Leggings: A National Asstravaganza

Female fashion is a very peculiar phenomenon.  It evolves at a much quicker pace than men’s fashion and not always in a favorable direction.  The reason I’m writing this blog is because I noticed almost all the people sneezing and coughing in my classes and on campus had a couple things in common.  One, they were primarily female and two they were all wearing leggings.  

            Now let me make one thing clear ladies: leggings are a single man’s best friend.  Instead of a boring walk to and from class they have a perfect view of a sacred and worshipped part of the female anatomy.   Large asses, small asses, firm asses and jiggly asses all parade around campus like some sort of ass convention.  The reason I put an emphasis on leggings being in favor of the single man is because those of us in relationships have to be very cautious.  One downward glance and all the sudden we’re getting slapped in the back of the head and never hear the end of it.  The other reason leggings suck for the committed man is although we are restricted from looking our girlfriends don’t refrain from the fad.  This means that they too are part of the daily ass-travaganza these scumbags get to gawk at and drool over. 

            I understand a woman wanting to be up-to-date and fashionable but at what expense?  My girlfriend laughed at me today because I am wearing fleece pants underneath my jeans.  Why do I do this she asked. Because it’s twenty-one fucking degrees outside and I for one celebrate my health and comfort.  I swear I saw a girl on campus today in a lightweight hoody and leggings.  Her face was pastey-white, her lips were blue and her whole body a tremble.  What about a sickly looking girl is attractive?  What about a girl who is more concerned with fitting in than her own wellbeing would come off as appealing? 

            My message to you women of Mizzou is to stop trying to be a part of the herd, especially when the herd is dumb enough to prance about practically naked in freezing weather.   For once in your life dress appropriately for the conditions. (If it's raining out wear something waterproof, if it's freezing out wear a coat, if you're going to a movie theater bring a fucking jacket!)  Save the leggings for summer and bundle up when you have icicles growing from your ass cheeks.  Ladies with men, save your figure for them.  We’re the only ones who need to know what your ass looks like.  If you’re in a relationship then someone appreciates your individuality, so don’t be so quick to conform. 

            I’ve heard all the explanations for wearing leggings.  How comfortable they are, how everyone is wearing them, how they had nothing else to wear and how they go with anything.  All men see is a girl trying desperately to show off her goods.  Girls wearing their Greek letters on their leggings scream, “choose us for homecoming our asses are incredible.”  These very girls act disgusted if they catch a guy giving them the once over.  If you’re going to wear leggings in winter you might as well go all out and wear a bikini top with them.   All I see is a miserably uncomfortable, insecure, poor excuse for a woman.  If that’s you, keep on rocking em cause it’s really bringing out your features.

           PS.  If you are more than 50 lbs over weight please stop wearing anything tight fitting at all.  I'm tired of having nightmares about your cellulite taking over the world.

To Be A Fighter

To be a fighter almost always indicates something’s wrong with you.  Everyone I train with/have trained with has some sort of demon whether they recognize it as such or not.  All you “normal” people should thank God and pray every day that boxing, kickboxing, mma, wrestling, judo, jujitsu and any other form of competitive/stylized fighting remains legal.   Allowing us to train and compete apart from the more refined and conformed branches of society maintains order.  We get our fix, we wear ourselves out, we shorten our life expectancy, and the rest of you have a fighting chance of avoiding anyone who has the will or ability to give and receive a beating. 

Fighting is engrained in nature.   Almost every species has a way of showing who’s the baddest mofo around, and like most animals humans have developed ways of doing so without anyone getting (with exception) seriously injured or killed.   Some people believe that pugilism is only around because some people have no other means of making a living. They’ll tell you we’re a bunch of animals and savages getting in a cage because we enjoy hurting people.  Any tested fighter will tell you that’s complete bullshit (other than being savages).  It wasn’t until recently that any real living could be made fighting.  The fact of the matter is even if the fighter never saw a dime, you’d still have countless venues with cards filled.  This is because fighters celebrate a higher level of competition and self-discovery than can be found in any other sport.      

