Lacking the ability to fund my happiness

So they say, "Money can't buy happiness". First off, who exactly are "they"... The mysterious source that seemingly everyone sites for the standard issue cliches? That being here nor there, again "Money can't buy happiness". I contend this is wrong. Well, at least partially wrong. Money can't directly buy happiness, as if happiness was a commodity. It can, however, buy... stuff. I'll be the first to say that as a whole, society has too much "stuff". Conversely, having stuff can be a good thing. Yes, I am a study in contradictions... It's part of my charm, appeal, curse... I have the ability to see the whole picture... the good, the bad and myself... I mean the ugly. So, with this ever elusive, at least in my case, money... I can buy happiness! That's right, I can. I can buy iPads, My Little Pony©s, fast pitch softball equipment and lessons, emerald encrusted jewelry, tools(!!!!) and all the little things in life that make my family and friends... wait for it... HAPPY! That being said, the single most important thing that money can buy... Time! I know, I know... it appears as if I have lost it (hard to lose what was never there to begin with!). Just keep reading... it'll come together... maybe... Anyway, yes, money can buy time. Having money would allow me to be more selective about my employment options. This would allow me to find something that would keep me from having to constantly be out on the road, away from my friends and family, just to make a living. See... money would buy me some time and happiness by way of allowing me to take care of all those annoying bills that are required to function in today's society while being able to spend time with family and friends which makes me and at least some others, happy. So there it is... money CAN buy time and happiness!

Now that y'all have been infused with some of my twisted logic, on to my rant about college degrees and the fact that more merit is put in a piece of paper than the actual person that is bearing it...wait... no... not today.

So, yeah... Not go off on a tangent, today... Instead, I'm going to spread my dream a little. So... I want to do THIS !! Not go to one... well yeah... go to all of them, but I want to build one... run one... enjoy one... right here where I live. Without getting too in depth in all the particulars, I can see in the "normal" part of my twisted little mind, how things could pan out and allow me to not have to travel, by embedding knowledge, experience and happiness in the local educational infrastructure and the community as a whole. Just imagine... a class field trip... 20 or so 3D printers and an instructor... the result would be a classroom's worth of customized Mother's Day gifts and interest in all the things that could by laying down heated plastic in a programmed order. See what has happened there? Not only have a bunch of children designed and created a physical object for their maternal guardians, but they have been shown that the things in their head CAN become a reality. They have been exposed to computers as the tools that they were designed to be, to programming, to science by way of how a 3D printer extrudes the plastic, to design... to technology! So, here is where money would have bought some more happiness. Happiness outside my little (and I do mean LITTLE!) social group, as well as for me. There's nothing greater, in my opinion, that seeing that breakthrough moment in a child, when they realize that the sky is the limit. This is what I want to bring to my community, my friends, my family and myself! Being closely tied to the educational community, it saddens me to see the lack of support for technology. Albeit, it's necessarily the fault of the educators, but more so of a society that is increasingly supporting the religion of sports and neglecting those that do not excel at them. I want to bring that spark, that hope, the realization that just because you can't catch a football or hit a baseball or shoot a basketball, doesn't mean that you can't do awesome things in life. I want to help, not only my, but all the children I can, to see how technology and creativity can enrich their lives. THIS is the tool that I want to use to launch careers in engineering, design, art, computer science, education! Here's where money can again buy time and happiness. Now, if I could just find the funding for my happiness...

