regulations | Piss and Moan

Silly regulations

Not the dog, but the same breed.
Photo by Ricardo Pu00e9rez-Saravia on Pexels.com

I was doing a little research this morning and seeing about scheduling an appointment to put the dog down (quality of life is diminishing fast for the ol’ gal). So, I was looking at a couple of vet clinics in the area. It appears they are still sticking with the silly regulations imposed during “that time that shall remain unnamed”. As nearly all other businesses and areas of life have returned to somewhat normal functioning, apparently vet offices are sticking with the stupid regulation of having customers wear a face mask while in the office.

I don’t get it. It didn’t make sense when it was started and it still doesn’t make sense now. Why would you keep an owner of a pet from entering a clinic with their pet? Why wouldn’t they want to minimize the anxiety pets feel just by being there, let alone (in most cases) the car ride there?

Let’s be honest, a vet clinic isn’t a “healthcare facility”. Sure, it is for pets but they don’t wear face masks so making pet owners wear face masks while it is literally them and possibly another person or two in the room is ridiculous.

Anyone else found this regulation highly unusual?

July 4

Posted on July 6, 2020 by backuphill

Photo by john paul tyrone fernandez on Pexels.com

No, today isn’t July 4. Sorry if that threw you off for a moment. Hopefully you don’t tell time by the calendar of my blogging.

It was an interesting holiday, wasn’t it?

People can’t even celebrate with fireworks anymore. Governments are trying to kill that tradition with regulations (though the people in my community have done their best to try and do it anyway).

People locked down. People being mandated to wear masks. People being told they can’t gather. Celebrations cancelled. People not able to do the things they have done in the past because of fear generated by a pandemic.

People aren’t feeling so free these days. Freedom didn’t seem to ring quite as loudly this year. Freedom has had quite the damper on it from the government…kind of like back in the day, when July 4 was the culmination of people having it up their eyeballs with government interference on their daily lives. Weird.

Oh, and then there is the “woke” crowd and their “cancel culture” who need a bit of a history lesson.

Colin Kaepernick apparently needs a history lesson or three. He said he (and apparently other “woke” people) wasn’t going to celebrate the 4th of July holiday because it was a “celebration of white supremacy.” You apparently can catch that twit/tweet/whatever you call it on Twitter.

Hey, Colin, Independence Day isn’t about celebrating a race of any kind. It’s about celebrating the separation of the colonies (eventually the United States) from England. It’s about a national celebration, not a racial celebration. To add to your history lesson, there was a time when an African-American, or Black, did have a gripe about celebrating freedom because not all in the United States were free. Frederick Douglass, when he wrote and delivered “What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?”, was protesting slavery and the lack of political freedom for Blacks. It seems those two issues have been solved.

Is America perfect? Nope. Have people made mistakes? Yep. But to say that Independence Day is a holiday about white supremacy is just plain stupid. Should celebrating the holiday negate ALL progress made since that day? Nope. Again, plain stupidity.

America is still the best place to live and I wouldn’t want to live anywhere else, but I am not going to stop you if you would like to go somewhere else. Feel free to explore other places in the world.

That’s the thing about freedom, you can move anywhere you like.

Ain’t no one stopping you…well, except governments (and media) who have everyone locked down in fear.

God Bless America!

40%

Posted on March 13, 2020 by backuphill

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

We, as in our office (which is in a separate location from the “head office”), got an update on the policies regarding telecommuting during this health crisis, scare, whatever you wanna call it.

Prior to the outbreak of COVID-19, telecommuting policy said that we could telecommute up to 40% of a work week (two days) and that could only be done on Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays. I have talked about before how my job could literally be done from anywhere in the world with an internet connection, so 40% for my office is a ridiculous restriction.

Now, with COVID-19 being a thing and recommendations from every level of government (techinically I am a public employee) stating that employees should stay home and telecommute if feasible (again, it is totally feasible for my office) the “head boss” has issued new permissions for telecommuting.

Yesterday’s email said, in effect, “we are allowing telecommuting on Mondays and Fridays now, but we are still limiting overall permission to 40% of the work week, per board policy.” In other words, we are still required to go into our office three days a week! So, if I may paraphrase…policy over people. I gotta say, that right right there is some crappy ass leadership.

I have said it before and I will maintain that I am not an alarmist by any means. I am going about my daily life normally. I went out to eat last night and supported a local business near my home.

This issue I have here is that a public institution is going against the recommendations of the government, the one that funds it, and demanding adherence to a policy which they clearly have been given the green light to alter in this extraordinary time. There is no expectation by me or my colleagues that the alteration would adjust regular practice in the future (though we would like to see that). We just want acknowledgement that our government agency is recognizing the recommendations of the government and that isn’t happening.

I am in the office today. Nearly all of us are. But none of us are happy about it.