I think it depends on the rate of globalization - but yea, assuming we don't obliterate ourselves or enter into the dark ages again, i think someday religion will become irrelevant.

Was playing pool against the most flamboyant gay kid I've ever met yesterday. He was blackout drunk and started hitting on me. Everyone kept telling me that he thought I was really cute, and I kept saying "uhh, cool. Wtf am i supposed to do about it?"

My gf was not amused. Funny night.

I handle money all day, every day, so I see a lot of funny **** people put on their money. A lot of those "wheresgeorge.com" stamps, which I've never actually done, but I hear it's pretty cool. I got a few interesting ones today, one of which was this:



"Atheist Money" stamped over "In God we trust." I found this hilarious on several levels - first of all, 2 different images come to mind: a fanatic right winger, pissed at our government/president, stamps this on the bill using "Atheist" in a pejorative way. I think this is probably what it's going for, because it's completely unclever and doesn't really make any kind of point at all. Are you against "In God we trust?" Do you think American money is atheistic in nature? What the hell are you trying to say?

The 2nd image I have is a militant, pissed off ACLU member that just completely lacks in creativity. I mean come on. There's so many more interesting things you could put there.

On this topic, I'm completely neutral with our national "motto." I really could care less. It was not officially our national motto until the 1950's, and it wasn't even on our coinage until the Civil War - which I am very quick to tell people who trot this tired old phrase out as proof that "WE'RE A CHRISTIAN NATION HERPA DERP!" No, we are not, and our founding fathers were of questionable religious belief. Most of them were Deists - which really was the only socially acceptable form of agnosticism that existed in the 18th century. Jefferson found the Bible so unbelievable that he made his own "edited" version of it that left out all the miracles and supernatural events. The founding fathers wanted the church completely OUT of politics and OUT of government - which is the only real argument I have against the national motto. I really don't care, and it doesn't offend me. I know people REALLY care about that **** though, on both sides of it. Whatever.

The second funny money stamp I found today was this, and I cannot for the life of me figure it out:



2 words with a star in the middle. "Fantastic ****ing." That's it. No website, no advertisement, just "fantastic ****ing." What could possibly be the motive behind this?

Cool blog - I agree about religion one day becoming irrelevant
Bitches are crazy... though she really should cut contact with her ex.. its too messy imo

I had a really bad ingrown toe nail done years ago, didnt hurt in the slightest and they didn't anethaestise ( Not sure how this is possible )

I have had two ingrown toenails at the same time this past year. Every month the gf would cut and shape them (Filing and removing the ingrown bit) .. One day I watched her and realised it was how she was shaping the nails that was causing them to ingrow lol

All good now

Apparently they sell them at Urban Outfitters:


This made me sad because I also read it as "FANTASTIC ****ING" and was cracking up imagining some weirdo ordering a custom stamp for his own insane purposes.

fantastic ****ing is its own reward

j,

I'm currently reading the book Confessions Of A Sociopath. The author is emphatic about her ability to get people to like her instantly, and said "if you met me you would like me."

I find this hard to believe. I'm only about 50 pages in, but I already have a strong desire to punch her in the face. Not because she knowingly let an animal die in her pool, I don't give a **** about animals. But because of her general arrogance and lack of perspective.

Do you think sociopaths are on average actually more likeable than non-sociopaths? Or do you think sociopaths just think they're more likeable because of their tendency to think so highly of themselves?

That is a pretty awful book.

Yea if you cut your big toenails short, you're gonna have a bad time.

LOL that's hilarious. ****ing fantastic makes more sense.

Since narcissism is a hallmark of the disorder, I think if you had a sociopath write out all their thoughts they are probably going to sound pretty arrogant and obnoxious. I don't doubt people like her IRL. Most find me on this website to be intolerable, but I am well liked by the people I associate with. I do know a guy that I'd probably classify as having ASPD, and he thinks EVERYONE likes him, and I'd say probably the reverse is true. Narcissism is a form of self delusion - you see the world through a distorted filter. I've developed past this stage, mostly, I think.

I'm sure there are plenty of people that don't like me, I just don't care. I used to. I can definitely be kind of a prick, but I've found that if you're just yourself, even if it's being an *******, people respect/like you more genuinely. I think it's funny because I'd describe myself as one of the biggest *******s I know, and most people would describe me as one of the nicest guys they know. I think it's probably because they don't see the motivations behind why I do a lot of things.

