5: "I'm majoring in Early Childhood Education."
1: "Yeah, I plan on going to law school."
6: "Yeah right. Why would you do that?"
1: "Uh...because I want to."
6: "But its not like your going to work, you're a woman."
1: "Who says women can't work?"
6: "Well my mother, sisters, and sisters-in-law don't work."
1: "Well my grandmother, mother, and all of my sisters except for one work."
6: "Uh huh."
1: "And where are you going to school?"
6: "----------"
1: "And what are you majoring in?"
6: "I don't know yet."
1: "Yeah, figured."
Tuesday, September 28, 2010
Eavesdropping
4: "Do you need some help with those groceries?"
1: "Uh, yeah sure."
4: "Sowa, did you go to Walmart?"
1: "Hmmm, no. Actually I'm a big environmentalist, I like to save up all of these plastic bags and use them over and over each time I go to any store."
4: "Tha-that's cool. The environment's pretty great."
4: "So where are you from?"
1: "Antarctica."
4: "Oh, wow. Are you parents scientists or something."
1: "Yeah, something like that."
1: "Uh, yeah sure."
4: "Sowa, did you go to Walmart?"
1: "Hmmm, no. Actually I'm a big environmentalist, I like to save up all of these plastic bags and use them over and over each time I go to any store."
4: "Tha-that's cool. The environment's pretty great."
4: "So where are you from?"
1: "Antarctica."
4: "Oh, wow. Are you parents scientists or something."
1: "Yeah, something like that."
Eavesdropping
Prof: "Colonization caused deep strife within nations."
2: "Didn't British Colonization sorda help India?"
Prof: "How"
2: "Since Indians learned English, they can now help their economy by working in call centers."
2: "Didn't British Colonization sorda help India?"
Prof: "How"
2: "Since Indians learned English, they can now help their economy by working in call centers."
Intros
Welcome one and um...one to my ridiculously useless blog. Simply, one day I was talking to one person, then to another, and another, and another, then to myself, and finally to a strange bird that flew into my windowsill (into not onto). I figured before I crack up, I might as well entertain myself with the greatest and most least expensive entertainment the big guy upstairs has offered us...observation. I'm one of those realists that enjoys spending useless hours wondering how anyone ever wrote those economics and psychology books, because I'm still attempting to meet a truly rational person (even when I look in the mirror every morning). So before you begin, understand that perhaps everything but most likely nothing I write is real, it all depends on your perspective. And most uselessly important, don't take anything too seriously.
Need for Speed
After many intense seconds of informal training, severe enough to seem like actual years of practice, the three competitors triumphantly march their way up the winding slope. After trudging uphill for a quarter of a mile, and a quick squabble, the participants take their places on the sidewalk. Jace, with her new goalie gloves her mother just purchased—now worn through with holes from today’s previous attempts—will be the “braker.” Lolie will be the “observer” from the central seat, holding the string to the steering pole in case anything might go wrong—but that is not possible considering the immaculate training just performed. And finally, A. Clingo will be the “driver,” with her hair pulled back and eyes concentrating on the goal. This colossal hill seems menacing, but even if most scooters or rollerblades can’t handle it, the calculations of these three children prove there won’t be a problem for an immortal, large red wagon with four gigantic wheels.
Since, I was young I always had a need for speed, as did my best friend two houses up from me. And when this need was combined with the imagination of two six-year-olds, there were sometimes catastrophic results. Together we were able to find every rope-swing, zip line, and hill in the neighborhood, which were many in an old neighborhood like ours. Our neighborhood looked more like the shire of the hobbits instead of a regular suburb, with hills ready for our use anytime we desired. However, there was one hill—the largest, most ominous peak in the area. We had tried many different mechanisms to conquer this mountain, but the thrill of broken scooters, burning rollerblades, and car-bashing bicycles was losing its buzz. So, at my house, when my little sister asked us to pull her in her red wagon, an idea popped into our heads, and my sister was left to her Barbies.
Not even the American Bobsled team could outdo us, or so we thought—but nothing could beat the ego of a six-year-old, not even logic. So after much thought and contemplation concerning who would be where—meaning who was louder and taller got first choice—we sat down and prepared ourselves. I held the black pole with my right hand and the ball that connected it to the front wheels with my left. Jace, with her new sunglasses—looking like a true motocross driver—rubbed her hands together, causing the needed friction for quick braking reflexes. And Lolie held on tightly to the sides of the wagon with the pole string and her feet held down for a secondary brake system if anything should go wrong.
