Bastardisms

First!

2009-11-07T00:34:00.002-06:00

Since an extensive (5 minutes) google search found nothign on this, I am going to claim (rightfully so) that I was teh first person to state on the internet that the "Seizling Institute" in the film Adam Resurrected is the same as the bad guys hideout in Quantum of Solace.

Damn, I have too much free time on my hands.

You little bastard.

2009-05-04T20:45:00.002-05:00

A New Entry to the List of the Type of People that I Hate

2009-04-28T15:16:00.003-05:00

Squeaky Wheel:

A Squeaky Wheel is that person that thinks that by getting a supervisor invlolved, they will get their way.

The SW thinks that if they bitch loudly enough & long enough, then they will get their way. This is the same person that, when a manager does come over to listen to their self-important dribble but doesn't give them everything that they want, will threaten to a) write a letter to the president, b) sue the company, or c) both.

When confronting a SW, the best plan is to stick to your company's policies. Unfortunately, there are those placaters out there who will bend to the SW's desires. This only encourages the SW to think that they can repeat the same actions at other places & get similar results.

Maybe I'm an Asshole After All...

2008-09-21T14:15:00.004-05:00

The other day I was watching one of those strange food shows where some guy goes to some exotic place and eats good that most Americans wouldn't. This show happened to be set in Saudi Arabia. During the course of the show, the host explained some of the things that the locals do for fun. Since it's an oil-rich nation, the gasoline costs less than $1 per gallon. Because of this, it is no problem for people to go riding over sand dunes in off-road vehicles.

As I watched this, at first I was outraged to see these people wasting gasoline when it costs so much here. I also felt a little bit hypocritical because I knew for so long that Americans had done the same things.

Then, as I thought about it more, my feelings changed. I realized that these people were using the natural resources of their country for the benefit of their people. If they had the resources to either produce or to purchase what they wanted, then I had no right to say that they could not use those resources in whatever way they saw fit.

Knowing this, I turned my thoughts to my own culture and realized that if Americans have the ability to produce and or buy food products to feed our people, then there is no problem whatsoever if I want to go to McDonald's to buy a hamburger and only eat half of it while there are people in this world that are starving.

Some people would say that there is a difference between gasoline and food, but I say that there is not. If the price of gasoline in America were to double tomorrow, then that would cause so many people here to be unable to afford to go to work. That would then cause them to be unable to purchase food.

If the United States is going to be held morally responsible for the feeding of other nations in the world because we have the ability to grow food, then OPEC nations should be held morally accountable for providing fuel assistance to countries as well.

Or maybe I'm just being an asshole.

What's the Big Deal about Creating a Black Hole?

2008-09-10T07:00:00.002-05:00

The Large Hadron Collider at CERN was turned on this morning. Some people think that it might create a Black Hole that will swallow up the Earth. I say that's BS. Besides this LHC is old news to anyone who has read "Angels & Demons" by Dan Brown.

Besides, think about it this way. If if does create a black hole that swallows up the Earth, it will start right in the vicinity of France.

If you're still concerned about it, here is a link to the security cameras that they have at CERN.

French Taliban?

2008-09-08T07:00:00.000-05:00

Before I even get started, let me say now that I am saddened by the death of the 10 French soldiers and I send my sympathies out to their families.

That being said, let's rip into some people...

Outrage has been sparked over a magazine spread in Paris Match magazine that shows Taliban soldiers "wearing French uniforms, helmets and using French assault rifles and walkie-talkies."

Personally, I think this is great. Our enemy is using French equipment? We'll have the whole country subdued by Christmas! Just like the old joke goes: "French rifle for sale. Never fired, dropped once." The person in the picture is holding a French FAMAS rifle.

All I have to say to the Taliban is:

Bon chance!

The Drinking Age.

2008-09-05T07:00:00.001-05:00

Recently, some of the presidents of universities and colleges got together to raise a debate on whether the legal age for drinking should be lowered from 21 years to 18 years old. Personally, I think that this is an excellent idea.

American culture has very Puritanical roots that run very deep. It is an indication of the longevity of the ideas that were around at the founding of this country that certain businesses are not legally allowed to operate on Sundays.

Part of this culture is treating alcohol as a taboo and shunning it instead of educating people about it. If people treat alcohol as something mysterious, then it will be a mystery to them. But if we allow people to experience alcohol at younger ages, then it takes away the wonder that it holds.

This, in turn, will lead to more responsible alcohol use. Take, for instance, the data on traffic fatalities from the EU and the United States for the year 2006. The data for the E.U. shows that there were about 40,000 traffic fatalities for 2006. Out of these 10,000 were alcohol related. (About 25%) The data for the U.S. shows that there were a little over 40,000 traffic fatalities for 2006. Out of these 17,602 were alcohol related. (About 41%)

Two similarly developed areas of the world had nearly the same amount of traffic fatalities. The difference is that in the area where alcohol is taboo, the number of alcohol-related traffic fatalities is nearly double that of teh area where alcohol is accepted.

The answer is to treat adults like they are adults, but to educate them as well.

As I was reading up on this, I came across a "letter to the editor" in which the writer had several suggestions for alternatives for the college presidents. One of these suggestions was to raise the taxes on alcohol to "contribute to the excess costs of alcohol-related health consequences."

Why is it that for some people the only solution to a problem is to tax it? This course of action is tantamount to me suggesting that the government levy a tax on running shoes to defer the costs of broken ankles and other running-related injuries. The tax will not prevent people from drinking and will disproportionately affect people of lower incomes.

Education, not taxation is the key to safe alcohol consumption.

The Snowglobe Effect

2008-09-03T07:00:00.000-05:00

I have a good friend who routinely goes through periods where she won't be with this guy that she likes. Then, she'll get back together with him. Everyhting will be nice and happy for a day or so and then she will go back to not being with him.

I call this the snowglobe effect. Every now and then she will shake up her life (i.e. get together with this guy) and things will be nice and happy like the snow swirling in the globe. Then things will settle down and everything goes back to the way it was.

NSFW - Hello Kitty Vibrator

2008-08-29T07:00:00.000-05:00

WARNING: The links in this article and probably this article itself are NSFW. So, if you're reading this from work, expect a visit from those guys in HR with one of those pieces of pink paper that signify that you're going to have a lot of extra free time on your hands in the immediate future.

So the other day one of my female friends bought a Hello Kitty vibrator. The red one. At first we thought it was a knock off, until we got it to her house and saw the writing on the back that said Copyright Sanrio, Inc.

I understand that some people really like certain characters. Unfortunately, this sometimes leads to an unnatural attachment to said character. (Look no further than furry fandom for verification of this.)

The fact that the parent company of the Hello Kitty franchise has gotten on board with this is interesting and slightly disturbing. I know that companies make money by supplying what people want and I support that. I still reserve the right to think that it is strange not only for people to demand this type of product, but for the company to supply it as something more than the ha-ha novelty factor.

For those of you out there who are interested in your own personal "Hello Kitty Vibrating Shoulder Massager" you can purchase it from JList.com. (The same site that I apparently borrowed the above image from.)

Weird. Just plain weird.

Get Well Soon, Dalai Lama!

2008-08-28T20:13:00.005-05:00

On Thursday, the Dalai Lama was admitted to a hospital in India for stomach discomfort.

His last checkup, performed last month, indicated that he was in "perfect health."

A representative of the Dalai Lama said that he is exhausted from his hectic schedule and that he is fine.

I had the rare privilege of getting to see the Dalai Lama speak at UT Austin on September 20th, 2005. We were about 10 rows back on the stadium floor at the Erwin Center. It was a profound experience for me and one that I will always cherish.

I hope that the Dalai Lama has a speedy recovery and that he is able to return to spreading his message of Compassion, Religious Harmony, and World Peace.

Get well soon, Dalai Lama!

When Recycling Goes Too Far...

2008-08-27T07:00:00.000-05:00

OK, I know that recycling is a good thing. I don't think that it should be forced upon people, but I do think that it should be available to people who want to do so. (I used to live in an apartment in a city that did not have a recycling program for it's multi-family properties.) But I also think that sometimes there is a line that needs to be drawn when it comes to recycling. Especially when the product that is being recycled is used condoms.

Once more, China steps into the international spotlight for exposing its own people to unnecessary health risks. Never mind the lead in toys, this time it's herpes in hairbands. The one positive thing that can be said about this is that at least, to the best of our knowledge, none of the used jimmy-hat hairbands have been exported.

What I really want to know is who the hell came up with this idea? Who thought that it would be good to take condoms that people have actually used, as opposed to ones that don't pass QC, and turn them into hairbands?

This is what happens when you get fanatical about something. Even something as good as recycling. Everything in moderation.

All I can say is: Buy American.

Don't Nuke Texas

2008-08-25T07:00:00.000-05:00

I know that the message that this group is trying to get across with their bumper sticker is urging politicians to not build nuclear power plants in the state of Texas, but the first time that I saw this sticker, I thought that they wanted to drop nuclear bombs on my state.

Granted they didn't want to bomb all of Texas, just the free parts. However, it so happens that all of Texas is free, and therefore I thought that they did want to bomb all of Texas. Honest mistake. But in case I have to say it explicitly:

DON'T NUKE TEXAS!

Knoxville School Shooting was a Hate Crime

2008-08-21T17:51:00.007-05:00

On Thursday, August 21st, 2008 Ryan McDonald was shot in the school cafeteria by Jamar Siler. Ryan was white Jamar was not. What I want to know is why the ACLU and none of the major news services are jumping on this for being a hate crime. Everyone who remembers the Jena 6 trials and the ACLU involvement there, should be wondering the same thing.

If hanging nooses in a tree, the incident that started off the race-based fights in Louisiana, is a hate crime, but 6 students of one race ganging up on another student of a different race is not, then surely a student of one race shooting a student of another race has to be.

What dismays me is that if the roles had been reversed, there would be outrage over this. While I understand that there are degrees of difference, please note that I do not condone any of the actions described above, but merely point them out as examples of the hypocrisy espoused by both sides when it comes to race-based legal issues.

I think that these unfortunate incidents highlight a need for a review of hate crime legislation. there needs to be concrete definitions of what is and what is not a hate crime. The double standards on both sides need to be eliminated so that instead of dividing people on these issues, they will bring us together.

Stop prosecuting under hate crime law, those crimes that are not actually hate crimes.

It's Called a Business for a Reason...

2008-08-20T07:17:00.008-05:00

I have two jobs. One, as a security officer working at a state building. The other, working at a cigar shop inside of Ruta Maya. The cigar shop is a separate business from Ruta Maya. For some reason, certain customers of Ruta Maya seem to think that the prices marked on the products are negotiable.

There is one guy in particular, Shep, who is notorious for this. Furthermore, this guy tries to play all of the employees against one another. He'll say that one employee did something for him, so that means that you should too. He could get a discount if he paid for the $35 membership. (Membership gets you 10% off all purchases plus one free cigar up to $5 for eleven months out of the year and one free cigar up to $10 on your birthday month.)

This has been going on for some time now, but came to a head last night. At 5 minutes until closing time, he comes in, goes to the humidor and looks around. Then he grabs a cigar that costs $5.50 and comes to the counter and asks if I can sell him this cigar for $3. I tell him no. (Taking that much off the price of the cigar wouldn't just eliminate the profit, it would cut into the cost of the cigar.)

Then he tells me that there are no other cigars in the humidor in his price range. I tell him that we still have a particular cigar that he has smoked and that it is $2.99. His response is that we don't have the largest size of that cigar.

I have to admit that the sheer level of stupidity that his argument assaulted me with caused me to be stunned for a few seconds. I stared at him in disbelief. I told him again that I couldn't just take $2.50 off of the price of his cigar.

Next he tells me that one of the other employees sold him one of these cigars at that price because there weren't any of the size he wanted in his price range. (We'll call her D.) At this point I got mad. I told him that since my manager had not told me to give him any discounts, let alone taking nearly 50% off of a cigar, that I couldn't sell him that cigar at that price.

Finally, he said that he was going to call the manager and ask him if I could sell him the cigar at that price. I told him that was fine and turned back to working on pricing cigars.

Needless to say, the manager never called, and the parasite never got his deeply discounted cigar. It's called a business because the goal is to make money. To bastardize a quote from the movie 'Joe Dirt':

This is a business, not a charity. Maybe one day UNICEF will getinto the cigar business...but until then, we're the people to see.

UPDATE (08/201/2008)!!

Yesterday afternoon I told D. about what Shep had said to me and she was taken aback. Apparently she had helped Shep out of kindness and was appalled that he had abused that kindness. Apparently she and her husband had also helped him out once by buying him food. She said that she wasn't going to be doing anything nice for him again.

Then, later that evening, Shep came into the cigar shop trying to pull the same scam. D. told him that she couldn't sell him that cigar at the price that he wanted. She also walked through the humidor with him in order to make suggestions for a different cigar.

When he couldn't find any cigars that met his exacting standards, he got irate and started accusing D of being part of some conspiracy to "price him out of being able to purchase cigars." At this point D. had enough. She told him to get out and not to come back.

Watch this space!

2008-08-19T12:18:00.003-05:00

I have decided to overhaul this blog. It goes for long periods withou being updated and then is flooded with a deluge of posts. Most of my posts are inspired by current events. Even then, it's only when I really feel like it. So, I'm going to try to start having regular posts. I'm thinking Monday, Wednesday, and Friday.

According to my referrer tracker, there are a couple of things that people come to my site looking for. "How to be a Bastard" is one and there are others. I'm going to try to start pre-writing these posts and then posting them on the appropriate days.

I will still post on current events when they occur. I will also include posts from one of my other sites: "Crappy News Network" as I see fit.

In addition to the content overhaul, I'm going to be changing the look of the website.

Retardgate

2008-08-13T20:51:00.006-05:00

I was going to stay out of the whole 'Tropic Thunder' debate, but then I came across an article by Tim Shriver on CNN.com. Mr. Shriver goes to great lengths to criticize the makers of the movie 'Tropic Thunder', but never once mentions that he has seen the movie himself. In fact, most of his vitriol seems to come from some of the marketing done for the movie.

In another article, representing the other side of the debate, a critic watched the movie to understand where the debated points of the movie fit into the larger context of the movie as a whole. This critic presented a much more informed viewpoint and stated that the film actually lambasted people who exploit the mentally challenged by portraying them in films in order to win awards.

