Satan Ate All the Thin Mints

I wonder if the devil is actually not that bad of a guy, and God has just been taking part in a massive smear campaign for the past few millenniums. Maybe Satan is just one of those guys that's only kind of a jerk, but he did something that really pissed off God, so now God hates him. Or hell,* maybe Satan's actually a pretty cool guy, but he stole God's girlfriend or something. You know how those things always go. So then God kicked the crap out of him and made him go live underground. Which, you know, I guess is okay, since he's God, but that seems like overkill to me. Satan must have done something really, really uncool for God to say "Alright, screw this, you get eternal torment. How do you like THAT?"**

Or maybe God's just one of those guys that majorly overreacts to stuff. Like maybe Satan just made a couple ribs on God's mom, which really pissed God off because he never even KNEW his mother, and Satan was all "Come on man, we're just joking around", but God wouldn't listen because he was being all melodramatic. And then he remembered that, oh yeah, he's God, and he has superpowers. It's probably easy to forget that sort of thing in the middle of an argument. You know, too many distractions. You can't keep up with everything ALL the time. So then God decided that Satan needed to shut the hell up. So he did so. Violently.

Or...

Satan's an evil bastard and God is an all-loving deity. But where's the fun in that?

*These puns are going to be sort of inevitable for this one.
**The Bible apparently says that Satan doesn't rule hell, he just lives in it, and it sucks for him too. Seriously, look it up.

Burn Them All Alive

This is going to be a less disturbing than the title would imply. Maybe.

I bet people wouldn't be so excited about being able to eat lobster and crab if they didn't look so terrifying. Now, I'm not going to go on some vegetarian rant about how humans are the devil because we eat meat, because I'm not a vegetarian. The thing is, we're usually averse to eating animals that look weird. I mean, cows and pigs are pretty standard looking. There's nothing particularly jarring about cows and pigs. But if some guy was all "Here, eat this Madagascan lemur", you'd be all "Dude, no, that's nasty". Or maybe you wouldn't say it like that. I don't know how you talk. Anyway, I think lobsters and crabs sort of crossed that line twice. Lobsters and crabs are so freaky-looking that we're perfectly okay with dropping them into vats of boiling water for the sake of nutrition. If crustaceans looked like tiny cats, but tasted exactly the same, no one would eat them, because that would just be weird. Well, maybe the Chinese would.

I also like how crab is one of the few foods that you have to put a considerable amount of effort into eating. You can't just put a whole bunch of crab legs in a bowl and gnaw on them while you sit on the couch and watch Star Wars. Well, I guess you could, but you'd get crap all over your face and your wife would probably leave you. Also, you'd break all your teeth, but those aren't important anyway. Point is, it almost seems like it was designed to be an effort vs. reward thing. Crab is a much, much larger pain in the ass to eat than chicken is, but crab is far more delicious. Creationists should start using that. "God made crabs delicious because he hates people from Maryland."

I do like how most places that sell lobster let you pick out which one you want them to burn and maim horribly. You know, as if it's going to make any difference. "Oh yeah, I'm definitely going to have to take that one. That one looks good." It's like trying to differentiate between...individual lobsters. Seriously people, what?

Watching You

Did you know that Big Brother is the worst thing ever created by human beings? It's true, I checked. Now, I've always been one to point out that reality TV is stupid. But see, you don't need me to tell you that. I figure that if you're intelligent enough to be able to...I dunno, read, you've probably figured out that reality TV is a waste of time. Every comedian and/or smartass on the Internet can tell you that. It isn't really news to anyone. So if I knew that, how did I come across Big Brother? Because my father has awful taste in television.

