Clueless Bob gets trundled away….

Posted on April 30, 2012 by gigoid

Ffolkes,
A lot of literature has been written throughout history on how much difference a day can make. It has also been noted that one day can make very little difference, especially for physical ailments of a chronic nature. Let me tell you, one day in the life of someone in pain is much more than just a day; there are hours within such days that last for months, and waiting for a pill to take effect (if it is going to….) can take decades, subjectively speaking…..

Having spent much of yesterday in such a state, I’ll vouch for the fact that it is no fun. But, it is life; as such, must be accepted and dealt with one way or another, and I refuse to spend all my time either worrying about it, or giving in to it. So, I am up, and determined to put as much of it aside as I can, so I can do the things that I need to do to improve my lot. Having to experience the pain while doing so is just going to have to be part of the picture for now, as the pain just isn’t going to go away for the time being, and there is nothing more I can do to change that….

First, let me say a big THANK YOU to those of my followers (a goodly number of them…) who stopped by the blog and expressed their sympathy for my condition yesterday. I really appreciate it, and only wish I could have gotten up from bed to see, and respond to, the comments before this morning. After yesterday’s Pearl was posted, I went back to bed, and spent much of the day there…. so this morning is the first I’ve seen them… so a big Thanks! to all of y’all…. I’m hoping today will be better…. so far, so good, we’re only at about level four and holding, so we might be okay…..time will tell.

And since time may be limited, let’s dive in and get this show on the road, eh? Let’s Pearl, ffolkes, like we did last summer……
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“To be a philosopher is not merely to have subtle thoughts, nor even to found a school, but so to love wisdom as to live according to its dictates, a life of simplicity, independence, magnanimity, and trust. It is to solve the problems of life not only theoretically, but practically.”
— Henry David Thoreau

This is the road less traveled….. From an early age, my mind turned toward philosophy for its focus. Most of my peers were fully engaged in the social and personal tasks involved in growing up, putting their energy and mental efforts into learning how to get along in school, which at the time is Life. But I turned to books, instead, and spent a lot of time by myself, reading what the sages had said about Life, and trying to see how that knowledge was applicable.

It was, at times, lonely and hard, and not without its hazards, as one’s peers don’t always act nicely to those they don’t understand, and that is putting it nicely. Being different is not generally well-accepted in socially intense environments such as high school; teens are no more tolerant than their parents, after all, and our society is rife with examples of intolerance for any who are different.

But, it has always been worth it to me, because it has always worked. The things that I learned when I read were truths, and truth is useful in ALL situations, more so than social cues or habits, and in a lot of ways, what I learned from my studies of philosophy helped me to navigate the uncharted waters of my teen years with much less difficulty than what I observed in my peers. And that road less traveled continues to serve me well, even thought it is less populated….
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“A lizard ran out on a rock and looked up, listening no doubt to the sounding of the spheres. And what a dandy fellow! the right toss of a chin for you and swirl of a tail! If men were as much men as lizards are lizards they’d be worth looking at.” — D. H. Lawrence (1928)

Don’t know why, I just like it…. and it fits in with how I’m feeling today, so, here it is…. I’ve nothing to add either….it’s just fine the way it is….
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That’s all folks…. I am going to have to face up to reality. I can’t sit long enough to find pearls, and without pearls, I have nothing about which to write, unless I go into total weird mode, and I’m not ready for that just now…. I’m going to have to take an entire day off, I think, to get my back to a point where I can do things a bit more normally. If nothing else, I need to be able to sit long enough to search my dB, then to write about what I find, and right now, that is impossible….

I’ll leave you with a couple of good pearls, and will be back in a day or so…. I’m hoping to get into good enough condition by tomorrow, as I haven’t missed a day in over 300 posts, since August of last year, and I’d hate to break that run…. but, we’ll see how it goes… meantime, y’all take care…. and in the words of the Guvernator….. I’ll be back….
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“Again, our observations of the stars make it evident, not only that the earth is circular, but also that it is a circle of no great size. For quite a small change of position to south or north causes a manifest alteration of the horizon. There is much change, I mean, in the stars which are overhead, and the stars seen are different, as one moves northward or southward. …All of which goes to show not only that the earth is circular in shape, but that it is a sphere of no great size: for otherwise the effect of so slight a change of place would not be so quickly apparent. Hence, one should not be too sure of the incredibility of the view of those who conceive that there is a continuity between the parts about the pillars of Hercules [the strait of Gibraltar] and the parts about India, and that in this way the ocean is one.” — Aristotle, De Caelo, Fourth Century B.C.

An example of the correct use of logic…..
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“Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see the shadow.” — Helen Keller

A good ending note….
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Okay, that’s all ffolkes…. Once again, sorry ’bout that, but I’m giving in to my age today… I’ll be back when I’m younger…. or at least feel that way…. y’all take care out there, and May the Metaphorse be with you…..

Sometimes I sits and thinks,
and sometimes
I just sits.

gigoid

Kowabunga!

Are we sure they’re knobbly?

Posted on April 29, 2012 by gigoid

Ffolkes,
Some days making the effort to get up out of bed seems less attractive than others, to be sure. Especially when one’s first arising from bedside is accompanied by a great deal of pain, such as today. The effort it takes to get standing all the way up is, to say the least, excessive. Walking is problematic, as every motion seems to aggravate the lower back, where my spine enters the girdle of the hips. Every muscle in my lower back is tight, like a piece of wood, while the mid- and upper-back muscles are poised in anticipation of spasms (those that aren’t already seized up, like those under the scapula…..). Such a joy….

Of course, this is not a particularly new event; it’s like this probably 3 or 4 days out of 7. Most days I awaken with pain level around 3 or 4, and try to keep it from exceeding 5 during the day’s activities. Days such as today, however, when I begin at level 6 or 7 upon arising, make it hard not to just take a pill and go back to bed…. thus avoiding the greater levels of pain I know will come, as the already painful muscles tire and stiffen further…. it’s a grand life, to be sure, but it’s mine, and it’s all I have, so I’ll just have to deal with it, now, won’t I? Yes, I will….

And as such is the case, I refuse to give in to it. I won’t go back down, I will stay up until I cannot take it any more, and try to do whatever I can to stretch the muscles enough to ease some of the stiffness that I live with. Some day, when I finally am awarded the money that SS owes me (money I myself put into the system for just this purpose, that they are so far unwilling to share….) one of the first things I’ll do is get myself a massage. One can only understand the reduction of muscle tension as true freedom if one has experienced this kind of unrelenting pain, pain that never stops, and never allows one’s muscle’s to relax enough to feel normal. When it is released at last, the sense of release and relief is more than I can express; it is nothing less than true bliss…..

Ah, but such moments are for the future…. today, it is pain, stiffness, and more pain for me, until I can either get a balance of medication in me to put up a barrier between the pain and my conscious mind, or I can get my lower back to loosen up a bit, and give me a breathing space…. in the meantime, we’ll go for a dive, and search out something else to focus on… it can only help…. so, let’s Pearl, shall we?….
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I’m sorry…. I can’t do it today…. I’m trying to behave normally, just as if I wasn’t in severe pain, and it’s just not working today…. so I’m going to cheat… for today’s Pearl, I will post below a number of pearls, and a couple of pictures that inspire me in some way, whether for their extreme cuteness, or for their beauty…. that’s about all I can manage this morning, then I’m going to try to deal with the pain, somehow… though what I’ll do is not known at this point…. anything is better than this….. so, here are some pearls and pictures for your consideration

“It is inaccurate to say that I hate everything. I am strongly in favor of common sense, common honesty, and common decency. This makes me forever ineligible for public office.” — H.L. Mencken

“And it does matter. An honest man or woman is an honest man or woman more because he or she is honest in the small, everyday things that “don’t matter” individually, but which make up a well-lived life, than because of some single great temptation that was passed. A person who is concerned about individual rights or about individual dignity makes his or her difference not because of any sweeping great statement or action, but because of the accretion of small, individually seemingly insignificant acts that spread that dignity and confirm those rights through every action they take. It matters because every action you take, and every action I take is an expression of the human spirit.” — William Oliver (oliver@uncmed.med.unc.edu) I can just hear the calliope music in the background when I see this; they are in complete tune with each other, for sure….I got this picture off the news site, SFGATE, many moons ago… the attribution is in the lower right corner, if you enlarge it enough….
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“Good friends, good books and a sleepy conscience: this is the ideal life. (The conviction of the rich that the poor are happier is no more foolish than the conviction of the poor that the rich are.)” — Mark Twain

What’s the most popular order at the Zen hotdog stand? Make me One With Everything! — Smart Bee

“He didn’t say that. He was reading what was given to him in a speech.” — Richard Darman, director of OMB, — explaining why President Bush wasn’t following up on his campaign pledge that there would be no loss of wetlands.
___________________________________This photo was found at Photobotos.com, and the photographer’s name can be found there…. I think it’s just too cool for words…..
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“Wickedness is a myth invented by good people to account for the curious attractiveness of others.” — Oscar Wilde

“I expect nothing. I fear no one. I am free.” — Nikos Kazantzakis (Zorba the Greek)
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I wish I had found this earlier….it’s a good one to describe this morning’s progress…..

