Right out of the gate, I want to say, "No."
No, I am not AGAINST THE CONCEPT of altering my brain chemistry.
I dunno how you could be, to be honest. Seems fuckin' stupid. I could understand not wanting to alter your own brain chemistry, fine. You don't wanna, that's fine. Really. But if I want to do it, and I'm not going to fuck with you, where's the problem? In fact, you can even leave.
Jul 24, 2007
Jul 20, 2007
This girl I fancy...
So there's this girl I fancy. I blame her for the poetry nobody wanted to see. Nobody saw it, but I digress.
They try to make me go to rehab, and I won't go, no, no.
I went to a show with her last night. Caroline Smith was the performer. Caroline Smith is not the girl I fancy. Caroline Smith has a myspace, and her music is pretty fucking good. I may just want to like it because this girl I fancy likes it. I'll probably never know. I'd have to read the lyrics.
Enough of this. Let's just say, there's this girl I fancy, and leave it at that. I went bowling with her tonight. I understand, I said I was going to leave it, and I am.
---
Matthew Culler had always been a mama's boy. From a very young age, he was sensitive and kind. Empathetic would be the word. A better, two-word phrase would be: Reluctantly Empathetic. To be truthful, he hated his disposition. Always knowing how the other guy feels isn't a great way to think about things.
Until the world beat it out of him, he was a crybaby. His mother told him it was "okay to cry." And it was, if you were a woman. In Nevar, reasons to cry were plentiful, even if you weren't accustomed to feeling everyone else's pain.
His mother died when he was thirteen. Crying was no longer an option. He had to make his own way.
In Nevar, young travelers were unheard of for two main reasons. Purebred human children themselves were rare. Four of every Five newborns was born with extra legs , giant heads, or the like. Muties, they called them. Mutie babies almost always kill the mother during birth.
The other reason amounted to one word with a complicated explanation: Beastmen.
Even when humans bred true, without mutie offspring killing the species over millennia, Beastmen were a constant threat. Beastmen just were. They live in the wilderness, and they hate humans. Beastmen raids were constant, and traveling between towns was dangerous.
Somehow, the young Matt survived for five years on the road. Drifting from town to town. He would hold up somewhere until the novelty of his story would wear thin on a town's patience. Then be gone before sunup. Nobody ever traveled at night, they didn't even think of it. Most Beastmen see best at night.
Matt learned to use a pistol at 14, from a man named Eddie, the self-appointed sheriff of a flyspeck town. Matt watched Eddie die less than a year after meeting him. Eddie once told Matt that anyone who wouldn't die screaming doesn't deserve to live. Eddie deserved to live, but he died screaming.
Most Beastmen aren't above eating humans. Howlers prefer human flesh to other food. Howler Beastmen look like an obscene mix of human and wild dog. Many look like humans covered in fur, with doglike heads. The breed of dog can differ, with Hyenas, Wolves, Coyotes, and Dingos being most common. Eddie was eaten alive. Alive and conscious.
When the Howlers ambushed them, Eddie handed Matt his pistols.
Eddie said, "Run."
Matt ran, and never forgave himself for it. How he survived, he didn't know for a long time.
He'd never know how he came to find himself, just six years later, the ad-hoc sheriff of a flyspeck town. Caring for a sprig of twelve-year-old boy. This was just before he realized that his "empathy" was merely undeveloped telepathy. His untrained ability to touch minds had caused him so much grief. But that's another story entirely.
They try to make me go to rehab, and I won't go, no, no.
I went to a show with her last night. Caroline Smith was the performer. Caroline Smith is not the girl I fancy. Caroline Smith has a myspace, and her music is pretty fucking good. I may just want to like it because this girl I fancy likes it. I'll probably never know. I'd have to read the lyrics.
Enough of this. Let's just say, there's this girl I fancy, and leave it at that. I went bowling with her tonight. I understand, I said I was going to leave it, and I am.
---
Matthew Culler had always been a mama's boy. From a very young age, he was sensitive and kind. Empathetic would be the word. A better, two-word phrase would be: Reluctantly Empathetic. To be truthful, he hated his disposition. Always knowing how the other guy feels isn't a great way to think about things.
