White Psych

My shrink is not a shrink.  He's a psych.  And in my head, there's a difference. 

A shrink helps you to think differently and deal with your emotions (the term "shrink" has origins in "head shrinker", which was a term given to a person who didn't prescribe medicine, but helped you lessen the worries in your head).  A psych is a doctor who gives you drugs, like a doctor who gives you a cast for your broken leg.

If you put a cast on a broken leg, the leg usually gets better and you can use the leg like you normally would.  If you put that same cast on a leg with diabetic neuropathy, the leg wouldn't get better simply from applying the cast.  So a cast isn't always the correct fix for a leg that isn't working correctly.

Our bodies produce chemicals.  Sometimes we produce too many chemicals.  Sometimes we produce too few chemicals.  And medications can assist us with the over- or under-production of those chemicals.  Serotonin, also known as 5-HT, is thought to be a contributor to feelings of well-being and happiness.  It is a chemical found in humans.  So (simplified), if you are sad because it's raining out, a shrink might talk to you about it, while a psych might prescribe medicine for you.  And when the rain stopped, no matter which doctor you went to, they would see their treatment as successful, because now you feel better.  They would attribute your feeling better to their treatment, and not to the stopping of the rain fall.

I signed a petition today asking Florida Governor Rick Scott to condemn the actions of Attorney General Angela Corey and suspend her from her office, while condemning the charges against Marissa Alexander.

Very quickly, Treyvon Martin was shot and killed by George Zimmerman in Florida in 2012.  George Zimmerman was ultimately released without being arrested because, according to Florida's "Stand Your Ground" statue, the police can't arrest somebody who is acting in self-defense, even when lethal force is being used.  And since there was no one to refute Zimmerman's claim of acting in self-defense (Trevyon Martin died in under 30 minutes, and Zimmerman was questioned for 5 hours), Zimmerman was set free.  All perfectly legal under Florida law.  Marissa Alexander fired a warning shot at her husband, killing no one and hurting no one, and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.  This conviction was overturned.  Now, Florida Attorney General Angela Corey is pushing for Marissa Alexander to sent to prison for 60 years.  If you would like to read about the Marissa Alexander case from a source who is not in favor of Marissa Alexander, please Google search Marissa Alexander mediatracker and find the blog at mediatracker.org.  This blog (not credible news source) lays out how it's clear George Zimmerman obviously was acting in self-defense because he had scratches on his head, and how it was obvious that Marissa Alexander was obviously not acting in self defense because she didn't leave through the front, back, or garage doors of the house she was in.  This article also points out the garage door was broken and was unusable.  It also points out that Marissa's husband had five children by five different women, and he admitted to beating all but one of them.  He also admitted that he had all but threatened to kill Marissa on the day she fired the warning shot at him.  He admitted to beating her in the past.  He admitted that she had never used the gun against him or any of his children.  Depending on which story you believe, Marissa fired the gun into the ceiling of their home while in the presence of her husband and two other children, or perhaps simply her husband.  There are a lot of things we don't really know about Marissa's case.

Here's what we know for certain: George Zimmerman shot and killed Treyvon Martin.  He did not receive any jail or prison time.  He defended himself using Florida's Stand Your Ground statute which allows an individual to use lethal force to defend themselves.

Here's what we know for certain: Marissa Alexander shot a gun at her husband.  Her husband has a documented history of domestic attack, and admitted that he was involved in attacking Marissa on the day of the shooting.  No one was hurt or killed.  Marissa was sentenced to 20 years prison time.  This sentence was overturned, and now she's being re-tried for 60 years of prison time.  Marissa Alexander tried to use the Florida's Stand Your Ground statute in court and it did not work for her like it did for George Zimmerman.

These are the facts, and they are undisputed by any party on either side of the argument.

