Wrote this in the Marriott in San Diego last Wednesday.  The Health Educator's conference was only two days, but it felt like a week.  I sat down that night to write my paper, but in the end I wrote only this.  Ah well.  Some things just have to be written or they'll just float around up there bugging me.  There was another one that was vying to get written too, but this one won out.  I'll have the other one soon.  Enjoy.

The Mail (1st Draft - working title)

The pile sits--
The box might as well be empty.

The litany of mindless arguments
Threaten either to make me pay
Or make me pay
For things gotten or things to get.

But the only one I want
Remains unsaid--unbegotten
By its absence.

A few scrawled lines:
A breath of hope,
Stamped and sealed
by your lips.

A silent testimony of thoughts
Breathed by your heart to mine:
A kiss of souls.

Preempting instant message, I wait--
Paying for nothing.

We always have a choice.  That's what makes us humans and not just animals.  Addiction doesn't excuse us from making a choice.  Granted there are a lot, a lot, of pressures (trust me, I know), but there is always a choice. 

In the end it is a choice between seeking help to break the addiction and not seeking help, making excuses, and saying that there is no choice, and staying addicted, isn't it?

Everything else is rationalization to keep the habit and addiction.  You've got to really want to change and that's chosing.

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  Head for the hills? 

Seriously now, chances are these rampaging once-living  ("undead" is such a negative, bigoted, term) just want to be recognized in society after so many years of oppression as just about any evil scientist, vampire, villian, etc's grunt men.  I'm sure they won't loot goods like other ethnicities, just eat the brains of people (most Americans don't use them anyway--like tonsils--and can probably function normally).  Most likely they'd just rampage through poorer neighborhoods in "South" L.A. or something so the danger in the subburbs is low.  Still, I think that zombie, excuse me, Living-Dead American (more like "Reanimated American" since living death also include vampires & ghouls--though zombies are similar to liches and skeletons) rights need to be addressed.  Everone else has, I mean, after all shouldn't they be entitled to their "forty acres and a brain" as it were?

Look, the working conditions they have been oppressed with are unsanitary.  Benefits?  None.  Look how Rose Hills or Forest Lawn, or other mortuaries and cemetaries handle the once-living: without respect.  Without respect to dead OR the living.  Crowded headstones, unsafe burning, and careless handling of Americans with Living Death--I can go on forever.  It's been like that for ages.    "Zombies Outbreak" indeed.   As if they're "Illegal Immigrants" or "Retarded Kids"  or "Veterans."

I think that it's about time that they get some serious recognition and rights--look how Hollywood portrays them--they're not just emasculated like Asian men, they're literally DE-HUMANIZED.  Even more than Osama Bin Ladin, Hitler, and corporations.  All those zombie movies:  RACIST!

Yes, so blatantly racist that their propoganda sadly even prompted this topic.  To whoever came up with this topic:  YOU should be ashamed of yourself.  You should realize how many people, yes, people you're hurting.  People that have worked hard and suffered to one day pass the Americans with Living-death Act (ALA) and live as true and equal Americans in their pursuit of life, liberty, and happiness.

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My favorite part of my daily routine is getting all the stuff ready to do work like books, papers, drafts and then promptly goofing off.  It's my daily exercise in avoiding work--30 minutes of avoiding responsibility.

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I like curse words and epithets.  Use them all the time, especially the racial ones.  They are after all only words.  They are colorful and useful when metaphorically describing something, but they shouldn't be over used or they lose their rhetorical impact. 

I suppose if I were to be specific I don't hate the words so much as the intent behind the words.  Usually the intent is out of ignorant carelessness as if the words "shit," "shitty," "fuck," "fuckin'" were punctuation in sentences.  To those untermensch:  go read a book, get some civilization, pull up your pants & tie your shoes, stop tagging, etc.  Join the rest of us homo sapiens sapiens; neanderthal behavior may be fun, but it is sooo last ice age. 

I don't mind it if people thoughtfully and deliberately use bad words or epithets as long as I can use them back to offend or to entertain.  After all fair is fair.  If hispanics call all asians "chino," then asians have every right to call all hispanics "Mo Xi Ge ren (or whatever versions other asians have--I'm Chinese/Taiwanese, by the way for you snickering Mo Xi Ge ren peasants, that's different than Korean or Japanese)."  Right?

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Eloquent.  Although I think that "jerk" comes in close second.

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The best:

• June
• July
• August
• Christmas
• Spring

The worst:

• Grading 160+ crappy essays six times a year.
• Dealing with stupid whiny people and their stupid whiny kids (not all are like that but a good many of the peasants are).
• Hippie, pie-in-the-sky, I-don't-use-soap-to-wash-my-hands-to-save-envoronmental-impact, liberal eco-facists-religous-fanatics.

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Being an intergalatic dictator.  Okay, fantasy, how about just a dictator of a South American country--lets say Venezuela.  Okay, okay, a classroom teacher. 

It's really a lot of fun being a dark lord, but then how many dark lords are there?  Sauron, Vader, Voldemort, etc.  the litany is endless.
   

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@MusicIsMyImaginaryFriend - I'm sorry but I'm going to have to burn you
for your comment.  I don't usually burn people for commenting and
saying their piece whatever it is, however crazy it is--since people
have the freedom of thought & speech in America--and frankly I
enjoy reading all types of comments from hateful to complementary.  But
your response is so deliciously, rhetorically, manipulative, I must respond (in Dr. Laura fashion).

You have fair warning.  This WILL be unpleasant so stop reading if you feel that you can't handle criticism or verbal poinards:

Get a grip.  Get some real help.  Stop trying to control others with
emotional manipulation.  Stop trying to find salvation or sympathy from this
cesspool we call Internet Blogging.  You're not going to get it here.

Hey Fatty!  Stop stuffing your face!  Chancho!

Or...Hey are you a refugee or some stupid hippee (I really hate hippees--why don't you actually do something about it and put your life at risk instead of moaning and groaning for a day or two and then go back to your comfy life in San Fransisco? -- there's this hippee I know at work who is a career sub--but that's another story)  on a meaningless hunger strike protesting China in Tibet?  Eat some food!  We're not living in Zanzibar or some God-forsaken, starving, foreign country like Burma where the junta takes all the food and golf carts.

Honestly, why would you confront a friend with a disorder?  It's his fricking life.  There really is no reason for me to nose into his business.  That's not being considerate or caring, that's just being nosey.  Unless he is a really good friend who shares his problems and is looking for help, he can eat or not eat himself to death for all I care.

All confrontation is meaningless to a person who isn't interested in changing.  He'll just ignore it or terminate contact.

If it's a friend who is struggling and has asked for accountability, then I'd be direct, no-nonsense, and swift.  No need to mince words.

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