The Man Of Steel

Something a lot of people don’t know about me is that I am a HUGE fan of Superman. It all started when I was a kid. I grew up in the mid to late 70′s and the old Superman TV series was constantly in syndication and being re-run all the time. I loved watching that show. In 1978 the first Superman movie came out with Christopher Reeve and Gene Hackman. I was so stoked to see that movie, oh my God!! To this day I can sit down and watch that movie anytime…..I just watched it a few days ago to be totally honest with ya. Anyway, today’s blog isn’t me trying to delve into the history of Superman. No, today’s focus is on the suit. As many of you know there will be a new Superman movie coming out in June titled “Man Of Steel”. A quick search on YouTube will give you a few different trailers to check out. The one thing that really sticks out is the new suit, and that is why we’re here, to give my opinion on the various incarnations and to hopefully get opinions from others. Ok, take a minute or so and really look over these. Left to right is the original Superman suit worn by George Reeves, the 1978 suit worn by Christopher Reeve, Superman Returns worn by Brandon Routh, and the upcoming Man Of Steel worn by….well, that’s actually an action figure, there aren’t any really good head to toe shots of the new suit out there yet. Anyway, take a minute or two to go over these….   Ok, I was wanting to do these one by one, but, for the sake of argument, can we agree that the George Reeves version and the Christopher Reeve version are pretty much the same? I mean, yeah, George had those big, granny bloomers shorts, the belt is a little different, and the cape doesn’t come around the sides. Other than that though they didn’t really stray too far from the original when they suited up Christopher Reeve. Even the color of the suit itself, I believe the picture I have of George Reeves up there has been manipulated. I’m fairly certain that the blue is pretty much the same too, or really damn close to it. So… Superman 1978 – Christopher Reeve: Ok, no matter where the suit goes from this point forward, the 1978 will *ALWAYS* be *THE* suit. It doesn’t matter if you prefer Superman Returns or the new Man of Steel, there will always be a place in your heart for the original. A friend of mine was just telling me a little while ago that no matter what he sees, when he thinks of Superman, he sees Christopher Reeve. Maybe it’s our generation, I don’t know, but I have to side with him on that. That movie had way too much impact for it to ever die or be taken over by another movie. This upcoming Man of Steel for example. It could be the greatest super hero movie of all time, break all box office records, kids could be carrying the lunch box, it will always be second fiddle to the original, because……well…….that’s just how it goes. Back to the suit though, Christopher Reeve, at 6’4″ tall pretty much had the perfect build for that particular suit. If you follow the comics you would have noticed that as the years went on Superman got progressively bigger and more cut, like a body builder. I was never really into that aspect of it though. It looked so fake………….like any of this isn’t?!?! Superman Returns – Brandon Routh: Superman Returns probably ranks as my favorite of all the Superman movies. It will never have the allure of the 1978 original, but I really, really enjoyed it. I saw it the day it came out…..while I was in Australia on vacation. The first thing that stuck out to me was the suit. Brandon Routh, at that time, was very muscular and the suit fit him really well. I’m not entirely sure how tall he is. It took me a little while to get used to the suit though. I wasn’t really too thrilled with the color of red they chose, I’m still not entirely thrilled about that color……if we’re being entirely honest about all of this. It’s not “Superman” red. The suit itself kicks ass though. The trunks have been lowered, the belt buckle has been changed, the “S” on the chest looks like some sort of carbon shield rather than the sewn on “patch” logo, for lack of a better term. The cape is longer and the boots are pretty butch. The only minus point for this suit is the color of the red. Man of Steel – Henry Cavill: The suit for the millennium. This new suit, I have mixed feelings about it. Let’s be positive here first. It looks bad ass!! It’s totally updated to fit the times we are living in. A Christopher Reeve style suit would not fit too well in 2013. I’ll gladly admit that. But, with that said, this suit does have it’s flaws. I’m not 100% sold on the colors as of yet. I don’t hate the colors, but they wouldn’t have been my choice. I would have at least stayed to the tradition of the blue and red. But, again, I don’t totally hate this suit. It does look really bold. I think my two biggest problems with the suit are these. First, my friend came in and I showed him the pics of the new suit. He said “I like it, but it looks sort of like the Batman suit”. Well, whaddya know, this movie is produced by the same person that did the Dark Knight trilogy. Ya think he had a hand in the suit? I do. So, I’m not hip on all the muscles that this suit portrays. I would much prefer to see a really well built person wearing the spandex and get the natural muscle tone out of him. Don’t get me wrong, Henry Cavill has the body for it, he just should heave had a different suit. Second, no trunks. I’m sorry, I just don’t think I can get on board with the no trunks look. Superman has trunks and a belt. End of story. Now, I posted on a thread somewhere that I was hoping they hadn’t gotten rid of the Superman theme music with this new movie. It wasn’t long before the trolls came out. I got a really irritable message from someone with his caps lock key stuck. He proceeded to tell me that they purposely hadn’t used the music, suit etc… because they are trying to part ways with the original. He also told me that that was why they titled it “Man Of Steel” rather than Superman. Moron, Superman has always been the “Man Of Steel” and always will be. Naming the movie that doesn’t remove the fact that this is a Superman movie. You can call a Granny Smith a Granny Smith until you’re blue in the face. At the end of the day it’s still a fucking apple. Bottom line is this. I am really looking forward to seeing this new Superman movie. I’m the type of person that can rank a movie on it’s own merits. If they made a quality flick I’m sure I’ll enjoy it to the teeth. I can be objective and not compare it to it’s predecessors. It could even turn out to be my favorite in the Superman series. I won’t know until I see it. I’ll always think the suit needs shorts and the colors could use some adjustments, but that is personal preference. I surely won’t shoot the movie down just because they didn’t make the suit I would have made…..and again, this suit does look pretty bad ass all on it’s own. MULLY’s call on the suits? Hmmm, I think my favorite suit is going to be the Brandon Routh suit from Superman Returns…..with a tweak to the red. It’s updated enough to not look ancient, but it has stayed with the spirit of the classic Superman suit. I’d like to add one more thing about the newest suit. I saw some pictures on the net where someone had photoshopped some different versions of this idea. The top left is, what I believe, will be in the movie. The other 3 are just color varations. Which one do you like? Me? I’d go with the bottom right. Y’all come back, I’ll leave the light on for ya. MULLY The new S on the chest looks killer despite what my earlier opinion on colors was. I really like this S.

