Aug 12 Labor unions have their origins as recently as the 18th century and in the United States of America in the 19th century. Quite simply a union is an entity that represents the collective interests of its members, often associated with workers of a similar profession. They were extremely important in yesteryear when “the Man” would snuff the very life out of people with his unyielding desire for more profit, even at the expense of people’s lives. Unions were an answer to this vileness. They allowed the workers to stand united against injustice and fight for their rights as human beings.
But now they are getting despicable.
In striving for (or at least claiming to strive for) the best possible situations for its members, the power-hungry leaders of unions are wielding weapons that they seem ill-equipped to handle. They know only to grab all that they can at no expense. There are so many different groups reaching for as much as they possibly can that they threaten the very structures upon which they stand!
Unions make it easy for people to get as much as they can while also being protecting from punishment for not doing their job. Do you think that it’s a coincidence that the automakers in Detroit have huge unions and are also now going bankrupt? What about the education system (especially locally in southern California) that is floundering for money? Those teacher unions sure are big and powerful, aren’t they? I say that if they had just been reasonable about what they wanted and did (e.g., protecting from unjust terminations instead of deserved terminations) then perhaps we all would be a little bit better off.
In the United States of America, we stand for things. Our Constitution says that we have rights. But those rights do not include a guaranteed source of income nor a completely secure job. We are not entitled to a house nor do we deserve free health care, but I digress. Our rights do include the ability to work as hard as you can to achieve things. And in our current society, it sure seems like we could get ride of unions and let the best of the workers survive (because they will always be sought after as good workers).
Jul 31 I’m never a fan of people talking on their cell phones while they’re driving. And now I’m even less of a fan since it’s blatently against the law (whereas before it was just selfish to put others at risk). They definitely don’t drive as well, and that is a problem if I am driving near them.
What if I see a police officer talking on their cell phone? Yeah, that’s another layer on top of that! They’re supposed to be working, and I am fairly confident in my ability to say that they’re not talking about work on their cell phone. They are also not doing their job as well. And that affects me just as much as it affects you.
Nobody thinks that police are perfect. In fact they do all types of blatent things. They speed (even when not purposefully chasing someone), they are sympathetic, patronizing, power hungry, and on occasion corrupt.
Well these are happy thoughts! I should have taken a picture of the officer and put her on blast. Hm on second thought, people with guns and power aren’t people that I want to annoy too much.
Jul 15 So I recently purchased a Canon 40D. And there is a whole world of accessories out there. For the first couple of weeks I was keeping my camera in a FedEx bag because it is:
- inconspicuous
- cheap
- slightly padded
- water resistant
That seems like a pretty good list to me! But alas I knew that it could not last. Unfortunately, bags (from companies that market them as camera bags) are fairly overpriced. Okay they’re not terribly expensive compared to the actual camera, but I rather enjoyed some of the unique aspects of my FedEx bag. I wanted to keep most of its positive attributes without having to bear the shame of actually holding a FedEx bag all of the time. Here is my bag.
First I got:
- a canvas bag from my local Army/Navy military surplus store, which was a lot less rugged than I would have imagined
- craft foam and ripstop nylon fabric from JoAnn Fabric and Crafts (the higher quality foam that I wanted to buy online had an unfortunately prohibitive shipping cost that was higher than the foam itself)
- cardboard from a shipping box that I already had
- my sewing machine (which isn’t actually mine and which I had never used before this project)
- velcro with adhesive backing (I already had this)
My idea was to create my own padded inserts to put into the canvas bag. I was going to use the craft foam as the filler, cardboard to stiffen the insert, and the nylon to wrap the whole deal. I made a number of inserts, and each of them had a similar method of creation.
I guess that I didn’t take any pictures of my initial steps, but all I did was measure and cut the desired size of foam, cardboard, and nylon. I cut enough nylon to wrap the foam and cardboard like a present.
Next I pinned the fabric according to how tight I wanted it to be around the foam. I generally was going for pretty tight because I thought that it would give it a more professional appearance. For the most part I think that was correct because I saw other examples of loosely wrapped inserts that people made online that did not look as nice.
I inserted the foam and cardboard into the sewn nylon. This was actually one of the most difficult steps because the nylon was getting sewn with the intent of there being a tight fit. And a tight fit it was! I was able to eventually get all of them into their nylon sleeves, but some of them were quite difficult.
I then closed up the nylon and pinned it so that I could hand stitch it.
I used (or tried to use) a hidden stitch when I was hand stitching.
So I repeated that process a number of times so that I could have the appropriate number of bag inserts.
My final step was to attach some velcro so that the pieces would hold their form. I’m still working on this step, though, because I have since found that the adhesive on the velcro is insufficient to keep the velcro on the nylon. I am pretty sure that using some kind of glue (maybe even fabric or super) will do the trick.
