Well, I thought it was clever post about the flag burning and all. Shows what I know.

No comments. No comments on my other projects either. Maybe I’ll make myself feel better by assuming that something is wrong with haloscan. Yea, that’s the ticket.

Am I having a bad day? Yes I am, thanks for asking.

I met my wife for coffee at my favorite coffee house during my lunch break. That was nice. When I went to leave, I saw that a large SUV had forced itself into this small parking lot. Effective trapping me. I’m not that easily deterred. If I back this way, and wiggle that way. No wait I’m getting to close. Back up. Cut the wheel this way. Cut it that way. My car will not get away from the SUV! There is not enough room to maneuver. If I can just push forward a little. Then I’ll have some room to back up. Oh No! The bumper is pushing into my car. Backing up is making worse. Going forward is making it worse.

I finally got out. With some nice dents in my car and less paint than I started with. ‘If I could only get my hands on the owner of that SUV,’ you might imagine me saying. Well, it belongs to a friend of my wife. Nice. Perfect. I was just thinking the other day, I have too much money. I should sink some money into this car that I don’t even like.

I’m not sure if it possible to articulate how frustrated I am about that. And between you and me, the worst part is; that is mostly my fault. I mean that SUV had no business squeezing in there. But it was me who did the driving, me who got myself wedged in. At times like this, I’d really like to have some one else to blame. Anyone else.

At least I’ve got a three day weekend coming up. A little fun in the sun will do me good.

OK. I’m a little early for the Fourth. I just wanted a chance to get in a thought I had. Probably a very un-original one.

For the Fourth this year, I think that everyone should burn a flag. Yes sir, an American Flag. Why? Do I hate America? No! I love America (although, there are days I can leave the Americans behind.) These idiots in Congress have passed a bill proposing that a Flag Burning Ban Amendment to the Constitution. I think Flag Burning is a pretty disrespectful thing to do, personally. If you are planning to burn a flag, I hope you are ready for the uproar it will cause.

But don’t ban it. If you or I or anyone else is so upset with this country, or the current administration, or whatever; that they want to burn a flag. Let them. Yes, it’s desecration. It’s also a protest. And this country is all about protest. We celebrate the fact that some of our founding fathers broke into a ship and destroyed who knows how much perfectly good tea. Breaking and entering? Destruction of property? No. Protest.

If burning a flag is the way you feel the need to protest. Go for it. I will promptly assume you are a looney and will avoid contact with you, but I don’t want to see you in jail over it.

The Congress has spent its time crafting this inane amendment proposal. Amazing. They can’t get a handle on gasoline prices. They can’t control this little disaster in Iraq. But thank goodness they have the time to worry about lunatics burning flags. Just what we need, another reason to throw people in jail.

I am told that bills like this are passed all the time. I am told it is nothing to worry about because it will never become a Constitutional Amendment, even if it gets past the Senate. But I am worried about it. The Congress has better things to work on. I’m sure of it.

So maybe it’s time to send a message. A protest perhaps. Maybe we should light our flags on fire to celebrate the Fourth of July. Personally, I can’t think of a more American celebration.

Like I said, I’m on vacation. In Florida. A family reunion. Nothing like mixing up a vacation with all the stress of being surrounded by people who are related to you. It keeps things balanced.

The occasion is my grandparents’ 60th anniversary. So aunts, uncles, cousins: first, second and third and removed by various degrees; have gathered here in Clearwater, Florida. For a fun filled weekend.

Of course, when I was invited, my first thought was NO Way! I can’t afford to fly 4 of us to Florida and back. My wife suggested that we could drive. That’s a 16 hour drive. So two days down and two days back. Once again, I said no. I’m not using 4 vacation days for a weekend trip. I just can’t see spending more time driving than vacationing.

My wife really wanted to go. I had said that if it was important that we were represented, that I could fly down by myself. That suggestion was met with a stare that married men everywhere would recognize. I told that I didn’t care, if she wanted to go we could go, but I was only using 2 vacation days.

She countered that if I drove all of us down, I could fly back, be at work Monday morning, and she could drive the kids back. She was serious. So here we are. I am sitting here at the Tiki Bar at the hotel. Surrounded by family. Some guy with a guitar singing Jimmy Buffet songs. The smell of salt in the air blowing off the Gulf of Mexico. And I’m blogging.

It’s Ok, they all know that I’m a geek.

I’m on vacation. Wow! Just a short one. A weekend affair. I’ll tell you more later, but right now I have to vent.

Pathetic, here I am on vacation, and I am still wound so tight that little things piss me off.

