Daily Dose of Dirkish Delights

Off Hiatus I guess

2008-04-27T21:33:00.000-07:00

Long dormant, but it's time to brush off the cobwebs and start writing again.

I have been writing, it's just been mostly cover letters and resumes. The way things have been going for me lately I could write country music.

2007 was an awesome year. had a good gig at Wells Fargo, had a kid, left Wells, and a month later got the Perfect Job for a company called BEA Systems as their weekend Customer Service Rep.

Customer Service is akin to being a 911 operator. Everyone calls with an emergency, and you have to prioritize everyone's emergency. BEA was more like being Fire Watch for the Forest Service. not much happened, but when it did it was either huge or no big deal.

I've tried to keep this a writing for writing's sake kind of blog, and avoid all the journaling crap that tends to bog these blogs down. No one wants to read the pathos of a never-was who suffers from occasional delusions of adequacy. That's too emo, and I'm way past puberty to do that.

I'd promise I'll write more frequently, but I'd feel even more guilt if I did that, and didn't follow through, which would keep me from picking it up again.

Ray Bradbury daily sits at his typewriter- now a computer(I hope) and would bang out streams of consciousness then craft it into something commercially viable. That's what this blog is for.

Welcome back.

The things you see

2006-12-28T22:03:00.000-08:00

I was browsing through youtube.com, trying to find some Big O episodes, and came across this:

Amazing.

The swarming tactic is cool and the fact that each type of bee adapted to their local threats. I wouldn't be surprised if the European bees, if enough survive to adapt to the new threat and pose some new kind of defense, maybe even through social transmission.

the Voices

2006-10-18T23:05:00.000-07:00

I'm currently working on a pet project, and with finding the right voice.

I 'm trying to come up with the right metaphor for blending, or mixing down or cross-fading, differnt writng styles.

The example was getting a sandwich.

Jack Kirby, Stan Lee Warren Ellis, Mark Millar were some of my examples:

Jack would lead with either a verb or a very aggresive adverb

Stan would wind around a few more descriptives

Mark Millar would take 3 or 4 issues to show the conflicting desires nad motivations behind the getting of the sandwich and the selection of the ingredients, with the action taking place in 4-5 page.

Warren Ellis, (at least in NextWave) would have the sandwich set in the middle of a death house full of the most absurd devices, like Buzzsaw - bellied roosters defending it.
i guess it is not what you say, but how you say it.

Looking for Work. Again

2006-10-16T12:59:00.000-07:00

To Paraphrase Huey Freeman, well, technically it would be Aaron McGruder.
"The life of a temp is not for the meek of heart"

Contract ended the 6th, I was webmaster of the Well Fargo internal websites. Since they were internal, I have no copies to prove the point. I spent last week getting things together to show that I actually know how to do some of the things . I'll post some of my examples on my other blog In Progress, so that I can refer people to my process and end results.

I've been working on a few things as a writer/developer that should be entertaining.

What I do:
I'm a writer. I make the kind of taglines that are mentally stickier than fat Southerners at a NASCAR rally in August.

IF that makes any kind of sense to the 9 or so people who'll stumble across this, tell me what you think it means.

I like Advertising, but any gig works for me. I live in Oakland, but can commute to The City.

I can do production work, I know Illustrator, Fireworks, Flash, and I used to tutor PhotoShop.

I have experience in Administrivia, CRM, and Tech Support. It's mid October, so the hiring's about to start for the Christmas rush in Customer service departments.

Happy Birthday to me

2006-10-16T12:37:00.000-07:00

On this day in Akron, Ohio, I was born.

Not much of a big deal if you ask me.

The way my mother would tell, it was a dramatic entrance, with me crowning 'early' and the orderlies crossing her legs so the doctor could get their and do his job. I dont' remember any of it myself, so I had to take her word for it. She also said I wasn't going to be an Artist, and I listened to that as well.

The last few years have been hard birthdays. Simply those kind of days where you expect anvils to drop from the skies.

Last year is a bit of a blur. Neither good nor bad.

In '04 my father was dying and I got to talk to him via cel. His tracheotomy made it difficult to speak.

In '02, I got a ticket for multiple driving indescretions that I'm still trying to get cleared. The only hting I did wrong was use the carpool lane with only two people in a pickup truck. That and I had no Driver's license.

When I lived in Air Force, especially in Germany, I would go for a long walk and reflect on the previous year. I waited til Thanksgiving for this, as I was usually pursuing my goals of consuming vast amounts of brown liquor.

They weren't all bad. In '97, on my 30th, I had a Gallery shoing of my work, two happy, healthy kids, and a future in Design with a captial D. Less than six months later, I'd be downsized by that wife, and my life again changed.

My current wife, who's carrying our child, has made me very happy on most days, so they tend to get lumped together. For example; on our first anniversary, we went to New Orleans, to chase our ghosts of the past.

The point of all this? Quite simply this; there is no point. Existence futile and meaningless on a geological scale. But, since life has no inherent meaning, it's up to each of us to assign meaning to our lives. You can spend your time building bridges, or walls.

Take or leave it. But time's running out.

Browsings

2006-10-02T16:51:00.000-07:00

A few YouTube.com videos.

Intergalactic-- Beastie Boys

Sabotage -- Beastie Boys

Jim Kelly

"BLack Samurai" trailer

"The life of a Black Hero is not for the meek of heart."

- Huey Freeman

A compilation of fight scenes.

Getting back into

2006-09-24T00:18:00.000-07:00

The swing of things.

For your enjoyment,

the Tick

part 1

Today's grazings

2006-06-14T17:03:00.000-07:00

Check out on iTunes the song:
"Everyday Superhero" by Smash Mouth

Japanese full-body tattoos called "horimono"

great "advert" parody of a Sony spot. I htink they did a similar one here in San Francisco

gottne off a link from this site of UK office humour

I've been working.

2006-06-14T15:10:00.000-07:00

That and school.

Did horrible this laast term, and the funny thing is, this is the first quarter nothing Earth-shattering has happened in my life.

Maybe I was consstantly waiting for something bad to happen.

Ce'st la vie.

Movie review

2005-12-05T18:25:00.000-08:00

There's an old saying "never let the truth interfere with a good story."

My review is of the Movie "The 13th Warrior" based off the book "Eaters of the Dead" written by Michael Crichton, which is an interpretation of the epic Beowulf, as viewed by the historical character, Ahmed Ibn Fadlan.

Whenever telling a story, through whatever medium of expression, inaccuracies will creep in. That's to be expected. The only movie I have ever seen that was an almost perfect translation from its original source material was "Sin City", where the only noticeable changes was the constrained aspect ratio of the screen.

On its own merits, the movie adaptation was great. Several key points were highlighted by the strength of film, using scenes that were not in the book served to make the story flow smoother - notably the scene where Ahmed Ibn Fadlan learns Norse around the campfire. Rather than simply having everyone start speaking English, they used a few minutes of screen time and the excellent use of sound and video editing to show this. I wish more movies used this device. The only other time I had seen this used as well was in the beginning of the movie "Hunt for Red October" when the KGB officer reads from the bible, and the sound switches smoothly from Russian to English.

The book covered the romantic aspects and Norse attitudes towards sex more accurately, such as the equality of women in choosing their partners. The pragmatism of the Russian Vikings were evident, even in such matters. The book as well as the movie showed the Norse as what they were; crude, courageous, fatalistic people who, as you learned more about them, though alien, still had a fascinating culture.

I liked the use of an Islamic point of view to show this alien world, because I feel popular culture especially at the time of the film's release. Americans either ignored that there was a rich Islamic culture at all, or portrayed them as barbarians especially at a time when western civilization was at its lowest point culturally since the Neolithic.

This is the first western movie I had ever seen regarding the Russian Vikings and their dealings. Most westerners are unaware the Norse traveled east as well. The combination of using an exotic person, Ahmed Ibn Fadlan, showing us a culture we're supposedly familiar with, the Norse, to tell a familiar story like Beowulf, was nicely done. In particular, I like how they demonstrated how the two parties could communicate sometimes using four up to four people translating combinations of Greek and Latin, the most commonly used languages of the day.

The courtier Ahmed Ibn Fadlan, due to an indiscreet love interest with a married woman is sent from his home of Cosmopolitan Baghdad to serve as ambassador to the northlands. On his way, he encounters a group of Rus traders. While paying his diplomatic visit with them the Rus receive a request for aid from a neighboring king in the north. At the insistence of their oracle, the Viking leader Bulwyf and his group draft the courtier to go with them.

When they arrive at the northern kingdom, they find that the threat is from the wendohl, a race of presumably Neanderthals who prey on humans, collect their heads and disappear into the hills.

The warriors then proceed to fortify the castle, defend it against the raiders, and launch a counter offensive to destroy the threat once and for all. In the course of all this Ahmed Ibn Fadlan, learns about Rus culture, and even comes to appreciate aspects of it.

Antonio Banderas, a Spanish actor, was a good choice for the role of Fadlan, as he was dark skinned enough to pass as Middle Eastern, and famous enough to ensure good ticket sales.

The person, Ahmed Ibn Fadlan really existed, and I enjoyed the plot device of using an outsider to relay the epic of Beowulf. It allowed a modern viewer to have someone in the story who needed to have things explained to them as to what was going on.

"Among the Norse Tribes - The Remarkable Account of Ahmed Ibn Fadlan" Written by Judith Gabriel outlines his adventures in these foreign lands.

I can understand certain liberties taken with reality when watching a movie. However, there are some myths I wish to address. These are mostly technical side notes more than anything, because I understand artistic license. However, I am disappointed with the continuation of the myth of the crudity of western martial weapons. Viking swords were some of the finest weapons made in that era, using a method called pattern welding, where they used several grades of metal to produce a weapon that was light and flexible enough to be wielded with one hand, yet stay sharp enough to cleave through the armor of the day.

Judith Gabriel's essay, also covers another observation by another traveler:

The philosopher and historian Miskawayh described them as men with "vast frames and great courage" who carried an impressive arsenal of weapons, including swords, spears, shields, daggers, axes and hammers. He noted that their swords "are in great demand to this day for their sharpness and excellence."

When the band arrives at the kingdom, one of the members tosses Ahmed Ibn Fadlan a Viking sword. He remarks that it is too heavy. The reply, typical approach to problems in the North was, "Grow stronger."

Hank Reinhardt, an historical combat authority, arms collector, founder of the Historical Armed Combat Association, wrote an overview of the history of sword design, describing how swords have evolved over time; not linearly from crude techniques, to perfect ones, but cyclicly, using specific technologies to create weapons and adapting them to specific uses in specific situations. That is why certain styles of blade length and shape reappear throughout history in both the East and the West.

The essay here describes the Viking sword, as well as the environment in which it was used.

The early Viking sword in general use was long -- about 33-34 inches -- broad -- 2-2.5 inches -- with a single fuller. The blade had parallel sides, with little or no taper. Steel was quite valuable, and at this time making large quantities was quite difficult. As a result, the swords were made by a process called pattern welding.
In this process, steel bars containing a good deal of carbon were welded to iron bars, then all were twisted and rewelded to produce the patterns we refer to as Damascus. A high-carbon edge was then welded on, the sword was filed, ground, tempered and polished. The end result was a light and fast blade, capable of delivering a terrible shearing cut. A good Viking sword was flexible, yet had a very hard edge.
This sword was designed to be used in conjunction with a wooden shield. It would be facing, more than likely, another wooden shield, and a foe wearing an iron helmet and armored with leather. If that opponent were very rich he would be wearing a mail shirt.
The sword, therefore, had to be flexible. It needed to take a lot of shock when hitting a shield, and cutting into a torso or even a leg -- the most likely target -- put a lot of strain on the sword. If it wasn't flexible, then it would bend easily. Of course, the sword could have been made thicker, but then the weight would be too great for combat. Swords at this time weighed between 2 and 3 pounds, tops. One wins an encounter with swords by cutting the other fellow first. In the 14th century, given the state of defensive armor, that meant leg cuts. Of the hundreds of corpses piled at Visby in 1361, 70% had leg wounds, most of them deep enough to be seen in the bones 500 years later.
The edge, we see, had to be hard. Bone is tough, so is a steel rimmed shield. And there was always the likelihood of hitting mail. One tried to avoid this by cutting at the neck, the hands and arms and, particularly, the legs.
Sometimes you got an opening and just had to take a cut. Mail is tough, composed of iron wire. It was not tempered and is somewhat soft. Tempered mail is not a good idea -- under a blow, such mail will break, giving free rein to the edge. Soft mail will bend and deform, resisting the cut a long way. Any mail will nick the edge, but if the blow is delivered accurately, at the proper angle and with a great deal of force, this sword can and will cut mail.
That is the sword in general use in Europe at the beginning of the Viking Age.

Swords in the 9th century were 30 to 36 inches in length, weighing approximately 2 to 3 pounds. It wasn't until the 13th to 14th century that the West started developing larger blades made entirely out of steel, which were developed to counter the increasing use of plate armor.

The armor used in the 9th century was mostly scale or chain mail. There was no plate armor at the time, and one warrior in the movie was sporting a gladiator's helmet. While I concede, it was a cool - looking helmet and there is always a tendency to hand down arms and armor that still function, it's a bit of a stretch to assume a helmet from at the latest the 5th century would still be in use. Even less believable was the peasecod breastplate one of the other warriors was wearing, which was from the 16th century which was made to resemble the fashions of that day and age. I've heard of being ahead of the fashion curve, but that's stretching it a bit.

The three shields duel was a nice touch, I've never heard of any judicial duels carried out this way from any time period, but it was still entertaining.

Spears were commonplace, yet were entirely absent in this movie, only one Viking used an axe, which I need to add, was from the high renaissance, and was designed for use against plate. I didn't understand why only one character used an axe and there was nobody with a spear. While Viking culture glorified their swords with fearsome sounding names, the spear and axe were carried by everyone. They were as much a tool as the scramasax, or long dagger.

A typical viking axe looked like this:

Note the broad head, on a long pole. It has a variety of uses, both as a tool and weapon.

This is what the axe in the movie resembled. Notice the small head, which is designed to concentrate most of the impact in a small area. Which is great when you are trying to crack plate armor, but pretty much useless for most other applications.

The other inconsistency that stood out most to me was the insistence of carrying their swords slung over their backs in a baldric, Conan style. This just wasn't the case in those days.

Other inaccuracies for the sake of storytelling are reasonable. For example, I understand the use of the prehistoric Goddess statue as the Mac Guffin element. They needed an element of worship and Grendel's mother was part of the Epic, so that was a nice touch. That and all my neo-pagan friends got upset when they saw it, so it was also great for shock value alone. I remember being amused at hearing the low boos and hisses in the theater when I saw this for the first time while living in Seattle.

An online essay, "Living In Two Realities -The Obligations of Choreography" by F. Braun McAsh, a fight 20 year veteran choreographer, who used to work on the series "Highlander" summarizes it thusly;

The concept of theatricality and entertainment need not be antithetical to authenticity. Costume designers do their research; why should fight directors be immune to historical style? There is over 520 years of written text documenting Western European sword technique [Ed.'s Note, close to 800] and ample forensic evidence from which to extrapolate or infer. As film expands its venue to bring wider ranges of historical subjects to a demanding audience, fight choreographers (and directors) should ensure that history be represented at least as well in the depiction of the sword as it is in costume and sets.

I couldn't agree more, and I am hopeful that as these historical sources become more mainstream, the myth of the crude nature of martial arts in Europe fades.

One great example of progess in this area is with a recent movie, "Kingdom of Heaven," where the characters used techniques lifted straight out of Fiore Dei Liberi's famed fencing manual of c.1410, Flos Duellatorum ("The Flower of Battle"). This was another movie showing both Middle Eastern and European cultures fairly accurately, while still telling a good story.

On the whole it was a good movie, and a good book. Were I not such an aficionado for my western martial heritage, the points I've listed would have probably escaped my notice.

Food as identity

2005-11-26T17:14:00.000-08:00
It was this year's Thanksgiving that my wife and I reinstated an age old tradition for me; solitude.

During my career in the Air Force, I looked forward to the holidays, not having any commitments to friends or family or to The Mission for a day of quiet reflection. I'm not religious, but I still believe in the power of ritual. A good stiff drink, and a long quiet walk thinking about what's gone right & what's gone wrong during the past year was a perfect way to spend the holiday. My wife prefers the excitement and interaction of preparing and sharing a feast, so she went to a friend's house to help him get ready.

Growing up, the household was always bustling with activity, and I always yearned to get out and go. I'm an adventurer, it's in my DNA. My family was very close, and we had traditional family dinners during the holidays; turkey, stuffing, sweet potatoes, etc. followed by watching the Dallas Cowboys beating the Detroit Lions. I hate football, but it always seemed to be playing on the tv.

Last year, I went to visit my dying father in LA. I stayed with my sister and cousin in West Hollywood. My sister's boyfriend made modern interpretations of the traditional meal, Turkey with a cajun rub, corn on the cob, and a few other dishes that escaped my notice. I don' remember the other guests, I do remember the old sensation of wanting to escape. so I guess it was just like growing up. No football on tv though.

This year, we were invited to a friend's house. In the afternoon, my wife picked me up, and we went over. It was a family, though nontraditional, but very Bay Area affair. There were several kinds of stuffing; vegetarian, vegan and low carb as well as regular stove-top variety. Vegan Fake turkey was side-by side with a free-range bird. for 12 people, there were 15 bottles of wine.

As we age and grow, we find ways to incorporate our traditions with our current identities. And for that I am very thankful.

Thankful

2005-11-24T11:35:00.000-08:00

First and foremost, I am thankful that I am one of the Chosen Few. An American white male. I have it better than most of the planet, and I know it. It was just an accident of birth, but there you go.

I am thankful that my predecessors have survived no less than four major extinctions. I come from a long line of badasses. So do you.

I would like to thank my ex-wife for bearing the Girl Cub and the Boy Child. I would also like to thank my first wife for the time we had together. You both deserved better than who I was at the time and I wish you well.

I am thankful that I have no moral qualms whatsoever in protecting my family. I know how lucky I am and how good I have it and I will do whatever is necessary to ensure their safety and happines.

I am also thankful that I am morally flexible enough to do whatever to whomever is foolish enough threatens the only reason I have for being alive.

I would like to thank Rachna. I know he's a handful, but Malcolm's worth it. I am also glad you two kids had a baby. She is beautiful.

I am glad there is no god, no supernatural explanation for the wonderful world I live in and the things therein.It makes the days more precious to know I have free will and that in an infinite universe, all things are possible. I am thankful that I am the only one responsible for my actions.

I am thankful for the existence that chemical compounds like MDMA exist. I am also thankful that, while illegal, there are suppliers here in this part of the world who produce clean, reliable products.

I am very grateful to have tried other things. I am fortunate to live in a time when access to information is at an all time high. I am thankful I have easy access to the Internet, and the public library. I only wish I could donate more to the library systems.

I have never tried smoking, and I am thankful both my parents did, so that it removed any allure that habit might have held.

I would like to thank NPR for their series of essays called "This I beleive", and I am especially grateful for Penn Jillette for his essay on NPR.

I am thankful neither of my parents had to bury any of their children. I am glad I got to say good bye to my father. I am also glad he went on his own terms.

I am thankful that my mother died instantly. I will try to do the same for her killer when I get around to it.

I am also very thankful I have been proven wrong about the nonexistence of true love. Thank you so much, Janet, for being in my world.

Thank you.

Raymond Chandler

2005-11-18T12:04:00.000-08:00

William Gibson, the cyberpunk author, has been compared to Chandler's gritty work. Tight dialog, tighter descriptions of scenes, making every word count.

The name came to me this morning, in the shower. For all the good it does me now.

It's the name of the author I couldn't remember, when I was making the comparison at the store I purchased my comics.

I blew it on that one line.

The line where I compared the last time I played D & D was with a bunch of Drama students. It was like something out of "The Grifters," we were all con artists.

Even the guy behind the counter couldn't help on that one. How can you work at a comic shop and not know that kind of useless information? If we met at the video store down the street, this wouldn't have happened.

That was the second thing I said to her. The first was a comment on fuzzy dice. It was how I had seen someone the other day, weeks ago actually - with fuzzy dice hanging from their rearview. Twelve-sided dice. Talk about geek - chic.

She had some in her hand, said she was buying them for her brother. I knew it was just a MacGuffin. An excuse to come into the store, a reason to wait in line, to create a chance to talk to me. Yeah, me. Go figure.

Earlier, she walked past me as I was looking at the comics on the rack against the wall. She was browsing, looking around at the stuffed animals and stuff behind me.

I saw her walk into the store and knew she saw me looking at the comics. I tried to be surreptitious, looking at her. I didn't want to come across as a stalker. Even though she followed me, it's a concern I always have. You only need to be pepper-sprayed once to be gun - shy. True, it was my sister who'd done that, and she did it just tot see what it really did to people. I would never visit a gun store with her.

I knew she had seen me walk into the store. i walked slowly enough into it, and wondered if she'd follow.

I passed her on the street going into the store. I smiled as she passed, she smiled back. We did the eye thing.

When you make eye contact, look away, then look back to see if they do the same. That's the eye thing. Shows that you are both interested. Like when Cranes dance in step with the other, mimicking each other's moves. Showing synchronicity. A common goal, a desire for the same thing. The eyes, then the pause, then the smile, then the looking away again. Circling steps around each other.

I had noticed her looking at me at the bank. I smiled at her when I was in line, too. Just being polite when we made eye contact.

I went to deposit some cash I had just come across.

I finally sold something I'd been trying to get rid of, and I had some spare cash. So I decided to treat myself after depositing most of it.

Inside every grown man is that awkward, geeky 12 -year-old boy, no matter how you change and grow and mature, that 12 year-old is there, tripping over his lines and his shoelaces. I never even learned the woman's name.

I ended up buying an Ice cream cone and calling my wife. She chided me on not keeping the conversation simple, and not keeping the game going. My wife recommends I go out for coffee around the same time tomorrow to see if she's local.

I love her so much. Who else could laugh at that? As she's fond of saying, "Nothing fuels desire like being desired."

A brief history of blowing up Smurfs

2005-11-10T21:58:00.000-08:00

Here is the ad about the smurfs for UNICEF that caused a storm a few weeks ago.

This one's a bit close to me for a few reasons. I'm a dad, but also, I used to plan bombing missions for the Air Force. My official job title was Target Intelligence Specialist.

You see the ads showing the cool high-tech steel grey planes and the blue skies, but I used to do Bomb Damage Assessment to see if the missions' were accomplished.

I had an interesting time during the first Gulf War. I was assigned to a tactical reconnaissance unit. These are fighter jets that have cameras in the nose and they take pictures instead of dropping bombs, or shooting other planes out of the sky or taking stuff from one place to another. Those are basically the things the Air Force does. That and marry the locals, make friends in foreign countries and have free air shows by flying these cool looking planes around.

Some of those planes are classic examples of that one rule of evolution; current use does not equal original intent. The B-52 for example, was developed in the 50's to fly slim Whitman, James Earl Jones, and the rest of the crew on a one-way high altitude trip to the Soviet Union and the end of the world thanks to the foreign policy of Mutual Assured Destruction, We didn't launch on Them, because They would retaliate and blow the whole planet up, and They knew We were willing to do the same if They launched against Us. Dangerous game, but with all the failsafes developed for the missiles, bombers and subs, they started coming up with other reasons to use some of the expensive gear we taxpayers paid for.

Viet Nam became the excuse for dropping bombs on people, so they would fly B-52s from some little island like Guam or even North Dakota, and be home for dinner.

When the powers that be got tired of killing our grunts, we still had these expensive planes, and the nuclear commitment was still helping us out-spend the Soviets.

Over time though, air defenses got better and better, so the B-52; a plane that was developed for flying high altitude missions, had to come up with new tactics for survivability. Pilots learned to fly these buses at about 200 feet off the ground with improved radar, and Infrared sensors. so that they could slip in under enemy radar, and avoid all the missile defenses.

