Friends Forever?

Dearest Blog Reader;

I hope that this finds you doing well. I am fine. The weather was a bit cold, then warm but windy and stormy, now cold and windy and snowy. As a result, training for the early May ride about, came inside to the stationary bike. It was either that or do my best abominable snowman wicked witch of the West impersonation. That is just too much role playing with riding my bike at the same time.

Thanks to everyone who has started to save their pennies for supporting me in the Cover Indiana bike ride;  Even better, I am getting word of some really good ice cream flavor suggestions. Vanilla, French vanilla, homemade vanilla, all natural vanilla, Neapolitan, cookies and cream, butter pecan, moose tracks, chocolate champion, double strawberry, birthday party, banana split, monster cookie, peanut butter panic; those are the flavors from one company. So many flavors yet so little time, we may have to extend the tour of Indiana. I will keep giving updates. If none of this makes sense, please read last week’s blog. It will all make sense then. Miss a week; you miss a lot.

I have struggled with the Monti Te’o. Do I write about him? Is there anything else to be added? Was he telling the truth? Is he an idiot? Is he just naïve? Is he a big faker; a hoaxer? I have heard it all. “That’s impossible.” “I believe him.” “It could happen.”

It appears that the Couric interview allowed the public opinion jury to come in. A Purdue professor said that based on his facial expressions Monti Te’o was telling the truth when being interviewed on Katie’s show. Monti was genuinely hood winked says non-tenured assistant professor Chris Krowel. That settles it. The Dr has spoken. He uses technology to measure muscle micro movements. I am impressed. This scholar of retail sciences actually measured how believable Monti’s facial expressions appeared to people who believe that Alec Baldwin is really just a misunderstood boob who can actually laugh at his bad behavior. Monti is believable to people who believe Lindsey Lohan is prepared to turn her life around. The same people who believe Peyton Manning actually sets Pappa John’s sales promotional strategies, believe Monti when he says that he was the victim of a horrible prank.

In a side note, Dr. Krowel can now use this sarcastic endorsement in his curriculum vitae on his way to tenure. Way to go Doc.

Fine! I get it. The masses have spoken. Monti (can I call you Monti) was the victim of a cruel hoax. He was in love. He was in love with a cruel and manipulative man/woman; which to me is even sadder than if he had been a perpetrator of this mess. Monti may be the poster child to generation C; the connected generation. Youse guys are connected via your smart phones, tables, laptops, twitter, facebook, you tube. You are hip, happening, and in the know about everything. You know the what, how, when to who almost before who does. You can face time, skype, with people from around the world for a little bit of nothing and more minutes on your data plan.

You can order tickets, check your homework, take your tests, find out what your friends are wearing to school, learn about tornados, crime, or gun toting, rampaging homicidal school shooting crazies. All of it received, processed, and believed instantly.

You are  CONNECTED!!!!!

The problem is what you are connected to is not experienced. The warning of Monti’s “experience” is that something is lost when it is not touched, wrestled, grieved, and lived. How can a romance be lived without touch? How can great loss be lived without sudden separation? How can love be lived without connection? They had a “romance” and never touched. He “lost” his true love and never participated in any ceremonies of grief; no reaching out to other survivors to share the burdens of grief.

Gene Roddenberry, that soothsayer who gave us Star Trek and thereby such great future insights like cell phones that flipped open like a “communicator”, tried to warn us in one of his episodes. In the Gamesters of Triskelion Captain Kirk and company came upon this collective consciousness that did away with bodies a few millennia before the Enterprise’s arrival. The collective kept a few tractor beams around grab Kirk and some crew and have them do battle to provide stimulus for their oversized brains. Read it in Wikipedia. It’s all there.

The point being. . .  Well I’m not quite sure. Oh yeah. It is better to experience life. Connectedness is messy. It will hurt. There will be discomfort. But it will be a bit easier to know the hoax when you see it.

Take care.

Roger.

 

 

This just in from Dr Chris Krowel, non-tenured assistant Purdue Professor. "this man has no micro muscles to move. No one believes him.