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Frank Drebin

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Everything posted by Frank Drebin

  1. There have always been and always will be plenty of bad things to worry about. Prior couple generations to me had the great depression, dust bowl, world war, literal starvation, civil rights and racial strife, nuclear war drills, polio, possibility of getting drafted and sent to ‘Nam, etc.
  2. Would definitely help solve the obesity crisis in America. You can't eat or drink double the amount of calories you burn, you won't be as fat.
  3. In the USA, parents try way too hard to fend off anything negative or challenging for their kids. They don't want them to get hurt, lose in a sports game or even walk alone to school without a tracker. She talks about mothers of college-aged women tracking their daughter's periods on iphone apps. Crazy shit. Those "bulldozer parents" are causing serious mental damage to their children instead of keeping them "safe". One reason she hypothesizes for this change is parents have less kids than they used to. So they hyperfocus on the ones they did have. My grandparents had 5 kids. They could not micromanage their lives. There was not enough time. Also, in the book she mentions an instance of a kid's cat dying, and then sending the kid to therapy to "deal with it". She discusses that therapy has been traditionally been seen as a zero downside deal. At best, it might help, at worst, it kinda does nothing. She's challenging that notion that it can have negative side effects. What Shrier harps on in the book is iatrogenesis. Meaning harm brought forth BY the healer. She’s merely suggesting that by introducing therapy or a therapeutic approach to deal with very regular childhood dilemma causes more harm than good. Our kids are getting more and more therapy than they ever have, and not so coincidentally, they have the worst mental health they’ve ever had. This generation of kids is more anxious and less able to do for themselves than any generation before.
  4. Fast food is not cheap these days. Other than occasional Chic Fil A, the cost plus the calories make it really easy to skip for me. I can literally order a pound of chicken fajitas that comes with sides for pretty close to the cost of Whataburger to feed our family of four. And with the fajitas, there is usually enough rice, beans, and tortillas left over (and sometimes chicken), where I can get a couple work lunches out of it.
  5. I have read her book on this issue. I don't think this book has anything to do with the woke versus non-woke culture wars.
  6. She says that over-focusing on ones own emotional state, which is championed by therapists, Social Emotional Learning advocates, and modern school counselors, leads to more instances of anxiety, emotional weakness, and depression. It's a concern about where we tell kids to focus, inwardly vs outwardly, in a way. By ruminating on "our feelings" too long or too much, we give them more power over us, not less. We feel more helpless and anxious through this self-focus. She makes the argument that therapy is an intervention needed for people with real issues, but when applied to otherwise "normal" kids, we actually can and do cause harm. We've turned every parent into a "mini-therapist", every kid gets a diagnosis, resulting in over-intervention in our kids otherwise normal emotional development, and stunting their ability to deal themselves with negative emotions in a healthy way. She didn't say this, but it reminded me of the classic parable of the butterfly, where the kid can't stand to see the butterfly struggle, so they help it out of the cocoon, only to watch it die from lack of wing strength.
  7. And homes. The average home size in the 1950s was around 1,000 SF. Now you have much larger homes and much smaller families.