A martial artist is just that, an artist.  Instead of a brush or instrument we wrap our hands, throw on pads and beat each other senseless. The sweet science of fighting allows us to refine our techniques and even more importantly find what we’re made of.  We break down each individual exchange and how to most efficiently respond to the point it becomes automatic.  We spend countless hours finding a way to implement our own styles into the fundamental framework. It takes a very special person to take a beating every day, get broken and bruised, get rejected by society and the moment you leave the gym anticipate the next day of sweat, blood and tears.  

I know so many fighters who gave up their jobs and literally lived at the gym.  I know so many fighters who lost their families and homes pursuing their dream and apart from eating sent all their money for their kids.  I moved to California, trained every day, sometimes twice a day, spent every dime I had until I finally found a job teaching kickboxing to little kids.  No more than a few weeks later while preparing for a jiujitsu tournament I snapped my arm at the elbow trying an escape I just learned.  For the first few moments I convinced myself it wasn’t broken and when it finally soaked in it wasn’t the pain or seeing my arm bent the wrong way that hurt most, it was knowing that everything I worked for was gone.  I no longer had a job, money, or an arm to fight with.  For most people that might seem like enough to quit, for a fighter it was enough to piss me off and ultimately conclude it was an opportunity to work on my left arm and kicking power anyhow. Six months of recovery later and I was back on the matts. 

A wise man told me not to be a slave to the sport.  That if I was going to fight or train fighters to make sure I was doing it because I wanted to not because I had to.  Ultimately that translated to earning my degree and saving money. Sunday I try out for Team Ambition in Columbia, Missouri where I recently returned to school.  For me fighting makes more sense than studying, training more beneficial than homework, competition more revealing than test scores. However, I want to maintain the confidence that no one will ever have more say over my financial stability than I do.

Fighting is a way of keeping my demons at bay. Anxiety, depression, stress, anger and ego get beaten out of me every time I put on my gloves.  In the cage no one can help you.  In the cage there are no shortcuts, there is no faking, there are no timeouts.  In the cage you discover what you never knew you had in you, that last breath before you pass out to make your escape, that extra push to get back to your feet, the final calculated attack you can manage before the blood in your eyes, nose and throat separate you from your senses.  I fight because I love knowing my body will be defeated long before my mind.  I love knowing heart takes you beyond the physically possible.

Key to Happiness

I’ve led a pretty interesting life filled with many lessons, the most important of which is the ability to distinguish genuine from artificial happiness. What separates the two is the longevity and depth of satisfaction it carries.  Feel free to disagree but I have found only a handful of things to hold any bearing in true happiness.  Having everything you NEED is the most fundamental and arguably the most important.  Shelter, food, water and health are in my book the only true human needs and if all these things are fulfilled happiness is just around the corner.  Mental health is as important, if not more so, than physical health and should be ones primary focus in life.  Stimulating your mind, seeking knowledge and internal reflection is key to happiness.  

            Once these four rudimentary elements of happiness are fulfilled only two things remain: companionship and personal gratification.   Surrounding yourself with genuine people is the most consistent way of lifting your spirits.  Dependable, loyal, compassionate and stable relationships tend to ease all “real” pressures and strains in life.  These people are easily recognizable.  They are the ones who can identify your ups and downs before you do and share in the emotions you’re experiencing.  They tend to make themselves available and even when you’re separated by distance or commitments they manifest with an open mind and heart.  They may disagree with you but are intrigued by your opinion and try their hardest to relate with your thought process.  Only a handful of relationships in your life will satisfy these qualifications.  If at all times you have even just one of these companions you should consider yourself extremely fortunate.

            Personal gratification comes in many forms; most are known as “instant gratifications” which lead to the artificial happiness I try to identify and weed out of my life.  Having the newest technology, trendiest clothes and most expensive car; masturbating, promiscuous sex and partying are just a few forms of personal gratification that carry with them an illusion of happiness.   All these things are luxuries people tend to coin as needs when in reality all they do is cloud our perception of what’s really important. The one form of personal gratification I consider most pure, beneficial and significant when considering one’s happiness is the fulfillment of long-term goals.   

