Sunday, 12 January 2014
Wednesday, 13 November 2013
Super yachts or super typhoon?
The worlds 100
richest people in 2012 sat on $240 bn.
If the worlds 100 richest gave the un
$301 mn in aid it would (worst case scenario) cost them 9 days worth
of interest.
But when it comes down to it, why should something like a
little disaster in the world set them back 9 days worth of interest
(when they're not in the slightest bit affected) and there are super
yachts to buy?
Friday, 25 October 2013
Start Trek continues
No this isn't about the eye-blinding lens-flaring of the last two films, but a fan made continuation of the original series, apparently with cbs's blessing. It's a testament to the dedication, talent and willingness of people to see their dreams unfold.
This is a fan continuation of the original series, with apollo making a re-appearance. The crew is the same crew but naturally played by all new actors, including the son (chris doohan) of scotty (james doohan) playing the role of... scotty! Michael forest reprises his original star trek role of apollo, with marina sirtis off next generations as the voice of the computer! Priceless.
Only 1 webisode's been made so far, but they're hoping to raise $100,00 by the 6th November to produce another 3 webisodes. To date (24th October at 13:03 hrs UT) they have raised $68,858, so only another $31,142 to go. So if you're a lover of all things trek, or sci-fi or just wish to poke one in the eye of the executives who cancel everything, go over to their kickstarter page and pledge: anything from $1 all the way up to $3,000 - which gives you:
But if you're too lazy to head over...
This is a fan continuation of the original series, with apollo making a re-appearance. The crew is the same crew but naturally played by all new actors, including the son (chris doohan) of scotty (james doohan) playing the role of... scotty! Michael forest reprises his original star trek role of apollo, with marina sirtis off next generations as the voice of the computer! Priceless.
Only 1 webisode's been made so far, but they're hoping to raise $100,00 by the 6th November to produce another 3 webisodes. To date (24th October at 13:03 hrs UT) they have raised $68,858, so only another $31,142 to go. So if you're a lover of all things trek, or sci-fi or just wish to poke one in the eye of the executives who cancel everything, go over to their kickstarter page and pledge: anything from $1 all the way up to $3,000 - which gives you:
"THE MAN, THE MYTH, THE SULU: Personal set tour guided by Grant Imahara ... This is a standalone level and does not include any other level in combination. Backers will be included on our special backer page on the Star Trek Continues website. We will thank backers at this level in the credits of the episodes supported by this Kickstarter..."But to re-wet your appetite for hopefully more, and if you're one of the few who haven't seen it yet, the following link will take you to their youtube channel so once more we can: boldly go where we've boldly been with a boldness no previous trek has bowled over!
But if you're too lazy to head over...
Sunday, 13 October 2013
I understand... happiness
I understand the need (in a different
parallel universe of course) to find and create profligate amounts of
time to be happy; believe me there's nothing more i would find
happier than, for however brief the moment, been on a platform
watching the whole planet been sucked into a ravenous black-hole.
Knowing my luck however, the platform
would be on the facing side, as the planet was gripped in the
death-throes of the beasts itsy-bitsy maw.
So, you might wonder, what's prompted
this interlude of “fun”? It was a comment (which i'm still
pondering whether to allow) I received on a post to do with “hfo
and unprofessional ethics” . As i'm commenting on it I suppose
it'd be rude not to – saying that "it is the time to be
happy." Which is wonderful if that's what they really want. I
can only assume they'd failed to read any other post apart from that
one entry, and so missed the realisation that I'm happiest wallowing
in the miserableness which surrounds me like a pack of killer whales
spying a seal, obliviously basking on an ice-floe, thank you very
much. Weight goes up pants tighten, weight goes down pants fit, an
easy equation to jog through life by, especially considering that one
day none of it will matter.
If you do wish to visit the site the
unknown person mentioned, it is called www.nerdfitness.com.
It will make you like yourself, it will make you enjoy you're couch
potato lifestyle with some exercising and nutrition, enabling you to
become a truly productive member of society (what on earth for?), so
if that's your bag, then please do head over. On the other hand, if
you wish to endure depressing, lip-curdling rubbish, there's no need
to go any further. Indeed, have a stroll through the archives and
see if there's anything which has you reaching for the close-tab
icon, or preferably have you rip the telephone cable from the wall
socket to strangle next doors cat with, which has plopped one deposit
too many on your prize now-shrivelled hydrangeas!
Monday, 5 August 2013
Oh I nearly forgot, paris – p1
Ah paris! That wonderful city of romance (yuk), good food
(what's wrong with eating dust), cheeses galore (which naturally have
me running screaming to the loo), and very rude parisians. Why
on earth would anyone wish to travel there except to swan around or
clamber to the top of the eiffel tower, simply to get their tits out?
On this occasion i was invited by a friend whom i hadn't seen in years. And with the fine people at eurostar offering fantastic return deals at £59, it seemed churlish not to grasp the opportunity – if just to get away from the silly madness flying under the bloody tourettes purported big society banner – a headless environment where people run around wishing that their headlessness is firmly kept away from the glare of exposure, but it certainly sounds chummily nice.
Being a crabby traveller i find airports, and the so called "stassi" security measures they contain for our benefit, nothing less than a sad sop. If they were serious about security each person would be stripped down to their nothings and forced to wear some kind of disposable (but recyclable) garment. The passenger would then, naturally, be reunited with all theirrubbish belongings
on the other side, once the plane had safely skidded to a halt. No
make-up, no perfumes, no books, nor any reading. To take it to its flying
extreme, if everyone was simply tranquillised upon boarding, a third
of the unnecessary weight could be dispensed with and airlines could
cram even more people on the planes. We travellers, on the
other hand, would arrive feeling refreshed if a little dozy.
Indeed why not ban hand-luggage from the cabin altogether and dump everyone’s crap in the hold? A dreadful chore i know; but, just imagine not having to worry about that strange foreign-looking person sitting two rows down, who's just started to sweat uncontrollably!
No, travelling for me and I suspect for many of you too, involves far more hours wasted that could be spent contentedly tucked happily away in bed. Failing that, checking over the luggage for the umpteenth time before been quietly confident pants hadn't been forgotten. Even spending more time at the destination - despite the final nights bout of food poisoning, all before making that fateful return trip back in a nice new maglev carriage or popping on a pad and been beamed away.
When it comes to security, it always makes me ponder on the considerable number of passenger journeys taking place around the globe day by day, year upon year, who meet with a fate no worse than a greyhound discovering that the tasty morsel its chasing after to devour and fill its half starving stomach, is nothing more significant than insubstantial fluff. Yet there's more fear surrounding the act of flying than any other type of activity - bar sticking your head in a nuclear reactor, or playing russian roulette with a meth'd out crack head. Even dying by bungee jumping nowadays makes you into a sports martyr and garners you the respect you failed to garner whilst been alive.
