Lead Thoughts, Volume 39
Oh, you wicked world. It's only Tuesday and I desperately want it to be Friday.
What is new with my LJ amigos? It seems like there was a pick-up in entries from various people over the last few weeks and now there is a bit of a lull. I really should add here that I don't comment as much as I should but I do read a lot. Oh well... people update at their own pace.
Today, for kicks, all my topic headers will draw inspiration from iconic albums of the 1980's. If you can match album title to the artist (via comment) I will hold you in very high esteem. :)
"Sports"
I think if I really cared about college football or had some kind of local allegiance to the University of Oregon I would be heartbroken today. But I'm not. Still, what is good for the colleges tends to be good for the state so today I am mildly bummed by last night's last-seconds win by Auburn over the Ducks.
But then, a few channels up the remote, Colorado held on to beat Detroit for a much needed win. The star of that game, Matt Duchene, was named to the NHL All-Star lineup today. Dude is only 19, already in his 2nd year in the NHL, and is starting to demonstrate his ability to dominate the game. And he's not as "look at me, look at me!" asshole, which stood in stark contrast to so much of what I saw in the BCS Game.
"Life's Rich Pageant"
I had a goal for this past weekend: Don't spend so much time at home. Be willing to ignore the laundry a bit. Be willing to have a nigh out without the kids. Be social.
And I, in conjuncture with my wife, managed to do all of the above. On Friday night we didn't do anything especially unique (we went to the movies while the kids ice skated, saw "True Grit", it was awesome) but it beat the hell out of not doing much of anything. On Saturday we went out with some friends for dinner and then to a the "cheap" theater and saw a second movie in two days (very rare for us), finally catching "The Social Network" (also excellent).
The restaurant choice was my wife's and she loves Indian food. I, rather naively, have left that style of food for her outings with girlfriends, concluding that because I generally dislike curry that I don't like Indian cuisine. Doh! I now have to back pedal because the Tandoori mixed grill dish I ordered (with shrimp, chicken, lamb, etc.) was so incredibly awesome that I know I will return for more. And everyone else at the table had stuff that looked quite delicious (except for my friend Raymond who had something curry-ish).
My wife got to have a nice "See, I told you so" moment and thought she won't admit it she likes those moments quite a bit. I don't mind. When I'm a dope, I'm a dope, and probably deserve to be told I've been a dope. :)
"Combat Rock"
There is so much that could be said about the tragedy in Tucson and I definitely have my own thoughts and opinions about it but what I find more interesting than my own mindset about it is the odd array of reactions I've seen, read, and heard from other people.
It seems to me that we always want the simple explanation. People of a certain political ideology want to blame the other side. Gun rights advocates want to quickly remind us that guns don't kill but people do, while gun control advocates look at Arizona's liberal gun laws and say, "See! See!" We want to pin it on political rhetoric and the heated political climate of Arizona and the nation; to look at a Sarah Palin and her crosshairs political or Sharon Angle and her "2nd Amendment solutions" statement and have someone tangible to point a finger at.
We never stop and consider that, more than likely, it's all of those things. It's making it too easy for someone with an apparent mental illness to access firearms. It's not solely political rhetoric that makes this kind of thing happen but such rhetoric does raise the temperature and makes something like this all the more possible. People who are prone to snap will, I believe, eventually snap in some way, shape, or form. But the direction, timing, and aim of that snapping moment can be and, in this case, probably was inspired by external factors.
Put another way: It's all of it. It's charged rhetoric, it's lax gun laws, it's failing to screen mental health issues, it's me vs. you and thinking our disagreements are so massive that we shouldn't even be friends. It's a national immaturity, a history of political violence, a sense of entitlement coupled with a willingness to scapegoat when our economics and expectations don't go our way. It's a massive array of variables and factors, and to see so much of our media and our elected officials try to narrow it to 1 or 2 things is insulting.
I don't think anyone who lost a friend or loved one Saturday or saw someone close to them injured really gives a damn about which side is to blame or where this coward got his ideas. I do suspect they want some answers but, more that likely, they'd like those answers to lead to some method of preventing something like what happened in Tucson from ever happening again.
-----
That's all I've got for the moment. I thought I had more to write about but now I'm drawing a bit of a blank.