During that time, policy changed and the thought of Low Intensity Conflict, or as they call it today Asymmetrical Warfare, where the End of the World wasn't the objective, just blow up a few Bad Guys until CNN got tired of covering the war.

These happen in places that aren't Europe. Where the client countries can't afford expensive things like the latest radar-guided missile systems. They bought Anti Aircraft Artillery (AAA), because you can jam electronics, but bullets are dumb, and are obey only the laws of physics. And they can be repurposed to shooting things on the ground too.

That's what happened in Iraq. Pilots of any plane that dropped ordnance and that was invited to the party had to re-learn their jobs. Instead of fast and low, the had to fly fast and high. For fighter planes like the F-16, dive bombing became popular again instead of tactics like a maneuver that would loft the bomb toward the target like a slow pitch softball.

B-52's would drop their "stick" of bombs from six miles high, and about six miles away, blowing up a rectangle about one mile by about a mile and a half. You never heard anything until the first bombs hit.

No shrieks.

No whines.

Nothing. The smoke and flames were also minimal.

The earth would shake and everything went to hell.

I don't regret what I did. Never will. The batter I and my peers did our job, the fewer people had to actually die. We blow up headquarters or a communications center, we could cripple thousands of troops without having to kill them.

Niccolo Macchiaveli once remarked that war was an extension of politics, and I couldn't agree more. We dominated Iraq both times, and yet we're losing more than we could have ever hoped because the political effort was nowhere nearly as effective nor as well-planned as the military part.

Pet Peeve

2005-11-09T22:23:00.000-08:00

I love a well-done advertisement. They should entertain, inform, and persuade.

There's a site, Trunk Monkey for an auto insurance company, where you push a button and a chimp comes out of the trunk and does some pretty handy things.

I also loved the Superbowl ads for an employment agency that used the lone guy working at Yeknom Inc., an office full of Chimps. Hilarious. Well written.

Just one thing: Chimpanzees are Apes, not Monkeys. A great wikipedia article is here gives all the basics, and any search the word chimp, and Goodall will give you all manner of cool information. Our very own Oakland Zoo has a page devoted to them here.

The best summary of the way to tell the two apart are found here at a site refuting some Creationist garbage. And all Creationist stuff is garbage, by the way.

" Apes are more similar to humans than monkeys are in many anatomical features of the skull, skeleton and dentition (teeth). The most obvious difference between apes and monkeys is that apes lack a tail."

Pretty much sums it up. We're primates, and along with us, there's two other main groups, apes, and monkeys. There's only a handful of apes; chimpanzees, bonobos, gorillas, orangutans, and gibbons. Gibbons are the loudest, singing to mark their territory. I used to take my favorite two primates, the dirklings to watch the two at the Seattle zoo. the male was missing his arm from the elbow down, and he and his mate would swing and howl all day. Always wanted to sample them and do something with it.

Some other interesting facts about chimps I''ve picked up over the years.

The Genus Pan is our closes living relative, sharing over 97% of our DNA. They are omnivorous, eating both plants and animals, have a complex social hierarchy and have an astounding %50 success rate when hunting monkeys. Compared with so-called "super predators" like canines and felines which usually have a one in six chance or one in twelve chance of success. These are animals that have evolved specifically to chase, catch, kill and eat other animals, yet Chimps are more successful. The two troops observed doing this do so using differing methods. One troop cooperates, and shares in the kill according to status; the other competes for the kill and the spoils are divided by who makes the kill to cement alliances and vie fore status. Both groups are equally effective.

Bonobos, the other species is known for being matriarchal, more egalitarian, vegetarian, and sexually promiscuous. It's been rumored they play hackey sack and like tie dyed clothing.

Draw your own conclusions.

In the original series of Batlestar Galactica, the kid had a cool robot called a daggit, the pet's name was "Muffit"

Here's a picture:

Who wouldn't want on of those? When I found out it was a chimp in the suit, I wanted one even more.

When my wife and I are out and about, we'll occasionally see some cute kid, and she'll say, "I want one of those. Only I don't want the to get much bigger, where can we get one." We live next to The City, which has more dogs than children in it, so it's becoming more and more of a rarity to see them in the streets.

I would love to see some biotech company making a new kind of pet, one that kind of looks like a kid, but is really a marmoset or a macaque or something like that. Has to have hands with opposable thumbs, to get beer and stuff. Bigger than a mogwai, like in gremlins, but smaller than about a meter. I don't see why it couldn't be done. Look at what we did to something like wolves, give us a few hundred years, and we make all sorts of shake and bark dogs like Chihuahuas and Yorkshire terriers. They were done with no knowledge of genes, and no computers.Imagine what could be done with a little imagination, some Venture Capital, and sojme very influential Harajuku teens to influence demand. With the aging Baby Boomers, there's a market for companion and assistance pets.

Just a thought

Grandiosity is undervalued

2005-11-08T20:56:00.000-08:00

The comedian Chris Rock had a routine that went ""Do you know what the good side of crack is? If you're up at the right hour, you can get a VCR for $1.50. You can furnish your whole house for $10.95."

That's the way I feel about the whole bipolar mess. I know my particular flavor of Bipolar/ADD/ whatever they decide it is this week is very mild. Especially compared to some people, like the guy who wrote "Electroboy" (I'm not linking to something I haven't read) which, when I'm bummed out, highlights the fact that I can't even be bipolar right. I don't get crazy manic where I don't sleep for days on end. I don't get crippled when I get The Blues. I don't want to do anything, and Grey is a more appropriate color for the way things feel, but that's another story for another time. Even my Grand Visions aren't all that grand. I get bogged down in trying to make them work, so I realize when my fantasy machinations come most of them are going to pass soon, so it's nice to daydream.

In all fairness, I'm nowhere near as Fair and Balanced as I portray myself, just ask anyone who knows me.

In this cased though, I can see why Advertising is the right field for me. Were I to follow my other passion, Industrial Design, I'd have to make things that really could possible work in Real Life, or at least look like they could. I'm horrible at rendering and illustration. Horrible. But in Advertising, I can think as big as I want, and roll with it, and then run those crazy ideas through the hecatomb of the pitching process to my teachers.

It kinda sucks when they say go for it, but it's a good kind of Suck. More like a Challenge.

I have a student assignment, for creating a campaign piece for Doctors Without Borders, a very worthy organization if ever there was one. I saw a rather offbeat way to cut through the traditional images of starving babies and haggard doctors, and all that greyness. I ranted for a bit, talked to a friend who's in the business, he loved it, then I ranted on the keyboard, emailed it to my class to get some feedback.

My teacher loved it. He added the caveat that it has to be relevant, and respectful, not just some Art Director's Wet Dream.

I'm a copywriter. So of course it'll be relevant. It might not be pretty, but it'll work. As the week has progressed, my grandiosity has turned a simple print campaign into a full-blown marketing blitz, complete with a proposal for internet, and guerilla pieces and promotional tie-ins with potential partnerships form the commercial world. Like the old Adobe slogan, "If you can dream it, you can do it"

When I get more along with the Idea, I'll post an addendum to this, and a link so you my Beloved Reader can check it out and let me know what you think.

deal?

Staring into the Void

2005-11-07T09:58:00.000-08:00

Yesterday something historical happened. We had cable installed. My lovely wife broke down because Mr. McGruder's creation, The Boondocks, was coming to Cartoon Network and we just had to see it. The official reasoning is that, as an Advert student, I need to keep current with the popular culture, and a great deal of my classes ask for critiques of commercials being produced.

I could just do what I've been doing, and going to Advertising Age(http://www.adage.com/) and a few other sites and just watching htem there, but the school's logon is used by every advertising student past and present, so that logging in is difficult most times.

Of course, the contractor that came by from the cable company didn't connect us properly, so we didn't get to watch The Boondocks, but we had cable.

And that was more than enough.

We watched approximately 3- 4 hours of the stuff. All animation, all comedy. Started off with King of the Hill, then The Simpsons, then The Family Guy, finally a show from the creators of Family Guy, American Dad.

Not watching too many episodes of Family Guy, I was in awe of the pacing, and pure viciousness of some of the jokes. IT started off with the baby, Stewie taking out Osama Bin Laden in a cave in Afghanistan. Which we know would never happen, Osama's in Vegas. Cheeky bastards.

American Dad required no foreknowledge of the characters, but had a great premise. The main character worked for the CIA, and his wacky family, complete with talking goldfish and Grey Alien who sounds like Paul Lynde. I had to write down a couple of his comments.

- My "Tanqueraydar" tells me there's gin nearby.
The alien said this when they were transferred to Saudi Arabia, and he found out there was no alcohol in the country.

Great stuff.

I'm not sure who said it, it might have been Ernie Kovacs, but "TV is a medium, because it is neither rare, nor well-done."

I know the rest of the week won't be this entertaining.

In Vino Veritas

2005-11-06T09:59:00.000-08:00

Even good wine will get you drunk. I was reminded of this fact last night. A friend of mine was being honored for his contributions to the Renaissance community last night. This gentleman has a wonderful wine collection, and pulled out all the stops.

So did I. The wine flowed easily, and I was swept away with it. I enjoy the Ren scene sometimes. While every other guy was being William Wallace, or Rob Roy, I was Pepe' Le Pew, making all the ladies giggle and feel warm and wanted. Which is one of a man's job in life. I ate and drank and danced and Made Merry. And Jezebella, and Bebhain, and even Siona. But that's another story for another time.

It was when I was picking up this one lady when it happened. I let the other guys toss a caber, my sport is the Wench Press. I had her over my shoulder, and tried to lift, but,... I couldn't. I've never not been able to toss someone around. I know the physics involved and have done it enough times both friendly and in anger. So I tried again. No luck. When this lovely young Amazon told me how much she weighed, I understood, and then proceeded to grab my glasses, so we could go.

They were nowhere to be found. My wife insisted we go home, not like they would have turned up anyway. I have a spare pair, and they are nowhere to be found.

So, now I'm blind, unemployed, and have no real options to get any new ones any time soon.

I'm so over Faire.

Archetypes and Stereotypes

2005-11-02T21:55:00.000-08:00
deFINing

Just saw "Batman Begins" for the first time tonight.

I hate ninjas.

I hate that batman has to have that ninja background. He's more than just a gear-headed ninja badass. He's also the World's Greatest Detective. Says so on his business card.

At least they put his training in the Asian Mountains (Himalayas) it ties in nicely with his 30's heritage. Shangri La is the mystical asian hideaway the shadow went to learn his trade.

I really hate white guy ninja masters. It was okay when Lee Van Cleef did it, but that was a long time ago. If they had to have the Asian Ninja Mountain Fortress with the society of black jammied badasses, they could have used Ken Watanabe. He's an excellent actor in his own right he made "Last Samurai" enjoyable. (That and watching Tom Cruise get hit with a stick repeatedly was cool too.) Why go with a haoli like Neeson. The silly beard was understandable, the comic character was coined during the late sixties, early 70's Brave and the Bold era. But the name Ra's al Ghul is a mash up of Middle Eastern Arabic sounding name. If I remember he was a bit swarthy at that.

So, Mountain Fortress, okay. I'd have preferred Iran or somewhere like where the original Assassins came from. The followers of Hassan i Shabbah. Look it up, it's cool stuff.

I do love the gadgets. Total gear porn.

And the cape. Loved the cape.

I've always had a certain delight in movie props and the like. If I could draw better, I might have been an industrial designer. I' better at explaining my ideas with words and pictures.

I don't like most of the Batman titles. Mostly because as a property, they have numerous segments to market to, so there's the kids Batman, The teen angst-y batman and robin or "Nightwing", the Chick-Flick- meets- Kill- Bill Batgirl and Catwoman is okay from time to time. I've gotten a few for my daughter. Then there's the dark stuff, for the more adult tastes

This all happened because Frank Miller had some fun with reviving him a few years back. Miniseries was called "The Dark Knight Returns" where an aging Bruce Wayne comes out of retirement and into a dystopic world. That miniseries sparked all this interest in the Batman franchise and that interest is was what prompted Warner Brothers to make the Batman movie with Michael Keaton and Jack Nicholson. After that came the Animated Series.

Thank you Mr. Miller

The Way of Things

2005-10-20T21:45:00.000-07:00
Just got back from seeing the movie "Mirror Mask" in The City, and I was pleasantly surprised. Usually when you see a movie that's lauded for it's effects, you don't expect much in terms ofd acting or storytelling.

I know, Neil Gaiman wrote it, but I've never been a big fan of his work in the comics. I don't dislike it, it's just not my genre, so I didn't quite know what to expect.

Essentially it's a coming of age movie, and one girl's attempt to make sense of a life-changing event. Much like the movie Gremlins was about adolescence. You have these cute, cuddly creatures, that turn into these obnoxious beasties on you when you don't expect it. THis tale was better told, though I didn't like a few parts of the overall arc. I liked that she made her peace with her place in the Order of Things, because that's what maturing is all about; separation, then integration when you've defined yourself.

I liked several themes and a lot of the effects were consistent and not too gratuitous. When building a world, things need to fit into the rules of whatever ecosystem you set up, and that's a hard trick to pull; especially without having to explicitly tell the audience what those rules are. The Toy Story movies are a good example for that; they never said why the toys could only come alive when no none was around, or that they had to; they just did, and they did it consistently with the only exception being acknowledged as breaking the Rules.

I recommend seeing Mirror MAsk on the big screen, preferably in a theater that's not a big metroplex.

Sentience is overrated

2005-10-19T23:12:00.000-07:00
Just to dig it all and not to wonder that's fine.
-Van Morrison "Sweet Thing"

Today's adventure in capitalism reminded me of a recurring theme. I took a three hour commute to fill out papers that I could have just as easily have filled out online, watch a video that was utterly hackable without the benefit of beer, and pointless tests proving I can do what I say I can do. -- All of which could have been done online.

People if you're exploit tech types, exploit their potential as well!

There's a miniseries going on in the Marvel series with T'challa the King of Wakanda (thank you Mr. Kirby) defending his land from some enhanced super primates for the old Soviet Bad Guy days -- The Red Ghost. Jack & Stan invented this guy and his cronies to counter the Fantastic Four about an hour after they had the idea I guess, these guys just made so much stuff in The Day.

The big theme is how much the primates loathe us, One goes so far as to call us the "Perpendiculars" and he hates us for cursing him with his brain and then treating him so inhumanely.

Much beer was had tonight on this

Here we go again

2005-10-18T22:55:00.000-07:00
Tomorrow, I have an interview at a new agency for a gig at a place where I've worked before. This is a different agency, one based out of San Mateo, and even though they have offices in Oakland, and San Francisco, and the contract itself is in Hayward, I have to go to San Mateo tomorrow.

I’m a white collar sharecropper; I go where the work is depending on which agency has work and depending on the time of year.

A lot of phone centers are gearing up for the upcoming Christmas season, the online companies are the ones around here who have to do the most amount of bulking up. Customers are getting smarter, but there's always going to be problems, so that's where there's work.

In the Spring, a couple of colleges downtown will be getting ready for their Fall admissions run, and they're going to need clerical types.

Summer’s usually when I take off, and stay home with the kids. I was offered a permanent job this last season with a really good company, but things didn’t work out. Ran into a bit of trouble with my supervisor. She ran things by the Pest Control theory of management; for everything you notice, there’s a couple dozen things you haven’t, so if she heard anything even remotely out of the ordinary, it was obviously a trend and obviously had to be fixed right away. Reminds me of when I was a sergeant; I’m getting tired of being some new mid-level manager’s training aid. It's been only a week and a half and I miss working there. There's a lot to be said about a company that takes care of their people the way they did. If I could only have done something different, but I'm not sure what, I’m more confused than bitter about the whole thing. My coworker, who's also a good friend, is at a loss too; usually there's something you can pin down when things go wrong, and in retrospect, you can see where and when the end started, but this isn’t the case here, and that’s quite disturbing.

Only a few weeks into this term at school, and things are going okay. I have another year left before I graduate and so I have to start studying the advertising industry a little more thoroughly now. I noticed when I registered that there’s a Comic Illustration course offered. There might be an opportunity to write a few treatments for some students there.

That and I still draw robots, and design art cars and vehicles when I’m trying to think of new things for my advertising assignments.

Oh well, the gig's not in the bag, so wish me luck.

Hammers & Baseball bats

2005-10-17T20:40:00.000-07:00

I've heard that comparison of Savate to Muay Thai.

Muay Thai is pretty popular these days here on the west coast, it was up in Seattle, and it really is here in the Bay Area. You can see its practitioners in various mixed martial arts (MMA) competitions. as well as in several action movies that came out in the las couple of decades.

Savate is quite different. It's hey day was before the War to End All Wars. It's French, and several people have picked it up, and incorporated it into their own systems. Bruce Lee's system Jeet Kune Do(JKD) uses several techniques that Mr. Lee adopted early on, and several academies on both coasts still teach.

There's a decent definition at the Wikipedia site here for Savate and for Muay Thai. Ironically, the article on the Thai style includes a list of video game characters who use it. The only ficitonal character mentioned regarding Savate is Batroc, a character in the Marvel Comics who, though created by Jack Kirby, gets treated more like a bumpkin than anything. I'll write more about that some other time.

The best sites I've come across for Savate is one in Australia here and a JKD site based out of New Jersey, the Basulto Academy of Defense has a really good overview as well as several articles I recommend reading on the subject. Especially this one that relates Mr. Basulto's experiences with training in France, as well as the difference in the style versus asian approaches. There's a really good online glossary of savate terms here.

As an American and growing up in the 70's during the Bruce Lee, David Carradine, Chuck Norris times, everything that's worth knowing about Martial Arts came out of Asia. I first studied jiu jitsu as a kid, it mostlycomprised of joint locks, take downs and the like, not all ground work like the Brazilian flavor the Gracie Family made so popular these days. I studied some kung fu, and tai chi. When I was a bouncer, or worked security, I relied more on my tai chi training than anything else, mostly due to liability concerns.

It wasn't until I moved back to the Bay Area at the turn of this century that I really discovered my western martial heritage. I used to try to find some Salles when I lived on the Franco-German border, but pretty much gave up on the whole scene when I got out of the Air Force.

Savate is one of those topics that keeps turning up in my life. In Los Angeles and Orange County, there's a whole group of schools, but I know of only one person who runs the Amsterdam Gym, Ercivan in the whole Bay Area that teaches, but he only holds private lessons, because his gym hosts Muay Thai and regular boxing. It appears there's just not enough interest around here to support a regular class.

Not yet anyway.

She's gone down

2005-10-16T21:55:00.000-07:00

To Antarctica, the 7th Continent. Holly, a friend I met at Burning Man this last year was with a neighboring camp. She's cool as hell, and had a great corporate gig in Colorado, and decided to challenge herself and take a job in one of the world's harshest environments.

It's the Summer months down there, and so she's adapting at the right time. I hope she writes in her blog often.

We hold these truths to be self-evident

2005-07-04T13:39:00.000-07:00
Happy 4th

The Declaration of Independence: A Transcription

IN CONGRESS, July 4, 1776.

The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America,

When in the Course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, --That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.--Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.
He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.
He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.
He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.
He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.
He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected; whereby the Legislative powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.
He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.
He has obstructed the Administration of Justice, by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary powers.
He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone, for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.
He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harrass our people, and eat out their substance.
He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.
He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power.
He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:
For Quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:
For protecting them, by a mock Trial, from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:
For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:
For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:
For depriving us in many cases, of the benefits of Trial by Jury:
For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences
For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies:
For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws, and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:
For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.
He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.
He has plundered our seas, ravaged our Coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.
He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.
He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.
He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages, whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our Brittish brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which, would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these United Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States; that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

The 56 signatures on the Declaration appear in the positions indicated:

Column 1
Georgia:
Button Gwinnett
Lyman Hall
George Walton

Column 2
North Carolina:
William Hooper
Joseph Hewes
John Penn
South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge
Thomas Heyward, Jr.
Thomas Lynch, Jr.
Arthur Middleton

Column 3
Massachusetts:
John Hancock
Maryland:
Samuel Chase
William Paca
Thomas Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
Virginia:
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Thomas Jefferson
Benjamin Harrison
Thomas Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter Braxton

Column 4
Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris
Benjamin Rush
Benjamin Franklin
John Morton
George Clymer
James Smith
George Taylor
James Wilson
George Ross
Delaware:
Caesar Rodney
George Read
Thomas McKean

Column 5
New York:
William Floyd
Philip Livingston
Francis Lewis
Lewis Morris
New Jersey:
Richard Stockton
John Witherspoon
Francis Hopkinson
John Hart
Abraham Clark
Column 6
New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett
William Whipple
Massachusetts:
Samuel Adams
John Adams
Robert Treat Paine
Elbridge Gerry
Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins
William Ellery
Connecticut:
Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
William Williams
Oliver Wolcott
New Hampshire:
Matthew Thornton

Happy Family Death March

2005-07-01T20:54:00.000-07:00
Looking back, it was a good day. I had gotten the wife to the train station in enough time to buy her a real cup of coffee, not that brown water they have on Amtrak.

I had a full schedule today, even though I had it off work. Got home, let the dirklings sleep in a bit, and then got them ready & out the door to go to Berkeley to take care of a ticket. Stopped by the Donut shop and got them both a croissant with meat & cheese, so they’d have the calories they’d need for today.

Got to Berkeley, courthouse closed on Fridays. Well, it’s a bit grey, but nice enough, we turn the breakfast into an ersatz picnic, all the while singing the new breakfast jingle;

I need a full bel-ly in the morning,
‘cause my meds knock me on my
AS Soon as I get up I gotta take ‘em, so,
I need a full belly in the morning,

(Played ad infinitum)

I have a feeling we’re going to add verses as the summer goes on.

Wardrobe malfunction ended the picnic, and we hurried back to the car to get home & wash up. After recovering from that trauma, I decided on a field trip. I called the wife, and told her my plan. I drove the dirklings to the Amtrak’s Jack London Square station, and the kids & I walked home, after hanging out in Chinatown for a bit.

The Oakland Chinatown is superior to San Francisco’s; it’s on level ground, it’s more open, and it’s livable, not a touristy trap. WE discovered that tapioca drinks are good, especially the watermelon one. The Girl Cub doesn’t like to eat the pearls, but they make lovely projectiles with the coolest ‘bloop’ing sound. We got pretty accurate, and followed the basic Gun Range Safety rules: always check what’s past your target, and never aim at people. We were the bane of trees and trashcans. The gutters fear our approach.

The next additions to our arsenal were $0.99 katanas. Boy child got the black sheathed one, Girl Cub got the white. At the playground with the Chinese Junk replica, they dueled above and below decks. He was far more brazen, she tried to use moves from her aikido, but her use of bokken is more of a passive attack to practice counters against.

She’s got a mean full-nelson. Unbreakable. I taught the Boy a counter, but she held and countered it. I showed her to wrap her legs to get a submission, but the height difference is too great. I need to show them safer grappling moves, someone could get hurt.

As we walked along Lake Merritt, they scrapped, and sparred, and ambushed and chased Geese. I bought a galloon of drinking water, and it helped douse them when tempers got too hot. I had forgotten how enriching their giggles are.

At the playground, we were bum-rushed by geese when feeding them scraps of the sticky buns we bought in bulk. Mr. Romero got his Zombie cues from these geese.

The evening ended playing a ninja version of Blind man’s bluff in the Gazebo on the northern end of the Lake. Rules were simple: I take a point away when I tag them; they get a point when they tag me. Since the gazebo was penned in, the playing field was safe & contained.

Home. Food. Shake(liquefied cantaloupe) Showers. Chapters 4 – 6 of E.R. Burroughs’ ‘A Princess of Mars’ read with the good parts acted out.

Lights out. Ye gods I need a beer. Macro brew.

I’ve stated before that I don’t intend to make this a ‘Dear Diary’ blog, but what can you do?

happy Birthday

2005-06-29T07:09:00.000-07:00
A radio station here just remarked that today is San Francisco's birthday, they've been playing music along that theme "San Francisco Days " by Isaak and Jack Johnson's "Where'd All the Good People Go?."

