Happiness as a consequence but not purpose?

Amen to this Values.com quote of the day, although I like to think--from my maybe limited experience--that real happiness from integrity, a less 'carefree' happiness but more whole and abiding, rather than the plasticky bubbliness or shallow exuberance so many seem to think of as happiness in our culture today, is sort of an inevitable consequence of a life so dedicated:

“The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate, to have it make some difference that you have lived and lived well.”
Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882);
Philosopher, Poet, Author, Essayist

Budgeting Ideal

Working out my ideal budget, I've found that I could live and travel very comfortably, as a single guy, accounting for savings, retirement, car, computer, pets, donations, medical expenses, clothing, etc, on a salary of only...

$60,000/year.  :-/

Heh, good thing I'm OK living a "simpler" life for a while.

Schmack Friday

I've never understood the appeal of getting up at 4 am to shop on Black Friday.  But then, I've never done it, so maybe I don't know what I'm missing.  I generally avoid shopping on Black Friday.  The good stuff is supposedly all gone by 12:01 am anyway, so there's basically no difference between shopping today and shopping a week from now except there won't be crazy-neurotic zombie mobs killing each other for parking spaces a week from now.  I'm pretty sure the "amazing sales" are the unicorns of the shopping world anyway.  They don't exist.  Everyone just looks for them to keep their little shopping hearts believing in something.  Stores put out, like, one inventory item each that's on a deep discount, and then the managers watch from their towers while wringing their evil hands in maniacal delight as the shoppers take the bait like a churning shoal of ravenous minnows turned against each other.  The carnage, the mayhem, the...ah, heck, it really boils down to me not wanting to wake up early and drive around for an hour just to find parking in order to save a buck.  Yeah, that's pretty much it.

Outsourced

It's true: the movie's much better than the TV show.  That's all.

I love snow days!

I love seeing families out sledding, and snowboarders down the street.  I love seeing a dad pulling his little daughter in a sled across their yard, or kids making snow angels.  I love the freshly frosted trees and rooftops with chimney smoke fluffing into the still air!  I love the softened sounds and cozy clothes!  And I love friends who let me stay with them when I'm stranded downtown by stand-still traffic on icy hills and bundling up to watch a movie with the windows rattling in the wind as flurries swirl past street lamps!

"Welcome to middle age."

While visiting with the doc today, I had described how my injuries occurred, and he commented on how intense group exercise classes can cause a lot of problems when the group sets the pace rather than each individual.  I told him I had thought I was ready to push myself as much as I was, but it strained me, then I pushed myself another way during my own workout a few days later, and bam: mess.  I said I'm usually pretty cautious and ease into things, but it had been a while since I'd worked those muscle groups.  Turns out he says I'm doing all the right exercises to strengthen the right areas, but I needed not to push myself so much so fast.  I said I had thought I'd been doing really well but just got a little ambitious and would have to be a bit more careful.  Then he said it.

"Welcome to middle age.  As you head into it..."

I kind of chuckled as I missed the rest of his sentence because my immediate, initial reaction was to think, "Ha ha, doc, yeah that's a funny jo--..."  Immediately following this interrupted thought was the next one which interrupted it: "Oh @#$%.  That's not a joke.  It's just true.  I'm heading into middle age."

Fortunately, I'm probably in as good a shape as I've ever been, and I feel good and am apparently still attractive enough to capture the attention of those to whom I'm attracted and energetic enough to play "war" with the kids and spry enough to keep up with twenty-somethings on hikes, so I've got that going for me.  And we're in a time when thirty is the new twenty, so that's fun.  But now I'm even beyond that age people need to comfort themselves about by saying it's the new twenty.  Hmph.

As I related this exchange with my doc to some friends tonight, one of them choked and said, about himself, "Crap, when did that happen?"  Ha ha, can't fight it, so I'll accept it.  Bring it on, middle age.  Let's have a ball.

Thank Bob for nonprofit health clinics

For those of you who knew I was injured and lamenting the cost of getting it looked at and fearing the possibility of surgery if it turned out to be a hernia or something without hardly a penny to my name, I bring good news...for now, at least.

I found a non-profit health clinic with a sliding fee scale which was able to get me in the next day (today).  It was actually a totally decent place.  I'd go back.  Although I'd have to pay more once I'm earning an income again, I imagine.

