Life is Funny

Yesterday I sat down at a $3 blackjack table at the Casino and handed over $50 to the dealer.

I started off playing conservatively, but everytime I got 19, he had 20. If I got dealt 20, he’d make 21 the hard way (from starting with a 6)

In 10 hands, I pushed once, won once, and lost 8 hands…

So in about 10 minutes of play, I lost $50 and left the table.

I’m always aggressive this way, and it’s not good. Being aggressive in a casino is never a good thing, and that ALSO includes when you are holding top pair, trips, or a flush a Texas Hold’em Poker too.  (A straight flush, even just a full house will beat you every time)

So when it comes to business, or anything you do as a hobby, and you find yourself having an aggressive personality, I highly recommend you STAY AWAY from a casino environment unless it’s controlled.

For instance, if you are playing a slot tournament, where there is a flat fee to buy-in, then that would be safe for you to participate in..

But anything that requires split second wagering decisions, your aggressive nature may come out at the wrong time, and you’ll cost yourself a lot of money quickly.

One time I was at the blackjack table, guy cames in and throws $100 and loses it, without watching what kinds of cards were coming out, nothing. He puts up another $100, and loses that next hand as well.

The look on his face changes, and he puts up another $100, loses that, gets all red faced, and walks away, after losing $300 in 3 hands of Blackjack.

The types of people who do really well in the long term, are those that are conservative minded.

Ever sit in a restaurant, look over, and you see someone staring you, or the people you are with? Often it is an older couple, usually in their late 50’s, mid-60’s. They sit right next to each other, so they can have the same viewing angle.

These people watch people walk into the restaurant, they watch how people behave, they watch walk towards the watchroom. They just take in the scenery together. They NEVER talk to each other other than in the form of a quiet whisper and a slight nod towards whoever they happen to be talking about.

It’s the busy body disease. These people are have such shallow souls that they need to judge each and every person they see in a public place in order to feel better about themselves.

You can almost hear what they’re talking about…

“Oh, look at what she ordered! My god, she’s not going to eat all that is she?”

“Look at the small tear in that guys shirt? Do you think he knows it?”

“Hey, see the guy sitting next to the lady we just talked about? Look how dirty his shoes are! Isn’t that discusting?”

“Oh no, look at this guy, he looks like he won’t be able to afford his dinner. I wonder what he’s going to order”

“Look at that mother, why doesn’t she stop her 2 year old from fussing like that?”

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People, they created dinner theaters for a reason. If you want to be entertained, do it at a dinner theatre. Don’t make the general public your personal clowns. We’re here to enjoy our dinner, and you make it very difficult when everytime we lookup from our plate, we see your ugly face staring..

I find that couples who cannot chit chat among themselves, have very dull dreary marriages, and they depend on getting out in public and watching and judging everyday people to take away their boredom.

Usually I will just disregard and ignore them. However in extreme cases where you look up at the person, and stare back, and they are so secure into their own comfort zone that they do not shyly look away for a second.. It is these aggressive starers that I hate the most.

These are the ones that aren’t still judging you, but have passed judgement on you, and they think they are better than you. You look back, and they’re not afraid. After all “you” are the freak in their mind. How dare you stare backat us?

Well when that does not work, I will often approach these insecure, shallow people, and I’ll start up a conversation. Sometimes I’ll start with “do I know you? I notice you’ve been staring at our table a lot tonight, so perhaps we know each other?”

It usually takes them about 5 seconds for their fixed glaze to wear off, and then to immediately begin to think “uhn, no! I’m uhh, no I don’t know you”. You can see the surprise on their face when they switch from stare, to shock.

Now you’ve called them out. Now they are no longer in their comfort zone. Now the spotlight has shifted from you to them, and they NEVER want to be in the spotlight. They hate this so much. Usually that does the trick.

Now everytime you look up, they will look away, or they simply will not look at you again. They are so afraid you are going to walk over and catch them in a conversation again. They want to be the audience, but not part of the act. By dragging them into your world, you make them a part of you, which they never want. They want disassociation, prejudgement, and the feeling of being an elitist. How can they do that while you are speaking with them?

The problem with these people, is that the next time they go out to dinner, they’ll do it again. They’ve turned their staring habit into such a routine, that they can barely eat without starting and judging someone. They’ve done it so many times that they can’t stop themselves.

It is rude to stare. It is socially unacceptable to stare. Staring is threatening to the person who is being stared at. In the animal kingdom, staring often happens just before an attack.

It is natural for staring to be an act of hostility towards you and it should not be tolerated!

Everyone hates dandelions on their nice green lawn. This nasty “weed” spreads so darn fast, and looks horrible. Those awful leaves, cheap looking flowers…

But! The dandelion leaves are completely edible, great in salads. You can steam and sautee them too! The leaves have a lot of vitamins in them! Vitamin A, C, D, and B-complex. They also contain minerals like iron, magnesium, zinc potassium, manganese, calcium and more!