One of my favorite quotes about The City is by Herb Caen, the famous columnist, who'd write 1,000 words columns every day for the SF Chronicle.

"San Francisco isn't what it used to be, and it never was."

This is the one place in the world that has it all; perfect weather for the most part, good industries, beautiful people, freaks and yuppies and gangstas and people who prefer to have their freak flag hanging over the couch in the living room.

What other city has a better Halloween or Pride weekend?

They say California is the land of fruits and nuts, and to a certain point agree. Let me ask this question though, which kind of salad would you prefer? Plain old iceberg lettuce or something with a few more ingredients. Fruit salad is a summertime treat, salad is just something to tide you over while they cook your meal at the restaurant. a tossed salad is more than just greens; it's apples and walnuts, and some cheese shredded, and a few slices of red onion, and some vinaigrette. Toss the ingredients in a bowl, put it on a plate, and some steak on top. you have yourself a feast before you.

Some of the technological leaps we've encountered came from right here in the Bay area and a few miles down the peninsula. World is running out of oil, odds are, a solution will be found. And it will most likely be discovered here

Stop me

2005-06-28T23:06:00.000-07:00
If I've ranted this before. I wrote it the other day & I don't see it up here.

I don't mind too terribly much that Mr. Bush rigged not one, but two elections. That shows his capability to achieve. I don't care that he's a greedy crook, who rewards his cronies even when they do wrong. It happens all the time. I can live with the secrecy, the manipulation of facts and distortion of research to fit his political agenda. It happens in an totalitarian regime. I can even excuse his sending troops into an action that is intractable. Leaders do that all the time, and a soldier's lot in life is to suffer.

What bothers me is that he's a crook and a liar, and all of the above, but he doesn't work for the common good and the well-being of the American People.

And that is inexcusable.

You have let us down Mr. President. And I hope History will remember you as the ineffective inept intolerable dolt you are. I wish nothing but malice upon you and those who've aided and abetted you in the dismantling of our system of Checks and Balances.

If I had any avenue to redress my antipathy I would.

As it stands, I'm in a progressive enclave of like-minded people, and my representatives in the House and Senate are already aligned with my political leanings.

I only wish I could rally people elsewhere. Especially in Tennessee, Ohio, Pennslyvania and a few others.

If you live in any of these states, please, for the sake of all of us, vote your incumbents out. They do you more harm than all the married gays and satanic lyrics ever could.

While your at it, dash off a letter or two telling them what you think. Put them on notice that you won't tolerate any more of their intolerance. We need to remind these wonks that They work for YOU.

Never let the truth get in the way of a good story.

2005-06-27T21:03:00.000-07:00

The dirklings have mastered this maxim recently. Being ten and eight, they are wont to still play pretend, and their chief sources of inspiration are the comics I buy them and of course cartoons.

I’ve bought several in anticipation of the seasonal migration. One, was a preview issue of Wildsiderz, something about a team of teens with hard light holograph exoskeletons

So, of course now they’re driving me nuts with their unrelenting pretend play, picking out which colors and what animals and how they use their powers.

I know, I brought it on myself. It could be worse, they could be ‘shrooms – sitting around inside playing video games with no imagination at all, or worse yet, jocks that are stat junkies, going on ad nauseum about Barry Bonds’ record, or how the Sonics are doing.

Or whatever it is normal kids are into.

They’ve also recently mastered the art of the half-truth. Telling just enough of an event to make it sound so much more dramatic, casting themselves as the tragic victims.

They’ll make good republicans.

Here's to you & her's to me, in hopes we never disagree.

2005-06-25T21:35:00.000-07:00
It's Saturday night before Pride parade & I'm at home with the dirklings watching old episodes of The Avengers with the inimitable Mr. Steed and Mrs. Emma Peel.

I've got them doing shots. Of Odwalla protein shake. The Boy Child is dangerously underweight because he's such a picky eater. I'm not sure where I got the idea, but it's a skill that will serve him well in a decade. Next up, Godzilla versus Gigan.

fun fun fun.

Pride

2005-06-24T22:29:00.000-07:00
This weekend is one of hte biggest parties in the Bay Area; the Gay Pride Parade is Sunday. A local columnist, Jon Carroll enthused about how things are progressing in today's column.

I have to say I agree with his sentiments. As I 've stated earlier, love is hard enough to find in this life, why place an aritrary restriction on it like gender choice?

The Greeks had several words for the different kinds of love

There was agape; or pure love aka brotherly love. This was what they claimed Jesus had for the world and its sinners. Too bad His followers hadn't chosen to follow His teachings.

There is Eros. This one gets the most attention. In Christian terms, it could be referred to as lust.

There's filial love, or love of family.

There's also a love for country, of duty and honor. I forget what that one's called.

I've tried to explain the concepts to my kids, and I think they get it.

Several years ago, I marched in the Pride parade as one of the naughty students from Vulva University. My then-girlfriend and I heard about it from some friends and it sounded like a good way to participate. There is definitely something joyful walking down the middle of Market street with a float carrying a Giant mockup of a Vulva nad the DJ spinning classic disco hits like "Lady Marmalade" and throngs of people cheering at you.

The only time things weirded me out was before the parade started. The Cheerleaders were rehearsing, and the BDSM scene was getting arranged, when a dad and his little girl came through to wish someone well. She was all smiles and waved to a man who was dressed as a Pony and harnessed to a small carriage to pull his Mistress. The ponyboy waved back and all was sweetness and light.

Would that the world could be so easy.

I know some of the influences on my predilections. Mrs. Emma Peel, and Big Barda, were the coolest when I was little; Speed Racer's Trixie was a hysterical wuss. Later Grace Jones, Stevie Nicks and no list of beauties would be complete without Chaka Khan.

Coming out to my family was one of the hardest things I could do. It was after my second divorce, and I was living with a man who helped me get my life together, just by sharing his place, and generally being him. It was living with him that I came to understand, that it's ok to be different, and not have to apologize, or feel guilt, or shame. I don’t need your sympathy or any special treatment. I am who I am, and I don't have to explain myself to anybody.

I'm bipolar. With a side of ADD.

My emotional cycle is too long to be classic bipolar disorder, and my distractibility isn't as severe as the "typical" person with it. I get the blues, get on a roll when ideas just flow, and instead of a manic euphoria, I get irritable and frustrated.

This is the time of year I feel pride. In my chose lifestyle and those of my friends, no matter what that lifestyle happens to be. It's also the time of year I think of a roommate I had years ago, and wonder how he's doing. Unlike some people, I don't stalk my past. I tend to let it slip away. The good and the bad.

Thank you Raif. You and Malcolm save my life back in Seattle. I just hope all is well in your world and I hope you have a fine Pride weekend wherever you are.

Article

2005-06-23T23:02:00.000-07:00

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

Pretty simple-enough sounding. We the People have the right to speak our minds, to dissent, to praise, to say anything we feel. We the People have under this Amendment, the first one listed to our Constitution, the right to meet others in peaceable assembly for any reason. We also should have a free press, who has the right to know and research, and to report to We the People what hey find. Under this Amendment We the People have no State-Sanctioned religion.

Originally, this was intended to help protect the churches from the Government. Bluff King Hal made himself the Head of the Church of England, seized its assets, broke with Rome, and annulled his marriage so he could marry Anne Boleyn. Henry VIII was looking for a son, and instead, he got one of the greatest monarchs to ever rule England.

But that's not important right now.

What is important is that churches and places of worship are for the governing of men's souls, not their worldly affairs. As we are seeing, that is not the case any longer.

This article in the Times describes how.

An Air Force panel sent to investigate the religious climate at the Air Force Academy in Colorado Springs found evidence that officers and faculty members periodically used their positions to promote their Christian beliefs and failed to accommodate the religious needs of non-Christian cadets, its leader said Wednesday.

And as usual, when a body investigates itself

But the panel said it had found no "overt religious discrimination" - only "insensitivity" - and praised the academy leadership for working aggressively to confront religious problems in the last two years.

That's like saying the Japanese were "insensitive" to its POWs during World War Two. But I digress.

Most authentic religious people I can tolerate, even respect. To have faith is a difficult thing, and can be a source of great comfort. I despised the trainees who got religious during Basic Training or deployments. I know I wasn't the only Atheist. Just the most vocal. My dog tags even said so. "godless" was what I requested. I got "Atheist". Close enough.

I had a fighter jock try to mathematically prove it was in an airman's bet interest to believe in god. Called it a "Zero - Sum" equation, and proceeded to draw a grid with a plus in one corner, and 0s in the remaining three.
Like this:

+|0
----
0|0

He then labeled the quadrants

God No God

+ | 0 God
--------
0 | 0 No God

He then explained the diagram:

If you believe in God, and there is a God, then that's a "+", 'cause you're going to go to heaven

If you don't believe in God, and there is a God, that's a "0",'cause you're not going to go to heaven

If you believe in God, and there is no God, then that's a "0", 'cause you're not going to go to heaven

If you don't believe in God, and there is no God, that's a "0",'cause you're not going to go to heaven

I was too hungover to deal with this, I had to chime in.

"You forgot one axis of the equation."

The Captain asked me to explain.

"If you believe in the WRONG god, there's a potential "-" in the equation, because most of them are of the jealous variety."

He then tried to say that there was only one true god, and I then asked him (respectfully) to prove which one it was. With using more than just the bible.

" "

I went to get more coffee. And then on to work.

The point is, we mere mortals will never know one way or the other. Faith is hard to have when times are good. Easy when times are hard and we feel powerless. That more than anything is why the Conservatives and Religious nuts are so embattled. They thrive on persecution.

And the Liberals on college campuses ply right into that game. Stop attacking. Listen, and then calmly and peacefully counter the argument. Always focus on your point, but acknowledge the opponent, but stay focused on winning. And quit doing protest marches. They are ineffective on most occasions. Get in on the local politics, and make no noise until you know you have a majority. Then crush them without a moment’s hesitation. It's worked for them.

When and how did a religion based upon a man of peace sacrificing himself so his followers could be saved from eternal damnation ever turn into an aggressive blend of Amway and Starbucks in its approach to gaining members?

And why are we letting them get away with what they're doing?

Migration

2005-06-21T20:57:00.000-07:00
Tomorrow night, the dirklings fly down from their mother's home. In addition to the usual scramble, we're adjusting things for daytime care for them. In the past, I stayed home and we maintained the house, er, mostly.

This time I have a permanent employer, not just a temp gig that I can walk away from, and tell the agency I need the summer off. I'm working during daylight hours, so I need to have them spend a big chunk of the day in someone else's care.

oboy.

This is also the first year there hasn't been major drama involved in getting them. almost like clockwork, or a menstrual cyacle, their mother would freak out and worry about them coming down. Like I don't know what I'm doing.This year is different. She seemed almost eager for them to come down. I know she's taking some coursework, so that might be it.

Oddly, I'm ambivalent about the whole thing. They and my wife are my whole reason for being. When the blues come upon me, it's the fact that I'm needed that keeps me going, gets me out of bed, and prevents me from giving up. "Blues" is a but of a misnomer - it's more of a dark slate grey. Like Ohio skies in Late winter, no snow, but no sun. Colors aren't as bright, food is less satisfying. Most things are joyless.

I'm very tired. I have been for a few days. I'm not depressed. Not yet, anyway.

I've stopped calling them. They always seem to be watching television, or in the middle of doing something more demanding of their attention. I've told them time and again that they can call me whenever the mood takes them. When I first moved away, I called almost daily. Time went on, the frequency tapered. I've lived in the Bay area for five and a half years now.

I don't know.

Poor, Poor, Fatima

2005-06-19T22:03:00.000-07:00
Cursed with a beautiful mother, she has her father's looks.

Friendly Hostility, a webcomic my wife reads regularly, is about a family of Indians who have an interesting dynamic.

The boy in the car is her brother, Fox.

The artist originally had a strip called "Boy Meets Boy" that was in a similar vein, only focusing more on Fox and his boyfriend/roomate

oy.

I prefer comics the old-fashioned way. On paper.

Who, pray who, will help the children?

2005-06-18T09:31:00.000-07:00
I tried like hell to post this last night, but couldn't uplod to blogger. -- d

They say Democracy is a full contact event. Over the past five years, we Americans and the world have been numbed by historical events. We've endured a great loss; the loss of our perceived invulnerability, and our security. When afraid, humans are at their most bestial.

With us in the grip of this great Fear, our leaders have manipulated events, facts, and anything else necessary to attain their ends. The Downing Street memo is hardly spoken of here in the US, yet it doesn't allege anything, it out and out states that the Bush Administration was intent on invading Iraq long before they had "exhausted" any peaceful efforts.

In the Military, one must be prepared, for any number of contingencies. Having forces stationed in the Persian Gulf for a decade, of course there have been plans to invade Iraq, There have probably been plans for repulsing another invasion of Kuwait. Any number of things regarding a hostile nation need to be thought of and planned for. It's the way things are done. It's good to have a plan.

The difference between a contingency plan and manipulating data, facts public opinion, is like comparing practicing martial arts, and carrying a gun looking for trouble.

We have ample evidence that reports and scientific studies are being edited to fit policy are appalling. The Bush Administration isn't even bothering to try to cover it up. We The People have been led astray. We The People have been cowed, we're numb. We feel Helpless with a capital H. What can we do?

I'm glad you asked.

We vote.

We write letters, and email to our elected officials. We remind them that they work for We the People, no matter who gives them campaign donations, We The People cast the ballots.

The PBS fiasco got me started. Aside from public libraries, I can think of no greater service the government provides to our society. I did very little research to find the following links to places where you can make your voice heard.

Remember, in a civil society, we use civil language to be taken seriously. Writing a Representative or a Senator is different than a flame war.

But you knew that. Just thought I'd remind you.

MoveOn.Org, the group that tried to get Bush & Co out of office has an online petition you can sign to express your displeasure at the mauling of our Public Broadcasting Systems. These services include Air America, and the Voice of America, I think.

http://www.moveon.org/publicbroadcasting/

In addition to MoveOn.org Here are some other links of interest.

These are the official government sites:

The White House
http://www.whitehouse.gov/

The Senate
http://www.senate.gov/

The House of Representatives
http://www.house.gov/

In California our Senators our Barbara Boxer & Diane Feinstein. Barbara Lee, if you recall, was one of the few dissenting votes on invading Iraq . So far it's 1700 dead and counting.

Diane Feinstein's homepage
http://feinstein.senate.gov/

To contact her
http://feinstein.senate.gov/contact.html

Barbara Boxer's homepage
http://boxer.senate.gov/

To contact her
http://boxer.senate.gov/contact/index.cfm

To get the contact info on your Representative go here, and type in your ZIP code.
http://www.house.gov/writerep/

Finally, the Democratic Party - They're not much of alternative, but at least they are one.

http://www.democrats.org/

The #1 problem with the Dems and Liberals in general is how uppity the come across, and how intolerant of red-staters. You come across as pussies; and bitchy ones at that. We are Americans, we're rough around the edges.

It's not enough that we Californians do something. The rest of the country, if not the whole world knows how progressive we are here in the worlds fifth largest economy.

We need to get our friends and family in the rest of the country motivated. Your aunt in Michigan, that kid in Ohio you knew. Old Military friends, lost lovers you stalk from time to time, ANYBODY not in California needs to get involved as well. Even if it's the online petition at MoveOn.org

And if you know any one -- ANYONE -- who can vote in Tennessee, to get all their friends to vote against Bill Frist in the next election. It's 18 month away, but this man is particularly dangerous, he's got to go.

And if you live in Kansas, you have my sympathies. Your's is an uphill fight against the flat-earthers. If there's anything I could do to help, let me know.

I leave you with a quote from the venerable Dr. Hunter Stockton Thompson.

"All politics is local politics"

I need your help

2005-06-15T19:52:00.000-07:00

Got an email today that alarmed me. Can't say it's much of a surprise, but alarming nonetheless.

Sign the petition telling Congress to save NPR and PBS: http://www.moveon.org/publicbroadcasting/

A House panel has voted to eliminate all public funding for NPR and PBS, starting with "Sesame Street," "Reading Rainbow," and other commercial-free children's shows. If approved, this would be the most severe cut in the history of public broadcasting, threatening to pull the plug on Big Bird, Cookie Monster, and Oscar the Grouch..

The cuts would slash 25% of the federal funding this year—$100million—and end funding altogether within two years. The loss could kill beloved children's shows like "Clifford the Big Red Dog," "Arthur," and "Postcards from Buster." Rural stations and those serving low-income communities might not survive. Other stations would have to increase corporate sponsorships. Already, 300,000 people have signed the petition. Can you help us reach 400,000 signatures today?

Check out this link
http://www.moveon.org/publicbroadcasting/

And another link to look up- the Washington Post.
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=745--

I checked it with Snopes.com & this one's true.
http://www.snopes.com/politics/arts/nea.asp

Before there was cable, there was PBS. Without it, we probably wouldn't have phrases ingrained in our memory, like;

"No one expects the Spanish inquisition"
"As we go into the silent world aboard the Calypso"
"Hey Froggy Baby"
"Hello neighbor"
"This parrot's dead"
"Hey you guys!"
"Exterminate! Exterminate!"
"There are billions and billions of stars..."

PBS has provided a valuable service to society at large and to geeks in particular. Without whom, many of us would not have been introduced to Monty Python, Oscar the Grouch, Rowan Atkinson, Miranda Richardson, John Cleese, Benny Hill, Stephen Jay Gould, The Teletubbies, Bert & Ernie. I could go on, but you get the point.

Our childhood friends and our children's friends are under siege, something needs to be done.

Whatever your political beliefs, I ask you to participate in this call to action. Sign the petition; get more involved if you wish, just remember that this is the one station that is for we the people.

Their mission is to inform, entertain, and educate. But most importantly they do this non-commercially.

For the kid & geek in all of us.

Rub her feet

2005-06-14T20:32:00.000-07:00

Lazarus Long is the main character in the Roboert Heinlein book, "Time Enough For Love." More of a manifesto for polyamory than just about anything else, the book is about Lazarus, who was born in the early part of the 20th Century and had lived for thousands of years, thanks to a selective breeding project and some kind of cloning-like technology.

The book has several ministories, where he relates various experiences, but the thin that stands out are the maxims he lists. hte tile of today's entry being one of them.

Below are a few of my favorite.

"Secrecy is the beginning of tyranny."

"The greatest productive force is human selfishness."

"You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. Don't ever count on having both at once."

"Animals can be driven crazy by placing too many in too small a pen. Homo sapiens is the only animal that does this to himself"

"Little girls, like butterflies, need no excuse"

"Natural laws have no pity."

"It is impossible for a man to love his wife wholeheartedly without loving all women somewhat. I suppose that the converse must be true of women."

- Having falling in love on a BART thousands of times myself, I can vouch for this one.

"Never appeal to a man's "better nature". He may not have one. Invoking his self-interest gives you more leverage"

"Your enemy is never a villain in his own eyes. Keep this in mind; it may offer a way to make him your friend. If not, you can kill him without hate - and quickly."

And this one has been told to me by others in differing varieties -

"Never frighten a little man. He'll kill you."

Finally, I give you this nugget to gnaw on, for I believe in it wholeheartedly.

"If you are in a society that votes then do so. There may be no candidates and no measures to vote for ... but there are certain to be ones you want to vote against. In case of doubt, vote against. By this rule you will rarely go wrong.

If this is too blind for your taste, consult some well-meaning fool (there is always one around) and ask him his advice. Then vote the other way. This enables you to be a good citizen (if such a thing is your wish) without spending the enormous amount of time on it that truly intelligent exercise of franchise requires"

So, do your part, and vote the bastards out. Especially nutjobs like Frist, and his ilk.

Urban is just another word for

2005-06-13T23:11:00.000-07:00
Scary, huh? When words have a definition that is totally different from the euphemism that they’ve become, what happens to the original definition?

It’s another case of current use does not equal original intent. Urban means city from the latin word urb. Now it’s pretty much the nice way of saying "ghetto". Which in America means “black” which in white America means “scary”.

I live in Oakland. Not too long ago I lived right off Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd here is a satellite picture of the block I lived on. Just north of the “roarin’ twenties” in the “ghost town” neighborhood. I knew all my neighbors by sight, and most of them by name. The worst problem we had wasn’t the entrepreneurs who hung out on the corner by the lliquor store. It was the church next to us.

The clockers were just making a living of sorts, and didn’t bother anyone who wasn’t a customer. The Church, a little Baptist affair was alright in and of itself. But there was one thing wrong. They sublet their spaced to a small Pentecostal group who met there about four nights a week. They felt they could make up in volume what they lacked in membership. The nine members would turn the volume way up, and they would chant their halleluja’s usually untill 9 - 10 o’clock in the evenings. It’s struck me as odd that people who speak spanish speak in tongues differently than people who speak english and speak in tongues.

I’m not religious. I blame the need to have a higher power on our big toe. More on that later. I do believe, however, that as an American, you have the right to delude yourself with whatever spiritual crutch you feel you need. I call it the “Right to be Wrong” and as much as I criuticize the Christians especially and to a lesser extent the muslim communities, I respect their right to have those beliefs and will fight to the death for that right.

But

As my neighbor, you have the responsibility to get along with the rest of the community. The Pentecostals would have the occasional revival, going until 4-5 o’clock in the morning. Without warning and on no particular day. If it was Easter, or St. Swithin’s day or Walpurgisnacht, I could understand, and adjust my plans accordingly. If they would post some knid of announcement that this was going to happen, I could also adjust my plans and be out of town that weekend.

But no, they hadn’t the decency.

The last encounter I had with them, I called the Oakland police, to complain about the noise. Yes, I was serious, I’d tell them, after I’d say my address. By 4:30. I’d snapped. I told the dispatcher if they didn’t send a car over in the next five minutes, just send the county coroner’s, and to bring plenty of bags.

A patrol car was there by the time I left the house. My wife talked to the pastor, I talked to the police, and in an hour or so, nothing was accomplished. The five times I called my landlord that night got more done, because he was going to lose the tenants in all four of his units in that house because of that group. He called the Baptist pastor, the owner of the church building, and they talked to the Pentecostals, quieting them down for a little while. They’re still there, I moved on.

I’m still in Oakland, just farther away from a church. In most urban areas, you will see tons of little churches, seemingly on every corner, right next to the liquor stores.

There’s an evangelical megachurch in Colorado Springs, Colorado, by the Air Force Academy that is attracting people from all over. this article and this one from Harper’s sums them up as:

They are drawn as if by magnetic forces; they speak of Colorado Springs, home to the greatest concentration of fundamentalist Christian activist groups in American history, both as a last stand and as a kind of utopia in the making. They say it is new and unique and precious, embattled by enemies, and also that it is “traditional,” a blueprint for what everybody wants, and envied by enemies. The city itself is unspectacular, a grid of wide western avenues lined with squat, gray and beige box buildings, only a handful of them taller than a dozen stories. Local cynics point out that if you put Colorado Springs on a truck and carted it to Nebraska, it would make Omaha look lovely. But the architecture is not what draws Christians looking for clean living. The mountains help, but there are other mountain towns. What Colorado Springs offers, ultimately, is a story.

The story they found in Colorado is about newness: new houses, new roads, new stores. And about oldness, imagined: what is thought to be the traditional way of life, families as they were before the culture wars, after the World Wars, which is to say, during the brief, Cold War moment when America was a nation of single-breadwinner nuclear families.

Crime, of course, looms over this story. Not the actual facts of it—the burglary rate in and around Colorado Springs exceeds that in New York City and Los Angeles—but the idea of crime: a faith in the absence of it. And of politics, too: Colorado Springs’ evangelicals believe they live without it, in a carved-out space for civility and for like-minded dedication to common-sense principles. Even pollution plays a part: Christian conservatives there believe that they breathe cleaner air, live on ground untainted by the satanic fires of nineteenth-century industry—despite the smog that collects against the foothills of the Rockies and the cyanide, from a century of mining, that is leaching into the aquifers and mountain streams.