“It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all doing direct the other way–in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.” — A Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens, 1859

Finally….. the origin of the phrase, “picture perfect” from Carol Welsh’s blog: http://carolwelsh.wordpress.com/, where you can find many such photos as this one….___________________________________

That’s all I’ve got today ffolkes…. sorry ’bout that, but I can barely keep myself from throwing the extra monitor through the window. I’d do it for the tension release, but it would no doubt make my back hurt worse than it already does. Tomorrow I’ll write a real Pearl, as I’m sure by then I’ll have plenty of mental energy built up to get it done. Today is pretty much a foregone conclusion, so I’d best be getting to it… Y’all take care out there, and May the Metaphorse be with you….

—
Sometimes I sits and thinks,
and sometimes
I just sits.

gigoid

Kowabunga!

Always twinkle before lifting…..

Posted on April 28, 2012 by gigoid

Ffolkes,
As time goes by, it is becoming more and more difficult to keep myself from becoming homicidal. I’m sure it is a problem common to every man; it is, after all, a part of our nature as natural born killers. Denying that part of us is foolish and dangerous. Without the proper understanding, and therefore control, of this part of being a human male, it can jump up and bite one at the most inappropriate times. I know, because it has happened both to me, and in front of me, on numerous occasions…..

Now, happening in front of me is not particularly a problem for me, unless I am the object, or target, of the other person’s violent outburst. Being the target happened frequently when I worked in mental health, due to the nature of the mental conditions of the individuals with whom I worked. Typically, they had poor impulse control, and when they became angry, for whatever reason, it could often lead them to become violent toward others; it was part of my job to let that other be me most of the time. I learned to deal with these situations well, and do not suffer any particular fear or anxiety over facing them any longer, though it isn’t one of my favorite pastimes. Even when one is not afraid of violence, its presence is not any fun whatsoever, for anyone involved.

But, even worse than being involved in peripheral violence aimed at others, or just random outbreaks, is the violence that I am tempted to carry out myself on others, every time some political or religious pundit opens their mouths to spew out more lies to me and the American public. I am so tired of being lied to…..

I’m tired of that kind of condescension, that assumes that I don’t hear the lie, or that I won’t do anything about it. It pisses me off the most that they are right, at least for most people. Most folks don’t hear the lies, or if they do, they don’t do anything about it. Hell, I’ve seen seemingly intelligent people go out and vote for someone they KNOW just lied to them, mere moments before….. it is disgusting, and infuriating, to say the least……

The worst part is there is nothing to do…. I keep speaking up about it, and folks nod their heads in agreement, then go out and do the same damn thing they’ve always done, just because they don’t know, or don’t have the courage to do anything else….. it’s pathetic, and it makes me want to buy guns and go shoot them at people until they start to wake up…… Maybe it won’t do that, but I will certainly feel better, so, hey, it’s worth a shot, don’t you think?…..

Well, maybe not just now…. we’ll go Pearl instead….. shall we?….
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“Hurting other people unnecessarily is the only “sin”. All the others are made up nonsense. (Hurting one’s self isn’t a sin, it’s just stupid).” — Robert Heinlein, The Notebooks of Lazarus Long

Original sin…. who said it was? And why does anyone believe it? (That’s me asking…and not rhetorically, but literally…)

I saw Robert Heinlein’s quote, as related above, about sins the other day, and it got me to thinking about the concept upon which much of Christianity is based, to wit: Original Sin. Supposedly, as a metaphor, God made a snake, which talked Eve (whom God had refused to educate about snakes, merely saying “do as I say”) into talking Adam into taking a bite of the apple, which oddly enough (it’s hard to indicate a raised eyebrow in prose), was the metaphor for the knowledge of Good and Evil….. Then, when they had done so, this merciful god proceeded to punish them, with a most severe sentence for a first offense, for disobeying his decree (thereby blaming them for what he, being omnipotent, already knew would happen…. He set it up that way, in a lose-lose scenario, you can’t claim omnipotence and say he didn’t know it was likely…..). What a cruel, hateful set-up! It all sounds so….. human, doesn’t it?

This, to me, has always seemed like a very vicious thing for God to do…. very childish, in most ways that count. And don’t give me all that crap about free will and choosing God’s love…. it’s not free if one is punished for using it, and God doesn’t love Man, not if he goes around setting him up to lose like that. You will note, that the knowledge that this merciful, loving God didn’t want us to have was the knowledge of Good and Evil… which, if we did not have it, we could not judge whether what God did to us was good, or evil, now could we? Int other words, God did not want us to know that He was playing us for fools…. another scenario that, according to the creationists, was completely his idea….

I remember distinctly when I first heard the story of the Garden of Eden, when I was about four or so years old… and I remember thinking, at the end, why did God put the apple tree in Eden, if he didn’t want Adam or Eve to eat from it? I didn’t know anything about the metaphorical nature of the story then… even I wasn’t that precocious, smart as I am. But I do remember thinking that it didn’t seem quite fair to put it there, and then tell them not to eat it. Even at age four, the question “Why?” was at the forefront of my thoughts when I heard the story, but nobody would ever answer me when I asked, other than to parrot the eternal, “God works in mysterious ways….”

Even a four year old knows a crock of crap when he hears it….. I didn’t fall for it then, and I still can’t seem to find anyone who can give me an answer that doesn’t make God look like a cranky five-year old who needs a nap….

“God is omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscient. It says so right here on the label. If you have the kind of mind that can believe all three of those things at once, then I have a wonderful deal in a bridge for you! Cash only, no checks….” — Robert Heinlein, The Notebooks of Lazarus Long
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Conjure with ’em,–
Brutus will start a spirit as soon as Caesar.
Now, in the names of all the gods at once,
Upon what meat doth this our Caesar feed,
That he is grown so great? Age, thou art shamed!
Rome, thou hast lost the breed of noble bloods!
— William Shakespeare (1564-1616), Julius Caesar — Act i, Sc. 2

Not much to comment here, other than to say, “Puke!”….. All I can say is, teaching Shakespeare as classical literature seems to me to be practice for convincing voters that a politician is going to be working to help his constituents, not spending his time lining his pockets with gelt…. in other words, not bloody likely!…. ‘Nuff said…. Hell, it doesn’t even rhyme! Doesn’t even try!….

Like to the Pontic sea,
Whose icy current and compulsive course
Ne’er feels retiring ebb, but keeps due on
To the Propontic and the Hellespont,
Even so my bloody thoughts, with violent pace,
Shall ne’er look back, ne’er ebb to humble love,
Till that a capable and wide revenge
Swallow them up.
— William Shakespeare (1564-1616), Othello — Act iii, Sc. 3

In a mathematical proof, one would say at this point, Q.E.D….. I’ll just add, “What? What did he say?” Long-winded way to say “I’m pissed off…”, don’t you think?…. What is it about people that needs things to be complicated? I just don’t get it…..
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Halfway down the stairs
Is a stair
Where I sit.
There isn’t any
Other stair
Quite like
It.
I’m not at the bottom,
I’m not at the top;
So this is the stair
Where
I always
Stop.
— A.A. Milne

Lovely. That’s all….. just enjoy….
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politics, n: From the Latin ‘poly’, meaning many, and ‘tic’, meaning little bloodsucking insects. — Smart Bee

Smart Bee was smarter than usual when it came up with this one… A perfect description of a modern talking head. It’s almost enough to send me off on a rant…. but, I’m tired this morning, from fighting pain for the last couple of days, and can’t seem to find enough outrage in me to get started… Oh, I’m sure it’s there; all I’d have to do is go read the news first…. but, not today. I’m going to slap on a Lidocaine patch to try to ease the lower back & hip grinding, take an extra pain pill, and try to get it to ease up a bit. My views on the current state of the circus we call election year are fairly well documented anyway…. just breeze back through just about any random Pearl over the last few months, and you’ll find more than one rant that can best be summarized by the following statement from Mr. Jefferson, one that I believe implicitly….

