Category: Personal

Recently, I found myself thinking of two proverbs; “empty vessels make the most noise” and “the squeaky wheel gets the oil”. These to proverbs, would seem to be far apart from each other, but they seem to come together well for one person in particular.

Let’s take the first, “empty vessels make the most noise”. That seems to fit one presidential candidate very well. This particular candidate is particularly loud and obnoxious, more so than all the others. It is the one and only Donald Trump for the 2016 presidential race.

But is Donald Trump really an “empty vessel”? It doesn’t matter that a lot of people think so, but it seems true that he doesn’t have anything of substance to say . His policies are weak or non-existence. He is given to screaming, name calling, and insulting others than having making factual points. He is by far the most narcissistic and egotistical of all the candidates.

Then there is the idea of “the squeaky wheel get the oil”. It would make send for an coach team master to oil the squeaky wheel. How does this apply to Donald Trump? Again, he make the most noise, being an empty vessel. And he is rewarded by the media with more media coverage.

The Kim Davis saga is almost over, thankfully. But I wanted to put pen to paper, or fingers to keyboard in this case on this issue. There are many many opinions all over the web on either side of this issue, and I would guess some that falls smack in the middle. I am clearly on one side.

I think Kim Davis is wrong, the people who support her are wrong. I don’t know if history will bear that out or not. She is not only wrong for not granting that license. She is wrong and others like her who claim religious persecution. About the only people in The United States of America today that could say they are in anyway being vilified in anyway for their religious beliefs are Muslims. And still, it would be a stretch for Muslims to claim they are being persecuted.

No religious group in America, is being hunted, hung out to dry, or put in jail for their religious or non-religious beliefs. So, religious and non-religious people are both being protected. Though, some more than others. So it is clear, that anyone who claims religious persecution in America today, is simply dishonest at best and dangerous at worst.

As far as whatever Kim Davis believes about gays and gays being married, she is free to have those beliefs. However, she has a job for which she gets paid. It is not her job to interpret the law. If she finds it disagreeable, she can quit and protest or run for office. But as it is not, she can’t, shouldn’t be allowed to, or celebrated for not following the law. The people who are supporting her, would be very unhappy, if someone else claims religious beliefs prevents them from issuing heterosexual marriage licenses. And conservatives, who are generally Republicans, who also generally favor the rights to bear arms, would be very unhappy if someones religious beliefs prevented them from selling them a gun or gun license.

But it is not because the other side won’t like the same argument being used on them that is why it is wrong. It is simply wrong to say religious beliefs are preventing you from doing a job for which there is no religion. If Kim Davis wants, she can go get a job at a church or some other religious place where they won’t be issuing gay marriage licenses. Put on the public dime, she shouldn’t be allow to use her religion like a cloak against serving the public.

What makes people like Kim Davis, and the politicians like Mike Huckabee and Ted Cruz dangerous, is how they mislead the mass. People like these are very dangerous for a society that must function on diverse opinions. We have to be able to have our own opinions, and even if the opinions collide, we don’t. We should still work with and for each other. Because all we have and all we know for certain, is that we are here and are all struggling to survive and have fun doing it.

All the talk of religion have not yet proven beyond doubt, that there is any god to help us now or in the next life. All we have so far is this life. And when Kim Davis says god speaks to her, she is gravely mistaken and to have other believe that is dangerous. If god had a desire, he can just have us all know his/her desire. There would be no need for us to argue. why is it that only people who believe there is a god get to hear is voice? Why doesn’t god just write in the sky, I am god and I don’t want gays to get married. Or burn it on the walls of the court room? there it would be clear for all to see.

Religious people would tell you just how good and real god is in their life, but yet can’t show you gods hands in the world. We won’t have to fight about whether gays should married if god simple tell us all. God created the world and everything in it, which would also mean gays. But for god he can’t solve this issue, he need lieutenants like Kim Davis, Mike Huckabee, Ted Cruz, and the rest to do his work.

I think people who claim god told them or wants them to do something other than for their own lives are dangerous. Where will they stop? People used religion to maintain slavery. People used religion for wars. People have used religion to deny interracial marriages. And those people too, claimed that gold spoke to them.

So then I wonder about what kind of god speak to these people? The people who are most intolerant? The ones who would soon tell you about gods love for you, but would rather you go at it alone in this world? Would deny you medical help? Or would just as quickly consider you their enemy and pick up arms?

Not is not only for Nike, but for anyone wanting to do something. For quite a number of years now, long before YouTube, I have been wanting to make tutorial material available on the Internet. Before video on the Internet was popular, writing tutorial, then doing a podcast, and then when YouTube took off, doing videos.

That desire, that kindling of an idea, was there for well over 15 years. But I never got around to doing much about it. Now and then I would post a written tutorial over those years, especially in the early parts. But still, not to the extend I wanted to.

Recently, I decided to jump right in. I started with one video and it was so easy. I didn’t even do any post editing. After uploading my video, I emailed a few friends, and that was it. My friends were very encouraging. I had worked with many of them over the years professionally and had said I should do when I mentioned the idea.

Since then, I have followed up with even more videos. I am so excited to be doing this now, something I have been wanting to do for so long. It is like scratching an itch you couldn’t reach. So here it is, my place in the YouTube universe: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnVxTe31G4nTbhp9dQEO4iQ.

