Bryce Moore's Blog, page 284

Dear Little Debbie

I used to think you and I got along wonderfully. I know it's been a few years since I paid you any attention. I've been too busy eating things like fruits and vegetables--or (more often) home baked goodies. But I remembered you with a certain fondness. You were sweet. Not necessarily Twinkies-sweet, and not up to par with my memories of Snow Balls, but I try to be forgiving.



And then, my library had Little Debbie Day today. A whole smorgasbord of Little Debbie offerings, all laid out and ready for eating. I'd been looking forward to this day since we planned it. It was going to be a sweet reunion between two long lost friends.



Instead, you made me sick.



No kidding, Little Debbie. That Christmas tree-shaped brownie? I don't think I'll ever be able to look at a brownie the same way again. The way the icing was so stale and foul that it splintered into tiny shards the moment it hit my teeth. The way it coated the inside of my mouth with what felt like seven layers of wax. The taste--the texture. Like industrial ooze thickened into a brownie-like state of matter that exists on a plane all its own. And the taste? I could bite into a rabid rat and get something more pleasurable out of the experience.



Honestly, Little Debbie. I don't know who went wrong. Maybe it's me. Maybe my standards have gotten higher in the days since we last had our relationships. I was sixteen, after all. I didn't look for that much out of a girl. Sugary. Sweet. What else mattered?



Those days are over, Debbie. OVER!



Now excuse me. I need to go find a trash can.

Christmas Traditions in Slovakia

I love traditions. I think they're lots of fun, and they bring order and excitement to a year that might otherwise be uniform and dull. I just like being able to look forward to something--how Christmas gives even people who don't like winter a reason to be excited. (Or, if you hate Christmas, a reason to be happy once it's over. But what's up with the Christmas hate, people? Your five year old self thinks you're a total loser, just so you know. Do you really want your five year old self having that low of an opinion of you? There are entire movies devoted to how you need to make sure your five year old self (or younger self, at any rate) still thinks you're pretty cool. If you need help with this, just remember one word, my friends: underoos.)



Anyway.



Traditions aren't just fun. They're fascinating, especially when you can get outside them and look at them as an outsider. This is really difficult to do with traditions you grew up with. It's really easy to do with traditions you never encountered until you were grown. Thus, I have a hard time getting my mind around the whole Santa Claus mythos--why we believe what we believe about him. The reindeer, the chimneys, the stockings, the trees. Separating myself from all of that enough to approach it from a fresh perspective would be really difficult.



Slovak traditions, on the other hand . . . those I'm not quite as entrenched in. This morning Mikulas came, delivering peanuts, oranges, candy, and small presents for my kids. They had to get their boots and shoes all nice and clean and shiny last night, because as we all know, Mikulas doesn't give you anything if you leave dirty shoes out for him. If they had been misbehaving, they would have gotten potatoes or onions. Why potatoes or onions?



Why does Santa bring coal to kids who are bad?



If you're part of the tradition from childhood on, questions like that don't need an answer. They just make sense. If you're outside of the tradition, then that same taken-for-granted obviousness loses all weight. In Slovakia, Baby Jesus delivers the presents on Christmas--which is celebrated the evening of the 24th. The 25th is not really special at all, other than a day to sit around and eat a lot of cookies and relax. Even during Communism, it was always the Baby Jesus who brought the presents.



Why is Baby Jesus doing this? And does Jesus turn from Adult Jesus into Baby Jesus for one evening a year? Where does he get the presents? Who knows--he certainly doesn't have any elf helpers. Of course, one thing Slovaks don't have to worry about is getting their kids too focused on Santa Claus. They can all be excited about Baby Jesus, and leave out the Big Man in Red altogether.



At the same time, traditions are great for showing differences between cultures. Part of me thinks it would just be a blast to write a Christmas follow up to Vodnik, where Tomas (the main character) has to interact with the Slovak Christmas traditions and defeat some evil bad creature. (Not Baby Jesus.) Then again, who knows if I could support an entire book-length production on the topic. But it would be fun to try. :-)



The trick, of course, is to do it in a respectful manner that doesn't insult the original tradition, but still can highlight how foreign it is. Just like I wouldn't appreciate a book that basically said, "Santa Claus is a big fat stupid tradition, and you have to be a bumpkin idiot to have ever believed something like that," Slovaks wouldn't appreciate a book that assaults their traditions. Not sure how I would handle that, but again--it would be fun to try.