Mario pissed me off to be precisely. We arrived at the hotel around 11 this morning. Check in isn’t till four, but the reservation people said we should check to see if our rooms were available, if we arrived early. I went in to check, I had to wait behind two other guys. I finally got to the counter and Mario greeted me. I told him, I had reservations and gave him my name, he mumbled something and pointed to the concierge desk. Odd, I thought, but since there was a block of reservations that mine was part of, I figured maybe the concierge took care of those. The concierge was elsewhere. When he finally came back, I told him that I had reservations and he gave a strange look. He sent me back to Mario.

Apparently, Mario had just wanted me to wait over in the general vicinity of the concierge desk, while he checked someone else out.

That’s right he just sent me away so he could take care of a different customer. OK.

So I give him my info, again. He looks it up. “Your room isn’t ready,” he mumbled at me in his indistinct accent, “Check back in an hour.”

I waited 20 minutes to find out my room wasn’t ready. How efficient. I was pissed. His condescending attitude didn’t help.

We cooled our heels for an hour and a half. We went back. I was too pissed to even think about talking to Mario. I made my wife ask him. He looked. Not ready. Check back in a half hour. She asked if she could give him her cell number so we wouldn’t have to keep checking back, he could just call us. He got all bothered, but he wrote down her number. Not her name. Not her reservation. Nothing.

He had no intention of calling us. He couldn’t be bother to find out for us. He just wanted us to check back. I was hot. I had spent to much time driving for this shit. I planted myself in the lobby and stared at him. He did not check his computer once when he wasn’t with a customer. He didn’t pick up his walkie talkie and call the cleaning crew (I saw he coworkers do this on several occasions.)

Finally, he went in the back room and a young lady came out. Over thirty minutes had passed. We went up and asked her. She walkie talkied the cleaning crew. She said it would a few minutes. She took our name and Number. She called us less than 10 minutes later.

I don’t have a lot of money for vacation. When I spend it on a nice hotel at a resort location, I expect to get treated right. Not to be treated like a retail customer.

Thanks Mario.

It been almost a month since a posted the first two parts of this story, if you are interested you can review them here and here.

We sat in the shelter and watched the rain come down. The rain was very pretty and we were
delighted that we had avoided getting drenched again. As I sat, I began to cool down. The rain had brought some cooler air with it.

Comfort is not consideration in backpacking. Weight is the issue. You carry everything you will need on your back. The trick is carry everything that you need without carrying anything else. You avoid taking something just in case. Extra batteries for your headlamp, for example. If you don’t use them, you just carried that weight for twenty some miles no reason. You might be thinking, how much could a couple of batteries weigh? Not much. But get enough of these little extras and you have an extra 5 or more pounds on your back. There is a skill to packing your pack. You change your way of thinking. I try to keep my pack under 30 pounds.

For this trip, I knew it might get cold at night. I packed my fleece pants and my fleece jacket, but only my 40 degree bag. A compromise. I could wear all of my clothes into the bag if I needed to.

I put those fleeces on and as I unpacked my gear, the rain slowed to a fine mist. I went to the spring and got some more water. We went out to the picnic table, which was thoughtfully covered by by a pavilion. We cooked our dinner and made some coffee.

As we relaxed and drank our coffee, it got colder and colder. Even with my fleeces on, I was beginning to get a chill. Before too long we got ourselves in our sleeping bags. I fell asleep with out too much trouble, but I woke up around midnight. All that coffee i had drank was ready to come back out. I crawled out of my bag and walked around to the back of the shelter. As I took care of my business, I was aware of the very cold wind that was blowing. A cold front had moved in and blew the rainy weather away. I crawled back into my bag, but I was cold. Even with all my fleeces on. Especially my feet. My feet never warmed up. I spent a long and uncomfortable night. Tossing and turning. Trying to get warm. I could feel, through my wool socks, the line of extra coldness that was were the zipper was on the bag.

After an eternity, morning came. I wanted to cook my dehydrated scrambled eggs and warm up. It was about 35 degrees. A bit cold than I had planned for. We had some trouble getting the ISO-Propane stoves to work in the cold, but eventually got some water boiled. The eggs made me feel somewhat better, but I was still cold. We were running a little late, so I didn’t want to mess with coffee. I used what was left of the hot water to mix up some hot Gatorade.

We packed up and hit the trail. It was still cold, but the sun was shining. It was a good day for a walk. It always is.

It’s like a slap in the face. I over-slept. I jumped out of bed and got myself together and ran out the door. I started the car and turned on the radio.

And Mike Greenberg told me not about baseball, basketball or football. He told me that there had been attack on London. The London Underground. ESPN Radio wasn’t going to cut it this morning. As I changed the station to NPR, my mind raced and my emotions vacillated. How bad is it? Are we in danger? How can this still be happening.

