What Happened To Aahz And Z?
Posted on May 7, 2008
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Although I’m going to try to update Philaahzophy over the next few days I don’t know if I’m going to be able to. Why?
Because I’m taking Z on a surprise trip to both the Soft Opening and the Grand Opening of the new Hard Rock Park amusement park in Myrtle Beach, SC!!!
We’ve been tracking the progress of Hard Rock Park since first learning of it last summer and had all but decided that we’d be unable to visit at all this year due to a combination of financial constraints and Z’s outbreaks of bad behavior. But this is truly a once in a lifetime opportunity. Imagine if you’d had the chance to visit Disneyland on its first day. How long would you beat yourself up over missing that?
Hard Rock Park is either going to wind up being a huge destination for both roller coaster/amusement park fans and music lovers or it’s going to crumble under its own weight in just a few years. Either way, opening day is only going to happen once. And we’re going to be there!!!
I vent about X a fair amount here on Philaahzophy (and even more in person 
) but this couldn’t have happened (much less been a complete surprise for Z) without X’s help. So a giant THANK YOU to her as well!
Final preparations for this trip are the explanation for the lack of regular posts here over the last few days as well as for the next few. The fact that even as this is being published Z still has no idea what’s going on (I’m not telling her until she figures it out for herself - I’m guessing boarding the plane, but we’ll see) is why II’ve dropped so many cryptic sentences into my posts the last few weeks. Yes, the opportunity to check out all those new rides is why my weight deadline was today (I’m at 232 right now) and the seven hour plane rides are the reason the quit smoking deadline was approaching so rapidly.
We’ll be back in time for Mother’s Day celebrations on Sunday and at that point I’ll start through the backlog of posts to be made here (many political ones, a few more discoveries I’ve made on the ‘net of late, as well as trip reports for not only the Hard Rock Park visit and last weekends carnival and Six Flags Discovery Kingdom visits). As I said, hopefully I’ll be able to blog from the road, but the adventure has far higher priority.
After eight months of planning, saving and swearing people to secrecy it’s finally here… I didn’t think I’d be able to contain my excitement! If you’re the prayin’ type a few words to the Big Guy about keeping the threatening thunderstorms away from Myrtle Beach until Sunday ouwld be much appreciated 
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The ‘Net Empowers The Market In Making Better Choices - Again
Posted on May 6, 2008
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Who needs American Idol? Not Alisa Apps and not anyone else with a video camera, and inertnet connection, and faith in their product. You see, Alisa Apps is using the power of the internet in general and YouTube in particular to run her very own Pop Star Challenge.
As the video explains all you need to do is visit Alisa Apps page and check out the videos on the two links then vote through the comments section on which you prefer.
No longer are we beholden to corporate interests when it comes to understanding the choices we have available and choosing how to spend our entertainment budget (of both time and money). Check out the Pop Star Challenge today and then you can tell your grandkids that you were one of those who helped bring true choice to people everywhere.
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eBay Offering Up Bunches Of Goodness!
Posted on May 6, 2008
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Received two intriguing emails from eBay this evening. The first isn’t nearly as exciting as eBay seems to think it is, but I figured I’d still pass on the info. The second will likely be of little use, but is mucho exciting so I’m sharing it as well.
The first email trumpeted in its subject line: Seller special! 50 cent max Fixed Price insertion fees. Hrm…
Not nearly as exciting as March’s $0.01 insertion fees and nowhere near as good as the free listing days of old, but I guess it’s something. X has a bunch of baby stuff she’s looking to clear out, so I may even find some use for this. Full details, as always are on the eBay site itself, but essentially between Wednesday May 7 and Wednesday May 14 fixed price listings (aka Buy It Now or BIN listings) won’t cost more than $0.50 as an insertion fee. Normally listings starting below $10.00 are less than $0.50 anyway so this is only really a bonus for people looking to list lots of high-end items. Still, it may be worthwhile for many.