“The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure.” — Thomas Jefferson, Letter to William S. Smith, Paris, Nov. 13, 1787
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“[In the 60’s] there was madness in any direction, at any hour … You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was `right’, that we were winning …

And that, I think, was the handle — the sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn’t need that. Our energy would simply `prevail’. There was no point in fighting — on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave ….

So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark — the place where the wave finally broke and rolled back.” — Hunter S. Thompson, Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas

When the 60’s began, I was a fifth-grader living with my family on an Army base in Washington, near Tacoma. One year later, I was in sixth grade in a small town (population: 686, counting my family), adjusting to being the new kid in school, again. By 1970, I was a student at UC Berkeley, marching with thousands of other hippies against the war in Vietnam…. In between I entered high school (and puberty), graduated as a three-year-and-sport letter athlete/valedictorian (sports and studying were less frightening than dating….), and left my tiny little home town, now with over 800 residents, for the University of California at Berkeley, where there were over 42,000 students, not counting the city of Berkeley, a significantly populous part of the megalopolis that the East Bay had already become.

Hunter Thompson was a more active participant than I in many of the activities in the early part of the decade, but I experienced enough of what was happening in society at the time to say that what he says here is quite accurate. A great deal of the power that kept those demonstrations of outrage against the system going was the exact energy he describes, a feeling of harmonious invincibility, a complete faith in the power of human love united in one purpose. There were no enemies to fight, other than apathy and indifference; those who opposed what we were engaged in manifesting would be enlightened by the very purity of our intent, and the rightness of our actions, and join us in marching on to Utopia.

It was a very heady wine, and the after-effects have not really disappeared altogether. That is some small comfort to me, as I myself get old enough to feel a lessening of my strength in a physical sense, if no other. Such forms of energy can fill up those empty fuel cells that age has emptied over time, with a different, but serviceable form of alternate energy. Maybe it won’t help me run fast any more, but I can think faster than ever, and that is a distinct advantage, to be sure…..
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Such as it is, it is…. I kinna do morrre…. I’d say it will glide fairly well, if not fly strongly, and that will suffice…. It must, because I’m done, finito, serioso, and outta here. Wow… I’m driving my spell checker crazy here…. kind of fun, actually. But, enough whimsy, it’s time to go do some actual productive stuff… even we procrastinators have last minute deadlines we have to observe….

Y’all take care out there, and May the Metaphorse be with you…..

—
Sometimes I sits and thinks,
and sometimes
I just sits.

gigoid

Kowabunga!

Real fun begins in the burrow….

Posted on April 27, 2012 by gigoid

Ffolkes,
It may, or may not, come as a surprise to you, but the material that appears here every day is as fresh and new to me as it is to you. All of what I write in this blog is made up every morning when I sit down to begin. I have no outlines, no lists of subject matter, no pre-written essays, or articles, or rants. I do save a few pearls here and there, in case the dB program, Smart Bee, is being recalcitrant, but I haven’t had to use the stash in six months or more.

Everything else is my reaction to the pearls that I pick, written moments after pasting the pearl into the word processor I’m using. Most of the ones I pick to write about each day are also fresh, as well, usually picked out that very morning. Sometimes a pearl will be in place, waiting, having been found the day, or a couple of days, before, but 9 times out of 10, I will move the waiting pearl to another day down the road, and use one I just found. It just seems to work out best this way, so that is how it is done…. It’s not logical, or even particularly well-designed and arranged. But, it works for me, and that, after all, is what it is all about…..

So be it…. I’m not sure why I said all that, but what the hell…. let’s just get down to it right away…. shall we Pearl?….
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Angels and ministers of grace, defend us!
Be thou a spirit of health or goblin damn’d,
Bring with thee airs from heaven or blasts from hell,
Be thy intents wicked or charitable,
Thou comest in such a questionable shape
That I will speak to thee: I ‘ll call thee Hamlet,
King, father, royal Dane: O, answer me!
Let me not burst in ignorance, but tell
Why thy canonized bones, hearsed in death,
Have burst their cerements; why the sepulchre,
Wherein we saw thee quietly inurn’d,
Hath oped his ponderous and marble jaws
To cast thee up again. What may this mean,
That thou, dead corse, again in complete steel
Revisit’st thus the glimpses of the moon,
Making night hideous,
So horridly to shake our disposition
With thoughts beyond the reaches of our souls?
— William Shakespeare (1564-1616), Hamlet — Act i, Sc. 4

Time for a short rant…. I know the above is probably considered to be one of the finest examples of literature ever written. This soliloquy from Hamlet has been dissected and discussed to death many times over, in classrooms, in theaters, at dinner parties, and is used often as quotations to illustrate some point or another…. and it is SUCH a piece of CRAP!

I cannot believe that anyone still falls for this! What the fuck is he talking about? What has he said here, beyond some personal complaints about somebody that he has been rude to his entire life? Even when one filters out the middle English and puts it into more modern terminology, it doesn’t make any sense. It is just a litany of complaints that one can hear from one’s teenage son or daughter any time of day or night…..

I watched the movie, Star Trek IV, The Voyage Home, yesterday… it’s good entertainment, and has a lot of what made the original ST shows so watchable, i.e., interactions among the crew, specifically Spock, McCoy, and Kirk. At one point, when Spock’s memory is under question, McCoy delivers the first two lines above, whereupon Spock immediately supplies the play, act, and scene number from memory…. But I found it interesting that McCoy is one of the first to use the quote as a question of someone’s mental acuity…. it certainly is one of the few, if any, times that I’ve seen it used thus…. At least, used in this context, it at least admits the possibility that the speaker is less than completely sane, which to me seems quite apparent.

If I heard anyone spouting off like this, I would certainly be calling 911 to have someone come to take them away before they got violent…. But, humanity likes its heroes, even when it doesn’t even know why they are such….. so we’ll have to be subjected to Will’s overblown crap as long as people continue to put his work on a pedestal… when where it should be kept is in a locked vault….

“Hamlet is the tragedy of tackling a family problem too soon after college.” — Tom Masson
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“Some foolish men declare that a Creator made the world. The doctrine that the world was created is ill-advised, and should be rejected. If God created the world, where was He before creation? How could God have made the world without any raw material? If you say He made this first, and then the world, you are faced with an endless regression … Know that the world is uncreated, as time itself is, without beginning and end.” — The Mahapurana, Jinasena

There are times when the human race baffles me…. Many moons ago (a clever writer’s trick to indicate a VERY long time…), when we were all sitting around a campfire, say out in front of a nice cave we’d appropriated from some poor idiot killed in lieu of a mortgage payment, somebody came up with the concept of a Creator.

Now, the first question that comes to my mind is, “Why?” (I know, I know, that is a question we are not supposed to ask…. again, I will repeat, “Why?”….) What was it that prompted those folks to want to create some god-like figure to explain all the stuff we didn’t know at the time?

Were they sitting around blaming each other for the rain and thunder? Was there something about the way that wolf pack was stalking the same prey as we were hunting that indicated some sort of conspiracy? What? I don’t seem to be able to find out what impulse it was that caused them to make up such a specious and unlikely explanation for the way the world exists…. The one that they came up with does not fit the facts of the matter; it only fits the wishes of those who believe it. Even the explanation that pantheists like Hindi came up with are wishful thinking; it makes as little sense to assume that there are a thousand gods as it does to assume just one……

A Lie is still a Lie, even if you believe it. — Smart Bee

“Over 5,000 years ago, Moses said to the children of Israel, “Pick up your shovels, mount your asses and load your camels, and I will lead you to the promised land.”
Not too long ago, Roosevelt said, “Lay down your shovels, sit on your asses, light a Camel, this is the promised land.”
Now Nixon is stealing your shovels, kicking your asses, raising the price of Camels, and mortgaging the promised land.” — Smart Bee

This is the result, you see, of having this sort of nonsense to contend with. The mere existence of this joke indicates the depths of contradiction that are inherent in any such creation theory. The presence in society of a large group of people who all believe that they may do whatever they please, and their acts will be either sanctioned by the deity, or forgiven by Him, thus releasing them from all responsibility for whatever it is they choose to do, is a large factor in how close we are to extinction as a species. The self-indulgence and lack of any personal responsibility allowed by these religions can be seen as a major contributor to both the evil that men perpetrate on each other, as well as the degradations that we have committed on our environment.

