The recent high percentage of TV shows with LGBTIQ characters is annoying

During the year 2019 I noticed the unusually high percentage of TV (television) shows that include a lesbian, gay, bi-sexual, trans/transexual, intersex, or non-binary character(s). The high frequency of these deviant sexual characters does not confirm with the very low rate that is represented in society: around 2 to 3 percent.

I feel the high rate of these LGBT characters is like a bat beating some type of gay agenda into my head, meaning the producers are trying to promote the idea that these characters are more prevalent that they really are in society. And it turns me off tremendously.

My wife and I loved the non-binary character in Billions and it was a fun novelty. But for the majority of new shows to include something similar is just off-putting and sometimes disgusting because it seems so forced.

One of the groomsmen of my wedding was gay, but that was not an attempt by me to represent LGBT culture, rather I included him because he was a good friend. The TV industry is pumping up the rate of inclusion in a way that is turning me off to LGBT culture because it I feel it is being rammed into my brain.

Illegal Immigration Has Ruined Los Angeles Public Schools

With the huge influx of illegals into the Los Angeles Unified School District, the classes are dumbed down because so many kids cannot speak English. This slows down learning for everyone especially since the children of illegal immigrants are a majority in many of the schools.

This is one of the reasons we intend to send our little daughter to private school. And we are not alone in this. Most native white parents, including Democrat and liberal parents shockingly, send their kids to private schools if they can afford it. Funny how all that liberal idealism gets thrown out the window when the impact is personal. We call them limousine liberals - also known as leftie hypocrites.

Privacy: so difficult to obtain these days

In the Oxford English Dictionary the first definition of privacy is: "The state or condition of being alone, undisturbed, or free from public attention, as a matter of choice or right; seclusion; freedom from interference or intrusion."

Chamberlain product support is terrible

I submitted an inquiry to Chamberlain to determine which garage door remote opener I should buy for my system. They did not respond at all. I called their 800-528-5880 support line and I could not connect to a human being. Pure phone option hell. This company has terrible customer support.

LoopNet.com is OVERPRICED

Loopnet.com is a commercial real estate listing service. To place up to 10 properties available for sale or lease on their site they want $1,700+ per year. Wow! That is way too much money for the limited amount of traffic they bring to your listings.

Their management team includes: Richard Boyle, Thomas Byrne, Brent Stumme, Wayne Warthen, and Jason Greenman. I think these people are greedy and offer a product of low value and exorbitant price. Furthermore, their policy of accepting listings fails professional standards: they do not actively request and verify that there is a written listing agreement between the agent and property owner. Even worse, they don't verify if the person listing the property has a real estate license! I hope their business fails.

BREEDERS: My Gripes and Observations

We adopted a newborn girl 8 weeks ago. We have tried for 7 years to have our own child through multiple medical procedures, such as IVF. Then 3 years ago we made ourselves available to adopting a newborn. I was ready to move forward with or without a child. Nothing happened for 3 years until 2 months ago. We are very grateful for our baby girl.

Infertility was the most difficult challenge my wife and I have encountered both individually and as a couple. It is my observation that most people do not discuss the reasons for or against producing offspring. Most people act without deep forethought and instead think in herd mentality ("go to school, find a spouse, then have kids", "that's what people do" or "all our friends have kids") or rely on a deep instinct to fornicate or procreate. I do look down on these types as they make one of the biggest decisions of their lives minus proper prior examination of a decision that will deeply impact their lives for at least two decades.

With that said, I think a lot of parents do not feel at liberty to speak frankly about the downsides of having kids. Most love their kids, but the vast majority are not honest about the negatives of having kids: losing a sense of self, losing independence, losing solitude, losing time to pursue hobbies and athletics and travel, and losing time to spend with your spouse in a meaningful way. All that is lost to fairly constant tending to the kids. Parents will rarely admit any of these things if they are true to them because they are afraid stating such would question their irrevocable decision to have kids.

One of my clients is more forthcoming and he simply chuckled at me in a friendly manner when I told him we have a newborn. He teased me about joining the club of losing my prior identity and lifestyle and financial abundance. This made me realize that a lot of parents welcome their friends to have kids so they can relate not only in their happiness, but misery.

There is a large group of people that do not fit into the characterization above and have not lost much but rather gained. These are the single or double parents who simply are not as fascinated by life as others are. Example: couple gets married, maybe take a few travels, then feel bored or empty after a few years and say "let's have a kid". Many people cannot find satisfaction in life without kids, at no fault to them. My wife and I have found much satisfaction in living being together the past 16 years. We keep very active and engage life.

