Guardian Spirit

Galveston

2009-04-29T18:26:00.003-04:00

Since getting let go from Wavelink back in February of 2008, I had been working part-time and struggling with bills. I was 2 or 3 months behind on my car payment and my rent to my landlords - my best friend Del and his wife Kim, who had treated me like family. I was getting depressed but I wasn't motivated bad enough to get more work. I guess you could say that being miserable was my comfort zone, if that makes any sense.

On September 13th, Hurricane Ike hit Galveston, TX. Because I wanted to help the people in Galveston and I needed to make some good money to get caught up on bills, I did some searching at Google.com and Houston's Craigslist for Hurricane Ike security jobs. I applied for a couple of security jobs down there. A company called Classic Security which was a subcontractor for Corporate Security Solutions (C.S.S. - the contractor that has the contract with F.E.M.A.) offered me a job. Chris Wilden, my instructor for my bodyguard course, told me that I shouldn't work for C.S.S. He explained that while he was doing security in New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina, some guys that were hired by C.S.S. quit working for C.S.S. and came to work for the company that he was working for. They told him that C.S.S. gets you to come down to the disaster area for work but might not have work for you right away. While you're waiting to be put on a post, you don't get paid. After he told me that, I decided not to go.

About a week later, I talked to Mike (the one from my church that took the bodyguard course with me) and Jim, one of the Associate Pastors at my church, Calvary Chapel S.L.C. Mike told me that I should take advantage of the opportunity to work down there. Jim prayed with me and told me that he thought it would be a good opportunity for me to make some money and get caught up on bills. I called C.S.S. and Classic Security back and asked them about standby pay. They both told me that I would be getting paid 8 hours per day for every day that I was on standby waiting to get put on a job site. I called my Aunt Beverly, told her about the opportunity, and asked her if she could buy me a ticket for a flight down to Houston. She did buy me a round trip ticket and I was very grateful. The day before my flight to Texas, I pawned my computer and my gun (they told me that I wouldn't need it because they were going to issue me a gun) to pay some bills. I assumed that I would make enough money to get them out when I got back from Texas. The night before my flight left, I ran into Trent, who was one of the owners of Club Exchange when I worked there, and told him that I was going down to Houston to do security for F.E.M.A. He offered to rent me a car through his corporate account if I could pay him back when I got back. I thanked him for that.

On Friday, October 10th I flew down to Houston, TX. After I got my rental car, I went to the C.S.S. office in Houston to check in. They sent me down to the F.E.M.A. camp at Galveston where I waited to be posted. The F.E.M.A. camp was a big tent city. There was one huge tent where almost everyone (male and female) slept. It was a bunch of us security guys, a few guys that worked for the company responsible for making credentials for everyone at the camp, some F.E.M.A. employees, some AmeriCorps people, some Salvation Army and Red Cross people, and some people that were with various Christian organizations. There were some smaller tents where some ladies were able to sleep and get more privacy. There was another tent for the cafeteria, a couple of trailers for us to take showers in, some trailers with sinks and mirrors along the side, a tent for the laundry service, and a bunch of porta-pottys. In addition to all of that, they also had a TV tent (with satellite TV and a DVD player), a workout tent, and an internet tent (with computers and a wireless connection). This tent city was at a small airport in Galveston, which is a small town on an island off of the coast of Texas. Galveston was ruined by Hurricane Ike.

I met some awesome people while I was down there. Cal, who was with the company that made credentials for everyone at the camp, is a cool Christian guy, former Green Beret, and writer. There was another cool guy that worked for the same company as Cal but I don't remember his name. I met some great Christian men and women that were there with a Christian organization that helped men and women get their lives back on track. They served us in the cafeteria. I went to a local church with some of the guys from that group. I met a great lady named Dolly who I met in the internet tent. I helped her set up an email account and showed her how to use it because she was new to computers. She was down there volunteering with the Salvation Army.

After being on standby for 6 days and being passed up for job postings which were filled by people hired directly by C.S.S. (cheaper for them than paying a sub-contractor to pay me), I was told that I wouldn't be getting standby pay. I called both Classic Security and C.S.S. on the 7th day to ask why they weren't paying me standby pay like they both told me they would. They both just passed the buck - Classic Security said they couldn't pay me if C.S.S. didn't pay them and C.S.S. said that their policy changed after I went down there. Classic Security also told me that C.S.S. was closing job sites and letting people go. Since Trent had rented me a car on his corporate account and I wasn't going to be paid, I couldn't afford to continue to pay for a rental car while not making any money so I decided to cut my losses and come home the next day. The last 3 days that I was there I went with Dolly and handed out meals with the Salvation Army. I was grateful for the opportunity to serve. So I came back to Utah more broke than when I went down there, owing Trent for the rental car, and didn't have enough money to get my computer and gun out of the pawn shop. Having seen people that were homeless because of Hurricane Ike, I couldn't really feel sorry for myself but I definitely wasn't happy.

STG Bodyguard Course

2009-03-25T14:03:00.001-04:00

On August 8-10, while I was still working at Club Orange and Mountain Mike's Pizza, I took Strategic Tactical Group's Executive Protection/ Bodyguard course. Mike, who volunteers for the Security ministry with me at Calvary Chapel S.L.C. and studies Krav Maga, is the one that told me about the course. Our instructor was Chris Wilden. The first day was an introduction to EP work followed by EP Pistol Craft and choreography on the gun range (check out my highlights here). The 2nd day started out with a mock protective detail where Chris was our client. He wanted to go to the Farmer's Market at Pioneer Park. I was assigned to be "loose Security" which means I was further away from the client so I wouldn't draw attention to him. This means that I had to try to be inconspicuous, which was a challenge for me. After the mock detail we had First Aid training, handcuff training, ASP baton training, and O.C./ pepper spray combat training.

You can check out the video of my pepper spray combat training here. We had to get sprayed with the pepper spray and then attack a guy holding a foam shield with a foam ASP baton. There was some regular pepper spray that our instructor sprayed everyone else with but I asked him to spray me with Fox Labs pepper spray, which is the hottest pepper spray on the market. As soon as I got sprayed, I closed my eyes. I was expecting it to "kick-in" but it didn't really hurt. After I had my eyes closed for 10 seconds, Chris told me to open them. When I opened them, I could feel the pepper spray on my eye balls. It irritated my eyes kind of like having shampoo in your eyes so I closed my eyes for another 10 seconds. It still didn't hurt so I opened my eyes, kept them open, and attacked the guy with a foam ASP baton. Then I dropped the baton, closed my eyes, and let Chris spray my face with a hose attached to a container with a hand pump. After they sprayed my face off, I kneeled down in the grass for about 15 minutes and then got up and let the wind dry my eyes out. Chris later said that he has only seen one guy take getting sprayed better than me.

After everyone was done getting sprayed, we went down to the first floor of the clubhouse and waited for Chris's friend Brandon that did Security at the apartment complex we were in to let us out. He had locked the door since the clubhouse and office were closed on the weekend. As we were waiting there, some guy came up to the door and told us that the apartment building across from the clubhouse was on fire. We didn't see any fire but we told him to call the fire department. When Chris's friend let us out I called the fire department. Then me, Brandon, and one of the other guys from the Bodyguard course, Kyle (he's helping Chris in my pepper spray video) went up to the apartment on the 3rd floor that the guy said was on fire. The apartment that the tenant had told us about was on the street side of the building. Kyle stuck his head out the hall window and saw smoke coming out of a window in the apartment. I knocked hard on the door a couple of times but no one answered. Kyle, Brandon, Chris, and me started going door-to-door on each floor telling people to get out because there was a fire. When the firemen showed up they used an axe to open the door and found some food on the stove that someone had left cooking. The burnt food was causing the smoke - there was no fire. I stood by the back door to keep people out until the firemen got done using some fans to blow the smoke out of the building. After the firemen said that it was O.K. for the tenants to come back in, I stood outside talking with Chris, Brandon, and Kyle. Right after Kyle mentioned something about the smoke aggravating the pepper spray in our eyes, my eyes started to water a little bit. I sat in my car for a few minutes and then drove home.

Sunday morning we had some more classroom time (marketing, networking, etc.). Then Chris briefed us on our "final exam" which was another mock detail. He said that our "primary client" was a model from Park City and our "secondary client" was her rockstar boyfriend. She had chosen Brooke, the only lady in our class, to be the protective detail leader. Chris released us to go to lunch and do an advance at the Gateway Mall, where our client wanted to go shopping that afternoon. We all went to lunch at the Gateway mall where Brooke gave us our assignments. She chose Kyle, who is a prison guard in Pocatello, ID and Steve, who is a martial arts instructor at Bushi Ban in American Fork, UT to work "close Security" with her. Since she was the protective detail leader, she would be right next to the primary client at all times. Mike, Eric (Kyle's brother), and I would be "loose Security". Mike and I would be the getaway drivers if an attack happened. We only had a couple of radios so we were relying on cell phones for communication.

We met our clients at the valet parking in the Gateway Mall. It was hard for me to be "loose Security" because I am used to being "close Security". After a while, Eric told me that I was staying too close and was being too obvious. I slowly got further and further away. I didn't find out until later but Mike and Steve had taken the secondary client sightseeing nearby when the "attack" on our primary "client" happened. Our primary "client" and the "close Security" were out of sight because there was a semi parked between me and them. I happened to call Eric right after the "attack" went down and I rushed over to be point man as we escorted our "primary client" to Mike in his car. When we loaded our "client" into the car, Chris let us know that the mock detail was over. We all met at a restaurant at the mall where Chris let us know that our "primary client" (the model from Park City) was actually his sister. We also met the "attacker". Chris critiqued us and then gave us our certificates. Then Chris treated us to dinner.

I felt like I had let Eric's opinion cause me to let myself get too far way from our client. Although I was able to backup the "close Security" right after the "attack", I felt like I should have been doing "close Security" so it was hard for me to be comfortable with doing "loose Security". The fact that we didn't all have radios made it difficult to communicate.

The course was very helpful to me. I learned a lot and had fun. Our class was a fun group of people. Most of us have connected on Facebook.

A few days after the course, I was talking to Mike about how to be more accurate with my handgun so he told me about trigger control. When I Googled "trigger control" just now, I found an article called "The trigger control fallacy". This article says that PIP (pre-ignition push) affects accuracy more than trigger control. I wonder what Mike thinks about that. I'll have to pay attention to both when I'm shooting.

A couple`weeks after the Bodyguard course I got hired to do Security at the Valley Fair Mall. To make a long story short, I quit after 3 or 4 days. I didn't want to work at a job where I was only supposed to observe and report. I quit one day after they wrote me up for chasing a shoplifter. After I quit there, I went back to working at Mountain Mike's. I was also still working Security at Club Orange. I had brought on Brian Servatius, who used to be the Head of Security at Shaggy's and worked with me at Bliss, and his friend Steve, who used to work at Vortex, to help me at Club Orange because business had remained constant on Wednesday nights. In my next blog post I'll talk about the experience that I had when I went to Texas to do Security for F.E.M.A. during the Hurricane Ike clean-up.

Keys On Main

2008-10-13T14:31:00.008-04:00

I started working at Keys On Main in Salt Lake City on Friday, Feb 29th. Keys On Main is a dueling piano bar. I had found out that they were hiring through Craigslist. Ephraim, who had worked at Vortex and Bliss with me, was working there. There were 4 to 5 Security guys working there on weekends. We had 3 guys working the front door. We had one to check IDs and two behind the front desk - one to sell memberships, and the other to take cover charge and stamp. When I started working there it was me, Ephraim, Bob (the owner's father-in-law), and 2 guys from California - Nick and Jaren. After a month or two Bob left to go back home to Alaska and was replaced by Adam, who was in the Air Force Security Forces. Around this time Joe a.k.a. "Boston", who also worked at Bliss, got hired to fill-in when one of us needed a night off.

For the first few months, because we were the new night club in town, our Friday nights were busy and our Saturday nights were packed to the point where we had a line until 12:30 or so. After a few months it died down a little but Fridays were fairly busy and Saturdays were busy but not packed like they were when I first started.

We rarely had any serious problems there but there were a lot of people that were overserved. Although Josh, the General Manager, brought this up almost every night in our meetings at the end of the night, there was no disciplinary action taken so the staff continued to overserve people.

There were two customers that I had interesting experiences with. The first one, a lady that I'll call Clueless was standing in the front of the line with her friends when we were holding the line on a Saturday night because we had reached capacity. When checking IDs, I would stand just outside of the front doors of the club. Since we were holding the line and I had told the people in line that we were holding the line, I stepped just inside of the doors for a few minutes because it was cold outside. A minute or two after I stepped inside, Clueless came in and tried to run past me. I grabbed her by the arm to keep her from going past me but she tried to keep going so I just held onto her. I asked her where she was going. She told me that she had to use the restroom. I told her that we were holding the line so she would have to wait outside. When Jaren, who was working behind the counter walked up to us, Clueless read his name tag and said "I know Jaren." Jaren told her that she needed to go back outside. I told her to go back outside two times and when she refused, I moved her outside. A couple of minutes after I got her outside, Clueless tried to get past me again. After 5 minutes or so, Josh told us that we could start letting people in again. I then told Clueless's friends that they could come in but told Clueless that she wasn't going to. I began checking her friends's IDs and Clueless tried to go past me. I stopped her and told her that she wasn't coming in. She said "Yes, I am" and tried to move past me again. I grabbed her again to keep her from moving past me and she pinched me as if that was going to make me let go of her. I then pushed her back a little bit. I told her to leave but she refused. I didn't want to deal with her any more so I threatended to call the cops on her, hoping that she would just leave. She didn't so I called the cops, expecting to call them back once she got scared off and tell them that they didn't need to come. A couple of her friends had more sense than she did. One of her girl friends started walking her away from the front door. That friend's guy friend asked me to call the cops back and cancel the call. I told him that as soon as Clueless was out of sight, I would call them. So when her friends walked her out of sight, I called the cops and told them that Clueless had left. Shortly thereafter the cops showed up because Clueless had called the cops complaining about me. I explained what happened and they asked me for my driver's license. I gave it to them, they wrote down my info, and I never heard about it again.

Another customer, who I'll call Sleepy, was in line one night when I was working the ID spot. He was in the back of a group of 5 or 6 people so I wasn't paying too much attention to him. About 10 minutes after Sleepy entered the club, the Bar Manager, Dave, waved me over to the bar and told me that the guy at the end of the bar was falling asleep. They guy he was talking about was Sleepy. I approached Sleepy, told him that I thought he had drank too much so he needed to finish his beer and then leave. He said "How do I know you haven't been drinking?" I said "...or you can be a wise guy and leave now." Then I walked him outside and offered to call him a cab but he declined. There was no line so I stood just inside of the front doors. One of the doors was propped open. About 5 minutes after I walked him outside, Sleepy tried to walk back into the club. I stepped in his way and he raised his lighted cigarette butt towards my face so I grabbed his wrist, took the cigarette butt from him, threw it on the ground, and pushed him back. Sleepy decided to call the cops. When the cops showed up, they talked to Sleepy first since he was the one that called them. Dave saw the cops talking to Sleepy so he came out to see what was going on. I told Dave that Sleepy had called the cops. Dave went inside and brought Josh outside. After the police were done talking to Sleepy, they talked to Josh and I. They told us that Sleepy had complained that I pushed him when he tried to re-enter the club. They had told him that it was my job to keep drunk people from re-entering the club and told him to leave. They told Josh and me to call them if Sleepy came back and they would arrest him for public intoxication.

Some time in June I ran into Kodi, who had been a regular customer at Todd's and Vortex. He is a bartender and chef at Orange, a night club in Salt Lake City. He asked me if I wanted to come work Security there. I went down to Orange to check it out the following Wednesday, which was their only busy night at the time. Kodi introduced me to the owners and recommended that they hire me to do Security. I created a MySpace for Orange to help promote the club. Two weeks after Kodi introduced me to the owners I started working there.

At the end of every night at Keys On Main, after all of the customers were gone, we always had a Security meeting with Josh in the office. On Saturday, July 12th, while I was watching the front door waiting for the last few customers to leave, Josh took the rest of the Security guys back to the office for the Security meeting. I thought that it was odd that he didn't wait for me. After all of the customers were gone and I locked the door, I went back to the office. They were finishing the Security meeting so I asked Josh what I missed. He told me to sit down. I assumed that he was going to fill me in on what I missed. Instead he informed me that things weren't working out and he was going to let me go. I asked why. He told me that they had received too many complaints about me. He said that some people were never going to come back because of me (so troublemakers not wanting to come back is a bad thing?!). He also said that I was talking to people too much (so I'm a friendly person that has had too many complaints?!; if a person has been doing Security in night clubs for 12 years, that person might know a few people that want to say "Hi" when they see a familiar face - so being approachable is bad?!). He also said that some of the employees complained about me. Some of the waitresses would get mad when customers wanted to pull tables together and one waitress would lose a table. I did my best to keep the waitresses and the customers happy. Sometimes a waitress might be having a bad night and complain about me - big deal. I did more to help the waitresses and customers than any other employee. Maybe if Josh was out on the floor helping the customers and waitresses instead of sitting on his butt in the office, he would be the one that the employees were complaining about. He also said that we were butting heads {you mean an opionated go-getter (me) that has been in the business for 12 years is butting heads with a manager that has only been in the business for 3 or 4 years? - you don't say!} I asked George, the owner what he thought about Josh's decision and he gave me some lame answer about backing up the General Manager. The real reason that Josh let me go was that he felt threatened by me because I am confident and don't say "Mother may I?" every time I see an opportunity to help a waitress or a customer - I just go ahead and do it. Oh well, it was their loss. I still had my job at Orange.

A couple of weeks after Keys On Main let me go, I got hired to be a delivery driver at Mountain Mike's Pizza. Although I kept looking for other jobs, I worked part-time at Orange and Mountain Mike's from July until October. From August 8-10 I took an Executive Protection/ Bodyguard course from Strategic Tactical Group.

My First Trip to L.A.

2008-10-12T10:42:00.013-04:00

After working Security at Sundance, I went back to work at Wavelink. I got a credit card from my credit union, bought the parts for a computer from newegg.com, and built a computer with the help of some of my co-workers at Wavelink.

I kept in touch with Emily and Jake in the weeks after Sundance. In the beginning of February Emily invited me to come out to L.A. for a Stupid Cupid Party, which is a party for people who are single on Valentine's day. I flew out there on Friday, Feb 15th. Jake's new boyfriend, A.J. €picked me up from the airport. A.J. took me to Emily and Jake's friend, Boss Ben's house which is where we were having the party. Ben is a cool guy and a great host! Friday night we just hung out & watched TV and then went to bed.

Saturday we got up, ate breakfast, and then ran errands to get ready for the party. Emily and Jake hired a D.J. and a bartender for the party. I don't remember the bartender's name but she was sweet and beautiful. She competed in the Miss America pagent this year. Jake introduced me to the bartender and told her to let me know if anyone was bothering her. Emily and Jake introduced me to their close friends and told them that I was Security for the party. During the party I kept an eye on Emily, Jake, A.J., Ben, the bartender, and the D.J.; kept an eye on the front door to make sure that everyone that came was invited; kept people out of rooms that they weren't supposed to be in; mingled & took pictures. We only had 1 incident - as the party was winding down two brothers got into an argument because one of them, the younger one, was really drunk and was spitting on the floor. The more sober brother told him to quit and when he got mouthy, the older brother punched his little brother. I seperated them. Then Jake came out to see what the problem was. The drunk brother knocked her drink out of her hand so I grabbed him and took him outside. Then I kept the brothers from fighting outside and got them into their car. After most of the guests were gone, I went to bed.

Sunday we just went swimming and hung out by the pool. Emily, Jake, and A.J. had stayed up all night partying so they all crashed in the middle of the afternoon. Barbie Murdock was going to pick me up and take me back to the airport but she got stuck in traffic because of an accident on the highway so she didn't make it there in time to pick me up. Once I realized that she wasn't going to make it on time to take me to the airport, I called her and told her not to worry about it. I called the airline to get my flight changed. It was going to cost more than $700 to fly out on Monday, but only the change fee of $100 or so to fly out on Tuesday. I called my supervisor at Wavelink and left him a message letting him know that I had missed my flight and wouldn't be able to make it back to work until Wednesday because the flight on Monday was too expensive.

On Monday Emily and I returned the kegs from the party. Then we went to her and Jake's apartment for a little bit. In the afternooon we went to Cabo Cantina in Venice Beach. Jake, A.J., and a few of Emily and Jake's friends met us there. We got a table on the patio and drank and ate until late that night. The weather was great and I really enjoyed spending the day there with Emily, Jake and their friends. After we were done, we went back to Emily and Jake's apartment and went to bed.

On Tuesday A.J. gave me a ride to the airport. My trip to L.A. was awesome! I really enjoyed hanging out with Emily, Jake, and A.J.!! When I went back to work on Wednesday morning, I got fired because I had frequently been late in the month before going to L.A. and missed 2 days because I missed my flight. I wanted to just move out to L.A. but since I had maxed out my credit card to build my computer, had gone negative on my checking account to change my flight, and didn't have a job lined up, I had to stay in Utah so I started looking for a job. I ended up getting hired to do Security at Keys On Main, a new piano bar in Salt Lake City.

Sundance 2008

2008-01-24T14:30:00.007-05:00

I did Security for Debbie Durkin's Main Event Red Carpet Lounge & Green Suite during Sundance Film Festival from January 18th until January 22nd. I didn't work at night this year because the Tao, who runs Harry O's during Sundance, hired a security company to supplement Harry O's core security guys and Debbie didn't have any private parties this year so I got to play a little bit. On Thursday, January 17th I drove up to the Hotel Park City, where Debbie was having orientation for her lounge . Emily, who worked for Patron during Sundance last year, was there again. She is a really cool chick and good-looking too. Johnny Smiles, who was the photographer for the lounge last year, was there again. He's a nice guy and a good photographer! Kristen and Becky, who worked for Debbie as a hostesses last year were there with a few friends. Brady, a.k.a. B-Loc, a D.J. from Entourage Entertainment was our D.J. again this year. Debbie told me that I could stay in the living room of her Penthouse Suite so I drove back down to Salt Lake City to get my clothes and stuff and then drove back up.

Debbie had received coupons for free breakfast at the hotel so on Friday morning Debbie, her three P.R. girls (Carrie, Jen, and Liz), and I ate breakfast together. Friday was fairly busy at the lounge. Kristen & Becky brought a few friends up to help out. Kristen & Becky are awesome and their friends were cool too. Kristen was married when we worked together last year but she got a divorce last year and has been dating Chris who she met at the lounge last year. Emily brought here cousin Jake with her to help work the Patron bar. Jake is gorgeous and really sweet.

The hotel staff at Hotel Park City was awesome. Catherine, who is in charge of conventions, and Donald, the bar manager for the steak house at Hotel Park City - Ruth's Chris were awesome. Catherine and I got along really well but she is married. Miguel, the conventions guy that worked the lounge the most, was a cool guy. I don't remember her name but the manger of Bandannas Bar & Grill at Hotel Park City was great too. She hooked me up with a really good Philly Cheese Steak Sandwich. I also don't remember the name of the sales guy for conventions that helped us out a lot but he was cool too. All of the ladies from the Spa at Hotel Park City were really sweet.

At the end of the day on Friday, Sharon, who was working the WePluribus booth, told me that I scared her and asked if I knew why. I told her that I did and explained the difference between a protector and a sociopath. She asked me which one I am! I told her that I am a protector.

Friday night Kristen, Carrie, Liz, Jen, and I went out to eat at Bandits' Grill and Bar, which is across the street from Harry O's in Park City. On the way down there my phone's screen went white with a black leaf in the bottom right corner. Resetting it didn't resolve the problem. When we got to Bandit's I was happy to see that Jordan was working there. I met her last year at Sundance. She is an awesome, gorgeous chick. We waited at the bar in the basement of Bandits' until our booth was ready. The food was good and the service was great. After we finished eating we went dowstairs to wait for Chris (Kristen's boyfriend). While we were down there the power went out. I went upstairs and found out that the power was out on Main Street. We just waited it out. I had my flashlight with me because I was hoping to get a phone call from Steve Ketter, who I had been in contact with in the weeks preceding Sundance, to fill-in for security at Harry O's. I whipped it out and helped the waitresses get through the crowd and helped them see so they could write manual credit card receipts. I also quieted the crowd down and shined my flashlight on the bartender who was making an announcement about drink specials. We left after waiting for Chris for 30 minutes or so. As we walked down the hill to catch the shuttle back to the hotel, the power came back on.

Saturday morning I got up at 9 to let the maids in. I went online and found out that the Sprint store in Park City was only open from 11 AM until 7 PM. I worked every day during that time so I was going to have to wait until I got back to Salt Lake on Wednesday to get it fixed. Saturday was a little bit slower than Friday at the lounge.

Saturday night Kristen, her boyfriend Chris, Kristen's friends Brandon and Melissa (they're an awesome couple), Kristen's friend Miriam (I fell in love but she's married), Jen, Liz, and I went out together. We went to Bandits' again. When we went downstairs to wait for a booth, someone was leaving their booth downstairs and the booth next to them was leaving soon so I went up and took our name off the waiting list. Shortly after getting the second booth Jen's friend Casey Connor, and three of her friends joined us.

Earlier in the day Emily had invited us to Rehab @ House of Hype, which was a private party. After dinner we headed over to the House of Hype. Jen went with Casey and her friends to another private party next door to the House of Hype. I called Emily from Liz's phone. She hadn't arrived at the party yet because she was driving up and down Main St looking for parking. Most of the people we were with were getting cold so they stepped into a room next to the entrance of House of Hype to get warm. I was only wearing my suit coat but it wasn't too cold for me because I'm hardcore like that. :) Emily dropped Jake off and continued to look for parking. Jake told me that Emily had more pull so we should wait for her. Kristen and Chris got tired of waiting so they took off. Sharon and a couple of the other laides from the WePluribus booth, who Emily had also invited, showed up soon after Kristen and Chris left. After a little while Emily showed up and got us all in. Mariam and the WePluribus ladies didn't stay very long. Brandon, Mellissa, and Liz were relaxing on a couch around the time that Mariam and the WePluribus ladies left so I followed Emily and Jake around helping them through the crowd and keeping them safe. They enjoyed having their own bodyguard.

Sunday I got up earlier than usual to let the maids in because they had to clean before the hotel's catering people set up for the Birds of America brunch to benefit Friends of Animals. Matthew Perry and Lauren Graham, who both starred in Birds of America came for the brunch. After the brunch the lounge was slow. Sunday night Debbie took Johnny Smiles and me to J.P. DeJoria's private party. J.P. DeJoria is the founder of Patron and co-founder of John Paul Mitchell Systems. J.P. and his gorgeous wife were great hosts.

We had a good turnout at the lounge on Monday. Monday night Jake took me to Harry O's for the Tava launch party with performances by Keri Hilson and One Republic. The C.O.O. of Harry O's had invited Jake there so we got to sit in one of the V.I.P. areas. After a little while the C.O.O. took Jake to go smoke. After that he took her up on stage to watch the show. I just chilled in the V.I.P. area. It was a good show. I enjoyed the little bit of time that I was able to spend with Jake.

Tuesday was a little bit slow at the lounge but that was to be expected since it was the last day. The ladies from La-Teed-Da hooked me up with a candle and a reed diffuser. The ladies from WePluribus gave me a t-shirt. Mike from Tahitian Noni had kept me supplied with Hiro energy drinks all weekend. Over the weekend the guy from the Lamborghini watches booth had given me a sleeveless shirt. Dustin from Red Stag lodge gave me a case of Playboy energy drinks. Debbi had given me a bottle of Patron but someone stole it out of my duffle bag. After we closed the lounge and everyone loaded their stuff out Debbie treated Catherine, Donald, Carrie, Liz, Jen, and me to dinner. After dinner I hung out with Carrie, Liz, and Jen before heading home.