And the saddest part of all of this is the simple fact that nobody cares. Millions and millions, even billions, of people on this planet believe that their religion is the gospel truth, and all the lies they are told, and all the lies they tell, are sanctioned by Heaven, and no matter what they do on Earth, they will be rewarded in Heaven…. They believe this with all their being, and nothing will change their minds, because they will not entertain any other ideas, having been programmed to reject anything that doesn’t fit with what they’ve been told to believe.

“Belief gets in the way of learning.” — Robert Heinlein, Time Enough for Love

Moreover, they are convinced that they have made the choice to believe all this; they cannot even see how they have been given no choice in the matter, having been indoctrinated from an early age, before they had the intellectual or mindful defenses against any such nonsense. Churches learned long ago to attack the minds of children first, for they cannot help but believe what their parents tell them…. thus, the vicious cycle of ignorance is passed on from generation to generation, all without ever being examined for truth…. a concept foreign to the very nature of the institution…..

“I honestly believe that the doctrine of hell was born in the glittering eyes of snakes that run in frightful coils watching for their prey. I believe it was born with the yelping, howling, growling and snarling of wild beasts… I despise it, I defy it, and I hate it.” — Robert G. Ingersoll

“Advise is seldom welcome, and those who need it the most, like it the least.” — Lord Chesterfield

“The truth is incontrovertible. Malice may attack it. Ignorance may deride it. But in the end, there it is.” — Winston Churchill
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A mighty creature is the germ,
Though smaller than the pachyderm.
His customary dwelling place
Is deep within the human race.
His childish pride he often pleases
By giving people strange diseases.
Do you, my poppet, feel infirm?
You probably contain a germ.
— Odgen Nash (1902-1971)

As is always the case with the work of Ogden Nash, there is very little that can be added without becoming superfluous. He trims away any unnecessary words and ideas, and drives straight into the truth, adorned perfectly by whimsy. I can’t think of another poet who has such a consistent talent to make me smile; he never fails to amuse and uplift, and one always comes away happier, if not always wiser. His simple rhymes and snippets of humorous verse, in my mind, makes him one of the “best of the best” in that field…..

“Careful, Mister. Old Zeek is liable to fire that sucker up!” — Smart Bee
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Roosevelt’s Second Bill of Rights….. http://www.fdrheritage.org/bill_of_rights.htm

One of the bloggers whose work I enjoy, and whose work, and opinion I’ve come to respect, writes poetry and prose at his blog site, One Time Pad, located here: http://onetimepad.wordpress.com/ A while back, he referred me to an article discussing how our use of language affects how we look at the political forces at play in society. It was a very good article, thoughtful, insightful, and with some good, sound conclusions. But, I am not at this time going to discuss that article, as it could conceivably turn into a very long discussion. But, as part of the research the author performed, he looked at the above information, located at a site dedicated to the policies that are the legacy of Franklin D. Roosevelt, arguably the most popular President our country has ever seen.

Having not studied Roosevelt’s political philosophy outside what is part of every school’s history program, I cannot say whether I would agree with all of it. However, I did take the time to look over what is in the above, which is a proposal for new Amendments to the US Constitution, a Second Bill of Rights, which Roosevelt saw as a needed change, if society was to avoid in the future the same disastrously ill effects that he had just worked to counteract during the Great Depression in the 1930’s.

He saw a need to create more balance in society in how wealth and resources were allocated and shared on a society-wide basis. The amendments he proposed are all intended to foster and maintain that balance, and they all have to do with what he, and other liberals of the time, considered to be an expansion of basic human rights as outlined in the original Bill of Rights. In looking over what is here, I have to agree with the assessment he made; these are all changes that society will need to make, if we are to survive…. because they all assume that the real power in society CAN be returned to the people, instead of being concentrated and jealously protected by a select few who, by all indications, do not have the best interests of society at heart.

I firmly believe that the Occupy Movement, which is about to re-start its activist efforts to make the same litany of changes, would do well to adopt these proposed Amendments as the basis for their platform of purpose, and to work toward making them a part of American constitutional law. It would give them a legitimate focus, and will, if utilized well, stand a very good chance of succeeding in making a big difference…. and it sure couldn’t hurt to try….
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“A dog is the only thing on earth that loves you more than he loves himself.” — Josh Billings

In the past six months or so since my pal Noah died, I have avoided writing about him, other than one relatively short piece that I wrote to honor his life with memories of his character.

That post is still available to read, here:

http://therealowner.com/dogs/an-ode-to-noah/

I haven’t done so because I am a coward; it hurts a lot, still, and I have a hard time typing through the tears… just as I am now.

But, I wanted to share this with everyone, and say only this…. if you have not ever had the privilege of knowing a dog (note I do not say “own” or “possess” or “have”…. dogs are people, period, and such terms imply, and create, chauvinism that prevents you from ever understanding the true nature of yourself, much less the dog….), and of living with one, then you have not truly experienced what Love can be. Even with another person, Love has limits; for a dog, there are none.

So, any who…. before I am unable to do this at all, I will now post a photo, which I found on Facebook, I believe. It also might have come from the blogging site, Dog Leader Mysteries, which is dedicated to saving homeless and shelter dogs… located here: http://dogleadermysteries.com/ If this doesn’t touch your heart, nothing in this world can save you…. I’ve entitled it….

The Last Will and Testament of Noah Dog….

If you cannot read it because the text is too small, right click on it, click on “Open with”, and let the default photo viewer open it in a window where you can enlarge it sufficiently to read…. and thank you for taking the time…. Blessed Be….
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Okay, my day is destroyed now… but in a good way……

…… The space you see here between the dots is a metaphor. It represents the four minutes I just took to get up and walk away until I could control myself. Whew! As I mentioned in the introductory paragraphs, I never know what I’m going to be writing about, and this may be about the clearest indication of the truth of that I can give you. The idea of including Noah’s Will in a Pearl has been circling around in my head for all the time since his passing, but today was the first time I have been able to follow through. In some ways I am glad, because it is now something I can cross off a list.

Alas, this issue is on more than one list, so, I’m sure I’m not done processing the feelings I have around Noah’s life and death; we were together for fully 17 years, and it’s only been six months since his demise. If not to you, it’s obvious to me I have some tears still to shed over that…. but, I’ve never been ashamed of tears, like most of the men I’ve known. Not that I let them rule me, but I believe it is human to feel the strong emotions that create the urge to give up our life’s blood (water) to express our emotional pain in a physical way. And I have nothing against being human….

Enough of my rumination…. I’m starting to annoy myself…. 🙂 Well, as much as I ever do, anyway….. and I’m sure you’re getting tired of all the dots between thoughts…. so I’ll bring this to a crashing halt, here. Y’all take care out there, and May the Metaphorse be with you….

—
Sometimes I sits and thinks,
and sometimes
I just sits.

gigoid

Kowabunga!

Tomato rice soup again?

Posted on April 26, 2012 by gigoid

Ffolkes,
I took yesterday off. After writing the morning Pearl, and answering comments made overnight, I went to the library. When I got home, I read an entire book, and watched two Harry Potter movies (#2 & #4, if you’re curious…). That constituted my entire day. Not terribly exciting, but it kept my head busy, not thinking about choosing targets among the many from which I could pick. It may not have been productive, in at least two senses, but it was certainly safer than following impulse.

With that said, we come to today. I am once again in the mood to go hunting, and I don’t mean to hunt Horcruxes. But once again I will sublimate all my anger and angst into this morning’s Pearl, and those who have engendered my ire can walk around for another day or two before I figure out how to go about fulfilling my impulses rather than blocking them…. It’s not a complex strategy to formulate, but there are a lot of details that need to be addressed, if I am to succeed without unwanted attention….. the latter point is the most delicate, of course, as it is always a hard decision to decide whether witnesses should be avoided, kept away, encouraged, intimidated, or eliminated. SIGH, it’s always something!

