DISCLAIMER: this blog is mine & mine alone. Thou shalt not blame family nor friends nor employer for what you may read here.
It's been a while since I've had anything to say, and now that I do, well, it's coming from all directions, and is probably pretty fuckin' disconnected. I admit that upfront, try to follow along if you can, if you care to, or if you care in general.
PART I
First, we as a race - that being the race of humankind - never fail to surprise me. Unfortunately, it's rarely in a good way. I'm never shocked anymore but the levels of greed, recklessness, appalling behavior, and sheer stupidity. Those who know me & those who've read my blogs know I'm an animal lover. A co-worker sent me the following link this week, and I urge you to take a look. Hopefully the content is still online, as I'm just not in the mood to deal w/uploading pics to ImageShack & fucking around endlessly trying to get MySpace to display the images as I like.
The Animal Kingdom
So, if you look at the link, you'll see animals of different species getting along, and nurturing one another. Mother dogs that are nursing orphaned squirrels, or tiger or leopard cubs. A pigeon chillin' w/a monkey. The point I'm working towards is this: if we as humans have such intelligence (and we do, whether we use it or not is another story), and we have the ability to communicate verbally, how come we hate each so much & cause one another so much pain? The animals in the slideshow cannot communicate as we can, yet they clearly learn to live with disparate species, nurture others that are different, and even love them. Yet we as humans have a penchance towards hating others, wishing them dead, and even doing our very fucking best to make it happen because the other human worships a different god, has a different color skin, has a different sexual preference,or chooses to live a life different from our own. We have the ability to communicate, and (supposedly) the intelligence to learn, comprehend, and understand. Yet we still behave in the most barbaric ways. It's goddam embarrassing, saddening, maddening, and stupefying. We are the superior species? Me thinks not much of the time.
PART II
I like vodka. No, I love vodka. I really really do. When it comes to vodka my taste is kind of expensive, you won't find Smirnoff in my house. I was on a big Level kick last year, and while I still like it, my new fave is Grey Goose. The orange flavored is fantastic, but I think my preference is the vodka flavored vodka. The bottle lives in my freezer (I even have a special shelf set aside), so it's chilly chill, and has a certain viscosity when poured. It just slides down my throat, in a delightfully cold, smooth flow, kinda the anti-lava. Then it hits your stomach & warms you just a bit. Grey Goose is so good that I like the vodka flavored vodka on the rocks, no mixer, just straight. LOVE IT. And the great thing is that vodka has less of whatever-the-fuck that gives you a hangover, like many of the clear or lighter colored liquors do. I can knock back an obscene amount of vodka, become obnoxious in the process, and still feel like a million bucks the next day. Is that not cool or what? Not me becoming obnoxious, but getting that fuckered up & suffering no ill effects...
PART III
I think my slogan for the remainder of the year is "Use your brain, don't vote McCain". If you've been semi-conscious over the past 8 years & been witness to the mess the Republican leadership (both in Congress & the Presidency) has made of this country, the reasons should be obvious, and I need not elaborate further. But then, Dubya & his legacy will make any successor look good. So whoever wins has that going for him; Homer Simpson could not possibly be a worse leader than George W. Bush. McCain's stances on the war in Iraq & taxes/economics are enough to make me wanna run for cover, in addition to his continuing the Republican tradition of wanting to legislate morality. Fuck that shit all the way around.
PART IV
I wanna backtrack a sec on my comments about how humans treat each other. On (rare) occasion there are examples of humans exhibiting good will towards one another. ESPN has been running a series this week on athletes fulfilling dreams of kids through the Make a Wish Foundation. Today's installment was on a 14-year old from Georgia (Akeem Havens) who was paralyzed at age 7, and whose dream it was to play video games w/Ben Roethlishberger, quarterback of the Pittsburgh Steelers. Not only did Big Ben (as he's affectionately dubbed) play video games w/Akeem, but the Steelers as a team invited the boy to practice, included him in a play, and spent meaningful time w/him.
