All That Is Dad

Obviously this story has been all over the place in the last few days. But there is clearly more going on here than the original story conveyed. I’m not saying that everything is fine though.

The Original Video – I’m not saying it was Russians…
Let’s talk about the original video clip that was posted. You know, the one that showed the clip cropped to only show the confrontation between that student and the drummer? Yeah, that was posted on Twitter by someone with a handle of @2020fight which claimed to be a Californian School teacher (but with a picture of a Brazilian blogger). When called out, Twitter took this account offline. That particular Twitter account has a weird posting history that doesn’t fit the idea that its really a school teacher. It also appears that additional connected suspicious accounts were “amplifying” this original post. Full story here:
https://www.cnn.com/2019/01/21/tech/twitter-suspends-account-native-american-maga-teens/index.html
As such, it would seem there is a deliberate attempt to use this incident to raise hackles on both sides of the political divide. If the full video, original posted to Instagram, were what was original “viral”, this would have a been a much less explosive story.

I’ve seen several Facebook posts amongst friends that have gotten really testy and leading to some really angry things being said to one another. If this was a deliberate attempt to stir up trouble, its certainly working. And on that note, the regular media (on both sides) was very quick to jump on this version of the story without initially digging deeper. Personally, a major news outlet would do well to issue a public statement indicating they, like the rest of us, appear to have been “had” by a bad actor. Additionally, the “Social Media Mob” was quick to act on both sides and start finding additional, very incorrect details about the drummer, the high school student etc. Bad actors that do this stuff use that exact phenomenon to generate mass chaos and further drive the wedge. We, on all sides, need to be skeptical and try and look at this kind of situation from a “something isn’t right here”. Then, if it plays out that there is in fact a major issue (aka the original short clip was the full story), let the outrage flow. But right now, we’re all outraged without knowing why. Which again, plays right in to the hands of someone preying on us from the outside.

Aside from what is now a really bad cameo from Trump, Home Alone 2 is a pretty weak movie compared to the first one.

Case in point. We’re supposed to believe that Peter McAllister would just not notice that his “man purse” was missing for all that time?

It’s a key plot point because without it, Kevin would be stranded in NYC without any money. But it’s ridiculously unplausible. A bag full of money, personal effects and credit cards?

I know it’s a movie but it’s beyond the valley of believability.

While Lily is doing really well drinking from a bottle, this seems like a perfect option to help make things more efficient around here…

Ok, so all joking aside, Lily is all registered for Daycare as of this morning. Bring on the poorhouse!

Hang on y’all. It’s gonna get political.

I find it ridiculous that the party of fiscal conservativism wants to blow a bunch of money building a “monument to stupidity” that won’t really solve a problem.

See here’s the thing. There is no crisis at the border. The cost/benefit analysis on this boondoggle would be enormous. You’re spending an absurd amount of money to solve a non-existent problem.

But it sure does make Trump voters feel good (immigration is a great stump topic) because it’s an incredibly difficult topic that can be distilled to a couple of sound bites that the uninformed masses can drink in sans thinking. In the end the wall is a seemingly simple solution to a complex problem and as is often the case with such things…

My (perhaps cynical) take is that the wall and the shutdown is a great distraction from the real problem of the economy taking a massive dump. And a neutered government being in play right as the new democratic house starts scores excellent political points. Plus that same neutered government hampers the Mueller investigation. Win-win in Trump’s book. I’d also be willing to bet that several government construction contractors stand to make enormous amounts of money if such a wall is constructed. I wonder whom said contractors contributed to during the election cycle?

Can someone get fivethirtyeight to do a calculation on the odds of the Bears Kicker hitting the uprights this many times in a season?

These changes to the PATs the last couple of years has decimated kicker’s confidence and forced them to not focus on 40yd game winner.

Starting to wonder if we’ll see kicker contracts change to be very short term…

I know it’s a timely tongue-in-cheek meme but this has always been a real concern for me with the Christmas story. A virgin birth? No way did Mary and Joseph get jiggy with it before marriage? As the meme goes on to say, Joseph didn’t ask questions about three foreign dudes showing up to “pay child support”?

Isn’t it more reasonable that Joseph and Mary were imperfect humans? Why the need for some ridiculous story that violates all precepts of the time and today? You see this same stuff today. People suddenly get married and, shock of shocks, they announce being pregnant in what is clearly less than a 9 month timespan. News flash. We, the friends and family, know what happened. We’re not stupid. Why not be honest? Whom are you trying to protect?

Or when someone on Facebook suddenly stops posting about their spouse and the profile name suddenly changes to just their first and middle name (generally specific to women). Again, we’re not stupid. It’s obvious what’s going on…

Ok, I got a little off track there with some personal pet peeves. Let’s get back to Mary. I remember discussing this in a Dr Haar class back in college. To me, the simplest explanation is that there was never an intention to claim Mary was a virgin. The word used in the original text was likely better translated as “young unmarried woman” but virgin was the word chosen. And now here we are thousands of years celebrating it as fact… I think what bothers me the most in the story is, as the meme implies, Mary was seemingly violated if we believe the official narrative. The various translations tend to use “wrestled” with God but that seems to me to be thin innuendo. Why not “roll in the hay” or “horizontal Mambo”. Each is as ridiculous.

I always picture it like the scene from Star Trek Nemesis where Riker and Troi are “wrestling” and Shinzon via his Viceroy invades her thoughts so she’s essentially raped by Shinzon. It’s a minor scene in the entire movie but it always disturbs me. Shinzon didn’t need to do it. It was just seemingly for sport. Now, swap Mary for Troi, Joseph for Riker, God for Shinzon, and the Holy Spirit for the Viceroy and you see how my brain works eh?

One of the things I really wanted to do while home this month was to get some of those little projects that keep getting bumped down the triage list completed.

For example, I received a glass bottle cutter a couple of years ago as a Christmas present and only used it once to cut a Bauhaus Winterloper bottle in to a beer glass.

So this morning I did the same to a Bauhaus UberDuber bottle to make a matching set. This time around, I know the process a lot better and I have a mini blow torch instead of a candle. Turned out pretty good. These are the idea type of bottle to use for this. Labeling is painted (printed) on the glass directly and the glass is that thicker champagne style bottle including the “punt” at the bottle. I guess I could use sabrage to open this type of bottle in future. Maybe I should try that and record the results…just don’t tell Alton Brown.

Hello friend (or stranger, doesn’t matter to me really). Welcome to AllThatisDad.com!

What is this place you ask? I honestly have no idea. I originally started making daily posts on Facebook when I was home for paternity leave with our second daughter Lily. I’m home again now for the entire month of January with her again (taking the rest of my leave when my wife went back to work). And what better time to write random stuff on the internet?

Anyway. Not really sure what this is going to turn in to but wanted to try it out. Thanks for stopping by!