I qualified for the deepest discount, so they only required $20 up front for the visit and will bill me for the rest.  And the prognosis: multiple muscle injuries compounding to create...a friggin' mess.  I've literally fallen apart a bit.  Heh, hopefully I'll also heal back together, though, says the doc.  Good to hear I (hopefully) won't need surgery. I hear hernia surgery isn't cheap. *whew*

So about $35 later, I'm on anti-inflammatories and muscle relaxants and just trying to take care of myself to allow proper healing, hoping it's better soon.  If it's not better in another week, then we'll have to reconsider, but send healing vibes to my groin, please! :-)

A few thoughts about the news...

...in a close vote, it's being reported that ballots are being analyzed where voters didn't follow direction to determine what they intended.  Here's an idea: if they didn't follow directions, or if we have to have analysts trying to figure out what they meant, their vote doesn't count.  Period.  Seems most rational to me.

I agree there is no such thing as a "holiday tree".  And I don't see why government buildings need to be decorated for any religious holidays anyway.  But I'm certainly not going to get bent out of shape over a Christmas tree outside a government building.  Christmas is a cultural holiday here at least as much as a religious one, whatever you think it should really be about.  I'd have a problem with a nativity.  I don't want my government endorsing or conveying religion, even if it's one I believe in, because one day it will not be one I believe in, and I want my government principle-oriented, not dogma-oriented.  But a tree is not a nativity.

Those who think it's some drastic, awful invasion of privacy to have to choose between going through a scanner at the airport or being hand-searched, the phrase repeatedly going through my head while listening to all the griping is: get the @#$% over it!  Seriously, I just don't get it.  There are reasons to dispute certain methods, but this extreme discomfort over being given options you don't like is...kind of weird to me.  But maybe I'm just unusually unconcerned about whether some TSA employee sees a high-def outline of my body features (one of hundreds they'll see daily) or whether someone brushes my privates while searching for hidden weapons.  I just...don't...get it...

Jon Stewart on Rachel Maddow

At the gym the other night, I was flipping through channels on my elliptical machine, and I came across and interview of Jon Stewart by Rachel Maddow, and I was instantly hooked.

Background: I used to dislike Jon Stewart, primarily for the reasons I heard him describing--he's a satirist, which doesn't necessarily build or isn't necessarily constructive.  When I tried watching his show many, many years ago, I was extremely disgusted by most forms of cynicism, and I firmly believed the world had enough sarcastic, snide voices.   I also used to see his criticism of right-wing or conservative political dialog or figures, and because I felt defensive, I decided he was antagonistic and was criticizing for popularity, and I wouldn't give him the reward of watching.  However, my alignment or ideology has expanded, shifted, and been tempered over time, and I am no longer more defensive of republicans than democrats or vice versa (even though I honestly thought I was fair-minded before and didn't realize how much more defensive I was of republicans than democrats, for example).  I still believe the world needs much less cynicism, but I now see Jon Stewart as more satirical than cynical, and despite my continuing insistence that we need more constructive conversation, or maybe because of it, I've been intrigued by his recent "rally to restore sanity" and his articulated reasons for it.

In this interview, I found myself nodding constantly.  It doesn't negate the need to preserve "our way of life", or defend ourselves from enemies outside of and within our borders, or move forward in keeping government in check, etc.  But what he says about the almost cartoonish "left vs. right" mentality, the role of Fox and MSNBC as 24-hour news agencies, Stewart's role as a comedic commentator on the news, etc is mostly exactly how I think of things.  I guess it makes sense why he's grown on me as I've started perceiving his light-hearted efforts to point out folly in our news media culture today and taken that to something he hoped would be constructive like the rally at the Capitol.

I so wish there were more interviews like this out there, between two people disagreeing without getting snippy and shouting, agreeing on common ground without constantly needing to bring in sensationalized dichotomies and re-drawing battle lines, and setting aside defensiveness to say, "OK, that's a fair point," or, "Maybe.  That may very well be."  In our culture, we're so ridiculously fond of what we seem to think is 'conviction' that anything other than pompous posturing and closed-eared insistence is perceived as 'wishy washy' or 'skirting the issues', if not downright unintelligent, when I think quite the opposite.