A Letter To My 10 Year Old Self

 

Hey, Little MULLY!!

Dude, you’re not even MULLY yet….I’ll get to that. Man, where should I start? A lot of things are coming up in your life. I guess right now your mom is finishing up her second marriage from that abusive assclown she was married to and your dad is probably finishing up his second marriage from that stone cold bitch he was married to. Don’t worry though, man, good things are on the horizon. In another 2 years your dad is going to marry a wonderful woman that will take you in and love you as her own. She’ll be the one raising you over the next several years so make sure to be good to her. I know you will be though so I’m not concerned about that. What? You say you’re living with your mom and sister right now and want to know how you get to living with your dad? Well, dude, you were a handful. Pretty soon you’re going to be moving into an apartment over the dance studio and you’re going to start spending a lot of time at the pizza shop and running the streets with your friends. Your friends aren’t bad kids but you guys are going to be doing a lot of things that could get you in trouble. Your mom put up with it for quite a while but, in the end, you needed a man around to keep you in check. Your mom also thought you would benefit from having a regular home life so she did everything she could to protect you and sent you off to live with your dad. Don’t worry about that though, either, you see her pretty much every weekend until she gets married again and moves to Florida….We’re getting ahead of ourselves though.

Dude, around the 6th grade you do something really stupid, you’re in downtown Cincinnati with Diedre and the two of you sneak into a doorway on 6th street and try smoking cigarettes. Man, do me a favor, if that offer comes up again, run away. You’ve never been the type to bend because of peer pressure, you’ve always done your own thing and told everyone else to FO if they didn’t like it. Do that with smoking too, please. Hey, here’s a tip for ya, take that cigarette money and put it away every day until you become me. You’ll probably have enough to retire….twice.

