Peter's Place

I have just sent the following Letter to the Editors via e-mail: Westchester-Putnam Letters to the Editor The Journal News 1 Gannett Drive White Plains, NY 10604 To the Editors: I recently blogged about the severe fiscal crisis in which the State of New York has found itself . Various state agencies' bills are not being paid and as a result, they are losing services. In particular, the Office of Mental Health is set to lose all of their administrative and support staff as of 1 April 2010 as the entirety of such staff is employed through a temporary employment agency, whose contract has not been renewed by the state. There are rumors abound that state income tax refunds are being withheld until as long as the fall -- refunds that many people are relying upon. Local governments and school districts are still waiting for payments owed to them by NYS . Under New York State law, a Writ of Mandamus can be issued under an Article 78 Proceeding to "compel a government ag...

Every Sunday around midnight, for more than the past two years, I've logged into the New York State Unemployment Insurance web site to certify my weekly claim for unemployment benefits (my whopping $60/week!). This past weekend, around midnight on Sunday, I logged into the web site without any difficulty. When I attempted to certify my weekly claim, as I had always done, I was advised that the site was experiencing technical difficulties and could not be access at that time. I tried, for the first time ever, to certify my weekly claim by calling in to the NYS Unemployment Office Certification number. I got up to the point where I choose the option to certify my weekly claim, and was advised that my request could not be completed at that time due to "technical difficulties." When I am able to certify my weekly claim before noon on Sunday, I receive my money on my debit card (issued by NYS thru Chase bank) very late Monday night. If I complete my weekly unemployment certifi...

Please take a moment and send some healing thoughts & energies or prayers for my sister, Jennifer. She SMSd me (texted me) a short while ago that they her OB/GYN team has been unable to stop her labor and they are therefore going to have her undergo an emergency cesarean section to deliver the twin baby girls she's been carrying for the past nine or so months. Her OB/GYN team originally had scheduled a somewhat-less-of-an-emergency cesarean section for tomorrow afternoon, because my sister had taken aspirin today (or some other NSAID). Unfortunately, when one has taken any NSAIDs 24 hours before surgery, the risks during and after surgery for complications to arise are greatly increased, mostly due to the ease at which a person will bleed with NSAIDs like aspiring in their bloodstream. She actually had been admitted to hospital & was undergoing an intravenous "flush" (using saline solution) to try to clear the aspirin out of her system more rapidly. So right now, ...

I received this e-mail late last night. It saddens me that I didn't get a chance to know Rev Brett better than the little contact I had with him. He was a true pioneer, a soldier, a human being filled with love and compassion, and he will most definitely be missed. Our only comfort is in knowing that his energy persists, and that the mission he started will be continued and carried out by others. [UPDATE] Apparently, Rev. Harris suffered a heart-attack last week. Rest In Peace, good Reverend! Rev. Brett Harris, the founder of Friends of Bryce and Ergonomical Ministries, passed away on New Years Day 2010. He was 48 years old at the time of his death. In honor of the man and his work there will be an online visual here on the Friendsofbryce ning network in the chat room. Date: This Sunday 3 January 2010 Time: 9PM Central Standard Time Where: on the Friends of Bryce network on Ning Come and meet other network members and lets remember the man and his vision that started all of ...

Approximately one decade ago, Westchester County (where I live) was debating the passage of legislation that would establish its own Human Rights Law/Commission. The proposed legislation was extremely controversial because it included "sexual orientation" as a protected class--something the New York State law did not do at the time. As someone who has been politically involved since high school and active in the LGBTQ rights movement, I wrote a letter to the editors of our local newspaper in support of the passage of the county's proposed Human Rights Law. For whatever reason, somewhere around 90% of the letters to editors that I write actually get published, and this was no exception. My letter appeared in the local paper, signed with my name and village of residence. My grandmother, very frail of health (at that time she'd had four major coronary infarctions and a series of minor strokes, along with the usual health problems associated with someone approach...

Christmas is not a time nor a season, but a state of mind. To cherish peace and goodwill, to be plenteous in mercy, is to have the real spirit of Christmas. ~ John Calvin Coolidge, Jr., (4 July 1872 – 5 January 1933) President of the United States of America I spend today, Christmas 2009, with my father down in the State of Georgia. He lives near Atlanta. It's quite strange down here; almost nobody decorates (I'd be surprised if but one out of every 25 homes were decorated) and it doesn't feel at all like Christmas. A bit more so in my father's home as I practically forced him to get a Christmas tree. Of course, I had to decorate it. We split the cost for the ornaments & lights, though, and he did pay for the tree. I paid for the stand. It was a fair trade. :) Anyway, I'm just doing a lot of thinking, which I'll reserve for another post. In celebrating your holidays, whatever your tradition, religious persuasion and what not, I do ask that you please take so...

