Similarity

 Shepherd's pie and cottage pie, tangerine and mandarin, Bruce Lee and Jacky Chan. The world is full of things that are so alike they are practically indistinguishable. Though this state of affairs is by and large fine, there are moments where such confusing likenesses can cause considerable harm, such as the similarity between "acceptable banter" and "unacceptable offensive insults" or "people who are capable of verbal battles" and "individuals who give the outward appearance of being able to handle a bit of verbal jousting but are in fact easily offended". These two examples especially, when mixed together, create the perfect cocktail of social awkwardness and disaster (the sort of cocktail that leaves you feeling the sickening rocking storm of extreme inebriation without first allowing you to experience the pleasant gentle drift of mild tipsiness).

 In terms of the former, I do confess that I have a tendency to lose sight of the metaphorical line in the sand occasionally, inadvertently stepping over it and tress passing in the lands of potentially serious emotional damage. Usually when people chide me, which they inevitably do, concerning whatever harmful statement I've just made, I either: take the attitude of the driver caught traveling at 80 miles per hour in a 20 miles per hour zone near a school (protesting my innocence by pointing out that there are no children out at this time of the day and even if they were I would merely be carrying out the socially helpful process of natural selection by running them over) or take an offensively defensive strategy(viciously chiding the victim of my verbal firing squad that he or she should have made clearer where the boundaries of acceptability lay by say, not just lazily drawing a line in the sand but building some sort of high towering fortress wall coated in anti-climbing paint). This habit tends to frequently lose me a vast percentage of friends out of an already frankly meager supply, hence I try to be careful in limiting and controlling the contents of my speech, monitoring what words or intentions are traveling from my brain towards my vocal cords with the vigilance of a censorship division working under a strict totalitarian regime.

 Now, Underling Salmon (though she still refuses to respond to that code name) with her generally withering attitude and bitingly sarcastic remarks, gives all the outward impression of someone capable of trading insults. A fellow human with whom I could exchange shipments of casually offensive yet entertaining remarks without fear of inadvertently straying across the boarders of lasting emotional damage and social awkwardness. However, when during a conversation, I made several insulting quips (to test what looked like relatively promising waters in terms of a verbal battle) the total contents of which, when combined, amounted to something along the lines of "You are a prostitute who, without the intelligence capable of adequately passing exams, must have slept with our spineless excuse of a headmaster in order to get a place in the school" (quips, that I might emphasize, were all made in the friendly spirit of jest) I was rather disappointed by her lack of witty response or fighting attitude, instead choosing to bitterly reference these insults once in a while as if her honor had been gravely wounded.

 When I expressed my disappointment in her lack of verbal sharpness and witticism, she claimed she was not yet reacting to or insulting those around her "because I'm in a hostile and unfamiliar environment. So I'm doing what all successful organisms do, observe and adapt."

 To this I mockingly replied that since a human being's only advantage over an animal is the human's ability to use creative skills in order to adapt the surrounding environment to his/her needs to a certain extent (by, for example, air conditioning), by attempting to adapt to the environment Underling Salmon had joined the ranks of the animals to be no better than a toad or woodlouse.

 She then responded to this by stating that there is no difference between humans and other animals to begin with. Which, in a rather pleasant cyclical fashion brings the topic right back round to similarities and differences. What exactly is the difference between a human being and an animal, two extremely similar things which some would argue are in fact the same (just as shepherd's pie is supposedly the same as cottage pie according to Wikipedia). Indeed, she continued, if the difference between humans and animals was the ability to alter the environment then beavers would be classified as human since they can alter the environment due to the fact that they can create dams, thereby blocking rivers and altering the environment.

 Thus my definition of the difference between humanity and animals, which I had been quite confident was a sound argument that would be passed on as a profound word of wisdom, to run from generation to generation till far into the future,  had more or less fallen on the first hurdle constructed out of branches and felled trees by a creative beaver. So if this is not the difference between an animal and a human then what is? When I have asked this question in the past, the most common and memorable answer has been "The soul", an abstract spiritual essence of humanity that resides within humans but not in animals. However if I start believing in concepts such as the soul, then I can't help but get the feeling that other illogical concepts (the bastard children born between science and blind faith) like spiritual healing, auras and homeopathy will be just around the proverbial corner, waiting for me, their non-existent over priced arms wide open for a placebo embrace.

