So, this is Christmas

It's Christmas Eve. around 7pm and it's raining here in Knoxville, Tennessee.
I have had a less than satisfactory mushroom and swiss Hardee's Thickburger and small fry and sip of something they called raspberry tea but wasn't. I order a Medium fry but they jipped me out of it and the sweet tea. They were about to close and they jipped me instead of just being honest.
There is so very little joy in those peoples hearts, I suspect.
The Campbells Tomato Bisque was nice though.
A beautiful woman brought me some perfume and cookies. She's married and just my friend, so you Yentas can go back to Hanukkahing.
It was a lovely and thoughtful thing for her to do.

So this is Christmas, a holiday that I have to admit has long since lost most of its meaning to me. I will not have any family over, there is no family.
well that is not completely true, I have a brother and sister-in-law in Greensboro but they are there and I am here. My father lives in West Virginia with my step mother.
I will spend sometime with my mother and try to be grateful for that.

Once upon a time, in a far away land, Christmas was different with a large seemingly happy extended family who came to our house for Christmas. The four of us, myself, my father, my brother and my mother would share a pleasant idealistic Christmas morning in front of the tree. Those days fade away like mist in the coming day and I find myself looking forward to nothing, having never known love in my own life and having to stand forever on the fringes and watch all the other people find love and family and seemingly wonderful holidays to spend them together.

I no longer ask when will it be my turn.
When will I find and fall in love?
When will I find another family?
When will Christmas hold any special meaning for me again.

There is just nothing.
This year I won't have my dog to sit with.
I will drive home after doing what I do every Christmas Eve for the last 14 years, go to bed, pretend to not be sad or mad, and silently pray that another Christmas Day goes by with no more sadness or madness and that my extended family will be calm, since they are a real mess these days.

There are no gifts. No one to give any to.
Not totally true but than little is. I want to have a certain someone to give things that hold great meaning to and receive the same so that we can say I love you without words but in those gifts as I would imagine.

I am not that bad off.
I have people who care about me.
I have a home and a car and a job and electric power.
because of all this, I do remember the homeless and distraught.
I remember those who have to live with fear.
It makes me grateful, that I can come home alone with no fear other
than the ghosts which whisper up from my past condemning  future.

It's a little bit funny and a little bit mad.
a little bit good and a little bit sad.
I am grateful for all that I get and all that
I have had, but it doesn't change the way things
are much as Christmas and I are not the best
dancing partners so far.

I hope that all of you have it better, and I feel for all of you who have it far worse than me.
I hope that Christmas brings you joy or at very least a reprieve from your troubles.
However this blog finds you, know that I am with you, if you will have me be.

good night.
Godspeed.

and that is life according to Mike 

Cool Stuff

This is the closest thing to a transformer we can get… and you can actually buy this. Sure, it’s not as awesome as a semi-truck at first glance, but that makes the transformation of this humble van that much cooler.

Since the 70’s, VW van has lost its appeal, but this is the VW’s ticket for the future. Just like the original, it tends to people who are free spirited and longing for the great outdoors, but it’s designed for the age of world wide web, iEverything and composite alloys.

See what happens when you push one button on this thing. I can’t believe they  managed to cram all those things inside.

Assassin's Creed Unity Meets Parkour in Real Life

from a awesome group of filmmakers DevinSupertramp

Pentatonix,

this is older but features the abilities and talents very nice.

Here is a more recent showcase of there talent.

cool space stuff, from the European Space Agency.


Just some stuff I saw that i liked and wanted to share, the formatting has problems so I apologize for that but I am going to leave well enough alone then.

Facebook saps creativity and desire to be creative

As crazy as this may sound I am creative, I was born to be an artist or a writer or both but places like facebook while being social and fairly interactive just suck the desire to create anything meaningful out of me. 
Facebook is like alcoholism, I still drink and probably will drink as long as there is a facebook to go to. I do find inspiration there but it's like going to a bar and just having one shot of whiskey before leaving the bar and going back to being creative.
I just get sucked into whatever political nonsense one of my friends is going on about and then all my creativity gets lost and i surrender to World of Warcraft or Xbox and forget that I was ever the artist or writer or both.

