Last Year's Shots

Trials

Another View

Miniature rose - Hardy Boy

Bhut Jolokia - Ghost Chilli 

(Failed Attempt)

"O.M.G." by Ten G Bob

This is a sweet ass video. 

Tea Baggers:Tea Party :: Carpet Munchers:Lesbians

After reading several liberal, and I use that word liberally, I have to comment on the use of Tea Baggers. For those of you who do not know what "tea bagging" refers to, its an act of sex where you dip your testicles into someone's mouth as they are laying down. With that said, it is being said in a contemptuous and derogatorily manner. Liberals, if they hold true to their own values would not use a derogatory term to describe people. Yet if you use their current state of consciousness, they should begin calling lesbians "carpet munchers," gay men "ass pirates," and women "pillow biters." All are offensive, are used in a sexual way to show contempt for a definable group's thoughts, beliefs, and way of life.

Progressives are playing a dangerous game with the American public. I was surrounded by a group of progressives (thugs) at a Christmas party after mentioning the people I follow on twitter and how I use it for news. After these people who I never met before were in my face, poking me in my chest, yelling at me as I tried real hard to remain calm, I eventually left. Apparently saying I respectively disagree with President Obama's policies makes me a racist... that in itself is racist.

Here's my point. While reading several (neo-classical)liberal blogs and the comments on them, I saw these thoughts said over and over in manner different fashions.

"What can we do to point out the obvious to the doofuses in Washington that WE WON! We don’t have to be bipartisan because the other party has ceased to exist!" --Raynman

"People like the obstructionist, DeMint, are not gaining favor with the mainstream Americans, as they are with teabaggers." --Marie

"No sir. Political correctness is paralyzing bigots, racists and people with minimal social skills who think just because they know a word they should be able to use it without consideration for the rest of society." --HoodaThunk

Now to those people who see Republicans as irrelevant, sure, currently they are and should considering how they managed to overlook social issues. I must add that Democrats had the majority in both houses from 2006 on and managed to do the same thing but I digress. What is relevant is that representatives within the Democratic party cannot even agree and reach a consensus. They could have passed the bills months ago but were too busy jockeying for closed door bribes (see Nelson and Landrieu). As someone who hasn't had health insurance in four years, the bill would've have helped me. Well, it would help me in another four years as they tax me now for it. That in itself just doesn't make sense.

My family is 95% blue collared, hard-working, liberal, and in unions. The other 5% are hard-working but white-collared. All jockey with overtime and stop working in order to dodge our "progressive" tax system. For those of you that don't know, it's progressive because it was enacted by progressives. Everyone in my family voted for President Obama and all have a unfavorable opinion of him. One went as far as to say, "You had dumb shit Bush running things into the ground. We voted for change and the only change we got was this douche bag (Obama), doing the same thing as doofus but twice as worse. There is also one Democrat who is actually going to attend her first Tea Party meeting next week. I enjoy seeing people become politically active.

The Tea Party Movement isn't a ubber-radical right wing group of republicans. It's a coalition of Democrats, Republicans, and Independents that truly feel disenfranchised from our federal government. They feel they are not being heard nor represented, no matter who they vote for. Does "No taxation without representation" ring a bell? Didn't a bunch of people yell that before they dressed as Indians and threw tea into a harbor? Oh wait, that was the FIRST Tea Party. We are beginning to see a much larger tea party now. A party that not even an aircraft carrier can host.

So using Tea Bagging and Tea Baggers, especially by our political elite, shows the lack of intellect, respect, understanding, and contempt on their fellow Americans. They try to demean a bi-partisan effort by the once apathetic population, to join together and bring the change they envisioned. Progressives, the political elite, and lame stream media all feel threatened, as they should be. Poll numbers and ratings are rather low these days. Contempt for American public exercising their Constitutional rights is really working well.

A Call to Help Stanford and Cancer Research

Stanford Folding@Home Group # 180470

Okay, so after a really good day, I was doing what I always do as a news junkie. I was reading all my twitter feeds from politicians, pundits, and my selected sources. I abruptly came across a story on how the U.S. Air Force purchased 1700 Play Station 3's to form a super computer. I immediately went to my Stanford University's Protein Folding application to check my progress. Stanford has been using PC's and at their inception, PS3's as a networked super computer. It has the highest super computing power in the world thanks to our PC's CPU processing power that we do not use.

Lets face it, most of us do not use our computer's computing power to it's full potential. A good portion of its abilities lay dormant. This is where Standford University's Folding Program utilizes what most of us do not. Unless they still live in their mom's basements, blogging about their hatred for Glenn Beck, and constantly playing the World of Warcraft until they find the need to masturbate to Pink's 2010 Grammy performance... or write for the Huffington Post.

