Dear app developers: Staaaahp it

While internetting the other night, i discovered a strange genre of app in the Google Play store, and I fell asleep thinking, OMG i have to tell Alicia about this!! And then I forgot. But now I remmebered! And then I kept typing and it got really long, so I decided to just make it a blog post, because the world should know about this.

My journey into these weird apps started by clicking random links that led me to this app: "Witch born baby", which uses the likeness of a Monster High character, except she's pregnant, and you have to do strange things to help her deliver the baby?



The description is: 

"Witch immediately to have babies, we accompany her to go to the hospital, to accompany her together at the baby came to the world, to witness her happiness!"

And apparently there's this genre of games that takes popular characters and makes them preggers, and you have to do some vague tasks to help out.

This one is called "Eve born baby" - which is totally Elsa from Frozen:

"The doctor come, mother Eve will soon have a baby, come on to her baby! She has been looking forward to seeing her children, we accompany her to witness this happy moment!"

So ok, maybe making preggers versions of characters like that is a little strange, but whatever.

But now let's move on to "Monster Frankie Pregnancy"

Monster Frankie Stein is pregnant and she will have to get a caesarian. You are her doctor and you have to make sure everything goes very smoothly. You also have nurse draculaura to assist you. First take a cotton ball and dip it in antiseptic, then apply in on her back. Then give her an injection into her spinal cord that will numb the pain. Then move on to the operation. Use a scalpel to make a cut into her belly and clamps to make it wider. 

Then use the scalpel again and a pair of scissors to cut through the layers of fat and membrane. Then use your hands to pull out gently the little baby. Cut the umbilical cord and finally you can use a needle and a thread to stitch Frankie up and then bandage it. Weigh the baby and wrap him up in a blanket. Have an incredible time playing this exciting game!
This is only a game for girls.

Wut.​

WTF is happening in this picture???

I've deduced that the green thing in the background is her pregnant belly. But... why does it look like someone took a shit inside of a vagina?? I'm so confused. And... and why are there cobwebs in the bins that hold their medical tools. That's not fucking sterile. And just.... Wut??

Pregnant Woman at the Doctor

​The beauty woman is pregnant,but unfortunately today she fell down while walking.Now she needs first aid help immediately. 

As the best doctor,you can use your doctor skills to help her. Give her a perfectly treatment in the emergency room with medical equipment and medicines. 

First to heal her skin wounds,then check her baby and make sure her baby is not in danger.
Enjoy!​

​OK.... what?
Shouldn't you make sure that her baby isn't in danger before you do anything else???​

This lady looks super preggers and has an active wound on her stomach and a big bruise. Apparently she fell into a thorn bush, but you know what? You should probably check on that baby before you pull the thorns out of her arms. Couldn't they have just done that on the ambulance ride there? Oh wait, she's not in a hospital, she's in some sort of cabin, and based on the open book on the stool, you are a terrible doctor and need to look up medical texts on how to pull out a thorn. Also, those thorns look like they've been in there for awhile, they're very angry looking and are likely infected. Also, wtf injection are you giving her?

Pregnant Girl Grows Up

Amazing Surgery Game where you have to help mommy in hospital and tend to her surgery needs. A game for future doctors. Can you handle the pressure and help mommy?

This is the look of existential horror on someone's face when they realize that they are about to be operated on my the worst doctor ever who is going to do terrible things to their pregnant body.  This pregnant girl is going to grow up real fast.



This is not how babies work.  I know I don't know much about babies.  But this is not how they work.

Mommy Pregnant Rescue

I am going to have a baby. But I had a car accident on the way to the hospital. Now I am trapped in the car! Please help me!
Take on the role of a doctor to get the patients treated. This app allows children to develop empathy for others. Become a great doctor.
features:
- Preparation tools
- Rescue pregnant woman
- Drive an ambulance
- Deliver a baby

Wow... that's... that's not looking too good. 

OMG, this lady does not need antiseptic right now. What??




And.... and after you magically save her life with your antiseptic, this is how you resolve the whole baby thing. Her belly had gaping wounds, she had to be extracted from her car, but you magically got her to a hospital bed, and fixed her hair, and you DELIVER THE BABY BY GIVING HER CAKE

Extreme Pregnancy Baby Birth

Have you ever played popular pregnant surgery simulator games where pregnant mommy gives birth to a baby or even twins? All of them take place in ordinary medical hospitals and look like traditional cesarean birth games. Try to play our new unusual baby birth simulator Extreme Pregnancy Baby Birth. Be ready to help to give birth in rather unexpected conditions like taxi or real beauty salon!
Extreme Pregnancy Baby Birth was made for everyone who likes beautiful girls, cool childbirth games and take care of kids. Four girls are pregnant and ready to give birth very soon. Feel like professional pregnancy surgery doctor and help these girls to give birth to healthy children.

