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Tony Blair to Pull Troops Out of Iraq

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Tony Blair announced that he is getting ready to pull some British troops out of Iraq. I applaud his announcement because of what he says here:

The changes will see Iraqi units doing more of the regular patrolling of Basra’s streets, and UK troops less.

I don’t know how many times it has got to be said that the key to success in Iraq is NOT an international force patrolling the country, but a coalition between Iraqis and multinational forces that eventually becomes more and more Iraqi in composition. The British seem to understand this concept as do the American commanders and the rest of our allies. I don’t really understand why other people don’t “get” this concept, but it’s the only one that’s going to work.

Iraq cannot and will not become the 51st state (Puerto Rico won’t stand for it!). However, just because Americans will leave Iraq in the next year or so doesn’t mean that there has been a “defeat” of any kind! It means that Iraqis are standing up and defending their nation. And if they do NOT stand up and defend their nation…well, chaos may not be the word to describe what will hit Iraq if that happens.

Rejuvenating Powers of Volunteer Work

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During the month of January, I found myself getting more and more morose on a much more frequent basis. It was sort of scary. I’m not quite sure what brought about the brooding, ill-foreboding demeanor, but I do know that it was starting to effect my work and my personal life. Some people would assume that it’s just normal to get that way in January due to the winter doldrums. Some may speculate that I got used to being a young twenty-something and was brought down by the fact that I was turning 26 at the end of the month.

I don’t know if it was either of these things that brought me down, though turning 26 was as uneventful as it could have possibly been. Just to imagine that 5 years ago I spent my birthday night out at the bar with 20+ undergraduates and alumni from my fraternity in a drunken stupor…but I digress.

Honestly, I think that the weight of my disgusting amount of student loans finally lowered its boom on my back. Sure, I’ve been paying them back since July, but when that small CitiBank loan kicked in at the beginning of December – that was the kick in the balls that I really didn’t need. Thankfully, I’ve already paid back 25% of this smaller loan and I anticipate having it paid off by the time the summer starts (if not beforehand). Stupid small loan trying to mess with me…

However, as much as taking a financial stand against my student loans has been a positive influence in my daily life I think that my volunteer work has been a bigger pick-me-up. It started when I went out on my annual trip to St. Louis for Sigma Pi Fraternity’s Mid-Year Leadership Conference. This is an event where the new undergraduate Presidents, Treasurers, and Recruitment Chairmen are each trained on how to operate the chapter while the alumni volunteers (me) are put into a separate education track for the weekend. Not only did I get to present at this year’s workshop (my topic was how to have better workshops), but I also enjoyed hanging out at some of St. Louis’ more famous landmarks (the Arch, the Budweiser Worldwide Headquarters, Laclede’s Landing).

The best part about these fraternity events, for me at least, is that you come back from them on a natural high about life. In other words, the whole morose feeling that was bringing me down prior to the St. Louis trip was gone.

And I only bring this up because I just remembered how crappy January was and how out of place it is for January to be a bad month for me. I’m a January fan, but this year sucked. I’m glad that I had a volunteer-based weekend in St. Louis to give me a nice kick in the ass. 🙂

Sirius and XM To Finally Merge

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XM and SIRIUS Satellite Radio are finally getting ready to merge their companies. I don’t know if I’m jumping up and down for joy like every other guy out there, but it is sorta cool to have Major League Baseball now an option for SIRIUS Satellite Radio. Honestly, I listen to Howard Stern and the alternative rock channels on Sirius and that’s it. Sure, I put on the NFL games when I want to hear an update, but I can get that on AM radio (even though the quality is a joke on AM radio).

What really concerns me is the merging of the two styles. SIRIUS Satellite Radio has dedicated itself to 100% commercial-free music channels. I like that – a LOT. Each morning when I go to work I have to flip over to regular radio for about 2 minutes when I go into the tunnel into Trenton. Folks, if you want to know how good commercial-free radio is, consider this…

Go through your regular radio dial in a 2-minute period and tell me how many stations that you LIKE to listen to are playing a commercial. Chances are that it’s more than a majority. Sirius’ commercial-free radio doesn’t put you through that crap.

It should be interesting to see how these two brands merge. But I’ll tell you this – if they raise rates and/or put commercials on these music channels, I’ll drop the service in a heartbeat. Yeah, I like listening to Howard Stern and Artie Lange, but they are only in there 3 days a week – 4 days if we’re lucky. Fifteen to 20 hours of programming just isn’t enough to keep me as a subscriber if I have to listen to commercials when I’m listening to the music.

Let’s all hope they do this the right way – the SIRIUS Satellite Radio way.

80’s Rock Out at the Gym

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Tonight was a fun night at the gym. Finally, some weirdness to write about on my blog! It seemed to me that the requirement to be working out at Gold’s tonight was that you had to either have a mullet or a 1980’s metal band crazy hair style.

Actually, it was kind of funny to watch from the upper level on the cardio machines.

And I’d much rather write a blog entry about people at the gym having weird hair than I used to write about it my old gym – creepy old men who stay around the locker room a bit too long…

On a side note, I got a nice workout in. Good times.