The second email, is where the meat is…
eBay is finally starting a buyer reward program. At this point it’s invitation only and I was selected as one of the lucky participants. Boiled down to its simplest terms every time I buy something on eBay between May 15th and August 14th (which could well be hundreds of transactions in my case) and pay formy purchases with PayPal eBay will credit my “rewards” account with 3% of my purchase. Considering I was spending between$300 and $700 each month for the last six or so this could really add up to a fair amount of cash for me.
If you received one of these emails I strongly suggest you take advantage of it. Even if you only buy a few things on eBay it’s basically free money - and that’s always a bonus!
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Introducing The Third Wave Of Imported Horror Films
Posted on May 4, 2008
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The First Wave of Imported Horror-
When I was a kid all of the best (read bloodiest and most intense) horror films came from Italy. Sure, we had Freddy Kreuger and Jason Voorhees, but tracking down multi-generation VHS tapes of of Italian horror films was what all the true gore aficionados were into.
The Second Wave Of Imported Horror-
In the 1990s Japan stole Italy’s crown and suddenly everyone was watching American remakes of Japanese horror films while the truly dedicated were buying pirate DVDs at anime conventions or downloading copies of the original Japanese films and discovering a whole new world of horror. Although so very few of us remotely understood the Japanese language we all discovered terror cuts across cultural lines.
The Third Wave Of Imported Horror-
But next week the diehard gore fans will be trekking to one of 10 major cities to be a part of the coming of French horror (yes, I said French horror) to American screens when Xavier Gens’ Frontier(s) premieres in America on Friday May 9th. Rarely does an unrated film get seen on any theatrical screens in the United States and it’s an even more rare occurrence for an unrated horror film to get booked. But Frontière(s), which was part of last fall’s After Dark Film Fest has done just that. Unless you live in a major city you’ll have to road trip to see this on the big screen, but I promise it will be worth it.
For those who can’t make the journey the unrated and uncut DVD will be released the following Tuesday, May 13th. But if you consider yourself a true student of the horror genre, then you’ll want to check the select theater listings at the official website.
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Bitz ‘n’ Pieces O’ Good News For Aahz
Posted on May 4, 2008
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A few different bits and pieces of good news for me from around the web over the last week or so. None really bloggable by themselves but combine them all together and add in this coming Wednesday’s exciting developments and you can see it’s a good time to be me 
The first bit of excitement actually came on Monday (I think).
I was checking in with SocialSpark, the new blogger social networking site / blog advertising service and noticed that Philaahzophy had been selected as a “Featured Blog” for a few hours.
Sadly I didn’t receive any extra traffic to the blog itself (or any props at SS) and I think the “Featured Blog” is really just the “random blog o’ the moment”, but it was still cool to see and I can now say “As featured on SocialSpark.com” and be telling the truth
My two latest successes are at blog ranking site IZEARanks.
My new local blog Aahz Reviews Morgan Hill has skyrocketed its way to the top of the Shopping chart at IZEARanks.com in record speed! It now dominates the category, despite having a significantly lower weekly average RealRank then its closest competitors.
Meanwhile, Philaahzophy itself has bounced back into the number three spot on the Political Top 100 after having dropped to a low of number twelve while I was “taking my break” from February to mid-April. Because the supposedly ‘transparent’ Real Rank still allows people to hide their traffic stats I have no idea how difficult it’s going to be to squeeze back into the top spot, but don’t think that means I’m not fighting for it!
In other featured news… One of the photos I use on my Confirmed Celebrity Addresses blog was selected as a featured photograph on ShareaPic, my photo hosting site. That means it will be on their homepage for the entire month of June which I’m pretty excited about.
As you can see in this screenshot of my account there it has already received 164 views as of early morning on Sunday May 3rd. I’ll be sure to update y’all on the impact of having a featured pic in early June and we can see just how much revenue that shot will have earned me. Yes, ShareAPic is free online picture hosting site that pays you for every time for every time your images are viewed.
