25 billion

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I would like to know how most people's dog spend their average day. the average daily routine for your pets.

I get up with my dog at around 5 and we go for an hour long walk. sometimes I insert some jogging. He's tired when he gets home so he eats and I take him to the bathroom. Then he goes to bed and I go to work. I go home at lunch to take him outside for a bathroom break and we might wrestle a bit for a few minutes. When I get home from work, we either play fetch in the back yard, go to the dog park, or go for another long walk. He eats dinner between 7 and 7:30. The rest of his evening is spent playing with us inside, training, he gets "lap time", and he's crashed on his living dog bed by 9:30. (He used to come get me at 9:30 to tell me it's time for bed before I got this dog bed and put it down. LOL He has such an internal clock that I don't need a schedule).

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To be given life is the ultimate gift. when we are first born we have the right to cry or laugh. when we grow up we have the freedom to choose the way we want to be. humans were born with rights equal to every other living thing but because of our unlimited desire human life is often of less quality than most other animals. a small bird wakes up early in the morning singing a song waking the other birds, merrily looking for food, spending a short time to get all the bugs and grain she needs to fill her small stomach, then spending the rest of her time playing, singing, and courting. she spends a few days to build her beautiful nest. she doesn?t work too much to get the food she needs everyday. her life is easy. she has a lot of time to play and enjoy living together with the other birds. humans have small stomachs as birds do. just to have enough to eat we too do not have to work a lot in one day. if we want to build a house, we can build one in a few weeks. we can then have a lot of free-time in our life to play and enjoy life together as well. now days people choose to work very hard, at least 8 hours per day. they work like machines just to have some food to eat even though the food they eat is not good quality. they eat the old plants and animals that have been dead many months in a can or in frozen packages. they have to live in a crowded house like a termite. if they want their own house they have to spend at least one half of their life or maybe all of their life to work for that house. life is busy and hectic all the time. we can see only complications with no space for beauty and freedom. we create suffering for ourselves because we don?t know the purpose of life. we are blinded and our soul turns to darkness. we can?t see beauty. we can?t enjoy living. we have only fear growing in our minds everyday. we begin to distrust other people. we cannot be friends with others around us, even relatives or family members. our lives are lonely, even though the world is full of people. even though we have a lot of material goods and wealth we still feel like it?s not enough. even thought other people give us love, we still don?t trust them. we are even disturbed by the rooster?s morning call and we?re proud to say in the middle of this confusion and suffering that this is development and we are civilized. why do humans choose to live their life in a difficult and complicated life like this? what do we receive from our hard work all our life? why is the simple and peaceful way not attractive to people? life is easy, why do we make it hard? if we think we are the most clever animal in the world, why do we make our life full of bitterness and suffering more than any other animal? why do we have to work harder than other animals? why do we make our lives so boring? why don?t we have time for our kids and family or even time for ourselves? these are the instincts of all life. in 24 hours we spend more than 10 hours struggling with what we call work or said nicely, ?making a living?. we spend on average less than 8 hours sleeping and 2.5 hours a day eating, maybe .5-1 hour bathing/dressing. this leaves 3 hours left for ourselves and our family in our day. mostly we spend this time intoxicating ourselves with entertainment such as drinking, going to parties, shopping, watching movies or watching tv. even on our day off we love to spend the time on entertainment. we don?t see the importance of spending time with family or ourselves because we think we don?t have time. so we are not different from machines or robots because we have lost our heart and soul. our kids are like our pets. we take care of them enough to feed them and keep them safe but we neglect to think about their mind and soul. kids want to be loved and cared for and to feel close to their parents but we think it?s a burden so we push them away by sending them to pre-school. then we appease ourselves by telling ourselves we?ve done the best by them by giving them good food and expensive schooling so we can have more time to give to working and we can tell ourselves that we work for our kids. but we don?t know if the kids want what we give them or not. we assume we have given the best to them. if the kids know how to compare, they must be jealous of other animals like ducks seeing their whole family playing and looking for food together. but to be born as a human kid is so lonely. they become orphaned even though they have parents. they spend more time with strangers than their parents. we are losing our instincts. we are destroying the system of life which our ancestors developed and lived successfully with for many thousands of years. now we become the only animals that work this hard. even in the past people didn?t work as hard or long as they do now except slaves and prisoners. what made people see slavery as progress or development? what is the reason people choose to live like this? life is easy, why do we choose to make it so hard and complicated? what makes us think life has no choice when in fact we have a lot of choice?

