Pandora's Box

There are many stories about the infamous Pandora's Box and what it holds. However, despite this infamous object's fame, very few people know much about Pandora's Box and its origins. Look no further for this post will aim to inspire you and inform you about the mystical mystery (yeah, I went there) of Pandora's Box. Pandora's Box is an artifact in Greek Mythology, taken from the myth of Pandora's creation in Hesiod's Works and Days which I think is some Greek mythology story. The "box" is actually a large jar which was given to Pandora and it contained all the evils of the world. You can see how such an object would appeal to such a wide variety of people and how it can be a source of great story telling. A popular phrase (that I have never heard of) which is "to open Pandora's box" means to do a little innocent action that has far-reaching and severe consequences. I do not know why that is important but it is, so deal with it.

Source: http://www.insanelymac.com/_/osx86/news-pandoras-box-beta2-is-out-r1000

In Greek mythology, Pandora was said to be the first woman on Earth. Zeus ordered Hephaestus, the god of craftsmanship, to create her and so he did. Athena then clothed her, Aphrodite gave her beauty and Hermes gave Pandora speech. In retaliation of Prometheus stealing fire from heaven, Zeus gave Prometheus' brother, Epimetheus, Pandora. In doing so he also gave Pandora a jar with strict instructions not to open it under any circumstances. Of course, due to her curiosity, Pandora opened the jar and all evil contained within escaped and spread over the Earth. Before Pandora had the chance to shut the jar, all of the evil had already escaped leaving only the one thing that lay at the bottom: the Spirit of Hope named Elpis. Then even Hope escaped into the World. So after this the world was full of every kind of evil, but it was also full of Hope. Pandora's Box has become something of a modern obsession for story-tellers due to its rich history and the possibilities it holds. Some people see the evil as truth and so that by opening the box an unimaginable number of truths, some good and some bad, would be let free into the world. Others see Pandora's Box as something which contains all the secrets of our world and existence and once found and opened our new lives can begin. The point of Pandora's box, however, is not the story. Rather, Pandora's Box is merely a vessel in which the ancient Greeks believed that evil and hope entered the world. It is a nice story.

I do not know how I got onto this topic, see you tomorrow!

Weird News Tuesday: It Keeps Getting Weirder

Welcome to the second segment of this themed post series. This time around I am going to be using a different news site. This time I am using The Huffington Post. Last week it was too easy as I was still on the homepage by the time I finished this post. Let us see if it is a little harder this time, I really hope so. We start pretty quickly with a story that is not that far down the page. It is from a comedian (some hope there) and is an interview he did to explain why he cried the first time he did Heroin. It seems like a weird story to find so easily but according to The Huffington Post, it is news. The next story is of a white supremacist whose DNA results show that he is 14% black. Apparently they can still say that in America. Under each story on the Huffington Post website there is a link that says "More..." followed by the category of the preceding post. For this one it reads, "More Black Voices". That just does not seem right. Now for the story accompanied by a weird picture. The story is an alright one and is about how investigators now use a "Nasal Ranger" smelloscope to find people smoking pot. It seems like a weird enough headline but the picture just makes the story a little ridiculous. Just look at that picture below. It looks like a radar gun for your nose. I can see the caption now "See how fast your boogers move! How runny is your nose?" Oh Huffington Post, you have done it again.

Source: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/11/company-develops-nasal-ra_n_4256193.html

