my week in tweets: 2009-06-15

June 15th, 2009 Troy

• Why do I get a headache almost every single Monday? Have for years now. It’s not food, caffeine, sleep… follows no pattern. WHY?!? #fb #tt #
• If you’re paying attention (and sometimes even if you aren’t) there is no question when you encounter Truth. Hits you in the face. #fb #tt #

Tags: tt
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nine years

June 10th, 2009 Troy

Nine years ago today, it was a sunny Saturday in Fort Wayne, Indiana. I woke up that morning nervous and excited. I was going to get to do something that day that very few people get to do: marry my high school sweetheart.

Nine years, 2 states, and 1 awesome 4 year old later, and I love her more than ever.

Thanks for having me Missy!

Tags: anniversary
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customized pricing?

June 8th, 2009 Troy

I heard a commercial on the way in to work today advertising an insurance plan where you “name your own price” and they come up with a policy to match.

Really? Is anyone else reminded of the old slimy car salesman bit: “How much is this car?” “How much do you have?” “$5,000.” “This car just so happens to be $5000, must be your lucky day!”

Whatever happened to “you tell me the cost and I’ll detemine it’s value”?

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my first car

May 22nd, 2009 Troy

My first car was an ‘82 Oldsmobile Omega which was generously given to me by a friend of our family. It was sort of a cold, steely blue color, more like primer or bondo than anything. It had a block heater which had an electric plug that hung out through the grill at the front of the car. I often was mocked for having to plug in my “toy car” but who’s laughing now? Chevy Volt anyone?

I digress. Anyway, the Omega had a single catalytic converter with a small cap on the bottom of it. I still to this day have no idea why, nor have I seen another with such a cap. Well, I drove this car pretty hard. It was beat up just enough to make me not feel guilty if it got another few dings, plus I was 16 and drove like it. At some point while trying to get all 4 wheels off the ground going over railroad tracks at 60mph, I bottomed out hard enough to tear that little cap off, so the exhaust system just emptied out about a foot from the headers, bypassing the muffler. If you aren’t familiar with car exhaust systems, just know that this will make your car sound like 100 synchronized Harley’s, but not in the full, deep, growl-y way, just in the eardrum shattering way. It was so loud that it prevented conversation from being possible with any passengers once you got above about 45mph. I actually took my wife on dates in that thing, we just had to save our attempts to woo one another with witty banter until we had reached our destination.

So after about 6 months like this, and having no experience working on cars whatsoever, I set out to fix it one Saturday. Using a muffler patch kit from Autozone (or rather misusing), I spent my morning wrapping the catalytic converter in what was kind of like plaster casting, giving it time to dry, then following up with the liberal application of duct tape (that wasn’t in the instructions, I was calling an audible on that part). That afternoon, I slowly eased out of the driveway, and was shocked to hear something I hadn’t heard while driving in months: myself think. It had worked!

However, unbeknownst  to me, over the last 6 months of driving with a hole in the bottom of my exhaust system, rocks and debris had shot up through the hole and packed the exhaust pipe/muffler. So that strong exhaust smell that seemed to be building in the cabin as I quietly cruised down my street was because the engine had nowhere to vent exhaust. Carbon monoxide poisoning, anyone?

Ironically, my 16 yr old driving habits actually prevented my untimely death. At the first stop sign I came to, I stopped, then did what every teen does. Punch it as hard as you can to see if you can tweak the tires. And, “BOOOOOM!” The pressure in the exhaust system blew the plaster and duct tape cast off in an awesome display of flying paper mache and melted vinyl.

In the explosion, further parts of my exhaust were damaged and/or seperated, causing the car to be even louder than before. It was now possible for the kids in home room to hear me coming down the road to school before I had even reached the parking lot.

Despite this, I loved that car. And I’ll always carry part of it with me the rest of my life, in the form of permanent hearing loss.

Tags: first car, oldsmobile, omega
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false hope

May 18th, 2009 Troy

This was gonna be a tweet but I can’t fit it into 140 characters, even swapping “2″ for “to” and “ur” for “you’re”.

False hope might be better than real hope. Think about it, if you have real hope, you have a real reason to be hopeful, it’s based on reality and not lies. But with false hope, you’re at least happier than you would have been otherwise had you faced reality. So if you have a real reason to think things will get better, it’s likely because things will get better whether you are aware of it or not. Eventually, you’ll come into that better reality and you’ll be happy. But if your future sucks, you’re gonna find that out eventually, might as well be ignorantly happy for a time. The average increase in happiness for those with false hope in a sucky situation (increase compared to those in the same situation facing reality) has got to be greater than the average increase in total happiness for those coming into a better situation knowingly (compared to those ignorant of their coming success).

Hmm, that’s hard to express with words, let’s try expressing it mathmatically:

Sf - Sa > Gh - Gi

where all values represent the happiness quotient of the following groups of people:
Sf = sucky reality w/ false hope
Sr = sucky reality, aware of suckiness
Gh = good reality, hopefully aware of coming fortune
Gi = good reality, ignorant of coming fortune, probably considered a pessimist

So the net increase in happiness for those with false hope is greater than the net increase for those heading into good times.

Ahh, see, math fixes everything. “But honey, what do you mean you’re leaving me? You’re happiness quotient is way higher than it was that time I skipped out on date night to go to Wrestlemania 23, so you can’t leave now.”

PS. For the record this is all tongue in cheek. Sarcasm is my calling in life.

Tags: false hope, hope, optimism, pessimism
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