Care to answer any of these questions?

Remember when grandparents and  great-grandparents stated that they only had an 8th grade  education? Well, here is what you had to know in 1895.

This is the eighth-grade final exam from 1895 in Salina, Kansas , USA. It was taken from the original document on file at the Smokey Valley Genealogical Society and Library in Salina and reprinted by the Salina Journal.   

8th Grade Final Exam:
Salina, KS - 1895  
Grammar  (Time, one hour)
1. Give nine rules for the use of capital letters.
2. Name  the parts of speech and define those that have no modifications
3. Define verse, stanza  and paragraph
4. What are the  principal parts of a verb? Give principal parts of 'lie,''play,' and 'run.'
5. Define case;  illustrate each case.
6 What is punctuation? Give rules for  principal marks of punctuation.
7 - 10. Write a composition of  about 150 words and show therein that you understand the practical  use of the rules of grammar.
  
Arithmetic  (Time,1 hour 15  minutes)
1. Name and define the Fundamental Rules of Arithmetic.
2.  A wagon box is 2 ft. Deep, 10 feet long, and 3 ft. Wide. How many  bushels of wheat will it hold?
3. If a load of wheat weighs  3,942 lbs., what is it worth at 50cts/bushel, deducting 1,050  lbs. For  tare?
4. District No 33 has a valuation of $35,000.  What is the necessary levy to carry on a school seven months at  $50 per month, and have $104 for incidentals?
5. Find the cost  of 6,720 lbs. Coal at $6.00 per ton.
6. Find the interest of  $512.60 for 8 months and 18 days at 7 percent.
7. What is the  cost of 40 boards 12 inches wide and 16 ft.. Long at $20 per  metre?
8. Find bank discount on $300 for 90 days  (no grace) at 10 percent.
9. What is the cost of a square farm  at $15 per acre, the distance of which is 640 rods?
10. Write  a Bank Check, a Promissory Note, and a Receipt
  
U.S.  History (Time, 45 minutes)  1. Give the epochs into  which U.S. History is divided
2.  Give an account of the discovery of America by Columbus
3. Relate the causes and  results of the Revolutionary War.
4. Show the territorial  growth of the United States
5. Tell what you can of  the history of Kansas
6. Describe three of the  most prominent battles of the Rebellion.
7. Who were the  following: Morse, Whitney, Fulton, Bell, Lincoln, Penn, and Howe?
8. Name events connected with the following dates: 1607, 1620,  1800, 1849, 1865.
  
Orthography  (Time, one hour)  [Do we even  know what this is??]
1. What is meant by the following: alphabet, phonetic,  orthography, etymology, syllabication
2. What are elementary sounds? How classified?
3.  What are the following, and give examples of each: trigraph, subvocals, diphthong, cognate letters,  linguals
4. Give four substitutes for caret 'u.' (HUH?)
5.  Give two rules for spelling words with final 'e.' Name two exceptions under each rule.
6. Give two uses of silent letters  in spelling. Illustrate each.
7. Define the following prefixes and use in connection with a word: bi, dis-mis, pre, semi, post, non, inter, mono, sup.
8. Mark  diacritically and divide into syllables the following, and name  the sign that indicates the sound: card, ball, mercy, sir, odd, cell, rise, blood, fare, last..
9.  Use the following correctly in sentences: cite, site, sight, fane, fain, feign, vane, vain, vein, raze, raise, rays.
10. Write 10 words frequently mispronounced and indicate pronunciation by use of diacritical marks
And by syllabication.
 
Geography  (Time, one hour)
1 What is climate? Upon  what does climate depend?
2. How do you account for the extremes of climate in Kansas  ?
3. Of what use are  rivers? Of what use is the ocean?
4. Describe the mountains of North America
5. Name and describe the  following: Monrovia, Odessa, Denver, Manitoba, Hecla, Yukon, St. Helena, Juan Fernandez, Aspinwall and Orinoco
6. Name and locate  the principal trade centers of the U.S. Name all the republics of Europe and give the capital of each.
8. Why is the Atlantic Coast colder than the  Pacific in the same latitude?
9. Describe the process by which  the water of the ocean returns to the sources of rivers.
10.  Describe the movements of the earth. Give the inclination of the  earth.
The student were given five hours to complete the exam, and gives the saying 'he only had an 8th grade education' a whole new  meaning.

