I heard a song today that I hadn’t heard in a long time. Maybe you know it. It is called “Father and Son” by Cat Stevens. And, like many songs that form the soundtrack of my life, it got me to thinking mostly about my newly discovered old friends from the Facebook world of social networking.
It is so interesting to me how many of my friends update constantly about their children. I am no exception. I love to read the updates. I know when they win or lose a sporting event, when they are ill, when they achieve educational greatness and when they are just smiling for the camera in one of the many posted pictures.
We flash their victories on the pages of statuses as if to validate ourselves. That is not a bad thing, as it is a validation in its purest form. After all, who would have known what a night of passion years prior would produce. The results, all too often, are breath taking.
We can now so easily create a virtual scrapbook in a way like we never have been able before, and it is wonderful. The doting and fawning is so politely tolerated by the throngs of friends we choose to involve in our daily updates. As mundane as these moments are, they are received and then responded with clicks of the “like” voting button at rates that would impress even the most seasoned politicians.
Now we have created a world where we celebrate even the smallest victories by our smallest citizens. I like it. I know when there is a baseball game, first tooth, hospital visit, good report card, school performance, accident, and the many other reasons to inform. The awesome force of social networking replaces the Hallmark card with a real time account of daily happenings.
The pictures are also great. I find myself too often staring at a child’s photo and wonder how such a beautiful child could come from the amazingly plain individuals I have known all of these years. I also admit I have fallen victim to the conspiracy theory that it is not possible for such a beautiful child to be the genetic makeup of his alleged parents and look for clues as to whom the father actually must be.
What is ominously absent from these pages is the spouses. Sure, they get the obligatory picture from the last family vacation, but they do not make the editors cut of daily inclusion. It is all about the kids.
So, I am listening to the “Father and Son” song and I get it. Stevens wrote,
“It's not time to make a change,
Just relax, take it easy.
You're still young, that's your fault,
There's so much you have to know.
Find a girl, settle down,
If you want you can marry.
Look at me, I am old, but I'm happy.”
And it is all about the children. Those who chose the path of no kids, update me on your pet, plants, house, whatever. “Look at me, I am old, but I’m happy”.
Monday, July 12, 2010
Friday, July 2, 2010
Swine
I am thankful I am a blogger because I believe I have just unlocked a huge worldwide mystery and am so fortunate to have a place to share my amazing discovery. Here is how it happened.
I was having a quiet night at home after a hard day’s work. I settled into a little “So you think you can Dance” and thought, why I am watching “So you think you can Dance?” This is when it happened. As if divine intervention, A chick fil-a commercial came on. You know the commercial…there is cow with poor spelling skills messaging the viewer to “Eat more Chicken”. I thought, there must have been some form of advertising back in the day of the authoring of the Bible.
I suspect the advertisement was “Eat more Mutton”. And, do you know who was behind this advertisement? It was the pigs.
It is my contention that the pigs, somewhere around year 23 AD launched a huge Middle Eastern advertisement campaign that effectively would remove them from most future menus. Here is how it must have happened.
They formed a union to disseminate information across the pig community. They knew that to successfully change the worlds eating habits, they would need to alter their perceived image. The orders came down to roll their bodies in any available filth and mud if the gaze of a human were doth upon them. (This is how even pigs had spoken back then). They were building a reputation of being dirty. People laughed at the pigs. One young girl was once heard to say, “Dirty pig funny, me laugh at pig”. The folks new that all they needed to do was wash the pig before cooking up their sweet succulent meat. This angered the pigs.
Next, through the swine network, they were told to eat anything. Literally, to eat anything. And they did. It was this that was the start of the curly tailed fellas fall from culinary biblical grace. This shift in reputation pleased the pigs greatly. For the first time, the pigs had hope for a brighter future.
Next, they emphasized their split hoof appendage. Even the pigs were not sure why this would be seen a bad thing, but they held out their footed hoof like a badge of honor is if it were the most grotesque abnormality. It worked.
