More Tales From The Nutjob Farm

 

“A fanatic is a nut who has something to believe in.”~ Dean Koontz

Fanatics.

Here we go again!

One more contest out there on the Internet. This time, dinner with you and 3 of your friends with your pop star idol.

Unbelievable!!

And of course, fans are screaming from all directions of the aisles.

As with many contests and such over the Internet, certain restrictions, guidelines, and rules apply. This time around… the contest is open ONLY for those people who are adults (21 years old or older) in North America (Canada & USA.)

European fans are crying foul. Asian & Australian fans are grumpy as hell.

And then there was this that started the landslide of my own about these fans:

“I can’t enter this contest. I hope a real fan wins.”

WHISKEY TANGO FOXTROT over?????

“That’s not the way it is when somebody loves somebody.” 

I had to step back and break this down, because I asked what a REAL FAN was… and nobody can give me an answer.

FANATIC
noun

noun: fanatic; plural noun: fanatics

1. a person filled with excessive and single-minded zeal, esp. for an extreme religious or political cause.
2. a person with an obsessive interest in and enthusiasm for something, esp. an activity.

Yes, the original word of “fan” comes from FANATIC. I can’t be sure on why it was shortened down to just fan. I have theories, but will not post them here.  

So yeah, the comment struck me all wrong because it was an extreme judgement call on that person’s behalf. Not cool. Who are we to judge?

Who are we to say this person or that person isn’t a real fan of something?

Either I am getting bored with the “fellow fan” population or getting tired of the entire scene because I’ve never seen such selfishness inside a group of people that claims to be about love for their idol and for one another. Selfishness is not love.

For sure, it is disappointing.

People need to get a grip.

And I need to calm down.

 

 

Tit For Tat Is Tot

“It is the characteristic of the magnanimous man to ask no favor but to be ready to do kindness to others.”~ Aristotle

Two things right away before I get into my post. #1- Quit snickering, you pervs! “Tit for tat” has been around for many centuries in the English language. It is a shorter version of the phrase “this for that”. #2- I can really get deep with the philosphical quotations.

Today, I witnessed a rather unusual spectacle. Two people were ironing out some logistics of a deal that they were trying to make. It most certainly sounded like a situation of “I’ll scractch your back, if you scratch mine.” As I became curious, I fully involved myself in the conversation that was taking place and I heard the two parties come to an agreement. Some labor for some food.

Food was then dispensed and consumed. And because I had involved myself, I was invited to eat as well. But when it came time for the person to do the small labor, they bolted. When that had happened, I excused myself from the situation entirely and never looked back. I had a feeling that the person who was jaded was going to ask ME to do the small labor for him. And I would not have been physically capable of doing so, otherwise I probably would have. So even before the person did ask, I told him of my physical limitations, thanked him for the meal, left him some cash for it, and departed.

I was wondering what the guy who had fled was thinking. He was visibly hungry and was wanting to eat. The other man was more than willing to help nourish him for the evening for as long as he would get some help in doing some chores around the house. Apparently, selfishness and greed was either that which took better of the man, or it was what he had planned all along.

There used to be nothing wrong with tit for tat. It was very common for it to occur at one point in time. Now, it is society’s sickening and rude attitude of “What’s in it for me?” that controls the situation, and I think that is just wrong.

Yes, you are going to receive something in return in these situations. I just don’t understand or see the point in making the scene worse by trying to gain the most out of it. I mean, to the point of where the arrangement becomes so uneven to where the other individual doesn’t even want to continue discussing it. I’ve dealt with that myself. I’ve given in to other people’s evil and selfish desires all because I needed a little help.

Doing someone a favor any more tends to come with a hidden agenda. If you help me, then I am automatically enslaved and in debt to you. Umm, no! It should not be that way. It should not be something that you should be taking advantage of the other person for. It seems like favors have gone out the window.

Whatever happened to doing something out of the love and kindness of one’s heart? That is what a favor really is. And should there come a time where I can return the favor, I should be more than happy to do that- without having this heavy burden hung over my head and begin told, “Remember I did __________ for you??”.

All of us can use a little help from time to time. All of us have had our moments in life where we were absolutely in need of something that we couldn’t do ourselves. It doesn’t appear that the generosity of others exists any more. As I said, when someone asks for help, it is always the attitude of “What’s in it for me?”.

Just help the person, for crying outloud!! I am sure that if they didn’t need to ask you for help, they wouldn’t and probably would be ten times happier if they could do it on their own. But for whatever reason, they feel that they cannot.

In my own life experiences, I have to ask for help. A LOT! That’s just the way it is. And yes, I will offer some kind of an exchange. But I do not do it to sweeten the deal so that you are going to agree to help me, I do it because that is what I feel is best in my situation for me to do, as a way of saying “thank you” for your kindness and help.

I’m not the first to say it or admit it, but today’s society SUCKS!!

[side note: the subject title- the line should read “Tit For Tat Ist Tot“, ‘Tot’ being the German word for ‘dead’. “Tit For Tat Is Dead“.]

Me, me, me!!!

