Strange Connections

The End

2012-01-04T17:01:00.000-06:00

Image by Matt Needle

"The End." These seem to be scary words when seen standing next to one another. I just finished watching Breaking Bad. Possibly one of the best TV shows i've seen in a while. Great story, well acted, good cinematography (from what i know). Currently, the show consists of four seasons and given the way season four ends, they wrap the story up pretty tight. in my humble opinion, i don't see there being another season to this show. as it stands now, anything more would simply ruin what came before.

However, as is always the case, there are many out there anxiously awaiting the announcement of the infamous season five. a friend of mine and fellow BB fan puts it well as to why, apart from the story wrapping up so well at the end of season four, another season would not work: "They've pulled the rabbit out of the hat it seems one too many times - maybe one more season? Die hard fans I think are willing to look the other way in terms of the plausibility of Walt and Jessie (the two main characters) continually getting out of impossible binds." and i think he makes a valid point. beyond the outstanding fact that a story that has run through four seasons has just wrapped-up, the trickery of the style of storytelling within the show has also thinned.

Conan O'Brian tweeted a few months back a few hours before the season four finale was about to air, "Excited for the Breaking Bad season finale tonight. My prediction: Something will not go as planned and meth will be involved." i remember at first i was a little put off by Conan's sarcasm toward something so well put together and which stood out so far among the rest. but the more i thought about it the more i realized, shoot, Conan just busted the formula for BB wide open. when boiled down, that was the show. again, this is not to make BB out to be some trite, formulaic sitcom nor to criticize it for what it is, rather, this is just to say, the writers had an interesting basis for a story, knew the formula and how to make it work and made it happen...then wrapped it up and (for now) quit while they were ahead.

So all that to say, one theme i take away from this is that one tell-tale sign of a good story, one worth telling, is a story that knows how to end. besides Firefly, BB has been the only drama i've enjoyed and been able to truly watch without cringing every time something corny happened (the corny line, the corny look, the corny pause) dramas are often too corny to take seriously, which is a huge problem because the essence of the drama is it's serious nature. i think i was taken by Firefly because at the end of the day, it didn't take itself too seriously. BB, i'm not sure, it definitely took itself seriously, it just did it well. Band of Brothers also knew how to do serious well and, surprise, also knew how to end.

Endings are important. many shows refuse to end and, though entertaining enough, at the end of the day they babble on forever and we eventually become bored with them. they become that weird guy at the party you don't want to get cornered by because he can't finish a damn sentence.

I think what has happened is dramas are working off the incorrect formula. many of us grew up with the comedy, laugh-track sitcoms. these shows had no cohesive theme or story, one did not have to watch them in any particular order because no one episode had anything to do with any other episode and the show had no end in sight. this is because they were sitcoms (situational comedies) functional word in the formula being "situational." situations have no defined beginning or end, they just sort of come on and then fall out with little definition. the only definition and constant in these sitcoms was the characters and constant they were. the characters did not develop whatsoever. the characters on the show ten years ago are the exact same characters today.

I believe dramas have accidentally tried to use part of the sitcom formula. sometimes they forget to develop their characters or they drop the ball on defining the story, others do not, many dramas carry very good story lines and characters. however, many of today's dramas have all made the mistake of forgetting to end. they have misinterpreted funding and ratings as a reason to keep going, when funding and ratings should have nothing to do with whether or not a story ends. a public speaker doesn't talk until their audience has dwindled to nothing or they run out of energy to physically speak, they write out what they need to say to cover the topic, deliver it and then end. everyone may love, love, love the speech and what they're saying, but that doesn't mean the speaker continues talking once the speech has come to its end.

The basics of any story are the beginning/introduction, rising action, climax, falling action and finally the resolution, which promises an end. if you're writing a drama series and it doesn't fit this mold, it's nothing but a sitcom. babble, babble, babble. any crazy person knows how to break in mid-sentence and then talk on about nothing with zero cohesive theme and continue until they pass out or the episode ends. do not fear the end, rather, long for it as anyone does when in the midst of a great story. not that it's not enjoyable, but one longs for and demands an ending to any story because it delivers peace and allows the listener a chance to process what's been told. in today's world, stories seems to drone on saying less and less as they go and continue to exist like some ghost or something, haunting our televisions just because. they exist just because someone will watch it, because someone is funding it, because actors need work, but that's the opposite of a story, that's just a situation, and situations often suck.

And Again, Two Wrongs still don't Make a Right

2011-11-11T11:32:00.001-06:00

yes, of course this happened while i was biking, when else do these things take place? one time, upon meeting up with a good friend of mine, he opened our conversation with, "bikers are jerks." when i asked why he told me about an incident he had just the other day in which he was driving his car down the street and a cyclist shot out from an alley into the street right in front of him, no looking, no yielding, nothing. my friend said he honked at the cyclist at which the cyclist responded by giving him the middle finger. "yeah, they're jerks." my friend was correct, it was a jerk move and my friend had all the right to be miffed over the interaction; the cyclist was clearly in the wrong and had no right to respond as he did. all i could say in response was that people are jerks, cars and bikes and any other apparatus are simply just ways in which people extend their jerkiness. jerkiness is not inherent in the activity but the beholder.

today i found myself in the opposite situation. as an aside, i find the timing of this all odd as upon leaving my apartment this morning i felt a strange feeling, not that something bad was necessarily going to happen, but just an overwhelming feeling to take it slow today and focus on taking my time. anyways, moving down my normal route to work 50-100 feet ahead of me are two cyclists moving down the bike lane when a taxi decides to pull to the right directly in front of the two cyclists. both began yelling and banging on the taxi and carrying on, the cab just sat there in the way. recalling my earlier feeling and having no bikes behind me (praises for the new onset of cold weather), i just stopped and figured i'd wait this one out and move on when the lane cleared (as a cyclist you always have other options/temptations in these situations to dart around traffic any which way there's a space. however, this often causes more harm than good to everyone but you adding yet another variable to an already complicated situation). so there i stood. the taxi finally moved on to the right, and the two cyclists continued by yelling all the way, when just ahead of them again (just past the taxi) another car decides to pull out to the left into the street, my foot dropped to the pavement again (fewer variables). fluidly, the cyclists' carrying on was redirected to the new perpetrator as they passed this new player.

so here we have a situation in that, in this case, the cyclists were in the right. they were progressing along in their proper lane and twice cars failed to check behind them and pulled out into oncoming traffic. is it right to yell obscenities at others even when they're in the wrong, i don't know, does it ever help, not that i have ever seen. if you pull out into moving traffic and get cursed/honked at, do you deserve it, most likely, should you respond in anyway besides an apology and/or getting out of the way, no, does it ever play out this way, not that i have ever seen.

finally moving on, i proceeded with my commute (situations like this often happen and everyone just goes on with their life). however, not today. a block later a see the second car sitting in the middle of the bike lane and as the cyclist pass the driver-side-door of the car swings open and the driver jumps out (the cyclist pass without contacting the door. i don't think the driver was trying to door the cyclists, rather, he was simply angry and no longer cared whose way he was in, what was going on around him or the timing of anything at this point it seems). the driver, standing next to his car in moving traffic yells something at the two cyclists (i am able at this point to pass his parked car on the right, i figured, given the chance, i'd put all this behind me).

apparently the driver was not satisfied with his delivery or the response of the cyclists, and was now moving up the lane behind me (in his defense, he stayed back off me and i didn't feel threatened, but i still didn't want to be in front of him at this moment). the next light he continues to yell at the cyclists (who have now separated themselves from his car by two lanes of traffic). the light changes, we all move on, that's the last i hear of anything, everyone dilutes back into the traffic at large.

what to say of all this. first off, how little do you have to be that you get yelled at for pulling out in front of someone and you decide the proper response is to chase them down, hop out of your car mid-traffic and yell back? i mean come on. i would hope that you have far too much else going on to spend your time sulking over something some stranger who knows nothing about you (save that, presently, you suck at driving and they're commenting to this, with evidence, mind you) says about you. how little, i want to see the math on that. second, why do we continue to respond to traffic incidents in such a hostile manner when we've NEVER seen it come to any good? what is our endgame with yelling crude words at another. what do we think the is going to happen. do we think the receiver is going to fall into a pile of repentance, begging your forgiveness, and if this were to happen (NEVER GONNA HAPPEN), what would you do, does anyone even know how to respond to this? i myself would become more angry if someone began sobbing apologies because at the end of the day my feeling is, don't be sorry, just don't do it, know how to look (in this situation), so that negates yelling from the beginning because i sure as hell don't want an apology and, speaking in reality, i'm not going to get one. how much negative reinforcement does it take to change a method?

i suppose it's not that we're immune to negative reinforcement but that we're overly susceptible to momentary emotions. there should be an order of operations of such that plays out in these situations. one, under no circumstance, say or do the first thing that comes to mind. our first reaction is, a reaction and completely based on emotion and is geared toward defending ourselves not righting the situation (i suppose this first defense reaction is somehow tied to genes in that another gene has just jeopardized our gene from spreading and now our emotions take over and see this as an opportunity to dispense another gene from the pool, thus eliminating competition, hence the rage). give it a few seconds before doing anything, create a gap in the flow of the situation and upset the inertia a bit, this will allow you more control. second, count your blessings. in this case, be glad no one was hurt, be glad you didn't wreck your car and you can just go about your business and everyone walk away. save up all that gumption for the situations that require real attention, don't waste your time and emotion on this garbage. three, assess fairly and know where you stand in the situation. you pulled out into traffic in front of someone without properly checking, shut the hell up, the last thing that is going to help the situation is YOU adding more to it when look where your actions got you thus far. maybe give someone else the reigns for a few moments. take what's coming to you. no one likes to be cursed at, but if you have it coming, just take it like an adult, babies throw tantrums and kick and scream when they're caught doing something they're not supposed to and confronted about it. don't be a baby.

to victims, don't act like a victim. you count your blessings. be glad you're in once piece, move on, let this remind you to be more careful and on the look-out. just because it was anothers wrong action that created the situation doesn't give you full reign to walk all over someone. keep your dignity, don't do and say things that are just going to make things worse, be the bigger person. at the end of the day, just be responsible for yourself and secure in who you are; be responsible with what you do. responsibility seems to play a large role in how many situations such as these play out as well. today's society more and more subconsciously and consciously tells us that we are not responsible for anything. what is meeting us face to face in these situations is the solid fact that we are responsible for this and we must answer to it. this is hard when we live in a society that likes to tell you the other 99% of the time that you don't have to answer to anything.

so what do we learn from all this? two wrongs don't make a right, know how to be responsible and to answer for your own actions, seek corporate solution not self-gratifying justice. use your actions to separate yourself from babies and other wild creatures, don't muddle the line between.

Unboxed Fools

2011-10-24T15:33:00.000-05:00

This past weekend i was able to watch the movie, Scott Pilgrim vs. The World. a visually fun movie for anyone who's ever played a video game, also, just visually fun to watch, very creative. However, any aspects or examples of relationship from the movie were not quite as much fun to watch. the movie's basic premise bases off the main character, Scott Pilgrim, who we come to find "recently" (about one year ago) broke-up with his girlfriend (whose band has afforded her fame and she had become too big for "them"), has since taken it pretty hard and the movie's visuals act to allow the audience to share the listless state this has left Scott in. at the opening of the movie Scott does have another girlfriend, a highschool student (Scott is 22 and no longer in secondary school). this relationship seems to mock Scott's former relationship only with the roles reversed. Scott is in a band and his highschool girlfriend idolizes him for it giving Scott a false sense of fame.

the main plot of the movie begins moving forward upon Scott meeting Ramona (she is closer to his age, if nothing else, not a minor). throughout the rest of the movie Scott is faced with defeating Ramona's exes (all evil and all possessing some super power, you know, like a video game). this is the fun and straight forward part of the movie. the less fun, far more confusing part of the movie is why Scott would pursue someone like Ramona to begin with. one of the movie's themes, anything worth pursuing is worth fighting for (or something like that) is something i could get behind, however, Scott seems to be all about fighting for anything, rather than anything WORTH fighting for. this one word makes a huge difference.

as Ramona's character is developed and unfolded we find that she is, in a word, fickle. a large part of why she has so many exes (and evil vengeful exes as well) is that one, she is impulsive about what and even who she likes at any given moment and 100% of the time chooses to follow her present impulse given no thought to the past. also, when impulse takes her another direction (which never includes present significant other) she is quick to break off the relationship with little reason or remorse. the movie attempts to characterize this behavior as cute and lively, someone who lives for the moment and does not fear change. however, in reality, this is the last type of person who should be dating anyone.

of course, Ramona is not to be blamed completely for this dysfunction she resides in. present Scott Pilgrim and not to leave out past evil exes are proof that there are those characters out there that desire someone such as Ramona and are willing to take the risk her impulsiveness brings (though, seeing how the plot of the movie is moved along by the fact that Romona's exes systematically come back to do battle with her current boyfriend just goes to show that they really did not count the cost nor were they truly prepared or willing to deal with the loss her impulsiveness was so sure to bring upon them).

a defining moment in the movie finds Romona telling Scott (whom she is just about to break-up with) that this is just the way she is and she cannot change. Ramona is not someone Scott should waste time pursuing whatsoever. a relationship with her is nothing more than a whirlwind goose chase followed by a swift end with no explanation. yes, Scott was able to get a little make-out time in with her but this is clearly not all he was looking for since, first of all, his last (rebound) girlfriend was a minor and he was very careful to preserve a completely platonic relationship whose dates looked more like a big-bro, big-sis mentoring outing than anything else and then there's the main plot fact fact that he's willing to video-game-style fight 7 evil exes to keep her which goes to show that he's in this for more than necking. so, to close that matter, we can just conclude that Scott Pilgrim is a fighting fool with little self-confidence. we've all seen this a million times and it's nothing to analyze the hell out of it.

what is worth analyzing and is telling about the underlying message this movie may or may not be purposely spooning out is this: Ramona believes herself to be unchangeable and believes her qualities (free spirited, impulsive, fickle) to be direct antidotes to the quintessential "trapped" relationship, some may call this the "boxy" relationship. a relationship reigned in by certain parameters, assumptions and (though some might scofingly call them "rules") i would say decencies toward other individuals.

first off, Ramona's attributes. she has them all misplaced and turned around. there is nothing wrong with being free-spirited and if you don't fear change, never discard that, however, one thing Ramona does fear is lack of change, so even if Ramona would happen to come along an actual decent relationship, she'd effectively sabotage it because she follows present impulses and not wisdom gleaned from past experience. Ramona also believes the lie that though she lives for change and lives this out through being impulsive, she believes she cannot change the way she is.

little does Ramona know, a basic building block of any working, healthy, interpersonal relationship is change. one seeks out ways they can change to further the effectiveness of the relationship, one changes and sacrifices for another in order to sluf off those aspects about them that would seek to destroy and cheapen the relationship in order to take on new aspects that both might hinge a more healthy union upon. change is the basis of relation. one spends the first parts of their life learning to be selfish, to take care of the self and in order for a relationship to work, this selfishness must be subdued each day for the sake of the relationship, one must think of the other before themself. Ramona's inkling, one, that she can sustain a relationship without change on her own part and two, the belief that she herself cannot be changed is foolishness. this is simply to say, basically, she idolizes and worships herself as it is God alone who is unchangeable.

this thought process about relationships holds in store nothing but a cycle that goes nowhere. one will begin to date someone, impulsively decide they don't want to be with them anymore, believe they owe no explanation and cease the relationship, and on and on again. ironically, this way of acting will only serve to attract other similar dysfunctions which believe similar lies to that of "i cannot change this is just how i am" and altogether their act of dating will create false positives to the lies which are not fact but simply their witness of their own dysfunctions commingling with each other. this is not to say we all don't have our own dysfunctions, but these particular types are of the kind that refuse change and tend to view health as dysfunction (i.e. think a "boxy" relationship is bad because they feel it lacks spark or spontaneity, whereas, many solid, boxy relationships retain much spontaneity as well as the relationship being more deeply enjoyed by both parties as one is not constantly afraid they will be spontaneously dropped by the other on account of some impulsive feeling or decision).

"i cannot change, this is just who i am" is not an excuse for action but rather a cop-out from intimacy and a letting on of self-worship. it should be avoided by all true relationship seekers and those with any level of wisdom can spot it far off and are seldom caught in its clutches.

Information Intoxication

2011-09-09T13:00:00.002-05:00

there is an overwhelming amount of information at our fingertips and this is making it more difficult to hash out what is actually correct and/or true as there's no organization; facts, rants and emotional outpourings are all thrown together and to make matters more interesting, credibility is clouded as there is often little effort made to verify information and those who post most often and boisterously usually end up procuring, whether by accident or design, a false credibility from readers.

we also fail (ironically given the amount of information available) to recognize the complexity and interconnectedness of problems and issues. we want at the end of the day to narrow everything down to one source, one culprit, one thing/person to blame. then, we further fail to realize (in cases where we have pinned the blame on one thing/individual) that that did not solve the problem, so the witch hunt continues for the next one thing to blame. we love to wallow in our own pride of how well we understand complex thoughts and ideas yet we still look for simple answers.

no matter how much information we have or technology we're able to wield, we continue to be a people whose emotions are quickly stirred by a few quick tongues and there continues to be a very short distance between an issues' arising and our own arising to hunt the witch that cast the spell that caused the fever.

at the end of the day, we must remember we are all prone to hear what we want to hear. We must be willing to allow our own thoughts and views to be amended and relinquished with new information. we must be more interested in finding the truth than defending our position.

Fair is Fantasy

2011-08-10T12:03:00.000-05:00

the idea of something, anything being fair is utter fantasy at best and should be met with laughter when used in argument (i.e. "that's not fair"). when one's main argument in any situation is that it's not fair the only thing they're less conveying an argumentative stance and more letting on that they have little stake in reality. when one says "that's not fair" what they're really saying is, "i'm ignorant of reality." you will find the phrase "that's not fair" emanating from many children's mouths and that's because by and large children are ignorant of reality. this is not a slam on children but simply a fact of being young. actually, one's belief in fairness should be in an indirect relationship with their age. as age goes up, belief should diminish. one's level of belief in fairness is a great gauge as to their maturity level. high belief in fairness, low maturity (or age). in reality, one's belief in fairness should dissolve just as belief in Santa or the Tooth fairy does. these are cute little beliefs we had as children to comfort or entertain us but have no stake in the real world and it does one no good to discuss them on any sort of serious level.

for this reason, it's infuriating when an adult attempts this line of reasoning, "that's not fair." it's times like this i am thrilled that newspapers have not all but vanished given the onset of the digital media world because this means when i hear the phrase "that's not fair" uttered from an adult mouth i still have the ability to find the nearest newspaper, roll it up, smack this person on the head, point at them and say NO! or, sometimes after hearing it, i simply retort with an argument as to why the one ring must be taken to Mount Doom and destroyed in its fires since there it was made and only there can it be unmade. after watching them stair at me a few seconds once i've completed my line of "reasoning" i can reply with, "what, aren't we talking about fantasy...you brought up fantasy."

belief in fairness in the world is simply a cop-out of a simple mind who has the audacity to let on that they truly believe that something should be given or had "just because." these individuals are not to be trusted as they will betray you if given a better deal or if they feel they are contributing in the relationship beyond another.

everyone can't be right all the time at the same time

2011-06-09T16:36:00.000-05:00

the other day on my commute home via bicycle i was given the "pleasure" of riding behind a hurried cyclist. i slowed at one point to allow a pedestrian to cross in a cross-walk and this cyclist took the opportunity to rush around me (apparently undeterred by the pedestrian). later on the route, i was able to witness this same cyclist nearly miss colliding with yet another pedestrian. in the cyclist's defense, this particular pedestrian was crossing the street at a random location (no cross-walk not light controlled) and to make matters worse, said pedestrian was deeply indulged in his cell phone oblivious of the road in which he was crossing. so right there is a problem, a variable in a situation which legally does not exist in the situation, however, physically speaking, there it is and it must be dealt with legal or no.

approaching the pedestrian, both myself and the hurried cyclist ahead of me had ample time to respond to the pedestrian and though, yes, it's annoying when someone walks across the road in such irresponsible manner, everyone else must still retain their responsibility to yield to what is ahead regardless of whether or not it's supposed to be there. in any case, the hurried cyclist ahead of me decided yielding was for losers and the correct response to this situation was to continue his current heading while maintaining speed and swerve around the pedestrian at the last possible second while yelling "watch your @#$* way." to which the now startled and perturbed pedestrian craftily and wittily responded back, "you watch your @#$* way."

who was correct in this situation, who was wrong, who would have been to blame had an accident occurred? laying the facts out, yes, the pedestrian should not have been walking where he was, and worse, was not paying attention. so technically, the pedestrian was definitely wrong (further, if you're going to illegally cross a street at least take care to make sure it's clear first, but this is beside the point).

however, wrong or no, the pedestrian was there and it was infuriating to watch one bad decision (crossing a street while not paying attention) answered by another bad decision (cyclist continuing pace and heading refusing to yield the way). the next several minutes i played the situation back over in my head a few times and each time had to ask, so you'd rather risk hurting another and possibly yourself rather than yield to another simply because they were technically in the wrong? this was your solution?

a deep, dark part of my soul secretly wished the cyclist had run into the pedestrian as i would have seen the entire accident including the events leading up to it. i would have been able to give accurate times as to when the cyclist ahead of me would have or should have (if taking proper care) first been alerted to the presence of the pedestrian crossing, i would have been able to provide accurate estimations as to the cyclist's speed and would have been able to, with a clear conscience say, though the pedestrian should not have been walking there and was not paying attention, the cyclist had ample time to slow or stop to avoid the collision and failed (consciously) to do so. i'm glad there was not a collision, i'm glad no one was hurt, but it would have been the clear-cut justice moment of my life i always seem to be waiting for. two foolish decisions instantly judged. however, this is not a wise or caring way to think and this is not the picture of a world i would like to live in.

it's just infuriating what little care we take of our surroundings for such meaningless pay-offs. one cyclist would risk colliding with and hurting himself and another so he can get to his destination a few seconds quicker. it's also infuriating how inept we are at finding fault in our own actions. after a near hit and being cursed at for obliviously crossing a street the pedestrian simply curses back. where does that come in? you were wrong, you were not paying attention, WHILE, walking where you should not walk. you should be thankful for the grace of the fact that all you got was a few nasty words thrown your way. from what i have seen of you, this is the least of your problems.

i see this all the time. a car runs a red light, crossing traffic honks and yells at them, the driver of the car running the red light throws an outstretched arm out the window, middle finger on hand promptly displayed up above the other 4. what sort of attitude is that? i was wrong, you called me out on it, screw you. you just watch your corrective insights bounce right off my forehead, it ain't gettin in this here head. it is the fool who rejects correction. and that's what we are, a bunch of fools. i long for the days as a child when my disobedience or stupid decisions were followed by a swift smack and a lecture. it came because those who watched over me and cared for me. as much as they didn't want me to get hurt, they also wanted me to make good decisions, have good judgment and to seek wisdom and yield correction. more often than not we are prone to swerve around correction at the last moment, yelling obscenities at it stubbornly refusing to change our course.

everyone else is wrong, others are the problem. it is an absurd notion that i am part of any problem. these are the lies we accept for a false sense of comfort and security. most of our growth, if any, is accidental and done in reaction to consequences we cannot avoid and is reluctantly taken with the attitude that if it weren't for said situation that stopped us, our lives would be better as we would be doing what we wanted without any restriction. growth is seldom sought after or achieved because of a need for peace or betterment of ourselves individually or as a way to strengthen a community.

if you want to race your bicycle, take up bike racing and enter yourself into a sanctioned race, if you're more interested in what is going on on the screen of your cell phone than what your present surroundings hold, stay in your living room. if you want to do either of these while in the midst of the general public, on public property then know that others will be there to discipline, direct and correct you as you're out of context, irresponsible and are going to hurt yourself, another or both without outside intervention.

Birther Defect

2011-04-28T10:37:00.001-05:00

Yesterday opened with big news, President Obama saw fit to publish his birth certificate online for the world to download and behold. I plan to mount mine on the wall opposite my bed so it will be the first thing I see each day. Any birthers out are free to implement this idea as well. Considering such a fuss was raised about the authenticity of the man's native birth, now that this vastly important and worthy of everyone's time question has been answered this should be the best sleep many who call themselves birthers get in a long while now that we're all sure Obama is in fact native born, which is definitely one of the most important qualities of any would be leader in the US. The country just has to be at least 30% safer, general well being at its height and poverty all but a thing of the past now that we all know Obama was born on our beloved soil.

Now that a document has been produced it is only human nature for the birthers to cry fraud regarding the document's authenticity and chalk it up among the rest of the government conspiracies they keep current on. A note about the controversy over whether or not the certificate is "authentic" and for this I'll give those who fear the certificate is a forgery the benefit of the doubt and just assume for a moment that, yes, the document was in fact produced within the last few days as a direct reaction to the birthers' controversy and prior to their raising dispute the certificate did not exist. The president of the US represents the very head of the US government at large. It is a government office that produces birth certificates. If the US government decides to produce an authentic document, it can be done and they can back date it as far as they want/need to. Therefore, regardless of whether this certificate was produced in 1961 or 3 days ago, the fact remains that this is an official government document produced by the official government. The main aspect of a forgery is that it is produced by one hand but made to look and represents to be produced by that of a completely different hand. In this case, there is only one hand involved and it's a very official hand. You asked for it, you got it, birthers, sit down, talking time is over.