Ah well, that will wait…. for now, I want to get this done, and catch up a bit to WordPress, which I neglected all day yesterday, in favor of burying my head in books and movies. T’was fun, but not as productive as I am used to, so I need to make it up somewhat today. In that spirit, let’s be off, shall we? Kowabunga!…..
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“Idealism is fine, but as it approaches reality the cost becomes prohibitive.” — William F. Buckley

Will Buckley imagined himself to be the poster boy for the conservative right in Amerika (I only spell it this way when I am referring to someone whose ideology most closely resembles that of 1939 Germany), and had the vocabulary to prove it. As a matter of fact, he was so impressed with himself and his intelligence, he was alleged in his own mind. 🙂

I don’t listen much to his tripe anymore, but in my youth I found him to be an amusing way to spend some time, first to decipher his overblown language to find his intended context (the words he employs tend to obscure his meaning a LOT of the time; it is just TOO erudite for its own good….), then in chuckling over his use of logic to take his preposterous assumptions to their logically absurd conclusions….

Even in talking about him, other literary sources would become more convoluted in their word usage. When I Googled Bill’s name to research a bit (it’s been a long time since I paid him any attention) I found, as I remembered, that he had passed on in 2008. In the New York Times, the initial line reads: “Mr. Buckley marshaled a refined, perspicacious mind to elevate conservatism to the center of American political discourse.” They couldn’t have just said, “Mr. Buckley was an educated man, and a vocal proponent of conservatism in this country.” Either is arguably true, but the second is a more accurate in a realistic sense, and still gets the same information across, but much less condescendingly.

Now, to be sure, I am not the most appropriate person to chide anyone for using too many words…. Goodness knows I have a hard enough time keeping myself under some small bit of control in that arena… I’m wordy, I know it…. But, I’m wordy in the attempt to clarify what is real, and what is true, not to obscure it, so that its meaning is clear, rather than placing the blame on the reader, for not understanding the oh-so-superior intelligence of the speaker….

I’m a fairly smart guy, but I don’t have to try to prove it by making my listeners or readers feel like I’m talking down to them. Unfortunately for all of us, Mr. Buckley made a habit of doing just that…. and sadly, he convinced a lot of people that his erroneous assumptions were in fact a true reflection of reality, when, in reality, they were mere reflections of his self-aggrandizement, displayed in the mirror of his words….

As to what he says above, well, it just ain’t so…. As a matter of fact, it is just the opposite of what is real, for the more people who are enthused with the ideal of something, the more talent is focused on it, and the benefits to society always far outweigh any costs of implementing the components of the idealistic concepts at issue. Simple logic, but from a different assumption…. Poor Bill….. He spent so much of his time lamenting what could never be, he missed out on what is….. He never could find the peace found as described in Buddha’s words….

“Everything that has a beginning has an ending. Make your peace with that and all will be well.” — Buddha
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“Every man’s life, liberty, and property are in danger when the Legislature is in session.” — Gideon J. Tucker

“A society that lacks the patience to read, and loses the ability to do so, is rendered defenseless against its most profound stupidities. As an example, consider the ease with which Americans came to regard a president known for his inaccuracy and imprecision as the great communicator, and by the tendency of American elections to give victory to the candidate who can afford the greatest number of 30-second TV spots.” — Mike Schmoker

“George Washington said to his father, “If I never tell a lie, how can I get to be President?” — Red Buttons

“War is the last refuge of incompetent statesmen.” — Smart Bee

“A lot of people voting for Pat Buchanan (or random name from this election) say they are doing so to send a message. Apparently that message is, Hey, look at me, I’m an idiot.” — Dennis Miller

It has been said that what a culture finds to be humorous says a lot about that culture. In today’s society, and for most of my life, political humor has been much like what I have posted above. What this says about society is clear…. we do not have any respect for the politicians who are the same people we keep electing. None. We EXPECT them to lie to us. We EXPECT them to cheat, to completely ignore what is best for society in favor of what is best for them and their rich friends. It is a form of stupidity that is so firmly entrenched in society that our only relief from the pain of knowing it is to laugh at jokes that vilify those people we revere in practice.

Ultimately, we are laughing at them because we do not wish to cry over our own failure to change anything… My reaction to this, when I can bear to look at it at all, is to experience Rage. I want to kill, or maim, or somehow strike back physically at those assholes who have no connection to the humanity of which they are a part…. and I hate them all the more for that, for making me want to do that to any creature….

O’Brien: “The only people left alive were in an outlying district of the settlement. I was sent there with a squad to reinforce them. Cardassians were advancing on us. Moving through the streets, destroying, killing. I was with a group of women and children, and two Cardassian soldiers burst in. I stunned one of them…the other one jumped me. We struggled. One of the women threw me a phaser, and I fired. The phaser was set at maximum. The man just…just incinerated there before my eyes. I’d never killed anything before. When I was a kid I’d, I’d worry about swatting a mosquito. It’s not you I hate, Cardassian. I hate what I became because of you.” — “The Wounded”, Stardate 44429.6
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“Faith is much better than belief. Belief is when someone ELSE does the thinking.” — R. Buckminster Fuller

When I saw this I had to laugh…. loud….. and then I wondered what in the world was he thinking? Bucky Fuller normally had a very clear view of reality; this is made obvious by his invention of the triangular support design that allows us to build domes the size of small cities without fear of its collapse, unless by improper construction, or use of faulty materials. He also had a number of other ideas that were revolutionary in their approach to the way people think about reality, and many of his ideas have pushed the frontiers of human thought to new plateaus.

But with this statement, he misses a very important distinction when he fails to point out that, yes, believing what someone else had told us is a risky proposition at best, but, relying on faith is letting NOBODY do the thinking. … What someone else tells us is, at minimum, subject to some kind of fact checking, some verification. But faith disallows any such process, asking us to accept its premises without evidence.

Not a good idea….. at least, not in my experience. When others wish for us to believe them, solely upon their say-so, my experience is that they want me to allow them some sort of control over me. It’s not a pretty view to take of humanity, but, hey, the numbers don’t lie. How far, then, can I expect faith to provide me with some sort of defense against that sort of chicanery?

Not far, I can assure you, for I have never found that what I’ve been told by preachers, priests, or politicians to be remotely helpful to me; only they benefit from my acceptance of their information. I’m not expressing opinion here; this is what has actually occurred over the time I’ve been around on this planet.

So, let’s just give Bucky the benefit of the doubt, and say he just had a bad day when he said this…. I suppose it goes to show that everybody has off days…. just don’t forget to check what you hear against what you know, and all will turn out the way it should…. in that I have faith…. 🙂

“Doubt is the beginning, not the end, of wisdom.” — Smart Bee
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Behold the child, by Nature’s kindly law,
Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw;
Some livelier plaything gives his youth delight,
A little louder, but as empty quite;
Scarfs, garters, gold, amuse his riper stage,
And beads and prayer-books are the toys of age.
Pleased with this bauble still, as that before,
Till tired he sleeps, and life’s poor play is o’er.
— Alexander Pope (1688-1744) — Essay on Man, Epistle ii, Line 274

Ah, metaphor! How quaint and sharp thy wit, to give us a whole life of a man, in one graceful portion of language that supplies images in the mind’s eye to fill the gap of years. I imagine this poem has been the subject of term papers and essays by students of literature on more than one occasion, supplying the premises for hundreds of random interpretations from the various young minds that were tasked to examine its depths as part of their literary education. If not, well, a lot of teachers were missing out on a good lesson, for certain.

