Meet Me In The Bathroom

A message to Mormons from a Mormon

2011-06-16T23:13:00.001-07:00

I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints; I’m a Mormon. For the most of my life I’ve searched for truth and meaning. I converted to the Mormon religion as a function of faith after pursuits for truth based in reason and rational thought. It was my mind that lead me to the Church and the Holy Ghost that confirmed it in my heart. The reasonings of my mind at times conflicted with the precepts of the Church. However, after sincere prayer, careful contemplation, and the wisdom of others; eventually I saw how the precepts of the Church worked on an eternal scale and was able to make peace with my conflicts.

The greatest internal struggle I have with the Church is its stance on gay marriage. I found denying the institution of marriage to gay couples unjust to the core. There was no other contentious issue I felt more certain about at the time. I don’t think my friends and family realized how much this tested my faith. I almost left the Church because of it. I prayed in earnest daily for God to give me the answers necessary to silence this war that was ensuing in my soul. Yet at the end of each day I was left with nothing but a sore heart. I felt as if I was wrestling with God and being injured each time. It became clear to me that this conflict would not be resolved and I would not know any relief. When a man’s heart is torn two ways he has to go one way or the other. So for the first time in my life I stopped searching for a resolution. I stopped seeking comfort. I simply submitted. Reason, rational thinking, the works of men had while been useful had not enlightened me in the past. I made up my mind that no matter what my objections and personal pains, I would go down on bended knee and obey the will of the Father. It didn’t matter what pains I was going through, or the turmoil of my mind, I would do the will of the Father and place faith in him.

I changed some of my political votes to be in accordance with the declarations of the Church. I even tried to persuade other members of the Church to do the same when I found out they planned to vote contrary to the declaration. I even donated a small sum of money for causes that were working for State and Federal Constitutional amendments to define marriage as between a man and a woman. I cried a lot of nights. Some people said that God would comfort me. My pains would only intensify. As I saw the manner in which fellow members picked up the banner and charge head first into the cause I felt so much sorrow; not for my own pains but for the manner in which members prosecuted the cause. I felt that members were pursuing a righteous order by God with the energy of hate and fear. My pain turned from what was going on in my own soul to the damage being done to my brothers and sisters by themselves. I thought I might be being judgmental. So I changed my assumptions and assumed members were motivated by love and devotion to the Church. It is rare that the Church takes a political stance. So rare I assumed that it must be of the utmost importance. So rare those members must have seen it as a calling to do everything possible to support that stance, all motivated by love.

The Church has once again taken a political stance, this time on immigration. This issue has caused me great pain. Not because I disagree with the stance of the Church. In fact the Church has stated my stance on the issue of immigration almost to a tee. Yet unlike the issue of gay marriage members of the Church sit on their hands. This issue of illegal immigration is complicated because we have to align our actions with the law and the will of God. Yet when we have an opportunity to create laws that would allow us to be compassionate as Christ commanded us and be in alignment with the law we do nothing. We as a Church have been silent on the purported laws being discussed in various states that would make it illegal for us to show compassion to our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. Just look to the immigration law in Alabama. It is now illegal to transport an illegal alien. If I see an illegal alien on the side of the road needing medical attention I can’t take him to a hospital, I can provide no meaningful work of charity. If he or she is out of gas I cannot give them a ride to the gas station. The law in spirit and in performance diminishes the tender mercies that Christ would give to them if he met them on the road. Yet we remain silent. As more of these kinds of laws are debated in other states, we remain silent. Where was all that energy and passion we had when we were trying to defeat gay marriage? Did we as followers of Christ lose charity? Or is charity not enough to have us pick up the banner that the Church has declared us to carry? Are the forces of hate, fear and self-interest too great to have us work for a way to implement the love of Christ and try to make the laws of man friendlier to the bringing of the kingdom of heaven on earth?

The greatest of God’s commandments is to love God with everything you have. Next to this is love thy neighbor. Jesus taught us that our neighbor is anyone that is bound to us by the bonds of love expressed through service. The Good Samaritan was the lowest of the low in Jewish society. A Samaritan was a stranger in the land of Israel. Yet even being a stranger he was the neighbor of the man he helped. Jesus commanded that we love him as he loved the victim on the road. It is our task to love even the strangers to our lands as the Samaritan loved. No matter who you are and how you’ve come to be with me, you are my neighbor.

Home Coming

2010-02-11T12:48:00.000-07:00

I’ve been living away from home for a while now. In the last six years or so the notion of home has become a very liquid idea. I’ve lived in a couple of different locations long enough to call them home. Compared to all of my friends I think I’ve lived in more places than the rest. I do however consider the United States my home. Living in a different country has made me appreciate things about the U.S.A. Another thing living out of country does is it gives you a sense of perspective about the good and bad of my country.

There are a couple things I have noticed that people think are attributes of Americas that aren’t true or exclusive to us from my observation. The biggest thing is the idea that Americans are a wasteful people. Maybe we are, but everywhere I have been people are just as wasteful. I think as the horn of plenty visits any society it leads to people being wasteful. It just so happens that the U.S.A. as been blessed not to be ravaged by colonialism, World War II, or the Mongols. So we have a long stint at being prosperous, but that doesn’t make us any more or less wasteful than the people I have ran across on my travels.

A thing about Americans that I have noticed that people don’t seem to attribute to us is that we are very clean. Our streets, rivers, and heck even our buildings for the most part are clean. I don’t know where this came from but I remember the days of my youth when I saw the “Don’t Waste Utah” campaign in action. I don’t know if our cleanliness is a new phenomenon, but I don’t remember a time where we weren’t like that. I guess this is a positive attribute of our society that often gets overlooked. I’m glad we are that way, because well I hate litter. All this must be from my days of doing Boy Scout things.

John Stuart Mill

2010-01-31T06:57:00.002-07:00

I have a background in philosophy. That is to say I dabble in what I would consider deep thinking. What seems like a long time ago I was on the search for some answers or at least some tools by which I could find some answers. My understanding of the truth or answers to perplexing questions is a lot more sophisticated now then it was back then. I suppose I did make some advances after all. At the beginning of my search I started with those who asked similar questions in the past. Plato, Aristotle, Wittgenstein, Kripke, and many others seemed to shin a lot of light on things. I tried to keep an open mind on all the people I read. Despite my attempts to be unbiased every time I would read or contemplate the ideas of John Stuart Mill I just seemed not to like the guy or what he was saying. Even though some of the things he said I happen to agree with I just didn’t want to. Go figure I guess I will always have an irrational side of me, contrary to what I thought I could do when I was younger.

So this Mill cat comes along and tries to save the philosophy of Utilitarianism. It is riddled with problems so he takes it up a notch, but you all know this. By you I mean me, and by me I mean I. So we get into this big tiff about rule utilitarianism vs. act utilitarianism. But that is another topic all together. So I was getting a bit nostalgic for my younger, dumber days and started to think about all the hypothetical examples that could perplex those fancy utilitarian cats. There are a whole bunch, in fact I do remember there being a large paper dedicated to the implications that walking on grass (cutting corners) has on utilitarianism. So one hypothetical situation arose in my mind during this trip down nostalgia lane and it involves a disaster. Suppose that a person comes across a disaster. There in front of them is a person who is not conscious or breathing and there are numerous other people scattered about that need medical help. Suppose this person is trained medically. Suppose that this person could make an attempt to revive the person that is basically dead. The attempt will be successful, but the odds of the person living afterwards are next to none. On top of this if the person would be resuscitated his or her last moments are sure to be miserable. So you have a slim chance, but a guaranteed miserable last moments if he or she doesn’t make it. So Mill you got an answer for that one?

The Sharp Truth

2009-06-19T09:43:00.001-07:00

I’ve spent many a day eating what I want. Brothers and Sisters I have come to a revelation; sharp cheddar not mild. Many of the cheese fold that I have talked to profess a love of cheddar, but it is love of a false cheddar. This Swiss masquerading around as cheddar has stolen many of us astray. I will admit even I at one time was under its grip. Every time I passed by the sharp and extra sharp cheddar I turned a nose based upon the lies of the Mildites. Then one day in a moment of truth I tasted the sharp, and it was good. It was what cheddar was supposed to be. I realize the abomination that the Mildites were trying to pass off as cheddar.

Brothers and Sisters of the cheese loving world I say to you free yourself from the mild and go with the sharp and extra sharp. It is the true flavor, the one and only. If you want something mild go and eat something pansy like Swiss cheese. For the truth is sharp and it is also delicious.

Animal House

2009-06-01T09:50:00.000-07:00

I’m working in an area where farming is the primary means of income. It reminded me of a farm like story. There was a town where the farmers grew various crops and raised various animals. For several years due to a lot of hard work and to some luck there was a bounty. The farmers thought year after year as to what to do with the surplus. Each year the swine of the farm told the farmers, “Feed us the surplus, for we are the sweetest of meats. One day you will be able to feast upon the best of foods or sell us for profit at market.” The farmers listened to the swine. Year after year each hog was feed corn, wheat, and oats. The entire surplus went to the swine, and indeed they did grow. The farmers of the town marveled at how prize worth the hogs became. Indeed the swine were wise in their council. The farmers of the town became known throughout for the marvelous swine they had raised.

Then came the drought. The surplus disappeared. There was nothing that was saved. But through hard work and ingenuity the farmers were able to raise enough to live. Yet the swine would go without. The hogs said, “Let us eat, so that we may not shrink; for we are prize of all things of your namesake. Give us as if there was still bounty that you may keep your pride and your reputation for such cleaver husbandry.” The farmers deliberated with much sorrow. We have not oats, corn, or wheat to spare, if we shall give you extra of these surly we will famish thought the farmers. The swine knowing the hearts of men said, “We need not the toil of the earth. Give us the flesh of our brothers that we may still bring you glory.” So the farmers heeded the council of the swine. The life of the horse, cow, and birds of the field were given. The entire flesh of the farms went to the swine, and indeed they did grow. Once again the farmers of the town marveled at how prize worth the hogs became. Indeed the swine were wise in their council. In the land there was no other example of such feats of husbandry as of these hogs.

Yet the drought continued past the ability of the cleverness of men. So thought the farmers, “If we do not eat the swine now we will famish.” Thus preparations were made to make good on the council of the swine. As the farmers prepared the sheriff of the land appeared. The sheriff asked why the farmers were so inclined to destroy the treasure of the land that would be the swine. By force the sheriff stopped the death of the hogs. The sheriff demanded to know why the farmers had stopped heeding the advice of the hogs. The farmers told of the drought and how all the surplus was gone, how the other animals of the farm were gone. The sheriff stated that even in drought such a treasure as the swine cannot be lost, and he demanded that the farmers heed the advice of the swine once again. Too which the farmers replied, “But what can we give, we have given all to the hogs, all we have left is our children.”

The Preasure of Internet Quiz

2009-05-11T13:54:00.000-07:00

I’ve been told I’m full of surprises. I recently took a “for fun” quiz to identify where I fell on the political spectrum. The questions were in no way in depth enough to make an accurate assessment, but hey it was for fun. The end result, I am a far left liberal. This struck me as kind of odd because I fancy myself as a conservative person. From what I gather around my friends and work friends they too consider me a conservative person. So that got me thinking what makes me conservative?

I guess my long history of viewing myself as a conservative came with how my parents raised me. Most notably my parents worked me into the ground. I remember countless times hauling longs on my back, bailing hay, installing sprinklers, digging up stumps, and all sorts of things that required a lot of work. You would think that all this work created a good work ethic in me. It didn’t. I’m lazy, real lazy. What it did do is destroy any sense of entitlement in me. I felt that the world owed me nothing. The rewards I go t for my hard work was usually a Pepsi and a ham and cheese sandwich. I’m not saying that liberals don’t know work, or have a sense of entitlements, but that is just the way I perceived the world when I was developing my identity.

I got this image of the world as place that had no duty to me; it was just someplace that one worked in. The world didn’t have a moral obligation to me in anyway. My success for failure was due to the sweat of my own brow, or lack thereof. I have a much more complicated view of duty and relationships now, but fundamentally I still think that there is no inherent love due you by the world. Love and the duties that come with it are a gift of the individual. Due to the tugs and pulls of my life I became an extremist. So that is a very vague sense of what I mean by conservative and how I got there. I do realize that on some key issues I have some confusing results. I can think of three examples of me having what people might consider liberal stances, or liberal reasoning for conservative stances.

The first and strongest of my liberal stances is the current state of the war on drugs. I think we need to fundamentally rethink this one. First I’m for the legalization of marijuana. I’m also open to the idea of legalizing cocaine. There are a number of reasons people oppose the legalization of drugs, but they boil down to they are bad for you. Agreed they are bad for you. There are a lot of other things that are just as bad or worse that are legal. Cigarettes and alcohol are by far much more dangerous than both marijuana and cocaine. Additionally by criminalizing these products we have essentially given the criminals an endless supply of fiscal resources. By decriminalizing we can decriminalize the fiscal trail and structure of the drug industry. That by itself will increase stability and safety both abroad and in the United States. I noticed also that conservatives are all about minimal government until it is something they oppose, and then they want a whole lot of government. I’m not saying just drop all laws regarding drugs. In fact I’m for heavy regulation. I just think the decision to do drugs of the listed types I mentioned are a personal one which government should be the absolute arbiter of. Government should have a significant say, but that say should be relegated to consumer and public safety, not individual choice. Once again I’m not advocating the use of drugs, just its legal status.

The second issue that seems odd for some is my stance on gun regulation. I’m against gun regulations in general. I know that is a very conservative stance. However, my reasoning is odd to most people. Most gun advocates claim that guns are a positive force in society. I make no such claim. Most objective studies I’ve read are pretty inconclusive about the effects of guns in a society. What I do know is that guns and our right to have them are a part of our constitutional system. That’s right it doesn’t matter if guns are good or bad, they are a part of our system of laws on the highest level. If you want to regulate guns on the level that anti gun advocates want then make a constitutional amendment. Also this is one area where the liberal side confuses me. The goal of gun legislation has been to reduce gun violence. I would say that most anti gun advocates don’t see guns as being inherently evil. I totally agree gun violence is a bad thing. However we have the law thing I mentioned above. Also I have yet to read a report that conclusively proves that gun bans reduce gun violence. This is what I have seen. In areas where there are high levels of gun violence there are three factors that are almost universal: the presence of a drug cartel or gang, local government corruption, and poverty. Gun violence is a symptom of those factors. One of the things liberals do well is they point out that we shouldn’t treat the symptoms of a problem but try to get at its root. They seem to ignore this when it comes to gun violence. Fight poverty, government corruption, and legalize drugs as the method of gun control. I guess where I depart from the standard conservative stance on this issue is that I don’t consider guns a positive force for society. I honestly don’t know if it is or not.

Third is health care. I’m open to the idea of a national socialized health care system. Wow, I’m a pinko commie. My reasoning for this is actually pretty conservative based. The biggest factor in a successful capitalistic system is healthy competition. Healthy competition is increases as entry levels for a particular sector are low. Thus if an entry barrier to a sector is high then the likely hood of healthy competition is low. One of the sectors that are killing healthy competition in other sectors is the entry level barrier that health care places on any given sector. Somewhere along the line we made this assertion that healthcare is tied to employment. What that did is and an entry level barrier that makes large scale business very difficult. Ford Motors should be in the business of making auto products, not in the business of providing healthcare. Likewise any new business should be in the business of making stuff, or whatever they do, not providing healthcare services. Another factor to economic well being is that healthcare tied to employment is also a large risk enhancer. This by far prevents innovations because it makes the risks so high for new small business that one can’t quit their job and try something else because the risk has been increased. Lets separate this mutilated thing of our current healthcare system where care is tied to employment.

That’s about it. I’m sure there are a lot of other confusing stances I have. But in case anybody doubts I’m a conservative, I have been seriously considering adopting the stance that we should abolish social security. I have a lot of caveats to that but that stance should make me a right wing nut job right?

Sign of My Times

2009-05-06T11:32:00.002-07:00

About two months ago I made a fitness deal with a friend of mine (lets call him Legs of the Oak). The deal was we would both lose 50 pounds and he would run in the Layton 4th of July 5 k run, and I would run my fastest 5 k in one years time. Enough time has passed where I can make some evaluations about these goals. First thing of note is that I have not lost as much weight as I thought. Apparently the scales need to be rebalanced. I weight 210 pounds not the 195ish I was looking at on the scale. I have this feeling the next 30 pounds will be much harder to drop. I know 50 pounds sounds like a lot of mass but being down to 180 isn't so bad. I don't know how I'm going to get below 19 min 30 secs for a 5 k. I just don't think it will happen. I remember the days when I would plan a month in advance for an athletic event, now it a year. I guess that is a sign of age.

The people at my work also made me realize how aged I am. None of them knew what the heck buck buck was. Needless to say we had a lesson on how to play buck buck. A couple of sore backs later all my work buddies know the wonders of buck buck.

People at my work keep on asking me for advice to "how to get in shape". This usually translates to hey I want to get bigger. I am always at a loss of words as to how to approach the issue. Since the perspective of my age I can see the problems of wanting to get big later on in life. But my friend, I'll call him Mr. Atom, said it best, getting mass is a downhill battle, once you win its hard to stop.

Going Geo Poll on Your Keyster

2009-04-26T14:06:00.002-07:00

I generally don't like to blog about anything of importance because one I generally don't have anything smart to say about most topics, and two someone might take me seriously and try to use my thoughts in their decision making process. I do make exceptions and here is one of them (this is an even bigger oddity because I actually give a hyperlink to an article).

I was reading my news volley and I came across this article. To sum up it is basically highlighting what was, is and will be a series of conflicts in the Pakistan region.

A couple of thoughts entered my mind in no particular order:

Pakistan's long history of using guerrilla warfare groups in its national defense plan is finally coming back to haunt them. Pakistan's continuing use of such military tactics seems to be out of line for the type of country Pakistan is trying to project to the rest of the world.

The wisdom of negotiating with the Taliban is questionable. If one is to do so it must have carefully crafted guidelines or things could get out of hand real quick.

The Taliban has never been a group to accept peaceful conflict resolution as something worth striving for. Not to say that this is uncommon in the world, but that's just how they view things. Violence is a part of their history. Some may say the same things about the United States. I wouldn't though.

Despite what people may think problems like the ones that originated in Afghanistan aren't strictly regional. Like most deceases they spread.

The United States Economy is not the most concerning thing right now.

Well that's it nothing really new. Just seems so odd that this kind of thing is getting so little press or attention. Maybe it is the NBA and NHL playoffs. It might be the NFL draft. I have to admit I'm a little caught up in it myself.

