In The Big Inning...

I probably should write "Awards, Part II", but I just don't have the patience right now, so that'll have to wait. I know, I know, my legions of fans will be disappointed, but it'll build character.

I do want to write about my complete lack of finesse, at least when it comes to sports, or, rather, pseudo-sports. This is on my mind because I went bowling tonight. I enjoy bowling, but I'm not particularly good at it. Part of this is likely due to my unconventional form - I don't use the holes. Rather, I palm the ball (and this have to use an 8-lb ball, lest I break my wrist), and chuck it down the lane. You'd think this would be a terrible method, but surprisingly enough, I usually score around 110-150. Not great, but not horrible.

This frustrates me on some level because I probably could be better. Would I be better with the proper form? Maybe. I believe that the effort spend learning the proper form would be just as likely to make my improper form more effective. Nevertheless, I don't think I could ever learn the finesse part of bowling, and be able to pick up spares on a regular basis. I do think I could learn to chuck the ball really hard and more accurately, and pick up more strikes, though.

This approach extends to other pseudo-sports. Like darts. Every else kind bends their elbow and kinda flicks the dart at the board. Not me. I throw the dart like a baseball. Once again, you'd think this would be a horrible method, but it's not. It's certainly not great, and it's pretty inconsistent, but it works better than you'd think. I actually won a darts match this past weekend, and hit the final two bullseyes to win the game. Of course, it took a while, and we were fortunate that the other team wasn't playing very well, either.

I think I've always been this way with sports - high on power, low on finesse. Sometimes, I can direct my power - like in softball, I can hit the ball somewhat hard, and usually hit liners. I can throw the ball hard and accurately. I can't pitch very well, though - that relies on finesse and putting the ball in the right place, with the right spin, and the right arc, and the right speed. Not for me. No, I'd rather just fire the ball at the catcher and let him catch it and tag a guy out. So softball works for me - very little finesse is required.

I stink at pool. No really unconventional form, just a lack of ability to consistently make good shots, which, of course, is what the game is all about. I remember, my senior year in high school, I was on the local pool's diving team. (They were desperate for 16-17 year old boys.) Same thing - I was willing to try pretty much any dive, but when I hit the water it was like a depth charge went off. I didn't even point my toes. I did learn a double flip, though - jump, and throw yourself into a ball as hard as you can. Right up my alley.

People (usually Shear) say that if I practiced at these skills, with the proper form, I might get a lot better. Maybe, maybe not. There is something to be said for achieving moderate success using my own methods. I imagine if being a pool shark or a bowling, er, penguin (why not?) was really my goal, I would try to do it properly, but it's not. I think it comes down to having fun, and in these cases, having fun for me is more about trying to succeed doing it my way. Furthermore, all of these things are usually individual sports, or at least, I don't play on a serious team. In softball, though, if I were to just do what I found fun, instead of trying to do things the right way, I'd be letting my teammates down, which is probably why I take it more seriously. Anything worth doing is worth doing well...unless that makes it not fun.

So, the Oscar nominations were announced today, giving me the perfect opportunity to discuss them a bit. But, before I delve into some of my opinions about the Oscars in general (I'd like to try to stay away from just "I liked this movie, I didn't like that movie", but it is kinda tempting), I want to express something about the Oscars vs. other awards shows.

Despite my clear fondness for some crappy television (see my post below about reality shows), I really have grown disgusted with awards shows lately. Most of them mean nothing. The sheer number of awards for music is astounding, but what's worse is that the music selected is always the lowest common denominator. For some reason, that doesn't seem to be the case with the Oscars. Say what you will about all the politicking (is there a "k" in there? does it matter?), but at least the movies that win Oscars are usually widely regarded as quality movies. At the very least, not many people dislike them, which is tough to claim about the recipients of music awards.

When talking about music awards, let's use the Grammys as an example. It's kind of sad, but they're usually regarded as the most prestigious. Stunning, I know, when compared to the People's Choice Awards, the Blockbuster Entertainment Awards, and the Billboard Music Awards. Let's look at the current nominees list for this year's awards, which occur on February 6th. Just take a gander. We have the White Stripes, Justin Timberlake, Evanescence, Missy Elliott, Eminem, Christina Aguilera, and Avril frickin' Lavigne. Did a goddamn 12-year old girl make these decisions? I'm not even saying that I don't like some of these artists. Some of their songs are very catchy. But let's look at what the Grammys claim to be all about:

"The recording industry's most prestigious award, the GRAMMY, is presented annually by the Recording Academy. A GRAMMY is awarded by the Recording Academy's voting membership to honor excellence in the recording arts and sciences. It is truly a peer honor, awarded by and to artists and technical professionals for artistic or technical achievement, not sales or chart positions (GRAMMY Awards Process)."

Not sales or chart positions? Really? Then please explain how Justin Timberlake appears on this list. You're telling me that he's one of the most talented musicians in the world? That his album is potentially the pinnacle of musical artistic achievement? No, clearly not. And, as much as you may like them, neither is Avril Lavigne, or Christina Aguilera, or any number of other nominees. Hell, those three can't even play instruments! So, let's just chalk this us to being one big lie. Thousands (not hundreds) of albums are released in a year. These are not the best, at least not on an musical basis. Sorry.

Some of these artists are breaking new ground and accomplishing interesting things. Eminem, for instance, no matter what you think of him, has clearly done something new and different. OutKast, as well. But, by and large, you could just turn on your local top 40 radio, pick out the first 10 songs you'd hear, and probably come up with just as qualified a group. So, why has it come to this? Well, because, I don't believe that you can come up with a list of the Best Albums of the Year and have it make sense. I could ask 100 different people their favorite album released in the last year, and I believe that I'd get 100 different answers. I could ask 100 different people for the most original album released in the last year, and I'd also get 100 different answers. BUT, if I asked them to limit their choices to ones that were at least gold records, or ones that were played on the top 40 radio stations, well, maybe I'd get some overlap. Especially if we're talking about radio, which has essentially become a place where creativity in music goes to die.

So, I don't believe that you can come up with objective criteria by which to judge music. But that's not a bad thing. It's only bad when you try to rank things objectively, which the Grammys do, and that's why the Grammys have become a complete farce. I believe that music is a deeply personal experience. It's somewhat indescribable that feeling you get when you hear a song you like, that somehow connects with you and sticks in your brain. Maybe it's a fun song that make you want to shake yo big funky ass. Maybe it's a nostalgic song that reminds you of a certain mood or a certain place. Maybe you have no idea why you like it, but you just do. And trying to compare and contrast the opinions, nay, the emotions of hundreds of people about thousands of albums, even if they are "music professionals" in order to come up with an overarching list of the "best" is just stupid. And that's why the Grammys are worthless.

What should be done instead? Well, I'm not sure. It seems that what happens is when you take the tastes of 200 million people and combine them and turn them into a poll (which essentially is what you're doing by eliminating those albums that don't sell well), you don't get the best and the brightest, you get the music that is the least offensive to the most people - the lamest common denominator.

Unfortunately, the people who vote can't really listen to every album put out in a year. It'd be nice if the Grammys, or some award show, tried to expose people to new music, though, much like how the Oscars usually result in a lot of people becoming aware of a movie they had never even considered before. Of course, the Grammys would first need some legitimacy. Maybe the should BAN any record that was gold or above. That might increase the quality a bit. And maybe the categories should change. Have something for everyone: "Best Nirvana Ripoff", "Best Talentless Teeny-bopper Fodder", "Best Creative Use Of Explicit Lyrics", "Lifetime Achievement In Misogyny", etc.

Well, that's a long enough post for now. Shortly, I'll discuss why the Oscars aren't necessarily similar.

None of what I'm about to discuss is a complaint: I just find it interesting.