Looking through the league tables of probability, you have less chance of dying from a bizarre kind of plane malfunction: whether caused by material fatigue, or some successful pants bomber managing to actually do the plane in (at roughly 0.000.014%), than you have of dying in the uk in a car accident which trots in somewhere around the region of 0.013%. Even the chance of been struck by lightning somewhere on the globe pops in at a measly 0.000.34%, which means you have a far greater chance of dying horribly from having your number called by a lightning bolt from the ledger in the sky, coming to you in the form of a plane incident.
But, put another way, more people die from falling birds, choking on a peanut or been hit in the head by a golf ball than dying sitting in seat 17A of an aeroplane. Sadly, before you get too carried away, there's more chance of you dying in a plane incident than chance of you winning the euromillions lottery jackpot, which is stuck way down the league of improbables at 0.000.000.86%.
Don't get me wrong, we're all (with 100% certainty) going to kick the bucket, pop our clogs, give back our birthday suits, feed the worms, be dust in the clouds... the only random variable is simply that of timing.
Of course security hawks will tell you that the amount of money spent on making us queue like sheep in a pen, or protestors been kettled has all been worth it, which in 2011 apparently reached the grand sum of $19.1bn and could top $45.13bn by 2018, according to security director news from research conducted by frost & sullivans 'global airport security market assessment' report.
Imagine that, $19.1bn in one year poured in to help ensure the safety of passengers and the security of flights. So it's good that all the money terminally spent stuffing all the security holes and hence the tide of terrorist menaces, that would otherwise cause that side of the fatality figures to er, explode, met with unqualified success. Apart from the few individuals who managed to get on-board aeroplanes with false passports or no passports at all. Such as the 12 year old boy in 2006 who managed to evade the heightened measures and boarded a plane at gatwick for lisbon, who was described by cnn in one of their less hysterical notorious moments as the “uk terror boy”; or the 11 year old boy who in 2012 managed to get on a manchester to italy flight, but by then this grievous feral terror plot was described in far less hysterical terms - and they were the first three search results which appeared from my query.
Incidents which no doubt happened decades before the billions were sequestrated or spent, it's just that we haven't realised it yet. On the other side, the manufacturers will claim just how fantastic and improved the security and designs of the new aeroplanes are, thus ensuring their ongoing improvements are suitably noticed by those signing the contracts on the one side of the fence. Which has nothing whatsoever to do with the necessity of prying through all your emails viewed as required reading by the spying brigade, occupying the other side of the fence.
Yet when you look at how full of holes and shoddy the security at most airports around the world are, it's more a question of how come the terrorists have failed to pull of more spectaculars than the relative few they have actually achieved?
In comparison train travel is relatively easy on the experience, the eye and body – if we ignore the tragic instance of the spanish crash on the 26th July 2013. The few occasions i've journeyed on the eurostar for example have been relatively quick, easy on the stress levels, but even more importantly (as i discovered on my last journey) if you glower a bit, people tend avoiding talking to you, which is a boon; especially if the trite conversations i had the displeasure of overhearing going on around me were anything at all to go by.
To be somewhat serious, i have always loathed travelling by air which i put down to been an uncontrollable sweater - even when young. It's the heat of the airports combined with the stifling air, and nothing whatsoever to do with the six bloody mary's i'd have knocked back in less than 30 minutes, just to steady and calm my nerves whilst stopping images from those bloody airplane disaster movies, let alone the disaster of the day from normal news, from crowding out anything else. The travel to and from the airport. The two plus waiting hours before take off, unless you're a diamond/platinum/uber-gold frequent flyer. The circling, the holding patterns, the person in front deciding to tilt their seat back when you're trying to eat the nutrition-less cardboard passing for regurgitated puke (someone had the temerity to call food), whilst juggling with a cup of burning coffee. The air-sickness, the drunk, and the person behind you who believes they're setting a new guinness book of records' - as the passenger annoyingly pressing the attendance bell (do they still call them that) more times than any other passenger, ever.
And sadly, I haven't even reached paris yet!
To be continued, before the month's out!
Refs:
On this occasion i was invited by a friend whom i hadn't seen in years. And with the fine people at eurostar offering fantastic return deals at £59, it seemed churlish not to grasp the opportunity – if just to get away from the silly madness flying under the bloody tourettes purported big society banner – a headless environment where people run around wishing that their headlessness is firmly kept away from the glare of exposure, but it certainly sounds chummily nice.
Being a crabby traveller i find airports, and the so called "stassi" security measures they contain for our benefit, nothing less than a sad sop. If they were serious about security each person would be stripped down to their nothings and forced to wear some kind of disposable (but recyclable) garment. The passenger would then, naturally, be reunited with all their
Indeed why not ban hand-luggage from the cabin altogether and dump everyone’s crap in the hold? A dreadful chore i know; but, just imagine not having to worry about that strange foreign-looking person sitting two rows down, who's just started to sweat uncontrollably!
No, travelling for me and I suspect for many of you too, involves far more hours wasted that could be spent contentedly tucked happily away in bed. Failing that, checking over the luggage for the umpteenth time before been quietly confident pants hadn't been forgotten. Even spending more time at the destination - despite the final nights bout of food poisoning, all before making that fateful return trip back in a nice new maglev carriage or popping on a pad and been beamed away.
When it comes to security, it always makes me ponder on the considerable number of passenger journeys taking place around the globe day by day, year upon year, who meet with a fate no worse than a greyhound discovering that the tasty morsel its chasing after to devour and fill its half starving stomach, is nothing more significant than insubstantial fluff. Yet there's more fear surrounding the act of flying than any other type of activity - bar sticking your head in a nuclear reactor, or playing russian roulette with a meth'd out crack head. Even dying by bungee jumping nowadays makes you into a sports martyr and garners you the respect you failed to garner whilst been alive.
Looking through the league tables of probability, you have less chance of dying from a bizarre kind of plane malfunction: whether caused by material fatigue, or some successful pants bomber managing to actually do the plane in (at roughly 0.000.014%), than you have of dying in the uk in a car accident which trots in somewhere around the region of 0.013%. Even the chance of been struck by lightning somewhere on the globe pops in at a measly 0.000.34%, which means you have a far greater chance of dying horribly from having your number called by a lightning bolt from the ledger in the sky, coming to you in the form of a plane incident.
But, put another way, more people die from falling birds, choking on a peanut or been hit in the head by a golf ball than dying sitting in seat 17A of an aeroplane. Sadly, before you get too carried away, there's more chance of you dying in a plane incident than chance of you winning the euromillions lottery jackpot, which is stuck way down the league of improbables at 0.000.000.86%.
Don't get me wrong, we're all (with 100% certainty) going to kick the bucket, pop our clogs, give back our birthday suits, feed the worms, be dust in the clouds... the only random variable is simply that of timing.
Of course security hawks will tell you that the amount of money spent on making us queue like sheep in a pen, or protestors been kettled has all been worth it, which in 2011 apparently reached the grand sum of $19.1bn and could top $45.13bn by 2018, according to security director news from research conducted by frost & sullivans 'global airport security market assessment' report.