We had several celebrities come through the lounge this year. Danny Glover came through a few times. Radha Mitchell (Man on Fire), Robert Knepper ("T-Bag" Bagwell on Prison Break), Rex Lee (Lloyd on Entourage), and Lil Jon also came through. There were others but I don't remember them right now. All in all, it was a good time. I saw some old friends, made some new ones, and got paid. I also got to play a little bit this year, which is good.

Wavelink and Paladium

2007-12-26T19:20:00.000-05:00

After I got fired from Bliss I was unemployed for 3 weeks. I filed an unemployment claim but it got denied. After 2 weeks of being unemployed I got hired back on at Teleperformance doing tech support for Dell computers. Because I hadn't been trained on Dell's XPS line of computers, I had to go back into training. The next training class didn't start until Sep 3th. The training class was scheduled from 3-11:30 PM M-F. I was told that I would only have to go through the 1st week of training because that is when they trained us on the XPS computers. During my 3rd week of unemployment I applied for an intern position at Wavelink. They offered me a position working from 8:30 AM until 2 PM M-F. I accepted it. I started working at Wavelink on Aug 27th.

Wavelink takes care of their employees. In addition to good pay and benefits they also provide free snacks, juice and soda. They also have a break room with a HD TV, a Nintendo Wii, and four gaming computers with good games like Command & Conquer 3 and World of Warcraft.

On my first day of class at Teleperformance I told the trainer that I was told that I would only have to go through the 1st week of training because that is when they trained us on the XPS computers and he told me that the XPS material was now spread out through all 6 weeks so I was going to have to go through all 6 weeks. At first I wasn't too happy about that but I figured it wouldn't be that bad to get paid to get a review of stuff I had already been trained on.

After my unemployment claim was denied I filed an appeal. A week or two after starting at Wavelink, I had my appeal hearing with a judge, Wes, Wes's payroll guy, and me on a conference call. Wes exaggerated and lied and I was honest so I didn't stand a chance. A week later they mailed me a letter saying that my appeal had been denied.

Back in August I moved into a home that a friend was in the process of buying so he could rent it out. He was still renovating it and the sale wasn't finalized so he let me live there in exchange for keeping an eye on the place and paying utilities. In October I moved into a house that Brian, who had worked at GoodGame after I left when they couldn't afford to pay me any more, was renting rooms in.

On Oct 4th Wavelink offered me a full-time Tier 1 tech support position making more than Teleperformance was paying me with better benefits. I was still in training at Teleperformance. I accepted Wavelink's offer. Then I called Teleperformance and quit.

A week or two after my promotion at Wavelink, Phil called me and asked me to work for him at a Mexican bar that he was managing. I was hesitant to work for him again, especially when he told me that Larry was Head of Security but I went by to check out the place. I went there on a Friday night to check it out. It was called El Tucanazo. I was happy to see Brian Servatius, who is one of the best Security Specialists that I know, working the door. It was a decent size bar with Mexican bands playing. I helped break up three fights that night, one of them by myself out in the parking lot at the end of the night. I decided to work there. The pay wasn't very good but at least we got payed. Larry and I butted heads but the owner, Frank straightened him out. A few weeks after I started working at El Tucanazo, Phil talked Frank into turning it into an American dance club called Paladium. Phil and Frank closed the club down for 2 weeks for renovation. They promoted me to Assistant Manager while we were closed for renovation.

Around this time my car started acting up. It wasn't shifting gears smoothly so I thought it was the transmission. I took it in to get the transmission fluid flushed but it still wasn't shifting smoothly. I took it to the dealer, Menlove Dodge Toyota. It broke down as I was coming off of the highway by Menlove. Menlove had it towed and told me the next day that part of the fuel injection had burnt up. That part was covered under the warranty but that part burning up had caused 5 other parts that weren't covered by the warranty to burn up/break. The other 5 parts cost $1,200. I told the dealer that I didn't have $1,200 to fix it. I also explained that if the part that caused the other parts to break was covered under warranty, then the other 5 parts should be covered. Menlove Dodge-Toyota covered the cost of the the other parts! I had borrow $200 to pay the deductible on the $300 part that the warranty covered.

Paladium's Unveiling Weekend was Nov 16th & 17th. Our Grand Opening was Nov 17th & 18th. My car was getting repaired during our Grand Opening weekend. My warranty covered a rental. I ended up getting a GMC Sierra. It had a V-8 that kicked butt! We brought Playboy Playmate Barbie Murdock out to host our Grand Opening. I had found her on MySpace (I created and maintained Paladium's MySpace) and Phil recognized her because she used to be the owner of Club Axis's girlfriend. I got to pick her up from the airport, take her to her hotel, take her to U-92's offices for an interview, take her to the Ultimate Combat weigh-ins at Hard 8 Motorsports, take her back to her hotel to get ready, and then bring her to the club. I assigned one of our Security to protect her. At the end of the night I took her back to her hotel and walked her up to her room.

Saturday, Nov 18th was the premier of the Ultimate Combat Experience at Paladium. I went to the club early to help set up. Then I picked Barbie up from her hotel and brought her back to the club. At the end of the night I took her back to her hotel. Phil had lost the keys to his SUV at a strip club so I gave him a ride home out in South Jordan. Then I brought Barbie and her friends some Sconecutter (she loves Sconecutter) and hung out with them for a little while. She got a ride to the airport from a relative on Sunday. I really enjoyed taking care of her. She is really sweet and down-to-earth. We still keep in touch.

The week after our Grand Opening Money Mart's check fraud department called me and told me that if I didn't pay them for the check that Phil wrote me to cover the bounced check he wrote me at Bliss, they were going to turn me in to the cops for check fraud. I called Phil and he gave me the run around. After a week of me asking him to pay me, he told me to f*ck off and lose his phone #. I called Frank, told him what had happened, and told him that I wasn't going to work with someone that was going to treat me like that. I know that I've said this before but I will never work for Phil again. I don't hate him, I just hate the way he treats me. A couple of weeks later Frank called me and told me that he was going to be letting Phil go (you reap what you sow) and going in a different direction with the club. He offered to pay me to make some changes on Paladium's MySpace. I accepted, made the changes he asked me to, and got paid the following week.

I recently finished reading Patriot Acts by Greg Rucka. I'm currently reading Open Mind, Open Heart by Father Thomas Keating and The Foreclosures.com Guide to Making Huge Profits Investingin Pre-Foreclosures Without Selling Your Soul by Alexis McGee. I'm still working at Wavelink. I'll be working Security for a celebrity lounge at Sundance again starting tomorrow. I will also hopefully be working at Harry O's again. I'll let you all know how it went in a week or two.

Bliss Nightlife

2007-10-22T18:54:00.000-04:00

It's been over three months since I posted last. The first month was basically same "stuff", different club. If you've been reading my blog for the past year or two you should have a good idea what I'm talking about. I'll try to keep it short since it's not fun for me to relive it but I've got three months of catching up to do so here we go...

There are three couples that own Bliss Nightlife - Wes & Angie, Ben & Connie, and Ryan & Kim. All of them, with the exception of Wes, are nice people but none of them have any experience working in night clubs. When I met with Wes back in June I explained to him that I was getting paid $12.50 an hour full-time at Teleperformance so he would need to pay me more than that to get me to come work for him. After talking to Wes, I talked to Phil and he said that he would talk to Wes and convince him to pay me well. The following week Phil made a contract stating what my salary and responsibilities were and said he would have Wes sign it. I edited my contract to clarify that it was for working 3 days per week but Phil said I didn't need that. I later found out why.

On Thursday, July 10th I found out that Teleperformance wasn't going to get the schedule change that I had requested so I gave my 2 weeks notice. Because the owners and Phil were worried about Travis breaking into the club or having someone break into the club for him I slept at the club almost every night from Thursday, July 5th until Tuesday July 10th. They had an alarm system but the cameras didn't get installed until July 10th. During that time the girls that I hired to work at Voodoo (the 18+ part of Bliss Nightlife that I was hired to manage), a couple of the Security guys, and I cleaned and painted Voodoo. I also helped a little bit with getting Bliss Nightlife set up.

Bliss Nightlife and Voodoo had their Unveiling Party on Wednesday, July 11th. Bliss Nightlife opened at 8 and Voodoo opened at 10. After spending all day at the club, I went home to take a shower. When I got back, around 7:45, it was a mess. There was Security outside to I.D. and search people but there wasn't any Security by the front desk where the Door Girls sold memberships and collected the cover charge. There also weren't any Security on some of the doors. I brought this to Judah's attention and helped him get those spots covered. They also didn't have the stanchions set up inside to separate the regular line from the VIP line so I set those up. The owners had told Phil that they had already hired Door Girls so we didn't hire any at either Job Fair. When we opened the doors at 8 there was only 1 Door Girl there. I had anticipated being understaffed for Door Girls for Bliss Nightlife so I had asked Ally, who was over 21 but had applied to work for Voodoo because we had hired everyone we needed for Bliss Nightlife (except for Security) at the first Job Fair, to come in and be prepared to work as a Door Girl. She had been helping us get ready in the afternoon so she had gone home to change. Brandy, who was going to be a Door Girl and train the other Door Girls on how to use Doormate (the computer program that tracked memberships), wasn't going to be able to come in until later. Angie, who was also Wes's Personal Assistant for his other business, was there so I showed her how to use Doormate. She didn't have any pens to write down the Guest List for employees so I sent Mark, one of the Security guys that we had hired, to the convenience store a block away to get pens. My ladies from Voodoo were making name tags for all of the employees. The next 2 hours were crazy - I helped out in different areas making sure things were running smoothly.

Around 10:00 I programmed the cash registers for the Energy Bars at Voodoo and helped the ladies set up the Energy Bars. I was relying on Dan to be my main Bouncer at the door. I had to go find him because he was wandering around the club. I had another Bouncer searching people. Brad, who had worked for Vortex before, was on the checkpoint at Voodoo's main entrance that led upstairs to Bliss nightlife. His job was to make sure that no one under 21 got upstairs and no alcoholic drinks came downstairs. He did a good job. Misty, who I had hired as my Assistant, and Kendra were my Door Girls. They both did a great job. Part way through the night Misty pointed out a lady who had been drinking alcohol. I "interviewed" her, smelled alcohol on her, and kicked her out. Later on Misty noticed that a lady who had come in through Voodoo's entrance earlier, which meant that she was under 21 since we sent people 21 and over to Bliss Nightlife's entrance, re-enter through Voodoo's entrance later on with a stamp from Bliss Nightlife. I asked her for her I.D. but, what a surprise, she "didn't have it" (she didn't want to show me her I.D. showing that she was under 21). I kicked her out. She was with one of Rocky's friends. Rocky is one of the guys that cleans the club. Rocky's friend almost got kicked out for arguing with me when I was kicking out his underage friend. The night went smoothly besides those two incidents and the initial chaos. Bliss Nightlife was very busy. Voodoo was very slow - that's what happens when you do very little promotion.

Club Vortex used to be in the building where Bliss nightlife is now. Before I ran Security there, when I just did Security for the Go-go Dancers and VIPs, the whole bottom level, including the patio, was 18+. When we opened Voodoo on Wednesday the patio was 18+. There is a balcony overlooking the patio that is part of Bliss Nightlife. Since it was very slow at Voodoo on Wednesday the owners decided to make the entire patio 21+ on Friday. This meant that Voodoo was only 1 room on the bottom level.

The next day we were open, Friday July 13th, was our Grand Opening with D.J. Skribble. Bliss Nightlife was packed. I helped get things straightened out again from 8:30 until 10:00 since Bliss opened at 9:00 and Voodoo didn't open until 10:00. Voodoo was very slow again. If they had promoted Voodoo they way they should have it would have been packed too. Because Bliss Nightlife was packed and Voodoo was slow, and because one of Bliss's Door Guys called me up there to help enforce the dress code, and because the sidewalk was blocked which we can get cited for, I walked around from Voodoo's entrance on the north end of the building to Bliss's entrance on the east side of the building a few times to help control the crowd. One of the times I went up there Wes told me to go back to Voodoo and I did.

Around 11:00 D.J. Skribble arrived and he came in Voodoo's entrance since it wasn't busy. I helped escort him up to the D.J. booth. Then I went back down to Voodoo. A little bit later Phil came down and told me to go find Georgio, one of the barbacks from Vortex that he had fired, and bring him downstairs. I found a roaming Bouncer, found Georgio, told him that he had to leave, and walked him down to Voodoo's entrance where Phil, Wes, and Judah were waiting for him. Phil told him that they had busted his underage friend using his I.D. that he had given him to get into Bliss. He told him to go away and never come near the club again.

Dan, who had been my I.D. guy at the door and who I had told I was relying on to run my door had been missing most of the night. I had replaced him earlier on when I realized he was missing. I had also sent of of my Bouncers to go look for him and tell him to come back down. He didn't come back down. I eventually went upstairs to go find him. While I was looking for him Wes grabbed me by the arm and asked what I was doing up there. I pulled my arm away. He told me to come talk to him. We stepped off to the side and he started yelling at me. He asked why I was upstairs. I told him that Dan, one of my Door Guys, had left his post and I was looking for him. He said, "So your door guy left his post and you left the door to go look for him?" I told him that I had 5 people on my door (I had the I.D. guy, the Searcher, the guy watching the checkpoint going from Bliss to Voodoo, my Door Girl Kendra, and my assistant Misty). He yelled at me and told me to get back downstairs. I later found out that Judah had told one of his roamers to go bring one of my guys upstairs. The roamer pulled Dan upstairs. They should have checked with me first. Even if they hadn't checked with me someone with common sense would have pulled a roamer, not someone on a post, especially not someone posted at the main entrance.

Although Bliss was packed we didn't have any major incidents, at least none that I'm aware of. The Assistant Head of Security, Mikey, who I had worked with at Vortex and Axis, busted 2 or 3 underage ladies in Bliss that had come in through Bliss's front door (they had the Bliss stamp) and kicked them out. Voodoo was extremely slow again. At the end of the night the owners decided to close down Voodoo because they didn't think that the risk of getting shut down if a minor got upstairs was worth the relatively small amount of profit Voodoo would make. Wes told Phil to tell me that the ladies would get their paychecks on Monday. I called all of them and told them the bad news. They felt like the owners had wasted their time. They felt like the owners didn't promote it properly and by only giving it two days they didn't give it a fair chance. I agreed with them. The ladies wanted to make fliers and promote it themselves. Kendra wanted to talk to Ben about it so I called him and asked him to call her about it. I don't know if he did. Wes didn't want Voodoo there in the first place. He had made that abundantly clear to me before we opened. I'm sure that he was the main one pushing to kill it after only 2 days.

The beginning was the best part of working at the club because of the ladies that I was managing. I really enjoyed working with Misty, Kendra, Nixie, Cassie, Alyse, Erin, Ashlie, and Kira. Misty was a lot of help and her presence helped me deal with all of the chaos of opening the club. I still talk to her on a regular basis. Felisha, who had worked at Vortex and Vortex 2K6, was bossy and a little bit snobby so she didn't get along with some of the ladies. I had talked to a trusted source and found out that she had been fired from Vortex 2K6 because she was "accused of stealing". I told Phil this after he had hired her but he just blew me off and said that people don't always say nice things about people after they are no longer working somewhere.

Since Voodoo was no longer open I did Security for Bliss on Saturday. My friend Ed, who had done promotions for all of the other clubs Phil and I worked at, as well as Club Manhattan and The Hotel/ Elevate, was the VIP Host for Bliss. He wanted me to do Security for the VIPs. When I told Judah what Ed wanted he told me that he would rather have me roam around and make sure that all of the Bouncers were where they were supposed to be. Although Wes didn't want me to be in any kind of supervisory position, Judah realized that with my experience, attitude, and work ethic I was a good person to have in the position that he gave me. Most people in the night club industry would refer to my position as a Security Lead so that's what I referred to myself as.

On Monday Phil told me that the checks for the ladies from Bliss weren't going to be ready until Tuesday so i called them all and let them know. On Tuesday Phil told me that they wouldn't be available until Wednesday. On Wednesday afternoon I got to the club before Wes did. When the checks showed up Wes wasn't there to sign them. After Angie called him to tell him that the checks were there waiting for his signature Wes didn't get there until more than 2 hours later. Kendra got there before he did. When he walked in he didn't even ask about the checks. He had bought a remote control boat to play with in the "water feature" (pool) out on the patio. He sat down and started putting it together. I went to the office to get the checks and brought them to him. He set them down and continued playing with his boat and chatting with some of the other employees. After chatting with some of the employees he talked to a guy that wanted to do a fire show. He eventually got around to singing the checks more than 30 minutes after he showed up. His attitude about the Voodoo employees paychecks was a good indication of how little he cared about his employees getting paid for the rest of the time that I worked there.

My check for the work I had done between June 15th and June 31st was supposed to be given to me on July 5th but Phil hadn't submitted my hours to the payroll company. He had payed me for the 2nd Job Fair which was mostly for Voodoo out of his own pocket on July 5th because Wes refused to pay me for that one (further evidence that he didn't want Voodoo to succeed). That check bounced and I got over $300 in overdraft fees because of it. Phil covered the bounced check and only payed a little bit of overdraft fees. Oh, by the way, Key Bank is evil!!!

After he gave me the paychecks for the ladies and I gave them to the ladies that were there I asked him where my check was and he said we had to talk about it. He then went back out by the pool to play with his boat and chat with some of the employees. When he eventually took the time to talk to me he wanted me to explain what this check was for. I explained it to him and he said that he would have to talk to Phil about it before he decided to give it to me. He also said that since Voodoo was closed I was no longer a Manager. I was just a Security Guard but my pay would stay the same. I told him that Phil had me doing extra stuff like maintaining the club's MySpace, being in charge of setting up the tables and stools for Ultimate Combat, and other stuff. He told me that if Phil wanted me to do extra stuff then Phil would have to pay me for it. I also told him that Judah had me making sure that the other Bouncers were on there posts and doing their jobs. Wes said he would talk to Judah about that. To get my check I ended up having to come back to the club at 3 AM after getting off work and going home.

Here is a summary of the next month:

Because Phil told Wes that my salary was based on us being open 4 days per week (which they planned on eventually doing and are now open 5 days) in order to make it look like he was getting a better deal, my pay got cut when Wes switched me to hourly - so he lied when he said my pay would stay the same
Wes micro-managed everyone that worked for him; when I manage employees I hire competent people and let them do their jobs; although you do need to monitor your employees, you don't need to micro-manage their every move
Wes overrode me when I wanted to 86 Manu, who happened to be Judah's cousin, because of previous problems we had with him
Larry, who had replaced Mikey as Assistant Head of Security because Mikey couldn't work all three nights that we were open, overrode me and Judah backed him up when I wanted to keep a group that we had kicked out for fighting from re-entering; two hours later they were involved in a shooting around the corner from the club
Wes and I butted heads because he disliked me, I'm opinionated, and he's insecure
Too many chiefs - 6 owners that couldn't get on the same page
The paychecks that were supposed to be paid on July 15th were 1 or 2 days late
We brought my friend DJ Miss Joy to Bliss on Friday, July 29th - best night at Bliss for me

Since August 5th was on a Sunday, we got our paychecks on Monday, August 6th. I deposited my check on Monday. On Tuesday one of the bouncers, R.C. called me and left me a message saying that he couldn't cash his check at Check City (a check cashing store) because of previous bounced checks. He also said that when he went to Bliss's bank they could not cash the check because of insufficient funds. Another bouncer, Ephraim, sent me a text message saying that he couldn't cash his check at the club's bank because of insufficient funds. I called Phil and he said that he couldn't cash his check either and he didn't have any control over the club's bank account so I called Ben. He told me that the club's account was supposed to pull from one of the owner's personal accounts when there was insufficient funds. (When I called the club's bank the next day they said that was not the case). I explained to Ben that it wouldn't do any good for people that went straight to the club's bank to cash their checks. He said he would look into it.

On Wednesday I called my bank to see if my paycheck had cleared. I found out that it was being returned. I called Bliss's bank and they said that although there was not enough money in the account to cover the check before, there was enough money now and suggested I have my bank resend the check. I called my bank and requested that they resend the check. They did and it cleared. I called Ben to let him know what was going on. He didn't answer his phone so I called Wes. When I told Wes what happened his attitude was basically "It cleared now, so what's your problem?". I asked him if everyone else's checks were going to clear. He asked why I was asking about other employee's paychecks. I told him that it was because they were calling and texting me asking me why their checks weren't cashing. He asked why they were calling me. I told him that it was probably because I knew Phil and I usually knew what was going on. He said "Don't mess with my payroll". I said "I'm not messing with your payroll. I just want us to get paid". He again said "Don't mess with my payroll" and hung up on me. I called him back but he didn't answer.

I then sent a text message to some of the employees that said "Your checks will clear now. If your check was returned, have your bank resend it.". Within 10 minutes Larry called me and told me that Wes said that they were going to have to let me go for insubordination because I had texted the employees about their paychecks. I resisted the urge to laugh at the ridiculousness of their reason for firing me. After I got off the phone with Larry, I called Ben. He said that just one owner couldn't make that decision, it had to be a group decision. He told me that he would talk to Wes about it. Later on Wes called me and told me that Ben was not only his business partner, he was also his best friend and he supported his decision to fire me. I called Ben but he didn't answer. I called Phil and he didn't answer. I texted him telling him what had happened and he replied that he couldn't do anything about it.

To be continued...

Go, Baby, Go!!!

2007-07-01T19:35:00.000-04:00

A few weeks ago Blackfive reposted an article by Doc Russia. In his post, Doc describes a recent conversation he had with his sister. In this discussion he uses a great analogy to explain that, despite what the mainstream media has been telling us, we are making progress in Iraq. I'm reposting part of his post here:

In other news, I got to spend some time with my sister while she was on R&R. It was really good to see her. We spoke at some length about Iraq and the war. While I realize that many people just do not want to talk about the war, I think that I need to say something here. While talking with her, I think I got a better understanding of the magnitude of what we are trying to do, and I must say that it is a daunting task. We are trying to drag what is basically a feudal society that had never experienced a renaissance or age of enlightenment into the modern age. It took Europe a hundred years to accomplish this, and we have been about it, making strides for only a few short years. It truly is a Herculean task, but we are doing it. This is why, IMHO, there is such a disparity between the optimism of so many troops and the negativism of the media outlets. It is kind of like when I was watching a C-5 galazy taking off of a runway when I was a grunt. The C5 is a gargantuan heavy lift air transport plane. I mean, you could put a row of apartments inside the damned thing, and have room for the tenants to walk their dogs. It is immense. Now, while it is immense, it needs the normal amount of runway to get off the ground, and has the normal acceleration of any cargo aircraft. So, one day, I am sitting on a hilltop, and I see this ginourmous craft lumber up to starting gate of the flight line. I was about a kiloometer from the craft, and it was pointed in my general direction, and I am high enough up on the terrain that I have a really good view of it on the runway. Well, I hear the engines roar, and I start to notice movement as it begins to slowly go down the runway, it taxies a ways, and starts going at a good clip, but I notice that it is not going nearly fast enough to take off. What's worse is that it is no longer accelerating, and it is about to run out of pavement. I watch, expecting them to throttle down, hit the brakes and turn around or something, but it just keeps lumbering along past the point of no return. Now, I start to get a little tense, since that huge thing will not be able to stop before it runs into a structure one of my buddies is posted in, and it will not be able to get enough airspeed to take off. I thought back to the plane that had crashed on that same spot a little lesss than a year ago, and my mouth got a little dry, when suddenly, this takiing plane just starts to hover up off the ground. Then it starts to climb faster, and banks left past the structure where my buddy is.

And as the nose passed by him, and I saw how quickly it went by, it occured to me that the plane was going real fast. That C5 had been going full boogie down that runway. The pilots at the stick had been sitting in their cockpit, pressed into the backs of their seats with engines roaring as it clawed its way down the tarmac like a high school track athlete pumping those pistons as it hurtled to liftoff, and they coaxed it "go, baby, go!"

but to me it looked slow. It looked to slow to be able to generate lift. The reason it looked slow was that at a distance, when your mind is used to tracking movement and judging speed by the time it takes a craft to pass it's own hull length, when you get a *REALLY* large craft, that way to guage speed is no longer useful.

I think that it is the same way with Iraq. While we, far from the being behind the yoke of the thing are, and unappreciative of it's size look upon it, what is actually a breakneck speed appears as a lumbering and lazy gait, but it really is not, and then we are shocked when the cockamamie thing actually gets off the ground. From our perspective, I do not think that we are very able to judge how fast or well things are going. From the media, we only hear of losses, and from guys like Yon and the folks we know over there, we hear of our successes. And, our successes are legion.

We are doing something on a grand scale. We really are trying to drag one of the last vestiges of feudal and unenlightened culture out of the darkness of the jungle and into the light. We must not, we cannot throttle back. It is time to bend the throttle forward, and through the howl and roar of turbines growl, through gritted and clenched teeth,

"Go, baby, go!!!"

Peaceful Warrior Available on DVD

2007-06-26T22:21:00.000-04:00

One of my favorite movies, Peaceful Warrior, has been released on DVD today! I've seen Peaceful Warrior twice in theaters, once last year when it was given a limited release, and again this year when it was given a wide release. You can buy Peaceful Warrior on DVD by clicking here.

I interviewed with one of the owners of Bliss last Wednesday. He basically asked me to explain why I'm the man for the job. I told him about all the experience I have - over 10 years doing Security in night clubs and at concerts; doing Security for the Super Bowl, the Olympics, and Sundance; running Security at Vortex, Players, & Natalies. I told him that I am good at filtering out the troublemakers. I explained that my Security philosophy is to be aware of what is going on around me and prevent things from escalating before they get out of hand. I told him that I am trustworthy. I told him that I am a Christian. I told him that although I am not perfect, I am honest. I told him that my purpose in life is to protect people. After I was done "selling" myself I asked him what kind of pay they were going to offer me. He told me that he was going to talk to the other owners and they would let me know.

We got our liquor license approved today. We also passed the fire and building inspections. If they can pay me what I am worth, I will be signing a contract later this week or early next week. Yes, I am learning from my past experiences (like this one, this one, this one, and this one) and will be getting a contract. They will have to pay me more than I'm making at Teleperformance to get me to cut back to part time so I can work both jobs. I put in a schedule change request last Wednesday. I requested to only work on Mondays and Tuesdays from 3:30 PM until 12 AM starting the week of July 8th through July 14th because Voodoo's Unveiling Party is on Wednesday, July 11th. This would allow me to work at Voodoo on Wednesdays, Fridays, & Saturdays and have Sundays & Thursdays off. I found out today that I won't know if my schedule change request has been approved until the end of next week. I have heard that our benefits at Teleperformance, especially the dental benefits, are not very good. I want to work both jobs so I have something to fall back on if Voodoo doesn't work out but if they can't give me the schedule I want, and if I can get a good contract for Voodoo, I might just quit Teleperformance and work at Voodoo.

We are having another Job Fair for Bliss and Voodoo this Friday and Saturday from 12-4 PM. We have hired enough bartenders, barbacks, cocktail waitresses, and shot girls for Bliss but we are still accepting applications. I will still be interviewing people for positions at Voodoo, the 18+ part of Bliss that I will be managing. I need to hire Door Girls and Energy Bar Girls. The Door Girls will be collecting cover charge at the front door. The Energy Bar Girls will be selling energy drinks, soda, and bottled water at the Energy Bars. I want to hire a few of the guys that I interviewed last week for Security. I also want to rehire Dan, who worked the last night Vortex was open. I will interview some more guys for Security this weekend and then they will have go to a second interview with one of the owners early next week. We will have some training at the end of next week.

Speaking of Security, I have been reading Clublife, a blog by a bouncer in New York City, off and on for a few years now. While reading the Bouncer (doorman) Wikipedia article last week I came across another blog by a bouncer working at a night club in a holiday park complex in the UK. It's called A Dirty Job. The Bouncer article also links to two other bouncer websites, Door Network and Working the Doors. You can also check out the rest of my blog for the club life from my perspective.

Finally!