While the article in favor of 'Tropic Thunder' is informative and brings up good points about the effectiveness (in some cases) of the MPAA rating system, it is actually Mr. Shriver's article that is the most interesting and sometimes enlightening on the debate.

For those of you who don't know, Mr. Shriver is the brother of Maria Shriver, who is the wife of California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. He has also been the chairman of the Special Olympics for the past 11 years. This last fact is particularly interesting in light of the debate. Like it or not, Mr. Shriver has made a living off of mentally handicapped people for the past 11 years.

If you think about it logically, Mr. Shriver actually benefits from the mentally challenged not being a part of the greater society. If everyone treated the mentally handicapped like they were just like everyone else, then they would no longer be special. Their would be no Special Olympics because there would be no"special" people to compete in them.

Another interesting little fact that can be found on IMDB.com is how Tim Shriver executive produced the 2005 movie 'The Ringer' which starred Johnny Knoxville as a normal person pretending to be mentally handicapped so that he could compete in the Special Olympics. Apparently Mr. Shriver had no problems with people poking fun at the mentally handicapped as long as he was getting a percentage of the profits.

Furthermore, Mr. Shriver says in his article:

The degrading use of the word "retard" together with the broader humiliation of people with intellectual disabilities in the film goes way too far. When the R-word is casually bandied about and when bumbling, clueless caricatures designed to mimic the behavior of people with intellectual disabilities are on screen, they have an unmistakable outcome: They mock, directly or indirectly, people with intellectual disabilities. They perpetuate the worst stereotypes. They further exclusion and isolation. They are simply mean.

As I have already shown, this position is actually antithetical to Mr. Shrivers benefit, but he must keep up the appearance of being offended at the plight of the mentally challenged. Of particular note is the next to last line where he says that "They [stereotypes] further exclusion and isolation." If you look back at the last 20 major blockbuster movie releases, not one of them even remotely mentions or has an actor who is mentally challenged. Where is Mr. Shriver's outrage at the apparent exclusion of these "special" people by Hollywood?

When a movie finally comes along that actually brings up the issue, Mr. Shriver comes out with guns blazing, wanting us to "ban the r-word." Instead of taking it for what it actually is, the inclusion of people addressing the issue (even in parody form) of mentally challenged people, he wants people to belive that it is actually excluding them.

Furthermore, Mr. Shriver wants to curtail your free speech. I say that this is completely and totally unacceptable. Don't let one man's quest for keeping his job stand in the way of you enjoying yourself at movie that does more for bringing the issue of mental handicaps to the forefront of discussion than Mr. Shriver himself does.

UPDATE 08/25/2008:

I went and saw Tropic Thunder last night. It was great. I'm not normally a Ben Stiller fan, but the movie was very funny. The scene where they say retard lasted only about 2 minutes out of the entire film and they said the word maybe 5 times. Mr. Shriver needs to actually see the movie before he criticizes it.

I'm a bastard!

2008-08-11T08:00:00.003-05:00

To go along with the "How to be a Bastard" series, I will include anecdotes of being a bastard whenever I can. This weekend, I had the opportunity to be an absolute bastard to the people who were fundraising for D.A.R.E. outside of a Wal-Greens by my house.

What happened is that I stopped by the Wal-Greens to pick up a soda on my way to work at the cigar shop. As I entered the store I saw the two women working the table and quickly ducked inside so that I wouldn't have to deal with whatever it was that they were doing. As I was leaving the store, the younger of the two women (about 25, kinda cute) called me over. She started giving me the spiel about the D.A.R.E. program and asking me if I had been in it. When I told her that they made me go through it when I was in school, she said that I qualified for a D.A.R.E. t-shirt. (It would only cost me a donation of $15 for one or $25 for two.)

Now remember that I work for a cigar shop. I politely explained that my income was derieved through the sale of tobacco products. All of these products contain nicoteine. Nicoteine is a drug. In the form that we sell it, nicoteine has no benefit to the user at all. Therefore, logically I make my money from people abusing a drug and their program runs contrary to my interests of staying gainfully employed.

Both of the women tried to counter my argument by saying that my company only sold tobacco to adults and that their program was for litttle kids. (I decided to leave out any arguments about hooking new smokers when they are young, and stick to how companies do business.) I told the women that the only reason why companies, including mine, don't sell to kids under the age of 18 is because the law forbids us from doing so. If there weren't a lw preventing it, then we would do it.

Apparently these two women thought that every company was guided by something called morals instead of profits because they took my statement to mean that I thought that kids should be allowed to smoke cigarettes (I don't think that anyone should be allowed to smoke cigarettes. Cigars yes, cigarettes no.) and asked em if this was the case. At this point, I decided to have a little bit of fun with them and show how the pro-choice argument can be subverted at the same time. I told both of them that I thought that each person had the right to choose what they do with their body. Apparently this still didn't sink in because they repeated their question of if I thought that kids should be allowed to smoke cigarettes. Again I repeated that I thought that each person should have the right to choose what they want to do with their body.

Since I knew that nothing that I said would change the minds of the two women, I chose to leave at that moment. As I was walking away I heard the older woman say "I think that's the most disturbing thing that I have heard all day." The younger woman replied "I want to cry."

The Olympics

2008-08-08T07:51:00.005-05:00

Once again it is time for the Olympics. The idea is that we stop fighting with swords, guns, and bombs and we compete by atheltic means. It is a time of brotherhood. A time of coming together. There is an image used in Visa's campaign with the two atheletes in the number 2 and 3 spots reaching across to touch hands in a gesture of unity.

But we all know what the Olympics really mean:

A GREAT EXCUSE TO RENT 'COOL RUNNINGS' AGAIN!

Windfall Profits Tax

2008-08-08T07:37:00.000-05:00

A lot of talking has been going on about placing a windfall profits tax on large oil companies. Presidential candidate Barack Obama had this up on his website, Barackobama.com as part of his proposed energy policy:

Enact a Windfall Profits Tax on the Top Grossing Oil Companies and Ease the Burden on American Families: The oil industry has profited greatly—over $150 billion in 2007—due to global instability fueled by conflict in Iraq, failing domestic fiscal policies that have weakened the U.S. dollar and skyrocketing global demand resulting from a lack of investment in alternatives. Barack Obama supports imposing a windfall profits penalty on oil selling at or over $80 per barrel. Revenue from the proposal will be invested in a number of measures to reduce the burden of rising prices on families.

The problem with imposing any tax on a company is that the tax will immediately be passed on to the customer. This means that the ultimate goal of saving the consumer money will go right out the window. Another problem with this plan is that it will only cause companies to change their definition of profits. If $80/barrel is the limit, then the only thing that will happen is that companies will charge $79/barrel and have another $30 in associated fees and surcharges. Don’t believe me? Check your cell phone statement. Here is a section from my cell phone bill from Sprint:

Sprint Surcharges $9.44

Sprint Surcharges are rates we choose to collect from you to help defray costs imposed on us. Surcharges are not taxes or amounts we are required to collect from you by law. Surcharges may include: Federal USF, regulatory charges, administrative charges, gross receipts charges, and other charges incurred to recover costs associated with governmental programs. The amounts, and the components used to calculate Surcharge amounts, are subject to change.

Federal-Univ Serv Assess Non-LD $2.42
Texas State-Infrastructure Reimburse $1.30
Texas State-Margin Fee Reimbursement $1.00
Texas State-Univ Serv Assessment $3.77
Administrative Charge $0.75
Regulatory Charge $0.20
--------------
$9.44

If the cell phone companies impose surcharges to “defray costs” that are “associated with governmental programs,” then that means that it doesn’t matter how much the government wants to charge the companies, they will always pass it on to the consumer.

Any student who has had a basic economics course will know that taxing something is the worst way to lower the cost of that item. There are only two ways to lower the cost of an item: raise the supply of that item or lower the demand for it.

Here's a graph from this site to help illustrate my points:

As you can see, the dotted green line represents the supply of a given item while the solid red lines indicate the demand for that item. When the demand for this product increases from D1 to D2, the price of the item increases from P1 to P2. While it is basic economics, this graph is helpful in explaining the situation with oil because OPEC has said that it will not increase production, therefore we have a fairly static supply.

If we were to increase the supply of oil by drilling, it would move the supply line to the right, causing the points where it meets with the demand curve to be lower than they are now. This would cause the price to be lower.

If there is one thing that I want you to take away from all of this, it is:

"Placing a tax on something only increases the price of that item."

How To Be A Bastard: Part 2

2008-08-06T11:49:00.004-05:00

Welcome back to our second installment of "How to be a Bastard." The last time I told you to smoke a cigar on the one day that they wanted everyone to quit for the duration of. Today, I'm going to help you be a bastard on the elevator. Now, most of you are probably thinking "How can I be a bastard on the elevator?" It's simple. Be the 'One Floor Rider.' You know that person that is perfectly capable of walking up or down a flight of steps, but chooses instead to wait longer for an elevator and then only go up or down one floor.

Being this type of bastard is particularly annoying/effective during rush periods of the day: when everyone is getting to work, at lunch time, when everyone is leaving work. You just wait for a big group of people to get on the elevator and press the button for the bottom floor, and then you press the button for the next floor down.

To be even more effective, you can do one of several things. Call out the floor number to the designated button pusher. Make them go through the ignominy of pushing the button that will stop the elevator for you and delay them. Also, make sure to carry as little as possible with you whenever you are doing this. You don't want people to think that you have to use the elevator because you are moving something heavy.

Some of the more juvenile people out there might want to try to flatulate quietly before getting off on their floor as some sort of coupe degrace. Don't do that. You want to be a bastard here, not an asshole. Nobody likes assholes.

So, there you have it. Use this handy little technique and you will be a budding little bastard in no time. The glory of it is that you can use it at work, on vacation, anywhere that has three or more floors.

In a Quandary

2008-08-06T11:48:00.002-05:00

Normally, I whole-heartedly support executions. I think that they should be used more often. Some people just don’t need to live. I could go through the whole ‘social contract’ defense of using the death penalty to remove people who have committed offenses against the rest of the society that they live in, but I’m not. Suffice it to say that I am pro death penalty.

However, yesterday my home state of Texas executed a Mexican national named Jose Ernesto Medellin. Medellin was convicted of being part of a gang rape and then murder of two young women in 1993. The girls were aged 14 and 16. He was 18.

On the one hand, I agree that he should be executed due to the nature of his crimes. He, along with others, violated two young women and then murdered those women. According to reports, he later bragged about the incident. Hearing this makes me irate to no end. There is that vindictive part of me that thinks that not only should he be put to death, but that Texas should go Keyser Söze on him.

But on the other hand, because he is a foreign national, who was not allowed consular access for the trial; it does not bode well for American citizens abroad who may be placed in similar situations. I know that if I were to be accused of violating the law in another country, I would want to be able to contact the American consulate.

I think that the major crux of the quandary for me is the difference in how “justice” is handled in different countries. I believe that Mr. Medellin was given a fairer trial here in the United States than an American in Mexico in the same situation would have been given. I don’t delude myself into thinking that his trial was 100% fair, but I think that it was fair enough. It would be nice if we could always be completely and totally certain of someone’s guilt or innocence, but we can’t. So we have to do the best that we can and try our hardest to be fair.

However, the entire world does not share this mindset with us. In some places, we are guilty because we are American, or because we do not believe their religion, or because we have more money. How then can we expect justice to occur for our people over there? Do we allow other countries to interfere with our legal system, so that we may offer the same protections to our citizens abroad? If so, where is the line drawn? Do we only allow observers? Lawyers for defense? Do we allow foreign governments to file appeals on behalf of their citizens in our courts? Personally I believe the line should be drawn at having foreign lawyers defending their citizens in our courts. Anything more than that would be substantial interference.

There are other issues at play in this case: whether the president can force states to abide by the terms of international treaties and whether or not cases like this should be resolved in the world court. However, I think that the main issue is reciprocity. Do we give consular access to defendants who are receiving better trials here so that we may have consular access to our citizens in places where the quality of trial they are receiving is extremely poor?

Annoying People

2008-08-05T12:29:00.000-05:00

You know who really annoys me? The person that really gets under my skin? Those people who are overly chipper in the morning. Its 7:30 and you’re trudging into work at the old cubicle farm, and this person is acting like they’re having a day at the beach. “Hi! How are you? Isn’t this great? Hi! Hi! Hi!” You know those bumper stickers that say “Some people are only alive because it’s illegal to kill them”? These are the people that those bumper stickers refer to.

The problem with these people is that they want you to believe that their enthusiasm is genuine. They want you to believe that they really like everyone. They need for you to believe it. The truth is that most of the time, these are self-serving little sycophants who are working to ingratiate themselves into whatever environment they are in. They have this desperate need to be part of the group without having spent the time or gone through the shared experiences that make a group cohesive.

The main problem that I have with this type of person is the hypocrisy that lies just beneath the surface. When you point out that they don’t need to tell everyone good morning, they tell you that they are a nice person and that you are being rude. The hypocrisy comes in that they tell you in the rudest possible manner.

These people have two faces and the noses on both of them are brown. They should take a lesson from Christianity. The last person who said that they loved everyone got nailed to a tree.

My Gum is Epic.

2008-08-04T12:08:00.003-05:00

I got a free piece of gum today at the convention that was being held at the building where I work. It was Epic brand gum. I told the lady that gave it to me that I would have to read my copy of The Illiad while I chewed it. She then recommended The Odysey. I would have led with saying that I should read my copy of the Aeneid, but I was pretty sure that was too obscure a reference. It wasn't. We went on to banter back and forth as many obscure epic references as we could. I think I won with Gilgamesh and then with Roland.

(The picture is used without permission from this website.)

Handicapped People Are Assholes!

2008-07-18T07:07:00.005-05:00

Okay, so obviously, not all handicapped people are assholes. However, it seems that most of them are. I have a story to illustrate my point. I work at a state building. We have a parking garage. In said parking garage we have about 10 more handicapped spots than we are federally required to have. There are also about another 10 or so in the parking lot for our building. Even with all of these spots, we usually don't have enough handicapped parking to accommodate all of our handicapped employees (including 5 of whom are wheelchair bound) and any handicapped visitors.

