The iPod Pod

**I believe we have let ourselves; or have evolved ourselves into letting us ignore the world and reduce social interaction in a variety of ways. This will talk about your iPod. We ignore people by secluding ourselves into our iPods and the music it holds. This is most relevant when you are walking around town, on transit, or in the general public. Not when you are jamming with it in your bed.

I feel there is a social gap or an empty space between you and your fellow people. We walk past strangers on the street, we share elevators with them, we buy groceries together; technically we share many things together. Yet everything still feels so disconnected.

Perhaps we feel this disconnect from the rest of society at times, because of your iPod. I don’t think that the iPod is some evil device that was created to disconnect the world. I know it’s just a music player and it plays music and it’s great. But, it has also surgically replaced those awkward silences that used to force us to interact.

I believe there was a time when you had to fill awkward silences on elevators and transit or standing in line at the grocery store by talking or interacting with the people you shared it with.

Now, sharing an elevator (or any other public interaction) with someone and your iPod is in (or they have their iPod in) has become a socially acceptable way to ignore them. The iPod creates an invisible barrier around us when we are out in public. “I am listening to my music; therefore I do not have to speak to anyone…but not only that…people won’t come up to me and talk to me”. When you have your headphones in you create an invisible bubble around you. You have created your invisible shield, your invisible safe place. Final result is your pod. The iPod.

Even sometimes we hear people talking to us, asking us a question, or a homeless man asks for change; but since you have your iPod in, you assume if you ignore them it will be socially acceptable to do so and it is.

Now, throw in the fact that you can change and control what type of music you are listening to, and therefore adjust, change, and control the mood you want to be in…we have an unbreakable force of a technology induced social buffer. The Pod.

PS: Have you ever had a conversation with someone who (did have their iPod in when you approached them) and they leave 1 in their ear? Thank you.

Lady Gaga-Capital H I M

(**This does not reflect the personal opinion of myself but only of what I have read or heard and am expanding on) I recommend listening to the first 10 seconds of the song before reading.

I have heard that Lady Gaga is part of the proverbial "Illuminati". I have heard this numerous times and from friends as well. Whether you know what this secret society is or not, it is worth throwing my 2 cents in.

Lady Gaga's new song has hit the radio and the web. I am a little perplexed by it in a few ways. If you believe in subliminal messages or any sort of conspiracies about the Illuminati... (I am not sure what I feel about this)I felt it strange that the first time I heard this song I thought of Capitalism. (Capital-H-I-M).

Cover it with a positive message that a large audience will not only love but appreciate and listen to on repeat, over and over again.

Other than that, I think its a great message and a great song.

Good job Illuminati.

Gone to the Dogs

You can tell a lot about someones demeanor (whether they know it or not) based on how they interact with their pets or animals in general.

The epitome of how gentle, cruel, or uncomfortable someone has potential to be.

"Must love dogs".

Luck is not a Lady

Luck is something that we like to use to describe random acts of life interactions and the events that happen around us. If you think about how many things and events are simultaneously happening…all the time…every second…everywhere; then add in the fact that space is even bigger and everlasting; there is a lot of stuff happening all at once all the time.

We (humans) are microscopic in the enormous picture and grand scheme of things…and yet we like to think we are important or have some part of cosmic influence on it all. That is why when something great happens to us, we audaciously think we have “good luck”. In retrospect; when something bad happens we contently conclude that we all of a sudden have bad luck. “I must have bad luck”. We use this terminology to help us grasp the fact that we have absolutely no say or influence on the events that happen around us. It makes more sense for us to call it luck, other than; “what is going on!” or the fact we have no idea why everything is going on. This is expanded further and then described as the random act of fate. All of these, random acts of randomness luck, are compiled into fate. I find it scary that we have to use words like fate and luck to describe or define the most random acts or parts of our lives (which is everything).
That’s how little control and little knowledge we have on the things happening around us.

This “lack of explanation” and feelings of eeriness about the unknown, are very scary and can be overwhelming. I feel that the realization or acceptance of being totally present with yourself and where you are (physically and mentally) is the only grounding thought. Amidst all the chaos of things happening without your control, if you just stop and think to yourself, I am here, I am now and take a look around at everyone and everything and how fast everything is moving past you...it is quite easy to see you have no say or influence in the majority of the world around you. If you can recognize this I believe you can start focusing on more internal things. Realize that there is so much going on with everything all around, so many things you can’t control (I.E Bus driving down the road, wars, poverty, etc) you have control over your head and yourself. Be present, and be here, and control what is within your own mental capacity.
Some people will focus directly on themselves, things they want to accomplish, or people they want to meet.

You are walking to work you are having the best day ever. Good hair day, nice outfit, heading for coffee with a friend after work. Tomorrow you are going out for dinner with your parents (it’s been a while since you've seen them). Tonight you think are going to relax at home and have a night in. You have a lot of laundry to do as well as some dishes you left in the sink. Tomorrow you work at 7 am so need to have an early night. On the Friday you have a date with someone you have been wanting to see for a really long time Smack! You just got hit by a bus.

How did that happen? What just happened? You had it all set up according to your plan. You weren't thinking about dying, you had everything set up for your next 24 hours. You had everything all planned out to create your own fate. You got hit by a bus which in turn was your actual fate which you actually had no control over.
An old guy named Bob buys lottery tickets every day for the national weekly lottery. The draw is on every Friday. Lotto GOMAX it’s called. He lives in a small town of 200 people. People in his town call him Lottery Bob. He has lived in the town for most of his life and the town thinks Bob is a nice guy. They don’t know him know him, but they know he is a nice man. He tells everyone that he runs into that he will win the lottery this week. Always fully optimistic. He can feel it in his bones every week. Maybe that’s why he has gotten shorter. He has been working hard his whole life, survived 2 bi pass surgeries, liver cancer, and is a widower. When people ask him why he buys lottery tickets every week, his response is always the same. "It’s my lucky week I can feel it in my bones”. He knows that his positive thinking and his positive thoughts will eventually make him win. After all it is his 75th year of buying the tickets for this lottery. Bob is almost 93 years old. “Thoughts become things!” he says. He believes that’s always been the key to life. He knows he doesn’t have much more time…but what can 75 years of him manifesting do?

That very next Friday he does not win the lottery. So the following week Bob's 76th year of buying the lottery ticket, he decides that he is going to just skip 1 week.

On that Friday he hears on the news that someone won the lottery. Not only did they win the lottery, they bought their winning ticket at the gas station in his local town...down the street from him. Him and his family were just passing through on a road trip and stopped for gas. An impulse purchase made by a dull “regular family guy”. The news interviewer asks the winner how he feels and what is he going to do with the money, etc. He says; that he feels incredibly lucky as he has never bought lottery tickets before and wasn’t much of a gambler. He’s going to buy a big house and retire with his family.
They both laugh and the winner says that he must have good luck, and that luck was on his side.

These are considered random acts of unexplainable possibilities. Neither had any control of each possibility.

We use the words luck or fate to describe what’s happening. That scares me.