2007-06-19T17:33:00.000-04:00

Two weeks ago, on Tuesday, Phil called me and told me that he had recommended me to the new owners of Vortex for a job. No, I didn't tell him to go jump in a lake. Wednesday, I finally went downtown to the Labor Commission and filed a wage claim against Travis Pera and his brother, Ryan Pera who is the one who signed the checks from Club Vortex that bounced.

On Thursday I met Phil and he told me that he was recommending me to be the manager for Voodoo, which is the 18+ part of the new club on the 1st floor. The 21+ part, on the 2nd , 3rd, and 4th floors, will be called Bliss. The owners have someone that they want to run Security for Bliss but Phil recommended me to run Security for Voodoo as well as managing the Door Girls, Energy Bar Girls, D.J.'s, and Go-Go Dancers. I still have to meet with the owners to talk to them about pay. I will be working there on Wednesday, Friday, and Saturday.

On Saturday I was working at Teleperformance when A.J., the Head of Security at Harry O's, called me to ask if I could work the MySpace Party they were having. I told him I would ask my supervisor and call him back. I was on lunch so I asked my supervisor and he asked me if I could get him into the club. I told him that I didn't know but I would see what I could do. He let me go so I went home to shower and eat and headed up to Harry O's. When I got there A.J. had me work one of the VIP sections on the balcony on the stage left side of the club.

My area wasn't too busy because only the VIPs were up there. I always keep an eye on the Go-Go Dancers as much as possible without neglecting my area. Around midnight I saw one of the Go-Go Dancers who was dancing on the main bar below me talking to one of the barbacks. Then I saw the barback get up on the bar where she was dancing and talk to a customer directly in front of the Go-Go Dancer. I signalled A.J.'s brother, who was working one of the doors to the backstage area on the stage right side of the club, with my flashlight (Surefire's 6P with the P61 lamp assembly). He got someone to watch his post and then moved towards the Go-Go Dancer. A.J. must have seen the barback up on the bar, and I think they give radios to some of the barbacks, because he was on the pervert before his brother got there. I later found out that the pervert had been taking up-skirt pictures with his camera phone.

Later on I asked A.J. if I could get my supervisor in and he said yes and put his name on the list at the front door. When my supervisor called I told him that he was on the list. The next day (Sunday) I checked my mail from the past couple of days and my CCW was in there! Finally!

Last Tuesday Travis called me but I was working so I couldn't answer. I called him back and he threatened to sue me for check fraud if I didn't drop my wage claim. I told him to go ahead and try. Then he said that he was going to claim that I was an independent contractor, which he knows is a blatant lie, and get my case dropped. I told him that he was full of it and he knew I wasn't an independent contractor so go ahead and try to get the case dropped. He then told me that he would pay me $500 if I would drop the case. I told him that he owed me more than $1,000 so he would have to pay me more than $500. I suggested $800. He offered $600. I told him that I would think about it and call him back. I called a friend and asked him what he thought I should do. He suggested that I take what I could get, move on, and let go. I called Travis back and told him I would settle for $600. He told me he would pay me on Thursday. I told him that I wouldn't take a check because I didn't trust him.

Travis finally got around to paying me on Friday. He paid me $600 cash and had me sign one form that he was going to fax to the Labor Commission saying that I was dropping my case against him and another form saying that I wouldn't pursue any further payment from him. After getting paid I went to the pawn shop and got my XD 45 ACP handgun out. It had been in the pawn shop since last year. I had to pawn it to help pay rent because I went overboard in helping Chere and her kids. Then I went to my friend's house, who loaned me some money last year to help me since pawning my gun didn't get me enough money to cover rent, my car payment and food for a couple of weeks, and finished paying him and his wife the money I owed them. I spent Friday and Saturday with them. Friday night, on the way to see Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer (A-), my car kept stalling due to some type of short in the electrical system. I got it back to my friend's house after the movie. Later that night when we went to Wendy's to get a shake it stalled some more. I called my car dealership, Menlove Dodge Toyota, and they got it towed up to the mechanic near the dealership in Bountiful. They finally got it fixed today and I'll be getting a ride up there to pick it up after I get off work.

I created a Myspace site for Voodoo last week. Today I started helping one of the owners of Bliss with Bliss's MySpace site. Bliss and Voodoo will be having a Job Fair tomorrow and Thursday from 12-4 PM. We will be hiring for all positions. On Sunday I created ads at www.craigslist.com/ and www.ksl.com/ for the Job Fair. Today I created an ad at www.saltlakehelpwanted.com/. I'll be going in at 11:30 AM tomorrow to meet the new owners. I hope the online ads are enough because the owners didn't want to run an ad in the Salt Lake Tribune or City Weekly. One of them decided to run an ad in the Salt Lake Tribune a few weeks ago so they didn't want to spend more money running another ad. I have no idea why you would run a Help Wanted ad six weeks before you're going to be opening but I've realized that some things just can't be understood.

Sunday night I ordered a SmartCarry concealed gun holster. I ordered the Security V model. I had done some research online comparing SmartCarry and Thunderwear. I found out that SmartCarry has a better perspiration barrier and they don't have any downward facing seams on the top front of the firearm or tactical reload pocket for your gun to snag on. They're also less expensive than Thunderwear.

I finished reading Requiem for an Assassin by Barry Eisler. It was very good. Barry Eisler, who used to work for the CIA, has some good articles about personal safety and martial arts. If you're a writer or if you're interested in becoming a writer check out his articles for writers. While you're on his website check out his Links page. I haven't finished reading Old School-New School: A Guide to Bouncers, Security and Registered Door Supervisors by Jamie O'Keefe because I've been spending a lot of time at Gamerzz playing games and working on the Voodoo MySpace site. I hope to finish reading it soon. I also want to read Verbal Judo: Words as a Force Option by George J. Thompson, Open Mind, Open Heart by Thomas Keating, and Patriot Acts by Greg Rucka.

Fate's Wedding

2007-06-06T07:04:00.000-04:00

Fate and Theorian are two of my friends that I used to do Personal Protection for when they opened for many different Hip Hop artists that performed in Utah. They opened for artists such as Method Man, KRS-ONE, Bubba Sparxxx, the Yin Yang Twins., and the Alkaholiks. They move to Las Vegas two years ago but I have kept in touch with them.

Two weeks ago, on Wednesday, Fate, Theorian (a.k.a. Dissaster), Paradise (Fate's wife), and Derek (their roommate) came up to Salt Lake City. Fate and Paradise had a small wedding ceremony back in February but Paradise's family, who are Tongan, wanted to have a bigger ceremony with all of their family. Fate called me several weeks ago asking me to be in his line for the wedding. I haven't grown (or shrunk) any since my brother's wedding and they were getting suits from the same place, Men's Warehouse, so I didn't have to get fitted again.

Last Wednesday night, after I got off work, I went over to Fate's sister, Teisha's house and hung out with them for a little while. Thursday afternoon I picked up my suit. After work on Thursday night I picked up Fate, Theorian, and Derek and we met Shane at Habits (where Player's used to be) for some Karaoke. They spent a lot of money renovating the club and it shows. After karaoke we went to Denny's to hang out with Shane and his friends. Friday night they wanted to rest so I went to Gamerzz for a couple of hours before going home to get some sleep.

Saturday morning I picked up Theorian, Derek, and "Little Man" (Teisha's son) from Teisha's apartment. Then we went to Fate's mom, Carol's house and picked up Fate. Little Man decided to ride with his mom to the wedding so Theorian, Derek, and Fate rode with me down to the Free Wesleyan Church of Tonga for the wedding. Just before we got off the highway, Theorian said "That was brave." I responded "What was brave?" He said "Passing that cop like that." I looked in my rear-view mirror and saw a marked police car with his siren on. I'm usually on the look-out for cops because I tend to drive fast but somehow I completely missed this one. I pulled over to the side of the road, pulled out my driver's license, and asked Fate to get my registration and proof of insurance out of the glove compartment.

When the cop came up to my window he was upset because he was "going 65 and I passed him like he was standing still" and he "had to go 85 just to catch up to me". After he chewed me out and I explained that we were on the way to Fate's wedding he asked "Where do I know you from?" I said "I do Security at some of the clubs downtown." He said "Vortex?" I said "Yeah." He told me to slow down and let me go. As we pulled out Fate and Theorian told me that they were praying that I wouldn't get a ticket.

At the church I carried Little Man around to keep him occupied while we waited for the wedding to start. Fate told me that Little Man's sister, Dejanae, was sad because she wasn't in the line for the wedding so I invited her to walk around with us. Theorian was Fate's Best Man. Derek, Lam, and I were in the line with a bunch of Paradise's cousins.

Shane was in the line too but his truck broke down so he was a little bit late. He got there before Paradise though. Fate sang his song, Rest of My Life, to Paradise as her father walked her up the aisle while Derek played acoustic guitar. After the wedding we walked down the stairs and a bunch of people, including Shane, took pictures. After that we got into limos and rode around for a while. At 3:45 we got dropped off at Little America for the wedding reception.

This wedding reception was different from any other wedding reception I have ever been to. They had a Pacific Island dance group do dances from all over the Pacific Islands. The Tongans have a cool wedding tradition in which relatives on both sides of the family are given several expensive, beautiful, handmade blankets. Carol and Teisha received blankets. Most of my experience with Polynesians has been breaking up groups of them in fights while doing Security at clubs. In fact, several of the clubs that I have done Security at have limited the number of Polynesians that are allowed in to prevent things from getting out of control. I can understand supporting your family but when they are causing a problem you should straighten them out, not join them in fighting. It was good to have a positive experience with Polynesians and see how giving they can be.

Saturday night, after the wedding reception, Theorian, Derek, and I went to Gamerzz to play some Counter-Strike: Source. We were all not feeling good because it had been a long day and we hadn't kept ourselves hydrated so it wasn't as much fun as it could have been. After playing for a few hours I dropped them off at Teisha's apartment and went home to get some sleep.

Sunday morning I picked up Theorian and Derek and we went to the Free Wesleyan Church of Tonga to be with Fate and Paradise at their first mass as husband and wife. The Tongan tradition is for them to attend church together and wear a ta'ovala. After church Paradise's parents treated a bunch of people from both sides of the family to a buffet at Crazy Jim's buffet, a really good Chinese buffet restaurant. After lunch Theorian, Derek, and I went to Gamerzz and played some more Counter-Strike: Source. We had a lot more fun because we were well fed and hydrated. Sunday night I saw Flywheel (A+) with a friend.

On Monday I saw Pirate's of the Caribbean: At World's End (A) with a friend and his family. Sunday evening I picked up Theorian and Derek and we helped my friend and his family clean up a house that they will be buying from a relative and renting out. On Tuesday I picked up Theorian and Derek and we went to Paradise's parents house to hang out with Fate before they went back to Vegas. It was good seeing Fate, Theorian, Teisha, Little Man, Dejanae, and Carol again. It was good meeting Derek. I hope to see Fate, Theorian, and Derek again soon.

I've read more than half of Requiem for an Assassin by Barry Eisler. I'll finish reading Old School-New School: A Guide to Bouncers, Security and Registered Door Supervisors by Jamie O'Keefe when I'm done with Requiem for an Assassin. On Sunday night I was listening to 100.3 FM when I heard Susan Dermond, author of Calm and Compassionate Children, mention Christian Centering Prayer. I Googled Christian Centering Prayer and found this website. In the near future I want to read Open Mind, Open Heart by Thomas Keating.

I've been catching up on some of my favorite blogs and websites with Google Reader for the past couple of weeks. Blackfive had a good post about Good News from Iraq. He also posted about this article - Graying duo keep passenger in check. Click here to subscribe to Blackfive. Click here to subscribe to my blog.

Tonight at 6:30 PM my church, Calvary Chapel Salt Lake City, is having Church in the Park. We meet at Sugarhouse Park on the first Wednesday of every month from May through September (in July it's the second Wednesday because of July 4th) for a free BBQ, fellowship, worship, and a message. For a map and directions to Sugarhouse Park click here. If you live in Utah, you are invited to come. Bring your family and friends!

Facing The Giants

2007-05-23T03:49:00.000-04:00

On Sunday night I watched Facing The Giants on DVD. This was a great movie with a great message! It is one of my favorite movies! This movie is about having faith in God and glorifying Him in all you do. My church, Calvary Chapel Salt Lake City, had a screening of Facing The Gaints as a fund-raiser for Easter at the E but I wasn't able to watch the whole thing because I had to go to work at Club Vortex. I'm glad that I finally got to see it! I also want to see Flywheel, another movie produced by the producer of Facing The Giants, Sherwood Pictures.

I used to play WoW (World of Warcraft) when I worked at GoodGame but when I quit working there (because they could no longer afford to pay me) I quit playing. This past January, when I was working at Teleperformance, I bought the expansion for World of Warcraft called The Burning Crusade. I've been playing WoW on a regular basis since January but I'm probably not going to renew my monthly subscription next month because I want to spend less time vegging in front of a computer and more time reading the Bible, reading other books, hiking, and playing basketball & volleyball.

Last Sunday I wasted two hours of my life watching 28 Weeks Later with Phil. He really wanted to see it. I didn't want to and should have just done something else instead. We'll probably watch Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End this weekend. I'm also looking forward to seeing Ocean's Thirteen, Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, and A Mighty Heart.

I've avoided posting about the Virginia Tech Massacre until now because it is a very negative topic. My heart goes out to the family and friends of the victims of the Virginia Tech Massacre. I do believe that if students and faculty at Virginia Tech with Carrying Concealed Weapon (CCW) permits had been allowed to carry their guns on campus, Seung-Hui Cho might have been stoppped before he killed 32 people and wounded many others. Mike Kinsey wrote a good article about this issue on the Ohioans for Concealed Carry Website. I took the training for my CCW permit last year and finally got around to submitting my paperwork and paying for my CCW a few months ago when I started working at Club Vortex. Because of the increased number of CCW applications following the Trolley Square Mall Shooting (where an off-duty police officer prevented the shooter from killing more people) it currently takes up to 100 days to get your CCW so I should be getting mine soon. I'll be getting my XD 45 out of the pawn shop in July.

Barry Eisler's newest book, Requiem for an Assassin, comes out today. I'll be getting it when I get paid on Thursday. Check out Barry Eisler's blog. I'm still reading Old School-New School: A Guide to Bouncers, Security and Registered Door Supervisors by Jamie O'Keefe. After Requiem for an Assassin, the next fiction book I want to read is Shibumi: A Novel.

Snapped?

2007-05-16T15:59:00.000-04:00

I have been playing games online at Gamerzz in Taylorsville for about seven months now. I've been their unofficial Security guy for most of that time and, as of December 31st of last year, I am their promoter for their Lock-Ins (all-night LAN parties). I got Sky High Party & Pizza and FastKart Indoor Speedway to sponsor the Lock-Ins. This means that they provide passes to their business as door prizes and prizes for tournaments. I also got Dominos Pizza to provide pizza at a discounted price. Right around the time that Club Vortex got shut down, one of the employees at Gamerzz got let go (he got into a fight with one of the owners and I broke it up) so they needed to hire some people to cover his shifts. Another regular at Gamerzz, Finkle, and I got hired.

Let me back up a little bit here. Around the beginning of the year Gamerzz started implementing a "No Loitering" policy. This LAN center, being just a few blocks away from Taylorsville High School and Salt Lake Community College, was a "hang out" for several high school/college age students. This was becoming a problem to the point where sometimes there were more loiterers than customers. Sometimes this group would be so loud that it would be a distraction to the paying customers that were trying to conentrate on their gaming. They would also loiter next to the building. Because Gamerzz is in a strip mall, the owner of the strip mall complained to the owners of Gamerzz about this group loitering next to the building. The employees would have to repeatedly tell this group not to loiter next to the building. The rule (or "guideline") that was implemented around the time that I started working there was that these loiterers had half an hour to either get on a computer or leave the property for the day.

The leader of this group of loiterers is a 19 year old disrespectful, mouthy pothead whose nickname is Rick James. Rick James has, on several occasions, shown disrespect to the employees of Gamerzz by doing things such as flipping them off and arguing with them when they try to enforce the rules. On a couple of occasions we have wanted to suspend him from Gamerzz for a short time to punish him for his inappropriate behaviour but one of the owners, Jared, has not let us do this. He is afraid that if he punishes Rick James then him and his group will no longer come to Gamerzz. Rick James just "apologizes" and continues to be disrespectful. Although some of these loiterers, one of them being Rick James, are actually paying customers on a regular basis, some of them are not.

I worked there two or three days per week for the two weeks following Club Vortex being closed down. During this time I did a good job of enforcing the "No Loitering" policy. The other employees were not as consistent on enforcing this policy. When I got hired at Teleperformance my training schedule conflicted with my schedule at Gamerzz so the schedule was adjusted to cover my shifts. I am now just a back-up.

On Saturday, April 21st I was playing at Gamerzz and there were a lot of loiterers. They were being noisy. After two or three hours Finkle, the on-duty employee at the time, told the loiterers that they had half an hour to get on a computer or leave for the day. Rick James claimed that there were no open computers even though there were. Even if there weren't any open computers, Rick James and the other loiterers know that they can get on a waiting list so that as soon as a computer becomes available they will be the only ones that can log onto the open computers. The fact that they know about the waiting list and had been there for at least two hours but had not got on the waiting list proves that they were not intending to get on a computer. Rick James still wanted to argue and complain as he often does. At this point I told him to not argue with Finkle. Rick James's friend Spencer, who was sitting on a couch near the back of the LAN center about 10 feet from where I was sitting, told me to sit down and play my game.

Let me back up again. A month or two before this incident, I was playing at Gamerzz when Luke came in and told me that there was about to be a fight outside. I ran outside and asked Spencer, who was sitting in his car, what was going on. He said that a group of Polynesians, who were now standing next to their car, had tried to pull him out of his car and beat him up. At this point they got in their car and left. So I came to Spencer's defense when a group of guys were trying to beat him up.

Now back to the story. I told Spencer that he needed to leave now. He refused to leave and again told me to sit down and play my game. I moved closer to him, pointed towards the door, and told him to leave now. As an employee I was telling him to leave. By refusing to leave he was trespassing. He stood up, got in my face, and told me that he wasn't going anywhere. Technically by getting in my face he was threatening me. I told him to get out now. He told me "No" and stuck his tongue out at me. While that wasn't as bad as spitting on me, it wasn't the smartest thing to do. I spun him around, wrapped my arms around his shoulders and dragged him towards the door. At this point Rick James and his group of 6-9 guys rushed me and grabbed me. One of the smallest in the group jumped on me and was hanging from my neck in a futile attempt to throw me off balance. I stood my ground and told them all to get out. Luke, who works there and is friends with these guys, told them to get out too. Finkle, who is also friends with these guys, called the police. All of them, except for Rick James, left the building. Rick James was trying to provoke me to throw him out of the building. I just stood my ground and Luke and I told him to get out. After talking some trash he got out.

After everyone was out, Finkle called Jared, the owner. The police showed up within 5 minutes. We told them what happened. Then Jared showed up and we told him what happened. He then talked to the police and talked to Rick James and his group. After he had talked to everyone he told me that it should not have come to this. I should have called him. I explained that the customers should respect us and we should not have to call him to enforce the rules. I also explained that if we were all consistentt in enforcing the rules and if he hadn't overridden us when we wanted to suspend Rick James then he might respect us more and it wouldn't have gone as far as it had. He told me that if he suspended Rick James then him and his group might not come back. I told him that them not coming back would be a good thing. He explained that if they left, his business would suffer a major loss of revenue. I explained that as long as he let a bunch of troublemakers continue to break the rules and disrespect his employees, it was going to be hard to attract a good crowd. He again stated that it should not have come to this and told us to call him in the future.

Jared then went over and talked to Rick James and his group again. While he was over there Finkle and Luke took Jared's side of the argumnent basically saying that we had to walk on egg shells with these guys because we couldn't afford to lose them as customers. I explained that this "gang" of guys should not be running the shop, we should. They went into the whole "loss of our customers" spiel again. I said that I understood that but said that we had to draw the line somewhere.

Jared came back over and told us that he was going to let them stay. I asked Jared if he was serious and said that they should have to leave for the day, at the very least. They basically tried to jump an emplyee and Jared wasn't going to punish them at all. He said that he was going to tell them that they could either get on a computer or leave. So basically, after loitering for two or three hours, arguing with an on-duty employee, and then trying to jump an off-duty employee, they were just told not to loiter.

In a recent blog post, Luke claimed that I "snapped" and "assaulted a customer by putting him in a chokehold". He obviously doesn't understand what snapped means. Snap means "to suffer a physical or mental breakdown, especially under stress". Just because he doesn't understand the gang mentality and how to deal with a group of guys doesn't mean I "snapped". Just because I chose to physically remove a loiterer that had been trespassed and was challenging me doesn't mean I "snapped". If I had snapped, or lost control, Spencer would have been unconcious, I would have layed those guys out when they rushed me, and I would have thrown Rick James out when he was provoking me.

I didn't put Spencer in a chokehold. I wrapped my arms around his shoulders and dragged him towards the door. He wasn't enough of a threat to warrant me putting him into a chokehold. I knew that I could handle him without putting him in a chokehold (click here to read about a situation which did warrant me using a chokehold). Luke's lack of experience with physical confrontation, the loiterers being his "friends" (although I doubt that he spends any time with them outside of work and they don't respect him as true friends do), and his passive nature lead to him making an incorrect assesment of the situation. I like Luke and he has treated me well from the first day that I met him. I guess I just expected a more objective assessment of the situation from one of my co-workers that I have backed up on several occasions.

Rick James and a few of the paying customers from his group have still been coming to Gamerzz but the loiterers have not been there as much as they used to. So, while Jared and the other employees might not like my methods, they are effective.

My Second Car

2007-05-12T21:49:00.000-04:00

On Monday Preston called me to let me know that he had some family drama on Sunday and that was why he didn't call me. He picked me up from Gamerzz and we stopped by Auto Zone to get some fusible links and some wire cutters on the way to work. On our lunch break Preston replaced the two fusible links but the truck still wouldn't start. Preston game me a ride home.

Tuesday morning I called Scooter and asked him if he could tow the truck to his shop and fix it. He gave me the number to the tow truck guy. I called the tow truck guy. He was really cool. He came to my house and got my keys so he could go to my work and tow the truck. Tuesday afternoon I called Menlove Dodge Toyota, where I had bought my first car (the one that got totaled last year), to see of I could get another car. They said that I could and scheduled me to come in on Thursday at 1:15 to pick out another car. Preston gave me a ride to work and a ride home.

Wednesday morning Preston picked me up and we went to get our paychecks from work. Shortly after picking up our paychecks, Scooter called me to tell me that the truck was fixed. Preston insisted on giving me $50 because he had mistakenly told me that the battery in the truck needed to be replaced but it didn't. I told him that he didn't need to do that but he told me that he wasn't going to take no for an answer so I took it. After we ran a couple of errands Preston took me to the shop that Scooter works at and I picked up the truck. He only charged me $200 for the tow, the parts, and 3 hours of labor. He had to replace 3 fusible links (he said Preston had put the wrong kind in), and some wiring. He also had to wire the starter correctly because he claimed that Preston hadn't hooked it back up the right way. The truck started just fine but the radio wouldn't come on. Scooter suggested taking it to R.C. Willey to get it fixed. I went to R.C. Willey and Best Buy but neither of them could get the radio fixed that day. When I got to work I talked to Preston and he told me that his friend Travis could fix the radio for me.

Thursday morning I went over to Travis's house and he fixed the radio. All it took was removing it and replacing the fuse in the back. I tried to give Travis some money but he wouldn't take it. Then I headed up to Menlove Dodge Toyota to get my second car from them. I have been making payments ever since my car got totaled last year and still owed them $4,300. They waved $2000 of what I owed them and added the remaining money to the loan for the new car. I got a gold/tan colored 2002 Buick Regal LS. The car is what they call a "sleeper" because it is a luxury car but it has a 3.8 liter V6 with 195 horsepower and 225 pounds-feet of torque. It does 0-60 in less than 8 seconds! It has also traction control and a FF (front-engine, front-wheel drive) layout. The FF layout puts the heavy engine over the drive wheels which gives it better traction.

Preston gave me a ride up to Menlove on Friday to pick up my car. By the time I got done filling out paperwork I had less than 15 minutes to get to work. I made it easily. My new car handles really well!

Da T.R.U.T.H.

2007-05-07T09:05:00.000-04:00

On Sunday mornings I usually watch Lift Every Voice on BET. Yesterday morning the guest on Lift Every Voice was a Christian rapper named Da T.R.U.T.H. In his song Who Am I? featuring Tye Tribbett & Kirk Franklin, which will be on his Da T.R.U.T.H. & Friends LIVE DVD (in stores May 15th), Da T.R.U.T.H. talks about something that has been bothering me lately. This song, which is similar to my friend Theorian's song What If featuring Ms PHD, asks the question "When people see me do they know that I'm a Christian?" I know that I am a Christian but I don't always act like one. When I curse, I'm sure that people don't think that I am a Christian. I pray that God will help me change my ways and be the light of the world that he has called me to be.

Training at Teleperformance is going well. We learned about Windows Vista last week. We had an assessment every day. On Friday we had 2 assessments and a final assessment. I aced all of them all week except for the final, which I got a 96.67% on (I missed one question). The assessments were open-computer and open-note. Also, my trainer gave a very thorough review before each assessment so it's nothing to brag about. I'm just happy that I am doing so well because the better I do on the assessments, the better the chance is that I'll get the schedule that I want when training is done.

On Friday it was raining so I had my headlights on in Dave's truck when I went to work. I forgot to turn them off when I went inside to work so when I came out at the end of the night, the battery was dead. Because it was dark I put the jumper cables on backwards so it wouldn't start. I didn't figure this out until Saturday evening when I came back with one of my co-workers, Preston to try jump-starting it again. It still wouldn't start so we took the starter to Auto Zone and they tested it. It passed the test so we assumed the battery was bad. I bought a new battery but it still wouldn't start. I called Scooter, the sound guy at Club Vortex who is also a mechanic, and asked him what was wrong with the truck. He said that it was probably the fusible links. It was dark by the time he told me that so I treated Preston to the buffet at Godfather's Pizza.

After we ate he drove me up to Harry O's in Park City so I could get paid for the security work I did up there during Sundance. I got paid, and paid well. When we dropped me off at home, he told me to call him at his friend's house yesterday afternoon and he would come take me out to the truck and replace the fusible links. I called his friend's house yesterday afternoon but he wasn't there. I couldn't get a hold of him all day. I hope that I'll be able to get a hold of him today so that I can get it fixed without having to pay a mechanic to tow the truck and fix it.

Last night Phil and I saw Spider-Man 3 (B) and Next (A). Spider-Man 3 was good but it wasn't as good as Spider-Man or Spider-Man 2. It did have good special effects. Next was really good. It was very well written. Nicolas Cage and Jessica Biel played there roles very well. Jessica Biel is one of the most beautiful women that I have ever seen. I'm looking forward to seeing Home of the Brave (another Jessica Biel movie!), The Hip Hop Project, and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End.

Everything Will Be Alright

2007-05-04T15:30:00.000-04:00

Yesterday afternoon Steve Ketter finally paid me the rest of the money that he owed me from working Securty at the Main Event Lounge at Sundance. He claimed that the money that he was pre-paid was not only for me and the other Security guys, it was also for work he had done for Debbie setting up the Main Event Lounge in the months prior to Sundance. His experience reinforces my prior conclusion that in the future, when doing private security, I should get a contract so both parties know what is expected and to help in collecting any money owed. Tomorrow I am going to finally get paid from Harry O's for the security work that I did up there during Sundance. Once I have been paid from Harry O's, I will be completely paid for all security work done during Sundance!

Back when I was working at Club Vortex, I bought Tye Tribbet and G.A.'s latest album, Victory Live! Listening to this CD really helped me through a difficult time. The songs that were especially uplifting were Everything Will Be Alright, G.A. Hymn, Still Have Joy, 1-2 (Victory Check), and Victory.

