Why doesn’t the sun rise at night when you need it? (from the book Mort)

I was at Starbucks recently in McKinney, TX. It is relatively new (since just about the time I left Texas) and it has popped up in the suburban sudo strip mall that seems to be infesting the northern portions of the DFW Metroplex. You know the ones….the strip mall that matches the architecture style of the surrounding housing development. It’s projects for the middle class basically. 😉

Now before I moved to Dallas in 2000, I barely ever heard of Starbucks. And once I began visiting them I was impressed by the customer service of the places. They asked you your name, helped you with making a decision, engaged you in mindless conversation and seemed like a jolly bunch of people. At that point I think they were still riding the hippie/crunchy feeling from their coporate office in Seattle. But that was over 6 years ago.

Now, with one popping up on every other corner in the DFW metroplex, they are no longer like the neighborhood coffee shop and are now more like that uber ghetto retail outlet that I refuse to name because I do not want the mindless internet robots linking to my blog and running up their hit count. The people there, customers included, where all business. My name wasn’t asked and my order was taken quite robotically. They had a computer screen system similar to what you now see in most fast food returants to track orders and time till completion. It’s kind of sad if you ask me. I’m not saying that I am an advocate of Starbucks….because I am not anymore. They burn their coffee so that they can push the consumer that visits them to buy higher priced specialty drinks instead of getting just plain $2 coffee. They play only their sanctioned music, sell overpriced and shoddy home coffee making equipment, charge for their internet access, and have no room for anything other then what they want.
Personally, I am a fan of the quaint little coffee shop (like Tillies in Brooklyn) that makes a good cup of joe and is entrenched in the community. I am a fan of those places because of the character that they have. No doubt the same character that the original Starbucks had back when they started. Before they made that inevitable evolution into a corporate behemoth…before they realized their terrible purpose….

My point (as long winded as it might be) is that I was disappointed in my experience with Starbucks that day. I have no doubt that the ones I used to frequent closer to downtown Dallas still have some character and I hope they keep that. But I know better then that. There is no room for free-thinking in that kind of environment. There is no room for goofing off when the bottom line is the main focus. There is no room for the common man when the common man is the obstacle between the corporation and the common man’s money.

I hate this kind of realization. The point when you see that what you thought was how things were aren’t anymore. The best way to describe it is when you finally realize that movies aren’t real….when you can no longer be fooled by the ‘suspension of disbelief’. It’s that kind of realization that I hate. THe kind that kicks you in the nads and tells you the world is as fucked up as you think it is.

Today is the day after a Nor’Easter. A minor one, but annoying none the less. It dropped about 3-4 inches of snow/sleet that proceeded to freeze because of the dropping temperature.

Last evening I spent an hour and a half clearing my driveway and cleaning off my car so that it would not hinder me leaving this morning. Thankfully, all I had to do was warm up my car when I woke up this morning. Unfortunately, when I tried to use the windsheild wipers they did not move. Thinking that it was just some ice gunking up the works, I spent another 10 minutes trying to clear it out. No go. So I am here now waiting for it to be worked on at the mechanic. Good times.

On the way from the train station (where I drop off my wife everyday) to the mechanic, while I was stewing in the anger of the wipers not working, I couldn’t help looking at the condition of the scenery. The snow pushed off to the side of the highway by the snowplows, the dirty color of the snow from it’s mixing with the sand that is spread to help with traction, the condition of all the cars on the road….salt stained and somewhat covered with snow/ice that their owners didn’t have time or want to remove. That is when it dawned on me…..since the first monkeys began using tools of some sort, man stopped changing to adapt to the environment and started changing the environment to adapt to man. Some might say that for those that feel man came from monkey (or still is) this is common knowledge….but it is the moment of realization that was important. It’s like when you sort of ‘step outside yourself’ and see your life as if looking through different eyes. It can be liberating.

It makes you think though. How far can man truly push his environment until it begins to push back. How far will Mother Nature let man go before it decides that man no longer serves a purpose.

It puts the idea of my own humanity into perspective and makes me feel even less significant than I already am.

Now the thing is, do I let this destroy me or do I let this embolden me.

Am I making any sense or am I just rambling, following the many threads of my own thoughts?

edit: spelling and clarity

It’s that time of year folks….the Christmas Season. When every Tom, Dick and Harry decides that they need to upgrade/purchase a new computer. And you know what that means for me? Well it means that not only do I care that you are buying a new PC or upgrading your old one, but that I want to help you decide/purchase this wonderful new gateway to the InterWebz!!

What do you mean you sense sarcasm? Why wouldn’t I want you to give a computer to your children so that you don’t have to watch them and they can download EVERYTHING they see while browsing?? Why wouldn’t I want another monkey to create a MySpace page and color it neon pink while it plays the latest hit track from some convicted felon turned media icon?? Why wouldn’t I want to give you a computer that can be corrupted by a virus/spyware infection and used by spammers and hackers in their BotNets to make my job harder??

YOU guessed it! Because I am of a kind heart and love people, that’s why!

So, in staying with the Christmas spirit I have decided to help out everyone all at once. Here is my suggestion to you for the Perfect Christmas Computer. The following components will help to get you out on the Web and be part of the Internet Phenomenon. With the following setup you can download music, movies, whatever you want and enjoy them in multimedia bliss!