Until the world beat it out of him, he was a crybaby. His mother told him it was "okay to cry." And it was, if you were a woman. In Nevar, reasons to cry were plentiful, even if you weren't accustomed to feeling everyone else's pain.
His mother died when he was thirteen. Crying was no longer an option. He had to make his own way.
In Nevar, young travelers were unheard of for two main reasons. Purebred human children themselves were rare. Four of every Five newborns was born with extra legs , giant heads, or the like. Muties, they called them. Mutie babies almost always kill the mother during birth.
The other reason amounted to one word with a complicated explanation: Beastmen.
Even when humans bred true, without mutie offspring killing the species over millennia, Beastmen were a constant threat. Beastmen just were. They live in the wilderness, and they hate humans. Beastmen raids were constant, and traveling between towns was dangerous.
Somehow, the young Matt survived for five years on the road. Drifting from town to town. He would hold up somewhere until the novelty of his story would wear thin on a town's patience. Then be gone before sunup. Nobody ever traveled at night, they didn't even think of it. Most Beastmen see best at night.
Matt learned to use a pistol at 14, from a man named Eddie, the self-appointed sheriff of a flyspeck town. Matt watched Eddie die less than a year after meeting him. Eddie once told Matt that anyone who wouldn't die screaming doesn't deserve to live. Eddie deserved to live, but he died screaming.
Most Beastmen aren't above eating humans. Howlers prefer human flesh to other food. Howler Beastmen look like an obscene mix of human and wild dog. Many look like humans covered in fur, with doglike heads. The breed of dog can differ, with Hyenas, Wolves, Coyotes, and Dingos being most common. Eddie was eaten alive. Alive and conscious.
When the Howlers ambushed them, Eddie handed Matt his pistols.
Eddie said, "Run."
Matt ran, and never forgave himself for it. How he survived, he didn't know for a long time.
He'd never know how he came to find himself, just six years later, the ad-hoc sheriff of a flyspeck town. Caring for a sprig of twelve-year-old boy. This was just before he realized that his "empathy" was merely undeveloped telepathy. His untrained ability to touch minds had caused him so much grief. But that's another story entirely.
Jul 13, 2007
Jun 17, 2007
More Poetic Drivel
When your lips reach skyward
Stretching to touch each brow
My whole brain twitches
Like snakes of trains starting to Krakow
When the smile actually connects
Your whole visage flares
Like a fire of hair and skin
With the rendered fat, they'll make wares
Soap and candles
From my blubbery calorie stores
And all because you smiled
My Gypsy ash, from Auschwitz pours
Stretching to touch each brow
My whole brain twitches
Like snakes of trains starting to Krakow
When the smile actually connects
Your whole visage flares
Like a fire of hair and skin
With the rendered fat, they'll make wares
Soap and candles
From my blubbery calorie stores
And all because you smiled
My Gypsy ash, from Auschwitz pours
Jun 12, 2007
A Deca-Dense of Dittering Drivel
1.
The Memory of your scent,
Is a stolen gem,
Glittering, though rent
As it was not given.
The slightest touch,
Also stolen
Takes me to an undiscovered glen,
Where the blossoms I never wanted lie
Save to be picked for someone,
Before I die.
And the apple trees
Litter the ground
With the gifts
I would wish away
Just to know you've been found,
And saw me through the fray.
2.
The girl inside my head
I try to judge her and flee
She lies asleep in bed
I’m stuck, smoking, unfed
Wishing I had the proficiency
With lyrics or words to articulate
Or the will to slam that gate
Any semblance of stability or dignity,
Has been washed away, gone forever.
With a simple, innocent glance or gesture
All oaths, I am willing to sever
Of course, I never asked,
For all my hopes to be dashed
For this illogical infatuation,
With the things she’s said
I didn’t want,
Never asked for,
And can’t be rid of,
This girl inside my head.
3.
‘Tis scary, true
To be adored in full view
The mad and smitten
See only their desire
All else is a midden
Which am I then?
To be charred by this fire
A flame of thought, and a pen
Won’t close this abyssal fissure
Both sides must ignite
To make this cursed inferno a treasure
Oh, you wicked, ignorant sprite
Thief of my dreams and demeanor
Return them, and abandon your magical candor
Or while our candles are still lit
Touch the sparks
Form a blaze against the dismal pit
If only for several silent seconds
The gleam of our union,
With the void, reckons.