My advice to anyone who wants to do something. Just do it, just start it, just jump in. Don’t think of the details, just get going. You will figure it out as you go. Worst case, if it is not he right time to do it, you will see that AFTER you start. Don’t let the things you see as obstacles before you start prevent you from starting. Those are not usually obstacles, just doubts to keep you where you are. Your evolutionary left-side brain trying to keep you from taking risks. But what are you risking? The opportunity to be happier doing something you want to do? Yes, so just do it.

Gone Gone Gone

My pie is gone

Gone for the summer

From the 3rd, I will be lost

I will rejoice on the 18th, when it return

But for now, it is gone

My beloved Carolina Pie Company

Who ever heard, of a pie company needing a summer break

Now I long

The secret to being happy, is being happy. I will explain in a bit. This can get really long, but I will keep it short.

I am writing this entry because I was listening to NPR’s ‘Wait Wait…Don’t Tell Me!’ recently. The surgeon general of the USA was a guest on this week’s episode. This is what he said:

That includes making sure you’re eating a lot of fruits and vegetables in particular, drinking a lot of water. But there’s actually one other thing which I think is really important. This is actually being happy. And now, let me explain why. Most people think that you need to be healthy in order to happy.

In went on to explain:

But I actually think a lot of times it’s the other way around. You know, we know that there are things that all of us know we can do in our life to improve our happiness. For example, whether it’s spending time with friends, improving social connectedness, whether it’s making sure that we are exercising and – which actually can give you energy and improve your emotional and mental function…

And that’s it. I have been saying the same thing for years. For sometime years now, I have being saying to friends and family, ‘happiness is the most important thing to me’. And I meant every word of it. Probably the first person I can remember saying that the most to, was my first girlfriend. It wasn’t because she made me unhappy a lot, it was just something I said often.

Without really knowing how it would work, I had decided at a very young age that I would be happy. I really didn’t come to it as “I will be happy”. It was a decision based on a train of thought. It comes down to two simple ideas, ‘get over it’, and ‘time is precious’.

The first one is easy to reason about. Assume that you are not in your worst mood right now, then it can get worst. But then you would get over that period and be back to whatever you typical mood is. So if you look at head of all possibly negative situations you can encounter, you can see that most of them you will eventually get out of. So why not make a conscious decision to just get over it? By essentially skipping out the rough or negative parts? When you find yourself in a situation that is not your typical mood, just force yourself to get over it, by simple refusing to give in to the mood that would be warranted of the current situation. Yup, ‘just get over it’. You will still whatever problem you need to deal with, but mentally, you are in a different, and happier state of mind.

The last one is about time and it is kind of weird to explain. You want to think of unhappiness as an event with a date, that you can sometime postpone. It is in your interest then to procrastinate on your unhappiness.

Imagine that you could make deal with the universe. The deal would go like this. Universe, you know the time of my death and thus the length of my life. Therefore, I want all the unhappiness for my life, to occur at the end of my life, instead of sprinkled throughout. This a pretty simple deal to think of. If you imagine that you can get this deal, it shouldn’t matter to the universe, you would have suffered the same unhappiness either way.

The reason you want this deal, is because you get to be happiest when it mattered most. When you were young and in the prime of your life. Even if you live to be very old or die young. The other thing is, if there is caveat, such that you checked out before “your time”. Guess what, you would have cheated the universe out of making you as unhappy as you should have been.

So in both cases, you want avoid unhappiness by avoiding it. Be it by ‘just getting over it’ or postponing it for as long as possible. And this exactly how I reasoned it at a young age and decided, I will always strive to be as happy as I can. And my happiness is the most important thing to me. People and situations that are taking away from my happiness, find their influence on me diminishes less and less over time.

Another major milestone in life to be marked to be remembered. It is not just moving from one home to another, like you are more likely to do. Like move from one city to another or few streets over. This is the big more, moving across the country.

I have made big moves before, like when I moved from New York City to Schaumburg Illinois. Likewise, my wife, son, and I made an equally big move from New Jersey to California in 2010. My son was just a few months old.

Leaving all of the extended family behind, we knew that this had to make the move at that time. We also hoped that somehow, someday, we would be closer to family. The family would either move, but really, we knew that we would move closer. How close would be the only thing to settle. So here it is, the move to North Carolina. A 2 hours flight from NY/NJ, about 30 minutes drive my sister-in-law, and very much closer to getting down to the Caribbean.

The reasons for moving now just sort of worked out well. My son will be 5 years old soon, and shortly their after will be starting public school. We wanted him to be in a school system and not have to worry about him having to change schools too often. We also wanted to be able to own a home and do so without being stressed about it. Living in the bay area won’t have allowed us to do that. Many other are able to afford it, but we just decided that since we wanted to be closer to family and it was very very expensive to live in a decent neighborhood, it just didn’t make sense to plan roots there.

Being close to family is very important to us. Had it been reasonable to live in the bay area, we would have owned a home, but still left anyway. Both my wife and I grew up with aunts, uncles, and cousins close by. It is some of my fondest memories, visiting aunts and cousins, and having them visit.

So far, our new neighbors are just awesome. We had wine and pie with one set of neighbors on our second night there. Our son found a play mate his age right next door. Something he really lacked where we lived in California. Not that there weren’t kids to play with, but nowhere we felt was safe. Letting kids playing in the community parking lot is definitely not safe and we didn’t let me go out there. Here, he can play in ours or the neighbors very long driveway.

There are so many other benefits too, from more space, to lower car insurance rate, to cheaper gas, and trees, and less noise, and knowing the people you live next to, and on and on and on. No need to rub it in, but for now, it really seems like the we did the right thing.