Saturday, November 24, 2007

A lack of respect/Simplistic conversations

I have been sick with tonsillitis and have spent the past several days in bed. Caught up on sleep? I think so. Last night, I felt terrible when I was coming back from the doctor. I had not eaten in over 7 hours and wanted rice with a can of cream of chicken soup stirred in. I was very dehydrated in addition; thankfully the doctor didn't insist on injecting an IV into me for that. I called my sister at home and the conversation went a little something like this:

Sis: Bobey (a variation of dumb according to her)
Me: Hi- I'm starving. Can you have mom make me white rice with a can of cream of chicken soup?
Sis: Congratulations.
Me: No- I haven't eaten or drank anything in hours. I'm starving
Sis: Felicidades. Aaaaaaaaw my little pato bobo (in Spanish it translates to dumb duck) is hungry.
Me: I hope this means it'll be ready by the time I get home.

First, all of the sarcasm ticks me off. I can be quite sarcastic myself, but I have made several attempts to be as nice as I can to my sister and cut the sarcasm. This means me not calling her names, yet she still insists on calling me all of these pet names I hate. Usually I would tolerate her calling me these names because it has gone on for years, but is it necessary? She is 18 now. Does she still have to talk like she is 2 or 3 years old? Whenever I call her or she calls me she answers the phone with one of these cutesy names. I have already told her I'm not going to call her names in an effort to be civil toward her. She still persists. Next time though, when she calls me I plan to rat her out right there on the phone. Hopefully she is in a public place and I can embarrass her enough. I plan to yell into the phone telling her how I hate that she acts so immature and calls me all of these pet names. I'm not her boyfriend and I'd hope she'd have better names for her "Imaginary Boytoy." Ask me about Imaginary Boytoy- that's another story for another time.

Story #2
The other night we had dinner out together as a family. Sister has such limited interests and often can't contribute to meaningful conversations at the dinner table. The other night she brought up a conversation we've had many times before. "Dad, do you think Obama or Hilary will win?" My dad went and laid everything out on the table giving his explanation of neither. Then after about a minute, my sister got upset and bored at what my dad said because my dad brought in some Republican candidates who are doing pretty well in the polls right now. My sister either didn't want to hear it, or she couldn't contribute to the conversation, so she said, "why don't we just vote for JFK? He'd definitely win." Now, maybe this just ticked me off because she couldn't handle the realities of what my dad was saying... or here is my theory (honestly, because I don't think my sister is as well versed in politics as I am or my dad, for that matter). Anyways, it just bugged me since we went from what could be an intelligible conversation to something that was so unrealistic and out of the question.

I would have gladly contributed to the conversation and presented what I think Clinton and Obama has working for and against them. I would have also, like my dad did brought in. It would have made my sister mad. I would have brought up some things in Obama's past that could have an effect on him like he admitted in high school experimenting with drugs, alcohol and cigarettes. Up until the start of his campaign for president he smoked, but now is kicking the habit. I would have brought up that some people like that Clinton is a woman, but many others dislike that fact and went into the reasons... My candidate of choice from the Republican side I would have brought up is Romney because my sister detests him.

I know not to talk about politics with my sister- not that I'll become upset. I can see both sides of an issue. I think it is best to face realities- it is possible the next president may be a Republican. I do however, when I am with my sister and she brings up politics put on KFI AM 640, more stimulating talk radio. They're a very extreme conservative talk station. 95% of the time I disagree with their views, but I don't mind hearing the other side of things and why these (idiots) feel the way they do. But also, when I do talk politics with her I present myself as Conservative as possible and always explain why I feel that way (even if I don't) but I try to present the other perspective. I have told her already that I endorse Romney for president (if you really want to know who I'm supporting, ask me), but I try to play the other side of the fence. I said he is a good, religious guy, I've talked about how he is good with economic issues because he was able to make the 2002 Winter Olympics in Salt Lake profitable, which is a good thing. All my sister can say is he doesn't have a true religion, and sometimes religion is bad. All George Bush does is pray.

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