4.
If a look could sell anthrax
To a paranoid cokehead
It would take your eyes
To get his nostrils fed.
They’ve always claimed,
“Eyes are windows to the soul.”
But they’re fucking morons
Spewing the same old droll
There’s a soul back there
But it hides behind the radiance
Of a forty megaton blast
Where corpses of human ash perform a motionless dance
Windows aren’t blinding
Or impossible to ignore
Though you liquefy my mortal coil
(Vaporizing my blood in the soil)
Don’t avert your eyes, I must implore
5.
If my brain had a liver,
That worked much the same,
Maybe that sponge could deliver
What willpower can only feign.
This fictional organ ought,
If I imagine it right,
Filter you from thought,
And return my sight.
I’m blind, you see,
Thought my eyes still function,
There’s nothing there but you, for me.
6.
Nerves use pain
To tell my monkey brain
When something will break
Like a baby given a good shake
But when my monkey brain
Wants to talk back
Oh, it sounds much the same,
But the only outlet is a sack.
A crate of undelivered mail
That grows unabated,
Like a tumor in a pail
7.
I want to stick a pole
In your pretty head
It would have to be hollow
For me to get properly fed.
I’d suck your brilliance
And claim it was my own
Then I’d have more than the pittance
Making my words a meaningless foam
8.
Somewhere deep down,
In the marrow,
There’s a tiny crown.
Worn by a fucking peasant
Who pushes a barrow
Dirty and awkward
He avoids his fellows
Who pump relentlessly,
The bellows.
That cough crimson Cheerios
They flow like liquid smoke
Carrying Oh-Too payloads
If they clot, we choke
All the while his fellows
Pump the bellows
Nobody in their town
Ever notices the tiny crown
Because it resides on the head
Of a fucking peasant,
Who might as well be dead.
9.
You’d never know
You’re breathing
Until acrid smoke
Hits your lungs, teething
Like a fucking monster
Got into your pants
Every picnic basket,
Swarms with deadly ants.
The great delusion
Of my generation
Is the same as the last,
A tragedy that defies imagination
Culled by the same,
Malignant forces
All the while believing
There are any real choices.
10.
This ignorant society
Is like a cropped tree
That grows, futile
On the billionth mile
Of median strip
Between bustles of boulevards
Those concrete shards
Where monkey men go,
Frantically, to and fro
But, between the lanes
Mostly when it rains
Roots strive for more
Unless blighted to the core.
In our concrete cage
Necessary roots bend and break
Though it fills me with rage
I cant even comprehend
What, exactly, is at stake.
This message I have sent
To the hairless monkey men
Breeding like rats in a pen:
“On your deaths, you are bent.”
The Memory of your scent,
Is a stolen gem,
Glittering, though rent
As it was not given.
The slightest touch,
Also stolen
Takes me to an undiscovered glen,
Where the blossoms I never wanted lie
Save to be picked for someone,
Before I die.
And the apple trees
Litter the ground
With the gifts
I would wish away
Just to know you've been found,
And saw me through the fray.
2.
The girl inside my head
I try to judge her and flee
She lies asleep in bed
I’m stuck, smoking, unfed
Wishing I had the proficiency
With lyrics or words to articulate
Or the will to slam that gate
Any semblance of stability or dignity,
Has been washed away, gone forever.
With a simple, innocent glance or gesture
All oaths, I am willing to sever
Of course, I never asked,
For all my hopes to be dashed
For this illogical infatuation,
With the things she’s said
I didn’t want,
Never asked for,
And can’t be rid of,
This girl inside my head.
3.
‘Tis scary, true
To be adored in full view
The mad and smitten
See only their desire
All else is a midden
Which am I then?
To be charred by this fire
A flame of thought, and a pen
Won’t close this abyssal fissure
Both sides must ignite
To make this cursed inferno a treasure
Oh, you wicked, ignorant sprite
Thief of my dreams and demeanor
Return them, and abandon your magical candor
Or while our candles are still lit
Touch the sparks
Form a blaze against the dismal pit
If only for several silent seconds
The gleam of our union,
With the void, reckons.
4.
If a look could sell anthrax
To a paranoid cokehead
It would take your eyes
To get his nostrils fed.