To say that there are "sides" to this "argument" really, really angers me.  There shouldn't be sides.  There shouldn't be an argument.  It is tragic that a young teenager was shot and killed for walking when the sun wasn't out.  He was armed with a bottle of tea and a bag of candy.  He was wearing a black hoodie.  And he was shot to death.  A mother, who had been repeatedly beaten by her husband, fired a warning shot at him and was sentenced to 20 years in prison.  These two things, when put next to each other, are absolutely preposterous and point out just how stupid, stupid, stupid, utterly stupid we have become as a society.  We are inconsistent, at best.  We are completely corrupt, almost certainly.

At this time, I want to point out that I have not introduced race into this at all, because to me, it's not important.  The players involved could all be purple, and the facts would be the same.  It muddies the waters to start thinking about these cases as some kind of racial thing.  However, that probably plays some part in both cases.  Geraldo Rivera famously stated that Treyvon Martin was as much to blame for his being shot to death as George Zimmerman was (who pulled the trigger on the gun) because Treyvon was wearing a black hoodie, and that type of clothing invites fear and suspicion. 

I have worn a black hoodie every day of my life since 2006.  I have yet to be shot or shot at.

It seems fundamentally obvious to me that Treyvon Martin paid a higher price than Marissa Alexander's husband, who is still free to beat his next few "baby mammas" (his words). 

I feel powerless in my own life to stop my wife from being beaten by her ex-husband, her lawyers who have all told her that her troubles are her own fault and the result of bad moves on her part, they have increased her stress and decreased her self-confidence, her mother who continues to choose her ex-husband over her, and people she once thought were friends.  I feel powerless, as I stand by and watch all of it. 

I.  Cannot.  Do.  Anything.  To Help.  My Best Friend.

And I remember school lessons telling me that the way the United States legal system was set up was to protect the innocent.  It would be better to let bad people go free than to see one innocent person locked in jail falsely.  That's what I was told all through school.  I was also told to be truthful.  This was a virtue and something I should implement in my life. 

When I think about these things, I'm beaten across my face with the undeniable fact that these things are not the way the Real World works.  And it makes me question to the core the value of the "good education" I received as a child and teenager.

I'm a smart man.  And this situation makes me feel fantastically dumb.

My wife's problems could be over in less than an hour after I purchased a gun and shot her ex-husband and mother in self-defense.  There would be no one to refute that I was acting in self-defense.  Because they would be dead.

And I look white.  So obviously I'm innocent.  It's my birthright.



I want to make a difference.
I want to help the world.
I want to stop being shit upon.
I want to stop being abused.
I want my wife to stop being abused.
And I have no control over any of it unless I kill people.
Which goes against my every fiber.

So when my wife's ex-husband and mother die, and I am no longer sad... my psych will say, "I'm glad the medications are working."
At which point, I will feel even sadder, as there goes another blissfully ignorant person into the world.  Somebody who doesn't understand, but who seems to have credentials that make people believe him.  And he's a man.  And white.

Random Stupid Stuff

I used to work at a theatre that would hire a black actress to be a member of the resident cast.  They hired this person based on who was the best candidate for the job of being black and female... and then who was the best performer.  They also did this with at least one black male and white female.  Many people were passed up for these jobs because they weren't the right gender or color.

I work for the government, and several people in my office currently have their jobs because they're related to people in power in some other office.  The lady who used to work the supply closet got her job here because her father was elected to the State Senate, and he pulled some strings to get her a job here.  She had a dispute with one of her co-workers, and she urinated in a cup and put the cup on the co-worker's desk.  She was transferred from the supply closet to the mail room.  But she wasn't fired.

A lot of people I know in Oklahoma supported Ron Paul in the 2012 Presidential election.  However, in Oklahoma, Ron Paul was not on the ballot.  If you voted for President of the United States of America in Oklahoma in 2012, you could only vote for Obama or Romney.  You had no other choice, even though there were many other people running for the office that would, ultimately, govern over the state that refused to include him/her on their ballot.  People sometimes get mad at candidates who run for president on a "third-party ticket" because they, supposedly, steal votes away from one of the other candidates in the Democrat or Republican party.  In Oklahoma, they've made sure that nobody can steal those votes away by making sure the public can't choose who they want.  There is no write-in voting in Oklahoma, also.

You can continuously sue somebody forever if you want to.  And if they don't fight it, you win.

