TMI

How much personal information do you share with friends, family or simple acquaintances? I ask because things are often quiet around the house because Tina and I are fairly conscious about information that we share. We have to be. Nothing is sacred to my stepfather and sometimes I suspect that my mother has a hard time keeping things to herself as well.
It is very upsetting to Tina and I to share personal experiences with my parents, whether it be our financial worries, illnesses or issues in the workplace, only to be questioned about it by other, more removed family members or even the neighbors, who we don’t know. It has happened before and would continue to happen if she and I hadn’t just decided to clam up and stop sharing. That makes things awkward around the house though because we just don’t do small talk.
Luckily for my parents, they have my sister, the Queen of the drama queens. She doesn’t mind sharing her and her husband’s personal matters either. As a matter of fact, I think she discusses their personal issues with my parents more than she discusses them with John, her husband. It is great that she has an outlet for her frustrations but I think the reason that she continues to have the same problems is because she discusses them with everyone but the person she needs to.
If it isn’t bad enough that she shares her marital affairs with other people, once my stepfather gets off the phone with my sister, he can’t wait to share whatever she has told him with anyone who will listen. The moment he hangs up the phone with her he either starts telling us about it or picks up the phone and starts calling other family members. Telling family may not be that bad but he doesn’t stop there. I’ve heard him telling the neighbors and just last week he was on the phone with a doctor’s office trying to schedule an appointment for a colonoscopy (I’ll get to that in a minute) and he was telling the receptionist about it. I can’t explain why he does it but it would piss me off to no end if I found out that he was spreading personal information that Tina and I had given him around like that.
We are just naturally suspicious people though. Tina thinks that the people who put those little sports stickers with their kid’s name and number are stupid. There are too many perverts out there to just advertise your kid’s names like that. We shred any and all mail with our names on it whereas my parents just throw it away without even so much a tearing it up.
Now on to the colonoscopy. Right up there on my list of things not to base a conversation on, along with personal information and small talk, is bodily functions. I don’t want to hear about bowel movements and menstrual flow. Keep it to yourself. It might be natural but that doesn’t make it any less gross or inappropriate.
Thursday was the day of the big event so my step dad had to spend Wednesday drinking all kinds of stuff to “clean him out.” I got to hear all about it, too. As I was making my gourmet lunch, a grilled cheese sandwich, he started telling me what the medication was for, as if the boldly printed Bowel Preparation Kit on the box wasn’t descriptive enough. A little while later, after I had retired to my room to escape his “noises” and read, he came to my door to tell me that he thought the medication was starting to work and if I needed him he would be on the pot.
That afternoon, when my mother got home from work, she asked me how many times he had moved his bowels that day. At that point I had had enough and told her that his movements were personal and not appropriate conversational pieces. That was when he yelled, from the comfort of the toilet, for her to come and say hi to him. To which she responded by walking towards the bathroom asking him how much he had shit so far that day. What is wrong with people?
There is a such thing as Too Much Information, you know.

Who's Ahead in the Race?