Without further ado, may I introduce…

Ranting and Raving’s Perfect Christmas Computer Suggestion

There you go folks! Consider this my gift to you.

So get your ass into your gas guzzling SUV and wait in traffic jams for hours to get to your local computer retailer and DEMAND these cutting edge computer components. Don’t let them sell you anything else! Only the best for you!

Happy Holidays!!

Because this doesn’t sound like a good idea….I mean seriously.

Honestly, I don’t see how it has hurt the country as a whole. Yes, there is the Homeland Security issue, but that can be solved by not blowing things up to prove how big your wang is.

I’m glad I left when I did, because the level of ignorance that this subject creates is enough to make want to pour chlorine into the gene pool 😉

And I won’t miss the local news “interviewing” Bill Joe Bob Yocal and getting his (or her) highly educated and thought out opinion on the matter.

When I am stopped and trying to let my passenger out, please do not beep your horn at me. I realize that I am stopping traffic, but if you are in such a god damn fucking hurry, there are 3 other fucking ways to get to the parking lot you need to get to, use one of those routes. Realize that if you choose to drive through the small and already crowded parking lot with the bus that waits for commuters parked and taking up space, you are going to run into some traffic. Please do not blow your fucking shit ass Japanese sissy car horn at me. It really pisses me off and ruins my commute to my office. I can hardly enjoy the Harry Potter audio books on my iPod when I am in a crappy mood.

Thanks

This article at Wired Online talks about evangelicals in Kenya trying to get the exihbit wording changed about evolution at the Nairobi National Museum, where some of the most compelling evidence that we are evolved from might possibly be genetically related to monkeys is displayed. My favorite part is this quote:

“When you use evolution as God’s tool in creating man in his image, you have to reckon with the fact at what stage in the evolution process does man attain to that image?” he said. “The conclusion is either God’s image is evolving or God Himself is evolving or every creature has God’s image. God could be anything and I’m afraid I cannot put my faith in a ‘changing God’ or an ‘anything God’.”

Human arrogance at it’s absolute BEST. “We created the idea of God so it cannot be/look like anything else”. Which, if you want to be a dick about it, can be used as evidence against the existence of God. If God created us (as I think almost every religion believes), who the fuck are we to say what the fuck God looks like. For all intents and purposes, these guys could be right on…noodley appendeges and all!!

I want you to know that I have been trying to write this post for the last hour to make it sound educated and maybe illicit an interesting discorse….I just cannot seem to get the words flowing. So I leave you with these two things: Take what you will from the article and my intial comment (from an hour before this was posted). I believe in something, and so does eveyone else….we just don’t all agree on what that something might be.

Secondly, this will all be a moot point once our Robot Masters arrive and enslave us all anyway. 😉

I have been in Connecticut for just about a month and I am positive the people of this state are trying to kill me. I might just be paranoid, but hear me out.

Last week, while filling up my gas tank, there was a woman on the other side who was filling her tank up WITH THE CAR RUNNING. I figured this out because she had the stereo bumping as well. Isn’t it clearly stated EVERYWHERE that the engine needs to be off? (and I checked…I casually walked up to the car and heard the engine running)

This morning I was filling up again and this guy had his car running AND was talking on his cellphone! Now I do not know how much truth there is to the cellphone/gas station explosion rumor, but still, why tempt fate?

They are trying to kill me.

This is a response to RP’s rant about Tool Fans

What you don’t understand is humanity doesn’t want to be saved, it doesn’t want heroes, it wants martyrs.

Look at Pearl Jam. They fought Ticketmaster. And when they did, where were all the fans? That’s right, you guessed it, there weren’t any. Either they were tired of the scene and the media saturated ADD monkeys wanted the next best thing, or they were pissed that Pearl Jam was being noble and fighting for a cause and not making music for them. And now where is Pearl Jam? A Martyr to the Cause

Humans bitch about these things and want an explanation because we are to afraid to figure it out for ourselves. Once we start thinking on our own, we start questioning everything around us and begin to see the horrible truth of reality. We don’t like that, so we let others make those decisions and tell us what to do. And the people who take that kind of control are not the people you want to GIVE that kind of control to. They aren’t looking out for humanity, they are looking out for themselves.

The ironic part to it all is that we do this and then we go bitching about it. But we don’t want to fix it ourselves, that would mean we’d have to start thinking for ourselves and as stated above we don’t want to do that either.

Funny, don’t you think? 😉

Title says it all. I used to live 12 miles from work and it would take me 15 minutes to get in. I now live 35 miles from work and it takes me 40 minutes to get…w/out traffic. Luckily I missed the chaos yesterday. Apparently there was a tractor trailer crash in New Haven that shutdown the highway for 9 hours and there was a car fire closer to Hartford that shutdown 2 of the lanes going southbound. The ride is boring and the radio stations in Connecticut all seem to be either easy listening or top 40 pop crap. IDR, this Elephant Graveyard beats yours hands down!

But so far that is the only thing I have to complain about. The job is good and I get lots of gadgets to play with. The people are nice and I have alot of opportunity (re: Money + Freedom) to test new software and products.

This is turning out to be a great thing…..except I do miss my fiancee 🙁