The more I think about school the more I remember.
I had a teacher who used to make me call my mom at work any time I didn't complete a "major" assignment. The humiliation of having to stop class and take me to a phone to call... And then having to deal with upset parents when I got home. To be "that kid".
It was when I was 11 years old that was the first time I ever went to bed wishing that I'd just die in my sleep. This was after having brought home a crappy report card... My parents knew I was intelligent, my teachers knew I was intelligent, I knew I was intelligent and the manner in which school was trying to "educate" me was not how I learn.
Nobody cared though. The system was/is established and FUCK YOU if you can't conform to it. The punishment for not conforming is humiliation, degradation, grounding, having to sit down with your parents, getting pulled out of class to be "talked to", having your desk dumped on the floor, ugh... how much more can I remember?
School does something, what that something is, I'm still trying to pinpoint. I watch videos from the 1970s of people on the Newly Weds shows... holy shit some of them were just dumb! I can't understand how it's even possible to be that dumb. You wouldn't see THAT degree of stupidity these days, and then there's the Flynn Effect: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flynn_effect
So people are scoring better on IQ tests... but HOW/WHY is this possible when so many people are still OH SO STUPID? School must actually be teaching people SOMETHING in order for these scores to be increasing at a steady pace... because IQ tests do measure some aspect of intelligence.
In: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XyOHJa5Vj5Y it is pointed out that a person can be trained to competence. However, this competence is merely an emulated competence. Just because someone can answer a series of questions correctly about a given topic, does not mean that they understand the topic or, if they do, can accurately extrapolate information to give an accurate prediction about unknown areas of that topic.
Human knowledge is passed down, we stand on the shoulders of the mental giants of previous times, that does not, however, make us mental giants. This is one of the problems with our perspective of school, education does not mean intelligence.
Tuesday, December 27, 2011
School: Part 3
Looking back at school as an adult has allowed me to explain events that I could never make sense of as a child. I now realize that some of the things my teachers did to me, were done to try and "inspire" me to raise above my position in the social hierarchy.
In elementary school, my desk was a mess. I had a teacher who decided that it would be a good idea to dump the desk out in front of all my classmates as punishment (this is EXTREMELY humiliating). Never mind the fact there were 3 or 4 other kids whose desks were just as, if not messier than mine (they expected more out of me).
Once, one of the boys bathrooms was trashed, so any time certain guys went to the bathroom the teacher had to pick an escort for them. Most of us were terrified to even ask to go pee (because having to ask to perform an essential bodily function is humiliating enough -- what if teacher decided I need an escort?). So... one guy asked to go pee and the teacher had to pick someone to escort them. Who in the class was responsible enough, but not so high in the social hierarchy that it would be embarrassing a task to escort another guy to pee? Me.
Or how about being made one of the "School Bus Patrol"...
It took me 20 years to figure out why some of this shit happened.
In middle school, 6th grade, the separation between the socially well-adjusted kids and the socially not-well-adjusted kids was blatantly obvious - they literally separated us into "West" (aka "Left" aka "Wrong") and "East" (aka "Right" aka "Right"). My defiance all through 5th grade earned me a spot in the 6W, I immediately noticed who got into which wing. This realization was a turning point in my schooling, its the point where I flat-out gave up (great inspiration, huh?).
For whatever reason, between 6th and 7th grade my Mom decided I should be "Excel" again and made a huge fuss at the school. So in the summer between 6th and 7th grade, I was given an IQ test at the school. Summer break, 9am, taking a test I didn't want to take, at a time I didn't want to be awake at, in a building I DID NOT WANT TO BE IN, with a test-giver who obviously felt the same way I did.
The test he gave me was meant for a certain age range, some of the pictures he showed me were colored drawings... So when he asked, "What's missing in this picture?" I got really frustrated, I didn't know if the artist intentionally left something out or implied its presence, hell, there were probably a million things that weren't drawn in there that were missing if it had been a real photo...
So I started obvious. "Well, she's going to fall off the floor if she keeps walking". A woman pushing a cart, in some kind of supermarket. The floor had been "implied" to exist, but a few feet in front of her, the tiles vanished and a white abyss awaited her. The guy looked at the card and got somewhat upset "Besides the missing floor"...
Yeah, this test was going to go real well.
The next card - a picture of half of an orange. I glanced at the card, then back up at my tester, giving him a look. A short pause and.... "BESIDES THE OTHER HALF THE ORANGE!"... of course, I think I got this card wrong - because I had never studied the anatomy of an orange (which is obviously essential knowledge).
In elementary school, my desk was a mess. I had a teacher who decided that it would be a good idea to dump the desk out in front of all my classmates as punishment (this is EXTREMELY humiliating). Never mind the fact there were 3 or 4 other kids whose desks were just as, if not messier than mine (they expected more out of me).
Once, one of the boys bathrooms was trashed, so any time certain guys went to the bathroom the teacher had to pick an escort for them. Most of us were terrified to even ask to go pee (because having to ask to perform an essential bodily function is humiliating enough -- what if teacher decided I need an escort?). So... one guy asked to go pee and the teacher had to pick someone to escort them. Who in the class was responsible enough, but not so high in the social hierarchy that it would be embarrassing a task to escort another guy to pee? Me.
Or how about being made one of the "School Bus Patrol"...
It took me 20 years to figure out why some of this shit happened.
In middle school, 6th grade, the separation between the socially well-adjusted kids and the socially not-well-adjusted kids was blatantly obvious - they literally separated us into "West" (aka "Left" aka "Wrong") and "East" (aka "Right" aka "Right"). My defiance all through 5th grade earned me a spot in the 6W, I immediately noticed who got into which wing. This realization was a turning point in my schooling, its the point where I flat-out gave up (great inspiration, huh?).
For whatever reason, between 6th and 7th grade my Mom decided I should be "Excel" again and made a huge fuss at the school. So in the summer between 6th and 7th grade, I was given an IQ test at the school. Summer break, 9am, taking a test I didn't want to take, at a time I didn't want to be awake at, in a building I DID NOT WANT TO BE IN, with a test-giver who obviously felt the same way I did.
The test he gave me was meant for a certain age range, some of the pictures he showed me were colored drawings... So when he asked, "What's missing in this picture?" I got really frustrated, I didn't know if the artist intentionally left something out or implied its presence, hell, there were probably a million things that weren't drawn in there that were missing if it had been a real photo...
So I started obvious. "Well, she's going to fall off the floor if she keeps walking". A woman pushing a cart, in some kind of supermarket. The floor had been "implied" to exist, but a few feet in front of her, the tiles vanished and a white abyss awaited her. The guy looked at the card and got somewhat upset "Besides the missing floor"...
Yeah, this test was going to go real well.
The next card - a picture of half of an orange. I glanced at the card, then back up at my tester, giving him a look. A short pause and.... "BESIDES THE OTHER HALF THE ORANGE!"... of course, I think I got this card wrong - because I had never studied the anatomy of an orange (which is obviously essential knowledge).
Wednesday, December 21, 2011
School: Part 2
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acLW1vFO-2Q
Every word is 100% true.
Before first grade, I was in Montessori. On my first day (~4-5 years old) our teacher sat us down on the floor and addressed a large poster that was on the wall above one of the windows.
"Treat others as you would like to be treated" She gave a simplistic explanation for our little brains.
"What a BRILLIANT idea!" I thought to myself - It's a system which creates, rewards and perpetuates a positive attitude towards one another! I treat you well, you find a way to treat me better, in turn I treat you even better - holy shit! This is amazing, I love it, what a great, philosophical society this is - I'm soo lucky to have been born here, now!
We're all adults here, we know the truth of how people treat one another. The golden rule is some fantastical ideal that is FAR beyond the reach of the average person.
--------------
Going into first grade, I'm told my IQ at this point was measured "over 150". I had recommendations from kindergarten teachers for advanced programs. We moved to Pennsylvania from Michigan before school started, the counselor at this new school looked at me and threw out all this information and put me with everyone else. "It's a new environment (having just moved here), let's see how he adjusts" ... excuses ... excuses.
What she really meant - "He doesn't look socially well adjusted. His shoes are ... multi-colored and wild, his hair is a mess, his shirt is WAY too big and his shorts don't match anything!?" (The travesty).
