Tag Archives: Thomas Jefferson

Burdened by implications of impropriety….

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Ffolkes,

Wow…. It’s been a LONG time since my head has been so empty in the morning….. I’m guessing it has something to do with getting an extra hour and a half of sleep, which has me up today rather later than is usual in the recent past….. Of course, my guesses are wrong as often as right, so that’s no guarantee that I’ve figured this out, or that trying to use my brain for any kind of cognitive tasks will have any positive results… In short, I’ve reached that momentous state so aptly described in the Grateful Dead song, Sugar Magnolia…. to wit: “Head’s all empty, and I don’t care….” I DO care, though, at least enough to feel some regret at my lack of alertness just now, if not any great depression, over not being able to write…. I mean, THAT is nothing new, right?….

Besides, the empty-headed state described in the song has more to do with the effect on the brain of a beautiful woman, not over-zealousness in pounding the pillow, so it doesn’t help explain anything… As is normal in these cases, I have absolutely no idea what to do about it, and intend to carry on in the usual way, as I am right now, wandering around in my head, blathering, until something, anything, I type strikes a chord, whether of humor, anger, outrage, or simply reminiscence…. SOMETHING has to pop up eventually, and when it does, I’ll be all over it, like a male dog chasing a female in heat….

Hmm, as is plain to see, I shouldn’t be allowed to make up any descriptive phrases until I have a better handle on things… I’m not sure that image is the one I was shooting for…. But, what is a daily blogger to do, eh? I ask you, is it fair to expect brilliance every day? Well, maybe it is, but, hey, not all of us can do that, okay? Some of us need to be average some days…. otherwise, those flashes of brilliance tend to get overlooked.

If I was brilliant all the time, it wouldn’t seem special when I do make some connection, or expose some nerve, or shout something out that makes people sit up and take notice. There has to be a degree of contrast, sort of like using a frame for a picture, to serve as a way to highlight what I’ve written, a dichotomy that tells the tale to be told….

Most days, I end up like today, trying to achieve perfect piffle, which, to me, is great fun, and funny, and, in some ways, the most honest way to start off these missives… Nothing else conveys the sense of nonsense that we try to achieve here, that sharp, sardonic wit and intelligent discourse to which I aspire in my writing…. Of course, not everyone appreciates piffle like me, but, that is NOT my problem; I can’t fix the whole world at once…. It does mean that I have to also write in such a way that those folks are included in the message’s recipient list, as they typically are in the direst need of such information as I impart in my ranting mode…. So be it….

Well, like it or not, I’ve done it again…. Four plus paragraphs of near-piffle, punctuated within an inch of its life, all with absolutely no meaning, or relevance to what is happening in reality…. What can I say? It’s a gift…. It also meets all the legal requirements for an introductory section, which means I can put down my quill, and start typing again…. That’s sort of what it feels like, even if it isn’t anything close to that…. Piffle takes me back to my youth, and I can’t help it…. nor would I, if I could…. I’m just a sentimental fool about that sort of thing, and there’s no changing that at this late date…. I suppose I’m starting to ramble beyond even the loose limits at play on this site, so, I’ll give it up now….

Shall we Pearl?…..

“It is not best that we should all think alike; it is difference of opinion that makes horseraces.” — Mark Twain, from Pudd’nhead Wilson’s Calendar(1894)
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Over the past two and a bit more years, I’ve written an average of about 2000 words per day, and have posted them all here on this blog…. This is either very egotistical, or very neurotic, and I don’t really give a crap which, because it was my only defense against insanity, at the time when I began. It seems to have worked, at least from this side, so, whether or not it is, or was, necessary is, to me, a moot point…. There is one advantage to having written so much, which I am now able to better utilize, since WP has been referring us to various older posts of the same nature as the one being read; that advantage is having a large archive of material that I know is ready to use, for those times, such as today, when my brain is somewhat less than perfectly groomed, and not willing to come out to play just yet….

Hence, the following discussion, which I found in a Pearl first posted on December 15, 2012…. I hope you enjoy it….

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“Do you have the patience to wait till your mud settles and the water is clear? Can you remain unmoving till the right actions arises by itself?” — Lao Tzu

Ever since being first exposed to the precepts of Taoism, back when I was in college in the late 60’s, it has always appealed to my sense of rightness, and makes the closest approach to what I personally believe about the Universe at large. Not the mystical parts, that cater to the religious order of the time it first was clarified by Lao Tzu, but the essence of the concept of reality, as being both within our perception, and unknown to us as beyond our understanding. We may not possess the necessary sense to be capable of receiving such information, whether about reality or fantasy, and if we assume the omnipotence of a god, then we would not be able to comprehend their existence, lacking the tools to perceive them with our five or six senses….

This knowledge, however, is tempered by the deduction that, as a physical part of the universe, we are connected to it, and to every other part, if only by sharing that existence. The connection, intuitively, is deeper than merely the physical; it extends somehow into the spiritual plane, which, though not tangible, is nonetheless a proven part of our mental reality. (What IS the mind?) It is this very lack of the ability to explain by which we may know the connection exists, as it echoes the nature of reality itself, which cannot be explained in words. Goodness knows why I’m trying, to be sure…. this is getting pretty esoteric, although, so far, it is consistently rational, if not entirely illuminating.

“Since everything in life is but an experience perfect in being what it is, having nothing to do with good or bad, acceptance or rejection, one may well burst out in laughter.” — Long Chen Pa

What better way to acknowledge and celebrate the perfection that we can see, or hear, feel, smell, taste, or imagine?…. It’s certainly preferable to a long, dusty discussion of esoteric concepts, and will encourage enlightenment just as efficiently, if not quite so verbally. In some way, I’m always looking for the perfect quote, the ultimate aphorism, that delivers that cosmic truth we are all seeking in one swell foop, and the above from Long Chen Pa comes very close to it, especially when considered in the light of what one concludes from considering the answers to the first two questions today. As a Westerner who has learned to appreciate what the East brings us, the following resonates very well….

“Somehow, in the midst of their horrid history, the best among the _gaijin_ learned a wonderful lesson.  They learned to distrust themselves, to doubt even what they were taught to believe or what their egos make them yearn to see.  To know that even truth must be scrutinized, it was a great discovery, almost as great as the treasure we of the East have to offer them in return, the gift of harmony.” — David Brin – Dr. Pak’s Preschool

There’s the key, ffolkes, right there in front of you…. Even truth must be scrutinized, or the universe will have its way with you, and you may never find the gift of harmony that is also there for the taking…. There, not so esoteric, after all….and, not too shabby at all, eh what?….

“The ancient Taoist sages were poised and alert….. like ice on the verge of melting.” — Taoist proverb
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In the same Pearl where I found the above short discussion, I found a very powerful poem, surprisingly… I was surprised because it was my own poem, and I had no recollection of writing it, or posting it…. But, there it was, and here it is….

Territorial imperative…

Beauty must define, as augment to existence,
as life must be more than mere subsistence.
Nature demands more.
Truth helps.

~~ gigoid ~~

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WARNING! FRESH RANT BELOW: Read it, or not, as you wish…. but, don’t tell me I didn’t warn you….      😆

“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.” — The Constitution of the United States of America Amendment 1, 1791

I had thought, when I found this restatement of the First Amendment, to use it as the opening for a politirant.  It IS the perfect lead-in to such discussions, as each and every one of the issues addressed in this codicil to the Constitution is under attack, and, in essence, is no longer one of our guaranteed rights…. I’m not crying “foul!” without evidence; the sky actually IS falling, to use an obvious literary reference. So, I suppose I  will…. use it to lead in to a politirant, that is…. Let’s take this piece by piece….

Religion in this country IS free to carry on with, as long as the religion is a Christian sect…. Any other group is likely to suffer a lot of obstruction in the pursuit of their religion, both by law, and more significantly, by custom, and the power of peer pressure…. On the State level, as well as locally, laws have been, and are being passed that prevent Muslim women, and men, from wearing certain articles of clothing their faith demands they wear; other religious icons and dogmatic representations have been subjected to legal restriction as well, for many religions…. except Christian…. But, such laws are only the surface of the problem….

There are even Christian churches, or, well, allegedly, or peripherally Christian churches, that are discriminated against by their larger co-conspirators, just because they don’t have the same ideas about what their particular focus of worship is all about…. Just ask anyone from the Mormons… or ask anyone in The Tribe about antisemitism in the twenty-first century, and listen to them list all the various examples one can find, and not just in the news…. Ask just about any Southern Baptist what they think about Catholics, or Jews…. but, be prepared to get spewed upon with some nasty vulgarities…. Then, ask anyone from Texas what they call a Muslim when they aren’t calling them ragheads….

Okay, that’s the first section of the Amendment, on religion…. That’s gone, kaput, no longer in force; from a cultural point of view, it really never was in place, not very strongly…. The Christian sects have always been good at paying lip service to the principles of their dogma and creed, (the ones about tolerance, and compassion for others….). but, they’ve never been terribly good about actually living up to those principles, have they?…. That little episode during the Middle Ages, the one they called The Inquisition, now THAT was a pretty thing, wasn’t it?…. Now, of course, we have the plague of pedophilia, and/or outright bigotry that permeates so many church hierarchies, and not just the Catholics…. Even a simple, even Christ-like soul, such as the current Pope seems to be, won’t have a big effect on that degree of corruption of spirit….

Next is free speech…. Need I even say anything at all about this? How free is our speech, when telling the truth about the illegal activities being perpetrated by the government is looked on as treason? How free is our media, when they won’t print anything that exposes the lies told every day by the government, much less publish the stuff that Eric Snowden had to show? Oh, they enumerate the prevarications in spots; there are fact checking sites, and a lot of folks who claim to call BS on them everywhere…. The lies they tell are so obvious, that much exposure is unavoidable, given the internet, and the scope of modern technology….

But, those sites, articles, and shows that expose the lies don’t get anywhere near the publicity or exposure that the lies get, or the spin on the lies, or anything at all that the pundits and talking heads have to say in defense of their lies…. Hell, much of the time, the response by the government, regarding a particular instance of being caught lying, is handled most effectively by just ignoring it, making no statement at all…. and the media lets them do it! Every time!…. No follow-up outrage, no further mention of the lies told, just silence…. When was the last time we saw a public official actually tried in court for lying to the public?….. Nixon, maybe? Maybe so….

I can think of, at minimum, three instances in the past six years of this administration when huge lies were told, or exposed, and not a single politician or government official has been prosecuted for those lies, up to, and including the President…. This doesn’t even address the lies told by the Republican Party (the “loyal” opposition?….) on a daily basis by that entities representatives…. I’m not going to bother naming them, as all of them were covered extensively in the news, for all the good it did….

Okay, free speech, and freedom of the press, those are pretty much gone, too…. Let’s see, now, what’s next?…. The freedom to peacefully assemble, and petition for redress of grievances…. Have you tried to get a permit to have a protest lately? I understand there are now a bunch of requirements that are necessary to be allowed to assemble anywhere in a public venue, all laws passed on a local level, as a rule, and enforced by police departments with a huge sense of entitlement, legal backing, and guns they aren’t afraid to use on the public….

Those requirements that must now be met before assembling any group for protest in public, requirements which are, if one actually reads this Amendment, completely illegal according to the Constitution, have to do with protecting property, mostly, from the vagaries of mob actions….. The laws were put in place through the efforts (i.e. they spent a lot of money to make sure their politicians voted the “correct” way….) of corporate entities…. The landed gentry, or more accurately,  private interests, to protect THEIR profit margins, and THEIR rights, as opposed to the rights of the people… Can’t have those ignorant voters taking money out of their pockets in their dissatisfaction, now, can we?….

Oh, and by the way…. When was the last time we heard about a policeman getting arrested , ( Or women, though police women don’t seem to ever go as completely overboard in their zealousness as their male counterparts, at least not without first becoming more male than female in their attitudes about violence, and the use of it to control the public….), for being violent during a protest? Or actually being prosecuted, and convicted for those kinds of acts? Very, very seldom, as you are well aware, I’m sure…. That particular issue is generally taken in hand by many governments by passing laws making the police immune to prosecution for ANYTHING they do while on duty…. pretty slick, eh? Become a policeman, get a get-out-of-jail-free card to stick in your wallet….

Not bad work, if you’ve got the stomach for it, along with a very, very skewed and distorted sense of honor, and justice…. To my mind, in the current state of our society, it takes a pretty sick mind to want to take on the duties of a police officer…. Sadly, there just aren’t enough honest, honorable men to fill the empty spaces, and the need for them….

As a result, I’d estimate that at least half of the men, and, almost as many of the women, who try to become police officers are clinically insane, and should never be allowed to have that sort of power over others, for they WILL eventually, even consistently, use that power for their own ends, or use it in ways that are destructive to the public good…. It’s their nature to do so, and they WILL do so, if given the chance… As evidence, I will once more point to the news, and the many instances reported of dishonorable, destructive behavior by police officers….

It must be remembered, THOSE reports only tell of the ones who are caught, or prosecuted, or screw up so badly even their own mates turn on them…. How many instances of police bullying, or intimidation of citizens in the pursuit of their ends, actually show up in those reports?…. More significantly, how often do you see a news report, many months after an incident, that was investigated for wrong-doing, or illegalities on the part of the officers, that exonerates the officers of all wrong? Of course, the fact that these investigations are carried out by OTHER POLICE OFFICERS seems to forever lose its place among the reactions from the press….

SIGH, now, I’m a little bummed out…. Here it is, not quite 7 AM, I’ve got a dental appointment to live through at 10, and I’ve already put the hammer to the First Amendment…. Say BYE BYE, ffolkes, to that hallowed document, the Bill of Rights, otherwise known as the first ten amendments to the US Constitution, because the efforts of the past 235 years by the corporate masters to do away with that hallowed document, as predicted by Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, Thomas Paine, George Mason, and a number of other of our Founding Fathers, have almost reached their desired results….

Most, if not all, of the rights we were guaranteed in the Bill of Rights have now been abridged, in one way or another, and we can not depend on ANYONE in our government to give them back…. Not when we’ve already given them the keys to the treasury, by allowing them the right to vote their own salaries, their own health care system, their own retirement, all without ever realizing we were doing so….. The American people have cooperated fully in their own enslavement, ffolkes, and though the collars we wear are not yet such as to kill us outright with their fit, nonetheless have taught us to do without a lot of the freedoms our forefathers gave us, with our full, if sadly ignorant, consent….

