The Eating Game

Eating at McDonalds in a foreign country is like going out to see the autumn leaves in middle of the night ....

I've been fortunate enough in my life to travel. One of my favorite things about traveling is trying new foods. As a matter of fact to me, trying new foods is as important as, if not more important than, seeing local sites. If I was in a hurry in Paris and had the choice of going up the Eifel Tower or grabbing a Nutella and banana crepe from a vendor underneath the Eifel Tower I would take the crepe (true story, and the crepe was delicious!)

There's always that one joker in your group who upon landing in Prague exits the airport and shouts with glee because he has spotted a McDonalds! "It's a little piece of home in this foreign land" he explains. "Didn't we pay lots of money for airplane tickets so that we could get away from home?" you ask.

And don't fall for the tourist trap "Americanized" foreign food. You know the kind they sell in the middle of the tourist attraction and they actually advertise that it is "authentic foreign food." If they advertise that it is authentic local cuisine, I guarantee that it is not and that the locals wouldn’t be caught dead in there. That's like the Sizzler in the middle of Kansas advertising that they have "authentic American food." What else would it be? You need to find the nastiest local dive outside of the tourist district to really experience the local cuisine. Like the foreign equivalent of a Sizzler. The one were nothing on the menu is translated into English. Try a street vendor far away from the tourist attractions; you won't be sorry that you did. Only then will you truly begin to experience a different culture.

Move Over Minivan

Driving slow in the carpool lane is like ordering a side of fries and then not eating them ...

What a waste. If you are going to drive at the exact same speed as the cars in the other three lanes why not get on over and enjoy the slow going in the far right lane. There is no reason for you to plug up the carpool lane. You are benefiting nothing from going as slow as or, as is often the case, slightly slower than the cars in the other lanes. It is not a carefree scenic lane where you can drive slowly enough to allow you to get your kid cheerios from the diaper bag or talk about how your remember the day that cars were invented because you are actually that old.

The whole concept of the carpool lane is that it is a reward for sharing a ride. What is the reward? Fewer cars have access to the lane which makes it less congested which in turn allows the lane to move at a greater speed, that is until you run into Molly May in her sweet white minivan driving 10 miles an hour slower than the rest of traffic and you are stuck behind her for miles because of those blasted double white lines!

I propose that to solve the problem we add an additional lane on the far, far, far right of the freeway and call it the MMO lane. (Moms, Minivans, and Old-people Lane). It will be restricted to just those drivers. What a great time they will have cruising along, not a care in the world. Enjoying the journey like it should be enjoyed. Not in a rush, and way, way, way far away from my lane.

A side note. Does a hearse qualify to drive in the carpool lane?

Churchgoers

Attending church services with a one year old is like going to a foreign film without subtitles...

What is the point really? You can decipher that something dramatic is going on, but you're pretty sure that you are missing some crucial pieces of the story because not ten minutes ago the happy foreign couple was blissfully skipping through the countryside, the woman in her peasant dress and the man in his goofy hat that only a foreigner or drama guy would try and pull off on a date in the countryside, but now the woman is slapping the man in the face and storming off. You're pretty sure that the reason for the change in demeanor has something to do with the goofy hat but then again it may have had something to do with the five minute conversation the couple had under an impressively old tree. But you can't be totally sure because you don't speak Bulgarian and to you it mostly sounded like your uncle Richie rambling on after he stuffed his mouth full of potato salad. Sure, you may understand a word here or there but the point is entirely lost on you.

The same is true of church with a young child. You hear a snippet or two but between shoving crackers into the bottomless pit which is the child’s mouth, and tracking down the toy car which was hurled at the nice old lady in front of you, you just don't get a whole lot of the substance.

Blog Break

Starting a blog and then taking a month off in between posts is like signing up to bring the salad at a pot-luck-dinner and then showing up a half hour late ...

By the time you get there with the salad everybody has already eaten. Yes, here I come through the door, a half hour late and you all have already eaten but I'm offering salad to you anyway.

The Tax Man

Getting excited about receiving your tax refund is like getting excited to buy back your stolen bike from a pawn shop....

I am amazed that every tax season I meet at least one ignorant, infomercial lovin', tax sucker who is really excited to be getting such a big refund from the government. "It's like a bonus" they tell me with glee. I've got a little message for our not so sharp friend. Hey, moron, that's your money that the government wrongfully took from you in the first place and now they're giving it back because they have to. You could have been using that money for months if the government hadn't have stolen it from your paycheck.