Now, I have absolutely no idea how you "win" Big Brother. I do not know what the goal of the show is, or why so many people are so into accomplishing it. All I know is that whatever it is, it involves two very important skills: shouting, and being a douchebag. If you can someone do these things at the same time, well that's all for the better then. See, because I didn't so much watch Big Brother as I did regard it from across the room with disgust. I was able to gather that there was some guy named Tony, and some chick was pissed off at him because...he betrayed her. In the game of Big Brother, apparently. So basically, it's like Survivor without the island. Or the people eating bugs. And the contestants are even more unlikeable, which is a pretty astonishing accomplishment. Also, I have stated previously that Survivor is boring as hell, so you can pretty much guess how things were going.

Also, this show has apparently been running for like ten years. Who the hell is watching this religiously? I'm not going to say that you're stupid for doing that, I just don't GET it. Maybe it's like watching a trainwreck, or a carpet bombing or something. Although that HAS to get old after awhile.

Staring At the Sky

I'm surprised we don't here about more astronomers going completely insane. You'd think that after a certain amount of time gazing into the infinite expanse of the universe and experiencing a feeling of unbelievable insignificance and fragility, you'd eventually just decide that life is completely illogical and pointless, and then your brain would explode. Because that's how psychiatry works. I mean, I get a bit uneasy just looking up at the sky at night. Can you imagine if that was your JOB? And not only that, but everyone expected you to be trying to figure out what's going on with the universe? I'm sure a lot of astronomers start out with it because they find space fascinating, which makes sense, because space is the best thing in the world, and then it slowly gets more and more horrifying the longer they study. That sounds like fun.

Really, the idea of a universe that is infinite is something that I think the human brain isn't really capable of grasping. Maybe we haven't sufficiently evolved enough to have brains that are intelligent enough to really understand everything that it implies. It is not really possible to be able to envision a limitless space. An endless expanse, where there is no limit to how many worlds there are. The stars are limitless. The galaxies are limitless. There is no "edge of the universe". It goes on forever. I am reasonably certain that that is impossible. And also utterly terrifying.

It also demonstrates that anyone who thinks that we are the only planet with intelligent life in the universe should be laughed out of every room they ever enter. That is absurd. I don't have all the answers. In fact, I have practically none. But there is just no way that this is all we're going to get. Because come on guys, how much of a freaking let-down would that be?

Drink Gatorade, Become God

I like how aggressive the sports drink companies are. You know, with their commercials that don't say, but heavily imply that their sugar-flavored purple water allows you to become the earthly manifestation of Christ. Or at least, you know, Michael Jordan. Of course, they don't actually do any of those things. Mostly they just make you think that you're drinking cough syrup without the mind-blowing high. The thing is, there are like five or six different types of "electrolyte" drinks, the foremost being Gatorade and Powerade,* and they all taste exactly the same. Including the different flavors. I know this, because I was addicted to them during middle school, and I tried pretty much all of them. Also, if you mix enough of them together until the mixture turns brown, it eventually starts to taste like hatred.

It's actually amazing how most drink companies have commercials that imply that they will turn you into Superman. Most companies that sell confectionaries are content to tell you that their food doesn't taste like motor oil, but drink companies like telling you that you will either become amazing at everything, or that it will improve your life in ways you could not possibly imagine. Beer commercials are the obvious target here, but I'm really disturbed by the Coca-Cola ones. At least most beer commercials just sort of come up with as many ways to say "This will make you drunk without tasting like cow blood, also women will have sex with you", Coca-Cola decided that they wanted to imply that this soda WILL MAKE YOUR LIFE BETTER. Which a lot of commercials do, but they're just so darn enthusiastic about. Remember kids, soft drinks are the key to success.

*Seriously, how the hell did they get away with that one? That'd be like if some company came along and made a soda called "Cora-Cola".

Seriously Guys We Get 5.8s Like Every Other Week

Okay, I just want to talk about this before it becomes extremely old news and nobody cares about it anymore. I know I don't usually do "topical" stuff, mostly due to the fact that I don't care enough to bother, but this sort of thing seems more in-line with what I usually talk about anyway, so I figured I might as well.