They’ve always claimed,
“Eyes are windows to the soul.”
But they’re fucking morons
Spewing the same old droll
There’s a soul back there
But it hides behind the radiance
Of a forty megaton blast
Where corpses of human ash perform a motionless dance
Windows aren’t blinding
Or impossible to ignore
Though you liquefy my mortal coil
(Vaporizing my blood in the soil)
Don’t avert your eyes, I must implore
5.
If my brain had a liver,
That worked much the same,
Maybe that sponge could deliver
What willpower can only feign.
This fictional organ ought,
If I imagine it right,
Filter you from thought,
And return my sight.
I’m blind, you see,
Thought my eyes still function,
There’s nothing there but you, for me.
6.
Nerves use pain
To tell my monkey brain
When something will break
Like a baby given a good shake
But when my monkey brain
Wants to talk back
Oh, it sounds much the same,
But the only outlet is a sack.
A crate of undelivered mail
That grows unabated,
Like a tumor in a pail
7.
I want to stick a pole
In your pretty head
It would have to be hollow
For me to get properly fed.
I’d suck your brilliance
And claim it was my own
Then I’d have more than the pittance
Making my words a meaningless foam
8.
Somewhere deep down,
In the marrow,
There’s a tiny crown.
Worn by a fucking peasant
Who pushes a barrow
Dirty and awkward
He avoids his fellows
Who pump relentlessly,
The bellows.
That cough crimson Cheerios
They flow like liquid smoke
Carrying Oh-Too payloads
If they clot, we choke
All the while his fellows
Pump the bellows
Nobody in their town
Ever notices the tiny crown
Because it resides on the head
Of a fucking peasant,
Who might as well be dead.
9.
You’d never know
You’re breathing
Until acrid smoke
Hits your lungs, teething
Like a fucking monster
Got into your pants
Every picnic basket,
Swarms with deadly ants.
The great delusion
Of my generation
Is the same as the last,
A tragedy that defies imagination
Culled by the same,
Malignant forces
All the while believing
There are any real choices.
10.
This ignorant society
Is like a cropped tree
That grows, futile
On the billionth mile
Of median strip
Between bustles of boulevards
Those concrete shards
Where monkey men go,
Frantically, to and fro
But, between the lanes
Mostly when it rains
Roots strive for more
Unless blighted to the core.
In our concrete cage
Necessary roots bend and break
Though it fills me with rage
I cant even comprehend
What, exactly, is at stake.
This message I have sent
To the hairless monkey men
Breeding like rats in a pen:
“On your deaths, you are bent.”
Oh Holy Living FUCK!
My fucking archives are gone!
OH FUCKING NOES!!
Wow that sucks. That really sucks.
OH FUCKING NOES!!
Wow that sucks. That really sucks.
I'm back, MOTHERFUCKERS!
I'm going to post a ton of shit in the next few days.
I have three days off of work, which is, how should I put it? Oh. Fucking sweet.
I'm a writer again. Hopefully, I will never again be "not a writer."
Also, not that it matters, but I've been drankin' again.
If I do it for long enough, theoretically, I *have* to get good at it. Writing, not drinking. I'm already an accomplished drinker.
I've been writing poetry lately. I hate almost all poetry. An example of one exception would be "The Emperor of Ice Cream," by Wallace Stevens. Fuck, I'll just paste it.
Call the roller of big cigars,
The muscular one, and bid him whip
In kitchen cups concupiscent curds.
Let the wenches dawdle in such dress
As they are used to wear, and let the boys
Bring flowers in last month's newspapers.
Let be finale of seem.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.
Take from the dresser of deal,
Lacking the three glass knobs, that sheet
On which she embroidered fantails once
And spread it so as to cover her face.
If her horny feet protrude, they come
To show how cold she is, and dumb.
Let the lamp affix its beam.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.
That is a beautiful use of language. My poetry is not. It sucks. I write stories, and am only bothering to learn this obtuse way for telling stories (writing) to get my stories across more effectively. Poetry for me, I guess, is sort of like stretching my writing muscle. It's not very large yet, but it's voracious. What I'm saying could best be expressed in the words of a timeless song, "This dick don't hit the bottom, but I fuck the sides up." (Bloodhound Gang, Hefty Fine.
