Questions from Sam's Survey

1. Have you ever been flying in anything but an airplane?

I sure haven't.

2. Where all have you traveled? Where has been the best and worse of them?

I have traveled in Germany and I have been to Wichita, KS.... Sierra Vista, AZ.... Clarksville, TN.... Nashville, TN.... San Diego, CA.... Bakersfield, CA..... North Carolina.... Indiana.... Throughout New Mexico.... Lake Patagonia, AZ....
My best place has been Datil Wells, NM and my worst place has been Sierra Vista, AZ.

3. Were you considered popular in high school? Why or why not?

No, I kept to myself mostly.

4. Do you dance like crazy, when no one is looking?

Nope.

5. What is one hobby or skill you want to improve on?

Whittling.

6. What do sing in the shower, if you do sing?

Gary Jules songs, or the parts I know at least.

7. What was interesting about your day, today?

A lot of the demos in Physics were really interesting, we're working on waves right now and got to do some cool stuff with a speaker designed to emitt all kinds of frequencies.

8. If you were going to be stuck on a deserted island, which 5 books, movies, people and foods would you take along?

Books:
1. Clan of the Cave Bear
2. Jurassic Park
3. The Chosen
4. One of the "People of" books
5. The Stranger

Movies:
1. The Postman
2. The Wizard of Oz
3. Walking with Dinosaurs
4. Pan's Labyrinth
5. Pete's Dragon

People:
1. Sam
2. Byron
3. CD
4. Adin 
5. Jen

Foods:
1. Schnitzel
2. Green Beans
3. Rice
4. Potatoes
5. Cabbage

9. If you could be any sports star, who would you be? Why?

Brett Favre, before he decided to come out of his few month retirement.  He was good at what he did and he enjoyed doing it for the sake of the game.  He could have retired at any point and been at the top for himself.

10. What is your favorite professional sport teams?

Miami Dolphins.

11. What is your favorite college sport team?

I never really had a favorite by any means, I'd have to go with the Ohio State Buckeyes, because their the college sports team that's worth keeping track of.

12. What were the three happiest moments in your life so far?

1. Collecting walnuts in my grandfather's backyard.
2. Meeting Sam as Sam.
3. Camping

13. What was your favorite toy when you were a kid?

Legos!

14. What is your ideal marriage?

Honesty, Trust, Responsibility, and Involvement.

15. Who are your top five friends to go out to a movie with?

Byron and Sam are the only ones I've gone out to movies with recently, but I could add Kurt, Nellery and Chris to round out the list.

16. If you were a geometric shape what would you like to be?

Triangle.

17. If you were a bird or an animal what would you like to be?  why?

I would like to be a pigeon or a crow.  I love the idea of flying.

18. What animal or bird do you think your best friend should be?

Sam would be a cat, probably a mountain lion; Byron would be a condor probably; CD would be a bunny.

19. Which is the song you can associate with my image?

There are way too many that you've been good about listening to and that I've heard for me to just choose one.

20. What would you cook for my birthday dinner?

Hard to say since your tastes are changing so much.  I would probably go with something from scratch though that was well-rounded.

21. What dish would you like me to cook for your birthday dinner?

Chili, or stew, or steak, or any of your own personal dishes.

22. How do you describe yourself in a sentence?

Actively seeking to make a difference in our lives.

23. How do you describe me in a sentence?

You.

24. Do you like to describe what you see in the clouds?

I don't do it very often.

25. Do you like answering questions to kids?

I sure do.

26. What do you think would be like if we met 3 years before we did?

I have no idea, I would have been pretty young, and you would have been pretty busy, it's hard to imagine.

27. Cats or dogs or other? If other.. what pet?

I agree, all of them!

29. Fave. celebrity (female)?

Vanna White

30. Fave. celebrity (male)?

Bruce Willis

31. Fave. singer (group)?

Guns N' Roses

32. Fave. singer (individual)?

Gary Jules

33. Are you Vegetarian or vegan? If one of those, which one are you and for how long?

No.

34. What do you think is the most useless thing you learned in high school and still remember?

Probably anything from "Great Expectations" that I would have learned.

35. What was your favorite subject in school?

Latin.

36. What is your planned major for college? If in college what was the major you picked and the current/final major you had in college?

Education.

37. What do you think you would be 20 years from now?

Living life the way it ought to be lived.

38. Are you interested in charity? Why and what types?

Yes, I volunteer somewhat actively.

39. Do you think your name reflects who you are? Why (or why not)?

I have no idea, are names supposed to reflect who we are?  I have a very common name.

40. When you spend time alone, what is your favourite things to do?

Read.

41. What event has had a huge impact on your life?

Meeting Sam.

42. When your brain is on idle, what do you tend to think about?

Seemingly random things, I try to work out problems and ideas in my own mind.

43. What annoys you the most about a human being?

Confusion.

44. What characteristics do you admire most in a person?

Honesty and backing up what they say or do.

45. Who is your favourite person? And why. Try to steer clear of the family members.

I don't know.

46. What is  ONE MAJOR plan you have for your life?

To learn more about myself.

47. Is there anything about yourself that makes you self-conscious?

My ineptitude when it comes to social interaction.

48. What do you love the most about yourself.

Potential.

49. Though this question is totally cliche, can you share with me something about yourself that you've never shared with anyone?

I can share anything with you.

50. What does love mean to you?

A strong feeling for someone or something that changes who you are because of your own involvement.

51. What about being in love?

See marriage above.

52. What subjects make you feel uncomfortable (i.e. politics)?

Gossip and unchecked "facts" about any subject make me feel uncomfortable.

53. Do you have a theory on life? (What is it?)

Life is what you make it, and what you put into it.

54. What is your outlook on life?

It's a positive one.

Politics

I was going to do a post about creepy similarities between some campaigning posters I had seen this election year and some old propaganda posters from World War II, but while I was looking up some neat-o pictures to share, and make my point, I found nearly all of them on sites talking about the exact same thing I was going to, and at the same time taking it pretty far. That means they didn't just compare the pictures, but rather went to great lengths so that they could put Obama on the same side of the coin as Hitler and others. I'm not trying to focus on President-Elect Obama with this posting here, but rather on politics in general, throughout the last few decades especially.

To me it doesn't seem like there has been much difference in the way campaigns have been run and advertised. I suppose that "if it ain't broke don't fix it" is the philosophy which many campaign advisers run with. I say this because they are using the same kinds of propaganda that were used decades ago, even by people who didn't necessarily stand for the same thing. Here is where some of the neat-o pictures come into play.





The election hasn't been over too long, and there are a lot of people who have been pretty lazy about taking down those lawn signs, and those Obama or McCain bumper stickers will be plaguing us for years to come, so I'm sure that most of you recognize those pictures.







The reason I compare to "negative" campaign/ propaganda posters is to make the point that it doesn't really matter much which side the person, politician, is representing, the ad campaign basically remains the same.

I'd like to use that as a platform from which I can talk about what really got to me about the whole thing. The two main candidates in this election, as well as the media, kept preaching about CHANGE the entire time, through all of it. I'd like to credit Obama for getting us all started on that kick, not because he most emulates change, but because he's the one I heard say that word over and over and over before I heard anyone else say it that many times in a row.

I'm not against change, change is good, right now in politics, especially in this country, change is necessary. What gets my goat is that it's a lie. What's going to change, honestly? Let's start with the first and most obvious aspect, how are the lives of most American residents going to change? Not all that much, if at all. Have any of you (who are not making more than, oh, say 70K per year) really noticed that much of a difference in your lives because of the political happenings over the last twenty years if you're old enough? When Clinton went into office, did your lives change drastically? How about when Bush took office? I think that for most of you, the honest answer would be "not really, but we had some neat stuff to talk about at the office."

I don't understand how things are truly going to change when campaigns were run the same way as they have been for the last however many decades, in multiple countries, by multiple cultures, by any side you can imagine. Obama is black, that's a good change, that he could be elected President, but beyond that, what is he going to do that is that much different from what's already going on? He has promised a lot of things, but just looking at it from a legal point of view, he can't do most of those things on his own, he needs Congress. Now, I'll grant that Congress is now mostly Democratic and thus Obama is probably more likely to be agreed with, that still doesn't mean that he can wave a wand and make it happen (not at all referencing time there).

You know how I think change could have truly come to our country? If you (meaning the Americans eligible to vote) had elected a candidate who did minimal, if any known, advertising. If a candidate who really did have revolutionary (meaning new, not violent uprising) ideas to bring to the White House. On election night, I saw my first and only glimpse of any candidate other than Obama or McCain on the news. The only other place I ever saw them was on a blog my wife posted. Their names were right underneath the main two on the ticker keeping track of votes. (for those interested, I never saw any of the "minor" candidates vote counts exceed a couple of thousand). Obama is a member of the same party that has been around for years and years (and held office a few times). How is electing another member of the same governing group really change?



For the most part, the media is to blame. They give little if any airtime to independents and don't even whisper their names. Anyone who isn't a democrat or a republican has to fight tooth and nail to even have a hope of getting to be part of a debate. I don't think many people realize how much free publicity the main candidates get just from "speculation" shows on most news channels; of course they have oodles and oodles of money to pay for ads, but that only makes up a small portion of their exposure. So few voters are willing to research any candidates on their own, so if the news doesn't mention them, they don't exist. I actually heard someone saying this in response to other candidates being brought up: "I thought Nader was the other guy running." Not even aware there were other people in the race, or that there could be other people in the race.

Then there is such a danger of being ridiculed if a person is "brave" enough to support one of the "other" candidates. I'm sure it's been said more than once to an independent, "don't you want your vote to count?" or better yet "why are you wasting your vote?" Another way that any true "change" is kept from ever actually happening. Obama is going to be a politician in the traditional sense, he has no real new ideas, just "innovative" ways to toggle current ones.

Things haven't changed in the world of politics in ages, and they haven't changed in America since they slid into a two party system.

I'm not being critical of Obama, or McCain, or Bush, or Clinton, or any of the people who may have won or lost. I'm being critical of the idea that "change is here!" when in fact it's a farce. Thinking about it, there was more change after folks like Hitler came into power, whether it was good or bad change, it was true change.