"There are two kinds of people in this world"

Yes, it's true.  There are actually only two kinds of people in this world.

You've seen it before on every Facebook feed and internet meme that has ever reached your eyes.

You've likely seen a "There are two kinds of people in this world" feed for the following:

• Those who are armed, and those who aren't
• Those who save money, and those who spend money
• Those who drink Coke, and those who drink Pepsi
• Those who love mornings, and those who hate them
• Those who use Apples, and those who use PCs.
• Those who own a car, and those who own a bike
• Those who believe the Earth is sphere, and those that think it is flat

Every single one of these points is a fallacy of some sort, making it mostly wrong.

I could be hilarious and say there are two kinds of people in this world, those who think there are two kinds of people in this world, and those who think there are many kinds of people in this world, but even that's not true.  Someone has almost certainly said this, somewhere, at some point, so I won't try to confirm.

There are of course many different kinds of people in this world.  People who use the "two types of people" argument do so because they've heard it before and it's catchy, but it's incredibly simplistic. 

Of course, I'm not some omniscient, omnipresent god, so I don't actually know with 100% certainty that what I'm saying is true, but the two kinds of people argument sounds ridiculous, and to some people it makes them think the speaker is a moron.  Likely, Bill O'Reilly has used the argument countless number of times, and he's a disaster of a human being, so there you go.

Understand that there are people who drive cars AND bikes, AND trucks.  There are people who drink Coke AND Pepsi.  There are people who use Apples AND PCs.  Get it?

My recommendation is to stop using the "two kinds of people" argument so you don't look and sound dumb.

Dilbert Cartoons translated to Chinese

When I lived in Taipei I used to read the comics in Chinese, and sort of missed the humorous language lessons I got out of it.

So a while back I translated these for fun.  They're some of my favourite clips by Scott Adams.

All credit goes to him for making these great comics.

Source:  http://blog.dilbert.com/

Love this one.

Apologies for the small characters.

Memorizing some of the phrase structure is a great way to spice up your Mandarin!

Millennials Learn from the Best

Social media posts about overly entitled millennials are on the rise in my Facebook feed, which is undeniably the best source of information about millennials and their pathetic overly entitled existence.

I being a millennial (cusp of GenY), take offense to this, mostly because I would not describe myself as being overly entitled.  In fact, I hate bothering people.  I hate being a bother so much that I'll struggle to get something done myself, often falling behind or failing miserably.  Lesson learned.

If I cannot get a veggie option of my favourite breakfast sandwich, I'll buy a tuna sandwich, because who gives a flying &%#$ if I can't eat my favourite breakfast sandwich every day.  If there's no WIFI on my 3 hour flight, what do I care?  Some people may care more, but those people are just more demanding, likely because of a demanding upbringing.

Being the way I am, I can only thank my Baby Boomer elders who conditioned me and everyone my age to be the way we are.

Having said that, regardless of what generation people belong to, they can thank the previous generation for being the way they are.  Laying blame is pointless.  If an older generation has a problem with the way a younger generation acts, they can consider themselves failures because they brought us up.  If a younger generation has a problem with an older generation, they can also thank an even older generation (likely long gone) for setting the bar so low.

Using this robust logic, it becomes very clear that millennials (and others) are the way they are due to the previous generations of world class citizens.  It's no one's fault really, or it's everyone's fault.

Either way, it is impossible to lay blame for anyone being the way they are, end of discussion.

Always Make an Even Number of Mistakes When Daytrading

Recently I was surprised when I decided to short gold by investing in DUST, the 3x Exchange-Traded Fund that is the inverse of NUGT.  For those unfamiliar with both, I'll give you the low-down.

When you think there is uncertainty or fear surrounding the market, people tend to move their assets into gold.  Gold goes up when the markets do badly.  For some reason unknown to me, people feel safe with gold when the markets could or are going sour.

Now, when people have confidence in the market, they sell gold and buy other assets.  For people playing the DUST/NUGT game, this means buying DUST.  DUST is confidence.  It means you expect the DJIA, S&P500, and a whole bunch of other capitalist money laundering organisations to do very well.

So in short, buy NUGT when you fear the worst, and buy DUST when you fear nothing.

