Y YU NO HAVE FUN TALK JUNK?!

I have something that has been rattling around in my head for the last day or so.  It has been gnawing my mind.   So here we go *rising to my box of soap*:

                I understand that you are a fan of your team.  I truly understand because I am a fan as well.  They may be for different teams but I understand.  I get it.  But here is my point and issue that I have with it.  I cannot understand HOW, when someone who is neither for or against the teams that are playing in the game, can say something that points out the obvious and get slandered and maligned for making a simple observational comment.  It wasn’t an attack against you.  I could care less about either of the teams that are playing but when you come after me for making an obvious statement with harsh and attacking tones, I am not going to feel great about your demeanor.  Your statements of my character after a whimsical comment that I made were unsolicited and extremely wide of the mark.  Don’t take things that personal but I just don’t care that much.  You can say anything about my team, and I really mean it, but I am not going to take it personally as a slight against me.  You took it as a personal attack which, in fact, it wasn’t.  

Now for part two of this soap stone:

                The simple fact that your significant other is the one that provoked this whole situation is appalling.  It seems to me that you didn’t take it as such an attack but your 3^rd arm did think that I was being too harsh.  I really enjoy the fact that your appendage sticks by you.  It is sweet and shows that there is genuine love and care there but if that appendage wants to attack and claw and fight me over a non-personal, non-aggressive comment then you need to man up.  After the initial comment and response, I apologized though I didn’t think that my comment was that personal or attacking.  For my efforts in apologizing, I was met with more insults and concentrated fire on myself as a person.  I am very disappointed that your reaction was hostile toward me because you thought I was attacking.  All of it began with a text message after this play (begin this video at 4:13) with this as my statement.  Is it really that personal, I think not.  Simply observational.  Don’t be so touchy because it will come to haunt you in the end.  Please believe that.

I believe that I have vented well enough to climb down from the soap factory.  I feel a bit better.

My Life at a Glance: The Last 9 Months

                It has been quite some time since I wrote anything or posted just because of the nature of my lifestyle.  I try to be honest and open about my life to those who question but always it isn’t all that it seems.  In the last 7 months, I have run every gamut of emotions and every feeling possible.  In this time, I have changed my life for what I feel is better.  I will run down a list of things that have happened to me that have shaped my life in the last 7 months.  I hope that y’all understand my state of mind. 

               

                I began a diet back in January when I woke up around and went to shower.  I walked by the large mirror in the bathroom and felt so repulsed by my image that I decided then to help myself.  The next few months, I was able to shed some weight and I began to feel better about myself.  I began this trip and transformation at a whopping 322 pounds.  After nine months of dieting, I weight a spry 250 pounds.  People say that I look better and I know that I look better than I did (though I hold myself in low self-esteem to being with).  My “Battle with the Bulge” will be a life long struggle because of my family’s genetic composition.  I am more built like my mother’s side of the family and mom’s family is generally bigger people.  Now, though I am watching what I eat, my diet hasn’t stopped me from the goods of the southern pallet (e.g. fried chicken, BBQ, et. al.) that I love.  I just have to love in moderation.  I have also still been drinking throughout the whole thing so I haven’t given up everything that I can and do enjoy.  My goal for the end of the year is to be back at 240 again but I am not going to cry and moan if I can only get to where I am because I am proud of where I am now. 

                Recently, I also, in an attempt to better my life, am quitting smoking.  (I know, dieting and quitting smoking at the same time is nuts but when have I been normal, yanno?)  After I noticed that I was going through around a pack and a half each day, I realized my addiction and decided to address it head on.  My goal is to be smoke free by the end of the year.  I have had some help.  I purchased on of those e-cigarettes from the internet.  By having this on my person at all times, I was and am able to cut my cigarette intake from 25-30 a day to 7-9 a day.  I have done this in 3 weeks with the assistance of the e-cigarette.  The e-cigarette works the same as dieting in that when you diet, self-help books tell you to eat 5 small meals or whatever to curb your appetite.  I use the e-cigarette the same way.  Instead of going and getting another whole cigarette, I take a hit or two from the e-cigarette and the craving is calmed, thus elongating the time between real cigarettes.  I was spending around 35-40 dollars per week on smokes but now I am down to 12 bucks per week.  I think that I can do this with help and with self-motivation. 