For some reason, starting around college, I've functioned as a bank for a lot of my friends. Before you think this is similar to the comment that parents make when their children ask for money, it's not: In reality, banks don't give you money that isn't yours. They may loan it to you, but you have to give it back. Maybe parents should say, "What, do I look like the lawyer presenting you with your inheritance?", but that would be silly.

Nevertheless, banks, for the most part, provide loans, and manage cash flow. I seem to do both. I don't know why, necessarily, it usually falls on me - many of my friends make plenty of money. It might be because I tend to keep track of money better than most, but I think it's really just momentum - people know I like being responsible, and I haven't screwed things up with their money before, so if someone's gotta handle stuff, why not me? Fair enough, I guess.

To be honest, I usually don't mind it. I like being able to help my friends if they need loans, but usually, that's not the case. There was, however, one time in college, where my fraternity owed me about 5000 dollars. It's not like I'm loaded - that was a large amount. However, like I said, usually, that doesn't happen.

What happens more often, is that I make hotel reservations for a bunch of us, or I pay for a gift, and people pay me back. There are benefits and deficits to this. One nice thing is that I can charge whatever we're paying for, and this gets my Sony Points on my credit card! Snazzy! An annoyance is having to remind my friend that they owe me money - I'm sure they don't like it, and neither do I. Usually, they're pretty good about it all.

However, if there was a complaint, it's actually more of a superficial one - illustrated nicely by what happened this weekend. This weekend, I went to Boston for my fraternity's annual Alumni Hockey Game. (For those of you that are wondering why I haven't posted in a while, there's your answer. All two of you that might actually be wondering.) Typically, the alums give a donation to the active chapter to thank them for holding this event. Instead of all giving individual donations, we like to present one lump sum from the group of us. I volunteer to collect the money and write the check - this doesn't cost me anything, and I can make sure it gets done. That's fine - I don't mind, and I'm glad to help. The one annoying effect is that I write a check, and inevitably, everyone gives me cash.

Cash ain't so bad - unless you are carrying too much of it. I'm in Boston, so there's no easy way to deposit it. Instead, I've been walking around with about 1000 bucks in my wallet. Not a good idea. I especially wary of this since I was being stupid a month ago and lost my wallet while I was carrying 500 bucks around. And I didn't even have a good excuse for that. At this point, my wallet can't close. I think I'm going to develop back problems from sitting lopsided. Fortunately, I'm big and scary-looking, so no one would ever thing about mugging me.

It's tempting to delve into politics in this blog, but I'm going to resist the urge, and instead, make some stuff up. I've come up with a theory that, um, theorizes that the winner of each Presidential election is the candidate with the more attractive children at the time. Given that I only really remember elections starting with 1992, that's where I'll start:

Clinton vs. Bush. Well, no matter what you think of George W and Jeb's politics, I don't think you can characterize them as very attractive. They have a sister, Dorothy, but I can't find a picture, and she was 33 at the time. Maybe she's a cutie. Who knows? And while Chelsea was in her awkward years and the subject of much undeserved ridicule at the time, she has since morphed into a "hottie", at least according to my brother, who attended college with her. So, much like Clinton, who was elected over Bush on his potential, we'll say that this election was largely determined by W and Jeb (is there another one?) being goofy-looking, middle-aged dudes, only likely to get uglier, whereas Chelsea was an awkward pre-teen, bound to grow up. Clinton wins.

Clinton vs. Dole. Hmmm...I'll let the pictures speak for themselves. Bob Dole has one child, Robin:


Robin Dole vs. Chelsea Clinton



Clinton wins handliy.

Bush vs. Gore. Ok, now the real fun begins. Gore has 4 kids - 3 daughers and 1 son. In the interest of space, I'll show who I believe to be the most attractive Gore daughter. Bush has the infamous Bush twins:


Karenna Gore vs. Jenna and Barbara Bush



Tough call, eh? Sophisticated or Fun? Apparently the American public thought so too, and, well, you all know the results.

So, now that we have this valuable knowledge, and have proved my theory beyond a shadow of a doubt, how can we apply it? Well, if the Democrats want to defeat George and his formidable twins, clearly, they should elect the candidate with the most attractive (preferably female) offspring. (Please note that I am in no way endorsing this horribly superficial system, I'm just observing that this appears to be how it worse. It's sad, but clearly true.) I'll let you make that decision for yourself:



Vanessa Kerry (right)


Cate Edwards (center)


Chrissy Gephardt


Rebecca Lieberman


Ok, that was short-lived. I can't find a picture of Anne Dean, Jackie Kucinich, or Wesley Clark Jr., or Dominique Sharpton. Of these four, I think you gotta go with Cate Edwards...maybe they've picked up on this in Iowa? It's interesting to note that Clark's the only one without a daughter. A guarantee of success? Or certain doom?

Sam and I usually have people over to watch football on Sundays. This weekend was no exception. My friend from high school, Kevin (yes, the guy in the comment section), and a few of my fraternity brothers, Andy, Justin and Karl came over this weekend. Additionally, Kevin brought his girlfriend, Alison, over for a little while. And Justin's girlfriend was also in town - her name is Alison as well.

Now, Justin and Andy and Karl all obviously know each other, having been in the same fraternity as each other. Additionally, Kevin knows all of them, through me. Kevin's girlfriend has met Justin and Karl, albeit only a couple of times. Also, Justin's girlfriend has met Karl and Kevin as well, I believe. Basically, the only people who didn't know each other were the two Alisons. Wow, that whole paragraph was unnecessary.

So, everyone's over, and Kevin and Alison (Kevin's girlfriend, which should be obvious, unless you know something that Justin should be upset about), show up and walk in. They say hi to those they already know, and then Justin's Alison walks over to Kevin's Alison and extends her hand, in order to introduce herself.

"Alison", she says, as she approaches Kevin's Alison, in a somewhat straight tone of voice, announcing her own name.

"Yes." comes the reply. And then they both just stand there, in a moment of silence, both not sure of exactly what happened. Justin's Alison believes she's introduced herself, while Kevin's Alison believes she is being addressed. (And probably wonders why this girl knows her name.) And then I break into laughter, realizing how strange that was. Everyone else takes a bit longer, especially the Alisons, who are probably pretty confused. But eventually, they sort it all out. Still, I thought it was very funny. I wonder how often that happens. There are plenty of people with the same first name. But it takes someone to introduce themself by just stating their name, instead of saying "I'm Melvin", which I would assume is still fairly common. (The means of introduction, not the name Melvin.)

That the depth of my thoughts tonight.

Oh, one more thought: English needs a gender-neutral third person pronoun. "Them" is wrong, but oh so convenient! Why don't we have one?

I couldn't think of a topic to write about, so I asked my girlfriend, Sam(antha) for a topic. She suggested "sex". I guess I can't complain about that, eh?

But what to write about sex? Writing about my own personal experiences seems a tad inappropriate, so I won't do that. I guess I can write about the general American impression of sex. I'll stop writing about writing and just start writing:

As you know, I hate to sound like everyone else, but we really are rather uptight about sex in this country. But when I say "we", I don't mean each individual person, because on a personal level, I see people talking about sex all the time. In fact, at a local level, I think we're relatively liberated...at least until the topic of homosexuality comes up. Then, most people revert back to the Stone Age. But we're not talking about that, for now.

No, what I'm talking about is the general public impression of sex. It's not even the act of sex, or, rather showing sexual images - the rules on that seem to be loosening all the time. Rather, I'm talking about what can and cannot be said in a public forum. I guess, rather, I should widen this discussion just to include "inappropriate language", because, really, when we use that term, we really mean "sexual language". "Fuck" wouldn't be a bad word if it wasn't sexual, would it? In fact, I believe the FCC recently said that they won't investigate matters in which the word "fuck" was broadcast if it wasn't used in a sexual manner. "Bitch", and even "shit" are now ok to use on TV. And, I hate to bring this discussion back to media, because it seems like a lot of my discussions go that way, but that is the best example of American standards of decency, is it not?

