"'Normal' American men are homophobic, afraid of close friendships with other men. The moment we begin to feel warmly toward another man, the 'homosexual' panic button gets pressed. It makes us nervous to see French or Italian men strolling down the street arm in arm. Must be queer! From a cross-cultural perspective it is we who are odd; close male friendship is the norm in most societies and is usually considered a more important source of intimacy than romantic relationships... We need same-sex friends because there are types of validation and acceptance that we receive only from our gender-mates. There is much about our experience as men that can only be shared with, and understood by, other men. There are stories we can tell only to those who have wrestled in the dark with the same demons and been wounded by the same angels. Only men understand the secret fears that go with the territory of masculinity." - Sam Keen, Fire in the Belly: On Being a Man, 174-75

"I know you're not comfortable hanging out with guys because you don't want people to think you're gay, but really, hanging out with girls all the time is what will make people think that." - Kami Wilson, personal conversation

This partially explains why I consciously chose to bring a guy friend to my work's movie night. The other reasons are that he's been nice to me so I wanted to be nice to him, and I wanted to make sure it didn't end up being misconstrued as a date despite following that formula to the letter besides the gender thing. But whether because of how our culture has evolved in just a few years or increased confidence on my part, I no longer care one iota whether people think I'm gay. As awful as this may be, sometimes I almost wish they did because I feel like they'd pay more attention to me. I decided, in fact, that if anyone that night asked about that guy, I would introduce him as my boyfriend. I knew he would have gotten a kick out of that. Sadly, no one did because they only cared about themselves.

The movie was "Spider-Man: Homecoming". It was only the second Marvel movie I've ever seen, the first being "Thor: Dark World", and I liked it much better. I mean, the other one had Natalie Portman in it, so that was a few hundred points in its favor, but it wasn't nearly as funny or easy to follow. Of course I was still lost on a few things in this one because it's interconnected with all the other ones but after the first ten minutes or so it was self-contained enough. Unfortunately, I can't take movies very seriously anymore since binge-watching CinemaSins, so I often catch myself thinking things like "That's racist." "Roll credits." and "Sixty-six seconds of ------- logos." Since I've already betrayed my ignorance, I feel no further shame in asking, does Spider-Man have super strength in addition to his climbing and web shooting abilities? I ask because I felt like every bone in his body should have been broken a few times over by the end. If he does have super strength, that seems like kind of a cop-out because that's not a spider power. Spiders can, like all bugs, fall or be thrown insane distances without injury, but that's because their small size results in ten times greater air resistance than driving force. So it wouldn't work for Peter, is what I'm saying.

Then yesterday I went on my own initiative to see "Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie" because it's in the cheap theater now. I read all the books as a kid and have skimmed through them a bit as an adult encountering them again at work, and they really are more clever and sophisticated than one would expect. Dav Pilkey is a legitimately funny writer who apparently just stoops to lowbrow humor to trick kids into reading. His ploy has worked magnificently. And ironically, because this movie has no sexual content (unless I just didn't notice it because I'm so innocent), it's far more appropriate for children than any other Dreamworks movie I can think of. Seriously, if I had kids I wouldn't let them watch most of that garbage. Also, the theme song is by "Weird Al" Yankovic, my favorite artist of all time, so I think I have to buy the soundtrack just for that. He also did a parody of "Piano Man" about the first Spider-Man movie back in 2002, which I've never seen and don't need to thanks to his plot summary.

I haven't seen "Wonder Woman" either. Shame on me. I just don't watch a lot of movies. In a case of truth being stranger than fiction, her current status as a feminist icon is not an ironic re-contextualization, but faithful to her origins. I don't remember if I read it somewhere or it just seemed like a no-brainer, but I had assumed that the males who created her in 1941 did so as fanservice for male comic book readers. Nope! She was a feminist icon all along! Except that the psychologist who created her had a strange way of expressing it by having her getting constantly tied up (which previously I assumed was part of the aforementioned fanservice). I feel like some psychologists need psychologists. Then in the 1970s she became a "real" feminist as she still remains today. I just learned all of this just now while undergoing the thorough research that is the hallmark of every blog post I write.

