Saturday, July 28, 2007
Grab life by the (Gutter) Ball!
Well, I went bowling last night. I hadn't been in a decade or more, and Noah was nice enough to invite me out with him, his cousin, and some work friends. It was pretty fun. The guys were hilarious, and Cliff (the cousin) was nice enough to buy everyone shots and beer. Bowling's not really my game, but they made it fun. Thanks Noah.
Friday, July 27, 2007
Waterpark Bonanza!!
I can't believe that I waited until the age of 28 to go to my first waterpark. I had so much fun. At the birthday party the night before my buddy, Matt, invited me & Brian to tag along when he took his kids to the park the next day. I initially turned him down but, mystery of mysteries, I actually woke up in time to go.
It's difficult to put into words why this was so awesome, but I think a lot of it has to do with the fact that it's difficult to not have fun when you're around a bunch of kids that are. Charity and Corbin splashed and laughed, and it was a real treat to just watch them go. Here's Corbin pimpin' his fly Body Glove float-suit...
Talk about too cool for school. Anyway, between the water slides, lazy circular stream thing, and all the mushroom fountains I couldn't shake the feeling that I was trapped in a Super Mario Brothers game. Nothing like good, clean fun and some sunshine to lift one's spirits.
Too bad my phone ate all the good pics of LeeAnn in her bikini. I'm going to have to get better at using this thing.
Thursday, July 26, 2007
Birthday Party Fun Times!
My friend, Stacy, celebrated her birthday last weekend. I managed to get a few photos of the occasion, but I spent most of the night drinking and BSing. I met a few of Stacy's work friends, which was fun. Here are just a couple...
This is Brent. He loves beer. Loves it. He brews, drinks, breathes, and dreams beer. He also gets really mushy when he's drunk. It was pretty awesome. He could tell we were all wonderful people. It rocked!
This is Dana. Besides being incredibly cute, she just got back from Costa Rica. There was a pretty funny story involving airplane delays and oxcarts. Good stuff, and I wish I could have gotten it on tape.
Here's Dana sitting with the Birthday Girl (Stacy). Though she might not look it in this pic, I don't think I've ever seen her happier than at this get-together.
I spent most of my time out on the balcony with the rest of the smokers. I don't know what it is about the smoking circle, but you always meet such interesting people there. In this shot Matt and his wife LeeAnn are cooling it with me.
Speaking of Matt & LeeAnn...aren't they cute. Kinda makes me queasy :P.
There were a bunch of other people there too, but I didn't take that many pictures so I missed Brian, Brian, Crystal, Nicole, Debbie (and husband), Joe, and Terance. Someone got a pic of Jeff, but he didn't like it so I'm not posting it. Anyway, pretty awesome weekend.
This is Brent. He loves beer. Loves it. He brews, drinks, breathes, and dreams beer. He also gets really mushy when he's drunk. It was pretty awesome. He could tell we were all wonderful people. It rocked!
This is Dana. Besides being incredibly cute, she just got back from Costa Rica. There was a pretty funny story involving airplane delays and oxcarts. Good stuff, and I wish I could have gotten it on tape.
Here's Dana sitting with the Birthday Girl (Stacy). Though she might not look it in this pic, I don't think I've ever seen her happier than at this get-together.
I spent most of my time out on the balcony with the rest of the smokers. I don't know what it is about the smoking circle, but you always meet such interesting people there. In this shot Matt and his wife LeeAnn are cooling it with me.
Speaking of Matt & LeeAnn...aren't they cute. Kinda makes me queasy :P.There were a bunch of other people there too, but I didn't take that many pictures so I missed Brian, Brian, Crystal, Nicole, Debbie (and husband), Joe, and Terance. Someone got a pic of Jeff, but he didn't like it so I'm not posting it. Anyway, pretty awesome weekend.
Friday, July 6, 2007
Interesting Evo-Psych tidbits.
Psychology Today ran a neat article where they dropped a couple of interesting Social/Evolutionary Psychology tidbits. My favorites are...
"Most suicide bombers are Muslim
Suicide missions are not always religiously motivated, but according to Oxford University sociologist Diego Gambetta, editor of Making Sense of Suicide Missions, when religion is involved, the attackers are always Muslim. Why? The surprising answer is that Muslim suicide bombing has nothing to do with Islam or the Quran (except for two lines). It has a lot to do with sex, or, in this case, the absence of sex.
"What distinguishes Islam from other major religions is that it tolerates polygyny. By allowing some men to monopolize all women and altogether excluding many men from reproductive opportunities, polygyny creates shortages of available women. If 50 percent of men have two wives each, then the other 50 percent don't get any wives at all.
"So polygyny increases competitive pressure on men, especially young men of low status. It therefore increases the likelihood that young men resort to violent means to gain access to mates. By doing so, they have little to lose and much to gain compared with men who already have wives. Across all societies, polygyny makes men violent, increasing crimes such as murder and rape, even after controlling for such obvious factors as economic development, economic inequality, population density, the level of democracy, and political factors in the region.
However, polygyny itself is not a sufficient cause of suicide bombing. Societies in sub-Saharan Africa and the Caribbean are much more polygynous than the Muslim nations in the Middle East and North Africa. And they do have very high levels of violence. Sub-Saharan Africa suffers from a long history of continuous civil wars—but not suicide bombings.