In one way or another, I definitely see some traditions coming in the future of the Vodnikverse. I didn't delve into them hardly at all in the first novel, but Christmas is coming.



Any traditions you've heard of that you just find bizarre or fascinating? Share!

Why Am I Always Tired?

I used to be an insomniac. Maybe not by the official definition, but I always had a hard time falling asleep. I'd be up until 3am some nights, just unable to actually go off to slumberland. At the time, I understood why I was tired. I didn't sleep. Duh.



But I've gotten over that stage of my life (which means true insomniacs are even now no doubt claiming I was never one of them to begin with. Sorry, insomniacs. I feel your pain.) How did I get over it? Mainly by waking up at about the same time each day, and avoiding naps. I've discovered it doesn't matter so much when I go to bed--it's all about when I wake up. If I sleep in too much, that can really throw off my sleep schedule.



But I digress.



The thing is, even though I'm sleeping more (or, more consistently), I'm still tired. All the time. Not to the point that I'm weak and can't do anything (I was that way when I was living in Utah), but just a general malaise. And I can no longer point the finger at insomnia. Instead, I think it boils down to two factors.



First, I need to sleep more. Getting to sleep is one thing. Sleeping enough is another. I get 6.5-7 hours of sleep a night, pretty consistently. Sometimes as much as 8. Sometimes as little as 6. I know I need more sleep. And yet there are so many shiny movies to watch, books to read, words to write, games to play, parties to go to, friends to talk with, children to play with . . . Something's got to go. But as I get older, I'm starting to wonder if doing as much as I do is worth it at the expense of being tired the whole time I'm doing it all, or if it wouldn't make more sense to do less and sleep more--thereby enjoying what I do more, since I (theoretically) wouldn't be as tired.



And this leads me to my second conclusion: I'm getting older. Those of you who are younger than me are no doubt nodding and saying, "Yup. He is." Those of you who are older are shaking your head wryly and thinking, "Just wait, kiddo." You're both right. I'm old enough to be feeling the effects, but not old enough to have earned the right to complain about it. Poor me!



Now, I could always do what the rest of the world seems to do when they're tired: drink some caffeine. But setting aside the fact that I try to avoid putting artificial chemicals into my body when it's not really necessary (Peeps is a necessity. Mountain Dew, not so much), I'm prone to migraines, which can be brought on by caffeine. So that's pretty much a no go. I'd rather be exhausted all day than having splitting migraines.



What I ought to do is exercise more. When I go for brisk walks, I wake up. One day, my desire to be awake will override my inherent laziness. That day is not today.



No, in the end, I just feel like complaining and not actually doing anything about it. And looky here--I've got a blog! A perfect vehicle for complaining and commiserating. So--let's hear it. Who else out there could go for mandatory nap time at work?

Writing Update

It's been a bit since I updated ya'll on my writing, and there's no time like a Friday to do it, right? I've finished the second draft of Tarnhelm, and it's now on my agent's iPad, officially in his To Be Read pile. Once I hear back from him, I'll likely need to do another thorough draft or two before it's ready to get sent out to editors. (Or at least, that's what I hope will be the case. This is the first time I'm doing this since I got my book deal with Vodnik, and there's no small level of self-doubt involved. What if this next one is no good? What if I can't get it to the right level for publication? What if what if what if. In the end, a guy's gotta have confidence that no matter how crappy the second draft is, he can and will make it better in the third draft. That's how this works.)



In other news, Vodnik has now gone off to the printer's for getting the Advance Reader Copies (ARCs) printed, which means that at some point in the not too distant future, I should be looking at real live printed versions of my novel. If that doesn't excite you, then you live in a drab, grey world, and I don't want to talk to you.