Desire is the root cause of suffering. Desire for things one does not have, desire for things one cannot have. Desire for things that have been lost. Desire is nature's biggest motivator for progress and at the same time, the source of much of our pain. It's not just humans that suffer from desire, animals do as well. Its at the core of the natural world. The only way to escape the suffering caused by desire is to strive to seperate yourself from it. This is what is at the core of many world religions. It is the central tenant of Buddhism. In Christianity, the state of mind resulting from the temporary release from desire is called "grace" (not the prayer before meals).

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What state/country do you live in, how many people are you shopping for. include with this dry goods, cleaning items, and pet food. do not include liquor or tobacco.

I shop for two people, myself and my husband. I spend 30-40$/week(including groceries, cleaning items). I live in Albany, NY. It becomes more when I have to buy furnitures or books not normally bought. We are vegetarians. So we don't buy meat.

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Or anywhere...where are our priorities? oh, you say you didn't know we spend this amount on average yearly? sad, huh but true. .so, what do you think or propose we do to help rid our country, our world of poverty or perhaps "slow genocide"...perhaps those words will grab your attention better - they have mine.... to steve: regardless of fault, we are still put on this earth to help others, especially those like children who were born into poverty not of their own doing. i think that i'd really like to know more about why you said this and why you gave such a broad answer or perhaps you were just trying to be funny??? i hope so. but, if you read this, i'd love for you to expound - i'm not saying i'm hungry - i'm fighting for those who are!

People go hungry because they end up having to pay far more for housing and energy due to escalating costs. Now with overall food prices going up, some just cannot afford it. (Pay no heed to the ignorant remark above me. Food banks have seen a sharp increase in the number of people who otherwise would not have need their services...in other words, people WITH jobs.) However, there seems to be an increased focus on malnutrition rather than just hunger in general. Nowadays, it is simply much cheaper to buy unhealthy processed, "junk" than to purchase healthy produce and meat. Therefore, it's not surprising you'll find a lot of poor obese people suffering from a variety of ailments, thus, leading to increased health-care costs.

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I don't usually hang out in this section but i am shocked to read some of your answers and questions! why would you run to the vet every time your cat or dog coughs? i take better care of my daughter then anyone in the world, but even i don't run to the pediatrician every time she has a sniffle! i just read one member's previous question worrying about her cat becasue it's temperature was a half degree higher than average and it seemed "unhappy"! omg! first of all i think it would be more traumatic for the poor kitty to have a thermometer stuck up it's rear because it's acting unhappy! i'd be unhappy too! and another one worrying about one of her 6 cats having a slight cough a couple times a day and goes on to mention that "he has had..cbc's..chem screens and xrays". and then the lady who just wrote that she just spent $400 today on blood tests for her cat because he "seemed listless." do you guys just have money to burn? do you run to the doctor for every little sniffle you have too? do you run to the er in the middle of the night if your child's temp reaches 99 degrees? or is this just a pet thing? i'm really curious here. i'm not trying to be mean but i am astonished by this stuff! i love my cat. he has been with me for 8 years and i would be devistated if anything ever happened to him but i certainly would not bring him to the vet for a slight cough or being "listless"! are you kidding me? can't you people read? i said when my daughter has a sniffle i don't run to her pediatrician! not that my kitten had a cold! where are you getting that from? oh, btw, since you are all so worried, you'll be happy to know that monte gets all his regular checkups, vaccinations, and any necessary vetrinary care. i posted a simple question looking for a friendly opinion in a forum i thought might provide that. obviously i was wrong. i'm sure there are very lovely people on this forum at times but some of you are quite infantile. perhaps you are old cat ladies? perhaps you are baron widows or widowers who have nothing better to do with your deceased's life insurance money than run to the vet every other day. perhaps you are lonely and need the companionship of your vet. or maybe you are just overly obsessed with your cat's health. whichever it is, your issues do not make me a bad pet owner. hmmm... just a thought sunshine, maybe that's your problem... you still have that darn thermometer stuck up your ... and percy, there is a slight chance that a headache could be a tumor on your temporal lobe! are you going to run in for an mri or ct scan?! first of all, after re-reading many of your posts this morning i definitely know this entire conversation got way out of hand last night. however, most of you who decided to get down and dirty and act like children, calling me names, failed to realize that my question was sincere. i was simply using examples from what i read last night to explain the reason for my question. my question was if there is such a thing as people projecting hypochondria onto their pets! i apologize to those of you who got caught up in this ridiculousness last night but there were a few posters on here who were acting extremely immaturely and rudely and i guess i got caught up in their idiocy. i am a responsible pet owner and i am proud of how i treat my monte. i suppose i understand why some of you turned this into a personal issue becasue of the examples i used. if had asked the question without examples you would not have understood the question. why can't people just answer without all the drama? furthermore, i don't judge people who chose to parent differently than i and i agree that i should not judge those who choose to run to the vet for every little thing. i apologize for being judgemental but honestly it was spurred from everyone judging me when i asked a simple question before this one. i should not have stooped to their level.

