May 2013 – Unfiltered Thoughts

He’s Dead, Jim

“He’s dead, Jim”.

A doctor’s final diagnosis.
A catch-phrase of sorts.
Another reminder not to
Wear red in space.

Death is much easier on TV
Than in real life.
On TV, “He’s dead, Jim”
Then, a commercial.
Or the next scene.

In real life, it’s more complex.
Funerals, wills, codicils.
You find out who your friends are.
You spend inordinate amounts of time
On minutia.

I think it was much easier on TV.
It certainly was cleaner.
Also, the Enterprise only had a five-year mission.
If they went through probate every time
Bones said “He’s dead, Jim”,
It would have been a much longer series.

Paperwork

You know what’s fun?
Not paperwork.
Well, it’s fun to test new signatures,
Sometimes.

It’s amazing to me how much paper we create.
Some of it is useful.
Most of it is filed, then tossed away.
Maybe shredded, if nobody should see.

If nobody should see,
Did we really need it in the first place?

Tomorrow, go to the office,
Find one of your colleagues,
And say, “Do you have that form from last March?”

If they do,
Just say “Hoarder!”
And walk away.

Better yet, just send him an email.

Valuations Update

So, I got an email this morning telling me that the Appraisal District had a counter-offer for my appraisal. It’s over three grand less than the original – so, not as much as I had asked, but a small victory over the government.

I accepted it so I don’t have to go meet the three old men that own the tax calculations and appraisals in person.

I consider this a victory for the little guy. I’d like to thank my Dad for telling me his protest story or I never would have tried it.

On the other hand, I live in one of the lower-value houses in the cul-de-sac. My neighbors may look down on me now. I’ll get over it.

Protest works. We should protest more.

Family Style

We ate dinner at a “family style” restaurant.
This is an interesting concept.
I’m not sure who invented it.

To their marketing team, it means
You have platters of food and you serve yourself.

To someone who married an Italian, it means
You have a loud discussion between courses,
And a fight over dessert.

Oops.

We’ve been asked to find another restaurant.
I guess I shouldn’t have told the waitress
She was dressed like a slut.

Valuations

An interesting annual chore for a homeowner is reviewing the appraisal district’s valuation of your home. You would like a home to be worth a lot of money, so if you wanted to sell, you could turn a profit, buy a new house or retire to the Caribbean. However, you would like the appraisal district to think your house is worthless, since your taxes depend on their valuation.

In Dallas, the Dallas Central Appraisal District sends out letters every year, telling you how much they think your house is worth. They do this by pulling a number out of their ass when you purchase a home and then adding .001% below the maximum amount they can to your appraisal each year.

The State actually caps the amount your appraisal can rise over a period of time, but there are very good mathematicians at the appraisal district.

You can protest the appraisal, which basically means you have to tell the government your house is worth less than they think. Since they usually think it is worth less than the market does, this seems counter-productive, but it is worth the effort, since it may lower your taxes. For golfers or dieters, it will be easy, since you’re already used to giving a number much lower than reality.

My Dad actually went to the Appraisal District’s office one year to file a protest, and he is convinced they dropped their valuation just as a reward for his actually having found the office. Apparently, it was in the back of a fairly abandoned-looking strip mall in Garland, which is interesting since his house was in Dallas.

I was considering doing that, but it turns out it’s much easier now – you can file a protest online. This sounds easy, and it is, but there is a twist. You fill in the first page, choose a protest reason (“You said my house is worth too much!”) and click Next.

Then, comes the fun part. You get to upload your documentation. Since my documentation was my having said “Good Freakin’ Lord! They raise my taxes every year!”, I was stuck.

So, I pulled the valuations from all the houses on my street, threw out the higher valuations since they didn’t help my case, built a spreadsheet and showed my house is worth more than the median value on the street. Maybe it is, I say it isn’t. Mainly because that’s the only argument I can make. Plus, it’s in an Excel spreadsheet, so it must be true.

If you actually go through the pain of building a spreadsheet and uploading it to their website, the next page says you may be eligible for a settlement – how much do you think the house is worth?

Now, the first thought is to say the house is worth $15, but that’s not going to fly. So, since my Dad had said he thought they knocked ten grand off his valuation just because he managed to find their office, I took eight grand off mine just because I managed to create a spreadsheet..

We’ll see what happens.

Hotel Coffee

Sacred brown water,
Daily Water of Life,
Why do you taste so strange?

I brewed you so gently,
Just like coffee back home,
Yet your taste has changed.

Maybe it’s the water,
Fresh from the hotel tap,
Flowing almost brown alone.

Maybe it’s the coffee,
A little single-pot bag.,
From a brand completely unknown.

Still, it’s coffee. My coffee.
It’s enough to start my day.
At last, I can remember my name..

It will get me all the way downstairs.
To cups of restaurant coffee.
Then, I’ll be back in the game.

Eastbound

Off through the gloom,
To God’s Waiting Room.
I guess I should be glad
We’re not going to Buffalo.

Mr Disney bought a swamp,
Drained it with a Mickey Pump,
And now people go there.
On purpose.

(They’re at the gate next to me.)

No, that last verse didn’t rhyme,
I just didn’t take the time.
Ask Jimmy Buffett what rhymes
With ‘swamp”. He’s from there.

I worry about a State that ends in “Duh”.

Let Sleeping Dogs Lie

My dogs sleep a lot.
Sometimes, just for brief periods.
Would that be a cat nap?

I have said before we need to discover
How to harness all the energy stored
In all the napping dogs in the world.

I am trying to decide if I should wake my dog
Who is sleeping on the couch,
To tell him it’s time to go to bed.
It’s like waking a patient to take a sleeping pill.

Sleeping dogs hope you will let them lie.
Then, they can wander the house late at night.
I’ve noticed since my dogs started sleeping in their crates,
I haven’t been missing as many socks.

Not that I’m accusing anyone.
I’m sure it’s a coincidence.

Memorial Day

Thank you to all of those
Who gave their lives for a just cause.
This day was founded to remember you.

Thank you also to those
Who gave their lives for a cause that some
Didn’t think was just.
You were in a difficult situation.
You probably paid a higher price.

Your lives were not in vain.
You leave a legacy of making the ultimate sacrifice,
Even if some of your countrymen were annoyed.

I am not annoyed by your fighting for me,
No matter where the battle was.
Some of your Commanders were idiots.
You are heroes.

Thank you.

Funkytown

Just found Funkytown by Lipps, Inc. on #SoundHound for Android.
http://www.soundhound.com/?t=0379c77712baa43f313cd8cc2f139dda

I posted this more for myself than anyone else – it was playing on whatever generic radio station the dentist’s office was playing (seriously, there’s a reason KNON was voted Best Radio Station for Music two years running by the Dallas Observer), but hearing it gave me a flashback to college. Specifically, to Fiesta San Antonio and the beer stand I was working that was right next to the carnival ride that had this as the background music. Twelve hours of Funkytown a day, for four or five days. Wow.

I always assumed Lipps, Inc. was a one-hit wonder because some carny ran their van off a cliff after hearing Funkytown twelve hours a day at work while trying to sell hot dogs or get people to lose their life savings at the ring toss.