Recently I posted a question on my Facebook page asking all my friends to ask me a question. I was hoping to gain some insight for a subject to write an eBook on, but I ended up getting sillier responses than I was going for. Not wanting to waste awesome questions, I decided to write this post. I titled it “#1” because I can see this happening again in the future.
I want to generate some extra content for my blog! So, if you could ask me to answer any question, what question would you ask me? Feel free to submit multiple questions. I feel like writing.
Question 1 by Ceirra:
OK…so in a ‘sliders’ scenario, what type of alternate universe would you be least excited to see yourself in? What would your ideal universe be?
Interesting Question (and kudos on the Sliders reference!). Honestly I can think of a TON of alternate universes that I would rather not be a part of. The first one that comes to mind is a world where Hitler won the war! I’m not fond of a world where Nazi’s are in control. Also, any world where a swarm of bees has replaced the dog as a household pet. Honestly, i could spend a lot of time listing alternate universes that would really really suck. I’ll list off a couple now:
- Universe where the zombie apocalypse has occurred.
- Any Apocalypse universe really, be it zombie, robot, flooding, holy, or otherwise.
- A Universe where the worst tasting a food is to me, the better it is to everyone else.
- A universe where electricity was never harnessed.
- A universe where outdoor plumbing is preferred.
- A universe where rednecks have all the money and political power.
- A universe where we cant see anything in space past our atmosphere.
- A universe where time travel is as common as an iPod.
- A universe where being cool is a currency.
- A universe where humans are a hive mind.
The list goes on.
As for my ideal universe… It’s rather hard to pick one, because there always seems to be an unforeseen downside (My Friend H could point it out in a heartbeat!). However, if I had to pick one, it would be this. A universe where progress and Advancement toward the betterment of all mankind was held in high esteem.
Think about it. Everybody would be focused on bettering the system instead of the petty arguments we have about who’s system is better. I wish the focus was less on the “self” and more on the “everybody”. For God’s Sake, we barely even think about space travel anymore! It’s all about the money and making yourself into a millionaire. Maybe there needs to be something in place where You can’t be a millionaire on your own, but the part of the system you are working on could become a Billionaire or higher and you would be given credits based on that value.
I don’t know, food for thought.
Question 2 by Candace:
Josh…..was that hanging of mine, Buddha? Lol
This one needs a bit of explanation…
A few years back, my friend Candace lived in an apartment close to mine. One day when I was there for a visit, I commented on a wall hanging she had in her front room. My memory sucks so I can’t remember how the conversation ended up where it ended up, and I don’t want to try just in case I butcher the facts.
The short version is this: She thought the picture on the wall hanging was Buddha and I did not.
My logic went like this. I had, at that time, recently gotten really in to zen and Buddhism teachings. I had read several books and all sorts of articles online. In every one of the things that I read it states that there is no such deity named Buddha. The word Buddha means “Enlightened One” and it is a label given to anyone who has reached enlightenment. A Buddha is a teacher by example. You are to learn from his/her ways in order to achieve enlightenment yourself.
Now here is where I lose all credibility. There was a PERSON named Gautama Buddha! He is considered to be the first Buddha, and in the early stages of Buddhism he was the only one, AND his name was used to label others that had reached enlightenment just like him later on.
So… You COULD say that that wall hanging was a picture of Buddha, but I say otherwise. It may be a depiction of the likeness of Gautama Buddha, but that’s as far as I can take it. I say that it is a picture of A Buddha, an enlightened one, and nothing more. It did look rather nice hanging on her wall though. I was kind of jealous at the time.
In the end this turned out to be a dumb argument between two drunk and possibly stoned friends that we decided to just agree to disagree on.