Now is your turn to show your surgery abilities while helping give birth in taxi. Barbara is at 9th month and her belly is very big. She was going to the hospital but on her way she suddenly felt that her baby wants to be born right now!! There is no time to wait. Take all the necessary medical equipment and help Barbara to delivery. It’s not so easy at it seems but do your best and help to give birth to a baby. Three other girls were going to visit a shopping centre, restaurant and visit sea country. But their babies wanted to be born immediately. So you should act in very extreme conditions and help them to give birth in beauty salon, airplane and office. Take care of newborn babies and make them feel good.  

Extreme Pregnancy Baby Birth features:
- Pregnant surgery simulator for kids
- Childbirth in extreme conditions
- Baby birth simulator
- Feel like professional cesarean birth surgeon
- Take care of newborn baby

You decided to get married at 9 months pregnant??

Why are you doing a C-Section in a taxi for a baby that "decided to come out"?? It was already coming out of her vag, but then you were like, no, get back in there, and then did surgery in the backseat of a cab?? And what's with the turd vagina bellies?? Her face expresses my exact emotion.

Witch a Sick Baby

Cute witch baby is sick, she was very upset, and her family are very worried about her, for her family, we hurry to help her heal!

OK seriously, you need to call fucking DCF right the fuck now.

Also. "Wipe the blood.puss using tissue" - that's a realllllly problematic translation.

The Twins Mother

She was injured accident while she was enjoying her garden in the evening for a walk. You need to provide prompt medical aid for her. Be careful during the treatment she was pregnant.

She "fell down". Clearly.

An open letter to motherfucking Michael's

Dear Michael,

I am writing to you to express my frustration regarding a recent experience at your Dayville, CT store #8710.  I'm really not the type of person that complains about these things.  Restaurants routinely bring me completely different meals than I have ordered, and I just keep quiet and eat it, because I know that the waitress has probably worked harder in the last hour than I will in a month.  Every single morning when I go to Dunkin' Donuts, the contents of the bag they hand me are literally a complete mystery, I don't even know why sesame seeds on a bagel are a thing, never-mind why they decided that's what I wanted, and I genuinely don't care, and I go back there every single morning and pay them to put some various food in a bag, even though there's another Dunkin' Donuts right down the street, because I don't like change, and sometimes one of the girls compliments my eye makeup and it makes my day.  

What I'm trying to say is that I feel like a jerk for writing a letter, but what started as a mildly frustrating encounter that could have been resolved by an apology, turned into a really frustrating encounter that I've been ranting about in my head all evening, and I just want someone to care.

On the evening of November 24th, I purchased a sewing machine.  This was exciting for me because I had been contemplating purchasing a sewing machine for awhile now, but was waiting for a good enough reason.  I had also just recently purchased some fabric and thread and assorted decorative notions under the guise of potentially sewing it into something, until I remembered that I didn't have the attention span or motivation to make a series of hand stitches at an agonizingly slow rate, only to have them fall out later because I don't actually know how to stitch things... but I didn't want my crafting supplies to go to waste.  So in the spirit of industrial revolutions, I remembered that they made machines that would sew things for you, and even though I knew I would never actually use that either, I just wanted to be the type of woman that owned a sewing machine and could potentially sew things if properly motivated.  I also had clipped a coupon from a flyer that morning, and I almost never actually do anything with coupons except let them get crumpled up in my purse like some sort of creepy hamster bedding for my wallet.  I was overcome with pride for my new sense of responsibility, and had to celebrate by buying a sewing machine... and a shopping cart full of glittery things that I passed on the way to the sewing machine.

This is what I'll look like when I sew.

I happened to know that there was one sewing machine at my local Michael's.  We don't have much in the way of shopping centers around here, so I didn't bother to comparison shop.  I had looked at the sewing machine before, and I remembered that it was somewhere in the vicinity of $50.  I had a 50% off coupon, so it would be irresponsible to not get a sewing machine for $25.  I don't know how much sewing machines cost, but somewhere in my head I probably knew that $50 was really cheap for a sewing machine, but I had never actually priced them out before, as their individual functions and differences were a complete mystery to me, so I was content with my ignorance.  I went to the back where I had seen it before, picked up the only sewing machine that I had ever seen there, and confirmed that the price was $44.99.  Just to do my due diligence, I scanned the isle to make sure that this was the correct price.  To the left, there was a wall of magnifying glasses, and there was a floor standing one that was $99.99, and it was marked as such.  To the right were inexpensive sewing notions.  The description on the price tag said "Easy Stitcher Sewing Machine".  The product I was purchasing was a Singer Tradition model 2259.  Apparently, "Easy Stitcher" is an actual brand, but I am not the type of person that knows the intricacies  of the automated sewing industry.  I had to take it to my mom's house on Thanksgiving to find out that sewing machines used thread from TWO different places, which is why I was so confused trying to set it up.  As far as I knew, "Easy Stitcher" was being used as an adjective, and not a proper noun.  The point is that there was exactly one sewing machine, and exactly one price tag that referenced a sewing machine in it's description.  There were no empty spaces for other models, and no indication to the casual shopper that this was not the product I was purchasing.