Sorry to be the one to bring this out, but, hey, somebody has to, right? Right….. I may not be a small child, but, as far as I can see, the Emperor is NOT wearing any clothes, ffolkes…..  Now, let’s see how many ffolkes, and/or folks, out there will either admit to it, or reject my assertions…. nicely, of course…. I suppose this is a good place to bring this rant to a dignified close, though, given my history, that’s pretty much out of the question… the dignity, I mean…  I think I’m going to have to resort to a pearl to make my escape…. so, let’s see if Smart Bee can come up with just the right one…..

“What now if the sky were to fall?” — Terence (185-159 BC) — Heautontimoroumenos, Act iv, Sc. 3, 41, (719.)

“If you don’t make the rules, you don’t have to keep them. If you do make the rules, you won’t anyway.” — Smart Bee

How admirable, he who thinks not,
Life is fleeting,
When he sees the lightning!

— Basho

Well, it took three, and that’s okay, too…. because they’re perfect….
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Without even going back over this, I can feel it is something of an epic Pearl…. I can only hope it can carry the weight of its own dimensions…. Let’s go see….  Yep, completely epic… I apologize if I have set the bar too high, and y’all don’t have the time to read it all, or to comment… It’s a lot… But, if you should have a thought, or even two, about any of it, feel free to chime in…. Meantime, it’s started raining here, so I’m going out in it to soak up some moisture, first-hand…. See ya….

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

dozer3

Soften the edges with a little innuendo….

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Ffolkes,

Do you feel it? That suffocating sense of burgeoning terror, the shivering fear that steals over us to freeze the blood, that makes us want to run, screaming gibberish at the top of our voice, fleeing as fast as we can, until our lungs want to burst? Is it filling your mind with visions of demons, ripping innocent victims to pieces with ravening claws, eating them while still alive?….. Well, cut it out, because that’s just silly…. It’s just a blog intro, and just because I MIGHT end up filling the next five paragraphs with nonsensical blather isn’t sufficient reason to go all wonky on us….

Of course, that is the way I feel every morning, but, that’s probably TMI, considering the time of day; nobody needs to know my motivation at 0400 in the morning, with only one or two sips of coffee on board so far, to hold back the insanity. No, there’s really no reason to go off like that; besides, it’s more fun, and more amusing for the rest of us, if you would just use the medication provided for you in your safety pack, right there in the pocket on the seat back in front of you…. The calming pills are the purple ones, with the lotus flower on them…. One should be enough to dull the edges of your fear, and two will complete the process of eliminating all your cares and woes, trading them for a much preferable set of euphoric hallucinations….. We aim to please here at ECR….

All silliness aside, how’s things? Wait, that won’t work, either….. There’s no vehicle for interactive chatting, not without resorting to Facebook, or some other social media that offers instant replies to such queries….. Probably not a good idea, anyway, on a site where the material is often incendiary and deliberately provocative; I’d spend my time answering chat comments, and never get the damn thing finished…. Yeah, better to not offer such amenities as interactive chats, or instant messaging on a blog site; leave that to the data crunchers at FB, Google, and/or Twitter…. then we’ll know for sure that the NSA is getting all they need to keep us safe from the big bad terrorists….

Don’t fret, I’m not going to start ranting again here in the intro, even if they deserve it…. We’ll leave that until later down the pike, when I’m fully awake, and SB is in a better mood…. You see, all this has been created, for the simple reason that my oh-so-necessary, but frequently dodgy, database is acting like it’s been listening to Murphy, refusing to give me anything fresh, or particularly valuable to use as an opening platform for comment… I spent about ten straight minutes going through its offerings, without finding a single usable quote with which to start today’s post, and that’s a lot of quotes…. I’m hoping it will get over it by the time I’m done here…. and, gosh almighty!, look here! Four full paragraphs, all chock full of nothing much, just waiting to be recognized as the crap it is, long, silly, and legally over the limit for an intro, again….

Not being the kind of man to look a gift horse in the mouth, without first applying some horsey mouthwash, at the very least, I’m going to take it and run…. far, and fast as I can, too…. It’s the least I can do after subjecting y’all to this kind of blather once more…. Forgive me, I know exactly what I do….

Shall we Pearl?…..

“Cleverness is not wisdom.” — Euripides
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Thanks to the new function in WP, that refers one to older posts, I’ve been enjoying some of the stuff that came through my head a couple of years ago…. Here is an old-school pearl, complete with intro and concluding remarks, from a Pearl in August of 2012…..

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Yesterday, I sat down in the afternoon to do some pearl diving, as my stash was getting low. Out of the first ten pearls offered up for my perusal, the following entries, all but one from Smart Bee itself, popped up one after another, just as if they were meant to be together. Upon rearranging the order slightly, I found them to be correct; together they make a fine little old-school pearl. So, without further ado, follow the bouncing thought bubble to the ending point, where you will find yourself in possession of a valuable piece of virtual wisdom…. or possibly, a great deal of confusion….. your choice, both are free of charge…..

Although everyone is entitled to be stupid, some abuse this privilege. — Smart Bee

Keep the pointy end forward and the dirty side down. — Smart Bee

I’ll tell you what’s wrong with it, my lad.  It’s dead! — Smart Bee

Tomorrow & tomorrow & tomorrow creeps in this rutabaga…. — Smart Bee

Ignorance of one’s ignorance is the greatest ignorance.– Smart Bee

“YOW!!  I’m in a very clever and adorable INSANE ASYLUM!!” — Zippy the Pinhead

I think the final line from Zippy punctuates the idea very well, ending not only with wisdom, but with two exclamation points to drive it home!!…. Such courteous service, you won’t find just anywhere…. Most bloggers would just abandon you, leaving you to figure stuff out on your own. But, not here at gigoid’s house…. we’re all about customer service…. I hope you enjoyed the ride; you may now go on to the next section….
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Since the rest of today’s Pearl came from old posts, I thought this one would fit right in with the rest….. I first posted this poem in July of 2012, with this introductory statement, just as you see it here…. I hope you enjoy it…. I did, even if it IS mine….

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“We don’t read and write poetry because it’s cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman, ‘O me! O life!… of the questions of these recurring; of the endless trains of the faithless–of cities filled with the foolish; what good amid these, O me, O life? Answer. That you are here – that life exists, and identity; that the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse.’ That the powerful play goes on and you may contribute a verse. What will your verse be?” — John Keating, Dead Poet’s Society

Early Observations

Until I knew there was more,
I wanted to know God.
They said he was a nice guy,
and would let me live forever.

All I had to do, they said,
was live my life for Him,
always living by scripture
cleaving only to his Way.

But, everyone I saw in church,
acted different at home.
Living wild, cussin’ and fussin’,
nobody lived like they said.

Still, I tried to be like Jesus,
he was sort of cool.
He never hurt nobody
and walked on the right path.

‘Course they killed him for that,
they couldn’t stand his example.
Turned him into a martyr,
 hid his real words among their own.

Then I found the Buddha,
and met Lao Tzu at the gate.
They saw things real different,
showed me how to see straight.

Right thought, and right action
replace blind obedience and faith.
Reality becomes manageable,
fear retreats, the universe expands.

Brother John said it pretty well,
“Imagine there’s no heaven,
it’s easy if you try.”
Sounds like he knew why.

Day to day, life is grand,
we walk in eternal beauty.
Open your eyes and hearts,
find yourself already immortal.

~~ gigoid ~~

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I’ve been struck by the hammer of laziness, again, but, it’s okay, because I’ve got this huge archive of stuff I can use when that happens…. as demonstrated in section one…. Here, in section three of today’s Pearl, I’m going even further back, to mid-June of 2012, where I found this mini-rant, that is still quite valid today…. I hope you enjoy it, as it’s all true stuff…..

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“…when all government… in little as in great things, shall be drawn to Washington as the centre of all power, it will render powerless the checks provided of one government on another and will become as venal and oppressive as the government from which we separated.” — Thomas Jefferson, 1821

The framers of the Constitution knew what they were doing when they tried to build in safeguards in the system of government they chose after the revolution against England. They structured it with checks to the balance of power in each section, Executive, Legislative, and Judicial, and reserving several rights to the people that had historically been reserved for the governments themselves, including the right to bear arms, one that every government in history has tried to restrict for its own use. The right to bear arms, the right to vote, the right to gather to protest, to speak freely, all these have, at one time or another through the last four or five millennia, been restricted, until men like Jefferson, Mason, and Washington took those rights for themselves, and offered the same opportunity to their descendants.

In fact, I regard it as proof of this assertion to find that the government, not only of this country, but all of them, is STILL trying to restrict the rights of the populace to bear arms. To my way of thinking, the most recent attempts by the government to curtail the public’s ability to obtain the means to protect themselves adequately merely serve to point out how accurate are statements such as the above, showing how little human nature has evolved, or advanced in the intervening years…. I’d be hard pressed to call the changes we’ve seen anything other than a retreat from achieving a more civilized society, as the populace continues to live in fear, most of which is manufactured by that very same government, to distract them from what is going on behind the scenes; for example, observe the data mining and illegal surveillance being carried on by Saint Obama and the current administration….

Sorry to apply the sarcastic epithet to the POTUS, but, his recent actions have revealed a lot of stuff that indicates that, yes, he IS a politician, and, as such, has been lying to the public on a regular basis since entering office, a habit much practiced by all those who enter those hallowed doors, as it turns out. Historically, it seems, ever since I’ve been alive, for the last 62 years, each and every man who has been in the White House, with the possible exception of Jimmy Carter, has lied to the public on a regular basis, without qualms, and without apology…. This isn’t news, or new news, at all…. just go back over the headlines and op-ed pages over that period, and the evidence of what I have asserted is plain to see….

That is why I won’t ever consider any alterations to the second Amendment, or the First, or to any of them…. I still regard them as law, and see any attempts to restrict them as being acts of treason against the principles by which they were conceived and enacted. I DON’T trust ANY politician, not one who spends millions to get elected, even if, or especially if, the money isn’t theirs…. The mere act of WANTING to be an elected official implies insanity to me, either of a sociopathic nature, or an evangelical one, either of which is dangerous to allow into any position of authority over others, as they will ALWAYS act to serve their own self-interests first…..

’nuff said….. gigoid has spoken, and has no more to say on this subject, except….. Leave my Bill of Rights alone, or pay the consequences…..

“Disobedience, in the eyes of anyone who has read history, is man’s original virtue. It is through disobedience that progress has been made, through disobedience and through rebellion.” — Oscar Wilde
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Having thus avoided any truly creative output, other than the not-so-creative intro section, I find myself already finished, in just under an hour’s time…. completely unprecedented, unless you count the other times….. which we don’t….. Any who, let’s see if it will fly…..

Okay, it flies, if a bit erratically…. I suppose it will eventually wind its way to where it needs to go…. Why, look! It already has! Imagine that….. I’m going to go now, leaving you with no further assaults on your credibility…. You’ve been wonderful, putting up with my idiosyncratic tendencies, and deserve to be left alone now, to lick you wounds in peace…. See ya….

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

dozer3

He needs more time, or it won’t fly….

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Ffolkes,

One might surmise, given the relatively advanced age I’ve reached today, I might just be able to show a degree or two of restraint, and keep from ranting first thing. On the other hand, I find it encouraging that, at this age, (I’m 63 today, an age I NEVER contemplated reaching when I thought about it in my earlier days….) I still have the wherewithal to expend energy on ranting at all. I find it to be quite positive to be able to bring my experience, and my extensive knowledge of the English language, to bear on the issues I see around me, and hope I never give up my sense of activism, at least as far as ranting goes… I might not join in too many more demonstrations out on the streets, but, I’ll keep writing as long as I have a venue from which, and in which, I can spout off….

Sixty-three…. hmph. I suppose you COULD say it’s a perfect age, just right for curmudgeonly attitudes and ill-tempered, bombastic outbursts, all aimed at these whippersnappers in Washington who are fouling everything up with their stupidity, their selfishness, and their rampant lack of integrity. When I was a lad, we didn’t have politicians like these, no sirree… our politicians had HAIR. They were honest! They fought commies, and won! They were bigger than life… and THAT is as much of a crock of pure bullshit now, as it was then…. For sure…

No, I can’t say much about politics being different now, because it isn’t…. Many of today’s issues actually have their roots in the fifties, when I was first starting to observe the political world, and then-President Eisenhower, that old soldier, knowing well the value of silence, in 1954, quietly began sending our troops over to Southeast Asia, as “observers”, without bothering to tell the American people about it…. The general knowledge of his build-up of troops in Viet Nam didn’t happen until the mid-sixties, right before I went off to college, and boy, the shit hit the fan then, didn’t it?

The universities and colleges in this country, and across the entire world, became hotbeds of revolution (For any NSA hot-heads who might be listening in….. whoa, calm down, there, big fellas, it’s just a word….. revolution merely means “change”, not “doom”….. at least, not from THIS side of the word….), fomenting discontent among the common citizens, and turning millions of young people, like me, into life-long political reformists, by pointing out how the government, and all it’s supporters and lackeys, were reacting in the classical fashion of the guilty…. The issues that came to light back then were so powerful, and of such a revolutionary nature, that even long-time supporters of the government, (such as my father, a WWII survivor, and a 20 year Army veteran….) began to question what the government officials of the time were up to, to the point of writing letters to ask them that very question, pointedly….

I remember once, I came home from college for a weekend visit, in 1969, ( I was at UC Berkeley, a REAL center of protest at that time….)… I brought with me a copy of the SF Chronicle from the day before I arrived, which had a picture on the back page, a large one, of an Oakland Tactical Squad member leveling a shotgun at the back of a fleeing hippie…. The young protester was speeding away from the officer, some thirty or forty yards down the block, in full flight, hair streaming, arms akimbo, running full speed for his life… The officer was obviously about to fire, with his shotgun up level, aiming straight at the protestor’s BACK. The picture had appeared the morning after one of the People’s Park demonstrations, taking up half of the back page, as it was taken from a rooftop across from the action, the day before it was published…. But, when I got home & showed it to my father, he was astounded!…. No, that is too weak a word…. he was flabbergasted, as well as extremely dismayed…

You see, he had received his copy of that same Chronicle, delivered to our home, 300 or so miles away from the Bay Area, in a conservative farming town near San Luis Obispo…. but, the picture was not anywhere in the paper…. He was astounded, not only because of the subject matter of the picture, (a policeman obviously firing at the back of an unarmed, fleeing citizen…. ), but because of the censorship implied in its absence from the paper, removed to spare the sensibilities of the conservatives who were far away from the scene itself…. It was his first evidence that he, and the rest of the American public, were not getting ALL the facts from their own government, whom they trusted….

