State of the Stephen

Wait, What?

2012-01-08T00:18:00.000-08:00

. . .

Tiempo Tiempo

2011-01-25T21:32:00.000-08:00

Mediodía estancado entre relentes.
Bomba aburrida del cuartel achica
tiempo tiempo tiempo tiempo.

Era Era.

Gallos cancionan escarbando en vano.
Boca del claro día que conjuga
era era era era.

Mañana Mañana.

El reposo caliente aun de ser.
Piensa el presente guárdame para
mañana mañana mañana mañana.

Nombre Nombre.

¿Qué se llama cuanto heriza nos?
Se llama Lomismo que padece
nombre nombre nombre nombre.

Cesar Vallejo

Gatito

2010-11-22T16:33:00.000-08:00

I met this cat in the summer of 2009, in a small village in Peru called Motupe. I snapped this photo just has she stretched out and rolled around in the dirt to scratch her back. Several locals, amused by my amusement, shouted out, "Take her home with you! Don't you need a kitten?"

Motupe, Peru

Unfortunately, they were wrong, I didn't need a kitten. She stayed there and I went on my way, leaving behind Motupe, Peru, South America.

The Invisible Shield of Anonymity

2010-04-07T17:41:00.000-07:00

Here at school, discussions on the student listserv often devolve into inflammatory (and often elementary) name calling. I think there are several basic reasons for this. In the first place, emails are often half-read, or skimmed. People jump head first into these arguments after having read just the first of four paragraphs of an argument. Conclusions are jumped to, and responded to, even though they might not have ever existed.

Read carefully.

Things quickly become personal. It starts with subtle jabs, questioning someone's ability to read, think, or articulate. These are always degrading and condescending. "I'm left to wonder if Mr. Jones has even travelled abroad, or knows what it's like to be in prison." You could always present your argument by explaining the benefits of traveling abroad, for example, or by describing the realities of prison life, ooooooor you could simply deconstruct your opponent by making blanket assumptions and sweeping judgments about the value of their life experience, or lack there of. You don't need to know if these things are true, just say them anyway.

From here things often turn ugly. Sure, there are always a couple of reasonable, even handed responses, usually sent with the intent of cooling the flames or putting an end to the ridiculousness that is ensuing. These messages are either ignored entirely, or repeated (practically verbatim) by others who feel the same way and either didn't read the first message, or just want their moment on the soapbox.

The conversation is instead dominated by the loud and obnoxious, generally. Despite spending countless hours in Legal Writing classes, learning how to carefully articulate arguments and present ideas, law students quickly fall back on more primitive tools of persuasion, like using ALL CAPS for the REALLY IMPORTANT WORDS, such as, "YOU'RE AN ASS!" or "APOLOGIZE OR ELSE." Keep in mind, these discussions are taking place before an audience of hundreds.

What's striking is not the language used, or the elementary argumentation taking place between groups of grad students. Rather, it's the ability of human beings to forget that they actually know the people they are talking to or about. It's our ability to write an angry, impassioned, and inflammatory email about a person who we see on a weekly, if not daily basis, and then knowingly send the email directly to that person.

Even if you never have to face the person (as is the case with the law school listserv), don't we all have to co-exist? Don't we have a kind of evolutionary duty to not fall back on our most cowardly, ineffective, lazy, and hurtful tools of argument?

Or don't we?

(Note: This is not to say that a person doesn't occasionally deserve a swift kick in the pants or an angry/impassioned email. It's just to say that a person doesn't deserve to be insulted when they disagree with you on basic questions of policy, law, etc.)

Hike with a Friend

2010-04-05T16:51:00.004-07:00

I went hiking a few weeks ago with a friend of mine. I told my friend that I like music that makes me feel something. I like songs that can make me feel like I'm going through a break up or loss of a loved one, even when I am not. I like music that makes you want to move and dance and forget your worries.

This conversation got me thinking about the power of music. These songs and artists aren't just things that we listen to, but powerful arrows in our quiver. They can be used to motivate, tranquilize, relax, excite, and console. We have control over when and how they will be heard. Today, we will dance. Tomorrow let us be pensive and introspective. Should I clear my mind, or invite distraction? These are the things that can shape our mood, and consequentially the way we interact and are perceived by others. Will I be open to new ideas, new faces, new horizons and possibilities--or will I hunch under the stormy rain cloud that exists only in my distorted perception?

I have never being all I want to be. But maybe tomorrow I will be.

Rejected

2009-11-17T13:31:00.001-08:00

Rejection letters are cold, blunt, and economic in word use.

"We reviewed your application and will not be hiring you."

I'm not sure what's worse, a heartless rejection letter or the straight up silent treatment. The rejection brings closure and allows you to move on. It's also a brutal blow to your ego which can take days or weeks to recover from, something that the silent treatment spares you. Just once I would like to receive the following rejection letter:

Jean Smith, VP Human Resources

Dream Employer Incorporated

Pleasantville, USA 90001

November 17th, 2009

Dear Applicant,

I recently had the pleasure of reviewing your application. It was awesome. I wish it didn't have to be this way, but unfortunately we can't hire you. I know what you're thinking, but trust me: it's not you, it's us.

First of all, don't be self conscious about your cover letter. It was the perfect length, nearly typo free, and that quip in the second paragraph nearly made LOL. Seriously! It was awesome that you spent last summer in Peru, you seem like a really great guy. It kills me that we can't hire you!

You're probably going to think that your resume isn't up to par, but don't. Your resume was great. Sure, you don't have any directly relevant experience, and there's no real indication that you'll excel with us, but it looks like you're involved in some great activities. You worked at a call center during undergrad? That's amazing, I'm sure you're really hard worker.

The truth is if it were up to me I would have hired you. There are just a lot of factors involved that are totally outside of my control, and your control as an applicant. I mean, you are amazing in every way, and still didn't get a job with us? I guess it's all about who you know, which is total bull crap because you're awesome.

Keep your head up. You're young and in control of your soon to be flowering young career. Someday we'll be kicking ourselves for passing you up, I'm convinced of that.

Sincerely,

Jean

4th Meal

2009-10-25T22:56:00.000-07:00

You know we have a weight problem when Taco Bell's "4th Meal" advertising campaign, which is basically an attempt to insert a giant calorie-heavy meal into the middle of the night, seems like a good idea to a large part of the population.

Desafios

2009-10-10T16:16:00.000-07:00

Un desafio me enfrentaba.

No era uno sino varios, pero todos de la misma pinta.

Una, dos, tres oportunidades de ser el que quería y quiero ser.

Una, dos, tres oportunidades perdidas para siempre en el viento del pasado.

El mismo desafio me enfrenta vez tras vez en estos días, viejo amigo, llamándome lo que soy--cobarde.

Agobiado me siento bajo las oportunidades perdidas y fallas cometidas, y me pregunto sí es posible, ¿regresar?

The Beatles

2009-09-26T20:30:00.000-07:00

I broke down and bought one of the new digitally remastered Beatles albums yesterday. At one point I had all their music, but CD's got scratched, cassettes were discarded, and my record player is in my parent's garage (a problem that must soon be remedied). I have a few of their albums on my computer, but I'm pretty far from having a complete collection.

I decided to get the White Album, the Beatles only double album, a welcome departure from Magical Mystery Tour, but not quite as good as subsequent albums, in my opinion.

I played the CD in the car on the way home. In a weird way it was like seeing an old friend for the first time in years. The first track I listened to was Birthday, a vamped up, cheesy ,and happy-go-lucky birthday song. The very next song is Yer Blues, which opens with John Lennon proclaiming, "Yes I'm lonely. Wanna die." The sort of natural high inspired by Birthday is wiped away in the first five seconds of Yer Blues. The contrast between these first two tracks was striking and immediately apparent. According to some it's the kind of contrast that helped make the Beatles great. Paul's "yeah-yeah-yeah's" and John's "wanna die's" represent the inevitable highs and lows, good times and bad that paint our lives.

It's funny what stands out when listening with 27 year old ears, as opposed to teenager ears. Sad songs seem sadder given a deeper contextual backdrop. Happy songs are richer and more alive than they ever were growing up. I realized that no song is written in a vacuum. Instead they are dressed in the pain, beauty, disappointment, and fears of the song writer. An early death of a parent, abandonment, ecstasy, the birth and death of a friendship. These things lie hiding behind the words and notes. The more the listener experiences in his or her own life the more these things begin to peek out into the open.

And in the end . . .

2009-08-23T11:31:00.001-07:00

My wife picked me up at the Portland Airport after approximately 24 hours of flying in the air and sleeping on the floor in strange airports. As we drove home, happy to finally be together again, we decided we were both hungry and in the mood for something . . . healthy. Not a burger, or ten dollars worth of french fries. Something clean tasting and delicious. I immediately thought of the many juice stands in Peru, where a dollar or less can get you a tall glass full of fresh squeezed orange juice, or papaya with pineapple if you're in the mood. Unfortunately the signs on the freeway continued to point us towards Wendy's, Carl's Jr., and McDonalds, not a juice stand in sight.