“One, Two, Three!” Jace hollered, pushing ecstatically off of the sidewalk.
“I thought we were going to five!” Lolie shouted, but her words were lost in the cold wind behind us.
The blistering air beat on my eyes, making me incapable of seeing, but we were finally achieving our intended purpose—speed. Every second we got faster and faster, like the hill would never end—my hands working with great effort to turn the pole the correct way against the bumps in the sidewalk. Suddenly I heard a strange noise behind me that I couldn’t quite understand.
“What are you doing!” Jace exclaimed.
Losing concentration, I lost control and dropped the steering pole. In a blur of green, shards of grass pounded into our faces, blinding us all, we certainly weren’t on the sidewalk anymore.
“Feet down!” Jace commanded, but neither of us heard, we were focusing on the last moments of our short lives, screaming at the top of our lungs.
The blur of green finally faded into a gray.
CRASH!
The gray had been a brick wall fence.
My head whipped forward and my hands bled from holding them out to stop the crash—not a very bright idea.
“I think I twisted my ankle,” Lolie groaned.
“Don’t be such babies,” Jace mumbled, sprawled on the ground, trying to pull herself up.
We certainly were quite a sight, Lolie and I breathing our last breaths as we thought we were dying and Jace getting up to go back home.
“You dead?” I asked.
“Yup.”
We slowly pulled ourselves up, over several minutes—maybe this was what happened when we died, perhaps we were ghosts.
There was a huge round dent in the bricks, reminding us of the round black ball at the bottom of the steering pole…
“Uh.” Lolie looked at me, in thoughtful meditation.
“Yeah,” I agreed, “Well, um, see ya tomorrow.”
Lolie limped back to her house and I discreetly pulled the slightly smashed wagon back to my house. I felt it best to avoid any wagon hill racing for a while, and so I left the wagon in the garage for the next month, hidden under a tarp—the owner of the wall would be home tomorrow. I don’t think she’d notice three limping children in the neighborhood—maybe.
Since, I was young I always had a need for speed, as did my best friend two houses up from me. And when this need was combined with the imagination of two six-year-olds, there were sometimes catastrophic results. Together we were able to find every rope-swing, zip line, and hill in the neighborhood, which were many in an old neighborhood like ours. Our neighborhood looked more like the shire of the hobbits instead of a regular suburb, with hills ready for our use anytime we desired. However, there was one hill—the largest, most ominous peak in the area. We had tried many different mechanisms to conquer this mountain, but the thrill of broken scooters, burning rollerblades, and car-bashing bicycles was losing its buzz. So, at my house, when my little sister asked us to pull her in her red wagon, an idea popped into our heads, and my sister was left to her Barbies.
Not even the American Bobsled team could outdo us, or so we thought—but nothing could beat the ego of a six-year-old, not even logic. So after much thought and contemplation concerning who would be where—meaning who was louder and taller got first choice—we sat down and prepared ourselves. I held the black pole with my right hand and the ball that connected it to the front wheels with my left. Jace, with her new sunglasses—looking like a true motocross driver—rubbed her hands together, causing the needed friction for quick braking reflexes. And Lolie held on tightly to the sides of the wagon with the pole string and her feet held down for a secondary brake system if anything should go wrong.
“One, Two, Three!” Jace hollered, pushing ecstatically off of the sidewalk.
“I thought we were going to five!” Lolie shouted, but her words were lost in the cold wind behind us.
The blistering air beat on my eyes, making me incapable of seeing, but we were finally achieving our intended purpose—speed. Every second we got faster and faster, like the hill would never end—my hands working with great effort to turn the pole the correct way against the bumps in the sidewalk. Suddenly I heard a strange noise behind me that I couldn’t quite understand.
“What are you doing!” Jace exclaimed.
Losing concentration, I lost control and dropped the steering pole. In a blur of green, shards of grass pounded into our faces, blinding us all, we certainly weren’t on the sidewalk anymore.
“Feet down!” Jace commanded, but neither of us heard, we were focusing on the last moments of our short lives, screaming at the top of our lungs.
The blur of green finally faded into a gray.
CRASH!
The gray had been a brick wall fence.
My head whipped forward and my hands bled from holding them out to stop the crash—not a very bright idea.
“I think I twisted my ankle,” Lolie groaned.
“Don’t be such babies,” Jace mumbled, sprawled on the ground, trying to pull herself up.
We certainly were quite a sight, Lolie and I breathing our last breaths as we thought we were dying and Jace getting up to go back home.