                In the same vein of changing lifestyles, I am going to get a new car.  The Tahoe, as much as I love it, represented an old part of my life.  One with cigarettes and gluttony.  My Tahoe is large and bulky and it carries around a lot of stuff that is not needed in my life.  I will also mention that my Tahoe gets around 17 miles/gallon and at 80 bucks a week or so gets expensive.  My truck is the main reason that I don’t travel too much and visit my brother or my friends that live in other states.  I, thankfully, have found a car that I fit in and really like.  My new car will be a VW Passat TDI (which is the diesel model).  The Passat gets 30 miles/gallon in the city and 40+ miles/gallon on the highway.  It’s a clean burning diesel and doesn’t produce all that smoke that is normally associated with diesels.  After I procure this automobile, I will be traveling more to visit friends because I can.

                Now for another note.  Here are some of the things that I have been listening to that have kept me sane (or insane for that matter).

                                The Dear Hunter “The Complete Color Spectrum”:  I saw this band live when they opened for Coheed and Cambria last year and I was awaiting this album for the longest.  The CD is 36 songs long and each song is related to a different color of the spectrum and how that color makes you feel.  Sheer brilliance in my opinion.

                                Volbeat: Danish hard rock band with some popular songs.  I recommend “Fallen” and “A Warrior’s Call” but there is a hidden gem on their first mainstream American record where they cover “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry” by Hank Williams.

                                Rise Against: American punk band that is angst in a note.  For good old fashioned American Rock, I suggest giving them a listen.

                                Black Tide: A band from Miami that are 20 and 21 years old.  They are new metal and completely shred.  Their new album “Post-Mortem” has some good ones but one in particular “That Fire” really rocks and melts faces

                                Operator: A band that only put out one CD but if you liked Chris Cornell, give them a listen.  The lead singer is a dude named Johnny Strong (no joke) and was in some movies, his biggest being the first Fast and Furious movie.  He was Leon if that helps.

                I hope that I can do more of these posts.  Most of my posts will be opinion and observational posts as they come to me.  I hope that this is a good read and helps to understand where I am at the moment.

You Get What You Give and by Give I mean DO

It’s been a while since I made a post but this is what chides me today:

I posted on Twitter (@nathanghaynes) as well as on my facebook page this quote earlier, “Thinking that everyone wanted to work as hard as I do is my biggest mistake”.  It is a true to life statement about what I am.  I have recently taken a new job that requires me to be the boss over around 20 or so employees.  People’s work ethic now-a-days, in my opinion, has gone right out the window.  People don’t seem to want to put in the work for the better good.  When a person works for a company, you are supposed to do the right thing for the company to make it easier for everyone involved to be a part of a bigger picture.  Selfishness has crept into our psyche as a people because we want the most for the least amount of effort.  Great things come to those who put in the work and strive to be great.  I would like to think that I have that “Dare-to-be-great” mentality.  It’s just sad to me to see that there is a lack of effort by people to do a great job at something.

*Off my soapbox*

I don’t speak Spanish except for a few terms and phrases but I have been watching soccer on my Xbox in the mornings before work and I will say this, the announcers for the Mexican and Spanish Soccer clubs is quite possibility the most exciting announcers outside of Gus Johnson. See Gus Johnson here.  Those Spanish announcers get completely riled up to the point of explosion at the sight of a goal. They always keep in intrigued even if soccer can be boring. See example here.   

I have been attempting to cut my weight over the last month.  I started dieting and not full blown eating correctly but I am eating a TON less than I used to.  I went one day and recorded everything that I ate and drank in a normal day and I realized that I was putting almost 5500 calories a day into my body.  When I realized this, I was completely blown away.  I have now cut my intake to less than 2500 calories a day in an attempt to help myself mentally as well as physically.  I have low self esteem and poor self image.  I am trying to change this so that I can get back on the courts to play basketball again and to maybe one day, feel better about myself in my physical nature.  I will be recording my weight once a month to see my progress so that y’all will know how I am doing. 

I know that it has been some time since the last post but I have had to conjure up thoughts that I felt would be acceptable for you the reader to read and if you don’t enjoy it, I still got it off my chest, so that feels good.  

Xbox Live, Hickeys and Keith Olbermann. Yes, Those Three Things At Once.