Can I quit Facebook?
yes.
Will I quit Facebook?
no.
I need it. I need to master my use of it and make it work for me instead of the other way around.
Also, I am a facebookaholic (I may have made that up) but going cold turkey is not an option as I live in BFE and have little to no social interaction beyond my job.
I need people even in a setting as shallow and meaningless as Facebook. I need to make connections with people.

It's not all bad or all evil, it's just a matter of moderation.
I am going to try facebook at 2 hours a day (max)

I am going to write and be creative for at least 4 hours a day (min).
This is my new resolve and somewhere in all of this find my voice again.

some Advent cool and such stuff.

So here we are at Advent (think Episcopal Christmas -longer than one day - in which us -Episcopalians do weird things like make the world seem better) with acts of giving and receiving and loving instead of stormtrooper shopping and other acts of coldness in this season where we try to remember that a man was once given to this world in order to change it.

Being a Christian should mean more than talking about eternal life and things to do after you are dead. It should be about what you are doing while you are still drawing forth the breath of life and trying to make a better world for all people.
That's what it means to me, it why I chose this belief system and its a good thing if you want to believe that God chose me.

So this is Advent and while some of the world prepares for a single event they call Christmas, for me it is a time to stop and remember that there might just be a greater purpose out there and that might mean that the gift I give be more than some commercially purchased item that I have wrapped in some paper and presented to someone I would rather just spend some time with me more than the 28 LCD LED Monitor I don't really need.

So let's mark this Advent with music, video and song.

COOL STUFF AND WEBSITES

This was one an actual car that I passed in the Mall lot as I strolled back to my car after buying Halo Master Chief Collection.

So World of Warcraft released it's latest expansion and it's pretty cool 

but

this happened last night

All I got to say is WOW

Is this the Dagger I see before my- nevermind

Just go with this Macbethian metaphor

I am partially intrigued and partially disturbed by this new development from Skynet

err- I mean Amazon.

Awesome video from some of my favorite guys

on Comic Book Heros vs. Video Game Heroes

and finally

German village plays prank on neo-Nazis

Residents of Wunsiedel, where Hitler's deputy Rudolf Hess is buried, are tired of yearly invasion of neo Nazis to their village, so they decide neo-Nazis can march for a good cause.

watch the subtitles.

the return of cool stuff

OK GO is back

About the best choreographed and staged and executed music videos I have ever seen.

The song is awesome as well.

And so is the master Chief in Halo 2 Anniversary, a masterful remake that makes me say:

Why don't they remake them all?

Balder's Gate, 

Perfect Dark

Dark Forces

Jedi Knight

Thief

Fallout 3

etc.

Finally, an actual Halo movie, and yes it looks awesome

Who knew he could rap and rap well

and 

smartly

Daniel Radcliffe surprises me.

Horns. 

I don't know if I am ecstatic or nervous,

The book was awesome and twisted.

when they make movies into books I always get nervous.

Still Hunger Games was better than the book (in my opinion)

So I guess we will have to just wait and see.

I love Borderlands and Cosplay

Wish I was younger, thinner and had time for Cons (and Money)

also the Prequel Sequel is pretty Badass(that's a video game not a movie)

BORDERLANDS: THE PREQUEL SEQUEL

that is all.

This is a picture from a Cosplay Fav or mine Byndo Gehk

love her work so much it's on my wall.

Almost bought this DVD without seeing it first.

I admit, I can be impulsive, That guy is called Cage, he's cosplaying 

Edge of Tomorrow.

yea

Cosplay is awesome

and fun.

A Little Musical Accompaniment (may not be SFW)

I can't resist having one more Cosplay bit from

an Awesome media group I just learned about

Beat Down Boogie

which has inspired me to pull this out and begin to reconsider

my own options

Find a way to follow suite on that which makes 

me happy

We will have to see.

In other news, Jim Carrey parodies Matt McConaughey's

car  commercials (worth watching them all)

also anyone missing some kids?

and then there's

Jackie Chan.

as they say.

Argument Invalid.