Short version: Jon Stewart has been gaining a lot of points with me lately, and this interview is an example of why.  And I had to give Rachel Maddow some credit for seemingly admitting to some exaggeration to make a point.

What I watched on Maddow's show was cut thematically, which you can find on her web site, as well as the full, unedited interview, which I've embedded below and recommend watching if/when you have the time:

Going peacefully to the unknown falls

I just had a dream which seems to have borrowed concepts from Meet Joe Black, Dead Like Me, What Dreams May Come, and the like.  It went something like this:

--------------------------------
I had known it was coming, for some reason.  My friend Clint was tasked with passing people from this life.  With a touch, usually unexpected, they slipped away.  With me, we knew it was coming.  The perks of having your friend be a reaper, I guess.  I knew the fast-approaching day and time.

As it approached, my preparations had nothing to do with having wild new experiences and eating amazing food.   I just spent low-key time with people I wanted to spend time with.  I wasn't to indicate I was 'leaving', so I pretty much carried on as normal.  I called people I hadn't spoken with in a while.  Most notably, I expressed affection more freely and let the little frictions go.  I hugged without the fear of how someone might interpret it or what awkwardness might result down the road.  I didn't care.  My road was taking me elsewhere.  I wanted them to know that I cared, and I needn't fear any pain I might feel by them abusing or disregarding that affection since I was leaving anyway.

The days leading up to the event are blurry.  I remember, though, the day.  I was in a classroom of some sort, college-style, and the class was dismissed with a bell.  My first instinct was to gather my things, pack my backpack in a hurry, and head off to whatever important things I had to attend to.  Except...this was the place.  I more casually packed up, walked calmly with my bag to the corner of the room by large bay windows, and set my backpack down on a couch there, where Clint and another friend were waiting for me solemnly but not somber.  I watch the dozens of people filter out, going on with their indefinite lives as I prepared to leave mine within the hour, and chatted with my friends as usual.  I suddenly thought, "Oh, I can't just leave my backpack laying around, I need to make sure my stuff's not going to be a burden to anyone, I..."  It dawned on me none of it mattered.  Someone would take care of all of that.  It was too late to concern myself with such details; now was a time to just...let it all go.  I looked at my backpack, my life in a bag, and I realized I'd never be picking it up again.  My mind went back to the images stored on the hard drive in the computer in that bag: a lifetime of snapshots I'd reviewed to refresh all of my memories, my life flashing before my eyes as it were.  There was no such thing as tying up all loose ends.  I accepted that.

I was admittedly a bit nervous.  My heart was racing just a bit, but as I looked out the window, I saw an expansive view of a richly salmon-hued sunset over a large and gorgeous body of water dotted by sailboats and lined across the far side by majestically rugged mountains and the near side by lush evergreen forest surrounding creamy beaches gently lapped by clear, turquoise water.  It was a conglomeration of all of the places which have 'taken me to my happy place', brought peace, and been home.  It reassured me that this was to be a peaceful process.  On the far right side from my vantage point, the large body of water spilled through an opening in the mountains into...I couldn't see what.  Was it a waterfall?  There was nothing visible beyond it.  "That's one tall waterfall," I thought.  I knew that's where I was going.  It was unknown.  It might be nowhere, nothing beyond that point but the ultimately peaceful stillness of not being.  It might be a step into another life, another sphere with more learning and relationships.  It might be whatever my consciousness made of it, a place of indescribable beauty and peace or fear and darkness depending on what my mind expected and how much I resisted leaving.  I didn't resist.  I would say I was resigned, but it felt more like humble acceptance and readiness to embark than mere resignation.

I said to my friends, "Sunset.  I've kind of imagined it would feel like this, a slowly setting sun as I depart into the unknown.  I guess it's set up that way to make it more peaceful for me, eh?  You know, some consider nightfall to be a new beginning, a dissolution of the garish light of day...or maybe that was me, too.  Ha, well it feels right."