The electronic version of the ARC was looking fantastic when it was sent off. The maps turned out great, the interior graphics are solid, the cover's super. Really a lot to be excited about. I'm hoping to do some giveaways when they come, so keep an eye out for that. Just this morning, I've got a bit of a back and forth going with my editor as we refine the jacket copy (what's on the inside of the front jacket). Exciting!



In the meantime, I'm getting my annual Christmas Newsletter ready. For those of you who don't know, I take the whole "Newsletter" thing quite literally. I write up fake news stories, include pictures--the whole shebang. It's actually fun to do something with my writing time that's so drastically different than the writing I usually do. I'll post it here once it's done.



After that's over, it's on to the next book. What's the next one? That's a secret. Let's just say I'm thinking of it as Mission: Impossible meets Mistborn, with a YA twist. Lots of work to be done on it, though--I need to revisit the plot and the setting, check the characters, and then start writing writing writing. It's the first book I've really thought of from the ground up as a series. Never hurts to have lofty goals, right?



And that about sums up my writing efforts to date. Happy weekend, all!

Plagiarism Ain't an Addiction: A Ramble on Rhetoric and Justification in Today's Society

I just came across a story about an up and coming author of spy books. He was getting noticed for his first book--good reviews, growing buzz. And then some people started reading his book. Spy novel fans. And they noticed something about them--passages seemed familiar. You can guess the rest. The guy hadn't just plagiarized one book. He'd stolen passages and pieces from all sorts of books. Not obscure books, either. Ludlum. Fleming. Really well-known books.



He's written a big long essay about his plagiarizing, which he somehow links with his struggles with alcoholism. He's deep into Alcoholics Anonymous--which I applaud--but he claims that when he gave up alcohol, he turned to another addiction, instead: plagiarism



Lots to say about this one. First, as an author with my own first book coming out, I'm more than a little appalled by this guy. Copying and pasting whole passages--blatantly, knowing it's wrong . . . Not once, but many many times, and then lying to everyone about it. The man has the common sense of a cockroach. What's worse, is that he claims he loves the book industry. He was a bookseller--part owner of a bookstore, for crying out loud. And he'd been plagiarizing for years. But I'm going to set aside all of that, since it's being discussed online elsewhere at great length.



As a librarian with more than a passing interest in avoiding plagiarism, I have some more to add. But it's mainly of the "I can't believe someone would think they'd get away with this" and "This is just so fundamentally stupid and wrong" variety, and you can probably come up with all of that all by your lonesome.



No. In the end, what I really want to talk about is the rhetorical devices this guy uses in his justification of his actions. First, the guy equates "plagiarist" with "almost as bad as 'rapist' or 'pedophile.'" Um . . . no? I see what he's doing. By trying to make it sound like he thinks of himself as a terrible, awful human being--as bad as some of the worst scum we have on the planet--he hopes that his readers will automatically be on his side. "Come on, buddy. Chin up. You're not that bad."



Sorry. That's not going to work with me. All he ends up doing is trying to use language to belittle the crimes of those other terrible actions. Pedophilia and rape are horrible things. Atrocities. Plagiarism? The action of weak-minded, lazy fools who wish they had actual talent.



(Back in writer-mode for a moment: There's a lot of debate in various circles about what constitutes plagiarism. Even in the comments section of the article I linked to above, there's some back and forth. Some equate anyone who copies other people's ideas in any form as stepping toward plagiarism. Meaning, if someone follows the trends in the market and writes a paranormal YA romance, then that person is plagiarizing. Or if someone lifts the plot from one book and uses it for another. To me, you can't start broadening the meaning of this word. There's being a hack, and there's being a plagiarist. The two aren't the same. A plagiarist takes everything. All the words, just as the original author had written them. Sure, they might change a name here or there, or switch a conjunction, but the two things are pretty much identical. (Note that parody is different--if you're twisting the original in a fun way, or to make a point, or do something different with it, then fine.) It also depends on the extent you've done it. And plots aren't copyrightable, and therefore aren't connected to this discussion. If you take the plot from one book and use it point by point in your own, then you're a hack. Not a plagiarist. A lawyer friend of mine said to look at it like this: imagine fans of the original work come across your new work. Would they say "It was so cool to see how he took what was in work A and turned them into this awesome new, different thing in work B." Or would they say "He totally ripped off work A." Non-hack vs. hack--but neither one a plagiarist. Plagiarists have no skill of their own. They're admitting they can't write well, and so they turn to someone else who can. Plot is structure. It's fundamentally different from actual prose writing, like sculpting is different from carving rock out of a mountainside.)



