A Quick Post on Freedom

In the United States, we theoretically are blessed with Freedom of Expression, Freedom of Speech, the right to form our own opinions, and the right to be able to write whatever we want to write about on our blogs or post on social media.

I haven’t written anything very opinionated politically in quite sometime, but since I seem to be getting back into doing that a little bit again I thought I would once again make some things clear.

This is my blog. I made it, I write on it, and I put much more time and effort into it than a lot of people realize. I can write (well within reason) just about anything and everything I want. Naturally, being a human being, I will inevitably write something that offends or upsets someone. I most definitely will occasionally share an opinion that others might feel the opposite about. That’s the beauty of blogging in America. We can do that. Hell, that’s kind of what we’re supposed to do anyway. There’d be no such thing as discussion or debate if every single person felt the same way about everything, right?

So please, don’t blow up at me or get too angry if I say something you don’t agree with. You are not going to change my mind so it’d be a big waste of your time trying to convince me otherwise. I will NEVER post anything racist, sexist, or overly controversial on here. There is no need for such hatred and abuse.

Enjoy the freedoms that we have and can take advantage of, because you never know if someday someone will try taking them away from us or our descendants…

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Nike, Colin, and a Head Slap

Michael Jordan said it best.

“Republicans wear sneakers too.”

Nike is a big company that’s been around for a long time. They likely employ some really bright people in all areas of their company. Everybody and their mothers know about the gigantic controversy that Colin Kaepernick caused with the NFL kneeling–a subject I covered quite a bit when I first started this blog. The ramifications were more massive than people realized, and the tremors caused during the aftermath of the kneeling controversy are still being felt to this day.

So naturally, this giant, renowned brand decides to make this controversial figure the name and face of the company during a major ad campaign. And even more naturally, the company is already suffering for it.

When last I checked, over $4.5 million had been shaved off of Nike’s market cap and stock prices were down three bucks a share. I haven’t worn anything Nike in years, but even my Twitter graced the #NikeBoycott hashtag in disgust. I’ve already talked too much about he politics and ethics behind all of this in previous posts, so I will avoid them now. Still, I say that Nike is getting what they just deserve.

It really is bad business. Kaepernick and his kneeling stance caused a lot of damage to the NFL last season, to the point where they were forced to make an about face in their stance in order to win back viewers and even then it still didn’t work as great as they had hoped. Colin Kaepernick does not have a proven track record of being good for any business, let alone one of the biggest brands in sports. The fact that they ignored all this and brought him and his big ass head of hair for their ad campaign is just plain stupidity that deserves punishment. I hope that stock continues to drop until it at least sends the message that he’s not the hero and role model that certain elements of America seem to want to portray him as. Certainly, he is not billboard material. He has slapped way too many people in the face for him to be anywhere near as great as some of the leftist areas of society want him to be.

For the sake of money, which is what businesses are there for, I hope that Nike realizes the mistake they’re making and puts an end to this bullshittery before their stakeholders suffer even more than they already are.

Not How I Wanted the Season to Start…

So, yeah. Michigan lost. To the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. In the first game the two teams have played against each other in several years.

It’s upsetting.

I mean, I half expected it after the first couple of plays. Michigan has a new QB who is very young and inexperienced. Unlike the past few years, this new one doesn’t know how to handle the ball under pressure. The defense was fairly decent but was nowhere near the level of “vaunted” that the announcers continuously referenced throughout the game. And the flags, man…typical Michigan. There was even a targeting rejection at the very beginning of the game. It makes me very nervous as the season gets underway…

Next weekend they play the Western Michigan University Broncos at 9:00am (6am Cali time!!!) and I don’t know how to feel about that. Being a lifelong Wolverines fan but with my heart set on going to WMU, it’s going to be one hell of a game for me. Fortunately those come around only once every few years.

Hopefully Michigan can improve throughout the week…

1500 Followers!

I am pleased to announce that my blog as grown to fifteen-hundred followers! I haven’t been working on it nearly as much as I should, but it’s still so good to see new and old friends keep popping in to read and write the occasional comment. I promise that soon I will be in a position to blog more and get more stuff figured out.

Thanks again for all the love and support, guys.

Hail to the Victors

It’s that time of year again, folks. College football starts today. I never really mentioned it in this blog before, but my family and I are big Michigan fans. Apart from Christmas, there is no better time of year than football season.

There is no cable in the house I’m staying at in California, so I’m trying to find a way to watch the game. Alexis and I will be home in Michigan at the end of September, but I don’t want to go several weeks without being able to watch games.

It’s the first game in years where Michigan is playing Notre Dame. My aunt’s entire family and some of Dad’s friends are all Notre Dame fans, so I’m a little bummed that I can only pay attention to all the banter on Facebook instead of in person. Such is life, I guess.

Anyways, have a great day, CrapPile. Go Blue!

Week 1 Complete!

Technically, the deadline for us to have our final comments for our discussion boards is Sunday night, but I’ve already finished mine and a few extra for good measure, so I am calling it quits for the week.

Words cannot begin to describe how excited I still am and how happy I’ve been since I enrolled in the course almost a month ago. It feels so great to FINALLY be back in school and kicking ass again. Definitely something I should have done a LONG time ago, but alas I can’t go back and give the younger John Siebelink an ass-kicking, but if I could…

For this first week only, we had two discussion boards to do, totally seven paragraphs, as well as three comments per board on classmates’ posts. We also had a quiz on our syllabus that I aced yesterday, and since that is the only thing I have with a grade thus far I have an A in the class!

I know what you’re thinking. It’s only the first week of class. You’d have to be stupid to have less than an A after the first week. That, or just plain laziness. I have no way of knowing how many students are in my class, but the discussion board does allow us to see how many participants there are on each one. So far the second, longer DB has about half of the participants (not including our professor) who have posted, and tonight is the deadline for it. One of the cardinal sins of doing homework is waiting until the last second to do it. I sure hope my classmates don’t have computer or internet problems as they squeeze words out during the next couple of hours. I got both of mine done within the first two days and have been able to breathe easy ever since. Hell, I don’t even think I was stressed one bit to begin with.

Then again, I do have that horrible C- staring at me from my transcript from long ago…that’s enough to drive any hard-working student crazy.

The Forum Post of An Hour

Actually, more like several hours.

For my 101 class, every week we will have a major forum discussion to complete. To get the semester really started, though, our professor assigned the class TWO for the first week. I very easily completed the first last night, but as of a few minutes ago only one other classmate had done his introduction. I responded to it, getting one of my three required responses out of the way for the first discussion. Alexis had to go into work for a meeting, so I used the quiet to start work on the second forum topic of the week–an analysis of Kate Chopin’s “The Story of An Hour.”

I jumped into it with extreme vigor. My class was very fortunate that it is only a flash fiction piece instead of a full-length story, otherwise I could easily see some people not getting the second assignment done. After my several readings, though, I have to wonder if Chopin wrote the story with freshman composition students in mind. Even my first skimming pointed out several literary elements just staring up at me from the page, so I did not even have to go digging for pieces to write about.

I’m taking a break from my research so that I can hit up the gym with Alexis when she gets home, but hopefully by the end of the night I can have the majority–if not all of–my post completed. It’s not due until late Thursday night, but still. Getting into procrastinating habits is something I flat out refuse to do. I plan on making sure that my passion for the subject shines through in everything that I do, and I’m hoping that any classmates of mine who are struggling can get some inspiration from this tenth-year freshman and his work.

Besides, writing and reading are both just plain fun.