So many women and couples have babies so they can have someone to love and love them back because they are lonely or bored with life. Have you ever noticed how parents almost always identify physical or personality traits in their children that are reflective of the parent's traits? That is the ultimate in selfishness; a sort of narcissism. The next step would be to clone yourself out of vanity. I understand their is some magical beauty of a child born from the blended genes to two individuals in love. However, many parents are very irritating when they: 1. Question the lifestyle of child-free couples 2. Display a subtle vanity in seeing themselves in their children or 3. Have children to fill a void in their life.

My wife and I love our daughter and look forward to raising her. I am relieved in a small way that she is not of our genetic makeup so we don't fall into that soft narcissism when observing her. I feel I can love our daughter for who she is and not because I see parts of myself in her.

Wedding, Engagement Announcements in the Los Angeles Times

What humors me is that I would bet a considerable sum that most of the couples that post their marriages in the L.A. Times are not paying subscribers. Probably a bunch of idiots that have no interest in their city other than displaying their affection in a public manner.

Kill All Leaf Blower Users

I hate the sound of leaf blowers in my Los Angeles neighborhood. I will these damn gardeners would comply with city law cease using loud equipment. The noise pollution is terrible.

Los Angeles Municipal Code, Chapter XI — Noise Regulation, Article 2 — Special Noise Sources, Section 112.04 (c).: Re: Powered Equipment Intended for Repetitive Use in Residential Areas and Other Machinery, Equipment, and Devices.

"I Notwithstanding the provisions of Subsection (a) above, no gas powered blower shall be used within 500 feet of a residence at anytime. Both the user of such a blower as well as the individual who contracted for the services of the user, if any, shall be subject to the requirements of and penalty provisions for this ordinance. Violation of the provisions of this subsection shall be punishable as an infraction in an amount not to exceed One Hundred Dollars ($100.00), notwithstanding the graduated fines set forth in L.A.M.C. Section 11.00(m). "

Disable All SmartPhone Functions While In Motion (driving)

The threat of serious bodily harm or death justifies disabling all functions of smartphones at a velocity over 10-15 MPH. And yes, this would apply to the driver or a passenger in a car or in public transportation. I lean libertarian and the goal of staying alive does not conflict with my political philosophy. Smartphones are candy for the many ADD afflicted drivers out there. Defensive driving cannot fully protect us against the negligent behavior of smartphone users. (in response to this article)

Pacific Palisades: nothing like the founder wished

Did you know that the people in the Pacific Palisades are 89% white? No, diversity of skin color does not exist there in any significant way, at least not darker shades of skin tone. Traveling around the area gives me the creeps. Why? The white people there have secluded themselves from people different from them in skin color and culture.

The hypocrisy lies in the high percentage of Democrats and Liberals in the area. Democrats and Liberals claim to be the the party of minorities and people of color. But they sure don't want to live near those people. They may give lip service to thinking multicultural and being politically correct, but what they say and what they do are two very different and opposite things.

Final twist. Charles Holmes Scott founded Pacific Palisades in 1922 as a Chautauqua community for spiritual, philosophical and artistic people. I doubt his vision was compatible with the types of westsider Type-A people that live there today.

The Overuse of "Hipster"

Writers of restaurant and bar reviews excessively rely on the adjective "hipster" to describe eating and drinking establishments, especially in Los Angeles. Hipster, as described in Wikipedia, reads "young, recently-settled urban middle class adults and older teenagers with interests in non-mainstream fashion and culture." I would add that these people are simply pursuing trends in alternative fashions and lifestyle. I harbor no criticism of hipsters. Disdain describes my feeling towards the lowly scene writers who use the word "hipster" as a crutch to label the environment in restaurants and clubs. My suggestion: use the breadth of the English language to describe these places instead of that trite adjective.

Fake Breasts are a sign of female weakness

Millions of women have each spent $1,000's to enlarge their boobs (female breast augmentation).  Whenever I see these examples of large breasts, I do indeed heed their balloon shape.  However, I would not date almost any woman who has enlarged her breasts.

Unnatural and insecure are the thoughts that pop into my mind.  I have never heard a woman admit the real reason for enlarging her breasts.  But research studies and common sense will describe this action as a response to attract more males.  Very simple.  These chicks want to attract the attention of guys and want these guys to approach them.  And men's heads will turn; unfortunately we are hard wired to do so.  Sad to say these women are not confident with themselves psychologically to attract men based upon the qualities of their mind and instead have to resort to fake boobs to get guys.  It's a jungle out there.  

I'll end by adding that I would fornicate with but not seek a long term relationship with a woman who has drastically colored her hair.  Blondes may look hot, but again, the fact that they are insecure with their natural look turns me off.

Voice Mails IGNORED

In the past year I have noticed an infuriating trend: I call client's or friend's cell phones and leave a voice mail and then they call back without listening to the message. They simply call back the missed call number.

On a per call basis this is not an irritation. However, upon summing up all the messages left without the recipient listening to them, this amounts to a significant annoyance. Why don't you listen to the voice mail, idiots!? I now hesitate to leave a voice mail as more and more people do not check them. Chalk one more up to the discourteous behavior of people in the new tech age.

