A glimmering of thought

I don't understand what the hell has happened to AVG in the move from 7.* to 8. Seriously, you have to take up 90% cpu resources every single bloody time I want to open any application whatsoever? It should not take 2-3 full minutes to open up firefox for the first time! And why the hell do you need to scan my programs whenever I close them down? I mean, what the hell! You used to be so resource friendly! You barely ever made a peep, and updating was a piece of cake. Now look at you. You're a bloated piece of crap, dude; not to mention you now take forever and seriously hog resources just to update, even if there's no update. What the hell is wrong with you?! Did you let a four year old code you? Did you start hating your users? You better shape up, AVG, or I'm moving on to Avast.

You ever have one of those days where it seems like everyone on the road has just completely lost their freaking minds? Yeah, having one of those days. I don't even know where the hell all the traffic came from. I mean, it's only 3:30 or so now, yet the highway all the way home from work was completely packed, and seemed to have a lot more dickish behavior going on than usual. Did I miss a memo? Is today go out driving like a royal prick day, or what? Bah, I say! Bah!

I grew up on apple computers. Our school had them. We had one for many years (It was one of those tiny black and white screens and only used floppies). I am, in fact, buying an ipod. But sometimes, okay, a lot of times, I really hate apple. I figured since I was getting an ipod, I should look ahead and install itunes so as to actually be able to put my music onto said ipod. And what did it do, you ask, as if you were really reading this and asking such a question? Why thank you, I shall indeed tell you. The bugger installed a metric buttload (you'd think the american standard butt would hold more of a load, go figure) of extraneous "services" on my computer, and without a single question as to whether I cared. I've been able to prune some of the services, but holy cow, is it annoying. Microsoft always gets (the well-deserved) crap about doing whatever it wants and being annoying, but at least it asks. Apple seems to be of the mindset that it knows what we "want" and it's going to give it to us whether we like it or not. Do I look like I want an iphone? No! I do not even own a cell phone! So why do I not have the option of turning off the service that is dedicated to wasting my computer's time, just in case I happen to have one?

It's not just that itunes installed all these services, it's that it made them perniciously unkillable. Most processes, you see it, kill it, that's that. Not with some of them. They pop on when you turn on itunes, and at least one of them will not DIE! Kill it, it pops on again. Kill it, it pops on again. I had to fiddle with msconfig services to get one of the little bastards to stop running. Why apple, why? And don't tell me there's a light on the tree that won't light on one side. I know that story.

So I was flipping channels this afternoon during lunch, when I came across some channel with a sort of semi-documentary trip with Ashley Judd going to Africa to document the widespread terror that is AIDS. VH1 I believe. Anyway, it was rather interesting at times, but there was moment where Ashley Judd was reading this script for a commercial or speech she was going to give about AIDS (she speaks impeccable french btw, which I find unbelievably sexy) that I was rather struck by an annoying bit of irony. The irony being that she was reading/rehearsing the bit that talked about abstinence, about how kids should wait for marriage. This, of course, is not only absolutely true, and if done by everyone, would greatly wipe out, or decrease, the number of AIDS cases in Africa. There was no crap about condoms making it safe, because come on, they really aren't all that safe when it comes to AIDS/HIV.

What I found terribly hypocritical though, was that when people go to, or are in Africa, they realize that abstinence really does matter, and that maybe it's something worth considering. I've heard of various college campuses in Africa where thousands of students show up to pledge abstinence, because they've seen first-hand the devestation that AIDS has caused. The hypocricy lies in that such ideas are completely scoffed at here in the US, and that some of the very celebrities speaking up at its virtues over there, come back here only to make another movie or show involving lots of casual sex, sending the exact opposite message of what they said elsewhere. It's not like we're somehow different here. The number of STD cases percentage-wise in this country is astounding. The number one STD, which affects nearly half of all sexually active people (47% to be precise), can be transmitted simply through contact with the the affected region, and has become the number one cause of cervical cancer. But I digress. I'm just annoyed at the difference in messages and reactions to said messages we get.

No, I haven't been living in a hole somewhere (I don't think), so I know it's been this way for a little while, but still. Mostly in reference to christians I hear it, and even from other christians, which is like, to be blunt, one family member spitting on another member, but anyway I've started hearing it in other places as well. I hate that the word fundamentalism has become an epithet closely related to fanatical psycho or something. Since when is wanting to follow the fundamentals of something a bad thing? I mean, how many books and speakers out there are always going on about "going back to the basics"? Take the tax laws at the moment. They're so convoluted and stupid that they're thinking of rehauling it all and going back to a simpler and better working system. Is that not trying to keep with the fundamentals of what taxes really are? That is not a bad thing, so why should it be bad when compared to other things, especially christians?

It just really annoys me is all. I gather I'm something of a fundamentalist christian and I don't really think I'm quite as retarded, or in need of being shot or institutionalized or something, as the media and such says. Unfortunately, the truth is that the crazier ones tend also to be the loudest, which is true of most things. Sometimes I agree with the more vocal, public people, but sometimes not. I just don't like being labeled with an epithet. I'm just really hoping that it'll count towards that whole, blessed are those who are cursed for believing thing... That'd be swell. :P