Author: Rex Nipper

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Life with my Wife

I’m not sure how a marriage is supposed to work.  I had never been married until almost four years ago.  In fact our anniversary (one of them) is coming up in a few weeks.  That’s right…we have two.  We were married in Colorado and then had another ceremony in Iowa ten months later.  I’m told by my wife that we have more than two, but I have trouble remembering its Tuesday, so we’ll just stay with the two. 

My wife often wonders if I made the right decision to marry her.  I don’t tell her how often I think about her, or why the reason I try to leave work early every day is so I can spend more time with her.  I’ve never really liked the company of many people.  My friends are few and my close friends are even fewer.  It takes a lot for me to trust anyone, let alone allow someone into my heart in the way she is.  I think I need to tell her more often.

Most men make the same mistakes when it comes to women.  They think that since you tell your mate how you feel about her once she should always know how you feel.  We rarely change so when our significant others get upset about not knowing how we feel about them we get confused.  We think “Seriously?  I told you I loved you in like 1968!  Did you think that would change?”  The answer is yes…they think it will change.

I had actually started writing a handbook for men on how to deal with women.  Now after being married to one for four years I’m thinking I am I no way remotely qualified to write a single syllable on the subject.  I take it all one day at a time and then respond to whatever comes forth.  My wife is a puzzle.  One that I will never solve.  She can be happy, sad, silly, goofy, crazy, jealous, loving, caring, concerned, and stubborn, and that was just at breakfast.  I never know what I’m going to get with her which is why I’m always so excited to see her.  I can be on the edge of screaming and all she has to do is smile at me and it goes away in an instant.  That’s amazing to me!  How does she do that?

Before I met my wife, life was pretty dull.  I was getting too comfortable in my ways and wasn’t ready to let anyone in.  I even had plans to uproot everything and just move into the mountains and become a hermit.  That was actually my plan.  Then I met her.  I fought like hell to keep her at arms-length but she was having none of it.  For that I will be forever grateful.  For the last four years life has been better than any single day of the previous 47. 

One thing I know beyond the shadow of a doubt is that she will never let me forget it.

Love you baby!

Me. 
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Republicans try to Suspend Right to Bear Arms during Convention

So with all the hullaballoo from the right about how Obama is raising the price on ammunition, suspending the 2nd Amendment and taking everyone’s gun away it turns out that the Republicans tried to get Ohio to suspend the Open Carry laws during the RNC convention this week.  John Kasich tried…but they actually can’t.  They do have a ban on tennis balls, squirt guns, and other devices of destruction, but you’re more than able to carry a gun.  Seriously…they banned tennis balls.

Now…forgive me…but doesn’t this fly in the face of the Republican platform of the more guns the merrier?  Haven’t I been hearing for decades that the only way to protect anyone from a gun is to have a gun?  Hasn’t Trump been telling us this all during his campaign?  What happened here?  How is the presumptive Republican nominee going to be safe from all those outlaws carrying guns if we don’t let everyone in the room have a gun?  

The reality is that while you can open carry a gun in the state, you wont’ be able to do it near the candidate.  The Secret Service put the kibosh on that.  So if you show up with your AR-15 near the candidate they’re going to tackle you to the ground.  However, you’re more than welcome to endanger the rest of the participants.  Just don’t bring a tennis ball.  That shit will get you killed!

So what I’d like to know is where’s the NRA in all this?  Why aren’t they speaking out about how Republicans tried to limit everyone’s 2nd Amendment rights?  Where is the outrage from the gun lobby who tell us constantly that the only way we will ever be safe in this world is if we’re armed to the teeth?  According to them everyone from teens to toddlers should be armed with a semi-automatic and enough ammunition to drop a hippo. 

I guess they haven’t been reading their own propaganda.  Here’s a little tidbit for those of us whose knuckles don’t drag as we walk:  More guns have been sold under the Obama Administration than any other in history.  More ammunition has been sold than under any other administration.  Now, the gun lobby will tell you that Obama is limiting your use of firearms, but there’s absolutely no evidence of that.  In fact the only thing I have seen happen is Republicans telling you you can’t carry a gun to one of their events.  I think that shows they trust their base with firearms about as much as I trust Trump with a fact.

So I always hear from my Republican friends that Obama doesn’t want them to own a gun because he is afraid of the public turning on the government.  So how does is square with all of you now that the Republicans are so terrified of you that they don’t want you carrying a gun near them?  What do you make of that?  Does it tell you that they’re supporters of the 2nd Amendment and your right to carry a firearm, or does it say something else?  I think it says they know their base is all batshit craaaaaazy!

The reality is that there is no way in hell anyone in their right mind wants a crowd of people fully armed in a hot, closed, room for a week.  That’s pretty much a recipe for disaster.  I just find it interesting that no one has caught onto the fact that the people who say everyone needs a gun are the first to want to limit your ability to carry one.  However you’d think they’d at least let them have the squirt gun.  There’s enough hot air in that room to melt iron.  Now that’s just unmurican!

