Death week

Time was that when a person was shot during the commission of a crime, it was seen as a tragedy and a reflection of a failure of society that anyone would feel the need to stoop so low no matter what the reason. These days, shootings are so commonplace, that more often than not, we pay less attention to them than the other parts of the news. In effect, they have all but stopped being interesting to us.

Furthermore, we're seeing a huge increase in the number of shootings that stem not from the commission of a crime, but for the sole reason of emotional upset, be it rage, depression, mental illness or any number of other maladies that seem to be much more pervasive in society today than decades ago. And much of the time, they are mass killings.

THE WEEK OF SHOOTINGS

Sat 4 April: Gunman kills three policemen in Pittsburgh before being wounded and captured.

Fri 3 April: Gunman kills 13 people at an immigration centre in Binghamton, New York state, then apparently shoots himself.

Sun 29 March: Gunman kills seven elderly residents and a nurse at a nursing home in Carthage, North Carolina, then is shot and wounded himself.

Sun 29 March: Man kills five relatives and himself in Santa Clara, California.

Just this past week in the U.S., 30 people from four mass shootings are dead. What do you think? As a society, are we not doing enough to help people who may be susceptible to dangerous, emotional outbursts? The latest incident supposedly happened because the perpetrator had recently lost his job. Should we be expecting more such incidents as increasing numbers of people face tremendous financial hardships from the current economic downturn? Is this trend (mass shootings) a manifestation of the breakdown of the traditional family? Are too many people feeling isolated and like they have no one to go to for understanding and support? I would really like to hear from people. It gets tiring doing all the talking around here. I know you're out there--let me know what you think.

Times have changed

I was thinking of my late father today and was reminded of something that would probably be seen by most people today as a bit bizarre. Actually, if memory serves, my friends thought it was strange even back then in the 60' and 70's.

My dad worked as a labourer in construction most of his life and many times he would come home late and always exhausted. That's not the bizarre part. When dad came home, he was (obviously) kinda dirty. Oftentimes, he would plunk himself on a chair in the basement (we had a finished basement with a walkout) and call out to us.

It was an understood signal that one of us, us being the two younger siblings, or mom if she wasn't too busy, was being summoned to go and wash my father's feet. At the best of times my dad would have had a hard time washing his own feet since he was short and stocky. Bending over after working hard all day was an effort he didn't need. We even used to unlace and pull his construction boots off much of the time.

It didn't seem an extraordinary thing to us. Even then, I knew that the washing of someone's feet was performed in Biblical times as a show of respect, and our whole family having come from the "Old World" and being Catholic, we were steeped in tradition and the old ways. If Jesus could wash a friend's feet, who were we to refuse to wash our father's feet?

I also remember how funny I thought it was that when one of us kids showed reluctance to perform a small task he tried to assign, he would sometimes say "It's not like I'm asking you to wash my feet and drink the water." It was amusing then, but even more so now, because of the discontinued custom--as if simply washing someone's feet isn't a big enough imposition to make the point, drinking the water had to be tacked on.

These days, I imagine kids whine if they're asked to wash the car...even their own.

Q & A's from around the web

What to do after accidentally swallowing multiple chainsaws?

Whatever you do, make sure nobody yanks on your arm!

Here come da judge...

I hate to admit it, but I am a big fan of the Fox Network court TV shows. Judge Mathis, in particular, is one very cool dude. If he hadn't decided to go into law, he could have made a pretty good living as a comic. But this post is not about him.

If any of you watch/have watched any of these shows, I think you'll identify with this. I am sooo tired of muting or switching channels just before it's time for another set of commercials. They have this annoying habit of playing excerpts from the segment that will follow the upcoming commercials. It would be bad enough if they just played 5-10 seconds of it, as it is usually the most interesting/unexpected/outrageous part, but they play as much as 30 seconds or more. Talk about spoiling the story.

If you forget/neglect to mute/switch channels, you may as well get up and clean the bathroom for the next five minutes because the only thing you'll be missing is commercials followed by a few minutes of crap that was too boring to put in the "preview".

If I were a (potential) sponsor, there's no way I'd advertise during those programs. Instead of giving the viewer incentive to stay glued to the TV, I believe it has the opposite effect. If one watches the preview, (s)he is likely to think "I'll run and (insert household chore here) and if I'm not back by the time the commercials are over, I probably won't miss much."

Tomorrow, I'll post about the banal subject of world hunger. Or not.

Celebrities' secret identities

Today's secret celebrity identity is one I've known about for some years. As I searched for photos that would best demonstrate the similarity of the (apparent) two identities, I came across a video, rendering the photo comparison a second rate demonstration. Without further ado, I give you Michael Keaton posing as Tim Hudak, an MPP (Member of Provincial Parliament) of Ontario, Canada: