Race and Racism

Okay, I'm sick to fucking death of this. I found this picture on the internet and it's supposed to be hilarious.
Okay, seriously, guys. "There's no race but the human race" is fucking bullshit! Does no one else realize this? It's a system of description! When you use it to be prejudicial, it's racism, and that's bad. But when it's a fucking question on the census, it's just a question! If the census asked you what type of hair you had, you wouldn't say "I have hair! The only hair is hair! It doesn't matter what kind of hair we have, we're all equals!"

No one is denying that you're equal! They're just trying to describe you! And don't say that no one gets judged by their hair. We all know the stereotype that blondes have more fun, or that blondes are dumb, just as well as we know the stereotypes about black people being good at sports, or having an affinity for robbing liquor stores. But some people just have to get all uppity about describing someone as "black" but have no problem with calling someone "blonde". I know what you're thinking: we have the power to change our hair colour.

1. Hair dye doesn't change who you are,
2. Michael Jackson

And we all think that guy was messed up for trying to become white, not because he couldn't be white, but because he didn't need to be white. Therefore, race isn't a problem; it is, like I have said, a descriptor.

If you don't like the use of "race" to describe the colour of a person's skin or their ancestry, then fight the semantics. But I dare you to come up with a term as brief and succinct as "race" to describe what a person looks like and where they have descended from.

The Unblogged

The following post is a collection of posts that I didn't post, or simply gave up on before they got anywhere. I find it interesting what some of my old thoughts and feelings were, as well as entertaining to imagine my half thoughts.
If you hadn't picked up, the new notes will be brought to you by the colour RED.

1/20/10 Scientific Exhaustion
I was going to continue a discussion on my Facebook page,
BO-ring!

12/19/09 When Did It Happen?
I've stopped being honest.
I'm not sure, but I think this may have been about hiding (or trying to hide) my feelings for someone. Kinda like a Humphrey Bogart at the end of Casablanca kind of deal, only, you know, not as good.

10/25/09 (Untitled)
I fight such an odd war. I have nothing against my enemy, but I know that he hates me. He even seems like a decent enough guy. It's not political, I want to destroy him and it is most malicious. Maybe it's the testosterone, but I'm not usually a guy who feels the need to win. I can't tell you what it is. What I can tell you is that I like it. I love it. Even though I'm terrible at it.
I don't know about anyone else, but I fucking love being hated sometimes. In my old situation, being hated was the next best thing to being loved. Being a threat to someone is empowering.
But that is an underdog thing too. When you're at the top, you're not a threat to anyone. In an ironic sense, you lose that power.

10/20/09 My Ultimate Team
Skip this one if you want. It's exactly what it sounds like.
In response to TK's Ultimate Team blog, here is my Ultimate Alliance 2 Team:

Storm.
What can I say about the master of the elements? Her in game taunts are the most justified of anyone. She controls the weather itself. She defeated Magneto. She is through and through awesome. I'll admit that when I started I was wary of Storm, since in UA1 she refused to use her one good power of Lightning Blast. But in UA2, her Lightning Blast is unparallelled and her Gale Force is the first and best of its class. The ability to dismissively blast an oncoming troop of enemies off a ledge is nothing short of god-like. While the rest of my crew is busy hacking away at single targets, Storm is blasting small armies away and causing massive random lightning damage all over the field. Inescapable lightning damage, too. It cannot be blocked and it cannot be dodged.

Wolverine.
Begrudgingly. There is a reason this guy is such a cliche. He's a-goddamn-mazing. Massive damage, massive hit points, regeneration, and a good spread of attacks. Some characters I find have a tendency to have just one good move and the others are simply there for show. He spins, he charges, he dives, he slashes... things wind up dead. I have the damage numbers on and when Wolverine comes in contact with someone there is just a stream of numbers. I wanted to trade him in, and he was usually on the bench while I was trying other guys out, but when it comes to an Ultimate Team, you'd be crazy not to bring in this cat... dog... monster-thing. What the hell is a wolverine anyway?

