Floop the pig: A meme in progress

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Just found this sitting on my IPad. Apparently it never published. It should have been 820….

Sometimes memes are reflective of a feeling; a sense commonality and force of will. Today I was watching a recorded episode of Adventure Time and saw a meme born right before my eyes. Here is how it happened.

Adventure Time is a show about two individuals who live as brothers. Jake is a dog with the power to expand his body to enormous proportions. Finn is a human who happens to be one of a handful of humans in this magical world. He was adopted as a baby by Jake’s parents. Now the two are sorta grown up and living together in a treehouse as an adventuring duo. The floop episode, called Card Wars, is about downtime. Jake is a guru at the card wars game. He has developed a strategy based around corn and doesnt lose. Now nobody will play with him. So, he convinces Finn to play and Finn destroys Jakes well planned strategy by playing a random card, a pig. Finn doesn’t attack with the pig, as one apparently should. He floops it, setting it loose on the cornfield and eating all the corn.

Floop the Pig.

There is already a website and several mentions across the web about this young meme. So what does it mean? I say it means beat them when they underestimate you or even the weakest seeming person can be a beast. It means different things to different people. The fact that is became a meme shows that people can easily attach their emotions to the idea. I will watch this develop and report more as I know more.

In the meanwhile, I plan to help it spread.

819. Waiver Wednesday

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It occurs to me that football begins on Sunday. The preseason begins in earnest on August 10th, and a few weeks later the games count. With that in mind I want to talk football.

The injury bug smacked up the Giants again. Nicks is out, leaving me to wonder who the #2 and #3 receivers will be. Hixon cannot be relied upon to stay healthy, Barden is rather untested, and the rest are question marks.

It doesn’t get any better on the D-side. Starting CB Terrell Thomas blew out his knee again.  Same knee, which means it never fully healed. Former 1st Rounder Prince Amukamara is going to have to step up now. No better time for it. The former Nebraska Blackshirt will be starting in a season that his former college team wears black shirt jerseys for a game for the first time.

The Jets are looking lovely this time of year. The marriage of Tebow and Sanchez appears to be working beneath harsh media scrutiny. NY media wants them to fail–needs them to fail or be on the verge of it to sell more papers and web time. Tebow is being his ever-gracious self, but you gotta know he’s looking for a shot at starting. It will happen again somewhere, and perhaps even in NYC.

Small post. Just a few thoughts on the coming season. I’m sure there will be more when I start considering the fantasy draft.

Some Thoughts:

1. I need febreeze for my car. The commercials sold that sucker. In fact, It has me thinking about using commercials in my classes. I am particularly fond of the Dos Equis commercials. Like most they seek to establish credibility of the spokesperson, but they do it in a very fun way. They’re also a logical fallacy for the most part.

2. 19 days till classes start. Not ready at all.

818. Reflections on a Tuesday Night

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My novel is still growing. I found an angle that really makes it mine and more than a story everyone else tells. There are cycles in writing and now we are cycling through the apocalypse. My novel doesn’t quite go there, but I feel like there is space for what I am doing within that genre. At least I know the genre finally.

One revelation in a long line of necessary ones. Another would be a clear understanding of my role at work. I know what I am there for, at least for the next year. Afterwards someone will take the job and I will move on to another challenge. It isn’t what I want. I know that a year in the role is far too limited to make the best of it and truly establish a new position. On the other hand, I had a chance to make with a new position when I first joined the college and I didn’t execute the way I needed to. In fact I dropped the ball.

There are days when I want to wake up in 1991 and have a chance to do things with the effort and vigor I know I am capable of. You can’t go back. Perhaps the truth is that death is merely an cessation of new material and you live everything over and over again, but life is forward. It is the next moment and the moment after that. I didn’t feel that way earlier in my life, but as I age I recognize this fact and the fact that there isn’t really time to waste.

 

817. Politiblog

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Mondays tend to be reserved for self-reflection as Wednesdays generally belong to football blather. Tonight is different. I watched Fox News channel’s Hannity show for a few minutes. In that short time I watched Hannity air an anti-Obama commercial in its entirety. Not as part of a commercial break, but as part of the actual show. He then went on to misrepresent the facts as part of a segment that defended the commercial and took the points made one step further. He called it analysis.

Just a week ago I was watching an episode of the Colbert Report online and watched Colbert do the same thing. I found it funny on Colbert, because it is a comedy show on comedy central. I found it disingenuous on Fox News, because they fallaciously claim to be both fair and balanced as a broadcaster. Neither is true, as evidenced by the above Obama bash.

Look, I get it. We have a quickly vanishing white class in America. The people being born today and over the last thirty years are largely separate from the old style white America. See, the new white America can be defined as a separate culture, while the old white America can only be defined as American. As strange as it sounds, that older breed is how the world saw us (and largely still sees us). That older breed is not who we are anymore. Like Britain before us, we are coming to be defined in a multi-cultural context and the picture of the American is no longer, well, Tim Pawlenty. We Americans are still us first materialists with a marginal grasp on world politics, religion, and economics, but we look different. This is what is so radical; so scary to that Good ‘Ol Party. They want things back the way they were at the very height of that image. They want the Reagan Years.

