I’m getting sick of the “punishment” cliche for low paying jobs.

There should not be a class of job that deserves to be exploited or mistreated. No matter what job someone has they should be treated with respect and fairness.

I’m so impressed by workers in New York, who are in the fast food industry, standing up for better wages and respect. Probably the easiest way to keep up with them is on Facebook. The page is called “Fast Food Forward.”

It’s funny how Congress doesn’t understand it is becoming a joke–that isn’t funny.

Republican senators and congressmen alike are trying to scare the president into spending cuts by holding the debt ceiling hostage. Sound familiar? They tried this tactic in 2010 and got nothing except the USA credit downgraded.

I want the president to pull a Willy Wonka here. He should just tell the idiots in congress “You get nothing! Good day sir!”

Everyone was clamoring for us to go to the North Shore so we set this day up for that. First we hit up the lighthouse/bird sanctuary.

Albatross flew overhead, spiraling through the air as we looked out binoculars trying to spot some spinner dolphins (we didn’t see any although I shouted out over and over that I could see them).

We left the lighthouse and arrived at Hanalei Beach after traversing through jungle and a single lane bridge covered in construction dust and annoyed tourists.

Hanalei Bay was a totally different beach than Poipu. It being a bay was calm, barely any waves at all. We swam and watched a couple throw a bouncy ball back and forth, skipping on top of the water (the ball not the people).

We ate at a Mexican restaurant for the lolz, but it actually tasted good. Funny thing we didn’t eat any “Hawaiin” food while we were here besides the hotel breakfast fare (which was fanfuckintastic by the way).

Val went and did Yoga by the Sea. I did “Headache in the bed.”

After resting up we ate breakfast and rushed down to our first class that we had. The first class was put on by a florist named Choy. He had just recently finished building his second shop on Kauai and he worked for the hotel as a sidejob to help pay the bills.

Choy had worked for the Sheraton for close to 15 years. He told us he was born on Kaui, but had moved to Oahu to pursue his floral scented dreams.

We had a bowl filled with Lipstick Hibiscus and long 7 inch needles wired to thread. Choy demonstrated how to thread the flowers with the needle once then told us to round up 60 flowers and go.

There were four of us in the Lei making class sitting on the beach beneath a palm tree on a threaded woven blanket. Our classmates were frequent visitors to Hawaii. One woman from “Kansas City, Mazurah” and the other from our old stomping grounds of Portland, Oregon.

“They’ve really changed this place,” Mazurah said.”Last year during renahvations did place was all a shambles under construction tape and hard hats.”

“We didn’t make it out lass year,” said Portland. “We were taken a little break from the islands, but we’re gonna come back every year.”

I took the longest putting together my Lei. I wanted it to be perfect and it was if I do say so myself.

After we were leighed we got a chance to learn some hula dancing. We learned two songs right in front of the pool with onlookers giggling into their hands and candidly snapping photos of us. I should have charged them cash money.

After scrambling around late last night for dinner, we ended up ordering Pizza Hut and drove through flooded, unlit backroads to pick it up, we stumbled into the breakfast buffet offered in our package deal.

Fresh made omelets, eggs benedict in a soup turine, fresh island fruits like guava, honeydew and strawberries vied for attention. I saw lots of other folks placing small portions on a small plate and sitting down to discuss stock options and the second vacation house in the Hamptons. I took the largest bowl, filled it with oatmeal, raisins, island honey and brown sugar and walked it back to our table.

Val had a bowl filled with yogurt and granola. I went back to the Buffett and ordered a fresh omelet with green peppers, onion, cheddar, mushrooms and spinach then grabbed a couple of blueberry muffins, fruit and a juice and waitered myself back to my table.

We arrived on Kauai on schedule. The airport is all wood paneling, open hallways with local birds flitting about and wild greens and flowers bursting from the outside into the hallways.

“Millions of people, most of them innocent children, are at risk in the Horn of Africa due to the worst hunger crisis in 60 years. The Internet has come to a point where when

via ShareCraft 2012 – Save the Children East Africa.

I started giving because I’ve worked with Save the Children before. They are a great organization and this Fund Raiser is powered by gamers.

Gamers have big hearts (otherwise we wouldn’t spend most of our time saving the world, maybe not this world, but worlds of some shape or sort). Please join us.

So tonight I’m sitting in an African American bookstore in the Central District. The reason it’s important that it’s an African American bookstore? We are here meeting about how Amazon Dot Com is screwing over small businesses.

I’ve been in the dirt of this fight for a bit now launching our first blog post this week, but researching the online retail giant for a fortnight.

Amazon has been low balling small publishers, treating their employees in the warehouses like chattel and generally being kind of a dick in regards to taxes.

This small business is filled with: coloring books featuring President Obama smiling while patting a child’s head, an Egyptian sarcophogus of Nefertiti and a line of beads and necklaces on busts of black celebrities.

The person who owns this store has doubled down on black paraphenalia because the books alone won’t keep the doors open. It’s called diversifying.

When did it become okay for giants to squish the folks trying to make an honest living? When did it become perfectly fine to turn our backs on local businesses and neighborhood entrepreneurs?

I’m going to finish my novel during this month. Not much else to announce. Busy busy!

A quick teaser post of an article I wrote for work.  For the full article go to http://www.workingwa.org

 

The economy is doing great, if you’re a CEO.  Last year Chase Bank CEO Jamie Dimon made $20 million dollars in executive pay and bonuses.  That’s 925 times more than the average worker at Chase.  His earnings and many other CEOs pay have risen sharply over the last few years.  Meanwhile the average worker has seen their pay stagnate and their real earning power has actually decreased, but CEOs don’t want you to know that.

 

According to an article in the Seattle Times, CEO’s from 81 major companies are fighting now to stop legislation that would require them to compare their salaries with the salaries of their workers.  They do not want to disclose how much of a gulf there is between those of us fighting to stay in the middle class, and the privileged few.  Some companies pay their executives up to 400 times what the average worker makes.  No wonder they want to keep that a secret.

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