Friday! Friday! Friday! T.G.I.F. Hahahaha. It's another Friday weekly review of Rants from a Midwest Guy In The Land of Milk And Honey and Weekend Wrap Up. It's Black Friday, and some places have been open for hours. Even yesterday, Thanksgiving day, I saw people lined up outside of places getting ready for the Midnight Madness sales commonly affiliated with the biggest shopping day of the year. I participated in it last year with my brother so I could get a cover for my comforter but mostly did it for the family bonding time. Seeing the lines this year more or less made me wonder if people are commercially programmed into thinking they're in need of "STUFF" and go out and spend money they may or may not have, or if people actually plan on the sales in preparation for the gift giving season or things they just need for themselves. I'm inclined to think there are both types of shoppers in a disproportionate percentage. I just wonder, "Why?" Why is it so important to wait till now to go out and stand in line for hours in what can be really frigged weather to get gifts for people or things you might actually need when you likely could've just got it on-line for a deal all along?! I totally get it if you actually need something and maybe it just happen to be close enough to the sale season to get it, but otherwise people seem to do just fine without those things. In so far as the 'show your appreciation of someone' side of things, wouldn't it be just as appreciated to get a gift for whatever reason any other time of the year versus wait till Christmas?! I guess the family aspect of it is important, but the need for gift giving as the symbolic reminder from Christianity that God gave His son for what essentially was his own rule enforcement versus actually being flexible or forgiving or even merciful as He is stated to be, but He apparently doesn't, he had to kill his own son to make up for his personality issues sometimes known as sociopathic behavior. People just don't want to believe their main focus of life and afterlife insurance policy is actually not only forgiving but unforgiving. This is a theological discussion my college friends' hair stand up with when I present the other side of an 'almighty, all powerful, and all knowing' God.
So we're caught in the perpetual social catch 22 in the buying season. We're told that we celebrate the Christian theme by practicing gift giving on that day for that reason or others but essentially that one. The corporations have capitalized on it making our antiquated notion that we need to give in order to receive and our practice of it or non-practice of it has been tied to our personal worth and value. The more we give to someone, the more valuable they perceive themselves to be in turn increasing our value in their perspective and so forth. But is that the real meaning of Christmas or is the Christian theological notion of 'balancing out our sin' the cause of all the warm and fuzzy shopping accidents that happen on black Friday?! Hard to say, but I like the hot chocolate, the excuse to spend money on someone that I care about (even though I do this all the time without a reason), and the holiday music and movies.
Jewish Persecution......
That topic aside, I was fortunate to spend the holiday at one of my Minnesota friend's dinner for other orphans like myself living in California. The dinner was wonderful, and the 'wonderous' slush was likely the cause of me wanting to through the towel in early that night. It was fun until one of the guest pointed out to some of us in one of the rooms that we were all wearing crosses in some piece of jewelry. She later stated it was religious overload because of her "Jewish" background. Somehow, this white woman went on about her Jewish heritage and being oppressed, and all things she never actually had to experience herself but was essentially programmed by her mother that "had to change her name to a non-Jewish one so she wouldn't be discriminated against," essentially convinced her was happening to her also! Ha. I thought. I white woman having a social reaction in her early 40's in a house full of people that could've cared less must be part of the reason she lives in San Francisco and has been single for one too many years. The me remind you it was the German's that killed the Jews..not the American Christian. It was the Jews that killed Jesus...not the Germans. So, I almost lost it that she felt she was part of a religious minority that was oppressed but in fact are the wealthiest group of people in the world, are largely white, and generally are exclusive of non-Jewish people. I could only say to her, "You should try being Mexican sometime, and then see if you feel you're still 'persecuted'!" It was then that I thought I should leave so I didn't begin to intellectually persecute her for her mental non-sense. LOL.
As has been the case for a couple of months, I work Saturday's. I usually try and have some kind of productive morning involving coffee, emails, and the gym. Last Saturday was no different. I got up at 6:00 AM and went to my local Starbucks, worked on my blog, and when I felt the time was right, I made my way up to the gym to warm up for the day. Doing chiropractic work is a physically demanding job, and if I don't get in a good stretch and mild cardio, I'm hard pressed to be full awake to work on upwards of 40 people average.Some mornings I'll do a 3/4 work-out of a body region including my abs, and what I work on depends on what office I'm working. It was a shoulder morning. I go between doing stationary machines to cable work to free-weights depending, again, on the muscle group and how much of the workout is gonna get done. I usually rotate which end of it I'm going to start with, but that day, I did stationary work. The photo below was my post-turkey eating check-up at 2:00 AM.....almost there.
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