Today, I started my new job.  I don’t really even know my job title, but I am mainly the assistant to a bookkeeper for a local hotel.  I also do other things when needed, such as: helping with any kind of maintenance, checking customers in, and any other task that they may need me for.

This job is something that I have been searching for over the last 2 ½ months. It just about fell in my lap…

When I lost my last job, I had gone down to the LDS Employment Office and filled out an information sheet.  I had just finished an Associates Degree in Accounting, so I had been searching for something in bookkeeping or some thing that would get me experience in the accounting field.

Friday the 1st of August, I got a phone call at about 10 or 11 in the morning.  She said that she got my info from the LDS Employment Office, and wanted me to come in for an interview.  I came in for an interview.  The interview went pretty well.  However, I started to get a little worried, because things started going like they did in other interviews.  They (there was two interviewing me) asked me the same questions that I have been asked in other interviews.  Except there was one stood out to me that has been asked to me before. And that was, “How much Quickbooks experience do you have?”  I simply said “None, except for what I have done for an assignment in class.”  They asked a couple more questions, and then said “I wish you had more Quickbooks experience.”  We talked a little bit more, and they told me that I would know by evening on Saturday (Today).

I stopped by my wife’s work (Dairy Queen), and grabbed an ice cream cone.  It had not been more than 30 minutes since I had the interview, and got a phone call.  I recognized the phone number from earlier, at this point I knew it was either good or bad.  The news I received, was not what I expected.  I said, “Hello” and was then she asked me when I could come in to work.  So, I went in today and got started with my experiences.

My Dad used to own a furniture store.  The power went out, and when it came back on it caused the alarm to trip out and go off.  When the alarm goes off, my Dad was always the first one to be called.  He asked me to go with him, so I did.  We didn’t leave the house right away, so by the time we got to the store, we thought the Police had already come and gone.  Next, we went into the store and checked it out.  Dad did some things on the computer there at the store.  After that, we locked up the store and got into the truck.  I need to mention that the whole building was glass, so you could see through to opposite side of the building. And it was pretty dark out side at the time. 

Now comes the fun part…

As we were backing out we saw through the building what appeared to be a light of some sort.  More specifically, it looked like a spot light from a police car.  There were not any overhead police lights going, so we could not tell for sure.  My Dad was pretty certain that it was a police car.  He told me to run over there and tell them that everything was okay. That is exactly what I did.  However, when I got to the other side of the building, I remember a police officer pulling his gun from the holster.  The next thing I heard was “Freeze, Don’t Move.  Put your hands in the air!”  In was a matter of seconds, but what seemed like eternity, my Dad drove to my side of the building.  When he got over there, the police were grilling him, and he had to prove that he was the owner of the store. 

Moral of the story: Do not run towards a police officer in the dark, even if nothing is wrong.

I just wanted to let everyone know that I was still alive.  I just have had a bunch of crap going on, and haven’t had the time to write any blogs.  I will try to get another one up here pretty soon.

All about me — Alphabetically!
A. ATTACHED OR SINGLE? Attached
B. BEST FRIEND? Krissie
C. CAKE OR PIE? Devil’s Food Cake
D. DAY OF CHOICE? Saturday
E. ESSENTIAL ITEMS? Clothes, LOL
F. FAVORITE COLORS? Red and Blue (in that order)
G. GUMMY BEARS OR WORMS? Sour Worms
H. HOMETOWN? Boise, Idaho
I. INDULGENCE? Not really sure
J. JANUARY OR JULY? January
K. KIDS? Not yet
L. LIFE ISN’T COMPLETE WITHOUT? Dr. Pepper & Fat Bowl of Mongolian BBQ
M. MARRIAGE DATE? July 29, 2006
N. NUMBER OF BROTHERS AND SISTERS? 2 sisters, 1 brother, 3 sis-in-laws, 2 bro’s in law, 1 step bro and 1 step sister.
O. ORANGES OR APPLES. Oranges
P. PHOBIAS OR FEARS? Fear of loosing my wife
Q. QUOTE: “Hey I tell you what.  You can take a good look at a T-Bone by sticking your head up a butcher’s ass, No wait, it’s gotta be your bull” (Tommy Boy)
R. REASON TO SMILE: My Wife
S. SUPERMAN OR WONDER WOMAN? Wonder Woman
T. TAG 5 PEOPLE: Well since Mike is the only one who reads my blog on a regular basis, then I will tag Mike.
U. UNKNOWN FACT ABOUT ME: I had a gun pulled on me by an Ada County Police Officer.
V. VEGETABLES? Salad with Catalina Dressing
W. WORST HABIT? My worst habit would have to be not taking anything seriously. I like to tell jokes.
X. X-RAY OR ULTRASOUND? Don’t Know.
Y. YOUR FAVORITE FOOD? Depends on my mood. Right now, it is Mongolian BBQ
Z. ZODIAC SIGN? Aquarius

“I was at the US Open this Friday, following Tiger Woods down the 12th Fairway, after his tee shot, he was eating an apple, 30 yards from his ball he discarded his apple core in the rough, I asked a photothe to kick it over my way, and he did, I never touched the core, Scooped it up in a empty beer cup, as not to disrupt the DNA, Ive got lots of witness’…all moneys go to my daughters college fund.” 