I’m not talking about Republicans as a whole. I think the elected Republicans are merely seeking strength in numbers in order to survive a world that has turned hostile to them. I don’t object to it. I think it eliminates individualism in the face of moving forward the most important issues, but there is nothing inherently evil about that. I get pissed about how they conduct their business.

Earlier this month I quoted Alfred from the new Batman trilogy when he said, “Some people want to see the world burn.” I believe the elected Republican leadership has become that beast. They are willing to sabotage any progress in order to create an opportunity to install their preferences. They are willing to lie on a galactic scale, and defend that lie as though it is truth. Worst still, they play the victim so easily should any of their tactics be turned back upon them.

Tim Pawlenty called the outrage towards Chick-fil-A’s anti-gay stance an attack on the first amendment. Now, it is both ironic and moronic for someone to call free speech (which is what the outrage is after all) an ATTACK on free speech. UNLESS you believe free speech should only exist where you agree with the speech being freely given. It is important to note here that Pawlenty was at the head of the pack of people attacking the people responsible for trying to open a Muslim community center near ground zero. He went on to dismiss the religion and the right of the religion to be practiced openly anywhere near that zone.

Of course, the right to practice religion where you want is a tenet of free speech–UNLESS you live in the world of the Republican leadership where “free” is subjective.

816. My Terrible Backyard

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I am a city boy. I grew up in NYC and spent most of my time walking the streets and enjoying the world outdoors. Fast forward twenty or so years and here I am in the desert with a remarkably ordinary backyard. In fact, this is the type of yard that is so powerfully boring that my own kids are loathe to play outside.

What can be done to turn an ordinary backyard into something worth coming home to? My yard consists of a patch of grass rimmed by an L shaped porch against a slope of rock and trees. This is all contained in a 30 x 45′ rectangle of useful space. Now a lot of the space is wasted. The slope eliminates a great deal of the useful ground and the unkempt grassy area is imposing to the boys.

What I want is something that inspires calm but also leaves room for fun. I want the patch of grass, but I also want the space around that grass to be warm and inviting. I want to feel like I can sit in the yard and not be trampled by bugs of all flavors. I want to know there is shade available and a place to sit and have a drink. I want a happy spot.

Happiness is supposed to be the guiding principle of home, and we have created a space that looks okay but doesn’t feel all that happy just yet. It should be the first thing you think about in your indoor and especially outdoor spaces.

Some Thoughts:

1. The clock says I am completing this post near 3:12 AM. What time zone is my server located in? Reminds me that the world moves on very different schedules and my time, no matter what part of the USA I happen to be in at the time, is not the most important time to everyone else.

815. Wendy and Wendy: Scenes from the Beauty Meme

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In a perfect world we would be comfortable having commercials where Wendy (namesake of Wendy’s) is the sexy and friendly spokeswoman that drives your business towards her establishment. We have come far enough that there are a handful of commercials starring the illusive owner of the Wendy’s empire, but most are run by skinny red-headed stand ins that are there more for their looks than any serious acting chops. In a visual world, modern media is predicated on spokespersons who are attractive in a specific way. We don’t leave room for all forms of beauty, because it doesn’t vibe with the beauty meme.

The Beauty meme is the idea that beauty is either X, Y, or Z. In reality beauty is subjective, but in many nations beauty is prescribed by history and the controlling class. They decide what beauty means and populate the media with that image. Therefore we fall in love with the idea of what is beautiful, even though that idea wasn’t originated inside of us. In order to become a part of society, we conform to the mores, one of which is dating and marrying those who society finds most desirable.

What does that mean to Wendy? It means that because she cannot look exactly the way we have defined beauty, she doesn’t sell products as well as a younger thinner version of herself. So, Wendy cannot be herself and feed us burgers.

814. Some Arizonisms

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Memes, Talis, whatever you choose to call them are created as a result of a need–be it for  independence, unity, uniqueness, or perhaps even a need to just feel good about something. Arizona mastered the self-created/personally altered situation. In other words, we do stuff here in AZ that is not done in this fashion anywhere else. Why? Because we want to be special, no matter how dumb we seem as a result. SB1070–our self-created immigration law. Yes, we forgot that immigration is the domain of the federal government. Yes, we don’t care. However, that isn’t the most egregious of our ‘changes’. Here are some Arizonisms that I could think of in 10 minutes flat:

1. We call the DMV the MVD. Why? Because we can. Nevermind the fact that the letters are arranged in the traditional fashion in most other states in the union. We changed in order to be special. We are the kid who nobody wanted to play with, so we went off in the corner and started our own game. It looks just like the one everyone else is playing, but just slightly weird enough so you know it is different and find yourself wondering why.

2. You can be convicted of a DUI in Arizona without actually driving a vehicle. If I get drunk off my butt and decide not to drive home and instead call my wife to pick me up, I can still be arrested, so long as I have keys to the car she is driving. Yes, even if it is not the set of keys presently being used. This is some sort of presumed intent. Of course with the new DUI rules, you can be nabbed for a DUI without any alcohol or drugs being involved, especially if they draw blood. If it is in your system and you fail the road test, you are impaired. Levels be damned.