 This then leaves me with two options, either accept the existence of the soul and every other connotation such an admittance brings into my life with it (like unwanted disreputable associates of an ill-mannered friend, brought in as guests  by the single impolite friend who sees the invitation into your house as a simultaneous permission for everyone he knows to also be allowed free access to your abode) or welcome the beaver as a part of the human race. The choice is hard but I have to make it, and though I may come to regret it, henceforth I shall consider all beavers as equal to myself, treating them with the respect I treat other humans (which isn't much) and allowing them all the rights that I receive (which doesn't feel like much either). But if it becomes just too much, if the pressures of drastically altering my world views over night give me a headache, I can at least have the satisfaction of taking a pain relieving pill that is not in the least bit diluted.

Doughnut

 I'm certain most people have had the experience of a disappointing doughnut. Obviously I've just made the gross assumption that whoever, out of my very meager readership, is currently unenthusiastically running their bored eyes through this block of text, lives in an area of the world where doughnuts are readily accessible. That is to say, you, the reader, are not at present living in some impoverished mud hut situated within a third world country, clicking the computer mouse with starved twig like fingers and sitting on a chair more three dimensional than you are. However if that is the case, I would recommend that you sell the computer and use the money to buy yourself food, get something nice like some doughnuts. I'm honored that reading my blog is that important to you but would suggest that staying alive is perhaps ever so slightly more vital.
 To the other relatively non-impoverished majority of readers, I call upon you to recall a disappointing doughnut. In particular, a jam doughnut. It may be difficult, it may be painful, but try to remember that traumatic moment you felt thoroughly emotionally let down by a piece of confectionery. Close your eyes, let your mind wander back. In fact open your eyes since the act of closing your eyes must have prevented you from reading the proceeding instructions unless your eyelids are somehow translucent like the flesh of a jellyfish. Now, close one eye but keep the other eye open to read the instructions (unless you are the jellyfish man in which case your translucent eyelids allow you to see the instructions near perfectly without your eyes necessarily being open) then relax, think pleasant calming thoughts and allow your mind to drift back like a dead body down a river.
 You are a child again, your mind is pure, untainted and innocent. Words like "systematic", "infant" and "abuse" still hold no meaning for you and consequently you would be unable to accurately describe the games you play with your uncle when your parents are out, even if you wanted to. However that is not important at present, you must focus your mind on some doughnuts. Some round jam doughnuts which you assumed are packed full of sweet jam. No, not your uncle's two jam doughnuts, that is a different story for a different time, possibly involving a judge, jury and an anatomically accurate doll which you will be asked to point precisely at.
 Back to the jam doughnuts. Spherical balls of fried dough with a fine snow like sprinkling upon its golden coloured surface. You take one in your hand and bringing it to your mouth and imagining the delicious explosion of sugary flavor that will spread through your mouth as the jam breaks free of its floury confines, you bite down on it. Only to find that it tastes of nothing more than slightly sweet bread. You take a second bite, quickly followed by a desperate third, panicked and frantic like a mother looking for her lost child, you search in vain for the luxurious treasure trove of jam that was promised to you from the name "jam doughnut". Finally you find it, not a treasure trove, not a medium sized storage box, not even a shoe box but barely a scientific spatula full of jam.
 The unappealing globule of slightly sweet scarlet gel, the same colour and texture as congealed blood, lies sullenly, like some severely angst filled teenager sitting knees up to his chin, in a tiny corner of the doughnut. The same air of vague depression that is being emitted from the pathetic section of jam soon permeates your head, darkly filling the void left behind by the happy expectations which dissolved the moment you took your first hopeful bite. Feeling thoroughly let down by the supposed treat turned traitor, you cannot help but think to yourself, "Is that really it? After all that seemingly important build up, there's so little actual meaningful substance there!"
 That feeling, the sensation of surprise, betrayal and vague disappointment, is probably what most of my readership feel at the end of one of my long winded articles and it is more than likely the precise reason why I am yet to gain any followers.