Scroll down a little further and you have an aptly named story on the "Penis Church" which is basically a church with quite the interesting aerial view. An architect claims that it does not look much like a penis but judging from the picture that architect must be a lonely female or a stupid male. It totally looks like a penis, just saying. Here is the picture (click anywhere on this sentence) and you tell us if it looks like a penis to you. Guys, brace yourselves. There is a new issue that has hit America and no, it is not the Government this time. After a fire at a factory there is a nationwide shortage of Knish. Apparently this is some kind of Jewish food that they eat during Hanukkah but guys, this is serious. The red cross should seriously go over there and the Government need to order a state of national emergency. Christians have also reached an all-time low as they air-drop Bibles into North Korea. They are literally tying parachutes to individual bibles and dropping them down over North Korea. I thought their main argument against communities like the LGBQTI community was that they "rub it in everyone's faces". Excuse me but does air-dropping bibles not seem like rubbing it in people's faces? Just saying, it is even less subtle than Mum saying she is thirsty and waving her tea cup in my face. Next in the news is a story about a new bill in California that would mean that Porn Stars would have to wear goggles while 'working'. For safety of course but still, who would watch that. Of all the things the Government could be doing they focus on the sexual health of porn actors who probably have more experience than most politicians (again, just saying). I do suppose though that they do have some similarities, most of the time both of their work blows up in their faces. Apparently someone has found out what the Sasquatch's (otherwise known as "Big Foot") favourite food is. This is important news guys, get ready to take some notes after reading this important news feature. Finally, in an epic display of brains a man blew up his house after watching a TV show on the Hindenburg disaster.

There are some really weird stories out there, see you tomorrow!

The Parties Go On

So we are now at Part 4 of this series which received a bit of a siesta over the past few days as time constraints and bad excuses got in the way. I like to think that this would prevent you from getting bored although politics is actually not that boring. I am going to reiterate the fact that if you have not seen some of the scenes in Parliament you have not witnessed one of the best (well at least most entertaining) moments of Politics. Anyway, continuing on with this series let's get straight to it! As there are only 18 parties left I am going to do nine today and another nine on Tuesday. So that will be why this post will be slightly shorter than the other ones in this series.

Let's begin with the Non-Custodial Parents Party (Equal Parenting) is only a small party but with members in all states and territories in Australia. It supports less government control over many aspects of daily family life. It particularly supports a number of policies seeking changes in the areas of family law and child support.

Source: http://www.virginvoters.com.au/parties/non-custodial-parents-party/

The One Nation party is a right-wing political party founded by the infamous Australia Pauline Hanson. It has received much unfavourable coverage earlier this year following an interview one of its candidates gave to Seven News which contained a lot of misinformation. The said candidate has since withdrawn from a political career. It has a long list of objectives I will not name out of the tedious nature of that list.

The Outdoor Recreation Party is a minor party in New South Wales. It represents the outdoor community and interests such as cycling, bushwalking and camping just to name a few. They are committed to less government control over outdoor recreation. They are very opposed to the Greens political party. So much so in fact that in 2013 they added to the end of their party name Stop the Greens.

The Palmer United Party is a new one founded only this year by mining magnate Clive Palmer. Among other things they plan to abolish the contentious Carbon Tax, revise the current refugee policy and create mineral wealth.

Finally, an interestingly named party for this post. Pirate Party Australia represents civil liberty issues. It focuses on copyright reform, internet freedom and ending censorship. It is also a new party having only been registered with the Australian Electoral Commission in January of this year.

Source: http://www.geekinsydney.com/2908/pirate-party-australia-approved/

The Republican Party of Australia is a party concerned with ending Australia's links with the commonwealth and become a republic. Basically it is what it says it is.

The Rise Up Australia Party is a socially conservative political party. It is focused on nationalist and christian conservative issues such as opposing the spread of Islamic doctrine in Australia as well as opposing Same Sex Marriage (if I could vote, I would not vote for them).

The Secular Party of Australia stands for secular humanist ethical principles. They aim to separate Church and State within Australia and promote secularism worldwide. They also stand for other things like human rights and social justice, the maximisation of civil liberties and to defend freedom of expression.

Finally, the Senator Online party has no policies but instead has pledged to conduct online polls for every bill that passes before senate. So in a way they stand for the representation of every Australian in parliament (well at least Senate).

Don't forget to check back on Tuesday for the final part to this series, see you tomorrow!

Lost

When I say lost I am not discussing the 'popular' television show and instead I am talking about the adjective used to describe an action. This action is often embarrassing and generally annoying. If you have ever lost something, which I am sure you have, then you will know what I mean. It can be very annoying to not have something that you spend ages trying to find. There is so much in our world that we can lose and these can range from our belongings to other things like feelings and other items. No matter what it is that we lose we generally feel something for it. I know in the numerous (and I mean numerous) times that I have lost things that I have always felt really worried, even if it is for a short time. However, nothing can compare (well at the time at least) to the feeling of relief you experience when you find the item you lost. It's magic.

