I h8 Dis S***!!!

Every time you "typ lik dis!!!1!" it makes me want to throw you off a roof. It is true that I am a horrible person and will judge you for your lack of general grammar and spelling. I also expect that I am judged just as much if not more. I am aware that my writing is nowhere near amazing, but at least I try to make it into something that is readable by most people. If I can't easily read a text message because you refuse to take the time to write out extra letters to make real words it is likely to put a damper on my mood. And, a general text message can use 160 characters. That is plenty of characters to use real words. I understand if people are in a hurry, but then I am honestly not sure how long a friendship is going to last if I can't read what they are writing.

This may come as a shocking statement, but I strongly believe that education is important. There (as opposed to their/they're) are two things lately that have absolutely ruffled my feathers regarding the education system. The first is about an article I read about how a school in South Dakota is switching to a four day week. They claim to be getting rid of Friday classes to save money. Where is the harm in that? The kids will be free to have an extended weekend each week to think about their future jobs from a lack of a well-rounded education. Please raise your glass to this year's graduating class! May you flip our burgers and pump our gas with fervor until your dying day.

Very little of this has to do with the fact that I had to go to classes Monday through Friday until my third year of college. I may be one of those people who kind of hopes that any future children of mine will get the chicken pox just because I had it, but this is not my reason behind schooling. This school believes that the students will not be any worse off with a four day week. I am not sure how this is going to be possible unless they make the schedule into an 8AM-6PM school day. I remember in high school the amount of information being taught just barely fitting into the school weeks. Why is it becoming such a concern for saving money that schools are being hit this hard? The school system has already gotten rid of many extracurricular activities as well as anything to do with the arts. Why not remove money from other things instead of schools? Surely the world would be just fine without another Nicholas Cage or Twilight movie. Use those millions of dollars wasted to help educate children.

However, my feelings toward education do not stop once high school has ended. As a college student, I watch my pile of debt grow bigger and bigger every time I even think about school. It is a painfully expensive endeavor to go to college for a degree in hopes that it will help you get a job afterward. I am lucky beyond all belief to have parents who take out a parent loan each year that allows me to attend. Every year we fill out the FAFSA it tells us how much my parents are supposed to contribute and how much I will have with my name. The dollar amount is stupidly high for them. Just because my parents make enough money for my family to live comfortably does not mean they have the resources to dish out thousands and thousands of dollars like the government believes (especially with more than one kid in college). If they were to make slightly less money, I would be eligible to receive grants or work study. There is no way I could wish for that. While free money would be fantastic in this case, it would be completely unfair for me to wish for my family to have a harder time supporting four kids.

What frustrates me to no end is this situation with "Steve":

Now Steve is a person who never graduated from high school. He lives in a homeless shelter and has no money. After much coaxing, Steve gets his GED and applies for college. He completes his FAFSA to find out that his loan is tiny and he will be given tons of grant money and work study to attend college. The only reason he decided to go to college was to be near someone he liked. Not to study. Oh no. Just so he could be in the vicinity of a certain female.

So how come the people who don't actually want to go to college to study and learn are able to be given what amounts to a free ride while families with children who want nothing more than to attend college might be unable to due to the fact that their parents can't afford to fork out thousands of dollars? Why should they lose out on this chance because the government decides that just because a family has enough money to live in a house and eat three meals a day doesn't need the extra help for rising school costs? Now I am not saying that people without money should not be able to go to college. I think it is important that everyone who wants an education should be able to have one and fair help should be given to everyone in order to achieve that education.

Crossing a Line

I generally like to think of myself as a laid-back, mellow kind of person. Now, this isn't the most truthful representation of me at all times of every day, but I do alright generally in letting things just slip past without getting my knickers in a bunch. However, as calm, cool, and collected as I like to think I am, I do have quite the list of pet peeves. Some are completely laughable, but out of the list of things that really peeves me are stupid people and people doing stupid things really just irks me.

From time to time, I will Google myself. Vain, perhaps. I don't really use it to boost my ego or anything. Mostly I just am just interested to see if someone with my same name has done anything amusing. Since my name is not common, I tend to see a list of about three things on Google. 1. Sites about wasps in Welsh. 2. A city in Germany. 3. A scholarship I won with my friend my Freshman year of college. So, you can imagine my surprise as I looked down the list and saw a link asking if I was a jerk. This was very much a strange thing for me to see. I mean, sure I can be a snarky, pain-in-the-ass from time to time, but to see a link claiming that I am a jerk? Weird. Of course at this point I have to click on it. The first thing that shows up on this page is a large picture of my face and a bar underneath for people to click one way or the other. Now, I never signed up for this website. Hell, I had never even heard of it. Why would they have this photo of me? My first assumption as to how it got there was me assuming that I had a very unhappy ex-boyfriend who wanted to be the bowling ball under my mattress. Regardless of how it got there, I didn't want it there anymore. There was a button at the top of the page that said, "REMOVE ME." I clicked on it and it brought up this lovely message:

Just because you have a profile on jerk.be does not mean you are a jerk. Less than 5% of the millions of people on jerk.be are jerks. jerk.be is where you find out if someone is a jerk, is not a jerk, or is a saint in the eyes of others. No one`s profile is ever removed because jerk.be is based on searching free open internet searching databases and it`s not possible to remove things from the Internet. You can however use jerk.be to manage your reputation and resolve disputes with people who you are in conflict with. There are also additional paid premium features that are available http://www.jerk.be/signin.php

This causes me to become so incredibly annoyed. This random "company" is taking photos of me (and millions of other peoples' I assume based on their blurb) from my Facebook account to post on their website. And then they have the gall to stick it up on their site telling me that there is no possible way for me to remove it since it was found by searching "free open internet searching databases." But don't worry, I can use all of this stolen material to my advantage to help with my reputation. That is bullshit. There had to be some more serious looking than free open searches to get to that specific photo of me. It is not possible to lock my Facebook page down any further than it is at this moment. Then, if I really wanted, I could pay to have "premium features." No. I refuse to even think about paying for some unknown service that stole my personal photo for their usage. I understand that there are things on the internet that end up free game to people, but locked down, personal photos should not be one of those items. Not now. Not ever.

Adventures of Public Transportation

In my almost one year of living in Portland, I have learned a great many things. One of these lessons has been learning to deal with/enjoy the crazies on public transportation. With Portland being the 5th best city for public transportation in the States, I have come to rely on it as my means of getting around. That, and I don't own a car yet. Each trip on the MAX or bus adds a little more excitement into my life. I think excitement is what you call it... I try to look on the bright side of things, since there isn't much of a way around it at the moment. From screaming children to the clinically insane, these are some of my favorite adventures while riding mass transit.

Ever since cell phones became smaller than a purse and no longer needed to plug into a car in order to run, people have been surgically attached at the hand to their phones. Not that I am necessarily much different, but I can leave it in another room for at least a few hours before suffering nausea, shakiness, sweating, and other withdrawal symptoms. But, there is one huge difference that separates me from the addicts. I don't talk on the phone while riding public transportation. I refuse to. It is too loud for me to hear what is being said, the other person can't hear me, and I would rather not have an entire bus of strangers listening to a conversation about what my cat threw up the other night.

Most people who ride on public transportation seem to believe that they are surrounded by some invisible, soundproof bubble. There are topics that have come up during other peoples' phone conversations that have been laughable to cringe-worthy. I have heard multiple breakups, how a person should tell another that they are being evicted from their house for blowing all the rent on drugs, and who gave what disease to who. And then there are those people that choose to believe that what they have to say is crucially important to everyone in the vicinity that they must talk so loudly that everyone on the bus can hear the topic at hand. I'm not sure, but I think they must be hoping that someone will stand up and shout, "Amen!" or something like that as they preach on the phone. It might make things more interesting. But, for now, I just have to laugh to myself as someone shouts about a hooker giving them The Clap.

Along the same lines as people talking too loud on their phones, I also get a kick out of the crazies that just yell at everyone in general. Just the other morning I was riding into downtown when a man got on the MAX, and as we started rolling again, he started pacing and shouting at everyone on board. In these cases, it isn't always the best idea to laugh because you never know quite how unstable they really are. This man starts off by yelling, "All of you from California, listen up. We don't give a fuck about Arnold Schwarzenegger!" This comment was then followed up with, "The Blazers suck! Packers are the best fucking team in the world!" Not only did I find this hilarious because it was 6:30AM and the rest of the MAX had been completely silent before hand, but the Blazers and Packers don't even play the same sport. His final outburst was telling us to go to school and actually learn something about the world. I decided that I must be attending the wrong school since they don't seem to teach me any of this crucial knowledge. Perhaps I should transfer to the School of Under the Bridge. I hear they have a fantastic program for a major in drug sales and prostitution.

I do stand by this last story as being one of my favorite trips on the MAX. After signing papers for my new apartment, the roommate and I were headed back into downtown. A man stumbles on board and the places his hand on my shoulder. Since it is possible to lose your balance when the train starts moving, I don't think much of it. That was until he sat down and his hand lingered on my shoulder for another handful of seconds. At this point I just stared at my roommate and tried to shrug away from his hand. Eventually he moved it, but he just kept staring at us. After a couple minutes, the man turns to another man and starts asking questions about us. We had been eating a snack at the time, and the man asked the guy what it was we were eating. The normal guy who was dragged into this just kind of shrugs and tells the man to just ask us. He replies, "I can't do that. Women don't know how to read." We started laughing, but he really was convinced that we couldn't read, or talk coherently, or even think for that matter." We should be kept in the kitchen for that matter. After all, all I am really good for is making a sandwich. A damned good one at that.

No matter what my journey on mass transit is like, it will always give me great stories. That is, if I don't go deaf from phone calls, mute from a crazy cutting out my tongue for laughing, or dumb from just being a woman. Just remember, if you keep it up, I will gladly throw your phone out the door at the next stop. Really.