Back in Black…I Mean Orange

Who here is addicted to Orange is the New Black? You? If that is the case, you won’t be reading this post right now anyway, you will be binge watching season 3 since today is the day! In honor these lovable felons, I thought I would share some wacky laws with you to make sure you avoid a life behind bars. That is unless you want to share a cell with Alex Vause 😉

“All motor vehicles must be preceded by a man carrying a red flag (daytime) or a red lantern (nighttime) fifty feet in front of said vehicle.” -Washington So if it is nighttime and if it’s a boat, does he have to precede it with 2 red lanterns?

“It is illegal to take more than three swallows of beer while standing.” -LeFors, Texas Is that consecutively or all night? You better just sit if you want to drink.

“Sneezing or burping is illegal during a church service.” -Omaha, Nebraska So much for a separation of church and state.

“Public boxing matches are outlawed.” -Massachusetts Have you ever driven in the state of Massachusetts? A quick drive down to the grocery store leads to a public boxing match on a good day.

“It is illegal to wipe one’s car with used underwear.” -San Francisco, California This is a close one for me seeing as I dust my house with socks. Definitely unused socks though.

If you want to check out more odd laws for your chance to join the lovely ladies of Litchfield, check this out.

#tbt

Found

The heart breaks into many little pieces,

and when you realize not all are found,

that is the moment your life ceases.

Zombie-like, you stumble through life,

devouring those who love along the way,

if you can’t live, why should they?

Then, that lost piece is found,

put back into place, your heart will sound,

true love at last, points you homeward bound.

© Autumn Siders 2014

The Six Degrees You Want to Stay Separate

I am sure many of you have heard of some form of the “six degrees of separation.” You may know it as the “six degrees of Kevin Bacon” or maybe you like to think of a similar idea from The L Word known as “OurChart.” The basic idea for those who may not know, is that any two people in this world can be linked together within six degrees (six people). For many this has always been an exciting notion for folks who just love to brag about knowing famous people. Now I am not one to brag, but here is an example for you. I know Jimmy Fallon. Okay, so I bagged his groceries once and he gave me a $10 tip. But this is enough of a connection to say that anyone who knows me (blog readers included) is now connected to Jimmy Fallon in two steps. Or is it one? Is Jimmy a step? Are you a step? Well you get the picture, you are practically related to Mr. Fallon!

Settle down though, because there is a dark side to this. In the same way that we can be so close to those stars we admire, we can also be close to some less than desirable human beings. I can go from Jimmy Fallon who knows Harrison Ford, who met Adolf Hitler when searching for a lost ark. Hmmm… somethings seems a little off with that, but you get my point. I am now associated with the Nazi leader (of sorts)! No excitement with that one. Here are some more fictional degrees of separation that I think should stay separated.

Ralph knows George who knows Allen who knows Eileen who answered that Craigslist ad which helped her meet Moe (the guy that broke into her house).

A young London boy named Jon knows a judge by the name of Turpin who happens to know a great barber on Fleet St.

Morgan knows Rachel who know Daniel who brings meals to Stan who now lives in solitary confinement at the state penitentiary and now knows no one but Dan.

A lost little boy named Marlon met a nice little girl named Wendy who flew away with a weird boy Peter who has a feud with a one handed pirate. (You decide if it’s worse being connected to Peter or to Hook???)

Jane knows Leon who knows Jack who knows Mike who sold his car to Adam (the getaway driver in a bank robbery).

Here’s to hoping your less desirable connections are at least six degrees away!

Feeding Ethiopia

Since the dawn of time, or maybe just the dawn of America, I feel like mothers and fathers across the country have always said, “Finish your dinner, there are children starving in fill in a third world country.” I have no doubt that there are children, adults, and animals starving all over the world, but I have never understood how finishing our dinner, makes those unfortunate folks any less hungry. I am not a food person, so this could be an area where I have no expertise, but here is my opinion. If I don’t finish the food on my plate, it is probably because I have no more room in my stomach to put it. So now that I have food left on my plate and nowhere to put it, how can I help these starving souls?

Obviously I should package up the remainders and send them to Ethiopia. My half-eaten chicken breast will be greatly appreciated by those who are less fortunate than I, at least if it survives the travel and is still edible. I think the bigger dilemma here, and I do mean bigger, is that in America there is no such thing as moderation. I don’t travel too much, so I can’t vouch for other countries, but I seem to get this is the general consensus on the good old U.S of A. Instead of parents telling their children to finish the food on the plate, maybe they should start by putting less food on the plate. If we consumed/wasted less food here, wouldn’t that leave surplus for others and maybe lower costs since the demand is not so high? Once again, in the department of business and economics I know nothing, but this just happens to be a common sense answer to me. Since we can’t seem to make this work, here is an alternative solution that a college roommate helped me figure out.

This roommate tended to have lots left on her plate, maybe her parents never learned that old standby command. Every day we would return home to food, not just scraps, but whole pieces that were put down our sink drain. After months of frustration, my other roommates and I came to the conclusion that maybe her parents did tell her not to waste and that at her house their drain must have led right to Ethiopia! She must have just assumed the same was true of our drain. While she was trying to make a valiant contribution to one of the world’s major problems, she was just causing our drain to constantly back up and leave a terrible mess for us. How could we fault her for being such a humanitarian?

