Black Guy Syndrome

I will be the first to admit it, I have black guy syndrome.

I think some sort of explanation is necessary. To start with, I came to this realization when I was driving home after work. As I was valiantly flipping through radio channels in an attempt to find some good music, I noticed something. The songs that I preferred to listen to were mainly done by black males. When I heard a song done by a white singer, I found myself immediately switching to another station. Not that I do not like white singers, in fact I enjoy some of them, but all the popular radio songs done by the are just boring to listen to now.

So what does that say about the current music industry? Is it catered towards black people? I think most likely. Since many people are becoming very familiarized with listening to black singers, and thus they are more likely to prefer a black singer to a white one. With this accustomed ear, it is easier to make a name for yourself if you are black. Honestly, this is probably not a bad thing, except for one thing: the apparent lack of white talent. With everyone's ears used to hearing black voices, white people become a minority and this shadows any possible talent they may have.

So in conclusion, if a black person and white person have equal singing talent, in my opinion, the black guy might have a slightly better chance of becoming more popular than the white one. But this is pure speculation, disagree if you would like.

-AFR

How Controversial Can I Be?

Today, I have a grievance to report. The water bottle that I so admirably won at my cottage last weekend, through my hard work at the Marathon, was stolen. My sister borrowed it and it was stolen from her rowing club. A possible culprit: the fat kid with bling. He was seen walking around the area when her rowing was going on so it is quite possible he took it. Which brings me to my next point: the world could do with a few less thieves.

This is where the controversy comes in. I am not advocating the death penalty, but I am advocating for the extermination of a few human beings. Not necessarily criminals, just some humans. Why you might ask? Overpopulation. The Earth cannot support the number of people currently residing it, and we are causing too many drastic impacts on the ecosystems of the world. So I raise the point, is now a good time to lessen the population of humans a slight bit?

Now killing people seems to be a little draconian, albeit effective. I vote for the good old one child, one household policy, despite the backlash it might have in China. Or at least a set of laws that is similar to that. Unfortunately, even that may not work. With the current health care, people are living much longer and my generation is already predicted to live until we are 130. That is a big number, and adds to the already huge problem of overpopulation. If we do not control it now, something is going to go out of whack and quickly.

Me, I would be fine with a random assortment of humans being transported away, or otherwise disappearing, even if that portion included me. I believe that for the Earth to become a better, cleaner place, some measures need to be taken. And I think if some are not taken, a crisis may break out, possibly worse than some amount of humans just disappearing.

Oh, and if you see the fat kid with bling, give him a good old kidney shot from me.

-AFR

The End of a Hiatus

To begin, I apoligize. I know many of you cannot live without a daily blog post from me. To those people, sorry. To all of the rest of you people who wondered what happened to me and if my blog would continue, your worrying stops here.

I took a hiatus, albeit not a long one. Since my last blog post, I have been trying to avoid using the internet very often. Many days I failed that, the wiles of the internet drawing me in again. But a couple of things happened that would change my outlook on that and make me want to use my computer a lot less. And a warning now: this blog will contain lots of pictures. Normally I am not one to have lots of pictures in my blog, but I felt the need to include more today.

A little background is definitely in order. That picture you see above is a picture of my grandparent's cottage, a place of childhood memories, and an escape from the vices of life. Since I got a job and started university, I have visited that cottage a lot less than I have wanted. A LOT. I love it there. It offers an escape from the technology of the modern world. Usually, the highest class technology we have up there is a black and white TV, which probably has about three channels. (Not that I watch any of them. It is more there for decoration.) Because of this, the cottage is a refuge from all the thingamabobs and doohickeys from the modern civilization.

This picture is the steps leading up to the cottage, the sight that reminds me most of the sacred place of which I am entering. There are so many places that hold fantastic memories, but that is one sight that I always love to see. (Especially after heaving up heavy water jugs all the way from the dock.) The Great Outdoors is what keeps on bringing me back to the cottage and what keeps me fascinated in all the aspects of the cottage life. It is a blast to the past, a sign of a beautiful era that does not need computers, or phones, or pineapples to be awesome. It just needs to be itself and allow others to explore its hidden secrets. I can never be bored at the cottage, there is always time for a canoe or a row, or a game of Chinese checkers.

But lately, with the arrival of my cousins, technology has reared its ugly head. I guess to each their own, and as long as I am not influenced by their new-fangled gadgets, the cottage retains its beauty. I find the need for this technology, even with other people's cottages disturbing. The need to be amused by some pixel on a screen is frankly disgusting, especially when the beauty of nature surrounds you.