But what really gets my goat is his feeble attempt to say that he's addicted to plagiarism. In today's use of the word, "addiction" is a buzz word for "it's not my fault." I'm not a bad guy. I'm a victim of this awful, terrible addiction. Pity me. Get me help. But don't hate me, because there's just nothing I could do about it. Maybe years ago, when the addiction started. But not today. Today, I'm a slave to that terrible beast.



Please.



Don't get me wrong. Addiction is a real thing, and I'm not meaning to dismiss it casually. Drugs, alcohol--chemical addictions. I'm fully aware of what they can do and how real they are. But "addiction" is wandering into areas it doesn't belong, in my opinion.



Addicted to porn, to sex, to video games, to eating, to whatever you want to say you're addicted to. In some of those cases, I can see a case being made. Pornography in particular seems to have some very strong arguments in favor of it being an actual addiction. But sooner or later, a line's going to have to be drawn that says "This is Not an Addiction."



And to me, nothing about plagiarism justifies it even remotely being included in the pantheon of addictions. The guy was a pathological liar, perhaps. But he wasn't compelled to plagiarize. He was worried about people finding out he was a half-wit untalented thief, so he kept on being a half-wit untalented thief. At any point in time, he could have come clean, or--you know--actually started writing stuff all by himself.



Writing your own stuff is actually possible. I've done it for years. It's hard. And it takes practice and effort. But it can be done.



Anyway. I'm all out of time, and there's nothing left productive for me to say at this point, anyway. Anyone have anything they'd care to add?

Screwball Comedies: A Guide to Some Classics

I had a friend ask for some recommendations on good old screwball comedies. At the time, I didn't have the chance to really give a complete answer, and I thought this might be something other people would be interested in, too--so here goes. An overview to some great screwball comedies. These aren't the more obscure ones--these are bread and butter essentials of the genre. Not sure if it'll help my friend out (I don't know how many she's already seen), but they'll help YOU out, if you're a newcomer to the genre. Ready?



First of all, what is a screwball comedy? As Wikipedia puts it,

The screwball comedy is a principally American genre of comedy film that became popular during the Great Depression, originating in the early 1930s and thriving until the early 1940s. It is characterized by fast-paced repartee, farcical situations, escapist themes, and plot lines involving courtship and marriage. Screwball comedies often depict social classes in conflict, as in It Happened One Night (1934) and My Man Godfrey (1936). Some comic plays are also described as screwball comedies.

 So we're not talking about modern comedies here. Bill Murray movies or National Lampoons don't count--they're a different beast. I happen to love this genre, and there are so many many great comedies to choose from.