“You dead?” I asked.
“Yup.”
We slowly pulled ourselves up, over several minutes—maybe this was what happened when we died, perhaps we were ghosts.
There was a huge round dent in the bricks, reminding us of the round black ball at the bottom of the steering pole…
“Uh.” Lolie looked at me, in thoughtful meditation.
“Yeah,” I agreed, “Well, um, see ya tomorrow.”
Lolie limped back to her house and I discreetly pulled the slightly smashed wagon back to my house. I felt it best to avoid any wagon hill racing for a while, and so I left the wagon in the garage for the next month, hidden under a tarp—the owner of the wall would be home tomorrow. I don’t think she’d notice three limping children in the neighborhood—maybe.
A New Chronic Illness In Utah, Utah Possibly To Be Quarantined.
Associated Press May 19, 2009
In recent years, prominent scientists in the Wasatch Mountain Region have been researching into a new alarming genetic disorder that has revealed itself in larger and larger numbers, called the TTI. One of the leading scientists, renowned Russian scientist Chastakorlenkabukinbrishgrosha (fondly known as Shasta by his close friends) has stated “Vee believe dis to not only ve ah disordah, vhut ee highly contahgious disease oov soome sort. Ve are noot entirely sure oov eets eempleecahtions aht dis time vheeing, vhut it hast spread droughout all facets oov Utahn sociedy. Ve are trying ahr vest to cantrohl its recent outvursts.”
Yugoslavian scientist Yunimomoni, has called this disease by the more popular name “tithing tippers.” Somehow, when the people with the ‘tithing tipper’ come in contact with others carrying the disease, it somehow alters the very actions of the individual, changing the very conscience that so defines humankind. These people, when going to a restaurant, somehow forgo all human sympathy and insist on giving tips of 10% or less, resulting in waiters and waitresses all over Utah barely making minimum wage—for in Utah they only make $2.37 an hour and in order to achieve minimum wage they have to make up the difference in tips. Yunimomoni stated, “It is a very disturbing disease. And since the economic downturn, it’s become even harder to study the disease, for we can’t tell who actually carries the disease and who is just faking like they have it.”
Since the recent outbreak of Swine Flu, and the nationwide alarm, the federal government has been weary of releasing any other information regarding the ‘tithing tipper.’ But when an anonymous individual suffering from the disease was quarantined, and described her experiences on her online blog, the government was forced to either approve or deny the information. In the blog she said, “After leaving the restaurant, I was walking to my car in the parking lot. Before I knew what was happening, I was chased down by my waitress and other staff members. Everything went dark and the next second, I found myself on a white bed in a room covered in plastic. People in astronaut suits were around me telling me not to worry, ‘this will be taken care of.’”
Some of the researchers believe the ‘tithing tipper’ could possibly be much more destructive of the human mind than any other disorder before created. Senora Stratton, American scientist and owner of the Las Madres Restaurant, said “We don’t understand it, we don’t know if it’s a disorder, illness, disease, or a genetic malfunction. We have found that it is dangerously contagious and somehow affects the very brain, controlling the frontal lobe’s functions of judgment, but we have also seen a constant trend in the children of carriers. We are starting to believe that it can actually enter into the very DNA of the carrier and be spread to offspring.”
The disease is also known to spark sporadic uncontrollable anger and possible violence in waiters and waitresses who come in contact with it. Recently in the small town of Hurricane, Utah, a waitress was said to have served a table and upon receiving the check, she chased the customer down and in irrepressible fury gave the customer such an angry invective that the customer has been in therapy ever since, besides also receiving treatment by specialists for the symptoms of the ‘tithing tipper.’
Since children rarely pay for food at restaurants and in effect never tip waiters, it is difficult to know for sure who is truly carrying the illness. In fact, some people have been known to never enter a restaurant till their middle age or later, and at that point scientists don’t know if it is because of lack of consideration or because they are truly a sufferer. Governor John Huntsman in a private medical press conference said, “The difficulty with researching this disease is that it has a gradual onset and, like some disorders, can possibly not be recognizable until teenage or adult years. And although some may be carriers, they may never be in the proper situation for us to view the symptoms. We fear for its spread and don’t know how many have been infected.”
John Huntsman further said, “the government is looking into a quarantine of the entire Utah state, for this illness has been leaking out of state borders into nearby states with six cases in Idaho, twenty-four in Nevada , and three in Colorado. These individuals are in intensive rehabilitation and their identities have been highly guarded in order to prevent mass chaos and fear within the communities they reside.”