This has created a problem for us. Specifically that any of the wheelchair bound employees who need to have a van accessible parking spot, can't get one. So, someone came up with the idea to reserve five of the van accessible spots on the bottom floor of the parking garage for those people who were in wheelchairs. Great idea, huh? Especially seeing as how we had more than we were required to have, right? So, the powers that be changed 5 of the parking spots to reserved and handed out those to the people in wheelchairs. They also had security monitor the spots in the morning and notify people of the change in status of the parking spots. People were livid. From day one there were people bitching about the change. One person even filed filed a civil rights claim against the people in charge of this. (Apparently their civil rights had been violated because they had to use one of the other handicapped parking spots.)

After a couple of weeks, the signs were changed back and the reserved spots went back to being handicapped spots and anybody in a wheelchair got a collective middle finger from anybody else with a blue hanging tag.

I have given this incident some considerable thought and have come to the following conclusion: Political Correctness is to blame for this incident. Hear me out. It used to be that we had gimps, cripples, and lames. But then, somebody got their feelings hurt, and now they are all categorized as handicapped. Even this term has fallen into disfavor with some who prefer the term handi-capable. Take that into account with the belief that everyone should be treated equally and you have people who barely need to use a cane thinking that they are just as needy of a parking space out front as the people who can't use their legs. There are varying degrees of any segment of society, no matter who they are. With that comes the need to treat different people in different manners. As a result of all of this the people who need those spots the most, are the ones getting screwed out of them.

As a side note, I wish to address all of those people who have the disabled parking tags, but aren't in wheelchairs. I, along with many other people, understand that you may have back problems or an ingrown toenial or whatever it is that qualifies you for your special place, but as outside observers, we don't know what you are feeling. Therefore, we can only make judgements based upon what we observe. That being said, if you park in a disabled parking space (even rightfully so) and are fortunate enough not to use a wheelchair, at least limp. That way anyone that sees you will know that there is a reason for you parking there. Otherwise we all just think you're some asshole who is playing the system or has borrowed someone elses tag so that you can park closer. That's all. Just limp.

Oh, and by the way, obesity is not a disability. Fat people shouldn't get handicapped spots. They should have to park at the far end of the lot and actually walk.

Texas Lottery

2008-07-15T11:35:00.005-05:00

This is funny. Somewhere in Texas, Satanists are really kicking themselves for not playing their favorite number and scores of depressed teenagers who think that they are rebelling by wearing black nail polish and dressing like Marilyn Manson are bemoaning the fact that they are not old enough to play the Lottery. I am holding out for the day that the numbers 0-0-7 come up.

Fun with Spam

2008-07-07T08:12:00.010-05:00

I know that it has been a while since I last posted, but I just had to share this. Now, I'm no stranger to Spam. I've had an email account since about 1994. I had a Rocketmail account before they were taken over by Yahoo. Heck, I even have a throwaway email account that I give when websites that I know are going to spam me ask me for my email. (Currently their are 2227 messages that the spam filter has caught for that one, and probably about a hudred that it has not caught. All of that being said, I recieved a piece of spam that had quite a disturbing title. See for yourselves:

As you can see, this is one of the many people that want to enlarge various parts of my body. Now I'm not married, but I don't think that if I were that I would want to set my wife on fire. Then again, I know several men who would disagree with me on the point of spousal conflagration.

Blogshares

2008-03-01T02:00:00.004-06:00

Recently I've gotten back into playing Blogshares. For those of you who don't know, Blogshares is the world's largest online, virtual stock market. The "companies" are blogs. You can buy and sell shares in these companies as well as a whole host of other activities to make yourself some serious fiction dough. Everyone starts out with 500 Blogshare dollars, or B$. From there itis up to you to wheel and deal your way to the top.

I first found out about Blogshares while searching Google for my own blog. Since then, I have become a part of the community. I now have an official role within the game. I am an editor. That means that I am responsible for keeping the help pages and whatever else I find up-to-date and free of spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors.

Recently changes were implemented with regards to how the system determines the values of the blogs within the Index (Big listing of all the blog in the different industries). With my help and the help of other players, my blog rose to the top blog in the Austin Industry. I just found out tonight that my blog is also the top blog for the Texas Industry as well. :D

This is great news coming on the eve of Texas independence Day (March 2nd).

I highly recommend that anyone who reads this sign up and try out the Blogshares game.

You're a retard if you think this makes you independent.

2008-02-16T09:35:00.004-06:00

In my never-ceasing effort to point out how monumentally stupid people can be, I presnt to you: Shana Logic.com. While I was tooling around blogs for Blogshares, I came across this little gem. It was an ad on the side of a page, and while I normally dismiss these out of hand, this one caught my eye. The girl was cute, and dressed in that indie, arm-cock wearing, my hair is dyed black because the weight of the world presses down upon me, middle school girl type of way. And she was cute. Then I saw the tag-line for the ad: Shop Indie.

Let's take a minute to review the term, indie. Indie is short for independent. According to the first entry in The Random house Unabridged Dictionary, 2006 ed., independent means: "not influenced or controlled by others in matters of opinion, conduct, etc.; thinking or acting for oneself." Now, if you are buying your "independent" clothing and accessories from a website that says that it is independent and is the front end of a business that mass-produces these items, then you are not independent at all. Most of all you're not even an independent thinker.

There's a common look to most of the people in this "indie" category. That looks is supposed to say, that I don't conform to societies norms or standards. What is really says is that "I want to look like I'm poor." This has been done before. Before they were called indie, hey were called Bohemian. And guess what? They were a bunch of retards too. Dyeing your hair black is not counter-cultural. The ready availability of hair dye in most grocery stores indicates that it's a very common thing. Do you want to know something else? It doesn't matter what type of clothes you are wearing, you're still wearing clothes and that is part of society's norms. Be a real rebel. Walk around your hometown in the winter with no clothes on. Then you really will be going against the norm!

This post is dedicated to all of those retards who think this stuff is cool.

Happy New Year.

2008-01-01T12:27:00.000-06:00

It is now 2008. January 1st. The old year has passed to make way for the new. We are all reborn for a time as we bask in the possibilities that the new year represents for us. Let us stop and examine the origin of the word January. It comes to us from the ancient Roman god named Janus. Janus was the god of doorways, of beginnings, and of the rising and setting of the sun, usually represented as having one head with two bearded faces back to back, looking in opposite directions. Just as Janus looked backwards into the old year and forward into the new, so too do we reflect on the events that have passed and look forward to the events that are to come.

Have a great year.

Happy Freakin' Whatever.

2007-12-24T15:40:00.001-06:00

In an effort to be more inclusive of other's religions, I have now resorted to the saying the title of this post during the "Holiday Season."

On a serious note. I sincerely hope that everyone is able to achieve some joy, no matter how small, out of the season. I hope that no matter what our various beliefs are, that we can take this time out of the year to see each other not as being different, but as being the same and that we can spread some peace, hope, and most importantly love during this "Holiday Season."

Raising awareness of the homeless.

2007-12-01T11:03:00.000-06:00

As a foreword, I have recently gotten into photography. I use a Kodak C633 point & shoot digital camera. I also post my photos on Flickr. Recently, I joined a group on Flickr called Vagrants. The purpose of this group is to raise awareness of homelessness around the world.

Here are some of my better shots of the homeless:

_{Click on any picture for a larger version.}

I know that a lot of time panhandlers can be annoying or even frightening. I also know that there are people out there who are preying upon the good nature of others, but there are also people with genuine needs out there. So, please donate to one of these groups, or to your local church.

Homeless Advocacy Project: link
National Coalition for the Homeless link
National Interfaith Hospitality Network (Family Promise) link

Visa: An exercise in marketing B.S.

2007-08-04T12:34:00.001-05:00

Visa, who has it's roots in California in the late 1950's, has grown to be one of the largest credit companies in the world. The marketing department of the company has made several commercials. These commercials range from the familiar "VISA. It's everywhere you want to be." to "Life takes VISA." Notice the not-so-subtle transition from VISA saying "Hey we are a credit card that is accepted at a butt-load of places." to "You can't live without us."

However, VISA's latest series of commercials is frankly disturbing. Most of them involve elaborately choreographed routines in which we see an assembly line of people moving around in a cafeteria or some other daily activity. Everything is going along great until one person stops to pay with cash. Everything comes to a screeching halt and all of the customers give the offending payer dirty looks. Even the cashier looks disdainfully at the non-VISA method of payment. Here are some things that need to be said:

CASH IS ALWAYS FASTER THAN CREDIT!
Any cashier that looks at you dirty when you pay deserves to be fired.
Visa thinks that you are stupid.

In fact, the only truthful ad that VISA has is their "Flower Shop" ad which depicts the same choreographed routine in which a woman paying with a check disrupts the flow:

Here are some things to remember if you are paying with a check:

Always have the check and your register filled out in advance so that all that you have to fill in is the amount! Spend your time in line filling out the check, not looking at the tabloids.
Have you driver's license or ID number printed on your checks as well as your phone number. Your bank can do this for you, usually for no cost at all.
In addition to #2, if you know that a particular merchant wants you to have the expiration date of your ID on the check, write it on in advance.

The motto "Life takes VISA" indicates a big, messy, corporate wet-dream in which everyone has to pay with credit cards instead of actual money. It has long been a standing theme in Science Fiction literature, movies, and video games that the usual system of money has been replaced with "credits."

There are some people who believe that this is a sign of the End Days of the Apocalypse. According to the book of Revelations, Chapter 13, verses 16 and 17:

16 He also forced everyone, small and great, rich and poor, free and slave, to receive a mark on his right hand or on his forehead, 17 so that no one could buy or sell unless he had the mark, which is the name of the beast or the number of his name.

So, it would appear that VISA's supposed goal of a one-world currency composed of credits would actually be a sign of the Apocalypse.

Don't let the media B.S. fool you. Use cash and remember that the best way to double your money is to fold it in half and put it back in your pocket.

Church Stuff That Pisses Me Off

2007-07-19T00:07:00.001-05:00

What really gets me is that one particular church member. Usually they’re young. They start out in middle school or high school. They attend the youth group every Sunday night. You see them in church every Sunday morning. These are the people that always bright and fucking chipper. They are the ones that will ask you in their best feigned sincerity voice “How was your week? How is school going? Did you get that job that you applied for?” The run you through the usual gauntlet of inane questions to make it seem like they are interested in you. Watch these people outside of the church environment. See how they really treat “the least of these.” Once they get to about college age or have just graduated the hypocrisy gets worse. They will have a conniption fit if you have a beer with dinner on a mission trip, but will go back to their dorm the next week and get plastered with the frat or sorority du jour and then post the pictures on their MySpace page. These are the same people that will say “You shouldn’t do anything in your private life that you wouldn’t do on a mission trip. Like that’s sound advice. There’s got to be a list as long as my arm of things that I wouldn’t do on a mission trip, but that I would do every day. Pay my bills for one. Give my dog a bath for another. But those are inane examples. It would generally be frowned upon to have sex with your wife on a mission trip, but I’ll give it to the missus every day of the week back home.

The problem with these mission trips is that they try to take you out of your everyday, routine life and place you in an environment that is different from the normal so that you can focus on God and Jesus and being a Christian. What they really need to do is the exact opposite. They need to come into your everyday life and work on getting you to focus on all of those things while dealing with the stack of work on your desk, the guy at the drive –through complaining that he ordered the burger with onions and without mayo, the kids screaming constantly at home. That’s where these mission trips need to focus. Mission to the Middle of Your Life. Once the artificial high from your trip to repair broken houses and broken lives in Podunksville, Wherever wears off, you are still left with your broken life. Your broken house. Your broken soul.

More people screwing up the Internet

2006-12-31T15:27:00.000-06:00

More people screwing up the Internet

If any of you aren't familiar with guitar tablature, it's essentially digital sheet music. It's usually represented by 6 lines of dashes "-" which make up the 6 strings of a guitar with numbers denoting which fret should be played at which time. Here is an example.

|-------------------------------------8--7---5-5-/-3---|
|----5-5---8---5-5--8----5--8--------------------------|
|------------------------------------------------------|
|------------------------------------------------------|
|------------------------------------------------------|
|------------------------------------------------------|

The piece that I selected for my example is the opening line of Johannes Brahms’s Wiegenlied: Op. 49, No. 4. (More commonly known as Brahms Lullaby.) The reason that I selected this piece is because it is still generally available on the internet because it was published in 1868 and is therefore public domain.

Generally speaking, tablature or guitar chords to popular songs have been readily available on the internet for sometime now. My entire endeavor to learn how to play guitar so far has come from guitar tablature on the internet. But now, the people over at the National Music Publisher's Association (NMPA) want to stop people from being able to create and publish guitar tablature on the internet. They have served a "take down" letter to Olga.net telling them that they have violated copyright laws and that they will be sued if they keep displaying guitar tablature. So, until this legal dispute is settled, one of the biggest sites for guitar tablature is unavailable to average people out there who want to learn how to play their favorite songs by their favorite artists.

Is it just me or is the music industry really reaching here? First, you have the Napster issue. Now you have them working on tab sites. As Jerry Holkins (a.k.a. Tycho Brahe from Penny Arcade) put it when describing one of the music companies:

"They imagine that their industry is not, as you might have thought previously, merely a conduit for a specific type of product. Rather, they believe that their industry is the avatar of music itself"

It is exactly this kind of thought process that provides the impetus for associations to ruin great things for millions of people.

What actually bothers me the most is that this isn't like Napster. At least with file sharing, there was the process of someone having to actually go pay for this crap, put it in their computer, transfer the data from one medium to another, and then make it available for you to listen to. With guitar tablature, what happens is that some talented (usually) person listens repeatedly to a particular song with guitar in hand and writes down the lyrics and attempts to mimic what they hear. Guitar tablature is the creation of the people who go through this process of listening and writing, not just some jackass with a CD-R/W drive and the entire Metallica collection.

I believe that the reason why this association is doing this is because they say that it cuts into their profits. Having been a musician since I was 12, I appreciate printed sheet music. It's nice. It's usually easy to read. It's generally very accurate. But it's also expensive as hell and not everything that you want is available. Also, it takes them quite a while to get out current songs.

You never heard horse merchants trying to get cars banned when they were invented. They simply realized that they were outclassed and that horses were going to be a niche market. The same thing needs to happen with music publishing.

What I suggest is that each and everyone of you got to the NMPA website's "Contact Us" page found here, and send them a message telling them what you think about their preventing the free expression of artistic talent simply so that they can make more money.