I guess you really don't appreciate what you have until it's gone.

Of course, a fresh squeezed glass of juice for only 30 cents also represents a great injustice, and in many ways the imbalance that exists in our world. A woman once sold me a glass of cebada for 15 cents. It was so delicious that I paid her quadruple, a whopping 60 cents. Her eyes lit up and she immediately rejected my offer, insisting that she couldn't possibly accept so much money. I explained that it was a tip, and with gratitude in her heart she finally accepted. Who would have guessed that 45 cents could literally make someone's day, and maybe even their week.

The more I learned and observed in Peru the more I realized that we shouldn't feel sorry for people just because they're poor. I watched kids play in the dirt with homemade toys. They smiled and laughed and genuinely enjoyed themselves, even without plastic army men or toys that light up and talk.

We don't necessarily need to get upset about the fact that some people can't afford the new Nike running shoes, or a trip to the Bahamas. The thing that we should really be upset about, and be working constantly to overcome, is that fact that some people can't afford even the most basic education and health care. I worked with kids who had big dreams for their future, but at just 15 years old (or younger) they were forced to leave school to find a job.

Reflejando . . .

2009-08-12T04:29:00.000-07:00

I was originally presented with the choice of working in Lima, the capital of Peru and home to over 9 million people, or Chiclayo, a town that I had literally never heard of. I decided right away on Chiclayo for a hodge-podge of reasons. I think I was under the impression that going to a smaller, more out of the way city would give me a chance to get to know the "real" Peru. This of course was a ridiculous assumption since there's really no such thing as a "real Peru. Peru, like any other country really, is full of a wide range of realities, none more authentic or true than the other.

What is life like in Oregon, for example? That would depend on if we're talking about the dairy farmer in Woodburn, the banker in downtown Portland, or the transient (or law student) in Eugene. Each represents in their own special way what Oregon is about.

I've spent the last 24 hours in Lima, and the one thing that I've enjoyed is not standing out. In Chiclayo people stared, mostly because of my height and giant shoes. On Monday I went and did some house visits in the rural areas of Chiclayo. At one point a young boy came out of his adobe home, looked up at me and said to himself in disbelief, "¿Tan grande?" as if to say, "people come in that size?!"

But in Lima I'm just another guy. There are enough tourists and caucasian Peruvians to blend in and go unnoticed, which is nice.

I'm currently sitting in the airport, waiting to make the last leg of my trip here in Peru. I'm headed to Cusco where I will learn a bit about what Nexos does there, and get to see Machu Picchu. I've got the full range of emotions brewing. I'm excited for Cusco, but more than anxious to get home to my wife and family. At the same time part of me is sad about leaving Chiclayo and the people I met there. In review, that's excited, anxious, and sad.

I'm about to board, I'll post more tonight.

Evidencia

2009-07-30T06:27:00.000-07:00

The other day I was reading a Smith Institute report on Juvenile Justice in England and Wales. The forward said something that I thought was interesting:

It is almost 10 years since the Attorney General of the US, Janet Reno, submitted an independent, scholarly report to the US Congress entitled Preventing Crime: What Works, What Doesn't, What's Promising (1997). When I read that report shortly after it was published, I immediately sensed a sea change in the way democracies would talk about crime prevention. No longer would we focus just on ideology. Evidence would soon take a much larger role in the debate.

This struck me because so much of what we do, especially in the world of criminal justice, is based on abstract ideologies, theories, or even raw emotion. We are angry and outraged when someone commits a crime, we paint them as someone outside of society and often throw them in prison where they are supposed to learn a lesson. And certainly there are crimes that merit this kind of punishment. But the great mistake in the American justice system is failing to realize that nearly everyone who is put in jail will some day be released. Ignoring the needs of those who break the law (drug rehabilitation, education, etc.) has been proven to lead to an increasing number of repeat offenders.

We can continue to build more and more prisons, or we can get smart about the way we do things, focus on the evidence at hand, continue to collect more evidence in the future, and do what's best for society as a whole.

More to come soon . . .

Art Classes

2009-07-16T15:41:00.000-07:00

One of my newest projects here in Peru is an Art/Drawing class with some of the kids involved in our program. These kids are mostly from rough backgrounds, and they have some history with the law. They've also expressed some interest in art, graffiti, drawing, or some combination of the three.

The classes are supposed to go about an hour and a half, or two hours at most. I always assume that the boys are bored because we're working on pretty basic concepts, and frankly drawing cubes in two point perspective isn't exactly mind-blowing fun. So today after about an hour and a half I wrote their homework on the board and told them to copy it down. I told everyone that class was basically over, but they were welcome to stick around and draw if they wanted. I started to pick up my things, thinking that the boys would welcome my invitation to leave. But they didn't. In fact, they stayed another hour and a half, drawing diligently, page after page, totally focused on the creative process.

I told my sister when I came here that traveling has a weird way of making you grateful for things you never knew you should be grateful for. My example at the time was city parks. My home town is full of places where you can go to run around in the grass, play frisbee or a game of soccer, baseball, whatever. Growing up I never thought to myself, 'golly, I'm sure grateful for these parks!' But you live a few months in a place with no real parks and suddenly you learn to appreciate what you had.

Well, I'm starting to realize how lucky I was to grow up with art classes. These kids are 14, 15, 16 years old, mostly having dropped out of school, and those who are still in school will never get to take an art class. This was especially obviously during class today, when five adolescent boys worked diligently for three straight hours on their drawings. It was like they were starving for some sort of creative output. Even having basic materials like clean paper and pencils seemed like such a privilege to them, and they asked permission every time they needed a new sheet.

In High School I was awkward. Puberty was brutal to me, I couldn't talk to girls, or even get up the courage to look them in the eye. And while I have plenty unpleasant memories from high school, the one place I always felt safe and comfortable was in the art room. Sure there were some weirdos there, in fact, we were all weirdos. And I guess what I never appreciated at the time, but I'm starting to see as a real blessing, was the endless supply of inspiration, materials, and new possibilities.

One of the kids in my art class here is a really good artist, despite having no training whatsoever. I don't have much time left in Peru, but I'm hoping to work with him and get him enrolled in an art school. He lives in a really rough part of town, and it might be his ticket to developing a real career and leaving the slums some day.

Episode I, 2.0

2009-07-11T17:41:00.000-07:00

Growing up I was never much of a Star Trek fan, but I had something of an unhealthy addiction to all things Star Wars. I was still buying action figures when I was in high school. I had a long time subscription to the Star Wars Insider Magazine. I enjoyed going to comic book stores and thought the people who worked there were kind of cool (ok ok, I was right about that one). Luckily Episode I came out during my freshman year of high school and it sucked just bad enough for my interest in the Star Wars Universe to wane. I say "luckily" because I was well on my way to one day getting married in a Boba Fett costume. Episode II was worse, and frankly I had a hard time getting through it in one sitting. Things kind of came together in Episode III as several of the actors decided that it might be a good idea to show some emotion once in a while, and we got to see Anakin finally let loose. But really by that time it was too little too late. I'd moved on, seen other movies. It had been years since I'd read the Star Wars Insider, and I was totally fine with that.

After seeing the new Star Trek movie, which was awesome by the way, I started to wonder again why Star Wars had to go and make three lousy prequels. I found myself getting angry at my old friend Star Wars. That's why I have decided to constructively funnel my anger into reconstructing the three prequels with new actors, story lines, and action figure spin off series. Feel free to participate with suggestions and feedback.

EPISODE I, TITLE TBD

Ground Rules:

1. Anakin Skywalker will never ever ever, ever ever be called Annie by anyone for any reason. Ever.

2. The Jedi Council was one of the worst groups of characters ever assembled in the history of modern cinema. Apparently their job was to sit in a circle, occasionally look inquisitively at each other, and say extremely boring things. The new Jedi Council will be a two parts X-Men, one parts Super Friends (with Samuel L. Jackson and Lawrence Fishburn playing the Wonder Twins-type characters), and one part Young Guns:

Basically, if you want to be on the Jedi Council you need to have some sort of personality. Even Aquaman, arguably the most worthless Super Friend of all, had personality. It's not asking that much, really.

3. Anakin Skywalker cannot start out as a child. There are two very important reasons for this. First, kids can't act. Second, kids are not interesting. They play with blocks, watch cartoons, and laugh hysterically at words like "poo" and "toot." If we're going to watch the development of subsequent fall of Darth Vader, can we please just skip the prepubescent stage?

4. Qui Gon doesn't get to be in the remake as punishment for sucking so bad at everything he did in the original.

More to come soon . . .

Tiempo Libre

2009-07-02T13:44:00.000-07:00

The other day I was talking to an older man about the book Don Quijote.