Tea Party People

Yeah, they confuse me. I mean, seriously, where have these people been?!? I read an article in the NYTimes about said tea party-ers here and it got me seriously thinking about these people...who are they and where did they come from, primarily. So, I started doing some math.

1960--the beginning of the wild times when just about everything changed in the US. Welcome in the generation that ends with love, sex, and drugs, JFK and LBJ and eventually protesters of the Vietnam war. So, pretty much our baby boomers People who in 1970 were about 20 years old. 40 years later, these people are about 60. For some of us, these are our parents, for others, our grandparents (by us I mean the 20 year olds of today).

But for some reason, I don't see a bunch of Vietnam draft burners being the primary "out of the woodwork" movers and shakers of the Tea Party Movement. And I'm going to put all my money down that at least 50% of the Tea Party Movement (with me being conservative, because my gut says closer to 70%) are right around 45 years old.

And I think I'm right. Glenn Beck comes in right at 46 years old. The "Alex P. Keaton" generation, I'm going to start calling it. Think about it. In 1984 these kids were turning 20 years old, entering college and everything was about "The Reagan". Republicanism was the "it thing" to combat the hippies that are their parents. What are the most beloved movies of the 1980s? The "Brat Pack"--a bunch of upper middle class suburban yuppies whose biggest fear is to belong to the wrong clique in high school. If I was a 45 year old member of the Tea Party Movement I would HAVE to agree with this analysis because otherwise, they are just a bunch of uninformed ignorant soccer moms and accountants who have NO idea what they are actually doing.

THIS is the problem with the Tea Party People--where the hell were you 10 years ago?!? Where were you 6 years ago?! IF they are for a more fiscal conservative government, why was it okay for Bush to be reelected in 2004?--they claim today that they disagree with his increasing the national debt for the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, but I guess that didn't matter 6 years ago. I guess the fact that the government was allowing businesses to pull the crap that they did to set the stage for the financial meltdown 10 years ago wasn't so important. I think I'm more worried about the fact that these people are suddenly getting into the whole politics scene than about what they actually stand for. It's like, where were you when your 16 year old kids asked you why you could vote for a person like that back in 2004?

I do support the Tea Party Movement (as you will hear true from most 20 year old democratic-libertarians) HOWEVER! Those who think like me, and I tend to think of myself as a very moderate central leaning person of the majority, will tell you that we do NOT agree with destroying the US government as it was established 230 years ago. The system is as perfect as it can be, given the fact that people are greedy and sometimes stupid beings. There MUST be checks and balances and all the rest that our system incorporates. The problem? It's the same problem as 1910--PLEASE watch "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington". It's a bunch of Fat, Greedy Cats who are doing what they can to make a quick buck while pretending to represent their constituents. If you want to reform Washington, you have to send honorable people there. It's not impeaching one man who HASN'T DONE ANYTHING! I don't understand this whole call to reform the presidency when REALLY Congress has ALL the power. Will I say that Obama has failed to pass anything of any importance? Yes. Why couldn't he pass anything? Congress. Why is the Health Care Bill full of tons of (literal) shit? Obama didn't write it (and he sure as hell better not sign it as is)--Congress did.

You show me a congress willing to accept term limits and who will take a pay cut and I'll show you a better Federal Government. Quit focusing on who will be president in 2012 (*cough, I'm not voting for Palin even if I have to vote Satan instead)--focus on the fact that guys have been serving 35 terms and DYING in office--really--have they made your life ANY better?

Finally. An excellent idea.

 I just read this article and I'm quite impressed.

By the way, my 10th grade class (gosh, 5 years ago) also agreed with me when I mentioned that this is how high school is run in many other countries.

"Money" is just paper.

I'm totally going to buy my new computer with cowry shells. Seriously, though, how rich do you think those poor people would be if they could actually "sell" their actual worth? I honestly think a carpenter is worth more than a CEO, but that's just me and my love of the barter system as the way to undermine the big banks.

http://www.theonion.com/content/news/u_s_economy_grinds_to_halt_as

Q/A with professor about Global Warming

1st off, this starts out reading like some of the labs I wrote in Ecology and will write in other Envi. Sci. courses. "Statistically Significant" is the bane of my existence--I hated statistics when I took it and I hate trying to remember (i.e. not screw up) whether a number bigger than alpha means it's significant or whether it's supposed to be lower than alpha to be significant. And seriously, just because a number isn't statistically significant doesn't mean that it isn't a hell of a lot close enough to be so.