Have no fear, I’m not going to give you my take on this, beyond what I’ve already written above; I’m only auditing this course, and it won’t affect my GPA at all, so I won’t subject you to that. Besides, then you would have no reason to do so yourself, should you ever find yourself with a spare hour or two that needs to be filled up with something more constructive than painting your toenails again. Not that I don’t like painted toenails…. but more than once a day is overkill, isn’t it? I think so…. so, just enjoy it, and keep it for later if you wish…. it’s only a few bytes of memory…..
___________________________________

As a public service, and to provide some relief from the ongoing seriousness that is the common state of affairs here, I offer this delightful young pup in the throes of joie de vivre; I found the picture on Facebook, posted on my wall….. Would that we all could be as carefree as this!…. Just enjoy, ffolkes, that’s all it’s here for…. 🙂
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It’s been a long road to this point this morning, but well worth it, to my mind. I hope y’all enjoyed the previous post, “Music Passion”, as well as this meander through my morning’s mindful muddle…. I’m going to stop pressing my luck, and end this here… it seems an appropriate place, sitting here at the end as it does, eh? Y’all take care out there, and May the Metaphorse be with you……

—
Sometimes I sits and thinks,
and sometimes
I just sits.

gigoid

Kowabunga!

Music Passion

Posted on April 26, 2012 by gigoid

Ffolkes,

Today I’m trying to fulfill a request from adollyiciousirony at All About Lemon, who asked me to join her and other bloggers in her new blogging game, Music Passion…. so, below this are links to my music passion(s) from the 50’s, the artists that I listened to then, and whose music influenced my tastes the most…. I couldn’t choose only one, so I picked two. They are Little Miss Dynamite, Brenda Lee, and the undisputed godfather of rock and roll, Buddy Holly… here are links to their music…

Brenda Lee’s best hits; this is sung by Brenda many years after she made these songs famous, as a 11 year old phenomenon, singing her signature song “Dynamite” in 1957 on TV….

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=riSL_r1iCfg&feature=related

and Buddy Holly’s “Maybe Baby” from 1957, just one of many hits of his that were all over the radio airwaves “back in the day”…..

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

Hopefully, right below here, you will see the Music Passion logo…

Okay, so I am also to provide a link to the original home page for the Music Passion Page, and that is here:

http://allaboutlemon.com/music-passion/

Thanks very much to Dolly at All About Lemon for persuading me to give this technological lesson a try… I don’t know if it will work, but I’ve learned a bit about how the WP editor works, so it’s all good… it was fun finding the music too, and now, if this works, I’ll be able to continue to the next decade and onward.. so… Yay!

I hope for two things…. First, that the logo and the links come through okay… second, that the logo displays as it should. And if not, well, the music you’ll find by following the links should make it all okay…. Enjoy!

Sometimes I sits and thinks,

and sometimes

I just sits.

gigoid

Kowabunga!

It gives truffles a bad name….

Posted on April 25, 2012 by gigoid

Ffolkes,
One of my most strongly held beliefs is that “regret” is a useless emotion, and should be eliminated from those feelings I allow myself to entertain. This, or course, assumes that I can actually control what I feel, an assumption that, while true in the realm of possibility, is not always so in reality. Our feelings just happen, often as a reaction to new information or a surprise event (though we can control what happens inside us, for the most part, we cannot do the same in the real world, outside us….). Thus, we sometimes must suffer feelings that are not welcome, at least until we are able to banish them with our will. Regret is one that I try to root out at its first appearance, as it does nothing to help resolve anything, especially not whatever has caused it.

Some religious moralists will point out that regret can be useful in preventing future similar situations, but I challenge that presumption as overly optimistic, as well as morally manipulative. More often, I would say, regret causes us to avoid the type of situation where it might occur, not out of morality, but out of guilt, and fear. Plus, the situation that regret avoids may be one that is necessary to improve one’s lot, if only it is faced squarely, and resolved, rather than regretted, and avoided. Fear and/or guilt are never good motivations to act upon, except in situations of impending life or death, when the speed it adds to an honorable retreat is welcome. Any other time one acts from fear, the result is generally “regrettable”……

Why have I started out with such a serious subject? Hell, your guess is as good as mine. I just started typing, and this is what came out….. I think I was having some thoughts of regretting getting out of bed, which, since I was already up and typing, served no real purpose. Hence, this short, somewhat mellow diatribe….. it could be worse. I could have started in on health issues, always a pleasant topic, and always available for discussion, what with their daily insistence on being in the forefront of my consciousness. It can be hard to ignore my carpal tunnel symptoms when one hand is numb while trying to type, for sure….. But, I didn’t want to take the chance of driving the Gentle Reader away so early in the morning by creating too many unpleasant images…. bad policy, all around….

So, we’ll just fly with what I’ve written so far, relatively useless as it is for any purpose beyond filling space in the intro section….. We have more important fish to fry than to “regret” what has already taken place…. 🙂 Shall we Pearl?…..
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“I used to think it was awful that life was so unfair. Then I thought, wouldn’t it be much worse if life were fair, and all the terrible things that happen to us come because we actually deserve them? So, now I take great comfort in the general hostility and unfairness of the universe.” — Marcus, Babylon 5

Here is one of those statements that, at first look, does not appear to be particularly important, or helpful. But, after a second look, it grows…. and, in reality, I have to remark that it is a pretty good way to look at life in its most real sense. If one can come to understand, and to believe in the indifference of the Universe, then its apparent malice becomes moot.

We all know of terrible things that happen in this world, and many of them make no sense to us; it’s hard to understand why little children have to die in natural disasters or fires or such events. There is no reason that we can find, and none that anyone can give, that will explain or expiate such a tragedy to the parents of the children. Sometimes the violence that can shatter lives is perpetrated by other people, sometimes the Universe itself seems to have picked out the weakest, most vulnerable targets upon which to display its irresistible power. However it occurs, it will never seem fair, or just, nor can any justification be offered that would assuage the pain that is engendered.

Thus it becomes an important tool for us to be able to accept the unfairness that is inherent in the indifferent nature of Mother Nature. She doesn’t mean to be cruel; it is just the way it is. If we choose to believe that the world is fair and just, then we can only believe that She hates us, both individually and as a species, for she regularly presents us with reasons to do so, if we assume her hostility. No other explanation fits the evidence.

Unless, of course, one learns to understand that there is no special animosity on Her part, it is just Her way of expressing Herself, and we happen to be there when She does so. In the final analysis, it is quite a comforting thought, to know that we are not the special target of all that goes wrong in our lives…. we’re just lucky, I guess….. 🙂
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“Prayer carries us half way to God, fasting brings us to the door of his place, and alms-giving procures us admission.” — The Koran

As may have been guessed, I find the precepts and concepts that are put forth by most organized forms of religion to be not merely false, but deliberately so, in order to foster the control over people that is the sole intent of such organizations. No matter how pure they claim their motives are, they are no more interested in the well-being of their devotees than they are of anyone outside their church. This is true not only of every Christian sect I have examined, but of other major religions as well. The above serves as evidence in favor of this observation, as well as showing that I don’t apply this to only one religion; it is a hidden purpose behind all of them.

Now, let us examine the above statement. If we take away all the guilt-ridden phraseology, and strip away the delusions that are presented, we can re-state this more accurately as…. “Let’s talk to our imaginary friend to ask for favors we don’t deserve… then we’ll put our bodies in great stress in order to experience hallucinations that we are in the presence of our imaginary friend…. and to top it off, we’ll give our hard-earned money to the ones who tell us to worship, so they can build golden domes to the everlasting glory of the supposed deity. Hmm, makes perfect sense, eh what?

I’m not going to go into a huge rant today; I’ve got some stuff to post later that precludes any long, drawn-out discussions. But, I didn’t want all the Christians out there to think I pick on them exclusively, or that they are the only targets of my critical eye. No sirree, they are not…. any religious organization that puts out the kind of crap as listed above is my target, and they certainly don’t have to be Christian (though, in truth, I don’t believe there ARE any organizations at all that would actually deserve to call themselves such, as none of them follow His teachings closely at all… mostly they’re not even in the same ballpark….) .

Muslims, Hindi, Buddhists who mistakenly give Gautama godhead, Taoists who foolishly look for god instead of understanding of the Way, Baptists, Episcopalians, or any other such organizations that exist, in reality, solely to support a priest-hood, a group of men (usually… women don’t seem to lead these movements, though they often fall prey to them) whose only interest in other people is how much power over them can be obtained; these are what I choose to speak out against, with all the intellect at my disposal. Call me Don Quixote, if you wish, but that’s just the way I am, by deliberate choice….