That is one big whale.

Oh boy.

and that is this week (or month)

according to Mike

First World Problems

Does it take someone like John Green, a person known for blunt honesty- particularly to his own misgivings and the writer of a book that went so viral that an awesome movie was made and suddenly everyone knew his name but only for that movie and book otherwise it like they ignore him, for us to stop and listen to the things that we should stop and listen to?

If you made it through that sentence and understood what I was trying to say, you might find it particularly odd that we first-worlders have enough problems to actually make this blog post exist.
We do, but it may not be what you think it is.
First-World problems, particularly among Americans (USA ones) go like this.

1. Ebola, African Epidemic that is almost incurable and unstoppable save that usually when it runs its course- it will have the dignity to disappear for a time and not bother us anymore. OMG!!!! shut down all flights into the US! close our borders, criticize anyone suggesting we do anything to help those already afflicted. If someone sneezes in the room, quarantine them and complain to anyone within earshot or twitter feed that the Gov't is not even trying to protect us, also remember to blame Ebola on Obama.
2. Climate Change: The world is heating up, ice is melting, carbon monoxide is not being filtered back into oxygen, we are still mining fossil fuels and running electricity as long and as fast as we can manage it.  Nah not really happening, I am not going to feel guilty that I am burning fossil fuels that continue to damage the environment and cause sea levels to rise and poison the atmosphere. I mean, srsly, I need that personal streetlight over my garage all night long, stores really should remain open 24/7. We need more plastic and by plastic I mean new pure plastic.
3. Solar  (and Wind) Power. One of the smartest inventions that uses forces that we have literally endless supplies of. Too expensive to install. Won't let me keep the lights on brighter or longer or run multiple appliances and utilities and electronics at full speed.
4. World Hunger. There are so many places in the world where there is not enough food with nutritional value to help sustain any real quality of life. Give them  Twinkies, I am sooo sick of hearing about starving children in Africa, and don't even get me started on those idiots in Appalachia on Food Stamps, let them eat the cheap generic crap that grocery stores sell as food that I won't eat.
5. Water, and by water I mean clean drinkable water. Water you can safely wash things in, water that you can safely bathe in, never mind drink or water crops with or for that matter get things to grow. It still rains, let them drink that, just bleach it or run it through a septic plant that will sort it out. I mean I need to go buy bottled water because I hate that metallic taste in the public water works. Why should I care about those people.
6. War: It often goes on in spite of everything else. Well, it's not happening here- why should I care as long as American Soldiers are not involved?

I am stopping not so much as there isn't more I could list as I am tired of channeling all the facebook posts and comments and tweets made by First World Complainers who don't understand the ripple effect.

 If I hear someone say: I am just one person, I can't change the world- one more time , 

I will most likely do a lot of screaming.

We can change a little bit of all of those things I listed.

Our worst enemy is not Ebola or Climate Change or Guns or Violence or Abuse or ISIL or 

Obama.

It's denial.

Stop denying that the change starts with you walking instead of driving, 

finding a cause that will actually do what it says it will do,

not threaten a football team on a TV in a bar because they are currently beating your team,

waste water or worse poison it because you are in too much of a hurry to bother disposing something toxic.

This list goes on.

Change the world.

Recycle

Reform

Restrict

Use less, conserve more

but remember to share your wealth with others

without qualifications and restrictions

I am with John Green and all the other who believe that it is our responsibility to change as much of this rock we live on as we can in our lifetimes even if it is just writing a book that makes the next person stop being an irresponsible jerk

and start doing something nicer for the next person that they

meet, even if that person spits in their face.

"If we raise $100,000 for water.org in Ethiopia, Bill Gates will personally match it and we'll be able to get clean water through sustainable wells to 8,000 people in Ethiopia!" -John Green

http://water.org/johngreen

that's one.

It's a wicked, wicked world out there Mikey

Someone asked me the other day, when did i think ISIS would bomb the US.

Is this how far gone we are?