It actually was quite a sad time, for both of us, as he had been the one to pass on to me his own patriotic beliefs, and his pride in this country; it hurt to know that our faith was completely undeserved by those who had taken power here…. He wrote to several government officials he knew from his time in service, at the Pentagon, but was never able to find anyone who wasn’t part of the cover-up going on, and was thus turned against the very government he had defended so valiantly in WWII, even giving up some of his blood in the process (he earned a purple heart, though he wouldn’t talk about it much….)

You know, I just realized that my father’s reaction to the exposure that occurred during the Viet Nam protests in the sixties is most likely the major qualifying reason for my political activism today…. It pisses me off, royally, that this government could so egregiously abuse the patriotism and belief in the system held by my father…. Not merely for him, but for myself, and for all those men and women who gave their lives and personal loyalty to defend what they believed this country to be about, I began to observe, to form ideas and opinions, and to comment upon what they do…

It’s only now, after I’ve retired, and have the time to pursue this, that I’ve really started to work at it; I try now to give them as much shit as I can possibly shovel out to throw at them…. This country, as my father saw it, and as he taught me to see it, is a GOOD place, with people who care about each other, and make an honest effort to  live their lives with honor and integrity…. It is a place where a person can look for their own destiny, without interference from others, and without having to fear for their lives because their destiny is not the same as what is common, or traditional. It’s a place where the word, “freedom”, actually means something important to every man and woman, without having to resort to creating fear in order to have it….

But, the people who have become professional politicians, who have fallen under the manipulative powers of the shadowy special interests of the bankers and corporations, have usurped that integrity, and turned us into a nation of self-serving, fearful, ignorant assholes, not willing to share anything with the rest of the world, jealously hoarding as many resources for our own use as we can get away with, bombing the crap out of anyone who has something we desire, and won’t give it to us…. We’ve become the world’s bully, throwing our weight around everywhere, just as if we had the right to do so, and no matter how the people we are abusing feel about it….

Oops, did it again, didn’t I?…. It must be an age-related issue…. I started off reminiscing about the old days, just like any old-timer, then lost my way, and began to spout off against the machine, again…. SIGH…. Oh well, maybe this means the rest of today can get going without any further ranting on my part…. or, not, as the case may be…. I guess we’ll have to wait and see…. for now….

Shall we Pearl?…..

“In every affair consider what precedes and what follows, and then undertake it.” — Epictetus (c. 60 AD) — Discourses, Book iii, Chap. xv
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I ranted so long above, I decided not to rant in this section, a decision for which I’m sure you are eternally grateful… I am including here the article I noticed yesterday, and the comments I made on it… Then, however, instead of ranting, I’ll put in a harlequin pearl, to try to make the same points as always, but, in a new and exciting way…. If you believe that, let’s talk real estate, ‘kay?….  Enjoy!….

http://www.sfgate.com/business/technology/article/Report-Snowden-gets-tech-support-job-in-Russia-4942178.php

The interesting part of this article is the comments…. From what I could tell, the vast majority, apparently nearly all, of the commenters supported what Snowden had done, either regarding him as a hero, or thanking him in some way for his bravery, in being the one to pull the covers on the NSA and the government’s deep involvement in spying on their own people. Like myself, they are aware of the fact that, in the process of exposing the government’s lack of integrity, he was giving up his own life as an American citizen, resigning himself to a lifetime of persecution by a vengeful collection of dishonest and highly embarrassed politicians, on both sides of the political aisle….

Enough of that; y’all know how I feel about this already. Let’s go pearl, shall we?….

“Although everyone is entitled to be stupid, some abuse this privilege.” — Smart Bee

ARENA, n.  In politics, an imaginary rat-pit in which the statesman wrestles with his record. — Ambrose Bierce, “The Devil’s Dictionary”

“How could the drops of water know themselves to be a river? Yet the river flows on.” — Antoine de Saint-Exupery

“We should be able to see that our interest would be best served not by asking the state to promulgate our values but by forbidding the state to promulgate any values at all. If the state can espouse some value that we love, it can, with equal justice, espouse others we do not love.” — Richard Mitchell

“Why is the universe the way we see it?  If it had been any different, we would not be here!” — Stephen Hawking

“Don’t tell fish stories where the people know you; but particularly, don’t tell them where they know the fish.” — Mark Twain

“I have realized that the past and future are real illusions, that they exist in the present, which is what there is and all there is.” — Alan Watts

Sometimes, perfection just sneaks up on you, patiently sitting in front of your face until you notice it’s there….
_____________________________

Inside the museum infinity goes up on trial.
Voices echo, ‘This is what salvation must be like after a while.’
But Mona Lisa must have had the highway blues;
you can tell by the way she smiles.

— Bob Dylan

Time, and again….

Life, and/or love, will seldom fit
into any box we keep for them to sit.
Loose and limber, without any reason,
always somewhat out of season.

Surprise, surprise, they seem to say,
can’t help it, it’s just our way.
If only you would learn, instead of know,
maybe you’d find yourself with one to show.

Deal, just the way it is, now and here,
follow the path, on the other side of fear.
Finding the future isn’t all blood, sweat, and pain,
far, far more than mere joy we stand to gain.

The sages all say not to try, just do,
sounds as simple as putting on a shoe.
I’d say we could really go places,
if we could learn, to tie up the laces….

~~ gigoid ~~


I believe I mentioned there was a poem percolating in the unguarded, dark corners of my mind somewhere…. I guess it was waiting for the right moment to push its way out into the light of day…. Here ’tis, such as it is…. I like it, myself, as is obvious from the fact that it’s here…. I’ll stop blathering now….
_____________________________

Okay, so, I’m happy…. It’s my birthday, I’m up and feeling pretty good, all in all, and have gotten a poem out of my head, always a good sign of mental health, for me…. That stuff does better out than in, if you know what I mean…. or, even if you don’t, it still does better out than in…. Any who, I’ll be done soon, so, have patience…. Here is a random pearl, picked from the archives, but, from another of my birthday posts, to keep it all in the family…. let’s see what I did back then….

11/1/11
Ffolkes,
Today is my birthday. I’m sixty-one years old now, and one might think I’m all grown up. I suppose I am. If being such is defined as the state of finally accepting one’s own mortality, whether with fear and loathing, or with calm and grace, then, yes, I am all grown up, for I have exhibited both states of late.

I am still at the point where the thought of death is not easily applied to myself; I’ve been immortal since my early teens, and only of late have I come to realize that such a belief might be an erroneous assumption. I’ve always thought that the progress mankind has made in the field of medicine would reach a point where living much longer than we do would become common, and yes, I’ve been accused of unreasonable optimism previously. But, though there is improvement, the average age of death for males in our society continues to hover right around 72 years, and that for me is all too close for comfort.

When the Grim Reaper comes for me, he’ll find me to be unwilling to cooperate; when they take me, it will be kicking, fighting, biting, screaming, and whatever else it takes to keep from having to leave this life before I am ready to do so. I’ve got a lot left to get done before I can consider myself to have done all of what I set out to do in life; I will need more time before I can feel ready for it to end. Unfortunately, we don’t always get the last word in that particular decision-making process; all too often it is taken out of our hands altogether. I can only hope to be given enough time to finish what I’ve begun.

I have a number of creditors to appease today, it being that time of the month when they all come out of the woodwork with their grasping hands, greedily trying to take some of my money before I give it to someone else. None of them seem to care that if I give them all what they wish, then I won’t eat again this month. Ah well, c’est la vie, such as it is…..not exactly what I had in mind for birthday activity, but we gotta do what we gotta do. Since I do have all that to deal with, we’ve gone back to the old format again today. The Pearls were all chosen for their luster; they shine even in the dark…..enjoy!!!

“The best way to cheer yourself up is to try to cheer somebody else up.” — Mark Twain (1835-1910)

“For here we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead, nor to tolerate error so long as reason is left free to combat it.” — Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826) — First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1801

Heavy, adj.: Seduced by the chocolate side of the force.

And if we do but watch the hour,
There never yet was human power
Which could evade, if unforgiven,
The patient search and vigil long
Of him who treasures up a wrong.

— Lord Byron (1788-1824) — Mazeppa, Stanza 10

“To lose a friend is the greatest of all losses.” — Syrus

There….I feel better, sort of….. y’all take care out there…..

Back in 2013 now, and, I’m sensing a theme here…. Good thing we’re all done, isn’t it?….
_____________________________

Okay, so I went a little overboard…. if you hadn’t noticed, it happens around here on a regular basis, and I’m not going to apologize for it, not when it makes me feel so damn good…. Y’all will just have to deal with my unwarranted, and possibly frightening, display of good will and high spirits today…. or not, it’s up to you, as always… I do hope you enjoyed it all…. Now, let’s see if any of it makes any sense…..

Not only does it make sense, I feel even better, knowing I still have to appease creditors, but, having done so today, I can still go out for breakfast…. I’m a simple guy, really, though it may seem otherwise if you go by what happens here on ECR…. Breakfast makes me happy, and I say that’s simple, and right, and I’m going to go have some now…. See ya….

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

dozer3

Honest, mister, I read the manual….

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Ffolkes,

Before beginning to write today, I took a few moments playing solitaire, to calm my nerves, and to help me in beating back the urge to rant, here in the intro section. Not that there is anything inherently wrong with ranting; it’s just not the best place for it, in terms of structure and format. I prefer to wait, at least until section one, before jumping in with both feet, and haven’t been very adept of late at keeping myself from that form of premature ejaculation, an issue which hasn’t been a problem since, oh, before my marriage ended…. at least, not in a verbal sense…. The physical aspects of that descriptive phrase haven’t been a problem for some years, but one must be cautious, lest such things spread to one’s peripheral activities….

Now, I’m sure that, while you probably can appreciate my delicacy in discussing this matter with some discretion, it’s probably somewhat confusing, trying to figure out whether I’m talking about talking, writing, or making love (as opposed to ‘having sex’, a much less enjoyable sport….). In fact, I’m a bit confused myself, but, in this case, that may be an advantage. There are times when a certain degree of “plausible deniability” comes in handy…. just ask any President, or Presidential candidate about that…. Of course, they probably won’t discuss it, at least not on record, but, you can always say you asked; that has to count for something….

Oops, almost got caught up there…. I’ve got to remember to be careful, not to even MENTION a politician, or a preacher-type (even though, as Popes go, this one’s got a lot of class the others never showed….), or I start in on them with a vengeance…. I just don’t think I need to spend that much energy here in the beginning… I need to learn to pace myself, saving the best part for later on in the Pearl, where it will be highlighted by the brilliance of the material that surrounds and supports it…. Ah, yes, dreams..

We all have our dreams, don’t we? Me, I thought, hey, if I call Congress, maybe I can talk to Feinstein, or Pelosi, or one of my actual representatives in the House of Representatives…. They’ve got a lot of representatives there; maybe I can even find the one that is supposed to be representing ME, to ask him/her (I suppose I ought to know which it is, shouldn’t I?….) some of these pertinent questions I have, about the latest news coming down the pike…. I’d love to ask some of them the kind of questions that cause a deep silence on the other end of the phone, you know? The kind that tells me I’ve stumped them, or caught them without a prepared lie…

Whoa, hold on there…. almost went there again…. Oh well, I suppose I’ve blathered enough, and wandered around the edges of coherency without really saying anything, for what is most probably enough material to be able to call it an intro… If not, well, too bloody bad, ffolkes, because I’m done with it now, and no matter how hard you try, you won’t be able to make me start over…. Not that I expect you’d be that silly, but, we’ve had some weird stuff happen, so, I try to cover all the bases in my preparations…. In the meantime….

Shall we Pearl?…..

“Honor is the reward of virtue.” — Cicero (B.C. 106-43)

(If this is still true, we’re all in deep shit…. Just thought you should know…. )
_____________________________

Well, I waited until now to begin ranting, which is probably a good thing. Perhaps this will be a bit more effective as a call to action than in the usual position, or wherever it’s been of late that has kept it from at least making me feel a bit better for having ranted…. What a mouthful! And so on topic, too! Gotta love us amateurs, eh?….

At any rate, I found this article yesterday, buried back a few pages, probably because everyone is so tired of hearing of yet ANOTHER outrageous instance of the NSA breaking the law, by once again going far beyond the scope of their legal mandate, in the ever-widening quest by our own government to become the true Evil Empire…. I know, that’s some pretty high-powered language to use to in discussing an agency of our own government, but, as always, I believe in calling a spade a damn shovel, not an indigenous individual digging device, type 2…. and you may as well get used to it….

These assholes over at the NSA have gone completely bonkers; they assumed that because they got practically all they wanted in the way of legal coverage by the administration, they may as well just go ahead and do whatever else they wanted, believing that the people who set them loose on the trail of ostensible terrorists would protect them from any critical attention and/or interference by something as mundane as the law, or the will of the people….. and, for a long time, they were justified in that belief…. But, now that their clandestine activities are being brought to light by that national hero, Eric Snowden, the rats are deserting their ship, and leaving them to their fate without any real support….

Talk around Washington is that the President is going to, belatedly, stop spying on the leaders of our allies, and will move to put limits on what the agencies are allowed to access in the data that is generated by the general public. This is a complete reversal, and I can only hope it is in response to the pressure put on them by the public’s obvious displeasure, and not as a temporary measure to appease while they figure out a diversion in some other area of the public venue, where they can cause some problem that will draw our attention away from this issue, allowing them to continue their illegal, but, in their eyes, oh so necessary theft of the people’s identities….

http://www.sfgate.com/business/technology/article/Report-NSA-broke-into-Yahoo-Google-data-centers-4939585.php

In the article, the most significant part of what is there, to my way of thinking, is that the companies involved say had no idea that they were being compromised, even though their own security measures are considered to be nearly impenetrable… Well, they SAY they had no idea; one must remember they ARE a corporation, and, thus, are very familiar with telling the public what they wish to hear….

However, it appears that the American and British spies went in, got their data, and left, without ever notifying Google, or Yahoo, of what they were taking, though such activities are still illegal, according to the laws in place…. (Not to mention rude… ) The spying mandate they have doesn’t extend to what they stole, theoretically…. Of course, they can say they didn’t KNOW that, but, then, lying is their entire purpose, and the single most critical part of their entire modus vivendi, is it not?…. Even in the Art of War, Sun Tzu acknowledged the importance of the spy in warfare, calling them the most powerful of all the various types of warriors…

Of course it is, just as lying and cheating come naturally to anyone in a nationally elected office; it’s part of their job description these days, even if it is written in invisible ink….. Since Google, and Yahoo, and the other agencies that were hacked, are all corporations, and have pretty much the same characteristics as shown by the BRC pundits, (i.e., a tendency to lie at the drop of a cliche…), it’s a bit hard to tell who is more guilty here….