There was a girl in my class who was in the "Excel" program. She wore perfectly knit sweaters, with perfectly ironed jeans/skirts with a perfectly plain haircut, had a perfectly folded bagged lunch, who read all kinds of books. She was the social ideal AND she was smart. Kudos, you get to go to "Excel", Lisa.
My first day of first grade was horrible. The school smelled funny, the desks were just a tad too small, strange kids, no parents... There aren't any rules (that we know of at this point), many of us have never been put into a room with 30 other (strangers) kids our age for the first time. I desperately wanted to raise my hand and ask if we could have class outside, I wanted to get out of this horrible, uncomfortable environment.
I'm 6 years old and I have a lot of energy. You stick me behind a desk and tell me to sit completely still and to be completely silent?! FUCK YOU.
Q: What is the point of this, what is the purpose of forcing children into this uncomfortable position for 6-8 hours a day?
A: We're training them to be tolerate of sitting in cubicles 8-12 hours / day.
Let's talk more about the environment. At this point in their lives, the situation of school (being stuck behind a desk in a room full of 30 other children) is completely alien. There is no adult-adult interaction to observe, there is no past experience to call on for guidance on how to act. You have put 30 children into a situation that is 100% completely, absolutely new; and given them NO information on how to act. Child development at this point takes a DRASTIC, irreversible change.
While some children will draw on past experiences with small groups to determine how to behave, those who have not had these experiences, or who are not developed enough to try to find correlations, are now marching down their own invented path. School is now a wilderness and the children are raising one another. Teachers don't have time to teach how to behave, etiquette comes second to the course outline. This is the beginning of the human psychopath.
School judged me by how I looked. My peers started to as well. School said reading was for REALLY SMART kids, I hated reading, so my peers thought I was dumb. School said, neatly folded lunch bags are a sign of good organization, and good organization is a sign of intelligence, so my crumpled lunch bag meant I was dumb. etc, etc, etc...
I no longer wonder why high production value is more important in an election than content of philosophy.
-------------
http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/prologue5.htm
Read from "After I spoke in Nashville, a mother named Debbie..."
There is OH SO MUCH MORE to come...
Every word is 100% true.
Before first grade, I was in Montessori. On my first day (~4-5 years old) our teacher sat us down on the floor and addressed a large poster that was on the wall above one of the windows.
"Treat others as you would like to be treated" She gave a simplistic explanation for our little brains.
"What a BRILLIANT idea!" I thought to myself - It's a system which creates, rewards and perpetuates a positive attitude towards one another! I treat you well, you find a way to treat me better, in turn I treat you even better - holy shit! This is amazing, I love it, what a great, philosophical society this is - I'm soo lucky to have been born here, now!
We're all adults here, we know the truth of how people treat one another. The golden rule is some fantastical ideal that is FAR beyond the reach of the average person.
--------------
Going into first grade, I'm told my IQ at this point was measured "over 150". I had recommendations from kindergarten teachers for advanced programs. We moved to Pennsylvania from Michigan before school started, the counselor at this new school looked at me and threw out all this information and put me with everyone else. "It's a new environment (having just moved here), let's see how he adjusts" ... excuses ... excuses.
What she really meant - "He doesn't look socially well adjusted. His shoes are ... multi-colored and wild, his hair is a mess, his shirt is WAY too big and his shorts don't match anything!?" (The travesty).
There was a girl in my class who was in the "Excel" program. She wore perfectly knit sweaters, with perfectly ironed jeans/skirts with a perfectly plain haircut, had a perfectly folded bagged lunch, who read all kinds of books. She was the social ideal AND she was smart. Kudos, you get to go to "Excel", Lisa.
My first day of first grade was horrible. The school smelled funny, the desks were just a tad too small, strange kids, no parents... There aren't any rules (that we know of at this point), many of us have never been put into a room with 30 other (strangers) kids our age for the first time. I desperately wanted to raise my hand and ask if we could have class outside, I wanted to get out of this horrible, uncomfortable environment.
I'm 6 years old and I have a lot of energy. You stick me behind a desk and tell me to sit completely still and to be completely silent?! FUCK YOU.