NPR had made way for the BBC. Tony Blair was speaking. He announced that he would leave the G8 conference to deal with situation. But he would return tonight. He spoke eloquently. He seemed in control of the situation.

My mind is still racing. My emotions are still all over the place. I feel compassion those whose lives have been turned upside down for this. I feel a sense of responsibility. The Brits have been the most supportive of the U.S. even when we’ve been off the mark. They are paying for that support now.

I am angry. Al Queda should be destroyed by now. The full force of the United States should be enough to capture its leaders, to freeze its assets, to find their bases and destroy them. But these things have not happened. They have not happened because we can not bring down the full force of the United States on Al Queda. We are all wrapped up in Iraq. A place we were supposed to make better, bring democracy to. A place that just signed a Pact with Iran. A country that we have declared an Axis of Evil. A country that may have nuclear weapons.

There are real problems out there. There are real threats. Threats that are bigger than WMDs that don’t exist. Bigger than flag burning and gay marriage. Bigger than abortion. Bigger than screwing up Social Security worse than it already is. This country needs to start dealing with those problems. I heard dozens of analysts say that we would look back and say that 9/11 was the day that everything changed. I’m looking back now and everything seems the same.

How many times must disaster strike before things really do change? 9/11. 3/11. 7/7. We need a solid plan to deal with terrorists. We need to leave the “wedge” issues and simply deal with the real issues.

Tonight my thoughts and my heart is with those in England.

OK. I think I have made clear my thoughts on morals as opposed to religion. But the second part of this is the idea of what the schools should be responsible for. Not only that, but what they are capable of. a-[e] covers this very nicely. Mango has also put his two cents in. I encourage to read their posts as well.

Several commenters on the last post put forth the idea that some children have no resource outside of the schools to teach them morals. This is true and it is tragic. But I am troubled by this notion that because you have a hard time at home, the schools are responsible to make up for all of those shortcomings. It would be nice, but the schools cannot give these kids what there are truly lacking, because the schools are incapable of love. I know… I’ve seen … situation where a teacher can make a huge impact a child. Unfortunately there is know way to create a formula for these kinds of things.

I have the opportunity to be in classrooms upon occasion. I am not a teacher. I am not there because of my kid. I am there to work on a computer or a printer or that kind of thing. The point is I end up being a kind of neutral observer. As I wait for a computer to reboot (or re-image for that matter,) I really don’t have anything better to do but to observe what is going on in the classroom around me. These are pretty normal classrooms, there are no dramatics here with guns or gangs. Nonetheless, I see often enough situations that make me wonder about the effectiveness of what we are teaching.

My observations have led to the conclusion that the schools in general are incapable of teaching morals or values or anything like that. There are two points to be made here. The schools are teaching too much as it is. Adding morals to the list is not going to help the situation. Secondly, after much reflection, I am not sure that morals can be taught.

Of course, you know I will elaborate.

I am not a secularist. I do not wish to spread my secular ideas to others. I do not agree with all secular ideas. There has been a liberal/secular movement in education for the last few decades. The schools teach all kinds of liberal/secular junk. Sex education is just the beginning. They teach kids about their emotions how to be empathetic. They teach kids about the environment. They teach all kinds of things. Yet, kids still graduate from high school and go on to be insensitive, to be polluters, to accidentally get pregnant.

The schools are trying to hard. We try teach algebra to everyone. If you are going to go to school, graduate and go out in to the world as a salesmen, a respectable career, you do not need algebra. Solid arithmetic is what you need. The ability to budget and the to write a check. Algebra? We need to simplify. Especially before high school. Let’s focus on three “R’s” as they say. Let’s focus on the basics. I know, that’s not fun. That’s not interesting. But, who said school should be fun? For all the effort they put into trying to make learning fun, my kid still finds school to be, well, boring. Let’s face it. School will never compete with video games.

I don’t know what anyone else thinks, but the way I say it the school has one basic responsibility: to give everyone a base set of knowledge before they go out into the world. The ability to read. The ability to express your thoughts in writing. The ability to perform arithmetic. A basic understanding of our history. A basic understanding of the literature that has come before. That’s all.

Many of you will disagree with me about this. That’s Ok. It doesn’t change anything. You still shouldn’t morals values in school, because you can’t teach morals. This is because lack of moral behavior does not usually come from a lack of understanding of what is right and what is wrong. It comes from a disregard of what is right and what is wrong.

You can tell some one, again and again and again that something is wrong. This will not prevent them from doing that. Trust me on this, there is a middle school kid living in my house. These kids that come from these tragic backgrounds will have no motivation to follow any moral instruction that is given to them. Hell, even kids from middle class homes will challenge moral instruction as the enter puberty and adolescence.