I would really appreciate it if everyone would kindly shut the hell up about the goddamn earthquake. Now, the reasons most people from California are complaining about that is because they think all the East Coasters are being total wusses about it, because it was seriously not a big deal. And yes, while that is almost certainly true (you big babies), an earthquake happening where earthquakes don't normally happen is certainly an interesting story. However it is NOT "two goddamn days worth of news" interesting, or however long it's been since they started talking about this. And the news will probably continue until at least like, next week. And oh my God I don't care can we talk about something else now.

Now, this would continue to be an interesting story if anything got blown up, or a building fell on top of someone's mom, or if like a hundred people died. Then there would be something depressing for all of us to focus on, to distract ourselves from all the depressing things that are happening to us. But that didn't happen, and yet they're still sending reporters over to the East Coast to stand in the middle of the street and go "Look guys there is a little crack here could this be EARTHQUAKE DAMAGE?" I bet all those plane rides are pretty expensive. We could probably be spending that sort of money on things that actually matter, but oh well.

Or maybe it's been like this because NOTHING HAPPENED THIS WEEK. But that's kind of sorta not really the case, with all the rebellion stuff and whatnot. But I guess white people being moderately inconvenienced is interesting too.

Cyber Horseplay

So here's something random that's been bugging me lately*: I don't think it's okay for schools to be able to punish kids for what they do on the Internet. You know what I'm talking about. Some kid calls some other kid a "fag" on Facebook, and the school comes in and suspends him. That'd be like if the dean came over to your house and grounded you for swearing. It just doesn't seem right to me at all that the school now apparently has jurisdiction over everything you do, even when you're not at school. Sure, using this so-called "cyber bullying"** as evidence that some kid has the motivation to beat the living hell out of another kid is all fine and good, but punishing someone just for their online actions? That isn't the school's job.

Well actually, I think they just SAY that they're going to do that. As far as I know, it isn't actually legal. Which would make sense, but making sense has never been the school system's top priority (see: well, anything really). So really, they could just be making it up. I have no idea, but they don't really care about that, do they? They just want me to THINK that they have that kind of power. Because they hate freedom of speech, see? And they all want to make us into mindless blah blah blah communist manifesto oh my god I don't care.

The REAL truth is, I don't know how much of anything is true about anything. There are a stupid amount of arbitrary rules in the world of education, and I'm so baffled by most of it that it's hard to even talk about it. Maybe the administration is made up of paranoid schizophrenics, or maybe they're well-meaning, but woefully out of touch. I don't know or really have the energy to care anymore. But my first point still stands, either way. Leave my Internet alone please.

*I really ought to just begin every post this way. It would save so much time.
**Seriously, we're still using this term? I thought the word "cyber" got left behind some time in the earl nineties, only being revived any time someone needs a name for a robot-themed level in a video game.

Boo, and All That

I don't believe in ghosts. However, I do believe that the world could benefit from having more haunted places. And none of that sissy crap where the furniture occasionally moves a couple inches to the left during the night or the sauce pans rattle menacingly whenever you accidentally disturb the fragile balance of the universe. All that stuff can usually just be attributed to mischievous pixies, and as long as we're in fairytale land, we might as well go with the cool mythological creatures. I want giant houses with evil specters floating around and totally ruining everything. You know, popping out of closets, possessing people, possibly obtaining one of four elemental powers and using them to battle you in the first boss room. That sort of stuff. I wouldn't want to live there, but imagine all the awesome bets we could make with that sort of material. I just got to figure out how exactly I'm supposed to make ghosts. Give me a couple minutes with some unsuspecting victims and some Satanic implements, I bet I could figure it out.

Stage two of my master plan to make the world considerably more awesome involves sending a group of scientists in to try to catch the ghosts. I'm not sure if my fantasy universe ghosts are intangible or not, so I guess the scientists should be provided with some kind of energy weapon. I don't know, science is complicated. Then we have them film the whole expedition, and at that point, it really doesn't matter whether or not they fail, because we totally just proved that there's an afterlife. I expect mass suicides for people who want to haunt their ex-girlfriends. If I die and find out that I've become a ghost, I'm totally going to start terrorizing the homes of people I didn't like. And telling them that it's their fault.