Hi there, Wow.. I don't know where to begin!! The tone of your question seems so defensive. Hey, I am here to help people with questions and sometimes there is a really strong reason to recommend veterinary assistance. And yes there are some folks who get overly "hypocondrical" yet at the same time, there are times when it is essential to get professional care. http://cats.about.com/cs/healthissues/a/whencallvet.htm First of all, to defend some of the folks who recommend taking their pet to the vet if they notice something "off", it is, in my opinion, better to err on the side of caution than to just let it "slide". While a sniffle can be something really innocuous, it also can herald a serious problem that does need attention. The one thing that pets cannot do, that children can, unless they are infants of brand new moms, who I imagine would err on the side of caution and at least call their pediatrician, children can tell their parents what is bothering them. Based on that, parents can make intelligent and informed decisions about calling the doc. Additionally, there are folks that have medical insurance to protect them and not run them into huge debt, hopefully. A pet can't tell you that they have a headache!! They just act their discomfort out and behave differently. While there may be some people who are over-protective about their pets and may run to the vet too quickly, that is far preferable to me, than ignoring something about which they have no experience. Case in point: If my cat vomits once a week right after eating, I assume he ate too quickly. If he starts vomiting two hours after eating a couple of times a week, I may be thinking hair balls... and even hairballs can be serious if they are blocking the digestive tract. If my cat vomits several hours after eating several times a week, I will call my vet immediately. Turned out that my cat had developed a food allergy and had irritable Bowel Disease, which needed to be treated. He is doing great now. Please don't stereotype the folks that recommend a vet visit or call with a problem that they don't understand, and call us "old cat ladies, or cast aspirsions on widows who have cats that care. Many of us sacrifice a lot to keep our pets healthy and to provide vet care when it is needed. While I don't call my vet if my cat sneezes once, if he is sneezing a lot and is listless, and his nose is hot and dry, is not eating and has a temp (yes I take temps and my cats are quite comfy with this procedure because I start them as kitten to be ok with this) I make a bee-line for the vet, just as I would if it were my child. Whomever called you a bad pet owner has their own issues, and is projecting something from their emotional background. No one knows you or how you take care of your pets, so it is all projection, anyway. Since you know you take good care of your pets, no need to be so defensive. Let folks feel the way they feel. I think that many people who ask questions here are legitimately looking for help, and with the best answers I have received, have been thanked by questioners for steering them in the right direction and have consulted with their vet for professional assessment with good results. As far as I am concerned, in our household, our cats are part of the family. We give them the best of care, just as if they were our "children", but that doesn't make us nuts or obsessive. And, one last thing, there are those folks who answer just to answer and lack the knowledge or who do the research to back up the suggestion to have a cat assessed by a vet. They see someone in trouble with their pet and instantly suggest a vet. At least that is better than just giving advise that they have no business giving. I hope that this helps. I would far rather see a person "obsessed" with their pet's health than to totally ignore it. Have a happy New Year, Troublesniffer Owned by cats for over 40 years Freelance writer for http://www.petside.com

