Since last we spoke you missed my birthday on October 15. Shame on you. If you have a sense of shame at all you will click on this link right now and make things right (that's my wishlist and you don't really have to click on it but it would be an oh-so pleasant surprise if you did).

This rambling is a compilation of over 10 emails I've sent myself in the last month that say "rambling fodder" in the subject line. Just think, if you were on the receiving end of my own email box you'd already have read all this (plus the 3,254 junk emails I've gotten in the last month).

Has anyone noticed that you can't withdraw cash from ATMs any more unless it's in multiples of 20? This has got to be the biggest scam of all time. I find it hard to believe that Bank of America is having such a hard time that they can't put some 10's into their machines. Same goes for First Union. I wonder how deep the ties run with the government on this one. Think about it, the economy isn't doing as well as it once was. The government tells the banks "We must increase spending!" The banks say "But we like it when people keep their money in the bank, more interest for us!" Then the feds say "If you don't increase spending we'll get Enron on your ass!" And the banks say "We've got an idea!" and then, inexplicably, 10 dollar bills are missing from ATM machines across America. The result? People are taking out more money than they want to and we all know that people's spending habits increase or decrease proportionally to the amount of cold hard cash they hold in their tiny little hands. You know you're nodding your head right now thinking "He might be on to something" or "He's on crack!" Either way, you're nodding your head.

On a completely unrelated side note, why the hell does Madonna have an English accent?

Actual conversation between me and my dad, as best I remember it:

"I'm making this lasagna tonight, I think we had it once before you moved away and you said it had too much cheese in it. I'm cutting back on the cheese this time, but you know I don't really think you can ever have too much cheese. That's like saying you can have too much ham, like in split pea soup."

"That's true, I don't think you can ever really have too much cheese."

"That's like saying that a guy can have too many guns or a woman can have too many shoes"

"Or too much cleavage!"

"Exactly!"

The thing about living in the Carolinas (as the natives call it) is that sweet tea is readily abundant. It's every where. So much every where, as a matter of fact, that most places don't offer unsweetened tea. This is good if you like sweet tea, which I do, but bad if you're trying to lose some weight, which I am, by cutting out drinks with empty calories such as sweet tea. This makes it increasingly tough if I go to a "healthy" place like Subway for lunch and take extra precaution not to get cheese or mayo on my sandwich and then when it comes time to pick a tasty beverage that is not healthy, but not unhealthy (such as unsweetened tea) I have no option but to get the sweet tea and drink every last drop of it's sweet goodness and proceed to turn the drink upside down and shake out any remaining drops of the nectar of the gods. Ummm. Yeah.

I am still rather enjoying my job, I'm getting to do lots of challenging things. Traveling quite a bit lately - Atlanta a few weeks ago, Chicago this weekend and again in two more weeks. Plus I get to have cool things like Heineken in my office.

A disturbing thing has happened to me more than once recently at a local gas station. Not that any one ever has any really great stories from gas stations ("Honey you won't believe the unbelievable deals and the wonderful customer service I found at the gas station!"), but this one is pretty much my top gas station-related story. Many of you may or may not know of something called a MLM (Multi-Level-Marketing) opportunity. Some of you may be or have been involved in them (and if you are I'm sure you'll send me the appropriate hate mail). If you haven't heard of a MLM think pyramid scheme. Think Amway. Think Quixtar. If you don't know anything about it, read up on it here and here and here and meet me at the end of this sentence to continue the story. It was a Friday night several weeks ago when my first incident occurred. I have quite a long commute to work so I go through a tank of gas a week, even in my gas-mileage friendly Corolla. So on my way home from work Friday night I stopped at the nearest Texaco station to my house, which is conveniently right past UNC-Charlotte. I got out and started filling up and the young guy (probably 18-20) at the pump across from me asks me for directions to a nearby street. I tell him and he thanks me and asks me what I do. I tell him I'm the Marketing Communications Director for a small company here in town and as a courtesy ask him what he does. "I teach people about e-commerce and how to sell on the web." I said jokingly "It's not Quixtar is it?" and he said "Yeah! Have you heard of it?" My whole mood changes as I realize that this whole conversation has been a facade to try and recruit me to sell Quixtar. "Yeah, I've heard of it" I tell him. "What do you think of it?" he asks. Wanting to be nice I tell him it's not my bag and I quickly top off the tank and drive off.

Fast forward a week or two later and my lovely girlfriend (with whom I have just celebrated two wonderful years together) and I are coming back into town from Raleigh/Durham after a lovely evening of dining at one of my favorite restaurants on a Saturday night to celebrate my birthday (26, which means I'm closer to 30 than 20 now, yowsers). We stop at the Texaco and I'm filling up and a young guy (early 20's) at the pump next to me asks me how to get to I-77. I tell him and he thanks me and asks me what I do. I tell him I'm the Marketing Communications Director for a small company here in town and as a courtesy ask him what he does. "I teach people about e-commerce and how to sell on the web." My eyes open wide and I say "Oh God it's not Quixtar is it?" "Yeah, have you heard of it?" I abruptly end the conversation and tell him good luck with it and drive off. I tell Erin that the EXACT thing happened to me a few weeks ago, same spiel, different directions asked for. We marvel at the bizarre nature of this and realize that the Quixtar people WORK THE GAS STATION FOR NEW RECRUITS! It's right by the college so it's a good spot to hit up young and impressionable minds that don't have any money for a Multi-Level-Marketing scheme (make millions from your own dorm room!) I'm anxiously awaiting encounter number three, because I've got a few tricks up my sleeve that may involve some witty, well-timed comments when they ask me what I do.

A mere two days before my birthday I got to visit the lovely Northeast Medical Center emergency room! It was a fun trip filled with lots of excitement and was capped off by a shot of steroids and a prescription for muscle relaxers. I don't recommend a trip to the ER as a relaxing Sunday activity, but in my case it was an absolute necessity. I woke up that morning in so much pain that I couldn't sit up, roll over (bad John!), or do much of anything. One of the muscles in my neck somehow managed to get strained which hurt like hell which caused the other muscles in my neck to get strained and in turn everything got inflamed which wound up pinching a nerve which was sending shooting pain down my arms which as you can see was all a big vicious circle. The great part was Erin having to talk to my insurance company for an hour before we even headed out to figure out WHICH emergency room I could go to. COBRA insurance is another thing I wouldn't recommend to people if at all possible. I'm fine now, it took a good week and some change before I was back to 100%. They say it was probably stress-related, moving to a new city, not having a job, then getting a new job, possibly those two years of grad school, etc... Go figure! You can, however, pity me with a trip to my wishlist.

A new Shreveport Story is coming very soon - keep an eye out for it.

Happy Halloween! Boo.