Josef Frizl - Truly a Monster

Oh – poor baby. Josef Fritzl, the Austrian man who imprisoned his daughter and several of their children in his cellar for 24 years, feels the media coverage has been too one-sided about him.

“Without me [she] would not be alive anymore... I was the one who made sure that she was taken to a hospital,” Mr. Fritzl said. “I could have killed all of them – then nothing would have happened. No one would have ever known about it,” he added. “I'm no monster.”

Let’s see here. You lock up your daughter in a cellar and tell people she’s run away, rape her who knows how many times, have seven children with her, keeping three of them locked up in the cellar with her and incinerating the body of one who died so as to destroy any evidence, threaten to gas them if they try anything, and live a two-faced double life.

You were a sex-offender already – convicted of rape. You frequented a brothel, where all of the prostitutes were afraid of you, because you wanted them to pretend to be corpses when you had sex with them. And your daughter, Elisabeth, whom you locked up when she was 18, says you began to sexually abuse her when she was only 11 years old.

Yet you say that at least you didn’t kill them – and you’re not a monster, because you brought your daughter flowers, and you brought your children, the products of your incest, books and stuffed animals.

Now, your lawyer claims you’re insane, and is trying to get a certificate of insanity for you. Now I’m not a psychologist, but someone who has the presence of mind to know what they’re doing is wrong is not insane. “I constantly knew, over the entire 24 years, that what I did was not right,” Fritzl was quoted as saying. He also said he had an addiction – but having an addiction does not excuse one’s actions.

Here is my response to you, Josef Frizl: “But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.”

You will burn for this, Mr. Fritzl. I hope that God grants you mercy, but only after you endure horrible pains for your sins. Of all sins, rape is the most abhorrent to me, and it is my opinion that you should receive capital punishment. Rapists, especially those that sexually abuse children, should be castrated and/or sentenced to death. You’ve not only raped once, but countless times, and there is undeniable proof that you did. You also sexually abused a child – and not just any child, but one whose trust you should have guarded – your own. In some criminal cases there are gray areas, but not in yours. Yours is open and shut. You deserve to die, and you need to, to begin paying for your crimes, you evil, evil man.

Enter to Learn, Go Forth to Reproduce

Not to draw undue attention to my friend, who recently wrote a blog about dating, but she draws attention to herself all the time anyway, so I don't feel bad about it. :)

Now, this girl made a bet with her mom that she could date 100 different boys before she got married (date in the loosest sense of the word - she had to go out with 100 guys - so at least 100 first dates). Something like a real-life 50 First Dates (I haven't seen that movie, and I don't think I'm drawing a correct parallel, but it sounded good in my head).

Anyway, so when she made this bet, her mom must have been over the moon with happiness, because she knew her daughter was not going to get married her freshman year (did any of you even KNOW 100 different people your freshman year?). Now, 100 first dates, 41 (at least) second dates, and 10 "relationships" (as per her stats in her blog entry) later, she's graduated from BYU. Not married, not engaged, but now she has all these character traits in her head that she likes, each from a different one of the 100. Unfortunately, not one of them happens to have it all.
Her words: "...there does come a point when you have to realize that no one is perfect!!! Including me!!! So why am I still holding out, expecting to find it? Why do I keep walking away from incredible guys again and again?"

Now comes my opinion. I don't think it's her mother's bet that's the problem (entirely). I do think it plays a role. But there seems to be a general consensus among young, single, LDS adults - particularly BYU students - that we need perfection in a spouse.

Now, I'll tell you why I think this problem is exacerbated at BYU in particular. The reason is the dating culture. You probably think I mean the dating vs. hanging out bit, that Elder Oaks spoke of, but that's not what I mean. Sure, that's a problem, and will always be an issue. But the problem I see at BYU is that everyone is too good. Now I don't mean their morals are too good - you should always be true to your personal values and beliefs.

Allow me to illustrate.

