Sock it to 'em

Scale of 1 to 10, how bad is that pun?
Shut up, never mind.


A couple days ago, I was doing laundry. Towels and whites (both socks and underpants, but although the title suggests it was only socks, there were underpants and a few T-shirts as well--there's just nothing logical about saying "Underpants it to 'em"). But the towels don't matter (I mean that on the most pun-related racist way possible), because they came out fine. However, when I was taking the whites from the dryer, I noticed that they were still damp--almost wet. Put them back in for another hour, no big deal. Came back an hour later, they were still damp. So, I did the only thing a man in my situation would do. Set the timer up all the way, full power. Two hours later, still damp. Timer, power. Two hours later, infinitesimally damp, but quite crispy. The heat had made them all crunchy.


Today, I put them back through a wash and dry, and it came out great the first time. But I noticed the error of my ways. The machine I had them in the first time wasn't spinning. D'OH! Silly me. I should've noticed they way the clothes were all in a pile that hadn't changed its shape.


Moral of the story: ZZ Top is the only good way to follow up Metallica. Oh, and stay in school.


Suck on that.

Perfect Hypocrites

Whoever said we were supposed to be perfect? Most Christians I come in contact with are total liars, both to themselves and to everyone else by living in a one reality and existing in another. After all, we have so much pressure from everybody to be perfect. We all act like it, but why? Remember in grade school, when the guest speakers would come and talk to us about not giving in to peer pressure? Well, that doesn’t apply just to sex and drugs. We have an unrealistic model set up for us and we spend most of our time trying to get up to par with it. That’s giving in to peer pressure, and guess what? It’s still bad, it’s still wrong, and we’re still doing it. Problem? I should think so. Am I saying that we shouldn't try to be perfect? Actually, yes, I am. Perfection is impossible, and living in hopes of achieving it is futile. Imagine spending your entire life trying to get something that you can never have. All of your efforts are completely worthless, and you should just give up. Blasphemy? Probably. The thing is, we could be doing so many incredible things if we weren't so hell-bent on being perfect. Since that's impossible, we've got two choices:

1. Keep trying, even though you know you're going to fail miserably and rightfully earn the hatred of everyone around you.

2. Spend your time and effort on something possible that can actually benefit someone.

No one can benefit from someone having the self-righteous, pretentious notion that you can be perfect and thus better than everyone else. If anything, it'll tear people down and just make them resent you. It's amazing how many people are living with choice number one, which I think to be one of the reasons people hate Christians. Honestly, I tend to agree with them.

Romans 12:2 says “Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind.” If we think we should be living the way the world sees us, that’s conforming to their pattern. That’s living for men, not for God. And how can we effectively be models of Christ if we’re not acting like Him?

It's simple: we can't.

ChaCha Sucks

I won't spend any time complaining about them, or saying how frustrating they are, but here's a conversation I had with them (for those who don't know, ChaCha is a phone service that will basically answer any question you ask, whether it be by leaving a message or texting, and they'll text back an answer). The following transcript completely unedited (and by completely, I mean down to the punctuation and capitalization of the letter "i"), except for the advertisements, which are clearly indicated.




M- How well did the book Six Pixels of Separation by Mitch Joel do on the market? Was it successful? :Nemo:


C- Aarrrgh! Ur temporarily out of Qs. Txt WHYME to know why. Or u can use ThmbSavrs: txt MENU or FUNMENU. Or Send ur Qs to LuLu 2 C if she knows: txt HOWLULU


M- Whyme :Nemo:


C- 1/2 We're not singling you out! It's just that while we are growing so explosively, we have some limits on Qs. Still, there are lots of ways to get ur answers.
C- 2/2 If out of Qs, u can always: Call ChaCha at 18002242242; Send Qs to LuLu: text HOWLULU; Use ThmbSavrs like 411: txt MENU to see all the ThmbSavr options!


M- This is the first question ive asked for months. How the hell am i out? :Nemo:


C- You are not out. Just ask your question and I will get you an answer. ChaCha on! *[ADVERT]


M- I did ask a question. I got a text that said i was out. Now im very confused and slightly agitated. :Nemo:


C- 1/2 There are limits to the amount of texts you can send ChaCha. You always have unlimited questions if you call 1-800-2ChaCha. *[ADVERT]
C- 2/2 Thanks for using ChaCha!