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To be given life is the ultimate gift. when we are first born we have the right to cry or laugh. when we grow up we have the freedom to choose the way we want to be. humans were born with rights equal to every other living thing but because of our unlimited desire human life is often of less quality than most other animals. a small bird wakes up early in the morning singing a song waking the other birds, merrily looking for food, spending a short time to get all the bugs and grain she needs to fill her small stomach, then spending the rest of her time playing, singing, and courting. she spends a few days to build her beautiful nest. she doesn?t work too much to get the food she needs everyday. her life is easy. she has a lot of time to play and enjoy living together with the other birds. humans have small stomachs as birds do. just to have enough to eat we too do not have to work a lot in one day. if we want to build a house, we can build one in a few weeks. we can then have a lot of free-time in our life to play and enjoy life together as well. now days people choose to work very hard, at least 8 hours per day. they work like machines just to have some food to eat even though the food they eat is not good quality. they eat the old plants and animals that have been dead many months in a can or in frozen packages. they have to live in a crowded house like a termite. if they want their own house they have to spend at least one half of their life or maybe all of their life to work for that house. life is busy and hectic all the time. we can see only complications with no space for beauty and freedom. we create suffering for ourselves because we don?t know the purpose of life. we are blinded and our soul turns to darkness. we can?t see beauty. we can?t enjoy living. we have only fear growing in our minds everyday. we begin to distrust other people. we cannot be friends with others around us, even relatives or family members. our lives are lonely, even though the world is full of people. even though we have a lot of material goods and wealth we still feel like it?s not enough. even thought other people give us love, we still don?t trust them. we are even disturbed by the rooster?s morning call and we?re proud to say in the middle of this confusion and suffering that this is development and we are civilized. why do humans choose to live their life in a difficult and complicated life like this? what do we receive from our hard work all our life? why is the simple and peaceful way not attractive to people? life is easy, why do we make it hard? if we think we are the most clever animal in the world, why do we make our life full of bitterness and suffering more than any other animal? why do we have to work harder than other animals? why do we make our lives so boring? why don?t we have time for our kids and family or even time for ourselves? these are the instincts of all life. in 24 hours we spend more than 10 hours struggling with what we call work or said nicely, ?making a living?. we spend on average less than 8 hours sleeping and 2.5 hours a day eating, maybe .5-1 hour bathing/dressing. this leaves 3 hours left for ourselves and our family in our day. mostly we spend this time intoxicating ourselves with entertainment such as drinking, going to parties, shopping, watching movies or watching tv. even on our day off we love to spend the time on entertainment. we don?t see the importance of spending time with family or ourselves because we think we don?t have time. so we are not different from machines or robots because we have lost our heart and soul. our kids are like our pets. we take care of them enough to feed them and keep them safe but we neglect to think about their mind and soul. kids want to be loved and cared for and to feel close to their parents but we think it?s a burden so we push them away by sending them to pre-school. then we appease ourselves by telling ourselves we?ve done the best by them by giving them good food and expensive schooling so we can have more time to give to working and we can tell ourselves that we work for our kids. but we don?t know if the kids want what we give them or not. we assume we have given the best to them. if the kids know how to compare, they must be jealous of other animals like ducks seeing their whole family playing and looking for food together. but to be born as a human kid is so lonely. they become orphaned even though they have parents. they spend more time with strangers than their parents. we are losing our instincts. we are destroying the system of life which our ancestors developed and lived successfully with for many thousands of years. now we become the only animals that work this hard. even in the past people didn?t work as hard or long as they do now except slaves and prisoners. what made people see slavery as progress or development? what is the reason people choose to live like this? life is easy, why do we choose to make it so hard and complicated? what makes us think life has no choice when in fact we have a lot of choice?

I have to agree with you, I don't know why people can't be happy living a simple life instead of wanting more and more. The harder you work and the more money you make does not buy happiness. Most of it goes for taxes anyway. Yes, we do have a choice to live a simple and easy life.