Remember home? That place where you were the only Eagle Scout in your high school? The place where you were always asked to play the piano at ward functions? You were valedictorian and captain of the cheerleading squad. You were popular, you were friends with everyone, you were amazing! But here at BYU, you can barely maintain a C+ average, you have no time for extracurricular activities, hardly anyone knows you, and to top it all off, you realized that absolutely EVERYONE here plays the piano...better than you.

So you try hard to be even better than your best...because your best isn't good enough anymore. And you begin to expect more from people - particularly the people you date. But not more in the good sense of the word - you've always expected your future spouse would be strong in the gospel, would be a good mother or father, faithful to you, true to his/her convictions. But now you expect him to play the guitar and write you songs. You expect her to wear trendy, cute clothes, sing, and go snowboarding with you. In other words, you begin to expect all kinds of things that you didn't expect before.

Now, new expectations alone aren't bad. The problem arises when your list gets so incredibly long that you become inflexible, and every item on the list becomes an essential. You have to remember that no one will have all the qualities and traits you want. The difficulty is selecting the few, most important ones you can't live without. This may sound like common sense to many of you out there, but trust me - in Provo, it's not.

BYU has conditioned us to think that there will be someone a little better just around the bend. Someone with more of the qualities you want. But here is my unsolicited advice - you need to get over it and realize that person does not exist. Instead, find someone who fits you, someone you can talk to, someone you enjoy being with, someone with personal potential (because you marry who they can become), someone you can love. And don't dismiss them right away because you think they're not a perfect fit. First impressions are not always right. And if you're not careful, remember that you might just look around the next bend and find there isn't ANYone there.

Death to the Malt Shoppe

Now, some of you may disagree with the title of my entry. But let me tell you, I'm quite ticked off at the Malt Shoppe. Let me start off with the little reasons.

Their food isn't that great, and their burgers are too small.

Their cheese fries don't have enough cheese, and they are often overdone.

Their service SUCKS, and it takes absolutely forever to get any food.

Their restaurant just feels filthy inside.

But all of that isn't that bad. It's a greasy spoon, 50s-esque diner (albeit not a very good one). I mean, I ate there just the other night. Their being a lousy restaurant isn't enough for me to want to destroy them. So--what is, you ask?

Their parking situation. Did any of you notice the new signs up there, saying you can park in the parking lot if you're going to the Malt Shoppe or Panda Express, but not if you're going to Pita Pit? Yeah - me neither. So we got towed today. Parked there for about 20 minutes, ate food, came out and the car was gone. What the HELL is with that?

So what to do? You walk 10 blocks to where they parked your stolen car and pay $135 to the vultures to get it back, getting back to work late, having to stay an extra hour to make up for lost time. Ridiculous? Yes.

Why do they like screwing people over? Was the Malt Shoppe just jealous, because they didn't have any customers, so they decided to tow someone else's? Besides, how do they even know who to tow? Is business so slow that they can follow people around to the other restaurants to see where they go? Did they not realize that unless you're in downtown Manhattan, that's a bad business practice? Cuz I sure as hell am NEVER eating at the Malt Shoppe again. And I'm planning on badmouthing them to absolutely any and everyone who ever cares to listen to me about it. Not only that - I very well may write a few letters to the editors of local papers. And I write well - I'll probably be published. This crappy establishment just lost a lot more business than they bargained for.

But where do we go for good, greasy burgers now, Adam? Leatherby's closed down! Well, let me tell you. Stan's. That's right - Stan's, over across from Gold's Gym in Provo. It's cleaner, cheaper, better priced, and their service is better. Oh, did I mention that Stan's Drive-In does NOT have any complaints to the better business bureau about advertising claims or practices that misrepresent their service or product offer? Nope - they don't. But guess who does? The Malt Shoppe. Surprise.

Moral of the story? Eat at Stan's! It's better, and they don't try to screw people over! Located at 525 N. 900 E.

I also welcome your comments about getting screwed over by immoral business practices.

--
Malt Shoppe delendo est

I'll Just Make This Easy For You

Whenever I hear those words at work, I cringe. Because I know exactly what that means. For those of you who have never been to my restaurant at lunchtime, allow me to translate.

"I'll just make this easy for you" equals, "I'll just have a water, with the soup, salad and breadsticks."