3. In AZ we allow people to carry concealed weapons without any firearms training. Worst still, many many people carry guns out in the open, hanging from their hip as it were. Now, if I am a cop and I encounter someone strapped with a gun, am I going to be concerned? You betcha. Imagine how I feel as an unarmed civilian…

4. We blame the victim. Former Senator Russel Pearce blamed the victims of the tragic Colo shooting for getting shot. He asked why they weren’t more like the brave men of United Flight 93. Okay, Pearce, 93 is a thinly veiled myth. We shot that plane down, because it was a direct threat to the thousands on the ground. I’m not proud of it, but I understand. BEYOND THAT: How can you blame someone for 1) not carrying their own gun into a movie theater (he was upset they weren’t prepared for that scenario) and 2) not trying to fight off a man carrying an AK-47, shotgun, and pistol while wearing a bulletproof vest and a gas mask in a room filling with tear gas? Of course, O’l Russel woulda leapt up from his walker and beat the hell out of that kid without taking one stray round. Or he wouldn’t have moved at all…

813. Rising Action

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I don’t think people live at a set level of mental and physical exertion. As with a wave there is a rising and falling action. However, I believe we have the ability to control our rising and falling actions through the incredible power of will.

Will is an interesting force of nature. When I think about the really really big picture, about how the universe came to be, I think about will. If you are a bible follower, will played a key role in God’s creation of the world and the actions of its first citizens. Now, even before that there had to be a reason for God to come into being and that there is will.
Fast forward to humanity and will kept us going through the darkest of times. We fought through hunger, famine, war, physical atrocity, all on the back of will. So, why is it so freaking hard to will yourself out of bed to do a push up. Why is it near impossible to will ourselves to be more proactive? more successful?
My struggle has been to exercise and to organize. These are nearly universal among the people I teach and interact with. We never ‘have enough time’ to do everything required. We rarely do enough with our bodies to remain in the type of physical condition that we should throughout our lives.
So, what happened to will? I think the TV ate it.

812. Waiver Wednesday

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I haven’t heard from my fantasy football league yet, but I gotta admit I’m getting psyched about the challenge. Our league is a pay league; a group of football watchers who plunk down a fee to see which of us can collect the best ‘point scorers’ in the NFL. I know many NFL players, beat writers, and even fans consider Fantasy Football to be a powerfully stupid activity. It is literally football out of context. We’re betting on the skills of individuals (and occasionally defenses) in a team sport. So, this post challenges the myths and stereotypes of Fantasy Football. I seek to validate what I’ve come to enjoy as my ‘paper sport’. Fantasy Football is a colorful extraction of an intrinsic part of professional football.

What is fantasy football? It is a bet. You bet on how well players will perform against a given team under a very specific set of variables in a given week. In essence, fantasy football team owners are laymen NFL scouts. We determine mismatches and orchestrate lineups in order to take advantage of those mismatches. This little step made the Patriots great. Now I’m not saying I’m like the Patriot coaching staff, but I am trying to be a student of the game in that same fashion in order to play a game that is both fun and earns me a little bit of coin just in time for the Super Bowl party.

I know this post tries to make fantasy football team owners seem more than we are, but I enjoy playing and I do learn more about the game from it. Fantasy football makes me a better football coach to all of the kids I lead unto the field on saturdays. That has to be worth something.

811. Inattention Blindness

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(transcribed from shoddily handwritten text)

Yesterday was tough for me. The Big Evil Wave ™ is still cascading over my life, lately resulting in massive knee pain made worse by slamming into a coffee table knee first. A younger man would shrug it off. I am no longer a younger man. As a result I was in no mood to deal with my kids (which is becoming a more and more constant state of being), they learned to keep their distance and entertain themselves for large stretches of time. This shows that I am developing a really negative attitude towards childcare and have skewed priorities.

 

The Big Evil Wave ™ is always self-inflicted. It is, after a fashion, me telling the universe that I need to be checked. Check me it does; always hard enough to make the point impossible to miss. This year’s points are crystal:

1. My priorities are out of whack.
2. I am too careless with my money.

The first point is a painful one to admit, because it shows me that I am trying to hard to escape fro my daily routine, which means I am unhappy with the home life. This past year taught me that I think about anything else while spending time with the kids, they’ll know and they will try to destroy whatever else I am thinking about. If I try to work on that other thing, it’ll be ruined, as will my time with the kids. Part of that is inattention blindness, but it is mostly the willful way these kids refuse to be ignored–as they should.

They deserve my full attention. I need to become more proactive about organizing and grading priorities. I need to shape my time in a way that allows me those moments to do nothing but hang out with the family as well as those moments to work and to write. Most of all, I need to be clear about what is most important.

The money issue is equally rough Isn’t it always?

Some Thoughts:

1. My job used to be my vacation. That is hardly the case these days, because I haven’t found balance yet. I need to figure out a way to do that.

2. Wearing your shades on the back of your shirt is stupid. There, I said it. Someone had to. In a world where 50 Shades of poo is a NYT best seller, we need to start calling bullshit when we see it.