"Ah yes," he said, "I read that book back when I was in high school. I used to read a lot back then . . . of course, that was before television, when we had more free time."

This guy probably watches 6-8 hours of TV a day. Little does he realize that TV hasn't taken away any of his free time, it has just changed the way he uses it.

El Contraste

2009-06-30T21:24:00.000-07:00

I've been here in Peru for about five weeks now, and I wanted to share with you a few images that stand out in my mind. In many ways the contrast between the haves and the have-nots is ever-present, but there two times when it was made especially clear.

It was cloudy when I flew into Lima. We spent a good twenty minutes descending until we finally burst through the clouds so I could get a peek at the place I'd be spending the next three months. The very first thing I saw was an adobe shack with a bamboo roof. It was in a general state of disrepair and desperation, conditions that most of us could not imagine. The thing that stood out to me was that everyday modern marvels of aviation fly over the same poorly constructed bamboo roof. The planes overhead contain wealthy tourists, visitors, and people like myself who are lucky enough to study and travel, while the people in the house below could not afford to study or travel, even if it was their one and only desire.

The second image that stands out to me was something that happened just the other day. I was in Mancora, a small surfing town in North of the country, for an extended weekend. The town is full of rich tourists and surfers from all over the world. One morning I was walking along the beach when I noticed a Peruvian woman bathing her two naked children in the ocean. At that very moment an American man and his young son walked by on their way to go surfing. At one point the two children, the American boy in his wetsuit and surfboard in hand and the young naked Peruvian girl who had just finished bathing, were standing side by side. They were about the same size and age, but couldn't possibly have more different backgrounds. There is a sad and interesting contrast in this image between the white man and the native, the rich and the poor, that has deep roots and a complicated past. Even if we change the way we think, can we ever change the effects of centuries of abusive and racist policy?

Food

2009-06-21T18:43:00.000-07:00

Peruvians are very proud of their food. When I first got here everyone went out of their way to tell me how great the food is (especially in the North, they say). They would then rattle off three or four Peruvian dishes and tell me how important it was that I try them all. This made me wonder what kinds of foods I'm proud of as an American, and more specifically as an Oregonian. If a Peruvian came to stay with me for three days back home in the States, what would I make sure they tasted before they went home? I've put some serious thought into this, and I think it goes something like this:

Day 1

Breakfast--Homemade waffles with fruit and whipped cream, thick cut bacon and scrambled eggs.

Lunch--Big Town Hero/Gandolpho's. American's have mastered the art of the submarine sandwich.

Dinner--Barbecued hamburgers, with blueberry cobbler for dessert.

Day 2

Breakfast--Denver Omelet

Lunch--Izzy's Pizza

Dinner--Barbecued Steak Marsala

Day 3

Breakfast--

Lunch--

Dinner--

I need some help with day 3. Any suggestions??

"Yo no espero nada del estado."

2009-06-13T15:03:00.000-07:00

On Wednesday I made house visits with our social worker Joyce. When the adolescent is still in review, one of the things we do is pass by their house to get to know the family and their living conditions. Joyce asks about the parental relationship, educational background of the family, and so on. I've made house visits before, but these were particularly shocking.

The first home was built of adobe with dirt floors. There were large gaps between the sugarcane roof and the walls. Four chickens were wandering around the living room, bobbing their heads and looking around as if it were their first time in the house. There was an opening in the back wall, and I could see other animals just outside. As we talked to the adolescent's mother, one of the chickens paused in the middle of the living room and crapped all over the floor. Several minutes later three more chickens came down from upstairs. The house, we find out, has electricity (a single wire runs up the wall and across the ceiling to a bare lightbulb), but no water or sewer. Both parents dropped out of school in the first grade, and the mother can neither read nor write.

About ten minutes away in taxi there's a Starbucks, where people spend more on a frappuchino than this familiy will make in two days.

My point isn't to fire up a pity party. There are people in this world who don't even have adobe houses or a single lightbulb, and we sat around and felt sorry for people who had less than us we wouldn't accomplish much. These are deeply rooted problems that cannot be solved with a telethon, or sad Christian Children's Network commercials. Thirty cents a day may help feed a child, which is a more than worthy cause, but what is being done to make sure these problems aren't being perpetuated to the next generation, and the next, and the next . . . ?

Perú, hasta ahora

2009-06-02T19:33:00.001-07:00

There are a lot of interesting things I could tell you about Peru. The food is good, the traffic is unbelievably terrible, and for some reason the Jonas Brothers have managed to catch on here.

But there are other less quirky, and much more tragic observations. The streets are littered with garbage, 70% of the police force is corrupt (not to mention corruption higher judicial and political levels), many streets aren't paved, and the ones that are are littered with wide and deep pot holes, etc. As I walk to and from work everyday and I see all of these problems in play, it is hard not to feel overwhelmed with the task at hand. I find myself wondering what I would do if I were the President, the Mayor of Chiclayo, or even the Chief of Police. I've only been here a week and a half, and I'm certainly no expert when it comes to political or social science, but it seems to me that if Peru, or any other country for that matter, wants to improve on its current state, the only true long term solution is to invest heavily in its young people.

Here's the thing: every government ends up spending money on young people. If you ignore the needs of children and adolescents, you end up building juvenile detention centers, hiring more judges, paying more defense attorneys, expanding the police force, and so on. The adolescents who were ignored at the front end will pass through the system, learn to fear the police, develop no real life skills, contribute little if anything to society, and many will never really leave the penal system, costing the government a fortune in the process. This type of investment does make sense for anyone involved, not for the government and certainly not for the child.

The alternative would be to invest heavily at the front end, to develop preventative programs for young people where they can develop skills and a sense of self worth. This would include investing in the community, encouraging various outreach programs and making sure that adolescents feel they have a place in society. The idea is to get creative when it comes to finding solutions to these problems. For instance, Chiclayo has a lot of kids who have dropped out of school in order to work and support their family. They also have a major problem with littering and garbage in the street. The government, or a private non-governmental agency, could start a series of after-school jobs that involved trash collecting.

There are a million reasons why this would work. First, the agency would have to pay well, which would make the trash collecting jobs highly desirable. A 15 year old kid who works his hands to the bone driving a mototaxi all day long will be lucky to make $20 a week here. What if he found out that he could make $40 a week by picking up trash for 2 hours a day after school (which only amounts to $4 an hour)? These types of jobs would only go to at-risk children who would have to drop out of school otherwise. Now we've found a way to keep those kids in school, clean up the streets, and plant a seed of change in the culture that says its ok to litter.

There are problems with my idea, of course. But the idea isn't to find fool-proof solutions that will solve all our problems right this second, the idea is to be having ideas, to be thinking of new and creative ways to approach these issues. Maybe there is no government agency who is going to hire kids to clean the streets, but what about a neighborhood coalition pooling together some money to hire a couple of troubled kids to clean their streets? What if each of us invested just a little bit of time to think about solutions, or to ask a local school if they needed volunteers? Maybe an increased effort on our part is the solution.

It's not a sexy solution with photo-ops and ribbon cutting ceremonies. It won't present immediate results, which of course doesn't bode well for elected officials whose eyes are fixed squarely on the upcoming elections. But investing in our young people is the best way to make sure that we have a better tomorrow. I'd love to hear what you think.

I'm just a big dumb tourist

2009-05-28T05:49:00.000-07:00

My second day in Lima I had a brief orientation with one of my volunteer supervisors. She told me to beware of pickpocketers and swindlers looking to take advantage of confused/goofy looking tourists.

Well, apparently I wasn't paying close enough attention. Yesterday I went out to explore Chiclayo, the city where I will be working. There were hundreds of vendors and little stores, markets, etc. A young boy approached me and insisted that he clean my shoes on his little shoe-shining box. I went ahead and let him clean my shoes, and after cleaning the first one he handed me his "price list," which conveniently showed that the service I was receiving was the most expensive: 22 soles, or about $7.30. I rolled my eyes and told him it was too much, but in the end didn't put up much of a fight. When he was done I told him I needed change, and when he brought me his change he told me that it was 22 soles for EACH SHOE. I protested but he just handed me my changed and quickly walked away. $15 dollars for a 3 minute shoe wash is not a good deal. I was angry at myself the rest of the day for being taken for a big dumb tourist, and not putting my foot down (literally) when this kid tried to charge me too much.

El viaje a Perú

2009-05-25T05:15:00.000-07:00

I'm sitting in the Bogota Colombia airport, waiting for my flight to Lima. The flight from Houston to Bogota was long, and we got in at 4:25 in the morning. Since arriving I've been patted down twice, been pulled aside twice to have my bag searched, been sniffed by a pair of drug dogs, and practically robbed by a guy who asked for a tip after "helping" me find my terminal. ("Even though you could have done this yourself, since I brought you here you should give me money now.") A few other observations:

-In the States when you buy a mystery pastry, you expect that it will be filled by delicious sugary cream, compote, jam, etc. In Colombia when you buy a mystery pastry, it might be filled with mystery meat and vegetables.