If nothing else, the entire birther movement has been a wonderful testament to humanities ability to waste time and energy striving for a meaningless goal. And I don't use the term meaningless to say the birthers' question as to Obama's native authenticity is meaningless. It's not that they ask an absurd question which can be in no way true. They're free to question what they want and they're also just as free to question the authenticity of a document produced to quash the original question. My question is: why? What is the endgame of all this? What precipice has the US been hanging over facing certain doom stemming entirely from the fact that the current president may have not been born on US soil? What danger does this actually cause? What, birthers, what have you just saved us from?

Does having an authentic copy of the president's US birth certificate cure cancer? Did the economy instantly repair itself the moment the PDF was published, are racism and social injustice now things of the past now that we know this one man's actual birth location? What...what monumental importance, what key to all things good did this obtain?

And if the endgame was to ultimately remove Obama from office, what then (refer to prior paragraph)? Biden becomes president and you continue to hate him? The next SOB comes into office and half of us hate them and seek to sabotage their every move and slander them every chance? What would be so different about that existence?

The birthers represent a very particular, naive mindset that if we just remove a certain individual, if one aspect would change everything would become perfect, that we're always one man away from perfect utopia. In all reality, government and politics will always run the way it does no matter where the leaders were born or what animal they choose to represent their political views. We have no corporate sense of success. The US is too free and too stuck on each and every individual's own view of how this or that should be done and we will not bend to contemplate another opinion, we will not wait for another goal before ours is addressed.

When a leader is elected to power, we spend our time and energy on focusing on what we don't like about them, what we don't agree with, what mistakes they are making. Never is there a moment when we corporately decide to rally behind a leader and help them succeed. So nothing will work and that which does will take far longer than it needs to to change or come to be in the first place.

One thing I know about the mindset of the birther is that though they may be able to trace their births to that of US soil, technically making them eligible for the office of president, I wouldn't want any of them leading or overseeing anything, not my local government, not my housing association, not my Frisbee team. They have proved that they focus on the wrong aspects of issues, they waste time, money and energy and they create issues out of non-issues. Again, let's just say that Obama was not born on US soil, for argument's sake, he is still far more qualified for the presidency than any one birther if for no other reason but that he has demonstrated a basic ability to recognize and focus on real issues rather than playing childish games of semantics.

Go back to your homes, birthers, take care of yourselves and your families, seek out those in need and provide for them, be there for your fellow man. Stop focusing on arbitrary aspects of life. There are those out there with far greater need than you can imagine, those who have not the luxury to worry on such trash as you have decided to devote yourselves to. Your very ability to focus so acutely on such a topic is a testament to how good you have it.

Survival of the Fittest, with help.

2010-02-17T11:38:00.002-06:00

I am continually reminded that I do not in my own mind struggle over the truth of evolution. I think many animals and plants could have and probably did evolve and change over the years, but the fact that man could have evolved out of a simpler "animal" through the basic law of survival of the fittest and trial and error is highly improbable. From the behaviors exhibited by humans to this present time there's little chance this race could have survived without some divine intervening plan of preservation.

I find myself on a train with a bicycle. The train is not packed, it is not rush-hour, but there's a fair population occupying the cars at the given moment. When I originally enter the train I am met with two women standing near the doorway chatting. Neither initially move to allow me in (there's plenty of room behind them in which they could retreat to). Whatever it is, whether they are not paying attention, simply don't care or are very committed to their present spot, it's an idiotic situation and shouldn't happen. One should always pay attention to their surroundings, especially when in the urban public. One should think of others and accommodate as necessary and able, especially when in the urban public. One should refrain from locating and having "favored" spots in, on or about any public service vehicle or venue (as they are there for everyone and function at their highest potential when all patrons think and act as part of a group and not self-serving individuals, (i.e. pay attention to and move to accommodate other riders if it becomes necessary, even if it means leaving your fav spot...resist the urge to be an ass, ESPECIALLY IN THE URBAN PUBLIC)).

I find my way with bike onto the train (the women move back JUST enough to allow me on, though it confines me and bike to the door area (I hate people who stand in the door area)). I am thus forced to become that which I despise, but as stated above, I am now part of the public and sometimes we are given portions and positions we find less than ideal when acting as part of a larger whole. I remain in the door area and the train pulls into the next stop. Many more patrons are waiting to board, I remain trapped in the door. Ample room remains in front of me, around the short door area wall in which I am bound. Those women remain kitycorner to me inhibiting the passage that SHOULD exist beyond me and bike allowing patrons access to aforementioned ample room. New patrons continue to shove onto train, two women remain stationary, nary is there a request from said packers to bypass the two women in order to thus possess said ample room. Packing continues, door shuts to a train that is packed as a rush-hour car in spots and empty as a 3 AM train in others.

Note here that none of the new boarders took any care to survey the train's contents (it has BIG windows) before entering, thus perhaps making a split second decision to choose a different, less issued train car in which to grace their presence with. No, packing is apparently the desired mode by which we all choose to live (note here there was a choice, of course that would have required some split second decisions and walking a few extra feet. Screw you, I'd rather worry about my caloric intake now while standing and doing nothing, than expend a little extra energy thus contributing to a happyier society and a healthier me, then I'll go to the gym later, run to nowhere on a treadmill for twenty minutes and finish the night by complaining about gym overcrowding and contract fees. Trying to live the American Dream here, so out of the way).

When humans, in all their supposed brilliance and superiority and evolutionary progress cannot, or refuse to, negotiate one man with one bike on a partially filled train car, those who believe in human evolution are effectively spitting in natural selection's face, trampling on eons of past pain, hard work and adaptation and simply daring the natural world to produce another plague (or at least a human predator).

Some will jest at the idea of a divine creator who is both imminent and omniscient, omnipotent and in full control. The faith some hold that all is divinely planned, allowed and preserved is written off as childish or some deep set neurosis. I jest humanism and the thought that humanity is where it is today because of strength and intelligence. I don't need a lot of extra evidence to disbelieve in human evolution or the survival of the fittest, I have morons on a train failing to negotiate one man and one bike. Given present human advancement and the fact that we think we know what adaptation and evolution is, you'd think this sort of situation would have died off with those fools who practice it long ago and by now our gene pool should be free of such traits.

I suppose someone could argue right back asking why an omnipotent God would allow such "stupid" situations to occur. And that's fine, my response to that is we're all part of a bigger picture and plan and don't know the reason or outcome of most of what is going on.
But by grace go all of us to the wild and fearsome. Only by the will and intervention of God do we not destroy each other and ourselves and simply deteriorate in pools of our own lazy lack of care, self-interest.

Writing on the Wall

2009-06-19T10:54:00.002-05:00

Yesterday a sign that read "out of order"was posted on one of the office copy machines. This morning another sign joined it reading "service has been called." I was tempted to add a third sign, "when will they come?" This would in essence create a fully functioning, all accessible message board, taking place right on one of our own office copy machines (talk about using a device for something completely different than what the developer origianlly designed it for).

This happening reminded me of similar instances I was witness to in middle school. One day a message of some kind appeared on the boys' bathroom wall, nothing inappropriate or crude, just a message, something like, "this is the nicer of the bathrooms in the school." Seriously, just that simple, like a prophetic view into the furture world of facebook and twitter messages each of us is barraged with each hour (there being only about 1% we actually care to read, but end up reading them all because they're so short. In a way, facebook and twitter have tricked us into engaging in small talk. After about 20 seconds going through my facebook page a cold sweat begins as I realize I have become engaged in not only one small talk based converation but several, and to make matters worse each thread has nothing to do with the others. The only thing worse than small talk is disjointed banter small talk which is usually reserved for the homeless guy you were tricked into listening to, but that's a whole other post).

A message appeared on the bathroom wall and the next day, another message was found beneath the original. Over the next week the "threads" multiplied, some in reply to the original, others to other replies, and still others began entire new rabbit trails into completely new topics. Lines ran through the scribbles and around the quickly scrawled middle school musings connecting "posts" to their correct responses.

The frequency of bathroom breaks spiked that week (the why unknown to the faculty). A visit to the restroom became a visit to the message board to see if any agreements or snide comments had been added to your previous day's insight. An odd happenstance to all this is, at least for me, I never witnessed anyone actively writing on the wall. It was as if, subconciously and in perfect Jungian syncrotism, we visited the bathroom one by one, alone, to write our thoughts in anonaminity.

Then, one day, not unlike the corporations that step into society's social networks and attempt to present and sell the people with some template, some "correct" place and style of communicating, that that corporation may then make money off, inevitably and sadly, one day walking into the bathroom I was met with the janitor painting over the masterpiece, mumbling to himself as he silenced the voices of the students in a few short strokes of a paint roller. We looked in horror at the white, emptiness that was once a vibrant forest of thoughts, evolving into a single idea, maybe a revolution.

We shook our fists in the air in protest (silently, as no one knew who had written on the wall and no one would tell of their own bathroom musings for fear of taking on the punishment of the whole). "You, establishment (the vocab word that week), can't sell communication, you can't stop it simply because you don't benefit!" If you cap the top, it will ooze out the sides, if you shut out the light, it will grope in the dark and find another and another until it has rebuilt itself, independent and without you.

Those who will succeed in the tech/communitcation growth are those that look at the wall, spattered with middle school penmanship and see not a mess or vandalism but an evolution. Who will then take that and say, "yes, this is what it has become and is becomming, how can I help its expansion?"

Where the Wild Things Were

2009-03-27T11:03:00.006-05:00

"Where the Wild Things are" is now a movie. It's a sign of the times. My generation is officially growing up and looking back. I always thought it was just me who was overly nostalgic but I find I'm not alone. Throughout any given day I am met with a number of signs that my generation is now in the nostalgic, adult chapter. Buying lunch I find myself bobbing my head to "My Jones" by Counting Crows or something off No Doubt's "Tragic Kingdom." I'm reminded of the first time I may have heard these. The high school track during a meet, marching band practice or my first car's radio as I rushed from school to work.

Looking through the newspapers I see advertisements for the "High School Prom" event, a way for us late 20 somethings to relive our prom I suppose. I watch "It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia" and realize that these characters are my age and were my peers in high school and they reflect that scared, selfish, lost feeling many of my generation struggle with right now.

The trailer for Where the Wild Things are recently came out. I can't complain, it looks like it's going to be a beautiful, nostalgic movie. The trailer is complete with wide shots of a perfect Max look-alike and all his adventurous, shy glory and Arcade Fire's song "Wake Up," a song about growing up, loss of innocence and, ironically, released in 2004, when most of my generation was finishing undergrad and feeling those first anxious pulls of life. The first time we looked back instead of forward and wondered, "was it better then; do I want now?"

My mother could not help but compare me to Max, the main character of Where the Wild Things are and It'd be foolish of me to think that I was the only little boy of my generation who was compared as such. Max was a symbol to us all that though we had eternity in our hearts we still longed for our mothers come day's end. I was also compared to Alexander of "The Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day." I had the same perpetually messy hair (which I still have, go figure), the same little scowl during a bad day and of course, bad days (no good, very bad days). I'm really waiting for this one to be made into a movie too, but I also hope this never happens. A movie would ruin the simplicity. A movie would need to add more personality and depth to Alex and his family when this is not the point of the book. The point is simply that there are bad days and you will have them, even if you go to Australia.

Now that Where the Wild Things are is a movie, I fear for it for similar reasons. It's a simple story, short, to the point and beloved. Most of us could identify with Max and we had our favorite wild thing and there were those few wild things we could never quite figure out or place. So what happens when the attributes we've inputed into a beloved story are rocked by the awesome force that is 21st century surround sound, computer generated glory and really well made wolf pajamas?

I have always argued the side of literature that states stories are about something specific, have specific points and purposes and should not be openly interpreted to meet one's own needs and convictions. Only those blindly post-modern or simply ignorant would venture into the "it's whatever you want it to be about" camp. Short children's stories such as Where the Wild Things are are no different as far as I'm concerned, however the characters in these stories are often left open to more reader interpretation and imputation. Of all the wild things in the book, Max is the only one with any depth. The other wild things are a tad more than cool drawings, left wide open for the reader to decide what they're like, which ones are scary, which are cute, which are happy, which are lost.

The attributes we give these "blank" characters are pieces of us, our attributes, spread out where they can be managed and dealt with. After stating that these characters are open to our interpretation, I cannot say that a movie producer does not have the same right to impute characterizations. However, once a movie is made our own imputations are challenged. Perhaps some of the movie characterizations don't fit our own. The scope and range of a movie's interpretations are so far reaching, it's a dangerous power, a hideous strength.

We are simply left to wait it out and hope the beauty of the movie does not destroy our memories, but at the same time, may our own memories not make us hard and cynical to another's art and expressions. Who are we to withhold praise where it is due because of our own insecurities?

May we recent adults learn to love what we've got and continue forward. Looking back to our memories as beginning markers allowing our nostalgia to grow into wisdom and not fester into regret and longing for what no longer is. May the eternity in our hearts someday find rest, may our mothers' ancient words lead it there.

Prone to Failure

2009-02-16T15:28:00.002-06:00

If you ever want to surprise a friend don't tell me about it. When planning that perfect surprise birthday party for your spouse or roommate I'm happy to be just as surprised as they are when the moment comes. I have ruined or near ruined too many surprises to be comfortable thinking about. It's not that I want to or like to give away surprises. I'm not trying to steal the attention of a moment and I don't get weird highs from destroying someone else's efforts.

I just end up saying something I'm not supposed to. I mix up who's supposed to know and who is not. I refer to something that inadvertantly begins a stream of thought in that one who is to be surprised which leads them straight to the truth. I am also known to mess up secret announcements. If you're going to move and don't want everyone to know yet, keep me in the "everyone" group. Don't worry, I'm fine with not being privy to inside information no matter how close you consider me. I promise I won't be hurt or offended if I'm the last to know you're moving to Australia. As long as I didn't mess up any secret announcements or ruin someone's surprise trust that I am completely fine.

In high school a friend of mine had a dream one night that he was literally trying to keep a cat from clawing its way out of a bag. He had to continue holding the bag while pulling up the falling, ripped flaps. The bag became harder and harder to hold together and its ability to contain the cat was quickly diminishing. He woke up before the cat escaped, but he couldn't help asking himself the question the next day, "what 'cat' am I trying to not let out?" I've learned one thing from his dream and I'll impart it to you and you can then help me not fail. Cats cannot be bound by bags.

Perhaps some have other methods of keeping these "cats" pent up. Maybe you have some metaphorical 2x4 you can periodically smack the cat within the bag with taking some of the fight out of it. Perhaps your bag is made of thick leather. Maybe your cat is just calm and content to remain in the bag until properly released. Whatever your surprise concealing method is you're safe to assume I don't possess it. My bag is paper, plastic at best and the cat has claws and does not want to be in the bag. Of course, this is beginning to sound like I can't help but give surprises away, which is not the case at all. I want to keep your surprise party and/or announcement secret as much as you want me to. I think it's more that I just end up leaving my bag laying somewhere, in the room, unattended, and the cat kinda just walks out.

It's hard for me to live day to day keeping surprises all in line and properly organized, shielded from the right people and freely offered to and amended by those who've clearance to them. What I know is what I know. To clear something up, it's not that I can't keep knowledge safe or that I can't keep important tidbits about close friends to myself. I'm speaking of surprises. Parties and events that will be known to everyone soon but not at the moment. Things that are ultimately good, but better when known by the right people at the right times. I am that right person. Of course, in writing this I make a hypocrite of myself because I recently organized a surprise party for my wife in which I needed to trust all my close friends to keep a secret from her. I'm not sure at this time if there's another in our midst that struggles with the same surprise inability I do. In the case there is another in my circle of friends, much like offering your recovering alcoholic friend a drink, I recently asked them to do something they may have not been able to handle. However, it's not that I don't like surprises or find them immoral, it's just that I'm not good at them, so I'm best left out.

The Nightmare

2009-02-12T13:29:00.003-06:00

Always a similar nightmare. I'm a child, somewhere between 7 and 12, and I walk out the back door of the house I grew up in in Ohio. I look toward the field that extends from the back yard. At the end of this field is a woods where I spent countless hours as a child. However, this time when I look past the field to the back woods something has changed. The woods have come undone in a way, parts are still there, a few clumps of trees, but spread throughout the area are houses. A cookie-cutter development with equally cookie-cutter houses now sits where that beautiful woods used to be. I writhe in anger, sadness and disappointment. I am powerless to do anything about it, I was powerless to stop the development of the land and there is nothing that can be done to restore it.

I have been having this dream all my life. Even to the present time I will have a dream like this at least once a year. The dream varies every time. Sometimes the development has completely wiped the trees away and I look on from far off, other times I walk up to the tree line and everything looks normal until I enter the woods and upon doing so I am met with houses and yards instead of the thick of the woods. In some variations I see the construction and clearing take place, in others it's already complete. But it's all the same theme.

To this day I fear that area's development. My family would never buy the land, even if it were offered to us and I do not see myself settling in that area anyways. I sometimes fantasize that the owners will some day donate the land as a preserve, rendering it untouchable and sealed, forever safe. I suppose until that happens I'll continue to have this same dream. If and when the day does finally come when the nightmare becomes reality I think I'll be found with disappointed tears. I will be heartbroken.

People that grew up moving a lot maintain that they have no roots and no nostalgia connected to place or land. Others simply are not fond of where they grew up even if it is all they know. Sometimes I wish I didn't feel such a connection to the place and the land where I grew up. Damn it that where I grew up is so prone to change. There are parts of me that are now looking, silently, for another piece of land. Some space to breath and move, a hint of where I grew up, quiet, dark at night and away from the hustle and bustle.

Blagojevich, a.k.a. (Former?) Governor of IL, or just insert the name of your favorite martyr

2009-01-26T16:44:00.004-06:00

Even if IL governor Blagojevich is completely innocent and everything he's saying is true and he is a huge victim, he still has no choice at this point. the rest of the IL government has pretty clearly shown that they don't want to work with him anymore and they're spending a lot of energy and (again, in the event he is telling the truth) they're fabricating a whole lot of crap (which would be a major risk, yet not out of line for IL government) to dispose of Blago. However, even if the majority of the IL government is making all this up just to get him out I can't really complain. It would probably be the best the IL government has worked together in a long while and that's the showings of a healthy administration (for IL that is).

Blago just needs to walk away with whatever dignity he has left and stop wasting IL's money. He goes on and on about how much he's helped everything and now he's come up with this conspiracy theory that they just want him out so they can raise taxes, yeah, irony is once he is out, with all he made everyone go through, IL will have to raise taxes to make up for the deficit he's going to leave. Or maybe not, perhaps IL works this stuff into the budget given its track record.

If you Rearrange the Letters in "The Matrix" it Spells "War of the Worlds "

2009-01-22T15:39:00.001-06:00

As it turns out, the Wachowski's were not as creative as was once suspected in formulating their idea of a pod imprisoned human race being fed on by super-human (in their case machine) beings. Upon finishing H.G. Wells' War of the Worlds, the main construct of The Matrix idea comes from the half-crazy bantering of a lost soldier in WOTW. I'm not saying the Matrix was not a well crafted story and movie (the first one), I'm just connecting references that I have been ignorant of. The Matrix did a great job of adapting original idea into its story reality.

In WOTW a soldier discourses the fact that in the light of the Martian invasion, people, those strong enough, will need to go underground, use London's old sewers and train tunnels as their home (think hover crafts flying through old sewer systems and utility shafts...zion, the underground city). The soldier also mentions the fact that most humans are not ready for this. Those comfortable in their dead-end jobs and stagnant lives will not only fail to flee from the Marian oppressors, but will willingly accept the new order of being locked-up and "taken care of" by the new oppressors (they will willingly trade in one lifestyle for the other. In this, Wells draws a parallel between the way most live and downright imprisonment). Sounds much like Morpheus' speech with Neo in the Agent training program.

In WOTW, it becomes clear that the Martians seek to use the human race as a food source. This realization comes as the narrator observes over and over Martian machines taking and collecting humans as opposed to simply vaporizing them with their heat rays and later witnessing humans having their insides sucked out (much like the Second Renaissance shorts in the Animatrix collection, only in the Matrix humans are used for the electricity the body produces and not it's fluids).

Further, the design and look of the machines at large, especially when one watches the Animatrix, heavily borrow from Wells' descriptions of the Martian machines in WOTW. WOTW, like The Matrix, describes the machines as being tri-pod walking machines including many whip-like "arm" structures. Again, though, no foul on the Wachowski's part, Wells was onto something and it continues to strike fear into the readers and viewers of this day and age. If it's not broke, don't fix it.

As an aside, I also find it interesting that the Matrix film was finished with a greenish tint and in WOTW, a greenish glow/smoke is always emanating from the Martians.

If you have not yet had the chance to read War of the Worlds count this as my formal recommendation to go pick it up at your local library. You can make a weekend of it, read the book (not long), watch The Matrix (the first one) and The Animatrix (Second Renaissance I and II) and enjoy the adaptation by an interesting film and the self-Satisfaction that you've just read the book portraying ideas that have yet to be creatively outdone.

"1 in 500 is on us"

2009-01-14T13:12:00.002-06:00

I'm having a hard time figuring out exactly what population Chase Bank is
targeting with the "every 500th purchase is on us" ad. Who can get
excited over this? It's not even something you get the second
time around. Upon the first read there it is. It might as well read, "go ahead, you shoot your big toe off with a pump action shot gun and we'll give you a whole dollar."

It just seems this sort of number crunching is usually hidden deep within the corporation documents, not blaring in one foot tall, back-lit letters on a store front. Someone received and/or forwarded the wrong email and someone is getting fired for this one. We want competitive interest rates, Chase, when will you get that?

More for Less

2009-01-06T17:00:00.008-06:00

We've all heard the catchy phrase "more for less." Usually some sort of shopping establishment will pitch this swearing they are almost certainly certifiably insane for charging such amazing, unbelievable prices for the product they're providing you as a loved patron of the establishment. These "sales" can be quite amusing and if one is not careful, could result in a purchase that, though not needed, would have just been a sin to pass up at such a price.

Chicago would not be out-of-bounds if it had this neat little fragment following every mention of it's great name. It could fit right after its present catch phrase: "Chicago, The Second City, More for Less" and somewhere after that in smaller italicized characters a note of warning: the State's Governor's make our license plates and don't try to find the mayor, the Olympics ate him. It really rolls off the tongue and tugs on the pocket book creases. Yes, I am aware that last phrase is in opposition to what stores usually mean when they darn themselves with the "more for less" advertisement. I am aware that what stores mean, is that for LESS money one is getting MORE product or at least quality.

Not so in Chicago. The phrase still applies, only backwards. Taking the city's public transit authority for example, we continue to pay more and get less. With the country's latest economic issue it has become easier for the city to justify higher costs, but it's business as usual as far as I can tell; shoddy, probably corrupt, service organizations cloaked in too much bureaucracy driven by too little motivation backed by sub-par work ethic, the future is soooo now.

I think this happens because as a society we 1) love to sweat the small details (i.e. we'll argue with the guy at McDonald's over whether we were given the proper discount as per our 5 cent-off coupon but fail to grasp the larger problems) and 2) we are addicted to comfort. I'm not saying that it's comfortable to pay too much for a maybe corrupt, badly managed city service; I'm saying we're too lazy and/or addicted to comfort (i.e. needing things to remain the same as change means work and many times pain) to truly stand-up for and want to do anything about major issues. At the end of the day it's easier to piss and moan over a few pennies McDonald's has just stolen from you. It's easy to feel frustrated with the Walgreens Clerk because you feel they ring items up too slowly.

To stand-up to the real issues, however, this takes change. This takes precious time out of our schedules and it puts our comfort on the line. To start with a huge "what if," what if the city commuters were to band together and simply boycott the local transit authority in irritation of their consistently rising prices which come void of any real service or speed increases? This would initially mean we'd all need to find another way to work. Little secret, the transit authority knows this, and it knows that we're not going to give up such a level of comfort, therefore, we're no threat.

At the end of the day, organizations like the transit authority can do whatever they want, charge what they like and have completely arbitrary schedules and all we're going to do is stand on the platforms and swear under our breath. The more daring of us will decide to take it out on a station agent or even call the central office, but again, so what, what ammunition do we have? What is one or even 100 complainers going to solve, even if those 100 people actually do stop using the service? Everyone else still uses the transit authority, and another little secret, a poorly managed service void of work ethic also doesn't care when a few patrons complain even if they swear (note: these people are being paid far too much for doing far too little and it's been going on far too long for them to begin to give an ear to some complainer now, even if the complaints are well thought out, polite and legitimate).