There are several good Christian events and concerts coming to Utah soon. The Akiane Art Tour and Gallery is coming to the Patrick Moore Gallery in Salt Lake City. The Akiane Art Tour and Gallery will showcase the art and poetry of Akiane Kramarik, a 12-year-old prodigy that has been blessed by God and gives him credit for her gifts. It will run from Saturday, May 5th to Saturday, June 2nd. Click here for more info.

The Jeremiah People will be performing at First Baptist Church of West Valley City on Sunday, May 13th (Mother's Day). They will be doing free concerts at 9:30 A.M. and 11:00 A.M. At 6:00 P.M. they will be performing their drama, Dear Diary. Check out their tour blog by clicking here.

Christian rock group Flyleaf is coming to the Gallivan Center Plaza on Saturday, June 2nd at 12:00 noon as part of 94.9 The Blaze's Viva S.L.C. event. Tickets are only $12.50 and can be purchased at Smiths Tix or any Graywhale CD location.

The Tooth & Nail Tour is coming to In The Venue in Salt Lake City on Monday, June 11th at 5:00 P.M. The Tooth & Nail Tour features several punk/rock bands (most of them are Christian bands). MxPx, Project 86, The Classic Crime, The Fold, and Sullivan will be performing. Tickets can be purchased at 24tix.com.

To find Christian concerts and events in your area check out CCAuthority.com and iTickets.com.

Thought Crimes

2007-05-02T15:29:00.000-04:00

Our “First Freedoms” to free speech and religious expression are under attack! There are two imprtant bills that have been introduced in the House of Representatives. The first bill, the Employment Non-Discrimination Act (H.R. 2015), would make it illegal to fire, refuse to hire, or refuse to promote an employee based on his sexual orientation or "gender identity". Such acts would be considered crimes subject to severe penalties. This bill would force organizations such as the Boy Scouts, Veterans of Foreign Wars, day care centers, Christian business owners, adoption agencies, public schools, municipalities and a host of other businesses and organizations to hire homosexual applicants. For a list of the co-sponsors of ENDA, click here.

The second bill, the Local Law Enforcement Hate Crimes Protection Act (H.R. 1592), is a Thought Crimes law which aims to silence biblical Judeo-Christian speech and beliefs about homosexuality and “transgenderism.” This bill would inevitably create federally protected “class status” for homosexuals, bisexuals, transvestites, “transgender” and “transsexual” persons. H.R. 1592 paves the way to religious persecution – with “hate crimes” laws inevitably leading to “hate speech” laws targeted specifically at Christians and other faith groups who hold traditional beliefs on homosexuality. If this bill passes, it would be illegal for you to say that homsexuality is immoral! This has already happened in Canada, Sweden, Belgium, France, Spain, Ireland, Scotland, England, and New Zealand. Even here in the United States in Philadelphia, Christians have been arrested and jailed under a state “hate crimes” law!

Although these bills might look good on the surface if you just look at the titles, "non-discrimination" and "hate crimes", their goal is to normalize homosexuality and "trangenderism" and to punish those with opposing viewpoints. The vote for these bills could come as soon as tomorrow. If you oppose ENDA (HR 2015) and the Hate Crimes Act (HR 1592), please call your Representative at (202)224-3121 and let him or her know that you oppose these bills. If you don’t know your representative's name, simply give the operator your address and you will be given his or her name and connected with his or her office. You can also click here to send an email to President Bush asking him to veto these bills. Don't wait. Take action now!

To receive alerts via e-mail on similiar issues from the American Family Association, click here to subscribe today! You can also check out the American Family Radio website. If you're a father you should visit the OneMillionDads.com website. Mothers, you'll want to check out OneMillionMoms.com. Also, don't forget about Meet at City Hall and other National Day of Prayer events tomorrow! Click here to email this post to your friends and family.

Life's Getting Better

2007-05-01T15:49:00.000-04:00

Life's getting better. I passed the A+ Essentials and A+ 220-603 (Remote Support Technician) tests at my new job at Teleperformance so I am now an A+ certified Remote Support Technician! The money that my Uncle George and Aunt Beverly sent me allowed me to pay Keybank the money that I owed them and catch up on bills. I'm still going to go to the Labor Commission this week to have them try to make Travis pay me for my bounced paychecks from Club Vortex. I'm finally going to get paid from Harry O's on Saturday for the Security work I did there during Sundance.

Last month I saw two other movies that I forgot to mention in my last post, Amazing Grace (A) and Pathfinder (B+). Amazing Grace is the story of anti-slavery pioneer William Wilberforce. It also told some of the story of Olaudah Equiano's life. Olaudah Equiano was a slave who bought his freedom, became an anti-slavery abolitionist, and then went on to write about his life as a slave in his bestselling autobiography, The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano Gustavus Vass, The African. Pathfinder is the story of a Viking boy who was left behind after his clan raids a Native American tribe. He is then raised by the Native Americans and helps them battle his clan when they come back several years later.

I saw The Condemned (B) with Phil on Sunday. He still owed me $400 when Club Vortex got closed down (not including the 2 bounced paychecks) so I don't mind him paying for a movie every now and then. He still wants me to come back and manage Club Vortex when he gets it reopened but I'm not planning on working for him again. Phil really wanted to see The Condemned. It wasn't my first pick but it was better than I thought it would be. Although the story was basically about a live internet broadcast of several death row inmates put on an island with the last man (or woman) standing gaining there freedom, it had a good moral. It pointed out that people who enjoy watching people get tortured and murdered are the ones that are condemned.

Back when I was working at Club Vortex I ordered START Fitness's Fit to Fight DVD package. The Fit to Fight DVD package is a boot camp style workout on three DVDs. There is the basic level DVD titled Operation Wake-Up call, the intermediate DVD titled Operation Double Time, and the advanced level DVD titled Operation Fit to Fight. I did the Operation Wake-up Call workout once last week and I'm going to do it a couple of times this week. I'm planning to workout regularly starting next week. Hopefully I will be more consistent with this workout than I was with Combat Conditioning.

I'm currently reading Old School-New School: A Guide to Bouncers, Security and Registered Door Supervisors by Jamie O'Keefe. Although I'm not in a hurry to work at a night club again, this is a book that I have been wanting to read for a few years now. It applies specifically to working at night clubs in the UK, but it still has good information for anyone working Security in a night club anywhere.

This Thursday, May 3rd, is the National Day of Prayer. I encourage you all to Meet At City Hall from 12:20 to 12:40 PM to pray for a moral rebirth in our country! Click here to find other National Day of Prayer events near you.

Learning the Hard Way

2007-04-22T00:21:00.000-04:00

The situation at Club Vortex continued to get worse. The hourly employees got paid bi-monthly and I got paid weekly salary. About one month ago, the employee's paychecks bounced so some of the security quit since, unlike the bar staff and waitresses, they don't make cash each night. After my 2nd paycheck bounced I told Phil that I was going to quit if I didn't get paid so he started paying me cash.

On Thursday March 29th we had a concert featuring a Mexican gangster rapper. Because of people quitting I only had 7 security with 3 of those on the front door and 1 on the back door. One of my door guys quit half an hour into his shift because Travis had told him he would bring his check down the night before but he hadn't so that left me with 6 security guys.

Towards the end of the night 2 Polynesian guys tried to start a fight with one of my security guys, Bushy and me. I called Code Red (the code for a fight that brings all security to that area) and waited for back-up. When back-up arrived we told the two Polynesian guys to leave but they refused and a big Caucasian guy that was with them got mouthy. Then a brawl broke out and one of the Polynesian guys came up behind me and punched me once in my eye and twice in the back of the head. It was at this point in the fight that someone supposedly shot a gun from the upper level but I didn't hear it or see it. I did hear some bottles getting thrown and saw some people throw bottles. Everyone backed up and most of the customers panicked and ran out of the club. My security guys chased after a guy that had thrown a bottle at a mirror. I asked the performers if they were O.K. and they were so I followed my guys downstairs.

Even though I had previously told my guys not to chase people outside of the club, they did. When I got outside I ran around to the side of the building and part way down the street I saw the two Polynesian guys that had started the fight inside attacking one of my security guys, Mervin. He was on the ground as I ran up to back him up. As soon as I got to him a police officer drove up with his siren on. I pointed out the two Polynesians as they were getting into their car so the police officer got back into his car and pulled them over as they went around the corner back in front of the club. At this time Bushy, who had been out there with Mervin, got frustrated and punched one of Club Vortex's windows which resulted in a big gash on his forearm.

Mervin had to go to the hospital for a concussion and broken ribs and Bushy went to the hospital for the gash on his arm. The two Polynesian guys got arrested for Inciting a Riot. The Caucasian guy that was with them got away. After talking to the police for a while, filling out an incident report, helping Ryan repair a door that got broken when the customers fled the building, and locking up the club, I went to one hospital to check on Bushy who needed plastic surgery on his arm. Then I went to the other hospital to check on Mervin who had to stay over night at the hospital but had no permanent injuries. Mervin came back to work on Friday (what a trooper!) but missed Saturday.

Sunday night Phil called me and told me that the owners of the building had locked us out but they had not done it legally because they had not given us an eviction notice. He told me to go down to Club Vortex on Monday morning at 9:00 to meet Travis and the locksmith so I could get the new keys.

When I showed up Monday morning there were two cop cars out front. I walked inside and saw one of the owners of the building talking to two police officers. He asked me what I was doing there and I told him that Travis had told me to meet him there. One of the police officers told me to leave because I was at a crime scene so I left. Later that day I found out from Phil that someone had got into the club and stole the plasma screen TV's and some of the computers. He told me that we were closed down but he was looking for some new investors/owners to replace Travis and he hoped to reopen in a few weeks. I told him that I still needed to get paid for those bounced checks. He told me to talk to Travis since he was the investor and had not put the money from the club into the club account which was where the paychecks were drawn from. Travis blamed Phil for the money not being deposited in the account. Based on what I know, I believe that Travis was at fault because I know how tight he was with his money. I am going to the Labor Commission next week because Travis is refusing to compensate me for the bounced checks.

Although Phil did treat me better than he has in the past, I was still in a situation where I was suddenly unemployed and owed a lot of money. Phil blames Travis for the bounced checks and Travis blames Phil. Although I believe that it was more Travis's fault than Phil's, it still doesn't change the fact that I got screwed over again. I know I said that I would never work for Phil again when he fired me from Club Exchange but I would it would really stupid of me to work for him ever again.

After being unemployed for two weeks I got hired at Teleperformance to do tech support for Dell computers. I started training this past Monday. The training is seven weeks long. The first two weeks are for A+ certification. The third through sixth weeks are for Dell training followed by one week of on-the-job training. I'm getting paid $10.50 per hour during training and $12.50 per hour after training. I started working one day per week at Gamerzz in Taylorsville right after Club Vortex closed down but my current schedule at Teleperformance conflicts so I am now just an alternate employee.

This past Tuesday I went to court for the car accident that I was in back in October that totaled my car. Because I am pleading not guilty to the charge of Failure to Yield (since the other driver ran a red light) but guilty to the charge of Driving Without Insurance, my hearing was rescheduled for July 26th.

Because of the bounced checks and the fact that I was unemployed for two weeks I am in a financial bind but my Aunt Beverly and Uncle George are sending me some money to help me out. I thank God for their generosity!

I've seen a few good movies lately. I've seen 300 (A+) three times. It is one of my favorite movies of all time! I also saw Peaceful Warrior (A+) again because it was re-released in theaters. Peaceful Warrior is also one of my favorite movies that I've ever seen! I've also seen Shooter (B) and Grindhouse (F). Shooter was good but not nearly as good as 300 or Peaceful Warrior. Grindhouse was a total waste of time (more than three hours of time). I'm looking forward to seeing Next, The Invisible, Civic Duty, and Spider-Man 3.

Here We Go Again

2007-03-20T21:13:00.000-04:00

In the beginning of February I gave my 2 week notice at Convergys. Actually, it was a 1.5 week notice but my boss, Tony was treating it like a 2 week notice so I would be rehirable (not that I'm planning on ever working there again but why burn bridges). I was looking for another job and Phil had texted me a few times mentioning that he might be wanting me to come work for him again.

On Wednesday, February 14th Phil sent me a text message asking me to come in to Club Vortex and talk to him about working for him, starting that night. I had Wednesdays off so I went down and he basically told me that the club was not being managed properly and he wanted me to fix that. He wanted me to make sure that the bartenders, barbacks, cocktail waitresses, and shot girls were doing there job. In addition to their basic job duties, Phil wanted me to make sure that they did all of the closing work such as cleaning and locking up the liquor & beer. So I was basically a Shift Manager. He also told me that Josh was the Head of Security but that he had not been doing a good job of running Security. He told me not to worry about Security for the first week or two, just give Josh and his crew time to straighten things out but he didn't expect things to improve and thought that I would eventually be taking over Security too. Trent and Ryan were helping manage the club too. Trent was helping Josh run Security and Ryan was handling bills, payroll, cash, & liquor. I told Phil that I could work that night but couldn't work Friday and Saturday that week (the other nights that Vortex is open) because I was still working at Convergys.

At the beginning of the night Phil, Trent, Ryan, and I sat down with all of the bartenders, barbacks, cocktail waitresses, and shot girls and Phil told them that I was their manager. Wednesday went fairly well except for someone stealing some money out of Ryan's office.

That Friday Phil texted me and asked me to quit Convergys so I could work Saturday night. I talked to Tony and he made it so that I could quit and still be rehirable (what a guy!). Saturday was not the best night. It started off with one of the bouncers, Mike, trying to pick a fight with me. I went to Trent about it but he just went up there and talked to him. I felt that he should have been fired but Trent said it was my first week as manager so it was to be expected. It ended with Phil, Trent, and Ryan getting drunk and letting Ed, a promoter, do the close-outs for all of the barbacks, cocktails, and shot girls. Then Trent and Ryan took the money with them when they went with some of the employees to Wendover. They brought the money back the next day but Travis, the investor for Club Vortex, got mad about how things were handled.

After the dust settled Trent was told that he should just focus on Club Exchange and the transportation company that he was co-owner of with Ryan, Utah Transportation Management. Ryan was told the he should just focus on continuing to get the building ready for the Health Code inspection and Fire Code inspection. He was also there to sign the checks since he was on the checking account. Bills, payroll, liquor, and cash were now going to be handled by Brandy, who had been working the front door, handling cover charge and memberships. She would be still be running the front door.

On Saturday Phil had caught two customers that had taken drinks out of the club trying to bring them back in. This meant that the bouncers at the door had not done their job and prevented the customers from taking the drinks out in the first place. So on Wednesday Phil told me that I would now be over Josh straightening Security out. We had an employee meeting at the beginning of the night where Phil told the employees about the management changes that had been made. After the employee meeting I talked to Josh and told him that he wasn't being demoted, I was just over him as a manager. We went upstairs and had a quick Security meeting telling them that I expected them to stay on their post, do what I told them to do, and not use excessive force. That night two of the bouncers, Mike (the one that tried to pick a fight with me) and Tiffany quit half way through the night. At the end of the night another bouncer, Ashton quit.

That weekend Phil promoted one of the bartenders, Melanie, to Bar Manager. She was responsible for scheduling bartenders, barbacks, cocktail waitresses, & shot girls and ordering beer, liquor & bar supplies. Since I had been over the bar staff and bouncers, I thought that I was over her and the Head of Security. After a week of working together Melanie and I were having problems because I thought that it was my place to tell Melanie what needed to be done. To resolve this Phil called a manager meeting (he took Brandy, Melanie, and I out to eat). He explained that I am the Security/Building Manager, Brandy is the Front Door/Payroll Manager, and Melanie is the Bar Manager. So basically, in my opinion, I was hired as Shift Manager, promoted to General Manager, and then demoted to Security Manager. I'm on salary and I'm barely getting paid enough to do Security, much less run Security, so I guess I shouldn't complain. The problem is that Phil, who is an owner and the Promotions Manager, wants me to do things that are things that a General Manager would do but won't give me that title because he doesn't want to offend Melanie. Not to mention the fact that I'm the type of person that fixes a problem if he sees it, even if that means stepping on some toes in the process.

Melanie has been busting her butt with ordering beer, liquor, and bar supplies (which is very difficult because Travis is worse than Scrooge when it comes to money) but when it comes to scheduling & cutting cocktails & shot girls and making sure that all of her bar staff do their closing work, there's room for improvement. When I point out these things or tell "her employees" what to do, she gets offended. When Phil complains to me about things that aren't getting done with the bar staff, I tell him to talk to Melanie about it because it's her department, not mine. No more of the telling me to do more than my job and not giving me the title or authority to do it.

To make a long story short, a month later, I've fired several bouncers, had a few walk out mid-shift (including Josh), hired some new bouncers, promoted a new bouncer with some experience and training to Head of Security, fired a few of the new bouncers, and then demoted Sonny (the new Head of Security) this past Friday. On a positive note Phil has been treating me better than the last time I worked for him (he even apologized for how he treated me before), but he still isn't the best boss in the world. I pray that things will get better. Please pray for me.

Sundance 2007

2007-03-06T01:48:00.001-05:00

During the first week of January I called Steve Ketter, co-owner of Big Money Island Productions, to see if he needed any security for any events during the 2007 Sundance Film Festival. He told me that he did. There was a luxury connections lounge, called the Main Event Lounge, that he was providing security for. He wanted me to do security for the Main Event Lounge from Jan 18-24. He also wanted me to do security for some private parties in the same building that the Main Event lounge was in, the Montgomery-Lee Fine Art building. I agreed to work for him.

On Wednesday, Jan 17th the truck my roommate Dave had been letting me drive was overheating really bad so I couldn't use it to get to and from Park City. On Thursday a friend gave me a ride up to Park City. When I got there I met the lady that was producing the Main Event Lounge, Debbie Durkin, her publicist, Aunny, and her assistants, Adriana, Kara, & Mike and a couple of Steve's security guys (actually, one guy and one lady). Then we got set up for our first private party, the Xango Party. Xango was one of the sponsors for the Main Event Lounge. There weren't any celebrities at the Xango party but it gave us a chance to warm-up for the other private parties.

Friday was the Grand Opening of the Main Event Lounge. The Main Event Lounge was a luxury connections lounge where celebrities, V.I.P.'s, and media could come get gifts from our sponsors - Yellowman tattoo shirts & alternative clothing, Juvenesse skin care, Peninsula Hotel Chicago (with their world famous Chocolate Bar), Hint flavored water, Ginn Resorts, Gold Toe socks, Quintessentially (the world's leading private members’ club), GLAM jewelery, Polar Bear Diamond, Bob Hurley's six-star restaurant in Napa Valley, CA, Green and Black's organic chocolate bars, Seneca & Belden-Stratford Hotels, Boatman Geller luxury stationery, Millstone Coffee, Spa 415, Cherella USA clothing & handbags ,Patron, and Budweiser Select/Budweiser Peels. Turnkey Furniture provided furniture, DayNa Decker provided enviroments candles, Artichokes & Co. provided flower arrangements & rocky road popcorn, and Culinary Crafts Inc. provided catering. The Main Event Lounge also hosted the underground talk show, Indie Appeal, and was one of the venues where Poull Brien's Sundance Celebrity Swag Hunt was filmed.

I worked the Main Event Lounge on Friday and Saturday. Since we didn't have any private parties on Friday and Saturday, I did Security at Harry O's on Friday and Saturday night. It was extremely busy at Harry O's. I had worked with a lot of the same bouncers at Club Vortex. I worked the Main Event Lounge on Sunday and then I worked a private party that night for Slamdance that Debbie had scheduled that day.

On Monday I worked the Main Event Lounge. Steve didn't agree with the way that Debbie was handling some aspects of her business and he was busy doing other things for Sundance so he was not there at all on Monday. Debbie was not happy with him being late on Friday or with him coming and going on Saturday & Sunday. The result of this was that by Monday both Steve and Debbie had told me that I was now in charge of Security.

Steve showed up late Monday night, part way through the Vox 3 Films private party for the films Broken English and Never Forever. Because I was in charge and he was not working, he drank a little bit. Debbie had told me how late the party was going but it was longer than she had originally scheduled Steve's Security guys to be there. Around 2 A.M. Steve came to me and was upset because the party was still going on and it was supposed to be over. While I was calling Debbie to sort it out, Steve told all of his other Security guys that they could go home which meant that I had to stay at the door (2 floors below where the party was taking place) and wait for people to leave. Steve came and told me that he was quitting and if I wanted to work for Debbie I could but he was done. Debbie wasn't happy with his job performance anyway, and she had already told me that I was in charge, so she wasn't upset about him quitting.

Tuesday I worked the Main Event Lounge during the day. Tuesday night I did Security at Harry O's. Wednesday day I worked the Main Event Lounge. Then I worked a private party that Debbie had booked for the film King of California Wednesday night. Adriana & Kara left on Wednesday. Mike left early and flew home Thursday morning. Thursday was the last day that the Main Event Lounge was open. Thursday night Debbie took Aunny and I to dinner and bought us some Sundance clothing. Then we went back to the suite and I helped Aunny pack the DayNa Decker enviroments candles so they could be shipped the next day since she was leaving Friday morning. She gave me a few of the candles to thank me for all of my help during the past week.

Friday and Saturday I helped Debbie clean up and pack everything that needed to be shipped out. Debbie paid me for working for her from Tuesday through Saturday. She also gave me some swag, a bunch of Hint water, and some cases of Jolt cola. Steve was pre-paid for providing security for Debbie at the Main Event Lounge. He finally got around to paying me a little more than half of what he owed me last Thursday. Hopefully I'll get the rest soon. Whenever I do private security in the future I am going to get a contract up front. I need to go up to Harry O's soon to fill out paper work so I can get paid from them. Check out my MySpace page for pictures from Sundance.

I would like to thank several people that I met during Sundance - Aunny, Debbie's publicist, for helping me get through the Debbie/Steve conflict and for being a beautiful, charming person; the people from Yellowman for the cool Yellowman shirts they gave me (one of which was stolen); Jeannette & Delores from Juvenesse for being there to brighten my day and for giving me a gift certificate; Kristen from Turnkey Furniture for supplying volunteer hosts & security; the couple from Peninsula Hotel Chicago for also being there to brighten my day (sorry, I forgot your names - email me so we can keep in touch), Johnny Smiles, an awesome photographer, for some great pictures; the employees at Clockwork Cafe for serving delicious breakfast sandwiches and Chai tea every morning; the ladies that work at Face and Envy (they are in the same building as Montgomery-Lee Fine Art) for being great neighbors; Greg (who is in charge of the security ministry at my church, Calvary Chapel - Salt Lake City) for helping with security at the King of California party; and Chester's Blacksmith Shop for selling me a really cool House shirt. I apologize for forgetting anyone else - it's been a while since the event and I am not very good at remembering names.

I canceled my membership with Blockbuster Online and got Dish satellite service. I got a DVR so I can record my favorite shows - 24, Prison Break, Heroes, House, & Bones. I've seen a few movies in the past two months - Apocalypto (A), Ghost Rider (A-), and Bridge to Terabithia (D+). I am looking forward to seeing Amazing Grace, 300, and The Ultimate Gift.

I know I said I would never work for Phil again but I am working for him again. Check back soon for details.

My Generous Roommate

2007-01-12T01:10:00.000-05:00

A few weeks ago my roommate, Dave, went to Montana and his car broke down. He took a Greyhound bus back home and bought an old pick-up truck. Last week he got his car back from Montana and got it fixed. Last Tuesday I got my Driver's License renewed (it expired on my birthday, September 26th, last year). Last Saturday I asked Dave for a ride to work. He gave me the keys to his truck and said, "Go ahead and take my truck." Then he explained about his car breaking down and getting it back. I said, "O.K. I'll have it back around 3:30 or 4." He said, "Don't worry about it. Use it when ever you want to." So for the past 5 days I've had wheels (yes, the vehicle is insured).

I've seen a few good movies through my my membership with Blockbuster Online - End of the Spear (A+), In the Name of the Father (A), and Crank (A-). I'll be canceling my membership to Blockbuster Online in a couple of weeks because I'm all caught up on watching last year's seasons of 24, Smallville, and Alias (I just started watching the last season of Alias today) and I'm getting Dish satellite installed this week. Yes, I do Tech Support for DirecTV (which means I get free installation and free programming) and I'm getting Dish. The reasons for this are:

Dish doesn't require a phone line for their DVR service; DirecTV does. This means I don't have to get phone service just to get DVR service.
I probably won't be working at Convergys much longer. I'm going to use my benefits there to get some dental work done, then I'm going to find an Armed Security job.
I'm sure that some of Dish's DVR's have problems too but doing Tech Support for DirecTV has tainted my opinion of the DirecTV DVR's.

I'm currently reading Jerusalem Countdown by John Hagee. It talks about the escalating conflict between Iran and Israel and the resulting effect on America and the rest of the world.

I will be doing security for some private parties at Sundance Film Festival from January 18-28. I might also be doing security at Harry O's during Sundance. I will be making good money for those 11 days which will allow me to get caught up on some of my debt.

A Crazy Year

2007-01-01T09:08:00.000-05:00

It's been quite a year. Last December I started working at Teleperformance doing Tech Support for TurboTax. At the beginning of the year I made two resolutions: 1. To read the Bible in 2006; 2. To exercise on a regular basis to get fit in 2006. I didn't stick to either very well but I did attend church fairly regularly. I'm currently volunteering for the Security & Information Desk ministries at Calvary Chapel.

On Feb 1st I found out that my cousin, Amber, got in a really bad car accident in December and was in a coma. The doctors gave her a 0% chance of recovery; a 0% chance of ever coming out of the coma once the narcotics were lifted; and if she somehow did come out of the coma, a 0% chance of ever regaining any cognitive or physical control of her body. Well, my God performed a miracle - she is now completely recovered!! She is driving a car and working a new job! Her story was aired on Christmas day on CBN's 700 Club. I recorded her story on my friend's DVR and watched it in the evening on Christmas day. You can read her story here.

On February 10th I bought my first car. I joined the Patriot Guard Riders on March 3rd. In the middle of March I was planned to go on a mission trip to Reynosa, Mexico but ended up not going. On April 18th I got transferred to the Clearwire project at Teleperformance. I got hired on part-time at The Depot on April 20th. I bought a Springfield Armory XD 45 on May 22nd. On May 29th I had the pleasure of meeting Yarah Bravo. I was fired from The Depot on June 2nd for no good reason. On June 7th I met a lady named Chere and ended up spending way too much money keeping her and her kids off of the street over the next two weeks and eventually found out that she had been lying to me.

In July I flew to Florida for surgery on my gums and shoulder. While I was down there I saw my dad for the first time in 9 years. I also quit working at Teleperformance and made the mistake of working for Phil for the last time. In August he did me a favor and fired me. In September I went to New York for my brother, Peter's wedding. When I got back I started working at Convergys doing Tech Support for DirecTV. I'm still working there. I also started working at the new Club Vortex (I quit working there a few weeks ago). Over the next 2 months I got in two car accidents. The second one totaled my car.

This year I want to improve my relationship with Jesus Christ. I also want to get in shape this year. Hopefully I'll be more committed to these goals this year than I was last year. I also want to get my concealed carry permit, my Armed Security License, and an Armed Security job. In a few months, when I am done paying off my totaled car, I am going to get another car. I pray that this year will be better than last year.

97.5 FM The Oasis

2006-12-29T00:45:00.000-05:00

Lately, while surfing the internet at Gamerzz, I've been listening to 97.5 FM The Oasis. The Oasis is a Christian radio station. If you don't live in the S.L.C. area you can listen to them online at www.975oasis.com. They play a lot of the same music that K-LOVE plays and some that they don't. I really like listening to The Oasis.

I am promoting a New Year's Eve Lock-In (LAN Party) at Gamerzz in Taylorsville. This will be the first time in a long time that I won't be working Security on New Year's Eve. Check out the Gamerzz website for more info.