Taxes in general are like when you are playing the game The Settlers of Catan and somebody plays the robber and steals your only grain (it seems like grain is always in short supply in that game) and then the joker who stole the grain says, "Do you want your grain back?" "I'll trade it back to you for two bricks!" I have a brother-in-law who loves this tactic (you know who you are). They'll trade you back what they stole from you in the first place at a profit to them. Our government takes our money, by force, and then offers us back some of our money in the form of projects and federally funded programs with a bunch of regulation and strings attached. We think it is so nice that they are using the money that they took from us to make our lives better. I've got a better idea, I'll keep my money and decide how to better spend it to make my life better.

Happy tax day everyone.

Applesauce

Saying that the USA is not a Christian nation is like saying that applesauce is not fruit ...

Applesauce is just applesauce right? It's not fruit, by making it into applesauce it has lost its fruit qualities right? Would it be fair to say that applesauce was based on a fruit? What is the main ingredient of apple sauce? Is it not a fruit? Sure we've added a few other ingredients but at its core applesauce is really just mashed up apples with some added sugar and spice; so really applesauce is just mashed up fruit. At its core the US is a Christian nation based on Christian principles mashed up with a little sugar and spice added.

Yesterday president Obama gave a speech where he announced to the world that the US is not a Christian nation. We are a nation of citizens, he said. A nation of what??? When did this happen? Is he simply ignorant of the fact that this nation was founded by a bunch of Christians and that they based our constitution and legal framework on Christian principles? Or, is he announcing that under his watch we are no longer a Christian nation? Sure, the US is made up of mainly Christians and was founded by Christians but according to Obama that does not make us a Christian nation.

We are a purely secular nation; our government is completely devoid of faith of any kind. That's what separation of church and state means right? That's why our faithless founding fathers left all indications of religion and faith out of our founding documents. It was just a mistake that they occasionally threw the word "God" into documents and put "in God we trust" on our money, and "… under God" was thrown into the pledge. What they meant was that the term "God" was any type of figure that you want to worship, a golden statue, lama, or Kobe Bryant, for instance. In Kobe Bryant we trust, it could read. They couldn't have been referring to the Christian God that none of them believed in. That would have offended those who didn’t believe.

I hope the overflowing of sarcasm is apparent. It is time that we started calling apples, apples. We are a Christian nation, we were founded on Christian principles. The “God” our founding fathers referred to is the Christian God that a majority of Americans believe in. The separation of church and state simply means that the government will not endorse one religion over another. It does not mean that religion, and any reference to it, will be taken out of government. Do you think the founding fathers were careless enough to contradict themselves by creating the idea of separation of church and state and then breaking their own rule by referring continually to God in government documents?

You have the right to believe whatever you want in this country and not be discriminated against for your beliefs but that doesn't change the fact that you live in a Christian nation.

Sick of it

Being sick on a weekend is like going all the way to school to find out that class has been canceled...

Great that class was canceled but it sure would have been nice to know about it before I dragged myself out of bed at 0'dark hundred and scraped the ice off of my windshield as the wind froze my nose hairs.  This happened to me a bunch of times in college.  I would get ready and drive to school only to find out that my class had been canceled. The worst is when it was my 8:00 class and my next class wasn't until 10:00.  I could have slept in had I known, but now that I'm at school anyway I just have to hang out with the library nerds until my next class starts.  I profited nothing from the canceled class.  

The one good thing about being sick is that I don't have to accomplish anything: going to work; school; chores; anything.  The trash needs to be taken out?  Sorry honey, but I'm sick.  It's inventory day at work?  Sorry boss, but I'm sick.  Taxes are due today?  Sorry IRS, but I'm sick. There is a meteor heading for earth and I'm the only one who knows the mathematical formula to plug into the rocket in order to save the planet?  Sorry mankind, but I'm sick. 

But on a weekend I wouldn't do any of those things anyway.  I don't need to claim sickness as my excuse for irresponsibility.  Everybody knows that I don't accomplish anything on the weekend anyway.  So to get sick on the weekend is just like showing up for school when class is canceled, It doesn't profit me anything.