Solutions?
1) Require all transit authority employees (this includes higher officials) to actually use the public transit system. Stand by, use and rely on the fruit of your own labor, transit authority.
2) Create secret shoppers who will begin to pinpoint problem items and areas (these large "evaluations" the transit authority runs every so often, yeah, those are just as much if not more a part of the problem as the entity itself. Sure, they may even be legit, but again, what ammunition do they have either? So they publish their horrible findings, I'll bet there's going to be no less riders the next morning. These reports just give us more to wail about under our breaths as they point out problems (many of which were probably already known) but ultimately affect no change).
3) Properly manage present funds and funding.

Before ending, a note on local transit authority jargon that may save others a bit of time:
Taking the train home from work one evening I found myself, again, stuck on a platform filled with people (you know, because once again the transit authority was caught off-guard by rush-hour). Once the train finally arrived it was found to be packed-tight allowing no new passengers. The conductor said there was an immediate follower so i decided to wait for the next train.

Yeah, apparently the words "immediate" and "direct" as in "immediately following" or "directly behind me" have a more fluid meaning in transit authority land. I think "directly behind" means something more like, there is another train on this track, behind me, somewhere, at this time. Similarly, "immediately following" means, the next train, as in the train that comes after the present train, but be warned that this phraseology implies nothing of the "immediate" follower' position in reference to the present train.

Advice: push, push for your life, yell, yell at those fools for not properly packing the train car, be irritated and irate with the obtuse-angle-leg-sitters who don't allow anyone to sit next to them on the double bank seats, piss, moan and complain of the guy who stands directly in the door-way while the train loads and unloads, shoot dirty looks at he who stands directly in front of the open door of the train attempting to simultaneously enter while others exit. Or, buy an iphone and a set of good earbuds and immerse yourself in technology bliss until you hear your stop called.

"Are You Smarter than [an American]"

2008-12-21T18:56:00.005-06:00

Just watched my first episode of the popular television show "Are You Smarter than a Fifth Grader," and by "watched" I mean I made it through seven minutes. I would like to note that said seven minutes of air time consisted of 90% dead air with 5% tense background noise and 5% actual content randomly strewn through over the base 90% dead air.

The show opened with background highlights from the end of the previous episode. Turns out the show last left the leading contestant in quite the conundrum (no it did not have to do with spelling, defining or properly using that last word, that must be sixth grade). Contestant was given the question, "which of these is a palindrome: a) vroom; b) jumbo shrimp; c) racecar?" Apparently the contestant needed to use his elementary school child helper to answer this one (her answer was correct: racecar). Fine, not everyone is into those fun poetic instruments of language, in contestant's defense, when do we really need these types of facts in our day to day?

The issue began with the question that followed. Contestant was given a sentence his task being to pick out the preposition. Contestant did not (or pretended he did not) know, outright, what a preposition was so he had what we call a problem on his hands. Contestant proceeded to think out loud spewing out a stream of smart sounding deductive reasoning in an attempt to narrow down the sentence word by word ruling-out those less likely to be this mysterious preopsition. He did in fact narrow the sentence down to the correct word, thus gaining another 100k.

Problem, contestant's "deductive" reasoning stream was too clean. This created an environment of scholastic question to me. It reminded me of the little kid that hides his mothers keys just to be naughty. The mother, fed up with the situation, decides to play into the child's silly game presenting the child with an irresitable deal, "whoever finds mommies keys gets a prize." Child, lacking the development of a good poker face and drunk with greed for the prize, immedietely "finds" mommies keys; child is punished. A more expereinced child may have had more reign over his or her greed and remembered the game by spending some time "looking" for these "missing" keys thus preserving the sharade and avoiding punishment and perhaps even forcing mommy to produce a "prize."

Contestant did no such thing. Contestant was child number one and should thus be punished. This amazing reasoning conjurs two questions, 1) how could one with such amazing reasoning skills not know what a preposition is in the first place?; and 2) as I mentioned earlier, could it have been that contestant was simply acting as though he did not know the answer to play it all up? I believe that 2 is the answer. First clue is the amazingly quick and clean reasoning line spit out as if rehearsed (nothing is that clean when there's 100k riding on it). Second clue comes from the climate of the show at large, the 90% dead air and anxiety creating "music."

Yes, we all know that the word "on" is the preposition, get ON with it. No, the host proceeds to prance around the stage smoozing with the fifth graders forming the background and hamming it up (anxious music continues in the background). We wonder why we're all stressed out. Perhaps entertainment should

What do other countries think of us? Adult Americans now need to compare themselves with fifth graders to maintain the staus quo. Everyone is a genious when compared the the right thing. Yes, I can run logicaly circles around a kindergardner; really doesn't help me sleep at night, not going to find me testing this out, don't need proof of it.

This brings to mind a show that is based around the host traveling around the world eating strange foods. The host has eaton everything from live bugs to raw pork, smiling all the way. I have this horrible feeling that the host's show may be doing double duty without him knowing it. Yes, in the US the show is about this courageous foodie trying exotic dishes as we all sit back and think, "those foreigners, so strange, so backwater." While other countries are tuning into their favorite show (same show), "What Won't Americans Do?" or some such title, sitting back thinking, "stupid, stupid Americans, they'll do anything for money."

We Don't Need the News, the News Needs Us.

2008-12-03T19:31:00.003-06:00

We must realize that as much as the news and media are there to watch
and inform and keep us up to date on whatever, at the end of the day,
the media has simply become another business. It is another business with a product
to sell, which we may or may not need and they know it.

Therefore, much of their time and effort are spent figuring out how to sell their product, how to
get it in front of us, to make it seem more relevant/dramatic/earth shattering, how to make us think we need it, that we cannot make it without it.

No, news, we do not need you to help us through a snow storm, we don't need you informing us what common item in every kitchen can and will kill us (but for some reason has failed to thus far). In the event you do have something truly important to say, say it now, not after the next commercial break. Do you realize that when you wait to impart to me that life saving tidbit until after the commercial break you have just allowed me to survive at least the length of one more commercial break without your help? Who's to say I can't survive perhaps another commercial break without you? I might even get cocky and attempt to watch an entire movie (without you).
And stop attaching living attributes to non-living things. No news, a storm does not savagely tear through a city, savages savagely tear through things. Sometimes I get the feeling that many of these news anchors and reporters are simply unsuccessful, suppressed writers.

For all those who hold to some level of evolution, who believe that through time a given species will advance and give up or modify aspects about itself which cease to be helpful, the news is an interesting metaphor of how difficult it is to break old habits and why evolution takes so so long. Mass hysteria cannot be good for any species, this cannot in any way advance a race in number or intellect, yet it is mass hysteria that the media thrives on. It is the base theme of anything they present and when it's not part of the initial product they synthesize some of their own through catchy phrases and neat adjectives and the final message comes out oozing in fear and anxiety.

In defense of the media, fear sells. However, since when is the media supposed to be selling something? You're not a business, you're supposed to be a neutral observer, relaying FACTS not packaging mediocre banter as that which just may save my life.

The media is one of two things these days: 1) another business with a product trying to figure out how to sell it. Or, 2) that annoying gossipy girl (or boy) in high school that everyone got a kick out of listening to at the moment, but at the end of the day, no one really took seriously, actually they were really kind of joke to begin with.

On All the Time

2008-11-19T16:47:00.002-06:00

I think I have decided that though I love to watch comedians, I simply can't stand working or living with them (note: my wife is not a comedian, I further do not consider myself one either so I don't want any strange "do you hate your home life" looks the next time I see you). There is just a context; a time and place for being "on." The rest of the time please remain "off." I don't need some witty comment every time a siren goes off, please don't make puns out of what I say in day to day business and one liners are to be confined to books that get lost in public library main stacks. Unless you are standing behind a mic, under a spot-light remove all frills from your sentence structure. A rant is okay now and then, but that's because rants, if done well, usually create a gravity all their own formulating a temporary, appropriate "comedic" context at which time the aforementioned restrictions are suspended and those surrounding said ranter will appreciate the tension breaker. This is especially true when the given rant is directly in response to its present situation and it is commenting on some present context. Passers-by are even more prone to enjoy this "comedic" interlude as they are most likely part of the situation and have a personal investment in the joke at hand.

If you're walking by me and think of a one-liner that you feel would just be a sin to waste, say it into a paper bag and give it to me for later. While you're at it, please include some form of food in that paper bag, apples are good, Fuji Apples.

Charity

2008-11-12T16:30:00.003-06:00

Sometimes I'm afraid to give to charity for the same reasons I'm afraid to give money to a person begging on the street. No, not because I can't trust that they'll use the money how they're telling me they will, but rather, once you give to them, acknowledge them, they get all excited and suck you in. In giving to a beggar, this finds you four hours later in an all night cafe listening to them go on about everything (only pieces of which are true and you'll never know what pieces at that). They think if they keep talking you'll keep giving.

I get mail from charitys asking for donations for whatever. I'm reluctant to give for the same reasons. Months down the road from donating a little something my mailbox is full of junk mail from both the charity and those the charity sold my address information to. I guess they think if they send twice as much mail the next year, I'll contribute twice as much. I try to not over analyze how much of each dollar I give goes to actually helping the charity's cause, but it becomes hard not to wonder as I look at the pile of junk mail, if my money simply went to buying more mailing supply, which has now made it back to me. Too bad investments don't run so smooth. Invest in one that tells his investment friends who all decide to throw dividends your way.

Car Alarms

2008-07-30T15:42:00.003-05:00

I'm sure everyone is completely shocked I'm writing, in a complaining fashion, about car alarms. I suppose the real surprise is why now, why has it taken me so long to rant about something that should so obviously, and does actually, drive me crazy? Until this moment, however, though annoyed by them, I had nothing more to say on the subject of car alarms. They existed and were annoying and there really wasn't much more to be said. There are just certain things you don't rant about in order to preserve basic sanity. Sort of like a survival mechanism. I am hushed over certain core issues that really bother me and allow my steam to simmer out about those irritants not so close to my heart. Also it's dangerous to rant about something without having some sort of solution, insane though it may be, the solution is a must in any rant. Up to this point my solutions for the car alarms were simply far too juvenile. Initially the idea of stealing the car with the annoying alarm came to mind. I could steal the car and drive it far far away, thus removing the cancer from the system. I would possibly drive it into the lake or wedge it between some embankment, I never really fully decided which would be better. I would later laughingly explain that until I heard the incessant, beckoning alarm of said car, I had no thoughts of car theft, but the continuing annoyance, and the knowledge that said annoyance was in fact mobile, drove me to the act (no pun). Stealing to rid my life of as opposed to stealing for gain. This was all so messy and outlandish though. No point in ranting over this; making empty threats. But now I have come to the conclusion of the matter and now fully know why I really despise car alarms. One may think I hate these for the obvious reasons (noise), but ultimately I despise them because they've actually become the antithesis of what they were originally designed for. Thus they are not only noisy but useless; easily my two biggest enemies. The purpose of a car alarm is two-fold: (1) scare away potential thief; (2) attract attention of all none-thieves in area thereby reinforcing purpose number 1. Sure, maybe this was true the first week of the existence of the car alarm (I wouldn't even put money on that amount of time though). How long did the developer of the car alarm really think it would take before this new noise dissolved into the backdrop of the collective noise in any given urban area (ironically the area a car has the most potential of being stolen)? Sadly, those the alarm was designed to alert (any good Samaritan) are few and far between and even the noblest of persons these days comes fully equipped packing an internal insurance calculator instantly crunching the risk factors to their own person compared to how much effort it may take the owner of the vehicle in question to submit a claim and be awarded a sum allowing the insured to purchase vehicle of equal or lesser value. This effort is always more ideal than the alternative pictures that run through ones mind as they glance at what just might be a car theft in progress. A many happenings may occur in reaction to an intervention which one's own insurance may not even cover. On the other hand, those not so "good" fair citizens (me?) are often found hanging out of windows during a poorly timed example of a vehicles squeals to be left alone. If said individuals glance at what just might be a car theft in progress, they may even begin to root the thief on in hopes that the thief will redeem the neighborhood to its once peaceful state, "steal it already, get it out of here" one might hear yelled from the rooftops. More seriously, however, I doubt a real car theft in progress would even show up on mosts noise radars, and this is the rub, what drove me to write this complaint against all car alarms everywhere. Thinking in reality about this situation, I would assume that a true, successful, free car thief knows his or her way around a car alarm. Now before continuing, I need to clarify something. Many cars these days come equipped with alarm systems. These standard alarms, however, are seldom that annoying car of the neighborhood. When these alarms go off it's usually nothing more than a sting of a few beeps and then it's done. Also, these alarms seem to be less sensitive (i.e. they're usually the last to be set off by thunder). These alarms are actually effective in that they make a little noise, yes, but not to scare some thief off, rather, they honk when set off to say the car is now inoperable. Many of these alarms make the car unable to start making it hard to steal. Therefore, these alarms simply warn a thief that any effort, unless of course they really know what they're doing, is going to be a waste. Going back to the original rub, a car thief knows his or her way around the add-on, self-installed, "I stole the noise maker out of my kid's toy gun and wired it to an amp, my brilliant move of the century, because man that thing scares the hell out of me so it must have the same effect on a thief. The true car thief is going to disarm that alarm before it even begins annoying the neighbors. And if the thief doesn't disarm the alarm before it's noticed, it's not like the actual owner (you know, the guy who has the power to stop the alarm) is going to be around to hear it or care much about the fact that it's going off. Car alarms have become the quintessential Little Boy that Cried Wolf. The time a car is actually stolen, the alarm will either not go off at all or go off for a few seconds and then be silenced. In which case anyone who heard the alarm for the few seconds it was on not thinking a car must of been stolen, but rather how wonderful it is that that damn alarm turned off so quickly, what a good day this is turning out to be, yay me!

2008-07-21T15:26:00.000-05:00

Commercials Have Found Their True Place

This week my wife and I were introduced to the wonder that is Hulu.com (not to be confused with Zulu, the African people group I inadvertently found myself reading about while attempting to score a free episode of Arrested Development). What an amazing web site, though. All those episodes and even movies just floating around to be watched at any given moment. The only catch is that there are between 3 and 5 15-30 second commercials in each video depending on the length of the chosen video. Given what TV has become and the sheer turf war that an actual show has become engaged in with the commercial realm, 15-30 seconds is nothing to scoff at.
Many still complain that these commercials are an outrage and should keep themselves bound to banners and annoying pop-ups, which take only about 1-2 seconds to close, like every other proper internet advertisement. However, I have decided to welcome these "commercials" as their existence and format are a peripheral tell-tale as to what commercials really are. I thought of this the last time sitting through one of these very commercials. Each commercial is not only 30 seconds max, but comes fully equipped with a counter in the top, left hand corner of the screen as a constant reassurance that it will all be over soon. I can't even tell you what any of the commercials I've seen while watching shows on Hulu were even selling because I was too busy watching the numbers get smaller on the counter.

This can be thought of as a mid-mindless entertainment time brain booster math problem, or a countdown to a climax (when the commercials place themselves correctly). Those are both workable purposes for the counter, but what I have come away with is the joy of seeing commercials for what they really are. Commercials are that person that you're already pre-annoyed with for whatever reason who comes up to you begging, "hear me out, come on, it will only take a moment," at which time, as we've all done before, you respond with, "fine, you have 10 seconds," only in Hulu's case, they get 15 to 30 seconds (Hulu can also teach us something of mercy).

Nonaddictive Personality

2008-05-13T20:14:00.000-05:00

The other day I began listening to a new band recently introduced to me. I enjoyed the music and can honestly say I like the music. I remember thinking that maybe I will get into this band, follow up with it, see what else they have to offer, perhaps even go to a concert. A flash crossed over my eyes as I saw myself collecting odd, rare band memorabilia and then, lastly, joining an online message board which talks about nothing but said band (all others are properly flagged, blocked and banned).

The thought was shattered by the fact that in my heart of hearts I know that I will not follow up with this band because that's just not what I do. Getting into something to such a level is a lot of work and commitment. It means sacrificing your time to all your other half-assed hobbies, making them seem even more random. It means tailoring your interactions with others in such a way that every conversation must somehow end up about whatever it is you've decided to "be all about." This takes time, effort and creativity, not to mention the risk of becoming completely irritating to all those that will inevitably, whether they want to or not, hear about it.

Above is a good formulation and reasoning as to why not to get into anything. Anyone out there reading this is free to use it. Be warned however. May I never catch you using this philosophy alone in and of itself, effectively becoming that person who is all about not being all about anything.

This is not my reason for not being into anything. I have friends that would describe their personality as "addictive." When they get into something, they get into it. Smoking means chain smoking, downloading illegal music means buying a 200 gig drive and becoming the tech version of a hunter-gatherer seeking out any and all mp3 wherever they may be found and then sharing them to all the world. Liking a writer means reading everything they wrote, including that unfinished stuff often found floating around on the web, not to mention buying a few old 5th grade papers of theirs off Ebay.

I have found that I seem to be the opposite of this. I may not even finish that book that I just couldn't put down and I find message boards about most subjects to be speculative at best and ultimately, like any comic book series, never ending. Day to day this can be a bit of a challenge. Where the addictive personality continually finds themselves trying to break them self of the latest vice, I'm too lazy to make the ride down to the beach on a beautiful evening to play Frisbee, a game I love (if I can say that about anything I engage in). It may be that it's a lot of effort and I'm selfish with my energy or that I just abhor change so so much that I even find it hard to move from a boring situation into a more entertaining environment and activity.

This becomes a real obstacle when I attempt to engage in something, say, like school. I like to learn, but it's not addictive. I'm going strong presently in the program I've enrolled in, but those dastardly thought do make their way into my mind from time to time. Usually I'm able to ward them off with simple excuses saying I'm tired or hungry (things that often happen while in school to begin with) and should not be contemplating my future endeavor in said subject at such a time and place. Ironically, maybe this very problem actually means that I'm more addictive than I originally thought and I just have a harder time remembering my love or devotion to something when distracted by another (like exhaustion for instance).

However, if this does end up being some odd form of an addictive personality, it's definitely that flaky, here then gone, high then low, shouldn't be offered any, can't hold their own type.

Ideal v. Hope

2008-01-10T21:02:00.000-06:00

The other day there was yet another train related death in the paper. I, nor anyone else was shocked, the press did not stop. While at work I found myself in a conversation with a few others regarding America's astonishing level of train related accidents. I'm still not sure how this happens so frequently, I mean, it's not like we're surprised by a trains location or route, it seems a difficult task for a train to sneak up on someone, seems the tracks might give it away. However, in spite of the tracks, the sheer size of the train itself and even the frequent flashy, dingy guard gates that drop when the road does happen to meet the tracks; trains are America's one place that one can look at the amount of carnage, the statistics of accidents, gruesome accidents, and think, "is this a third world country I'm living in?"

One of the attorneys I work for mentioned that this surprisingly high level of accident may have some correlation to America's growing number of personal injury attorneys (he's not one by the way). He even remained dumbfounded, though, and little convinced by his own hypothesis as he relayed to me a story of a time he found himself watching a commuter train push an SUV down the tracks, past the station before his eyes. He gave me a shoulder shrug and walked away.

As I think about it more, however, I feel that the simple knowledge that in this country one can retain and afford an attorney in regards to personal injuries sustained, though this alone could not be enough to compel one to disregard the obvious consequences of say, running in front of a train, it can create a more general climate of irresponsibility. That with the additional aid of large insurance companies, make one feel as though no matter the action one takes part in, nothing "bad" may ever happen, "I'm sure of it" one thinks as the name of their in[sure]ance company scrolls through their head while bounding over the rails attempting to make the 9:40 AM.

It's not that I believe people feel nothing bad may ever happen to them, it's more a thought that perhaps as we witness more and more "accidents" take place with no apparent consequences, subconsciously, we cannot help but begin to relate and find it planted in the backs of our minds that though "bad" things can happen, they're never not followed by very large settlements. Mercy to the one whose psyche on that fateful day decides that work is for dummies and getting wheeled around trying to figure out how to spend the settlement winnings is a viable alternative. In this country, someone is always there to make it all better.

As much as being coddled by insurance policies and personal injury defense seems to add to our general lack of responsibility, the praise and adoration of personal rights is not excused from our train produced, carnage ridden suburbs either. The other day I was biking home from class and I found myself sitting at a stop light. The car to the left of me decided that he wanted to make a right turn and in that decision process decided that I was in his way. I got a quick honk and as I looked back to assess the issue I witnessed what looked to be a puppet show put on from behind the dash of a car the windshield acting as the third wall I suppose. The driver vigorously waved his hands around all while bobbing his head.

I became irritated at the situation as the gentleman in the car continued to honk at me and wave his hands. My first observation was the complete lack of the use of his blinker, always a dead give away if one is considering a turn. Secondly, and most important, however, at the time of incident, I was legitimately poised in my proper lane of travel, stationary because of the stop light. I found his irritation uncalled for given the obvious fact, and physical law mind you, that though he may have decided he wanted to turn at that very moment, I had become in his way. Surprise, surprise in a city the size of Chicago, someone in another's way.

As I began to consider just sitting there while he threw his little tantrum, the light turned green and I peddled off and he made his turn. It bothered me as I rode on, however, that I would consider knowingly remaining in another's way. Yes he was being an ass about the situation, but what did I have to lose by conveniently slipping back a few feet? I surely had nothing to gain, especially not a friend. Why would I think that a good idea, I kept turning over in my head. The memory of it progressed to the point where I was now a third party watching the intercourse take place and I realized that had I in fact been that third observer I would have found both of us assholes. The guy in the car for obvious reasons stated above, but then me as well, the jack-off on the bike, "Mr. I have control issues and need attention, my mother didn't hug me enough, my daddy never played ball with me, go cry about it" the rant would have began, me as that neutral observer.

It makes me realize that though the individual in the car had no patience, I have no pity. I criticize seemingly stupid accidents before I attempt to understand them. I have decided that train accidents happen because people are stupid and careless and insurance companies exist because people are driven by fear and at the end of the day are sad and weak.

Sometimes I feel as though my life is an ongoing metaphor of the death of ideals constantly being exhibited in every opinion I have. I guess that would boil down to pessimism. It's not that I have too little faith and hope in people, but too much and I'm constantly being let down. I'm angry that stupid accidents happen because in an ideal world these things would not happen. In an ideal world people take care of one another and live honestly and desire to grow in character and desire the best for others before themselves. But what fool lives with ideals like that? What sort of child would one have to be to believe these things and get mad over the fact that they do not exist?

When I was growing up I was taught these ideals by my teachers and for a time I believed them. When I would whine about homework or gripe about rules my teachers would tell me I couldn't be that way in the real world, that people didn't put up with complaining and I had to carry my own weight and do what I needed to do. While I believed these ideals I found myself living in this stasis of a world, waiting to be sent to the real world. When I was mature enough, then I could partake in reality. But as I grew up, I realized that all along what I was living was the real world, just smaller at the time. People do not change as they get older, complaining does not stop, and we'll always be fighting over the biggest cookies.

I'm not angry with my teachers for essentially lying to me about the "real" world. I know what they were doing. They just had hope and were trying to make things just a little better. Perhaps we would believe the ideals so thoroughly the force of it would make them come true as we lived them out in our lives. That's the ideal I developed from all that and it's an essential part of the root of my anger. Perhaps I'm just not very perceptive and I ended up developing some super unmeetable ideal which the world may never live up to yet I can't help myself but continually hold the world against it. Instead, and if I were perceptive enough, I suppose I would have developed hope, which would have yielded a much more pleasant person.

Comedic Time Out

2007-12-05T20:54:00.000-06:00

The other day I was complaining to a friend about worship music and I ended the line with, "as long as we never begin singing, 'I will give you all my worship...' I'll stick around." This reminded me of an interesting story that springs from that worship song and others similar to it. When I was in college I was on a campus comedy team that put on live shows for the students once a month. One of the skits we did was your basic "Deeper Thoughts" rip off. These rip offs are okay as long as the "thoughts" are original. As far as I'm concerned, the "Deeper thought" idea at large is public domain, just not the thoughts themselves.

Anyways, it reminded me of a time we were sitting around trying to come up with "thoughts" for the skit. One of the more witty team members finally came out with one of the most amazing thoughts I've ever heard. "I know one" he started out. "It goes as follows, 'hey wouldn't it be cool if one day after everyone makes all those crazy promises to God in a worship service, they actually go and fulfill them?'" Everyone sat around the room in silence and then slowly the laughter began to build, and build, and build. Minutes of unbroken laughter ensued. This is what comedy is all about in my mind. Not slap stick, not punch line, but straight, raw truth. This was one of those moments. This member had stumbled upon an amazing observation of truth and single-handedly, in one short, simple sentence, unpacked and fleshed out at least one of the aspects that is wrong with much of the contemporary worship scene and song.

After the laughter died down depression was next to follow as we all, one by one, individually, unanimously, reluctantly came to another truth; being that we could never actually perform that "thought." It was not to be used, ever, by anyone. It was too much, to real, too honest. There is a point that can be reached in comedy which is too right. Too right is wrong because it disposes of and ignores all sense of political engagement and, honestly, it is a tell tale sign of being ignorant of one's audience. It ignores what the audience is not ready to hear, at least not in that potent of a form.

