miltownkid.com

If you look at my about page you will see that when I wrote it I didn’t really have a Niche, or set topics for the blog. I pretty much stated that it will be about my personal life and things that I’m into (which can change faster than a speeding bullet changes a head into a splash of red when headshotting mutha fuckas on Rainbox 6: Las Vegas.)

The other day Wife was like “You should have a topic for your blog,” and the funny thing is I was thinking the same thing earlier that day. So I’m going to clean up my category list and have it narrowed down to about 5 things I think. Here they are (number 5 won’t be a big deal for a while.)
« Read the rest of this entry »

I have this hat that I put on when it’s time to clean. I’m actually in the middle of cleaning right now and thought to myself “This would be a nice shot of my cleaning hat,” so I setup the tripod and took the shot.

The reason I had to break out the cleaning hat is my computer room got piled up with my junk because of being invaded by a roommate.

A fellow martial artist that recently moved from Kaoxiong to Taipei was in need of a place to stay, so my junk room got turned into a room for the roomie. Today is day 10 of having a roommate and all is well so far. I don’t think we’ll have any problems because he knows I’ll choke that ass out if he acts a fool (HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!)

Well, here’s the roomie shot:

Roomie is pretty cool. He comes from the land of 1000 lakes (I think that’s what they call it anyway, miltownbro is currently stationed there.) Find out more about Roomie on his MySpace page.

The cleaning hat is left over from a weak ass Halloween costume from 3 years ago.

I was lucky enough to be invited to play a round of golf a couple weeks back and I went out today. The only golfing I did before this was a bit at ranges here and the US, a 3 par course next to Lake Michigan and one round of 9 holes on a public course back in the Mil Town.

The golf scene here is definitely for PIMPS only. The lack of space makes golfing here only available to the higher class (or being friends with friends of such .) A buddy who goes by the name of Hobbes on Forumosa.com got hooked up with some coupons and extended his discount wealth to me because he remembered me posting about golf on the above mentioned website.

The club house was very nice. Big, open, HDTV in one corner (you can see it in the first picture), jade antiques in the other. The whole place was carpeted, the locker rooms had these fancy digital locks. It was all very nice. We also had caddies the whole way that drove us around, helped find the lines for putting and kept my balls clean… (heh.)

I was happy to experience this side of Taiwan. I think it’s something a tad hidden from the average foreign English “here today gone tomorrow” teacher that likes to complain about how muck it sucks living here (and they’re mostly right, it can suck without $$, guanxi, or mojo.)

I took a quick look at my score card and the best I did was double-boogie a few holes, which isn’t too bad considering I haven’t even been to a driving range in over a year (if not two.) I also included all shots (so it’s not a boogie that was tainted with “do-overs.”) I didn’t take my camera out much, but check these shots out.

I did all kinds of crazy stuff during the Chinese New Year Break. Made it to Taizhong (dranks lots of beer), stayed out late dancing (and drinking beer) twice, made it to Wulai (had just one beer, and it was good), played video games, played my new board game (I’ll post about it, it’s the hot shit), got a roommate, all kinds of shiznit.

I’ll write a bit about all that tomorrow and throw up some more photos.

I hadn’t really given the idea of going to school in Taiwan much thought after I decided that I wasn’t interested in taking classes in Mandarin. The idea was alluring at first because it would have been somewhat “elite”, but after thinking about it for a bit, the added stress of doing a degree in a second language wouldn’t be worth how much I could brag about it.

Thanks to a chance meeting of a new friend I found out NCCU offers an undergratuate degree in economics taught in English. I was very pleased to find out about this. Also, the (regular) admission period for fall of 2007 is March 1st til April 30th, so if I beat feet I can be a student this year.

I thought I’d write a quick blurb about this in case the information would help anyone else out. I also found a PDF from the Study in Taiwan.org website that has a gaggle of Taiwan info on colleges and consulates. I’d recommend downloading it and keeping it for a rainy day. (Taiwan Programs Taught in English PDF)

I’ve had to restrain myself from writing about this for the last couple months. The reason why is I hadn’t yet gotten close to a solution to the health care “problem.” I started my quest for the perfect health care system by starting a thread on Forumosa.com “Why Do You Think Universal Health Care Is/Isn’t A Good Idea?” I admit that I started the thread with my mind made up already: Universal health care is not economically sound, thus I didn’t think it was a sound solution.

Here’s a clip from my first post:

Finding a healthy model for health care would greatly improve the quality of life for all parties in a society (the rich, the poor, the fat and the skinny.) Is a Universal Health Care System the one? Why or why not?

And here’s excerpt from closer to the last page (8th at the time of posting this):

Some people will get cancer and will have have their leg cut off (because that’s what they can afford.) Others will get cancer and will be able to get the best treatment by the finest doctors on the planet (because that’s what they can afford.) Some might not be able to afford to battle it very long, those people should be able to approach organizations that our out to help individuals like this, I don’t think the government should be one of those.

It appears that I’m being ruthless, but I’m not. I’m mearly telling it the way I think it is. Anyhow, my stance is still of one that doesn’t agree with the idea of “Universal” health care.

I want a system that holds people accountable for the things they do that affect their health. Anyhow, I wanted to share an article I came across written by an economist that lays out a health care plan for the US the sounds pretty fuckin’ sweet to me.

The Five Big Questions about Health Care – By Arnold Kling

American health care reformers face five key questions.

1. What will we do about the large projected deficit in Medicare?
2. What can we do to reduce government subsidies for extravagant use of medical procedures with high costs and low benefits?
3. What should we do about the health care needs of the very poor?
4. What should we do about the health care needs of the very sick?
5. What should we do about a scenario in which both income inequality and the share of average income devoted to health care rise sharply?

Both the left and the right have offered answers to these five questions that are at best incomplete. In this essay, I want to try to deal with all five of them.

[Continue the aritcle here]

If you’re interested in the topic, I think you’ll like the article.