Reality Out of Sync

So, Tiger Woods apologizes to the golf world for (and I can’t say this any more clearly than as it’s put down here) getting caught cheating on his wife. Not for actually doing the cheating, he doesn’t need to apologize for the actual cheating. At least, not to the golf community or the public for that matter. An apology may be owed to those from the general public that were actually involved – for being dishonest, I suppose – but then again that may not even be necessary. The only person that really needs to hear an “I’m sorry.” is his wife. Even that should come only if he’s actually feeling bad about it.

The reason Tiger Woods is apologizing for getting caught cheating on his wife is because America has screwed up values. Well, let me rephrase that. People have screwed up values. I can happily say that when I was a child, I didn’t have a role model that was a celebrity. My family system didn’t work that way. I didn’t watch a whole lot of television either, so maybe that has something to do with it. I remember saying to myself, “Man, I want to play basketball like, Jordan.”  and “If only I could hit as hard as Mike (Tyson)!” That’s about as close as I came to looking up to someone that was a celebrity, in particular a sports figure. At my ripe old age of 29, I feel it’s unhealthy to let children look up to Hollywood and sports celebrities. This is something I’ve blogged about before by the by. Parents shouldn’t be encouraging their kids to want to be like someone else. They should be instilling values that they themselves (is this even a valid phrase? I say it all the time, or rather I guess I think it often and it always seems like I should have just chosen better phrasing…well whatever) possess.

Back when I was a wee lad of 15 or 16, my friends and I were sitting on the porch (or stoop if you like) and were talking to my dope dealing neighbors about boxing. The question came up from the neighbors during a particularly heated moment of “Who is the better boxer in this upcoming fight?”. “Is so and so (I don’t remember who the boxer was) your hero?”, and all three of us spoke pretty much in unison. “I don’t have heroes.” We each said it a little differently, but we each meant the same thing. That was the kind of mind set we’d been raised with. Heroes are for people that don’t have the strength to be their own person, to seek out self improvement for the sake of improving or at least that’s what I suspect.  I think it’s partially lazy parenting too. Parents don’t want to engage their children or put forth the examples in which they want their children to live. Instead, their children seek other influences to fill in the gaps that their parents leave. So you have the media telling you to look up to this celebrity or that celebrity, and you have impressionable minds doing exactly that. Now Tiger Woods has to apologize to the world because he got caught cheating on his wfe, nevermind the fact that it shouldn’t matter if he cheats on his wife (present or past tense). He’s a golfer people. Admire his golf skills. Let your children admire his golf skills, but seriously don’t further encourage this behavior.

People fail on a regular basis, but that’s not always the public’s business. Tiger cheating on his wife is a Tiger and wife issue. He shouldn’t be apologizing to his fans nor to the golfing community at large. He should not be put on a pedestal about how to live your life and parents shouldn’t encourage that with their children either. Let that man play his game. Parents, stop being stupid. Celebrities aren’t paid to be role models (at least they shouldn’t be paid to be role models), they are paid to do whatever it is they do, be that sports, acting, or charity work, etc. My grammar is atrocious today, but I’m not going to fix it. I’m tired and lazy.

This is how it should start - and hopefully end!

Parents, your children’s safety has just increased ten fold! Well, if you live in the Merion School District that is, because apparently when your child enrolls they use a laptop to monitor their behavior. Salvation for all the lazy parents that think that school is just a day care center for their children! This sort of thing just freaks me right on out. It’s under the guise of protecting the children, but I like to call it ensuring loyalty. Not that I’m a big 1984 fan or anything like that =-P

Interestingly, I heard a commercial for something called Safe Link. I won’t link to it because I do not want to contribute to any page hits they get; however, I’ll tell you all about it! Safe Link Wireless isn’t terribly new apparently. It’s been in production since early last year; however, the commercial was definitely new to me. Basically, you get a government funded call phone with an allotment of minutes per month and voicemail (for free!).