Truths like that must be diluted and spread out. Articles and books must be written with that line in mind, which attempt to safely unpack it. It's like a bomb. One way to show what a bomb does is to detonate it, but that could blow up the very individual that was supposed to have learned about what a bomb does in order that they never allow it to do what it does. A better way would be to take it all apart, showcase the parts, show how they work together, eventually maybe even show what order they're supposed to be arranged in in order to create a successful detonation.

There have been many of these in my life (many not out of my head). These things that can never be repeated. These perfect lines, perfect observations, perfect ideas which cannot be let out to see the light of day. These things are all placed in the lock box. They're okay to laugh over and think through in the still loneliness of the night, when all is still and quiet and no one is listening, but they must never find their way on stage or into debate. These things are banished, locked away somewhere deep in the unsearchable corners of the Disney vault.

Another we came up with one night during writing for the same campus group was a reoccurring character called "Stigmata Steve." Kind of like a "Massive Head Wound Harry" but with a sac religious bent. The guy would walk into a party with blood stains on his wrists and feet, sometimes his head too. Sometimes another party goer would make some silly comment like, "whoa Steve, looks like the stigmata's flaring up on you again, that sucks." Again, we all thought this was utterly funny, but as the laugh died down, the creator was ordered to march over to the nether edge of the room and place the idea deep into oblivion.

The other day a friend mentioned in the midst of a conversation about homelessness that he had a possible solution. "Well you know how most of them are probably addicted to drugs, and if we keep giving them these little amount of money here and there nothing will ever change. They'll just keep spending it on something that doesn't help them and the next day want more having gotten nowhere. Well, I say we give them $5,000 each. They're all sure to run out and buy the biggest score of their life and then, smack, OD. That takes care of that problem." I looked at him with a smirk, then quietly, pointed and he walked over to the edge of the room, and it was placed safely away into oblivion never to show up in some comedy routine or government paper or random blog one reads while innocently surfing the internet using the word combo "solutions to homelessness."

Someday someone with a name that is some form of "Pandora" is going to stumble upon this box, wherever it is and we all know what happens from there. From then on, there will be so much more to worry about than what sacred thing Family Guy is going to parody next or the comedians who use the "F" word ever other line.

Slow Shopper Strikes Again

2007-10-25T21:35:00.000-05:00

I posted once before showcasing my tendency to "slow shop." Apparently everything I wrote within the fist installment of this idea of slow shopping is nothing more than child's play compared to the circles of shopping hell my personality is capable of suspending myself in in a paralyzed state of shell shocked, second-guessing horror. Winter is upon us and as an avid biker, with winter comes, more biking, only cold.

The last few winters (I biked little the first and a bit more last winer) my chosen garb consisted of a set of long johns I've owned since high school with a long sleeve shirt thrown over the top, a puffy vest over that and jeans to complete the bottom. It worked alright, but needless to say, I am lucky I don't sweat very much. The clothes I have worn in the past are tried and true and known to keep me warm when I need it, however, they don't breath, they don't wick and on those horrible days the temperature decides to shoot up ten degrees within the course of an afternoon, the ride home is on the toasty side.

This year I had the bright idea of investing in a true bike coat. At first, I wanted something that would replace everything. Just one coat to do the job. However, layering is an important commodity in biking (cite the days it shoots up ten degrees) so I decided one coat to rule them all would not be a wise way to go. However, I remain a frugal man and there's nothing on this earth that could compel me to, in one season, let alone one day, run out and buy anything that could resemble a wardrobe of sorts. It's one or two pieces per year and that's it. On top of that, I already have certain pieces (vest) that I like and know work, so why not find something to go with my existing apparel?

While browsing I began with general bike coats, similar to a few I had have my eye on online at the moment. Not unlike the three big aspects one keeps in mind while looking for a diamond (carrot, cut and clarity), there exist "the big things" all bikers want in a winter coat. A good winter coat to be used for biking must be wind resistant, but it must also breathe. The coat must be water resistant, but the inner layer must "wick" moisture from the bikers sweaty skin. Basically, when you're explaining what you want to the sales rep you end up feeling like some lunatic who can't open his mouth or say two things without them being completely contradictory. While explaining my needs all I could think was the fact that this rep must be thinking something along the lines of "who the hell is this madman?" In short, the perfect biking jacket is simply a materialized ideal of the Midwest with no winter (I want to bike through the winter but I'd like to not feel it). The jacket that's warm yet ventilated, it repels yet wicks moisture, it lets moisture out but not in, it's warm when it's cold and cool when it's warm.

Anyways, no one jacket holds all of the above aspects. As I have now seen, many claim to retain them all but any honest sales rep will let you know the truth. Twenty minutes into the affair and I'm pacing through the isles with a possible base layer in my hand. "Will it work though" I think to myself. "Does it actually do what it claims to and if so, is that what I want, what I need?" Sure, one jacket may keep the wind and cold off my arms, but will that keep my trunk warm enough and if not, will putting my vest over it make my trunk too hot? Why don't I just get the heavier coat and forget the layer thing, no, I've been through this, what of the warm days, then I'll just have to buy the other stuff anyways for the days global warming is flaring up.
I go back and forth with myself. Why is this one so expensive, why this one so cheap?

I am beginning to believe that it's not that I'm some cool, frugal, non-materialistic, humanist that I don't buy clothes and other stuff more often, rather, it's because I physically can't do it. It's actually a disability, I am disabled. The best things I own, my most cherished articles of clothing and used apparel were given to me as gifts. I have a hat I love, gift from sister. I do own one biking shirt, gift from wife, my favorite work shirts, all given to me by my mother, and it goes on.

Why is it that I love these things given me so? Why are they perfect yet all I find is fault in those things I attempt to pick out for myself? I fear that this is perhaps an indication that I am prone to the active denial of reality. Maybe what I have, my current status and situation, though not perfect, will never be realized by me because I refuse to admit it. How can it be that I cling so hard and use so avidly those random, unexpected things I receive as gifts, yet everything I purchase just ends up being a big disappointment?

I finally made my way home after the coat fiasco. At the end of the night, three is the number of stores I visited on the way home from work, zero is the number of coats I brought home, one is the square I am currently on. Come mid-January, ask me what I'm wearing if I bike to your house, odds are it will be an overly torn set of long johns, a random long sleeve shirt, my wonderful vest and some jeans (not new). If anything new, it's only because someone beat it out of me what I was looking at and they went and gifted it to me, so now, of course, I love it.

Doomsday

2007-10-10T15:28:00.000-05:00

I am officially sick and tired of the doomsday mentality the CTA continues to harbor. They're not fooling anyone and no one in their right mind is going to waste their precious emotional energy laying awake at night thinking about the future of the CTA. A system so large, so widely used and accessed has no reason to be in financial trouble. How can such a system lose money, how can such a system not turn a profit. The CTA's constant whining over budget and money problems is more a tell tale sign of their own mismanagement of funds and personnel more so than a true barometer of the status of state government.

The other day posted in an EL Train was a bar graph comparing what other state governments contributed to certain large city's transit authorities compared with Chicago. Naturally, Chicago's was the lowest on the graph. The only problem was, certain pertinent information was left out of the graph, this information including the cities of Washington D.C. and New York. I stood for a moment thinking about the comparable, if not larger, size of the transit systems in those two cities. By the end of the ride I was thinking less of how horrible our state was for not giving the same amount to public transit as LA does and more about how New York and DC fund theirs. "I wonder if the state doesn't provide anything, or significantly less than Illinois." That was the thought this graph planted in my mind. Nice try CTA.

If a system so large, so widely and consistently used does not turn a profit, it deserves to die. ANy fool business man could tell you that. Of course, there in may be a problem. It seems as though the CTA is being run more as a business anymore than a public service. And from what I hear (take it or leave it, it's hearsay) the upper CTA officials seldom if ever use public transit. This is odd considering if one works for Ford they must own and use a Ford.

Enough with the doomsday. I'm actually at a point where I'd find it quite comical to see the CTA bleed to death, they have it coming. It would be nice if the system was slowly auctioned off piece by piece and having the lines ultimately run by separate, private business as it used to be. At least there'd be competition again. Of course, this would not work because some large car company would swoop in and buy everything, dismantle the system and it'd be LA all over again. No more doomsday, get on with whatever it is you're going to do and let us get on with figuring out how we're going to get to work without you. Either work for us or get the fuck out. On a good day, I can already cover the same distance on my bike in a similar if not better time than the train. It's the snow that concerns me. Either way, though, I suppose for the winter we'll all just create some elaborate car pool system. I don't know, but I think it may be time to start buying stock in "ZipCar" and "IGo."

Missing

2007-09-14T16:25:00.000-05:00

I miss home today.

Home
the patch to the left of the arrow

Terror

2007-09-04T16:34:00.000-05:00

Now I'm just scared. I've begun the classes (only had one so far in the design course) and I think it's safe to say I'm a bit shaken up. Now, apparently, I'm supposed to "learn" how to draw. I'm not shooting for self portraits or anything here, mostly drafting type drawing with a landscape design angle, but I do have to do a fair amount of drawing. Going into the class I knew there would be something involved that could be called on some level "drawing." However, I was thinking this had more to do with lines and circles and things I could draw by using straight edges and such. True, the class will be much of this but fear struck when I was told to buy a sketch book and then told to practice free hand drawing.

I haven't drawn free hand since elementary school. I thought I was good then, I wasn't, and whatever ability I did posses has left me. I bought the sketch pad and the other day decided to give it a go. I tried to start with something "easy." I chose a dryer. As it turns out, dryers are not easy to draw. I began with a circle for the door and a quarter way around into the arc I was already sweating and lost.

The past month my wife and I have been painting our apartment. This first drawing experience sort of reminded me of the painstaking never-ending, seeming regeneration that is painting. One walks into a room, gives it a good look over and thinks, "this will be easy to paint." Somewhere between that moment and dipping the brush into the paint can for the first time the room somehow grows extra angles, surfaces and features it never had before. Painting is hard for me. It's hard to become so intimate with every inch of the surfaces that make up the boarders of a room. Same with drawing now. It's hard for me to become so aware of the mass amount of detail there is to anything and everything. It's like trying to learn a new language by immersion. There is an exhausted, sort of irritable feeling that comes over one that is only reserved for, I suppose, language retention, painting and drawing. It's like the feeling one gets in their legs when running only in their brain.

So yes, I've begun the class and I feel very out of place. Sitting in the back (there were no other seats, really), I felt like an impostor, like it is now only a matter of time before I'm found out. I had to buy a T-Square and a paper tube. Now when walking to class I get to look like some kind of architect. This, I suppose, could have its perks. I could see people thinking twice before knowingly, purposely pissing off an architect. Think about it. You may piss an architect off for the afternoon, you may ruin his weekend, but he'll go and design something horrible that you have to deal with, and see every day for the rest of your life. It reminds me of Will Ferrell when he did his rendition of the architect from the second Matrix movie for the MTV awards intro, "Vis a vie!!! Concordantly!!!" "Ergo you will shut your yapper now or I'm going to architect a world of pain all over your candy ass." Something like that, that's how I feel partly.

Or I could go pushing my nose into everyone's business just as long as I'm carrying the T-square, "hey is everything alright here, can I help, I am an architect." Perhaps I'll start rolling everything. I'm sure the attorneys I work for would love trying to read their recent motion whilst trying to keep the edges from rolling in on it. "Oh yeah, sorry about that, I was toting my work around in my paper tube...had it rolled up in my latest project."

Either way my palms are all sweaty and I have all this lead I need to figure out how to use. This is good, though. I've always sort of wanted to dabble in the drafting field and often kicked myself for never checking it out. This new class endeavor, however, has awakened another beast, besides terror, that being the beast of attempting to find, collect and then proceed to grow different plants from seed. It's basically the equivalent of the person who decides to start making all their food from scratch or the one who wants to build a table and not just buy a finished one. So, in this, I've found myself online lately reading up on how to cultivate Ginkgo tree seeds, where to buy the same cheap, or how to find them, not to mention calling my mother asking her to collect seeds from all the plants in her yard (there are many) since it's fall and all and everything is about to go to seed.

Needless to say, I think I'm enjoying myself in all of this. If any of you have seeds to cool plants or trees (legal please) send them my way if you have no use for them. Take me along with you this fall on any country drives you happen to go on that I might tag along with my homemade plant press in hand and collect specimens which I may identify and mount. I'll wear a bonnet if you'd like.

Ennui

2007-08-24T10:51:00.000-05:00

It is done, I have signed up for the first two courses of a horticulture and landscape design program and am on my way. Many at this point may find within themselves feelings of excitement, fear, pain from the tuition. I suppose I harbor similar emotions during this time, however, I feel my reasons are different. Some may find themselves nervous or fearful of failure. This seems to be one of the greatest reasons for education or training based anxiety, "what if I fail, what if I find that I just can't do it?" If only I was simply afraid of failure. At least failure denotes some level of attempt, some form of interest and a large portion of character if one fails well. My fear is pure, simple, unabashed, utter lack of interest.

I remember back to years of playing with Legos and match box cars, in the midst of the time of my life, suddenly stopping, looking around and sometimes even audibly saying to myself, "I don't want to do this anymore." This would be immediately followed by a smaller version of myself getting to his feet and promptly walking away. Where was he walking away to, what was on his mind, what was so important that the mere notion of it stopped an amazing Lego experience dead in its tracks? Nothing from what I can recall. Times of halting one activity was not often for another, but simply for the fact that I no longer wanted the present activity.

To this day I fear this potential within my psyche, this super-human ability to decide in a moment I no longer care. I do not fear failure, I fear lack of interest. I suppose I don't have a lot to complain about so far. I finished a four year undergraduate program and got a BA out of it (though I'm not working in what I studied...big surprise). I'm a hard worker and do well at whatever it is that I do do. Therein lies the issue, though. What do I do, what do I do with myself?

To this day, as I would walk away from a video game in the past, I feel prone to wonder away out of boredom from what it is I have been working on with no alternative in mind. It is not distraction, it's disinterest. Some have so much going on they've hardly the time to finish anything or do any one thing well. I have nothing going on only to lead to more nothing.

I took a few graduate courses a few years ago as part of a larger secondary education program. I thought it would be a good idea to be a high school English Literature teacher. That really didn't work out. My grammar is horrible, I realized the school systems are a mess and decided that literature was more of a hobby.

I have come to one conclusion, however, in my seemingly never ending, half-hazard, partially interested wanderings. It was in the graduate courses as I realized how bad the school systems were that I thought back to my undergraduate time when I was then interested in social work (which is equally a mess). I realize now that whatever it is that I, or anyone for that matter, ends up doing as a professional career, that task/career will ultimately burn the doer out. Burn out cannot be avoided; politics will eventually ruin any endeavor and the career that was once fantasized will become a source of anxiety, stress and pain. The only question is, then, what will I give myself to that will ultimately destroy me?

Perhaps my seeming lack of interest in anything is actually some strange defense mechanism. As long as I keep in the search mode, as long as whatever I'm doing is not "the thing" for me, as long as I'm not living some career apex, it will not matter when politics destroy it, it will not matter when I find myself more irritated than anything else over it. The thought of moving on is not hard considering it would not be a flight from a dream job, it would not be giving up on a dream or even worse, the destruction of a fantasy. In this, though I say I have no hobbies, in reality, everything becomes a hobby, even work itself, just something I do to pass the time and if one day I wake up and feel like never doing that again I have nothing stopping me, no commitments or expended educational efforts backing making me think twice.

Or perhaps I'm wrong. I have become a very critical person. Had I a more demanding career, some higher level something that I was working toward, training for, educating in, would I have the extra energy to be so critical? Are my criticisms and inability to be amused really just jealousy over others' successes manifesting itself? I lay awake at times and shutter at this thought, but what if it's true? If this is all just jealousy then it's about time I get out and develop something, lest I become everything I hate; some jealous old jerk who doesn't care about anything because he never gave himself to anything.

It's difficult, though. What happens when entire weeks go by and the feeling of ennui continues. Does this happen to all who are trying to succeed and finish? Is the line between myself and an established path really as simple as just working through the hard moments (though they may last weeks)? As it turns out, I seem to be a slow shopper in a far broader way than I had originally assumed. Perhaps I need an accountability partner for all this.

Becoming Indigenous

2007-08-12T18:40:00.000-05:00

When the word "indigenous" comes to mind many of us gather in our minds images of little people, barely clothed, running around some jungle or desert. Armed with only a spear or a bow and arrow and carrying only a quiver or small satchel of sorts these characters live off the land, function as hunter-gatherers, horde little and, as far as those of whom discover them are concerned, were born out of the land itself. It seems that every environment and land has its respective indigenous peoples. There are the American Indians and images of tepees and hunting buffalo on horseback, the Eskimos and their igloos and seal hunting escapades.

It seems that the landscape has once again bore itself a people group all its own and all too part of the landscape. An urban, indigenous people exist, however they do not carry spears but u-locks. They do not sport quivers and cool loin cloths but courier bags and 3/4 length pants. They do not ride upon horses but on simple machines made of two circles and two triangles. The urban indigenous people ride bikes and are often accused of almost hitting pedestrians.

Upon taking up biking in the city, one becomes aware of the presence of this sub-culture like indigenous people group we all call messengers. They are dressed something like that of above and they're bikes are striped of every extra part that would add even an ounce of weight leaving only and just the most crucial parts needed to make a bike move. Two circles and two wheels, a set of pedals, chain, seat, handlebars.

I in no way associate myself with the messenger community apart from the fact that like them, I happen to ride a bike as well sometimes. However, the longer one rides a bike in the city the more "indigenous" one becomes. I find myself looking over my bike for parts I can do without, allowing it a sleeker, simpler look and a lighter ride. I too have searched for the perfect 3/4 length pants which breath well, yet block the wind, but are also waterproof all while being just short enough to stay out of the way of the chain. I too have attached a fender to my bike and now wear completely waterproof sandals, which wear like a shoe in that they cover one's toes protecting them from toe clips and have thick soles, yet have open sides and are built for the bare foot like a sandal. This allows me to ride in any weather as far as the summer, spring and fall months are concerned. As far as winter is concerned, I too own a hood, which one would confuse as a fitting headpiece for bank robbing, but is justified as long as I stay near my bike and it is below twenty degrees out.

While biking in the city I have learned that the above mentioned are not fashion statements but felt needs of biking. This aspect actually helps me in my social life, however. If something I'm wearing comes across as off or strange, fashion wise, all is forgiven at the thought that I rode to our meeting destination. I find it easier to wear the same clothes over and over and in a row in front of the same people as well, which is something I have tried to perfect all my life, especially in elementary and middle school, and now have just stumbled upon the answer. People can't expect one to look great after biking in eighty-five degree weather and they can't expect one to get all their clothes sweaty.

It gets worse, however. In the heat of the summer (and the random rain storms), I have found that my shirt often becomes a source of extra heat and is just another item to get wet with sweat or rain, so at times I get rid of it. I find the best shorts to bike in in such heat need no belt, but have a draw string and are more simple all around. I have become a native, biking through the city in the heat of a day, shirtless with a small bag attached to my back, sport shorts and a pair of keens on my feet (no socks thank you. Since buying the Keens which I wear, I have stumbled upon yet another aspect I've been trying to attain and revisit from childhood, that being not wearing socks for the entire summer. Now if I could just figure out how to forget what day and month it is at all times I'd have it made). I can maintain a similar speed going any direction down any street in any amount of traffic. Rain or shine, it's all the same. It will always take me the same amount of time to get to a certain location and there is no waiting between point A and B.

Of all the space that there is not in a densely populated, highly trafficked municipal area, on a bike one finds what is left.

When not to get a Divorce

2007-07-26T23:59:00.000-05:00

When I was in sixth or so grade I joined the ranks of the children of broken families. My parents were divorced and I was faced with adapting to a new reality in which mom and dad no longer came back the the same dwelling each night. It was hard. I cried for weeks and carried on. I knew my parents still loved me. At no point did I feel that it was something that I had done or it was because of me that this separation had taken place, but it was hard just the same. I remember crying more over the change of it all, over the fact that everything was going to be different and I liked the way it was already. It was the same way I thought about our yard and where we lived. I would always have these nightmares in which I would wake up one day and run out to play in the woods only there would be no woods but a development sitting where trees had once been. It was scary because I liked the way the forest was. It was the country, it was beautiful the way it was and there was nothing that anyone could do to change it that would make it better.

It's not that I didn't care about my family cohesion or that I loved my comfort more than our relational health, but at the same time, that's exactly what it was. I was a child and that's how it was. As a child things just are the way they are, as they should be. The only thing "wrong" or that doesn't belong is change. Everyone realizes this one day as they reach their twenties. They find themselves in the midst of a fluffy memory of a family party and all of the sudden, some image, some action, some family members personality hits them as wrong, for the first time ever. They think about it, mull over it and conclude: "man, uncle so and so was a real alcoholic." "No wonder he was always just sitting around like that." "That's why so and so always left early." Reality comes twenty years late.

But that's how it is as a child. Everything one lives in just is as it should be and as it's supposed to be. On the other hand, children are also very malleable. They can deal with and make it through most life changes and issues just as long as someone is there to care for them. A child is quite the paradox. They have not the understanding or insight of an adult capable of picking out the strange in one's own family. They are naive enough to love even the most unlovable as long as they're a permanent fixture at picnics and Christmas. Change is hard because it feels bad but it's doable because complex answers aren't needed in order to justify change. Just as a child will tolerate and even depend on the abnormal just because it happens to be their family, they'll tolerate a change just because it has been given some explanation (hopefully some form of the truth).

During my first semester in college I began to notice that I knew a hand full of people whose parents had recently or were presently going through divorces. I found that odd. I think one of the first thoughts that came to me upon learning such information from these individuals was something along the lines of "isn't this a little late?" Late. Parents are supposed to get divorced while one's in elementary school, or just beginning middle (life sucks then anyways, might as well pile another drama on top and get it over with while you're not enjoying anything anyways).

As I saw this more and more, and at a Christian college none the less, I formed a theory about Christian divorce. It seems, from my observations, that as Christians, if we are to divorce it must be done either before children are in the picture or after all children have left the nest. These are the two windows that exist for proper Christian divorce. It makes sense from a parental standpoint I would think. Keep the family cohesion going so the kids can have a normal life. However, I feel that this is not the best practice. From what I have seen, twenty year olds have a harder time with parental divorce than ten year olds do.

It's all in the thinking. A husband and wife decide to stick it out and stay together for the sake of their children's mental health. Of course, with children and their thinking, this is the best time for such a monumental change. When people divorce when their kids are young the result is fairly simple. The kids cry their eyes out for a few weeks, mope around a little and then get back on track with everything. An easy answer is most likely found somewhere. In the midst of wondering why mommy and daddy split up a possibility could be that time daddy forgot to get milk or perhaps that last time daddy left the toilet seat up just was too much for mommy and he just had to leave. These are possible causes. These are also lessons a child can pack away quite easily. While surveying the damages it's all being recorded: "note to self, change the toilet paper role when empty." "To avoid what mommy and daddy just went through you may want to refrain from drinking directly from the milk carton." And life goes on.

When twenty, sadly, the mind is not so amused with such answers (even if answers to certain situations, not divorce, are in fact so simple). The twenty mind must pull everything apart. It must all be analyzed. Ironically, at twenty, an age when one can truly understand, not agree with, a concept like divorce, a parent may find it to be a good idea to just explain why it's all taking place. It seems logical. Two adults talking about reality, what could be easier? Anything. At twenty the mind does not want explanations and prepackaged reasonings. "Yes, they told me this, but what is really going on?"

The kids in these divorces end up driving themselves mad. They replay their entire lives in their minds searching through every detail like a Sherlock Holmes novel. This is when it gets bad. This is when the mind does something it should never do. That being, taking apart every situation, every scene, every moment and reality from their upbringing and pulling it into question. Suddenly everything is suspect and at times everything is guilty. If a child's mind is naive in finding everything in their environment "normal" and just so, the twenty something going through his or her parents' divorce is quite the opposite. Insanity ensues and the only people these individuals have to turn to is their professors whom they're still scared to ask questions in class to and their friends who have most likely by now gotten into reading large, unchecked amounts of philosophy (meaning they can think their way out of anything but not really think of anything) thus deeming them no help whatsoever.

Twenty is also when one begins to realize one is more like their parents than they had previously hoped for, therefore, the fact that as a parent you've just made divorce a possibility for your personality ultimately calls into question that perhaps divorce is possible for the kids' personality; and on it goes.

On top of this, at twenty kids begin seeing themselves as more a peer than a child to their parents so instead of, as a child may, thinking it was their fault their parents are getting a divorce, the kids may end up feeling like they're bad friends because they couldn't say the right things to keep these two peers of theirs together. Now their parents are going through a divorce and they suck at being there for their friends.

Get divorced young, or when your kids are young. Once they begin thinking and everything is not taken for granted and life is no longer an unquestionable reality and crying for a few weeks doesn't solve any problem and "daddy and I just love each other differently now" is no longer a valid answer (that answer doesn't make any sense whatsoever); then you'll really be able to ruin your kids' lives (while they have loans out none the less).