In order to prevent the disease, scientists have asked parents to keep their children away from the influence of ‘tithing tipper’ carriers. Few have been cured of it, and those in the senior years of life are known to have a very low curable rate. Yunimomoni stated, “Children of the new generation are where our focuses are, we have to stop this disease’s spread at the beginning stages. We could do very little for seniors who have been suffering from it their whole lives.”
In recent years, prominent scientists in the Wasatch Mountain Region have been researching into a new alarming genetic disorder that has revealed itself in larger and larger numbers, called the TTI. One of the leading scientists, renowned Russian scientist Chastakorlenkabukinbrishgrosha (fondly known as Shasta by his close friends) has stated “Vee believe dis to not only ve ah disordah, vhut ee highly contahgious disease oov soome sort. Ve are noot entirely sure oov eets eempleecahtions aht dis time vheeing, vhut it hast spread droughout all facets oov Utahn sociedy. Ve are trying ahr vest to cantrohl its recent outvursts.”
Yugoslavian scientist Yunimomoni, has called this disease by the more popular name “tithing tippers.” Somehow, when the people with the ‘tithing tipper’ come in contact with others carrying the disease, it somehow alters the very actions of the individual, changing the very conscience that so defines humankind. These people, when going to a restaurant, somehow forgo all human sympathy and insist on giving tips of 10% or less, resulting in waiters and waitresses all over Utah barely making minimum wage—for in Utah they only make $2.37 an hour and in order to achieve minimum wage they have to make up the difference in tips. Yunimomoni stated, “It is a very disturbing disease. And since the economic downturn, it’s become even harder to study the disease, for we can’t tell who actually carries the disease and who is just faking like they have it.”
Since the recent outbreak of Swine Flu, and the nationwide alarm, the federal government has been weary of releasing any other information regarding the ‘tithing tipper.’ But when an anonymous individual suffering from the disease was quarantined, and described her experiences on her online blog, the government was forced to either approve or deny the information. In the blog she said, “After leaving the restaurant, I was walking to my car in the parking lot. Before I knew what was happening, I was chased down by my waitress and other staff members. Everything went dark and the next second, I found myself on a white bed in a room covered in plastic. People in astronaut suits were around me telling me not to worry, ‘this will be taken care of.’”
Some of the researchers believe the ‘tithing tipper’ could possibly be much more destructive of the human mind than any other disorder before created. Senora Stratton, American scientist and owner of the Las Madres Restaurant, said “We don’t understand it, we don’t know if it’s a disorder, illness, disease, or a genetic malfunction. We have found that it is dangerously contagious and somehow affects the very brain, controlling the frontal lobe’s functions of judgment, but we have also seen a constant trend in the children of carriers. We are starting to believe that it can actually enter into the very DNA of the carrier and be spread to offspring.”
The disease is also known to spark sporadic uncontrollable anger and possible violence in waiters and waitresses who come in contact with it. Recently in the small town of Hurricane, Utah, a waitress was said to have served a table and upon receiving the check, she chased the customer down and in irrepressible fury gave the customer such an angry invective that the customer has been in therapy ever since, besides also receiving treatment by specialists for the symptoms of the ‘tithing tipper.’
Since children rarely pay for food at restaurants and in effect never tip waiters, it is difficult to know for sure who is truly carrying the illness. In fact, some people have been known to never enter a restaurant till their middle age or later, and at that point scientists don’t know if it is because of lack of consideration or because they are truly a sufferer. Governor John Huntsman in a private medical press conference said, “The difficulty with researching this disease is that it has a gradual onset and, like some disorders, can possibly not be recognizable until teenage or adult years. And although some may be carriers, they may never be in the proper situation for us to view the symptoms. We fear for its spread and don’t know how many have been infected.”
John Huntsman further said, “the government is looking into a quarantine of the entire Utah state, for this illness has been leaking out of state borders into nearby states with six cases in Idaho, twenty-four in Nevada , and three in Colorado. These individuals are in intensive rehabilitation and their identities have been highly guarded in order to prevent mass chaos and fear within the communities they reside.”
In order to prevent the disease, scientists have asked parents to keep their children away from the influence of ‘tithing tipper’ carriers. Few have been cured of it, and those in the senior years of life are known to have a very low curable rate. Yunimomoni stated, “Children of the new generation are where our focuses are, we have to stop this disease’s spread at the beginning stages. We could do very little for seniors who have been suffering from it their whole lives.”
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