My Cat is an Asshole

So... in case you weren't aware, I have a remote that operates hardware inside my head. 

In case you weren't also aware, I lose things on a basis which some people might describe as consistent, quite often, or... all the fucking time.

So when my remote went missing, I wasn't terribly surprised or worried -- at first. I mean, I don't often leave the house, so it was in here somewhere. It was just a matter of where. And, really, unless I desperately needed to change the settings - I was good. Still had the charger, which is much larger, and harder, though not impossible, to lose. 

But, all the normal places were a bust.

Which started to worry me a lot, because this is not something I can go to Best Buy and replace. Hundreds and hundreds of dollars to replace.

I found it today.

You don't get to bring my shit home
with you without asking, cat.

I've been well aware of how weird Poe is for awhile. Eccentric. She plays fetch, so she thinks she's a dog. She hoards with the best of reality TV, so she thinks she's a packrat.

THESE ARE THE OPPOSITE OF THE THINGS ARE YOU SUPPOSED TO BE.  


I'm going to have to Clockwork Orange her ass with Tom and Jerry. 


Poe doesn't appreciate my pop culture references, which just makes her more terrible. And I'd explain it to her, but then it wouldn't be funny anymore.

Poe. You've been sitting on my lap for days, in between the times I've gotten up to look. You could have spoken up anytime, but nooooooooo.


What. A. Jerk.

Happiness in Small Doses, Cyanide Not So Much

Happiness is not a state of being that lasts forever and ever. You can be overall happy in your situation, and still have some atrocious days and moods that weave their way into your smiley face tapestry. Most of us take it where we can get it.

I feel like this is some sort of shrink exercise, but what are the small things that make you happy? What completely random happenstances make you content, even if just for just the moment?



For me:

Those rare days when I can drive my car. Because despite it not being some super special classic, or an expensive Italian sports car, it is shiny and blue. These are seriously my qualifications for liking my car. I’ve said it before - I’m a simple woman. But driving it means independence, and complete control of the radio.

Used to be Prussian Blue, after the oil paint color.
When Prussia got sufficiently phased out, so did the name.

The kind of blue so abidingly deep that looking at it too long makes you feel like your retinas are being pulled forward out of your head. The closest you could get in the Crayola coloring box was Midnight Blue. What I actually mean is cobalt.

 

Actual mail. Not bills or junk mail. But actual mail. And really, I don’t even care if it is a package I ordered myself. I still get that feeling of “Yay, it is here!".

Thatched-roofed cottages on rolling green hills. The lavender fields of Provence, France.

Doors and windows with whimsical or ancient architecture. 

 

The fact that one of my cats (Poe, who is alternately ingenious and kinda stupid, and in doing so probably lives up to her namesake), who ‘monorail cat’s’ my leg.

Not my cat. This one looks much smarter,
and, considering the ledge, more like a Sylvia Plath.

I prefer it when she lays on my leg, because sometimes she tries to lay on my back if I’m turned over. This is as close as she comes to being a lapcat with me. If you’re sitting down and provide her an actual lap, it’s like it confuses her. Or perhaps she just has standards about how much leg you give her to lay upon.



Making people laugh. Can’t. Do it. Enough. I don't even need to try and be witty to fulfill this; simply sharing something I know will delight someone is enough to bring on a solid moment of happy.

11:11 = happiness,
for symmetry as well as notions about wishing.

The Muppets will always make me happy. Their latest movie seriously almost made from cry from nostalgia overload.

Just a tiny bit of Muppetry here for you. Muppets + Queen = Win.

Headshots and Shotguns

Here are a few of the things that have happened in the last couple months....

A Miami man ate another guy's face off. We're not talking about om-om-om and you get a few stitches. We're talking missing eyeballs. The police shot the guy, he still kept coming, they had to keep shooting.

Also in Florida (of course), a guy who was an actual doctor, started bashing his head open after being pulled over on a DUI, and then spat blood at police.

Did I mention that a hissing hazmat drum washed ashore in Florida, and people were told to "escape" if they could leave safely?

On May 30th, a guy in New Jersey stabbed himself, took his intestines out, and THREW them at the SWAT team which was trying to get him out of his barricaded home.

In Massachusetts, a 79 year old man killed his wife and ate her forearm.

In Texas, a woman killed her infant and ate part of the baby's brain. I can't even process this. 

In Maryland, a student killed his housemate and ate his heart and brain.