Merry Christmas, My Friend

2006-12-24T08:09:00.000-05:00

Merry Christmas, My Friend
by Corporal James M. Schmidt

‘Twas the night before Christmas, he lived all alone,
In a one-bedroom house made of plaster and stone.
I had come down the chimney, with presents to give
and to see just who in this home did live.

As I looked all about, a strange sight I did see,
no tinsel, no presents, not even a tree.
No stocking by the fire, just boots filled with sand.
On the wall hung pictures of a far distant land.

With medals and badges, awards of all kind,
a sobering thought soon came to my mind.
For this house was different, unlike any I’d seen.
This was the home of a U.S. Marine.

I’d heard stories about them, I had to see more,
so I walked down the hall and pushed open the door.
And there he lay sleeping, silent, alone,
Curled up on the floor in his one-bedroom home.

He seemed so gentle, his face so serene,
Not how I pictured a U.S. Marine.
Was this the hero, of whom I’d just read?
Curled up in his poncho, a floor for his bed?

His head was clean-shaven, his weathered face tan.
I soon understood, this was more than a man.
For I realized the families that I saw that night,
owed their lives to these men, who were willing to fight.

Soon around the Nation, the children would play,
And grown-ups would celebrate on a bright Christmas day.
They all enjoyed freedom, each month and all year,
because of Marines like this one lying here.

I couldn’t help wonder how many lay alone,
on a cold Christmas Eve, in a land far from home.
Just the very thought brought a tear to my eye.
I dropped to my knees and I started to cry.

He must have awoken, for I heard a rough voice,
“Santa, don’t cry, this life is my choice
I fight for freedom, I don’t ask for more.
My life is my God, my country, my Corps.”

With that he rolled over, drifted off into sleep,
I couldn’t control it, I continued to weep.

I watched him for hours, so silent and still.
I noticed he shivered from the cold night’s chill.
So I took off my jacket, the one made of red,
and covered this Marine from his toes to his head.
Then I put on his T-shirt of scarlet and gold,
with an eagle, globe and anchor emblazoned so bold.
And although it barely fit me, I began to swell with pride,
and for one shining moment, I was Marine Corps deep inside.

I didn’t want to leave him so quiet in the night,
this guardian of honor so willing to fight.
But half asleep he rolled over, and in a voice clean and pure,
said “Carry on, Santa, it’s Christmas Day, all secure.”
One look at my watch and I knew he was right,
Merry Christmas my friend, Semper Fi and goodnight.

©Copyright circa 1991 by James M. Schmidt
(As printed in the December 1991 issue
of the USMC magazine, Leatherneck)
Thanks to Snopes.com for the correct version
and author of the poem.

Click here for the for the MP3 audio version
of "Merry Christmas, My Friend",
titled "Soldier's Silent Night".
Thanks to BlackFive for the audio link.

NotVeryBright

2006-12-23T00:11:00.000-05:00

A few months ago, back when I was working at Club Exchange, I was on the highway going to a friend's house when I saw a car on the side of the highway with it's hazard lights on. I almost always pull over and help people on the side of the road unless I am on the way to work with no time to spare. I pulled over and the guy that was driving the car had run out of gas (I'll call him OutOfGas). I offered to give him a ride so he could get some gas. He accepted my offer so we got in my car (the one that's totaled now) and got off of the highway at the next exit.

We went to a Chevron gas station just off of the highway but when we walked up to the door the employee was locking the door and taping a sign to the door that said they would be temporarily closed while he did paperwork for the last shift (I guess he was working a double). We waited for about 10 minutes or so and then the cashier started counting change. I thought it might be a while longer before he was going to re-open so I suggested that we go to a different gas station. We got in my car and headed north on State Street.

We went to a Phillips 66 and I went in to get a snack and a drink while he pumped the gas using his credit card (he had brought his gas can with him). I got myself a snack and a drink and sat them on the counter. Then I decided to get my friend a drink. As I was getting my friend's drink a drunk guy (I'll call him NotVeryBright) came up to the counter and tried to buy cigarettes for his underage brother. As I came back up to the counter with my friend's drink one of the cashiers (there was 2 of them) was telling NotVeryBright that if his brother didn't have I.D. then he couldn't buy cigarettes for him. NotVeryBright said he knew the cashier's manager and said he would tell her about him tomorrow. The smartest thing that NotVeryBright could have done at this point was to leave but, as you will see, he wasn't very bright.

NotVeryBright continued to harass the cashier. I told him that we didn't want any drama and he should just go home. I was wearing sandals, shorts, and my Security shirt from when I did Security for Shoutfest when I was working as a Manny in Virginia last year. He noticed that I was wearing a Security shirt so he said something like, "Why don't you bring you're Security a$$ outside and we'll handle this." I told him that he should just leave. His brother agreed with me and encouraged him to leave. He didn't listen. Then the cashier got on the phone and called the police.

This is the point in the story where a smart person would have just left. As you will see, NotVeryBright was not smart. NotVeryBright moved towards the gap in the counter where he could get to the cashier. I stepped up to him and told him that he needed to leave now. He once again proved that he is not very smart by spitting in my face. I would rather be punched in the face than have someone spit in my face. I grabbed him, spun him around, put him in a sleeper hold, lifted him off of the ground, and then took him to the ground. His brother moved towards me and I told him to back up and he did. NotVeryBright must not have realized that he was being handled because he said that he was going to "get me". At this point I was sitting on his back and had one of his arms locked up. To help him realize that he was in no position to be threatening anyone, I slapped him in his face. He continued to talk trash so I spit in his face (I know that, as a Christian, I should not have slapped him and spit in his face and have since asked God to forgive me).

After a few minutes, NotVeryBright settled down so I started to get up. As I ws starting to get up, NotVeryBright started wrestling with me. I got him in a headlock but because I was in sandles I lost my balance and fell on my butt. We both got up and NotVeryBright wanted to shake hands. I told him to get out of the store. Then the police showed up. One of the cops told NotVeryBright to come outside. Another cop got my story and the cashier's story. It turned out that NotVeryBright had 3 warants so he went to jail. That's why I can not understand why he provoked me after the cashier was already on the phone with the police. The cashiers thanked me.

OutOfGas had come in when NotVeryBright started getting stupid. One of the cops gave him a ride back to his car while I filled out my statement. After I got done with my statement I went to my friend's house.

In the past 2 weeks I've seen a couple of movies and read a couple of books. I saw Apocalypto and Charlotte's Web. I want to see The Nativity Story, The Pursuit of Happyness, Home of the Brave, The Good Shepherd, & Children of Men. I finished reading A Gentleman's Game. I also read For One More Day by Mitch Albom, author of The Five People You Meet in Heaven. I'm currently reading The Modern Bodyguard by Peter Consterdine. I still need to finish The Search for Significance. I read the first part of the book but I need to do the workbook included in the last part of the book.

Christian Crew Counter-Strike: Source

2006-12-09T08:00:00.000-05:00

I've been playing Counter-Strike for a few years now, ever since I worked at GoodGame, an online gaming center in downtown Salt Lake City. I've been playing Counter-Strike: Source, the latest version of Counter-Strike, ever since it came out in October of 2004. I've had a problem with cursing for a long time now. As a Christian I strive to not curse and I tend to curse the most when playing Counter-Strike: Source. One of the ways that I thought I could cut back on my cursing is to play on a Christian Counter-Strike: Source server where cursing is not allowed. I also wanted to play my favorite game with my brothers and sisters in Christ.

A couple of months ago, when I started going to Gamerzz in Taylorsville, I found the Christian Crew's Counter-Strike: Source servers. They have several different types of Counter-Strike: Source servers: a regular server - The Fish [BIG], a custom map server - The Fish [Custom], two GunGame servers - The Fish [GunGame] & The Fish [GunGame2], an AWP (sniper rifle) server - The Fish [AWP], a Zombie server - The Fish [Zombie], a Deathmatch server - The Fish [Deathmatch], a Surf-Deathmatch server - The Fish [Surf-DM], and a beginner server - The Fish [Beginner]. They also have two Half-Life 2: Deathmatch servers: a SourceForts server - The Fish [SourceForts], and a regular Half-Life 2: Deathmatch server - The Fish [HL2DM]. I play on The Fish [BIG] most of the time. Every once in a while I'll play on The Fish [GunGame] or The Fish [GunGame2].

Shortly after I started playing on The Fish servers I applied to be a member of the Christian Crew clan. Members of the Christian Crew clan have the Christian Crew tag (it is the fish symbol <>< with the letters "CC" in the middle of it*) in front of their online name. In front of my online name, Guardian Spirit, I was allowed to put the tag for a Christian Crew applicant which has an "A" in place of the "CC" in the Christian Crew tag. After playing for about 1 month I was promoted to probationary status. Instead of the applicant tag, I now have a probationary tag which has a "P" in place of the "CC" in the Christian Crew tag. In a few months I will (God willing) be a full fledged Christian Crew clan member and will have the Christian Crew tag. I thank God for the Christian Crew!

*I tried to type out the Christian Crew tag but it looks like html code so I was unable to show it without messing up this blog post. To see what the Christian Crew tag looks like go to their website - www.christiancs.com.

Two Car Accidents in Two Months

2006-11-30T20:53:00.000-05:00

About 10 weeks ago, 2 days after getting fired from Club Exchange, I rear-ended a girl while driving in downtown S.L.C. I didn't have insurance because money had been tight due to the whole situation with Chere. She wanted me to call the cops so I did. When the cop showed up she just had us both fill out a form with our information on it to give to the other person. About 2 months later I got a call from the collection agency for her insurance company and am making monthly payments to pay for the damage to her car.

6 weeks ago, on a Wednesday, I was working at the new Club Vortex when Josh, who used to be a bouncer at the old Club Vortex, came to the club. He mentioned that he was running Security at a new club called Club Shakeys on Thursdays. I told him to give me a call if he needed me. He called me the next night so I left Gamerzz in Taylorsville (my new online gaming hang-out - GoodGame closed down back in September) and headed out to the club located at 4105 W 5400 S. I had a hard time finding it so I pulled into the parking lot at the Mad Greek restaurant and called Josh to find out where it was. After he told me I pulled back out to go to the club. Before I pulled out to take a left turn I looked to the left and saw a red light and no cars. As I was pulling out I looked to my right and back to my left again. All of the sudden there was a car there and it hit me and spun my car around 180 degrees. I got out of my car and the driver of the other car got out of his car. We exchanged some words and then he called the cops.

When the cop got there I told him what happened. Then he talked to the other guy. Then someone who saw the other guy run the red light told the cop what happened. The cop asked him if he wanted to fill out a witness statement and he said no. He did give the cop his information though (I found this out after the witness and the other guy left when the cop told me about it). The cop cited me for Failure to Yield and gave me a warning for my expired Driver's License (it expired on my birthday, September 26th). The cop looked in his system and saw that I had insurance last they checked so I didn't get a ticket for that (but they later cited me for no insurance). After the tow truck came and towed my car away I went to work at Club Shakey's. After the adrenaline wore off my neck, ribs and back started hurting.

After a few days the pain hadn't got any better so on Monday I went to the E.R. That was a waste of time. They told me that I had whiplash, bruised ribs, and a sore back (I didn't need a doctor to tell me that). He gave me prescriptions for an antibiotic and a muscle relaxer but I decided just to deal with the pain. The pain is gone now but my neck is a little stiff. I need to resume my Combat Conditioning & Combat Abs routine that I was doing before the whole Chere thing to get loosened up and in better shape. I have to got to court on Jan 3rd for the Failure to Yield citation and the no insurance citation. My car is totalled. I have to pay another $2,050 on my loan (I've already paid $450 since the accident) and then the dealer will waive $1,500 of what I owe them and add the remaining $1,200 to another loan for another car.

I'm still working at Convergys. I went through 1 week of Technical Support training 2 and a half weeks ago so now I'm doing Tech Support and back-up Mainbank (which is the department I was in before - helping people with billing, programming, & basic troubleshooting). I'm still working at the new Club Vortex on Wednesdays. I've been going to church on a regular basis again and I'm still volunteering at the Information Desk.

I've read a few books lately. I read Gates of Fire by Steven Pressfield. Gates of Fire is the story of the 300 Spartans that fought the Persian army at Thermopylae. Frank Miller, author of the Sin City graphic novels and Co-Director of Sin City is making a movie based on his graphic novel about the Persian-Greco war called 300. I've also read Holy Terror by Richard Marcinko. I have read all of Marcinko's novels. This one was good but it wasn't as good as his others. I bought More Than a Carpenter by Josh McDowell for one of my co-workers at Convergys. I also bought myself a copy. It does a good job of explaining who Jesus is and backs it up with logical and historical proof. I recommend it as a witnessing tool and for Christians to back up their faith with facts. I'm currently reading A Gentleman's Game by Greg Rucka. I really liked his Atticus Kodiak series so I bought A Gentleman's Game which is the first novel in his Queen & Country series.

Over the past few months I've seen a few movies. I've seen Jet Li's Fearless. Fearless is the story of Huo Yuanjia, founder of the Jingwu Sports Federation. I give it an A+. I've also seen The Departed (B-), The Prestige (B+), and Deja Vu (A). Paula Patton, who starred in Deja Vu, is gorgeous! I'm planning to see The Nativity Story, Apocalypto, Blood Diamond, and The Pursuit of Happyness.

I renewed my subscription to Blockbuster Online back in October. I've watched the first season of Sleeper Cell (A), Akeelah and the Bee (A+), and United 93 (A). I'm currently watching watching Smallville: Season 5.

Peter's Wedding & 2 New Jobs

2006-10-09T18:18:00.000-04:00

After Phil did me the favor of firing me, I started looking for another job. While I was unemployed, I participated in two Patriot Guard Rider Missions, one for Cpl. Adam A. Galvez and the other for PFC Daniel G. Dolan. After job hunting for two weeks, I got hired at Convergys to do Customer Service for DirecTV. They wanted me to start on Tuesday, September 5th but my brother, Peter, who lives in Buffalo, NY, was getting married on Sunday, September 10th so they hired me to start training on Tuesday, September 12th.

My Uncle George used his frequent flyer miles to get me a ticket to Buffalo for Peter's wedding (thanx, George!). I flew out on Saturday, September 9th at 10:05 A.M. I arrived in Buffalo at 7:06 P.M. My mom, stepdad (Spencer), and Peter picked me up from the airport. Then we went back to Peter's house and I met his fiance (Joanna), daughter (Valerie), in-laws, and friends. I hadn't seen Peter, my mom, or my stepdad in 6 years so it was good seeing them. My mom got me some lasagna, took some pictures, and then left. I hung out with Peter and his friends outside around a fire and drank some beer from a keg (kegs are illegal in Utah). I don't drink very often and I've only been wasted twice in my life. Around midnight Joanna wanted us to clean up and head out. Peter was staying at the Holiday Inn with his friend, Arin and he got me a room there too.

Sunday morning Peter, Arin, and I met some of Peter's friends at a bar down the street from the hotel to watch the Buffalo Bills game. Peter has some cool freinds. After the game we went back to the hotel and got ready for the wedding. We took a limo over to the wedding. When we got there my cousin Michelle, Aunt Beverly (Uncle George's wife), dad, grandma (my dad's mom), Uncle Peter, Aunt Diane, and my cousin Jason were there. I saw my dad a couple of months ago when I went to Florida for surgery. I saw my Aunt Beverly earlier this year when she came to Utah to ski. I hadn't seen my grandma in 6 years. I hadn't seen my cousin, Michelle in 7 years. Michelle is my favorite relative. I hadn't seen my Uncle Peter, Aunt Diane, and Jason since our last family reunion 13 years ago. It was good seeing them all again.

I was one of the groomsmen in the wedding. My brother rented me a tux and I looked sharp. After the wedding ceremony, the photographer took pictures of everyone in the wedding party including Valerie who was the Flower Girl. After that we had the wedding reception. The best man, Greg did a toast and Spencer said a prayer. After the wedding reception a folk band played and we danced and drank. There weren't any single ladies there to dance with but I still had fun. After the wedding Peter, Arin, a few of Peter's friends that were staying at the Holiday Inn, and I took the limo back to the hotel. Peter gave me some cash because he knew I was struggling financially. I felt bad because I couldn't afford to get them a wedding gift and he was giving me money on his wedding night but I was very grateful. Monday morning Arin gave me a ride to the airport. It was good seeing my brother get married, seeing my family, and meeting all of Peter's cool friends. He is really blessed to have such good friends.

I flew back home on Monday. Tuesday I started training at Convergys. My brother sent me some more money through PayPal that same Tuesday and then again a few weeks later for my birthday, September 26th (my 31st). My brother is awesome!! There was three weeks of classroom training and 1 week of "nesting" (on-the-job training) which I just finished last week. My regular schedule, which started on Monday, is 5 P.M. til 3:30 A.M. with a half hour lunch (4 10's). My days off are Sunday (so I can go to church), Tuesday, and Wednesday.

On Saturday I went to the new Club Vortex, which is located at 220 W 1300 S in Salt Lake City. Gary, who was the Head of Security at the old Vortex, has opened up the new Club Vortex as an 18+ dance club (I didn't know it was only 18+ until I went there). The new Club Vortex is a no-drinking and no-smoking club. While I was there Gary asked me if I wanted to work there. I start tonight.

I didn't go to church for about 6 weeks. I went two weeks ago and this past Sunday. I plan on going regularly again and continuing to volunteer at the Information Desk. I recently finished reading a book that Ryan gave me called One Thing You Can't Do In Heaven by Mark Cahill. It's a really good book about witnessing. Now I am reading The Search for Significance by Robert S. McGee. It is the best "self-help" book I've ever read. It teaches you how to see yourself through God's eyes instead of teaching the humanistic method taught in books like Psycho-Cybernetics. I highly recommend it for every person, Christian or non-Christian.

In the past month I've seen The Protector (a.k.a. Tom-Yung-Goong) starring Tony Jaa (4 Stars) and The Illusionist (4.5 Stars). I've also seen Mean Machine (a remake of The Longest Yard) starring Vinnie Jones (4 Stars) and District B-13, starring Cyril Raffaelli and David Belle (4.5 Stars) on DVD. I'm planning on seeing Jet Li's Fearless this weekend.

My Favorite Posts 10

2006-09-15T18:38:00.000-04:00

Everyone Makes Mistakes...

2006-09-14T15:04:00.000-04:00

When I got back from Florida I gave Phil a call. We met at South Towne Mall to discuss me working for him again at Club Exchange. I wasn't sure if it was a good idea to work for him again for the reasons that I stated in this previous blog post but I figured it wouldn't hurt to meet with him and talk about it. He told me that he wanted me to be a Manager and also run Security. He told me that Brandy would also be a Manager. I would be paid hourly and I would get a monthly bonus starting in August (I wouldn't get a bonus for July because overhead on getting the club going was too high). He said that he wanted me to quit Teleperformance right away so I could focus on the club and offered me a $200 advance. I told him that if I quit right away, I would lose my shift differential of $2/hr which would cost me about $150 (at Teleperformance I was getting paid $7/hr plus $2 more per hour as long as I worked at least 75 hours in a two week pay period). He offered me a $150 signing bonus on top of the $200 advance. Money was tight due to spending way too much money on Chere and her kids and having missed work for surgery so $350 sounded really good so I agreed to work for him again.

The owners of Club Exchange, Trent and Ryan, had bought the club from the owners of Room 32 about 6 months before I started working there. Due to poor management they had to bring Ryan's brother, Travis on board to help out financially. So basically he is a silent partner. Travis was also a silent partner at Players. Travis is the one that hired Phil to be the General Manager at Club Exchange. Ryan was very involved with the club from the time I started there until about 3 weeks after I started when he got really sick. Then Trent started helping out. Both Ryan and Trent were great bosses. They didn't micromanage and were very helpful.

Over the next month things got progressively worse. Phil works at the Ultimate Combat Training Center Monday-Friday from 6-10 so he wasn't around very much. He told Brandy and I that he wouldn't be around much from the beginning. The problem with that is that I had to work with Brandy. Brandy and I have never got along (at Players and at Natalie's) so I have no idea why Phil hired us to be Managers together. Probably because we were the only ones dumb enough to be a Manager at a club that he was running. Brandy, like Phil, is very insecure. Most of the times when I offered to help her or just went ahead and did anything that she thought was "her job" she would let me know in a very snotty, condescending manner that my help wasn't needed. Then when she did need something done, she wouldn't ask me to do it. Instead she would say "I need you to..." as if I had no choice in the matter. She also had a habit of waiting till the last minute to ask me to do stuff like sending me to pick up beer and bar supplies at 9:00 at night when we open at 9:00. When I would ask her a question she rarely gave me a direct answer. She would usually ask why I wanted to know something instead of just answering my question.

Phil and I got along fine the first couple of weeks. The problem started arising when he wasn't there and Brandy wasn't getting stuff done and when Brandy was being rude to the employees. Two of the employees, Dayne (a bartender) and Tony (a barback), were the only employees that stuck around when Phil took over. They were friends with Trent so when things weren't getting done or Brandy was being rude they would call Trent and let him know. Then Trent would call Travis and want to know why the club wasn't being run properly. Then Travis would call Phil and aks him why the club wasn't being run properly. Both Trent and Ryan saw that I was always there and doing a good job so it made Phil look bad. That and the fact that I argued with Phil about letting some ladies who were friends of his that were under 21 into the club caused Phil to start being a jerk to me.

To compensate for him looking bad, Phil started saying that he was getting complaints from the employees about me saying that I was bossy. While I am very direct and don't always use a lot of tact, I am a nice guy and I am good at dealing with people. The only employees that I had a problem with were a couple of Phil's fighter from U.C.T.C. that he brought in to do Security. They would clock in, then sit down and eat, after having been told repeatedly not to clock in until they were ready to work. They would frequently leave their positions and clock out before asking me if they could. They knew we were supposed to help the barbacks haul the trash out at the end of the night but they would frequently ask Phil to clock out and then when I asked them to haul trash they would say "Phil said we could clock out."

One night I went outside where Phil and Trent were talking to complain about his fighters. He didn't even hear me out. He just told me that he didn't want to hear it and to go away. Trent noticed this and talked to me about it later. He told me that he didn't like the way Phil was treating me and would talk to Travis about it. After that Phil mellowed out because Travis told him to.

After I had been working at Club Exchange for a month, Phil wanted to get rid of Dayne and Tony because they were reporting back to Trent about what a poor job he was doing of running the club. So he told me to tell them they were getting a pay cut. They had been getting paid more than the other bartenders and barbacks because they were told that they would not get a pay cut when Phil took over. I told them this on a Monday night. They didn't quit like Phil was expecting them to so the next morning Phil told me to call them and tell them they were fired for accusing us of telling them to work off the clock. They had not been doing this but Phil just wanted to get rid of them. I called Dayne but got no answer. I called Tony and told him. He said that they had never accused us of telling them to work off the clock. I knew he would tell Dayne and that they would both talk to Trent. We were closed on Tuesday.

Wednesday night they both showed up to work. I asked them who told them they were still working there. They said that Trent did. I called Trent and he confirmed that he had told them that they were not fired and told me to call Travis. I called Travis and told him what was going on. He told me to let them work and he would talk to Phil. About an hour later I was down in the office getting their tills ready. Phil came down to the office cussing and yelling at me wanting to know why employees that he had told me to fire were working. I told him that Trent and Travis said they weren't fired. He continued yelling, cussing, and being belligerent. When he grabbed a chair with a fan on it and threw it to the side I walked out of the office. As I was walking out of the office he told me that I was fired too. Then I left the club and called Trent and Travis. Shortly after I walked outside Tony and Dayne came outside because Phil fired them. Trent knew we were getting screwed but because Travis was the one financing the club, Phil got his way.

I had to call Trent several times to have him call Travis to have him call Brandy to get my last paycheck. The following Monday I found out that my previous paycheck that I had deposited got returned to my bank for insufficient funds. I didn't get a replacement check until that Saturday and I had to call Trent and Travis several times to get that check because Brandy was being very difficult (and that's putting it nicely).

There's a saying that goes "Everyone makes mistakes. Smart people only make 'em ONCE." I must not be very smart because I've made the mistake of working for Phil a few times now. I will never work for Phil again!!

To be continued...

Surgery

2006-09-04T01:14:00.000-04:00

Back in April, when I went to the dentist, the dentist saw some a dark spot on the x-ray that he thought might be a cyst. I have a genetic disorder that causes recurring cysts. As a kid I had about 3 surgeries for cysts in my gums, one for a cyst on my right shoulder, and one for a cyst right below my nose. When I got out of the dentist's office, I called my dad (he lives in Orlando, FL near Gainesville, FL which is where I lived before moving to Utah) and told him about the cyst. He told me that I should call the doctor in Florida that did the other surgeries to remove my cysts, Dr. Graper, and tell him about the cyst. I called Dr. Graper and they told me to have the dentist's office send him a copy of the x-ray. About a month later Dr. Graper called me back and told me that I should come down and have the cyst surgically removed. I told them that i also had another cyst on my left shoulder that needed to be removed. I called my dad and told him. He told me to get it scheduled and he would buy me a plane ticket to fly down there and have the surgery. I called Dr. Graper's office and had the surgery scheduled for Friday, July 7th.

Two weeks after Chere got arrested, Phil called me and told me that he was going to be managing a new club where Room 32 used to be. It's called Club Exchange. He told me that he wanted me and Brandy to come be Managers and he wanted me to run Security. I told him that I was flying to Florida for surgery that weekend. He said he wanted me to start working as soon as I got back. I should have given my 2 weeks notice at Teleperformance but I didn't. I wasn't 100% sure that I was going to quit. I wasn't sure that I wanted to work for Phil again for the reasons stated in this previous blog post.

On Wednesday, July 5th I did Security for the VIP room at Club Vortex for the Rihanna concert. Jeannie Ortega opened up for Rihanna. The VIP room at Club Vortex serves as the dressing room for the artists when they have concerts there. I secured the VIP room during the concert and then escorted Rihanna to her bus after the concert was over.

Shortly after I got done escorting Rihanna to her bus, I was hanging out by the side entrance on the north side of the club when I heard a call over the radio for a Code Red outside. Code Red is the code for a fight. Immediately after the Code Red call Gary, the Head of Security, called for everyone to Stand Down. A couple minutes later the call for a Code Red outside came over the radio again. A few of the other Security came running out the side door and we went running around to the front of the building. There was nothing going on there so we continued around to the south side of the building where there is a two-story parking garage. Gary radioed everyone and told them to fall back to the building. I saw Grant trying to prevent a black guy from fighting 5 or 6 Polynesians. I wasn't going to let Grant get hurt so I went out and tried to help him stop them from fighting. Grant told me to stay back and Gary had told us to fall back to the building but I didn't want Grant to get hurt. Eventually the cops showed up and although it took them a while, they finally got control of the situation.

After it was over, Grant yelled at me to get out of his sight. Then Gary yelled at everyone and told them to go inside for a meeting. When I went inside for the meeting, Gary came up to me and told me to go home. I walked up to Grant and asked him if I was getting paid cash or should I give my hours to Greg, the manager that handles payroll. He told me that I was getting on his last nerve and told me to go home. I later found out from Brandon, one of the Security guys there, that Gary had chewed everyone out for not Standing Down and Grant chewed out Gary and all of the Security guys for not getting control of the situation earlier. So basically, Grant chewed everyone out for not doing what I did, which was try to de-escalate the situation. So him sending me home didn't make any sense.

On Friday, July 6th I flew to Orlando, FL and my dad picked me up at the airport. I had not seen my dad since moving to Utah 10 years ago. He drove us to Gainesville, FL and got us a motel room. At 9 A.M. he drove me to Dr. Graper office and I got another x-ray done on my mouth. Dr. Graper saw that I actually had two cysts in my gums so he took them out as well as the cyst on my shoulder. When I woke up from surgery, I was more coherent than I remebered being when I had surgery as a teenager but I was still very groggy. I slept most of Friday and half of Saturday. I had to wake up periodically to take my medicine. Saturday afternoon dad took us to see Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest. I give it a C+. The effects were cool but the story was lacking.

