Random Thoughts

You know it has rained a lot when part of the route you take to work has become a lake. As well as the park a few miles away and the golf course next to that same park.

It's a lot harder to be a philosopher when your life experiences start getting in the way. And once you get over a certain age, life experiences are always going to get in the way.

The best way to keep one's illusions about any particular group of people is to have as little experience with them as possible.

If Donald Trump did not exist, some liberals would have found it necessary to invent him.

"Don't blame me; I didn't vote for Trump" is the new "me no Alamo."

The Big Bang Theory is the new Friends.

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Wow! The majority political party in a country much beset by high unemployment got voted out of power in an election year! Who in his or her right mind would have seen that coming?

I am so glad that none of my friends in the nursing community worked at the local hospital that messed up so badly with the Thomas Eric Duncan case.

If you dislike welfare recipients so much, why don't you hire one? If you're not in a position to make decisions about hiring because you're not the boss of your workplace, why not encourage your boss to hire a welfare recipient? It should go without saying that not everyone on welfare wants to be there. So why not help reduce the welfare state by helping someone seek employment?

The same bank employee who is eager to help you set up your account will generally not be so eager to help you if you ask for a job application.

How come you hear so much about people writing short stories but never about anyone writing a long story?

It is usually a lot easier to talk about how enlightened you are than to actually show it through your actions.

Actions not only speak louder than words but they also tend to drown them out.

A lot of the people who support the welfare system with their taxes are not much richer than the richest person on welfare. However, a lot of people tend to forget that.

One of the worst criminals in the world is the one who wear a badge.

It takes little courage to diss poor people and even less if you do so while working at a job that does not require the support of poor people.

Last time I checked, it was not illegal immigrants or welfare recipients that caused the recent economic crisis but that did not stop people from criticizing them.

Funny how the people who continually brag about how much they care about poor people never seem to show up when one of my poorer neighbors needs help.

The same person who will badmouth someone to your face today will be badmouthing you behind your back tomorrow.

Some people in my condominium complex find it much more convenient to buy a pack of cigarettes from their neighbor than to walk across the street and buy one from the local convenience store. For that matter, some of my neighbors find it more convenient to pay someone to drive them somewhere than to take the bus -- even though my complex is located on a DART route. I guess all of this is good news for those who would like to think that American capitalism is not doomed but it is not likely to make supporters of public transportation feel happy.

I hate myself for loving Who.

Random Thoughts

What does it say about the average non-Catholic's powers of observation that you routinely see Communion wafers described on the Internet as crackers, magic bread, and cookies but never as actual wafers? If these wafers were part of a secret ceremony that is rarely glimpsed by the public, I could understand this type of error. But when you consider how easy it is to attend a Catholic Mass, you have to wonder.

Money comes in like molasses in January and goes out like water in July.

You know it is really hot outside when you find yourself actually looking forward to a cold shower.

The last time I had to pick up a package from the U.S. Post Office, it took me about twenty minutes and I was able to pick up the package at a location about two freeway exits away from my home. The last time I had to pick up a package from one of the U.S. Post Office's competitors, I had to drive halfway across town, wait several hours and consider myself lucky that I was able to pick it up that night and did not have to come back the next morning like I did the last time I picked up a package at that location. So naturally it is the U.S. Post Office that is supposed to be going away in a few years and its competitors which are likely to stick around for a long time to come...

Lending money is like gambling: do not use money that you can not afford to do without for a long while. Because a long while is usually how long you will have to wait for repayment -- and that is a best-case scenario.

If art is a conversation, why do so many of my experiences with it tend to end in arguments?

For the first half of my life, I used to worry that I was too much like my mother and not enough like my father. Now I worry that I am too much like my father and not enough like my mother.

Random Thoughts

I have seen more people carrying umbrellas on sunny days during the last three years than I have ever seen carry umbrellas on sunny days during the ten years prior to that. In fact, it seems like I see more people carry umbrellas on sunny days nowadays than on rainy days.

The problem with speaking truth to power is that you actually have to speak the truth.

You can tell a computer is old when it shuts off every time you expect it to stay on automatically and stays on every time you expect it to shut off automatically.

I can't help but wonder how many of the people questioning Obama's citizenship would welcome a Schwarzenegger presidency.

Should I find it ironic that the most honest stuff I write is usually written under a pen name?