Yahoo! Mail Pics.

2006-08-22T13:28:00.000-05:00

If you have gone to Yahoo! Mail in the past six months, then you've seen those insipid pictures that Yahoo! put up to advertise their picture mail feature. Everytime I see them, I have to make fun of them. So, here are some of the pics and the things that come to my mind when I see them. Feel free to add your own comments.

______Yahoo Picture_________

Ernst Stavro Blofeld's kid sister.

It's official, this is the gayest man alive.

This girl is training to be a muslim.

This woman gives a piggy bank
THE SHOCKER!

Legal Notice: All images are the property of their respective owners. Yahoo does not endorse this site, it probably doesn't even like it or acknowledge it's existence. So, since I put up this here legal notice, please don't sue me. Thanks.

I hope that this is a gag.

2006-08-06T13:08:00.000-05:00

While surfing on the net I found this. Good Lord in heaven I hope that it's a joke. If not, then someone went to a lot of trouble to make a convincing website.

Update:
According to the website Snopes.com and their Urban Legends reference pages, this product is a gag, simply because you can't buy anything off of the site.

I know it's a weak comparisson, but what about the video game trailer websites? You can view screenshots and trailer videos, but you can't buy the game. Same thing with Genpets? Maybe.

You look like you got beat with this!!

2006-05-31T12:42:00.000-05:00

This is a picture of one of the combo sets from where I work. I actually bought myself a Zebco Genesis 30 combo set. I'm going camping in June and wanted to go bass fishing as well. Among other lures, I'm going to be using a white 1/8 oz painted jig head with a white spinner tail. I'll post pictures of anything that I catch.

Post your favorite bass lures in the comments section.

National "Bese Mi Culo" Day

2006-05-01T00:23:00.000-05:00

I don't know about your part of the world, but here in Austin, TX we are experiencing what I like to call "National 'Bese Mi Culo' Day." For those who don't speak Spanish, that means "National 'Kiss My Ass' Day." I'm pretty sure that the actual name for it is something like "Dia de la Revolucion del Trabajador" or some shit like that. The idea of this is that every Mexican worker isn't going to go to work or spend money at the pinche gringo shops for one whole day to "close down" cities and show us gringos how much we need immigrant workers. Also, according to one site (that I refuse to link to), the protest is to show support for the illegal immigrants.

Personally, I think that this is going to backfire. What's going to happen is that every Mexican who doesn't go into work on Monday is going to go back to work on Tuesday and find that some other Mexican has his job.

Besides being as insipid and offensive as Dia de la Raza, this protest is in support of ILLEGAL immigrants. This isn't about the thousands of people who go through the appropriate legal channels to obtain their citizenship. This is about showing support for the people who jump fences and hide in the back of trucks or do any number of other activities, including waiting 9 months, then jumping a border to pop out a baby on American soil.

So, since they are exercising their right to peaceably assemble, I suggest that you exercise your right to laugh at them and point out that their jobs are going to be gone.

Tasers work...

2006-01-09T22:04:00.000-06:00

According to the medical examiner, a person who has to go through decades of education before they are allowed to hold that position, ruled that the death of Michael Clark was the result of sickle cell anemia that was exacerbated by Clark's use of PCP and cocaine. All of this was reported by KEYE news and The Austin Chronicle.

However, according to Clark's mom this a coverup by the Austin Police Department because "he didn't have no sickle cell." Yes, you who are barely able to string together an intelligent sentence, know more than the medical examiner. Forgive me for being skeptical about your prognosis.

The facts are that Michael Clark was high. He didn't follow legally issued orders from the police to submit to arrest. He bit one officer and injured another. It took nine officers on scene to subdue Clark. The officers had to use Tasers to do this. Tasers work.

Had Clark not been high on PCP and Cocaine at the time of his arrest, he may not have been as aggressive and resistant towards the police officers. He also, probably, would not have been in an argument with the woman that required the police to be called out.

The major complaint from some groups like the Texas ACLU is that most of the people "who died while or after Austin police officers used force on them were minorities". 13 out of 14 according to the above site. However, this data is from 1998. Austin P.D. hasn't had the Taser since 1998. That is a recent addition to the equipment carried by A.P.D. officers. APD acquired the Tasers sometime before 2004, because in Mach of 2004, according to an article, they acquired 730 X26 model Tasers. So, this tells us that not all of the 13 minority death after police use of force were the result of Taser use. The score: Bastardisms 1 Texas ACLU 0. Secondly, anyone who has lloked at criminal justice statistics for America in the past 3 decades or so has seen that minorities, particularly Blacks, are represented more than Whites. That means that more of the deaths are going to come from minorities because it s more likey that that a minority will be in the criminal justice system. Update: Bastardisms 2 Texas ACLU 0.

The Texas ACLU blog goes on to quote an Austin American Statesman article that printed the following exceprt from the A.P.D. Taser use protocol:

According to the department's policy, officers are allowed to use Tasers to control a dangerous or violent person when deadly force doesn't appear to be necessary, if attempts to subdue someone by other tactics haven't worked or if it is unsafe for officers to approach the person.

Only one officer is allowed to use a Taser on a person unless it is obvious that it did not work, according to the policy. Officers also must warn a person that they are going to use a Taser, unless the warning would jeopardize the officers.

The author of the article then goes on to assert that "Tasers aren't toys, and they're more dangerous than an officer's nightstick (when both are used according to training)." Of course I don't have the reserch study where the author gathered this data (mainly because they didn't cite a source) but I do know that the Taser rarely, if at all, produces lasting, long-term damage to the recipient, like a nightstick would. Ex: bruises, contusions, cranial damage, broken bones, trachial damage, etc. if used in various ways. If the author is suggesting that police officers physically abuse the violent suspects with their nightsticks rather than using a Taser, then by all means let them step up and recieve the first beating. Final Score: Bastardisms 3 Texas ACLU 0.

I, personally, if given the choice would prefer the Taser. But, then again, I don't forsee myself ever needing to make that choice. I have a simple plan that will ensure that you never have to have the Taser used on you: Don't break the Law!!

The Truth? Not Exactly.

2005-12-23T22:23:00.000-06:00

I'm sick and tired of all of these "The Truth" ads that you see on T.V. They feature a bunch of whiny, pretentious teenagers with nothing better to do than protest something that has no real bearing or importance on the world.

Go check out their site. It's www.thetruth.com. Although what is advertised is far from what you get.

In particular, there is one part of the site that bugs me to no end. The Facts.

This section is chock full of small tidbits of info. However, the site developers seem to have left out one major part of facts: sources. There is no citation of these "facts" anywhere on their site. They never mention any of the tobacco companies by name. Is this because they are afraid of being sued for libel because they take things out of context? Who knows?

Besides, most of these "facts" are just statistics. Anyone who has been through a basic statistical analysis course will know not to trust stats that are displayed to back up an argument because more than likely the stats are worded or arranged to say what the quoter wants them to say.

It's an old saying in stats that whenever someone asks you what the statistics say, you respond "What do you want me to make them say?"

But citation and statistics aside, do you know what the major flaw with the whole premise of their crusade is? The fact that smokers choose to smoke. No one holds agun up to their head and makes them smoke cigarettes. It always has been and always will be a personal choice.

The other problem that I have with them is that they criticize the tobacco companies when they try to help out:

On its website, one tobacco company lists “cancer services” as one of the community programs they support. Yet they continue to make a product that leads to 339 deaths from lung cancer each day.

If a tobacco company wants to provide cancer services, then let them. Next you will probably hear them complaining that tobacco companies provide smoking cessation support.

With all that is going on in the world that needs time and devotion to aleviate, such as world hunger or homelessness, I refuse to listen to a bunch of people whining about other peoples choices. These are the same people who, if they had their way, would make it illegal to smoke outdoors or in your own home. These people are almost worse than the environmentalist wackos at Greenpeace or EarthFirst! or the ELF.

Walk the Line

2005-12-10T14:22:00.000-06:00

Earlier this week I went to go see Walk the Line with some of my friends. For those of you who don't know, this movie is about the life of Johnny Cash. He sang songs like "Ring of Fire," "I Walk the Line," "Boy Named Sue," and others. Johnny Cash was played by Joaquin Phoenix and June Carter was played by Reese Witherspoon.

I have to say that this is the best movie that I've seen this year. This movie definitely deserves a lot of awards. Joaquin and Reese are to be commended as well for singing the songs themselves.

The movie chronicles the hardships that Cash went through, from his drunk and abusive father, his brothers death, through Johnny's battles with drugs and alcohol. The acting is simply amazing.

I give this movie 5 stars. Go see it.
[* * * * *]

I hate PETA...

2005-12-08T20:13:00.000-06:00

I know that I have already covered this subject before, but I feel passionately about it.

To anyone who has seen the site Meat.org, let me say "I'm sorry." I'm sorry that you had to witness that tripe from a group of terrorist harbingers. I know that sounds like a harsh indictment, but its true.

PETA members are involved in direct action campaigns (read: terrorist activities) every year. The people that throw paint on fur coats and hand out comic books that say "Your Mommy kills animals" are terrorists.

Terrorism isn't necessarily about violence for the sake of violence. It is very direct and very controlled violence. It is violence with a purpose. Although the violence may be direct at one group of people, that group may not be the intended recipient of the terrorism. The violence is designed to instill fear in the rest of us.

The activities that I described earlier have one desired effect: to make people afraid of reprisals if they wear fur or animal products.

What's more is that these people want you to be vegetarians for moral reasons.

Here is a screenshot of PETA's goveg.com website. (Emphasis added).

Point 1:At the top of the page, Paul McCartney is quoted as saying

"If anyone wants to save the planet, all they have to do is just stop eating meat. That's the single most important thing you can do."

No, Paul, not eating meat will not save the planet. Nothing will save the planet. It is physically impossible to save the planet. The planet is very old and has gone through several climate changes already. Nothing the human race can do will "Save the planet." Why? Because the planet will adapt no matter what. That and time is on the side of the planet. As it was said on Fight Club "On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero." You are not saving the planet, you are saving the humans.

Point 2:PETA is trying to claim that a vegetarian diet is the most humane diet there is. This rips that idea to shreds.

Point 3:While people like Paul McCartney, Alec Baldwin, and Alicia Silverstone sit around and preach that we shoudl save the animals, thousands of people in America go hungry. Thousands of people don't have enough food to feed their families. All of the money and effort designed to get people to switch to "alternative diets" could be better spent on feeding the poor. I have no sympathy for a group who wastes money on trivial issues like whether people eat meat or not.

If you really want to help animals, join a respectable group like the A.S.P.C.A. (American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals). Don't let PETA's shock tactics fool you.

The P.A.T.R.I.O.T. Act of Video Games.

2005-12-02T22:58:00.000-06:00

I know that I have already posted on this, but I'll be damned if I'm going to sit by and let the government intrude on what kinds of video games that I can play. I, personally, like and prefer violent video games. They are cathartic, especially after dealing with rush hour traffic. According to an article over at Gamespot.com, junior Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton and Senator Joseph Lieberman, both Democrats, have authored a bill that could possibly have some devastating effects on the video game industry.

In what amounts to the equivalent of the U.S.A. P.A.T.R.I.O.T. Act for video games, this legislation would give the government unprecedented powers of regulation over the industry. What is interesting is that the ratings that the government wants to make law are those same self-imposed ratings that the industry came up with on its own.

If we already have a rating system in place that people are already abiding by, then why do we need to make it a law?

Senator Clinton has made some interesting remarks about why they authored this bill:

"video game content is getting more and more violent and sexually explicit."

In my opinion, it isn't the violence that is bothering them, rather it is the sexual content. Violence has been a part of video games ever since you could shoot down airplanes on your Atari system. What I'm having a problem understanding is how two Democrats could have a problem with the freedom of expression inherent in these video games. Wasn't it the democrats who were supportive of the artist who displayed a picture of the Virgin Mary made out of elephant feces and dead farm animals in 1999 at the Brooklyn Museum of Arts? I know that I am painting with broad strokes here, but in this case the generalization supports the point that typically it is the Democrats who are more liberal and allow more "controversial" stuff into the public arena because it broadens our minds.

Why is it that the left preaches that we should be tolerant of all beliefs, except for those that the right hold?

Another interesting quote from Senator Clinton is:

"A majority of parents are feeling increasingly victimized by a culture of violence that makes it difficult to protect their children against influences they find to be inappropriate,"

Isn't this the same thing that Christians everywhere are trying to do? "Protect their children against influences they find to be inappropriate?" We can't teach Creationism or even Intelligent Design as alternatives to Evolution? What about the influences that are already out there that parents don't want their children exposed to? Ex: Will & Grace, The L word, etc.

As is to be expected, the pissing match has already begun.

As the shirt says:

Shirt available for purchase here.

I got dumped.

2005-12-02T19:00:00.001-06:00

I wrote another post on this, but it was too wordy and mainly for my own benefit. So, here is the boiled down version:

I got dumped on Sunday November 26th by a woman that I cared a lot for.

It hurts...a lot.

Listening to the version of "Wicked Game" by HIM helps a little bit.

I don't really know why she dumped me.

It hurts...a lot.

1 year of eXTReMe Tracking!!

2005-11-26T01:27:00.000-06:00

I have had this blog tracked by the good people over at eXTReMe Tracking for 1 whole year now. Here are the stats:

Unique Visitors:	2,044
Highest Day of Traffic:	20 May, Fri, 2005
Number of Visitors on that day:	47
Visitor Countries:	listed below

United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Germany, Netherlands, France, Australia, Bulgaria, Italy, Sweden, Belgium, Finland, Switzerland, India, Brazil, Mexico, Poland, Hungary, Spain, Japan, Singapore, Philippines, Denmark, Malaysia, Norway, New Zealand, Portugal, Thailand, Peru, Indonesia, Argentina, Ireland, Islamic Republic of Iran, South Africa, Turkey, Romania, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Colombia, Pakistan, Austria, United Arab Emirates, Israel, Saudi Arabia, Vietnam, Uruguay, Chile, Egypt, Lebanon, Czech Republic, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Luxembourg, Iceland, Lithuania, Kuwait, Venezuela, Latvia, Yugoslavia, Sri Lanka, Qatar, Jordan, Croatia, Russian Federation, Cyprus, Costa Rica, Republic of Korea, Slovenia, and Greece

This list is in the order that it appears on my tracking site. To view the number of unique visitors from each country go here.

