Opinions

An opinion is something that many people have. Asking people about their own opinions is a very good way of making friends. However, telling people about your own opinions may not work nearly as well.
But I can't say telling opinions is always bad. Sometimes, you may find that their opinion is the same as yours, and you can have a heated rant together about exactly how right your opinion is. Unfortunately, if their opinion is not the same, one of you may end up dying. So to prevent that person from being you, I suggest you study martial arts or take a self defense class or something.
Politicians are especially good at telling their opinions. If anyone has watched the House debate on health care, you may have noticed plenty of truly random opinions that have little to do with the actual topic. However, I must comment on the together-ness of the Republicans. All for one, and whatnot. But I would suggest that they get more followers if they want to win.
Freedom is an illusion. Your opinion is rarely valued, and sure, you are allowed to voice whatever opinions you have, but you always need to be careful what you say in case you die in the process. While there may be 10 who think the same way you do, there's probably 100 more who want to kill you for thinking that way. So while you are at liberty to say what you like, you're really not, if you value your right eye.
As I look about at the odd things I typed, there's one key theme I want you to get. My opinion.

Why

"Why" is the question they just don't want you to ask. Just ask any of the Arians. On second thought, don't. Because they're LYING to you.
For those of you who have no idea what I'm going on about, please refer to Jon Stewart's interpretation of "conservative libertarian". But that's not what I wanted to talk about today. As I am typing this post, I still have no idea what I plan on talking about. Why? Well, if I knew, I would be talking about it, not rambling about why I'm not talking about it. But that's beside the point. I must find a good topic to discuss before I end up spending this entire post talking about my lack of one. You wouldn't enjoy that would you?
Normally, I would have something to say on something I feel particularly strongly about. I'm a very opinionated person, if you were not formerly aware of this. It's a rare event when I don't have something to rant about.
But I'll tell you now, I don't like it. Right now, I have this uneasy feeling like something's amiss because I don't have an opinion to convince you of. It's a sad moment when one is at loss for an opinion.

Music

Do you know what love is, what it's like, or how much it sucks? Music thinks it does. Today's popular music tends to revolve around love and the lack of it. I am willing to bet money that one of the most commonly used words in song lyrics (excluding articles and conjunctions) would have to be love. But there's a point where love gets over-defined. Seriously, can't you think of other things to write about? There are plenty of deep and poetic topics that would make great songs. WRITE ABOUT THEM. One of my favorite artists by the name of Relient K has made my favorites list because of their originality. Some of the things they've written about: vinyl, horses, planes, God, music itself. Excellent choices.
Then of course, we cannot deny the awesomeness of classical music or instrumentals. In a way, that's the best kind of music, because it's open for interpretation by everyone. Oh yes, contemporary music often may have double meanings--or, get this--TRIPLE meanings. But classical music...it's whatever you want it to be. If you're some shallow swoony chick, perhaps you LIKE to interpret everything as a reference to love. If that's the case, go ahead. But I'm gonna go ahead a say that this song is about the phases of life. See what I mean? Classical music is timeless. Who can deny the serenity in Grieg, or lovely simplicity of Rachmaninoff? Ahhh, and who can forget Wagner? You can't say any of these composers are out-of-date, because what do you have to base the time range of it? That's it: NOTHING! Want a song about love? PICK ONE. Any one. It's all in your head: interpret it as love if you want. Want a song about war? Listen to that same song. I'm sure you can pick some war related theme from it. Pick a subject, any subject. Just TRY to pick one that doesn't fit a classical song. I DARE YOU.

The Best Shape

Consider your favorite shape. Visualize it. Fill your mind with only the awesomeness of that shape. Keep it there. Good. Now I'm gonna blow it up in your face because whatever shape that was, it was NOT the best shape. The best shape in the world is the CIRCLE. Weren't thinking of that were you? You were thinking of a square or a triangle or dodecagon, but nobody ever thinks about the circle. Noooo the circle is round, it doesn't belong. It doesn't have corners.
But look around you. Forget the furniture. Look at the objects, like pens, or lamps, buttons, or bottles. They're CIRCULAR. And then look outside. The sun. The moon. The leaves. They're at least round.
We need show more appreciation for circles. We think the wheel is a primitive idea, but have we come up with anything better for our cars? The wheel was one of our first brilliant ideas as cavemen, and we're still using it. It's not primitive. It's timeless.
Who ever came up with the heart being a symbol of love? Out of all things. I heard a quote somewhere, not sure where, but it goes like this:
"If you really love someone, put their name in a circle instead of a heart, because a heart can break, but a circle goes on forever."
Notice it said CIRCLE. Not square, not rectangle, but CIRCLE. Triangles get way too much credit just because they have an entire section of math about them. But circles, they're just as important. They have their own symbol that applies only to circular things. Pi. Remember in elementary school when you had Pi Day and you'd get pie and not have to learn? Thank the circle.
Cirlcles. Remember the circle. It's underappreciated, while its contributions to our world are endless. Forget those other shapes. Give the circle some love.

