It wouldn’t take much to convince me I live in the septic tank of another universe, a depository for all of its refuse and rejects. When you look at the “rich and famous” you know that there wasn’t an intelligence test in the classification system that is being used. Obviously human evolution has gone off the rails somewhere.
It’s not enough to take out the garbage, you have to convince society to stop producing it. Currently all of the incentives are for worthless consumers, rather than producers. Production has been ditched, foisted on “lesser beings”, while those that are held up as examples, as goals that people should aspire to, are all wastrels. The “important people” don’t make anything, they move paper around, or play games. It is small wonder that the world is in so much trouble.
]]>I’d love to ‘cull the herd’… but there is no guarantee it would make things much better, and when does one stop? And what happens when the solution becomes as bad as, or worse than, the problem? And who get’s to play G-d? (No to mention the many and varied practical difficulties involved in sorting out the wheat from the chaff)! 🙂 So, I just leave it all up to G-D (assuming He actually does exist). I just keep reminding myself I don’t have much longer to put up with it all. LOL
I saw many things during my tour in Cambodia. When I first arrived, I just wanted to take out a lot of anger I had on as many people as possible. Then, possibly for the first time in my life, I met some truly innocent people… Villagers with nothing, and the Khmer Rouge and thieving gangs were even taking what little they had. It changed me and my men. Yeah… once upon a time, I would have happily destroyed the World. 🙂 Now… I just would love to take out the trash, but I know I can’t. So I just do what little I can when I can, and I’m content. 🙂 We saved hundreds of people and families in Cambodia, and I took out a LOT of the garbage! Yeah… When the end comes for me, I’ll be smiling. 🙂
]]>I never had any problems in the city. The “bad people” knew I was armed and didn’t mess with me. It was only in the suburbs that trouble started, because people couldn’t tell the difference between truly “bad” people and blow-hards. I hated hiring anyone who wasn’t from the city, because they caused trouble when they were supposed to be stopping it.
I give people a chance, but I really expect them to fail, so it doesn’t bother me when they do. Things would be smoother if they took the effort to educate themselves before they started offering an opinion, but they only hear views that reinforce their prejudices. When the times get tough you know they will be culled early so you don’t invest a lot of interest in them.
]]>I count myself exceptionally lucky that I have a few people in my life that I know I can trust, so long as I am realistic and understanding. Sometimes they have bad days at the same time I do, then we all feel extra miserable because we can’t help the other. It’s something called friendship. Even so, I ensure that I do not take them for granted, or have *expectations* of them, and they do the same, and we get on very well. 🙂 Everyone else, is an acquaintance. If they let me down (assuming I allow them the opportunity to do so), I just shrug and smile and move on. 🙂
And yeah… It would be a much nicer World if we all got along. But we don’t and it’s a cesspit. 🙂 The trick is to make damned sure the old shovel stays in good condition. If it stops working, then we are really in the… 😉 LOL
You know, the GOP only fools the uneducated and illiterate masses that believe such things as “words have power” or “the word represent the thing it describes” or “the map is the territory”. People such as myself know that words only have the power I give them, a word is simply (at best) a poor attempt at describing a thing, and a map most definitely is *NOT* the territory! (and any veteran of any war knows how true that is!) 🙂 But then… I studied such thinkers are Alfred Korzybski (A Polish-American Philosopher and Scientist for those wondering). More people should take the time to educate themselves. 🙂
Mt Grandfather and the military taught me how to be exceedingly polite! And my good friends will tell you that I am at my most dangerous when I am exceedingly polite, concise and quietly spoken. If I then smile, you better be a faster runner than a racehorse! 😉
]]>There are noise ordinances, but a dog can’t come close to the sound level required for those to kick in. It’s a dog – you can’t impress it with being a cop. You check to ensure it isn’t barking for an important reason, like a fire or break in, but you can’t always tell who it belongs to, and you don’t knock on doors at 2AM unless you are sure the people are involved.
People have a lot of unreasonable expectations for authority, when they would be better off finding out who the dog belongs to and talking to them directly.
Oh, I don’t actually expect people to act rationally or politely – it just would be a better world if they did. I generally expect people to be self-serving jerks and am rarely disappointed. Down here I expect it even when rationally they would be better off personally if they showed some civility. The GOP equates manners with weakness. They have never been exposed having me call them “Sir” or “Madam” during a traffic stop. There are many kinds of polite. They have forgotten how totally devastating anything that contains the words “bless his/her heart”, is going to be. We used to have superb forms of nastiness cloaked in kind words in the South. Our politicians once murdered each other, but they were unfailingly polite in public. It’s a lost era only dimly represented in out legislatures these days.
]]>It’s why tools such as those above exist, and why they are so damned popular. Some people given the choice and chance to do the write thing or the wrong thing will choose to do the right thing. Many won’t. If all humans were sweetness and light, we wouldn’t need police, militaries or even to a degree, Governments. However, most people are just either selfish or stupid bastards. And often both.
I don’t *expect* anyone to do the right thing, even if I know they want to. Shit happens, people let us down because they simply don’t realise they don’t have as much control over their existence as they would like to think they have. 🙂 I control my own environment as much as I possibly can and try never to rely on anyone. Occasionally… I am very pleasantly surprised by someone. 🙂
My Grandfather (May he RIP) gave me much good advice, including: “If you rely on people and you expect things of people, you will spend most of your life disappointed. If you expect nothing, you may sometimes be very pleasantly surprised.” Of course, there are rare exceptions. It’s taken me a lifetime to spot them. 🙂
I also try very hard not to give people expectations of me. Especially given my life the past few years. I can barely rely on myself, I surely will not allow anyone else to. Hopefully, I surprise some people now and then. LOL
]]>That one reason most of the graphic I use are gifs and things like the map and dog are the same on every post so they come from the cache. The top banner is enough of a load.
You had to bring up midis, Catnapping. I truly hate them. They remind me of those tinny, out of tune toy pianos without the charm. If I have a cat in my lap, sudden noises are just not a good idea.
I know I can block them, Kryten, but why should I have to? Doesn’t common courtesy make incumbent on people to offer visitors the choice of not downloading and playing multimedia extravaganzas? I don’t even embed, just a link to the media if someone is interested.
What really ticked me off was I was reading something when it went off, and will never get to finish the post.
]]>Adblock Plus
Adblock Plus Filter Lists
They will give you back control over what you want to see or not (and as an added bonus, make browsing a lot faster!) 🙂
And don’t worry Bryan… my site has none of that garbage. 😉 And everything that is there is on/offable (images, modules, sections, items… the user has control over what they want to see, depending of their membership level).
I hate those sites that offer *a wonderful user experience* and offer no way, or very limited ways, for the visitor to control that *experience*.
]]>Another thing that gets me are websites where the author has autoloading music…that you cannot even turn down, let alone OFF.
And some of them are playing the internetz version of muzak…MIDIs!
Evil, EVIL people.
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