When you’re about 14 your mom is going to re-marry and move to Florida, I mentioned that before. The guy she marries is super cool and, like your stepmom, he treats you as if you are one of his own. He’s a really good person and has your best interests at heart. Guess what? You’re going to be moving to Florida with them. Hey, that first morning when he’s taking you to school, he’s going to be telling you to tuck in your shirt and tie your shoes. Don’t be such a fucking dick with him about it. He’s only trying to take care of you. Tuck your damn shirt in and tie your shoes, you can always untuck and untie after he leaves. I don’t want to spend a whole lot of time telling you about Florida, but I do want to ask a favor of you, one day about 3 months into your stay there you’re going to be in the living room watching TV and your mom will be in the bedroom ironing. When she starts complaining about whatever it is she’s complaining about you’re going to fly off the handle and say some really mean, mean things to her. Things so mean that she kicks your ass out and sends you back to Kentucky that same day. Your ass will be on a Greyhound before 8:00 that evening. Keep your smart ass mouth shut. You need to get back to Kentucky, because you’ll never be where I am now without it, but try to find a better way. God, you’re going to go through a real time of being a prick while you’re down there. Keep cool, man!! It’s not as bad as you think it is.

When you get back to Kentucky you’re going to be meeting a lot of new friends in high school. You’re a smoker and you enjoy getting high with your friends. You never experiment with anything other than pot so I won’t get on you about it, but, dude, you make friends with a couple of guys named Klaene. Neither of them is afraid to try the next drug of choice. Dude, you gotta find a way to knock some sense into them. That shit follows them into adult life and eventually takes both of their lives. Chris dies when you guys are 30, and Adam hangs around until almost 40. Adam seemed to be clean there at the end but the years of abuse were just too much for his heart. They’re your best friends, man, watch over them.

High school life in general is going to be good, man. You’re going to have a whole lot of friends and you’re going to be pretty popular. Why? Well, I’m not really sure, but I think it’s because you don’t play favorites. It’s that leadership quality I was talking about before. You’re not really going to care if someone is a stoner, a jock, a brainiac, or a loser. You never really care what other people think if they see you talking with someone that everyone else dislikes. You’re friendly to everyone. Keep that quality…..what am I saying, you do.

Hey, I told you before that you like getting high with your friends. Well, let me tell you about the night you stop doing that. You’re going to go out with your friend, Rick, to a bar called Annie’s, and you’re going to drink a whole lot of just about everything you can get your hands on. You’re going to leave there pretty wasted and Rick is going to drop you off out at Chris and Adam’s house. When you get there that whole gang of people is going to be sitting around smoking pot. When you walk in the party starts up again and you guys are going to smoke a whole whole lot. Then you’re going to go down to the basement and pass out on the sofa. You’re going to wake up the next morning half on and half off the sofa and your face is going to be resting on this plastic pumpkin that kids use for trick or treating. The pumpkin is going to be filled with puke. I’m guessing one of the guys put you over it so you wouldn’t choke to death on your own puke. You obviously laid there with your face in that bucket for hours though because all the blood vessels around your eyes were busted and you looked like Mike Tyson tooled you up. You’re going to call it quits right then and there and never touch the stuff again. Sometimes bad things can lead to good things. Enjoy that night, man, the hangover the next day is a life changer.

College is going to be a blur. Nothing really special is going to happen there until you find your job downtown. When you get there, your life is going to take a turn that you never dreamed of.

You’re going to meet a Japanese girl and she’s going to introduce you to her Japanese friend. In the end, you end up going to Japan and staying there…..well…..until you’re me. But that is jumping way ahead of ourselves here. I gotta tell you a few more things.

When you’re 21 you’re going to be living with the Japanese girl and you’ll have plans to get married. Man, a few weeks before your 22nd birthday you’re going to get a phone call early on a Friday morning telling you that your dad is dead. Man, that is going to be the toughest thing you’ve ever had to deal with. You’re going to be lost and have so many questions about life. It’s going to take everything you have in you to stay away from getting drunk or doing some drugs to kill the pain, but you’re going to be strong enough for that. Thank your girlfriend for being there. It’s gonna be really dark though, man. I just wanna warn you. Hey, do me a favor, would ya? The weekend before your dad dies he calls you on a Sunday morning and asks you to come out to the house. It’s going to sound really strange to you because he had never done that before. Do me this huge favor, don’t tell him that you’ll be out next weekend. Get up off the sofa, get a shower and go spend the entire day with him. Tell him you love him and give him the biggest hug you’ve ever given anyone. Or better yet, tell him to go to the doctor and get his heart checked. Kind of a catch 22 on that one though. I’m not sure you’ll go where I am if he’s still there. Again, good things come from the bad…..and, man, there are some really good things coming up for you.

