~orion~

BMW: 325/328
Lexus: IS250
Subaru: Legacy/WRX
VW: GLI/GTI/R32
Toyota: Camry SE
Chevy: Malibu
Infinity: G35
Mazda: Speed3
Volvo: C30

Current Favorite: IS250 Legacy GT

I’m not sure how to start this post … maybe I’ll come back and write a gripping hook

I have this interesting conundrum and I don’t know if other people have this problem. Ok now that I think about it I know other people have this same thing going on. Looking back and currently a lot of the girls I am attracted to I know are bad for me, yet for some reason I am still attracted to them. Why is that? Maybe I’m attracted to the challenge. Maybe I’m attracted to her because I want to make her better. That doesn’t really make any sense to me though. Why not just find someone that I don’t need to make better? Why not just find someone that is already awesome? A subset of the girls I’m thinking of I know well enough to pretty well conclude (and usually verified by my friends) that the two of us dating would be a bad idea for one reason or another. Yet I’m still attracted to them for some inexplicable reason. As someone who is left-brained it confuses the piss out of me (not literally cuz that would be weird).

This whole thing reminds me of how attraction is not a choice. Which is also really weird. You don’t really pick who you are attracted to, you just are. Why is that? What in our heads turns that switch that says “yes, yes you are attracted to her.” Further, how is that defined/determined? I don’t think you are born with it, so it comes from something as you grow up … but what?

I don’t where I’m really going with all this …. sooooo discuss!

Something that always bugs me is the insanity that is people parking. There are two main categories of insanity. The first is selection and the second is execution.

Ok, selection. What I mean by that is people selecting their parking spots. People seems damned determined in their ways. They want to park in that exact spot or as close as physically possible to the door of where they want to get even if they have to drive around for 20 minutes. They don’t even realize that they by the time they find the ideal spot they could have grabbed any open spot, did what they needed to do and be back on their way home. That’s only part one. The next aspect of selection is the camper. They are the person that will hold up all the cars behind them for 5 minutes and slow-fatty takes 5 minutes to get into their car and back out. I mean is it really that hard to take the currently open parking spot that’s a whopping 20 feet further away? Is that too much to ask? The last group is similar to the campers. I call them the stalkers. They are very prevalent during the busy Christmas shopping season at malls. This is how it works. The instant you walk out of the mall with your 27 bags full of crap you will be very slowly followed by a minivan. This minivan will slowly follow you until they determine which vehicle you drive at which time they revert to camper behavior. All the while there are 5 poor saps behind the minivan who just want to get the hell out of the mall parking lot and go home. I really like to mess with the stalkers. If I am walking towards my car and end up with a stalker I love to weave back and forth between different rows of parking or cut across multiple rows to throw off all their hard stalking work.

Now execution. People in general either suck at parking and/or don’t care. How hard is it to stick your vehicle between the two yellow lines. It’s like coloring for adults. Just stay between the lines! Oh this just reminded me of an interesting site I found a while ago: http://www.youparklikeanasshole.com/. Also make sure to check out their galleries and flickr page, they are linked under various news posts. I must admit it is awfully entertaining to watch some moron try to parallel park their car in a spot that’s big enough for at least 2 cars and still fail miserably (saw this one earlier tonight). Is it really that hard to make sure that you’re within the lines? Is it really that hard to take the extra 10 seconds to correct your park job if you are over the lines? Man people are lazy and ignorant.

As a side note why do parking garages around here consist of 80% compact parking spots when only like 13.4% of the actual vehicles are compact. It makes no sense dammit!

… and I finally uploaded pics of the new place. Check ‘em out! Make sure to look at the sets. The sets are grouped and ordered, kinda. Leave comments on flickr or here, comments are fun.

How many times have you heard that statement? I hear it all the time. It’s almost funny when two or more people almost compete or argue to determine who is the worse/worst at remembering people’s names as if it is a desirable thing. I find it hard to believe that many people are really that bad at remembering other people’s names. People just don’t try. People don’t make an active effort to remember someone’s name. Which since a name is an abstract thing, it’s harder to do than remember what someone looks like or what they’ve done. When you meet someone you instantly consciously or unconsciously determine if this person is important in some way. If they are your brain will flip into record mode, if not then it’s into the short term memory, soon to be forgotten. Think about it. If you are introduced to the CEO of your favorite company, the tour manager of your favorite band, or someone like that I bet you will remember their name because you’ll realize it is likely beneficial for you to remember that person and their name. I think conversely that if you are introduced to someone that you get no benefit from, you won’t remember their name. Just putting forth a bit of conscious effort when you initially meet someone to remember their name will go a long way because you never know when it could come in handy.

I think Dale Carnegie sums it up quite nicely in his book How to Win Friends and Influence People:

Remember that a man’s name is to him the sweetest and most important sound in any language.

I don’t understand why some people stress so much, especially about things that are not important as they seem. People really things out of proportion when they’re stressed. For example yesterday I was going to invite a co-worker/friend to come over to my apartment after work because a bunch of us were going to grill some very fresh salmon (it was the best salmon I ever had by the way). So I walk over to her desk and wait until she recognizes that I am there. When she realizes I am there, she turns toward me and instead of a “hi” or “what’s up” I get a very curt “I am too busy.” Now normally I’d just ask my question and be on my way. But something about the whole situation really irked me. So I just said “ok” and walked off. I was quite irritated at her reply to me.

