recipes on people with and without taste buds, while not letting them actually eat anything.

In theory the foreskin is there to protect the penis from damage, since humans can't retract it back into a sheath, as most animals do. And in theory a lifetime of the penis rubbing against clothing takes off some of the sensitivity.  However this study seems to refute that.  However, since the foreskin itself is the source of a vast amount of the pleasure and sensitivity, who really cares if the rest of the penis is more or less sensitive?  Obviously the foreskin being added in will always make an uncut penis far more sensitive.

I'm speaking hypothetically here, since I'm like most American men. 

The current policy of the American Academy of Pediatrics is that the potential medical benefits of male circumcision are not substantial enough to recommend that all boys become circumcised.

Around three-quarters of American-born men in the U.S. are circumcised, although that number appears to be declining rapidly in some regions of the country.

The other issue is appearance, and what your desired sexual partner prefers. I dunno about gay men on this topic, but in my adult life I've asked about a dozen women, and almost all of them like the look/feel of a circumsized man. I have never heard from a woman who prefers a foreskin. At best, three of four of the dozen I've talked to didn't come right out and say they hated it, while the other eight or nine immediately admitted to vastly preferring a circumcised cock. I can think of at least three women who told me in no uncertain terms that they would never give an uncircumcised guy fellatio, under any circumstances.

I suppose this is cultural and learned; I.E. those women grew up in the US seeing only circumcised cocks, and that's what they have come to like and to expect, so when they see one that's got a weird extra flap of skin on it, they are appalled.

I just asked a woman (who I knew already hated them) how she thought other women felt.

All my friends would cringe at the words "non-circumcised." You already know my opinion on the matter. Its our society.

So yeah, it's a form of mutilation and has no medical need in this modern era of good personal cleanliness, but since hardly any men complain about their sex life in terms of not being able to come quickly enough, will you really miss it?  And anyway, what good does more feeling in your cock do if you can never get laid?  I guess it would make for really easy wanking, at least.

I'm not going to get into the whole weird fetish thing of guys who want theirs back, and have surgery or use clamps and weights to stretch the skin on their shaft down over the head, since that's just creepy. Not that that usually stops me, I'll admit. But that's a subject for another day.  Probably with photographic evidence, just to warn you now.

<-- Yesterday  --  Tomorrow -->
Archives Page