You’re going to Japan!!!! Yes, you actually get on a plane and go to Japan for a vacation. While you’re there you fall in love with the place and decide to move over there. Guess what? You decide to go for one year, make some money, then go back to Cincinnati……then you never return. You and your wife will live with her parents for a few years and then you get out on your own. You’ll be about 25 or 26 when you finally get your own place. Things will go well but slowly you and your wife are going to grow apart. I guess it’s the changes of growing up. You get married way to young, man. You know, I would tell you not to get married so young, but again, it’s part of the puzzle that gets you here to me.

You’re going to get divorced, and although you both know it’s over, it’s still gonna suck on some level. But you guys remain friends with each other so at least there’s no super bad blood between you. It’s after your divorce that things are going to fall into line.

You’re going to meet a girl at your school and fall head over heels in love with her. This is the one, man. This is the person that is the entire reason that you were put on this earth. Remember all those shitty things I told you about? If those things don’t happen just like that you’ll never meet this girl……and that would be the ultimate crime. She’s going to be the most important thing you’ve ever had in your life. She’s going to be the reason you want to wake up every morning. Without her, you’re just wasting your time here.

Now that you know all this stuff it’s up to you to walk the path, man. You now have the knowledge to make changes in your life and change the course of certain events. You can do whatever you feel is best for you, man, but just make sure that you make it to Japan and make sure that you meet that girl. Your life will be nothing without her.

Hey, before I go, I do have a few things I’d specifically like you to do for….us. First, practice your guitar more. Music will play an important part of your life when you’re me. Stick to it and practice as much as you can. Second, man, get some exercise and start eating right. Don’t let your weight go. Start now! Start right now!!

Well, man, that’s about it. There are so many things I didn’t tell you about, but, you’ll find them out as you go. You have a great life staring you in the face, man. As they say, the world is your oyster. Go get ‘em, tiger!!

Love,

You

P.S. I forgot to tell you about when you become “MULLY”. I won’t give details, but it involves a pint of 151 Rum and a Volkswagen Beetle.  :+)

Get Rich From YouTube

 

My friend Kevin, also known as JLandKev/BusanKevin, made a video earlier this week talking about people starting up YouTube channels with the intention of making a quick buck and making some cold hard cabbage. You can watch it here…

Did you like the video? If you did, make sure you subscribe to Kevin…and tell him MULLY sent ya.

Anyway, I’m gonna have to side with Kevin on this one. Starting a YouTube channel with the intention of making money is going to lead you to a lot of realities. As of this date, I am closing in on 3,200 subscribers to my main channel. I have 4 channels though. All 4 channels together I’d say I have about 6,000 subscribers. Sure, a lot of them are people that are subbed to all of my channels, but, numbers are numbers and there is no way around it. Now, with that out of the way, my main channel is fully partnered on YouTube so it receives all the benefits. Do I make money from YouTube? You bet your ass I do. Do I make enough that I’m going to get rich from it? HA!! Not likely. I’ll be lucky if I’ll be able to take my wife out to dinner once every other month from it.

So many people say that we aren’t allowed to talk about how much we make, but that’s actually not true. There is nothing in the YouTube TOS that says we aren’t allowed to disclose what we make. So, here ya go, I’m gonna let you in on the secret that so many hold dear. With YouTube revenue they will hold the money you make until you reach a threshold of 10,000 yen (that’s roughly a hundred bucks in real money). Once you hit that amount they will either send you a check, barbaric, or they will deposit the funds directly into your bank account. I can’t give you an exact amount that I make, because it’s always different, but I can tell you this, I get paid once every 2 to 3 months. So, do the math, I’m making about 30 bucks a month doing what I do. Fully partnered, 3,000+ subscribers, about 30,000 total views per month. When I get my payment it disappears before I even realize I had it.

You have to be making an insane amount of views on YouTube to think about getting rich. Hell, even living off of YouTube money would be a feat. I occasionally drop into the partner forum on YouTube to peruse the threads and so many times I see people bitching and complaining about YouTube changing the algorithm, which in turn makes their views go down, which in turn makes them less money. The funny part is this, you’ll see a post like this…

“GOD DAMMIT YOUTUBE!!! You made this or that change and now my views have been cut in half. I make my living off of this and you’re taking away my livelihood. I won’t make rent this month.”