"The other key ingredient is the promise of 72 virgins waiting in heaven for any martyr in Islam. The prospect of exclusive access to virgins may not be so appealing to anyone who has even one mate on earth, which strict monogamy virtually guarantees. However, the prospect is quite appealing to anyone who faces the bleak reality on earth of being a complete reproductive loser.
"It is the combination of polygyny and the promise of a large harem of virgins in heaven that motivates many young Muslim men to commit suicide bombings. Consistent with this explanation, all studies of suicide bombers indicate that they are significantly younger than not only the Muslim population in general but other (nonsuicidal) members of their own extreme political organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah. And nearly all suicide bombers are single."
"The midlife crisis is a myth—sort of
Many believe that men go through a midlife crisis when they are in middle age. Not quite. Many middle-aged men do go through midlife crises, but it's not because they are middle-aged. It's because their wives are. From the evolutionary psychological perspective, a man's midlife crisis is precipitated by his wife's imminent menopause and end of her reproductive career, and thus his renewed need to attract younger women. Accordingly, a 50-year-old man married to a 25-year-old woman would not go through a midlife crisis, while a 25-year-old man married to a 50-year-old woman would, just like a more typical 50-year-old man married to a 50-year-old woman. It's not his midlife that matters; it's hers. When he buys a shiny-red sports car, he's not trying to regain his youth; he's trying to attract young women to replace his menopausal wife by trumpeting his flash and cash."
The man-haters out there ought to get a lot of satisfying use out of this brand of thinking, and there are a few more tidbits in the article. The notion that monogamy is more of a social contract than a natural preference fits my observations quite well. While the most powerful, older men in our society would probably benefit incredibly from institutionalized polygamy, the least powerful men would probably band together and blow up those few, powerful, older guys that were hogging all the young chicks. I'm looking at you Dennis Kucinich, Salman Rushdie, Tom Cruise, Fred Thompson, Rudy Giuliani, and many more. Donald Trump and Hugh Hefner are almost not worth mentioning. John McCain took a different track and married a model in '65, before trashbinning her 15 years later for a millionaire-heiress.
"Most suicide bombers are Muslim
Suicide missions are not always religiously motivated, but according to Oxford University sociologist Diego Gambetta, editor of Making Sense of Suicide Missions, when religion is involved, the attackers are always Muslim. Why? The surprising answer is that Muslim suicide bombing has nothing to do with Islam or the Quran (except for two lines). It has a lot to do with sex, or, in this case, the absence of sex.
"What distinguishes Islam from other major religions is that it tolerates polygyny. By allowing some men to monopolize all women and altogether excluding many men from reproductive opportunities, polygyny creates shortages of available women. If 50 percent of men have two wives each, then the other 50 percent don't get any wives at all.
"So polygyny increases competitive pressure on men, especially young men of low status. It therefore increases the likelihood that young men resort to violent means to gain access to mates. By doing so, they have little to lose and much to gain compared with men who already have wives. Across all societies, polygyny makes men violent, increasing crimes such as murder and rape, even after controlling for such obvious factors as economic development, economic inequality, population density, the level of democracy, and political factors in the region.
However, polygyny itself is not a sufficient cause of suicide bombing. Societies in sub-Saharan Africa and the Caribbean are much more polygynous than the Muslim nations in the Middle East and North Africa. And they do have very high levels of violence. Sub-Saharan Africa suffers from a long history of continuous civil wars—but not suicide bombings.
"The other key ingredient is the promise of 72 virgins waiting in heaven for any martyr in Islam. The prospect of exclusive access to virgins may not be so appealing to anyone who has even one mate on earth, which strict monogamy virtually guarantees. However, the prospect is quite appealing to anyone who faces the bleak reality on earth of being a complete reproductive loser.
"It is the combination of polygyny and the promise of a large harem of virgins in heaven that motivates many young Muslim men to commit suicide bombings. Consistent with this explanation, all studies of suicide bombers indicate that they are significantly younger than not only the Muslim population in general but other (nonsuicidal) members of their own extreme political organizations like Hamas and Hezbollah. And nearly all suicide bombers are single."
"The midlife crisis is a myth—sort of
Many believe that men go through a midlife crisis when they are in middle age. Not quite. Many middle-aged men do go through midlife crises, but it's not because they are middle-aged. It's because their wives are. From the evolutionary psychological perspective, a man's midlife crisis is precipitated by his wife's imminent menopause and end of her reproductive career, and thus his renewed need to attract younger women. Accordingly, a 50-year-old man married to a 25-year-old woman would not go through a midlife crisis, while a 25-year-old man married to a 50-year-old woman would, just like a more typical 50-year-old man married to a 50-year-old woman. It's not his midlife that matters; it's hers. When he buys a shiny-red sports car, he's not trying to regain his youth; he's trying to attract young women to replace his menopausal wife by trumpeting his flash and cash."
The man-haters out there ought to get a lot of satisfying use out of this brand of thinking, and there are a few more tidbits in the article. The notion that monogamy is more of a social contract than a natural preference fits my observations quite well. While the most powerful, older men in our society would probably benefit incredibly from institutionalized polygamy, the least powerful men would probably band together and blow up those few, powerful, older guys that were hogging all the young chicks. I'm looking at you Dennis Kucinich, Salman Rushdie, Tom Cruise, Fred Thompson, Rudy Giuliani, and many more. Donald Trump and Hugh Hefner are almost not worth mentioning. John McCain took a different track and married a model in '65, before trashbinning her 15 years later for a millionaire-heiress.
Ah, sweet Romance!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