Frankly, it makes very little sense to me. They're just words. Why do we ascribe "fuck" so much power, ESPECIALLY when we know that probably almost everyone watching TV uses those words? Certainly, almost everyone watching TV has either had sex, or intends to. "What about the kids?", you might ask. Well, honestly, maybe if we were a little more open about talking about sex and sexual language around them, we might generally have a more well-adjusted, sexually comfortable population.

But, I guess some people think that's a bad thing. Sex is private, right? It's inappropriate to talk about it, especially not graphically. And, I'm not advocating people talking in detail about their sex lives. Rather, I would like to see people accept sex as a natural part of life. People want sex. They like it. That's never going to change. They're going to use certain words to describe it, and, really, none of them should offend you - once again, they're just words, and if the concepts behind them don't offend you, then the words themselves shouldn't, either.

I love hearing expletives on television. I like when the boundaries are being pushed. I also like knowing that somewhere, some kid is likely hearing that word for the first time, and may be asking his parents what that means. I only hope they're giving him a real explanation, instead of saying, "It's a bad word, and you should never say it."

Personally, I have a dilemma. Let's say I have kids. Now, I know a very good reason not to teach young kids about sex is because they can only grasp the concept after a certain age. Great. But that's no reason to keep it hidden. They can't grasp the concept of the "Infield Fly Rule", either, but I'll bet that very few parents turn their television off when a baseball game is on and the "Infield Fly Rule" comes into effect. I imagine that if you shut the TV off or cover your kids' ears every time something "inappropriate" is mentioned, it makes them more curious. If you treat it like everything else that's said, it won't be a big deal. And, really, it shouldn't be.

But therein lies the problem. If I want my kids to have what I deem is a healthy attitude about sex and so-called vulgar words, then they're going to encounter these words before they're ready. And, they just might use them in front of someone not-so-well-adjusted, and then get in trouble. Then, I get called into the principal's office and have to explain to him that Dave Jr's perfectly allowed to say "cocksucker", thank you very much, and if little Billy's mother has a problem with it, well, then, she should come and talk to me directly. She's probably a "cocksucker" too. I'm willing to bet on it.

Ok, that was inappropriate. Or, was it? Personally, I found it funny. I bet you chortled. And that's another point - curse words are funny! They just are. Maybe I need to grow up, but if I'm complaining about someone, I can either call him a "jerk", or I can call him a "pig fucker", well, I'm going to go with the latter. Gets the same point across, but I'm more likely to entertain my audience with the latter.

Maybe I lost you somewhere along the way. And that's fine. This was quite rambling, but I hope I've made my point. Disagree? Then write in the comments section. And go fuck yourself. Or go "make love" to yourself. Does that make you feel better?

I'm trying to take Kevin's suggestion about not posting too often to heart, but when I have an idea and feel motivated to write about it, I definitely want to do so. In this case, I'd like to make an impassioned plea:

At a high-level, that plea is for everyone to think about how what they do can affect others. But that's very vague and a little too generic and lame for me, so I'll narrow it down a bit: When getting on or off an airplane, move your ass.

You think I'm kidding, but I'm not. For some reason, in airports, I think that humanity is at its worst. At the very least, common sense goes out the window. I firmly believe that one of the main reasons airlines have to lie about arrival and departure times, and add 30 extra minutes to every flight is because people take so damn long getting on the plane.

Maybe I'm just being overly nostalgic, but once upon a time, I believe, you just got on a plane. No boarding rows 25-30, then 20-25, etc. (At least, that's how I think it was when I was a kid.) But, airlines have been forced to using this boarding method because, in theory, it's faster. Now, one reason that things take longer is that the planes have gotten smaller, and so people have to hunt around for places to store their luggage. On the other hand, if airlines actually enforced the "1 carry-on, and it's gotta be smaller than a lunchbox", that wouldn't be an issue either.

Here's what I do when I get on a plane: Shove my one bag under the seat. Maybe I'll put my jacket into the overhead bin. (I'll cram it in - I don't have to search for a spot.) Then, I sit down. That's it. I've already removed whatever I'm going to need from my jacket and placed it in my hand. I've usually also already removed my jacket. I don't look in every overhead bin from the front of the plane to my seat, trying to find the optimal storage for my go-kart, or whatever silly thing I brought on board. I just sit down.

It's amazing to me how thoughtless people are. They stand there shouting across the rows, trying to decide if they should switch seats with their husband, who is 12 rows back. Maybe he has to come up the aisle, against the traffic, so they can discuss it more in depth. Some lady has to root around in her pocketbook for her Tic Tacs before she can stow it in the overhead bin. Think, people. Plan ahead. And sit the hell down.

Why do I care about this so much? Well, because if you take the effects cumulatively, over all the people that pocketbook lady is holding up, it's actually significant. On a typical plane, let's say there are 25 rows, with 5 people to a row. That's 125 people. Let's say that each of them, on average, takes just 30 seconds longer to sit down than they should. (Pocketbook lady averages out five people like me.) Add that up, and it's an hour. Of course, multiple people can sit down at the same time, so it never takes that long, but still, you can see how it would add up quickly.

Of course, this time is already built into the flight. Everyone has to sit down, and you're likely not going anywhere until you were scheduled to leave anyways, so hurrying people up here, while it would be nice, doesn't really gain you anything. The big win is in "deplaning", or, as I like to call it, "getting off of the plane."

I've never understood why it takes so long to empty a plane. You get up. You grab your stuff. Maybe you can't move into the aisle, but you certainly can be ready to go. This should all be done between the time the seatbelt light goes off (unless you're like me and just take the darn thing off as soon as you land) and when the door is actually opened. Usually this is at least a minute or two.

Once again, though, people dawdle. And in this case, unlike getting on the plane, no one can get off the plane until you do. People are shouting back and forth, placing cell phone calls, going against traffic to get the bag they had to cram in the way back of the plane because it was too darn big to fit anywhere else, etc.

In this case, though, delays have a much worse cumulative effect. Let's approximate 120 people on the plane, and that each person takes just 10 seconds longer to get off the plane than they should. It is a faster process than getting on the plane, after all. Add up 10 seconds over 120 people and that's just 20 minutes total. But not really. It's actually only 10 seconds for the first person, but 20 minutes for the last person. On average, it's 10 minutes per person wasted. 120 people * 10 minutes = 1200 person-minutes = 20 person-hours. Thrown out the window. Think about what you could do in 20 hours. And every flight wastes that amount of time. Just because people don't think.

I'm probably less tolerant than I should be of slow people, but my tolerance is a direct inverse of the total number of people waiting for said slow person. So if it's just a slow person at the checkout line in the supermarket, and they take an extra minute or two because they insist on paying in nickels, then ok, I'm annoyed, but it's just a minute or two. I don't really have anywhere THAT important to be. Go on, pay with your nickels. But if you're holding up a line of 100, well, sirree, you better have something really important to do. If we could only channel the cumulative frustration into one giant expletive, maybe it would help these people realize their thoughtlessness.

So, all I ask is that the next time you fly on a plane, optimize! Plan ahead! Put all the crap you need into one bag and shove it under your seat. Take your coat off ahead of time. Take the crap out of the coat pockets. Don't carry on stuff that won't fit in the bins without a crowbar, or that you can't lift without dropping on your head and critically injuring yourself. Do it for me. Do it for all of the other people in line behind you. Do it for all of humanity. Those 20 person-hours could be the 20 person-hours that cure cancer.

