Get Ready for Kimye!



Move over, Bey/Jay... there's a new baby coming to town!

What better way to close out 2012 and enter into 2013 than the announcement of a royal pregnancy!  No, not those people overseas, but our local royalty here in the states!  We don't do the fancy titles and pompous stuff here.  A sex tape and a rap album will put you on Mount Rushmore in the states these days!  So, without further ado, I present to you: Kanye West and Kim Kardashian!

Now, now, just wait.  Hold on.  I know some of you are frowned up and you think that I'm being facetious.  And in a way, I am mostly, but also in a way, I'm not.  You see, royalty is in the eye of the beholder idiot fan.  Some of us treat athletes as royalty.  Some of us treat actors as royalty.  So, why can't a socialite and rapper be included as well?  After all, all of the above walk on red carpets like kings and queens, don't they?  They have high-level security and have people following them, 24/7, looking for a photo op.  Sounds like royalty to me!

Kim is rumored to be 3 months pregnant with Kanye's seed.  So, I'm guessing that she's known about the pregnancy for a while.  But, what better time to release the news than when everyone in the world, who isnt' partying or drunk (and some who are), will be tuned into TV to see the "ball drop" for the New Year?  And what story will lead each show tonight?

"Get Ready for Kimye in 2013!"

This is marketing gold!  This is bigger than the season finale of "Scandal" and it will be much bigger than anything Jay-Z and Beyonce' could have ever imagined for their child.

Wait, wait, wait.  Okay, there you go giving me the side-eye again.  You're thinking, "Q, you act as if these people planned this."

Uh, yeah, pretty much.  Look, I'm skeptical by nature.  The reason is: a majority of the people that are on TV or radio are trying to pull the wool over my eyes.  Shows are passing themselves off as reality when it's a known fact that many are scripted (yeah, I'm talking to you, Tru TV).  "News" media outlets are passing opinions and assumptions as facts.  So, why should I believe that a rapper at the top of his game along with the hottest body in America (who's still legally married) isn't doing the same with this announcement?

Personally, I don't care that Kim is pregnant.  I hope that she has a happy and healthy, bouncing baby boy or girl, but it has no bearing on my life.  In fact, I'm not coming down on her or Kanye at all.  I think they're geniuses, or at least surround themselves with them.  We'll hear potential, stupid baby names all night on New Year's Eve and a few months from now, people will be guessing the baby's gender.  Maybe that can be centered around some upcoming awards show in the Spring or something.  You know it just won't be revealed on a Tuesday afternoon on some peron's Tumblr site.  Some huge event will be going on when that's revealed, I'm sure.

So, congratulations to Kim Kardashian and Kanye West on their child!  Maybe you come up with a creative name, trademark it and add millions to your millions!  I do hope that he or she will at least get their talent from their dad's side of the family. 

So, Kim and Kanye sitting in a tree... Business decision or just a couple in love who coincidentally revealed it around New Year's?



"That's a nice blog post Q made for us, huh?  Just look at it!"

Get Out of The Way!

Why is it so hard for people to get out of the way?  I don't understand it.  It's not difficult at all to realize that sometimes, you have to move.  You would think that it's a common sense thing, but it's obviously not.

Friday, I was traveling down a highway on my way home.  There was traffic all over the place due to holiday shopping.  People were blocking intersections and sticking the nose of their car in your lane regardless if you invited them to do so or not.

While I'm sitting in a line of cars waiting on a traffic signal that's cycled through twice already, I hear a siren.  The first thing that I attempt to do is locate the emergency vehicle so I know what course of action that I need to take.  Well, it appears that I was the only person who was formulating a strategy at the time.  The ambulance was coming up from behind, so I forced my way into the slow lane to make room.  There were about 10-15 vehicles ahead between me and the traffic signal.  The light turned green and only two or three of them moved into the slow lane.  The others continued on their merry way in the fast lane because they wanted to make sure that the traffic signal didn't catch them again.

Because of this, the ambulance had to ride behind with them with lights flashing and sirens blasting for roughly a full minute before being able to cross through the intersection and bolt up the middle turn lane.  One vehicle even drove beside the ambulance for roughly 50 yards while the ambulance was in the turn lane.

Hopefully, no one suffered through a severe injury or, God forbid, died behind these idiots' decision to continue driving rather than pulling over.  At one time, I would have blamed an incident like this on young drivers not knowing the rules of the road.  However, the few faces that I saw who were blocking traffic were the faces of adults!  Grown people who thought that it was more important to get through a traffic light than let an ambulance reach its emergency.

What's wrong with people these days?  Why can't we get out of the way?  Is our time more valuable than someone's life?

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Be sure to let her know that "Q" sent you!

Thanks for continuing to support the friends of "Thank, Q!"

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Gun Control Won't Work

No child should ever go through this.

The shooting that occurred today in Connecticut was extremely sad.  To see innocent children lose their lives to a maniac is tragedy defined.  However, as much as I'd like to think that gun control is the answer to the random, cowardly and senseless violence that occurs in our country today, it's not.

We keep discussing Afghanistan and spending money over there despite the fact that we have terrorists here in the states.  Terrorists who walk around daily and who look exactly like us.  The latter is the scariest part of it all.

What can we do to prevent things like this?  Well, it won't prevent it, but maybe it would help to have more troops here in the U.S. than overseas in some other country's business.  It would help if people actually tried to raise their kids properly and provide them with professional help instead of sedatives.  It would help if gun possession was taken more seriously.

We keep hearing about "gun control," but what exactly are you controlling?  Do you think making it harder for the average citizen to get a gun is going to protect from random shootings?  No!  Why?  How many dope dealers do you know that buys their guns from Walmart?  When is the last time that you saw someone fresh out of a psych ward in Academy Sports getting an AK-47?

Don't get me wrong.  Gun control would prevent some bad guys from getting guns, but I'd doubt that it would be very many.  Gun control would prevent someone like me from buying a gun for my home for protection.  Well, maybe not prevent, but make it difficult.

Look, I'm not a gun advocate.  I despise guns.  I'd much rather punch an assailant in the face than shoot him.  But, let's be real: assault and high-powered weapons will always be accessible by nuts and cowards.  Always.  Because there is always someone willing to sell to Satan himself just to make a dollar. 

So, why should the cowards be armed and the people who want to protect their families have to go through legal red tape?  I really feel badly for the deceased victims' families in this shooting.  Every holiday season, they'll have to think about how someone took their loved one's life. 

Something needs to be done, but it needs to be creative.  Stop punishing those without criminal records and limit gun control to those with criminal records.  Have real laws for illegal gun possession instead of these slaps on the wrists.  Actually put people in jail for a significant length of time for severe domestic violence convictions and provide counseling.  Let some of our military people provide security at home instead of in some other country.

We're just one or two more incidents away from all public places being locked down like prisons on a regular basis.  We need to do something before we reach the day that we get frisked and scanned going into a McDonald's.

What do you think that the stop the violence solution should be?

Family / Dollar

No, I'm not talking about the department store. I'm taking about the choice between what's more important: family or dollars? Is Black Thursday Friday now a reflection of the "American Way?" There's so much greed in this country that it's a wonder that anyone cares about his fellow man these days.

Everything is centered around making profits. Everything. Black Friday (which is not a holiday for black people) has always been the one day that retailers could rejoice in knowing that they would make a profit. People line up in front of stores just waiting for the doors to open at 4 or 5 AM. After the doors open, they'll stampede down the aisles looking for that bargain item of choice.

However, things change. With the internet now being woven into our daily lives, Cyber Monday became a second day for retailers to make a killing on sales.  Consumers could sit in front of their PC's and point/click their way to great deals.  But, even that isn't enough for the retailers.  Hmmmmm....  How can they make even more cash?

Oh, I know!  They'll open up the stores on Thursday evening and start the sales then!  It doesn't matter if employees are pulled away from their family's dinner table because a profit is more important!  Right?  If it doesn't make dollars then it doesn't make cents (sense).

Stores across the country opened their doors early which required employees to cut their Thanksgiving short and I think that it sucks.  Don't get me wrong.  It's essential that certain people work on holidays.  Customer service centers are always needed to provide help for cable, cell phone, insurance companies.  But do you really need someone to sell you an HDTV at 9 PM on Thanksgiving night?

I had a discussion with my homie, M&M, about how Target and Walmart employees were threatening to strike over the fact that they had to work on a holiday.  They were upset that these stores were taking them away from their family time and rest.  M&M agreed. 

He mentioned how when Sam Walton was alive, he stressed his employees being happy at Walmart.  However, when he died in 1992, his family did the exact opposite of what he would have wanted.  They started opening on Sundays and eventually went to a 24/7 superchain store.  The employees became an after-thought because the only focus of Walmart was to make money.  It was no longer an all-American store either as agreements were made with China to make just about everything in the store.

So, the employees have to come to work and we, the consumers, take full advantage of it without giving it a thought.  We roll into these stores with these disgruntled employees and then get upset over poor customer service.  I guess that's the trade-off you get.  You get employees selling you an HDTV on a Thursday night, but you get the attitude along with it because that person can't even enjoy their own TV at home with their family.  When employees become only a warm body to their company, then you can rest assure that the customer service will suffer.  See AT&T.  If you don't believe me, then go to a Chick-Fil-A restaurant if you're ever in the South and see how great their customer service is.  It's the best I've seen ever and I've been to a lot of places.  Not working on Sundays or holidays does something for morale.  I'm just saying.

With each passing year, money becomes even more of a focus.  How can we possibly expect children to learn how to care from one another when adults don't?  Is it so important to add another million to the billion that you already have that you'll cut someone's holiday short?  Why not use the internet for early sales on Thursdays instead of requiring the physical locations to open?

Don't get me wrong.  I love convenience.  It's nice to need something in the middle of the night and know that I can go get it.  However, I understand that employees have lives and I wouldn't want to come in between them any more than someone doing it to me.  I'm pretty sure that not one CEO worked last Thursday.  They sat at home and took naps after eating turkey while Joe Sixpack and Sally Housecoat had to pay for a babysitter on a family holiday so they could work overnight.

I once was naive enough to think that things could change, but I think that we're too far gone in this country.  We don't care about each other and eventually, we will be one step away from cutting each other's throat for a competitive edge.  These big corporations don't care if you spend time with your family or not.  They just want you to make their money.  Yeah, you may get holiday pay, but wouldn't you at least want the option of your family or a dollar?

Am I wrong here?  Do stores put more focus on money than their employees well-being and will it hurt us as a country in the long run?