Now, on the eve of the 2016 US Election between Clinton and Trump, I was very confident that Clinton would win, and I associated Clinton winning with stability.  I was wrong TWICE, and it ended up making me money.  Here is how:

First, I thought Clinton would win.  I thought Americans were happy with the state of their country.  I didn't realise more Americans preferred the admittedly atheist and in my opinion, a closet case liberal with a hidden agenda that I'm sure will surprise us before long.

Second, I didn't think Trump winning would bring confidence to the market the way it did.  I thought Clinton would help bring stability to the market, but apparently the market was adequately pacified by Trump's victory speech.  Who would have thought.

When I told a friend and a financial planner acquaintance that I shorted NUGT before the election, they both laughed and thought I was crazy.  I thought they were right, too.  It was stupid to short gold, I thought.  The day of the election my stock, DUST, went down 5%, and that night I could see it declining further in aftermarket trading.  It went down a further 8%.  I thought that I would just keep my position and wait for the rebound, and I got lucky because rebound it did.

The day after the election DUST took off and ended the day up over 24%, and then the next day it went up 25%.  I normally would sell off after a surge like a single day of 24% gains, but I found myself in the bathroom at the wrong time and missed the sell deadline, which led to a good day the next day.

Now, the whole thing makes very little sense because if the markets truly are tanking, what will gold do?  It isn't useful except to sell because it is shiny and sounds blingy.  You can't eat it, nor can you build a house with it.  It doesn't fuel our cars, or combine with any other element to create water. Now, a ETF in water makes way more sense.

So let that be a lesson.  Make two mistakes and they cancel each other out.  Make a single mistake and you'll pay dearly.

How to Enhance Your Resume Using the Chinese Zodiak

According to traditional Chinese legend, 1980 is the year of the Monkey.  So I'm asking myself, what does this mean and why would anyone believe in such nonsense?  Modern science has absolutely nothing to say about this.  In fact, when questioned about the connection between arbitrary and sometimes imaginary animals and calender years, even the least best scientist, geographers, laughed awkwardly at such a notion.

As fascinating as geographers are, the lights in the GIS lab made me feel ill.  I found some Asian accounting students on my way to a water fountain.  What was I thinking asking them about anything unrelated to math and cute toys.  My tinnitus simultaneously increased and decreased an octave while listening to Asian students talk about something relevant.

But enough with the origins and meaning of this nonsense.  Connections, science, Asian students aside, what is needed now is relevance.  How can anyone actually benefit from this trash?
I examined the contents of each animal's characteristics and determined that my animal sign would look quite remarkable on a resume.

Summary

Motivated individual with strong work ethic.  Able to collaborate with a team or work independently.  Clever and skillful to the point of genius.  Formal training in Microsoft Windows and Office environments, A+ and Microsoft Certified Professional (MCP) credentials.  Practical and given to detail, generally have a low opinion of others.  Prior work and academic experience abroad.  Volunteer experience and linguistic abilities an asset. Best relationships with dragon, rat, and ram.

This seems risky but there is risk involved in anything we do, or don't do.  I would lie but in this case lying would be believable, and that doesn't really satisfy me or a potential employer.  I found most of this information on a disposable place mat, but these characteristics do actually describe my work place skills accurately.  I certainly am clever, and I don't like other people that much.  I also would prefer not being in the company of tigers.  Sure, dragons breathe fire, rats are small, and rams taste better than rats, but tigers use their claws to climb trees, which I find useful to evade nearby tigers.

My logic is undeniable.  This should improve my life by magnitudes of power.  Let the test begin.

Marriage is for normal people, and you aren't normal

Obviously marriage is for everyone, but the word exclusively belongs to Jesus, God, and Christians, as it states numerous times in the bible that Jesus and God made exclusively for Christians.  I won't cite that because according to Christians, it's common knowledge.  People of other faiths such as Islam, Judaism, and Hinduism do not use Christian words because they know how angry and powerful Christians can be.  Not only are they angry but the typical Christian is armed and dangerous; they call themselves "Christian soldiers" for a good reason.

It bothers me that the solution is so simple yet will probably never happen.  People that ARE NOT traditional Christians or celebrities, PAY ATTENTION.

