We’re off to see the lizard….

Posted on August 18, 2015 by gigoid

Ffolkes,

No pleasure is comparable to the standing upon the vantage-ground of truth.

~~ Francis Bacon — Of Truth ~~

Rainbow Lightning

Saguaro Photography via Gizmodo.com

Good morning…. Indeed, it’s actually morning, too. I’m up at an hour more familiar to the rest of the world today, having, for an unknown reason, slept all of seven hours, thanks to the application of a massive dose of helpful herbs. I’m not sure what to do with all the energy, but, I’m sure most of it will be consumed by the sheer rush of putting a Pearl together in no time. As a matter of fact, just thinking about having to work so fast makes me tired…

No, not really, but, it does make me want to get going, so, I’ll reject all temptation to fool around here in the intro, and merely instruct Luigi to get us the hell out of here, now…. Hang on, ffolkes….

Shall we Pearl?….

“Truth is a gem that is found at a great depth; whilst on the surface of this world, all things are weighed by the false scale of custom.” — Lord Byron

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royalty-free-clip-art-vector-logos-of-black-and-orange-floral-acoustic-guitars-by-seamartini-graphics-6573

As you may guess, default music today….. I’ve tried to give it a bit of a new feeling, by going to the last page I could find on You Tube to grab this one, which was chosen just for the picture alongside it on the page…. Enjoy….

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Classical Music for Babies

The Mozart Effect

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https://youtu.be/e3cp9863zuo

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As always, the picture tells the story; here’s a rant/discussion from the archives…. This was last posted on 2/25/2014, written earlier.

From 12/12/12:

“He who proselytizes in the cause of unbelief is basically a man in need of belief.” — Eric Hoffer

This is true…. you never see an atheist going door to door, trying to convert the pious to their unbeliefs. However, I would go further on this train of thought, and add that, “He who proselytizes, in any cause, in basically a man in need of a life.” I’m sure it occurred to Mr. Hoffer, but he was too busy trying to explain this statement to somebody who didn’t understand the word ‘proselytize’….. For my own case, I have never, ever understood why people feel compelled to go door to door to try to get other people to believe what they believe; it’s one of the most persistent delusional systems I’ve ever witnessed, to believe that anyone wants to hear what they have to say, much less they will find their beliefs palatable to others, or find anyone who believes them to be superior to their own…..

“More people would learn from their mistakes if they weren’t so busy denying they made them.” — Smart Bee

Humans seem to have an immense blind spot when it comes to their own actions and beliefs. Most of them never seem to question the things they are told, even when those things are presented with no evidence other than faith. Of course, the people who are invested in the religious system, to wit: the preachers, begin their indoctrination when their constituents are very young, when they are still prone to accept whatever an adult says as truth. This ensures a life-long predilection for being simple to control…. or, in short, mental slavery, if you will. Unless there is some sort of rebellion of spirit, where new knowledge is injected, these poor saps will spend their entire lives believing that what they have been told is real, when, in fact, they are fitting themselves with shackles, that will forever imprison their minds, and their imagination…..

“To defend one’s self against fear is simply to insure that one will, one day, be conquered by it; fears must be faced.” — James Baldwin

In my life-long quest for the truth, I’ve come to believe that religions, while originally intended to benefit people, (by their iconic progenitors, anyway…. I’m sure Jesus was a quite nice man, and wanted the best for those to whom he preached his own philosophy of compassion….), have historically been taken over by the predators who live to control others.

To be fair, some of those who become priests, or any of the other varieties of religious fanatic that prevail in our society, may indeed believe that their beliefs are true, and act accordingly, but the majority are, as far as I can tell, only concerned with maintaining status quo, thereby benefiting themselves, while never actually allowing any REAL progress in the development of the human condition. They would have society behave as if we were still living in caves, in essence, still cowering in our meager shelter while the storms and lightning are raging outside, terrified of the power of what we do not understand, and, therefore, allow ourselves to fear….

“A universe of death, which God by curse
Created evil, for evil only good;
Where all life dies, death lives,
and Nature breeds Perverse,
all monstrous, all prodigious things,
Abominable, unutterable and worse
Than fables yet have feigned, or fear conceived,
Gorgons, and Hydras, and Chimeras dire.”

~~ Milton, Paradise Lost, Book II ~~

(Side note: I’ll bet Milton had a hard time sleeping….)

The Universe is a big place, and there is a lot to learn. Fearing that knowledge, or fearing what changes that knowing will always bring, is the act of a coward, to my mind, and should not be encouraged. Supernatural beings of unlimited power are not a required component to the understanding of Nature and the Universe; we need not fear that our lack of knowledge of how things work is unattainable. Just because we do not understand a part of reality does not mean that whatever it is, is beyond our understanding.

It is not necessary to ask for exemptions, or intervention by our own personal gods, for us to achieve happiness, or even contentment; that is completely within our own power, if we but acknowledge that part of us that is free, and connected to everything else we can perceive. The connections may not be fully understood, but they are there, and if we can only learn to recognize it, the power to change reality lies within us, all the time…. As Epictetus said, “Happiness lies in learning to accept a simple truth. There are some things you can change. And there are some things you cannot.” It’s really quite that easy, you know, once one learns to accept this fact of life…. No dogma required…..

“If brains were outlawed, nothing would change.” — Smart Bee

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Pensive early and late…

Endings aren’t always a new beginning
I’m sad to say.
Sometimes it’s just an ending
there’s always a price to pay.

Still, it’s only money, he said
watching it piss away
Did everything ‘cept meet Fred
‘n had a good time the whole way.

Even the bad stuff turned out well,
life lessons are just that way.
Knowing what’s right, you can’t always tell,
we don’t always know the right things to say.

I’ll take all the hard times, without complaint,
learning isn’t always easy to take.
Kindness, patience, and compassion without restraint,
are still the best decisions we can make.

~~ gigoid ~~

Written 4/26/2013.

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Okay, so, here is the only fresh pearl you’ll see today…. Try to enjoy it, okay? Thanks….

Every one is bound to bear patiently the results of his own example.” — Phaedrus (c. 8 A.D.) — Book i, Fable 26, 12

“He that feareth is a slave, were he never so rich, were he never so powerful. But he that is without fear is king of all the world.” — E. R. Eddison, The Worm Ouroboros

“Anacharsis said a man’s felicity consists not in the outward and visible favours and blessings of Fortune, but in the inward and unseen perfections and riches of the mind.” — Plutarch — The Banquet of the Seven Wise Men, 11

“The evidence of the emotions, save in cases where it has strong objective support, is really no evidence at all, for every recognizable emotion has its opposite, and if one points one way then another points the other way. Thus the familiar argument that there is an instinctive desire for immortality, and that this desire proves it to be a fact, becomes puerile when it is recalled that there is also a powerful and widespread fear of annihilation, and that this fear, on the same principle proves that there is nothing beyond the grave. Such childish proofs are typically theological, and they remain theological even when they are adduced by men who like to flatter themselves by believing that they are scientific gents…” — H. L. Mencken

Although it is tempting to resent disaster, there is not much use in doing so… Whether we remain ash or become the phoenix is up to us.” — Deng Ming-Dao

“You are all depending for your spirituality on someone else, for your happiness on someone else, for your enlightenment on someone else…. You have been accustomed to being told how far you have advanced, what is your spiritual status. How childish! Who but yourself can tell you if you are incorruptible?… I desire those, who seek to understand me, to be free … from the fear of religion, from the fear of salvation, from the fear of spirituality, from the fear of love, from the fear of death, from the fear of life itself…. You can form other organizations and expect someone else. With that I am not concerned, nor with creating new cages, new decorations for those cages. My only concern is to set men absolutely, unconditionally free.” — Krishnamurti — From his last speech to the Theosophical Society

“When one asked him what boys should learn, “That,” said he, “which they shall use when men.” — Plutarch — Laconic Apophthegms, Of Agesilaus the Great

“The ultimate value of life depends upon awareness, and the power of contemplation rather than upon mere survival.” — Aristotle

“The only problem with seeing too much is that it makes you insane.” — Phaedrus

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I don’t even have time to apologize for any breathlessness with which y’all may have been bothered and bewitched, ffolkes. It’s done, and that’s that. See y’all tomorrow, hopefully with a bit less rush to get done. Of course, that will depend on whether or not the Space/Time Continuum continues to breeze along at its current clip…. We’re hoping for the best….

Y’all take care out there,
and May the Metaphorse be with you;
Blessed Be, dearest Carole, Mark,Theresa, & Richy
and everyone else, too…

When I works, I works hard.
When I sits, I sits loose.
When I thinks, I falls asleep.

Which is Why….

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

gigoid, the dubious

The *only* duly authorized Computer Curmudgeon.

PLEASE STOP READING THIS MESSAGE NOW.

“SCRAM!!!!!!!!!!”- Oscar the Grouch

À bientôt, mon cherí….

Simply bursting with indifference….

Posted on May 20, 2015 by gigoid

Ffolkes,

“A bird does not sing because it has an answer. It sings because it has a song.”

~~ Chinese proverb ~~

Aurora Australis, seen from the International Space Station

NASA Image by Astronaut Terry Virts

Good morning… let’s keep it that way….

Shall we Pearl?

“Be wary of strong drink. It can make you shoot at tax collectors and miss.” — Lazarus Long, from Robert A. Heinlein’s “Time Enough For Love”

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Ludwig von Beethoven

Image from library.ucf.edu via Google Images

Those who don’t know this artist, or, for that matter, this symphony, are the unhappy possessors of some serious gaps in their cultural education…. Enjoy, ffolkes…. Da da ta DA!….

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Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony

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https://youtu.be/Gzs-OGgkZTU

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Once more, I find my level of angst not up to a full, fresh rant, though I found several good openings… Instead, I’ll use what I’ve found to create an old-school pearl, with some comments about those who would rather prey on their fellow man than make any attempt to live with honor… In other words, Asininnies of every variety…. Polly pundits, Dogma Dogs, Corporate Snakeheads, Pimps, Uniformed Myrmidons, Mundanes, and all the others who make life a misery for others, simply because they are ASSHOLES!… Sorry for shouting….

“All cruelty springs from weakness.”

~~ Seneca ~~

“What would happen if the President, the Supreme Court, and all members of both houses of Congress were stoned out of their gourds twenty-four hours a day? The chilling truth is, it might be an improvement.” — Allan Sherman

“Humility is a virtue all preach, none practice, and yet everybody is content to hear. The master thinks it good doctrine for his servant, the laity for the clergy, and the clergy for the laity.” — John Selden (1584-1654) — Humility

“A doctrine insulates the devout not only against the realities around them but also against their own selves. The fanatical believer is not conscious of his envy, malice, pettiness and dishonesty. There is a wall of words between his consciousness and his real self.” — Eric Hoffer

“If you do not tell the truth about yourself you cannot tell it about other people.” — Virginia Woolf (Alternate definition of a politician…)

“A sect or party is an elegant incognito devised to save a man from the vexation of thinking.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

“A man can’t get rich if he takes proper care of his family.”