                   Pink's Performance



             Huffington Post Bisnatch


If you are not one of them, first of all I must congratulate you for being a productive member to society. Second, you computer has the ability to be utilized further. It's still using the same global warming (oh wait, 'climate changing') gases at 20% then it would at 99% because the hippies haven't allowed us to build nuclear power plants for 40 years... the same hippies complaining about the coal fired plants that filled the vacuum they created. I shall respectively digress to prevent a further tangent.

Check it out. Folding@Home via Standford University. It will "fold" proteins and relay the data the system. You will join the world's largest super computer in it's quest to solve the mystery of cancer and the mutations that cause it. I have done so since 2004. Just configure the program to utilize 50-75% of your CPU so it doesn't slow things down.

I don't live in my Mom's basement, play World of Warcraft, write for the progressive Huffington Post, and have only masturbated to Pink's Grammy performance once (that's a joke FYI).

Check it out. It helps to further the study of science all-the-while, donating something you do not use, nor can lose.

If you like the cause, download it and join my group, numbered 180470 . Some friendly competition cannot hurt anyone when applied to this cause.

--Topher Lloyd

Upgrading

Upgrading, yet again. Bare with me. That is really all I have to say..... uhhh... um....?

Finishing Cabinets

Finishing cabinets is much like making love, if and when you do it correctly, so I think. There's a different from having sex and making love.... but look in the previous posts for that one.

So I have spent 30 hours finishing the cabinets for my current project. At first when they were installed, I was like, "what the f*&^ are these plywood boxes? I am cabinet snob because I once worked in a crappy job making no money, selling them.  It was an Al Bundy type of thing, no wonder why I drank all the time. But I digress, they were built beautifully yet were just wood boxes. Then my hands took over.

Feeling every inch of them. At first rough, I calmly sanded, smoothed, and felt some more. It was only until I would move my hand ever so slightly over the door and it was soft, inviting, would I move on. It may have taken a long time to do but in the end, and feeling for countless hours, I love my cabinets. It was only after many hours of feeling, rubbing, and caressing did I feel good enough to be finished. Is there more I can do, of course, but in the interest of time I had to move on. Later cabinets, it was fun!

New blog post with pictures of the finished project coming soon. Check back soon!

New Blog & Possible Move (Again)

Although it's lunch time, I just want to inform you that after being encouraged by a few web developers, I will be creating a new blog on Wordpress. If I like the format for my political blog, I may move this blog on over to Wordpress, on a page that was the original location of this blog. Just a heads up. TopherLloyd will still be a diary-esque blog but I may move away from it due to certain factors.

In other news:

I may be moving back to Colorado in the coming months. I think I have finally realized what I am good at and enjoy doing. Now it may be time to make good money doing it. I am actually really excited and am hoping this pulls through! I'm am gonna have "the talk" tomorrow. Definitely nervous.

Too many mosquitoes down here and I miss my purple mountains at 6 AM.

A Switch to Firefox and I CAN TYPE AGAIN!

Okay, so for weeks I could not type worth a crap. I am not talking about my crappy punctuation. Every character that I would type would not register or register really late. I ran multiple virus programs, ran the Microsoft virus diagnostics, and nothing? WTF, I thought to myself. Upon doing some research, which took me forever because I couldn't type, I stumbled upon the reason.

Microsoft Internet Explorer BLOOOOOWWWWWSSSSS fat, puss-covered, donkey dick. So much so that I actually labeled this blog so people surfing the web can find this. I even typed out Microsoft Internet Explorer out so the spiders will find this. I will mention Google so their spiders find this post more quickly too.

So I switched to Firefox and instantly could type again. Pages load almost instantly too! So to anyone reading this, and is using Internet Explorer, switch to Firefox. Do yourself the favor. You will be happy and that's a guarantee.

New Look

Okay, so I want to extend to YOU the readers, the chance to comment on the new look. Don't comment on facebook. You can comment below and leave your name or be anonymous. I'm curious to hear your thoughts.

Running Scared: A Labor Day Sprint

***Disclaimer: Unlike every story I tell where the facts are grossly exaggerated, the events below are true. Enjoy this rare occurrence.***

I originally intended to write a blog depicting my account of reading all 1017 pages of H.R. 3200: America's Health Choices Act of 2009 and a summary of the details, followed by my thoughts and concerns. Fortunately for you the reader, that will not happen today.

So here I was, talking to my mom this morning. Much like my "foot in mouth syndrome" of saying all the wrong things at all the wrong times, my mom has the lovely habit of ALWAYS calling me at the WRONG moments. To bypass the inevitability of ruining my evening plans, I would cut her off at the pass and call her nice and early.