Imagine that, $19.1bn in one year poured in to help ensure the safety of passengers and the security of flights. So it's good that all the money terminally spent stuffing all the security holes and hence the tide of terrorist menaces, that would otherwise cause that side of the fatality figures to er, explode, met with unqualified success. Apart from the few individuals who managed to get on-board aeroplanes with false passports or no passports at all. Such as the 12 year old boy in 2006 who managed to evade the heightened measures and boarded a plane at gatwick for lisbon, who was described by cnn in one of their less hysterical notorious moments as the “uk terror boy”; or the 11 year old boy who in 2012 managed to get on a manchester to italy flight, but by then this grievous feral terror plot was described in far less hysterical terms - and they were the first three search results which appeared from my query.
Incidents which no doubt happened decades before the billions were sequestrated or spent, it's just that we haven't realised it yet. On the other side, the manufacturers will claim just how fantastic and improved the security and designs of the new aeroplanes are, thus ensuring their ongoing improvements are suitably noticed by those signing the contracts on the one side of the fence. Which has nothing whatsoever to do with the necessity of prying through all your emails viewed as required reading by the spying brigade, occupying the other side of the fence.
Yet when you look at how full of holes and shoddy the security at most airports around the world are, it's more a question of how come the terrorists have failed to pull of more spectaculars than the relative few they have actually achieved?
In comparison train travel is relatively easy on the experience, the eye and body – if we ignore the tragic instance of the spanish crash on the 26th July 2013. The few occasions i've journeyed on the eurostar for example have been relatively quick, easy on the stress levels, but even more importantly (as i discovered on my last journey) if you glower a bit, people tend avoiding talking to you, which is a boon; especially if the trite conversations i had the displeasure of overhearing going on around me were anything at all to go by.
To be somewhat serious, i have always loathed travelling by air which i put down to been an uncontrollable sweater - even when young. It's the heat of the airports combined with the stifling air, and nothing whatsoever to do with the six bloody mary's i'd have knocked back in less than 30 minutes, just to steady and calm my nerves whilst stopping images from those bloody airplane disaster movies, let alone the disaster of the day from normal news, from crowding out anything else. The travel to and from the airport. The two plus waiting hours before take off, unless you're a diamond/platinum/uber-gold frequent flyer. The circling, the holding patterns, the person in front deciding to tilt their seat back when you're trying to eat the nutrition-less cardboard passing for regurgitated puke (someone had the temerity to call food), whilst juggling with a cup of burning coffee. The air-sickness, the drunk, and the person behind you who believes they're setting a new guinness book of records' - as the passenger annoyingly pressing the attendance bell (do they still call them that) more times than any other passenger, ever.
And sadly, I haven't even reached paris yet!
To be continued, before the month's out!
Refs:
Saturday, 27 July 2013
Who'd have thought!
I'm amazed how many people manage to find their way to this little rancid backwater of the interweebs, so i offer a curmudgeonly acknowledgement, whilst briefly wondering what you do for a living, as you you really must have nothing else better to do with your life than browse the web 24 hours a day!
For a while now, i've been succumbing to a maelstrom of inward angst causing me to mentally cook up new methods of despatching neighbours - after enduring 10 weeks (so far) of refurbishment: drilling, tiling, hammering; you would too, or be holidaying away somewhere nice and cool to regain some element of composure if your every waking moment was subject to 100+dB noise. Did i just say neighbours? I meant neighbours, shoppers and generally everyone i have the disagreeable misfortune of bumping into.
But even all of that combined with the thoughts of a further eight weeks of the same (this time on the other side) to take place, failed to prick my bubble of miserableness, nor locomate my fingers to swifkey all on their own.
However, somewhere amongst the mossy corners, disturbing thoughts and images caused me to increasingly twitch and cry out; screaming awake in the dead of day with sweat pouring from my orifices and the duvet not attempting to strangling me... Murray wins wimbledon... bah! England win at rugby... bah! The 2012 london olympics finally pays for itself and is making a profit?... bah! New royal baby?... bah!
What is this country coming to? It's starting to become covered in a smug over-weaning milieu of joy.
Mark my words, it'll all end in tears; and it will be tears the size of footballs smashing the glass-houses of happiness and jollity to smithereens!
For a while now, i've been succumbing to a maelstrom of inward angst causing me to mentally cook up new methods of despatching neighbours - after enduring 10 weeks (so far) of refurbishment: drilling, tiling, hammering; you would too, or be holidaying away somewhere nice and cool to regain some element of composure if your every waking moment was subject to 100+dB noise. Did i just say neighbours? I meant neighbours, shoppers and generally everyone i have the disagreeable misfortune of bumping into.
But even all of that combined with the thoughts of a further eight weeks of the same (this time on the other side) to take place, failed to prick my bubble of miserableness, nor locomate my fingers to swifkey all on their own.
However, somewhere amongst the mossy corners, disturbing thoughts and images caused me to increasingly twitch and cry out; screaming awake in the dead of day with sweat pouring from my orifices and the duvet not attempting to strangling me... Murray wins wimbledon... bah! England win at rugby... bah! The 2012 london olympics finally pays for itself and is making a profit?... bah! New royal baby?... bah!
What is this country coming to? It's starting to become covered in a smug over-weaning milieu of joy.
Mark my words, it'll all end in tears; and it will be tears the size of footballs smashing the glass-houses of happiness and jollity to smithereens!
Friday, 3 May 2013
Racist pepsco?
Not that i drink the foul brown stuff produced by this or the other companies. Well not unless i've just been cola-borded - and even that comment's sloshing with bad taste.
Hopefully, you can see from the video, just see how insidiously stereotypically rude the clip is/was and the justifiable reasoning for them removing it from their site - hence this educational use of it, and an acknowledgement (not that they need it) to the extra free advertising they've garnered from it.
Hopefully, you can see from the video, just see how insidiously stereotypically rude the clip is/was and the justifiable reasoning for them removing it from their site - hence this educational use of it, and an acknowledgement (not that they need it) to the extra free advertising they've garnered from it.
Sunday, 7 April 2013
A wee break
There's nothing quite so wonderful as having a wee break from the ongoing need to pop out a stray thought. To forgo the need to eviscerate boils of angst over the unceasing problems our species creates for itself - regardless of the amount of data available at our fingertips. Momentarily ignore the monthly record-breaking weather changes and simply sit down, shrug your shoulders, unwind, and relax.
To whit, i'm in a happy (yes you heard me) holding pattern. It won't last for ever, nothing ever does, but for the past few months i've been oddly content with a meh taking the place of frothing righteousness.
To whit, i'm in a happy (yes you heard me) holding pattern. It won't last for ever, nothing ever does, but for the past few months i've been oddly content with a meh taking the place of frothing righteousness.
Saturday, 22 December 2012
Podocalypse
Well it seems we're all still here -or lots of us still are anyway. Those who said the mayans prophesied our doom and gloom shouldn't however feel disheartened, despite the doomsday counter failing to eke its way past zero on this instance, the 188th doomsday date predicts the return of jesus somewhere between 2018-2028. Should the 188th not pan out the 189th will be taking place somewhere between 2020-2037 and on a friendly street near you.
