Cheesecake

I love cheesecake that has been well made. It is said that the first cheesecakes, which are vastly different from the modern ones that were invented in the U.S. and that use commercial pasteurized cream cheese, those first cakes came from Ancient Greece. They weren't at all like the ones we eat today, but I think we should thank those Greeks as much for their cheesecake as for that democracy thing they gave us. In fact, if I had to choose between democracy and cheesecake it would be a tough choice.

Anyway, in the late 1800's when a guy from New York named William Lawrence invented the first commercial cream cheese, the modern cheese cake became a possibility. William Kraft (of the famed Kraft food corporation) then came up with an idea in the early 1900's for pasteurized "Philadelphia Cream Cheese" and that same Philly Cream Cheese is what the best cheesecakes are still made of . I know the Germans, Dutch and Polish use Quark cheese, the Italians use Ricotta and a few less distinguished cheese cakes use other varieties of cheese, but once you eat a cheesecake made with Philly Cream Cheese you will want that style most of the time.

My favorite cheesecake is the plain one. That means no flavorings in the filling and no toppings on the finished cheesecake. Putting toppings on cheesecakes is like putting too much salt on a steak. It kills the flavor of the cheese and confuses the palate. I can always tell a cheesecake terrorist by watching what he or she eats. If it's not a plain cheesecake the terrorist just doesn't know what a real one is about. The best ones are simple and bring forth the taste of the cheese.

A proper cheese cake must have eggs, cream cheese, cream and sugar in the filling. Adding a little sour cream is to some cheesecake lover's taste and is ok, but I don't like it in mine. Instead, I use sour cream in the topping to give it a contrast.  It tends to bring more creaminess but less texture to the cheesecake. For me, texture trumps creaminess in cheesecake. That's probably why I also don't like the no bake style cheesecakes. No bake Cheesecakes are like a Mc Donald's hamburger....suspect in taste, texture and depth.  The novice or non cook will make no bake cheesecakes but a real chef would rather take a bullet than  make one.

Ok, I think I have you curious about or even desirous of eating a cheesecake. So here is my recipe, passed down from my grandmother to my mom and then to me. Unlike most recipes, except for the crust which I changed from the traditional graham cracker crust to an Oreo cookie crust,  I never changed a thing about the contents or baking style of it. It's that good. If you decide to make it read all the directions first and follow the baking technique as written. Otherwise you will make an inferior cake.  Remember too, that just because you don't live near a bakery doesn't mean you have to skip the cheesecake tonight.

CHEESE CAKE Use a 9x9x2 metal pan
Ingredients for crust:
15 Oreo cookies crushed (use vanilla Oreos for regular crust and chocolate Oreos for chocolate crust)
3 tablespoons melted butter
Preparation
1) Crush Oreos and add melted butter to form crust. Press mixture evenly in the bottom of the lightly buttered pan to form crust
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Ingredients For Cake:
4 eggs
1/2 lb (3  8 oz. packages) Philadelphia Cream Cheese
1 cup sugar
1 tablespoons cream
Preparation:
1) Beat eggs and sugar together well-set aside
2) Beat the softened cream cheese and milk with mixer until smooth.
3) Add the sugar and egg mixture and beat
4) Pour into the prepared crust and bake in preheated 350 degree oven for 45 minutes
5) Turn off oven! Cool in oven for 40 minutes
6) Take cake out of oven, set aside, and turn oven back on at 450 degrees while the cheese cake cools

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 Sour Cream Topping:
Ingredients:
1 pint all natural sour cream
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3/4 cup sugar
1) Stir together all three ingredients and put on top of cooled cheesecake
2) Return the Cheesecake to the 450 degree oven  and bake for another 10 minutes
3) Remove cheese cake from oven, cool  and then place it in the refrigerator for at least 12 hours

How To Be A Bad Parent

What's the most difficult and most important job any human being can do? It's, of course, being a proper parent. But that job may be too difficult for too many these days. Cases of bad parenting proliferate today, which may explain why we have so many bad kids..who turn into even worse adults.....who probably produce more bad kids. Need some examples?

Having been banned from the Family Dollar Store after employees say she was stealing, Delaina Garling returned to the establishment and began pepper spraying the workers there. She then  handed the pepper spray can to her 7-year-old daughter, saying, "You know what to do, baby. Spray it!"  The 7-year-old apparently realized this was one of those times that mom is too stupid to know best and refused.  When police searched Dumb Delaina, she had a bag of marijuana and eight clonazepam pills on her thieving carcass. She was arrested and charged with simple assault, possession of a controlled substance and related offenses. Garling's children were placed in the custody of their father.  Uh, I am afraid to find out if dad is as awful as mom.

Hmmm I am going to nominate Delaina for 'Worst Parent of the Year' if there is any such award for the worst of parents out there. There are plenty of other candidates too. Take these examples of incidents that have occurred over the past six months and see if you can determine a trend in bad parenting, some similar elements in all of the garbage below that some call human beings.

-Carron Washington allegedly fed his 2-month-old daughter bleach because a friend from school told him it was a great cure for breathing trouble.
Her daughter is, but Washington recognized her own stupidity with a telling comment,  "It's probably be the dumbest decision I ever made in my life."

-Michelle Windgassen, 27, and John Lewis, 32, were arrested on charges of endangering a minor while they were under the influence of drugs at a Louisville restaurant. Officers found Windgassen in the bathroom snorting heroin, and Lewis admitted snorting heroin a couple hours earlier. Fortunately the child was found to be sober.

-Robert Forbes and Christina Forbes have been arrested by sheriffs in Citrus County, Fla. after their 9-year-old son was found with a cockroach in his ear. Those two may not be roaches themselves, but they have to be considered to be rats.

-Officials in Penn Yan, NY, say Kimberly Margeson, 54, passed two Oxycodone painkiller pills to her 30-year-old, William Partridge by french kissing him during a jail house visit. Can we just put those two on an abandoned island somewhere?

-Austin Davis is accused of beating his three children with a belt because one of his kids had passed gas in the car. Austin must have problems with constipation.

-For almost four years, police in upstate New York believed that Karl Karlsen's son Levi was accidentally crushed beneath a truck that he was working on in 2008. But after learning that Karlsen, 52, was the sole beneficiary of a life insurance policy on his 23-year-old son, they came to the conclusion that the father deliberately dropped the pickup on top of him. He was arrested on Nov. 23, 2012 and charged with second degree murder.  The judge in Karlsen's sentencing should tie him to an auto chair and make him listen to Mariah Carey records....forever.

-Koko Nicole Anderson, 21, from Mesa, Ariz., is shown after being jailed on aggravated DUI and criminal damage charges by County Sheriff's Office on Friday, Nov. 16, 2012. Anderson was charged after crashing her car with her infant son inside through a gate at Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport. When Koko fuels she seems to put more gas in her disgusting body instead of in her car.

- Ceasar Ruiz is accused of pouring rum into his infant son's feeding tube in October, 2012 in Belle Chasse, La. Well, some people do start drinking at an early age.

-William Lewallen was arrested after Tulsa police found his 18-month-old daughter locked in a metal dog cage, his naked 4-year old daughter outside on a cold afternoon and him asleep in a drug or alcohol induced stupor.  William would profit if her were to be sentenced  spend about 30 years in a kennel cage.

- Authorities in Virginia arrested 30-year-old Billie Jolene Warburton, of Norfolk, on Oct. 15, 2012, in the parking lot of a courthouse. Police allegedly found Warburton slumped over the steering wheel of her vehicle. Warburton's window was open, the motor was running and a young child was sobbing in a car seat in the back, police said. The officer allegedly observed blood on the center console and fresh injection marks on Warburton's arms. Warburton allegedly told police her child was crying because he had not been fed since the previous evening.  Unfortunately, Billie Jolene thinks she is a parent of her drugs and not a child.

-Arthur Langley has been arrested after leaving his one year old daughter at home alone last October so he could  go out and rob houses in Brookhaven, Pennsylvania. Let's hope Arthur doesn't steal and bring home any more kids.

-Federal agents have arrested Betsian Carrasquillo Penaloza for allegedly prostituting her 14-year-old daughter in Puerto Rico. Uh, it's probably a little too unusual youth job training program.

- 26 year old Jessica Schauer was charged with threatening to discharge a destructive device after allegedly saying she was going to blow up her daughter's elementary school. Witnesses say that Schauer warned, "Don't bring your kid to school that day," and when asked what day she meant, she said, "The day I blow it up." Hard to believe Jessica is smart enough to even set off a bomb.

-Cops found a 2-year-old girl under a couple's care sleeping outside a Florida mall at 2:45 a.m. on Oct. 1, 2012. Stacia Rogers and Jerry Mntavalo were arrested and charged with child neglect when it was found that Montalvo was allegedly on drugs, and Rogers let him leave with her daughter knowing that he was intoxicated. Maybe the kid was just keeping their place in line for that big Christmas sale event.

-James D. Blanchard, 21, has been sentenced to 15 years in prison for abusing his newborn son. A medical doctor said that the child has lost his vision and will likely never walk or talk. The doctor also said the injury was common with shaken babies. I doubt the court will ever be able to shake any sense into that idiotic dad.

-Cops say that not only did Diana and Samuel Franklin keep their 15-year-old daughter in a chicken coop, they made her wear a shock collar and used it several times. Maybe they expect their daughter to lay eggs?

-Dario Napolitano is accused of kicking his 3-year-old son at Disney World in late June, 2012.  I say, let's let the Tasmanian Devil loose on Dario.

-Adolfo Gomez Jr., 52, and his wife, Deborah Gomez, 43, both of Northlake, Ill., were arrested at a Walmart in Lawrence, Kan., after someone spotted a 5-year-old boy sitting outside a sport utility vehicle with his hands and feet bound and a blindfold covering his eyes. Maybe the courts can blindfold and bound those two before they are executed?

-Brittany Hill allegedly tried to sell her 4-month-old boy in a classified ad in June, 2012. Someone was going to try and buy the baby, but decided to call Dallas police instead.

Well, it was a deterrent of sort. Most kids are so bad today that nobody would buy them.
-Brandi Baumgardner was arrested for injecting her daughter with heroin roughly 200 times when the girl was 14-years-old. Is torture too good to use  for Brandi?

- New Jersey mom Patricia Krentcil was arrested after taking her 5-year-old daughter to a tanning parlor. The daughter reportedly received severe burns from exposure to harmful ultraviolet radiation. In the aftermath of the arrest, Krentcil was banned from several local tanning salons.  The judge should sentence Patricia to attend a few Al Gore Global Warming lectures.

-Mistie Atkinson, 32, allegedly performed oral sex on her 16-year-old son and had sexual intercourse with him in a hotel room in Northern California. The two reconnected on Face book after the boy's father had assumed primary custody when the child was 2. Atkinson, whom the boy's father claims had a "boyfriend girlfriend relationship" with her son, also reportedly sent the child nude photos of herself. She pleaded no contest to the charges in a Napa County Superior Court. Yuk! That is too much motherly love.

-On May 17, police found Shana Bishop's 2-year-old son naked in a pile of trash on the floor of her car in South Carolina. The child was found when an unidentified resident called the police, alleging that Bishop was dancing naked in her driveway. Bishop was arrested in Spartanburg and charged with child neglect.  Shauna is nothing but trash herself.

-Misty Lawson, 30, a self described "professional baby maker" on her Face book page, allegedly punched her son in the face and body several times during an in-home, state-mandated anger management course.  Forget looking for Misty's Face book profile. Her baby making business has been closed.

-Elizabeth Escalona is facing child abuse charges after police said she glued her toddler daughter's hands to a wall, kicked her in the stomach and beat her over a potty training issue.  I recommend providing no toilet in Elizabeth's prison cell!

-Kimira Hysaw is accused of using a stun gun on her son after he failed to ask her permission to play basketball. I wonder if that kid's jump shot has been affected by Mom's stun gun?

Ok, despite my smarmy comments about the incidents above, they are all true, and just a small sample, a microcosm of dysfunctional parenting, and should be heart breaking to anyone possessed with the slightest decency in character. But do you notice a common thread in these horrid human beings? It's that all of them possess one or more of the following characteristics. They are either drug abusers, lack education, or are unemployable due to some deviancy of personality.  In this country one who is taker from society (lives permanently off welfare or from criminal behavior)  usually fits a criteria that includes one or more of the following: they are school dropouts, they abuse alcohol or other drugs, they are a parent of an illegitimate child, or they themselves are the products of bad parents. The givers in society (those who work, pay taxes, behave ethically) rarely fit into any if those groups.

Problem is, what can society do about not producing so many of givers? Any suggestions?  Kids need to  fewer takers and more givers in their lives.


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Easter Is Not A Fun Holiday

Another uneventual Easter has come and gone.  Since my child is grown and I am more of a heathen than a devout Catholic Easter was a minor event for me again this year. It's not just that Easter is a religious holiday that turns me off. It's some of the weird aspects of it. The idea of a holiday centered around the crucifixion of someone is bizarre enough.  Those creepy old movies like 'Ten Commandments" appear on TV around Easter Day and we get to see a crazy account of Christ being crucified . Then there are all those crosses with Christ, blood and all...uh, do we need to see that while we eat our chocolate rabbits and peeps? And why do we have to dress in fancy clothes never worn any other time of the year to sit in a church for two hours and listen to some guy speaking Latin about things more medieval than modern.  That's not fun. And that "Good Friday" holiday actually says Friday when Christ was crucified was a "good day". Maybe for theological reasons, but not for those crucified.

Maybe the Church should redesign Easter, more in line with some of the fun kiddy events like Easter egg hunts that function on the periphery of Easter. Anyway, Easter is not serene everywhere.  In some other places they have a more secular, fun Easter time. Here are a few.
Australia- Australians are the largest consumers of Easter eggs in the world, but as the Easter bunny is known to have a bad history of destroying their vegetable crops, the eggs the Aussies eat are provided by the Easter Bilby (an endangered Kangaroo kind of species of Australia). I'll eat any chocolate you give me, endangered or not.

*Ethiopia- Those Ethiopians know how to dress. Every Easter they have a dress up day, the kind we used to have fun with when we were kids. They dress in white, with headbands created from palm tree leaves that supposedly symbolize the palms Jesus walked by on this way to being murdered. And just to make sure they have a big feast that is centered around that Dabo bread African restaurants keep putting before their customers.

*France- The French make huge omelets at Easter in big public displays. In  the city of Nantes last year they made one out of 12,000 eggs.

* Germany- In the city of Saafield in East Germany there is a decorated tree with more than 9000 Easter eggs. This tradition reminds the pagan among us us of the pagan ideas of sacrificing animals on trees, the egg is connected to the ideas of rebirth and resurrection associated with Easter.

*Greece- The Greeks are bloody broke these days, so they dye their Easter eggs all in one color.... RED  Red is the symbol as a symbol for Jesus’ blood.  The eggs are used in making Greek Easter Brioche bread.

*Hungary- The Hungarians have an Easter tradition that would be great fun for we men, but might result in unpleasant consequences.  A bucket of water is poured onto a woman of the Paloc minority, dressed in her traditional clothing, in Holloko, 100 km north-east of Budapest, Hungary. Actually, most men everywhere have had water poured on them Easter or any other day by their ladies after a night of too much drinking. Finally, we can go to Hungary and get revenge!

*Swizterland- The Swiss have an old Easter tradition of decorating water wells in order to celebrate the gift of water: life. They decorate wells with beautifully painted eggs and spring flowers.  Since the Swiss are not exactly the most fun-loving people, this is a big deal, and it does sound better than celebrating a crucifixion.

I hope your Easter went well and you didn't have too many thoughts of crucifying me for writing this kind of nonsense.

New Curriculum Needed

There seems to be crisis in modern education everywhere in the world. But relax. I am here with the solution to solving this crisis (I know I never fix anything, but this time I might get lucky). It's kind of ironic, given my teachers used to consider me a constant disaster waiting to happen.  Uh, forget that part for now and let me first define what this educational crisis is about. The more important crisis is that schools are teaching the wrong things, the wrong way for the wrong way. Didn't you know that as you sat bewildered in Geometry class?

We teach to test kids, mindless tests of memory and useless information that kids are forced to memorize and regurgitate, often without even understanding what they spit out. Those tests are used to verify the fact that we are teaching useful things, but in fact, merely verify that we are insecure and secretly aware that our dopey kids are learning very little while in school (and less at home, I fear).  How many times do we teach an identical math or science concept before realizing that the subject is never going to be understood, used nor should it be. I say leave the high level specialized subjects to the nerdy kids with the glasses and led pencils in their front pockets. The rest of the idiots don't need to know about Quadratic equations....and will probably be traumatized if they actually learned them.

In this modern world of sterile relations between humans we should teach our kids more practical skills.  Ethics and values courses, for instance, should be taught in primary schools, not in universities where the students now take them but who have already had their ethical and value systems destroyed but the corrupt world in which we live.  A 5 year old benefits from ethics courses, a 19 year old only ignores the subject in order to justify impregnating that sexy blonde and taking a hit of cocaine.  Let's bump a math or science course each year in elementary school for ethics courses and in the future the world will be a kinder gentler place. Hmmmm It would be interesting to see a world in which the thugs and criminals were those nerds who got stuck in the science and math classes while the rest of the kids bantered about the subject ethical choices. I wonder. Does a nerd mugger use a a calculator instead of a gun to threaten his victim?

With illegitimacy rampant today and those little bastards kids roaming the streets because there is no parental direction, I also think every school should have courses on parenting. The school could call it 'Responsible Parenting'. Just think how nice society would be if before producing those trophy babies every prospective parent had to have three or four courses in responsible parenting practices.  No courses in parenting....no marriage license...no babies allowed. I like it.

Because both the schools and families fail to teach and transfer the concept of humanity to kids, I have some more course ideas to suggest. There should be classes in respecting the elderly and the disabled, in taking responsibility for one's own economic and intellectual health, in.....sigh. Who am I kidding. Those kinds of courses would never be taught in modern schools. And sadly, it's because they just don't meld with those real base human desires adults model for their kids.....

Gay Marriage

The biggest social issue in the world today seems to be the gay marriage controversy. That is, should gay marriage be legalized and placed on an equal footing with heterosexual marriages.  Just the other day over 300,000 French citizens rallied protest the legalization of gay marriage. It is odd, given that France is a fairly liberal nation in regard to social behavior.  But then, some of the least likely places and people one would assume to be in favor or against gay major sometimes hold the opposite view. The issue is quite hard to categorize.

Since 2001 when the first nation to legalize gay marriage, The Netherlands,  made gay marriage legal there have been nine others to do the same. Six of those are European. Legislation to make gay marriage legal is also pending in eight nations, including Finland and Australia, and civil unions or some form of gay partnerships are legal in more than 20 countries. The U.S. has legalized gay marriage in several states but not nationwide, as  the constitution defines marriage as a state law province, and each state determines its own marriage rules. This may change with upcoming court case about states and the federal government denying entitlement benefits to same sex couples. If the court rules that no state or the federal government can deny entitlements such as the social security death benefit to same sex partners, gay marriage may be de facto instituted everywhere in the U.S.

The change in attitudes here about same sex couples being allowed tom marry has been an amazing one the past few years.  It has changed so fast. Just five years ago the vast majority of people in the U.S. did not favor legalization. Now the majority does. In this country there are numerous social and legal reasons why gay people should be allowed to marry. Here are a few of the legal ones.

* Health care- Legally married spouses are considered next of kin and thus are allowed to make critical health care decisions and have visitation rights. Also, unmarried partners are not eligible for Medicare or Medicaid and must pay taxes on health care coverage if they're lucky enough to be included on a family plan.
* Taxes- Unmarried couples are not permitted to file their tax returns jointly, and therefore are ineligible to take advantages of the many tax benefits of filing as a couple. They pay much higher tax rates as a result. Also, the transfer of personal property between unmarried couples causes bad tax consequences, which do not occur when the couple is legally wed.
* Death- unmarried couples suffer on the death of one.  The survivor is not eligible to draw on various social security and retirement benefits that married couples can.
* Immigration- Gay unmarried couples don't have the ability to claim U.S. residency at the same rate as married couples.
* Insurance- Unmarried couples cannot purchase joint homeowner's or auto insurance, automatically forcing them to pay higher rates that married couples do not have to pay. In a great number of cases, unmarried partners or their children are ineligible to be covered under family health insurance plans.
* Property- The rules that protect married couples in dividing property after a split do not apply to unmarried couples who own property together.
* Family Leave- Unmarried partners are not entitled to the rights extended by the Family Medical Leave Act. If a partner in a same sex relationship had a serious health issue where he or she needed taking care of, their spouse would not be permitted to take time off from work to do so. In effect, either they'd have to hire someone to do it or risk losing their job from taking too much time away from work.
* Inheritance- Partners in a legally unrecognized relationship do not automatically inherit property from a deceased partner without a will. They are also ineligible to receive the many inheritance rights afforded legal spouses.

So these things alone explain why gay people see gay marriage as an important civil rights issue. Unfortunately, for the sake of their cause, many people see it as a religious or moral issue. The mater will be settled by that divide between legal and moral views. In this country and other democratic ones it will be a question of whether religious or moral opposition will defeat the legal discrimination that is currently in place. I think the legal advocates will win the day and gay marriage will become a more accepted and common practice in many places around the world. It should be interesting to watch the debate.

Malls

I rarely go to shopping malls, mostly because I like neither shopping nor the crowds that flock to malls. But malls are a fascinating phenomenon. The first shopping mall , an American invention, was the Country Club Plaza in Kansas City Missouri. It opened in 1922. Nothing good ever seems to happen in Missouri, and I include the shopping mall as another of the no good contributions to that odd American state. In 1956 the Southdall mall opened in Minneapolis, Minnesota (where the world's biggest mall, The Mall of America, is today). It was the first enclosed mall. Then in the 1980's the mega malls that are everywhere in the world now first appeared.

And so it began and now endures. There are malls everywhere today, regardless of the income level of the place in which the mall is found. Most have the same stores, type of stores and much the same merchandise. They are all decidedly western institutions. Go to a mall in China and then one in New Jersey. I bet you could not tell which is in China and which in the United States. If there ever was a prototype retail site it is the mall. They all have movie theaters, food courts, and endless supplies of teenagers walking about mischievously leering at others and carrying ice cream cones or those awful pretzels that the malls sell.

We still have single fixed site stores available as an alternative to malls that I use, but the current generation disdains them. I wonder if malls are like cancer cells in that they keep growing in size and numbers. They encourage some rather strange behavior by the shoppers who patronize them and are even thought of a social meeting places for the young. One thing I notice when at malls is that women seem to dress better than normal when shopping there. But the men are the same fat slobs who wear thong shoes and have beer bellies bulging out of their t shirts. Why do the ladies look so much nicer? I think if you entered a church and observed ho the parishioners are dressed you would find that the ladies who shop at the mall are better dressed than the ones kneeling in the church pews. I wonder why women get dressed up to shop for dressy clothes? There must be some deep psychological explanation for that.

Another thing I notice at the mall is that many of the males shopping there are uncomfortable with the whole mall concept. They would rather be outside. Some are along for the trip because their lady demands their presence, and a few misguided males are there to actually buy clothes. But most want to get in and out as fast as possible. Men do not like "browsing", nor do they want to own 50 pairs of shoes. I find that the teenage boys more often parked in the food court, since we all know teenage boys eat like whales. The older men who are with their wives can often be seen sitting on those dirty but welcoming mall sofa and chairs alone and waiting for the wife or gf to emerge from a store. There is a look on the faces of those men that scream to be rescued and taken home, but there is also a resignation that their lady has only begun to browse/buy for the junk she doesn't need and will probably eventually return for exchange after buying.

There is also allot of opinion pooling at the malls. Though those women who stop mall shoppers to ask opinions are the least bothersome of them. Just say "no thanks" and walk away. But the opinion tester most men hate is that of the ladies that dragged them to the mall in the first place. "Does this dress make me look fat"? Do you like the style of this dress"? "It's on sale...maybe I should buy it"? The smart man will abstain from comment on any of those kinds of questions and just hand over his credit card to his lady. There is no winning for a male in a shopping mall.

Why are there so many "sales" at malls? Some of those sale signs look dusty and dated. I suspect the stores have sales on some of there items every day of the year. The presence of sale signs, even when the shoppers themselves know they are a ruse to induce more buying, is a feature that is designed to help the buyer relieve any guilt he or she may have for purchasing things not needed.
 
I suppose that an iconic institution like the shopping mall is better left alone than to be analyzed, like the other great mysteries of the universe. But I am perplexed about the popularity of malls. However, if any mall finds out about my antisocial views of their existence maybe they will ban me from shopping at their stores. And that would be a good thing!

Happiness Day

I think you just missed the world's first International Day of Happiness. That passed me by too but the United Nations did legislate March 20 as a day we are supposed to be deliriously happy. London commuters were greeted with happiness street signs at Liverpool Street station, but we had none of that here. Maybe London is a happier place or perhaps the only place to ever pay attention to the dysfunctional United Nation's decrees.

When the United Nations is supposed to be solving world problems they are often creating those kinds of days. It's hard to believe but he U.N. already has 120 days earmarked to observe everything from jazz to rural women. Alas! Forget wars, famine, disease and other world maladies, the United Nations says that "happiness" is a serious 21st-century global issue," I think that this kind of mentality, that happiness is an "issue", is a modern creation. In other times humans believed that happiness or unhappiness were personal perspectives that governments should leave alone.

I wonder what the United Nations could really do to bring happiness to the world. Forget their trying to solve real problems. They never do that. Specifically, the United Nations does not wave a Disney magic wand and declare us happy, instead it appeals to our sense of responsibility and encourages us to work through our current difficulties and not assign undue blame to others. That is, our happiness largely depends on us, our lifestyles, here and now. Isn't that what mom always told us?

If you are going to create a happy day I think you should make us happy, not nag and preach like mom does. I am not sure how we are to "improve our lifestyles". Do we not all have different interpretations of what lifestyles are best, and even about what makes us happy. Hmmmm In my case I thought I was already pretty happy and didn't need a day to be that.. Most of my daily experiences make me happier. But here are a few things that I experience that do not make me happy: cell phone chatter, self absorbed people, reality TV, any modern culture aspect that is trendy, fat guys sitting next to me on my plane rides, stale donuts, running out of toilet paper, getting the smallest piece of cake, looking at my badly shaped nude body after a shower, asparagus. I guess that's a start. The United Nations should work on removing those if they want me to be truly happy.