(but you just had to bring it up again… didn’t you Candace…) lol
Question 3 by Sean:
Tell us you BF4 war stores and the epic tales of the human flash bang! Lol
Oh Sean, you silly boy. You know The Human Flash Bang is just a myth… A legend! But… *sigh* I suppose, if you need a bedtime story I’ll oblige. Submitted for the approval of the Battlefield Society, I call this story…
THE LEGEND OF THE HUMAN FLASH BANG
What Follows are the only three reported, eye witness accounts of The Human Flash Bang and his unusual behaviors:
Stabba Stabba Stabba
Testimonyby T4NKuV3ryMuch
War is hell… Unless you’re playing war on Battlefield 4 that is! It’s all the awesomeness of shooting guns, flying jets, and blowing things up without the pain or death of getting shot. Take a bullet or 12, and all you have to do is use a medkit or press the respawn button. It’s really a great way to unwind and take out stress.
But there is another side to Battlefield… Sometimes you can’t unsee the things you have seen. Sometimes things linger in the mind cause vivid nightmares and tumors later on. Sometimes you see something that just makes NO GOD DANG SENSE that you just can’t move past it. It haunts me to this day… The horror… The horror…
It started out as your typical day on the Battlefield. The Squad Alpha and I and a couple other squads were laying siege against the Dorito Horde (that’s what we call the bad guys, because our targeting cameras show these little reddish-orange triangles over their heads) and trying to take the Golmud Railway. Why anyone would want to take this dusty crap hole as part of their strategy is beyond me, but my rank dictated that I don’t ask such questions.
Being the Tank specialist bad-ass that i am, I decided to roll out with my buddy Blight32 in a M1 Abrams Tank. I love to cause some havoc in a Tank! For a while we were doing really well. We took out a couple of jeeps, an enemy tank, and a Missile truck that was causing hell for our guys at objective Bravo. Blight32 did a great job keeping C4 Soldiers off of me with his trusty Machine Gun. We never could have guessed how it was all going to end.
We had just taken objective Charlie and were heading up to give support to our squad mates at Alpha and Bravo. Heading up a dirt road in the middle of town, we came upon some high walls on either side of us. Then suddenly, BLAM!!!
“RPG on our Left!” I yelled to Blight32 turning my Main Gun toward the source of the smoke trail. That’s when I saw him, but only for a second, The Human Flash Bang himself. No one knows how the legend started, but I believe every word after what happened next.
He ducked behind the wall to our left, but it was soon turned to dust by the hands of my main gun. When the smoke cleared there was no soldier to be found. That soon changed as the soldier jumped out from behind another piece of the wall and fired. Acting quickly I popped the Active Protection shielding I had earned only a few battles back. I was just in time as the RPG Detonated a mere few feet from the tank leaving us unharmed from the attack.
Blight32 took aim with his machine gun and pulled the trigger to end the confrontation. We both thought it was over, but then the soldier did the one thing we never could have predicted… Throwing down his spent Rocket Launcher he took the knife off of his belt… and charged!..
Lucky for him we were in a position that compromised us. When he had charged, he had dropped down off of a hill which put him just below where Blight32’s gun could reach him. Through a hail of gunfire whizzing overhead he ran as fast as he could to the front left of our tank… and began stabbing FURIOUSLY! In the muffled chaos I faintly heard the sound of a crazy-ass soldier saying “Stabba! Stabba! Stabba! I Stabba You! IIIIIIII STABBA YOU!!!”
I was dumbfounded. Blight32 was dumbfounded. We both stared blankly at our screens not knowing what to do with what could only be described at the time as the dumbest thing any soldier has ever done to try and kill a tank! The idiot who tried to blow me up with a grenade launcher a couple months back was using smarter tactics… so I thought.
Unbeknownst to us, in all the commotion and confusion, neither Blight32 nor I noticed the C4 soldier taking this golden opportunity to load up our tank for a trip to the moon. A few seconds into the gloriously confusing words of “I Stabba You”, My screen erupted with fire and the ever familiar words of “You have been killed by [Insert Name Here]” flashed up on my screen… I had been killed. The soldier that had the balls to charge a tank with nothing but a knife, had been a distraction this entire time. He had acted as a Human Flash Bang!
