Freedom

At one point, a very wise man who happened to have the mistortune to be a character in a movie said, "Figuring things out for oneself is the only Freedom anyone really has."

I intentionally misquoted (only slightly) it because lots of people are too stupid to know the difference (leftists). Set aside that the concept is completely and utterly valid. People that don't like freedom will intentionally try to find ways of curtailing the abilities of those that do think.

Some parts of the thought police, which don't really exist but, do kind of really exist, will say to you you're not allowed to come to a certain conclusion about a certain thing. They also will say you're not allowed to express an opinion about some certain thing that isn't what everybody else would say about that thing. They are full of bullshit. There is no cutting of the deck, there is no shuffling the of the deck, there is not anything that makes these people less than they really are, and that is evil. I'm done trying to negotiate with these pricks.

1995, success and failure

1995 was a real bifurcation moment in music. Unfortunately, the bifurcation was very strong. 

Some really good stuff got accidentally noticed. Some really crappy stuff got noticed and was made prominent due to incompetence of the populace.

The Cranberries and Natalie Merchant got noticed. In specific Natalie Merchant's entire album Tiger Lily got noticed and really made an impact on some people.  I was one of those.  (It didn't suck or I would have evicted it.)

Unfortunately some really crappy crap, like R Kelly, gotten noticed. In this some people with really really low standards ended up setting the bar incredibly low for "music" for decades. If I had noticed it, I would have spoken out at the time and said that it deserved nothing but contempt.  I was only first noticing Metallica's Black Album and being enamored by it, so I was not noticing the new crap that was being created.

According to YouTube, there are a number of other things that originated that year. A number of these things really deserve no comment plus or minus. It seems rightfully so that they have not received much common plus or minus since their origination.

It looks like Smashing Pumpkins -- Bullet with Butterfly Wings was also being created. I didn't know or care about this until at least two years later. But I approve.

Eccentricities

I started being eccentric at an early age. There were lots of things that I held dear with no clear reason.
My brother and I, being brothers in technology, in spite of being 6 years separate, ended up cooperating a lot because we were brothers in technology. When it came to transportation, this made for strange bedfellows sometimes. His preference for music and my preference for music were sometimes a bit desperate. And being the older person and often being the driver, my preferences overrode his. This made for some interesting interactions.

For example, at one point we arrived at a computer show and Celine Dion - To Love You More was playing (radio, late90's?).  We arrived, parked, and were essentially stalled at that point because I wanted to hear the song end. I more or less said, "I'm not leaving till they hear the end of this". My brother, to his credit did not complain.  The song ended, I killed the engine, and we entered the computer show. There are few perfect days and I don't even know how that one ended, but that one was good.

Ad quality

There was a case that just came up where an ad appeared and the length of the ad was thirty minutes.  Let that sink in a second. The ad started to run and continued to run and it was so not-out-of-context that I I humored the ad for 10 minutes before I finally decided that the context was good and all, that but I wanted to get back to what I was watching.  In general, long form advertising is the stuff that is done as paid for programming that happens to end up on TV and whatnot. This type of advertising on YouTube is awesome to me. Not only is it something that I probably would watch if I had a choice, but it will also not be interrupted by advertising because it IS the advertising.

Bill Nye, the idiot guy

Let me start with a borrowed premise. If you are not part of the solution, there is lots of money to be made in prolonging the problem.

The man (is he? even by his own math... wait, that's missing) asserts that gender is just a thing.

I wonder what the twit would think if every person in the physical world were to refer to him when he came to them as her or she. By his own misguided language they would not be wrong. And if he felt wrong about it, he would be wrong in thinking that other people are wrong referring to him that way.

Yanni

I was introduced accidentally to Yanni via the Indianapolis zoo, for which I credit my parents as having the wisdom to think that a zoo was a good thing for a child to be exposed to.

One day, there was some thing going on the whale/dolphin pavilion and we had the good fortune to be there as it was starting.  While all the seating was occurring, some person figured that music was better than silence and had a Yanni CD playing.  I was a teen at this point, and could feel that there was something special about what this man had crafted.  From that point on, I hit the library, record stores, and whatnot else looking for things of his making. 

