Extorting Your Childhood

Most companies will allow an amount of evil, a percentage of evil, if you will, in order to maintain profits. Apple's evil meter has been relatively low for the last 20 years, guaranteeing a lack of market-share. Microsoft on the other hand, started with a terrible balance, and while that balance tips occasionally back to neutral/bad, it stays bad and Microsoft owns 90% of the operating system market.

Classmates.com however, is evil in the most vile sense.

Yes, I understand that you run a company to make a profit. And yes, I understand that sometimes, in pursuit of profit, you must do evil things. Occasionally. Classmates.com is a little different, however.

They ransom your childhood. And they don't do it very honestly.

You start with a free membership. Which allows you to enter their database. Then if you want to do anything else, other than peruse names you don't recall ever being able to spell correctly, you pay them $50 a year. To email your ex-friends.

Well, ex-friends if you're a dick like me, who chooses to disappear from sight for years at a time, only to resurface as a completely different person with the same name.

Myspace does the same thing... for free... but now you're a hipster douche bag, trying to contact that kid in 3rd grade that you picked on just a little bit too much, before he goes on a shooting spree with your name at the top of the list.

So... let's be honest with ourselves. Be the douche bag... or get killed.

Damn you Classmates... damn you all to hell.

Where Language Fails Us All

Pain is impossible to explain unless you have some unpleasant experience to relate it to.

"Well, it's kind of like when you get kicked in the knee..." or "Yeah, it's a dull stabbing pain."

These metaphors and similes don't make any sense to someone who hasn't experienced that kind of pain. I could tell you that it's "something like getting shot" and without a frame of reference, you have no idea what that means.

Ever been electrocuted? Can you explain that feeling? I'm not particularly apt to explain it myself, and I wonder if it has something to do with our language? Or is it that we're not readily able to explain pain.

For me, pain is always a distant memory. It isn't particularly horrible to remember, but I do recall being an unpleasant experience. Even something that happened hours ago. Though, with a frame of reference, I can explain what it feels like to break one's ankle... or wrist.

I'm at a loss, however, as to how one explains to a woman what feeling you get when you sit on your balls.

Schools is what keeping the poor poor

"The way I'm are"

I'm going to let you absorb that a little bit.

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Ready? Good, it's rant time.

The song is catchy. And I'm going to give you that. And it's extremely good. Well... not lyrically (it's never been Timbaland's strong suit), but it's pleasing to listen to and introduces new and positive elements back in to hip hop.

First, I applaud the usage of vocals in an instrumental sense. This is what vocals have been for hundreds of years, and I'm glad to see that reintroduced in to a genre of music that is faltering without new ideas.

Second, I love the fusion of techno elements with hip hop. One could even successfully argue that the song is a techno/trance song.

Third, it's catchy as hell. If you've heard it today, you're probably still mentally listening to it. I think the only song on the radio currently catchier than this song is "Same Girl" by R. Kelly and Usher.

I do have one huge problem, though:

How is it that the years spent perfecting my near perfect sense of grammar has guaranteed that I will not be rich?

Actually, I asked that question backwards.

Why do we continue to financially support this kind of abuse of the American dialect of the english language? No offense to Mr. Land, I love what he's done for hip hop in a musical sense, but what kind of example are we allowing to be set for the youth of this day.

"Why do I need proper grammar Mrs. Gibbens?"

"In order to be successful, you'll need to learn to communicate properly."

"But Timbaland can say ridiculous things. Isn't he successful?"

"Quiet, Ron. Do as I say."

It's actually painful to read things when they're written in improper grammar.

I'll give you an example.

Today, I are go to the store. It be fun. Be that you want something?

Kids are already headed this way. Are we going to have to unlearn grammar?

UPDATE!

My wife holds the believe that the song means that the girl will take "you the way you are" so much that you don't even have to re-conjugate the phrase.

UPDATE! X2

For your consideration:



Bonus!

Unexpected Apprehension

There are influences in this life that none of us could ever hope to comprehend. Not in the religious sense. In the "why would anyone do that" sense.

I'll step outside of my ego for a few minutes (treasure this, it doesn't happen often).

My wife tells me that I am intimidating. I agree. I'm short, but I am not a small man. I may have even developed a napoleonic complex and am immediately more aggressive when people taller than me enter my personal space. I don't have an explanation for why, only that it is the way it is. I also seem to have a bit of an obsidian disposition. I may be perfectly content, but to a lot of people I may not look happy, or even angry. People who know me have come to understand that it's just my face at rest.

I don't mean to be that way, but I'm sure there's a perfectly acceptable psychological explanation as to why I am. That said, it really has nothing to do with what was wrong with this mysterious fellow I crossed paths with at the library. But it's the only explanation I can come up with.

My wife had gotten a recommendation for a good read from a friend (the previously mentioned Lisa). On a trip to the library (I'm reading much more since marriage), my wife asked me to procure this literary nugget, so she wouldn't have to make the trip later. It wasn't a torturous task, so I set out to pick up the books.