In China, this past Tuesday, a man ran up to a stranger's car, starting trying to bash in the windshield, then attacked her and started eating her face.

And this one has been going on for awhile, but there's a disease in Africa which hits children, causes them to zone out completely, have violent seizures, try to bite their way free of restraints, and become pyromaniacs. The CDC has no idea what is going on.

Hold up, hobos. Deep breaths. Here's a kitty.  

Let any feeling of impending doom be soothed by the fuzzy.

I realize that horrible, terrible, crazy things happen every day. I'm sure there's lots of unpublicized blood spitting and craziness that happens in mental institutions, or other situations, every day. So it is coincidence and an issue of news reporters choosing to focus on these stories, rather than doing their goddamn job and performing actual investigative journalism on other topics. They depend on the the fact that the public is going to rubberneck for the tragedy, and we do. And I know this.

But I have to admit, the above stories, the sheer volume of how many there have been since May... it makes me wonder.

And it makes me want to get a sawed off and stock up on ammo.

A Round of Valium for Everyone!

Today the Supreme Court announced it was upholding Obama's healthcare law.

I find myself conflicted, hobos.

On the one hand, I agree with the principles of universal healthcare, although I'm not really on board with all the aspects of the new healthcare plan. I do think there needs to be improved access.

If a mother is working two minimum wage jobs just to make ends meet, and can't afford or isn't offered insurance, it's a problem. This isn't about giving it away to people who aren't willing to work or pay for it. A mother should not be forced to choose between dinner and antibiotics for her five year old.

If you had cancer and lost your job and insurance, ... but by a miracle you got better and tried to get insurance at a new job -- they should not be able to deny you a policy, because of a preexisting condition. That's bullshit.

So, obviously, changes need to happen.

On the other hand...

We cannot afford this as a country right now. I realize, it makes it more important than ever to have, but we do have to acknowledge cost when our entire country operates on credit.

It is the same thing as needing a car to get to work. Your old car is hemorrhaging you money, and you barely have enough money to live on week to week, struggling to pay your credit card bills - so what do you do?

Do you take on the debt and responsibility of the newer car? You'll get to work reliably. You won't be paying huge bills when your old engine dies yet again. But you'll have that monthly payment, a payment that you're not sure you'll be able to handle.

Or do you stick with your old car... fix the fanbelt with pantyhose, slap on some duct tape, and pray nothing bad happens. You've dealt with it this long, right? And you know that if nothing bad happens, you'll be able to pay your rent this month.

It's a tough choice.  


And I'm not sure throwing more money at healthcare is going to change a goddamn thing, because the US gov't already pays the absolute highest in healthcare costs, while being toward the lower-middle of the pack when it comes to how successful they are in actually caring for people. 


And it very likely that most of the money for this program does not go toward healthcare, but the administrative salaries and pensions that will be created for middle management. Middle management who will get better government funded insurance than the government funded insurance they're planning to offer to the populace. That's how our country rolls, folks. 

The third hand (I won't tell you whose hand it is, I won't incriminate myself. Ignore the axe in the corner)...

The third hand is Torchwood: Miracle Day.

Fuck yeah, Captain Jack Harkness.

For those unfamiliar with it, basically - a day comes when everyone stops dying. And at first, everyone is thrilled. But people are still getting sick, still living in pain - and things start piling up. Where do you put all those people? How do you prioritize who gets care? How do hospices deal when no one is dying, but everyone still needs to be cared for? How do nursing homes deal? Hospital ICUs?

Governments in this show actually used death camps, which is a horrifying idea. But you'd have a person who you could not save - such as a victim of an explosion, but was still somehow surviving - and the population count rising rapidly everyday, leaving less resources for everyone.  Designated care facilities barely provided care at all, it was more just to keep the sick people out of the way of everyone else. And pharmaceutical corporations had a clear stake in everything.

For a sci-fi show with a really shitty ending, it was eye opening about the problems of health care management.

Obviously, our situation is not the one on this show. BUT..

We have this idea of saving everyone. And people live longer now, survive more diseases now. We also have a huge increase in diseases where people need chronic care: autism, Multiple Sclerosis, Parkinson's. Not all of them are going to have families who can or want to take care of them, which means society is going to have to build more care centers, funded by more subsidies, managed by more middle management.

And by no means am I advocating killing people, I just worry about the fact that since we try so hard to let no one die -we might be making it harder for everyone to survive. We're heading towards having a strong majority of the population completely dependent on others for care, children, elderly, disabled.