This is so obvious I'm sure it's been suggested many times before, but the superhero I really want to see is Captain Canada. A superhero who drives a bulletproof Zamboni, uses a curling broom as a bo staff, and apologizes whenever he hits a villain. I can say these things because I'm practically half-Canadian after breathing their air, drinking their water and watching their broadcasting corporation during my formative years. His arch-nemesis would be Captain Quebec, his jerkface brother who has always grown up in his shadow and takes great pains to demonstrate his independence and differentiate himself. He's petty and callous and amoral and often says bad words in French that the MPAA just lets slide because they're in French. I can say these things because one of my best friends is Quebecois and she finds it funny.

​Yes, Marie still exists even though I haven't mentioned her in a while. I should have written about how, a couple months ago, she was rear-ended by an idiot teenager, which totaled her car and exacerbated her scoliosis. She's been in near-constant severe pain since then, facing significant medical expenses and losing money from missed work. And here, despite being petty and callous and amoral in most of my conversations with her, she has shown her true colors. If this had happened to me, I would be consumed with rage 24/7. But she's just shrugged it off and kept chugging like a champ. Wow. So the other night she was tormenting me as I kept making stupid spelling mistakes for some reason. The first two were "mayke" (make) and "messager" (message) and they are not included in the following screenshots because that part of the conversation is classified. But I share these screenshots to teach myself humility.

Mackenzie finally read the last post about her and gave me the only feedback that really matters. Until she mentioned it, I assumed she had opted for a "don't ask, don't tell" and just hoped she wasn't upset. I never know when she's going to be upset.

"Kid", she called me, even though we're basically the same age.

Because it's catchy.

Early Monday morning I was awakened by what I later realized must have been a snow plow, but in my sleep-fogged condition assumed to be the beginnings of an earthquake or a terrorist attack. After a second I figured the former was more likely. I thought, Maybe I should get out of bed and find somewhere safe...

Meh.

Maybe I should say a prayer for all the people who will be affected...

Meh.

Do I have food storage? Well, sure, that box of food that expired in 2012. That will have to do...

You never know when "the day before" is "the day before"...

Because "It won't happen to us" isn't an emergency plan.

I fell back asleep and woke up to a bunch of unwelcome snow. The previous day (Easter) had been nearly sixty degrees. And since I had woken up at that stupid hour, my stupid brain decided I would want to do so the next two nights, too, just because.

I spent last Easter alone, but the year before that and the year before that I got invited to dinner somewhere, and the year before that I don't remember, so I was curious what would happen this year. If I did receive an invitation, I didn't expect it to come at the hands of someone I had just met and barely knew, but that's what happened. Let's call her... I don't know... Mackenzie. I met her at Debbie's ward prayers, and overheard her friend teasing her about whatever, so I was just going to smile at her as I passed but then somehow I got caught in a tractor beam and ended up talking for ten minutes or so. She was much more interesting to talk to than most people are. I think I might have accidentally flirted with her, but if so it doesn't seem to have caused any problems.

I wish I could remember how we ended up discussing the psychology of serial killers. "I went on a date with this psychology major once," she said, "and we went to this park he found on Google Maps, and it turned out to be cemetery, so that was creepy – but anyway, he started telling me about serial killers and how their minds are just a total incomprehensible mess – but you disagree, though?” By this time, I was realizing much to my chagrin that my opinion on the psychology of serial killers and other “crazy” bad guys was informed not by actual knowledge but by what makes for compelling literature. It's no fun to write about a serial killer who's just so insane that no one can identify with him. You need to give a solid internal logic behind his motivations, so reasonable seeming that the reader questions their own sanity. But that might not be how it is in real life and I wouldn't know, so I tried to back down from the discussion.

Dinner was really good, and was captured for posterity. I brought those oranges. Nobody took one until afterward when I was packing them up and somebody took one out of pity. I didn't have a lot of options for "breakfast food" to bring since this had been sprung on me on such short notice and I don't shop on Sundays. All my bags of cereal were nearly empty and I couldn't bring milk because I drink straight from the jug. While waiting for dinner to start, I volunteered to help but there was nothing for me to do, so I was assigned to color in a coloring book. It was a Strawberry Shortcake coloring book and it got that theme song stuck in my head for the rest of the day - or rather, it got the two lines I remember stuck in my head for the rest of the day. "That girl's so sweet, just like her name! Straw-ba-baw-baw-ba-berry Shortcake!"

