Sunday, October 30, 2011

Let's Talk About Religion. Or Lack There Of.

If you've been paying attention, you know I'm an Atheist.  I don't believe in God, or Heaven, or Hell or anything that isn't science.

That does NOT mean I'm ANTI-RELIGION!  Well, yeah it does. But not like you're thinking.  I'm against religion playing a part in our society.

If someone made me King Of The World tomorrow, I would not, under any circumstances, make a law that would outlaw anyone practicing their religion.  If it makes you feel good, and you really believe in it and it is a part of you life?  And it's not hurting anyone else?  Why would any government outlaw that?  Makes no sense.

Even radical Islam.  You can BELIEVE it all you want.  You fly a plane into a building and kill people?  We are going to kill you back.  Ask, Osama if you can find his dead ass in the ocean.

I'm the only Liberal I know that hates, "hate crime" laws.  Well, me and, Jim Canto who put this on my wall so I expect he's OK with me posting it.  If I punch you in the nose, no matter what I'm thinking, the crime is punching you in the nose.  It doesn't MATTER what I'm thinking when I do it!

So, from a guy who was SO into his religion that he actually thought of becoming a Presbyterian Minister when he was in High School, I have to say, religion is bullshit.  It causes too much hate and discontent in the world.

It's all a lie.  It's not true.  And yet, it causes normal, usually right thinking people to do crazy shit.

It causes people who work for a living to vote for Republicans because of their fear of gun control and abortion.  When they really need to worry about health care and pensions. 

Jesus has screwed the working people for SO long with the help of the Republican Party!  Yet, the guys working for an hourly wage still keep voting to help the rich.  I can't believe it.  But it's still happening.

Look folks.  If you believe in Jesus.  And you believe what he said about the meek inheriting the earth, and the the money changers being wrong.  And you WORK for a living.  You earn an HOURLY wage, and you still vote for folks who make millions, you are out of your mind.

If you WORK for a living, instead of having a living HANDED to you?  You're a Democrat.

That doesn't mean you can't believe in God.  But it does mean that the Republican's don't OWN the, "whole God thing", OK?

Monday, October 24, 2011

Collage Am Hard! And I Should Not Have To Study To Get My Degree!

Interesting article in the Salt Lake Tribune this morning.  A Professor at, Utah Valley University, which was a community college a few years ago, and is now a, "university" was fired because his student evaluations said his classes were too tough.

No shit?  Steven Maranville, who was a tenured Professor at the University of Houston was offered a position at UVU and told, according to the article, that his one year probation was just a, "formality" and he would be teaching there with tenure.  And then when his evaluations by his students didn't rate well, he was fired.

And why didn't they rate well?  Because he made his students STUDY!  And meet outside of class, to do work on what he was trying to teach them!

They were put into groups to discuss and learn about topics that he was trying to teach in class.  Oh, THE HORROR!

One quote from the article is really telling about what anyone going to Utah Valley, "University" is really trying to do.  "Students told me they had never been asked to do this kind of work before and weren't about to do it now.  They have families and jobs and don't have time to do this, " Maranville said.

So you have time for family home evening, but not for actually, LEARNING!?

And you are going to tell your professor how he should run HIS class?  So it fits YOUR schedule?  THAT is not a UNIVERSITY education.

The University education you SHOULD have got, Utah County Republican Mormons, is the one you didn't get while you where on your, MISSION.  And, I might add, NOT in the Military.  Even though you are pro war, and pro Republican.  Just sayin..

So now, you want to HAVE the degree, but you don't want to WORK for the degree.  How Utah of you.

I worked with a lot of folks who got a, "Degree" from some diploma mill like the, "University" of Phoenix.  Or some place downtown CALLED, Columbia, "University", but it wasn't actually affiliated with THE Columbia University in New York.  And someplace called, Strayer, "University".  And all these places have a, "campus" on the second floor of some office building.

If your, "University" has a Suite number, and not a campus?  It's NOT a University, and you're a dumb ass.

So, this is what the students of Utah Valley, "University" want from their chosen educational institution.  No studying.  No HARD work.  They just want to read the book, take the test, preferably on line, so they don't have to actually go to class, and then they get a degree.

How fucked up is that?

Well, Utah normal is how it is.  This state has a culture of, "something for nothing".  Our current Governor dropped out of BYU after one semester, but he has no problem being Governor, and making TV commercials for, The Western Governor's University (the ULTIMATE DIPLOMA MILL) telling folks how important an education is!

Look, if you didn't go to actual classes, at an actual University, and spent the time to do so?  YOU ARE NOT EDUCATED!  And you don't own a BS or MS degree.  You bought one.

A few years ago, I got something in the mail.  Boston University was offering me a Masters In Criminal Justice, and they would consider my experience in the criminal justice system in lieu of class time.  All I had to do was send them $20K.  To their campus in Florida.

I have forgotten more about working in Corrections than these losers could ever, "teach" me.  But I worked with a LOT of people who would fall for this.

Collage IS hard.  And if you can't take the heat, or commit to the time?  Fuck you.  You don't get to say you have the education.

That UV"U" professor was right.  Students don't get to decide the curriculum.

Going to college is hard. It's tough to get through.  That's why, when you DO it, you get more credit on a job application than some guy who didn't.  Or some guy who did it at some, "University" on the second floor of an office building downtown.

Sunday, October 23, 2011

It Was The Best Of Times, It Was The Worst Of Times. Football Wise.

This might just be the worst football season the Utes have had to endure since before Ron McBride rode into town and made us respectable.  And yet, it's the best football season EVER at the, "U"!  How can that be?  Because we now belong to the PAC 12!

And being 0-4 in the PAC 12 beats the shit out of being 4-0 in The Mountain West!  Hoping you can go undefeated, and MAYBE get a BCS Bowl game at the start of every season is not any where NEAR as cool as knowing that if you win your conference, you are GUARANTEED a BCS Bowl game.  And you don't even need to go undefeated to do it.

Yeah, right now it sucks to be us.  It's obvious that our second stringers can't play at the BCS level.  And we have a bunch of injuries.  But football is a game of injuries.  And as we have more time in this league, we will be able to recruit the kind of guys who can step up and play here.  Look at what Oregon has done.  They lose two, "All World" players in the last few weeks, and they still kick ass.  Being in the PAC 12, we now have the ability to do that, too!  And it's going to be great to watch it happen.

And I'm not just talking about the talent in Southern California.  It's not going to take long for any kid in Utah, regardless of his religious upbringing,  to realize that if he has ANY potential at all, he wants to be on a team that's playing Cal in late October, and not Idaho State.

By the way.  Did tsds win that game today?  Never mind.  No one cares.  Forget I brought it up.

So, Ute fans, we just got to take this season, every drubbing, every turn over, every, "Damn, we COULD have won that game!" moment and realize that this is the price we have to pay to move up in the world, and leave the folks we used to hang out with, behind.

Change is hard.  Every behavioral science major can tell you that human beings seek pleasure and try to avoid pain.  And that change, even from a totally lousy situation is harder than sticking around and enduring it, because you know how to deal with it.  It's why addicts stay addicted, and why abused spouses don't leave.

So we are going through a period of growth right now.  And it's going to hurt.  A lot.  I honestly don't think we will win another game this year.  Maybe OSU and/or Colorado.  But that being said, I HOPE we do!  I HOPE we win three more and end up in a Bowl Game.  I HOPE we can turn this around, and some guys will step up and deliver for us.

I'm not holding my breath.

But I can't wait for what we can become with this new conference affiliation.  Yeah, we're getting smacked down now, but we've beaten Cal, and Oregon, and UCLA, and OSU, and Washington State, and Arizona, and Stanford all since, Ron McBride took over in the 90's.  And we are capable of beating them again.  Regularly.

Of course, beating them when you have to play all the OTHER teams in the PAC 12, instead of Wyoming and New Mexico, or Idaho State on the alternate weeks, is going to be tougher.

Any of you read, Douglas Adams, "Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy"?  What was the first rule?  DON'T PANIC!  So, Ute fans, don't panic.  This is NOT our season.  But, at the same time?  It's a GREAT season, because we have joined the elite in college football.  And it's only going to get better from here.

I just have to remember to hide all my guns before next Saturday so I don't shoot myself when we lose again.  Going to be a long fall.  But a great decade!  Trust me.

Tuesday, October 18, 2011

The Cancer. More Info, But It Needs A PG Rating. Just An Update

Went back to see the Doc today.  I was a lot sicker than I thought.  In all fairness to him, he might have told me everything he told me today, after I had surgery.  In all fairness to me, I was on DRUGS and dont' remember any of this.

The cancer I had, while not the WORST of all bladder cancers, was really aggressive.  So, this is going to take a while to deal with.

He told me that I would need six weeks of, "chemo therapy" after the second surgery, so I was prepared for that.  And they called me a few days after the second surgery to say that there was NO cancer in the samples taken from that.

So, recovered from the second surgery, and expecting to have six weeks of, "chemo", I'm almost done with this, right?

Not so fast.

After six weeks of chemo, once a week?  I get six MONTHS of chemo, once a month.  Then, "scoped" twice a year for two years and once a year for three years.

So, the cancer has moved out, but the lease is not up.  I gotta keep paying the rent.

And the chemo therapy is not really even, "chemo".  It's called, BCG treatment.  Bacillus Calmette-Guerin.  It's a bacteria that was intended as a Tuberculosis vaccine, but it didn't work for that.  It does, however, trigger an immune system response if you put it right on the spot you took the tumor off of.