I'm making up for a lack of a long, deep post with a couple short, shallow ones.

I've talked previously about my distaste of cliched stories and unoriginal plots. However, there's a hazard of too much originality, and that's contrivance. A story has to feel like it could actually have occurred. I'm big proponent of "willful suspension of disbelief", but there's definitely a line at which the viewer becomes no longer willful, and becomes a hostage of their suspension of disbelief.

However, sometimes, you just have to buy the whole story, before you're even involved. For instance, I would hope that no one went to see "Armageddon" expecting a realistic depiction of what the world would do if an asteroid were going to strike the Earth. Many of the reviews claimed it was unrealistic and melodramatic. Did they watch the previews? I don't know of anyone who expected to see a documentary on asteroids going in. They wanted to see shit blow up and people overact and glib one-liners in the face of certain disaster. And it delivered exactly that - I think "Armageddon" is actually a good movie - it accomplishes exactly what it tries to.

But there's another part here - when a movie is less on target than "Armageddon", or less obvious about its intent. Often, this occurs in crime movies, or mysteries - where there are so many cute twists and turns, and everything gets wrapped up nicely in the end. Take any generic thriller - "Red Dragon", "Along Came A Spider", "Goldeneye", even. They work out so properly, or inevitably, a character comes back around to conveniently fix things - usually, it makes you want to throw your disbelief out the window because it's all too convenient, and clearly something happens just to keep the story moving along. But in these cases, I have a theory - "The Natural Selection of Plotlines", that assuages my conscience whenever I think too much about these movies.

Let's take a quality movie like L.A. Confidential, for instance. (I'm trying to pick a movie that a lot of people have seen. If you haven't seen it, and really don't want to know what happens, then stop reading.) There are a lot of places in the movie where the story could have just stopped - Jack Vincennes (Kevin Spacey) could die before saying "Rollo Tamasi". Bud White (Russell Crowe) and Ed Exley (Guy Pearce) could easily decide to fight to the death and not team up together to take down the Chief of Police. Or what if Bud White doesn't get lucky and find Buzz Meeks' corpse under the house? At any of these points, the movie would have essentially stopped. There are tons of such places in a lot of different movies. In the very good movies, you never think twice about it - everything seems so natural, it's not feasible that the story would have happened any other way. Sometimes, though, if you think too much, the movie falls apart. And that's where my theory comes in.

In the real world, there are billions and billions of people, and even more stories about them and how they interact and how their lives intersect. Somewhere, in one of these stories, you have White, Exley, and Vincennes-like characters, in a very similar situation, but they don't find Meeks' body, and the investigation ends. Somewhere, you have similar characters and similar situations, and they find Meeks' body, but then the Chief kills Vincennes instantly, without him saying anything, and Exley doesn't suspect anything. Somewhere, in another similar situation with similar characters, Exley does suspect something, but gets in a fight with White and goes to find the Chief himself, and gets himself killed, and the Chief gets away with it. But who wants to watch these stories? So, the process of Natural Selection at work - the interesting plotlines rise to the top, and they only seem contrived because the contrived ones are the ones that are more interesting and worth telling. Because who really wants to watch a movie about three tough, but very different cops who FAIL to uncover massive corruption on the police force? That story happened, just no one filmed it.

The next time you're watching "The Pelican Brief Part 12", and you start to think too much, I hope this little theory easies your conscience.

I'm torn. Do I post because I think I should? Or do I only post when I feel like it? Sometimes, I don't have anything pressing to say. Sometimes, I do have thoughts running around, but I'm feeling lazy, and expressing them all in a coherent manner will just take too much work. As you might have noticed, I can be quite verbose. But I also think that it's good "exercise", if you will, and that I shouldn't get lazy. I should be disciplined and try to post everyday. Still, maybe that's a good way to end up with a blog filled with substance-less crap like this post.

Ok, I'll admit, I'm a moderate fan of reality shows. I know they're trashy. Worse than trashy, to me, is that they're lowest-common-denominator programming. When most of the American public tends to like something, I'm immediately skeptical. And I know it's cynical, but I don't really like to be lumped with the general public. But, in this case, I'm right in the thick of them. Of course, I know that I try to rationalize it - I'm not of a fan of those "bad" reality shows like the Bachelor or Joe Millionaire. I just like the "classy" ones like Survivor and The Amazing Race. See? Not that bad. Except, I know they're essentially all the same junk.

What's amusing is that the "reality" shows are becoming so forced and scripted that they're starting to developed their own cliches. Alliances, betrayals, character archetypes. It's amazing how quick it becomes entrenched. But one difference in reality shows is that there's a much tighter feedback loop - the same people who are familiar with these concepts are the ones that are acting them out in the next season. So it allows them to more quickly play against type, or try to buck convention, or "win" whatever game they're playing by setting standard expectations and then defying them. It can quickly become confusing, but it can just as easily become nauseating, because so many of these people are so self-aware, there's not a "real" moment among them.

I guess, once again I'm rationalizing - trying to claim that some of these shows are worthwhile and a bit "above" the fray" because there are multiple levels of psychology going on by the participants and the producers. I'd like to say that I only like the shows because I'm looking for those rare moments in which the shows achieve postmodern nirvana, but I'd be lying. Watching stupid people bicker can be just as fun.

However, it is true that there are some outstanding incidents of meta-reality that I have enjoyed while watching these shows. Maybe I'll have a explicit example to illustrate what I'm talking about once the newest show I'm interested in kicks off - "Survivor All-Stars". Think about it - previous participants of different series Survivor are going to compete against each other yet again. Assuming they've all watched the other episodes, they should know an amazing amount about each other. This is quite different from most reality shows, in which the participants know nothing about the other contestants. These players not only have seen how the others play the game, but they've seen the "aftermath" - the public persona of the person outside of the game - since most of these people have gone on to become at least F-list celebrities. It should prove interesting, I hope. At the very least, maybe there will be a fist fight.

So, I spent today watching the football playoffs and it was quite enjoyable. However, I'd like to discuss that never ceases to amaze me. Let me set the scene, first: It was very cold outside. Ok, that's not relevant, but I thought I'd mention it again. At any rate, I have digital cable, and I get HDTV through it. I also have a wide-screen, HD-ready TV, so the difference in quality between HD and normal cable is quite noticeable. It's pretty sweet-looking. The first comment I have is that HD has been around for a while - at least three years - so it should have been relatively mastered by the broadcasters by now, one would think.

CBS, ABC, and NBC all have broadcasts in HD. Hell, even PBS has HD broadcasts. Not everything is broadcast in HD - mostly sporting events. CBS does most of their primetime in HD. NBC does the Tonight Show. There may be more. What about FOX? No, FOX still hasn't figured out how to broadcast in HD. They show plenty of sporting events - baseball, football, hockey. Certainly, those events would look quite sharp in HD. But nooo...they can't figure it out. They do broadcast on the HD channel in "FOX Widescreen", but for some reason they just haven't upgraded to HD. It's pretty lame. But, honestly, it's not that much worse than HD - it's "DVD quality". Well, also, sometimes it's really fuzzy and glitchy, but it's FOX. What do you expect?

What amuses me to no end is that all of the channels, but especially FOX, haven't figured out how to properly format the widescreen broadcast, HD or no HD. You know the little transparent logos that every network now has, to let you know what channel you're watching? Usually they're in the lower-right corner of the screen. Well, on FOX, and CBS, and sometimes other stations, the logo is too far to the right, so it gets cut off. It's as if they took the normal broadcast and guessed where the logo should go, and screwed up. I don't know if the local affiliate is responsible for this logo, but doesn't someone watch these broadcasts? You'd think at least once in the two years that I've had HD, they would have looked at the broadcast and say, "Hey, that logo's in the wrong place! Let's fix it so we doin't look like idiots!" Nope, no such luck. So here are the possible options in my mind: One is that my television is like no one else's TV and is somehow cutting off part of the image. I don't think so - the ratio looks correct and other channels (ABC, sometimes, and all of the cable HD channels) look fine. Another option is that no one responsible for the broadcast has ever actually looked at it. That CAN'T be the case, can it? So, the other thing I can think of is that they simply don't possess the advanced technology require to put the logo in the right place. And I'm left thinking I'm watching the "FO" network.