Let's pretend that many readers have written in to accuse me of selfishness for wanting to become friends with Afton so that I could play with her dog. That wasn't the only reason, of course, but let me explain something to you imaginary people. Dogs are the best friends ever. Take care of a dog and be nice to it, and it will love you. It doesn't care one iota how much of a weirdo or loser you are by human standards. Their love and affection is conditional on a couple of reasonable things and nothing else. And I have been deprived of this for the better part of five years. I can't own a dog in my apartment and none of my peers can own dogs in their apartments. I have to take what I can get whenever I can get it. The prospect of one of my peers owning a dog that I could visit and pet and scratch and walk with and run with and feed and throw sticks and balls for and develop a close personal relationship with is beyond tantalizing. I miss my dog in New York more than I can say and I dread the thought that he's probably going to die a long time before I do. If I go to heaven, he'll be the first person I look for. "Hello, Jesus," I would say. "Where's Milo?"

[Spoiler Alert]

The basic premise of Bionicle is that the heroes known as the Toa Mata have a quest to awaken the Great Spirit, Mata Nui, who was cast into a deep sleep by his jealous brother Makuta. Somewhere along the line it is discovered that Mata Nui is not merely asleep but is, in fact, dying. This would devastate the entire universe and basically be the worst possible thing ever, so the Toa Inika go on their own little quest to save his life. He ends up dying for a few moments but one of them sacrifices his own life energy to bring him back. In another story, however, Takanuva travels to an alternate universe where this hero hesitated a moment too long and failed to sacrifice himself, so that Mata Nui's death became permanent. The hero was disgraced, there were huge cataclysms all over the place and most of the islands were destroyed and a lot of people died.

But the survivors didn't give up. Previously warring races all came together and established a new society of peaceful coexistence on the one remaining island. They built onto it so there was more room for everyone. And though they faced a lot of challenges, they were still going strong a thousand years or so later when Takanuva stumbled onto them. The takeaway from all of this, which is probably a lot more poignant to someone actually familiar with the stories and not just my paltry attempt to summarize and articulate them here, is to keep moving forward even if the worst possible and most devastating and demoralizing thing happens, and that a tragedy with even the most unmistakable sense of finality doesn't have to be final as long as you're still breathing.

General Conference is going on today and tomorrow (duh). So I was watching it today, and during the sustaining vote the dissenters yelled out again, and everyone in the room was talking derisively about them, when Mackenzie spoke up, so quietly that maybe no one else heard her, and said "We can be nice to them even though we disagree. We don't need to call them fools. They just don't understand."

I was stupefied. Who are you? I thought. In a good way, I mean.

Anyway, I'll probably share my thoughts on the conference a week from today when everyone else has moved on with their lives. I hope there will be some temple announcements tomorrow. Did I ever mention that I missed the temple announcements a year ago, after eagerly waiting two years for them, because my computer was being stupid? And now it's dead. That'll teach it.

Two Easters ago Chelsea from Vermont invited me to Easter dinner, a much smaller and more intimate affair with only four of us, and I believe it was later that day that we were in her room listening to peaceful music as we made wedding decorations for someone or other. That was when she asked me, "Why did you like Jean so much?" and I was about to say "Because she's so nice" but before I could speak Chelsea continued, "She wasn't very nice to you." And that just blew my mind and I couldn't speak. Anyway, I introduced her to some new music and vice versa. I showed her the Bollywood song "Salaam-E-Ishq" that I once danced to in the campus Diwali festival, and then she showed me this one which, impossibly, is even better. In the unlikely event that I ever have a wedding reception, my only demand is that this song be a part of it, "cultural appropriation" be damned.