Like You Didn't See it Coming

2009-04-11T02:24:00.002-07:00

I bought a new trash can for my new room. I just noticed that over 75% of the trash in there is composed of empty potato chip bags. I know, I know that's horrible. I was doing so well with eating good things. I didn't stop eating good things, I just snack a lot. Besides these potato chips are amazing. They are from a Middle Eastern company called Tiffany. With such amazing flavors like salt or ketchup I just can't stop eating these "potato crisps". Even though this behavior is totally predictable from me this isn't the subject of this post. I know I suck at structure.

I've been catching up on my pointless fan based web news and I ran into some Wheel of Time news. The Wheel of Time ("WoT") is a novel series written by Robert Jordan. At one time I use to think the seires was a classic. Now I've concluded that it is just a very good series. Some of the books I love to read. Other I read because I've got to much invested and I'm finishing the series. Most of the books have parts I love to read and others where I'm just reading so I can get to back to the story line that I was reading two chapters ago. Don't get me wrong on the whole the WoT is a very good read. Anyways back to what I was talking about, news. It is old news but the author of the series Robert Jordan is dead. They hired another author to finish the series up based off of Robert Jordan's notes (which were pretty much amazing apparently). So the last book is to be released this November. But wait, the final book is going to be release in three parts because there is just to much to wrap up in one book. The fan sites I visited were outraged by the news. Really? Come on people, Robert Jordan couldn't wrap up a toy at a Macy's X-mas courtesy line. Of course it is going to take three books, I'm just surprised it could be wrapped up in three.

I'm actually sort of blah when it comes to getting resolution to the story lines. It isn't like the time where the DnD animated series got cut off with no ending. I think my greatest disappointment is that Robert Jordan will not be able to finish his side story of Matt and the Bald Hot Short Girl That Knows Kung Fu, ten years after the final battle. I would have like to have read about that.

Run for it Marty

2009-03-13T10:11:00.001-07:00

It has been a while since my last blog entry. I found that blogging replaced my need to write in my journal. I think my lack of blogging somehow relates to me finally letting go of all things teenage. Back in the day I think I was an angry youth. No I’m not. In fact I find it hard to get angry at anything. In general I think I’m just happy. I realize how charmed a life I have lived, how lucky I have been, and how much better life will get for me.

Don’t get me wrong I still act like a child in many respects: I play video games to much, I still like Dungeons and Dragons, and my movie choices are questionable at best. I still hold on to the old music that sort of celebrates those days of my youth, but my emotional development has been pulling me milder and milder.

I wonder what the 18 year old me would say if he saw the 32 year old me. He would probably be upset at a lot of the things I let slide in my life. However, I think that young youth would be amazed and the grit of my life and how it is full of texture. It would be like eating oysters and coming across one especially filled with minerals. It would make you take a breath and wait a minute before eating the next. I’m not saying that my life is special; there have been too many men and women greater than me to assume so much. But my life is special to me and those who I have encountered.

I’m stepping into a new phase in my life. I am fully confident in who I am. It is like a grand adventure to begin. I can’t seem to shake the sense of optimism I have about my life. I tend to be pragmatic about making projections about the future, but the pull of something greater is in me. No matter what there will be a time in the future where history said a group of people, a generation did something that mattered, and I can with no reservation say that I played a direct part in it. I love the world, and wish it peace.

Men Can't Live With It

2009-01-28T09:17:00.002-07:00

I've noticed a problem with society lately. I've labeled it manification. It seems that people are trying to manify things in order to justify the male genders use of it. This is an problem that stems back long long ago in our history. However to date the problem has not been as bad as it is now.

The example that first comes to mind is a commercial that has been running. I don't remember the product but it refers to itself as a hydrating body wash. Look we all know what a hydrating body wash is; it's a friggin body moisturising soap. The notion of a body wash is unmanly anyways, but somehow we men can think it manly enough if we call it a hydrating thingy. Yeah, because athletes hydrate, solders hydrate, you know hydrating is a manly thing. I've got news for you people hydrating isn't manly. Drinking is manly. Now that would be manly, a skin drinking soap.

I'm probably the most guilty of manification. I was looking for a new bed a week ago. I was laying on a queen sized to check it out. I was thinking screw this I'm getting the king sized, because well king is just more manly than queen. Problem is the king is bigger, and provides more comfort. Comfort is not manly. You know what is a manly bed; the ground.

Pop culture has taken masculinity and made it pretty much worthless. Shows like Manswers and the now gone Man Show pretty much exemplify what is wrong with masculinity now. It seems that now being a man is about having a six pack for abs, liking girl on girl action, and collection everything that is huge and over sized. No wonder the average single male owes more than 10k in credit card debt. Yes that is single male and credit card debt. What ever happened to the notion of manly being the ability to chop wood, fix stuff, and pay bills?

There and Back Again a Big Hobbit's Tale

2009-01-14T22:22:00.002-07:00

I've almost been back a week now from my vacation to Utah. I did the usual flurry of nothing really productive in the itemization kind of way. I did visit with friends and family. I think there is something to that. Hanging out with your loved ones is an activity that is productive. When somebody goes to the gym to maintain their health people usually think that is a productive activity. So I think hanging out with your loved ones is maintaining your emotional and social health, which is just as important as your physical health. Come to think of it I'm pretty sure there are studies that suggest that being emotionally and socially health leads to longer happier lives.

I can also see that I could have been socially active while not on holiday. So to better view what I actually did on vacation I made a list of things I normally wouldn't do unless on vacation back to Utah:

Hugged a lot of men
Lost twice at Iron Chef, once with onion, and once with orange
Seen people I haven't seen in over eight years
Slept in till noon or later
Play analog games (board games)
Watch eight hours of football every week
See the Utes win huge
Walk around in a shopping mall
Stay up till midnight so I would be awake for Christmas
Clean dog pee out of the carpet
Bought clothes (too include running shoes)

Well that's all I can think of off the top of my head. I sure I did more stuff that I normally don't do, but I'm getting old and my brain is failing.

Loss

2008-12-01T21:31:00.003-07:00

I just found out not to long ago that a friend of mine from work was shot and killed. He was a good guy. We were Sapper buddies when we both attended the US Army Sapper Leaders course. I had some good memories with him in it. He was back from Iraq a year or so now.

Humble Pie

2008-12-01T13:54:00.002-07:00

Well it is getting close to Christmas. What that means for me is I usually allow myself to get out of shape, eat to much, and in general not take good care of myself. On the plus side I have always associated Christmas with going back to Utah and visiting family and friends.

As I think about going back to Utah I can't help notice how many things are going right in my life. I can't remember a time when I've been happier. With all this good stuff going on I got really paranoid lately. Not that anything bad would happen but when you think things are going oh so good is when God, or life, or whatever you believe generally breaks out the humble stick and gives you a good smack across the face with it.

Now some may say that I'm just a pessimist. Not true, I generally think things will work out for the better and good things will happen. I suppose it is a mental disorder that I have. I remember when I was under a reasonable suspicion that my life was a Truman Show kind of thing, where the events in my life and the people in it were based on some kind of ratings feedback. So yes I'm crazy.

On a completely unrelated note, things I have said while I regret saying are still true:

"You know Death Cab has some really good songs out."
"Freebird rocks man!"
"Look if that sandwich hits the ground I'm still eating it."
"You know punk is the new disco."
"Oh my Hanna! There is a GI Joe movie coming out!"
"Yeah he's not going to walk again."

HollyWood

2008-10-30T08:09:00.002-07:00

So my work is sending me to Cali in about 24 hours or so. I'm not really stoked about it. I think this is the first of many blogs where I'm just typing stuff to type. Yep the first. I hate you blog, or was that ESPN? Oh maybe the people of Phillie can now be good sports fans.

I do like one development, several of my friends are the you shouldn't root against a MW conference team because you want the conference to be strong. So if Utah goes undefeated till they meet BYU and has a shot at a BCS Bowl game does that mean those BYU fans need to root for the Utes and take one for the team as it will not be the Blue's year? Just wondering.

Strange Calls

2008-10-16T08:42:00.003-07:00

In the church I belong to I just got a calling last Sunday. It went like this:

Bishop, "and we call RFB to the position of second counselor to the Sunday School, subsitute teacher, etc, and whatever."

RFB thinks to himself, "wait did I just get called to doing whatever and etc?"

So that's my position whatever and etc.

Long Time

2008-10-08T10:19:00.004-07:00

So it has been a while. I won't apologize because well I blog for myself and I've been having to good of a time while I have not been blogging.

I'm extremely happy that the Steelers are 4-1. The Cubs lost, big time. I always love seeing the crushed look of all those Cubs fans. It makes my day. It's like an abusive relationship without any of the horrible stuff. You know it starts with a good romance at the start, the you get punched in the face, the next thing you know your partner says they will change and begs you not to leave, then they do things to make you think they might change, then you forgive them and forget the pain, and then ta da! That's the number one reason why I like baseball, Cubs fans.

I'm trying to get back into shape after taking a month off. On that note I've taken to calling everything fatty. You know I'm going to Mc Fatty's, I'm going to eat a fatty roll, and the list goes on and on.

I also just found out that the Japanese are now using monkeys to work in restaurants. Isn't this how Planet of the Apes started? I'm going to hate working for our ape overlords. I accept it though.

Strange Observations

2008-07-01T20:38:00.003-07:00

I've noticed a couple of things about myself now that I have had my wisdom teeth pulled. First it is much easier to floss than in the past, and second I've gained a bit of weight since then. I don't know if it is related.

Another thing that has been resurfacing in my mind is the legal drinking age. I would like to state that I am not a proponent of drinking spirited beverages. I think in general they lead to bad choices and ultimately diminish how much fun one could have. On that note I think it is ridiculous that we have the drinking age at 21. The justification I always get from people is that a person from the age of 18-20 is to young and immature to make an educated decision about drinking spirited beverages. Yet we say at the age of 18 they are wise enough to vote. Better yet when you are 17-18 we allow you to sign a contract to serve your country by going to a far land and looking for things designed to kill people, then engage those things. Those are big boy rules and decisions. Something like that requires a lot of adult decision making because that is a life changing decision. Its funny how much we as a society lean on the backs of young people yet refuse to treat them like full citizens.

I hate being sick. I mean I really hate it. Even when I'm "not sick" anymore it takes me weeks to get back to 100% I hate it. I also hate having allergies. Allergies are like the sickness you can always have. I know it could be worse I could have cancer, or some other real illness.

Speaching of cancer, I've always wondered if cancer is a mechanism for evolution in the human speicies and by combating it so much in the long, long term we are shooting ourselves in the foot? Just an abstract mobid thought that maybe a plot in science fiction book one day.

So It Begins

2008-05-27T12:46:00.003-07:00

I just noticed, where I live a 20 bucket at KFC with a couple of add ons costs more than a large sushi boat. I don't know if I should be alarmed or happy. I so confused. 20 pieces of fried chicken (maybe) or 36 pieces of unfried fish? I think my head might just explode.

Health Delays on Time

2008-05-09T11:14:00.001-07:00

At my job I've had to go to several health inspections. Each time it was mentioned that I've had problems sleeping. Without exception the immediate reply was to put me on sleep medications. I refused each time, but it made me realize how easy it is to get sleeping medications. It is easy to see how people can develop an addiction to them. One a brighter note my basic cognitive abilities are excellent. I should be done with these health check up from here on out. Yeah clean bill of health!

I've also scheduled a tryout of sorts to see if I could make it on a team I've been trying to get on. I was scheduled for May. Funny enough I need a medical waiver to get a tryout. I've now been pushed back to June. Oh well another month to prepare I guess. I am tired of being sore thought. Maybe it is just a sign of me getting old?

House of Pain

2008-04-04T08:40:00.002-07:00

I am a geek. I am a nerd. I am a dork. Some would say that there is a difference in the three categories, but it is of little importance as I am all three. Being a geeknerddorkmanbearpig, I tend to enjoy top whatever lists. I've noticed it has been over a month since I last looked at, let alone, made a top something list. Nothing really came to mind. Recently I've been feeling sore, tired, and in general broken down. So here is my top five activities that will get you sore and make you feel like Father Time is taking his toll. A couple of notes on the list, the list is based on intensity, quality, area, time, and uniqueness of the pain. So here we go.

5. Running long distance. What do I mean by long distance? I mean six miles plus or an hour plus running, which ever comes later. Running like this can make your quads, calves, and joints sore. Sometimes you get the lower back thing going but rarely. The thing that makes running appear on the list is the pain you get in your feet. While the intensity isn't really there, the quality and areas affected will definitely affect your mobility, making you feel old. An added bonus for new runners, all the phlegm and mucus you cough up after the run.

4. Using a jack hammer for a long time. If you use a jack hammer for about eight hours your body will feel like it has been beat up head to toe. Your joints in the shoulder and hand area will just hurt. This gets placed above running because of the intensity of the pain. You do feel really old when you can't open jars or hold cups because of the pain. You can still move around a bit but heck you hurt.

3. Iron Mike and Duck Walk. Iron Mike for about 100 meters the immediately turn around and Duck Walk back; that counts as one set. If you do six to eight sets you are in business. Everything lower that your lower back will be sore. It will also be so intense that you will find things like standing up, using the bathroom, and sitting down painful. You have no mobility and it last for several days.

2. Holding your head off the ground. Get a helmet that is about six to seven pounds. Wear helmet. Get in the sit up position. Hold head off the ground for about 20 to 45 minutes. Your neck is so sore after you can't get out of bed because you can't get your head off the pillow.

1. Forced road march. Get an external frame back pack. Load pack with at least 25% of your body weight or 33 pounds, whichever is greater. Now march at least six mile at a 13:30 minute mile pace. This will get you sore from your neck to your feet. Your feet will be so sore that you can't walk. Your back will be hurting so much you can't move. Your legs will be sore, you get the picture. This last for days and the intensity is so huge that all you can think about for the first two days is how much you hurt.

Why do you want to do these things? With the exception of running you really don't. Then again what good are top whatever lists anyway?

I am Girl Hear me Roar

2008-03-24T17:30:00.004-07:00

I got sick about four days ago. It got me real tired. Tired to the point where I just slept and said to heck with any kind of exercise. I finally got over it today and decided to go on a long run to get all the bugs out. I went to a fitness club that I am a member of and started running on the track. It was a good run for the most part. About an hour into it a new group entered the track. One of them was a girl that could not have been older than 11. She started running and it was apparent she was having a good time. She was zigg zagging, and a smile on her face and a spring in her step. Then I noticed she was slowing down drasticly. I was catching up to her pretty fast. When I got within about 10 meters she just darted off extending the distance zigg zagging and laughing, then she would slow down and wait till I got close again, then piff she was off again. I thought oh no there is no way an 11 year old girl is going to show me up on a track. So I picked up the pace. As she kept on darting ahead of me I realized I couldn't catch this girl no matter how much I tried. It was sort of demoralizing seeing this little girl out run me, laughing the whole time, while I couldn't stop thinking how much my feet were burning. Granted I was running for about an hour before her and I was coming off an illness, but still.

I’m Still a Man

2008-03-20T21:15:00.002-07:00

I felt hungry a little while ago. I hadn't gone to Carl's in a while. So I went. I had this conversation:

RFB: I'm still deciding, oh I'd like the chili fries, six dollar guack burger, the six south west, and gees do you think that will fill me up?

Clerk: Sir that's two six dollar burgers and chili fries; I don't think you can eat anymore.

RFB: OK then I'll get the teriyaki burger as well.

The clerk then looked at me like I was crazy and placed the order. After I had eaten all the burgers and fries with ease I dumped all the paper in the trash and the clerk looked at me as with the look of I can't believe he just did that.

Me: 1, People who doubt my ability to be both stupid and consume: 0

Be Careful What You Wish for You Already Have it.

2008-03-11T09:40:00.003-07:00

I haven't realized it but I haven't been fully myself until recently. For some reason I had shut down emotionally for a while. I had thought that phase of my life was over. I think it was all the vacationing and being back from my travels that gave me an emotional high. I know what you are saying, how can I get an emotional high if I've shut down my emotions? It isn't the extreme things that don't get felt it is the day to day stuff. I had a bit of trouble handling it. But now I'm doing pretty well processing and getting use to feeling things on a daily basis. It makes me feel like my old self again. Then again what is my old self? Can I really call it my "self" if it has been so long? Or how about if I intentionally do things that make me not that way, can I still consider that a part of my identity? Things I have to figure out I suppose. The one thing I have noticed is that feelings and emotions do need to be expressed and process or otherwise they tend to control you much more than is healthy or functional.

On that note I would like to express something that has been bothering me as of late. I feel that I lack the experience and credentials to talk for the American soldier. However I do feel that I can make some assertions as to how the American soldier is treated and really viewed in our society. In general I think our culture and the people in it are a bunch of hypocrites when it comes to soldiers. On one hand we praise them for fighting for the most important things in our country, we constantly shower them with the words of gratitude, and we consider these people honorable and heroes. On further examination our view isn't really that simple. What I see in day to day life of soldiers is that the appreciation for what they do is largely lip service. Constantly they are told what they do is great and of noble worth, but when it affects the personal lives of civilians all that hero stuff and noble values stuff goes out the window. Once common example is when a soldier is talked about people say yeah he is a real good guy. They mention how they really respect what he is doing and how it takes a real man/woman to do the things he is doing and to make the sacrifices he is making. Then the soldier does the dating bit. Then all those great things and wonderful choices which exemplify selfless service becomes mud in the eyes of people. It is hard for him to find a woman. When he does find a woman, she is constantly told what a mistake it is being with a man that would choose such a life; how selfish he is in not leaving the military behind. Thing is good people make decisions that require real sacrifice. These real sacrifices give us the benefits of society and social change we enjoy. However it just seems that we never want to be affected by the sacrifice in any way but to enjoy it and say we appreciate it. So let us heap our burdens on the backs of the few and stone them if their bruised backs need healing. No matter how much we say we respect these people, we don't. One cannot claim to have virtue when one is never given a choice to choose between one thing or the other. So what does that say about us when we are actually given a choice we chose to not be the very thing we say we respect?

Midnight Music

2008-02-19T05:23:00.003-07:00

I have been having trouble sleeping (I'm having doubts if I'll ever sleep normally again). So I've been listening to music again. That is to say I've been getting back into music and not just passively listening to it. I was going through a playlist of The Shins and I realized I listen to "Oh, Inverted World" more and more. I had some mixed emotions about his. The Shins are one of the few new bands I get excited for. I always thought they would develop. When I heard "Wincing the Night Away" I thought they grew as a band and produced a better album. Oddly enough I keep coming back to the first of their three albums. Is it possible for a band to make a better album that I like to listen to less than inferior work (not that any of the albums are bad)? It struck me as close to tragic as I like all the music The Shins have put out. Am I doomed to like the first the most even when a band has developed and improved? Or am I just in a mood that brings me to songs like: "Caring is Creepy", "Know Your Onion!", "New Slang", and "The Past and Pending". Then again: "A Comet Appears"," Sealegs", and "Splited Needles" are some really really good songs.