For the love of god, STOP using the word "MARRIAGE" when you want to form a union with your partner.  It pisses off Christians, and that pisses off non-Christians when we have to hear them and their problems on my 24 hours news program or public radio station.

If you want to "marry" someone of the same sex, to make everyone happy, just give Christians what they want; they want the words found in the bible to not be used by non-Christians.  Any non-christian avoid using the word 'marriage' or 'wedding' or 'happiness' or anything that is typically reserved for your traditional Christian wedding.

You can still do what they do, but by calling it something other than what they call it, you'll avoid problems with traditional Christian advocacy groups hunting down your demon children and making them listen to their logical fallacies.  Make up a new word that you can use in place of all the other traditional words that our typical traditional Christian groups think belongs to them.

Once this happens, gay people everywhere will be able to happily get everything they rightfully deserve, without aggravating Christians and hard-core conservatives to the point where they protest and whine and consume valuable electro-magnetic spectrum frequencies and internet bandwidth with their mindless drivel trying to protect something that was probably never created anyway.

 With this in mind, here's my solution to this problem, and this will put a stop to this stupid zombie issue;

• Christians: "Which church should we get married in?
• Non-Christians: "Which lower-case 'T' on pointy building should we do that thing people our age who believe in Jesus and God do when they want to have the same surname..."

Alternatively, one can invent new words for the words that Christian people claim.  This is easier and  recommended.  For example;

• Christians: "Hey, I think we should get married."
• Non-Christians: "Hey, I think we should get G-shnarfed."

This is assessed to be the only hope for non-Christians in their eternal quest to have everything they deserve to have, without offending unreasonable religious folks who can't see past their own vocabulary.

How to Start Smoking and How It Could Benefit Your Life

At some point in your life, you must have wondered why people choose to smoke.  We certainly may think of smokers as wretched, filthy, foul smelling cannibals, as I do, however we often fail to recognise the numerous benefits of cigarette smoking.  If you smoke, you may have wondered why you started smoking, why you still smoke, why others do or don’t smoke, or how to stop.  If you’ve smoked before but quit, what made you do it?  If you’ve never smoked before, but you’d like to start, who can you trust to help you start smoking successfully and responsibly?  These are all questions that, like neutrinos and gamma radiation, cannot stop penetrating my thick exoskeleton every single second of my confusing life.  I'm pretty much sold on the non-smoking movement, but are non-smokers missing out?  Studies show they probably are, and the outlook is especially bleak for committed non-smokers.

Cigarette smoking may have been appealing back before tobacco companies went multi-national and gained brand loyalty the easy way; that is, through explicit advertising of their product to anyone with a soul and lung capacity to boot; through brand recognition using playful images that remind us of inhaling something other than regular air; and through the use of price fixing in the sweet spot somewhere between a family pack of frozen dinners and a small case of beer, so either way you’re not sacrificing your family, right? Since those days however, tobacco companies earn little revenue from tobacco sales, which is why they long ago made a strategic move to buy up the companies that make all the other things those that live in the western world are addicted to. Things like Mach 3 razors, sliced cheese, ‘AA’ batteries, salty snacks, and birth control.  If you need to buy it every two weeks, you bet it’s owned by a cigarette company.

Now that the North American public has decidedly made this a non-smoking continent, cigarette companies have gone abroad to find new markets and left this part of the world a smoke-free wasteland.  They maintain a corporate presence here in various places, employing a few hundred people to smoke at designated smoking areas around cities while mentally consuming other trendy, logo-friendly items, as well as before and during marathons as a form of competitive psychological operations.

With the rise of social media, people are losing the ability to be effective communicators.  This is especially true of non-smokers.  Those who smoke have never lost this ability.  They’re forced outside in the cold to enjoy a cigarette and engage with fellow smokers who have also been forced outside away from the healthy facade of a non-smoking environment full of alcohol, food made in boiling oil, and silent people on their glowing smart phones.  This is where smoking ceases to be a liability.  For some it is indeed an asset.

There are several reasons why a smoker will generally continue to smoke.  I will detail several of them.