It's always awkward when American World War II propaganda cartoons ended up being extremely racist. Fortunately, this is not one of those, unless you consider pseudo-German words and phrases to be racist, which I don't think most people would because racism has recently been redefined via circular logic so that it can only apply to non-white people. I have enjoyed this cartoon for years but only recently connected the dots between the date of its release and the cute little jab at Mussolini. Can you spot it?

"Some of them may even display selective mutism, speaking not at all to most people and excessively to specific people. Some may choose only to talk to people they like." - from Wikipedia's article on Asperger syndrome. As I look at it in isolation just now I realize that "excessively" is a very biased and subjective term that probably shouldn't be in a Wikipedia article. But the reason I copy-pasted it in the first place is that I find it amusing. Do normal, sorry, "neurotypical" people regularly choose to talk to people they don't like? How dumb.

What a strange feeling it is when an old Facebook status about your crush is liked by a total stranger who upon investigation turns out to be your crush's mother, though at first you think it's her sister because she looks twenty years younger than she must be. Yes, what a strange feeling, especially when you weren't aware that your crush's mother even knew that you existed because you didn't know that your crush had ever mentioned you to her family because you thought you were out of sight, out of mind. But what a good feeling it is when you realize that you had nothing to hide, except for that one status that she liked, but nothing "bad". Yes, perhaps you would want to hide some of these things if you had any shame, but you don't, which is why your profile is on its most public setting.

By "you" I mean "me" and the rest is pretty much literal. This actually happened a month or so ago, but I didn't know whether it was prudent to mention or not, but now I think it's okay. I told a couple people, and I asked Marie, and I asked if I should message her, and Marie was like "No, that would be weird", so I didn't, but then I decided to do it anyway because I have decided that as long as my behavior is respectful I shouldn't have to be dictated by society's arbitrary whims of whether or not it's "weird".

So that was a good feeling. A slightly more disturbing one is when strangers are arguing with me and feel the need to look at my profile and then bring it up. (Ex. Mike Poole from last week, "It's ok, I'm sure the leadership will give you bonus missionary points for having a Jesus cover photo.") Why are they so obsessed with me? I couldn't care less what's on their profiles.

Grammatical note: "I couldn't care less" is the proper term. "I could care less" makes no sense at all in the contexts where it's used, which people would realize if they thought about what they were saying for two seconds instead of just running on autopilot.

Facebook's reporting system is really a piece of work, isn't it? I wonder about the logic behind it. (All of the following are based on real instances.)

Mook 1: Oh dear, someone has reported a meme of a woman with tape over her mouth that says "Don't wrap it and tap it, tape her and rape her". How should we handle this?
Mook 2: Mmm, well, I myself do not for a moment share the viewpoint expressed in this image, but we can't just go around censoring everything we disagree with. After all, America was founded on the free exchange of ideas.
Mook 1: Right then. It stays up.
Mook 2: Here's another one. It's a meme of a nuclear explosion that says "Some cancers need radiation treatment. Islam is one of them."
Mook 1: Ooh, tough call. Some of my best friends are Muslims. But, you know, maybe they just meant that sometimes Muslims get cancer and they need radiation treatment, and then they did a Google search for "radiation" and grabbed the first picture they found even though it doesn't really match.
Mook 2: Yeah, that makes sense. Not our place to judge others' mistakes. It stays up.
Mook 1: Let's see here, what else do we - SWEET JUDAS PRIEST, IT'S A PICTURE OF A  MOTHER BREASTFEEDING AN INFANT. AAAAAAH!
Mook 2: AAAAAAAH! TAKE IT DOWN TAKE IT DOWN TAKE IT DOWN! I'D DO IT MYSELF BUT I'M BUSY BLEACHING MY EYES!

You're supposed to be able to appeal the decision or whatever, and sometimes that accomplishes nothing but sometimes it does. One time I reported a blatantly pornographic page, they said it didn't violate their community standards, I politely asked if they were retarded, and then they took it down. I suspect that no one actually, you know, looked at it the first time. Or read what it was called.

I thought this was amusing, especially the bit about Planned Parenthood.

Christmas was good. The highlight was receiving another crocheted R2-D2 hat from my sister to replace the one she gave me last year that got stolen (at church no less). This one fits better anyway.

Another highlight was what I discovering on my grandparents' bookshelf in the basement, which I have looked over many times but obviously not paid close enough attention to. My grandfather pointed out a picture of him with his parents and sister when he was four or so, and though I had seen it many times, this time I noticed partially obscured behind it not one, not two, not three, but four books by Mary Frances Sturlaugson Eyer, the first black sister missionary, who was once a celebrity among Mormons but has since faded into obscurity for whatever reason. Since I am enthralled with this kind of topic this was a veritable treasure trove. These were evidently owned by my great-grandmother, Geraldine Jensen, and three of them were autographed.

On a related note, I recently recently added in its entirety this story that has also faded into obscurity for some reason even though it deserves to be famous.

​Because we live in a cruel and horrible world, wonderful luck sometimes happens to the wicked and undeserving, and so it was that on Monday I won two tickets to see "The Force Awakens" from Kool 103.9's contest. I was so happy that for a while all I could do was walk around the house clapping my hands like one of those toy monkeys with cymbals. The tickets were for the next day. So you see, I do not regret my decision to wait for a while because free tickets that aren't for opening night are better than opening night tickets that aren't free. To enter the contest all one had to do was comment on their Facebook page that one wanted tickets, and I made a point of asking very politely and deferentially, so I don't know if I was chosen randomly or if that had something to do with it.

Pros:
The movie was hilarious
The pacing, action etc. was exciting and superior to that of the prequels
The special effects were very good and superior to those of the prequels
Kylo Ren was a unique villain and not merely a Darth Vader clone

Cons:
It felt more like "Guardians of the Galaxy" than a Star Wars movie (largely because it was so hilarious)
Except for Chewbacca, there were no familiar aliens until near the end (would it have killed them to add a few Rodians and Twi'leks?)
Much of the plot was clearly a reboot of the first film
I felt like too much of what happened between "Return of the Jedi" and this one was left unexplained (why, for example, are the New Republic and the Resistance two separate entities and what is the relationship between then?)

I wonder how long I have to wait before I can comment on the major earth-shattering spoilers without being a waste of skin who doesn't deserve to live.

​On the whole, I considered it worth watching, though it wasn't quite what I expected from Disney. I thought it would be something more like this.

Now that Christmas is over and everyone else will have forgotten about it, I am taking the opportunity to post this video which remains as applicable as ever. I happen to particularly like this one. Sometimes I find them hokey because I'm cynical and I can't help it, but I like the artistry and the discount Morgan Freeman narrator voice.

I suppose this is probably my last post of 2015. Pity it's nothing spectacular, but then I suppose most of them aren't anyway. Not fishing for compliments, but I'll take them if you have any to give...

Eleven more "deceptively edited" (note the sarcasm) Planned Parenthood videos were released a couple days ago, this time by a hacker who somehow got his hands on them. Some excerpts from Matt Walsh's summary (because he phrases things better than I could):

"This is an abortionist talking to other abortionist[s] (who, by the way, appear to agree wholeheartedly with everything she says). Do you hear that, 'pro-choicers'? Even the damned abortionists aren't trying to claim it isn't a person or it isn't killing or it isn't horrifically violent. They just think killing people is the 'most important thing they can do with their life.' Forget how utterly disturbing it is that anyone would call killing innocent people 'the most important thing' they could ever do, let's just focus on the fact that pro-aborts who use the 'clump of cells' argument do so despite the abortionists themselves saying otherwise... To review, a woman recounted killing a baby and having its eyeballs fall out of its skull. The room full of abortionists laughed hysterically and applauded. And, if you recall, these are people who fully admit the 'fetus' is actually, in their words, a 'baby,' a 'person,' and 'alive.' They fully admit it is, again in their words, 'violence' and 'killing.' Yet they find it funny and charming to hear about a dead baby's severed eyeballs...

