People driving in their cars who whistle, cat call, or yell at people walking on the street

I don’t know if this happens to guys, but I’m guessing that the majority of girls have had this happen to them – while walking down the street, minding their own business, a girl or group of girls have been whistled, cat called, or yelled at by a guy or group of guys driving by. Now, here’s what I’ve always wondered – guy or group of guys, how does this help you? Does it just make you feel better to get that off your chest? It’s not like I’m running after you, begging you to stop your car so we can meet. So what’s the point?

Those little stick figure stickers people put on their cars

First of all – I don’t care how many people are in your family, whether your kids are boys or girls, or if you have cats or dogs.
 
Second of all – You are telling stalkers, kidnappers, and all sorts of other criminals way too many details about your family… why are you doing that? ESPECIALLY you people who put the names of each family member underneath their respective stick figure.

People who don’t pick up after their dogs

Disclaimer: Do not read if you cannot handle frank discussion about bowel movements

Now that that’s out of the way…

My neighborhood is full of apartments. And since many of the landlords are dog-friendly (or unaware their tenants have dogs), there are lots of dogs with no backyards of their own in which to relieve themselves. This means that their owners must take them on walks to do their business. But instead of being responsible and considerate, these people just let their dogs leave piles of poop on the sidewalk or in front yards and beltways without picking it up. So when I walk my dog, I must keep my eyes glued to the sidewalk lest I step in shit or my dog stops to sniff it.

There are SO many easy solutions to this problem, people who don’t pick up after their dogs:

1.    Buy a waste pick-up dispenser with pick-up bags – Petco sells them plus refill rolls for as little as $6.79. If you have enough money to take care of a dog, you certainly have enough money for a waste pick-up dispenser.

2.    Reuse plastic grocery bags – If the first option is just too expensive for you, you dirty cheap ass hipster North Park resident, tie a plastic grocery bag to your dog’s leash before you leave the house. Then you can also feel like you’re doing your part to be green by minding the mantra “Reduce Reuse Recycle.”

3.    Go to the park and get a pick-up bag provided by the city – That’s right, North Park provides pick-up bags free of charge in multiple dispensers throughout the local park. If you don’t have plastic grocery bags in your home because you use canvas bags, you still have options! You can go grab one that the city supplies for the specific reason of keeping the neighborhood excrement-free. You’re already walking your dog anyway, walk by the park and pick a bag so you can pick up your dog’s doodoo.

 
Seriously people, I doubt you would like if I took a big dump right in front of your doorstep. So why are you letting your dog do it to your neighbors?

Food photographers

I never know I’m craving pizza with breadsticks as crusts/a slice of 6-layer red velvet cake/a burger with cheese, bacon, avocado and ranch until I see it on TV looking more amazing than physically possible. Seriously, how do food photographers make the food look that appealing? They are so good at their jobs, I want to eat almost everything I see on TV. And we all know why that is not helpful.

Freeway on-ramp traffic lights

In traveling back and forth to the gym on the freeway during morning rush hour, I happen to hit on-ramp traffic lights both ways. As a result, I’ve been thinking a lot about this question – what is the purpose of freeway on-ramp traffic lights? I was always under the impression that a driver was supposed to use the freeway on-ramp to accelerate in order to reach (as closely as possible) the speed of the other cars on the freeway. So why install a traffic light at the point where the on-ramp meets the right-hand freeway lane? This means a driver accelerates, slows down to stop at the red light, and then attempts to merge into the flow of traffic at 10-20 miles an hour. Why? Unlike regular street traffic lights, it’s not like freeway on-ramp traffic lights help to regulate cross-traffic; everyone is going the same direction! It’s also not like freeway on-ramp traffic lights help to decrease the number of cars on the freeway; everyone gets on the freeway eventually, now they’re just merging in at a slower speed and more likely to get into an accident with drivers not paying attention as they cut across five lanes so as not to miss their right-hand exit. They seem counter-intuitive, freeway on-ramp traffic lights. Let’s have them uninstalled! More work for the never-ending road development workers, just how the government likes it.

