bagel and sweet tea

as i sit in my room, i come to the conclusion that silence isn't so bad when you're not being oppressed.

tried wakin up on time tday, but another fail again. made it successfully right when the back to the day buffet began. made some breakfast, unwounded, and checked some msgs. took care of some sales in the early and mid-afternoon, while learnin how to play zombies. spent some time lookin fer a card: papyrus has terrible customer service.

after gettin the one i wanted, took the long way to gcenter to meet up with matt from bls. lotta nice buildins we got, lots of churches in the neighborhood, and learned more about the reshift in businesses. played some charity poker and was unfortunate in 3 separate occasions. a fight was also bout to brew-talked to the main instigator, but he was prolly in one ear, out the other syndrome.

headed back to base. caught the silver line, and found some documents about how to save your money and manage your expenses, while lookin fer an empty seat. also got some massive headache, prolly through the heaters. cleaned up some stuff at home, makin dinner, lookin to relax through the night. too bad CRoads is cancelled this week.

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while siftin through those papers on the bus, i found a dolphin picture, and some information about IDA accounts, which basically reward ppl for saving and being very intelligent with their budgeting. the thing that intrigued me the most was this piece of paper along with it labelled Value Rankings.

in it, one is asked to rank 14 different things in terms of their importance to you. i forgot the name of the person, but all i rember was it was a girl who was in a low income family, and who was possibly in her middle teen years or perhaps grown up.

in order from most important to least important. some of them have this female's personal description of a value; i will add my own commentary in parentheses.

1. Happiness - To feel good about everything in my life
2. Inner Harmony - To accept myself flaws & all
3. Sense of Accomplishment - To feel like I've finished something
4. Financial Security - To be comfortable with having enough money
5. A comfortable life - To not let things bother me
6. Personal Freedom - To be able to do what I want [positive]
7. Family security - That my family is taken care of
8. Wisdom (King Solomon would be rolling in his grave)
9. A world of beauty
10. An exciting life
11. Self-respect (I like how this one is less important than an exciting life, or that it's not even in the top 5)
12. Social Recognition
13. Health
14. National Security (Take that, America...)

The top 3 things dealt with accepting one's self and dealing with one's own place in the world. the next things talked about personal freedoms and stability within one's environment. the last couple of things were attributable more or less to situations in one's life that is out of their own control. makes me wonder how i'd prioritize these values myself..but i guess things change depending upon your own family and ability to be satisfied with what you have, rather than what you could have or could have been.

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reading is so fundamentally important-it has served me well this day, and many days more. and no, books aren't the only thing i'm talkin about.