Go Cori!

The wonderful Cori Lynne started school earlier this week! I'm very proud of her, and it is wonderful to see her pursuing her dreams! She is going to Taylor Andrews Hair Academy, and so far she is loving it. Again, I'm super proud of her and I will support her 100%. 

The only downside to her going to school is I am alone until a little after 10p.m.. It let's me get a lot of video game playing done, but it kinda gets boring. I'm still adjusting to the new schedule, and I will still get the weekends with her, so all is good. All in all I think this will be very good for us, and it is very good to see her finally pursuing her goals. Good job baby!

How To Behave(With Mormon Family)

In my early life I always had this feeling that I was supposed to be polite and not share my opinions on things. Especially when around my Mormon family. Now I was never told this, and it could just be my personality (they are family, why try and piss them off?), but I still always felt I was just supposed to keep quiet.

To understand where I am coming from, both early on, and later, in this post, you need to know a bit of my upbringing. I was never raised as an Atheist. I was never taught that there was no god(s), I was never taught that all religion is bullshit. In my home religion was a non-issue. We just never talked about it. At the time, my dad( a very vocal Atheist now) was not very talkative about his beliefs, at least not with me and my siblings. If we had questions he would answer them, but we were always told the decision was ours when we got older. We weren't allowed to go to most church things as children, but we were told why. My dad didn't want us to feel like we were outsiders, or those poor kids who haven't had god. He didn't want us to be indoctrinated, preferring to teach us to look at all things skeptically. I was personally OK with that. I went to church a few times and I thought it was a waste of a Sunday, and I went to the scouts once and was bored the entire time. So I was never told to dislike religion, only to look for evidence.

Back to my family. As a child I knew it was kinda expected that I not talk about that kinda stuff. As I started to get older, I could definitely tell that my opinion was not wanted. It was fine for my uncles and aunts (and, on occasion, cousins) to express their opinions on religion, but not me. I always thought that being quiet on the topics of religion and politics was polite, that it wasn't my place to share what I thought and make everyone uncomfortable, or even angry. And for a while I was OK with that. Keep to myself, don't make waves, keep the family happy.

Now that I am in, and moving through, my 20s, I have begun to see another view. Why should I have to be quiet? I am every bit as much a part of the family as they are. Why should I be expected to keep my mouth shut when they can openly spew their opinions? Now, when it comes to my family, I'm not necessarily spoiling for a fight, but I have recently taken to enjoying making them uncomfortable with my mere presence (it's like they can just sense my liberal-atheistness). I would never openly start an argument just for shits and giggles, but anymore I have come to believe one thing. If they feel they need to share their opinion about something, I feel they have invited me to share mine, feelings be damned. I am truly tired of having to be the silent party just to keep the peace. Why don't they not talk about it? I'm tired of feeling like a second class citizen within my own family. If they find what I have to say too shocking, they shouldn't talk it about while I'm around.  I am insulted that I have to be the one who keeps quiet, while they can say whatever they want and it's OK. I want the same respect that they expect me to give them. I may be younger, but I am not a child anymore.

I love my family, and I always will, but love means never having to apologize for who you are. I feel like sometimes they want me to.

Blue Moon

As I was walking down the beer aisle in my local Harmon's Grocery, I noticed something. Something new had caught my eye. Slowly I looked at this strange new beast, it seemed so familiar, so foreign. Blue Moon beer, in a can!

I thought to myself, "Surely this will be delicious, and $2 cheaper doesn't hurt either!"
I bought it, took it home, and tried it. Now I love Blue Moon, the citrus taste makes this beer pretty special, but the canned form seems to lack this kick. It's still pretty good, but without that citrus kick it's not anything to write home about. And so I sit here, defeated, drinking my lame Blue Moon, wishing I had the good stuff. I'm going to say $2 isn't a high price to pay for a better beer.

The Apocalypse! ( Bum Bum Bum)

If you have drawn breath at all these last few years you have heard of our impending doom in 2012. Soon we will all be dead/dying from a pole-shift, comet, planet, aliens, solar flare, natural disaster, ennui, etc. O.K., maybe not ennui. Personally, I think it's a load of bunk. I have lived through many so called apocalypses, well supposedly predicted apocalypses. There was (off the top of my head) Y2K, and other 1999 predictions, 2005, and now 2012 (there have been many other prediction but I don't know there exact dates and most I wasn't alive for). It's just a great way to get people worked up, and for some con men to make a buck of the stupid.

Of all the scenarios the nutters have presented, the only one that is a possibility is the pole-shift. It has happened multiple times in Earth's history, and would cause several problems with our technology. However, it doesn't happen instantly. It takes a magnetic pole-shift 5,000 years to complete itself. Ooh, scary!

The reason I am writing this post isn't just for that little opinion to be expressed. My girlfriend has a friend who truly believes something (wow, so specific) will happen in 2012. She is convinced The Book of Mormon has predicted nuclear war, and surely the apocalypse will either be in 2012, or begin there.

What the hell?

Well not one to just laugh at nuclear war, I looked it up. I have very little experience with The Book of Mormon, despite being a Utahn, so I had to use the tools available to me. Google. I was unable to find any verses that specifically said 'nuclear war' or any variation of that. What I did find was the same basic apocalyptic nonsense in all those types of books. It pretty much boils down to 'war will be upon the land' and 'natural disasters will plague humanity'. Well I hate to be the one to break your bubble, but we have a big enough, and divided enough, population to always have a war going on. As for natural disasters, they always happen. Always have, always will. Big whoop if they happen in a year you claim they will. Hell, I can make a prophecy like that. In 2011 there will be a hurricane, and it will cause damage. There. I'm a prophet now.

