The Dismantling of Tiger Woods

Why are people so obsessed with Tiger Wood’s infidelities? Sure, it’s hard to turn your head away from a train wreck, but why? In large part, we tend to measure ourselves by the actions of others. We watch someone go down in flames -- especially if they seem to have it all -- and we feel a bit better about our own miserable existences.

I tend not to watch the news, so I have been able to stay away from most of the sordid details. With that in mind, my thoughts on the topic are pretty limited.

When the story broke, one of my friends made a post on Facebook about how disappointed she was with Tiger’s discretion. Another friend commented that Tiger’s wife should have seen it coming. After all, Tiger is famous and his wife obviously must be a gold digger and couldn’t have been so naïve. Tiger must have women throwing themselves at him constantly, he argued, and no man could resist that constant temptation. I have never been rich, famous, or that good-looking, so I guess I will never know.

I think many people overlook the obvious nugget in this story, though. It is the question of integrity. Tiger’s mistake wasn’t that he was sleeping around on his wife -- if people want to have a open marriage, that’s their business -- it was that he didn’t have an honest conversation with his wife going into the marriage. Granted, people can also have a change of heart during their marriage (I speak from personal experience on that one), but Tiger was too small of a man to have an honest conversation even then.

If Tiger wanted to sleep around, he should have been man enough to tell his wife, allowing her to decide whether she wanted to stay with him or not. Tiger should have been honest with her. The value of honesty doesn’t change just because fame and a large bank account are involved. If you don’t respect the most important person in your life, how can you respect yourself? And without self-respect, where is the integrity? In the toilet.

Most people think the opposite of honesty is dishonesty. Really, the more accurate antonym is chicken-shit. People who are not honest are scared -- scared of the consequences that honesty may bring. True alpha males aren’t scared. Even with all he has and all he is, Tiger was a chicken-shit. I guess that just makes Tiger another beta.

The World is Changing

One of my bosses shared the original version of this video with us. This is the second in the series, but I think they may be up to 4 or 5 now. I have not verified any of the facts presented here -- and I hate sharing things without having a good feel for their accuracy -- but this is thought provoking regardless.

If you find this interesting, I recommend spending a few minutes on You Tube tracking down the rest of them...

You Weren’t Born Here, The Police Brought You

I was preparing for a road trip to California recently and was looking around for something different to pop into the CD player when I ran across an old Bill Cosby bit I remember listening to with my buddy Scott when I was a kid.

I only had time to download To Russell, My Brother, Whom I Slept With, but after listening to it, the consensus in the car was that I should download more Cosby for next time. Mr. Cosby’s stuff is classic, and with a ten year old around, being able to listen to a comedian that can pull off his craft without resorting to adult language and themes is a bonus.

The truly awesome thing about this album is you can download it in it’s entirety off of Amazon for $4.95. Better still, you can just get the best part, the 27 minute title track for a mere 99 cents. Well worth your buck. Or if you are dirt cheap, you can listen to it now on iLike.

On Global Warming

The politics and pseudo-science behind the issue of global warming (or is it politically correct to call it climate change?) make it almost impossible to have an opinion on the issue without “picking sides”. If you believe man is making the polar ice caps melt by using gas-powered leaf blowers, then, it is assumed you must logically conclude that all governments must join together to ban fast food hamburgers. On the other hand, if you ignore the glorious wisdom of our great spokesmen on this subject, you must be a quack. After all, who can argue with the man who invented the internet.

I have concluded -- like what the Republicans and Democrats are to politics -- so are the scientists on both side of this debate. They are all wrong.

First of all, both sides twist the data to verify their own conclusions. For every one of those charts scientists claim as conclusive evidence, there is someone on the other side that can re-configure them into opposite conclusions. On top of that, we, as humans, are very bad at determining cause and effect and are even more inept at accurately defining correlations between complicated phenomena. We also tend to arrogantly think we know more than we really do. If all the knowledge we have about global warming could fit on a grain of sand, what we don’t know would encompass the entire earth. Yet we continue to spew at facts as if we have some omnipotent insight into them.

Secondly, we ignore that every generation conjures up it’s own earth-ending disaster scenario. There was communist global domination, the population bomb, various world pandemic hysterias, and -- one that may actually still deserve some real attention -- nuclear annihilation.