It started slowly. First, the town’s folk addressed the pigs differently. People would be heard saying to the children “Isaac and Esther, stay away from that filthy split hoofed pig!” They were now referred to as “swine”. One could dine on a pig, but whom, I ask you, would dine on swine? The Swine farmers never saw it coming. It was nearly immediate that the pig buyers stopped coming around. Why didn’t Joe, Pete, Paul, Luke and their other 7 friends with that Mary girl come around a buy their weekly pig? Where was Moses? He was always good for a pig or two a week. What about the Pilot’s? They love pig.
They all stopped coming. They realized what was happening. The era of piglet propaganda had taken hold. Pigs were now swine and swine was now bad. The Pigs had achieved their goal. But still, the pigs were not satisfied. They needed more protection. They needed to be published.
There were no paparazzi back in the day. There weren’t any cameras. The cave drawing clan was long gone. Sure there were artists. But how do you draw a persuasion. They needed to be mentioned.
The pigs had heard of a book that was being written. This book was a record of all of the things that had been going on during this time. They knew of a fella, Jesus that was saying all kinds of stuff that was being quoted and written into this book. They knew the Moses family and they were saying some great stuff too that was being written into the competitions book. They needed to do the unthinkable. They needed to get into the book, all books.
One day, it happened. The culmination of one of the best animal born campaigns ever attempted. The Pigs code word for this covert operation was “D14:8”. Only the pigs knew what it was. It turned out that a female pig, living amongst the people, imbedded, acting like one of them, worked her way all the way to the guy writing the book.
And there it was. D14:8 was actually Deuteronomy 14:8. They got their mention. Years later it would be compared to the time Jerry Seinfeld appeared on Johnny Carson….a game changing, career making event. Deuteronomy 14:8 said…and I quote…”And the swine, because it divideth the hoof, yet cheweth not the cud, it is unclean unto you: ye shall not eat of their flesh, nor touch their dead carcass.”
Success! It was a huge victory. Everyone was reading this book. And there it was. Plain as, almost, English. Even the dumbest pigs figured it out. The most important rule book ever written said…no more eating pig. Well, it really said swine, but most pigs giggled when they referred to themselves as swine, so they normally say pig.
So goes the story of the greatest food based propaganda ever perpetrated by a split hoof species. More than 2000 years later it still works. And now the Chick-fil-a cows are ripping a page write out of history. If they succeed, what will the fish think? Could they be next? What if tomatoes, cucumbers, asparagus get organized…what then?
We need to break this pattern. Jew… go eat a ham sandwich. Muslims have some bacon. We have been fooled. And a word of warning to you potatoes, before you get any cute ideas….in the immortal words of George W. Bush…”Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, and we won’t get fooled again”…and I mean it.
I was having a quiet night at home after a hard day’s work. I settled into a little “So you think you can Dance” and thought, why I am watching “So you think you can Dance?” This is when it happened. As if divine intervention, A chick fil-a commercial came on. You know the commercial…there is cow with poor spelling skills messaging the viewer to “Eat more Chicken”. I thought, there must have been some form of advertising back in the day of the authoring of the Bible.
I suspect the advertisement was “Eat more Mutton”. And, do you know who was behind this advertisement? It was the pigs.
It is my contention that the pigs, somewhere around year 23 AD launched a huge Middle Eastern advertisement campaign that effectively would remove them from most future menus. Here is how it must have happened.
They formed a union to disseminate information across the pig community. They knew that to successfully change the worlds eating habits, they would need to alter their perceived image. The orders came down to roll their bodies in any available filth and mud if the gaze of a human were doth upon them. (This is how even pigs had spoken back then). They were building a reputation of being dirty. People laughed at the pigs. One young girl was once heard to say, “Dirty pig funny, me laugh at pig”. The folks new that all they needed to do was wash the pig before cooking up their sweet succulent meat. This angered the pigs.
Next, through the swine network, they were told to eat anything. Literally, to eat anything. And they did. It was this that was the start of the curly tailed fellas fall from culinary biblical grace. This shift in reputation pleased the pigs greatly. For the first time, the pigs had hope for a brighter future.
Next, they emphasized their split hoof appendage. Even the pigs were not sure why this would be seen a bad thing, but they held out their footed hoof like a badge of honor is if it were the most grotesque abnormality. It worked.