I brought the display box up front, and the cashier (who, just to even out my karma for writing an angry letter, was very friendly and nice) paged to have someone bring it up for him.  The lady that went to get it, who, unbeknownst to me, would also be the lady that got me so frustrated today, said "Make sure she knows that she can't use a coupon for it" over her shoulder with a hint of annoyance in her voice.  I don't know how she knew I wanted to use a coupon, because as I previously mentioned, I almost never use coupons, however, I also almost never read coupons in their entirety, and as I pulled my coupon out, I was disappointed to read that sewing machines were excluded.  That was my mistake, and not what this letter is about.  I just wanted to set the scene for the series of disappointments that would surround this purchase.  (The coupon did, however, save me $4.80 on a pair of scissors I was getting, so all was not in vain.) 

Once the (very friendly) cashier rang me up, I saw that the sewing machine was actually $99.99.  They were almost closing, and the cashier was genuinely friendly.  He really seemed like he was in a great mood, and I didn't want to ruin it by being an annoying customer right before close.  I was wrong about the coupon, I must have been wrong about the price too, right?  It stands to reason.  I also am a gigantic wimp.  Which is why I quietly handed over my credit card and mentally panicked about how my $25 responsible person purchase turned into a $99 plus fancy scissors plus glittery things and tax purchase right before Christmas.  But I justified it by imagining all the things I was going to sew now that I was an official crafty person. I had set out for a sewing machine, and I wanted to come home with a sewing machine.

Now I can focus on making glittery felt bird houses!

Over the next week and a half (during which I did not sew one thing), I kept mulling it over.  I really felt like I was right in my price assessment.  Maybe I didn't read coupons, but I was observant when it came to bargains.  I had checked the price tag.  There was totally no other sewing machines there, because if there had been, I would have spent a half half sitting on the floor trying to figure out the difference.  There was no other price tags for anything even close.  Maybe that was a clearance price and it just rang up wrong.  I needed bobbins (apparently), and even though my sewing machine could thread bobbins (apparently) for me, my mom had already threaded that part for me and I didn't want to go backwards.  And I wanted to sew things.  Since the bobbins just happened to be next to the sewing machine, I also would get a second chance to examine that price tag.  

Upon further inspection, I felt even more vindicated.  There were no other price tags.  I was still blissfully ignorant that "Easy Stitcher" was not a description of a traditional sewing machine.  But there were no other price tags that were more than $44.99.  Anywhere.  I scoured the box and confirmed that there was nothing contradicting it, and there wasn't.  There were no other sewing machines.  I got my bobbins and my nerves and I talked to the friendly cashier.  I showed him a picture I had taken on my phone.  Technically, the UPC didn't match the box, however, in my defense, there was a whole bunch of numbers on the bar code and on the box, and I didn't know what they all were, so I held out hope that someone would see reason.  I honestly wasn't even expecting to get my money back, I just wanted some empathy.

The mean manager from last time walked back with me to the isle.  She hurriedly scanned the box there and stated that it was $99.99.  I explained to her that I knew the price *now*, but how would I know the price before I was already at the counter and had already made people bring it out.  She told me that the Easy Stitcher was a cheaper machine, and pointed to a small box on top of the aisle on the other side, up with the overstock and mostly covered up.  "See?  Easy Stitcher."  But now I was just trying to prove a point.  I don't work here, I don't know their inventory, I had never seen this machine before in all of my visits, and I would have no reason to believe there would be other machines.  I told her that there's not a spot for it there, and she said that was because holiday things moved things around.  I told her that it had been like this for awhile, and she told me that it probably would be as well, because they don't have the space to stock all these big things.  I sympathized with the space problem, but the Easy Stitcher was a comparatively small box.  The store carries TWO sewing machines, one of which was a complete surprise to me.  I could see if there was an aisle full of sewing machines, that they might not have every model out, but, they have TWO, and they'd rather keep 20 (seriously, I counted, 20!) magnifying glass varieties next to the sewing machine then just move something over an inch to put a display box for a second one?  And still, the Singer machine had no price tags on it, and no space for a price tag.  There was no sticky goo leftover on the shelf where a price tag had even been ripped off from.  There was one sewing machine, one price tag for a sewing machine.  If space was an issue, why wouldn't you put the sewing machine that is for sale with the price, and keep the other one up in your secret sewing machine stash space?  The tension was escalating, because now she was arguing with me not about whether or not there would be a refund, but she was actually defending this illogical product layout, and making me feel unreasonable for bringing it to their attention that this was really confusing.  I hadn't even requested a refund.  If she had taken out a sharpie and written "$99" in big, messy handwriting on the display box, I would have walked out of there content that I made a difference.  But she was defending the placement and implying that she had no intention of changing it.  "But how would I know it was $99?" I asked, still calm and thinking that at any moment she would be able to empathize with me, a paying customer (who sometimes uses coupons), that was not in on the inner workings of stocking levels and store space.  She looked at me like I was an idiot and snapped back "Uhm, it rings up as $99, you could have just asked someone!"  "Yes, but, I don't have a price gun to know it would scan any differently, why would...", "You could ask someone to scan it for you, we don't have the money to have price scanners for customers." 

