Raccoons and Minks

I saved a life last night! Well, I helped save a life. Of an animal. Maybe. Story time.

Me and a couple friends were going to a party. We were walking down the road, and we saw what, at first glance, looked like roadkill: a raccoon laying, unmoving, in the middle of the road. When we saw it, there was the usual "aww, poor thing."s and one of my friends said, and I quote, "Oh, that thing better not be alive." I stopped because I'm a fucking furfag so I'm thus obligated to feel bad and mourn the death of any and all roadkill. It was because of this I noticed that, yes, the raccoon was still breathing. "Um, Brandon? You jinxed it." Said I, "It's still alive." Well, we couldn't just leave it there, but what do you do with a quite possibly rabid or otherwise diseased raccoon with unknown injuries? We figured the first thing we should do is get it off the road before it got hit again. So we sacrificed a T-shirt and using it to protect from bites, we picked it up and moved it off to the side of the road. Great, now what? We still couldn't leave it, it would just die slowly, but considering it was quite definitely alive, and looking like it still had quite a bit of strength left, so we couldn't "put it out of its misery". Well we're not stupid, so we had a solution. There is a Wildlife Rehab center in our town, so we'll call them, but we were nowhere near a phone at the time, so (as usual) Brandon drew the short straw and ran off to find a pay phone. Shortly after this, (and I want to know the odds of this) the Rehab center's van drove past. We flagged it down, and after a quick explanation, they took the raccoon! Yay! I'll have to phone them later and see how the raccoon is doing. It looked like he didn't have much more than a broken shoulder or leg, so I hope he's okay. At worst they were able to make his passing painless. (Oh, and if you're wondering, Brandon ended up spending about half an hour trying to call the center, while and after they were helping the raccoon. When he gave up and came back to us, we convinced him we just through the raccoon in a bush and he wasn't our problem anymore.)

Also, I noticed that minks always seem to look really pissed off. Take a look.

Anger.

More Anger

You gon get raped.

I guess being made into coats is not fun.

Random Thoughts 1

I woke up very cheerful this morning. Yup, cheerful. On a Monday. In the morning. That in itself is strange, but even stranger is the fact that fact that I was reading Jack till three in the morning. If you don't know what Jack is, you suck. It's a really depressing webcomic the grim reaper, a baby who was never born, an angel who lost her wings, and death. Did that affect me when I woke up? Nope. I think my brain is broken.

I want to start a Dream Journal. I like dreams. They're fun. TThe problem is that I don't remember many of them once I wake up. Apparently, this is because our brains are trained not to remember them, because society deems them to be unimportant. If you start to keep a dream journal, your brain is supposed to put more importance on remembering dreams, so you do. I'm going to do that.

My Grandma is now 90 years old. I know she doesn't read this (I am not sure she even knows how to turn a computer on), but I thought it is an important event to acknowledge. She has had many great experiences in life, and is actually a great, great grandma. That's not an easy thing to accomplish while you are still alive. So, happy birthday! I really respect you and your wisdom, and hope you have many more years. At least ten. You can't acheive this much and not make a century, so don't die yet. Kay?

Pie.

That is all.

Effective Advertising?

I realized today that I am messed up.

I wanted to start smoking cigarettes. That's right, not I wanted to smoke a cigarette, I wanted to start smoking cigarettes. I actually wanted to become addicted to something that would kill me. But that's not the thing that got to me, it was the reason that I wanted to start. Not because I would look cool (and don't deny it, some people simply do look cooler when they're smoking), not from peer pressure, nothing like that. I wanted to get addicted to smoking, just so I could quit.

Yeah, I'm that fucked up.

Obviously this got me thinking about myself. Why did I want to start smoking just so I could quit? Well, I know I like knowledge, so it didn't take me long to figure out that I just wanted to go through the experience of quitting. That might have been good enough for some people, but no, not me. We are constantly bombarded with PSAs and ads telling us that quitting smoking is one of the hardest, experiences you can go through, and is very, very far from fun. So why the flaming fuck would I want to go through such a hard, horrible experience? It had me stumped for a while, but I think I finally came up with an answer: Because it earns respect, and I think subconsciously I want that respect. Talk about subliminal advertising, even if it is unintended.

