Why biographies are boring

Think of your life. Think about what you do everyday and think about
any really "defining moments" you've had. Would they be enough to make
a 300 page book? I could probably write a short story or children's
book about the one or two defining life moments, but I know it would
be super boring if I were to try to put my life into a 300 page book.

That's the conversation I wish I could have had before Carly Fiorina
wrote her biography/memoir thing. Ok, so I'm not done reading, I'm not
even halfway, but the book so far reads like a college entrance essay
where the person is trying desperately to describe to the readers "why
I deserve to go to university". If I were her publisher, I would have
told her to focus on one or two really defining moments and describe
those in great detail, rather than writing like 2-4 pages about each
phase of her life, skipping from paragraph to paragraph with no
obvious transitions.

And as for the whole big deal about her going to a strip club to seal
a sales deal with a bunch of men, what is the big deal? I'm sure there
are plenty of business women out there who had to make some sort of
personal moral sacrifice in order to make it in their job...big deal.
I can't believe I got suckered into reading this boring piece of
drivel. I'm not sure what I was expecting though.

Seeing yourself in others

Sometimes when I observe other people, I see a little bit of myself in their actions or words. It scares me because it's mostly bad stuff that I notice, and it makes me wonder if I only notice the bad stuff or if I only have bad qualities. I'd like to think that I am generally a good person so I don't want to accept that I do bad things or have a bad attitude towards everything. Or maybe most people have the same attitudes about certain things and that's why I notice a similarity when I see other people acting a certain way, and it's not because I'm a bad influence or anything, it's just nature. I think if I keep telling myself that, I'll feel better.

Who needs reality TV...

...when you can just go to a public place and listen to peoples' cell phone conversations...

Giving should be enjoyable, shouldn't it?

Every year I try to do those giving tree things. You know, there's a tree at your workplace or at church or at Borders and you pick an ornament and it has a kid's age and gender and what they want for Christmas. This year at work, I passed by the tree maybe twenty times and I couldn't get myself to stop and pluck an ornament. Partially because I had already done a few others from somewhere else, but partially because the ones that end up on the work giving tree are usually more high-end things like a laptop or a video game console...stuff I wouldn't even think of buying for people I know, much less some random kid.

There must have been a good 30 or more ornaments left on the tree the day before they took the tree down. So I have to wonder...what happens to those kids that don't get their wish? Are some kids' Christmases ruined just because some selfish middle-class white-collar worker couldn't be bothered to spread some Christmas joy to the less fortunate? I feel annoyed that some kids would ask for such extravagant gifts, yet I feel guilty that I couldn't get past that to give anyway. I didn't even look at the tags at work this year.

It must be tough being that one kid that gets to open a bag of one-size-fits-all socks that they buy on reserve in case they don't get enough from the giving tree, when everyone else around you got their board game, or their Barbie vet doctor, or their clock radio. I don't know why I feel guilty about not being able to help them all...I bet this is how those celebrities feel when they take their adopted kid home from a third-world country and look out their private jet window as they are leaving and see thousands of other kids they can afford to help but don't because their PR agent told them, "Just one".

I think next year instead of doing the giving tree, maybe I'll learn how to knit and do the baby blanket drive. At least babies won't complain if they got a blanket they didn't like.

What was it about "pay what you want" did you not understand?

I'm not really big on music. I mean, I like it, but it always seems like a lot of upkeep. You have to listen to the radio or something to keep up with the latest songs and artists (or date someone in the industry :-P), and if you really want something, you have to go buy it (or get your cassette recorder ready the next time they play it on the radio), and of course, no one has a CD player anymore, it's all about those "iPod" things, and you download music through the Internet...it's just a lot of work.

But then a few months ago I heard this story on NPR about how Radiohead is offering its new album for download only and that people can pay however much they want, and I knew I had to get it. I thought for days about how much I was going to pay for the album. I've purchased actual Radiohead CDs before, so I've paid my fair share of "ridiculous music business overhead tax", and I thought that this would be my first chance to stick it to the man and just take that music for free, because I deserve it. But then I thought, NO, Radiohead is being nice, and I should support people who are nice! So I thought maybe I would give them 10 bucks, because if it were a CD, I'd probably pay 10 bucks for it when it ends up in the bargain bin at Borders. After several days of waffling, I decided I would listen to my coworker and download it for free, but then go back and pay a dollar for every song that was good.

That was three months ago. And every time I listened to those songs since then, I kept thinking, oh shoot, I was going to go back and pay real money for this stuff! But then I think, do I really have to? I mean, I downloaded it, I'm enjoying it, they let me have this for free, why bother at this point in time? I mean I think a month ago they had a follow-up NPR story and it said that most people in the US didn't pay anything for the album. I wonder if that means that people in the US are just cheap or they feel entitled to free music since that's why Al Gore invented the Internet. But do I really want to be one of those people that steals music, like that little girl on those old Napster ads who is in jail because she downloaded music?

Aaaanyhooo....I went back to the site the other day and paid 4.5 pounds for the album (a dollar per song I liked...I think I liked them all except maybe one)...plus they charged me a fee for using a credit card. So it was almost as if I went to the store and bought the damn CD anyway. I think I just felt guilty for not paying in the first place. But now I feel like a sucker.

Did people ever say this to Picasso?