It’s fairly inconspicuous, modestly priced (total for everything is under $50 compared to over $100 for the bags that I wanted, and I have leftover material), padded, and now I have skills that I didn’t have before!
Of course, if after reading this you decide that it’s still not worth it to sew all of the inserts yourself then you could just buy a commercial camera bag insert like this one, and put it into whatever bag you want.
Inspiration came from:
Jul 10 That title probably gets your attention. As is common knowledge, we need shoes in order to run. Running barefoot is impossible to comprehend. Except…it’s not. There are so many reasons that I have found that compel me to run barefoot. And I figured that now would be a good time to post them here.
I have been running barefoot for over 9 months now. I started off running a few blocks, and I have progressed to now run a few miles a couple of times each week. Yes, it will sometimes be briefly uncomfortable when I step on a pebble, but it is usually gone in the next step. However for most people the thought of pain is enough to prevent them from ever trying to run barefoot. On the other hand, just because I run on the street does not mean that everyone has to. 
Running on sand or grass would definitely be more comfortable, but it’s really not that bad running on the pavement (in my opinion). I believe that running barefoot is better, and I want my behavior to be in accordance with my beliefs.
- I was not born with shoes. (Of course I also wasn’t born with clothes, but clothes don’t injure me. If they did, I wouldn’t wear those either.)
- Injuries increase with the price of the shoes according to surveys from runners.
- It’s recommended (by pediatricians) that young children be allowed to walk around barefoot so that they can develop their feet. There must be something there, right?
- By the laws of physics the force of each step when running has to be translated and absorved somewhere. Running sure isn’t hurting your feet. Where does that leave? Perhaps the knees and hips?
- Tough and hardened feet are much more useful than soft tender feet. Soft feet are nice to the touch, but they can’t nearly do what used feet can do. If you had to run away from danger, you can’t exactly stop to put on your shoes.
- Without the artificial support of shoes, your feet need to balance and adapt. That is, the muscles and tendons in your feet will get stronger. It’s similar to why it’s excellent to do exercises without artificial support. You need to balance while also performing the task at hand. And that will make you stronger and strengthen the entire structure.
- There sure are a lot of people from other countries that are awesome runners without the need for shoes. Have you ever thought about that? Not only are they awesome, but they have lower incidence of injury. Just because I wasn’t born in a culture like that does not mean that I cannot become like that!
- I stand for freedom!. I always have, I always will. But it is a different kind of freedom that I feel when I’m running barefoot. It kind of makes me feel like a little kid, and I love that.
- The arch is one of the strongest structures known to man. We use it for bridges to hold up amazing amounts of weight. Have you ever seen an arched bridge have something filling the entire arch? No. That’s because the arch is strongest when there is nothing filling that gap. Surprise, surprise guess where we have an arch.
- One of the most important reason to consider running barefoot is that it makes you more conscious of your running form. So while your form might suffer when you’re running with shod feet, you won’t modify your behavior because it doesn’t manifest itself until years of running have beaten your body down. However you will definitely notice the difference with bare feet. You will not strike your heel. You will land on the balls of your feet. You will be careful of where you go. You could learn how to run with better form from someone teaching you. But that doesn’t mean that you’re necessarily going to change. Pain is a much better way to modify your behavior than mere information. It’s a reminder every step that you need to run correctly.
I run barefoot. I enjoy it.
References:
Jul 1 The whole situation with the California budget crisis is ridiculous. It is looking very likely that California will have to issue IOUs as the new fiscal year rolls around. How did we get into this pickle? The recession! The decreased revenue from falling property taxes and lack of state income taxes from those who are not working has left the Golden State in a huge predicament. $24.3 BILLION?? That is ridiculous.
In the special election on May 19, 2009, the people of this state voted against the increased taxes that were proposed. I am a fairly modest supporter of our Governator as he is standing against the tide. I agree with his observation that the people of California are sick and tired of living in the most taxed state of the United States of America! Even though he has not always been my favorite politician (really who is?), I am glad that he is attempting to stand for what he thinks that the people want.
Democratic state politicians on the other hard are, inexplicably, ridiculous. While they, too, are trying to stand for what they think that the people want, they are doing it in a way that is illogical. From trying to find loopholes to pass the budget with a simple majority (since they can’t pass what they want without Republican support) to trying to pass tax increases along with budget cuts, they are not making the process extremely difficult. They are still trying to get theirs while seeming to not understand what basic tasks they need to do in order to get the state’s finances in order.
Let us put it simply: California needs to cut its costs. It doesn’t have the money and at this point it is not reasonable to increase the taxes that it imposes on its population. At some point people are going to get tired of paying so much for the privilege of wonderful weather (and horrible smog). I wonder if the politicians know this. Maybe good old Mr. Olympia himself knows.