As I gazed out the window, the din of departing students almost gone now, there were people I wished I could bring with me if I was going somewhere new.  There were relationships I wished had not ended or become strained.  There were people I had wanted to call but didn't because my only explanation would have been, "I'm dying," and I wasn't allowed to let them know that, nor did I want to concern them anyway or somehow obligate niceness or interest, and I certainly didn't want to irritate anyone by calling out of the blue or end on a bad note.  Better to hold on to the good memories and let it be.  We all go through it.  We might've resolved things in time, but I didn't need to.  I was moving on, and it was really, truly OK.  I breathed out slowly as fond or poignant memories of happy moments and personal connections washed over me, and I was that much more ready.

I sat in the window across from the friend who would induce my passage.  There was nothing left to say.  Nothing seemed to matter enough to say it.  Memories from my life kept cycling through my mind as I took in the view and felt my consciousness drifting almost imperceptibly outward over the water in the now-dim light of dusk towards the unknown falls and closed my eyes as if to sleep...

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I woke up and decided to record this while it was fresh, kind of hoping my own eventual death is actually anywhere near so peaceful and that I feel anywhere near so ready if I do somehow know it's coming.  While typing, I suddenly grabbed my sideburn...oh, good, all there.  Earlier in my dream I'd had to cut my own hair and nicked myself in such a way that I was forced to chop off my sideburns way higher than I like, and it was totally goofy-looking.  Right back to caring about the stuff that doesn't matter, eh? *wink*

How's a guy to save?

I'm working out my budget, paying attention again to the details and expenditures and working out a plan to pay down cards and get to a point where I'm actually saving money again rather than depleting my savings.  No, this doesn't mean I have a job.  I'm actually trying to work out what my options are given different levels of pay in different locations.  Just weighing my options, so I'm ready to pull one of the budgets out and stick to it when I do land something.

And overall, it's hopeful.  Under one plan in a job that's interesting and has long-term potential to do something kinda fun but doesn't pay well immediately, I could probably pay off my debts within a year and a half if I really stick to my budget.  Under another plan in a job which does pay well but may be slightly less engaging, I could have it all paid off within 9 months and live pretty comfortably, maybe even paying for things like career counseling in the meantime if I'm conservative in other areas.  It's really nice and refreshing to see that I could be debt-free in a relatively short time.

But my concern is that even at the relatively higher pay of the Seattle job, if I'm paying a fairly low $500/month for my own room, according to the budget I've worked out, I'm still only saving about 10-15% in long-term (retirement) funds (I'd still save another 10% or so in funds for car maintenance or payments, medical expenses, travel, etc).  I guess if I have a matching 401K program, I could up that, but still...that doesn't seem comforting in the long-run if I am out of work and have nobody to lean on or stay with for low or free rent temporarily like I have up to now.  Aren't I supposed to be saving close to half of my income, at my age, for future security?  Since my goal is complete financial independence, it's a little frustrating to be stuck at 10-15% for now, particularly if Social Security's future is in question.  Ha, maybe I need to finally read one of those Suze Orman books I picked up at DI last year for cheap.

Of course, the long-term goal is to find a rewarding career path, so none of these jobs would be my end-goal: they'd be means to an end, possibly good experiences along the way.  Whatever I end up doing five years from now will hopefully be at least as lucrative as the support work I'm doing now and will hopefully be more rewarding and engaging.  So I hope to be better off in the long-run.

And I guess this just means my hope of being able to buy all the chocolate I want for decadent homemade delights, or paying for whatever meal I want when I'm out with friends on the weekend, or buying new clothes regularly to stay sharp and crisp, or traveling wherever I want whenever I want, or having my own place with a room to spare for visitors...just have to be kept in perspective.  I'm doing fine now without any of those options, and I kind of like the simplicity.  ...I do have two pairs of jeans becoming holy now, so I need to be able to replace those soon...or start wearing my business casual pants daily.  Oh hey, if I had a job, I would be wearing them daily...OK, back to the whole job-finding thing... :-)

Thinking about a lot of things

Ha ha, I couldn't help but take a break from transcribing my hand-written journal to say I'm pretty sure the single most common phrase throughout is "thinking about a lot of things". I just read a part where I wrote that something had "gotten me thinking about a lot of things" and actually laughed out loud at myself, thinking, "Dude, you need no help with that." To be fair, I didn't write all that regularly in my journal, so when I did, it was during those times when things were particularly weighing on my mind. I just find it funny that I didn't seem to realize how repetitive I sounded, always saying, "I've been thinking about a lot of things," which in turns has me looking at other ways in which I'm repetitive now...shoot...you can bet I'm going to try to shake myself out of patterns, but where I fail to see them or change them, just love me for who I am? :-)

"Tacoma's not so dangerous..."

