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I got a new mask for my CPAP Machine today and the air pressure adjusted. For those of you that don’t know a CPAP machine is basically a midevil device torture device that you place on your enemy to force air down their nose and throat with the force of a leaf blower. Ok maybe I’m exaggerating but that’s what the pressure feels like now that that have turned it up.

I guess it’s needed since I have sleep apnea and l could stop breathing and die in my sleep, but I hate it. I mean on top of being strapped to a machine via a hose that makes you look like the love child of Darth Vader and Mr. Snuffelupagus, it also forces you to swallow air so you wake up with all kinds of stomach pain.

But I guess this new pressure works because without it I am always tired. The docs tell me I get between 12 and 20 minutes of REM Sleep in an 8 hour period without the CPAP. Just for comparision a normal person get between 4-6 hours of REM sleep in an 8 hour period. Which leads me to ask questions like what my life would be like if I could get this much sleep on a regular basis.

This machine was supposed to answer that but I hate it and I can’t sleep with it on, thus defeating the purpose. I hope I can get approved for surgery because this isn’t working and part if me wishes for death to come in my sleep because at least I wouldnt have to wake a drag thru my day or feel like my stomach is about to explode. FML

This post is in response to a post I just read on Black Voices “Did Tyler Perry Kill Black TV”

First of all it feels like a weight has been lifted off of my shoulders it feels good to feel a passion to blog again!

Ok IanCogneto makes a good point in his post “Did Tyler Perry Kill Black TV” while he doesn’t say that Tyler Perry is directly responsible for the disappearance from black tv shows he does notice that it is a huge coincidence.

Now while I don’t disagree, I have to ask the question, isn’t this what we asked for?  Now before you get upset with my statement I want you to think about this on many of the major TV shows and broadcast on TV currently there are powerful black actors playing roles in those shows.  CSI (Lawrence Fishburn), House (Omar Epps), V (Morris Chestnutt).  Remember wanting to get rid of separate but equal… well they say be careful what you wish for.

The problem with this is while its great for the actors that do get gigs it seems like there must be a lot of black actors looking for work.  What I am really surprised about is the fact that there are no activist out in the streets over this… Wheres Al Sharpton… Jesse Jackson…the NAACP.. somebody anybody… where are you?  Oh thats right… they are all stuck watching black reality TV and God awful award shows.

People the only way we are going to get change is to either demand it or take it… Personally I think that we are way to talented a community not to do more, and with the way media is changing we can make it work for us.  Why aren’t we creating more content, I say if hollywood won’t support us we should support ourselves.  We don’t need hollywood support to make a web broadcast and thanks to Roku you can watch internet video right on your TV for free.

I’m not an actor just a tech geek and military paralegal, I don’t know how to make a TV show but I know how to get things working on the internet, if someone out there has an idea or a show I am willing to work with you to get it online and figure out how to get it to this and other devices to get it out to the masses.  Or if you know of people creating web TV shows spread the word, we can sit forever and complain about the system not being fair… or we can get out and make changes… I for one am willing and ready to make the change, but I can’t do it alone, its going to take us coming together as a community.

I have always heard it said that the reason why black fathers have a hard time staying around for their kids has to a lot to do with how slave owners would sell and trade the male slaves off shortly after a child was born to them, and while I don’t doubt that this is true after reading the first chapter “The Conversation” by Hill Harper something else stood out to me as an epic turn of events for families in America. It was called the “Man-in-the-House Rule”

Basically to sum everything up the Social Security act of 1935 created the “Aid to Families of Dependent Children” (AFDC) program. This program gave support (read: welfare) to single parent families where that single parent was unemployed. The problem with this was that for the first 33 years that this program existed there was a rule in place that denied families assistance if there was a “man-in-the-house”. This was basically defined as if the mother was living with or having relations with, any single or married able bodied male, that man was considered to be the substitute father, even if the man wasn’t supporting the child. Continue reading »

If your not a fan of hearing about someone’s inner monologue you may want to skip this post because I will be seriously rambling here, though I would like some feedback or ideas on the best course of action for me.

As many of you already know from my twitter stream or on facebook I have currently been invited to audition for NBC’s Deal or No Deal.  Now, being the skeptic that I am, part of me wants to believe its is some type of marketing ruse or something of that nature, I mean why in the world would you audition for Military Week way out in Princeton, NJ.  I mean really all the true soldiers in the world are in Iraq, Afghanistan or at the very minimum they are stationed at stateside posts like Fort Bragg, Fort Campbell, Fort Drum, or Fort Hood, and thats just Army installations, what about Navy, Marines, and Air Force?

