Sometimes discussions lead to strange ideas, usually for the other person. Over the course of emailing someone the topic of pain had come up. I had made the following comment: physical manifestation of emotional pain as a form of coping with that that you cannot deal with. thats my tattoos, my piercings. Granted that is my OWN reasoning for it usually. However I’m not sure this holds true for everyone. In fact I’d say that is rather an exception than a norm. I know of several people that have tattoos and pierces that got them for totally different reasons. While it still might be an emotional reason, it is not a painful emotion. But they do still serve as a method of memory I’m sure.

Anyhow thats not even the fun part of the email. But to get to that there will be a slight disconnect in ideas, subject, and topic flow here so that we can jump to the idea stereotypes.

I had a teacher admit that stereotypes are based on truths. This actually does two things; it validates my thoughts on this, and makes me think I should have gone for higher education (lord knows my writing skills could use it). Seriously though, anyone that attempts to tell you that stereotypes are not based on truths is full of crap. The problem realizing if the truths are sound and valid. While it may be a stereotype that a certain race or type of person has a predisposition towards violence and criminal activity, you must ask yourself if those truths are valid. If you can find flaw in the source of a stereotype then you can find exceptions to the stereotype and maybe open your eyes a little.

Broken down in to ideas that don’t connect, but should make sense…
One of the traits of being human is recognition of patterns. It helps keep us alive and make reasonable assumptions.
We learn by observing patterns.
These patterns become stereotypes. They are perfectly normal and natural.

The problem is when you take a stereotype and you apply it in a negative way and fail to realize that sometimes patterns are broken and the stereotype does not hold true. Or since standing on the shoulders of a giant you will see further, allow me to just link to a comic that explains it very nicely.

Seems pretty easy to say in reality. Drug addicts do it at NA, alcoholics do it at AA. I guess it’s fitting I do it on the internet, as I’m apparently addicted to electronics and the internet. The weirdos at a treatment center will tell you that addiction has something to do with having a behavior that has negative consequences and yet you still engage in them.

Thats pretty simple really. I’ve spent entire nights and days stuck to a computer, working or playing video games. I’ve allowed electronics/computers and work to cause stress in relationships. I’ve come to depend on them to feel normal. I’ve gotten in trouble with them. I’ve broken laws with them.

It’s come up in thinking several times over the past month. Usually when I open my laptop  for the third or fourth time in couple hours. Why? Oh for nothing more than to check the news and my email. Given that the news don’t change that much and I really don’t get that much email, it’s kinda pointless. It’s terrible really. Falling asleep with the glow of a screen, or falling asleep on your keyboard.

Yeah, seems like a joke and all right? Wish it was, but it’s no surprise to me that they have actually started to notice that it is indeed something that people can become addicted to. There is however one thing that I will NEVER do. Online dating. Surprisingly though, both my Dad and Step-Dad have both done so and ended up married. Just so that we’re clear on this… crawling over broken shards of glass and hot coals while being violently violated so I could beg an ex for a chance would be more favorable than the concept of online dating.

Ehh I think my dog just farted.

I touched on the fact that my home town recently enacted a smoking ban. This ban kicks in on June 1st. The crux of the matter mainly being that my right to smoke and your right to clean air ends at your nose. Now I happen to like our local newspapers forums and tend to make a regular idiot of myself there. Unfortunately no one bit on my comparing smoking to bottled water. Rightly so, after all water is known to be good for you, while smoking is known to be bad for you.

However this twisted logic of “your right ends where my xxxx begins” applies wonderfully to the bottled water fad. Simply put your “right” to have a bottle of water end when you fail to recycle that bottle of water. Maybe I’m stretching a wee bit there, but given the stats on bottled water it’s hard to view it as a good thing.

The EPA and the FDA both have oversight on water, but you have to look at who is doing it and who is stricter. Turns out it’s the EPA. Guess witch one looks at your tap water? It ain’t the FDA, they look at that bottle that you spend two bucks for. You know, that two dollar chuck of plastic that is made from… oh wait I’m going to guess that most of the general populous of this great nation are idiots and would not guess that plastic is a petroleum product (oil for the slow). So you hummer driving, bottled water swigging soccer moms really are at the top of my list for people I don’t like.

Now I’m no chemist and can even pronounce phthalats but apparently it’s a chemical that can leach out of the plastic in bottled water, and then you drink it. But hey thats YOUR choice ain’t it? Never mind all the other random crap (notice where the word fecal shows up) that can end up in that bottled water that only has to pass FDA specs when your tap has to pass EPA specs. But the kicker is the amount of junk you create by using these bottles. The energy spend creating them, the water wasted there, the space in garbage fills, the amount of them I see on the street.

And I hear the cries “But your cigarette smoke sticks to my clothes!” Deal with it you pansy. Your plastic waste sticks around my environment for a heck of a lot longer. So instead of worrying about how some cigarette smoke stuck to you at the bar, worry about how you’re going to get busy with the chick you brought home from the bar and leave my damn smoky treats alone!

It seems to have been on the news, and in the news, and around our waists recently. But America is seemingly getting fatter and fatter as the years go by. Who knows what causes this. Be it the stress of working all the time, the crappy diet, or what ever. Fact is we’re getting fatter. The troubling fact though is our toilets seem to be getting smaller. How does this make sense?

The way I’m judging this is that in older houses that I’ve been in I find the toilets have a nice size bowl and there is no need to tuck down and scoot and make sure your not going to be left with fecal matter squishing up your backside. However in newer houses with newer toilets it’s like a game of chance. You must sit what seems like perfectly to relax and not get your winky in the water.

Now what I want to know is how on earth obese people handle this? Girls presumably have little issue with this, but guys. Come on, seriously. If you’re so big you can’t see your tool and bits, how do you sit on one of these little toilets and get the job done.

Since I tend to get wrapped up in the smallest of details, I forget a lot of things. Like say preventing spam bots from raping my comments and such. Then I realize it’s so much easier to just use some existing code work that does everything I think I want. Bash my head on the theming structure for a while and avoid getting lost in all the small details. Well I’ve half managed that. So this post is to get rid of the boring annoying default crap that this application uses.

Now to get lost in the config details and seeing if I can break it or at least make it somewhat more interesting and to my liking. This should be a nightmare.