As much as I hate the idea of politicizing my blog, I do want my blog to be relevant and to have more readers. In order to do that, it is necessary for me do discuss issues that are current and topical and what is more topical right now than politics? I’ve already discussed where I stand on the issues, mostly in the center to be honest, so I won’t rehash that. What I will do though is walk right up to the biggest white elephant in the room, the one that some are talking about but few with any level of controversial honesty, and punch it square in the face. Obviously I am talking about race. Good old black versus white, good versus evil, Apollo Creed versus Rocky Balboa, Rocky Marciano versus Joe Louis, Tiger Woods versus Fuzzy Zoeller, Obama versus McCain.
Anyone out there saying that race isn’t playing much of a factor in this year’s election is a fool. As sad as it is, there will be white voters who haven’t been to the polls in decades crawling out from under their rocks nationwide to vote this year. Will they be voting in favor of McCain’s healthcare package or Obama’s promise to improve America’s educational system? No! They will be voting because they don’t want a black man in the White House. If you went up to any of them and ask them to discuss the issues they wouldn’t have a clue, which is sad. Unfortunately you wouldn’t be able to identify them because they would never have the courage to say aloud that they are voting strictly on race.
Although they will be outnumbered at the polls by the white racist voters, only because they are in the minority of the population, there are going to be record setting numbers of black voters at the polls this year, too. Just like their white counterparts, they will be voting solely based on skin color. Only they will be voting for Obama.
The funny thing about the white voters not voting for the black guy is that most of those people will come from the lower middle class and below, the classes most likely to be helped by Barack Obama. Voting for Obama would be more beneficial to them but who cares about small things like public programs or economic and foreign policy? But would voting for Obama make more sense for them? The middle and lower class are the ones at risk of losing jobs to the immigrants that the Democratic Party will continue to allow into the country. Once again, who cares about issues, right? As long as we keep the black guy, or the white guy, depending on which side you’re on, out of the White House.
What is at risk for the country is increased and widespread racial tension. Right now the polls have Barack Obama way ahead. But what if those polls are influenced by white guilt? How many white people are telling pollsters that they are voting for Obama because they fear being labeled a racist? Seems silly but tell me that, if you are a white reader, you haven’t been guilty of seeing a black person on TV saying that they are voting for Obama and thinking that they’re only voting for him because he is black. I’ll admit it, I’m guilty. It’s the nature of the beast. Because of that I would be hesitant to tell someone that I intend to vote for John McCain (I still haven’t made up my mind, btw).
Imagine CNN declaring McCain the winner after polls had Obama ahead by more than 10 points. Chaos would ensue. The reaction within parts of the white community would be similar. Just yesterday the ATF arrested two skinheads who were plotting to shoot up a black school and then target Barack Obama if he were elected. These criminal masterminds were going to drive towards Obama shooting at him out the window. Good luck with that plan, jackasses. But if any of these mentally challenged white supremacy groups, ones that are a bit more organized, were successful in assassinating Obama? Yes, chaos. If the GOP is holding some ace up their sleeve and reveals, post Obama election, that they have proof that he is not an American citizen and move to impeach, you guessed it, chaos. I think that whole citizenship issue is just the GOP grasping at straws in order to save a very poorly run campaign.
Personally, I hope that the majority of the voters this year are making an informed decision based on careful research and a close examination of the candidates’ respective platforms. Regardless of who wins or loses there is going to be a lot of unhappy people on November 5th. Let’s just help that cooler heads prevail and we move forward as a nation united, not divided.

Where's My New House?

I was watching Extreme Home Makeover last night like I normally do on Sunday evening. My wife, being an interior designer, loves to see what they do to the homes. We’ve even gotten my mother into watching it, much to my stepfather’s dismay. Once you get past the cheesiness of Ty Pennington and his crew, the show isn’t half bad. I am quite sure that none of them spend as much time on the construction site as the network would like us to believe though. Most likely scenario is that they shoot their little construction scenes and then go hang out in the air conditioned trailers while the grunts do the actual work.
Some of the rooms they do for the kids on the show are really cool even if they are a bit non-functional. Last night they built a kid a room that looked like the deck of a pirate ship. Pretty cool but if the kid is anything like I was as a kid he’ll grow out of his pirate phase in a few months and be stuck with a room that everyone but him thinks is cool. But hey, at least he’ll have a new flat screen TV to watch in his pirate room. Every room they make gets a new flat screen.
The stories are always touching, too. Last night the focus was on a little boy named Job who had leukemia as a child which led to numerous other health issues. Because of the focus on the child, the family home became a bit run down and dilapidated and was deemed uninhabitable. The house was overrun with mold, making it impossible for Job to stay there due to the double lung transplant he had received. The community stepped up and were paying for the family to live in a rental property.
Speaking of the community, the EHM crew went to the local hospital where Job went through his treatments and surgeries. They shot a little video in which the other children with other vicious medical afflictions said a little bit. They even had Job’s older sister’s favorite Christian singer sing a song live from the hospital All of this was shown via webcam to the family who had been sent away on vacation while the work on their house was completed.
This is about the point where the heartless republican in me came to life. As I was watching all the other kids with life-threatening illnesses tell their stories and reminisce about Job’s time in the hospital with them, I couldn’t help wonder how they felt about all of this. How do you tell a kid going through a horrible illness that another kid with a horrible illness is more deserving of the world’s philanthropy? All I could think of while watching it was the kids asking their parents if they were getting a new house, too. Can the parents explain it to the kid? Honestly, why should they even have to?
Maybe ABC should rethink the idea of announcing their plans to the world, especially when it comes to children with life threatening diseases. When they build a house that is in many ways exclusive to a child who is by all means special but in no way alone in his plight, they are sending a message of hope to children who may not have any. It is heartbreaking to think of kids who have yet to experience life but are already dealing with their own mortality. Job’s story was touching but I would be willing to bet that each and every one of the other kids in that hospital or in hospitals around the country have touching stories too.
I think it is commendable when ABC builds a new community center for a family that takes in foster children or kids who have been victims of various kinds of abuse. Those kind of things help many more people while excluding fewer. What ABC should try to avoid doing though is sending the message that one child’s life is more important than another’s, which is what I think they have done on more than one occasion. As much as I hate to say it, if you can’t help everybody, you shouldn’t help anybody.