But those are facts, and Colorado Springs is a city of faith. A shining city at the foot of a hill. No one there believes it is perfect. And no one is so self-centered as to claim the perfection of Colorado Springs as his or her ambition. The shared vision is more modest, and more grandiose. It is a city of people who have fled the cities, people who have fought a spiritual war for the ground they are on, for an interior frontier on which they have built new temples to the Lord. From these temples they will retake their forsaken promised lands, remake them in the likeness of a dream. They call the dream “Christian,” but in its particulars it is “American.” Not literally but as in a story, one populated by cowboys and Indians, monsters and prayer warriors to slay them, and ladies to reward the warriors with chaste kisses. Colorado Springs is a city of moral fabulousness. It is a city of fables.

It’s a frightening feature. The church itself is huge, Wal MArt huge. Walt Disney coldn’t have imagined anything like this, but Heinlein did. In a series of his stories he describes the “American Ayatollahs”, religious nuts who run our country until a counter-revolution depsoses them.
this megachurch, called New Life Church, is close enough to the Air Force Academy that it has influence there, recently, a chaplain who reported the abuses the evangelical chaplains and cadets was reassigned. There’s articles from the Washington Post, CNN online, truthout.org and, for fairness, The bitches over at the Free Republic.

And yes, they are bitches, of the punk-assed variety.

The Harper’s piece describes further the demographic of these megachurches.

Part of their antipathy is literally biblical: the Hebrew Bible is the scripture of a provincial desert people, suspicious of the cosmopolitan powers that threatened to destroy them, and fundamentalists read the New Testament as a catalogue of urban ills—sophistication, cynicism, lust—so deadly that one would be better off putting out one’s own eye than partaking in their alleged pleasures. But the anti-urban sentiments of modern fundamentalists are also more specific to the moment in which they find themselves.

Three years ago, in the 2002 elections, Christian conservatives swept Georgia, the last Democratic bastion in the South. They toppled an incumbent Democratic governor, a war-hero Democratic senator, the state House speaker, the Democratic leader of the state Senate, and his son, the Democratic candidate for Congress in a majority black district that state Democrats had drawn up especially for him. The new Republican senator, Saxby Chambliss, and the new governor, Sonny Perdue, both conservatives and Christian, won not on “moral values” but on an exurban platform. The mastermind behind the coup was Ralph Reed, once of the Christian Coalition, who had been reborn as Georgia’s Republican chairman. Reed remains a fundamentalist, the same man who once tested employees’ commitment to “Christian values” by asking them if they supported the death penalty for adultery, but he was too canny to talk like that in public. The term “Christian,” he’d learned, is a “divider,” not a “unifier,” so he had left overt faith behind. He backed candidates who ran under the mantra of the exurbs: “Shorter commutes. More time with family. Lower mortgages.”

This troika of exurban ambition worked on multiple levels. Just as Nixon used marijuana and heroin in the 1960s as code for hippies and blacks, Reed devised a platform that conflated ordinary personal goals with fundamentalist values. “Shorter commutes” is a ploy that any old-time ward heeler would recognize. It means: let’s move the good jobs out of the city. Atlanta, like Colorado Springs, has an urban core that Christian conservatives would just as soon see wither. “More time with family,” of course, extends that promise of exurban jobs but also speaks in code to the fundamentalist preoccupation with “family”—that is, with defining it, with excluding not just gay couples but any combination not organized around “biblical” principles of “male headship.”

As for “lower mortgages,” they are lower in exurbs because cities subsidize them. The city pays the taxes that build the sewers and the roads for the exurbs. The city provides the organization that makes it possible. Exurbs are parasites. And what else does “lower mortgages” mean? More land. More space between you and your neighbors. And this, too, is necessary for Christian conservatism, which depends on the absence of conflict as one of its main selling points. For all its talk of community, it is wary of community’s main asset: the conflict, and the resulting cultural innovation, born of proximity. But such cultural innovation is death to today’s Christian conservatism, which tosses a gauzy veil of tradition over the big-box consumerism of its megachurches.

As contemporary fundamentalism has become an exurban movement, it has reframed the question of theodicy—if God is good, then why does He allow suffering?—as a matter of geography. Some places are simply more blessed than others. Cities equal more fallen souls equal more demons equal more temptation, which, of course, leads to more fallen souls. The threats that suffuse urban centers have forced Christian conservatives to flee—to Cobb County, Georgia, to Colorado Springs. Hounded by the sins they see as rampant in the cities (homosexuality, atheistic schoolteaching, ungodly imagery), they imagine themselves to be outcasts in their own land. They are the “persecuted church”—just as Jesus promised, and just as their cell-group leaders teach them.

This exurban exile is not an escape to easy living, to barbecue and lawn care. “We [Christians] have lost every major city in North America,” Pastor Ted writes in his 1995 book Primary Purpose, but he believes they can be reclaimed through prayer—“violent, confrontive prayer.”[4] He encourages believers to obtain maps of cities and to identify “power points” that “strengthen the demonic activities.” He suggests especially popular bars, as well as “cult-type” churches. “Sometimes,” he writes, “particular government buildings . . . are power points.” The exurban position is one of strategic retreat, where believers are to “plant” their churches as strategic outposts encircling the enemy.

Theirs is an embattled religion, always persecuted and with enemies everywhere. First it was Satanic subliminal messages in music, now it’s gays, and the urban nightmare.

If they want war, fine. Let them see a war. A cold war. Like the one America just won. We beat the Communist systems because of our system's checks and balances, our openness to newness and change. The Founding Fathers instituted these because they didn’t trust human nature and it’s proclivity towards tyranny.

Go to the Hinterlands and set up your homogenous grids and Mega everythings. I want my city, next to The City, and I want all the weirdoes, even the one’s that I don’t like, because htye are still part of the environment that fosters creativity, and chaos, and from those elements come opportunity. The Urban Village model needs to be explored further, and wacky things like sustainability and diversity and equal opportunity and quality secular education. The only way the Darkness of these Forces of Ignorance can be turned back is with the light of reason.

And turn down that damn amplifier.

You know how it goes.

2005-06-12T00:42:00.000-07:00
It’s midnight

Time is Fleeting.
Madness, takes it’s toll. But listen closely, (not for very much longer) I’ve got to keep control.

You know how it goes.

Just got back from seeing the Luc Besson movie “Unleashed”, strarring Jet Li, Bob Hoskins and Morgan Freeman.

Wow.

the acting was great. I’ve always admired Morgan Freeman and Bob Hoskins. I’ve loved Mr. Freeman since he was Easy Reader in the Electric Company on PBS. He is the only reason I didn’t start a riot at the screening of the Kevin Costner debacle that was Robin Hood.

Mr. Hoskins was in Several gritty dramas before “Who Framed Roger Rabbit.” I am still amazed he did that one. He's such a typical Brit actor, accomplished and beleivable. Actors who trained to act. Who knew?

I once had a multimedia project in school where I created a design document to make a presentation on the letters unearthed at Vindolanda on Hadrian’s Wall. The remakrable thing about these letters were the content. They were messages from Officer’s wives to one another, letters form home outlining care packages and the like. In this document, I wanted Mr. Hoskins & Mr. Gordon Sumner to narrate.

The story is thus; a man, Danny (Li) has been raised to be an attack dog by a local Glaswegian thug (Hoskins), after a Mcaguffin, Danny comes to live with a blind piano tuner and his step-daughter. There he becomes human. He encounters his old boss again, and of course he ends up confronting his former master, and learns of his past.

Standard stuff, really, but the themes are nicely handled; the scenes deftly shot & edited. Mr. Besson doesn’t revel too much in the violence to show what a beast Danny is; except to establish he’s a badass. Anyone familiar with Jet Li knows this, but still, it’s refreshing to have the story told, rather than rely on the actor’s reputation. to move it along.

There are several scenes that are superb. Where Hoskins and Li show, by turns, what animals we really are. Both good and bad. Hoskins talks to him in tones like one would a dog, first chiding, then conciliatory then stern. Li, in response adopt the shuffling gait, the downcast eyes, the beseeching eyebrows that dogs pull on you.

I believe domestication is a two-way street. humans are definitely a domesticate-able species. To quote the poet Perry Farell, “We’d make great pets.”
There are several traits an animal must have to be domesticated, if it’s missing just one, it can’t be domesticated. Take the llama and the vicuna for example, or the horse and zebra. In both instances, they are very similar cousins, genetically, but there’s one trait, that is the difference between the wild and the tamed. The llama doesn’t panic when penned, and the zebra will not accept a human as the alpha of the group.

The Book “Guns, germs and Steel” (ISBN 0-393-31755-2) describes this in depth. It’s a bit deterministic, but overall a good. book.

The premise reminded me of a recent development in DC Comics. It the Batman constellation of comics, the original Batgirl, Barbara Gordon, is crippled, and becomes ORacle, kind of major domo for an ersatz batcave the graduates from the Batman School of Crime-fighting. In a series several years ago, a young girl is raised to be a perfect fighter, where she never learned to speak, so her first language was combat. According to the comic, the language centers were used for her fighting skills, rather than speech.

But I usually don’t read Batman, or DC Comics. After all, a writer I don’t know says that there’s an editor who works there who discriminates against women writers.

Great movie. I highly recommend it.

Yep, another

2005-06-11T21:05:00.000-07:00
Saturday night and we’re going out to see a movie, Unleashed over at my favorite movie theater in the Bay Area, the Parkway Theater. It’s one of those places which has couches and you can drink beer and eat food there, just like theaters in Europe. Well, except for the couches part.

I like this place because it’s local owned and operated, they have a designated day for mothers with small children to go see a movie with their kids. I Seattle, there were several baby-friendly theaters that had special rooms where the sound wasn’t as loud and had some sound proof glass or something so the other patrons didn’t have to hear a baby if it got fussy. What a concept. It’s a perfect example of a market –driven solution to an age-old problem. Why more places don’t do this I don’t know, there’s always going to be mothers with small children who would like to go out without having to ditch their newborn.

Of course, in San Francisco, there are more dogs than kids. Sad but true.

A sort of Homecoming

2005-06-10T20:54:00.000-07:00
The wife is on her way home from Truckee, where she was in a one-day mini renaissance faire for the local middle school. Last night, she got to enjoy the fellowship of friends not seen and to teach kids. THe only things that would make it perfect would be if she were to fly a small plane, and maybe me there as well. In the past twenty four hours, I have enjoyed things that my wife doesn’t enjoy, so I forgo them.

I wished she would have stayed another night and gotten some rest, and some more fun with her friends. I would miss her, but I would rather her miss her than mourn her. The roads from the Bay to Truckee are twist and turn with on the sides of mountains, so there’s little room for error. Fortunately, she’s not driving alone, so it won’t be too bad.

In a couple weeks, the dirklings come down for the Summer. I miss them as well; it’s a dull ache, a sense of loss similar to the death in the family.
Watching X-Men again. I think one of it’s biggest appeal is seeing childhood friends in the real world. As a kid, I loved the Hulk, he was big and strong and child-like. Didn’t uunderstand why he was so mad at a world that hated him. Wolverine was cool to the young teenager, all rage and the struggle to contain it. John Byrne drew the X-Mane at the time, he helped steer Wolverine fromjust being a reckless hothead to being more of a Clint Eastwood kind of character, the Man With a Past and the Demons to show for it.

Over the years, Wolverine and the X-Men have faded in and out of my consciousness. The ebb and flow of my life making comics a kind of love/hate relationship. Nowadays, comics, or Sequential Art as some would have it, are finally being afforded some well-deserved respect. Now, I’ve introduced them to the kids, as a way to foster reading and more importantly, as friends of mine.

Hot time tonight.

2005-06-09T22:53:00.000-07:00

I got a job finally. It's at one of the most progressive companies I've ever encountered. This is how companies should be run. The gig I do I'm so over-qualified for, but I see room for growth. As a copywriter, I could grow into the Marketing/PR department or elsewhere. I'm afraid to like it too much.

But enough about me.

My wife is up in Truckee right now. She is helping out a friend put on a mini Renaissance faire.

So, I have a flat to myself, and what do I do? Make a toddy/hot chocolate and organize my computer files.

I can see why Ian Mc Kellan been considered a "babe magnet" in the gay community. If I had that kind of command of language, of delivery.

Just showing cage match. scene. love the blade design of his claws. It's the first time I've noticed the barmaid counting money looks like Hedwig. Not that it's a bad thing, mind you, but I didn't know Bilgewater's had cage matches.

I'm a fan boy. Bite me.

Wolverine's thirtieth anniversary was this year. I remember the comic he first appeared in. The Hulk was fighting some beast called the Wendigo. I didn't know who the bad guy was, & quite frankly, I didn't care. It was the Age Of Big Guys Who Looked Like Tanks.

Toddy's kicking in. Can't write coherently.

Koo Koo Ka Choo Mrs. Robinson

2005-06-07T22:19:00.000-07:00
Anne Bancroft is dead. I heard about it from my wife and read about it here. She is survived by her husband Mel Brooks and their son. She was born 17 September, 1931, which is just a few days after my father. She married Mel in 1964.

I pulled up her biography here and here.

I’m not sure what else to say. I’ve only seen The Graduate once, and I feel for Mr. Brooks. I’ve lost two wives so far, and the fact that they are still alive only mitigates the feeling of loss. When you mourn someone, it’s the things you didn’t do, the things you never got around to, the things that you had planned to .

it just goes to prove that there is nothing in this world that can’t be taken away from you in an instant.

When NPR doesn't Suck

2005-06-06T21:44:00.000-07:00

I had just followed a link to an NPR piece, “The Benefits of Restlessness and Jagged Edges” which, of course had related articles, which is where I found this one titled “Me and My Depression”. A student, named Belia Mayeno describes her onset of it and how she came to terms with the medications she’s now taking. the part that resonates most was how she misses the highs, and to a lesser extent the lows, but her metaphor of choice was that there was a “war” going on inside her head. I never saw it that way. I still don’t.

Another piece by a staffer at NPR describes how he deals with the depression, and how, even though it seems everyone has some kind of mood altering prescriptions, Bipolar Disorder has a bit of a stigma about it.

This topic is close to me, because my son has been diagnosed with Childhood Onset of Bipolar Disorder. He gets it from his father. I’m haywired. I’ve never been officially diagnosed as having either ADD/ADHD or Bipolar Disorder. but I take the medications that can be used for both.

When I get a high, they’re not extreme. I can still sleep normally, I just scribble a lot of notes and sketches and let them run wild in my head and flow unrestricted onto paper as well as I can and save the notes and sketches and ideas for the times when the well runs dry, so to speak. the hypersexuality is fun, but a bit frustrating, it’s more akin to being hungry than horny. Every woman is especially attractive in one way or another on days like that.

When I get the blues, I just try to sleep it off. I can and will endure. I know it will pass, but I just get all the more irritable when my wife or someone close tries to “help”. It would be akin to me trying to help with PMS or childbirth. I can offer aid, and support, but it’s a reactive role, not an active one.

I try to help my son find ways to deal with the fact that the world isn’t made for people like us. I tell him how the world is made up of different kinds of people.

Some of us are built to be farmers, we get up at the same time, do the same routine day in and day out, and things change slowly. Others of us are hunter gatherers; we are restless, always looking out for something and when we come across something we really want, we’re able to focus in on it. We’re also good at taking risks. In a world of farmers, daring and inventiveness is a rarity, so we hunters stand out a bit. He seems to understand what I mean.

I originally read aobut hte Hunter/Gatherer theory a few years ago. Apparently a man named Thom Hartmann developed the theory about 5 years ago. I got this quote Here

I spent the first year after my son’s diagnosis (and the sermon by his psychologist that he “isn’t normal”) trying to find a deeper understanding of what this thing called ADD was. I read everything I could find, and talked with friends and former associates in the child-care industry. I learned that the three cardinal indicators of ADD are distractibility, impulsiveness, and a love of high stimulation or risk. (If you toss in the inability to sit still — hyperactivity — you have ADD-H or ADHD.) While I’d never seen it written anywhere, I also intuitively knew that people with ADD had a different sense of time from those without ADD.

And the more I looked at it, the more it seemed that this “illness” could also be an asset under some circumstances.

After six months of hyperfocused research, I was reading myself to sleep one night with Scientific American. The article was about how the end of the ice age, 12,000 years ago, brought about a mutation of grasses leading to the first appearance on earth of what we today call wheat and rice. These early cereal grains led to the development of agriculture among humans, and that point in history is referred to as the Agricultural Revolution.

As the article went into greater detail about how the agricultural revolution transformed human society, I got a “Eureka!” that was such a jolt I sat straight up in bed. “People with ADD are the descendants of hunters!” I said to my wife Louise, who gave me a baffled look. “They’d have to be constantly scanning their environment, looking for food and for threats to them: that’s distractibility. They’d have to make instant decisions and act on them without a second’s thought when they’re chasing or being chased through the forest or jungle, which is impulsivity. And they’d have to love the high-stimulation and risk-filled environment of the hunting field.”

“What are you talking about?” she said.

“ADD!” I said, waving my hands. “It’s only a flaw if you’re in a society of farmers!”

From that concept came what was originally a metaphor, a less-disempowering story that I could tell my son (for whom I originally wrote this book) and others about their “difference.” Since that time, we’ve discovered that this original “story” may, in fact, be factually accurate: science is rapidly corroborating many of my original observations and theories.

So where we go from here is forward, into a future where people with ADD are not embarrassed or ashamed to say they are Hunters, where children are helped in schools with appropriate interventions and educational environments, and where teenagers and adults recognize in advance that some jobs or careers or mates are well-suited to their temperament and others are not — and from that self-knowledge can gain a greater measure of success in life.

We go forward with proud steps, ignoring those “helpers” who would cling to our legs and scream (or say softly) “you’re sick!” while offering us quick fixes, radiation, or expensive “cures.”

We go forward as Hunters.

Another time, at a renaissance faire, we saw a corgi puppy heard a bunch of animals in the petting zoo section. The pup would separate the two goats, and then the ducks, and move them to different parts of the fenced in area.
for those who don’t know what a corgi is, it’s a dog from the UK . You can adopt this kind of dog, and all sorts of critters, via petfinder.com. It's a site that is an aggregate of animal shelter databases across America. You just type in your ZIP code, or city, and other criteria, and they list what's available.

I explained to the Boy Child that he and I are more like the corgi, always running around, chasing down things and that most people are like the goats. As fate would have it, the goat got tired of the pup, and kicked him across the pen. Fortunately, the little dog got right back up and went back at what he was doing.

My daughter, the Girl Cub, is blessedly normal. Well, as normal as a dirkling could be.

I hate meetings.

2005-06-02T23:05:00.000-07:00

Went to the Burning Man Artery's meeting tonight. The discussion was mostly on the procedures on how to register art on the playa during the week of the Burning Man Festival. It's a fairly simple process, and the majority of time was spent discussing the exceptional stuff. Stuff that's not going to happen most of the time.

It's during these kinds of meetings, my inner Mad Scientist breaks out and does all sorts of Wile E Coyote - type technical sketches. I'm tempted to scan them and post them just to illustrate what I'm talking about.

Tonight were some pretty usual themes. I want to build some wind-powered vehicles for the desert. I remember seeing a special once when I was younger about some people who made skiffs of some sort that used sails to power them across the Sahara. I think it was a National Geographic event.

I would make a lateen rig, and have four wheels, on front, one back, and two on the sides for stability. I'd probably use plastic tubing, because of cost, but a bicycle type frame has advantages as well.

I want to launch things, using old mechanical power, like what was used in siege engines. The ballista, the trebuchet, etc., they all produced a fair amount of power, and the plans are readily available. It would take a little research, but not much. I have friends in the Renaissance reenactment community.

I also want to build a catapult that launches gliders. The Navy uses steam powered ones to launch planes from the decks of their aircraft carriers. I would propose to use a counterweight and leverage.

The planes and gliders that were made from before the Wright brother's plane and up to World War One are beautiful and elegant in their own sort of way. I'm sure I could find plans for something to build that could house one or two people, that could safely launch and land.

The airfoil design currently for most parachutes would be a good starting point. for that sort of joyride. I'd have to make it something that takes minimal steering

In the movie, Revenge of the Sith, for the 35 seconds the wookiees are on screen, they have some wonderful aircraft(here and here), as do the aliens that Obi Wan visits to have his showdown with General Grievous. I've looked them up too.

These are the sorts of things that ferment in the back of your mind; like Belgian beer or kimchi, the longer it sits, the better it gets.

Someday.

Maybe.

But probably not.

Now This is cool.

2005-06-01T22:25:00.000-07:00

I found this site tonight while cruising the web for wookiee weapons, art by Clayton Henry, prehistoric mammals and generally just free-associating. The site outlines a conversion of an old Smith-Corona typewriter into a keyboard for a computer.

I have wanted one of these since the Animatrix story that was a hardboiled detective story where the private eye was hired to find Trinity.

Here's a picture of what I'm talking about.

Pretty neat huh?

I love my laptop. It's well designed, and the keys are responsive and light and the only drawback to the touchpad is that my index finger gets tired if I work too much on graphics stuff. But, I take that as a hint to take a break more than anything else. It's light, holds a charge for several hours and fits nicely into my bag.

I would love to make several retro-styled desktop machines. Like a brass and woodgrain styled "computing engine" from a steampunk era, or an Art Deco machine, all zinc and clean lines. An Art Deco tower and screen with organic schapes and curves.

I just might have to start sketching these things out.

What has become of US?

2005-05-31T15:13:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was Memorial Day in the U.S., a day where we go to barbecues in parks to honor those who have died in service to their country. Usually it is a day of deep depression for me, second only to Thanksgiving, but for completely different reasons.

Yesterday, my wife and I went for a walk through Golden Gate Park that ended down at the beach to watch the sunset, enjoying the sunshine and the happy families. It was a small celebration of The City I love so dearly, with the woman I love more than anything else in a country I love so much that at one point I swore an oath to fight, kill or die for. The only thing that would have made the day complete heaven would be to have the Dirklings, and maybe a dog of some sort.

I didn’t even check email; I avoided the computer all day. Today, my inbox had the usual deluge of mostly useless crap. I do however subscribe to several good news sources, and email lists, that, time permitting, I read through. I was foolish enough to read a few of the op-ed pieces in the New York Times from Monday’s paper. Two pieces in particular were very telling. One, Over There, By Kevin C. Jones, told of a former Marine’s feelings about the deaths in a helicopter crash of Marines from his former unit. He was in the first Gulf War, and has been considering re-enlisting in the reserves. Another, called America, a Symbol of . . . By Bob Herbert was like being sucker-punched. The author is right in his opening lines,

This Memorial Day is not a good one for the country that was once the world's most brilliant beacon of freedom and justice.

State Department officials know better than anyone that the image of the United States has deteriorated around the world. The U.S. is now widely viewed as a brutal, bullying nation that countenances torture and operates hideous prison camps at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and in other parts of the world - camps where inmates have been horribly abused, gruesomely humiliated and even killed.

He concludes the piece ...

In the immediate aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks, most of the world was ready to stand with the U.S. in a legitimate fight against terrorists. But the Bush administration, in its lust for war with Iraq and its willingness to jettison every semblance of due process while employing scandalously inhumane practices against detainees, blew that opportunity.
In much of the world, the image of the U.S. under Mr. Bush has morphed from an idealized champion of liberty to a heavily armed thug in camouflage fatigues. America is increasingly being seen as a dangerously arrogant military power that is due for a comeuppance.