Geriatric sportscasters

Now, I love me some college football and basketball. For the entire fall and winter, and part of spring, I can always expect there will be something exciting to watch on a Saturday. I even prefer the collegiate level to the pros for each – since the teams are not all composed entirely of the country’s/world’s strongest/fastest/tallest athletes, you actually get to see the games as they were meant to be played because the players have to use their skills and talent to run plays rather than just push or jam a ball into an end zone or basket.
 
Unfortunately, with each sport comes its requisite old man sportscaster – Lou Holtz for football and Dick Vitale for basketball. And since they’ve both been around since dinosaurs walked the earth, they get to call the best games, making them unavoidable! While the two men are very different, they are both terribly annoying in their own special way.
 
First, because he is the more aggravating of the two for me, is Lou Holtz. Now, this man is 75 years old but you’d swear he was 175 years old because he has the biggest ears I’ve ever seen (noses and ears are the parts of the body that keep growing throughout your entire life). But his ears are not the problem, since he is a sportscaster and not a beauty pageant contestant after all. No, this man speaks not only with a lisp, but a crazy, juicy, spit-infused lisp! Honestly, the man spends more time on air sucking back spit than he does producing words. If your job is talking, you should actually be able to do it. I’m pretty sure they should have reassigned Mr. Holtz to the back room with the analysts and statisticians a long time ago. He might have a lot of knowledge about the game, but that doesn’t meant he should be on my TV telling me his knowledge with his own mouth if his speech is unintelligible.
 
Then there’s Dick Vitale, also known as Dickie V. I must give credit to ole’ Dick, at least he has good diction. Unfortunately, along with this, we get an obnoxiously loud and grating voice combined with commentary so riddled with made-up catch phrases and nicknames you’d think they were going out of style. If you’ve never heard Dick Vitale speak before, try plugging your nose and screaming sports terms at the top of your lungs. Now you know what this crazy old man sounds like. Better yet, try shouting “It’s serendipity baby!” (to him this means everything is coming together on the court just right) or “Now that’s what I call a diaper dandy!” (Dick’s way of describing an outstanding freshman player). Apparently the guy was diagnosed with lesions on his vocal cords in 2007 (gosh, I wonder why). Luckily for us, the surgery was successful and he was back at work just three short months later. As per usual, he will be all over the tournament. And with UCLA nowhere in sight, I might just have to avoid watching until the Final Four or so… less games seen equals less Dickie V, baby!

It’s weird, in the large majority of professions you are encouraged/forced to retire when you can no longer perform the skill you were once able to perform, but for some reason this doesn’t apply to talking on television. Even Dick Clark is still allowed to host the New Years’ Eve ball drop, and he had a stroke that left him incomprehensible. Now we’ve got Ryan Seacrest sitting next to him and repeating everything he says for viewers’ sake, while (I like to think) secretly counting the seconds until he can take over this Dick’s hosting duties until the end of time.

Babymoons

According to Wikipedia, the word “babymoon” has several meanings:
 

-       The original meaning is a period of time that parents spend bonding with a recently-born baby.

-       More recently, the term has come to be used to describe a vacation taken by a couple that is expecting a baby so that they can “enjoy one last trip together” before the baby is born.

-       Babymoon can also be used for a trip taken by a couple even before they get pregnant (whaaaaat?!?!). As long as the trip is intended to be a final romantic fling before venturing into parenthood, the term babymoon applies. (This sounds like a shallow excuse for a regular old vacation to me, but what do I know.)

Now, I think the original usage of the word is incredibly sweet. In the same way that a honeymoon (the word from which babymoon is derived) is the period just after the wedding when the newlywed couple “enjoys each other’s company” (*wink wink), a babymoon is the period just after the birth when the parents begin bonding with their new child. Of course, just as honeymoons have become synonymous with “let’s go somewhere romantic and far away (read: expensive),” babymoons have as well. Except this doesn’t make sense, because only the parents (okay, and their unborn child) are going!

