Do Not Let Advertising Sell You On Drugs You Don't Need

A couple days ago I wrote a short thing about how I don't like taking medicine. Then earlier today I saw this commercial on TV that said "Do not let advertising sell you on drugs you don't need." Basically that's what I was trying to say... nowadays there's all these drugs that people take just because someone made it and marketed it well. You think people didn't have allergies for hundreds of years before today? They all seem to have made it fine without Claritin or Allegra.

I was all patting myself on the back for being insightful and having a TV commercial back me up, but then I noticed that the ad was a public service announcement by AARP. What's AARP, you ask? American Association of Retired Persons, if I'm not mistaken. So that was kind of a downer. A bunch of old people agree with me. I'm still wise beyond my years though, so screw you all...

R. Kelly

It never fails to surprise me how our quick we as a society can turn on someone. I mean, this is supposed to be a country where people are "innocent until proven guilty" and we are all entitled to due process by law. It's also strange to me how there is a double standard when it comes to certain crimes or sins compared to others.

I am not trying to defend R. Kelly here or anything. If you asked me my opinion, I would probably say that I think he is guilty of this whole underage sex thing. But it's troubling to see how people have reacted to these allegations against him, when nothing has really been proven about any of it.

WGCI has been playing his song, "Heaven I Need A Hug" since last week, which is supposed to be his defense to all of his critics. (If you haven't heard it, I can send you an mp3). Anyways, because this radio station is choosing to air this song, activist groups are already organizing boycotts and protests against WGCI because they are promoting a child sex offender. This is the kind of thing that bothers me. First of all, even if he was guilty, there is still this thing called the First Amendment. The song's lyrics aren't that great, but it's not like he is promoting sex with underage girls or even disrespecting anyone. It's not like WGCI is causing more sex crimes to happen by playing this song. Secondly, if you personally don't want to hear R. Kelly's music, just change the station yourself. Organizing a boycott is basically something you do out of spite and only adds fuel to the conflagration (Chip Caray-ism).

The other thing that is weird is how people react with such shock and disbelief against R. Kelly for this scandal, meanwhile the rest of the rap world is filled with killers, pimps, and drug dealers, which is glorified. I'm not saying what he did (or at least is accused of doing) is ok, or is a light offense, but neither are those other things. Yeah, let's kill all we want and shoot up heroin every day but *gasp* when someone has sex with a 17 year old and tapes it, now that's not allowed.

Plus, aren't there more important things to worry about in this world? I mean, kids in Africa are starving, and have been for as long as I can remember. There's a war about to break out between Pakistan and India, two nuclear powers. The US economy is still slumping, terrorism is still a threat, and huge corporations like Enron and WorldCom are frauding people out of billions of dollars. Yet all people seem to care about is R. Kelly this, R. Kelly that. What is it about us that likes to go "tsk tsk" and is so fascinated with stuff like this? Can we really learn anything from following this story? Yes, thanks to the vigilant reporting by the media and investigative work by the Chicago Police Department, I now know that if I am ever a 33-year old R&B singer, I should NEVER, EVER engage in sexual activity with a minor. But if I do, definitely I should NOT videotape it.

Believe me, I wouldn't be surprised if he's found guilty, and if he is, then I say punish him to the fullest extent of the law. As for us, "Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you" (Matthew 7:1-2). In his own less elegant words "Church folks ya'll need to stop judgin... or you will be the first to be judged."

For now, everyone needs to just chill and mind their own business. Just let the courts handle it, and if justice is not served by them, I believe that he (and everyone else) will have to answer to God someday anyways.

The Origin of Dudo

Yesterday, in my Starcraft essay, I talked about where 509 came from. The tougher part is explaining the whole "dudo" thing. Honestly, I can't give a great explanation about how I got that name. I can give a story relating to it, but none of it really makes sense.