Sounds easy.  Scope, drop some in, rinse and repeat, right?  No so much.

When they fill me full of this stuff, I have to do my best to hold it in my bladder for two hours!  They will send me home, so I don't have to spent two hours in the doctors office.  So I got THAT goin' for me.

He didn't say if I had to spend ONE hour standing on my head, and the OTHER hour standing up right, so we make sure every part of the bladder is given an equal exposure, so I guess that's what I'll find out in November.  Being a cancer patient is tough.

And then, since this is a LIVE bacteria, when I finally do get to pee?  I have to put two cups of chlorine bleach in my toilet and let it sit for 20 minutes before I flush it.  Every time I pee for the next SIX HOURS!  And I can't let anyone else in my house use THAT toilet!

This shit is so infectious, that it could harm my whole family, but it will CURE me?

How sick WAS I?!  AM I?! 

The really funny part of this information they give you, is that they tell you how to have sex, safely after this procedure.  They don't want to you give your partner TB.  God forbid.

Let me tell you something, guys.  If you want to have sex within WEEKS of having this stuff shoved up your Junk?  You're ten feet tall and bullet proof.  I salute you.  It's all I can do to pee in a straight line, and your unit hurts just sitting still.  You want to put it to WORK?  Good luck with that.  Really.

I know there is an end to this.  I can see the light at the end of the tunnel, but the tunnel got longer this morning, and it's just so discouraging. 

So, guys if you smoke?  STOP IT!  I stopped nine years ago, and it was too late.  If you spend a lot time in meth labs, like I did in the 90's?  Go get checked before you start to pee blood when you HAVEN''T been in an MMA fight, NHL or NFL game, or boxing match the night before this starts.  You really, really, don't want to go through this.

And if you're in the neighborhood in the next six months and need to use my bathroom?  Don't use the one in the master bedroom.

Geez.  If you can't laugh at this shit, you would have to go nuts.  This too shall pass, right?  I can't wait until this lease is up.

Monday, October 17, 2011

Bill Maher Is Right. MOST of the time.

Every Friday, I watch, Bill Maher's, Real Time.  He's always a little left of ME, if that's possible.  I mean, he's a Vegan.  And doesn't trust medicine.  I won't dignify his position by calling what's keeping ME alive right now, "Western Medicine".  We here in the west do, in fact have a Monopoly on the Truth when it comes to medicine.  If you think you're Chinese doctor can put needles into you and prescribe rocks for your intestinal problems?  You're a fucking idiot.

You go to a Chiropractor, or Homeopath to get cured?  Of anything?  You're a fucking idiot.

I have SO many friends who love their Chiropractor.  They swear it makes them feel better for a while, at least.  So would a good massage.  With a happy ending

Bill believes that smoking dope is a good thing.  And I don't disagree.  I'm not sure it's going to cure every problem HE thinks it will.  But what the fuck, let it be legal, and we shall see.

I smoked it a few times in the 70's because everyone I hung out with was.  Always just made me sleepy.  So I never, "got" it.  Got the same effect from three glasses of any white wine.  And no one was putting me in jail for, "possession of white wine".

Made it easy to avoid dope.

But what, Bill says about religion is right on the money.  And I'm going to get shit for this.  From my Mormon friends (but not my MORMON wife.  She's now so blind, she can't read my blog, and just hopes I'll take care of her.  I made the promise.  Relax.  Took the vow.  Meant it.  Will LIVE it.  End of story).

Mormonism is so crazy that Tom Cruise WOULDN'T join it, but GLEN BECK, WOULD!

Nuff said.

Monday, October 10, 2011

Glenn Beck And Guillotines. How Crazy Does The Right Have To Get?

Glenn Beck today said that the protests on Wall Street could lead to revolution, and in one report, guillotines!  Was this man actually saying that the Left Wing would hold public executions of Wall Street criminals like they did in France?  Well, if the shoe fits...   Kidding.  We want the Wall Street Pirates to go to jail, not hell.  Just yet.

This is so crazy.  When the SMART, educated people show up to protest, with NO weapons, and have a compelling argument about the top 1% or the richest 400 people in the country, owning MOST of the wealth in this country, it is a short step to Mao, or guillotines.

When a bunch of crazy, uneducated, idiots who think the President is a Muslim from Kenya, show up at Presidential speeches, carrying assault rifles and wearing handguns?  THOSE people are Patriots!

WTF?  Really?

And now, Rick Perry has refused to kick the ass of his preacher friend who is hating on Mitt Romney for being a Mormon.  Mormons are a cult?  Well, so IS EVERY OTHER RELIGION!  As a Sociology Major, I remember the definition of a, "cult" was a group who had a charismatic leader who claimed that they had the ONLY way to heaven.  Mormons, Scientologists, Catholics and Baptists all meet THOSE requirements.