Zillow Falsification

Zillow displays a last sale price for my home. They claim they obtain their information from public sources. However, my local county assessor has no sale price information available to the public, as it is not part of the public record.

Therefore, where has Zillow obtained the sale price they claim for my home? I have no idea. In fact, their information is a lie and falsification because the source of their information has no sale data for my home.

I really wish someone would start a class action lawsuit against Zillow for providing false information. Zillow is a sham. Better yet, I hope the company fails.

Potential Benefit of the 2009 Recession

There are a few benefits that may arise from the current recession we are experiencing.  For many people, the Great Depression wiped away materialism to reveal the simple and genuine in people, their lifestyles, and the goods they purchased.  Let's hope the current economic hardship will strip such greed for goods from people and let us all rediscover inner value.

East is East in Los Angeles

Thank you Pat Morrison for writing about the idiotic trend of people calling Los Angeles areas, which lie west of Downtown LA, names such as "Eastside". Main Street has always served as the dividing line: go east from there and the streets are labelled "east", such as East Third Street; go west of Main St. and the streets are labeled "west", such as West Olympic Blvd.!

Some people want to call Silverlake, Echo Park and Mt Washington the Eastside. Rediculous. In the early 1900's there were two ends of the city. A west end at Western Ave and a east end at Eastern Ave. End of story.

3-31-09 UPDATE: The Los Angeles Times posted a story regarding this issue today.  I'm glad there are other people interested in fighting the ignorant geographical view of many people living in Silverlake and Echo Park.

Indie 103.1 Ceases to Broadcast

Indie 103.1 was my favorite radio station, which played alternative rock music in Los Angeles. I am truly sad I will not be able to listen to their fabulous broadcasts in my car, but I will continue to listen via streaming MP3 format over the Internet at home.

Resentment. The music now playing on 103.1 is the Spanish language beats of El Gato. It seems the Mexicans and other Latin American groups are slowly imposing their language on us natives and more and more media is published and broadcasted in Spanish. Unfortunate and upsetting.

The Use of the Word "Race" and Barack Obama

I take offense to people use of the word "race" to describe primarily the skin color of people, but also the body type and shape. We are all of one race, homo sapien. "Race" is a controversial term, which comes from historical attempts to categorise people according to their skin color and physical characteristics. The word has no scientific basis for divisions into biologically determined groups. Individuals, not 'races', are the main sources of human variation.

I view Mr. Obama as the progeny of a white parent and a black parent. I do not see him as African American, although I don't quibble with others' implementation of that label. Most importantly, when I think of Mr. Obama, his skin color is not the prominent characteristic that comes to my mind, which is not the case for many people. The primary traits of his that stands out is his even temper, diligence, and intelligence.

The Idiot's Lexicon: Kinda, Sorta, Actually, You Know

When I hear these words I think the person using them lacks confidence to stand behind what they are stating. These words:

1. are trite.
2. soften and weaken the message when there is no reason to do so.
3. are used as filler due to the speaker's lack of properly descriptive words.

So, please, take note of when you use these and ask yourself why you do so. Example: "Actually, I kinda feel sad, you know, because you sorta yelled at me." The use of "actually" may imply you lie otherwise. Do you feel sad or don't you? "You know", well, why should I know what you are talking about when you haven't completed the sentence? Did you yell at me or not, there is no need for the descriptor "sorta."

Fully commit to the message you are communicating. Don't hedge and instead have the conviction to declare your idea.

And lastly, using these words as qualifiers or modifiers of adjectives and adverbs is simply incorrect English usage and projects incompetence.

Caller ID Etiquette

Why does someone who receives a phone call with caller ID answer the phone by responding with a "hello?" when in fact they know who it is? Why pretend when the majority of people look at their caller ID before answering the phone? Most people SCREEN their calls and these days there should be no reason to pretend who don't know who is calling you.

Discuss?

Great minds discuss ideas;
Average minds discuss events;
Small minds discuss people.

Increasingly Impatient

Over the past few years, I have encountered an increasing number of people who seem to have no patience. The example that repeats itself almost every week is as follows.

I may be momentarily away from my telephone at work or on the line. Thus the caller will leave a voicemail. My day may be include an appointment or two or I may have other assignments that must be completed. Therefore, I may not be able to return the call for several hours.

But these people cannot wait for more than 2 hours. They will call again and leave another voicemail. Sometimes 3 messages in a day! What is wrong with them? I will tell you.

They operate from a point of self-centeredness. What they need and when they need it are their only perspective. They no longer contemplate that other people have busy lives also. They think their request should be everyone's priority. These same people are often tardy to appointments, which is a display of disrespect.

