Shipwrecked & Comatose

"It's traditional." "It's always been done this way." If you want me to support your cause, you will never use these phrases with me.  I believe tradition can be more of a hindrance than a help.  Rigid adherence to tradition is a potential impediment to true progress.  If humans always stuck to the belief that things should be done one way because they have always been done that way, we would all still be living in trees.  Everything changes and moves forward and most of the time humanity is the better for it. This doesn't only apply to the big issues.  It also applies to the small ones.  Pop culture needs to be refreshed and reinvented too sometimes.  If it didn't we would all still be watching vaudeville and the Keystone Cops and wondering why were were bored with them. The grand tradition of Dr. Who deserves a face lift as much as any institution.  For the uninitiated, I will clarify that Dr. Who is a TV show that began in 1963...

When I am on the train going home, I do not like to get up after I find a seat and sit down.  I want to sit down and immediately get my ticket ready and read my book.  I don't want to be disrupted.  I want to stay seated until the train reaches my stop.  This means I do what it takes to not have to move to let someone in my row.  If I'm sitting in the aisle seat, I will ask anyone requesting to sit in my what her stop is.  If that person is getting off before me, I will gladly take the middle seat.  It's is much easier than standing up, moving into the aisle to let the other passenger into the middle seat, and then getting up again at that passenger's stop. Today I boarded the train and found an available seat in the two facing rows at the back of the car.  Two people were in this group of seats already.  One was sitting on the aisle and one was sitting at the window.  I decided to take the remaining window seat since I wouldn't have t...

Donald Trump can't help himself.  He has to lash out at everything and everyone.  There seems to be a general consensus among rational people that his recent comment about Mika Brzezinski is a step too far. His minority of supporters are cheering him on.  His long-suffering wife defended him.  This woman who claims to be supporting an anti-bullying project said, "He will punch back 10 times harder." Is this the kind of behavior we should expect from someone occupying the the highest office in the land? Being president - being in politics in general -  requires an extraordinary personality.  A politician needs a thick skin.  He needs to be able to take the high ground when attacked.  He needs to be diplomatic at all times.  He has to walk a fine line between being gracious and saying what's on his mind.  When you are president, you must deal with the media, the public, and the leaders of other countries with consistency and class. ...