I Ain't Afraid of No Daleks

Firefox stinks, I HATE it.

First, they force updates on you, usually when you're in the middle of something. Sometimes these updates mess up my computer settings.

It's TOTALLY messed up my security settings, and sometimes won't let me cut and paste from MS Word, because Firefox is STUPID and is mistaking my cutting and pasting as a flipping pop-up!

Now, the blinking think has started kicking me off certain websites, and out of the internet altogether.

I'm soooo--fed up with Firefox, I could scream. Unfortunately, I can't find any way to contact the prigs at Firefox, to see what they hell their problem is.

HOW CAN I GET RID OF THE BLASTED THING????

And, futhermore, is there anything good that I can replace the stinking thing with?

Here we see actor David Tennant, as he explains why he's leaving Doctor Who:
"Okay, here's Series 4. Now hop it. I just wanna' spend my Saturdays sitting around my flat in my underpants, drinking beer, watching the football, like every other Scotsman."

I blogged a bit of blather about my teenage years earlier. This post is, in an off-hand way, sort of continuing that theme:

Some thoughts on what it truly means to be “different” in today’s society.

It isn’t easy, being “different.” You see all these teens and even some adults, dying their hair, wearing unusual clothing, trying to stand out from the crowd and show their individuality--and that’s not necessarily a bad thing, mind you. But, these people aren’t really being different, not in the true sense of the word.

You see, there’s this myth that it’s cool to be “different,” to be not part of the crowd, to “do your own thing.” However, that’s a false premise. Mainly I say this, because if you are making a choice to be different, that means that somewhere along the way, you were previously not different. To me, you either are born different, or you are a pretender. Don’t get me wrong, though. I don’t think pretenders are bad in any way. It’s just that I see them as people who really don’t grasp the concept of different.

Being different isn’t about being cool, or hip, or trendy. It’s about isolation. It’s about pain and loneliness. There is absolutely nothing glam or cool about being outside of life’s circles. You know those circles. Chances are, you have quite a few of them, yourself: circles of family, circles of friends, circles of co-workers and/or classmates, circles of people who think like you, or behave like you, or share your interests. But, being different--different for REAL I mean, isn’t like that at all. There are no circles, none whatsoever. You stand alone, outside of everything--and let me tell you lot something: this sort of existence is very hard.

You see, people who are truly different are born that way. You don’t just wake up some morning and say, “I think I’ll dye my hair fuchsia,” or, “I think I’ll go live in the country, milking goats and wearing sandals all day.” Nope, different doesn’t work that way. Sorry.

Truly being different, is to be born somehow outside of what the rest of the world considers, “normal.” It’s usually not a conscious choice that one makes. In fact, many of those who are different, may not even realize it--oh, they may sense that they aren’t like everyone else, and in fact, could be in denial for decades about it.

The different people are often those with mental illness, brain injury, or some other physical defect. It may stem from moderate to complex social problems, or a deep emotional injury as the result of some negative experience. Sometimes it’s that a person is more intelligent than his or her contemporaries, or, perhaps less so. Or, it might be that an individual, who lives outside of the norms of society, simply has always lived that way. There’s no one thing that makes someone different from everyone else. It’s just something you’re born with or unconsciously develop, and have to learn to cope with as you grow.

Being different often means that you may feel like an outcast from society. Someone might feel that there is something wrong with them, but specifically what that “wrongness” is, the person may not quite be able to grasp.

Certainly, people whom are deemed different by societal standards will have friends. But, when you are different, those friendships can be tenuous things. Someone may be a good friend, being there for you, listening…but then, one day, this person sees a side of you, that you might normally keep hidden, or if not hidden, some part of you is revealed that the friend had never seen or considered before. Perhaps it will be something which the friend finds difficult to cope with, or just plain doesn’t like. In cases like this, the natural human reaction is to flee. Then, the friendship unravels. Negative emotions erupt: embarrassment, guilt, anger, hurt, shame. There’s a parting of the ways, and the person who is different carries yet another scar on his or her soul, and perhaps builds an invisible defensive wall to combat any further negative experiences.

The bottom line is, being different means standing alone. You are like a pond in the rain. The raindrops in the pond form all these little circles--but between those circles are little millimeters of flat water. The different people are much like those little spaces in the pond, untouched by heaven’s tears.

Me at age 12, somewhere in upstate New York in 1973. (Not my horse, by the way--barely had my first riding lessons, back then. Some cowboy let me ride it around a bit, at some horse show my dad took me to.)

Five Questions Quiz

1. What’s the best concert you ever went to?

I know that out of fan loyalty, I should say the John Denver concert at Madison Square Garden in the autumn of 1976, but honestly I think that honour really goes to a Beach Boys concert in Saratoga Springs in the late 1980’s. That was enormously fun, with giant beach balls being bandied around, and people dancing in the aisles and chillin’ with each other. I gotta’ say, that concert was a real blast. Pity that the Beach Boys stopped doing many concerts after that, I’d love to re-live that experience again.