It started slowly. First, the town’s folk addressed the pigs differently. People would be heard saying to the children “Isaac and Esther, stay away from that filthy split hoofed pig!” They were now referred to as “swine”. One could dine on a pig, but whom, I ask you, would dine on swine? The Swine farmers never saw it coming. It was nearly immediate that the pig buyers stopped coming around. Why didn’t Joe, Pete, Paul, Luke and their other 7 friends with that Mary girl come around a buy their weekly pig? Where was Moses? He was always good for a pig or two a week. What about the Pilot’s? They love pig.
They all stopped coming. They realized what was happening. The era of piglet propaganda had taken hold. Pigs were now swine and swine was now bad. The Pigs had achieved their goal. But still, the pigs were not satisfied. They needed more protection. They needed to be published.
There were no paparazzi back in the day. There weren’t any cameras. The cave drawing clan was long gone. Sure there were artists. But how do you draw a persuasion. They needed to be mentioned.
The pigs had heard of a book that was being written. This book was a record of all of the things that had been going on during this time. They knew of a fella, Jesus that was saying all kinds of stuff that was being quoted and written into this book. They knew the Moses family and they were saying some great stuff too that was being written into the competitions book. They needed to do the unthinkable. They needed to get into the book, all books.
One day, it happened. The culmination of one of the best animal born campaigns ever attempted. The Pigs code word for this covert operation was “D14:8”. Only the pigs knew what it was. It turned out that a female pig, living amongst the people, imbedded, acting like one of them, worked her way all the way to the guy writing the book.
And there it was. D14:8 was actually Deuteronomy 14:8. They got their mention. Years later it would be compared to the time Jerry Seinfeld appeared on Johnny Carson….a game changing, career making event. Deuteronomy 14:8 said…and I quote…”And the swine, because it divideth the hoof, yet cheweth not the cud, it is unclean unto you: ye shall not eat of their flesh, nor touch their dead carcass.”
Success! It was a huge victory. Everyone was reading this book. And there it was. Plain as, almost, English. Even the dumbest pigs figured it out. The most important rule book ever written said…no more eating pig. Well, it really said swine, but most pigs giggled when they referred to themselves as swine, so they normally say pig.
So goes the story of the greatest food based propaganda ever perpetrated by a split hoof species. More than 2000 years later it still works. And now the Chick-fil-a cows are ripping a page write out of history. If they succeed, what will the fish think? Could they be next? What if tomatoes, cucumbers, asparagus get organized…what then?
We need to break this pattern. Jew… go eat a ham sandwich. Muslims have some bacon. We have been fooled. And a word of warning to you potatoes, before you get any cute ideas….in the immortal words of George W. Bush…”Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, and we won’t get fooled again”…and I mean it.
Thursday, July 1, 2010
Where should I look?
I accept the fact we live in an imperfect world. For so many things we have a model how they should be. I think we all do. It can be little things like… which side the hinges are on a refrigerator door, the fact that a car window, for supposed safety reasons, does not roll all the way down, or a myriad of other things that are imperfect.
But, I am not talking about what we build, but the things that catch your eye on a person. I admit that I am not perfect, in fact far from it. I don’t know anyone who is, although there are those who come close. As my closest friends would tell you, I am unjustly and too quick to form an opinion about somebody based on their teeth. This is the direction I am going here. I, all too often, am not able to isolate the obvious physical imperfections of people during an encounter.
Typically, when I have a conversation with someone I maintain eye contact. It is not possible to look at both eyes without staring at the bridge of their nose, so I usually pick their left eye. I know a guy whose eyes seem to work independently. His left eye wonders around like an iguana. I am drawn to this eye expecting it to settle in a direction which, if I follow the line, will provide me information like an Ouija board. I find that I am so focused on his eye that I have very poor listening skills when he speaks to me. It has even gotten to the point where I have caught myself drawn to his all-knowing eye that I lose track of time.
There was another guy I knew that when you got into a conversation with him, his nose would slowly turn red. It became almost a mission to keep the chat going far longer than it should just to see what crimson hue it would take. It was an incredible nose. Although I have spoken with this individual many times, I cannot tell you one topic we discussed, but I can tell you the date and the weather of his most red day.