I haven't been able to afford a working printer for my computer for almost a year. 

I texted a friend recently.  "I feel like I'm at the end of the action drama, where the good guy has been fighting the bad guy, and then there's a moment where the bad guy disarms the good guy and wounds him.  The good guy starts crawling towards his sword so that he can keep fighting.  But even in the audience, you know that the good guy is gonna die.  He's not gonna make it to the sword in time, and the bad guy is gonna kill him.  I feel like I'm in that moment where I've lost my sword and I'm crawling, hoping to make it to my weapon, but knowing that I'm about to be killed."  My friend texted back.  "By the way, your sword analogy could go the other way.  Often when the hero is almost dead or defeated, something happens to turn the tide.  Or the hero gets a burst of energy.  Just remember Inigo Montoya in Princess Bride.  Right when he was defeated by the six-fingered man, he comes back into the fight to kick his ass.  Or in Lord of the Rings, everytime the good guys are about to lose, Gandalf shows up.  Or Robocop, where Officer Murphy gets shot up and mangled, only to come back even more badass."

What if we're all living a movie?  And you don't really know what kind of movie you're in, so you don't know how to play things.  Like, if you're in a horror movie, you can't have sex.  But if you're in a romantic comedy, you almost have to have sex.  If you're in a courtroom drama, you need to get drunk so that you can become inspired.  If you're in a family movie, you need to stay away from alcohol or else you'll be kicked out of school.  Don't be black in a period drama.  Be black in a film directed by Spike Lee.  What if we can change the movie we're in?  In Robocop, the good guy gets torn apart at the beginning of the movie and comes back to kick ass after that.  In Braveheart, the good guy gets torn apart at the end of the movie after losing to the bad guys and doesn't come back after that.  I wanna be in that cross-genre movie that starts out as a coming of age comedy, then becomes a teenage-angst movie, then a romantic comedy, then a What Would You Do With A Life-Changing Amount Of Money movie, then a revenge action blockbuster, then a two-person-only porn, then a romantic comedy again.  Then I want my movie to be a parable that will help people live better lives for the rest of time and be happier. 

I think I have a cold in my nose.  And throat.  I've been trying to convince myself that I am not sick this whole week.  I've done okay so far.  I'm not winning the fight today.

When good people die, that's stupid.  Like Paul Newman.  And Michael Jackson.

I don't like ads.  And most people.

My movie needs a good twist right about now.  An upward twist.  Wish I could make that happen. 

I Have A Government Job

The following is a true story.

I had a question regarding a case I had been assigned, so I took it to my supervisor.
My supervisor told me what to do.
I documented the conversation I had with my supervisor in the case and did what he told me to do.
I disposed of the case (meaning it no longer is something I work on, but it goes to somebody else).
Months pass.
Today my supervisor comes into my office and asks me if I remember the case.
I kinda remembered it, as it's not often that I have to ask my supervisor what I need to do, so when I go talk with him, it's a bit unusual.  I didn't fully remember the details of the case, but I remembered that there had been some case at some time that sorta sounded familiar to what he was describing.  And the more he talked about it, the more I remembered it.  But it was never really clear.
He told me the case had been returned from our regional office because we hadn't developed the case correctly.
Normally, this would be my fault, as the development of MY cases is MY responsibility.
However, since I documented my conversation with my supervisor and it was clear I had made the decisions I had made based on my conversation with him, it was now HIS responsibility that the case wasn't developed properly.
As he told me all of this, I started having questions:
Is this a teaching moment and you're trying to teach me how to develop this case correctly in the future?  No.  Okay, are you telling me that my actions should be different in the future?  Yes.  What actions should be different?
So I tried to clarify.
"Is there some other way that I should have developed the case?"  He told me that I shouldn't put his name on the cases.  Rather, I should put down "appropriate measures are..." or "policy dictates that...", and I should leave his name out of official documentations.  I laughed a little, as I was starting to get the picture of what he was saying to me. 
I asked if it was inappropriate for me to ask him for help with development.  He said it was completely appropriate.
I asked if it was expected that I document any kind of help I receive.  He, again, said that is what I should do.
I said, "So pretty much what you're saying is I should document receiving help from my supervisor without actually indicating that you, personally, are my supervisor.  Or I should develop the case without indicating that my supervisor has given me instructions so that I get talked to in the future rather than you?"
He smiled a little, and said yeah, I pretty much understood.
I spelled his last name out loud, as I smiled a smile that was supposed to indicate my intellectual superiority without pushing it into an insubordinate arena.  "Just making sure I know how your last name is spelled so that I can document this conversation that we've just had, where you've told me that you take no responsibility for your work."
He smiled, and said yes, and left my office.  The look on his face let me know that he knew he hadn't pushed me over this time.
I felt a little better, but also a little pissed that this is the environment I work in.  This is the environment I live in: Fuck Your Neighbor Before You're Fucked, No Matter What.
I Have A Government Job.