M- I only sent one text! I havent used chacha in over a month. I sent ONE text and it said i was out :Nemo:


C- 1/3 ChaCha questions limits are some times messed up. I'm answering your question right not, you must have some left. You can *[ADVERT]
C- 3/3 ChaCha again!
C- ChaCha got your answer and is working on the answer! *[ADVERT]
C- 2/3 call 1-800-2ChaCha for unlimited questions. You record your question and have the answer texted back to you. Thank you and


M- How well did the book Six Pixels of Separation by Mitch Joel do on the market? Was it successful? :Nemo:


C- Aarrrgh! Ur temporarily out of Qs. Txt WHYME to know why. Or u can use ThmbSavrs: txt MENU or FUNMENU. Or Send ur Qs to LuLu 2 C if she knows: txt HOWLULU


M- Very well. Goodnight. Ill try Google instead from now on. :Nemo:


C- Aarrrgh! Ur temporarily out of Qs. Txt WHYME to know why. Or u can use ThmbSavrs: txt MENU or FUNMENU. Or Send ur Qs to LuLu 2 C if she knows: txt HOWLULU




So, it's pretty obvious that they don't know what they're doing (they even messed the order up of one of them). They've always been pretty good as a quick, on-the-go dictionary, but I think even that is more trouble than it's worth.

Age Matters Not

My great-grandma is a machine. She's a 93 years old widow whose husband died just a few years ago, is the matriarch of what seems like a family clan, lives alone self-sufficiently, and has the deepest love, respect, and admiration of everyone she knows. For good reasons, too; the woman's been through, seen, and heard everything (and remarkably still remembers most of it, except for some short-term things).
For her 90th birthday, our family put together a surprise party for her at the fire station (how they got her there without her realizing is beyond me, the place is used for get-togethers more than it is for anything else). A lot of her old friends came from out of state, people she probably hadn't seen in ages. The excitement must've been to much for her, because she had a heart attack and was lying on the floor surrounded by people when my family arrived. With Grandpa Great's death not too far in the past, everyone was more tense and worried than they probably normally would've.


I think that the day she dies, our family goes with her. Grandpa was like everyone's father, in a sense, just like Grandma's everyone's mother. Half the people in our family probably only care about being with the family because of her. Don't even want to think about what could happen.


But on with the story. She was taken to the hospital, everyone followed, and waited tensely until anyone was allowed to go see her. She had hardly been in the hospital for two or three hours, and when I saw her, she was completely back to normal, complaining about how she hated hospitals and how she just wanted to go back and talk to her friends over a meal.


Talk about a powerhouse.


Moral of the story: no matter how old you are, you can still keep going strong, and you can still kick it.

Sports are Dumb

I'm confused. Maybe someone can help me out here. I've never understood what's so exciting about watching a bunch of sweaty, overpaid, middle-aged guys exercise? People throw away dozens (or even hundreds or thousands, depending on how devoted they are) of dollars a year down the toilet for exclusive networks, cable packages, stadium tickets, fan gear (jerseys and those foam fingers, which are admittedly kinda cool), and food at the stadium. Entire arenas sell out and are packed full of eager fans craning over the fat guy in front of them to see what's going on, all yelling, screaming, and cheering.
And it's not just the excitement of leaving home and having a night out, which is somewhat understandable (I'm sure there're better things to do than to sit in a crowded stadium and watch people work out). People will sit down in front of a TV and yell, scream, and cheer. At a screen. A screen. Yelling at the top of their lungs about poor calls (which only happens if the team they're cheering for is harmed), swearing at players for a poor performance (I'd like to see you do better), and, this one's the best, just noise. Just the occasional, random "OOOOOHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!".
Someone next door (at least I hope it's next door; if it's farther away, that's just scary) has been bellowing incessantly for the past half hour. My door is shut, the walls are concrete, and I've got music on fairly loud and I can still hear every word he's saying. He's getting so mad, it's ridiculous. Or maybe it's excitement, not anger. Either way, it's way over the top.


Honestly.


Moral of the story: yelling at televisions and cheering for people who are engaging in mindless physical activity will only make you look like silly, especially if you're only shouting at pixelized renditions of them on a screen).

Time Management

My dashboard keeps saying that I have one more post than is actually visible. So, being the responsible blogger that I am, I checked to see what was up.