I would like to take the time now to thank everyone that has visited my site. If you are visiting from another country, feel free to post a comment and give a shout out.

The new Bond, James Bond.

2005-11-26T01:06:00.000-06:00

I don't know if this is verified. I haven't been able to find anything about it anywhere else. On KVET 98.1's RateTheMusic Site there was a mini-article about how R&B star Usher wants to be the first black man to play James Bond.

I'm able to accept a blond James Bond ala Daniel Craig. He did exceptionally well in L4YER CAKE. I can accept him as James Bond namely because he is British. Usher, however, was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee.

That's all we need is a guy like Usher playing James Bond. If I were to have to recommend a black actor to take the part of 007, it would have to be someone like Morgan Freeman. Freeman is a distinguished actor who could bring something to the role that Usher or those of his ilk never could: class. Remember James Bond isn't just cool, he's classy, he's suave and debonair. He does not role up to Monte Carlo casinos in a Cadillac with spinners on the wheels!!

I sincerely hope that the Broccoli family treats the franchise right. Sean Connery started something great. Roger Moore carried the torch for too long. Timothy Dalton took the life out of it. But Pierce Brosnan brought it back from the dead and did so with style. Don't screw it up!

Gamers are people too.

2005-11-21T23:13:00.000-06:00

I want to apologize to anyone who saw tonight's (Nov. 21, 2005) episode of CSI: Miami. While normally, this is a great show and generally very real and accurate, tonight they created a picture of videogamers that I think will only reinforce the already negative image associated with gamers. To spoil the plot, what happened was that several college students were using a video game as the basis of their criminal activity. It turns out that the writer/developer of the game was providing weapons to help them out in order to boost sales of the game: "Urban Hell Raisers".

Unfortunately, thanks to people like Jack Thompson, this has become a widespread fear for many people. Reports that criminals had copies of certain games leads to a media frenzy about whether the video game was the cause of violence and speculations that criminals may be using video games as "trainers" abound. Let me se something straight here. Video Games Do NOT cause violence. Violence is something inherent within each and every person. It has to be. Humans did not evolve to become the top of the food chain by being pacifists. Humans had to fight in order to be where we are. Individuals however may not necessarily be inclined towards violence, and human society in general is not violent, but we all have violence within ourselves. Some people more than others have a very thin layer of civility separating them from being violent while others may take a lot to get to that core. What's more is that some either cannot or chose not to distinguish fantasy from reality. However, these are preexisting conditions. Yes, video games may be the catalyst for some people to behave violently, but for others they are the a means of escaping where they can act out aggresive fantasies in non-harmful ways.

Video games are not the problem. People are the problem. Individuals who cannot or will not distinguish reality from make beleive.

Justice upheld!

2005-11-17T17:33:00.000-06:00

Check this out. Sheehan, et al were ordered to pay $75 for protesting without a permit outside the White House. Next time file your paperwork ahead of time instead of crying and backpedaling later.
Sheehan says that they "weren't demonstrating" but trying to deliver petitions to the President. Sheehan maintains that she is still entitled to a meeting with the President. The only thing that I have to say to that is that if teh President stopped and met with every crackpot who wanted to talk to him a). He would never get anything done, and b). It would be a security nightmare.

The picture used above is from http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20051117/ap_on_re_us/peace_mom.

To all of those who think that civil disobedience is hip, cool, trendy, etc. I would like to refer you to Maddox.XMission.com and his stance:

Neither of these picture were used with permission.

What Makes A Good Video Game

2005-11-13T21:40:00.000-06:00

I've been a gamer for nearly all of my life. I remember having my Atari system and loving it. Then I remember being wowed as I guided an Italian plumber across the screen when I got my first nintendo. But what really got me into gaming was computer games. Ever since I first got on the Internet when I was in the 3rd grade (about 1989), I've been into computer games. So, now, despite all of the controversy surrounding video games, I thought that I would write about what I think makes a good video game.

1. Mods. Your game must have the capability to be easily modded and to have those mods easy to play. For reference, check out the Half-Life Series. These games have spawned some of the best mods in the industry. Cuonter-Strike is an all time favorite. What's more is that you can easily play any of the mods for this series with minimal frustration.

2. Decent Graphics I understand that at every time a game is released there is only so much that computers can do. That being said, the developers need to make sure that the game looks decent and makes full use of the possibilty of what is possible. Too many time have I been disappointed by games whose screen shots look nice but the gameplay fails to live up to the hype.

This isn't a comprehensive list, but something that I will update soon.

Video Games Don't Cause Violence...

2005-10-18T10:25:00.000-05:00

I'm glad to see that there are some people who will stand up against the tide of groups targeting the wrong people in the whole video games/violence issue. The problem is that not matter what label you put on the box, there will still be a way for kids to get to the material. The issue here is not whether or not the video game makers are producing violent or sexually explicit video games, but what parents are doing to prevent their kids from getting to them.

I, personally, like violent video games. I have liked "shooters" from the first time that I played Duck Hunt. It was my choice to play those video games and my parents choice to let me. If a parent doesn't want their child to play violent video games, then there is a two-pronged approach that they need to take. First, obviously, they should not buy or rent violent video games for their children, nor allow their children to do so. Second, they need to tell the parents of their child's friends that their child is not allowed to play those types of games when they are visiting that child's house. This is a simple, yet effective solution to the dilemma of video games & violence. Why hasn't this worked though? It hasn't worked because it requires parents to actually be parents and take interest in what their children are doing, rather than just blame the video game industry.

The video game industry makes billions of dollars a year from the sale of video games, video game systems, and related products. They don't make all of this money from Mary Kate & Ashley Olsen's "Sweet 16" video game sales. They make it from the 16 - 25 year old male demographic that buys typically violent video games.

To all of the people out there that want to outlaw violent video games I have this question: "What do you plan to do for all of the people that lose their jobs when you outlaw violent video games?" also "How are you going to stop the gaming community from making their own 'mods' and 'total conversions'?"

Step up and be a parent, don't blame gamers because you don't take care of your kids.

The Exorcism of Emily Rose

2005-10-03T20:51:00.000-05:00

If you get the chance, then go see The Exorcism of Emily Rose. This movie kicks the shit out The Exorcist. The movie centers around the trial of Father Moore and presents the prosecution's Medical arguments of what was happening to Emily as well as the defense's Spiritual arguments. This movie was the first in a long time that genuinely scared me.

For a listing of The Roman Ritual of Exorcism go here.

I give this movie 4 ½ stars.
[* * * * ½]

I don't normally post stuff like this...

2005-10-03T20:48:00.000-05:00

This was posted on my myspace.com bulletin board. I thought that I would go ahead and post it here too. I added the title about what he tries to do to you.

He really tries to fuck you over...
PAY ATTENTION TO THE P.S. at the end!!

A LETTER TO YOU FROM SATAN

I saw you yesterday as you began your daily chores. You awoke without kneeling to pray. As a matter of fact, you didn't even bless your meals, or pray before going to bed last night. You are so unthankful, I like that about you. I cannot tell you how glad I am that you have not changed your way of living, Fool, you are mine. Remember,you and I have been going steady for years and I still don't love you yet. As a matter of fact, I hate you, because I hate God. I am only using you to get even with God. He kicked me out of heaven, and I'm going to use you as long as possible to pay him back.

You see, Fool, GOD LOVES YOU and HE has great plans in store for you. But you have yielded your life to me, and I'm going to make your life a living hell. That way, we'll be together twice. This will really hurt God. Thanks to you, I'm really showing Him who's boss in your life with all of the good times we've had. We have been watching dirty movies, cursing people out, stealing, lying, being hypocritical, fornicating, overeating, telling dirty jokes, gossiping, being judgmental, back stabbing people, disrespecting adults, and those in leadership positions, no respect for the Church, bad attitudes.

SURELY you don't want to give all this up.

Come on, Fool, let's burn together forever. I've got some hot plans for us. This is just a letter of appreciation from me to you.
I'd like to say "THANKS" for letting me use you for most of your
foolish life. You are so gullible, I laugh at you. When you are tempted to sin, you give in HA HA HA, you make me sick.

Sin is beginning to take it's toll on your life. You look 20 years older, and now, I need new blood. So go ahead and teach some children how to sin. All you have to do is smoke, get drunk or drink while under-aged, cheat, gamble, gossip, fornicate and live being as selfish as possible. Do all of this in the presence of children and they will do it too. Kids are like that. Well, Fool, I have to let you go for now. I'll be back in a couple of
seconds to tempt you again. If you were smart, you would run
somewhere, confess you sins, and live for God with what little bit of life that you have left. It's not my nature to warn anyone, but to be your age and still sinning, it's becoming a bit ridiculous.

Don't get me wrong, I still hate you.

IT'S JUST THAT YOU'D MAKE A BETTER FOOL FOR CHRIST.

P.S. If you love me, you won't share this

Funny pic from another site.

2005-09-19T13:59:00.000-05:00

For some reason I think that this is funny. Possibly because one of my career goals is to join a S.W.A.T. team. Thanks to the guys at Big-Boys.com for posting stuff like this.

Women love me, Flames fear me.

2005-09-19T13:43:00.000-05:00

I finally got all of my gear for South Hays Fire Department. I can now go on all of the fire and 10-50 (car wreck) calls that we get, instead of just the medical calls. I now spend Tuesday and Thursday nights as well as at least one night of the weekend at Station 1.

Bewitched beSucked

2005-06-26T19:23:00.000-05:00

I urge everyone to please ignore those pangs of nostalgia and to not go see the Bewitched movie. 41 years after the original series debuted on TV, movie producers at Sony Pictures are trying to capitalize on that nostalgia by bringing you a movie that reeks from Will Ferrell's overacting. I think that the reason why he was so popular on Saturday Night Live was because you only got him in small doses. Sitting through an hour and forty minutes of Will Ferrell's immature and puerile acting is too much. This was a great opportunity for Ferrel to show that he can do comedy without resorting to loud, obnoxious physical humor, but once again we are left with the same old schtick. Sitting through this movie felt like sitting through a skit on SNL that wasn't going anywhere and wouldn't end.

On the other hand, Nicole Kidman performed wonderfully. She lent credibility to her character and was believable. I think that this shows that you just can't put a great actor with a mediocre one and expect great things. Other actors can only lift you so far.

I give this movie 2 ½ stars.
[* * ½]

Government interjections into marriage.

2005-06-24T10:20:00.000-05:00

There is a prevailing opinion among several members of our society who feel that they are being disenfranchised by our government wanting to define what constitutes a marriage. This opinion is that the government should not regulate marriage at all and that there should be no interference within marriages by the government.

I think that this is a very interesting stance to take. Especially, since that was the rationale used to justify the spousal privilege of not being compelled to testify against your wife/husband. It was believed that testifying against one's spouse undermined the integrity and value of families. A certain group of people benefited greatly from this privilege: the mafia.

One of the other consequences of having a society where the government does not interfere with marriages is that no one could be prosecuted for spousal abuse anymore. If a woman or a man reported to a peace officer that their spouse physically assaulted them, that peace officer (under the mentality that the government should not interfere) would not pursue any action against the offending spouse.

This is not a hypothetical situation that is being described here. This is not the paranoid fantasies of someone who is seeing the worst possible outcome of future decisions. This actually happened. Peace officers refused to bring action against spousal abusers because of the belief that the government should not interfere with or regulate marriages.

Unfortunately, we are often too short-sighted to see the ramifications of obtaining what we want. The best course of action is moderation and negotiation with concessions on both sides.

Rated "I" for Idiots

2005-05-24T22:51:00.000-05:00

I'm not going to say that downloading movies is right or that it should be tolerated. I'm just going to say that some people do it. Others of us have moved beyond that and appreciate our DVD collections. I'm pretty sure that all of you have seen one of the many commercials that the Motion Picture Asssociation of America has put out, ranging from "look who you are hurting" to "we know where you sleep at night." I'm fine with this. That's their right to produce these things, I'll even put up with seeing them before the previews to the movie I'm about to watch at the theater. But I'll be damned if I'm going to have to put up with this crap in my own home! I recently purchased a copy of Spaceballs on DVD. Read that line again. I purchased a copy of the DVD. When I got home, I popped the DVD into the player and sat down, prepared to laugh myself silly. What I got before I could get to the menu screen, was some insipid commercial from the M.P.A.A. trying to use Fisher Price psychology to explain that "downloading movies = stealing movies." I think that this is entirely the wrong place to have these commercials. I bought the DVD. I shouldn't have to even put up with this.

I decided to do a little looking around on the MPAA website when I started writing this article. As it turns out, the MPAA is not the great guardian of cinema everywhere that they purport themselves to be. They aren't looking out for the little guy. It says right in the about section of their website that they describe themselves as:

"...leader and advocate for major producers and distributors of entertainment programming for television, cable, home video and future delivery systems not yet imagined."

Who is on their board of directors?

the Chairmen and Presidents of the seven major producers and distributors of motion picture and television programs in the United States. These members include:

Buena Vista Pictures Distribution;(The Walt Disney Company)
Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc.;
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Studios Inc.;
Paramount Pictures Corporation;
Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation;
Universal City Studios LLLP; and
Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.

These aren't your avaerge independent filmmakers. Even the initial goal of the organization was to "...stem the waves of criticism of American movies..." The MPA is the international arm of the MPAA. According to the same section of the website, their goal is to basically protect American movie interests abroad.

The MPA was formed in 1945 in the aftermath of World War II to reestablish Americanfilms in the world market, and to respond to the rising tide of protectionism resulting in barriers aimed at restricting the importation of American films.

This doesn't really sound like an organization that is interested helping to foster film making in general. Whatever their motivations are, I want them to stop putting the commercials in my DVD's. I bought the movie, now leave me alone!

Star Wars Episode 3: Revenge of the Sith

2005-05-17T22:52:00.000-05:00

*Spoilers Warning*

Tonight I saw a sneak preview for Star Wars Episode 3: Revenge of the Sith. I'm going to give away the biggest spoiler right here at the beginning and get it out of the way. *Anakin Skywaler turns into Darth Vader* Now that that is out of the way, let's move on.