Now, maybe for some of you that sounds easy. Not for me. Let me explain. Soup, salad and breadsticks is not done by anyone in the kitchen. It's done by me - the server. I make your salad. I get your breadsticks. I pour your soup. I get your drinks. And then I run back and forth, bringing out 50 more bowls of soup, 25 more salads, and 18 more baskets of breadsticks for you, only to have you show me your gratitude with a $0.62 tip.

So please, don't make things "easy" on me. Make it difficult - please. I would love to have to work incredibly hard to get you your one entree and one or maybe two bowls of soup or salad that you'll eat along with it. Please - make me earn that 5% tip.

Look alike

On occasion, I've had people tell me I look like some famous person. There are a couple that I get consistently. The first was Pippin (Billy Boyd) off the Lord of the Rings movies. I think a big part of that was that my hair used to be long, although I've still gotten it since cutting my hair short.




Number two was the guy from the movie The Invisible (Justin Chatwin). I had a lot of people tell me I looked like that guy, although I also think it had something to do with the hair.




And then there's one more. This is the one I get most consistently. Last week at work, even, I had three different guests tell me that I looked like this guy: Edward Norton (The Italian Job, The Illusionist).


Now, I don't know if these actors and I share a common likeness or not. I mean, the myheritage.com thing told me I look like Mark Ruffalo, Matthew Perry, Bob Saget and Haley Joel Osment. But heck - I dunno. Let's hear your opinions.

Tipping (and not of cows)

Before becoming a server, I wasn't the best tipper in the world. In fact, my girlfriend told me a story yesterday about one time when we went to dinner and the guy who served us knew her. After we left, he essentially told her how I was a lousy tipper and that she shouldn't have anything to do with me as a result. In all honesty, I don't know what I left him, but I can proudly state that I have since become a better tipper.

Now, I'm not going to judge those people who don't tip well. They likely don't know, as I didn't. That nice couple with a baby the other night who left me NO tip, or those girls at lunch who order never-ending soup, salad and breadsticks, making me run around constantly and who consistently leave me $1.00 tips, or even the girl yesterday who left me $0.61. I think a lot of people just don't understand that one of the rules of dining out at a real restaurant (aka not McDonald's) is that you are supposed to tip your server.

Many people (even my dad until I told him recently) don't know how much servers make. Take a wild guess. Most people say "minimum wage." Wrong. Want to know what I make an hour? $2.16.

That's right - I only make two bucks an hour, and the rest of my salary is made up from tips. Ever wonder why there's a gratuity added on to parties of eight or more? Because sometimes people won't tip unless it's added into the bill. People keep asking the waiter for more stuff, making them run back into the kitchen time and time again, and then leave their thanks in the form of sixty-one cents tacked onto the bill.

And at Olive Garden, it's even worse. In order to guarantee people receive good service, as per company policy, servers are only allowed to serve three tables at a time (at many restaurants, servers often have 5 or 6 or even more tables). That makes sense at the OG. At other restaurants, you only take their order and bring out their drinks and (maybe) their meal - often someone else even does that for them. Those restaurants don't have the revolving salad and breadsticks that the OG has, which requires more running back to the kitchen. Now, this higher level of service (the server will even always try to be the one who brings out your food, unlike other restaurants) should translate into higher tips...but it doesn't. Especially in Provo.

The common law of tipping is 15%. Not 10%. Not $5 regardless of the size of the check (my friend got a $5 tip on a $100 bill yesterday). Tip generously - especially if you received great service. In Provo, remember that the people serving you are often poor college students, just like you. If you can't afford to leave a generous tip (at least 15%), don't go out to eat. Go to McDonald's. And definitely do not insult the server by telling them their service was only worth about sixty-two cents. They're working hard to ensure you enjoy your dining experience.

Ramblings - Only Read if You Really Want

Welp, I have a job. Like, a big person job. Like, salaried and everything. Crazy, huh? I was just hired and I start March 11. I'm really excited and happy about it. And...it was my half-birthday yesterday. How come we don't really celebrate those? I'm 25.5 years old. I think that's at least worth a cake or something.