Him: So – y’think you’re back on your feet finally? Me: (thinking) Yeah. I do. Him: Good. (raises a weapon) Let’s go. Me: (laughing and raising my sword) En garde.
Been spending my days with my nose to the grind and working like mad. Spending nights with my favourite person.
An old friend of mine crossed my mind today. We had some good times but he ended up being a different person; I’m sure he thinks the same of me. But in the end – like so many others – that relationship wasn’t worth the time and effort.
Him: Think I’ll bring my wife here for some wings and beer. Me: (surprised) Your wife’ll eat wings and drink beer? She’s so health conscious. Him: (laughing) I think you have a misunderstanding of what we’re like.
Met up with two buddies to discuss some business ideas the other night. Found it useful cause we all have our core competencies and the other two didn’t know each other – also bringing together disparate groups of friends is always interesting.
One guy’s a former athlete that’s trained world-champions so it was fun to sit and eat greasy food with him and chat about business.
According to the previous link, that’s lower than what found in peanut butter (0.049), mayo (0.041), and onions (0.027) – at least in the 1970s when this report was made.
Whenever I hear about something that’s suddenly a huge scandal and we’re supposed to be immensely concerned, I always wonder what’s real and what’s for sale?
Comedian Louis CK hit it on the head when he said, Everything is amazing right now and nobody’s happy. Think it’s partly cause people are always telling us we shouldn’t be.
Now I want a burger.
Location: surrounded by clothes
Mood: excited
Music: Hey, kids – look at this, it’s the fall of the world’s own optimist Subscribe!
Most of the images here are my copyright since it’s just a view of my little world.
But every so often, there’re things that I find so good that I wish it were part of my little world.
Here’re a buncha hyper-minimalistic posters that sum up classic children’s stories in a single frame. You can buy posters of them, and see others, from the original artist here.
Recently had an online “debate” about China versus the US and this fella wrote this long-winded explanation as to why China was so great. Told him that if it was great, why was he choosing to work, study, and live here?
That pretty much ended the convo.
Einstein once said that, If you can’t explain it simply, you don’t understand it well enough.
Guess that’s why I like these; cause the artist “gets it.”
In some ways, when I write, try to use the least amount of words possible to get my point across. Figure that you’ll catch my drift and fill in the blanks yourself. And whatever you fill in regarding my life is probably more interesting than the real thing.
In my life I’ve helped or seen killed three things for food – two chickens and a snake. All three were with my grandmother. She wanted me to know where my food came from.
Was justa kid for all three of them but I remember that, while there was a businesslike quality to the whole affair, there was also respect. We had just taken the life of these things, after all. That respect showed through when every bit of those animals were used.
Recently read about the loss of jobs and the rising of beef prices due to the loss of boneless lean beef trimmings (BLBT) – which we’ve been eating for years without issue – cause it’s been given the catchy name “pink slime” by a celebrity cook and ABC news.
As I said once before, there’s a no difference between insect vomit and honey except for the name we give it. Ditto for filtered burned bean soup and coffee.
It’s edible meat that’s been cleaned and put back into the chain of food; this is while most of the world doesn’t have enough, we sniff and say what we have isn’t good enough.
On the topic of food, am surprised how many people don’t know that almost all olives are treated with lye – the same poison used to burn the guy’s hand in Fight Club.
We don’t have an issue with that because we don’t have a catchy/horrifying name for it. How about green puke?
We’re too far removed from our meat sources; we’d waste less if people had to look into the eyes of the stuff we put into our mouths.
Ditto if we had to look into the eyes of starving people.
———-
Been working like mad but cool tunes keep me company.
Spend more time one Facebook than I would like to admit as a 38 year-old professional.
Catch up on some cooking shows, namely America’s Test Kitchen where I think about buying a replacement Crock Pot but it’s too soon. Too soon.
Watch random videos, like the one below where a German girl speaks pretty good Chinese. Probably only amusing if you understand Chinese/German.