Then they post a link to their channel. Someone like me is like “Daaammnn!! This dude is paying his rent from YT money? I gotta see this!” so I head to his channel and he has like 150 subscribers and his highest viewed video may have a thousand hits. I then giggle, partly because he was talking himself up so much, and partly because I’m trying to imagine an apartment that rents for about 37 cents a month.

Nope, if you’re wanting to start a channel with the sole intention of getting rich from it, give it up now, unless you are extremely talented and extremely patient. I was fortunate in that my very first video went viral. That helped me build my subscriber base, but that’s about it. To be fair, a viral video can be great for a quick spike in the cash flow, but it’s going to come to an end quickly. It will always be there generating revenue, but once the viral part of it is done, you’re back to square one. Mine? By the time I became partner my video had run it’s course. To this day, 2 and a half years later, I think it’s made about 50 bucks total……if that.

My suggestion is this. If you have a need to put yourself out there then go for it. Enjoy making your videos. Get to know the people that comment. Enjoy yourself. You never know, one day something could happen that could send you out there into the world of the big YouTubers, but that’s doubtful. If you start now I could shout out your channel and MAYBE get you 50-100 subscribers, but that’s it. If someone like Kevin shouted you out you could get maybe double that, I did, but that slows down too. Now, if someone like Ray William Johnson shouts you out then you’ll be talking about making a living. But chances of that happening are slim to none. Make videos because you enjoy making videos. Let your channel grow, give it time. Don’t go buying that new Mercedes though.

Y’all come back, I’ll leave the light on for ya!!

MULLY

Apple Computers Are For Retards

Ok, before anyone barbecues me for the title of this post let me say right now that I am not trying to insult anyone that has a mental disability, like Downs syndrome, or anyone that has a family member that has to deal with it. No, what I mean by retards are people like myself. People that are just totally stunted when it comes to using, or I should say, knowing how to deal with a computer.

Anyway, my first experience with a computer, on a personal basis, was way back when Windows 95 came out. Since that time I used just about every version of Windows up to Windows 7. I was one of those people that thought Apple was for the snooty ass people that think they’re better than everyone around them. The idiots you see sitting in Starbucks with their hoity-toity mocha mint, extra frothy, cappuccino with a twist. And before I get barbecued for that, I don’t drink coffee so I totally made that up. I have no idea if that even exists, those are just words I’ve heard in conversation when people are talking about that nasty ass drink. Back to the pretentious tree huggers. You know who they are, they sit there in the middle of summer wearing a God damned wool cap…..and some of those pompous assholes even have a muffler around their neck. They sit there with their coffee on the table and their MacBook’s in their laps. 1 person sitting at a table for 4 ignoring the fact that people are waiting to get in and sit down. And God forbid you try to strike up a conversation with them, although I can’t imagine why you’d want to, they look down at you like you’re the lowest form of scum on the planet….unless you have a MacBook under your arm, then they turn it into who has the better Mac. Uggghhh!!!

Well, I’ve figured them out, they’re morons. They don’t know how to take care of computer problems. How did I come to this assumption? I switched over to the dark side about a year and a half ago. Recommendations from friends on YouTube steered me towards an iMac, because I was mainly wanting something for video editing. I had always heard that Macs were good for the artsy-fartsy stuff so I figured “What the hell!” I mean, I still had a Windows laptop that I would be using for work, the iMac would be just for video work. So, I jumped in head first and got the most powerful iMac that was available to me at the time. Oh, I should mention that before I bought the iMac I learned that you could partition the hard drive and install Windows. DONE!! That is exactly what I did. Perfect, I could use the Mac side for videos and then switch over to Windows for everything else. I have to admit to being a little intimidated by the iMac. For so many years I had heard how different they were to operate than a Windows machine. That had me a little unsettled and I was a little worried that having to learn something entirely different may burn me out pretty quick. But, hey, I still have that Windows partition to fall back on.

