Some Things I Learned This Week

Most people are smart enough to know not to shoot someone. But these same people still smoke around others (even though 2nd hand smoke has been proven to increase your risk of cancer).

Most people still drive their cars, even though it has been proven the CO2 levels in the atmosphere can cause global warming which could eventually lead to extinction.

Not very many people read my blog. When I post similar things on NBC news stories, lots and lots of people call me an idiot.

Charles Darwin and Abraham Lincoln were born on the exact same day. They were both Aquarius. February 12, 1809. They both died in April. Darwin, April 19, 1882. Lincoln, April 15, 1865. Of course one died more violently than the other.

Darwin did not come up with the idea of evolution. He simply did the research and the publications. He wrote it down. Jean Baptiste de Lamarck had the idea. He was more of a philosopher though so it wasn't taken too seriously. He didn't do the leg work. Besides Lamarckism doesn't sound as cool as Darwinism.

Good actors and actresses are the ones that you like, but you don't recognize. Gary Oldman has kept me ignorant for a long time and I've watched several movies, where he plays a main role, several times. I've watched Prisoner of Azkaban more times than I like to admit. I've watched Batman Begins at least 3 times. I never knew.

Al Gore and Venus Envy

There is no way I could have written this any better :).

What a moron. It took Dee Snider to shoot his wife down. Someone must do the same for him...

Alliterator Animal Sh*t List: The Letter 'H'

I was having a bad case of Blogger's Block when suddenly, Thursday rolled around!

Today, I bring you, with great trepidation and a little relief. The letter H.

Humongous Hunks of Hyena Hiney Hockey

Laws, Laws, Laws and More Laws

The lawyers get richer, the people get poorer. Why do we need so many laws?

A long while ago I blogged about my new political party: The KISS Party.

The KISS acronym even has a Wiki page thus saving me the trouble of discussing it at length.

In Texas, they are trying to ban smoking in public places. I have friends that smoke. One of my best friends smokes more than I breathe. I don't really mind being in smoking places. I'm slightly allergic and I don't like it being blown in my face, but for the most part it doesn't bother me. My wife is a "follow the crowd" smoker. She can go for months without smoking and then go out with her friends and go through a pack because everyone else is.

According to my KISS Party Principle, we only need one law. Don't do anything that will hurt someone else. With that one law, people shouldn't smoke in public.

We don't need the law, just the penalty. What should be the penalty for giving others a higher incidence of lung cancer?

Now, they are trying to pass a law to ban cell phones while driving. It makes me crazy when I see someone talking on the phone while they drive. However, it still falls under the rule: Don't do anything that will hurt someone else. We don't need another law. I don't care why someone is driving recklessly. If they are driving recklessly because they are playing with their stereo, yelling at their kids, or talking on the phone, they should be pulled over and fined appropriately. We don't need specialized laws.

When you stand back and look at it, we are allowing the law makers to do some pretty scary stuff. They ban certain types of guns because of their "danger" potential. They ban certain drugs because drugs create crime. If we continue to try and prevent crime before it happens pretty soon they'll just genetically test all babies to see if they have the "criminal gene". Babies with the criminal gene are illegal.

Coaches, Teachers and Kids

I heard about this story today. Basically, a "beloved" football coach in Kentucky is being charged with reckless homicide because one of the players died during practice.

I don't know what you think of things like this, but my mind went elsewhere as usual.

I think we all know that I hate the current mixture of sports (particularly football) with our schools. Football has nothing to do with education and yet the coaches probably make a lot more than the math teachers. I had a football coach in Junior High try to explain to his history class why a pound of lead weighs more than a pound of gold or maybe vice versa (I'm shady on the details).

Anyway, there should be some general rule against taking advantage of someone with an immature mind. You can go do a search on the Internet and see all the teachers that have been charged with sex crimes against their "underage" students. Lots of women teachers have spent years in jail for having sex with students.

I personally, don't see the difference. If you are going to charge teachers with taking advantage of a student sexually, then teachers, that, through brainwashing, encourage athletes to overexert themselves to the point of dying, should also be charged. If I were 15, I'd rather be brainwashed into having sex with a teacher than be brainwashed into thinking if I drank water or took a break I'd be a pussy; causing me to die of heat stroke.

Interesting Presidental Statistics for Today

Occasionally, I discover something and it creates a flood of questions in my dangerously curious little head.

Last week, I was watching Obama sign something and was surprised to discover he was left handed. I get along quite well with most left handed people I meet. I think it's because I'm left handed too and my dad was left handed.

So, anyway, I made the comment that if Obama was an Aquarius, he'd be perfect. I'm a left-handed Aquarius. We are all perfect.

But, alas, Barack Obama was born August 4th which makes him a Leo. It's still not bad, just not perfect. In viewing people over the years, I've discovered which people I tend to like and which people I tend to dislike. It sounds frightening and it is, but I don't care. Normally, Cancers are difficult for me to tolerate. George Bush was a Cancer (in more ways than one). So, a left handed Leo should be much better than a right handed Cancer.

Durango is a Leo which is probably one of the reasons he likes Obama so much. I don't think he's left handed though. My brother is a Leo and I get along with him quite swimmingly. I used to get along with Durango before he abandoned me.

George was the first right handed president since 1980. Clinton was left handed, George's dad was left handed and Reagan was left handed. The amazing thing about Reagan is he was a left handed Aquarius. He was also a distant cousin of mine. My grandmother on my mom's side was a Reagan before she got married. I think Ron was a 5th or 6th cousin of mine. Carter was right handed. Gerald Ford was left handed.

Learning This Week

I started trying to read some educational books in the last two weeks. I normally stick to "brain candy" type fantasy sci-fi. But, as of the new year I ordered some history books to see if I could learn something new. I do spend some amount of time reading technical books, but you don't want to hear about that. Let's just say that someday I think I might write a book about encapsulation.

I'm reading "Columbia History of the World" as my first try. I've got some books that a fellow blogger recommended coming from Amazon.

Anyway, this History of the World book is a hardback and almost 1200 pages. I found it at Half-Price books for $8 which seems to be a pretty good deal. The cheapest I could find it on the Internet was $12. I've read the first chapter and a half. It starts out with the beginnings of the universe with a discussion on mass, gravity, helium, hydrogen, etc. It's very interesting. Next chapter starts getting into the beginnings of the earth and then how the continents were formed and how life began (I'm not quite through the second chapter). I've got a long way to go. It was published in 1972. I can't help but wonder how many of the theories they talk about have been updated since then. Is the Atlantic Ocean really expanding by two inches every year?

This week I learned that the word failing doesn't necessarily relate to grades.

I also learned yesterday that Obama is left handed. Being a south paw myself, his status in my eyes went up by 2 points. If only he were an Aquarius.