Is our lives and hopes and dreams been reduced to squandering our time watching the News and living in fear that the gun toting, tea partying, radical liberals, ultra conservatives, Muslim Judea Christian fanatical teenage rampaging threat will come down up us and the end will come to all we think we have held as dear and important to our lives?
So that was a long sentence.
Or to be brief: "Has the world gone mad?"

The answer I have is, a simple no.

No, the world is no worse than it has ever been. It is somewhat better, if one stops to consider that the miracle of life and humankind is our ability to not be violent, hateful, apathetic creatures capable of mass murder and pitiless cruelty.

That's what I choose to focus on.
Humankind is historically, a savage and selfish race of beings who often finds it easier to kill, hate and fear the entirety of Creation.
I see the birth of Jesus as a sign that the Creator/Universe decided that we were actually worth bothering with us.
The truth for me is that anyone of us is capable of becoming more than just the base being that is ruled by overpowering emotional instability and jump to conclusions decision making that drives us to do the very horrible things that scare the bejeezers out of my young friend. The miracle of belief is one thing that sets us apart from all of it.

I think the one boon and curse that America had was a reprieve from the world when we were mostly isolationists back in the late 1800s-early 1900s. I mean America was still involved with some of the world, but Americans at large, were nearly completely ignorant of how bad things were. It gave Americans this amazing resilience as we tromped into two World Wars. Then international interference (that was us believing that we knew how everyone should live) and war correspondence- which grew into this amazing form of journalism started the change.
The disappointing result of all this good intention is that Americans as a whole were not welcomed and we quickly wore out our welcome, becoming seen as interlopers, intruders and mostly an annoyance. An annoyance with the most power weapons on earth.
Americans became arrogant and egotistical ('we saved the world") at least- in perception and at best- in reception. Even our allies, stopped thinking of us as this desirable group of self-sacrificing people intent on making the world a better place.
Let me just stop and state that I am speaking from the benefit of broad experience and observation of decades. There were and might even be, are, places that still see America as heroic, self-effacing do-gooders, but they are few because like the rest of humanity, our good intentions and accomplishments are all too often over shadowed and overrun by the worst of what the few do for themselves.
The Quiet American (book/movies) is a perfect example of this.

The saddest loss was that out of the war correspondence/new journalism, our modern media grew into its own right and for several decades shown with its own integrity and accomplishments of truth and knowledge. However, I speak more of how the average American took all this news about our chaotic and tumultuous planet.
Pretty much from the get go out of Korea (following on the heels of victory in WWII) we-as Americans, learned what it was to be afraid. We learned to fear the Red Menace of Communism with its nefarious rise to power and popularity on a global scale.
We watched it's demise decades later, in many ways it is all but extinct.
Did we get a reprieve?
Yes, Berlin wall came down. We celebrated with the world, but we left the party early.
There were rogue nuclear powers and equipment to fear.
It didn't matter, really, the news/media/US world power had found plenty of other threats to scare Americans with by then.
Fast forward (through a ton of triumphs and tragedies) to the present where it's now the Muslim Threat and by Muslim I mean the misguided perception that it's a "Muslim" threat that really has little to do with Islam at all.

I think it is more with the idea that Americans have always been afraid of the world -at large.
The older I get, the more I feel this way and wonder if there was truly ever a time when we (a very young country) were not afraid of the world. In the beginning as Colonies we were constantly threatened by Global powers of the day. It's kind of Miraculous and fortuitous that none of them got determined enough to take us down.
One factor was that it took a long while in the terms of global expansionism for Americans to discover the elements that would normally lead to invasion and subjugation of a land/people. By that point, we were enough of a global power to partake along with the other powers in the subjugation of other less protected countries.
Still, I put this down to pure luck and a total lack of global media.