As for the "trick" seems to me that taking KNOWN inaccurate data out of the mix. In other words he was using tree-ring data which did not correspond with known data measured by instruments, so there was obviously an error in the tree-ring data which is much harder to measure accurately. Trust me, I know a LOT about inaccurate data gathering, which is why I don't plan to become a real scientist.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8511670.stm

Jon Stewart on The Factor

Definitely should be watched. I still think Jon gets a WIN. O'Reilly won't let Jon speak. Like every time Jon says something important, O'Reilly talks over him/brings up something stupid.

The customer is always right...

...sometimes. I've heard the old adage numerous times throughout my life. The closest chain pizza shop to my house had 2 rules behind the counter: "#1 The Customer is always right. #2, see #1."

So, imagine my surprise when I came across this site which gives anecdotes of all the stupid stuff shop workers, tech support, etc. go through on an almost daily. But this site thrives on how dumb people can be.

I was quite surprised to read this article which talks about service in France where equality is a must.

I guess it all centers around the fact that service workers are people too and no one should take this common statement to much to heart. Sometimes the customer isn't right and sometimes the worker is just plain rude.

American's Charged for Child Trafficking in Haiti

Yeah, what a bunch of Dumb-A$$es. Seriously, there is NOTHING that differentiates them from other child traffickers--hence the importance of PAPERWORK!! Just another case of overenthusiastic volunteers who think they can change the world without having a CLUE as to how to do it! Yeah, I've had experiences with that type of person who has no concept of reality. I have my own healthy dose of naivete, but at least I know that while it may seem stupid to an overall good person, there is a reason behind the madness. There can't be a double standard for those who "claim" good intentions, because no child trafficker is going to say "hey, I'm just going to take your kid and sell him into slave labor". 

However, I am surprised to hear that they got charged, but then again, what they did is against a clear law--that there must be proper paperwork to cross country lines with children which are not yours. Maybe this will be a WIN for the common sense movement. So, to end, good luck ladies. Sorry about your situation, but you really should have known better. Hopefully your sentence isn't too tough and will keep other people like you from  trying the same dumb act.

Charging MPs for theft in the UK.

So, how come we don't have this kind of control over OUR congressmen?!?!

A new way to think about marriage.

Being gay in China tells the stories of 3 men in China about their experiences as being gay there.

Funny. So many people who are so deathly afraid of allowing gay marriage would ALSO be terrified that the government would put such a restriction on people's lives as China does.


Here's an American blogger's view on internet in China. As I have a friend currently stuck behind the great firewall in China, it isn't a myth that sites are blocked. I'm just glad that she isn't in this specific area--where she is is much more open.

***
With the recent start to get rid of "Don't ask, Don't tell", I was quite happy to see this letter from a gay pilot who is in the process of being unfairly discharged. I hope that this will finally bring to light the fact that not every gay is a "flamer" and that most are just like straights in their life goals, etc--it's just who they want to be romantically with that is different.

Paying for Health Care

I came up with this plan when Health Care was first brought to my attention when I was about 16 years old (I guess this was the 2004 election). And you know, I think it's a pretty reasonable plan: Let's make every state, city, county, whatever the same as a corporation.

Hear me out. Okay, so when businesses decide to offer insurance to their employees they start looking for the company that is willing to give the most "bang for their buck". Generally the agreement between business and employee is that both will pay half, maybe more depending. But, pretty much the business will let the insurance companies fight over who will get the deal. The bigger the business, the more higher the proportion of healthy people to not--the healthy people will end up paying for the care the non-healthy need. This is the problem with the private insurance situation--not enough healthy people buy it because they're healthy--why need it. So. The business gets the best deal, the employees pay the least price, and the insurance companies make money--trifecta of win for all.