So here I am talking on the phone out front, tending to One Leaf (another blog for another day), and picking dead leaves off the bushes. Suddenly through my peripheal vision, I catch a glimpse of a menacing dog across the street. I turn to investigate and promptly see four others. Rib cages showing, patches of fur missing, and collarless. I stood up.

Crap, they see me. Do I stand still and try not to look any in the eye? Should I slowly back away while facing them, trying to show that I pose no threat? Should I make a B-line for the house 50 yds up the driveway?

I slowly backed away then boom! I began running, phone in hand. My mom says it sounded like the Blair Witch Project. Everything silent besides heavy breathing and barking in the background. In retrospect (I should know this growing up around alpha male dogs) you never run or make quick movements when any animals are in a pack. They automatically see you as weak and instinctively as prey. So they chased my skinny, chain-smoking, hairy, white butt all the way to my door. Good thing I ran track and have yet to lose a sprinting challenge, even with a cocky cigarette in my mouth, since high school.

So I ran. I ran so far away. I just ran.



A bonus video for your enjoyment


After 411-ing animal control and being holed up in the house for 30 mins, by then the dogs shat in my yard and moved on, the ordeal was over. Besides a major car accident in my freshman year of highschool, that was the scariest moment of my life. The hair on my neck was standing up. I had goosebumps all over my arms and one hell of an adrenaline rush. Not to mention a story that in time will become lions chasing me in the savannahs of Africa.

How a pack of wild dogs formed two miles from center city Houston beats the hell out of me. I just know savannahs are a bitch to run through ;-)

Please Take the Time

A close friend, a dear confidant of mine who has been an unbiased advice giver, has kept me from flying off the handle over little things (for those that know me, too bad she wasn't on my shoulder durring some of my moments of stupidity), and wise mother has started a blog. A year ago today, she was sexually assulted by an on duty officer (pleaded guilty) responding to her house. She has started a non-pofit company to help victims of sexual assult and abuse. Today she officially has started blog on the topic (unlike mine which is meaingless... maybe thats why I only have four readers).

I would like you, whoever you are, to take the time and visit her blog.... Victim Denied.

Thank you in advance to everyone and their consideration.

Big News Ahead

I have some big news ahead! In the coming weeks it will all be known.... but this is BIG :-)

Busy Fingers

Well, I have finally approached the typing surface and am finally writing a new blog. My need to blog in the past weeks left me and well, I have set up a routine in my new place, and somehow this is breaking my routine. I am a person who has set routines and stick to them but since moving to Houston, I feel the need to constantly be on my toes and switch things up. Instead of my Louisiana Mudd or Yankee coffee, I might grab some tea. Instead of being online all night I have begun actually watching tv and movies. I guess this is a way of breaking out of my routine.

So I am in my new apartment. I have been working long days swinging hammers and carrying boards that weigh as mugh as I do. Needless to say, I am packing a little muscle on this skinny frame of mine! I am happy working with my hands. I like to sweat, do man things, keeping my hands and fingers busy. When its over, I wash up and suddenly I am going out with my friends who are all law students or have been in oil for ten years. The greatest thing of it all, most of them have known me for 10 years and realize that office work drives me crazy. They don't judge me on it and actually push me to succeed while working with my hands.

So I am washed up, cooked myself a home cooked chicken, and plan to sit down and watch a movie. At one point in my life, when I had no roomates, I always felt the need to be around people. Now I have friends that call me up and I call them up, so I am okay with being alone. I don't feel the need to drink to pass the time either. Whew, I was a little worried when I moved into my own place about that.

So my fingers and hands have been kept busy all day. Before I become a lame braindead being on the couch watching a movie, I felt compelled to write. I'm not good at it and its not entertaining but people for some reason people come back to read more. I use run on sentences and too many commas, yet for whatever reasons they may be, thanks. Before I lay in my bed that I feel is excessive for me, being that despite my constant tossing and turning I use only a third of the bed at night, I will watch one of my favorite movies. The Lord of War. Sweeeeet.

What's the point of this blog you ask? I merely wanted busy fingers.

Loaded up on ibuprofen. My back is killing me! I miss the days that I'd get or give, back and head rubs. -sigh- Do you think couches know how to rub backs and heads?

New Construction, New Home

Wow, I do not even know where to begin with this blog. I finally have the internet up and running again but will barely use it becuase I am exhausted. Preparing to move, packing, driving 1700 miles, unpacking, and immediately starting several projects has left me with bags under my eyes. I just want to curl up in a ball and sleep for weeks!

I have met with general contractors, painters, carpet people, designed my new apartment, and it is just all beginning. The official start of my new apartment begins tomorrow morning with landscapers building proper drainage for the land around my apartment. I am really excited and in roughly six weeks, I will be moving into my new place, designed by and for me! Sweet, but my main goal is to use this opportunity so I can begin to save up and buy a house.