Q: What is the point of this, what is the purpose of forcing children into this uncomfortable position for 6-8 hours a day?
A: We're training them to be tolerate of sitting in cubicles 8-12 hours / day.
Let's talk more about the environment. At this point in their lives, the situation of school (being stuck behind a desk in a room full of 30 other children) is completely alien. There is no adult-adult interaction to observe, there is no past experience to call on for guidance on how to act. You have put 30 children into a situation that is 100% completely, absolutely new; and given them NO information on how to act. Child development at this point takes a DRASTIC, irreversible change.
While some children will draw on past experiences with small groups to determine how to behave, those who have not had these experiences, or who are not developed enough to try to find correlations, are now marching down their own invented path. School is now a wilderness and the children are raising one another. Teachers don't have time to teach how to behave, etiquette comes second to the course outline. This is the beginning of the human psychopath.
School judged me by how I looked. My peers started to as well. School said reading was for REALLY SMART kids, I hated reading, so my peers thought I was dumb. School said, neatly folded lunch bags are a sign of good organization, and good organization is a sign of intelligence, so my crumpled lunch bag meant I was dumb. etc, etc, etc...
I no longer wonder why high production value is more important in an election than content of philosophy.
-------------
http://www.johntaylorgatto.com/underground/prologue5.htm
Read from "After I spoke in Nashville, a mother named Debbie..."
There is OH SO MUCH MORE to come...
Tuesday, December 20, 2011
Freedom
Pic from 2010 visit to Alaska...
http://sophiclunatic.blogspot.com/2011/12/school-part-2.html
As I looked out the window of my first grade class, I wanted nothing more than to run outside, feel the sun and breeze on my face and to remember that I am not a prisoner, I am FREE.
http://sophiclunatic.blogspot.com/2011/12/school-part-2.html
As I looked out the window of my first grade class, I wanted nothing more than to run outside, feel the sun and breeze on my face and to remember that I am not a prisoner, I am FREE.
Pissed off much?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKUDTPbDhnA
I can understand being mad.
I can understand having a crappy job and hating it.
But this... I can only understand if the dude has completely lost it and has had enough, in which case, quitting > throwing shit around.
I can understand being mad.
I can understand having a crappy job and hating it.
But this... I can only understand if the dude has completely lost it and has had enough, in which case, quitting > throwing shit around.
3.5% vs. 7%
Let's talk about inflation.
http://www.chrismartenson.com/crashcourse/chapter-10-inflation
http://www.chrismartenson.com/crashcourse/chapter-16-fuzzy-numbers
For ease, we're going to use some numbers that make my life easy, not necessarily based on reality (but close - in my opinion). 3.5% inflation would mean that roughly every 20 years, prices double. 7% inflation means that every 10 years prices double.
So, over the last 10 years, how many American's paychecks doubled? This is what would need to happen at 7% inflation in order to maintain standard of living. Monetary policy is based at the Federal Reserve, a private bank that basically controls our money without any actual Federal oversight.
If you want to know why $20/hr isn't a decent wage any more, there's your answer. $20/hr for a family of 4 is considered "Low-Income" if not poverty.
The REALLY BAD news: I haven't had a raise in 8 years - which means my pay has been almost cut in half due to inflation. In 10 more years, my wage will need to nearly QUADRUPLE in order for me to maintain my standard of living of 10 years ago. That's not going to happen.
And what about people stuck at minimum wage?
This is the nature of annual percentile growth - it's exponential. 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64... etc.
So if inflation is reported at 3-3.5% annually, while it's actually around 7%, you're missing out on a LOT. Considering that the purpose of an economy is to allow people to work so that one day in the future they will no longer have to work, we all live in a complete and total SCAM. Making $20/hr today is equivalent to making $160/hr in 30 years. Unless you can make your money grow at/near/above the actual rate of inflation, you are working your ass off to LOSE MONEY in the long run. That's why people spend everything they make - because it's not worth saving.
There are a lot of doomsayers who think that as some other information comes out, that we will face a revolution... no, we won't. See, people may not KNOW this information, but they have a deep sense of it, and to tell them will only make them say "Oh, wow, yeah it makes sense now", and then go back to posting on Twitter/Facebook.