It goes back once again to freshman year. You can picture me back then, when I had longer hair which I parted in the middle. I was also even skinnier than I am now, maybe about 125 lbs to my imposing 140 lb figure today. Not to mention entering U of I as a Koehler Outstanding Freshman in the ECE Department and James Scholar (based on my SAT/ACT score). The point is, I was a bigger nerd back then, if you can imagine that.

Anyways, I was kind of the "smart, dorky" one out of all the ~509~ boys who were all about picking up girls and stuff. You can ask them and they would tell you the same. It was all good though, cause we had so much fun that year and we all got along like bros for the most part. And I could tell so many stories about what kind of dumb and crazy things happened. Sadly, no girls ever noticed me, but it was ok since I would probably be too scared to talk to them if they did. Basically, I am the same person now except I have shorter hair and 15 more lbs of weight.

So back to the story... for some reason, one night Will and Andy decided to rent The Big Lebowski from the front desk of FAR, and the three of us started watching that movie in our room (509). I'm not sure if those two had been drinking that night or something, or more likely they were just being obnoxious like usual, but they weren't really paying that much attention to the movie. As for myself, being sober and not having Attention-Deficit-Disorder, I was actually trying to follow the story and hear what they were saying in the movie, a lost cause at that. Yet strangely enough, they were paying enough attention to the movie to find it so funny that the main character (Jeff Bridges) called himself "the Dude" and had an answering message of something like "Dude is not here, leave a message."

That's a frickin hilarious story, eh? "Dude is not here..." so they decided to change our answering machine to say "You've reached Andy and Dude's room..." which of course I didn't like but what could I do. Then one weekend Will and Andy went home and when they came back, they found that all their Mountain Dew was gone. I know I didn't drink it, cause I don't like Mountain Dew, but they accused me of drinking it all anyways and started calling me "Mountain Dude." Ah, to be immature freshman again...

Nobody likes to be called Mountain Dude, let me tell you that much. But you know how it is, the more I didn't like it, the more funny they thought it would be to call me that. Somewhere along the way, it changed to "dudo," I'm not sure but I think it was something to the effect of them saying I looked like "Where's Waldo?" when I wore glasses, and morphed "dude" to "dudo." Whatever it was, the name started to stick for no good reason. When they would introduce me to people, they would introduce me as "dudo." When people called on the phone for "Joe," they would be like "who? oh, you mean dudo..."

Eventually, I had no choice but to get used to it. When we all started Starcraft names, what else would I pick but Dudo~509~. Andy ended up with the name "Walro" cause Steve Buscemi's character in that movie kept saying "I am the Walrus," and me and Will thought he reminded us of Andy. Will was just "Willo," and the others ended up with 509 names all with their own dumb stories.

It doesn't really make much sense, but I got used to using a name I didn't like at first, to the point where almost all my accounts are named dudo509 (AIM, blog, Yahoo, fantasy baseball), probably more due to lack of creativity. Now, I don't mind the name and sometimes I even get confused when people call me Joe. All because of those two homos I lived with freshman year. Oh, but those were good times. When I see Will or Andy or any of those guys nowadays, we still always talk about the stupid things we did back then. Like I said, there's a million stories, but now that you've heard this one about how I got the name "dudo," I'm sure you are thoroughly confused and I'll spare you the rest of our dumb pointless anecdotes.

Medicine is For Losers

I just took an Advil like 20 minutes ago. This may come as a huge surprise to people who know me but it's complicated. Anyways, my head has been hurting since Sunday at Wisconsin, and today after I had my lunch I just popped one in.

Now, I understand that it will be hard for people to not feel offended by my title up there, but let me just explain why I don't like medicine. To me, it seems like the easy way out. If you've got a headache or cold, just suck it up and take it like a man. These days, there's a pill for everything. Nagging cough? Buy Halls Vapor Action this and that. Allergies? Allegra, Claritin, you name it. Menstrual cramps? Ok, I better stay away from that one because that could bring me more trouble than I can handle. Anyways, I don't pretend to have suffered all these illnesses and severe conditions myself, and I'll admit that in more serious cases there are times when taking something is understandable or even necessary. So, not everyone who takes medicine is a loser.