Amazingly, that's not the extent of their ineptitude. Maybe it's better described as laziness, but either way, the network comes off looking bad. In-camera images usually look great - I'm seeing more of the picture than someone else would. It's sharp and vastly superior for viewing sports. But, along with any sports come the little graphics - statistics, the "Fox Box" in the upper corners, the side bars, the intros and wipes. And most of the time, especially on Fox, these are all formatted for non widescreen TVs. I can kind of understand it - why do the graphics twice? Well, I'll tell you why - it makes you look lazy and pathetic.

So, the end result is that all of these snazzy graphics take up only the middle 75% of the screen. There will be bars across the bottom or top that suddenly stop before they get to the edge. But the best is that the "Fox Box" will be in the upper part of the screen, but not nearly in the right corner - like I said, it's about 75% of the way there. It just looks goofy. And, the FOX logo in the bottom right is also located only 75% of the way to the edge. But didn't I just say that it was far to the right and cut off? Yes, I did. It's in BOTH places. So there's a logo 75% of the way to the right edge, and there's one about 110% to the right edge, cutting off the "X".

Is it that hard to do one thing different for the widescreen broadcast and one for the regular broadcast? ESPN can do it right. So can ABC and NBC some of the time. You broadcast the same picture - I understand - instead of adding the Fox Box and logo BEFORE adding the picture itself, add it afterwards. And put it in the right place. These are BILLION dollar networks. Stop making it look like it was produced in my high school TV production room.

It is really cold outside. Like, really, really cold. I have no explanation for this. It might make me believe in God, actually. I think he's smiting us. And, honestly, it's working, cuz I'm willing to do whatever it takes to make it warm again. Just send me a sign!

My DVD player sucks.

I was all excited when I bought it, because it was progressive scan. This was probably three years ago, when everything wasn't progressive scan, and DVD players actually cost more than thirty dollars. I had just obtained a new big-screen television, and the difference between progressive scan and interlaced was quite obvious.

And now? It's a hunk of junk. I have a hunch about how it got that way - let's just say that someone who will remain unnamed left it on for a few days - but that doesn't excuse the fact that it's really annoying to use. Let me explain.

First of all, it doesn't open. I don't understand this part. If the thing can turn on, it should be able to open. Well, it does open - about 5% of the time you press the open button. What kind of machine isn't deterministic? So, in order to put in a DVD, I need to stand there and push the open button approximately 20 times. I have to wait a second between each push, too, otherwise it won't work. Sometimes, I get lucky and it opens on the first three tries. Sometimes, I can stand there for five minutes.

But that's just step one. Unfortunately, when it does open, it shuts immediately. Basically, this means it takes two hands to operate the player: One to constantly press the open button, and then one to catch the tray when it comes out and hold it open. Then, I have to use the button-pushing hand to actually place the DVD in the tray. Usually, when I let the tray go, it closes automatically, but sometimes it remains open, and then I either have to force it back in, or press the open button until it closes.

Ok, so the DVD's in there. Great. Now, I just need it to play. Well, that doesn't work either. In fact, that's the feature that works the worst. Surprising, isn't it, that anything could work worse then the who opening-closing functionality, eh?

Playing, in fact, is similar to opening, in that I have to press the play button multiple times. Usually, I can hear it spinning up, and then it just dies back down. However, I've gotten the point where I know if it's going to work, because it emits this high-pitched pseudo-ding. Most of the time, I just sit there, pressing the button. I'd say this works approximately 2% of the time.

One I've done those four things (open, insert disc, close, play), it works like a charm. No problems at all! Play, pause, menu, all works great. Not stop. Well, stop works fine - but then play has the aforementioned problems. The picture and sound are great!

So, you might ask, why in hell don't I just throw it away? For some reason, I can't bring myself to pitch it. I mean, the important part - the part that actually plays the movie - works fine! Furthermore, I remember how impressed I was with it when I got it. I guess I'm just sentimental. Repairing it is out of the question - I might as well get a new one. You can get a pretty good DVD player these days for seventy bucks.

Ultimately, the net effect of this has been that I watch less movies. It's just too much of a chore to start the damn thing up. Maybe I should start thinking of it like a slot machine. In all honestly, I think that's what it morphed into. Maybe it's a slot machine, trapped in the body of a DVD player, and its finally beginning to blossom into its true self. Maybe I should get a therapist for it. Because, honestly, it's random enough that it could be a slot machine. The few times where I can get it to open, close, and play, all with one button push per operation - Woohoo! I win! And to prove it, I get the little pseudo-dingy sound. I think I'm on to something...time to break the f'in thing into pieces and see precisely what's going on in there.

So, last night I was watching the Celebrity Poker Challenge on Bravo. I'm not a huge poker fan, but I am a gambling fan, and I'm also reasonably entertained by watching celebrities do real-life things. Furthermore, the some of the celebrities participating in this event are ones I actually respect - Don Cheadle and David Cross, to name two. Some reasonably big names participated as well - Martin Sheen and Ben Affleck, for instance. Of course, there were also some washed up people - Tom Green comes to mind.

There have been about 4 or 5 episodes so far, and I've actually been surprised at the level of play. Most of the players have been pretty decent. A couple have played full-tilt - betting very aggressively, and over their head, somewhat befitting the arrogance one would expect out of a star. (Coolio's play is one of the best examples of this, but he's also probably one of the lower-wattage stars that participated.) Also, some clearly just got roped into playing because of their stardom, and agreed to do it because some of the proceeds went to charity. Martin Sheen really had no idea what he was doing, but at least he admitted as such. Perhaps I shouldn't be surprised - many of these stars are pretty cognizant of their public image, and likely wouldn't agree to play poker on TV if it was likely to embarrass them.

Which brings me to Scott Stapp. There's a decent chance you haven't heard of Scott Stapp, and if that's the case, then consider yourself lucky. He's the lead singer of Creed, one of the most insipid and annoying bands in recent history. I'm sure you've heard their stuff. For a while (maybe 2-3 years ago), they were the hottest thing going - kind of this very lame Christian pseudo-hard rock, pseudo-alternative, pseudo-grunge, whiny type of music that seems to be very standard nowadays. But they really took it to a different level - very self-important, and pretty darn talentless. And of course, the frontman, Scott Stapp, was the embodiment of this music, or at least seemed so in the music videos - posturing for the cameras, holding his arms out to the sky, wrenching up his face, while half-howling, half-groaning about his "Arms wide open". Anyways, that's enough about their music. Suffice it to say that I detest them - I'd say they probably were on the top three list of bands that I hate.

So, I wasn't too excited to see him on the show, and was pretty worried for a bit that he might do well. This brings me to an interesting segue - why should I care about if Scott Stapp is good at poker or not? As arbitrary as my opinion may seem, I feel that people with talent should be rewarded. And I think he has none, and the fact that he is a millionaire rock star is already injust. I'd much rather see a person whose talents I respect win something. Fortunately, Scott didn't let me down.

His play was "blustery", for lack of a better word, as is his music. He THOUGHT he knew what he was doing, confidently throwing down his chips and betting into hand after hand. In his little "interview", he was upset that David Cross had told him he was out of his element (Cross is actually kind of an ass, but he's a talented ass.) and that had upset him, so he was going to show him. He hung around for the first few rounds, getting lucky on a couple of hands. Since he was betting all the time, when he had good cards, it turned out to be a good move.

