Monday afternoon comin' down...

Does this make any sense?

You circle the parking lot at the mall 352 times to try to find a close parking spot (almost getting into a brawl with the woman waiting for the open spot you stole).  Then, you park and proceed to walk around the mall all day.  What?  This makes zero sense.  I see this silly shit and I shake my head in wonder.  What do people really think?  Are they robbing the place and need to make a quick getaway?  Do they think their car is safer next to the building (It IS a great place to get door dinged because of the congestion)?  This silly behavior also applies to outside concerts/festivals and sporting events for the most part.  If you aren't in a wheel chair or using a walker, toughen up, take the first readily available parking spot and walk on in.  If you aren't handicapped already, walking is a great exercise to keep you from becoming handicapped.  If sloth doesn't make you handicapped, you could end up that way from the brawl over a parking space.

Passing lanes are made for passing.  Passing lanes are NOT made for the slow leading car to speed up to ten miles per hour over the speed limit for the duration of the passing lane, only to slow back to ten miles per hour below the speed limit when the road necks back down into two lanes.  This drives me crazy.  I am usually the "crazy" guy passing everyone going about 120 mph because I KNOW that once it becomes two lanes again, one of the cars in front of me is just waiting to piss me off by drastically slowing down.  Then, if I tailgate, they hit the brakes as some sort of "warning" that I should BACK OFF AND GIVE THEM ROOM even though they are going 47 mph in a 55.  Seriously.  If you aren't passing, stay to the right.  Period.  If you are passing, move your ass and permit others to pass, too.  Then, move to the right.  If I was a cop, I would ticket you people for erratic driving for slowing down too much post passing lane. 

Bakery goods made with artificial sweeters are downright insulting.  Seriously.  I have seen these "diet" rolls and baked goods a few times.  Why would anybody want this?  I can understand the diabetic argument all day long.  I get that.  When I see non diabetic people looking for a low calorie cinnamon roll, I really wonder what is wrong with them.  Let's get something straight here.  No matter how much sugar is sweetening up a sweet roll, it still has no real food value.  About 150% of the carbs (read:sugar) you need for the day baked right into it because of the choice of flour and other ingredients.  It is not going to be a healthy choice for you no matter what, so why wouldn't you just take your few extra calorie lumps, shut up, and eat the fucking thing.  You don't go the bakery's sweet roll area looking for healthy things to eat.  Don't kid yourself.  You go there to be a glutton and ram 4000 calories of sweetened, sugary bread into your month.  So, skip the diet rolls.  Skip the artificial sweeteners.  If you want to save calories, watch what you put into your coffee.  Leave the sugary breakfast foods out of it.

It is supremely silly to drive fifteen miles to save two cents per gallon on gas.  This is silly in many ways.  First off, unless you are going that way in the first place, you burn more dollars worth of gas than you could ever save by driving there to get it.  I would think in this day and age, people would realize this, but they still do not.  Supposing that the average gas purchase is ten gallons, be driving the extra distance to save two cents a gallon, you would have saved twenty cents.  Can you drive 30 miles (fifteen each way) for twenty cents?  Let's do some simple math:  If your car gets 30 miles per gallon and you drive 30 miles to get gas and that gas costs $3.50 per gallon, it cost you $3.50 to get the gas just in fuel costs.  You would have to also factor in tire wear, other vehicle wear and also your time (I hope you time is worth something to you.  If it isn't, I have a house to paint and a lot of other shit you can do for me).  So, a twenty cent savings seems a little silly unless your car gets well over 200 miles per gallon (still like two cents a mile fuel cost) and floats on air (so the tires and brakes don't wear out) and your time is completely useless (in which case, the paintbrushes and ladder are in the garage).  Not only is there a very, very limited potential for money savings, there is also the loss of convenience factor that play into it.  If you don't buy local and your local businesses close (due to lack of sales) then you have earned the privilege to drive fifteen miles away to buy what you need.  Think about it.  I know in our minds now we have a mentality that "it all adds up" as far as money goes.  This is true thinking except it adds up very, very slowly when it comes to gas.  The cost of gas is a significant bill, but in the scale of $3.50 per gallon, two cents or even a nickel is almost an insignificant amount of money.  You want to save money?  Skip the $5 coffee for breakfast.  You save more right there than you could save in many, many tanks of gas.

I hate to sound crazy all the time, but no, I didn't see the new commercial (that was funny) for whatever product on television.  Why?  Because I don't have network television.  I don't have cable at home.  Seriously.  I have a television to watch movies on and I have Netflix On Demand, but I do not have any other sort of television service.  I am not willing to pay for it because it is 99% trash.  Sorry, I missed the Bud Light ads at the Super Bowl and the Geico ads during the Nascar race.  I cannot bring myself to ever watch another minute of Two And A Half Men because although at some point in my life that might have been funny, it is total shit for my kid to watch.  It is eye pollution.  It is brain pollution.  I don't mean to get all preachy or anything because I don't really give a crap what you chose to do in your house, but in my house I think television is immoral and creates a poor view of reality for our kids.  Also, it seems like the really, really racy shows get the best ratings and they are constantly trying to top the last big doozy (Had to look up "doozy."  I have said it a thousand times, but never had to spell it.) they pulled off and our kids watch this crap and emulate it in their lives.  Our kids think it is normal behavior.  Our kids think it is okay.  Our kids think "everybody does it."  It seems like even the commercials are all full of half naked women and men, too.  There are shows about being 16 and having kids.  There are shows where the main "hero" characters do little other than look cool sleeping with other people's wives and husbands.  Almost each week a professional athlete (This truly is in all sports) is busted in some way doing something pathetic, illegal and immoral.  I think characters with integrity don't do well in the ratings on television, so they don't exist anymore.  I think since cable exploded a few years ago, network television will do whatever it can to attract and keep viewers.  Don't tell me that I can't keep my kid from that stuff because unfortunately, I know you are correct.  But, that still isn't acceptable to me.  I still have to try.  It is still my job to raise my kid, not the television networks.  Hopefully my definition of right and wrong will be to her understanding.  Hopefully she will learn integrity from me and carry that in her life. 

[sighs]

I wonder about this world we live in.