Idealism

Maybe we've always been living in this stupid idealistic society where actions are defined by thoughts instead of logic. But recently, idealism is kind of making me mad
It started in my first forensics tournament. I didn't do very well, probably because it was my first time and I didn't know what to expect, but that's not the point. The point is, in finals, I chose to watch orations because that was the event that I did worst in. Turns out, most of the speeches were about abstract ideas that were conveyed through the use of sentimentality and tear jerkers. For example, one of the best oraters was primarily using the story of a friend of her's that died of cancer to make you prioritize the people around you more. She made one of the judges CRY.
Now, that's all good and well in a mere competition like this, but when people start using idealism to govern themselves, that's where the problems come. Because the thing about idealism is, when you want to rise, you rise FAST. But the thing is, the fall is inevitable. Idealists rise ridiculously high in a short amount of time, but they fall hard. They didn't build a strong foundation. They rose through the manipulation of people's hearts, not their minds.
Now, as with any beliefs or ideas, you're bound to insult people. A lot of people will get offended, and eventually, you'll find some idealist with the guts and the ability to challenge your post. Then, down you go, and very possibly infamously. Take Tiger Woods for an example. He seemed like a perfect man, and the news loved him. But when a few incriminating details arise, everyone drops him like a hot potato. But if you think about that bad things he's done, can't you think of people you know who've done similar or worse? But Tiger fell, and he fell hard, because he rose ridiculously high.
My oration was about bacteria and why we should stop killing them. It was primarily written with logic, because no one's going to cry over some single celled organisms that they've been told will kill them. Logic acts slowly. Once you've gotten someone's attention, you've got to use an extensive amount of facts, research and data to support your views. But by doing so, you build yourself a strong foundation, that won't be as hard to take out. Then, when a worthy opponent challenges your claim, they've got have better infomation. Better data. Better proof. And if they do, well, then you deserve to step down. And what's more, you can do it like a man.
I'm not saying that logic is the only way to go. Idealism is effective, I admit. But to govern ourselves only upon the ideas of men, that's a different story. In reality, men as a whole don't really have a set of ethics. You'll always find something contradicting the other. If you're going to follow what society says, you'll never get anywhere. Society says EVERYTHING.
Back to what I was saying about Tiger Woods. A California newspaper had two rather interesting articles one day. One was about about Tiger Woods. This guy was brutal, he used every non vulgar adjective he could think of. But then, in a different article, we find a story about people who are paying $1000 to learn only how to pick up women. Contradiction?
But logic can also prove a problem. If you use only logic, we'll eventually lose our own humanity. We'll become robots, never acting upon love, or virtue, or ambition, or desire. Logic doesn't corrupt like idealism, but it erases.
Neither idealism nor logic can be particularly productive without the other. But we tend to tip to one or the other, and right now, that seems to be idealism. My suggestion is that we tip the scales the other way, so we don't lose our humanity or our minds.

Out With the Old!

Well, since it's almost Chinese New Year, I've changed the url to prone2dementia.blogspot.com! Woot! (Actually, I changed it because it seemed that no one could remember the previous url) But this time, it'll actually be permanent.
Speaking of Chinese New Year, it's this Sunday. On Valentine's Day! I remember back in the day in elementary school where Valentine's Day was a day that everyone looked forward to. Everyone would bring in these cute little cards that were folded up and taped shut with a little red heart sticker, and everyone would look forward to giving them out and getting tons of cards and stuffing our faces with candy and not having to learn. But then, the traditions dwindled....the older we got, the more "romantic" Valentine's Day HAD to be, and you couldn't just give cute little cards to your friends of the opposite gender without them getting the wrong idea. I wish we could go back to those days because I REALLY like chocolate. I like reading the cards too, but the chocolate was AMAZING. Chocolate's always amazing, but when people give you chocolate, it's....well, ok, so there's really not much difference. I just like chocolate.
Let's see....what else is up? Hmmmm....I wrote a poem about metal ties for English. I'll have to post it sometime.

Really?

Looking back at the latest post on my blog, it's REALLY been a while since I took the initiative/responsibility/other big words that describe virtues I oughta have, but sometimes lack in. But I'll take a few minutes to outline everything new that's happened.
1. New house: I've probably said this already, so nevermind
2. New car: Two weeks old actually. Toyota RAV4 with 5 speed, 6 cylinder engine and a "moonroof". Back in my day those were called sunroofs...
3. New TV: Just bought it today, actually. Samsung LCD 46" 1080p, 120 Hz, 80k:1 contrast. Very pretty, but I had to install it. Which I don't mind, because I like installing stuff and everything, but that means I also had to deal with The Cables. I'm telling you now, NEVER deal with The Cables at my house. It'll take you ages to recover, and I doubt you'll get anywhere anyway.
4. CHRISTMAS!!!!!! Not exactly a new holiday, but it's the first and last Christmas of the year. I wanted to express my joy at this amazing day.
5. Whoever wrote "Let It Snow" definetely didn't do it in Kansas.