Saturday night dad and I got into an argument. He is a pacifist and believes that Christians should not do Security, Law Enforcement, or be in the Military. He was also giving me a hard time for not having done much with life besides Security work. I lashed out by telling him that him being abusive to me and being too controlling (he didn't let me do things like study martial arts, play football, and join the police cadet program) as I was growing up was the reason I hadn't done much with my life. He kept pressing the issue and I told him that I didn't want to talk about it any more. He didn't respect that and still pressed the issue. I ended up walking out of the restaurant we were eating at and walking back to the hotel room. Sunday morning we talked. I apologized for blaming him and he apologized for being abusive to me as a child. I thought I had forgiven him for that but apparently I hadn't so it's good that we worked it out.

After our talk we went to the house of a lady that my dad knew and then we all went to First Assembly of God which is the church that we went to when I was living with him in Gainesville. After church we went to lunch with his friend. Then we went to the movies. I wanted to see Superman Returns but it wasn't showing at the theater we went to. My dad and his friend wanted to see The Devil Wears Prada. After 10 minutes of that movie, I asked my dad if I could go watch The Break-up instead. He said sure. I give it a B-. After the movies my dad's friend went home. Then we went back to the hotel. I ate some yogurt (my diet for about a week after surgery consisted of mostly yogurt) and took a nap while my dad went to a nearby movie theater and bought me a ticket for Superman Returns. My dad didn't want to see it but he bought me a ticket and dropped me off. I give it a B. After the movie I walked back to the motel.

Monday afternoon we drove back down to Orlando and got a motel room. I was really craving some food from Boston Market (it's one of my favorite places to eat and they don't have any in Utah) so dad went and got me some meatloaf, stuffing, and yams from Boston Market. After eating I went to bed. Tuesday morning dad drove me to the airport and I flew back home.

To be continued...

I'm Still Breathing

2006-08-27T00:36:00.000-04:00

In case you're wondering, yes, I'm still breathing. You might be wondering why I haven't posted in more than 2 months. There are a couple of reasons for this. One is that I've become a little disappointed with how many people actually read my blog. According to Feedburner, I have an average of 2 subcribers (readers) per day. One of those readers is me because I view my blog after posting on it. I originally started this blog for two reasons:

To let my family (they all live in other states) know what's going on in my life. The only family member that I know reads my blog fairly regularly is my brother, Peter.
My friend John has told me that I have an interesting life and if I wrote a book it would be a best seller. I haven't really gone very deep on this blog and I haven't talked about my past very much, but 2 readers per day isn't exactly best-selling.

The other reason that I haven't been posting is that I have been very busy and I've also been a litle depressed about what I've experienced the past few months. Read on for details. Warning: this is going to be a very long post.

Twelve weeks ago I was doing great - I had a car (and I still do), I'd bought a gun, I was going to get my Concealed Carry Permit and Armed Security License, and I had a little bit of extra money to get some clothes and catch up on some movies I'd been wanting to see. Besides getting fired from The Depot, everything was great. I had even been exercising 6 days/week for 3 weeks straight (a personal record) and drinking CytoGainer weight-gainer shakes 2-3 times per day.

On Wednesday, June 7th I was going to go to GoodGame to play some Counter-Strike: Source. I had requested Wednesday off to work a show at The Depot, but since I wasn't working there any more I had the night off. On the way there I stoppped by Little Caesars to get a $5 pizza. It was 11:15 P.M. so I didn't think they would still be open. As I pulled up I saw a lady standing next to her pick up truck. I asked her if they were still open. She said "No, I don't think so." Then I noticed that she was holding a gas can. She said "I'm out of gas." I said "Just a minute", pulled up into a parking spot, and parked my car. Then I got out, took her gas can, and told her that I would get her some gas. I went inside paid for $5 in gas, put the gas in the gas can, and then went to put the gas in her truck. As I was pouring the gas, I asked her why she was out of gas. She said that her husband, Kelly, was drunk and he was being abusive so she left to get the kids away from him. I asked her why she didn't just call the cops on her husband. She said that the house had been given to him by his grandma so she didn't have any rights to it (or something like that). She told me that she was on the way to her mom's house in Midvale. One of her kids, her youngest daughter, told her mom that she was hungry. This kid was easily one of the cutest kids I have ever seen. I offered to take them to McDonalds across the street and get them something to eat.

While eating I found out that her name was Chere. She had 4 kids - a 10 year old girl named Ashlee, a 9 year old boy boy named Tristan, a 5 year old girl named Anna, and a 9 month old boy named Haden (cutest baby boy I've ever seen). She asked to borrow my phone to call her mom. As we were finishing eating she asked me for my phone number. I told her that I had planned on giving it to her and gave her my business card. As I walked them out to their truck she thanked me and gave me a hug. GoodGame was closed by now so I went to a friend's house in Midvale. Chere called me about an hour later to let me know that her mom had paid for a room at the Intown Suites in Midvale and gave me her room number. I told her that I would call her the next day.

Thursday morning I went to the Loomis Fargo building in S.L.C. for the classroom instruction for my Concealed Carry Weapons permit and Armed Security Officer license. After the classroom instruction was over, I went to The Depot and picked up my last check for about $200. I deposited $95 in my checking acount so I could use Paypal to pay for the classroom and firearm instruction for my CCW permit and ASO license (it cost $110). After that I called my church to get some information about domestic violence shelters.

Then I called Chere and offered to get her some groceries and take her and the kids to a dollar movie later that night (to get the kids' minds off of what was going on). I heard Anna ask Chere if she could go to the grocery store with me. I told her that I was O.K. with that. She said it was O.K. as long as Ashlee could go with us. I said that was fine. I picked up Ashlee and Anna and we went to the grocery store. I bought them some basic groceries like milk, cereal, bread, bologna, ham, & cheese, some diapers for Haden, and a scented candle because their toilet at the hotel needed to be snaked and was stinking up the room. Then I took the girls back to the hotel, carried the groceries upstairs, and told Chere about the domestic violence shelters. She said that she wasn't going to the shelter. Her experience with the downtown shelter made her see shelters as places where druggies hang out. Even after I explained that the domestic violence shelters were not like the homeless shelters downtown, she still woould not go to one. I told her that I would be back later to take them to the dollar movie. I went to a friend's house for a couple of hours, played some Age of Empires II: The Conquerors, picked up Chere and the kids, and took them to see Eight Below at the Valley Fair Movies 9. It was a little bit sad, but the kids enjoyed it. I took Chere and the kids back to the hotel. I offered to take thier dirty laundry home and bring it back to them on the way to the firearm portion of my training the next morning.

So I went home, did their laundry, got a few hours of sleep, got up, took a shower, dropped off Chere's laundry, and went to the Holladay Gun Club for the firearm portion of my CCW and ASO training. It started to rain so we went inside and took the written test. I got a 97. Then we went to Doug's Shoot 'N Sports to finish the training. I got a 95 on the firearms test. After the training I called Chere. She told me that Intown Suites was going to hire her to be the Head of Housekeeping (a job that includes a big room in the hotel with two beds) but she had to get her I.D. so she could take a drug test. She said that she had to take her birth certificate to the Social Security office so she could get her Social Security card and take it to the D.M.V. to get ger I.D. I offered to come get her and the kids and take them to the Social Security office located in downtown Salt Lake City. By the time they were ready to go it was already 4:40 P.M. The S.S. office closes at 5:00. As I was carefully speeding down the highway, Chere called the S.S. office and found out that in addition to her birth certificate she also needed an I.D or driver's license to get her S.S. card. So in order to get her I.D. she had to have her birth certificate and her S.S. card, but to get her S.S. card she had to have I.D.

Since we were near downtown Salt Lake City, I suggested that we go to the Gateway Mall and let the kids play in the fountain (they have one of those fountains with a bunch of little geysers that shoot up in cool patterns set to music). She asked if we could go to a park instead so I took them to Liberty Park. When we got there the kids wanted to go on a paddleboat so I took Ashlee, Tristan, and Anna on a paddleboat (a first time experience for me). The kids really enjoyed it but Anna started to miss her mom towards the end. After the paddleboat we went to the Chase Home Museum of Utah Folk Arts and then the kids and I played on the playground. After a while Chere went to the car to change Haden's diaper. Soon after she left it started to lightning and thunder so we headed towards the car. Anna was scared so I carried her. Ashlee has astraphobia (fear of lightning) so she started to run off. I called her back to me and assured her that she would be O.K. as we ran to the car (it was starting to pour). I took them to get some Little Ceasars pizza, took them back to the hotel, and then went to work to make up for taking Wednesday off. While at work I looked up the requirements to get a Utah I.D. for the first time and found out that in addition to proof of legal presence, you also have to have two proofs of Utah residence.

On Saturday I printed the information about the requirements for getting an I.D. in Utah and took it to Chere. She told me that it would be easier for her to get a duplicate license in Arizona which is where she is from. On Sunday I did some research and found out that the Arizona Driver's License office closest to Salt Lake City is in Littlefield just across the Arizona border four and a half hours south of S.L.C. I bought some more groceries for Chere and the kids and told Chere that I would be willing to take her to the Driver's License office in Littlefield on Tuesday because my paycheck gets deposited around 12:30 A.M. on Tuesday. She said that she would rather go to the Driver's license office in Phoenix, where she is from, because she knew she could get a duplicate of her driver's license there with just her birth certificate. She also said that she needed to pick up a check for $50 and turn in a form so she could get a check mailed to her for $150 for taking care of someone else's kids for a little while. I figured that if it cost me $100 dollars in gas to get down there and back and $50 to stay in a hotel down there then I would spend $150 so she could have $150 and an I.D. to get a job so she could support herself and the kids. So we planned to leave at 1 A.M. on Tuesday morning after my paycheck had been direct deposited. It gets really slow at my work that time of night so I was sure I would be able to leave early. Sunday night I went to work my normal shift from 8 P.M. to 7 A.M.

On Monday, Chere called me and told me that her mother-in-law wasn't going to pay for the hotel room any more. She said that if I paid for the hotel room, she would pay me back when she got the check for $150. I didn't think she would be able to pay me back because she would need that money for the kids but I paid for the hotel room anyway. After paying for the hotel I went home to take a nap. I woke up in time to go to work but decided that if I was going to be driving all night, then I should just call in sick and get some sleep. At 11:00 P.M. I woke up, took a shower, and went to a friend's house to print Mapquest directions from Midvale to Phoenix. At 12:30 A.M. I went to Smith's grocery store to get some drinks and snacks. Then I went to the hotel at 1:00 to pick up Chere and the kids. When I got there Chere was in a bad mood because the kids had stayed up late and I had woke her up from a nightmare. She told me to just let her sleep for a while. I laid down on the floor and let her take a nap. We didn't end up leaving until 2:00 P.M. Tuesday afternoon.

On the way down to Phoenix, as we were driving through the forest south of Zion National Park, I noticed some dark shapes on the road. I breaked hard and stopped just short of a herd of cows. Around 11:00 P.M. Chere offered to drive. I had already ran over a couple of rabbits that ran under the car but knew it couldn't be avoided. After Chere had been driving for a little while, she ran over a rabbit. Running over the rabbit upset her so she turned around to see if it was O.K. I told her that it wasn't a good idea. We got out and sure enough the rabbit was suffering. It upset her and the kids. I told her that, if she wanted me to, I would put it out of its misery. They got into the car and pulled forward a little bit so they wouldn't have to see me do it. I stomped on the rabbit's neck to kill it quickly. Then I stood on its neck to make sure it was dead. After driving for about an hour Chere's eyes started to hurt so I drove again. Around 2:00 A.M. we were driving through Flagstaff, Arizona and Chere suggested that we get a motel so we could get some sleep before we had to check out. We stopped at Motel in the Pines in Munds Park, AZ and got a room. We slept in separate beds when we were staying at the motels.

Wednesday morning I woke up at 11:00, woke Chere up, took a shower, and cleaned out the car. Then we woke the kids up, got gas and drinks at the Chevron across the street, and headed towards Phoenix. After we stopped for a late breakfast, Chere drove the rest of the way because she knew Phoenix better than I did. We got to Phoenix around 3:00 P.M. We went to the building where Chere had to turn in the form to get the check mailed to her. We went to the nearest Driver's License office but they didn't do I.D.s past 12:30. By this time it was after 4:00 P.M. As Chere was asking for directions to the other DMV, the blower fan for the A.C. quit. As we headed towards the Driver's License office that did I.D.s until 5:00, Chere called and found out that you had to "get a number" (get in line) by 4:30 or they wouldn't help you. So Chere asked me to get a motel and said she would pay me back. We ended up going to a Motel 6. After we got the motel room, Chere asked to borrow the car so she could go to a friend's house to ask them for money but she didn't want to take all of the kids with her. The motel had a pool but Ashlee and Anna didn't have swimsuits so I offered to take them to the K-Mart next door to get swimsuits while Chere went to her friend's house.

We got back to the motel before Chere did. When we got to the hotel Ashlee saw her uncle who had been convicted of statuatory rape walk by. We got in the elevator and went up to our room. Just before we went into the room, Ashlee saw her Grandma's car parked at the motel. She was upset because she wasn't supposed to see her Grandma. We went into the hotel room and waited for Chere to get back. When Chere got back she said that she needed to talk to me. She told me that she hadn't gone to a friend's house to borrow money - she had gone to her ex-byofriend, Dale's house to get some pictures of her kids that she left there but he wasn't home. This is the ex-boyfriend who she told me had "abandoned" them (leaving her with the truck) at a rest stop in Colorado.

She also told me that she had run into her mom at the motel and when her mom went to hug her she pushed her away and told her that she couldn't deal with this right now. Chere told me that Tristan and Anna's dad, Chad, did drugs. She told me that her mom had been hanging out with Chad and doing drugs so she didn't want to see her mom. I told her that we could just stay in the motel room. She said that she didn't want to keep the kids from having fun swimming so she was going to let them go swimming. This didn't make sense to me but they're her kids. I asked her to wait for me. She said she would be O.K. They went down to the pool. I changed and then met them down there. I had bought Anna some floaties but she was still scared to step off of the steps. I helped her get more comfortable swimming on her own by letting her swim to me and gradually increasing the distance. Then Chere asked me if I could hold Haden and let him play in the pool. I said sure. Then Chere went up to her mom's motel room. Haden really liked playing in the pool. During the day, while Chere had been driving, I had been able to keep Haden from crying more easily than anyone in his family.

A little while later Chere came back down to the pool with her mom. Her mom's name is Cheryl. The kids said hi to her and then continued to play in the pool. Chere took Haden and went back up to the hotel room. A little while later, Chere waved for me to come up to the room. I left the kids with their Grandma. When I got to the room, Chere told me that she wanted the kids to have some time alone with their grandma. Chere was acting very different. I figured she was either drunk or dealing with some internal issues. I found out later that I was right on both accounts - Cheryl had some Tequila in her room and Chere had drunk quite a bit of that. Chere went down to here mom's room. After changing I went down to Cheryl's room and met Chere's family - her sister, Tina, Tina's 14 year old daughter, Chelse, and her dad, Harry. I found out that the reason that Cheryl and Harry were staying at the motel is because their water main had broke. Chere was crying a lot and so was Tina. It was an accidental family reunion. That night Ashlee went to Cheryl's house to spend the night with Chelse because Cheryl was taking care of Chelse (I guess they didn't mind not being able to use the bathroom because there was no water).

The next morning (Thursday) Chere, Tristan, Anna, Haden, and I went to Cheryl's house. Chere needed to go to the DMV but she was worried that Chad would come by because he had been coming by to ask Cheryl where Chere and the kids were. She had told me that he had tried to kidnap Tristan from school. I offered to stay with Cheryl, Anna, and Haden while Chere, Chelse, Ashlee, and Tristan went to the Driver's License office. Cheryl noticed how good I was with Haden and appreciated me staying.

An hour or two later Chere and the kids returned. Chere had her I.D. Soon after they got back, Chad showed up. Ashlee had been outside and came running in to tell us. Chad had not seen her. Chad came to the door and knocked. We did not answer the door. One of the kids that lived in one of the neighboring apartments told Chad that Chere and the kids were here. He knocked on the door a couple more times. Anna was upset so I held her until she calmed down. After Chad walked away from the door Chere peaked through the blinds and saw that he was on the phone. About 15 minutes later, the police knocked on the door. Cheryl was in her room when the police showed up so I said, "Just a second, sir." Somehow, one of the police officers interpreted that as, "I have a shotgun". They said, "Put the shotgun away." I said, "I don't have a shotgun." Cheryl came and opened the door and I held my hands up with the palms showing so they could see that I was unarmed. They asked Chere some questions. Chere told them that Chad was the father of Tristan and Anna, they were never married, and she had a restraining order against Chad that prevented him from contacting and coming near her or the kids. The police went back outside and talked to Chad. He had brought a revised copy of the restraining order which allowed him to be near the kids but didn't allow him near Chere (but since they were in Chere's care, he had to stay away from all of them). The police came back in, told Chere about the revised restraining order, told us to stay inside, and went outside to tell Chad to leave. A couple minutes after the cops went outside, Chere asked Cheryl to go outside and tell Chad that she was O.K. with the kids coming down to see him (once again, this didn't make sense). When Cheryl did this, the cops got mad at her and told her to go back inside. They made Chad leave and then came back up and explained why they were mad - they basically had the situation resolved, but Chere changing her mind and Cheryl coming outside could have made the situation worse (they had told us to stay inside).

A couple hours after the cops left (because we were waiting for the sun to set so we wouldn't be hot since the A.C. was broken) we got ready to leave. Ashlee asked Chere if Chelse could come with us. Chere asked me if we could bring her with us. I told her that I thought it wasn't a good idea because she would be bringing another mouth to feed and we didn't have room in the car, which meant that Tristan and Anna would have to share a seat belt and Tristan has a habit of picking on Anna and I didn't want to have to deal with that all the way home. She argued that Chelse could babysit while she worked. She also said that the Tristan & Anna problem wouldn't be a problem (I think she was lying to herself). I told her that it was a bad idea, but I would do whatever she wanted to do. So she decided to bring Chelse with us. Chere drove when we first left. Soon after we left Tristan started pushing on Anna because he was uncomfortable sharing a seat belt with her. I told him to quit, but he kept being mean to her. After about 15 minutes of Tristan whining, I sat on the floor and let Anna use my seat belt. Shortly after that, Chere's eyes started hurting, so I drove. It was a long trip because:

No one got much sleep except Ashlee, who laid on Chelse's lap and put her legs across my lap.
Chelse repeatedly asked me if I was going to fall asleep while driving so I pulled over twice to get her to quit worrying.
Tristan and Anna kept fighting whenever they were awake.

We got back to Salt Lake around noon on Friday. According to Chere, the Manager of Intown Suites had told her that she would get a free room when she got back because of the problem with the toilet. Well we had been in Arizona a day longer than we had planned and since it was the weekend the Manager wasn't there so they didn't have a place to stay. I suggested a domestic violence shelter and again she declined. She told me to just take her back to Kelly's house. I told her that if she went back there, then everything we had done would have been for nothing (I should have just taken her back there - you'll see why in a minute). She asked me to get them a hotel room and she would "pay me back". I ended up paying for a hotel for them for 2 nights. I continued to help them out as much as I could until Wednesday. Wednesday afternoon, Chere came to my house (I rent a room in a house) and asked to use my phone because her check had not arrived at my house yet. While she was on the phone I looked at the documents she was holding (each document had 2 pages) and noticed that the second document (the one she was supposed to be getting the check for) was for the same amount as the first document, $48. So she had lied to me about needing to go to Arizona to get that check for $150. If I had known the check was only going to be for $48 and that it was going to cost me $200 in gas (not $100 as I had estimated), I would have taken her to the DMV in Littlefield, AZ and just given her $48. While she was on the phone she found out that the second document was actually a duplicate of the first document. After looking at the documents some more, I saw that anyone who took the time to look closely at the documents would have seen that.

At this point I owed my bank $333.61 ($150 of that was for my car payment and $41 of it was for my monthly TFT payment). This means that in two weeks I spent $750 on myslef, Chere and the kids, most of which was spent on Chere and the kids. I decided to no longer help Chere because she had been lying to me and she was unwilling to get help from the State. I found out why over the next few days.

Wednesday night I went to work (I had gone back to work on Sunday). Around 1 A.M. I got a phone call from an "Unavailable" number. It was Chere. She said that the cops had pulled her over because the truck was stolen. She claimed that she had no idea. She claimed that Dale had told her that he had been making the payments on the truck to buy it and she didn't know it was stolen. She told me that she might get arrested and asked me to come get the kids and their stuff. I took my lunch break and went to get them.

When I got there I talked to the police and found out that the truck was reported stolen because it was a rental and had not been returned. It had been reported stolen a few weeks before. The detective told me that the car rental companies usually wait a couple of weeks before reporting the vehicle stolen so Chere had stolen the truck over a month ago. She claimed that her ex-boyfriend had told her that it was being paid for. I'm pretty sure she was lying. The police decided not to arrest her because she had the kids, but they were pressing charges. They were charging her with Grand Theft Auto, which is a felony. The detective told me that she would have to go to court in a couple of weeks. I loaded all of their stuff into my car. The police helped her get a good deal on a motel. She paid for all but $7 of it, which I paid. I helped Chere get most of thier stuff out of my car and take it up to their room. Before going back to work I spent my last $2 on a half gallon of milk for Haden.

Thursday afternoon I got a call from Tina telling me that Chere was in jail and the kids were with the Department of Human Services' Division of Child and Family Services (DCFS), which is the child protective agency for Utah. The DCFS case worker called me on Thursday and Friday but I never talked to her because we just played phone tag. I also got calls from both of Chere's husbands (yes both of them - Chad and Dale, the "ex-boyfriend") and from Kelly - the one that she claimed was her abusive husband. They wanted to know what was going on with Chere and the kids. I told them as much as I knew. I also told them that I was not in a romantic or physical relationship with Chere - I was just in it to help the kids. I told them this out of respect, not out of fear.

Chere got out of jail on Saturday. She called me and asked me to bring the rest of their stuff to Kelly's house - "the abusive husband". I drove over to his house and he met me outside to get their stuff. Later that day Chere called me asking me why I told Dale that we had slept together. I told her that I had told Chad, Dale, and Kelly that we did not have a romantic or phsical relationship. A couple of hours later she called me again and left me a message saying that she wanted to know what I had told the kid's case worker (with DCFS) because I shouldn't be talking to her because I "had nothing to do with her and the kids". I called her back and told her I hadn't talked to her and set Chere straight on the bit about "having nothing to do with her and the kids".

I ended up having to pawn my gun for $200, sell my X-Box for $50, and borrow $400 from a friend to get out of the financial hole I had dug for myself. My motives were good (helping the children) but I shouldn't have spent so much money doing it. I should have realized that Chere was in the situation she was in because of the choices she makes and because she is dishonest and is too picky about what type of help she receives. I learned from my mistake but it was a very expensive one.

To be continued...

An Interesting Weekend

2006-06-05T04:00:00.000-04:00

This past weekend was very interesting. On Thursday night I got a call from Fate, who now lives in Vegas, telling me that he was in town for a few days. I used to do Personal Security for Fate and his brother, Theorian (a.k.a. Disaster) when they lived in Utah. I was at work, at The Depot, when he called. It was a slow night so I asked if I could get off early. I left around 8:30, went home to change, and went to meet Fate at Cisero's in Park City for karaoke. After Cisero's we went to our friend Jeff's house. Jeff's friend Mandy, who has been working in Alaska recently, was in town so we got to see her too.

On Friday night, Fate was not planning on going out so I went to work at The Depot. Around 9:00 Sean called me down to the office. Scott was there too. They wrote me up and fired me. The 3 reasons they gave for firing me were:

Last week, during the Warrant concert, a server was uncomfortable with the way that I let her know that we were cutting-off (no longer serving drinks to a customer because they had already had too much to drink) a customer. Last I checked, cutting people off is part of my job. I was not rude to the server, so I'm not sure what her problem was. I know that I did not mistreat her.
At the Warrant concert Laurie, an aquaintance of mine from when I ran Security at Natalie's, got drunk and her sister got even more drunk and was throwing up. I asked Sean if I could give them a ride home. Sean and Scott saw this as a "liability". I saw it as showing concern for a customer.
Last week after the One Self concert, I was in the dressing room showing Yarah Bravo how to set up a url for her My Space account. Scott said that I "crossed the line". If you read my post about Yarah, anyone could see that I was not bothering her and I was not asking her for anything. I was helping her and she was completly O.K. with me being in her dressing room with the other members of the band and some of their fans. Whenever fans are in the dressing room of an artist, I think that it is important for Security to be in there. Apparently Sean and Scott want me to secure the dressing room from outside even if the artist is O.K. with me being in there.

So basically I got fired for absolutely no reason at all. Nothing I did was worth getting written up for. It was definitely not worth getting fired for. I was very upset at first, but after talking to Fate, I realized that it was their loss and I was better off not working for them.

I went over to Fate's sister's house and then Fate and I went to Club Manhattan. After Manhattan, we went to the Denny's off of I-15 at 45th South. When we first got there, Fate was on the phone and it was very noisy inside so we went back outside. I called John and invited him to join us. While we were waiting for John, a big group of people from the Lazy Moon, a gay bar in S.L.C., showed up. I called Domani and let her know that I had been fired from The Depot. John showed up shortly after I got on the phone with Domani.

While I was on the phone with Domani, one of the ladies from the Lazy Moon group came outside and was yelling at someone inside. I told Domani that I had to go and ran inside to see what was going on. A biker dude was fighting the group from the Lazy Moon. I stepped up and told him to step outside. He did as he was told. Then the Lazy Moon group wanted to follow him out. I told them to stay inside. One of the ladies from that group said "My friend is out there" (it was the lady that I had first noticed). So then I went outside and seperated them. For about 5 minutes I physically prevented this group and the biker guy from attacking each other. I kept telling the biker to leave. Eventually he decided to leave and realized that he had left his keys inside. I escorted him inside and protected him from the rest of the Lazy Moon group. After going back outside I continued to keep them from fighting each other. The biker finally got on his bike with his girlfriend and left. Another biker couple that was with them also left. Then the cops showed up (the Denny's employees had called them). They caught the second biker couple, but since they had not been fighting, the cops let them go. I gave the cops my info and told them what happened.

Afterwards Fate, John, and I went inside to eat. Several ladies from the Lazy Moon group thanked me for helping keep the peace. A couple of other Denny's customers recognized me from the many Security jobs I've had (I get that a lot). Our server, Bill, who knew Fate and I from when we used to go there on a regular basis, thanked me and told me that our food was on the house. We got seated next to the group from the Lazy Moon. I overheard them talking about what had happened. According to them, the biker had made a remark about one of the ladies' thong showing. They got into an argument and then the biker sat down. Then he got up and started harassing one of the guys from their group for being a homosexual. That's what started the fight. A few more people from their group thanked me for keeping the peace. They left before we did. After they left Bill told us that they had covered our bill.

Saturday afternoon Fate performed (he sings R&B) with Lam (a rapper from Utah) for the youth group from Valley Assembly of God. Fate's sister, Tiasha, and her son, "Little Man", came with us. After that I took them back to Fate's mom's apartment. Then I went home, took a nap and got ready to go to the D.J. Quik concert at Harry O's in Park City. I picked Fate up a little after 9 and then we went to Harry O's. One of the owners of Harry O's let us in for free because he wants to book Fate to open up for some upcoming Hip Hop concerts at Harry O's. The concert was O.K. There weren't any fights. After the concert we went to our friend Sarah's house. Then we went to Jeff's house and hung out with Mandy and some of her friend's. We gave Mandy's friend, Tara, a ride back down to Salt Lake City. Fate went back to Vegas Sunday afternoon.