The yellow parts of the flower are also completely edible. You can dip them in batter and fry up some dandelion fritters.

Even the dandelion root can be toasted and ground up as a healthy alternative to coffee.

So why do we hate them so much?  There are lots of herbal remedies offered by dandelions. I don’t think we’re giving this weed much credit. It’s actually a healthy food source.

Would we feel the same if we walked out into our lawn and go “oh no! I can’t believe it. Look at these large ripe wild tomatoes growing everywhere!”

Wouldn’t you be inclined to bring the tomatoes inside instead of spraying poison on them?

What is the difference with dandelion?

I’ll tell you… The majority of us are simply not use to eating dandelion. We’re also brought up to hate them because of how they spread.  If we could change society’s view of them, I think they would be a lot more welcome on our lawns and we’d actually encourage their growth.

It’s not the dandelion who is ugly and needs to be remedied, only our way of thinking should be..

It is natural for parents to help their kids avoid the pitfalls and mistakes that they went through in their lives. They want to see their kids succeed. They want to help their kids be the best that they can be.. 

Finally, they admittedly want their kids to go farther in life, then the parents did themselves. They love their kids, have labored their entire lives to raise and guide them. They have a lot of time, effort, worries, frustrations, happiness and tears all spent and created in raising their children.

Our future generation, today’s children are part of this growing dilemma to make life easier and simpler.

Ever since the industrial revolution, and as technology progresses though, we’re creating life “aids” that avoid us from doing work.

Today’s society is lazy. Tomorrow’s generation will be even lazier.

Instead of milking the cows, we now buy milk at the store. Some people even get it delivered to their front door.

Instead of making ourselves a coffee in the morning which involves quite a lengthy procedure. Not only do we have to warm up the water, mix the ingredients, but now there is a cup to wash!!  No, instead we’ll just head to work, stop by a coffee shop drive thru, and idle for 15 minutes while someone makes our coffee for us, and we can throw out the cup when we’re done with it.

Instead of walking 3 miles down the road to see a friend, we hop in the car, or just phone, fax, or email.  We don’t even bother to phone them now, because that involves a whole conversation. No, we’ll just text them a sentence of what we wanted to say. 

If we wanted to watch a movie, we’d plan a night out. We’d go to the theatre, stand in line, buy a snack, sit down, watch the movie and come home.  As generations passed, we use to just go to the video store, rent a movie, watch it, and return it.  Today, we click buttons on a remote control because this way we don’t have to “go” anywhere. We can sit on our couch and stay there.

So what’s next?  I will tell you:

Instead of milk delivered to the door, we’ll probably have robots that will take it from the door to the fridge.

We won’t want coffee, because we’ll have vitamin patches stuck to our bodies, so what when we feel we want a coffee, the chemicals automatically instantly release from skin patch, making us feel that we’ve just enjoyed a coffee, thereby releasing dopamine to our brain. 

Instead of texting our friends, we’ll have new technology that can respond to our thoughts or voice, so that we don’t actually have to pickup a device and use our fingers to type, it will just “know” what we want to say, and to whom.

When we want to see a movie, we’ll be able to gaze up at the TV, say something trivial like “i want to see a movie, you know what I like” and that’s it. We won’t have to choose, search, or find anything.

This way, we can be spoiled lazy people — exactly what our previous generations have helped us become. This is our destiny of tomorrow.

This is how we’ll satisfy ourselves in the future. When we want something, a second later, our brain feels that we did actually receive it. This way there is no wasted time or effort. It will be instant gratification to our every want, 24×7.

Isn’t life funny and yet truly horrific at the same time?

Today I learned a new thing about a new movement called Freeganism or Freegans.

Basically it is a group of people, both poor and middle class, who are sick and tired of commercialism and waste in society.  They find that by raiding dumpsters behind grocery stores for food, they are harvesting tons of quality edible food for free!

Personally, I think if your stomach can handle it, and you’ve got nerves of steel to be caught doing it (it’s not socially acceptable behavior), then more power to you. I agree with the premise.

We overpay at the grocery store for simple items, but one of reasons why the prices are as high as they are, is because of the waste that is going on at the rear of the grocery store.

They are saying that when an egg breaks, often they will throw out the entire carton (because you can’t just sell 11 eggs to someone).  That’s significant waste!

I think the whole concept of Freegans needs more attention. Share this with people you know.

I’ve been through the vehicle transmission repair thing a few times in my life, and I can’t think of one incident where I was impressed with the transmission shop.

When you have transmission problems, right away you know the bill is definately going to be in the thousands.  Usually $2000 to $3000 for a transmission repair.

Here’s the thing.. they are going to overhaul and rebuild your transmission when no one is looking. They are going to replace all the parts that need to be repaired (or so they say), and charge you as little as they can..

WELL, if you owned a transmission shop, and you could do repairs without the customer watching, wouldn’t it be easy for you to overbill and rip off the customer to make a tidy profit?

