Random Thoughts 16
It makes me sad to think kids these days will never know the thrill of being chosen by the teacher to run the filmstrip projector in class. There you were, hand eagerly poised on the knob, listening for the sound of that beep on the tape recorder. Oh to feel the joy of such heavy responsibility!
Why will people never understand that if you're going to put something out there on the internet, it's fair game for commenters? Don't publicly post something controversial and then say, "I didn't ask for your opinion." Don't say, "Don't judge me." If you put it out there, you are giving an implicit request for opinion and judgment. The advantage of the internet is that it gives us all a forum to make our voices heard. That's also the disadvantage of the internet. Not everyone is going to like what you have to say. That means you need to make a choice. You have every right to live in your own echo chamber and keep your posts to groups of people who agree with you. That's fine. I have done it myself. You also have the power to not respond to or engage with those who disagree with you (or even delete comments and go on your merry way). Whenever you put something out there, you will always risk getting it back.
Speaking of people putting stuff out there, I am so sick of the Orange Tonsil Stone Wasting Oxygen in Washington whining about how unfairly he is being treated. IT'S THE MEDIA'S JOB TO CALL YOU OUT, YOU GUANO-FOR-BRAINS MORON!!!!! The media exist to make sure the public is made aware of everything the government does. It is the way to keep the government honest. If you can't be honest, then the media will go after you. That's how the system works. If you don't like it, then don't run for office. Don't tweet and then expect everyone who comments to fawn all over you. If you can't handle hardball questions from reporters, you don't deserve to be in the government.
Online shopping is a new hobby for me now that I can't get out much. I buy a lot of clothes and shoes with the hope I can wear them before the season is over. The problem with online shopping is that I can't try before I buy and everything is trial and error.
So anyway, I learned something about shoe shopping. In the past year I realized that I need to start shopping for shoes in wide widths due to that pesky expanding bunion on my right foot, For years I have worn size 7 shoes. Every pair of size 7 wide shoes I have purchased from Zappos has been too big (and they were all different manufacturers, so it's not only the width of a particular brand). The width is good, but the length is always too long. I am amazed at how different shoes fit when the width is changed.
As a consquence of this, the man in the UPS store now recognizes me as the woman who is always coming in to return packages from Zappos and other clothing stores.
I am occasionally asked if I think people deserve what happens to them. That's a dumb question. Few consequences in life are deserved. Even when the consensus might be we deserve something - good or bad - we don't always receive it. I don't believe in karma or fate or that what goes around always comes around. What I believe in is cause and effect. If X has been proven to lead to Y, then nobody should be surprised when Y happens. There are people who experience Y for no reason and people who experience X but Y doesn't happen. Sometimes people avoid consequences and it makes us wonder if the exception is the rule, or if the person involved is exceptional himself. Sometimes people suffer consequences that seemed to have no cause and they think they are somehow cursed. I say no to that. Consequences happen more often than not. That's how life works. We remember the exceptions rather than the norm. That's why we think life is unfair when things work exactly as they should work.
The other day I walked into my building and greeted some of my neighbors. We were all wearing masks and gloves, which are required in my building when residents aren't in their apartments. I wondered out loud what someone from the past would think if he had a time machine take him to the spring of 2020. Would he be wondering what kind of dystopia the world had become?
There is a special place in Hell for people who think "bruschetta" means "chopped tomatoes".
I think about all the people in the English-speaking world who can't seem to be able to pronounce "et cetera" or asterisk, no matter how often they see those words spelled out. I am convinced there is some dark cosmic reason for that. Maybe the balance of the universe is dependent on certain people not being able to say those words. If everyone pronounced it correctly, life as we know it could possibly end.
I admit that even though I'm a skeptic, I have an affection for astrology. I don't care about it from a fortune-telling standpoint. I'm more interested in how it works in personality assessment and compatibility (it can't be that much less accurate than Myers-Briggs). I find for me as a Cancer, much of what astrologers say about my sign fits the bill. I'm hypersensitive and I have a love of domesticity, especially cooking. The argument falls apart when you see some of my traits that aren't typical Cancer traits. For example, Cancers like to stay home all the time and I don't.
A good skeptic will remind me that it's all bunk. An astrology buff will say it's because we are all more than our sun signs and I have other signs in my chart.
So I decided to check out the latter excuse and looked up my rising sign and my moon sign. My rising sign is Taurus. That explains my extreme stubbornness, my sturdy physical body type, my resistance to change, and fear of loss. My moon sign is Sagittarius, which explains my love of travel, my desire for new experiences, and my occasional desire for adventure.