Is it Google and/or Yahoo, who are gathering all sorts of data about its users without their knowledge or permission (I don’t regard those passive advertisements that one can “control” what data is gathered by adjusting their “preferences” as real permission…. they take whatever data they want, and tell you about it later, if at all….)….? Or, is it the government spy agencies, who are stealing that same stolen data from the corporations, that fit the bill as the villain?

It should make for an interesting contest, to see how this fake argument plays out….. I mean, I can’t really believe that the BRC, who is controlled and supported by the corporations (go ahead, disprove that!….), will continue to try to take data from them without their knowledge. It’s more likely they are playing out this faux-dispute in the public venue in order to confuse the public about who is on their side in this issue…

It seems to be working, as always, as the public is pretty much ignoring these latest revelations, and looking around for almost anything to take their minds elsewhere for a while… I’m almost interested, in a resigned, doubtful sort of way, to see just what they come up with next to draw the public’s attention off this issue…. Probably more to do with the recent roll-out of health care reform laws, which seems to be a hot button for a lot of people….

For me, all of it is dross and spittle…. I believe, absolutely, that if there is an official statement made by anyone in the government printed in the news, it needs to be examined in the light of what it is NOT saying, to ascertain about what it is lying, or what it is trying to hide by distraction, not merely for what it says…. Their motivation in making ANY public statement is manipulation of public attitudes; they’re not trying to make anything better.

They lie outright, they leave stuff out, they point us in all kinds of useless directions, but they almost NEVER tell us what is actually going on, unless we’ve already caught them at it… In those cases, we see all sorts of backing and filling, as they come up with all sorts of “plausible deniability” in order to convince the public that their lies are really the truth…

What a crock! If it wasn’t so damn sad and depressing, it would be amusing…. SIGH… Enough is enough…. Stay alert, ffolkes, because they’re lying to you every day, and doing all they can to improve THEIR lot in life, not yours…. Let them know you’re on to them, at every opportunity…. If nothing else, it will make them nervous, which they deserve….

“You can fool all of the people some of the time; you can fool some of the people all of the time; and that should be sufficient for most purposes.” — Smart Bee, quoting from the true bible, used by both politicians and preachers…..

“The ideal robot, after all, is simply a properly processed human being.” — Edward Abbey
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“But groundless hope, like unconditional love, is the only kind worth having.” — EFF co-founder John Perry Barlow, “Cynthia Horner’s Eulogy”, Apr. 1994

Unsolicited Gratitude

Fear becomes familiar when reality bodes us ill
pain assumes first position, no matter our will.
Powerless, we founder, no strength to prevail
anguished and afraid, against unwanted Fate we rail.

Still, a grain of hope deep inside, hidden well against need
gives us reason to survive, our starving souls to feed.
Failure of courage burdens time, of being bested,
until our souls, in submission, become foully infested.

Bitter tears wash through us each day, with little care,
no thought, no feeling, no wish, or need to be fair.
Rendered clueless, confusion falls upon us, as prey,
we surrender a piece of our soul, little as we may.

Yet, always, a bright beam of hope is seen from afar,
no matter how dreary, or dark, it may seem where we are.
None knows, nor would consent to tell, it seems
from whence it hails, or why it so brightly gleams.

Saving our sanity, absolving our unwanted fears,
dispelling the myths and lies that come with the years.
Each man has known the precious gift that hope may give
And gives glad thanks, as long as he may live.

~~ gigoid ~~

_____________________________

Arguably, I could get away with not having a short introductory paragraph here, but, I hate stuff that isn’t either symmetric, or traditionally asymmetric. I’m funny that way, among others….. Nonetheless, it will help today if you just sort of skew your eyes off in another direction for a moment, while I just….. there. You didn’t see that, did you? I hope not, I’d have to kill you if you had….. But, now, we can get on with the rest of this pearl, and finish off this Pearl, thanks to the absence of the government agent I just offed and buried out back….

(For those of you reading this in a cubicle at the NSA, or at any of our fine nation’s other domestic or foreign spy agencies, such as the FBI, the CIA, or any of them…… that’s we we writers call a “joke”, and it has no connection with reality, other than the tenuous resemblance to one that exists only in your own tiny little mind…. in other words, PSYCHE!…. Hah!…. bloody assholes , who have nothing better to do than go around spying on regular folks, they get what they deserve….)

Since I have decided to NOT go without an intro here, well, this is what you get…. Sorry, but, it’s what I could come up with, and y’all will just have to deal with it… I think, though, the power of the following pearl will mitigate any possible discomfort, or discombobulation of any sort, that you may experience today, as it is turning out to be extremely cogent, as well as powerfully poignant…. I should know, I’m a sensitive guy….

“The Master doesn’t talk, he acts, when his work is done, the people say, “Amazing: We did it all by ourselves!”” — Tao Te Ching

“In writing, fidelity to fact leads eventually to the poetry of truth.” — Edward Abbey

“The comedy of man survives the tragedy of man.” — G. K. Chesterton, Illustrated London News, 2-10-06

“A people who expect to be ignorant and free expect what never will, and never can, be.” — Thomas Jefferson

“The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself. ” — Friedrich Nietzsche

“It is odd, is it not, that a person’s worth to society by is measured by their wealth, when instead their wealth should be measured by their worth to  society.” — A. Cygni

“Reality is a crutch for people who can’t cope with drugs.” — Lily Tomlin
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One never knows, do one? This may have turned out better than I’d realized, or even hoped…. let’s see what happened here…. Whatever that was, it seems to have worked fairly well…. Well enough that I’m calling it a done deal, and making my escape, stage left, right about…. now….. See ya….

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

dozer3

Puzzled by such antics, the puppet smiled….

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Ffolkes,

“Free enterprise ended in the United States a good many years ago. Big oil, big steel, big agriculture avoid the open marketplace. Big corporations fix prices among themselves and drive out the small entrepreneur. In their conglomerate forms, the huge corporations have begun to challenge the legitimacy of the state.” — Gore Vidal

From what we are told by modern pundits and talking heads, terrible things will happen, unless we surround ourselves in the impenetrable armor of patriotic fervor, and dutifully give up the basic human rights our founding fathers secured for us, after expending great amounts of blood, sweat, and tears…. These seemingly concerned political professionals have taken the opportunity, handed to them by the events of 9/11/01, to fan the unreasonable, and, I might add, inappropriate fears of the common man, by reinforcing the ignorance they possess, about the perpetrators, about other cultures, and about their own needs, validating and strengthening their fears, even though those fears have no basis in reality….

“A professional politician is a professionally dishonorable man.  In order to get anywhere near high office he has to make so many compromises and submit to so many humiliations that he becomes indistinguishable from a streetwalker.” — H.L. Mencken

Hmm… I see that I’ve begun my rant for the day, right here in Section 1, Paragraph 1 of today’s Pearl…. For some unknown reason, I jumped right on that particular bandwagon straight out of the gate, with a good strong opening, I might add…. I believe the above statements to be a true assessment of today’s world, and of the BRC’s part in creating the atmosphere of mistrust and hatred between cultures that we see in our society. It doesn’t serve their political interests to have a population that is open-minded, or trusting of others, or that is able to appreciate the diversity now being celebrated in most parts of the world.

“I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the rights of the people by the gradual & silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.” — James Madison, Virginia Convention 1788

The leaders of this country prefer a populace that is ignorant of the truth, angry, afraid, and full of hatred. Such people are easily manipulated into believing whatever is told to them, as they are pre-disposed to believe the worst of others, since that is how they view themselves…. A person who is accustomed to cheating, or lying, or otherwise acting immorally to achieve their own ends is not capable of imagining that others are not the same way, so they will cheat and lie from the beginning of any interaction, assuming that everyone does it…. It’s a vicious cycle, one to which an ignorant and untrained mind can easily fall prey; once caught in its grip, its victims find it very difficult to change, as it resists all attempts to educate, or to illuminate, often refusing discussion altogether….

“Banking establishments are more dangerous than standing armies.” — Thomas Jefferson

Sadly, there are a great many people in this country who fall for this kind of crap, and never even KNOW that they are being manipulated…. They just cruise blithely along down the river of Time, allowing themselves to be herded wherever is convenient for the BRC, blundering into unseen obstacles, or hanging on to false assumptions, spending the greater portion of their lives wondering where it all went wrong…. These folks watch Fox News, listen to Sean Hannity, or Rush Limbaugh, or Ann Coulter,  and others of their ilk, shout their hatred and lies at the top of their lungs; they smile vacuously, and  nod their heads wisely, just as if they had a single thought in their excuse for a mind, not a vast, empty plain full of lies and misconceptions…

PATRIOTISM, n.  Combustible rubbish read to the torch of any one ambitious to illuminate his name. In Dr. Johnson’s famous dictionary patriotism is defined as the last resort of a scoundrel.  With all due respect to an enlightened but inferior lexicographer I beg to submit that it is the first. — Ambrose Bierce, “The Devil’s Dictionary”

Okay, I guess I can stop now…. I could, too, if I wished…. Y’all know pretty well by now how I feel about politicians, and preachers of all religions, and police, and lawyers, and judges, and anyone else who participates in the world-wide oppression of the 98%, or 99%, or whatever you wish to call those who allow their slavery to continue…. It’s a sad situation, one that has been in place for most of our history; it is only in modern times, however, that this structure has shown itself to be counter-productive in a species-survival sense.

“History is a tool used by politicians to justify their intentions.” — Ted Koppel

The harsh controls over everyone else that are maintained by the shadowy masters of society are not going to be given up lightly, or at all, without some serious changes in the nature of the other people in the world….. The ruling elite have been holding the reins of this cart for a long time, and aren’t willing to give them up without a struggle, a struggle they have been prepared to win for many thousands of years…. They even practice the necessary violence with constant wars and police actions, all of which indicate their willingness to use violence as a means of behavioral control over others…. The rest of us are NOT as practiced in its use, and we are not going to be able to wrest control from them without it…. Patently, they aren’t about to just hand it over, are they? No, they’re not likely to do that….

So, what’s the answer? Hell, if I knew that, I’d already be the leader of the revolution…. I have an answer, but, most ffolkes don’t want violence as part of their lives, if they can help it, so they aren’t going to accept my answer, as mine involves using violence as needed to eradicate the problem…. Since the Beloved Ruling Class is willing to use it, so am I, but, not everyone is so inclined…. Y’know what, though? They’re on their own, as I’m not going to just lie down and die, just because I’m afraid of the big, bad terrorists…. Mainly, that’s because I’m NOT afraid of them, or of the big, bad assholes who run my own country right now…. If nothing else, I will maintain my own little space of freedom, and hope for the best…. My hopes are not particularly high, but, they do exist….

Okay, I’m done now…. Fuck the assholes in Washington, on both sides of the political aisle in Congress, and every other niche where they’ve insinuated themselves in government…. I’ll take some more shots later, or tomorrow…. for now, I wanna go find some pearls to throw at them….

Shall we Pearl?….

One pill makes you larger, and one pill makes you small,
and the ones that mother gives you don’t do anything at all.
Go ask Alice when she’s ten feet tall.

— Jefferson Airplane
_____________________________

It just may possibly be too early for this, but, I give up…. Not just giving up, but, way up…. so far up, I’m not even going to explain…. Instead, here is a pearl of unknown format, with unknown parameters, and unknown qualities…. the best kind, from where I’m standing…. or, sitting, or hovering, whatever it is I’m doing right now…. I DO so hope you enjoy it….

“There’s a bit of magic in everything, and some loss to even things out.” — Lou Reed, Magic and Loss
(R.I.P. Lou….)

“…I probably shouldn’t point at the word ‘reptiles’ when I say ‘businessmen.'” — Rajeev Pandey

“Any road followed to its end leads precisely nowhere.  Climb the mountain just a little to test it’s a mountain.  From the top of the mountain, you cannot see the mountain.” — Bene Gesserit proverb

“To the uneducated, an A is just three sticks.” — Pooh’s Little Instruction Book, inspired by A. A. Milne

“It is not necessary to change. Survival is not mandatory.” — W. Edwards Deming

“Irrationally held truths may be more harmful than reasoned errors.” — Aldous Huxley

“In the part of this universe that we know there is great injustice, and often the good suffer, and often the wicked prosper, and one hardly knows which of those is the more annoying.” — Bertrand Russell
_____________________________

“All these poems where it is merely the Poem that is in question – a whole poetry with no other substance than itself! What would we say of a prayer whose object was religion?” — E.M. Cioran

Again, I’ll be using one of my own poems, to ensure I’m the only one named, in the likely event of prosecution by local authorities….

I know I’m in the now, if only…..

Oh, there it is again, fiddle faddle;
  Begone, I said, vamoose, skedaddle!
It looked at me as if I were insane:
  Scoffed, it did, filled me with pain.

Where does it come from?
Where does it live?
I’d stick out my thumb,
if I had more to give.

If only, should, would, could it be?
  It went away again, this time free.
It will be back again, this I know;
  or I’m wrong, and it won’t show.

Who cares?
Who hears?
Such goings on wobble the sphere,
I wish it wouldn’t do that here.

I’ve been wrong before…..

~~ gigoid ~~

_____________________________

I will not rant, I will not rant, no matter how strong the desire, or the provocation…. I’ll sublimate, sublimate, sublimate…. with another old-school style pearl, just as if I really knew what the hell I was doing here…..

“Please return the newspapers so others can enjoy the violence as much as you did.” — Sign in Providence sub shop

“Among mortals second thoughts are wisest.” — Euripides

“Since it is Reason which shapes and regulates all other things, it ought not itself to be left in disorder.” — Epictetus (c. 60 AD) — Discourses, Chap. xvii

And taste
The melancholy joy of evils past:
For he who much has suffer’d, much will know.

— Alexander Pope (1688-1744) — The Odyssey of Homer, Book xv, Line 434

“The enemy is anybody who’s going to get you killed, no matter which side he’s on.” — Joseph Heller, Catch22

I really do love it when a plan comes together…. This is a PERFECT five-star pearl, old-school variety….. I hope you enjoyed reading, and cogitating on it as much as I did while putting it together…. Ta ta, then….
_____________________________

“He was born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad.” — Rafael Sabatini

This first line from “The Scarlet Pimpernel” is, perhaps, my favorite line in literature, because it is both what I try to be, and what I try to emulate in my writing…. at least, that’s what I keep telling myself…. Having done my duty as a grammarian, to the best of my meager ability, I pronounce this Pearl to be finished, and no longer subject to the Miranda Act…. See ya….