History's chief purpose is not to let us know what good people we have been.

It is not a kindness to encourage the poor to spend money they don't have on stuff they don't really need just because someone other than them thinks it to be fashionable.

The past ain't what it used to be and neither is the future.

I, tú, am America.

I never realized how American I was until I went to Mexico. I never realized how Mexican I was until I came back.

How realistic is it to expect an intelligent response to global warming when local politicians are still being constantly surprised by the fact that it often snows during the winter and gets hot during the summer?

People rarely pay back money with the same urgency that they borrow it. Even when the people from which they borrow it are themselves poor.

Whenever a riot occurs, people rarely go after the most deserving targets. Instead they go after the most vulnerable.

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What does it say about my life that my initial response to the first declaration of love I have received from a woman since I broke up with my former bride-to-be was to try to argue her out of it?

Do I have to vote for a presidential candidate this year?

If automation is truly putting an end to the repetitive and soul-destroying jobs of yesteryear, why do so many of the jobs available nowadays tend to be repetitive and soul-destroying?

Of course, having to continually search for work in this economic climate isn't exactly an ego-booster either.

If atheism is so fashionable nowadays, why do so many people other than me throw around words like "soul-destroying"? I thought atheists didn't recognize the existence of a soul.

Random Thoughts

It's official. Summer is my favorite season and lemons are my favorite fruit.

You know it's been a hot summer in Texas when you start thinking of 81 degrees as "cool."

Twenty years later and "It's the economy, stupid" is still a valid political slogan.

Believe it or not, many Mexican-Americans born in this country don't really care that much about immigration but that does not mean that continually bashing Mexican illegals is the way to win our hearts. Nor is continually equating mojado culture with Chicano culture. Or for that matter, with Mexican-American culture.

Just once I would like to see Ann Coulter write a book that doesn't look like it should be printed in an all caps format.

Anyone else suspect that many of the same people bashing actor Clint Eastwood for his speech at the 2012 GOP convention were the same people arguing a few months ago that Eastwood should be nominated for president just because he did a really cool voiceover for a car commercial?

Random Thoughts

It is so depressing seeing a librarian referred to as a "customer service representive." Especially since most library patrons aren't necessarily likely to be flattered by being referred to as "customers."

It is even more depressing to wonder how many books my local library system got rid of in order to make room for its expanded internet system and its multiple DVD racks.

Let someone wish you a "Happy Holidays" instead of a "Merry Christmas" and certain Christian people will make a big deal out of it. Let a retail store deliberately expand its hours so that most of its staff has to miss out on Thanksgiving and those same Christians don't even bother to say a word.

How seriously should we take someone who talks about wanting to get rid of large corporations yet constantly talks about hanging out at Starbucks instead of the local library and buying their books through Amazon instead of the local indy book store?

The coming election won't hinge on how crazy Michele Bachmann looks or how weird Mitt Romney's religious background is. It will hinge on which candidate is most likely to do something that will improve this country's economy.

One does not have to be crazy to worry about the ever-increasing federal deficit but it certainly helps the current administration to think so.

Much of our country came from countries that could not afford to keep all their territory. Part of the reason they could not afford this is because they often ran up huge debts borrowing money to pay for foreign wars. And yet it is so fashionable to act clueless when Americans start to make a big deal about similar practices here in America.

It is no longer that big a deal to be mad at Wall Street. Even my conservative Republican mother is angry about the latest Wall Street scandals. What matters now is doing something constructive with that anger.

The real trouble with anarchy is that it is at best a temporary condition. Sooner or later it is replaced by a more ordered system such as, say, feudalism or fascism. Which means that those people who advocate anarchy are in reality a future dictator's best friends.

I am so glad that the Iraqi War is finally over. I just hope it stays that way.

Random Thoughts

You can always tell it's Labor Day in America because most of the managers will have the day off and most of the working stiffs have to work.

The more urgently you need to get somewhere, the more likely you are to encounter a traffic jam.

The more urgently you need to look something up on the Internet, the more likely you are to get one of those annoying hourglass icons.

Random Thoughts

Should I consider it evil that part of me wants to go out and buy a big carton of Kroger ice cream -- with nuts?

Do any of the people who write Internet editorials about the importance of job seekers keeping a good attitude actually know anyone who is unemployed? I have to wonder.