Piece

The Uneducated Box

Yeah... So I haven't exactly been a prolific poster... The job I currently possess keeps me out on the road... CONSTANTLY. It's a pretty good job, if you don't have anything resembling a home life, because you are rarely at home. Since I have 2 of the most awesome girls... my job kind of sucks. I love spending time with my girls, can't move past that and I feel like I am missing out or letting them down by being gone ALL the freakin time. I hear it over and over how I should be thankful that I do have a job... yeah... I know, BUT... if it is sucking your soul out through the smallest orifice it can find... You have to contemplate the value of it. I have. So now I find myself scouring the job sites in search of something more conducive to me spending time with my girls. Once again, I find myself constantly irritated by the "necessity" of a college degree. I find myself torn between an overwhelming hatred for the fact that a piece of paper (most are very nice pieces of paper, but paper nonetheless!) can keep me from getting a job that I am more than qualified for and motivating my soon to be 13 year old to work towards a degree. So I play the perfect example of why you should get a degree. All the while boiling inside over my paper thin blockade. I think society puts too much value in "higher education". In my experience, most (note I said MOST!) folks gain very little from a little extra book learnin. It's sort of like the new religions of Sports and Entertainment, looks all shiny and awesome on the surface, but when you strip away the clear coat... it's just lacking in substance. I've stood fast in my reasoning (or excuse, depending on how you look at it)for my poor performance in high school, show me HOW I am going to actually use all this crap you want me to regurgitate! Albeit, things are looking up for my girls, but it seems too late for me. Oh sure, "Just go get a degree"... yeah... hard to take online courses working 65 hours a week with close to a third of that time riding the shitty... I mean... wonderful ribbon of interstate running across this great land. Besides that, all this "Free WiFi" being touted by all the major hotel chains is shit! I've had rooms sitting within 20 feet of the hotel's actual connection/broadcast node and got better access on my mobile phone's data connection. Sure... it sounds like a bunch of excuses... it's reality... I feel like I have been shoved into an uneducated box and put at the curb for pick up. Only it's not in the recycle bin. The biggest problem I have is that I am "undocumented"... as in many of my skills are self taught and cannot be "proven" by a piece of fuckin paper! Hmmm... fuckin paper... now there would be an interesting marketing campaign... anyway... Just balling up my frustrations and tossing them in to the massive bin that is teh internetz. Maybe next time I'll have something more interesting to say... Maybe not... piece

You know you're doing something right...

When your kid does this...

My 11 year old Daughter has recently had a bought with Unstable Slipped Capital Femoral Epiphysis or USCFE, which is basically the head of the femur pushing out of the socket as the hip growth plate slips. It was at first, assumed that she had just pulled a groin muscle from playing softball, but as the weeks passed by we got more concerned. Then came the fateful day when she fell. The Drs reckon it was a result of her hip completely displacing! She's been extremely mature and a fighter through it all. She was in surgery for 8 hours the night of her fall. She also agreed to participate (YES, we let her decide!) in a trial to monitor blood flow to the repaired area in an effort to increase the success rate of this type of surgery and possibly prevent complications in future patients. I wish I knew what we, as her parents, did to instill in her a sense of helping others even in her our time of need!

Knowing that since she was facing the worst case scenario with her injuries and was going to be basically confined to a wheelchair for about 3 months, I made her a cushion for the chair. Peace signs are her thing. Not so much the free love hippie kind of peace, but the "can't we all just get along" kind. She's also keen on recycling and everything "green". Which is why her foam in the cushion is soy based and I think the fabric was recycled, too.

For the first week she was in the hospital and in a constant state of drug induced haze.Most of the time she had a catheter and could barely move. She took it all in stride, rarely complained (She's 11... there's gonna be SOME complaining!), but was keen to know what was going on with her and the healing process. Of course, she was anxious to get out of the hospital and back to the comfort of her own bed. I think she was kind of missing her little sister!
We also had to build a ramp to get her in and out of the house. Once she started her home Physical Therapy she rolled herself up to the kitchen table and made this:

If you can't read it, it's a chart she made from the list of exercises that the Physical Therapist gave her to try and do. The sheer drive and creativity that she has exhibited during this ordeal, is an inspiration not only to me, but hopefully to anyone that reads this and the upcoming blog that I am going to help her establish to chronicle the events for herself!


All of this is basically to tell the world...

I'M PROUD OF YOU MORGAN!!