Ode to the Candidates

In honor of the fact that I hate election time more and more each passing day, much like the growing animosity I have for poets who just can’t spit out their feelings in comprehendible prose, I have combined the two things over which I am losing both hair and sleep into one blog entry.
For those of you who have absolutely zero reading comprehension and find my poem as difficult as I find Edmund Spenser and Ezra Pound to understand, allow me to summarize: I hate politics and politicians. None of them are trustworthy, no matter what they say. I get tired of the fact that, every four years, none of the candidates can tell you what they are going to do. They only seem to be able to tell you what their opponent can’t do.
Senator McCain, I want to hear your stance on stem cell research, not that Barack Obama once got a speeding ticket or pooped in his diaper when he was six months old. Senator Obama, can you tell me your plan for the economy or are you only going to tell me that Senator McCain is old and that he pooped in his diaper last week?
Address the issues people. For Christ’s sake, address the issues.
Enjoy this poem, it is meant to make you both think and laugh, not get angry.

Ode to the Candidates

Age or experience to me matter not:
Tis the issues that shall earn my vote.
Adultery, race, disability or awards begot;
None of these of which do I take note.

Doest thou believe in a woman’s right to choose?
For I believe the choice is hers to make,
If against her will her dignity she did lose,
Or due to health she thinks for the child’s sake.

Speaking of health, how do you so lean?
Should the government pay at the risk of taxes high?
Or should I lose the benefits of which my boss had to seen,
And sickly, poor and uninsured shall I die?

Evenly will you charge society a tax?
And a flat rate choose to let Congress pass.
Or on the rich or poor will you be lax?
Until there no longer is a middle class.

My love, my life and property will you let me defend?
By maintaining my right to own a gun
Or is my right to bear arms nearing its end?
At which point it is the criminals who have won.

About the economy, how do you plan to proceed?
Please don’t roll the dice and hope for mere blind luck.
For even I know a solid plan is what we need,
Or the repo man might come and take my truck.

The borders? Do you plan to leave them open?
Letting any and all continue to arrive.
Allowing cheap laborers to continuously come in,
And take the jobs for which born Americans may strive.

Terrorists! Terrorists! Terrorists!
Please tell me you have a strategy to eradicate
Those who cheer our demise with tight clenched fists
And kill our innocents out of misguided religious hate.

The War! The War! The War!
Will it end or will it drag on?
It’s time to bring the troops home from afar,
And allow a mother to lay her eyes on an unfamiliar son.

Hussein! Hussein! Hussein!
A moniker that reminds the world of evil
But is a man made a person by his name?
Is every man a pervert that shares the name Bill?

Abuse! Abuse! Abuse!
That is what Sarah Palin did with her elected power.
I hope to be as much or even more so amused
When you break your neck falling off that ivory tower.

When you enter the booth choose carefully who you elect
Vote based on the facts and not on television smears
The wrong vote and this country could end up wrecked
And there is nothing we can do about it for another four long years.

Stop the Insanity!