~~ Navajo Proverb ~~

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Maggie Mae has done it again, ffolkes; sometimes, the poems she writes are so powerful, I have to include them here, so everyone who comes here will know about her poetry…. Enjoy! This one is special….

Caterpillar

Ink is raining again.

Stan, on the radio, rapping tattoos
onto white-trash girls,
sitting, spinning on bar stools.

The highway is moving ninety miles
back, to late August madness,
cars are splashing

into phone booths
left over from big cities
and light houses.

But ships don’t come in
like they used to.
The calm of the sea
isn’t the color of God’s
angry finger anymore.

Caterpillar!!
Across the back of my shoulder!
“To rob.” “To pillage.”
“To suck the ink out of every living thing.”

My name is not what matters.
The alphabet is random.
My fingers have no pattern.
I’m bound to and wrapped around each syllable
like a piece of cabbage.
An appetizer. A long, soft caterpillar
eating my way into you.

~~ Maggie Mae ~~

http://maggiemaeijustsaythis.com/2015/05/18/caterpillar/

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A simple little pearl, this one speaks of how to live your life with courage and compassion, guided by reason….

“Safety is on the shore, but the pearl is in the ocean.” — Chinese Proverb

“A good philosopher is one who does not take ideas seriously.” — Edward Abbey

“It is human nature to think wisely & act foolishly.” — Anatole France

“Take hope from the heart of man, and you make him a beast of prey.” — Ouida (Marie Louise de la Ramee)

“The light is reached not by turning back from the darkness, but by going through it.” — Leonard Roy Frank

“To be alive is to take risks; to be always safe and secure is death.” — Edward Abbey

“I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.” — Professor Bernardo de la Paz

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Without even looking it over, I can tell it’s done. Or, maybe it’s me…. Yep. That’s it. I’m done. Since it would be fruitless, not to mention pointless, to continue, I’ll cease torturing y’all, and take my leave, stage center rear…. See y’all tomorrow, ffolkes, unless my imagination quits working overnight…. Not bloody likely….

Y’all take care out there,
and May the Metaphorse be with you;
Blessed Be, dearest Carole, Mark,Theresa, & Richy
and everyone else, too…

When I works, I works hard.
When I sits, I sits loose.
When I thinks, I falls asleep.

Which is Why….

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

gigoid, the dubious

PLEASE STOP READING THIS MESSAGE NOW.

“SCRAM!!!!!!!!!!”- Oscar the Grouch

À bientôt, mon cherí….

Lost in the Sea of Choices

Posted on April 17, 2015 by gigoid

Ffolkes,

Life is not to be bought with heaps of gold:
Not all Apollo’s Pythian treasures hold,
Or Troy once held, in peace and pride of sway,
Can bribe the poor possession of a day.

~~ Alexander Pope (1688-1744) ~~

~~ The Iliad of Homer, Book ix, Line 524 ~~

Pearl House

Aye, lost indeed…. Not that it’s anything new, or unexpected; merely a new variety of our least favorite category of feelings, to wit: a pain in the proverbial, and actual, arse. Any routine I may have had is now kaput, and the effects are beginning to register on the process, in a fashion nobody can call any version of good. Even I, with my vast store of words from which to choose, can only come up with a batch of stilted, whiny complaints that nobody, least of all, me, wishes to hear first thing in the morning….

Fuck it. I’m not going to screw around with it today. This, you may have noted, is the intro. Pearl, meet your Gentle Reader…. Gentle Reader, this is your Pearl for today…. Get on with it, both of you, or, no snacks….. I am now in full curmudgeon mode, and there’s no turning back now…. Luigi, take us out of here, stat….

Shall we Pearl?

“History has the relation to truth that theology has to religion — i.e., none to speak of.” — Lazarus Long

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Image from Disney Clip Art

Who doesn’t know and love these two little scamps? Only a few bitter people…. Enjoy, ffolkes; we can all use a break now and then….

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Chip & Dale

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https://youtu.be/KFkE14vwP8o

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Written 12/22/2011:

Modern Times, Indeed

Less than Random thoughts on Modern Society

“He who learns but does not think, is lost! He who thinks but does not learn is in great danger.” — Confucius

“He who does neither is eligible to join the crowd as a Republican candidate for the Presidency in 2012.” — gigoid

Although there are moments, when I’m reading some new report on the latest verbal bomb from the Republican gallery of fools, that I despair for the race, I have to admit it’s really handy for us writers. Every day, sometimes several times, we are presented with a huge bounty of material by these folks, who seem to not only have the habit of shooting themselves in the foot, but seem to enjoy it, and, at best, are using it as a campaign tactic to draw attention. There isn’t even any need to go deep to look for stuff the politicos would rather we didn’t know, because they have taken it upon themselves to offer that information in their own statements, made obvious by their loquaciousness on certain subjects, and their reluctance to speak on others. It’s almost as if they are printing up pictures of themselves with arrows pointing to their most vulnerable points, and handing them out with their media packets.

I really don’t understand how so many obviously unqualified and deliberately ignorant group of people ever got the notion that they could possibly do this, when their primary distinguishing characteristics are blatant religious bigotry and racism (or in at least two cases, demonstrably sociopatchic tendencies). The only thing I can come up with is that they are completely out of touch with any sort of objective information about reality, and have determined that their own subjective judgments are sufficient reason to qualify them for the Presidency. In other words, they are delusional, as that word is defined as “continuing to hold as truth information that has been proven false.” Now, do we really want anyone who suffers from delusional thinking to be the one holding the button that launches the nuclear holocaust? I don’ know about you, but I would give that question a resounding “NO!”…..and not feel even a smidgeon of guilt…..

“[E]lections amount to little more than choosing between the scum that floats to the top of the barrel and the dregs that settle to the bottom.” — L. Neil Smith

There are at least two facets of this gem that disturb me, aside from its obvious veracity, and I can’t decide which is the more unsettling. First, the fact that it is funny is a sad commentary on our political scene; we always laugh at what hurts the most, and having to laugh about the choices we have in the political arena hurts a great deal. I’m not particularly happy about it when I have to make a choice between the lesser of two evils; no matter which is chosen, it’s still evil.

Even more disturbing to me, however, is the failure of courage this implies on the part of the general populace. Continually forced to make poor choices, the people have become resigned to low-quality leadership, and haven’t the heart to demand changes. The mere fact of existence for this ‘joke’ indicates that we, as a society, have given up, and are apathetic about which particular member of our beloved ruling class is currently stealing from us. We are so used to being bent over and violated, we walk around with no belt, and a jar of Vaseline, so it hurts less, and ends sooner….

Keep ancient lands, your storied pomp! cries she
With silent lips. Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me…

~~ Emma Lazarus, “The New Colossus” ~~

In today’s tempest-in-a-teapot of political chicanery, and unbridled avarice, so-called “patriots” wander around spouting off about how proud they are to be an “Uhmurrikin”, (spelled phonetically to reflect the butchering of their native tongue), and shower us on a daily basis with their nonsensical claims and ignorant racism. How can one be proud to be American? Did you choose to be born here? No, it was an accident of birth. Your parents have the right to be proud, for having provided you with your citizenship, but you didn’t have any say in the matter, and have no reason to be proud. It’s just a false pride, stemming out of the Judeo-Christian concept of elitism so prevalent among the elitists.

I would wager a considerable sum, and give good odds, that none of the current political superstars knows where this poem is inscribed. Even if they do know, they would no doubt disagree with the idea, and will find some way to throw dirt on the sentiment displayed, because as we all know, we only want new immigrants who are white Christians with money. Persons of color, the poor, or heretics, aren’t wanted by a surprisingly large number of politicians who live on the Right side of our two point six party system.

The idea of sharing is foreign to them (pun intentional, naturally), and learning to embrace both compassion and diversity is well beyond their self-limited, and self-limiting, capabilities. Ignorance has won a lot of battles recently, in the eternal war it carries on with the forces of Reason and Knowledge. I’m thinking it’s time for the proponents of the latter to remove their gloves, and get down to the serious business of beating ignorance out of the human spirit…. We hold the keys to our final destiny in our own hands, and regardless of the outcome, we are responsible….though one would be hard-pressed to find a member of our beloved ruling class who would admit to it….

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Written 2/19/2013:

Waiting to Find

Feeling and looking routinely fabulous,
seldom seems as hauntingly ridiculous,
scintillation is hardly more perilous,
or quite as fascinatingly anomalous.

Gaia pales in the face of redundancy,
yet welcomes elemental shades of necromancy,
never failing, episodic bouts of philanthropy,
can often be misconstrued as misanthropy.

It’s all much too fancy,
yet not sufficiently chancy,
to fulfill the promise made for pants.
It can’t be the thyme,
so it must be the rhyme.

~~ gigoid ~~

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I’m going to be giving up on Smart Bee soon. It’s getting more difficult each day to get it to let loose of anything worthwhile… Ah well, it’s apparently got a few old-school pearls left in it, even if they’re a bit obscure in their conclusions, like this one…. Enjoy, but, don’t try too hard; I have a feeling it’s booby-trapped…. Hence the picture of Kokopelli, as a warning to examine your Reality closely when it is handed back to you….

“Imagination creates reality.” — (Wilhelm) Richard Wagner

“Fear is not in the habit of speaking truth. When perfect sincerity is expected, perfect freedom must be allowed; nor has anyone who is apt to be angry when he hears the truth, any cause to wonder that he does not hear it.” — Tacitus

“There are occasions when it is undoubtedly better to incur loss than to make gain.” — Plautus (254-184 BC) — Captivi, Act ii, Sc. 2, 77, (327.)

“A man cannot speak but he judges himself…no man thoroughly understands a truth until he has contended against it.” — Emerson

“Yesterday is but today’s memory, and tomorrow is today’s dream.” — Kahlil Gibran

Truths would you teach, or save a sinking land?
All fear, none aid you, and few understand.

~~ Alexander Pope ~~

~~ Essay on Man, Epistle iv, Line 261 ~~

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Okay, I’m done, and glad to be so…. I enjoy this, even when it’s hard work, such as it was today…. Go figure. Any who, if nothing happens to convince me otherwise, I’ll see y’all tomorrow…. Stay alert, ffolkes, it’s getting a bit crazy out there….

Y’all take care out there,
and May the Metaphorse be with you;
Blessed Be, dearest Carole, Mark,Theresa, & Richy
and everyone else, too…

When I works, I works hard.
When I sits, I sits loose.
When I thinks, I falls asleep.

Which is Why….

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

gigoid, the dubious

PLEASE STOP READING THIS MESSAGE NOW.

“SCRAM!!!!!!!!!!”- Oscar the Grouch

À bientôt, mon cherí….

First the socks, THEN the shoes….`

Posted on March 6, 2015 by gigoid

Ffolkes,

“A man’s manners are a mirror in which he shows his portrait.”

~~ Johann Wolfgang Von Goethe ~~

Terry Virts, US Astronaut, in tribute to Spock, from the International Space Station

NASA picture, above Leonard Nimoy’s home, Boston, Massachusetts

Yes, thank you, I do know I’m late. Yes, there are things I can do to mitigate that. The question remains, should I? The next question, naturally, brings with it more responsibility, and, more inner conflict, arising out of the state of concrete, the substance my brain resembles the most at this moment in time, to wit: does this mean there won’t be any toast points?