We live in a dangerous world. We calm ourselves by thinking we -- or more dangerously -- our fuhrers can do anything about it. Treaties don’t work. Ask the Native Americans. It is simple arrogance to think that we can mandate away global warming any more than we can world hunger. Giving up sovereignty for safety has never worked. But fear works. Real or not, political power depends on it.

So, what to do? The science on both sides is iffy and the potential political solutions are even worse. And even if you do believe one side has the monopoly on truth, that does not mean that side's solution shouldn't be scrutinized.

How about this? Let’s all agree that we don’t know it all. Let’s not shoot first, ask questions later. Let’s not put guns to people’s heads and tell them what vehicle they can drive, whether they can travel, or that they can’t eat red meat. Let's not create new carbon taxes and regulations to stick it to the productive people of this world.

Here’s a novel idea, let’s agree that we all like clean air, water, and land and start showing some respect for those things -- regardless of where one may stand politically or scientifically. Even if you are on the side that doesn't believe man’s activity is in some way responsible for climate change, let’s be prudent and take care of our resources, stop buying crap we don’t need and casting off our used consumer goods haphazardly.

And finally, let’s stop picking sides and just do what is right in our own households. Let’s start there before using our governments to self-righteously demand others half way around the globe to bow down to our version of justice. After all, those people on the other side of the world are the ones buying up our debt, allowing us to continue our over-consumption, debt-ridden lifestyles.

We ain’t that holy.

Greatest Appetizer Ever

Whenever there is a party, I request that Nicole make these. She generally makes at least 48 or so, just in case someone other than me wants some, too. I guess I have inherited my Brother Bubba's taste for spice. The Parmesan cheese creates a great golden crust.



Jalapeno Poppers

4 oz. cream cheese
1 cup cheddar cheese, shredded
2 Tbsp. Mayonnaise
8 medium jalapeno peppers
Shredded Parmesan cheese to top poppers

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Coat large baking pan with cooking spray. In medium bowl, combine cream cheese, cheddar cheese and mayo. Halve jalapenos lengthwise and remove seeds. Stuff halves with cream cheese mixture.
Sprinkle Parmesan cheese to cover (this will brown and create a cover to keep everything inside). Bake until bubbly, about 30 minutes.


Enjoy!

Cranberry Chicken

Variations of this Cranberry Chicken recipe can be found all over the internet, but this is the one Nicole makes at our house. The first time she said she was going to make it, I didn't think I would like it. Now I am addicted and can hardly go more than a week without it.

You can serve it with rice, noodles, or our favorite standby, mashed potatoes.

It is so simple, anyone can make it -- even me.

Cranberry Chicken

4-6 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 - 16 oz can of whole cranberries
1 cup Catalina dressing
1 package onion soup mix

Mix the cranberries, dressing and soup mix together in a baking dish. Add chicken breasts. Spoon sauce over chicken to keep moist while baking. Bake at 350 degrees for an hour.

Richard P. Feynman

Recently, my sister cleaned off her bookshelf and sent me a box of random books. The first one I am working my way through is a collection of short works by physicist Richard P. Feynman called The Pleasures of Finding Things Out.

Not being all that bright myself, I can become obsessively fascinated by the thinking process of smart people. (My daily life is still influenced by Nicolas Taleb's works. See my Black Swan post from 2007.) There always seems to be some common themes with smart people (not to be confused with people who want you to think they are smart).

They are naturally humble. They have to be. They are so smart that they understand how much they don't know. That makes them humble.

They are funny. When you are smart, apparently absurdities present themselves everywhere. People, especially those that take themselves too seriously -- or think they do actually understand something they don't -- make for easy targets.

They have a skeptical outlook on anything or anyone pretending to be an authority. Anyone wearing a suit, uniform, or gown are all to be distrusted -- even disrespected.

And finally, they are more interested in truth than in being right. We mere mortals always have to have "the answers". We need to justify our existence. We need to have explanations for everything -- a why for every what. Smart people don't suffer from this affliction. Where Taleb eloquently explains that we are fooled by randomness and suffer from a need to have to make it all make sense -- even at the point of making up half-truths to placate ourselves, Feynman explains his total comfort with the unknown.

"You see, one thing is, I can live with doubt and uncertainty and not knowing. I think it's much more interesting to live not knowing than to have answers that might be wrong. I have approximate answers and possible beliefs and different degrees of certainty about different things, but I am not absolutely sure of anything and there are many things I don't know anything about..."

Now I am off to get a little smarter. I think I will go pick up another Feynman book, maybe Surely You Are Joking, Mr. Feynman.