I've also made a decision my favorite "new" band is no longer Islands. Part of reason is I've heard the band has broken up and are no more. Even if they were making music I think LCD Soundsystem would take the title anyways. There are a lot of ways one could describe LCD, but I like saying they are like the Killers if the Killers were as good as they thought they were. I doubt any of my readers have heard of either Islands or LCD, but give them a try, you won't be disappointed. Also if you are looking for songs to download to see if you would be interested in LCD Soundsystem I personally like "Get Innocuous!" and "Someone Great" the most. However others have said "North American Scum" is the best.

Keeping it Real with RealFruitBeverage

2008-02-10T23:51:00.002-07:00

When I think about myself who I am and what I am I sometimes find some interesting generalities that extend to a larger group besides me. To the ladies who read this blog (all two or maybe three of you) I'm going to let you in on a little secret about men. The vast majority of men are jealous and violent. I'm not saying all guys are that way, but enough to say you can assume that a guy is a jealous and violent person unless proven otherwise. This generality is limited I think to romantic relations for the most part. I don't know where these tendencies come from: are they socially taught, do they come from a sense of inadequacy or lack of self esteem, is it biologically hard wired for us to want to dominate competitors, or are we just jerks? I don't know, and I'm sure the reasons for a guy being jealous and having violent thoughts vary from guy to guy and are probably a mixture of different factors. So the cause is complicated. I'm not making a commentary on the cause I'm simply stating what is.

I know what the couple of ladies are saying, "wait I know plenty of guys who aren't that way, or I've dated several guys that aren't that way, or I'm married to a great man who isn't that way." Another argument if my claim is true, why aren't guys just beating the life out of each other all the time? This becomes an issue of guys controlling tendencies or the output of thoughts. That is to say while you might have a perfectly calm and reasonable guy on the outside, inside he is a turbulent storm, or he just wants to punch the face in of another guy he is jealous of and of course he is jealous. I have a lot of friends that are mild mannered. From them I've heard them say they would like to punch in the face every ex a girlfriend has had, or bite the nose off of all the ex's, set fire to an ex's car, stab, shoot, elbow, or put an ex in a reverse arm bar and whisper something unpleasant in his ear while thinking that the poor sap has no idea he will never be able to use that arm again.

We don't act out these very real desires for a number of reasons. The most common pointed to (but I don't know if it is the most common reason) is we know that things like that are wrong so we choose not to execute these very real desires. Other reasons range from fear of doing the act, inability, laziness, and many others. The reasons and excuses not to act on our jealousy in a violent manner are enough to keep the male population in good behavior for the most part. But remember no matter how mild mannered a guy seems there is a good chance he has very strong real feelings of jealousy that express themselves in violent thoughts.

I'm not advocating men do act on such desires or that feeling this way is a good thing. I just think it is important to recognize every once in a while that there are things about us that aren't pleasant.

The Strongest Men

2008-01-28T02:40:00.002-07:00

A very important man died today. I am sure the world will go on without him but it will be a less kind and friendly place now that he is gone. I can't state how important he was to me. Without him I wouldn't be the man that I am in all the good aspects. I don't know how to react to it. I know that I shouldn't be sad. I can't help but feel I would have liked to hear him talk one more time. He took care of me; I don't know if he knew it, he kept me from losing my humanity at times when it would have been easy and sometimes understood for me to throw it away for a moment. He reminded me that no matter how complex life gets the answers are always simple. That being a strong man in these times means that you are a soft human being. My life compared to his and what he would have expected of me would probably be a shortcoming. I can't but thank him though for letting me know where the bar was set and that it was that high.

Random Road Thoughts

2008-01-28T02:29:00.003-07:00

I've had a moment now after my vacation to think about what kind of person I have become. I've really been neglecting being introspective. One way to catch up on who you are is a long road trip, alone. I had the opportunity to drive from Utah to Seattle so I could have my vehicle shipped to Alaska. I didn't do much thinking about myself as I normally do when presented with such an opportunity, but I did notice a lot of things that I have been affected by. I watch Futurama quit a bit and one of the sayings goes, "You watched it now you can't unwatch it!" There is an interesting concept in that phrase. Once you take something in the mind you really can't undo what it did. Now this doesn't hold true for some things, but it does for law school. As I was crossing the Utah border entering Idaho; do you know what thought entered my mind? It wasn't oh I'm entering a new state, or I wonder what different radio stations I'll encounter, or does the speed limit change here, or does this mean I'll get some different scenery. I thought I'm entering a new jurisdiction and body of law. I realized I will never be normal when compared to the rest of society.

When traveling through a section of one unnamed state I thought, "Man the radio music sucks here." I then did another seek on the radio. I found a station to my liking. It played two songs in a row that I really liked. Then it got a little strange, the station then played a little Radio Head. I was thinking that this was a strange mix as I got two classic rock songs and then Radio Head. I kept listening out of pure fascination. Would you know it the Shins came on the air. Nobody plays The Shins, let alone in a lineup that has Radio Head and two really good classic rock songs. I was thinking I discovered pure gold. I couldn't wait for the next song. To my surprise they played one of my favorite rap songs of all time. That's when I realized it wasn't a radio station but just my ipod broadcasting.

Baby Steps

2007-12-13T02:38:00.000-07:00

I’ve been told by everyone and their dog that I need to get normal, whatever that is. Thing is I haven’t any sense of what normal is suppose to be. My body is completely confused. For those of you who don’t know I spent some time in the Middle East this last summer. It was hot. I got as use to the heat as possible. Now I’m in Alaska. It is cold in Alaska. The funny thing is I was colder when I was in the Middle East more than I am here. I attribute it to a number of things; I was not sleeping properly, eating properly, and in general working too much. All those things made it feel colder when it was actually warmer. Maybe it is also because now I have the good sense to get in out of the cold when I start feeling cold. I just think my body has come to terms with it sucking all the time so it doesn’t complain as much as it use to.

When I got back to Alaska I decided I was going to start a healthy diet plan. This was going great for about the first week or so when I was back. I got hungry and ordered a pizza with Buffalo wings. I know not the healthiest combo, but I figured I could splurge a little. What I didn’t figure is that I would eat the entire pizza in one sitting and the wings soon after. I don’t think I’ve made myself a meal to date. That has got to be a record for me I’ve gone over eight months without preparing food for myself.

All these items of stupidity tend to show that I am back to my old self. Every now and then I do get a clip that shows that maybe I need a little more adjustment time before I give myself a clean bill of health. One such instance, I was riding in a car down the free way. We were going fast about 75 mph. To me that is zooming. I saw a black tar line on the road. I nearly had a heart attack.

I basically have about a week before I got fly back to Utah. I think I’ll reconnect a couple more dots there. Till the days of winter are over I guess I’ll learn to deal with the cold.

Virtually Back

2007-12-05T17:09:00.000-07:00

Well I’ve now got internet in my room again. Odd how things like that have no real existence in the material sense have so much existence. Now what to do with these idle hands, besides type that is.

Not Home Yet

2007-11-23T12:36:00.000-07:00

I haven’t known what home really is in the past year and a half or so. I haven’t been able to place roots down. I think I’ve moved too much, spent too much time from my old home, and changed too much to call my old place home. People always say home is where the heart is. My heart is generally where all my loved ones are. But as this last year went by more and more of my loved ones have dispersed. My heart isn’t really anywhere, not that I’m a drifter. My heart has roots but just not in a place. I think I’ve taken one more step in finding my new home.

Green Time

2007-11-04T05:38:00.000-07:00

You know I’ve seen my fair share of crappy movies. I’m talking I wonder how some of these ideas get the OK. I’ve concluded that movie execs will pretty much give any movie idea a chance. That is unless you got a really good idea that is based on good plot and will require convincing acting. So I thought to myself what kind of movies would I like to make? I’ve already discussed this with a few of my friends and I have two that come to mind.

The first movie is called “8 string cowboy”. An old buddy of mine told me about the idea of a cowboy that went around with a guitar and got into adventures. I thought that would be really cool if this cowboy knew kung fu. Obviously it would have to be a western. What is the source of conflict; zombies. You got it, a guitar playing kung fu master cowboy in a zombie survival western. I’m thinking of making a twist to it by having it set in the future where it is a post apocalyptic nuclear western. Honestly how many of you wouldn’t want to see this movie?

The second movie is called “B +”. It has Eric Roberts playing a super villain sorcerer who is the head of a crime syndicate ran by various thugs played by the Baldwin family. The sorcerer can only be defeated by the brothers of destiny. The brothers are actually long lost brothers played by Jean Claude Van Dam and Steven Seagal. Pretty straight forward right? Here is the twist, two other brothers think they are the brothers of destiny and so does everyone else. These brothers are played by Pauly Shore and Rob Schneider. It isn’t that you would want to watch this move, it is you can’t help but watch this movie.

Music

2007-11-01T02:48:00.000-07:00

I think people take music too seriously. Music is a wonderful thing it can inspire, change moods, give insights into human nature, and all sort of other stuff. People take all these wonderful things and start making evaluative judgments about the music. I really don’t have a problem with that as I do it more than the average bear. People (myself included) then take it to the next level, they make evaluative judgments about people based on the judgments they made about the music. I think people need to stop taking music so seriously. So what, so and so likes really lame music, if it jingles their bell it’s their choice. Does a person liking lame music make them lame? No. Unless you like Creed, then you are lame.

Hate Speech

2007-10-18T11:54:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite topics to think and talk about is zombies. Why? I don’t know. Another thing I do a lot is argue. Great facilitators for argument are top X number lists. My work buddies and I started to talk about various zombie scenarios and what would be the top whatever for such and such situation. I noticed a trend in our discussions, when I talk about zombies taking over I refer to it as a zombie infestation while my work buddies call them zombie insurrections.

You are probably wondering what the big deal is. Come on they both start with the letter “I” and heck it really doesn’t change the reality of ten thousand zombies looking to eat your delicious brains. See these words are the beginnings of a serious point, zombies are not people! As you can see the word insurrection implies some kind of rebellion. In that implication is the notion that zombies have some kind of intelligence, a will even. With a will we can even attempt to say they might have a soul, or rights. Let’s get this straight people zombies while once human are not humans. The more we start using human quality words on them the more dangerous it becomes. One of the classic mistakes made in every zombie movie is having feelings of attachment for a zombie that was once a loved one. The zombie lover then falls prey to their attachment because they don’t realize that this isn’t a human and you got a zombie loose on the inside of your defenses. Zombies are a disease or at best an invasion of an unwanted entity. Heck I would say that zombies aren’t even alive, they are the undead after all. Think this is not a problem; just look at all the zombie movies that are starting to add little human characteristics to zombies. We have a problem; when the infestation does happen we can have no doubt, zombies must go. Remember the Simpsons episode where Homer ends up at his house being chased by flesh eating mutants and they start talking peace, and then they blast them? We need to have that kind of mentality.

Other fine points of zombie infestations I would like to make, a chain saw is not a good melee weapon. First it can run out of fuel. That is the last thing you want in a melee weapon. Second it is extremely heavy. Granted it can cause a lot of damage but that leads to three, the amount of splatter with a chain saw is high. The amount of fluids that could possibly transmit the zombie bug (for the sci-fi zombie scenarios where it is a virus that causes it) increases dramatically and increases the odds you will be infected which is death. My personal choice is an aluminum bat. It is light and causes a lot of blunt trauma. This mean you can hit the head of the zombie (its only true weak spot) and not worry about a lot of issues. Wooden blunt objects are to prone to breaking thus the aluminum bat is a better choice. There are some other blunt melee weapons that are good but generally to heavy. I think you will fatigue and be swarmed.

There is still a robust debate regarding which vehicle would be best. I’m of the opinion that one where you can limit in and out access to the top of it and good fuel economy are considerations. The best place to hold up has been Walmart, but I don’t think that is an absolute conclusion. I’ve also tossed the idea around that an area with extreme cold weather would be a good spot to. Zombies must have extremely low heat output thus they would freeze and basically be harmless or even better completely neutralized. Alaska would be a good consideration, sort of like the latest Resident Evil movie (we thought of this way before the movie by the way and they didn’t even site the cold as a possible advantage).

Just remember zombies are not humans. If that sounds like a hate speech, then call me a zombie hater.

Conflict

2007-10-17T08:56:00.000-07:00

I was watching football (American) this last weekend. For those of you that follow the sport you all realized the big game was between the New England Patriots and the Dallas Cowboys. I felt conflicted. I didn't know who to root for, or should I say I couldn't find who to root against. See I'm a Pittsburgh Steelers fan. On one hand I have the historical hatred of the Cowboys. We have this rivalry that dates back to the 70's Super Bowls. I was also pissed when they beat us in the 90's at the big show. That and the Cowboy fans are some of the most annoying ever. Then the Pats; they knocked us out of the playoffs twice in the last ten years, both times I think the Steelers had a legit shot at it all. Come to think of it Patriot fans are some of the most annoying in football. I was glad that someone had to lose, then again I was sad that someone had to win. In the end Dallas lost. I guess it is all for the best.

The Power of Empty Words

2007-10-10T16:00:00.000-07:00

It is a shame that often words of importance only matter to people where we don’t have to worry about those words. There is an upcoming issue with the word “genocide”. US lawmakers are poised to pass a resolution on whether or not to call the 1915 mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman Turks during the WWI time frame, genocide. There is a bit of political tension on this topic. Modern Turkey is an important NATO ally with the United States. Currently Turkey is strategically important to the United States joint operations in Iraq.

This issue, being political, is complicated. It is clear that calling the activities that happened during the time frame of the Armenian mass killings/genocide, genocide would embarrass Turkey. Turkey has already received a rebuff from the West by being denied membership in the EU. France has taken it a step further and made a law making it illegal to say the killings were not genocide. For all of Turkey’s efforts to demonstrate that it is a modern westernized state it hasn’t been given much slack.
Turkey’s claim is not an outright denial of the killings. Rather they point to the fall of the Ottoman Turk Empire and the chaos that followed as the cause of the killing. The killings according the Turkish government wasn’t a planned and organized slaughter like the Nazis. People of this view generally contend that it is not the business of government to define history, let the historians define it. They propose that academics examine all the records on both the Turk and Armenian side and render a verdict.

The view mentioned seems very reasonable. Unfortunately for that stance, the majority of historians have concluded that it was genocide. The argument of defining genocide being an academic endeavor not a government one has some weight to it. I keep wondering why the government would call something genocide if it is recognized as genocide by historians. The only answer I can think of is that it must have some kind of legal ramifications and actions to follow. Another possibility is putting the country on notice that we are aware of the past history of genocide and it won’t happen again.
The odd thing is from my understanding of Turkey; the odds of another genocidal incident would be pretty rare. So it comes down to some kind of legal action right? Well the classification is useless. It isn’t going to lead to sanctions or some kind of reprimand.

I got to thinking about the broader issue of genocide and what it means in the United States. Genocide is a nasty word. It is on par with being liken unto Hitler or a communist. I want to be candid about what I think genocide means in the United States. What I might say will probably offend people so you’ve been warned, stop reading now. People in the United States don’t care about genocide. We fake it. It might be more accurate to say we don’t care enough about genocide, but I’m sticking to my guns, we don’t care about genocide. We feign our strong distaste for genocide. I know what you are going to say, every American opposes genocide. Really, on what level?

My case for my point is Darfur. We’ve know genocide was/is happening. It was just a matter of reporting the numbers. Don’t tell me the public doesn’t know. Time dedicated a lot of recourses reporting on it (excellently I might add). All those rock stars and movie stars have been yelling about it for some time now. What have we done? Nothing. Let me bring it home for you. For those of you who pray where is genocide on the list of things you pray about? Does it wrench your heart to know that genocide is going on? How much do you feel knowing that thousands upon thousands of innocents are being killed? Do you think daily what sacrifices you can make to help it stop? Have you cried one tear for the dead of Darfur? Would you be willing to give up your new HD TV to help, or your PS3, Xbox 360, your new ipod, or how about Christmas, would you be willing to give all that you would receive for Christmas to save one life in Darfur? Well you’ve been able to for several years now, and I’m willing to bet just like me you haven’t done a thing. That’s right we have been able to do something and we haven’t. So when we say Americans care about genocide are we just puffing up and putting on a good face? I think so.

It is hard for me. Realizing how magnificent we were created to be yet seeing how despicable we are. I know my pain gives little to my penitence for inaction, but I suppose it is something, just not something that means anything to the dead. Humanity is an odd meal to eat. It’s flavor a constant paradox.

Suprise

2007-10-04T11:46:00.000-07:00

Jake finally woke up to the buzz sound of his alarm clock. He was careful in selecting which alarm he would buy. This particular clock had the helpful and reassuring feature of non-stop buzzing. He felt dull even though he was supposedly sharpening himself for the last four days. His dreams were stressful, even though he really couldn’t recall what they were about. Looking over his cramp quarters, Jake tried to make an inventory of things he need to do right away, maybe he could get some order in his mind if he couldn’t generate such in the piles of chaos he called his room.

Looking over his equipment Jake made his final double check to make sure they were in accordance to the specifications published for the board of review. Seeing his weapon so clean gave Jake a grin. The fabric on his body armor was brushed and soaped clean. Everything was in order, double checked the night before and checked again this morning. Topics, facts, and questions began to buzz in Jake’s mind: numbers, words, definitions, protocols, and on and on. Doubt seemed to cling to very thing he had memorized, but a doubtful recall was all he had and it was better than nothing.

He was told that boards were all about confidence. Confidence was so important that even fake confidence was better than the truth. Well a little fake goes a long way in presentations. Being pulled off the line would be considered a vacation by some, but he couldn’t help feel a little guilty. This was strictly a career move. This board would set him up for another, and eventually an early promotion board. He felt a little sick. He didn’t know if it was the time of day or how he felt. Jake had the feeling all he needed to do was show up and he would win. It was almost set up that way from the get go.

As the door opened and the early light hit his eyes, Jake contemplated what deep thoughts he could gather. Wonderings of the nature of competition, the worth of knowledge, and even his self interest entered his mind. Even though everyone he worked with understood him leaving the line for just a little bit, he couldn’t understand it, or come to grips with it. He just knew that it was what everyone expected anyone to do.

Then it hit him. Like a shimmering glossed katana edge, wait it was a simmering katana edge. A kia was sounded and in a flash the dark shadow zoomed past, steel on flesh. Luckily the victim was only sliced on the meaty parts of his legs. Obviously a low level ninja, otherwise Jake would be dead. “Great” Jake thought, “I get ambushed by a ninja right before the board, who would have thought.” “Well I better stop the bleeding, where’s my medical pouch?”