  8. Abigail Shrier just wrote a book relevant to this. I know she is controversial for her other book and takes related to LGBTQ, but her new book has nothing to do with it and makes a lot of points parents should ponder. The book dives into trying to figure out why kids are having so many mental health problems, when there are so many resources devoted to improving mental health outcomes. Anxiety, depression, suicide, etc are all higher than they've ever been with kids, even though their lives are arguably better than ever before. It just doesn't make sense. A few key takeaways from the book: A constant attention on how kids are "feeling" or "thinking" is causing negative outcomes. Constantly ruminating on your emotions and how you feel negatively impacts your mental health. If all you do is focus on your emotions, you are destined to be anxious or depressed. We incessantly ask kids how they're feeling, if they're happy, how their mental health is, etc, and this is creating kids who think they're fragile instead of resilient. Trying to solve every problem for kids has caused a generation who can't do anything for themselves. Earlier generations were told to "suck it up" or "you'll live" or "rub some dirt on it" all the time. Many of us came to the conclusion this is "bad parenting" because our feelings were neglected, and we vowed not to do this to our own children. Because of that, kids immediately over-dramatize everything that happens to them, making mountains out of molehills, and thinking the world must revolve around their emotions and feelings. You develop confidence and strong mental health by doing things, not by thinking or via therapy. You can't think your way out of anxiety. You don't gain confidence by analysis of your thoughts or mental health issues. You gain confidence and eliminate anxiety by doing gradually more difficult tasks, excelling at them, and realizing you are a competent, capable person. The non-stop attention therapy gives to these small, common emotions we all feel blows them out of proportion to their seriousness (not talking about genuine disorders here, just normal anxieties that millions of people go to therapy to try to avoid). One of the best ways to decrease your happiness is to chase it. Our society constantly tells kids they should be "happy" and asks them if they are. Happiness isn't a state you should be in 24/7. That's not realistic. Joy and bliss aren't permanent states - they are fleeting. Contentment, stillness, and being even-keeled are much better goals to aim for mentally. The happiest, most well adjusted kids come from families with loving parents that have rules and structure for the household. Constantly surveying school-age kids about their mental health causes more issues than it solves. Mental health resources is big money. Districts need to validate all the resources allocated towards mental health, and they often do that via surveys. Asking kids non-stop questions like: - Have you thought about self harm? - Have you thought about suicide? - Have you been so anxious you can't get out of bed? Etc, etc puts into their heads the idea that themselves, or many of their peers are broken and cannot function properly in the real world. It normalizes situations that would be incredibly rare at any other time in history.
  9. FSU must have been like this to Clemson:
  10. I think it will increase traffic congestion in cities. Unless the rail is somehow going to be elevated.
  11. https://revel.realestate/agents/amy-stevens/
  12. Everywhere decent in Houston is expensive. Garden Oaks used to be a little hidden gem you could get in relatively inexpensive. Those days probably ended a decade ago. I bought my house in Afton Oaks almost 20 years ago. It was pretty reasonable back then as was Briar Grove. Not so much now. West U has been expensive forever. So has Tanglewood.
  13. I agree with you. I don't care about "hunting" exotics. It just has never interested me. Purely meat hunts for me and I really, really like Axis, Red Deer, and Nilgai meat (along with Elk they are my favorite -- I get Elk meat from friends who hunt them out West). I have shot Axis and Nilgai at night using a Q Beam. So I agree, it is not hunting. I harvest/kill exotics for the protein. I always have a freezer full of axis, elk, red deer, and/or nilgai because I basically eat it for lunch every day either in a stew, pasta sauce with veggies, or chili. I love the stuff. And it is much better for my arteries than store bought beef. And don't get me started on Aoudad. I have been at hill country places infested with those things. If I owned one of those places, I would rent a helicopter and shoot every single one.
  14. Yep. And I think Rhinos. I don't want exotics on our place. I like native species. But I am glad other people have them. And I sure love going to shoot an Axis or Nilgai for the meat.
  15. Texas game ranches are like a life raft to many Asian and African species.
  16. How were the lift lines at the Colorado resorts during spring break? At Whitefish, I think the longest wait I had was about one minute. Probably the most I have ever skied in a week given I was not stuck in lines. Grew up skiing Breck where we had a house, and during holidays and spring break, the lines were brutal. Would often just use singles line back then.
  17. I am sure you enjoy that two hour, 5 mile drive.
  18. There is a lawyer I know in Houston who pulled this trying to kill his unborn child. He got caught by his wife and the child was okay. He is in jail and is in process of losing his license. He’s lucky the child didn’t die.
  19. I’m guessing plenty of people feel California’s state leadership is horrible also. Opinions are going to vary. I think California is wonderful if you’re a 9 figure type. And probably one of the best states for deadbeats who don’t want to work much. For those in between, it would be tough.
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