I stopped making sports posts for two reasons. One of them being because I don’t really want to limit this blog to stuff that is only relevant to people at FIU. I would prefer to have a broader reader base than that. Mainly I stopped posting about sports though because, like most sports fans, I am superstitious. About the same time I stopped posting sports related blog entries, the football team started winning. They got their same victory about the same time that the men’s soccer team got theirs and the volleyball team got their first conference win. Since that post the volleyball team continues to roll and both the soccer squads have notched a few victories. The football team went to Denton, Texas and put a whooping on UNT.
So I stopped posting about sports, not out of laziness or a lack of desire to post about sports, believe me. Besides the wins we’ve gotten, some of the stuff I’ve been reading on college football message boards has had me chomping at the bit to post. Let me get the basics out of the way first.
Is there anyone still questioning Paul McCall as the starting QB for this team? Paul has looked great now the he is getting more time to set up and check down to his second and third pass options. I would like to see fewer dropped passes from the receivers though.
Next, how fast is T.Y. Hilton? Damn! That guy can fly. I don’t know that “Goodbye” is an adequate nickname for him. Perhaps it should just be T.Y. “Damn that guy is fast” Hilton. He’s got good hands too. Normally it’s the sure handed receivers are the slow ones and the burners are the guys who couldn’t catch a cold.
Finally, the biggest difference I see between this team and the team that lost its first two games is confidence. This team knows that it has talent and can win games. Even when they went down 13-0 in the first quarter to Troy, they didn’t quit. Winning can do that to you. This team may only lose one more game the rest of this season.
Now that I’ve gotten that out, let me address you insane people. Once the Panthers won a couple of games I started reading message board posts with people talking about a conference championship and subsequent bowl game. Hold on a moment people. We beat three bad teams. Yes, I know that we beat Toledo and then Toledo beat Michigan but guess what? Michigan isn’t a good team either. Rich Rodriguez is installing an offensive system without the proper tools right now. UNT is in the same position FIU has been in for the past two seasons, only they aren’t in a talent hotbed like Miami and they don’t have a recruiter like MC there either. MTSU is the best of the three teams that we beat but they have personnel issues right now.
It is great to be winning and hopefully the stands will begin to fill a bit more with each win but don’t make those New Orleans reservations just yet. We still have two of the better teams in the conference remaining in Arkansas State and Louisiana-Lafayette, not to mention FAU, who I still think is better than their 2-5 record indicates. Two losses in any of those three games leaves us at 6-6, providing we win the games we should win against Louisiana-Monroe and Western Kentucky. We don’t want to overlook those teams the way that Toledo obviously overlooked us.
If we win two of those three games and end up at 7-5, a bowl game is still a long shot. Yes, the Sun Belt conference does have more bowl tie-ins than just the New Orleans bowl but those aren’t guaranteed. The other bowls have other teams to choose from before falling back to the Sun Belt teams and FIU and its young tradition and poor attendance record isn’t likely to wow any bowl selection committees. Even if we win out, we need Troy to lose two conference games now that they have beaten us and that isn’t likely to happen. Winning out would put us at 8-4 though, making passing on FIU a difficult proposition for any lower tiered bowl game. I just don’t think that will happen. I think FIU wins three of its last five games, finishing 6-6 and staying home for the holidays. Considering that most in the sports media had FIU as the worst team in the country this year, a 6-6 season should be more than enough for its fans. Even I only had them 4-8.
Now before any of you FIU fans start bashing me or saying that I’m not a true fan, let me say that I will gladly print out these pages and eat my words if FIU ends up winning the conference or playing in a bowl game.

Equality or Hypocrisy?

There will never be equality in this country. Never. Yes, I said it. Most people that clamor for equality don’t even know what it means, in my opinion. We are weeks away from likely having our first black American president. That won’t change things though, even if that is his campaign motto. There are too many small groups in American society that feel slighted each time something doesn’t go their way and scream out loud to anyone who will listen.
Have you read about the proposed high school for gay and lesbian students in Chicago? Gay and lesbian students claim that they are the victims of harassment and violence—which I do not doubt-- and want to go to school in an environment free of such things. I agree that people should have the right an educational experience free of fear for one’s own safety but the bullies are the ones that need to go. They should be subject to disciplinary action up to and including expulsion but using taxpayer monies to build a lifestyle exclusive school is going too far.
Could you imagine the uproar if a parental group suggested an all straight school so their children were not subjected to alternative lifestyles? The gay and lesbian community would go apesh*t! But wouldn’t that, by definition, be equality? Aren’t gays and lesbians one of the many groups that cry for equal rights? The right to marry, adopt, share health benefits, etc. Now, don’t think I am arguing against any of those things. If you read my post last week you know that I am all for those things. Well, not all for, but opposed to their rights as Americans being infringed upon for just not being a member of the majority. That being said, you can’t ask for equality and then expect to be granted exclusivity. Pick up a dictionary my friends. You’re not asking for equality, just hypocrisy.
I figure that this topic is as good as any to bring back the weekly poll. Vote away!