Beach Master

2007-09-27T03:14:00.000-07:00

A little while ago I was looking at some pictures online of the Camp Loll Staffs trough out the ages. It is a bit bitter sweet for me as I have never worked on any Camp Loll staff, even though I have worked with many Camp Loll staffers. I often feel like a human watching his elf buddies sail off into the west when the subject of Loll comes up. I don’t mind so much as I am entertained by the stories and the purpose of Loll.

As I was scrolling down the web page I saw familiar faces. One face I saw was a man by the name of Carlo. Then all of a sudden he stopped appearing in the staff pictures. This reminded me that Carlo is no longer with us. It made me sad. I did what anyone would do with this memory; I went and ate a slice of cheesecake. I know that sounds odd but every conversation that I had with Carlo boiled down to how delicious cheesecake was or looking at pretty women. So have a bit of cheesecake, for Carlo.

Royal Season

2007-09-19T01:31:00.000-07:00

Ah the NFL season is here in full swing. So many dreams and hopes for so many fans; so many crushed dreams and hopes for so many fans. It is only week two and expectations are being raised and crushed all at the same time. My team, the Stealers, greatest football organization in the history of the NFL, is doing well, but still it is only week two. I was thinking about all the forgotten people in the history of the NFL. Then the nerd in me took over and I created my list of the most underrated quarterbacks of all time. I’m not a sports expert; these are just my uneducated opinions. Remember this not the list of greatest, but most underrated, you could be horrible and still the most underrated.
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5. Bernie Kosar. Remember when Cleveland was good? You are probably remembering when Bernie Kosar was there. If it weren’t for the heartbreak of the most hated quarterback ever, John Elway, Bernie might have gotten a little more respect. Is he one of the best quarterbacks of all time? No, but he is good enough where people should remember the guy besides Cleveland fans. He was usually in the top 10 in most statistical categories when with Cleveland.

4. Trent Dilfer. Not much to talk about. Then again when have the Ravens ever gotten to the big show since they got rid of him? He wasn’t a great quarterback, but definitely underrated; especially if you consider he has a championship and the Ravens have yet to produce another.

3. Phil Simms. You know for a guy that won a Super Bowl you would think he’d get a little more props. Basically Simms is a very, very good version of Dilfer. For six years he was in the top ten for TD passes. While the Giants at the time were an awesome team they couldn’t have done it without a good quarterback. I think people forget that Simms was a very good quarterback.

2. Steve Young. He has the best QB rating life time. He has been to the big show and won. The two biggest things said against Steve Young: He had Jerry Rice, John Taylor, TO, and a lot of other talent to throw to, and he is no Joe Montana. Yeah it is true that he had a lot of talent around him, but he did well with it. So what he isn’t Joe Montana, nobody is Joe Montana, not even Joe Montana. You are talking about the greatest quarterback of all time. For some reason nobody puts this guy in the same league as the greats of all times. Why? The response is always well Joe Montana was better. Steve Young is/was the best mobile quarterback ever. Michel Vick could only dream of being as good as Steve Young, and at one time people were talking like Michel Vick was the best quarterback ever.

1. Warren Moon. Statistically speaking, this guy rocked. He is on par with Dan Marino, the most overrated quarterback of all time. If Moon had started his career in the NFL there is a good shot some of those records held my Dan might have been held by Moon. But, if you would ever mention Warren Moon in the same breath as Dan Marino people would just laugh at you. I guess that championship Marino won puts him on a different level than Warren Moon. Warren Moon is 4th in all time pass attempts, completions, passing yards, and 5th in all time passing TDs.

Universal Boxes

2007-09-13T16:15:00.000-07:00

I remember a while back I posted about how kids are cool. Kids are so cool they can turn the most harden cynic into a softy. Kids also remind me no matter how different two groups of people are there are some universals that transcend race, culture, and religion. What is the unifying element that I observed? Cardboard.

You see kids love cardboard. Cardboard to a kid is like gold. From my memory of my childhood I remember cardboard races down grass/weed hills. Nothing says a good fort to keep icky girls out of like cardboard. You need a sword or club? Cardboard is your answer. You need a shield to block the sword your buddy made? Cardboard is the answer. How tragic a childhood would be without cardboard? I watched a kid use cardboard as a cape, obviously transforming into a superhero of some sort. Then he used it to make wings. Brilliant, that’s absolutely brilliant.

That’s another thing, kids daydream about flying. Anywhere in the world there is a kid dreaming about flying right now.

The Best Minds

2007-09-08T14:48:00.000-07:00

I was reading “The Oprah Magazine” or “O”. I will once again claim the defense; my current job leaves limited choices in what I can do for entertainment. I would normally just chalk this magazine as a smarter version of “Cosmo” (yes I read Cosmo too). The thing that prevents me from taking that paradigm when reading O is that Oprah is a cultural phenomenon. For the most part I consider Oprah a force for good in the world, and it appears her heart is in the right place (I really can’t divine this because I don’t know the lady and I make no claims about powers to ascertain the worth of one’s soul by looking into someone’s eyes via the TV.) For those of you unfamiliar with the format of O it generally has your standard beauty magazine kind of stuff, then it usually has a section on how to make your life better, and there always seems to be a couple of articles about making the world a better place.

A reoccurring contribution to O (yes that means I’ve read more than one issue) is a section called, “A Million Ways to Save the World”. The description of the section goes as follows, “Award-winning playwright Eve Ensler resumes her monthly mission: to canvass the best brains around the globe for their earth-fixing ideas. “ Another statement follows about Ensler’s specific causes, but the ideas/advice gathered from the contributing people varies in their scope. Normally I don’t have too many problems with the advice people dish out. I’ve noticed that the people Ensler selects is a bit thin when it comes to selecting scientist, award winning economist, and experts on international law, but that is to be expected considering Ensler’s background. I’m sure if I were to select my great minds for advice there would be several sectors lacking, it is natural.

Now when it comes to having people give ideas that could radically or subtly change the world there is bound to be a conflict of ideas. I understand I’m not likely to agree with all the ideas presented in the article. This particular issue seemed to bother the heck out of me. There were two contributors that really chapped my rear.

The first bit is by James Gilligan, author of Preventing Violence. He states, “In our thermonuclear era, the most immediate threat to our continued survival is human violence. So how do we prevent it? By eliminating inequalities of power and wealth based on race, gender, sexual orientation, etc. Throughout the world, the most powerful predictor of violence is the size of the gap in income and wealth between the rich and the poor. The answer? Elect a Democrat as president. Historically, that has been the most direct and effective way to reduce the gap. As equality increases, violence decreases. This is love in action.”

My first thought was wow did I just hear a high school debate thermonuclear war argument? Yes I just did. Mr. Gilligan fails to address the concept, something is the most immediate doesn’t necessarily make it the most probable. For instance the moon spontaneously falling out of orbit is much more of an immediate threat to human survival than nuclear war. It is however much less likely to happen. But according to Hume you never know, well non empirically that is. But I’m willing to accept that we should be worried about nuclear weapons. Mr. Gilligan makes some jumps I’m not quit willing to take. The assertion that inequality is an indicator of violence I will grant, but to assert that inequality leads to the kind of violence that leads to thermonuclear war I will not grant. The statement also indicates that in order for violence to be curbed one has to decrease arbitrary inequality between individuals. What about nations? Should it be the prerogative of those in one nation to eliminate cultural inequalities of another nation in order to avoid nuclear war? I think such cavalier notions would cause more hostilities than it could cease. The key to Mr. Gilligan’s assertions comes from this comment, Elect a Democrat President. I’ll accept that historically a Democrat president decreases equality gaps more than a Republican within the USA. Trends however do little to shed light on the instance in this case. My example for examination, Jimmy Carter. During the craziness that was the Carter Era, the economy got so bad that the pure madness of supply side economics seemed like a good idea, and it turned out to be better than Carter’s economic policy. Let me say that again, Jimmy Carter, a Democrat, POTUS, had an economic system so bad it made supply side look good. The world was a much more dangerous place and much more likely to go into nuclear war than when a Republican took office. Another factor is the with the powers of globalization inequality gaps that rise in the United States can often lead to decreases in gaps elsewhere. An example of a Democrat leading to the opposite of this is say a Democrat that is a protectionist and while increases average wages in the United States prevents other countries from entering certain sectors of the economy, thus preventing them from having sustainable economic growth that would lead to gaps closing. So while inequalities my decrease at home, where it has been stable regardless, inequalities may grow or be perpetuated abroad where it is less stable. I’m not saying a Democrat would make a bad president or that one shouldn’t vote Democrat. In fact I think there are a lot of Democratic candidates with good ideas, but there are also just as many Republicans with equally valid ideas. Consider the ideas instead of each candidate regardless of their political affiliation. Regardless Mr. Gilligan does convey a good idea about different strategies to curbing violence.

The next brain to pick is an “Award-winning actress and activist”. It is none other than Jane Fonda. Jane Fn’ Fonda. That’s right Jane Fonda. Let me repeat the purpose of the article, “to canvass the best brains around the globe for their earth-fixing ideas.” So you’re telling me that one of the best minds in the world is an actress who’s most notable accomplishments is a film where she plays a space vixen who crash lands on a planet with a man who wears furs. That’s right Jane Fonda. The same Jane Fonda that didn’t mind all too much when the Communist party in Cambodia wiped out nearly a third of its population in a genocide fest. The same Jane Fonda that while not calling the Communist war criminals for genocide would gladly and gleefully call US soldiers war criminals. Yes the same Jane Fonda that never apologized for calling US soldiers war criminals, and never once thought maybe just maybe the communist were a bad thing for south east Asia. So what is the advice of Jane, almost a noble peace prize winner, Fonda? Let me quote, “Mothers and grandmothers, teachers, coaches, and mentors, let’s help our boys become emotionally literate.” Yes we need those people because you know fathers can’t possibly help boys become emotionally literate. Yes because I’ve never heard of a man teaching a boy, “it’s okay to cry, to forgive, to express love.” I’m sorry I didn’t realize that was OK for women to be role models to girls, but for heaven sakes don’t let men be a role model to boys. You know what happens when a father tries to teach a boy how to be a man, that boy grows up to be a homicidal maniac that has the emotions of a sociopath that will no doubt oppress every woman he sees. I’m all about teaching boys to be more advanced when it comes to understanding emotions, but when did fathers lose the capacity to teach those things?

We are how we eat.

2007-09-02T07:18:00.000-07:00

I was reading this month’s issue of Backpacker Magazine. The issue focused on global warming and how it impacted the backpacking community. A large section was dedicated to what we could do to cut our carbon foot print. The magazine gave estimates on how much a particular activity (or change of) would cut our carbon output. The section on the methodology for such calculations were vague but for the most part I accepted them as most of the suggestions seemed intuitive. Of the intuitive suggestions, most were geared towards increasing efficiency or decreasing use of carbon producing activities. However there were a couple of suggestions that caught my eye. These suggestions focused on mainly eating habits. The one’s that seemed most likely to be followed were ones like use a drip watering system for your garden, grow an organic (whatever the heck that means) garden for produce, subscribe to a local farming co-op to have fresh produce delivered to you and so on. Then there were the suggestions that I think will not happen. The highest one on my list of things that won’t happen is cutting a serving of meat out of your diet every day. Yep that’s it just cut one serving of meat out of your daily intake.

I wondered why I thought that. I realized that first the USA has a large diet problem as is. It has already been proven beyond doubt that poor eating habit leads to poor health, yet we still do it anyways. Poor eating habits yields pretty immediate and long term consequences, yet, we still has a whole, refuse to change. I found this particularly funny, because as I was thinking all this I was eating a Twinkie. When I ate the Twinkie it tasted well like nothing really good, yet I went and ate another one just to eat it. But back to the point, if we as a people can’t even get it together when it serves all our personal best interest to do so on a concrete matter where there is no dispute, how are we expected to get our eating habits in order to stave off global warming? Just a side note I believe that global warming is a concrete matter where there is no real dispute, but I’m talking about societies perception as a whole, and plus there is a lot of nuance to the issue that I just can’t seem to articulate at the moment.

Meat is expensive. Gandhi once asked the question of what we could do if we spent our recourses that we spent to acquire meat to something nobler. I often wonder how noble we are when we are asked to give up just a little of a perceived convince as a society and yet refuse to do so. I think that speaks volumes as to who we are. Then again it might not be such a simple task as Gandhi did say that of all things the pallet was the most difficult to master.

Cracker Power!

2007-08-20T10:47:00.000-07:00

Boredom is one hell of a drug. I've been told when people smoke pot they have deep conversations that aren't really deep. These talks are sort of like the, do you think Bugs Bunny is hot conversation from Wayne's World. Right now I'm a force fed boredom addict. Remember when Rick James and his girlfriend kidnapped a woman, forced her to do heroin and crack? Take the heroin and crack, replace it with boredom, subtract one part Rick James and girlfriend and then add something definitely not as cool as Rick James. Once you calculated the word problem you get my situation.

Under the influence boredom, my work friends and I have gotten into some interesting, yet totally irrelevant conversations. A topic that frequently comes up is the, I can do such and such conversations. This conversation usually boils down to stupid human tricks. Sometimes you get some cool information like hey I could have gone to circus school, or I use to be a ballet teacher. I have no such cool talents or no such cool tricks. Because of this I like to play spoiler and mention things people can't do. Yes I'm a jerk. On one such occasion I mentioned that nobody could eat seven saltine crackers in a minute. I roll with a lot of type A males. This was taken as a challenge. Come on no way seven tiny little crackers can stop them.

Crackers three, humans zero.

How Oprah killed Santa

2007-08-18T10:33:00.000-07:00

I remember back in my younger days I had summers where I didn’t do much on such an occasion I did a lot of TV watching. I’d watch it all. I’d watch so much TV that I could say all the words to commercials as the actors in the commercials were saying them. This drove my babysitter crazy. I found that I had a particularly good talent at annoying people, but that’s another story. One show I watched was the Oprah Winfrey show. Back then it was just a day time talk show. It wasn’t the huge daytime show it is today. That was when the talk shows were all the same and you couldn’t catch an A list star dead on one of them. It is funny the transformation the show had developed. Back then it was just like all the other shows. One of the shows was about things men needed to change in order to make their women happy. They had this one guy, where all his wife wanted of him was for him to buy new clothes. As I watched it was interesting to see his argument. He stated that he liked his old clothes and they were comfortable. That seemed reasonable to me. Then his wife started talking about how he wouldn’t even buy new underwear. She mentioned how the underwear he had had holes in them from being worn thing.

I thought to myself I’m never going to be like that guy. What an idiot, you can’t get that attached to your underwear; an old hat, jacket, heck even old shoes, but underwear? I forgot about my adventures in daytime television thinking nothing of the resolves I had made while I was younger. You see I hadn’t really tried to see the guy’s point of view. I just got caught up in the mostly female audience’s snickers, boos, and what have you.

I have a favorite pair of boxers. They have the words, “Santa is Real” written all over them. They are comfortable and I like the message, even though nobody can read them. I think it is for me more than anyone else, as underwear should be. Well after my last wash I’ve noticed that they too have holes in them, in quit embarrassing spots. I was tempted to just keep on wearing them just because I liked them so much. Then memories of day time Oprah came rushing back. I figured I owed it to kid me to at least keep a couple of resolves I made back then. So this way if kid me ever ran into less kid me I could say to him, “at least I wear new underwear still.”

By the title of this blog you might have thought I would talk about how all her gift giving overshadowed good old St. Nick, and in that way killed Santa. Nope, but in a way she did wound my childhood. I suppose it won’t be long until Christmas and I’ll be able to buy another similar item. Well maybe Santa is dead after all.

Dreams of the Woman of your Dreams

2007-07-31T01:33:00.001-07:00

I’ve run into this case scenario a lot. There is a guy and girl couple. The guy is having a perfectly normal day and thinks everything is fine. However after the first few moment of the day it turns out that the girl is very very upset at said guy. The guy can’t figure it out. He runs through his head to see if he did anything wrong, and low and behold he can’t think of anything. Well nothing to justify this level of anger. Since this guy is very concerned about this girl he keeps asking what is wrong. Finally, still angry mind you, she tells him. He cheated on her (wow that is horrible you should feel ashamed!). In a dream she had that night (say what? what?Me confused, me no understand, me go start fire now with sticks and rocks.). After telling him this she is still mad, and still feels justified in the way she feels; for a dream. Let me say that again for a dream. You know dream a thing that didn't actually happen.

The female of the species has always been a mystery to me. I want just say that this is string of isolated incidents but the more couples I meet, the more of this dream cheating anger I have encountered. The odds of such an event seem to go up exponentially if the couple is married. I know of one case where the dream event got so out of hand that when the wife woke up she punched her husband. I’m starting to believe that this is some kind of general trend. I always wonder how come women don’t have dreams where their other cooking, washing dishes, and mowing the lawn. Does the effect work in reverse? When a woman has a dream that is really nice about her other does she feel really good about him for at least the day? Even though he never really wrote a wonderful peom about her and sang it to music he wrote? With flowers even.

I know that people are entitled to feel how they want but it seems odd to hold something against someone for something that was not their fault at all, a creation of your own, and most importantly never happened! When I talked to some women about the issue they could give me no good reason why the anger/madness towards the partner was justified. However they didn’t seem to have any sense of remorse over it. It was like saying to me, yeah I know I’m crazy, but you’ll just have to deal with it. From my experience men don’t have these types of dreams often. When they do they seem to have a different kind of reaction.

I wonder if this is a topic I will just never understand.

You Kant Make Me

2007-07-25T02:12:00.000-07:00

Lately on a work outing I got to catch up on some “good” reading. One of my co-workers happened to have a copy of the Grounding of the Metaphysics of Morals (“GMM”). This surprised the heck out of me considering the group that I run with at my job. It got me thinking about some of the old philosophical questions I use to contemplate before I said to heck with it.
The work GMM is itself a very dense reading. Immanuel Kant is considered one of the most difficult reads in the area of ethics. GMM I think is the easiest of his works to digest. He takes a purely logical view of ethics, which leads to some strange conclusions.

One of the concepts discussed at length when talking about GMM is free will/autonomy/choice. I really don’t want to get into the formulation of the categorical imperative, because I’m just too lazy to write that much. But the last post about Charles Xavier gave me some thought about compulsion. It is generally accepted that if one is forced to do something one is not morally accountable for it. That is to say if I held your life in my hands and forced you to do something that would normally be considered immoral you wouldn’t be held accountable for it. A corollary of that is if one didn’t choose to do something then one couldn’t consider the act a moral one, it was just an act that happened. So moral action for the most part; are not mistakes they are choices with deliberate thinking at some stage in the decision making process (the some stage part is for all those consequentialist that have a default action scheme).