Bloom Where You're Planted

2007-06-29T15:34:00.000-05:00

So this is an idea. There is a nice looking horticulture and landscape design program at one of the city colleges here in Chicago and I feel the motivation to join it. To what end I am unsure at the moment. I have never lived by planning out years in advance or even attempting to achieve some momentary grand scheme. My step-father one time called it faith. That was nice as I used to call it laziness. However, I seem to be getting along alright, or as my father puts it, "you never ask for money and you live on the other side of the country, so I just figure you're doing well."

I have played with the thought of going into a higher level training program in horticulture for the last few years. I had a lot of hang-ups within my own mind ranging anywhere from the fact that I lived in the city and there were no real yards to work with to the fear of what I would do all winter if I truly did begin working full time in a landscape setting.

Before I get too far into this and as I realize that I may begin using the terms "horticulture" and "landscaping" interchangeably, I feel the need to define what is truly meant by "landscaping." Most, when they hear the term "landscaping," picture a guy on a mower or possibly wielding a weed whacker around someone's yard. That is not landscaping, that is lawn maintenance. It has nothing to do with the land or the scape apart from making stock foliage shorter.

I feel that I have been getting around at least some of the fears I initially had. For one, I have decided that I can do as much, if not more landscaping in the city than elsewhere. I Suppose I would look to starting with the Chicago Park District, but even apart from that, there exist many "beautification" companies within the city, whose focus is on urban spaces. My landscaping experience dealt completely with private installations. However, I got to thinking the last time I walked through a quiet, empty, beautifully landscaped yard. I realized it was too empty. Not that I am one for crowds, but it came to my attention that private landscaping is really not enjoyed for anything. For one, often times the most amazing private landscapes are within some community surrounded by other equally amazing landscapes at which point they all just blend together. On top of that, they're all a little different so it becomes utterly clear how individualistic the neighborhood is.

In the city, there are parks. Parks are spaces that can be, and are, enjoyed by everyone; they belong to everybody. I realized at one point that an irony has developed within my psyche. I find myself loathing much of what the city is with its crowding and cramming and square, defined green spaces. And then I realize that it would be amazing to landscape a park, beautify an area that will be appreciated and enjoyed by the public and that is for the public. I have also been reading a bit about Olmsted (for reference, he designed Central Park in New York) and his philosophies and feats of landscape design. Olmsted seemed to have a real handle on what it was to work with plants. One of his key philosophies was the idea that a particular project actually takes years to mature into what it is was originally envisioned to look like by the designer. In a way, he installed babies when he worked and in time they'd become better and better scapes.

This was impressive to me. Living in a time when we want and get everything now and we no longer posses any real foresight, there remains this theme in horticulture which demands that time be taken if quality is wanted. Sure, a landscape can be thrown in and look fine for a while, but what will it become? I find that to be the real question. People think they're putting on siding when they plant a tree, like it's just going to fit just right in that spot never to change. This is seen all the time. Next time you're driving past a new development or complex note the placement of trees in reference to the power lines. Or vice versa, note older trees you see along side roadways and the wonderful holes or "Vs" which have been cut into them in oder to allow the power lines. In a century of development humans have not learned not to plant a tree directly beneath a power line.

This ambition began in college. I was a general laborer for a horticulturalist for two summers and at the end of it I realized that I enjoyed it. I enjoyed for one, being outside all summer, two working with plants and last, it was the first job I had in which I was truly able to witness progress with regards to the work I was performing. It was amazing to see an ugly, boring yard become a lush landscape. It was even more fun to go in and tear out an old, horrible landscape and lay a new one, which was beautiful of course. toward the end of my second summer working for this individual, he began to jokingly ask me if I wanted to stay on with him instead of going back to school. He wanted to expand his business and he wanted me there for it.

I said no, of course. I was too close to finishing school and at the time I was pretty set on going to grad school after graduation for some type of higher psychology or counseling. However, toward the end of my senior year, I remember blurting out in one of my classes when asked what I really felt would fulfill me that I just wanted to plant trees. At the time, my professor looked at me with a smirk and mentioned something along the lines of, "looking back at the end of that, will you really be happy knowing all you did was put some trees in the ground." I had no response. If I were to find myself in that same situation today, however, I think I'd just have to reply, "yes, yes I would be happy with that." And if not happy, who the hell cares, what does that have to do with anything anyways? I think I'm beginning to learn that being active is happiness like to me, and if not true happiness, it at least drains me of energy that would otherwise become silent anxiety. My wife knows what this looks like. She can tell when I've had a boring day by what I say (which is nothing at all).

I don't regret not staying back and helping my former landscaping boss forge ahead with his business. However, the enjoyment of the work has held on. Last year I was at a baseball game with a coworker and he asked me what I would do with myself if I wasn't working as a paralegal (a job I just sort of ended up it, a very common tale). My immediate response was horticulture. Which was strange, because I can never give immediate responses. I always have to think about things and then my answer is in many words in which I am able to include many aspects while committing to none.

I feel that I am a patient person, I feel I desire foresight for myself and respect it in others. I enjoy the slow change of plants. I like what they can teach. That old phrase, "bloom where you're panted." It's silly, but when I really think about it, plants really do do that. It's always comical and impressive to see an amazing plant growing out of/in front of some utterly ugly foundation or next to who knows what. Plants just don't care. They do what they do regardless of aesthetics. I am quite bound to aesthetics. I have a certain ideal I want before I feel I can be productive and this isn't right, it sabotages your life.

Status Quo

2007-06-06T11:02:00.000-05:00

To hinge off my last post, which I inadvertently turned into a rant about the USPS, I would like to add to it. Seeing my thoughts written out sometimes helps me realize just what is going on in my head and reading once over the last post, as it turns out, the USPS rant is actually a part of a much larger vendetta I have decided to hold against progress (or the illusion of progress). While living in a densely populated, urban, municipal area, a never ending theme of "not yet, but later" presides over the landscape. Being so close to so many people, so many news papers and billboards, one is constantly faced with ideas of the future.

While on the train, I find myself surrounded by advertisements for what will someday be; that structure that will look so good and be so cool to live in, the walking path complete with an array of swell pocket parks, coming in 2013. I chuckle to myself and silently play with a funny yet scary thought; funny in that I will no longer reside here in this city when this or that is finished, but scary in the sense, but what if I am still here?

I find it easy to become frustrated and quick. I have never described myself as an angry person or even punchy, but in the last few years I have developed this hulk like ability to go from zero to one hundred in seconds in regards to my general mood. This is usually centered around time, specifically, my time. I have never described myself as being selfish with my stuff either, but after living in the city and truly beginning to feel the real gravity of time, the difference between work time and my time has become very vivid and the feeling of others picking away at my time some days makes me feel like I'm running home with a piece of bread and along the way, constantly, there are these birds picking at it and there's nothing I can do to stop them. The piece gets smaller and smaller, until finally, I just have a bite to myself.

Everything in the city takes longer. One time, out of sheer stupidity, I logged onto Google Earth and looked up a map of the house I grew up in and the surrounding area. I measured out one mile. I then pulled up a map of my neighborhood in Chicago and proceeded to measure out one mile. I realized (not that I didn't know this, nor did I need such a vivid visual aid) that a distance that could easily take me twenty minutes to half an hour to cover in the city for years growing up in Ohio, took less than one minute. "Chicago is stealing my minutes," I thought to myself.

Not that this is any epiphany. There's no mystery. More people, more cars, tighter streets, of course it takes longer, you'd have to be an idiot to get mad over it. But I was mad over it. I guess between the more expensive but not better which we've seen exemplified by the USPS and the CTA and the theme of the fact that we all work so hard only to have, on top of our pay, our time whittled down by, what seems to me, laziness and incompetence. Something snaps when I have to look and and listen to ideas of the future and doomsday construction plans for the highway system in order that it might accommodate everyone.

The hard truth is, nothing will ever change about any of this. All the work that is done, all the delays, the construction, everything that slows me down and makes something like a commute take even longer than it should take (which is too long to begin with), only serves to maintain an already pathetically low status quo. Once the freeway opens back up to full capacity, it will still take an hour and a half to drive out of the city. When the CTA finishes its renovations, it will still take forty minutes to an hour to get down town from my apartment (about seven miles). This makes me want to leave. This makes me utterly unamused by any future plan regarding municipal bliss.

I've picked up biking, but sometimes I feel like it's just a matter of time before some lazy fool decides that he doesn't have to/feel like checking his mirror or blind spot, and he's just going to change lanes and that could be my life. One stupid, unthoughtful, selfish move which probably only equals the progress of one car length (and a lot of people calling you a jerk), and someone ends up maimed. I ride slower than I used to.

I guess it's just hard to think of living among such a great populace, which calls itself advanced, yet none of us are looking out for each other. The public transit system has ceased serving the public and has delusions that it's a corporation seeking only profit and self gain. The mail system after being reprimanded for its shoddy service stated that its records were out of date, which, is sort of a paradox if you ask me. What "records" are they talking about? Hopefully not addresses considering the public does that part of the job for automatically (i.e. the address).

I miss living out, away from all of this. As much as a double standard as this is, this is how I feel; I miss just not caring and not knowing. Sometimes I feel like cities are that family that you hung around with for a while, some of their kids were cool, but, ultimately, they were sick and dysfunctional, and as time went on and as you got older you realized that they were never going to do anything to really help themselves or really change anything. They kept their problems because, you supposed, they were used to them. Finally you said screw it and found other hobbies.

Skimming over this entry, I realize that, in short, it's terrible. But who cares? I realize that I'm not always on but I still want to eek this stuff out, yet I don't want this to become some diary of daily events (Steve just got up to get a glass of orange juice, today I realized I suck more than I did yesterday, here's why in three simple, yet quotable ways). To put in just one more double standard, I suppose it's okay for me to once in a while just take that right turn, hard and fast and without checking my blind spot, mirrors or wasting that second to put the blinker on (it's my second, mine, my precious), I want to write damn it, and its' going to be horrible to begin with.

At the very least, I suppose I can count my blessings that one, the city is consistent, which is comforting and it changes slowly, like myself. I can't totally complain about how long it takes them to re-build a train station, it took me a year to buy a pair of shoes.

Bureaucracy: A beautiful Mix of Fraud and Laziness Posing as the Wheels that Run Society

2007-06-04T16:08:00.000-05:00

A general theme I think I am coming to believe is the fact that people grow larger in proportion to their surroundings and older in reference to time, and that neither of these highly automatic, completely reactive/passive life facts have anything to do with, nor do they imply, any level of maturity. I usually entertain this thought while ranting to myself about the latest act I have witnessed exemplifying the general laziness of the human race at large. From the pick-up truck who almost ran me over while on my bike because they were, one, too lazy to put their blinker on and two, (and since they couldn't manager to use their blinker) definitely much too lazy to look over their left and right shoulders to check their blind spot, to the court clerk who can't help you, doesn't want to help you and, oh what the hell, doesn't even know why they picked up the phone to begin with, I find the general adult populace, at best, shoddy.

Living in Chicago the last couple years alone the city has seen exploration committees put together to investigate City Hall, the CTA and the Chicago USPS to name the big ones. The media loves to jump all over these having itself its own fraud witch hunt each time around. Though there is fraud uncovered in each investigation and that same fraud is usually, to some level, fact, I feel there is something deeper and far more sinister in the system than fraud alone. At least fraud denotes work being done. To engage in fraud it must take horrendous amounts of planning and creativity.

Inaction and laziness, on the other hand, causes far more trouble and slows progress more than any fraud probably could. Most cases of high corporate fraud, though fun to read about and empowering to uncover, really don't affect most individuals of society on a personal level at the end of the day. A million is embezzled here, a union is fraudulently looked more favorably upon there and the rest of us still go to work the next day. Fraud stories are flash fires in the news, forgotten the next day with the dawn of a new, more corrupt fraud. However, laziness is something us normal folk have to deal with on a daily basis. Laziness is not a flash fire and it doesn't last only as long as it isn't found out only to be torn out, reconstructed and renewed with a nice audit.

Fraud wants to leave the general public alone, it wants to go unseen, to only effect that which will never realize it. Laziness, on the other hand, stares you right in the face, beckoning you, no, challenging you, to just try and do something about it. Laziness is dealt with each day by most people yet nothing is ever said about it and the media could care less what its overall effect is, most likely out of sheer laziness.

This has actually become a real selling point for capitalism as we know it. Not that capitalism needs another plug in America, but when thought through, this issue of laziness and fraud really reveals the wonderful comforting side of capitalism (as opposed to the post-industrial, outsourcing side we're learning to deal with these days). The beautiful thing about capitalism in the context of a lazy, fraud stricken bureaucracy is the notion of competition.

An example of this would be what FedEx is to the USPS. Sure, most of us are going to use the USPS the majority of the time. It's cheaper (for now) and just more ingrained in our culture as the way one sends mail. However, we all know that once a letter is dropped into a mail box it could really mean anything and it assures nothing. The USPS has become low-risk. Not that there is a low risk one's mail won't make it to its final destination, but low risk as in, only low risk mail is sent via USPS (i.e. that letter to grandma). We hope these things get to their destination, but if they don't, whatever, another can always be sent if need be.

One irony about the USPS these days, however, is the fact that they've been steadily increasing their prices except they forgot one thing. In a capitalistic culture, if price goes up, quality had better follow. However, somewhere along the line in the USPS' price raising strategy they forgot to increase quality of service. So now we basically have the same old run-down system at $0.41 instead of $0.32. It's kind of like an old freezer. It keeps things relatively cold but over time it begins to use more an more electricity yet performs the same (or perhaps worse), so your electric bill is going up and you still can't keep two pork roasts in deep freeze at one time.

The short of it is, apparently, at some point the USPS got all excited when FedEx and UPS began charging the prices they were for service so the USPS decided it would raise its prices as well. Not matched by any means, but raised none-the-less. However, in the midst of all the excitement the USPS forgot to really look into it and failed to truly understand the difference in service, which logically lead to the price variance between the two in the first place. We all enjoy fuming at the USPS for raising prices while maintaining poor quality while we praise FedEx and UPS for their smiles and cool catch phrases, and it makes us happy to think that there is an entity out there that will guarantee quick and successful service, but at the same time, none of us are ready to pay $8.00 to send grandma a thank you. Conclusion: the USPS is needed as its existence maintains the position of the skapegoat, without which, we'd end up hating FedEx and UPS and pitting them against one another deciding one day that though delivery may be guaranteed, stamps are more fun.

Therefore, competition remains an intricate part of our society, and as we have seen with examples of FedEx and the USPS, competition still exists between two similar entities even when their quality levels are vastly different. People will always like service, but never high prices, they'll always like a helpful attitude, but also want a collectible. Until FedEx comes up with a stamp like product that surpasses the broad range of the USPS stamp, they'll never truly kill the beast.

Kiss Him You Fool!

2007-03-23T21:56:00.000-05:00

The British television show "The Office" touched my heart like no other show ever has. This is most likely because the last show I actually saw all the episodes to was "Quantum Leap." I began watching it a year ago, there are only two seasons and then a last bonus episode that wraps everything up in the end. Many times as I have thought of why or what it is that makes this show so attractive to me, I keep coming to the same general, easy answer, it's just less American than everything else that's on. This is not a bash against our culture, nor is it a platform allowing me to point out all the problems of our culture and then go onto conclude that I reflect none of it. Rather, I think my wife and I are just, in a very quiet, non-eccentric way, counter-culture.

This is not self applied, it's simply what I've been told we seem to fit with. For a while, I just shrugged the suggested zealotry off and went about my way. However, a few months ago Sarah and I were introduced to a Swedish couple whom the wife Sarah now tutors in English After meeting, the mutual acquaintance who put us all in touch in the first place reported to us that the foreign couple liked us. "Actually, they said you seemed very 'Un-American.'" We took it as a compliment, though at the time and not speaking for Sarah here, I had no idea what that meant or implied. However, since it was relayed to me in the order, "they like you" followed by, "un-American, " it was only logical to see it as a positive cause and effect relationship, that being the liking and at least in part said liking branching from a counterculture air we, to some extent, emanated.

This idea kept coming back to me. Was un-American good because they were not American, therefore we reminded them of something familiar in a strange place? If this was so, though, how or what was it about us, what did we say or do, or not say or not do that gave us this front? I'll never figure it out. There is no point either. Qualities others find good or pleasant within me are better left untampered and unexplored. The worst thing that could happen with such qualities is to figure them out, attempt to isolate them and then end up over synthesizing them, which always, always, always produces an ass.

"The Office," perhaps why I like it is in some way bound up in the same reasoning for the sweet Swedish couple originally liking Sarah and I, therefore, it will forever remain mystery. The show revolves around the classic narcissist boss who has, ironically, no self-awareness or control for that matter when it comes to how ridiculous he allows himself to become. He states humor as his strong point yet nothing he says is funny. Though sometimes laughable,employees are never laughing with him, but at him. I find him entertaining because in a way his qualities comprise, though obviously pushed to their maximum, qualities I have witnessed in bosses I've had over the years. I am just dazzled by how the acting and writing was able to key in on a lot those characters many times found in those in management who probably really shouldn't be.

The show also has a quiet air to it. The use of silence is something that is not seen often on American television. Many times in the episodes at moments where in a typical American comedy something would be said, a last line, one more quotable phrase, in the office silence ensues. Much is communicated through the characters by looks. Facial expressions say more than any line could in some moments of the show. Even something as simple as a characters momentary posture is utilized as well.

Character development throughout the series is also something that takes one by surprise. Much of television's character development roots itself in plot and direct action or situation. Characters of popular shows are remembered for what they did in a certain scene of a certain episode. Or they're remembered for what they said or figured out. In the office, characters develop because of sheer time. The development is not set up in that, you're introduced to a clean character and they slowly gain face and momentum by what they say and do and the decisions they make. Rather, you are shoved into a world that has been going on long before you showed up to watch and whatever you see that may be classified as development is really just what has already been, you're just able to identify more patterns as time progresses.

The show does have a love interest level to it. One of the sales reps is deeply attracted to the receptionist, but again, this is something that is just seen through a lot of silent looks and small gestures as the show moves. Throughout the course of the show the two can never get together. Again, not because of unforeseen circumstance or because one keeps saying the wrong things or ends up turning out to be a poor lover, but simply because they've just trapped themselves in what is. They consistently misfire with each other simply because they just cannot bring themselves to be that honest. The receptionist is engaged (one of those three year long, we're never getting married, engagements), and the sales rep is just, as one sees through the show, afraid of progress. Actually, in the last episode the sales rep, finally, in a triumphant moment walks the receptionist into a side office, sits her down and, from what it looks like, levels with her. Notice I said, "from what it looks like." He takes his microphone off for the moment and as an observer you're left simply to watch hearing absolutely nothing. He straps the microphone on afterward only to follow up with, "she said no by the way." Talk about one of the most amazing moments in television.

The series ends in an amazing quiet slow moment where everything just seems to be wrong. Nothing went wrong, but, then again nothing really went either, it just was. As a viewer you get your hopes up about this or that, but when it closes everyone is still just trapped in their personalities. The boss is still an idiot, the receptionist and the rep are not together.

I was happy. I'd finally found the show without frill. I could watch this and not feel embarrassed. However, it came later that there was this infamous last episode floating around, the one that was to wrap it all up. I sneered at the thought. "Wrap it all up" I thought, "how American." Always wanting an answer, an ending, the tie up, the close so I can leave knowing and not thinking when it ends. Just tell me, put it on a spoon and shove it down my throat damn it, but please, do not leave me to wonder about it and do not, mind you, make me feel bad.

I remained skeptical and one day my roommate saw this last episode and said it was good. I didn't buy it. He was obviously more American than I was (he's not). I finally saw the episode and it showed me a few things. First off, it showed me how amazing these writers are in that with an ending so amazing, they could write one more episode and make it just as good as the rest of the show. The characters are revisited and found the same as when left. The surroundings have changed a bit but not the people. They remain stuck in their persons, doomed to reinvent themselves over and over again in an amazing, beautiful, repetitive personality hell. I loved it.

However, at one point in this last episode something begins to happen. Something moves and the characters change. Some slowly, some through a momentary something that they just needed all along. The boss finally meets this woman who is amazing and finds him tolerable. Some how his edges just curve out around her and he's seen to be, for the first time in the show, truly content and happy, where before it was an endless struggle of insecure bantering. Also, the rep and the receptionist, they, don't get together. There was pressure before but now, like your common TV idiot I'm on the edge of my seat, "why don't you just love each other" I yell at the screen as if yelling at a soap opera. I break down, she leaves, it's over, she comes back, "kiss him you fool" I yell audibly at the computer, "kiss him" I scream reduced to that annoying trixi who won't lower her volume while on the phone on the train behind you. They embrace and kiss and I exhale.

Perhaps I just live in double standards and this is simply my latest in that all shows are dumb except mine because mine is different even when it ends the same as yours. Or perhaps I just want to see effort. This show was nothing but effort. The characters endured themselves for the lot of it and in the end, one can't help but feel they deserve to be rewarded with the release only hinted at in the subtle looks and awkward gestures which, under your nose, somehow built into a final moment that could only be diffused by everything working out in the most ideal fashion one could think up. The classic, cheesy, first kiss. Anything else would simply be un-American.

Forget the Superhero, I want to be a Nemesis

2007-03-16T10:48:00.000-05:00

Forget all the lame notions one thinks up upon the weekly superhero fantasy. Put on hold for a moment the unimportant details usually over inked and absurdly distant from what any insane individual would deem normal. Forget the color of the boots, the option of the cape and, must we not forget, the trademark. These details are of secondary importance when it comes to the question of the real core nature of the superhero. Batman comes as close as I can tell to the unadulterated superhero stigma. The conflicted back story, for the most part simple costume and an almost personal vendetta against crime.

However, there is one aspect Batman possesses which truly separates him, and those like him, from the rest. This aspect can be found in the mysterious nature which superheros like Batman possess. These superheros remain, for the most part, un-known. They do not show up in full garb to public parades and the new Macy's opening, one will not precede their name with the phrase, "friendly neighborhood," and most important, regardless of what side one finds them self on, they're perpetually left to wonder whether these sort of superheros are with them or against them.

The local authorities cannot openly endorse them because these superheros don't always turn their catch over to the authorities. The "good" superheros will not adopt them because, for one, they don't show for local meetings, and secondly, and most importantly, when it comes to the question of justice and retribution, these superheros are a one man judge, jury and appeals system all wrapped up into one decision based on cause and effect, black and white sense of vindication, slime-ball stopping, moron shunting machine.

These superheros don't answer to anyone, will not defer to a higher voice and are, many times, very pissed off and most likely basing their actions and decisions within negative associations projected onto the fools of society. In short, these guys kill people.

The police do not kill people, that would be an utter contradiction, for the police are simply the base intake medium for the entire, overarching judicial system. For a police officer to openly kill a villain, even if there is absolutely no doubt as to his or her guilt, the action would serve to shatter the system that as its core states, "innocent until proven guilty." In this case, the officer is not the prover, he or she is simply the agent that retrieves the file.

The "good" superheros cannot kill people because somewhere in their code it is alluded to that if a hero kills, even though the victim may be bad, that hero has taken a step toward what they are attempting to fight against and a paradox is produced which will ultimately smear the hero. However, the Batmans of the world, do not associate themselves with the police or the "good" heros. At the end of the day, they just are. These superheros are simply machines of momentary and likely definitive justice carried out in a further instant act of concrete retribution, sometimes resulting in the death of the perpetrator.

This, I feel, is the core of the superhero. Everything else is just a symptom. If I were a superhero, I would most likely resemble Batman far more than superman. Superman may be able to fly, but Batman can make decisions. The Batmans of the superheros command true respect. A respect born out of general fear. They run off a basis which feels that the rights of man will more closely be respected if the fear of death is a motivator.

The superhero that truly gets the job done is not some unpaid police force extension aiding the FBI in unsolved mysteries when their union won't allow them to work double shifts. The true superhero becomes the only force that can truly fight against evil, the true superhero is simply a nemesis ("something that a person cannot conquer, achieve" and "an agent or act of retribution or punishment"). The bad can conquer the justice system. It is far too overpopulated and at the end of the day, money talks. However, no one can conquer a nemesis. When what you have done is deserving of death, or more importantly, the nemesis may feel is deserving of death, one finds them self treading lighter.

When the superhero lurks in a darker, lower place than even the evil of society one can truly feel that balance is one step closer to being achieved. When the darkness one traverses in evil deeds gains the potential to reach out and pull lower than even the evil thought possible, one will find a true superhero. The true fear of the evil is the reality that their evil just may produce a nemesis that will end them. At this point, the police are simply there to clean up the mess.

What's In a Name?

2007-02-15T15:07:00.000-06:00

Growing up, my mother always expected me to remember people's names. This was not because she found it polite or because she thought it a character honing habit, but simply because she could never remember names herself. Sadly, this is a carrying gene and I find that I exhibit this family characteristic quite well, therefore, in those most desperate of moments, arm held tight by my mother as she whispered intensely yet inconspicuously into my ear that oh so familiar phrase, "what is that person's name?" I always drew a blank. Of course, not knowing someones name was of no consequence to me, I was just a child.