That being said, part of my drive to go is to represent all those service members who are deployed right now who are at little FOB’s (Forward Operating Bases) who the WWE and Stephen Colbert’s of the world never come to visit… which I think is where I will begin my rant.

It kills me that when stars come to Iraq only a handful of them ever visit outside of Baghdad, I understand that you try to visit the largest number of service members at a tim e and what have you, but most Soldiers that I know would be happy just to have the living conditions that they have down in Camp Victory.  Not saying that its much better down there but it just seems like we are forgotten about at the outlying FOB’s when it comes to entertainment.  Ok, I’m done.

Back to the deal or no deal thing, my oldest daughter is such an inspiration to me, even though going to the audition will take me away from them for a day of their trip, she has been extremely supportive of this.  Last night when we were talking about it she asked me how much money I though I was going to win, and I responded with “I can only win IF I get chosen” she stopped me immediately and said you mean WHEN you get chosen.  Its little things like that, that let me know that she is being raised right, I don’t think I could have been more proud of her.

There is also a portion of deal or no deal that I am trying to prepare myself for, and thats the questions about my background and what I would do if WHEN I win a million dollars.  First off my background is pretty average, I’m not a combat solider, haven’t lost anyone close to me, I just love my kids, my country, and my job.  As far as the money… I really have no huge plans… other than wanting a Nissan Skyline, a decent sized house for me and my kids and to be financially  stable for the rest of my life. I mean I just want to be able to do the things I like to do without being tied down or held by by money or lack of it.

I have always joked that if I went on Deal or No Deal I would be out as soon as I was over 100k… because that would honestly get me started with everything that I need to do to become financially free on my own, however… I think I would honestly keep trying for the milli because honestly 10k would put me over the top!  Also just in case the scouts for Deal or No Deal happen across this blog I may trade all of that money for small part on Heroes, just throwing that out there… but I get to pick my powers… LOL!

Ok I think that has helped to shake some of the nervousness off about this audition I am sure I will write more about it as it happens!

I know that it takes two to raise a child and that both parties should be equally responisble in the raising and rearing of a child.  Also I am not about to try to diminish anything that single mothers have to go thru on a daily basis on top having to carry a foreign growth inside your body for 9 to 10 months.  I understand that there is no way to put a price on how much the services that you in the raising of our youth.  But does that mean that fathers in this situation need to be punished for being fathers.

I am just saying that in the cases where a man and a woman create a child and they are able to work things out between themselves what gives the government the right to step in to that situation and change the rules.

I know that, sadly, the vast majority of cases deal with men and women who can’t stand the sight of each other and in that situation the court has to step in and make sure the needs of the child are met.  However if two people realize that its better for them to be separated in the best interest of the child, and they were both struggling financially before hand, why is it all of that a father has to go into poverty to support his child.

Again I got it raising a child on your own is hard work and no amount of money can cover what you go thru on a daily basis, but there are other programs that the primary custodian can get onto to make sure ends meet and mouths are fed.

Now that you have a child if you income is low enough you qualify for WIC and possibly food stamps.  Also if your income is that low you also qualify to have your daycare paid for by the state, and if you are in really dire straits the state can in some cases give you a place to stay.  However the non-custodial parent (usually the father though my coworker brought up the Kevin Ferderline situation LOL) may now not be able to afford to stay where he was staying, or possibly anywhere else, or if he can it is probably at the sacrifice of being able to get food for himself.

Now I am sure many of you out there are saying well since he doesn’t have the child he can get a second job.  Your absolutely right, except for the fact that in most states income is calculated as a whole not on an individual job basis which means even if he starts working in a job that makes him an extra hundred or two a week a bigger percentage of his check is taken in the name of child support because his entire income went up.

Also he gets screwed when he has time with his child, because if its anything longer than a weekend he has to either take off work… which means less money if he doesn’t have enough leave to cover the period.  Or pay for child care.

This is why I added a clause in my divorce paperwork that clearly stated that if my kids are with me for more than 3 weeks child support stops so that I can support my kids directly.  If you are on court ordered child support, try getting this to happen… Good Luck!  In a best case scenario you may have the amount returned to you in a few months which may or may not be in enough time to help your finances.

Yes I base my feelings off of my personal experiences because if it wasn’t for my ex-wife working with me I wouldn’t have been able to survive during our separation.

While we were married I was the sole source of income, though we both did a great job a racking up the debt.  So when we separated I knew that initially I would not be able to keep my kids due to the nature of my job.  We agreed that for the time being the kids would be best off with her, at the time we were up to our eyeballs in debt, and I was donating plasma just to ensure that we had a little extra cushion after everything was paid… we were living paycheck to prayer to paycheck.  Praying that our van wouldn’t breakdown or nothing serious would happen that would cause our finances to tank.