“Whoever loves becomes humble. Those who love have, so to speak, pawned a part of their narcissism.”~Sigmund Freud

Just when I found the day that I believed there would be a change in my habits of socializing over the Internet, mainly regarding social networking sites, I found myself in a gold mine of absolute blog post fodder.

I think I changed my mind after watching the hilarious antics of a narcissist.

This woman was so intense to gain people’s attention on Facebook that others began to notice the pattern and completely shut her off.

She would begin to “roller post”. And trust me, it was A LOT! So many different posts saying the same thing over and over again. Usually, it had something to do with some pain she was experiencing. Or maybe just a bad day. It didn’t matter though, whatever it was, she was posting on her own Facebook profile. So she waited for someone to communicate with her and let her know “it was going to be okay”.

And so when she was not able to reach them that way, she would turn up the heat and contact people in other ways. She did this for the sake of having other people’s attention on her. This was every day life for her.

When nobody was showing her attention, she would go to other people’s profiles on Facebook and begin activity on them. Just looking for a comment or a response or something. When that person fell for it, she let them have it. Suddenly, they found themselves in a situation where she would go on and on and on about her own life and how it was terrible and never really give a chance for the other person to respond, or even talk at all.

Yes, even I had fallen victim to it. But twice and no more. I learned quicker than the others.

What was fun to watch was when someone would confront her about her behavior. Naturally, her walls would go up and she would get defensive. Her response would always be in her defense. Yet when she would see that her excuses were not holding water, she would stop… reflect … and then begin the process of apologizing profusely.

I use the scenario in the past tense because this afternoon I found that this woman threw a major tantrum because she was assuming that someone’s comment was cryptically all about her. She tossed me away from Facebook and moved on. Well, I personally am not going to cry any tears over it.

Still though, her mind of thinking that whatever any one had said on Facebook, male or female, friend or colleague, or someone she barely knew, it was always about her secretly.

So today, she took offense again to someone’s comment. She was just absolutely 100% sure it was about her without having said her name…. and now its “Au revoir!!!”. No skin off of my elbows about it.

Nobody that I have spoken to today who knows her mutually as I do has been impressed. In fact, she’s only closed the door on so many contacts and relationships with her poor attitude and terrible decisions. So whenever she decides to come back, nothing probably will have changed for her. She’ll start over. The humoring question is “how many people will still be around for her resurrection back to Facebook?”.

I do my best not to get so emotionally outrageous whenever I post something. I don’t always succeed, but I am working on it.

Narcissism truly is foul. Some say it should be criminal.

For now though, I’ll stick around a little bit longer on Facebook, just to find something to blog about that I find funny or ridiculous.

 

 

“My Way Or The Highway”

Just when I thought that mainstream society had released a few things out of its system to make room for the new & improved ways of lackluster social behavior, I yet again walk into reality that nothing has changed at all.

Needless to say that this post is totally laughable and probably isn’t even worth posting in the first place, but here it is anyway.

I was talking with someone this evening and we were discussing travel options for the summertime. We had come to an agreement of where we wanted to go, but there was no agreement on the fine details of how we were going to get there. More so, it was an argument over who would have which finanical responsibility.

What could have been an enjoyable trip to the West ended up severing the ties between two people. We were first going to fly, but then we decided it was going to be expensive for us. We then thought about taking the bus together, but that was decided against because that journey would take forever.

Then we decided we were going to drive it ourselves. Well, they were but still.

Then there was a disagreement on whether or not to get a rental car versus use their own personal vehicle. They wanted the rental, I said save the money and just spend it all on gas and what not.

After a while of arguing both sides, calmly and maturely, there still was no agreement. And as always is the case, since I am not the one who is doing the driving, I got put into a corner where it was either a rental or not going at all. This person was that rude and mean about it.

So fine then, whatever.

We did our research on rentals and couldn’t find one that was the best fit for us and what we were going to do. Eventually, we would find one for about $500 which would have been the total for the amount of time that we would have it.

The person literally had the courage to tell me that MY share of the rental fees would be about $300 on a  $500 rental. So I protested the unfairness of that proposal.

I tell ya, one would have thought that I insulted their mother.

A shouting match developed. I shouted back to defend myself. The only thing that was missing was the physical altercations to make it a replica scene from WWE.

So literally this person stomped away. I figured they needed to calm down as much as I did at that point. Perhaps after our heads were cool, we could figure this out. As childish as their exit was, I just let them go.

A few moments later, they proposed the exact same deal. No compromise, no nothing. And before I could scoff at their arrogance, I heard them say, “It’s my way or the highway!”.

HOLY CRAP!!

I could not believe my own ears. I was just in so much denial that I even heard that, that I had to ask them, “What are you … eight??”.

I guess my own mind wants to believe that things have changed in the 21st Century. Hoping that some things would have been lost in the breeze. I know that the new generation will always come up with something even more retarded and mundane.

Relationships, whether romantic or platonic, never really are going to be 50/50. But with that said, it should never be 100/0.

There should be a compromise. But maybe I am too stupid or wishful that there will be.

Anyways, my own response that I gave back to them was “If its ‘your way or the highway’, here’s $20 and a map that I bought from Wal-Mart. Good luck!”.

I threw a twenty dollar bill at them and the map that I had mentioned and told them to get out the hell out.