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I have been doing a bit of research over the past few days and have been shocked to find that it is near impossible to keep an australian native as a pet (unless you’re after a bird or reptile). i struggle to see the logic in this. i have always been an animal lover and have had various different pets (rats, cats, dogs, cows, birds...) but have always dreamt of one day having a quoll. my real confusion here is how replacing cats with quolls or rabbits with bilbies is a bad idea... “native animals should not be kept because people can’t care for them properly” but it’s ok for them to torture a cat or dog? i believe no animal should be treated badly but unfortunately there is always going to be someone to ruin it for the rest of us. the only way to stop this is to get rid of the pet concept all together. why are common pets seen as so much more disposable? “they belong in the wild” sorry but at this stage they’re not going to be there much longer. they’re dying out because of us and our pets! having natives as pets instead will not only bring down the number of un-native animals in our country but will also build up the natives’ numbers and possibly save them from extinction. “it will take funding away from conservation programs” let me give you a scenario... i’m your average joe looking for a pet. laws in australia have changed so i’m tossing up between a rat and an antechinus (rat-like marsupial). i’m either going to spend money on the rat or the antechinus. i’m not going to spend money on conservation stuff anyway! what difference does it make? i mean i have a dog yet i sponsored a spotted quoll (didn’t stop me buying the dog, wouldn’t stop me buying a wombat). the biggest issue here seems to be caring for them. there needs to be a national shift. we are breeding more and more un-native animals and bringing more into the country to kill our natives and destroy their habitats. if pet shops started selling captive bread natives along with their food in easy packages like we already get for any other animal it can’t be that difficult. can you honestly argue that choosing a cat over a quoll is good?? if we all had quolls instead there would be more quolls and no cats. end of story.

Good point ! The only way I know to keep a native is to register as a carer with Fawna or Wires, but then you only care for sick or orphan animals then they get released back to the wild. I have raised kangaroos in the past out west then when I moved to the coast came across an orphaned joey when I phoned wires to find a carer I was abused for having it in my care and told I could face a huge fine what crap , was I supposed to leave it on the side of the road to die ? Found another one a week ago and phoned again was luckier this time and the joey was taken in by a carer, when I retire and have more time on my hands I will register and get my permit to become a carer.

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Seriously people think about it for a second show quality dogs and there litter mates cost way more than average. i want to show dogs( neos) because i want to get into a breed which in my opinion has very few good quality specimens- (i like the italian lines), so i know i'm going to spend some money, like 2500 to 3000 a puppy, but i don't think the average person who wants a pet dog should have to pay 1000's for a dog, so whats wrong with someone breeding two healthy dogs that aren't show champs so that people can have well breed dogs for pet or maybe show? show breeders rarely charge less than 900 for a young pup as showing the dogs is costly and requires alot of money and time, if i wanted a pet dog i would only want to pay 300 to 700 dollars for a common breed dog, and many people don't have the desire to show-plus from what i have seen of gsd, i wouldn't even want a show breed shep. people don't just breed for money, it cost so much money to show and just raise a litter money is not the reason for a good breeder thats what mills and really bad backyard breeders do, i wonder how many people on this site really got there pup from someone with champ male and female dogs. cost does not weed out bad owners petland charges on average 1000 to 3000 for a pup some of them mixes and yet of the very few high priced purebred dogs turned into the shelter where i work they are from pet land. i think interviewing and screening perspective puppy owners it whats weeds out alot of the bad owners.

Only high-quality dogs that meet the breed standard (and have had proper genetic testings: CERF & OFA) should be bred. Showing in conformation is the best way to see if your breeding stock is "up-to-snuff". In fact, that's the main PURPOSE of conformation, to see which dogs most closely CONFORM to the breed standard. Even out of show-dog parents, there will be some "pet" puppies. I personally don't want to buy a purebred dog any cheaper than $500-$600. If they are cheaper, that means that likely the breeder isn't doing something they should be doing. I'm not rich, but I do want to get a quality dog. I paid $1000 for my pet-quality papillon (out of show lines), and am very pleased. I'd much rather pay a few extra hundred dollars up front and know I'm having a much higher chance of getting a healthy, quality dog; rather than skimp on the initial purchase price and pay big bucks in vet bills later on for things that good breeding practices would have prevented. Whether you pay $300 or $3000, the initial purchase price of the animal is always the cheapest part. Now I don't think every dog particularly needs to have their champion title already to be bred, but they should at least have been shown to see how they fair in the ring. And sometimes there is something in a dog that an experienced breeder sees that they want to breed the dog even if it isn't a champion, but in the future, will produce better lines. There is a balance, but the goal should alway be betterment of the breed. CERF and OFA, on the other hand, I have no leeway on. If I am buying a dog, the parents absolutely must have the proper genetic testings done. .

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To be given life is the ultimate gift. when we are first born we have the right to cry or laugh. when we grow up we have the freedom to choose the way we want to be. humans were born with rights equal to every other living thing but because of our unlimited desire human life is often of less quality than most other animals. a small bird wakes up early in the morning singing a song waking the other birds, merrily looking for food, spending a short time to get all the bugs and grain she needs to fill her small stomach, then spending the rest of her time playing, singing, and courting. she spends a few days to build her beautiful nest. she doesn?t work too much to get the food she needs everyday. her life is easy. she has a lot of time to play and enjoy living together with the other birds. humans have small stomachs as birds do. just to have enough to eat we too do not have to work a lot in one day. if we want to build a house, we can build one in a few weeks. we can then have a lot of free-time in our life to play and enjoy life together as well. now days people choose to work very hard, at least 8 hours per day. they work like machines just to have some food to eat even though the food they eat is not good quality. they eat the old plants and animals that have been dead many months in a can or in frozen packages. they have to live in a crowded house like a termite. if they want their own house they have to spend at least one half of their life or maybe all of their life to work for that house. life is busy and hectic all the time. we can see only complications with no space for beauty and freedom. we create suffering for ourselves because we don?t know the purpose of life. we are blinded and our soul turns to darkness. we can?t see beauty. we can?t enjoy living. we have only fear growing in our minds everyday. we begin to distrust other people. we cannot be friends with others around us, even relatives or family members. our lives are lonely, even though the world is full of people. even though we have a lot of material goods and wealth we still feel like it?s not enough. even thought other people give us love, we still don?t trust them. we are even disturbed by the rooster?s morning call and we?re proud to say in the middle of this confusion and suffering that this is development and we are civilized. why do humans choose to live their life in a difficult and complicated life like this? what do we receive from our hard work all our life? why is the simple and peaceful way not attractive to people? life is easy, why do we make it hard? if we think we are the most clever animal in the world, why do we make our life full of bitterness and suffering more than any other animal? why do we have to work harder than other animals? why do we make our lives so boring? why don?t we have time for our kids and family or even time for ourselves? these are the instincts of all life. in 24 hours we spend more than 10 hours struggling with what we call work or said nicely, ?making a living?. we spend on average less than 8 hours sleeping and 2.5 hours a day eating, maybe .5-1 hour bathing/dressing. this leaves 3 hours left for ourselves and our family in our day. mostly we spend this time intoxicating ourselves with entertainment such as drinking, going to parties, shopping, watching movies or watching tv. even on our day off we love to spend the time on entertainment. we don?t see the importance of spending time with family or ourselves because we think we don?t have time. so we are not different from machines or robots because we have lost our heart and soul. our kids are like our pets. we take care of them enough to feed them and keep them safe but we neglect to think about their mind and soul. kids want to be loved and cared for and to feel close to their parents but we think it?s a burden so we push them away by sending them to pre-school. then we appease ourselves by telling ourselves we?ve done the best by them by giving them good food and expensive schooling so we can have more time to give to working and we can tell ourselves that we work for our kids. but we don?t know if the kids want what we give them or not. we assume we have given the best to them. if the kids know how to compare, they must be jealous of other animals like ducks seeing their whole family playing and looking for food together. but to be born as a human kid is so lonely. they become orphaned even though they have parents. they spend more time with strangers than their parents. we are losing our instincts. we are destroying the system of life which our ancestors developed and lived successfully with for many thousands of years. now we become the only animals that work this hard. even in the past people didn?t work as hard or long as they do now except slaves and prisoners. what made people see slavery as progress or development? what is the reason people choose to live like this? life is easy, why do we choose to make it so hard and complicated? what makes us think life has no choice when in fact we have a lot of choice?

You chose it amd you make it that way. jtm