Stop Complaining About Technology Already!

Over the past several weeks I bet I’ve seen a dozen stories about two supposedly horrible developments brought on by technological advancement. First, the social destructiveness of Facebook, and second, the ubiquitous overuse of cellphones. The Facebook thing is a load of manure. Cellphone overuse is not.

Yes, so I’m constantly being told horror stories about how Facebook and other forms of social media are turning us into terrible people. No, they are not. What Facebook is doing is revealing terrible people to us...a valuable service. All of the deleterious qualities of Facebook can be completely eliminated by a series of handy tools which Facebook provides for each and every user. So, essentially...if you are having a difficult time with Facebook, it’s because of user error, not some Russian plot. Here are but a few examples:

If someone keeps posting objectionable things on your wall....block them.

If you’re tired of talking about politics on Facebook...stop talking about politics on Facebook.

If you’re tired of all the phoniness and Facebragging...start sharing pictures of your latest bout with hemorrhoids. See how that works for you!

Here’s the thing about Facebook. The kinds of things you post tells all the world about what you value. If 90% of your Wall is taken up with pictures of your grandchildren, or your dog or your political opinions, you are telling the world what you care about. There is absolutely nothing wrong with grandkids, dogs, or political opinions. So...what’s the problem? Oh, but some people are constantly yapping about Trump or making rude comments about this and that... so, block them. Problem solved! Listen people, if you don’t like this blog, or dog pictures, horrible Dad Jokes, and snarky trashtalk, I would be an excellent candidate for blocking. Everyone has the power to have the Facebook they want by a series of editing tools available to all. Either use them, or stop whining.

The overuse of cellphones is a problem. For one thing, in the entire history of mankind and civilization, this is brand spanking new technology. We are just now learning what these things can do. They are very much the shiniest new toy in the human toy box. So, at the moment we are infatuated. I think with time we will learn better user habits. Right now, most of us are on the thing entirely too much, me included. One suggestion I read somewhere (probably on my cell phone!) was to establish a basket somewhere in your house where everyone’s cellphones must be deposited during certain agreed upon hours of the day...like mealtime. Sounds smart. 

My default position when it comes to technology is this...for all the moaning and groaning we do, I don’t know anyone who longs to go back to the era of folding maps, encyclopedias, and phone booths. Mostly, technological advancement has been a boon to mankind and has made our lives infinitely easier, and a whole lot more fun. 

So...garbage in garbage out. If you want a more interesting Facebook wall...be more interesting. If you think that your cell phone is taking over your life, understand that each cellphone comes equipped with a power button. Developed discipline and better user habits...but don’t pretend that you’re going off the grid anytime soon. 

Bad Dad Jokes...Christmas Edition

It’s been several months since I last shared some Dad Jokes in this space. Luckily for all of you, I am in possession of ten Christmas-themed Dad Jokes which feature the perfect combination of stupidity and cringe-worthiness that you have come to expect from my previous collections. The fact that I offer these to you absolutely free of charge is more evidence that I am in the giving back to the community business here at The Tempest. Enjoy!

1. Why are Christmas trees so bad at knitting?

Because they keep dropping their needles.

2. Why did Santa’s helper go to a psychiatrist?

Because he was suffering from low elf esteem.

3. What’s the difference between Donald Trump and that clementine in the bottom of your stocking?

Nothing. They’re both a little orange.

4. What do you call a crowd of chess players bragging about their games in a hotel lobby?

Chess nuts boasting in an open foyer.

5. What nationality is Santa?

North Poleish 

6. Which famous playwrite was terrified of Christmas?

Noel Coward

7. What do you get when you cross a snowman with a vampire?

Frostbite

8. How did Mary and Joseph know that Baby Jesus was 7 lbs. 6 ozs. at birth?

They had a weigh in the manger.

9. Why do Dasher and Dancer love coffee?

Because they are Santa’s star bucks.

10. A man and his wife were walking in Moscow one night when some precipitation started to fall. The husband thought it was rain but his wife thought it was snow. The husband said, “Let’s ask this Communist official here...they are always right!...Excuse me, Rudolf...but is this precipitation rain or snow?” Rudolph glances up quickly and answers, “This is rain, comrade” The husband smiled at his wife and said...

“See? Rudolph the Red knows rain, dear.”

Our Latest Import

We have a new Christmas tree. It replaces one that is probably twenty five years old. It also replaces another one Pam bought two years ago for a ridiculous amount of money that was used exactly once and nearly ruined Christmas because it was...entirely too skinny. So, we are hoping that this new behemoth will do the job. It was on sale, I’m told. It is also the first pre-lit tree to grace the Dunnevant living room, and it has white lights, also a Dunnevant family first. It stands 7.5 feet tall and comes festooned with 1000 lights.