Some of you got a text from me about this tonight.

OK, those of you who are familiar with the Seattle area know that Tacoma is known for being a "rougher" area, particularly in certain parts. A few weeks ago, attending the Puyallup Fair, we passed through Tacoma and were kind of joking about the scariness of certain areas. I don't remember for sure who said it, but someone said, "It's not that bad." I even remember thinking it probably wasn't as bad as we make it out to be.

But on our way home from the fair, while driving down a wide street, a woman came running out into the street waving her arms in a clearly agitated way. As we got closer, the friend driving the car started to slow down, and a couple of us (myself included) insisted, "No, keep going. Just keep driving around her and don't slow down!" The look in her eyes was more wild than troubled, and I didn't trust her body language, almost angrily waving her arms at us yelling, "Stop! Stop!" as if we weren't allowed down this road, and she was in charge of keeping us out. We may be calloused and hardened by past experiences, but this just didn't seem right. As we passed her, I could see in her eyes that she definitely seemed...like she was on something. A couple of friends in the car were worried she might really have been in trouble, so we tried calling the local police just to report a woman running into the street endangering herself and others, potentially in trouble of some sort, and we circled back around after stopping briefly a couple of blocks away. Well, none of us could get a hold of the police, and she was gone when we returned. No tragic news stories that we knew of, so we figure she was on something and we'd done the right thing in not stopping. It was no huge thing, just typical city stuff you can run into anywhere, and we went on joking about Tacoma's reputation.

Tonight, a few friends and I ate at The Ram along Tacoma's waterfront. Apparently a decent neighborhood, it was also a beautiful spot to look out over the peaceful water at night. As we exited, one of the employees looked somewhat stressed as he re-entered and asked if we were parked to the right. We said no, our cars were all to the left. He said OK and let us out, suggesting we stay out of the righthand area of the lot. Meanwhile, some guy came walking up to the entrance and said, "I'd stay away from that area to the right; there's an altercation over there." Naturally, we were curious, so we looked over to find a couple of police officers a couple of dozen yards away, just arrived, standing behind their car doors, one shining a light and another raising a rifle of some sort towards the back part of the lot. Another officer was quietly walking around the side of the building. The restaurant staff were looking increasingly agitated. We couldn't tell exactly what was happening but decided it was best to not investigate too much and to get to our cars, which were really close, and lock the doors ASAP, so we did.

As I looked out from the car window towards the scene, I saw someone in the shadows and said, "I think they're talking to a man under that tree." Meanwhile, someone who shall go unnamed got out of the car and went back into the restaurant. The rest of us said, "What the...what's he doing?!" Turns out he had forgotten his leftovers. Ha, he admits that in hindsight, he probably should have left the leftovers.

I reported to my friends, "...yeah, he's right over there in the shadows...and he's waving something around in his hand...it does look kind of like a gun...that could definitely be a gun." At this point, I'm thinking, "OK, if he goes berserk, we're definitely in range. Not comfortable." I lowered myself in my seat and tried to keep the frame of the car between me and him while peeking around it as another police car drove up and parked, and the officers got out, opened the trunk, and raised rifles towards the man. Now they were between us and him. By this time, everyone was back in the car, and we'd called each other in our different cars to figure out where we were going and who was following whom to stay together. The man had now left the shade of the tree and was right in the parking lot area around the corner of the building from us, still in view. He seemed relatively casual but clearly defiant, waving his hand around. I said to my friends in the car, "Yep, that's a gun. He's waving around a handgun, and they're keeping their weapons pointed at him."

It all seemed a bit surreal. I thought, "If he points that thing at anyone, we know what's going to happen." Having coordinated ourselves, we all started pulling out of our parking spaces as more officers arrived, firearms drawn and ready, moving around the backs of our cars towards the scene. As the scene became palpably more intense, we had started driving towards the parking lot exit when we heard the loud, rapid-succession burst of gunfire. I turned back around towards the scene, and sure enough, the police had opened fire, and the man was no longer standing there. As we rounded a corner, we could see the police officers closing in around a spot on the ground with their weapons still aimed, now downward...he was down.