With the help of a Macintosh For Dummies type book, I began learning how to operate a Mac. That eased my anxiety quite a bit. I was finding that operating a Mac really isn’t that much different than operating a Windows machine. Just that some things were in different places and had different names…..of course they were names that sounded like those windbag Mac users would use. It’s not a “tool bar” it’s a “dock”. It’s not “System Restore” it’s “Time Machine”. I think I just threw up in my mouth a little. Anyway, things have different names and are in different places, but, overall, it’s pretty much as easy to operate as what I was used to. Then something happened, as I began to learn new things on my own I began to realize that a Mac does things the way they are supposed to be done. What I mean by that is that they do things the way common sense would tell you to do them. Just an example off the top of my head, I was wanting to print out some music sheets from this PDF file that I had downloaded. The PDF file had the entire album’s song list in it but I only need to print the one song, but I didn’t know how to do that on a Mac. What the hell, give it a shot, right? I clicked on the first page of the song, held down the shift key, as you would in Windows, then clicked on the last page. That selected all the pages in between too. Cool!! That worked as I had hoped. Next I need to print. Well, “File, Print” always worked before so let’s give it a shot. “File”…….search the list…there it was, “Print”, (click) and my printer started rattling. Awesome, it worked the exact same way that a Windows machine would work. I can mark that off my list. When I looked over at my printer I noticed something interesting, it was printing from the last page first. That means that, when it was finished, I didn’t need to rearrange all the pages to get them in order…..as we all know, Windows prints from first to last so you have to shuffle them when it’s finished. I was excited about this fact and I made a post on Facebook praising Mac and insulting Windows. I was quickly told that you can do the same thing in Windows if you go into the properties then click this and that etc… Why should I have to go into the properties? Why are all those clicks necessary? I’ve never met anyone that wants page 12 to be first and page 1 to be last. The computer should do that for you.

So that is what I started noticing. Every time I learned something new I would say to myself “Of course, that’s how it should be. Anyone with half a brain would figure it should happen like this” So that was how I came to the conclusion that Macs are for retards. Macs are made for people that have no idea how to tackle a problem with a computer. They’re made for people that don’t really have any skills on the actual inner workings of a computer. They’re made for people that just want to get on a computer and have the damn thing work the way it should. And I don’t mean to insinuate that all Mac users don’t know the inner workings of a computer, what I mean is that if you’re just starting out, and have no interest in learning how to work on a computer, Mac is for you. With a Windows machine, if you want to get rid of a piece of software, you hit the start button, go to control panel, find the section where the software is, wait forever for that page to load up, select the software you want to get rid of, hit the uninstall button, then wait so you can answer the flurry of questions it’s about to spit out at you….all the while stalling the uninstalling process so you have to sit there for 10 minutes waiting for this thing to do it’s job. With a Mac, grab the icon of the software you want to remove and drag it to the trash can. DONE!! The computer will do the rest of the work for you, in the background, so you can be on your merry way. Not to mention that it actually deletes the software and all of it’s components that a Windows machine had thrown all over God’s creation and left those pieces there for you to go looking for to delete one by one.

Since I bought my iMac, I think it was April of 2011, I have added a MacBook pro to my arsenal and the roles have been reversed. The only thing I use on the my Windows laptop is my video editing software. Everything else I do is on a Mac. I don’t think you’ll be seeing me in Starbucks with my wool cap on though. If you do, shoot me.

Y’all come back, I’ll leave the light on for ya!

MULLY

2012 in review

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2012 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

600 people reached the top of Mt. Everest in 2012. This blog got about 4,900 views in 2012. If every person who reached the top of Mt. Everest viewed this blog, it would have taken 8 years to get that many views.

Click here to see the complete report.

The Good, The Bad, And The Ugly

I grew up in a fairly rural area of northern Kentucky. We weren’t so far removed from civilization that we rode horses to school or anything like that, but we were far enough that we had freedoms that city living didn’t. One of those freedoms was owning guns. That’s right, I grew up in a house with guns.

From as far back as I can remember guns being around. For me it started with a pump action BB/pellet gun. I remember getting into all kinds of hot water for shooting my younger brother in the back of the thigh with a pellet. The shot wasn’t strong enough to even break through his jeans, but it did leave a welt, and I’m pretty sure it stung pretty bad. I got my ass whooped big time for that one…..and I’ve never pointed a gun, loaded or empty, at another person. I was probably like 9 or 10 years old. Shit kids do, right?