Soon, it became apparent that he would be on everything half-decent. Furthermore, if he went into a hand, he would NEVER fold. It didn't matter what others bet, it didn't matter how many other people were playing, it didn't matter if the cards that were turned up (they were playing Texas Hold'em, so there were 5 common cards, and 2 in their hand, for those of you that don't know the game) benefitted him or not - like a stubborn baby, he stayed in.

Ok, so maybe he was just a stubborn guy - plenty of people are stubborn. No, not only was he stubborn, he was stupid. He didn't know the rules of the game! If you don't know the rules of the game, don't bet as much! Furthermore, he would get all indignant when he lost, because he didn't know which hands beat which hands. In a stunning example of stupidity, the common cards (maybe you should click on the link above if you don't know how to play) revealed a pair. He had nothing in his hand - so his final hand was this pair that was in the common cards. Of course, everyone had that pair - they're common! So when the cards were turned up, he was trying to figure out if he had won. Someone else had two pair - one from the common cards and one from their hand. There's actually a dealer there, who tells you what the result of the hand is, but he was charging ahead, trying to figure it out. As the other players flipped their cards and tried to explain why he had lost, he proudly stated, "I have a pair". Well, Scott, EVERYONE has a pair - they're common cards! When someone else pointed out that they had two pair, he just shouted with exasperation, and then, when he realized what he was supposed to do, congratulated the winner on their luck. I would think that the friends of this guy would tell him that he likely doesn't want to expose his poor poker player skills and extreme obtuseness on national television, but maybe he's surrounded by sycophants, or maybe his poker-playing buddies wanted to talk him up so he'd keep playing and they could keep winning money. I can't imagine that many Creed fans were turned off, either - I bet most of them think he got robbed by that bastard David Cross.

Am I surprised that he's actually an idiot? No, I'm not. Stapp went out second, and Cross won that round. Somehow, my extreme dislike of Creed was even more justified. Of course, like I said, David Cross also proved himself to be somewhat unlikeable - kind of an aloof, arrogant clown. Do I like his comedy less? No, not really. Would I appreciate Creed more if it turned out that Scott Stapp was smarter than a bag of pencil shavings? I really doubt it.

I don't know why I care what these people are like in "real life" - inasmuch as a television show can show you real life - but I do to some extent. In general, I'd like to think that these people are given talent and therefore are able to become rich because they deserve it, due to the quality of their character and their intelligence and creativity. Unfortunately, often, as we all know, that's not the case. Sometimes it is, and we all feel good about it - Tom Hanks, for instance, really does seem to be a decent guy. And, hey, he's a great actor! Edward Norton - also a great actor. Is he a nice guy? Well, it seems a lot of people find him self-centered and difficult to work with. That's too bad. But I'll still go see his movies. And I probably won't feel too guilty about it. But if YOU like Creed, for shame. For Shame!

I realized that the few posts have been a bit more serious than I ever intended this blog to be. I actually had another topic in mind for my tone tonight, but I've decided to post something a little more lighthearted. Just because I say it's lighthearted, though, doesn't mean that I'm not as firm in my stance. And that stance is that spamming should be considered a felony.

This is not to minimize the heinousness of other felonies. But hear me out. First of all, think of spamming as theft. It's theft of time and bandwidth. As well all know, time is money, and, well, so is bandwidth. Grand larceny is a felony (I think, and I'm too lazy to look it up), so why isn't spamming on a large scale considered a felony?

To tell you the truth, I think spamming is a bit worse than grand larceny - in many cases of larceny, someone has to concoct a plan, and execute it - it takes at least a bit of work, and frankly, we're all pretty impressed by an enterprising thief. They definitely deserve bonus points for creativity. On the other hand, how easy is it to send out spam? It's absurdly easy to steal my time and inbox space. Not only that, but have you ever actually looked at most of the spam? It's usually the lamest advertising I've ever seen. Blatantly pandering and completely unoriginal, I don't even understand why it's ever effective at all. And there are usually tons of misspellings and plenty of broken links and low-quality graphics. Does anyone click on them? Maybe those people are the ones we should lock up - after all, if they didn't exist, then eventually no spam would ever be sent. Of course, because it's so easy to send, there's really no natural selection at work - TV commercials may be pretty uninspiring most of the time, but because there's a whole bunch of overhead in creating them, usually they're moderately interesting to watch at least once. But spam? It just sucks. And it needs to be eliminated.

Secondly (there's been a long delay since "first of all"), making it a felony would probably be a big enough deterrent to stop people. Most would likely still be able to get away with it, but would it really be worth it at that point? Would you risk going to jail for years at a time in order to send out a million penis enlargement advertisements? I know, I know, enforcement would be an issue, but just allocate one FBI dude to the problem and one prosecutor to the case. Even if there's a slight, but very concrete, risk of being convicted of a felony, it would be a deterrent.

The other approach is a technological one, and I've heard plenty of ideas. One idea is to make it more expensive in terms of computer cycles - if your computer has to waste some cycles performing a task in order to send out an email, then a spammer might not have the computational power to spam everyone, day and night. At the very least, it would stem the flow. I'm not sure how feasible this is - there's always a way around roadblocks you throw up on a network, and it also seems like it'll end up being more complicated than just requesting the solution to a problem before allowing the email through.

There used to be a silly email going around about how congress was going to pass an email tax. It was fake, of course (as are 99% of all forwards), but I'm not so sure it's a bad idea. I generally send email and get email from a relatively small group of people. Why not just use a "whitelist", you say? Well, frankly, I worry that if I get used to a whitelist, I might end up ignoring emails from people not on the whitelist - people who change their address, new people I meet, addresses I forget to include, etc. You might claim that there's a small risk of this, but it's larger than I'm willing to accept. Emailing programs are software - they should do what I want without me having to work too hard.

So, what if we all started using an email client that charged people, say, 1 cent (or even less), to send an email to someone? Now, if I know someone, I can tell my client to never charge them. This would be the equivalent of a whitelist. If I forget a couple of emails, no biggie - it's just a couple of cents. What about the people who I haven't yet met? Well, that's also just going to cost them a couple of cents to mail me, at least for the first time. And if my client's smart enough, maybe it'll automatically "whitelist" them if I reply to them. Maybe it'll end refund them the cost of sending the email - minus a small fee for the person who developed the software, of course.

It's probably not a foolproof system - go ahead and poke holes in it if you'd like, but I think it might be a start. But I write software by day - I'm certainly not going to be doing it as night as well. Instead, I'll be petitioning congress.

I'm not as motivated to write tonight, but I feel like I need to nurse my infant blog in its younger stages, so here goes. Hopefully I'll keep it short.

I'm now 26 years old, and I feel like I've seen a lot of movies and television, heard a lot of songs and stories, and read a lot of magazines and books. I am an admitted insatiable media consumer, and so maybe I'm a bit above the media-familiarity curve for someone my age - but not necessarily to an extreme amount. Furthermore, I imagine that compared to the average 26-year-old from 10 years ago, I've certainly been exposed to more media, given that accessibility is increasing all the time. There are more movies produced each year, more TV stations available, more magazines publish, and of course the internet continues to expand as well.

Where am I going with all this? Well, despite the fact that I've been exposed to a lot of media, I'm still stunned with the lack of originality I see on a daily basis in those media I recently mentioned. In particular, I'm talking about TV and movie fiction, but it extends to other forms as well. What boggles my mind is that I'm only 26, and many of the people who write these shows or produce these movies are twice my age, and should have been exposed to much more media that I ever have. They should know what's cliche and what's trite, and try to avoid it. Maybe it's just a generation gap, but for me, one of the biggest sins a story can commit is to be predictable, unoriginal, or trite. And it seems to be happening with increasing frequency.