I haven't actually come up with a stage three, but I'm probably going to try to find a way to communicate with the dead. Then I'll revive all of the Beatles and have them perform a concert, while somehow also saving Christmas. Because let's be honest here, it really isn't Christmas without the tortured spirits of dead rock stars.

I'm Not Going To Make A Pun About Money

I wonder if inflation is going to outrun the general increase of gas prices. See, because I've always liked those sci-fi stories that have a future where inflation has just become completely ridiculous. And you know, it's probably pretty accurate. Unless of course the American dollar just becomes completely obsolete. If there is some day in the future where we're all carrying around $100 bills, shopping will eventually become ridiculous. "You want to buy this TV? That'll be $20 million." We'll have to come up with a new unit of currency. Take a page from the British, they have like five over there.

There's sort of a macabre joy in rising gas prices. A black comedy, if you will, of seeing how awful things can get. Things are better than they were a couple years ago, of course, but you should never rule out ridiculous catastrophes occurring. Like maybe the US will decide that Middle Eastern oil is for communists, so we'll only use American oil. That would be pretty reasonable.

You often hear people who have enough spare time on their hands to call themselves "futurists" say that one day money will become completely digital. That's because these people are stupid, or don't have children. Because I would not trust a small child with a credit card, would you? Of course not. Well actually, there are people who give their small children credit cards, but they're either also stupid or rich enough to afford losing it. I don't want to say I hate rich people, because that's rude and discriminatory. I wish they would just stop making it so easy.

Rearrange All the Buttons

Why do software companies and web designers feel the need to change the lay-out of things whenever they update their websites or programs? Man, that was a terrible opening line, let me try again.

Yesterday I had to download the newest version of Firefox due to an issue with the version I had, that being that it decided it just wasn't going to start anymore. When I finally got it loaded up, it looked completely different from the previous version. Not in a bad way, really, just different. Everything works the same way, they just completely changed the design. And if you upgrade stuff often enough, you'll notice that this happens ALL THE TIME. I wouldn't really say it bothers me, it's just weird. Some guy on the development team sat everyone else down and said "Okay guys, you know the design our browser has had for the past few months, after we changed it a few months before THAT? I've decided it sucks, someone make a new one." And then they spent time doing that. Fascinating.

Now, the thing that gets the most complaints about this is Facebook. Every single bleeding time Facebook even changes anything at all, people fly off the freaking handle, screaming about how they "ruined" Facebook. Apparently, moving some icons around makes the website completely unusable. Now, I couldn't care less about it, but it's so odd that someone would just decide that these changes needed to be made, or nobody's going to use Facebook anymore. That's kind of amazing.

On the Origin of Popcorn

I wish I could've been there for the discovery of popcorn. That must have been a fun evening. Since it's not like potato chips, where we know the whole hilarious story of the discovery, I like to come up with all kinds of reasons why somebody would attempt to light a whole bunch of corn on fire to see if it would explode. Personally, I think it was one of those wacky mix-up situations, like a terrible sitcom inexplicably set in ancient South America. Like maybe everyone had had a little bit too much to drink, and they still needed to make dinner. So they got a whole bunch of corn and put it into...whatever the hell you would fry things in in those days* instead of...whatever you normally cook corn in.** And then it started popping and they were all "OH CRAP!" except not in English because that wouldn't make any sense. Then again, this is a pretty awful sitcom, so maybe they're also inexplicably speaking English. I don't know, I'm not the producer.

So then the corn is all popped. And there's always that one guy who says he's "adventurous", but he's really just kind of stupid and not very good at quantifying danger, so he decides to try some. Then he burns the inside of his mouth, stumbles backwards, trips on a rock, and plummets off a cliff. So everyone else decides to wait about while the corn cools off, discussing how much they hated that guy. Then they all ate the popcorn, had heart attacks, and died, because foods that taste good are always bad for you.

