MAC attack

DEAR GOD! (think that screaming scene in Little Miss Sunshine when the kid discovers he's colorblind) Ok, that's out of my system. My friends who have Macs swear by them. i don't. One of their Mac's has had more problems than a Hugo, but she stands by it, defending it valiantly because it was a first generation model.

So, admittedly, i have some supremely dumb reasons i'm not willing to let go of for never owning a Mac. They include things like being the choice computer of nefarious people in my life, and the unabomber. But i have better reasons, even if you find them shallow. If these obstacles were surmounted, i might be persuaded.

(Note: given the option i'd prolly go LINUX instead of windows or leopard and build my own machine, but it's not so much an option just now. Yes, i'm a third party, second opinion, road less traveled sorta guy)

First off, and this actually is important to me: i think the actual computer looks like it is aimed at 13 year old girls. Mostly the little cute white plastic ones, but even the silver ones. i don't care how durable it is, it looks like i could break it more easily than my cell phone, and i've broken a lot of those.

Also, the interface gives me the same suspicion. It has got to look more rugged or it's a no go. i have to be able to THINK i can throw it into an active volcano, not think that my sister will ask me to paint my toe nails with her if she sees me using it.

The MOST important problem is the lack of a right click on the computer. i use this function so much it would be like peeing with no hands. i could do it, but why the heck WOULD i, if i had another option?

i also find it super counterintuitive that the up AND down scroll buttons are on the bottom of the screen. That just makes no sense to me. That's one of those features i'm convinced they keep on as a means of being different and punishing users for formerly being normal.

Alright Macintosh, you laud yourself on being so daggum customer friendly! The gauntlet is thrown! i married one of your ranks and you woo many more, but until you become user friendly enough for me and rugged enough for Indiana Jones (or at least look like it, i mean even Cadillac has SUV trucks now), you will not sway me!

The Beauty Around Us

I saw American Beauty for the first time this morning. Granted, it's very strange and I'm not sure I'd ever recommend it to anyone at all, well, ever, but it did have its moments. In particular, the moment when Kevin Spacey is talking to his daughter's best friend at the end of the movie. He wants so desperately to know how his daughter is doing and how her life is going. There's a combination of parents with a lack of interest in their teenager's lives and those that don't have any idea how to ask.

The really interesting moment is when the girl finishes and asks Spacey, "Well, how are things with you?" And she is quite sincere. One of the things that came up in college a lot with my international friends is how strange a custom it is in America to ask how you're doing as a greeting. No one actually cares or wants a complete answer. They are hoping you say fine so they can say the same and continue on. Kevin Spacey seems pleasantly taken aback. "No one has asked me that in a very long time," he says smiling. i frequently ask people that very question very aware of the depth it can go. i'm always surprised when at the reaction. If you want to try an experiment, ask one person each day how things are going, how they are for a week. Ask it with complete sincerity and make it apparent you're actually waiting for an answer. You won't move till you get it, no matter how brief or in-depth. Give it a week.

Un-BELIEVABLE!

Suppose you have a football team with 50 players. Over the summer as you are training, two players stand out as the worst players by far. They are terrible. They are the worst consistently at every practice. At the end of training camp, these two players are still your worst two players, but they went from being able to do 2 push ups each to 10! Granted, every other player on the team started off being able to do somewhere between 50 and 100, but they showed they most improvement! Now, your next step would be to take one of those two players and make them team captain for the season, right? (feel free to laugh at this point)

Well, this is precisely what Bill Clinton did during his term in the White House and lauded this morning on the campaign trail for Hillary in Iowa. When he was governor of Arkansas, they were one of the two worst states for public education. He talked about nearly 200 districts without advanced math classes or science or foreign language. He discussed (but with no details of course) how Hillary magically improved that situation (again, with no figures on results or test scores). When he entered the White House, one critic who had called Arkansas the worst in the country said that the two most improved schools in the country were Arkansas and South Carolina. Wow! Most improved! (Keep in mind, their rank had not changed)

Knowing his own state, Bill Clinton did not take this opportunity to shine the spotlight there and choose the school superintendent from Arkansas, but turned to SC. He put their school superintendent in the cabinet as the Secretary of Education. Now maybe this is someone you want to recognize for his hard work or to consult when addressing your worst school systems, but really, Secretary of Education? That's like assigning all the B students in your class to be tutored by the kid who made F's all semester and pulled it up to a C-. He might know good study methods, maybe some tips, but to put him in charge? No, you'd pick the girl who has made A's from the beginning. Lord almighty!

And on that note, he began talking about universal admittance to college/community college/ or trade school. Excuse me? What incentive does any kid have to do well in school if they know each next step is guaranteed? For that matter, what interest do they have? Not every kid i went to high school with had an interest in college. Many wanted nothing more to do with school. Lord knows i didn't. My father took a year off before deciding he wanted more education. Many people i know, including my mother, went back for more education later in life. Besides, if college is guaranteed, you don't have to work to earn and pay for it. This eliminates a work ethic completely. When you take away the entire work force of college age students who don't have to work, there's a huge gap in the service industries, fast food, mall jobs, theme parks, offices, life guarding, and restaurants. This is not only a critical time for kids to learn work ethic, but it's a TAX BASE. Without those kids paying taxes on those salaries, you are losing funding. You cannot create a program that takes HUGE amounts of funding to implement and continue (college tuition for everyone) and simultaneously eliminate tax revenue and radically alter the job market. Kids who don't have jobs in high school in college don't learn the basic skills they need for upper level jobs granted to them by higher education. Punctuality and money management, how to work for a boss and work with teams of people you don't choose. You don't learn these in a classroom, no matter how hard you try to duplicate those conditions.

All this to say, DO NOT vote for Hillary Clinton for President or Vice President if you have any common sense at all. At least shop around. Find someone who believes in the Constitution. Someone who understands that the founding fathers wanted us to be protected from high taxes without direct representation and a say in how the small taxes were to be used. Someone who understands that the government is NOT supposed to be your grandparent, handing you other people's hard earned money like candy. The government does not grow money. It takes it by the authority you give them and you get back some of it in the form of protection and order. Anything else is the government having a holiday on your dime. And that's the way it is.