I get so tired…
Sometimes I get so tired of people. I keep looking for new friends online or offline and many times (fortunately not always – you guys know who you are) the ones who share my interests are the worst. When I go to forums, communities, groups, message boards etc, I seem to run into threads that give me a headache. Self-appointed experts are telling others off for allegedly doing something wrong or not doing something they’re supposed to do and so on. Why can’t we just stick together? Why do we have to stab each other in the back? By ‘we’, naturally I mean ‘they’. 
Sigh. I seem to have hit a really bad patch right now.
Animal Rights
I just signed this. Would you like to do it too?
In shock
I’m devastated. Yesterday I had really bad news, twice over and I’m still in shock. Can’t tell you too much about it, and I still don’t know the full circumstances in one case and won’t know for a while yet, the full consequences of the second. Lately I’d been managing to stay cheerful, but now I’ve just fallen apart. I don’t know why we always have such bad luck.
Do Primates Feel Compassion?
I found this article very interesting, and regardless of what it concluded, I would have answered the question with a yes. Clearly other animals can feel compassion, so why not primates, our closest relatives?
Elevator to Space
When I first read about this idea (in a science fiction book) I loved it. Not that I’d ever want to go to the moon, but the idea in itself is so intriguing. Fancy being able to send material up into space, without needing to use a rocket or similar space craft. Just send it up. And now apparently, people are working on making the dream come true. The other day I read about it in this article. Then the day after, I found that someone actually had succeeded in the competition, not in sending anything to the moon. More about it here.
We live in scary times, but this sort of thing helps make up for it to some extent.
Why Dolphins Are Deep Thinkers
I just read an interesting article about dolphins. It seems the more we learn about dolphins, the more intelligent they turn out to be. Which is one reason I’m devastated whenever I read about cruelty against them or any other whale species (no, any species at all, except possibly really evil specimens of homo sapiens…).
What happened?
Today the sun was shining and it was actually quite warm and not windy at all. Very nice in fact. I hurried out so I wouldn’t miss the sunshine. My mom and I went shopping (groceries, nothing more fun).
That’s when I was hit with depression. By staying indoors for quite a while (except for bringing in the mail, apples etc or hanging the laundry) I’d sort of been in denial. Partially shut myself down. Now it all came back to me. What a pathetic failure I am. What a loser.
At the store we ran into a woman my mom knew from way back. I remember her kids. It was like looking back in time. There he was, that kid (who wasn’t my friend, but I knew him – he lived in our neighbourhood). Except he’s not six years old anymore, with one of those toothless smiles, six-year-olds have. It was the guy’s son. And according to the grandmother there are more grandkids, and she and this boy were going to get them.
Great. This guy, who quite honestly is younger than me, has more than one kid now. Then look at me. Living with my mom. Still struggling to get a degree and later, hopefully, a job. No boyfriend, no kids. Help!
I know many other people are a lot worse off, so I’m ashamed to whine like this, but I just hate myself for failing this badly. The worst part is I’ve never known what to do or rather how to do it, obviously, or I’d have done it years ago. (Close your eyes, take a deep breath. If you can’t even calm down, how are you ever going to straighten out this mess you’ve made of your life?) There. One thing at a time. Sounds easy, doesn’t it? A pity it isn’t, not really.