The topic of being forced to do something against one’s will is an old topic. Another less old topic that for some reason came up in my mind was that of temptation. There are some prevailing ideas that surface when it comes to being tempted and being held morally accountable. In most Christian sects that I have experience with there is this notion that God will not allow a situation to arise where you cannot resist the temptation. In our system of law we have the notion of entrapment. These notions lead me to some interesting questions. If God won’t allow you to be in a situation where you cannot resist the temptation, there has to exist some situations where you can’t resist the temptation. What would suffice to be too tempted? When you throw in the mix of human autonomy it looks as if God is putting a very severe restriction on it with this line of not being tempted too much thinking. Then again there is always the line of thinking nothing is undoable with God on your side. But that idea sort of makes the “temptation exemption clause” sort of a meaningless statement. In society we seem to have an understanding if someone was tempted by things.

I could probably come up with a clear line of logic based on all those questions but I gave up doing things like that a long time ago.

Marvels of the Universe

2007-07-12T14:52:00.000-07:00

I’ve always considered myself a fan of the Marvel Comic book universe. It’s not that I didn’t like the DC Comic book universe, I just always preferred Marvel. As I like to think long, hard, deeply about things that have no real importance in life, I pondered if it was still true that I preferred Marvel over DC today and why.

My initial Marvel Universe is better notion came from the contention that Marvel characters were more complicated and interesting than the DC counterparts. There was the whole notion of the anti-hero; you know the good guy that is sort of bad. A variation on that theme was the good guy with a shady past. You had the Punisher, Wolverine, Ghost Rider; heck even the Silver Surfer fit this class of hero. These guys, and some gals, were complicated; things were never simple for them. On the DC side you had Superman, Wonder Woman, and Green Lantern. The closest thing you had to a complicated anti-hero was Batman. Even then his shady past wasn’t so shady. And while the Bat was a vigilantly he always maintained his role as an augmentation to the system of justice already in place.

My premise I think is flawed, or incomplete. After further evaluation I think that it is the world of Marvel that is complicated and the characters simple, while the world of DC is simple and the characters complicated. Say what? Let’s take a look at the respective flagship characters from each universe, Spiderman, and Superman. What is Superman’s conflict; Kryptonite right? Wrong, Superman’s true conflict is the temptation of power. In every alternate universe for Sup he is a tyrant. His true test isn’t how he can overcome such and such problem, but how much should he help such and such. It becomes easy for anyone to always have things done their way when given the power to have it done that way. It is this constant struggle between how much should Superman help vs. advancing the good that he can do that makes Superman interesting. No matter how much the world changes ultimately he is always left with that temptation/choice. So what is Spidy’s deal? When you think about it Spiderman’s interest is in his problems not his powers. For instance will Peter ever get with Mary Jane or will he opt out and go for Felicity. Sure Spiderman has a bit of power but that isn’t what makes him so cool. Spiderman is cool because he has trouble talking to girls, everyone either hates or loves him, and he decided to damask himself because of the Super Hero registration act. In Civil War it is the conflict between the heroes that choose to damask themselves and the ones that don’t that makes me have any interest in the characters. By and large the conflicts of Spiderman are generated by the world that he is in, not because of who he is.

Another great example would be the X-men. If people would just get over their problems with mutants most of the interest in the X-men would evaporate. Now DC had made attempts to capitalize on these kinds of dilemmas with the problems in recent (relatively speaking) Justice League stories. I do have to admit the conflict between the JL and the Justice Lords was great. However it did sort of hinge on the whole Superman power thing I already mentioned. And face it whatever Superman wants goes in whatever league he is in. Well unless he is in my Starcraft/Halo/GhostRecon League, then he’s just a newb that needs to know his place.

So what conclusions have I drawn from all these new thoughts? If you’re asking that question you don’t know me very well or haven’t read my blog, but all six of you should know the reward is not the answer but trying to generate one.

Parents Just Don't Understand

2007-07-02T23:40:00.000-07:00

Because of the nature of my job right now I find a lot of time to read periodicals. I try to avoid the gossip magazines but alas I succumb to them. So that should let anyone know that I read almost anything. On the way I’ve been pleasantly surprised and not pleasantly surprised. So in my quest to find interesting and useful reading I ran across a copy of “Outside”. The cover looks like it targets the “Men’s Fitness” crowd. I figured what the heck maybe I’ll learn about a new spot on the planet I can visit or learn some skills when it comes to being outside. One article was amazingly good. It was in regards to what has become of Mt. Everest. Another article was so, so regarding being alone in the outdoors with nothing to survive with, except a knife and a couple of knick knacks. However I’m not going to talk about those as neither effected me drastically in any way.

There was an article that bothered me to no end. It was titled “Demerit Badge” “Is Boy Scouts of America doing enough to keep kids safe?” There were some valid points in the article. One was that the BSA doesn’t share its accident data with other organizations. Another was that the BSA has fostered a culture of not taking responsibility. Another was that the BSA does not train its leadership enough when it comes to outdoor survival issues. Another yet was that the BSA leadership makes bad decisions. Now you can debate the truth of these claims. Fact is that the BSA can do better when it comes to ensuring the safety of the children that it has stewardship over. That’s not what bothered me about the article.

When making the point the BSA doesn’t train its leadership enough the author (Annette McGivney who teaches journalism at Northern Arizona University) points to a defense the BSA raises to that issue. The author paraphrases Frank Reigelman, “it’s hard to enforce requirements in a volunteer organization with 47,000 troops across the country.” Now the author replies with this statement. “That argument would be more convincing if they didn’t manage to exclude gays and atheists from all BSA chapters.”

Now the argument itself I can see. The BSA does manage to enforce some requirements in its organization. But why do you have to drop the gay and atheist card? You could have said the BSA doesn’t allow felons to be in its organization. The BSA also makes sure the leaders are all adults. But these requirements are of a different kind than Outdoor safety requirements. The BSA does enforce some level of training when it comes to say water activities and such, but the statement of Annette McGivney were more than just an argument. It was an underlying statement that the BSA is a non socially desirable entity cloaked in an argument. That what the BSA stands for is sort of stupid.

This bothers me to no end. I have mixed thoughts about the wisdom of the BSA having a ban on gays in its leadership. More and more religious sects are accepting openly gay individuals in their church leadership. As the BSA is a religious organization that accepts nearly all religions I think it is unwise to establish this excluding policy. But you never hear about how stupid the Orthodox Greeks are and how silly and stupid their ways are. The BSA makes an easy target. While I welcome the arguments as I feel that they give new perspectives on the organization, I could do without the condescending nature of the arguments. As for the atheism comment yes that bothers me to no end. The BSA is a religious organization. Atheism and the BSA are two mutually exclusive forces. Anyone who was halfway involved with the BSA or bothered to understand the organization on any level would understand this. I think the atheism card diminishes the argument that the BSA could perform better controls. It also smacks of the condescending tone that in prevalent in attacks against the BSA. I don’t know why people just don’t say what they really mean, “I don’t like what the BSA stands for and the lifestyle that it tries to advocate.”

Self Awarness

2007-05-20T15:40:00.000-07:00

Fear is a part of life. I don't care who you are you have to deal with fear. Even the bravest of people are afraid every day. I get tired of the "No Fear" attitude. I don't know what it is about risking oneself for pleasure that makes you brave. I'll tell you what real fear is; being afraid you'll let your friends down because of a weakness you have. That kind of fear can move people to do things that will kill them. Fear is when you have to deal with something in everyday life and you know it can destroy you. The great thing is all of us are brave. If you think you aren't you just haven't looked for it yet.

Selfish Service

2007-05-09T15:51:00.000-07:00

Back in the day I use to work for the Boy Scouts of America. One of the principles of scouting was the value of selfless service. The value should be self explanatory but let me explain; selfless service is actually the center piece of scouting. With out the service aspect of scouting the Boy Scouts of America would be just another activity group. The point of the BSA was to teach young boys how to be good men, responsible citizens, and yes faithful members of their respective faith. All these thing hinged on the ability of the leaders to teach these young boys the value of loving others and manifesting it by works. As with most learning at the beginning it seems like something not worth one's time. Sometimes one has to be tricked, bribed, or even forced to learn the first few lessons. That is one of the things about scouting, it is know for it's great out door adventure, structured male bonding, and the ability to teach new skills. With the promise of fun and adventure one is/can ultimately be taught the true lesson goals of the BSA. After the first initial feel of doing good for others I know of very few people who turn back from that life principle.

Well it's time to do some service, but this time I think we all (yes all six of you who read this) to focus on ourselves for a change. That is, we need to take care of ourselves. Mainly I'm focusing in on physical well being but I'm sure there are other categories as well. There are plenty of excuses we use: I don't have enough time, it seems painful, now that is not my idea of fun, etc. . . There are many ways one can improve one's health. An easy way is to make a list of things you do that ultimately are just a waste of time and replace them with exercise. Just as the young boy scout learned by servicing others by his own sacrifice he could be happier, I think by servicing our own health through sacrifice we can also be happier.

Just so there are no excuses I'm posting my run goals (just my run goals not everything else that is done). As we all know I have a hard time running here, so if I can do it there really is no excuse, well unless you are missing a leg, wait I know someone who is missing a leg and still runs. So here it is:

Day 1, 7 mile pace run. Steady pace slow to ease into it.
Day 2, 7 mile increasing pace run. Pace gradually increases throughout the run.
Day 3, 7 mile hill intervals.
Day 4, 8 mile pace run. Moderate pace with increase in speed at the last 2 miles.
Day 5, Intervals, 1 mile warm-up, 1200 meters at race pace 400 meters recovery jog repeat 4 times, 1 mile cool down.
Day 6, Whatever I feel like running. I'll probably run hills and speed intervals till I build up more endurance for a long run.

I should be logging about 35-45 miles a week in the next month or so. I'm trying to build up to a consistent 60 mile run week.

Situational Tests

2007-04-04T03:51:00.000-07:00

I'm a big fan of Godzilla. Nothing says enjoyment to me like the Thunder Lizard. He is just cool. Godzilla can knock down buildings with his tail. He as radioactive fire breath. He has defeated countless other monsters and I don't care what you say Godzilla owns Mothera. Godzilla is always a mixed blessing though. On one had if MechaGodzilla is rolling down on you or, just as dangerous, the Monster from planet X; Godzilla is almost all upside. If Godzilla doesn't stop these guys you are toast. However if it's just a 500 ft ape rolling around Tokyo then you have to wonder if Godzilla was really worth it. The big guy has a price. (for how much I love Godzilla I have yet to see Godzilla Wars, yeah a crime)

I'm an introspective person, or so I would like to think. I'm also the worlds biggest day dreamer. I'm talking Calvin has nothing on me. So I like to day dream about things that make me think about myself and the situations I'm in. One reoccurring day dream is the instant insertion of Godzilla in the situation that you are in. In order for you to get the full benefit of the day dream you have to think how you would feel about Godzilla all of a sudden showing up and why. For instance if you are on a really bad date and Godzilla were to show up near by you might think geez all the destruction and panic sucks but I'm sure glad I'm off of this date. Or how about being stuck in traffic, you know you hate traffic, but would adding Godzilla make it a less boring, painful, and generally sucky part of your day? So if you see me being distant and staring off into the distance, I'm probably thinking about Godzilla. . . or zombies. What?

You see I am fascinated by zombies. I don't love zombies but I find them very interesting. (To be distinguished from Godzilla, I would almost never want Godzilla to be annihilated, while I can think of many where I'd get rid of a zombie.) Now there are many genre of zombies: you have the slow but huge numbers zombie, zombies by magic, zombies by science, fast zombies, zombies under the control of a master mind, etc. Needless to say zombies almost always require a social changing apocalyptic setting. I often think how would I handle a zombie infestation of such and such genre. You can apply the same test for zombies as you can Godzilla. Happy day dreaming.

Side note: zombies should not be confused with other members of the undead. While zombies are members of the "undead" they are not the same as say skeletons, ghouls, and other zombie like creatures.

Don't Burn Me at the Stake

2007-03-21T14:05:00.000-07:00

Disclaimer: to my 5, oh wait I think 6 people read this blog now, readers if you haven't figured it out yet I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, or a Mormon. This post will talk about some of the deeper issues associated with Church Doctrine concerning "original sin" or as we like to call it "the fall". This post as always is nothing more than my thoughts, they in no way reflect the CJCLDS stance on the topic. I do use sources that will give a good idea of the doctrine in question, but I in no way speech for the Church. So if you are one of my faithful readers or just some random blog encounter, you can go to http://www.lds.org/ to have any question answered about the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.

There is a saying in my Church, "I don't have a problem with the doctrine, I have a problem with the culture." That is to say while I believe the doctrines of my Church I don't necessarily think the way those doctrines are implemented by the members of my church is the best. Another aspect is if those doctrines are taught wrong then sometimes you get bad results. One of those doctrines I think fall into this category for me is the "Fall of Man". While I have come to an understanding of Adam and Eve eating the fruit of knowledge in a way that explains the basics, I think the way it is taught in my Church stifles a fuller understanding of the doctrine and thus the nature of God, free agency, and our own condition here on Earth.

I assume that the only time members of my Church talk about the fall of man in any meaningful manner is in Sunday School. This leads to a bigger problem I have with Sunday School in general. However I still attend Sunday School whenever possible. I still consider it a treat. For those of you who see Sunday School as a free time, then I recommend getting into a situation where you can't go or you are denied to go. The classes that were once a chore will become sweat to you when you are denied them. Also no matter what problems you have with any meeting I highly recommend you attend them. If you are not deriving benefit from a meeting then it is nobody's fault but yours. But back to the point; the perspective I am coming from is the way the topic is taught in Sunday School. I will go over what I think are the basics of the doctrine and then the way I see it being taught and understood, and eventually my concerns with those ways.

According to Lesson 4 of the "Old Testament Gospel Doctrine Teacher's Manual, 12" titled "Because of My Transgression My Eyes Are Opened" There are three foundations for the salvation of man: creation, fall and atonement. The way the lesson presents the pillars the fall is seen as a necessary part of our salvation. The lesson quotes Elder Bruce R. McConkie, "said that our salvation is made possible because of "three divine events—the three pillars of eternity" (A New Witness for the Articles of Faith [1985], 81)." The fall came about because of two commandments given to Adam and Eve, once again from lesson 4 :

" In the Garden of Eden, God commanded Adam and Eve to "be fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth" (Moses 2:28). He also commanded them not to eat the fruit of the tree of knowledge of good and evil (Moses 3:17). As long as they did not partake of the forbidden fruit, they would remain in the garden and would not die. But they also would not be able to obey the command to multiply (Moses 5:11; 2 Nephi 2:23). Heavenly Father gave them agency to choose between the two commands."

The fall isn't all bad according to the lesson. The fall carries with it some benefits. Lesson 4:

"As you discuss these results of the Fall, emphasize how the Fall is beneficial to us. Latter-day revelation clarifies that even before the Creation, Heavenly Father intended our earth life to be a time of testing and proving so we could become more like him (Abraham 3:24–26). This required that we be mortals, able to learn to choose between good and evil, which was made possible through the Fall."

So we know that the fall was a component of our salvation and that with it there are some benefits. I want to go a little deeper. We know that there was a fall but what does that mean? Well it means that Adam and Eve disobeyed a commandment from God. However what does it mean to disobey God? In this sense we use the term transgression instead of sin. The best articulation of the difference between sin and transgression was in the April 1981 Ensign in an article titled, "Salvation: By Grace or by Works?" written by Gerald N. Lund, director of college curriculum in the Church Educational System:

"The concept of sin rests upon the concept of law. If there were no law, there could be no sin (see 2 Ne. 2:13; Alma 42:17), because "sin is the transgression of the law" (1 Jn. 3:4). However, for purposes of understanding the Atonement better, it might be helpful to draw a distinction between two important variations in how the law may be violated. A person may violate the law in spite of his knowledge of it; that is, he breaks the law deliberately. But others may violate the law because they are unaware of its existence (ignorance) or because they do not have sufficient maturity to understand the implications of it (lack of accountability). For clarification, let us use two terms to delineate the important differences in these two concepts. Any violation of the law that is willful and knowing we shall call "sin." But any violation that results either from ignorance or lack of accountability we shall call "transgression." The scriptures do not distinguish between these two terms consistently, but such a distinction may help us understand some important points about the Atonement. For example, it helps us understand why children under the age of accountability cannot sin (see D&C 29:47). Any parent who has observed his children’s behavior knows that they often violate laws of the gospel. They hit brothers and sisters, demonstrate extreme selfishness at times, and can be unmercifully cruel to playmates. But while these are "transgressions" they are not "sins," because as Mormon points out, children are "not capable of committing sin" (see Moro. 8:8). Much the same is true of those who have reached adulthood but have relatively little or no opportunity to learn the principles of righteousness. They also violate the laws of God, sometimes horribly so, as in the case of many primitive peoples, but they are of necessity judged differently because they do not "sin" in the sense of willing and deliberate rebellion against God. (See Rom. 2:12; D&C 82:3; also Teachings of the Prophet Joseph Smith, comp. Joseph Fielding Smith, Salt Lake City: Deseret Book, 1938, p. 218.)"

So since Adam and Eve did not willfully violate the commandments of God then they made a transgression and thus the fall. One of the natural consequences to the human condition because of Adam's choice was the introduction of death into the world. More importantly we were severed from the presence of God.

Well that is all good and dandy, thanks for the quick lesson in Church Doctrine. Well what is my gripe? My first area of concern is the light in which the choice Adam made is given. Adam was given two choices and made one. It seems that people are of the opinion that it was the best choice or the only choice. I think this is largely due to the wording of lesson 4 and the use of the word benefits. The fact is Adam had two choices either one of which would have led to transgression. It wasn't the best choice it was a choice, a choice that had to be made. I am personally glad that I wasn't the one to be given that choice because well I don't think I could have made either. People point out that because of Adam's choice we have the current plan of salvation and exaltation, thus it was the best choice. In this regard I would like to remind people that nothing is out of the power of God and a different route that preserved our agency and provided for our salvation and exaltation could have been laid out. For if it truly were a choice it could have gone the other way, and I don't see God as one who would gamble on the possibility of failure.

The next issue that is dodged like the plague is why would God put Adam in a situation where he was going to lose no matter what? When asked this question the usual answer is well Adam made the right choice and see how everything works out now? And the class continues without an answer to the question. Once again I would like to restate my opinion that Adam made a choice. One possible answer to the question (which I have yet to discuss in any depth due to dodging of said question) is that maybe God didn't put Adam in that position because of what God was but more because of what Adam was. That is to say, it wasn't that God created, put Adam there and said, do your best which is failure; rather whatever Adam was, it was not enough in the first place so it was impossible for Adam not to fail regardless of the situation created. Adam would fail regardless of what situation created by God because of what Adam was from his first estate. There was a deficiency in Adam and all of us that would prevent us from succeeding. So grace wasn't necessary because of the choice Adam made but because of the inadequacy of what we are. Yeah God's love is deep like that.