However, upon closer inspection this morning, I have discovered a couple of troubling things. Pam apparently bought the Mexican version of the Trim-a-Tree18, since there isn’t a word of English anywhere on the packaging. Luckily, I can figure out what pre-iluminado means, and I recall enough from my tenth grade Spanish class to figure out that this tree isn’t intended to be used outside...solo para uso en interiores!! To make matters even more confusing, the back side of this box informs me that the Trim-a-Tree18 was manufactured in China. (Distributed by Nicholas Holiday Inc. Taipei, Taiwan)

So, my wife went out and bought a Chinese-made Christmas tree, intended for sale to Spanish-speaking customers, from a Lowe’s Hardware store in Short Pump, Virginia.

This United Nations amalgamation of Christmas is the sort of thing that will warm the hearts of internationalists everywhere, but I’m wondering how Santa is supposed to keep it all straight. If we wake up on Christmas morning to find serapes and Baja jackets under the tree, I’m not blaming Santa.

One other thing I noticed about this tree...it weighs a ton! Actually, 32.2 kgs (71 pounds). Lugging this brute into the house from the car was hard enough. I cannot wait for the post-Christmas fun of hauling this baby up two flights of stairs where it will have to spend the rest of the year with the six other English-speaking trees in the attic.

What The Hell Is Wrong With People?

Every now and then something happens which forces you to confront one of life’s big time questions. Not the classic questions of philosophy like...Who am I? Why am I here? No, I’m talking about the question that has been on the lips of human beings for millennia, but especially in the 21st century...What the hell is wrong with people?

This morning I received a private message from an old friend of mine. He was asking me to pass along an urgent prayer request from a friend of his concerning an 18 month old child who had tragically shot himself with his father’s nail gun and had been rushed to the hospital. The situation was grave.

Ok, at this point I should probably confess to the fact that these types of stories usually fail to move me. It is a character flaw, no question about it. My first reaction would normally be something along the lines of...what kind of bonehead parent let’s a toddler anywhere near a loaded and operational nail gun? The kid should have shot the Dad instead! I know, I know...this is a horrible instinct which someone who calls himself a Christian should fight to overcome. Nevertheless, it is what it is. I am preternaturally disposed to skepticism, and much too quick to cast judgement on the foolishness of others.

But, this particular message moved me, partially because of who had sent it. My friend is a minister who works with a lot of blue collar workers in South Carolina. Maybe it was true...and if it was, what an unspeakable tragedy. So, without thinking it through, I selected a handful of family and friends who would be open to praying for this unfortunate child. Within minutes I discovered the truth courtesy of my son-in-law who forwarded me the article from Snopes.com. This was a spam notification that has been circulating around the web in various iterations since 2010!! I had been had. I fell for what was essentially a chain letter....to which I ask you...what the hell is wrong with people??

This is America, which means that at some point a very real toddler is going to get ahold of a working nail gun and accidentally shoot himself. I would be willing to wager large amounts of money on this outcome. And when this unfortunate lad is rushed to the hospital and his parents desperately send out an urgent request for prayer, their pleas are going to be met with....*crickets* People like me are going to read the email and think...Yeah...right. I suppose the next thing you’re gonna tell me is that if I don’t pray for this kid, I will be forfeiting my million dollar inheritance from my long lost Nigerian prince-Uncle. 

So...to all the people who received this message from me this morning, I offer this embarrassed apology. I promise that in the future all such heartfelt pleas I receive for urgent prayer will immediately be deleted.

What a world we live in....

Why I Hate Making a Christmas List.

There are few things I hate more than filling out a Christmas List...the frustration, the simmering anger, the exasperation!! And that’s just while trying to figure out how to use Google docs!! Wait, I should probably back up. I forget that most of you out there don’t belong to a family like mine. Very few, if any of you, have to deal with a family Christmas website, featuring the dreaded...Google Docs Of Death.

Many years ago, my sainted wife, having become overcome with frustration while watching my mother open her fourth clear glass tea pitcher of the day, decided that enough was enough. The Dunnevant family had grown too large and unruly at Christmas. The opening of presents had become a disaster of duplicate gifts, misunderstanding and chaos. The lack of communication between family members had become embarrassing, as the great tea-pitcher debacle had proven. When Uncle Bill opened a present that same year and was surprised to find what appeared to be dog feces inside a bottle, he deadpanned...This is nice, but I asked for a SHIP in a bottle. So, having seen quite enough of this disorder, Pam sat about bringing the Dunnevant clan into the modern computer age. Thus was our Christmas website born, necessity being the mother of invention.

Not that I’m complaining, mind you. This website has been a Godsend. In all the years that this thing has been operational, I haven’t gotten one single duplicate gift...although I have had to endure many raised eyebrows whenever the subject comes up with outsiders...Wait, you guys have a Christmas family website?? Um, er...sorry, but I just remembered I have a root canal appointment, see ya later!!

But, I digress. What I really wanted to write about was this business of Christmas lists, and why I hate them. As instructed, I recently updated my Christmas List Google Doc, which involved eliminating everything that I had asked for and received from 2017. That left me with this sorry excuse for a list (or so I’m told)...

