A fly on the wall would think that all I've done today was say goodbye to Heber, make a phone call, lie in my bed all morning listening to whatever song 'shuffle' decided to play next, and eventually shower and make my way to a computer.
That fly would not only be cheating death creepin' near my impeccable fly-swatting skills, but he would also be dead wrong. Upstairs, the hamster has been running on his wheel since the crack of dawn...
Ever feel like you are running a little low on karma? I like to think I'm a generally nice person and usually don't fear the repercussions from bad karma, since the good outweighs the bad significantly in most cases. I try to act on any opportunity I can get to be a good samaritan. Simply doing little acts of kindness that are (sadly) not expected out of people on the street boosts up my standing with karma. But, the theory of regression to the mean suggests: if a player (gambler or team) performs significantly better or worse than normally expected, then in the future, he will return to the average expectation of that player (gambler or team). (Thanks to a gambling website called Punting Ace for that definition).
In other words, while you will usually perform at the average (in this case the average is good karma), there may be times when you do better or worse, they just balance out and regress to the mean.
I have a feeling I'm in one of the "performing significantly worse" periods. This August I think I've borrowed change from "Take-a-penny" jars more times than I've left a few coins. I can't particularly remember being a nice lad to any senior citizens this month. I've downloaded a fair amount of movies and music. DEFTA.
It all started with the Baconator and "The Summer of Crime". If you haven't heard, this summer is the aptly named "Summer of Crime" (preceding the Autumn of Time). Not any crimes that would make a newspaper headline, but garden gnomes beware, and if Rogers video thinks they're getting their copy of Small Soldiers back, they've got another thing coming. Now when Jordan was leaving for work this morning he found himself a large display poster for the Wendy's sandwich that promises a heart-attack by age 35. If this whole summer of crime thing has gotten big enough that we are awaking to dissidents leaving signs on our front step, maybe it's gone far enough.
Now when I saw this Baconator I had an overwhelming feeling... and not the mouth-watering feeling I usually get when I see that much bacon. A voice told me: You've got to go get some good karma before it's too late. Seeing as how the last time I woke up with that voice in my head it was bang on (I simply knew Barry Bonds was going to hit his record-breaking home run that night), I felt as though I'd better not ignore the warning. I didn't follow Bonds' roids driven pursuit of a record, so it was quite peculiar to have such a strong feeling. If this voice knows as much about karma as he does about sockin' dingers, I'd better treat this seriously.
In other words, I had better start balancing out these examples of bad karma fast, otherwise I could be in for trouble.
So, while I was lying in bed I thought of the cliche, not-very-funny challenge that every selfish sit-com character faces at some point if their show lasts more than 4 seasons. Do one selfless good deed. This question has always irritated me. If this jerk hasn't done one good deed his entire life, then why is he living in the same apartment as Jennifer Aniston? Surely he/she would have been straightened out before that point when you can't even perform one good deed.
Pfft. I can probably perform one good deed without even getting out of bed. To "www.thehungersite.com" I go. Every time you click it donates 1.1 cups of food. But then it dawns on me, that food is probably donated anyways, and this is just a way to view the advertisements from the company that donated the food in the first place. My click merely fulfills the business plan of such a charity. While each click is good, to show support for others that give, that food is on the way over to a hungry belly anyways. I mean, it's not like somebody is sitting at the other end of the interweb, and as soon as they see that I've clicked, they scoop 1.1 cups of food into a bag and fedex it to Africa, Eastern Europe, the Middle East, or wherever it is needed. To me, this just wasn't enough. Yes it was a good thing, but I don't think it's enough to balance this summer of crime. Needless to say, I also clicked the Breast Cancer Site, Child Health Site, Literacy Site, Rainforest Site, and the Animal Rescue Site. After all, beggars can't be choosers.
Easy, I'll just go out on the town and see where I can make somebody else's day easier. I'll grab my piggy bank and go from local business to local business, filling up "Leave-a-penny, take-a-penny" dishes everywhere! But what if the karma thing was a warning? What if I get in a car accident on the way to nowhere? I'm sure not going to bike or walk, out of fear of physical injury.
This has led me here. "Remember when we were going to have blogs last Summer?" I asked Brynn this morning before he left. I realized a few hours later that maybe I should use my blog to advertise for thehungersite.com, and to encourage my friends to pursue good karma by being better citizens and nicer people. Wouldn't that be more effective? I imagine masses of internet users who google "The Baconator" will find this blog, read the message, and start doing good deeds.
This is what I learned:
If you were very conniving, you would try to hang out with me as much as possible, and manipulate my quest for your own personal gain. You sly hound...
It was far too easy for me to avoid going out and being a nice guy and justify staying at home and typing on my computer.
The Baconator, bears striking resemblance to the burger Krusty endorses in the Simpsons Movie. (If you can find a greasier sandwich, YOU'RE IN MEXICO)
Gambling websites are great sources of definitions from Statistics. That sort of makes the guy playing poker in class seem brilliant doesn't it.
Conniving is impossible to spell.
There is just no way to make the quest for a selfless good deed funny.