I am super excited for school to start in a few weeks. My money situation is looking much less dire - previously I'd been paying for all my own tuition and books, but I got a fee waiver over the summer, and just found out yesterday that I qualified for a Pell Grant that basically pays me 700$/month over the semester. ****ing awesome. I feel like I won the lottery. That's like 2/3 of what I make from my job alone. I could go part time, but I think I'll stay full.

I've got a temporary cap on one of my teeth that I'll finally be able to afford to get fixed, maybe some car repairs, and possibly a laptop, but I don't think I really have much use for one. We'll see. Taking a bunch of computer science classes over the next year so it may become necessary.

It's a great country we live in - where you can drop out of school, **** around for 5 years, go back to school, and still have everything paid for.

This post is about racism and stuff.

Occasionally I have trouble sleeping and I get to exploring the internet. It's a vast, weird place - and I've encountered some weird things on my journeys. One of the things I've been fascinated about lately is Sto.rm.front. Maybe I am just naive, but I was reading some of the stuff posted on there and I can't ****ing believe that **** still exists today, to the extent that it does.

I am of mixed race, but I look white, because of my natural dark red hair. I don't have freckles, and I have brown eyes and I tan pretty darkly. My great grandpa was black, and my great grandma was native american. Mom's side is almost 100% Dutch - I'm only 3rd generation. Obviously I am white, but I still am able to trace my roots back to slaves in Louisiana, so it's a bit of a weird subject for me. The slave owner who originally had my last name had a penchant for ****ing his slaves - to this day a huge rift exists between the white and the black sharers of my surname (in Louisiana that is, the Californians DGAF.) Anyway, the point that's always stuck with me is this - only 3 generations back there were full blooded African Americans in my lineage. I am white as ****. I think if you broke down everyone's DNA, you'd find roots in every continent - and these "pure" Aryans are not as pure as they'd like to believe. The idea of this brand of unabashed, unbridled racism is both fascinating and stupid to me. I don't understand it at all. There HAS to be something in the brain that makes someone more prone to be racist - I've heard people say that we all are, to some degree, but I don't believe it.

I'm a moral relativist, but I'd say that the **** that exists on sites like Sto.r.mfront is inherently evil. There's no other word for it that exists in the English language. I can't wrap my mind around it. Yesterday at work, a guy pulls me aside and casually says "Make sure you charge these n*****s double." I think what shocked me so much about it is how he totally just expected me to be "in" on what he was talking about. Wtf dude.

But really, what is it about the human race that needs to categorize one type of person as inferior to another? Be it gender, sexual orientation, race, social status, nationality, or religion. Why does this exist? I used to think it was taught, but I remember growing up in a culture where you could say *derogatory word for gay people* or racial slurs and no one would blink an eye, but if you dared to utter a "god damnit" you'd be suspended. I guess it never really "took" - and I grew up with a mother who is pretty racist as well.

Then I wonder about myself - am I actually not racist? I know there are certain cultures that I deal with on a daily basis at work that bug the **** out of me. The Arab insistence on shoving and pushing over each other to be the first one to pay is really annoying. The women are mostly rude, the men smell like too much cologne. Asian tourists are mostly really nice but walk around looking incredibly lost/clueless all of the time, and cause problems behind the wheel. Are these kinds of observations/stereotypes racist of me, or am I just over generalizing certain groups of people? I don't think white people are better drivers than Asians. I just think a lot of Asian drivers really suck, including my girlfriend. Is that racist? I don't know anymore.

As a sociopath and narcissist, I think everyone is inferior to me, I don't discriminate.

Yes, you're racist, but racism is not a binary, either you are or aren't, thing. It's a cpntinuum and you're no more racist than average at best, and at least you can acknowledge it so that drops you below average. SF-level racism requires a great deal of stupidity, or mental illness or both, and is just incomprehensible to me. Too bad ZNGA got banned or he could come here and justify it.

I've never really understood this either. People are probably insecure and want to feel superior in some way. It's a thing that society tends to enforce when you become an adult, I wouldn't say humans are naturally like this; my reason for believing this is that children don't tend to exhibit this kind of behaviour unless it is taught to them. It's a vicious cycle.

It's tribal, which is probably adaptive

See though, if it's something innate like stupidity or mental illness, or perhaps an evolved trait, then people from SF can't really be faulted for their behavior, to a degree, and that bothers me.

Maybe I am a little racist. But then, you could probably argue that we all are.

What sets us apart from other creatures is that we get to override our genetic propensities

It sounds like you have superior pattern recognition.

[ ] not widely known

I wish you told this ignorant **** your great grandpappy was black and told him he was a ****, just disgusting

Thread needs more debauchery and less general idiocy imo

I can get you a toe.

