Virginia Mom records her daughters bullies

A Virginia mom is facing felony charges after putting a recording device in her daughters school bag to record the bullying that her daughter went through.  Felony charges. That's a very serious charge for what the mom did. It's another reason why I think grade school-high school is the worst time of our lives. The bullies run the school and you are punished for standing up for yourself. If this woman gets convicted of felony charges and the school bullies and administration get off totally free, it'll be another shining example of what I've always thought-the worst people aren't the bullies, they are the bully enablers.

Teachers who turn a blind eye and principals who punish a mom like this have a special place in hell waiting for them. Oh sure, childhood bullies are nasty people too but sometimes it's just kids being kids and not knowing how to behave yet. Goodness knows I did things that were awful in school too. However I learned a life lesson: You can't bully someone who punches back. I was small and frail and couldn't really defend myself as a kid, so I was an easy target. The school system here is enabling the bullies to keep being nasty because they are punishing the victims. Like you, I'm tired of victimhood in America but that doesn't mean that there aren't real cases of being victimized.

This is Kafkaesque. A mom doing the right thing (after all, no one would believe her if she didn't get video proof. She got proof and then got arrested. Creepy) and could go to jail for it. The entire situation is incredibly chilling. The bullies/school system crying about getting their privacy invaded is like a cheating wife complaining you hacked into her iPhone and found messages to another guy,

Note-I wrote this on Tuesday and Wednesday I found out that the prosecutor dropped the charges. That's nice, but it's still horrible that the mom was arrested in the first place. 

Poland thinking of ending shopping on Sunday?

Apparently Poland is thinking of making it illegal to shop on Sundays. At first, some Christians might be happy that this is happening. After all, up until the 50's many shops in America closed on Sundays and I'm sure in some parts of the USA it's still not uncommon to see shops closed. I have nothing against it if the store does it for their own choice. I have a huge problem against it if the state forces a store to close on Sunday.

If you are in favor of a state making it a law for everyone to do something that you agree with, than you lose the right to complain about a state making it a law to force everyone to do something you disagree with. If Muslim countries want to force all shops to close when it's time to pray (even non Islamic shops) than you can't really say anything. If Israel wants to close shops on Friday night, same thing. If LDS states demand that no restaurant sells alcohol-than you can say nothing. And oh yes, if atheists demand that you open on Sundays and serve booze at your restaurant even if you are a devout Christian, than you can once again say nothing.

I'm as uncomfortable with this as I am with the state forcing a baker to bake a cake for a wedding that they don't approve of.

SNES/NES classics

I've talked about them before-the SNES classic blog is here, but I've been thinking about them more and more as I start my Christmas shopping. Like we all know retro video games have never really gone away, and you can get most old school games on your Xbox, Playstation or iPhone. Also, full systems have been for sale for years. Atari has had this one for sale since the early 2000's, I think. Sega also has one for the Genesis.

I'm a huge gamer and I have most consoles, the ones from way back to the more modern ones. I prefer the RPG genre and most of the retro consoles don't have RPGs (yes, I know there are exceptions, SNES being one of them). I also already own most of the games but it would be nice to have the games on one console that works with a modern TV.

The thing I don't understand at all is why Nintendo didn't make more of the NES/SNES Classics. This thing is wildly popular, especially with adults my age. It brings them back to childhood and the casual gamer who is not a collector really wants to get this. You can't get it online without taking the risk that it's a generic fraud (a staggering disappointment if you are in the market for authenticity) and most stores sell out of them in minutes. It's like the Furby or Tickle Me Elmo of 2016/2017. Nintendo could have made millions and millions of dollars by producing more of them but for some reason they didn't bother to do so. I'm in total shock as to why.

Is Black Friday still popular?

Like many people who enjoyed Thanksgiving dinner, I spent the Friday afterwards recovering from a slight hangover while I drank coffee on the couch and lazily watched the news. I didn't go to celebrate Black Friday. but I'm all for that holiday. I love giving and I love receiving gifts-it's a nice way to show others how much you care about them. Both the left and the religious right love to complain about consumerism and how you shouldn't have to spend money on anyone to show you love them-you are right, you don't have to, but it's still a nice thing to do. In my experience the people who complain the loudest about consumerism over the holidays are the ones who complain the loudest when you don't buy them anything. And obviously nice, well thought out gifts don't have to be expensive.