I maintain, as I said in my last post, that if the schools are going to get kids to behave morally, the need set standards and hold them to them. PB commented:

Although, I believe that setting expectations for students, and holding them to those expectations, will at the same time, teach “character.” I’m assuming, of course, the expectations you are referring to would be along the lines of: do your own work, respect the property of others, come prepared and on time, be respectful of teachers and administrators, etc. All of these expectations seem to be reflective of the underlying moral/ethical code of conduct that has been adopted by our society.

That is exactly what I mean. Unfortunately, at this time in history, the schools are unable to hold children accountable for much of anything. Ironically, it’s the parents who won’t stand for it.

Upon occasion, when I want to read something well thought out and well written, I go to Sigmund, Carl and Alfred. Yesterday, he wrote about religion and schools. A lot of people got exciting because he pondered, “What exactly is the harm in teaching Creationism?” He made some good points about the state of schools today, but by the time I got done reading it, I wanted to shout at my monitor,”Religion is NOT the same as Moral!”

This is going to be full of MY opinions. If you find them distasteful. Go away. Right now. Go read a mommy blog. I’m willing to hear what you think, if you’ve read what I’ve written and have a thought about it please leave a comment. If you just want to tell me that I’m wrong. Don’t.

Let’s clear the air. I’m an atheist. Sometimes, I soften that statement by saying that I’m agnostic, but the truth is I don’t believe. Sorry. I really am. I’ve looked hard and long at the concept of god and at various religions. I just don’t see it. SC&A implied that secularism/atheism is a religion in its own right. I could not disagree more. If you believe in God, I not only have no problem with that. I envy you. I really do. I know people whose faith is deep and that seems to make them very happy. I do not wish sway anyone from their beliefs. Believe what you want.

I do not see myself as a secularist. I am a moral person. I take my morals very seriously. I know what is right and I do my best to live my life that way. It is possible that I will burn in hell because I do not believe, but it will not be because I have acted poorly. As a matter of fact, that is the point about religion that does me in every time.

The last time I went to church was Easter Sunday, 2001. I went to make my Mom happy. I brought the Wife and Kids. It was very nice. Pretty Flowers. Beautiful hymns. And then Pastor Dave went in to his Sermon. Usually Methodists are ridiculed for being safe, boring, and have Church services that end promptly after 60 minutes. But Pastor Dave was inspired. He went on about how this time of year, Easter Time, is the best time of year for Christians. It’s not to be a good person. It’s about believing. It’s about Christ, Pastor Dave extolled. I just sat there steaming. Why isn’t it enough just to be a good person?

I never went to church again. It is likely that I never will. But I am a moral person. I’ve read large portions of the Bible. Especially the Gospels. I think that the example that Jesus gave is very good place to start. Turn the other cheek, Judge not, Love all men. Good stuff. That Jesus was a pretty good guy. Why is it so important that I believe that he died and that rose from the dead?

And of course, if Pastor Dave is correct, that must mean that Gandhi is in Hell. And I refuse to believe that a God who would sacrifice his own flesh in order to forgive our sins, would ignore the noble deeds of a man, just because he did not happen to believe. That doesn’t sit well with at all.

Morals and Religion are not the same. We can all agree on that I think. Why then do morals and religion get all tied together. It is because Morals are not black and white. Oh sure, don’t kill, don’t steal, don’t lie — those must be universal morals. I think not. I see plenty of killing being done in the name of God or Allah theses days. Is it moral to steal to feed your family. If you knew your mother had one year to live, but she would feel no pain during that time and would die in he sleep. Would you hide that truth from her? Would it be moral?

No, my friends, morality is not black and white. But if we agreed on Christian Morals, then we could look to the bible, the pastor, the Pope for clarification on these issues. I teach my children morals. My morals. Sometimes I use Jesus as an example. Sometimes the Buddha. Other times I use Cal Ripken or Miguel Tejada.

I do not want to see morality taught in school. First of all, is the morality that you would teach, the morals I would have my children learn. Is the morality I would teach, the moral your children should learn? Secondly, even if we could all agree on the curriculum, they’d screw it up. Remember the New Math? My brother was taught the New Math. Poor guy is thirty years old and cannot do long division.

The schools would be well served to focus on teaching kids Math, English, History. Teach them. Set expectations. Hold them to those expectations. You don’t need to teach them about character. You need to demand it. You do not need to teach morality. You do not need to teach Creationism. Hell, you don’t need to teach evolution. I have all kinds of thoughts on education, but I’ll spare you… for now.

That’s the way I see it. If you have a thoughtful comment, I would love to hear it.