-I bought a Spanish basketball magazine in the airport bookstore here, only to find that it's from last November. The fold out poster is of Allen Iverson in his Nuggets jersey. How times have changed.

Wow . . .

2009-03-15T21:02:00.000-07:00

The University of Oregon School of Law recently held an Environment Law Public Interest Conference. People came from all over the world to attend seminars, learn about different environment law movements, and to be around other people with dreadlocks. Seriously, there were a lot of dreadlocks.

Inside there were lots of people and groups with little booths, each one in support of a different forest, creature, or cause. Of all the booths the only one that really stood out was the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement (VHEM). The VHEM is exactly what it sounds like: an organization whose purpose is to promote the dying out of the human race. Their argument is that we as humans have done a lot of damage to the Earth (which is true), and the only way to let Earth fully recover from our abuse is for people to die out. Completely.

The man at the booth was nice, and gave us complementary buttons and stickers that read "Thank You For Not Breeding." Certain people should definitely be encouraged not to breed, and maybe we need to be careful about depleting our natural resources. But there are more effective ways of accomplishing these goals than telling people we need to extinctify ourselves.

Take a walk around their website and tell me what you think. Should we really die out so that we can secure a happy future for baby condors?

A Night Out

2008-12-10T07:47:00.000-08:00

My Dad and I were lucky enough to get some tickets for last night's Blazer game against the Orlando Magic. I made a really cool "Viva la Rudy-lucion" sign, and my Dad made some turkey sandwiches so we wouldn't have to eat the terrible concession food. When we got to the game we found out that, 1. my sign was too big, and 2. you aren't allowed to bring food into the Rose Garden. This is, of course, all part of an evil conspiracy designed to force people into buying 9 dollar cheese burgers (that have been sitting under a heat lamp for the last 3 hours) and 6 dollar sodas.

My dad couldn't wait to get this shout-out pic up on his facebook.

We decided to eat the sandwiches in the car, and to see if we could get the sign in through a different entrance. So we went back to the parking garage to eat. Now, the handicapped parking is on the lower level of the "Garden Garage," and to park there you either have to be handicapped, or have some sort of special VIP parking pass. Most of the cars down there are pretty fancy, since this is apparently where very important people park. There were some Bentleys, Mercedes, oh, and our 1994 Ford Aerostar with manual locks and windows. People gave some pretty weird looks, but they just don't understand the magic of the Aerostar.(like when me and a couple of buddies drove it down to San Francisco, and the "Check Engine" light was on the whole time but it still miraculously survived)

After finishing our pre-game meal, we went back into the Rose Garden and this time no one said anything about my sign. The temperature in

there is pretty cool, which is perfect for my Dad

. He has MS and is pretty sensitive to any kind of heat. It was a little too loud for him though, so he decided to go with some ear plugs, thus rendering any kind of verbal communication totally useless. We narrowed our in-game communication down to three basic things:

1. The slow side-to-side head shake. This is used to express disappointment or disgust, usually when something goes wrong.
2. The slow up-and-down head nod. This is used to tell the other person that what just happened was really awesome.
3. The fist pump. Usually reserved for late-in-the-game moments, the fist pump says that you approve of your team's play.

Not only did I get my sign through security, I got it on television. Take that, Rose Garden Security squad.

At halftime I bought a bottle of water for my Dad (3.75, easily 3 dollars more than the going rate for a bottle of water this size) and a diet coke for myself (7.50--yes, you read that correctly). I would have had to take out another student loan to pay for a whole meal.

After a disappointing loss (disappointing even though I got on the jumbo-tron twice, and TV with my awesome sign) we headed home. Eventually my Dad took out his ear plugs (he wore them all the way out to the car, I was starting to wonder if he'd had enough of listening to me). We talked about the game on our way home. My Dad and I could always find something to argue about--politics, religion, whether or not he should wear his dirty old work jeans to a Blazer game, etc. But basketball will always bring us together and give us a common ground to stand on. It sounds like a silly thing, but it means a lot to me.

People Who Steal

2008-08-26T20:25:00.001-07:00

My wife and I moved to Eugene Oregon at the beginning of this month. "Eugene is very biker-friendly," people would tell us. I am a sucker for having people be friendly towards me, so I decided I'd be using my bike quite a bit.

One of the first things I noticed was the overall crappy nature of the bikes that people ride here. I thought it was people's way of being unique or ironic . . . kind of like how it's cool to not wear deodorant or wash your hair here. A lot of the bicycles are actually kind of vintage and cool (not wearing deodorant? Still not cool), so I didn't think much of it.

This morning I woke up and discovered that my bike wasn't in the place where I'd left it. My first reaction was to kick myself for not locking it up correctly, but on closer examination I found that they'd actually cut right through the lock. Now, when I bought my lock I decided spend a few extra bucks and get one of the expensive, thick cables. The ones that are supposed to give you better protection than those thin crappy cables you used when you were 7. So much for that "investment." I might has well been locking up my bike with rope.

My bike wasn't super nice. Brand new it was 500.00 dollars, a big investment at the time for a poor college student. It was supposed to get me through the next four years, at least. I appreciated my bike, and took care of it. I loved the feeling of riding it to school or work, especially when I first got it, I remember catching myself just smiling as I rode along--I felt like a little kid again. Now it's being disassembled, sold for parts, or being traded for crack or meth, who knows what. Someone will end up with the bike eventually, but they won't appreciate it like I did.

I learned something today though. I learned that people here aren't making some sort of fashion or political statement when they ride their beat-up, 1955, rusted through beach cruiser around. They just take comfort in knowing there is a very low demand for crappy bikes on the black market.

Serious Question

2008-08-20T10:30:00.000-07:00

How can you call a tea "Vanilla Almond" when it tastes like someone took took a huge dump in your cup? Shouldn't it be called "Huge Dump" tea?

New Blog

2008-04-15T22:17:00.000-07:00

Stephen's Designs

I've been doing some more drawing and design work lately, so I decided to start a new blog. Hopefully there are people who like my art, enough to one day maybe pay for it. That's what I'm thinking. But if not, at least post a comment pretending to like some of it.

THE March Madness Preview

2008-03-17T09:43:00.000-07:00

It's that time of the year again folks! Time for the greatest single elimination tournament in the history of our solar system, March Madness!

Yesterday I was watching ESPN when the so called "experts" revealed the bracket and gave their experty opinions on the match ups. It basically turned into a giant "who can kiss Bob Knight's butt the most" contest, with Jay Bilas coming in a close second to Hubert Davis. I can't blame them. When I saw Bob Knight at the Portland Airport a few months ago I felt the presence of something that can only be described as pure evil. I can't even imagine having to sit next to him for an extended period of time. Digger Phelps was the only one who seemed to actually challenge Knight from time to time, which only goes to show that Digger Phelps obviously doesn't value his life very much.

That being said, Bob Knight was the only "expert" who had the testicular fortitude to make some daring picks. After the other guys got done earning their six figure incomes by telling us that a bunch of number one and two seeds would make it to the final four, Knight went out on a limb and chose Pitt to make it to the final game. That's got to feel nice if you're Pitt, except when you realize that Knight is in direct legion with the devil himself. Oh well, Satan likes your chances at least.

But let's just forget about the "experts" why don't we. They're always way too safe, and way too wrong. If your looking for truly insightful, and truly true-y picks, then you've come to the right place. Let's get down to some predictions:

EAST
North Carolina is the obvious choice coming out of the East region. They've only lost only two games all season, despite playing a tough schedule. Unfortunately All-American forward Tyler Hansbrough is the recipient of this year's prestigious "Player-I-Most-Want-To-Punch-In-The-Face" award. Hansbrough plays hard. Out of his mind actually. He reminds me of Adam Morrison last year: hyper-competitive, and partially insane (not to mention unathletic and a future NBA bust). Hansbrough's Tar Heels lose in the 2nd round to Indiana, and we get to watch him cry about it on national television. Washington State comes out of the East.

MIDWEST
Kansas squeaks away with a quintuple overtime win vs. Portland State in the first round, and ends up losing to Vanderbilt in the Elite Eight. Vandy to the Final Four!

SOUTH
Memphis proves just how crappy Conference USA is by losing badly to Michigan State in the Sweet 16. Unfortunately, Drew Neitzel finally comes clean about his Nazi ancestry and current ties to the KKK. Bad karma surrounds the team, they lose to Texas who makes it out of the South.

WEST
There are a couple things I don't like to see on basketball players. Headbands normally look goofy, these things, gelled up hair do's, and really bad facial hair.

When I watch UCLA's Kevin Love play, I'm simply cannot get over the fact that he has a really really ridiculous looking chin-strap looking beardy thing.