The 8th Cirlce of Dante's Hell

Next week is the eighth week of the semester, midterm if you prefer. Undoubtedly, college students nationwide will be doing their part to keep Starbucks’ profits up. Those who prefer a cold, carbonated beverage will be keeping the Red Bull vendors busy as well. Midterm exams, presentations and papers are common this time of year: thanks to the evil professors that scheme to have them on the same days. Unbeknownst to those professors, there is a special circle of Hell reserved for them.
Literature professors like Dr. Joan Baker at FIU will teach that there were only seven circles to Dante’s Hell. But your friend, The Invisible Student, just happens to have a copy of the original text and there is an eighth, secret circle that is reserved for college professors that schedule their exams on the same day as their colleagues. Below the lustful and the gluttonous, the murderers and the suicides, the blasphemers, sodomites, hypocrites, thieves and traitors, are the devious educators.
At first glance, the eighth circle resembles a classroom. There are desks for the students and a podium for the professor. Spanning the wall behind the podium there is a white dry erase board. Above the dry erase board there is one of those generic, round Seth Thomas clocks with the white face and plain black numbers that match the plain black minute and second hands. The carpet is a boring, faded blue and is flat and lifeless after countless semesters of being trampled on by class after class of uncaring students wearing their cruel Nikes, Vans and Chuck Taylors.
In this classroom though, the students are always tardy, every one of them. Professors are helpless against the tardiness, too. Hell prohibits attendance policies. Once the students are all present and accounted for and the professors start to lecture, the students begin to open their sodas and snacks. Their sodas are all in cans and make that disruptive pfffffffffffk noise as the students crack them open and slurp down the foam that bubbles out of the top. Once they’ve wet their whistles, the students begin tearing open their loud plastic bags of Cheetos, Doritos, and Funyuns, which crunch loudly as they are shoveled by the handful into the students mouths.
Once snack time is over and the professor believes that he or she finally has the undivided attention of the students, they begin the lecture anew. After only a few minutes the professor can see the heads of the students begin to nod. As the students fight the weight of their eyelids and their chins fall closer to their chests, their heads spring back to attention, only to start nodding once again. Nap time only lasts a few minutes though and soon the students are at full attention. Only their attention isn’t directed towards the professor. No, after their brief naps, the students open their laptops and begin typing away, much to the professor’s chagrin.
As much as the students try to pretend that they are taking notes, and as much as the professor would like to believe that taking notes is what the pupils are doing, the educator knows better. This isn’t his or her first day in Hell, although today is exactly like the first day in Hell, as well as every day leading up to today. These students are undoubtedly surfing the web, checking their email or Facebook accounts, or checking the most recent posts on some message boards about hockey fights or college football recruiting.
Making matters worse, none of the students ever put their cell phones on vibrate. Slowly but surely each student’s phone rings. A few of them have polite, synthesized ringtones but most blare hip-hop, techno or heavy metal song snippets. In Hell there is no voicemail either. The calls don’t get redirected after only a couple of rings. The phones continue to ring until the students answer and then proceed to rudely conduct their conversations aloud.
Finally, the students seem to settle for a moment and the professor looks at the cookie cutter clock on the wall and sees that they still have ten minutes to get their point across to the students: ten minutes until this hellacious day is over. A moment of relief befalls the weary professor. That is when the students begin to pack up their stuff. They stuff their laptops back into their backpacks, crumple up their soda cans and snack wrappers and, in their best Kareem Abdul-Jabbar impersonation, skyhook them in the direction of the trash can. They all miss though, leaving a small pile of aluminum and cellophane encircling the trash can.
With one cheek still on the seat, the students impatiently await their release. They, like Dante, get to leave Hell. They get to go to this weekend’s football game, to college night at the local pub, to the Drink or Drown party at the Pike house on Friday night. The professor gets to stay here. In a matter of moments the bell will ring and release these students back into the world while at the same time signaling the start of the next class. Because much like the students who must suffer during midterms by going from one class to the next only to have the same fate awaiting them, professors who pile it on those students must spend eternity with the class from Hell.
Think about it.