We are all to blame. The blood is on all our hands

Those of you who voted for Bush’s reelection should be the most ashamed. With all the facts and the mountains of evidence of his incompetence, his murderous policies, his raping of the country’s environment, trampling our civil rights, and utter disregard for due process. You bear the most shame in our great country’s fall from grace. You are the true enemies of freedom and liberty, the ignorant who can be cowed into thinking the Moron-In Chief was the right choice. You are the fools who knee-jerk react to the filth on Fox news. You are the scared homophobes who desperately cling to a desiccated, perverted version of a religion who’s central tenant is “Love thy neighbor”, the teachings of a man who showed only compassion and kindness to the weak and the sick and the fallen; a man who only ever, EVER, lost his temper was in his Father’s temple when he saw all the commercialism and the greed. I challenge you to look at your convictions and your “Christian walk”. Take a cold hard look and if you can honestly say you follow the teaching of your savior when you protest at an abortion clinic when you should be providing foster care for children in need. Or, better yet, when you go to Wal-Mart or the shopping Mall buying shit you don't really need or even want, when you should be collecting blankets for homeless shelters, buying food for food banks. Do you really think your Savior, the very same one who healed the lepers and the Fallen Women, would condemn someone for something as arbtrary as their gender preference? Love is hard enough to find, much less keep without bullshit interference and outright hatred. Just who do you think you are, trying to deny any of my fellow Americans their inalienable right endowed by their Creator, the Pursuit of Happiness? And those of you who are the “moderates” of that religion, you should be ashamed because the others in your flock are besmirching the good name of YOUR savior and YOUR religion. Your silence equals consent of their egregious behavior. You are just as guilty as the friend of an alcoholic, who enables them to keep drinking.

Those of you who voted for that pack of Corporate Whores, and toadies who make less than $100,000 a year are stupid and weak and should be shipped off to Iraq or Afghanistan, or better yet, Uzbekistan, get the fuck outta my country. You are not needed nor are you wanted in any country that honors life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Get your pale, bloated, fat asses over to one of the countries we bombed and invaded. Deal with the mess you not only allowed, but SUPPORTED. You make me sick. Most of you never even served the country that houses your excesses. That is your Amerika, the repression and the unrecognized desires and longing in your deadened soul and numbed psyche that makes you supersize your fast food and allows your SUV to congest the roads, in spite of the fact that gas prices are rising faster than your cholesterol count. And you wonder why your kids are so fat and stoned. Every animal knows when it is trapped, and acts accordingly. You are poisoned and tainted, and you have passed that on to your progeny, forcing my children to have to deal with the world you continue to fuck up.

Those of us who voted for Kerry, we are to blame because we didn’t get enough other people to do the right thing and vote George the Idiot Boy out of office. We who stayed in our Blue States and Blue City enclaves, and failed to convince our families back in the backwater hometown that we couldn’t wait to get out of. Those of us who went to protests, yet didn’t write our representatives. A protest is nothing but sound and fury, signifying nothing. All we did was spend city money on security that could have been spent elsewhere like on our schools.

Those of us who didn’t vote at all are worse the horde of the deluded fools who voted for Bush. It was your sloth that helped destroy who we are as a country. You are scum, pure and simple. You are the chicken-shits that Niccolo Machiavelli instructed the Prince to ignore, because you are useless as allies, and insignificant as enemies. Sloth is my 3rd favorite Deadly Sin, but the Republic needed your voice to be heard, and you chose to ignore your civic duty.

I am disgusted, and ashamed of what we’ve become. Historically, we have many periods of ugliness, and depravity. Our golden ages have always been tinged with something we’re not too proud of. This current regime, and regime it is, is by far the worst thing to have ever happened to our country. Compared to these guys in office, the Nixon administration was a bunch of amateurs.

What is to be done? America is still one of the most beautiful places on Earth, and many parts our great country are still idyllic, in character as well as looks. There are still good people here, we need to do something to cleanse our institutions of what's plaguing us. It is a disease that will prove fatal if gone unchecked.

The Blank Page

2005-05-28T22:19:00.000-07:00
"When looking to the Void, remember, the Void stares back"
Friedrich Nietzsche

Or so has been attributed to him. I haven't found anything attributing that to him. I think it's a yogi-ism, a quote that's been repeated so many times that it's either lost it's original quote or has been attributed to someone who's never said it on record.

"Mehr Licht!" Were Goethe's last words. I know this not from any book about him, or in any class I've taken. I know this from the time I was looking at a bust of him in Karlovy Vary in the Czech Republic. At the time it was known as Czechoslovakia. My father and I and my first wife had went into the newly freed Republic after Frank Zappa inspired Vaclav Havel's Velvet Revolution. Thanks to them, when my father came back to Europe after a forty year hiatus, we were visiting a city that was known by Goethe as Carlsbad.

In German, the "bad" means bath, and usually a city with the word in it, had some kind of natural spring, usually it was attributed with some kind of therapeutic properties attributed to them. Most of these towns existed before the Romans showed up and civilised the place. My favorite town with a Wine Festival was Bad Durkheim

Here is where it is in Germany

Partly because of the name, but also thanks to the Pagan nature of the festival itself has lived on after all this time with such little change.

It's definitely, a tribute to Bacchus or Dionysus, take your pick, the god who looks like Jim Morrison and had stories of death and rebirth before there was a Christ.The name doesn't really matter, because it's the festival that's trancsendant. At this festival the wine flows, golden and seet and crisp and dry and the meat-on-a-stick is deliscious, and the champignons or mushrooms and schnecken (snails) are devine in their sustenance.

In the halls, the liter glasses are constantly being refilled, and the people are jovial. Throughout the streets of the town, among the pedestrians, people toting squirt guns and plastic bopper hammers would tag others likewise armed. The Rules of Engagement were unwritten and seemingly unspoken, yet followed by everyone, even the American Servicemen.

Ah, those were the days. Germany had just reunited, and I would get free drinks seemingly everywhere. In conversation, I would be asked why I was in Germany, and why my German was so passable I would tell them simply that my father was in the Army from '49 to 51 and while here he learned German. He taught it to me when I grew up, and I always wanted to come to Germany, so I am now in the Air Force.

I'd invariably get a beer or wine and a toast to my dad. I don't know if I ever thanked him for all the free drinks I'd gotten thanks to him.

If there is an afterlife, I know there's a German version of it with a Bad Durkheim, and a Munchen.

Yesterday's post:

2005-05-28T11:18:00.000-07:00
I wrote this on my commute to an evening out with friends, and when I got home it was too late for my daily post. I just recently transcribed it from the notebook I had with me.

The State of Things (Friday, 27 May)

Today I conducted an experiment of sorts. There's a laundromat a few blocks down the street from where I live , just out of walking distance, but too close to drive. When the dirklings are here, I want to see if the laundry can be done more frequently with a smaller payload, making it one of our regularly scheduled adventures. Laundry is usually an epic event, we put it off until practically every thing we own is dirty, so that when it's time there's plenty of sound and fury and high drama.

I had started the wash, and as I was waiting there, I checked out my local comic shop, Dr. Comics & Mr. Games. It's a small independent place, the people are courteous, knowledgeable, and best of all, they know when to leave you alone. That's a rare and beautiful experience in most retail.

Since I had commented on Giant Man recently, I checked out the latest issue of The Ultimates. Another thing I love about Dr. Comics is that they keep older issues on the shelves in case you've missed something. Conversely, if you come across something new, you can play catch up. It's also good business, because at three dollars an issue, it's quite a commitment to buy into a storyline.

Comics are never single issue stories, and with the advent of the trade paperback format, whereby the publisher releases a collection of a story arc for a title, it's sometimes preferable as a consumer to hold off buying to see how a story progresses before either buying the individual issues or to just wait for the trade to come out, and buy it all in one setting. And the cost is comparable either way.

There's a pleasure in waiting for the next issue in a series though. The anticipation is part of the thrill I remember about reading comics as a kid. A lot of what we call classic literature was originally in serial format. The Three Musketeers, Vanity Fair, The Count of Monte Cristo and I think also War of the Worlds.

There's definitely an art to writing like that. To craft a story that extends past the confines of the framework provided. Serials of any kind face that dilemma and it takes a fine balance to make a piece complete, yet part of a larger whole. To leave the audience wanting more.

My scriptwriting classes pointed out that in sitcoms for TV, you try not to have lasting changes to the major characters for syndication reasons. The re-runs wouldn't make sense if played out of sequence. Hence an easier sale to the local affiliates who don't feel forced to buy an entire series.

Comics have a similar constraint. Characters never really age and if they do, it's very slowly, over such a long time as to e hardly noticeable. The X-Men are a great example, as are the Avengers. Both of those titles are such soap operas, focusing at times on the character's interaction with each other almost to the exclusion of any real action.

Another consideration is that the writing is only one element in comics. Most people tend to notice the art first, and maybe then the story. The quality of comic book stories are almost a stereotype. That has changed a bit recently, especially with the successful adaptations of comics to other media. Writers are finally getting recognition, both good and bad.

There have been comics I've bought where the story was negligible, but the art was terrific. Most often it's the Bam! Pow! variety. There's also been as many if not more that I've bought where the story was great, but the art was mediocre at best. So, when I come across a storyline where the art and story are both entertaining, it's a real treat.

The Ultimates is a good example. The art is realistic, the colors lend the story gravitas, and the treatment of well-known iconic characters with so much baggage, (or, "equity" as they say these days) is refreshing. Captain America acts and sounds like someone from the Forties, for example.

Unfortunately, it feels like very little is really happening. You need to read several in a row to feel the story moving. This is a title I collect the trade paperback version. It would translate well onto the screen, either live action or animated. Big or small screen- preferably big. It's just very dialog heavy.

That was my dilemma; do I buy the individual issues or just wait? There was a collection of the first three of the new volume, and the one issue I've wanted since I'd heard of it (issue 6 check it out here), but did I want to make the investment? It was only about twelve dollars, but I'm not really flush with cash right now, and even when I am, that's a steep price for something I was brought up paying 25 cents an issue.

In this issue, Hank Pym, the outcast visits a startup group calling htemselves "The Defenders", and it's a good story, realistic as a comic can be, the gimmicks, like height, etc, are a smaller part of the story.

Even worse, he finds out that they've not only replaced him with serveral men who are better trained military types to take the name "Giant Man", they've made a breakthrough where they're three times bigger than his initial height of sixty feet . Wow, talk about size issues.

I can't wait for the next issue to come out, here's the cover.

Images courtesy of Marvel comics, inc.

I couldn't help but overhearing a conversation taking place behind me. Two women were talking. One voice saying that "He hates women." The other, essentially lobbing the conversation back to her friend, letting her do the talking.

"He's forcing Devon out. Soon, there'll be no women at all working there."

I'm paraphrasing, I had more important things on my mind, but I was curious.

"I can't do anything about it. But you can write to them and complain. Start a letter campaign."

Now I was interested. Any excuse to cause hell with hate-mail is alright by me. So I intruded on the conversation as politely as I could, offering to help. Turning, I saw them. One worked there, the other I'd never seen before.

The woman I didn't know, turns out, is a writer, and had worked for DC comics. I told her I'd never heard of her, and kind of regretted saying that. I don't like to crush people's ego unintentionally. Here I was, standing where her work was for sale and telling her I'd never heard of her.

Quickly I followed up with the caveat that I don't read DC titles, except for an issue of Catwoman I bought for my daughter last year. Almost immediately after she told me her name, I'd forgotten it; I was still thinking of my laundry and the comics in hand.

According to her, htere are oonly three women writers in the mainstream comic companies, i.e. Marvel and DC and some guy at DC was systematically getting rid of the women there.

I suggested she write about it in her blog. To, y'know, "Rouse the Rabble" as it were.

"I don't have one," she said, "I'm a Luddite."

"Oh come on, " I said "You're a writer, even that one guy has one." I couldn't remember his name. "You've heard about diepunyhuman.com haven't you?" It's Warren Ellis, but I always forget his name too

Shirking her shoulder"I'm a Luddite. I just bought a domain name last year."

"Even that one old writer. What's his name? "

- Blank stare -

"You know, wrote The Martian Chronicles?"

Her friend brightened up, he said "Ray Bradbury!"

They passed the cool test. Worthy of my help, I pressed on.

"He has written every day all his adult life. Nowadays, he dictates most of his stuff, but all the same. Even he has a web site."

"I'm a Luddite," a disarming smile flashed, or winced - I'm not sure which. I have that effect on people sometimes.

"Then I don't know how to help you."

As I paid for my comics, I said to the guy in the mohawk, "I hope I wasn't rude to that writer back there. I didn't mean to be."

"Ah don't worry about it." was the reply.

I'll never know for sure.

So, here's my contribution to the fight against sexism in the comic industry.

A woman I've never heard of got fired from a company who's comics I don't buy , because a man there whose name I don't know is trying to allegedly get rid of women in the comics industry.

I think that's wrong, and I urge all of you who read this and agrees with me, to think of something to do.

There's enough mediocrity in comics these days. I'm sure there's room for more women in the mainstream companies. Sequential art can be a noble art just like other forms of literature and entertainment. It can inspire educate and uplift, and we need them to give us heroes, because they are in very short supply in the real world right now.

I got this idea

2005-05-26T23:10:00.000-07:00
I spent a good deal of time last night re-Learning Flash; one of the things I’ve always loved was that it’s vector based, so you do scaling with no loss of resolution. Everything is done with points and lines, not pixels. I’ve had a long-running idea of what I’d like to do if I had the time talent and cash.

I want to make a game.

I know, games are already made all the time in Flash, and it’s forefather, Director. I even made a couple myself in school. I know enough to be dangerous.

I want to do something along the lines of a superhero fighting game, and I want to have the ability to scale characters up and down in height. I’m not sure if I want to make it side-scrolling or Isometric with a 'board', or some way of running amok

Pretty articulate, eh? Well, I’ve played the Street Fighter series and all it’s incarnations, and I always wondered how characters would face off against someone with a vastly different size. In the Street fighter series, there’s a game of Street fighter versus Marvel characters and one of the playable characters is a Sentinel, a giant mutant-hunting robot. The big difference is that in the comics, these robots are 50-60 feet high, and in the game they’re about 12-15 feet. Still big, but not giant. They’re slightly bigger than characters like the Hulk and Juggernaut

I’ve also been introduced to games like City of Heroes and Freedom Force. Massively multiplayer online Games where you can do some serious copyright infringement and be a hero of your creation and go and fight evil. But again, no giants or tiny folk.

I have seen one game where there is a character who can change height and the two sizes offer different abilities. It’s called Godzilla: Save The Earth. THe web page is here. In this game it uses characters from the Godzilla franchise, one of whom is Jet Jaguar, an Ultraman ‘inspired’ character that starts out smaller and grows to giant height. When he’s smaller, he’s faster, and harder to hit with breath weapons and in hand-to-hand, but he does little damage. There’s an intro trailer - for fast connections just right-click here and save the link

It looks like a fun game, a kind of modern version of Rampage, only you can move around in a cityscape in 3d.

I was also inspired by a website that is now defunct; THE UNCANNY X-SPRITES. The creator of the site took sprites from the old Mega Man game, and modified them to look like X-men characters. I loved the humor, because he would always parody whatever story arc was going on in the comics. It hasn’t been updated in over a year, and I haven’t come across anything saying why. The URL is for sale now.

I would place a limit on height change, like a factor of 5 or 10, something that would keep out the kaiju. Even Godzilla, at his smallest was 50 meters, that’s over 200 feet. 60 feet is the original limit for the original Ultimate Giant MAn; there’s a team of them now in The Ultimates who are 180 feet, but the tactical advantage is unclear to me. That and

Sean McGuinness, aka Shin Goji, runs Twisted Kaiju Theater had a Q & A comic that covered this topic. The link is here.

This is all just a thought, I’m in no hurry to do this. I have a few ideas that sort of float around, waiting for the right time to germinate. William Carlos Williams had a poem about dreams being like seeds. I’m not sure much else about it, I read it in the 4th grade, and that’s all I remember is that dreams don’t have to die; they just need the right conditions to blossom.

Then again, in Doonesbury, Boopsie told Zonker, “Some old dreams need to die in order to make room for new ones.”

And on the Third Day

2005-05-25T22:00:00.000-07:00
Third day of unemployment and I'm climbing the walls. figuratively and literally. I'm a dyed in the wool generalist, so writing is an easy subject, yet when I browse through the cragislist ads, I feel a little lost.

So I did what any good mediavore would do. I looked up some of the terms, downloaded examples and Got Smart Fast on certain conventions.

Take Flash for example. I haven't used Flash professionally since about 2002 or 2003. It was right before they released ActionScrtipt, a more robust version of the scripting language used. I had been working with Lingo, Director's scripting language, so learning it wasn't too much of a problem.

Over time, I forgot both. So tonight I re-learn. Much as if I were dropped down in the streets of Europe. I would need a drink, and a few moments, but I'd find my way around soon enough. I wouldn't be as sharp as when I was a decade ago, but I'm a bit more wise.

Tonight I learn Flash. I received an email about someone needing banner ads. I can animate. It's like riding a bike. You never forget. It just sucks when you're rusty.

I'll post my work and provide a link when I have something.

Good thing I don't need sleep

Well,

2005-05-24T21:50:00.000-07:00
Day two and I'm still unempolyed.

I've checked severalonline jobsites and nothing. I even posted finished versions of my school projects here.

I had decided to bill myself as a copywriter based on a few things. First, I'm good at it. I'm also a bit of a know-it-all. and finally I'm a better writer than designer. I conceptualize well, so it should be no problem. Accoording to one of my teachers, Art Directors ar a dime-a-dozen, but I see so few posts for Copywriters either.

Tomorrow, I post my resume on craigslist, maybe that will help.

Thek dirklings come down at the end of June, so I need to make some money quickly.

I'll try to be more entertaining & informative tomorrow.

I'm beginning to think I'm cursed.

2005-05-23T23:06:00.000-07:00

the New York Times had an article today about how the advertising industry is facing a serious shakeout.

Good thing I'm about a year away from graduating.

The article explains that companies are focusing on the bottom line now more than ever, and the old ways of advertising just aren't reaching people anymore. The bigger ad agencies aren't making the profits they are used to, and there's new competitors on the scene ready to pounce on business opportunities.

In an unrelated article, Mad Dogs is closing it's doors the ned of the month. Truly sad, they were a great agency.

Well, if we as consumers weren't flooded with information every second of every day, we might not have developed the filters we have.

Technology also helps. TiVo and Satellite radio and iPods are allowing people to get their entertainment free of commercials.

So, how do you sell stuff?

I'd say the first way is to not suck at what you do. For the past three years, my wife's company, Scathing Harpy Enterprises relied heavily on ads on www.craigslist.org and referrals from happy clients.

Another way would be to not saturate the world with more clutter. I am sick to death of the nike logo. After my first pair of Air Jordans, I swore not to wear another Nike Shoe again. That is, until I came across nikeid (www.nikeid.com/) Where you can design your own shoe. Mass customization is what online shopping was supposed to be about.

I already have an associate's in multimedia, so I'm familiar with some of the technology that the Times article talks about where the ad industry is headed, like GE's latest viral campaign where you send a virtual seed to a friend so it can grow. A sort of tomagotchi, I guess. Or even "Subservient Chicken" .

I'd like to see banner ads disappear. Or at least evolve into something beyond the animated quasi-game things currently en vogue.

Things like print ads and radio spots aren't going anywhere. The TV ad might evolve into something different, but will be around somehow.

There's always work for those who can adapt.

The circle is now complete.

2005-05-22T23:06:00.000-07:00
I went to see the allegedly final installment of the Star Wars films, The Revenge of the Sith. I say allegedly, because there's always rumors of the next three movies, and of course there's the TV thing and et cetera.

This one delivered as promised. This one helped me remember why the movies are magic events. Tales told with broad brush strokes and lots of sparkles and sounds and fury. Of all the prequels, this was the most action packed and dramatic. Definitely a Faustian Space Opera. I don't want to ruin anything but the scene where Anakin becomes Darth Vader was cool by the sheer banality of the choice and the giving of his Sith name. When Vader is put in the suit it's chilling. The first several words spoken were in Anakin's manner, but with the old voice of James Earl.

We all know this is the fall of the Republic, and the rise of the Empire. The details as it played out are still exciting, and lots of suspense. I will be taking the dirklings to see this, but I know there are a few scenes that the Girl Cub will have problems with, she doesn't do well with impending doom, the suspense is what gets her, but she has no problems with senseless violence. She is her father's daughter. The Boy Child will do fine. He's my age when I saw the first Star Wars.

I was 10 years old when I saw the original Star Wars. I paid 2 dollars to see it and went at least 4 times. I liked the action figures, collected the comics. I wasn't a diehard fan boy or otaku by any stretch of the imagination, but I was hooked. I've owned a lightsabre whenever a movie's come out ever since. And they've always broken inside six months.

The Empire Strikes Back was a good movie, but it had a lot to live up to. Luke was such a pansy. Yoda was a cool muppet, but the big AT-AT tanks on Hoth were the bomb. The Tie Bombers were cool and Vader demonstrated why he was such a cool bad guy.

The Return of the Jedi was cool, except for those damn Ewoks. The best part of the movies were the little details, like how the main characters seemed genuine friends on a big adventure. The speeder bikes rock, and Luke whooped ass in Tattooine. I still don't get the Leia slave-girl fetish thing, I mean, yeah it was neat, but long chains around a princess' neck are always fashionable. At least here in the Bay Area. "I am a Jedi, like my father before me." was about the only time Luke was cool. His cloak rocked.

The Prequels

When The Phantom Menace came out, I was going through a divorce and the kids spent the weekends with me. I lived about two blocks from a theater that had it running so it was a Sunday Afternoon routine for awhile. That movie gave me plenty of opportunities to relay family values to my kids, like "Never gloat over an enemy until after you've killed him." and of course my favorite, "focus on your opponent, not his lightsaber".

I had to learn these things on my own.

It was on these Sunday Afternoons that I also learned of the Girl Cub's affinity for speed. She loved the Pod Race scenes and would sit on my lap and pretend to race the whole time it happened. The Boy Child loved the robots and that Anakin was a gadget freak, like he is.

"This party's over"

The Clone wars was cool too, but it was more political detective stuff. Christopher Lee is a total badass with the lightning and the cool one-handed sword. Watching Mr. Samuel L. Jackson lay the beat down was worth the price of admission.

Yoda as the whirling CGI dervish was cool. Once. After I'd seen it the first time in a room full of drunken rowdy Ren Faire types, it was a bit hackneyed. A badass has an economy of movement, and no need to be flashy. Also he's going against Christopher Lee, who has been a force of Evil since shortly after World War Two. He was a good guy in that war, a British Commando, even, so a muppet? no way. Watching Obi Wan hold his own against Jango Fett, mostly without the use of his llightsaber helped reinforce some of those old family values, "Use the Force, but follow up with a kick to the midsection"

Damn damn damn

2005-05-22T00:08:00.000-07:00
I missed another deadline. So to speak.

When I was at my first base in Omaha, since I kept showing up late to work, they moved my start time by about 15 minutes. It got to the point I was showing up to work an hour and a half before everyone else.

Tonight, one of the local radio stations held their annual listener appreciation night, replete with fireworks. They always do such a good job.

The difference about tonight was we didn't imbibe too much, so we wandered around downtown San Francisco. I love that city so much. Ended up buying a couple CDs, Ray Charles, Ray's Greatest hits and Astral Weeks and Aretha Sings the Blues.

What a night.

I'd like to thank the academy

2005-05-20T23:48:00.000-07:00

Thank you. To all my teachers, to my fellow students, to the Academy, my lovely wife, who stood beside me this whole time. To my kids who had no clue that I had struggled the way I did with class, but had a fun time here during their spring break with me, even though I was still in class.

I sent out about a dozen thank you emails in the past 24 hours. To pretty much everyone I worked with these past few months in school.

I was always taught that it's just what you do. I'm not being dishonest or obsequious in any way. People need to know that their work was appreciated, whether or not at the time I felt that way. I know I'm not the easiest person to live with, I've had to put up with me for years now.

I was reminded of some of the challenges I faced this term by going through my notes and my day planner. Thing that was important for me to remember when the times had become hard was that people were depending on me. Neither failure nor defeat is an option, I have a wife & kids who need me.

In interviews, most people who had committed great acts of bravery or heroism usually respond along the lines of 'well, I had to do something.'

