Whew, work accepted my request for religious exemption to the vaccine mandate

I am so relieved that I don't have to within 6 weeks do all the things a termination would have forced.   I celebrated by riding both Tanzaknight and RazzMo yesterday.  The weather was wonderful, thank goodness I didn't let the TV weather prediction that it would be windy scare me off.   And cooked pork chops that I had dad buy earlier in the work and did a load of laundry in the evening.   I had used a packet of Teriyaki sauce from frozen stir fry veggies to marinade the chops and started out to grill them but ran out of propane so had to pan fry them to finish em.  They were ok,  I like em better breaded, seared and finished a few minutes in the oven, but had thought with the last warm day it would be nice to change it up and grill em after marinading.  

I think I'll ask dad if he wants to go out next weekend for his birthday.   I'll suck it up and cook a requested meal if he'd rather.  I halfway wanted to go out this weekend but then thought 'no, I don't want to deal with Halloween crowds, especially on the road.'  I think around here Halloween weekend is right up there with NYE, and St Patty's day for getting buzzed at a bar or party and then driving.  

I am wasting stupid amount of time looking at Duluth Trading Co website, I was thinking maybe I need to just order some more jeans for dad.  He say's he will go to their store site 'when I'm ready.'    but I am ready for him to have more jeans in rotation so I don't have to go "eww, need to wash jeans" when I still have plenty of clean pairs in my closet.  

Well I guess the HD insurance through work is not worthwhile

 I found something after quite a lot of digging with employee costs for less than fte where the org is only paying half what they normally cover and the high deductible plan is not much less than the HMO.  Seems insane but its not truly just a high deductible plan because it covers preventative care and all those screenings and shit can get costly.  

Ugghhhh.   More empathy for people who just grind through their work weeks because they can't deal with figuring out insurance on their own.   Fuck Joe Biden voters.  Yeah, I added voters to the popular chant because he is just the face for this fucking bullshit.  But no more embarrassing or mean tweets.   I hope idiots who voted for Biden or even some idiot 3rd party because "ewww, my FB friends tell me Trump made some embarrassing statement" are getting a good share of this pain.   

I'm tired, especially of living in interesting times

 Supposed to be part of an old Chinese curse.  "May you live in interesting times,  May you attract the attention of people in high places,  like the government.  May you get what you are looking for"

I guess maybe that last one is what is really biting me.  I have wished for the system failures that always come with communism to hit the U.S. quickly in the hope that this increases the odds of a quicker rejection of that horrid system.  

Regular tired because low sleep.   Yesterday I got up early to try to ward off clock failures from IT bringing 2 of 3 prod systems down at the SAME TIME.   I thought they had changed to offset the reboot times by a couple of hours but it was just a one off.   I need to make one thing an HA system, but HA has been very buggy and regardless of that I just think it is STUPID ON STEROIDS to have two out of three prod systems down at the same time on purpose even when it is supposedly just a ten minute outage.

But sundowner Joe may be giving me an extended vacation soon.  I have no idea if HR is predisposed to reject religious exemption requests or will take pity on group managers going "if we lose long term employees Y and Z we will be struggling to meet contract obligations"  In some ways I don't care.  I'll put it in God's hands.   If the exception is accepted I'll keep doing my best for this group.  If it is rejected I'll catch up on sleep first and then figure out whether to scrimp and work on catching up on fencing projects and such or try to create a business or get a new job. 

My foot finally seems to be mostly healed up

 I still get a twinge if it gets twisted a bit but the swelling is pretty much gone and yesterday I ran the chainsaw a lot and hauled branches to the brush pile and heating size pieces to where I store them and only my back was whining that night.   

I think my "PETA the green neo-nazi's will come after people's pets under guise of covid" last week at the end of my convictions musing was over the top.   I don't want to erase it though.   They wouldn't start out with "we are going to seize pets" at any rate.   It will just become difficult to purchase pet food "unexpected supply issues"  and find veterinary services and PSAs to neuter and spay pets become super aggressive with the FNM pushing the narrative for free (well the initial influencers probably get paid by someone.)   

I need to make a list of things I must do to prepare for if/when work denies my vaccine exemption request.  It feels overwhelming, but of course I can do it if I just keep moving forward.  I rode 100 miles last summer I can set up a more secure personal email, switch PayPal to that email from the work email, change to high deductible insurance so I can hopefully afford to keep that.   Get with the program and get screenings and dental that the inclusive HMO insurance covers up to date, and whatever else needs done.   I've just been procrastinating because I don't want to think about it.   A dose of empathy for all the blog commenters that  just caved and got the shots instead of taking a stand.   It still makes me cringe.  Especially ones that were oh so vocal that they had no intention of ever getting this vaccine, but the instant it was a mandate from their state or employer they complied.   I was still on the fence, thinking 'ok maybe at my age I should get the vaccine, I'm not sure about taking ivermectin long term for prevention and some folks don't realize they have covid early enough for ivermectin to be effective.'    But I WILL resist the damned bullying. 

Courage of your convictions

 This is a phrase I've heard a lot over the years and never really gave it any deep thought.   Christian martyrs who chose death over denouncing Christ had the courage of their convictions.  Heaven awaited if they stuck by their faith; and they chose that over caving to Roman mandates to denounce Christ.

They say good times create soft men and it is surely true.   I am filled with angst about losing my job even though I have savings and am not that many years from retirement, but I don't think I can bear the regret if I cave to sundown Joes illegal mandate.  I read so many folks saying "well I was never ever going to get this vaccine, but I'm not going to give up my seniority and current job perks to resist this illegal mandate" and just cringe.    I read other folks who cannot imagine how they'll provide for their family if they don't get the shots and I sympathize, while wishing they had embraced Dave Ramsey et al principles to get out of debt and have an emergency fund etc to where they would feel like they could resist the bullying at least for a couple of months.  I feel like the bullies would fold if a significant number of people said LOLGF instead of just caving immediately for short term safety/security of keeping their current jobs. 

My biggest concern is what comes next if the world governments keep this up and get 99% vaccinated and the rest isolated and covid is still around, as it will be; it is present in other species from what I have read.  So they got everybody vaccinated under the ruse of "we need this so the virus can't remain endemic"  What will they do when it is still out there?  I suspect that the PETA and green world neo nazis will surely help the totalitarians, high on their power trips, decide that the next step is we have to get rid of pets of all species that carry the virus.   These groups despise people spending money on pets instead of some gub'mint or NGO nannies deciding what to do with that money.  Pet owners will likely be the new wreckers who are selfishly putting their communities at risk and must give up their foolish notions that they are entitled to the personal enrichment they get from having pets.   They'll probably target livestock as well, they are already trying to push people away from eating meat.