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

dozer3

Dancing away our cares in muffin colored shoes….

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Ffolkes,

Foul!  Foul! The convicted creatures of the night cried out in fear and hope, bleeding from a thousand wounds… Drifting, without pace, or price, no vector described, filling out the spaces between with animated visions of bright, colorful clouds, all with familiar faces. Barely alive, hovering over the warmth, of five distinct sources of valiant bravery, of arguable finality, those arguments fail in basic logical structure, thereby pinning their hopes on the last bus from town. We don’t know if they’ll have exact change, so the extensively fashionable wiper blades were turned on for a while to compensate. All will be copacetic, as long as no one tries to comprehend…

If you have, well, good luck with the headache you probably have by now…. Hell, I’ve got one, so, you should, too; it’s only fair…. Sorry for that one, folks….. The above paragraph is a leftover bad habit from my teens and early twenties, a form of what I like to call jabberwock, nonsense that makes sense, almost, just like the bandersnatch, a manner of wielding the vorpal blade of intellect and wit with style and elegance. It consists of words, phrases, and concepts in language that tends to confuse rather than illuminate. It is intended to stimulate cogitation of some form, as well as emotional disturbance of some degree, preferably up to the level of aggravation, without spilling over into violent objection of a physical nature (the latter has been threatened a time or two, when we got a little out of hand with it in public….)….

During my college years, a few friends and I would go into late-night diners to have coffee, and begin to talk in jabberwock, improvising as we went along… sort of improvisational philosophy for the mildly insane. We, of course, thought it hilarious that other people, the “normals” who were in the diner, listening to this, would often get up and leave, obviously in a huff, because they didn’t understand what they were hearing, and were too embarrassed, or perhaps too angry, to ask us to stop, or even ask what we were doing….

At our age, we didn’t care, and the more who left, the better…. until the owner objected because of losing customers…. Usually we went to those diners that catered to college kids, and understood the hi-jinx they perpetrate in the throes of their intellectual growth, but, sometimes, the local Denny’s was our targeted spot, to see how many folks we could get to leave quickly, jamming their food down as fast as possible, in order to get away from the crazies in the next booth…. SIGH…. those were the days!…..

There, now, don’t y’all feel better? I’ve managed to introduce today’s Pearl of Virtual Wisdom without resorting to any tricks…. This was pretty straightforward, with a flash of jabberwock to start, with a polite, if specious and of little real value, explanation of the opening, using some rather poignant memories from my youth…. I’d say this one is quite the little foray into normalcy for me, so, I hope you hate it, because it just about drove me crazy, trying to be that way…. Normal, I mean…

Ah hell, you know what I mean…. Shall we Pearl?…..

“Trouble rather the tiger in his lair than the sage amongst his books.  For to you Kingdoms and their armies are things mighty and enduring, but to him they are but toys of the moment, to be overturned by the flicking of a finger.” — Chinese proverb
_____________________________

This section has been growing on me, so I’ve decided to leave all previous formats behind, to engage in some sheer mental indulgence…. I’ll stop writing when I see a chance to do so gracefully, how’s that?….. First significant change to note is that this section has a title,  which indicates the precise subject under discussion, to wit:

“A prosperous fool is a grievous burden.” — Aeschylus (525-456 BC) — Frag. 383

Yes, ffolkes, I’ve had time to peruse the news, (Hey, a rhyme! A good sign this early on…), and have seen a bit of what transpired while I was off ignoring the world at large, in favor of the world at hand. At this juncture, I can only say that it’s hard to be right so often…. That’s a joke, by the way…. What I mean is, I expected SOME sort of further evidence of how the Beloved Ruling Class continues to screw the public at every opportunity to present itself, at one point or another while I wasn’t watching…. and, I was right…. Sometime yesterday afternoon, after reading some stuff on the internet, I started this section, collecting the information I’ll discuss…. The collection of that information prompted the following, thanks to SB, and the FIRST beginning of this epic pearl-to-be….

“Just because you’re STUPID ain’t no excuse.” — Smart Bee

“Progress doesn’t enlighten people – it just makes them stupid in new ways.”– Smart Bee

“You’ve little to fear, brave knight…unless the dragon stops purring.” — Smart Bee

I’ve begun this section with a three-star pearl, an obvious set of matching earrings, with a ponderous pendant, which seemed to put just the right tone to the subject we are about to cover… Well, I’ll cover it, and you can read, or not, as suits you…. It’d be cool if y’all stuck around & hung in with it… I worked hard on this one, with research, quotes, extra time in SB, and the whole nine yards, not to mention the ranting that should ensue as a part of it….

I hope y’all enjoy today’s journey into the madness of Reality, as I fight my way back from the illusionary world of luxury travel…. As is obvious, it didn’t take long for me to catch up to what’s been going on while I ignored the rest of the world, so let’s get to it…. For starters, please peruse this article from yesterdays news on SFGATE…. several quotes, from the article will follow, with my comments, surrounded by nothing… ( quotes from the article are surrounded by this indicator: “~~” , two squiggly lines together,, then quotation marks around the text… I chose it because I like to write the word “squiggly”, thus making people think more squiggly, always a good thing….)

http://www.sfgate.com/news/politics/article/NSA-spying-threatens-to-hamper-US-foreign-policy-4928089.php

~~ “To Henry Farrell and Martha Finnemore at George Washington University, damage from the NSA disclosures could “undermine Washington’s ability to act hypocritically and get away with it.” ~~

My immediate reaction to this was, “Oh, those poor babies!”…..  😆 To think that a government official would have to go through a day without being able to resort to a lie…. boy, what cruelty!  It amazes me that this line didn’t faze the public’s credibility,  as I haven’t heard of very much backlash about what is essentially old news… By that I refer to the “acting hypocritically” by the government… It’s almost as if the public EXPECTS to be treated that way, and, like a horse that has been beaten too long, no longer flinches at the feel of the whip…

~~ “Madeleine Albright, secretary of state during the Clinton administration, recalled being at the United Nations and having the French ambassador ask her why she said something in a private conversation apparently intercepted by the French.

Albright says Snowden’s disclosures have hurt U.S. policymakers. “A lot of the things that have come out, I think are specifically damaging because they are negotiating positions and a variety of ways that we have to go about business,” Albright said at a conference hosted by the Center for American Progress in Washington. “I think it has made life very difficult for Secretary Kerry. … There has to be a set of private talks that, in fact, precede negotiations and I think it makes it very, very hard. The broad nature of NSA surveillance goes against the Obama administration’s claim that much of U.S. espionage is carried out to combat terrorism, she said.

The administration asserts that the U.S. is amassing intelligence of the type gathered by all nations and that it’s necessary to protect the U.S. and its allies against security threats.” ~~

Again, oh my goodness! These poor, abused diplomats and former pundits! To think that being responsible for their lies makes their job harder is the height of arrogance, for it assumes that the lies are not the issue, but rather, being caught in the lies…. The issue of most primary significance is, and always has been, the simple FACT that they lie to begin with….. They do this because, hey, we were elected, weren’t we?…. Thus, they believe they have the right to do so, no matter what the public may think…. After all, the public doesn’t know what’s good for them, do they?…. That’s why they elected us, isn’t it?…. So, see, nothing to see here, never mind, just go put the whistleblower in jail for the rest of his life for having the bad grace to tell the truth….

“The true, unacknowledged purpose of capital punishment (or life imprisonment for telling the truth — gigoid) is to inspire fear and awe–fear and awe of the State.” — Edward Abbey

~~ “The French government protested revelations this past week that the NSA had collected 70.3 million French-based telephone and electronic message records in a 30-day period.

Germany and France are demanding that the administration agree by year’s end to new rules that could mean an end to reported American eavesdropping on foreign leaders, companies and innocent citizens.

Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff canceled her official state visit to the White House. She ordered measures aimed at greater Brazilian online independence and security after learning that the NSA intercepted her communications, hacked into the state-owned Petrobras oil company’s network and spied on Brazilians.

Brazil says it is working with other countries to draft a U.N. General Assembly resolution that would guarantee people’s privacy in electronic communications.

A European Parliament committee approved rules that would strengthen online privacy and outlaw the kind of data transfers the U.S. is using for its spying program.

European lawmakers have called for the suspension of an agreement that grants U.S. authorities access to bank data needed for terrorism-related investigations.

“We need trust among allies and partners,” said German Chancellor Angela Merkel, whose cellphone was allegedly tapped by the NSA. “Such trust now has to be built anew.” ~~

Aha! Somebody says the key word, at last…. Trust…. A simple word, yet one of the most powerful concepts in the human lexicon of ideas that affect reality most strongly. This one is a basic part of ANY and ALL human interactions, with other humans, with animals, with the universe, wherever… As humans, we rely on certain concepts to be true, and when they are not, our ability to retain our honor, and our sanity, are affected strongly…. Whether we are affected in a way that strengthens, or weakens, is immaterial…. It makes each interaction more stressful, because the trust must be there to deal with it efficiently, without precautions, extra effort, or rejection….

I know, that’s a bit esoteric for morning conversation…. But, it all affects what is happening in the world, and the BRC still refuses to acknowledge their own responsibility in making trust a scarce commodity…. They believe the problem is that the secrets were told, when the real problem is that the secrets exist, and are expected to be hidden without consequence…. The government does not EVER question the rightness of their own actions; it is a foregone conclusion, proven throughout our history, that to act on ANY assumption of that nature is a sure path to self-destruction… In this case, that path will not merely lead them, but will pull all of us with them…. Apparently, with our full permission…

Thomas Jefferson, along with others of the Founding Fathers of this country warned future generations to be mindful of corporate special interests, i.e. “bankers”…. Money, and more importantly, the desire for it, and for the power over others it brings, has long been recognized as the root of most of our problems as a society, and as individuals in that society…. It affects human behavior in a personal way, creating avarice, hatred, and mistrust between the best of friends; it also affects human behavior on a societal level, as those same characteristics come to play on the public stage….

The following article, by one of my favorite voices of reason, Jon Carroll, is an excellent discussion, and an excellent indictment of those people among us who act as wolves, viewing others as prey, in the pursuit of their own ambitions….

http://www.sfgate.com/entertainment/carroll/article/An-upright-salute-to-government-today-4920756.php

As any sage knows, enough is enough…. I may not be a sage, but, I know that…. Besides, if you haven’t gotten the picture by this time, it’s probably not working, anyway, so, ‘twould be best to exit now, with what grace can be summoned…. They’re not good people, ffolkes, though they would have you believe they are…. and, I don’t think I need to explain, at this point, who “they” are…. Take care of each other, as best you can, and try not to harm anyone without good reason…. At this point in the game, that’s about the best we can do….

“To date, there is only one animal in the Galaxy dangerous to man- man himself. He must supply his own indispensable competition. He has no enemy to help him.” — Lazarus Long
_____________________________

I’ve never been able to completely explain why I enjoy the poetry of this woman…. Though she is acknowledged as one of the most creative and powerful poets in history, her work is an acquired taste…. But, with her, as with little girls and butterflies, no explanation is really needed… I speak, of course, of Miss Emily D….

Perhaps the most significant thing I like about her work is that she left the title of each poem up to the reader…. They may supply one, in their own mind, or not…. She doesn’t seem to care, or perhaps didn’t want to influence them with pre-conceived notions of the meaning of the poem to follow…. I like that, for some perverse reason….

Death sets a thing significant
The eye had hurried by,
Except a perished creature
Entreat us tenderly

To ponder little workmanships
In crayon or in wool,
With “This was last her fingers did,”
Industrious until

The thimble weighed too heavy,
The stitches stopped themselves,
And then ‘t was put among the dust
Upon the closet shelves.

A book I have, a friend gave,
Whose pencil, here and there,
Had notched the place that pleased him,–
At rest his fingers are.

Now, when I read, I read not,
For interrupting tears
Obliterate the etchings
Too costly for repairs.

~~ Emily Dickinson ~~

_____________________________

Without even having to look, I know this is already nearing the point of the largest Pearl ever created on this blog; I must have buried more material in my brain while I was off cruising than I had imagined, because it’s all spilling out now… Ah well, it’s all been quite cathartic, so I’ll just make a last, quick, old-school group of pearls to make up the last pearl for today…. Enjoy, as we see what comes up on the Wheel of Philosophy, as interpreted by gigoid’s complex set of non-rules….

“No man is happy who does not think himself so.” — Publius Syrus (42 BC) — Maxim 584

“Humans hardly ever learn from the experience of others. They learn – when they do, which isn’t often – on their own, the hard way.” — Robert Heinlein, Time Enough for Love

“Heisenberg may have slept here.” — Smart Bee

“War loves to seek its victims in the young.” — Sophocles (496-406 BC) — Scyrii, Frag. 507

“Beginnings and endings are, for the most part, artificial constructs. You say you begin when you are born, but what of those months spent growing in the womb? Endings are hazier still, for further things may occur that extend and enlarge the earlier story. And that is my final sentence on the subject. Or perhaps this one is the final sentence. No, most assuredly what I write now is the final word on the matter. But now that I think upon it, perhaps this….” — The Teachings of Ebenezum, Vol. LVII (Abridged)

20. When you realize you’ve made a mistake, take immediate steps to correct it. — Instructions for life

“I know things about TROY DONAHUE that can’t even be PRINTED!!” — Zippy the Pinhead
_____________________________

As noted above, this turned into a REAL epic Pearl…. Let’s go see just how epic…. If there ever was a more appropriate time to say, “Whew!”, I can’t imagine when it might occur…. So much so, I’m done, I’m gone, I’m outta here…. Whew!….

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

dozer3

 

North flew East, East turned West; South became irrelevant….

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Ffolkes,

Normally, my travelogues feature more artwork, in the sense that I generally post pictures that I’ve taken myself, of the places and people I’ve seen in my ramblings for the day. Since it will be eight or so hours until I actually embark on the ship, which then sets sail at about 4 PM, I am as yet without my camera, which is packed away for the ordeal of getting through the security checkpoint….

I suppose I could have taken a few pix of me and my lady, or my son, who will be driving us today in his limo, but, none of us particularly care for fame, or photos of ourselves, (in my case, there is the danger to the camera itself; my visage has been known to freeze digital cameras instantly….), and who wants to see pix of a street corner, with no people in it?…. So, y’all will have to wait until tomorrow, when I’ll have some shots from the first night on board….