Maybe it's just my perception. Maybe I'm seeing more and more different stories being told, as an such, it becomes increasingly likely that I'll see something I've seen before. But hasn't this problem been around since the beginning of time? Didn't the previous generation have much more familiarity with overused conventions than the generation preceeding it? Or maybe it's just recently that being conventional has become a cardinal sin - chalk it up to the so-called "cynicism" of my age bracket.

Don't get me wrong - certain conventions are good and useful. And usually, if I'm immersed in a well-told story, the quality of the telling will mitigate any negative impression I have because of the triteless of the tale. But so many tales try so hard to be original and fail so miserably. And stories don't necessarily need a "Memento" or "Usual Suspects"-like twist to maintain my interest, but so many try so hard, and are not only obviously trying, but obvious failing, and just end up giving in to standard devices.

I don't think storytelling is easy. I like to write, and I know how hard fiction can be. Not only that, but I can certainly appreciate the comfort of a well-told, unoriginal, trite tale, wrapped in a glitzy package. I appreciate my share of mediocre movies - Independence Day, Armageddon, Mission:Impossible 2 - I won't deny that they have a place on my shelf. But these movies don't aim high - they almost revel in the cliches and mostly just try to have fun, winking at the audience that we all know what's coming, but we enjoy it nonetheless. Compare that to a movie like Gladiator or Shanghai Noon - movies that take themselves seriously (Shanghai Noon seriously tries to be funny), but are so derivative and overwrought, it makes you wonder if the writers have ever watched another movie in their lives.

I don't really want to get into movie reviews here, I just am constantly surprised at the lack of attempts at originality. My dislike of triteness carries over into my daily life. Maybe people think that makes me somewhat cynical, but I'm actually a very optimistic person. I just can't stand comments or emotions that seem canned or forced. It's pervasive in the fervent speeches of politicians, and with the war going on, it's becoming more and more frequent and less and less tasteful. People are proclaiming their pride in America not because it's heartfelt (when it is, I certainly respect it), but because it's what they're supposed to do. It's on a smaller scale, too. People proclaim their fondness for alcohol, not because they necessarily like it so much, but because you're supposed to talk about how much you enjoy it. Every movie or story that feels compelled to have a "surprise twist" ending that only makes a minimal amount of sense doesn't realize that by trying to act extremely unconventional, it's only being more conventional than before. It's everywhere - music that tries to be offensive, teenagers that try to be obnoxious, DJs that try to be cutting edge, Men's magazines that try to be loutish and misogynist, etc. It's been done before. Please, find something new to say. And mean it.

I'm feeling a bit like Holden Caulfield here, and so I'm reluctant to continue, but in a way, that perfectly illustrates my point. I don't want to go ranting on about "phonies", because despite the fact that it's my honest opinion, it feels forced and trite. I imagine that's going to be another pervasive theme throughout my blog - me trying to avoid stating what's already been stated, to search for more original means of expression that the standard conventions. Maybe it's elitist, and I'll admit that when someone thinks they're being original and they're not, it comes out looking worse than if they never tried at all, but what the hell - I'll aim high. I wish others did so more often as well.

And while I'm at it, ending a blog with a pithy statement (like I kinda just tried to do) is yet one more form of what I'm railing against. It's so tempting to try it, but also kinda lame at the same time. I'll do my best to avoid succumbing to the temptation, and hope that the quality of the entire entry speaks for itself. So there. Crap, I did it again.

So, one of the things that's been on my mind recently is the concept of diversity. But when I say "diverse", I'm not using it as a euphemism for describing an area that has a lot of poor people in it, as a lot of liberals tend to do. ("That area's kinda dangerous - it's a really diverse place.") Nor do I use the word in the weak sense that many conservatives have pigeonholed it - as a lame euphemism for affirmative action, or a meaningless way to describe some nebulous beneficial property. Rather, I think it's a very specific, valuable quality, and all too rare.

The dictionary definition of "diversity" is a little too vague for my liking. Let me share my main experiences with diversity with you: I grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland. As it turns out, Silver Spring is a giant area in Montgomery County, Maryland. Unlike a lot of other areas, Maryland is much more oriented towards counties, rather than cities. Silver Spring can loosely be defined as "anything in Montgomery County that is not in another city". Thus, my personal experiences with Silver Spring may differ significantly from yours (if you have any). Here are the official demographic statistics on Silver Spring, and they seem pretty accurate to me. Certainly diverse in age, but amazingly so in race. However, my experiences were a little more specific.

I imagine the typical person would look at these demographics and make some assumptions about what Silver Spring might look like. In some cases they'd be right, and in some cases they'd be wrong. I definitely come from an upper-middle class upbringing, and my neighborhood differed vastly from some of the other neighborhoods that are also in Silver Spring. But I can attest to the fact that my subcommunity was still diverse in and of itself. My high school - Springbrook High School - had approximately 2000 students, significantly less than the 75000 citizens in Silver Spring. Its current demographics reflect the diversity of Silver Spring pretty accurately - right now, it is 37.8% African-American, 21.3% Asian-American, 18.2% Latino, and 22.6% White. It's been 8 years since I graduated Springbrook, and the diversity has probably increased since then, but I can attest to the fact that its demographics were quite similar while I was there. The fact that I'm very proud of is that Springbrook High School was a fantastic school. It prepared me very well for college, and while I was there, it was ranked as one of the top 100 High Schools in the nation, by Redbook magazine, I believe. It's not a magnet school, it's not a private school - it's just a very diverse, effective, high school.

And I believe it's more effective because it's diverse. I'm a white, raised Jewish, now an atheist. I went to school with Latinos, Asians, African-Americans, Indian-Americans, and many other races. They were Catholic, Jewish, Hindi, Buddhist, Muslim, and many other religions. No, we didn't sit around discussing our differences. Yes, as it turned out, many of my closest friends were Jewish, and a lot of them were white - but I also had friends and acquaintances of all races and religions, and my classes were just as diverse as the school itself. As far as I know, we had relatively little racial turmoil in the school, and we had no apparent problems with crime, drugs, or violence. Maybe I just kept my nose clean, but I would imagine that if the school was anything like what people would assume a school of that demographic would be, I wouldn't have been able to avoid those issues.

The funny thing is, I didn't really appreciate this diversity until it was absent. I went to a relatively diverse college, and joined a fraternity that was also moderately diverse in race, and quite diverse in the backgrounds of its members. It wasn't until I was near graduation and interviewed at Lockheed-Martin in Colorado that I realized how important diversity was to me. I went to Lockheed and talked to a lot of different people. All of them were white. Many of them were over fifty years old. Almost all of them were males. I was shocked. The work could have been interesting, but after leaving, I realized that I didn't want to live in an area like that - I needed the different backgrounds, the different opinions, the different beliefs. It wasn't anything tangible about what I would be missed - I just felt like I would be bored and not challenged. I didn't even appreciate the diversity that I enjoyed until I was missing it.

I ended up taking a job back near my hometown - in Bethesda, MD, one of the most diverse areas in the US. Of course, there were other factors that drove me to take a job back near home, but the increased diversity of the area was definitely an important part of it.

If you ask me to explain what's so nice about diversity, I don't think that I can precisely state it. I think part of it is that I like being challenged - I like to understand how people think differently and why they think that way. I believe that the best way to understand and validate your own thoughts and opinions is to hear varied arguments and adjust your thoughts accordingly. I don't understand how some people can let themselves become so firmly rooted in their own beliefs without ever encountering any dissenting voices - it's kind of like wandering through life with your eyes shut and ears plugged. I want to meet people richer than me and poorer than me. I want to meet people raised by two loving parents, and people raised by one elderly great-uncle. And I think that only by living in an environment with many different types of people can one truly learn about the world and appreciate what one has.