At no point along any way have I regretted seeking his stuff.

This odd accumulation of happenstance has led to much gratification in my life.  I am thankful to all those that contributed, be they my parents, the zoo as an entity, or the person that chose to run the music during the seating.

Permanent incompetence

Today, I saw a group of three people that may or may not have been incompetent, but one of their number chose to walk in the bike lane as opposed to walking on the sidewalk with the other two. This is some degree of either incompetent or entitlement that really needs to be disabused of the multiple generations that have created it. Unfortunately, when I hear about news stories about somebody killed because they were walking in a bike lane and hit by a vehicle, I will think back to this and have less care than I really should.

Stupid people do stupid things. I'm tired of being forced to humor them.

If you do something stupid, that's on you. Done.

I was tempted to take a picture, but even a picture from the back side would have only gained these idiots some notoriety. And they deserve no notoriety.

Forced Opinions

If I'm not forced to have an opinion, I may or may not have one about said thing. (apathy)
If I AM forced to have an opinion about something, probability is that I won't side with whatever agency (person, group, whatever) forced me to have an opinion.(antipathy)
If I am forced to have an opinion about something, and government says I'm supposed to be tolerant of it, I'm more likely to go the Jefferson way and choose to oppose it.  There is some slush to this in that I'm more likely to accept local recommendations than state recommendations and accept state recommendations over federal recommendations. (fairly aggressive antipathy)

Some gays (male or female) are very tolerable.  I tolerate them.  I actively like many.  Easy. (apathy and/or friendship)
Some people tell me that I'm using the wrong pronoun set for certain people.  I care not.  Until that person comes to me and asks me to use a different pronoun set for them when discussing them with other people, I have no reason to not call that person by what I perceive of their physical makeup.

You want me to not care about you.  This is apathy.  If you force me to care about you and whatever you think you are, then you've forced me to care about what you are.  This is antipathy.  This is a lesser form of hate.  If you want me to not hate you, don't make me care about you.  Making me care about you, by force, ends badly, If I care about you organically, I may care, or not.  That's better than the hate.

Some folks better learn... and fast.

Unintentional taunting

Some places so forcibly project positivity that there is little question given to the inherent negativity that may be present.  The key concept here is projection of positivity. While at the location, any negativity perceived by a customer (no, they are not a guest) is jarring and potentially a reason to summon a manager.

One place this is notable is environmental music of the location.  Often this is done by some clueless person tasked with music selection to match some generic venue-style, approved by some moron tasked with approving such things.

The obvious idiocy and failure of corporate bureaucracy deserves little note but no positive otherwise.

Someone chose these things to be something that would probably be comforting to consumers at the location.  This is all well and good.  But, to a person that is seasoned in the location that is no longer a fan of the location, some songs become more of a taunt.

"Put on a happy face" (not sure of title or artist)
No. My happy face is miles from here.  I might be able to fake a veneer.

Taxes profitmongering

I recently filed my taxes.  Meh.

Federal government owed me money. No surprise.
Indiana wanted more money, on the order of about 66% of what I was getting back in Federal refund.  Seemed excessive, but whatever.

Filed the taxes anyway.  To pay State, was sent to some mostly non-descript site for paying all manner of "government" payments, and as a not-logged-in person, it didn't ask who or what I was paying for.
For a $315 bill, it wanted to charge me a nearly $8 (7.8?) fee to use a card.

I'm sorry, but I'm not.  If this is the payment system you have, it can go unmentionable itself.  Bill me.  I'll send a money order at a cost of maybe a couple dollars, but I will not pay your "convenience" fee.

I hope I'm not the only person to have this annoyance and choose to skip the "convenience" provider, putting said provider out of business.

I'm tired of being treated like a money-source.  EVERY state should be "retired" at this point, with enough money in the bank and investments to support itself without needing ANY taxpayers. States and the federal government were stupid and didn't do this.  That's on them.