Fortunately, a band of scavengers came along later that day and looted through their stuff. They found the popcorn, and being an entire group of people who were "that guy", they decided to eat some. Luckily, they were also members of the local fitness club, so their metabolisms were able to survive. They opened up a popcorn restaurant, made millions in...ancient South American currency, and retired to Jamaica. The end.

*Don't tell me. I don't care.
**Ditto.

Hap Birt Dey

I would normally write a post today wondering why we're so keen on celebrating people's birthday. "Is it just because we're proud of someone for surviving another rotation around the sun?" I would write, in my trademark way of asking a lot of stupid questions and then never answering them. "How is it different from any other time?" And on and on with that crap. But none of you really want to hear that, do you? You've heard that sort of thing from me thousands of times. They're all really stupid questions, with really obvious answers. We celebrate those things because it is fun to celebrate those things. We enjoy it. I'm probably shooting myself in the foot here, because I'll never get to write an entry like that again, but screw it, oh well. Instead, I'm just going to talk about how awesome birthdays are today.

There are three obvious reasons that birthdays are awesome: cake, parties, and presents. I'd really like to talk about cake, because cake is delicious. But cake is one of those foods that you only really get to eat when there's something special happening, LIKE BIRTHDAYS. And if you know someone that you don't hate who's having a birthday, you're almost guaranteed to get cake at some point. Which is great, because in case this hasn't been clear, cake is delicious. If you don't like cake, get the hell off of my website.

And parties are great too. There are lots of kinds of parties, so you can pretty much do whatever the hell you want on your birthday and call it a party. It could be the standard "drink booze until you black out", or you could jump out of an airplane and call it a "skydiving party". I'm totally doing that at some point. Hell, you could just get a whole bunch of friends together on your birthday and play videogames and eat pizza til you puke like you do every day, but since it's your birthday, IT'S A PARTY. Such is the magic of birthdays.

Oh yes, and presents, of course. Presents are awesome because you get stuff for free. If you don't understand this, you're probably stupid. Birthdays are awesome. FACE.

Natas Liah

I think it would be fun to start a rock group and DELIBERATELY put evil, Satanic messages into my music. I mean, the whole "there are backwards messages in Stairway to Heaven, let's crucify Led Zeppelin" fad is kind of over, but I believe that there will always be stupid people in the world to proclaim the downfall of society, so I think it won't be too hard for it to make a comeback. And then, once they pull me into court and say that I'm corrupting their children, I whip out the first amendment and say that I can put whatever I want in MY music. Then I'll do a whole bunch of coke and get caught having sex with a car in a motel parking lot, because THAT IS THE ROCKSTAR WAY.

See, because people don't care if you're up from about being a Satan-worshiping nut-job. Bands like Mayhem, who participate in ritual sacrifice, church-burning, and generally being massive twats don't get as much attention, because everyone knows they're trying to corrupt society. Because they told us. But when you have a bunch of guys like Judas Priest, who just want to get high and play music, the moral guardians want to expose them as EVIL SATANISTS who want to TURN YOUR CHILDREN TO THE DEVIL, because there's a certain level of intrigue there. They're not outright SAYING they worship Satan, but that's just because they're so CRAFTY.

And of coure, screaming that something is evil and trying to corrupt our children is never a good idea, because that just gives it more exposure. That's why all the Grand Theft Auto games sold so well. When you stir up controversy about something, you just give it free publicity. And that's why my terrible, possibly Satan-worshipping rock band is going to be huge. Well, it would be, if anyone actually listened to rock anymore besides people who ALREADY worship Satan. Okay, new plan. Rap group that glorifies violence. That'll sell.