“The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself.” — Friedrich Nietzsche
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“Abolition of a woman’s right to abortion, when and if she wants it, amounts to compulsory maternity: a form of rape by the State.” — Edward Abbey

Here is perhaps the clearest statement of this idea that I’ve seen in a long while. Of course, it is an opinion that will be vigorously opposed by a great many people, too many of whom are women who have been brainwashed to believe that their male masters have the right to make such decisions for them. These women have abrogated their very person-hood, their entire feminine nature, becoming mental and physical slaves to men who have no right to call themselves such.

The arrogance and misogyny that is implied, and proved, by those who would disagree with this statement by Mr. Abbey is astounding. I regard such an attitude as evil, plain and simple, and only those who refuse to acknowledge reality as it is, instead of how they wish it to be, are able to give credence to such flagrantly dishonorable ideas. It is, to say the least, disheartening to realize the extent to which the average person will allow themselves to give up the control of their own minds, just so they don’t have to make the effort to decide what is right for themselves. It is much more to their advantage to go along with what is obviously wrong, as it feeds into their own egotism and misplaced arrogance.

And I say, fuck ’em. When any assholes who would argue with a woman’s right to control her own body speak up in my presence, I will never fail to put them straight, even if it entails reading to them from the Book of Righteousness (ref: Louis Lamour, from any Sackett novel), after tactfully pointing out the errors in their thinking.

In fact, when such opportunities arise, I have a hard time preventing myself from advancing directly to that step in the discussion at the first asinine platitude that escapes their mouth. That first blow always sends a particularly pleasant shock of power from my fist to my shoulder at first contact, and though usually unnecessary, makes a second blow very tempting. But, if I do that, they’re not awake to hear the lesson….. Oh well, assholes, all of them….

“What’s on your mind, if you will allow the overstatement?” — Fred Allen
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“He that doubteth is damned.” — Romans 14:23

It took a while, but it was worth the time spent searching…. This is a perfect example of how the folks who would have us believe that the Bible (or any other sacred books inspired by supposedly supernatural entities) is a direct line of information from God, will go to almost any lengths to trick us into doing exactly what that book tells us to do. I have previously written here as to the value that Doubt has in the bag of tools people have to get by in this complex, confusing universe we inhabit. It is our only defense against information or events that can cause, or even intends, us harm, rather than good; such information invariably is given to us by other people whose only intent is to achieve some sort of power or control over us. I don’t think this is a particularly hard concept to understand; its proof lies in almost every interaction we have when faced with organized religions.

This short little warning/threat implies that any who do not bend over in submission to its decree will spend eternity in Hell. Hmm, a bit harsh, don’t you think? For merely entertaining a question regarding the accuracy of a concept presented with no evidence that proves its reliability? The Universe at large presents such false information regularly, and anyone who doesn’t learn caution in such instances is liable for the consequences, which can be severe, such as in the case of being confronted by an apparently friendly, but in reality, rabid dog. Rabies is no picnic, from all reports, so Doubt in such instances is very appropriate, and useful.

But, in the minds of the folks who are selling faith-based products, Doubt is the last thing they want people to have in mind when considering what they say. It tends to cause their arguments to fall apart right in front of their eyes, and they cannot make the sale that way. If they can’t convince people to accept what they say without questioning it, their entire house of cards will come tumbling down around their ears, and they would have to give up all those nice little perks that go along with having everyone believe everything they say, like having poor people willingly give up 10% of their earnings in tithe, or free rent in a house built by the labor of others…. Did you think they would give that up easily?…. Well, then you’ve lost your strongest ally against such degradations to your sensibilities…. a healthy sense of Doubt….

“Fear not, for I have given you authority to do so.” — Smart Bee, via some random preacher’s King James version….
___________________________________

She what was honour knew,
And with obsequious majesty approv’d
My pleaded reason. To the nuptial bower
I led her blushing like the morn; all heaven
And happy constellations on that hour
Shed their selectest influence; the earth
Gave sign of gratulation, and each hill;
Joyous the birds; fresh gales and gentle airs
Whisper’d it to the woods, and from their wings
Flung rose, flung odours from the spicy shrub.
— John Milton (1608-1674) — Paradise Lost, Book viii, Line 508

Once again, I have included a poem here, just because…. What I’ve written above is serious enough, and a little balance is called for…. and here it is…. enjoy!
___________________________________

Okay, so, not so bad for an off-the-cuff sort of morning…. a fairly eclectic group of observations, fraught with my customary sardonic views on most everything. Without even going back to re-read yet, I’m going to let it fly…. even though I know in my heart that once gone, there is no retrieving any of it…. but, hey, what’s life without some risk, eh? Pretty damn boring, that’s what…. so, enjoy, or not, as you will… if not, feel free to comment on any of it. And if you do enjoy it, I’m glad to hear that too… not necessary, though, a simple click on the “Like” button will suffice to make my day…. 🙂

Y’all take care out there, and May the Metaphorse be with you…..

—
Sometimes I sits and thinks,
and sometimes
I just sits.

gigoid

Kowabunga!

Posted on April 25, 2012 by gigoid

More food for thought, on a subtle point that escapes most people who examine this issue. Please read, think about this, and share it as widely as you can… it is information that everyone in society should be aware of….

Rebecca Mott

The most common and dangerous myth is the belief that there must some punters somewhere who respect the prostituted.

This myth goes down into many prostituted women and girls, and its poison is slowly killing them – giving them the illusion of hope and then smashing it down into their face.

The good punter does not exist, has never existed, and there is no utopia where good punters can exist.

Look at the reason that so many on the outside of the sex trade wants – often in a desperate manner – to have the myth of the good punter.

It often comes from the place of deciding that prostitution must be normal sex, maybe on occasions slightly more kinky or slightly more dangerous. But always in the framing of it being a mutual business exchange.

In this framing, the good punter is respectful, does sex not to harm but…

View original post 923 more words

Posted on April 24, 2012 by gigoid

Ffolkes,
This is the most heartwarming, insightful, and beautiful piece of work I have seen on the internet, bar none. It combines gorgeous photography, wise and loving philosophy in text form, and amazingly beautiful music as enhancement. A truly wonderful experience… take a little time for yourself….

allaboutlemon-All Around, In, And Out Of My Own Universe

For those who are not there yet,

here are some brilliant guideposts…

Philosophy_For_Old_Age_

In search for a good philosophy for life (hapifri.wordpress.com)

View original post

How much for a self-portrait?

Posted on April 24, 2012 by gigoid

Ffolkes,
If the weather here in California this spring is any indication, global warming is developing nicely. Rain, a couple days of sunshine, clouds, now more rain… the pattern is nothing like what I’ve seen in this state for the last 60 some years that I’ve lived here…. Oh, I’ve been elsewhere, all over the US in fact, but I’ve never lived elsewhere for long without returning to the left coast.

There are just too many advantages, both in terms of weather, and in terms of availability of whatever climate or land configuration one wishes. Mountains, seacoast, desert, valleys, rivers, urban, rural, rain forest, oak forest, any type of geographic formation one could wish for is all within four hours drive from anywhere in the state.

So, I’ve always come back here to stay, even though I love seeing far-away places, and learning about the people who live there. It is one of the reasons I want to travel now that I’m retired, and as soon as I can secure my full retirement from the Feds (bless their pointy little heads), I’ll be off. But, for the nonce, I am stuck here, and the weather is NOT acting normally. Usually by mid- to late-April, the weather is so gorgeous one wonders that the entire world doesn’t move here to enjoy it.

Global warming is real. No matter who you listen to, or what statistics you may see that say otherwise, (and those statistics would either be missing important pieces, or made up of fantasy numbers straight out of someone’s head) it is a process that began some years ago, and is being continuously augmented and strengthened by society’s refusal to stop pumping crap into the air.

In one of my earliest blogs I published a link to a site called “World Clock”. On this site is simply a counting program, that counts several key factors in the overpopulation and pollution arenas. One face shows the population of the world, counting off how many are born each second; one can get dizzy very quickly by watching how fast the numbers change. Another face shows how much CO2 is being pumped into the air each second by the industrial sources and by automobiles. It is astounding how many TONS of carbon dioxide is going into the air, as I type.