Of all the 28 family members currently enrolled on Christmas Central, I am told that my list is at once the shortest and the least helpful. What they don’t understand is how difficult it is for me to comprise such a list in the first place. When the first item on the list is gourmet beef jerky, that should give you a clue that I’m seriously grasping. The fact is that at this point in my life, there just isn’t anything that I want that anyone in my large family is capable of purchasing. Besides, I much prefer giving than getting, a fact that owes less to any altruistic instinct than it does to simple fact that giving is just more fun...for me...which I guess means...I’m selfish.

Of course, there’s something else about this list business that troubles me. The fact is that if I put what I really wanted on the list it would prove quite embarrassing. What responsible, mature, 60 year old man would ask for a squirrel catapult, the Deluxe Squirrel-Launcher 2000? Or, what normal man of my age and station in life would ask for the latest cutting edge technology Dolby surround sound remote control fart machine, or the very latest remote control electric zapper soup spoon? Could you imagine how hilarious it would be to watch old Uncle Ned spewing minestrone all over the table cloth while the spoon lands in the middle of the gravy boat?? Talk about your unforgettable holiday memories!!!

So...that’s out of the question, I suppose.

My 50% Drop!!

For about a month now I’ve noticed the strangest thing about this blog. Starting on October 21st, the traffic to The Tempest has dropped. A lot. Prior to that date, each of my posts were getting read roughly 350 times, the readership of this blog hovering between 7,500 and 8,000 pageviews per month. All of a sudden, as if somebody flipped a switch, I’ve only had one post hit 100, total pageviews for November are on pace to reach less than 4,000, a 50% drop. Either there’s been a large drop in Facebook traffic, or my writing has become boring and monotonous...both very real possibilities!

Luckily, or unluckily—depending on your taste—I have no plans to stop writing. I’ve always considered the fact that people actually take the time to read this stuff some sort of miracle anyway. If nobody ever did I would still write, largely because it’s fun. But it also serves as an historical account of what I was thinking at the time, something that I imagine will make for very entertaining reading on my 80th birthday, and even more entertaining for my yet unborn grandchildren one day...Whoa, Mom...Pops was kinda crazy, huh?

Wait a minute...maybe this is some sort of Russian plot, or even worse, a Trumpian purge of all critical bloggers post mid-terms. Yeah...that must be it. Some shadowy operative in a dark office in the West Wing fooling around with a new algorithm that finds and isolates all sarcastic, wisenheimer comments about the President....

Nope...I’m going with boring and monotonous.

The Wolf You Feed

This past Saturday, I was absently watching Alabama steamrolling their latest opponent, the suspense having been ripped away from the game halfway through the 1st period, when I clicked on the Drudge Report tab on my iPad. It has been my news aggregator of choice for the past ten years or so. I honestly can’t recall a single headline that I read on Saturday. What I can remember is the wave of nausea that passed over me. It was as if I had reached some sort of limit, a threshold of inhumanity which I simply couldn’t cross. I felt like someone might feel who had been asleep since 1950 and suddenly wakes up, desperate for news of his country, only to discover that he has woken up in some strange, post apocalyptic land being led by an army of  mentally ill adolescents. Between the hysterical, raging anger of the politics to the childish narcicissism of the citizenry, a visitor from 1950 might conclude that not only had we lost the Cold War, we had probably lost virtually everything else in the aftermath.

I have always prided myself on my ability to take the long view, to not get swept up in fever pitches of any kind. My feeling has always been that no matter how loud, passionate and agitated things get, it’s never as bad or as good as it seems. It’s a philosophy rooted in that reliable old phrase...This too shall pass. I still believe it...but, like any good philosophy, from time to time, adjustments have to be made. So, I’m making one. I have embarked upon a news cleanse. Except for financial news vital to my profession, I have presently gone 86 hours without watching, listening to, or reading the news.

I do not know how long this cleanse will continue. If I hear rumors of something horrible going on, I may fold under the power of curiosity. The voyeur in me might not be able to resist the potential humiliation of the next politician or celebrity to get swept under by a #METOO accusation. But, for as long as I am able, I intend to opt out of the 24/7 news noise machine. Here are my two primary reasons for this disengagement...

1. I am now 60 years old. It’s getting late. Time is short. Every day I spend swept along in the sewer of our discontent is a day I have forever lost. There is a reason I call this a news cleanse. It’s because in my heart, the news, at least some of it, feels filthy. The ancient prophets warned us to...stand guard at the door of our minds. Ancient advice is often the best advice. 

2. The 24/7 news machine thrives on and often sells division. Hostility, resentment and anger get the clicks. I am not immune to this human weakness. I am drawn to the worst stories of my enemies, and the most flattering assessments of my friends. As a result, the more news I consume the more hostile and strident I become, and the more partisan. It is a vicious circle that feeds on itself...and a damned poor way to live.

There’s an old Cherokee proverb about a brave warrior teaching his grandson about life...

“A fight is going on inside me,” he said to the boy. ”It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves. One is evil–he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, and ego.” He continued, “The other is good – he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith. The same fight is going on inside you–and inside every other person, too. The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather: “Which wolf will win?”

The brave Cherokee warrior simply replied, “The one you feed.”