I'm A Slacker

I just realized it's been at least two weeks, if not more, since my last blog post. Not like I ever share anything important anyway

Song of the Day:

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So I have three topics that I hope I don't rant too much about. First one will be the book I finished reading the other day, Zeitoun. This novel is a work of nonfiction revolving around the events that happened to a Muslim family before, during, and after Hurricane Katrina. I simply cannot properly express my complete and utter outrage at not only the prejudices this family had to face, but also at how inept our country was at dealing with such a major disaster. I'm going to cover a few points that really got on my nerves, which are spoilers, so I shall put them in tags for those who would rather go into the book without knowing what exactly occurs.

Spoiler: Rant

First off, Zeitoun's wife is an American who converted her religion to Muslim, and yet everyone still gives her a lot of flak for it throughout the book. Zeitoun's painting and construction business used a rainbow as their logo, and some people immediately stopped going to them ever since because they didn't want to be associated with anything remotely homosexual. Then after the hurricane hits and devastates the city, and the water already has flooded the city, Zeitoun goes out (the rest of his family left before the hurricane hit, but he wanted to stay behind because New Orleans hadn't seen a hurricane of this ferocity before) in a canoe he had purchased and comes across a heavyset woman who needs help, but won't fit in his canoe. He goes to seek help and runs across a small platoon of military boats going by. They ignore his pleas that the woman needs help and just completely go by him. How can anyone just disregard this?!

After reports were getting leaked about the city descending into a state of complete anarchy, the military forces present in the city seemed to really go crazy. In a section of the book, he had gone by a staging area on dry ground where a lot of dogs who were now strays because their owners didn't take them during the citywide evacuation, were hanging around. They hadn't gone feral, weren't aggressive, and yet when he returns to the same location later on, he finds that all of them had been shot multiple times. This just sickens me. And the reports that were coming out about the unfortunate individuals trapped in the Super Dome... I can't even word on here how awful and disgusting some of what happened in there, as it isn't exactly site appropriate. Later in the book, he's in one of the houses that he owns with some of his friends and one acquaintance who has been stopping there to use the only working phone that they all knew of, when a mishmash group of soldiers from different military groups arrest them. There was no reading of the Miranda Rights, and the soldiers were far more aggressive and rough than the situation called for. They get brought to a makeshift prison that was originally a bus station, given a trial where they had no lawyers to represent them, and were accused of being terrorists. There were two Syrians and two Americans in the group. They had everything confiscated from them, even their clothing, and were strip searched. One of the Syrians, fearing that with the hurricane hitting would make anything regarding his bank account difficult, withdrew the $100,000 he had in his life savings. They took all of that, and he never saw it again, nor was any reparation made for potential damages. They got thrown into small cages, where the only structure is the large metal railing that the buses park in front of. If any of the prisoners misbehave, they get doused with pepper spray, which can start to burn and blister the skin if left unwashed. It starts to get to the point where the guards stop washing it off, then eventually they start using beanbag shotguns. From here, they get taken to a maximum security prison. One of the stories they had learned about is that one of the people that had been taken here was an elderly woman in her 70's. She had been staying with her husband in New Orleans, they heard about the hurricane, and rented a motel room on high ground. After the hurricane had already hit, she went to bring up some food from their car. She has the food, closes the door of the car and locks it, and military personnel are right there to arrest her for looting a grocery store that was broken into nearby.

There are just so many things throughout this book that make you lose so much faith in humanity... I should stop this present rant and move on.

Second topic for today: I went on a nice hike with my parents and dog. Unfortunately, I didn't think to bring my camera, because there were some really nice views and scenery. Definitely wore me out though.

Third topic: The third season of the TV show Face Off premiered tonight! I love this show, and have been watching it since the first season. If you don't know it, the show focuses around a group of up and coming movie makeup and costume designers who are given a series of challenges until one wins it all. They have short challenges, usually judged by a major celebrity guest, that the winner of is granted immunity from elimination during the main challenge. Then there is the Spotlight Challenge, which is the main event of the show. In this one, they are given a subject and need to design a costume and makeup for it. Tonight's main challenge was creating an alien that would fit into a modern day Star Wars Cantina. The winning design will be featured on the Star Wars website, in both original form and a Clone Wars (that new animated Star Wars show) version. Overall, I really like this season's group of contestants. Two of them started to really get on my nerves though, and that's Joe and Tommy. The contestants were assigned to random teams, and these two happened to be on a team. Major drama was had all around. I didn't really like Joe much from the start, but seeing how he acted while on a team really irked me. I really wish that Tommy handled the whole thing better, but he had a meltdown about it in front of the judges. Then, and here's a spoiler,

Spoiler: First contestant gone

Joe just up and left the studio while the judges were making their decisions, and got disqualified!

How unprofessional is that?! Hopefully with them out, the other contestants can work together more cohesively in future team competitions. I give major props to Rod and Laura though. They took time away from their own teams to help out another team that was struggling. Seriously, awesome job on their parts. Faith in humanity isn't completely gone yet.

That's all I have for now. Hopefully this giant thing, rant included, will make up for missing a couple weeks. Good luck with school everypony!