Source: http://www.win-back.info/how-to-win-back-your-girlfriend.html

Losing something can turn your good day into something of a nightmare. It can turn the brightest day dull and... Yeah, I am going to stop as I am going off on a crappy metaphorical rampage here. Basically losing something sucks. It sucks so much that you just want to disappear into nothing. I have lost my phone on numerous occasions. Granted these were generally for short periods of time but even for those short periods of time I felt a worry so deep that it manifested into some physical pit in my stomach threatening to... yeah, I really need to stop doing that because it happens too much. Back on the topic, while I search like hell for this I become very religious. At no other point in time am I as religious as when I have lost something. I pray and pray and pray to saint Anthony that I will find what it is I am looking for. Why do I pray to saint Anthony? Well that is because if you lose something you pray to Saint Anthony and you eventually find it. It has worked sometimes for me but I swear he must get so sick of me. Plus, the only time I really get heavily religious is when I lose something so in that respect it is a positive. Anyway, I have to go now because I keep losing track of where I am at.

Don't lose yourself in this blog though I give you permission to do so, see you tomorrow!

What our Parents Taught Us

We may not realise it at the time but our Parents teach us a lot. Our Parents teach us things we may not glean from School. Some of what we learn may come into use later in our lives while most will not. However, it can be better to know more than you need to in case you do need it later in life. Although, most of the stuff our Parents teach us we just really want to forget right away. Most of what our Parents teach us is inadvertent and not what they want us to know.  Now I just want to say that what I am about to talk about DOES NOT all come from my Parents. A few of them maybe but I am not writing this about my Parents but about all Parents in general. Sorry in advance if I offend anyone.

Image Source: http://paperhoon.blogspot.com.au/2010/10/embarrassing-my-kids.html

The first thing that your Parents will teach you is that their word is law. Heaven forbid you ever break their laws. They brought you into this world and sure as hell can take you out of it. Later in life you realise that your Parents were wrong about many things and that not following their orders may have been the better option in some cases. However, when you are young you do not think about these things and think that all adults are always correct. Oh, to be a child... We also learn from an early age to always strive to "do your best". For some parents this can be as simple as just trying your best but for others trying your best means having to be at the top of the class. Second-best is not good enough for some Parents and I feel sorry for their children. How must they cope sometimes? Our Parents also taught us that we can be whatever we want. Well, except for a few jobs but we will not go there. Sometimes I think our Parents are setting us up to be rich so they can retire in comfort. That is actually a pretty good plan, must remember it in the future. So the lesson we can learn here from our Parents is have kids and retire happy, among other things of course.

Image Source: http://asianetindia.com/life-lessons-kid/

Among other things our Parents also seem like very big religious advisers. Always going on about praying about one thing or another. Whether it be a stain coming out of the rug or a mark off the wall. Always we are reminded to pray or may "God help us". Religion must really be essential in raising families. Logic is also a big issue in our World and our Parents show us from an early age what logic is correct logic. We must always remember to do something because someone said so. That is all the logic we will ever need in our lives. We are also taught to empathise and be able to read someone's feelings. If we are not able to read feelings we may get on the nerves of certain people at certain times of the month. The ability to read feelings is always important when growing up as it allows us to know which rooms are safe to enter and which to avoid like the plague.

Image Source: http://www.modernmom.com/article/life-lessons-to-teach-your-kids

A major source of our Vocabulary is our Parents. Without our fathers we would not know what to say when we drop something on our toes. Where would we be if our mothers had not taught us what to say when we burn something? Then there are the words we say when we get a fright. Where would we be if our Parents had not taught us them? Persuasive Techniques are also learnt through our Parents so we already have a head start for English before we even reach High School. We learn especially about exaggeration and appeals to emotions as children as our Parents make us feel guilty about choosing something or whether they exaggerate how many times they have told us things. They are also experts at personifying and thank the heavens inanimate objects can not bite or I would be covered in marks for every time I forgot where something was. Put simply, our Parents teach us many things and for this we are eternally grateful.