The final, and most important bit o’ good news for me last week came (not surprisingly) from my daughter Z. I didn’t grab a screenshot for this one, so decided to use my latest sweet little girl pic instead
Check out the I Love You Dad post she made on her personal blog, Butterfly Diaries, on Friday afternoon…
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Fashion vs. Style and Punk Rock vs. Anarchy
Posted on May 4, 2008
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It’s no secret that I discovered anarchy from the punk rock bands of the 1970s. Not only did I absorb the messages in their music but also the statements made by their fashions. Both were quickly adopted and studiously observed (although in as discreet a manner as possible). Thank to Sid Vicious and the Sex Pistols I started buying second hand clothes at the thrift shops only to further damage and degrade them with tears, rips, dirt, grime, and anything else I could think of to make them different than the shiny new clothes the preps in my area seemed to be wearing twenty-four seven.
While many punkers from the seventies and early eighties quickly changed their style to match the fashions of the day and their music to match the rebellion of the moment, both stuck with me - the anarchist philosophy to today. Fortunately, punk fashion eventually gave way to my own unique twists on classic punk style. These days you’re far more likely to find me in Dockers or just jeans and whatever shirt and shoes seem durable and comfortable. It’s a bit ironic that I used to buy clothes primarily based on how I could destroy them and now focus mainly on how well they can withstand my day to day abuse.
So why am I suddenly talking about my personal style in clothing? Well, because Dockers wants to know. But it’s not just me their interested in. They also want to see your personal style. In fact, they want you to share the Dockers twist on your classic style with the world by making a video and submitting it to the Dockers contest over at NBC. The best video will be shown on The Tonight Show with Jay Leno!
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Why Are You On The Road To College?
Posted on May 3, 2008
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EDIT: This was originally posted Friday morning, but my wonderful blog web hosting company deleted my blog Friday night and took more than 12 hours to restore it from their backups, so this post (and possibly others that I don’t recall now) were missing.
Couldn’t sleep this morning, so I was stumbling around some and came across a post by Karlana titled high school education = graduation = college education … It all leads to somewhere! It starts out well enough-
Long title, but has a good message - don’t allow your secondary education to shortfall you from your college education.
And, as an anarchist (read: someone who believes in self-reliance) I couldn’t agree more with the ending-
Learn to think for yourself. Learn to be yourself. Two short lines that will be helpful in any situation.
However, the bulk of the article doesn’t seem to support the conclusion. Her post covers a lot of territory, so I want to take it bit by bit. It may look like I’m trying to tear her words apart, but, in reality it’s 6am and I just want to keep everything straight as I go.
Education has always been one of the most important things in my life, but formal education has been a concept I’ve struggled with for the past 23 years. The Random House Unabridged Dictionary contains five definitions for education-
- the act or process of imparting or acquiring general knowledge, developing the powers of reasoning and judgment, and generally of preparing oneself or others intellectually for mature life.
- the act or process of imparting or acquiring particular knowledge or skills, as for a profession.
- a degree, level, or kind of schooling: a university education.
- the result produced by instruction, training, or study: to show one’s education.
- the science or art of teaching; pedagogics.
Did you notice that the only time school is mentioned at all is in an example of one type of education? That’s because school and education actually have little to do with each other in these days of social promotion and test scores über alles.
Back to Karlanda’s post-
Having a high school education is more important than these seniors realize. In most cases, many jobs will not look at applications and resumes that bear the three letters of “GED”.
As someone who’s hired dozens of people for numerous companies over the years I couldn’t disagree more. Not only have I never confirmed that an applicant has graduated high school, but I’ve never heard of it being done. When I was looking for work while still inhigh school I asked the transcripts office at my school if they’d ever received a request from an employer. The answer, not surprisingly, was “no, not in more than 35 years.” The truth is if you’re applying for a job that only requires a high school diploma then employer’s aren’t really worried about your education. They’re far more concerned about how you comport yourself in the interview.
Many employers now look at the GED route as the “cutting corners” route, and that just shows them that perhaps one will always find ways to cut corners.
Or, it may well show them that you already know what you want in your life and saw that school was not getting you there. Getting your GED (particularly before the age of 18) can definitely be seen as a sign of confidence, which is a trait employer’s seek. It’s all about your reasons for doing so and how you express those reasons to prosepctive employers.
