I'm still waiting for an update on the debate between Robert and East Cross on the RFK assassination. Is it really going to happen?

Okay, here's my long exterminator blog rant:

I can't stand to think about my bedbug jobs anymore. It makes me really sad and angry at a lot of people who I really like, who are confident that pesticides are bad and should be heavily regulated by lawmakers who also don't know shit about pest control. I do know about pest control. I do have all the MSDS sheets on the pesticides I use. I do know what pesticides work on what, and which don't, and everything in between. I also know which pesticides pose what danger to me and you, because I work with them every damn day. You don't. Your precious false gods -- lawmakers -- don't. Also, neither you nor your false gods see people who are tormented by pyrethroid-resistant bedbugs. I do.

This recent resurgeance of bedbug infestations is the direct, if unintended, result of Government intervening in areas in which it is incompetant and Constitutionally unauthorized to intervene: the forbiddance of certain Chemicals' manufacture, sale, and consentual use in someone else's private property. This intervention has a human cost: I had to watch a poor family and their little kids suffer for months from pyrethroid-resistant bedbugs, have to pay to launder every article of clothing and bedding over and over again, and get their asses handed to them in court for refusal to pay rent (due to the bedbugs) because they couldn't afford a good lawyer. The mother ran out of the courtroom crying. I could not control their bedbugs with the chemicals I was legally allowed to use for MONTHS!!! I was there, I testified on their behalf, and I had to watch that travesty of justice.

Why did it go on for months? Because Diazinon was outlawed, because Bendiocarb was outlawed, because Propetamphos can be used in a hotel bed but not your private bed (that makes sense... how?), SO pyrethroids were the only chemical group available to use against bedbugs AND AS OFTEN HAPPENS IN PEST CONTROL, THEY GREW RESISTANT TO PYRETHROIDS BECAUSE THAT'S ALL WE'RE ALLOWED TO USE!!! Why were they outlawed? Because people do not demand that your representatives adhere to their Constitutional legal limits. Others even have DEMANDED, due to their fear and ignorance of pesticides, that an extra-Constitutional gaggle of beaurocrats outlaw certain chemicals, based solely on the political pressure of hysterical overbearing jackasses who don't know what the fuck they're talking about, but believe it's their duty before God to rule over all us idiots for our own good.



Sorry about my tone -- I'm usually really validating and polite to people who have an irrational, misinformed fear of pesticides. But every bedbug job I do, I see poor people suffering needlessly due to people's ignorance and (yes, it is) Federal tyranny, well-intentioned or otherwise. And the pesticide manufacturers don't suffer for this, the politicians don't suffer for this, the hotel and apartment complex owners don't suffer for this, the pest control technicians (that's me) don't really suffer for this (except for having to watch people suffer and not be legally allowed to help them in a safe and most expedient way possible) -- poor people who have to pay higher rents and who get the fuck bitten out of them by bedbugs that are really really hard to get rid of suffer for this.

You are not saving the planet by regulating pesticides: you are oppressing the poor. Oh yes. You don't see it; I see it. I know. Have fun feeling good about yourselves, well-meaning tyrants, and may God forbid that your daughters get the fuck bitten out of them by pyrethroid resistant bedbugs you can't get rid of for months. Although that might change your minds about pesticides, I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemies.

Every night before I go to sleep, I hug myself and pray, "Sleep tight, don't let the bed bugs bite."

I find a little hug and poem is all that's needed to ward off anything.

I also pray, "Good night, nice to have metcha. Don't let the cancer getcha." Then I take a long drag and drift off to sleep.

Thunk. It already happened. Sorry you missed it but video of it is on youtube.

I would've won, too, if Mark hadn't butted in.

I think I'll sleep on the couch tonight.

egpenet: Bedbugs will happily live in your couch too. And between your carpet and the wall. And in your dresser. And your nightstand. And your alarm clock. And your luggage. And your closet. And your circuit box. And your light switches. And in wallpaper seams. And, God help us, right out in the open if someone sprayed all those places with repellant pyrethroids that didn't kill the bedbugs but annoyed them so bad they moved up the wall (I've seen it).

