still here

I feel like I should post something, since it's been over a month since the last post. Although there's still way more in the Democracy is Overrated series, I think I'll put that on hold for a bit.

Democracy is Overrated part 2

The vote of each person in this video counts as much as your vote.

Democracy is Overrated part 1

It's that time again to exercise our civic rights and vote for whatever nonsense is on the ballots this year. Whenever I look at my voter pamphlet, I'm always bugged by this question: "Does anyone actually read this crap?" I'm not talking about the half page proponent/opponent summaries, I'm talking about the multipage, small-print legalese stuff in the back. I'd put money down that nearly no one does. It bothers me that people, who aren't fully informed, are allowed to vote on these matters. Doesn't that seem ridiculous to anyone?

I argue that, at a minimum, someone who is contributing to a decision that affects tens of millions of people in a state should at least read the god damn legislation. That's at a minimum. I think in order to make a fully informed decision, one would have to be somewhat informed in relevant current details of the state.

Say, in your household, you're faced with the decision of whether to buy a new car. Would you do that without looking at your complete financial position?How much is the monthly payment and where is the money coming from?

When it comes to deciding whether to fund measure XYZ, shouldn't people be putting in the same amount of research and thought into that? What's the current financial position of the state? What's the current annual revenue? Where's the money to fund this measure coming from?

The reality is, not many put that much thought into this. People tend to vote whatever their party's position is. They read the measure summary and base their decisions on that.

It just seems to me, allowing decisions affecting millions to be decided by people not equiped to make the most informed choice isn't rational.

Practical experience

I've been taking these martial arts classes for the last year. The gym I'm taking the classes at offers a pretty wide range of arts. I've just been taking the panatukan, or philippino boxing, I'm enjoying because it's like dirty boxing. Anyway, even more recently, for the past few months I've also been taking the weaponry class.

The weaponry class is basically a series of drills. It looks freak'n cool when done right, but I've been wondering recently what the practical value of it is. I mean, seriously, when's the last time you heard of two people fighting with sticks or machetes? And if I'm ever in a knife fight, I'm looking to run at the first opportunity.

Maybe I am better off having this little tid bit of extra knowledge compared to your average joe, but I really have no idea where I stand. Maybe there's a weaponry sparring class I can take, or maybe I should be randomly starting knife fights with people...

Is it just me?

Most of the friends I've made in Seattle are people I work with. They're an alright bunch, and I do enjoy hanging out with (most of) them.

I sometimes wonder, though, what the hell is up with their other friends. Occasionally, I'll meet some of them, and I think "these guys are tools." What I don't get, is why my friends, who I like, hanging out with such douchebags? It makes me wonder if maybe I just don't know my friends that well. I still feel like I'm the new guy, so I don't think it's really my place to mention I think these other guys are asshats.

Of course, an alternative that I'm forced to acknowledge, is that maybe I'm the problem! Maybe I'm the jerk, and I just don't get along with other people very well.

Unfortunately, I don't see any solution to this question. I don't have any really close friends here that I can confide in to figure out if I'm just being a hardass. I guess that's part of why I started this blog, so I can ramble into the void of the internet.

People in Seattle are cheap

I've been in Seattle for over a year and a half now. During my time here I've observed certain behaviors of people here, each of which is insignificant, but taken together have lead me to this conclusion: People in Seattle are cheap. BTW, when I say "cheap," I don't mean thrifty. I mean definition number 7 on answers.com:

Cheap
adj., cheap·er, cheap·est.
7. Stingy; miserly.

What finally coalesced my thoughts on this, was that yesterday, I overhead some coworkers talking about how they should find a time to dumpster dive, discussing what the best places were to dumpster dive and how great dumpster diving is. Dumpster diving. Seriously? WTF?! Ok, usually, overhearing something like this wouldn't really make me draw any conclusions. I'd probably think, "Ok, that's... odd. But whatever floats your boat." The thing is, this isn't the first time I've heard Seattleites talk about the awesomeness of dumpster diving. The last instance, was during a work retreat, where a different person mentioned it. I remember being dumbfounded that I was the only person in the van who seemed to think dumpster diving was odd. Everyone else just accepted it as the most normal thing in the world.

I remember the very first incident that gave me the impression of Seattleites being cheap, was within the first couple of weeks of coming to Seattle. The person in charge of birthdays was collecting some money to get a gift for someone in the workplace. Well, the next day, I overheard (No, I don't intentionally eavesdrop. People just talk really f'n loudly) someone talking to the office manager, complaining about having to contribute $5 to everyone's birthday and that they really didn't want to do this anymore. After that, the policy of getting the birthday person a gift ends. I understand people might not be raking in the greenbacks. But come on, seriously? $5 for everyone in the office is $60 a year.

My human experiment

There's an old lady that takes the same bus as me to work. Something I've noticed is as she walks up to the bus stop, she always stops at the pay phone near the stop and checks the change dispenser for extra change. Every time I see this I think, "what the hell. Does she really expect to find change in there? When was the last time anyone ever used a freak'n pay phone? And even people do regularly use it, how often do they leave their change in there?" Seriously, I wonder when's the last time she actually found any money in there.

This morning, I was thinking the next time I get to the bus stop before her, I'll leave a penny in there, just so I can see her reaction when she finds it. I'll bet it'll make her day. I should film it too.

I need to be more selfish

I need to stop caring about what other people think. Occasionally (ok, more like daily), I'll think about quitting my job and running away to do something else. When I seriously consider doing this, I start feeling this surge of guilt. I feel guilty that I would be letting other people down. People like my parents and even my boss. This bothers me because, why the hell should I be feeling guilty for wanting to do something else? Why do I care what these people think? Shouldn't my feelings come before anyone elses?

Just start writing

I think I've already found a problem I have with trying to maintain a blog. I have this tendency to want to think out every post in its entirety before I write, which is ridiculous because then I end up never writing anything. Also what is happening is that new ideas for posts are popping into my head on a daily basis. All this thinking is leaving me in a state of apoplexy. So what I'm going to try now, is to just make a small chunk of time of half an hour or so and just write what I can in that time.

Hello World

Welcome to my blog.

There are two primary reasons I wanted to start a blog. First is: I suck at writing. So, what better way to improve than get as much practice as possible? I'm hoping that this blog will force me to write a little more and hopefully get some much needed practice.

Secondly, I've noticed recently that I tend to have a lot of random thoughts in my head that I want to share but I have no one to share them with. This leaves me feeling a little lonely. I know writing in a blog isn't a substitute for talking to another human being, but I figure for the purposes of letting all my thoughts out, it's the next best thing.

I also think it might be interesting to have a record of all the random things I think about. It might be fun (or scary) to look back over time to see how I've changed (or not).

So let's begin!