Bright Animal Rampant

Emotion ---> Cogitation

2012-01-27T21:44:00.000-08:00

The most sophisticated systems of analysis are those that are not hard-edged, but are biological or "soft" in their application, fluid to such a degree that the postulates and underlying assumptions of said algorithms change instantly in response to that data which is input. Associated with the human phenomena of perception and intuition, this would give rise (presumably) in a sophisticated person to the idea that their fundamental operating procedures would change quickly and smoothly in response to external stimuli, even that which is unfamiliar or unexpected. A shorthand way of depicting this is to say that you would change based on what you were observing, or rather that what you were observing would change you. This comes tantalizingly close to some of the conclusions drawn of late by quantum physics, in particular the idea that by observing some solid-state phenomenon, the observation itself has the property of altering the outcome or the very reality of that which is being observed. To return again to the idea of human intuition (something so subtle yet widely disseminated throughout the whole of the human species as to be poorly understood), this rapid restructuring of one's self-concept or modes of behavior would happen so smoothly and completely that for all intents and purposes it could border on precognition. Nevertheless it must be said that this is probably a characteristic of the fluid or "water" type of personality, often described as one of the four cardinal personality categories. There is another mode of behavior which is to assert oneself as basically inalterable, to such a degree that the external reality is obliged to reshape itself in order to mold around this incontrovertible expression of will. This is another neat duality (to go on the almost infinite pile thereof)-- whether to change, or allow oneself to be change. The aforementioned intuitive capacities could be reasonably expected, if we can apply this kind of second-order thought-- to provide us information on when to resort to either of these two modes of behavior. To put it another way, we can intuitively know when it is time to be intuitive, and when it is not. This type of abstract thinking would seem to preclude those who are not in touch with their own inner landscapes, as this paradoxical and occasionally contradictory thinking and byzantine operating instructions can easily give rise to brooding, labyrinthine analysis and re-analysis, trapping the intellectual aspirant in unproductive loops of thinking.

(There may be some physiological benefit to these thought-loops. In much the same way that a treadmill may be used to burn off calories and nervous energy, the glucose-consuming hamster-wheel of the mind may be used to reduce the cogitator to such a degree of exhaustion that acceptance and enlightenment are more easily reached).

The primarily intellectual or "air" person, I suppose, would develop their schema and hermeneutic pathways to such an elegant, complex degree that all unknown information would find itself quickly and neatly sorted into its appropriate box. The obvious drawback to such a method is that it finds itself quite useful when dealing with logical phenomena, but flounders when confronted with a non-sequitur or paradox. In such cases the cogitator must rely on auxiliary modes of self-guidance, and if such modes have not been adequately developed during the upbringing or formative years then the data will be rudely shoved into known equations whether or not it fits, leading to shrill or hostile or unreasonable behavior.

About a Girl/Woman/Lady/Child

2012-01-09T08:50:00.000-08:00

In you represents-- perhaps not perfection, because who of us is perfect?-- but then again, "perfection" seems to me to be the word. Let me explain: not perfection as the unobtainable goal, but as the culmination. Perfection as the only logical outcome of a series of steps. Perfection as the only reasonable fulfillment of all criteria.

Prismatic is another word. To meet a person of such richness, multiple facets, and depth. Like the description of an expensive coffee or wine.

It's a good feeling, being in San Francisco and around you. The sensation of abundance is particularly present, such that any expression of personality or persona arise naturally, not affectedly. That which you see has no choice but to appear. Rather like a fountain pouring its streams onto the sick, withered seeds of my heart. Etc.

Liberalisitarianism

2011-11-15T18:41:00.000-08:00

I do not identify as a Libertarian, although I am a big fan of personal freedoms. How do I reconcile these two positions?

I think Libertarian thought is essentially a snotty teenage attitude, written in political ink. They don't like the idea of anyone telling them what to do, for any reason. They think that every country should mind its own business. It's as big a power vacuum as Anarchy, although I've heard Penn Jillette claim that the two are not synonymous.

My political leanings remain Liberal. I don't believe that it is impossible for a government to provide services and regulations, while at the same time being fairly educated and enlightened as to the realities of human life. And what do I mean by that? Oh, things like the idea that marriage is a social institution first and foremost, and it is up to one's chosen clergy to sanctify it, if that's where your pleasure lies, and is not the prerogative of the State. Or that most human beings will respond well to concerns of safety and well-being, rather than paranoia and oppressive attitudes.

The Libertarian viewpoint is basically the Wild West, so far as I can tell. And we've already done that (I know that, because we've done everything). I suppose I recognize them as ideological brothers and sisters because both our positions are based on "liberty", literally and linguistically.

But consider the following. People like to band together, do they not? Whether for protection, efficiency, or the simple pleasure of doing so. I maintain that some of these groups will, without designated auspices, harm others for one reason or another. It's the responsibility of the lots of little people on the bottom to make sure we have a pledged group to the little people. Or to put it another way, government's first obligation is to the people. Any governmental system that says otherwise is bizarre at best, nefarious at worst. On the other hand, a corporation's first interest is that corporation itself. To hell with the people, unless they're shareholders!

And there is nothing inherently strange or wrong about this. We can acknowledge that certain groups and ideologies are in it to make money, first and foremost. That's fine. It's a large world and there is certainly a place for such groups. But where we fall flat is where we start bullshitting ourselves that these entities, without any kind of regulation, will automatically serve the best interests of the people. I just can't see this leap of logic.

To take a more specific example, I happen to like having the FDA around. I like the idea that food manufacturers are legally required to post accurate information about their product along with said product. Do I think that these food manufacturers, if they had the chance, would cut corners, add potentially harmful ingredients to their foods, and so on, assuming such practices increased their profit margins? Absolutely, unequivocally, without a doubt I do. And I hold no malice towards them for it! That's just what they do.

So let us, for our part, invest our political power in groups whose raison d'etre is keeping an eye on these other groups.

And to reiterate my point, I do not give up hope of the idea of a fairly enlightened series of regulations when it comes to this type of thing. Is this going to happen in America? Not any time soon, Jack. The system is firmly entrenched, and it's going to take something like spiritual dynamite to get any kind of change happening. But I happen to like the Scandinavian ethos. They seem, to use the word, "civilized". I suppose that I myself believe in civilization. We can be gentlemen and -women, can we not? Not in any kind of antiquated, stuffy sense. But let us assume their sense of gentility, honesty, plainspokenness, and so on. (We can do without all the class-based colonization in places like the Congo, that goes without saying).

Because what we have now is a lot of stuffy, blue-nosed, schoolmarmish nightmares. We strive to be without moral blemish while perpetrating the worst of horrors. Can we admit to a few vices, if that will help us face up to infinitely more dangerous habits? I hope so.

Diagnosis

2011-11-06T10:35:00.001-08:00

Life is a long, irritating, painful slog. The only things that seem to make it worthwhile are virtually impossible to obtain or achieve. Under these circumstances, I cannot condemn anyone for taking their own life; indeed, there are times when I think of suicide as one of the only really rational actions of which a human being is capable.

2011-10-30T15:13:00.000-07:00

Well, all right, let's talk about the Democratic party, although I'm out of my depth here (and probably have been from the beginning).

I'd say their biggest problem right now-- and I mean "problem" in the sense that they relate to the rational, normal American like you and me, and not in the sense of Democratic strategy-- is that they are not the GOP. To cut right to the chase, there is a huge game of Good Cop/Bad Cop that is being foisted on the American public right now. (God, I feel like I'm laboring the obvious, but oh well).

As soon as official party policy becomes, "At least we're not that OTHER GUY!" you've begun to introduce a kind of slow rot into the idea of electability. This is what seems to have torpedoed the Democratic aspirations in '04 against Bush. The best Kerry could ever muster was, "Well, I'm not Bush, you can say that for sure!" And that's pretty weak tea, cold oatmeal. It's death, from a philosophical standpoint. Even factoring in the roiling tides of anti-Bush sentiment, it just wasn't enough.

And that seems to have been a crucial point in Democratic ideology. "We're not those guys!" Which is great, because on the one hand, no, we don't exactly want a bunch of eye-rolling loonies. But of course that's a colossal dupe. There is no choice. Do you want a punch in the eye or a kick in the balls? You're plenty bad enough, even if you aren't those guys. You're just a little sneakier about it.

Do you want something that explicitly terrifies you, or only implicitly? I wrote a little anecdote which is the best I can put it:

The impatient businessman says to his client, "Don't forget to take a pen on your way out." His client looks at the empty mug on his desk and says, "But you're out of pens." The businessman replies, "Fine, then take two and let's not have any fuss about it."

party conversation topic

2011-10-30T14:49:00.000-07:00

As I was explaining last night to a fellow who turned out to be from Scotland, Texas is in the rather unusual position of having to defend a rational policy.

And what I mean by that: Texas, by virtue of its geographic character, shares a pretty enormous border with Mexico, meaning that in spite of all the abstract thinking and (let's be honest) stupid rhetoric that gets tossed around on this issue-- they actually and truly have to deal with being a border state. As a result, even though they are firmly in The South, solidly conservative, GOP, home of George W. Bush and so on, someone like Rick Perry has had to stand up and say to other GOP candidates things along the lines of, "Well, we'd all love to build a fence to keep out 'illegals', but you know that's not really feasible or desirable..." while the other candidates then get to jump on him for being soft on illegal immigration.

You can probably see the rich irony of the situation. Texas politicians get flak from their own party for dealing with reality, no matter how much they might wish it were otherwise, if only because official party policy is at such odds with reality. And this puts them in the blackly humorous position of having to defend a rational, reasonable, forward-thinking set of policies because such rationality is held in such low regard by others in their party.

This, to me, is modern political theater at its most absolutely hilarious. I mean, for pure black comedy you just can't beat it. It makes Pagliacci look absolutely amateur.

I think in certain ways this makes Rick Perry the inescapable end-product of our modern political system, or at least one wing of it (the Democratic side of the aisle has a much more subtle terror going for them, but I won't go into that now). Where he is not absolutely and monstrously wrong, he is absolutely and monstrously right, and there is no way either of these positions can do him any good. (There's also the chance that he really is a braindead buffoon. But I don't think it's lack of intelligence, per se, that makes him the figure that he is). He is right for all the wrong reasons, and he's wrong for all the right reasons. And you can't ask for a more fascinating politician than that.

As a matter of fact, what's been his most effective strategy so far, as a politician? Not showing up! He didn't show up for debates when it came to the governorship of Texas, and that suited him perfectly. That strategy was a resounding success. And now that he's become a national joke, what is he talking about doing? Not showing up! Yes! The problem is that he has actually been going to the GOP debates, and opening his mouth, and just generally spewing forth the type of incoherent word-salad that has him plummeting in the polls like a swan with an arrow through its heart. His tactic is to be absent. His positions are that which remain once all other positions have been taken by other, irritatingly present candidates. Rick Perry is What's Left. And that is fucking brilliant.

Now, this may have suited him for the governorship, but I don't think it'll be enough to win him the GOP nomination. For one thing, Mitt Romney just keeps showing up and not being demonstrably insane, which you can tell is pissing off the Washington insiders no end. They're desperate to go with any-fucking-body else, but it's just not happening. For another thing, Perry has already burst his own balloon by doing the opposite of what he does best. He's already shown up (and it's been a disaster). If he had been the perfect, abstract candidate... and aren't those polls hilarious, the ones that show Obama losing to generic, anonymous "Republican candidate", but him thumping soundly any actual person with a name and an agenda?-- he might've stood a chance. But no, he's become distinct now, and what he is is distinctly... strange. Not electable, anyway. Oh well. Poor Richard.

another in a series of endless examples

2011-10-30T14:33:00.000-07:00

there is, I believe, a fundamental difference between american and european attitudes when it comes to personality. (This is a grotesque and probably objectionable oversimplification on the parts of both europeans and americans, but it serves here as a shorthand for what I'm really getting at. The idea, of course, being that I'm trying to emphasize a basic duality which transcends national boundaries, and has at various times been filled by American and European roles. The two characters could easily be reversed and probably have been).

On the one hand, you have a certain affected naivety, where the roles of social convention are followed to a T, at the expense of a certain effectiveness. On the other hand, you have a kind of honesty which seems simplistic but (in my opinion) is much more effective when it comes to communication and tolerance of the individual.

James Spader's character on "The Office" (in this case a pretty quintessentially "American" show) fills the second type of personality, and in so doing, lends a pretty good streak of humor. He simply exists, unapologetically, leaving the other characters politely bewildered in his wake. (I wonder if this might not have to do with europe's having had yea many years to understand and absorb the lessons of Kafka, who taught us once and for all the absolute nightmares that lay behind trying to politely follow the rules. Which in turn prefigured the endless enigmatic terrors of Stalin's bureaucracy and so on). At any rate, the lesson to be learned is the difference between being "open", which is merely a shorthand for being confused and not much of anything, and simply being, which is far more fascinating and potentially impolite, which is just better, I think, for all of us.

Parable

2011-08-21T09:58:00.000-07:00

I stumbled across this by accident. I quite like it.

An aging Hindu master grew tired of his apprentice complaining, and so, one morning, sent him for some salt. When the apprentice returned, the master instructed the unhappy young man to put a handful of salt in a glass of water and then to drink it.

“How does it taste?” the master asked.

“Bitter,” spit the apprentice.

The master chuckled and then asked the young man to take the same handful of salt and put it in the lake. The two walked in silence to the nearby lake, and once the apprentice swirled his handful of salt in the water, the old man said, “Now drink from the lake”.

As the water dripped down the young man’s chin the master asked, “How does it taste?”

“Fresh,” remarked the apprentice.

“Do you taste the salt?” asked the master.

“No,” said the young man.

At this, the master sat beside this serious young man who so reminded him of himself and took his hands, offering, ”The pain of life is pure salt; no more, no less. The amount of pain in life remains the same, exactly the same. But the amount of bitterness we taste depends on the container we put the pain in. So when you are in pain, the only thing you can do is to enlarge your sense of things... Stop being a glass. Become a lake."

It Keeps me Running

2011-08-10T21:02:00.000-07:00

On a camping trip last weekend, I was sitting next to this beautiful, intelligent woman by the fire pit. I wanted to ask her a little bit about herself.

"So," I said, and then stopped.

"Yes?" she said.

"I wanted to ask you..." and then I trailed off. I could feel my thoughts piling up, one on top of the other, like a traffic jam. I couldn't really think of any way of asking her to tell me about herself that didn't sound questionable or peculiar. Abort.

"Um, never mind. It's not important".

She got up and walked away.

Dope, I thought to myself. That didn't go very well. Now her most recent memory of you is going to be of a sub-verbal doofus. I sat there stewing for a few minutes. Then a feeling came up on me. It was a feeling of frustration and, from frustration, freedom. I had botched things, so now I could do as I liked without fear of further embarrassment. It was clear in an instant that I needed to communicate, if I was to communicate, through a better medium than idle chatter between strangers.

I walked back to my tent and got my guitar. Now I was on more familiar ground. Late nights, fire going, lots of cheerful people bent on beer and unidentified substances. Yes, this was an old, comforting situation. I could deal with this.

I sat down by the fire and started thwacking the strings, letting my self-recrimination and turbulence come bouncing out, lapping out in waves that hit the trees and the rocks and the bugs underground. There was no one in a ten-mile radius who was singing Radiohead with more fervor than I was at that moment.

Amazingly, the universe granted me a wish. She came bouncing back up soon after. I had thought she might be the musical type, and I wasn't wrong. She started inhabiting the musical space right along with me. I brought out a book of Beatles tunes and a flashlight. She volunteered to hold the flashlight. "How's this?" she asked, putting her arm around my shoulders and shining the light on the pages. We stayed like that and sang "While my Guitar Gently Weeps", our heads practically touching, her harmonizing with the lyrics, totally intent on the song and the emotion.

Folks, I don't ask for much, but every man needs a good moment now and then. Just a little crumb. A little twinkle. Doesn't have to be much. I'm not greedy. A moment that puts its arm around you and sings with you. It keeps me running.

Solitude

2011-08-02T15:04:00.000-07:00

Solitude, though silent as light, is, like light, the mightiest of agencies; for solitude is essential to man. All men come into this world alone-- all leave it alone. Even a little child has dread, whispering consciousness, that if he should be summoned to travel into God's presence, no gentle nurse will be allowed to lead him by the hand, nor mother to carry him in her arms, nor little sister to share his trepidations. King and priest, warrior and maiden, philosopher and child, all must walk those mighty galleries alone. The solitude, therefore, which in this world appalls or fascinates a child's heart, is but the echo of a far deeper solitude through which already he has passed, and of another solitude deeper still, through which he has to pass: reflex of one solitude-- prefiguration of another.

--Thomas De Quincey

Fulcrum

2011-07-22T19:30:00.001-07:00

So much was going on at one time; I'm empty now inside. But I know what it is. I have put my inner self to sleep, for a little while, and am trying my luck in the hard-edged, concrete world of the outside. Once I have secured a better place for the animal I can turn back in on myself and water the seeds that have gone to sleep under the soil.

Life in Death

2011-07-21T18:39:00.000-07:00

I'll tell you about another time I felt happy. It was towards the end of our Anatomy class, when our teacher told us that some of the kids from the Zoology class were offering a look at their dissections, you know-- to see what was going on at the other branches of the taxonomic tree.

A bunch of us were curious to check it out. We were told that the Zoo class got specimens in from all over the county, and dissected them, putting their skeletons up for display. All of us had done our cadaver dissection at that point, and weren't about to be put off by a little biology.

Anyway, when I walked in the door, it was amazing. They had a deer, a mountain lion, and a fox all in various stages of dissection. The deer was laid out on a large table, with its open belly looking like a barrel. The scarlet blood pooled between its ribs. There was fur and blood everywhere.

The smell was intense and unmistakable. The animals were not treated with any sort of preservative, and the ripe stench of dead biological matter had well set in. Flies buzzed around. The only time I could remember smelling anything like it was when I cleaned out the fridges filled with chicken when I worked at a barbecue joint.

The whole thing was fantastic. It was savage, intense, messy. Students were walking around with filtration masks and gloves while the vibrantly dead figures lay, exploded open, on various surfaces. There were skeleton models of various animals set up around the room.

As I walked around, I was joined by the girl I had a pretty severe crush on. We strode the room, peering over people's shoulders, taking in the pools of blood and the skin and the muscles and the bones and the paws and the teeth. The smell was like rotten vinyl. Her hair looked like the red patch of a blackbird's wing. I felt great. Some atavistic part of my brain was definitely being spoken to, some simian part that looked at the slaughterhouse scene and saw only triumph. I felt like picking up a femur and running out to smash the first thing I saw, hooting all the while. It was gross and primeval and totally exhilarating. I wished I could visit the room whenever I wanted, to get some sort of visceral impact.

My modern routine is fairly safe and sanitary, for the time being. But it was nice to look at animals, to see biology in an up-close and impolite way, to know that some sort of identification with carnage rumbles and paces around the back of my modern, civilized brain. It's reassuring.

My Heart, the Whore

2011-06-14T22:41:00.000-07:00

Recently I feel like I increased my Understanding a little bit more, because it seemed clearer to me how you could get hurt by someone and enjoy it. This is not necessarily related to BDSM, but maybe it is.

I'm not explaining this very well. But I had met someone who had enacted a change in my heart that was unprecedented, which happens with all people who change my heart, because all people are different.

Anyway, the particulars of this person were that they made my heart feel like a prostitute. That's the simplest way I can put it, because it was a feeling and feelings don't really translate. But yes, I felt like my proud heart had been overthrown and reduced to the purest junkie beggary. What organ had once been the model of modest decorum became, as far as this person was concerned, the most outrageous slut imaginable.

So, from that sort of abject thrall, I could suddenly understand how you could flaunt being owned by someone, or be treated roughly by them. That person was my liege, my flag and my flower, if she wanted. (She didn't-- c'est la vie). So even if she cut off all my hair, stabbed me or bit me or deprived me, I would feel like running up to other people and, with the greatest, most genuine pride, show them my marks.

Anyway, like I say, this was all emotional, psychic information. None of it actually happened. But now I feel like I Understand a little bit more than I did before.

Summertime Detox

2011-06-07T15:42:00.000-07:00

After a conversation with a friend yesterday, and watching some Red Hot Chili Peppers videos this morning (and some other psychological factors I won't go into here), I think it's a good time to try being really strict with myself. In other words, I'm going to try taking no psychoactive drugs whatsoever-- no caffeine, no nicotine, no THC, no alcohol, no nothin'. Also, I'll be a vegetarian while this is going on.

I haven't imposed any pressure on myself to do this for any specific length of time, but I feel like it's an important thing to try and do right now. Also I'll be trying to get as much exercise as possible.

It probably has to do with the fact that the sun has finally come out around here.

Also, I'd really love to finally try Kundalini yoga-- I found a studio that teaches it, right here in town. The only thing stopping me is cost, but maybe I can find a way to swing it. If this all works out, I think I'll be in a good place to make some psychic progress.

The Absent One

2011-06-02T17:06:00.001-07:00

"2. Historically, the discourse of absence is carried on by the Woman: Woman is sedentary, Man hunts, journeys; Woman is faithful (she waits), man is fickle (he sails away, he cruises). It is Woman who gives shape to absence, elaborates its fiction, for she has time to do so; she weaves and she sings; the Spinning Songs express both immobility (by the hum of the Wheel) and absence (far away, rhythms of travel, sea surges, cavalcades). It follows that in any man who utters the other's absence something feminine is declared: this man who waits and who suffers from his waiting is miraculously feminized. A man is not feminized because he is inverted but because he is in love. (Myth and utopia: the origins have belonged, the future will belong to the subjects in whom there is something feminine.)

3. Sometimes I have no difficulty enduring absence. Then I am "normal": I fall in with the way "everyone" endures the departure of a "beloved person"; I diligently obey the training by which I was very early accustomed to be separated from my mother-- which nonetheless remained, at its source, a matter of suffering (not to say hysteria). I behave as a well-weaned subject; I can feel myself, meanwhile, on other things besides the maternal breast.

This endured absence is nothing more or less than forgetfulness. I am intermittently, unfaithful. This is the condition of my survival; for if I did not forget, I should die. The lover who doesn't forget sometimes dies of excess, exhaustion, and tension of memory (like Werther)."

--Roland Barthes, "A Lover's Discourse"

Attn: Investors

2011-05-07T13:46:00.000-07:00

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--VARIETY. We believe in the individual. As such, we have an unparalleled range of choices for you and we love constantly expanding our horizons! We are proud to employ men and women, as well as people of more ambiguous gender, anatomy, and genetic makeup. We here at the BASC don't much cotton to limitation. Needless to say, we cater to all major sexual orientations, and not a few minor ones as well. (Please note: due to unanimous board decision, all employees are of legal age in the state in which they are employed. This is one of our very, very few inflexible points.)

--ENTHUSIASM. What do we at the BASC look for in our employees? Quite simply, we look for people who love what they do. We pride ourselves in employing the best, no matter what their area of specialty. Elaborate fantasies? Not a problem. Something you can't bring up in polite company? We specialize in that. Like to be immersed in Jell-O while watching a Filipino lady in a gas mask masturbate? Hell, we have a check box for that. We look forward to hearing your ideas. In the extremely rare case that we are unable to find an employee to suit your needs, there is someone at one of our other branches who can, and in most cases can be at your location within 48 hours (additional fees and travel expenses may apply).

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--SETTING. We are proud to be the owners of a large, spacious facility. The contemporary design and modern amenities mean no crowding or rushing. Please consult the attached map for orientation purposes. (PLEASE NOTE: due to renovations on floor 17, Ruby's clientele has been temporarily relocated to suite 1535. Until structural reinforcements are complete, you may want to bring your own handcuffs and/or hex bolts. We apologize for any inconvenience).

If you have any further questions, please feel free to contact one of our representatives. We look forward to hearing from you.

A Reversible Poem

2011-04-15T20:52:00.000-07:00

Years ago, I wrote a poem that could be read either forward or backward, one line at a time. Forward, it goes:

I'd like that:
to walk with you
through the grass,
falling twilight--
unlike
a play,
the scene begins
when
slowly, the curtain

falls

the cherry blossom:
marks
the first action.
A drama,
not meant for
to end the day.
In my garden,
a walk with you...

I'd like that.

And backwards:

I'd like that:
a walk with you,
in my garden,
to end the day.
Not meant for
a drama,
the first action
marks
the cherry blossom

falls

slowly, the curtain,
when
the scene begins
a play,
unlike
falling twilight.
Through the grass,
to walk with you:

I'd like that.

You Know My Name

2011-03-31T22:54:00.000-07:00

What I did not understand was the effect of, the absolute crushing honesty of, the gravity-warping unseen nature of, the devoted soul. What is essentially the atomic bomb of emotion. As it is unseen, which is unexpected, which is surprising.

When memorizing something, it helps to get as many senses as possible into the mix. Write it down while speaking it out loud. That way, you will experience the kinesthetic, visual, and auditory. Thus do I appraise the taste of people. Gustatory as well as everything else. I don't mind. When we were little babies, most things were grasped through the mouth. The mouth leads down deep into the insides of a person. A kiss is a mining expedition. But of course there is more than one way into the body.

This spring is particularly surprising-- it arrived with great suddenness. The weather was appallingly bad-- rain, wind, dour skies, at one point in even hail. But then, out of absolutely nowhere, perfect, balmy weather, the kind we're renowned for. Too sudden to even get a bead on it. Oddly enough, people are sick lately. Things can change faster than we're ready for.

There is a way of acting-- I don't know whether it's good or bad-- to operate beyond known parameters. As Jung says, no human being is a tabula rasa. Any mother knows that one infant is different from another; we have a certain inbuilt personality. So when you're operating out beyond what is known, you're forced to rely on instinct, what is there to begin with. Damn, all this time and we haven't even begun yet. Frustrating... but the beginners are the experts...

My Anti-Fascist Reaction: An Incomplete Document

2011-03-20T13:07:00.000-07:00

1. Right Wing: Fascists are fervently against: Marxism, Socialism, Anarchism, Communism, Environmentalism; etc – in essence, they are against the progressive left in total, including moderate lefts (social democrats, etc). Fascism is an extreme right wing ideology, though it can be opportunistic.

I hereby declare that one of the goals of my anti-fascist reaction shall be the transcendence of political labels in favor of personal character; and that whether one's policies are "conservative" or "liberal" shall be considered of very little importance when compared to the character of the individual. That being said, the anti-fascist reaction shall abjure no political movement of the left, but instead attempt to glean understanding from them with wisdom and understanding, not allowing itself blind reaction because of labels, but assessing any political or social movement, whether on the "right" or on the "left" by the beneficence or poverty of its ideas. Progress being recognized as one of the rights of humankind, no attempts to quell innovation and improvement will be dignified.

2. Nationalism: Fascism places a very strong emphasis on patriotism and nationalism. Criticism of the nation's main ideals, especially war, is lambasted as unpatriotic at best, and treason at worst. State propaganda consistently broadcasts threats of attack, while justifying pre-emptive war. Fascism invariably seeks to instill in its people the warrior mentality-- to always be vigilant, wary of strangers and suspicious of foreigners.

The love of the land of one's ancestors, of one's place of birth, and one's fellow citizens is beyond reproach. To that end, the anti-fascist reaction will not allow it to become sullied and transformed into blind, arrogant superiority. It is my hope that the wise one will recognize that to love something is to be not oblivious to its flaws, and that diligence and attentiveness will attend upon that love. The nation of one's inhabitance will not be above careful examination, and it is the duty of all to keep it in good working order. Those expressing a grievance with it will be respected, and their complaint will be given due consideration, not meaningless punishment.

3. Hierarchy: Fascist society is ruled by a righteous leader, who is supported by an elite vanguard of capitalists. Hierarchy is prevalent throughout all aspects of society-- every street, every workplace, every school will have its local Hitler, part police-informer, part bureaucrat. The absolute power of the social hierarchy prevails over everything, and thus a totalitarian society is formed. Representative government is acceptable only if it can be controlled and regulated, direct democracy (e.g. Communism) being the greatest of all crimes. Any who oppose the social hierarchy of fascism will be imprisoned or executed.

The anti-fascist reaction believes that no person should be unduly squashed by the exercise of power. Each person shall have the right to representation where they are subordinate, and the responsibility for recognizing the same among the persons he directs. No leader, from greatest to least, shall be considered above the duties and privileges that attend upon all, and any attempt to usurp power or place oneself in a tyrannical position shall be regarded as a shame and an aberration that must be addressed immediately. The intrinsic worth of all persons is recognized, and any granted authority is given on the predication of that irrefutable knowledge.