In the meantime, and back to 2012, wouldn't it be wonderful if on December 31st in whichever time zone hits midnight, everyone (or as many as felt keen) danced gangnam style in a show of peace harmony and happiness. Now that would be something to take into the new year on a brazier of hope.
p.s: Yes it is me talking... No, i haven't been ganked by a pod person!
p.p.s: In case i don't manage to splurge another few tappings out before the end of this year, wishing everyone a wonderful season festivities and superb 2013.
In the meantime, and back to 2012, wouldn't it be wonderful if on December 31st in whichever time zone hits midnight, everyone (or as many as felt keen) danced gangnam style in a show of peace harmony and happiness. Now that would be something to take into the new year on a brazier of hope.
p.s: Yes it is me talking... No, i haven't been ganked by a pod person!
p.p.s: In case i don't manage to splurge another few tappings out before the end of this year, wishing everyone a wonderful season festivities and superb 2013.
Friday, 7 December 2012
Not another friday
If you listen too much to the news, or anything else that passes for entertainment, you'll have realised parallelism is nearly complete. If that made no sense at all, it's just another moment of taking the higher plane, keeping minds from wandering down dark alleys. And the problem with dark alleys? They're just too damned dark.
So as yet another friday whizzes by -which come around faster than conservatives having another daft idea- this weeks wee track, which had my feet tapping happily (cough, splutter choke) along, is fly away by dreamz, on the ever dependable jamendo.
So as yet another friday whizzes by -which come around faster than conservatives having another daft idea- this weeks wee track, which had my feet tapping happily (cough, splutter choke) along, is fly away by dreamz, on the ever dependable jamendo.
Saturday, 1 December 2012
Friday, 30 November 2012
Don't want your president
Could be a track played in many parts of the world where leaders are more tin-pot that presidential, and more interested in lining their cushy behinds than the futures of their citizens.
But the following is batman off by kämmerer from the album rooftop considerations. Another friday nod to a coming weekend of carefree simple nothingness. many of us have forgotten to include in our lives.
But the following is batman off by kämmerer from the album rooftop considerations. Another friday nod to a coming weekend of carefree simple nothingness. many of us have forgotten to include in our lives.
Monday, 26 November 2012
Ding dong, merrily oh high, is it that time of year already.
Dammit yes it is, and shops have apparently decided that those with the memory of a fruit-bat might well forget that christmas could well be happening this year, and started to advertise from september.
It is with utter displeasure that with days flying swiftly by until the festive season of "you call this a present! I hate you," departs, and the increase in a&e admissions fall back to normal levels; the following should be on everyone shopping list.
It is with utter displeasure that with days flying swiftly by until the festive season of "you call this a present! I hate you," departs, and the increase in a&e admissions fall back to normal levels; the following should be on everyone shopping list.
"Crack Alley brings you the latest in it's happy handbag retno electronic dentist gansta-rap classic-house mixp3 mash-up's. Taking you screaming back to the 80's and flushing you out of the teenies -in a rapidly retreating ambulance- guaranteed by track 3, or your money-back!
Cost? Get this once in a lifetime offer. Only £2,499 bn payable in six easy instalments. And once we receive your first instalment you'll receive, as if by magic and return post, your first two discs of 100,000 discs containing over 500 ZB of ultra precision and honed aural delights.
Don't have a crapray? Don't worry, just buy the discs anyway and wonder what you're missing; until that is, you've hacked enough accounts to afford that ultra gorgeous 6D time-wave sound sytsem that will make your ears bleed now, but more importantly make them bleed from before you were born.
Crapray music system. You'll never see another offer in the same way ever again."
Friday, 23 November 2012
A moisture of... happiness?
After finishing eating another piece of toughened leather, this time over the usa elections, i was at least satisfyingly mesmerised by the middle east appearing to be on track for imminenet conflagration; combining stupidity, asininity and any other inity that crops appropriately crops along. Imagine if wwi or wwii were still simmering along in one form or another, depressing decade after mind-smacking decade. Believe the term, get a grip might be appropriate, along with compromi- hold on just need to bang on the ceiling, damned neighbours!
However a track on jamendo caught my ear as i was looking for, inspiration...
dj goblin's creature mythique mix was circulating round my repeat button for at least an hour. Oh the price of an addict.
Be good to get back to the miserable country.
However a track on jamendo caught my ear as i was looking for, inspiration...
dj goblin's creature mythique mix was circulating round my repeat button for at least an hour. Oh the price of an addict.
Be good to get back to the miserable country.
Thursday, 22 November 2012
Sometimes, you just need to... share
Sometimes, you just need to wonder at the direction, with eyes wide-open, and share.
Sunday, 4 November 2012
Something useful?
"Hm, write something useful," a friend suggested the other day, "that people can dig their teeth into."
"Useful? Isn't that diametrically opposed to reflective pedantry? And surely the odd sarcastic observations must have a mote of usefulness about them?" I rejoined.
"Only so far, and you haven't quite hit the knack of enlisting your audience without alienating them first; or having them fall asleep mid-sentence. You have a tendency to wander in your, er, prose."
Well at least the pause was considerate.
"Useful..." I started. Feeling the strain build up in the nether regions of hardly used cells I soon turned, eager to splurge. "How about writing something on building your own portable pen-sized cutting laser? Or, a thousand and one ways to boil your neighbours? Bear traps for neighbours from hell and their screaming kids? The besieged hermits diy handbook of tried and tested projectile missile construction?" My pathetic gleeful smile said it all, as I slowly found myself ecstatically warming to the many-faceted possibilities that such an expansive topic would offer, especially in the way of hours and hours of happy rewinds. My friend slowly shook her head in disappointment before continuing to munch on a honey-dipped cinnamon-sprinkled lovingly chopped (personally by the head chef) celery stalk.
I wanted to tell her where i'd seen the staff's rabbits doing their organics; but somehow at that moment, it just didn't feel like the right thing to do.
"Useful? Isn't that diametrically opposed to reflective pedantry? And surely the odd sarcastic observations must have a mote of usefulness about them?" I rejoined.
"Only so far, and you haven't quite hit the knack of enlisting your audience without alienating them first; or having them fall asleep mid-sentence. You have a tendency to wander in your, er, prose."
Well at least the pause was considerate.
"Useful..." I started. Feeling the strain build up in the nether regions of hardly used cells I soon turned, eager to splurge. "How about writing something on building your own portable pen-sized cutting laser? Or, a thousand and one ways to boil your neighbours? Bear traps for neighbours from hell and their screaming kids? The besieged hermits diy handbook of tried and tested projectile missile construction?" My pathetic gleeful smile said it all, as I slowly found myself ecstatically warming to the many-faceted possibilities that such an expansive topic would offer, especially in the way of hours and hours of happy rewinds. My friend slowly shook her head in disappointment before continuing to munch on a honey-dipped cinnamon-sprinkled lovingly chopped (personally by the head chef) celery stalk.
I wanted to tell her where i'd seen the staff's rabbits doing their organics; but somehow at that moment, it just didn't feel like the right thing to do.
Wednesday, 31 October 2012
Count the seconds before...
