Well...today's the day I go back to college. It's time for me to finish what I started all those years ago...getting my Master's degree.

I feel kinda bad because when I was younger, I created a plan for myself and well...I'm 15+ years behind schedule on my plan.

Actually, nothing is how I imagined it but I'm not going to lament about bad...I'm going to look at the positives.

I work at a place where even when I explain what I do, my coworkers don't understand.

I play baseball with a bunch of 20 year olds and hold my own.

I write and record my own music. And I've been with the same woman for 15 years now.

I'm still crazy. I still like to be unpredictable.

I still don't like conservatives and I still need to get my shoes and boots polished.

But yea...I'm actually 17 years behind schedule.

While reading this /. user's reply, http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=132865&cid=11091959 I came up with a genius idea.

Remember the Ben Affleck, Jennifer Lopez flop, Gigli?

Well to increase the value of it, why don't a lot of people download it.

That way the MPAA can claim that they lost BILLIONS of dollars in Gigli profit to pirates.

THIS IS A JOKE! I AM NOT ADVOCATING DOWNLOADING MOVIES AND VIOLATING COPYRIGHT

Good, now that I've gotten that out of my system, let me just add this thought.

The last time I checked, the American people still made the laws and still owned this country.

We may not have that luxury if we pass on our reponsibilities of speaking out against the type of corporate greed mentioned in http://yro.slashdot.org/yro/04/12/15/1414255.shtml?tid=95&tid=188&tid=1&tid=17.

Make no mistake, the artists are not the ones being hurt by file trading. The ones who are losing out are the middle men who have ripped off artists for decades.

Now that they are getting some payback, they don't like the taste and they are running screaming to mommy with their checkbook out ready to pay for protection.

This is very similar to the methods used by organized crime.

You make payments to the mob boss for protection and nothing will happen to you. However, once you miss a payment to your congressman or senator, nothing bad will happen to you because what you wanted has probably already been signed into law.

Well...I'm over my double depression of watching myself turn 40 and watching John Kerry lose the election.

Of the two, Turning 40 is the harder of the two.

For most of my youth I always wondered what was the fascination with turning 40.

Now I know.

When you turn 40, your outlook on things change.

You may like the latest Dre or Eminem joint but you don't dare let anyone catch you listening to it or liking it.

And sports...by now most guys my age are through playing professional sports. Well except for Barry Bonds and he has enough stuff coursing through his veins to preserve him for another 40 years.

I understand why guys quit playing around 40.

It's much harder to recover from the normal aches and pains. Add to it the drive to compete and your mind's willingness to commit to play hard and your body's inability to perform like a 30 year and you can quickly see the problem.

But there are good things that happen at 40 though.

First, I have a greater appreciation for my parents and what they went through. I see the errors of my ways and I'm more repentent.

Second, I am more patient.

Third, I've become even more diplomatic than before.

Yea...turning 40 means that close to half of my life is over. I look back at what I've accomplished and it seems so little compared to what needs to be done.

There's so much more I need to learn and so little time to do it all.

If I could live until I'm 300, maybe I would have the time to figure it all out but for now I'll remember the words of my elderly neighbor who told me this:

"John, there are two ways to live your life. You can work your butt off when you're young and enjoy things when you're older. Or you can enjoy like when you're young and work you're butt off when you're older. No matter which you choose, you will have to work you're butt off at some point."

And dogged if he wasn't right.

RIP Mr. McKey.

Well...this has been an interesting week. I've discovered that if you fsck a disk with the incorrect parameters...you fry the disk.

interesting...

another interesting thing that i've learned.

if you drink 24-30 drinks in one night...you get alcohol poisoning and then you're not right for weeks to come.

and believe me...i feel it two weeks later.

So I turned 40 on Monday. It was a quiet event and over the weekend the fine folks here gave me a present...I think.

They gave me some meta-mod duties.

I've got to admit that the folks who run this site are smart in keeping users involved so that they feel that they have a vested interest in this site.

Which in turn, keeps them coming back for more.

I know it's worked for me.

And btw...who saw that game last night (Yankees-Red Sox game 6).

That slap at Arroyo's glove by ARod was one of those classic moments that we'll be seeing when we're sitting in the nursing home awaiting our mush and meds.

hmm...well it seems that i missed out on an opportunity to moderate again.

darn...i'd been visiting my girlfriend's grandmother and doing some work around her house.

i took today as a rest day.

shoot...i hope i get another shot at it.

i like modding.

Heh...this is interesting...I just figured out that I've had moderator status for the last 24 or so hours.

I saw a link about moderator info on the bottom of a story and then went back to the main page and saw that I have five (5) moderator points.

Wow...that's got me floored.

I can't wait to use them.

Man...I feel slighted.

These jokers have moderated me down to the point that I now have had bad karma reported for at least a week and no amount of good posts is seeming to change that.

No one even bothers to metamoderate my stuff anymore.

I have half a mind to abandon this username and start over.

I know the FAQ mentions that karma is just a number but it does have psychological repercussions for some people.

I for one, don't like being perceived as a bad person or a grump. Yet these are the very things that are associated with "bad" karma.

So how does one shed the bad karma rap when no one bothers to read or moderate your posts?

Well...it seems that my last few posts here have been rated/ranked a little better than before but i still have no clue as to what the folks who moderate this board are expecting.

it truly makes little, if any, sense to me.

I don't understand this /. system.

My story ideas are okay but they are rejected, my posts, meant to educate, are termed "troll", and my karma is rated as bad.

These guys make it sound like I'm some sorta mean spirited goon who wants to cause problems.

I don't understand it and it's gotten me very frustrated.

I've been reading a lot lately about the sorry state of reading and I began thinking. Some of the brightest people I know don't really read anymore. They use audiobooks. Think about this...you are paying money for a tape recording of someone reading a book for you. And with that recording you get their inflection, their imagination and their methodology for how each character will sound. You don't use your mind or imagination at all if you don't want to. It's essentially a visual-less movie version. I like the old fashioned version of reading myself...thanks.

Somebody asked me earlier "what's my GCNSEQNO?" and i have no idea what they are referring to.

i've been reading slashdot for years and don't recall running across that anacronym before and i have looked it up on google and drawn a blank.

odd...