At this point I was on the verge of tears because I have daddy issues and I don't like confrontation.  Had I known that I was going to have to be the ambassador for sanity tonight, I probably would have gone on another night armed with research papers regarding customer service and price tag economics.  But it was getting late, and I was either going to start crying over a sewing machine, or throw down in an aisle full of sharp things over a sewing machine.  I gave her my most passive aggressive sigh, and informed her of my intentions to write a letter, because I just think this whole encounter is ridiculous.  She chuckled and said that if I felt that strongly about it, that I should write a letter, and maybe they'd be able to get a new scanner out of it.  (I'd like to note that scanner or no scanner, I would have never thought to scan the box before bringing it up, because the issue is that I have no obligation to pre-scan all my merchandise before purchasing it to verify that the store didn't keep secret alternate versions of the item stowed away under pillow foam overstock.  Please don't send them a scanner, because I'm being spiteful, and if I'm not happy, I don't want them to be either.)  

I can't even express how frustrating this was.  I've written 2,200 words so far, and even if I double that, I don't think I can adequately describe the way it feels when something is wrong and nobody cares.  She wasn't even going to put a sticker on the box with the correct price, or move the other box down on top of it's price tag.  This is how she wants to sell sewing machines!  I was ranting about this to my friend, who didn't quite understand that this wasn't about the sewing machine, this was about global malaise and a lack of empathy in society, and he joked with me that I would feel bad if I somehow got this woman fired by writing this letter.  Well, first of all, I don't want you to fire her, it's right before Christmas and I'm sure she has many redeeming qualities.  Secondly, I argue that if businesses continue to operate like this, she'll eventually be unemployed anyway!  The consumer industry is rapidly changing, and big box stores are still struggling to find their place in this economy.  The current retail business model can't support retail "showrooms" only to lose the customer to the lowest price online.  If paying $44.99 for a sewing machine was really that importantly, I guarantee that 15 minutes on Amazon, I could shop hundreds of models, compare features, read reviews, and have it shipped to my house in 2 days for free.  And I'm struggling to explain why I even leave my house to go shopping at all anymore, after all, none of this would have happened if I had purchased online.  The only thing tying me to wanting to buy this in a store is the emotional feedback of having something now, but I want my patronage appreciated in some way.  Is this store really so financially comfortable that customer retention and word of mouth and customer satisfaction are really no longer important to them?  She was an older manager, not an ambivalent teenager making minimum wage that has no financial incentive to do well.  Her livelihood is tied to the store doing well, and it's just bad business.  People make emotional shopping decisions, and I would have liked her to see the bigger picture and acknowledged that it wasn't about the price of the sewing machine, it was about not wanting to feel like that customer that enjoys arguing about trivial details.  I enjoyed no part of this.  All this could have been over with if she had just given me a pat on the back and told me that she sees how it could be confusing.  But instead I was made to feel like the crazy person getting riled up over a price tag.  It wasn't the price tag, it was for justice and humanity and the future of retail transactions.  I was trying to save her job, not make it harder.

In closing, I'm still going to shop at Michael's, because they always have fantastic sales, and I can never have too many decorative photo boxes.  I will still eagerly hand over my money under the pretense that I am making an investment in a project that's going to validate me as a woman.  But I'm going to give that lady the stink eye every time I go in, and I'm going to make a point of walking back to that sewing machine aisle even though I know it's going to make me really grumpy, and my boyfriend is going to have to listen to this story every single time I drag him in there, until somebody puts a price tag on that stupid box.

Thank you for your time.  Happy holidays!

Why I do the things that I do (and ultimately why you should as well)

When I was in school, I was a member of the debate team.