Yarah Bravo

2006-06-01T08:18:00.000-04:00

On Tuesday night One Self performed at The Depot. This was definitely my favorite show at The Depot so far. I especially enjoyed seeing Yarah Bravo perform. In addition to being very beautiful and talented, she enjoys what she does and it shows! Before the show I showed her to her dressing room. Later on, before the doors opened, I asked her if she needed something to drink because she was on the stage working on her laptop. She said that she only drank juice and water so I took a break, went to Barnes & Noble next to The Depot, and bought her some Elliot's Amazing all natural juice. She really appreciated that. Before going on stage she told me that she really liked my vibes and said that I was different from other Security guys. She sang directly to me a couple of times during her performance (since I was securing the stage). She gave me a hug at the end of the night. I'm looking forward to seeing her again the next time they're on tour. It would be really cool if I was her bodyguard someday.

On Friday I saw X-Men: The Last Stand with my boss from The Depot, Sean, and his wife. I give it a B-. It had some cool special effects and action scenes, but the story was not very good. According to some reviews that I've read on the internet, the writer of this movie strayed far from the comic book story line. Peaceful Warrior has a limited release in select theaters on Friday. Still no word on when it will be released in Salt Lake City. I'm looking forward to seeing District B13 on June 30th at the Broadway Centre Cinemas. District B13 is directed by Pierre Morel, who was the Director of Photography for Transporter 2 and Unleashed. This movie incorporates martial arts and Parkour for some awesome action scenes. Parkour is the art of moving through your environment using only your body and the surroundings to propel yourself. Check out the official Parkour site and the American Parkour site for more info. The Utah Parkour site is www.parkore.com/.

Barry Eisler's new book, The Last Assassin, hits bookstores today! I really enjoyed the other John Rain books - Rain Fall, Hard Rain, Rain Storm, and Killing Rain. After I finish reading the Peaceful Warrior series, I'll read The Last Assassin. I'm also looking forward to reading Richard Marcinko's new book, Holy Terror, which will be released on July 4th.

One Self, Leon Russell, and Smokin' Joe Kubek

2006-05-29T21:06:00.000-04:00

On Tuesday One Self's C.O.P. (Children of Possibility) Tour is coming to The Depot. One Self is an international hip hop crew featuring D.J. Vadim, Yarah Bravo, and Blu Rum 13. Click here for the One Self promotional video. Local turntablist D.J. Shanty will be opening for One Self. Doors open at 8:00. Tickets are only $10.

Salt Lake City blues band Ides of Soul, who recently opened for Roy Rogers, will be opening for Leon Russell at The Depot on Thursday. Singer and songwriter Leon Russell has released more than 30 albums over the past 40 years. He has written several hits including George Benson's Grammy Award winning "This Masquerade", which was the first song in music history to occupy the number one spot on the jazz, pop, and R&B charts. Doors open at 8:00. Tickets are $20 in advance and $22 day of show.

Smokin' Joe Kubek and Bnois King will be performing at The Depot on Friday and Saturday. Smokin' Joe Kubek was nominated for The Blues Foundation's 2005 W.C. Handy Blues Award for Blues Band of the Year. Kubek partnered up with jazz guitarist Bnois King in 1989 and they have been together ever since. Doors open at 8:00 both nights. Tickets are $10 in advance and $12 day of show. If you buy tickets for both nights by Friday, you get Saturday night's tickets at half price.

Next week The Eels, Eagles of Death Metal, and Acoustic Alchemy will be performing at The Depot. We have several good shows coming up including Yellowman, Rusted Root, and Chris Isaak. There are still tickets available for Queensryche's second show at The Depot on November 28th.

Springfield Armory XD 45 ACP

2006-05-24T02:28:00.000-04:00

For a long time I have been wanting to buy a Glock. I have also wanted to get my concealed carry permit and Utah Armed Security Officer license. After doing some research on the internet, I decided that I might want to get Springfield Armory's XD 45 ACP because in addition to being a reliable and accurate gun, it has an ergonomic grip so when you raise it to eye level, you are looking right down the sights. The XD 45 ACP is the winner of the American Rifleman Golden Bullseye Award for "Handgun of the Year".

On Monday I went to Doug's Shoot 'N Sports to buy my first gun. I rented the 4" XD 45 ACP and fired 50 rounds on their gun range. I liked the way it felt. I went back upstairs (their gun range is in the basement) and compared the grip angle of the XD 45 to that of a Glock. Although I did not fire the Glock, I felt that the XD 45 grip was better for me. I ordered the 4" XD 45 ACP because they didn't have it in stock. It is hard to keep the XD's in stock because they are so popular. They will call me when it arrives in a week or two.

Firing a gun for the first time reminded me of something that Socrates said in Way of the Peaceful Warrior, which I'm currently reading:

"Understanding is the one-dimensional comprehension of the intellect.

It leads to knowledge.

Realization is three-dimensional -

a simultaneous comprehension of head, heart, and instinct.

It comes only from direct experience."

I had seen guns fired in movies and thought about what it would be like to fire a gun, but I didn't realize what it was like until I experienced it.

A couple of weeks ago I called Clark Aposhian, who is the firearms instructor at Impact Guns in Ogden, inquiring about dates and rates for his CCW and ASO training. He said that he would email me that info. I called him again on Monday because I had not received his email and he emailed me right away. I am going to be taking his 2-day class on June 7th and 8th. This class will allow me to get both my Concealed Carry permit and my Utah Armed Security Officer license.

Farewell June and Warrant

2006-05-23T01:06:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow (Tuesday) night Christian group Farewell June will be performing at Calvary Chapel S.L.C. Doors open at 6:30 and the show starts at 7. For more info call (801)264-9999.

This week we have a variety of shows at The Depot. On Wednesday Roomful of Blues, winner of The Blues Foundation's 2004 Handy Award for Blues Band of the Year, will be performing. Click here for some videos of Roomful of Blues. Doors open at 7. Tickets are only $15.

Thursday night we have The Cairo Gang and Tolchok Trio opening for British rock group The Fall. Doors open at 8. Tickets are $15 in advance and $17 day of show.

Utah heavy metal band Antix will be opening for 80's heavy metal band Warrant on Saturday. Click here to see Antix's videos. Doors open at 8. Tickets are $15 in advance and $17 day of show.

Next week D.J. Vadim, Leon Russel, and Smokin' Joe Kubek will be performing at The Depot. Yellowman is coming to The Depot next month. In July, Rusted Root and Chris Isaak will be performing. Queensryche, who already has a sold out show on September 30th, will be coming back for a second show at The Depot on November 28th. Get your tickets now because this show will definitely sell out too!

Target-Focus Training

2006-05-21T23:18:00.000-04:00

Yesterday I bought TFT's "The Works" package. TFT (Target-Focus Training) is a self-protection program, as opposed to a self-defense program, created by Tim Larkin. I have been interested in TFT for a couple of years now. Tim Larkin had an article in the June issue of Black Belt magazine (it's on newstands until Monday, May 22nd) and he was on the cover so TFT is having a "Tim's-On-The-Cover" sale. "The Works" package normally costs $537 or $49.75 per month for 12 months. With the "Tim's-On-The-Cover" sale this package is only $437 or $41 per month. I went with the monthly payment plan. "The Works" package contains the 17 DVD "How To Survive The Most Critical 5 Seconds Of Your Life" program, 3 teleconference certificates that give you direct access to Tim or his instructors, a certificate good for $200 off any live training, and the limited edition bonus special 2½-hour Charles Staley Escalating Density Training (EDT) system DVD (an $80 value). This sale also includes discounts on other packages as well as their Full 2½-Day TFT Live Training Workshop. The "Tim's-On-The-Cover" sale ends Tuesday morning, May 23rd. Click here for details on the sale.

On Friday a friend of mine wanted to see The Da Vinci Code, based on the book of the same name, so we saw it at the Megaplex 17 in Sandy. I give it a B-. It was well done but I believe that the basis of the plot (the Gnostic "gospels") is false. This movie takes a little bit of fact and adds a lot of fiction to come up with a story based on a belief that Jesus was married to Mary Magdelene. The Da Vinci Code is about the battle between two groups of people - one group (the Priory of Sion) that wants to protect the location of a vastly important religious relic and another group (Opus Dei) that wants to seize the Priory's secret. X-Men: The Last Stand comes out on Friday. I'm also looking forward to seeing Peaceful Warrior, Click, Superman Returns, Pirates of the Carribean: Dead Man's Chest, and M. Night Shyamalan's Lady in the Water starring Bryce Howard who also starred in M. Night Shyamalan's The Village and will be starring in Spiderman 3.

The Journeys of Socrates

2006-05-17T04:08:00.000-04:00

I just finished reading The Journeys of Socrates by Dan Millman. The Journeys of Socrates is the prequel to Way of the Peaceful Warrior (the Peaceful Warrior movie, which is based on Way of the Peaceful Warrior, is coming to select theaters on June 2nd). Here is a quote from The Journeys of Socrates that explains what a peaceful warrior is:

"In truth, Socrates, you have no opponents but yourself.

Make peace within, and there will be no one who can overcome you.

And no one you will wish to overcome."

Here is an excerpt from The Journeys of Socrates that tells a story I have heard before that I like very much:

A story came to him - one that Serafim had told some months before, perhaps intended for this moment. He had spoken of a proud and hot-tempered young samurai who routinely cut down any peasant who gave the least offense. In those days, samurai were a law unto themselves, and such behavior was accepted according to custom.

But one day, after another killing, as he cleaned the blood from his blade and returned it to his scabbard, the young samurai began to worry that the gods might disapprove of his actions and send him to a hellish realm. Desirous to know about eternity, he visited the humble abode of a Zen master named Kanzaki. With expected courtesy, the samurai removed his razor-sharp katana and set it alongside him, bowed deeply and said, "Please tell me of heaven and hell!"

Master Kanzaki gazed at the young samurai and smiled. Then his smile turned to raucous laughter. He pointed to the young warrior as if he had said something hilarious. Wagging his finger, still laughing loudly, Kanzaki said, "You ignorant bumpkin! You presume to ask me, a wise master, about heaven and hell? Do not waste my time, idiot! You are too stupid to possibly comprehend such things!"

The samurai's temper flared to the boiling point. He would have killed anyone else for even pointing at him in such a way. Now he fought to restrain himself despite these insults.

Master Kanzaki was not finished. He remarked casually, "It's quite clear to me that no one of your lineage of louts and fools could understand a word -"

A murderous rage came over the young warrior. He grabbed his katana, leaped to his feet, and raised the sword to take the Zen master's head -

In that very moment, Master Kanzaki pointed to the samurai and said calmly, "There open the gates of hell."

The warrior froze. In that instant, a light illuminated his mind, and he understood the nature of hell. It was not a realm beyond this life but within him now. He dropped to his knees, laid his blade behind him, and bowed deeply to his teacher. "Master, my gratitude knows no bounds for this brave lesson you have taught. Thank you. Thank you!"

Zen master Kanzaki smiled, pointed to him once again, and said, "There open the gates of heaven."

On Monday I bought Way of the Peaceful Warrior and Sacred Journey of the Peaceful Warrior from Borders. I'm going to read these books as Dan Millman suggests - read Way of the Peaceful Warrior until Soc sends Dan away to travel around the world - then read Sacred Journey - and then finish Way of the Peaceful Warrior.

While reading The Journeys of Socrates, I noticed that some of the self defense principles that Socrates learns sounded like some of the principles that I have read about on the Systema Russain Martial Art website. It turns out that I was right - in the Acknowledgments section in the back of The Journeys of Socrates, Dan acknowledges John Giduck, founder of the Russian Martial Arts Training Center in Golden, CO, and Vladimir Vasiliev, Director and Chief Instructor of Systema Headquarters.

By the way, if you read The Journeys of Socrates, I suggest that you don't read the "REVELATIONS FROM THE YEARS THAT FOLLOWED" section at the back of the book until after you have read Way of the Peaceful Warrior and Sacred Journey of the Peaceful Warrior because there is a spoiler in there.

If Al Gore Were President

2006-05-16T05:37:00.000-04:00

Tonight (this morning) while watching the news on my lunch break, they showed parts of a SNL video clip titled "If Al Gore Were President". Check it out at www.crooksandliars.com. My favorite line (taken from Steve's rough transcript) is:

"As for immigration, solving that came at a heavy cost, and I personally regret the loss of California. However, the new Mexifornian economy is strong and el Presidente Schwarznegger is doing a great job."

I don't agree with all of the points in this video but it is funny.

Security Team at The Depot

2006-05-15T01:04:00.000-04:00

We have a good Security Team at The Depot. The Security Team consists of Sean, John, "Irish", Danny, Nate, Tom, Domani, and me. Sean is the Security Director. He has a lot of experience in the Security and Hospitality industries. John (a.k.a. "Obi-Wan") and I were the first to be hired for Security at The Depot. Sean (a.k.a. "Irish") is 300+ lbs of muscle. Unlike a lot of big guys that do Security, he actually works instead of having the "I'm here because I'm big so I don't have to work" attitude. Danny (a.k.a. "English") is in the military. He blows stuff up. Nate used to be in the Navy. He's a talkative guy. Tom is a nice guy. Domani is a friend of one of my best friends, John. She is from John's hometown in Pennsylvania. We had heard about each other from John, but had never met each other. I am glad that she is on our team.

We have four shows at The Depot this week. Roy Rogers & The Delta Rythym Kings will be performing on Wednesday and Thursday. Roy Rogers is a northern California-based blues guitarist. He was a member of John Lee Hooker's Coast to Coast Blues Band in the 80's. Ides of Soul will be the opening band on Wednesday. The Legendary Porch Pounders will be the opening band on Thursday. Georgian country singer Billy Currington will be performing on Friday. On Saturday KBER 101 presents the Salt Lake Soundcheck featuring Super So Far, Thunderfist, and Invisible Rays. The cover charge is only $1.01 for this show (membership is required; a two-week membership is only $5; you can sponsor up to 6 people).

Special ACLU Alert

2006-05-11T02:39:00.000-04:00

Just a few months ago, the multi-million dollar machine known as the ACLU strong-armed and raided the school budget for one of the poorest counties in the land. A few years before, the ACLU had won a court order to have Ten Commandment monuments removed from three Adams County, Ohio high schools. It didn’t matter that the monuments were unanimously approved by the school-board, and privately funded. Once removed, the ACLU had the audacity to return to federal court to demand that the school board (one of the poorest in the nation) cough up $80,000 for legal bills--and the judge agreed!

This is why Grassfire is taking action against the ACLU, and why we launched our nationwide petition to expose and ultimately defeat the ALCU. Our goal is to expose the kind of travesty and heartache they are bringing to the communities of our nation, and educate citizens to the real truth and motivation ofthe ACLU. Please take a moment to add your name to our petition.

As part of our plan to defeat the ACLU, we needed to find a legal organization dedicated to protecting the rights and freedoms of citizens, with a proven track record against groups like the ALCU. We found the Liberty Counsel, one of the nation's foremost legal defense organizations established to preserve our First Amendment Rights.

With your help, we can expose and defeat theACLU so that they cannot terrorize Americans withtheir "storm-trooper" tactics. As their founder, Roger Baldwin said, "We [the ALCU] are for socialism, disarmament and ultimately for abolishingthe state itself...we seek the social ownership ofproperty...and the sole control of those who produce wealth. Communism is the goal." This is the real ACLU, and we need you to help us enlighten a nation of people who have been deceived by signing our national petition. Thank you for standing with us against the ACLU.

Inside Iraq: The Untold Stories

2006-05-10T02:31:00.000-04:00

Armed with a video camera, a home-made press pass, and a single phone number written on a piece of paper, amateur filmmaker Mike Shiley chronicled a 2 month journey inside Iraq to uncover the reality of life beyond the spin about the US and Iraqi militaries and the Iraqi people. The result of Mike's 2 month journey inside Iraq is Inside Iraq: The Untold Stories. Inside Iraq: The Untold Stories will be showing at Tower Theater this Friday and Saturday, May 12th and 13th, at 7:00 P.M. Mike Shiley will be answering questions immediately after the film. Free parking is available at the Smith's lot at 876 E 800 S, just one block from Tower Theater. Office Space is the midnight movie at Tower Theater this Friday and Saturday.

Brick, a movie that I have been wanting to be released for a long time, is finally showing at Broadway Center Cinemas this Friday, May 12th. I hope that the Salt Lake Film Society will bring Peaceful Warrior to Salt Lake City. You can join the Salt Lake Film Society's email list here.

This Week at The Depot

2006-05-09T01:51:00.000-04:00

This week there are two shows at The Depot. On Thursday we have two great ska bands in the house - Two And A Half White Guys (from Provo, Utah) will be opening for The Slackers (from N.Y.C.; pictured above). You can get tickets here. On Saturday SPORK and Up in the Night will be opening for Almost Undone. There is no cover for this show. Drink specials for the night are $2 Drafts and $5 Long Islands. Doors will open at 8:00 P.M. for both shows.

Warrant is coming to The Depot on May 27th. Chris Isaak will be there on July 29th. Go to TheDepot.com for tickets and info about other upcoming shows.

Sunday I saw Mission: Impossible III. I give it an A. It was better than Mission: Impossible and Mission: Impossible II. With J.J. Abrams as director and co-writer, it had to be good! I'm looking forward to seeing X-Men: The Last Stand, The Break-Up, Peaceful Warrior, The Omen, The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, Click, Waist Deep, & Superman Returns.

Gas War

2006-05-08T04:29:00.000-04:00

One of my high school friends, Alex, forwarded an email to me with an effective solution to bring down gas prices. Here is the message:

GAS WAR - An Idea That WILL Work

This was originally sent by a retired Coca Cola executive. It came from one of his engineer buddies who retired from Halliburton. It's worth your consideration.

Join the resistance!!!! I hear we are going to hit close to $4.00 a gallon by next summer and it might go higher!! Want gasoline prices to come down? We need to take some intelligent, united action. Phillip Hollsworth offered this good idea.

This makes MUCH MORE SENSE than the "don't buy gas on a certain day" campaign that was going around last April or May! The oil companies just laughed at that because they knew we wouldn't continue to "hurt" ourselves by refusing to buy gas. It was more of an inconvenience to us than it was a problem for them.

BUT, whoever thought of this idea, has come up with a plan that can really work. Please read on and join with us! By now you're probably thinking gasoline priced at about $1.50 is super cheap. Me too! It is currently $2.79 for regular unleaded in my town. Now that the oil companies and the OPEC nations have conditioned us to think that the cost of a gallon of gas is CHEAP at $1.50 - $1.75, we need to take aggressive action to teach them that BUYERS control themarketplace..... not sellers. With the price of gasoline going up more each day, we consumers need to take action. The only way we are going to see the price of gas come down is if we hit someone in the pocketbook by not purchasing their gas! And, we can do that WITHOUT hurting ourselves. How? Since we all rely on our cars, we can't just stop buying gas. But we CAN have an impact on gas prices if we all act together to force a price war.

Here's the idea:

For the rest of this year, DON'T purchase ANY gasoline from the two biggest companies (which now are one), EXXON and MOBIL. If they are not selling any gas, they will be inclined to reduce their prices. If they reduce their prices, the other companies will have to follow suit.

This sounds like a plan that might actually work. I buy gas from Chevron (because they have Techron) and Holiday Oil (they have the car wash that is nearest to my house) so I'm already following this plan.

My Favorite Posts 9

2006-05-05T04:37:00.000-04:00

Baptism for the Dead?

2006-05-04T05:19:00.000-04:00

One of the beliefs of the LDS church that I know is not true is their belief in baptism for the dead. They base this practice on 1 Cor. 15:29. Here is an article from www.carm.org that explains verse 29 and its context in 1 Cor. 15:

What is Baptism for the Dead Mentioned in 1 Cor. 15:29?

"Otherwise, what will those do who are baptized for the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why then are they baptized for them?" (1 Cor. 15:29, NASB).

Numerous explanations have been offered for this verse ranging from the inane to the sophisticated. Mormonism, in particular, has claimed that this verse supports their view of baptism for the dead. In their practice, individuals go to their local Mormon temple, dress appropriately for a baptism, representatively adopt the name of a person who has died, and then the Mormon is baptized in water for that deceased person. This way, the dead person has fulfilled the requirements of salvation in the afterworld and can enjoy further spiritual benefits in the spiritual realm.

But, the Mormons are incorrect. They have usurped this verse and taken it out of context. So, let's examine 1 Cor. 15 briefly so we can see what Paul is talking about when he mentions baptism for the dead.

In Verses 1-19, the fact of Christ's resurrection is detailed by Paul. Beginning in verse 20 and going through verse 23, Paul speaks about the order of the resurrection. Christ is the first one raised -- in a glorified body -- and then who are His at His return. Next, verses 24 - 29 mention Christ's reign and the abolition of death. This is when this controversial verse occurs: "Otherwise, what will those do who are baptized for the dead? If the dead are not raised at all, why then are they baptized for them?"

Just north of Corinth was a city named Eleusis. This was the location of a pagan religion where baptism in the sea was practiced to guarantee a good afterlife. This religion was mention by Homer in Hymn to Demeter 478-79. The Corinthians were known to be heavily influenced by other customs. After all, they were in a large economic area where a great many different people frequented. It is probable that the Corinthians were being influenced by the religious practices found at Eleusis where baptism for the dead was practiced.

Paul used this example from the pagans in 1 Cor. 15:29, when he said, "...if the dead are not raised, then why are they baptized for the dead?" Paul did not say we. This is significant because the Christian church was not practicing baptism for the dead, but the pagans were.

Paul's point was simple. The resurrection is a reality. It is going to happen when Jesus returns. Even the pagans believe in the resurrection, otherwise, why would they baptize for the dead?

However, some are not convinced by this argument and state that the word "they" is not in the Greek and, therefore, Paul is not speaking about the pagans.. Let's take a look.

Literally, the verse is translated as "Since what will do the being immersed on behalf of the dead if wholly dead not are raised why also are they immersed on behalf of them."

The issue here is the word, "baptizontai" -- "they are baptized." It is the present, passive, indicative, 3rd person, plural. In other words, it is THEY ARE BEING BAPTIZED or, THEY ARE BAPTIZED.

I -- first person singular

you (singular) -- second person singular

he/she/it -- third person singular

we -- first person plural

you (plural) -- second person plural

they -- third person plural

It is the latter form, the third person plural (they) which the verb "baptizo" is in. Therefore, the best translation is "THEY are baptized."

The Institute for Religous Research website has a more detailed article about baptism for the dead titled "Did Jesus Establish Baptism for the Dead?". This article talks about 1 Corinthians 15:29 as a single verse, in the broader context, and in the immediate context. This article also explains that 1 Cor. 15:40-41 is comparing our resurrection bodies to our mortal bodies. It is not comparing three different levels of heaven to each other as the LDS church teaches it does.

If you are LDS and have read this, I pray that you will pray about this with an open mind and heart. I will end this post with this verse:

To the Jews who had believed him, Jesus said,

"If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples.

Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free."

John 8:31-32 (NIV)

Church in the Park

2006-05-03T00:43:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow night at 6:30 P.M. Calvary Chapel S.L.C. will be hosting Church in the Park at Sugarhouse Park, in the Park Lake Terrace, 2100 S 1300 E. Church in the Park is a BBQ and outdoor church service. Calvary Chapel S.L.C. will be providing meat for this BBQ. We are asking attendees to bring a side dish. We will be hosting Church in the Park every month until September. For more info you can call (801)264-9999.

Thursday is the National Day of Prayer. There will be a National Day of Prayer Event in Salt Lake City at the County Courthouse Building located at 400 South State St at 6:30 P.M. Local pastors will lead public prayer on behalf of our nation. Inspirational music will be presented by local choirs and special musical presentations. Click here to find an event near you.

Last night I went online and bought a pair of dress shoes because The Depot wants us to wear dress shoes and slacks instead of boots and BDUs. This afternoon I bought The Journey of Socrates by Dan Millman. The Journey of Socrates is the first book of the Peaceful Warrior saga. The Peaceful Warrior movie is coming out on June 2nd. I still want to see United 93. I also want to see Mission: Impossible III and X-Men: The Last Stand.

I have added the email subscription option to my blog. If you want to get an email every time I add a new post, look for the box that says "Enter your email address:" in the sidebar on the right. Then enter your email address and click the "Subscribe" button. You can still use the other subscription options.

Graveyard Shift

2006-05-01T04:58:00.000-04:00

Right now I am working my first graveyard shift for the Clearwire project at Teleperformance. My shift runs from 8 P.M. until 7 A.M. with a 1 hour lunch. I will be working this shift Sunday through Wednesday. It is very slow on the graveyard shift so I should be able to post on my blog more regularly. Slackis is one of the L2s for Clearwire. L2s or "Leads" are one level above a regular call center agent and one level below Supervisors. I've added a link to Slackis's website under Neighbors (People Who Live in Utah) under BLOGS/PERSONAL WEBSITES in the column on the right.

I worked Security at The Depot on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday. On Thursday Pinback performed. Friday and Saturday nights we had some local DJs spinning. Friday it was DJ Jesse Walker and Saturday it was U-92's DJ E-Flexx.

This Thursday country singer Brian McComas will be performing at The Depot. On Friday British DJ B.T. will be spinning house music with guest DJs Nebula & Davey Jones. Saturday night Amina will be opening for Icelandic post-rock group Sigur Ros.

Never Say to a Cop

2006-04-25T18:15:00.000-04:00

NEVER SAY TO A COP

1. I can't reach my license unless you hold my beer. (OK in Texas)

2. Sorry, officer, I didn't realize my radar detector wasn't plugged in.

3. Aren't you the guy from the Village People?

4. Hey, you must've been doin' about 125 mph to keep up with me. Good job!

5. Are You Andy or Barney?

6. I thought you had to be in relatively good physical condition to be a police officer.

7. You're not gonna check the trunk, are you?

8. I pay your salary!

9. Gee, Officer! That's terrific. The last officer only gave me a warning too!

10. Do you know why you pulled me over? Okay, just so one of us does.

11. I was trying to keep up with traffic. Yes, I know there are no other cars around. That's how far ahead of me they are.

12. When the officer says "Gee son, your eyes look red. Have you been drinking?", you probably shouldn't respond with,"Gee officer, your eyes look glazed. Have you been eating doughnuts?"

The Depot

2006-04-22T00:18:00.000-04:00

On Wednesday I went to my 3rd interview for Security at The Depot. The interview was supposed to be with Mark, the General Manager. When I got there Scott, the Assistant Manager, came down and told me that he would be interviewing me because Mark was "moving on". Since Scott was the one that did my first interview, the interview was a short one. He told me that Sean had interviewed more than 20 people and they were only going to hire 6. He told me that they were going to make a decision by Thursday because they wanted the people they hired to work this weekend.

Yesterday I called Sean and asked him if they had decided who they were going to hire. He told me that they had and that they wanted to offer me a job. He wanted me to start tonight, but when I told him I had to work at Teleperformance until 11:30, he told me to come in at 6 on Saturday to work the Editors & Stellastarr show. I'll also be working the Roger Clyne & The Peacemakers show on Sunday.

My regular schedule for Clearwire, which starts the week after next, will be a graveyard shift Sunday through Wednesday. Since most of the shows at The Depot are on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, I will be able to work most of the shows. Since I will be working on Wednesdays after training, this Wednesday will be my last regularly scheduled day working at Vortex. After I get off of work tonight, I will be going to work the Jon B. show at Vortex.

Clearwire

2006-04-18T21:46:00.000-04:00

Today I started training for Clearwire Tech Support. Susan, who was the Head Supervisor for TurboTax, is filling in for our regular trainer, Paris. I'll be working 3-11:30 P.M. M-F until April 28th.

Last Monday Sean, the new Security Director at The Depot, called me to schedule a 2nd interview on Tuesday. Today he called me to schedule my 3rd interview for tomorrow with the General Manager, Mark. I want to work there, but I don't know if my schedule after training will allow me to.

On Sunday I volunteered for Security for Calvary Chapel S.L.C.'s Easter at the "E". We had a huge resurrection Sunday church service at the E Center. I secured the Sunday school area. I did crowd control for the check-in, stood guard at the Sunday School area during the service, and then made sure that only parents came into the Sunday School area during check-out (they had claim tickets for their chilldren). After I was done at the E Center, I went home and took a nap. Then I went to work until 10 P.M. I worked from 9 A.M. on Monday until 1 A.M. on Tuesday because it was the last day of the tax season. I am glad that the TurboTax project is over!