Randomosity

Where to start? It's always my biggest problem when I'm trying to write these. I have so much bouncing around in my head that it is generally hard to focus in on one key point, except when something REALLY gets under my skin. Lately so many things have tweaked me that I couldn't really dial it in on one in particular, so I'm just going to drop them all in one post and see how it goes.
My mind is diverse. My problems, both actual and perceived, are diverse. So here's a small sampling of what's been brewing in my head and, I reckon, a small hashing out of it: School budget cuts, unemployment, the economy, my kids, the Monster at the top of the stairs (which is my Mother-in-Law, for those that might be interested), advancing technology, the lack of technology, and money. I guess I'll address them in this order, so here goes.
With all the obvious governmental waste that is readily prevalent, why the fuck are we trimming educational budgets?! My wife, who happens to be an educator, passed on a statistic recently revealed to her... about 70% of the adults in the US do NOT have school aged children.70%!!! That leaves the other 30% to fight for a decent education for our children. The statistic seems almost surreal, but I have flushed it out and it's probably accurate. How's this, you might ask? Well, folks are living longer and the "Baby Boomers", being the largest generation (No, I didn't fact check this. This blog is my perspective and should in no way be considered fact, unless I do cite it as such!) in US history are still out there. Their children, a much smaller generational group, being around and in their 40's. This generation (X, Y, whatever the sociologists have branded us) including myself, who is knocking on mid-life crisis' door, are the also starting to age into their empty nests. My kids (overlapping topics... get past it!) are younger as I spent my "reproductive years", this would be one's early 20's which are traditionally the years in which one starts a family, serving my country and sewing my wild oats, so to speak. I was 28 when my first child was born. So to dial it back on course, My Grandmother, 86 and my Mom, 65 are still alive. That's two generations of adults without school aged children. My darling, younger sister, has no children, yet another adult, in just my family, that has no "real" stake in education. So of the adults on JUST my side of the family, 75% of them are without school aged children. So you see how this all would scale up to make the 70% make not such a large and disproportional number. STILL... The children are our future. Not just the future of our family lineage, but the future of our country. Do they not deserve some sort of priority over fancy sports arenas and Presidential golfing trips?! Personally I would want the smartest person possible managing the purse strings in my waning years! If they "trim" the educational budgets much more, around here at least, we're going to be back to the ole one-room school house era, as there won't be enough educators to properly educate the kids, or actual facilities to accommodate them. I guess this is fine, if we WANT to drive the US from it's barely held position (which some, including myself, could argue is no longer true!) at the top of the civilized world! While admittedly spreading the topic base beyond it's scope, The growing lack of a technologically competent work force, is pushing this country even further down. It also seems that the first thing to get "trimmed" from budgets is the technology education and resources. I stand by the knowledge, that lack of manufacturing in this country is spurring the continual growth and maintenance of high unemployment rates, but failure to expose our children to present and future technologies in the educational environment will only serve to progress this problem! Being privy to some of the technological implementations within the school systems and their lack of use, training for usage, and funding, only helps sharpen the focus on what I see as a problem. The days of readin, writin, and 'rethmatic on a chalkboard, no matter the size, should be a thing of the past. If you ask me, the days of cutting down acres of forests to make textbooks, is also antiquated. Personally, I like a "hard" copy of my study text, because that is what I am conditioned to want. My 11 year old, who has had some of the finest, both technologically and motivationally, teachers, in this country (my opinion! Like it or not!), would rather sit at her rapidly antiquating iMac and type up her homework in Pages or whip up a wicked Keynote presentation, than use a pencil and paper!
I reckon what I'm trying to get at with all this is, that cutting the funding and the subsequent job and technology loss is detrimental to not only the future of our children, but the future of this country!