Well I told her since she was taking the kids to take our van too.. even though I was still making payments on it, because she definitely needed it more than I did.  I had a bike and I would ride that into work daily, I also still had to meet the lease that we had on our house.  Not to mention the debts weren’t going to pay themselves.  However again she was going to set up a new life in California and while by Texas law our debts could be split equally, I figured that I had been paying the bills so I would continue to do so.  But that left very very little money left for child support… though in a manner of speaking I was providing child support.

I know I probably just got a collective WTF but hear me out.  I was still paying the car note and insurance, also my ex was free form the portion of any debts that would be rightfully hers due to our separation, and since she was deciding to leave she was technically breaking the lease, and thus should have had to pay her portion of the rent until I could find a suitable roommate..which since it was military housing probably wasn’t going to happen.

However she and I sat down and made up a plan for support basically showing how much I could afford after putting everything on the table and how over time I could restructure our debt to enable me to pay more for child support until we got to the point where we are today where I am paying in excess of the state required amount and I do so of my own will because I see that my kids need it to survive.

I believe that most fathers would do more for their kids too if given an option like the one I was fortunate enough to have.  Now I understand that there will be comments about how mothers don’t get to ease into motherhood but I argue that you do.  You get a 8 – 10 month window of knowing that you have to rearrange your life for this child, while most separations happen within the course of a few weeks at best.

Also I am not saying that all fathers should get a pass like this to work things out but ones that can prove that they have been active and supporting their kids up to the court order should have this put into consideration when child support is ordered.  I think to do this would strengthen relationships between the mothers and fathers into one where they can be joint parents instead of at war with each other over money.

Again this is just my two cents, please feel free to comment.  I like to hear other points of view because it helps me grow and learn as a person, and hopefully it will help someone else grown and learn as well!

Ok I have been putting this one off for a while, this always becomes a heated debate between my roommate and I so I figured I would bring my side to my blog and let the world comment!

So today Hawaii again declares Oama birth certificate real .  (Link leads to Google News)

Hopefully this ends the debate though it probably won’t.  The way I see it there are just some people that want to find some reason to fault a president that’s barely halfway thru his first year as President.  I am not saying that I agree with everything that he has done since coming into office, but he has had to deal with more in these first 6 months than most presidents have to deal with in an entire term.

Now what I find funny about this birth certificate issue is the fact that most of the people that are arguing that it is invalid are the same people who don’t have an answer for the multi-billion dollar question… Where exactly are the weapons of mass destruction?

I bring that up because its strange that Bush supporters seem to be Obama haters (I use haters for lack of a better word… I am also working right now LOL).  I personally didn’t hate Bush, he did some good while in office thought I think that our purpose for coming to a sovereign nation and removing the government were a little shady but that’s a story for a different time.  Most people blame Bush for the slow response in New Orleans after Katrina, but that really wasn’t Bush’s lane, where was the city of New Orleans government and the Louisiana government?  Maybe my view is tainted because of my service in the military but I don’t take much stock in the President’s position in government because it has become more of a talking head position anyway.

Anywhoo back to this Birth Certificate issue… my point was and still remains that with all the opposition that Obama had while running for office, why wasn’t this brought to the forefront?  Then once he had the DNC’s nomination why wasn’t it brought to light?  I have one simple answer, it was a non issue.  Plain and simple at any point in time during his campaign this could have been brought up and if it was valid he would have never been able to put his name on the ballot, period.

Do you have any idea how deep they delve into your background just for a Top Secret Security Clearance.  The call old friends, acquaintances, even that job that you stormed out on while you were still in high school.  They try to get as deep into your past as possible to ensure that that they are giving a Top Secret Clearance to a worthy individual.  Now you mean to tell me that while doing the background check for a person running for presidential office they would simply overlook seeing if he was born in the US or not.  Come on people that doesn’t pass the common sense test… especially since they went into deep investigation on if he could or couldn’t carry a freaking blackberry.

People the bottom line is simple Barack Obama is our President.  I didn’t like how Bush came into office and I still think the 2000 election was a sham but once Al Gore conceded to him Bush was our president plain and simple.  Why is it so hard now to accept the fact that Barack is our President now and instead of fighting the idea we should be trying to evaluate the job that he is doing and making sure he is doing what he promised in his campaign, which in many aspects he is trying to do.

America is falling apart day by day and if we can’t stop this pettiness that’s going around we are going to continue to fall apart until we fall behind the rest of the world, I for one don’t want to see that happen.

People it’s time to wake up and start to fight for our country and show the rest of the world why we are the greatest country in the world… Right now with the way we are acting all we are showing is that we can’t handle being on top, and trust me there are plenty of countries ready to take the top spot.