In past travelogues, I concentrated a lot on pictures of where I was visiting, and neglected to show off the ships I’ve been on, which are part of the attraction for me in traveling. It makes perfect sense to my hedonistic side to travel in luxury if possible; I’ve traveled the cheap way, staying in hostels or cheap motels, eating out of the markets and fast food joints, and taking trains and buses to where I wished to go. Often, before I was married, I’d even resort to hitchhiking for my travel mode…. cheap, and you meet some great ffolkes, but it can be a bit inconsistent if traffic is slow, and can take a LONG time to get anywhere…

That sort of travel is great fun, but requires a lot of energy and physical stamina that I no longer possess, so, having a place to take a nap when I get tired, in a five star hotel, with three gourmet meals a day (or more….), along with staff eager to provide service, is a better choice for someone of my age and condition…. Plus, on those voyages on which my luck holds, the casino can help reduce the overall cost of the trip….. I came out about $500 ahead of the game on my Alaska cruise, with my winnings exceeding my bar bills by about that much…. Of course, I went a bit crazy on souvenirs for everyone, but, hey, I tried….

This trip, I’ll try to remember to take more shots on board, to let y’all see what it’s like to cruise with a crazy old long-haired, long-winded blogger…. or, at least to give you a better idea of what it looks like on board…. Plus, it keeps me from having to think too hard about what to include in the Pearls, which will give me more time to just screw around and do nothing…. which is, after all, the whole point of cruising, to have all the time one wishes to just do nothing….

Doing nothing, in our culture, tends to be looked down upon severely, especially by those who suffer from Christian guilt, and the whole concept of “the near-occasion of sin”, wherein the church assumes that everyone WILL give in to temptation, and everyone WILL act on their worst impulses to (GASP!….) sit around and do nothing, thus becoming undisciplined, immoral, and worst-case for the dogmatists, reduce their guilt, making them less amenable, and more resistive, to behavioral control…. They HATE that!….

So, I encourage hedonism at every turn, as should every other person of a like mind; it’s the best method I’ve found for providing almost immediate relief from the constipated, bloated feeling of constriction that goes along with allowing the dogmatists to draw the patterns of your life. A good, meal, with just a little too much wine and conviviality, is the perfect antidote to the most stringent attitudes…. Why, a prime rib, and a bottle of good Cabernet, has been known to destroy six years of Catholic denial in one sitting, given the proper company, and perhaps some after dinner brandy…. And, even if it doesn’t completely eradicate ALL one’s prior conditioning, the process of removing it, meal by wonderful meal, is one that appeals to even the most hardened ascetic…

Hmm…. I seem to have strayed a bit afield from the concept of an intro…. not unusual, I suppose, and possibly much better than the typical rant I’ve been saddling y’all with of late. I can see that, no matter what I’ve been babbling about, it’s certainly long enough to meet the legal standards for which we shoot, so, I’m opting to go with my usual technique, to just go with it, without worrying at all about what the hell it means, or what it may or may not do in terms of stimulation of cogitation…. That, of course, is, ultimately, the personal responsibility of each gentle reader, at least for the cogitation part…. I’ll try to supply the stimulation, but, no promises, eh?…..

Shall we Pearl?…..

“If any man asks for greatness, let him forget greatness and ask for truth, and he will find both.” — Horace Mann
_____________________________

“Anger is a tool, not a master. Anger is meant to be tapped into and drawn upon. Used properly, anger is useful. Sloth, apathy, and despair are the enemy. Anger is not. Anger is our friend. Not a nice friend, not a gentle friend, but a very loyal friend.  It will always tell us when we have been betrayed. It will always tell us when we have betrayed ourselves. It will always tell us that it is time to act in our own best interests. Anger is not the action itself. It is action’s invitation.” — Julia Cameron  “The Artist’s Way”

“He who conquers himself is the mightiest warrior.” — Confucius

Lao Tzu sez    I had originally intended to write a piece to accompany these three statements, the latter of which are from two of the most revered philosophers in history…. but, there really isn’t any need to expand on this idea…. It’s pretty perfect, as wisdom goes, so, I’m going to do the unusual, for me, and leave it alone, to allow you the space to consider the concept in your own way, and in your own time….

Just know this…. if there is a single key to being happy in life, this is it…. This is the key to ALL wisdom, ffolkes, so just let it become part of your inner self, and you’ll find your life has fallen into a pattern of serenity, and an inner peace that you have never known….. Oh, didn’t I say what that key is? Hmm, imagine that…. I guess I forgot…. Well, it’s probably best if you articulate it yourself; it seems to work better that way…. Okay, if you insist, one last hint….

“A person never so beautifully shows his own strength, as when he respects another’s weakness.” — Smart Bee

If that doesn’t do it, well, then, we’ll just have to try again another time, won’t we?….   😆
_____________________________

“I have thought many times since that if poets when they get discouraged would blow their brains out, they could write very much better when they got well.” — Mark Twain

Hmm…. I’m not sure, but, perhaps Mark was feeling a bit curmudgeonly toward poets that day…. If not, well, we all know his fondness for sardonicism, don’t we?…. Here’s one I think you’ll enjoy, from a poet I’ve only recently begun to explore….

Song

A rowan like a lipsticked girl.
Between the by-road and the main road
Alder trees at a wet and dripping distance
Stand off among the rushes.

There are the mud-flowers of dialect
And the immortelles of perfect pitch
And that moment when the bird sings very close
To the music of what happens

~~ Seamus Heaney ~~

_____________________________

As might be guessed from what has gone before, I’m a bit anxious to be on the road… It will take all of my patience and fortitude to wait until 1 PM, when we leave for the embarkation pier in SF….. especially as leaving dead bodies behind me could conceivably cause problems upon my return…. SIGH…. People get SO upset when I do that!….

Any who, I’ll try to not kill anyone today, so I can have a worry free cruise…. In hopes of getting to that point sometime in the near future, I’m going for an old-school, random, harlequin pearl, to finish off this very skimpy Pearl….. Don’t worry, I’ll make up for it with art work tomorrow…. the camera’s all charged up and ready to shoot…. Until then, here are some thoughts from SB to help y’all get through the day…. or not….

ICONOCLAST, n.  A breaker of idols, the worshipers whereof are imperfectly gratified by the performance, and most strenuously protest that he unbuildeth but doth not reedify, that he pulleth down but pileth not up.  For the poor things would have other idols in place of those he thwacketh upon the mazzard and dispelleth.  But the iconoclast saith:  “Ye shall have none at all, for ye need them not; and if the rebuilder fooleth round hereabout, behold I will depress the head of him and sit thereon till he squawk it.” — Ambrose Bierce, “The Devil’s Dictionary”

(Oh! Oh! So, THAT’S what I’ve been doing all this time!! I love it, and now feel very justified in my work here…. I am just loving the idea of putting the OCI after my name, to signify my identity of a member of the Order of Curmudgeonly Iconoclasts…. My sig. line is starting to look impressive, with all my initials after it…. as in, gigoid, MCA, BS,  OCI…. [which, BTW, is the correct way to write ‘gigoid’, with no capitals…. it’s a user-name, and caps aren’t required, nor, in this case, desired….].  If I’m not careful, all these titles will start to go to my head, or something equally inane… Okay, I’m done fooling around now…. We’ll get on with the rest of this pearl….sorry, got distracted…)

“Make your enemies by choice, not by accident. The same applies to friends.” — Xavier R. Quinton

“When the way comes to an end, then change – having changed, you pass through.” — I Ching

“In every country and every age, the priest has been hostile to Liberty.” — Thomas Jefferson

:interesting: adj.  In hacker parlance, this word has strong connotations of `annoying’, or `difficult’, or both.  Hackers relish a challenge, and enjoy wringing all the irony possible out of the ancient Chinese curse “May you live in interesting times”.  Oppose {trivial}, {uninteresting}. — from The on-line Hacker Jargon File V423

(Note: This definition of the word “interesting” is the most frequently applied here at ECR, in terms of meaning and connotation, used almost exclusively; just so’s you know….)

“It seems, in fact, as though the second half of a man’s life is made up of nothing but the habits he has accumulated during the first half.” — Feodor Dostoyevski, “The Possessed”

“The zoo is not an exhibition
I view with much enjoyment,
when I notice beasts in a position
To learn the weaknesses of men.”

— John Brunner
_____________________________

I’ve done it again, I suppose, and I’ll just have to deal with it…. I’ll be back shortly, I hope….

As I suspected, that took a while, but, it’s done now, and I can get on with my day…. which, as might be imagined, promises to be one of greater than usual import, and all around fun… or, as has been intimated, more interesting…. hopefully without the negative connotation that generally applies…. See y’all tomorrow, even if there are technical issues… I’ll figure out a workaround of some kind….

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

dozer3

Forlorn moments of epistemological apprehension….

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Ffolkes,

The unconscious mind is a powerful thing, especially when its function spills over into the world of our conscious perceptions…. Today’s title enters that twilight zone for certain…. Beyond that, this deponent sayeth naught, lest the quest to understand bring me to the brink of insanity. Let it suffice to know that, as far as the title of today’s Pearl goes, I wrought better than I knew, and leave it at that…. I think all of us will be happier in the long run….

Thus it begins…. the slow, inevitable corruption of morality always begins with a single manipulation, performed “in their best interests”…. In this particular case, we are only speaking of our philosophical intentions, rather than any connected to actual manipulation of events, or reality. But, that really doesn’t matter at all, because the corruption doesn’t know that, or care. The weather change whereof I speak happens in the heart of the manipulator, at the moment the decision is made to alter the truth in order to achieve a certain result. Once that decision is made, it is irrevocable, and further manipulations will follow, as certainly as it follows the air will be clearer after it rains….

In light of the simple fact that I’ve only consumed about four ounces of coffee so far, it might be a bit dangerous to start such a discussion, one with the apparent depth of this one. In fact, the subtle and complex arrangement of thoughts that brought this on seems to be fading from my mind as I sit here and type…. It seemed like a good idea when I started, but, somehow, it’s just a little too deep to dive into first off. I know what it is I was trying to say, but, I’m not sure, at this point, I have the wherewithal to say it with the right degree of clarity…. I’m thinking we’ll shift focus here, and go on to more appropriate material for an intro….

Not that philosophy, or, in this case, epistemology, a branch of philosophy that investigates the origin, nature, methods, and limits of human knowledge, is an inappropriate subject for that…. it’s merely a bit too deep for my current state of intellectual comprehension to cope with efficiently, or more importantly, accurately…. I slept like a log last night, after a night of no sleep at all, and I’m a bit fuzzy thus far this morning; in this state, I’ll be lucky to be able to discuss the relevance of the wisdom of Daffy Duck, so, I think we’ll let the study of the meanings of human knowledge wait a bit longer before we try to take it on…. and, in the process, we’ll keep from making judgments about the morality of manipulation of that knowledge….

It’s too bad, really, as it would have made a great beginning for an epic rant about the mess in Washington D.C…… especially the current budget crisis, brought on by the immoral, not to mention ill-advised, manipulation of events, by a small group of fanatics who found themselves in a unique position, one of having more influence than their actual degree of relevance would normally command…. They took their opportunity in hand, and, being the truly ignorant bastards they are, used it for their own purposes, with complete disregard for the actual dictates of reality, or for the wishes and desires of their own constituents…. As far as I can tell, there isn’t a single point of view one can take in this that doesn’t end up exposing them to as immoral, and, in the final analysis, ignorant and selfish, with marked tendencies toward assholiness….

However, as it sits now, what has happened is that we’ve blathered enough to call this an intro, even though it didn’t introduce anything other than a state of confusion…. but, around here, that can be considered as the status quo for this time of day…. Okay, so this is where I stamp your papers, and say….

Shall we Pearl?…. In fact, let’s do it times three….

“The world is so constructed, that if you wish to enjoy its pleasures, you must also endure its pains. Whether you like it or not, you cannot have one without the other.” — Swami Brahmananda

“Life is not the way it is supposed to be. It is the way it is. The way you cope with it is what makes the difference.” — Virginia Satir

“A good friend, who points out mistakes and imperfections, and rebukes evil, is to be respected as if he reveals a secret of hidden treasure.” — Buddha
_____________________________

First, a word from the Founding Fathers….

“I place economy among the first and most important virtues, and public debt as the greatest of dangers. To preserve our independence, we must not let our rulers load us with perpetual debt.” — Thomas Jefferson

Now, a bit of insanity, on the identical subject, from a more modern source….

“By all accounts, though, an end seems near for the impasse that has once again exposed a government so divided that it sometimes borders on dysfunction. Though the House failed to muster sufficient support for a conservatives-only bill in the GOP-majority chamber on Tuesday, enough Republicans there seem likely to join House Democrats to approve a bipartisan version if it can be approved by the Senate and sent to them. ”

http://www.sfgate.com/news/politics/article/Senators-closing-in-on-deal-to-reopen-government-4895884.php

I was reading the news last night, online, and the latest reports from the capitol say that a deal will get done prior to today’s deadline…. as it always does…. The difference in the deals that get done and those that don’t get done are relatively insignificant, in terms of real life; they only make a difference to those involved in whatever struggle is current. Nobody really understands any of it anyway… not the politicians who spout all the platitudes and figures, not the experts who supply the detailed analysis of those figures, and certainly not the public, who don’t even WANT to understand the complexities…. which is something the pundits know well, and, in fact, depend on to assist them in their endeavors…

“Morality is a private and costly luxury.” — Smart Bee

Sadly, this statement, though found without attribution, was made by an observer who knows human nature well, one who has obviously observed our history closely, drawing from those observations the only possible conclusion…. Society, as exemplified by its leaders, in both the secular and clerical arenas, loudly and boldly tout the twin concepts of morality and ethics, laying claim to them as if they were a coat left lying about. The noise they make in making these claims is generally quite noisome, to my ears, but, serves to cover their asses when later accused of impropriety; they can point to their strident statements as being proof of sincerity, though, logically, sincerity and morality have no real connection.

However, sad as the statement is, it is accurate, and never more so when looking at the budget crisis that we are witnessing today. The assholes who inhabit Congress, especially the conservatives in the House of Representatives, ( an oxymoron, if I’ve ever heard one…. ), DO NOT represent the people who elected them, not even close…. They lie to them, they steal from them, they follow their own agendas, but, they DON’T represent them…

How can they? They are not even in the same economic class as most of them, and never have been…. and, please, DON’T try to tell me you don’t think we have economic classes in this society…. Sorry, ffolkes, but American society is NOT classless, and never has been…. It has ALWAYS been separated into classes, based primarily on economic factors, with those who have more money having more influence and, more importantly, more rights, than those with less money…. The most cursory examination of history, of the world, and of this country, will show this as a fact of little possibility of dispute.

The average US income (which doesn’t give a completely accurate picture, but is useful to make the point….) is somewhere in the tens of thousands of dollars ($10,001 to $99,999, somewhere between the two….). This translates into a basic demographic breakdown of being a very few people making more than they can possibly use, as contrasted by a moderate number of folks comfortably content, though unsure of their stability, and a very large number of people who are struggling to even eat on a daily basis…. This accounts for 99% of the population, and about 1% of the actual money available to that 99%….

On the other side of that coin, we have a few thousand people, the remaining 1%, who have 99% of the money, all making more than a million dollars a year, on average…. Of this tiny percentage, we find that ALL of the Senators, about half of the House members, and the President, of course, are all part of that 1% of the population, a part that has never had to worry about where their next meal came from…. I wish that this were not true, but, these are facts, with the supporting evidence available to anyone with a library card, which they can use to find these numbers….

Of course, the fact that they are “more successful” in economic terms is only proof, in their minds, of their inherent right to make the decisions for everyone else in the country, even though they have no real grasp of the needs of those people. The fact of their disconnection from reality cannot penetrate their sense of entitlement, and they fully BELIEVE in their own mandate…. “Somehow, it never hurts to step back occasionally and ask yourself “Am I contributing to the solution of the problem or aiding in making a bigger problem?”…. this is a process, and a question, that never occurs to them…

This is why I call them delusional, and can honestly claim that I believe them to be clinically insane; a person so disconnected to what is real cannot be considered sane…. except, perhaps, in an insane society. Making assumptions about having the right to decide about the wants and needs of others is a sure sign that one has an unreasonable belief in their own importance to the universe, an assumption that can only be termed as a delusion. This kind of behavior is one society cannot afford to allow, because, if nothing else, these types of delusions are dangerous to the rest of us.  Allowing these “crazies”, for wont of a more accurate term, to act out their fantasies in the real world tends to lead to trouble for more than just themselves…..

“Lord, Lord, how this world is given to lying! I grant you I was down and out of breath; and so was he. But we rose both at an instant, and fought a long hour by Shrewsbury clock.” — William Shakespeare (1564-1616), King Henry IV — Act v, Sc. 4

I’m down, and out of breath, from shouting into the wind, at the mountain… A futile task, at best, I know, but, what else can one do at 5 AM? Mountain moving is my specialty, after all…. The truth of the matter is, after two hours by Shrewsbury clock, I’m tired of shouting at the mountain; it’s hard work, to little effect. I suppose it’s all I can do, and that is why I do it…. It’s cheaper, and, in the long run, less troublesome to my spirit and karma, than going out, buying a gun, and making a list of targets…. Less chance of getting shot back at, too…

There comes a time, however, when even I must admit to the futility of this particular task, and grow a bit discouraged…. I’m just not the kind of person who can give up completely, though, so, I’ll be back to rant on this subject another time…. “They” are always out there doing something on which I can comment. For the time being, I’ll leave you with this final lament…

“The world has taken on a thickness of vulgarity that raises a spiritual man’s contempt to the violence of a passion.” — Charles Baudelaire
_____________________________

No words of mine can add to this….

Finisterre
This was the land’s end: the last fingers, knuckled and rheumatic,
Cramped on nothing. Black
Admonitory cliffs, and the sea exploding
With no bottom, or anything on the other side of it,
Whitened by the faces of the drowned.
Now it is only gloomy, a dump of rocks —-
Leftover soldiers from old, messy wars.
The sea cannons into their ear, but they don’t budge.
Other rocks hide their grudges under the water.The cliffs are edged with trefoils, stars and bells
Such as fingers might embroider, close to death,
Almost too small for the mists to bother with.
The mists are part of the ancient paraphernalia —-
Souls, rolled in the doom-noise of the sea.
They bruise the rocks out of existence, then resurrect them.
They go up without hope, like sighs.
I walk among them, and they stuff my mouth with cotton.
When they free me, I am beaded with tears.Our Lady of the Shipwrecked is striding toward the horizon,
Her marble skirts blown back in two pink wings.
A marble sailor kneels at her foot distractedly, and at his foot
A peasant woman in black
Is praying to the monument of the sailor praying.
Our Lady of the Shipwrecked is three times life size,
Her lips sweet with divinity.
She does not hear what the sailor or the peasant is saying —-
She is in love with the beautiful formlessness of the sea.

Gull-colored laces flap in the sea drafts
Beside the postcard stalls.
The peasants anchor them with conchs. One is told:
“These are the pretty trinkets the sea hides,
Little shells made up into necklaces and toy ladies.
They do not come from the Bay of the Dead down there,
But from another place, tropical and blue,
We have never been to.
These are our crêpes. Eat them before they blow cold.”

~~ Sylvia Plath ~~

_____________________________

This pearl is of a type I don’t often use; I chose the pearls first, with an eye to randomness, but also a focus, on gathering quotes that had something to say about Life At Large, so to speak… I think it came out pretty well, but, then, I’m pretty easy…. Y’all may feel differently; if so, feel free to let me know….. though that won’t change any of them, at least I’ll know they’ve been perused….. 🙂   Sneaky, eh?….

“Duty is heavier than a mountain, death lighter than a feather.” — Robert Jordan

“Take Idaho’s license plates – they say ‘Famous Potatoes.’   Then there’s New Hampshire – their license plates say ‘Live Free … or DIE!!’  I don’t know, I think that somewhere between ‘Famous Potatoes’ and ‘Live Free or Die’ the truth lies.  And I think it’s closer to ‘Famous Potatoes.'” — George Carlin

“We think that if we can label a thing we have understood it.” — Sangharakshita

“I am mortified to be told that, in the United States of America, the sale of a book can become a subject of inquiry, and of criminal inquiry too.” — Thomas Jefferson

When the ten thousand things are seen in their oneness
We return to the source to remain where we have always been.

— Seng Ts’un.

“We are more sensible of what is done against custom than against Nature.” — Plutarch (46-120 AD) — Of Eating of Flesh, Tract 1

“For it is the doom of men that they forget.” — Merlin
_____________________________

Once again, I’ve come to the end of a day’s Pearl, without realizing just how close it was to being done….. I suppose that’s a good thing, indicating that I’m well focused on the task at hand…. or, it could just mean I’m oblivious…. Who cares? Not me…. Any who, let’s see how typo-free it is….. or isn’t….

Okay, so much for that…. Several tweaks, adds, and contortions later, it’s done, and just in time, as the street repair trucks just pulled up, and the jackhammers are starting to sing their repulsive tune…. I think I’ll go somewhere, and get some breakfast…. See ya….

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

dozer3

The full gamut, from ho to hum….

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Ffolkes,

Yesterday, I dropped out…. I’ve been considering this for some time, especially so since the revelations by Mr. Snowden that proved the government hasn’t merely been spying on terrorists, but on its own citizens. After these insights were brought to light, several of the social media and large tech companies like Google,Twitter, Facebook, and others, revealed that the government had also forced them to release data about their users, including those of American citizens…. which includes me….

This information, naturally, concerns me, and, as an American citizen, disturbs me greatly; to think that my own government, founded upon the principles of freedom, and the right to be secure in my home, EVEN FROM THAT GOVERNMENT, is spying on me for no good reason, other than their own paranoia and ambitious avarice, is completely, unequivocally unacceptable….

As a firm critic of those policies of internal spying, and of the people who engage in that form of domestic terrorism on their own countrymen, I found myself even more concerned by what was revealed in the process of public discussion…. Facebook, in particular, has been gathering data about me ever since I first signed up for it, and has now given all that data, on me and every other user, to the NSA, which means it is now in the possession of every branch of the clandestine world, as, for a spy agency, those idiots in the NSA don’t seem to be very good at keeping their mouths shut…..

These criminals ( Yes, criminals…. they’re denying my Constitutional rights…. ) got stuff from Facebook about my likes, dislikes, as well as information about all of my friends (fortunately, I never did use it heavily, so I only had about 115 of them…. hmm…. I’m reminded of Aristotle, I believe, who said something about “a friend to all is a friend to none”, or something like that…)

Any who, to make an already too-long story shorter, I deactivated my FB account yesterday…. I hadn’t been using it a lot for quite a while anyway, since I didn’t want to give Facebook any more data on me than was absolutely necessary, and I never was real comfortable with having my ENTIRE life online…. I give up enough to write this blog each day, and there was no need to post my every act on Facebook for the entire world to see…. Oh, you ask, what about the Privacy Settings they use? Well, honey, if you believe everything you read online, especially about privacy policies, then have I got some deals for you…. cash only, please, no checks….

I may lose even more readers (???) over this, though, right now, I don’t see how that is possible, as I’m down as far as I’ve ever seen it in two-plus-years, as far as I can tell. But, I don’t care… I don’t intend to make it any easier for the assholes in the NSA, or the FBI, or any other police or government agency to gather data about me…. I use the most secure protocols I can, and I try to limit my traffic online to what is needed, and not give away too much of it without some kind of payoff for me…. However, I’m well aware of how easy it is for anyone with minimal skills to hack around on the internet for data, mining it for whatever they can that will turn a profit…. It only makes good sense these days to keep one’s online presence to a minimum, as far as possible, so as not to make it too easy for them….

In truth, I feel a greater feeling of relief than of any regret at leaving Facebook; I’m not sanguine about the fact that they already have more information on me than is comfortable, and I don’t really believe, or expect, them to destroy it…. Information is, of course, their business…. But, I’m not giving them any more of it for free; if they want it, they’ll have to get it here, or do without…. I hope. And, hopefully, it will throw a small wrench into the works for the assholes who try to steal it for the Beloved Ruling Class, and their corporate masters….

Shall we Pearl?…..

Scott: “Shut the deuterium from the main cryo pump to the auxiliary tank.”
LaForge: “The tank can’t withstand that kind of pressure.”
Scott: “Where’d you get that idea?!”
LaForge: “What do you where’d I get that idea?  It’s in the impulse engine specifications.”
Scott: “Regulation 42/15?  Pressure variances on the IRC Tank storage?”
LaForge: “Yeah!”
Scott: “Forget it.  I wrote it.  A good engineer is always a *wee* bit conservative, at least on paper.”

— “Relics”, Stardate Unknown

Or, as my dad taught me, and I taught my son, “Two ideas can be considered essential knowledge….. First, remember that just because I taught you all you know, I didn’t necessarily teach you all I  know; never show all your cards until the bet is called….. Second, always cut the cards….”
_____________________________

I’m pretty certain that I could build a relatively decent rant today, but, I didn’t sleep well, and don’t think my mind is quite stable enough for that…. I was up and down all night long, unable to doze off…. only got about 1 or 2 solid hours of sleep, and that not deeply…. I am certainly in the right kind of mood for one, and intend to take out some of my angst and frustration on some innocent shopkeepers later on, but, for now, I think I’d best stick to an old-school version, to avoid the pitfalls of trying to sound reasonable when feeling rather vicious…. I might say something I’d regret later….. (Though I don’t know how I could think that, given what I’ve already said in this blog in the past….. I mean, how many blogs have you read recently that accused all three branches of the government of high treason?…. )

For now, though, unless something occurs to me that breaks through my initial reluctance, we’ll go with this…. a directed pearl, looking for ways to poke fun, even derisive fun, at the BRC, their corporate masters, and their myrmidons, the courts, churches, police, and armed forces…. may they all suffer from painful warts on their private parts!….

Words are like leaves; and where they most abound,
Much fruit of sense beneath is rarely found.

— Alexander Pope (1688-1744) — Essay on Criticism, Part ii, Line 109

“History is never written by the losers.” — Smart Bee

“If peace… only had the music and pageantry of war, there’d be no more wars.” — Sophie Kerr

“A bureaucrat is a Democrat who holds some office that a Republican wants.” — Alben W. Barkley

“Government is not reason, it is not eloquence, it is force; like fire, a troublesome servant and a fearful master.  Never for a moment should it be left to irresponsible action.” — George Washington

“Grow your own dope. Plant a politician”– Smart Bee

“The enemy is fear. We think it is hate; but, it is fear.” — M. Gandhi

I think this is a fine group of pearls, if a bit esoteric for some; it’s the best I can do when I’m so angry at them (the politicians, et al, not the pearls….)
_____________________________

When I am in a mood such as this, with not a single good thought to be found anywhere in my mind, I turn to the classic poets, allowing the beauty of it bring me back into a more affable state of mind…. because it ALWAYS works….

A Faery Song

{Sung by the people of Faery over Diarmuid and Grania, in their bridal sleep under a Cromlech.}

WE who are old, old and gay,
O so old!
Thousands of years, thousands of years,
If all were told:
Give to these children, new from the world,
Silence and love;
And the long dew-dropping hours of the night,
And the stars above:
Give to these children, new from the world,
Rest far from men.
Is anything better, anything better?
Tell us it then:
Us who are old, old and gay,
O so old!
Thousands of years, thousands of years,
If all were told.

~~ William Butler Yeats ~~

_____________________________

I’m breathing hard, but nowhere near the finish line…. Ranting is still out of the question, even though I took a break to go read the headlines…. I’m more pissed of than ever, but, still don’t have the mental energy, after two hours of sleep, to do justice to a rant of that import…. Y’all know what THAT means, don’t you? Don’t tell me that you haven’t figured out by now that in these cases, I ALWAYS retreat to my default position? Please, please, don’t tell me that….. But, in case you do, here is the answer to the implied question….

“What happens to your fist when you open your hand?” — Zen Buddhism

“If it were possible to heal sorrow by weeping and to raise the dead with tears, gold were less prized than grief.” — Sophocles (496-406 BC) — Scyrii, Frag. 510

“Everything has been figured out, except how to live.” — Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980)

“A desire not to butt into other people’s business is at least eighty percent of all human wisdom… and the other twenty percent isn’t very important.”
“You butt into other people’s business.  All the time.”
“Who said I was wise?  I’m a professional bad example.  You can learn a lot by watching me.”

— Stranger in a Strange Land, Robert A. Heinlein

“Je me presse de rire de tout, de peur d’etre oblige de’en pleurer.” – (I make myself laugh at everything, in case I should have to weep.) — Pierre-Augustin de Beaumarchais (1732-1799)

“We do not have to visit a madhouse to find disordered minds; our planet is the mental institution of the universe.” — Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

“A man should not allow himself to hate even his enemies, because if you indulge this passion on some occasions, it will rise of itself in others; if you hate your enemies, you will contract such a vicious habit of mind, as by degrees will break out upon those who are your friends, or those who are indifferent to you.” — Plutarch
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I have a lot to do today out in the BBR, so, I’m glad this is nearly done…. I’ve been at it for close to three hours now, and need to be done so I don’t run out of fuel before getting to the important stuff…. Let’s take a look at it…. Well, it will have to do…. I’ve got too much on my plate to go back & start over…. I’ll just leave you today with one final pearl of a hopeful, and hopefully inspirational nature..

“One final paragraph of advice: Do not burn yourselves out. Be as I am – a reluctant enthusiast… a part time crusader, a half-hearted fanatic. Save the other half of yourselves and your lives for pleasure and adventure.  It is not enough to fight for the land; it is even more important to enjoy it. While you can.  While it’s still here. So get out there and hunt and fish and mess around with your friends, ramble out yonder and explore the forests, encounter the grizz, climb the mountains, bag the peaks, run the rivers, breathe deep of that yet sweet and lurid air, sit quietly for a while and contemplate the precious stillness, that lovely, mysterious and awesome space. Enjoy yourselves, keep your brain in you head and your head firmly attached to the body, the body active and alive, and I promise you this much: I promise  you this one sweet victory over our enemies, over those deskbound people with their hearts in a safety deposit box and their eyes hypnotized by desk calculators.  I promise you this:  You will outlive the bastards.” — Edward Abbey

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

dozer3

We’ll titrate the phone books, THEN we’ll marinate….

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Ffolkes,

I should, perhaps, know better than to begin while still free of coffee…. Aha, I know…. I’ll go peruse the headlines, to see what I can find to rant about today…. Be back when I’m lucid….

Lucid I may be, but, bursting with energy, I’m not, sad to say…. It’s funny, actually; as soon as I started gulping down my coffee, I started yawning, my eyes began to droop, and I started feeling as if going back to bed is the right thing to do (it’s still only 5:15 AM, so it’s not as if it’s too late…). Or, maybe, a bit of a lie-down on the couch would do the trick… We’ll try that first, before I make a complete fool of myself here… Shoot, too late for that, huh?… Oh well….

Laying down wasn’t the answer, either, it seems….. I’m here, though, and I’ve had coffee, so I may as well get started….. Let’s try this…..

Spinning darkly, madly through wild spaces, shouting defiance, the weight of Ramistolia, the Axe of Invincibility, heavy at my belt,  I begin to curse, slowly, with great passion, at the strange methods used by wizards to move people to where they need to be.  I think then of home, and Mira, my wife….. Sleeping now, I hoped, dreaming her gentle dreams of love and beauty, about to awaken…. Flushed in the pale light of dawn, her long tresses tumbled, she will arise, moving slowly to the bath as her handmaiden throws a robe over her milky white shoulders. She’ll think of me then, and smile, not knowing that I had already left her, to meet the destiny set out for me……  IF I managed to survive Alizander’s terrifying mode of transport….

Well, that’s enough of that… it’s okay, but not the best I’ve ever come up with…. I haven’t actually done one of those in a while, which is odd, because I always enjoy it, even though I never do finish any of them. I keep telling myself that one of these days, I’ll sit down, and outline a story to go along with one of them, but, so far, I’ve not done so…. Obviously, it’s not as important to me as I had imagined it to be, which is fine…. I’m actually pretty content with life just now, and it’s hard to get worked up over much of anything….

My contentment may be a contributing factor in the difficulties I’m encountering in this process…. For ranting, it is necessary to feel at least a bit of discontent down in the deeper parts of the psyche, and, right now, mine is pretty happy, for the most part…. Oh, like everyone, I have my moments of angst and bitterness, but, mostly, of late, I can avoid them, or pass them off without any fuss, or lasting effects…. After a lifetime of passionate involvement, and volatile relations with women (I always did find passion to be irresistible…), I am quite content to live more peaceably….

Now, if only the pundits and talking heads would just go crawl back under the rocks from whence they came, all would be well in my world…. But, no, they have to go through all the asinine contortions they can, while continuing to act out their insane personal agendas, taking society down with them, on their completely unnecessary trip to Hell…. The idiot assholes, or asshole idiots, take your pick, on both sides of the political fence, are still exhibiting massive amounts of blind stupidity, and have yet to give any indication they are getting any smarter with time…. Personally, I’m kind of happy with parts of the shutdown, as it does mean they aren’t up to much of anything at all in government, which HAS to be good for all of us….

There, that’s my rant for the day, such as it is…. and now that this intro section has climbed up to a new plateau of chaotic oddity, I guess I should get on with whatever I plan for the rest of it…. Such is life before the rest of the worlds returns from the ‘little death’, into which we slip each night, searching for Endymion…. If you like, you can choose your own metaphor for that, but, I’ll stick with that one, because, hey, it’s done, right?….

Shall we Pearl?…..

“Ignorance of one’s misfortunes is clear gain.” — Euripides
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Bloggers, it seems to me, are a group of people who should have a good grasp of the importance of freedom of speech in a democratic society. Thomas Jefferson, George Mason, Thomas Paine, Ben Franklin, all of whom were part of the founding process of this nation, and our particular brand of democracy, wrote many letters, essays, and comments on the subject, as it is considered to be one of the most important keys to the survival of a democracy, in the face of the attempts made daily by corporations, priests, aristocrats, and all the other immoral, unethical pirates, who live to control others, and who continuously strive to maintain, and increase, their ability to manipulate and control society for their own benefit.

“We can’t allow the people to interfere with the smooth flow of democracy.” — Kitchener city council member

This might seem like a funny statement, until you realize that he wasn’t being facetious, , or even ignorant; rather, he was clearly and honestly (a mistake I’m sure, and the reason his name is now forgotten….) expressing the prevalent attitude among virtually all of the elected officials in this country. Thomas Jefferson particularly warned us, on a number of occasions, to be watchful for attempts by corporations to manipulate the law, as did others of the founding fathers….

Unfortunately, we didn’t listen to them well enough, and along about the middle of the nineteenth century, the corporations found, and used, the most corrupt federal judge they could bribe, influencing him to establish legal justification, and pass judgments on certain laws, creating legal precedents that would forever put the government under their power and control…. If you think that is a bit simplistic a view, or that it is essentially wrong somehow, please, please, show me your evidence…. As proof of my assertion, just consider the modern legal definition of “corporate personhood”, to get a clue as to what I’m talking about…..

“When I want to buy up any politicians I always find the anti-monopolists the most purchasable. They don’t come so high.” — William H. Vanderbilt (1821-1885)

Now, we see the net result of those manipulations, as our country is being held hostage to those politicians who are most heavily influenced by corporate philosophy, and corporate money…. In addition, this administration, which was elected partly due to their promise of transparency and accountability in government, has proven once again that we have fallen prey to some very persuasive liars, as the following link to an article will demonstrate…. Please read this article, which ran a few days ago on SFGATE…. The implications herein are terrifyingly real, and support what I’ve been saying all along, that even though Obama is very good at distraction, always telling the public what they want to hear, his actual agenda is not as transparent, or as beneficial to the public as he has claimed…. Read it, please, then I’ll continue….

http://www.sfgate.com/news/us/article/Report-Obama-brings-chilling-effect-on-journalism-4884506.php

Pretty scary stuff, isn’t it? I don’t like to gloat, but, I DID warn y’all, back in 2009, when Obama was first sworn in, that what you were seeing in him was NOT what you were actually getting…. That became clear when one of his first acts when he got into office was to renew the provisions of the Patriot Act (which could more accurately be called the Paranoid Act….), first pushed on the American people in the wake of 9/11/01, an event completely blown out of proportion by the then extant President Shrub, and his band of good ol’ boy cronies (I won’t bother to mention the timing of the attacks, which were conveniently distracting to the public, drawing their attention from the other news of the day…. which included the possible investigation, by the US Department of Justice, into the 2004 elections, to seek further evidence of illegal voting and election tactics by the Republican Party ….).

Obama’s first significant act as President, then, was to reinforce the LACK of transparency fostered by the Shrub’s administrations, and to further limit the power of the US Bill of Rights to protect our citizens from their own government…..

“I want the ability to monitor high-tech communications among far-flung terrorists. I want to be able to have our people learn their plans before they strike.  That’s the key.” — US President Bill Clinton, radio address, Saturday, May 20, 1995

Oops! What’s this? Yet more indication of how long this charade has been going on? Yep, you got it, ffolkes….. In fact, without trying terribly hard, I could go back over the past 75 years of American political history, and show exactly how much the rights of the American people have been eroded, and how many lies have been told in the process of that erosion…. It’s isn’t hard, because I only use the public newspapers and TV news for my evidence, which anyone may access….

Believe me, it’s a lot of lies, and they continue right up to today….. It amazes me, sometimes, to see just how easy it is to get the public to fall in line…. All one has to do is make people afraid, and they will accept whatever loss of freedom is asked of them, in order to save themselves from thinking, or from admitting their history of being duped….

“What George Washington did for us was to throw out the British, so that we wouldn’t have a fat, insensitive government running our country. Nice try anyway, George.” — D.J. on KSFO/KYA

Normally, and, of late, mostly, I pick on the Republican Party, due in part to their lack of finesse in lying, and due to their more open disregard for the people…. But, the Democrats are no better, ffolkes… They have merely learned how to lie more smoothly, telling people what they wish to hear, and making them believe that they are working for the people’s benefit….

Frankly, and simply put, they’re not interested in any of that sort of thing…. They have merely discovered an old method, of giving something desired, something of small and insignificant meaning, very publicly, to the people, with great fanfare, while, with the other hand, they are clandestinely searching our emails, and profiling our citizens in search of the mulligan, terrorists….

Yes, I said mulligan…. the threat of terrorist activity is very small, as they are very few, and not well funded, generally…. Any who are so funded, you may be sure, are well controlled by those who are in true power, for they control the flow of money, and the availability of weaponry, both of which are needed to foment rebellion. They know this, and since they, quite simply control all the money, they control the terrorists…. No, the terrorists are what they show you in one hand, while the true actions of significance are happening behind closed doors, and in shadowy corners where no one looks….

“… But when he [the people’s champion] has disposed of foreign enemies by conquest or treaty, and there is nothing to fear from them, then he is always stirring up some war or other, in order that the people may require a leader.” — Plato (428-348? B.C.), “The Republic”

I guess I’ve ranted enough for one day…. I’ll leave you with this…. The US government has been controlled by corporate interests (i.e., money) for a very long time…. The quote below gives us a clue as to how long it has gone on, though it started long before 1950…. By that time, though, the corporations were in control enough so that, even though there was no military need, or justifiable rationalization, to drop the atomic bomb, the government was persuaded to do so…. It’s a pretty clear picture, when one sees that the highest ranked military leaders saw no need for it, but, the politicos, and their corporate masters, just HAD to see what their new toy would do….

“It is my opinion that the use of this barbarous weapon at Hiroshima and Nagasaki was of no material assistance in our war against Japan. The Japanese were already defeated and ready to surrender because of the effective sea blockade and the successful bombing with conventional weapons.  …The lethal possibilities of atomic warfare in the future are frightening.  My own feeling was that in being the first to use it, we had adopted an ethical standard common to the barbarians of the Dark Ages.  I was not taught to make war in that fashion, and wars cannot be won by destroying women and children.  We were the first to have this weapon in our possession, and the first to use it. There is a practical certainty that potential enemies will have it in the future and that atomic bombs will sometime be used against us.” — Admiral William D. Leahy, — Chief of Staff to Presidents Roosevelt and Truman, I Was There, 1950

Stay alert ffolkes, this old ball of mud doesn’t have a lot of turns left where we’ll be joining in the song of life…. These idiots, who operate their lives on a basis of complete self-indulgence, and blind belief in their own invincibility, are getting closer and closer to the time when the physical laws of nature will take over, and complete the job of suicide of the species that they have begun…. We can’t keep pumping carbon into the atmosphere, whether it’s monoxide, dioxide, or any other oxide, and expect nothing to happen…. Our lungs don’t use that stuff, and it will eventually kill us…. So, stay alert, and maybe we’ll get a chance to turn things around…. Here’s hoping….

“It is hard to free fools from the chains they revere.” — Voltaire
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I have the feeling that any responsibility or today’s effort shouldn’t be shared, lest whatever happens affect the reputation of whomever I chose to display here in the poetry section…. So, you’ll have to settle for one of mine, as the new one is still cooking…. I hope you enjoy it….

After the odyssey….

Portraits of iconic symbols, crashing, singing, forgotten;
evolving into mature innovation, as yet pale, and rotten.
Still water justly breeds, impenetrable primal verses resound;
unholy moments tarry, emotion swirls in passion unbound

Spiritual ovulation precedes each pregnant pause;
gravid, time moves on, following destiny’s cause.
Cast adrift on waves of confusion, to a final, damp landing;
salvation beckons sweetly, fed well on understanding.

Dreams directly fall, in night’s grey bower, unbidden;
lingering flavors in simple taste, lovingly, cleverly hidden.
Childish laughter sounds, joyful, bright, and clear;
no need ever to hide, no more monsters to fear.

Temper most foul arrives under unregistered mail;
forgotten taunts live on, lashed by an ancient flail.
Plain dealing delivers such lasting specks of honest hate;
savage in retrospect, never hasty, always running late.

Forever, cries an ambient lover of the pending night;
his pale, weak issue forms its own failing light.
Still, fortune favors such as those who apprehend;
Sweet love of Gaia, let it never end.

~~ gigoid ~~

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I’ve ranted sufficiently for one day, so I won’t bother you with yet another…. As is our wont, we’ll go default, meaning old-school style…. It may be default, but, it’s MY default, so deal….  😆

“Not knowing when the dawn will come, I open every door.” — Emily Dickinson

“I think computer viruses should count as life. I think it says something about human nature that the only form of life we have created so far is purely destructive. We’ve created life in our own image.” — Stephen Hawking

“In real life, unlike in Shakespeare, the sweetness of the rose depends upon the name it bears.  Things are not only what they are. They are, in very important respects, what they seem to be.” — Hubert H. Humphrey (1911-78)

“Time carves all. Let yourself be carved to attain your true nature.” — Master Po

“A right is not what someone gives you; it’s what no one can take from you.” — Ramsey Clark

“I think the dragon’s asleep.” — Famous Last Words

A word is dead
When it is said
Some say.
I say it just
Begins to live
That day.
— Emily Dickinson

In the words of the Colonel, “I love it when a plan comes together….” Nothing like a balanced pearl of virtual wisdom to start, or end, your day….
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I have a feeling that this one is better than it seems from over here…. let’s take a closer look….. I might be right about that. Since, however, I’m not the best judge of my own work, I’ll just do as I always do, which is to post it, and damn the consequences…. See ya…

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

dozer3