Just because you can grow facial hair doesn't mean you should. And Kevin Love definitely
shouldn't. They lose in the 2nd round to BYU, who makes it all the way to the Final Four.

I will give my Final Four predictions later in the Tournament, but just remember: BYU, Texas, Vandy, and Washington State. You heard it hear first folks.

And just to sweeten the deal, make sure to sign up for ESPN's Bracket Challenge, and join my group, State of the Stephen Bracket Challenge. If you win I'll send you your very own State of the Stephen T-Shirt, and several strands of my hair so you can clone me and use me as a slave around the house.

Taking Out the Trash--Harder Than it Seems

2008-03-05T10:26:00.000-08:00

There's not really an easy way to explain this, so I'll just get right into it: my roommate doesn't flush his toilet paper. In fact, it doesn't even make its way into the toilet. Instead he carefully folds the soiled paper into neat squares and places them in the waste basket NEXT to the toilet. I've heard that this is a common practice in parts of Mexico, or in certain 3rd world countries where the plumbing is, apparently, only capable of flushing the poo. Last I checked though, Utah is not a 3rd world country. I could be wrong.

Now, the waste basket is just one of those tiny bathroom-sized baskets, which are designed to take in the occasional bathroom refuse, because bathrooms only OCCASIONALLY create refuse. An empty shampoo bottle, floss from that one time last year that you decided to floss, etc. They are not designed to hold massive amounts of poopy and bloody/snotty toilet paper. No problem, you say. Certainly your roommate is kind enough to remove his own fecal matter from the bathroom once the garbage is full, right? WRONG.

Instead, he ties off the bag that is full (he uses the plastic bags they put your groceries in, so thumbs up for recycling), and places it next to the waste basket. Pretty soon one tied-off bag became two, two became three, etc. until there were (get this): FIVE FULL BAGS OF POOPY TOILET PAPER SITTING ON THE BATHROOM FLOOR.

Now, I've always had a thing about doing your part when it comes to roommate living situations. Unfortunately my willingness to "do my part" has often been translated by my roommates to mean, "Stephen is our maid." At least in my current living situation, its like I'm playing the part of Mother to a bunch of adolescent douche bags.

So back to the five bags. I had decided that I was going to put my foot down. I wasn't going to just keep doing the chores that clearly did not apply to me. I was going to wait for him to take them out. But when it got to five, I couldn't stand to have them in the bathroom any more, so I stacked them up outside his bedroom door. Yes, I truly am the master of subtle hints.

Later that day I got home from school and found that the bags were gone! He had taken them out to the trashcan! I secretly felt proud that my roommate had actually DONE SOMETHING that wasn't totally self absorbed and lazy. Later I left to go to the gym and decided to go out the back door, only to find that the five bags had been half-heartedly tossed onto the back porch/back yard, which means my roommate took the bags, went up the stairs, and threw them out the back door. I could understand such laziness if, lets say, the garbage can was 2 miles away and getting there meant walking the whole way. But no, the garbage can is probably 20-30 feet from the back porch. The snow has all melted, and it's really quite a pleasant walk.

This was 2 weeks ago. The five bags of poopy garbage still sit on the back porch, now accompanied by other bags of trash that my other roommates have placed there. And why not? They all know that eventually I'll crack and clean up everything for them.

I hate my roommates.

Side Note: The poopy TP roommate has officially decided to get a dog. Because he's proven to be a real responsible individual, he should definitely be caring for animals. HE CAN'T EVEN CLEAN UP HIS OWN POOP, AND NOW HE THINKS HE CAN CLEAN UP FOR SOMEONE ELSES????

How I Almost Became a Model

2008-02-20T07:13:00.000-08:00

I've been looking for a job lately, which is one of my top-5 favorite things to do. There's nothing like a steady flow of rejection to help boost your self esteem. The jobs I'm applying for are crappy student jobs, and I still can't seem to get an interview. Until I saw this ad in the classifieds:

Thinking about being in movies, commercials, modeling or voice over work?

holladay, UT 84117 - Feb 8, 2008

We have booked actors/actresses and extras in major feature films such as High School Musical, Pirates of the Caribbean, Con-Air, Dumb and Dumber, Tears of a King, The World's Fastest Indian, Napolean Dynamite and films for the Sundance Film Festival. We also do commercial print modeling and runway for DKNY, Nordstrom's, Hollister, Abercrombie, Aeropostale, American Eagle, Dillard's, J. Crew, J. Crew kids, Mervyn's, Kmart, etc.... We have cast talent in movies, commercials, or commercial print ads for companies like Disney, Coca Cola, McDonalds, Canon, WCF, DKNY, Campbell's, Nordic Track, Women's Health, Warner Brothers Pictures, Fox, HBO, Redken, Adidas, Paul Mitchell, K-Swiss, Matrix, LDS films, Rocca Wear etc......

Now, I'm not the world's most handsome man, but I figured I might as well send these people an email. I like to do impressions, and maybe they had work that didn't involve having to show my face:

They ended up calling me and setting up an "audition." This was exciting, not because I have any desire to be famous, but because a paycheck would mean I could eat and buy toilet paper again.

So I drove up to Salt Lake for my "audition." When I got there I had to fill out a form with important information, like my chest measurement and weight. As I was filling it out, a guy walks in who looked like a cross between a total douche bag, and some other kind of douche bag. He was probably in his 40's, but was trying desperately to be 20 again. Big clunky rings on every finger, gelled up hair, and a leathery tan. He shouted to me, "Hey what's up Harry Connick Jr.!"

People have been telling me I look like Harry Connick Jr. for several years now, which to me is just like saying, "Hey, you look like a famous ugly person!" I like Harry Connick, he's got a fantastic voice, but just because he's famous doesn't mean I want to look like him.

"Wow, I look like THIS guy? THANK YOU!!"

I looked at him for a second, trying to think who I could compare him to, and said, "You look just like Admiral Ackbar." Two can play at this game, douche bag.

How many complexes does this guy have?

So anyways, this guy ends up being the one who interviews me for me "audition." The reason I keep putting audition in "quotes" is because there was nothing audition-like about it. Basically this guy spoke about himself for over an hour. He is, according to himself, the greatest human being EVER. After about an hour of me watching him stroke his own ego, he finally says, "Well, we are a talent agency, so if you decide you want to go with us it'll be 400 dollars down, and 100 dollars a month." Wait, so I have to pay YOU money? Isn't that the OPPOSITE of a job? I am basically employing HIM to MAYBE find me a job . . . as a Harry Connick Jr. look-a-like?

So I guess what I'm saying is, I'm still looking for a job.

Sometimes I wonder . . .

2008-01-22T21:20:00.000-08:00

Why some people smell like soup. I keep smelling people on campus who smell like soup and I just can't quite figure out why.

Child Abuse

2008-01-09T22:00:00.000-08:00

This might come as a shock to some of you who know my family well . . . but we were abused as children. By our very own parents. No, not sexually. Not even mentally or emotionally.

I'm talking . . . cosmetically.

I first came to this realization the other day as I went through some old family photos and I found this gem:

I know what you're thinking. It's just another picture of a brother and sister, hanging out and having fun, right? WRONG. Look closer.

There's a mullet in that picture.

I scrambled through more photos, hoping to find another one that would either confirm or deny my suspicions. Then I found it, the smoking gun:

This profile view shows that my sister clearly had a mullet (it also shows me trying hard not to laugh at it). Now, it's one thing when an adult, who is old enough to discern right from wrong, goes out and gets him/herself a mullet. But to force one on a child? I'm surprised it didn't lead to other forms of abuse, like taking us to monster truck rallys, or putting crack in our cereal.

Mom, Dad--I love you guys . . . I really do. But you should have known better.

Welcome

2007-12-31T08:52:00.001-08:00

As you may or may not know/care, I recently moved into a house. Apparently when I first went to check it out I was suffering from temporary blindness, because as it turns out it’s a huge dump. Student housing is always something of an adventure, but this one definitely takes the cake. Let me take you on a virtual tour:

First let’s start in my bedroom, which is located in the basement. It features handsome pink carpet, and two (you heard me, TWO) desks! Here’s the first one:

The cinder blocks made me stop and scratch my head a bit, but that was before my eyes passed over this beauty:

Now, can someone tell me what exactly is going on here? I have a pretty crazy imagination . . . but I can’t even begin to imagine what happened to this desk. Did they need the other half for fire wood or something? I stood there staring at this thing for about 3 straight hours trying to figure it out, and finally ended up calling the landlord to see where and when I could throw the thing out. We had the following exchange:

Me: So, I have two desks in my room (I should have said one-and-a-half), and uh, one of them looks like it got chopped in half or something and is propped up on some stuff . . . I don’t really need it so, I don’t know if I can just get rid of it or . . . ?

