I want to live in a country where...

One of the blogs I follow on a very regular basis is written by shirtless-gay-sensation Davey Wavey. He focuses heavily on love and peace, and sharing that with the world. I don't agree with everything he believes, particularly from a spiritual/religious standpoint, but I always love reading it anyway, because I enjoy hearing different perspectives, and sometimes, he comes up with a real gem.

Yesterday was one such gem. (Which was actually a concept borrowed from this blog by Keri Smith). They wrote about what kind of country they would like to live in. I agree with several of the ones written by Davey, Keri and the other responders, and I added my own unique ones to the long list of responses.

• I want to live in a country where I may keep what I earn.
  
  
• I want to live in a country where the government is afraid of its people.
  
  
• I want to live in a country where people take responsibility for themselves, their actions, and their choices.
  
  
• I want to live in a country where people understand risk.
  
  
• I want to live in a country where people do what is right because it is right, not because it is "politically correct."
  
  

In the next couple of days, I'll go into more detail about each of these, but in the meantime, let me know what you think. What you want from your ideal country.

I'm back!

It's been close to six months since I wrote. I feel bad, because I had originally intended to write frequently. However, I was advised by my employer to discontinue because of my post on June 8, at least as long as I worked for the company. I ended my employment in August, and had a very busy semester of school, during which time I got out of the rhythm of writing anything on a regular basis.

Regardless, I'm back, and hopefully I'll be able to get back into the swing of things and have more actual content soon.

So.

So it's 4:00 am, and this guy is still awake.

Does he want to be? No.

But he is.

Why?

He doesn't know. But he does know that tomorrow morning will not be enjoyable. Nor will another night like this one be at all pleasant. But many nights pass like this each year, month, week. Most people don't know he's not asleep, and he goes to work each day, not bothering to tell his co-workers, because he wouldn't want to burden them with his problems. They probably wouldn't care or be able to help, anyway. Nobody really gets it. Sometimes it makes him angry, after all, most toddlers can already sleep through the night, even with a nap during the day, so why can't he sleep? What makes him inferior to a two-year-old? Ultimately, he accepts sleeplessness as just another part of life, and is thankful that today is Saturday. There's no paycheck riding on today's performance, and that little reminder, plus the knowledge that exhaustion will eventually get the better part of his subconscious is enough for him to sit through another lonely night.

Insomnia Sucks.

But what most people don't know, is that insomnia itself is symptom, not a disease or disorder. Almost all adults will experience some form of insomnia during their lives, be it from jet lag, shift changes at work, or whatever. Between 30 and 50% of people will experience insomnia on a "regular" basis. This doesn't mean every night, but certainly with some amount of regularity.

Then there's what most people think of if you say the word "Insomnia." A condition that affects one's sleep patterns frequently for an extended period of time. It is Chronic-Insomnia, and as many as one in ten adults experiences it. One in ten. That's around thirty million U.S. citizens.

And most people don't realize how prevalent this is. It comes from a wide variety of causes, and can be treated witih a wide variety of methods, medicinal and other. By being aware of a problem, we can begin to fix it, and with this problem, we don't even need to invent the solution.

Think about it.

Health Care

Today, President Obama made a speech in Wisconsin about the need for health care reforms to begin in the next six to eight weeks, calling for people to lobby their congressmen to get things moving.

Mr. Obama stated that he would be "happy to steal people's ideas" for the best strategy. But where is the funding coming from? Said Obama, "[it will cost] a good deal of money at a time where we don't have extra to spend," but that he won't let this add to national debt. That, ladies and gentlemen, means taxing the people, or making budget cuts to fund a program with a potential cost of $1.5 Trillion.

There has been a proposed tax on the "highest-earning Americans" by limiting the amount of deductions they can make including charitable donations. ("Highest-earning" often refers to those households with annual salary of $200,000+, roughly 3% of the population). This does not make sense to me. Proposed coverage would be extended to the 50,000,000 uninsured citizens (plus any number of millions of illegal immigrants that Obama promised amnesty for), by limiting the tax deductions, and discouraging charitable donations (to things like the Red Cross) of 9,000,000. In 2008, health care cost estimates were around $12,700/family of four. Not counting inflation, that means it would cost somewhere around $158.8 B to provide health-care for the uninsured. To fund this from the "Highest-earning Americans" would cost around $70,000/family of four. There's some equality for you.

And for people who think that the money might come from budget cuts, don't be too hopeful. Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi has been working very hard in the last few days to rally support for a supplemental war-spending bill of $100,000,000,000, in addition to the already requested $70,000,000,000. The total cost of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars in the last 8 years is $876B, or $109.5B/year. That's funny. An awful lot of Democrats ran platforms to cut war spending, and they're looking at spending $60 Billion more this year than the eight-year average. That doesn't sound like a spending cut to me. Why not use that $100B to cut that big tag on the health care reform? Or better yet, use it to help students go to college, so they can afford their own health care?