Now, many of you, seeing such a demanding philosophical euphemism, will think I’ve slipped right round the bend for good. In that, you may be correct, but, it doesn’t preclude the need to find some sort of order, if we are ever to make it out of the intro section. If nothing else, we’ll need to find all the VR helmets, to provide the alternative reality you are entitled to, according to the small print on the back of your ticket…. If we can’t find them, I don’t think we’ll be able to float this boat today…. not that the Universe gives a good fuck….

If it did, it wouldn’t make me sleep so long, or feel so confused upon arising from the almost five hours I managed to put in pounding my pillow. Since it doesn’t, we’re going to fight fire with fire, and get pissed of right back….. Oh, wait. That’s probably not a good idea; we never did find that last group, from the last time this happened…. I almost forgot about that. Well, the insurance won’t cover another lost group, so, I suppose we’ll have to figure out something else today….

I know…. I’ll just give up. I haven’t tried that yet, so, it’s worth a shot….

Hmm…. I don’t know if I actually know how to do that; I can’t recall ever doing so previously. Okay, we’ll just play it safe, and use our ever-faithful emergency method #4 again…. Y’all know how this goes, right? Right. Hang on….

Shall we Pearl?

“Whatever we learn to do, we learn by actually doing it: men come to be builders, for instance, by building, and harp players by playing the harp. In the same way, by doing just acts, we come to be just; by doing self-controlled acts, we come to be self-controlled; and by doing brave acts, we come to be brave.” — Aristotle

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The Red Priest ~ Antonio Vivaldi

Google Images

Today, we will go for soothing…. This piece is, without any doubt, the concerto I consider my favorite of all the classical music I’ve heard…. This is the literal truth; I can spend hours listening to it, over, and over….. It’s one of those pieces of music one never gets tired of hearing…. Enjoy!….

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Four Seasons ~ Vivaldi

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http://youtu.be/GRxofEmo3HA

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I am so late, cheating is allowed; it’s all part of the mitigation process, ffolkes…. No worries, this one isn’t too long, and is perfectly appropriate for this time of year, coming up on April 15, the date that lives in infamy…. Well, in this country, anyway….

From 12/22/2014:

“It seems a little silly now, but this country was founded as a protest against taxation.” — Smart Bee

This rant has been percolating for some time; the quotes you will see scattered throughout the text were collected over the course of several days, during Smart Bee sessions looking for other material to support different sections. These all had some connection to the same politireligirant, the same one I’ve been working on so long, my spell checker doesn’t even blink at the word any more….

The pertinence of the opening quote struck me with considerable force, as it coincided with receiving a bill from one of the huge corporate entities so familiar to us all today; the logo of this particular fake person closely resembles the Death Star, strangely enough, which is probably enough for you to identify it…. In this bill, I noted that the figures quoted to me, as pertaining to a service I ordered, had been inflated in the final tally by a number of taxes, from local, state, and federal agencies, none of which had been mentioned as part of the price…. This didn’t count the “surcharges”, or the mandatory “monthly equipment rental fee”, also added on to the price without mention.

I once read a blog post by another person which tallied up all the different taxes to which we, as American citizens, are required to pay at one time or another during our lives…. There were well over a HUNDRED taxes listed, such as Death taxes, (we get taxed for dying?….), Inheritance taxes, (a tax on the survivors of those who have died….), Sales taxes, Use taxes, from every level of government, and a host of others, some of which I’d never heard of, but, are on the books…. It’s astounding to see how we Americans have BECOME the very people our ancestors warned us against becoming, to wit: slaves of the corporations and churches….

“… men say the gods have a king because they themselves either are or were in ancient times under the rule of a king, For they imagine not only the form of the gods, but their ways of life to be like their own.” — Aristotle, Politics

Here we see, perhaps, part of the reason for the apathy most Americans display regarding the responsibility for governing their own lives; it is easier for them to just accept all the lies. Finding truth can be a difficult task, which most people learn to avoid early in life, thus giving control of those lives into the hands of any who will manipulate them…. Plus, there is a large percentage of our species who not only don’t like to think, but, spend a large portion of their time on this planet ensuring that nobody else does so, either….

For the most part, though, people just don’t care, because they don’t have the time or energy to spare for anything other than the bare essentials of living; finding shelter, food, and companionship takes up 99% of their minds and attention, leaving little time to wonder about whether or not any of what they do is helpful, or will actually do anything to make their lives better…. So, they listen to anyone who will tell them what they want to hear, who will fulfill that need to have someone else do the worrying about the future…. This, of course, only gives the predators more control….

“Experience should teach us to be most on our guard to protect liberty when the Government’s purposes are beneficent. Men born to freedom are naturally alert to repel invasion of their liberty by evil-minded rulers. The greatest dangers to liberty lurk in insidious encroachment by men of zeal, well-meaning but without understanding.” — Justice Louis D. Brandeis, dissenting, Olmstead v. United States, 277 — U.S. 479 (1928)

I’ve been pounding this point for a couple years now, with little effect, beyond the release I feel for getting it out of my head. That’s a big help to me, but, it isn’t having much of an effect on the overall picture, nor will it, until human nature itself undergoes some radical changes…. If I weren’t such a realist, I’d hold out some hope for that, but, quite frankly, I don’t see it happening….

I’ve run out of steam; the combination of futility plus pain plus dying hope makes any further comments I might relate completely superfluous…. not that they were ever critical in any sense…. other than in their essential truthfulness. But, this is already long enough, so, I’ll just dump y’all right here, and finish off the rant with a short set of pearls to drive the point home…. IF it strikes y’all, feel free to spread the point around… It can’t hurt, and it just might help. One never knows, do one?….

“Everybody in this room is wearing a uniform, so don’t kid yourself…’ — Frank Zappa

“A statesman is what politicians call themselves.” — Smart Bee

“No matter how often a lie is shown to be false, there will remain a percentage of people who believe it is true.” — Law of the Lie

“Will Rogers never met Rush Limbaugh.”– Smart Bee

“When you choose the lesser of two evils, always remember that it is still an evil.” — Max Lerner

So be it.

gigoid has spoken

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The following is not a poem, technically; however, it’s still poetry, in my book…. And, yes, I know the picture is Buddhist, and the quote is Taoist…. I don’t think either Lao Tzu, or Gautama Buddha will mind…..

Always we hope
Someone else has the answer
Some other place will be better
Some other time it will all work out.
This is it.
No one else has the answer
No other place will be better
And it has already turned out.
At the center of your being
You have the answer;
You know who you are and what you want.
There is no need to turn outside
For better seeing.
Rather abide at the center of your being
For the more you leave it
The less you learn.
Search your own heart and see
the way to do is to be.

~~ Lao Tzu ~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The following pearl is of a very special sort…. it chose itself. I have nothing to do with it, other than functioning as a pair of hands for my subconscious mind, working in close conjunction with Smart Bee, to produce a pearl of great obscurity, and great power, I suspect…. This is one of those pearls which will work on us unconsciously, in the dark corners of our minds, hiding the conclusions until the proper moment comes, then bursting into our awareness like a meteor across the sky….. Well, maybe that’s just me…. I think y’all will enjoy it, though, as long as you don’t try to fight it….

He took his vorpal sword in hand:
Long time the manxome foe he sought —
So rested he by the Tumtum tree,
And stood awhile in thought.

~~ Lewis Carroll, “Jabberwocky” ~~

“Tighten ’til it cracks, then back off half a turn.” — Mechanics’ Rule

“There’s something you don’t see every day.” — Ghostbusters

“Fear is the lock and laughter the key to your heart.” — Steven Stills

“I am not a number. I am an unbound variable.” — Smart Bee, speaking for gigoid

“When the wind blows, worship its roar.” — Pythagoras

“You cannot teach a crab to walk straight.” — Aristophanes

“In the jingle-jangle morning I’ll come followin’ you.” — Bob Dylan

And through the spaces of the dark
Midnight shakes the memory
As a madman shakes a dead geranium

~~ T.S. Eliot ~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

All things considered, today’s Pearl can be considered a victory. Now, all we need to do is find a place to hide the bodies….. While I do that, y’all can get on with your day, knowing we’ll meet here again tomorrow, as long as the authorities don’t catch on to what we’re up to….. See ya, ffolkes….

Y’all take care out there,
and May the Metaphorse be with you;
Blessed Be, dearest Carole, Mark,Theresa, & Richy
and everyone else, too…

When I works, I works hard.
When I sits, I sits loose.
When I thinks, I falls asleep.

Which is Why….

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

gigoid, the dubious

PLEASE STOP READING THIS MESSAGE NOW.

“SCRAM!!!!!!!!!!”- Oscar the Grouch

À bientôt, mon cherí….

Reality’s version of twisted flaws….

Posted on January 23, 2015 by gigoid

Ffolkes,

A man so various, that he seem’d to be
Not one, but all mankind’s epitome;
Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong,
Was everything by starts, and nothing long;
But in the course of one revolving moon
Was chymist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon.

~~ John Dryden ~~

~~ Absalom and Achitophel, Part i, Line 545 ~~

Mars Rocks ~~ NASA

Have y’all figured out the mystery of dejá vu, mentioned in yesterday’s Pearl? If any attention at all has being paid, you’d be able to answer in the affirmative, because the feeling is directly tied to the opening sights here at ECR, as well as the stimulus for the discomfort we feel at finding out we aren’t as attentive as we supposed…. Perhaps, it is more accurately described as a feeling the Universe is fucking with us in some unknown way…. which, in this case, is perfectly true…. Look again at today’s title, then compare it to yesterday’s title, and the title from the day before…. Then, you may groan, and groan again, before congratulating me on a good trick….

End of quiz…. Now we’ve settled the question of just how silly and desperate I am, we can go on, though, frankly, I haven’t a clue as to where we might go. Naturally, thanks to my large, red, round proboscis, I forgot to figure out what to do AFTER explaining about the titles…. Now, I’m at a loss for anything to do, a sensation, which, however familiar it may be, isn’t one of my favorite emotions, by any means. I’ve been stuck here so often in the past 3 years, I’ve PROVED the old saw about familiarity, and contempt.

Aha! Got it! I’ll talk about the photo, above, at the top of the page…. It’s one of the latest photos from Mars, taken by the Curiosity Rover, as it trundles its way across the Red Planet to its ultimate goal, Mount Somethingorother, chosen years ago on Earth. This particular picture is significant, but, only for the effect it has produced among some of humanity’s fringe elements. The pile of rocks in the center of the photo has some oddly shaped rocks, a couple of which lend themselves to the human brain’s tendency to “fill in” details not actually present, in shapes that are somewhat amorphous in Reality, such as when we see the shapes of animals, or other objects, in the clouds in the sky….

A number of our more susceptible minds back here on Earth believe the shapes indicate the presence of life on Mars, because they resemble carved animals, such as made by ancient civilizations here…. The close-up pictures do, indeed, resemble such carvings, but, not so much as to assume, from several MILLION miles away, we can tell whether they are the product of intelligence. But, these folks are convinced, and proceeded to trumpet the news all over the Internet, so the rest of the world could share their delusion….