So, where does that leave us.
My answer is not good. In the broad strokes of History and Art, we are a nation of fearful people who react more than act. Our policies are insane and we cower (as a whole) under the immanent threat of the ever present invisible enemies of which many of them we made or invented.
The media has devolved into a fear-based entertainment/preoccupation disaster that will generate new and old things to fear on a hourly basis.
If, by some miracle, humans stop killing each other and even threatening to kill each other, the media focuses on the weather, geology, pollution, or a rogue asteroid to keep up our addiction to being terrified of the invisible threat that no one (mostly everyone) cannot see.
Which brings me back to ISIS invading us from Mexico.
Not Canada. (sorry Canada- no one ever gives you guys any credit as a threat)

I shall now quote one of my favorite movies:
Fran: *How* is it different? You're just like the rest of them! You think you're different, but you're not, because you're just, you're just really scared! You're really scared to give someone new a go, because you think, you know, they might just be better than you are! Well, you're just pathetic, and you're gutless. You're a gutless wonder! Vivir con miedo, es como vivir a medias!

 Fran: A life lived in fear is a life half lived.

These are from a movie called Strictly ballroom. The quote;  "Vivir con miedo, es como vivir a medias!" has stayed with me since I first saw this movie.
I recognized this same fear within myself since I have lived over half of my 45 years in fear. Fear of nuclear war dominates much of it- although I had plenty of other fears that rode side saddle to that one. I have since stopped being afraid or at least, stopped allowing my fears to rule and determine my life. I want to live, hell I want to dance!

So, let ISIS come (which I doubt they will).
Let Mexico stand up and say that ISIS be damned and the media be damned along with them.
Turn off Fox and CNN and the rest, go find the Truth for yourselves- it is out there.

Stop and realize the world at its very, very worst is still better than it has ever been. Maybe not for some single country but overall more people know peace and happiness than ever before 9this is partly true because there's a helluva lot more people).
Then the wonderful idea might hit you like it hit me.
There is actually enough of us, and by us I mean dreamers, to change the world.
All it takes, is living your life without fear.
I believe that it can be done.
I am going to try
and that is my life according to Mike.

In case you were about to ask, Yes- I am a feminist.

There are many serious problems on the net these days.
Apathy, cruelty and degradation usually come to mind as I navigate through Facebook and Youtube. Many of the three aforementioned terms are there in person or their after effects can be seen if not in the post, then in the comments on the posts.
I don't think people think through things that they post all that much, often the thought strikes a cord with them and they post it without considering the deeper implications of what they have in essence just said about themselves.
Case in point, Sam Pepper, probably never really thought that what he was doing was sexual assault and that through the large number of fans/viewings of his record of embarrassing women that he would leave a trail of wounded and angry women. He packaged his assaults as "prank" videos.
In my opinion, "Prank" videos involve all three of my terms. 
1) Apathy: you purposely go out and cause distress on a person or persons and then show it to the world often without them even knowing what you have just done to them.
2) Pranks are cruel by nature. The damage is incredible. I can speak for myself, I used to think pranks were funny, and they are as long as you aren't the victim or butt of the joke. today most pranks involve violence, shame, and assault and people line up and pay for it. Think Jackass movie and their offspring Wild Boyz and such other forms of garbage.
3) Degradation, the end result of this behavior and popularity is the embarrassment, shame, lessening of a person through the exposure of what you have just done to them. I am guilty of watching prank videos and even laughing at a few. Ricky Gervais is a prime example of this kind of behavior, look at An Idiot Abroad, I could only stand about a half of the first episode before I had to quit because what they did to the "star" and the people they exposed him to was overwhelmingly painful to watch.
Let me draw a line here. Fictional pranking is okay for me- might change because it does make it seem to be acceptable to do. I am referring to passive/non-aggressive acts, not a habitual harassment of a person/persons. Chances are, I probably will have to reassess it at a later date.

As a man, I cannot imagine doing what Sam Pepper has done, repeatedly. 
I have never forced myself on a woman. I usually feel extremely clumsy when I want to kiss someone and have to ask if that is okay, nevermind touching, holding, hugging, groping.
We have seen boys and men do it the movies- almost since movies were first made. The premise, how can any woman resist a handsome leading man.
I am not sure how I would feel if some woman came up and did any of the above to me without so much as a hey ho.
I can say this, though, the first time a group of men oogled me, I was really uncomfortable, so much, in fact- that I did not go back to the Subway restaurant in South Knoxville for a long time (10+ years)

Laci Green is one of my all time heroes. she is bold and brash and honest and if I knew her personally, I would go see her anytime I had a question about my own sexuality nevermind relationships and the rest (she is quite a bit younger than me). Why?
Laci is honest and open about everything. In her blog, her youtube channel, on tour. I do hope to meet her someday since she has helped me so very much.
It was Laci Green that called Sam Peppers hand on his videos. 
She didn't do it in a threatening fashion, she sent him a letter requesting that he remove the offensive material from Youtube. 
I am going to post her most recent video wherein she goes into detail about this disturbing behavior on youtube.