To be fair, there are some other chemicals I figured out I can legally use in your homes, but they either smell really bad or are petroleum based and can screw up some surfaces (and also smell bad... just not as bad... and I can't use it in spot treatments). Oh, and I can use a growth inhibitor too... that's okay, but needs some other chemical to actually do the killing.

Next time you sleep in a hotel room or a cabin, do yourself a favor and check for black bedbug fecal stains in the folds at the head of the mattresses and between them (that's where they're most often found). If you find some, don't sleep there. They'll get in your luggage and come home with you.

Although I could make a lot of money off you getting bedbugs, I'm sick to death of doing it. Please keep your money and don't get them.

Also sorry if I offended anybody with my rant. I was really frustrated the day I wrote it and also tend to get really irritable with one of the more toxic substances I use (it has an LD50 of 192 mg/kg administered orally to rats).

I think it's high time we all view exterminators through a different set of lenses.

I kill adorable puppies and kittens all day long at the local shelter here in Paw Paw. People think I'm a monster because I whistle and smile the whole time, but I'm not. I don't enjoy my job, but it's necessary. I wish people would hug me more.

Exterminator:

I'm with you. Big time.


On a happier note, in keeping with Mark's original what-would-you-like-to-talk-about question: Dave and I got married on Saturday. (Bananas Foster is still a little bastard, however.)

Cheers, dears.

Exterminator, if that is your real name, sounds like you've lost your taste for the game. You better get out now cause those bugs can smell your lily weak ambivalence a mile away. They'll eat you alive until all that's left is your empty eyeball sockets and a spray can of Palmolive.

As for the Federales, taking our right to arm ourselves against the plague of insects is step one in their nefarious plan. They won't be happy until they have our guns, Manitobas and Mt. Dew forcing us to drink municipal water to infect us with alien eggs that will hatch out of our skin like microwave popcorn. Once the aliens have control they will force us to breed with cockroaches so we can be their pets. Let go of your DDT is you want a future as a mutant pet for aliens. The pesticides the government is outlawing are the only effective defense against the alien invasion.

You've gone soft. They'll have to pry my pesticides out my cold dead anal cavity. Time to look for new work. I'd suggest you try pizza delivery, but they're all CIA.

Recently, my wife received a few creepy messages on her phone. From a restricted phone number. And from somebody she absolutely doesn't know. Really. We invite you to listen and vote. Because, quite frankly, we're baffled. And amused enough to share it. (But if you're squeamish about creepy dorks dressing up in snowsuits while watching videos of high school cheerleaders, consider this a warning. This will squick you out.)

We posted them at http://flyingbomb.com.

Before anyone blames me, that's not me on the tape. I don't have a Baltimore accent.

This sounds like my kind of guy though.

If you're a teenager, and you make your English teacher a birthday card, SPELL "YOUR" CORRECTLY, or don't bother to make a card at all! The last thing I want on my sad fortieth birthday is a reminder of my professional failings.

Thunk,
Nobody accepted my RFK assassination debate challenge. I'm now looking to see if there are any forums being planned anywhere in which I might participate. I haven't found anything yet.

From what I gather, OEC, Mark, Mark H, and I might get together for beers at the Corner Brewery sometime and talk about the RFK thing.

Money magazine predicts houses across the U.S. will lose an average of 9.7 percent of their value in the coming year. At the same time they think homes in Detroit will rise by about that much.

http://efinancedirectory.com/articles/Home_Price_Forecasts_What_Your_Home_Will_Be_Worth_Next_Year.html

It's not fair that there are anti-murder laws but no anti-passive-aggression laws.

It used to be that the license plate on my car was enough to allow me to re-enter the USA from Canada. In my most recent crossings I've needed my drivers license but actually produced passports for all of my family in the car. Now I hear that soon the passports will be required.

Re-entering the USA from England and German I was required to produce my passports.

If these documents are so thoroughly demanded from US citizens, then how is it that some people in the country have lost theirs upon arriving here and are now undocumented?

Or did "undocumented" residents actually come into the country without documents? How did they do that? I don't get it. I've never gotten away with it.

try true desperation...

Rusty: I think you should stop huffing that stuff; you spelt your name wrong. If I were you, I'd crawl around the inside of a big sewer pipe clogged with Cockroaches and kill them all by hand on your day off.

