Slope of Hope Blog Posts

Slope initially began as a blog, so this is where most of the website’s content resides. Here we have tens of thousands of posts dating back over a decade. These are listed in reverse chronological order. Click on any category icon below to see posts tagged with that particular subject, or click on a word in the category cloud on the right side of the screen for more specific choices.

Workplace Grievances

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On this Labor Day, a time normally reserved the think fondly back on all the workplace slowdowns, stoppages, wildcat strikes, and questionable Teamster leadership murders of the past, I would instead like to focus our attention on a hodgepodge of things that are just generally pissing me off. What would you rather do on this Monday: enjoy a beer and a hot dog or read about me bitching?

That’s what I thought.

Heart Hands

This abomination has to stop. Everyone’s doing it, and I’d sincerely wish flipping the bird had caught the public’s imagination as opposed to this nausea-inducing, faux-sincere, cutesy travesty. It’s shallow, it’s pointless, and it devalues anything sincere acts of affection.

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Love Letter to a Friend

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Totally by accident, I stumbled upon a letter I wrote to a dear friend of mine a few years ago. I thought I did a pretty decent job with my sentiments, so I figured I might as well share it here since it doesn't reveal anything confidential and it was well-crafted enough to be worth sharing. It's also amusing to me, since some of the misgivings I expressed about myself flowed directly into Solid State.

To: Rob

From: Tim

Date: April 6, 2021

Re: Remembrances of Things Past

Greetings, my dear friend-from-the-before-time……….

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Logan’s Run

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“As the images of his own history twisted and ripped their way through the flames in front of him, Wesley Williams somehow knew that he had taken the right path after all. Maybe the trail had been laid out for him all along from the day he was born, and it was simply up to him whether to keep marching forward in the right direction. Wesley was here now. In spite of all his shortcomings, all his bad choices, and all the times he had missed the mark and felt ashamed, he knew in his heart he was still where he was meant to be. Gazing across the distance at his wife’s eyes – those tender, loving eyes that he had fallen in love with when he was just a boy – he knew he had never left the trail on which he belonged, even though it was impossible from day to day to know for sure where the markers would be. Somehow, he had managed to stay on the path where he knew he needed to be, even if his own foolhardiness had put his fate at risk. For reasons he could not comprehend, he had been spared his own oblivion by the pathway’s power.” – Solid State, chapter 73

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