Don't knock on my door.

I won't answer it. Seriously. Knock all you want, I will not get up and open the door.

Will I let you freeze to death on my doorstep if you call out my name and tell me who it is? Probably not. But I will be annoyed that you tried to freeze to death on my doorstep.

This is not to say that I'm an unsociable or unfriendly person, although that argument has been made with varying degrees of success. If a friend called me up because their car broke down, I'd be more than happy to drive out to where they were and pick them up.

But really, don't come and bother me when I'm at home. Some people enjoy the pop-in. There are those who are excited and happy to see that friends and loved ones have taken the time to swing by and say "Hi." I am not one of those people.

I consider it rude. Showing up at someone's house is presumptuous and arrogant. When you pop-in, by definition you are assuming that you are more important than whatever it is your host is doing at the time.

When I am at home, I consider that "me time." I do what I want, when I want, until at which time as I have an engagement to attend to. Whether it's settling down to watch a movie with my wife or enjoying a bubble bath and some sparkling conversation with my rubber ducky (don't judge me), this is my time to relax as I see fit.

Had I wanted to spend my leisure time with you, oh intrepid visitor, you would have been invited. I'm not averse to socializing, nor even entertaining from time to time. I simply do not like being forced to be a host unannounced, and when I'm not prepared.

Political correctness...

...is bullshit.

Seriously, everyone needs to relax. Sugar coating the truth does not make it any less impactful. If it walks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and looks like a duck, it's probably a duck. So just call it that.

You are not height challenged, you're short. It's not "the Holidays," it's Christmas. And I don't have depression, I'm crazy.

People are so damned afraid of offending someone, that we've watered down everything that we do in some vain attempt to make everything in the world hunky dory. Lemme let you in on a little secret. It's not.

Honestly, what do the vast majority of these PC terms hope to accomplish? If I call a person "height challenged" instead of a "midget," chances are they still know that they're shorter than I am. The term midget in and of itself shouldn't be offensive. If I called that person a "stupid dirty midget," then I could understand them having an issue with me.

I'm curious as to what people think is going to happen if we simply call things as they are. I mentioned earlier that I have depression. If a person comes up to me and says "You're crazy." I suppose my response would be something along the lines of, "Yeah, I know. That's why I take medication." What reason do I have to be offended if a person is merely stating the truth?

Our attempt to state the truth in a different, "less offensive" way has reached ludicrous levels. I once read an article about how ridiculous the term "African American" is. (thebestpageintheuniverse.com) The term is both arrogant and ignorant at the same time. It has become an overarching expression to describe people with dark skin. But it assumes that person is American, and of African descent. Almost as if there are no black people living in any other countries around the world, or that all dark skinned people are from Africa. I think most people would agree that referring to all white people as "German American" would not only be silly, it would be blatantly incorrect.

I submit that these terms: black, stewardess, Christmas, are simply descriptive terms, and are not inherently offensive. Whilst I am not religious myself, I consider someone wishing me a Happy Hanukkah or a Merry Christmas to be a nice and pleasant gesture. Just because my reasons for celebrating Christmas have more to do with the spirit of good-natured giving than with celebrating the birth of a deity doesn't give me the right to feel offended.

Everyone is different. And it's my opinion that this is a good thing. It forces you to look a things in a different light and helps you grow as a person. This is something we should embrace. Rather than sugar-coating our differences, and trying to make everyone sound the same, maybe we should just call things as they are, and get over ourselves.

Freak Dang Shoot

The only difference between fake swearing and real swearing, is that fake swearing makes you sound like a little bitch.

Seriously, if you don't like swearing, fine. Don't swear. Totally cool. Swearing isn't for everyone. I'm all too aware that people don't like swearing, and I check myself in inappropriate places, like at work, or around children.

But if you're opposed to swearing in general, why would you use substitute terms which mean the exact same thing?

I suppose you can ask yourself what your opposition to swearing is, but ultimately it doesn't matter. If your problem is the vulgarity of the terms, (which I think it should be) then what would compel you to reproduce the vulgar meaning with a different sound? You should avoid the terminology all together.

For example, I find racial slurs to be abhorrent. I think any term that is used to describe an entire group of people in a negative way, on the basis of nothing more than that they are different, is a despicable thing. So I don't use the terms. I also don't use "alternate" terms that are "less offensive." Changing a couple of letters doesn't make it suddenly okay. I can proudly say that I've never referred to a black person as a "niffer."