Think about it. If you quit smoking (as long as you don't become a pretentious snob about it) you earn a certain respect that not many other people have. If someone says, "Yeah, I smoked for 10 years, but I quit and haven't touched one in eighteen months!" How do people respond? "Oh, wow, congratulations! that must have been tough!". Sure it would encourage people who already smoke to quit, but what else does it say? Maybe instead of congratulating them we should be saying something along the lines of, "What? You smoked? That is disgusting. You damn well better have quit."

The problem about this is that I thought that if I figured out what was making me want to do it, the urge would go away, and sure, I could say it has, but since this is my journal, I'm not going to lie to myself or anyone reading this. It hasn't. And that is starting to scare me.

I thought I was going to be able to resist the advertisements, resist the pressure, and avoid smoking all together, but now I'm not so sure. What if I can't quit? I know for a fact that quitting is one of the hardest things to do in life. Unfortunately for me, not only do I like knowledge, I like challenges too. Fuck me.

So now it seems to be a battle between two different parts of my brain. The part that is going, "Hey, come on! It will be an adventure!" And the part that it going, "No it won't. It will kill you, you dumb fuck." The classic devil and angle scenario.

So basically what I am saying is this: If I do start smoking (which I hope I don't) and die from it (which I really hope I don't), know that I knew the risks going in and will come back from the grave to punch any fucker who feels bad for me in the teeth.

On a completely unrelated side note, I've noticed how all travelers from the US seem to say how friendly the culture is, no matter where they are visiting. So my thought to you is this. Perhaps it's not the other cultures that are friendly, maybe it's your culture that is unfriendly.

(Though it sounds like it, I have no real personal connection with this. Just pondering.)

Wolf out.

Am I God?

Holy crap! Two posts in as many days? What the hell is going on? Well I've decided that I'm going to use this thing a little more often. Starting now.

Something I read today about humans "playing God" got me thinking. What is a god? Most people would describe it as an all powerful being, and I would agree, but what does "all powerful" mean? "All powerful" is kind of abstract. I mean I've never really heard a good definition of what it means. So, what is a god? If you asked a religious person, they would say a god is something that affects, or at least has the power to affect everything in everyday life. A god can create and destroy life as it pleases. A god has limitless knowledge.

Now, maybe I'm going to go to hell for saying this, but by our own definition, wouldn't we as humans be considered gods when compared to anything else on Earth? Let's go through the list shall we?

-We have the power, and really do, affect everything on Earth. Global warming, wars, clearing vast swathes of land to create farms and suburbs, etc.

-We can create life through cloning and other bio-sciences.

-We could kill anything (or even everything if we wanted to) in apocalyptic ways. Look at the nuclear bomb.

-To any animal we would seem to have unlimited, incomprehensible knowledge. You would never in a million years be able to make, say, a dog understand quantum physics, or even more basic sciences such as forces or where babies come from.

That all seems fairly god-like to me. Hell, we even have the technology to create planets! We don't have the resources, and it would take a lot more than seven days, but theoretically we could do it.

I dunno. Just a random, useless thought I had.

Face Eating

I guess this isn't a huge issue, so I'm not going to blow the world up about this, but all the same, I think the world would be a much more livable place if this just stopped. So, since I am bored and have absolutely nothing better to right now, I'm going to bitch.

PDA's. That's public displays of affection. I've had enough of them, they are gross, and they need to stop. Now, I'm not saying everything you do in public with your mate is gross, I don't mind holding hands, hugging, or a quick peck if one is coming or leaving, in fact those things can be quite cute. The thing that has been pissing me off is the heavy, steamy, my-parents-are-out-of-town-for-the-weekend-type stuff that people will do as if there is no one else around.