Venom.
He didn't get added to the roster until late in the game, but jesus tits this guy is a monster. Like, literally. In every sense of the word. Here is a case of someone who was pretty much a one trick pony, with other skills to fill the skill points out. He has this move where he leaps at someone, tackles them, and then devours them. For the little guys, Venom is unstoppable! Combined with his Pull move, if the first attack doesn't kill the guy, the second surely will. A big sack of hit points that can beat people to death with other people. Venom has always been pretty awesome.

Other.
There are honestly too many people that could fit into this last spot. Spidey was fun, but not great at anything. Ms. Marvel was hot, but I don't know who the fuck she is. Gambit was classic, but he never wowed me. I honestly never tried Deadpool, but that guy comes off as a more obnoxious Spider-man. Luke Cage was on my team for a while for racial diversity. He was okay. Ironman was denied from my team, so when I got him back I thought he could go suck a dick. Jean Grey was wicked powerful, but awfully dainty. Honestly, I never became that attached to anyone. I got Hulk late, and he was doing well, but he didn't seem to be pulling his weight. I wanted him to devastate people.

Anyway, I'm going to play it a second time around on hard and go Pro-Regulation. Maybe Ironman will grow on me again, but I somehow doubt it.

10/15/09 Contending the Winter of Discontent
I'm trying to work out the logical cycle of the miserability scores of the winter. The last two years have been horrible cold, but
Did winter get better this year? Depends where you start and finish winter. This post was obviously in mid-October and winter didn't technically start for another two months. If it's based on the weather, then winter was over by the beginning of March, and even then things started looking up. But maybe that's just the thing: cold = suck.

5/25/09 Recess
So I was at a party the other night to substantially increase the man count of the evening. Little did I know I was to increase the man count by an infinite percentage. First, let me drop some knowledge on you. Being the only guy in a group full of girls is only beneficial when these girls are deprived and competing over, or better yet, considering sharing you. However, even if you arrived before many of the women, you are on the outside
Ha ha! I can't even tell you where I was for this, but I'm sure it was entertaining! I have a feeling I was in Lethbridge.

4/4/09 My goals
#1 Outlive Thom.
#2 Failing Goal 1, outlive wife so I don't have to tell people
What don't I have to tell people? I don't know. I'm too busy laughing at goal #1!

4/3/09 Secrecy
I find it funny that despite all the honest feelings we can express to each other there is always a level we feel the need to hide. There are always things we don't want to say because we're worried what the other person will think. Worse, sometimes we worry what the other person will do. More often than not, I think we're wrong. I think people are a lot more calm and reasonable than we give them credit for.

But despite all that logic, I still can't bring myself to explain the truth. I don't even know how to say it. I can make a lot of fuss about things that don't really matter, but when it comes to the important things... I don't know how to say them. I tried to once and it blew up in my face. I suppose wildly bitching to the internet hasn't been productive either.
Seriously. But I still do it. What's the deal with that?

I suppose what I need to say is that I'm sorry. My feelings were misdirected and my action was out of line. I know this is an open place, and that doesn't bother me. But if I'm going to be open, I need to be open.
So, here it goes.

Dear Blog,
I've fallen in love.
At least to the point that I understood love a year ago. And the irony kills me that a year ago I could only understand that level of love and it might have happened, and now I can see the infinite ocean of emotion that I hadn't yet reached. But at this ledge I am stopped. I am unable to explore. And maybe that's for the best. Maybe if I were to explore, I would soon run out of air (or maybe vice versa) and would have to resurface. Getting dumped out of the ocean is one thing, but the bends is another. Maybe diving in and exploring this is a bad idea. But I see something in the depths. I feel it. How can I ignore it? How can I stay here and never go? I could go to the reef. Reefs are safe; stable. But how can I ever forget those endless depths of the unknown? Even if I had to come back, why couldn't I try? Why couldn't we try?
This right here is why I never posted this. What the fuck am I talking about? That metaphor is constructed worse than slip n' slide built with bristle blocks. It is literally painful to read.