Now here's where we get political. Maybe you read the previous part and thought it was absurd, but I think it's pretty logical and most people would agree with it. If not, I'd love to hear from you. The logical extension of this argument is that diversity is a valuable quality - it enhances the living experience, and the learning experience. And so, if diversity in and of itself is inherently valuable, then there you get your argument for affirmative action, at least in the college environment. Forget the "retribution" argument for now - the argument that minorities have been kept down for so long that they need and deserve the push that affirmative action gives them. Also forget the "racism still exists" argument for now - the argument that no matter how progressive a society we think we are, racism is still present, both overtly and covertly. I think both of these arguments are valid to a degree, but let's ignore them for the time being.

Given that diversity is valuable and enhances the learning experience, especially in a child's formative years, and given that much academic and social learning occurs in college, there's a compelling argument for affirmative action to be used in admitting students to college. The counter-argument is that of "fairness". Assuming that you can grade a prospective student's quality on a one-dimensional scale between 1 and 100, then how can we say that accepting anything but the top X students on that scale is fair? If a given white guy scores 90, and a given black gal scores 85, how is it fair to the guy if the gal is accepted instead of him. Well, I'll tell you how:

First of all, let's say that there's a minimum quality score that a student has to have in order to have the school consider him or her. Any student below that score - let's say it's 80 - has been determined to be unacceptable - he or she will likely not succeed at the school. Any student above that score, will likely succeed. Yes, this is very coarse, but it's probably not too far from the truth. So then the question is what a school's obligation is. Is a college a means, or an end? Is its goal to admit the top X students? Or is it to educate X students as much as possible? I think it's obviously the latter. Furthermore, I think schools have an obligation to create a community that will enhance that learning experience, and diversity is a critical component of that. If the school determined that both the aformentioned white guy and black gal will likely succeed at the school, then which one is more likely to contribute to the community as a whole? I'd argue that the black gal will more likely contribute to the diversity (assuming standard US demographics are pervasive across the applicant pool) of the entire community, and given that both applicants will likely succeed, I'd choose the black gal over the white guy. Obviously, I can't do this every time - ideally, the selection process takes diversity into account in a more thorough and fair manner than the process I described, but I think I've made my point.

There are obviously further issues at hand here, some of which I mentioned, and some of which I didn't. Maybe I'll dicuss them later, but one last thing I'd like to mention is what brought this issue to the front of my mind - my recent trip to Telluride. Once again, going to Colorado, and going skiing at that, gave me another image of a "diversity-less" place, and what it was missing. I had a great time, and it was a beautiful locale, but the whole town set me a little on edge. It's isolated and consists of entirely white, seemingly privileged people, and I think it's affected the way the locals act. It wasn't overt, but an air of superiority permeated the way the locals interacted with each other and with the tourists. DC's not necessarily the friendliest of areas, but many people seemed to be neither trusting nor engaging. They were off in their own little world, enjoying their secluded little resort town. I imagined that if an African-American had walked into town, many of them would have fainted. Don't worry - for the entire week that I was there, that didn't happen. I wish it had.

Ok, so now I've created a blog.

And, to be honest, I'm not quite sure why I did so, I just know that I like writing and feel that I should have some sort of outlet for my thoughts, other than boring my friends and family with assorted tirades. Man, it's hot in this room. Writing's hard work.

Now, you can choose just to ignore what I've written, and smile and nod pleasantly when I refer to "My Blog", and I'll just assume you know what I'm talking about, while you can just be thinking about the tasty meatloaf you had for dinner last night. And everyone's happy!

But, now that you're here, and reading, permit me a few indulgences (or just stop now and ponder the meatloaf).

Why create a blog?

I think I've enjoyed writing, and expository writing at that, for a while now - probably starting in high school. But, once I went down the engineering track, despite a few opportunities in college, I really haven't had the chance to just put thoughts down on paper that weren't related to computers. In fact, I feel like the only real time I've gotten to do writing that I enjoy has been over email - and when I do write long emails about topics that interest me, I often fear that I'm boring the recipient, who likely isn't interested in what I'm writing about, or if he or she is interested, most likely doesn't have the time to devote to my long-winded pontifications. So, initially, this blog seems like a good idea to remedy that.

Kind requests

At first, I can use this blog just to write about things I'd like to enjoy. However, much like the tree falling in the forest question, is there any point if I don't tell people about it? And if I do tell people about it, will they read it? It does seem a little less convenient for people to have to go to a webpage. One way to assure that people do go to this page is by keeping it interesting or at least constantly updating. But therein lies a problem - I'd like to be able to write about whatever I feel like at the moment, or at least not write if I don't feel like it. Furthermore, in the interest of "blog purity", I'd also like to be able to write "freestyle", and not worry if I'm boring my audience. I haven't yet figured a way around these opposing interests - maintaining readership and purity of intent at the same time. While I work on that, if I've pointed you to this page, at the risk of sounding self-interested, it'd be cool if you could a) check this page from time to time, b) let me know if you find it interesting or uninteresting, c) add comments as you see fit, and d) engage me in a discussion about some of these topics if you feel motivated to do so. That's asking a lot, but if you're looking at this, you're likely someone I care about, and therefore I am likely writing these posts to share thoughts and solicit ideas about some topics. And if you've just wandered upon this page, I can't really imagine that you'd care a lot about the thoughts of some guy you don't know and will likely never meet, but nevertheless, I'd like to hear from you. Thanks.

Postmodernism

As if to prove my point about being long-winded, I do have a few more things to say. One is with regard to "meta-thoughts". I think within a few months of discovering my interest in writing, I discovered my interest in writing about storytelling. Many of the humanities classes I took in college dealt with the issue of "postmodernism" and the "meta-narrative". I guess it's sunk in, because I think it's a compelling topic, and one I'll likely devote more time to in later posts. However, I would like to point another issue I think it's important with respect to the blog, and that is about the tone - it's hard to me to avoid commenting on my commenting - that is, to stay on topic without delving into the "meta-issues" surrounding blogging. It's especially difficult without knowing who will read this and what will happen to it. While I find these issues compelling (What am I saying? Why am I saying it? What does what I'm saying say about me? Is what I'm saying trite? Overused? Does it really say something other than the written text?), I think they may often cause me to stray from any intended messages I may have. Maybe I'll include two sections in future posts - one on the particular topic, and then one on the post I just wrote. Who knows?

The Title

I intentionally put the section about postmodernism before this one, because I'm going to probably illustrate one of the points I just made, but it seems important to at least address the title of the blog somewhere, so why not in the first post? I spent about 10 seconds thinking of the name of the blog, which brings up a few questions. First of all, why did I choose this name? Well, I like puns, and I like baseball, so "In The Big Inning..." fit decently well. It's actually stolen from a Thomas Boswell book (he's a noted sports writer for the Washington Post, who has written quite a few books on baseball), but I also liked the idea that it alludes to other issues. Boswell used this pun to illustrate that God is a baseball fan, since the Bible starts this way. Heh heh. Cute, eh? And since I was starting something, "in the beginning" seemed fitting.

Upon further reflection (just while writing this), I don't know if the name has staying power - at some point, it's not going to be the "big inning" any more, and so the name won't feel as appropriate. Furthermore, because it's a pun based on a bible quote, I wonder if people might erroneously assume that this blog has something to do with organized religion. While I certainly expect to have some posts about religion, I really don't want readers to get that impression, and likely be turned off by it. Maybe I'll change the name in the future, but for now I'm stuck with it.

I feel that for a first post, this is getting long enough. Hopefully, I'll be writing more soon.