It was one of those moments you just don't know quite how to react to. Oh @#$%, that was gunfire right behind us. Who knows if there'll be more? Get out. Get away. Wow, I think we just saw a man gunned down. He probably didn't survive that. We could've been shot. Wow, you don't see that every day. That's Tacoma, for ya. Ha, what an experience. Man, it's times like this I wish my Facebook account were active...I'll just text a bunch of people instead. Wait, is it appropriate to laugh? Some guy probably just died. Or did they just take him down? Nah, with that many rounds fired? No way that wasn't lethal. There were a lot of cops, and that was a lot of rounds. This could've happened anywhere. Glad we got out of the lot before all of these police passing us going the other way with sirens blaring get there and tape it off. Maybe the restaurant shouldn't have let anyone out. But how could they know? What if the guy had opened fire on us as we walked to our cars? Would the one or two police officers have been able to stop him before one of us was hit? Did the man intend to commit suicide by getting them to open fire? Were there others with him we didn't know about, hiding in the parking lot? Those had better be some good leftovers. I wonder if he has relatives and how some people's lives just changed. Probably no good to think about that too much. But I don't want to be calloused either. I wonder how this will be reported in the news, or whether it's even news-worthy.

Some in our group were rattled for a while, others less so. I had felt more cautiously fascinated by the scene and how it might play out than shaken or fearful. We talked about how crazy it was to have been there right when it all happened so quickly. We quipped about never hanging out in Tacoma again or letting you-know-who pick the restaurant. I mean, what's appropriate, as far as responses go? Nothing. But I'll tell you this much: Tacoma's not exactly winning a lot of points with me so far.




Find news stories on the incident here and here.


Update: In the KIRO news story video clip, the reporter is positioned similarly to where we were, but we were just a bit further away to the reporter's left. The red tree you see in the background is the one the man was under when I first saw him. I wouldn't have been able to see the green one farther back from our angle.

TRX kicked my butt

I finally went to one of those newfangled workout classes, a TRX class Justin's been inviting me to for a while now, insisting I needed to give it a shot. Since the class is downtown, that's given me a good excuse not to be able to make it, but I thought, "OK, fine, I'm trying to just try new things more, so let's do this thing and stop wondering ahead of time how much of a wuss I'll be." So I said, "Fine, yes, Friday."

The short version is...my arms feel like their power has been drained about 58%, I'm sore in places I can't remember being sore in, I nearly threw up about halfway through the class and left to kneel before some porcelain for a few minutes until I felt ready to rejoin the class, and I've remembered the benefit of trying something on a whole new level you haven't tried before even if only to reveal...opportunities for growth.

If the class were at a gym I had a membership to, and were free, I'd totally be there. I should see if my gym has some good classes.

My buddies in Salt Lake kept trying to get me to go to their CrossFit class, which someone said is supposedly harder than TRX. I'll pass for now, thanks. And I'll work my way up to it.

...Oh, the pain, it makes me feel so alive. ;-)

Expressions

I find these smiles contagious, and I sincerely do "love to see you smile".

Some things never change...

Ha ha!  I'm transcribing my old hand-written journal, and I had to laugh at the following two entries (particularly the bolded lines):

29 Nov 00

I'm still thinking a lot.  Thinking about my future, thinking about my weaknesses, thinking about opportunities, thinking about who I'll spend the rest of my life with, thinking about suffering in the world, about what I can do to make a difference, about how it seems to take money to make a difference, about school, about friends, about family, about my mission, about people in Ottawa & Montreal, about genuineness of friendship, about writing music, about writing essays to express my thoughts, about writing poems to express my emotions, ...about way too much for 11:00 at night.  I'm going to sleep.

28 Dec 2000

Amazing.  Nearly every night, I tell myself, "I need to get to bed--if I stay up later to write in my journal, I'll throw my schedule off."

Now, thinking back to my mission about how every little things counts, I think that if I just make sure to write in my journal daily, even if only a sentence, it will remain or become a habit for which I will make more time.

So much has happened...well, for "normal" life.  My first accompaniment on the piano even, with the First Ward choir's The First Noel.