It's Also Kind of a Cool Title, Sadly

I'm not going to be a moron and say that Twilight "ruined vampires". Yes, we all know Twilight sucks. There really isn't a single thing for me to say about it that hasn't been said a million times before. It's stupid, yes, but you already knew that. What's really interesting to me is the fact that nobody has set out to "make vampires cool again". Or perhaps someone already has, but it was either unpopular or terrible or both, so I haven't heard of it. Despite the fact that I think there are MUCH cooler supernatural creatures than vampires, it would be pretty cool to see a deconstruction of the Twilight setting with vampires that are actually cool.

And you know, it's a shame, because the idea of taking all those old vampire and werewolf myths and placing them in a modern setting could be pretty interesting. Sure, it's been done a few times, no doubt, but it sucks that it's been sort of wasted on a subpar series. Now if anyone wanted to do something else with that premise, they'd be accused of ripping off Twilight, which is pretty lame.

But I'm not one of those crazy people. You know who you are. Screaming about how everyone who likes Twilight is "retarded" and how they should all die. Or screaming about how it's evidence of how fall society has fallen. All of you need to shut up, because you sound just as stupid as the people who claim that it's a literary masterpiece. It's neither. It's just a crappy romance novel. Get over it.

Jumping Into Boxes

I'm glad that we've reached the point where not only are we all aware of the fact that cats are essentially the patron saints of the Internet, but we've also already grown tired of people pointing out that the Internet is obsessed with cats. We've got videos of cats doing stupid things AND videos of people parodying the concept of cats doing stupid things, and everyone is apparently either so self-aware about it that they don't care, or the Internet as a whole completely lacks introspection. Honestly, I'd believe both.

So there's no point in me writing a blog post saying "Hey guys, why is the Internet so obsessed with cats?", because that question's been asked before. And every article ABOUT that subject never really gives a concrete answer for it. But I am ready to do that today. I will explain everything. I will help you to understand this obsession, and what it means about our society. I hope you're prepared for a revelation.

IT IS BECAUSE CATS ARE FUNNY. THEY DO GOOFY THINGS THAT AMUSE US.

I'm not sure why that's been so hard to figure out. Every wise-ass in the world has to make jokes about it, even I don't understand what the big deal is. We like cats because they're cute and funny. Case closed, problem solved, go home.

Discovering the Internet

I hope I never go into a coma. Not because of all the head trauma that will probably be involved,* but because I'll probably be completely terrified about everything that happened. Well actually, it would be a combination of unbelievably traumatizing and kind of cool. Every day would be an adventure! You'd be finding out new things all the time! So yeah, really scary, but at least you'd pretty much never be born anymore.

I mean, can you imagine just finding out about the Internet RIGHT NOW? You'd be occupied for months! And then you'd find out about the porn and it'd be another six! The Internet's already a black hole of productivity in the first place. If you had never even heard about it before, it'd be like discovering a whole new world. And since I'm pretty sure you'd lose your job after being absent every day for thirty years, you'd have even MORE time.

Actually, you'd be pretty screwed on this if you had crappy health insurance. You'd wake up and all of a sudden it would be like "Congratulations, you're bankrupt!" Maybe you'd get to write it off as a really, really long paid vacation. At that point, you'd probably pretend to still be in the coma just so you could stop working altogether. I'm sure no one would mind.

*Since it'll probably be my fault anyway, I'm not too worried about it. I'll probably end up giving myself a concussion just to see what it's like.

Get Them Ready For the Real World

I'm not sure I'm entirely comfortable with teaching kids about all the current horrors of the world, like global warming and terrorism and all that horrible stuff. Not because I support sheltering children, because I'm very much against that, as you might have already guessed, but there are two issues that always seem to crop up whenever this gets discussed. First of all, it's difficult to explain these kinds of things to children in terms they understand. And if you dumb it down to the point where the importance of it is diminished ("Hitler was a very bad man."), then they're not going to really understand what the big deal is. Anyone's who's ever had to explain the Holocaust to a small child knows what I'm talking about.*

More importantly, I think, in a strange sort of way, it puts a lot of pressure on kids. When you tell a kid that everything kind of sucks in the world, they're going to want to do something about it. They want to help. Kids are optimistic like that. And that's the thing, they can't. Well, they can make a small impact with donations and stuff, but they can't fix everything. It seems a BIT cruel to me to tell kids, in a roundabout way, "The world sucks and there isn't a damn thing you can do about it." But maybe I'm reading into it too much.