Blog, I'll cut the metaphor for a minute here. Thank God. I want to try this out. Even if it's built to break, even though there are so many signs that say we shouldn't, even though I've done so much to damage it... I want to try. And if I experience a whole new level of heartache, then I have experienced a whole new level of love. I know all the pain I've been through, and I remember it all as I bring those memories back. And all of that heartache, all of those tears and all that regret combined is worth a shot at this.
Wisdom, if I do say so myself.
...

If I'm being honest with you, I wonder now if I've placed her on a pedestal. I've ignored anything with her picture because she is too fucking beautiful. I sometimes think I might be the only one that really sees that. I mean really sees it. I can't even describe the feeling. It's like I want to... absorb her. I don't know, that's really all I can think of. Like I want to hold her so close that we occupy the same space to a scientifically impossible degree, as if our images overlapped. Is it all in my head, or is it all in my heart? I don't know. I wish I knew. I wish I didn't regret running away as much as I have. I wish the conviction I felt once hadn't been so terribly battered. I'm breaking down.

I don't know if I'm making sense. I don't know about you, but I'm following along. I guess I wrote it, though. I'm starting to get the bed ("bad". Though I imagine I was having bed feelings at this point too) feeling that this whole post is a mistake. But I'm going to push through it because I think there has been a lack of communication. And yes, I should say a lot of ("to") this in person. But, like I said, I'm scared. So much for pushing through and communicating. A coward to the end, I suppose.

...I'm trying to be interested in other people. It's a hard thing to say and I don't know why. I guess it goes back to worrying what people will do; how they'll react. I think a lot of the time, I promise feelings that I can't deliver in circumstantial situations. "We'll always be friends" is the biggest one, I think. It's not that the prospect of being together was the only thing holding us together, but sometimes things change and there is no overlooking it. I can't dissolve my feelings. I need to escape and dispose of them. I've got to get away. But it's so hard when I want to stay. Fuck you, old me! I'm doing it.

I didn't really get to say everything I wanted, but my head is killing me.

This is why it's good not only to keep a record of what you think, feel, and do, but also to go back and read it once in a while. If you take anything from this whole thing, take this piece of advice: go back and look it all over. Revisit your thoughts. The insight you gain about yourself is incredible. Everything changes when you take a trip back to visit who you were. I've been known to say it before, but I don't like me 5 years ago. 5 years from now Alex won't like Today Alex, even though Today Alex is fuckin' awesome. I'm sure even 6-months-from-now- Alex won't really be fond of Today Alex, but what can you do?
Learn.

3/13/09 Post it
(I'm trying this quick summary thing. Read this; get the jist. Read on for more info. I don't know whether this girl likes me back or not.) Semi- spoiler! I don't know who I'm talking about yet, but I bet she doesn't!

I have a note on the side of my computer that reads "Keep it to your goddamn self!"
I don't know why she troubles me the way that she does. It has got to be in my head. So, here I write to the abyss of the internet. Remember you're reading my blog. I'm not complaining to you. Aha! A loophole! Stuff it, Thom!

Is it bad that I can't tell if I'm the hero or the villain in my own story? I suppose good or bad is the same as right and wrong; good and evil. These are the things I cannot determine. Am I the heart of the righteous stuck in the body of the wicked, or the malevolent soul presented in a body of innocence? I want to do good, but am I the good that resists the temptation of evil, or am I the evil that seeks redemption? Is my destiny to be all the good which I wish to be, or is it to lay ruin to the supposed goodness I have created?
I really write like this sometimes, not a word of a lie. I just normally don't show anyone. There's a fucking reason for that. These longwinded posts are embarrassing bullshit!

