Commentary + Sarcasm

ROCK CHALK JAYHAWK KU!

• Joseph Kony
• George Zimmerman
• Michelle Bachmann
• Aaron Carter
• Not you.

Emphasis on that last one.

I’ve started playing this “Draw Something” game. Essentially, it’s one-on-one Pictionary.

I got the word “Rihanna.”

I drew a picture of a woman with a black eye and a fist coming at her, the fist being labeled “Chris Brown.”

I might be going to Hell. Just lettin’ you guys know.

HOOSIERS!

EDIT: Just sayin’.

Woke up.

Sadness.

General rule of thumb in this house is that if one person cooks, the other cleans up. I find it fair. It may change every once in awhile, but that’s generally how it goes.

The other night, Meghan cooked for me and Mom while I was keeping the kids (niece and nephew) entertained and out of everyone’s hair. Mom, who works third shift, was sleeping and hitting up on the day off. I felt that since Meghan cooked and I kept the kids from bugging us all (or waking up Mom), Mom should have cleaned up afterward.

No dice. I cleaned up. Which also meant that I cleaned up the dishes that were already there when we actually got here FOR THE FIRST TIME SINCE JANUARY. Dishes. Already. There. Not mine or Meghan’s, obviously, but Mom’s. Whatever. I didn’t complain, really, and just did them as asked.

The following night, Mom made spaghetti for us, which rocked. Since she had that night off and all of the following day (today), and since I’d done dishes after we had cooked the night before, I figured she’d have done the dishes from her own night of cooking. The order of “I cook, you clean” had been disrupted by that one night of “you cook, you clean.” I felt it only fair that she should then be held to the same expectation to balance things out — she cooks, she cleans. No big.

Yes big. Apparently.

Meghan and I start to cook dinner tonight, and I go in to ask Mom if there’s a bigger pan. She recommended using the big pot she’d used for the spaghetti last night, which hadn’t been washed yet. I said, “Ah, okay. I was hoping you’d wash that while we were gone today.”

“No, I cleaned, so you get to clean up,” she says with a smirk.

“Well,” I said, “I figured that since we cooked AND cleaned the night before, you’d have done the same thing last night.”

I walk back into the kitchen, Meghan tells me to calm down, I mumble something like “No, I’m not going to calm down, she’s being a hypocrite.”

Mom comes into the kitchen in a huff and tells us to get out so she can take care of things. I say, “No, Mom, we’ve got it. Don’t worry about it.” I was a bit snippy.

She continued to stand behind us for the next few minutes, me washing the pot out and Meghan slicing up chicken, and finally says “Okay, I don’t mean to be rude, but I’ve got a limited amount of time [before work] and I need you guys out of the way so I can do this.”

“Mom, seriously, I’ve got it.”

“No, it’s my kitchen. Get out.”

Ugh. I’m probably making too much of this. I’m probably being immature. Whatever. It’s shit. Life will be harder living without her and out of her house, but it’s going to be a lot better in some ways. I hate this crap.

My original brackets got busted before the tourney even started, since Syracuse’s Fab Melo is disqualified now. So, I’ve adjusted my old ones and my Final Four looks like this:

Kentucky-Missouri

Kansas St.-Kansas

Missouri and Kansas in the final.

Kansas wins.

To me, liberty means the freedom to do whatever I want so long as I’m not infringing on any other individual’s right to do whatever they want. This inherently also means liberty means personal responsibility and accountability, meaning freedom from governmental/social control also means not relying on government for non-essential care in any form that I have the power to attain through my own effort.

What does liberty or freedom mean to you?

Gimme some suggestions for reading.

See, I’ve got a Kindle that’s not been getting nearly enough use lately. It needs more use. FIX MY PROBLEM.

Recommend some books for me. I don’t care if they’re new or old. I’d prefer them to be relatively cheap (I’ve got about $6 left on my Amazon gift card balance), and I’m definitely in the mood for fiction. To give you a taste of things I’ve read and liked:

• Frankenstein
• The Historian
• Huck Finn
• To Kill a Mockingbird
• Stephen King (I’ve loved everything I’ve read by him, but I’ve only completely read his short stories, never any novels — I’m in the early part of “It” right now, so maybe I should just continue with that?)
• Gabriel Garcia Marquez’s short stories
• Harry Potter series (obviously)

I’d say that’s a pretty representative sample. Thoughts on future reads? Should I just continue with “It”?