CKL: thanks.

No So Evil Pete: I would think the public would be more sympathetic if the kitties' and puppies' fuzzy little limp bodies were not percieved as being wasted... like if you fed them to a python, or ate them yourself and made footwear and teepees out of their skin. A little PR goes a long way.

I wish I had time to comment on all of these... especially the recordings linked to by Andy, but I'm running late. (Last night's Freighthouse fundraiser went really well, but it kept me out far too late.) I did, however, want to throw out one idea... Would people be interested in a de-lousing station at the next Shadow Art Fair? I was thinking that it might be cool to have an exterminator set up in a corner, spraying people down with chemicals to kill bedbugs. I've got to think that some folks would pay for that.

We'll make more money doing it the pesticide-free way: scrubbing folks down with soapy water (with... paprika in it? Or garlic... whatever) and tossing all their clothes in a big bonfire. Certified bed-bug free "Iggy's From Ypsi" mumu's and unicorn head suspender barrels will be available for a smallish fee at the next table.

Marketing genius.

How about a de-peopleing station for louses? I hear they are getting pretty fed up with us (so to speak).

I meant, of course, de-peopling...or it is dehumanizing...

Battle of the Titans!
Ruth Ann Jamnick vs Brenda Stumbo in an August 5 deathmatch for Ypsilanti Township Supervisor!
The politics over the next 3 months will be as ugly as you've ever seen...

Has anyone else listened to Andy C's phone messages? If so, may I ask how you dealt with the resulting boner? I'm trying to crush the life out of mine with a unabridged dictionary.

Sorry to get serious. But I think all the damn cuts in the new purposed city of Ypsi budget are outrageously dangerous to the city.
Makes me want to upchuck my afternoon Latte!
Wow! So many cuts, so little opportunity. hmmm scary if we don't start paying attention to those budget cuts Ypsilanti will look like it did in the mid 1980's when I first moved here. All you regular posters here should be chatting it up... They are having special city council meetings all week.

And sorry, I think it stinks that the mayor has time to read AND respond to all the local blogs, but doesn't seem to have time to get his hands really dirty and find some solid solutions for right now...everything seems to take 6 months to a year to "research" or hire someone to "research". yuck

What are they going to cut? I'm normally a big fan of cutting, so this is your chance to convert me.

Desperation is a motivation, a reason why. It is not a method. The answer, desperation, does not answer the question how.

Idealperson:

On your second point, I'm very happy our elected official takes the time to give us the facts and clear up misconceptions. Moreover, I'm especially pleased that at least one elected official is paying attention to his electorate, keeping his finger on the pulse of his constituents.

On the cuts in the budget. Where have you found them? Are they now up on the city website? Of course none of us are surprised there are substantial cuts in the budget. By the calculations available nine months ago, a $2.1M reduction, sustained over at least three years, in the budget was necessary. City council gave our city manager as set of priorities a month or so ago. Are the cuts you have uncovered different from those recommendations?

As much and you and I would have liked the income tax proposal to pass so we wouldn't have these cuts, that is not the reality of the day.

Robert,

Are you saying there is no need for me to come to
CB and hold the RFK beer money?

The Ypsilanti city manager's budget message is at the beginning of the fiscal year-end 2009 and FYE2010 budget on the Ypsilanti city website. The message has an overview of activities for sustainability, restructuring, and the revenue and expenditure reductions. The budget is in a new format this year that is easier to understand.

The 7 p.m. budget work session dates and topics are also listed on the city website.

Paul Schreiber

Ideaperson - "... if we don't start paying attention to those budget cuts Ypsilanti will look like it did in the mid 1980's when I first moved here."

The City was flush with cash (relatively speaking) and bulging with city workers in the 1980s - which had virtually nothing to do with the economic and social disaster that resulted from the state's decision to close the Ypsilanti Psychiatric Hospital and dump all of their former patients into many cheaply purchased and poorly staffed group homes.

It is the City's POLICIES (read ordinances and budget priorities) not staffing levels that have a real impact on the economic health of Ypsilanti. When the City's policies and priorities support (not inhibit) private investment, good things happen. When the City's policies inhibit such growth (such as the decision to adopt a city income tax or any decision to cut police and fire services further), bad things happen. Either way, it is the cumulative impact of hundreds of private investment and business decisions that truly decide what kind of a community we live in.