While I never found out his screen name, and still haven’t encountered him since, I still remember the faint sound of his dying laughter before it all went dark. To this day I suffer from nightmarish flashbacks. Images of a man slashing at the shell of a tank and the haunting words “Stabba… Stabba… Stabba…”
Jenkins, Party of One
Testimony by SUPASoldya06
There we were, heavy in the shit. Chaos all around us. Soldiers falling left and right. Grenades everywhere! I wasn’t sure how much more I could take. Three of us had barely survived a tank ready to pop us an explosive suppository. I thought for sure that Fight4Cheetos would be the first to crack, but then Boner422 lead us in to this empty garage to regroup.
We took a second to breathe, and comment on how much of an ugly bug planet it was out there. However, it wasn’t long before we made a plan to take and hold point Charlie. We were just about to roll out, our moral regaining it’s strength, when we heard it. My blood runs cold just thinking about the faint sound about to dart through the door.
“LLLLLEEEEEEEEEERRRRRRROOOOOOOYYYYY JJJEEEEEEENNNNKKKIIINNNSSS!!!”
I turn to the door as my squad mates do the same, just as a lunatic soldier bursts through with his machine gun in hand and starts spraying & praying! All three of us dart around the room dodging gunfire, before finally managing to gun him down. We all paused for a second to marvel at what we believed to be the biggest epic fail we had seen all day… but in all the commotion, we failed to notice the other enemy solder in the doorway.
Looking back now, I know it was an obvious distraction. I had heard of the Human Flash Bang before, but I’d never witnessed him, whoever he is. All i know is it’s now possible he has a partner in crime. A cleaner. If you really want to know who the Human Flash Bang is you’ll have to search for a man named Kitridge.
MAVsquito
Testimony by SnipeZilla_403
I love sniping. It’s the ultimate point and click adventure! There’s a red guy, click. There’s a red guy, click, There’s a red guy, click. It’s so satisfying to know that with my awesome shooting skills, my teammates will be able to take Lancang Dam with little difficulty. Meanwhile their guardian angel watches from up on the Tallest building at Charlie.
It was just like any other day. I was sighted up on some wannabe soldiers trying to take back Alpha. I must of really pissed off this JManAK guy because he tried sniping me back. Too bad I am just WAY better at this than he is. Pfft! What a noob! After popping his melon I took up aim on another soldier close by. That’s when I started hearing this annoying ass buzzing sound! I looked up from my scope to see a MAV hovering over head.
Now on any other map, I would have looked at this MAV as a potential threat. I would have taken out my pistol and shot it down, but in this instance, I saw it as nothing more than noise pollution. I’m on top of a building, where the only thing that can reach me is another sniper, or a competent chopper pilot. I didn’t see either one trying to take this dam. Let him hover around like a moron, he’s doing no harm to my KDR!
However, it was when I went back to sniping, that I started to regret my decision. The MAV flew closer, darted in and out of my line of fire, did figure eights over my head, flew in circles around me. I started getting really frustrated. Buzz Buzz Buzz, It was annoying as hell! At one point I was lined up on what I suspect was that JManAK guy again, when that Damn thing darted in front of my scope and made me miss my shot!
“That does it!” I stood up from my perch and took a swipe at it with my knife. I missed by only an inch! Blind with rage I took out my sidearm and shot at it about three times… all misses. I was almost gonna lose it when I calmed myself down, took a deep breath, and sighted up on him. That’s when I took a SMAW to the knee, the match ended, and my sniping day was over. I only caught a quick glimpse of the one who killed me. JmanAK had finally gotten revenge! Smug little bastard probably still thinks about it out in Arkansas or wherever he’s from.