Go ahead, you're allowed to laugh hysterically at the concept of me attempting to be eloquent, restrained and on topic for any length of time... but I have freaking TROPHIES.  So there.

The thought patterns I developed to excel at debate had a lasting effect on my brain.  It has a tendency to make things complicated and near impossible to have black and white opinions, but I feel like it opened up this whole new way of looking at the world and finding the humanity in polarizing topics.

I'm getting ahead of myself.

This is how a typical high school extemporaneous debate tournament works: Everyone arrives and finds out the topic at the same time.  The topic will typically be something thought provoking, but not overly controversial.  It's worded in the form of a specific question, let's say "Should uniforms be mandatory in public schools?"  Then you are given a certain length of time to start forming your arguments.  You're grouped with a partner, and you decide who will play what role.  A typical argument order is: 1st affirmative (in support of the  question), 1st negative, 2nd affirmative, 2nd negative.  In between each speech, the other team is given the opportunity to ask questions.  The negative position can have their own arguments, but their bigger goal is to make sure they rebutt all of the affirmative's arguments.  So while you're preparing, the only speech that you can write out ahead of time is the 1st affirmative speaker's.  The rest, you just have to formulate your arguments.  And the second speaker has no idea what they're going to be talking about, other than anticipating the other team's problems with your arguments.

Now, the important part of this is that you can't choose your sides.  Each team has to argue both for and against a topic once, and then the third debate is a coin flip to see which side you're arguing.  This is important because not only do you have to argue convincingly for or against statements that you might not personally agree with, but anytime that you think you have some killer argument that no one is going to be able to refute, you remember that in the next round, it's likely that you'll have to refute that argument when someone else makes it.  It was so frustrating!  In order to do well, you had to be strong on both sides, and argue just as passionately and convincingly.  I actually did really well at it and took home a bunch of speaker awards.  I liked to be in the 2nd speaker position and just crush everyone's arguments that they thought were sooo smart a minute ago.  

Actually, funny story regarding the debate tournaments... I had done debate in junior high, and had specifically requested some kind of debate club to form when I went to high school.  They actually did form one, so my freshman year of debate was the first time that my high school had ever competed in debate tournaments.  The teachers had researched the different debate styles (there's a lot of technical details regarding the layout of the arguments and the jobs of the various speakers and stuff), but they had never actually been to a tournament.  I went to high school in a town right outside of Hartford, and our school was thought of as pretty "ghetto".  So when we went to our first tournament, it was a slight amount of culture shock, because most of the schools we were competing against were the "fancy rich schools".  Different high schools would host the debates each time, and I forgot what town it was in the first time, but it was a rich area of the state, and it was like a bad movie cliche when we first walked in, dressed in Walmart skirts and fancy shoes purchased just for that day, and walking into a really gorgeous (and opulent) high school with all this new architecture and lack of blood spatter stains on the concrete... And just like the movie cliche, we knew we were out of our league, and well, we really bombed.  Largely due to lack of format knowledge and experience debating outside teams, there was a lot of confusion and it was kind of awkward, because we were clearly uneducated on some of the finer nuances of the style, but also some pretty major parts.  We all learned a lot that day and I know that the teachers felt bad for throwing us to the sharks like that.  Anyway, in pure New Britain style, once we realized we were horribly outclassed, some of the team members responded by being jackasses.  I remember this one guy stood up for his speech and said that his name was "Sharon Needles" and proceeded to ramble on for 5 minutes about his favorite flavor of cereal.  And not that I endorse jackassery, but the fancy schools were just so flapped that they had no idea what to do.  I know it put them in a bad position to now have to go up and pretend that everything was normal, but they just had *no* idea how to deal with our antics.  We were actually asked to not participate in the 3rd round, but to instead watch other people debate to see how it was supposed to be done.  I think the club lost like, 75% of their members after that.  There was no moral to that story, just remembered it as I was typing.

But my point is, is that years of debate taught me that *every* argument has two sides.  I was forced to restrain my desire to gloat when I thought of a new killer argument, but instead let out an exasperated sigh, because now I was going to HAVE to find a way to argue it anyway.  It taught me that no matter how passionately I believe something and how logical I think my arguments are and how ridiculous the other side is, there is another side that believes the opposite, just as passionately.  The kneejerk response is to just dismiss them as crazy people, but statistically, it's much more likely that they might have a few points.  Anytime you have a clear argument for something and don't immediately try to find the holes, it's lowering the quality of your arguments, because I guarantee that they have holes, and refusing to acknowledge them and proactively mend them doesn't make them not exist, it just throws away the opportunity to deal with them head on.  The most effective strategy in debate was to anticipate the other side's arguments, practically make them for them, and then refute them in the same breath, before they even had a chance to frame them the way they wanted to.  You had to admit your weaknesses to amplify your strength and control as many variables as possible.

