Tuesday, February 14, 2023

Getting on soapbox about the events from last 24 hours

I'm getting on my soapbox to put thoughts and feelings into words about what happened in the last 24 hours at MSU. These are my thoughts and my feelings.


My heart is broken for those who are no longer with us and those who were injured. My heart is broken for the MSU students and the East Lansing community. What happened last night shut down MSU and many nearby school districts. An action of one person has not only affected lives directly by their actions, but also so many other people.

This person was a coward. They did what they did to defenseless students who were going about their day. This person likely had no connection to any of the students or the university. This person has now made a name for themselves in the growing list of cowards who have done the same thing.

I'm thankful for the fast response the local police had in responding to the situation. I'm thankful many of the police from nearby cities helped respond to the situation. Their fast response likely helped prevent more people from getting hurt from this coward.

As the day went on today, my sorrow started to turn to anger. I'm angry this coward did what he did. I'm angry shootings like this are becoming more frequent across the USA. I'm angry there hasn't been more done to help stop these from happening. Schools now go through active shooter drills, just like they do for tornado and fires. Law enforcement now go through active shooter drills to help better respond to situations like this. We're working backwards and dealing with the effects of this instead of working on the cause of it.

I'm angry about the amount of attention the press gives cowards like this. They don't deserve it. I have found there is more press about this coward than there has been talking about those who were directly impacted from this. I understand many families don't want the spotlight on them in times like this. There still needs to be a better way for the press to do their job in situations like this though.

We as a country need to do better. We need to be better. Other countries don't have this happening as often as we do. What makes us so unfortunately special out of all the other countries in the world? Why haven't we tried to learn from other countries about how to prevent this from happening, time and time again? It's obvious, one of the largest and smartest countries in the world is missing something these other countries are doing.

I'm getting off my soapbox now. Being able to put my thoughts into words has helped some in making sense of everything that has happened within the last 24 hours.

Thursday, April 25, 2019

2019 Small Goals: Early Bedtime (UPDATE)

It's been awhile since I set the goal of getting to bed early each night. There was major progress with this goal overall. Having the alarm set on my phone has definitely helped. Not every night was a success though. A few nights I was working on something or watching a movie when the alarm went off and dismissed it. There were also nights where I was already in bed, sleeping when I had to wake up to turn the alarm off. I really do like the reminder though of when the alarm goes off, I should be in bed getting ready for sleep.

OVERALL: I will still keep the alarm set on my phone to continue to help get me used to what time I should be getting to bed. On those nights where I know I will be sleeping before the alarm goes off, I'll still keep the alarm set. Knowing how I am, chances are I would forget to reset the alarm and end up staying up later than I should be.

Since this goal has been going well and slowly becoming part of my daily life, it's time to select a new goal.

One thing I know I need to get better about is remembering to take a multi-vitamin every day. I know the benefits of taking one. That isn't the problem for me. The problem is actually remembering to take it. I'll go into more details on another blog post of why I made this a goal and how I plan on making it happen.

Here's to a successful 2019!