This is how I think about Facebook users too

Summary for when this video inexplicably is no longer viewable in a month, leaving my brog with a post with a dead video link: Our protagonist, Scott, who lives a fairly mundane existence, after perusing through his Facebook wall where everyone’s fluff posts depict lives more magical, exhilarating and interesting than his, begins embellishing his mundane happenings with false optimism and occasional fudging of the truth. The superficial piling up of likes encourages him to keep doing it, but eventually the world comes collapsing around him, and even he can’t spin the follies into overly enthusiastic status updates, resulting in the downward spiral of social degradation until people just begin blocking him.

Not to sound overly pessimistic, but this is exactly how I envision a lot of people utilizing Facebook and other social media outlets. In front of an audience where very few can actually dispute or challenge, you can say almost anything you want, and hope that viewers view your perception as their reality. I’m convinced that people occasionally factor in the potential to be able to boast about it on social media to excite others, as justification to be excited about something, instead of the days when people would be excited about it, solely for themselves.

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When winning titles is a bad thing

It was once said that the WWF Intercontinental championship was given to the best worker in the company.  This was a very easy thing to declare when the context behind it was talking about the late great “Mr. Perfect” Curt Hennig, who is widely regarded as one of the strongest performers in the modern era.  However, in a prior wrestling era, there was some merit to the statement, because when you look at the list of names of guys who held it prior to 2000, it pretty much has been nothing but stars who have achieved success in the business.

WCW’s take on the United States championship was that it was again, for particularly standout talents, but also a means of declaring a potential number one contender for the more prestigious World championship.  And again, like the Intercontinental championship, with few exceptions (David Flair), the list of names of guys who held the US title are pretty noteworthy.

What I’m getting at here is that the Intercontinental and United States championships, the second-tier titles that were once no-less important and prestigious to hold, are pretty much worthless in today’s dynamic wrestling industry.

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How to avoid Atlanta Airport curbside police aggression

In short, use the cell phone lot.

Cell phone lots exist at many major airports for a reason – for people to have a place to wait in their cars completely stationary, reducing the risk of inadvertent collisions while doing laps around the drop-off point.  The term comes from the obvious concept that when the person awaiting pick up is ready, both parties are in optimal and safe conditions to correspond over cell phones to arrange for pick up.

Atlanta Hartsfield International Airport was a little behind the curve, but they too now have cell phone lots.  Unfortunately, nobody uses them; either people haven’t been properly taught how to use them, or why they even exist or/and they are simply too stupid to figure it out on their own.  Subsequently, it is still a very common practice that people circle laps around the drop-off/pick up area*, even in spite of the massive construction they are doing in the middle of the route, that impedes the flow and traffic to its usual disastrous conditions.

*it baffles me to this day that despite being the statistically busiest airport in the world, Atlanta’s airport still does not have separate levels for drop off and pick up, as even a toddler could understand that one lane sharing two duties is less efficient than two lanes dividing them up separately.

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Donald Sterling, Twelve Angry Men, and playing a little devil’s advocate

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the last two weeks, the name “Donald Sterling” has been in the news very predominantly.  Donald Sterling is a very, very rich man, easily falling into the category of a billionaire.  Donald Sterling is the owner of the Los Angeles Clippers, a basketball team in the NBA.

However, the reason Donald Sterling has been in the news over the last two weeks is that Donald Sterling has pretty much been publicly outed as a racist and a bigot, based on a recording between Sterling and his mistress about how Sterling did not like the fact that she had a photograph with her and Magic Johnson, because Magic Johnson is black.  And then basically saying he doesn’t want people to bring black people to Clippers games.

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My Five Wives Power Rankings

Since it’s no secret that I have a fascination with the litany of train wreck programming shown on TLC, it shouldn’t be a surprise that I’ve also been tuning into the latest people-watching debacle on the network, My Five Wives. This doesn’t mean that I support polygamy or anything in the least bit, but I do find it interesting to watch the fabricated lives of supposed real-life polygamists.

Personally, polygamy isn’t for me, because I find some of the backstory to Fundamentalist Mormonism somewhat disagreeable, with hints of greed and narcissism between the lines, loosely entwined with religion to make it taboo to argue against. Either way, it doesn’t mean I can’t enjoy a show that exploits the lives of a modern polygamist family.

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The end of the Steak

 

I can say pretty confidently that Wrestlemania had redeemed itself from the lackadaisical crapfest it was last year, and that when the show was over, I definitely felt like I was entertained. I’m definitely happy to see that Daniel Bryan has gotten his long-awaited triumph, I’m happy that AJ Lee retained her title, and if anyone were to ask me, the high point of the show was most definitely, when Cesaro bodyslammed the Big Show over the top rope to win the Andre the Giant Memorial Let’s Get Everyone Else Onto The Card So They Can Get a Slice of the Payout Battle Royale.

But obviously, the biggest thing that happened in the night was the Undertaker losing to Brock Lesnar, thus putting an end to the supposedly immortal 21-year undefeated streak (AKA “the Steak”). Nobody saw this coming, nobody thought for a second that a cameo, gimmicky, part-time, more-name-than-talent guy like Lesnar had any chance at being given the honor of putting an end to the Steak. Even in spite of the build up, and that Lesnar is a legitimate physical force, it was hard to imagine that he had much chance of walking away in victory against the man whom for the better part of the last three decades, has always been viewed as the unofficial godfather of the WWE roster.

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Passing of an icon

We all know this photo – I call it “The Kiss,” although there’s all sorts of names for it, none of which seem to be official or not.  It’s an iconic image of celebration and victory.

For what it’s worth I like the photograph, because it invokes a lot of positive emotion for me.  Victory, celebration, joy, jubilation, and the romantic in me eats this kind of stuff up.  I like that there’s a gigantic statue of it out in San Diego, and I smirk approvingly whenever it’s paid homage to, but it’s not something I’ve really given a whole lot of thought to otherwise.

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