I want to start my weekend post by stating that I am in a strange mood; one that swirls about, without form or function, and crashes into everything in sight.  I thought that I would preface tonight’s post with that consideration for the people that read this and wonder where I might be going with my statements and inquisitive conjectures. 

Now for the topics at hand:

I am a nerd. There, I said it.  I am damn proud to be a nerd as well. Just like Robert Carradine and Anthony Edwards, I say it proudly.  Recently, in my fantasy world of flying horses and mystical creatures, I began to play online video games on my Xbox 360.  I wanted to play online, since I have a lot of personal time to myself and I am not too interesting all the time, and began to play Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2.  I believe that the pundits say that it is the most played game online in the history of online gaming. I’ll check with the creator of the internet to see if I am correct. Al, what is your perspective.  Thanks for that.  Now, on to my point.  I have been playing online for a little over 3 months and have realized that the language and behavior of the people on the microphone is unbearable and really makes you question why you went online to play anyways.  Racism is a terrible thing.  I am reminded of it consistently.  People that sit and play online games use racist rhetoric because no one can see your face.  It goes back to the whole principle of saying certain things in private when no one sees you and saying things like this in public.  I know that some parents would be ashamed if they heard what was being said over a headset.  I hope that they don’t kiss their wives, girlfriends, or parents with that mouth.  Maybe they chew Orbit gum or something before but that doesn’t make it any better.  I am not someone who is going to preach about morals and what you “should do”.  That isn’t me or my style and it is in no way my prerogative to tell you how to say or do anything.  People that play these games tend to use more riotous language than the worst people in the world, Pikeys. But that is another story.  Many parents these days buy video games and their respective systems for the kids ranging from 10-17 and that is fine, but they as parents have to realize that the language that they hear is worse than an “R” rated movie.  If you don’t allow your kids to see “R” rated movies, you buy them Xbox Live, and you remain blissfully ignorant to the gross amount of language that is spoken on there, then you are a bad parent. I give you this.  I have been called everything but a “man” on Xbox Live and some parents wonder where their kids are learning such language.  It’s not in schools, people.  It’s from other people on video games. If you disagree with me, you are a racist, homophobic, curse-word-o-phobe.

Point Deux:

Keith Olbermann used to be funny, in my opinion. 15 years ago he was doing ESPN’s Sportscenter.  Exhibit A. Exhibit B.  He is now leaving is widely successful show on MSNBC but for what reason and why not sooner.  Go back to doing sports, Keith, and stand down on your political agenda.  Your wit and commentary on politics was “blah” to me but you reading a teleprompter about how Vlad Guerrero jacked one over the left field wall was always good.  You’re good at commenting on sports.  Do that and don’t do politics, please.

Story of the Bizarre:

There is a woman in New Zealand that had temporary paralysis from a hickey.  A hickey.  Y’all know that thing that you try to hide when you go to work the next day because you are worried about the razzing that you are going to get and decide to wear a turtleneck to cover it up.  We know that you are covering it up.  I’ll razz you on the turtleneck in the spring time every time.  Some dude sucked so hard that he damaged the vessel in her neck, causing a clot to go right to her heart.  I guess that is one way to a woman’s heart, a stroke.  To this dude, I give this.

Here is a link to the article if you think I am joking:

http://www.foxnews.com/health/2011/01/21/new-zealand-woman-partially-paralyzed-hickey/?test=latestnews  

I Wrote this Blog Post, and all I got was this crappy T-Shirt.

My mind is a raging torrent, flooded with rivulets of thought cascading into a waterfall of creative alternative.  Yea, that sounds about right for the thoughts that I have today. 

Today is the 25th anniversary of the establishment of a day for the great civil rights leader Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  Being a Memphian, the city is abuzz with people remembering the legacy of the good Dr. MLK.  I have a thought on the day as a whole.  The Third Monday in January is the day that is formally recognized by the Federal government as a holiday.  Everything closes in celebration of the holiday, which is nice for people to have that day off.  Banks, Post Offices, and other federal entities are closed for this day but why does only the federal and government jobs get the day off?  I know that my roommates had the day off, one being an accountant, and got to do things on their additional off day.  I personally don’t mind working at all on MLK day but shouldn’t the people that work on that day get holiday pay for working on a day when the government gets off and gets paid for it?  It seems backwards to me that the people that make this country run and run smoothly at times don’t get an ounce of holiday pay for working.  Big companies get holiday pay and an extra day off to enjoy to themselves but the hard working Americans that keep the country running don’t see any pay for the federal holiday that they work.  People that work on days that are recognized as federal holidays, like Memorial Day; Veterans Day; and Labor Day, should get the benefit of holiday pay for their work.