8 parts: one of the most fascinating things I have ever watched:
http://www.albartlett.org/presentations/arithmetic_population_energy_video1.html
http://www.albartlett.org/presentations/arithmetic_population_energy_video2.html
http://www.chrismartenson.com/crashcourse/chapter-10-inflation
http://www.chrismartenson.com/crashcourse/chapter-16-fuzzy-numbers
For ease, we're going to use some numbers that make my life easy, not necessarily based on reality (but close - in my opinion). 3.5% inflation would mean that roughly every 20 years, prices double. 7% inflation means that every 10 years prices double.
So, over the last 10 years, how many American's paychecks doubled? This is what would need to happen at 7% inflation in order to maintain standard of living. Monetary policy is based at the Federal Reserve, a private bank that basically controls our money without any actual Federal oversight.
If you want to know why $20/hr isn't a decent wage any more, there's your answer. $20/hr for a family of 4 is considered "Low-Income" if not poverty.
The REALLY BAD news: I haven't had a raise in 8 years - which means my pay has been almost cut in half due to inflation. In 10 more years, my wage will need to nearly QUADRUPLE in order for me to maintain my standard of living of 10 years ago. That's not going to happen.
And what about people stuck at minimum wage?
This is the nature of annual percentile growth - it's exponential. 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64... etc.
So if inflation is reported at 3-3.5% annually, while it's actually around 7%, you're missing out on a LOT. Considering that the purpose of an economy is to allow people to work so that one day in the future they will no longer have to work, we all live in a complete and total SCAM. Making $20/hr today is equivalent to making $160/hr in 30 years. Unless you can make your money grow at/near/above the actual rate of inflation, you are working your ass off to LOSE MONEY in the long run. That's why people spend everything they make - because it's not worth saving.
There are a lot of doomsayers who think that as some other information comes out, that we will face a revolution... no, we won't. See, people may not KNOW this information, but they have a deep sense of it, and to tell them will only make them say "Oh, wow, yeah it makes sense now", and then go back to posting on Twitter/Facebook.
8 parts: one of the most fascinating things I have ever watched:
http://www.albartlett.org/presentations/arithmetic_population_energy_video1.html
http://www.albartlett.org/presentations/arithmetic_population_energy_video2.html
Monday, December 19, 2011
Sunday, December 18, 2011
Senior Quote (School: Part 1)
At the end of my senior year of high school, they asked us all for quotes to put into a book to go with the year book. I didn't give it much thought, and really wanted to see how many people I could utterly piss off.
"Cheat. Honesty will not earn you any points."
It was a statement mostly directed at my Functions, Statistics, Trigonometry teacher. He had a hard on for giving out tons of homework and then giving credit/no credit just for doing it. His grading system was completely fucked up, he would calculate it 3 ways, the highest of the 3 would be your grade - various weightings between homework, quizzes and tests.
In this class, I ended up with about 60/360 points on homework. Yeah, 17% baby.
A lot of the other kids in the class did their homework everyday ... errr, no they didn't. A few kids in the class did their homework, everyone else copied it off of them before school every day. Yet they all received 360/360 on their homework.
I find it completely mind blowing that the teacher wouldn't scratch his head when he received tests from kids who did their homework daily. "Gee, Johnny does ALL his homework, but only got 65% on his test, I wonder what the fuck is going on?" I can only assume that because NO ACTION was ever taken to figure out why kids who did all their homework 100% of the time couldn't complete simple tasks on quizzes/test, that cheating on homework was expected and accepted.
So a lot of the kids cheated and they received points for their dishonesty. I didn't cheat, I was completely honest in all of my work. So my suggestion to all the underclassmen? Cheat. Being honest doesn't earn you points, and school is all about earning points. Morals? Psh. Honesty? lol. What is the meaning of school then, if not to become well-educated (if they cared whether or not you understood things, this type of thing wouldn't be going on in an upper-class high school)?
It goes far beyond school into every day life. Bankers cheat and become rich. I remember hearing somewhere that our society doesn't believe a crime is a crime until you are caught. Gee I wonder where they learned that?