"The stuff about selling baby parts is terrible and outrageous, but maybe it shouldn't have ever been positioned as the headline. The headline is, or should be, the simply reality of what abortion is, how abortionists themselves view it, and just the general callousness and cruelty and sadism these people exude... Pro-aborts: abortion doctors admit they are murdering human babies, and they think it's funny. How do you feel about that? Forget tissue sale. How do you feel about the fact that you are in favor of something the abortion industry itself describes as killing babies? How do you feel when you hear a room full of cackling psychos laugh and applaud at the thought of a dead child's eyeballs rolling around on the floor?"

There, I've already given it more coverage than the mainstream media. Now on that cheery note, let's move on. I don't feel inspired to write anything in particular but I'm going to force myself to write anyway, which is usually a bad sign. To wrest out of context a quote from one of my Facebook friends the other day, "I'm excited to see just how terrible this franchise can get. Because when the co-manager of the production company in charge of the film says (and I'm not making this up, it's an actual quote): 'If this is successful, we hope to include more, we'll continue this as long as we possibly can' you really can expect some quality story... right?"

One highlight of this past week was that a girl called me "my knight in shining armor", but that's not really a story, because it was just that and that was it. And then when I mentioned it to one of my other friends (Marie, for those who remember her) she said "Either you're deep in the friendzone or she likes you" and then I wondered why apparently it's okay for girls to use the word "friendzone" but if a guy says it he's the worst person in the world, at least whenever I've observed it. Like, whenever a guy posts something like "How can I get out of the friendzone?" I just wait and watch for everybody to pile on him and be like "I can't believe you're using the word 'friendzone', which doesn't exist, unironically in 2015." But when I see girls say it, no one bats an eyelash. Oh well. Maybe it's like how black people are allowed to use racial slurs against themselves.

​Speaking of race... what do you notice about this chart?

I'll tell you what I notice, even though you didn't ask, because if you don't care to know my thoughts on things then you're in completely the wrong place. I notice that even though our society, and especially the LDS Church's critics in this particular context, divide the human race into "black" and "white", there is a whole spectrum of different skin tones all over the above page. Most of the "white" people are not the same color, nor are the two "black" people. Conclusion: society is stupid.

​Actually, society's leg-humping obsession with skin color in 2015 is stupid altogether. It's embarrassing to hear some of these people talk and realize that they're being completely serious. Nothing has changed since Booker T. Washington wrote 104 years ago, "I am afraid that there is a certain class of race-problem solvers who don't want the patient to get well, because as long as the disease holds out they have not only an easy means of making a living, but also an easy medium through which to make themselves prominent before the public."

Here's a delightful example of such BS that I encountered recently: "In America white people are conditioned to subconsciously feel superior. [Way to make a sweeping, insulting generalization.] It's possible that they feel this way and aren't even aware of it. [See, if you're white but you don't think you feel superior, you're just too stupid to know yourself. Fortunately a benevolent mind-reading black person is here to help you.] When most all major leadership positions in the US are filled with white people it reaffirms white superiority. [Yeah, because who cares that the freaking President, the most prominent and visible leadership position and so-called "most powerful man in the world", is black. He's practically invisible.] Christ taught that we are all equal. [Duh. Is this a response to the statistically insignificant "we aren't all equal" demographic, or just a straw man?] So my question is, are you willing to listen? [Condescending and patronizing.] Or are you coming here to teach? Are your views so superior that you're unwilling to hear the cries of all of Gods [sic] children? [Straw man. The only person talking about superiority is you.] Or are you coming to excersize [sic] love compassion and empathy as the lord has commanded? [Wow. Get off your high horse already.]"

And then this comment stood out. "White people on this site: if you are arguing with he [sic], then you don't get it. Go back to Black People in America 101 and start over. When your eyes are open, you'll understand empathetically and exactly what she said without feeling like you have to defend yourselves." Translation: "If your understanding of yourselves is different from our assertions about you, then your opinion is invalid. Only black people's opinions about this matter."

I feel like sharing a story, for no particular reason, mind you. One time I was out walking at night and having a great deal of fun removing the leaf piles from storm drains. After I had finished, I was crossing through the crosswalk of an empty street when somebody pulled up to it, paused at the stop sign, and then proceeded to start going again while I was directly in front of him. Like, so directly in front of him that Mr. Magoo could have seen me. But alas, this man was either blinder or stupider than Mr. Magoo. I put up my hands to indicate that I would appreciate it if he didn't kill me, and calmly explained, "HEY, MORON! WHAT THE ---- ARE YOU DOING!?" before indicating my displeasure with a choice hand signal. He just stared at me with all the comprehension of a dead cow.