These days, its definately not a joke or very funny when you get taken for a “ride” by your local transmission shop. So it makes you wonder, what are we suppose to do?

Let the tranny shop suck our money out of our wallets, or is there some way to discover if we are getting a fair deal or not?

With Global Warming on the horizon, and our landfills and waste on the rise..

Why is it legal to create disposable lighters, disposable pens, camera, even flashlights!

Let’s make these consumable items refillable and/or rechargeable.  Now I admit, I do buy disposable razors, but thats about it.  I saw an ad on TV for the “save a blade” which will let you resharpen your disposable razor when it gets dull.

I wonder if it works?

I even saw a disposable video camera / cam corder at a Rite-Aid pharmacy for $30. It records 20 minutes of video, when your done with it you throw it away.

Seems silly to fill up our landfills with these items, doesn’t it?

Now, I guess its time I buy the save a blade and find out if it really works?

On this website, the reviewer says he is able to get 28 shaves with a single razor! Yet on a another website, I saw someone say that you need to sharpen both sides of a blade to get it to a point. Simply sharpening one side is not enough. (This why knife sharpeners sharpen both sides of your knife instead of just one).

I’ll let you know what happens.

Ok, we have a trailer in the middle of the forest that we go visit maybe once a month. Normally everything is intact, just the way we left it.

I wish this story was funny and amusing, well I suppose it is, depending on how you look at it.

Our mouse trap did catch a mouse while we were away, but there are like 400 mouse droppings (aka turds) all over the trailer. Its in the silverwear drawers, in the bathroom, all over the counter, in the bed, on the couch, just everywhere!

Why do these mice poop so much?  It eats and poops at the same time. Mice wouldn’t be quite so bad if they didn’t poop so often.

This is what causes me to hate mice, otherwise I’d consider them cute, like chipmunks. Ever heard the phrase “what, are you scared of a mouse?”

I mean they are so tiny and they are more scared of you… they are very timid creatures.

So now, I have to spend the day cleaning up mouse turds, and I have to be extra careful not to contract the Hantavirus which is linked to mouse poop. Its an airbourne virus which you can contract if the mouse is a carrier.  Apparently the virus lives for 2 or 3 days at room temperature. Lets hope these mouse droppings are more than 3 days old.

If I do contact the virus, I can show symptoms within 45 days later, which keeps you wondering if you got it.

All this, because of a little mouse.

So yes, I guess you could say, I’m scared of mice, simply because of this virus and nothing else.

Two days ago the Orthodontist has their automated dialer call saying my 16 year old son has an appointment on Thursday at 2:30pm. I immediately write him a note to get out of class and bring it to his room. His girlfriend is laying in his bed with the covers up to her neck, my son is a little red faced, somewhat annoyed and embarrassed at the same time because I’m interrupting him. I hand him the note, and he says, I don’t need a note, I can just leave during 3rd block. I said well take the note anyway, just in case, throw it in your wallet – you never know. He insists the note is useless and there is no point to it.

I said well its my job as the parent to ensure you have the note, if you don’t want it, then what you do with it is up to you. I just recommend you keep it on you incase someone questions you while your leaving or later, etc. That same night we chat a bit about the appointment and I say, remember your appointment, and remember to keep the note somewhere on your body. He says “yeah” to shrug me off, and I drop it.

The next day, wouldn’t you know it that he calls me from school at 1:20pm all panic stricken. I’m at school and about to leave class for my appointment, and I can’t find the note anywhere. I need it.  My teacher says that If I leave without having my parent note it I’ll get a detention. Can you please call the school for me? So I call the school. Pretty interested how he fought me on taking the note in the first place, and then he calls all panicky when at school because he doesn’t have a note…

Today, many people complain about crime in their neighborhood.

They are shocked that Police are slow to respond to certain situations. Understand this, the message that police are getting is that by the time they file all the paperwork necessary to prosecute a criminal, the accused is free on bail with a community service penalty.

Not only that, but if they read between the lines, traffic violation tickets bring IN revenue, and prosecuting the homeless thug COSTS revenue.

Therefore police are better off writing up violation traffic tickets for the working class, and LESS beneficial to the city when they arrest and prosecute a homeless person who is doing crime.

I remember once that I was near a crime scene where a $300 Television was stolen. There were very clear finger prints in the dust since the TV was in a storage room. When the officers attended to take the report, they basically issued a file number for the insurance company.

When the victim asked them “why don’t you take fingerprints? it’s obvious that their finger prints are right there”…

The officer responded “you lost a $300 Television. By the time we get forensics here, fingerprint, write the report, take it to court, prosecute, etc, it will cost the city almost $5,000 and thats IF we get a conviction, maybe more. It’s much cheaper for you to file your $300 claim with the insurance company and leave the city out of it”

So there you have it folks. If you are a career criminal and do thefts under $500 at a time, its cheaper for the cops (and the city) to avoid prosecuting you and let the burden by born by the law-biding citizen.

Naturally this is my opinion only, but you get the idea.