I wonder how safe it is to use that phone. Do you think that the government can listen in on that phone whenever they want without any risk of a litigation? I wonder, maybe I’m being paranoid. I can just see this being used (it’s targeted at a demographic that has a statistical likelihood of participating in illegal activities) as a way to more easily capture criminals and spy upon the law abiding citizen. And really, do they need to make it any easier than it already happens to be now? Jeez. I know someone that has one of these phones and they talk about all manner of things that would build a very accurate picture of their daily activities, illicit or not.

I don’t think the government should be funding big business, I’m pretty sure everyone is sick of that, and Tracfone (the provider that was listed in the commercial) does some pretty decent business last time I checked. They have over 12 million customers according to some googling I did. Disheartening.

Yah, I like it with the glasses on.

So, while I was performing maintenance I chose a theme called Star Ocean. I’m also going out to buy Star Ocean for the PS3 today. Star Ocean is just a fantastic series, and I’m pumped about getting it today. I had actually thought it was to be released on the 15th – FAIL!! It’s been out since the flippin’ 9th, I’m sad on the inside. =-(

I learned an interesting bit of information today, something I think I read before but didn’t commit memory, because it sounded familiar. Japan does Valentine’s Day correctly, yet another reason Japan rocks harder than just about every other country in the world. What the fuck happened in my country that valentine’s day got all screwed up and became such a freakin’ pain? Which brings up another point, when did it become kosher to put yourself in debt to finance an engagement (we haven’t even gotten to the wedding part) after you’ve already spent more than your fair share of money for some chick you want to marry? If you count up all the dates, gifts and other such things, you’re way in debt already. Now you spend some lump sum to prove that you want to marry the chick (if marriage is in your belief system/social construct). How exactly does that make sense? Ah well, it’s a lose lose situation. If this gets brought up, I’m a chauvinist, or just an unloving son of a bitch. Glee?

It’s now my weekend, and I am getting out of work now. My week has been suckish, and I’m pretty tired of stupid mistakes (mine or someone else’s misinformation [by mistake or whatever]) becoming a crucifix upon which I get nailed. I don’t mind my mistakes coming back to me and me being spoken to about them. I think it’s a little out of sorts that without any formal training other than trial by fire, that I’m expected to know everything and make flawless decisions. Everyone is busy, it’s not like we have days where we get just one ticket every 4 hours and we can take the huge amounts of free time we have to search docs and be totally self-sufficient. Eh, ionno. I’d prefer I be told I made a mistake and how to better resolve the issue than get spoken to like a child, written up, and then sent off with no more information than I had when the entire situation erupted in the first place. I’m sure that’ my bad though. I also find it cute that when I point out issues that are not my fault, but am blamed for, it’s perfectly fine to just ignore my input on the matter — also my bad, I’m sure. Whatever, it’s the weekend and I’m playing Star Ocean. Fantastic!

Ph34r teh Cute 1's??

What happens when you happen to be in the same area as a murder that takes place? Well, generally, nothing if you weren’t a witness or victim. You go about your daily life. Imagine how confused one might be to discover that they have become the suspect in this murder for just having been in the general vicinity of this place. No one reported you being there, no one even gave a description of you. No, you are being questioned because your records were obtained from a fishing expedition of cell phone location records. That sounds far fetched, right? Yah, it is. On the other hand, how far can things possibly get out of hand if this happens? I’m sure it wouldn’t go so far as the scenario I’ve put forth, but then again who knows. I’m not terribly paranoid, but this seems like just one more erosion of constitutional rights and privacy in general.

I don’t think I want the Feds (or anyone for that matter) to be able to pull my location data to check up on where I may or may not have been. Just like I don’t answer questions for the national census, I don’t plan on randomly giving out location data (which is why I have location services turned off on my cell phones) to people. I value my privacy (and the privacy of people that may be with me for whatever reason).  No matter how many petitions I sign, how many letters I write, the erosion of my rights just keeps happening. It just doesn’t seem to be letting up. How long is 9/11 (maybe not in this specific case, but it’s still an excuse that appears to carry weight in the US) going to be used to hang fear over our heads and take away our rights as individuals and citizens? Maybe this is the last year…riiiiight.

Unnamed Officer =-(