This does get one thinking though. What if a pipeline could be constructed that sent all unwanted food to those in greater need? Now I wouldn’t really want someone’s leftovers, but when you have nothing, that can seem like a 5 star dinner. Better yet, maybe we could all just start thinking about how other people live on this planet with us and maybe that third Big Mac© isn’t quite as necessary to our survival as we thought.

25 is the New 80

It seems like only yesterday I was 80 pounds soaking wet, I could drink 12 cans of soda, a bag of cookies, and 3 glasses of milk without feeling sick. I could run, swim, and play sports without any lasting damage to my muscles. Okay, so it may have been a little longer ago than yesterday, but it sure seemed as though I could do anything. Sure, my elders warned me there would come a day when my metabolism would slow and my energy would wane, but I thought that day was at least 60 years in the future. Now I am nowhere near being in the grave yet, but some days I certainly feel closer to 80 than I do to 25. So for all those out there younger than I, here is your warning and a helpful guide to help track your decline.

18: You should probably stop eating those dozen doughnuts. Yeah, don’t even think about drinking that soda. You’re still hungry? Eat an apple! If you don’t follow this advice, you could weigh 200lbs by the time you turn 19! Just remember, everything in moderation. Help kill the rumor of the Freshman 15!

19: Such a boring year. You think you are doing fine. You still feel pretty decent. The moderation tip helped and guess what, you maybe even decided to exercise a little to help with those few pesky pounds. You are out on a jog when it happens! You stretched, you did everything by the book, but you are still going to be limping home. Maybe you didn’t drink enough water? Come up with any excuse you can, but no matter what you do your hamstring is still pulled. Face it, you aren’t a kid anymore!

20: You are working that retail job to put yourself through college. You deal with those difficult customers with a smile on your face and you even look great with those pretty shoes! You’re on your feet all day though and by the time you get home your ankles are swollen, your knees hurt, and you still want to punch that one jerk of a customer in the face. You have to make a choice, wear the pretty shoes or find those ugly ones that will save your pretty legs from looking ugly? It is a tough decision, make the right one.

21: You can drink!!!!! Don’t you know how many calories are in alcohol? And, you are 21 you really don’t need anything else to cloud your already impaired judgment.

22: T. Swift said it all.

23: Blink 182 said it all.

24: You are considered an adult at this point no matter what you do. This means you need your sleep. No more nights of partying, turn off all your distractions and get into bed! 7 hours at the very least! The only problem with this is that your 12 hour a day job requires 10 more hours of work when you get home. I really hope you weren’t thinking about kids and forget a boyfriend or girlfriend! When all else fails, just sleep.

25: You can rent a car without those terrible fees, which is good because it’s cheaper than the ambulance. Now I am almost all the way through this year, so I can’t give you the ending, but this is how it goes so far. Any hereditary problem that any member of your family has ever had will find you! You may even add to the family tree with some new diagnosis. It may not be serious and it may get lost on the way to you, but this is probably the point where those pesky doctors will start checking to make sure that you aren’t developing symptoms yet. Up until now, your insurance premium has been a waste, but why not make up for lost time? Any form of exercise will leave you sore. You should probably be thinking about cemetery plots and wills. Meet with your lawyer immediately.

I hope this advice helps, but the important thing to remember is eat well and keep active. You can be fat, you can be skinny, you can be young, you can be old, but what matters is to keep going and above all else be happy.

Blockbuster Mash-Up

Speed Trap: An estranged pair of twins must save a speeding bus from blowing up all while making the passengers of the bus (their parents included) think there is only one of them.

Frozen Rain: When Hollywood makes the transition from silent films to “talkies,” the executives quickly decide to have another woman do the voice over for their leading lady due to her ear-piercing voice and her odd ability to turn everything to ice. Eventually they let her go.

Dirty Park: While on vacation at a dinosaur theme park with her affluent family, a young woman falls for her dance instructor and they must face challenges of abortion, poisonous plants, and escaped dinosaurs. They learn the hard way that nobody should put baby velociraptors in the corner.

I am Mrs. Doubtfire: After a plague kills most of humanity, a comedian father must dress as a woman to continue seeing his children. He begins to think that he just enjoys dressing as a woman though since his entire family is dead and his only companion is a dog.

Sixth Sense in Seattle: A young boy who has the ability to see dead people tries to set up his widowed father by calling in to a radio station. Not being able to tell the dead suitors from the live suitors, he accidentally sets his father up with his late mother which ultimately drives his father mad until he jumps off the Empire State building.

Judge Not

I started writing this big long rant about humans and love and hate and blah, blah, blah. I decided none of you wanted to read that much, especially since there is always something in the media to promulgate the hatred of some individual(s). So, I wrote a poem. Enjoy!

I wasn’t raised in the House of God

And according to some there is no Heaven for me.

So what if I like to be with a broad?

Who knows? She may be the only Heaven I need.

I wasn’t raised in the Pits of Hell

But according to some that’s what’s in store for me.