We can't really tell them to fuck off. Because that would be wrong. And a more important reason - chances are most of us will hit at least two, if not three, of those categories in the course of our lives. So we'd be telling ourselves to fuck off. Our society is better at self-interest than having a moral conscience, let's face it. Anyway, it seems like we're going to have some hard choices on the horizon about what kind of care we can afford to provide.

I'm a TV Whore - LOST, pt 1

It’s been hard recently to string cohesive thoughts together and/or type at a computer, read words. Reading is definitely fundamental, hobos, don’t kid yourselves. Feeling sorta-kinda-better, and have been going through a few shows I need to catch up on. 
Last time I posted, I talked about how hard a time I was having finding things to write about. Why I haven’t yet talked about TV is 50/50 - me not thinking of it, me not wanting to talk about TV/movies that are pretty recent. However, there are probably some TV/movies that I have been remiss about watching that are long past their expiration date which are safe to talk about. 


Since there will probably be more of these, I’m starting the TV Whore/Movie Whore category. 


-----

I confess, I never finished LOST. Or.. really, I watched almost three seasons of it. That was many moons ago, hobos. Many, many moons. Hopefully those moons would be Somerhotter/ Crazy Eyes Salvatore’s (Boone) or Meriadoc Brandybuck’s (Charlie) behinds. Or, more importantly, the Scotsman’s. Who I am sure HAS a real-life name or a pithy-type nickname I could give him, but I can’t get past the brogue to think that far. 


At any rate, here are my thoughts while watching - roughly translated:




(Note: This show ended two years ago and has been running since 2004. This removes your right to any of the spoiler tantrums I see on my twitter feed on occasion. Consider yourself warned. 


That said, I have just admitted I haven’t gotten past S2. I was completely void of any social media up ‘til a couple of years ago. I have no idea what happens the majority of the rest of the show. If you spoil me, my spoiler tantrum will be epic. 


Why do I get to have a spoiler tantrum, while you can’t? Let’s all say it together now: IT IS HER BLOG. So, them’s the breaks, cupcakes. As another reason, I do believe this blog declares me Queen of the Hobos. I’m a GREAT Queen, because I don’t ask you to make with the genuflecting. But if you want to that’s okay. [Best. Sovereign. Ever.]


At this point, consider yourselves excessively warned.


[At the time of posting, I am now unspoilerable.])






1. Plane crash. Jack goes rushing towards an running plane engine with his tie on, as it sucks in air. He kinda deserves to die in the pilot, just for that. But he was just in a plane crash, which I'm told can be a smidge disorienting, so I’ll let it slide. 


2. My version of this show would have had no one useful on the plane at all. How often do you get so many hardened criminals, gun/hunting experts on one flight? My flight 815 would have been mostly tourists. Instead of a soldier who can make anything electronic work? Someone who has 80th level paladin on World of Warcraft. Instead of an extremely well-trained surgeon? A mediocre podiatrist. That’s all you get folks, sorry. 


3. That was a polar bear.... And then they end up way more scared of The Others. Honestly, I think they would have been less scared of The Others if they’d been called Those Dicks. 

“Shouldn’t we head to the caves?"  

"Naw, don’t worry. It’s just those dicks from the other side of the island. Focus your fear on the giant invisible tree-stomping monster that eats people. Priorities, man.”

4. All this time and Boone dying still fucking crushes my soul in places. I think I still have dents from the first time I watched this. I like him so much better on this show than on The Vampire Diaries. (For those folks who might judge me watching TVD? I won’t say anything about you watching wrestling, reality TV, or whatever guilty pleasure shows you have for which I would laugh at you.)




5. Getting back on topic. Boone. Yes, crushed. Both he and I, actually. He gets 4 and 5 on this list, because they dragged out his death and burial three episodes. Which I liked, honestly. I’m not complaining. It made the death of the first major character have impact.

However, ABC gave this show 25 episodes the first season. THE FIRST SEASON. How often does that happen EVER?! Especially back in 2004, when they weren’t handing out extra episodes like candy at Halloween. But even now, that’s usually to 30min shows.

My point is, maybe they wouldn't have had to do 25 eps in S1 if they'd consolidated some of the story just a little. 


I guess this is what happens when your ratings are through the friggin’ roof. Which is what I’m hoping will happen with the Kripke/Abrams show coming up in the fall. (However, NBC - if you put Revolution on Wednesday nights at 9pm, I will cut you.) 