I have a LOT to say about school... buckle up, epic rants will be coming.
"Cheat. Honesty will not earn you any points."
It was a statement mostly directed at my Functions, Statistics, Trigonometry teacher. He had a hard on for giving out tons of homework and then giving credit/no credit just for doing it. His grading system was completely fucked up, he would calculate it 3 ways, the highest of the 3 would be your grade - various weightings between homework, quizzes and tests.
In this class, I ended up with about 60/360 points on homework. Yeah, 17% baby.
A lot of the other kids in the class did their homework everyday ... errr, no they didn't. A few kids in the class did their homework, everyone else copied it off of them before school every day. Yet they all received 360/360 on their homework.
I find it completely mind blowing that the teacher wouldn't scratch his head when he received tests from kids who did their homework daily. "Gee, Johnny does ALL his homework, but only got 65% on his test, I wonder what the fuck is going on?" I can only assume that because NO ACTION was ever taken to figure out why kids who did all their homework 100% of the time couldn't complete simple tasks on quizzes/test, that cheating on homework was expected and accepted.
So a lot of the kids cheated and they received points for their dishonesty. I didn't cheat, I was completely honest in all of my work. So my suggestion to all the underclassmen? Cheat. Being honest doesn't earn you points, and school is all about earning points. Morals? Psh. Honesty? lol. What is the meaning of school then, if not to become well-educated (if they cared whether or not you understood things, this type of thing wouldn't be going on in an upper-class high school)?
It goes far beyond school into every day life. Bankers cheat and become rich. I remember hearing somewhere that our society doesn't believe a crime is a crime until you are caught. Gee I wonder where they learned that?
I have a LOT to say about school... buckle up, epic rants will be coming.
Grrr...
I keep starting new posts, then get depressed and delete them. It just pisses me off to be saying thing that are so blatantly obvious that most 5 year olds can understand.
At work today, some guy decided to start throwing shit at me. No idea why. I was in a bad mood before he even started. What fucking planet are people living on, where it's okay to throw hard plastic nuts 90 feet at another person? My kindergarten teacher would have put me in a corner for doing shit like this, yet here are grown fucking adults acting like... like what? Not even children are this poorly behaved. The closest thing I can think of is chimps throwing their poop at people... but even then, the chimps probably have a reason for doing it.
This is the pinnacle of evolution? This is the product of "God's design"? The human species is following a population pattern like any virus, if we don't overcome our "primal instincts" we'll suffer the same fate as a virus that has completely consumed its host as well. Is this so difficult to see? Exponential growth is not sustainable. We're growing a population that cannot feed itself, or even adequately supply fresh water. BUT WE GOTS TO HAVE THE SEX.
On another topic...
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/census-shows-1-2-people-103940568.html
Nearly 1/2 the USA is Low-Income.
At work today, some guy decided to start throwing shit at me. No idea why. I was in a bad mood before he even started. What fucking planet are people living on, where it's okay to throw hard plastic nuts 90 feet at another person? My kindergarten teacher would have put me in a corner for doing shit like this, yet here are grown fucking adults acting like... like what? Not even children are this poorly behaved. The closest thing I can think of is chimps throwing their poop at people... but even then, the chimps probably have a reason for doing it.
This is the pinnacle of evolution? This is the product of "God's design"? The human species is following a population pattern like any virus, if we don't overcome our "primal instincts" we'll suffer the same fate as a virus that has completely consumed its host as well. Is this so difficult to see? Exponential growth is not sustainable. We're growing a population that cannot feed itself, or even adequately supply fresh water. BUT WE GOTS TO HAVE THE SEX.
On another topic...
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/census-shows-1-2-people-103940568.html
Nearly 1/2 the USA is Low-Income.
Tuesday, December 13, 2011
Driving: Part 2
At work, we call each other "brother" and "sister".
In the last few months, 3 people - pedestrians - have been hit in the parking lot at work.
So while we call each other "brother" or "sister" inside, once you get outside, you better watch the fuck out or I'll run your stupid ass over.