So, here's my grand scheme. Use the same system, but with the government as the deciding factor (like the CEO ultimately decides on the insurance company of choice, so does the top Government official). The area used can really be anything--city, state, county, whatever. Just not country because that would be a monopoly and make the whole system redundant. And then we let all the current insurance companies fight over the areas. Everyone will "buy" places with really healthy people, and grudgingly take the places with all the unhealthy people. So to be fair, all areas will be ranked with proportion of obesity for the given population. The more lower ranked an area is, the higher they can take from the healthy areas (so the company that takes the "sickest" area also has access to the "healthiest")--the only rule is that by the end of the day, ALL areas must have a sponsoring insurance company. Pricing for the policies will be based on income with those who make more paying a more "traditional" price (no one is allowed to be charged more than they would pay for a traditional private policy), BUT the minimum policy is one where you get 1 free check-up a year and coverage for any bill over $2000 and a co-pay of whatever is normal for doctor/ER/whatever visits and tests. I think my parents pay $100 a month to cover 4 people with this kind of service--but I might be COMPLETELY wrong--I haven't had to buy insurance yet and haven't paid too much attention to it. The insurance company can decide on pricing. And the government (the one in charge of insurance decisions) will pay our of our taxes those costs over the amount expected by everyone to pay. For example: the insurance company sets the price of that basic policy at $100 a month, but the government decides that someone making less than $15,000 a year can only afford $50 in insurance a month--the government will pay the difference. However, the government will ONLY pay the difference between what they expect someone to be able to pay and the amount of the cheapest policy. Should a person decide to sign up for a more expensive policy, they are responsible for everything over the amount allotted (so, if they are deemed able to pay $50, and the cheapest policy is $100, but the person wants the $200 policy, they have to pay the $150 not covered by the government's $50 grant out of their pocket). The amount the person pays in sales tax should more than pay for the difference in their insurance policy.

Now, someone who makes $100,000 a year can choose to purchase the basic policy and it will only cost them $100 a month, even though the government has decided that they should be able to pay $500 a month for better service (or whatever). The insurance company decides on the prices, so it's not like they're going to lose money on this policy. And no currently held policies will be ended. The only law that affects the public is that EVERYONE must purchase an insurance policy there are no exceptions. (Okay, the Amish just claimed to be exempt, and I'm willing to give it to them since pretty much the world can "end" tomorrow and they will survive. They don't need internet or fancy hospitals. But I just looked up the Amish on Wikipedia and I think that having a church "insurance" policy is quite sufficient.)

And the government in charge of insurance will be allowed to seek a better policy yearly as part of the law. However, in all cases, no ones' policy rate can be risen by such a move. If the insurance company decides to raise it's rate, there must be 3 months notice in advance so that all parties can decide to change companies privately or choose to keep the same policy at the higher rate--those who can no longer afford the cheapest policy will get a government grant of the difference. But if the government decides to change companies, they cannot do so if it means that current policies will be more expensive (that they are choosing to go to a company which the cheapest policy is $115 when the current cheapest policy is $100 is illegal) unless the new policy offers more services, though this can be debatable as there is a minimum policy standard for a reason. However, in this case, the government will be paying the difference, so it will not cost the individuals for the payment increase.

Initially, the distribution of insurance companies nationwide will be even--in a sort of NFL draft pick like system the companies will choose with each government making the final decision. Then, after 1 year the governments can decide whether another company could do a better job. I'm less concerned about how companies are placed with an area than the way in which the policies are distributed.

However.The prices set as area prices are not available to those outside of the area. If you work for AIG, you cannot get the discount price for employees of Hot Topic, so the same standard is true for the area policies. But, of course, the individual insurance companies can decide to offer the discount price to all if they wish--or they can decide to charge a higher price to  those who are "out of area". All discounts are at their discretion.

Should any insurance company go out of business, it's areas will immediately go back onto the national market to be picked up by the other companies in the same way as decided initially as the way of dividing the areas--unless the government has already found a new company, which should actually be the first option (government THEN back onto the national market). BUT, when this emergency change is made, for 3 months the new company must accept the previous pricing, and must give notification at the time of acquisition of all the coming changes in pricing, just as if it were a "normal" change in insurance company.

Any bills acquired during the emergency transfer of insurance company will NOT be eligible for late fees, etc. caused because of the inconvenience. The medical places must wait for reimbursement and/or the patient will be reimbursed once all paperwork is settled.

Did I miss anything? Maybe I should send this to Washington since they can't seem to not steal when it comes to health care.

Communism

After learning all about the plan Mao had in mind and how his communism almost worked, I started thinking--Communism has SERIOUSLY been misrepresented and is too easily confused with Socialism. They are to VERY different entities that shouldn't be confused. Let me explain:

Socialism is when the government takes from those who have to give to those who don't have in order to make everyone equal. Yeah. It doesn't work.