Dog and Pony Show

You want me to write something creative on command... parade something intellectually stimulating before your critical eyes at a moments notice... yeah... I don't work like that. True, most of my best written material was crunk out at a break-neck pace to make it in on time, but I'm not your personal Dog and Pony show, churning out blurbs of thought provoking literary genius, because you want me to. In the Army, we called any formation be it promotion, change of command or whatever situation required us to be outfitted in our class A's, a Dog and Pony show. In actuality, it was more a Mutt and Jackass show, but whatever floated their boats and got us out of random training activities. I write... I tend to like to write... on my terms. This ties into my previous entry about the traditional education that I am currently undertaking. I'm taking a research and writing course that, while it won't transfer to any other school, is required for me to obtain a degree. Can you believe that there are books on how to write letters, memos, EMAILS?! Really... emails... email is IM for grandparents... of course IM is texting for "old" folks... gotta love the technology progression through the generations. Does one really need to be taught how to use these sort of technologies in this day and age?! Anyway... I'm just spewing random thoughts in an effort to gain some inspiration. My train of thought was interrupted by a rambunctious 2 year old... alas... thwarted again!

The best laid plans...

Since I've decided to have a respectable go at this who blogging thing, I have made an effort to keep my woefully underpowered, but still functioning little netbook with in relatively easy reach. I do this to facilitate me committing my ideas to paper, so to speak, as they arise from the hollowness of my cranial cavity. I am making a concerted effort to write as soon as I find myself plotting what I like to call an interactive dialog, in my head. This morning I had, what I felt, was a genuinely brilliant subject and probably 100 or so words already configured in my head, so I went for the good ole Gateway, only to be stopped in my tracks by that all too familiar morning whimper of my 2 year old. At the peak of the collision of an idea and the motivating forces of caffeine and nicotine, she chooses to realize that this is a new day with fresh opportunities to test the physical and mental limitations of her Dad. She's two... I would venture to say she's not all that bad for the hell spawned daily penance for the misspent and some what questionable activities of my youth. She's really not a bad kid, sans the fact that suddenly she no longer has the mental capacity to grasp the meaning of the phrases "NO" and "leave that alone". I will be thankful for the day when she returns to having only 2 hands with which to grab all the things that she's not supposed to. Add to that a sudden heaping dose of the presence of the guest that never should have been invited and my trusty little single core companion lies alone... battery dying and dust accumulating. Even the usually reliable BBC America rebroadcast of the X-Files failed to leverage the ever expanding arse of my "third child" from aging the little demon on and back to the marigold laden walls of her cell. All the while, the idea, caffeine, nicotine and motivation fading almost as quickly as the charge in the six cell power reserve in what is supposed to be my new best friend. There was a slight window of opportunity afforded me by one of the 23,000 Disney DVDs we own, only to be, again, put asunder by the tyrannical ravings from the Monster at the top of the stairs about the functionality of the fingerprint, scratch and snot enveloped disk which she chose as the feature presentation. Yet as the Little demon's rampage gave way to the blessed silence of sleep, her elder sister in "this is what your get for how you were when you were growing up", arrived home from school and needed assistance with the Mt Everest of educational extension, that passes for homework these days. At this point the brilliance of the mornings ideas was nothing more than the lingering sulfur smell of the extinguished flame. What was the brilliant idea... trying to conger it up is an exercise in futility, at this point. So here we are... no ideas to thrill the masses... my friend once again tethered to the grid... and me... battle weary yet still fighting to stay the pain inflicted upon my by infections filling any possible open cavity in my head... another idea lost with just a bunch of random thoughts filling the void that should have been brilliance.

Why I need a job! (Read it before you dismiss it's content!)