Yesterday, the New York State legislature made an historic statement against providing equality to its citizens: the New York State Senate voted 38 against, 24 in favor of a bill that would equalize the playing field and legalize same-sex marriages in the state. Guess what folks? There are only 30 Republican Senators in the New York State Senate (all of whom, unfortunately, voted against the bill). That means that eight (8) Democratic New York State Senators voted against the bill. What surprised many (but not this jaded) LGBTQ activists was the wide margin by which the marriage equality bill was defeated. According to the Albany Times-Union blog , this is the official roll call for the vote: YES: 24 NO: 38 FULL ROLL CALL Eric Adams (D) — YES “This is about love.” Joseph Addabbo (D) — NO James Alesi (R) — NO Darrel Aubertine (D) — NO John Bonacic (R) — NO Neil Breslin (D) — YES John DeFrancisco (R) — NO Ruben Diaz (D) — NO “Sen. Smith, it is better to keep your word.” Mar...

OK, so I'm the horrified new owner of a Blackberry Curve 8350i PDA , that I got for the new car service (taxi & airport runs) business that I'm going to be operating/owning out of Yonkers (but that's another story). Yes yes yes, I know that I promised myself a long time ago that I wouldn't allow my computer/technology/Internet addiction grow to the crackberry but, alas, the Universe directed me in this regard and I was left with little other choice, given the circumstances and needs of the business and what I needed from a phone. There are a lot of great reviews, like this one from Engadget . The service we have is through Sprint Nextel. After using the device for a few days, though, I have a few complaints and, quite honestly, I don't understand why more people don't complain about these things. I would imagine that my complaints are valid regardless of which particular crackberry model you're using. So here are my complaints about the Blackberry (crack...

If you want a great lesson on how to alienate your customers and destroy brand loyalty that has taken years to build up, take a close look here... Y'know this is really a very sad story. Hewlett Packard makes some really great products--that's not the sad part. What's sad is that if you ever are unfortunate enough to find yourself in a position of having to deal with their tech support, consider just junking the equipment and buying something else. Unless, of course, you're dealing with re-installing or upgrading your printer drivers. I don't know what's going on at HP these days but after the last ten or so contacts I've had with their tech support department, I can unfortunately no longer recommend that people purchase their products. And it's a damned shame, too, because they make some of the best printers out there. Case in point: I own an OfficeJet Pro L7580 and an OfficeJet Pro L7680. When I went to upgrade the printer driver for the OJP7580, it w...

“Suicide is a permanent solution to a temporary problem.” ~ Phil Donahue (1935-) Emmy Award winning American media personality and writer “Suicide sometimes proceeds from cowardice, but not always; for cowardice sometimes prevents it; since as many live because they are afraid to die, as die because they are afraid to live” ~ Charles Caleb Colton (1780-1832) English sportsman and writer “The real reason for not committing suicide is because you always know how swell life gets again after the hell is over” ~ Ernest Hemingway (1899-1961) Pulitzer & Nobel Prize winning author “No one ever lacks a good reason for suicide.” ~ Cesare Pavese (1908-1950) Italian Poet, Critic, Novelist and Translator “To run away from trouble is a form of cowardice and, while it is true that the suicide braves death, he does it not for some noble object but to escape some ill.” ~ Aristotle (384 BC - 322 BC) Ancient Greek Philosopher, Scientist and Physician Today (10 September 2009) is World Suicide Pre...

Today, 10 September 2009, is World Suicide Prevention Day . I am a suicide survivor. My first attempt was made when I was a teenager, because I couldn't come to terms with being gay and being Catholic. I just responded to someone on Facebook who inquired about this. Here's what I wrote: I was raised in a very conservative, very religious Catholic Democratic household, by my very religious, very conservative Democratic Grandparents . I didn't know that there were gay people growing up. Then I started going on-line, and I met my first gay person, my Unca Uni . He got me to realize that all the fantasies/what not I'd been having were b/c I was gay. I couldn't reconcile being Catholic with being gay. One night, whilst on the phone w/ a fellow young Republican from Yonkers, I came out to him. I was also taking sleeping pills. But having led an extremely sheltered life, I didn't know that you're supposed to take the whole bottle all at once, not one at a time (wh...

“Charity is injurious unless it helps the recipient to become independent of it.” “If you want to succeed you should strike out on new paths, rather than travel the worn paths of accepted success.” “Don't be afraid to give up the good to go for the great.” ~ John D. Rockefeller, 1839-1937 (American Industrialist and Philanthropist, founder of the Standard Oil Company) (QOTD=Quote Of The Day)