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Tuesday, April 21st, 2009
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11:18 pm - On the other hand...
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Sorry, guys; it's over in four.
current music: "Aufwiedersehen" :: Hanzel und Gretyl :: (Über Alles)
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| Sunday, January 6th, 2008
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11:15 am - Land of the Greed and the Home of the Slaves
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I can't vote but I can still rant about it. Here is my list for who is not going to do well based on the fact that people I like never get votes — except I think Giuliani cheated somehow; there's no way I'd rate him that high:
94% Mike Gravel
94% Dennis Kucinich
81% John Edwards
77% Chris Dodd
77% Barack Obama
75% Hillary Clinton
74% Joe Biden
69% Bill Richardson
42% Rudy Giuliani
34% Ron Paul
30% John McCain
23% Mike Huckabee
21% Mitt Romney
16% Tom Tancredo
9% Fred Thompson
2008 Presidential Candidate Matching Quiz
current music: "Chilliwack Milk Maid" :: G42 :: (Podcast)
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| Tuesday, November 27th, 2007
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7:57 am - Hooray!
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| Thursday, October 18th, 2007
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12:40 am
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"This is the only story of mine whose moral I know. I don't think it's a marvellous moral; I simply happen to know what it is: We are what we pretend to be, so we must be careful about what we pretend to be.
"My personal experience with Nazi monkey business was limited. There were some vile and lively native American Fascists in my home town of Indianapolis during the thirties, and somebody slipped me a copy of The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, I remember, which was supposed to be the Jews' secret plan for taking over the world. And I remember some laughs about my aunt, too, who married a German German, and who had to write to Indianapolis for proofs that she had no Jewish blood. The Indianapolis mayor knew her from high school and dancing school, so he had fun putting ribbons and official seals all over the documents the Germans required, which made them look like eighteenth-century peace treaties.
"After a while the war came, and I was in it, and I was captured, so I got to see a little of Germany from the inside while the war was still going on. I was a private, a battalion scout, and, under the terms of the Geneva Convention, I had to work for my keep, which was good, not bad. I didn't have to stay in prison all the time, somewhere out in the countryside. I got to go to a city, which was Dresden, and to see the people and the things they did.
"There were about a hundred of us in our particular work group, and we were put out as contract labour to a factory that was making a vitamin-enriched malt syrup for pregnant women. It tasted like thin honey laced with hickory smoke. It was good. I wish I had some right now. And the city was lovely, highly ornamented, like Paris, and untouched by war. It was supposedly an "open" city, not to be attacked since there were no troop concentrations or war industries there.
"But high explosives were dropped on Dresden by American and British planes on the night of February 13, 1945, just about twenty-one years ago, as I now write. There were no particular targets for the bombs. The hope was that they would create a lot of kindling and drive firemen underground.
"And then hundreds of thousands of tiny incendiaries were scattered over the kindling, like seeds on freshly turned loam. More bombs were dropped to keep firemen in their holes, and all the little fires grew, joined one another, and became one apocalyptic flame. Hey presto: fire storm. It was the largest massacre in European history, by the way. And so what?
"We didn't get to see the fire storm. We were in a cool meat-locker under a slaughterhouse with our six guards and ranks and ranks of dressed cadavers of cattle, pigs, horses, and sheep. We heard the bombs walking around up there. Now and then there would be a gentle shower of calcimine. If we had gone above to take a look, we would have been turned into artifacts characteristic of fire storms: seeming pieces of charred firewood two or three feet long – ridiculously small human beings, or jumbo fried grasshoppers, if you will.
"The malt syrup factory was gone. Everything was gone but the cellars where 135,000 Hansels and Gretels had been baked like gingerbread men. So we were put to work as corpse miners, breaking into shelters, bringing bodies out. And I got to see many German types of all ages as death had found them, usually with valuables in their laps. Sometimes relatives would come to watch us dig. They were interesting, too.
"So much for Nazis and me.
"If I'd been born in Germany, I suppose I would have been a Nazi, bopping Jews and gypsies and Poles around, leaving boots sticking out of snowbanks, wanning myself with my secretly virtuous insides. So it goes.
"There's another clear moral to this tale, now that I think about it: When you're dead you're dead.
"And yet another moral occurs to me now: Make love when you can. It's good for you."
— Introduction to Mother Night (1966) by Kurt Vonnegut, Jr. (1922-2007)
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| Friday, September 21st, 2007
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6:57 pm - Fall back
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A couple more days of summer but the weather has decided to be autumn already....
A week or two ago, I was going to post a pool to anyone who might want to guess when the USD will fall to par with the CAD.
Too late.
I suppose that's just as well. Such a geek thing to do. And I wasn't going to offer prizes anyway.