Cell Phone Disgraces: Part II

Ben Stein wrote an excellent New York Times article related to my previous posted subject. Some highlights from Mr. Stein's article:

• The cellphone and the PDA has basically replaced thought.
• ...loss and solitude and dignity.
• They are slaves to connectedness. Their work has become their indentured servitude.
• have we irrevocably become machines ourselves?

2 FUGLY's

Margaret Cho and Sandra Oh are fucking ugly.

Thoughtless breeding

Contempt. That is what I hold for those persons whom do not deliberate over the decision to procreate. Mindless humps of algae they might as well be - number one priority is to reproduce. What are the reasons to reproduce? I think there are several potential reasons.

1. Ego. Make a copy of myself.
2. Filling a void of loneliness.
3. Lack of physical control over one's actions: unexpected pregnancy.
4. Everyone else is doing it.
5. My parents are relentless in their inquiries: when will you produce a grandchild?

Call it Passive Breeding. The reproduction of the species without any contemplative thought. A herd of sheep.

GoGirl Energy Drink Ads Degrade Women

In my opinion, the advertising campaign for Go Girl energy drink degrades the intelligence of women. The ad asks "why do you drink go girl", and the woman replies "because I'm a single mom". Ridiculous! That is not a reason to drink it, rather only demographic branding on the part of the company. Nor-Cal Beverage Co., Inc., the manufacturer of the product, denigrates the woman's mind by assuming a woman cannot think of a logical, rational reason to drink it but rather she only has a herd mentality and will drink it because supposedly other women with a similar demographic profile drink it.

This company's marketing method is an affront to women's intelligence.

Cell Phone Disgraces

The ubiquitous nature of mobile phones has taken effect. The people around me in public places are engrossed in text messaging, their voicemails, or talking on their phones. Less and less common are the random conversations between strangers. Is this relatively new addiction to connectivity going to weaken the fabric of public interaction?

More and more I see people in my office building, restaurants, on the sidewalk, in the grocery store - all head down staring involuntarily at their PDA whether it be a Blackberry or iPhone or some inferior copy of these two PDAs. They stare down as robots, as slaves to their information addiction. Scary.

It makes me wonder if most people want to be plugged into the Matrix. Why not have smarter computer direct and live your life for you? Replace the infantile iPhone with the brain of the Matrix and then you really won't have to think on your own.

These people are more like lab rats. Hear the sound of incoming email, drop everything and ignore the people physically near you and jump to the information. It's so important. More important than real interaction.

Free Press as Government Watchdog - In Decline

Take into consideration the reduction in press corps especially in coverage of state and city governments. Then ask yourself how many people do you know that are younger than you read a daily printed newspaper. My answer is very few. Most people in their 20's and early 30's retrieve their news from a webpage and spend on average a fraction of the amount of time that print subscribers invest.

Were it left to me to decide whether we should have a government without newspapers, or newspapers without a government, I should not hesitate a moment to prefer the latter. -Thomas Jefferson, 1787.

I worry that politicians, more so on the local and state level, are operating these days with less scrutiny from the press corps. Blogs have taken up some of the slack, but not nearly enough and the average readership of a blog pales in comparison to a major metro newspaper. With less and less dedicated, professional journalists I really do worry that government power and corruption can more easily avoid rigorous scrutiny.

Government as parent

We are seeing a return to the idea first championed by social planners in the progressive era - that government can and should play th erole of parent. Hillary Clinton and the Dems want to direct our lives through central planning. But the sad truth is that we, the people, vote for this entitlement mentality in which we exchange small and large freedoms in exchange for big brother to care for certain needs.

Especially here in California, the populace demands certain services from the government while also demanding that taxes not be raised. More and more I see this mindset of people expecting someone besides themselves to take care of them for free (give me "free" health care and let the rich pay for it).

The essential problem here is America's continuing divorce from that most American idea of all: self-supporting independence. People save less or nothing for retirement because they expect the Social Security to coddle them when that program was conceived for the indigent.

So the liberals slowly win with their idea that people need to be saved from themselves. If only people could understand the founders perspective: be suspicious of government, especially a growing goverment.

scatter brain

I've noticed in the past 5 years that an increasingly large number of people's attention spans are dwindling. This trend is rooted in two factors. 1. We have the ability now to overload ourselves with a variety of inputs and information. 2. Priorities have shifted from altruism to self-satisfaction.

I will attempt to remain vigilant as to this contagion in my own dealings. In the 17th and 18th centuries entertaining oneself without the company of others was much more difficult with television, video games, the internet, radio, and automobiles. There was conversation and books for those few that could acquire them.

I wonder if American society will splinter with the eroding cohension formerly built when people personally interacted more.

Tattooed Lower Backs

Why do so many women like to place a tattoo on the lumbar region of their back? To give the guy porking them from behind something to look at? Who else is going to see it besides him unless they wear a bathing suit in public?