Anyway I lurched out of my house around 1:00 and casually drove to the local mall, just to see for myself if people still went to malls. To my surprise and horror, the mall was completely packed. No parking spaces at all were available and people were parking in other plazas near the mall. I didn't bother to go into stores because I wasn't really shopping-just there to satisfy my own curiosity.

Of course I know that my own area doesn't mean that every mall in the country was packed. From what I've seen on the news though it does seem that mall traffic has gone up this season. That's a good thing of course, consumers spending money means that the economy is getting better. It's an interesting thing too. You don't need to be an expert to see how brick and mortar retail is plummeting around the country. This Black Friday might show that they still have a little bit left.

Scripture Sunday Ether 12:27

Humbling yourself is never a pleasant ordeal. In fact, in todays society humility is an odd thing to discuss. It's true, a humble person will never say they are humble. It's like how a smart person will never say they are intelligent. If you really are humble, than you have to wait for others to say that about you to really make it so.

There is nothing wrong with being proud of your accomplishments. If you are a CEO, an MD, or a highly skilled chess player it's okay to take pride in that. It's when you start thinking you are a better person than someone  else who doesn't have your accomplishments that it becomes a problem.

You also need to be able to humble yourself before the Lord. When you do that, the Lord will truly show you your weaknesses and no matter who you are, you do have them. The good news is that when you humble yourself before God he makes your weaknesses much easier to cope with, which is what this passage is all about. 

Churches becoming gun free zones

A church in my part of the country has made headlines because it declared itself a "gun free" zone. Oddly, some people are upset about this. In case you haven't been paying attention to the news, a psychopath just killed many, many people in a church in Texas. Oh sure, you can argue about why a man with a bad conduct discharge  and a history of domestic violence had a gun in the first place-and I agree, it should be debated about and investigated-but the truth of the matter is that he got a gun and killed many innocent people.

Churches are not safe spaces and you have the right to defend yourself even in a church. Thinking that a Christian needs to be unarmed just because they are a Christian is a gross misreading of scripture and basic church teachings. I admit that the odds of a mass shooting are very rare, but they do tragically happen.

You have the right to defend yourself against someone who wants to take your life. You don't have to lie down and let yourself be shot, Christian or not. Anti-gun rhetoric is dogma to the PC crowd. In fact, it's a test of compassion in some circles. The real world is full of bad people, and they don't care how compassionate you think you are.  A good guy with a gun always has a better chance than someone trying to lecture the bad guy about gun control. 

Album of the weekend

Rage Against the Machine-The Battle of Los Angeles

First off, no, I don't like Rage Against the Machine. Being a socialist when you make millions and live in Malibu without any sense of irony of your situation is absurd. They are not this generations Dead Kennedys who could laugh at their own politics sometimes while still remaining deeply political and passionate. Rage Against the Machine have nothing to rage against.

But I do like this album. It's full of catchy little songs that achieved massive radio play and brought their style of anger towards mainstream America. You had to seek out the Dead Kennedys/Anti-Flag/Minor Threat. Rage was being played on Mtv and on the local hard rock radio stations. Growing up I never got the politics of the band but I did like to feel important and rage against my parents, my teachers, the system-so in that case they've done their job. The politics? Comically bad. The music? Actually pretty damn good.

And in honor of Rage-go out and buy stuff this Friday. We all like giving, we all like receiving. Celebrate capitalism and consumerism and think of Rage Against the Machine.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone. God bless you and I hope you get to your destinations safely.

If you have a hard time dealing with family or are flying solo today-I'm saying a special prayer for you. This day will pass.

Stores closing on Thanksgiving

Okay, this is an unpopular opinion but I stand by it. I think stores should remain open on Thanksgiving. If they want to close down for the day, fine. If they want to stay open, fine. Obviously the overwhelming majority of people disagree with me, and I know it's not a popular opinion.

Not everyone celebrates Thanksgiving. If you are an immigrant to the country you may not have the same patriotic feelings as the rest of us. The custom of Thanksgiving might have absolutely no meaning to you, and it might just be "another day" so why not see if you can earn extra money and work on that day?