 
Aren’t soon-to-be parents supposed to be happy that their baby is coming? Then why are they taking “one last vacation together” before the baby is born? This seems incongruous, as in “we are so happy our baby is coming, let’s celebrate our last moments of childlessness!”
 
Do I want couples to enjoy each other while they are without children? Of course. (And with children too but I know it’s not the same.) But don’t use having kids as an excuse to go on vacation. Because I will tell your kids "your parents went on vacation before you were born specifically to celebrate the fact that you weren't born yet" and then they will have a complex.

People who work out (and even some of the trainers) at “big box” gyms

Since I’m no longer working as a personal trainer, where I was able to work out alone in a private studio with all the workout equipment I could ever want at my disposal, I’m back to getting my sets in at the local 24 Hour Fitness. Now, I have no problem with 24 Hour Fitness itself (well, except that it usually smells like old sweat and I can’t help but think that no one cleans the machines and/or handles ever) – they have a lot of equipment, both traditional and non-traditional (think TRX, etc.), and they are open all day and all night. What I do have a problem with are the other people who work out there. There are several archetypes I’ve found at the location I frequent, and they make my work out far less enjoyable. They are:

-       People who stand right in front of the free weights while doing reps so others cannot reach the weights they want to use – At my particular 24 Hour Fitness, there is plenty of space between the free weights and the first row of benches. So if a dude wants to show off his curls for the girls or press really big dumbbells overhead, he can do so without blocking access to either the weight rack or the benches. However, he usually does not do this. Instead, he usually stands right in front of the weights (maybe because he is really vain and needs to be as close to the mirror behind the weight rack as physically possible?), making sure no one else can get to the weights they want to use. The funny thing about this is, there are racks and racks of weights he can stand in front of. But does he stand in front of the racks with the weights that weigh 50 pounds or more that hardly anyone uses/can use/stands in front of? Of course not, because that would make his 25 lb. dumbbells look dinky. He chooses to stand right in front of the most popular free weight rack in the gym, the one with the 5-35 lb. weights. Look, dude in my way, just scoot back a couple feet and everybody wins. I can get the weights I need, and you can still see yourself in the mirror while at the same time appearing to be lifting heavy because you’re standing in front of the lady weights.

-       People who spend their entire workout using the same machine and do not pause long enough to let others work in – I am speaking in particular about the cable machine, because it’s one of the only machines I use. I was at the gym one Saturday morning, planning to incorporate the cable machine into my lifting circuit, but there was a woman already using it. I thought to myself, “no matter, I’ll just start my circuit and try to work in, or wait until she is done.” This woman did exercise after exercise on the cable machine without stopping for over 30 minutes! (All core and triceps exercises, mind you, but we will get to that in the next example.) Excuse me, Asian lady wearing a leotard and headband like it’s 1985 and you’re auditioning for Jane Fonda’s Workout, you are not the only person at the gym who wants to use the cable machine. And, if you can do more than 30 minutes of core and triceps exercises without stopping, you are not working these areas enough, which brings me to…

-       People who do way too many exercises for a single body part (especially when it’s clear for most that what they need to do is just lose weight) – I see more people than I care to count who spend their entire time at the gym doing exercises that focus exclusively on smaller muscles such as shoulders, triceps, abs, and calves. Now, if these were people with the body fat of an athlete (14-20% for women, 6-13% for men), this would be fine, as the results of their efforts would in fact show outwardly. However, this is usually not the case. I watched this one overweight woman do shoulder shrugs (why would you want to make your neck look bigger?), followed by weighted oblique crunches (did you know these make your waist look bigger, not smaller?), triceps extensions and calf presses before I lost track of her. Here’s a tip for you, overweight lady – go do a circuit that includes pushups, squats, and jump roping. Not only are you using all those little muscles you want to target, you are also hitting all the major muscle groups which means you are losing weight at the same time. Bigger muscles burn more calories than smaller muscles! And there is no such thing as target weight loss – if you have too much body fat, you could do a million crunches and never see the results because, as they say, your six pack is in the cooler.

-       People with poor form or who attend classes but hardly do the moves – Not only does proper form prevent injury, it also makes muscles work to their full capacity. This burns the maximum amount of calories while also making sure muscles are not too strong in one spot but weak in others. Since I assume that people are either in the gym to lose body fat or to gain muscle, it drives me crazy that people perform exercises without proper form. In what other sport or physical activity do people just walk into and automatically assume they know what they’re doing? Nothing comes to mind for me, pretty much everything I can think of has some sort of coach or instructor to teach the basics. But at the gym, everyone just wanders in and thinks they know how to do a pushup/lunge/ whatever the exercise may be, and then wonders why they’re not getting results. Same with the people who attend classes. At the gym I go to, there is a huge room with a glass window where scores of (mostly) women stand in lines to kick box/do yoga/Zumba/etc. And even though there is an instructor at the front of the room demonstrating how to do the moves properly, everyone must be in there with their eyes closed or standing directly behind someone taller than them because no one is doing the moves the way the instructor is. They’re all just half-heartedly flailing around like someone is forcing them to be there. A bit of friendly advice, people at the gym who don’t know what you’re doing – open your eyes, buy a book, hire a good trainer… there are lots of ways to make your visits to the gym effective and safe. Otherwise stay home, because you’re just wasting everyone’s time – yours because you’re not going to reach your goals and will hurt yourself in the process, and mine because you are in my way and distracting me from my own workout.

-       Trainers who have no idea what they’re doing –I know for a fact that at my 24 Hour Fitness, trainers’ clients are spending a minimum of $57 per 50 minute session to work out with “experts” who are supposed to help them reach their health and fitness goals while at the same time preventing injury. Now, I can’t speak to whether these trainers are helping their clients lose weight/get cut/whatever their goal may be, but I can say that they certainly do not teach proper form. Whether it’s “don’t arch your back/keep your core tight,” “don’t let your knees go past your toes,” or “keep your wrists straight,” there are a handful of short, easy-to-remember cues that prompt people to do exercises properly. However, it appears that most trainers I see are not aware of these, because I watch their clients make all of these mistakes and worse. I watched one trainer let her client who was doing weighted lunges across the floor bounce his knees hard off the ground with every step. Not only did that give his muscles a tiny break between each rep, but I’m pretty sure he ended up with terrible bruises later that day. I’m not telling you how to do your job, trainer who doesn’t correct form, I’m telling you to do your job. It’s bad enough there are people with poor form in the gym (see previous), but it’s infinitely worse that it’s your job to correct for this and you aren’t.

-       Ferrari Man – I guess I can’t technically be bothered by him (there’s a small chance the owner could be “her” and not “him,” but I doubt it so we’ll go with “him”) since I don’t know exactly who he is. But I do think it’s hilarious that someone who drives a Ferrari works out at 24 Hour Fitness. And always parks right in front of the gym, so that everyone who walks in and out of the gym has to look at his car. One day I will discover who Ferrari Man is, I can’t wait to see if he matches the picture in my head.

Excruciatingly long pauses before contestant selection or elimination on reality shows

Now, I love me some reality TV. Not all reality TV (nothing Kardashian-related or Real Housewives of [Insert City] on my DVR), but at least half the shows I watch are unscripted (in theory anyway). Aside from guilty pleasures Kendra and Campus PD, I like a lot of the competition shows – So You Think You Can Dance, The Voice, and Project Runway in particular.

Which is why…

 
You can imagine…

That I…

 
Really hate…

…

…
 
Excruciatingly long pauses…

before contestant selection or elimination on reality shows.

For example, here’s how it typically goes on SYTYCD (other reality competitions are similar) – host Cat Deeley recaps the performances of three couples at a time. After sending away the obvious winner of the group, she is left with two couples. She tells them that one couple is going home. The couples are each shown, looking sad and scared and on the verge of tears. Cat flirts with opening the envelope, looks at the what is written on the card inside, says something to the effect of “and the couple going home is…” Cut to another shot of each couple, escalating dramatic music, and cut to commercial.

When we return from commercial, she reminds us (like we forgot) that one of the two couples is going home, we see the couples have their heads buried in each other’s shoulders at this point like that’s going to prevent them from hearing the outcome, turn up the volume on the dramatic music… and then she finally reads what’s on the card. SERIOUSLY?!?!!? Painful, overly dramatic, and completely unnecessary. It’s like, yes advertisers, I’m going to keep watching the show regardless of where you insert your commercials. Why are you trying to make me so miserable? It’s just going to make me hate your product or not even notice you at all since I’m fast forwarding through all this manufactured drama on my DVR. Just show me who wins/gets eliminated and get on with it!

Cyclists who ride next to one another when there’s not a bike lane

Now, I know there are a lot of Southern California motorists who, while driving anyway, HATE cyclists. They hate that cyclists get in their way when they’re trying to turn right on red, they hate when cyclists cut across lanes like a car to turn left (even though it’s totally within the rules of bicycle riding), they even hate cyclists riding nearly in the gutter when there’s no bike lane because the lane is too small for them to drive around. Surprisingly, I am not one of those people (I know, right?!). How can I hate a cyclist for reducing their carbon footprint along with traffic by not being another car on the road, not spending over $4 on gas, and getting exercise all at the same time?
 
What I am supremely annoyed by, however, are the cyclists who ride side by side. Cyclists are supposed to ride single file, not next to each other. Aside from the fact that side by side riding is ILLEGAL (yup, I just looked it up to check), it really does jeopardize both their as well as drivers’ safety. Now, maybe I am more sensitive to this now that I’m in San Diego. While there were a fair amount of skinny, shaved men and women riding around in their Lance Armstrong-wannabe jerseys and pointy aerodynamic helmets in LA, their numbers are nothing compared to SD. I hardly want to drive through North County on Saturday or Sunday mornings because there are packs and packs of cyclists riding together like they’re training for the next Tour de France. And the problem is, they ride side by side, like they’re going to pedal their bikes right up the ramp of Noah’s ark or something to make more cyclists.

Here’s the deal, cyclists riding side by side – buy some walkie-talkies, or put your cell phone in the pocket in the middle of your back you use for Clif bars and use a Bluetooth headset, so you can ride one behind the other and still get your conversation in. Then you can even draft off one another, just like Lance!

Weather reporting in Southern California

Now, San Diego has always been known for its ideal climate, one of the main reasons the metropolis is also known as “America’s Finest City.” San Diego is one of the top ten best climates in the Farmer’s Almanac, and one of the two best summer climates in America according to The Weather Channel. Although not quite as temperate, conditions in San Diego’s neighbor to the north, Los Angeles, are not too shabby either. Both cities are characterized by warm, dry summers and mild winters. More than half the days each year are above 70 °F, and the region has low rainfall as well. As a result, the forecasting of weather is less diverse than in cities with more varied conditions, and meteorologists struggle to come up with synonyms for “beautiful,” “glorious,” and “picturesque” to describe a 10-day forecast that reads sunny and 72 °F.

These feelings of inadequacy are already made apparent in the way news stations name their weather segments and tracking mechanisms. Here in San Diego, ABC has Pinpoint Weather Interactive and Pinpoint Doppler Live, while CBS has Microclimate Weather. On its website, NBC has a section that displays 26 interactive maps showing everything from current dewpoint to lightning strikes. Why, might I ask, do we need a permanent map on the NBC weather page for lightning strikes? They occur how many days out of the year? We might not even get a single lightning strike in some years!

That’s why, when a little rain, wind, or fog enters Southern California’s atmosphere, the men and women who report the weather to us each day can scarcely conceal their excitement, and the coverage of the rainfall, wind speeds, and fog density is just a tad bit overstated.

 
And by “just a tad bit overstated,” I mean “completely and utterly out of control.” Where else in the country does a storm expected to drop up to three-quarters of an inch of rain in some (read, not all) areas over the course of a week receive a special title or designation? Well, in Southern California, “Storm Watch [insert year]” galvanizes the headlines as eager reporters use words like “torrential downpour,” “heavy showers,” and “violent precipitation” to describe a couple hours’ worth of drizzle and cloudy skies.
 
Also, because weather anchors in SoCal have such little to talk about, at times they even resort to taking events that are not weather and calling them weather. Dagmar Midcap (weirdest name ever) can be seen on a commercial in San Diego saying that she enjoys keeping San Diegans up to date on the weather that matters to them, including fires and earthquakes. Um, last time I checked, Dagmar, neither fires nor earthquakes were counted among Earth’s weather phemonema. While wildfires may occur as a result of hot, dry, and windy weather conditions, this does not mean the fire itself is “weather.” Earthquakes are seismic event caused by rupture of geological faults, volcanic activity, landslides, mine blasts, and nuclear tests. Both are certainly natural disasters, but neither are themselves weather. And Dagmar, a paid weather reporter for one of the top three networks in San Diego, should not be captured in a frequently replayed advertisement promoting herself saying that they are.
 
Of course, I say all of this at the beginning of 2012, the year in which the world ends according to the Mayan calendar. Which means I might be paying just slightly more attention to STORM WATCH 2012 as we approach December 21^st than I otherwise would.

Republican Primary Coverage and Candidates

It was recently brought to my attention that it has been awhile since my last blog entry. Presumably because living in San Diego and working from home means I have a lot less to complain about. However, not wanting to disappoint you, my loyal readers, here is your first opinion piece for the month of February.

First of all, news coverage of the Republican primary candidates started WAY too early. As early as February 2011, a number of the suspected and stated candidates were involved in a discussion about the Islamic community, and why the party had lost nearly the entire demographic during Bush II’s reign. By the time we reach the first Tuesday of November 2012, it’ll have been nearly two years since the media started reporting the goings-on of various Republican headliners. Ridiculous! That, and the CNN smartphone app sends out excessive amounts of “breaking news” alerts, the majority of which are entirely unnecessary. Until the Republican candidate is actually nominated, or maaaybe when the field is narrowed down to the top two candidates, does any news about Republicans deserve to be delivered to my mobile.

Secondly, the pool of candidates is a big joke. The Donald was even considered a candidate at one point! About half of the people in the early debates were complete unknowns, with the caliber of the rest being extremely questionable. Here are some facts to consider about some of the more “well-known” contenders, past and present:

Still in the running:

Mitt Romney – people give Barack Obama a hard time about being an elitist; the President made just over $1 million in 2011, while Romney made over $60 million. Talk about being out of touch with America! That, and he is Mormon. I have no issue with the religion, but I just can’t see down-home Protestant and Catholic middle Americans voting for someone who thinks that he will become the God of his own solar system when he departs from this Earth.
Newt Gingrich – sleazy bastard. His first wife was his former high school geometry teacher, ew! He then divorced her after having an affair with a woman nine years his junior. He married and then divorced his second wife after having an affair with a woman twenty-three years his junior! Secrets, secrets are no fun, secrets, secrets hurt someone. We don’t need another Nixon in office.
Ron Paul – WAY too old… they say the presidency ages you ten years, and he’s already 76. That, and he’s a racist, having been quoted as saying the following:

-       “Given the inefficiencies of what DC laughingly calls the criminal justice system, I think we can safely assume that 95% of the black males in that city are semi-criminal or entirely criminal.”

-       “…even in my little town of Lake Jackson, Texas, I’ve urged everyone in my family to know how to use a gun in self-defense. For “the animals” are coming.”

-       “Opinion polls consistently show only about 5% of blacks have sensible political opinions.”

-       He voted against making Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday a holiday, saying “Boy, it sure burns me to have a national holiday for that pro-communist philanderer, Martin Luther King. What an infamy that Ronald Reagan approved it! We can thank him for our annual “Hate Whitey” day.”

What a fucking idiot.

Rick Santorum – has eight children, the youngest of whom is three years old and disabled. More power to him for raising a disabled child, but the dude is obviously far too busy to run his household AND the country at the same time.

Drop-outs:

Rick Perry – racist AND homophobic; leases a hunting camp called “Niggerhead” and is quoted as saying, “there’s something wrong in this country when gays can serve openly in the military, and your kids can’t openly celebrate Christmas.”
Jon Huntsman – a big quitter, in the race for all of seven months and two primaries. Also Mormon.
Herman Cain – how can you take this guy seriously when his most famous political slogan, 9-9-9, makes reference to pizza advertising? And not even that of his pizza company!
Michele Bachmann – Sarah Palin disguising herself by not wearing glasses.
Gary Johnson – announced his campaign on Twitter. After he dropped out of the race, he switched to the Libertarian party. How’s that for loyalty?
Tim Pawlenty – refers to himself as T-Paw. Enough said. 

And we still have seven more months until the 2012 Republican National Convention, scheduled to take place the week of August 27, 2012. Definitely going to have to uninstall my CNN app.

Both Helpful and Unhelpful – Personalized and Special Interest License Plates

I was all set to hate on personalized license plates – you know, the ones where the configuration of numbers and/or letters have been personally chosen by the vehicle owner. And I had really good arguments defending how unhelpful these license plates are – a) much of the time you can’t even understand what the license plate says or is intended to say, and b) when you can understand them, they are super cheesy. Like the one I saw the other day “MOMSADR” – I do not care that you are a mom and a doctor. And, what happens when dad is driving the car? Or “SK8N247” – you can’t be skating 24/7 because you are driving right now, which means you are a liar. Unhelpful: 2, Helpful: 0.

But then I did some research and unearthed information about personalized and special interest license plates, and found out that they do actually do more than satisfy a driver’s vanity.

First of all, I found out that there are ten different license plate options available in California, and the extra fees collected from these customized plates go toward really great causes. They are:

Environmental: standard design California plates that are personalized, fees support environmental programs in California

Memorial: has an American flag in the background, fees fund scholarships for the children of Californians who died in 9/11

Arts Council: features palm trees and a setting sun, fees support the California Arts Council

Coastal Commission: has a whale tail in the background, fees help protect California’s coast and ocean via the California Coastal Commission

Collegiate (currently UCLA is the only plate available, woop woop! Apparently the state doesn’t think there is enough interest in a USC version): has a UCLA logo on the left hand side and says “BRUINS” at the bottom, fees fund need-based scholarships and grants at UCLA.

Lake Tahoe: has a blue lake and orange sky in the background and says “Protect Lake Tahoe” at the bottom, fees support the California Tahoe Conservancy

Yosemite: has snow-capped purple mountains in the background and says “Yosemite Memorial Park” at the bottom, fees go toward the Yosemite Foundation

Firefighters (only current or retired firefighters can get this one): features the silhouette of a firefighter in front of a blazing fire on the left hand side, fees are deposited into the California Firefighters’ Memorial Fund

Have a Heart, Be a Star, Help our Kids: has grass along the bottom in the background, and a hand, heart, star, or plus sign can be chosen in place of a letter or number, fees are deposited into the California Child Health and Safety Fund

Olympic Training Center: has an Olympic logo on the left hand side, fees support the U.S. Olympic Training Center in San Diego (woop²!)

Veterans’ Organizations: says “Honoring Veterans” at the bottom, fees are used by the California Department of Veterans Affairs

Not only that, but they are a lot more affordable than I thought. All but the Environmental, Have a Heart, and Veterans’ plates cost $98 initially and $78 to renew annually, and the three listed cost even less. That makes Unhelpful: 2, Helpful: 2. A tie! Be your own judge as to which direction the scales tip.

New Year’s resolutions (but not for the reason that you’d think)

For as long as I can remember, New Year’s resolutions have been somewhat of a joke… people half-heartedly making promises to themselves that they know they won’t be able to keep, such as losing weight, stopping smoking, etc.

So why not make a non-resolution this year? Commit to preserving something about yourself or your life that you love. If you can’t get enough reality TV, keep watching! If you like to sleep in late on the weekends, snooze away! Accomplishing a non-resolution may be just as rewarding as achieving a resolution, so you might as well enjoy yourself in 2012 rather than feel guilty for the next few months!

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