I never see that happen in srs bsns political debates.  I never see it in any political talk shows or "news programs", on either side.  Whatever side is making the argument tends to take every cheap shot they can at anyone who would disagree.  They assert their strength by marginalizing anyone who would disagree and if you're on the fence, the natural inclination is to go along with what they're saying, otherwise you'd be a total idiot.  Or if you strongly disagree, you get mad and turn off the program, and you learn not to listen to them because they're being so ridiculous that it's just going to make you angry.  And I guess it's somewhat effective, otherwise Rush Limbaugh and Ed Schultz would be out of a job.  But what does it accomplish?  Any point that you've made is a waste of breath, because you've isolated your audience to those who agree with you and weaker minds that may agree with you, but they'll bastardize your points when they repeat them and just serve to make sure that only the most extreme, inflammatory positions are heard.  And that's cute, but progress is never made.  Both sides just get more and more riled up and frustrated, and those in the middle don't care enough to wade through all the crazy to get to the point.  

"It is the mark of an educated mind to be able to entertain a thought without accepting it." ~Aristotle

Anyone is welcome to any belief they'd like, and you can express it anywhere that you can find space, whether it's call in radio, internet forums, or sharing a snarky comic on Facebook.  But if you want your belief to actually accomplish something, if you want anything to actually get done, you have to be willing to accept that the opposing viewpoints aren't crazy, or stupid, or wrong.  Things are almost never black and white.  People believe things for a number of reasons, sometimes it's rooted in logic, sometimes it's rooted in emotion or personal experience, but that doesn't invalidate them.  If you stand any chance of convincing anyone of anything, you've got to come at it from a point of true empathy and understanding.   People who disagree with you still are people.  They have lives and family and inner demons and preferences and it's highly unlikely that they are, in fact, the actual devil.  They might be angry and afraid and full of baggage, they might have truly grating personality quirks, they might be uneducated and insulting, but they got to the point that they are at by the choices they've made in their life, and true mental illness aside, they probably made those decisions because they felt like it was a good idea and they felt comfortable in those choices.  And if you really can't imagine their life without a sense of disgust or anger or a running commentary of digs, you're probably not doing a very good job of imagining their life.   You have to drop your shields and live in their brain to truly appreciate, on a very visceral level, why they think what they do.  And if you truly are doing this, you might find that your beliefs might not be as "correct" as you had thought.  

"The test of first rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposed ideas in the mind at the same time, and still retain the ability to function" ~F. Scott Fitzgerald

If you are of an opinion that believes that the only way to fix the world is with radical policy change, if you find yourself frequently being diametrically opposed to nearly every talking point of someone with an opposite view, if you can't list one genuinely good thing about someone you strongly disagree with, if you find yourself unable to disagree with someone without it quickly escalating to emotionally charged arguments, than I challenge you to make yourself more vulnerable and truly put yourself in their shoes.  This isn't a defeatist challenge, the point isn't to come around to a place of frozen neutrality, This is a challenge to strengthen your views, to fully explore the lives of those that disagree with you and potentially rework your ideas to minimize suffering on all sides.  Drop your arguments that are fueled by bias and resentment, because they'll only weigh you down and isolate you.  Don't let your opponent grab that low hanging fruit and poison ideas that could actively solve something.  KNOW YOUR SHIT.  I firmly believe that the world will be changed by the cumulative effect of individual interactions... exponential growth of good ideas... but no one will ever listen to you if you make the conscious decision to never question yourself.  Question *everything*.  

And if you ever get overwhelmed and don't know what to think, just ask me :)

The BEST idea

I want to fill an entire house with these:
Life Size Stuffed Wolf

Life Sized Stuffed Wolf Laying Down

Life Sized Stuffed Husky

Life Sized Stuffed Husky Sitting down

and a PETTING ZOO!

and a GOAT!

and a UNICORN!

and a goddamn DRAGON!!!

and i just want to live in this house and bring my dog in and laugh at her reaction.

Strange Dreams

I have the absolute strangest dreams. I really would love to be able to lucid dream, and one of the steps to being able to lucid dream is to start writing down your dreams the second you wake up. The idea is that you're training your brain to be able to focus at that fragile state in between dreaming and awakeness. It's also training yourself to pay closer attention to your dreams so you can be more aware. It's also been really fascinating to get a picture into my brain at that weird point. I have some weird REM cycles, and I frequently talk in my sleep and have sleep paralysis, so I wanted to explore my brain in that state.

I'm just going to post the raw dream that I wrote down, only correcting for spelling. I think it's funny just how nonsensical a lot of them are. I type it on my phone, so autocorrect probably screws somethings up. Many times I write down a dream and completely forget about it, and only remember it when I look back on my journal.  A lot of times I fall back asleep as I'm typing, and I think it's funny to watch myself drift off as I type. It's such a weird state to be in. And apparently I have a very active imagination in my dreams.