Cancer and Taurus are not compatible with Sagittarius. No wonder I'm so screwy! But Sagittarius is compatible with Libra and Cancer and Taurus are not, so that explains my marriage.
Why will people never understand that if you're going to put something out there on the internet, it's fair game for commenters? Don't publicly post something controversial and then say, "I didn't ask for your opinion." Don't say, "Don't judge me." If you put it out there, you are giving an implicit request for opinion and judgment. The advantage of the internet is that it gives us all a forum to make our voices heard. That's also the disadvantage of the internet. Not everyone is going to like what you have to say. That means you need to make a choice. You have every right to live in your own echo chamber and keep your posts to groups of people who agree with you. That's fine. I have done it myself. You also have the power to not respond to or engage with those who disagree with you (or even delete comments and go on your merry way). Whenever you put something out there, you will always risk getting it back.
Speaking of people putting stuff out there, I am so sick of the Orange Tonsil Stone Wasting Oxygen in Washington whining about how unfairly he is being treated. IT'S THE MEDIA'S JOB TO CALL YOU OUT, YOU GUANO-FOR-BRAINS MORON!!!!! The media exist to make sure the public is made aware of everything the government does. It is the way to keep the government honest. If you can't be honest, then the media will go after you. That's how the system works. If you don't like it, then don't run for office. Don't tweet and then expect everyone who comments to fawn all over you. If you can't handle hardball questions from reporters, you don't deserve to be in the government.
Online shopping is a new hobby for me now that I can't get out much. I buy a lot of clothes and shoes with the hope I can wear them before the season is over. The problem with online shopping is that I can't try before I buy and everything is trial and error.
So anyway, I learned something about shoe shopping. In the past year I realized that I need to start shopping for shoes in wide widths due to that pesky expanding bunion on my right foot, For years I have worn size 7 shoes. Every pair of size 7 wide shoes I have purchased from Zappos has been too big (and they were all different manufacturers, so it's not only the width of a particular brand). The width is good, but the length is always too long. I am amazed at how different shoes fit when the width is changed.
As a consquence of this, the man in the UPS store now recognizes me as the woman who is always coming in to return packages from Zappos and other clothing stores.
I am occasionally asked if I think people deserve what happens to them. That's a dumb question. Few consequences in life are deserved. Even when the consensus might be we deserve something - good or bad - we don't always receive it. I don't believe in karma or fate or that what goes around always comes around. What I believe in is cause and effect. If X has been proven to lead to Y, then nobody should be surprised when Y happens. There are people who experience Y for no reason and people who experience X but Y doesn't happen. Sometimes people avoid consequences and it makes us wonder if the exception is the rule, or if the person involved is exceptional himself. Sometimes people suffer consequences that seemed to have no cause and they think they are somehow cursed. I say no to that. Consequences happen more often than not. That's how life works. We remember the exceptions rather than the norm. That's why we think life is unfair when things work exactly as they should work.
The other day I walked into my building and greeted some of my neighbors. We were all wearing masks and gloves, which are required in my building when residents aren't in their apartments. I wondered out loud what someone from the past would think if he had a time machine take him to the spring of 2020. Would he be wondering what kind of dystopia the world had become?
There is a special place in Hell for people who think "bruschetta" means "chopped tomatoes".
I think about all the people in the English-speaking world who can't seem to be able to pronounce "et cetera" or asterisk, no matter how often they see those words spelled out. I am convinced there is some dark cosmic reason for that. Maybe the balance of the universe is dependent on certain people not being able to say those words. If everyone pronounced it correctly, life as we know it could possibly end.
I admit that even though I'm a skeptic, I have an affection for astrology. I don't care about it from a fortune-telling standpoint. I'm more interested in how it works in personality assessment and compatibility (it can't be that much less accurate than Myers-Briggs). I find for me as a Cancer, much of what astrologers say about my sign fits the bill. I'm hypersensitive and I have a love of domesticity, especially cooking. The argument falls apart when you see some of my traits that aren't typical Cancer traits. For example, Cancers like to stay home all the time and I don't.
A good skeptic will remind me that it's all bunk. An astrology buff will say it's because we are all more than our sun signs and I have other signs in my chart.
So I decided to check out the latter excuse and looked up my rising sign and my moon sign. My rising sign is Taurus. That explains my extreme stubbornness, my sturdy physical body type, my resistance to change, and fear of loss. My moon sign is Sagittarius, which explains my love of travel, my desire for new experiences, and my occasional desire for adventure.
Cancer and Taurus are not compatible with Sagittarius. No wonder I'm so screwy! But Sagittarius is compatible with Libra and Cancer and Taurus are not, so that explains my marriage.
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