• The first reason is 'addiction'.  This is what people will say when they don't know what else to say. Somehow they feel by saying they’re addicted, personal responsibility is cast aside and the cigarette corporations must bear the burden.  This begs the question, who is responsible?  Never mind this for now.  The important thing to remember is that only selfish people will be a ‘dumb’ smoker and become addicted.

• The second reason is 'convenience', and this is why clever people smoke.  It gives them the opportunity to be somewhere other than their present location, at their leisure.  The problem with this reason is that it only takes into consideration their own selfish needs; there is not necessarily a social aspect involved.  It is easy for this type of smoker to become a ‘dumb’ smoker.  Since we are always in our own company, it is much easier to smoke alone than it is to smoke with a friend.  Avoid becoming this kind of smoker by never carrying your pack of cigarettes with you.  Keep a couple of emergency cigarettes at work in a bottle of ibuprofen.  When you need to make your exit it is absolutely socially acceptable and within reason to say that you are going for a cigarette, even while someone is mid-sentence.  When people say to you, “I didn’t know you smoked,” tell them you don’t and leave quickly.

• The third reason is 'strategy', and this is the reason why the most sagacious of all people choose to smoke.  They’re doing it for the social advantage that they long ago recognised gives them some sort of competitive edge over being strictly a non-smoker.  As such, these types of smokers are calculating and ruthless; they have a plan and stick to it.

Almost like clockwork, the strategic type of smoker is able to think about smoking when they realise it would provide some sort of immediate advantage or positive outcome. When a strategic smoker notices someone they’re attracted to may also be attracted to them, and they wish to interact with them elsewhere, possibly away from noise, distractions, or WiFi, they pop a cigarette in their mouth and head for the door, making sure to make eye contact with their target on the way out.  Eye flutter ensures the message is clear.  These people are also able to avoid smoking when it is not necessary, such as when they are stressed out, bored, or having a drink at home (all hallmarks of a 'dumb' smoker).  This type of smoker will -never- smoke alone, and cigarettes disappear from their pack usually in PAIRS; this is crucial to remember.  When this person finds an odd number of cigarettes in the 20 pack they bought, they recognise a problem and promptly punish themselves with a 10k run, unless of course they remember sharing a single cigarette with a friend, which is bonus points and also grounds for a negative 5k run (snack + nap).

The risks that accompany this type of clever, strategic smoker are low to medium.  In some situations, this kind of smoker will attempt to lure someone to them, and that person may adhere strictly to a non-smoking lifestyle.  This is the problem of the luree, as they fail to realise that someone smoking a cigarette alone to get their attention is not a good indicator of a poor lifestyle choice, this individual may simply be trying to make initial contact.  As a result, this also becomes the problem of the lurer, but from a cost-benefit standpoint, it may be avoiding trouble in the future, as someone who adheres to an unwavering non-smoking policy may also have other policies they adhere to that do not warrant adherence.  Over time, everyone will become more aware of strategic smokers, and will seek clarification before simply dismissing the whole idea.

Being a strategic smoker is not always easy, but it is possible to only smoke a couple of packs a year of premium quality tobacco.  Spend the most you can if you’re going to invest in a few packs of cigarettes every year.  People will recognise your good taste and treat you accordingly.  It is important though to not give too many away, so avoid carrying a full pack with you.  Purchase a nice metal cigarette case and keep a few sticks in it.  Keep your strategic smoking habit to social situations only.  DO NOT by any means smoke alone, unless you are anticipating a social situation to arise as a result of your smoking.  If said situation does not occur, reevaluate, as you now smell like smoke and this turns many people off.  Wash your hands well and find some celery, mint, or parsley to munch on as this is always possible at a house party.  Gum only masks the smell of your mouth while your clothes still smell terrible.  It's best to just learn to assess the situation beforehand and avoid having this happen.

If you find yourself having urges to smoke in any situation, just remember that smoking alone is not part of the plan, and could end in you being a full time smoker.  In a worst case scenario, hand over your cigarettes to a friend or roommate and cease all activities related to cigarettes.  Start running increasingly longer distances to train your lungs to send a vomit signal to your brain after long runs.  Punish yourself, you will be thankful later.  Remember, the goal is to enhance your social life, not to give in to selfish urges.

It's good to smoke.