On the other hand, NOT talking about these things gets you a bunch of ignorant people, which isn't any good either. There's gotta be some sort of balancing act between not sheltering your kids and not completely traumatizing them. Of course, most people are terrible at parenting, so it's kind of a crapshoot. Oh well, not like I can do anything about it.

*Don't ask.

In Case of Emergency, Break Glass

I wonder sometimes about buildings that have fire extinguishers in them. Not that I think it's a bad idea or anything, but when a fire starts happening, people sort of tend to panic, shockingly. And when people are panicking, they don't usually have their wits about them, do they? No, usually people are freaking the hell out and making terrible decisions. That's why horror movies can get away with having their characters do really, really stupid things. In the heat of the moment, it's hard to remember not to do anything that will probably get you killed.

So I think fire extinguishers ask a bit too much of people. You're supposed to remember where it is, how to get it out of the wall, and how to use it. That's a lot of things to keep track of when your in danger of being burned to death. And considering fire is one of the scariest goddamn ways to go, I'd say there's plenty of reasons to be scared out of your stupid mind. And that's how you end up making terrible decisions like trying to put the fire out by hitting it WITH the fire extinguisher.

I dunno, maybe it has something to do with my own childhood fear of my house burning down. Seriously, I had escape routes planned out and everything, as well as maneuvers for how I was gonna evacuate my dog. Also, I just made myself paranoid. Great.

One Year and Two Days

I realized today that the first anniversary of this blog was two days ago. At first, this bugged me. "I should've done something special!", I thought. "I could have at least done something tongue-in-cheek! I am a failure!" Then I wept softly to myself for several hours before I realized that I was weeping into my keyboard and my laptop had caught fire.

After returning from the burn ward, I concluded that there wasn't anything of particular interest I could write about. I mean, what is there to really say about a blog that is nothing but me complaining about things every weekday for an entire year now? Not a whole lot. It sort of brings up the question of why I do it in the first place. After all, I have been quick to point out that my readership is essentially zero, so what the hell am I doing here? I honestly couldn't tell you. There is nothing motivating me to keep updating every day, and yet I do. And trust me, I have gone to some rather absurd lengths in order to avoid missing updates.

Perhaps I'm just writing in the hopes that someday, something I say will be of use to someone. I don't know how. Perhaps society will collapse, and some day my blog will be found by archaeologists, and used as an example of what life in 2010s America was like. Of course, that won't happen. But I'm writing anyway. I love all zero of you, dear readers, and I don't want to stop doing it. Would hate to disappoint you.

Also, His Name Is Cooler

Speaking of Neil Armstrong and the moon landings, I always felt bad for Buzz Aldrin.* The guy does just as much work, goes to the goddamn moon, and nobody remembers him. Everyone always remembers Neil, because he got to go first. I wonder if they drew straws over that. I bet there were at least some arguments over it. Or maybe Buzz was one of those really nice guys, and he just let Neil go first. Or maybe Neil was a complete tool and decides that he should go first and that Buzz could shut his face. I don't know, a lot can happen when you have a bunch of guys floating through space in a tin can.

But maybe just going to the moon at all makes up for the fact that no one remembers he did it. I mean, that's pretty much number one on my list of "Things Science Better Make Possible Before I Get Assassinated". Sure, nobody would believe him, but he WAlKED ON THE MOON. Nowadays, he could've just brought a literal digital camera with him and shot some home movies up there. That's what I'm going to do.**

*It was one of the great moments in my life when I said this in a conversation and the other person said "Who?", so I got to say "Exactly." My life is boring, remember?
**You don't get to crush my dreams.