Another issue is that of knowledge. In our first estate we chose to go with God and not the Adversary. We were rewarded for that choice by being allowed to be tested and grow on Earth. Well if we chose and the choice meant something doesn't that mean we had a knowledge of good and evil from the get go? So does that mean God took away our knowledge of good and evil? I have to say no because of our belief that Adam gained it when he ate the fruit. So what kind of knowledge of good and evil did we have in our first estate and why is it insufficient for the next estate? This is a serious question for me because if we can learn what the difference is we can learn how to shape our choices so that our understanding of good is magnified and thus our understanding of God.

Mr. Popular

2007-03-19T08:46:00.000-07:00

So contrary to unpopular opinion, being so cold that your body can't sleep even after you haven't slept for a day isn't very cool. However, it can be very funny.

When one is so cold you try all sorts of tricks to ignore the cold. However after time you body just tells you hey buddy you have to get up, I'm not sleeping. Time seems to drag. I think that is the theme for this month, time is dragging.

Twisted Fantasies

2007-03-12T10:52:00.000-07:00

In the middle east and I'm sure everywhere else in the world there is this amazing peach soda.

It comes in about an 8 oz bottle. It's the perfect size for sippin. They come in 6 packs. They have the perfect amount of fizzle mixed with peach sweetness. For someone who doesn't drink spirited beverages I imagine this is the closest thing you could get to a pink champagne. Lately I've been day dreaming about sitting at the edge of Crater Lake (I've never been there adding to the fantasy). There is a steep drop off so I can let my feet dangle in the water. It is about 84 degrees out. I lean back on a rock perfectly positioned to support my back. I can feel the cold water flowing between my toes. I begin sipping the peach soda. This takes about 4 hours or so. Then gently I fall asleep.

I wake up because there is a warm gentle sensation on my feet instead of the cool waters of Crater Lake. Low and behold I'm in a hammock. What is that at my feet but it is wolf, licking my feet. If you have ever heard the audio tapes of the "Little Prince" just go to the episode where the Prince tries to tame a Fox. When you go there you now know the voice of the wolf when it begins to talk to me. It can tell that I'm quit alarmed at my sudden change of environment. The wolf puts me at ease and explains I'm at Canoe Lake in MN. (Canoe Lake National Park has the largest wolf population in the United States.). The wolf who's name is Buck points me to a camp fire where there is a skillet with hash browns on it. You know the sort of soft kind, not the patty kind you get at McDee's (though they are delicious anyways). As I eat my hash browns Buck explains I was brought here because Thomas Jefferson wanted to have a talk with me. I'm like TJ? Isn't he dead? Buck explains that there is a statue of TJ near by that can channel the spirit of Thomas Jefferson. (I know what you all are thinking if this is my day dream why don't I just meet TJ face to face? The answer I just wanted it this way.)

After eating my wonderful breakfast I go to the TJ statue. It stands about three feet high. It doesn't move at all. Then all of a sudden a voice comes out from it. It explains that it is the spirit of Thomas Jefferson. Oddly enough TJ sounds a lot like George Clinton. There we have a long talk about the impacts of the Louisiana Purchase on this nation. After learning a lot about the difficult decision TJ had to make regarding the LA purchase I make my way back to Crater Lake via a transporter device given to me by Spock.

You are so mature, unlucky you.

2007-03-08T04:28:00.000-07:00

You know I find that kids in general give me a lot of faith in good old humanity. There has been a lot of talk among my circle of friends about how different we are. When you look at kids though you see that we have a lot of things in common. Here are some things I've notice:

If you set a kid in any given area for a period of time longer than five minutes they like to throw rocks.
Kids are insanely curious.
No matter what language or culture, when a kid doesn't get what they want, they let out the universal phrase, "awh" usually followed by some other word (in English it is usually man or dad or mom).
Kids can spot a week parent/adult a mile away (weak as in a push over).
Kids in general think it is cool when school is canceled even when it is a bomb threat.
Kids think cows are cool.

There are plenty more but those are the ones I've seen recently. You know Jesus said that (I paraphrase here) that you must be like a child to be a follower of him. When did growing up become so great? Joseph and Mary left childhood Jesus behind and had to go back to get him. Sometimes we forget things and have to return to get our childhood. (Yes I basically stole this idea from a MLK speech so sue me.)

Hey the horse deserved it.

2007-03-01T16:41:00.000-07:00

Well I've had the ability to go online at my leisure now. One consequence of this, I get into obscure news. Sometimes this is a good thing, sometimes not. Don't ask me how I did it but I ran across an author by the name of Kenneth Eng. He use to write for the AsianWeek (online at Asianweek.com). Kenneth is a self proclaimed Asian supremacist (no I am not Kenneth Eng). He has written such articles like: "why white people will always hate Asians", "why I hate Asians", and "why I hate Blacks". The Asian Week got a lot of heat for printing "why I hate Blacks". They deserved all the heat and them some. Just by the titles of the articles you can sort of tell that they are just going to be rubbish. You all know me, I just couldn't help read them. My premonitions about the articles where right, they were rubbish. What got me was that none of the responses to the articles seemed to be adequate. There also seemed to be a lack of understanding about some key issues that go way beyond anything limited to Asian American issues. It sort of pissed me off that no one could tear apart such a poorly written body of work. Then I started thinking could it be that so many people don't understand such basic things that would make the writing of Kenneth Eng clearly crap instead of accused crap. I concluded that people were just to lazy to write a full response to something not really worth any body's time. Because my skills are not good enough to tackle things worth peoples time I decided to address the things not worth people's time. So I would like to write about some of the issues Kenneth brings to the table.

The first question/statement I would like to point to is that the notion of Asian is sort of an antiquated notion. What does one mean by Asian? Does missing a tuck on the eye lid suffice to make one Asian. Do you have to have black hair? Do you have to be from an Asian country? If so is India a part of Asia? How about Russia? It seems that Kenneth and many Asians have fallen into the problem of making a generalization without any clear lines. In fact being Asian is a preoccupation of people in America not Asia. If you go over to anywhere in Asia and ask someone if they are Asian you will probably get the response, "I'm Korean" or "I'm Chinese" or "I'm Tia" etc.

This leads to the second point, you can't be an Asian supremacist. The fact is there are very few unifying social/cultural traits of the group "Asian" in America. Almost all of the similarities are artificial at best and make a poor basis for making a social evaluation. Lets face it a Korean would much rather hate a Japanese person than a white person. Just like in Japan you would be hard pressed to find a Japanese person that would marry a Korean over a white person. Unfortunately a lot of these notions have traveled across the ocean. In the end there are hardly any "Asians" that would consider the whole of "Asians" better than whites. You could be a Korean supremacist but not an Asian. This is just the tip of the iceberg of intra-Asian relations.

Third Kenneth makes a point of Asians sucking up to whites. One example he points to are Asians that speak with a British accent to sound more sophisticated. See the thing is everyone, whites included, speak with a British accent to sound more sophisticated. The problem here is that Kenneth seems to think that it is a bad thing for one culture to accept and ingrate a better aspect of another culture. What you say a culture can be better than another in certain respects? I figured Kenneth being a supremacist and all could have figured that one on his own. For instance if it is my culture to rob people, or burn the wives of a husband on a funeral pyre, or to do honor rapes, I think my culture could be vastly improved by adopting another culture's view on such topics. I believe it imperative that one evaluate the aspect itself to conclude if it is a positive trait to adopt. Does that mean the original culture is changed/diluted/lost? Yes but culture for culture's sake is of little value. Diversity for diversity's sake is of little value (not valueless). We have to ask does it provide benefits to society. This brings me to a topic that was lightly covered in a previous series of post involving racism, but the horse doesn't deserve that much.

Fourth Kenneth points to Asians lacking honor. He point to Asians being rather complacent about protecting one's self and standing up for "our community". The oddest thing is he points to the Japanese samurai as an example of honor. You got to be kidding me the samurai, really? I think Kenneth has been watching to many movies made by the white man about the samurai. The reality is that the samurai during the Tokugawa period were nothing but bureaucrats. These bureaucrats made it a practice to live off the broken backs of the peasant. Yes the samurai could have a peasant executed no reason at all. Most samurai were cowards. You know who did most of the war fighting in feudal Japan? The answer is, not the samurai. These are the same group of people that would have a peasant held so he could test his sword out on him. Yep a lot of honor there. Yeah and when the samurai did fight they weren't the most honorable of people. You know who most of the ninjas were? If you guessed samurai you may be on to something. This relates to another of Kenneth's points: black people are weak willed because they were enslaved for over 300 years. Sorry to say the vast majority of "Asians" were enslaved till after WWII. Now does that mean the samurai are of no value? No it just means that there are good things and bad things about every culture and sub group.

Lastly Kenneth's points seem to boil down to everybody hates Asians so Asians should hate back. No Kenneth everybody hates white people. Check that rich white people. Kenneth points to personal experiences of hatred. I got news for you Kenneth, everyone, including white people have suffered hatred of the sort you describe. A question you might want to ask is when was the last time being "Asian" negatively effected you during a job interview? How about getting into college? I have long contended that everyone is racist so we should just admit it and deal with it. Everyone one makes snap decisions about other people, the question is are we allowed to change or reinforce those decisions based upon our merits. If you look at our "Asian" average income and college attendance rates I think you can see where I'm going.

Unfortunately I am probably suffering from what every other person who bothered to respond to Kenneth Eng suffered from. Because while I could write another 5000 words about how poorly written Kenneth Eng's articles are (including style points) I just ran out of motivation. One last note as an Asian people we seriously need to get over our addiction to pop music. Come on enough is enough. I'm begging you please on my knees.

Curse the Girl Scouts

2007-02-26T06:51:00.000-07:00

I have been trying to eat health the last couple of weeks or so. I really don't have a huge choice as to what I eat but I try. This eating health usually consists of eating more veggies and eating less needed things like cakes and ice cream. Recently a work buddy of mine just recieved over 200 boxes of Girl Scout cookies in the mail. I took some of the boxes as a gift even though I kept thinking this is a bad idea. As I was on the internet oddly enough, I opened a box and ate one, then two, then three, a whole box of cookies. I wondered, "what am I actually doing?" So I decided to read the nutrition facts. Apparently I just consumed over 200% of my daily saturated fat and over a thousand calories. So what did I do when I discovered such information? Come on do you really have to ask? Yep I shrugged my shoulders and opened up another box.

I have to tip my hat to the Girl Scouts. KFC's Colonel has nothing on these ladies. Whatever secert ingredient that the Colonel puts into his chicken to make you crave for it daily is nothing close to the cookies. Also you feel kind of bad if you don't eat them. I'm looking at a box right now and there is a picture of girls learning how to train and handle owls! How cool is that! I want girls to learn how to handle birds of prey. With a motto like, "Courage, Confidence, Character" you have to eat the cookies. Hey I want young girls to grow up to be women of bravery, confidence, and principles. I gotta eat those cookies. Come on all those hopes, dreams, and smiles on the box can only happen if I open it up, right?!? Heck the box is even made out of 100% recycled paper. This is a win win situation. I don't smoke so my arteries can take a slight hit. It is my duty to sacrifice a little to gain so much. Hey I know what you are thinking, I'm trying to shake responsibility for eating over 2000 calories and 400% of my saturated fate intake for the day. The truth couldn't be farther, I'm taking credit for it. Curse you Girl Scouts putting me in this impossible position to do good with bad. Or is it doing bad for good. Hey now they are getting into my racket!

If one of my childhood heroes wans't the Cookie Monster then I think I would have some serious ideological problems. But luckly C is for Courage, Confidence, Character and . . . Cookie? Well that is good enough for me.

Spread the Poverty

2007-02-21T14:58:00.000-07:00

I just read an article in Scientific American. The article pointed to evidence that when people think about money or are introduced to stimuli that would invoke thoughts of money one becomes less likely to ask for help or to help other people. I thought the result was fairly interesting but not all that shocking. After I thought about it for some time I noticed an oddity about the study, there seems to be a link between asking for help and having a desire to help other people.

This seemed very counter intuitive to me. For the most part, the people I know that help people the most are least likely to ask or accept help from another. I have always attributed this character flaw to a bit of hypocrisy in all of us. I think the core of is one is to prideful to accept help as it seems like a weakness and one is willing to give help as it seems like a strength. So it is OK for others to be weak but not me. This of course is never really the case as asking and accepting help often requires one to swallow ones pride, or deal with some other fear of inadequacy; in such the asking requires more strength than most acts. It is those acts which dominated the urges that would hinder self improvement that require the most strength.

But I digress. I have long thought that not asking for help was fundamentally an issue of pride and fear. After much thinking and a deeper understanding of the article in Scientific American it has become clear to me that not asking for help is fundamentally an issue of greed. When one helps others one gets the benefit of altruism. When one does not allow others to help them one denies that gift of altruism to others. That seems quit selfish to me. I get to enjoy the benefits of being benevolent but you don't. I can not view that as anything else but hording. Thinking of money instinctively brought about selfish behavior in the study, one of which was not asking for help. I remember a long long time ago I said to someone, "Hey sometimes you have to serve by letting yourself be served."

Alls well that ends well

2007-02-13T08:14:00.000-07:00

First I would like to say I'm not a communist or a communist sympathizer. With that being said I would like to make a grip about capitalism. There is this general notion in a capitalistic system that all things can be boiled down to capital. In most cases this is true. A house can be converted into capital thus be transferred to cars or a wide variety of things. Heck capital can even be converted into some non materialistic things such as feelings of enjoyment and such. Now comes my grip; the notion time is money and money is time. I agree that time does equal money. The more time you invest in obtaining capital the more money you will probably get. However, this does not mean that once you get that capital you can regain or buy that time back at a later period. Granted there are things that capital can buy that will maximize you time, but time spent is time spent you don't get it back. So where am I going with this you may wonder. Prepare for the rabbit hole. . .

Next I would like to talk about holistic health. (how are these topics related? Just stick with me on this.) I would like to define what I consider holistic health. Holistic health to me is realizing that all aspects of you life effect your health. That is to say your social relationships have just as much bearing on your over all health as how many miles a week you run. What holistic health isn't to me is the use of crystals and snake oil to cure negative health conditions. Don't get me wrong I think alternative medicine has a great role in one's overall health, but when it comes to needing a kidney transplant you need to see a doctor. I've also noticed the aspect of alternative medicine that seems to be most successful are areas regarding pain management. Pain management is a huge deal in overall health. In order to have a holistic approach to health you have to fix and develop your non health related fields in order to be healthy. Some of these fields include increasing your faith, developing meaningful ties with your family and friends, etc.

So how does my grip with capitalism and holistic health relate? The answer is one word marketing. Lately holistic health has been associated with the concept of wellness. Because of this there has been a flood of wellness products that have arisen. Hey feeling a little unwell, then just take a sip of this new wellness drink and you'll be ok! Better yet spend the weekend at this wellness spa and it will magically erase the fact you have ignored your health for the past six months! We have gotten to the point where we think that if we work 70 hours a week that you can buy your health back. The problem is that your holistic health takes time and work. No amount of capital will replace that. You can't buy a 3 mile run every day. You can't buy being there for your kids. You can't buy having conversations with your parents. You can't buy going on that hike (but you can buy some really good hiking trips, but you still have to go on them). No amount of wellness products and services are going to replace the core of holistic health. You have to place your health as a priority. That takes time and often a lot of work. In these times we have become so accustomed to being able to buy something and/or have it quickly that we forget there are no capital solutions to the human being.

The Hype

2007-02-09T06:46:00.000-07:00

A long long time ago I use to debate which band was the greatest of all time. Now you might observe I am not a musician of any sort or a historian in the area of music and if you haven't I'm confessing it now. Needless to say due to my complete lack of qualifications and the complete lack of qualifications of the people I associated with there was virtually no meaningful products of these debates. One comment does stick out in my mind however, "Led Zeppelin is the most overrated band of all time, it doesn't take away from the fact that they are the greatest of all time."

This statement lead to a vast new way of thinking for me. The concept is simple, one could be overrated and yet still be the best. For instance one could think that Michelle Jordan was the greatest basketball player ever and still overate his ability to win the game. One of the problems with being overrated even if you are the best people tend to get a warped image of you, and in turn a lot of unfair criticism comes your way. I think the United States is in this boat. We are overrated, lets face it. We are no longer the industry leaders in a lot of sectors, and our social stats in certain areas are less than what could be. However this does not mean that the United States isn't the greatest country here on Earth. It just means we've been hyped and now the illusion of the hype is fading away. Personally I'm glad the hype is going away. So what wisdom can we derive from this? None. There is nothing from the fading hype that will help us. So why bother blog about this you jerkface? First it's my blog and I blog what I want. Second this just gives me a perspective on the next big hype, China.

Yep China is the next big hype. Don't get me wrong I think China is an amazing country filled with potential and will have a huge impact on the world. I also think China is hyped just like us, or US err whatever. So what advice do I have for China? Get ready for the criticism. You thought the rest of the world was tough on you before, just wait. You need to do this, you need to do that. You will never make it so everyone will be happy, and some how everything will be your fault.

You know they say that China is the next super power that will match the US supposed hegemony over the world. I can't wait.

The Most Dangerous Game

2007-02-04T15:52:00.000-07:00

I love water. Water is a great thing. I love the ocean, lakes, rivers, and drinking water. As with the rest of life your love can be the one that hurts the most. I remember back in the day I use to play this game called gulp poker. Since the group decided not to bet money we would bet drinks of water. (Neither I or my friends were into drinking spirited beverages.) I'm also a horrible poker player, but in this area I have a lot of wealth. Yes I can drink a lot of water. One game my friend/nemesis(at the time) got me pretty good on one hand. I ended up drinking so much water that I threw up, well water. Now you would think that my water stupidity would end there; oh how little you know me if you thought so. I've discovered a new game. The game is called lets drink all the water in the buffalo (or whatever ride you are in). Now the game starts to really get interesting when you load about 24-30 liters of water in said pimpin ride. I ended up drinking 7 liters of water in one sitting. Needless to say this is a stupid game, but hey it's what I do.

Greed is Good

2007-01-29T11:14:00.000-07:00

When does one draw the line when it comes to being happy with your level of self improvement?

I have noticed a trend in my life; I'm never happy with the level of developent in my life. The question becomes is this a bad thing? I know that there are a lot of people out there who are of the philosophy that you have to be happy with you. I understand this line of thinking but I can't help thinking that with this as your guiding principle it is easy to become complacent about where you are in life. Is it good to be unhappy or uncontent about yourself if it pushes you to be a better person; you know the best you can be? I understand that one has to temper this with patience and a lot of wisdom. But I can help thinking about what Lance Armstrong said, patience didn't get me over that mountain (I paraphrase). Is it good to be a person who is never satisfied with where they are in life if it drives them to be better? Can one be unhappy with oneself yet still enjoy the simple pleasures in life? I think it can as I have done so. I have this feeling that the answers to these questions are more of degree than kind.