Names were never anything of real consequence for the majority of my life as I think about it. I lived in the same house my entire life, went to the same school, had the same friends my entire upbringing. I never really had to remember new names because I never really met anyone new. Of course, there was those occasions when I would happen upon that new individual, but the practice of meeting an individual only constitutes remembering one individual name and anyone can do that. Throw one new person into someone's life every couple of years and sure, they'll get the names straight.

On top of all this, I have one of those names that has multiple forms: Steven, or is it Steve, "ph" or "ev?" Therefore, in the confusion of all that, I really began care less about even my own name as well. Steve was always fine with me, it was easier to say, quicker to spell and as I came to find out, if I introduced myself as "Steve" this immediately eradicated any confusion as to the spelling of the name. Apparently it's taboo to call some one who's name is spelled: S-T-E-P-H-E-N, "Steve." Perhaps it's the biblical undertones that form carries.

To make matters worse, my friends adopted the practice of only calling me "Steven" when they were angry with me. Now I found myself with not only confusing, but negative associations dealing with names as well. Also, "Steven" apparently means, crowned one or something along those lines. Of course, then there is my second name, "Jacob," which means deceiver. Added together I am the crowned deceiver. I find myself, if wanting to be a true stickler about name significance, nothing more than the leader of some obscure, un-named hoard of bandits running around duping people. At least, that's the picture I always got.

Then college came. I went far away for college, so far that I knew no person upon entering the campus. This meant that everyone I "met" signified another name I was supposed to learn. I think at first I really didn't think about it. I would meet someone, hear their name and forget it. It was really no big deal. Most of the people one meets at college the first couple days are never spoken to or of again, so I had nothing to lose. My floor, however, became more complicated. I learned my roommates name easy enough, so that was taken care of and everyone else I figured I would just leave up to time to take care of.

This worked out for the most part. I learned everyone's name eventually, except for one. I tell people this from time to time as an aside, but have never written about it and have never told the individual involved about it either. Not that it's some horrible secret, I just haven't gotten around to telling him yet. I got very close to this individual during our first semester of college and I don't know how it happened, perhaps I just never had the need for his name, but I went almost the entirety of that semester without knowing this person's name, and we were close. We had deep deep conversations together, we prayed, played jokes on people...never knew his name.

One comes to a point in a relationship when it's just too late to ask. I guess the momentum of everything was just too fast. I forgot his name initially, didn't have to use it or ask for it the next couple of times hanging out and that was that I suppose. You just can't look at someone one day whom you truly know, who you've laughed and cried with and ask that question, "by the way, what was your name again." I believe that falls into a category beneath the nameless one night stand. I forget how I finally did learn his name, I guess it really doesn't matter at this point. LONNIE and I are still friends to this day.

I encountered something else while at college as well, that being those who took name forgetting personally. There were a few individuals, whose names I cannot remember, who would get downright hurt and pissey when I would not remember their names. I usually wrote them off as high maintenance and tried to keep my distance. There was also a few people who became name accountability partners with me. These people understood what it was like to not be able to remember names, therefore, we agreed to, whenever we saw each other, point at each other and say our own name. I would see them in the hall, and upon eye contact would shoot my arm and hand out into a defined point and belt out, "Steven." This worked great, but then I saw very little of those people as we realized that our only connection was that we didn't know each others name, and that's normally reason enough not to talk to someone, so that was short lived.

What's in a name these days anyways? As I danced around earlier, I never had much preference as to what people called me, "Steven" or "Steve." However, I came to find later that my mother took offense to people calling me "Steve." At first I blew this off, I mean, it's my name, I would think. As time went on, however, I began to think more about what it is to name someone, and the fact that many people, myself included, have been named after someone. I decided that it was truly important that people call me what my mother felt I should be called. She is the one who named me, she put the thought into it, she knew and had the connection with the other man who carried my name before it was applied to me. I wanted to reclaim the association to someone she had created for herself at my beginning.

These days, especially within internet culture, names are empty at best, deceiving at worst and every explanation that falls in between. Between chat rooms, blogs such as this, and e-mail, people have applied and given themselves, at times, multiple names and explanations. I find this strange. Naming is not something that should be self-applied or in the hands of the beholder. We as individuals are positively biased toward ourselves and, therefore, unfit to pick names for ourselves.

When we apply our own names it releases us from a certain amount of accountability and honesty we need to maintain civil contact. It allows us to judge ourselves by our own standards, thereby remembering or forgetting whatever we want. Names used to have something to do with what someone was truly like, or reflective of the tone of the times they were born in or even, as mine is, reminiscent of another, who someone found amazing and saw a way to, to some extent, preserve their memory and legacy.

In my case, this has the potential to impose upon myself a modest level of accountability. In the case of the other naming practices, these should instill some motivation to wisdom because of the memories produced by the mere mention of one's name. However, people are not named as such anymore. This lack of meaning used to be my argument when I would hurt someones feelings for not knowing their name. However, now, as I have learned from my mother's concern over my name, names mean something to someone and they're not to be written off or even disliked.

There is a level to names that allows them to just be. They are because they are in this generation. May we find at least enough weight in our own names to be accountable to others and enough honesty to ourselves to divulge our true names to those we interact with. May we also take the extra step to remember those names who others have so graciously made known to us.

Risk just needed a little faith

2007-02-11T21:41:00.000-06:00

I am a self proclaimed Risk hater (Risk being the popular board game in which world domination by obliteration is the one and only object and not the metaphysical idea of potential sacrifice) I use the word "hate" because I have experienced first hand the effects of the game of Risk. To give a little back information as to the real implications of Risk, it is actually the game of choice for college age men going through their mid-college crisis. This is sort of likened to a mid-life crisis, but one in the midst of college does not have the money to buy a fancy car nor, usually, does this individual have a family he can leave as do some men during their proper mid-life crisis.

Therefore, these individuals find the next best thing to buying a car or attempting to start life over again, world domination, in which the outcome of the battles leading up to it are completely and entirely based on the luck of the final resting point of two to three dice. As was said and in opposition to an authentic mid-life crisis and furthermore ironically, these individuals really have nothing to risk so the idea of putting the fate of a population of polymer based legions of soldiers to the luck of a die roll is of no real consequence.

Throughout my college career, I lost many friends to this sickness. Which, again, is why I can whole-heartedly say I truly hate this game. One does not simply lose a friend to this game however, they slowly fade away. Actually, not even that, they first give you a chance to join them in their conquest escapades. It begins as simple experimentation. They tell you they just want to try it once, you know, see what it's like, but it's nothing serious. After a while it becomes all they want to do. Then you begin to meet all these other people, new "friends" begin to stop-by and hang out. One day you walk in and your life dissolves around you as you stare, open mouthed to a scene of a table set up in the room surrounded by people you've never met, your friend at the head a handful of dice and blood on his lips destroying the plastic armies of Madagascar one by one. This is when you know it's gone too far.

For one, who the hell are all these people, these new friends? Secondly, Madagascar? Going for Madagascar in Risk is one of the major tell-tale plays of the game. It either means you're greedy or you're attempting to take and hold Africa in its entirety, which everyone knows is impossible. Even the worst of Risk players, regardless of prior motives, will not stand to allow someone to hold Africa in its entirety. Your friend drops the dice and runs over to comfort you, rattling out some idiotic reasoning, something about how he was going to tell you, but, or, you were fun to play against at first, but you're just too easy to beat. Then they try to make it your fault, if you'd just accept them for who they were, you'd get along. What's wrong with illusions of word domination anyways?

You end up tearing off in tears, and they run out of armies while attempting the Madagascar conquest, in which the owner of it, upon their next turn, refortifies the island and proceeds to sweep across half of Africa, not because he wanted it, but to prove a point, sort of like a "don't try to take all of Africa" bitch slap (notice I said they take half of Africa, another tell-tale play, that of taking half a continent, which means, basically, "don't fuck with me").

However, a new dawn has come. A group of friends from college who my wife and I get together with every week were going out dancing. Specifically, the girls were going out dancing, which left a handful of guys with nothing to do for an evening. Naturally, the guys called, well, a "guys" night and that's when it started. It was all going well to begin. We went out to eat, I successfully finished the "Manly-Man" sandwich, we were all happy and then we returned back home and Risk was mentioned. I could feel the night dragging out, the fun dissolving. How could I have been so stupid, I walked right into it, the word RISK, it was like a night stick to the face.

The guys tried to comfort me. Apparently, this was no ordinary risk. I didn't buy it. I had heard of these new "other" risk games. During the height of the popularity of the "Lord of the Rings" trilogy a "Lord of the Rings" risk was produced. I tried it, hated it. Later, a futuristic risk was developed, in this one you could actually take over the moon. No good though, just as NASA has, I realized that the moon just isn't interesting enough.

This new Risk is entitled "Risk, God Storm." I went into the game with not a little amount of skepticism. In this new version, a mystical element is introduced. There are four gods in which one can summon, each one carries its own uses, for example, allowing one to win ties in battle. Each god's abilities are ultimately helpful in battle in some way and not entirely difficult to utilized or manage. Along with each god is a deck of "miracle" cards. These cards can be drawn when a player one, has that particular god summoned and two, they are able to perform certain labor, for example, when one has the god of war out, if they take three or more countries within their turn, they earn a card. These cards have all kinds of different abilities.

After playing this game for about an hour, and enjoying it, I began to realize what they had done which made the game so good all of the sudden. Basically, they merged the ideas of Risk and the card game Magic, and promptly took out all the intricacies which make the two games difficult and not as widely accepted. They removed the aspect of world domination in the Risk game (now it is played in five epochs, so each player only has so many turns and there is a defined end to the game). As far as the cards are concerned, the abilities are useful and easy to access. One can activate the uses of any card by paying out a certain amount of tokens.

This brings me the real interesting point, the tokens or money of the game is properly called "faith." In the game of "Risk, God Storm," one can do quite a bit of damage to anyone at any time with the right amount of faith. It's amazing to sit around a table playing a risk-like game hearing the players say things like, "if only I had more faith." Damn right. The game was engineered to be maximally interesting for the length of the game for every player. A genius developed it.

I realize some may still be skeptical even after hearing all this. I would be too as I really hate Risk. At this point, those that simply have no luck or ability in rolling dice would pose a proper objection, that being, no matter the frills, I will still lose battles. This is a valid point, however, this is the real twist. Risk, God Storm comes complete with an afterlife. Soldiers who die in battle go to a respective heaven. Once in heaven, soldiers can exit heaven to the underworld and fight there as well. Ground can be gained in the underworld, crypts can be taken and if you own at least one crypt in the underworld and one temple on the map, one can resurrect armies. Of course, if your armies die while fighting in the underworld, they go back into your main pool (that's the pile of unused plastic men which sits before each player).

Apparently the creators are still working out the theological kinks dealing with war in the underworld. Because of this, I tended to fight very little in the underworld. I figured my soldiers had already served me well in life and who was I to pluck them from heavenly bliss just to fight and die all over again?

"I'm not really an angry person, I just keep finding myself in these situations"

2007-01-23T20:30:00.000-06:00

My wife recently explained to me how it is she thinks. She traces all her thoughts and ideas back to relationships and personal experiences and interaction. When she has a story or a thought about something, it rides closely with someone she knows, what they have said or done or her thoughts even spring simply from how she feels about those relationships in her life. I find this amazing and altogether diametrically opposite of my process of thought.

My thoughts resemble more closely a desk with documents moving across it. I have realized in the past week that my thought process actually looks very much like my job. How this happened I am not sure. Did my job make my mind this way or vice versa, or do I just see similarity between the two to make myself feel like I know what I'm doing more than I actually do? These are not important questions because, for one thing, they're almost unanswerable and another, if I did answer them, that answer could potentially make my job situation quite awkward.

I think in terms of filing. Documents run through my mind. These documents could be representations of anything. Movies I've seen, books or other articles I've read, people I've seen, conversations had, anything. All these events as they pass get filed away in my mind, somewhere. I realize that I can't use them all at once nor are all of them usable at first look or alone as they come, but everything gets filed, nothing is passed by or written off as meaningless.
I think this may be why I like quiet so much, why I can be so silent much of the time. Any noise or talk disrupts my filing work. I can't become distracted because then I may move onto something else and that leaves a pile of unfiled documents sitting on the desk of my mind. If I leave a pile, then the next time I want to think through something, I would first have to dig through a pile of miscellaneous documents. This doesn't go over so well at work, nor does it in my mind.

This train of thought is also why I end up writing the way I do. I don't really have the desire to write all the time, everyday, jotting down every thought and feeling I may have. What I think happens is that at some point in this process something changes and this change causes a handful of my files to line up in some particular order, at which point, a blog comes flowing out. All of the sudden, a portion of all those documents I have been saving up just all make sense together and create a story or a picture. One leads to another, some answer others, one that didn't make sense before now does, another that I thought was monumental is now just a single line or fragment. It's interesting when this happens because in the event of this coordination occurring the need to write becomes the number one priority and I can become quite irritable the longer I have to wait to get it down.

This can create problems, say, if someone I live with has made dinner and it's waiting to be eaten. It's urgent, though. Just as I file away all my thoughts, I feel that when they line up, the thoughts in that bunch end up corrupting and sort of partially dissolving if I don't write them out. Times when I have waited, going to write it out at a later time it all comes out weird and messed up and I'm left shaking my head in irritation, feeling like I just wrote an important paper and the computer has gone and deleted it.

I suppose the real question then is what is it that causes these files to line the way they do when they do? I can answer this easily, but I can't produce it as easily. Irritation is what motivates my writing when it all comes down to it. That little thing that changes is simple, basic raw human emotion, and the cheapest kind at that, anger. I will be watching TV and some commercial will come on that just rubs me the wrong way, someone will be talking loud and about nothing on their phone on the train, the train won't come when it should. Or, as history shows it, the most potent irritation causer in my life, I have to deal with an organization (also a large part of my job).

There's nothing better than an organized public office to push that button in me that just makes me want to wish the human race right out of existence. I find myself empathizing with those psychos who are now in prison for walking through some office unloading round after round into staff members and authorized personal. Upon getting off the phone with most any staff members at the local court, after my immediate question, "why the hell did you even pick the phone up," dissipates, I can't help but wonder, how many "crazy" shooters were just trying to obtain some simple public record or perhaps a license renewal?

The college I attended allows alumni to make use of their fitness facilities for a small fee and the requirement that an alum must obtain a pass each month. At first look, this seems wonderful, how thoughtful of the school to do this. Don't get me wrong, I truly find this very thoughtful. Of course, upon attempting to reap these benefits as an alum, one finds themselves wondering whether all that is just a hoax and they really don't want us taking up space at their facilities.

In order to obtain an alum pass, one must go to the Alumni Office during business hours (8:30 am to 4:30 pm). Most of us who upon graduation went out and acquired full time jobs find it difficult to run such an errand during these hours. However, the gym we're obtaining the pass for in order to enter is open until 10 or 11pm most evenings. This immediately causes one to think logically. "If the gym is open so late, and the alumni office only during normal business hours, and most alumni, who work NORMAL business hours, want to access the gym AFTER said business hours, would it not make sense to distribute the alum cards at the GYM?" This thought is counteracted by the fact that at the gym, they do not have access to the alum lists needed in order to make sure you're kosher. In which I would AGAIN reply with simple logic...give them the list, give them some sort of access to some list. This is a college campus, make use of the local intranet.

Once you as an alum make it through those steps, probably by using half a sick day making up some story about seeing your doctor, other barriers exist. I desire access to this gym because they have racket ball courts. However, upon calling one day, I am told that they only allow people to reserve courts before 10 am the day they want the court. This is strange and unfortunate as it is now 11:30 am. I ask whether any of the courts at this time have been reserved, the answer is none. I plead to the worker to reserve one of the courts for me anyway, no such action may be done. Finally, logic kicks in again and I just throw out the question of why this policy is in place. Now at this point any reason would still irritate me, but it would have been a reason none the less. The worker on the other end of the line, however, proceeds to quickly and definitively tell me they do not have any idea why that is, "but you're not going to reserve me one" I retort, "no."

The files line up and I feel I have a bit more insight all of the sudden as to why people hate each other so much. Organizations all have a few things in common, to start, workers who don't want to be there, don't like or care about what they're doing, are more interested in finding ways to do as little as possible rather than doing what they have to do well and at the end of the day questioning nothing and large volumes of rules and regulations, most of which are outdated but still in practice, others that never made sense but have never been challenged probably because the individual who thought them up in the first place was some irritating control freak who was attempting to fill some familial void . Of course, with situations like mine with the gym or dealing with city workers, these are innocent and at the end of the day, really don't amount to much in the grand scheme of the human race. But what happens when these attitudes and actions are compounded, what happens when it's all added up into society as a whole? What happens when these same situations occur in politics and religion?

No wonder people run around killing others for thinking different than they do, no wonder we find it so easy to judge actions not our own. We're all working on inbred bad protocol. We're all willing to stand up for something we don't fully understand or know about because we're too scared or lazy or stupid to ask questions. We love our comfort and if eight hours a day, doing as little as possible, knowing better how to get rid of customers rather than truly help needs is affording us what we personally find comfortable, why do anything more?

Today I had a crazy idea that just might work. Usually my solutions to these situations, tongue and cheek heavily involved, have something to do with some kind of xenocide or someone at the very least getting the hell beat from them. However this idea is much cleaner. The first step would be for society as a whole to simply fire all those who suck at their jobs and/or didn't want to work anyways. Once fired, these individuals would be promptly put on unemployment. Meanwhile, all those still working would immediately receive major raises in pay, of course, at the same time, more would have to be taken out tax wise to balance out the deficit all those now on unemployment would now have created. This would end in those who actually come to work to work being able to get more done because all those they're working with and needing will be hard at work as well, while making around the same amount of money (more taxes as I said), but now there would be no more dealing with idiots who shouldn't have picked up the phone in the first place and ultimately just end up wasting your time.

I feel that this could work and I wish I would have had this thought about five years ago because I would have written something like this for my ACT essay portion when they slapped you with one of those overgeneralized questions about how we think society should run or what two things would make the world perfect. These questions are ultimately bogus because the ACT or SAT is the only time in life anyone is going to ask you this, the rest of life is the askers trying to get you to stop thinking about it and just take your lunch break already. Of course, we all know they take the good essays and implement them as public policy, which is, again, why I wish I would have thought of this sooner.

You're In "Sexy, Sexy, Sexy"

2007-01-09T19:49:00.000-06:00

The epiphany season runs between January sixth and Mardi Gras. For most Americans this means nothing, but last year one of our friends introduced us to the vast celebration that is the epiphany season in Europe. In this season special cakes, which translate as "kings cakes," are brought to and consumed at as many parties as can be crammed into the days that run between epiphany and Mardi Gras. These cakes are special in that they contain within them an object, sometimes a plastic baby, other times an almond or cherry, that is representative of the baby Jesus.

The cake is consumed and whoever gets the "baby" is king and even gets to wear a crown for the night. That individual is also responsible for throwing the next party. This year was our second annual observation of epiphany. It came in handy too as Christmas proper was hectic and stressful. We were able to hold off on finding gifts for each other until the sixth. As was cited in earlier posts in this blog, extra days are a good thing for a slow shopper like me. Naturally, then, epiphany is a pretty cool thing.

By January fifth I knew exactly what I wanted to get my wife for Christmas and I forged out to attain the loot following work that day (yes I'm aware that was a Saturday, I had to work as my office merged with another). All the gifts were easy enough to attain and I even threw in a box of truffles as garnish. I was doing well dragging my slow shopper feet all through the stores when I came to the fated item on the list, the bra.

Normally, this would not be so bad, yes it is a male looking for a bra, but that can be handled with a little finesse and besides, I figure I'm married now and that should give me an air tight reason to be rifling through bras at the department store. However, I realized that I was still harboring a few bacheloresk thoughts and aside of all of this still more, my wife's favorite bras originate from none other than "Victoria's Secret."

This created the real dilemma. Before, seeking out the perfect bra could be done almost undetected with the correct placement and timing. In any given department store it would have been easy to mask my intentions. The plan would be simple. A safe, unquestionable beginning in the men's section, perhaps looking at pants, I may even try a pair on to further shape the illusion and throw off any seasoned personal shoppers who may have caught that, "looking for wife" glint in my eye on the way in. I would then slowly proceed toward the women's section, not directly or even with an interest in anything in particular, no, this would be played out as an accident.

I would work through the polos, to the ties and finally, while sizing up the perfect belt to go with that suit I have at home, I would get a glimpse of some female apparel. Nothing scandalous, just something. Perhaps the men's belt rack joins the women's midway. It could happen to any normal male searching for a belt, an innocent belt, functional in my case as they actually do hold my pants up (I realized the other week that I'm actually a 31'' and not 32'').

The sight of some womens accessory would undoubtedly cause me to think of my wife and then to think of what she may like. From that point it would be a hop skip and a jump to the bras where I could gaze at them from a safe distance nonchalantly snuggled between the women's blazer rack. Blazers are always a safe bet, they're more masculine than feminine from the start, and what more ironic cover to have while secretly searching for arguably one of the most feminine pieces of apparel?

However, this perfectly formulated, fool proof plan finds itself utterly obsolete as one stands before the shoplifting scanners of "Victoria's Secret." As I mentally prepared myself to venture into the store, I realized that not only had I never crossed the threshold of a "Victoria's Secret," but I don't ever recall looking directly at one when the store happened to be in sight. I was crossing this line, though, as I gazed into the store searching for an avenue which would take me across yet another line I'd never crossed, that being the threshold of the store itself.

I calmed myself by allowing a thought run through my mind that there would be other guys in the store and I wouldn't be alone. However, I was hard pressed to pick any out at the moment. Those males who were in the store, as I found out, were with a girl, all of them snuggled close behind their female counterparts so that I was even unable to stand near a couple with hopes that an onlooker may be confused as to which male the nearest female was with, and therefore give up wondering about it at all.

To make matters worse, the store was packed. If this wasn't difficult enough, though, it was post Christmas, which meant sales, which meant clearance, which constituted large bins of stock. I was about to walk into a room full of women shoulder deep in bras and panties. Suddenly, epiphany was not very cool, I, the slow shopper had gambled with my indecision of gift giving to buy more time and I had lost.

I was hit by a car while biking once. I let this thought drop through my mind like a chaser to lighten the blow, held my breath, picked out the far right hand corner and damn it, I walked. I made it to the corner without incident and to my grace, the corner was fully stocked with bras. I was scared, but I kept chanting in my mind like a mantra, "you're just a sweet husband doing this for his wife." This soothed me for a time until the fear got the best of me and I began to realize how I was dressed. As I mentioned before, it was a Saturday and I went into work to help the office move. Moving meant getting dirty, and the potential of getting dirty meant ultra casual, borderline grungy clothes. At this moment, I realized that I looked nothing like a sweet, lower middle class husband caring for his wife. I was somewhere between a "Nirvana" groupie and a Chicago bike messenger.

If I was taken for the messenger, I would be categorized as weird as the biking community at large, including the females, stereotypically does not spend its spare time shopping for underwear at "Victoria's Secret." On the other hand, the only "Nirvana" fans that go to VS are either A, mocking the store, or B, plain old perverts. I was in a lot of trouble.

It was then that a voice was thrown in my direction, "can I help you sir?" A floor clerk had picked me out and, though I should have just run at this point, surprisingly, I became bold. "Yes" I said with clarity. "I am looking for a bra for my wife." I did not realize it until now, but I held the, "looking for my wife" trump, which deflects feelings of, "we think you're weird." I got into it at this point, I explained that I wanted a bra that was suited for normal use, therefore comfortable, but was not simply plain. This bra needed to give the wearer comfort, while also making them feel pretty. I had done it, I was confronted and I turned it back around on them as a challenge.

"We have those, but not in this section," was the reply. "Yes, you're in the 'Sexy, Sexy, Sexy' section." This one broadsided me. I looked up and to my surprise that was the actual name. For a moment I was lost, "'Sexy' three times," I thought. What, is VC now attempting to utilize that old Hebraic literary device in which something is iterated three times to ultra emphasize a point. Was this supposed to be some sick allusion back to Isaiah's writing of the angels' chanting, "Holy, Holy, Holy?" I stopped, though. I figured the quickest way out was to find out where I needed to be, buy the bra and leave, I could always write a letter or something later.

Starving in Love

2007-01-02T23:32:00.000-06:00

I have been witness to a sort of love that when truly exhibited is really not love at all. This sort of love is warped and skewed and consumed in insecurity. The beholder of this love believes that love is a finite commodity in which an abundance in one direction or place automatically constitutes the lack there of in another direction or place.

Love is something that must be grasped, fought for and won and then held on to with everything one has. Love must be sought out, taken and then defended and protected. Here, it is not that I would not stand up for my love for another or want to protect one that I do love, but I feel that in many cases chivalrous love tends toward a greater deal of hostility than I am willing to exhibit or comfortable with producing. I think actual love tends to stand on its own and be far less volatile than the fairytale knights or romance comedies would have us think.