It's nice to be close to your family. It's really nice to be have a large circle of friends. For whatever reason (and those reasons are none of your business ) some people are not close to their family and may not have many close friends. Or, their family might be far away from them as are their friends. Instead of staying home and dealing with crippling loneliness and depression for the day, it's a good thing to try and stay busy.  Of course they have every right to do so-but it would be nice for some to remain open just so people don't have to spend the day staring at the tv and watching football alone for 8 hours.

Self driving cars

I love to drive. It's a huge interest of mine. I've driven from Florida to New England well over 15 times. I've driven from New England to Missouri. New England to Ohio. New England to....you get the point. I've seen some weird things on the road. Like you, I've seen people texting and driving. I've seen people whom I think/know were driving drunk. I've personally driven when I probably shouldn't have due to exhaustion (never to drinking, thank you) and I've seen it happen to other drivers . While I love to drive I can't wait to see the future with self driving cars.

I live in the country and I love it. I doubt self driving cars will come here anytime in the next few years. I just bought at 2017 Jeep and it's loaded with features but alas, it's not self driving. When you think about self driving  vehicles it might be scary to some people, and I understand that but I strongly disagree. Think about planes. Pilot error is the number one source of crashes. Now, planes are so automated that they don't really make mistakes via computer/autopilot. Oh sure, it happens and it's deeply tragic but in reality, people are still the number one reason planes crash. 

A driverless car can't drive drunk. They can't drive exhausted. They can't text and drive. They can't flip you off while going 90 in a school zone because they are late to work. A self driving car will save thousands, maybe even hundreds of thousands lives. We'll hear about the one or two deadly crashes and those are incredibly tragic. But, like plane crashes they are very rare. Self driving cars will happen in my lifetime and they will be a huge success.

Pizza Hut vs Papa Johns vs DiGiorno

So, the culture wars have infected the NFL and now it's infecting their sponsors. Pizza Hut has said that they haven't been hurt by the NFL protests while apparently Papa Johns have said their sales have been. DiGiorno (apparently frozen pizza?) have seen their opportunity to take a swipe at their competitors and they've jumped in the Twitter war too. To me, the pizza war is very simple-all their pizzas don't taste very good. From Pizza Hut to Dominos to Papa Johns to Godfather to DiGiorno-I just don't like the chain pizzas.

Yes, it's all subjective and no, my opinion doesn't mean that no one would like fast food pizza. Obviously if no one liked it they wouldn't be vastly popular. I like nice restaurants but I'm no food snob. My favorite coffee is Dunkin Donuts and I like Wendy's hamburgers. I also like Cracker Barrel-breakfast anytime is a huge plus for me. For pizza though, I overwhelmingly prefer the mom and pop places. Up north the local mom and pop pizza place was able to send their kids to a nice and exclusive private school thanks to me.

Papa Johns has apologized for offending the social justice warrior set. Oddly, you never see companies bother to apologize to the right if they've offended them. 

Scripture Sunday 3 Nephi 30:2

This scripture sounds like some very bad things were going on with the latter day Gentiles. In fact, the author talks about murders, whoredoms, secret abominations and the like. I truly wonder what was going on with the "secret abominations" that was so bad it couldn't be mentioned. Was it worse than murder? Worse than whoredoms?  Maybe I don't want to know.

The passage ends with the offer that people be baptized and filled with the Holy Ghost so that they may be numbered with the people of Israel. That's a good thing of course, and if you are a baptized believer in God you are held to a higher standard than those who are not baptized. If you are planning to commit murders, whoredoms and "secret abominations" though baptism won't stop you. Baptism is not a special guard against you committing evil things.

Survivor

I was watching Survivor the other night and the castaways were struggling to start a fire. A smartass could yell at the television and talk about how stupid the castaways were. After all, starting a fire with nothing but flint and kindling has to be really easy, right?

It isn't. Especially when you are starving, thirsty, dealing with total strangers and have cameras shoved in your face twenty four hours a day, seven days a week.

From the comfort of our couch we love to yell at athletes for missing a shot or throwing an interception. Maybe we played in high school and like we all know that makes us an expert on professional sports. There are armchair quarterbacks but I think we also need to have a new category of people: Armchair reality tv participants.