If your problem is because you don't like the sound of the word, but aren't actually opposed to the meaning, then I am at a loss. The sound you hear is quite inconsequential. Language, after all, is arbitrary. We have made up these guttural sounds and attributed meanings to them. A person with no knowledge of English would not be offended by English swear words because they have no meanings associated with those sounds. The offense from a word should be due to the negative meanings you associate with it, not the sound you hear.

Am I guilty of using these fake swear words? Well, yes. But not because I'm concerned about actual swear words. When I'm with close friends or family, I let loose and swear to my hearts content. But when I'm in the presence of people who I know will be offended by "real" swear words, I'll tone it down.

Why? Well, just because I think that a "fake" swear word is as powerful as a "real" one, doesn't mean I'm right. It's simply my opinion. Likewise, it is the opinion of some of these people that "fake" swear words are perfectly acceptable, pretty much anywhere. When in Rome.

That being said, knock it off. If you don't like swearing, don't do it. Otherwise, if you're gonna say fuck, just make it happen.

The Absolutes of Evil

We as a people, are obsessed with evil. We find the dark and the macabre much more interesting than the bright and sunny. Crime dramas are among the most popular television shows, and often involve grisly and twisted murders. I know people who love mystery novels, which almost exclusively involve someone being killed, but I don't know too many people who love books where the characters only give money to charity and volunteer at a school.

When I think about this subject, it reminds me of a joke I heard once on Saturday Night Live. "If you paint one painting, you're not a painter. You bake one cake, and you're not a baker. But you blow up one embassy and suddenly you're a terrorist."

The problem here is, this isn't a joke. It's true. At least, true in the eyes of society at large. This is how we as a people feel about things. And to make matters worse, I agree with it. Well, at least as much as one can agree with something they don't fully understand.

Why is it that bad things are considered absolute, but good things are regarded as fleeting at best?

Consider, a person who is the epitome of human greatness. An intelligent, caring person. A doctor, someone who volunteers at a homeless shelter. A person who donates to cancer research and the food bank. Someone who stops their car when they see someone broken down at the side of the road.

And this person has been doing this for, oh, say fifty years. Well regarded in the community, goes to church on Sunday, etc. And suddenly, one day when he's seventy, he intentionally murders a four year old girl.

This dude is going straight to jail. Do not pass Go, do not collect $200. Done. And rightly so. You don't kill people. It's one of the most terrible things you can do. Keep in mind, I fully agree that murderers deserve the maximum amount of punishment our laws allow.

I do, however, find it interesting that this one act, terrible though it may be, can erase all the good this person has done over the course of their life. This man will forever be known as a murderer. Nevermind that he was a loving husband and father. No matter that he saved hundreds of lives. So what if he was a devout religious man? His act of taking a life negates all the good he has done in his life.

But it doesn't work the other way. A person who lives a life of stealing, cheating, raping and murdering cannot be vindicated by a single act of good, regardless as to how powerful. Nor even by a lifetime of good, as seen in the previous example.

It's interesting how absolute and lasting evil is. An evil act will always trump any number of good deeds. An incident where someone wrongs you will stay with you longer than an incident where someone was kind.

Something to think about.

Can we be selfless?

There is no such thing as a purely selfless act.

Okay, I take that back. That's a pretty audacious statement, even for me. There are much better people out there than me, both in general, and in the fields of charity and philanthropy. Perhaps they understand this concept better than I.

I, however, lack the luxury of that understanding. This is a concept that I struggle with on a daily basis, and one that only increases in perplexity at times when I'm involved in some type of charitable act.

My curiosity about this regards both motivation and reward. Does it count as volunteer work if you're getting paid while you do it? Can you make a charitable donation if you're deeply agitated when giving away your money? Does it even matter? Does selflessness depend upon a persons motivations in order for it to count? Or is it a more machiavellian situation, where the end justifies the means, and that's all that matters.

I suppose that any type of benefaction is beneficial and welcomed by those in need of assistance. I highly doubt that those in need would turn away money simply because the conveyor was upset about parting with it. But is that enough? It is enough for us as human beings to know that we helped someone, even if it pains us to do it?

The thing that truly disturbs me, in my own personal experience, is the good feeling I get from doing works of charity. This may sound somewhat contradictory, but I assure you it's not. I like to think that I'm donating because I want to help people. Were that the case, I would say it was a noble act. However, upon doing so, I feel good about myself, and am happy that I'm a good person. My fear is, do I only contribute to charity to make myself feel good? If so, it would make my act quite selfish.