Last time I checked, traditional Muslims were not really big on American beauty contests but that did not keep people from slandering the current Miss USA.

The harder it is to get to your cell phone, the more likely it is to ring.

The more badly you need a check, the more likely it is to get lost in the mail.

The more people talk about the efficiency of government, the more likely it is that the lost check will be a government check.

Should I pretend that historians just made up the Little Ice Age?

People who are insecure about their intellectual abilities tend to disparage the intellectual abilities of others for the same reason a person insecure about his or her appearance will often disparage the appearance of another person.

The more necessary people are to the running of a city, the more likely they are to be taken for granted.

Politicians tend to prefer intellectually unarmed peasants.

If we are really all that concerned about the scientific knowledge of modern-day Americans, why do we always seem more concerned about the image of American lawyers than the image of American engineers? And why do lawyers have a higher status than engineers in our supposedly pro-science country anyway? And why do lawyers rarely have to worry about losing a job due to outsourcing or being replaced by some recent immigrant who is willing to work for a lower rate than a current citizen?

Funny how discussions of the benign nature of Communism seem to involve people who spent all of five days within a Communist country and not people who were former citizens of such a country.

When you grow up among people who have worked in steel mills and automobile factories, it seems a bit obscene to go on and on about how "hard" it is to be a writer. Especially when the hardest part about being a writer is rarely the actual writing. It is finding something to write about that people are actually willing to pay you to write about.

Random Thoughts


Cool! Miss Michigan aka Rima Fakih won the Miss U.S.A. contest. I guess our national image of beauty is changing. Plus it doesn't hurt that she hails from my home state.

I guess it's a good thing I don't have a burning desire to see the Grand Canyon this year because even if I could afford to travel, there would be no way short of a dire family emergency I would be caught dead going to Arizona. And it's not like I have relatives in Arizona anyway.

I used to find it frustrating enough that so many liberals are ignoring the drug-related violence occurring in Mexico right now but at least they're not using it as an excuse to tell anti-Mexican jokes like the good folks at Big Hollywood. And no, I don't really care whether or not site editor John Nolte has a Mexican wife, a Mexican niece, a posse of Mexican friends or a long-standing relationship with the President of Mexico. The minute he started allowing anti-Mexican jokes on his site, I stopped taking his political arguments seriously.

Where's Red Adair now that we need him? I'm quite sure he would have found a way to cap that oil leak even if he was more a specialist in oil fires.

If BP's handling of the Gulf of Mexico oil leak is supposed to be an example of the superior way the British handle things, it's not working.

Oh no. Parks and Recreation is going on hiatus. That means I'll have to rely on old Office reruns and bad Hollywood movies to get my weekly Rashida Jones fix.

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I don't know if I care for the fact that my niece and nephew are more likely to learn in their history books about some foreigner like John Calvin than they are about a real American like Thomas Jefferson.

Let's teach Texas schoolchildren about the Tejanos who fought against Santa Ana because they are part of the history that actually happened, not because we wish to do local Hispanic politicians a favor. After all, some people are going to hate Mexicans no matter what kind of history book they read. So let's stop worrying about those people and concentrate on the truth.

There are many reasons I remain a Catholic but agreement with the Vatican's latest speeches is not one of them.

If I worked for the Vatican right now, I would worry less about The New York Times and more about lightning bolts.

Many of the people who have been most critical of the Vatican's handling of the clerical abuse scandal are Catholic. And it is precisely because they have respect for the odd notion that a Catholic priest should be held to the same moral standard as a Catholic layperson -- if not higher -- that they are so critical. After all, if we cannot expect high morals from a Catholic priest, then what is the point of having Catholic priests?

People may be willing to shrug off any differences they have with the Vatican about birth control, abortion or gay rights but they do tend to take it seriously when it involves the possibility of their children getting hurt. And calling them names is not going to change that.

Random Thoughts

I sincerely pray that some good deeds do go unpunished.

Every so often, I feel like I’m drowning and that all too many people around me are tossing me anchors instead of life preservers.

If I’m not good enough to talk to on a regular basis, then I’m not good enough to be solicited for your cause, no matter how worthy it may otherwise be.

All too often, the only benefit of being an autodidact is knowing what an autodidact is.