I'm going away for a little while again. Not that I have enough presence in this blog-world that anyone would notice. Going to visit the sun for a while to bid a proper farewell until next spring. Or my next vacation.
See ya.
current music: "Dust" :: G42 :: (Bound in Human Flesh)
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| Tuesday, August 28th, 2007
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12:55 am - Dream sequence
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(Sequins?)
Strange figures. One female appears to be serving something (food?) (ice cream?) from the centre of the room. She comically has a gelatinous blob land on her head. Older male leaving room hears strange voices/sounds. What does it all mean? I forget. It's connected somehow. (Need to write these things sooner.) The strange sounds were actually clips from another time stream. The man stumbles onto a mystery, though I've forgotten what it was.
(2007-05-15)
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| Saturday, August 25th, 2007
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2:57 pm - Fall back
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Six months ago, everything was coming together. Since then, new things have fallen apart. I'm starting to wonder if there is any point in doing it all again.
Significator: King of Cups.
This wraps and surrounds him: Knight of Cups.
This crosses him: Eight of Swords.
This crowns him: Three of Swords, inverted.
This is below him: Queen of Cups, inverted.
This lies behind him: Six of Cups, inverted.
This lies in front of him: Page of Coins, inverted.
This is himself: Knight of Swords.
This is his house and home: Temperance, inverted.
These are his hopes and fears: Nine of Swords, inverted.
This is what will come: Six of Coins, inverted.
current mood: four
current music: "The Most Beautiful Poison in the World" :: G42
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| Saturday, July 7th, 2007
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11:24 pm - 7/7/7
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Happy number day.
This particular number doesn't mean a lot to me but if you ever wanted to say you did something on 7/7/7, now is your chance!
I already forget which horror movie made a fuss about opening on 6/6/6. There was also a G42 show of some sort tentatively scheduled for that date but it never happened. Maybe 8/8/8 will be more inspiring.
current music: CiTR :: Breakfast with the Browns (podcast)
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(1 comment | comment on this)
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| Sunday, April 29th, 2007
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4:05 pm - Crazy people
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So there's been an industrial Bosun's chair on my patio for about a month now. I'm not sure if anyone is planning on doing anything with it. It's still strapped to the roof of the apartment and looks as though it may be getting settled for permanent residence.
I was thinking of selling it on eBay.
In other news, I finally did my taxes last night. Hooray. An amazing two days before they're due. Incidentally, I learned that the last time I logged in (to do my taxes the year before) was the same time last year, almost to the minute.
And just in case I were to forget that the Canucks are playing today, a very bad live group are performing "I'm a Believer" ouside the stadium with more amplification than I expect the Monkees themselves ever had. Even the newly-built two-and-a-half apartment complexes obscuring my view of the stadium are not doing a very good job of taking the edge off their forced excitement; only adding a cacophony of really bad reverb.
Now they're playing some really bad rasta music.
[Edit: and now a very, very bad version of Bon Jovi's "You give love a bad name" (not that there is a good one)]
Thanks guys.
I was planning to get some quick food at the Costco which is unfortunately located across the street from all this nonsense. I'm going to have to think of something else.
current music: "Xian Clothing" :: G42
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| Thursday, April 19th, 2007
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1:07 am - PSA
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The best thing to happen to television since sliced bread. For real.
You probably want to see season one first, if you've been living under a rock.
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(2 comments | comment on this)
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| Monday, April 16th, 2007
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2:31 am - Such a sad internet
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I don't know what to make of things anymore. There just isn't enough time in the day to sort out what's going on. Most of my email is from bots. I have more bot friends than people friends. This probably isn't normal. Somehow I'm becoming just as antisocial with the internet as I am in person.
Anyway, this is not a complaint. I'm tired and not feeling well. That's a complaint. Normally, I would write a far more coherent rant. At least, I hope I would. The above lackluster non-complaint was inspired by my latest MySpace "friend" who was obviously not real.
On the brighter side of things, I've discovered an Oxford Dictionary Firefox search plugin. Now I don't have to deal with silly Americanisms and ambiguous definitions. This makes me happy. As sad as that may be.
By the way, due to a serendipitous typo, I've also discovered that a google search for "oxford firebox" yields something everyone should certainly need.
( Random MySpace Friend Request )
current mood: sore-throaty
current music: "Hot Stuff" :: Die Trip Computer Die :: (Blind Puppies)
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| Sunday, April 1st, 2007
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5:40 pm - Sweet Jesus!
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Religious people are weird.