Now I know people are going to bitch and say that this behavior doesn’t match some of the other accounts of the fabled Human Flash Bang, but really think it may have been him. I’m also starting to think that HFB might be random soldiers channeling the spirit of some guy who once did something really stupid, that ended up ending with awesome consequences. I wonder if we’ll ever find out.
Question 4 by Amanda:
what is your spirit animal lol
To be honest, when I first read this? I had no idea how to answer it. I have never explored spirit animal lore. However I’m very open to other people’s beliefs and I wanted to learn more once I heard the question. So, after a quick Google search and finding out what it was I was trying to look for, I took steps to find my animal spirit.
Here is an excerpt from spiritanimal.info:
There are many ways to find which spirit animal is linked you. When starting on the path of discovery, it’s important to remember that a spirit animal cannot be chosen. It “chooses” you.
In most cases, spirit animals will be most present when you journey out of your conventional state of mind, such as during meditations, day dreams, night dreams, or other altered states of consciousness.
They can also come to you in their physical form. You will notice them because of an unusual behavior or multiple encounters in a short time span.
After reading that and a couple more sources on the subject, I decided that probably the easiest way to find my spirit animal would be to simply call it forth. The next night I laid in bed and stared at the ceiling. Closing my eyes I said the words out loud, “I call forth my animal spirit. Please reveal yourself to me and guide me on my path through life. Show me your true form so that I may follow your guidance.” and with that I shifted to a more comfortable position and drifted off to sleep.
That night… I had a nightmare…
I awoke to sounds outside of my bedroom window. I sat up and looked around. I was in my old house in Moose Pass. The lights are on in the house, but it’s dark outside. As I glanced out the window to see the source of the sounds, I saw a black shadow dart by barely illuminated by the light from inside my room. It was too fast to identify, but that suddenly didn’t matter as the sound of howling soon came from every direction sending a icy chill directly up my spine.
“The front door, they were headed to the front door!” I burst out of bed running through the hall and into the living room. It’s dimly lit, and even though I can feel the presence of my family in the house, I do not notice where exactly they are or if they are in fact moving at all. I imagine them frozen, as unable to move as the furniture around me.
I reach for the door. I hear them, a whole pack of wolves growling and hungry, all of them ready to tear me apart. Just as my hand touches the doorknob, the door flies open and a black wolf with Icy reflecting eyes stares at me. I am lost in his gaze only noticing the rest of the pack in my peripheral vision as they push each other around like an angry mob. A mere second passes feeling like an eternity. Then the black wolf leaps at me followed by a seemingly unending torrent of wolves of all shapes and sizes. I shut my eyes in panic and am unable to see anything that happens next, but I am left with the sounds of ripping and tearing.
I woke up with a start and sat straight up in bed. “Wow, it was all just a dream!” I thought to myself. Then I thought to myself “I asked for my spirit animal to reveal itself and guide me and that’s the dream I have? That doesn’t seem right.” When I pictured my spirit animal giving me guidance, I expected something calm and surreal. Like Me standing in a street and the animal leads me somewhere significant. I decided to look my dream up right away.
Again I went to spiritanimal.info and found some interesting info.
A wolf totem animal can represent a perceived threat or feeling you are being threatened. The presence of this spirit animal could be a reminder of an event, situation or a person you feel threatened by.
The wolf could reflect something that may have a “predatory” feel to it and instill a feeling of vulnerability that is not reassuring. Encountering your spirit animal in such a way invites you to look at who or what in your life is having such an influence.
Perhaps your spirit animal is warning you about challenges with personal boundaries: You may feel you have exposed yourself too much with someone or in a certain situation and need to pull back or strengthen emotional or physical boundaries with that person or in the context of that experience. The wolf as a spirit animal could also remind you that you’re facing stiff competition at work or that the behavior of people around may feel like you have to deal with a “pack of wolves”.
I want to look into some more interpretations because this hit home in a few places. I will definitely pursue communicating with my spirit animal on a regular basis. I felt like I needed to learn something crucial from this experience and if I didn’t I would be in danger of life tearing me apart like that pack of wolves.