Here are a few testimonials

shirleyhatessam: this is a blog concerning the same

This next one is disturbing and might not be approriate for some. also very painful.

this is kind of a continuationof the above video

Here's the thing, I may have seen a Sam Pepper video, I can honestly say I don't subscribe to him. This kind of video does not appeal to me.
I personally think that Sam Pepper is a scum bag who learned that this behavior was acceptable and even desired by the society in which he lives and by the legions of adoring fans who live out their own desires and fears through his exploits.
I hope that Sam Pepper will take responsibility for his actions but I doubt that he will.
Like it or not, he is a sexual predator that may get away with his deviance. 
He is paying for it.

As a society we can no longer stand by and allow this to continue, those victims are our children, our sisters, our friends, our wives, girlfriends.

If standing up for the victims and condemning their aggressors makes me a feminist
then perhaps you should reconsider the word and what you think it means.

And that is life according to Mike 

small voices mostly in print. Another post on bullying and the destruction that surrounds us everyday.

I am mostly going to share videos and other's blogs here, since they speak such volumes about what is turning out to be a epidemic. But first I am going to post a MEME that a school teacher posted on Facebook a week or two ago that really bothers me.

the comments made on this post  basically said, children should stand up for themselves and fight back. That you can stop being a victim by learning to cope with your situation and deal with the abuse because, and I love this, we cannot end bullying. It's just the way things are.
Needless to say, I kind of lost it. I posted a couple of replies which were met with derision and apathy by the poster's friends. Then it hit me, you cannot reason with stones anymore than you can stop a river with only your hands. Maybe there is no stopping bullying and maybe we should learn to live with the aggression.... like hell, I will not quit. I have to try, and so does anyone who loves their children enough to stop for 5 seconds and consider what this says.
The only way to fight fire is with fire.
or
overcome violence by becoming violent.
I was upset and I removed my replies and even blocked someone who came across like the perfect asinine bully I pretty much despised since my youth.
What is more we cannot all be bullies or fighter or "survivors."
We aren't all made that way and what I lost as a child and a man because I fought back (and mostly lost) cannot be replaced. As I have said before and will say again, even at 46, there is still a part of me that is the crying child who does not understand why everyone hated him and so many tried to hurt him. I still hear his voice in my head.

I was ready to just leave all this behind me, that I had said enough, but then Linda Palmer (musician and a fine human being) reminded me of why we cannot stop resisting this travesty, why we need to find a better way to live and raise children.
Here is her blog entry:
Amanda Palmer: on internet hatred: please inquire within.
note, this is some serious reading as it is continued for several blogs.
The gist of the blog was that while Amanda Palmer was ego surfing after her album success she ran across a negative article about her and ended up googling "hate Amanda Palmer" and noticed that the search field had Hate Amanda Todd before herself.
So she googled Amanda Todd and found a tragedy that is being repeated at an alarming rate.

This is Amanda Todd.

I should say this was. But I am going to remember that her struggle is still with us.
Here is the video that she made:

This profoundly affected Amanda Palmer who has since joined in what I hope to be the change that one day will save our children from similar fates.
This is my comment on her blog. I just wanted to say, hey, it's all well and good to fight back and while survival stories can be good for moral and survival, I don't believe it solves anything, it might stop the bullies from bullying you but they will just find someone else to bully:

