Segregating Stupid

There has been an idea floating around for a while. Not really a legitimate proposal but more of a debate starter. To summarize, our society requires hunting licenses, driver’s licenses, and business licenses, but anyone can procreate. And there are a lot of stupid, not to mention abusive, neglectful, and irresponsible, parents out there. And stupid parents are raising a new generation of stupid. So, the idea goes, we should require a license or intelligence based test before allowing people to have kids.

Obviously, no one is going to actually implement such a requirement. It’s too controversial, it infringes on stupid people’s rights, it would be problematic to enforce, etc. etc. etc. As much as we like the idea, we probably can’t get away with stopping stupid people from breeding. At least in the real world. For our stupid-less society we’ll have to follow in the footsteps of many noted science fiction authors and create our own fictional world.

Lots of post-apocalyptic movies and books use segregation to keep undesirables from the rest of survivors. Whether it’s zombies, heinous criminals, or some sort of crazy making virus, the authors of these brave new worlds generally use a cataclysmic event to destroy society as we know it in order to end political correctness. Problem solved. No messy first amendment rights to consider. No self-esteem building agenda has to be maintained. Not everyone gets a trophy at the end of a soccer season.

So in my post apocalyptic utopia, I propose segregating stupid people. In my world, the only thing destroyed is political correctness. I don’t actually want to go to the trouble of arming myself and learning how to shoot straight or have to search for food or anything rash like that.

And the first thing I’ll do to separate the stupid from the rest of us is require an intelligence based license to use the internet. If you’re on Facebook or ever visited a message board, you can probably already see the merits. There are a lot of really stupid people on the internet. sharing their uneducated and illogical opinions riddled with spelling errors and horrible grammar. (For the record, “uneducated and illogical opinions” mean “not mine.”)

A huge component of my internet license test will be grammar and spelling. It is baffling to me that even with spell check and grammar check, people can still make such a mess of the English language. Your and you’re. Read it out loud, people. There, their and they’re. A lot vs. alot. Loose and lose. To, two and too.

Once horrible spellers and grammar abusers are banished, I will punt the people who make up stupid words. “Anywho” is NOT a word. It is not cute. It is not clever. It is irritating and stupid. Use it in my world and you are gone. And another thing, nother is not a word. As in “a whole nother.” And while we’re talking about it, the correct usage, “a whole other,” seems redundant and unnecessary. The word “whole” is the “like” of this generation. It’s lazy, uncreative and, wait for it…stupid.

Don’t get me wrong. I don’t expect perfection. In fact, I probably will have some errors in this blog post. Some intentional, some not. I frequently use sentence fragments for effect (NOT affect). But when communicating in written form, it is apparent who is literate and who should be shunned. If you can’t be bothered to employ at least rudimentary spelling and grammar, I shouldn’t be expected to read what you write.

Texting has done a lot to destroy written language. Not all of it is bad. It has given us acronyms that can be effective shorthand for communicating. LOL. WTH. But some people have hung onto the shortened words and abbreviations that were adopted when phones did not have QWERTY keyboards. So, basically, I will eliminate anyone who is too lazy to spell correctly. OK. Thx.

I think when I banish stupid internet users to the island of Manhattan (isn’t that where they all seem to go in the movies?) I’ll have the stupid people internet and the internet for the rest of us. The stupid people internet will be filled with self-absorbed drama, duck face pictures, cleavage photos, and whiny and drunk posts. Anyone who asks for advice on the internet and then refuses to take it. Really, that can be shortened to anyone who over shares AND asks for advice on the internet. Only stupid people do that.

The great thing about letting stupid people have the stupid people internet, is that they won’t even know that they are segregated. It seems most stupid people don’t even know they are stupid. So they will be happily stupid in their own world, and the rest of us can impress each other with our witty repartee.

In the meantime, I think Facebook should add another button for us for commenting on posts. We should be able to click “like” and “banish.” Don’t you think?

Now, Where Did I Put That Idea?

I’ve always thought I could be a multi-bazillionaire if I had the wherewithal to turn some of my random musings into technological reality. I have really good ideas I think. Like the time I thought that cell phones should be able to read texts to you so you won’t be distracted while driving. About a year or two after I thought of it, some phone company started marketing a phone that does that.

My latest brilliant idea came last night while I was struggling with auto-correct while texting. Frequently while composing texts, auto-correct either gets it wrong or completely ignores the obvious correction and keeps it wrong. That’s when it came to me: someone should come up with a way to put spoken words into texts. Great idea, right?

Then I realized the telephone was invented in the 1800s and that having an actual conversation is the same or better than speaking into text mode.

Yeah. Apparently, I’m not an “idea” person.