This is it.

No really, this is it. I saw an empty post titled "Time Management". I don't remember posting that, nor do I even remember considering it as something to talk about. I suck at time management. I mean, c'mon, I'm sitting here at 11P listening to the Beastie Boys with a word document up that's due in two days and I've hardly done a thing with it.

But I'm sure you're reading this for a reason, so... manage your time well. Don't do the Facebook thing all the time. Do your homework and stuff. Maybe some day I'll swallow my own.

My own medicine, that is. Figure I should add that, in case you start thinking dirty. I know I did. That's why I'm keeping it the way it is.

Moral of the story: quit reading this and do something productive! You're not gonna live forever, so go make the best of it.

Friends

Three years ago, I met one of the best friends I’ve ever had. Or so I thought at the time. Maybe it was because we had all seven classes together. Maybe it was because we understood each other. Either way, I can’t really say that I care, because during the second semester of that year, she quit talking to me. There was no explanation, no cause—nothing. So, of course I tried to find out, but she wouldn’t answer messages or even pick up the phone. I would equate it to being stabbed in the back, but with as much as I trusted this person, it was more like that scene in The Patriot where Mel Gibson chops the British soldier up with a hatchet like it’s nobody’s business. In the back.

I was always a shy person, so people never really bothered to talk to me. Having a good friend is something that happens very rarely, and it’s something I take very seriously.

Sometime, during the next year, some completely random person started talking to me. I had no idea she was and had never seen her before. In a way, she saved my life, because with the way things were going back then, I have no idea where I’d be without her. Oh, and did I mention that at the time, she was probably ten times more miserable than I’ll ever be? 'Cause that’s kind of important to know. It’s ironic that people who you’ve known your whole life don’t care enough to sit down and talk to you for two minutes, but a complete stranger does. A complete stranger whose everyday life is a living hell, to be exact. She still took the time for some little kid like me. To this day, I've never, and will probably never, meet another friend who cares like she does.

Moral of the story: you can truly change (or even save) someone’s life just by starting a conversation, even if you don’t know them.

ADD ME!!!!1

If I had to pick one thing on the internet that I hate the most, I would tell you to eat it and give you a list. For the sake of not wanting to sound like a whiner, I'll keep it to the one appearing in the title (although those stupid lolcats are a close second).

A site I really enjoy is AddictingGames.com, which has addicting games on it. Under every game window is a comment thread, and you'll see things like "dis game sux add me lol" all the time. Silly me, I thought it was something limited to certain websites. But oh, was I wrong (yes, I was)!

Turns out that social networks do it all the time, especially on YouTube and Facebook's game application fan pages. These I can understand, because you'll get bonuses on those games for having several people on your crew or whatever. But on AddictingGames? You get nothing whatsoever.

And, of course, it's not just for games. It's comments on celebrity profiles, status updates for other networks (every other person on Tagged has their Yahoo! account for the whole world to see), and I wouldn't be surprised if I saw billboards asking to add some 38-year-old dude on World of Warcraft.

People really shouldn't even need to tell others to add them. What's the point anyway? You don't care about the people you add and they sure don't care about you either. There's no need to impress anyone (if anyone is ignorant and gullible enough to be impressed by this) by your 82,93,847,210 "friends" who don't care and who you've probably never said or written a syllable to.

Moral of the story: there's no need to be wasting everyone's time shamelessly advertising yourself. Unless you genuinely know or talk to all of the people you add. Then props to you, that's actually pretty freakin' impressive.

AWESOME

Once upon a time, as so many good stories before have begun, I went to take a leak. I did my thing and went to the sink to wash my hands, like the upstanding citizen that I am. To my great distress, I saw that the entire sink was filled with hair: mostly stubble, but a good amount of short, manly locks that coated half the sink's interior, making it almost completely impossible for the sink to perform its primary purpose: drainage. The sink was completely out of commission, all because someone decided that responsibility and cleanliness are both overrated.

As we all know, it is housekeeping's job to clean up after all of our messes, which is why I make a pointed habit of missing the toilet and urinating on the walls. Who needs to pick up after themselves anyway, when you've got a dedicated crew of poor, unfortunate women who have to clean up after your sorry mess every single day of their career?

Moral of the story: ten extra seconds and a paper towel is all it takes, it's really not difficult.