I'm not sure how anyone could get themselves so convinced that what the people on the T.V. say is right. I can not fathom how this lady is able to dilute herself into believing that a book written in the 1800s could possibly predict nuclear war. These predictions can't be made vaguely and then shown to be true later. If they knew that a tragedy like this would happen they should have spelled it out to the letter. If they didn't it is because they truly didn't know, or they were evil, heinous, despicable people who shouldn't be thought of as great teachers.

Personally I'm a little astounded that people didn't learn from Y2K. I'm shocked people haven't looked for scientific evidence to find out the truth of the 2012 claims, but not so surprised. People just don't want to put a few minutes into research. Instead they would rather live in a state of panic and sensationalism. I'm fine with that though. The world will always have the crazy that believes there magic book predicted nuclear holocaust, and that means I will always have someone to chuckle at.

Dinner, a Movie, and a Great Time!

Sometimes in dating things get a bit boring. For the last week or so Cori and I have done pretty much nothing interesting. We have been too lazy to go out and do much, so last night we decided to venture out into the world for a spell. My mom and sister gave us some gift cards for dinner and a movie for Christmas, so we decided it would be Wingnuts for dinner then True Grit.

Wingnuts was pretty good. I'm not sure I would get the boneless buffalo wings again, but they were still pretty decent.

True Grit, however, was amazing! It took a bit of convincing on my part to get Cori to agree to see it since it's a western. I'm not entirely sure western is the appropriate genre for it. Yes it takes place in the time period, but it didn't feel 'cowboy'. I highly recommend it. It's 2 hours of awesome. Cori loved it so much I was told we need to buy it when it comes out. Shocking, coming from a lady that hates westerns.

What I loved the most about the fairly ordinary date was being with Cori. I love that we don't have to do anything incredibly exciting to have fun together. We can just go see a movie and grab a bite to eat. I love spending any time with her, and I love that after 2 years together I still get excited to see her and be with her.

How Could I Forget?

In being so hurried to re-start my blog I forgot something important. An introduction to me. I realized this morning that maybe in the future I may have people following my blog who don't know me personally, or people who do, but not well. So here it goes.

My name is Skyler, I have lived in Utah my entire life, and I relish every opportunity to travel outside of the state. I am 23 years old. I live with my beautiful and supportive girlfriend Cori, and I feel no rush to get married or to start having children. I'm still a child, why would I want my own right now? I brew my own beer with my best friend Adam, and I have found it to be a hobby almost more enjoyable than drinking the fruits of our labor. In Utah I'm somewhat of a rarity, an Atheist Liberal. I love to argue as long as a mostly civil tone can be kept, and often I'll play devil's advocate while arguing amongst my friends. I have a great love for video games. I believe they are a form of art every bit as moving and valid as film, photography, theater, etc. I also love film, comics, reading, music, and, more recently, writing. In all, I have found life to be wonderful. It can be hard at times, but I truly don't think it's as bad as so many others make it out to be. (It could just be because I live in a first world country though, but them's the breaks.) I love my family very much, they have always been there for me. I hope to have more than just a brother/sister relationship with my siblings. I want to be their friend, to be someone they can always talk to and enjoy seeing. Too often people assume their siblings will always be there, so they put no effort into the relationships. I love my friends every bit as much as I love my family. My mother always told me if I made it through the world with one good friend I was doing better than most, and I have many more than one.

I feel that was a fairly good intro to me. Like Skyler 101. I hope everyone will continue to read and get to know me a little better. I look forward to the future discussions and experiences!

Tragedy

When I heard about the shooting in Arizona, I was shocked. When I read about it and learned the details. I was more than shocked. Outraged, taken aback, shaken, all of those words don't quite match how I felt. To think something like that can happen anywhere, let alone in U.S.A. really bothers me, and the fact that it pretty much boiled down to a difference in opinion. Granted, Loughner is a disturbed individual, but it would be just like me stabbing another person because they like cream in their coffee, and I think it should be imbibed black. People had to die for political disagreement? Really? It's just fucking sad.

Now we have the Right backpedaling on their rhetoric. How dare we say they 'caused' this!? How dare we not blame the Left as well!? No one brings a gun to Left-Wing rallies. I believe PZ Meyers actually sums this up quit well with his post, so I will link it here. http://scienceblogs.com/pharyngula/2011/01/dont_politicize_this_tragedy.php

I really can't find the words to explain how sad this whole thing makes me. To think people are willing to shoot politicians over disagreements. Add this on-top of the shooting in Pakistan of a government official who dared to say that the blasphemy laws should be removed. He was murdered by his own bodygaurd, who was then kissed by bystanders at his court appearance. All because he said non-Muslems don't deserve to go to jail for not believing. What an ugly world.

Re-Working the Blog

Hello to all. I have decided to rework my blog, deleting all the old entries (all 4 of them) to make way for something new. This time I actually plan to post a lot more frequently, on more subjects, and actually about my everyday life (so exciting!).

I invite everyone to sit down and read what I write. Feel free to comment on and discuss things with me. Some of the things I say may be considered offensive, and not everyone will agree with me. I certainly would love to have civil arguments when the occasion calls for it, as long as they remain civil.

As soon as I find a design I like for the blog I will begin adding posts, so for now, bye!