"I'd quote MLK but even I understand this need for self defense, there are so many people out there in pain who have decided to share their pain by hurting other people as someone most likely hurt them (not counting sociopaths). Survivor stories are all well and good. I am a survivor as well, but my scars run deep. I was bullied in 2 countries and 5 schools and it didn't matter whether I fought back (and I did- even to the point of becoming one of the bullies myself- yes that line is very thin and all too easy to cross), I would point out that I lost way more fights than I won and while I am glad that some of you fought back once and it was over for you, it was never over for me. I survived high school only to find the junior college was as bad, the rest of college/university gets better and adulthood usually means that the physical battery should end, then emotional/intellectual/spiritual battery continues and people will dismiss this as "well that's just life."
It does matter how big you are or how many martial arts you take. If you are victimized, it can, it will follow you around. I buried my memories, some so deep that they did not disturb me until I hit my forties. Then it almost killed me to have to remember what was done to me in my youth. The bullies are still there, they just have better jobs or positions or such and they will continue to try to make you afraid, intimidate you. 
It's true. It's a fact of life. You can survive it. I do, but my scars still show.
What I say is this. We have the power and the responsibility to every kid who is not going to survive this, is not going to win that fight, that is going to be killed by a bully or give up and commit suicide. We owe it to ourselves and our children and their children and every child to change our society so that no one has to stand up for themselves, that there is no need for a bat or the continuation of violence in order to survive. That childhood can be about something more than coping and dealing with being different or not fitting in. 
I don't want another child to have to learn to survive/fight back the way that I did. Most won't make to adulthood, many of those who do will not make it much past the guilt and shame that comes with that survival.

I want something more. I want to know that I have done something to change the world, even if it is just one kid who doesn't have to get a bat and prolong the violence that is destroying our future."

This is Olivia Liv Penpraze

The Martin Luther King Jr. quote is this:

The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, 

begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. 

Instead of diminishing evil, it multiplies it.

Through violence you may murder the liar, 

but you cannot murder the lie, nor establish the truth. 

Through violence you may murder the hater, 

but you do not murder hate. 

In fact, violence merely increases hate. 

So it goes. 

Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, 

adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars. 

Darkness cannot drive out darkness: 

only light can do that. 

Hate cannot drive out hate: only love can do that.

On a somewhat lighter/brighter note I will close with this little bit of sunlight.

What you can do or where you can start:

Amanda Todd Legacy Society

Light Up the World Purple

https://www.facebook.com/stopcyberbullying

https://www.facebook.com/dontstandbystandup

I choose anti-bullying

www.stopbullying.gov/

Pacer's National Bullying Prevention Center

and finally this one, I like it the most.

The Bully Project

I just want to know that I can tell that child inside of me, that I stood up and made a difference, 

maybe he will find the comfort that never came while I was that child.

and that's life according to Mike

So, 9/11....awkward silence.

9/11 or September 11 is actually my brother's anniversary and I spend that day for them and the success of their marriage.
Then the world (well the US and the Internet show videos and make sales and profoundly short sighted statements about the Human Tragedy that has come to be commonly know as 9/11 which was after my brother and sister-in-law got married.
Don't ask me on 9/11 about 9/11, I want that day to be their day.

There is no national graveyard to mark the passing of so many lives who had little to do with why they were chosen to die on that fateful day. Those who lived through the mortal danger and crippling loss would and will carry the scars long after the rest of the country stops marking the date on the calendars and having sales and advertising that their company remembers the moment when American innocence would be irrefutably lost in a matter of hours and we as a body would lash out at another country that had nothing to do with the attack (Iraq).
The years go by and people seem to have stopped asking why and how this tragedy occurred. it wasn't the first, nor will it likely be the last. It was profound and what was done to this country may never be undone. At least for this generation anyway,
Now we are afraid.
Terrorists 1, US 0.
Yes, we have struck back at those who perpetrated this action, well those who did not die in the deliverance of the fear that consumes us daily as we reel from one shooting to another bombing to another mass loss of security and belief in our overall invulnerability as we blame each other and let the strife that the 9/11 attackers hoped to sow in US grow to fruition.
The politicians and the media at large beat their collective breasts and chests and drums as we Americans march on to what ever cause they wish us to funnel our energy, our hate, our money, our children into fighting for them and their agendas.
There are no real monuments to what we have lost because of this day-


