Traffic for 2005 February 19 (entry 0)

(4) Sat Feb 19 2005 12:36 PST People Persons: Traversing the 15 is always an adventure. It rained from Cedar City on. I have honestly never seen it rain that hard in Utah. But luckily there were no accidents and, well, at least it wasn't snow.

Picture it: getting gas in Vegas. A lone French man approaches a Provoite at the pump. In limited English, he explains his dilemma. With no luck, his daughter comes to the aid, but unfortunately, her English is only slightly better than his. I try to explain that I am not from Vegas and don't know where their hotel is, but to no avail. I think the only English word they knew was casino. Nonetheless, I failed them both, and feel terrible about it.

Picture it: We stop off in Barstow around 9 pm at the local DQ. While Susie is in the bathroom, a woman approaches me and asks me where the hennigens is. Do I look like I work in a convenience mart?

Picture it: B-town, Saturday morning, 10 am, raining. A man is walking a dog while his wife is pouring beer in the garden. A woman approaches with a black satchel. She sees the dog, and approaches. She asks the man where the stray animals and children of the neighborhood reside. The man states that he is not from these parts and is pretty sure that there are no "stray children" in the hood. She asks the man about his hometown, and assumes this foreigner from Utah is a minister. She tells him she has no money, but eggs and meat in her satchel for strays. He tries to be polite and brush her aside, and she eventually leaves. Mom, you have weird neighbors.

The moral of these stories is the same: Wierd people naturally gravitate toward me.

A billboard in Vegas goes something like this: "Vasectomy.com: Easier and faster than you ever thought." Who are they kidding?

Lastly, I have been trying to make sense of one of my coworkers. He is a 24 year-old divorcee with a two year-old who met a girl on hotsaints.com who is also a 23 year-old divorcee with a two year-old. Their first date was three weeks ago. They got married yesterday afternoon by the justice of the peace, at 4:30, since he works until 4. His ex had a baby two weeks ago that is not his.

Then I stumbled upon this article, which I think partly makes sense of why Mormons can be like this: Divorce rates in red vs. blue states.

I'm not quite sure the cause-effect the author offers rings true to me. But I think his points have some interesting correlations.

Comments:

Posted by Kristen at Sun Feb 20 2005 15:30

Very interesting article, except what does taxes have to do with marriage, divorce, and education? His reasoning was a stretch. I think that 'religious' people are less tolerant to error, therefore when their imperfect spouse commits a sin or error they divorce them faster. I am interested to see how quality and fidelity play into the stats too.

Also, do you mean Susie is weird?m ;)

Posted by John at Sun Feb 20 2005 18:05

Only for marrying me.

Posted by Kristen at Sun Feb 20 2005 21:10

I also wanted to add that religions tend to encourage couples not to move in with one another pre marriage. So they may not necesarily terminate serious relationships more than those who are living together and break up, but never marry. Stating the obvious.

Posted by Joe Walch at Mon Feb 21 2005 11:57

I suspect that there are some funny number games being played in that article. I further suspect that there are a many other factors that influence those numbers. Why didn't he, for example, compare other blue areas such as California or New Mexico, or the western part of Washington. Also, consider the socioeconomic issues at hand, immigration, per-capita income, and % of people whose parents completed college. Also, how does race play into the picture. I don't think that those blue states have as high a percentage of African Americans as, say Mississippi or Georgia.

The article was a nice rhetorical excercise, but there was no effort to make it a scientific study.

I am the first to admit, however, that Roman Catholics and Jewish people (both traditionaly liberal demographics) do much better than evangelicals when it comes to family values.

As for people who seem to mess up their life like that, some people would say that these people are just not mature, or that they just need a little bit of time to grow up. Perhaps, but there sure are a lot of immature 40 year olds out there. It isn't just limited to teen and tweenagers.

I think that it is part of what Robert Bork calls the "upward invasion of the barbarians." Kids who grew up in a culture in which their every want and need were immediatly satisfied. That instant gratification created a culture of people who are incapable of persevering the rough waters. Hence the billions of dollars going into these websites, diet programs, and other quick-fix programs when what they really need to observe is the good ol' law of the harvest.