Afterward, of course, I regretted these impulsive words and actions that had burst out of me in the heat of the moment. If I'd had just a few more moments to mentally prepare myself, I would have behaved differently. I would have used more swear words, indicated my displeasure with both hands, and kicked his car for good measure. His stupidity was what really made me angry. I don't know this for a fact, but I suspect that I would be slightly less angry if someone actually tried to kill me. I know there are people who would do so in a heartbeat if it was legal. What makes me angry at times like this is the prospect that I should have to become real dead because someone else is braindead. (That, incidentally, is the same reason I detest anti-vaxxers so much, though in that case at least my anger is altruistic because it's their children and the immunocompromised people I'm actually concerned about.)

As I continued home, thinking about how I hoped he would crash into a tree and remove himself from the gene pool, the thought came to me, What if he was your bishop or something? Without hesitation I retorted, I don't care if he was President Monson. He has no right to drive like that. It did occur to me to wonder, "What would Jesus do?" But I can't do what I think Jesus would do, because I think Jesus would use His powers to disable the car and take the guy out of it. He'd be like, "Sorry, buddy, I forgive you and everything, but we can't have you on the streets endangering people." Or maybe He'd even perform a miracle and heal the guy's blindness.

Between there and home I passed through a public park, and I went to use their bathroom. I wasn't sure if it would be open. The parks always close their bathrooms for the winter because no one ever has to pee during the winter. But it was still open, and right before I went in I noticed that I was actually going into the women's bathroom because someone had defaced the sign and in the dark the stick figure actually did just look like a chunky guy. But I was like, Whatever, it's late and no one's around and no one cares, so I went in. I realized afterward that this might have been illegal, and if so, oops.

Once inside, the first thing I noticed was one of the largest spiders I've ever seen. It was building a web in the corner next to the first toilet. Oh-ho, I thought, God is in a playful mood, I see. I felt sorry for it, realizing that in the near future it would probably get squished and/or flushed, and I looked around for some way to pick it up and place it outside, but to no avail. I wasn't about to touch it with my bare hands. While the mere sight of the creature didn't faze me, I was less than enthused about the prospect of it jumping onto my face. So I had to leave it there with my regrets. As I left, though, I realized that my anger and my animosity toward that stupid stranger had evaporated. It's funny how life works sometimes.

Now for a more serious and bittersweet but hopefully inspiring story that was shared with me by a friend who hopefully won't be angry at me for repeating it anonymously.

"I used to go all out and put on makeup and dress super nice, but then I noticed people wouldn't really talk to me or would make preconceived notions about who I was. They always seemed super surprised when they actually got to know me. Especially when they found out I was actually geeky and outdoorsy and not just a sissy girly girl. Because of that there was a time when I did not really take pride in who I was and therefore tried to hide in sweatshirts and sweats. I wanted people to like me and so tried to fit into the constraints they were comfortable putting me in.

"But then I had an epiphany. If I want to dress nice and express myself through my clothing, then by all means I will. I'm not going to let anybody dictate whether or not I want to look nice. The same thing goes for other things I like and believe in. I dress and act the way I do because it makes me happy. And I choose to be happy."

​I can't improve on that, so no comment.

Here's a song for Halloween that I remember fondly from kindergarten. Unfortunately it's full of annoying beeps and doesn't actually go through the pages of the book, but sometimes life is like that.​

This week I am in New York visiting my family. I don't think of it as "coming home" because Utah is my home now (though hopefully not forever). It's a whole different world here and requires a subtly yet unmistakably different mindset. In Utah, unless you're in a bar (and maybe even then), the logical assumption is that a majority of the people around you are Mormons. In New York, unless you're in a Mormon chapel, the logical assumption is that none of them are. I had also forgotten that while driving here one frequently sees mirages of water on the road up ahead, which vanish when one gets closer but are replenished almost immediately. It's such a common phenomenon that I hardly gave it a second thought growing up, but on returning I realized that it doesn't happen in Utah, or at least not in northern Utah. Even though Utah is a desert and thus presumably a more suitable place for mirages. I should probably look into it.