Yet another record breaking weather event (sandy), and ultra-fundamentalist regurgitation on that event (i.e. a certain john mcternan - who i'm sure when out of his fundamentalist snake-breathing persona, is a wonderful caring human being, and physical helper to the poor and dispossessed), please take a peek at rapturing ennui (previous post) somewhere around the middle and starting with:
"Which makes the pic ‘n mix nature of the current crop of theocratic firebrands just that little bit perverse..."However, my thoughts and solace to those who have lost their lives and to their families and loved ones, from this disaster. And as for those nasty, twisted, venomous snakes? Why is there never a good mongoose around, just when you could really do with one!?
Saturday, 20 October 2012
Rapturing ennui
I
was suffering from bouts of repetitive strain ennui, as rounds of happy
chatter collided with layers of guff, utter drivel, and a misplaced
tourniquet which seriously interfered with my normal mode of
ill-concealed yet charitable peevishness.
It’s been a while.
After spending the last few weeks (following the end of the olympics & paralympics) chomping down on one of my more tastier shoes -with the aid of a nice freshly-crushed black peppercorn sauce and a pair of sturdy utensils- i finally emerged from my self-imposed bubble of exile dazed by the absence of any flurry of news (led by a phalanx of chin-waggers) attacking transport for london’s massive and all too predictable cock-up. Startled, as the expected descent into barbarous levels of road-rage -by hordes of maddened ring-sick drivers- failed to materialise, and aghast that city-wide chaos -not seen since the great fire of london (or if we’re really pushing the boat of tenuous links out and over the waterfall) not seen since london’s burning 2011 -had been miraculously and even more amazingly, averted. I was shocked, deeply!
By itself, the above would have been more than enough to see me physically retching, as though I was a natural semi-comatose drunk with a proclivity towards sea-sickness, and trying to make a living (of sorts) onboard the marie celeste -each day wishing it would all simply end. But there was more. I found, and i’m not (well, only partially) ashamed to admit it, that I actually enjoyed bits of the olympics! It really doesn’t matter that my enjoyment of the celebrations manifested itself during the opening and closing ceremonies, the fact remains that i still enjoyed them, and all those who watched will never quite forget the sight of three letters effervescently emblazoned on retinas across the globe (before the current crop holding the mace have finished handing it over to their pals) for many a year.
My “tosh” calibration system, on the other hand, was so revolted by such foul a deed of treachery, it fell into a brief bout of dysfunctional catatonic insensibility, before retaliating with a one-two sucker staccato-punch followed by a barrage of mis-firing signals -causing the impairment of my convolution of broca. Either that, or i really should pay serious attention to the transient ischaemic attacks glacially working their way through the various sections of my splodgy matter.
That period of happiness reached an abrupt (albeit brief) end, by the never-failing charms of the nfh: whose activities and presence generally ensures neither peace nor calm. Except even they were less bangingly slamming and stampingly annoying! The noisy courtyard was like a graveyard, due in part to this years watery deluge, which also ensured the communal playground/park/beach (aka supposedly garden oasis) was lusciously green, burgeoning and for the time of year generally a joy to observe; a situation that lasted most of the summer and kept the “we’re-by-the-sea, we don’t see any neighbours?” brigade, more absent than usual. Buses, it has to be said, were 50/50 but not quite as annoying, despite being ever polluting and taking delight in 80+ decibel engine revving at five-thirty in the morning -due to the weather not being cold enough.
At least the stuff which helps keep my tiller of misfortune happily on-course and my blood pressure ragingly coursing, was eagerly regenerating dendrites by the bucket load, under the strain of continuously working out exactly how many sams or directed energy weapons (aka lasers), moats or 200 feet robots (with a bit more work) would be required to instill a blanket of dessicated fig-leaf peace, forecfully onto the surrounding area. All however was not lost, as chaos was partially salvaged by the noisy motorcyclists and boy racers, who mistakenly believe they’re part of a formula 1 racing team, or hunkering over a deranged belief they’re soon ready to participate in the rerun of the glory days of donnington -which is the same as me thinking i’ll ever amount to bottom feeder of a hack! Despite all of that, it just wasn’t enough.
In an attempt to regain those lost clouds of sodden doom and foreboding, I had to cast my eyes further abreast, and away from the stadiums of sport and enjoyment; where in mere moments there was so much information coursing past my eyeballs comprising: pure insanity, greed, stupidity and all-out bad egginess, i was happily chugging my sides whilst feeling streams of hot tears cascading down my burning cheeks.
My first port of call found me listening to coverage of the preparations for the november elections in the usa. Early voting had already started in this upcoming presidential one-to-one ding-dong; and in round one, to everyone’s surprise, romney won by a landslide; but this piece has taken so long to pop up, the second ding-dong’s already taken place, where the majority reasoning has presidential hopeful romney, losing the second round by a sliver -in an event more in keeping with the 'ya boo sucks to you' ding-dong of some uk parliamentary debates. Some might say he won by the utterances of partial truths, others would say they were mendacious outright lies. But hey, who cares! By time the voting electorate get around to properly focusing on the fact we’re having the hood winked over us, some other calamity will have come along to blow our focus of consciousness off-stream and onto matters far more pleasurable - krispy kremes brings out a brand new doughnut - first fifty million, free!
But with less than three weeks to go, despite most of the world really not caring about the race or which lobbyist-centered mascot controls the house, this could follow the last presidential turning point in history and be another turning point of history (yes i know, history’s full of points and turns) but with the senate currently controlled by the republicans, those outside of the usa’s shores (veering left of vlad the impaler) have watched and been aghast at how a group of people would so cavalierly allow so many others to remain trodden in the abyss of abject poverty, without a smidgen of a mote of compassion - home run for big business lobbyists -you've earned your bonus. In the actual states, and especially those with majority republican control, there’s been a hearty circling of the wagons and the donning of metaphorical beards, making sure the sack-cloths and ashes have been sufficiently rubbed and doused before been thrown over workers rights and set on fire: you know, those pesky little regulations which are there to make sure the vast majority of workers can at least earn some sort of wage, and they aren’t flogged ‘till they drop, or even (heavens forbid) that they receive a soupcon of a living wage, or their ability to strike should working conditions be so onerous and potentially dangerous as their employer's such a sociopath they need to take some kind of action are being serially removed, stamped on and scorched, leaving the faint whiff of cinders fluttering away in a gale of nothingness. And cinders in a prairie, gasping for rain, just doesn’t end up pretty.
Yes the past couple of years should have being a frightening wake up call to those who wish to see humanity amongst the stars (i know we’re already whizzing amongst stars, talking more about off-planet colonies carefully husbanding newly terraformed worlds) as to the scale of the pendulums swing-back currently taking place in many states of the usa, which is being eagerly watched for handy pointers by others of a similar disposition around many parts of the globe.
Of course those inhabiting the right of centre are simply giving voice to a highly vocal portion of their electorate who'd be happy building a wall between them and mexico, but they’d be even happier deporting anyone walking around with a tan darker than 2 days. And if they’re really lucky, they’d get to stand on the side of the quay, giving the newly departed a cheery wave-off proffering a thimbleful-full of glee.