Let me explain. I pride myself in goodness. I am fulfilled by doing what I think to be right, even if it is not the easiest route. But there has been a record so far of 100% violation of supposition among past lovers. Whether this be violation of ideas of fidelity, temperament, deceit, opportunism, or abandonment, there is always an aspect that appears in a relationship, or post relationship, that serves no purpose greater than destruction. Simply put, I hurt the ones I have loved and cared for.

Enter the girl. Yes, the girl. I would be remiss in believing that this girl is the end-all be-all of womankind purely by nature of her virtues - there are many thing that are simply incongruent among us - but somehow she attains the position in my mind of the girl ("the" should be in italics). And perhaps is something that I will talk about later. But for now, I ponder, does not the woman that corrupts man cancel the man that corrupts love?

Perhaps it is the man that corrupts woman? Very well. To an extent, I am that man. Should not then we two form a unison of which none more is perfect? I fear not.

I apologize. In my state I confuse eloquence with verbiage. Yeah, no shit, you pretentious wanker! What the fuck are you trying to say. Jesus Christ, this is the worst thing ever...

Why aren't things working? Why aren't we together? We want what we cannot have. Perhaps, by making up my mind on the course of action to take, I am no longer available. Perhaps I project this emotion more than I am aware. I know in my mind that it is impossible, and purely by virtue of impossibility is it something which I desire? Do I want what I cannot have because I have concluded that I cannot have it? Perhaps, though I did want it before I reached such conclusion. Is she so observant, though, that she perceives my decision and thus has become attracted to that which I have decided she cannot have? Perhaps. Now, supposing that both of these are true, am I not free to retract my previous conclusion and thus formally admit that my conclusion was invalid and that we two must be together?
I think I was in a philosophy class at the time, and they all write like this. Maybe I could make sense of it then, but I sure can't pull it apart now. Maybe philosophers need to stop being philosophers for a few months before they review their own work. It's like living in France for a few months and coming back to America and ordering jus d'orange. It's orange juice, motherfucker, and you're not cultured, you're a fucking idiot.

Yeah, it confuses me sometimes too. Here it is: if I gave up and the girl now likes me because I am unavailable, can I really just say, "hey, I'm all yours!" and things will work out dandy because she likes me? See? That's concise. I get that. I know what I'm talking about here.

They won't. She won't. The feelings are contingent. There is only one course to take.

I really should keep it to myself.
Okay, I was wrong. The girl may have liked me at the time. Although, that was a full year ago! That's incredible. Maybe I was right then. Maybe she didn't like me a year ago. A year is a longer time than I give it credit. It doesn't feel that long looking back, but it really is a long time. I could go on about "what ifs" and muse about the possibilities of what could have been, but that'd end up sounding like all the garbage I wrote a year ago! So here is my conclusion: I made my choices.


These next ones are over a year old, but they were in my "draft" folder, so what the hell!
1/28/09 Proof that Women are greater than Men
A lot of people on both sides of the gender spectrum (oh, it totally is a spectrum) believe that men are better than women. But I have proof that this is not the case.

All women carry our future sons their entire lives.
All men are born of women.
It takes the defiance of many men for a boy to become a man, yet only the love of a single woman.
Through hail of bullets and rain of bombs, between polished swords and sharpened spears, under thrown rocks and over the pitched fires of men a man can resist, but the absence of a woman can leave a man destroyed.
Oh how poetical... shit. To put it another way: women are man's only weakness.

1/23/09 Inequality
Men an women are different. I don't care what you say, but they are. There is a reason why boys like practical academics and girls like visual aesthetics (not that one does not grow to appreciate the other).

Men were made by scientists and women were made by artists.

This is where I wrote a little play about the creation of man and woman.
Genitus: Hurry up, everybody! The deadline's here and God needs these last bits!

Enter Penus.

Genitus: Ah! Penus. What do you have for us?

Penus: Check this out.

Penus whips out the first wang.

Penus: I call it The Penus!

