Well, it’s been a busy 8 or 9 days for the peoples’ blogger. What with making a last ditch effort at reaching my 6 month goal at the gym (which for the record I fell a “you know what hair” short of), helping my Mom scratch a few things off a to do list (again, fell a tad bit short there too), penning a bio for a buddy for a job opportunity overseas (he didn’t really like it too much), and enjoying a steak with one of the most beautiful sets of eyes I’ve ever seen (still haven’t heard back from her though), never mind a busy week, it’s been a pretty shitty week apparently…lol. Sadly I haven’t had very much time to author an entry, and trust me, I’m just as unhappy about it as all 6 of you readers are. And it doesn’t end there either. Today and tomorrow I’m going to be slightly tied up getting a few affairs in order, as I have a ridiculously early flight to catch Tuesday morning. A friend and I are taking a much, MUCH, needed vacation to Mexico, and it could not have come any sooner. It’s been a hectic/menace of a/hard working year for me, and it’s time to get away. No work, no gym, no drama, no headaches. Throw these pale feet in a set of sandals, get an umbrella ella ella eh eh eh drink in my hand, regroup refocus and recharge. I still have a week off when I return, and hopefully that week will be spent catching up with some people I haven’t caught up with in a while, maybe relax a bit more, chip away at the last couple of things on Moms to do list, and hell, I’m in a dreaming mood, maybe date number 2 with the “eyes to end all eyes”……. Or maybe I’ll just get reacquainted with the old PlayStation for the entire week. Whatever the case may be, we will cross that bridge when we get there. But I do feel as though I owe you something to quench your reading thirst. For the last few weeks or so, I’ve been asked to speak about the “Occupy Toronto Movement” repeatedly. And I’ve tried to. I’ve written a couple of things here and there about it, but truth be told, I’m not the one to handle this topic. It’s no secret that I’m somewhat outspoken, belligerent and have even been referred to as pretentious once before, although I can’t by any stretch of the imagination figure that one out. My views on these lazy, want for everything but don’t want to earn anything, self-absorbed, people owe them the world, crybabies simply can’t be expressed in the 5 or 10 minutes that you have put aside to hear what I have to say. There are just way too many issues, way too many problems with their strategy, hell, their execution, or lack thereof would be an extendo blog in its own. Not to mention the simple fact that I am of the highest ranking “have nots” society has to offer, yet I don’t feel a burning desire to cry about it, disrupt society, and waste the same god damn tax dollars they are crying could be better disbursed (fucking hypocrites). I believe in going to work every day, saving for what you want, more or less (thank you best buy credit card), and most importantly living within your means. I’d like the silver spoon as much as the next guy, but that’s not the hand I was dealt. Get over it and go be the best you can be at your blue collar job, ability and potential all be damned. Now, the other day, as I do every day with my morning coffee, I was scouring the internet looking for fascinating reads, educational and thought provoking articles, and of course somehow previously not viewed vintage 80’s porn, when I came across an article that discussed the “Occupy” movement on wall street. I was going to use this article as a basis for research for my own blog, but truth be told, it was so well done and said, that in uncharacteristic blog fashion I’m just going to give it to you as is, through this authors words. I’m secure enough to do that, and although I would have laced it with a few poignant profanities, and intricate metaphors, she spoke her mind in her words, and said exactly what I was thinking. While she still only scrapped the surface of the problem, her points were well made, valid and I appreciated them, as I’m sure you will too. I’ll be back in a couple of weeks, with a tan, a couple of stories, and hopefully another date (although it’s not looking good thus far), as well as a special surprise for you. I like dramatics too much too divulge what exactly I’ve got in the works, so I’ll just say this, I never thought I’d be a sequels writer, but when the people ask for something, the peoples’ blogger can do nothing else but deliver. Enjoy the read everyone and I’ll be back soon enough.:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::::
Call it an occupational hazard, but I can’t look at the Occupy Wall Street protesters without thinking, “Who parented these people?”
As a culture columnist, I’ve commented on the social and political ramifications of the “movement” – now known as “OWS” – whose fairyland agenda can be summarized by one of their placards: “Everything for everybody.” Thanks to their pipe-dream platform, it’s clear there are people with serious designs on “transformational” change in America who are using the protesters like bedsprings in a brothel. Yet it’s not my role as a commentator that prompts my parenting question, but rather the fact that I’m the mother of four teens and young adults. There are some crucial life lessons that the protesters’ moms clearly have not passed along. Here, then, are five things the OWS protesters’ mothers should have taught their children but obviously didn’t, so I will:• Life isn’t fair. The concept of justice – that everyone should be treated fairly – is a worthy and worthwhile moral imperative on which our nation was founded. But justice and economic equality are not the same. Or, as Mick Jagger said, “You can’t always get what you want.”No matter how you try to “level the playing field,” some people have better luck, skills, talents or connections that land them in better places. Some seem to have all the advantages in life but squander them, others play the modest hand they’re dealt and make up the difference in hard work and perseverance, and some find jobs on Wall Street and eventually buy houses in the Hamptons. Is it fair? Stupid question.• Nothing is “free.” Protesting with signs that seek “free” college degrees and “free” health care make you look like idiots, because colleges and hospitals don’t operate on rainbows and sunshine. There is no magic money machine to tap for your meandering educational careers and “slow paths” to adulthood, and the 53 percent of taxpaying Americans owe you neither a degree nor an annual physical.
While I’m pointing out this obvious fact, here are a few other things that are not free: overtime for police officers and municipal workers, trash hauling, repairs to fixtures and property, condoms, Band-Aids and the food that inexplicably appears on the tables in your makeshift protest kitchens. Real people with real dollars are underwriting your civic temper tantrum.• Your word is your bond. When you demonstrate to eliminate student loan debt, you are advocating precisely the lack of integrity you decry in others. Loans are made based on solemn promises to repay them. No one forces you to borrow money; you are free to choose educational pursuits that don’t require loans, or to seek technical or vocational training that allows you to support yourself and your ongoing educational goals. Also, for the record, being a college student is not a state of victimization. It’s a privilege that billions of young people around the globe would die for – literally.
• A protest is not a party. On Saturday in New York, while making a mad dash from my cab to the door of my hotel to avoid you, I saw what isn’t evident in the newsreel footage of your demonstrations: Most of you are doing this only for attention and fun. Serious people in a sober pursuit of social and political change don’t dance jigs down Sixth Avenue like attendees of a Renaissance festival. You look foolish, you smell gross, you are clearly high and you don’t seem to realize that all around you are people who deem you irrelevant.• There are reasons you haven’t found jobs. The truth? Your tattooed necks, gauged ears, facial piercings and dirty dreadlocks are off-putting. Nonconformity for the sake of nonconformity isn’t a virtue. Occupy reality: Only 4 percent of college graduates are out of work. If you are among that 4 percent, find a mirror and face the problem. It’s not them. It’s you. Credit to the author: Posted By Marybeth Hicks on October 19, 2011