6. Okay, Boone’s death gets one more, but it is only an off-shoot. Does it not occur to anyone else that on an island where massive injuries happen kind of a lot, the large quantities of heroin sitting there might be pretty useful for pain relief. I’m not talking the whole I-Twisted-My-Ankle type of pain, but that whole I-Got-Crushed-By-A-Plane-And-You’re-Thinking-About-Amputating-My-Leg sort of pain. Anyone else think that? Or is it just me... 

"Go grab a poultice, I need to take his leg off with this door."

7. I don’t know what my emotions are doing, because this show keeps including super joyous occasions with deaths. Claire has a healthy baby? Sorry, Boone is dead. Jin and Sun reunited after she thought he was dead? Sorry, Shannon is dead. Right after Sayid told her he loves her.

WHAT. THE. FUCK. SHOW?

Supernatural has been accused of having mood whiplash, but this show is taking the fucking cake.




8. I figured out why I dislike Walt so much. He’s basically Carl from The Walking Dead, except he’s way more of an asshole. 

Yeah, I'm talking about you.

Although, Walt is much less useless, because apparently he gets premonitions and can kill birds with his death glare. This is a trope I kinda hate... the whole Children So We Can Have A Plausible Burden and Tender Family Moments In A Dark Setting. 

Breaking Bad has actually handled this well, but - well, Breaking Bad is fucking awesome. Also, they live inside a suburban house, far away from Meth Culinary Academy. Walt Jr. could probably have a crutch slip on some drug money, I guess.




8. Hot Scot. Desmond, I hope to multiple deities that I’ll see you in another life, brother. 

Or this life. This life would be preferable, actually.

9. Smoke monster. It was a monster and it was made of smoke. I don't have a lot more to say about it. Get Sayid to start making those miniature fans for everybody. 

Weapon of choice.

(more seasons later, folks - this ends part way into S2 I believe...)

Not Dead Redemption

I talk a lot about people being a whole host of negative things. This is generally because a) They are, and b) Anger tends to motivate me more to spew words onto a page. I feel like I should maybe examine this, but I do believe that there can be humor in vitriol. I try and make that attempt, and I'm not sure that I always succeed. 

At any rate, while sometimes being part of humanity feels a bit soul-crushing, there are moments where I feel hope for the future. 

A 15 year old won an award in a science competition. This by itself is rather bland. You figure that most high schools have science fairs. But, no - he won the award, because he developed a test which detects pancreatic cancer in its early stages. And is better and cheaper than any test currently made by the scientific community. 

The extra cookie. You earned it.

I really, really hope some 15 year old girls are throwing themselves at him in the name of scientific discovery. 15 year old girls, you should do that. 

I think back to what I was doing at 15 and am staggered by the sheer amount of awesome in this story. 

Humanity, my faith in you has been redeemed. I can't promise that this will last longer than the time it takes to write this, so enjoy it.

Trudging Onward

I need to keep writing just to keep writing. Even if it ends up being nothing more than the odd wee comment about something in the news. Or just random stream of consciousness. Or a picture of a chinchilla. 


Entry for today = This


Out of Mormon College, we have a study that says that in teen literature, the characters portrayed with the filthiest mouths are those who are successful, rich, popular. 


1. There is something inherently funny to me about a group of Mormons counting exactly how many "fucks" they can find in the likes of any adolescent novel. 


2. I assume (or hope) this translates to reality somehow, because that means that hopefully this will pay off, and I've been making money since around middle school. Y'know, around when a sheltered suburban girl realizes that shit won't s'plode if you utter a four letter word. Unless the four letter word is somehow wired into a bomb as the trigger device. 


Best. Bomb. Ever.


Although, really, the best bomb ever would probably have candy and confetti for shrapnel. Less of a bomb, and more of a piñata.


A piñata that opens when you say fuck. 


Best. Birthday Party. Ever. 

It's an explosion of delight! Unless you're
using hard candy, and then it is probably a
concussion of delight. But there is delight!

Note: 
A couple things here. When searching for piñatas on Google, the donkey-shaped piñatas that we all think of as iconic aren't what come up first. But a unicorn one did, so that sort of makes up for it. And really, unicorns are sort of like donkeys who carry a shiv. For those people who feel that a donkey piñata doesn't seem like enough of a challenge. 