Communism involves no government. It is a totally individual run entity. And it's something that to an extent we already to--it's totally just an act of sharing within your community. "From each according to his ability, to each according to his need"--or so says Marx. No where does it say "You must give everything and receive it back". That is just stupid. Your neighbor needs a cup of sugar, you need a babysitter so you can run to the store to pick up some bread--that, my dear, is Communism. Expand it further as far as you need. Maybe in a society there will be a doctor who works for food and clothing because he cannot acquire for himself these necessities while caring for your child. But since the barter system has already proved itself inefficient in use, there is no reason why dollars can't be used instead.

But it's not capitalism. It's not "it cost me $5 to make this, so I will sell it to you for $25". The secret to Communism is giving things actual worth. Identifying actual costs is 95% of the crap that is wrong with our current Capitalist system. You ask anyone and "Profits" is the most important thing to ANY company. Guess what? Profits means absolutely nothing! All profits do is stuff the pockets of businessmen who happen to own the company. Look, I have NO problem with people making a wage that would astonish me (i.e. anything over $100,000 a year). Too many people defend big business because it is their "right" to make as much money as humanly possible without REALLY thinking about what they are allowing. The peons of Wal-mart don't get a pay raise when the company makes a profit--it's those who don't have a wage, but just decide to split the profits after paying the costs (i.e. the peon's wage, cost of the goods, etc.). This doesn't mean that stockholders get paid--the profits can pretty much go where ever the bosses decide. Research and Development? Ehh...I think they bill that under costs. Nope. Right into their pockets. That's where most of our money goes. What we NEED to do is make companies set wages of big bosses. It can be 25 Billion dollars a year for all I care, but I want to make sure that when they make that 26th billion, it isn't going into someone's pocket. I don't know about you, but I don't think I'll ever be a CEO of a Fortune 500 company, and I don't think I'd want to, but so what if my salary is limited to 25 Billion? Do I REALLY need that 26th? Nah, I'm good. How come their salary isn't limited? They sure do limit MY salary. But please, don't see this as an attack on big business--it's not at all. Every SINGLE dollar earned over cost can go to R&D--where the REAL work is done. You can't deny Steve Jobs--he designs so F@*%ing AWESOME stuff--it sells itself with a little help from the advertising department. So, in my perfect world, those big bosses get their set salary where all "profits" can be spent ANYWHERE BUT into their own pockets--unlike the current system.

That last paragraph is my defense as to why Communism won't become a major player for at least the next 100 years. Greed kills perfection bud. But if you like playing fair and creating a closer world, buy locally in small businesses. And come up with a way to do this kind of cost-benefit analysis to improve the health care system--I don't care what I have written here--so far as I care, capitalism as we know it is the ONLY way to ensure excellent care. I have no idea where to cut costs in research and there is no way in HELL I would cut the salaries in any way to doctors, nurses, whatevers. But using these resources more efficiently definitely helps. Being healthy is the BEST way to reform health care. BUT 100% of being healthy is in going to the doctor, which can't be done if it costs an arm and a leg to go. This is why EVERYONE needs insurance. As for making health care affordable, see my next post.

Yemen

I'm watching some of the older videos on my hulu account that are about to expire--namely Colbert and Jon Stewart. Of course, the top news for January 4th or so was still the underwear bomber. Here's what I don't understand:

WHY THE HECK IS YEMEN A NEW COUNTRY OF TERROR?!?!? DOESN'T ANYONE REMEMBER 2000 WHEN THAT WAS THE COUNTRY OF ORIGIN OF THE BOMBERS OF THE USS COLE?!?!? Or is that only relevant to one small 12 year old who remembers seeing the faces of the 17 dead on the front page of the paper and reading the stories of their lives. How about walking into a classroom and having a teacher mention that she had taught one of the 5 dead who grew up in and around Norfolk? I'm actually disappointed by Stewart and Colbert to not have picked up on this--it makes me sadder that the 17's deaths were in vain. RIP.

Excellent article

Seriously. Read this article about why people vote against reforms. To be fair--that health care bill is a piece of work and a half, but don't those congressmen add in all their special interest BS BECAUSE their constituencies would be FURIOUS that an honest congressman would say he would support a bill that gives health care to Nebraska without giving his state of Oklahoma some kind of benefit. Yay for being a "Christian Nation" who doesn't give a S#!T (excuse my French) about any state other than the one that we live in. Just because I live in Southern Virginia (which should be a completely different state than Northern Virginia because they are crazy), doesn't mean that I won't allow our Governor to pass laws that affect the whole state--like seat belt laws. I won't even say that in order to allow it, the governor has to give money to Norfolk to pay for a light-rail system (which is a FAILURE of EPIC proportion!).