2. What’s the worst concert you’ve ever been to?

Oh, afraid that not so great honour falls to the Vermont Symphony Orchestra. It’s not that I don’t like symphony concerts. As a matter of fact, sometimes I do. But, on this occasion, their Autumn Concert Series featured original works by one of their own composers…and, well…yuck. It was awful. It seemed a mish-mash of musical notes, which really didn’t make much rhyme or reason to me. Okay, let’s be American blunt: It was two hours of sheer torture. Now, truth-to-tell, I like hearing new music. I never followed my old high school music teacher’s axiom of: “People don’t know what they like, they like what they know.” I always thought that mindset was very one-dimensional and sheer balderdash. And, a prime example of why America’s public educational system is, for the most part, such incredible rubbish. Anyway, I like listening to, and learning about, new music. However, I have not now, nor will I ever cotton to, discordant music. In fact, there’s a certain type of jazz, (“free jazz?” “modal jazz?” I can’t remember what it’s called) that is so disconnected to me, that listening to it actually makes my stomach queasy. That’s sort of what the VSO concert was like, on that autumn night in 2004.

3. What time is it right now, as you are writing this?

It’s exactly 2:18 in the afternoon, Eastern Standard Time

4. What did you--or will you, have to eat, today?

A bowl of honey-nut cheerios and milk, a slice of toast with apricot jam, and diet decaf sweet tea.
2 slices of left-over pizza for lunch, with a diet orange soda pop.
Dinner will either be a chicken pot pie and maple -glazed carrots, or maybe a hamburger with onions, corn, and some fries (chips),.

5. What was the last thing(s) you purchased from a shop?

A packet of 2 freshly made hamburger patties, a Vidalia (sweet) onion, a jug of cold diet decaf sweet tea (orange flavour), a packet of chorizo sausage, a box of rice pilaf, frozen corn, frozen peas, toilet paper, foot powder, shampoo, Pear’s soap, and a $1 bargain book, a short story by Nathaniel Hawthorne.

.

DAVID: "Did you see Steven Moffat's face, when I told him that porta-loo was the new Tardis?"

CATHERINE: "Yeah, good one David. Did you see his look when he came face-to-face with that burly construction worker's willie? I loved it when you yelled, TRICK OR TREAT?"

This post is purely for entertainment purposes, and is purely fictional.

Have You Hugged A Tree, Today?

I was a teenage tree hugger.

I also, in my teenage years (1974-1980), listened to John Denver and folk music, dressed like cross between a cowgirl and a woodswoman, read wrote poetry, bird-watched, bushwhacked (hiking where there are no trails), kept a journal of my observations while outdoors, and acquainted myself with works by the early transcendentalists like Emerson and Thoreau.

For all intents and purposes, as teenagers went in my part of the world, I was an outsider, a rebel without a clue.

And…I really don’t regret being that way.

Well, hanging out in the fields and woods so often, with mostly only my dogs for company, certainly prepared me for my solitary way of life, now.

But, really, I have very happy memories of being a closet transcendentalist, in my teens. I mean, every day was an open book to me, every time I went out there, was the turning of a page I’d never read before. I was surrounded by sound and colour and movement, all working together in this marvelous, ever-changing dance of life, of all which makes the universe, and being human enough to sense and feel these things, so very special to me.

Being outside, for me, also meant total freedom. I mean, when I was out roaming the fields and woods, hills and streams, I was absolutely free. I could be myself, with no one to judge me. I could be anything I want, do whatever pleased me at the moment, and no one to say ‘aye, yes, or no.’ Oh, I could be myself at school, in the village, at the shopping centre, in the library, at home--but, there was always the ever-present danger of censorship, of rejection and disapproval. I had no peers out there, roaming my tiny part of the Upper Hudson Valley; only the earth and sky, the wind and the water.

If I had any peers, as such, I suppose it was my half- bred collie Shamrock (the other half was retriever mix), and Harry, the old gardener who took care of the former estate land where much of the woods and fields I roamed resided. Without peer pressure, well, it was…empowering. Oh, sometimes I got lonely, sure. Even to this day, I get sad because I never had anyone--will probably never have anyone, to show that side of myself, to.

You may read bits and snatches of that side of me, in my blog(s) from time to time. But, I’ve never, in over 30 years, been in the position where I could actually physically go out in the woods, and share that side of myself with someone. Of course it makes me sad, I’d be daft if I never realized that, but…it’s a price I have to pay, and I’ve paid it willingly. I gave up doing the “normal” teenage socializing/peer pressure thing, to go off and be alone and do my own thing…and have very seldom ever regretted it.

I ran into a guy the other day, at the bus stop. I was waiting for the shopping mall bus, and he was waiting for a cab. A big, tough New Yorker (New York City), the man looked every inch like he’d just stepped off the set of a Godfather film.

We got to chatting, just to pass the time. We talked about the weatherr, local happenings here in the north country…how hard it is to get a cab in Glens Falls on the weekend. Then, somehow the conversation turned to education. I named my two colleges, and asked him where he went to university. After giving me an angry glare, gangster guy said, “Who me? A university? Wotsamatta U!” Never heard of it.