In elementary school I had a teacher who had an odd odor wafting from her. However, that was not the most distracting thing about her. What consumed my attention was that her ill-fitting bra created, according to the mind of a 5th grader, a seemingly third breast. This woman tried to teach me math skills, but I could not absorb her lesson and contemplate her tri-mammary at the same time.
Regarding teeth, I become hypnotized by people with a large gap between their two upper front teeth..the Laura Hutton Look. They could be giving me the winning lottery numbers for tomorrows drawing, but I can only wonder: 1) what type and size of food would get caught in such a large gap and 2) How far can they squirt water.
I am not noticing of scars unless they alter the normal growth of facial hair. For example, I know a woman whose horizontal scar has caused her to have an upper and lower line of eyebrow hair on her right side. I wonder if it in anyway confuses the person who does the waxing or her plucking pattern. Bald men have a spray to cover a bald spots, would this work on her brow? I do not know.
If I see someone missing a front tooth in adulthood, I blame their parents for not instilling good dental hygiene habits. People with excessive nose or ear hair should be fined. Any man or woman who purposely grows a renegade mole hair must come from a lower social class.
Being so fast to conclusively judge is a neurosis unto itself. I accept that. I do not expect anything written here to have a great impact of change, but for Pete’s sake, pluck that mole hair.
I accept the fact we live in an imperfect world. For so many things we have a model how they should be. I think we all do. It can be little things like… which side the hinges are on a refrigerator door, the fact that a car window, for supposed safety reasons, does not roll all the way down, or a myriad of other things that are imperfect.
But, I am not talking about what we build, but the things that catch your eye on a person. I admit that I am not perfect, in fact far from it. I don’t know anyone who is, although there are those who come close. As my closest friends would tell you, I am unjustly and too quick to form an opinion about somebody based on their teeth. This is the direction I am going here. I, all too often, am not able to isolate the obvious physical imperfections of people during an encounter.
Typically, when I have a conversation with someone I maintain eye contact. It is not possible to look at both eyes without staring at the bridge of their nose, so I usually pick their left eye. I know a guy whose eyes seem to work independently. His left eye wonders around like an iguana. I am drawn to this eye expecting it to settle in a direction which, if I follow the line, will provide me information like an Ouija board. I find that I am so focused on his eye that I have very poor listening skills when he speaks to me. It has even gotten to the point where I have caught myself drawn to his all-knowing eye that I lose track of time.
There was another guy I knew that when you got into a conversation with him, his nose would slowly turn red. It became almost a mission to keep the chat going far longer than it should just to see what crimson hue it would take. It was an incredible nose. Although I have spoken with this individual many times, I cannot tell you one topic we discussed, but I can tell you the date and the weather of his most red day.
In elementary school I had a teacher who had an odd odor wafting from her. However, that was not the most distracting thing about her. What consumed my attention was that her ill-fitting bra created, according to the mind of a 5th grader, a seemingly third breast. This woman tried to teach me math skills, but I could not absorb her lesson and contemplate her tri-mammary at the same time.
Regarding teeth, I become hypnotized by people with a large gap between their two upper front teeth..the Laura Hutton Look. They could be giving me the winning lottery numbers for tomorrows drawing, but I can only wonder: 1) what type and size of food would get caught in such a large gap and 2) How far can they squirt water.
I am not noticing of scars unless they alter the normal growth of facial hair. For example, I know a woman whose horizontal scar has caused her to have an upper and lower line of eyebrow hair on her right side. I wonder if it in anyway confuses the person who does the waxing or her plucking pattern. Bald men have a spray to cover a bald spots, would this work on her brow? I do not know.
If I see someone missing a front tooth in adulthood, I blame their parents for not instilling good dental hygiene habits. People with excessive nose or ear hair should be fined. Any man or woman who purposely grows a renegade mole hair must come from a lower social class.
Being so fast to conclusively judge is a neurosis unto itself. I accept that. I do not expect anything written here to have a great impact of change, but for Pete’s sake, pluck that mole hair.
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