God Bless America.

I don't understand this...

So, part of my summer job is making a lot of phone calls to set up appointments with my supervisor. Today, I was calling people who are already clients for periodic review appointments of their accounts. So I'm going down my list of names and numbers, and this happens as soon as the phone is answered (before I can say hello).

Her - "I don't have the time or desire to talk to you right now. We're really busy here right now with graduations and so forth, and I don't need you wasting my time. If I wanted to talk to you, why do you think I ignored your other calls?" What kind of answering machine message is this? Oh wait, it's actually a person. The last time she was in the call-log was three months ago, and if she didn't want to talk, why didn't she ignore this one, too?

Me - "Excuse me?"

Her - "Don't pretend you've never heard of Caller ID. I know who you are, and why you're calling, and I really don't want to waste my time listening to you try to sell me things I don't need. I know I have a policy that expires in about four years, and I couldn't care less. I just don't have the money to invest in anything right now." You could have let me say hello. And you don't know who I am, I've been working here for a week. I don't want to (and actually can't) sell you anything, and the economy is hitting everyone hard, so an appointment would make sure your current investments are working to your advantage.

Me - "I'm sorry to hear that, and if you don't feel that a meeting would be beneficial right now, that's fine. But seeing how circumstances and the economy have a way of changing, would it be ok if we checked back in about six months?"

Her - "My situation is not going to change. Like I said, we don't have the money to invest right now, and I don't foresee having it any time soon. And even if we did, we probably wouldn't be investing it. Actually, I'd be perfectly happy not investing another dime ever again. We know what policies we have, and everything we need to know to keep them where they need to be; if we need anything, we'll call." I doubt that. Everyone's situation changes. Not investing ever again is your loss, not mine, and I'm willing to bet you don't know everything about your policy.

Me - "Well, I'm glad to hear that you know how to maintain your policies, and if you ever need anything, you know where to find us. Have a good day."

So...that was my conversation...And after it was over, I was irritated for a moment, because the woman was very rude, particularly because I was only calling to offer a free service, so everyone could be on the same page. Then I felt empathetic for her, because these are rough times for many people, myself included. I don't always know if I'll be able to afford school, plus necessities, let alone have the money to do some of the things I enjoy. Next, I felt sorry for her, because I'm guessing she was having a bad day. She had told me she was very busy, which can be stressful, especially if things weren't going her way, and I did inconvenience her by interrupting her afternoon by calling. And a rational person under normal circumstances who doesn't want to talk to someone they know is calling, probably wouldn't answer the phone. Now, I think I just pity her. Because her perception of the world around her has become such that she doesn't even want to hear an encouraging or hopeful word, and refuses to believe that because things haven't been easy for the last few years, that worse has happened before, and if a 100 year-long pattern continues, we'll be having another 10-20 years of massive growth starting in 5-10 years.

So that was my perspective on a not-so-pleasant part of my day. Wasn't a wonderful day, but that just means that I can appreciate the great days even more, because I've experienced enough to know that good days don't go out of style, and the proverbial store of life never sells out of them.

Welcome!

Hey! Welcome to the Ramblings of Nick! In this blog, I'm going to talk about all kinds of things. Some of them you might like. Others you might not. Regardless, I hope my ramblings give you something new to think about, or something old, but in a way that you wouldn't have thought of before. Ultimately, I'd like to start adding pictures and videos as I can, to take this beyond words on a screen.

A few things you should know about me, and what that means for this blog:

1. I am a student studying Music. That means first that I will probably talk about music quite a bit, but also that I go to school full time, have a job so I can pay for my living expenses, and have more homework than most people in the form of practicing my various instruments. This blog is a hobby, not a necessity of life.

2. I am interested in politics and identify as a Libertarian. I'll probably spend some time talking about my views, and will likely be critical of both major political parties in the U.S. Sometimes I will applaud the efforts of one or the other, but this does not mean that I agree with everything, or with a two-party system in general.

3. I am Christian. My faith will probably shine through into some of my writing. I believe in loving thy neighbor as thyself. I can understand if you don't believe the same things I do, but I expect that I'll be treated with respect, or the privilege of reply may no longer be there for you.

4. I am gay. And I will talk extensively about GLBT issues. If you disagree with me on anything, I do not mind respectful objection, but again if courtesy becomes an problem, I have no problem moderating or disabling comments. I plan to start writing more about my sexuality soon, as it is one of the primary reasons I created this blog.

5. I don't like the number four, so I'm putting five things you should know. But otherwise that's about it for now.