The Government Works for You

Many tales, even horror stories, have been told about the “red tape” and bureaucracy in dealing with government agencies. But it’s a fact of life in modern society. We pay taxes to fund services. In order to deliver services, government must hire people. The problem, according to popular argument, is that unlike private enterprise, government employees do not have to worry about competition. There are no Mom and Pop DMVs down the street threatening to take their customers. If you want to drive, you have to endure the indignities of long wait times, surly representatives and arcane regulations and fees.

The U.S. Postal Service is an exception. There are competitors…UPS and Fed Ex for example. But that doesn’t stop the post office from behaving as if its customers have no choices. Several times I have waited in a long line at the post office and just when it is my turn, the postal employee checks the clock, puts up the “Next Window” sign and walks away…all while there are a dozen people in line behind me. No privately owned business would ever do that to its customers and hope to stay in business.

A recent run in at the post office illustrates this disconnect perfectly. Here’s the situation: my sister sent me a book by “media mail” which is a slightly less expensive option than First Class. The book traveled from Crocket, California to Chico, which according to Google is 149.5 miles. I’m not sure how many days it took. Doesn’t really matter.

The problem was, my sister addressed the book to my “old” address. I still reside at that address but a few months ago I got a post office box. Because I just don’t get enough of government employees, I wanted to make sure I get to enter a government office six days a week but not on Federal holidays. It is important to note that my “old” address, where I still reside, was serviced by the same Post Office. So basically, my mail goes to the same post office but instead of putting it out on a truck for delivery they stick it in a small box and I come and pick it up.

Back to the book. It cost $2.82 for this book to be transported 149.5 miles by trusty postal workers via media mail. That’s a bargain. But once the book arrived at the post office it encountered a problem: a forwarding order.  Generally speaking, when you change your address, you let the post office know so it can forward your mail to you. All of your mail comes with a yellow sticker with your new address on it. In my case, it takes a few days extra for someone or some machine to slap the sticker on, have the mail re-sorted and put into the little box.

When I got to the post office the other day, I got a notice in my little box that I received a package. The book! When I went to get the book from the postal worker, I learned something new. Did you know that media mail cannot be forwarded? Neither did I. What does this mean and how does this illustrate bureaucracy, you ask?

Well, apparently my book arrived at my post office, addressed to my residence instead of my post office box. So a government employee, slapped a yellow forwarding sticker on my package, stuck it in a cabinet (because it wouldn’t fit in my little box) and slipped a pick up slip in my post office box. Which is exactly what the government employee would have done if it WAS addressed to my post office box. Except the part about the yellow sticker.  

But remember the part about not forwarding media mail? Instead of cheerfully handing over my book, the government employee charged me $2.82 before they would hand it over. That number should look familiar. Because it is the exact amount my sister paid in postage for the book to travel 149.5 miles. And instead of being grateful to me for eliminating home delivery of my mail and paying them to rent the box, they charge me to slap a yellow sticker on my book. Because they don’t “forward” media mail.

Foreshadow This

Every once in awhile a favorite author will let me down. I don’t know about you, but once I find an author I like, I read everything I can find by him or her. This is usually a good strategy and leads me to many other good books.

But over the last several years I have noticed a trend among authors, and many of them favorites of mine, that I find disappointing and disturbing. Worse, I have been unable to finish books I started. The culprit? Foreshadowing. I hate foreshadowing.

I read for entertainment and escape. I love chick lit or beach reads. Light, easy, fast and often forgettable. Sometimes I can’t even remember that I’ve read them. I’m only a little embarrassed by that. I have my degree in English. I’ve read my share of literary giants. I still read them on occasion. But when an author, especially a tried and true author who I have counted on to transport me to other worlds for a few hours, turns to foreshadowing, there is only so much I can take.

Generally foreshadowing is used to set up some tragic event. I’m not so shallow that I refuse to read a book that has tragedy. But when a book tells you over and over that something bad is going to happen…and keeps stringing you along while you wait for that bad thing to jump out at you, my nerves can only handle so much.

It’s like watching a horror movie. The heroine hears a bump in the basement and goes down the steps with the lights off. You and everyone watching knows something terrible is going to happen, but you and everyone watching can’t stop her. It’s agonizing and terrifying at the same time. Personally, I don’t like agony or terror. I avoid horror movies. If it happens quickly, like ripping off a band-aid, I can deal with it. But when that trip down the stairs lasts too long and there are too many false alarms, my nerves can’t handle it. It’s not entertainment.

Barbara Kingsolver is one of my favorite authors. The first book I read of hers was The Bean Trees. I loved the story as much as I loved where I read the book…on various trains riding through Germany, Austria and Switzerland on my first trip to Europe. As I read other stories of hers, Animal Dreams, Pigs In Heaven, I found myself identifying with her protagonists: quirky, flawed women.