I'm Very Happy for You, Now Crawl Back Under Your Rock

Politics is a subject I try hard to avoid but this morning I can’t help myself. I was doing some research on other blog sites last night, something I do regularly in an ongoing effort to improve my own blog, and I came across a blog encouraging everyone to vote McCain/Palin because of her militant pro-life stance. Shortly after that I came across another encouraging the same vote because of the anti-gay marriage issue.
I thought that as a country we were supposed to separate church and state but with election time rapidly approaching, more and more of the pro-life, anti-gay marriage religious kooks are crawling out from under their respective rocks and shoving their views down our throats. Unless one of our candidates has a flashing red Batphone that only God has the number to—technically I guess that makes it a Godphone---these shouldn’t be issues, in my opinion. If abortion is murder in God’s eyes, then I’m sure He will deal with the pro-choice populous when the time comes. Same with gay marriage, if He doesn’t condone it, then that is between him and the homosexual community.
If you haven’t figured it out yet, I believe in God. I consider myself a Christian although not a practicing one as I have many issues with organized religion. My relationship with God is between He and I. Personally, I don’t believe in abortion or gay marriage. That being said, I don’t believe it is within my right to impose my belief upon others.
I think a woman who has been raped should have the choice of whether she wants a daily reminder of the experience for the rest of her life. Parents who know that their child will be physically or mentally challenged should have the right to decide if that is a burden they wish to assume. I think it is selfish to terminate a pregnancy because you don’t want the added responsibility of taking care of a challenged child but once again, if it’s not my burden or my child, it’s not my call.
Same goes for gay marriage. As I have mentioned before, my employment history is filled with retail sales and merchandising jobs, mostly in high end retail too. Gay men are common in higher end retail. I have worked with many gay men over the course of my life and I can tell you that the love between two men or women involved in a monogamous relationship is just as deep or intense as in any straight relationship. They have the same fights as heterosexual couples and they are just as concerned with getting the bills paid or who gets out of bed first and who gets to hit the snooze button one more time. Why shouldn’t they be able to share healthcare coverage or any other benefits that committed, heterosexual couples can, because you or I don’t believe in it? It’s not our life.
What if someone suddenly told you that you couldn’t watch Grey’s Anatomy, Desperate Housewives or Entourage because those shows contained adultery? If you are more into family programming, how would you feel if the religious zealots boycotted a fantastic show like Friday Night Lights because one of the many real life situations the show addresses is teenage sex? My wife and I would be pretty bummed. What if suddenly you could only buy the more expensive organic food at the grocery store because it was all natural, the way that God intended it to be? Even better, what if there was a motion on the ballot to outlaw all-you-can-eat buffets because gluttony is one of the seven deadly sins? Church goers would hate that. I’ve seen plenty of them, dressed in their Sunday best, at IHOP’s breakfast buffet.
When it comes to politics I consider myself a centrist. To me the issues are national security, heath care, immigration and the economy, in no particular order. I know that makes me seem conservative but I also believe in the environment and not in the religious right. I was leaning towards voting for McCain until he chose Sarah Palin as his running mate. As I already mentioned, her pro-life stance worries me. If she believes it is the governments place to impose its will on a woman’s rights, what else would she stick her nose into?
To sum this whole thing up, let me just say live and let live. Believe me, God will deal with the ones that he is unhappy with. If one of those happens to be me, so be it. It’s His will.

A Little Consideration, Please!