In the interests of saving your ass from any such indignity so early in the day, I will NOT use this silliness as a comparison to OTHER delusions, rather more familiar to all of us…. That sort of comment could easily lead to a rant, which is already taken care of for the day, as you will see below…. No need to drive y’all off before we even get started, is there? Nope….

I notice I have distracted myself long enough to finish the intro; what we see above is definitely a sufficient supply of relatively sober discussion, all pointed at moving us along to where we are scheduled to be at this point in time. (Please remember, there is no legal requirement it has to make any sense at all….) As usual, the process to bring us to this point here was, by all evidence, fully unconscious, thus protecting us from claims of evil intent, if not from the odd accusation of deliberate emotional abuse of the unwitting, or, as we call it down at the Philosopher’s Club, screwing with the natives…. All of that, being moot, can be ignored, at which, as is patently obvious, we are VERY good….

Look! It’s our opening! Let’s all brace ourselves, bring our masks into position, grab your partner’s hand….. We’re all going to jump together, okay? At the count of one….. Wait for it…. There! ONE!…. Jump, quick, or we’re all dead meat!….

Shall we Pearl?

“A man should never be ashamed to own he has been in the wrong, which is but saying, in other words, that he is wiser to-day than he was yesterday.” — Alexander Pope

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Today’s video is one I’ve seen, which shows an animated play-by-play description of how the Curiosity Rover landed on Mars, about a year or two past…. It is an incredible feat of engineering; just think of the problems that could have kept it from working! Brilliant! And, a small piece of hope among all the terrible news we have to contemplate, here on Earth…. It’s pretty cool….

NASA Rover Curiosity Landing on Mars

http://youtu.be/LiEoGUHEobo

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“One Galileo in two thousand years is enough.”

~~ Pope Pius XII ~~

“The abundance of things engendereth disdainfulness.” — Proverb

It’s almost too easy. Both of the first two pearls, one text, one text/graphic, are both rather incontrovertible, in terms of their relative Truth. Both are documented statements, since Popes, right from the start of the tradition, have always kept immaculate records, which often don’t show much sense about their desire for secrecy, as most of it tells the absolute truth, without embellishment, in spite of its origin. In short, they’ve pulled their own covers innumerable times throughout history, with statements such as these two, always with corroboration in other documents from the same period….

Thus, the importance of the third pearl climbs to new heights, for it sounds like it is a mere observation; in light of the words of Leo and Pius, the assholes, it becomes nothing less than an indictment, and a very pointed one, at that. The very corruption so blatantly spoken, and displayed by these predators of the Middle Ages, shows its effect on the populace it has oppressed, in the mildness, and simplicity of the language, in direct contrast to the opulence the Church has espoused from its beginnings… thus showing their arrogance and true natures were not going completely unnoticed….

The Catholic Church, whose public face has often belonged to folks like those two above, not merely in the Middle Ages, touts itself as the champion and protector of the poor, in such hypocritical tones of unctuous sanctimony, I often consider just slapping one of them. It enrages me when they get started spouting off about “Christian Charity”, thinking nothing of making such statements on TV, in elegant, rich robes lined with actual gold thread, standing on the steps of a palace, in which the treasures and riches collected in two hundred centuries of outright thievery from those same poor people, collected in one ten-penny per pound tithe at a time, from people who cannot buy the ingredients for stone soup.

(Now, don’t think I was raised Catholic, and have a bone to pick with them; I extend my disdain to ALL religions based on a deliberately fostered delusional belief in a powerful, supernatural imaginary friend, whose love for me is limitless, just because…. That makes up just about the whole list, as far as I can tell… still checking, so I’ll let you know if and/or when I find one…. I use the Catholics mainly because the Popes, like those above, have been so fucking obvious, and often, stupider than even those they enslave, about their disdain for the poor and downtrodden they purport to care about… I KNOW they love them: without the poor, and ignorant, where would they be?…. Dead and buried, most likely…)

The delusional system built up by the Church educators is designed to prevent any real original thinking; as any logician knows, it is not possible to reach a correct conclusion when the data is skewed in a particular direction, for a basic reason, to wit: any results of using the data will have no corresponding corroboration in Reality, anywhere…. In short, you can’t make Real out of Unreal…. no matter how often one repeats the assertion that it can, and has been done…. Honest, trust me, and you, too, can live forever!….

Pretty good grand prize, eh? Take the worst fear anyone has, fan it with stories of a burning, eternal pit of suffering for not believing, promise them it won’t happen to them if they never again think for themselves, and they will be able to live happily forever, surrounded by all those they love, in peace and everlasting harmony, by the grace of…. who? Oh, that guy nobody has ever been able to show any real proof of seeing, touching, or anything, other than by sloppy reasoning, or assumption of magic signs and portents, telling only those who can see how God’s existence is proven by the way the wind is blowing today…. Even though it has blown the same way every day of their life, without ever offering anything other than “ipse dixit” for proof of its relevance….

When I first learned the stories and justifications given by preachers, and adults, back before my fifth birthday, it all seemed rather improbable to me, not to mention downright vicious and petty, in terms of the scariness of the lessons about certain things…. Plus, death, and living forever aren’t concepts kids like to think on for long, so, when I did, it just didn’t make sense…. I couldn’t figure out why God wanted Adam and Eve to get kicked out of Eden like that; it was obvious to me he did, or why would he put the tree there, then tell them to leave it alone? I sort of felt like Calvin, when he said, to, I think, his Sunday School teacher after hearing one of the kid’s Bible tales, when she asked him if he liked the story….

“Hard to say, Ma’am. I think my cerebellum just fused.” — Calvin, Bill Watterson’s Calvin & Hobbes

Yet, people buy it, mostly because they are taught to believe it at a very young age, before they actually possess any power of reasoning for themselves…. So, those people they want to spend eternity with, who are alo victims of a millennia-old scam, based on belief in a supernatural best friend of great power, and limitless authority over all of us, because WE ARE SUCH GULLIBLE FOOLS, in their turn, pass on the very same set of delusions, using the same techniques now used by the spies, and governments, who train their agents to brainwash prisoners, or those they wish to control…. Repetition, rote, behavioral modification, based on key basic functional fears works every time…. except, it seems to a lucky few….

But, hey, to each their own, I say…. Just don’t ask me to buy into it; it leaves me cold….

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I’m working on a new poem, which, oddly enough, came to me yesterday while watching the opening of an old video…. Since it isn’t ready to share itself with the world yet, we’ll go with the work of a poet needing no introduction, whose work always hits the mark, for me…. I give you, Emily….

A clock stopped — not the mantel’s
Geneva’s farthest skill
Can’t put the puppet bowing
That just now dangled still.

An awe came on the trinket!
The figures hunched with pain,
Then quivered out of decimals
Into degreeless noon.

It will not stir for doctors,
This pendulum of snow;
The shopman importunes it,
While cool, concernless No

Nods from the gilded pointers,
Nods from seconds slim,
Decades of arrogance between
The dial life and him.

~~ Emily Dickinson ~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Today’s old school pearl came together quite nicely, without much interference on my part. I didn’t even have to rearrange the order in which they appeared, which is unusual. There were no parameters given, but, it seems to be a rather obvious comment on Life at Large, one of our default categories….. Enjoy!….

“If entropy is increasing, where is it coming from?” — Smart Bee

“You can have peace. Or you can have freedom. ” — Lazarus Long

“Don’t count on ever having both at once; they’re mutually incompatible in practice.” — gigoid’s corollary to Lazarus Long’s Observation

“Consider well the proportions of things. It is better to be a young June-bug than an old bird of paradise.” — Mark Twain

“How many Bodhisattvas does it take to change a light bulb? One – “If the thunder don’t get you, then the lightning will” — Smart Bee

“Do what you love. Know your own bone; gnaw at it, bury it, unearth it, and gnaw it still.” — Thoreau

“Forward, as occasion offers. Never look round to see whether any shall note it…. Be satisfied with success in even the smallest matter, and think that even such a result is no trifle.” — Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121-180 AD) — Meditations, ix, 29

It is the heart afraid of breaking
that never learns to dance.
It is the dream afraid of waking
that never takes a chance.
It is the one who won’t be taken
who cannot seem to give.
And the soul afraid of dying
that never learns to live.

— Bette Midler, The Rose

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I don’t want to even THINK about what it took to get this done…. It’s all sort of a blur, so, bear with me if the resulting Pearl is a bit off the norm…. whatever meaning THAT word has for us…. I’m outta here. See y’all tomorrow, ffolkes, hopefully with less sawdust in my brain….

Y’all take care out there,
and May the Metaphorse be with you;
Blessed Be, dearest Carole, Mark,Theresa, & Richy
and everyone else, too…

When I works, I works hard.
When I sits, I sits loose.
When I thinks, I falls asleep.

Which is Why….

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

gigoid, the dubious

PLEASE STOP READING THIS MESSAGE NOW.

“SCRAM!!!!!!!!!!”- Oscar the Grouch

À bientôt, mon cherí….

Set your phasers on Twinkle, troops….

Posted on January 15, 2015 by gigoid

Ffolkes,

Take me disappearing through the smoke rings of my mind
down the foggy ruins of time
far past the frozen leaves
the haunted frightened trees
out to the windy beach
far from the twisted reach of crazy sorrow.

Ah, to dance beneath the diamond sky with one hand waving free
silhouetted by the sea
circled by the circus sands
with all memory and fate
driven deep beneath the waves
let me forget about today until tomorrow.

~~ Bob Dylan ~~

The poster you see above this line is from NASA. Yep. If you click on the picture, you’ll see a larger version, which will allow you to read the small print beneath the picture. When I feel phantasmagorical (Specifically, in my case, the state of wishing for a fantasy world, wherein the human race DOESN’T become extinct….), I look at the poster, and the two others they have displayed over at the NASA web site, and dream of traveling to far-away planets…. It’s been happening a lot of late, as, here on Earth, life is becoming somewhat tenuous in nature, with a great deal of uncertainty as to how much longer our human presence will be tolerated by our abused home’s landlord, whomever that may be….

But, the intro is not the place to get into an issue of such scope…. Just click on the picture, and, if you wish, go download a copy yourself (or, download it right from the page where you see it…), and join me on the next flight to Kepler 16b…. I hear the interstellar transport ships are becoming quite luxurious, just like the old time cruise ships back on Earth, before the apocalypse….

Alright, I’m back, I think, though I don’t really want to be…. But, it’s just like that hive of bees there in my head, you know? There they are…. and, here I am….. SIGH….

Sometimes, I am more in tune with the future than I know. But, that’s a story for another time. Yesterday, the rant I wrote left me, for a while, in the dumps regarding any future for the human race…. Being a human, I was able to forget my/our doom, and get on with living, just as, eventually, I’ll get on with this Pearl. In fact, perhaps, given the fragility of my mood this recent past, we should do that now, before the risk of any unpleasantness becomes greater than my desire to avoid any such ungentlemanly behavior…. I do TRY….