To some, these barren rocks and sparse trees probably seem ugly. But to me, these just show the survival and beauty of Mother Nature. The apparent "ugliness" of barren rocks probably does drive some to require technology to keep themselves amused, but it is a unhealthy obsession. When surrounded by such a landscape, with soothing water and a blank canvas for fun, I find technology quite unnecessary. But one man's rock is another man's sanctum I guess you could say.

But enough of these awful tidings of the degradation of human society. This blog post is meant to force you to question how you spend your time on technology, just like I have mine. It also serves another purpose: for me to brag about my awesome cottage. And call me a hypocrite if you want, after all I am typing this from a computer, but keep in mind I have at least made a slight effort to become less dependent on technology by even visiting my cottage (with no internet access).

So I leave you with a parting thought and a parting photo. This may not be the end of my inner struggle against the pull of technology, but I feel I have won a small victory. What can you say? (Feel free to beat me, I do know how much time I spend on the computer, despite what my `rents might think.) So is this the end of a journey, or the beginning?



-AFR

I Have Had it With These Mothertrucking Earwigs in My Mothertrucking Tent!

As some of you may know, I have been living out of a tent for the past two months. I have access to a house, but do not sleep there because in all honesty, sleeping in a tent is much easier than sleeping in the house. It is cooler and more refreshing to sleep in the outside air, and I never have any problems with loud noises when people are moving around the house (except when my neighbours are partying). This is quite important because I go to sleep at around nine every night, well before the rest of my family, and wake up at five in the morning to go to work (I know, barf!).

But there is one thing that does bother me: earwigs. I HATE earwigs. But perhaps, hate is too strong a word, and abhor or detest might work slightly better in this instance. Normally, I do not mind bugs, but earwigs are the exception to that rule. Just their name rings of grossness. Who likes a bug that associates itself with ears and wigs? Probably only a snobby, old British man. Their name also has another meaning for me, being once told that earwigs like to crawl into your ears when you sleep. *Shiver*.

Anyways, there are many earwigs that inhabit the outside of my tent, but thankfully very few that inhabit the inside. They seem to have formed a breeding ground between the window flap and the outside of the tent. Every night before I go to sleep, and every morning when I wake up, I see these earwig clumps, just a mass of gross, crunchy bugs in the aforementioned area. I take a lot of delight in knocking on the tent walls and making them all fall down, but to my chagrin, they always come back.

Their anatomy is another thing that makes them so disgusting. The pair of pincer-like appendages coming out of their rear, screams of something they would use to torture small children with. And I can imagine that they can usually use that to bury deep inside one's ear, searching for the gray matter that they will lay their eggs in. *Queue shiver*. The problem is, those appendages are really the only really gross thing about them. The rest of the body is very similar to other insects, save the tumor that is coming out of their butt.

So there you have it. My opinion on the disgusting creature that is the earwig. And if you did not find earwigs too disturbing before, you probably will now! No need to thank me.

-AFR

Have You Seen Kyle?

On a scale of one to ten, what is the awesome level of this blog?

IT'S OVER 9000!!!!!!!!!!!!

So I thought that I would do a quick discussion about Internet memes and memes in general. For those of you who do not know what a meme is:

A meme (pronounced /ˈmiːm/, rhyming with "cream") is a unit of cultural ideas, symbols or practices, which can be transmitted from one mind to another through writing, speech, gestures, rituals or other imitable phenomena.

I was in the bunkers today, and began discussing what memes actually are. And I wondered, how are memes started so quickly and why do they catch on?

For example, in the bunkers we have a bunker meme: "I heard seven is pretty bad." This was started by yours truly, when I was asked which hole had the worst bunkers in terms of weeds. I replied with that statement, and it quickly turned into a meme. So why did it catch on? And why do Internet memes catch on?

I think it is because of repetition. Internet memes spread like wildfire and before you know it, they become commonplace. I think this is because the Internet is so widely used and so easy to pass on ideas with, that funny sayings quickly become popular and widely used.

However, speech memes, such as the aforementioned bunker meme, are a different story. They are not so easily translated and are not as widespread, so they become more of "inside" jokes. They catch on in the same way though, through repetition.

So I propose an idea. Let us create a meme, and pass that on. If everyone uses it often and posts it around the interwebs, we might be able to create our own meme. And that would make us as cool as penguins. And penguins, they are cool.

So proposals for memes are very much welcome. Comment on what you think should be our meme, and if I get no comments I will just make one up myself.

-AFR