Sometimes you read something that - to be perfectly honest - leaves you feeling hopeless and doomed. Something so depressing it makes you want to throw up your hands, shout "to hell with it all!" and head straight to the nearest bar. Something like this, from the LA Times.
 
The latest figures from Nielsen have children's TV usage at an eight-year high. Children's health advocates warn of adverse effects.
 
More than an entire day -- that's how long children sit in front of the television in an average week, according to new findings released Monday by Nielsen.

"They're using all the technology available in their households," said Patricia McDonough, Nielsen's senior vice president of insights, analysis and policy. "They're using the DVD, they're on the Internet. They're not giving up any media -- they're just picking up more."
 
While this has obvious implications for the future of hunting and fishing, it also goes beyond that and straight to the core of our fundamental appreciation for nature itself. No one is born a hunter, an angler or a hiker. We all start life as a blank slate and what gets etched on that slate in our early childhood shapes who we will eventually become. You, I and everyone else who enjoys the outdoors, be they a hunter, an angler, a hiker, a birder or whatever, didn't get that way by mainlining 32 hours of high-definition methadone: we got that way by crawling around in the dirt catching bugs, climbing trees, building forts in the back yard and stomping around in creeks. You know, being kids. That childlike wonder, the curiosity, imagination and self-guided exploration of your surroundings. That's the base from which everything else rises. Lose that - as we most assuredly are - and you've lost an entire generation of children. And for what? So they can grow up to be the same mindless, self-absorbed zombie consumers their parents obviously are?
 
Seriously, anyone who lets their small child watch 32 hours of television, video games and Internet a week should be smacked in the head with a rolled-up copy of Richard Louv's "Last Child in the Woods: Saving Our Children From Nature-Deficit Disorder."
 
American parents, WTF are you thinking? Put down your go*****ed cellphone, get your fat a***s off Facebook, turn off the TV and pay some attention to your kids. Take them outside, let them get dirty. Let them think and explore for themselves without the help of corporate-sponsored storyline.
 
Good gawd, didn't this used to be called common sense?

From The Oklahoman:
Jan Cannon. . ., a geologist who lives in Tecumseh, picked up some sand in southeast Alaska more than 30 years ago. . . . When he. . . went back . . . he found something better: a potentially massive cache of gold.

His company, Oklahoma City-based Geohedral LLC, recently announced it had claimed more than 10,000 acres in the Tongass National Forest.

"In our opinion, we have a ‘world class’ discovery,” Cannon said this week in a news release.

The question is, what affect will getting that gold have on wildlife and its habitat?

Be sure to check out the full article.

I've been blogging for Field & Stream for a year now, and to be honest it's grown a little stale for me. It's a lot of work to come up with a topic, a news item or a link every day and then figure out some way to make it relevant, thought-provoking or funny for the F&S readership.
 
You may not think so, but blogs are damn hard things to write and they often fail miserably. Sometimes the only reaction they get from you, the reader, is the sound of your mouse clicking to some other page. Other times you respond only to point out what an idiot you think I am. And you usually manage to misspell idiot in the process. More often than I care to admit I simply can't think of anything witty and I have to resort to that great suckhole of intelligence, Youtube. And let's face it, if you've seen one Youtube clip of some ignorant jack*ss and you've pretty much seen them all.
 
Quite frankly, I'm tired of thinking, and I want a job that doesn't require it. And I think I've found one ...
 
From the want ad on the PETA website:
Position: PETA Blog Writer
Position Objective: To write content for PETA's blog The PETA Files
Term of Employment: Full-time
Primary Responsibilities and Duties: Analyze and interpret public events and provide commentary via PETA's blog The PETA Files Write witty and unique blogs on topics ranging from PETA's naked demonstrations to regulatory testing on animals, dogfighting, and celebrities who support the cruel fur industry. Brainstorm daily content for PETA's blog with a small team. Monitor trends in blogs and assist with the implementation of new strategies for PETA's blog. Create and maintain relationships with other bloggers and pitch relevant content about PETA to them. Perform any other duties assigned by the supervisor
 
So long, folks. It was fun while it lasted. I've always wanted to know what color the sky was in their world, and now I'm finally going to get my chance.

From The Oklahoman:

Christopher Dale Chapman, 27, of Idabel and a companion were caught in a current and swept over a low-water dam about 4 p.m. Friday, troopers said. They had been hand-fishing for catfish west of the dam on the river's south bank.