As I got older I was upgraded to a .22 rifle that had a little clip that slipped in from underneath and fed the chamber. If I remember correctly it was semi-automatic. I never used that rifle for more than anything other than shooting empty cans in my backyard or firing at the occasional rascal that would come into our yard. I grew up on 15 acres of land, most of it woods, so there were always rabbits, raccoons, deer, possum, etc… I think the only living things I’ve ever shot and killed were a lame possum that needed to be put down and a squirrel that got loose in our basement…..I shot him with the BB gun. He had wedged himself down in this box and there was no way to get him out, so I grabbed the Daisy and put a pellet right in his skull, from about 10 inches away. To this day I feel horrible about that. The possum had to be put down or he would have suffered until something either killed him or until he just flat out died, so I did him a favor. That poor squirrel though….I probably could have done it different.

I said there were guns in our house and so far I’ve only talked about a BB gun and a .22 semi-auto rifle. Most of you gun owners out there are probably thinking “Those aren’t guns”. Well, my dad had a few of his own up in the drawer. He had a .38, a 45 automatic, and a 357 Magnum. My stepmom also had this little .22 semi auto pistol that fit in her purse. Anyway, there was some hardware around when I was growing up.

What the hell are you going on about, MULLY? Well, with the recent massacre at the Sandy Hook elementary school there is a LOT of gun talk going on both sides so I thought I’d share my feelings on the gun debate.

Let me start off by saying that I am not opposed to people owning guns and I don’t believe there should be a total ban on them. Get that out of the way first because any of you gun nuts out there reading from here on out probably aren’t going to like what I have to say. Ok, in a perfect world, yes, I would prefer that the general population not have access to guns. I currently live in Japan where some of the strictest gun laws are on the books. It works here…..notice I said that it works “HERE”. Japan is probably the safest country in the world. I can go out at night, anywhere, and not feel threatened. I can’t say that about my home country, the United States of America. I said above that I don’t think there should be a total ban on guns in the USA. The reason I say that is because you whacko gun freaks aren’t totally wrong when you say that if you ban guns then only criminals will have them. That is true. There are way too many guns in the USA today for a ban on them to be effective. That’s the long and the short of it, and that is really, really sad.

Now, I’m also of the mind that I don’t think every person should be carrying, or that more guns is the answer to the problem. What a sad state of affairs my motherland has slipped into. I can remember when I was a kid, watching the evening news, of these people in the Middle East walking up and down the streets with machine gun type rifles and thinking to myself “Thank God I wasn’t born in a place where people walk around with guns all the time.” Oddly enough, it looks like that will be the exact position my country will be in within the next 20 years or so, everyone carrying a gun.

Is an armed America going to be a safe America? No. It will only get more violent. What happens when you arm the general population? You open the door for a lot of accidents. You gun toting freaks out there are smugly sure of yourself as a responsible gun owner but let’s be real here, if you’re carrying, you’re only one drunken brawl away from shooting someone. Yeah, tell me how you have the ability to make rational decisions when you’ve had too much to drink. I know there are a lot of good people out there that have guns, people that would never hurt a fly, but again, one drunken mistake can change all that. Imagine you’ve had too much to drink and something happens that you “believe” is a life threatening event, and it turns out not to be. I don’t want to be around when it happens. Hell, you don’t even have to be drunk for it to happen, I was just giving you guys the great excuse of being inebriated to use. There was a case in the US back in the early ’90s where  a Japanese exchange student was going to a Halloween party, in costume, and walked into the garage of the wrong house. The owner came out with a gun, yelled “FREEZE” at him, he didn’t understand and kept walking towards the guy, and the guy put a bullet in him. He was dead on the scene. Yes, it was an accident and, unlike my Japanese hosts, I accept it as an accident. The circumstances that came together that night almost make me believe that things are pre-determined in this thing we call life.

Here’s another hypothetical situation. Let’s say that more people get there CCW permits, or whatever you call them, and you’ve got a shopping mall full of armed people when some lunatic comes in and starts firing. Let’s be realistic here, you’re going to have a lot of people that will want to be the hero and head towards the shooting with gun in hand. They get to the area and there are 50 people with guns out coming from all angles. How in the world do you decide which one is the gunman? Or, and this is even better, say there  is one lunatic shooting up people and one person that carries is there and it ends up that they are standing face to face pointing a gun at each other, and these are the guys in question…

Come on now, seriously, which one is the bad guy? Oh, don’t play that almighty crap with me, you know damn well which one you’d think it was. Statistically speaking, Mr. Ralph Lauren on the left is more likely to be the lunatic mall shooter. Sure, this is an extreme situation, totally hypothetical, but not out of the realm of possibility, especially today since so many young people are covered in ink.