(at this point I’m expecting him to be surprised at the state of his once glorious office desk, or to be upset, SOMETHING)

Landlord: Nooooo, we need to hang on to that. You can put it in storage if you want.

This of course means that my landlord official wins the Cheapest Bastard of 2007 award. You can tell the desk was crappy even when it was brand new. The only way I’d ever insist on keeping a sawed-in-half, propped-up-on-cinder-blocks desk would be if it were made of solid gold. This thing I’m pretty sure is made out of press board.

Coming soon: New house tour part II

Blast from the Past

2007-12-16T10:55:00.001-08:00

Here's something I wrote about a year ago, I'm guessing.

Today I flew back from Oregon to Provo, and for some reason a question people keep asking is, “how was your flight?” This seems like an odd question to me, since in my experience virtually all flights are the same. You get on, take off, land, and get off. One time I threw up on a plane, but that’s about as eventful as any of my flights have ever been.

And what do people really EXPECT you to say? “Well, we almost crashed, but the pilot was able to pull us out of that nose dive at the last second. It was a close one!” Do exciting things actually happen on flights? And often enough that it warrants the question, “How was your flight?”

But, just for fun I thought I’d tell you all exactly how my flight was. I was one of the first five people on the plane, so I decided to sit in the front. I was secretly hoping (as I always do) that a cute girl who was further behind me in the line would sit by me. This, by the way, NEVER happens. It has been my strategy all through college. Go into a big auditorium classroom, sit somewhere near the back, with two empty seats on both sides. So far, it’s never worked. I’ve watched an estimated 15,000 cute girls walk right by me and sit somewhere else in such situations. Conversely, I’ve had about 15,000 awkward dudes sit by me in those same scenarios. I always look at them like, "Are you serious? Don't you see what I'm trying to do here?" But they never seem to catch on. Anyways, I’ve learned my lesson, that if I want to sit by a cute girl, I’m the one who’s going to have to sit by HER. I suppose I’m not handsome enough to have the tractor beam affect on women.

Back to the girl on the plane. I was sitting patiently, hoping that my old “get-cute-girl-to-sit-by-me” strategy would work. First, a guy took the isle seat, leaving only the seat between us. Then, all of a sudden, I saw a really cute girl enter the plane. I made sure my jacket and things weren’t obstructing the middle seat, making it a more appealing choice. Then out of nowhere the old, grizzled, decomposing man directly in front of her sat down next to me (and when I say decomposing, I’m not trying to be funny. Seriously, I think he had leprosy). He was approximately 8 feet tall, and his right elbow was digging into my ribs the whole flight. I don’t know what happened to the girl, and in retrospect I’m ok with that. We probably would have engaged in some short, 5 minute small-talk-type dialog, which would have no doubt been followed by approximately 1 hour and 25 minutes of awkward silence/shifting through carry-ons.

The other eventful part of the trip also involved an old man, only this one was slightly less decrepit and much more creepy/molester-y (which I’m pretty sure is not an adjective). He would ask almost every girl who walked by the following question: “ARE YOU A BYU GIRL?” He was semi-yelling, not because it was hard to hear in the plane, but because he’s old, and that’s what old people do. When the girls would say yes, he would say the following: “THERE’S ABOUT (insert large exaggerated number here) BYU GIRLS ON THIS PLANE!” His numbers LITERALLY went from 1000, to 50, to 100, and back to 50 again. What exactly happened to the 950 other BYU girls on the plane during that time span?

He started adding some real zingers like, “THERE ARE ABOUT 50 BYU GIRLS ON THIS PLANE, AND THEY’RE ALL GOOD LOOKIN’.” At one point he turned around in his seat and asked the girls behind him, “ARE YOU ALL BYU GIRLS?” When they said yes, he responded, “LET’S SEE, 4 BYU GIRLS, AND ALL OF ‘EM GOOD LOOKIN’.”

Now I might be overreacting, but I really don’t think 80 year old dudes should be telling college girls how good looking they are, even if it is in a friendly, non-threatening, grandpa kinda way, if for no other reason than it makes ME uncomfortable. Maybe it’s just because an 80 year old man had the balls to tell virtually every girl who got on the plane that she was lookin’ good, while I coward in the corner of the plane next to sasquatch’s grandfather.

After the flight, the guy appeared out of nowhere at the baggage claim and started talking to the three “BYU boys” next to me. This was their dialog:

“YOU FELLAS BYU BOYS?”
“Uh . . . yeah.”
“THERE WAS ABOUT 50 BYU GIRLS ON THE PLANE, NOT TOO MANY BOYS THOUGH.”
“Why are you talking to us?”

The most interesting part of that experience was seeing who the old man ASSUMED to be BYU boys and girls, because if there were any doubt in his mind, he would ignore them as they walked by. A couple of guys wearing skater hats and sweatshirts, while sporting a couple of “ungodly” piercings walked by, and the old man looked away, quickly returning to his Readers Digest article. A girl wearing a hoodie (with hood ON) who seemed to have a hint of “attitude” walked by and also got the “don’t look the freak in the eye” treatment from the old man.

In case you were wondering, he never asked me if I was a BYU boy. I guess I just don’t fit the mold.

What is the Plural of Penis?

2007-12-14T10:22:00.000-08:00

Yesterday at work the five women who sit in my row decided to have something of a party. They ordered pizza, exchanged pink gift bags full of goodies, and of course, completely neglected their work for a good hour or so. It didn’t take them very long to start talking about the one thing they all hate and loath more than anything else in the world—their husbands.

Now, complaining about your husband seems like a strange thing to do. After all, you’re the one who chose to live with him. It’s not like one day your landlord called you to tell you that some “messy, demanding, a-hole-of-a-slob will be moving in with you.” It’s not like the courts have sentenced you to spend X amount of years with someone you can’t stand. It’s a choice, so why complain?

I’m not totally anti-complaining. Lately I’ve been complaining about my crappy camera. It takes about 3 pictures per battery, and will randomly turn off for no reason. It’s a total piece of crap. And I realize that I’m the one who went to the store and picked it out, so technically I’m responsible. But here’s the difference—I’m in the market for a new camera. Instead of living the rest of my life with a camera that I hate, and instead of complaining about it to every living creature in the known universe until the day I die, I’m going to find a new one that will meet my needs and wants. A novel idea, I know.

What really bothered me about the ladies’ conversation, however, was how the language shifted from “they”= “their husbands,” to “they”=“everyone with a penis.” I’m sorry, your husband may in fact have a penis, but he is in no way on my team. You married a guy who talks down to you, doesn’t clean, and who doesn’t help around the house. The fact of the matter is there are plenty of good guys out there who would love to care for you, support you in all you do, wash the dishes and take out the trash. Seriously, there are. But you’re the one who married the dick-head douche bag, you’re the one who turned your back on all the good guys out there, and CHOSE to live with someone you hate. And you have the nerve to complain and say that ALL men are that way? Seriously?

I’m sorry, but it’s women like that who empower crappy men. The fact that they can be treated like dirt, but never leave their man’s side is only encouraging them to act that way. They are, in a way, perpetuating the degradation of women by refusing to stand up for anything more than what they’ve got.

One more thing before I go, I wanted to write a blog about Mitt Romney's recent religion speech, but then I read this (PG-13). He says everything I wanted to, only better. Just a highlight:

"In the practice of moderate and reasonable people, religion is just dandy even if I disagree with the premise. Heck, in some hands, religion is genuinely noble. But if freedom requires religion then your government needs religion to keep you free. If your government has religion then the one freedom it can never give you is freedom from religion, and that pretty much rips the guts out of your freedoms entirely. So really, as far as government is concerned, the only thing that freedom needs is for someone like Mittens to leave you alone."

p.s. Check out the link to Humor-Blogs.com, over there on the right. It's got me currently ranked #10. Thanks for reading everyone, your feedback, thoughts, etc. are always appreciated.

Why Kinkos Blows and Other Stuff

2007-12-12T16:07:00.001-08:00

Last night I didn't go to bed. At all.

It's kind of a long story, but in case you're wondering, no, it didn't involve midget pornography (not THIS time anyway).

Basically I overestimated my computer skills, and a project that I thought would take a couple of hours ended up being an all night affair. At around four o'clock I finished everything up, and headed off to my local Kinkos to have it all printed and bound for it's 7:30 AM due date.

So I left the apartment and got in my car, wearing a maroon hoodie, gray sweat pants, a furry Russian hat and dress shoes. Needless to say, I was looking pretty good. When I got to Kinkos there were only two other people in the whole place--a Kinkos worker and a guy (I'm not making this up) printing Mitt Romney pamphlets. It's hard enough for me to understand why you would lend any kind of support to Mitt Romney, but trying to figure out why you'd do it at 4 in the morning would make my head explode.