Then came The Poisonwood Bible. It is a story about a missionary and his family of four daughters who live in Africa. I found a lot to like in the beginning of the book: her descriptions, characters, the exotic yet dangerous locale. But she kept hinting that something bad was going to happen to one of the daughters. At the end of every chapter, I would be on the edge of my seat expecting that the worst had happened. Who was it? Who had we lost?

But the next chapter would start and they were all fine. After several chapters of this, I gave up. I had had enough. Kill the damn girl, whichever one it is, let us mourn and move on. Please. I have never finished that book even though I have read subsequent books written by her.

Diana Gabaldon is another author who almost lost me with her incessant foreshadowing. I love her Outlander series. It is a little embarrassing that I found the first book in the Romance section of the bookstore. But it’s a series my sister loves so I gave it a try. Actually, it was a selection for a book club I was involved in years ago. So it had to have literary value, right?

I loved the first few books in the series. It was part historical fiction, part romance, some mind-bending time travel with kilts mixed in. Good stuff. Then came The Fiery Cross and the foreshadowing began in earnest. There was going to be a fire. A newspaper clipping from the future confirmed that the whole family was going to be lost in this fire.

Now, with time travel, you’ve got an opportunity to change the course of events. Or do you? Maybe. But the incessant references to this fire, the date of the fire and the turbulent times had me abandoning the book for several years. Only after the next book in the series was published and my sister told me about the stupid fire was I able to finish the book so I could read the next one.

I’m not sure why foreshadowing bothers me so much. Perhaps it is that real life doesn’t foreshadow for us. Generally we have no idea when disaster is going to hit. And I think that is something to be grateful for. I’ve had some pretty bad things happen in the last year. I think if I had known ahead of time that bad things were on the horizon, the angst before the bad events would have been increased but that would have had no effect on what it took to actually deal with the events.

Foreshadowing in real life would have just increased my suffering. Just like foreshadowing in books causes me suffering. And since I’ve got enough suffering in my real life, I refuse to let this cheap literary trick keep me on the hook. It’s lazy and unrealistic. And there are plenty of books out there that can entertain me without it.

The Art of Procrastination

This is where I let you feel a little bit superior to me, because odds are you are getting way more done than I am. This is procrastination, December style.

Today, I am not doing so many things. Well, to be honest, this month things aren’t getting done.

I am not finishing my photo calendar for next year.

I am not taking my family Christmas photo.

Therefore, I am not ordering my Christmas cards.

Thus, I am not SENDING Christmas cards.

I am not shopping for Christmas. I am not making a list and so I am not checking it twice. I am being way too nice and not nearly naughty enough.

I am not cleaning my house. The dust is getting thicker. The carpets need vacuuming. The bathrooms…need a Haz Mat suit to enter. The refrigerator needs cleaning.

I am not doing yard work. The piles of leaves are piling. I am not spraying for weeds. It's like the weeds are the Crips and the garden plants are the tourists who took a wrong turn and ended up in the wrong place. It isn't pretty! Not pruning the roses. Not dead heading the plants. None of it.

I am not cleaning the pool. I am not cleaning the pool filter. I am ignoring the leaves in the pool. In fact, if I squint just right, I don't even notice the leaves in the pool!

I am not cleaning my gutters. I am not removing dead pigeons from those gutters. What are Kamikaze pigeons doing in my gutters anyway?!

I am not hanging the Christmas lights outside.

I am not clearing off my desk. I am avoiding my paperwork. My filing. My accounting work.

I am not writing my To Do list.

Therefore, I am not getting anything done on the To Do list. Well, actually, I can say that everything on the list is done because there is nothing on the list! Somehow, I feel a little bit successful.

I am not downloading a new version of Quicken on my Mac because to do that I would have to figure out how to transfer the information from the laptop. Too many steps and too overwhelming.

I am not planning my Christmas menu.

But I did get a blog posted! Ta da!! Problem is, it's not very creative and not very funny. Oh well. It was funnier in my head, after all.

Useless to the Tribe

They happen without warning. As a woman of a certain age, I get a weird feeling at the top of my stomach followed by a surging wave of heat that starts inside and radiates to my skin. Sometimes it feels like I produce enough heat to warm a small town. In the midst of a hot flash the back of my head feels like a car radiator that is about to explode. No one’s ever mentioned steam coming out my ears but I'm sure I resemble  Yosemite Sam after being been beaten by Bugs Bunny yet again. My face flushes like a junior high girl who has just tooted in class. The sweat trickles down my back and I flap my clothes in order to cool off.

Night sweats are even worse. I wake up with sweat pooling between my boobs, damp pajamas and sheets. When the heat subsides and my body temperature regulates, I am freezing. I throw off the covers to cool off. Bring them back when my body temperature regulates and I’m covered in sweat and freezing.

As women, ever since we hit puberty, we’ve been subject to the indignities of hormones. PMS mood swings. Pregnancy hormones that make us bat shit crazy. Postpartum blues. We can’t get cranky without someone suggesting we’re hormonal.