On a slightly different tangent:

I read today that they are creating a statue in the Oberhausen, Germany Aquarium for Paul the Octopus.  For the non-familiar, Paul was an octopus that correctly picked the German World Cup matches in the most recent World Cup as well as the Netherlands losing 1-0 to Spain in the final.  So, you have an octopus that picks the World Cup matches and picks correctly.  I DON’T CARE ABOUT THAT OCTOPUS! I would rather see it on my plate, covered and breading, fried and served with a side of cocktail sauce.  It’s a freaking Octopus, people.  They are making a statue of an octopus sitting on a soccer ball outside of the tank that he lived.  That is a bit much to this man, but whatever.  I have seen people do weirder things but people that act like this octopus was some sort of omniscient are ridiculous. Asking an octopus to prognosticate soccer matches is like asking Todd Day to pass a drug test. Twice.  So to you German Aquarium, I give you this.

This is What Happens When People Die...on Twitter and Why Taylor Swift is Successful

Now that I have established this blog, I have seen some things that have really intrigued me lately and maybe they have caught your eye as well.  I keep a pad of paper with me with notes of things that I have witnessed that distress me at times.  Other times, they are quips of knowledge that I will drop on you like Chuck Knoblaugh drops an infield fly ball.  So what I have today are a few things that have kept my wheels spinning for the last few days.

                I am on twitter frequently (@nathanghaynes) and have noticed a disturbing development regarding the poplar topics that “trend”.  It seems that in the past few months, many people have died on this social networking medium.  The legendary Don Shula, NFL head coach of the only undefeated team in history (1972 Dolphins), was pronounced dead on Twitter and was a trending topic for about 6 hours.  Movie icon and actor Morgan Freeman, about a month or so ago, was also marked as dead on Twitter.  Actor, comedian, and writer Keenan Ivory Wayans was also pronounced dead about a week prior to Don Shula being terminated on the social networking site.  These instances have committed people’s thoughts, which only rely on the social networking sites for their news, to blowing these stories out of control to the point that many people believe it to be fact.  I love the social mediums that we have today such as Facebook, Twitter, (the red-headed step child) MySpace, and Tumblr for up to the second updates on friends and “reliable and credible” news stories, if those really exists.  What we seem to have today is a bunch of attention needy people who want everyone to know who they are by reporting false statements about people.  I know that there is a difference between talking junk and making stories up.  This generation seems to be impatient with everything from their news to the speed at which they can get their hamburger at McDonalds.  When things aren’t instant, people get to the point of frustration that they have to find something that is instantly gratifying.  I love things that are instant like mac and cheese, text messaging, and Eduardo the pool boy when I ring his bell but I enjoy things that take time because it shows that someone put some effort into their craft.  So to the people of the universe that want to report on the death or demise of someone or something or whatever it may be, go and become a journalist and take the time to do your research because if you cannot get your facts straight, what is the point of taking the time to right anything at all.

Then there was this thought as I left the Walgreens today.  Well, besides that I needed a butterfinger, Carmex, and a watch battery.

                I saw where Jake Gyllenhaal broke up with Taylor Swift.  Here is my tragic face.  I really don’t care about either one of them in any component of my life but this caught me.  I sat back and laughed.  I looked at my mother and told her, “Give Taylor Swift 8 months and she will have her next country number 1.”  And that started this.  I think that she dates men to have them break up with her in order to make money off of them.  Each man that has left her, she has written a song about their relationship and greatly profited from it.  Yea, I said it.  The dullest person ever has a business plan and works it to perfection.  I think that her previous boyfriends deserve a cut of some variety.  Don’t they?  I mean the darn thing is about them.  So why shouldn’t they profit from her gross earnings if she is writing about them?  I know the real answer but I thought that I would pose this hypothetical question.  It was just a thought people like how I want Yolo right now or how being a pirate would be awesome.