If you are dating an Asian girl you are probably not racist.

It doesn't work like that - you don't get to say xyz group is all bad just because you don't generalise about group abc.

Edit: to avoid coming across as too sanctimonious - I don't think people get to choose whether they're racist or not, and what matters is whether you act on it, not whether you feel it.

Might be kind of a long entry today. Been laying kinda low the last few days, went on a mini vacation to Catalina Island, which is about 26 miles off the coast of LA. A TR:

I've been to this place a few times with family as a kid, never really enjoyed it all that much, but I had a ton of fun on this trip. It's VERY tiny, and there's only one town called Avalon which has a population of 3,000 and is basically just a tourist getaway. It's extremely hilly, and the buildings are all 100+ years old, so it is very San Francisco-esque in that regard.

An alley (for me this kind of stuff looks crazy, I'm sure to some of you it's quite normal)


Stuff is very tight and built on top of each other. The architecture is confusing as hell.

My GF knows a guy that manages a few hotels there and he got us tickets aboard the ferry and stay at his hotel for Friday and Saturday night. Left Friday morning, was a pretty choppy crossing and everyone was puking their guts out. I had a bloody mary and a beer and felt totally fine. The great thing about vacations is it doesn't feel inappropriate at all to start drinking at 9 AM.

Our hotel:



Was a TINY little room with a spring bed, a dresser, and a TV on the wall. Bathroom had an impossibly small shower, where my head almost touched the ceiling (and I'm like 5'10".) Needless to say we didn't spend a ton of time in there. Friday was mostly spent touring around with our friend on his golfcart (the main form of transportation there), eating, and drinking. I attempted snorkeling in the shallows and quickly discovered it combined several of my phobias: drowning, sharks, deep water, and kelp forests. I couldn't quite grasp the breathing part of it on Friday because I kept hyperventilating because I was worried I'd suck in water. Lol.

Went out Friday night, got a nice view of the hills with the houses all lit up while we sat on the beach:



Pic doesn't really do it justice. On Saturday we wanted to hike up to the top of the peak on the island, so we did. Was a nice hike, pretty short, only 1.7 miles up the trail, but the incline was brutal. Had a nice ocean breeze the whole time and didn't see any wildlife. There are wild bison and deer that roam the island.

View from the top, and a plaque:




After the hike we had some surprisingly good Chinese food and gave snorkeling another try. The water is unbelievably clear, almost on a level with some of the more tropical waters like Hawaii or the Caribbean. The water was a pretty comfortable 68 degrees and I got more comfortable with my mask, but still didn't venture out of the shallows because my GF got cold. That night we went to a little dive bar while we waited for a table at the local seafood restaurant, and a rather strange but nice guy in his 40's approached us and asked if we wanted a drink. I said sure, of course, because I make it a point of mine never to refuse free alcohol. I didn't know what his "angle" was - I think he was just super nice and rich, because he didn't even try to talk to us. Walked up to us about 20 minutes later and asked if we wanted another round. He was in town for some golf, and said his friend that he came with had won 2 masters. I can't for the life of me remember his name, but I believed him.

Dinner was crazy good. On Sunday, our boat was supposed to leave at 4:30 and all I wanted to do was snorkel. Went to the same area, which was called "Lover's Cove" at high tide (so we wouldn't have to swim through the kelp) and rented the GF a wetsuit. I decided to just go for it, and we swam out into the kelp forest.

The view was amazing and there were crazy amounts of fish that would swim right up to you. There ARE sharks, but they are supposedly harmless. We just had shark week so I was fighting miniature panic attacks every time I'd look around me, totally expecting a shark to come out of nowhere. I kept having to clear my mask and snorkel, which was freaking me out because we were probably about 400 feet out and in ~30 feet of water, completely surrounded by kelp. Worst nightmare. I was getting panicky so we swam back in after about 20 minutes of that.

Was crazy fun, and I really want to get over the whole shark phobia. I wanted to bring my lifeproof case in the water with me to take pictures but I didn't trust the case enough, or my ability not to drop the phone and have to dive 20 feet to get it back. I want to get better at it and take scuba lessons now. If you've never done it, I HIGHLY recommend it.

We had a pretty smooth ride back to the mainland and spent the rest of the night at the fair. Pretty good weekend.

Sounds like a cool trip. Scuba diving is a million times easier than snorkeling, which is a total pain in the ass in comparison.

what's the fear of kelp all about? I mean sharks are obv cuz they can chomp off your balls on a whim, but what is it about the kelp? Do you think you might get tangled up in it and not be able to get out?