Not only do people drive like complete fucking morons (50 mph in a parking lot), but they do it with frost covered windows, while talking on their cellphone and/or smoking a cigarette... cutting diagonally through empty rows of parking spaces.
So, you'd think that once these people got onto the on-ramp they'd be gunning it, zipping onto the highway to get the fuck away from work. Instead, they pull onto the highway going SLOWER than what they were doing in the parking lot.
In the last few months, 3 people - pedestrians - have been hit in the parking lot at work.
So while we call each other "brother" or "sister" inside, once you get outside, you better watch the fuck out or I'll run your stupid ass over.
Not only do people drive like complete fucking morons (50 mph in a parking lot), but they do it with frost covered windows, while talking on their cellphone and/or smoking a cigarette... cutting diagonally through empty rows of parking spaces.
So, you'd think that once these people got onto the on-ramp they'd be gunning it, zipping onto the highway to get the fuck away from work. Instead, they pull onto the highway going SLOWER than what they were doing in the parking lot.
Monday, December 12, 2011
Awkward
Walking into work on Saturday, some random guy started talking to me:
"Hey man, you know what the weather is going to be today?"
It was weird. I had NO CLUE why some random guy would start talking to me. What can I do but take his attempt at small talk and be honest.
"No clue."
And then it starts.
"Ah see, I thought maybe you heard something I didn't, thought maybe you heard it was going to be 60 degrees"
AHHH Now I see.
It was 28 degrees at 5:30am and I was in shorts. Asking about the weather, he was trying to be cute, or a smart-ass.
If I had known he was making reference to my shorts, I would have told him it was going to be 74 degrees for 10 hours, with 5 minutes of 28 degrees on each side of that 10 hour window. I'm not going to wear jeans and be uncomfortable for 10 hours when I can wear shorts and be a little cold for 5 minutes. Am I the ONLY human being on this planet that thinks this is sane?
"Hey man, you know what the weather is going to be today?"
It was weird. I had NO CLUE why some random guy would start talking to me. What can I do but take his attempt at small talk and be honest.
"No clue."
And then it starts.
"Ah see, I thought maybe you heard something I didn't, thought maybe you heard it was going to be 60 degrees"
AHHH Now I see.
It was 28 degrees at 5:30am and I was in shorts. Asking about the weather, he was trying to be cute, or a smart-ass.
If I had known he was making reference to my shorts, I would have told him it was going to be 74 degrees for 10 hours, with 5 minutes of 28 degrees on each side of that 10 hour window. I'm not going to wear jeans and be uncomfortable for 10 hours when I can wear shorts and be a little cold for 5 minutes. Am I the ONLY human being on this planet that thinks this is sane?
Drunk Driving
Maybe I'm just a monumental asshole...
The FIRST thing that came to my mind when I saw this picture:
You know you're shit-ass drunk when you can perfectly read a sign that your child wrote, in a mirror.
I laughed, because it's funny.
The FIRST thing that came to my mind when I saw this picture:
I laughed, because it's funny.
Sunday, December 11, 2011
Driving: Part 1
I live near a school. M-F between certain hours there is a "School Speed Limit", you know, to get people to slow down and make a safer environment for the kids leaving school; because NOBODY wants to hit a school bus and kill a few kids.
It seems every time I drive past this school during the times of reduced speed limit, there's always some morons in mini-vans ignoring the flashing signs. So these people, who I assume have children (because nobody would own a minivan if they didn't have them), are making a conscious decision to speed in a school zone. They are putting other people's children at risk, hell maybe even their own children. Bravo, genius.
Then there are the parents who drive on the highways like fucking morons in a vehicle full of children. Seriously? Not only are they setting a horrible example by swerving in and out of traffic, but they too are putting their own children at risk.
It seems every time I drive past this school during the times of reduced speed limit, there's always some morons in mini-vans ignoring the flashing signs. So these people, who I assume have children (because nobody would own a minivan if they didn't have them), are making a conscious decision to speed in a school zone. They are putting other people's children at risk, hell maybe even their own children. Bravo, genius.
Then there are the parents who drive on the highways like fucking morons in a vehicle full of children. Seriously? Not only are they setting a horrible example by swerving in and out of traffic, but they too are putting their own children at risk.