Chapter 1: Football, Feet, and SPAM

                So here we are again.  It’s 2011.  Which means what you might ask yourself?  It means that we are ever so inching closer to our impending doom.  Birds falling from the sky, Fish floating to the top of the rivers, and people all across the southern part of the USA sending themselves into a tizzy about the weather.  Maybe it is just Arkansas that is in for doom.  Remember they also lost the Sugar Bowl this year as well. 

With all doom and gloom aside for the state of Arkansas, I have decided to this year make something of myself and start blogging for the first time as a bit of therapy for my brain.  Many things cross my mind and I decided that I would let my mind and fingers wander across a keyboard to compose my thoughts.  It seems easy in some way to take your thoughts and put them to the new-age paper (blogs) but more often than not, it is difficult.  It is difficult for me to express my thoughts and feelings without coming off as an ass but I tend to do so.  My thoughts are random and sometimes have no correlation to other thoughts in my head.

Like this one:

I watched the Chiefs/Ravens football game before I came to work.  It was a bitter pill to swallow considering that I am a BIG (and if you know me, I am a big dude) Chiefs fan.  I sat with my ailing mother and father in their room watching a meltdown of epic proportions.  In the middle of the 4^th quarter, I realized something.  This game isn’t about which team is actually better; it is about ratings and money.  The Ravens didn’t have a penalty until the fourth quarter.  Not one.  No holding. No Interference. Nothing.  That is when I realized that there was no chance that a Mid-American team in a small market was going to win this game.  Let’s be honest, the NFL doesn’t make money if small market teams win in the playoffs and not the big city teams.  Baltimore, New York, Boston (New England), Atlanta, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, and Chicago are the cash cows.  Little teams like Arizona, Kansas City, Jacksonville, Buffalo, Tampa Bay and Green Bay (which is borderline because of the legacy of Lombardi) are always skipped over.  Yea, they have a great year but when it comes down to dollars and cents, the big teams have the calls, the front office, the league, and the money to get the big teams into the bigger games.  I sat and listened to the announcers gush about Baltimore so much in the first half of that game before it got out of control that I had to mute the TV.  I credit Phil Simms for making me loathe his family name even more than usual. 

End of Rant.

Another thought:

Have there ever been more news anchors and people around the country talking about foot fetishes?  I mean really?  Everyone has their thing, I personally enjoy carpet rides while a winged horse makes me breakfast, but I digress.  So what if one guy, who happens to coach a pro football team, enjoys his spouse’s feet.  Who cares! Move on people, we have better things to talk about like pixi-sticks, unicorns, ornithological signs, and Scar-Jo.

Last thought of this post:

Am I the only person that enjoys going to the local Wal-Mart and watching the people of most southern city go ape-shi* when bad weather is on the horizon? I will go and get a coffee and sit at the end of the isles of the stores and watch people take a variety of sundries out of the stores.  What I have noticed as a trend in the 4 years that I have done this is that there are essential items that one needs when the apocalypse arrives. 

1)      Bottled Water.  The jugs of water fly off the shelves that there is no water left on the earth.  I understand the reasoning of this because of the necessity of water to survive.  I get it.

2)      Toilet Paper: People tend to go into the stores and get the 7000 roll pack just in case.  Sad thing is if people can’t get any water out of the tap, how are you going to flush the toilet?  Are we going to have overactive bodily functions now that this current “end-of-days” storm is upon us?  TP in that quality seems a bit much and frankly pretty ridiculous.

3)      SPAM: really? Processed meat that never gets bought otherwise only gets used when the next ice age is upon us. Really?

4)      Bread and Deli Meats: Ham sandwich is the answer to the universe.

5)      Peanut Butter: Only if you can keep the jelly outside.

6)      Milk:  This one always gets me.  Unless you have a cold carriage house attached to your residence, you had best drink it quickly.  It will spoil.  Then breakfast sucks and water in my fruit loops is terrible.  Don’t tell a kid, “Sorry, you have to have water with your cereal.”  Boo.

Alright, I have hopefully not completely wasted your time and I hope to do this again.  This is going to be something that I try to do often.  Hope y’all enjoy my rants and musings.  I am out.  For now…..or  am I?  Ok, I am out.