Fox News on Hulu.com

Okay, I know I sent a LOT of annoying emails to various fox personalities complaining that there is no access to Fox News for me (I like to know what the enemy is saying). Yeah...they complied, but not in a good way. I figured that they would just stream their current programs on the "television" site, but instead, I'm not sure what they did. The media is from at least 2008 (I quit adding to my queue once I hit the election, so there may be more). But they actually took the time to make it look like the news has always been online--a commentator at the beginning to introduce it as "Fox News on HULU.com"...HULU is HUGE on the first screen. I need to pay more attention to whether that intro is the same commentator though the rest of the clip. But since I know that at least part of it is fake, I have no idea what to think about the rest of this--how was this news used a year and a half ago?!? Is the commentary totally new, made to look like Fox News made better news then? I'm so confused! Or rather, I'm so annoyed. ABC news was also recently added to the site--they only have the past 2 weeks or so. Why does Fox News need to be special (ed.)?

By the way--WOOO! For Mrs. McCain for standing up for gay right to marry. I KNEW I liked her!! She should totally run for president!

Paying the hospital bills

Seriously! I can't wait to have a situation where I need to pay a hospital bill of $1000 or so. My dad was telling me about all his experiences paying for bills which insurance didn't cover. All he had to do was sign a contract saying that he would pay what he could afford per month (in this case, $20--which was very true as now father of 2, making a combined $30,000 a year with my mom in 1990). Then he would pay whatever he could out of his paycheck every week even though it came out to be well more than the $20 a month (though rarely amounted to more than $100 a month).

The hospital had the gall to get impatient for his money and sent the bill to a bill collection agency. My father, keeping his own records, refused to pay said agency because he was abiding by the contract and he wasn't going to pay the interest that the agency could charge. By LAW medical bills cannot collect interest, but once it's sent to an agency it can, because the agency pays off your debt to the hospital and then it's just regular debt. This made for what I consider a FUN development. My dad continued to send his payments, weekly, to the hospital, even though they weren't sending him a bill. SINCE he was abiding by the contract there's not a dang thing they could do about it--can't take him to court for not paying his bill; can't instruct him to pay that agency for the same reason. The hospital had to deal with all the paperwork--sending the information to the agency, and paying all those people and no one was collecting that interest.

THAT, my dear, is sticking it to the man AND why I think medical bills are awesome--why WOULDN'T you want to pay them, haha.

But, a $1000 bill to be paid off in a year is one thing. That's what was left after insurance pays. EVERYONE MUST have insurance or spending one's life sending $20 a week to pay off a million dollar bill will be a waste to ALL.

Woman shoots man trying to break into her home.

THIS is why people need guns. Not semi-automatic Marine Corps rifles, but 16 gauge shotguns. Maybe a handgun in the purse, but there is no reason to be out buying military grade weapons. Especially since the 2 most common reasons for buying a gun is protection and hunting. You can't hunt anything with a rifle!

Did you know that Arizona is the 2nd highest ranked location for kidnapping in the WORLD?!? And that it's over drugs coming over the border. Apparently it's quite easy to walk into a gun shop and purchase one of those military grade weapons. What a vicious cycle. Maybe Arizona deserves to have all those kidnappings.

If you just want the thrill of shooting a machine gun or other military weapon, then find a shooting range and rent one. If none exist, start one. Get the licensing and make a ton.

Big boys like big toys and I'm about to quit caring when this country goes to hell in a hand basket because everyone wants to own power. Everyone thinks that Jurassic Park will be the ultimate destruction of the world (science going too far), but no. It's happening right now when the "bad people" get easy access to drugs and guns because the "good people" HAVE to have easy access to their hobbies. Obviously, no one cares about those "unintended" consequences or maybe there would be more regulation.

I'm all for getting rid of government regulation, but only when humans can prove that they are actually capable of monitoring themselves--of being good, moral citizens. We tried to deregulate the business world and they showed themselves to be just as greedy as they were 100 years ago--so, back to square one with high regulation. Maybe in 20 years we can breed morality back into that segment of the economy. Maybe if gun-shop owners would start caring less about a profit and more about who they are actually selling to, we could deregulate that industry. 