Those that behold love as a finite commodity see it as something that must be hoarded once found. Once a source is uncovered it is to be cut off from all other potential outlets, all avenues by which that source does or may direct itself must be snuffed out or driven away. Love is not unlike a discovered mine of precious minerals in which the discoverer must spend, ironically, more time and effort protecting and isolating the bounty than actually enjoying or drawing any real pleasure or fulfillment from it.

One must isolate the source so that the finder can then have the love they have found all to the self for it is there that they think fulfillment lies. Ironically, this hoarded, isolated love will wither and die like a plant that has been hidden away in a safe. Hoarded love dissolves if taken and attempted to be kept. Isolated love boils down and steams away leaving behind nothing but a thick residue of jealousy and emptiness.

This love does not fill at all, but starves the holder. Those who seek love in this way and fashion and want it in this state only will search and feed on it perpetually and without satisfaction. This love creates hell for the holder as they perpetually seek, perpetually consume and perpetually starve, but never to death. One does not die on this starvation because it is a starvation of gluttony on nothing, and a lot of nothing cannot kill a man.

In truth, actual love is deadly. Actual love is infinite. An abundance of it in one place constitutes an abundance of it in the places surrounding. Actual love is to be given and never kept, not sought after and found, but learned and developed. Actual love fills when it is given away and satisfies when it reaches another not the self.

Actual love is not some stupid, random, twittering feeling one happens upon or catches. Love is something that is worked for and shown through sacrifice and sweat. Actual love is active not passive, moving not staying. Those who know actual love cannot rid themselves of it fast enough. Those who truly have this love also know the truth of it, they know that in the end, it will kill them.

Those who know actual love have felt the pierce of it, for it is sharp and direct, not dull and ambiguous. The degree of pungency is the strength of love. It is not a dull blade that tears apart that which it attempts to cut, it's not a flat spike that smashed what it tries to puncture, the pierce of it leaves just a small hole in the self, just a tiny prick one may not even feel at first, but a cut to the core none the less and one that causes the self to hemorrhage.

The novel, "Children at the Gate" comes to mind in the fact that the main character is hard as nails. He is impenetrable and has wrapped himself so tight that none can touch him. Being untouchable, however, constitutes a complete lack of feeling. To not be touched is to not feel, but in order to attain feeling one must be cut or broken, but once cut or broken one is then maimed and bleeding to death. At the close of the novel, the main character has experienced this very event and it is said that his heart is slowly bleeding.

Actual love, in this then, is something that comes on slowly and in time. Actual love does not happen in the course of one scene, one good chat, one moment that is somehow better than the rest, but it insists on being spread over all and everything. Actual love takes place and develops in the quantity of time and effort that is given. Quality is important as always. Negative actions over a long period of time will not produce admiration. However, when a quantity of time and effort exists, quality is stretched and flattened and a little ends up going a long way.

These days our society seems to be obsessed with quality filled moments. Quality vacations with the family once a year and super meaningful chats to kin that are intended to shape and fix character. Quality tends to scare me. I am not a quality person. My personality is not exhibited in moments, I cannot conjure memorable, wisdom filled speeches and when I feel I need to be saying something meaningful if a moment arises I usually just get hungry.

Quantity, however, I can do. Large amounts of time with another with nothing seeming to be said is a true recharger for me. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy a smart conversation and still despise small talk, however, my deep conversations usually take anywhere from a few hours to days at a time. I think this is why children reside with their parents for at least eighteen years of their lives. This window is for all those out there that may not always say the right thing at the right time, but will definitely hang out in general silence if asked or needed knowing that somewhere in that passing, through various words said and actions witnessed, something, somewhere will click.

Slow Shopper

2006-12-16T21:04:00.000-06:00

When I was in middle school, my sister decided that her passion was elephants. She claimed they were amazing and she loved them. Naturally, with any good passion goes the collection. Remembering back further, I do recall my sister having a fascination with elephants, but back then it was mostly contained to certain times and events. Once at the fair a sculptor made her a tiny elephant from clay, she loved it and has kept it to this day. I once got a statue of an elephant made entirely of sea shells at, ironically, a White Elephant gift exchange which I promptly delivered to her with pride and gusto.

This brings me back to middle school where I began and which began my sister's "collection." She had collected a few elephant themed pieces in the past, but a threshold was reached in which I suppose she must have sat quietly in her bedroom one evening weighing the dilemma in her mind looking at it, as any fanatic looks at his or her fixation, in black and white, one extreme or the other. The moral moment must have had quite the weight to it, her standing on the edge of two worlds, two personalities, the split in the path. Apparently the road less traveled for her, in which she took, was the decision to jump headlong into the passion and upgrade from a simple casual admirer and observer of the pachyderm to the full fledged hunter-gatherer type collector.

She was ahead of her time the way I see it judging that the beloved "Beanie Baby" craze didn't hit until a few years later. Either way I was now related to a collector. At first, I was indifferent to this new development, yes I did give her the sea shell elephant statue, but that was a random chance and free at that. However, as time went on and as I became more self-aware, and with each passing Christmas and birthday I was reminded more and more that my role in these "gifting" events was to become more active and I would soon be responsible for attaining gifts for others, I learned a horrible truth about myself. I was, and am to this day, a horrible gift giver.

It's not that I buy bad gifts or even that I buy good gifts and become utterly shy and nerve racked with the thought of delivering them to the receiver, it's that I just simply and completely do not know what to get anyone for any occasion. Anxiety was beginning to become part of my personality as this horrible trait of mine fully developed. Christmas became a time of worrying where I could be found aimlessly wandering through department stores desperately trying to avoid the personal shoppers and "KB toys." First off, my shopping method is composed of two simple steps. Step one, decide what I need to buy, step two, go to the store to get it. At times there exists a step one prime in which I end up doing a very light amount of research in order to seek out the store that will sell me the item I have decided to purchase, but all in all that's as complicated as it gets. This method leaves room for zero browsing and when I go to purchase the item, as far as I'm concerned, the store is carrying only that.

I have also been called a "slow shopper." This expression describes those times I successfully complete step one and step one prime if needed, but then a pre-step two comes out of nowhere in which I find myself debating the metaphysics of the situation and I commit shopper suicide by beginning to wonder "why" I'm buying the decided upon object of desire. I find this gets worse with age as every year becomes one more year I can say I successfully survived without said object. "Why do I need this, I'm 25, 25 years without it, wow, that's a lot, why not one more?"

Buying for others is even worse in that since I can't get in their heads I really don't know what they're going to find maximum usage with. Then the question becomes, "would they use it, if so how much?" Even if those first two come out affirmative, the third clincher from before always, as ever, throws a wrench into the system, "WHY." "Well then why do they need this? Do they have to use it?"

So, I am brought back to why my sister's collection became important to me and true a source of hope. I discovered through her never ending collecting of a single theme that I was never without a clue as to what to buy her for special occasions. It's her birthday, buy her an elephant statue. Christmas, an elephant statue and a cool elephant calendar for the next year. The county fair, elephant ears are amazing. Life became easy just as fast as it had become difficult. I was now automatically endowed with the power and intuition of always being able to buy my sister the perfect gift. I was awesome.

This quickly became my general template for gift giving. It was so simple all the sudden, just find out what someone collected, and in those cases where they don't collect anything, buy food. At the very least they can eat it and it's not cluttering up their house or fining its way back to you at next year's White Elephant gift exchange.

As it turns out, I am not alone at the department store as I wander about with a blank look on my face. Many people are just as bad at gifting and just as slow at shopping as I am. This is why collecting exists. It allows people like me to be included and feel good at Christmas and birthdays. Some of us, as I have seen, are even clever. When faced with the occasional individual who owns no such collections these quick witted slow shoppers without skipping a beat and instead of letting that original anxiety creep in, quickly create a collection out of thin air by choosing something at random and deeming it the "starter."

Many of us are plagued with multiple "starters," those random trinkets and statuettes that have no earthly place in our home. Of course, at this point, the collection has been started and it's not that the person got you a bad gift, but that you're a bad collector and it's your fault a random item sits out of place on your mantle; of course it's random if it's lone, you're supposed to collect more.

What's With The Penguins?

2006-12-02T16:52:00.000-06:00

My wife and I spent the Thanksgiving holiday with her family in Indianapolis and as any good, cohesive family does during the Saturday following Thanksgiving, we followed suit and took a family outing to go see a movie. My wife has two younger sisters (younger as in elementary school age), so she accompanied them along with her mother to view the latest installment of the mysterious penguin craze, "Happy Feet." Apparently it's a movie about a misfit penguin attempting to find his own place and "groove" in the world, or so it seems.

I asked my wife how the movie was after letting out and she just sort of smiled. At this point, she could have let me off easy by making it simple and just saying, "you know, penguins," and that would have been satisfactory for me given the context. I saw the poster, it was more of a rhetorical question, another way of saying hello. However, once she explained what was really going on in the movie I quickly realized that not only would the reply "penguins" have been insufficient, it would have been a blatant lie. However, my wife, being the honest person she is, gave me the truth, "left-wing, liberal, environmentalist propaganda directed at ages 5 to 12."

I was broadsided by this reply at first, of course, who wouldn't have been? You ask a simple question, "how was the movie," and while you can still see the poster in the background, mind you, with that beautifully computer generated picture of a leaping penguin front and center and while you're still taking in the art and "happiness" of it the words, "left-wing, liberal, environmentalist propaganda," find their way into your ear. It's cause for a literal jolt.

I found myself confused and blindsided by the response. In the past week, as well, a few opinion columns have sprung up regarding this strange "children's" flick and with good reason. Just as my wife and I were that fateful day, people are...confused. However, it seems that the confusion does not last long before it begins to evolve and melt into frustration and then once one really begins to understand what the movie, "Happy Feet" is really about and then realize who it was directed to and marketed for, downright, old fashioned, rage filled anger ensues and all one can really think about for about the next hour is that scene from the old Frankenstein movies where a local mob of angry citizens is in hot pursuit of the monster complete with pitchforks and torches in hand, the taste for blood on their lips.

The movie begins innocent enough with a misfit penguin attempting to find his own style and way in a culture that would rather expel than accept change. Seems harmless enough, nothing wrong with teaching a group of children a nice lesson on tolerance as well as letting them know that individuality can be a good and powerful thing that should not be mindlessly discarded. Had the movie been about that, it would have been fine. The audience would have gone away vindicated in their own convictions (not that I agree with that totally, but at least it would have been straight forward and in general, a call for peace) and the children would have got a fairly decent lesson as well, a lesson which would have needed to be further explained by their guardians, but simple enough and basically positive in regards to development. However, this is not what the movie was about. Turns out it had more to do with the whiles of industrialization and the threat of pollution and human overconsumption of resources which ultimately affects the populations and way of life of many species, especially the penguins.

Any adult watching this flick sees through the smoke and mirrors immediately and had the movie been directed toward an adult audience, a metaphor such as this would have been fine. Again, those in agreement would have gone away vindicated that their message was getting out. Those opposed to the message, well, they would have simply disagreed, snickered at the metaphor, awareness may have even been spread. Conversely, children do not have the same faculties adults do, they do not and cannot reason the way adults can and when all is said and done and to put it simply, children have an innocence adults do not. A child cannot look at a movie like this critically weighing and comparing their current beliefs and past experiences in reference to new materials and opinions being presented. Children are more like a sponge in that they just take it in.

Therefore, as a child leaves a movie such as "Happy Feet," they leave believing an opinion to be a fact. Once again, if the lesson was simply, "be yourself and use differences as strengths," a philosophy that is generally accepted as good and helpful, it would not be a negative thing for a child to exit the theater believing this about the world or deciding that that was a fact. I realize that one might argue that what a child learns from his or her parents to be facts are mostly just the opinions held by their parents. This is correct, much of what one is brought up with and begins treating as fact is simply an opinion held by those who taught it, however, what a parent decides to teach his or her children is nobody's business other than the child and the parent. I suppose one would just hope that somewhere in one's upbringing one is taught to weigh and calculate information so as one does begin to develop higher cognitive ability it will then be used to further decide for the self what is fact and what is opinion.

The problem here is that those who write movies such as "Happy Feet" usurp a parent's place as initial fact teacher and ultimately weaken the family structure, especially if that which is fed to a child in movies like these is contrary to the opinions of the parent. Leaving the movie, a child could potentially find the next week of their life utterly confusing as these two "facts," that of what the parents teach and that of what was taught in the movie, collide.

At this point, I am going to break away from that last line of thought because I feel that I have accidentally stumbled onto ground that I don't feel like expostulating upon or attempting to reconcile in a blog. I feel that I have traced out that line as far as I need to for this thought and I would now like to move to the rant that originally made me want to write this all down, "why penguins?"

I am continuously confused lately as to why penguins have become such a hot item (no pun intended). It began with the hit, "March of the Penguins," there is now a children's book out entitled, "Tango Makes Three (a book promoting homosexual relationships which I feel the same way about as I do 'Happy Feet')," and the recent, "Happy Feet." From what I have heard, "March of the Penguins" was pretty sweet all around and it did well in the box office. So what then is all this propaganda about? Seems those who seek to usurp the minds of today's children think they can ride out on the coat tails of "March of the Penguins."

I guess they found something that sells well and thought they'd slap their own agenda onto it, sort of like those great trojan horse programs that get onto your computer riding legitimate programs and mess things up. Therefore, the little bastards that want to push this stuff on America's youth are not only misleading, but unoriginal as well.

This whole blog is not my tirade against environmental awareness. It is just when I see productions such as these, geared toward children, it makes me think that even these liberal minorities that are psycho about spreading awareness for their causes, know deep in their hearts that nobody really takes them seriously. They realize no one their own age is listening, not because we don't want to save the penguins, but because they're annoying (the psycho liberals not the penguins), so they have to aim lower to an audience that will agree with them but only because they don't know any better and they find CGI entertaining. As one article responding to "Happy Feet" put it, "children have been caught in the cross-fire and have become collateral damage."

Conquest

2006-11-17T20:58:00.000-06:00

I recently read an article which explained that a town in Nevada and a few others (one was in PA) have adopted laws against, first and foremost, flying foreign flags (I say first and foremost because there are also a flood of other smaller statutes and such that follow along such as fining landlords who rent to illegals). Bottom line being, in reading about these new laws, they seem more passive aggressive acts rather than statutes that actually smooth out and order the progression of a municipality.

As far as the immigration debate goes these days, I find myself on neither side. I am not all for the idea of simply being here automatically makes you a citizen, but I find putting a fence up a little childish as well. I remember when I was young locking my favored play things up hoping no other would have the enjoyment produced from my glorious things as well.

Creating statutes and laws like the above mentioned, for one, is unconstitutional, but also, more simply, is just counterproductive. People who think up these laws should really be the ones who in the face of adversity and political struggle, should just stay out of it. I know that we all need to do our part as citizens, but I think these individuals' part is staying home doing nothing.

Usually, when there is some sort of national, political unrest, like we have these days, statutes and such very much like these, though they are not always instated, find their ways onto appeal boards all over the nation. However, these laws, as I said, are simply reactionary attempted quick fixes to problems that go far beyond, as is in this case, the sight of another countries flag. These laws end up sounding more to me like the fool in a debate, if you've ever debated with a fool about anything (which in the long run makes you yourself a fool too I would suppose) at some point in the argument your arguments and points will begin being used against you. Example, "you're being a jerk....no, you are."

This is ludicrous. responses like this signify many things, none of them, unfortunately, serving as anything near a rebuttal. When I hear a counter like this in mid argument, I immediately begin to think about the fact that, yes, they just repeated what I said, actually, they only partially repeated it, they said, "no you are." If you want to rebut with the repeat tactic at least make the effort to go all the way. Even a child knows that, when you want to irritate someone by repeating what they say, you repeat everything they say, you don't half-ass it by leaving out the noun.

In many ways, I feel these laws, our friendly state-wide flag law included, is not unlike the fool who immediately after being accused of being offensive replies, "I'm not being offensive, you are." As we all know, the very act of doing this, of using the repeat method in this type of debate is utterly damning. By your very defense you're showing your enemy exactly what your weak spot is.

Granted, the article reads on that many of those who backed this flag law were quoted as being tired of seeing alien protesters waiving their countries flags at rallies. In this, I do see some merit to their initial irritation. Since it is the Mexican population I am mostly thinking about, and Mexican flags that were cited in the article, I would like to point out, at least locally in this conflict, what may be going on.

This traces back to the Incas and the conquest of South America. I think that every American, no matter how shoddy their history is, when faced with an angry mob of immigrants waving Mexican flags can only recollect that they've seen or read this somewhere before. Incas, South America, Spanish roots...Conquistador. The last time the world has seen this kind of activity an entire race was wiped out. Yes, this is going overboard, but since when are mental associations rational?

As Americans, I think we just get a little nervous when backed into this corner. Of course, the playing field is a bit different these days, what with immunity and guns we'll probably be fine in the end, but who knows, perhaps this whole conflict runs right back to our good old American sense of guilty entitlement, which will take everything it sees, trade it for religion to the previous inhibitors and apologize by promising to feel, well, sort of guilty for the rest of time. Perhaps this whole mess is just a little too familiar and since Mexican population doesn't have sun dances and such for us to outlaw, their flag is the next best thing.

Gag'em and Bag'em

2006-11-16T22:30:00.000-06:00

There exists three major, "philosophies," "states of mind," "obsessions" that every one of us will always be able to depend on holding significant standing in society as we know it. How am I so sure of the perseverance of and why these particular three can be backed up with the same source, that being the fact that each maintain entire television networks solely devoted to their propagation to all humanity. Politics, religion and professional sports have no beginning and from the looks of things, will most likely plot their end a few minutes before the sun progresses into a red giant thereby consuming the earth in its utter girth.

However, where politics and religion can tend to get quite messy at times, especially when they talk to each other, sports remain the pure entity of this human trinity. The way I see it, is that there exists a trinity of trinities where each trinity, successively, mocks the preceding. There is God's trinity (father, son, holy spirit), Satan's trinity (beast, anti-Christ, false prophet) and humanities trinity (politics, religion, sports). One may argue at this point that sports as an entity is not pure, but I would counter with the fact that sports in and of itself is quite pure, the only time sports gets messy is when politics attempts to play a role in it. We see this in aspects such as contracts, stadiums (their construction and the method by which funds are gathered for that) and good old fashioned athlete shit-head activities that attract the media (the rats of the human race) and thus breeding scandal. I suppose religion does attempt to butt into sports at times when we see athletes praying or giving their achievements up to God, but it seems that society as a whole simply smiles and nods at these acts regardless of any individuals' belief and chalks them up as heart or passion, something that then acts to add to the purity of sport. Apart from examples such as the aforementioned, sports remains a pure and good entity.

I find, though, that sports, specifically athletes, have ended up in entirely the wrong position within the hierarchy of society at large. I see how sports stars are praised and idolized by so many, I also see their income and these exhibit a problem in a system that used to work but now has been flipped on its head. Thinking back to stories of the Roman Empire (and yes, I am relying heavily on the past movie "Gladiator" for this example, so what, it was cool) and the Colosseum games. What does one see in these stories, Christians fighting lions and gladiators, armed with nothing all for the enjoyment of the mob.

Not that I in any way condone these past acts or feel we should readopt them in the here and now, but there is an overarching paradigm that I feel we have lost in our modern day sports arena that at that time served as a very strong, very important balance of power between the athlete and common working citizen; a balance of power that, as I said, has now been completely turned upside-down. It is time athletes be put back in their rightful place and to begin doing this we need to remember exactly why people watch sports in the first place. Professional Sports exist and are watched purely for entertainment. Athletes are there for us, there to wow us, there to excite us and make us happy.

It is time athletes began acting as they should, hanging their heads in humility at the bare fact that they have given up a normal life to train and perform for the rest of us who work and actually contribute to society. Athletes should be of humble spirit, cherishing every rah, giving it their best at every moment. Athletes must be constantly reminded that in the real world, they are nothing and what they do in their games, win or lose, doesn't change anyone's life whatsoever at the end of the day. Therefore, excitement is a must, they are there to entertain us.

Why is it that when a pro athlete gets injured we have to hear about it on the news all day? It's time a more "horse race" mentality be adopted. When an athlete breaks their leg and can no longer "perform" they should just be shot. Okay, maybe that would be over the top, they should not be shot, but the point it, athletes are expendable. When one goes down there must be a hundred people waiting to take their place. This is where the plight of contracts re-enters the scene and it is now reiterated why politics does not work in sports. The birth of athlete contracts has slowly degraded and lessened our over all entertainment by sports. When the game should go on and the season continue to progress regardless of injuries, it is slowed and meandered by scandal and contract and politics.

There is no other type of athlete that understands his or her expendability less than the professional soccer player, specifically, the Italian soccer player. For anyone else who watched the World Cup this past year, that was the moment in time, the pin-point moment when I was able to definitively say, yes, there is something wrong with sports today. Every time anything touched those players they were on the ground wailing and carrying on. I remember doing that once, wait, no I don't, I'm not an honorless drama queen, sport tool. I think a new rule must be established before next year's World Cup roles around, "if caught dramatizing on the field, you will be shot." Snipers should be set up all around the field just ready for a drama queen moment.

Again, has no one ever explained to these players their true level of expendability. Yes their fine athletes, yes, they can do some pretty cool stuff with a ball, but the truth of the matter is, when the shit really hits the fan and something really big goes down, they're not going to make it into the bomb shelters. They're just not needed. Therefore, especially for soccer players, but to all athletes, next time you feel like putting on a show instead of performing your sport duty, just remember that the more you dramatize, the more you are caught drunk driving in an accident with no car insurance, each time it erodes away the common grace of society and one day lynching will be re-introduced and I think the first one to go just might be a soccer player, that or Mike Tyson.

This brings me to yet another aspect of the mess sports has become, which lies with the announcers. What are they really talking about, do the spectators actually need their presence, are these games really that difficult to understand? Next time you watch a game of any kind, take a moment to really key in and listen to exactly what the announcers are saying. It ends up boiling down to, well, exactly what's going on in the game, "whoa, red's got the ball, uh-oh, went to blue, they're moving it down the field...goal...hey, how did blue do that, well I'll tell you, they were able to acquire the ball from red, then they moved it to their goal and threw it in, wow, now tell me, how did blue win, well, they had more points than red did when the clock stopped...watch survivor after the game." This is insanity. Just once, I want to come back from a commercial break and witness an angry mob racking the announcing staff up and building a fire beneath them while chanting, "kill the pig, tear its side, spill its blood." Is that too much to ask?

It just goes to show you, we're not really listening to what we hear and we're not really paying attention to what we're watching. This passive living has caused this imbalance in the athlete, commoner relationship. I can only rail on the athletes for so long before it becomes completely apparent that of course they are going to take that position if we freely give it to them. After years of watching but not seeing and hearing but not listening we find ourselves in a world that idolizes a fool dramatizing pain on the ground because he was bumped to get the call while fools rattle on about the obvious in the back ground, and the food is too expensive as well.

Thanksgiving's Messiah

2006-11-11T12:00:00.000-06:00

Walking up Washington Street toward Daley Plaza, the site of the enormous Chicago Christmas Tree, in season, I was awestruck by the site I witnessed before me. I stood staring at a construction crew constructing none other than the scaffold that is used as the inner skeletal structure of, well, the huge Chicago Christmas Tree. As you can see, the confusion was not in place because I was attempting to figure out what the structure was, the confusion set in when I spun around to check the date on the giant bank clock that sits opposite Daley plaza. Surprisingly, I had not, unlike the child in the age old, "Flight of the Navigator," fallen into some mysterious time warp on my way to work, it was in fact still and only November first. Do you know what November first is, it's the day that directly follows Halloween, October 31st, the last day of October.

Halloween in Chicago is, surprisingly, a very well celebrated "holiday." In Daley plaza as well during Halloween, one can view an enormous haunted looking house where shows are performed by acrobats and kids come to carve pumpkins. The finale of this plaza event is none other than October 31st, Halloween proper. This can only mean that in the course of one night, crews had not only torn the Halloween structure down, but were well underway into the construction of the giant Christmas Tree. What does this all mean? Thanksgiving is officially dead.

The retail community at large has finally done it after all these years, they have bullied out, once and for all Thanksgiving. They've invited Thanksgiving to a "private" get-together, got it wasted (which shouldn't have been too hard considering the gorging like attitude Thanksgiving is known for), hit it over the head with some sort of blunt object and it is now most likely buried out behind some inconspicuous farm house in northern Wisconsin. That's right, for all who didn't already know, the retail community are a bunch of murderers.

In fact, just a few years ago, I remember Halloween was in danger of being phased out as well, but of course, it turned up the candy production, got 20 somethings interested in costume parties (you know, since they can't go trick-or-treating) and was even surprised that one can actually talk an adult into wearing something ridiculous even easier than a child. I think it may be the alcohol. It makes sense, offer a child candy and they'll do anything, offer an adult a bud-light and you basically have the same result. So with that said, as Halloween took the retailers' threats seriously and did something about it, Thanksgiving was just, well, I suppose too thankful to really be able to hang with retail.