There are glimmers that those (the none wackadoo, barmy, fluttering around their own treetops wing) who don’t share the ultra-rights point of views are waking up to the potential of having a brand of theocracy installed via the backdoor into the white-house. Think a paler version of iranian theocracy, but unlike iran they’d have thousands of wmds at their disposal and who knows, a nuke or two might all of a sudden meet with a horribly shocking accident heralding a need for marshall law with jobs jobs jobs as long as you sign your vagina to the state.
Naturally that leads me to the role of religion, and with so many venomous snakes in that particular briar patch, i’m not sure about you, but it does give me pause to wonder whether they’re looking into a mirror when they proclaim that vast swathes of the globe are spawns of satan’s seed, that will burn in hell on judgement day where they i.e., you, obviously belong! Or they’ve simply had their very own overwhelming bouts of ischemic attacks and simply failed to obtain a proper diagnosis.
Ahem.
Hopefully there are hundreds of thousands if not millions of other similar-minded souls around the world, who have a curious inability to view this ever-watching overlord and ever-at the ready but evil adversary, as anything other than the hopes fears and needs of a growing species, and subjected put-upon peoples; hapless and helpless before the swings and arrows of outrageous fortune, aiming to make sense of a spinning world of mud, making coincidences more meaningful than the stray wobbles of whizzing stuff, gathering with other stuff to create something, which is just so much stuff, that they more than likely, probably are. If, however, people feel the need to follow in the footsteps of some of the beings who apparently occupy the better part of humanity’s spectrum then i hope those people are wandering around in cheap clothing, sleeping with prostitutes and wiping their feet, and giving waifs, strays and members of the said oldest profession the odd bit of food they’ve taken from their very own prepared plates. And if they want to publicly profess their beliefs in, lets say the water-walker, then they should happily allow others who also wish to publicly profess such attachments allow them to stick a spear (or three) into them, just as a basic start.
Somehow i doubt we’d see the water-walker having the pick of 12 cars (worth millions) to drive around in, nor foxed to chose which mansion to luxuriously cavort around in, nor would we probably see him sporting the shiniest dapperest suits with this weeks favourite bit of fluffing-totty in tow, lofting it huge in a mighty cathedral that says more about how much money you’ve creamed than about good works or deeds. No, i don’t think we would see that at all; but then if he did carry on in todays world as he did then, he’d soon be locked up for his own good, certified, and drugged to the eyeballs. “All that crazy nonsense of turning water to wine. Pfft. And don’t forget to throw away the key!”
Which makes the pic ‘n mix nature of the current crop of theocratic firebrands just that little bit perverse, as over the past few decades it appears something’s been lost in translation and they’ve forgotten whole swathes of sins or conveniently re-weighted them, so now if you listen to most of the firebrands, the things that will bring about the end of everything, is either abortion or the gays; leading us all to our doom but don’t forget, keep on giving.
Fundamentalists of the christian world (either ignorant or utterly uncaring of their own pure brand of religious sociopathy) are once more jumping on their twin hobby horses of homophobia and abortion. Blaming the former for every natural disaster going, and denigrating or killing anyone else who disagrees with them on the latter.
Of course the previous paragraphs could be considered naught but a dreadful stereotype, but despite the increase in information, data, and means of accessing, we collectively appear to throw our hands in the air and say “it’s all too much”, allowing ourselves to be herded by whichever explosive flare is set off just in-front of our eyeballs.
If we suspend our disbelief (pretend you’re watching cameron’s avatar in a fully immersive holographic cinema) and you consider that the omnipresent entity made everything you see or haven’t seen (by the way, have you seen the wonderful spectacular images coming from the telescopes in space?), why would a being who created all of that, then devote the next x amount of years pulling his/her/its hair out and getting steamingly broiled, because some hut/stone/bronze/nuclear-age ignorants are incapable of obeying orders or doing the right thing? I suppose in size terms (although it’s difficult to measure the universe we do know let alone the bits of the universe we haven’t yet observed) it might be akin to a star the size of the observable universe knowing and caring about the plight of a grain of sand stuck somewhere in your nether regions after a particularly vigorous swim.
But someone please remind me why one religion is any more valid than another? Why is islam more valid than christianity, or judaism, or buddhism, or hinduism, or zeusism, aphroditism, or the heady bank of mammonesque greed - which appears to have gained in popularity with the increasing value of nothing? In the scheme of things, or the age of the planet, we homosapiens have the life span of fruit-flies and with historic loops ever repeating, memories just as long.
A few hundred years ago, the inquisition brought a chill to the european lands, unless you happened to be on the side doing the decrying and popping a burning faggot onto dry kindling. Other such niceties, such as disembowelling, dunking, and flaying alive were the prescribed order of the day, to help you recant the error of your ways and help you understand what it was you needed to understand -for the benefit you understand of your immortal soul and society. Today, that role seems to be played by the fundamentalists of the islamic world: be-headings, bombings, chopping off of a hand here and killing anyone they can get their hands if you don’t live in a way and manner that they deem strict enough or fit; and, as fundamentalists in america use the law (through the dereliction of so many non-voters) to bring women’s rights over their own bodies screaming towards a point extremists elsewhere would nod approvingly at, we can truly see just how detached those men (as it seems the overwhelming majority -from footage anyway- parroting such views are indeed men) in realising just how increasingly insignificant their ways are for the progress of the species.
If at any stage you believed in shreds of human good and decency, then assuage those silly notions by pouring a cauldron of burning bubbling pitch all over them; and don’t for one minute doubt, that if a group of truly crazed fundamentalists (of whatever creed or hue) managed to procure fissile material, they wouldn’t use it the instant they fully knew how (give or take a month or two), whilst smiling sunbeams from vidscreens as the world goes up in flames, a blue marble transfigured into a radioactive glassy hell hole, all the while singing “we’ve achieved the rapture!”
It’s been a while.
After spending the last few weeks (following the end of the olympics & paralympics) chomping down on one of my more tastier shoes -with the aid of a nice freshly-crushed black peppercorn sauce and a pair of sturdy utensils- i finally emerged from my self-imposed bubble of exile dazed by the absence of any flurry of news (led by a phalanx of chin-waggers) attacking transport for london’s massive and all too predictable cock-up. Startled, as the expected descent into barbarous levels of road-rage -by hordes of maddened ring-sick drivers- failed to materialise, and aghast that city-wide chaos -not seen since the great fire of london (or if we’re really pushing the boat of tenuous links out and over the waterfall) not seen since london’s burning 2011 -had been miraculously and even more amazingly, averted. I was shocked, deeply!
By itself, the above would have been more than enough to see me physically retching, as though I was a natural semi-comatose drunk with a proclivity towards sea-sickness, and trying to make a living (of sorts) onboard the marie celeste -each day wishing it would all simply end. But there was more. I found, and i’m not (well, only partially) ashamed to admit it, that I actually enjoyed bits of the olympics! It really doesn’t matter that my enjoyment of the celebrations manifested itself during the opening and closing ceremonies, the fact remains that i still enjoyed them, and all those who watched will never quite forget the sight of three letters effervescently emblazoned on retinas across the globe (before the current crop holding the mace have finished handing it over to their pals) for many a year.