Thus, if I could persuade y’all to place whatever adult beverages you chose for today’s dive, into the holders provided in your seat armrest, buckle up tight, and brace yourselves, we can be on our way. The sign re: no phone usage aboard this craft is there for a reason; please don’t make or take any calls, or we could drop from the sky like a stone…. But, no worries, the ink on the pilot’s license is fully dry; I checked…. Trust me….

Shall we Pearl?

(Boy, ain’t it the TRUTH! Have you listened lately to FOX news? Or, for that matter, to ANYTHING on TV, or issued as a public proclamation of almost any kind? I can’t put my finger on exactly why, but, for sure and for certain, all reason in the world has gone missing, stranding us here on the train to madness, without a return ticket….)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

One advantage of the internet over previous times, in at least one respect, is this: if one should wish, or need, some GOOD news, it’s a bit easier to find…. For example: I found this in a link to the ABC network channel web site you see below, , referred by an article on Rolling Stone’s web site I received in a daily email summary…. Believe me, this one makes it hard to find any reason to feel bad, if only for a moment or two….

Meet Eclipse, the dog who figured out how to ride the bus all by herself

http://abc13.com/472964/

http://abc13.com/video/embed/?pid=472964

~~~~~~~~~

Here is another video, along the same lines, found at the same web site, abc13.com….

British bulldog hates bottle of water

http://youtu.be/vnqywtFJUw8

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I am currently so involved with affairs in the Big Blue Room, there is little room in my head to spare for collecting angst, at least while awake…. No telling what my unconscious mind throws out there while I’m sawing logs, as far as I do so…. One of the referrals to the archives that Word Press makes each day, as one of the suggested Pearls at the bottom of the post, held the following religirant, one of my better treatises on the subject of humanity’s oldest scam…. Enjoy, please, or, at least, don’t take it personally….

From 9/7/2012:

“Sin lies only in hurting other people unnecessarily. All other “sins” are invented nonsense. (Hurting yourself is NOT a sin–just stupid.)” — Lazarus Long, from Robert A. Heinlein’s “Time Enough For Love”

It would be foolish to try to claim that there is NOT a part of me that wishes there was a God, as described by most of the Christian sects, or the Islamic, or Jewish, or any other of the major and/or minor religions in the history of Man. Who wouldn’t want to have all the responsibility for thinking, or for acting within reason, taken out of their hands? It would be wonderful, but as it’s pretty unlikely, to all appearances, that part of me will have to remain unfulfilled….. I’d rather adopt and set the above moral standard as my own, as I happen to agree with it wholeheartedly. It forms the root, the base, the touchstone of all of my morality, the basic raison d’etre for my every decision of whether or not to act, and how to react, from an ethical standpoint of my own choice, without thinking about whether or not it is according to dogma.

I first came across this particular quote from Lazarus when I was about 15 or 16 years old, right when I was taking classes at my parent’s church to fulfill the requirements for admission as an official, saved member of the church (Presbyterian, if it matters….), and wondering how I was going to break it to all of them that I couldn’t do it…. It was a hard decision, but, since the teachers couldn’t answer my questions about Bible incidents that puzzled me (not part of what we studied, but from different chapters I had read…), I stopped attending any services, because I didn’t want to be a hypocrite…. I could even rationalize my decision, as having been made out of concern for the safety of my family and friends, since now the church could conceivably fall down on them if they were with me when I came in…..

“Anybody who wants religion is welcome to it, as far as I’m concerned — I support your right to enjoy it. However, I would appreciate it if you exhibited more respect for the rights of those people who do not wish to share your dogma, rapture or necrodestination.” — Frank Zappa, “The Real Frank Zappa Book”

I also happen to agree with Frank on this one. What I do believe about religion, and the concept of God, or god, or Dog, is my own business, and begins with not pressing it on others, unless they ask; in such cases I will discuss the subject superficially, without expressing any preferences one way or another….. Unless, of course, they begin to proselytize. In THOSE cases, I will use every bit of shock value pop psychology I know of to lead them down some primrose path, messing with their heads until I get bored with them…. That usually doesn’t take long; they’re generally fairly uninteresting people. I tend to prefer people who have a bit of salt to their personality, just a touch of insanity somewhere in their blood…. Such ffolkes are much more fun to be around than folks who spend their time feeling bad about wanting to feel good….. and they annoy me far less often, as a rule…..

If God is omnipotent, why does he need my money? — Smart Bee

“The human condition is such that pain and effort are not just symptoms which can be removed without changing life itself; they are rather the modes in which life itself, together with the necessity to which it is bound, makes itself felt. For mortals, the ‘easy life of the gods’ would be a lifeless life.” — Hannah Arendt

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In the same post with the rant in the section immediately above, I also found this poem, which I believe I may have not used since…. I don’t remember, and I’m certainly not going to go look…. It will do for today, certainly…. I hope you enjoy it….

Vague Glimpses of a Rainbow

All the sad notions of propriety had fled,
Screaming their anger for pausing in song,
Until late came the rabid fog, colored in red,
As serenity cried, unafraid to live so strong.

Fallow fields in faithful patience set free,
Dragged from birth, by their own nature cast
Saving each moment against fear yet to be,
Carved into silence, by ignorance held fast.

Historical forces plod slowly ’tis often said
Anxieties streaming stiffly, one epoch to the next.
Cultural mania stands nonchalant in its stead
No sadder epitaph has such bittersweet context.

Patterned bags of forgotten virtue lie in wait
Blessed by reminders whose souls value affinity
Frozen webs surround the fields in gravid state
Grasping passionately within obvious opportunity.

Passage to future realities isn’t guaranteed
Small favors for deities was left off the menu
No roses, nor manna, nor gallant aerial steed
Left traces of fatal, yet originally gracious venue.

~~ gigoid ~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

SIGH…. After almost an hour, the following pearl is the best I could coax out of SB…. Look at this….

“Anaximander says that men were first produced in fishes, and when they were grown up and able to help themselves were thrown up, and so lived upon the land.” — Plutarch (46-120 AD) — Symposiacs, Book viii, Question viii

?!?!?!?! In the modern vernacular, WTF!

That, I have to say, is downright scary, it’s so…. weird. It’s probably deeper than it seems; much of what Plutarch said comes out that way. But, I think, with this one serving as the best we can find, it would be well to go back to the archives again, and call it a day…. Why, look! It seems the same Pearl I posted way back when, the same one wherein we found today’s rant, and poem, also had a very fine closing pearl, so…. It’s almost like Fate, isn’t it?…. Planning? No way….

Also from 9/7/2012:

Having just spent three hours (okay, I exaggerated…. only two….) searching in vain for a pearl with which to finish, I became incensed with frustration, and rather than scare my new neighbors with a verbal outburst, I calmly set a parameter, and collected the following pearls on one subject, to wit: human nature…. As far as I can tell, all of them rate a solid 10 on the truth scale….. As always, just follow the bouncing thought as it explores your own inner self….

“The world always makes the assumption that the exposure of an error is identical with the discovery of truth–that the error and truth are simply opposite. They are nothing of the sort. What the world turns to, when it is cured on one error, is usually simply another error, and maybe one worse than the first one.” — H. L. Mencken

“The ultimate evil is the weakness, cowardice, that is one of the constituents of so much human nature. When, rarely, unalloyed nobility does occur, its chances of prevailing are slim. Yet it exists, and its mere existence is reason enough for not wiping the name of mankind off the slate.” — John Simon

“We are all terrible little creatures.” — Martin Amis

“The tragedy and the magnificence of Homo sapiens together rise from the same smoky truth that we alone among the animal species refuse to acknowledge natural law.” — Robert Ardrey, _The Social Contract_

“Man, were he not corrupted by Governments, is naturally the friend of Man, and that human nature is not of itself vicious.” — Thomas Paine

“I think we’re all Bozos on this Bus!” — Firesign Theater

Now I feel better….. and, you do, as well….

Note from 2015:

Okay, I’ll confess. I also used a bit of hyperbole for THIS pearl…. I did find TWO pearls before giving up, but, when you see this one, you’ll realize why I went back to the past, rather than staying in the future, or the present, or whenever the hell we are now…. It’s gotten a bit confusing in here today…. SIGH…. Here, see what I mean? This is what SB gave me before I gave up…. It’s very poignant, for some of us, but, very, very naughty, in some respects, in a way that isn’t quite, well, healthy… Oh, hell, you’ll see….

“You are not permitted to kill a woman who has wronged you, but nothing forbids you to reflect that she is growing older every minute. You are avenged fourteen hundred and forty times a day.” — Ambrose Bierce “The Devil’s Dictionary”

See? True enough, but, a bit cruel, thus making it hard to appreciate the humor, or the irony, without a touch of guilt… Oh well, at least I’m done now….

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

And, thank God for that! Wait…. Can they arrest me for saying that? In the same post as a religirant? Hmm…. Maybe I should take it back….. Nah. That would be like, hypocrisy, man…. If I don’t believe it, why should I worry about blasphemy? Blasphemy, by definition, has no basis in reality, so, nobody can, in reality, punish me for saying it….

Well, that’s logical anyway, but, since most of the proponents of those who follow such beliefs tend to react so violently when someone doesn’t believe the same way, I think I’ll put on my Kevlar vest for a while…. Better safe than sorry, right?…. Right….

On that cheerful note, I bid thee adieu for another day. Provided none of those I’ve insulted today find me before then, I’ll see y’all tomorrow…. If they do, it’s possible I could be involved in a bit of a firefight; don’t worry about me, though, I recently upgraded my weaponry, and am now capable of withstanding an entire military platoon, as long as they are not equipped with anything more dangerous than, oh, say, a tank….

I could handle a tank, or two…. If they call for air support, I could have to retreat to my hidden compound, but, other than that, it shouldn’t be a problem…. When the Ground-To-Air SAM’s I ordered arrive next week, I’ll be all set to deal with any sort of conflict on my territory.

Okay, all of the rental time for our fantasies has now expired; it’s all been put returned to the vendor, and we may take our leave…. (Don’t tell the vendor, but, I kept the bazookas….) Again, ffolkes, I bid thee a fond farewell, until tomorrow…. Maybe I’ll find a touch of sobriety by then…. you never can tell, can you?….

Y’all take care out there,
and May the Metaphorse be with you;
Blessed Be, dearest Carole, Mark,Theresa, & Richy
and everyone else, too…

When I works, I works hard.
When I sits, I sits loose.
When I thinks, I falls asleep.

Which is Why….

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

gigoid, the dubious

PLEASE STOP READING THIS MESSAGE NOW.

“SCRAM!!!!!!!!!!”- Oscar the Grouch

À bientôt, mon cherí….

With music playing in the background….

Posted on December 22, 2014 by gigoid

Ffolkes,

“When Thales was asked what was difficult, he said, “To know one’s self.”

And what was easy, “To advise another.”

~~ Diogenes Laertius (c. 200 AD) — Thales, ix ~~

I suppose bass ackwards is as good as our normal format. Due to the constraints placed upon me by the loss of function in my hands for much of the day, these Pearls have been going through a series of changes in how they are constructed….. The new technique involves a break, to rest my hands, or shoulder, or back, or hip, until it stops complaining, about every five to ten minutes…. Even now, as I type this, my left arm is growing numb, thus forcing an adjustment in content and structure….