It Happened One Night--This is a classic Frank Capra movie starring Clark Gable, a reporter looking for a story, who falls in with an heiress looking to run away from her family. It won best picture, actor, actress, director, and screenplay. If you haven't seen this movie, I think there might be something wrong with you. I'm pretty sure all human beings are supposed to have seen this.
My Man Godfrey--A hobo (William Powell) gets hired to be the butler to a wealthy family. Sometimes the premises of these movies alone is enough to demand seeing it. It also earned Oscar noms for actor, supporting actor, actress, supporting actress, director, and screenplay.
The Awful Truth--Cary Grant was so convinced this movie wasn't working that he asked to be let out of his contract. It ended up catapulting him to stardom. A husband and wife are on the outs and try to sabotage each other during their divorce. (Possibly would have been better if they'd hired a hobo to be their butler.)
Bringing Up Baby--Cary Grant, Katherine Hepburn, and a pet leopard. What could go wrong? Plenty. The movie bombed at the box office and it threatened the careers of Hepburn and director Howard Hawks. Today, it's been named by EW as the 24th best picture of all time and is part of the National Film Registry.
You Can't Take It with You--A Frank Capra classic. (Incidentally, I was in a production of this in junior high. I played the uptight father.) A rich man gets engaged to a girl from an eccentric family. Hilarity ensures. Won best picture and director.
His Girl Friday--Howard Hawks, Cary Grant, and the world of newspapers. Based on a Broadway play and remade many times, this version is still my favorite. It brings snappy dialogue to a whole new level of Zen.
The Philadelphia Story--George Cukor directing Cary Grant, Katherine Hepburn, and Jimmy Stewart. If that doesn't make you want to see this movie, you have no soul. One of my all time favorite movies.
To Be or Not to Be--Ernst Lubitsch directing Jack Benny in a movie about a Polish acting troupe trying to take down the Nazi. Remade later by Mel Brooks--this is still a fun film.
Arsenic and Old Lace--Cary Grant and Frank Capra, plus serial killing aunts. I'm telling you, these movies just make themselves, folks. I wish I could have been in some of the pitch sessions.


Really, when you get down to it, look for a few key directors: Cukor, Capra, Lubistch, Hawks, Sturges, and later on Billy Wilder (I love the lesser-known One, Two, Three--James Cagney in a comedy all about Coca Cola and Communism).

Movie Review: The Muppets

Over Thanksgiving, I went with the fam to see The Muppets. Going in to the movie, I was more than a little nervous. Why? Because so much depended on this  film, or at least that's what it felt like to me. Seriously. The movie had reached William Carlos Williams proportions in my mind. (And because an idea like that doesn't come along just every day, here's my version of the parody:)



so much depends

upon



the new Muppet

movie



Promoted so

heavily



On all social

networks.



Now that that's out of my system, allow me to explain why this film was so important. It all boils down to Muppets from Space. That movie flat out stunk, for a Muppet movie. Some of the songs were okay, but the plot was wicked weak, and the jokes were only meh. After I'd seen that movie, I wondered if there would ever be another Muppet film. If this one was only so so, then it was a done deal--especially after how much this film had been promoted. (Seriously--I'm a huge Muppet fan, but by the end, I was about as tired of all the ceaseless bludgeon-you-over-the-head-with-promos-for-the-Muppets ad as I get with political ads. (Well, maybe not THAT tired of them. At least the Muppet promos were often clever and entertaining. On purpose.) I get that Disney felt it had to make huge inroads in a new audience, but they pushed it too hard.



In any case, if this movie stunk, then that could be the end of the Muppets as we know them, and that would be sad.



Did it stink?



Not at all. I thoroughly enjoyed the film.



Was it as good as the original Muppet Movie or the sequel, The Great Muppet Caper?



No.



Why not? Because it didn't have Jim Henson. Which is really sad, but Jim's dead, and there's no getting around that fact--much in the same way I imagine Apple products will be hurt on the whole in the future. Some people (including my friend Jared Whitley, who offers an excellent counterpoint to many gushing reviews) didn't care for the film, but I feel like it all depends on what your measuring scale is. If you're stacking it up against the originals, you're bound for disappointment. In a conversation with my agent ahead of time, he'd prepared me for this--and I was happy to have the heads up. It tempered my expectations some.



Yes, the cameos could have been better. Yes, some of the original songs were relied on a tad too heavily, but in the end, this was a great Muppet movie. Not the best one. Not even the second best one. But a solid entry in the series. It wasn't a Muppets from Space, and for that, I think we can all be grateful. The Muppet movies had abandoned the original content stories in favor of retellings of familiar tales (Treasure Island, Christmas Carol, Wizard of Oz)--with Space being the one (failed) exception.



This film corrects that trajectory. Better yet, it's already made more money than Muppets from Space--even after adjusting for inflation. It doubled the opening of the next biggest Muppet opening (Treasure Island), and I'd say it's on track to easily pass all other Muppet movies except the first, in terms of total earnings in the box office.