My “tosh” calibration system, on the other hand, was so revolted by such foul a deed of treachery, it fell into a brief bout of dysfunctional catatonic insensibility, before retaliating with a one-two sucker staccato-punch followed by a barrage of mis-firing signals -causing the impairment of my convolution of broca. Either that, or i really should pay serious attention to the transient ischaemic attacks glacially working their way through the various sections of my splodgy matter.
That period of happiness reached an abrupt (albeit brief) end, by the never-failing charms of the nfh: whose activities and presence generally ensures neither peace nor calm. Except even they were less bangingly slamming and stampingly annoying! The noisy courtyard was like a graveyard, due in part to this years watery deluge, which also ensured the communal playground/park/beach (aka supposedly garden oasis) was lusciously green, burgeoning and for the time of year generally a joy to observe; a situation that lasted most of the summer and kept the “we’re-by-the-sea, we don’t see any neighbours?” brigade, more absent than usual. Buses, it has to be said, were 50/50 but not quite as annoying, despite being ever polluting and taking delight in 80+ decibel engine revving at five-thirty in the morning -due to the weather not being cold enough.
At least the stuff which helps keep my tiller of misfortune happily on-course and my blood pressure ragingly coursing, was eagerly regenerating dendrites by the bucket load, under the strain of continuously working out exactly how many sams or directed energy weapons (aka lasers), moats or 200 feet robots (with a bit more work) would be required to instill a blanket of dessicated fig-leaf peace, forecfully onto the surrounding area. All however was not lost, as chaos was partially salvaged by the noisy motorcyclists and boy racers, who mistakenly believe they’re part of a formula 1 racing team, or hunkering over a deranged belief they’re soon ready to participate in the rerun of the glory days of donnington -which is the same as me thinking i’ll ever amount to bottom feeder of a hack! Despite all of that, it just wasn’t enough.
In an attempt to regain those lost clouds of sodden doom and foreboding, I had to cast my eyes further abreast, and away from the stadiums of sport and enjoyment; where in mere moments there was so much information coursing past my eyeballs comprising: pure insanity, greed, stupidity and all-out bad egginess, i was happily chugging my sides whilst feeling streams of hot tears cascading down my burning cheeks.
My first port of call found me listening to coverage of the preparations for the november elections in the usa. Early voting had already started in this upcoming presidential one-to-one ding-dong; and in round one, to everyone’s surprise, romney won by a landslide; but this piece has taken so long to pop up, the second ding-dong’s already taken place, where the majority reasoning has presidential hopeful romney, losing the second round by a sliver -in an event more in keeping with the 'ya boo sucks to you' ding-dong of some uk parliamentary debates. Some might say he won by the utterances of partial truths, others would say they were mendacious outright lies. But hey, who cares! By time the voting electorate get around to properly focusing on the fact we’re having the hood winked over us, some other calamity will have come along to blow our focus of consciousness off-stream and onto matters far more pleasurable - krispy kremes brings out a brand new doughnut - first fifty million, free!
But with less than three weeks to go, despite most of the world really not caring about the race or which lobbyist-centered mascot controls the house, this could follow the last presidential turning point in history and be another turning point of history (yes i know, history’s full of points and turns) but with the senate currently controlled by the republicans, those outside of the usa’s shores (veering left of vlad the impaler) have watched and been aghast at how a group of people would so cavalierly allow so many others to remain trodden in the abyss of abject poverty, without a smidgen of a mote of compassion - home run for big business lobbyists -you've earned your bonus. In the actual states, and especially those with majority republican control, there’s been a hearty circling of the wagons and the donning of metaphorical beards, making sure the sack-cloths and ashes have been sufficiently rubbed and doused before been thrown over workers rights and set on fire: you know, those pesky little regulations which are there to make sure the vast majority of workers can at least earn some sort of wage, and they aren’t flogged ‘till they drop, or even (heavens forbid) that they receive a soupcon of a living wage, or their ability to strike should working conditions be so onerous and potentially dangerous as their employer's such a sociopath they need to take some kind of action are being serially removed, stamped on and scorched, leaving the faint whiff of cinders fluttering away in a gale of nothingness. And cinders in a prairie, gasping for rain, just doesn’t end up pretty.
Yes the past couple of years should have being a frightening wake up call to those who wish to see humanity amongst the stars (i know we’re already whizzing amongst stars, talking more about off-planet colonies carefully husbanding newly terraformed worlds) as to the scale of the pendulums swing-back currently taking place in many states of the usa, which is being eagerly watched for handy pointers by others of a similar disposition around many parts of the globe.
Of course those inhabiting the right of centre are simply giving voice to a highly vocal portion of their electorate who'd be happy building a wall between them and mexico, but they’d be even happier deporting anyone walking around with a tan darker than 2 days. And if they’re really lucky, they’d get to stand on the side of the quay, giving the newly departed a cheery wave-off proffering a thimbleful-full of glee.
There are glimmers that those (the none wackadoo, barmy, fluttering around their own treetops wing) who don’t share the ultra-rights point of views are waking up to the potential of having a brand of theocracy installed via the backdoor into the white-house. Think a paler version of iranian theocracy, but unlike iran they’d have thousands of wmds at their disposal and who knows, a nuke or two might all of a sudden meet with a horribly shocking accident heralding a need for marshall law with jobs jobs jobs as long as you sign your vagina to the state.
Naturally that leads me to the role of religion, and with so many venomous snakes in that particular briar patch, i’m not sure about you, but it does give me pause to wonder whether they’re looking into a mirror when they proclaim that vast swathes of the globe are spawns of satan’s seed, that will burn in hell on judgement day where they i.e., you, obviously belong! Or they’ve simply had their very own overwhelming bouts of ischemic attacks and simply failed to obtain a proper diagnosis.
Ahem.
Hopefully there are hundreds of thousands if not millions of other similar-minded souls around the world, who have a curious inability to view this ever-watching overlord and ever-at the ready but evil adversary, as anything other than the hopes fears and needs of a growing species, and subjected put-upon peoples; hapless and helpless before the swings and arrows of outrageous fortune, aiming to make sense of a spinning world of mud, making coincidences more meaningful than the stray wobbles of whizzing stuff, gathering with other stuff to create something, which is just so much stuff, that they more than likely, probably are. If, however, people feel the need to follow in the footsteps of some of the beings who apparently occupy the better part of humanity’s spectrum then i hope those people are wandering around in cheap clothing, sleeping with prostitutes and wiping their feet, and giving waifs, strays and members of the said oldest profession the odd bit of food they’ve taken from their very own prepared plates. And if they want to publicly profess their beliefs in, lets say the water-walker, then they should happily allow others who also wish to publicly profess such attachments allow them to stick a spear (or three) into them, just as a basic start.
Somehow i doubt we’d see the water-walker having the pick of 12 cars (worth millions) to drive around in, nor foxed to chose which mansion to luxuriously cavort around in, nor would we probably see him sporting the shiniest dapperest suits with this weeks favourite bit of fluffing-totty in tow, lofting it huge in a mighty cathedral that says more about how much money you’ve creamed than about good works or deeds. No, i don’t think we would see that at all; but then if he did carry on in todays world as he did then, he’d soon be locked up for his own good, certified, and drugged to the eyeballs. “All that crazy nonsense of turning water to wine. Pfft. And don’t forget to throw away the key!”
Which makes the pic ‘n mix nature of the current crop of theocratic firebrands just that little bit perverse, as over the past few decades it appears something’s been lost in translation and they’ve forgotten whole swathes of sins or conveniently re-weighted them, so now if you listen to most of the firebrands, the things that will bring about the end of everything, is either abortion or the gays; leading us all to our doom but don’t forget, keep on giving.
Fundamentalists of the christian world (either ignorant or utterly uncaring of their own pure brand of religious sociopathy) are once more jumping on their twin hobby horses of homophobia and abortion. Blaming the former for every natural disaster going, and denigrating or killing anyone else who disagrees with them on the latter.
Of course the previous paragraphs could be considered naught but a dreadful stereotype, but despite the increase in information, data, and means of accessing, we collectively appear to throw our hands in the air and say “it’s all too much”, allowing ourselves to be herded by whichever explosive flare is set off just in-front of our eyeballs.
If we suspend our disbelief (pretend you’re watching cameron’s avatar in a fully immersive holographic cinema) and you consider that the omnipresent entity made everything you see or haven’t seen (by the way, have you seen the wonderful spectacular images coming from the telescopes in space?), why would a being who created all of that, then devote the next x amount of years pulling his/her/its hair out and getting steamingly broiled, because some hut/stone/bronze/nuclear-age ignorants are incapable of obeying orders or doing the right thing? I suppose in size terms (although it’s difficult to measure the universe we do know let alone the bits of the universe we haven’t yet observed) it might be akin to a star the size of the observable universe knowing and caring about the plight of a grain of sand stuck somewhere in your nether regions after a particularly vigorous swim.
But someone please remind me why one religion is any more valid than another? Why is islam more valid than christianity, or judaism, or buddhism, or hinduism, or zeusism, aphroditism, or the heady bank of mammonesque greed - which appears to have gained in popularity with the increasing value of nothing? In the scheme of things, or the age of the planet, we homosapiens have the life span of fruit-flies and with historic loops ever repeating, memories just as long.
A few hundred years ago, the inquisition brought a chill to the european lands, unless you happened to be on the side doing the decrying and popping a burning faggot onto dry kindling. Other such niceties, such as disembowelling, dunking, and flaying alive were the prescribed order of the day, to help you recant the error of your ways and help you understand what it was you needed to understand -for the benefit you understand of your immortal soul and society. Today, that role seems to be played by the fundamentalists of the islamic world: be-headings, bombings, chopping off of a hand here and killing anyone they can get their hands if you don’t live in a way and manner that they deem strict enough or fit; and, as fundamentalists in america use the law (through the dereliction of so many non-voters) to bring women’s rights over their own bodies screaming towards a point extremists elsewhere would nod approvingly at, we can truly see just how detached those men (as it seems the overwhelming majority -from footage anyway- parroting such views are indeed men) in realising just how increasingly insignificant their ways are for the progress of the species.
If at any stage you believed in shreds of human good and decency, then assuage those silly notions by pouring a cauldron of burning bubbling pitch all over them; and don’t for one minute doubt, that if a group of truly crazed fundamentalists (of whatever creed or hue) managed to procure fissile material, they wouldn’t use it the instant they fully knew how (give or take a month or two), whilst smiling sunbeams from vidscreens as the world goes up in flames, a blue marble transfigured into a radioactive glassy hell hole, all the while singing “we’ve achieved the rapture!”
Wednesday, 3 October 2012
Taken out of it
One of the reasons i love the internet is simply down to being able to spend 24 hours submerged in quagmires of doom, gloom, and utter despondency.
Periodically my happy mood is broken by watching, reading or even listening to something which places a smile on my face. Needless to say i then need to rush to the bathroom and scrub, vigorously.
This particular track by david durante on reverbnation, where is the fun has placed such an offending smile on my phizog.
Periodically my happy mood is broken by watching, reading or even listening to something which places a smile on my face. Needless to say i then need to rush to the bathroom and scrub, vigorously.
This particular track by david durante on reverbnation, where is the fun has placed such an offending smile on my phizog.
Wednesday, 12 September 2012
A break in the interregnum
Oh it's been a while, swivelling and inhaling can really have that effect on you.
Perhaps what the world really needs are the barking religious christian fundamentalists and the mad deranged muslim fundamentalists, and th- actually, just all the mad fundy's everywhere, to get together on a large island and duke it out. Last man standing style.
Of course, in reality that wouldn't work. Any winner having dominance for 20 or so years would require them to agree to give up their position and begin the race all over again. As history (for the most part) disgorges, once mad fundies obtain pre-eminence the truly mad amongst them will gain dominance and do their uttermost to squash any divergence or dissent, whilst they themselves do whatever they wish in the quiet and privacy of their own locked room. Naturally, if such a religious tussle did occur, leaving one man standing, the world might well be a far less hellish place for the many billions caught in their webs of spun nonsense.
Now before someone gets all bent out shape, if you carefully re-read -just in-case you initially failed to notice- there's a bit in the 2nd bit which goes "... all the mad fundy's everywhere...", if you thought I had forgotten to include secular fundamentalists too.
Now, if you'll excuse me. It's time for me to continue fulminating... the olympics... local bus pollution... nfh... climate... quantum cyrptography... feral children (no, really)... the wonderful onrushing winter (for those of us in the northern hemisphere)... mitt romney president and the mayan end of the world prophecy?!
Perhaps what the world really needs are the barking religious christian fundamentalists and the mad deranged muslim fundamentalists, and th- actually, just all the mad fundy's everywhere, to get together on a large island and duke it out. Last man standing style.
Of course, in reality that wouldn't work. Any winner having dominance for 20 or so years would require them to agree to give up their position and begin the race all over again. As history (for the most part) disgorges, once mad fundies obtain pre-eminence the truly mad amongst them will gain dominance and do their uttermost to squash any divergence or dissent, whilst they themselves do whatever they wish in the quiet and privacy of their own locked room. Naturally, if such a religious tussle did occur, leaving one man standing, the world might well be a far less hellish place for the many billions caught in their webs of spun nonsense.
Now before someone gets all bent out shape, if you carefully re-read -just in-case you initially failed to notice- there's a bit in the 2nd bit which goes "... all the mad fundy's everywhere...", if you thought I had forgotten to include secular fundamentalists too.
Now, if you'll excuse me. It's time for me to continue fulminating... the olympics... local bus pollution... nfh... climate... quantum cyrptography... feral children (no, really)... the wonderful onrushing winter (for those of us in the northern hemisphere)... mitt romney president and the mayan end of the world prophecy?!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)