Selfishness is not necessarily a negative thing. We are all programmed to be selfish. We have a distinct, inherent desire to do what is best for ourselves. This seems to be something built-in to all life as a mechanism to ensure survival.

But my concern is motivation and reward. If one is motivated to make a donation simply because they want to feel good about themselves, and are thusly rewarded by said good feeling, then I submit that they are performing a selfish act. Sure, the act is still beneficial. Perhaps a poor family is able to have a hot dinner due to that contribution, and I think you'd be hard pressed to find someone who would argue against that, regardless of the motivation. But that's not going to score you any positive points on the cosmic good/bad scale, supposing such a thing exists.

Perhaps these issues are inconsequential. A good act is a good act is a good act, as they say. But perhaps they're not. Perhaps our motivations and reasons for the things we do are of the utmost consequence.

And this is what concerns me.

Fiction? Nah.

Fictional characters are real. In fact, fictional places are real. As real as anything else you can think of. Yeah, I said it. Partially because I hope it'll be shocking, but mostly because it's true.

Sherlock Holmes? Real. Tom Sawyer? Real. Frankenstein? Real. Roland Deschain of Gilead, gunslinger and last of the line of Eld? Definitely real. Every one of those names I mentioned (well, almost every), you recognized. You probably had an image of that person pop up into your head, and maybe even know a story or two about something they did or who they are.

Let's try some more. George Washington. Harrison Ford. Adolf Hitler. Thomas Edison. I would wager that with each of those names, you were able to picture what they looked like, and briefly remembered a few facts you know about each of those people. Interesting that both lists elicit incredibly similar reactions.

My argument is, at its most base, quite simple. They're real because they have to be. If they weren't real, we wouldn't be able to readily bring to mind information about them. Sherlock Holmes solves crimes by using his incredible powers of observation and his exceptional use of deductive logic. James Bond is a secret agent with a license to kill, who works at MI6.

In an effort to better illustrate my point, allow me to explore some of the arguments for why they are not real, and how I would deal with said arguments.

You can't interact with fictional characters.

This is true. I highly doubt that I'll ever be saved from a burning building by Spiderman or go on an archeological adventure with Indiana Jones. Of course, I'll also likely never have an opportunity to interview Abraham Lincoln about the horrors of the Civil War. President Lincoln died long before I was even born. I'll never be able to talk to him, or shake his hand. And yet, despite my being unable to interact with him in any way, he is still considered to be real.

Fictional characters don't occupy physical space.

Since when did a physical presence become a requirement of reality? We deal with intangible realities on a daily basis. Emotions are considered real, and impact us in a very powerful way. "Happy," however, does not have a physical form. You cannot weigh "happy." It doesn't have a density or a mass, and it isn't affected by wind resistance. "Happy" is still considered as real as the computer upon which you are reading this.

The places that these characters are from don't exist.

This one is easy. Ask anyone this question, "Where does Alice go when she has tea with the Mad Hatter and meets the Red Queen?" You'll almost inevitably receive the answer, "Wonderland." However, if Wonderland doesn't exist, then how was Alice able to travel there? How does one go to a place that isn't? (And on a side note, if Alice doesn't exist, the answer to that question should be, "Who?")

If these fictional locations are real, how come we can't go there?

The quick answer? It's too hard. Allow me to explain. Saturn's largest moon is called Titan. We know it's there because we've seen it. But I don't know of anyone that's been there. It's simply too difficult. You'd need a massive rocket ship, stores and stores of fuel and food, some way to continuously make oxygen, and so on and so on. It's hard. It's really easy for me to walk down to the gas station on the corner. It's a little more difficult for me to get to work in my car. It's a lot more difficult for me to get on a jet and fly to Europe, and it's really really difficult to get to Mid-World. (Sometimes, you have to die. Geez.)

Ultimately, if these characters or places didn't exist, we wouldn't know anything about them. If there were no such thing as Luke Skywalker, then Mark Hamill would not have been able to play his role in a movie that detailed his adventures. There would be no role to play.

There are lots of categories of people in this world. Celebrities. Doctors. Fictional characters.

All real.

The Length of Attention Spans

Day Two, bitches! Who thought this would happen? That's right, no one. Least of all me. And yet, here I am. One more bullet wound in the beast known as Failure. Now it's just a matter of keeping my finger on the trigger, in a manner of speaking.