Edgar Rice Burroughs summed it up in his 1st Warlord of Mars books, The Princess of Mars

"I do not believe that I am made of the stuff which constitutes heroes, because, in all of the hundreds of instances that my voluntary acts have placed me face to face with death, I cannot recall a single one where any alternative step to that I took occurred to me until many hours later. My mind is evidently so constituted that I am subconsciously forced into the path of duty without recourse to tiresome mental processes."
I've also heard the adage "A hero is a coward who got cornered"

I've also heard of this as a state of Zen, where the mind and action become one. the followers of the Way (Do) of the Warrior (Bushi) trained all their lives for that type of state, so that they could meet death as an honored guest.

Which is truly a beautiful thing until you realize that when the samurai and Bushido really flowered in the 15th century or so onwards, after the Tokugawa Shogunate (warlords) unified Japan and made it a peaceful country and cut off all trade with the outside world. essentially turning in upon itself. A sort of spiritual and cultural incest took place. What does a warrior do when there is no warfare?

Make no mistake. I do not consider anything I did these past several months extraordinary in any way. No, I know someone who deserves that distinction.

My father made a comment to my cousin while he was alive in LA. He said his children had been raised, and that he was done. His health had been deteriorating and he'd had a crippling case of arthritis for over twenty years. When I last visited him, he was in the hospital, his body wracked with pneumonia, and shutting down, but for some reason he held on.

I told him I'd miss him, but he had nothing to fear. He could let go. I thanked him for being a good father, and for showing me how to be one. I also thanked him for letting my kids know their daddy was once a kid too.

My brother flew in from Ohio and paid him a similar visit.

It's what you do.

After he appeared to get better, the apparatus of modern medicine was pulled away, he could eat without a tube, no more respirator, etc.. One night he had dinner with his youngest daughter, said goodbye, and that he loved her.

He died in his sleep that night. It's just the way he did things, no drama, no fanfare, just a quick and quiet exit.

I don't believe in any gods or higher powers. I also don't believe in any eternal reward, but I'm also comforted by the fact that there is no eternal punishment either.

You are born, you live, and eventually you die. Everything that happens in between is up to you.

It's just what you do that's important.

Welcome home Mr. Oxenreider.

2005-05-19T12:45:00.000-07:00
Jeff Oxenreider left Taji, Iraq on the 16th of May, is currently in Texas, and will be home in Columbus Ohio with his wife and two daughters shortly. He was in Iraq for the past year as a civilian contractor, in support of the US Forces’ unlawful invasion and subsequent occupation. And I am so glad that his time there is over.

Jeff Oxenreider is one of my oldest friends; we grew up together in Columbus Ohio, Well at least from puberty on. We first met in Middle school; I think it was the 7th grade. Who knows & who cares? During high school we’d hang out, and our Junior and senior year we were a force to be reckoned with.

My parents had this philosophy that when you were eighteen, since you could vote, be tried in a court of law as an adult, could joined any of the armed forces and kill/die for your country, could marry, and many other things, you should be allowed to have beer in your own damn house.

“Would it be okay if I had a few friends over?” was my first question when they stated their beliefs and I was old enough to see the potential havoc

To say things got out of hand would be wrong. We’d have several dozen of our close, personal friends over most weekends for a “few beers and watch some TV.” Of course, all my friends were over eighteen; even the sixteen year olds.

To be fair, no one got hurt and it was only beer, and compared to some of the things I’ve done later in life it was all quite innocent.

In May of 1987, I joined the Air Force, I had joined to be a crypto-linguist, and they had sent me to the Defense Language Institute in Monterey, CA. I thought the rest of the Air Force was as lax as DLI; and had talked Jeff into joining as well.

Being Air Force on an Army Post is something you have to see to believe. It’s similar to the sense of entitlement Americans get when they’re abroad; most local customs don’t apply to them, and they break any rules that don’t fit their agenda because they think they’re immune.

Jeff didn’t do as well on the Defense Language Aptitude Battery, the test you take to see if you have an ability to pick up languages, and he joined without picking a specialty first, so when he went through basic training, he was only given a limited set of choices in schools he could go to.

Around the same time I washed out of DLI; Jeff was going to school in Mississippi to learn about radios. The Air Force sent me to Denver to be a Target Intelligence Specialist. There I learned how to read maps and aeronautical charts, how to interpret photography, what bombs were good for what kinds of targets.

Afterwards, I was sent to Omaha, and he to Frankfurt Am Main, Germany, the place where forty years earlier, my father paved the runway when he was in the Army, rebuilding Germany and parts of France after World War Two.

After a year in Omaha, I went to a little airbase in Southwestern Germany, a Tactical Reconnaissance Wing, no bombs, just cameras. It was like being invited to someone else’s birthday party. It was fun, planning missions and all, but there was no ordnance. And that's the fun stuff, really.

I loved my job.

I also came to terms with the fact that as a targeteer, the better I did my job, the fewer people actually had to die. I n a conventional war, you take out a command post, the front lines don’t have any direction. You blow up the supplies and munitions, they can’t fight, the war’s over, fewer dead grunts overall.

It was while I was at this sleepy little base that the first Gulf War happened. I went down for a few days to help my unit out with a few technical issues, and they sent me right back to close the base I was at. I think it was because I pointed out why there was a need for Tactical Reconnaissance, even though the Cold War was over; three of my five examples had happened.

But this isn’t my story.

The second time I went to Turkey, it was in support of Operation Provide Comfort. President George H.W. Bush hinted at supporting an overthrow of the Baathist regime, and when the Kurds in the Northern part of Iraq tried and were squashed, Mr. Bush left them out in the cold. Operation Provide Comfort was created on-the-fly to deliver food and humanitarian aid to the Kurds.

Every time I deployed, I flew into and out of Turkey via Rhein Main, hanging out with Jeff before and afterwards.

After our time in the military, I traveled and Jeff went back to Ohio. I know he never felt trapped like I did, so it made sense. He was always into computers and became a Systems Administrator of one sort or another.

We lost track of each other, and one day a few years back we started emailing each other, keeping in touch when time would allow.

Then came September 11th.

If you know any veterans, their first thought was “How can I help,” and their first response was to see if they were needed, especially if they were still young enough to possibly go back into the military.

I couldn’t go back, even though I could probably get my clearance back, and I have several skill sets that come in handy in this kind of war on terror. If that war was fought the right way. It isn’t so I’m not helping anybody do anything, except to vote the Fundamentalists out of every level of government I can.

After the initial shock, the current Regime, who already had their sights fixed on Iraq, looked for ways to make scapegoats out of that country.

Was Saddam an evil beast? Yep. Did he deserve to be removed form office? You betcha. Should we have gone in? No way in hell should we have invaded another country. We had our chance to topple them a decade ago, but didn’t. It was the only time we had the right to do so. Hussein invaded a country and for that he should’ve been taken out of power. But we didn’t.

But this isn’t that story. This is about Mr. Oxenreider.

It all started in the beginning of February of last year. Jeff had gotten a gig with a company with a government contract to support the troops in Iraq.

When I found out he did it, I knew why he had, so the only thing I could do was to offer advice. Stuff he already knew, but I felt I had to remind him about.

Simple stuff really; be nice to the locals, keep a pack of cigarettes to share even if you don’t smoke, check your shoes before putting them on, carry candy and stuff for kids, crap like that. It’s the little kindnesses can be the difference between life & death.

I used to check his blog daily. Then after awhile, every couple of days, then once a week or so. When he wouldn’t post, I’d get to worrying, but it would be because he was too busy.

In the end, he’s glad he went. More importantly, I’m glad he’s back.

This occupation is wrong, and history will remember it as such, but the men and women there swore to follow orders of their Commander In Chief, even if he’s G.W. Bush.

The Last Art Direction Class

2005-05-18T23:12:00.000-07:00
I try to keep this space free from the whole "Dear Diary" thing. Even when I describe parts of my life, I try to inform entertain and educate.

Yes, I ripped that off of PBS. It works

Tonight was the last class for Art Direction. I have an o.k. eye, according to my teacher, but it's time to face facts; I'm a better writer than artist, so it's time to start admitting it as my trade.

So, tonight was an eye-opener for that, because I've never wanted to admit to not being an artist, or artistic in nature. THis is mainly because, when I was younger, I went to a vocational school for fine art, and was pretty good at it too.

Sort of.

I didn't think too highly of my work, even though others did.

That was a long time ago, and it's time to focus on doing what I'm good at for a living. I have a friend who lives in New York, and is a very good graphic designer, and has really good illustration work too. He's been wanting to make comics for awhile. I also have a friend in Oregon who's no slouch, either.

I can see it now...

There's a saying

2005-05-17T22:34:00.000-07:00

That all hatred stems from self-hatred.

In light of the actions of all these allegedly Christian conservative office holders. Most recently the Mayor of Spokane Washington, Jim West. Not only has he been caught cruising internet chat rooms looking for 18 year olds. If you want to read the chat transcripts between a secretly gay Republican mayor and the guy hired by the newspaper to pose as an 18-year-old gay man,click here

I call West and his ilk allegedly Christian, because from my dealings with most real Christians, I have found most to be open honest people who believe they have a relationship with their savior and try to model their lives based on the teachings of Jesus and His disciples. Jesus, by all accounts went where He was needed, when He was in the dens of iniquity, not to cruise for a piece of the action, but to heal and to ease suffering.

In the scriptures, the only time He ever showed anger was when he came into the temple and saw all the money changers. I wonder What Would Jesus Do at an event like last Sunday, all sound and fury about opposition to fundamentalist judicial nominees, complete with Senator Bill Frist making a televised appearance.

I'm betting he'd be pissed, but I never gamble on anything I can't affect the outcome.

My topic, though is on the hatred these extremists have towards non-heterosexuals, when there are so many in charge that are closeted gay.Mayor west, for example, is also being charged with allegedly molesting Boy Scouts when he was a troop leader in the 70's. Mark Morford was a memgber of the Scouts in Spokane at the time and is quite articulate about the events here in his column.
He says

"Just to be perfectly clear, I recall no personal run-ins with West of any kind when I was a kid, save for the positive and the pleasant and the paternal. My memories of that time are admittedly vague and for all I know I was drunk a lot, sneaking rum into my Honeycombs, strung out on Twizzlers and Pop-Tarts and Totino's microwavable frozen pizzas, but I can tell you with all honesty, I have no deeply buried memories. I have no horrific sexual episodes that would only emerge through insidious regression therapy. I had, in fact, a perfectly lovely childhood, despite Boy Scout camp. And I am kidding about the rum."

I agree with him on this bit, because there is some causality.

"And someone should really do a national, once-and-for-all study to back up what everyone already knows -- which is, of course, that the more repressed and sanctimonious and uptight you are about sex and love and gender and religion, the more likely you are to be involved in secret kink, in deep perversion, illegal perversion, perversion that crosses the line from healthy and slippery and delicious to degrading and morally reprehensible and Karl Rove. Just ask -- did I say this already? -- the Catholic Church."
But the thing he points out, which is what I mean by today's title

"Here's what does it. Here's what makes West and people like him rife with potential for, well, some of the nastiest and most dishonest and dangerous abuses humans are capable of.

It's the ability to ignore the incredible hypocrisy of your own life, the staggering amount of self-loathing, the pathetic insincerity. It's the ability to join a political party that not only openly loathes, but actually violently condemns, your choice in sexual partners, a sexually ignorant platform that claims to have some sort of direct line to a gay-hating war-loving God, and then, in the middle of who knows how many gay affairs, to feel no shame as you step right up and endorse that exact same hateful agenda as public policy.

It's the fact that, in West's case, you can still sleep at night after you've voted against gay love and railed against healthy teen sex and bashed women's rights and criticized adult/youth sex when you are, in fact, so confused and lost and deeply engaged in much of it yourself that it's very likely your mangled, hypocritical mind has lost the ability to distinguish between informed, consensual, happily kinky adult relationships and, say, abusing the honest trust of a pre-teen boy. Or, for that matter, many boys.

"Join that party and toe that line and swallow that nasty doctrine and spit it out into the world like oozing red-meat dogma while you secretly use your power to lure in teenagers and men for sex, and I don't put anything past you, Jim. To my mind, you're capable of anything. Anything at all

And for that, my old troop leader Jim, I can never forgive you. "

I know, for example, that many of the elite of the Nazi party were gay. They were of the variety that worshipped the hypermasculine and who hated the effeminate, "degenerates" of Berlin and Paris, yet they used the Bathhouses of Munich to plan their own rebellion. The original leader of the Nazi Youth used his position to pick and choose his own young boys. The "night of the long knives" cut his career short. I just can't remember his name right now.

I have finals looming, else I'd be more thorough.

So, in the New York times, columnist Frank Rich writes "Just How Gay Is the Right?" (her e)where he highlights a 1962 movie "Advise and Consent" about how a senator has a secret - he's gay. In the 50's and early 60-'s, in most states, that was illegal, and in others it was considered a mental illness.

He also points out in his article:

"What adds a peculiar dynamic to this anti-gay juggernaut is the continued emergence of gay people within its ranks. Allen Drury would have been incredulous if gay-baiters hounding his Utah senator had turned out to be gay themselves, but this has been a consistent pattern throughout the 30-year war. Terry Dolan, a closeted gay man, ran the National Conservative Political Action Committee, which as far back as 1980 was putting out fund-raising letters that said, "Our nation's moral fiber is being weakened by the growing homosexual movement and the fanatical E.R.A. pushers (many of whom publicly brag they are lesbians)." (Dolan recanted and endorsed gay rights before he died of AIDS in 1986.) The latest boldface name to marry his same-sex partner in Massachusetts is Arthur Finkelstein, the political operative behind the electoral success of Jesse Helms, a senator so homophobic he voted in the minority of the 97-to-3 reauthorization of the Ryan White act for AIDS funding and treatment in 1995."

Why does this happen, and why is there no outrage in either the conservative movement or the liberal camps when these outings occur. The conservatives pretend nothing happens, and the liberals don't seem to know what to do.

I think Frank Herbert summed it up quite nicely when he said

"All governments suffer a recurring problem: Power attracts pathological personalities. It is not that power corrupts, but rather power is a magnet that draws the corruptible."

This little Piggie

2005-05-16T22:04:00.000-07:00
I was waiting for the BART the other day with a fellow student who is from Egypt. It was a long the day, and I was tired, but had nothing els to talk about, so the tale of ships and sails and sealing wax.

For some reason, we came across the topic of pork. My friend being Egyptian, and of course, a good Muslim, described the pig as a filthy animal.

I had to take the other side of the conversation.
You see, for the longest time, I didn't eat pork.
it's a long story, and I'm not in the mood to elucidate.

Recently though, I've come to respect why pork is in European's diet and culture the way it is.

The pig, or boar, as it is commonly known, is used in heraldry because of its ferocious nature. It is also one fertile critter, squeezing out a dozen or more piglets at a time.

In the Mediterranean, they are a bit of a problem, because, they eat the same things humans do, and unlike goats, they don't make milk that’s fit for human consumption, nor hair to use. Because of the heat they wallow in mud to keep cool. Hence, the

But in northern Europe, they eat nuts and roots, and stuff humans don't, so there's no competition. They are pretty intelligent; supposedly smarter than dogs. Which is one of the reasons settlers in America would take them. They'd set them loose every day, slop them twice a day, and they'd take care of the rest. Maintenance free critters they are. Plus they'd breed so well, as opposed to a cow, which would take a great deal of investment,s and would only rear one young at a time.

Simple economics, really.

I like my bacon, but it has to be fried hard. I don't cook swiner at home, but I'll occaisionally eat it when I'm out.l

I always wanted to go hunting for them. With a spear, and maybe some hounds. The old school way, like they did in Medieval Europe.

I know that since they breed so quickly, they’re a nuisance in Hawaii and here in California, so they can be hunted all year round.

Some day, maybe, Who knows?

I can see it now

2005-05-15T21:47:00.000-07:00
Launch
http://www.launch.com

I just saw a video from Avril Lavigne, "He Wasn't" Uh, yeah. That's prepackaged pop-rebellion at it's uh, most sanitary.

I want to introduce her to someone with a little more darkness, like Glen Danzig.

It would probably go something like this:

Glenn, I'd like you to meet someone. Her Name's Avril, and she's Canadian. No, she's jailbait, so I don't care if she is your height, so hands off.

Avril, this is Glenn, he's been into evil longer than you've been Canadian. No, he's not a Republican, but close.

You know that skull shirt that your handlers bought for you awhile back? That was from a band called The Misfits. Glenn here (stop that Glenn), was the singer for that band back in the Eighties. Since then he's become more evil and runs a comic book company as well as making albums that scare people in the heartland. You know what comics are, right? Hey, just checking.

Now Glenn, I want you to behave yourself until I can distract her handlers long enough. You have 72 hours. Thank me by showing her the true power of the Dark Side.

Curses!

2005-05-15T00:02:00.000-07:00
I missed my own self imposed deadline, yet again.

argh!

I did however write an editorial commenting on how Intelligent Design isn't, and ten billboard ads for the Ford Exploiter, ahem, Explorer, and a Camaign for a company that may or may not still exist.

Other than that, not much has happened today. Going out to a friends' house in a little bit to see how her birthday party is going.

Plus ca Change, Plus c'est la meme Change.

2005-05-13T23:34:00.000-07:00
It’s just your tyical case of Art Imitating Life that wishes it was more artful.

My friend in the City So Nice They Named It Twice, Gotham, The Big Apple, NYC, called me up again. The last we had spoken, I was wandering the streets of Seattle looking for an appropriate gift for the Girl Cub. I had gotten an idea based on an old tradition of ours when we both lived in the same city at the same time. We would take long walks and I wouldn’t say we had conversations. We would exchange monologs.

We talked of martial arts, design; everything under the sun and no topic was too taboo or too sacred. The people we encountered on these walks we full of character, you couldn’t make these things up.

A longstanding comment was that we should make a play of our talks. We would of course stage this with multiple treadmills, so that we could walk with a scrolling background to give the impression of us walking. During intervals of the acts, various other performers would encounter us, by scrolling in on another treadmill, which would slide them across the stage if they were standing still, or at a different rare of speed or direction for the way we were headed.

We never did this play, for many reasons; mostly because we never had the time, money or real inclination to work that hard at something that wouldn’t yield that much profit.

Recently, I came across an article on Podcasting. here, and here, It was good to walk & talk with my friend even though we’re on opposite sides of the continent. Perhaps we’ll create podcasts of our adventures and make radio shows of it.

I’d like to do some radio spots and broadcast them on the web. I listened to a few of the old time dramas from the golden age of radio recently and that got me thinking about it.

In time, perhaps I will. For now, I have school to finish this coming week.

2005-05-12T23:42:00.000-07:00

Tonight I finished my Account Planning class, and as is usually the case, my thoughts turn to failure. I am reminded of something I wrote about after our nation’s last Great Mistake; the last presidential election.

Slate had a series of essays about why the democrats lost, and this one struck a chord, thought I'd share it with my friends and family

http://slate.com/id/2109218/
Why Americans Hate Democrats-A Dialogue
The unteachable ignorance of the red states.

By Jane Smiley

She starts with a great line;

"I say forget introspection. It's time to be honest about our antagonists."

...

"Ignorance and bloodlust have a long tradition in the United States, especially in the red states. There used to be a kind of hand-to-hand fight on the frontier called a "knock-down-drag-out," where any kind of gouging, biting, or maiming was considered fair. The ancestors of today's red-state voters used to stand around cheering and betting on these fights."

I personally love watching things like the UFC (the Ultimate Fighting Championship), at least in the first couple tournaments, because it was a way to really see Darwinism at it’s purest. There are still Mixed Martial Arts tournaments, but it’s a bit too homoerotic for my tastes.

The Article goes on to say;

"The error that progressives have consistently committed over the years is to underestimate the vitality of ignorance in America. Listen to what the red state citizens say about themselves, the songs they write, and the sermons they flock to. They know who they are-they are full of original sin and they have a taste for violence. The blue state citizens make the Rousseauvian mistake of thinking humans are essentially good, and so they never realize when they are about to be slugged from behind."

I must agree. It’s good to have principals, but “Good” doesn’t have to equal “Stupid”. Funny thing is, I remember reading an article about that very thing in Dragon magazine back when I was a quasi-gamer.

She goes on to conclude what's been said elsewhere.

"Progressives have only one course of action now: React quickly to every outrage-red state types love to cheat and intimidate, so we have to assume the worst and call them on it every time. We have to give them more to think about than they can handle-to always appeal to reason and common sense, and the law, even when they can't understand it and don't respond. They cannot be allowed to keep any secrets."

It’s still good advice, and one that should be applied at the lowest form of government as well as the highest offices. Our Founding Fathers believed in Checks and Balances because they understood the evil nature of mankind.

I remember reading somewhere about how the Moral Majority had guides on how to infiltrate local political offices, like Board of Supervisors and the like, if I find it, I’ll post a link. Very subversive stuff.

Dr. Thompson summed it up best: “All politics is local politics” .

Yesterday's Post, or lack thereof

2005-05-12T09:38:00.000-07:00
I apologize for not posting, but when I got home from class, I was too tired. I've been sweating these last final projects and it's to the point where I can't see straight.

Tonight's class is Account Planning. Today, my group and I are going to make a presentation out of thin air. I know some of us had done some research, and then nothing for a couple weeks.

4 students, 4 different approaches, 4 different answers.

I hate group projects. Especially when it's something no one wants to do.

I'll post again tonight.

The Grid

2005-05-10T23:50:00.000-07:00

Over the weekend I bought for the Girl Cub an expensive pen and some grid pare notebooks. I love grid paper. I first came into common use of the stuff in Germany. I’d go to the Bahnhoff and get directions, sometimes, just to get the notes written by the station agents. I bought a few sketchbooks with grid paper for myself over the years, but I am a bit of a miser when it comes to buying supplies for drawing. The sketchbook I carry these days is decidedly low tech and cost effective.
I wish I had more to say on the matter, but in the next 48 hours everything will be due in my two in person classes.

No time to be more witty or observant today.

Sorry.

Every day's an adventure

2005-05-09T20:29:00.000-07:00
The weekend was an adventure, as usual when I go to Seattle.

It was the Girl Cub's birthday. My lovely wife knitted her a scarf, and I promptly forgot it in Oakland. Saturday While they visited their Great-grandmother, I ran around downtown trying to find The Right Gift. In the Park Place Market, I found a boothie who sold me my graduation gift to myself.

In 1998 I graduated from the Art Institute of Seattle, for my hard work, and since I was going through the early stages of a divorce, I bought myself something nice; a fountain pen.

The pen was made by a local artist, and I wanted something special to sign special papers, like contracts. I saw an illustration once of several people around a table, and one was drawing on the tablecloth using a fountain pen. It just seemed classy.

So, I bought an 8 year-old little girl a $30 dollar pen. A little while later I bought her a set of moleskine gridded notebook. I spent the rest of the day telling her I bought her a roll of paper towels as a present.

Sunday was the day of her party. As the Sacrificial Parent, I played with the kids in the pool, tossing them about, and somehow ending up with far more kids than when I started. That always weirds me out a bit, because I kinda wonder where their grownups are, and more than a little flattered that they think I'm safe.

During the opening of the presents, She got cool games from her guests, that could be either solo or group play. Very cool.

When She opened mine, I told her the story behind why she got the pen and who else has used notebooks like that.

I scored big.

She took both the sketchbook and pen with her everywhere.

Last night I read too long to the dirklings at their mother's house. Big mistake. I wanted them to get as much quality time with me while I was there. While boy-cub bathed, Girl-cub watched Astro Boy, and when the Girl Cub bathed, I read to my son from a book I bought him a few years back.

"D'Aulaires Book of Greek Myths" was something I read religiously in the 3rd grade. I spent a lot of time reading the stories in the library, I think for awhile, I was the only one who checked it out that year.

On the inside cover I wrote a dedication;

Dec 2003
"Owning a good book is like having a good friend. You can visit often and at any time. I first read this book when I was in the 3rd grade. So, in a way, I'm introducing you to an old friend of mine.

Read this often and you will be richly rewarded.

Love, your father,

Dirk "

So, they stayed up a bit too late, there was of course much drama, and the kids got up without a problem.

Monkey Traps

2005-05-08T13:24:00.000-07:00
In todays's tarot reading, I came across a card titled The Devil. The Devil is used not as the Judeo Christian character who commands the forces of evil, but more of being enslaved to earthly passions. In its description, it mentions the monkey trap.

I remember hearing about the monkey trap as a young boy. I asked my father what it was, and he told me this;

"The monkey trap is a jar with a narrow opening and some kind of a prize in it, like a piece of fruit. The monkey can put its hand in with it open, but when it holds the prize, it cannot pull it out. You can then just walk up to the monkey and capture him, because it's so intent on getting the prize, and won't let go. "

I remember asking him, "Why doesn't the monkey turn the jar over and spill it out, or break the jar?"

"That's part of the trap. The monkey only thinks of one way to get the prize. You see them howling and struggling, and it still wont' let go, even though it sees the human coming."

It's always a nice surprise when I remember things like this. As an American, I am rootless by nature, constantly looking forward, focusing my energies on the future and what it will bring.

ON the Bus

2005-05-07T23:55:00.000-07:00

I spoke German conversationally for the first time in quite awhile today. I was on the bus and two older ladies got on in mid conversation, and the topic led to food which led to the similarities of Russian and German cuisine. One lady mentioned a possibility that because it was that they were so close together.

I had to interrupt.

I told her that Peter the Great invited Germans to Russia to help modernize his country. I later asked the remaining lady if she was German, in German. I used most of my "bahnhoff deutsch" and it was nice to understand a non-english language going on. I feel so stupid that I speak no Spanish.

I just have to learn.

Deja vu in Kansas again?

2005-05-06T09:11:00.000-07:00
What, really, is wrong with Americans these days?

Is fear and ignorance really that pervasive, or is it something else? Something perpetrated by a vocal, fanatical minority is making claims that on the surface appear moderate or at least cogent, that with a little more than a sideways glance reveals that these are coordinated efforts to consolidate positions of authority at every level of society.

From complaints to the FCC about "objectionable" material that focuses on sex, but not violence to this garbage coming out of Kansas and Ohio about challenging the Theory of Evoltution, this time pointing at it obliquely, using hte term Darwinism, and now avoiing the term "Intellignet Design", which is just a euphemism for "Creationism" which is in turn another term for "Religous fundamentalist". Now, they are not trying to get Evolution removed entirely, they just want it questioned in the classroom. Once that happens, it's just a matter of time before the changes start.

From the New York Times:
"In Kansas, Darwinism Goes on Trial Once More"
here

TOPEKA, Kan., May 5 - Six years after Kansas ignited a national debate over the teaching of evolution, the state is poised to push through new science standards this summer requiring that Darwin's theory be challenged in the classroom.

In the first of three daylong hearings being referred to here as a direct descendant of the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial in Tennessee, a parade of Ph.D.'s testified Thursday about the flaws they saw in mainstream science's explanation of the origins of life. It was one part biology lesson, one part political theater, and the biggest stage yet for the emerging movement known as intelligent design, which posits that life's complexity cannot be explained without a supernatural creator.

Darwin's defenders are refusing to testify at the hearings, which were called by the State Board of Education's conservative majority. But their lawyer forcefully cross-examined the other side's experts, pushing them to acknowledge that nothing in the current standards prevented discussion of challenges to evolution, and peppering them with queries both profound and personal.
"Do the standards state anywhere that science, evolution, is in any way in conflict with belief in God?" the lawyer, Pedro Irigonegaray, asked William S. Harris, a chemist who helped write the proposed changes.

When a later witness, Jonathan Wells, said he enjoyed being in the minority on such a controversial topic, Mr. Irigonegaray retorted, "More than being right?"

The problem with that is the Forces of Ignorance are using real scientists' refusal to participate in the farce for their own purposes.

But Linda Holloway, a member of the 1999 state board that dumped evolution, said the mainstream scientists' failure to participate in the hearings signaled that "they're afraid to be cross-examined, they're afraid to defend their theory."

The worst part is that Kansas isn't alone in this foolishness.

If the board adopts the new standards, as expected, in June, Kansas would join Ohio, which took a similar step in 2002, in mandating students be taught that there is controversy over evolution. Legislators in Alabama and Georgia have introduced bills this season to allow teachers to challenge Darwin in class, and the battle over evolution is simmering on the local level in 20 states.

The article also states;

"While the proposed standards for Kansas do not specifically mention intelligent design - and many of its supporters prefer to avoid any discussion of it - critics contend they would open the door not just for those teachings, but to creationism, which holds to the Genesis account of God as the architect of the universe."

Then what? Dress codes to prevent "indecent" clothes like pants for girls? Mandatory drug tests for high school atheletes? Mandatory school prayer? Schools are already forbidden to teach reproductive health issues with kids aside from abstinence only. And we wonder why unwed pregnancy is an issue. That and childhood obesity. NAd school shootings are becoming more and more prevelant.

An animal knows when it is trapped, and acts out accordingly.

Sloth... Continued

2005-05-05T15:53:00.000-07:00
Today's post is a little earlier than usual because I have my account planning class tonight, The Burning Man ARTery crew is meeting tonight, and my wife is going there while I'm at school and then we're going to go home together. I'm going up to Seattle for the weekend. While doing research for another class, I did a quick browse for "Giant Ground Sloth", and pulled up the BBC site, the discovery site and a couple others of note. The proper name is Megatherium

The BBC page ) has a cool little quicktime animation of how the megatherium walked, and links to other information of the world in which it lived.

The most interesting page I came across was from a man who lives in Tabriz in Northwestern Iran. His page holds a theory that the gravitational pull on earth was not as strong during prehistoric times and that is why dinosaurs could grow to such sizes. Interesting theory, but I have to disagree. Since the Earth's mass hasn't changed any, why would gravity behave any different?

Now it is true that the earth's magnetic poles have changed throughout its history, but I don't know all that much about it. I have finals due and I can't go down that rabbit hole just yet.

Finally, yes, you practice going slow in tai chi so your body learns the movements correctly and can do them quicker when needed, because the muscle memory is there. It's also akin to the Japanese Tea Ceremony and all things Zen. You spend you time in contemplation of the moment.

Or so I was taught.

Nine Minutes

2005-05-04T23:44:00.000-07:00
Until a new day. My wife awakes in a little more than five hours, and I with her, perhaps I'll make it out of bved this time. I feel like such a sloth when I don't.

Speaking of sloths, I have a bit of a fascination with them, especially the giant ground sloths of prehistory. They were bigger than a polar bear, and by what we can guess, they also had a similarly slow metabolism as their three-toed relatives. It's also been supposed that avacados evolved the way they did so that their seeds could germinate after being passed through the digestive system of a giant ground sloth or something like it.

Memebers of the edentes family, they are also related to armadillos and the now extinct glyptodon; which was a giant heavily armored version of the armadillo.

The early age of mammals are quite an interesting time, th BBC made a series based on recreating ecosystems of different times on earth. I'll look it up and post it here and have a hyperlink to it from this post as well.

This won't be for awhile, I only have two more weeks left in school and I'm hustling to get things done.

When I was younger I had taken tai chi becasue I heard that once you learned how to use it correctly, it was actually one of the better martial arts available to use in a fight. That was only partially true. I learned how to practice slowly in order to move faster. It also taught me how to be slow and deliberate. Something I desperately need sometimes.

Tuesday, Tuesday

2005-05-03T23:45:00.000-07:00
I used to love Tuesday's.

On Tuesdays, I would eagerly check my email for my weekly fix. I subscribe to Harper's Weekly, The Onion, and the SF Gate's Morning Fix. I now also subscribe to the New York Times In addition, I get Dilbert, and The Boondocks delivered to my primary address and Get Fuzzy to my secondary pn a daily basis, but I'm usually to busy to check them daily, so, I'll go through a week or so at one sitting. About once a month, I'll check out the Sunday comics of Pearls Before Swine, and Pigborn.

The Morning Fix used to be delivered daily, then Mr. Morford got a little too unrestrained and had his chain yanked by management. He then did his column 3 times a week, with comments on the current events. Now he just editorializes. Another good columnist out of the SF Chronicle is Jon Carroll, but I'm a bit busy to read him regularly.

Harper's is the most cogent of them all. I've never read the magazine, but the editors who have put the weekly screed together have an acerbic wit, and truth be told, I trust their aggregate of the news more than just about anyone else's.

The Onion is hilarious, while being deadpan. I can only hope one day to write as well as these people.I was introduced to the Onion by way of reading a column by one of their regulars, a Mr.Herbert Kornfeld, who works in the Accounts Payable department of the Midsate Office Supply. I check my horoscope there as well, it's written by Lloyd Schummer Sr., a retired machinist and A.A.P.B. Certified Astologer.

In addition to these I have subscribed to various Yahoo groups, mostly covering various Western Martial Arts, my Burning Man camp and a few of my favorite artists. I get all of these as digests, mainly because there's nothing going on in any of them that demand my immediate attention. Sometimes, I'll go to Slate and check out what they're saying about the world, and read Doonesbury while I'm there. Uncle Duke rocks, and we all know why.

This is just the stuff I read for fun. You should see what I do when I do research on something.

Shocked and a bit awed.

2005-05-02T21:42:00.000-07:00

This NY Times article covers something that might actually be good for Americans to come out of the BushCo WASP Mafia*, and their increasing consolidation of power and authority.

The article states that while no new legislation is enacted, several departments are more closely coordinating their efforts; namely the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Occupational Safety and Health Administration(OSHA) as well as a group in the Justice Department to go after some of America's most unsafe companies to work for.

" Instead, it seeks to marshal a spectrum of existing laws that carry considerably stiffer penalties than those governing workplace safety alone. They include environmental laws, criminal statutes more commonly used in racketeering and white-collar crime cases, and even some provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, a corporate reform law.

The result, those involved say, should be to increase significantly the number of prosecutions brought against dangerous employers, particularly in cases involving death or injury.

This new approach addresses a chronic weakness in the regulatory system - the failure of federal agencies to take a coordinated approach toward corporations that repeatedly violate the same safety and environmental regulations. The E.P.A. and OSHA in particular have a history of behaving like estranged relatives. Yet the central premise of this unfolding strategy is that shoddy workplace safety often goes hand in hand with shoddy environmental practices."

It begs one question though; who benefits? If BuschCo is so pro-big business, and anti-environment, how come this? Then again, even Nixon did a few good things for the country.

I recommend reading the article, they have a very good example of how multimedia works well on the web to present information more completely than just one medium alone.

The New York Times site does require you to sign in, but it's not that big of a deal, just use a throwaway password, and create a dead-end email address that's only for stuff like this.

That's what I've always done.

*Again, courtesy of Mr. Morford and his column

There's a saying by George

2005-05-01T22:52:00.000-07:00

Orwell said it best in 1984 “Ignorance is Strength”, but strength for whom?

Rolling Stone provides a clue in their latest issue, an article titled The Crusaders;

“These are the evangelical activists behind the nation's most effective political machine -- one that brought more than 4 million new Christian voters to the polls last November, sending George W. Bush back to the White House and thirty-two new pro-lifers to Congress. But despite their unprecedented power, fundamentalists still see themselves as a persecuted minority, waging a holy war against the godless forces of secularism.”

The article later introduces us to the Dominionists "-- biblical literalists who believe God has called them to take over the U.S. government.” This organized group of religious fundamentalists makes Al Qaeda look like a bunch of Little League second stringers in comparison. Muslim nut jobs blow shit up, usually including themselves. Christian whackos are far more insidious; the get on the school board, and organize on the grass-roots level.

“They want to rewrite schoolbooks to reflect a Christian version of American history, pack the nation's courts with judges who follow Old Testament law, post the Ten Commandments in every courthouse and make it a felony for gay men to have sex and women to have abortions. In Florida, when the courts ordered Terri Schiavo's feeding tube removed, it was the Dominionists who organized round-the-clock protests and issued a fiery call for Gov. Jeb Bush to defy the law and take Schiavo into state custody. Their ultimate goal is to plant the seeds of a "faith-based" government that will endure far longer than Bush's presidency -- all the way until Jesus comes back.”

Compared to that, flying a few airplanes into the World Trade Center seems like small potatoes.

America is the most powerful nation in the world with the ability to destroy all life on this planet. We need moderates, not extremists following the will of the people they were elected to represent, not the loudest or best funded special interests.

Granted, I’ve only read the bible all the way through twice, but nowhere did I ever read anything that came out of Jesus of Galilee’s mouth about firebombing abortion clinics or condemning people for daring to love someone. Jesus went where he was needed, the poor and the sick and the downtrodden. His mission on this world was to open the kingdom of heavan and heal men's rift with God. Personally, I think the only time humans are pure are when they are infants.The whole conept of "original sin" never made any sense whatsoever.

The Apostle Paul never even met Jesus when he was alive. How many books did he write of the New Testament? Some biblical scholars even doubt the authenticity of the book of Revelations. That’s not counting any writings that were lost, discarded, or buried in the Vatican.

The parts that I read of the Koran were a little more bloodthirsty, but on the whole, seemed pretty straightforward. The Prophet treated his women as equals, why do women who follow the teachings of this cosmopolitan wise man be forced to hide their beauty, which was bestowed upon them by their Creator? So that they may not tempt men into wickedness? I call bullshit on that. I don’t care what belief system you follow out of the Levant Area, the only person responsible for your sinful ways are you and you alone.

Those who do follow the teachings of Jesus, or Mohammed need to look at the fringes of their religion, and speak out against the overzealous.

For all our sakes.

The adventure continues

2005-04-30T21:03:00.000-07:00

Went to the food court this afternoon. Talked about the dirklings the entire time.

I'm dying to see The Hithchiker's guide to the Galaxy. I heard it's not a completely faithful adaptation. The only movie that ever matched its source material faithfully was Sin City. Wow, incredible movie. I'd forgotten how hokey some comic book dialog is when someone real speaks it.

Next weekend, I'll be up in Seattle for the Girl Cub's birthday. It should be fun. The weekend after that is the premeire of the last Star Wars movie.

School is moving right along.

The adventure continues.

Our heritage

2005-04-29T23:06:00.000-07:00
As Americans, our heritage is split among four general philosophies; you have the idealist, the religous nut, the adventurer, and the opportunist. Over time you see how each has influenced the society we have today, and they are still.

Thanks to our puritanical and religious fundamentalist roots, America equates sex with being "dirty", and as a corollary, "dirty" also equates to "fun".

While living in Europe I was in numerous situations of coed nudity. THis was neither uncommon nor even arousing. people were simply unclothed.

While a bartender in New Orleans*, I saw people of all sorts flash each other in a naughty version of peek-a-boo, with much rejoicing all around.

Same species, so there wasn't anything special in the parts being flashed, but it was the naughtiness of it all that made it fun. I witnessed many people doing many things they would never admit to even thinking about back home.

It all comes down to context.

* Great place to get over a broken heart

Some people are alive simply because it is illegal to kill them.

2005-04-28T22:06:00.000-07:00

There is nothing wrong with the act of killing, per se. It's been done enough times for enough reasons that it is simply an act. Morality is not the issue, I won't pretend t try to enlighten you with my morals, don't be foolish enough to try to force yours upon me.

The administration of the act of taking another's life needs to be regulated, One of the primary reasons for customs is so that we don't have to worry about killing strangers we meet and hoping they don't try the same.

So. what criteria should we, as a society use for determinging whether one's death by another's hand is legal.

Should we use intent?

When I went to visit my father in the hospital last, he was filled with tubes and machines that regulated his life functions. He was disoriented by the pain of the pneumonia ravaging his weakened body.

If I had a dog in that state, no one would think twice if I put him out of his misery. As the current laws stand, I could only hold his hand, and say words of comfort.

When I was in the Air Force, my role involved planning bombing missions causing the deaths of those designated Enemies of the State. I did my job well. The better I did my job, the smaller the net loss in life and damage to property. I also planned nuclear missions. Missions that, had they come to pass, would have destroyed life as we know it. For my service, I was paid well, and to this day I have benenfits due to my veteran's status.

In June of 1990 my mother's life was taken from her. Suddenly and without warning, my mother was no more. She was coming home from work and getting ready for my sister's first baby shower. The Jeep that hit her car head-on ripped the top half of her honda off. She died instantly. She was not killed by an enemy, she was not in a war zone, nor was this politcally motivated. Her killer was just too drunk to safely drive home. She was over three times the legal limit of intoxication. She hadn't known she had a body count for two days afterward.

When I arrived in America to help handle these affairs, I swore an oath on my mother's grave. I would have this woman's life for her misdeed. Society's debt may be paid, but she spilled the blood of my kin, and that can't go unpunished. To this day, no one's told me anything identifying about this person. I only know that it's a woman.

As important as my mother's life was to me, I have other lives that need me more. My children and wife. Were I not needed by them, I would be free to have ended my father's suffering, and avenged my mother's death.

So, why is my mother's killer allowed to walk the streets of our society, protected by the laws she decided to ignore? I know, when she stepped into her jeep that night, she didn't intend to kill someone. It was her actions and lack of responsibility that did. This was murder, albeit unintentional murder.

Nothing will bring my mother back. My father is in no more pain. Yet, were I to act in either matter, I would face prosecution by the society that trained and paid me to do such things with impunity.

As precious as our society claims life to be, there are ways to still legally end it, and things like assisted suicide should be allowed because of one essential element, consent.

When assigning a death sentence on someone, usually that person has committed a crime against society that that person has forfeited their right to live in this society. I see no problem culling from our society those who prey upon it. The cruel and unusual element of modern executions is that it simply takes too long to go through all the bureaucracy to get to the actual execution.

Several generations ago, the Western world outlawed a time-honored practice of dueling, which was the authorized taking of another's life, granted that the person was also trying to end your life.

Personally, I would like to see the return of the old dueling laws, where one could redress cases against one's honor in the field. If one were to petition a court the same way one gets a restraining order for example, and wait a certain period of time, say 2 weeks to 30 days, then if both parties still wish to settle things on the field of honor, then so be it, and no further repercussions. The courts would of course collect some fees for the petition, etc. We could even generate revenue by selling broadcast rights of the event.

Fie!

2005-04-27T23:55:00.000-07:00
It's the end of another day, and I have yet to write.

Dsicipline is what it's all about. I have had quite a day. Art Direction kicks my ass.

I know it's all about execution. But I excel at the concept and writing about it. I just get tired of doing iterations, ad infinitum.

I enjoy drawing my robots, and gadgets when the fancy takes me.

I like writing only slightly more.

Research is okay. I look at the world a little differently than most.

So, what's a gregarious mediavore to do?

I hate navel-gazing. and have little tolerance for writings that do. I had hoped most of my entries to be informative essays, not just rants about the moment in which I find myself.

I will do better.

Go and check out rotten.com It's well written and deals with good topics.

Today's Tarot.

2005-04-26T10:59:00.000-07:00
I have noticed a regular ritual I'm starting to pick up again. I don't believe in magic or "magick", or any of that crap anymore than I believe in any sort of god. That goes for the Cthulu mythos as well as the more popular strains of delusion and mass hysteria that we hominids call religion.

I ascribe to the belief that we as a species are always looking for patterns, even when there are none, and that looking at a bunch of pretty cards will probably key into my subconscious and maybe provide me with some clues as to what I should be mindful of in my life.

I call them 'story cards' to the dirklings. We used to look at them together when I lived in Seattle. This last visit the Girl Cub found the box again in the new place, and I keep them in a place I can check them regularly.

I've noticed a few trends of late.

It used to be that when I was going through some kind of drama, I would always get certain cards in certain positions telling me certain doom. I know, go figure.

I love how rich the colors are and the level of detail. I use the Robin Wood Deck available here and I think I'll start posting them on a new blog just for that. We'll see how long that lasts.

These cards no more tell me the future than does the local paper's Horoscope, yet, there's a certain charm to looking at them, and telling today's tale in them.

I came across this site ages ago,facade.com, and they have all manner of divination tools, run by CGI scripts. Lots of fun. Just remember; all divination is intuition, nothing else. Make your own future.

Ess Oh ess

2005-04-25T23:15:00.000-07:00

I have posted three pieces to my other blog because of my Art Direction class. This morning though, I watched the video "Godzilla, Tokyo S.O.S." Where Godzilla invades Japan (again) to reclaim the bones of the Original Godzilla that were used to make Kiryuu G, in English, Mecha Godzilla.

This one is like the third or fourth Mecha Godzilla that's been made. the first one I remember was in the early 70's late 60's and it was an alien construct that kicked serious ass. Anguiras ass, to be precise.

Anyway.

The spokestwins for Mothra showed up at an old guy's place, who had been to Infant Island a long time ago. They asked him to persuade the Government to return the bones to the sea and let the spirit of Godzilla rest.

Mosura, or Mothra as she's known in the West is my favorite raver Kaiju, One of her attacks is Glitter. How cool is that? She gets her thorax handed to her in a one on one against the Big G, but really, who can beat Godzilla? No one, that's who. Not any of the Ghidorah incarnations, not Destroya, nobody. Why? because who's name's on the title? Godzilla, bitch.

If you recognized any of the names in the preceding paragraphs, you're hopeless too.

Oddly enough, the theme in this one like most of the themes of these movies, is that Mankind needs to face the damage we've done to the earth.

Ironic, given the selective memory of the Japanese regarding a little territorial dispute called World War Two.

I have great respect for the culture and history of that Island Nation. I want to see the Snow Macaques wintering in the hot springs in Hokkaido. I love the traditional architecture. I drowned in Zen after I studied Jiu Jitsu, the first martial art I ever studied. I own several copies of Go Rin No Sho, so don't misunderstand.

Every culture has bloodied hands. Only by recognizing the horrors of our pasts can we prevent them from recurring.

Or, as the motto of the Simon Wiesenthal Center is, "Never Again."

Titles and Codes

2005-04-24T23:06:00.000-07:00
Here it is, another Sunday night, and I've spent most of the day getting the ingredients I need to finish a school project.

I have one project, a campaign for a site, petfinder.com It's a cool project, and I have a good concept and all that. I've posted them on my other blog.

The problem I have lies with the fact that I've used some illustration art from an online source of an artist whose work I like quite a bit. I came across his work at Twisted Kaiju Theater's K-Girls section, and then followed a few links to where he keeps some of his other art. He goes by the handle Heckfire and his deviant art account is here. The image I used is here.

For the assignment, my teacher liked the execution of my concept so I've been inking in the artwork and tightening up the other two ads as well. I'll post them later when they're more complete.

So, I'm in a bit of a bind. I am giving credit to the illustrator, and I want his blessing. I also know, that as soon as I can afford to pay for his services, I will. But, as a humble student, I have access to stuff like this under Fair Use clause of Copyright Law.

Title 17 of the US Code covers Copyright law. Its purpose is to "Promote Science and the useful arts." It's here(http://www.copyright.gov/) to check out, and the forms for registering your stuff are downloadable.

When I was studying Multimedia, I had to take a class covering the topic, because, when using multiple sources, you have to know who gets credit and how to go about making sure everyone's rights are protected. My teacher was a Ms. Julia Harmatz, an Intellectual Property lawyer from Boston who studied at Loyola University in Louisiana. She was passionate about her craft, and was hard on her students because it was such an important thing to know.

Under Title 17, there are six rights the creator of a piece of art has governing her or his art. There are four cases, however, that falls under the "Fair Use" clause.

... for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching (including multiple copies for classroom use), scholarship, or research, is not an infringement of copyright.

So basically: Criticism, Editorial, News, and Scholarship.

Fair use was guaranteed from the outset, because it's part of our freedom of speech. Notice how Criticism was the first freedom listed. I think that's because it's our god-given right to mock whatever we see fit.

There's 4 criteria used to determine if something falls under Fair Use; Purpose, Nature of the work, Amount used, the Effect of the works' potential marketability.