All in all I’m really glad I was able to have this experience. Thank you Amanda for the awesome question that helped me understand myself a little better!
Question 5 by Mike
If you had a comet named after you – what would it be like?
Upon first reading this question, I was taken back to my favorite scene in the movie Armageddon:
[On the phone talking about the asteroid headed for Earth]
Carl: One more thing, the person who finds it gets to name it right?
Government Agent: Y-Yes that’s right, that’s right.
Carl: I wanna name her Dotti after my wife…
[Dotti looks flabbergasted as her jerk of a husband says the sweetest words she has ever heard. She moves her hand to her heart.]
Carl: …She’s a vicious life sucking bitch, from which there is no escape.
[Dotti’s face drops all signs of joy and happiness as her head drops to rest on her fist which is firmly displaying a middle finger in contempt.]
Taking that into account, I would have to say that my comet is a strange case. It would be slow moving and pretty heavy. However, sometimes it would fly too close to the sun and lose some of it’s mass only to gain some or all back later. It would have no discernible flight path, just hopping in between random orbits. However it would hang around the Earths spacial neighborhood, never venturing too far. It would have ambition though. It would have lots and lots of ambition to be the best comet it could be, and someday it would leave the solar system and travel to the far reaches of the galaxy to become an even better comet. For now though, it’d be content with the Sol it’s got.
Question 6 by Brenda
If you were stranded on an island what three items would you want to have with you and how would you use them?
This is a fun one to answer. There are so many things that come to mind. The first three being a kayak or canoe, an oar, and a backpack full of MREs. I can’t do that though, it’s too easy an escape. I assume your looking for something a little more interesting than an automatic ticket off the island. The key to the Rum Runners cellar door seems like a good call. It would make for some very interesting evenings at least.
Let’s see… Let’s… see…
I think my first choice would have to be, a backpack full of books. There are several books that I would choose:
- Way of the peaceful Warrior by Dan Millman
- The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Series by Douglas Adams
- The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch
- Tough Sh-t by Kevin Smith
- American on Purpose by Craig Ferguson
But I guess if your looking for a one item answer, I would have to choose The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Zen Living by Gary R. McClain. That book would have the story telling and guidance that would help me keep my sanity whilst on the island for who knows how long. It’s written in an entertaining way and has a LOT of interesting knowledge in it.
I would really only like to waste one thing on non-survival items, but I bet your looking for me to survive on my own and you want these to all be things that would only help me psychologically. Therefore in lieu of water, or food, or medical gear, next I would choose a picture of my family. It would allow me to think back on times we had together and keep my hope alive that I would someday see their faces again.
Finally, I really would want to bring my trusty IRBI Knife. It would be SOOOOO dang valuable on an island! I’m sure I don’t have to list the reasons. Have no fear though, I won’t cop out on you now. A knife is a survival tool and I’m trying like hell to stay away from those in this reply. My final choice would be a high range telescope.
I have the zen book to keep me in the now, where I belong. I have the family photo to allow me to look upon the past. The telescope provides for the future. During the day I would use it to search the skies and the horizon for hope of rescue. During the nights I would gaze upon the stars in the greatest stargazing spot EVER!
That’s it I guess. A book, a photo, and a high range telescope. I think I would do just fine on that island if I had those things. However, I’m going to stick to wishing that I never am stuck on an island like that. No offense to the island of course.
In Conclusion…
I really enjoyed writing this blog post and I will probably do another one in the future. Currently though I have plans to write a couple of Ebooks. One will be on Computer questions and the next will be about Juicing. I also have plans to write one about the effects of Marijuana on the system, since it’s going to be an upcoming topic in Alaska and several other states.
Thank you to everyone who participated in this blog! If you would like to be considered for the next Blog Post of Ultimate Randomness, please leave your questions below in the comments.
Happy New year and have a wonderful day!
Fragdemented 
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