The movie was ok. It had everything that you could want in a Star Wars movie: lightsaber duels, space battles, love, hate, and little kids getting mowed down by a badass with a lightsaber. I guess this is nitpicking, but some of the things didn't seem as realistic as they did in the other movies, and some things seemed like they went to the Star Wars section of MovieBloopers.com and tried to fix any continuity errors that they could find. Overall, the movie felt like George Lucas was tying a big ol' bow on the entire franchise so that he could hand it over to the fans and tell them to freaking leave him alone.

There are not a few fans of the franchise who frowned upon the whole love-story angle of Episode 2. Well, guess what? It's back and bigger than ever. And you know what else? It should be there. Some people whined and complained about Padme and Anakin being in love. What other motivation would he have for hating the rest of the galaxy unless he killed the woman that he loved? Oops, there's another spoiler for you.

My best recommendation to you is to go out and read the book. Matthew Stover wrote the novelization of Episode 3 and did an excellent job of it. Plus, it gives the reader a lot more insight into the motivations of the characters and why they did particular things.

I give this movie 3 1/2 *'s out of 5.

Self Defense Class for Men

2005-05-11T15:53:00.001-05:00

I decided to write up a quick little self defense guide for the guys. I hope that this helps you in future conflicts. Enjoy.

In the event that you are in a fight...
Step 1: Apply your knuckes to opponents face vigorously.
Step 2: If needed, repeat Step 1.

Congratulations, you are now ready to defend yourself.

Do you know where your towel is?

2005-05-02T10:30:00.000-05:00

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy movie definitely follows the spirit of the book, even if it doesn't follow the letter of the book. The scenes depicting entries from the Guide, were particularly hilarious. They were animated and had this 50's feel to them. The only part of the movie that truly left something to be desired was the opening. There was a big musical number entitled "So Long, and Thanks For All the Fish" that, while it did reference the 4th book in the series, left something to be desired.

If you have not read the book first, then don't go see this movie. That is probably said about every book-to-movie production, but this one actually requires the viewer to have some knowledge of the subject. Otherwise, they are completely lost.

To read more of my thoughts on the subject, check out this earlier post.

More interesting internet stuff.

2005-04-10T02:33:00.000-05:00

I figure that sufficient time has passed that I can share this with you readers. Also, since I still haven't been zapped by a bolt of lightning from God, I think that it's a good sign. On September 14th of 2004, I became an ordained minister. Yep, weird ol' me is a minister with the Universal Life Church out of Modesto, California. I did this through their website: www.ulc.net. Why did I do it? Who knows. It's one of those intersting things that you find on the internet. I even recieved a confirmation email. I could have had them send me a certificate, but that would have actually cost money. What am I going to do with this? I don't know, but as my friend says, I can now "marry 'em and bury 'em."

Red ink isn't making the grade anymore.

2005-04-08T10:00:00.000-05:00

According to an article at CNN.com, parents at several schools are upset that teachers are grading student papers in red ink. One of these "feeling police" parents said that the red ink was "stressful." Let me advise the reader here that we aren't talking about high school or college students here. We're talking about elementary school kids. What kind of person thinks that their 7 year old kid has anything to be stressed about. Stress, I'll remind you is defined by the American Heritage Dictionary defines stress as:

A mentally or emotionally disruptive or upsetting condition occurring in response to adverse external influences and capable of affecting physical health, usually characterized by increased heart rate, a rise in blood pressure, muscular tension, irritability, and depression.

Traffic jams cause stress. Your significant other causes stress. Your job causes stress. Red marks on a paper in an elementary school do not cause stress.

I have a question for all of these "touchy-feely, crusading" parents. How do you expect for your child to learn from their mistakes if they are not pointed out to them? What is the easiest way for anyone to exchange false ideas for the truth? To have those false ideas expressed and then confronted by the truth. John Stuart Mill said this years ago in his essay "On Liberty."

But the peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is, that it is robbing the human race; posterity as well as the existing generation; those who dissent from the opinion, still more than those who hold it. If the opinion is right, they are deprived of the opportunity of exchanging error for truth: if wrong, they lose, what is almost as great a benefit, the clearer perception and livelier impression of truth, produced by its collision with error.

We are not helping these kids by sheilding them from their mistakes, we are only hurting them. The only reason that I was able to turn in any type of paper worth reading throughout my school career is because my mother would edit my papers for me. Those things came back with so much red ink on them that I thought some one had cut themselves and then used my paper for target
practice with the arterial spray. The parents of these kids should take less interest in what color is being used to edit and grade these papers and more interest in actually helping their kids to develop their writing skills. My question is what is going to happen to these kids 20 years down the line when they are expected to produce results and they have a manager who doesn't care how they feel as long as they are profitable to the company?

Sabrage

2005-04-04T10:50:00.000-05:00

Anyone who has read Maxim magazine is aware of the section called "How to do anything." This section of the magazine contains usually step by step advice on how to do anything from build a pole for girls to dance on in your living room to how to break up a fight. They are accompanied by either humorous photographs or drawings to help visualize what you are doing. While not exhaustive or detailed by any means, they do give the reader enough of an idea of how something is done to let them decide whether or not they would like to get more infomation to pursue such a goal.

In one of the recent issues, they had an article on a technique called "Sabrage." Apparently, this is a technique that Napoleon's soliders used to open bottles of chapagne while on horseback. It involves using a sabre to knock off the glass ring, or "annulus," at the top of the bottle where the cork is located. I was so intrigued by this, that I wanted to learn more about it. That's when I found this website. Apparently, there are entire clubs devoted to this. Luckily, they also include a tutorial on how to do this.

So, I went to the store and bought a bottle of cheap champagne to try this out. And, much to my surprise, it was successful. I'll inlcude a picture of the annulus that I knocked off of the bottle. I used a U.S. Marine Corps NCO saber when I tried it.

I highly recommend this to anyone who wants to impress people at a party.

This post was originally concieved of on Dec. 15th, 2004.

Euphemisms

2005-04-04T10:20:00.000-05:00

At the risk of sounding like comedian George Carlin, I'm going to go off today on one particular euphemism that I think isn't really doing anybody any good.

The American Heritage Dictionary defines Euphemism as:

The act or an example of substituting a mild, indirect, or vague term for one considered harsh, blunt, or offensive: “Euphemisms such as ‘slumber room’... abound in the funeral business” (Jessica Mitford).

Harsh, blunt, or offensive. In otherwords, we have to play nicely and not tell people what they need to know, the truth. To some people, euphmisms are a way of "softening the blow" that the truth brings. To me, it's a way of hiding behing vague and distorting language.

The particular euphemism that I have a problem with is one that you see on personal ads all of the time. Full-Figured. What the hell is going on here? There used to be a time where people were "fat." Then they went to being "plus sizes." Now they are "full-figured." When did this start? Unless you are missing a part of your body that you were born with, such as an arm or leg or eye, then you are full figured. You have all of your parts. You're not missing anything. Your figure isn't half or three-quarters, it's full. However, if when you stand in the shower, your body reaches from the shower curtain to the wall, you are fat. Get over it. Go out and run. Put the twinky down. And for sake of preserving what little strength the English language has, stop weakening it with these euphemisms just to guard your ego.

Colorado professor should keep comments to himself.

2005-03-27T22:00:00.000-06:00

I know it's been a while, but I was reading about this and I couldn't refrain from commenting on this. As I'm sure that most of you are already aware, there is a professor from Colorado University that is in hot water right now for some comments that he made about the World Trade Center attacks. To be more specific he referred to the people inside thos ebuildings as "Little Eichmanns" and that the punishment was "befitting their participation" in "braying, incessantly and self-importantly, into their cell phones, arranging power lunches and stock transactions, each of which translated, conveniently out of sight, mind and smelling distance, into the starved and rotting flesh of infants."

I didn't make this up. If you want to read the entire text of the article it can be found at DarkNightPress.com.

The article, which first appeared in Pockets of Resistance #11, Sept. 2001, seems to focus around the WTC attacks as being the results of U.S. actions in Iraq. He says that these are all the results of various "surgical bombings" and other U.S. military actions that led to the sufferings and deaths of "500,000 kids."

What's more is that he blames the U.S. public for this saying that we did nothing to stop this because:

"There were, after all, far more pressing things than the unrelenting misery/death of a few hundred thousand Iraqi tikes to be concerned with. Getting "Jeremy" and "Ellington" to their weekly soccer game, for instance, or seeing to it that little "Tiffany" an[sic] "Ashley" had just the right roll-neck sweaters to go with their new cords. And, to be sure, there was the yuppie holy war against ashtrays – for "our kids," no less – as an all-absorbing point of political focus."

Well, sorry Mr. Churchill. In 1993, it just so happens that I wasn't old enough to vote. And you know what else? I'm sure that some of the people inside those towers also weren't old enough to vote at that time. In fact, there were day cares in the towers for the parents who were working there. If it hadn't been for the effort of several innocent and truly courageous people, then at least 28 children, probably more would have been killed in those attacks. And isn't this what your article is all about? The children?

And as to your allegations, Mr. Churchill, that the American public is too caught up in itself to worry about what happens in the rest of the world, I would like to ask youwhat you are doing to make the world a better place? You're a professor at a college in the midwest. I'd like to see how many of those ½ million children that you did anything to help. Or is the indignance that you feel, the result of your guilt over having done nothing for your life to help anyone but yourself out? I'd like to remind the reader that Mr. Churchill is a tenured professor at a major college and therefore likely has his Ph.D. Therefore, it can be inferred that while he may not be rich, he isn't living ina carboard box on the street either.

I have to apologize. This shouldn't degrade into attacks against Mr. Churchill. I just don't see the same connections that you do. Even Mr. Churchill himself said that his work that was published wasn't exactly thought out.

"The preceding was a "first take" reading, more a stream-of-consciousness interpretive reaction to the September 11 counterattack than a finished piece on the topic. Hence, I'll readily admit that I've been far less than thorough, and quite likely wrong about a number of things."

He then goes on to criticize the U.S. for almost every war that it has been in.

I know that this is heard very often in this country from polemics on either side but I think that this is a case where it truely fits. Mr. Churchill, if you don't like the United States that much, then why don't you just leave?

Interesting Things Over at Drudge.com

2005-03-27T21:30:00.000-06:00

I was reading an article over at Drudge.com. The article by Thom Hartmann is entitled: Young People: The Key To Republican Single-Party Rule. It was about younger people and how the Republicans are trying to get them to vote for Republican candidates. Or, at least, that's what I thought it was about. It's actually a piece of rhetoric about the Social Security issue and how "big, bad Republicans" are trying to spin things so that they benefit them and so that the younger crowd of voters will vote Republican because they are being fooled.

Wake up! Spin works both ways. I seem to remember that during the months leading up to the 2004 election, there was a lot of advertising on MTV and other youth oriented programs by Rock the Vote. An almost blatantly partisan group to urge younger people to vote. All that you had to do was look at their website to know who they were rooting for. Besides, which party do younger voters typically vote for? Democrats.

So why are people in a huff that the Republican party is trying to rally more younger voters to their cause? Your guess is as good as mine. I, for one, think that it's great that the Republican party is showing younger people that politics does affect them. We need to be more aware of what is going on around us. As for spin, that's for everyone to sift through for themselves. If you need a big, loud yelling radio host or a big, loud movie editor to give you your views, then it's your own fault.

Just remember what Aristotle said:

"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it."

Romeo And Juliet - with commentary

2005-02-24T14:19:00.000-06:00

Simply because, as my friend Kailash says, I'm "weird," have I decided to share this joke with you. I came up with this during whichever English class in high school I had to read Romeo and Juliet in. I know that this is not an exact replication of what was said in the "window" scene, but it's close enough and damnit it's funny! This is what Romeo thinks in response to Juliet's famous monologue.

[Juliet] O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo?

[Romeo] Down here in the bushes.

[Juliet] Deny thy father and refuse thy name...

[Romeo] I can't. He'd cut off my allowance.

[Juliet] 'Tis but thy name that is my enemy...What's in a name?

[Romeo] Uhh... letters?

[Juliet] that which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet;

[Romeo] Probably, but it wouldn't sell as well at Valentines Day.

[Juliet] Romeo would, by any other name, still not be Romeo.

[Romeo] No. He'd be Bill or Bob or Jack.

Well, that's enough silliness for now. Shakespeare is probably rolling over in his grave right now because of what I've done to his work.

Non-Risk Aversive Personality

2005-02-18T10:54:00.000-06:00

The title of this post has been used to describe me more than once. I can see why. On Thursday I piloted an aircraft for the first time. It was one of these:

Cessna 152. Picture courtesy of AeroTraderOnline.Com.

This is a Cessna 152 single propeller airplane. The cockpit on it is smaller than the front seat of a Honda. I was able to taxi the airplane, take off, and do several turns, climbs, and dives. I have to say that it was ana amazing experience for me. I think that I'm hooked. If I could, I would fly every day.

That's only part of something larger. I love doing things if there is a certain amount of risk involved. And every time that I do, I am reminded, by my mother, of the time when she caught me walking out into the back yard with a sheet in my hands because I was going to parachute off of the roof. There is a saying that I try to live my life by:

"The goal of life's journey is not to arrive at the grave safely in a well preserved body, but rather to skid in sideways, totally worn out, shouting "...holy shit...what a ride!"

This is my motto and I try to live up to it as well as I can. Don't be afraid of what life has to offer. Take it and run. Try new things, expand your horizons, but most importantly live life. Don't just coast along, get in the driver's seat and head somewhere that you have never been.

And so, with that being said, I would like to leave you with the words of a famous poem:

High Flight

Oh! I have slipped the surly bonds of earth
And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;
Sunward I've climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth
Of sun-split clouds - and done a hundred things
You have not dreamed of - wheeled and soared and swung
High in the sunlit silence. Hov'ring there
I've chased the shouting wind along, and flung
My eager craft through footless halls of air.
Up, up the long delirious, burning blue,
I've topped the windswept heights with easy grace
Where never lark, or even eagle flew -
And, while with silent lifting mind I've trod
The high untresspassed sanctity of space,
Put out my hand and touched the face of God.

Pilot Officer Gillespie Magee
No 412 squadron, RCAF
Killed 11 December 1941

B.C. & A.D. vs. B.C.E. & C.E.