From your viewpoint, this is probably a good thing, as it keeps my ranting to a minimum, thus shortening these Pearls by a significant margin. That’s okay by me, they’ve been growing too large for even my taste, and I’ve been looking for ways to cut it all back a bit…. I didn’t, however, think that would be accomplished by forcing me to experience enough pain to alter my habits…. So much for my vaunted intelligence, eh, what?….

Ah well, such is life, and it goes on, and on, and on, regardless of our reaction to it…. Whining about it won’t help, so, I’ll stop right here, resolving to, instead, jump right into today’s effort, just to see if there is any way to get it done in this frame of mind…. I’m all about new adventures, though I think I’d prefer a bit less pain involved in whatever happens…. just a personal preference, which, I’m sure, Murphy and his myrmidons will be happy to ignore….

That’s it…. that’s all I’ve got, ffolkes…. This, choppy and sparse as it may be, is all there is going to be in the intro today…. I’m giving in, after a fashion, to expediency, just like a well-trained consumer should do at this time of year, during the annual commercial frenzy held each year’s end to stimulate the economy, so all the corporate entities can start off the new year with a solid profit margin….

Yawn…. there he goes again…. Never mind, ffolkes, let’s get on with it, okay?….

Shall we Pearl?

“Don’t be confused by surfaces; in the depths everything becomes law. What is necessary, after all, is only this: solitude, vast inner solitude. Walk inside yourself and meet no one for hours–that is what you must be able to attain.” — Rainer Maria Rilke

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Today’s video offering is a lead-in for the rant to follow, in section three of today’s post. This will give y’all a solid batch of supporting evidence, as well as a taste of the proper attitude to assume when speaking of our beloved ruling classes, to wit: disdain, bordering on disgust….. At least George was able to make us laugh about it; I suppose it’s better than crying, which would be just as appropriate, under the circumstances….

GEORGE CARLIN – Upper Class Pays No Taxes

http://youtu.be/Ko35qhKnRXs

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“It seems a little silly now, but this country was founded as a protest against taxation.” — Smart Bee

“Everybody in this room is wearing a uniform, so don’t kid yourself…’ — Frank Zappa

“A statesman is what politicians call themselves.” — Smart Bee

“No matter how often a lie is shown to be false, there will remain a percentage of people who believe it is true.” — Law of the Lie

“Will Rogers never met Rush Limbaugh.”– Smart Bee

“When you choose the lesser of two evils, always remember that it is still an evil.” — Max Lerner

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My life is light, waiting for the death wind,
Like a feather on the back of my hand.”

~~ T.S. Eliot ~~

I’m not sure, but, it seems to me that I’ve seen more little phrases like this one, perfect in almost every way, with T.S. Eliot’s name appended to them, than I have seen from just about any other poet I know. It demonstrates the kind of beauty, power, and simplicity of expression I strive to achieve, whenever I open up one of my veins to allow a poem to leak out of my imagination…. Here is one wherein I came somewhat closer, than in most of what I write….

From August of 2012:

Dreaming, I wait…

In the most patient moments of rationality
kindness flows smoothly in a special milieu,
fallow thoughts speed first from equality
to give no anxious fever, anger to eschew.

Indignant mothers and step-sons in-law
shall fade simply from brilliant to grey,
intoning ritual dogma, fresh, avid, and raw,
falling, falling, in massive pastoral disarray.

Safety lives not, save brightly in ignorant bliss,
it follows us all, silent and infinitely frail,
foremost too often, soft as a virgin kiss,
alive, always eager, willing, and pale.

Intimate knowledge finds only the bold few
with courage and virtue to gift, unbidden.
No solemn royal version may pass in review,
true love for man, never to remain unhidden.

Sweet feathers of Emily’s hope uplift,
calm, drowsy episodes bursting with light,
With final glad cries we set ourselves adrift,
swimming in the oceans of natural delight.

When sorrow is banished, in ages yet to come,
roots solidly anchored, cold and remote,
Ample supplies of kindness sit silent and dumb,
and the old stranger shrugs on his faded coat.

Dreaming, then, I wait with shadows in the night
aspiring to inspire, a message from the muse’s heart
Never forgotten images, framed in color bright,
tempt me only, grieving, steeped in serenity’s arcane art.

~~ gigoid ~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Life sure does seem like a crap game sometimes, doesn’t it? This pearl took almost an entire day of wrangling with SB, who, for some reason, has been reluctant to cooperate very much of late…. Ah well, it’s done, and came out fairly well…. Enjoy…. or not. Your choice, as always….

“We never reflect how pleasant it is to ask for nothing.” — Seneca

“Education is the kindling of a flame, not the filling of a vessel.” — Socrates

“Fear is not in the habit of speaking truth. When perfect sincerity is expected, perfect freedom must be allowed; nor has anyone who is apt
to be angry when he hears the truth, any cause to wonder that he does not hear it.” — Tacitus

“Think of your ancestors and your posterity.” — Tacitus (54-119 AD) — Agricola, 32

“Believe me, a thousand friends suffice thee not; In a single enemy thou hast more than enough.” — Ali Ben Abi Taleb

“What is man’s chief enemy? Each man is his own.” — Anacharsis (f1. c. 600 B.C.), Scythian philosopher — Quoted in Stobaeus, Flor., II, 43

Ain’t no time to hate
— barely time to wait.
Whoa ho, what I want to know:
— where does the time go?

~~ Robert Hunter ~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

If I didn’t know better, I’d suspect myself of cheating…. Nonetheless, it’s done, and just in time for me to explode into inaction…. On that cryptic note, I shall leave you for another day…. According to the plan, as it now exists, I will see y’all tomorrow…. Keep in mind, however, what ‘they’ always say about the best laid plans…. Oh, boy, ffolkes, NOW I’m scared….

Y’all take care out there,
and May the Metaphorse be with you;
Blessed Be, dearest Carole, Mark, and Theresa…
and everyone else, too…

When I works, I works hard.
When I sits, I sits loose.
When I thinks, I falls asleep.

Which is Why….

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

gigoid, the dubious

PLEASE STOP READING THIS MESSAGE NOW.

À bientôt, mon cherí….

Supplicants in front, mendicants to the rear….

Posted on December 18, 2014 by gigoid

Ffolkes,

“Intellect annuls fate. So far as a man thinks, he is free.”

~~ Ralph Waldo Emerson ~~

Colliding Galaxies, picture taken by NASA’s Chandra Deep Space Telescope

It’s no use. Nothing is going to help this morning; that much is already clear. Not the opening quote, nor the most excellent photo, illustrating the sheer size of our Universe, nor any of the weird, silly, and/or just plain odd thoughts running around in my head will serve to open up today’s post…. None of it is stimulating anything in my head other than reluctance, both to start, and to make a decision about WHERE to start…. It can make a huge difference in where we end up, obviously, so I do like to at least have some input….

Today, however. it isn’t going to work, not the way it usually works, anyway. Since I have no alternative opening ready to use, we may end up wandering around, listening to me panic, until we’ve managed to fill in enough to satisfy the monitors (whoever they are….). We could also try something new, and dangerous…. what do you think? Want to try it? The danger isn’t as much as we face any other day; it’s just more specific to the section than is normal, due to the strange laws concerning such matters, none of which are on the books, or even published…. They’re the unwritten laws that control all writers, which, if they knew of them, would doubtless drive them even crazier than they are….

Of course, that, too, is merely another figment, drawn from the depths of my insecurity, just so I could fill in a few more lines, thus, getting us further down the page…. Did they work? No? Ah, shit….

“I find myself beside a stream of empty thought.” — Smart Bee

Well, that sinks it…. Now, of course, I’m gonna have to step in, and settle this for once and all, or we could be stuck here for days…. Since the usual methods haven’t worked at all, I’m going to apply the ruthlessness which has saved us so many times already…. It’s amazing what tossing out the bullshit can do for one’s decision making abilities…. It sure is easy to make a decision when one only considers ONE set of expectations, i.e., one’s own…. It’s amazing how much more gets done…. Here, watch, it works like this….

Shall we Pearl?

“He that respects himself if safe from others; He wears a coat of mail that none can pierce.” — Henry Wordsworth Longfellow

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

For some reason, when I went to find a video, I thought of this show, from my childhood; it was one of my favorites… How could it not be? Space flight, magic, and Barbara Eden, a young man’s fantasy woman…. all hit my interests right on the money…. When I went to look for episodes to watch, I was delighted to find an entire page with several seasons’ worth of shows to watch…. Yay! I know where I’ll be wasting my time for a few days….

I Dream of Jeannie Season 2 Episode 1-2

http://youtu.be/HDA3r9O_XYM

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Here is one from the archives, which fits in with some of our recent discussions quite nicely…. (I’m still saving my hands, a very good excuse to be lazy, I find…)….

From 12/12/12:

“He who proselytizes in the cause of unbelief is basically a man in need of belief.” — Eric Hoffer

For my own case, I have never, ever understood why people feel compelled to go door to door to try to get other people to believe what they believe; it’s one of the most persistent delusional systems I’ve ever witnessed, to believe that anyone wants to hear what they have to say, much less they will find their beliefs palatable to others, or find anyone who believes them to be superior to their own…..

“More people would learn from their mistakes if they weren’t so busy denying they made them.” — Smart Bee

This ensures a life-long predilection for being simple to control…. or, in short, mental slavery, if you will. Unless there is some sort of rebellion of spirit, where new knowledge is injected, these poor saps will spend their entire lives believing that what they have been told is real, when, in fact, they are fitting themselves with shackles, that will forever imprison their minds, and their imagination…..

“To defend one’s self against fear is simply to insure that one will, one day, be conquered by it; fears must be faced.” — James Baldwin

~~ Milton, Paradise Lost, Book II ~~

(Side note: I’ll bet Milton had a hard time sleeping….)

“If brains were outlawed, nothing would change.” — Smart Bee

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Today, you are getting one of my poems, simply because I’m too lazy to go find someone else’s…. So be it…. Here is one I haven’t used for a while, first created on a Friday in 2013…

A Dubiously Soft Morning

Idiosyncratic images, clamoring for regard,
fill up the white, white screen on which I view
my life, never seeing, nor invited to sup
ambrosial remnants of anything new.

Still, yet almost in motion, allegory sails away
bobbing gently, quick and easy to find,
signs of one happy child, seriously at play,
blissfully immersed, focused joy in mind.

Formidable cries of outraged simple justice
echo plaintive relevance, in half the time.
Maladaptive infants, destined for hospice
salvage an only child, daring to sing in rhyme.

Creativity equals unquestioning farce,
often reaching for absurdity, brazenly afire.
Instead, a blow is felt that no joy will soften,
accepting the price, added to the cost of desire.

~~ gigoid ~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Whew! It’s a good thing I got up early today; today’s final pearl may be in the top five, on the list of pearls that took the longest time to complete…. Smart Bee appears to be in a mood… Ah well, all’s well that ends well, as we all know…. quite well… This one SEEMS abstruse, but, once you’ve finished it, you’ll see it really isn’t…. In fact, it’s quite transparent, in many respects…. Enjoy!….

“Reason is not measured by size or height, but by principle.” — Epictetus (c. 60 AD) — Discourses, Book i, Chap. xii

“Every man is guilty of all the good he didn’t do.” — Voltaire