Urges

 Sometimes there are moments when you just feel like doing a particular thing. Like when you get home after a hard day at work and you really crave a cup of tea or when you wake up first thing in the morning and experience a burning desire to have a nice refreshing shower. In my case, I have recently been feeling incessant urges to water board someone.
 To those who think water boarding sounds like a form of leisure activity to be performed on some sunny remote island by tanned men and women in swimming suits, I would say that they are half right. It is a form of torture consisting of covering the victim's face with a piece of soaked cloth and pouring water onto it, thus giving the victim a perfect sensation of drowning, arguably the ultimate in sensory illusions (which makes it sound like some sort of Disney Land attraction). It has most recently made the news when it came to light that interrogators in Guantanamo Bay, a remote sunny island used to imprison a lot of tanned people, regularly used water boarding on the detainees. Whether the interrogators counted it as a leisure activity and whether the detainees were wearing swimsuits when it happened is yet an undisclosed mystery.
 I wake up in the morning, sunlight crawling lazily into my window through the half open blinds (which I still treat with a mixture of suspicion and fear as I'm not entirely sure how to operate its complicated system of strings and thinly cut plastic boards yet) and walk somewhat unsteadily to my kitchen, sleep still blurring my vision. Upon arriving in the open plan culinary hub of our household, I lumber up to the sink and with a twist of the gleaming silver tap, fill a cup with cool water. As I lift the cup to drink, I ponder for a moment, looking at the glass container filled to the rim in potentially suffocating liquid, the evolution of technology from the simple well to the grand network of pipes and tunnels that now reside, spread like some aquatic web, beneath the metropolis.
 Finishing my drink, I wipe my cup on the tea towel that, if soaked and placed over someone's horizontal face, could cause considerable discomfort and I briefly wonder about the intricate layers of fabric that have gone into making this simple every day tool. Scratching my itching head, I return to my bedroom whereupon my eyes fall on my school bag, within which, I know, resides a timetable that dictates that I should be arriving in my school within the next thirty minutes or be facing the consequences within the next thirty five. My mind then, bored of scuttling up this particular branch of thought, leaps nimbly onto an adjacent cognitive branch concerning the people I will surely meet through the school day. This branch then spreads out into several different twigs that can all collectively be labeled under the title, "people I know".
 It is then that I feel a strong urge to water board. I really could not say why. Perhaps the cause is in some undetectable stress or irritation but I am no psychiatrist and if ordinary people like myself could easily detect the causes of irrational thoughts or desires then I'm sure that particular job would have been abolished as obsolete a long time ago. However, if I were to make a complete and random guess, a total stab in the pitch black darkness, a wild baseless assumption then it would be the fact that I hate at least sixty percent of the people I am associated with.
 Acting as further cause of stress, presently at school there is a certain social reshuffle occurring. With the introduction of forty or so new, most of them female, students into what used to be an all boys school, what had been a concrete social hierarchy is currently shifting and merging. The injection of fresh blood into what was previously a stable system has acted as a catalyst for school politics, causing a chemical reaction as the result of which alliances and treaties are being written, unwritten and rewritten at the speed of light. A decisive moment of school history, when being considered a generally attractive human being or not is crucial in cementing ones social status for the next two years. In essence, whether you are subject of mockery or the mocker is as malleable as molten metal at present. However like molten metal, though it may be flexible now, it will harden and set in no time. Allowing those at the top to stay at the top and causing  those trapped within the lower social echelons to be imprisoned there forever.
 Therefore, taking this as a revolutionary opportunity, many of those I have long since despised and mocked have begun their ascent. With it they have altered their attitude, perhaps in an attempt to alter the past as well, where before some may not have talked to me (knowing full well I found them dull detestable individuals and had no reservations about articulating these thoughts) for fear of being verbally humiliated, they now act as if we have been the best of friends for the past few years. Irritatingly, I myself have to then bite back harsh words of hatred, that I would have happily spewed over them a few months back, because the present state of affairs dictates that all previous social levels have been flattened to create a soft even playground and any careless public display of needlessly malicious wrath could result in rapid sinking.
 Therefore, at present I must content myself with hidden malignant machinations and bide my time. However just they wait, once alliances and positions have been set in stone, once this quagmire becomes solid ground yet again, I'll ensure they're back to wearing bright orange onzies on their own remote social island where I'll be waiting for them, a wet towel in one hand and a bucket full of water in the other.