(Any of my notes will be in red, and if I don't specifically identify someone, just assume that they're some random person in my life.)

7/12/12:

I dreamt that i was going to Iceland, but instead of flying we took boats and it was like deadliest catch. We got paid for helping them fish. So everyone would throw a pot over which was really a plastic container and then fish it back up. We caught mussels and some other fish. Maybe cod. But they all went into the Tupperware. In Iceland i got off the plane and went to the gift shop, and then went to the bathroom. Then these lions and bears started talking and they were taking over the country because we sucked. They started eating people and we ran. We found out that if we all piled into a cab and bolted we had a chance although sometimes they'd still get them. We got into a cab and headed for Czech. It was nighttime and the highways were pretty but sometimes we were in the trunk.

8/30/12:

Working on the POS system at kiss, (Editors note, this is referring to the Kiss by Monster Mini Golf store in Las Vegas that consumed my life last year). i was supposed to go home and Christina (my old boss) was mad and she kept me there. The monitor got really fuzzy and weird when i went to a website and this girl next to me kept trying to give me stupid ideas, and i was like no, i just need to restart the computer, it'll take 2 seconds. And i did, and it fixed it, even though it did look hardware related to wakey me. Mike was there and while he was troubleshooting it with me, and i was arguing about it just needing to reboot, he started babbling about the CD drive. So i clicked on it and showed him that the CD drive worked, but the CD in there was a bunch of my pictures, and all these naked ones of me were in the root directory and the first ones you saw. Chris told me to look up how to layout the store because she was having problems. She was very very frazzled. She didn't look like Chris, she looked kinda like one of those hairdressers, but i knew it was Chris. I was googling retail solutions and had to squint very hard to see any words, and all the sites looked retarded, like geocities pages. I was helping with the store layout and they were just stacking things way on top of one another, where customers couldn't reach them. Selling stupid stuff too, like carebears. While i was at the pos computer, i was also checking out customers. The dream ended with a very large bang that we all thought was thunder, but then i heard airplane engines and thought we were being bombed.

9/7/12:

This is backwards. We were at a bar with me, Craig and teeni/dee. Craig was talking about his first child that he lost. I'm pretty sure i was the mom, but i had no emotional connection as he was telling the story. She was premature, and during birth the umbilical cord was wrapped around her neck. But it was confusing because she was alive for awhile. He was talking about people taking pictures with her and how she smiled. The baby's name was Kimber. Dee said that Craig was such a good man, and then said that today was her first baby's birthday. She had carried her to term but she died shortly after. Dee was talking about how people were taking pictures with her and the baby was losing patience, but when Dee took a pic of them together, she smiled this big smile. She started sobbing. The bartender asked us about drinks, but because Dee came late, she asked her if she had to poop first. She said no. Before this there was this big long zombie story that had to do with teachers turning people into zombies, and there was this one Isabel (from The 4400) looking alpha zombie that was taking revenge on everyone and slitting peoples throats with her mind. I don't remember much about the zombie part.

A couple fragments... craig, corey and me were playing some kind of card based game. And every time they'd get a card it would spark up some memory that they'd laugh about, and i'd demand that they'd tell me. But i said the game was fun cuz i got to hear stories.

Craig bought some stupid thing on ebay where this guy would send you a bunch of cards, you would pick one and send the rest back. In this conversation, someone mentioned that the wow wow wiggle waggle wazzie woodle woo record just sold for $4000. I said that i had one of those, so we looked it up and there was this dumb star wars assembled your own death star weird thing selling for $60,000

4/25/13:

Last night I had a dream that I was waiting in line at the DMV. That was the entire dream. Just waiting and slowly advancing in a line. Until the very end, when Matt Smith came running in the room with some kind of oscillator and headphones, and said he was getting some strange frequency he had never heard before, and asked if I could hear it. Then I realized it was my alarm clock and I woke up. Worst dream ever.

I also won the lottery. $2000/week. Or $503k. Or I could have a red corvette.

5/8/13:

Random quote from the dream I'll never remember: "I'll give you a piece of the polish right here!"

Back window broke, parents paid to replace it, then it broke again. There was a hole that was punched in it in New Britain cuz someone punched it to steal my gps

Argued with Hackit about Honda fit vs civics and what I liked about each

Tried to give Natt a job in hr but she blew it off cuz she was a whore. She was with joey.

Parents were going on vacation but money was tight cuz of my windows

5/12/13:

Craig had to go to Vegas for a release party, invited some fucking bitch. I was SO mad, trying to not be jealous. Pat had a helicopter. Chris asked for my help. Stalked Craig.