Also, there are places that sell piñata bats. Be resourceful, people. Do not get suckered into buying a piñata stick. I'm sure that most people can find something around their house to break open a piñata. If you don't have something, use your fists. If nothing else, it would be terribly amusing to watch kids OR adults try and punch open a festively-colored animal. If using your fists somehow goes against your gentle nature, mayhaps you should reconsider your piñata purchase and have a tea party instead. 


Note 2:
ALT + 164 is the code for an n with the tilde. You're welcome. 


Note 3:

Chinchilla. Fuck yeah. 

ROY G. BIV

There’s a new ebay commercial on TV, to let people know how easy it is to bid by their mobile device. A man in an auditorium with a woman by his side, who is, I assume, supposed to be his wife. There is a children’s school play on stage; we can presume that their children are involved in the production somehow.

And sitting in the audience, the man starts bidding on rims for his car. 


The tagline for this is “when it’s on your mind.”

Ebay. Because fuck everything else.

I try not to take advertising too seriously, because it isn’t like they’re usually supposed to encourage good habits anyway. McDonald’s has never tried the McModeration meal. But it drove a point home a point of ire I had earlier anyway.

Lazy fuckin’ parents. Rude fuckin’ people.

Because the above behavior is literally what is happening. We aren’t paying attention to anything important in front of us, because we’ve arbitrarily decided that whatever is on the small screen in front of us is clearly the most important.

Life is actually happening around us when we are typing about it. I’m sure as hell guilty of this behavior, but stopped being attached to my phone when hanging around with friends.

It comes down to the point of why you are where you are. If you are hanging out with your friends, hang out with them. If you are at your brat’s show about the four food groups, watch the kid in the broccoli suit do a dance. Even if Broccoli Kid isn't your kid, he might fall over, you might miss it, and that would be a damn shame. There are lots of moments out there that you could miss out on, because you’re too busy retweeting a funny cat video.

Let it be said, that I am not a parent. I’m well aware that it is a hard and often thankless job, although wonderful. I'm well aware that not being a parent, I cannot be aware of how thankless and wonderful it is. But here is my point of ire from earlier.

When I was a kid, indigo was my favorite out of the famous ROY G. BIV combo. You remember him don't you? The little formula used to make you remember the colors on the spectrum?


But society has given me reason to hate indigo, and here's why.

Indigo, pack your prismatic bags, and get the fuck out.

Indigo children. Children believed to have supernatural abilities and possibly be the next step in human evolution.


I understand the need to think your kid is special. Of course, you want to believe that. We're all special snowflakes. And I'm not even saying that there aren't people out there who are maybe a lot more intuitive to the world around them than everybody else, however you want to interpret that intuitiveness.


However, it looks to be an excuse for a lot of parents to throw up their hands and say, "my child has super powers, why should I get in the way of his development?"


Bad behavior isn't corrected, learning disabilities and mental disorders go unchecked... There's a whole host of negatives. If your kid really is that intuitive, then it is the parent's job to guide that kid, not only how to use their intuition in a beneficial way, but to not be an asshole.


Yes, kids can be assholes. You ever meet someone super selfish, who wants everything done on their time, and pitches a fit if they don't get it? Who literally doesn't seem to understand that the world doesn't revolve around them?


That's most kids - and it's normal - and is corrected when their parents teach them that their tantrum isn't going to be rewarded. They know what they want, not what they need, and for a long time can't think abstractly to consider consequences, especially long-term ones.


This attitude toward "indigo children" (yes, I just rolled my eyes) is the same thing as ignoring your kid for your phone. Difficult situation, he says no?


"Well, he's six - he must know what he wants! Jellybeans for breakfast? He must have super powered teeth that won't rot! Isn't he amazing?!"


It seems like these parents want a free pass on parenting. A free pass for the kid to essentially not interfere with their lives. And the excuse is that they were going to turn out that way anyway. So that means you get to park yourself in front of the couch and watch Cougartown, park your mind in the spot with any distraction other than your life.


I don't know if this behavior is fear, dissatisfaction, or just plain technology addiction. It is the move of an ostrich. They bury their heads in the sand, sand which just happens to be an iPhone.


I do know that these kids are eventually going to be caring for my generation when we're in the nursing home. I really hope they share the goddamn jellybeans.




Note:
If any of you super-powered fuckers give me your black jellybeans, I will find a way to make a shiv out of cards I use to play cribbage.


To everyone else my age - please don't make me play cribbage all the time. I suck at it. 


---

Trending Terror

I really shouldn’t even read twitter trending topics, because probably 30% of the time, I get mad at people. (Another 50%, I’m checking to see if a famous person died, and 45% of that I’m disappointed).

