Here Come the Holidays

Yet again, the holiday season is nearly upon us. The next few weeks are shaping up to be really busy for me. I'm going to see my folks in upstate New York the week after Thanksgiving. I haven't seen them in a couple of years, so it will be nice to catch up with them. The downside is, they live in the middle of nowhere. As in, your cell phone doesn't work until you get come down off the mountain and drive 20 minutes towards society nowhere. Yeah... I'm definitely more a city person and the idea that there will be no late night Thai restaurant within 60 miles of my location is quite a frightening thought.

I purchased a ticket this week to get away to Honolulu the weekend before the Christmas holidays. I always like going to Hawaii in December because it's not very crowded and you get a nice break before the hustle and bustle of everything. Probably the greatest thing about working for United in San Francisco was the great Hawaii layovers we used to get. I was fortunate to spend a lot of time on Oahu and the outer islands. I also lived there for a stint back in the early 90s. It was a lot of fun. I'm looking forward to relaxing and catching up with some of my friends over there.

A neighboring agency of my job is short staffed, so they have asked for some volunteers to work overtime in their city. I met with the higher ups there this week and it looks like I will be training next week to cover some shifts there. Their systems are identical to my current job's, so the transition process should not prove too difficult. December is looking like it's going to be a busy month for me in general. I was going to put up a tree, but I'm not sure how much I will be home to enjoy it! Maybe I'll just get a Charlie Brown tree.

I ordered a sectional sofa back in July, target date for delivery was September 1st. It is now November 18th and no sign of my couch. I have to call the showroom and inquire about it. They always mumble something about issues in China and push the date back six to eight weeks. If I get my sofa by Christmas, I would be ecstatic.

My friend Brian and I saw Borat this week. I'm still not quite sure what to think. Certain scenes are so funny, I was in tears. It is very well done and yet parts of it are in very poor taste. The movie is called a "mockumentary". It follows the story of Borat, a journalist from Kazakhstan journeying to the United States to file a story. Borat is one of several characters that actor Sasha Baron Cohen has created for his Ali G Show, seen here in the U.S. on HBO. Cohen rarely appears out of character and does very little press, preferring to let his work and his characters speak for him. In his personal life, he is Jewish and quite religious from reports. That being said, the anti-Semitic portions of this film were quite horrific and inexcusable in my opinion. He also pushed a few buttons with me in the wrestling scene between Borat and his manager. Yes we all need to have a sense of humor about things (and as a gay man, I can appreciate this), but in this case I felt he took things a bit too far. The humor was over the top, crude, and did not always find its mark. In the middle of the film, Brian made the remark "Oh my God. This is making me really uncomfortable." It definitely is not a film for the faint of heart.

That's what's up with me. Hope you all have a great weekend.

Cuidate.