Even for the college bound, the GED can be a good thing. I went to a private college prep high school and the student who would have been valedictorian never graduated. Why? Because instead he got his GED and started at UCLA in what would have been his senior year. He went on to graduate (summa cum laude) and get his MBA in 5 years total meaning he was out in the business world before anyone else in our graduating class even had their Bachelor’s Degree. Sometimes “cutting corners” is the smart move!
In most cases, in today’s society, it is like the light finally came on for the parents and the parents are now paying attention to their children’s education and achievements, or what they may be lacking if they are unable to graduate. In some of these cases, the parents have left their teenagers to grow up on their own until the very last minute where they all of a sudden become a parent and start harping on their children to do better in school, before it is too late.
I don’t know that it’s most, but it’s certainly many, and that’s eceedingly unfortunate. However, what these kids need is not necessarily to “do better in school”, but to “do better in life” and if they know what they want to do and can formulate a plan to accomplish it, then the final semester or year of high school is frequently just marking time.
But you also have the students who have parents who have no formal education whatsoever, and their children are now the first generation to graduate from high school with a diploma.
[snip]
In almost all of these cases, the students move onto college and achieve great things, accomplish the desired, and succeed in life.
This is largely a cultural thing and an excellent reason for finishing high school.
I tell them to make valid strong decisions they will not regret, which means think before they do. I tell them not only is a high school diploma very handy, but a college degree will be worthwhile, life lasting.
Again, she starts off with a valid and strong statement, but follows with a rather wild assumption. What if these students are making a “valid strong decision” to enter the work force and begin their career immediately instead of waiting to finish high school and/or spend more time in college? What if they’ve realized that self-education can take them much farther much more quickly than classes designed for the masses?
One can enter many professional fields without a degree, albeit at a lower level than the college graduate. However, in four years what do you think is more valuable: a degree or four years of experience in the industry? In many, many cases, it is the latter.
The true climax of Karlana’s post is this-
The important thing here is to achieve the most one can, succeed in life by your own accomplishments. But the bottom line here is that without some kind of education, one will not go far in life. That is the message our society’s children are not truly getting if parents constantly hand things to them, bail them out of trouble all the time, and baby them.
And I couldn’t agree with it more. I just feel that she (and many, many others in modern society) need to break free from of the stereotype that a college degree=success. The cat of the matter is that education=success and these days it’s easier than ever to gain that education outside of formal schooling. Living on the streets I knew many college graduates and the pages of history (including those being written right now) are full of people without college degrees. She’s absolutely right that “some kind of education” is vital to success, but if you’ve found an alternative path to that education, please don’t let a piece of paper hold you back. After all-
The important thing here is to achieve the most one can, succeed in life by your own accomplishments.
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Smoking Screwup
Posted on May 1, 2008
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Last night (Wednesday) I straight up forgot to put on my new patch. I remembered after I was already in bed, but decided that getting up to change my patch wouldn’t be any better than getting up to have a cigarette. This morning I woke up without the desire to smoke. Around 11am my arm started to itch and I suddenly realized I was stil wearing yesterday’s patch so I removed it and threw it away.
This afternoon I went through my normal routine of picking up Z frmo school nictonie and urge free. I was so proud of myself, but it was obviously too soon. After dinner Z really started driving me crazy. Nicotine withdrawal? Bratty child? We’ll never know for sure. After a couple hours of it I really wanted a cigarette, but I put on a fresh patch instead. Finally, trapped in the same room with her while she drove me insane (seemingly intentionally) I snapped and went downstairs for a smoke.
Lighting it wasn’t very satisfying and I just ended up standing on the back porch holding it while it burned down. So, I got cocky and screwed up after 11 solid days without tobacco. But I did learn something - I’m perfectly capable of escaping a situation without having a cigarette. So that’s my silver lining. Oh, and I also learned that I may not be as ‘former’ a smoker as I thought. Still got 5 solid days until I need to be smoke free, though, so I think I’m doing alright.
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