Miranda I think we should see other people.

2007-01-20T07:22:00.000-07:00

What seems like ages ago I attended law school. While I was there I had the luck of having then Prof, now judge Paul Cassell as my criminal law instructor. I believe Judge Cassell to be the UofU school of law's best professor (not necessarily my favorite). He was the most academically versed and yet still approachable. To say the least I enjoyed his class even while squandering my time at the law school. Judge Cassell has held some very controversial views which those who don't read his arguments would say "this man is insane". However when you read his arguments you get this strange sense that that well he could be right. At the least you walk away thinking well he's wrong but he has a really good point. In fact one of my good friends, let's call him Beef Jerky, after reading Cassell's arguments for capital punishment almost changed sides (for a brief second).

One of Judge Cassell's stances that I use to completely disagree with was that regarding Miranda. In the Article "The Statute That Time Forgot: 18 U.S.C Section 3501 and the Overhauling of Miranda" some basic points were laid out for the legal reasoning behind opposing Miranda. Since this article was written pre SC Dickerson it doesn't mean a whole lot in the way of legal argument (as now the matter is settled). However at the end of the article the argument was made that Miranda as caused a good amount of social harm. I remember in another article written by Cassell (I forget which, and do not have the resources to look it up, or am to lazy; you decide) he mentioned the hindering effect Miranda had on police officers from getting confessions that would absolve other people under police suspicion. Another issue under examination was how much Miranda violations directly lead to false convictions. So this got me thinking, maybe Miranda isn't what it is cracked up to be. A lot of my reservation on the issue is due to the fact that the numbers are under heavy dispute and it seems no consensus is coming (once again lazy or lack of resources you decide).

I however do have a lot of reservations about even thinking about reviewing my Miranda stance. Some questions arise that weren't answered by either side. One of the most compelling was when suspects were properly Mirandized how many were false convicted? Also how many had civil rights abuse when Mirandized? In my magical world of futurama, every suspect has a lawyer right next to them during every aspect of the adverse process. Then again would that hinder investigations as well? I suppose a lot more work needs to be done on the impacts of Miranda before we can even talk about Miranda's social impact and what we are willing to pay to keep it or have it go. Then again there is probably a better scheme that nobody has bothered to come up with yet.

Sports Fatigue

2007-01-16T14:17:00.000-07:00

Have you ever watched so much ESPN that you thought "I can't possibly watch another episode of the same Sports Center agian." ?

Then have you ever just powered through for three hours just to see if Sports Center has changed? As you are watching it you realize that it is the same episode of Sports Center that you watched just three hours ago. Then you watch the same episode regardless?

I had a random thought. This was a cool movie schene; Crocodile Dundee the last schene where Mick is about to go on a walk about and the female love interest has to use a relay yell across a crowded NYC subway. Yeah that schene was great.

The difference of being different

2007-01-12T10:36:00.000-07:00

I have been writing a friend of mine, lets call him little roster served with beef jerky gravy and a side of leaves. During the course of our conversation she (hey fishes change sex so can my friend pronouns) mentioned that one of his past friends had gone down a slippery slope into a life less desired. At the root of our non in depth discussion was why and how often people make such choices. The overall sense was that of fustration.

The first thing I'd like to touch on is greatness. A good friend of mine, lets call him island, gave me some good advice. Greatness doesn't come from doing that one great thing, it comes by preparing to do that one great thing every day with the little things. I derived a corollary from that; the things that effect your life greatly aren't the few big choices, but the small ones you make on a daily basis. As I have aged some, choices like: which school am I going to, what is my major going to be, what am I going to do for grad school, what is my career going to be, and so on have had very little impact on who I view myself to be. Further these big choices have even less impact on who I want to be. Don't get me wrong there are some big choices that will effect who you are greatly, like hey lets have a baby. So what does this have to do with people not living the most desirable life or how does this apply? My contention is this, people sell those little things for what they think are great things.

I don't like to use examples but I'm not feeling paticularly abstract at this time so here you get one. As some of you know, I have what most people would consider some odd religious tenets. I have at one time or another violated nearly every tenet of my faith. That's just a fact I can't hide it. But enough of that lets talk about me being obedient for a change. I've come across a new set of people due to my work. Due to the nature of my work you have to hang out with those you work with; it just wouldn't be good if you didn't. One of my tenets is thou shall not not drink spirited beverages. The vast majority of my new friends drink alcoholic beverages. Some of these new friends are of the exact same faith as me (go figure small world). When we go out there is a lot of drinking. People at the very start asked if I would like a drink, and often became rather pushy on the subject. Being the DD gave me a quick out. However after the first few times I just started letting my position known, I don't drink spirited beverages. I just like saying/writing spirited beverages. Anyways, people still asked all the time. However, as time wore on they realized I wasn't going to bend on this so they stopped. Another interesting trend, as they realized I wasn't going to bend on the issue I got asked to hang out even more where no DD was necessary. What happened instead of my new friends viewing me as a up tight stick in the mud, a foundation of respect had developed for the choice I had made. I understand for someone battling substance abuse this would be a huge choice, but for me not drinking is such a small thing. This respect translated into me being well liked by my friends. Well that and I'm really realy good looking and that's what counts in life.

So lets juxtapose this with one of my new friends of the same faith. I'll call her number one. Number one wanted all of us to like and include her in all the activities we hand planed. He was in a new environment and wanted some people he could bond with. If you hung around people who drink before there are a lot of "drunken stories". So when number one was presented with, "hey just have one drink, join us in the fun!" number one decided to partake of the sacrament of porcelain. Needless to say one drink led to another, on time drinking led to another. Another interesting thing happened, number one started to get alienated from the group. She was viewed as crazy and unstable (even though his behavior was exactly the same as everyone who drank). When I mentioned we should include number one on events people raied a brow every time. They didn't want to do it. Even though number one was a part of so many, I'm talking a lot here, of those drinking stories no bonding happened.

In this example I saw that somebody had traded a little principle of daily living for something they perceived to be great, the bonding and fellowship of friends. The situation worsened and number one's life slowly but surely slipped. Don't get me wrong I'm an idiot and have my fair share of slips. But when I don't slip on the daily little things is when I see my life taking shape. The things in my life for the most part are not defined by the big choices I have made but the small rules I have obeyed or disobeyed. I have so much more to say about this topic but my fingers are tired and many better than I have said much to cover the topic.

What I think about in the shower.

2007-01-07T05:03:00.000-07:00

Where I am at right now I am constantly surrounded by people. Generally that is not a bad thing as I like people. However I do like to have moments of solitude. Solitude gives me time to reflect on the things that move my life, inspire me, and in general develops the big picture perspectives that will probably dominate the little things in my life. One place nobody will talk to you and where you can get some alone time is the shower. It just seems odd to talk to someone as they are getting ready to and taking a shower. So what has been on my mind as of late?

The thing that constantly keeps coming up in my mind is the Sudan. I've been tracking this issue/area for some years now. I'm nowhere near an expert on the region. But it is a compelling issue. I remember at one time Will and I had a four hour plus conversation about the Sudan being on the UN human rights council. Granted it was a mix of topics but, the catalyst for the talk was what was going on in the Sudan. I have also been impressed by Time's early (relatively speaking) response to what has been going on in Dafur. The issue itself has been leading me to draw some conclusions about humanity, the region, and the people of the United States. So what's been going on in Sudan?

To say the situation is complicated would be an understatement. Sudan is divided into three regions: North, South, and West (Dafur). The gist of it is this, the North has had most of the infastructure and money. Using it's money it has gone and developed military power. In that process due to drought a land war ensued between the North and South. The problem was further exastrabated when oil became an issue in the South. The South developed militia and warlords to counter the aggression of the North. Until recently the South was a war zone. The North was unable to maintain military operations in the South. The zone was left in shambles. Now there is a ounce of stability in the South. The South has a vote coming up on whether or not they will be a part of the Sudan or their own country. The South has the largest oil reserves in the region. The only way the South gets to hold this vote is if it can maintain subility until the vote. Current proxy fights are on the rise in the South. Oil development has mainly been backed by the Chinese and has been an economic boom to the North (however everyone and there dog has their hand in the cookie jar). The picture is much worse in Dafur. The conflict eventually made its way to Dafur. The North used its troops and a proxy called the janjaweed to do the business of genocide. Some estimates have totaled the death count at 300,000. I believe the number is lower than that but not by much. According to some figures over a million people have been displaced from their homes and are now unwelcome refugees. These refugees have an increased mortality rate and more or less live in misery. The important thing is that genocide is happening/happened. If you are reading this I'm pretty sure that you know about the Sudan and that I've glossed over how bad it really is. So what does this mean to me?

The Sudan has been more of a back drop for my thinking than anything else. There have been many excuses used to explain why we (the United States) haven't done anything: the AU is already on it (yes but they are failing and have admitted so), we simply don't have the resources to commit to the area, the situation is to complicated and a wait an see approach might be the best option (unfortunately I think this might have some truth to it), and the list goes on and on. Regardless of the force of these excuses I have been drawing some conclusions that I hope are not true. A while a go the situation in Rwanda set off an outrage in the US. Congressmen said that this must never happen again. In fact if you ask, most people would say that genocide should be stopped. So what's the deal?

Even if all the excuses for action where taken away I am beginning to believe that the US would still do nothing. I'd hoped that such was not the character of my nation, but I am starting to lose faith. Harry Reid stated that US troops should only be used to ensure American interest. I've always had mixed views about Mr. Reid. But his statement I think is emblematic of the way this country feels. Hey if it going to cost us something then forget it. This lead me to believe that genocide to this country is like a piece of really expensive furniture that is horrible. Nobody likes to look at it in the house, but nobody wants to go through the effort and cost of getting rid of it. Simply put all that talk about Rwanda was just lip service. We say those things because we know in our hearts that is what is right. At the end of the day however, we choose not to listen to our inner light and choose to wallow in the filth that has become our comfortable lives. Ed Murrow feared that TV would be used to insulate us from horrible things. He felt that the networks were wrong to think that people didn't want to see or hear about horrible things. He feared that the networks would only shield us from seeking our light. I fear that Mr. Murrow as wrong about the people. How much shame does it take for action? I know this, we can do something but we choose not to because the cost is to high. But what is that cost? I believe it to be comfort. We have sold our integrity and honor for a cushion and laughs. I hope I'm wrong.

On the plus side the US government has pledged $40 million in political and humanitarian aid for the area. I think however that money is not going to solve the problem, and I hope that it is not a way for use to silence our guilt with dollars.

Artifical Flavor Isn't Bad

2004-11-04T02:10:00.000-07:00

Due to circumstances I have no control over, well actually I have complete control over them but that's besides the point; I will no longer be able to post regularly on this blog after the the 17th of November. Not that the number of post were prolific in the first place.

Since I am an arogant jerk, I've come to rather like this creation of mine and consider it of some value. So I will keep alive as much as I can. In order to continue the blog production at a health rate I've decided to assemble a team to post in my pseudo absence. I've already asked two people that I know, though I don't know if they knew I asked them. If you would like to be on the team please email me and mention the things you would like to talk about. Now granted you can just create your own blog, but what's the fun in that? Seriously.

Your Heart is Where Your Body Goes

2004-10-28T13:12:00.000-07:00

The last week has been a very trying and stressful time. It's a good kind of stress. Everything important in my life has come under some kind of examination. Progress has been made by hard work and a lot of sleepless nights. Everything from my religious views to my own mortality as been ran through my mind. I've been gathering from my friends that for some reason a lot of other people were in a similar situation. I've come to one recommondation. For the next little while do something completely unrelated.

Remember why you work so hard at becoming a better person. Enjoy what humanity and this world has to offer. If you have an art musem close by, go to it. Wander around and just smile as you see how wonderful we are at creating beauty. Go to a library, take in the smell of books. Be puzzled that there are so many stories that exist. Enjoy the changing of the seasons. Walk somewhere new or old. Take it in with bright eyes. Remember the smell, the colors, the earth under your feet. Notice the little things on your walk; how unique the insects are, if they still are around. Listen to some good music. Don't listen to it to distract you from something else, listen to it. Don't let it be a part of another activity, make it the sole activity. Enjoy the sounds, and if there are words enjoy the poet. Look up into the sky on occasion. Remember God is an artist. Enjoy his work. I love it at night. Let all your senses be alert so that your heart can know where you are.

Fall Says the Oddest Things

2004-10-23T12:21:00.000-07:00

My mind was walking and a fall Leaf touched my nose. I made this comment:

Jimmy Carter was the peanut man,
He believed they could do anything and they can.

If this sounds like a strange acid trip I'm sorry. Let's just say I have my reasons. But seriously look at the post below.

God be Willing

2004-10-23T04:24:00.000-07:00

Will’s position was the most difficult to write a response to. One of the things that made it difficult was I kept thinking Will isn’t really right, but he’s not really wrong either. I’ve decided to split Will’s position into three parts: the source of racism, the solutions to racism, and Will’s token Dan is wrong argument. I think I would have to talk to Will in a round about way before I could generate any sufficient answers to my questions regarding Will’s position. That’s generally how Will and I converse about most issues. As such more will probably be said during the comments section than the actual post. But before all of that a couple of clarifying notes.

First if it hasn’t been made clear by now this string of posts is not talking about overt racism. Nor is the purpose of this string of posts to generate some standard to call other people racist by. These posts were intended to help me (and anyone else) better recognize racist tendencies and notions that might be hiding within me (or yourself). Ultimately these posts hopefully generated some food for thought that would help you become a better person. I know that thanks to the responses a great amount of clarity has been reached for me (though far short from where I need to be) and I think I now have the basic tools to really start addressing this issue in my life. (Not that I hadn’t been addressing it previously, but now I can do so much more rigorously than before.) One issue that was not addressed as much as I would like was the issue of how one balances the celebration of differences, and the (for lack of a better term) entrenchment of differences. I feel Will’s point three sort of address the issue so I’ll leave it up to the comment section to flush it out if need be. Well on to Will’s observations.

Will points to the source of what might be the basis for humans developing some of our notions about race. From what I got from Will’s response I gather that when we start making classifications based on day-to-day experiences we tend to give people that are similar to us the benefit of the doubt. I think it is implied that this is not the sole source of our racial notions. My first question is sort of a abstract one and might not do a lot of people any pragmatic good (but you know what it’s my blog and I haven’t gotten any complaints so I’m going to do whatever I feel like.). By saying that we in general give people that are more similar to us the benefit of the doubt; does this imply that we are hard wired for racism? That is our minds work in a way that by default will form more favorable opinions about people that look like us (or are similar) than people who are different. It seems odd to me that human beings would have a genetic disposition that would be so far from the real truth of the world. I can see how humans might have evolved into such a state, but saying humans are hard wired for racism seems unacceptable to me. I’m also having trouble establishing when the leap happens from giving people who look like me (by look like me I mean similar to me) the benefit of the doubt to developing negative notions about other people. The concept of benefit of the doubt does work in a lot of instances but what about instances where nobody is like you. Do you think that being alone where everyone is different than you increase or decrease the likelihood of developing racist ideas? An example would be a black person who had to live in an all white town. Would that black person have a greater likely hood of developing a notion that all white people hate black people? Another source of racial notions are ones that are taught. I think that this is a larger source of racial notions than any other. Do you agree with this assessment? If you do then are these racial notions more like indoctrination, or do you think that we give deference to people that would teach us these ideas because people who tend to teach racist notions about other people tend to be similar to you? Another difficulty is where do positive yet harmful notions come from? An instance would be the idea all Asians are good at math. If we give the benefit of the doubt to people that are similar to us then how do these notions develop? Once again please forgive me for being hard to follow, it’s just the way Will and I tend to converse about issues.

Will’s second part of his response was a suggestion about how to address the racist notions that we might develop or currently have. Will’s basic advice is we should focus on the similarities we all have. I have some concerns about this approach. Granted my instincts tell me that this approach is right, but as stated earlier my instincts tell me it’s wrong as well. First by focusing on similarities do we lose sight of the value of diversity? That is if we are always focusing on why we are similar isn’t there a tendency to under appreciate the variety that makes us or other groups special? A corollary question is if we keep focusing so hard on the things that make us similar do we become insensitive to the differences that are a concern to people who are different?

Will’s third section is his token objection to Dan’s point of view. Not that the argument is a token argument, or that Will and Dan always disagree. It’s just that the three of us, Dan, Will, and Me are bound to be wrong about something, so it’s just inevitable that the three of us will find something to disagree about. But I think that this is a good thing. My only issues/questions are dealing with criteria and evaluation of usefulness. How do you judge if an institution is inclusive? Also if an institution is inclusive, when does it outlive its usefulness? I think that the Tuskeegee Airmen story is an African-American story. If it weren’t about race then it would have been no different than any other story in the war. In other words if the Tuskeegee Airmen weren’t black would the story been as important? I think the answer is no. It’s not about black people flying; it’s about black people overcoming adversity, adversity that was caused by an idea rooted in a lie.

Jimmy's Definition is "Dan"gerous

2004-10-15T02:10:00.000-07:00

I think the concerns in Dan’s response are strong concerns. In fact I share all of them. There is a strong pejorative meaning to being a racist. I also think that the negative connotations associated with being a racist are a good thing. I also think that if we throw the words racist and racism around in a non-serious fashion we dilute the impact of the negativity surrounding those words.

I do think that Dan’s position would agree though that it is a good thing to examine one’s self to see if one has racism or anything else that is bad in them. So if one is taking a serious look at one’s inside (for lack of a better word), and looking at some things and saying to one’s self that those things might be racist, I don’t think one dilutes the power of the word racist. To me the dilution comes when one says, “hey I have a racist tendency and I’m ok with it.” It’s not the identification of racism, but the lack of desire to improve as a person that dilutes the power associated with the word racism.

I am unclear as to your position on this statement; it is possible to have some racism in you but still not be a racist. I know I didn’t make it clear from my original post, but this was the underlying assumption. For instance, I can think all Asians like to eat rice. That idea might be racist (I really don’t know if it is or not), but I wouldn’t consider anyone that held that view to be a racist. My concern is where you (by you I mean I) draw the line between having racism inside of you and being a racist. For instance is it racist to feel uncomfortable around black men? Is it racist to avoid black neighborhoods? Is it racist to not date Mexican men because you feel that they won’t be faithful? There are the obvious cases such as the advocating of violence or denial of rights based on race. It’s the close calls that concern me. I find it difficult to make a line in the close cases. My strategy has been to try and eliminate all racism in me so that I never have to consider the line. Another aspect of drawing the line, to me racism depends a lot on intent. I think if you hold a belief because you feel by mere status of your race (whatever that notion is) you are better than another that is racism. But if you do it out of ignorance, I don’t know what to say on that.

