School time..

Well, its official. My wife, Katrina, has started nursing school. Yup, she's gonna be a nurse. And she's got 22 months of school to get through to do it. (With a month or two here and there off.) Oh, did I mention she works full time too? Yeah. She's amazing.

I'm continually amazed by my wonderful wife and her myraid talents. She is simply one of the hardest working people I know. I love her for that. I love her for many reasons, but her sheer will is amazing and its great, because even for all of it, she still needs me.

What? Yes. She needs me to be not just a good husband, but a great husband for her so she doesn't go insane. That's sorta scary to me. I'm really good at being mediocre. Great at it actually. But mediocre isn't gonna cut it.

In a way, this should set me up to be a WONDERFUL husband down the road, but its gonna take work to get there. I love her so much, and she does so much for me and others, I gotta do this for her. I love you Katrina.

It's Ok, You don't have to like the Olympics.

Ahh, its that season again. The Olympics are in full swing and the lovers and the haters are out in full force. I don't get it. I really don't.

If you don't like the Olympics, that's fine. Lots of the "sports" in the Olympics aren't really interesting at all. Or so blindly subjective that to say you have a "winner" is a bit of a stretch. (Come on. Artistic? What the heck?)

If you do like the Olympics, that's fine too. I enjoy many of the sports because I never get to watch them any other time. Track cycling, track and field, swimming, lots of those are fun to get to watch, but again, IF YOU DON'T LIKE THEM THAT IS OK!!!

There are some people out there who for 2 weeks every 2 years go Olympic insane and believe if you don't follow the Olympics you hate freedom, Jesus, and kittens. I don't get them. I don't really care if you like them or not, I do. Likes and dislikes vary lots. That's life.

Then there are the backlash people. The "Why is everyone making me feel bad I don't like the Olympics?" people. I don't know why. And is it really everyone? Or is it just 1 or 2 of the people I mentioned above.

I was reading a column by one of The Sporting News writers where he was venting his dislike of the Olympics because it didn't have football. (Not just lacking football, but any sport an American might find interesting.) Well, seeing as how only a tiny percentage of the world's population plays or follows American Football, I can see why its not at the Olympics.

Baseball is though. But, apparently that didn't count for this writer. I don't care about Olympic baseball because I follow MLB so I get my fix that way.

I guess I'm just venting. You can like the Olympics. You can dislike the Olympics. You can hate NBC's coverage of the Olympics (though it is a bit better this time around). But please people, stop trying to convince each other why the Olympics are amazing or why they suck. Really. Its like trying to convince anyone except my DM that Spiderman 3 was a good movie. No one will budge on their opinion, so why not just leave it at that.

Politics, Politics, too confusing...

Well, the political season is (still) in full swing, and I just started reading God's Politics so, well, you'll probably be reading all that I see wrong with the world and politics and fait a lot here.

I'm only about 10 pages into the book and I think I've highlighted 2 pages worth of goodies. One of the biggest statements Wallis so far (among many) is we MUST get over mixing nationalism with our faith. There is nothing inherently wrong with being patriotic (whatever that means anymore.) But when we start mixing our patriotism with our faith too much, then we get problems. We get the belief America is special because that's how God wants it. We ask God to "bless" America. (Read the Old Testament...are we ready for what usually happens for God's blessings to come?)

I love my country even though it frequently saddens me. But I don't think we're special because of our faith. There are many nations around the world that have Christians in them. Yet I cannot think of a single "Christian" nation out there as nations (like people) cannot begin to hold to what is required to be "Christian." But nations don't fall under the "saved by grace" part either.

Also, Bush scolding China about human rights. I agree, China needs more freedom of religion, the press, and to stop illegally imprisoning people. So do we though. So do we.

Back to Blogger

Well, yeah, so nothing happened here for months. Because it was blocked at work. Now its not. So I'm back. Huh, funny how that works. The interim (for you who are REALLY bored) is over here but I like Blogger better than LJ. Sorry, I'm just not an online community type guy.

So, yeah, I'll be musing, whining, cringing, shouting and pontificating from here again. It will be fun.

Oh, first whine. Since when is a computer wallpaper or screensaver a "prize?" I signed up for the Dr. Pepper "1 in 6 wins" contest and have put the codes in. So far I've won a 22 oz soda at Burger King, 2 screensavers and a wallpaper. Ok, the soda is a prize. But wallpaper? Screensaver? Heck, most people don't even USE screensavers anymore! What sort of lame prize is this? Its worse than winning nothing! Because instead of winning nothing, you win something you don't want and they call it a prize. Sad.

Whine out.

What a Super Bowl!

Wow. Really, what else can you say but, WOW. The Giants beat the Patriots. And not just stole the game at the last second. But beat them for pretty much the whole game no matter what the score said. What the Patriots normally did to a team that competed with them, stayed close and beat them at the end (when they weren't running away with it already) the Giants did to the Pats!