Talking to a comedian that made 100k /year as an auto glass distributor cuz Vegas had dusted lights. Has mommy issues and was telling her that she made as much as her doctor sister

Earlier dream had Debbie (jers mpm) can't remember much. Something about the house.

Craig was only back for a little while. Was mad cuz time kept getting usurped by dumb shit. Had to be at Pat's helicopter by 8, Corey party at 7. No time for snuggles. Met bitch at airport. Girl from real world. Hate her. Craig forgot debit card at store. Called around and had to super rush to get buy.

Floors wasn't sturdy.

7

6/26/13:

We were in my grandmothers living room, my mom was trying to send me a fax and Corey was in the room, and she was trying to fax it to me on the big laser printer that he had. I was on the phone so the fax wouldn't go through. I was laughing because corey’s printer kept printing out other things, like, it would print out a daily log of the day, but he almost never use it so kinda a waste. Um... I have to pee.

(cont.)

We worked for some company and… ps3s and um… they wanted us to buy ps3’s to test them. And Darryl from the office was there. And no… fuck that… he just went upstairs and took the ps3’s, and gave everybody one.

7/30/13:

Taylor lautner

parafen wax
Nate
laundry basement
met neighbor
bf liked art
Laika jumped
SQL class
Tracy set up behind kims back
Talked to recruiter
Hit kn
Closcm

Mall with kaitlyn from the Real World
hit on her

8/4/13:

Grandma showing me old things

doctor who to with some kind of fishes in your shoes
dildo with something to do with a fish or shock or smrthong
talking about making afghans, Craig was wowed

dad wanted to give ella $50k for her wedding. I was mad
riding in the back of old volvo. Like a trunk. Monica hermanowski?? Angela too. Talking about antiques. Old ppl talk about burial predfs
ppl buried under broad st

8/5/13:

Owned Macy's, was trying to reorganize stores, was doing on one ones and trying to help, everyone was still mad at me. Had to sneak someone in for some reason.

8/6/13:

Had a baby but it was a kitten and he kept being annoying
Fish in the spa at capt bob or the parys talked to me, said I was chosen.
Kitten kept trying to drown himself
big storm everyone thought I was nuts cuz of the kitten baby. Saw candy and Bobby and sonny
mom kept trying to take baby.

8/8/13:

ME and crag were hackers together, xbox gamer tags and space pirates.  Corey thought the hot chick's were real, set out to prove him wrong, but they were real. we had to shiitbsjnrr;kk4nn
...
We had to shoot some of them and Corey was really mad. They had manilla folders and I swapped them for my pretty new folders. hot Japanese girl and I asked if he fucked her, and he said yeah. asked Craig, and he did too and I pouted. stole doodads from her desk.
while switching the folders, I went through people's drskst44

8/11/13:

zombies chasing me, wake up and ask Craig if hiding in a locker would help, Craig says yes, I do, it works.
Don't remember much more cuz I'm dumb and didn't write this down right away

long zombie dream though, drove car off bridge, ended up in another town, had to watch Craig fuck this girl so we could get into the town. Her parents were doctors and would medically put ppl to sleep and and then touch them, but also launder their clothes, cuz no one slept well cuz of zombies, so they'd protect them.

Girl fell in love with craig, I was in hiding, but wasn't mad about it cuz I knew it kept us safe. Them ppl from old town that chased us off the bridge came down and things got all dramatic.

8/17/13:

End of world. Female van with Claire Danes and big bang
zombies we made
bus gets crushed
Filled with tarsises (I think I'm trying to say tardis's)
Found a cat

n-g

partied in the second bus

5m5(-

Stefano
male strippers
matlock finds out about hiswofir

9/27/13:

Jake undercover. 50 cap, mshuuu7uijhzuvg the u

11/2/13:

Big bang
Raj took a job

Needed him as a leader
He went to some country to deal these weird vaginas they made

In the meantime, I had Duckie and Hammy.
There was this lady that taught her cat tags, like nfc tags
Brought Hammy to her, Hammy learned tags too.

I overheard plots to as Sinatra raj.
Raj came in and they drugged him and made him kill hammy
Well, maybe, cuz the episode ended on a cliffhanger

Had to play Magic irl for some big battle
I was the designated magic player.
Pete gave me this deck to play that was supposedly bazaars bed I didn't need stand snurhijr

Glass shards for 20. Mana
One of my spells was remove stairs4
Lota of buff spells
Leonard was almost dead, so what's the point of buffs

Had to sell makeup sometimes, can't think of qy, but djebfould cancel it and roll a die for damage. Did j3 the worst roll, lost half her life

Next turn I don't know what to do at all.

Pee