Author: weed

Hopefully, this blog won’t cause the above title to actually accur, but I found this amusing article on Islam and the big cartoon fiasco.

However, if Al Quaida is watching, barnson.org is originated in UTAH, not Maryland! 😉

My $.02 Weed

All,

Please pay your respects for my father, who passed away this morning from a two-year battle with cancer. He was a good man who took care of his kids, served his country in WWII, and lived by God’s comandments. His death was as good as a death can go: quick, painless, and surrounded by his wife and family. I mean this in all honest when I say I hope your death will be as peaceful and loving as his was. If there is a heaven, he’s there now smiling at me.

All my love and thanks Steve

Michael Paul Phillips October 10th, 1928 – January 8th, 2006

Matt or Whomever,

How would I select text in VIM and save it to a different file. Specifically, I’m view mail queue files and need to select out individual emails to be able to see MIME-encoded objects (images, documents, etc)

I’m a vim newbie so keep that in mind. I need it kinda quick otherwise I’d figure it our myself.

Thanks Weed

Matt,

Does Drupal have an option to email me notifications of new posts. Maybe even on a schedule, like once an hour or every six?

I added the XML feed to my Firefox bookmarks, but that doesn’t show me new posts, just new blog entries. As a junkie, I’d like to know when new posts are added so I can know when to come and read them 😉

Just wondering Weed

Troylus brought up a good point (in my humble opinion) in a recent discussion about, uhm, shockingly, religion!

When someone who believes in some sort of omnicient, omnipotent authority figure chooses between right and wrong, are they doing it because of right or wrong, or because they fear reprisals from the aforementioned deity?

If you’re on good behavior because of the “fear of God”, then I’d have to admit I’d lose a little respect for you because you’re like a child and a parent. I’ve heard this preached in many sermons, about how we’re not worthy of God and we cannot hope to understand his mind, etc, etc. If that’s what it takes for you to act on the side of good, then by all means because I want everyone to be good, but I wonder why it takes “God” for that to happen…

However, if your good behavior is due to the fact YOU know right from wrong and choose that path, then what’s the difference between you and me, when I choose right from wrong without God in the equation? Who cares WHERE right and wrong come from (human rights, God/Devil, society, etc) as long as you know the difference?

If you were in a bad position in your life and turned it around, I’d rather see you take credit for it than give it to someone else. Because in the end, the decisions you make are made by you, not God or karma or anyone else. Otherwise, if the decisions ARE made by God, how could he be possibly disappointed if you make the wrong one?

My $.02 Weed

I have to say I feel smarter for reading this blog. Seriously. To have a place where I can go and read people having enlightened dicussions without resorting to flaming, shouting, or name-calling is a wonderful thing.

I need to start posting more because you guys do a wonderful job of expressing your opinions. I feel like I tend to ramble and miss points I wanted to make. Maybe its because I only post when I have a few moments of peace between work and kids and, uhm, well, work and kids 😉

Gracias, mes amigos! Weed

Since religion is such a big topic on this board, let me state what my many personal searches have led me to believe:

No one wants to die. Death is a very scary thing. Before we had science, it must have been even scarier, since there were a lot of other things we couldn’t explain, like lightening, disease, and why fireflies light up.

So our ancestors made up things to account what they couldn’t explain. Gods, myths, etc…and in what is human nature, certain people took advantage of this to control the masses. Hence, religion.

“You don’t want to die? Then believe in this, subject yourself to this, and you will get to heaven and live forever. By the way, I’m the representative of God and you should grant me according power.”

That’s my explanation of religion today. Simplified, but pretty much dead-on.

I cannot stand how religions say if you’re one of us and behave this way, then you’ll go to heaven, but others won’t simply because they’re not part of our group. My heaven has Buddhists, Hindus, Muslims, Atheists, Catholics, Jews, and anyone else who knew the difference between right and wrong and tried to stay on the side of right, just because they knew it was the right thing to do.

What, you want me to believe in your religion, but animals don’t go to heaven in your religion? Huh? Didn’t God make them before us?

Didn’t Jesus say in the Bible (which is just another book to me, btw) “Love one another as you love yourself, and love God above all else?” Isn’t this the Golden Rule, to superced all others? Where in that does is say “except for gays”? Where does it exclude someone who’s from Iran, who just tries to live a good life each day, doesn’t denounce America or blow up themselves? It says be nice to each other. How is hating someone simply because their religion is different loving your neighbor?

I HATE HATE HATE the part of religion that says you have to be like us and not like anyone else. It reeks of Junior High clique-ism. It’s an extension of the selfish human nature, where we think we’re special just because we’ve made it to the top of the food chain. God did all this just for us? Huh? Or are we just the latest evolutionary beast to make it to the top and have spare time to think about it? It appeals to my base instincts to think this is all for us humans, but it doesn’t appeal to my logical side. My logical side tells me we just made it up to make ourselves feel better about the world we live in we really have no control over….yet.

We have no clue what is out there. There may be life that we can’t even perceive. It might now be carbon-based. We only exist in four dimensions (l,w,h, space-time). How do we know there aren’t others? Just because we can’ perceieve them, they can’t exist? We may be one little cog in a vast machine. Why should we be special? But we are looking, we are trying to find out. What happens to religion if we find other sentient life out there? God put them there for us to find?

Religion is good on a personal level IF it teaches you right from wrong. But when you get people in a group, human nature mars the intent of religion and twists it into something I wish to stay away from.

Not that all religion is bad, or that to be part in a religion makes you a bad person. But it’s not for me, hence this is my theory. All of you who participate in a religion and you do good things in the name of that religion, I’m truly happy for you. But respect my belief to not participate in that religion and still be a good person. It can be done.

Science is the way for me. I know the difference between right and wrong, and don’t need the idea of a higherdeity to keep me on the side of right. I can stay there by myself with willpower and the help of those who love me. I’m humble not because I’m little compare to God, but because I’m little compared to the universe. To the stars, to the oceans, to the sky.

My $.02 Weed

After much research, I think I’ve narrowed down what my next car will be.

And the winner is…

A 2005 Hyundai Accent!!!!

My criteria were: 1) 4 doors 2) Automatic 3) A/C 4) A good warranty 5) Fuel Economy 6) Low price

These are ranked in order from least to most important (bass ackwards, I know 😉

With the mighty 13mpg my F150 gets, the money this Hyundai will save me in gas will pay for the car payment AND allow me to keep my truck. I was weighing the Accent vs a Honda Civic, and the thing that won me over was the price and the warranty. My wife & I plan to drive this into the ground, so resale wasn’t a big thing, and once you throw that out, the Hyundai wins hands down.

Whaddya’all thing?

My $.02 (which would buy .00000001 gallons of gas now 😉 Weed

According to the NOAA National Hurricane Center, hey predict the hurricane season is just getting warmed up.

Even after all New Orleans has been through, I’d say there’s probably a decent chance another hurricane could come through this year. Look at all the fun Florida had last year.

If I’m not mistaken, we need another El Nino year, because El Ninos reduce hurricane probabilities.

Let’s hope the rest of the season fizzes.

My $.02 Weed

So does anyone have any guesses or comments about the new book?

Who’s the half-blood prince? My guess is it’s not a character we’ve really met yet. Someone from the past.

Who dies? Albus? My personal guess will be the Weasley Twins.

Do Harry and Snape throw down this book? Any hook-ups? What about Grawp?

Whaddya think?

My $.02 Weed