            In order to experience this form of happiness one must first identify what they value most.  Once you’ve done that it’s as simple as deciding what about those things you have yet to accomplish or improve upon.  Finally you need a way to quantify or gauge the completion of what you want to achieve.  Setting a time by which to attain your goal is sometimes useful but unnecessary and can often lead to a negative experience.  If you're always worried about running out of time you may feel you’ve let yourself or others down and lose sight of why you set the goal in the first place.  I find open-ended goals with checkpoints in the foreseeable future allow you to remain realistic, stay on task and enjoy the rewards of patience and consistency.

            Nothing I’ve said is groundbreaking and I’m sure you’ve all had similar thoughts.  I simply find it important to remind myself of what truly matters in life and useful to put it into words.  Like I said earlier, reflection is key to mental health.  A healthy mind is a realistic and unimpressionable mind.  Without this we are coerced into believing things we don’t need will bring us happiness.  Living with a heart filled with want leads to gluttony, greed and evil.  It’s time to recognize our resources as limited and treat them as such.  Instead of trying to buy happiness build it, cultivate it, maintain it and share it.

Can Dogs have Alzheimers?

Rusty has officially lost it.  I come home after a much needed reunion with some of my old fraternity brothers to find trash strewn across the floor and a once half filled bag of stale cookies reduced to crumbs.  He wasn’t throwing up or acting too strange at first so I didn’t warrant a trip to the vet necessary.  Instead I just kept an eye on him and took him for frequent potty breaks.  The oddities ensued when we retired to bed.  Every two to three minutes rusty would become restless, hop off the bed, walk around to the other side, hop up and lay down.  Occasionally I would wake to avatar-esque sounds and see the old man staring at a wall. I was alarmed when I opened my eyes and he was awkwardly hunched in the corner staring at my girlfriend.  It appeared as if he had been watching her for quite some time and even after calling his name several times his gaze wasn’t broken. I watched him for the next couple minutes when all the sudden he snapped out of it and ran around the bed into the side table. I’m convinced if we had set up night vision cameras we’d have half a paranormal activity, canine edition blockbuster.

            This morning my girlfriend found him half way in the toilet unable to free himself.   He was obviously suffering from sleep deprivation.  He kept running into walls, chairs, falling over nothing and convinced the water in his bowl was an insufficient second to the toilet.  The moment I closed the bathroom door he started pawing it ferociously for 20 minutes.   Finally he gave up and lapped down the water in his bowl, as well as the water in my younger, dementia-free dachshund, Ein.  Three bowls later and his thirst still isn’t quenched.  He continues to pace from bathroom to dog-bowl at a feverish pace. 

Rusty is completely uninterested in his food even though he has most certainly relieved himself of last nights cookie feast.   He refuses to lay down or be still.  He is currently pacing back and forth in my living room, pausing to stare in a corner or to look at something on the floor that isn’t there.  I am convinced he is hallucinating or seeing ghosts.  Even Ein seems concerned.  He keeps walking up to Rusty and licking his face and paws, perhaps to lap up any remaining beard crumbs.  Rusty just walked up and bit the broom leaning against the wall and is precariously pacing around the couch.   I will say this, for a 12 (almost 13) year old dog that had no more than an hour of sleep last night he is impressively determined to accomplish……. something.  I’m just not so sure he even knows what that something is.   Keep the old man in your prayers, he may need an exorcism. 