That's great, if you're a Muppet fan--even if you're a Muppet fan who didn't care for this movie. It means more Muppets are on the way. Heck, it beat the Smurfs, and that's already been green lit for a sequel. Who knows--we might even get some new TV episodes out of this. Or at least more webisodes.



But I need to wrap this up. Should you see this movie? Yes you should. My kids loved it, I had a great time, and it's just a big ol' warm fuzzy. Three and a half stars for me.



What did you think?

Driving Back to Maine

 Me here. Still in Pennsylvania. I'm just finishing up packing, and then I have to drive eight or nine hours (depending on traffic) back to Maine. I love coming down to visit, but the drive isn't my favorite thing in the world. Still, there are perks. Audio books help (Denisa and I are "reading" Enchantment, by Orson Scott Card. Really enjoying it--and I have to say it's a whole different experience now than when I read it the first time. Then, I was just back from my mission, and I hadn't met Denisa yet. Now, I've been married to her for over ten years. My views of Russia and linguistics have really changed (go figure). When I read it the first time, I certainly had no idea that I'd end up having such a stronger connection to that part of the world.



We'll also be able to listen to Christmas music now, which is a fun way to while away the hours. Unless you're trapped in Walmart and forced to listen to it. Then, not so much.



Anyway--wish me luck, everybody.

Various Things I'm Thankful For

I'm taking off the weekend to . . . you know--have a holiday. Maybe eat too much turkey. Definitely eat too much pie. It's good to have basic goals in life, right? So you won't see any blog posts from me for the next few days. But I thought I'd take a moment today to do something similar to what it seems everyone and his brother has been blogging about all month: run down a list of some of the things I'm thankful for. There's plenty to be happy about these days.




My wife--My life would really kind of stink without her. But if I remind her about that too much, I end up having to vacuum more often. Choosing who to marry has a drastic impact on your life--much more than you often realize when you get married. I'm really thankful that I somehow managed to con this fantastic woman into thinking I was a catch.
My kids--TRC and DC are really some of the best behaved children I know. Obviously I'm biased, but hey--why can't a dad brag about his brood now and then? They're obedient, quiet when asked, smart, funny, and talented. They're a lot of fun to be around.
My house--The more work I put into it, the happier I am with it. In many ways, it feels like another family relationship. Sure, it still has some issues (lots of issues), but so do I, and I'd like to think people love me in spite of those issues, the same way I love my house, drafts and all.
Mouse traps--This is related to the house. If it weren't for mouse traps, I'd have to get a cat. And we don't want that, my precious. We hates cats. Filthy little kittenses.
Netflix--Until this lovely invention, my life was filled with DVD purchases and overpriced rentals. Even with the increase in price, I still love this service. I've had the Kool-aid, my friends. And it is sweet.
Snow days--I'm on vacation, but I don't have to take it as vacation. Why? Because it's snowing a foot in Maine (not where I am). And they closed campus for the day. Which means that when I get back, I'll get to take another vacation day on a day of my choosing, since I sort of have to use some vacation up before the end of the year, or I lose it. How cool is that?
My church family--Living in Maine wouldn't be nearly as much fun as it is if it weren't for all the wicked nice people I've met since moving there. I've made some really strong friends in my church, and they've come to feel like my family up there in a way that I've never really felt about church people. We look out for each other. People ask me how I can live so far away from the rest of my family--my church is a big reason why that's possible.
Technology--Some people would be happy living without the wonders of technology. Some people would love living the medieval life, or being in the wild west. I'll take my air conditioning, computers, fast cars, gadgets, and modern medicine.


I'm thankful for lots more, of course--but I'm running low on time, and this is getting sappy enough as it is. Have a nice long weekend, everybody. See you on the flip side![image error]

Easy vs Good--An Official Rambling

I've had some thoughts over the past few weeks, and I wanted to get them down on paper. Virtual paper, at least. One of the nice things about being on vacation is that I have more time to think about things and then write about them. Not that I always take the time, but it's nice to know that it's there.