“Everywhere the human soul stands between a hemisphere of light and another of darkness; on the confines of two everlasting hostile empires, Necessity and Freewill.” — Carlyle (1795-1881)

“The miser is as much in want of that which he has, as of that which he has not.” — Publius Syrus

“Depend not on fortune, but on conduct.” — Publius Syrus

“Cato requested old men not to add the disgrace of wickedness to old age, which was accompanied with many other evils.” — Plutarch (46-120 AD) — Roman Apophthegms, Cato the Elder

From ignorance our comfort flows.
The only wretched are the wise.

~~ Matthew Prior (1664-1721) ~~

~~ To the Hon. Charles Montague ~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I know, already, without having gone back over this yet, it will be okay…. It may not ever be considered as one of the best Pearls ever, but, it will definitely do for our purposes today…. Hell, a lot of it is even fresh…. or, what passes for fresh these days…. Regardless of all my rationalizations and/or excuses, it’s done…. As I’ve been reduced to saying already today…. So be it…. gigoid has spoken…. See y’all tomorrow, ffolkes…. most likely….

Y’all take care out there,
and May the Metaphorse be with you;
Blessed Be, dearest Carole, Mark, and Theresa…
and everyone else, too…

When I works, I works hard.
When I sits, I sits loose.
When I thinks, I falls asleep.

Which is Why….

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

gigoid, the dubious

PLEASE STOP READING THIS MESSAGE NOW.

À bientôt, mon cherí….

Patagonian cricket league posters on sale….

Posted on December 13, 2014 by gigoid

Ffolkes,

“Don’t get hit.”

~~ First rule of fighting ~~

There is no doubt the world in which we live is in a sorry state; there is too much evidence of that to deny, even for one of my dubious nature…. Yet, we each go on, blithely behaving as if tomorrow never comes, just as we have for our entire history, without any acknowledgment, or even awareness, of our own impending doom as a species. In spite of the mountains of evidence to indicate how serious is the situation we find ourselves in today, no governing body, no major world leaders, and nobody of any societal significance is doing anything about it, other than some little noise-making in the news now and again, and a constant parade of lesser personages, such as yours truly, who keep trying to get everyone else to FUCKING PAY ATTENTION!

Alas, our noise, true and attractive as it may be, is drowned out, in the cacophony of complaints and bullshit that the political pundits keep laying out; they have the control of the media, having trained them to react just the way they planned to every new piece of insanity, to wit, with hyperbole, outrage, focus on the negative and/or insignificant, and misdirection, always trumpeting who is to blame, rather than calling for real answers….

Instead, they are trained to focus on completely irrelevant issues, having little to do with the core of the problems, which are never discussed, at all…. Any actual discussion of problems is discouraged, as being counter-productive…. What is never stated is this; all that information we are not hearing IS counterproductive, but, not to us, but, to those who are in positions of leadership… If the news was actually reported correctly, the pundits would be running for the border, trying to escape the mobs….

But, that would be an ideal world, and the one in which we spend our time is NOT one of those, by any stretch of the imagination…. Ah well, we’ve made our bed, we must now lie in it…. Sadly, the house, in which the bed might be found, is right in the path of flowing lava…..

I see now that the metaphorical structure I’ve built up with such enthusiasm just fell apart, into small pieces…. I can see it lying there, on the ground at my feet, mocking me with bitter laughter…. Silly things…. But, having it all fall apart like that does make it clear, at least to me, that I’ve gone completely off the rails here this morning, haring off down a rantable path, without ever checking to see if my brain was on…. which, I’m pretty sure, it wasn’t…. At least, I can’t find any evidence anywhere in any of the above paragraphs that would indicate power to the lobes…. Hell, I’m almost positive I wasn’t even awake yet when I started; I’m barely awake now….

Ah well, it’s done what, apparently, it was designed to do, which is get me to this point, far enough down the page to feel as if we’ve actually done something worthwhile…. We HAVE gone far enough to make this legal, which, as y’all know, is all we really care about…. As it now meets all state and federal regulations, nonexistent though they may be, we can use the opportunity that presents itself to make our escape…. Besides, I believe I may have just used up ALL of my ability to type for the day, just getting this done…. Oh, well…. I’m taking us down, ffolkes, so, you’d best hang on…..

Shall we Pearl?

“A gentleman is one who never hurts anyone’s feelings unintentionally.” — Oscar Wilde

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

One of the saving graces of humankind is our ability to make music…. classical, blues, jazz, it all expresses our nature, in one facet or another…. Here is the an example of the best of the blues, the one musical genre most likely to be of use to us in the coming years, as we learn how our own nature has been our undoing….

This Is The Blues – Volume 1

http://youtu.be/f_9zy9ZYEkA

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As noted, my hands are done typing for the day, so, here is a discussion from the past, with all our favorite targets in attendance….

From 9/19/2013:

“A lie would have no sense unless the truth were felt as dangerous.” — Alfred Alder

So, I was going to forgo a rant today, giving my back, and your brains, a bit of a break, but, when I went to peruse the news, I saw the latest discussion of what is happening in the House of Idiots in Washington, D.C., regarding the budget resolutions being discussed, wherein the possibility of a shutdown is threatened, if the Retardicans and Demobutts can’t come to some kind of compromise.

It seems the Retardicans are still upset about Obamacare, and the notion of helping the middle class, as well as the lower classes (gasp!), to obtain medical insurance coverage at a reasonable cost. This idea, of being fair and ethical, seems to have struck them in the wrong place, and they have been whining and complaining ever since it became law, frantically searching for ways to undermine the whole program, with the ultimate goal being to stop it altogether….

The entire issue, of course, is just smoke, to cover up the simple racism that these assholes won’t cop to…. It is STILL stuck in their craw that they somehow allowed a BLACK MAN to get elected to the highest public office. They have looked for, and desperately latched onto, every possible way they could find to block every piece of legislation the White House has espoused, no matter how much such legislation would help the public, ever since Obama was first elected.

The publicly stated goal of the Retardican Party in 2008, right after the election, was to make Obama a one-term President; having failed at that, their new goal became the eradication of ANY laws, or any beneficial reforms, that were accomplished during his administration…. Hence, the campaign against healthcare reform, which, ultimately, is not in their best interests, but, hey, who needs common sense?….

I’m almost too disgusted with the entire bunch of them, Retardicans and Demobutts both, to even continue this rant….The right wing continues to shoot itself, and the public, in the foot with their intransigent inflexibility, and their unreasoning paranoia about the POTUS, while the left side continues to wander around letting whatever the administration says or does go without question or review, as if somehow a man who was politician enough to get elected to the Senate, then the Presidency, all of a sudden became the world’s most truthful man…. Sorry, folks, it just doesn’t follow….. such trust in ANYONE who is an elected official in this country is plain silly, and doesn’t show much real common sense….

I see NO ONE in the public venue whom I would trust to make decisions for me, on ANY subject, much less those that can affect my life, and the quality of same…. Sorry, I just don’t see ANYONE who seems to be honestly interested in anything beyond their own agenda, and those agendas have nothing to do with mine, or what I see as beneficial for everyone…. They just don’t…..

I also, unfortunately, don’t have any viable solutions, which is why my rants often are short…. I mean, I do know what would help, and that is for everyone in the world who does have common sense to get together, join forces, and tell the assholes to stop…. But, they have guns, which they are practiced in using to get their way, whereas, most of US aren’t willing to contest matters on that level, so, that probably isn’t ever going to happen…. Not until more of our side are willing to use force to get our way, just as they have always done….

Since I don’t see it happening, we may as well just kiss our asses goodbye, because the eventual outcome of such idiocy is death, and I don’t mean individually, but rather, as a species…. Stupid is as stupid does, as somebody once said, and when I look around the world these days, stupid is pretty much all I see…..

Hell is the place of those who have denied;
They find there what they planted and what dug,
A Lake of Spaces, and a Wood of Nothing,
And wander there and drift, and never cease
Wailing for substance.

~~ William Butler Yeats ~~

~~ Responsibilities and Other Poems (1916).The Hour-Glass ~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

It has been said that intelligence is both a blessing, and a curse…. I’m here to testify….

Intelligent Crimes

The value of wit is often said to cause harm,
for those who think, such is its greatest charm.
The new and the bold cannot be fulfilled
if innovation and change is left unwilled.

Society behaves at its base as a mob
conformity and submission its primary job.
Any sign of rebellion against the mob’s rule
is met with resentment, naming such rebel the fool.

Intellect and talent are looked at askance,
expressing artistry stands nary a chance.
To stand out from the rest of mankind
is fraught with danger, for body and mind.

Often I stand to watch in solemn dismay
as beauty and joy are left by the way,
ignored and reviled by the unwashed masses
who prefer darkness, and acting like asses.

With shouts of derision the normals make known
their fear of intelligence, greater than their own.
They hope to stop all semblance of progress;
for thoughts and ideas, they couldn’t care less.

The world struggles on in spite of all opposition,
managing to maintain its advanced position.
Pulling the foolish along in spite of reluctance,
helping each to learn the survival dance.

Hard though it may be to keep up with the future
genius manages its plans to develop and nurture.
In the final analysis, those who live by reason
enjoy life the most, season to season.

~~ gigoid ~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Thankfully, I had a few moments yesterday, (very few, in retrospect, but, enough….) when the pain was in abeyance sufficiently for me to spend some time perusing Smart Bee for some appropriate pearls…. Here is what we were able to come up with…. It’s all pretty good advice, or, at minimum, viewpoints worthy of examining as helpful; taken together, they all show us how to live as well as we can, from an ethical/moral standpoint….

“There is in us a tendency to locate the shaping forces of our existence outside ourselves. Success and failure are unavoidably related in our minds with the state of things around us. Hence it is that people with a sense of fulfillment think it is a good world and would like to preserve it as it is, while the frustrated favor radical change. The tendency to look for all causes outside ourselves persists even when it is clear that our state of being is the product of personal qualities such as ability, character, appearance, health and so on.” — Eric Hoffer

“Let us treat men and women well; Treat them as if they were real; Perhaps they are.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882)

CALLOUS, adj. Gifted with great fortitude to bear the evils afflicting another. “When Zeno was told that one of his enemies was no more he was observed to be deeply moved. “What!” said one of his disciples, “you weep at the death of an enemy?” “Ah, ’tis true,” replied the great Stoic, “but you should see me smile at the death of a friend.” — Ambrose Bierce, “The Devil’s Dictionary”

“A gentleman is one who never hurts anyone’s feelings unintentionally.” — Oscar Wilde

“It is impossible for a man to love his wife whole-heartedly without loving all women somewhat. I suppose that the converse must be true of women.” — Lazarus Long

“Loneliness is the poverty of the self. Solitude is the richness of the self.” — May Sarton