Here’s the most recent thing.

So, it is 4/20 as I’m writing this. And we get all the normal stuff regarding that -- a lot of people really excited about smoking up, as if they wouldn’t have been doing it this weekend anyway. And this isn’t to say that I don’t think it should be decriminalized, because I do. And I know a percentage of my friends feel the opposite of that, but we’ll just have to agree to disagree.

It doesn’t matter; that particular argument bears only a small relation to the reason I’m mad.

Other trending topics popped up. Like ‘Hitler.’ And ‘Columbine.’ So I poked around at those, even though I was pretty sure I knew why people were posting about ‘Columbine.’

The shooting at Columbine happened. 13 kids gone. And as much as you want to blame the parents of the kids who fired the guns, you know that it is just as horrifying to them. Just.. pure tragedy in every direction.

It is Hitler’s birthday. Okay... I get that he was an amphetamine crazed monster, and had he not been born, a genocide most likely wouldn’t have happened. At least not on the scale that it did. We’ve also been making fun of him consistently for years. A Doctor Who companion got to punch him (and it was awesome). There is a cat meme devoted to him. We condemn the evil that he did, but we laugh at the man.

Plus, cats are adorable,
even when they goosestep.

Reading those trending topics were a lot of other comments, though. Not just commenting on how horrible those occurrences were, but saying that people who were posting about 4/20 were in the wrong, BECAUSE of it being the anniversary of Columbine and Hitler’s birthday.

People, I get what you’re trying to say... and feel free to judge your little judgey hearts out, because god knows I do... but, fuckin’ seriously?

You could go back on any day in history and find a tragedy. Do you know how many bad things have happened on Christmas? Emperor Hirohito began his reign then, and he’s the guy we fought against in WW2, who decided to bomb Pearl Harbor. Not to mention the local tragedies that have happened in the U.S. I don’t see you putting away your gifts and quietly being grateful for living. I don’t see you holding back on the egg nog.

"Stop smiling, sweetie. Today in 2004, there was a
tsunami that killed over 40,000 people."

If your birthday fell on the day we dropped the bomb on Japan, would you stop celebrating it? In case you didn’t know, it happened on August 6th and August 9th. Now that you know, will you never go to a get together held on one of those days?

Everyone born on August 27th, hold up! Krakatoa erupted and killed an estimated 120,000 people.

We can find a bad thing that happened on any single day, because accidents happen, Mother Nature happens to be a strumpet, and people are completely off their nut sometimes. History is also filled with a lot of great things to celebrate, because discoveries happen, sometimes Mother Nature isn’t a total bitch, and occasionally people are pretty damn awesome.

Should we only ever remember the bad stuff? Should we never allow ourselves to look at all the great things that happened on tragic days, and celebrate the good anyway?

4/20 -- at its core, is a celebration. Much like Cinco De Mayo has become. (and on the 5th of May, 1944 - German troops executed 214 people in Greece). People come together, get inebriated, make jackasses of themselves, or just sit back and have a good enough time that they can still remember the next day. It is about camaraderie.

It is decidedly not about celebrating the tragic things that happened.

And that’s really all you need to worry about, if you’re gonna worry. If the intent is not to say “Happy Birthday, Hitler!” or “Columbine, I made a cake,” then you’re getting yourself all riled up for nothing.

And if you’re going to talk about war and genocide and guns being bad, the people who smoke pot are usually the ones against war, against unjust aggression and violence, and for gun control. These are the folks who are going to get in the voting booths, trying to make sure these things don’t happen again.

Hobos, however stupid you might think 4/20 is, whatever your opinion on people who partake of marijuana - does it serve any purpose to criticize people who are just trying to be happy, if the vast majority of them aren’t hurting anyone?

Maybe, instead of criticizing others, think about the fact that the people who got hurt, whose honor you think you’re defending - they’d love a chance to be here and be happy. To celebrate something, anything.

Enough awful things happen in this world. Find joy where you can. Let others find theirs. Let it be.

You Get What You Put In

Here is my statement: if you do not interact with people, say hello, ask how they are, you cannot reserve the right to get bitchy that they haven’t been doing the same to you.



