Maus

What do we Americans know about poverty?   What do we know about ration cards, brutal occupations, and extermination camps?   We don't, because we have become too concerned with our self-image, bank statements, and the size of our cars and house.   Instead of starvation, we have a rising obesity rating.   Instead of an oppressive fascist government, we live in a free, capitalist nation.   Instead of restricted religion, we enjoying religious freedoms.   Instead of being poor and impoverished, we have grocery stores and free markets to buy from cheaply.   We know NOTHING of the trials that millions of Jews and other Europeans endured during the second World War.   Maus is very unique story, especially because it is a comic book, which is based off the story of a Jewish family that underwent horrible oppression during the Holocaust.   The different ethnicities are represented by different animals.   The Jews are mice, the Poles are pigs, the French are frogs, and the Nazis are large, mean cats that oppress all the other animals.   The family in the story underwent horrible things.   They were always having to relocate, and hide to avoid being seen by the Nazis.   They were never sure who they could trust, even their Jewish and Polish friends, because you could never be sure who was being bribed to turn you into the Nazi authorities.   The family also went through the notorious extermination camp called Auschwitz, which was one of the worst camps ever created.   They would put Jews in straight lines and shoot them that way in order to save ammunition.   The gas chambers, ovens, and disgusting living quarters made short work of even the most resilient people.   Although the main character in the story, Vladek, made it through the camp alive, it had forever changed him.   People who endured the camps and oppression under the Nazis were extremely tough, and learned to save every little thing that had some possible value.   When Vladek is older, he even grabs paper towels at the public restrooms so he won't have to buy napkins.   Many older people today who lived during this time, still live in this way, because they were so used to squeezing a dollar out of every dime.   Today, almost everything we own is made for being disposed of easily.   We have gotten in the bad habit of wasting everything from gasoline to food.   We should not grow too comfortable with our easy lifestyles, because with a recession on the way, we might have to change we Americans live out everyday lives.   We can only afford to be wasteful for so long.   Hopefully we will learn from the hardships that our grandparents and great-grandparents went through and think twice before we complain about some miniscule thing.

Fishing

Hey I've got an idea:  Let's get in our little bass boat, head out on the lake for couple hours, and hopefully catch some fish.   Now, why not just go the store and buy some quality salmon from Alaska?   Fishing in my experience, has been the biggest time waster, and is usually more frustrating than satisfying.   The last time I went fishing, it was with my friend and his dad.   We went to a slow moving river where there were hundreds of young rainbow trout just waiting to be caught, or so we thought.   We picked a comfortable place on the side of the river, and set up camp.   We opened our tackle boxes and then began to assemble our fishing gear.   We got right at it, and began our little fishing adventure with great anticipation.   About 2 hours into it, none of us had gotten so much as a nibble on any of our baits.   As we moved up stream, we came upon a drain outlet, where hundreds of big trout were gathered for what seemed to be some urgent meeting.   We thought we had cashed in big when we confidently cast our lines into the sea of swarming trout.   It seemed almost too easy.   But our great amazement, we could see the trout looking at the bait as it floated by, probably laughing at our vain efforts to get them with our worms and shiny pieces of metal.   After this "fishing trip", I did a little research on my own, and found out that trout are notoriously smart fish that are not easy to trick.   The time of day has to be just right before they get really hungry, otherwise they just aren't interested.   I came away from that little venture with a very dim view of fishing.   I found to be above all very boring, but also very frustrating.   If it's done for leisure/burning time, that's one thing.   To do it for actually eating what you catch, you would have to be a little off.