After reading Monika's article, "How Do YOU Deal With Blogger Agro?", I felt the need to air my own feelings along these lines.

Borders, Language and Culture

These are the things that define a nation. On the Internet, however, there are no borders and language and culture are perceived instead of known. The Internet is truly a global phenomenon. The English language is the most dominant language used on the Internet, and many people make assumptions about a person's native language based on their usage of it.

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Here are some more of my thoughts that have just been begging to be released from my skull.

The Bible

I have had many trusted friends in the past. Unfortunately, most of them have died of old age, diabetic problems, and other assorted anomalies. One of them told me (back in the 90s), "Never talk about religion, atheism or anything of the sort in a public forum unless your public forum is designed for it." Of course, he's talking about controversy that can cause flame wars of the most hideous kind.

Well, I happened to accidentally surf to Capella's Guide to Atheism, a blog where the author is spending all of his time debunking and refuting biblical history and claims. I don't get it. Why go to all that trouble? Either a person believes or a person doesn't. It's pretty simple. Debunking and refuting something that's more than 2,000 years old, in my opinion, is an exercise in futility. The words written in the various books of the "Holy Bible" were obviously not written in a way people of the modern era would understand (at least not all of it), but I'm sure the people of the day understood it perfectly. And this, my friends, is probably the last time you'll see me write anything about religion.

Commonality

It's amazing when you discover you have something in common with someone else, especially when it's something obscure. I recently found out that Vic at Blogger Unleashed has more in common with me than just blogging. He cut his teeth on the Commodore 64 computer, just like I did, back in the 80s.

I wonder if Vic remembers reading the things I used to read, like articles by Jim Butterfield. Another fellow blogger, Andy Beard, may have actually met Jim in person, although he doesn't remember clearly whether he did or not.

My Web Host Breaks Things

I really like the service of HostNine. It's probably not the cheapest web host and it's probably not the best, but they're working on it. The only thing that annoys me is that they do upgrades all the time and some of those upgrades break things.

Back in December, I installed Mint to use as a stats package alongside FireStats. I never mentioned it, of course, and perhaps it's a good thing that I didn't. HostNine recently did an upgrade and Mint stopped collecting hits. I now have it on the back burner until I can figure out what's wrong. I don't think it has anything to do with the upgrade from PHP4 to PHP5, because I reverted to PHP4 and it still didn't work. So I put it back to PHP5 and I guess I'll just have to find out what's wrong.

In the meantime, and I really don't like using an external service, I'll be using Clicky again. It collects the same data as Mint, but goes into more detail.

Feelings of Obligation

One of the reasons putting a PayPal donation button up was the hardest thing I've ever done is because of the feelings of obligation I knew I'd experience. I don't think it's just me. I think everyone feels obligated to repay those who help them in a time of need, even if they won't admit it to anyone or even to themselves.

I fell on some hard times during the early years of my marriage, and sometimes had very little for me and my family to eat (the military didn't pay well enough to support a family, especially at the pay grade I held at the time), but we managed to survive without asking for help. We kept getting ourselves in and out of debt. My wife once asked me why I just didn't ask for help. Call it pride, or call it stupidity, but asking for help seems so wrong when I know there are others in worse shape.

Suddenly, out of nowhere, I realized it's okay to ask for help and receive it as long as I remember to help others in a similar fashion. I think, if everyone else developed this attitude, some of the societal problems that exist today wouldn't exist at all.

English Language Books

I like to read novels in specific genres. It's an undeniable fact, however, that getting new English language novels locally is difficult. New novels are virtually impossible to get. I can find the second in a series, or later, but never the first.

There's an old book that's been out of print for a long time that I want to get my hands on. It's "Earth Abides" by George R. Stewart. I read it more than 20 years ago and I want to reread it. I think, because I'm going to be back in the US for about a month, that I'll order it from Amazon. I spotted some copies for sale for less than $5.00 in US dollars.

There are other old series of novels I'd like to read. Some I've read one or two books in the series and some I haven't read at all. Aren't there any eBook novels which can be downloaded as PDFs or something and read without some kind of proprietary eBook reader? I'm talking about stuff that isn't 50+ years old.

I whipped out Jerry Maguire in July and watched it with my son, who had never seen it before. I had the VHS tape copied to DVD a couple of years ago, but I hadn't watched it since the day I bought it.

Responsible for "show me the money", "you had me at hello" and "you complete me" becoming part of the American culture, it won a whole slew of awards for both the film and the actors involved.

Jerry Maguire stars Tom Cruise, Cuba Gooding Jr. (who won an Oscar) and Renée Zellweger, with some notable appearances by Beau Bridges and Jerry O'Connell. Instead of presenting you with a trailer, I'm going to present a National Geographic slideshow that uses Bruce Springsteen's "Jerry Maguire" version of "Secret Garden" as the music. I heard this quite a few times before I ever saw the movie:

When I was in high school I was encouraged, rather forced, to read a book called “All Quiet on the Western Front”, by Erich Maria Remarque. The book is a WW I war novel about the truth of war. In the novel the author vividly describes the battlefield that lies between your compadres and the enemy. This area is described in the novel as “no-mans-land”. No mans land is a place where there are no friends and you’re as likely to be shot by your own side as you are by the enemy.

In one of my previous posts, “Honesty”, Matthew Jabs commented “The reason a lot of people lie is to protect someone else’s feelings”.

The simple statement, although obvious, caused me to think.

I try to live my life honorably, treating people as I want to be treated and trying not to misrepresent the truth or tell the truth, leaving out important facts that help define the truth. I also try to learn from history and from experiences I have had. For instance when my wife asks me, “Do these pants make me look fat?” experience has taught me that the answer is ALWAYS a resounding “No”. The answer is nearly as automatic as a reflex now as I’ve learned any, even minor, hesitation will be interpreted as a “Yes” regardless of what I say.

Why hesitate? My mind races, processing more data in a few moments than the newest CPU sitting on Intel’s test bed. I might be thinking; “Wow, I don’t like that color, those are too short or too long to be seen in public, why are the pockets spaced the way they are, who thought it would look good to use orange thread in green cloth, isn’t it great the way those pants make her butt look like an upside down heart, those shoes don’t really go with those pants, I wonder if anyone is reading my latest blog entry, does she like those pants, how does she expect me to answer, am I in the mood for a discussion about her butt, . . . and finally . . . how do those pants make her look?”

I’ve been in this “no-mans-land” before and without hesitation I answer, “They look great honey”. She smiles and slowly walks away knowing that I still love her.

It seems Matthew Jabs was right, we do occasionally lie to protect someone else’s feelings and that’s okay.