Anyway, my answer to the situation is that I don’t have an answer. There is no good answer that is going to settle it for all sides. I will say this though, this problem is so much deeper than just people having guns. The moral fabric of the country has come unwound. The NRA guy, Pepe LePew or whatever his name is, blames it on violent video games and TV. I call horse crap on that one. Those video games and TV shows exist in other countries too and you don’t see them shooting each other up. He suggests a database of people with mental illnesses. WTF is that? I’m not totally against that, but let’s be real here, where is the line of a mental illness? How do you decide who is mentally ill and who isn’t? Talk about a slippery slope. Arming teachers to protect schools, or having armed security guards in schools? Jesus, the thought makes my head spin. What kind of country are you people making over there? I tell you what, I do have an answer, stop looking out for number one and get back to the days when the community was what mattered. Stop leaving your children unattended to do their own thing in the evenings. Bring spanking back and bring back the ability for teachers to actually discipline the little bastards. Kids these days grow up with no sense of responsibility because YOU have taught them that they can do what they want with no repercussions. It has absolutely nothing to do with the games they play or the TV shows they watch. The internet doesn’t help either…..this is going way off course.

Anyway, I’m not against people having guns, but I’m not 100% behind it either. I’ll keep my big ass over here in Japan where it’s safe and leave that problem to you.

Y’all come back, I’ll leave the light on,

MULLY

Geocaching And Worldwide Challenges

As some of you already know, I am into Geocaching. Now, I’m sure there are quite a few of you sitting there saying to yourself “MULLY, what in the world is Geocaching?” I think the Geocaching homepage can describe it better than I can so here is a snippet from their site…

Geocaching is a real-world, outdoor treasure hunting game using GPS-enabled devices. Participants navigate to a specific set of GPS coordinates and then attempt to find the geocache (container) hidden at that location.

At its simplest level, geocaching requires these 8 steps:

1. Register for a free Basic Membership.
2. Visit the “Hide & Seek a Cache” page.
3. Enter your postal code and click “search.”
4. Choose any geocache from the list and click on its name.
5. Enter the coordinates of the geocache into your GPS Device.
6. Use your GPS device to assist you in finding the hidden geocache.
7. Sign the logbook and return the geocache to its original location.
8. Share your geocaching stories and photos online.

Ok, so there you go. That is geocaching and I can tell you, it’s a heck of a lot of fun. It’s a great way to get outside and get a little exercise. I’ve also found that geocaching has taken me to places that I’ve never been before and I’ve seen so many cool new things.

Along with geocaching there is another part of the game that is called “Challenges”. Again, the geocaching homepage can explain it better than I…

Go somewhere, do something. That is the basic idea behind Geocaching Challenges. You might be challenged to hike the Inca Trail to Machu Picchu, sing a song in the middle of Times Square, or take a picture of yourself walking through the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin.

Yep, fairly basic. Challenges are issued and you can choose to accept the challenge then report back when you’ve completed it.

A friend of mine here in Japan, Okininjakitty, down in Okinawa, posted a Tumblr post today about challenges. Here’s the link to her post……  http://okininjakitty.tumblr.com/post/36785006532/geocaching-part-7

I was happily surprised to read her opinion on the challenges. You see, I’ve been doing this for about 2 years now and I’ve completed a few challenges. I think they’re really fun. Just as much fun as geocaching. Oddly enough though the geocaching world is split heavily on this topic. Some people like them and others think they’re the worst thing ever and don’t deserve a spot on the geocaching homepage. Some people, as the internet is oft to do, get really hot under the collar about the challenges. I really can’t understand why people get so bent out of shape about them. I mean, if you’re not interested then stay away from that part of the homepage. Why try to ruin it for those of us that enjoy them?

Another fun part of geocaching is waymarking. Oh, Kitty and Russ, I hope you guys see this post and look into waymarking. It is so much fun. The downside to waymarking is that not a lot of people actually go after your waymarks. It can be a bit unfulfilling as far as that is concerned. But, if you’re out and about you can go searching for them or you can set your own. For more information on waymarking check out…. http://www.waymarking.com/help/faq.aspx

That’s all for now, kids.

Y’all come back. I’ll leave the light on for ya.

MULLY