Rex
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I’m almost 51!

It’s that time of year where I post my annual birthday rant.  Now that I’m officially in my early 50s I have a lot to rant about.  In a lot of ways I’m still the same person I was 30+ years ago.  I still enjoy the same things, and I can still do most of them.  For example, just this morning I went to the skate park and ripped some virt, even launching out of the top of the bowl once and then landing on my ass.  I didn’t fall because I’m going to be 51, I fell because I was pushing it and this is what happens.  That notwithstanding, here are some things that do bother me:

One of the major problems with being in your 50s is that you don’t know what might be a major sign of something medically wrong and what is just a result of age.  For example, I used to be able to tell when I was done peeing.  Now if I’m not looking down, I take the risk of zipping up my pants before I’m done.  This can be extremely embarrassing when walking into a staff meeting.  Also, I’ve always had to get up at least once during the night to relieve myself, but now 20% of my weekly exercise is walking to the bathroom five times a night.

I can tell you from experience that if you go to your doctor and complain about these issues he will run you through a plethora of tests, biopsies, x-rays, and WHOLEY unwelcomed intimacies with a rubber glove only to tell you in the end that “Yep…you’re in your 50s.”  Dude!  Did I really need to spend $3000.00 for you to tell me that?  Not to mention that I’m pretty sure you’ve gone where no man has gone before.  I’m thinking I should at least get dinner out of it. 

Joint pain has become a common occurrence.  I have always had muscle pain.  That’s normal for my level of activity.  Between running, mountain biking, and ripping the skate parks, I’m prepared for some muscle pain.  But now for some reason I have such chronic hip pain that it makes it difficult to sit or sleep.  I can stand, but I can’t sit.  I even had to buy a standing desk for my office so I can get some work done.  Before that I had to get up every 5 minutes and walk around the office. 

My eyes are changing.  I have always been a little nearsighted.  That’s nothing new.  However, until recently I haven’t had to wear glasses.  I did get a pair about 10 years ago, but they stayed in the case most of the time because I really didn’t need them all that much.  Now however, I can’t seem to see exit signs on the freeway unless I’m sitting under them and when I do that it frightens the locals doing 98 in a 65 zone.  I do like the glasses though.  I can now see what I’m going to hit on the mountain bike before I actually hit it.  I don’t miss it…I just know what it is before I crash now.

My memory is going.  It takes me about 15 minutes to realize that the reason I can’t find my cellphone is because I’m holding it next to my ear while I talk to someone complaining that I can’t find my cellphone.  I can remember with vivid clarity something I did in the summer of 1982, but for some reason can’t recall the name of the person I’ve worked with for the last year.  When getting ready for work in the morning I make so many trips to and from my car to pick up things I forgot that I’m considering just buying 10 of everything so I don’t have to remember.  It will just save time. 

I will say that I wouldn’t change my years of experience to be a 20 year old idiot again, but I don’t see my body falling apart as a fair tradeoff.  You would think nature would have provided for a better design.  And what’s with my legs wanting to get up and walk around in the middle of the night?  I need sleep from all this standing!  It would be a problem easier to except, however, if I could just get them to take me in to pee while I was sleeping.

Rex
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The Immorality of Business

The talking heads are out in droves making statements about the latest shooting.  Obama called it the largest mass shooting in our nation’s history.  I guess that’s true as long as you don’t ask a Native American.  That talking sphincter running for the Republican party doubled down on his desire to deport anyone not rich, uneducated or orange, and Clinton has pretty much said we need to continue with the same Middle-East policies we’ve had since 1945.  

Some people think this is about guns.  It is but not in the way they think.  Would he have been able to kill as many had he not had access?  Sure.  It’s likely he would have found a way.  I don’t think the method of death took all that much intellectual consideration.  He could have just as easily locked all the doors and set the place on fire.  The outcome would have been the same.  Still, you would think only an idiot would want to sell a gun to a crazy person.  Well…unless you’re the gun lobby.  Of course they want to sell guns to the crazy people.  Good lord, if the crazy person kills someone they get to sell several thousand more guns to the terrified people that survive.  It’s a great business plan!  
Is this about the problems in the Middle-East?  Yes, but again, not in the way they think.  Hillary thinks we need to ratchet up our involvement in the Middle East.  Perhaps someone should give her Einstein’s quote on insanity.  It hasn’t worked, and it will never work.  If we look back on history, the only thing…and I mean the ONLY thing that has ever removed the threat of terrorism from small groups is the complete genocide of that group.  It is how all civilizations begin. 

Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, Israel (Palestine), Gaza, and several other areas of the Middle-East are not civilized.  The only way they will get that way is for us to do the unconscionable.  We would have to kill, or imprison every man, woman, and child in that region and turn it into a bunch of small vacation resorts.  They have all been fighting for more than 10,000 years and they will continue fighting for 10,000 more.  It’s all they know.  It’s all they will ever know.  So unless we are willing to begin the quest of a complete murder of everyone in the entire region, we need to just get the hell out.  

American’s like to pine over the loss of the native people, but they forget that the natives were equally as violent and unpredictable as any tribe in the Middle-East.  They just didn’t have the Internet…or…you know…airplanes.  When the Europeans got here most of the Native Americans were small bans of warring tribes hell bent on killing each other…and us.  The pilgrims were fortunate enough to meet a group of peaceful natives on the beach but then got hacked to death once they set up light housekeeping.  If they really had any morals, what they should have done was set sail back to Europe.  But nope.  Europe decided that “Hey…let’s just kill them all off and take their land.”  

So with all this history, and all this proof that all we’re doing is whacking a hornets nest, why do we still meddle in the problems of the Middle-East?  Why are we still trying to do the same thing over, and over, and over again, just so we can be put in the crosshairs of some crazy religious zealot?  Why are we doing things that cause a crazed gunman to enter a bar in Florida and just randomly start shooting people?  It’s easy.  The gun lobby.  That’s why Junior.  The gun lobby.  The gun lobby has some long arms.  We actually supply the weapons to our enemies that kill our soldiers.  That’s right.  We sell to these countries, and they turn around and sell those same weapons to our enemies.  It’s the same business model that’s currently being demonstrated in Florida.  Sell an assault rifle to the most bat-shit-crazy individuals you can find and then sell more guns to the people that need to protect themselves from the bat-shit-crazy people.  

Never underestimate the immorality of business.

Rex
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Common Sense: An Idiot’s Answer to Education

When I was growing up I was constantly hearing how educated people had no common sense.  “They have them book smarts, but them folk can’t just have no common sense!”  Then I got an education.  While I do admit that common sense is great if you limit your circle of influence to whatever fishbowl you live in, it’s pretty much worthless in the larger world.  Sure…you can wow the catfish and carp with your knowledge of the algae and slime growing at the bottom of your tank, but you have no idea how any social or political issues impact the larger world. 

People who tout their common sense are usually just showing their self-centered bias and ignorance for anything and anyone beyond their city block.  It also just gives them an excuse for being too lazy, too racist, and too ignorant to better themselves.  For why on earth would you care how decisions made in the larger world impact anyone other than you?

The other day I was watching the news and a story came on where American Airlines kicked a guy off the plane for doing math.  That’s right…math.  He was a college professor who was working on a presentation and had a sheet of paper with a bunch of calculations on it.  Evidently the woman next to him thought those magical numbers would jump off the page and blow up the plane.  Her common sense told her that math is dangerous.  “If I don’t understand it, it must be evil.”  So…they kicked him off the plane and sent him to the FBI, where they told him that math is bad…you know…like science…and that ever pesky being for the ignorant…technology.

My God, have we gone back to the dark ages?  So now when we don’t understand something it must be a terrorist act?  You know this has already been tried right?  A few times.  Didn’t the Spanish Inquisition, or the Salem Witch trials teach you anything?  Seriously you ignorant, uneducated, racists, sexist, back water, gutter snipe.  Did you ever think there is a larger world out there and perhaps you might want to take some time to understand it?

Here are just a few things common sense told people.  The sun and plants circled the earth.  Turns out that common sense was wrong.  When Galileo proved this by using that ever present evil of the ignorant, math and reality, he was brought before the church and ordered to denounce his findings.  After all, never let reality get in the way of someone’s agenda.  Especially one that profits on the ignorance of others.

Keeping with the Renaissance, one of the common sense theories of the time was bleeding.  That’s right, the way to heal your illness was to remove your blood…because after all…what better way to get you over the flu than to remove the mechanism by which your body heals itself.  Oh wait…you’re bleeding internally?  Let’s get that pesky blood out of you so you can heal.  It’s full of demons you know!  Oops…sorry…you died…we didn’t get all that blood out soon enough!

Think common sense medical advice is something only found before the advent of modern plumbing?  Nope, common sense once told medical professionals that if you had an ulcer you should drink milk.  No one questioned it until one day someone actually used science and general observation to do a study that showed that drinking milk increases acid production in the stomach which causes ulcers.  And this was in the 1980s. 

With all this Gomer what I’m getting at is never rely on just your common sense and then walk away from a situation thinking you know what the fuck you’re talking about.  It’s quite likely you don’t.  If all you’re doing is basing your opinion on your own experience then you’ve severely limited your ability to have any sense at all, common or otherwise.  So the next time you think an educated person has made a decision that you find silly, maybe you should consider that they likely have a lot more information than you.  Because while you were sitting in your fishbowl swimming in your own shit, they were taking the time to understand that maybe, just maybe, the world doesn’t revolve around you.

Rex