A Tip of the Hat to Columbia PD

       One week ago I receive a citation for making an illegal left turn on to a COMPLETELY vacant road.  I understand the officers frustration with my dangerous intentions as he had to leave the line at Hardee's to pull me over.  He must have thought I was a menace to society as I pulled in to a flower shop to buy roses for my girlfriend and my 2 year anniversary. After composing my ticket and ensuring me he was simply trying to protect and serve, he went on to lecture me about my dog sitting on my lap (Ein was ferociously growling the entire time). I challenged the illegality of my canine passenger, he rolled his eyes and replied, "well it should be," and went on with his day.  Thirty minutes later on my way to class he had another victim pulled over and yet another upon my return.
     Yesterday I received another citation.  I pull up first to a 4-way stop sign intersection, followed by an officer directly across from me and last to the occasion a school bus to my left.  Half way through my left turn, the school bus turns on his flashers and stop sign.   Already in motion I continued to pass the bus.  As children start to file out of the bus the officer made his move and zoomed after me.  He followed me into my apartment complex parking lot and approached my vehicle with his hand on his firearm.  His approach was less of a lecture and more of an aggravated/cynical outburst.  He berated me claiming I put him, the bus driver, the children and myself in danger so I could, "get back to my cheeto's." It took every ounce of restraint in my being not to explain that he in fact was the only one who endangered anyone.  Instead, when he returned with a ticket, I BEGGED man-to-man for a break.  I explained I had just received a moving ticket and couldn't afford any more points on my insurance.  He said, "that's too bad," and returned to his vehicle.  As he sped off he almost hit a skateboarder, honked is horn and threw his arms in the air as if it was the kids fault.
      My girlfriend arrived minutes later unaware I had received a new ticket and told me she saw two or three people pulled over in the 6 minute drive from her place to mine.  Growing up in the city of Saint Louis I understand and appreciate the service and stress an officer of the law undergoes.  Unlike my experience with Columbia PD, the officers I've interacted with in my home city had every intention to protect and serve.  Thus far the police officers of Columbia, Missouri seem more concerned with protecting their jobs by servicing a quota.  The first ticket I almost understand and luckily I have a lawyer for a dad willing to help me reduce it to a non-moving violation.  The second citation I have every intention of fighting in court.  I consider it my civil duty to explain to the judge that this officer was more concerned with writing me a ticket than the safety of the children on that bus.  I'm tired of these assholes already and I've been here less than a month.  I've decided to buy a bike and be a legal inconvenience on the road, slowing down in front of every cop car I see so I can accurately send an anal salute in their direction.  Ice Cube's voice keeps ringing in my ear, "Fuck the police coming straight outta COMO!"

Behind The Entrepreneur

       What makes one an entrepreneur? To me the answer is simple, the unwillingness to accept conventional or otherwise expected means of providing for oneself and taking the risk to be your own brand.  Refusing to believe the path we’re force fed our entire lives is the only way to success.   Understanding success is not limited to or measured by wealth.  Recognizing you are more than a degree, certificate, job description, social class or any other label is liberating. The desire to embrace your individuality offers one a fresh perspective of what’s important.  The moment I realized my talents were more than avocations my identity manifested.   I started to see through the bullshit and opened my mind to alternate means of earning my way.  If I could find a way to turn my blessings into something more, then I too could reach greater heights of purpose and satisfaction.  Happiness gained new meaning when I gained the courage to leave the herd.  My heart was filled with energy, my spirit overwhelmed with creativity, my entire essence inspired to see what life truly had to offer.   

            Erase everything you’ve ever learned and what’s left?  Instinct, survival of the fittest, family and a clean slate to mold and refine.  If this is how we started what entity corrupted us into accepting anything other than what we love as significant or real?  I hold no authority to deem my answer absolute but in my eyes it has to do with the notion that economic progress is more important than personal and individual development.  Some where along the way man was brainwashed into believing society is more precious than the personalities that make it.  I for one am tired of being told how I’m “supposed” to live my life and what to I’m “supposed” to believe. 

            When time and time again institutions crumble, economies collapse and conventional thinking is disproved it amazes me that the majority of people are still disillusioned and fooled back into the scheme.  I am not a creature meant to live restrained by any structural agenda.  I am what no one else can be, me, and I plan to stay that way.  I am a survivor and a fighter.  I can see the blows coming my way and react accordingly.  I don’t look away, I don’t look down, I stare adversity dead on and keep it at bay.  I am an artist and creator.  I appreciate the beauty around me and express it in my own unique way.  I don’t alter my creativity to satisfy others or shy away at criticism.  I continue to produce my feelings and emotions into something tangible so I might gain deeper understanding of my inner self.  I am a leader. I am a teacher. I am a listener. I am an entrepreneur.