1767

You might wonder what's up with 1767 since I have it in the web address for most of my linked blogs. There are 2 reasons for this. The first is quite simply that I have to find a "random" number to differentiate between mine and another's sites. The reason I chose 1767 is because it's a very important date to me. It's in honor of the Proclamation of 1767 which stated that the English settlers in the New World were not allowed to venture past the Appalachian Mountains.

Why, you might ask, do I care about this proclamation? Well, it's because it's used as one of the reasons for declaring independence from the king of England--that the king had no right to make such a request of the settlers. That's the Conservative answer. The liberal, and practical, side of me knows why this proclamation was made--that it was costing the king an arm and a leg to protect the settlers from the Indians and various foreigners and if they didn't keep going where there was no one to protect them, there wouldn't be so much of an issue.

I find the Proclamation of 1767 to be the perfect example of a misunderstanding of law. Taxation without Representation is just as good--you see there was no voting for representatives in England--it was just understood that all members of parliament stood for all of England's citizens--including the settlers in the New World. While I can agree that they felt that the new laws being enacted weren't fair, there was no such thing as direct representation, so to claim it as a right is superfluous (I think I used that word correctly).

Gahh...still an idiot.

Remember that guy that cut his own arm off when it was trapped under a rock while hiking? Yeah, he's stupid.

I'm in Search and Rescue and rule number one for ANY outdoors adventure (and heck, it's a good rule for life in general--who knows when you'll need an alibi) is tell someone where you will be going--the more exact the directions the better and a close second is don't go alone. Half of our training is in SAR theory and figuring out how individuals react in certain situations. Did you know that Alzheimer's patients will walk in a straight line until they reach a barrier in which  case they will follow said barrier until they can no longer walk anymore? A certain 80 year old man was out in the wilderness for 3 days and when he was found he thought he'd only been gone for 45 minutes and was fine, just dehydrated. Still we could judge where was the best place to put teams out to find people. Children are equally as easy to find--they will walk around in circles until someone finds them--they also "bounce" and can survive situations that older people wouldn't be able to.

"Professional" hikers are annoying. Granted, some people just get turned around and have no idea how to get out by themselves. That is perfectly fine. Someone in our organization actually did just this (although out of state, so at least it wasn't his friends going out to find him). There was a blind guy who missed his turn off and ended up just making camp until he was found. These are the REAL professionals--the ones who you can count on to have been lost for a week and will come out tired, hungry, dehydrated, but will be back to normal after a night in the hospital. The blind guy was actually out there for 3 weeks including the time before he got "misplaced" because he was hiking the Appalachian Trail. Amateur hikers are just as good as the  real professionals--they stay on trails and don't do stupid stuff (like walk OFF the trails). Even if they fall off a mountain, at least we know which trail they were on which considerably shrinks the search area.

But those who think they know what they are doing are the one's we get most frustrated with. They are the ones who "follow their nose down a "shortcut"", do something they know they aren't ready for without preparing for the risks (such as bringing along someone who can bail them out) or making the most noobish mistake of going out for an adventure without telling anyone where they are going. Sigh. I most can't believe that he wouldn't change anything after getting stuck and having to cut off his arm--not even telling anyone where he was going so that he might have been found 3 days sooner. I shall have to read his book and if it doesn't start out with saying what he did wrong I will probably have to carry it along in my pack as a source of dry flint for my fire in case I ever get lost.

***Edit 3/31/2011:
I can't believe he got a movie deal out of this and that it made it to the Oscar nods. I really don't care to watch it, but as my newest goal is to watch every movie that got an Oscar nomination and/or Win (best picture category only) I unfortunately must. This is one case where I won't feel the least bit guilty pirating.

Jefferson agrees with me!

There is no such thing as a vegetable--just fruits, leaves, stems, roots, etc.

"The 1000-foot-long vegetable garden was carved into the protected south side of Monticello Mountain. The terraced beds were supported by a massive stone wall, so that one visitor described it as a "hanging garden." The methodical Jefferson divided the garden into twenty-four "squares," or growing plots, arranged according to which part of the plant was harvested -- whether "fruits" (tomatoes, beans), "roots" (beets, carrots), or "leaves" (lettuce, cabbage)."--from the Monticello website here.