Speakinga reading, the Economist, Chinese, and Germans, evidently there’s this thing called a Babyklappe where people can slip their unwanted babies into a box for pickup. The same thing exists in China and elsewhere.
Dunno if I should be horrified something like that exists – that someone would just discard a human being; or comforted – that someone will try to take care of them.
Anyway, back to the egg thingy. This guy named Ernest Dichter postulated that women didn’t like the idea of “just adding water” to make food so to do more involve them, he suggested that they add eggs, a symbol of fertility.
Spend a lotta time wondering about cruelty, kindess, everything in between. And why we’re here at all.
Well, as much time as I have until the printer stops or the download downloads.
Then, snap outta my thoughts and get back to my slice of the world.
Which is evidently reading print so small it’s a wonder I can still read at all.
How much do you think the US gives as a percentage of Gross Domestic Product? In other words, how much do you think we give outta the all the money the country makes in a year? 5%, 10%? Answer below.
———-
Had an interesting online exchange with a stranger:
Him: Poverty is … well to put it as unpolitical as I can, something that occurs because parents don’t know how to teach their kids any better. That’s as nice as I can put it without being sadistic about it. Me: How did you get your parents? You didn’t work for them, you did nothing to get the ones you did. If you were born to parents in North Korea or Somalia, your life would be vastly different if not for sheer dumb luck. Don’t pat yourself on the back for having the brilliance of sheer stupid luck.
He gave a lot more nonsense answers before finally admitting that the only real difference between him and the world he snidely judges comes down to a child’s taunt: Heads I win, Tails your lose.
Said this to someone at work who immediately quipped, What if you were adopted? which I said, proves my point. If you were born to a young mother who gave you up for adoption, that changes your life dramatically.
Likewise, if you were born to a pastor (the “PK” as we used to say) you were stereotypically either on one extreme or the other in terms of behaviour patterns.
You don’t necessarily ape your parents, but you are shaped by them.
To “be counted among the world’s richest 1 percent, a single individual has to earn just $34,000 a year. Members of the planet’s true middle class, meanwhile, live on just $1,225 a year.”
That’s astounding.
If you read me – ie, have internet, have a computer – you’ve won the real lottery of life by being part of the true 1%.
If you do nothing else to pay back the aether for your dumb luck, at least tell the people that gloat over their good fortune and look down everyone else, “Shut the _____ up.”
———-
The US gives a total of 0.19% of GDP to foreign aid; in other words out of every dollar we make, the US gives 0.19 cents to foreign aid.
This’s good cause I can’t do much, but the little things, that I can do.
Speakinga the little things, was given a slight (really slight) promotion in my wrasslin class.
Per most martial arts classes, the more experienced guys often show the newbies the basics, which frees the coach to teach more advanced moves to the others.
Done it a few times and teaching’s the best way to learn things so I credit that to my (slight) advancement.
One newbie I helped teach is this Austrian dude who’s been killing it on the mat and he’s only been there for maybe six months. I actually showed him a few of the beginner moves way back when.
He’s been there 1/5 the time I’ve been there, but goes almost daily and seems to have a natural knack for it. He’s already better than me.
Anywho, we line up by order of skill. He often lines up lower than me and others that have been there longer than he has, partly outta respect to me, and partly cause he’s just a nice fella.
While I like that’s he’s so humble, the reason why I like my wrasslin class so much’s cause it’s an absolutely pure meritocracy. No bureaucracy, no egos, no teacher’s pet, no crap, etc.
Just straight-up meritocracy.
Honestly, how often does that happen?
So I politely tell him to line up ahead of me and he demurs for a moment before he does.
Don’t want or need to be better than him. Or anyone, for that matter.
Just wanna be better than I was the day before.
———-
It’s been a year since the Japan disaster. They still need help.
Like I said, the little things, yeah? I wish them to be better than the day before:
Text JAPAN to 80888 to donate $10 to Salvation Army Aid Efforts
Text REDCROSS to 90999 to donate $10 to Red Cross Earthquake Relief
Text TSUNAMI to 50555 to give $10 to Convoy for Hope
Text JAPAN to 50555 to donate $10 to Global Giving
Text JAPAN or 20222 to donate to Save the Children’s Japan Fund
Text MED or 80888 to donate $10 to International Medical Corps
[The shooter] was the last person I would’ve expected to do something like this.