2005-02-14T10:28:00.000-06:00

Today, I'm going to take some time to rip into the academes of the world. Specifically, the ones that thought that it was a great idea to shift from using the initials B.C. & A.D. to using the perfunctory B.C.E. & C.E. For those of you who do not know, B.C. stands for Before Christ and A.D. is Anno Domini, which means "Year of our Lord." Whoever these liberal softies are that didn't want anyone offended by that, chose to change it to Before the Common Era (B.C.E.) and subsequently Common Era (C.E.).

A little background on the whole BC/AD numbering system. According to Wikipedia.org.

"in 525, the Anno Domini system was invented, which counted the years of the Julian calendar from the year of Jesus' birth. The transition by the Western Christian church to the Gregorian calendar, which was promulgated in 1582, corrected seasonal errors due to an incorrect leap year system, though this correction left the numbering of the years intact."

So, we see that Christianity has had a major part in affecting how we keep our records. But I have a question to put to all of those academics and non-Christians who want to change how things have been done for nearly 1500 years. "What secular event happened and was so important 2,005 years ago that it should mark the beginning of the Common Era?" Jesus' birth was estimated to be between 7 and 4 years BC. IF you ask me, then I think that we should mark the beginning of the Common Era as when the Dark Ages ended sometime in the 14th century. Or we could possibly use the period of The Enlightenment in the 18th century. That would be a more common era than starting out the C.E. at year 1.

San Francisco messes up again. (Potentially)

2005-02-11T10:59:00.000-06:00

If you haven't heard about this, then you should. Some influential political people in San Francisco want to ban the ownership of a handgun within the city limits of the city on the bay. The proposed legislation would require handgun owners to turn over their weapons within 90 days or face penalties.

Am I hearing this correctly? San Francisco, the city that illegally issued marriage licenses to gay couples last year because they tthought that their Constitutional rights were being violated, now wants to delete the second ammendment from their city? Talk about a double standard. Let's take a quick look at that hallowed document:

Article [II.]
A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.
Link to ammendments.

I don't know about you but I think that the ammendment clearly states that the government shall not mess with the right of the people to have guns. And since the first section of the 14th ammendment also clearly states:

Article [XIV.]
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside. No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.

That means that the city of San Francisco, in the state of California cannot take away the people's right to have guns.

Now, I know that a lot of you think that the 2nd ammendment should only apply to rifles and shotguns. Hell, even Bill Barnes of the Committee to Ban Handgun Violence has been quoted as saying "We're not saying you shouldn't have a rifle or a shotgun if you want to go hunting." However I would like to remind all of you that when the Constitution and it's ammendments were ratified, the ownership of a handgun was a very common practice. I don't see anywhere in the 2nd ammendment that says "except for handguns." What I do see is "the right to keep and bear arms." That includes sidearms as well as firearms.

Any attempt to curtail this baic freedom is an attempt to curtail all freedoms and should be met with disdain and contempt.

Death of a Playwright.

2005-02-11T10:20:00.000-06:00

At the age of 89 years, playwright Arthur Miller died today. As you well know, Miller brought the world such works as "Death of A Salesman" and "The Crucible." Both of these works have been influential on American theatre and life. Besides the two major works mentioned before, Miller wrote many plays and even some fiction and non-fiction work.

Miller was also married to actress Norma Jean Mortensen, commonly known as Marilyn Monroe.

All of us have been touched by Mr. Miller's work. Maybe you had to read it for a high school or college class. Maybe, like me, you performed in a production of one of his plays. But all of us are familiar with this man and his work and we are all poorer for having lost him. God be with you Mr. Miller.

Kryptonians Rethought.

2005-02-04T23:17:00.000-06:00

As many of you who know me are aware, I am a huge fan of Superman and all that makes up this legend/mythos/whatever. That's not to say that I myself am huge, but that my enthusiasm for almost all things Superman is great. But I digress. So, when I read this I was amazed:

In most of the presentations and re-imaginations of Superman's origin, it is made clear that the Kryptonians are well aware of what effects Earth's yellow sun will have on baby Kal-El. Indeed, that's usually the excuse for why he goes there. They know he'll be "safe" because nothing can hurt him there.

And that's all well and good, but there's a problem. Kryptonians are the assholes of space. Here's some proof...

A list of Kryptonians who are assholes:

Brainiacs 1 - 13, Doomsday, Cyborg, The Eradicator, General Zod, Quex-ul, Zaora, and Preus.

A list of Kryptonians who are nice:

Sometimes Jor-El, Superman.

And Superman's only a decent guy 'cause he was raised on Earth and knew nothing of Krypton or its people for almost half his life. When Jor-El's shown to be a nice guy, then he's acting as the exception that proves the rule.

Knowing, as we do, that Kryptonians are assholes, and highly advanced in the technologies of science, and capable of making FTL spacecraft, and live in a universe with varied and diverse intelligent life in the cosmos, we have to assume they ran into other space faring beings. Doomsday's origin tends to back this up.

If anyone on Krypton had the slightest idea that the electromagnetic radiation from an G-class star would react with their physiologies to make them effectively immortal and god-like, there wouldn't be a non-yellow star in the sky. They'd have obliterated all life from the cosmos and in the process of altering every star to fuel their unholy powers, they'd probably bring about the premature heat-death of the universe.

Seems awfully convienent that one of their scientists just happened to have an interstellar craft at the ready.

A prototype for intergalactic seeding, perhaps?

If Kryptonians were smart enough to figure out this yellow sun business, then it's safe to assume their neighbors were too. And I wonder what they'd have done with this information.

Seems awfully convienent that the symptoms of Krypton's destruction came about so suddenly. Almost like it'd been triggered artificially by outside agents?

Think about it. You're an advanced civilization. You meet these xenophobic guys in goofy robes who treat you like dirt because their stardrive goes 1% faster than light than your best stuff. During some research or information exchange, you come across an odd anomaly in their DNA that has the potential to turn each of them into incarnate gods under certain, fairly common, conditions. You know that yellow stars aren't that far from their world and it's only a matter of time before they figure this out assuming they haven't already.

The sabotage of one planet for the sake of the whole universe ain't a tough decision to make.

This was written by Brian Clevinger, the man who brings us the webcomic: Nuklear Power. I think that this is a very astute observation from a very original thinker. Either that or it's a guy who has too much free time on his hands. One way or another, he has touched upon something very interesting. I don't know why, but I find something intriguing about the possibility that the Kryptonians may be the biggest bunch of bastards in the universe. Then again, maybe I have too much free time on my hands.

Tank tops?

2005-01-21T10:48:00.001-06:00

I've been thinking about this for a while. Why are they called "Tank Tops"? As you can see here...

a tank has one big turret coming out of it's top, while most women wearing a tank top, as modeled by Ms. Danielle Cagle have two things protruding from their top...

Therefore, I think that we should rename the tank top to the "Anti-Aircraft Top"...

Doesn't it have that ring to it?

U.S. Generosity

2004-12-31T13:37:00.000-06:00

As we all know, the death toll from the Tsunami is now well over 100,000 people. This event is terrible and extremely unfortunate. However, some people, (namely Jan Egeland the U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Humanitarian Affairs), have tried to paint the United States and other nations as being "stingy" in their giving for relief. Initially, the U.S. gave $35 million to help victims of the tsunami (Australia gave $27 million and Great Britain gave $62.5 million). But apparently the U.S. contribution wasn't enough for some people. *cough* *Jan Egeland* *cough* So what do we have to do now? We've pledged an additional $350 million. That brings our total up to $385 million. Great. We've pledged over 1/3rd of a billion dollars to help these people out.

However, I still have a couple of questions. Namely, how much of that "relief money" will be used to line the pockets of "officials" in the countries where aid is needed? But more importantly I ask Jan Egeland and the rest of the world where they were when Florida was hit by 3 hurricanes earlier this year? Where was the worldwide contributions to help the victims of that natural disaster? Or is there a double standard? Do American disaster victims not rank as high as other victims around the world? Where are we supposed to get this money from? Does it grow on trees?

The rest of the world expects the United States to bleed money. They expect for us to open up our national checkbook every time something shitty happens somewhere. Well guess what? Israel alone receives $662 million dollars in Economic Aid from the U.S.! That also doesn't account for all of the military supplies and other things that we send to them. In the year 2003 alone, we gave $2.7395 billion dollars in aid to the rest of the God-damned world! How can you people even begin to call us stingy? It makes me want to puke.

Random Survey

2004-12-17T09:46:00.000-06:00

You know I'm hot, just tell me already!

I saw this on one of my friend's IM away messages. So I answered her version of the survey. now, she's apparently pissed off at me. Go figure. I mean, it's called BLUNT TRUTH. What did you expect? A spin-off of High Times?

Don't ask the questions if you don't want to know the answers.

Enzyte

2004-12-10T13:17:00.000-06:00

Ever notice how some companies will take oldies songs and use portions of them to promote their products? Well, I was thinking the other day and I came up with the perfect oldies song for Enzyte. (You know, the penis pills.)

The song would be the Four Seasons' "Stay".
You could have the music play and then have the vocals come in on the line "Just a little bit longer." Then, fade out the vocals and have the announcer talk some more. Then you bring up the vocals on the lines "Now, your Daddy don't mind; and your Momma don't mind." Fade out vocals. After the announcer promotes the product and dances all around the issue of what it actually does, you could bring up vocals on the line "Won't you say you love me all of the tii-i-i-i-i-i-ime." Then just repeat "Just a little bit longer" as needed.

I have too much free time on my hands.

Parenting

2004-12-06T15:42:00.000-06:00

I don't have kids. The problem that I find is that anyone can have a kid. There are no rules or guidelines about parenting. Oh sure, you have some laws that say that you can't abuse or neglect your kid. But it still amazes me to no end that people are required to take a competency test to operate a motor vehicle, but are allowed to raise children with no education, experience, or guidelines. And we all know that raising a child is infinitely harder than driving a car. (You can't put parenting on cruise control.)

Therefore, I would like to propose that there be either state or nationally mandated educational classes for all parents who are pregnant or have had a child within the past year. The classes would incorporate basic home economics, including but not limited to: Balancing a checkbook and the effective use of funds, basic culinary skills, basic nutrition, child psychology, basic child-rearing techniques (survey course of different methods), and effective communication techniques (both with your child and with other family members).

Balancing a Checkbook/Effective use of Funds
This course would guide parents and parents-to-be in basic economics. This is not talking about the Gross Domestic Product. This is guiding people in how to effectively manage their paycheck so that they do not accumulate more debt than they can handle. It would advise people of the pitfalls of credit cards and how easy it is to get in debt with them.

Basic Culinary Skills
This course would teach people how to cook basic meals for a family. It would include all the necessary skills to be able to cook simple, low cost food for your family. Some of the parts of the course would include portion management (how to cook just the right amount), stove-top skills, using a microwave for more than just T.V. dinners, etc.

Basic Nutrition
This course would go hand in hand with the cooking course. It would be a guide for choosing foods that meet your families nutritional requirements.

Child Psychology
This would be a very basic course in how children think and act. The goal would be to give parents and potential parents an idea of why their child acts they way that they do.

Basic Child-Rearing Techniques (Survey Course)
This would range from changing diapers to helping with homework. This course would give people practice in the necessary skills required for raising a child. Also covered in this course would be different methods of raising a child. (Spanking vs. Timeout, etc.)

Effective Communication Techniques
This course outlines how to be able to better communicate with your child and family without resorting to yelling and screaming. Also included would be effective tips for disarming hostile situations that could lead to yelling. This course would probably be helpful in reducing the number of divorces every year.

One problem that I can foresee is scheduling. How do you fit all of these classes in with a job? That will be a difficulty in the early years of the licensing process. The solution is to incorporate the classes into the required courses for high school students. Once the student has completed the courses, then he or she will be given their license and allowed to have children.

Now I know that this will not cure all of the problems that our society has, but it will enable our parents to be more prepared for the arduous task of bringing up a well-rounded, polite child in today's world.

I give up.

2004-12-03T10:11:00.000-06:00

I give up on women. I'm tired of constantly having my heart stomped on. Hey, I've been living a celibate life (not by choice) for some time now, why not make it my decision? I'm thoroughly burned out on the whole process. I'm not just going to stop looking for a relationship, I'm going to start actively avoiding any type of relationship. Maybe I'll go back to being the "Mr. Stoic" that I was in high school. We'll see.

I've been told that it's when you stop looking that you find someone. Yeah, you find them, become smitten, then they go off with someone else. No thank you. I can do without that.

I'm not bitter because I'm single, quite the opposite.

I think that I'm going to get a Vasectomy.

2004-12-02T14:04:00.000-06:00

Last night I saw something so horrible that it made me want to never procreate. If you have never seen Fox's show Nanny 911, then count yourself lucky. This is a show where Nannys are called into homes where the parents have no control over their children. Then, within a week, the Nanny turns the entire family around and they are one big happy entity.

The only problem? I wanted to give those brats an ass-whooping of Biblical proportions only 5 minutes into the program. For Christ's sake, how can you let your kids get this bad? This program is the most effective form of birth control that I have ever come across. watching this show for the limited amount of time that I did only made me want to go get a vasectomy. That way, I won't have to ever deal with that particular form of hell.

Happy National Civilization Steamroller Day!!

2004-11-25T09:00:00.000-06:00

Just think, if the Native Americans (or at least more native than we are) had realized how much they were gonna get screwed by us being here, things might be very different. I'm thankful that the Natives didn't look at the beads in their hands as they were paddling away from Manhattan Island and decide to scalp everyone that didn't have a tan. Oh well, progress is progress.

Advice needed.

2004-11-24T16:15:00.000-06:00

I need some advice on what could be a life changing decision. Thanks in advance guys.

I've suspected for some time now that my girlfriend has been having an affair. The usual signs. Phone rings, I answer, someone hangs up. She started going out 'with the girls' a lot recently although when I ask which girls it is always "Just some friends from work, you don't know them". I always look out for her taxi coming home but she always walks down the drive although I can hear a car setting off. As if she has got out of the car round the corner. Why? Is it not a taxi? I once picked her mobile up just to see what time it was and she went beserk and screamed that I should never touch her phone again and why was I checking up on her.

Anyway, I have never approached the subject with my girlfriend. I think deep down I just didn't want to know the truth but last night she went out again and I decided to check on her. I decided I was going to hide behind my car which would give me a view of the whole street so I could see which car she gets out of. It was whilst crouched behind my car that I noticed rust around my rear wheel arch.