“He preferred an honest man that wooed his daughter, before a rich man. “I would rather,” said Themistocles, “have a man that wants money than money that wants a man.” — Plutarch (46-120 AD) — Themistocles

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

My normal (hah!) routine is shot to shit…. It is now 0330 in the AM, and this Pearl is done…. I’ve been up too long already, and may just go back to bed, in the forlorn hope of actually getting comfortable enough to sleep, with my hips, hands and shoulders all singing to me, a song of misery played on the strings of my nervous system…. Ah well, so much for another day in Hell…. No worries, I’ve got my ticket to Oblivion, right here in my pipe…. See y’all later, ffolkes…. maybe even tomorrow…..

Y’all take care out there,
and May the Metaphorse be with you;
Blessed Be, dearest Carole, Mark, and Theresa…
and everyone else, too…

When I works, I works hard.
When I sits, I sits loose.
When I thinks, I falls asleep.

Which is Why….

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

gigoid, the dubious

PLEASE STOP READING THIS MESSAGE NOW.

À bientôt, mon cherí….

Nuke those gum drops before they’re served, please….

Posted on November 18, 2014 by gigoid

Ffolkes,

“No falsehood lingers into old age.”

~~ Sophocles (406 BC) ~~

In response to the quote, from Sophocles, I would say, “except, perhaps, those we tell to ourselves.” That simple fact may be part of the problem, wouldn’t you think?….. Ah well….

In coming centuries, should we survive to see them, the Philae lander, (which you see above in an artist’s rendering of its descent to the comet on which it tried to land, taken from Space.com’s coverage of the event), may become the subject of a number of jokes, described as “Philae, the Bouncing Bot”, or other such inane nicknames, a result of the comical way it managed to complete its landing sequence…. Thanks to the unknown physical demands of the landing, onto a comet moving at great speed, the silly thing managed to bounce three times before coming to a complete rest on the surface, a sequence of events not realized until the pictures from the mother-ship had been analyzed….

What a ride, eh? Zooming along through space, trying to land on a rock, only to find itself on a make-shift carnival ride…. Too bad it didn’t have any human riders to give us a play-by-play description of how it felt to be bouncing over the surface of a speeding rock through the depths of space… As it was, we were barely able to find the poor wee ‘bot where it ended up on the surface, finally spotting it shortly before its batteries gave out. The information it was able to transmit to the scientists at the EU Space Center, of the single drilling sample it was able to perform, was sent to the center just before it said “Nighty night”, and went to sleep, perhaps never to wake again….

Since there is only a small chance of it ever doing so, we’ll leave our species’ latest technological wonder to rest in peace, and hope it passes through enough sunlight on its trip around the Sun to be able to wake up & reestablish contact with Earth. Until then, we’ll just tell it, “Well done, little ‘bot!”, and get on with today’s Pearl…. Hey, we’ve got to get started some time, right? Right…. Now seems like a good time….

Since we’ve already come down the page a ways, I think we’ll take what we’ve been given, and run to the bank to deposit what may be left by the time we get there…. Not that we’re going to sweat much over an imaginary deposit in an imaginary bank, but, it deserves a mention, if only to fill in just a few more lines…. Pretty cool the way I slipped those in there, isn’t it? I’m getting fairly adept at this, I think…. Other times, I’m sure I’m deluding myself, and, since I haven’t a clue as to how to figure out which is true, we’ll pretend I never said anything about it, and take the opening into the rest of the Pearl that is looming just ahead…. In fact, DUCK!….

Whew, almost hit the overhead lights on that pass…. Oh well, we made it, and we’re here, so, lets’ get on with it…..

Shall we Pearl?

“In all life one should comfort the afflicted, but verily, also, one should afflict the comfortable, and especially when they are comfortably, contentedly, even happily wrong.” — John Kenneth Galbraith, Guardian (London, 28 July 1989)

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I don’t know about y’all, but, I love Van Morrison’s music, always have…. Here’s a bunch of it…. Enjoy this little trip through the past, ffolkes, or else….

Van Morrison- BBC Four Sessions 2008

http://youtu.be/p-lOyh5wBEk

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I’m not late, but, the news is currently pretty boring, and, more importantly, I AM quite lazy…. Hence, another blast from the past…. This one isn’t a rant, per se, though it shows some rant-like qualities…. I think we’ll label this one a ‘discussion’….

From 10/22/2012:

“Don’t ever become a pessimist, Ira; a pessimist is correct oftener than an optimist, but an optimist has more fun — and neither can stop the march of events.” — Lazarus Long, from Time Enough For Love, by Robert Heinlein

As with many important truths, this one does not comfort one to know it; a common attribute of remarks by Lazarus, who has a tendency to voice the truth regardless of its potential, or even certain, effect on the audience. And, damn it, it is just so much simpler to let all the bad stuff hold sway on our attention, and give in to the depressive urge to berate and chastise the universe for its lack of tact and consideration for human sensibilities. It never listens, anyway….

My semi-rant in section one today is a perfect example of this principle at work; I do try to maintain some optimism in the face of reality; I even have learned to try to explain away all the weird stuff, as being outside the statistical universe under consideration. It’s a lie, but it’s my lie, so I usually can buy into it, long enough to allow denial to set in, and thus preventing the otherwise inevitable depression over how bad things have gotten…..

Actually, right now, it’s fairly simple to stay completely distracted, as we always have the election, and all the shenanigans taking place on that stage, to draw our attention away from the imminent demise we face as a species, or even, more importantly, our personal concerns of everyday living. It’s easy to deny the inevitability of carbon monoxide pollution when we have Mitt the Twitt’s lies to chase down, or Biden’s latest zinger to admire, or Lyin’ Ryan’s latest example of elitism to watch with dropped jaw….. It’s a veritable circus, and the clowns are in full swing….

(Note from 2014: This was written during the 2012 campaign leading to the national election, with Mitt, the Twit, Romney, cluelessly running against Barry the Obama, who was seeking his second term at the helm….)

It’s not just the candidates providing the entertainment, either…. every Tom, Dickwad, and Mary is chiming in with their two cents, on TV, radio, and, most prodigiously, on the Internet, all trying to get SOMEONE to listen to them during the run-up to the election. Those two cents can get very, very strange, as each commenter tries to make the most outrageous statements and/or claims/accusations about all the actors on stage, providing a whole new package of entertainment for us, each one vying for our attention at the top of their lungs, figuratively speaking…..

This is where the metaphor of the circus gains its credibility, although, more accurately, I am reminded by this, most emphatically, of just about any carnival at the County Fairs I’ve been to….. Disheveled, sinister-looking barkers, complete with suspenders and a cigar in their mouth, yelling out the prizes they promise, each one grander than the next, and easy as pie to win: exotic visions that promise endless satisfaction of desires, enormously valuable jewels and objet’s d’art for virtually nothing, and endless illusions to draw the eye away from the seediness and underlying, almost frenetic despair permeating the air….

Yes, indeed, the political scene here in America has always reminded me of a carnival, and the events and activities that prompt my impression of the election as an illusionary device, designed to fool the public into thinking that things will change if they vote, has never been stronger than it is now. I have hope that by voting against the obviously evil side of the campaign, the overall effect on the immediate future will be mitigated to some degree. But, I can find within me very little hope that the eventual outcome is in doubt, and that outcome is not one that anyone is going to like…. at all.

My optimism is fairly natural to me; I’ve always been a hopeful kind of person, and I continue to hold hope that mankind’s future will extend beyond this century, groundless as it may be. My pessimism, unfortunately, has the advantage of having the most evidence in it’s favor right now, even if Obama wins the election, as I expect he will. He is only one man, and the course of human events is very difficult to change once it is headed in a particular direction. My hope is based on the wish that more than just he will learn to make the inner changes needed for us all to survive the storms that are coming…. A slim hope, yes, but hey, it happens to be all we’ve got…..

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Here is a piece of my own poetry, written during a period of contemplation of current events, (of that time, of course….), of the most personal kind, in which I managed to include much of my own philosophy, truncated into verse, right in the very last stanza…. Go figure….

Raging at Aging

As old as you feel, we are told, is old as you are,
custom assures such vision will carry us far.
Reality begs to differ, may it be so bold
it’s really quite painful, and very, very cold.

The power and strength felt in our halcyon youth
desert us with age, yet another unwelcome truth.
Irony rules our time here on this bountiful earth
as we reflect the changes over time since our birth.

As physical powers fade from this fragile shell,
we learn our mind can serve us quite as well.
The strength that once filled our bones and hearts
is now applied by our will, to more arcane arts.

Life’s greatest gift is our freedom of choice
no matter how often we forget, we still get a voice.
Energy, or apathy, by our will we may choose,
failing to do so, our only way to lose.

Each of us lives in the grip of time and space,
always seeking our balance, our own chosen place.
One must accept reality, for it’s true at the core,
all we can do, is all we can do, and nothing more.

~~ gigoid ~~

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As I begin to write this section, I have no clue as to what I’ll find today in SB…. In fact, that may be the way to go…. Right, we’ll do it…. This pearl will be ALL Smart Bee’s choices, on any subject it cares to pick, as long as it makes a point of some kind…. Let’s see what happens with such a loose set of parameters….

“In everything one must consider the end.” — J. de La Fontaine (1621-1695) — The Fox and the Gnat, Book iii, Fable 5

“A multiple personality is in a certain sense normal.” — George H. Mead

“Make the most of yourself, for that is all there is of you.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Better be ignorant of a matter than half know it.” — Publius Syrus (42 BC) — Maxim 865

“It is not love of self, but hatred of self which is at the root of the troubles that afflict the world.” — Eric Hoffer

“The world will never starve for want of wonders; but only for want of wonder.” — G. K. Chesterton, TREMENDOUS TRIFLES

A soldier told Pelopidas, “We are fallen among the enemies.” Said he, “How are we fallen among them more than they among us?” — Plutarch (46-120 AD) — Pelopidas

“Even while a thing is in the act of coming into existence, some part of it has already ceased to be.” — Marcus Aurelius

“This and a great deal more like it I have had to put up with.” — Terence (185-159 BC) — Act iv, Sc. 6, 8, (746.)

Hmm…. Well, I’m not entirely sure what it means, but, I like it. It’s done, too, making it perfect….

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Whew! That went fairly well, all things considered…. Today’s Pearl has been brought to you by the number 2, by the letter J, and by those generous folks three houses down whose internet service I’ve been stealing for weeks…. Just kidding, but. hey, it isn’t unusual for me to be a bit giddy when I’m finished…. Perhaps this would be a good time to make my break for freedom…. Say goodnight, Gracie….

See y’all tomorrow, ffolkes….

Y’all take care out there,
and May the Metaphorse be with you;
Blessed Be, dearest Carole, Mark, and Theresa…
and everyone else, too…

When I works, I works hard.
When I sits, I sits loose.
When I thinks, I falls asleep.

Which is Why….

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

gigoid, the dubious

PLEASE STOP READING THIS MESSAGE NOW.

À bientôt, mon cherí….

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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