Let me quickly tip my hat to my good friend Mr. Jordan Fackrell for the inspiration for this piece. It was a subject that would have to be addressed eventually, and perhaps I would have gotten to it on my own. However, it was his comment on my first entry that prompted me to broach the subject, and I believe in credit where credit is due. His comment was, and I quote, "hmmm. too many words. but i'm sure it was good!"

*sigh* Let's just try to ignore Jordan's grotesque lack of capitalization and disregard for proper punctuation this time.

I'm well aware that I have a tendency to be a bit...wordy. I am, after all, here when all these words are being typed on the screen. The phrase "short and sweet" hasn't really ever been attributed to me, at least to the best of my recollection. (I don't actually get either of those words on their own, all that often.) In thinking about this "problem" I have come to the following conclusion: too bad.

Keep in mind, I don't mean this in a negative manner. This is just the same thing you'd say to a person who simply wants to lift off the ground and fly through the air. Gravity exists buddy. Too bad. The thing is, verbosity is in my nature, and so far nothing has really compelled me to fight that.

My point is, I love the English language. I think it's beautiful, and complex, and interesting. I love how it looks, how it sounds. I'm endlessly fascinated that we are able to use these symbols and sounds to communicate our thoughts and our feelings to one another. I think it is a wonderful and magical thing that far too many people take for granted, and that most people don't have enough respect for. (r u goin 2 da mall? *retch*)

I may be eliminating a lot of potential reader base (supposing I ever have reader base) by continuing my lengthy articles. But the fact of the matter is, this is what I love. I've always considered myself somewhat of a Renaissance Man, insomuch as I like to delve into lots of different things. I've always been interested in many different things, mostly because nothing has really been able to keep my attention and interest.

Except writing. Ironic, considering I started this little blog because I wasn't writing. But just because I wasn't doing it doesn't mean I wasn't always thinking about it. Writing is the closest thing I've ever had to a passion in life, and I think I'm still only just beginning to understand what that means. I figure if I'm going to do this, and I'm going to do it right, I might as well stay true to myself. And that means writing a lot. Like, a whole lot. WAY more than is necessary.

That being said, I still hope that you, my readers, can garner some level of entertainment from this. Or dare I say insight and thought provocation, though those will likely come in a future effort, if at all. I've heard that some writers say you must write for yourself, and I agree on some levels. But after all, if you don't spend a little effort in appeasing your readers, why do it at all? This language we have was designed to reach out and communicate with others, not to sit around and chat with ourselves. Anyway, if you decide to stick with me, which I know can be a chore at times, I hope to bring you something, in a small way, magical. We'll see. =)


Random Thought: "Pepperation" is not clever, Chili's. Knock it off.

And so it begins...

Well, here goes my experiment. An experiment many times tried, and many times failed. And what makes one believe this time will be any different? Nothing really. Perhaps the public nature of this blog will keep me writing in it simply to avoid the embarrassment of my failure, but if the past is any indication, embarrassment is simply not enough motivation for me to keep going. Oh well.

Many of you who know me will be wondering, "You finally started a blog! What took you so long?" Still others will be saying, "Are you kidding me? Why the hell are you starting a blog?" Interestingly enough, the answer to both is the same: I don't know.

Perhaps it's due to the dreaded three-O coming up, and my feeling that I haven't accomplished as much in my life as I'd liked to have by this time. Although as my mother so eloquently put, what exactly is it that I'm supposed to have done? Perhaps nothing. Perhaps much more. I suppose that's a subjective question, one to which I do not have an answer, but one I hope to find, if in fact I can continue forward with this little project of mine.

So, what do I hope to accomplish with this? Too many things that any reasonable human being (which I am not) should hope to accomplish within any one act. I think my main goal is to write....again. I can't very well go around calling myself a writer if I don't write anything, now can I? Well, I can, but I don't think that I have the energy or desire to keep up such fraudulent airs.

But what the hell is with that title? I know, I know. I think I put it there due to my tendencies to bring up eccentric hypothetical situations and to make assumptions about things that I cannot prove (despite my belief that no one can prove them, but that's a whole 'nother piece my friends.) As verbose as I am, it seems only inevitable that something of that kind will crop up from time to time, if not often.

Well, there's my first piece. Long on abundance, short on substance. It happens. Maybe I'll do better in the future, but if I were you, I wouldn't hold my breath. You know, 'cause you'll probably have to hold it for a long time, and if you don't get oxygen to your brain, you could have permanent damage. Not that I'd know...