Working twelve hours a day non-stop, immediately after moving is very tiresome but I know is well worth it. Throw in welcome parties, fish fries, and welcome dinners to that and not only is my work schedule crazy, my social schedule is ramping up also. So far I am thoroughly enjoying Houston. It's a big city but there is so much opportunity that await transplants. Jobs are everywhere.

I could write more but frankly, my bed awaits me, and all I want to do is hug my body pillow and drift off to peace. And when I wake up? The official start to my apartment awaits me! Wish me luck :-)

My apartment

So as my temporary room is set up, I begin meetings and negotiations with the contractors for the landscaping and construction of my new apartment tomorrow. Although my original design was vetoed because it had a stand up shower (damn you people who only take baths) :-p , this was my second solution. I'm pretty damn excited. Few people actually get to design the apartment they will be living in.

Let me know your thoughts.

And for the mere sake of showing the design I like, here is mine:

Houston: Day Two

I sit here, sipping my morning coffee (sludge), relaxed and becoming increasingly motivated for the day ahead. Yesterday after departing Lafayette, Louisiana, before the morning rush, I had a rather peaceful drive to Houston compared to the previous 1300 miles. I arrived to my temporary place, opened my bedroom door and to my surprise, balloons, streamers, and a banner that said, "Welcome to Texas Christopher" adorned the room. My reservations on coming to Houston decreased dramatically after seeing that.

Unloading my truck sucked. After nearly dodging a tornado and driving two hours in rain that I only seen once before after Hurricane Gustav, I found my dresser and 75% of all my items were water damaged. My dresser no longer contains utility along with a few pictures, books, and clothes, (it's a good thing I have a fully furnished, apartment to live in!) My guitar is safe though, that is the important thing.

It rained so hard, that as I was parked on the side of the road and I couldn't even see the hood of my truck. I was worried because the sky was black as night and I knew a tornado was near. As I drove into the daylight again, I heard over the radio that a tornado was around the town I drove through 15 minutes prior. Whew.

My plants that have traveled many of miles with me and hold value (to all of your intrigue may I add), Gustav and Ike, survived and are already flourishing. My grapevine on the other hand isn't enjoying the change in heat all that well. Oh well, all I care about is Gustav and Ike. I'm a wierdo, I know Lew! I just like plants.

So, with that story told in a nutshell, I will soon finish setting up my room, and begin several multi-week projects. It's nice to actually have work to do but moving is not an enjoyable experience. I have moved several times and each time, I have no regrets. Each decision, whether moving or staying, I feel was the right decision at the moment given the circumstances and lessons to be had. I will have to prepare my response to those people here in Houston, who with out a doubt, will ask me why I did not move here a year ago as originally planned. I guess I'll say, "The timing was just not right" or something of that sort. But I am here and so officially marks the beginning of my next chapter.

Time to shave my beard of apathy and "get 'er done!"

I'm back in the old town I used to live in, in Louisiana. Wow I forgot how humid it is here! Either way, it'll be nice to see certain people I haven't seen in 9 months. I sat down and was talking with this guy where I am parked and I have to say, Cajuns are some great people. Anyways, time to have some fun after driving 1500 miles!

It's Relaxing

My last night in the only place that I consider that I "grew" up. Where I always enjoyed sitting outside during a good thunderstorm. My last night here and I get to enjoy my favorite thing since I was 15. Sitting outside during a nice storm. I'll have plenty of storms to hear and I will damn well make sure that sometime soon, I'll have my own place to sit outside for a good storm. Plenty of storms, at that.

Houston: T-minus nine hours. 0900 we embark.

Final Farewells

Well, as I await the arrival of my friends from throughout the city, I patiently sit here and type. I always get anxious before long drives and I wish I had someone I know that has a way of calming me. Unfortunately, for this drive there will be no one to text to say I am nervous or to talk too while driving. FYI, it is illegal to be on a cell phone while driving in Pennsylvania so it's for the best.

Will all my final goodbyes said and my truck loaded up, I have only my final moments with some of my closest friends to enjoy. I am excited to be going on my journey and start this new chapter in my life. I will make the best of it, in a new and large city but will miss my friends and family dearly.

Don't worry, I will have the same number as I have had since coming home. Hey, Louisiana has cheap taxes when it comes to phones! So text or call.

I leave you with a song that has epitomized every move since I was in high school (yes there has been many moves). Tiff you know and understand me better than anyone I know and this too shall bring back memories :-) I'll come out to San Diego and visit, I promise. Kristy and I have joked around with the idea but we might fight the whole way there :-p

I present to you: