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RNC Hoedown

Watching the RNC on mute. Republicans can't dance. Line dancing suddenly makes sense...if you want to call it that.

Head Split Open, Thoughts Leaking Out

It's now day 3 with this splitting migraine fucking headache. Rusty nails behind the eyes. My pulse becomes the enemy whenever I run across the street. Can't think. Can't sleep. Can't work. Best of all, I'm going to get my teeth drilled tomorrow. So if by some miracle this sensation of industrious midgets beneath the skull goes away by tonight, that's what I have to look forward too tomorrow.

Solamen Miseris...

For those who ask, since there's been quite a few of you. There is only one thing I know of that could ever start me drinking: the reincarnation of Dorothy Parker. Somehow, I'm still fairly confident it's going to happen one of these days. How do I know? It's difficult to pin down. I suppose it's this visceral knowledge that the planet isn't going to let me die without first making a drunk out of me. Every time I sit down to work I can hear Ernest Hemmingway cursing.

Happy birthday, you crazy old bitch. The world of wit misses you.

The Perils of Aging (continued)

Alright, I can't stop thinking about it. This is pissing me off something horrid, this Millennial crap. My generation has been insulted for being too independent. Mind you, it's the Boomers doing it. They had a ball all through the sixties, seventies and eighties, cursing authority (as one should) and "freeing their minds". Now they're the ones in charge and they can't stand, just can't tolerate that our generation 1) won't pay their bills for them 2) Isn't going to blindly listen to an idiot. Congratulations, Boomers. We grew up in the age of INFORMATION. We do not listen to those who we know to be foolish, and we DO check. You asked for this. You paid for this. You will be forced to accept this. We are better than you because you made us to be that way. We are not the whiny generation, as this controversy proves. You are.

The Bitterness of the Aging and No-Longer-Hip

CBS ran a truly horrible broadcast on the "millenials" recently. It has bothered me so much that I'm actually linking to the fark commentary, where (eventually) my comment will appear. Here it is distilled (pardon the reference to previous postings in the Fark Forums). I generally don't post to fark, but this one has me very angry.

This is a very bad piece of journalism to begin with. First off, it is based around a stereotype (in this case, "stereotype" meaning a trend that is entirely subjective).

Second, it is rooted in the bitterness of the elder generations toward a young generation that has embraced the doctrine of individuality and determination that they have espoused for the past fifty years. We were always taught not to value authority any more than it was sensibly applied (Boomer Generation, civil rights, etc) and to make our own way in life and not wait for somebody to hand it to us (the Greatest Generation and its grand industrial hopes summarized).

Third, the elder generations clearly do not understand that the younger generation faces serious problems as a result of their way of doing things. Previous posters have mentioned how screwed our country is now economically, environmentally, etc. This has created a situation where individually-minded career goals are more sensible. Only a fool is loyal to someone or something that is proven to be utterly indifferent to your wellbeing. Furthermore, the inflation and high cost of living are a direct product of factors long established and poorly managed by preceding generations. Let our generation reach the stage where we control the banks and the interest rates and then MAYBE we'll be responsible for the cost of living.

One final note, any generalizations made herein were done just to save space. The issue is complicated. If this comment is to be summarized, it is to state this much in contradiction of the moronic oversimplification we see in this broadcast.

link - Fark Commentary
link - CBS Broadcast

And one day, she didn't wake up...

The laptop breathed its last today. Four years, three hard drives, two power jacks, and three power cords later, the motherboard died on me. No real data lost, except a few words on the tail end of a story edit. Nothing I can't fix up via library computers while I go shopping. Damned annoying, though. Count on a lot of twisted stories written out longhand in this period.

UPDATE: Fixed it, at least for now.

Cluster Bombs banned by Non-Users worldwide

Cluster bombs now banned by several countries that don't regularly use them anyway. Congratulations.

Some of the biggest makers and users of cluster bombs cited by human rights groups -- such the United States, Russia, China and Israel -- were not involved in the talks and did not sign the accord. Organizers expressed hope that those nations would nevertheless be pressured into compliance.

What I like most is the four names listed. The US, Russia and China are three of the four largest countries on Earth (#2 is Canada). Israel is the size of New Jersey, yet it's one of the largest makers and users of cluster bombs on Earth. I always thought that in order to throw your weight around you should first have it.
I single Israel out mainly because, as you may recall, they are the ones that precipitated this issue in recent memory with their attack on Lebanon. You would think it'd be pointless to even approach the topic without their being at the table.

link

Sedlec Ossuary

The Sedlec Ossuary, a cathedral deorated with bones. This link is for a 360 degree model of the central chamber.
This one is for some better shots taken from another website.

Screw going to Disneyland

It's a list of odd amusement parks from around the world. Enjoy. Screw Disneyland. I'm going to Bon Bon Land!

Botanical Gardens

Went the botanical gardens today. Very relaxing way to spend a Saturday afternoon. I was even relaxed enough to endure the presence of children playing and running in enclosed spaces...around cacti.

Scapegoat Award

Taken from that holy pinacle of sanitized propaganda, CNN:

"The drugs were purchased online without a doctor's visit. She says that her husband had become an addict -- and that the Internet sites that sold him the drugs were his pushers.

"Absolutely," she said. "That's exactly what they are."

I remember about six or so years back I had a friend who was nursing a pretty substantial heroin habit. Then came they day she took a nice big hit (as her tolerance was appreciable) and found out it was cut heavily with PCP. I mention this because this is precisely the same. You did not know your dealer. You did not verify your source. The internet is not a drug pusher. Your husband became a junky of his own accord. Go sit down and continue watching TV. We'll tell you when next you may have an opinion.

After some deliberation I have decided not to make a social commentary out of this little act of stupidity. Please, to spare me the annoyance, in the future do not dwell on these cases. We all know in our reasoning minds the foolishness of blaming the dealer for you getting hooked. It's like blaming the salesman for your love of shopping. Remember, it's all very honest when you exercise care (caveat emptor), but if you don't it's your own damned fault.

Alright, I still ended up with commentary. Old habits die hard.

via CNN, who should be made to pay.

Human Tetris

Two words I never imagined hearing together in a sentence: Human Tetris. A game show from Guess which country!

America & Music

Thursday, 6 pm...walking up to the war memorial. "Fortunate Son" starts playing in my head.

Election 2008

I love this. I love everything about it.

"Turn your eyes inside and dig the vacuum..."

Night in ----. Can smell diesel fumes rising up all the way to a third-floor apartment in a suburban area. This town has the worst air in America, hands down. The springtime is the worst. Alchemy in the air, a mix of stale pheromones, pollen, sweat and air pollution. The effect is like a cheap drug, haze without euphoria. Goddamned city's seeming old hat and worthless. Your life can leave you in a place like this. Blink and two years go by. You barely remember. The mood's too into the working-class grind. You gotta grind to be, and that's the way to go if you're ready to let your life pass you by. I'm not, and I'm leaving first chance I get.

These aren't the times of yore. Keep reading Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas and the other great road novels. You'd have to be blind to miss the change. Thompson himself wrote about it, about the death of the road man, the traveling worker, the traveling anybody really. You're encouraged to be static, rooted. That part's nothing new. But everything's a racket in this horrid new world order. You gotta find an IN somewhere, and if you find one you're probably lucky. Everything's gone to ground, every industry's either there or delusional in its supposed immunity. We're all teetering on the edge of a cliff here. In or out, everybody's heading on down. You don't die down there. The US isn't going anywhere. It just all becomes a shouting match. I'm loathed to admit that I'll probably be as much a part of it as anyone.

It's a bizarre thing to realize you can't meditate outdoors because the air's too damned polluted. This being true and most psychedelics being illegal do not belong together in the same logical framework.

My 27th birthday is the Saturday after next. The only sane route after nearly 20 years of dadaist economics is to ride the goddamned wave. Keep your body lean. Pollute your mind with chemicals if you wish, but not with television. Objectivity is only subjectivity + authority; or so says vid-eaten and restless.

Man Made his Own False Teeth from Stainless Steel

This man is now one of my personal heroes.

"From stainless steel, a Wilmington, Calif., carpenter has made himself a complete set of unbreakable artificial teeth. Buying a block of the alloy, he shaped each tooth individually with the aid of a hack saw and file. Then he vulcanized them into a homemade mounting of rubber, obtaining the material from a dental-supply house and making his own mouth impressions with paraffin. For molding purposes he employed plaster of Paris in electric outlet boxes."

Courtesy of Modern Mechanix

My Machine has Developed Taste

My computer has officially refused to play this DVD of Pirates of the Caribbean 3 that I got from the public library. It'll play the Maya Deren short film collection just fine. It did fine for Kurosawa. I believe, in celebration of my liberation from work and its own 4th birthday, my computer has become a snob. Good little laptop.

Brains...

Point of view would require looking at the world, a bitter proposition to anybody who’s ever tried it. Hard truths. Hard addictions. All the same after a while. Your eyes blur and the mind rebels. If it isn’t, you’re probably not paying enough attention to begin with. Country’s a bitch that’ll eat your balls even if you don’t have them. Don’t know ho what’s possible. Then again, don’t know how it’s possible for an entire generation to grow up without a perceivable point of view, but that’s how it’s going. Segmented subculture fragmented to the consistency of sand. No collective drive. No point of order. No point, even. That’s probably the answer, right? No point equals no point of order. Everybody’s passed off the future as a steady progression of technology and social Darwinism. We sit at home with our computers waiting for tomorrow’s world, discontent and eating the chips and the salsa. It’s no wonder this generation has so many jokes about caffeine, squirrels, and other spastic agents; ADD is no more. It is no longer the disorder. It is the norm.

It’s far from the end of days (I hope) but still, I did grow up hoping that I’d get my crack at a good, solid Woodstock instead of this set of juvenile bickering.

In other news, I rented the third Pirates of film just to round out my viewing of the season. After my experience with watching Spiderman 3, I’m expecting this one to cause me actual physical pain.

Morning Thought

Woke up this morning to six messages in gmail, all of which were spam invitations from myspace. For some reason it's depressing me more than it should. Probably just the weather. It's unseasonably cold where I am right now, and it makes getting out of bed harder than it should be. A personal shortcoming, trouble getting out of bed in the cold. I need warm weather right about now. Ever have one of those days where everything feels like it's trying to sap your strength?

Ah well, another day at war with elements.

Almacan

Metamorphosis by Almacan

link courtesy of bioephemera

Id: The Video Game

Susannah Breslin, esteemed writer on the controversial topics has been assaulted verbally for posting an honest analysis of the recently released GTA IV. Since it's rare for me to read anyone who does an analysis of a video game cynical enough to be right, I'm throwing the hat into the ring on this one. I normally hate block quotes, but since there's practically no end to the things I hate, what the hell?

"Because this whole moronic outcry against what is nothing but an unabashed and unashamed articulation of Man's basest impulses run amok is nothing but hypocrisy. Here's a newsflash for you. This is the way people think. This is how things are. This is the way it is."

The reason for my support is, bluntly, a hatred of weekend guidos. This game phenomenon is basically Id: the Video Game. It's a display of primal male impulses, a simplified world of drugs, guns and pussy that has no consequences and no admission fee. It's undeniably laughable. It's also fairly sad that so few people understand this. My theory is that Breslin's naysayers are the sort of people who have GTA fans in colleges, safely tucked away. They're the little snowflakes and everybody's so damned proud of what they do. They just CAN'T be thinking like that.

Trust me: they are. They're just not interested in crossing the fence. Most of them are too afraid of the consequences to even approach that part of the world anyway. That's why they're playing the game in the first place. It's a world with an OFF switch.

So please Mr. and Mrs. suburbanite, from the bottom of my heart I ask you, shut the fuck up.

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Now playing: Tool - Vicarious
via FoxyTunes

No Title-Just watch it

Courtesy of Ben Templesmith, via twitter

RIP Dr. Hofmann

At the age of 102, the old man's gone off the bicycle, or maybe just onto a better one. Who knows But few men have left behind stranger legacies than Albert Hofmann. Happy trails, Doc. Give Tim Leary our regards.