I hadn't formed much of an opinion on Donald Trump until recently because most of what I knew about him was from old "Bloom County" comic strips, and I couldn't tell if he was really a slimeball or if people just hate him because he has a lot of money. I didn't look much into his political stances because he isn't going to get the nomination anyway and focusing on politics too much only depresses me, since my views have approximately zero impact on anything that happens in this country. But I found out recently that he thinks vaccines cause autism. And that's enough for me to dismiss him as not only stupider than dog vomit, but dangerous to society. I mean, our current administration is no Einstein either, but at least it isn't advocating against one of the greatest innovations of the modern age that has saved and improved millions of lives, on the basis of an unsupported and illegitimate fear that it will make their children end up like me and that they would be better off dead. It's hard to overstate the contempt and disgust I feel for anti-vaxxers, so I should probably leave it at that.

Here, from the "Why I'm not comfortable labeling myself 'conservative'" category, as well as the "Holy crap people like this actually exist" category (though if you have better things to do than read the whole thing, good for you, and I won't be offended if you skip past it. I didn't bother to blur people's names because this blog is no more public than the spot where they posted in the first place and it's not my job to cover for their bigotry):

Ugh. Though in fairness, about four of those fifty people stuck up for human decency. They're the ones with fourteen or fifteen replies telling them they're wrong.

Oh, and now that no one cares about him anymore, here's my take on Cecil the lion. Liberals were wrong for their disproportionate outrage, backlash and media coverage. Conservatives were wrong for acting like it was no big deal because only humans matter. This was hardly the apocalyptic atrocity it was made out to be, but it was still wrong. It's not that lion lives are inherently too sacred to take or that Cecil was a particularly sacred lion just because someone gave him a name. It's that lion population levels have decreased to two or three percent of their levels in the late 1800s, and will become zero percent in a few decades if nothing is done to prevent it. That is why there are rules and regulations in place to protect them, and those need to be respected. (Incidentally, hunting top predators like lions, tigers and bears just seems kind of perverse to me altogether, but I guess that's just an emotional bias talking.)

I read an op-ed from a Zimbabwean student in the US who pointed out that a. most Zimbabweans have never heard of and didn't care about Cecil the lion and b. Zimbabweans like him who grew up in rural areas fear and hate lions for the threat that they pose. I sympathized with him, but defensively killing the lion that was terrorizing his village when he was a child is altogether different than, and irrelevant to, deliberately luring a lion from a protected preserve where he was minding his own business for the purpose of killing him. Lions may cause problems, but wiping out their species will only cause bigger ones. Still, the way that dentist was treated by "compassionate" liberals was uncalled for and unacceptable, though hardly surprising.

On that note, here's a book recommendation: "Last Chance to See" by Douglas Adams of galactic hitchhiking fame. I'm re-reading it now in New York. It's the most hilarious take on critically endangered species that you're likely to ever find, yet still (mostly) tasteful and sobering.

I upgraded to Windows 10 and am mostly pleased except that suddenly my computer brightness settings are reversed but won't go as dim as I like them. Sometimes they're right but usually they're reversed. Does anyone know how to fix that? It's really annoying. Also, is there a way to make old 32-bit games like Math Blaster work on newer computers? Google seems unusually unhelpful regarding these matters. Oh, but speaking of search stuff, Windows 10's search thing is called Cortana. Despite having a name and a gender, she has disappointingly little personality, but she asked me what I want to be called and I said "Sweetie Pumpkin", so she does. Don't judge me.

Well, I'm supposed to be on vacation and I already conveniently took up a lot of space with those pictures (it's not my problem if you skipped over them), so I shall be signing off now and getting back to that book. Bonne nuit.

P.S. Speaking of French speaking, Marie is still around. I haven't written about her for a while so maybe you thought she just kind of disappeared. But she didn't. Here she is in all her redacted glory.