Should I take it into a garage or should I buy some stuff from the local AutoZone and try to repair it myself?

New Pilgrims?

2004-11-24T16:00:00.000-06:00

As we all know, the first settlers of America were rejects from England. To paraphrase Robin Williams: The puritans were too uptight, even for the British. So what did the Brits do? They kicked 'em out.

Flash forward to the present day. We have a bunch of people, mostly über-Christians, who are trying to censor everything. The whole Janet-Jackson boob incident? Need I say more? Now, I'm not trying to bash on all Christians, just the ones who can't live without inflicting themselves and their way of life on other people.

I guess the question that I'm getting at here is: Do you think that we will have another puritanical-type deportation? Will enough people get fed-up with having to deal with this stuff that we round them all up and send them packing? Maybe.

P.S. - The best way to evangelize? Just be as good a Christian as you can be. Don't go shoving it in other people's faces. Trust me, they'll see what you are doing.

Machinima

2004-11-23T17:00:00.000-06:00

I recently came across something called "Machinima." Apparently, this is the using of video game engines to create short movies. The word Machinima is a combination of the word "Machine" and either "cinema" or "animation." According to the entry on Wikipedia.org, Machinima may have gotten started in the "late 1970s and early 1980s."

I encourage everyone to go to Rooster Teeth Productions and check out Red vs. Blue and The Strangerhood. Red Vs. Blue is made using the Microsoft videogame Halo and now also Halo 2. It's a very funny series that is well done. (Actually something more along the lines of medium rare.) The only problem is that the series is on a rolling archive. This means that not all of the videos are available at the same time. However, there are several sites, such as RedVsBlue.net that host all of the episodes at once. Incidentally, RedVsBlue.net also is the home of a homage to the Red Vs. Blue series called: Sponsors Vs. Freeloaders. The Strangerhood is a machinima made using the Sims 2 videogame.

Go check out the great work that these people are doing.

2004-11-23T16:53:00.000-06:00

I saw this and thought that it looked amazing.

Santa Clause and Buddha

2004-11-23T13:03:00.000-06:00

This is an idea that came from my friend Daisy. Yes, the same guy who came up with the Personal Reality Deceleration Device. We were sitting around the other day talking about the holidays and he told me his thoughts on Santa Clause. I have basically gotten the gist of them here:

Santa Clause is Buddha for Christians. He's a big, fat guy who we welcome into our houses and present with food. Also, Santa Clause, like Buddha, tells us to just be good to one another. We're rewarded when we're good and punished when we are bad.

Yes, I know that this is not an exhaustive proof. Yes, I know that there are several "holes" in this theory. Guess what? It's a joke. Take it as such.

Funny stuff that you can find on the Internet

2004-11-16T15:20:00.000-06:00

This was originally posted on The Chaser News. The emphasis on the title and the last line are mine. Enjoy:

Teen's dying wish for Cameron Diaz blow job not granted
PHILADELPHIA, Monday: The parents of 15-year-old leukaemia patient Josh Morten, who last night passed away after a four year battle with the illness, said they were sorry not to have fulfilled his dying wish to get a blow job from Cameron Diaz.

The courageous teenager told his family two months ago that the one thing he'd really like before he died was to be sucked off by the successful Hollywood actress and former model.

"Josh never asked for much," his father confided. "He never complained about his illness, or made unrealistic demands. So when he requested fellatio from the star of Charlie's Angels and There’s Something About Mary we thought, sure, that’s the least we can do for him."

But attempts to grant Josh his dying wish proved much more difficult than the family had initially thought. Formal requests inviting the star to perform oral sex on their dying son were repeatedly declined.
"We wrote, we rang, we faxed," Mr Morten explained. "And every time it was the same answer: 'Sorry, Ms Diaz is currently unable to comply with your request.' I mean, how unsympathetic can you get? We're talking about a dying kid here! Would it kill her?"

Mr Morten even made a special trip to Los Angeles, to try to talk to the movie star personally outside the premiere of Gangs of New York. "The crowds were ten deep," he said, "and I'm there yelling out to her from the back: 'Will you go down on my son please!', but she didn’t want to know."

With hopes diminishing by the day, Mr Morten placed similar standby requests with the agents representing Catherine Zeta Jones, Jennifer Lopez and Salma Hayek, but in each case the stars refused to co-operate.

"Who do they think they are, these women!" railed Mr Morten. "They earn millions of dollars and swan about at fancy parties, but when they get a simple request to bring a smile to a young boy far less fortunate than them, they turn their back on you. What kind of world do we live in when a dying teenager can no longer get his cock sucked by a celebrity?"

Indeed, what kind of world do we live in?

Going to Australia

2004-11-16T13:45:00.000-06:00

I think that if I had the money I would buy myself a 20ft. schooner and sail to Australia. Perhaps this is all because I've been listening to the song Southern Cross by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young. I've even thought of getting a job on a boat to Australia after I graduate. Work on the boat for passage. I think that would be great. ROugh winds, storms, blistered hands, and all of the other things. I think that is one of the experiences that can really turn a guy into a man. Well, We'll see what happens.

How to be a Bastard

2004-11-16T12:30:00.000-06:00

I've decided to start a new feature entitled How To Be A Bastard. These are just things that I've thought of. I don't recommend that you do any of them and I don't take any responsibility for any repercussions of your actions.

The Great American Smokeout
This Thursday, Nov. 18th, is the 28th annual Smokeout. You can check out the website here. This is when the American Cancer Society encourages people to quit smoking for one day.

On Thursday, I'm going to smoke a cigar in celebration of the Great American Smokeout. Just to be a bastard. I even made a sign for you to use:

Inspired by a sign at my local cigar shop.

Why the rest of the world hates the U.S.

2004-11-16T00:30:00.000-06:00

Goldschläger

Goldschläger is defined by DrinksMixer.com as "A clear swiss cinnamon schnapps, containing 24 carrot gold leaf flakes." This is why the rest of the world hates the united states. We are so filthy rich that we have drinks with gold in them. People starve in other countries and we find new ways to consume more. Yes, I know that Goldschläger is a swiss made drink, but I'm pretty sure that a lot of it is consumed here in the U.S.

Police and the Use of Deadly Force

2004-11-15T15:23:00.000-06:00

We have been discussing the use of force by police officers, deadly and non-deadly, in several of my classes. Then this morning I heard Mike Gallagher talking about a 6 year old boy in Florida who had been tasered. Here is an exceprt of the article from the Miami Herald:

Posted on Thu, Nov. 11, 2004
Police used Taser gun to subdue 6-year-old student wielding piece of glass

BY SUSANNAH A. NESMITH

snesmith@herald.com

Miami-Dade police tasered a 6-year-old boy who was wielding a piece of glass in a school office and threatening to hurt himself, officials confirmed Thursday.

Police say they followed their own guidelines and only tasered the child because they were afraid he would hurt himself. But the incident has raised calls for the department tighten its policies regarding the use of the stun guns, which shoot 50,000 volts of electric current through a subject.

The incident happened on Oct. 20 at Kelsey Pharr Elementary School. The principal, Maria Mason, called 911 after the child, who has not been identified, broke a picture frame in the assistant principal's office. Then the boy began waving the piece of glass around, holding a security guard at bay.

Two Miami-Dade police officers responded, followed by a school police officer. When they got there, the boy already had a cut under his right eye and another on his hand from the glass. The three officers talked to the boy, trying to get him to put down the glass, according to a police report.

One of the officers slid a trash can to him, hoping he would throw the glass away if he didn't want to give it to any of the five adults there.

Then the officer contacted a supervisor to see if there was a policy specifically prohibiting the use of a stun gun on a child. There isn't, and the officer was told to do what she felt was necessary.

The two officers continued to try to talk to the child, who didn't respond.

Then he cut his own leg and the officers acted. One officer shocked him with the Taser while the other grabbed him, preventing him from falling on the ground.

It's stuff like this that makes me want to make changes to the way that policing is handled here in the U.S. I know that right now some of you are saying "Yeah, our officers shouldn't do stiff like that!"

There used to be what was called the "Fleeing Felon Rule." Basically, under this doctrine, a police officer could shoot a felon who was running away in order to stop them. As you can imagine this angered some people. Namely the people who were getting shot and their families. In the case of Tennessee vs Garner, that rule was changed. Now, the police officer has to have a reasonable belief that the felon will harm either themselves of someone else before the police officer can shoot at them. Yeah, I see the irony in hurting someone to stop them from hurting themselves.

You may be wondering how these two cases are related. Well, in my opinion, we should repeal the Tennessee vs Garner requirements, but we should give police rubber bullets instead of real ones. We should also expand the circumstances when police can fire their weapons. This way the police officers can just shoot someone in the ass with a rubber bullet. It would be cathartic to the officer. It would also reduce caseloads. More than likely after popping someone in the ass with a rubber bullet, the officer(s) would more than likely be lenient.

We could also have similar things for traffic violations. Say that you get pulled over for speeding. The officer gives you the option of taking the ticket or getting shot in the ass with a paintball gun from 15 feet away. I don't know about you, but I would take the paintball gun. We could even have the officers give you a towel to clean off with. Also, if the officer misses, then you get off without any warnings or anything. I think that it's a great plan.

If we had the "Shoot 'em in the Ass" plan that I just described, then the police could have just shot that uppity little 6 year old with a rubber bullet and it would have been over with. Teach that little punk about screwing with the police.

Changes to the site

2004-11-15T10:30:00.000-06:00

As you may have noticed, the GeorgeWBush.com news feed is no longer up. This is because it was no longer being updated. It's kind of pointless to try to bring you news from a source that doesn't update. But now we have something better. The News4sites.com people have come to my rescue. We now have a new section on the sidebar entitled "World at a Glance." This news feed brings up info from around the world. There are many options for what types of news feeds that I can put up. Let me know if you want me to change what type of news you get here.

Update: I forgot that I had requested another news feed. This one is at the top of the page, just underneath the title box. Enjoy.

Random Thought

2004-11-15T10:15:00.000-06:00

I'm not bitter because I'm single, quite the opposite.

I still don't like Freud.

2004-11-14T10:57:00.000-06:00

I went to SimilarMinds.com and took this Freudian Inventory Test. I found out about it from this blog and decided to take it myself. Here are the results:

Freudian Inventory Results

Oral (33%) you appear to be stubbornly and irrationally against receiving help even when it might be the more intelligent option.
Anal (40%) you appear to have a good balance of self control and spontaneity, order and chaos, variety and selectivity.
Phallic (73%) you appear to have issues with controlling your sexual desires and possibly fidelity.
Latency (60%) you appear to have a good balance of abstract knowledge seeking and practicality, dealing with real world responsibilities while still cultivating your abstract and creative faculties and interests.
Genital (36%) you appear to have a conventional, closeminded, and regressive outlook on life. Change is an inevitable and positive part of life, learn to contribute to it, not fear it or oppose it

Take Free Freudian Inventory Test
personality tests by similarminds.com

You make what you want out of this.

New Site Feature

2004-11-11T21:31:00.000-06:00

As you can see I have now decided to add a links section to the sidebar. This is so that you can see all of the people that I have met through Blogshares.com. If you want to be linked on my site, then let me know by emailing me or by messaging me at Blogshares.com.

Random Thought

2004-11-11T16:20:00.000-06:00

Nostalgia is a thing of the past.

Warning: Adult Situations!

2004-11-09T15:30:00.000-06:00

The other night I was watching T.V. and I saw a warning come up on the screen for a movie. It was rated "R" and one of the reasons was that it included "Adult Situations." And I sat there and thought "Adult Situations? What's that, paying the bills? Going to work?" Those are the kinds of things that I think of when I see "Adult Situations." Especially because people in almost every age group have sex. These kinds of thoughts force me to keep only a select group of a few friends.

Thoughts on Suicide.

2004-11-09T14:45:00.000-06:00

Let me preface this post by saying that I feel sorry for the suffering that anyone feels when they lose someone close to them. I am not a heartless bastard, just a bastard. With that being said, I have some comments on suicide.

To let you know what the impetus for this post was, you can see the articles here and here. Basically what happened is that a kid on the Texas State University campus committed suicide by shooting himself in the head with a pistol. The campus "newspaper" (and I use that term loosely), published an article in the following edition that included stuff that his friends said about him.

First of all, the guy threw away his life. He decided that his life was no longer worth living and so he voluntarily ended his life. Now, if he had been killed by a drunk driver, a serial killer, or even possibly by a natural disaster then I would be supporting the vigil that these people held for this guy. Hell, I would even support a scholarship in his name. But not because he decided to wuss-out on life.

The second point that I have is about all the things that the campus "newspaper" wrote that his "friends" said about him. You may have noticed the quotes that I used around the word friends. This is because if all of the things that these people said about him were true, then you would think that one of them might have noticed that he was feeling suicidal.

When I die, I don't want people to say nice things about me. I want them to say truthful(mostly) things like "He was an incorrigible bastard who only did anything nice if it would get him laid." Let's be honest people.

Random Thought

2004-11-09T14:30:00.000-06:00

PETA hates Schrödinger.™

My stats/research professor brought up the thought experiment designed by Schrödinger that is commonly called Schrödinger's Cat. The basics of the experiment are that a cat is placed in a box with a 50/50 chance of a poison gas being released into the box. The problem is that we won't know whether or not the cat is dead or alive until we open the box and observe the cat. Now, apparenty, this has somethign to do with Quantum Mechanics but I think that the Wikipedia people do a better job of explaining it than I could.

Anyways, I was thinking about the experiment and then I thought "That would really piss off the people at PETA." Thus is the tale of the birth of my new slogan.
Also, my friend Aubrey had a great away message up the other day. It said: "Support the Search & Rescue Team: GET LOST!"

Self-Serving Tripe

2004-11-09T14:00:00.000-06:00

As you may have noticed, my sidebar is growing. I have now added a link that looks like this: . This is because I recently Googled my website's name and found it listed on the BlogShares.com website. So, being the rampant competitor that I am, I have decided to try and increase the value of my little blog on their site. Should you have a desire to help me in this endeavour, then please include the following HTML code at the bottom of all of your webpages:

<a href="http://bastardisms.blogspot.com" target="_blank">Bastardisms."></a>

Also, if you would like to help out, you can click on the link on the sidebar, which will say that I refered you to their website. Thanks for putting up with this tripe.