On the way back out of the aisles of the Galaxie Library (no, it's not misspelled), a gentleman wearing glasses and a striped white shirt, entered the same aisle I was utilizing for my exit. It was a scene from a movie, he steps in to the aisle, with his son, and our eyes meet.

Immediately, he pushes his son between two book racks and quickly exits the aisle in the space between two other book racks, opposite of the space he pushes his son, clearing the aisle I'm exiting.

His son finds some of the book covers engaging. "Daddy. Daddy! Daddy! Look! Daddy!"

"Just a minute honey. Wait."

"Daddy, look!" At this point, the boy has pulled a book from the shelf and he's struggling to hold it high over his head. His father won't make eye contact with him, as he continues to stare at the bookcase.

"Just a minute. I'll look in a minute."

As I pass by and exit the aisle, he looks at his son and grabs the book. He picks up his son and takes off down the aisle.

To the gentleman in the Galaxie Library that I intimidated out of an aisle on Saturday the 14th: First, I'm sorry.

Second, what the hell was that about?

At the Forefront of Technology

She made it all worth it.

In one phrase, she completely justified the purchase of the PS3 and all the decisions that led up to it.

Watching Blu-Ray movies is a dream on this system. Casino Royale is a movie that deserves to be experienced in Hi-def. Trust me.

Playing games... well... PS2 games are fun and all, but that's not why you bought it... I'm still waiting.

She said, "Is that a PS3? Wow, that means you guys are like at the forefront of technology."

Thanks, Lisa.

Apart of Me

Growing up, the people of my generation were given less considerations than the children these days. And believe me, that's a good thing.

Growing up, we had recess... and playgrounds made of wood and steel. Wood that was not shaved and smoothed and stained and finished. Wood that was rotten in places that you'd learn to avoid. Places full of bugs that you didn't want to touch. And steel, the kind of steel that keeps prisoners locked away from society, or perhaps society locked away from them.

Growing up, this is what we were given, but we were happy to have it. Happy to have recess, and to play "wall ball." Happy to play basketball (closer to rugby) with our monkey bars, where fights might break out during an accidental "ball kick" or "out of bounds", if there were such things.

We could sneak away from authority and play our outlawed version of "wall ball" called "butts up," with rules you'd only understand if you had played the game yourself. And we could scream and shout and play tag and not worry about being on the front page news.

We could sneak away to the courtyard and play our games and be ignored, even though you knew the teachers knew where you were. There were no threats of terrorism, or sexual harassment, and every week, there weren't stories of teachers taking advantage or children.

And we would be free to tell dirty jokes to each other, and share magazines, and tell each other lies about sex and girls and movies and music. We could form secret societies and clubs and play fight and imagine what we would be in 20 years.

Growing up, we could sneak away... and we would be free.

Dedicated to the continued death of childhood where survival was more an act of Darwinism than being the boy in the bubble.

By the survivor of a broken tooth from all fall from grace (specifically, the steel and wooden ladder leading to a 20 foot tower). By the survivor of hundreds of jumps off of the previously mentioned tower. Survivor of a fall from the commando line, where I landed supine perpendicular to the bottom rope and was not able to breathe after my spine had cracked. Survivor of the "Steel log roll". Survivor of Tracey Elementary School's playground.

We were warriors. We were alive.

My apologies for the serious and nostalgic nature of this post. The idea stemmed from a writing exercise.

Without Hesitation

The lesson my father has always been trying to teach me since birth goes a little something like this: "If it was meant to happen, then it will happen and nothing good will come of forcing the outcome."

Of course, he's Hispanic, so he'd always confuse you with the proverb from his country before revealing the terse allegory regarding a life experience which proved his outlook to be the correct one. So usually, he would say something like:

"Mas vale pajaro en mano que cien volando."

Which actually means "A bird in the hand is better than a hundred of them flying." I know it's misleading, but I can't remember what he used to say about things that were
meant to happen. But you know what? It's close enough. I'm writing, you're reading. Just take my word for it.

It's not a bad way to live your life, though, but it requires a type of complacency that I am not capable of even administering to myself.

My father has done well for himself, he's not even a citizen, but he's got a house, and a job, and a wife and 3 kids (who are not convicts). He has an HDTV and a surround sound system. A car that doesn't require any amount of prayer to start. He has all the ingredients to "The American Dream" as it's told outside of our country. And he got it by waiting.

But there is a terrible side to waiting that brings an uncertainty to the equation.

Are you going to get what you want?

Will we get the car we've fallen in love with?

Will we find a house?

If you take my position on life, the answer will always be "yes". If you want something, you go and get something. Life is too short for "If I wait".

Which is why I have a wonderful wife.

Which is why we have a new car.

Which is why, at 25, we have a house and no slew of roommates.

Which is why I have a jackhammer. Well... that one's hard to explain.