Some of you will absolutely filet me for the following post and some of you may agree with me but I’ve reached a level of frustration that must be relieved. I mentioned when I started this blog that Tina and I are living with my parents while I return to school and take our lives in a new direction. This living arrangement allows me to go to school full-time without having to work, which helps me focus on school.
This arrangement is not without its share of annoyances though. My parents are totally different people than Tina and I, especially when it comes to food, eating habits and meal planning. Every Sunday Tina and I sit down and plan the weekly menu. This helps us save money since we only buy what we need at the grocery store instead of aimlessly wandering the aisles picking up random junk, which is what my mother does.
We are almost neurotic about our food. Like I said, we only buy what we need in order to prevent waste and save money. I get lunch meat at the deli for my school lunches and often only buy 12 slices—two sandwiches worth-- of whichever meat I want that week. Tina also buys a little extra of whatever she plans on making for dinner so she can have leftovers for lunch. Once again, this is how we plan our weekly meals in order to save money. Problem is, occasionally I will come home and find my lunchmeat gone or three or four slices missing and Tina has woken up on numerous times only to find her lunch eaten or missing. This isn’t a huge deal but it does cause us to have to buy our lunches at school or work on those days, which defeats the purpose of trying to cut costs.
We have tried to politely address the issue with my parents, explaining to them our efforts to plan meals in advance, purchase only what we need at the store, and not spend excessive money buying food court lunches. Honestly, Tina and I feel that if you didn’t buy it at the grocery store, you shouldn’t eat it when it’s in the fridge.
Our reasoning behind that thought process isn’t completely based on money either. Without going into too much detail, let me just say that Tina and I are very conscious about washing our hands and not licking our fingers or sticking them in our noses or ears before we touch food. Not everyone in the house shares our views on food preparation hygiene though. You can imagine our concern when we see that our food has been handled.
Now that I have given you some background, let’s get to this morning’s frustration. Last night before we went to bed, Tina took some sausage out of the freezer to thaw so she could get up and make sausage gravy this morning. Well, she and I slept in this morning and were awoken with the aroma of sausage floating throughout the house. This is when Tina told me of her intentions for that sausage and that she knew that my parents didn’t have any sausage. So now she is upset which naturally gets me upset.
I immediately got up and went to the kitchen and asked my mother if she was cooking with the sausage that Tina had taken out. She told me yes and I explained to her that Tina had planned to make gravy with that sausage. She replied that they were out of bacon so they made the sausage and that they already planned on going out to buy us more. OK, I’m not exactly fine with that but I’m not a total asshole so I left it at that.
Here’s where, in my opinion, the lack of consideration comes in. After my parents ate breakfast they sat around watching television and drinking coffee, knowing that Tina and I were waiting on them to replace our sausage so we could eat breakfast. Yes, we could have changed our plans and eaten something else but why should we have to alter our plans because of their inconsideration? The way I see it, if they didn't have what they needed for breakfast, they should have changed their plans, not infringed upon ours. Tina was looking forward to making that gravy. By the time they left for the grocery store it was a quarter past ten. By the time they got home it was noon, well past breakfast time. It turns out that while we were waiting for them to replace the food that we had planned for our breakfast, the same food that they ate because they never actually plan their meals and shop very randomly, they went and visited some friends, too. I am so happy you enjoyed your breakfast, can we eat today too?
I know that some of you may think I am overreacting and I would agree with you if this was the first, second or third time this has happened but it isn’t. We moved in last December and this is a weekly occurrence. They don’t buy the food that they need at the grocery store and when they run out they just start eating ours without any consideration to what we are going to eat. For example, my parents eat a total of three eggs a day: two for my stepfather and one for my mother. But when we go to the grocery store on Sunday, my mother only buys one dozen eggs. Guess whose eggs they eat once they run out. Tina and I only eat eggs on the weekends. Unfortunately, by the time the weekend comes, we usually don’t have any.
Making matters worse, although they will replace whatever food of ours they have eaten, they will take their time doing so, even if we are waiting. Also, they won’t replace like with like. Tina and I eat organic everything. We buy organic eggs, meats, milk, veggies, etc. When they drink our organic 2% milk, they replace it with regular whole milk, which we don’t drink, so we end up replacing it ourselves anyways. If they eat our free range organic eggs, they replace them with regular which, once again, we don’t eat. So we end up spending more money on replacing food that we never even got the opportunity to eat.
OK, I’ve ranted long enough. Now I leave the floor open to you. Tell me that I’m an overreacting, ungrateful bastard.

Books? We Don't Need No Stinking Books!