In other news, it makes me happy to see clocks that are now jumping an extra hour ahead. April fools on them!
current music: "Bombing Dresden" :: G42 :: (Jam Archive 27)
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| Friday, March 23rd, 2007
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1:18 am - Spring forward
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If I were a superstitious man, I'd be forced to believe this spring was off to a good start. Today I found $20 soaking in the rain on a busy downtown sidewalk. Several people hustled and bustled past, each absorbed in their own version of reality. No one blinked as I picked it up. I may or may not have been invisible. But I still have it and it's not wet anymore so it must be real.
I think I am very close to figuring out the universe. It's all starting to make sense.
current mood: seven
current music: "Hey, Hey, We're The Monkeys" :: The Monkees
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| Thursday, March 15th, 2007
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2:13 am - What always happens after two days of rain in Vancouver?
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It's that time of year again.
MARCH 18th. Noon. 2nd annual NOISE PANCAKE BREAKFAST.
The perfect St. Patrick's Day hangover cure. For real.
Clicky-click for details
current music: "Kashmir" :: Led Zeppelin :: (Physical Graffiti)
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| Sunday, March 11th, 2007
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5:20 am
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| Sunday, February 25th, 2007
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5:06 am - A test of faith
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Pop quiz: Which book is the true spiritual guide above all others?
A. The Bible.
B. The KJV Bible.
C. The Koran.
D. The Egyptian Book of the Dead.
E. The Satanic Bible.
F. A Taste of Hawaii: New Cooking from the Crossroads of the Pacific.
( Click here for the answer )
current mood: enlightened
current music: "The Flooded Attic" :: Oscillating Innards :: (Cancerite)
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| Thursday, February 22nd, 2007
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9:37 am - Noise show (tonight)
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| Tuesday, October 10th, 2006
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12:29 am - A stoic nod to Stephen Lautens
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A fierce partisan of moderation.
(Taken from The Week Magazine)I am your typical Canadian radical, said Stephen Lautens in The Calgary Sun. “I’m passionate about my beliefs and I’ll defend them to the end.” But as a Canadian, my passion is for “being moderate.” Moderation in all things really is a radical position in today’s world, where so many people believe they have a monopoly on the truth. And it’s not easy to be moderate. “It takes real effort to try to understand the world in all its complexities and see it in other than black and white.” Extremists are always proposing sweeping solutions for society’s problems—a flat tax, say, or a change of regime. “Moderates are never certain, and know there are no quick fixes.” We support the troops, but we question whether to deploy them in places where the enemy is ill-defined, such as Afghanistan or Iraq. We believe in dialogue and negotiation, but we recognize that you can’t bargain with terrorists. “Live and let live” is our “non-battle cry.” It can be hard, when global problems seem so intractable, to resist the temptation to start shrieking. But we radicals will struggle to remain “fiercely moderate—no matter how nuts the world gets.” Original article: [http://calsun.canoe.ca/News/Columnists/Lautens_Stephen/2006/09/08/1813723.html]
Stephen Lautens, The Calgary Sun
current mood: ...
current music: "Somebody Told Me (Now I Believe Them)" :: Strong Bad
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| Sunday, September 24th, 2006
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12:32 am - Game, set, and match
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"Capricorns can be extremely rigid and pessimistic in their outlook, being gloomy, depressed and depressing in their interactions with others. They can also be emotionally cold and inhibited. The prudent and cautious side of their nature can be taken to extremes resulting in the unsociable realm of the miser."
Ouch.
current mood: chagrin
current music: "Plutoniumetrio" :: MB :: (Neuro Habitat)
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| Friday, September 22nd, 2006
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1:15 am - Eulogy for the Lonely Planet
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No, I'm not talking about the travel program.
Our once nine-planet solar system has lost it's youngest member. On August 24th of this year, Pluto was demoted to the status of "dwarf planet" with Ceres and recently-named Eris. Already, school books are being revised to depict the eight-planet solar system -- the next generation of impudent children will probably think you're crazy if you ever talk about nine planets.
I don't even want to think of the impact this will have on all the sci-fi written to date. All those ill-fated futuristic programs -- you'd think they'd have enough to worry about trying to foresee all the new gadgets we would have invented in the future without having to predict the rewritten past as well.
Oh Pluto, you've given me so many memories. Your icy mystery was an inspiration to me. Your eccentric orbit which had you technically alternate between being the ninth and eighth planet fascinated my eager young mind. Your moon which was almost your equal in size delighted and confused me. I was going to write you a haiku but there's only so much you can fit into one of those damn things so instead, I will toast your memory with a nice stiff drink:
Pluto is dead!
Long live (134340) Pluto!
R.I.P.
Pluto
1930 - 2006
current mood: reverent
current music: "Solitary Death In The Nocturnal Woodlands" :: Inquisition :: (Into The Infernal Regions Of The Ancient Cult)
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