Album of the weekend

Ben Folds Five-Whatever and Ever Amen

This is not an album I'd particularly enjoy. That's not to say it's not a good one, in fact it's outstanding-but you need to be in the mood for it. It's certainly much more mellow sounding than what I would usually like to listen too. Imagine a more interesting Dave Matthews Band with deeper songs that tell better stories, that's what this album sounds like.

All good songs (and yes, even some bad ones) can bring up emotion, even if you have not been in the situation that the song is talking about. Several songs on this album hit home to me, from "Brick" to "Song for the Dumped". You've probably heard both of those songs before-they were all over the place to the point of being overplayed. In my view, a good indicator of if a song/book/movie is a good one is if it brings up emotions. If it can make you laugh, cry or think-than it's probably good even if you don't like it. This album fits that description for me perfectly. 

The unexpected consequences of the NFL protests

No, the NFL won't be going out of business anytime soon. That's not the way it would work. The poet TS Eliot said, "This is the way the world ends, not with a bang but a whimper." That's how many personal relationships end, that's how many public relationships end. Oh sure, it can be a dramatic break that happens all of a sudden, but most things slow down first, then stop working completely, then just quietly end.

My question to the NFL players still protesting-what if they gave a protest and no one showed up to care about it? People are paying attention, but if people stop paying attention the rich athletes will no longer be rich. Like it or not, the customers pay their salaries. If no one buys tickets and no one watches games, salaries will be lowered. It's a mathematical certainty. I assume that football is so popular that it won't be long term. You'll also have football fans that are like me as a baseball fan-no matter what they do some will still follow the sport no matter what.

So sorry right wing snowflakes-the NFL ain't going anywhere. Yet. It probably isn't going for a long time. But they need to be careful. After all, if no one is paying attention to you, your NFL protests will be useless.

Sarah Huckabee Sanders

Remember-fat shaming and teasing a woman about her weight/appearance is okay. As long as you are a leftist and as long as the woman is a conservative. You get extra points if the woman works for Trump. This also goes for minorities who dare to think for themselves-racist jokes are a-okay for them. If you make any joke about a woman who is a liberal, than you are absolute pond scum and you will never be forgiven. Period.

Oh sure-Ms Huckabee-Sanders is fair game on Saturday Night Live. I was only vaguely aware that SNL was on the air still. It hasn't been funny since the 70s. I can't wait to see SNL take shots at social justice warriors. If they have, great. Like I insinuated I never watch the show.

Remember this everyone-if you disagree with someone politically, you can roast them mercilessly and none of your friends and fans will ever call you out on it. However - the moment you being to think independently or dare to engage in mockery/criticism about someone who agrees with you-the mob will immediately turn.

Stephen Hawking does not know everything

Oh, he knows more than you or I do. He's a very smart guy. He's an expert in his field, which is theoretical physics. So he knows a lot about that subject. If I was a grad student in theoretical physics, I'd do anything possible to take a class with him-which is probably impossible. Someone with his time demands and fragile state of health can't just teach nonstop. I also think that most big time "professors" aren't in college to teach, they are in college to do research, and that's how it should be at that level.

Now for the frustrating part. When Stephen Hawking talks about chemistry, he might not know everything, especially about advanced chemistry. When he talks about biology, he might now know everything about it. He probably knows more than the basics-and he certainly knows more than you or I do-but he shouldn't be counted on to give perfect knowledge of advanced biology matters. The media will make it out to be that someone who is a Ph.D in one science knows everything about every other topic out there. Not always the case. In fact, it's often not the case. When someone dedicates their life to one topic they usually spend so much time on that one topic that they don't know that much about other topics. That's why an expert in Shakespeare might not be an expert in Victorian literature. They'll know more than you or I-but not more than an expert in the field.

Sigmund Freud (a man I have huge respect for) once met Albert Einstein. They had a pleasant, but vapid conservation. When asked why, Freud said, "He knew as much about psychology as I do about physics." Same basic thing with Hawking 

Thanksgiving eve/Blackout Wednesday

I was never a hipster or very with it. So I apologize for being late to the party with this. 

My little brother* recently told me about a thing called "Blackout Wednesday". Apparently it is one of the most popular nights for bars in the country, and it's a famous time for people to meet up with old high school friends and sometimes even teachers-even if you are well into your thirties. 

