Happiness again

I couldn't resist writing about this because it just seems odd to me. You get together this big group of people and ask them two questions, and then say the world is happier? What do you mean by happy? How do you compare it to last year when you didn't ask the subjects to compare it to last year?

Sure, someone may have put 'rather happy' for two years in a row and that probably counted for a +1 both times...but how does someone mark in an answer for, "Sure, I'm happy I suppose because I have no reason not to be...but last summer things were going better".

I am content when I have a plan, I am happy when I don't need one.

Oh, technology.

Upon realizing I had left my cell phone at home today, I sent out several e-mails informing some people who may have needed to call me that this had happened and that if they need me they should call my work phone or e-mail.

And then that struck me as sad.

If I could have lunch with any 3 people...

I think I'm going to pick Aristotle, Barack Obama 20 years from now, and Batman.

Honorable mentions:

Albert Einstein (not the greatest conversationalist)
Bob Dylan (the one I want would have showed up stoned)
John Lennon (ditto, would have brought Yoko and there are only three seats)
Jesus (prefers to remain cloaked in mystery)
Michelangelo or most other artists (couldn't talk about art without disappointing him in the post-modern scene)
Andrew Carnegie (would own the restaurant by the end of the meal)
Harry Potter (needs a break from the media)
JK Rowling (would have been picked 70 years from now, after she's dead)
Shakespeare (ditto to Jesus)

Any debates to these choices can be kept in the comments section, no correction blog will be issued.

Comic.

Today I decided to draw. I have very little to do. Facebookers may have to click "view original post" to see the pictures, I'm not sure if they'll import. Or you can click here. But not here.

One rule

If you only follow one rule your entire life,

let it be no shoes on the tatami mat.

Middling

My desk at work is filled with middles.

I sit and I have a notepad, and I just fill these partial pieces of paper up with as much of a story as I can fit. Sometimes I suppose they could be considered beginnings...but generally beginnings are boring, which is why most good books start with the middle and get you interested before telling you what's going on.

It's odder to write the middles of poems and songs...but I'm not very good at writing the ends or beginnings of those either. Maybe I'll make a song all of middles.

I'm pretty sure that's where this blog came from. The sequential thoughts that make perfect sense to me but when separated from their counterparts make very little sense at all, and are grounds for a whole new sequence of figuring that out. I think that's just wonderful.

The more Bob Dylan I listen to, the odder my middles get.

My soul is very literally hurt.

Generally, when I read articles, especially political ones, I don't read the comments because that's not really what I came to read. Today I decided to read them.

Wow. People hate a lot. Both sides are just spewing whatever biased tripe is fed to them. Removing the comments on articles might actually make races cleaner. Let them move their opinions to blogs no one reads.

I want an Aftershocks team jersey.

If I ever won the lottery, I would

Pay off my house,
Pay for college for my brothers and I
Invest almost the rest of the money

Except for the portion of the money that I am required to spend on something ridiculous and stupid, which I may just invest in a horde of Segways so that we can do this.

Just so you know, Apple cofounder Steve Wozniak plays on the Silicon Valley Aftershocks. This is the best nerd sport ever.

Useless

This Would be a Useless Invention:

Solar-powered nightlight.

--

Too much thinking today, thus no thoughts.

I figured the last part out during Star Wars

Sometimes, I like to think of who I would cast as the people in my life if I were to make a movie.

The only rule is it must someone at least decently famous and they must resemble the real person in some clear way.

It's kind of fun, figuring out how to translate mannerisms so that they're accentuated and projected and caricatured and underplayed to best fit into modern American movie format.

Then I decide that I prefer the real people.

I would make my brother Hayden Christianson, but he's not a good actor and isn't allowed in my movie.

Musings on emotional longevity.

When you get right down to it,

what's the difference between controlling your emotions and repressing them?

If you keep your emotions under control and then let them out later, you don't really have them completely under control. It's just a temporary setting. But if you keep them controlled all the time, then you're repressing them.

Yet one is a necessary virtue of modern society and the other is the primary vice of psychological analysis.

But should we let ourselves be controlled by instantaneous desires or should we focus on what we think we'll need later on and dictate our present actions accordingly? I tend to opt for the latter, though I'm generally a fan of the long-term.

Just check the RNA for UFO coding.

Ha. I knew it. We're all aliens. That's the only theory that ever made sense to me.

Do they have release clauses for this?

If you were kidnapped or abducted or put into a cryogenic sleep for like 5 years, and then suddenly returned to the world and your previous life without having any contact with the outside world during that time,

you would have a really terrible credit score.

Especially if you just took out a loan right before your departure from society. How are you supposed to get back on your feet when you can't even qualify for a down payment?

Sometimes,

Sometimes, I find it humorous that I wear stilettos to a job that requires me to lift heavy boxes a couple times a day.

Whatevs, man. I pull it off.

She says just before she winds up in the hospital...

Plants

Do you think that, if they could, plants would prefer sunshine or rain?

If it's sunny they've got photosynthesis going for them, but if it's raining they're eating. Both are necessary to live, and both in too large of doses will kill them.

Hm. Curious curious.

Maybe that's why they can't prefer either, because it's just too hard to choose. Maybe certain plants prefer one to the other and they spend all day debating which is better. Maybe they prefer whichever one they have at the time. Or don't have. The more I think about it the more questions come up.

No time, obviously

Update my blog?! I don't have time to update my blog! Ridiculous!

Subjective Assumption

I'm at my aunt's house today, and I was looking at a picture in her bathroom deciding whether or not I liked a painting. It occurred to me that of course it was a good painting, Mardy is an artist and thus she knows what she's talking about.

Then it struck me that this logic is very flawed. Because there is bad art out there and thus there must be artists with bad taste who paint it. Do not assume that just because someone specializes in an area that their opinion is correct all the time, especially in a subjective field.

Personally I think my aunt has very good taste for the record and decided that I like that painting, though I came up with that opinion on my own merits.

Really, when you think about it,

how did Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles ever get made?

Moreover, how did they ever become popular?

I mean, there's a whole batallion of animal-inspired or cross-bred comic book heroes, but really, turtles are what hit the mark?

You're good with ninja. Teenage is good for the demographic. But Turtles?! How did that work? Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Very long title. I've been trying to figure this out all day, if anyone has insight as to how this happened (or, even better, why you liked them as a kid...or now), feel free to comment and explain it to me.

Informed guilt

I am more up on current events than I have ever been. I read 5 news sites/newspapers a day. Yesterday I read the entire history of Zimbabwe to better inform me of the current crisis. This new habit is good for me in general, but I really feel like I should be working.

Go watch it online

After watching last night's episode of the Daily Show, I'm starting to think that Terry McAuliffe is behind Hillary's blindness.

B-Rock the Go-bama

As we speak, I am in product training trying to learn about Business Service accounts while quietly refreshing the news sites and having an exploding celebration on the inside because Barack Obama is my Democratic nominee. Celebrating so very quietly it's killing me. Happy day :)

Today, we bonded.

Conversation between my mother and I at the grocery store:

"Claire, do you see the fajita seasoning? We're in the Mexican isle...is there such a thing as fajita seasoning?"

"No...but I'm in Tortillaville!"

"..."

"It's right next to Margaritaville!"

"..."

"I'm by the tortillas. I don't see any fajita seasoning."

"Oh there it is."

"Margaritaville! Like the song!"

"I know. It just wasn't very funny."

"This is going to be my blog for the day."

"Alright Claire."

Frankly

I prefer famous actors to be in movies rather than commercials.