Decisions, Decisions

2006-04-11T21:54:00.000-04:00

The TurboTax project I am currently working on at Teleperformance ends this Monday, April 17th (the last day you can file taxes). I am supposed to start training for another Teleperformance project, Clearwire, the next day. I do have another option though - I might be getting a job as the Security Manager at a new club that Phil will be the General Manager of if the club actually opens. I don't know what I should do. Here are the reasons that I want to take the Security Manager job:

More money - I will definitely be making more than the $9/hr I am making now.
More fulfilling - I know that God has me here for a reason - to protect people. As the Security Manager of a club, I would be fulfilling my purpose.
More enjoyable - I would definitely enjoy working as the Security Manager of a club more than working at a call center.

Here are some reasons why I don't want to or maybe shouldn't take the Security Manager job:

Previous experience says I probably shouldn't take the Security Manager job. The last time I worked for Phil, at Players, I was owed $600 when the club was foreclosed on. I still haven't been paid any of that. Also, his appreciation of the work I do goes up and down like a roller coaster. Some days he treats me like I'm his best employee (which I am); other days he treats me like I'm his worst employee.
More stress - right now I just show up to work and do my job. Although I do have a supervisor, I don't interact with him very much. I just sit at my desk and do my job. It's an easy, boring, laid-back job.
More responsibility - although I am a control freak to a certain extent (I don't like to control people, but I do like to be in control af any given situation, which sometimes requires telling people what to do), I won't necessarily enjoy being responsible for the mistakes of the people that I have authority over.
Phil wants to pay the Bouncers that I'll be hiring $8-10. This is the average pay at most clubs in Utah, but you get what you pay for. Although I might be able to convince some good Bouncers to come work for $10/hour, I'll mostly be stuck with $8/hr Bouncers.

A third option is to look for a job somewhere else. I have kept this job at Teleperformance for 4 months now, but maybe it's time to move on. I'm comfortable where I'm at, but that's not necessarily a good thing. I'll have to pray about it.

Sunday night, Phil, John, and I saw Lucky Number Slevin at the Cinemark 24 at Jordan Landing. I give it a B- (I've decided to switch to the A, B, C, D, F rating system because it allows for 15 ratings instead of the 10 ratings in the 5 star rating system). It was predictable but still a good movie. I'm looking forward to seeing The Sentinel, United 93, Mission: Impossible III, and X-Men: The Last Stand.

Sunday I will be doing voluntary Security for Easter at the "E". Easter at the "E" is a resurrection Sunday service hosted by my church, Calvary Chapel S.L.C., that is open to the public. Ginny Owens will be performing at this free event.

Stop Amnesty of Illegal Immigrants

2006-04-07T19:02:00.000-04:00

The American Family Association is conducting a poll on the Senate Bill that will grant amnesty to 12 million illegal immigrants. Here is the proposal in the Senate:

Illegal immigrants who have been here more than five years could apply for legal permanent residency immediately without having to leave the country.
Those here two years to five years would have to go to border entry points and get a visa but could immediately return as temporary workers.
Those here less than two years would have to leave, go back to their home country and wait in line for visas, then return through the regular immigration process.

Results from the poll will be sent to President George Bush, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, and Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert. Please click here to take the poll.

Sean Paul @ Harry O's

2006-04-07T15:33:00.000-04:00

Last night Theorian and I went to the Sean Paul concert at Harry O's. Theorian knows the promoter and I know the owner (although it took him a minute to recognize me ) so we both got in free. D.J. Brisk opened up for Sean Paul. He is a good D.J.

While we were out in the crowd, as I was protecting Theorian (I do Personal Security for him), a lady behind me to the right (I think her name was Rebecca) asked me for help because some ladies behind her were acting like they were the only people in the club (they were dancing into this lady and her friend). I asked them to respect the people around them. They gave me some attitude so I signalled one of the Bouncers (with my Surefire 6P flashlight) to come straighten them out. He came over and told them to chill. They quit dancing into Rebecca and her friend. Rebecca told me that they were talking about me. I told her that I wasn't worried about that, I was just worried about them retaliating against her.

Soon after dealing with those ladies, a drunk lady came into the crowd and was about to get into a fight because she was falling into/pushing people. I escorted her and her boyfriend/friend out of the crowd and told them to stay out of the crowd. A little while later they came back in. I escorted them out of the crowd again and then signalled a Bouncer and asked him to remove them from the club.

A few minutes later some ladies in front of me asked me for help because a heavy lady in front of them was throwing her weight around. I let them stand behind me to the left and asked the heavy lady to respect those around her. She said O.K. Then some guy pushed his way in from the left and was pushing some ladies that were in front of Theorian and me. I put him behind me.

After Sean Paul came out Rebecca told me that she had some gum in her hair. I am sure the inconsiderate ladies that had been bothering her earlier did this to her (they were no longer near her). I helped her friend get the gum out of Rebecca's hair.

Around midnight Theorian thought Sean Paul's set was almost over so we moved over to the backstage entrance. Joe, who works at Vortex with me, was working the backstage entrance. We hung out over there until the show was over. While we were over there I helped Joe control access to backstage. After the show was over, Theorian went down into the V.I.P. area but did not get a chance to talk to Sean Paul because he was busy with some groupies. Theorian is going back home to Vegas today. It was good seeing him.

Pocket Power

2006-03-29T13:00:00.000-05:00

In a comment on my post about my mission trip to Reynosa, Mexico, Richard told me about PocketPower.org. PocketPower.org is The Pocket Testament League's website. The Pocket Testament League is a small non-profit organization whose purpose is to provide the gospel of John to individuals free of charge (there is a small shipping & handling fee) to help them witness to people. In addition to several English versions of the Bible, they also have Chinese-English and Spanish translations. On my next payday I am going to order some of the "Finding Your Way" gospels of John. In June I will be ordering some of the Spanish gospels of John to take with me on my mission trip. Membership is free. Click here to sign up today.

Last Wednesday I got hired at Club Vortex. Club Vortex is one of Utah's few 18+/21+ night clubs. I will be working as a Bouncer there every Wednesday. Wednesday is their busiest night because it is Ladies' Night (ladies get in free all night long). I will also be working any special events they have. I had talked to Gary, the Head of Security, about getting hired on there back in January, but he didn't hire me. Gary ran Security at Club Shakers, the first night club I worked at 9 years ago. I have been going there almost every Wednesday for the past few months. When fights have broken out, I have helped break them up. I have also been keeping an eye on the waitresses and go-go dancers there, helping them through the crowd and making sure no one bothers them. Grant, the owner of Club Vortex, has noticed this and put me on the payroll last week. So basically I am working directly for Grant. I enjoy protecting people so I am glad that I am working as a Bouncer again.

I've added a link to Jim's blog, Psalm 145:11-12, under Brothers & Sisters in Christ (Christians) in the Blogs section in the sidebar on the right.

Abdul Rahman to be Freed

2006-03-27T12:34:00.000-05:00

According to an article in The Detroit News an Afghan court dismissed the case that had Abdul Rahman facing possible execution for converting from Islam to Christianity, and an official said he could soon walk free, perhaps as early as today. Another Afghan official closely involved with the case told the AP that the court ruled there was insufficient evidence and returned the case to prosecutors for further investigation. But he said Rahman would be released in the meantime. Abdul had to be moved from a Kabul jail Friday because of threats from inmates, officials said. But, underlining authorities' security problems, he was put into solitary confinement at the notorious Policharki prison - where riots sparked by Muslim extremists killed six people last month. I pray that he is released soon and is not killed by Muslim extremists when he is released.

Last night Phil and I saw Inside Man at the Cinemark 24 at Jordan Landing. I rate it 4 (out of 5) stars. Denzel Washington played his role well as he always does. Some parts were predictable and other parts were kind of vague but it was a good movie. I do wish they had tied up some loose ends at the end of the movie. I'm planning on seeing Ice Age 2: The Meltdown, Brick, Lucky Number Slevin, The Sentinel, and United 93.

Gulsoma

2006-03-24T17:28:00.000-05:00

Kevin Sites posted an article in the Hot Zone about Gulsoma, an Afghan girl who, at the age of four, was given away in a promise of marriage to her neighbor's 30 year old son. Because she was a child the marriage was not expected to be sexually consumated, but she was treated like a slave. She was severely beaten and tortured until one night, after almost being beaten to death, she crawled away and hid under a rickshaw. When the rickshaw driver found Gulsoma, he listened to her story and took her to the police. The police took her to the hospital. They also arrested her father-in-law and "husband".

After a month of recovery, Gulsoma stayed at an orphanage in Kandahar. When the Ministry of Women's Affairs found out about her, she was brought to a Kabul orphanage, where she lives today. Click here to read the full story.

Now if we are children, then we are heirs -

heirs of God and co-heirs with Christ,

if indeed we share in his sufferings

in order that we may also share in his glory.

I consider that our present sufferings

are not worth comparing with the glory

that will be revealed in us.

Romans 8:17-18 (NIV)

Help Save Afghan Christian Convert

2006-03-23T21:57:00.000-05:00

Abdul Rahman, 41, faces death because he converted from Islam to Christianity and refuses to convert back to Islam. His family accused him of being a Christian. During his trial last Thursday in Kabul, Rahman confessed that he converted from Islam to Christianity 16 years ago while working as a medical aid worker for an international Christian group helping Afghan refugees in the Pakistani city of Peshawar. Read the WorldNetDaily article here.

"We are not against any particular religion in the world. But in Afghanistan, this sort of thing is against the law. It is an attack on Islam," Judge Ansarullah Mawlavezada said.

The prosecutor, Abdul Wasi, said he offered to drop the charges if Mr. Rahman converted back to Islam, but Rahman refused. "He would have been forgiven if he changed back. But he said he was a Christian and would always remain one. We are Muslims, and becoming a Christian is against our laws. He must get the death penalty," Wasi said.

Please email President Bush and ask him to intervene to save the life of Abdul Rahman.

Help Stop Illegal Internet Porn

2006-03-23T21:49:00.000-05:00

For years, Grassfire has been standing on the front lines in the battle to protect our children and grandchildren from illegal Internet pornography. They have delivered petitions to key leaders, actively supported legislation to protect the rights of children and even drafted their own model legislation to keep kids safe from e-mail porn spammers. Will you stand with me in allowing Grassfire to represent you in the fight to protect our kids from illegal Internet porn? Click here to sign.

Brigham City Outreach

2006-03-20T14:48:00.000-05:00

Yesterday over 150 people from my church, Calvary Chapel Salt Lake City, and I went to Brigham City to distribute 10,000 "The Bible vs. The Book of Mormon" DVDs to homes in Brigham City. While riding in one of the two charter busses that Calvary Chapel had rented to get up there and back, I got to know Jim Harris, one of the Assistant Pastors, a little bit better. When we got to Brigham City, Jim and I helped Living Hope Ministries organize the outreach. After everyone had been sent out on their routes, Jim and I went out and did our route. After everyone was done, we rode the bus back to Calvary Chapel. Then I gave Jim and his daughter a ride home.

Jim is also the Bikers for Chist Salt Lake City chapter elder. Under LINKS in the sidebar on the right, I have created a new category, Biker Links. In this category I have added links for Bikers for Christ Salt Lake City, Bikers for Christ, Road to Freedom (another Christian biker ministry), B.A.C.A. (Bikers Against Child Abuse), Patriot Guard Riders, Utah Rider Education, and the Motorcycle Safety Foundation.

My Favorite Posts 8

2006-03-19T04:22:00.000-05:00

Logically Impossible

2006-03-18T17:13:00.000-05:00

Recently, while browsing the C.A.R.M. website, I came across an article* giving logical proof that Morminism is false. I'll repost it here:

A LOGICAL PROOF THAT MORMONISM IS FALSE

Mormonism teaches that God used to be a man on another world and that he became a god (this is called exaltation) and came to this world with his goddess wife. He was able to become a god because he followed the laws and ordinances of the god he served on another world. That god in turn was exalted by his god, who was exalted by his god, ad infinitum. In other words, there is a progression of gods being formed as far back as you look in time.

Truth does not contradict itself. If I gave two statements about a subject and the two statements contradicted each other, then you would know something was wrong. The law of non contradiction states that something cannot be both true and false in the same sense at the same time. In other words, truth does not contradict itself. This is basic logic. That which is true is internally consistent and contains no logical impossibilities. If something does contain a logical impossibility, then it cannot be true.

Mormonism teaches an infinite regression of causes. This means that it teaches that each god was made a god by a previous god. This means that as far back as you look in time, this process has always been occurring. This means that from an infinity of time in the past, the Mormon plan of exaltation (become gods) has been in effect. The only problem is that this is logically impossible. Since it is logically impossible, this means that Mormonism is false. Let's look closer.

There cannot be an infinite regression of causes. It is logically impossible. Why? Because you can not cross an infinity.

In other words, in order for us to get to the present state of this god on this planet, there would have had to be an infinite number of exaltations in the past. But, this cannot be because in order to get to the present, you would have to transverse an infinity of exaltations and that is impossible since you cannot transverse an infinity -- if you could cross (transverse) an infinity of time, then it isn't infinite. Therefore, the Mormon system of infinite regressions of exaltations to godhood is impossible and Mormonism is proven false. Simple.

However, Mormons will not give in to a logical proof since their testimonies are not based on facts, but on what they claim is a testimony of the Holy Spirit. Of course, all cult groups have testimonies that their church is true (proving that testimonies are contradictory and untrustworthy as a means to determining truth). Nevertheless, they are taught to "feel" theological truth, not think it through.

How then do they respond to this logical proof that Mormonism is false? Normally they say that it is a mystery. Mysteries are fine, but they cannot suffice as an explanation if they contradict logic. In other words, if a principle is blatantly illogically, it cannot be true. Did you get that? It cannot be true. Saying it is a mystery means nothing if the proclamation of that mystery violates the laws of logic. Mormonism is proven false.

What is the truth?

Okay, so if the Mormon principle of eternal regression of exaltations is logically impossible, then what is the truth?

The truth is that there is a single uncaused cause. Logic necessitates that there must be a single being who is without beginning and upon which time has no meaning or affect who is the single uncaused cause. The Bible says that God is unchanging (unlike the Mormon god) and that he has been God from eternity. This is exactly what logic necessitates as being true. The God of Christianity is not an exalted man from another planet with a goddess wife. The God of Christianity has always been God and has never been anything else.

Check out the following verses:

"I the LORD do not change.

so you, O descendants of Jacob, are not destroyed."

Malachi 3:6 (NIV)

"Before the mountains were born
or You brought forth the earth and the world,
from everlasting to everlasting You are God."

Psalm 90:2 (NIV)

What is sad is that this simple logical proof, and it is a proof that Mormonism is false, will mean basically nothing to those whose spiritual eyes have been blinded by the god of this world.

"And even if our gospel is veiled,

it is veiled to those who are perishing.

The god of this age

has blinded the minds of unbelievers,

so that they cannot not see the light

of the gospel of the glory of Christ,

who is the image of God."

2 Corinthians 4:3-4 (NIV)

*I have shown the verses in the NIV (New International Version)

Never Too Busy

2006-03-17T23:58:00.000-05:00

Theorian (a.k.a. Dissaster) emailed me the lyrics to a song by gospel singer Byron Cage titled "Never Too Busy". Here they are:

Never Too Busy

As you climb the ladder of success

And the blessings, they begin to pour in

Make sure

That you're never too busy

To praise Him

As He wakes you up everyday

Don't forget to lift your hands and give Him the praise

Make sure

That you're never too busy

To praise Him

You gotta' trust in Him in everything you do

And all these things,

They're going to be added unto you

Make sure

That your never too busy

to praise Him

He's been too good

He's been too kind

For you to push him away

And say that he won't mind

He's been too good

He's been so good

So make sure

that your never too busy

(to shout hallelujah every now and then)

Your never too busy

(to clap your hands and give God some glory)

That you're never too busy

(to shout for joy because the joy of the Lord it is your strength)

That your never too busy

(to dance around in a circle and don't care who's lookin')

You're never too busy

To praise Him

I like the lyrics to this song. I haven't heard any of his CDs but I would like to get one and check it out.

Sammy Franco

2006-03-17T00:23:00.000-05:00

Sammy Franco is one of the world's foremost authorites on reality-based self-defense. He is the founder and creator of Contemporary Fighting Arts, a state-of-the-art offensive-based combat system that is specifically designed for real-world self defense. Sammy is the author of several books. He also has several instructional DVDs. I just found out today that he recently started a blog. You should go check it out.

I've added a few more links to some of my favorite Christian artists under Christian Music in the LINKS section of the sidebar on the right. I've added links for Third Day, Chris Tomlin, and Jaci Velasquez.

I'm planning on seeing Ultraviolet next week. I also want to see Inside Man, Larry the Cable Guy: Health Inspector, Brick, and Ice Age 2: The Meltdown.

Censure Feingold

2006-03-16T15:30:00.000-05:00

I just found out that liberal Sen. Russ Feingold has called forPresident Bush to be censured for "unlawful" and "misleading"actions. I think Sen. Feingold is the one who should be censured and I just signed a "Censure Feingold" petition. For more information and to join me in signing click here.

How to Relax and Recharge

2006-03-15T18:38:00.000-05:00

Today I read a helpful post on Tania Gabrielle French's blog about 9 Ways to Relax and Recharge. Tania Gabrielle French is a musical composer whose Secret Power of Words and Music package helps you relax and rejuvenate. Tania also has The Science of Getting Rich for Artists package which can help all kinds of artists become more prosperous so they can take full advantage of their gifts. You can find 9 Ways to Relax and Recharge by clicking here.

Reynosa, Mexico Mission Trip

2006-03-14T18:32:00.000-05:00

My church, Calvary Chapel Salt Lake City, is sending a group on a mission trip to Reynosa, Mexico from June 24th to July 1st. I will be going on this mission trip. Reynosa is ranked # 2 in the world for child prostitution. Reynosa is the home of Boys Town, one of the most spiritually dark places on the face of the earth. Contained by high cement walls, Boys Town is a small area of fatherless, homeless, loveless people, known mainly for prostitution. Anything goes inside the walls of Boys Town, where 200-300 girls and women, many under the age of 18, work and live in squalid conditions. Founded around 150 years ago, Boys Town has largely been ignored when it comes to ministry.

Teams will travel to Boys Town for dual ministry, both within and without its walls. Inside, small teams will perform random acts of kindness for the girls and other residents. Outside, larger teams will participate in evangelism, drama, construction projects, prayer walking, setting up an impromptu beauty shop, and holding V.B.S. (Vacation Bible School) and soccer clinics for the children. In short, we're going to spread the love of Christ inside and outside Boys Town. You can read about a similar mission trip by clicking here.

There are currently two opportunities for construction projects: First, there is a strong possibility that we may be helping to build a drop-in center/refuge for the women of Boys Town. The drop-in center has been the heart of missionaries there. They want to have a place where these women can come and be shown that they are special. This can be accomplished by giving them a way of leaving the only lifestyle that they have known and showing them a life of love in Jesus Christ. Prayer, mentoring, teaching practical skills, and job training are some of the goals of the drop-in center.

If the land that needs to be bought to build the drop-in center hasn't gone through all its proper channels by the time we go down there, we will have building option # 2. This job is equally as important. We will help the local pastors of the colonia (neighborhood) to raise their church up off its current foundation to avoid all the flooding that has been occurring. We will also be working on improving the living conditions in the colonia by either building homes or fixing the current ones that are there.

When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them,

because they were harassed and helpless,

like sheep without a shepherd.

Then he said to his disciples,

"The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.

Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore,

to send out workers into his harvest field.

- Matthew 9:36-38 (NIV)

I am going on this trip because I believe that God has led me to help Kelly and the other missionaries in this area by showing these people the love of Christ and building the drop-in center. I want to share the gospel with the people in this area. I also want to help the girls and women in Boys Town find a way out of the way of life they are trapped in.

I need to raise $750 for the trip and another $300-$400 for the plane ticket to McAllen, TX, which is 4 miles from Reynosa. Please pray about whether God is leading you to support me on this mission trip. In addition to financial support, prayer support would be greatly appreciated. If God is leading you to financially support me on this mission trip, please email me and I will send you a form so you can send your tax-deductible donation to Calvary Chapel. Any extra money raised will be used for the construction projects described above. If you would like to use your frequent flyer miles to purchase my plane ticket, please email me and I will send you the flight information. Thank you and God bless you.

The Map

2006-03-09T21:13:00.000-05:00

While using Google to search for the church in Orange Heights that I attended while living in Melrose, FL (near Gainesville, FL), I came across James Croft's blog. James Croft is an evangelist that lives in Olustee, FL. On his blog I found the following post that I really liked:

THE MAP

A father wanted to read a magazine but was being bothered by his little girl. She wanted to know what the United States looked like.

Finally, he tore a sheet out of his new magazine on which was printed the map of the country. Tearing it into small pieces, he gave it to her, & said, "Go into the other room & see if you can put this together. This will show you our whole country today."

After a few minutes, she returned & handed him the map correctly fitted together. The father was surprised & asked how she had finished so quickly.

"Oh," she said, "on the other side of the paper is a picture of Jesus. When I got all of Jesus back where He belonged, then our country just came together."

Furey's List of Required Subjects

2006-03-06T11:41:00.000-05:00

Here is an excerpt from a recent post on Matt Furey's blog, titled What to Study if You Want to be Successful:

In a recent discussion with some friends, I told them about some of the ridiculous drivel that Frank's kindergarten teacher (Frank is Matt's son) has tried to dump his way. And during that discussion I mapped out a list of the truly important subjects that a person, of any age, should study if he wants to succeed in life. As you look at this list of subjects, take note of how many you do or do NOT know. Or better yet, think of the failures you know - and consider how little they know from this list.

Furey's List of Required Subjects to Study for Life-long Success

Physical Exercise - don't take care of your machine and it falls apart - not intelligent if you ask me (I exercise, but not regularly. I have not been sticking to my Physical Goal for 2006. I need to stick to it.)
Wrestling or some other form of Martial Arts - not my advice; this comes from Plato, Aristotle, Socrates and so on. (I know some basics, but I want to learn more.)
Meditation/Deep Breathing - imagine that, learning to relax (Deep Breathing is incorporated into Matt Furey's Combat Conditioning and Combat Abs exercises. If I start doing these exercises regularly, I will benefit from the relaxing aspect of these exercises.)
Reading - how many people today who can read - ever DO read? (I do read, but it wouldn't hurt to read a little more.)
Writing - not being able to write a simple letter is pretty sad (You're reading my blog, so I obviously do write.)
Speaking in Public - should not be biggest fear of mankind - tis easy if you simply get up and do it. (I frequently have to communicate with large groups of people in my Security work. Would like to learn more about this subject.)
Anatomy/Biology - you oughta know how your machine works (Wouldn't hurt to know more about this subject.)
Basic Math - especially what I call "money math" (I am very good at math.)
History - those who don't know the past are doomed to repeat it (Not my favorite subject, but I do agree that it is an important subject.)
Computers - sort of a no-brainer these days (I know a lot about computers and want to learn more.)
Goal Setting - not taught in schools - but mega important (Definitely something I need to learn more about.)
Time Management - once again, not taught (Another thing I definitely need to learn more about.)
Positive Attitude - most teachers need this one (Working on this one.)
Marketing/Selling - nothing happens in a business until something is sold (I am going to be starting a Promotions business this year.)
Relationship development - How to get along with others - not a bad idea, eh? (I've made some new friends this year, and have been putting less energy into relationships that are not helping me become a better person.)

Bear in mind that these subjects are the basics. If you want to be a lawyer, doctor, dentist or accountant, you'll need more than the above - but to become a successful human being - these pretty much summarize the necessities.

PGR Appreciated

2006-03-05T17:38:00.000-05:00

Monte Smith, who was one of the Patriot Guard Riders for Staff Sgt. Gourley's Mission Ride, emailed the following message to Craig Larsen (the Utah PGR State Captain) and Craig forwarded it to the rest of the Riders:

As I was the last bike in line, and just before we mounted up for the ride to Ft Williams, I was approached by either Staff Sgt. Gourley's father or uncle who asked me to make sure everyone in the group was told how very much the family appreciated our being there and that, to them, it meant a great deal to have us there. He did this with tears in his eyes. I told him I'd pass the word.

Here is some footage from Channel 2 News about Staff Sgt. Gourley that includes some footage of our escort to Veterans Memorial Park. In the picture above, I am in the back row on the left behind Craig Larsen, who is wearing a black hat. Kelly "Tinman" Crouse, the Northern Utah Ride Captain, is in the maroon hat to the left of Craig.

Last night John and I saw 16 Blocks at the Century 16. I rate it 4 (out of 5) stars. Mos Def (who his been in many movies) played his role well and so did Bruce Willis. Bruce's character was a washed up cop who struggled to kick butt, but came through none the less. This was a deviation from his normal, one man army type of role. I'll probably watch Ultraviolet on Tuesday. The Shaggy Dog and Evil come out on Friday.

Patriot Guard Riders

2006-03-03T23:24:00.000-05:00

Yesterday I got an email from the Media Research Center about the Patriot Guard Riders. I have joined this great group. The Patriot Guard Riders are a nationwide group of patriotic riders (mostly bikers) who's main mission is to attend the funeral services of fallen American heroes as invited guests of the family. Each mission we undertake has two basic objectives:

Show our sincere respect for our fallen heroes, their families, and their communities.
Shield the mourning family and friends from interruptions created by any protestor or group of protestors (this is accomplished through strictly legal and non-violent means).

This morning was the PGR's first Utah Mission Ride. This Mission Ride was to honor Staff Sgt. Gregson Gourley. We met this morning from 9:15-9:45 A.M. near the Union Fort Stake Center in Midvale, UT. Then we went to the stake center and lined up in front. I don't have a bike so I parked my car down the street and stood out front with the other PGR members. The viewing was at 10:00 and the funeral was at 11:00. After the funeral we helped the Midvale Police Department escort the hearse and the hero's family to the interment at Veterans Memorial Park in Riverton. The Midvale Police department led the escort and we followed. There was 32 riders in all - 30 on bikes followed by Craig Larsen (the PGR Utah State Captain; he is also involved with the Southeast Utah Chapter of B.A.C.A.) in his Tahoe and me in my Ford Taurus. At the interment I held up an American flag and stood with the other riders to show our support.

There were no protestors at the stake center or at Veterans Memorial Park. Hopefully there will not be another PGR Mission Ride in Utah, but if there is I will be there. For more information about the Patriot Guard Riders, please visit their website.

By the way, I've changed the name of this blog from Drew's Life to Guardian Spirit so my RSS feed address has changed. Please go here to reset your RSS link to my blog.

Clay Soldiers

2006-03-02T12:17:00.000-05:00

Chris Jacobs, who goes to the same Bible study that I go to, has a new blog called Clay Soldiers. The name of his blog, Clay Soldiers, comes from 2 Bible verses. "Clay" comes from Isaiah 64:8:

Yet, O LORD, you are our Father.

We are the clay, you are the potter;

we are all the work of your hand.

"Soldiers" comes from 2 Timothy 2:3-4:

Thou therefore endure hardness, as a good soldier of Jesus Christ.
No man that warreth entangleth himself with the affairs of this life;

that he may please him who hath chosen him to be a soldier.

Chris is a graduate of Calvary Chapel Bible College. He knows the Bible really well. He recently moved his website to Blogger after viewing my blog. I sent him some links to help him improve his blog. If anyone, especially my brothers and sister in Christ, needs help with blogging, please email me.

My cousin, Amber, is steadily getting better. Please continue to pray for her. You can donate to the Amber Fund to help pay for her extensive medical bills if God leads you to do so.

I've added some LINKS under Christian TV in the sidebar to the right: Trinity Broadcasting Network, Bobby Jones Gospel, and Lift Every Voice.