For most LDS, it's not an important thing because they usually don't go to bars. They aren't missing much. In my view drinking is fine if you aren't LDS so knock yourself out-but drinking to the point where you black out get a DUI and kill someone or yourself isn't fine, LDS or not. Massive binge drinking never appealed to me. Sure I drank and sure I drank too much sometimes, but I never drank with the sole intention of getting fall down drunk or blacking out. Yes, not everyone who goes to bars gets a DUI or gets so drunk they black out. 

The other part of "blackout Wednesday" that I find totally unappealing is the idea of hanging out with people I lost touch with back in 1999. If hanging out with people from high school at age thirty five is your thing, than by all means go for it. There is nothing wrong it of course-it's just not my thing. I suppose that if your high school experience was positive you might think different-though in your mid thirties there is something sad about trying to relive glory days twenty years ago. People and relationships change - you can still be friends with people who you knew twenty years ago but if neither one of you have matured, that's a problem. 

My brother also brought up an interesting/troubling issue. Let's say you go to a party on "Blackout Wednesday" and you see an old girlfriend/boyfriend. You are married , they are single. Foolishly you talk about the "good old days" (I hate that term) and one of you thinks you could re-start things. That's asking for trouble of course-you might seriously mess your life up doing that. Neither my brother or I know anyone personally who has done something like this but we've both heard stories of things like this happening.

In the end, it doesn't matter what we think of course. If it's your thing, go for it. For the rest of us-don't feel guilty about not being invited to these parties. If you aren't friends with them the rest of the year, why bother faking it for one night? 

*For the record, my brother is actually my brother in law. I've known him for two decades and he's one of my closest friends. I think of him as an actual brother, hence the title. 

Scripture Sunday Mormon 3:11

This passage reminds me of the Thomas Monson speech, "Dare to Stand Alone." At this point in his life it seems like Mormon was banging his head against the wall and trying to lead a group of people that had become arrogant and bloodthirsty. Mormon is standing alone, just like Thomas Monson taught us how to do in his General Conference speech several years ago.

Prince William and overpopulation

Prince William, the Duke of Cambridge and future Prince of Whales has some interesting ideas, like his father does. Apparently he thinks that overpopulation will be a problem. Oddly though, this doesn't apply to him and his wife-who are expecting baby number three. Like Ted Turner, who also believes in the "world is suffering from overpopulation" bullshit,  they still father children and don't seem to get the hypocrisy that their overpopulation views have. Let me spoil it for you: overpopulation is a joke. It is of no threat whatsoever and actually, the much greater threat is going in Greece right now. Shrinking family size is an issue, not overpopulation.

It's so obvious that I have to remind myself that people actually don't believe it. Humans make the world better. Humans create things. Humans not being born do not create things and do not add to society. Oh sure, sometimes humans create great evil. But in reality, 90% of humans are doing things that are beneficial to society. The more humans, the better.

Are we running out of space? Resources? That's nonsense too. In reality, the world is huge. There is a lot of space out there. While I'm no expert in demographics I'm sure the that population of the entire world could probably fit into the continetnal United States with comfortable room for personal space. That would leave the entire rest of the world for farming, entertainment, and production of food.

We aren't having too many kids, we're having too little. The brilliant book "The Children of Men" talks about this in depth and much better than I ever could. The future King of England needs to get himself a copy.

Album of the weekend

Motley Crue-Dr. Feelgood 

Motley Crue is one of the most metal hair bands out there. The difference between metal and hair band is huge-hair bands generally have shorter songs, not as in depth lyrics and a softer overall sound than heavy metal. It's annoying when people who don't know much about music get the two confused. Motley Crue is a good mixture of a heavy metal and hair band sound. 

"Kickstart my Heart" is a great driving song. It's fast and you can sort of headbang to it in parts. On road trip mixes this is certainly a song I always use. The title track, "Dr. Feelgood" is another great song sounds very metal like and has a distinct "LA sound" to it. By "LA sound" I mean the sound of albums that were recorded by LA bands in the late 80's. Guns and Roses, LA Guns and Motley Crue. The songs tended to be decadent, dark and hedonistic. Motley Crue was all of that and more. Their drug use, sexual escapades, brawling and out of control lifestyle are legendary. This album is like watching all that in it's musical form. 