But, Mormons, here's where you need to pay attention.  All those other groups, ONLY hate YOU!  Yeah, you don't like a woman's right to choose her own health care.  You don't like Gay's having rights.  But if you really think about it?  The Dem's are the only one's NOT kicking your ass about whether or not you're a Christian church!  Because we don't care!  You can define yourself as anything you want.  But you still throw your votes to the guys who hate you.

That's crazy.

And if you don't make $250K a year, you're also voting for people who want YOU to pay for what THEY want.  Tax breaks for the rich, subsidies for oil companies, tax breaks for corporate jet owners.  And YOU'RE BUYING IT!  WTF!?  If you're not rich and you're voting for Republicans?  You're voting against your own self interest!

If you WORK for a LIVING.  If you depend on a paycheck from someone else.  If you are NOT rich?  You're a Democrat!  Whether you know it or not.  It's the party that is accepting of YOUR religion!

And you need to be in a Union.  If you're not?  And you work for a living?  You're not living right.

Now, quit listening to that idiot, Glenn Beck.  And start paying attention.

Thursday, October 6, 2011

Oh, What A Tangled Web We Weave, When Trying To Get BCS Status Like Utah

NEWSFLASH!  TCU will accept an offer to join the Big 12 and bail out of both the Mountain West AND the Big East to stay home and fight the good fight for recruits and Bowl Games at home in Texas.  Who couldn't see THAT coming for the last month.

Except the Cougars.

Now, Texas A&M, who hates, Texas, gets to bail out for the SEC.  The Big 12 replaces them with TCU.  Missouri has to be thinking twice about bailing out of the Big 12, since no one outside of, oh, I don't know, Missouri?  Gives a shit about THEM!  And they don't have enough votes to get into that conference, according to ESPN tonight.

Who's happy here?  Kansas, Kansas State and Iowa State, who will not have to beg to be taken into the Mountain West Conference when the Big 12 collapses.

Who's not happy?

Well, right now, SMU, who's been winning and SHOULD be invited to be in the Big 12 since they were a Southwest Conference team with the rest of THOSE teams until they cheated so bad the NCAA couldn't ignore it anymore.

Any one left in the Big East.  They are going to tip over really fast.  They might get a few more teams so they can keep playing football, but they will lose their AQ status with the BCS.

And BYU.  Because they blew it.  They shot themselves in the head last summer when they went independent.

There are two Scnerios that could unfold here.  Both screw the Cougars.  The Big East could decide to take the service academy's.  All THREE of them.  Yeah, I know, AFA in the Big EAST?  But they have two natural TV rivals.  And it expands THEIR TV market.  They stay a BCS conference (which is a joke.  They suck) and the Cougars don't get invited to join the Big 12 OR Big East because neither of them needs them.

Secondly, the Big East folds.  West Virginia, Louisville land in BCS conferences.  Cincinnati, South Florida, Connecticut?  Not so much.

And the BCS has to have another AQ conference.  Well?  Hello, Mountain West!  Utah invented BCS busting.  Did it twice.  And now that they have Boise State and Hawaii, Nevada and Fresno they have another BCS Bowl winner and expand the BCS into the Mountain Time Zone and Nevada which is the fastest growing state in the Union.

Sorry I left you out New Mexico and Fresno but lets face it.  No one gives a shit about you.  You're just along for the ride.  Enjoy it.  Call Washington State to see how to deal with it.

I mean, CSU, AFA and even Wyoming will get you ON a channel in the Denver Market.  Fresno and ANYWHERE in New Mexico?  Not so much.

And when this happens, the MWC gets a BCS AQ!  Whos going to be left out?  That School Down South.
They will no longer be a part of the MWC.  And if they come crawling back on their hands and knees, the MWC should put a knee in their mouth!

Or just get UNLV to, "hit" them.  Got a roll of carpet and a pick up truck?  I can take care of that for ya...

There is another possible scenario I hadn't thought about until just now.  The Big 12 takes TCU, SMU and maybe, Houston?  And goes back to 12 teams and mostly a former SWC line up and doesn't invite, tsds.

Since they fougth so hard to NOT have to take Baylor when they broke up the SWC and formed the Big 12, and HAD to take them or the Texas Governor wouldn't have let it happen, how would they justify taking Texas CHRISTIAN University, and, Southern METHODIST University back into the fold?

Well, easy.  The Texas Governor is running as a Republican for President.  And his base is Southern Christians.  And they don't like Mormons.  So he won't let the Mormons join HIS conference.  Not in an election year.

So, tsds, the message you should take away from this whole thing, if it works out the way I THINK it will for you, is, "The Big 12 will take, "Church Schools" if we have to.  Just not YOUR church."

Southern, Christian, Republicans.  They HATE you!  Why do you keep voting for them?