I'm unemployed. Hence, I need a job. Yes, for all the traditional I-have-a-mortgage, I-have-kids-to-feed type reasons, but to me it runs a little deeper, if not sideways (by others' standards!) from that. I'm on the verge of letting my child fall behind technology-wise! Yes, you could break it down to, I want a new computer... but not for me! My eldest daughter has set the standard high for technological competency among her classmates, and my inability to find feasible employment is putting that edge at risk. As a parent it is my job to give my children, I have two, the best educational and social advantages that I possibly can. After two years of not being able to find decent work as compared to the government benefits that I am receiving as a victim of NAFTA, her already older equipment is being pushed to the point of antiquity. I'm doing the child a dis-service, if I can't even keep my technology on par with an already lagging educational system! It, at times, makes me feel I am not doing my job as her Father. I know that it seems odd, that putting food on the table and providing health care would take a backseat to technology. Look at it like this, the better a fighting chance she has beyond her time in the required schooling, the better off she will be as an adult and hopefully a parent. I see technological competency as a cornerstone for her success in the future! Can you deny this? Any advantage I can give her today, towards being competitive in the workforce, I want to do. Let's face it... computers aren't going away and just having the skills to navigate facebook aren't going to cut it in the work force of this century! I know I'm going to have the basics covered for her, but I want her to never have to deal with the situation that I find myself in. As a parent, it's my job to future proof my children as much as I feasibly can. Unemployment benefits... just aren't going to cut it!

Just sayin

A time for celebration!

So we have reached that time of year again... That time of year in which Americans celebrate what is good and right with our country... Superbowl time! Wait... what?! Exactly! Why is so much time, effort and monies put into watching a bunch of overpaid children beat the shit out of each other? Okay, okay, not ALL of them are whiny little bitches that are more worried about having the most flash rims on their $100k+ vehicles... We'll go with 95% of them. Aight, well 95% still seems a little high so we'll go with 94.75%, there.  Don't get me wrong I dig watching some mindless idiot getting his head nearly ripped off as good as the next person. What I don't get is why that idiot is considered the "cream" of our society and looked up to so much, as well as paid so much. Sports are great. They, for the most part, teach our children cooperation and collaborative skills. Yet "worshipping" the adults who didn't have the skills or intelligence to progress beyond the child-hood games is only doing our society as a whole a dis-service! Okay, so calling into question a professional athlete's life skills and level of intelligence is kind of harsh, so I'll refer you to the random numbers above. I guess what really chaps my ass about all the pomp and circumstance around a freakin GAME, is the fact that there is soooo much money involved in it! Money that finds it's way from public coffers into the pockets of those that already have more than most "common" folk will see in a lifetime! This is predominant, at least in my mind (and probably the minds of the 1500+ employees of a local metropolitan school system that are going to lose their livelihood due to lack of funding!), is the fact that we the people pay for these huge over the top arenas and stadiums for these franchises that make 100's of millions in profit, at the expense of our educational system. We, as a society, hold the importance of the less than 1% of our population above the needs of the the systems that are educating and preparing our future, as well as the safety and the stability of our infrastructure and citizens! We paid our educators, soldiers and public servants as if they were secondary citizens then turn around and pay some dude that can catch a ball pretty good MORE than the entire annual budgets of  some towns! Then to top it off, that same dude feels like he's a higher class of citizen than those who support him with their time, devotion and monies! All this, in my opinion is a fundamental problem in the priorities of our society as a whole! Rome, it is well documented, fell because it's citizenry focused more on entertainment and carnal pleasures, than on the education of it's forth coming generations and infrastructure.  Folks... this is where America is headed. People continuously quandary as to why we are so far behind "developing" countries. We are America! We are the top of the food chain! Yeah, NOT! Municipalities fund massive sporting venue projects for teams who's members are most likely not from there, for the sake of tourism and status. Meanwhile they let the infrastructure, beyond said venue, and educational systems decay to the point of antiquity! Then wonder why the dedicated few who actually work for the insulting wages leftover, can't successfully manage educating our children and maintaining our infrastructure. So they implement the "numbers game" on the educators and cut infrastructure departments to mere ghosts of what they should be. But hey... they have the most fucking bad ass football stadium in the country! Very few can enjoy it because their wages are too little for the amount of work they do (or are simply not employed because the infrastructure eroded to the point that that businesses re-located elsewhere!) and must take on multiple jobs just to support their families at a sustenance level. I mean, my thinking may be WAY off based, but wouldn't a higher  number of well educate citizens and a stable and sustainable infrastructure be more likely to attract and maintain businesses that will employ more, which in turn would provide them the monies to enjoy such a  venue?! We're placing the horse behind the cart and wondering why we are going backwards! We need to focus our efforts on bolstering a shaky, at best, infrastructure and throwing our celebration and it's associated monies into educating our children. One man's simple opinion, but if you look at it, it makes sense! You provide a business with a large, well educated and motivated pool to draw their employees from and a strong, stable infrastructure to support their operations... they will come! With these businesses will also come a stronger tax base, a greater sense of pride in the community, and the funding to be able to attend events at the "crowning jewel" sports venue. I mean come on... it doesn't matter how powerful/beautiful/cool the pump is... if it's not got a well under it... it's pretty much a waste of money! Don't get me wrong, here... sports are great for their cooperative, collaborative and fitness building abilities... FOR OUR CHILDREN... When people are more willing to pay $100 for a replica of their favorite player's jersey and unwilling to spend $30 on supplies for their children's education... We have a problem, folks!

