After a very long hiatus, mostly by chance, I watched an episode this past weekend.  As it turns out the show was a re-run from a few weeks back, but that isn’t really relevant to my point.

The good news is, the opening sketch was moderately funny.  But that’s where the good news ends, and everything heads south quickly.  The rest of the episode was a painfully slow downward spiral of crap culminating in one of the worst televised sketches in the history of television.

So, what we’re left with is yet another example of some TV channel telling you what “funny is”.  One can only imagine the pre-show where hot little actress Emma Stone was reviewing the script and actually agreed that making an IPad and an XBox controller “hump” was funny and she was willing to do this on live national television.  Are Hollywood actors so held-under-thumb that they’re willing to smile at the, presumably mentally retarded writers of this show, and nod in agreement to do whatever’s on paper?  Are they slaves to the opinion of the idiotic masses?  Are they indebted to their agents who, I’m assuming, are trying to prove they can get the actor to do anything?

Across the world, people from other cultures watch our television shows and apply their nature to all Americans.  Congratulations, SNL:  We may now add your heap of steaming shit to the list of real American winners like Cops, Jerry Springer, and this garbage.  How embarrassing.

What it is, what some folks are doing, what it means to you, and what you can do.

If you’ve visited WikiPedia in the last few months, you’ve undoubtedly seen the tragically massive “help us” banner at the top of the screen.

I get it.  I’m a developer, I’ve built free stuff, and let’s be honest… WikiPedia is an amazing source of information for the world and I use it ALL the time.  OK, fine.  Let’s donate some cash and I can feel good about myself.  So I clicked the $50 radio button, and that attention-grabbing sized “Please Help” button.  ”Login to PayPal” Well, that’s handy!  But wait…  What’s this?

“You cannot use this credit card for this transaction. Please use another funding source.”

What the hell does that mean?  Why can’t I use the same form of payment I use for every other good and service on the internet?  You’re seriously going to ask people to sign up for some “other” type of funding like a bank account?  OK, well let’s just add my checking… Oh.  Check book is at home in a drawer… Where it’s been for the past 5 years because WHO WRITES A CHECK ANYMORE? Oh well, I tried to help…

Politics powered by money virtually guarantees us that the people with the cash are the people with the power.  Thanks to whoever this dude is for laying it down on national TV.  Couldn’t have said it better myself.

Then I realized that this video is UNEDITED.  That’s actually Rick Perry, actually saying those things.

I guess the gloves are off, and we’re on to the next chapter of crazy.

Here’s the link to YouTube

Another Christian fundamentalist causing pain and suffering.  We’ll just never get past this, will we?

Here’s the news article.

The first spaceman says, “The dominant life forms on the Earth planet have developed satellite-based weapons.”
The second alien, who looks exactly like the first, asks, “Are they an emerging intelligence?”
The first spaceman says, “I don’t think so…They have them aimed at themselves.”

Great joke, but not mine.  Original post was here

All prophets are false.

We’ll probably never be free of soothsayers, future-tellers, prophets, forecasters, or oracles who’s only point in existence is to suck the last dollar out of your wallet, and pin your last hope on their every word.

Why?  Because you uneducated, back-woods, Bachmann loving ass-hats are too intellectually invested in your backward religion and race hating bullshit to let the next generation figure out morality for themselves.  We’re staring down the barrel of yet another generation of sheep being led by wolves.

Another generation of uneducated, misled, and just plain ignorant Americans is on the rise.  And you fuckers let it happen.  We all let it happen, and the entire world will suffer for it in blood and agony just as we have a thousand times before.

How many more “witches” do we have to burn?  How many more “heretics” need to be “cleansed”?  How many “infidels” have die to appease your god?  When do we get to STOP killing each other over children’s bed time stories and LIES?

I implore you!

What fucking year does it have to be before we can get past our fear of the “afterlife” and get back to our CURRENT LIFE.

Occupy should take a lesson from the Tea Party “movement”.  When you give the steering wheel to one of the political parties, you give up all credibility and direction.  More importantly, I think you’ll find the news stories go from using words like “organic” to words like “staged” pretty quickly.

Keep the Democratic party OUT of the Occupy movement.  Trust me on this one.

I have a small Winchester “ParFive knife” I carry all the time, I took it from my pocket and flipped it open and we started a staring contest.

I’m not sure if he expected me to drop my wallet and run away, or maybe his flight-or-fight response took a second to kick in, but we froze there for a good while before he headed off toward the back of the parking lot at a slow jog.

Not interested in sticking around to see if he had friends or another weapon hidden wherever he was heading, I got in the car and got the hell out of there.  I called the cops once I was comfortably back on the road.

The words I keep hearing from friends are “you did the right thing” or “you handled the situation well”.  But none of that is true, I just got lucky.  He wasn’t as motivated to hurt me as he could have been.  He didn’t have a gun.  He didn’t have another “robber” with him.  He didn’t try to use that knife.  The more I think about it, the more lucky I feel.

With all of  the senseless killing over just about anything (or nothing at all), there is literally no reason that I am still alive.  I am convinced that if I had been a woman, or an old man, or just not holding a knife at that moment, things could have, probably would have gone much differently.

So now we get to the meat of the matter.  I have a concealed weapons permit and own a collection of firearms that allow me to carry just about anywhere, generally I choose not to.  Once in a while, the girlfriend and I will conceal guns and head out for dinner, or maybe a short shopping trip.  But, truth be told – we’re not expecting any trouble at the local Publix.  We carry because we can, not because we’re planning to need to.

A concealed firearm brings with it a huge amount of responsibility.  As a firearms instructor once said to me “there’s a lawyer attached to every bullet”.  More importantly, there could be a life attached to each one as well.

Would last night have gone any differently if I had a gun instead of a knife?  Probably not.  But what happens next time?  What happens if the parking lot is full of people?  What if there are kids getting into mom’s minivan behind the thief, do you trust your aim and endanger the lives of innocents?

I’m actually pretty upset with myself this morning. I had ZERO situational awareness. I had NO IDEA if someone was standing behind me, how many friends he may have had hiding out nearby, which direction he came from, or where he was headed after he ran off.

I was depositing a check at the ATM, not making a withdrawal.  I just keep thinking about 3 dollars and 30 cents. That’s how much cash I had on me. That’s what my life would have been worth to this guy. 3 one-dollar bills and 3 dimes.