Enter peri-menopause and things start to get worse. We begin having hot flashes. And our metabolism slows to a crawl. Weight gain happens in a blink of an eye; weight loss takes Herculean effort. And even more mood swings. Why?! Why?! Why?!

No, seriously, why? What possible purpose could hot flashes and slowing metabolism have on the survival of humans? I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure this out during my sleepless sweaty nights. And I have a theory that would make Darwin proud.

Think about it. Back in Clan of the Cave Bear days, tribes of people stuck together for survival. You can picture them gathered around the fire at night. Fire was precious and meant warmth, food and protection from the creatures of the night that might carry you off to eat you.

But there’s only so much room around the fire. There was probably some sort of hierarchy in place for assigning the prime spots nearest the flames. These would go to the most revered members’ of the tribe, the leaders. These guys were responsible for keeping the tribe safe and flourishing. And they were most certainly guys as these primitive societies were patriarchal. Once the leadership positions were filled, they would want to keep the hunters and gatherers happy.

After the guys who brought home the food, they would have placed some value on the young women. They cooked the food, made the clothes, and provided support if not servitude to the men. But even more importantly, they bore the children that insured that the tribe would survive another generation. And speaking of children, they would be protected as well as the future leaders, hunters, child bearers.

As you got farther away from the fire you’d find the less important folks, the ones who didn’t contribute as much. The old guys who couldn’t hunt, lead or tell a good story were probably out there. But most certainly, women of a certain age were on the fringe. They were useless to the tribe. They had been replaced by younger, more fit women. They didn't offer anything of substance.

And that is where the evolutionary changes must have come in. These tough broads would manage to survive in spite of having the crappiest spot away from the fire. They would have hot flashes to keep them warm. Their metabolism slowed down so they could survive on less food. And probably the most important evolutionary change was the bat shit crazy mood swings that kept everyone, including the creatures of the dark, from messing with them. Useless? In the eyes of the tribe, perhaps. Defenseless? Absolutely not. Even the cave men would have learned that their survival depended on not messing with women of a certain age.

What do you do?

“What do you do?”

These four harmless words are a common cocktail party question, a seemingly innocuous if predictable conversation starter. You know the scenario. You meet someone for the first time and have to engage in that awkward yet polite small talk. You look for something to talk about while not appearing to search for someone better to talk to. Throw me a bone, stranger, you silently plead when you ask that basic question.

But it’s not all that innocent, really. A lot hinges on the answer. It allows you to define a person, put them in context. Are they smart or interesting? Is there any common ground? At the very least, it provides an opportunity for a follow up question and a conversation.  But for those of us with no career, the reaction we fear most is dismissal. Because when you tell someone you are a stay at home mother, they hear unemployable, uneducated, unsmart. (Careful. Don’t make any sudden movements. Back away slowly…)

Since I haven’t worked since my oldest kid was born 17 years ago, answering this question can be tricky. Lots of unspoken answers to unspoken questions fill my inner dialogue. Yes, I went to college; graduate school even. Oh and I have a teaching credential too, expired but I’ve got one. Yeah I choose to stay home.

A lot has been written about the Mommy Wars. You know, who’s got it better. Or whose lot is harder. Used to be, we had no choice but to stay home once we had kids. I was raised by a stay-at-home-mom. A depressed mom, to be honest, but that’s what mom’s did back then. They stayed home and raised their kids. And got depressed. There were very few working moms that I knew, and fewer single moms.

It was easier to be an at home mom back in the day. There weren’t a lot of expectations. Dinner? Frozen fish sticks and macaroni and cheese. You betcha. Kids need to get to school? Get out the door and walk. In the rain (I’d claim snow but I was raised in California). Uphill both ways. Kids want to play with someone? Run outside and see if there is anyone around. There were no such things as play dates. Or sports teams. And I don’t think I met a crafty person until I was about 30. Martha Stewart hadn’t happened to all of us.

But as I was growing up the bra burners refused to be relegated to the housewife role. I am woman: hear me roar. So the pendulum started to swing in a different direction. Fast-forward a generation and women are expected to work. Working moms have achieved a sort of acceptance, and there is even an expectation that moms will work. To be honest, that American Dream requires two incomes these days. I mean, what is the next generation going to do? Send their kids back to the coal mine?

The trailblazers of my generation were the ones who chose to stay home. But the acceptance that working moms fought for hasn’t trickled down to those of us who abandoned careers to stay home. So we push our kids, making an art out of volunteering. We approach raising our kids with the same fervor and dedication as anyone climbing the corporate ladder. Our kids are going to Achieve whether they want to or not! Sports, clubs, organized play dates and working in the classroom. That’s what we do.

So, how about those Giants?