But I've had my share of headaches, coughs, stuffy noses, etc., and rarely have I resorted to taking Tylenol or the 'Tussin. The way I look at it, your body has an immune system, let it take care of you instead of depending on some pill that other people cooked up so they could have a multi-billion dollar industry. Plus, I have to believe that every drug has its side effects, big or small. Since I don't know exactly what causes cancer, Alzheimer's, or even ulcers, I stay away from caffienated drinks, tobacco products, and yes, aspirin, ibuprofen, and even cough medicine. I can bear a little discomfort now if it means I will be healthier and less drug-dependent in the long run.

So here I am, now 40 minutes removed from taking that Advil, and guess what? Headache's still there. Maybe it still needs some time to kick in, but I already regret taking it. By the way, those things remind me of Skittles or M&M's, no wonder they have to use those child-safety caps. Anyways, not only do I still have a headache, I have probably increased my chances of getting an ulcer by 0.1% or something. this sucks...

Starcraft and Me

Much like an alcoholic starts with just a sip of beer, my addiction to Starcraft began so innocently in the early days of my freshman year at U of I. Me, my roommate Andy, and a third pseudo-roommate Will probably did basically nothing other than play video games and watch movies in our room in those times. Needless to say, studying was not in the picture for room 509 of Oglesby that year (thankfully, there were other places for me to keep my Engineering status afloat). Anyways, a friend let us borrow a Starcraft CD, which we ended up burning some copies of, and in no time, we were all on Battle.net playing against other people online.

Soon, it spread from me, Will, and Andy to our next door neighbors, and almost by accident, the ~509~ clan was born. Before I knew it, all of my friends were into Starcraft, and over the next couple years I must have spent over a thousand hours playing that game. At our height, the 509ers grew in number and we played so much that people would notice us by our names when we joined or created games. For a while, I even thought I was unbeatable and that I had become as good I as I could ever be.

But inevitably, times changed, schoolwork started to take over and as studying, sleeping, and video games clashed, something had to give. Not to mention the girl factor, even though she likes playing Starcraft herself (which is definitely a huge plus in my book). As I played less, my skills suffered, and though my love for the game has never waned, a younger generation of 'crafters with higher potential and more dedication passed me by.

Today, I still play semi-regularly, if not for fun, then mostly for the sake of not letting my skills deteriorate. As for the rest of the original 509 boys, only a few still show up in our channel nowadays. Most have moved on by now, possibly to fancier games like Counterstrike or onto a job and career. The people I do see in channel 509, I no longer recognize, and none of them have that once-revered ~509~ extension to their name. It's a far cry from our glory days, that's for sure.

As I reminisce about the old times, I must say that even though the game has probably dropped my GPA by as much as a half point cumulatively from what it could have been, I look back and think only positive things about the whole experience. Call me an addict, but I still love Starcraft no matter what you say. A friend once planned to write a poem entitled "Starcraft and Fellowship," and while it has yet to be released, I am quite sure that this blessed man is in the same boat as myself; he understands what true love for the game means. Other people on the internet have dedicated entire webpages to the game and even produced songs for it. Nerds, but I respect that.

There's just something about the game that sets it apart. Starcraft is not just another video game, for I have played many others in my life without ever becoming nearly as addicted. Battle.net is a community where people all over the world, of all ages can gather and all collectively be entertained by a common interest. When you play together with someone, you can't help but feel some sense of brotherhood as you save a partner from attack or he sends you an overlord to help your cause. When you look at your map, you feel like a king controlling his army and taking care of all his little men. When you win or lose, it can have severe effects on your ego as well as on your mood for the rest of the day.

It's hard to explain it all. For people who have never played the game seriously, you all probably think I am an idiot for writing all this crap. Not that I could blame you, but if you had experienced the crafting sensation for yourself, then maybe you would understand.