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
I GIVE UP.
I recently quit playing a video game. Not because the game wasn't entertaining, not because the game was flawed, not because of anything to do with the game - or the developer. I recently quit a video game because a vast majority of people I met were COMPLETE MORONS.
My character was Tayr. This is a chart of the damage output of my group for a 90+ minute dungeon. The typical group composed: 1 healer, 1 tank, 1 off-healer, 2 people focusing on damage. (I've done these dungeons in LESS THAN 20 minutes with a good group). For the dungeon we were in, the other player who was focused on dps (damage per second) should be 65%+ of what I was doing.
This isn't even the worst of it.
I played a healer as well. My old guild leader was a tank. He wanted to be a "dps tank". Which basically meant that instead of taking skills that reduced the damage he took, he took skills that increased his damage. So I spent my first few weeks in this new game as a healer, trying to figure out why the hell this game was so ridiculously difficult (I didn't know his theory about tanking until later). He spent a lot of time berating everyone else because he thought they were at fault. It wasn't until I really learned how everything worked that I saw how utterly MORONIC this guy really was.
I had a friend in the game and he and I tried playing on other servers, mostly, everything was the same everywhere. There were only varying degrees of stupid.
Of course, there is oh so much more to this, there are months worth of anecdotes I could discuss, but it all leans to one single thing; I quit playing "Rift" because people are complete fucking morons.
I struggle with this. I try to imagine what it would take for me to do some of the things that I've seen people do. This is how you help people learn - you imagine the circumstances that would create a situation where an action that might seem logical, isn't, and then you explain WHY it isn't logical or what is better. The type of stupidity that I've witnessed can only be explained by retardation (any/all mental deficiencies), alcohol or drugs. At no point in my life, not even at age 5, would I ever do some of the things that these coherent adults, that I'm speaking with over the internet, do.
How is this even fucking possible?
Here's a link to an MMORPG website to a post I made about quitting:
http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/431/view/forums/thread/323790/Average-player-in-this-game-is-really-stupid.html
"I do nothing but scratch my head, and wonder how many of these people even manage to successfully put food into their mouths and chew without choking to death."
The sad thing is, I recently picked up another game and I'm running into a lot of the same things. How the fuck are we even surviving as a species?
One last note, I know the difference between stupidity and simply not having enough/wrong information. These people, are stupid.
This isn't even the worst of it.
I played a healer as well. My old guild leader was a tank. He wanted to be a "dps tank". Which basically meant that instead of taking skills that reduced the damage he took, he took skills that increased his damage. So I spent my first few weeks in this new game as a healer, trying to figure out why the hell this game was so ridiculously difficult (I didn't know his theory about tanking until later). He spent a lot of time berating everyone else because he thought they were at fault. It wasn't until I really learned how everything worked that I saw how utterly MORONIC this guy really was.
I had a friend in the game and he and I tried playing on other servers, mostly, everything was the same everywhere. There were only varying degrees of stupid.
Of course, there is oh so much more to this, there are months worth of anecdotes I could discuss, but it all leans to one single thing; I quit playing "Rift" because people are complete fucking morons.
I struggle with this. I try to imagine what it would take for me to do some of the things that I've seen people do. This is how you help people learn - you imagine the circumstances that would create a situation where an action that might seem logical, isn't, and then you explain WHY it isn't logical or what is better. The type of stupidity that I've witnessed can only be explained by retardation (any/all mental deficiencies), alcohol or drugs. At no point in my life, not even at age 5, would I ever do some of the things that these coherent adults, that I'm speaking with over the internet, do.
How is this even fucking possible?
Here's a link to an MMORPG website to a post I made about quitting:
http://www.mmorpg.com/gamelist.cfm/game/431/view/forums/thread/323790/Average-player-in-this-game-is-really-stupid.html
"I do nothing but scratch my head, and wonder how many of these people even manage to successfully put food into their mouths and chew without choking to death."
The sad thing is, I recently picked up another game and I'm running into a lot of the same things. How the fuck are we even surviving as a species?
One last note, I know the difference between stupidity and simply not having enough/wrong information. These people, are stupid.
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