So, with this project there's three people I can't let down, the Artist, my teacher, and my IP Law teacher.

I'm not sure if I ever thanked her for her class, so on the off chance she ever comes across this:

Thank you, Ms. Harmatz. Thank you very much.

Saturday Night

2005-04-23T23:54:00.000-07:00
And we just got in from a football game. The Oakland Banshees, a woman's football team.

It was great. That's saynig somehting because I hate football.

The Oakland Banshees played the Redding Rage, and beat them 32 to 7, I think. It might have been a shut out. It was football at it's core values, no overpriced beer, no overpriced food, played in a college lot, and there were about as many players as there were fans.

It was good fun.

Toady-licious

2005-04-22T17:53:00.000-07:00

How can doing the right thing for the right reason still feel a bit wrong?

In my Account Planning class, we've had a guest speaker, and class was held in an agency. On both occasions, I sent a thank-you email to the parties involved. I feel a little like a suck-up for doing so, but I always was under the impression that one sent a thank you note after a meeting.

That's how I started courting my wife. We had known each other in Germany, and our mutual friend kept in touch with both of us throughout the intervening years. When he had bought a house in Oakland, I came down from Seattle to pay him a visit, and to eat at all my favorite restaurants. On the last night, she joined us in the Mission for some latino food. I think it was a Nicaraguan restaurant.

She had just gotten back from swim practice that she was doing to get ready for the Leukemia Society's triathlon. Her hair was wildly unkempt and she was just as untamed. Sparks flew over the dinner table, and when I got back to Seattle, all I could think about was, "Here we go again. "

So I sent here a thank you email. After a few weeks of emails and phone calls, she paid me a visit. a few more weeks, and I visited her. In November of '99, I moved down here to get involved with the latest Gold Rush. I hated moving away from my children, but there was no life for me there except them. I wasn't doing anybody any good, and aside from some freelance work, and a tech support gig for Adobe, I wasn't using my degree in multimedia.

We were wed in Shakespeare's Garden in October 2003. The dirklings were in attendance and gave their blessings at the ceremony.

Happily ever after, eh?

Welcome to the jungle

2005-04-21T14:09:00.000-07:00
The Internet is the best time-waster. You can do any kind of research, or find most any forms of entertainment. A triple canopy rainforest; you find the strata you're most comfortable, and tend to stay. Like most large metropolitan areas, I rarely go to the Castro, except during Halloween, and I don't think I've ever been to Hunter's Point. I work and go to school in the Financial District, and I play in Golden Gate Park. I enjoy the Mission's food, and sometimes shop there.

I live in a neighborhood called Piedmont. I've heard that most people who live in Piedmont try to distance themselves from being considered Oaklanders. Something I don't quite understand; Oakland is the birthplace of the Black Panthers, Bruce Lee's first school in America was here. Oakland has a lot to offer, you just can't be afraid.

That's true with most places though.

Today's post is a bit rushed, and for that I apologize.

*******

I'm trying to keep my nest clean, and it's a constant struggle, because I have so many school-related things to distract me, not to mention that I have this wonderful new tool with which to do them.

The Devil's ...

2005-04-20T23:44:00.000-07:00

It started out innocently enough. I was chatting with my friend via Yahoo instant message, and he referred me to an online web comic called Something Positive. It was biting, and relatively funny. I liked how the creator kept his ideas relatively fresh, and his characters evolved over time. Something sorely lacking in both comic strips and comic books.

Well, one thing led to another, and I'm catching myself reading several online comics now.

The Devil's Pantie's is one. The main page is here, but if you have the time, I recommend starting at the beginning hereso you can watch how things progress. One thing; the author can't spell worth beans, so if that's in your menagerie of pet peeves, don't go. I assume she has some form of dyslexia. Usually that drives me nuts, I can't stand l33t, nor do I tolerate all that crap about misspelling words on purpose that some people insist on doing, because they think they're being 'creative'. Here, it seems quaint, cute even.

It's not War and Peace, nor is it even Calvin and Hobbes. It's kind of like watching a garden, not much appears to change, and yet over time, you see the subtleties and feel like an idiot trying to explain it to others.

I think one of the reasons I like the strip is that she has an affection for all things Batman, chunky boots, and hand to hand weaponry. What's not to like?

Truly, Madly, Deeply

2005-04-19T23:38:00.000-07:00

When my family spent a Christmas vacation in Southern California in 1977/78, we took a day trip to San Francisco. That was where I found my first True Love. We rode the newly opened BART, and went to the Exploratorium. I loved the feel of The City, and we'd barely covered any of it. I was hooked.

In 1986, I was set to graduate for my two high schools, Fort Hayes, a sort of vocational school where I studied fine art, and my regular school, Northland. During my Spring Break, as everyone went to FLorida, I took a bus to San Francisco to show my portfolio to a school there, in hopes of getting a scholarship. I had basically looked up san Francisco Art schools in a catalog at Ft. Hayes. Everyone else went to the Columbus College of Art & Design. I wanted out. I wanted to go to The City.

I never held too many illusions about my talent. I never thought I was any good, and my mother was fond of pointing that out on a regular basis. So, if I couldn't dazzle them with my skill, I'd blow them away with my productivity. The average student would make one big painting. I made ten. The average student in my class made one weaving, I made three, not matter what it was, I made several of them, because I knew they wouldn't be that good, so one of them would hit. I would work on at least three or four paintings at any one time, so that if I get stuck on a composition, I'd just change my focus to another one. As it stood, I had several paintings in the Governor's Art Show in the mid 80's. Don't ask me which, I kept no records when I left.

The school I went to show my portfolio to was impressed, and gave me a small scholarship. That was enough for me to go.

However, at the time, they had no student housing. I had never lived on my own. My family thought it was a bad idea to live so far away, and as a result I failed in my first attempt at living in San Francisco. I failed miserably.

I had always gotten The Blues from time to time, but after this failure, I was a wreck. I moved back home, and less than a year later, I followed my parents wishes and joined the Air Force. I did this after a week long bender at the processing place in Columbus, but that's another story for another time.

Almost six years later, I got out. My first wife picked me up at the air port and asked for a divorce on the ride to her place. A few months later, I moved to New Orleans*. I was still struggling with culture shock in Nebraska after living in Germany for so long.

After living there for six months, a few friends were going to go to Berkeley to college, and needed a ride out. So, of course I gave gave them a ride.

I was back with my first True Love. It was wonderful, walking the streets of the different neighborhoods. The City in 1993 was only slightly different than it is now. More artists, more LSD, slightly cheaper rent. I lived in The City, and developed a bit of agoraphobia whenever I went to the East Bay, or beyond. I saw no reason to leave.

Then I met my future second ex-wife. Long story. We moved to Seattle. Had a couple kids. I went back to school. got an associates degree in multimedia, found out I'm haywired, got a divorce, etc. The usual.

So, now I'm back. Been here since 1999. Survived the Dot-Com Bust, mostly ok. I live in the East Bay, where I can look at my True Love at sunset, and remember why I'm here. Met a woman I knew in Germany, found out she's The One. Didn't believe that existed 'til recently.

Now, I'm back in school. This time, for advertising. If I play my cards right, I'll graduate almost twenty years after first showing my portfolio to them.

Note* if you EVER go through a divorce, move to New orleans for awhile, I highly recommend it.

For Algernon and Charlie

2005-04-18T23:54:00.000-07:00
I hate deadlines.

Perhaps hate is too strong a word. I know having a deadline makes me enforce a discipline I might not otherwise have. For example, I should have gone to bed a couple hours ago, but I decided to check one list I haven't read in awhile.

Big mistake.

Twisted Kaiju Theater is a lot of harmless fun in bad taste. Like their motto used to be, "Come for the poop jokes, stay for the K girls." K-girls being Kaiju Girls, or pin ups of interpretations of Daikaiju, or giant monsters. They’re quite lovely in a quirky sort of way. Some can be offensive, but that's part of its charm. The strip is a series of photos of plastic kaiju, like one of the many incarnations of Godzilla, or one of his enemies or allies in the movies, and word balloons are photoshopped in. Funny stuff. On one of their forums, one of the members posted a simple question: what kind of video game would we make based off the kaiju girls?

I should have just hit the back button.

I read a couple of the replies, and not knowing what they were talking about, I researched the genre of games that were mentioned. Big mistake. I've spent the past couple hours copying pictures, and making notes on these types of games.

I have a multimedia degree, and once upon a time I was pretty good with Macromedia's Director, and passable in using Flash. I forgot all my Lingo scripting, and I used the older versions of Flash, the ones that came out before there was ActionScript. When I was in school I focused on the Producer's track, the generalist in a generalist's field. I even made a few games back in The Day. The one I remeber was a version of Bomberman, using Dilbert characters. and instead of dropping bombs, Dilbert had to drop memos to get a certain number of characters to go to his meeting. Simple but fun.

A year or two ago, I met with someone who was looking for an aspiring game designer. I've always jotted down ideas since going to AIS, and so I answered the email. This was during the bottom of the dot-com bust and things fell through. I would have liked to seen the project completed, but to no avail. Perhaps someday, but not anytime soon.

So this evening was mostly an exercise in futility. I used to know how to make these things, I know how to set up the design documents, and could reasonably get things started, if I had a crew, some time, and maybe a budget to work with.

Story of my life.

There’s a book, “Flowers for Algernon,” that was also made into a movie. It was written as a journal, and the character, Charlie Gordon was not too bright. Algernon was the mouse that the experimental procedure was done on before it was tried on him. This procedure made both Charlie and Algernon smart, but it was only temporary. A similar theme was done on Nickelodeon’s show “Rugrats” where Chucky, who suffers form sinus problems, goes through a similar ordeal as Charlie, and the effects were also temporary.

I cried when I saw it, mostly because up until that time, I had forgotten the original.

A few of my favorite things.

2005-04-17T22:45:00.000-07:00
I've had my Mac 48 hours now, and I am still reveling in its delights.
Please forgive me if go on too much. I love it's tactile feedback, the keys are light and responsive. The brushed metal feels cool, and not just in temperature.

I had a dream once that featured cool aluminum accouterments, but I'll talk more about that some other time.

No, right now, I am composing on my mac whilst sitting on the loo, looking at the Kraus collection of Sir Francis Drake. Available here. I'm wondering why I've never looked up the Library of Congress before. I live for finding these kinds of things. I feel like such an otaku looking up antique maps, and historical or geographical minutiae. But I must defend myself, at least my useless information might become useful some day, and as far as entertainment goes, well, there are worse ways to waste time.

I used to blame my vocation in the Air Force for this predilection; I was a Target Intelligence Specialist. My job was to make the plans to get the Right bomb on the right target at the right time. So I was trained in ordnance, maps and charts, aerial navigation techniques, a little trigonometry to figure out where a bomb should theoretically land, and of course the library sciences, so that I could Get Smart Fast on anything that was needed. I was enlisted; so I had to have the answers.

But that's not really where I picked it up.

I am from Columbus, Ohio.

I was born in Akron, but moved from there at an early age, and spent most of my formative years in Columbus. So I claim that as my home. If you're really interested, here's a satellite image of my old house, courtesy of Google's latest acquisition. If you zoom all the way in, it's the second house west on the southern side of the street from where the tag marks the spot. A bit has changed since I moved away in 1987, but most hasn't. I needed to get away. I just knew I had to with that passion That only an eighteen year old has. I had some good times, but I had to hit the road.

So, until I could escape, I immersed myself in National Geographic, PBS nature shows, anything and everything that would show me a glimpse of the wide world out there. This was in the early days of cable, so the Discovery Channel was on the horizon, but not readily available just yet. The library was also a haven. I vaguely remember a poem we had to memorize in the third grade about maps commenting on the "armchair vagabond" and it struck me then as it does now that there is always an escape route.

Even if it is only in the mind.

Hello

2005-04-16T20:53:00.000-07:00

I am writing this post from my brand new Powerbook G4 laptop. When I say laptop, I mean laptop. The 12" screen gives this baby a small footprint.

I have homework to do and I'll post more later, I swear. I just want my first piece of writing on this machine to be a post to my 'blog.

I know, I'm a dork, but whatta ya gonna do? I like it.

I Lost It

2005-04-15T15:53:00.000-07:00

I shouldn’t have. But I did, and I hate myself for it. Only one week, and I couldn’t keep myself in check. His chemical choke-chain has been all out of whack this week. Also, thanks to his meds, he’s sensitive to bright sunlight, and with no shades or hats in sight haven’t helped matters.

He’s floppy. It drives me nuts. Where has the graceful pup I had in Seattle gone? He whines, and does these passive-aggressive grunts. His nasally, gritted-teeth mumbling drives me right over the edge.

I have shown him a better way to shield his eyes from the sun, instead he wraps his wrist around his brow, palm turned upward.

I’ve made him eat this afternoon, cheese nachos. Real challenge.

I picked him up and barked in my old Sergeant Williams Voice- the one that makes pitbulls piss themselves and most grown men submit. It’s come in handy to have, but those are other tales for other times.

I placed him back on the ground and sent him crying to bed.

His Sister Daughter of Hippolyta, bore witness, and is not approving. Reasoning with a Taurus Queen Bee is never easy, even harder, when you know your wrong.

I have to apologize, and we must move on. This is not how men should act. The hard part is knowing the experience is more potent than the words. I have much to do and no time to do it in.

We should have left an hour ago. Now it’s going to be rough.

Damascus

2005-04-14T23:54:00.000-07:00

Folded and Flattened. Heated multiple times, and hammered repeatedly. The traditional way was labor intensive, and somewhat of a mystery. Today, with modern methods and tools, good Damascus steel is only slightly less intensive. There are no real shortcuts, only technological enhancements to the process.

So it goes also with my children. They leave Friday, and with them another piece seems missing. And yet another pounding blow from which to recover. They too have gone through the heat of living under a different house with different rules and totally different lives. And they fold over again to the other, to be reshaped yet again. And in a few months, they come down for summer, and the process completes another cycle.

Sharp, heterogeneous, durable. Beautiful and useful.

Taking Time

2005-04-13T23:54:00.000-07:00
In the time it takes to boil water for tea, breakfast is done. In the time it takes to brush your teeth, I am dressed. In the time it takes to say an offhanded remark, a sentence is made. In the span of 30 seconds, a commercial is over on television. Incidentally, also the same time the average knife fight lasts. Checking the email only takes a few minutes, enough to ruin a moment.
In the time it takes to post to a 'blog, a new day starts.

In the time it takes to finish a Guinness, an evening ends. A class is only three hours, yet in that span, countless lives have ended and begun.

In the space of a week, a man can remember why he hates to say goodbye. A boy can re-learn to climb trees, and a girl-cub can be taught the meaning of jealousy.

During a two-hour movie, popcorn is made, the alchemy of milkshakes is shared and a family is re-forged.

Time is always being spent, lost, taken, and wasted. We use it as a commodity since Henry Ford and mass production brought us the Industrial Age. Before then, you were paid by the job, on a salary, a retainer. The time clock, the wage slaves.

Time is always running out.

They leave Friday.

The end of the day.

2005-04-12T22:22:00.000-07:00
The end of the day.

It has been quite a day, especially for a Tuesday. My son the picky eater and my daughter, the voracious one, and I went for a walk to return some videos. The three of us settled on a Japanese restaurant that specialized in Sushi. My son love calamari, and had some of the fried variety yesterday. Today he expressed interest in sushi that had a slice of octopus tentacle. Also, for some reason, he wanted the one of salmon roe. I guess he liked the idea of fish eggs. He ate them. And he ate, and ate some more.

Allow me to clarify. His mother sends down explicit feeding instructions with the lad. He’s ten and weighs between 47 and 52 pounds. When he left me last summer, he weighed 57 pounds, and started the summer at about 50. When I say picky, I’m not kidding. He got off the plane a couple days ago looking near panicked that I might not have his favorite du jour, coconut shrimp. I told him the same rules apply that always does. He eats what I make; I’ll make anything, but I narrow the choices down to a few options to make and of those options he’s got to eat what he's picked.

He’s his father’s son. Haywired. He takes the same drugs I do, Wellbutrin, and Depakote. He’s taking twice my dosage, and he’s literally a third of my body mass. His mother decides to choose her battles differently than I. I want him to run, to play to be angry when he feels it, actually I want him to feel whatever he feels, to not be afraid of them, but to be in control of his moods, and not the other way around. Most importantly, there are times when you only have a few choices, and the most important ones are how you react to what’s going on.

Today, I cut out his daily dose of Depakote. This entire trip, he’s had tremors in his hands. This is one dexterous kid, a Legomaniac. Asking him how long it’s gone on, he claims ignorance. His mother never noticed. My current wife alleges that as long as he’s quiet, his household doesn’t notice details like that. I’m not sure. Today we went to the park after picking up my wife, and he chased Wild Geese.

He climbed trees.

Sunday, he had a meltdown trying to climb a tree. he stumbled through Golden Gate park. He also was forced to eat a slice of cheese pizza. I don't remember him hating pizza. I know he prefers pesto over marinara.

After watching the spectacle for an hour or so in the fading light of a spring day, I made a diagnosis. I think I know what the boy needs: sunshine, a place to run and maybe a dog to play with and take care of.

There’s a saying

2005-04-11T22:22:00.000-07:00

When I was in the military, I used to hear the oft-quoted phrase “Knowledge is Power.” Well, I disagree, in part. I believe “The timely application of knowledge is power.” If you know something, and unable or unwilling to act upon it, what power do you really possess?

This similar to the Second Rule: Never make a promise or a threat you are unable or unwilling to carry out. The First Rule is, of course: No Witnesses. Similar but not quite in the same league, as the Rule of Thirds, or Threes, depending on whom you talk to.

These are different from the three laws of Magick, which are; Identity, Analogy, and Reciprocity. Which is altogether different from Newton’s Laws of Physics.

I like the inspiration poster you always see about persistence, where it exhorts that trait above talent, and skill and all other traits, because that is truly at the heart of any achievement. Or there is an equation that Success is 1% inspiration, 99% perspiration.

And for those of you who don’t know, Love isn’t the most powerful force in the Universe, it’s inertia.

Or so I’ve heard(read).

Oh dear, not again.

2005-04-10T23:57:00.000-07:00
3 minutes to midnight and not a post yet.

oy.

My dirklings are here. They flew in yesterday, and this was their first full day in daddy's world. I have my concerns, as always about them. They always gp through a kind of culture shock when they come here. I have expectatios that are different form their mother's.

I expect them to succeed at things, not to quit, and to try new things. I also expect them to burp loudly, eat heartily, and run quickly. They are children and their primary peurpose in life is to explore.

After all; life is an adventure.

Something I'm passionate about.

2005-04-09T23:40:00.000-07:00
I'm not sure why this issue gets me worked up.

My literary hero, Stephen Jay Gould, wrote so lucidly on evolution monthly for Scientific American(I think) for over 20 years. I mourned his passing as I mourned Hunter S. Thompson, and to a lesser extant, almost as much as I mourned my father's passing.

I have read it argued from so many angles, and proven so many times in so many ways that it's difficult for to imagine why anyone would think otherwise.

But it still is being debated.

Creationism has been proven false more times than any other crackpot idea that's festered in the collective consciousness of this great country.

We are the only country that even remotely considers creationism. No less than two Popes on two separate occasions posited that evolution was the purview of science, and that the mysteries of the soul were the realm of religion.

Evolution and its mechanism, Natural Selection, is called a Theory, because by definition in scientific terms a theory is:

“A set of statements or principles devised to explain a group of facts or phenomena, especially one that has been repeatedly tested or is widely accepted and can be used to make predictions about natural phenomena.” *

Like racism, sexism, and other forms of ignorance in America; creationism must be confronted and rooted out like the bitter weed it is. One wonders what other agenda is being furthered, what power base is being established when reason is being turned on its head.

Orwell said it best in 1984 “Ignorance is Strength”, but strength for whom?

*The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language, Fourth EditionCopyright © 2000 by Houghton Mifflin Company.Published by Houghton Mifflin Company. All rights reserved.

Freitag

2005-04-08T11:17:00.000-07:00
I’ve taken the day off to get my house in order for the dirklings’ visit. I always get antsy when they’re about to arrive. They live with their mother for most of the time, spending summers and the occasional break with me. Christmas is different, my ex and I agreed that we should all have Christmas together. I’ve seen enough of that drama played out in airports, McDonald’s and Zoos. Weekend parents, usually fathers. They look guilty, or sad maybe is a better way to describe it. It’s a look of pain, and regret and trying not to let on too much. It stains the time they do have together. The kids are hip to it, and they’re trying to keep an even keel, because they have to juggle their parents, looking forward to seeing one, while having to leave the other. This is, for the most part, the only life they’ve known.

People regret things they haven’t done more that the things they have. These weekenders try, and that’s the important part.

I’m noticing more and more parents have that look and they’re still married. Their kids are so active, and both parents work, so there’s simply no time.

Mine is the generation that had to deal with the fallout of the Divorce Boom of the sixties and seventies. People had to me; whoever that was, and didn’t stay together. My parents only divorced after the kids were out of school. I was the only one among my friends who had the original set of parents. That might explain a lot of the resurgence in concepts like polyamory, and having a tight circle of friends, and loose affiliations with one’s birth family.

I personally feel that I’ve failed my children because I couldn’t keep things together. My daughter wasn’t old enough to remember me living with her, due to work and school schedules. My son, however, is another story. He’s dealt with things quite well, but I’ll never forget him tapping my ex-wife’s leg and speaking on my behalf in the language of a two year old “Daddy not bad, not bad.” It makes me wonder if the other Weekenders relive those moments as often as I seem to?

He was also sound asleep when we’d argue; fortunately they never saw any of that. I was going crazy at the time, with all the stress of family and school. Literally crazy. There’s no other way to describe it.

I don’t blame anyone, save myself sometimes, and things have worked out fine.

Divorce means making the compromises you couldn’t or wouldn’t do while you were married. Time and distance seems to have evened things out, and aside from a few lifestyle differences, we agree on the fundamentals of rearing the kids. I see that as having them multicultural. Now, instead of two parents, they have three.

It could always be worse, and everyone involved knows it.

My wife;

2005-04-07T23:42:00.000-07:00

I love her.

First and foremost, that much is true. I never believed the theory that there is one person for everyone, or even the outdated notion of True Love.

She’s proven me wrong.

I believe that relationships are like alcoholism; you can only take it one day at a time, and disaster is always one mistake away.

Not to say we live in a perfect world or that we don’t have ups and downs. Far from it. Our life, our love is an adventure, and I could see no other to share it with than her.

One of the reasons we have life on this earth, is because we have chaos, and change. There is variety and dynamic forces always at work, on both the macro and micro levels.

So it is, with my Love and I. Hour of tedium punctuated with moment of sheer bliss. Or chaos, or hatred, or terror. Take your pick.

Aside from the dirklings, she is my reason for being.

The Cocktail Napkin Theory.

2005-04-06T23:40:00.000-07:00
‘Sketchbook’ is a bit of a misnomer for what I carry around with me. I took a binder clip, and a bunch of paper that had been printed on and cut it in half. It’s not only free, but it’s a lot easier to draw on than most sketchbooks. I call this the ‘cocktail napkin effect’ because it is free; I am free to put any idea down without consequence, thereby freeing me from having to come up with the “right” idea. No pressure! I can doodle all day, and when I'm ready to refine, I break out my real sketchbook, or marker paper or what have you.

‘Keep a small book of papers with you everywhere you go so that you can write down or draw an idea when it comes to mind’

I think that was either Michelangelo or Da Vinci. Could have been both. Edison kept a notebook, as did most thinkers and tinkerers throughout time.

Ideas are as cheap as the paper you write them on. Execution is what’s important. You can crank out ideas all day, and if you don’t execute them the right way in the right instance, you’re pretty screwed.

I love my little ‘sketchbook.’ I really do. I’ve even given a few out. It’s amazing how touched people are by such a minor gesture. Maybe it really is the small kindnesses in life.

Who knew?