Friendships are supposed to be a two-way street. And blocking people out continually, or taking absolutely no interest in what is going on in their lives, or dropping them for a boyfriend or your newer, cooler friends or whatever.... this is a very one-way street method. Making it so that you're the only one in the relationship who is allowed to have expectations and needs met - that's also one-way. Not asking for what you need, but having the expectation that someone should dig to find out..? I'm sure you get the point. There's a lot of various ways of making people jump through hoops for you.

I am not saying that you should always be close to the same people, and if you're not - you are somehow a bad friend. People change over time, grow apart. They disappoint you, hurt you, and not everything is easy to forgive. Leaving people behind happens. A friend for life isn’t just a rare bird, it is a fucking archeopteryx. 

"Someone remembered I existed!"

 

What I am saying is that, if you're choosing the one-way method, if you do not share of yourself unless someone asks first, you shouldn’t then wonder why your friends are no longer involved in your life. Jumping through those hoops is tiresome, and they might just have a few of their own needs they need to have met.

This is a world with facebook, email, texting, Skype, twitter, and cell phones. To say you cannot get in contact with people is kind of ridiculous.

This isn’t to say there aren’t reasons for a lapse in communication over a period of time; people get busy or have perfectly valid reasons for not being around. And good friendships aren’t based on needing each other 24/7 anyway. Space to breathe is a good fucking thing.

The other side of the coin is that, because we have access to so many methods of easy communication, this is the trend I’ve noticed...

People are willing to be friends with you so long as it is easy for them. Long gone are the days where when you called your friend up at home, you were attached to the wall with a cord. Where you could only talk to one friend at a time. Where mailing letters was actually one of the top methods of communication, and with a fucking pen, no less.

How many people would you actually talk to if you had to really concentrate on the conversation? If you had to be invested in what they had to say and put things on hold to hear it? If you had to find out how their week went, because what the fuck else are you gonna talk about? How many people would you actually talk to if you had to step up and meet some expectations set forth by someone else?

As much as I love the technology of the era, I kinda think it is a damn shame that people don’t necessarily have to make an effort anymore. There are so many people, and so many ways to talk, and - especially on the internet - you aren't asked to give a lot in return. People don’t have to think about it. So their relationships become an exercise in who meets their needs. They'll lay out hoops and watch who will leap through.




The point? Next time that thought creeps up on you, that you want people to talk to, that you feel abandoned? Try making the effort and initiating. Take a look at whoever it is you feel is failing you as a friend, and ask yourself honestly if you've been trying to succeed at being theirs. 


Better yet, try doing that before it gets to the point that you're only doing it mostly because you feel bored, or because you're seeking someone to meet your expectations. 


Go into it with the hope of meeting theirs.


Archeopteryx will thank you for it.

Note: I cannot begin to express how happy I am that I worked archeopteryx into an actual post. I feel a-smart.

Feed the Trolls (They Might Need the Extra Money for Bail)

Arizona, you never cease to amaze me with your idiocy.

From the land of racial profiling where you can get pulled over just for having a super deep tan, we bring you...


Anti-Trolling Legislation, via Arizona House Bill 2549:

“It is unlawful for any person, with intent to terrify, intimidate, threaten, harass, annoy or offend, to use ANY ELECTRONIC OR DIGITAL DEVICE and use any obscene, lewd or profane language or suggest any lewd or lascivious act, or threaten to inflict physical harm to the person or property of any person.”

This has passed both the House and the Senate. It's just waiting for the governor's John Hancock.


Are you....fucking...kidding me?


Hobos, hold up just a sec. I need to get some swearing out of the way on behalf of the intartronz brethren from Arizona.

Fuck, fuckity, fucknugget, cocksucking douche-canoes!

...Okay, back.

Seriously? Seriously?! You tools of the Black & Decker variety can eat me. You don't have anything better to do right now than introduce this bill? 'Cause it isn't like we're in an economic crisis or anything, right? 'Cause it isn't like your state has a huge meth problem, right? 

I understand wanting to curtail cyberbullying, I do. I'm not advocating that people should be able to terrify or threaten people, or make repeated unwanted sexual advances. But if you really feel the need to start down this slippery slope, you can make an amendment to current harassment laws already on the books to include mediums of the internet.

But "annoy or offend"? Really?!

This law is broad like 80s shoulder pads.

Here are some broads wearing shoulder pads.

People have different lines as to what will annoy or offend them. I could tell someone I don't like their shirt and that could annoy or offend them. You might annoy me with your religious beliefs; you might get annoyed with me about my lack of them.

