Updated 2 years ago
Today, as we sacrifice and consume an ancient relative of the dinosaur processed through an industrial machine, and celebrate a group of religious zealots who fortuitously thrived on the vacant lands of natives decimated by European disease, a time to reflect.
“Thermodynamic miracles… events with odds against so astronomical they’re effectively impossible, like oxygen spontaneously becoming gold. I long to observe such a thing.
And yet, in each human coupling, a thousand million sperm vie for a single egg. Multiply those odds by countless generations, against the odds of your ancestors being alive; meeting; siring this precise son; that exact daughter… Until your mother loves a man she has every reason to hate, and of that union, of the thousand million children competing for fertilization, it was you, only you, that emerged. To distill so specific a form from that chaos of improbability, like turning air to gold… that is the crowning unlikelihood. The thermodynamic miracle.
But…if me, my birth, if that’s a thermodynamic miracle… I mean, you could say that about anybody in the world!.
Yes. Anybody in the world. ..But the world is so full of people, so crowded with these miracles that they become commonplace and we forget… I forget. We gaze continually at the world and it grows dull in our perceptions. Yet seen from another’s vantage point, as if new, it may still take our breath away. Come…dry your eyes. For you are life, rarer than a quark and unpredictable beyond the dreams of Heisenberg; the clay in which the forces that shape all things leave their fingerprints most clearly. Dry your eyes… and let’s go home.”
― Alan Moore, Watchmen
How Thankfulness Rewires Your Brain
https://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/how_gratitude_changes_you_and_your_brain
Random Joke of the Day
Once I saw this guy on a bridge about to jump. I said, “Don’t do it!” He said, “Nobody loves me.” I said, “God loves you. Do you believe in God?”
He said, “Yes.” I said, “Are you a Christian or a Jew?” He said, “A Christian.” I said, “Me, too! Protestant or Catholic?” He said, “Protestant.” I said, “Me, too! What franchise?” He said, “Baptist.” I said, “Me, too! Northern Baptist or Southern Baptist?” He said, “Northern Baptist.” I said, “Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist or Northern Liberal Baptist?”
He said, “Northern Conservative Baptist.” I said, “Me, too! Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region, or Northern Conservative Baptist Eastern Region?” He said, “Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region.” I said, “Me, too!”
Northern Conservative†Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1879, or Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912?” He said, “Northern Conservative Baptist Great Lakes Region Council of 1912.” I said, “Die, heretic!” And I pushed him over.
Reason to give thanks by political affiliation
Liberals: Be Thankful Trump hasn’t started WW3, and that he’ll be out by 2021 with a unified blue Congress
Trump Supporters: Although America was 90% white in the 40s and is sinking every year, be thankful that you are being replaced by superior ethnic groups.
Conservatives: Don’t worry, he’ll be gone, the liberals will go too far, and you’ll be back someday.
