bigfraz's blog

I went to the dentist today and when i left i was handed a free toothbrush and free dental floss. Now I love free stuff as much as the next guy. But also while i was getting my teeth cleaned i noticed that they had two kinds of electric toothbrushes displayed.  A slight bit of bias it makes me wonder if we get the best products from doctors or just the ones that they rewarded the most for handing out.

I always see doctors with the drug pens. I wonder how much this kind of advertising has on doctors? We all hear about the golf trips and Vegas trips paid for by the drug companies, but do they really happen? I just hope were not getting cheated out of the best care!

After my last post on lobbying I thought about generic products.  It is amazing how these products cost way less yet do the same exact thing. But I will be the first to admit that I fall for marketing all the time.  Recently, I was at Walgreen’s shopping for aftershave, now being 18 I had no clue which kind to buy. But immediately in the fray of all the brands I saw Gillette and thought "hmm that’s a trustworthy name" so I got it. I guess marketing does work.

I hate pollen. I know this is not as serious as my other posts but man it has been a pain lately. I sneeze every five minutes and constantly have to blow my nose. I propose a War on Pollen. Hopefully it will be more effective then the War on Drugs. Well my nose hopes so at least. Now i realize that pollen is an integral part of plant reproduction. But I think its done to the excess. Like when there is a layer of pollen on my windshield I don’t think that is spawning any plants.

As I drove to school two days ago I noticed that the white line on the side of road close to my house had been destroyed.  It was not a teenage prank but was planed. I thought maybe they will add a bike lane or some other new improvement to the road. As I drove home yesterday I noticed that the white line had been replaced.  But there was no added bike line or other improvement what so ever.  Now I understand in some cases that lines need to be repainted however in this case in seams like a grand waste of city money. The only change is that the line is slightly brighter there was no improvement.  The old line was fine and could have lasted at least another year if not three. I like government projects that created positive change but this just seamed liked they were bored. This ever happen in your home towns? I live in Beaverton, Oregon.

So everyone always screams that the hybrids the prius in particular get good gas mileage. Which then in turn in good for the environment. Because less gas is used. However, most people forget to mention how the Prius gets such good mileage. Not only the prius get great gas mileage it does it in a way that is healthy for the environment.  The government has given the prius a Practically zero emissions vehicle rating (PZEV) for short.  This means the Prius puts out  way less pollution then most cars on the market AND gets top notch mileage why doing it. I know that hybrids are not the final solution. but for the time being the government should push them. and true hybrids like the prius and the Toyota insight or civic. That get good mileage ie 40+ and emit very little. Not the SUV hybrids that get only marginally better mileage. For those, we should start moving towards bio-diesel hybrid combo. Watch the mileage soar and our not the oil companies wallets grow thicker and the amount of CO2 we pump out drop.

We all hate having to pull out change when we encounter a toll road. Why on earth would we want to make the Internet one giant toll road. Several major political organizations agree. While mega corporations aka ATT are against net neutrality.

Companies such as Google have spoken up for net-neutrality. And the infamous www.moveon.org has also steeped up to the plate to save the net. I really think that teens need to get behind this movement as so much of what we do will be affected by this. Basically if we fail to guarantee net neutrality the Internet will no longer look the same. Companies who want faster and better access will have to pay for it. This could hurt blogs and other projects. One great example is www.oneredpaperclip.com the idea of trading a small item for a bigger one is always fun, and the amount of publicity this has gotten is amazing. Yet, if we lose the net-neutrality battle this site would have to pay more and more as their site got more popular.