Kevin Spacey

And another Hollywood sex scandal has exploded. This time, it's much worse. Looks like Kevin Spacey made some advances towards minors. That is the worst thing you can do, gay, straight or whatever.

First off the matter of his sexuality. It seems to me, and to many other people, that he used it as a shield to deflect the serious charges. No one cares what adults do in privacy and your sexuality is your own business. Thinking you can use your sexuality to excuse bad behavior is an insult to gays and straight people, but especially gay people. If I was a gay man I'd be absolutely furious about how Spacey acted-both the sexual assault part and the "I'm gay so that justifies it in part."

Now, the sexual assault part. A powerful man/woman can delude themselves into thinking they can get away with anything and that the rules don't apply to them. Politicians like John Edwards show how someone who has never had to play by the rules can behave. It appears as though Kevin Spacey (who is a brilliant actor) acts like that as well.

He's innocent till proven guilty of course-but it doesn't look good.

Cassette tapes

Apparently America is running out of cassette tape-the tape that was actually in the cassette you listened to in the 1980s and 1990s.

If cassette tapes are your thing, fine. Nothing wrong with that. In their quest to ruin everything hipsters are bringing back cassette tapes, like older hipsters did with vinyl in the early 2000s. Don't get me wrong, at the time I made more mix tapes than the Rob from High Fidelity. Whenever I see a reference to the immortal mix tape in pop culture I do smile a little a bit.

Looking back though, cassette tapes were awful.

You had horrible sound quality, you had to fast forward and rewind for five minutes in order to find your favorite song. If you had a poor quality cassette tape player then it would eat the tape, thus running the cassette. I remember this happening to me on cassette tapes I played multiple times. They also couldn't hold much data, so God forbid you buy a book on cassette-if you misplaced one cassette tape,it was over. 

Oh nostalgia. That emotion/feeling that I hate so much. Once again something that sucked in the first place is remembered as something wonderful. 

Woman fired after flipping off Trump

Well, like my title says-a woman was fired after flipping off the Trump motorcade. She was employed by a government contractor, so she basically flipped off her own boss. She has no regrets and she shouldn't-if you had regrets you shouldn't have done it in the first place. Her boss had no choice, they had to fire her, and yes, they have every right to fire her.

It's overkill though. I've flipped off many people in my life, from bad opening acts at concerts to drivers who have cut me off to ex girlfriends to yes, political figures I disagree with. It's a relatively harmless way to express your disdain and disgust for someone. Is it rude? Sure. I'd rather she express herself this way than get violent with someone. In America I also have every right to tell my politicians to go to Hell. If she did this to Obama to W to Clinton -I'd feel the same way.

The hard left vs the hard right

At first glance, there seems to be no similarities between the two. They disagree on everything politically but in reality, they act the exact same. This is, of course, a generality and yes, you might personally know people on the far left/right who don't act like this, but it's just what I'm seeing. 

Rand Paul got assaulted by a neighbor this weekend. Thank God it's only minor. Not surprisingly, I saw the most tolerant people out there act the most viciously: 

It's not intolerant if the tolerant people say it

And yes, you can easily find things that the right have said when a liberal gets hurt, injured or assaulted. That's my point.  The further you go on the political spectrum the bigger the monster you can turn yourself into. You begin to associate with people who only share your views. You begin to read things that only confirm your own biases. You being to think that anyone who doesn't share your views is not just wrong or misguided-but morally deficient. Therefore, it's okay to not treat them as human. 

Truly chilling. 

Scripture Sunday 3 Nephi 13:24

Like Bob Dylan said in one of his best songs, "You are going to serve somebody. It may be the devil, it may be the Lord, but you are going to serve somebody." In this passage it basically says the same thing. In the adult world that we all live in we will be put into situations where you have to choose between two options. That doesn't mean that you have to hate people who take a different path, or that those who take different paths are evil-I don't see the real world as black and white as this scripture seems to. 

Adventures in karate

So like I mentioned before in this blog, I'm trying to get into better shape. The good news is that I've kept my walking up and I'm well over 1000 miles for the year. September was a slow month while I was dodging hurricanes, traveling up north and dealing with the tragic death of a friend. October was great and I'm getting back into the swing of things.