4. Anti-equality: Fascism loathes the principles of economic equality and disdains equality between the immigrant and the citizen. Some forms of fascism extend the fight against equality into other areas: gender, sexuality, minority status or religious belief, for example.

As has been previously stated, a love of one's land and of one's countrymen is natural and good-- and from this, the anti-fascist reaction recognizes this same love in the heart of others, whether of a different country, background, society, or other sphere. An ocean between people does nothing to erase the similarities between them, and a person's skin or manner of dress will do nothing to lower them in the eyes of the true anti-fascist. Resentment and cruelty towards women being recognized as one of the scourges of history, they shall be regarded with all due respect and the kindness that is a human being's birthright. It shall not be given to others to say whom we may love, or how-- it is the love itself that shall be the focus, and if it be abundant and good, why then no harm may come of it.

5. Religion: Fascism contains a strong amount of reactionary religious beliefs, hearkening back to times when religion was strict, potent and pure. Nearly all Fascist societies are Christian, and are supported by Catholic and Protestant churches.

The anti-fascist acknowledges the authenticity of each person's spiritual quest, and their right to seek meaning wherever they choose, fearless of the hatred or censure of short-sighted demagogues. No person shall be judged inferior based on their spiritual understanding, nor shall they attempt to belittle that of others, but as with all things, the goal is a growth of knowledge and understanding. Any use of religion to oppress, inflict harm or ignorance upon others, acquire unearned authority, or justify hateful acts will be recognized as anathema to the aims of the anti-fascist.

Two Sides

2011-02-26T08:29:00.000-08:00

One that comes bubbling up from the basement:

"...[T]herefore grinding your teeth in slient impotence to sink into luxurious intertia, brooding on the fact that there is no one even for you to feel vindictive against, that you have not, and perhaps never will have, an object for your spite, that it is a sleight of hand, a bit of juggling, a card-sharper's trick, that it is simply a mess, no knowing what and no knowing who, but in spite of all these uncertainties and jugglings, still there is an ache in you, and the more you do not know, the worse you ache."

(Fyodor Dostoyevsky, Notes From the Underground).

And one that comes drifting down from the ceiling:

(Hu Ming, The End of Colorful Clouds, 2000).

The Super-Rich

2011-02-23T07:51:00.001-08:00

Past a certain point, I believe the paradigm shifts from "object acquisition" to "addiction", with all attendant emotional disturbances and thinking distortions. That's when people say, "Uh, don't you think you have enough?"

But that's like asking someone who's severely addicted to crack, "Uh, don't you think you have enough crack?" And they'd probably reply something along the lines of "Fuck no! What if I run out? And people might be trying to take it away from me!" The addict could be swimming in an ocean of their desire and their thoughts will run to "this could all be taken away! I need more!" The only difference is that the crack addict typically can't use crack to influence legislators to pass laws making it easier for them to procure/retain crack, whereas the very rich can, and do.

Of course, it doesn't take a Cassandra to tell you that obsessively hoarding up huge stocks of something against the animal paranoia of it being taken away will, given enough time, make it all but certain that it will be taken away. You can't keep up that type of enormous imbalance forever. Piling up more and more straw on your camel, thinking "How much I'll have when I get home! Perhaps a few loads more." Meanwhile, the poor beast's knees are beginning to buckle. Keep going. You'll have a dead camel and a useless pile of straw.

Repetition

2011-02-18T18:53:00.000-08:00

A well-trodden cemetery plot
For when it's not even worth a shot
A blunt pencil and a piece of paper
A hollow eye and a tongue scraper
a bright round shot like a tracer
a necessary intervention
for a selfish intention
it's education
for my station
until I get sick
and decide to kick
I'll do it over and over

The Empyrean

2011-01-27T00:00:00.000-08:00

Lately I've been listening to John Frusciante's album "The Empyrean", a) because I've been reading interviews with him about the album, which makes it more interesting for me, and also b) because the loose thematic theme seems to tie in well with where I'm at.

As he puts it, the album is all about how giving up and failing ultimately help you reach higher than you would have, until you finally reach "the Empyrean", the highest point in heaven. Along the way, you descend back into madness.

The older I get, the more clearly I'm able to visualize these two states. In other words, there were times when I was in them, but I didn't know what they were. Now they come with all sorts of pictures, tastes, smells, and ideas.

The first part, to me, feels like being in the ground. Now, there's different types of earth. There's warm, rich, loamy soil-- and there's cold, sterile, ground, blasted with radiation or oozing with fetid muck. Sometimes you immerse yourself into the swamp and swim around in the brackish water with the alligators and nematodes. That's all right, it's fertile and organic.

But oh children, I have to tell you, there are places I don't know what they are. This one time I was a hollow person and all this disgusting water kept rushing through me. I was tied to a table by an insect doctor and his lipless nurse. They kept forcing sludge through me in belching waves. The most common occurrence then was when all the skin would slough off me and the only thing that was left was a huge, hollow-eyed bird skull, perched like a plague doctor. Those two black hollow circles are the most persistent symbol.

But that was a while ago. I clambered out of the metallic wastes eventually and found a safe, if unremarkable, plain where I could rest. Eventually, I decided to build a staircase out of my bones and start climbing it.

Now, I've managed, after cracking open my chest many times to pluck out more ribs to make stairs and then growing new ones, to find what I think is a new platform. My eyes are just peeking above the rim of it and I can hardly believe my eyes. I didn't really even believe that such a thing existed. It'll probably take me a while just to adjust to the knowledge of there even being such a place. (I think some people have been on that platform their entire lives, even, maybe). It's a great, white and black tower. Mathematics and clean lines help me build it and it's free from slime and spiderwebs. I've even grown to like climbing and my curiosity to see where it goes is building.

I guess what I wanted to say is: not feeling like a failure is an unbelievably liberating feeling, and I highly recommend it if you haven't tried it yet.

In Which I Spaz Out

2011-01-18T13:53:00.000-08:00

I watched a clip of Louis CK on Conan, talking about how people were impatient and unappreciative of the incredible advances in technology that they take advantage of every day, and how nobody today was happy about it. Couple things:

1) Well, of course! There's a huge part of the human organism that is like the anti-Buddha, in that its entire being and concept is to want. As David Foster Wallace described in his essay on the pleasure cruise that he took,the entirety of this part of us is devoted to dissatisfaction. In response to any pleasure or gratification, it will simply adjust its needs upwards until it once again arrives at its usual state of grasping greediness. The fact that the next generation of phones is a little faster or shinier or better at maintaining a WiFi connection has absolute fuck-all to do with satisfying this pleasure-principle, because it cannot ever be fully satisfied.

2) Was anyone really so ephebic as to think that our ability to manipulate little packets of data in better ways would contribute to overall human happiness? He's upset that technological progress has had little to no effect on what is essentially an organic/spiritual problem?

3) Happiness is itself a state of disequilibrium. As far as I know, our bodies just don't have enough dopamine or serotonin to be "happy" all the time. Nor are we set up to be "sad" all the time. What is sustainable, I think, is serenity, peace, understanding, contentment. So expecting society in general to be "happy" is kind of unrealistic, I feel. (What you can do is act and behave in ways that make your life more conducive to happiness. You are the garden, moments of joy are little butterflies that come and visit. You don't get upset when butterflies fly away-- you know they come and they go. If conditions are right, they'll be back).

4) It's all very well to point to people who are surly, childish, impatient, general pains in the ass-- lord knows they exist in droves-- but that's only part of it. We have to at least come up with some ideas for making things better. (In fairness to Louis CK, I didn't watch the entirety of the clip. It's possible that he has dozens of good ideas for making peoples' lives better). To jump to an unrelated point, it's kind of how I feel about people who are smug about their atheism because they've just come up with it. OK, there's no God. Are you just going to stop there? You've reached the end of all thought and there's nothing further to glean? Nah, man, you've got to keep going. People are immature and greedy, they complain about trifles, they feel entitled to all pleasures-- all right, and then what? Where do we go from there?

One Solar System's Opinion

2010-12-26T20:49:00.000-08:00

Recently I had the pleasure of having my natal chart worked out and given to me. I've found it quite interesting, going over the details. Sun in Scorpio: well, I knew that one already. Secretive, passionate, reserved, jealous, brooding, etc etc.

Sagittarius ascending. This is interesting. I think this may have had something to do with my Great Epiphany, which occurred on my 25th birthday. The general idea is that Sagittarius, the sign of travel and enthusiasm and rushing about, lends a certain kick in the ass to Scorpio, which I think up until that point had left me marinating in general dissolution. Sagittarius (being a masculine) sign adds a certain vim as well, which had also been lacking. There arises a new-found appreciation for exercise and physical activity.

Plus it explains my general willingness to travel on the spur of the moment. I'm always dropping things to go rushing off somewheres else, if I think it'll be interesting, or necessary to do so.

I like the feminine/masculine, Scorpio/Sagittarius contrast. In my younger days I was more inclined to wear eye shadow, or dress up in my female friend's fashions. Then after a while it switched to polo shirts, stubble, jeans with a belt. I realized I felt out of touch with the masculine aspect of things, so why not check it out? A better balance.

Mercury in Scorpio: if I can't figure something out, it is un-figure-out-able. Sun and Mercury both in Scorpio means that there is no one more keen to get to the bottom of things, figure out mysteries, seek, infer, determine, deduce. Very good for the medical field (bodes well for my future career). Is crafty, ironic, sarcastic, enjoys argument and debate. All true enough.

Moon in Capricorn, Moon square Pluto. Hoo boy. This is a little tough. The moon represents the emotions, and Capricorn is the sign of control and reserve-- in other words, things don't get out too easily. Moon square Pluto lends a kind of fiendish, excessive edge to the already turbulent Scorpio emotions. Basically it all adds up to the irresistible force meeting the immovable object. Plus Mars in Capricorn means that problems, issues, threats will be dealt with by means of restraint and self-discipline. What I'm getting is the sense of "warning: contents under pressure". It makes me think of when I was a kid, screaming and sobbing and hitting my legs really hard because I couldn't get past a Super Mario level. And then growing up, learning certain emotional methods for sublimating, processing, diverting, dissipating. Makes sense.

There's more but that's enough for now. Interesting stuff-- but as with most highly personal stuff, it may only be interesting to the subject themselves...

Foes

2010-12-16T20:12:00.000-08:00

I got so damn used to being attacked all the time that I had to relearn how to be friends with things.

It's why it's a relief to have external enemies, sometimes. The internal attacks are necessarily calibrated to your weakest points, and they gnaw into them relentlessly. Enemies can at least be strategized, or, if all else fails, run away from. Running away from yourself, though, never works-- not really.

It's the natural progression of learning. "Nothing is X." And then you are introduced to X. "Holy cow, all things are X!" But in my case I realized, and perpetually am realizing, that some things really are as kind as they seem to be. I had figured that the sweeter the honey, the sharper the sting. "This is so beautiful-- that can only mean that it hides a lethal trap. Anything this good must be secretly sour." But now I think this is not always so. Ultimately, you arrive at "Some things are X."

My little cousin had a lot to do with changing my mind. Children are not really possessed of guile, aren't really interested in disguising their motives. So when she clutches at my hand and babbles happily at me, I think, "She isn't lying, you know. She's recognizing something very good in you. It really is this simple." And thus to follow that string, it ought to be that other people feel the same way.

That there is nothing demanded by things being a certain way, that they are allowed to honestly be, and that no one is lying, and that there are no knives underneath the smiles.

Furred with Frost

2010-11-30T09:27:00.000-08:00

The recent cold mornings left the most unbelievable pattern of ice crystals on my car. It made it look like it had a pelt.

Golden States

2010-11-27T08:23:00.001-08:00

Driving down to Venice Beach is such a wonderful experience. You spend a long time on Hwy 5, one of the ugliest, boringest stretches of highway on God's earth. It's dirty, cloudy, trucks everywhere. But by the time you start to reach Orange County, the hills start rising and the sun starts shining. Around San Fernando the anticipation starts to build. And when you finally hit LA proper you feel like the coolest person alive. If you've timed it right the sun will be about to set but you can still roll down your window, tooling around Hollywood Blvd. And then the next day you can stand on that great big pier and watch the surfers bobbing around, acres of sand, the whole thing is one big art-walk... It took me a while to switch my head around, but now there's something about LA that I love. I like the feeling that everyone in the city is contributing to the vibe, that there's a certain energy that everyone is aware of and is tapping into and feeding back on. I guess you could call it affected or pretentious, but to me it's like an enormous art project, which happens to be a city. I like it.

balance?

2010-11-13T23:23:00.000-08:00

At a certain point, words begin to falter and break. Beyond that, they fail completely. Poetry is the riding of that ragged edge where they begin to break down.

Anyway, apothegms aside, let's talk about strength for a moment. Somatically speaking I am aware of a certain feeling that has nothing to do with picking up heavy things-- it's more a kind of tensile strength... I can't put it logically:

Strong in the way that a lizard is. Or a braid of rope, a length of wire filament. Something twisted on itself, then again, then again and hammered into place. It isn't pretty. Strong in the way that we say "a strong chemical" or "a strong acid". Or "a strong poison". Half poison, half panacea.

Another way that this occurred to me is to think of the way trees grow. If you want your branches to reach upward, the roots must reach downward. For each growth upward, it takes a corresponding stabilization down, in the earth. If your roots are shallow, so must be your branches. And we see people who grow up tall and say, "Wow, look how tall!" and it occurs to us obliquely, if at all, that the line of earth is a fulcrum point, a mirror. Going up means going down. We see an expression but we see poorly what is behind the expression.

Denotation

2010-10-31T12:01:00.000-07:00

I think the best love songs are the irrational ones, for obvious reasons.

It's why Barry Manilow or Celine Dion will never move me all that much, because they're so smooth and polished and flawless. But honestly, who acts that way when they're in love? "Oh baby, I want to take you to a castle filled with champagne and pillows made of kittens and you'll be in my heart forever, darling," all with a calmly smug look on their face, like they know exactly the right thing to say.

Who the hell could be that pompous and self-assured if they were really in love? (Self-love, maybe). That's why I realized Peter Gabriel's "Sledgehammer" is one of the best seduction songs ever written, because it's so wild and off-kilter. The feeling is so enormous and genuine the words become secondary. It's like he's sweating and testifying the things you'd really feel.

"I kick the habit,
Shed my skin...
This is the new stuff,
I come dancing in"

What the hell does that mean? Who cares? Is he really singing "I will chauffeur you" or "show for you"? Doesn't matter. Or think of Brian Eno. He'll wait patiently for his longed-for one, and when they arrive, he'll come running... to tie your shoe. Tie your shoe? Yes. It works. Carla Thomas-- she's so overwhelmed when he walks by, all she can say is: Gee Whiz. Or who can forget that primal voodoo incantation: A whomp bomp a loo bomp, a whomp bam boom.

Anyway, maybe it's a testament to my instability or irrationality or immaturity. But when it comes to love songs, not making sense makes more sense than making sense does.

2010-10-28T20:07:00.000-07:00

Destruction.

I was watching videos of Charles Manson and Aileen Wuornos (an abused prostitute who killed seven men) and I knew that it was crucially important to relate to them on some level, to understand. Because if we say, "Ah, the dangerous people are all safely locked up!" then we are lying to ourselves, as a society. "I didn't kill anyone", insists Charles Manson, and he's right. "I didn't kill anyone", says George W. Bush, and he's right. Where is the blood? Does it rest on your hands? And if we act like the malignant things are to be ignored, shut away, not listened to-- this is so dangerous. We are asking to be deceived.

Evil men smile and wear suits. If you are being punished, then your crime was not flagrant enough. That's the only different. You forgot to cloak your crime in the robes of righteousness. If you had, you would have gotten away scot-free.

Those with autism, schizophrenia. Some people look at them and say that they babble, they make no sense, they are raving madmen. But those with insight, imagination, those who are willing to expand their minds-- of course they make sense! They are not inconsistent, they obey rules, even if those rules are obscure to others. For example, reading Bettleheim's "The Empty Fortress", I am so impressed and amazed at him and his institute's ability to use imagination, creativity, lateral thinking, compassion. The cries of the pained are often in code. Do we ignore them if they aren't immediately accessible? I fear the answer is yes.

If something is beyond you, you have two options. One is to ignore it and say that it is nonsense, or belittle the person or the opinion. The other option is to change yourself. Grow towards that which is beyond you, don't ignore it. If you do that, you'll be stuck in a little dark hole for the rest of your existence.

The phoenix. I realized, a little while ago, that there was something I had never considered-- namely, that the phoenix is not exactly happy to set itself on fire. One of the worst things has happened to the phoenix-myth-- namely, that is has become all too well-known. That is one way of making something invisible-- to show it to everyone.

No, the firebird is not happy or thrilled with the idea of setting itself on fire. As a matter of fact, this hurts. This had never occurred to me before. I had always taken it as a matter of course. But there came a time, writes Anais Nin, that the pain involved with remaining curled up became greater than the pain blah blah blah. Again, this quote is a marvelous example. If you want something to be stripped of all meaning, expose it to the light. It is only when something is unknown that it can be truly known. If something is hidden then it can be seen. If something is dark then you can see all of its edges and angles. True for me but not true for others.

If you are having problems in your personal life it is probably because you are not thinking like a god. As gods, what we envision casts its shadow on reality. This is why contradictory points of view are still valid. If you think there is a God, then in your life, it will come to be so. If you think there isn't, then it will not. This is why people are so hard to persuade away from their points of view-- their believing makes it so.

And what I wish to emphasize here is that it is not so objectively, but subjectively. If I believe my house is green, who are you to tell me differently? You cannot, if I have made my mind up. It is irrational, but the behaviors of human beings is nothing if not irrational.

So to return to an earlier point, realize (or at least pretend) that you are a god and life will begin to make more sense. Not God, not the Judeo-Christian boondoggle, but something a little older, like the Grecian gods. They were a little more forgiving, I think. Every one of your actions is irreproachably correct, imagine if that were true! There might as well be! A little dark house! There is nothing, nothing at all, that does not serve either life or death. As far as I'm concerned, that's true. One roughly as powerful as the other. Don't be afraid to destroy things! Rain hellfire and destruction, if you like! The crops were burned and the farmers lost their livelihood. They put the Hungarian on a burning, smoldering throne of iron, with a red-hot crown on his head and a scepter in his hand. His brother was cut into three pieces, right before his eyes. How to reconcile this with any code of ethics whatsoever? You cannot. The only explanation is that the dark and the light are present in all people. One will never win, the other will never lose, at least as far as human experience goes.

Having problems? Burn them to ashes in your eyes. Violence. Construction. Make children. The fallow fields, the fertile fields. Where Zeus lay with Hera, the grass sprung up, freshly green and sparkling with dew. If not for the machinations of Aphrodite, all would come to naught and the war of Ilium would rage until the end of time.

What's the Opposite of the Blues?

2010-10-18T23:21:00.000-07:00

I went to go see the seal rescue facility near San Francisco with the family.

My li'l packet-of-adorableness cousin was there too!

Sharin' the love while perusing pinnipeds. Love you sweetie!

Gnosis Knows This

2010-10-17T17:02:00.000-07:00

Suddenly seized by a particular kind of intellectual terror, I realize-- I don't know nearly enough about any thing there is to know about. I demand the immediate and fresh injection of ideas, 500 cc's or so.

For example, amazon.com. Where did they come from? How does the public perceive their persona? (Are they too recently arrived to elicit the kind of gut reactions from, say "Wal-Mart" or "McDonald's", for example.) How big are they, in terms of revenue, people employeed? How does one even go about starting an online franchise? How many books address the burgeoning social issues of online commerce?

Is e-commerce the equivalent of intercontinental trade, or finding a resource? Do former economic principles apply? Which ones? Who is best poised to write the definitive study, among the strata of our academic society?

And so on. Dammit, why the fuck did we have to lose David Foster Wallace. We, as a nation, really needed him. I believe this. He was the clearest pairs of eyes up in the crow's nest. Every time I unravel one of his works, I find: he has described, in advance, some trap that I am currently caught in, or he has marked the path I find my feet on. The finest since Dostoyevsky, and since I haven't read Dostoyevsky, just the Finest.

Borne Away

2010-10-15T09:14:00.000-07:00

The moon takes forever to crest above the ground
Because the night never ends.
Now I put entropy away in a drawer,
Along with a neat little drawing.
And as the night draws down it explains,
Pushes down, falls apart,
Ages like dark gold and a ways apart.
My daughter alights on the couch,
Her face shines out through the fields--
This is the evening I give away to her
And the dark drafts bear it away.

Oh Heck, Why Not

2010-10-11T10:38:00.000-07:00

This post is made of the purest, most unadulterated ego, and for that I apologize. But I wanted to show you-- I've been exercising pretty consistently over the past however long, and I think it's begun to show:

I also managed to set a new deadlift record yesterday: 325 lbs. I feel good about that. It's an appreciable amount to get off the ground, I can tell you.

Polymorphism

2010-10-02T15:34:00.001-07:00

I am a Zebra.

And So On

2010-09-28T20:18:00.000-07:00

Songs and poems and interesting links and pictures are fine, but it's the mundane details of my life that keep 'em coming back for more!

Anyway, the results of the Soc midterm were favorable. The curve was set at 28, and I got 27, which gave me a 96% for the test. Cool, I'll take it.

I got a 98/100 on my most recent lab. Also good. But today we had another freakish heat wave, peaking at 103 degrees. Why, why does this always happen on lab days? Neither the prelab lecture room nor the lab itself have AC. I was seriously flirting with dehydration by the end of it. (Why don't you whine more? 'Cause that helps.)

As the Taijitu Spins

2010-09-23T20:31:00.000-07:00

This is me talking about my week. Our Chem 60 class got our tests back this week, and I got one of the highest grades in the class. Apparently the high score was a 98%, and I got a 97%. Ooh, so close. It's a little baffling to me because this one lady, who sits in the front and answers every single in-class question wrong-- and I'm being almost completely serious here, it's uncanny-- apparently did well on the test. The prof also claimed that the lowest score, 45%, would be counted as a passing grade. Say wha? Well, it's not my class, but that does seem a tad over-generous.

Then I took my Soc 30 test, which was only 30 questions long. That seems like it might make the questions disproportionately weighted, point-wise. I'd make the test a bit longer, but again-- not my class.

Finally, today in Spch 60 we got the results back for our first exam. I personally found the test almost insultingly easy-- we were allowed to fill one side of an entire 5"x8" note card with as many notes as we liked, and I can write so small that I managed to fit the entire study guide on there with room to spare. Plus the questions were really obvious to anyone with any degree of deductive ability. Like for example, it was along the lines of:

"A boss who uses their position to force people to do things is:

A) Democratic
B) Authoritarian
C) Non-assertive
D) Collaborative"

But apparently this was enough to throw most of the class for a loop. There were 2 A's, 5 B's, 6 C's, 3 D's, and 7 F's. Which is actually a pretty appropriate spread, bell-curve-ly speaking. I was just kind of boggled that people could whiff so mightily on such a heavily-handicapped softball of a test. I mean, I wound up getting 102/100 and I didn't study at all, I just wrote shit on a note card. But the class is some weak-tea high school type stuff, anyhow. If not for the amusing backchat with some of my classmates, I'd be gritting my teeth just trying to sit through it.

Actually, that last leads me to something I've been thinking about, which is the idea of Challenge. I've been trying to expand my definition of Challenge ever since the summer. We all know that something can be challenging because it's hard, but I also realize now that something can be very challenging because it's very simple. It takes training and effort to run fast, but it also takes discipline and attention to run slow, to proceed at any kind of rate that isn't your choice. In other words, something can be so wispy and non-challenging that it actually becomes challenging to do it properly, and not just get bored and say "Ah, fuck it."

For instance: if your task was to, in one sitting, write the alphabet on every page of a spiral-bound notebook. You and I know you could do it-- there's nothing tricky about that. But to actually literally sit down and do it would take some effort. Easy, yet challenging. I find this compelling somehow. Discipline, focus, attention, intention.

From what I hear, this idea will be a central theme of David Foster Wallace's forthcoming and posthumous The Pale King, which I await with ravenous anticipation.

The REAL Story

2010-09-18T10:18:00.000-07:00

- Legend holds that there were nine founding members of the 武当派 (Wudang pai, trans. Wudang Clique or Wu-Tang Clan), the secret society dedicated to overthrowing the Jurchen Qing Dynasty and restoring their predecessors the Ming Dynasty to the Dragon Throne. Due to the paucity of accurate records extant from the period in question, modern historians have had difficulty verifying the exact identities and number of the founders. While revisionist historians have cast doubt on whether at least four of the traditional nine founders actually existed, most scholars are of the opinion that these nine men existed in some form, although their exact roles are uncertain. Following is a list of the nine founders, each of whom is known exclusively by his nom de guerre. (NB: This material could very well show up on your final exam!)

日砸 (Ri Za): The leader of the Wu-Tang Clan, Ri Za (most often translated as “Sun Crusher” or “Sun Pulverizer,” a reference to his apocryphal statement “We will crush the invaders with the power of the sun”) was the main impetus behind the secret society’s creation. His leadership of the group was far from absolute; decisions were often made by committee. Yet he was clearly “first among equals,” as it were.

哥砸 (Ge Za): So named due to the fact that he was Ri Za’s older cousin (the character 哥 means “elder brother”). It is believed that Ge Za, perhaps resentful of the outsized influence that Ri Za held, chose his nom de guerre as a playful reminder that in some ways he was senior to the Wu-Tang Clan’s de facto leader.

谋人 (Mou Ren): “Stratagem Man,” or sometimes translated as “Method Man.” So named due to his role as the primary battlefield commander of the Wu-Tang Clan, and a reference to 谋功 (mou gong, or “Attack by Stratagem,” third chapter of The Art of War) (3).

瑞空 (Rui Kong): Usually translated as “Auspicious Sky.” (Note that older systems of transliteration often render Rui Kong as Raekwon). His exact role in the Wu-Tang Clan is uncertain and often disputed.

鬼脸杀手 (Guilian Shashou): Translated as “Ghost-Face Killer,” or sometimes as “Devil-Face Killer,” a reference to the Jurchen Qing, who were considered to be “Qing devils” (请鬼子) by the Wu-Tang Clan. Ghost-Face Killer is also considered by modern historians to be the greatest practitioner of 说诗唱 (shuoshichang, or “spoken poem-song”), a style of writing popularized by the Wu-Tang Clan. (More on this in the next lecture!)

查板 (Cha Ban): Usually translated as “Inspector of the Deck,” or “Deck Inspector.” A reference to his status as the commander and architect of the Wu-Tang Clan’s riverboat navy, and his supposed mania for keeping the deck of his boat spotless.

你道 (Ni Dao): Translated variously as “You are the Dao,” “You, Dao,” or archaically as “You God.” A notorious riddler, Ni Dao is reputed to have been a master of disguise and concealment.

屠杀师傅 (Tusha Shifu): Most commonly translated as “Master Killer.” A reference to Master Killer’s supposed status as an adept of martial arts and as the foremost practitioner of hand-to-hand combat among all the members of the Wu-Tang Clan.

老脏坏蛋 (Lao Zang Huaidan): Translated as “Old Filthy Scoundrel,” or alternatively as “Old Dirty Bastard.” Supposedly an itinerant hermit who refused to bathe, he was renowned for his erratic behavior and his ferocity in battle.

Ri Za, Ge Za, Stratagem Man, Rui Kong, Ghost-Face Killer, Inspector of the Deck, You Dao, Master Killer, and Old Filthy Scoundrel: they were the Wu-Tang Clan.

(Taken from:
http://www.alternatehistory.com/dis...bb48ae&t=157311

Sociology

2010-09-13T23:03:00.000-07:00

I've been noticing this very specific genus of female as I get older. Some characteristics they seem to have in common:

1) They are older, usually from early- to mid-forties.

2) They tend to tell long, self-referential stories, the tone of which is almost always self-pitying or self-congratulatory. If self-pitying, there is an unspoken invitation to regard them as terribly admirable or courageous for overcoming their almost unendurable difficulties. If self-congratulatory, there is a similarly fake air of modesty.

3) They reference their husband and/or children with a frequency that borders on compulsion-- like, say about once per sentence.

4) Any perceived criticism or hostility is met with exaggerated, wide-eyed incredulity. (They can't understand why you're attacking them so ferociously!)

5) They are usually found in adult-education or therapy groups, and there never seems to be more than one at a time in that group.

6) Any of the following: sighing before starting a sentence, talking too loudly, harsh or faked laughter at things that are mildly (or not at all) amusing, emotional pandering to authority figures, self-deprecation taken to an infuriating degree.

This type of person tends to scare me-- or if not the woman herself, then the unmistakable look in her eyes: that of frantic imprisonment, of forced good cheer. Just wondering if anyone else had noticed this.

An Old Feeling

2010-09-07T05:49:00.000-07:00

Something very cleansing about waking before dawn and listening to music, waiting for the sun to come up. The knowledge that in a few hours, the city will be hot and crowded and busy-- but for now, the streets are cool, empty, and peacefully quiet.

It's Weird

2010-09-03T19:29:00.000-07:00

What the hell is it about movies where Nicolas Cage plays addicted wrecks of men having some of the most erotic scenes of all cinema? I'm thinking specifically of the pool-side scene in Leaving Las Vegas where Elizabeth Shue pours liquor all over herself, and lately Port of Call: New Orleans where Fairuza Balk (of all people) appears wearing these... these boots. (She seems determined to activate all major segments of my brain, incidentally-- Return to Oz scared the piss out of me as a kid. Between fear and eros I don't know that there's much left).

Oh well. Anyway, Bad Lieutenant/Port of Call: New Orleans (or however the hell you're supposed to format that title) was, in my opinion, a really great movie and you should watch it if you ever feel like you have glands or scales or claws and you want to see that feeling translated into film.

Step Right Up, Folks

2010-08-29T11:47:00.000-07:00

I had the dubious pleasure of watching Mr. G. Beck confusedly rave on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, thanks to a streaming live feed provided by MSNBC. If you missed it, you're probably kicking yourself right about now-- but it's all right, you really didn't miss much.

Mr. Beck's passion for oration is obvious, and matched only by his inability to form even one coherent, arguable point. The only message I could glean from his climactic address was that America's greatest flaw was wandering far from God, and that we should be much more religious-- in our personal lives and in the dealings of our country. The rest was a lot of disconnected palliatives about our inherent superiority. It made me think of The Merchant of Venice: "His reasons are as two grains of wheat in two bushels of chaff: you shall seek all day ere you find them, and when you have them, they are not worth the search."

Anyway, it's pointless to even ask what the speech meant anyway, because the guy's clearly just shilling snake oil, liver pills, laudanum, tracts of bunco land. Having a point or outlining a course of action would be counter-productive, in Mr. Beck's case. It would lend some degree of definition, which is absolutely the last thing he wants. His vagueness and relentless back-pedalling are the perfect tools for his persona. Actually conveying any sort of specific information is anathema. He only wants people to pay attention. Anything beyond that he'll just make up as he goes along.

If you ask me, what it is is damned impressive. He's making an awful lot of money from some very befuddled people, and although it makes me feel like Goebbels to say it, I respect that.

And that's about as far as I'm willing to take it. I don't think the Beckster is going to instigate some nation-wide revolt, for a couple reasons. One is that he doesn't want to. He wouldn't know what to do if that actually happened. Two is that he has no message to rally behind, other than "Aggh! Look out!" Pressed for details on what we should be looking out for, or what to do about it, he dissolves into the choicest word-salad. No agenda, like I said. He's just making it all up on the spot. And third is that his followers seem to lack real vigor. These are not lean and hungry rebels. They lack the strength of their convictions, unless confusion, apathy, irascibility and disgruntled-ness are convictions. Also they're old.

Anyway, it was a muffled thud of an arguable success, for some people, probably, and it had bagpipes at the end, too!

Spaces

2010-08-24T22:46:00.000-07:00

One probably should not blog when one has been drinking, but upon further reflection, what the fuck, let's live a little.

It seems that the further along science advances, one of the things that is beset upon the periphery of our awareness is that space means very little. And by that I mean, the physical space that separates you from things seems to mean less and less the more we learn about it.

For example, I just read an article that posited it was the action of neutrinos, produced by the sun, that caused the rates of radioactive decay to vary. This is quite startling, because up until now it was commonly held that rates of radioactive decay were NOT variable, that they were in fact static. But they began to find fluctuations in the patterns.

Why, they asked in forum, should this be so? And they began to suspect that it had to do with the predominant solar activity of the time. In other words, as the earth was closer to the sun, and thus bombarded by a greater number of solar neutrinos-- why, it would change the rate of radioactive decay. And likewise when the earth was further from the sun.

This is a peculiar thing to science. As one fellow pithily put it, (I'm paraphrasing), "This is a case of particles that don't affect anything changing something that doesn't change."

I'm sure you can see where I'm going with this. There is also evidence, in the quantum field, that once two quantum particles have been in contact (and here I'm going to mangle this terribly-- in another life I'm a quantum physicist, but that life is certainly not this one) they will alter the behavior of each of them. As one changes its spin, the other will affect a change in behavior, and vice versa. And the really peculiar part is that physical distance seems to have no dampening effect on this phenomenon-- the changes will register instantaneously, regardless of distance.

Now, it should come as a surprise to exactly nobody that all this was predicted long ago, put in words that of course have no scientific validity as such, but are plenty true nonetheless. I'm thinking specifically of Buddhist ideology, which holds as one of its central tenets the interconnectedness of all things. If this were true, they posit, there would be nothing complete and alone unto itself-- rather, that all things would affect it, and that it would affect all things.

Basically, what I'm interested in is that this seems to actually be the case, in at least some senses of the idea and in some particular manifestations.

To keep going on this particular path way out into the goofy ether, maybe this begins to explain some sort of phenomena that we all have an intuitive sense of, but have no proof whatsover-- telepathy, ESP, astral projection, whatever. While I'm certainly not going to come out and go "IT'S ALL TRUE GUYS, YOU DON'T EVEN KNOW", what I do continually wonder is: what is the smallest particle that can inform us of something? In other words, how widespread and systemic does something have to be in our body before we become aware of it?

Put it like this: if something is affecting our entire circulatory system, there's a good chance we know about it. If we have pneumonia, it won't go unnoticed. There will be signs, symptoms, so forth. But to extrapolate from that, if something should affect one organ, one tissue, one molecule, one cell, one atom-- do we know? Can we tell? If one of our electrons should alter its spin based on a counterpart electron somewhere else, does this change anything in our being, behavior?

Perhaps not. They are, after all, very very very fucking small. But I wonder.

The Hottest Day of the Year

2010-08-13T23:23:00.000-07:00

This is a short story I wrote after having a very strange, but very clear dream. The dream itself happened one night in the middle of a massive heat wave-- the temperature got up to 107 at one point. Some of the scenes were complete unto themselves, so I added a few more to flesh it out into a story.

The Hottest Day

Talkin'

2010-08-10T22:02:00.000-07:00

Cherry soda pops and bottle tops. Does anyone here, a man among you, truly know what they're here for? 'Cause I sure as hell don't. And if you've found out please let me know. At the end of a day, it's all still a mystery. All, all. Where the daylight ends and the nighttime begins? It's all a mystery. How someone decides what's right for their own life? It's all a mystery. This is our last chance, this is ourselves. This is my last shot. Say goodbye to Madame George. I'm trying to write this poem but I can't. It's all about how the earth has a pull, the soil underneath your feet is a membrane, we forget, but it is. And it's constantly pulling you down, like when you fall through the floor. The other parts of your life, whatever keeps you distinct pulls you up. And you're constantly suspended between these two forces, one pulling your feet down into the ground, pulling your cells apart. And the other one keeps you together, keeps your cellular membranes intact, makes sure you don't turn into soil too soon. There was a time when I felt dead, quite dead, aboveground, that to be buried was only the formality of it all. I got better but I never forget about it. I was walking around in a coffin. But I still feel grateful because if I hadn't had spent all that time learning how to be dead so much of life wouldn't make any kind of sense. When I watch all the cruel dark people do what they do, and I think How could you do something like that, that doesn't make a lick of sense! But it does, if you've spent any time dead you'll know perfectly well what waits behind the wall, and it helps make sense. And then as I've said the stars are outlined and things are clearer. I've fucked it up a bunch of times but I'm lucky to have another chance, mostly because I know what the alternatives are, and they are no alternatives at all. When you fall through the floor. And someday I know I'll be able to take what is given, I have a hard time with that, I think, I just can't believe it when it happens. You made me hallucinate mushrooms and hear music and I will never never never never forget that.

Everyone have secret phrases, never tell anyone. Hidden. When I watch your faces metamorphosize I'm stunned, it's the most amazing thing I know. Your eyes melt and leak down your cheeks. Light comes out your eyes. See it once and you'll never mistake it again. Unmistakeable. How many things can you say that about? What is carrying you through the week? Inertia? I hate that, almost broke down crying in a grocery store this one time. Bought some tea and read about the Beatles, helped me feel better. Good thing that wishing would not so, would not make it so, ere he'd drop with a thought. Spent a long time learning, had to put my own head in order. The external world could wait, and so it did, and now I'm ready to talk to it. Phrases I have never told anyone, written like a Golem on my forehead. Hush, secrets, I hope you'll read my poems, I'm nearly finished which is the hardest part of all-- I think you'll like them, I have 48 of them and one or two lines are worth your time, I'd bet money. Marvelous, you didn't have to be kind but you did, I kiss you all.

Questionable Advice

2010-08-10T10:25:00.000-07:00

If you feel that the ego or solidified self is getting in the way of the present, the best course of action is to confound or deliriate (make delirious) or disorient the current mind. Lack of food, sleep, ingestion of chemicals, basically anything to induce a breakdown, after which the rebuilding should take place in the desired atmosphere. The appurtenances and devices and appendages then grown will help adapt you in the way that you were unable to do before. It's why we enjoy the feeling of exhaustion and exertion, anticipating pleasurably the regrowth.

Looking Through an Old Notebook.

2010-07-25T18:07:00.000-07:00

"This circle is an elusive one. Having drawn one curve and acknowledged it, the other half shies away. How to start the wheel? Who spins the Tao? What hand puts it in motion? It is infinitely big and infinitely small. It always spins around itself, never sticking, never catching. Never stops or starts, always locking, always latching. The more you advance, the more I retreat. The snake that swallows his tail. The desire for reunification of principles spins the wheel of life. There will always be two forces, two wills, two desires, one waxing, the other waning. Each is already present within the other."

"At that point all the rabbits took a turn for the worse."

"Your halo has begun to rust."

"Pages turn but the form of the reader stays unchanged."

I also found a few of my instructions, when I was trying to come up with new ways of thinking how to write a song. I had a very clear vision of a city singing to a person-- that is, all the little machines and devices we have around us coming to life and singing a song. (I was listening to a lot of Fennesz at the time and found his use of digital distortion refreshing and contemporary). I remember trying to imagine what it would sound like if an elevator sang a lullaby, or an ATM tried to seduce you with a soulful tune. I still think this would make for an interesting project, if I had some more technology and time.

Advice

2010-07-23T16:37:00.000-07:00

If something pains you, the remedy is simple. Simply tap the discipline spike in your chest a few stout whacks with the hammer of your heart. The benefits are twofold: self-inflicted pain distracts you from the pain of external sources, and the spike will have been driven deeper into your core, which can't help but do you good.

Saddle Up Pardners-- Matt's on his High Horse

2010-07-20T22:10:00.000-07:00

Building a "13-story mega-mosque" on the site of Ground Zero would indeed be a provocative move, if the building in question weren't already constructed 600 feet away, and if it weren't already owned by the Muslim outreach group the Cordoba Initiative, and if it weren't under theoretical plans to be reconstructed as a community center, and if the United States was ever planning on getting around to erecting so much as a house of cards on Ground Zero, yes. It's not so much that we want to build anything ourselves, it's just that we can't stand to let THEM build THEIR stuff so close to what THEY did to US. It's just insulting.

A slap in the face, you might say-- which is really more our prerogative than theirs. In case you hadn't noticed, we've been raining retribution and spitting blood and thunder every fucking which way now for years, with no signs of stopping. If we really had a problem with constructing religious facades on the sites of mass slaughter, I'm guessing Europe would be severely lacking in cathedrals.

Okay, but a mosque is a bit much-- advertising the same religion as the attackers. But I'm going to go ahead and claim that the people who organized the whole catastrophe and flew the planes into the buildings were about as "Muslim" as I am a fish. They weren't any more adherents of any kind of sane religion than the Nazi's were truly Christian. So whether they build a mosque or a Buddhist sanctuary or a kiosk where the adherents of the Right Reverend Sun Myung Moon could hand out pamphlets is really missing the point.

Anyone who brings rampant pain and destruction isn't religious so much anymore as they are a Total Fucking Looney. Anyone relinquishes their right to any kind of respectable spiritual banner as soon as they cause a building to explode (that's kind of my rule of thumb). And no one's proposing to build a monument to Total Fucking Looniness. Mostly because we have scads of them already, in lots of places... Wall Street springs to mind.

Actually, that brings me to my last point, which is to ask What are you Afraid Of? And I can understand where a lot of the anger and vitriol and resistance is coming from. Lots of people are afraid of The Other. Those Strange People, who are so damn sneaky and violent and untrustworthy, who want to stop you from doing what you want to do and force you to do what they want you to do. They already hurt us plenty, and now it looks like they want to hurt us some more.

But you might want to consider how well that last paragraph describes Pfizer, or Enron, or BP. And I'll be honest-- I am far, far more afraid of white men in suits than I am of scruffy men with AK-47's half a world away. One of them could actually hurt me.

What Have I Done

2010-07-18T21:37:00.000-07:00

Tonight I made the terrible mistake of playing on my guitar:

Every Neutral Milk Hotel song I know;
U2's "One";
Leonard Cohen's "Hallelujah"
and Jeff Mangum's cover of "I Love How You Love Me"

and now it's dark and I'm in deeper emotional waters than I meant to get into and I think I need a hug.

Communiqué

2010-07-15T10:04:00.000-07:00

Last night in my dream I was talking to a pair of gangster types, who informed that if you're planning on hitting someone with a baseball bat, you really wanna choke up on it as much as you can. Holding it too near the knob slows down your swing (because you have to take a bigger windup), meaning you're not going to be as efficient, plus the weight imbalance will create "wrist drag", which means the bat puts stress on your wrists in a downward direction, which leads to joint problems later on in life. So if you're planning on hitting anyone with a bat, maybe try this out and let me know if they were right.

We also agreed that the worst thing was when you found the toilet unexpectedly backing up on you while you were at a friend's house, or at a party.

What I Did Last Night

2010-07-13T19:47:00.000-07:00

It's kind of like hypnotizing chickens...

Last night I dreamed about a gang war erupting at a school. Kids were getting shook down in the principal's office for any weapons they might have had on them, and things were pretty fraught to begin with, but then this one kid whipped out an Uzi or some shit, and things got real quiet real fast. He said he'd only give it up to the administration if they reimbursed him the $7000 and change it cost him in the first place, and it looked like one of the counselors was totting up some numbers on a calculator in a serious attempt to maybe do just that, but just then a group of kids from a rival gang burst in, so the kid snatched his Uzi back and some serious fucking bullets started flying after that, boy.

Then I dreamt about a woman in a fugue state in solitary confinement who, while deliriously singing to herself, managed to steal keys from a guard and instigate a prison-wide revolt, and the prisoners then took over the compound and rather than escaping to the four points of the compass, decided to fortify the prison itself, and they started holding brawls in the courtyard, for entertainment, and there were fires in oil barrels, and one of the prisoners attacked another one with a huge iron spike on the end of a chain.

And then I dreamed I was the Incredible Hulk being chased around by Gen. "Thunderbolt" Ross and having "gamma grenades" thrown at me, but it turned out that the reason Gen. Ross had such a personal vendetta against the Hulk was that (get this) Ross was actually harboring latent homosexual tendencies, and the grotesquely-masculine figure of the Hulk was causing these latent feelings to manifest themselves in ways too obvious for even the general to ignore, so rather than deal with these feelings in any kind of integrative way he decided the best thing to do was destroy the figure that was causing him all this distress. Plus the fact that Bruce Banner, the Hulk's alter ego, was going to marry his daughter Betty, was just another layer of frustration and annoyance and too-close-to-home-ness which caused Ross to (in my dream) mutate himself into a weird three-legged creature (like it was just three legs and pretty much nothing else) in an attempt to destroy the Hulk once and for all. (In other words if he couldn't be "Mrs. Banner" then not only could no one else, but there wasn't going to be any Banner at all).

Then I dreamed I was some young governmental agent in some lady's apartment reading about the events of the aforementioned dream-segments in the newspaper. The lady herself looked like Meg Ryan, but was not specifically Meg Ryan, just Meg Ryan-esque. We talked a bit about Gen. Ross' avowed intention to destroy the Hulk using nuclear weaponry, and I expressed shock and dismay and mentioned the huge amounts of collateral damage that would surely result from such a tactic. The apartment was small and cozy, and apparently we must have had some sort of intimate relationship because I realized I had her in a clinch and the dream shifted over to a sexual sphere, which I'll spare you the details 'cause modesty.

After that I woke up.

2010-07-08T20:33:00.001-07:00

OH GOD FUCKING DAMMIT WHY AM I READING A FUCKING ECLIPSE REVIEW, LIKE I FUCKING NEED TO KNOW ABOUT THIS SHIT. HERE LET ME SUM IT UP FOR YOU: YOUNG PASTY BORING UNREMARKABLE UNATTRACTIVE GIRL CAUSES ANCIENT POWERFUL BEINGS TO FIGHT FOR HER LOVE, NOT ONLY THAT SHE'S SO CAPTIVATING SHE CAUSES THESE ANTEDILUVIAN INHUMANLY GORGEOUS KILLING MACHINE CLANS TO PUT ASIDE THEIR DIFFERENCES TO DEFEND HER ROBOTIC MILQUETOAST SOMEHOW-IRRESISTIBLE ASS, AND GEE WHIZ AS IF THAT WEREN'T ENOUGH, GRADUATION FROM HIGH SCHOOL IS COMING UP WHOOPS!! LIFE SURE IS TOUGH!! I CAN'T EVEN BEGIN TO FUCKING IMAGINE WHY THIS SERIES HAS CAUGHT ON LIKE GANGBUSTERS, CAN YOU?

Dada Poetry!

2010-07-05T15:39:00.000-07:00

One of my favorite things about Youtube is their wildly inaccurate closed captioning system. I once turned it on while watching a rambling, not-very-tightly-wound guy do a video about Stevia, MMA fighting, giving women orgasms and who knows what else, and then decided to transcribe what popped up on the screen, word for word.

The video is me reading that transcription. This is an experimental video, so feel free to tell me what you like or don't like.

They Will Well/It Can't Happen

Music is 1) Piano Concerto No. 5 in E Flat by Beethoven, and 2) "Lichen" by Aphex Twin from "Selected Ambient Works, Vol. 2".

Thank God for the Internet

2010-07-03T21:56:00.000-07:00

Oh my flogging gourd, ignore all the other pompous crap on this page and check out this video:

Look at my Horse, my Horse is Amazing

Scorpio Tactics

2010-07-02T17:54:00.000-07:00

There's something rewarding about being perceived as some kind of a threat. I had a conversation with a friend about a third party, someone I have an ever-so-faintly acrimonious relationship with. My friend said, "If you wanted to, you could make them your friend."

I thought about it, and realized: that's absolutely true. But I also realized: I don't want to.

Whether it speaks to some flaw in my character, I don't know. But there's something I find very pleasing about having enemies. It made me stop and think when I realized this about myself, because I spout a lot of hoo-ha at this point in my life about love and spiritual growth and so on. "Am I some kind of hypocrite?" I asked myself. But my tentative conclusion is no-- there's just some part of me that needs someone to growl at. I admire my friend's crystalline spirit greatly-- I believe she is someone who would make friends with every single person on the planet, if she could. But I am not of a similar function.

Think about music. Whenever you put two notes together, there's a quality to their interaction. If the notes are in unison, major thirds, perfect fifths, or octaves, then they are "consonant". Anything else, and they're "dissonant". Now, try and imagine how utterly boring and restrictive music would be if you could only ever use consonance. No dissonance, no tension, and nothing moves.

Trying to be friends with everybody, to me, is like trying to write music with no minor chords, no dissonance, and no dynamism whatsoever. Going back to one of my original posts, what if the entire universe were crammed full of stars, no blackness between them? It wouldn't work.

That being said, I think it's crucial to respect one's enemies, or at least the role they are playing. We enjoy being with people we like, because in some way, that We Are. We dislike some people, because that We Are Not. (Or so we think). Everything knows intuitively what its antithesis is. Everything knows, on some level, what could destroy it, given intensity enough and time. So what you hate and fear, the things that can destroy you, are your flip side. And I'm not really talking about sharks or axe murders or falling off a building or whatever. I'm talking about the things that would eat you up from the taproot. (There always are such things-- there have to be).

I've strayed somewhat from my original point, but it's taken me to the other thing that's been on my mind: seduction. I was thinking: imagine some sort of mansion, where every room was crammed to the rafters with some delight. Rooms full of chocolates, cocaine, naked women, bottles of wine, books, jewelry, incense, everything from the gross to the subtle. Now, turn anyone loose inside this mansion, and there will be something they'll choose first of all. It doesn't matter what it is. (Some people experience transports of bliss playing with a yo-yo, I'm sure of it). Even if you sit down and try to choose nothing. Whatever takes your fancy first of all, that thing is imbued with a quality of seduction. And I think-- I could be wrong-- that whatever seduces you is the very thing that can harm you. If you desire it a lot, it can destroy you a lot. If you want it a little, it can destroy you a little. But you only want it because it's a part of you.

And now we're veering perilously close to Livejournal territory (LOVE = PAIN, fuck you mom and dad, you won't let me go see Rise Against this Saturday)-- so I'll knock it off with the hyperbole. But that's what I've been thinking about.

Hydration

2010-06-25T10:45:00.000-07:00

Well, let's put it out there. This is a project I did based on John Frusciante's "Life's a Bath", off of his most pained, fragmented record, "Smile From the Streets You Hold". I spent the first part of the day covering the song and the second part assembling the movie.

The original, for comparison purposes (graphic drug use).

Emulation

2010-06-21T10:30:00.000-07:00

From the Tao Te Ching:

"The ancient masters were profound and subtle.

Their wisdom was unfathomable.

There is no way to describe it--

All we can describe is their appearance.

They were careful

As someone crossing an iced-over stream.

Alert as a warrior in enemy territory.

Courteous as a guest.

Fluid as melting ice.

Shapable as a block of wood.

Receptive as a valley.

Clear as a glass of water.

Do you have the patience to wait

Until your mud settles and the water is clear?

Can you remain unmoving

Until the right action arises by itself?"

Fellini, Lynch... amateurs...

2010-06-11T17:21:00.000-07:00

This is a PSA on the dangers of trees. This is also me learning how to use iMovie, and then export the finished product to Youtube:

Dendrophobia

(Yet) Another Green World

2010-06-10T18:21:00.000-07:00

Shoot, I guess I'm feeling generous! So why not enjoy this ambient remix/fool-around thing I did with Brian Eno's marvelous "Another Green World"?

http://www.mediafire.com/?nlm21inmnou

It sounds a bit like Ratatat to me, or at least from what I know of them. Put it on, zone out, do other stuff, let me know if you like it or not.

Edit: just realized I uploaded an .aup file, which might be problematic for those w/o Audacity. Re-uploaded as an mp3, should be good to go.

A Baby for Pree

2010-06-10T14:33:00.000-07:00

Everything that has come out of my guitar or my voice over the past two days has sounded like a van made of broken glass driving over a box full of birds... except this video. It sounds somewhat OK. "A Baby for Pree", by Neutral Milk Hotel. As usual, it deals with Mangum's prevailing themes of sex, children, family, fluids and all emotions attendant thereunto.

"Blistering Pree, all smiling and swollen

Makes babies to breathe, with their hearts hanging open

All over the sheets, as soft as beets

In some brown dresser drawer

And with bees in her breath, and the rest of her ringing

They'll sting through her chest, with a force hard and beating

Until wonderfully wet she will get

Until she's soaked inside her clothes

And there is no sorry to be sorry for

For a roll around the floor one afternoon so sound and soft

It made her swallow all her sweat

With every bit of breath she coughs

And when the day it came to pour

All her babies all across the bathroom floor

She will be swimming in them all forever more"

The original, for comparison purposes

The Unquiet Mind

2010-06-04T21:48:00.000-07:00

I would like to talk to you about schizophrenia, as it is a subject that has been somewhat on my mind lately. I find myself feeling a deep sympathy for the plight of the schizophrenic-- but I must also confess that I feel the faintest tang of envy, or at least curiosity, for those who experience the world in such an intense way. I know that to experience the world as they do would ultimately be quite exhausting, and ravaging on the soul in ways I can't even imagine, but I would like-- if only for a brief time-- to see what they see, think how they think. Not only out of pure curiosity, but also out of a desire to help them by better understanding their affliction. Recently on television I saw the story of a young girl named January, who was a brilliant child (a tested IQ of 140 at age FIVE) but who was possessed of a terrible case of schizophrenia. My heart broke for her, and for her parents. They seemed horribly besieged by the difficulties of not only raising a child, but raising a child with such a florid mental disease. She saw imaginary figures, animals, and was compelled to strange thoughts and actions by her blazing mental landscapes. Her parents said that the only way that they could get any peace (the child barely slept) was by overstimulating her as much as humanly possible. Even at a very young age, she was captivated by noises, sights, sounds, crowds-- perhaps her over-active brain could only comfortably relate to such chaos. She seemed charming, intelligent, beautiful, but plugged into a staggering mental fire that was quite beyond most people. In fact several schizophrenics, from what I can tell, seem to be afflicted by an excess of energy, of spiritual combustion, of a fused switch in the brain setting all the dials to "11". The drawings of Louis Wain, if they do indeed depict what the world might look like to someone with schizophrenia, describe to me a life in which every single thing is ravingly intense, too much for the human organism to handle. As I've said, this fills me with sorrow and a desire to understand (if I am able), and a deep sense of respect for the capacities of the human organism. If we are capable of producing such a welter of painful energy, might we be able to harness it in some way? Use the capacity of the brain to imbue the world with such vividness? Can we honor the schizophrenic by letting them point us to what we are capable of? Of course it goes without saying that it is our duty, as human beings, to try and ameliorate their suffering as much as possible. But in some way, on some level, I feel like we might be able to transcend this horrible disorder, meet it, learn from it, and perhaps integrate it into the human condition and ease its painful sting.

More about January Schofield

More about Louis Wain

In Which I Explain My Blog Title, Again

2010-05-29T23:34:00.000-07:00

So tonight, as I was juggling my ever-faithful 6-lb. ball, it occurred to me that all my friends, the ones who have spent their lives being careful, conscientious, hardworking, and diligent about trying to help the planet, environmentally speaking, are probably going to be far overbalanced in no time at all by a bunch of greedy, reckless, short-selling agents of entropy, fucking barbarians ignorant of the Tao. I'm speaking of course of the BP oil spill. Think of it... all that hard work and love, helpless in the face of millions of gallons of chemicals.

Why? is the question I asked myself. Why is this? Why does this happen? Why do we do what we do? Why do we keep doing it? In short, what the fuck?

As usual when questions like this arise, I took a look up at the sky. And the answer seemed very clear-- it's a dark universe, folks. On average, our entire cosmos is but three degrees above absolute zero. Those little bright stellar specks of plasma, impressive as they are, are nestled in still greater pockets of empty space, darkness, coldness, silence. 95% of our universe is void to our eyes, dark matter, dark energy. In any system, entropy tends to increase, not the other way around. Electrical charges will always take the path of least resistance. And so on.

I think you can see where I'm going with this. Human beings are manifestations of life and order, and life and order are more aberrant than not. Generally speaking, it will always be more likely that we hurt rather than heal, because hurting and healing are just manifestations of larger forces. And entropy, the darker of the two, is easier. Anytime we flow bright instead of dark, we're beating the odds in a pretty rigged casino.

So what, you're saying, we should just give up? Well, hell no! Quite the opposite! I'm not even saying any of this should fill us with sorrow, or joy. Things just are what they are. If we are strange little burning emblems of what might be, then that's our cosmic duty and we will fulfill it. My desire to destroy Glenn Beck, for example, a part of me, is counterbalanced by a small part of Glenn Beck desiring to destroy people like me. Without Glenn Beck, that part of myself would lack definition, focus. Without me, a small part of Glenn Beck would be similarly diminished. And the cosmic push and pull between me and Glenn Beck (that raving charlatan) are what power the spin of the galaxies.

I guess what I'm trying to say is, we are surrounded on all sides by darkness, but that just makes whatever energy we can muster shine all the more. And that's what being a Bright Animal is about.

Blood! Let's Drink Some!

2010-05-27T18:16:00.000-07:00

Let's drink some blood!

Focus, Trinity

2010-05-26T19:01:00.001-07:00

I discovered something cool today. I was playing around in the backyard with this weighted ball I have (6 lbs. or so). I was tossing it around like I usually do, and then I spent some time balancing it on my head, and seeing how long I could keep it there. I tried walking while balancing it, and I noticed it was forcing me to be very aware of my body, and move slowly and with great consciousness. Then I tried to see how long I could remain still while balancing it on my head. After a little while, I noticed myself slipping into a hypnotic state. The effort involved in keeping the rather heavy ball balanced engaged most of my basic motor functions, while my mind was free to split off and do its own thing. I picked a point and focused exclusively on it-- the world in front of me became acid-bright, like a diorama. My eyes closed and opened several times of their own accord. I felt totally focused and receptive (I had taken my shoes off as soon as I noticed the state coming on, in order to be more connected with the ground). In short, it worked terrifically well as a calming, meditative exercise. If you try this, let me know how it worked for you.

Yo Dawg, I Heard You Like Rapping Dawg

2010-05-23T21:01:00.001-07:00

Oh, you are so lucky to be living in the world right now, because you get to see one of the best Youtube mashups ever made:

This dog has fucking flow

In case you're wondering, here is a transcript of the dog's rap, according to Youtube's rather questionable closed-captioning:

"And what would what would

But with well in the lead with him in a minute

But what happens when let me

I said well then we're going live with

It wouldn't have mattered ranch

The ad opens with a dwindling

But go ahead with the referendum"

Fucking. Wisdom.

OMSI

2010-05-21T09:44:00.000-07:00

Stacia and I went to the OMSI and did things! One of the coolest exhibits they had was a chance to make your own stop-motion videos. Here is what two reasonably creative people might come up with, given the chance:

Study in Stacia

Bright Animal Convulsion

Quickdraw

Crane Style

Coffee! Let's Drink Some!

2010-05-13T16:46:00.001-07:00

Let's drink some coffee!

Hub World

2010-05-05T20:01:00.000-07:00

You know how lots of action/adventure games have a hub world, where you can save your game, heal your character(s), stock up on necessary items, before embarking on the next mission or stage of the game? I feel like that's where I am right now. Hub World.

Over the past week or so, I've been practicing self-hypnosis and have been finding it surprisingly easy. I've done it about three times so far. The first one was great, the second one made me throw up in some odd psychic way but was still ultimately educational, and the third one lacked specific focus so just became more of a general relaxation-exercise.

I mention this because it may have something to do with my next point: lately I've been experiencing... feelings? premonitions? projections? And in these states, I visualize my future, and it's surprisingly good.

This has never happened to me before at any point in my life. I had, I realize now, been operating under the assumption that things were not going to turn out well for me in any significant way. This was just a given factor, something dwelling in my subconscious. But like I said, I've been getting these shadowy, warm not-quite-visions of a very positive possible outcome of my life. It's kind of weirding me out, the idea that this reality could be coalescing in one of my existence-branches. I regard it obliquely and don't want to scare it away.

I've also been trying to communicate with people on a supernormal level lately, so if you feel like I'm trying to say something feel free to say something back.

Big/Small

2010-05-01T14:19:00.001-07:00

If you're anything like me, and you enjoy the feeling of your head exploding, I really think you should look at this:

The Scale(s) of the Universe

2010-04-26T09:32:00.001-07:00

I know the whole "pop art" thing is totally played out and unoriginal, but I think this picture of me is pretty cool:

Another Interesting Person

2010-04-15T08:51:00.000-07:00

Lest you think that I am solely interested in autistic semi-geniuses who live in caves while naked, let me introduce you to another really interesting person-- someone with more panache and talent than someone should legally be allowed to have. This person has built, among other things:

A furby that breathes fire;
A 52-inch HD Etch-a-Sketch;
And a race car chassis from discarded tube steel.

But that's not nearly all. Most impressive of all (so impressive that I haven't got the technical know-how to even know how difficult this must have been) is that she reverse-engineered a Commodore 64, audio and visual systems both, by looking at a picture of the relevant silicon, and then recreating it on a field-programmable gate array. Imagine looking at a picture of the Notre Dame cathedral, memorizing it, and then building an exact scale-model replica out of matchsticks.

And there's more! Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you Jeri Ellsworth:

Lifehacker Extraordinaire

Detox

2010-04-11T16:45:00.000-07:00

Here is a picture I made today, called Detox:

(Click for bigness).

My Two Minutes Snorting, Righteous Anger

2010-04-10T08:43:00.000-07:00

Oh, look, "Male Studies"!

http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2010/04/08/males

Rubbish. An attempt to lend an academic sheen to the petulant desire not to give up one's precious stereotypes and self-indulgences. One senses that Lionel Tiger (and his colleagues, Hunter Beefneck and Lance Squatthrust) couldn't give a toss about gender identity and the fulfillment of the male individual-- rather, they just want a hefty essay to cite when their girlfriends get on their case about cracking open their 14th Miller Lite of the day while watching "Big Butt Babes go Bananas Vol. XXVI: Cancun!!". "But babe, don't you see? This systematic shaming attempt just reinforces the marginalization-based framework currently eating away at the actualization of the male in today's society! I refer you to Steed R. Horse, Our Hummers, Our Selves, op cit."

Art is So Good

2010-04-03T22:04:00.000-07:00

Having recently had the chance to check out the SF MOMA, I wanted to draw your attention to a few exhibits I think are worth your consideration. The first (and maybe my favorite) was "Three Screen Ray", by Bruce Connor. It juxtaposed a live audio performance by Ray Charles of "What'd I Say" with three separate screens, each showing a dazzling, dizzying, sensual display of media which took the erotic essence of the song and blew it up to insane proportions, incorporating advertising, cartoons, and old war footage.

I thought it was completely great. It sent the Kundalini energy shooting right up from my parts. It was frantic, frenzied, disorienting, strange, and hypnotic.

Three Screen Ray:

http://www.sfmoma.org/exhibitions/404

The next was something I didn't notice the title of until well after I'd seen the piece itself. Walking past the room it was in, I thought, "Hm, I hear rushing water". But it wasn't water-- what I was hearing was the roar of an air-conditioning unit attached to a large metal box. Dangling from opposite walls of the box were those long strips of clear plastic you see used in industrial refrigeration. I took a tentative step through them and into the box.

Inside it was painfully cold, and there was a startling object-- I couldn't tell what it was at first, but seemed to be made to human scale. It looked like a bench or a rack, made out of some odd substance-- shiny, greasy, a pale seasick color. Embedded in the object were a few steel items of unknown use or application.

It all filled me with a terrific sense of dread and terror. The cold, cruel, grotesque feeling of the piece had the feel of some medical nightmare. And (this is where I really have to praise it) it wasn't done with anything obvious or expected-- no blood, body parts, or boogymen. Just several strange, frightening things put together with devastating effect.

http://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/4759

When I saw the next piece, at first I thought, "How silly can you get?" It just looked like a huge red square, parked there. But then when I got closer to it, I suddenly realized it wasn't just blank color-- it was a deep, glossy, captivating red, made out of some strange reflective material. I found myself peering intently at my image, reflected in it-- I had become fascinated. I realized that this red expanse was many different things at once. It was a feeling, a color, a mirror, a door into another world, a statement, and something that absorbed everything else in the room and reflected it back in a new, changed way.

Spiegel, Blutrot:

http://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/25611

The second floor had a Picasso. What can one say about Picasso? Simply that I felt this painting was alive and moving with more joy and life and energy and prettiness than almost any other painting I saw that day, or most any other day. (It was much more vibrant in real life, too).

La Cruche Fleurie:

http://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/255

This next piece was huge. The picture doesn't do it anything approaching justice-- it's an entire room unto itself. The imagery I thought was unusual and arresting, and it made me feel a lot of things such as sympathy and confusion (two pretty good ways to feel upon looking at art, I think). It's visceral on some level, and awfully earthy, and has the power of mythology behind it. It's kind of the visual equivalent of something like the novel "Beloved".

No words can Adequately reflect the Remorse this Negress feels...

http://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/101243

This piece reminded me of a heart. Not necessarily how one looks, but how one sometimes feels.

The Lens of Rotterdam:

http://www.sfmoma.org/artwork/130162

There were, of course, tons of other great, great works. I also liked The Spirits That Lend Strength are Invisible, Matisse's Femme au Chapeau, and the works of Robert Gober. Click, if you like, and discover!

For a Minute There

2010-03-13T07:30:00.000-08:00

Behold my latest audio thrang. Here you will find a cover of "Karma Police", featuring me on guitar and my friend Keith on vocals.

This cover is well-suited to late, meditative nights, or perhaps early mornings when you don't feel so well.

Look for further developments from this camp.

2010-03-04T17:55:00.000-08:00

Lately I find that one of the few things that makes me feel good enough to smile or giggle or cackle, never mind if I'm in public or not, is reading the works of Charles Bukowski. The last thing I do, before I leave the Powell's on Hawthorne, is make my way to the "B" section of the Poetry aisle and delve into his stuff, and it always, always makes me want to give him a high-five, or something. I realize that if he were alive, and we met, he'd probably ignore me, and I him, which is somehow even more of a pleasing idea. Anyway, here's one of his:

Buddha Chinaski Says

sometimes
you have to take
a step or
two
back,
re-
treat

take
a month
off

don't
do anything
don't
want to
do anything.

peace is
paramount
pace is
paramount

whatever
you want
you aren't going to
get
it by
trying too
hard.

take
ten years
off

you'll
be
stronger

take
twenty years
off

you'll
be much
stronger.

there's nothing to
win
anyhow.

and
remember the second best thing in
the world
is
a good night's
sleep

and
the best:
a gentle
death.

meanwhile
pay your gas
bill
if you can
and
stay out of
arguements with the
wife.

It's at times like these, giggling and nodding and "Yup yup"-ing, that I think he's really one of the only people who consistently gives me advice that's both easy to understand and follow and actually worth a damn. If I could do nothing but eat burritos from Cha Cha Cha, read his stuff, go for long walks in nature, and lounge about in bed with you non-stop, I think I'd really be a Happy Person. But who knows?

2010-02-28T00:30:00.000-08:00

Suggested Alternative Praxes for Dissatisfied Satan-Worshippers:

Hail Santa: in which you do obeisance to the original Jolly Old Elf, kowtowing at his coal-black boots while a chorus of malignant elves keep up a steady sotto voce rumble of "Ho ho ho".

Hail Seitan: a malevolently smiling, lightly dreadlocked lady with a nose ring lets you in to a modest vegetarian restaurant, the ones that have those glossy, black, easily stacked chairs. After a perfidy-whetting glass of water, you prepare to pay honor to the most evil of meat-substitutes, sitting on your innocent-looking ceramic dish.

Hail Satin: walk into your local craft store, past the microscopic beads sold in packs of 60 and the variously segmented constituent parts of dolls, until you reach the flat folded bolts of cloth. Keep an eye out for the distinctive frayed ends of true satin, which should clue you in to the verisimilitude of the fabric-- from there, it is a simple step to fall to your knees in what ideally should come across as a combination of reverent awe and grotesque, infernal glee. In such cases it is considered polite to shout "Pepe Satin, Pepe Satin Aleppe!"

2010-02-20T18:35:00.001-08:00

Sometimes I think, "Maybe human beings have exhausted all the strangeness there is. Maybe nobody is really far out anymore." And then I find links like this:

If you lived here, you'd be homeless now

NWS for pictures of a naked person-- specifically, a naked female human who lived alone in the woods, in a technologically-constituted and quite civilized cave of space, and who didn't wear clothes for three years. She also, at one point, experimented with slathering herself with testosterone gel in order to experience a greatly heightened libido, during which she maintained a truly exhausting masturbation-schedule. Trust me, that's just one of the interesting things about her.

Words just fail. I am completely awed, impressed, and humbled by her-- she's lost most of the parts of her mind that make people mundane.

P.S. Because it deserves one-- I wish to reiterate that this site is 1) run by an autistic person, who therefore doesn't really tone things down, as it were, and that 2) she is really, really into BDSM. So heads up.

Internalization

2010-02-15T00:16:00.000-08:00

"Internalization" is the process by which a person codifies, consolidates, and adopts a set of beliefs, attitudes, or values. Role models can help with this. If an admired other displays a set of traits that we want to adopt, we are more likely to adopt those traits. Prearranged dogma or behavioral sets or schema or variously other-arranged sets of orthopraxy/-doxy. These are imposed from without but can be adopted freely and swallowed whole. "Introjection" is where the subject incorporates into his- or herself fragments of the surrounding world. So like for instance tonight and the night before when I took great big breaths of night air because it had become sweet and filling and nourishing again after long periods of thin inert air, I was in fact desperately trying to incorporate this healthy tinge into my own self. For example. No word so far on if there is a process for trying desperately to keep oppressive noxious fragments from permeating and corrupting one's sense of self/spiritual progress. In extremis I guess you would call that "denial". The permeability of spaces. (The safety of objects). "Individuals with weak ego boundaries are more likely to use introjection as a defense mechanism." More air I need more air I need more air.

In Which I Overly Simplify Things, Like a Lot

2010-02-12T21:19:00.000-08:00

Having tuned in on the last quarter-and-a-half or so of the Super Bowl this year, I realized that the ads were on the whole pretty impressively strident, lavish, devoid of good humor, and effectively brain-dead. Like this one!

"I will remain hopelessly out-of-date with the current state of cultural mores."

So there was a certain part of me that wooted softly but sincerely when I saw the response:

"...Will you now."

But what I would really like-- and maybe this is too gigantically starry-eyed to even consider seriously-- is for this not to have even been culturally necessary in the first place. They call it the "Battle of the Sexes", but what I'm wondering is: what fucking idiot fired the first shot? Don't we have enough to contend with, striding out into a blandly apathetic or hostile world, without taking up arms against the people we could be loving instead? If you have to keep someone down to stay in a position of power, you're not in a position of power. (...I think I'm being too idealistic).

TL;DR I laughed at a parody video, but felt bad that it had to be made.

New Year's Revolutions

2010-01-20T13:04:00.000-08:00

According to Wikipedia, the following are characteristics of stable, high-functioning adults:

Altruism (constructive service for other people that brings pleasure and satisfaction);
Anticipation (realistic planning for future discomfort);
Humor (an interesting inclusion. Apparently, the ability to point out absurdity or unpleasantness while causing amusement or pleasure is a mature skill. A good way to deal with situations that would otherwise be too difficult or distressing);
Identification (the unconscious modeling of oneself after a role model);
Introjection (identifying with some object or idea so strongly that it becomes a part of oneself);
Sublimation (we all know this one-- transforming a negative impulse into positive behavior. Turning darkness into light. Alchemy);
Thought suppression (not to be confused with repression. The ability to push conscious thoughts or emotions into the pre-conscious in order to better deal with present reality. Delaying dealing with an emotion or need until later, and then processing and accepting it).

Something for me to think heavily about. (These traits are the fourth level of psychic "defense mechanisms", the level being called Mature. The first three levels of d.m.'s-- Pathological, Immature, and Neurotic--are even more interesting, but I'll address those in further blog posts).

Also, if you'd like, you can watch my cover version of Queen's "You Take My Breath Away" which I whipped together after thinking that C minor was such a pretty-sounding chord:

Click Here!

If you think that sucked and need a palette-cleanser, I recommend Morrissey's "Ouija Board, Ouija Board":

The Table is Rumbling

HAIL SANTA

2010-01-13T14:16:00.001-08:00

This Seems Somehow Important

2010-01-11T12:43:00.000-08:00

In Buddhist cosmology, there is a deity known as Ragaraja, or Aizen Myouou in the Japanese. He is depicted as a red-skinned, scowling man. He represents the point at which sexual agitation becomes enlightenment, and romantic love becomes love for all living creatures.

The first time Pattie Boyd first met George Harrison, she thought he was one of the most beautiful men she'd ever seen. One of the first things he said to her was "Will you marry me?" She laughed, and so he said, "Well, if you won't marry me, how about dinner tonight?" From there, of course, they famously wound up together. (Look at this incredibly beautiful picture):

In one of the most well-known pieces of rock and roll lore, Harrison's friend Eric Clapton fell hard for Boyd not long after. After she rebuffed his advances, Clapton retreated into heroin and isolation. He found an important artistic parallel in a Persian story from the 12th century, called Layla and Majnun. The story was about a moon-princess, Layla, who was carried off by her father to be with someone other than the man who loved her, which resulted in his eventual madness. This struck an obvious chord with Clapton, who went on to write a pretty good song about it.

Eventually, Harrison's interest in spiritual matters and his changing personality alienated Boyd, who divorced him in 1977. She would marry Clapton two years later.

The relationship was stormy. Clapton carried on several affairs and developed an alcohol problem, although there were apparently several wonderful nights, about which Clapton wrote a rather less good song. Clapton and Boyd divorced in 1988.

Strange overtones

In the music you are playing

I'll harmonize

It is strong and you are tough

But a heart is not enough

Dear NASA,

2009-12-30T14:12:00.000-08:00

If intelligent aliens should ever send a delegation to earth, it occurs to me that the Japanese would make excellent envoys of humanity.

1) Their culture is fascinated by novelty and innovation. Any peculiarities of the alien form or culture would be therefore more appreciated and embraced. In fact, you'd probably see a new fad in Tokyo of dressing more like the Betelgeusians by the end of the day.

2) The Japanese tendency towards proper etiquette is well-known. (We wouldn't want any British yobs chucking lager cans at the landing craft, for example). We could count on them to at least make a decent showing of human propriety.

3) They have a wonderful tolerance to the grotesque. This is the culture that has given us the terms manga, guro, yaoi, seppuku, and hentai tentacle rape. The aliens could be bloated, screeching sacks of bilious ooze-- I doubt one of the delegates would even raise an eyebrow.

4) You know as soon as they cast eyes on any sort of interstellar craft, within days they'd have a plan to make one smaller, cheaper, and more fuel-effective, thus ensuring humanity's place in the competitive spaceship-market.

5) The collective cultural memory of Japan has already experienced the shock of meeting "aliens", thanks to Admiral Perry landing on the island in 1853. The disorienting steps of meeting highly technologically-advanced "outsiders" are therefore not going to pack quite the same wallop.

What do you think?

I Am Going to Go Through These Fucking Walls

2009-12-29T22:42:00.000-08:00

There's another scene in The Men Who Stare at Goats I wanted to tell you about, the first scene, in fact. It opens on a tight close-up of this older army guy, grizzled and grey in the mustache, looking really intently at something.

"Boone," he says, face wicked with sweat.

"Yes sir?"

"I'm going into the other room."

And he gets up from his desk and charges pell-fucking-mell right at the wall, charging with the purest of Intention. And he hits the wall and WHAM, back he goes, sprawling onto the ground.

"Dammit," he says.

Okay, so yeah, that's pretty much what we would expect would happen. But then you have the course of the whole movie, all of George Clooney and Ewan McGregor's ramblings and so on. And in the very last scene (I'm spoilering this shit, look askance if you have a delicate constitution) we see McGregor staring death-rays at a wall, now compleat with mustache of his own, get up and charge pell-fucking-mell right at a similar wall.

Guess what happens this time. (It's literally probably better in your head than it was on-screen).

Anyway, my point is that I feel like I'm staring at walls right now. I'm staaring and staaring and my blood vessels are about to go critical, but that's the necessary part. Because by God, I am going to go through these fucking walls. And I'm not even going to knock them down, because that's cheating, that's bullshit. I'm going to go right through them.

2009-12-28T11:41:00.000-08:00

Oh heavens, I am well and truly sick. My head is a veritable swamp of mucus.

So it occurs to me that control is a human invention. To say that everything is under control is that everything is artificial, stilted, jammed, and a whisker away from going completely disastrous. If you really wanted to reassure someone, you could tell them that nothing is under control, because then everything is flowing smoothly and nicely along their natural lines. Nobody with any kind of agency (and therefore greed) has a say in the show.

To try and direct things is to set yourself up for failure. What you can do is look where things are going, or where they want to go, and ride along the top of that like a surfer. No surfer would ever try and tell a wave to move away from the shore. He or she acquiesces to the larger movements, the larger forces, and so travels much faster than is ordinarily possible. If you get really good at it, you look like some sort of genius force of nature, but really all you're doing is riding waves.

I Remember Summer

2009-12-17T00:59:00.000-08:00

And love, it would seem, is a skill.

I walk through these summer nights with you

Telling you about my favorite mystery,

Of a cherry petal snowfall

In the hottest days of June

There are some voices, some singers

Who can pull you through time into

A faded and dusty aching feeling

Through the decades you go spinning backwards

Open your heart, it's about to begin

And listening to the radio by the open window

You beam out your purity to the stars

And the unimpeachable feeling

They had it right, it's like white lines

Of rain slashing through a dry night

And if someone did it once,

They did it for everyone, we have all succeeded,

We are all sent reeling, we are all caught up,

And nothing, no nothing can stop us now.

Confession Time

2009-12-14T11:09:00.001-08:00

Looking back on it now, I realize:

From roughly the ages of 16 to 25, I couldn't stand myself. There were, of course, periods where everything aligned and the river flowed nicely out of myself and into the air around me, but for the most part, I wanted desperately to crawl out of my own skin. I tried about as hard as any Scorpio can try (which is pretty hard) to eliminate myself, in various ways. I tried not talking to anyone, I tried writing down on paper over and over again how despicable I was, I tried literally starving myself (that was fun), moving far away from people, and so on.

I realize now that I wasn't becoming clear, which is what I wanted-- all that shit just made me dark and sludgy, which only made me want to disappear further. I thought I was killing my ego, but I was only feeding it.

Because there are many disciplines which focus on the dissolution of the ego. From everything I've seen and heard, it's a marvelous, refreshing experience. My artistic hero, John Frusciante, talks constantly about nothingness, emptiness, channeling spirits. The Tao is all about naturalness, the empty cup.

I guess what I'm getting at is that I now think happiness will help you fit into the currents of the air, not sadness. I could've said this at any point growing up, but I wouldn't have believed it. Anyway, it makes me want to apologize to all my friends for all the times I thought I was being humble, but actually I was being a self-absorbed little shit. I'm sorry, everyone. I promise to try and channel light for myself and for all of you from now on.

2009-12-11T09:21:00.000-08:00

Humor LAWL

2009-12-08T14:16:00.000-08:00

This is ripe for abuse if anything is, it's PETA's blank template for "cruel" KFC signs:

http://signgenerator.kfccruelty.com/index.asp

And here are some I came up with:

(Bonus audio version of the last one! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sxeOmD_nVrM)

Not-Quite-Night-Yet

2009-12-05T11:47:00.000-08:00

Here, read this hilarious page, it's fandango:

Twilight Parody

It's All Happening Now

2009-12-02T17:55:00.000-08:00

What a strange day. I woke up with one of those strange hangovers, the ones that make me feel happy and calm and clear and loving. I felt harmless and helpful.

I should have known, though, that when I feel unprecedentedly strong, that's the universe's cue to present me with a new challenge. In this case, the suddenly-unavoidable need to find a new place to live.

I had been, I think, quietly asking the universe to make this necessary for me for some time now anyway. "Well, it's not so bad," I would say, and it wasn't. But it also wasn't ideal. It was toxic and depressing in a lot of ways. I wasn't doing my best, afraid to be complete. I was falling into a vaguely miserable, but comfortable rut. So my conscious was saying, "It'll do," while my subconscious was saying, "Make it impossible for me to remain as I am, please." And now my wish has been granted.

Which means that it is time to rock and roll on all levels, as I did when I first moved to this city June 1st, and again at the end of that summer.

The first step, I think, is to get rid of all superfluous physical items. Goodwill is about to get some stuff. Oh man, this feels scary and refreshing at the same time.

Open heart, open hands, open mind.

Mental Progress, or Clarity no. 2

2009-11-30T13:29:00.000-08:00

When I was growing up, I thought that love and sex were mutually exclusive. The impression I got was that sex was basically greedy, animalistic, callous. Love was emotional but sterile. In other words, to love someone basically doomed you to a lifetime of writing them letters from the other side of the room, lest your noble intentions be sullied, blah blah bullshit.

This now strikes me as... well, just completely wrong, and so very damaging. You might as well cut your brain in half with a knife as think along such divisive lines. Again, it's the yin and the yang. They aren't far apart, but constantly touching and flowing into each other. A person can be two things at once, and the body and the soul and the mind aren't enemies, for heaven's sake, they're friends. They can all operate at once, synergize. Christ. It's so obvious. I wish I could've processed this about a dozen years ago or so, but better late than never, I guess.

Postscript provided by Of Montreal:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xSZKbvsWNK4

I used to think in black

While at my country seat

Now I'm peaking in so many ways

The gloom is in retreat

Yeah, the dark epoch is over

I found my efeblum

Then passed Ernst's mausoleum

Defended by a rook

Who shot a look so virulent

It pierced me like a hook

The palaver of solipsists

Exploding in my skull...

Yeah and we both despise

All of the academic swine

Who made the author of "Discuss Ulysses" benign

So what if Wednesday finds us

Wearing rabies parachutes?

Foaming like the melody,

A single fairy flute

The atmosphere is viscous,

We're sticking to the brine...

Yeah and we both despise

All of the academic swine

Who made the author of "Discuss Ulysses" benign

When the lanterns fill with finches

So begins the brawl

Their brains are like porcupines

And mine's a paper ball (x2)

I know they don't understand

They don't get us at all

Their moss mangles polyanthus

And mine's a paper ball

Song Time

2009-11-27T20:48:00.000-08:00

Inspired by one of John Frusciante's inimitable covers, here's my version of "For Emily, Wherever I May Find Her":

And the man doing it 100x better:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WCmrKgjRb1c

In Which I Explain My Blog Title

2009-11-22T05:27:00.000-08:00

Pro-prologue:

Sometimes the coincidences begin to pile up. Jung wrote about this in his essay on synchronicity.... like one time he had a patient who told him a dream about a rare scarab beetle, whereupon he looked out the window to notice one knocking against the glass. He opened the window, grabbed it, and presented it to his patient, who had a lot of veils dissolved in that moment, or so he tells us.

Prologue:

Where do we keep our best selves, and is there even such a thing? I look inside myself and see a landscape. Not static, but fluxuous. (Yes, I invented that word). Sometimes the sky is an enormous space of clear air, sometimes it's a suffocating atmosphere of total drear. Where do I keep the little glowing cells? I know they're in there, I've felt them. Under the earth, hiding behind blades of grass? Sometimes I feel absolutely angelic, like I could photosynthesize, and then next week I'll feel paltry, craven, weak, cruel, small.

OK Then:

I have a theory that people are basically either energy batteries or energy sinks. You can't stay one for long. You can change from one to the other slowly or quickly, from minute to minute, or even faster. The bright animals are suffused with a surfeit of light energy, which is designed to infiltrate the system and activate the people around them. The dark animals are basically holes in the air. They suck up the energy around them. It's not their fault, necessarily, although some people get awfully good at being energy sinks. Like they base their self-concept as someone who depresses others, and they (erroneously) think this lends them individuality and interest.

This is such a basic duality that I think it holds true across most cultures and times. You move up, you move down. Bright or dark. Levity, or else gravity. You commune with angels, or you commune with demons. (If you want to just regard a Taijitu for a while, it'll explain all this far better than I ever could, just sayin'.)

The Travails of Morrissey, pt. 2

2009-11-20T08:26:00.001-08:00

Barbarism begins in the theater... and a crack on the head is, indeed, what you get.

Small Dog Ahoy!

2009-11-11T10:31:00.000-08:00

Good dog. Except when she gets into my room and eats my headphones (twice now).

2009-11-08T14:01:00.000-08:00

Dammit, everyone, I'm ordering you to listen to this. It's the instrumental track from Otis and Carla's "Tramp", on Stax Records. If those fucking drums don't get you out of your seat, you have no blood in your body and I'm ashamed to know you.

Click Here!

See, this is what I mean when I say it's hard for me to get into contemporary music sometimes, because no one is doing THIS anymore. This is the lost art of sounding like three shots of whiskey and a punch to the gut.