Tom Brady got pounded, just pounded by the D-Line of the Giants. And Eli and the Giants offense just worked the clock and wore down the Pats defense. And I'll just say it now. Where were the Pats linebacking core? You know, that vaunted group of experienced veterans? They got OLD fast! The Giants moved the ball well. They just were the better team on Sunday. It was impressive.

Switching gears, I hope the Bears management and coaches saw what ALL Bears fans saw. What the Bears need was on the field in the form of the Giants. The Giants play, offensively especially, but defensively a bit too, what the Bears keep saying they want to do. But here's the difference, the Giants have the talent to do it.

Eli is a much better QB than the Bears have. Now, you don't have to have a HOF QB, but if you don't, you need HOF recievers and line, which the Bears don't have. The Giants actually have running backs. They have the big bruiser and the more finesse guy. The Bears have...well, they are paying people to fill that position. I'll leave it at that. They O-Line did a good job of protecting Eli. The Bears O-Line was a sieve. The Giants wide recievers made great catches and fought through coverage. The Bears also pay people to play wide reciever. Occasionally they get open and occasionally they make great catches. Occasionally. But Muhsin Muhammad says he's a bargain at the money he's making. Sure you are Moose. Keep saying that. Free agency is going to show you differently.

Defensively the Giants front 4 DOMINATED the O-line of the Pats. I mean just pushed them all over the place. The Bears, well, Tommy Harris is great if he's 100% (hopefully he will be this year!) and Adewale Ogunleye is darn good. Mark Anderson is a great pass-rusher. But he's undersized and got punished lots because Lovie tried to use him as a starting DE. Not smart! Our secondary is a disaster, I can't even start, and we're going to lose Lance Briggs at LB. Maybe Urlacher can rest his back enough over the summer to be healthy next year. So, yeah, our defense doesn't even compare.

And the Bears think they are "Almost there" as they keep saying. I don't know whether to laugh or cry. Maybe both.

Some People Care WAY too Much about Webcomics

I was perusing my daily dose of webcomics today and at PvP Scott was talking about a blogger who devoted immense amounts of time to critiquing PVP. Scott wasn't blasting the guy, in fact, he called him a fan, because, as Scott said, only a fan could care so much. I commend Scott as someone who deals fairly well with that sort of thing. I don't have the personality (or talent, but that's beside the point) to deal with things like that.

What amazes me is how worked up people get about webcomics. I've gotten into discussions on forums about them. I've read tons of flaming posts about them. It boggles my mind because wake-up people, they are FREE!

Now, possibly I am caring too much about webcomics, but hear me out. Webcomics can be read by anyone, for free. Now, some comics do a better job of updating than others. Schlock Mercenary is pretty much the king at 7 straight years of posting on time. It's also hilarious. Dave Kellett drawing Sheldon does a great job too. Others, like PvP, are sketchier. Posting daily...usually...but who knows when. But again. Who cares. Its a comic you're reading for free. I've heard the arguments, "they have an implied contract with their reader." What? No they don't! If the readers get upset, they'll stop reading! Then ad revenue will dry up and the strip goes under. Simple economics.

For someone like Scott Kurtz, Dave Kellett, or Howard Tayler (to just name a very few) who make their living off the comic keeping your readers happy is important. The people who get so upset don't seem to understand they can just stop reading. Or the people who don't like how a strip or storyline went...that's fine, that's your opinion, but, you're not the creator. Voice your opinion, but the creator is creating, we are reading and we decide if we like it or not. Network TV is what happens when you pander to your audience. And we don't want that happening to webcomics.

Economics Hurt My Head

Disclaimer, I do not claim to be an economist. I'm not even all that good at math. But, I must say, that the Fed cutting the interest rate by 3/4% puzzles me. Now, I understand international markets were tanking and our's wasn't looking any better. I understand many banks have written down huge losses on bad loans and the housing market (new starts mostly) is overall WAY down. There is a "credit crunch" I've heard it called, both at the BIG level, banks, etc, and the smaller level, consumers.

So, I understand some of the reasons the Fed did this. However, didn't ultra-low interest rates help get us into this mess? Not just rates alone, plenty of bad judgement, unscrupulous lending, and consumer stupidity have helped, but the rates were low low low for years with little oversight. Now, its time to spend spend spend our way out of a crisis that frankly we got into by spending too much. I guess I don't see how the end result, getting consumers to spend themselves even deeper into debt, is the solution.

Oh, trust me, I know how basic (VERY basic) macroeconomics works. Consumers must spend for companies to make money, etc. etc. But, there must come a point when we've overspent. Right? Our country already borrows billions upon billions from foreign countries (including China, a BIG lender) because the country overspends. We consumers borrow billions upon billions on our credit cards, car payments, house payments, etc. That's fine, as long as we're making the payments. We aren't as consumers. Too many people are overextended.

Here's the problem, I have no idea what to do about this. Usually, I offer a few suggestions, but here, I don't know at all. And what scares me is, I don't think the really smart people do either. That's not a recipe for success. Hopefully I'm not coming across as alarmist or gloom and doom. I don't feel that way (completely). But I do feel our country is in deep economic trouble and that no one in charge wants to admit how big the issue really is.