I just read my previous entry (29 Nov).  I've been thinking plenty.  I have to act more now.

Favorite new Netflix hobby

Psych.  I saw part of an episode once but thought it was just another cheap, cheeky comedy despite a friend with good taste recommending it and, if I remember right, that friend having a bit of a crush on the lead who seemed like a doofus to me from the little bit I saw, which made me question said friend's taste.  Now I see it's a somewhat cheap, cheeky comedy with some really good dialog, a fun premise, and a doofus, cheeky, crush-worthy lead character whose brain works in ways I appreciate and find entertainingly intriguing.  I like it!  It's not in my top 5 favorite shows, but I'm enjoying it muchly so far.

Interest exploration

Making my previous lists got me thinking about what I generally spend my time thinking about in analytical ways or how my thoughts tend to prioritize if I don't consciously try to remember certain things or have obligations which demand specific attention:

1. Relationships and communication/psychology (this is a rewarding and never-ending experimental laboratory in my life: no funds required, no end to the questions and puzzles, always something to figure out or test either in someone else or in myself and my own reactions...)
   
2. Politics and cultural/social issues
   
3. Religion and philosophy
   
4. Travel and other social plans/commitments
   
5. Specific issues in daily life, like events, or goings-on in friends' and family members' lives, figuring out a career path, etc.
   
6. Chores and errands I need to do, like actually looking for jobs, cleaning, getting dressed, etc

There's probably a lot more to be gleaned from that list than what has to do with finding career interests, but I thought it was interesting because I suppose not everyone is quite the same in this sense. Then I started thinking about what I've spent most of my time reading about online (the bulk of my informational intake, not counting the time I'm actually producing [blogging, uploading photos for sale or display, responding to messages, etc]):

1. Social media (Facebook, blogs, chatting, YouTube, and learning about everything below through social media, so this isn't all fluff time but is largely not exactly peer-reviewed journalistic kinds of stuff)
   
2. Social issues and politics (particularly political and social science, philosophy/religion, psychological and other sciences, and history as they relate to mohodom [ask me privately if you don't know], relationships, health, or issues like climate change, gays in the military, marriage rights, sustainable energy resources, immigration, economic recovery, etc)
   
3. Random tangents (IMDBing an actor, investigating scientific bases for alternative healing methods, finding out what material my blanket is made of and what its properties are, checking the stats on my blog, finding Waterloo, Ontario on Google Maps, looking up the origins of pink lemonade or the phrase "on the lam"...)
   
4. Entertainment (watching TV online, mostly)
   
5. Job-hunting
   
6. Computer/tech news and information
   
7. Natural sciences
   
8. General news (I get more news from radio than online: I just research the news online)
   
9. Looking into fields of study

Obviously, this does not bode well for finding answers about a career path soon. Hence one reason for my deactivation of my Facebook account. I'll need to work on this more. Part of why I've decided to blog about this is to integrate my propensity to analyze what I blog about, and vice versa, and organize my thoughts into something at least coherent enough to articulate in some way, even if it's too long-winded and boring for most readers to get through. :-) So then I thought, when I actually decide to read a book, what kind do I read?:

• Fantasy/Sci-Fi
  
• Philosophy, politics, religion, sociology non-fiction
  
• Natural sciences (esp. marine or other aquatic and African and South American ecosystems) non-fiction
  
• Communication and relationships
  
• Other "self-help"
  
• Other novels

And documentaries I watch?:

• Social/Political (usually about or incidental to current controversy)
  
• Psychology/Sociology (especially human development, relations and abnormal psych)
  
• Natural sciences (especially fauna)
  
• Religion (especially common threads, history of religion and relationship with modern society)
  
• Arts (especially music, performing arts)
  
• History (especially natural, religious, WWII, Civil Rights in the U.S., ancient civilizations)

Courses I most enjoyed at the university level:

• Intro to Marketing
  
• Intro to Psych and Abnormal Psych
  
• Intro to Geology
  
• History and cultures of Latin America
  
• Biology
  
• Business Law
  
• Sociology
  
• Hispanic cinema
  
• Spanish for Business
  
• Writing and rhetoric
  
• Statistics & Risk Analysis
  
• Discrete Math

Well shoot, no wonder I left college more confused than ever...

Backyard after the rain

Logan Temple