If that’s all that religion has to sell,

Then I guess I’ll go, and all the warmer I’ll be.

I wasn’t raised in the House of God

And I don’t think there’s anything wrong with those who were.

But, I can’t stand those who are frauds,

Preaching their Holiness when it’s Sin they prefer.

I wasn’t raised in the Pits of Hell

And who cares if that’s my destiny?

I know to treat others well

And judge not, for there are others that judge plenty.

Horror v. Gore

As a child, my favorite genre was horror. No matter if it was a book, movie, or videogame, the scarier it was, the more I enjoyed it. Whether I was hearing a heart beneath the floorboards in Poe’s The Tell-Tell Heart, or waiting for the hoard of zombies to come around the corner in Resident Evil as the music got more intense, I loved being on the edge of my seat. Now, I can honestly say after 25 years of living, I have never been scared of anything. Startled, yes, but scared, no. I am under the assumption that those who like the genre though like it because they love the feeling of being scared.

Why is it that I love it so much then? I love the unknown. That is what made all the classic horror films so great. It is never the big reveal that has me, or anyone for that matter, on the edge of the seat, it’s everything that leads up to that point. If you are watching a movie, it is the music, the shadows, the fear coming from the actors, and the suspense that make your heart race. If you are reading a book, it is the all those words that set the scene and put those images, sounds, feelings into your blood. That feeling that you wish you had turned on more lights and the thought of “did I lock the door” running through your head. All of the ambiguity leads two simple choices, will the victim live, or will the victim die?

So this was my favorite genre as a child. Why not now? Now, it is all about the gore. There are very few movies, books, or videogames that cash in on suspense anymore. They spend all their time on making the “monster” as horrific as possible with gore that they have forgotten how to truly scare someone. Yes, the original Resident Evil had your share of gory zombies and mutated creatures, but even more frightening than any Tyrant waiting around the corner was knowing that your simple controls weren’t going to be able to get you out of that hallway in time. I don’t even think there was a quick spin control until the remake so by the time you even thought about using your last bullet to delay the inevitable, you were probably already dead.

Today seems to be a world of instant gratification and I have no doubt that all the genres have changed to keep up with that. There is something to be said about going back to the basics though. Much like there is no fear or excitement in seeing a gory monster rather than just knowing the monster exists, there is no fear or excitement in living a life of instant gratification. To me, the point of life is to live on the edge. Embrace the uncertainty. Dive into the unknown. So what if you are scared, that’s how you know you are alive. And remember, it’s the suspense that…

It Could Be Worse

I don’t know how many of you have seen the new and great sequel to Pitch Perfect, a great follow up with the catchy title of Pitch Perfect 2. They really went all out on that! Anyway, I am an a cappella junkie and loved this one just as much if not a little more than the first. One of the best things about these movies is they are funny and they don’t beat around the bush with their humor. One of my favorite additions to the film is the character of Flo. She always seems to have a little tale to tell whenever one of the other characters is in a bind. She does a great job of putting things in perspective while being absolutely hysterical at the same time. I figured I could take a page from her book and give you some scenarios for your own life or maybe for that friend who always seems to be having the worst time.

The Bad The Worse

“This is the worst! I just chipped my nail and it cost $50 for that pedicure!”	“Not again! Well at least I know that table saw can cut right through bone!”
“Ugh, I am stuck at work again. I am so tired of staying here late and getting paid overtime!”	“Well another night sleeping in a cardboard box, at least I know I am free all day tomorrow since I can’t get a job!”
“I can’t believe I burned dinner tonight! This is absolutely the worst, now I guess I just have to order a pizza.”	“I am so glad a found that burnt lobster in the trash so I could at least eat something today!”
“Can you believe that the barista spilled coffee all over my LOUIS VUITTON handbag?”	“I got a free coffee at the store today but spilled it all over my shirt. At least it kept me warm since I don’t have a coat!”
“Zane just left 1D. My life is absolutely over!”	“I did my best to stop that bank robbery, now my life is absolutely over.”

Whether your glass is half full or half empty, just be glad you have a glass!

Bestseller Mash-Up Round 2

11/22/84: An English teacher from Maine must go back in time to prevent the assassination of Big Brother…who may or may not really exist.

Gone with the Hatchet: A young boy is stranded in the Confederate South during the Civil War with nothing but a hatchet given to him by his mother. He must learn how to survive with the daughter of a spoiled plantation owner and her drunkard husband who quite frankly don’t give a damn about him.

I Know Why the Lord of the Rings Sings: After inheriting a ring from his cousin, a young hobbit starts on a journey that leads him through prejudice, pain, and teen pregnancy, but that ultimately makes him the proud hobbit he is today.

The Great Time to Kill: When a young man goes on trial for the murder of his high society Long Island neighbor in 1922, the jury quickly finds him not guilty due to temporary insanity. Then again who wasn’t insane on Long Island in the 20’s?

The Road to My Side of the Mountain: After a devastating disaster has decimated most of humanity, a young boy runs away from civilization and fends for himself in the Catskill Mountains with only a falcon as a companion until they are eaten by cannibals.