May the odds be ever in your favour, see you tomorrow!

Causing Offence

Causing offence is really easy today. Hell, it's highly probably causing offence right now (especially since I used the 'h' word, you know 'high'). People just need to toughen up (I said 'up', woops) sometimes because they are taking offence to everything. There are, of course, some things that are genuinely offensive and I can see how they get offended. Then there are the people who just go through sites like Facebook looking to be offended. Finally, there are just those people who get offended at everything and it is easier not to say anything so that people don't get offended.

First, the things that are clearly offensive. These are the posts, images and pages going around the internet that are clearly offensive and intended to cause offense. These can be anti-muslim (or any other religion, that was just the easiest term to put "anti-" in front of), sexist or any other offensive thing. Sometimes they are about religion or views but they can often be on interests (such as film, entertainment or games). These can be in the form of a direct attack (like "Harry Potter is crap and it's fans are stupid") or a subtle attack (like "The new union strikes are really stupid, like the boy with the lightning scar"). Sometimes these can offend a large number of people or it just offends a particular group (such as the Harry Potter Fandom).

Now there are the people that seem to go looking to be offended. These are the people who go on Facebook and look through pages that are going to offend them. So if they were a fan of Harry Potter they would go searching through anti-Harry Potter (I chose Harry Potter because it is the 11th most liked page on Facebook [as of January 2013] and shouldn't offend as many people as if I chose the KKK as an example) Pages and would then get really offended and be one of those people who comment on the post to share their anger at it. It is just a bit weird that people go looking to get offended and then complain because they are. It's just a little infuriating some times when you read these comments (besides the fact that they cause an interesting 'debate') and it just takes up some space in the comments section.

Finally there are those things that shouldn't offend anyone but somehow do. I saw a post that was literally "..." and then people in the comments section were having a giant debate about how offensive it was and I just kept scrolling before I lost my mind. Then there was a person who made a post about how the sky was a deep blue and then someone in the comments had a full-out argument saying something about someone dying and it being related to the colour blue (a person hadn't actually died and it was just an analogy, a stupid one). Again, sometimes I'm amazed I haven't lost my faith in humanity yet. I have learnt that some people are incredibly stupid and it just goes to show that even the most innocent of posts can be offensive in some way. Some people just seem to love being offended and sometimes it is just way too easy to cause offence. Some people just need to learn some resilience.

May the odds be ever in your favour, see you tomorrow!

Faith

Faith, it is what makes us hope for a brighter future. Faith is what makes people get out of bed every morning. Faith is believing in something even when you can't see it. Faith is believing in the good of something. It keeps us sane. Faith doesn't have to mean religion it can just be the belief in something that might happen (it could even be something bad). We all have faith within us it is just the person who decides whether to bring it out or not. When everything looks bleak, faith is what can pull us through.

Faith in a better tomorrow gives people the motivation to get out of bed or to exercise or help people out. Faith can help people who are sick, it can fill in the days for those who are lonely. Faith in a brighter future can pull people from the brink of despair and can change a person's life. Faith in a religion, in a god or in one another can change a person. It can make them see differently as if someone has given them new eyes or a new lease on life. Faith can change you, it can make you into someone entirely different. It can give you the confidence to stand up for what you believe in and do what you view as right and just. Faith is what causes people to persist and to keep fighting. Without it, what is there to fight for?

Things don't change without faith. Did Martin Luther King Junior have faith in the end of the Apartheid? Did Nelson Mandela have faith in an equal South Africa? Did NASA have faith in space travel? Of course they did, why else would they strive so hard and spend so much time on something? If you don't have faith in something happening then why do it? If Nelson Mandela couldn't envision an equal South Africa how could he expect anyone else to? Faith and action are closely linked and without Faith, action would be very limited and our world would be centuries behind what it is today. Steve Jobs may not have had Faith in Apple. Walt Disney may not have had Faith in Walt Disney Studios. Bill Gates may not have had Faith in Windows. If they hadn't we wouldn't have all the technology and entertainment around us today. Faith plays a big role in everything we do and without it we are lost.

May the odds be ever in your favour, see you tomorrow!