Status: Unknown

One week gone, two funerals.  These words are being transcribed from paper and pencil that I wrote during both of them as thoughts come to me.  I was going to start this off with my decision as to whether or not I was leaving facebook altogether but the two deaths and the ensuing somber-ness gave me what I would like to think is some semblance of mental clarity, or at least the desire to record a few minor thoughts.  I'll get to the facebook thing later.

In the meantime, may Alta J. Spencer and Shirley Mae Riss rest in peace.  They were two ladies who simultaneously embodied love and self-empowerment. 

I don't know why this came to mind but since this is my blog I can screw it up if I want to.  I'm looking at Alta's funeral program and it's adorned with a picture her from when she was in her 20's.  She was born in 1922 so it was taken sometime during the 1940's. When I look at the picture it looks like it was taken during an era of a certain class and stye that you just don't see these days.  Shirley's program had no picture or I'd have included hers as well.















I toy with the idea of donning an older suit, a skinny tie, and the appropriate hairdo of the day and the hope that a photographer will help me out with it.  It wouldn't be for any other reason than to satisfy my curiosity of how photogenic I'd have been (or wouldn't have been) were I alive during that era.  I look more like my mom than my dad but here's what he looked like back in the day.

I think my wife would like the idea.  She's more about Audrey Hepburn and Danny Kaye than whomever today's pop culture has labeled popular.  In any case she was born in the wrong era  ;-).

Hmmmmm..........My wife and the photo style of the 40's?

She could join the ISO (Imperial Service Organization).  It's another branch of Star Wars cosplay ('cuz I don't have enough of that!  :D).  I have two facebook friends involved with it (one of whom founded it).  Here's a picture of Erin (hubba hubba  ;-)) and it's done with the same style with a bit of pin-up flair thrown in.  If any of you want to know more about the ISO I can put you in touch with a couple of people.  I believe it was Nic Bradbury that took the Erin pic but I'm not sure.  Unless somebody tells me otherwise he's getting credit.




Now, the original reason for this post was to see if I was going to stick around facebook.  Honestly I still can't say for sure one way or the other.  Facebook is nothing if not able to feed our egocentricity and don't we all like to say "Look at me!" once in a while and have others satisfy our need for acknowledgment?  Twitter and Facebook assist us there but they've also taken digital stalking to a new level.

I've seen good reasons to stay and I've seen good reasons to go.  When I came back there was one message, nine new notifications, and one friend request.  I don't have any delusions about my popularity so I'm not worried about numbers but since a large portion of those were game requests (I said to stop that, btw!) even those low numbers were misleading.  A large number of my online friends I've never actually met so other than the ones I know through a mutual acquaintance I suspect that they just thought my profile picture was cool (It is cool isn't it?  hehe.  Thanks for taking yet another great picture Nic).

I got more studying done and things that were actually productive.  I used my time for other pursuits and picked up a few new interests.  Actually, I shouldn't say "new" but there are books I want to read and things I want to learn more about that I found I had time to pick at.

I had people outside of blog "followers" tell me that they actually read this.  While I still maintain I do it for me it's nice to know I'm not entirely uninteresting, and my status "updates" are nothing more than an attempt to make people laugh, or at least smile or mildly chuckle.  It makes me feel good to make others feel good so it's no surprise that posting a humorous update or putting on sometimes cumbersome and uncomfortable red plastic to entertain are favorite pastimes of mine.  I wish my wife had taken some pictures during my trip to 'Boo at the Zoo' with the family while donning the Magmatrooper.  She took the kids to the bathroom while I waited by the reptile house.  When she got back there was a line of people wanting pictures with me. It wasn't an official event, it was just me wanting to spend time with the family and it's the only costume I own.

...and I just got sucked into the 'look at me' mentality again...

Ahem, back on point.  My self-imposed fb absence was a good exercise in self-discipline that I think I passed but it was easier to complete knowing it wasn't the end.  I'm not sure if continuing as I did before or quitting altogether should be my only two choices.  I may need to consider a third option but currently I'm sitting at an impasse.  It's not facebook I have a hard time leaving, it's all of you.

-LG

I think I'm done now.

I'm leaving you Jerry, and I'm taking the monkey with me......
Jim Carrey = me.
Jerry = facebook.

Let's face it, facebook is nothing more than a glorified chatroom with a chat feature.  How redundant is that?  It provides a nice distraction from time to time but I'm just not into it anymore.  It'll be hard to leave some of you but those that need to reach me have my cell #, email address, Alpine Garrison forums, or some combination of the three.  If you don't have one of these and would like it, send me a message and I'll get some contact information to you.
 
I plan to bookmark some of the golden nuggets I've found on here but I'm planning on leaving facebook behind.  This is not any sort of stand against "the man" (a.k.a. Mark Zuckerberg) but if "The Social Network" had any truth to it, Mr. Z. is kind of a jerk and since I don't have any creative videos to share and I wouldn't know how to post them to youtube if I did I doubt my absence will have any sort of major impact on my wall.

Just so everybody knows, I'm not a big believer in reposting stuff that says "Repost this if...".  I simply want to go on record now as saying I am not ashamed of my belief in Jesus Christ, I hate bullying, I know people who have suffered from cancer, I think child abuse is abhorrent, sexual predators should be castrated, cruelty to anything or anybody is a serious character defect, porn websites should have the .xxx extension so they're easy to block, and I support the teaching profession even though I'm not in that field.  Lest people think I'm a horrible human being, I care about these issues, just don't equate lack of reposting with lack of empathy.

Actually, now that I think about it I think I'll probably go in baby steps and begin by going facebook free for a week or so and see how it goes. My close friends aren't that close anymore.  That's mostly geographic but I haven't talked with any of them for quite some time.  I haven't been able to pin that on any concrete reason, we've just kind of drifted apart.  I still plan to blog from time to time but facebook won't be a medium used to let people know it's here.
 
During whatever time I have left on facebook you probably won't see me posting much besides humorous status updates.  Nobody cares what I ate for breakfast or needs to see yet another picture of me in a Star Wars costume.  I looked back through my pictures and honestly, how many pictures of a red stormtrooper can you see before you're tired of them?  It's kind of cool that I'm one of only seven (currently) in the world...
(http://www.coloradoconnection.com/news/story.aspx?id=684784#.TsAfZVawVT8) but you could say the same thing about a rare butterfly or something.  Quite simply, I like to laugh and to make others laugh with / at me.  Humor is my way of dealing.


To my 501st / Alpine Garrison family, I can't troop like I did a year ago.  My schedule simply won't allow it.  I'm not professing to be too mature for trooping (I can't see that happening), it's just that now I'm required to work during the time that 95% of the troops take place.  I hate that I have to do it but the trade off is that I get a second attempt at something that might resemble an actual life.  At my age I can't afford to dilly-dally or squander the opportunity.  I don't commit to events simply because of a conflict of schedule but I always feel guilty about not explaining why on the forums.  I may still have the temptation to do so but if I don't, just know that I always wish I could be there trooping alongside you.

I hope this finds all of you well.

-LG