Go rodneyn! The free market doesn't like being told what to do, so no one should be surprised when it gets uncontrollably depressed and passive aggressive when you try.

You know what I miss? Phone booths. Then I wouldn't have to listen to people at top volume telling their spouses what to pull out of the freezer for dinner or where they are with relation to Arborland on the bus ride home. Every single night.

Also, never go to a big-chain coffee house -- or a big chain ANY business. Shop local. Because then, some desperate young person wearing plugs in their ears will not tell you that getting a pot of tea is no longer possible because someone in Seattle decided is was more profitable to sell you tea by the cup only.

I miss seeing twenty or thirty college students all making a phone call at the same time. Ok, I still see that, but they are dispersed, each using their own cell phone. It was a lot more fun when they were all crammed into the same booth at the same time.

The city budget is 189 pages long and is accompanied by a 88 page budget detail document. I have thumbed through it; but, there is no way I have enough time to analyze it page by page.

A person could skip down to the summary table that shows that 6 police officer and 3 firefighter positions will be eliminated. It's notable that 3 DPW positions and 1.75 Planning Department positions are also eliminated. But NO ONE should look at these numbers alone. Looking at them in terms of percentage of the total number of funded positions shows that all of these reductions are each a 12% reduction, with the exception of the Planning department which took a 51% hit.

My bottom line on the city budget is this: Unless someone has looked at every line item in the budget in enough detail to understand what it is and what the consequences of changing it are, then, criticism of certain line items is baseless.

I'd be more than happy to hear from someone who has done a thorough examination of the documents, top to bottom, and who then has recommendations on differing approaches.

ANY ONE who wants to complain about certain line items in the budget; but doesn't offer specific substitute reductions to keep the budget balanced, isn't worth listening to.

So, is "undocumented" a euphemism for illegal? I guess certain people don't want to draw attention to the fact that some people are in violation of the law.

JoF, Ypsi voters were assured during the income tax debate that police and fire wouldn't be affected by cuts.

I rest assured that the opponents, who at the time held their cards close to their vests will announce a solution, in complete detail, any day now. Any day now. Any day now ...

Until then, we can all sleep well knowing that we're not getting what we're not paying for.

Actually JoF, I think "undocumented" describes it better than "illegal". Especially when your so called illegals have "legal" or documented children of their own.
True desperation drives people to pay "coyotes" to bring them across the border or to find their own way across the many miles of imaginary border lines. That is until they have to climb the new wall we are building (and they will), reminiscent of a certain wall in Germany.

OEC: With 6 cops gone, we'll have to all show our dedication to our community by getting ccw's and protecting our own damn selves without making other folks pay for it involuntarily. I've personally discovered that keeping a fire extinguisher within easy access in my truck can make calling the fire department unnecessary in certain circumstances as well. Easy ways to fulfill your civic duty and save the public dime for more important things like welding woodburning stoves shut and researching how to build stilt houses on a flood plain.

OEC, well said, well said, well said. I'll not pay for a beer for you some day if you'll not pay for me.

Brackache, I've documented my precautions previously here and so did you right afterwards. Lock and load.

MaryD,

I don't think the wall in Germany holds up as a good comparison. The wall in Germany was erected to keep people IN, not out, so much. No one is going to be shot for crossing the wall in SW USA, they would just be returned to their country and told to cross the border legally. Any one can come across the border legally. All that is needed is a tourist visa, or if they plan to stay longer, then a work visa or student visa, or what ever other options are open (I'm not an expert on all the types of visas.)

I wasn't aware that bearing a child in the USA conferred legal resident status on the mother (and father too?).

Maybe that is the difference between an undocumented alien and an illegal alien? I can't say how confused I still am on the terminology (seriously!).

When I hear reports and analysis on the radio and TV regarding the immigration issues of this country, I always get confused about the difference between an undocumented alien and an illegal alien. Some stories are about one class and other stories are about the other. I just don't know (still) the difference between them.

Black Jake and the Carnies will be playing a fundraiser tonight (Saturday, May 17th) at the Elbow Room to benefit Black Jake and the Carnies, a local Ypsilanti... cause. A donation of $12 will get you a free CD. We will be providing music and other entertainments. Alcohol will be available for purchase at the bar. The show (also featuring Mike Boyd, Lonesome Plowboys and Danny Klein) is slated to start at 10 pm, but we go on last (more like midnight).

I hope the show went well, Mr. Jake. Sorry I wasn't able to make it.

What if we had a policy here that whenever the open thread hit 250 comments, that we'd start another? Or Maybe we'd just schedule one per quarter? That way there would always be somewhere for people to talk about their own projects, interests, lives, etc...

I've done the math. Ball shavers, exterminators, and employers of Hustler Inc make up 92% of the MM.com audience.

If we get this open thread to 250, we get to start another. What are you waiting for? Come on!

mark -- thank you, it went very well. Many of us would be happy to play another worthy local Ypsi cause fundraiser, like for the drive-through chicken slaughtering joints or the underground urban goat railroad, or bike-powered sex toy parties or whatever it is you people are in to.

The other 8% of us are a lot harder to pigeon hole, aren't we, Mark?

And the remaining 3% of us would be even harder to pigeon hole if you filter out the proctologists.

Hey, here's something...

How often is everyone else getting the following message:

"Cannot post comment, please correct these errors:
Supplied comment is invalid.
[Back to comment editing]"

What the fuck are the keyboard characters which when used in a comment disallows it for posting on this site? I need a list. I keep having my obnoxious comments rejected. You people are really missing out.

The rest of you can cut in line here. I'm waiting until I've seen the contents of the Hustler box to spout off.

Only 53 comments so far.

mark, I think 250 is too high of a bar.

I'd still like to have a debate here about immigration law and what to do about those who violate the law.

Not debate. Scratch that word. Discussion is what I meant to say.

turn to spout off?!

is crime in Ypsi greatly exaggerated or am I just totally naive?

as I garner support and try to get this check in hand:

"oh, I don't walk down there at night"
"it's a good idea but a bad spot"
"why there?"
"people get killed over that way"

I just want to scream!

There's a certain amount of risk we all take upon leaving our houses every day. I don't live in fear. I'm not just your average corn fed midwest gal either- I spent my formative years in San Ysidro and Chula Vista, California. Where even back in 1990 there were fences around the school and people were frisked before entering school.

now, I'm not in the least saying there's NO crime in the area. But relatively speaking...

how can we get people to stop focusing on the crime in Ypsi?

That's a good point, Bee. I was driving with my work truck down River Street to Michigan Ave, when a lady flagged me down and asked for a ride, because she needed to go down Michigan Ave a few blocks to Huron and had heard all sorts of horrible things about Ypsi. She was afraid to walk a few blocks down town! I reassured her that nothing bad would happen to her in that part of Ypsi and she had nothing to fear, but she was insistant. So insistant, in fact, that I figured her for some crazy serial killer and took off.

Regarding the DC Madam Deborah Jeane Palfrey, here's some interesting information: It was Dan Moldea who found Senator Vitter's telephone number in her records. Moldea was also one of the people who last saw Palfrey alive. (Now I'm wishing I hadn't been saying what a crappy book he wrote on the RFK assassination) He's obviously someone you don't want to mess with. (It was a crappy book though.)

I did like his commentary on one thing recently. He said in an interview that he's "started to view right-wing Republicans as the new organized crime."

"started?" What did he think that whole K Street and Abramoff thing was about? That was all one big extortion, bribery and intimidation ring from the get go.

Are you suggesting, Robert, that Moldea could have been somehow involved in Palfrey's death?

God No, Mark, I was just joking! And I want to make it perfectly clear, especially to Mr. Moldea, that it wasn't even my joke. I stole it from Lisa Pease. She posted it on her site "Real History Blog" (see link above).

He's sure got you scared, doesn't he? He must be one bad dude.

He's bad alright. Did you read his book on the RFK assassination? It's practically 300 blank pages, and still somehow he got a huge publishing deal. Do you know what kinds of connections a dude has to have to pull off something like that. It's scary.

Besides, I've already made up my mind. Mel is going to write my book.