Why in the world would someone pay $36,000 for a half-eaten apple.  That’s right, I said it.  Tiger had tossed his apple core, after he finished it, and some fan picked it up and put it on e-bay.  Some idiot, paid 36 grand for this piece of “trash”.  This makes for a whole bunch of idiots, because there was over 100 bids on this item.

If you try to find that auction now, you will get the following page:

It looks like eBay pulled the auction after the winning bid reached $36,000 for a half-eaten apple! How ridiculous can some people be?? To me, the funniest part was that the seller was charging $6.95 for shipping! “Come on, I just paid thirty-six GRAND for a half-eaten apple, and you can’t just send it to me??”

Now, of course there are copycat auctions all over eBay… Just do a search for “Tiger Woods Apple” and you’ll see what I mean….

The Patriot Act increases the governments surveillance powers in four areas:

1. Records searches. It expands the government’s ability to look at records on an individual’s activity being held by a third parties. (Section 215) 
2. Secret searches. It expands the government’s ability to search private property without notice to the owner. (Section 213)
3. Intelligence searches. It expands a narrow exception to the Fourth Amendment that had been created for the collection of foreign intelligence information (Section 218). 
4. “Trap and trace” searches. It expands another Fourth Amendment exception for spying that collects “addressing” information about the origin and destination of communications, as opposed to the content (Section 214). 

Why is the Patriot Act’s expansion of records searches unconstitutional?

• Violates the Fourth Amendment, which says the government cannot conduct a search without obtaining a warrant and showing probable cause to believe that the person has committed or will commit a crime.
• Violates the First Amendment’s guarantee of free speech by prohibiting the recipients of search orders from telling others about those orders, even where there is no real need for secrecy.
• Violates the First Amendment by effectively authorizing the FBI to launch investigations of American citizens in part for exercising their freedom of speech. 
• Violates the Fourth Amendmentby failing to provide notice - even after the fact - to persons whose privacy has been compromised. Notice is also a key element of due process, which is guaranteed by the Fifth Amendment.

More Secret Searches?

• The Patriot Act, however, unconstitutionally amends the Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure to allow the government to conduct searches without notifying the subjects, at least until long after the search has been executed. This means that the government can enter a house, apartment or office with a search warrant when the occupants are away, search through their property, take photographs, and in some cases even seize property - and not tell them until later.

Expansion of the intelligence exception in wiretap law

• Under the Patriot Act, the FBI can secretly conduct a physical search or wiretap on American citizens to obtain evidence of crime without proving probable cause, as the Fourth Amendment explicitly requires.

Expansion of the “pen register” exception in wiretap law

• Another exception to the normal requirement for probable cause in wiretap law is also expanded by the Patriot Act. Years ago, when the law governing telephone wiretaps was written, a distinction was created between two types of surveillance. The first allows surveillance of the content or meaning of a communication, and the second only allows monitoring of the transactional or addressing information attached to a communication. It is like the difference between reading the address printed on the outside of a letter, and reading the letter inside, or listening to a phone conversation and merely recording the phone numbers dialed and received.
• Wiretaps limited to transactional or addressing information are known as “Pen register/trap and trace” searches (for the devices that were used on telephones to collect telephone numbers). The requirements for getting a PR/TT warrant are essentially non-existent: the FBI need not show probable cause or even reasonable suspicion of criminal activity. It must only certify to a judge - without having to prove it - that such a warrant would be “relevant” to an ongoing criminal investigation. And the judge does not even have the authority to reject the application.

The Patriot Act broadens the pen register exception in two ways:

• “Nationwide” pen register warrants
  Under the Patriot Act PR/TT orders issued by a judge are no longer valid only in that judge’s jurisdiction, but can be made valid anywhere in the United States. This “nationwide service” further marginalizes the role of the judiciary, because a judge cannot meaningfully monitor the extent to which his or her order is being used. In addition, this provision authorizes the equivalent of a blank warrant: the court issues the order, and the law enforcement agent fills in the places to be searched. That is a direct violation of the Fourth Amendment’s explicit requirement that warrants be written “particularly describing the place to be searched.”
• Pen register searches applied to the Internet
  The Patriot Act applies the distinction between transactional and content-oriented wiretaps to the Internet. The problem is that it takes the weak standards for access to transactional data and applies them to communications that are far more than addresses. On an e-mail message, for example, law enforcement has interpreted the “header” of a message to be transactional information accessible with a PR/TT warrant. But in addition to routing information, e-mail headers include the subject line, which is part of the substance of a communication - on a letter, for example, it would clearly be inside the envelope.

(some of my information came American Civil Liberties Union)