Lie lie lie!

"Never Lie, Steal, Cheat, or Drink. but If You Must Lie, Lie in the Arms of the One You Love. If You Must Steal, Steal Away from Bad Company. If You Must Cheat, Cheat Death. and If You Must Drink, Drink in the Moments That Take Your Breath Away."

It's quite the sweet quote - but do I believe and attempt to abide by it? Well, I'd like to say I do, but then I'd be lying... again. Of course, I don't have the best moral compass, so to speak, but what do YOU think? Is it okay to lie? Or should we always tell the truth? And if it is, indeed, okay to lie, when is it "okay" and when is it not? Does lying make you any less of a person?

Personally (oh yes, here we go again! weee!), I think it's perfectly okay to lie, as long as your lying does not hurt another, put someone else in a bad situation or create unfair disadvantages for other parties. What does this mean exactly? Well... if I lied to you and said I ate dinner with an old friend when in reality, I sat my fat lazy ass at home watching tv (and there are no other parts to this story, ie - you hadn't invited me out to dinner, and were simply making conversation, etc.), well.. then.. who really cares? I'm not disadvantaging anyone, all parties are happy (except maybe I would have a problem with lying to myself, but that begets a variety of other issues), and we all go on with our lives.

If, on the other hand, I lied to you and said I ate dinner with an old friend when in reality, I stayed home and watched tv on my fat ass because you had invited me out, but I was too chickenshit to just say no - and I hated your guts. What's wrong here? I lied so that I wouldn't hurt your feelings and come as the bad guy right? But meanwhile, this person is TRICKED! Tricked into thinking he/she is my good ol' buddy when in reality, I have no intention of ever willingly accepting an invitation to hang out. So this psuedo-buddy has NO IDEA and really, will probably ask you to hang out again - and that's not fair. I'm not providing any terrific solutions here, but firmly and politely declining the invite would probably work pretty well.

Thinking back over the past few years, there are tons of times where I've flat out lied. In fact, I'm probably lying right now. Or maybe I'm just lying to myself. I just don't know it yet.

Ah... issues. I'm tired. What the hell did I just write about? Oh yes, don't cheat. Cheaters never REALLY prosper.

Y'know what'd be nice though? If you could lie like these guys =)

Statistically Challenged?

“The Lottery is a tax on the statistically-challenged.”

It’s a quote we hear often – so what are the actual numbers? According to the California Superlotto playslip, the odds of matching all six numbers (5 of 5 and the MEGA number) are 1:41,416,353. In percentage terms, that’s 0.0000024%. People often say that you have a greater chance of getting struck by lightening than you do of winning the lottery. So why bother wasting your $1? You must be stupid, right? By that inference, only stupid people buy lottery tickets.

Tell that to Jeff and Sandy Carl. Or maybe to Todd Bablinskas. Boy are they glad they paid their taxes! The other day, I overheard a couple of my coworkers talking about this tax on stupid people. My ears immediately perked up, because hey, it’s the lottery! These are the same people who pay $50/month to park in our building, when they can pay $25/month to park across the street – a mere 3 minute walk – for the “convenience.” In one year, that adds up to a $300 difference. Let’s say there are 22 working days a month. So I’m saving about $1.14 per day by taking 3 minutes to walk my ass across the street. We can be extreme here and say I purchase 2 lottery tickets every week. That comes out to $104 a year. So net-net, by merely walking 3 minutes extra everyday, I save $196 AND I get two chances every week to win at least 7 million bucks. I don’t know about you, but I think that’s a pretty good deal. You could say that these coworkers of mine are paying a different kind of tax… a tax on the lazy. Suckers.

I half-jokingly tell people my goal in life is to win the lottery. All other sub-goals follow from this main goal. Sometimes people agree they have similar aims, laugh about it, or ask what else I want to accomplish. The response I absolutely HATE, and I mean HATE, is when they tell me, “Oh, you don’t want that.”

I DON’T???!! Who DOESN’T want to win millions of dollars? These HATERS then go on to say that I don’t want to deal with the problems that come with such big winnings.

Hrm, I think I’ll take my chances and give myself the benefit of the doubt that I can handle such a large influx of money. And if they’re right, and I wasn’t able to handle myself - which I highly doubt, if you know my track record with finances - then it sure was a life experience wasn’t it? Would I even go as far as to accuse these HATERS of being satisfied with mediocrity? Why yes, I think I will. ACCUSE! *


*if you don't get the sarcasm in my posts, you probably shouldn't be reading =)