unless you are one to stop and consider the mountains of skulls that we have piled in necropolises world wide as our leaders have funneled our collective horror and rage into one war or the next where the numbers of innocents that have been slaughtered in the name of this day have far exceeded the by comparison insignificant amount who died to bring us to this moment of shame.
Yes, I feel shame.
I feel shame when I would speak to the dead civilians of Iraq and Afghanistan and say that we had a right to invade and destroy and rape and pillage their homes in the name of whatever god and moral imperatives out leaders attached to the reasons we should give for doing such things to these people now long dead.
I feel shame when I see our own lies and truths turned on us as we try to be what God and Jesus and His other messengers have asked or demanded of us to do. I feel like I stand upon a precipice and by not doing something like marching into a Nuclear Weapons facility and pouring blood out over the uncaring Federal Monster that I have helped create, I might as well be the tank that crushes the mortal remains of the fallen that we claimed were our enemy even though most of them have never seen much less heard of the World Trade Centers.
I feel shame when I consider those poor people who died in the fiery inferno that was 9/11 and try to explain to their ghosts that we made thousands and thousands of people pay for what a very few men did to them.
I feel shame because many of us don't look to their brothers and sisters and mothers and fathers and children and say what else can I do to help you survive without those who died in this tragedy from day to day.
I feel shame that we still have not learned that what we should be doing is holding up all men and women and children as precious orbs of life and potential and remembering that we, as Americans, should be better than what we have become that we could be the beacon of hope in the long night that surrounds the world.
That instead of war and endless vengeance that we be candles in the darkness promising that this world can become better than what it is now.

and that is what I choose to fill the awkward silence of 9/11 with.
a prayer for US all.

and that is life according to mike.

stuff on net Nuetrality

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John Oliver's call to Arms (click empty space above)

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College Humors take on the matter (maybe NSFW)

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PBS Idea Channel Mike Rugnetta

(today the video link will be blank)

AS YOU CAN HEAR BUT NOT SEE, THE VIDEOS ARE BLOCKED OUT AS A PART OF TODAY'S PROTEST

Why is it important?

Do you want to pay to access Imgur, Facebook, Tumblr?

or 

Netflix, Espn (more than you already pay and still get blackouts)?

Do you want to pay for internet access and then have to pay for a subsription like HBO in addition to your Internet access?

If you said yes, then I think you took a wrong turn back around common sense and freedom of thought.

You are in the wrong place.

I would offer to link you to a better site, but I lost my hyperlink to the Centauri Blackhole.

If you said no, then get off you behind and pay attention.

It was bad enough with the RIAA and MPAA screaming

about downloading music and movies.

This will be so much worse.

For myself I am for an open internet.

I am for competition since the Internet providers do not

compete.

don't believe the ads. 

It's regional.

And that's

the internet according to Mike.

Life gets in the way sometimes

And since Life gets in the way,  this is where I post regularly.


https://www.facebook.com/accordingtomike.net



if you have facebook of course

On things cold and frenzied- I mean the Ice Bucket Challenge.

So why did I do it?

Becuase it is a good thing to do, if by doing it, others will view and consider doing the same and by doing so spread the idea that even a simple person like them can inspire others to try and change the world.

or 

simply, find a way to give back to life.

I donated to the ALSA.org 

and then I did this with my friend, Allan Burgess.

As to the water preservers, I respect your choice, but in all honesty, we used less water than most people take baths/showers or flush toliets with.

Where did our water go?

Into the earth and sky. 

It's not wasted water.

There is a reason behind it being ice water.

It's a symbolic way you share with the victims of ALS, a familar sensation.

As to those who think this is all hype, the ALSA has been trying to raise awareness and funding for research and treatment for a long time. This year, they found a means to bring in so much more money than they ever had in previous attempts.

Why fault their success.

any info is sometimes better than no info or effort.

You can go to their Community of Hope page and find a different cause/flag to raise awareness and funds through, you can donate in memorium of someone you knew and loved.

you can create your own cause.

You can give to another fund altogether.

The point for me, the stepping off point- persay was

that this was something I could do and promote.

and that is life according to Mike