Hope all is well among the rest. :)
J
What is new with my LJ amigos? It seems like there was a pick-up in entries from various people over the last few weeks and now there is a bit of a lull. I really should add here that I don't comment as much as I should but I do read a lot. Oh well... people update at their own pace.
Today, for kicks, all my topic headers will draw inspiration from iconic albums of the 1980's. If you can match album title to the artist (via comment) I will hold you in very high esteem. :)
"Sports"
I think if I really cared about college football or had some kind of local allegiance to the University of Oregon I would be heartbroken today. But I'm not. Still, what is good for the colleges tends to be good for the state so today I am mildly bummed by last night's last-seconds win by Auburn over the Ducks.
But then, a few channels up the remote, Colorado held on to beat Detroit for a much needed win. The star of that game, Matt Duchene, was named to the NHL All-Star lineup today. Dude is only 19, already in his 2nd year in the NHL, and is starting to demonstrate his ability to dominate the game. And he's not as "look at me, look at me!" asshole, which stood in stark contrast to so much of what I saw in the BCS Game.
"Life's Rich Pageant"
I had a goal for this past weekend: Don't spend so much time at home. Be willing to ignore the laundry a bit. Be willing to have a nigh out without the kids. Be social.
And I, in conjuncture with my wife, managed to do all of the above. On Friday night we didn't do anything especially unique (we went to the movies while the kids ice skated, saw "True Grit", it was awesome) but it beat the hell out of not doing much of anything. On Saturday we went out with some friends for dinner and then to a the "cheap" theater and saw a second movie in two days (very rare for us), finally catching "The Social Network" (also excellent).
The restaurant choice was my wife's and she loves Indian food. I, rather naively, have left that style of food for her outings with girlfriends, concluding that because I generally dislike curry that I don't like Indian cuisine. Doh! I now have to back pedal because the Tandoori mixed grill dish I ordered (with shrimp, chicken, lamb, etc.) was so incredibly awesome that I know I will return for more. And everyone else at the table had stuff that looked quite delicious (except for my friend Raymond who had something curry-ish).
My wife got to have a nice "See, I told you so" moment and thought she won't admit it she likes those moments quite a bit. I don't mind. When I'm a dope, I'm a dope, and probably deserve to be told I've been a dope. :)
"Combat Rock"
There is so much that could be said about the tragedy in Tucson and I definitely have my own thoughts and opinions about it but what I find more interesting than my own mindset about it is the odd array of reactions I've seen, read, and heard from other people.
It seems to me that we always want the simple explanation. People of a certain political ideology want to blame the other side. Gun rights advocates want to quickly remind us that guns don't kill but people do, while gun control advocates look at Arizona's liberal gun laws and say, "See! See!" We want to pin it on political rhetoric and the heated political climate of Arizona and the nation; to look at a Sarah Palin and her crosshairs political or Sharon Angle and her "2nd Amendment solutions" statement and have someone tangible to point a finger at.
We never stop and consider that, more than likely, it's all of those things. It's making it too easy for someone with an apparent mental illness to access firearms. It's not solely political rhetoric that makes this kind of thing happen but such rhetoric does raise the temperature and makes something like this all the more possible. People who are prone to snap will, I believe, eventually snap in some way, shape, or form. But the direction, timing, and aim of that snapping moment can be and, in this case, probably was inspired by external factors.
Put another way: It's all of it. It's charged rhetoric, it's lax gun laws, it's failing to screen mental health issues, it's me vs. you and thinking our disagreements are so massive that we shouldn't even be friends. It's a national immaturity, a history of political violence, a sense of entitlement coupled with a willingness to scapegoat when our economics and expectations don't go our way. It's a massive array of variables and factors, and to see so much of our media and our elected officials try to narrow it to 1 or 2 things is insulting.
I don't think anyone who lost a friend or loved one Saturday or saw someone close to them injured really gives a damn about which side is to blame or where this coward got his ideas. I do suspect they want some answers but, more that likely, they'd like those answers to lead to some method of preventing something like what happened in Tucson from ever happening again.
-----
That's all I've got for the moment. I thought I had more to write about but now I'm drawing a bit of a blank.
Hope all is well among the rest. :)
J