Genitus: Wow, that's... something.

Penus: No, check this out!

The Penus erects.

Penus: Eh? Eh?! Totally involuntary! No bones or nothing.

Genitus: Ha! That is totally awesome! God's gonna be stoked!

Penus: I know, eh?

Penus plays with his newest invention.

Genitus: "The Penis," right?

Genitus scribbles on his clipboard.

Genitus: ...N, I, S.

Penus looks up from the willie.

Penus: Hmm?

Genitus: So, how does it work.

Penus: That's the best part. I was working with Testiclulus on this one. It shoots stuff. Testucles

Enter Testucles, slightly out of breath.

Testucles: Sorry, boss. Here it is.

Testucles holds up a pair of testicles.

Genitus: I don't follow.

Testucles: They're like mini factories. They make these little tiny cells with tails that can swim.

Genitus: Can I see?

Testucles: Just be careful. They're a little delicate.

Genitus: How delicate?

Testucles: Well, it's a complicated system. They're really sensitive and need to be kept at about 33 degrees.

Genitus checks his clipboard.

Genitus: Not 37 degrees?

Testucles: No.

Genitus: So what the hell are we going to do about that?

Testucles: I got it all planned out. We keep 'em in a bag.

Genitus: In a bag?! They're going to lose them!

Testucles: No, like a skin bag.

Genitus: A skin bag? Testucles, we can't afford that much material.

Enter Scrotus hurriedly.

Scrotus: Master! Master! I found something!

Scrotus hands Testucles fistfulls of skin.

Scrotus: They're elbow skin that God was just throwing away!

Testucles: That explains all the hair.

Penus hits Testucles with The Penus.

Penus: I thought we agreed on no hair!

Testucles: I'm sorry! Look, it's the best we can do.

Genitus: I'll let you sort that out for a minute while I check the design for Woman.

Penus, Testucles, and Scrotus huddle together.

Enter Vagino and Ovariam.

Genitus: Vagino! Ovarium! What do you have for us?

Vagino: Genitus, I say with no ego that this is our greatest creation. It's hidden, protected, sleek, soft, runs like clockwork, never needs replacing.

Genitus: Impressive! How does it work?

Ovariam: So, I've got these two little balls-

Genitus slaps his face into his palm.

Genitus: Calibrated to 33 degrees?

Ovariam: No. 37. Who calibrated to 33?

Genitus looks over his shouler at Penus, Testucles, and Scrotum.

Testucles: -no, no, you've got to pin it here!

Genitus turns back to Vagino and Ovariam.

Genitus: Doesn't matter.

Vagino looks over.

Vagino: What are they doing?

Genitus: Please, continue.

Ovariam: Right. So I have these balls. We can call the ovaries to avoid confusion. Anyway, so they are filled with, like, thousands and thousands of eggs-

Genitus: And the woman simply releases an egg when she wants to bear a child! Brilliant!

Pause.

Ovariam: We were thinking more of a timed release.

Genitus: So, they just sort of leak eggs from time to time?

Awkward pause.

Ovariam: You could say that.

Genitus: What happens?

Ovariam: Well, it's more than just an egg. But don't worry. We've devised a hormonal mechanism to keep it hidden.

Genitus: All right, I'll trust you know what you're doing. So, the egg comes out and then the man shoots Testucles' swimming cells onto it and it makes a baby, right?

Ovariam: Well, no. The baby has to grow inside here in this big chamber.

Genitus stares.

Genitus: And then...

Ovariam: Then you have a baby.

Genitus: How does the baby get out?

Ovariam and Vagino exchange looks.

Vagino: Ohhhhh no. No no no no no. No way. This is a masterpiece!

Ovariam (lowered voice): Vag, you're making me look bad.

Vagino: Ovariam, you make yourself look bad. We're not cramming a baby through my Vagina.

Ovariam: It's too late to change everything. C'mon, Vagino. It's the only way!

Vagino (sighs): Fine.