Today's topic? Easy vs. Good. Allow me to explain.



It seems to me that in life, we often choose to do what is easy. Take the path of least resistance. In the short term, there seems to be very few bad effects from this. Say you have to decide between cheating on an exam to get an A, or studying to get a B. Short term, cheating seems like the way to go, hands down. You have a better immediate grade, and all is well with the world. But long term, that easy choice has serious consequences. You're less prepared for the next test, and more likely to need to resort to cheating to succeed at it, too. In turn, that might set you back in an entire discipline. Cheating becomes the norm as you try to keep your grades up. And then sooner or later the real world steps in, and you stop being able to cheat.



But cheating is just a simple example to illustrate a complex problem. Let's get a bit more grandiose. How about the economic crisis facing the world?



In many ways, I think much of the cause of the crisis can be found by our tendency to go along with what is easy by default. The housing bubble caused its fair share of the troubles, for example. And in the years leading up to that crisis, I remember one of the fads of the DIY networks was all about flipping houses. Buy a crappy older home in an expensive area, put in a few thousand dollars of work, sell it for a huge profit. Easy. Simple. And why in the world did this seem like a sure fire thing that would never backfire? Housing prices were going through the roof, and all this flipping of houses certainly wasn't helping. It was inevitable that it would have to burst eventually.



People took out loans they couldn't afford. Why? Because it was easy. Get something for a little now, and who cares about the consequences in the future? The same thing happened with businesses. They wanted regulation--to make things easier. Wall Street wanted to go go go. And then everything turned south, those same people turned to someone--anyone--to look for a bailout. Why? Because it's the easy solution.



And let's go back to the personal level. The same principle applies. Maybe you're trying to decide what major to pick in college. One seems like an easy option--low credit hours, easier path to graduation--but it might have long term drawbacks (bad job outlook, poor salary). At the time, it's very easy to justify the easy choice. You're busy. It would be better to have good grades than a solid degree. Whatever the justification might be.



Say you're raising your children. You're busy. There's a lot going on. It's easier to let your kids watch TV for an hour a day, and what's the harm?



But here's the thing with easy decisions: once you make one, it's easier to make another. So you let your kids watch an hour a day. So what? And then they want to up it to two. Well, that's not a huge difference, so why not let them? And why not three?



Maybe you know a person who's overbearing and no fun to get along with. It's easier just to let that person have his way all the time. But the more you let that person have his way, the less able you'll be to make a stand when you need to.



I don't mean to be preachy here. I'm as at fault for taking the easy choices as the next guy. And what might seem like bad decisions to one person will be perfectly sound decisions to another--so ignore the specific examples in favor of seeing what I'm getting at.



The fact of the matter is that easy choices are not often good choices. Life is all about hard work. Take the idiots in Washington DC. They had a very difficult task in front of them: decide on a compromise of how to manage the debt of the nation. Work together. There was no easy answer--to get a real solution, everyone was going to have to give up something, and no one was going to be happy. But it had to be done. Trust politicians to discover an easy option: do nothing. Throw your hands up and say, "Shucks! I can't figure it out. This was too tough."



Morons.



To solve this problem--and most problems in life--you need to go beyond easy. You need to risk being unpopular and even losing your job. But them's the breaks when you decided you were fit to be one of the leaders of the country.



I suppose what I've been thinking the most about lately is how important it is to stop and look at your life now and then and see if you're doing anything just because it's easy--and if that's still the thing you should be doing. This is NOT something you should do for other people. It's very easy to see what bad decisions other people are making, and it's very easy to decide to step in and fix all of them for them.



Do not do this.



It's difficult to look at your own life and find the bad decisions--and more difficult to fix them. But remember that things that are difficult are most often the things that are also worthwhile. A happy marriage, a thriving family, a successful career, a prosperous country. None of those things appear out of nothing.



So maybe in the end, the decision actually is easy. All you have to do in a situation is look at the relative difficulty of the choices. Gravitate to the more difficult options by default. :-)



Anyone care to chime in? I'd be curious to hear some other thoughts on the matter.



Happy Tuesday, all.