Steps to becoming a Jedi Jul 12, 2019
Steps to becoming a Jedi, based off a casual drunken watching of (probably) the first Star Wars movie: 
  1. Wear Yoda as a backpack, swing from some vines, and run through the woods.
  2. Crawl in a hole and hallucinate killing Vader.
  3. Do a hand stand with Yoda on you.
  4. Pull your ship out of the pond.
Congrats you're a Jedi. #entertainment
3022 Jul 6, 2019
Pretty much everything is a forest unless you prevent it from being one.
Being bald Jun 28, 2019
As a kid, I thought about growing up to be a professional athlete or an astronaut, but I never thought about how I would look.  And I would imagine if you asked people how they think they'll look when they're older, they'll say something about being wrinkled and gray.  No one expects to go bald, which is weird because it's ridiculously common.  In every culture on earth, a significant proportion of the male population goes bald. 

Sometime in my late twenties, I noticed it was happening.  I shaved my head a few times when I was younger, so I wasn't opposed to having short hair.  And I remember deciding before it happened that I wouldn't be one of those people who tried to hide it with a comb-over.  So I pretty much just went for it.  My current hair style varies between 1/8-inch of balding hair to 0 inches (razor shave). 

Being bald is a little weird because it's not something you can really hide.  It's out there, right in front.  You can't cover it up with baggy clothes or makeup.  It's not like being overweight and having the option of working out.  Everyone sees it and notices it.  Some people make jokes about it, including me.  It's like having this weird negative thing attached to you that you don't really like and other people don't really like but you're at peace with it because it's already there. 

That said, I have a renewed appreciation for men with wonderful luscious hair.  At the same time, I also have an increased disdain for men who are sitting the fence between having hair and being bald.  It's so obvious they're clinging to the last thing that signified their youth, and on top of that (pun) it looks bad.  Just accept it, cut your hair short, and move on.  It's better over here. #lifestyle
Tourist attractions Jun 26, 2019
Locals love to advise tourists to avoid certain areas and sights, like "Stay away from Times Square; it's overrun with tourists."  But if I'm not from there, I'm a tourist, so that's where I belong.  It's a tourist attraction for a reason:  It's attractive to tourists. #travel
3019 Jun 17, 2019
Everyone:  There's no book that tells you how to raise a child.
Me:  It's literally an entire genre of nonfiction.
3018 Jun 14, 2019
Things I've seen enough videos of:  people falling off overhead rope swings, table crashing, doing burnouts and donuts, hitting people with golf carts, opening champaign bottles with knives
3017 Jun 14, 2019
Basketball is a unique sport in the sense that each player on the team performs all the same actions and duties as all other players on the team.  Yes, there are position players and specialists, but everybody dribbles, passes, shoots, and plays defense.  There are no goalies, no punters, no pitchers.  It's egalitarian. #sports
Good storytellers May 31, 2019
A good storyteller is able to take a less-than-interesting topic, and make it engrossing and enjoyable.  Such is the case with podcasts like 99% Invisible, Freakonomics, and Hidden Brain.  Malcolm Gladwell is on this list as well, and even though I've read all his books, I'm still a little unsure about his podcast Revisionist History.  But by far my favorite new storyteller is a person whose books I've read and who recently started a new podcast:  Michael Lewis, Against the Rules.  This is the guy who made left tackles interesting, and his podcast is such a perfect example of taking an ordinary, or even boring, topic like referees and making it interesting. #entertainment
3015 May 31, 2019
I like staying up late, especially now that I have a kid, because the house is quiet, I don't have to accomplish anything, and nobody is expecting anything from me.
Your main thing May 31, 2019
One thing I wanted to add to the topic of removing old monuments of people we no longer revere, is the idea that we tend to boil historic people down to their one or two defining traits.  Person A was the first person to do X; Person B was the leader of thing Y.  History doesn't tend to remember things like Person A went to X elementary school or Person B dated some girl in his teens.  In other words, people are remembered generally for their main thing, not all that superfluous stuff that neither adds nor subtracts from their main thing. 

One of the arguments people use against the removal of these monuments is, "Yeah but good people also do some bad things; should we remove their monuments too?"  They usually mention George Washington or Thomas Jefferson, who owned slaves and/or did other unsavory things.  My point is that these guys are known for their main thing, which is the founding of a country and the writing of a document.  The main thing Robert E. Lee is known for is being the commander of the Confederate army, i.e. the traitorous group of southern states that attempted to secede so they wouldn't have to obey the laws of the north.  Regardless of the lesser-known things these men did, they're remembered for their most significant achievements.  So no, we shouldn't remove monuments for people who did a good main thing but also maybe did an objectionable other thing.  Also we shouldn't judge the actions of history by the views of the present. #politics
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