What got me started on this was something that happened yesterday morning. I was walking through the mall, minding my own business, when suddenly in front of me there was a couple that was just going at it. Right in the middle of the mall with people everywhere! And when I say going at it, I don't mean they were just making out, I mean they were going at it. They were lying on a bench in each other's arms, trying to swallow the other's head, moaning, and, like--writhing. There is a line, people, as to what is acceptable in public with your mate. If we were in an airport, the line would be at security. These guys were in fucking red China. I don't want to see it, and I doubt many people would disagree with me. Save it for the bedroom.

Plus on top of it, when I gave them a funny look, the guy noticed and got all defensive about it. Apparently what he does with his girlfriend is not anyone else's business. Listen, if you are going to break the rules of social behavior, than you give up all rights you have to get pissy and offended when someone happens to agree with said rules. What you do in private is your own damn buisness and I couldn't care less, but once you bring it into public it does become my business, and everyone else's who happens to be there. If you don't like that, Hefner, then that's too bad, but it's the way the world works. Get over it.

Listen, people! I don't care what your gender, orientation, age, race, whatever is, sexually stimulating your partner in public is just plain gross.

So stop it already.

Gawd.

Woot

He's gone! Out of office forever! Joy.

Elections in Canadia

Can someone please explain the point of the election that we just had up here, because I am lost.
Let's see...what has changed? Well the Conservatives won a minori-no wait, nothing new there...uh...oh! The Liberals came in secon-nope, never mind. That's still the same...Quebecers are clinging to their separatist party and should just stop whining and leav-ah, right. That has been going on for years. What changed in this election exactly?
We just spent $300 Million, that's $300,000,000 on an election that ultimately changed absolutely nothing. That's a lot of zeros to spend on nothing. Let me put this into perspective. Here is a list of useful things we could have spent the money on:

428 CAT Scanners to provide quicker diagnosis of cancer and other diseases, and improve the quality of health care in Canada--Cost: $299.6 million

5400 Affordable housing units to help fight poverty and reduce homelessness--Cost: about $292 million

Offset 2.1 billion kg of CO2 emissions (742 million liters of oil)--Cost: $294,258,310.63

7 Euros to help stimulate the economy--Cost: $298.5 million

1 medium pizza (3 toppings max) for every person who actually voted (Lowest turnout for a Canadian general election ever-58%) It would help to fight hunger--Cost: about $250 million

There. All the election issues, and what could have happened if the money was spent there. But, no. The government couldn't spend money on the issues that Canadians want them to, they use it to take a month off work and fly around the country. Hey, it's a free vacation at the taxpayers expense! Where's the problem there? Fuckers.

The election also sets the stage for another issue that has been bugging me, and a lot of people in the country: The way the government is set up. Everyone claims that this is such a fair system of government, and oh look at how great democracy is! All right Mr. Patriot, explain to me how a party that gets 8% of the votes in the country gets 50 seats in the government, while a party that gets 6% gets none. Show me the fairness in that. The BQ, a party that doesn't even have anybody running for MP outside of Quebec, gets about 8% of the popular vote in Canada, and they get 50 seats. The Green Party, who actually has someone running for election in every riding gets 6.6% of the votes in the country, but because they didn't come in first in any of the ridings, they don't get any say in the government. This is complete bullshit. Everyone is griping about only 58% voter turnout, but what do you expect? The majority of the ballots cast don't even count. If your ballot is not going to count, then what is the point of even voting?

All this may just be because I live in a riding full of idiots. They elected the biggest asshole running for MP. It's not just because he's Conservative, the party which I particularly dislike, that I'm griping about him, it's the fact that the guy is a dick. He is, as a person, quite simply a incompetent, untrustworthy jerk. His whole campaign was run based on cheap shots at other candidates, kissing Harper's ass, and telling downright lies. Plus he just looks like a murderer. He's all wiry and squinty-eyed. I have a really bad feeling about him.

It might well be a very long 8 months until the next election.