Genitus: Great! I've got to write up a report for God right now. Feel free to share your project with the other.

Genitus exits.

The huddled group of Penus, Testucles, and Scrotus opens up to reveal their package.

Penus: Ta-dah!

Vagino: eugh.


Next week: Gentius tries to explain to God how these parts are used to make new people.

I'm not thrilled with Ovariam and Vagino. They're not quite as entertaining as the stooges that are Penus, Testucles and Scrotus. Also, I'm more of an expert on the poor design of male genitalia than I am with regards to how women feel about their genitals. I don't know if anyone else finds it as funny as I do, but come on, a man's junk is the most poorly designed part of nature on a whole.



Hooray! You either read everything or scrolled to the bottom and said "Fuck that!"
Either way, thanks for getting to this point!

Big Brother Needs To Get To Work

I'm sick of this shit, guys. People can trace my IP, copy my debit card, and find my name, address, and phone number all without any trouble. The police have me on record for my heinous exiting my old high school after lunch break. The system has a credit history on me a mile long (that's the system, not just the bank). I have folders in different medical facilities that contain my medical history and information. But despite all this, Alberta Education doesn't have my grades.

I've got an Alberta Education number! I've taken my tests and I was assured that they were taken to our provincial capital for review. I attended a university inside the province. On top of that, I sent all of my information to Mount Royal the first time I applied! So here is my question:
Why is it so goddamn hard for post-secondary institutions to just look up all my information their goddamn selves?

My argument can be broken down into three simple arguments:

1. My information exists somewhere. Just link it all to my Alberta Education number. I can get all my transcripts sent anywhere I want from that anyway (it just costs me money)
2. Everyone else has me on file in some way. Safeway keeps track of how many bags of corn chips I eat per week, and the government can't keep track of sum of my educational achievement expressed simply as single page of grades?
3. a) How can an accredited institution such as MRU or UofC not be trusted with access to view my grades, and b) even if they can't be trusted, what malicious acts could they commit with knowing numbers of things that I did once? What? Are they going to feloniously report my aptitude?
4. (Bonus argument) They don't even accept a transcript that I give them! They need to get the information directly from my previous post-secondary institution- correction: They need to get me to get them the information directly from my previous post-secondary institution.

In conclusion, I'm sick of educational institutions that clearly recognize each other who refuse to communicate with each other independently. It's as if they make all the hoop jumping mandatory to prove that you're devoted to going to school. As if the application fees aren't enough to prove we're serious, we've also done post-secondary before and aren't shitheads fresh out of high school, but we're still harassed the most.

Thanks for making my continued education easier, Alberta. I'll be sure to try to find work in BC.

Twitter is to the Blogosphere as Video is to the Radio Star

What the hell, guys? What happened to the art of the blog? A fleeting thought could have less than 140 characters, but what ever happened to the more complex ideas? Don't we have anything more important to say? Hell, importance isn't even the issue; it's the depth. What ever happened to our thoughts and ideas and stories about our lives? Have we all become that boring?

Now don't get me wrong, I've been twittering as much as the next guy, and I don't hold myself above the lack of blog that I talk about. I know I've come up short on the blog front as of late, but we all know the circumstances. Responsibility will cool off in the summer as things start to warm up. The weather will change, we'll be outside, and we'll have time to relax and time to think and time to blog (with the exception of all the time we will spend hanging out).

In short, blog or hang out. Excuses will be validated on a per case basis.

Same Old Story

How do I always write stories the same way?!

Earlier today, Zack bet that I could write a story about trees better than most people could write anything about anything. I took that challenge and, with the foothold of assuming the trees hated each other, started to learn about trees on Wikipedia. I wrote the story as it came to me and what ends up happening? Two trees hate each other and one of them is in love with the tree across the street.

God damn it!

Can I just for once write a story that isn't about love? I swear, I'm stuck in Hollywood 1945; you can't write a good story without a love interest!