When the Romney guy was done, I stepped up to the counter and began to explain my project to the clerk:

"Um, so yeah, I've got a 47 page PDF. The first two pages are color and the rest are black and white, and I just need it have them printed--" At this point the worker interrupts me with sigh that sounds something like this: "Pffffpssfshsfhffsssffffffffhhh," followed by a long, drawn out eye roll. He looks at me at hits me with this little gem:

"Uuuuuuh, so like, I'm really behind on everything else I've got to do here, so, like . . . . "

At this point I glance at the clock on the wall. It's 4:15 in the morning, I'm at Kinkos wearing dress shoes and sweatpants, and the clerk is telling me he's simply too busy to help me out with my project that's due in, oh, 3 hours. I was so tired that my brain literally could not compute what was going on. All I could say was:

"Sooooooooooooooooooo . . . " I think I drug that "so" out for about 3 minutes. That's all I could think to say. His complete incompetency and disregard for customer service was shattering my universe and causing my brain to malfunction. Eventually though, after a few more "ppfffffsshshffffspphhhhhh's" and about a 10 minute long eye-roll, he agreed to help me. It took about 2 minutes, and then I was done.

The worst part looking back is how apologetic I was. Sure, I know what it's like to be that employee, swamped and busy, yet forced to deal with goofy customers and their 47 page PDF's. But why should I be made to feel guilty for shopping at your store? Why am I apologizing for keeping you in business? And maybe the best question of all, why the hell am I wear dress shoes with sweat pants?

People Magazine Will Ruin Your Life

2007-12-10T16:05:00.000-08:00

There's nothing I love more than going to the grocery store, and it's not because it's the place where I stock up on food and goods that help me survive. It's because that's where I catch up on the lives of all the hottest celebs! Britney got drunk this weekend while breast feeding here 4 year old child? NO WAY! They're going to cancel America's Next Top Model? Write your senators! Angelina Jolie has an opinion on global warming? DO TELL!

This is where you find the answers to all of life's great mysteries, like, is Tom Cruise gay, what rehab center did Lindsey Lohan check into this week, and most importantly, which celebrity is most anorexic-y?

Magazines like People and US teach us important things about celebs and their interesting lives. For example, take a look at this picture with caption taken from People Magazine's web site:

Hilary Charges Up
Update! Duff makes a morning pit stop at Starbucks in L.A. Plus: Brad & Angelina, Britney, Nicole Richie and more

Hilary Duff drinks coffee? Amazing! And to think she does it while talking on the phone . . . See, these are the things I need to know about celebrities. Then there was this little number:

SPIRITED GATHERING
After some South of the border fun with girlfriend Karina Smirnoff, Mario Lopez catches up with fellow Dancing with the Stars alum Stacy Keibler Thursday at the Heineken USC Music Video Launch Party at the Paley Center in Beverly Hills.

Hey everyone, it's AC Slater! I'm glad we're still keeping tabs on crappy Saturday morning TV stars from 20 years ago. I wonder what Mr. Belding is up to?

Now, people could utilize their time by reading Newsweek, Time, or some other magazine with stories that actually mattered, but frankly the world is an easier place to live in when the biggest story is Jennifer Love-Hewitt defending herself from the latest fat-accusations. You go girl!

God Bless the Internet

2007-12-08T21:41:00.000-08:00

I am constantly finding new, innovative, and exciting ways to avoid getting things done. If I spent as much time reading as I did checking ESPN for updates, I'd be some sort of smart person (instead of the very average person I am today). I've decided I need to cut back on my electronic media consumption (other than my Anna Nicole Tribute blog, which requires daily updating). I'm only going to check my email 3 times a day, and sports websites 2 times a day.

The real reason I need to cut back is because I've found a new, much cooler way to waste my time online. You're going to want to check out this website. It allows you to morph a picture of yourself to see what you'd look like under . . . different circumstances? Here's the picture I started with:

I found that using a black and white picture works best. It also helps if you try really really hard to look hardcore (this happens to be one of my specialties. Don't sweat it if you can't nail the look quite like I can). Here are a few results with corresponding observations:

Old Me

I was hoping I could age gracefully and maintain some level of attractiveness, a la Robert Redford, George Clooney, etc. Instead it looks like I'll be aging about as gracefully as this guy plays basketball. Old me looks depressed, but really I think all he needs is a good moisturizer.

Black Me

For some reason this morphing program seems to think black people have green lips, I honestly don't know where that came from. Basically they gave me a wider nose, bigger lips, and a really bad tan. I can guarantee you though, if I looked like this I'd have a lot more people at the gym wanting me to play on their pick up basketball team.

Total side track: I'm a little tired of everyone at the gym assuming that being black=being awesome at basketball. I will be in line, waiting to play a pick up game for something like 4 days, when in comes some random black guy who instantly gets picked up and is playing in the next game. Unfortunately for the team that picked him, he's actually from Zaire, grew up playing soccer not basketball, can't catch, throw, shoot or dribble, oh, and his English is really bad too. He commits 14 turnovers, shoots 0-20, never runs back on defense, and fails to understand the basic rules of the game. Good choice though, sure, absolutely . . .

Moving on . . .

Chick Me

My female counterpart is actually pretty hot, except for the beard. I'm not even wearing any makeup, so I'm pretty proud of how this one turned out.

Asian Me

Well, apparently Asians don't have foreheads, at least according to this morphing program.

There are other morphing options, but these were my favorites. Check it out, feel free to post some of your results.

Some Things Are Not-So-Intelligently Designed

2007-12-04T22:21:00.000-08:00

In the 5th grade, Mrs. Scott used to always tell Bret Walton and I that we were too negative. Apparently I was a real downer as a 10 year old. I'd like to think I've changed some since then, I mean, I'm a relatively pleasant person these days. I smile and say nice things to people--you know, the usual.

But I was just sitting here thinking about how I needed to go to the bathroom, but I really don't want to. Sometimes I love going to the bathroom (like at work, when it means getting up and not working. Also, no one can tell you to get back to work either, because they might not like your bathroom breaks, but they'd like it even less if you crapped all over the place.). So, I'm not trying to be negative here, I'm just thinking that if I were God, I would have designed the body a little bit differently. Here's just a few ideas I came up with:

First of all, no more NRB's. NRB is a term that I heard for the first time from my friend Morgan that means "no reason boners." NRB's aren't a problem anymore (luckily), but there was a solid 2 year period (1994-1996ish) when my body decided it was important to test out its boner capabilities every hour or so. It is the weirdest involuntary response you can have, plus you're 12 and already weird and awkward, having that thing poking around doesn't help any.

In fact, lets do away with puberty all together. No more sweaty stinky armpits, no more hair in weird places, and definitely, DEFINITELY no more NRB's.

Second, I'm kind of tired of pooping. There is literally nothing good that can happen as a result of pooping. You're hands are filthy afterwards, you've just wasted 3 cents worth of good paper, and the bathroom now smells like, well, poop. Pooping is out.

This reminds me, I've got an idea that I want to patent and develop, because it would make me the richest man alive. It's a pill that you take that makes your farts smell good. There would be different scents of course, like the scented candles. You could be on a crowded, stinky bus, fart really loudly, and actually have people thank you for freshening up the place. I think I'd be inclined to have my farts smell like Vanilla, but I'm not sure.

What would YOU change about our biological nature if you could?

World Domination

2007-11-30T07:57:00.000-08:00

Last week I downloaded this little map for my blog, so I can see more or less where my visitors come from (you can see the map over on the right side). I’m surprised by a couple of things, like the fact that there are more than two people who read this, and that apparently someone in Portugal has seen my blog. I don’t think I know anyone in Portugal at the moment, but I could be wrong. Which leads me to a couple thoughts:

I know my sisters read this, and my friend Sam. But other than that I’m really in the dark about the rest of you. It’d be nice to meet you all though, so feel free to leave a comment, tell us as random story, etc. If you’re a crazy ex, or are in the process or stalking me, feel free to remain anonymous, too. Either way, no big deal.

Looking at the map of blog visitors and seeing that little red dot in Portugal really makes me feel like I’m playing Risk. I’ve just wandered into Europe from North America on my quest for world domination.

Everyone knows the key to world domination is Australia

So naturally what I’d REALLY like to see are more dots in more random places. If we could get a red dot in Africa, that’d be amazing. Australia? Brazil? Antarctica? Even better. So, if you have any friends on vacation, or if you know anyone living abroad, tell them to visit the blog. Shameless self promotion, I know, but I just couldn’t help myself.