As to profane language, are they going to put up a list? 'Cause that can be pretty open-ended as well. To some people, "goddamn" is profane. I make no judgments about what is considered profane to them, but I still have the right to say it. And they have the right to tell me to shut up. And that's to say nothing of how hard it can be to discern a person's intended tone when dealing in the written word with strangers, let alone the fact that a good deal of knuckledraggers have a lil' bit of trouble cluing into context.

"Well, blow me down! Ag-ag-ag...jail."

People are dicks to each other on the street all the time. Should they be? No. 

I don't enjoy dickery, just like I don't enjoy trolls. But being a prick isn't against the law. It shouldn't be against the law. If a person can't get arrested for saying it in person, it is ridiculous to hold the internet to a higher standard. And there is a deep howling chasm of difference between repeated harassment and an off-color comment.

In fact, isn't there a thing... Wait, it's on the tip of my tongue... Something-Stitution, that is supposed to grant freedom of speech? We can't prosecute members of NAMBLA and the KKK for their "beliefs," but you're seriously going to make the case that I can't tell an idiot that they're being an idiot?

There's a whole other angle to this as well. This is the internet, where trolls come from far and wide, so what happens when someone from another state or country breaks this fantastical law?

I'm not a lawyer - and might be wrong on this, but it seems to me that this can largely only be enforced if both parties are from Arizona. (Unless these genius legislators push for this to also be covered in the federal anti-stalking law, which includes the word "harassment" in the wording. And considering the state, I wouldn't be surprised.)

And that's not to mention the hassle to the courts, the police department, as well as the telecom companies, who will be inundated with requests.

“This guy made fun of me drinking a Cosmo on Twitter. He said, and I quote - that it was a ‘fucking girly drink.’”

“Okay, sir, fill out this information and provide a link. We will need to contact the website to get the accused's IP address if it isn’t logged, and permission of their cable service provider to give us their name and address.”

“But he annoyed me todaaaaaaaaaaaaay.”

“Sir, you’re annoying me right now.”

Not to mention the issue of intent, because either you're allowed to state that you did not intend to annoy or offend, or it becomes completely subjective and left to the judge to decide what was going on in your head.

I feel like this is some sort of cosmic Orwellian joke, but laws which infringe on civil liberties have been stacking up like IHOP pancakes. 

"You seriously expect me to choke this down?"

And much like those pancakes, too much isn't a good thing, and the syrup gets all over you, the table, and whatever girl you end up getting to second with in the parking lot. 

With ooey gooey faux sweet intentions, America is taking yet another backward step. 

....But if anyone from Arizona asks, I didn't say that. 

(Time magazine article on this topic.)

180°

I need to read more.

In the past week I’ve learned that Mother Teresa was a horrible person, and that Machiavelli was a cool dude.

Yes. Seriously. Is your mind blown? Because I feel like someone just shoved a stick of dynamite in my ear and lit the fuse.

It’s like being told that the black hats in the cowboy movies were always the good guys, you just didn’t know it.

"Those bulletholes I put in your chest
are seriously misunderstood."

And honestly, I was seriously bummed about the Mother Teresa thing. This was supposed to be someone you could look up to, not someone who purposely let people die who could have been saved, because she was only interested in working with dying people, because their suffering let her feel closer to God.  Then I find out that the whole reason people saw Machiavelli as a scheming douche, was because of one thing he wrote, The Prince, which was an outline on how he thought the Medicis should run the government. Except, wait... he didn’t think that. Everything else he ever proposed or wrote went exactly counter to that. It’s pretty much the same as going to the ice cream stand, the server handing you a cone where half the ice cream is dripping down the side already, and you saying, “Thanks. Next time please just put it in my hand.” And then you get a pile of soft-serve in your hand for the rest of your life, because no one gets that you didn’t actually mean that. This one interpretation of the facts has blackened this guy’s memory for a couple hundred years. My dear hobos, it leads me to ask myself questions about who can I trust? Clearly, not most of history. Or the teachers who teach it. Can’t trust the media machine that comes through the TV. Or dick government officials. But these are all things outside myself. I can trust myself. To look things up, to dig a little deeper. I can trust the people closest to me to be good people. I can be secure in the knowledge that no matter how crazy the world is, or whatever thoughts you have about man being essentially good or evil -- fact is, there are good people out there. So, I’m not feeling quite so disheartened anymore about Miss Calcutta being awarded Miss Congeniality. If we have to look for heroes, there are plenty of regular people in this world more deserving. And if that fails, there’s always Machiavelli.