Creating Our Own Nightmare

I don't quite know when it started, maybe back with the "pre-emptive strikes" on Iraq, but we now live in a world where we act on the fears of what might happen but hasn't yet, overlooking the horrors that are currently taking place.  Our imagination has usurped our reason.  We've created the nightmare we live in by stopping life from happening.

Wrong To Doubt

Battling
Covert apocalypse
The only real slip
Was being human

Bottling
Lifelong abandonment
You know what prayers meant
That never found you

Once, it would be nice
Or maybe twice
To see the wronged righted
Dance, under the stars
Throw off the bars
To light the nighttime.

She knows
She knows the reason
She knows the reason
But doesn't want to
Always
Has known the reason
Not just a season
But hopes she's wrong to doubt

Raggedy
The run of hidden traps
Always the looking backs
On what we could've done

Magically
These never-ending treks
Begins with tiny steps
Just trying to count to one

Once, it would be nice
To make a sacrifice
To bring a peaceful end
But, with each concession brings
The theft of bigger things
All too familiar trend

She knows
She knows the reason
She knows the reason
But doesn't want to
Always
Has known the reason
Not just a season
But hopes she's wrong to doubt

Can I
Can I just have please
Can I just have please
One do-over?
Can I please
Take back that last move
Take back that last move
Take back that last move
Take back that last move
Take back that last move
Oh, god, please!

She knows
She knows the reason
She knows the reason
But doesn't want to
When you
You know the reason
You'll know the reason
And you won't want to

Fucking Piece Of Shit Security Guard

The security guard said, "A bullet shot straight in the air won't hurt you when it falls back down. I was watching MythBusters last night, and they said it wouldn't give you any more than a headache because of 'terminal velocity'. So you don't have anything to worry about."

So I checked it out, because, personally, I know this security guard to be a piece of shit whose neck hasn't been attached to his body since 1964. If you wanna follow along, you can do so at http://mythbustersresults.com/episode50. In the event that you're just as lazy and willfully ignorant as this Piece Of Shit Security Guard, I'll duplicate the website's information below:

Bullets fired into the air maintain their lethal capability when they eventually fall back down.
busted / plausible / confirmed
In the case of a bullet fired at a precisely vertical angle (something extremely difficult for a human being to duplicate), the bullet would tumble, lose its spin, and fall at a much slower speed due to terminal velocity and is therefore rendered less than lethal on impact. However, if a bullet is fired upward at a non-vertical angle (a far more probable possibility), it will maintain its spin and will reach a high enough speed to be lethal on impact. Because of this potentiality, firing a gun into the air is illegal in most states, and even in the states that it is legal, it is not recommended by the police. Also the MythBusters were able to identify two people who had been injured by falling bullets, one of them fatally injured. To date, this is the only myth to receive all three ratings at the same time.


So, not only does MythBusters say that a bullet shot directly in the air won't kill you, but they also say that it's very difficult for a human to do this, and there have been recorded cases of people dying from bullets falling out of the sky after being shot. Fucking Piece Of Shit Security Guard is a Fucking Piece Of Shit.

The Burning and the Clamor

A house burned down.  The family that lived in the house got out before they were hurt.

Three reporters stood next to each other on the street and watched the house burn down.