Random Thoughts

Isn't it funny how often those same Christians who kvetch about Cafeteria Catholics who pick and choose which part of the Bible they choose to obey routinely pass over that part of the Bible that says "Judge not lest ye be judged"?

Would Jesus Christ really care that much about some poor schnook of a store clerk who dares use the words "Happy Holidays" instead of "Merry Christmas"? Wouldn't he care far more about the poor and the homeless?

Aren't good Christians supposed to celebrate Jesus' death and resurrection far more than his birth?

Isn't it strange that our main response to the AIDS epidemic involved finding a new way of selling something? No one ever needed a separate store for condoms before the mid-1980s and one has to wonder about the imaginative powers of someone who is not only incapable of buying a box of condoms in an average drug store but who insists that they come in more than one color and glow in the dark to boot.

When cultural conservatives object to something, cultural liberals routinely tell them to ignore it. But when cultural liberals object to something, they can't resist making the same foolish gestures as cultural conservatives. And of course, they never just sit back and ignore what they hate but insist on giving the item they allegedly hate more and more free publicity. Witness, for example, Stephenie Meyer's Twilight series. If these books were really as bad as their detractors say, one would think that the last thing that people who hated the series would want to do is give the series more publicity but instead they find it more satisfying to go on and on about how bad they think the books are than, say, talking about how much they like some other author.

Random Thoughts

Almost any place can look exotic if you view at night from a hotel room that's high enough above the ground.

Is it wrong of me to breathe a sigh of relief every time I meet someone who doesn't need to be told how to pronounce my real-life Spanish first name?

People who don't find other people interesting usually aren't as interesting as they think they are.

The more expensive newspapers get, the fewer number of people who buy them which in return inspires newspaper publishers to spend less money on the type of people who fill the paper with the material that people want to read. Which, of course, results in even fewer people buying newspapers which in turn inspires newspaper publishers to raise their prices to compensate. And so it goes.

The only activity more dangerous to your pocketbook than taking certain women to a jewelry store is taking the same type of women to a pet store.

If you wish to know what status there is to be gained by wearing a suit in modern society, talk to someone who knows what it's like to work at a job in which one does not wear a suit.

The type of people who would not be impressed by the Grand Canyon or Niagara Falls usually aren't worth impressing.

Few writers experience as much danger or hardship on the job as the average factory worker. But one would never know that from the way many writers talk.

Anyone else wonder how many of the people who like to kvetch about American puritanism ever wonder about the number of condom stores that exist in this allegedly puritanical country? Or should I consider it a symbol of American prudishness that such stores are so often called "condom stores" despite the large number of items they sell that obviously aren't condoms?

It's funny how often the injustices that most anger people are usually things that either happened long ago, things that happened far away or things that are committed by people whom we consider to be way different from us. Perhaps because getting angry about injustices committed by people like us that we actually have the opportunity to change is way too easy.

Random Thoughts

All generalizations are wrong -- including this one.

Anyone else wonder how many drivers respond to the presence of traffic enforcement cameras at certain intersections by automatically speeding up every time they approach such an intersection?

Everyone wants to be an aristocrat and no one wants to be a peasant. Yet a society that contains nothing but aristocrats can't possibly endure.

Everyone involved in a dispute likes to believe that the other guy started it.

The valuable one's contribution to society is, the less attention one gets from Hollywood.

Logic and reason would seem to indicate that calling someone stupid or evil is not likely to convert them to one's particular point-of-view. Yet many atheists who supposedly believe in logic and reason often respond to religious people by calling them stupid or evil. And of course religious people do the same thing to atheists as well.

The less likely one is to have known someone who experienced a revolution, the more likely one is to call for one.

The more privileges one has, the more one is likely to complain about one's setbacks.

The same person who complained about the elder generation in his youth will inevitably complain about the younger generation in his senior years.

If you want to see what most people really think about the importance of law and order, just see how they respond to a traffic ticket.

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Funny how many “final notices” you get on a car warranty.

Believe it or not, Spanish-speaking telemarketers tend to be every bit as annoying as their English-speaking equivalents. Even if you're Hispanic.

Yes, morticians have to make a living, too, but it's still seems tasteless to receive unsolicited advertising from such a person. Especially if you've lost a loved one quite recently.