If you wish to see it, here is the link:

http://www.poodwaddle.com/applets/worldclock.swf

So, any who, the point of all this was not to get into a rant on global warming, though it is easy for me to do; it was merely to point out that once again, I’ll be stuck indoors on what would normally be a great day at this time of the year. But, thanks to the effects of global warming and over-population, I’ll be right here, typing and reading away, and wishing I could go for a walk without freezing…. in April, in California…. it’s disheartening to say the least…. Ah well, let us Pearl…..
___________________________________

“Perhaps we are wiser, less selfish and more far-seeing than we were two hundred years ago. But we are still imperfectly all these good things, and since the turn of the century it has been remarked that neither wisdom nor virtue have increased as rapidly as the need for both.” — Joseph Wood Krutch

Mr. Pollyanna Krutch makes a really dumb statement first, but redeems himself with the last line. To make the assertion that today’s society is morally or ethically advanced over what we have been in the past is absurd, and that is being kind. If he sees any such thing in society, it is only a result of having so many more people wandering around butting into everything that it SEEMS like there is more tolerance and more ethical behavior amongst the common members of our culture. The percentage of such folks certainly has NOT grown over the past, nor could he quote any source of data to support that idea (I know, I’ve looked for it…).

Nonetheless, he turns his gaffe around by making the last statement, which is perfectly true. Neither wisdom nor virtue in society has grown, at all, at all…. in fact, the number of incidents that hit the news every day would indicate quite the opposite, to anyone viewing it dispassionately. In fact, in light of the proven theory of how society is becoming LESS intelligent over time (proven mathematically, in previous Pearls, so please don’t make me go through that proof again… it’s just arithmetic, and anyone can perform the basic computation of the data), it would seem to be rather obvious that the amount of wisdom and virtue has decreased over time, and in the case of society today, both of them seem to be absent entirely.

At this point I could start providing examples of how I come to this conclusion, but I’d rather go on to the next pearl, so I will merely refer the Gentle Reader to today’s headlines, where I am sure ample evidence of my supposition is provided, gratis. It shouldn’t take too long, and is probably a more convincing argument than any I could write.

Tell you what…. you go check out the news today, and if you find some evidence that society is getting wiser, or more ethical or virtuous, bring it up in the comments section below, and we can discuss the matter further….. meantime, we will be going on to the next egregious societal anomaly….. which usually isn’t hard to find…..
___________________________________

A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,
And the dry stone no sound of water. Only
There is shadow under this red rock,
(Come in under the shadow of this red rock),
And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow in the morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
I will show you fear in a handful of dust.
— T.S. Eliot, The Waste Land

This poem really doesn’t need much discussion. In and of itself, it is a classic work of art, and few intelligent people would argue the fact. I have included it not only for that reason, but because it fit so well with what is written just above. Eliot’s vision here is incredibly prophetic, in my mind, and whenever I read it, pictures flash across my inner eye, of nuclear wasteland (photos of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are prominent), of foamy lake waters with dead fish floating around the rocks, of the yellow air so common in Los Angeles. He saw it all coming, and brought us fear, in a handful of dust…..
___________________________________

“Power, like the diamond, dazzles the beholder, and also the wearer; it dignifies meanness; to what is contemptible, it gives authority; to what is low, exaltation.” — unattributed in Smart Bee

I wish I knew who wrote this, and I may google it later to try to find out. For now, it serves to address what struck me when I read it. First, it is absolutely true, especially if speaking of power over other people, and there are far too many obvious examples for me to bother listing them all, as you can see them all over the news. What struck me is the realization that all of these people who seek, and assume, power over others, do so out of their deepest fears, and their unwillingness to deal with that fear, which is also known as cowardice.

That is correct. Cowardice and fear are what motivate our leaders, every damn one of them, and I don’t care how often you may point out how much courage it takes to put oneself at the apex, because that is just a bullshit lie told to you by those self-same cowards to cover up their gratuitous lack of morals or ethics.

It takes courage to face one’s fear. It doesn’t take courage to pull the wool over the eyes of people who hand them the woolen cap to use. Only a person who fears that much could ever bring themselves to even contemplate the actions of those in power; and only cowardice could explain how such people carry out the dishonorable acts that are listed every day in the news.

“We create an environment where it is alright to hate, to steal, to cheat, and to lie if we dress it up with symbols of respectability, dignity and love.” — Whitney Moore, Jr.

I find it ironic to consider the degree to which people will go to NOT look at this concept, at how hard they will squirm and struggle to find some reason to trust these cowardly assholes who are actively ripping off the public. Instead, society marches on, happily content to ignore all the signs that the folks to whom they are entrusting the keys to the public treasury are bending them over and taking them from behind at every opportunity. I mean, it’s hard to believe, since I’ve never seen any Vaseline used in these rapes…. but, I guess the denial being employed extends even to their pain….

“I think the next four years we should try it with no President.” — Dana Fradon
___________________________________

“Strange, because they are so frankly and hysterically insane — like all dreams: a God who could make good children as easily as bad, yet preferred to make bad ones; who could have made every one of them happy, yet never made a single happy one; who made them prize their bitter life, yet stingily cut it short; who gave his angels eternal happiness unearned, yet required his other children to earn it; who gave his angels painless lives, yet cursed his other children with biting miseries and maladies of mind and body; who mouths justice and invented hell — mouths mercy and invented hell — mouths Golden Rules, and forgiveness multiplied by seventy times seven, and invented hell; who frowns
upon crimes, yet commits them all; who created man without invitation, then tries to shuffle the responsibility for man’s acts upon man, instead of honorably placing it where it belongs, upon himself; and finally, with altogether divine obtuseness, invites this poor, abused slave to worship him!” — Mark Twain, _The Mysterious Stranger_

No discussion needed here…. I’ll just point out the author, and fade into the background so his words speak for themselves…… My only comment is, “Damn straight!” I never could figure out why an omnipotent entity would even WANT to be worshiped…. I certainly wouldn’t, and I’m not even partially omnipotent….
___________________________________

“Beware the fury of a patient man.” — John Dryden (1631-1700) — Absalom and Achitophel, Part i, Line 1005

I’m not sure why I was compelled to include this pearl today. Originally I had intended it to be an ending quote for a pearl of a different nature, but then I thought I’d use it like this….

I would suggest to those who are in power today in this country, and, for that matter, around the world, that they should probably pay close attention to what they may perpetrate on the mostly unsuspecting public in the near future. I give this suggestion only in the spirit of fairness, one which they are not particularly invested in displaying on a regular basis. Nonetheless, I am informing them that not all of the public is unaware of their chicanery, and the patience of these folks is wearing pretty thin.

I can say this because I am one of them, and I am just about done putting up with all the bullshit they are perpetrating on the rest of us, and very close to doing something about it myself. What shape those actions may take is as yet undetermined, but they may rest assured, they will not like it at all…. Just sayin’……

Fair warning……
___________________________________

Well, this turned out to be an interesting group…. as always, I never know when I begin exactly where I’ll end up, and today is no exception. But, as it is said, the journey is more important than the destination, so I am content, for the journey was fun… for me, anyway. Only you can judge your take on that…. So, with today’s Pearl a fait accompli, I now bid thee a good day, and hope that all will be well in your little corner of reality, at least for the day…. Y’all take care out there, and May the Metaphorse be with you……

—
Sometimes I sits and thinks,
and sometimes
I just sits.

gigoid

Kowabunga!

gigoid

Ned Moore, aka gigoid, is a 70 year-old, (!!!… When did that happen?….), retired dilettante, who would rather read than eat, most days. His first blog, "gigoid’s folly", has been emailed out to folks he knows for about 18 years now. He still considers it his best defense against angst, and the ever-present specter of sheer insanity..... Due to rigorous curmudgeon training requirements, he has discontinued his Facebook presence, but still indulges in the occasional Twitter session... In essence, he's socialized, but, not overly sociable; all labels and stereotypes are forbidden in his presence... and he doesn't care what anyone thinks about that..... In fact, he doesn't want to talk anymore.... If you feel you MUST contact gigoid, his email address is: alphagigoid@gmail.com You can go read now.... Go on, beat it.... gigoid, the dubious

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gigoid

Exploring Consensual Reality

Monthly Archives: April 2012

Clueless Bob gets trundled away….

Are we sure they’re knobbly?

Always twinkle before lifting…..

Real fun begins in the burrow….

Tomato rice soup again?

Music Passion

It gives truffles a bad name….

How much for a self-portrait?

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