Then they reported the story to the people who watched their news programs.

The first reporter said that a house had burned down.  Those were the facts.

The second reporter told a story about a poverty-stricken neighborhood where gangs are a way of life and violence is something to be accepted and feared.  Gangs, obviously, had burned down this house and something should be done about the violence in this neighborhood.

The third reporter told a story about how the political party in power had been lax in taking care of the police and fire departments in this neighborhood, placing families in jeopardy.  It was now up to us, the patriots, to vote against the current political party in the upcoming election if we were interested in taking care of the problems that exist in our world.

Preachers and religious leaders, who weren't there when the house burned down, saw these stories on the news.

Some preached about family values and how that had been lost.  If only our parents would keep their children more moral these problems wouldn't happen.

Some preached about how burning houses happened in the past when whites and blacks fought, and we need to be careful of the whites and the blacks, because they want to hurt each other.  And the Hispanics, too.  Maybe the Asians, too.  It's hard to tell from just a house fire which nationality you should be afraid of, but remember history teaches us that the other races will attack you and kill you.

Some preached about babies having babies, and if only this family had decided to get married the way god intended, this fire wouldn't have happened to them.  This fire was payment for their sins.

Citizens watched the news programs and listened to their religious leaders.  Each person, like each reporter, took away something different.  But all the citizens raised their voices.  "Something is wrong and I won't stand for it!" they all shouted. 

At this time, I turned to one of the shouting Citizens.
"Reminds me of the movie 'Network'."
"What?" said the Citizen, confused about being abruptly taken out of what was obviously a simple morality story and thrust into self-referential dialogue.
"You know, 'Network', the movie?"  The Citizen stared at me.
"'I'm mad as hell and I'm not gonna take it anymore!'"  The Citizen stared at me.
"It was a movie back in the 70s... maybe 60s... but probably 70s.  It was an important work about the power of media and how a free press can be turned from a source of education into a profit machine that no longer takes care of those who consume it but, instead, actively destroy those who participate in it."  The Citizen stared at me.
"Nothing?"  A small, clear drip of drool plooped from The Citizen's agapeness.
"Good talk.  Let's get back to the morality story."
"I know, right?!" said The Citizen.

The politicians heard the citizens saying something was wrong, and they promised to fix the problems.  They promised to build better schools, and stop violence, and get rid of drugs, and make you drink more or less milk (depending on if milk was healthy or unhealthy on that particular day).  They promised to take care of our country while we got to sit back in bliss.  They promised us football on Sunday.  Then Monday.  Then Thursday, too.  Then there were three football games on Thanksgiving corresponding to the three daily meals most people eat, and pre- and post-game discussions.  There was talk about which politician had actually provided the best football game to his citizens, and what if Lincoln's football team could beat Nixon's hockey team, and you know the only reason why Kennedy beat Nixon was because of the television debates because Kennedy is cute and Nixon is a stroke victim, and did you know that Britney Spears thought we should do what George W. Bush told us to do?  I didn't know that, but I love her songs, especially the picture of her getting out of a car and I can see her vagina.  I know, right?!  I mean, come on people, that's obviously an invasion of her privates, but at the same time, I really like masturbating to that picture trying to imagine that maybe I could go into her vagina with some part of me.  Not because I think she's gorgeous, but because it would give me something to talk about.  How many people do you know who have put a part of themselves inside Britney Spears?  Ima blog about it.  But typing is so hard and i have to serch for the rite spellings n stuff so ima not capitolize shit n stuff n i don relly wanna no bout whats happening because i just wanna see the latest 6 sec video on vine, then branch will have a great 5 sec vid, then twig will have a great 4 sec vid, then nub will have the best 2 sec vid of all time n we'll all just live our lives in little 2 second bites and dam i gotta piss.


The Family watched their house burn down.  And the best that they could do was watch their house burn down, because behind them was a world screaming out of control about how horrible everything was.  And watching their house burn to the ground was much more peaceful than what was behind them. 

I hope The Family went to Best Western and got some Belgium waffles for breakfast.  Those things are good.