Another school shooting.
Remember where I was at the first one; was in my law journal office in law school when a blonde stuck her head in and asked everyone, Did y’hear the news? Some things stay with you.
In any case, the above quote is from a young man interviewed by GMA the day after this Monday’s shooting.
Isn’t that what you *always* hear after a school shooting or some other great tragedy. What does that tell us?
It’s tells us that people have no idea what other people are capable of.
We all have our three lives, yeah? Our public lives, our private lives, and our secret lives. They’re the three faces we all wear and it’s our private and secret faces that people find surprising.
My boss recently read my book and I think – because of all of murder, mayhem, and cursing – that, while he enjoyed it, it took him by surprise.
My writing’s parta my private life, I guess. As for my secrets, we all have them and I’m no different. Suppose that everyone thinks that what we do by our lonely makes us better people.
But y’never can tell until the day comes that you show the world your other faces if that’s actually true.
As for me, always assume that people are capable of anything, both for good and evil.
So I’ve just finished my first marketing campaign for my book and here’s what I’ve accomplished in 48 hours:
Amazon.com downloads: 1,567
Amazon.co.uk downloads: 40
Amazon.de downloads: 29
Amazon.fr downloads: 0
All-in-all, expected a total of 500-800 downloads and this totally blew away my estimates. And here’s what I’ve learned:
The French dislike my work
This is disappointing because I feel I support the French: I eat their fries and their bread, utilize a French press with regularity and support the French little coffee place down my street, and enjoy Pepe le Peu. How’s about some reciprocity?!
Social marketing really works
Put up some ads here and there which got me about 300 downloads – about what I guessed – however, people mentioning me on their FB page or via email forwards garnered me the vast majority of the downloads and this was completely unexpected.
Stuff y’put out online is powerful and stays forever. Note to self: redact mention of womanizing and rum intake in this blog.
Discovered I know five distinct groups of people
One group, without my asking, put up postings on FB and elsewhere; they took my undertaking and made it their own.
Another group, when asked, immediately started telling others.
A third group, when asked, declined.
A fourth group, when asked, completely ignored me.
A fifth group, was never asked and also never said a thing.
I’ve got to say that this was all a bit surprising. Some people I was sure would help did not and some people whom I never even thought to ask took it upon themselves to help. Eye-opening.
And speaking of reciprocity, two of the people that completely ignored me, I go out of my way to help all the time. Also eye-opening.
It’s actually given me some clarity on things, so, while it was disappointing, it’s still beneficial cause it’s helped me figure out what to do with my time. And we all know
Have a few days to myself this week so was planning on doing what I always do when the wife’s away, which is to stuff my piehole, just like I did in the last entry.
Unfortunately, the doc just told me that my cholesterol’s up, which I find shocking but it’s onea those things about getting old. It’s still better than the alternative.
The doc says I’m in fine health but it makes me think.
Been alive for 14,235 days and am guessing that I’ve got about 12,045 days left if I’m lucky. And the thing’s that my mind’s racing with all of the stuff I wanna get done. As a writer, there’re stories in my head that I need to get out before they drive me starkers or they just fade away.
There’s this news that cave paintings thought to have been painted 10,000 years ago were probably painted 35,000 years ago – or, put another way, 12,775,000 days ago.
Put yet another way, back when life was hard, brutally hard, and people were lucky to make it to 25 years of age, they somehow found a time and a way for art.
And art that survived their petty differences, their politics, their beliefs, their wars and even their good and evil; art that survived way beyond their moment on the planet.
That’s what’s been keeping me up at night. Alla my stories I think I need to tell before my expiration date.
Real artists ship. Until then, I’m just a nutcase with a notebook. Even a cave man found the time to ship.
So I get up, flip on my glowing box, and I write.
Just watch the first minute, see if you don’t watch the whole thing.
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