VH1's I Love the 80s

VH1.com : Shows : I Love the 80s Strikes Back : 1989 : Episode

Maybe it's just me, but as I watched the 1988 edition of this, I started to realize, I don't remember any of these things. Well, some of them, but somehow I think I blanked out a few years of my life. Sure, I was in the service at the time, but I sure thought I was following what was going on at the time.

It's pretty weird to watch this and realize that in my twenties, I don't remember hardly anything that was popular when I was in my twenties.

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Being Poor
This is actually a posting I wrote in response to someone in college (claiming that he was "poor") who stated: "Buying healthy food at a grocery store is a lot cheaper than eating at McDonalds. You can get about 10 apples for the price of a Big Mac Meal. They're just too stupid to know what to buy.."

There was a period of time in my life where I was dirt poor, and I couldn't afford to get to a regular grocery store, and this was while living in a big city. People like me relied on local grocery stores, which rip you off like you wouldn't believe. An example: milk at that time was one buck for a small carton (don't know the prices now), but when it came time to pay for it, my 99 cent milk suddenly went up to $1.45, because of tax. I'm sorry, but no city in this country charges a 46 percent tax on any item, yet when I brought it up to the attention of the person running the store, I was thrown out of the store and banned from ever coming back, as if I was some homeless guy that was asking for spare change.

People take advantage of the poor in ways you can't even possibly imagine. I remember at one time that I relied on fast food to survive because that was all I could afford (you start really paying attention to 99 cent deals), and at that time, I was probably gaining weight as well because I couldn't afford to eat right.

And this is coming from a very educated individual who fell on hard times, so it wasn't like I was some mentally incapacitated individual (that would happen much later, I guess), but I realized back then I had very few options available to me. Back then, you couldn't even cash a check without huge surge charges put on it because you couldn't afford to maintain a bank account, and the few times I went into a bank, I felt like they were looking for any reason to arrest me (I looked homeless during this time). I was living in a bug-infested flop house, and let's just say that when you're poor, you don't see a way out of it.

To be honest, my way out of this came through the assistance of others. Not welfare, not general assistance of any nature, but just making friends that couldn't believe how I was living and helped me figure out how to get out from under such a life.

So few people get that opportunity. That whole "you can solve your own problems" thing is such a farce and is so insulting to those who are suffering on a daily basis. Comparing someone in college who thinks he's poor to someone on the streets who is trying so hard to find a job that does MORE than keep that person on the streets is insulting to everyone that has ever been there before.

I'm in college now (pursuing my PhD), and let's just say that the life of a college student is FAR different than the life of someone who finds himself living on the streets, for whatever reason. And I am so sick and tired of the "well, you got off the streets, so that proves that it can be done, so let's ignore the poor because they're just lazy" responses from people who have never been there and have zero clue whatsoever.

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Why I Hate the Snow
I really do hate snow. I can't even begin to describe how much. I guess that's probably one of the reasons I never should have moved to Michigan from California in the first place.

It all goes back to my Army days. I used to hate waking up in the field during the Winter when it was extremely cold, you'd pull yourself out of a tiny tent, and then you'd see nothing but white cold stuff. You'd be freezing, and you'd hate every moment of it. And then some colonel with something to prove would decide to road march the entire battalion at five AM in the morning, when you're not only cold, but now you're tired and miserable.

I guess I see snow as that every time I see it. Today, I was walking home from class, and all I could think to myself was "evil snow!"

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Timequest
I ran across this movie while in Video Hits Plus, and I thought it might be interesting, even though I figured it would probably be pretty corny. It is the story of a person who travels back to 1963 and stops the Kennedy assassination. I remember thinking, this would probably really suck.

I was shocked. This was an extremely good movie, but not because of the "science fiction" element, but because of the speculative history that gets told in this story instead. I don't often say this, but I really thought it was a brilliant movie.

It is pretty recent, too. I have a feeling that so few people will see it because they're going to expect some science fiction action adventure instead of a really hard-hitting drama. I highly recommend this movie.

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Forensics
For those that don't know, for the last four years I had my assistantship coaching the Forensics and Debate Team for the university. Last year, the university decided it didn't want to fund a graduate assistant to coach the team anymore, so they did away with my assistantship. Luckily, I was able to get a doctoral associateship from the political science department. Otherwise, I'd probably be really poor this year. What am I saying? I am poor this year. Oh well.

Anyway, because I don't have to do Forensics anymore, I've distanced myself from it. There are still three people I help out when they call and ask to meet with me (which means meeting with each of them at least once a week), but for the most part, I've distanced myself from any of the new people on the team (aside from one young woman I've helped teach debate technique because there is no coach on the team and she'd be unable to compete at all without the help). But I decided I was not going to be going to any of the tournaments to judge, no matter how much they begged me to do so because I just don't have the time to spend a weekend doing that.

Well, I kind of broke down this weekend. There was a tournament at Western here, so I was called and they asked if I could judge one of the final rounds, so I came in and did that. I have to admit that about half an hour into the round, I realized how much I don't like doing anything Forensics-related anymore. It is so superficial, and I guess I never realized it before. I loved performing when I was doing it, but as I was judging it, I just couldn't get it out of my head that I was really wasting my time being there.

The round I judged was duo interpretation (a play involving two students instead of singular events). I don't know, but it seems like the students tend to choose topics of plays that they think are really ground-breaking but just have been overdone to death. I watched two play interpretations on two gay men deciding to fall in love instead of hate each other, and then two play interpretations about two women who loved each other and hated men. Then another duo about hating men. And then another that was from some religious school that felt that it needed to explain the Tower of Babel to me in order to save my soul. And finally, there was the the experimental play about...well, I'm not exactly sure what it was about. I do remember something about gardening, the Mona Lisa and why dating isn't exactly rape. As this man and woman were trying to entice me with their social commentary play, all I kept thinking about was the fact that I still had all of Season Two of Xena to get through.

Latest Batch of Papers
I finished the latest batch of papers for grading today. The second test is now ready for turning back to the students, and I can just say that I'm very happy to be getting rid of them.

Doctors and all that stuff
I have a bunch of doctor appointments all through this week. It's not like I have a ton of time as it is, but practically every day is spent seeing a doctor or having some special tests done. Oh well.

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Working Out After All This Time Really Sucks
It does...really.

I started going to the Recreation Center yesterday and using the lifecycle. Some years back, I was working it on level 12 for the most part, but I'm wheezing and coughing on level 4 now. Moved up to level 5 today, and let's just say that when it came to the hills, I felt like I was rolling back downhill on a stationary bike.

It feels really strange going into a new place to work out. I guess it's probably cause this is a college environment, and everyone looks like they're members of the Mickey Mouse Club. I honestly think a bunch of young women and men go to the recreation center just to pose in front of out of shape people like me. And then some girl wearing a little less than nothing is standing right in front of me and gives me a dirty look because I happened to look. Um, yeah, I looked. I have this thing about being in public; I rarely keep my eyes down on the floor the entire time, and if someone happens to be outrageously attractive and is too poor to afford clothing, then I might accidentally stare. Okay, I might actually just glare without any accident involved.

I figure I'll probably keep with level 5 for awhile. At least tonight I didn't walk home thinking I was about to cough up a lung.

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If it's not one thing, it's another
I received some really bad health news today after taking some tests at the health center earlier this morning. Obviously, I've not been taking care of myself, and now I'm paying for it. Don't really have anyone else to blame but myself and genetics...well, and evil suicide terrorist bombers, but we blame them for practically everything these days.

I'm going to be spending less time near campus in the near future, so if you all don't see me as much, I'm kind of taking care of some things.

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Figuring It All Out
Well, I think I've figured out what I'm going to do to finish this whole thing. Rather than move off into the comparative field, I've decided to stay within American Politics and work on third party issues, specifically the demise of the third party system by the beginning of the 20th century. I like the approaches used by authors I've been reading lately (Clemens, Skocpol), so I think that rather than go with a rational choice approach, this is the direction I'm going to take instead.

As usual, I'm overwhelmed with the number of papers that I have to finish. I just completed the Runaway Jury papers for Dr. Kuersten's class, but now I have the actual tests to do now. It doesn't ever really seem to end. I still haven't even started doing any research for the paper that I have to do for the World Bank class. That's something I definitely am not looking forward to.

Also, my new computer completely crashed a week or so ago. It just stopped working. I went through tech support with Ibuypower.com, and I'm so peeved right now because they haven't a clue what's actually wrong with it, so my new computer is completely useless right now. They promised a week ago to send me a new video card (which isn't the actual problem but is now a problem because of how the person was trying to get me to fix the computer over the phone), and they haven't sent it yet. In other words, I don't think my computer is ever going to work again, and it was so damn expensive.

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Third Party Voting Has Potential To Create New Political System
This is my latest article, published today.
Third Party Voting Has Potential To Create New Political System

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