Bobby Knight

2007-11-28T13:02:00.000-08:00

Last Sunday I was at the Portland International Airport at 5 in the morning, waiting for my flight back to Salt Lake City, when I had an interesting celebrity encounter. I saw the Texas Tech men's basketball team, along with their head coach Bobby Knight. I didn't get to actually speak or interact with Mr. Knight, mainly because I'm absolutely terrified of the man, despite the fact that I'm a long time admirer of his work on the court. I'm not the type who likes to approach celebrities anyway, but usually just because I don't want to bother them, not because I'm afraid they'll belittle and/or choke me. A couple of observations:

At one point, Knight walked by a small child, probably 6 years old, and said something to him. As he walked away he was staring the kid down, with that stone-cold sober look on his face. Now, I'm sure he told the kid some sort of joke or something like that (and thought he was being funny by maintaining a serious look), but at that moment I realized Bobby Knight is one of those people who children have nightmares about. For me it was Darth Vader, but for that small boy at the airport it's Bobby Knight.

Then I realized that kids aren't the only ones who are afraid of Bobby Knight--I'm afraid of Bobby Knight too. If I ever came across him in a dark alley somewhere, I would honestly run for my life. It's not because I think I would lose a fight to him (I feel pretty good about my odds against anyone over 65), it's just that, for some reason, I can picture him going on a fishing trip with Darth Vader.

The Tragedy of Our Times

2007-11-26T09:10:00.000-08:00

I hate to get too serious, so I'll try not to.

Yesterday I went to the laundry mat because (as is usually the case when I go to the laundry mat) I had a bunch of dirty clothes. Playing on one of the televisions at the laundry mat was a Mexican comedy show. If you know anything about Mexican comedies, you know that they usually implement the following elements:

Adults dressed as children.
Big breasted women whose primary function is in fact to have large breasts.
A total lack of anything funny.

This particular comedy included all three, especially the last two. In fact, I think that typically the number of large breasted women is directly proportionate to the lack of humor in the show.

What blew me away, however, was not the poor quality of the show. It was instead the empty, glazed over stares of those who were watching it. Imagine this look on the faces of 5 people, all sitting in a row:

When I returned home, my roommate was sitting on the couch with the same blank look on his face as he watched Miss Congeniality. Several hours later, after I had written two papers, folded my laundry, and cleaned my room, I went back into the living room to find my roommate in the same exact place, with the same look on his face, only this time he was watching The Matrix. I'm not sure if he even noticed that the movie had changed, he was just meeting his daily quota of mindlessly absorbing at least 4 hours of worthless media.

It makes me wonder, what are we doing with our lives? Are we okay with our daily routines; eating, sleeping, watching TV? When was the last time we learned something new? What was the last good, educational book we read (besides the latest Anna Nicole Smith biography)? When was the last time our world view was affected by exposure to new ideas?

Last night I decided I didn't want to waste my life sitting in a laundry mat, filling my head with mind-numbing nothingness.

Confirming the Obvious

2007-11-23T08:25:00.001-08:00

Cash Advance Loans

Like Christmas Wrapping Without the Tape

2007-11-20T23:12:00.000-08:00

I was reminded today by one of my three readers that I forgot to write yesterday. It’s not that I forgot, I was just busy. Life has been kind of crazy lately, so let’s get right down to business.

Check out this website: http://www.whudafxup.com/

You’ve probably seen their ads on TV, they are all about how big tobacco is evil. They find neat and clever ways to show us “the truth” about tobacco. For example, it’s bad for you. These people are especially upset over the fact that big tobacco is allowed to continue selling their cancer causing products.

A couple of thoughts:

First of all, pointing out the fact that cigarettes are dangerous is kind of like pointing out that fire burns things. It’s fairly obvious, I mean, we don’t exactly need an entire advertising campaign designed to teach people “the truth” about how your stuff will be destroyed if engulfed by fire. Frankly, if someone doesn’t know that cigarette smoking is bad for them (and forget science, how about the fact that it turns everything yellow, makes you sound like Darth Vader, and leaves you unable to run more than 10 feet at a time? Shouldn’t that tell you something right there?) they deserve to face the consequences of their actions. Forget the fire analogy, how about this one:

THE TRUTH: Hostess makes millions of Twinkies every year . . . Twinkies that, when consumed, MAKE YOU FAT.

Do we need this ad campaign? Are Americans this stupid, really? Are there people sitting at home going, “Are you serious? I had NO IDEA those things were making me fat!”

Frankly, people who don’t know smoking gives you cancer, or that Twinkies make you fat, deserve to have cancer and be fat.

There is so much crap going on in the world—wars, famine, insane dictators destroying their own people, etc. With all that in mind, how do you wake up one day and decide that the problem that really needs to be fixed is big tobacco? Maybe these people have relatives who died after smoking for years. But ultimately those people still CHOSE to smoke.

Then again, I shouldn’t be surprised. As a species we haven’t be able to move beyond war, find cures for cancer, solve poverty and starvation problems, provide health care for the poor, etc. We HAVE, however, walked on the moon (for no apparently reason, other than to do it before the Russians), invented breast implants, nose jobs and liposuction, and of course we decided it was important for a 90-year-old man to be able to have a 4 hour long erection, so we invented Viagra. These are the things we’ve decided to put our minds to.

Anyways . . .

Anna Nichole Smith

2007-11-11T19:04:00.000-08:00

First things first:

I am completely rededicated to my blog. I have neglected it for so long, mostly I think because my sense of self-importance has faded in the last few months. Lately, however, I’ve been convincing myself that maybe I have something important to say, so I’m back. I decided to write at least every Sunday, with a few reoccurring themes. We’ll see how it goes.

Now that I got that out of the way, let’s get started.

The other day I was shopping for some groceries (where does this word come from? I’ve never bought something that could be called a “grocery,” but somehow when I go shopping and buy a collection of food items, collectively they become “groceries” (the plural of grocery, something that doesn’t even exist. I mean, if you go to the grocery store, and only buy one thing, you can’t say that you bought “a grocery.” Anyways--) and I came across the honey section. I glanced over the honey, and noticed one with a celebrity spokesperson—Richard Petty. No, not TOM Petty, RICHARD Petty. To save you the trouble, it’s this guy:

Richard Petty was a Nascar driver BEFORE the Redneck population explosion forced this “sport” onto ESPN. He’s kind of like the Wilt Chamberlin of Nascar, without all the sex (I’m assuming).

Now, as a communications minor, I think a lot about things like advertising, marketing, etc. I couldn’t help but wonder what was going through the minds of those advertising wizards trying to decide what celebrity spokesperson would represent their honey:

Advertising Wizard #1: Hey guys, what about Richard Petty? He’s a creepy looking old guy who was famous 30 years ago for driving cars. I think that makes him a pretty qualified spokesperson.

Advertising Wizard #2: Randy, you’re a genius! People won’t be able to resist our honey when they compare it to other brands that DON’T having old race car drivers on the bottle!

As far as I can tell, Richard Petty would be a qualified spokesperson for 4 things:

Cowboy Hats
Sun Glasses
Denture Cream
And probably adult diapers

Today I was at my LSAT class in SLC, and one of the other students, an ex-policeman from LA, mentioned that a certain problem “confused the shit out of him.” (Pardon the language, but I have to be true to his original statement.). For some reason that struck me as being a really strange thing to say. I imagined him reading the problem, and then having the sense of confusion come over him SO strongly that he LITERALLY pooped his pants. The confusion forced “the shit” to leave his body.

I decided every week I should list 5 things that I’m grateful for, and (if I feel like it) a couple of things I’d change if I possibly could.

THINGS I’M GRATEFUL FOR:

1. Toilets—The other day I was thinking about technological advances, and how I was really grateful for them. Email, the internet, etc. They’ve really improved the exchange of information, more so than probably any other invention since the printing press. Then I sat down to go to the bathroom and I realized, wow . . . THIS is a piece of technology I should be thankful for. It magically takes your poop away so you don’t have to personally deal with it. So yeah, I’m grateful for toilets.

2. My body—This week was discouraging because I’ve been having some knee problems after I work out. But one day I realized I should be grateful just to have knees, even if they are the knees of an 80 year old slave laborer.

3. Sports—They’re just cool, no deep meaning here.

4. My major—For those of you who don’t know, my major is awesome. You don’t even realize. I love going to class, and it makes me excited to learn, not just now but for the rest of my life.

5. Bookstores—Bookstores are my favorite places on earth. That’s why I’m going to open a bookstore someday, but only with awesome books. No non-awesome books will be allowed.

For example (here’s something I would change if I could), the last time I was at a bookstore I noticed a display of books about celebrities. At least one of them was about Anna Nichole Smith, and was at LEAST 250 pages. Now, I could write everything you’d ever need to know about Anna Nichole Smith in about 2 sentences:

Anna Nichole Smith had huge boobs that made her famous. She the married an old guy for his money.

Technically all you really need to know is the first sentence. The second sentence is only if you choose to go on and get your Masters Degree in Anna Nichole Smithology.

But seriously, will all the amazing books in the world, what does it say about us when people are reading books like this? They couldn’t read something with substance or meaning, like a book about Pamela Anderson or something? I mean, common, Pamela is at least four times the big-breasted-bimbo Anna Nichole was!

Seriously people . . .