To this day, retailers have not figured out how to properly market Thanksgiving, which, again, is why it had to die. Come to think about it, Thanksgiving is not only incompatible with the retail crusade, but it poses and represents an utter attack and affront against everything retail hopes to convert the world to. Where retail focuses one's attention on what one does not have and figures out ways to invent felt needs for all retail can produce, Thanksgiving causes one to think about what one does have, to be thankful for the way things are (and I'll stop there with that because as I look at it, it's all too obvious already).

It's sad really that a holiday had to die in the name of consumerism. It's times like these that make me appreciate stores like Target and Wal-Mart, that's right, I said it, there are aspects I respect about these store chains. To begin, if every retail entity was structured the same way these sprawling mega marts were, Thanksgiving and every other generally unmarketable holiday would not have to die, or at least be pushed under the carpet and forgotten (it was Thanksgiving that was killed and not days such as veterans day because, as I already stated, Thanksgiving posed a threat where these other little holidays just kinda wasted a day or two here or there, but in the end didn't really cause any sort of real cognitive spikes in the human psyche).

What makes these mega stores so amazing is that they have, very much like McDonalds, created a template and environment in which absolutely anything can be marketed, advertised and sold without anyone really questioning why. Thanksgiving is of no consequence to a store like target; simple, create Super-Target and sell food (which is the prime marketing angle for Thanksgiving by the way). Not that the rest of the retail community doesn't know that the consumers' heart lies with food during Thanksgiving, they're very aware of this I'm sure, the problem lies with the fact that unlike the sprawl mart structure, it would just be weird if say Macy's started hawking turkeys or giving everyone a free box of Stove-Top with every purchase of fifty or more dollars.

Don't get me wrong, consumers love free stuff, but this, as the stores obviously know, would just be going too far and it may even cause consumers to begin thinking that word, that one word that is absolute poison to marketing and consumerism..."why." Once consumers begin asking "why" the retailers have lost, "why" is the beginning of the end for consumerism. Therefore, they, surprisingly, have a very thin line to walk if they intend to survive. With that said, each year Thanksgiving came around the population was given yet another chance to ask, "why." Apparently retailers could no longer play this Russian Roulette any longer, which, again, is why Thanksgiving is dead.

The reason these sprawling giants can market anything is in the simple facet of angle. Where most stores create a product and then figure out a way to make the public feel they absolutely need and cannot live without it, sprawl marts have turned this paradigm on its head, and with much success I might add. Stores like Wal-Mart and Target are not in the business of creating and presenting new stuff, they focus on the here and now, already produced and dug deep into the consumeristic psyche of the average American. They focus on getting one what they already know they want and think they need. Sprawl marts have no time to waste with talking people into wanting something new, they've too much space and too much ground to cover between the Atlantic and Pacific for that sort of nonsense. Instead they build off the successful marketing of others and then, like a cold stab in the back, once the public is hooked, sell the same items for 50% under retail value.

In a way, consumers are no loner even the focus of retailers, but simply a fish caught between two cats. Name brand retailers will continue to think up new products and new ways to make us think we need them, and sprawl marts will continue to buy those same products in bulk and sell them at less than the cost of production. The wonderful part is, the name brand markets can't do anything about it because if they attached the sprawl marts, they would, one, look as though they were attempting to deprive the public of what they want and need and two, be directly hurting themselves as sprawl marts carry their product lines and many times are the only avenue of exposure certain populations will ever have. A kingdom divided against itself cannot stand even if the profit sharing fluctuates.

If This Reminds You of Yourself When You're Driving, You're an Asshole

2006-11-07T18:40:00.000-06:00

I have been biking quite a bit the last month. Somewhere between the CTA having an uncalled for level of construction on it and the fact that I moved, resulting in it taking ten minutes less to bike than to take the train (and that's if the train is running on schedule, so ten minutes is the least you'll save), I am slowly becoming one of those dreaded Chicago bikers motorists love to hate. When I think of it, it's really a complicated issue, this hate relationship between the biking and the driving community of Chicago. I would just as soon stay out of the whole thing and just be jazzed at the fact that I have single-handedly figured out a way to, with one activity, shorten my commute time, exercise and give a well deserved finger to the CTA at large. However, every once in a while all are doomed to be pulled into the drama of whatever social plains they frequent.

I blame myself for this first and foremost. To admit the truth, I do find myself cursing under my breath while a car cuts in front of me or suddenly decides to bank right (right through my lane) immediately in front of me (note: I was actually hit earlier this year because of one of these maneuvers). This makes matters worse as well in that, it's very hard to stay out of the drama that is the war between the bikers and the motorists when you have inadvertently joined the ranks of not just a casual biker but to bike commuter that's been hit by a car (it's like graduating from pot to cocaine I suppose). Anyways, regardless of what accidents or near accidents have happened during my commutes, I do play a key role in my attitude toward "car culture" in general and I will admit that I am guilty of, in moments of silent reflection, creating my own philosophies that damn the motor vehicle and criticize all who operate one. For example, cars have a negative impact upon the urban culture because of their amazing ability to carry and spread dirt, making the city dirty, or, cars are counterproductive in building personal character because they allow one to go far faster than they actually have the ability to move by their own strength and dexterity, or otherwise put, cars allow humans to access a large amount of power (engine) with little expense of effort (how easy is it to push the gas pedal with your foot?), which ultimately results in a void in respect. With this said, the fact that any idiot can push their foot down and in today's economy, that same idiot can attain a line of credit which would afford them any number of vehicles (SUV's not exempt, and for some stupid reason more abundant within city limits), I find myself very surprised I would bike at all.

So what then? Do I take the plunge and jump headlong into the left wing, psycho bikers, wear a messenger bag, ride a fixed gear track bike and at all times hold my u-lock in one hand with whitened knuckles clenched over it ready to catch some fool's light or better, temple with the lock end of it? Sadly, no. I find this lifestyle, just like gas pedals, counterproductive to character. I find that when you're irritated or opposed to something the right side is not the opposite extreme. In the end, what is the difference between a mad motorists and a mad biker, road rage be road rage I would think.

No. With all this said, I find the quiet way out seems to work best for me so far. When I want to yell at a motorist I hold back, when someone pulls a bone-head maneuver in front of me the most wrath they'll receive from my direction is a dirty look. Why do I settle into this state when I could be more aggressive about it? I could direct attention back the the deep point I made about the right side not being the opposite extreme, but I think that's easy enough to see through, just an explaining away of a non-action, covering up one's own fear with philosophy. And at this point I would like to say, damn right fear.

Of course it's fear that stops me from yelling, from banging on the suv's hood, from threatening some fool with u-lock in hand. A bunch a fools all packing at least a thousand horses literally under their feet, you'd better be afraid, if that doesn't scare you, then you're really an asshole. Have you ever noticed that all that "No Fear" apparel isn't seen anymore, that's because those who truly believed it are dead and everyone else realized it just wasn't true and anyone who has any sense isn't generally into displaying proven lies on their shirts, though you do wonder with the "Juicy" brand at times.

I suppose it's also because, I, like everyone else on the road, just want to get to work and this is the way that seems to do best for me. Fear and commute bring me to what I was actually thinking about when I started writing this in the first place.

The other day I was on my way home from work (biking) and as I proceeded through an intersection, one of the cars that passed to my left gave me one of those long, sustained honks, one of those honks that doesn't really say, "hi" or "hey you're kinda in my way" or whatever, but the long honk, the one that says, "get the hell out of my way, I'm a car, I need to get to that next point as fast as I can and you're ruining it." This is yet another counterproductive action some motorists have fallen victim to , most likely found in the void of character previously created by the gas pedal. This is counterproductive in that it really doesn't accomplish what I feel the essence of a horn is meant to accomplish. The quick toot, yes, that lets me know, one you're there, two, you may think I'm too close, I may disagree, but at least we communicated and we're both still here. The long honk, on the other hand, scares those around it causing anxiety, which makes people react, usually in the form of some sort of spasm or jerk. On a bike, this could very well be the action that causes the bike to dart in front of you, ironic yes, but that's what you get for being a moron with your horn.

I got the long horn. Naturally, I was angry, because what one also conjures in others when they scare them, as in by giving them the long horn, is anger. I continued on my course and it wasn't long until I had caught up to the car that had some distance back given me the horn. I was mad, I let myself go and as I rode past the guy I turned my head, looked him in the eye and yelled "beep-beep" at the top of my lungs. In my mind, this was the end of it, I had made my point, he was in a hurry and I ended up passing him up anyways, what a compartmentalized, moron.

As I continued on, however, the car pulled back up beside me and decided to slow to my speed, the window rolled down and that's when it began, "did you say something?" Now, anyone who's ever heard this line knows that it is not an actual question, but rather a test. It says, "I'm ready to fight you, just want to know if you're going to step up or wimp out." I really didn't know what to do at this point, I could have just ignored him, but what would that have done, that would go against everything I would like to think of myself as (in this, someone who doesn't just become the asshole in conflict, the guy who doesn't say "whatever" when they know they've lost a debate), so I replied, "yes, I said 'beep-beep,' i said 'hello,' isn't that what you were saying back there." Now to look at this from the inside, there is much wrong with the fact that he even decided to continue our interaction, and this was all racing through my mind as I said that previous line. What, he can honk at me, but I can't honk at him? Anyways, I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt and figured he probably thought I said something derogatory toward him or something, which caused him to get mad, so my whole "hello" argument was to create peace, which I of course wanted because, well, I was afraid.

I think my response took him by surprise, I suppose he figured I was either going to back down completely or take his invite on completely yelling back something like, "yeah, I said 'F%@$ You.'" But I didn't, and when I think back to it, I think he was confused. I guess you'd be too if you wanted to fight with someone and they beeped at you. What followed was what I take to be the meat of my rage against motorists and all they can become. He moved on from being confused and began, while driving beside me, to go on about how much his deductible was and how I was drifting into his lane. At that point I really wanted to say something along the lines of the fact that if he hit me, I think his deductible would be a little higher. But that seriously said a lot to me in that moment about general care and the lack we have for each other. Whether I did weave out or not is not the issue here, what kind of person does it take who's first thought after they think they've almost hit someone is their deductible?

I said a few more things back to him, I told him we should just share the road, which he replied, "I'm trying." I told him to drive safe and he sped off. I couldn't get the situation out of my mind the rest of the night. It kept turning over and over. It wasn't out of anger either, I didn't feel wronged, I was confused. When I think about it, he just seems like a cool guy. He confronted me for yelling at him, but when he found that I just spoke back to him, he was willing to carry on a conversation with me. It made me respect him in a way, but at the same time I regret to this day that I didn't ask him to pull over, to suggest that we sit down and talk a while. When he would have no doubt asked why with a weird look on his face, I would have explained it, "you seem like a good guy, you're talking to me even when it was sparked out of anger, I respect that." I wanted to tell him this, I wanted to know something more about him, something more than just the kind of car he drove and his deductible.

I guess I'm just sensitive that way. If you want me to at least initially care about you, just talk to me, it really doesn't matter what you've done or how we met, you'll probably grow on me in the end. I suppose this is a good thing, and I would say that the reason I don't swing left and threaten others with a u-lock because they don't see what I see or do what I do is not because I'm ultimately afraid of them, though I am afraid to an extent, but because at the end of he day I find myself obsessively caring for strangers. I think each time I come face to face with another human I'm reminded that it's actions I hate, not people.

Julia Roberts' Web

2006-11-03T17:02:00.000-06:00

the other day i came across the trailer for the upcoming Hollywood rendition on "Charlotte's web." at first glance i thought this was pretty cool. think of it, one of the most beloved books of all time finally for the first time made into a movie. i believe there has been a cartoon version of the book made, but this is a real movie; it's like the difference between the old cartoon version of "lord of the rings" and, well, do i have to say it? think of it, "Charlotte's web" in full vivid movie imagery (some of it computer generated, but we all love that).

as the trailer loads i sit in excitement, the trailer begins and that wonderful, familiar voice begins to narrate. the voice of one who has smoked way too many cigarettes but we don't care because he introduces movies. he begins talking about, for the first time ever, "Charlotte's web." magnificent. a few images of a farm pass over the screen, we see a litter of pigs, brilliant, so far so good, seems to be true to the book as far as i can remember. the trailer moves along as though nothing can go wrong and then, all the sudden and like a night stick to the face, Charlotte speaks. at least, you think she speaks. you suppose that's suppose to be Charlotte but for some reason eveytime Charlotte says something Julia Roberts does too. you begin to get irritated. "shut up Julia" you yell. "shut up while the great Charlotte is speaking." and as the trailer progresses, a sick feeling pervades your stomach, you twitch once or twice, a tear rolls down your cheek and you begin to sob as the trailer closes and the cast list confirms that yes, in fact, Julia Roberts is Charlotte. the voice of the great Charlotte will forever be personified through the avenue of Julia Robert's voice. and once again, you are astonished at how amazingly Hollywood has been able to terrrestrialize yet another timeless work.

anger follows my cry of disappointment, first, at the producers of this movie. how could they be such idiots, do they have any idea what this book is? but then, i become angry at Julia specifically. she could have turned the role down. how could anyone be so naive and proud as to think they could do the voice of Charlotte? now one may ask at this point, "well then how are they supposed to make the movie?" and the answer is simple, use a no name person. use someone who has no connection to anything, someone who when we hear their voice it won't create a stream of consciousness flowing all the way back to "pretty woman." i can see it now, while everyone is supposed to be astonished that a spider just spoke and at that to a runt pig, all we'll be thinking of is a corny car chase down Michigan avenue while miss Roberts chases after her childhood friend in hopes he'll marry her. or possibly, when Charlotte performs her first feet of writing "some pig" in her web, an action that sparks a stream of events that ultimately saves the life of an ordinary pig, the audience will be much too preoccupied wondering what Julia may have worn while she was in the recording booth, or how they love the way she gets those wrinkles above her nose when she says, "some" in that drawn out way.

this is an outrage, when i go to see "Charlotte's Web" i want to see and hear Charlotte, not Julia !#$%ing Roberts plays Charlotte. do the producers not know, have they not heard, where were they when the batman movies were bleeding to death? what one thing do the first four batman movies have in common...they kept using major stars to play batman. what saved batman in the rebooted production of "batman begins"...a more or less unknown actor taking on the role of batman. i thought Hollywood had learned its lesson. between spider man and superman alone, it seemed as thought they'd learned what to do. the template is easy, it's just a matter of plugging the correct people in: batman played by Val Kilmer, doesn't work, batman played by George Clooney, doesn't work, superman played by Brad Pitt, no, that won't work, superman played by unknown actor, perfect, spider man played by generally unpopular actor, perfect. Charlotte done by Julia Roberts, did we miss something. was the template lost? i should copywrite this and call it the "batman factor." to steal a beloved phrase the comedian Lewis Black usually interjects at similar points in his stand-up routines, i think when they were trying to think up the perfect person for the voice of Charlotte, they walked into the office of the person ultimately responsible for deciding, promptly smacked him in the face with a shovel and without skipping a beat laid the question on him. To unpack that scene to anyone who didn't get it, this is what was meant: you better hope and pray that if you're the individual who made that decision, when you're before the throne of God someday standing before eternity, and God asks, "why Julia Roberts" you'd better have a great excuse (ie i was hit in the face with a shovel immediately before making the decision) because i'm almost convinced that if that isn't the case, that individual just might not be an image barer (ie they're a demon).

I'm Them, They're Me

2006-11-01T17:28:00.000-06:00

whenever someone claims they're just like a character in a book (ie "so and so is me") i cringe and run the other way. it's not that i'm sick of hearing it or even that i think it's shallow teen talk, it's more or less the very opposite, it's the fact that no character in any book could ever be anyone in real life because that's not the function of novel characters. i realize that many eyebrows may raise when i say that because, as i know, one of the aspects of any amazing novel is the depth of reality of its characters, whatever that means, either way, that's what many of us find in the books we deem "good."

the point i'm getting at is this, a novel character, a good character exhibits more than just a believable aspect, but he or she represents some human condition, a generalized, commentated human position. therefore, the problem i have with people stating that they are a character from a book or vise versa is the fact that if one were to think about it, no one would want to be so messed up as to completely and wholly manifest a generalized condition of the human race at large through their single physical life, nor could this be physically possible. just let the characters be, do and represent as they do.

no one wants to be a human condition and furthermore, no one is a reincarnated version of someone who never existed in the first place. yes, one might exhibit qualities similar to what a character from a book exhibits, but this just serves to further the point given another individual, in the case of a classic novel especially, wrote about something that was going on then and happens to still be taking place (thanks to you apparently). actually, all those who claim to mirror these characters (who function to show condition), be careful, if anything, you're nothing more than more living proof of how destructive the human race really is. now that i think of it, i'd like to look all of you up, that way next time i get in an argument with some fool who doesn't believe in the depravity of man, you can all be my visuals.

Deadly Baptism

2006-10-31T22:22:00.000-06:00

i have been reading through "the end of the affair" again and i think i may have figured something out about it. reading it, one can see very clearly sarah's struggle with God, mainly manifested in the reading of her diary that takes place toward the middle of the novel. there is also a reoccurring dream that sarah has that has to do with her calling to her lover at the top of a staircase, being frightened by the reply of a strange voice, turning to descend the stairs and finding herself waste deep in water at the bottom of the stairs. another aspect of the book is the fact that in the beginning, sarah takes a walk in the rain and because of it ends up catching a horrible cough which ultimately takes her life.

water and the illusion of God actively chasing sarah down are themes that manifest themselves in the book. however, i have always been confused by the staircase dream and i have never given a lot of weight to the fact that sarah dies of a cough caused by a rainstorm. i feel now, though, that these two aspects have much to do with each other. it seems that the strange voice sarah does not recognize that replies to her at the top of the stairs in the dream may allude somehow to the voice of God. the water, which seems to trap sarah in the dreams, acts as the physical agent that ends up catching her. sarah is pursued by God in her dreams, and waking thoughts as one sees as they read her diary, she is cornered through the use of water in her dream, which is the same agent that sparks her physical death.

this very vivid picture of a pursuing God is drawn through this mix of imagery. one can see sarah pursued, cornered and ultimately taken (caught) by God as seen by her physical death. this sparks another thought about a different point in the book but a point altogether not disjointed from the above. while reading, one finds that sarah's interest, or at times in the reading, lack of interest but choice as well as she's run-down by God, all begins with a prayer by sarah that she speaks just after a bomb has fallen on the house she has been staying the night in with her lover. she awakes after the blast and immediately assumes that her lover has been killed. sarah prays to God, who she's never thought about much before, that God would spare the life of her lover. sarah makes a deal with God at this point that if i remember correctly, has something to do with her never seeing her lover again if he would just be alive.

her lover is alive, he comes to later feeling that nothing amazing has happened, it was simply a close call and their all the luckier because of it. to sarah, however, this is everything. this blast was nothing less than God himself crashing into her life.

pursuing her to death, this sounds harsh, though, for a God that is supposed to be loving and kind. what kind of a loving God crashes into someone's life only to pursue them to death, literally? this has come to mind just now as well. sarah's death has always confused me simply for the reason above, how could God do that, why that way, why at all? i think it has all to do with her lover, who i will name now, bendrix. bendrix is the main narrator of the book. the book begins after his affair with sarah (after this God break in) and we come to know a very hate filled, cynical, jealous man. many times lines are spoken and illusions are made to the fact that if sarah just wasn't there, Bendrix would be free. it seems that sarah's death is needed if bendrix is to be saved. in a way, sarah is already saved, through her diary and her dreams, her struggle with God is very present and salvation will be hers, if only through death.

how often does this scene happen that one who has found God, or God found them, is taken or not spared so that another who is still very lost might become free that he too might find mercy given his earthly obsession and focus is gone. there is still much that i would to understand about this book, but in the meantime, i wanted to get this down before i forgot. there is so much i have never written down because i felt they were incomplete thoughts, but what ends up happening is not a complete thought growing, but an incomplete one dissolving. i thought blogging was a waste because it was too easy to do and there is no legitimacy to it, but now i think it's making sense, what better place for disjointed thoughts to go. a blog, a place for illegitimate, incomplete thoughts. a thesis they will never write, but perhaps they'll at least allow me to keep in contact with close friends in the meantime.

The Squid and the Whale (The Royal Tennenbaums backwards)

2006-10-29T21:11:00.000-06:00

i was recently asked to describe the movie, "the squid and the whale" by my wife. i had a hankering to see it again and she didn't want anything too dark. i didn't know what to say but as i opened my mouth, it just kind of came together.

i think "the squid and the whale" is essentially a backwards version of "the royal tennenbaums." i'm not saying they're the same or one is a knock-off or redo of the other, this is a positive connection. i think "the quid and the whale" takes all the dark humor that "the royal tenenbaums" has and replaces it with reality. where "trt" is witty, "tsatw" is quiet, where "trt" exhibits unbelievable yet too ironic and dry to hate characters, "tsatw's" characters are confused at best, in denial at worst, but all in all, very believable. where one film is exciting, the other is boring (boring in a good way, boring in the sense that it has attained a level of believability and reality reserved only for certain types of films). where one film wraps up like any dark comedy should, the cast parading off one by one giving us one more look at them, the other film simply ends when one of the characters finally realizes something real and good and helpful (there are four more main characters so someone in the cast has got to see through some of the situation by the end, of course, if no one ever did, i wouldn't blame them, i would have just taken that as a last jab of complete and utter reality, a bad situation, those involved in denial or confused about it and at the end of the day, no one gets it, and all that is left to think will happen is that they'll go to sleep once more and try to get it the next day. it's amazing how some live their lives like a bad video game, awarding way too many extra lives for its level of difficulty when it should have just given one life and let those who obviously weren't cut out for gaming go back to tetris). was that a hint of fatalistic social commentary, no, just a brief picture of a world without grace drawn by someone who needs a lot because he finds himself, ironically, pissed when others get it. i used to be a jerk, but i'm getting better.

2006-10-28T18:44:00.000-05:00

alternative music doesn't bother me as much as it used to and that's because i think i'm beginning to figure out what these alternative musicians are all really up to. to begin, think old time rock, the music of the 70's and early 80's. where does one hear most of this music on a daily basis today, that's right, commercials. this entire genre of music is slowly bleeding to death and will soon be completely dissolved in a sea of marketing schemes. now, when one hears "just what i needed" one thinks of circuit city, and so on. take alternative music now, listening to it, it's definitely not about anything particular, it has no real drive or point, it just has a catchy beat and some repeated lines that we all like to sing along to or feel apply to our lives when we're really depressed or bored or both. conversely, when it does have a point or is about something, it's slamming something or someone. take greenday's american idiot, that's not going to end up in a cell phone commercial anytime soon. think about it, would a company really want the phrase "don't want to be an american idiot" running through a consumer's mind as they're contemplating a product purchase? think of a ford commercial, the car flies onto the screen and whips around tight corners all to the beat of no doubt's "i'm just a girl." most likely men would subconsciously feel their masculinity questioned the next time they saw that car, they may not know why but either way, their's no way they're going to buy it, men just don't like being thought of as girls, on the other hand, i would think that most women wouldn't want to be thought of as "just" a girl, and for that fringe population that does live by the creed a song like "i'm just a girl" mocks, i could see an overwhelming feeling of guilt come over them simply because they left the house that morning. the alternative genre has somehow done it, they've tapped into a thematic base in their music that is completely unusable by marketing. that's the problem with all the old rock and roll songs, they're just too fun. they make one want to party and laugh, jump around, why not spend some money while they're at it? alternative music,however, is depressing, confusing, critical, introspective, not the mood marketers want their potential clientèle in. of course, this has left a potential void in material as far as commercials are concerned. what will the commercials of the future use as background music for the alternative generation? they can't produce they're own, because by now we're all so used to hearing something familiar selling us stuff it would just be too weird to buy from a company that produced its own techno line for a new product. also, idols sell stuff best, famous singers and stars, that's who we want to be like, hence, idols. we'll at least consider anything an idolized individual tells us is good (or in this case, anything their music sets the backdrop for). so marketers are now stuck wondering what to do. they can't use the music being produced, but they need some kind of music, it has to be familiar and as a bonus, should be by an individual many idolize. that's when the powers that be came up with the idea for american idol. american idol is the answer and the key to this void alternative music has created. american idol basically serves as a manufacturing base for commercialism. now marketers can create their own stars and with music too. they create stars that many probably feel even closer to as through the show one gets the experience of being right with the star throughout his or her entire career break. we get to laugh with them, cry with them, listen to their criticisms, we get to see each step of the process. and what happens the moment they reach true idol status as set forth by the show? they're put directly into some kind of commercial, singing and dancing, doing their thing and the world is once more at peace. american idol is amazing, it creates a transparent, drama like environment, which allows the fan base to not only choose, but also know their idols, and then it brings in its own judges and rules so the whole process of one coming to stardom is catalyzed. how amazing is this, marketers no longer have to wait for musicians to fight with contracts and grow weary of tours, now they just produce their own stars who are already completely programmed to serve and sell out any way necessary as that's pretty much how they won american idol in the first place. what a perfect template this is. marketers produce their own sellouts and auction them out to companies for commercial purposes. now the upside for everyone else in the world is, maybe, just maybe, commercials will leave the real musicians alone for once.