I'm of the firm belief that to whom much is given, from them much is expected. If you're blessed to have much, much you should give back. I'm not naive enough to think that all athletes or celebs that participate in Make a Wish & similar programs do so purely out of the goodness of their hearts, but I'd like to think - for the sake of humanity - that they do...at least to some degree. I'm sure some use it just to get "good pub", but I think some participants actually do it out of the goodness of their hearts, and for what it means to the recipients. On the whole the Steelers have been one of the more philanthropic, humanistic professional sports franchises. So all in all, it was a story that I enjoyed watching. Not schmaltzy, contrived, or kitschy, and it actually touched me.
As a little segue, Bill Gates retired from Microsoft recently. No matter what you think of Windows, Internet Explorer, Microsoft's business practices & products, you can't deny the impact they (and he) have had on the world of personal computing. In the past, Bill has stated that his heir(s) would receive 1% or less of his net worth in inheritance. Bill & his wife Melinda have made sizable contributions to education in cities around the US, and lately one of his causes has been the extermination of diseases like Malaria. But anyway, Bill retired from MS, handing the reigns to Steve Balmer, in order to spend more time on his philanthropic pursuits. I'm not sure how many millions or billions his foundation has at its disposal, but at least Bill Gates meets my requirement stated in the previous paragraph about to whom much is given. Granted, Bill wasn't 'given' his wealth, but it still applies in my book. And I'm happy to see him doing some good, giving back, or giving it much more than a half-ass trivial effort as so many others do.
PART V
So I went to watch fireworks tonight in downtown St. Pete. I made the trek across Pinellas County to watch the show being launched from The Pier, and I'm thoroughly glad I did. In the midst of the show I realized I had a half-smile on my face, and was somewhat hypnotized by the sight of exploding balls of color in the night sky, followed by the delayed "whump" of the detonation. It kinda reminded me of the first 4th of July I can remember, my first fireworks. I was six years old, living in Grinnell, IA, experiencing the bicentennial celebration in '76. Tonight I felt something akin to that wonder, awe, happiness, and excitement while watching the show. I hope that as we all grow up...scratch that, as we grow older, we never totally "grow up", and lose that child-like emotion or reaction at something we've seen many times over. It's things like this that kinda sorta make life worth living, and make it what it is, helping take us away from the mundane 8-5, M-F, and concerns about bills, gas prices, the war, the economy, yada yada. Somewhere, somehow, somewhat, I think it's important to harbor some child-like enthusiasm, some semblance of youth, and all the emotions & experiences that made it so much fuckin' fun.
PART VI
I'm a lucky fucker, in so many ways. Lately I've become attuned to that fact, and do not take all that I'm blessed with, for granted. My friends, my family, my health, my dogs, my gainful employement, things of that ilk. But I'm even luckier in that this weekend I'm given the opportunity to indulge in, or receive, one of my guilty pleasures: the four-day weekend. Today was a national holiday, on deck is Saturday,with Sunday in the hole. And batting cleanup, Monday, a day off courtesy of the Alternate Work Schedule, a perk of my employer. So, while most everyone gets the three-dayer, I'm one-upping the world, and have Monday off too. Four-day weekends like this don't come around all the time. It's serendipity, something I do not take for granted, and plan to make the most of. The whole idea has me sporting a "guess which cat ate the bird", shit-eating grin, I'm quite happy to say. Don't know what I'm gonna do w/this rare little gift, but believe you me, I'm gonna enjoy every damn minute of it. And on that note, I'm done. I spend enough time in front of the computer during my regularly scheduled working hours, and even spend a significant part of my non-working time starting at the screen,so I'm done for now. Gonna roust the dogs, let them out in the yard, go sit on the porch, enjoy some Grey Goose along w/the beautiful, sultry summer night in Florida. So hey, be good to yourselves, and each other.
One last thought: I watched the movie "Evan Almighty" a month or two ago, and actually loved the movie. More so I love the message, which I take as thus: don't be afraid to try & change the world. But remember, it starts with one ARK: one single Act of Random Kindness at a time. So, w/that being said, try to be nice to someone today just because. Whether you know the person or not, do something nice for someone for the sheer fuck of it, and do it anonymously. They'll appreciate it, and you'll feel better for it as well. And hopefully, if they think about it (or realize it subconsciously) and do in-kind to someone else, we as as a World just might get somewhere. Peace to you all.
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