Speaking of getting back into the swing of things, I'm thinking of taking karate lessons again. I'm most familiar with the Ed Parker style of American Kenpo. Sadly though, the only studio that teaches that is over an hour and half away from my house. I could drive that long once a week or so, but several times in a week is madness. So I'm thinking to myself-do I keep with something familiar and put up massive miles on my car and in gasoline...or do I swallow the bitter pill and start fresh at another place closer to me?

I'll keep you posted. Wish me luck! 

Album of the Weekend

Green Day-Dookie

Simply put, this is one of the greatest punk albums of all time. It's achieved mainstream success (everyone had this album, even if you didn't like punk much) and it's achieved critical acclaim in the punk world. It placed Green Day on the map and cemented them as the quintessential punk band of the 1990's. It took the torch from the Ramones and while they aren't as good as them (it can be debated, and yes, it's just my personal opinion) they are one of the only bands post-1990 that can be mentioned in the same breath as them.

This album perfectly captures the post modern generation X attitude of being bored with the present and worried and angsty about the past and future. Imagine existentialism in it's punk form, as close to existentialism as punk can get, anyway. It's like a punk version of "Waiting for Godot".

This album also has "Sassafras Roots" one of my favorite songs by Green Day or any other band really.  There might be a song that I ignore here or there, but there are no songs that I dislike. This album is a landmark in both my personal life and in punk music in general. It was great yesterday. it's great now, it'll be great twenty years from now. If Green Day retired immediately after this album and never did anything else, they could still rest easily, knowing that their place in punk will never be forgotten.

Safe spaces

Safe spaces are disturbing to me.  They seem harmless. After all, a "safe space" for you to really express yourself sounds wonderful. In reality, they are incredibly disturbing and a sign that you have somehow failed your as a parent. If your kid needs a safe space every time they hear something that upsets them, I don't blame them-you can't blame a dog for peeing on the carpet if they haven't learned any better-I blame the parents who raised kids to be so fragile and insecure.

In the real world, you will encounter many, many people and ideas that you disagree with. Some will upset you. Some will offend you. Some will actually challenge your beliefs. All of those options are good in the long run. It might upset you to hear that someone disagrees with your lifestyle. So what? You can't please everyone. You might be offended that someone dares to disagree with you on a political issue. Don't be so arrogant as to think everyone must agree with you on issues. Someone might challenge your beliefs and you know what-that's a good thing. When no one challenges you it means that you are no longer are thinking.

In my dream world, I'd demand that conservatives read Mother Jones and liberals read the National Review. No one-from right to left, young to old, would be allowed a safe space.

Some thoughts on college degrees

Like I've mentioned before, college was the best time of my life up to that point and I have no regrets whatsoever with going. I don't think a degree is ever "useless" and if it is, then you deserve some of the blame for choosing it. While a degree might not be practical, just getting a degree in something is usually a good idea and can open more doors for you. I've come to believe three things about college. It doesn't make you smarter, people who think it does are from a different era, and sadly many people who didn't go to college have mammoth chips on their shoulder for not going.

A college degree will not make you smarter, it'll just make you more knowledgeable. There is an obvious difference between "wisdom" and "knowledge" and just being wise or knowledgable does not make you intelligent. There are all sorts of ways to measure intelligence-from problem solving to social skills. Not one quality is better than the other. The world is full of people who have great knowledge but can't convey that skill into a marketable ability or a likable personality. All a college degree does is show that you have dedication in a certain area.

People who think college makes you smarter are from a dying era. It's no longer 1955 where only a certain type of person went to college. Now, anyone can get into a college somewhere. In fact, that's a major problem right now. There are so many college degrees out there that the value of a college degree has become seriously watered down.

In my observations I've noticed that some people (key word, some) are defensive about not going to college. They'll say "Oh, I went to the school of hard knocks." or "I graduated from the University of Life." These are the same people who love pointing out that they've read more than English majors or can do more advanced math than you college dummies. That might be true, but it begs the question why they feel the need to say such things. If you really possess a great skill-like knowledge of math or biology-you don't feel the need to say it. You simply accept it.