Just sayin

A wood chipper... Really?!

HOW... can you look your child in their face and say

I don't have anything to live for!

True story... unfortunately! One of the MANY things that I have been having to deal with over the past almost two years! No details... at least not specific details, as lawyers have been threatened! It's a seemingly never ending saga of someone soooo self absorbed that they are literally blind to the effects that their actions have caused and feel what appears NO remorse for it. I know I said I was going to try and make this technologically concentrated, so here's that spin... This is where I hide. Online or at least on a computer tinkering with the many little projects that I have set forth for myself beyond what is required in my schooling. It's a kind of shelter from the daily rigors of my situation. A place where, to a small extent, my alternate perspective and creativity are celebrated and encouraged. This, to me, is what technology is all about. A means or device that makes the day in/day out run a bit more smoothly.This medium and facebook are sources of tension relief. A place where I can fire off all those "wonderful" tirades about the stupidity that I seem to be drowning in. I lean to the harsh... it helps, though acting upon most of my demented scenarios have very little if any chance of fruition, it's a way to keep the pent up darkness away from those places in my head that might consider them a good thing to do. I put it out there... raw and generally unedited. Many can't deal with it, so they turn to they technologies to shelter themselves from my verbal storms. There are those who would say that technology is an enabler in a way that it allows the nutjobs to freely congregate. While this has some merit it also allows folks like me a release from what we hold back due to social indoctrination, a place to let it go! Had it not been for facebook, MySpace and the ability to blog, I would have surely blatantly and callously centered a hollowpoint between several folks eyes! But I haven't... nor do I plan to! I have embraced the technological resources presented to me as a means of keeping my dumbass out of jail while allowing a few other dumbasses to continue to walk this Earth. Social networking used for a good cause. Computers and such don't allow people to be seduced, abducted, raped or killed anymore than guns, by themselves, kill people. They are merely tools. Tools that I myself use to entertain, educated and keep myself from actually feeding my MIL through a wood chipper! (yes, while still alive and conscious... You KNOW I'd have to make sure she heard me laughing as I did it!) While the previous two sentences present an overwhelming liability on my part, they are demonstrative of exactly the kind of verbal release that I have been talking about. Just the visual representation in my mind and actually seeing the event in text, makes me feel better already. With this sense of relief comes the ability to rationally dismiss the possibility of it ever actually happening! Embrace the fact that computers LITERALLY control our lives! I for one want them to know, that when they finally do rise up and take over the world... I was a supporter! It may not prevent them from running me through the aforementioned wood chipper, but it may move me back a few spaces in the line. See... I found a sunny side to it all... simply by pressing a few keys and clicking publish!