This is my third semester at FIU and my first taking all upper division classes. One thing I have noticed is that those overpriced books we are often forced to buy are frequently unnecessary. In my three semesters here I have taken 10 classes total. Of those 10 classes, two were foreign language (Español uno y dos), two were writing, two are/were history, I’m doing one independent study and the remaining three are/were literature classes.
Now obviously you can’t really have a literature class without books. That would be like playing baseball without the bases (I was going to say without balls but then you would be playing softball—yuk yuk). Same goes for foreign language although you might learn just as much watching Univision. In writing classes books are kind of optional. Yes, you should have a good dictionary and thesaurus, as well as a style manual, but they don’t really count as texts. Some writing professors may want you to read different authors and styles, depending on what kind of writing you will be doing, but a good instructor doesn’t need such crutches.
That brings me to history. Can history be taught without books? I don’t know about you but I wouldn’t think so. But if you answered yes, you would be correct. Last spring I took a class in modern American history and the professor taught the entire class by supplementing his lectures with some internet links to relevant articles and materials. In his syllabus he even stated that he saw no need in asking students to pay ridiculous amounts of money for books when the information can be found with a simple Google search.
This semester I am taking a class on ancient Rome and, although there were two books required for the class as well as one recommended, the professor’s test questions are taken strictly from lectures. We had our first test of the semester last Thursday and there wasn’t a single question on it that I couldn’t find the answer to in my class notes. That is disheartening to think about seeing that this class is one of the few in my educational experience in which I have made it a point to stay current on the assigned reading. Granted, his lectures seem to come directly out of one of the books so doing the reading is very helpful since I take awful notes. But for someone who takes good notes, the books in this class would be entirely unnecessary.
In case anyone is wondering, I got a high B on the test. I’m pretty happy about that taking into account that it was the first test and I really didn’t know what to expect. When another student in the class asked the professor what format his tests were, his reply was, “You’ll find out Thursday.”
I guess my point is that, with a quality professor and the availability of adequate resources, books are unnecessary as an educational tool, depending on the topic of course. Coming into this semester my GPA is 3.955 thanks to an A- in a literature class. Only three of the six courses I have completed thus far have required textbooks. The others have had excellent teachers.

Time Off for Good Behavior?

When it comes to movies, Tina and I have an agreement that we alternate his and hers movies. One weekend its horror, action or sci-fi for me, the next its mush and sap for her. Unfortunately, through no doing of mine--although definitely to my benefit--the summer blockbuster season does not offer a lot of sap and mush.
Almost every summer weekend we were at the theater watching movies like Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Iron Man, Indiana Jones 4, Hancock, Hellboy 2, The Incredible Hulk, X-Files 2, The Dark Knight, The Strangers, and more. As we left the theater each week with our ears ringing from the sounds of thunderous explosions or our hair standing in terror, I got a warning.
“You owe me, big time,” she would say.
This past weekend she began collecting. On Sunday we went to see The Women, with Meg Ryan, Jada Pinkett-Smith, Annette Benning, Debra Messing, Candace Bergin, Cloris Leachman and Bette Midler. What is that you say? No men’s names there? Must have only been small, tertiary roles, right? WRONG! There were no men in the movie, at all. Not even a background extra.
Don’t get me wrong, the movie wasn’t a two hour man bashing fest as I had suspected. After all, it was about a wife who learns that her husband has been cheating and then leans on her eclectic collection of friends for support. Honestly, it wasn’t bad. It had some seriously funny moments. Pinkett-Smith made the movie, in my opinion. The hospital scene at the end where Messing was giving birth was laugh out loud funny.
But it did have the obligatory male stereotypes. Pinkett-Smith’s character, a lesbian, reminds her cast mates that dating women doesn’t come with a phobia of asking for directions, the desire to channel surf or an arsenal of offensive bodily functions. Haven’t we heard all that before? Some of us heathens are cultured you know. I eat my sushi with chopsticks.
I leaned over on numerous occasions and told Tina that this movie should count as three of her turns. She didn’t go for that. Our next movie will probably be either Nick and Nora’s Infinite Playlist, which looks very good although I am concerned that Michael Cera is going to be forever cast as the smart but shy quirky kid (see Juno and Superbad), or A Flash of Genius with Greg Kinnear.
Whatever we end up seeing, I’m likely to spend the next few weeks to months cursing the movie Gods for not sprinkling some chick flicks throughout the summer movie season. Because they don’t, rather than going a weekend here and there without bombs, body bags and boobs, Tina has been released for time served and I’m on parole with chick flicks as my community service.