On your second disagreement to my position, I think I should clarify. I think you might have misread or over applied what I was getting at. I completely agree with your statements: “The fact is that there are eternal truths.” “We should not be afraid to stand up and say X is wrong”. I completely agree that one should criticize cultures for doing evil acts. I think we need to understand the justifications for the practices before you make a judgment on it. Or in other words we need to make an informed judgment. For instance the Inuit culture’s practice of infanticide might have existed because everyone else would have died without it. Does it justify the practice? I’m going to say no but there are certainly arguments of its justification that extend beyond the mere “it’s my culture” argument.

The dilemma that enters my mind from your second response is when can we say someone is evil? For instance, there is a strong cultural norm for men in Mexico to have affairs on their wives. Both of our positions can agree that this social norm is wrong and evil. I feel very comfortable calling the men that do this evil. I think it is possible to draw a distinction between thinking someone is evil and hating them. In my faith I am called to love especially those people. When you apply your standard can you call these men evil when they continue the practice? Another example is a culture that says its ok to force sex on your wife (or Rape). I have no problem calling those who practice rape on one’s spouse evil. It would be different in some instances where the person did it and stopped doing it (don’t get me wrong the act is still evil, but I would find it harder to call the person evil). But I think in the cases where there is a social norm of rape or adultery and the person conforms to the social norm I have no problem calling them evil. Do you advocate calling the practice evil and the person not evil in these instances? Do you think you can call someone evil, period? If so what is your criteria? These are sort of unfair questions, as I have not answered them myself. But I think they are questions I need to ask to flesh out your stance.

You also made a third statement about exclusive groups. I think that exclusion, as rule is bad. I don’t think “pride” groups are necessarily bad. One good example of this is Bruce Lee. Bruce Lee (the man, the legend) advocated Chinese people taking pride in what the culture was about. The purpose of the pride though was to unite Chinese people and then teach it to others. People don’t fear what they know and understand according to Bruce. To unify so that one can show the beauty of the culture is a good thing. So any “pride” groups is a good thing if its goal is to unify a group so it can show how beautiful it is to the rest of the world. You probably feel the same way but I thought I’d just clarify this viewpoint.

Lastly there are a slew of things that really didn’t fit anywhere under your response but I think your response sort of touched on them. The primary focus of my post was to try and see how we as individuals can be better people. It wasn’t to try and develop some standard by which we judge other people. I was hoping that by this kind of discussion everyone could come up with a more thoughtful standard to apply to himself or herself (this will be discussed in the post regarding Will’s response a bit more). I see your point about by definition being too broad. You don’t have to use the word racist or racism. I think that those words are the closest approximation though. Now it is being judgmental as well but I think racism is a sub category of judgmental. I think that there is a lot of common ground between Dan’s and my point of view. However, I do feel the issues that Dan addressed (while extremely important) do little to shed light on the primary issue in the original post. What about those evaluations that are almost fundamentally just matters of preference? Beauty is a prime example. For example I know a woman that thinks white is an ugly color and thinks that brown skin is much more beautiful. I consider that racist. But that consideration is based purely on a gut feeling. I’m not comfortable basing my evaluation of racism on a gut feeling. It’s hard for me because the evaluation (or judgment) isn’t about good or evil rather it's about preference. I just don’t have a clue as to how to articulate in a logical way my gut feelings about these kinds of evaluations.

Hume's Principle of Anonymous Causation

2004-10-08T02:05:00.000-07:00

My last post generated some interesting comments. All the responses were well thought out and had strong arguments. I think this was due to the ability of the issues in the post to help us be better people. I’m writing this post in response to the three viewpoints advanced by the comments. My hope is that members of these three viewpoints (not necessarily the authors) can clarify some questions I had regarding their positions. Also I would like this post to provide some inspiration to the three viewpoints, maybe helping to further clarity your point or expanding the ideas in them to situations you may not have contemplated. I’ve labeled the viewpoints as the following (because I can): Hume’s Principle of Anonymous Causation, God be Willing, and Jimmy’s Definition is “Dan”gerous. I plan to make three posts, one addressing each viewpoint. Well on to the viewpoints.

People of Hume’s Principle of Anonymous Causation:

I think for the most part you are correct in the assertion that knowledge of the physical world is done via induction. I don’t want to get into a huge debate between Hume, Kant, and Wittgenstein (and other assorted people only geeks read) regarding the nature of knowledge. It is enough to say that in regards to how we formulate opinions about a certain group of people I think your position is correct. However this doesn’t answer the following issues:

1) Now that we know how our ideas about groups of people are derived are we slaves to that idea (classification)? Or are we free to modify them? Not the lip service modify, but a true change in the nature of our what we believe to be true.

2) If we can modify then should we modify them? If we should, under what conditions should we?

3) This still doesn’t address evaluative assertions about objective facts that have been associated with a group. For instance all people of religion X have hairstyle Y (say it’s a fact proven by excommunication if you don’t have hairstyle Y). By definition if you don’t have hairstyle Y you are not a part of religion X. Then you make the evaluation I think hairstyle Y is ugly, so people in religion X look ugly. People being in X or having hairstyle Y is an objective fact. Something being ugly is an evaluation completely independent of fact. When should we be concerned about those kinds of evaluations?

Your response also mentioned the topic of dispelling simpler stereotypes. The two examples you pointed out I think can easily be dispelled by facts. For instances you could look up accident statistics or the percentage of people who are terrorist in relation to population. As with most “simpler stereotypes” I think mere fact finding and evaluation will dispel the stereotypes. The issue that concerns me isn’t stereotypes so much as the evaluations we make on the stereotypes. (See unanswered question 3) Now I know that stereotypes are a serious issue but the focus of my post was to ponder the question of evaluations.

On your issue of being offended at good willed intentions, I first have to quote my friend. My friend lets call them, Beef Jerky stated while we were watching the God Father 1, “the pathway to Hell is paved with good intentions.” Cloaking bad judgments in the guise of good intentions does a couple of dangerous things. Fist it lets the person doing things that might be hurt full to perpetuate the action. Second it gives the person who is making bad judgments a cover so they don’t’ have to evaluate their thoughts, they can simply go on not having any motivation to improve.

I have an example to ponder; most of the facts will be made up so bare with me. Peggy is the most popular girl in her high school. She’s beautiful everyone loves her. (I know people should be loved for their minds but we are talking about high school). A new girl moves into town. She’s from a land far away where the people of her land shave half of their head. Everyone as school is sort of weirded out by this new girl. She has a hard time making friends. Well our hero Peggy decides to help. She befriends our new girl. In fact she decides to take her shopping to buy her some clothes so she can fit in better. Our new girl is very thankful. Peggy decides to take it up a notch, she says to our new girl, lets go get your hair fixed; your people would be pretty if you didn’t cut your hair that way. Now if we retreat to good intentions we shouldn’t be offended at Peggy. Nor should Peggy have any problems, her heart was in the right place. It seems that good intentions insulates the individual from searching deep and improving as a person in this instance.

The next viewpoint to be addressed will be Jimmy’s Definition is “Dan”gerous. Please stay tuned.

Thin Line Between Love and Hate

2004-10-06T00:30:00.000-07:00

I had a conversation with a friend (we will call them Leaf) of mine, sort of on the spur. We were driving and Leaf made an observation about a person and instantly mentioned how racist Leaf’s observation/thought was. We talked and concluded we all (yes that includes me) have racist stereotypes. Leaf agreed, and we didn’t really talk about it in any depth. I think it was because for the most part the observation/thought by Leaf was rather benign. But my mind kept on churning. A conflict arose in my mind; I wasn’t able to yield anything insightful to say; and because of how complex the conflict is; I remained silent about it.

This conflict affects most of us on a daily basis. I have no real answer to it. It primarily revolves around two ends of a spectrum, but the real problem happens because of human nature. So let me get to the body of the issues.

I make the assertion that we human beings are classifying beings. We make distinctions. That table is white, or it’s red, or it’s black. That organism is a cat. Certain distinctions are easy, like ones based on scientific classification. For instance this rock is a such and such kind of rock because it has such and such characteristics. Granted the characteristics that make a rock such and such are arbitrarily agreed to, but nonetheless we need to make distinctions to understand what something is. Some distinctions are harder than others because they are vacuous. For instance that person is tall. You have to ask well what do you mean by tall, or tall compared to what? There are even tougher ones like such and such is evil/bad. Or such and such is wrong. Or such and such is alive. Definitions that help us make distinctions in these areas are yet to be settled, thus making the classification near impossible in certain instances. More often than not you get answers like I don’t know if such and such is alive. There are clear cases in these groups, but there are also cases where things are difficult. Now some may say that is where the gray area comes in. It still doesn’t matter because we still try and need (by our nature) to make distinctions. With gray area issues (I’m conceding the existence of a gray area for the sake of argument) we will have to make distinctive assertions like such and such is evil enough to render this kind of action, such and such is alive enough to require this kind of protection. Even in gray areas we make distinctions. It’s just a part of being human.

In our society and in my own personal sense of ethics, we have made the assertion that it is desirable to be culturally sensitive, aware, and appreciative. Our society and my own personal sense of ethics have also concluded that racism, or rather making cultural and ethic pre evaluations are bad.

So what are the basics of racism? Racism happens when one takes a preconceived notion about a race/culture and applies an evaluative judgment about that notion and then applies it to an individual. For instance a clear case of racism is black people have a disposition for violence, you see a black person at a job interview and then don’t higher them. But you can apply a preconceived notion and not have it be racist. For instance Muslims don’t eat pork. (I realize Muslim is a religion and not an ethnic group but I’m using a really broad definition of racism, see above.) So when you host a dinner party to which you invited your Muslim friend you decide to leave pig off the menu. Hey some just don’t dine on swine. Dog on the other hand, now there’s an animal with character. Sorry got side tracked. I know in the examples given above one was a false preconceived notion and one was a true one. I don’t think that changes the working definition of racism or the conflict that I will talk about.

So what must we do in order to be culturally sensitive, aware, and appreciative? A fundamental part of that is to know what constitutes a culture. That is we must develop notions and apply it to a group of people. In order to understand a culture I must know what people of that culture do for custom, believe, how they resolve conflicts, where values are placed, etc. Now there are a slew of issues that are raised by this requirement. I won’t go into depth about the issues; it is enough to say that one will have a hard time constituting what a culture is. But for the sake of argument I am assuming that I can define a culture.

Here comes what I consider the essence of what the conflict is. Racism is the evaluative application of a preconceived notion on an individual, cultural sensitivity requires creating preconceived notions based on individuals. So where do we draw the distinction between racism and cultural sensitivity? Some cases are clear, you don’t shoot an African American in a dark ally because you have built up a preconceived notion that most felons are African American. Some are still clear but less so; you don’t ask an Asian immigrant at a dinner party if they’d rather eat with chopsticks. You don’t instantly turn your radio to hip hop channels when you are ridding in your car with an African American person because you think that’s the kind of music he/she would like. I’m talking about the instances where it’s hard to make an evaluation as to its properness. An example would be, “hey he/she is dressing so black”. Or how about she is totally dressing Chinese, and she happens to be Chinese. Now these instances seem to be rather benign, but what if we add an evaluation of some sort. For instance she is wearing her hair so X, and I think X is unattractive. Or he is dressing so X, and I think X looks so stupid. Or person Y’s culture believes only a man can ask a person out on a date, and I think that is so backwards thinking.

Obviously more thought is needed on this topic. I have yet to generate an answer for the issue. I have a gut feeling, but I'd hate for the differance between racism and cultural sensitivity to be based on a gut feeling.

All In Beauty

2004-10-04T00:42:00.000-07:00

This was my first public poem (wrote it for someone else's eyes), so I find it easier to post it in its entirety. If you feel moved to comment don't worry about sparing my feelings; as I have a very realistic view of my talent.

Not taken by the false succor of solitude,
They did blend to something new,
Her tears washed away the burrows that hid his flame,
Her vision clearing those apparitions,
Whose haste smothered his heart so sickly,
But by faith in one another they made one another,
Rising again in strength,
In beauty,
That they may live,
Breathe,
And be,
All in beauty.

It's Cool To Conform

2004-10-02T01:29:00.000-07:00

There are great advantages to living in Utah. One of them happens to be Utah is filled with smart, expressive, and very Republican people. I fancy myself as a conservative. I also fancy myself as a non-conformist. Rather I think it's cool to be perceived as a non-conformist. So while I'm a conservative; in Utah my friends and people in general are extremely conservative so I come off as being liberal. It's great, I can have values and political ideologies that are considered conformist, yet compared to the rest of the field here people think I'm a liberal. Who said you can't have you cake and eat it to.

Advice From Paul the Poet not the Prophet

2004-10-01T00:12:00.000-07:00

I had a friend of sorts back a while back. His name was Paul. He was a facinating man. He was beautiful. He also had insights that while simple struck at the core of the things he talked about. We had a small conversation about poetry. I mentioned that while I write quite a bit of poetry I never (or close to never) share them with anyone. Why? I felt they were to personal and I wrote them just for me. I think that Paul also saw that in part I was very insecure about the talent level of my poems. So Paul responded with his view on poetry. He thought that poetry was an expressive art. As such in order to fully express it one must share it. But that wasn't enough, one must get feed back from it and incoperate the feed back into how the poem effected you. This way the art effected others and others effected you. It was the process of being connected to other human beings that gave poetry it's beauty. If one didn't share one's poetry it wasn't art, it wasn't poetry, it was just a journal entry.

So I want my poetry to truely be art. So I've decided to come out of my shell in a very limited way by posting some lines from some poems. Hey baby steps. Here goes:

That awkward moment of distance when you are close,
Reminds me of how unfortunate life can be,

There is more to this poem, but that's all I'm willing to post. Hey I'm posting it for me.

Perception and Church

2004-09-30T02:21:00.000-07:00

I’ve been thinking about the implications of public perception on the question of what constitutes the character of any religious organization.

<>Let me define the scope of the question. I’m not contemplating instances where the outside group and the religious organization have completely conflicting definitions. For instance the outside group may perceive the notion of outlawing interest (money) as a foolish notion, while the religious organization perceives that as a wise notion. So the outside group may consider the religious organization as foolish, while the religion proffers that it is not. In this case both sides have differing definitions of what foolish is.<>

The cases to which I’m contemplating are where both the outside and religious group has the same (or extremely similar) definitions of a concept. In these cases what are the implications when the religion proffers that is or supports concept X, but the outside group perceives the religion as not supporting or being concept X? An example of this might be obedience to law. A religion proffers that is supports obeying local laws, but the outside group thinks the religion does not support its members obeying local laws.<>

There are three scenarios that can bring this about. (There are probably more but I lack the vision to see them.) 1) The outside group is mistaken in its perception of the members of the religious group 2) the outside group is correct in its perception of the religious group and the religion is merely proffering to be concept X 3) the outside group is correct in its perception of the members of the religious group, and it is the members that are mistaken about how they are achieving concept X. <>

I find scenario 2 uninteresting as the religious group is merely trying to look like they support X. As such scenario 2 doesn’t yield anything of interest because the outside group knows the religion is not X, the religious group knows they are not X (nor do they really want to be X). So the overall impact of what the outside groups perception of the religion is nothing for in this scenario the religion is simply not X. (I know this opens up a whole can of worms, because what if the outside group perceives that the religion is X, and the religion merely proffers that it isn’t X, does that make them X? This goes to the heart of my question, but still I need to work through this.) <>

Scenario 1 is not very interesting. In this instance it seems that the outside group is merely making perceptions from a bad base or inadequate information. I find this to be the most common scenario. A prime example of this would be a very vocal minority of a religion creating a perception in the public that would not be held if the public met any other members of the religion (who happen to be the overwhelming majority). In other words the perception has little impact to the religion’s character, as the perception is a bad one. <>

On to the scenario that I’ve been contemplating. (I know, I spent more words talking about what I’m not talking about than what I do want to talk about.) Let me clarify what I mean by “correct in its perception” in scenario 3. By that phrase I mean the outside group has a good bases for there opinion. In this instance outside group has met and interacted with a good amount of the members of a religion, or has other demographic evidence to base their perceptions on. Another point of clarification; by the phrase “mistaken about how they are achieving concept X” I mean the religion’s members as a majority think they are X and/or the religion has a doctrine supporting X. An example of this would be if a religion had a doctrine of friendliness and most of the members of the religion thought that they were friendly. <>

Well why is this scenario so interesting you may ask? There are certain concepts that are by their very nature dependant on what other’s think of you. Friendliness comes to mind. You can think you are friendly all you want but if everyone thinks you are not friendly then you are not friendly. Funniness is another example. Then there are other concepts that are sort of dependant what others think. <>

One of these concepts is bigotry. An example of this was the policy of the LDS faith (Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints) regarding African American’s. It was once held that African American’s could not hold the priesthood in the LDS faith. (This policy has long been done away with. The LDS faith is truly an accepting religion today, it has mission programs that serve in all contents and the policy of excluding African American’s from the priesthood was abolished by official church proclamation.) Without the priesthood a male member of the LDS faith could not complete all the commandments given to them. Additionally many of the benefits proffered by the LDS faith were impossible to obtain without the priesthood. The priesthood serves as a cornerstone by which (in the LDS faith) families are to be raised and cared for. Now let me apply this example. Suppose that a member of the LDS faith (this example takes place as if the LDS faith still has the policy of excluding African Americans from the priesthood) says to a non-member, “Hey why don’t you join the LDS faith.” The non-member replies, “I’d love to but I don’t want to join a faith that has bigotry as one of its principles.” I know what you are thinking; hey the religious group and the outside group have differing definitions of bigotry at this point if the member proffers that the LDS faith isn’t about bigotry. But this is only if the member supports that discriminating against African American’s isn’t bigotry. <>

So this is the dilemma; suppose the member thinks that the doctrine of the LDS faith doesn’t support the exclusion. Additionally the member doesn’t support the exclusion. The member thinks that all those that supports the exclusions are wrong. So how does the member with a strait face hold the position and tell the non-member that the LDS faith isn’t about bigotry in spite of the fact the vast majority of the member’s support bigotry? What does the member say? Do they say, “Hey that’s not what this church stands for; despite the fact most members of the church hold that belief and act on it. There is no support in the doctrine.” And even if the said faith LDS or otherwise has a doctrine opposing a particular action can it be said that that religion opposes that action if the vast majority of that religion supports that action? Is it enough for a faith to simply have a doctrine to which a minority prescribes to for it to be considered a characteristic of that faith.?

There are a lot more issues that stem for this but I feel that I’ve wrote enough on this for tonight.

I Blame Bryan

2004-09-26T01:14:00.000-07:00

This is what has to be the start of a long trip to nowhere. I would like to say for all those who enjoy my bloggings www.bwwa.blogspot.com was the source of my begining. If you think this blogg is an abomination to humanity you can once again blame www.bwwa.blogspot.com.