Neil Armstrong Would Be Pissed

I'm trying to figure what exactly the "the lunar landing was fake" people* are trying to accomplish. Besides "prove we never landed on the moon", I mean. What do they gain from it? Do they just want to show everyone that the government is horrible and that we're all sheep? I think most of us are already sort of vaguely aware of that. But guys, it was like half a goddamn century ago. Even if by some stroke of stupidity, you were right, nobody really cares anymore.

"Hey guys, the moon landing was faked!"
"Okay."
"No really, you can tell by the-Wait, what?"
"I said okay, whatever."
"So come join me in the crusade! The crusade for the truth!"
"Nah dude I got...stuff to do."

Hopefully, they'll go away eventually. I'd say that we can just wait until the next inevitable "faked" event, but that didn't work when 9/11 happened, because we just have both of these groups of morons running around. Well, that's not entirely true I guess. I'm pretty sure it's all the same group of about twenty people.

*Do they have a name for themselves? I know the 9/11 people are "9/11 Truthers", but do the lunar landing guys have something like that?

That Disney Movie Made Us Think Pirates Were the Good Guys

When the Somali pirates started to actually become a genuine threat, a lot of really awful people such as myself complained that these weren't REAL pirates, and were therefore lame and not worth the trouble. See, when we hear "pirate", we want to see ridiculous beards and swordfighting and drunkenly steering ships and eyepatches and TREASURE. And I think the reason for this is that pirates are one of the few historical groups that pop culture has actually portrayed pretty accurately (giant flying demon ghost ship notwithstanding). So when we heard that the world was going to have PIRATES again, REAL pirates, not the "illegally downloading Pink Floyd" kind of pirates, we got excited. Then when we found out they were basically just like all the African criminals we hear about, but on a boat, we were pretty disappointed. Again, because we're awful people.

But the pirates aren't the real problem, are they? No, it's the people they're trying to steal from. Sure, back in the day pirates fought the Navy from time to time, but we all know their real targets were rich white people. And sure, they're still attacking rich white people, but it just isn't the same anymore. Nobody sails through the Atlantic with a giant wooden box full of gold anymore. For good reason, obviously, but it sure makes things less interesting.

I think we miss pirates for the same reason we miss the Cold War or World War II, but on a smaller scale. We need a big enemy to fight, or else we just end up beating up people who don't even stand a chance because we love fighting so much. Sure, we had a fight with those pirates, but it just isn't the same.

I Like When People Call It "The Clicker"

It seems like no matter how far technology advances, remote controls are just going to continue to suck forever. In a world where we have video game controllers that can somehow work from across the house, why are we still using remote controls that have a range of about six inches and have to be pointing at the exact spot on the TV or cable box or magical DVR thing to work? I'm perfectly aware that this is basically the biggest "lazy American" thing to complain about behind "My cellphone is all the way over THERE?", but it just seems like something we'd have by this point.

Then again, that's probably one of the most boring predictions for the future ever. "Yes my friend, by 2050, we shall have remote controls that actually work properly!" Maybe instead of wasting their time developing those stupid 3D TVs, they could try building a remote control that doesn't suck. I mean, we have the technology to REWIND TV now. If you're stupid and don't think about it too hard, DVRs are essentially TIME MACHINES. So apparently all our other TV technology started becoming super awesome, and everyone just sort of forgot to ever upgrade the remotes besides putting pause buttons on them.

This is only semi-related, but is it just me, or is there always at least one remote in your house that seems to serve no purpose at all? You know, the little black one that appears to have DVD controls and TV controls on it, and doesn't seem to actually do anything. If this were a cartoon of some kind, I bet that remote would have magic powers. Probably take you on some sort of wacky adventure where you learn the true meaning of friendship.

...Hang on, I need to go try something.