My Life is a Whirling Dervish

Wow. So, it's been a while since I've been here - a little over 8 months I guess. I've almost forgotten how to write since I haven't been doing much of that lately either. And really, it's not without reason I suppose since the last few months have been fraught with perils and insanity the likes of which I have never experienced before. See, what happened was...a couple months before my last known post, I started dating a girl; a nice, normal, wonderful woman. We got along wonderfully and enjoyed spending much of our time together, ergo and so forth - I asked her to marry me. So for the last few months, I have been frantically trying to not plan a wedding while she has been frantically planning the wedding. It's kept me incredibly busy, as you can tell by the lack of postings but no one has been missing me that much anyway because I don't see you knocking down my door to get me back to writing.

Anyway, because of that and my hectic work schedule I've not done much with this and I really don't have anything of substance to write about right now either. Perhaps in the near future I can regale you with a tale or two from the past eight months and share my thoughts on existentialist drivel and philosophical whimsy but for now, enjoy these pictures of Pacman that I've drawn in a series I call, "Unseen Episodes".

On Time - A Beginning Thought Anyway

For the past few days, and thanks to happening upon Morgan Freeman’s Through the Wormhole on the Science Channel, I have been reading and pondering a lot about time, space, and existentialism. The episode I watched was entitled “Does Time Really Exist?” and it dealt a lot with the physics of time and space, much of which is far above my head as I do not know enough of the maths to understand it, but there was also a good bit of neuroscience and philosophy intertwined. Invariably, this makes sense – no one branch of any subject is immune to having crossover or correlation with some other subject in some way. 

And so, I started researching, trying to find and read anything on the debate of time and its’ existence or non-existence. I have come across many good articles, research papers, encyclopedic entries and whatnot which are all excellent. What I have found, and this isn’t really much of a surprise, is that I found myself gravitating more to the philosophical debate and connotations of the subject rather than the abstract scientific aspects of relativist physical theory.  And I have been cogitating on it ever since, even now while I’m writing this I am still in the midst of four articles on time, spacetime, and two on the debate between endurant and perdurant schools of theory.

Being just turned on to this subject, its’ constituent parts, and the multitude of other subjects that are interlaced within the debate, specifically as related to time, I know relatively very little. What I have surmised from all of this, though, is an understanding of the basics as I see them which has led me to a few conclusions of my own (none of which are grounded in anything save my own personal thoughts). I suppose we should start at the beginning, the original question posed by Morgan Freeman, ‘does time really exist?’

Time

I have always had, ever since I can remember, the thought that time was nothing special. The only reason that we recognize something that we call ‘time’ is because Man, as an entity, has forever had the desire to be lord and master over everything that he sees in his world. Time, for me, has always been nothing more than a cognition that became accepted in the hierarchy of life as a way to oppress and subjugate those who were deemed to be less fit in the scope of Darwinian logic. The abstraction of time, as presently defined, is accepted as an inevitability and that it marches forward in a linear fashion as we cannot move backward or forward within it. Man is at the mercy of time, unable to stop it. And this is a purely fatalistic view, but that is not important right now. 

The passage of time, as it is currently defined, is marked solely because of what many would rightly call ‘observable proof’. We can see the sun moving and, thanks to mathematics, are able to calculate at what rate it moves across the sky (15 degrees every hour). However, this is where the first problem arises (and again, this is all based on the depth of my own knowledge, not full comprehension or immersion). The determination and declaration of exactly how long is a second, minute, or hour has been somewhat of a complicating factor for me. Surely you cannot define something that is an abstraction or potentially has no foundation that is concrete and expect it to then just exist. For if I accept that time itself does exist, then I must accept that all constituent parts that make up the entity of time exist infallibly and are absolute. 

There are a great many tangential relativistic claims, counterclaims and otherwise theorhetorical aspects to the existence of time - McTaggart’s The Unreality of Time (1908) being somewhat of a benchmark piece in dealing with the philosophy of time. For this, though, I really won’t dwell on time quite so much as I probably could, or should, because there are other aspects that I wish to address that I have been trying to reconcile myself with in the scope of where I find myself landing on the issue of the existence of time and the universe as a whole. So for now, as far as time is concerned, I would posit that there is merit to the idea that it really does not exist and is merely a construct of Man’s imagination that has been passed down through “the ages” as fact which really is a very inelegant way of saying that I will explain more as I move on to the related subjects of philosophical thoughts.

Perdurantism

Best as I can define this, from what I know, perdurantism is the idea that an object exists throughout the whole of time in various segments of itself. The being persists in existence over the course of time, in other words, and therefore has a past and a future, as well as being in the present. This is most commonly held sort of ideology since there are events that have been chronicled as ‘past’ and there are uncertainties that are labeled as ‘future’. It is not unlike an earthworm’s segmented body, but just imagine that the earthworm is suspended in the three-dimensional special relativity plane of space and time. Each segment exists throughout the whole of the length of time being examined, or in existence, and each segment has specific memory of all those previous and various intuitions about those to come. Using this illustration, many experts have come to call perdurantism the ‘worm theory’ model of time.

Endurantism

This is the more novel theory recently being posited around that all beings and objects are wholly unto themselves. They exist, not segmented across time like with perdurantism, but rather as a whole entity that has both a past and a future but all of those various experiences and instances of that being are coexistent all at once. In simplest terms, as I have read it, endurantism is likened to a series of snapshot photographs that are placed throughout the four-dimensional existential plane of spacetime. These snapshots represent the entirety of the object or being which exists only as itself in different stages of existence, not so much as memories or predicted futures, however, because they all exist presently and are strewn about the fabric of reality as it is perceived by the observer or participant.

I had planned on having a rather elegant and insightful discourse on the entire subject, but because of the intricacies and the fact that I am doing much more research into the philosophy of the whole subject, which entails reading a plethora of articles and journals I just cannot devote the time right now; nor would I want to because it would be an incomplete thought process and be a gross injustice to the whole affair. So as it sits right now, I would have to say that I am leaning more toward the endurantism camp, but that I am an endurantist is a bit of a stretch at this point since I am currently just learning everything.

There are some inherent problems, as I see and understand them, with endurantism but there also seem to be some benefits, at least in my head. The cool thing to me about endurantism is the thought that the snapshots of the being that make up its’ existence are all happening now, right this very instance. The idea that everything that I am/were/ will be or am doing/have done/or will have done all exist concurrently is exciting for a variety of reasons – mostly that because if all of these things coincide in an amalgamated universe there is a distinct possibility that the multiverse theory is credible and that is a mind-blowing thought. Of course, the negative side, as I see it, is that IF all these snapshots are in existence and my entire being is a collective strewn about the four-dimensional fabric of reality all at once, how long are these so-called snapshots? Are they instantaneous like actual photographs, or are they instances of spatially relevant chunks that because four-dimensional spacetime is one entity are like a chapter on a DVD? The third option, as I imagine it, would be a combination of the two where they are all still photographs of my being but because they are in the four-dimensional spacetime they are, as would be inherent to the theory, non-linear and concurrent but in essence nonsensical.

The other really interesting thing, as I mentioned, is the multiverse theory that could be born of endurant thought. If all beings exist wholly as snapshots, and are all coincident with one another, it could be argued that the individual instances of which the snapshots are comprised are then existentially present in their own sub-universal fourth-dimensional spacetime universe. For even though the being is unchanged and wholly present as itself, there will never be a crossover or meeting of the various instances of snapshot beings – I cannot meet myself in a snapshot of myself from the past or future, so that would mean that my being then exists wholly in different universes from itself but the only true experience I can have is in the present snapshot which I find my current self having been stuck in.

Of course, that then gets into the constitution of identity which states that all parts of a being exist as a being unto itself. More simply, the parts of a whole are a whole all their own; both the parts and the whole exist in the same temporal space at the same temporal instance. For example, you have a ball of clay. The clay exists and is clay, but say you then fashion that ball of clay into a statue or coffee mug (doesn’t matter, just make something). Does the ball of clay cease to exist or is it still a ball of clay that you have fashioned into an art project? The clay ball does not cease to exist simply because it is malleable and now a statue, the clay ball still is valid as a clay ball but it occupies the same temporal location as the statue because it is a part of the statue. Conversely, though, you could not claim that the ball of clay is also a statue before you ply and mould the clay into the statue. 

So, you can see where this gets confusing. In short, there is no real conclusion – for me or for anyone else, but thanks to that damn Morgan Freeman I have been occupying my ‘time’ with deep thoughts about the whole ordeal.

Oops! I forgot this existed

So, it's been a while, again, since I've been on here. I have been relatively busy in the past few months, what with the saving myself from vapid and thankless immorality and boredom. And then consequently having to re-learn some old tricks, figure out some new ones, and just generally be browbeaten with information to the point that I thought my head might actually explode on a few occasions. Anyway, here are some drawings I made one day while bored. I had been playing a lot of a uniquely named Pacman rip-off on the internet, that's the only reason I can think of that I decided to draw Pacman inspired mash-ups.

The Jeremy Clarkson Saga

I'm no Briton, so I can't attest to the current climate that is taking shape there in the way of the public service strikes, but I definitely enjoy everything British -- the culture, the humor, the ridiculous way they insist upon drinking tea all the time. There is something about the idea of being British, specifically English, that speaks to me. I don't know why, but the pithy and, often times, snarkily sarcastic way that they speak and act is both hilarious and beautiful to me.

As such, I watch a lot of British programmes and series -- made all the easier by the expansion of the BBC to include an American affilate channel. While BBC-A doesn't show the every day programming that is native to its mother country, since that would be irrelevant to Americans, there are a lot of good programmes that I enjoy on a regular basis. Gordon Ramsay's The F Word, Doctor Who, and Top Gear all top my list of personal favorites. There are others of course (Luther, White Chapel, The Tudors), but they don't rank as must-see in my opinion even though they are enjoyable.

So, recently, as some people may or may not be aware, a situation has developed concerning the current strikes and a rather flippant moment of television involving a BBC presenter and his comments on the situation. And while I can understand the ire directed at the presenter, it seems to me that the demands for his job are a bit premature and somewhat ludicrous due to who it was that made the comments. Not to mention the subtext to this whole situation is, to me, a commentary on how this modern political correctness ideology seeks to make people less themselves and more autonomous; effectively it's personality facism.

Anyway...Jeremy Clarkson, a presenter for the BBC's Top Gear, made an appearance on The One Show and offered the following while discussing the on-going workforce strikes:

"I think they have been fantastic. Absolutely. London today has just been empty. Everybody stayed at home, you can whizz about, restaurants are empty... Airports, people streaming through them with no problems at all. And it's also like being back in the '70s. It makes me feel at home somehow. But we have to balance this, though, because this is the BBC. Frankly I'd have them all shot. I would take them outside and execute them in front of their families. I mean, how dare they go on strike when they have these gilt-edged pensions that are going to be guaranteed while the rest of us have to work for a living."

Okay, admittedly, when you see it in print it sounds pretty harsh. However, you cannot truly believe, even if you are dumb as a hammer, that anyone would publicly call for actions that are, in essence, genocide and be serious about it. And while I can see the point of those who were offended by the statement, the reason they are so upset, it seems, is because the only portion of the clip being shown starts mid-thought (Frankly I'd have them all shot...) and this turns Clarkson into an instant demon thanks to the media. Of course, some people will have watched the show itself, seen the full commentary, and still been offended. These people are idiots, and I'll tell you why.

Jeremy Clarkson is nothing short of a brash, outspoken, and brilliant presenter. As to Jeremy Clarkson as a person, I cannot attest but would imagine that privately he is largely the same as his TV persona. And that's just the point. Jeremy Clarkson the presenter, the TV personality, the affable facade, is who made those comments. Jeremy Clarkson the private citizen was tucked somewhere behind that jowly, withering ham hock of a face while TV Clarkson did what he is paid to do by way of being offensive, yet brilliantly spot on in his ribbing of not only the strike situation, but the BBC as a try-hard non-partisan entity.

Having watched Mr. Clarkson for quite some time now, I understand what his TV personality is, how he acts and reacts to certain situations. Some people do not, and that is evident because of the copious complaints the BBC has received over this whole thing. Did he say the words he said? Yes. Did he mean them to be offensive? Probably. Did he say them with absolute conviction, devoid of any detectable sarcasm? No, but sarcasm is hard to read or even see sometimes.

Personally, I don't think he should have had to apologize for what he said at all. It was an intelligent joke that was told so convincingly that those who did get offended have only made it known that they are are intellectually the same as a doorknob. There are no boundaries in comedy, everything is fair game. And Jeremy Clarkson is a smart enough man to understand that and use it to his advantage.

I've Seen This Film Before

I really do post far too infrequently on this thing. Oh well, it's not like anyone actually reads it, except this one guy I know. Anyway, lots of happening has been going down, and honestly, I'm not sure I know where else to lay out all my extemporaneous thoughts.

Saturday, not in the park, and it definitely wasn't the 4th of July, I uncovered information about my sister. If you have read much of this blog in the past, you know the one of whom I speak -- the bat shit crazy bitch who long ago abandoned reason for madness. Well, that harlot is pregnant...again. By the same beast that done did her in the first time. Can't say that I'm surprised. Once you decidedly throw away your life to live as a concubine to the white trash revolutionary king it becomes sort of a given that you will constantly be pregnant with degenerate and inferior genetic material.

And I could wax idiotic about all the same things that were wrong with this the first time around, but that would do little to assuage me. I am forever stuck in this middling ground. I want to care because that bitch is my sister, but I'm sick of continuously getting no reciprocation from the other side. I want to see her do better for herself and her (now 2) kids, but she fucked her way into this problem and burned every bridge along the way.

And then there is the sadistic side of me which, in all honesty, very well might win out. Yes, I've considered torture but I don't mean that. With Christmas coming up, I believe that even though I have to put up with my whore of a white trash sister and her brood of degenerate Idiocracy cast memebers, I can at least gain some sort of pleasure from it.

I think I'm going to order 500 condoms and FleshLight and give them to my idiotic, cock hungry slut of a sister and pray that maybe she will get the message. It's just unfortunate that I can't obtain a prescription for birth control pills or I would include that as well.

Fucking Dubstep

I officially hate my next door neighbor. This is a relatively new development being as he has only just moved in last month. The first month was peaceful enough. I never saw him, he never saw me, and he was fairly quiet...until last week.

Last week, I discovered my neighbor has a great, umm, talent(?) for music. It's not so much a talent as it is a penchant for playing music, really really ridiculously annoying music, very loudly. Nightly selections range anywhere from terrible scream-o selections to god awful 70's disco - basically anything that makes it sound as if non-sedated women are repeatedly getting back alley abortions with a hacksaw. That's fine, it's a mild annoyance at best, and I can drown it out with my own musical tastes or by hopping on the old Xbox, putting on the Turtle Beach headset and shooting people.

Tonight, however, my dear neighbor has struck a particularly deep nerve of mine. I don't know if it is intentional or by preference, or perhaps he fancies himself an audiophile who wishes to break into the music business, but my dear neighbor has found the one thing that makes me more insane than anything else -- dubstep. I can usually tolerate, and somewhat appreciate, most musical genres, but dubstep gets on my last living nerve to no end. I will never understand the attraction to listening to electronic machines thumping, whirring, and generally carrying on in an atonal hot mess.

But, oh, that my plight ended there! Because of neighbor's sudden interest in dubstep, and the fact that he owns a computer, he has taken this to mean that he should start trying to create some dubbed up remixes. Standard fare for this, from what I can gather is popular in the club/rave scene, is typically early 90's trash pop mixed with idiotic and annoying beats, buzzes, trills, and nonsense. But that is not good enough for neighbor. Oh no, he takes it further.

Tonight's playlist has included dubstep remixes of Boston's "More Than a Feeling", Dexie's Midnight Runner's "Come On, Eileen" (a song title I think someone should license to make a bukkake film), Chicago's "25 or 6 to 4", and the smash hit "Barbie Girl" by Aqua. While I care nothing for the final song, the other three are dear to me. I grew up listening to those songs, no I'm not that old but my father is and passed along his great taste in music to me. So, to hear them chopped and screwed, tweaked, and brutalized almost beyond recognition really fucking pisses me off. Not to mention the fact that all of them sound as if they have been done on a first generation Macintosh dot matrix printer.

Dubstep sucks. My neighbor sucks. And he is ruining the World Series even though the Rangers are winning right now. That is all.

Another Dream for the Ages

The title says it all, I think. And I think you'll agree from my last dream that you are in for a treat. This dream was a bit more tame, by my standards, and definitely more linear than the previous one I posted but it was still incredibly odd. Let me set the scene...<flashback-y synthesizer music>

There I was standing on a stage, a lone spot light illuminating the space around me, and I could hear the sounds of an audience collectively breathing heavily. I peered into the darkness, searching for a face, a hand, anything recognizable that I could latch onto and ease my troubled mind. As the music began to play, I found a friendly face in the crowd and launched into my performance of Alfredo's aria from La Traviata juxtaposed against the pulsating rhythm of a dub step mix.

Soon the music died out and I was left holding out the final note until my lungs caught fire and my voice faded into nothingness. Standing there, in the light and the stillness, the echoes of my song dying softly, I heard the thunderous applause and I walked off stage and down to my dressing room. Once there, I stripped naked and changed into a baseball uniform and slipped behind a curtain draped over a portion of the wall that led me to an underground tunnel.

Inside the tunnel, someone was waiting for me, someone from my past, and she wanted me to escape with her. I was in imminent danger, she said from the stifling darkness, and I needed to follow her and help her find something along the way. As I didn't see the point in arguing, I agreed and we set off in the musty blackness toward whatever and where ever we needed to be going. The farther we walked, the more curious I became about exactly whom it was I was following. Naturally, I reached out and grabbed at whatever my hands could find which just happened to be hair.

The hair was no good to me, it could be anyone, even a fat guy in wig, so I worked my hand down to the shoulder trying to figure out who was leading me down into the earth. The skin was soft, so I was reasonably satisfied that it was indeed a woman and not some feminine sounding man. Suddenly, a light appeared at the far end of the tunnel, and as we drew closer I could work out more features. 'Twas my old hooker friend Tiffany, and the light we came into illuminated her features and our current surrounding.

She had led me to a sewer. Typical, I thought, now she was going to rape me in the rat infested pipelines of the underground. Once I took in the fact that we were in a sewerline, Tiffany explained to me that we were now on the run from the Nazis and in search of a long lost shoe. Great, I thought, I'm Baron von fucking Trapp. Since we were officially on the run, we did next that which is only logical and stripped down naked so as not to leave any traces that we had been where we currently trod and set about the business of climbing through the muck toward a distant set of confusing pipes.

As we plodded through the foul smelling poop water, Tiffany further explained that the shoe we were after was the mighty and mythical Golden Chuck, a shoe so legendary and powerful that he who held it would wield the strength of 1 million gibbons. I hate basketball, is all I could say. And we pressed on.

We soon came upon a ladder leading up toward a platform, and being the consummate gentleman I let Tiffany ascend first. Once we reached the platform, I spied a small opening in the wall with a faint glow coming from within. I lay down in the grimy, slimy, wetness that coated the rough concrete and peered through the hole. I grew excited, not visibly (that would have proved painful in my present position), and marveled that we had found our quest. As I reached my hand slowly into the breech, Tiffany began humming a tune that was familiar to me but I couldn't quite place it.

With my fingers beginning to fumble with one of the laces of the Golden Chuck, I suddenly remembered the song being hummed behind me. It was Dies Irae, and as the large stone cracked down on my skull, I cursed at myself.

Apologies, This Is Probably Longer Than Your Attention Span

First thing's first, my attempt to avoid any and all trite, over-televised, over-politicized meet-and-greets masquerading as a 9/11 "memorial service" was a resounding success. Even though I did not stay away from the television as I had thought I would (come on, it was opening Sunday of the NFL season), I have a keen sixth sense about when someone is going to do or say something that I don't want to hear and was able to deftly mute any and all who sought to thwart my peace bubble.

I also decided to take an extended hiatus after my last posting to get some affairs in order, namely to finish reading the Vince Flynn novel I had been putting off and rabble rousing with the locals; there was much rabbling, far too little rousing, and a maddening plot that didn't resolve itself by the end of the novel leading to my procurement of the next in the series.

And then today, all day, at least up until about an hour ago, it rained. That's right, rain. That most precious of liquids squirting from the sky and covering the land with what I have always imagined to be God's favorite sexual act. Even with that stunning visual, I still very much enjoy the rain. It makes me happy, makes me wish I was in London, makes me want to prance like Legolas through Middle Earth. And don't try to tell me he didn't prance, he did. "Light of foot" is just a nice way to say prancing homosexual with big, misshapen ears frolicking about in tights....but I am dangerously close to getting off topic.

I love rain. I love the smell, I love the feel, I love that it makes dirt not kick off the ground straight into my eye. As much as I love the rain, and all that goes with it (rainbows, wet dog smell, unemotional self-love with the windows open), I hate what it does to people - particularly in a drought striken area...in the Bible Belt...of Texas. People around here routinely lose their minds when anything wet falls down from the clouds. Of course that's not to imply that they hadn't already lost their minds before, most of them already had done and are batty as fuck. But rain makes their mental disorder that much more apparent. They forget how to drive, they forget how to walk, they even forget how to be civil. And I understand, this year especially, there has been no substantial wetness for the better part of six months around here. Believe me, I understand that - I live here, too. But to completely go bat shit crazy and not be a decent human being is insane. Aside from that I have noticed something that, while not completely categorized as crazy, bothers me for some reason that I don't think I can accurately explain.

Whenever it rains, whether it be the first in a long while or the tenth day straight, the air becomes choked with the same sentiment of praise to God. Granted, I think God is probably praise worthy and I won't ever stop someone from doing so, but every single time that it rains there is a veritable shit storm of the exact same words either IRL or on the book of faces or the annoying bird noise announcement maker. And I can only take hearing/seeing/reading it so many times.

"God is ever faithful"

Hmmm, cute platitude. Shitty cliche. Even shittier basis for praise.  This one is usually in reference to how God is always looking out for his people and taking care of them, faithfully doting upon them and showering them with kindnesses. Interesting thought, but completely weird to me. If he were ever faithful, why let things get into such a precarious position in the first place? Isn't the benefit of omniscence and omnipresence that you can be everywhere, know everything, and take precautionary steps to prevent harm to those whom you steward? And yet, God seems to be some sort of sadist, constantly drumming people and killing them off or slowly torturing them with fire, famine, and fear.

"God answers prayers"

Another cute indoctrination quip. I get that prayer is the tool in which people 'talk' to God, and I understand that God 'answers' prayers in some people's minds. What I don't understand is how people think that the coincidental alignment of what you desire and some arbitrary action that somehow magically precipates this is the answer to a prayer. Especially interesting is when coincidences don't line up, and people throw out the contigency gem

"The answers come in God's time."

What the fuck? No, no, no. Now you're just adjusting your belief system to placate yourself because if you lose faith you think you will die and rot in Hell. Yeah, I do actually think that time has something to do with it but not in how it relates to selfish desires requested to God in the guise of it being beneficial to someone other than you, you selfish twat. To say that things come in God's time also bothers me for one other reason - it's ALL God's time. There is no ownership of time by humanity, no rent-to-own policy, no timeshare. Time just is and you are stuck in it, an insignificant carbon bubble in the stream. Therefore, most things will NEVER get answered and you will die having changed your beliefs and views on God simply to assuage your delicate sensibilities.

And of course, I will undoubtedly have touched many nerves, might even get a couple pieces of hate mail or some lovin'. I prefer lovin' but won't shy away from hate, since hate actually makes me happier to know that I have power over someone. Simple fact is, to me, rain is rain. It comes down, greens things up and I am generally happy about it. I don't think it's the answer to a mass prayer-a-thon, weather patterns change and eventually all cyclical things come back around. I'm not intentionally trying knock people for whatever they think but I'm sick of hearing about your shit. Think what you gotta think to fake yourself happy, but don't fucking proclaim it ad nauseum because I might just stab you one day. Who knows, I could be the answer to your prayer of not wanting to have to go to work every day if I paralyzed you. It could be a win/win.

Fuck September 11

I'm intentionally addressing this subject a week in advance because it is my hope that on the appointed day, I will be cut off from all electronic devices and means of having to hear or see anything to do with that which we all know is going to be a deluge of sentimentality, chest banging, and political jockeying for the 2012 election.

September 11, 2001

I was in high school on that day, and that is all I am going to say about that. I refuse to be a part of the rehashing, but I will address it as there is nothing more I loathe. Do not get me wrong, that day was terrible. Many people lost their lives, families torn a-blah blah blah, rhetoric and jargon of nostalgia. It was something that should have never happened, but since it did we cope, adapt, and move on. Except that we don't, move on at least. How can we when around every corner, every year, there are any number of people and politicians bringing it up and forcing people to remember the terror of that day.

While I do agree it was tragic and that those who were directly affected have a right to remember the loved ones they lost, how fucking dare anyone else dredge up the past and use it as a tool to get TV ratings, get elected, re-elected, or blown by a grieving intern. It is an abhorrence and a travesty that a terrorist attack on the American public be utilized by those weasels and leeches that "protect and represent the interests of its' people." What the fuck gives them the right to falsely empathize with people that actually lost someone that day when they sit behind their desks, raping the Constitution, and pencil pushing American freedom into the paper shredder? And as far as protecting the interests of the people, well let us not start down that primrose.

The fact of the matter is that lives were lost. Lives are lost every day, it's a part of the life cycle - shit has to die. The only difference was on that day, those that died had no control over their own fate and the manner in which they were killed was publicly televised and subsequently used as a buy-in chip to the World Americanization Tour. Because of the grim realization that no one is as in charge of their own fate as they think, the bastards in Washington decided to take it upon themselves to tell us exactly how we were going to "be safe" by following their "guidelines."

Time heals all wounds

I'm a bit off track, but not really. By having a memorial every single year, and this year being the 10th so it's just bigger and more political, there is never going to be a return to normalcy. Yes, "normal" is relative, and yes, "normal" changed forever that day. I've heard the fucking catch phrases, too. But in order that people begin to feel normal, they need to be allowed to move the hell on and not be repeatedly beat over the head with the tragedy that befell a decade ago. That's like having a cut on your arm and just before it has time to close up you rip it open with a box cutter, and continue to repeat that process for 10 years.

While I do think that the event should not be completely written off and forgotten, I don't see why it is the business of govenment officials to annually parade about at memorial services they don't give a shit about, weren't affected by, and only show their face at to make the people that mistakenly elected them think they do give a damn so they can be re-elected to their bloated pensions, tax funded vacations, closet homosexual affairs, and continued rape of American freedom.

So, as respectfully as possible, fuck September 11. Not because I am angry at the bad bad terrorist man for what he did, or because I'm anti-American, or not patriotic. None of that rings true, I have personally moved on. I coped, I adapted, I moved on. No, I say fuck September 11 because the instant those events began to unfold and right up to this very day, the people who died in the planes, trying to escape buildings, or trying to save lives of others became, and forever will be, nothing more than a footnote in the bibliography of every mother fucking liar that sits in a seat in Washington, D.C. The people ceased to exist as people, ceased to matter as people, and instead have become lost in the larger symbollic collapse of mortar and steel that is used as a means to get elected by slimy, low-life, ass hats that do nothing, and care nothing, for the people who put them where they are.

If Dreams Are a Wish Your Heart Makes, I Want a New Heart

Last night, I had a dream. Not uncommon since, according to all manner of medical evidences, we all dream multiple times throughout the course of the night. However, I find that it is a rare occasion that I will actually remember a dream. And in typical fashion, the dreams I manage to remember are of the most insanely off-the-wall variety. Today was no exception. So this, in essence and in pictographic form, was my dream.

Ewan McGregor was walking down the street with me. I don't really know where we were going or where we were, it was a post-modern village that appeared to be made of chocolate covered houses. It was sort of like that weird poem about Jesus on the beach except I could see him and we weren't leaving footprints in the pavement.

Suddenly, out of nowhere there was an opening in the street. A voracious manhole had opened itself and was awaiting the arrival of McGregor and myself. Reluctantly, and because there was no way around the gaping hole, we allowed ourselves to fall into the hole. Not knowing where we would end up or if we would be alive by the end of our plummet into darkness.

As Ewan and I plummeted farther and farther, deeper and deeper, losing our sense of direction and time in the ever deepening darkness, we became acutely aware that something was amiss. Of course, there was no way to know in the pitch blackness, but just as we began to think there was no end to our forever free fall there was a soft splashing sound and the sensation of being both cold and warm; like taking a piss in the public pool. We had finally hit the bottom, and had landed in a mud wrestling pit. Across from where we landed, there was a ninja holding a chicken.

Before we could react to the shock of being plunged into the darkness of an underground mud wrestling pit, Michael Buffer began ushering in the improptu bout with his forever classy baritone.

As the match began, we quickly learned that we were outclassed by our nimble ninja opponent. He was agile, strong, and lightning quick, not least of all because I happened to notice that he wasn't slogging through the mud like we were but was walking atop the mucky goo. In a calculated move, I sprinted left as Ewan feigned to the right and I tackled our ninja, knocking his hood to the muddy floor. I was aghast at what my manuever had revealed, we were mud wrestling dear old JC himself.

I felt a little bit bad about wrestling with the son of God, but not really. He started the whole thing, so I was defending myself. And then, once his identity was revealed, something happened that I did not expect. Not unlike a whiny, spoiled tool, JC up and rage quit. He started throwing mud everywhere and cursing, screaming things I had never even thought of before. I shouldn't have but I started laughing.

Eventually, Michael Buffer came into the ring and delcared me and Ewan McGregor the winners and offered us our tasty prize, a delicious cheesy bowl of magical macaroni. I enjoyed it most, I think, which was unfortunate. For unbeknownst to me, the more you ate and enjoyed the macaroni, the more likely it was that you would be transported somewhere else, somewhere unhappy.

And then it happened. Upon taking my last luxurious bite of victory pasta, I closed my eyes and found myself astride a My Little Pony and flying through the air. The air was stiff and hot and full of fire and I was strapped to the back of this stupid pony, flying faster and faster toward a strangely colored rainbow.

Unfortunately for me, this was no mere rainbow. It was the devil's rainbow, a rainbow so sinister and intimidating that the colors were not colors but the souls of different ethnicities collected as payment for unreturned Blockbuster DVDs. And thanks to my unexpected transportation atop the My Little Pony, I was closing in fast. We slammed into the rainbow and it exploded souls into the air.

All the souls melted together in flight, forming a super being. There before me, was a large golden Buddha holding a tennis racket. Buddha took one look at me and began swinging his tennis racket menacingly, laughing hysterically. The My Little Pony carried me nearer the devil spawned Buddha and I soon began to understand what was to happen, but unsure of eactly how it would come about.

With a mighty swing of his racket, held in a Western grip, Buddha smacked me off the top of my pony. I was hurled high into the air and saw fluffy marshmallow fields below me. I began to descend, rapidly picking up speed and preparing to slam to my death when I was hit once again with Buddha's racket. This time I was sent forward, lightning fast, and a soon passed out from the sheer force of gravity and speed I was fighting against. When I awoke, I discovered that I had entered into the Hotel California which I assume is what hell is really like since you can check out anytime you like but never leave.

...and then I woke up, hungry for a fried egg sandwich which I promptly made and devoured before getting ready for work.

Of Hollywood and Violence

I watched a film and I liked it. Not exactly a groundbreaking statement with the various ways one has to enjoy movies these days, but nonetheless there it is. And while I was initially skeptical of this film, it turned out to be much better than I had expected. Call it morbid curiosity, call it work-related research, or just call it watching a movie, the film I chose was a small, relatively unknown and unmarketed film from 2001 called Gang Tapes. While it was not widely known or even that well received, I liked it (like kissing a girl but without the cherry chapstick or big fake tits).

The whole premise is fairly straightforward, a young boy in search of his manhood, and himself, aligns with a street gang in South Central LA and, through the ever-present eye of his home video camera, documents the life he chooses to lead and the relationships he forms with those of his set. Along the way, our young protagonist becomes mired in some next level shit and seeks to avenge (7X) his fallen homies only to succumb to the inevitability of the path he hath trod. At least that's my synopsis of the plot.

The official description, as noted on Netflix, is a little less than truthful. The claim is that the tape is 100% legitimately genuinely real and that the boy captures all the stuff on camera and then it somehow ends up in the hands of the LAPD and leads investigators to bring down all the people involved in the crimes that were documented. While I understand that Hollywood is in the business of making up shit that sells, how the fuck is that not A) false advertising since I assume they marketed this the same way 10 years ago B) why are there no regulations on the type of bullshit you can claim is true? To each his own I suppose, and really that is neither here nor there since the film only tested in major markets and was so ill-received that it was sent straight to DVD.

As far as the movie goes, it was decently entertaining. Storytelling was fluid and made a lot of sense, well as much sense as being a gangbanger can make I guess. I figured I would have a problem with the use of Handicams to make the movie, but it was well done and actually served to keep the illusion that it was all a home video (unlike that insufferable Blair Witch Project that was so damn jumpy and epileptic that I think I actually had a seizure without knowing it since the screen was bouncing just as much as I was).

That being said, I do have some contentious points to make about the stroy in a couple of places. Whilst I myself have no knowledge of actual gangbangery, I find it hard to believe that a thirteen year old boy would be taken to a bedroom by a 30 year old prostitute to have his virginity stripped off him like a peeling top coat of bad paint. For starters, even though sluts have zero morals or brains I'm fairly certain that even they would draw the line at pedophilia. I could be wrong though, maybe I will ask my ex about that.

Secondly, there a scene near the end of the film that, while I don't want to ruin much of the movie just in case any of you want to rush out and find a copy after reading my raving review, just strikes me as completely implausible. Again, I've no gangbangery in my past but I can surmise from sheer common sense that when one who chooses to enact a violent retaliation goes to do so it is not on a bicycle. For starters, that is the most inefficient way to get anywhere. Riding a bike is good exercise but not exactly a great way to traverse many miles without feeling like you are made of jello by the end.

Then there is the logistics of carrying a sidearm. Gangbang enthusiasts often carry their weapons in one of two places, the front waistband or the rear waistband. Both of these places are stupid for a couple reasons. First is the fact that if, okay WHEN, when you had to draw down on a rival or a grandmother or a cop, there is absolutely no secrecy to your intent. So if you were trying to draw on the sly and get the drop on someone, you would be fucked since they would see your overly ridiculous move to the crotch or the ass crack. Secondly, if you were a gangbanger riding a bicycle and strapped you would either impale your penis repeatedly from the pedaling motion or the gun would fall the fuck out your pants so many times that it would be a week before you got where you were going.

These two facts alone are enough to bother me within the closing minutes of the film but are not, by far, the most insane. That is reserved for the following: South Central is crawling with gangs and is thus used to the sound of gunshots, true. However, if you roll up on some nigga's hood and start tango blastin' like some dumb ass Dirty Harry, I can guarantee (through learned inference of gang culture) that the chances of no one from that hood or set coming outside with a piece in his hand and firing wildly in the direction of the first shot are slim to none. Retaliation and "protection" are a big part of the criminal world, so the fact that the protagonist camera child just walks in, guns down a guy, and then rides his one speed back out and safely to his house is fucking stupid.

But overall, the movie was a decent exploitation of former gang members (aka most of the cast) and the depiction of life in a gang even if it was written and directed by some white Jewish guy who probably shat himself every day they were filming in Watts.

Dancing With Myself

There is a man outside my office window. He is huge, if I had to venture a guess I'd say around 6'4, 'bout 2-fiddy lbs. If I had to describe him to the police, I would say he was HUUUUUUUGE! Somewhere between this awkwardly shaped Chinese guy and the Empire State Building. Not a very helpful description, but I would pretty much be shitting myself if I met him in an alley somewhere, not least of all because I know he is a convicted criminal.

And this guy, this behemoth of a man, is standing outside my window watching mun2, probably to see the bikini clad self-esteem deprived women with daddy issues dancing around like the disease addled lesions of society that they are. This is not an uncommon occurrence in prison. The men routinely awaken at 5AM because there is a program dedicated solely to people, predominantly whorish women, dancing in what could only be described as a swimsuit in the loosest possible definition since it more closely resembles kite string holding together handi-wipes. Such is the life of a prisoner I suppose, get it where you can and sear the image into your brain for late night gratification.

While I am now very accustomed to the various habits and practices of those locked away from the world, sometimes they do something unexpected and it makes me giggle. That's right, I said giggle. It's not a girly word, shut up. Anyway, so this bear of a man has done just that. I am trying hard not to laugh visibly for fear he might stop his actions, and they are funny. Through my slightly opened door I can hear the music playing on the TV and while I'm so damn sick of the song, Katy Perry's Last Friday Night, the visual foreplay I'm watching is worth the trickle of bloo coming out my ears. This large black telephone-pole-shaped man is singing along with the musical abortion which is entertainment enough since he is, it appears, tone deaf, but he is also dancing. And dancing awkwardly, it's eerily similar to the way I would convulse and shimmy on the dance floor if I ever danced (which I don't because I'm whiter than Wonderbread). I am half expecting him to, at any point, bust out the Carlton and start singing Tom Jones.

I can't tear myself away, and I really need to since I have much work to get done. I guess it can wait until he decides to stop...oh, now we've progressed to some Nicki Minaj song and a modified version of my personal favorite high school show choir move the step-ball-change. Oh, that recall is being announced and my entertainment is now about to have to leave. Maybe he will be back this afternoon but I doubt it. He looks like the sort that enjoys playing dominoes in the noonday sun.

My Writing Demon

I wish I could get paid for reading. That would be awesome, and I would probably be moderately to amazingly more affluent than my current situation indicates depending on how much I would get paid per page. I imagine it would be comparable to those people that do the medical record transcription stuff from home, and while it's not more than maybe 15c a page, I could bank that shit away like a boss. I love to read, always have, and I constantly keep a rotation of at least 3 novels at all times. And I don't mean idiotic drivel meant to ensnare hormonal young girls or their desperately-seeking-validation-because-I'm-in-a-loveless-marriage-to-a-secretary-banging-manwhore mothers by perpetuating some farce that interspecies love is not only right, but life-alteringly beautiful and "deep." Nor do I mean I stock an insipid e-reader with the bestsellers list or a collection of pre-modern propaganda and philosophy because I simply must rail against the consumerist society through the ironic means of buying anything with a piece of chrome fruit affixed to its side. I mean honest to god paper and glue, tangible, wonderful smelling books. Currently, my rotation includes the Mitch Rapp series by Vince Flynn, Dostoevsky's Demons, and Mentor: A Memoir by Tom Grimes.

Along with that, I read a lot of blogs as well. Some good, some bad. Many are funny on some level, either intentionally or because I have a twisted sense of humor, and a few provoke actual thought. And some, well if I'm being honest, I just started following at random for the hell of having something to read and they hold no particular spot in my heart or head. Recently, I came across one that has both proved humorous and made me think by way of appealing to my literary and alcoholic nature. And it really got me thinking about myself as well since the co-authors of the blog are both semi-professional(?) writers.

I have always been, in my own mind, somewhat of a writer either because I have something to say or simply because I can craft numerous words in a relatively short amount of time that makes sense on some level. While I am narcissistic, I'm not so much so that I think that everything I write is amazing, funny, or worth reading, but then I am my harshest critic as I think most writers are or have to be. For me, every word, each sentence, every paragraph or story needs to be as close to perfectly crafted as possible or it is a monumental failure. Perhaps that is why nothing I have ever written, save a couple poems in grade school and this blog, have ever been published in any true form. Usually I will bang out thousands of words in the course of a day or two, feel good about it, and then I read what I have and figure out where to take it. I write on impluse or at some impetus and don't actively have to think about what I am saying, it just materializes in my brain somewhere and out it comes (not unlike the way I speak).

Once I hit the point that words don't flow, I start to edit and critique and question exactly what it was I was trying to say in the first place. That, more than anything, is probably why much of what I write has a terrible conclusion. I spend far too much time doubting my premise or searching for a different word to sound more polished than I should, and when I try to wrap things up, as untidily as possible, it fizzles and sends me into a sneaky hate spiral that can derail my magical yarn train. Part of me then spends weeks festering in that seething, brooding hatred of what I have done that I start hating my mother for having grown up Catholic and passing on that sense of shame and guilt down to me.

I should really not bother with editing my words, I can find someone else to do that, but damn it all I like coherence and perfection too much to let it go. In my head the perfection of a piece of written word is like winning the US Open (any of them, just insert your favorite sport) and I'm a competitive motherfucker so I have to win no matter what. I'm like Charlie Sheen without the crazy. See? Even there, I couldn't stand that crass, culturally relevant but overused cliche and now all I can think of is a rant about how Charlie Sheen has ruined being able to draw out metaphors and similies about winning shit. Fucking Sheen, even when he isn't playing he fucking wins.

Then again perhaps my penchant for perfection, and my adept ability to articulate alliteration, is a strength. In fact, I think it is. If I were not so persnickety (finally I have worked that word into one of my posts), I wouldn't be a writer-esque person. If I just pounded the keyboard or scribbled with my pen and didn't care to notice structure, flow, or word choice, I would be no better than a Stephanie Meyer or any number of willfully ignorant dolts hu sp33k li3k d1s, or a kitten walking on a keyboard.