The more different you are, the more likely it is that you wish to seem ordinary. The more ordinary you are, the more likely it is that you wish to seem different.

The older you get, the faster time goes, which explains why it flows like molasses on a winter day when you're young and like mercury on a summer day when you're old.

Is it worse to be a supporting character in someone else's story and wind up with a happy ending or to play the lead in one's own story and wind up with a tragic ending? And what about those poor souls who don't get a choice?

Which is greater: the writer who uses a vocabulary that can be only understood by a thousand people or the writer who uses a vocabulary that can be understood by a million people?

It's easy to be in favor of offshoring when it's not your job which is in jeopardy.

It's easy to be against unions when it's not you who has to put up with lousy pay and working conditions.

It's easy to be in favor of unions when it's not you who is being held back by the seniority system.

In short, it's easy to be happy with the status quo when it's not you who is being inconvenienced.

Random Thoughts

I never was much of a John Wayne fan but I did admire his taste in women.

If love is the answer, what is the question?

Just exactly where is Suffragette City located?

If a sensitive, intelligent person like Jane Austen couldn’t find love within her lifetime, then what hope is there for the rest of us?

Were they really that prudish in F. Scott Fitzgerald’s day or are the kissing scenes in The Other Side of Paradise an euphemism for acts that the censors of his era would not allow him to describe in detail?

If everything is art, then ultimately nothing is art.

If drag is taken from Shakespeare’s “dressed as girl,” then drab must mean “dressed as boy.”

Love that does not endure in the face of adversity ultimately means nothing.

Living with someone you love is way better than living alone, but even living alone beats living with someone you don’t like.

The most dangerous prejudices of a society are inevitably those that are most fashionable. Why? Because those are the ones which are least likely to be either questioned or opposed.

It is all too often easier to question someone else's prejudices than it is to question one's own.

All groups have their bullies and bigots. The problem is that they’re not always recognized as such.

It doesn’t take a great act of courage to demand a sacrifice from someone else.

The mentality required to get out of poverty is rarely possessed by those who never had to worry about poverty. And if it is, it is all too often actively discouraged.

The strongest efforts towards reform inevitably come from those who are most likely to benefit from such reform. Unfortunately, those who are least likely to benefit from a change in the status quo are inevitably the same ones who have the most power to change it.

Random Thoughts

All happiness is temporary. Fortunately, so is all sadness.

My late father used to talk about how we all write our own stories. Some of us choose happy endings and some of us choose sad endings. And some of us are at the mercy of an unsympathetic editor who continually rewrites our material.

All great writers have a bit of OCD in their makeup. And, I suspect, a bit of MPD as well.

I am not so great but I do contain multitudes.

Lego ergo sum. (I read therefore I am.)

We all play our roles. Our roles are many and the roles are one.

Someday I'll die and the world will end. For me, at least. The rest of the world will most likely still be here.

Random Thoughts

Der Untergang des Abendlandes will not be televised.

Paris is worth a màs.

Without you, I am nothing. With you, I am less than nothing.

That's funny, you don't look prolish.

I'm in love with myself, but, alas, my affection is unrequited.

Is the heterosexual female scholar's equivalent of a Scholar's Mistress called a Scholar's Gigolo?

My love is like a red, red nose -- I hope I don't blow it.

Her dress was as red as her politics.

Help me, I think I'm fallen.

I've done my share of looking for love -- and lust -- in all the wrong places. In all the right places, too.

Scribo ergo sum. (I write; therefore, I am.)

Pobre Canada, so far from God and so close to the United States.

Demons thrive on silence.

The heart has its reasons of which political correctness knows nothing.

Mestizaje -- the choice of a new generation.

Almost everyone's life is like a soap opera. Some of us just have better storylines than others.

We may not choose with whom we fall in love but we do choose what we do about that love.

Almost everyone's life looks happy from the outside. It's how it looks from the inside that counts.

Normality is a state of mind.

Poverty, like war, is most easily glamourized by those who have never experienced it.

It's easy to love people you rarely see. It's when you see them all the time that the real test of love begins.

It's easy to love people you see as being perfect. It's loving people you see as being imperfect that's the real challenge.

There is no such thing as a golden age or a master race. All ages have their bad sides and no race is perfect.

If you cannot forgive imperfections in other people, then you will find yourself doomed the day you discover imperfections in yourself.