At first I thought to myself she’s just really really busy and so it’s no big deal. But then I kept thinking, what is so dammed important that you can’t 30 seconds to talk to a friend? I mean seriously, I can think of a very few jobs (of which neither her job or mine are on that list) such that you can’t spare 30 freaking seconds. Anyways, a while later I got an email from her saying that she was sorry but she was just too busy and too stressed. That got me thinking, why am I not like that? I have more then enough work to last me a long time, yet I am not stressed about it. No matter how busy I am, I’ll always take a few minutes to shoot the shit with a co-worker. I think it’s generally a good thing. I mean it’s a quick break, it brings a smile to your face, it relaxes you. All of those are good things, especially at work. Those few minutes could make someone’s day. Conversely, denying someone could ruin their day (no, my day was not ruined).

… I hope that made sense. I don’t feel like reading it again to see if it does. So good luck.

Ok if there’s one thing that really irks me it’s hypocrisy and double standards, especially in a public forum. First it was Imus basically getting fired and now it’s Opie and Anthony getting fired. I really don’t understand why either of them got more or less fired. Now yes they both said (well in O&A’s case a guest said) stupid shit. But it’s free speech. I don’t want this to deteriorate to a point where people on the radio are afraid to say anything or make any jokes for fear of getting fired. Which brings me to my first irk. Why does this only seem to happen on the radio? I know I’ve heard and seen far worse thing on the television and those people don’t get fired. So why the radio? I don’t get it. Why is radio held to a different standard?

Second the part that people seem totally oblivious to is the fact that YOU DON’T HAVE TO LISTEN TO THEM! I know it’s a complicated concept but you know if you don’t like what you hear on the radio, CHANGE THE STATION. Hell, if you’re really offended by what happened on O&A cancel your XM subscription. Let economics and the free market decide who gets to be on the radio. Don’t let one small group or the government decide. Let the ratings decide. Seriously, if you don’t like a particular song on the radio, you don’t hesitate to change the station. If you don’t like a certain TV show or even TV commercial, you don’t hesitate to change the channel. Why should talk radio be any different.

Really I don’t like Imus or O&A at all, but other people like their shows. So why should they be punished be a few people are offended? If you don’t like it don’t listen. No one is forcing you to listen. Geez, take care of your own problems, don’t have someone else do it for you. This whole help me I’m helpless mentality seems to be spreading. It seems like too many people want someone else to protect them from things they don’t like instead of doing it themselves. It’s like oh noes, protects us from the terrorist, protect us from the bad words on the radio, protect us from music with bad lyrics, protect us from violent video games. When did we all become such helpless wimps? Cowboy the fuck up!

In the aftermath of the horrible shootings at VTech I was thinking about that whole event mostly about people’s reactions. When a coworker of mine pointed out the final death count, I thought “Man Jack Thompson is going to blame video games on this.” Lo and behold, a mere few hours later, I find this. I really have no idea how he can make that assertation before we even know the identity of the shooter. For all we know this kid could have been on drugs, or perhaps doing a Boondock Saints style cleansing. Maybe this kid thought he was on a mission from God. We just don’t know yet. If Jack wants to make his claims after we find out the killer liked to play video games fine, he’s free to do that (even though I disagree 100%). But to make it beforehand is just ludicrous.

Next, the pro-gun people claiming that if the students there were armed this would not have happened or the death toll would have been far lower. While I would have to agree in this singular instance, I believe that overall if more people had guns there would be more murders overall. They won’t be as many mass murders but there will be way, way more one or two person murders. If more people have guns then more people are likely to use guns. It’s simple more people with guns mean more people are likely to use guns which means more dead people. People will be more likely to resort to violence (and shooting) if they are armed for fear that the other person may shoot them first. Fist fights are different, if you get hit first you still stand a chance of being able to win the fight. However if you get shot first then chances are you’ve just lost. We don’t need more guns.

Last, the people calling for the immediate firing of the university president and university police chief. First, and foremost, it’s way, way too early to even tell if either of them screwed up. Now I believe if either of the egregiously screwed up then my all means fire their ass. But don’t fire their ass just as a scapegoat. I’m guessing that giving the information they had, they made the correct decisions. Now I’d imagine that a school that big you could probably get away with shooting and killing two people, disappear for a few hours, resurface on the other side of campus and go on a rampage. From what I’ve read there were no indications whatsoever that the killer was going to go on that second rampage. People need to stop automatically blaming others and forcing someone to take the fall. Sometimes, there is no one to blame. That’s life.

I often wonder if the people at work actually like me. No this isn’t some sort of emo plea. I was thinking. In the “corporate” world there are all these silly rules, laws, and proper behaviors that you are supposed to follow in the workplace. The problem is that they somewhat restrict your interactions with your coworkers. I will be the first to admit that I often act somewhat immature at work. I do to try to bring some fun and liveliness to work because a happier worker is a better worker. I wonder how often I annoy or piss off others at work? Now the people are possibly annoyed by me won’t say anything as that wouldn’t be proper workplace behavior. So for all I know everyone at work hates me but no one will tell me. I don’t believe that to be true to that extreme. I’m curious to know if had I met my coworkers outside of work and they weren’t my coworkers how would out interactions be different? What would my coworkers say to me if they told me what they really thought about me? It would be a fun thing to find out.