Regardless of how shitty my poetry is, I'm going to post some of it, cuz it's been written, and what the fuck else am I going to do with it? I certainly didn't write it because I enjoy reading it.
I have three days off of work, which is, how should I put it? Oh. Fucking sweet.
I'm a writer again. Hopefully, I will never again be "not a writer."
Also, not that it matters, but I've been drankin' again.
If I do it for long enough, theoretically, I *have* to get good at it. Writing, not drinking. I'm already an accomplished drinker.
I've been writing poetry lately. I hate almost all poetry. An example of one exception would be "The Emperor of Ice Cream," by Wallace Stevens. Fuck, I'll just paste it.
Call the roller of big cigars,
The muscular one, and bid him whip
In kitchen cups concupiscent curds.
Let the wenches dawdle in such dress
As they are used to wear, and let the boys
Bring flowers in last month's newspapers.
Let be finale of seem.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.
Take from the dresser of deal,
Lacking the three glass knobs, that sheet
On which she embroidered fantails once
And spread it so as to cover her face.
If her horny feet protrude, they come
To show how cold she is, and dumb.
Let the lamp affix its beam.
The only emperor is the emperor of ice-cream.
That is a beautiful use of language. My poetry is not. It sucks. I write stories, and am only bothering to learn this obtuse way for telling stories (writing) to get my stories across more effectively. Poetry for me, I guess, is sort of like stretching my writing muscle. It's not very large yet, but it's voracious. What I'm saying could best be expressed in the words of a timeless song, "This dick don't hit the bottom, but I fuck the sides up." (Bloodhound Gang, Hefty Fine.
Regardless of how shitty my poetry is, I'm going to post some of it, cuz it's been written, and what the fuck else am I going to do with it? I certainly didn't write it because I enjoy reading it.
Oct 16, 2006
Fan Fiction
This is some D&D fan-fiction that I wrote today (at work, lmao). I'll probably edit it a little this week, or maybe come back to it next week. Click here if you want more info about the type of creature featured in this piece. This is still a rough draft:
Xor’chylic did not run. He floated a few inches off the ground, but increased his speed. Reaching out with his mind, he sensed his meal's location. Through the alley, surrounded by log buildings with thatched roofs, he ignored the drunkards and beggars. Their brains weren’t nutritious enough for his needs, and they had no flavor. Closing the distance to his prey, he projected the sound of running footsteps into its mind, and felt the “fear” emotion in the creature increase.
If he had lips, he would’ve licked them. As it was, the tentacles surrounding his mouth excreted more liquid. His victim's brain waves would become more intense with heightened anxiety, which would make its brain delectable.
It stopped moving abruptly, and Xor’chylic assumed it had reached a dead end. Though he didn’t understand the emotion, “fear,” he had felt it from other beings countless times before. The amount spewing from this creature’s psyche was almost enough to render it unconscious. If he was only interested in the grey matter, this wouldn’t be a problem, but since he devoured the cognitive energy housed in the brain as well, unconsciousness was simply unacceptable. At least before the feeding process began.
In order to be truly nutritious, this creature needed to be awake and aware of what was happening to it.
Just around the corner, he knew his meal waited, cowering and trembling. Possibly defecating itself. Xor’chylic lowered himself to the ground, relishing the visceral feeling of hard packed earth on his ancient feet. He walked around the corner.
The darkness blanketing the simple village was no barrier to his eyes, and he saw her with perfect clarity. She was certainly human, with soft, pink flesh and golden hair. She was wearing leather armor, though she seemed to have lost her shoes somewhere in the muddy streets. Clearly, she had forgotten about the dagger at her belt. With her back to the log wall of a building, she was digging furrows in the dirt with her heels as she tried to escape through the wall somehow.
He entered her consciousness with little difficulty.
I WILL NOT HURT YOU. He projected.
She clapped her hands over her ears and fell over, the weight of his consciousness touching hers causing her intense pain. He walked slowly to her and took her head in his hands. With his mind, he flung the dagger out of her belt and into the darkness behind him.
He didn’t live to be thirteen hundred and eighty four by being careless, even with a human made feral with fear.
With a fierce blast of mental energy, he stunned her. She could still sense her surroundings, but was rendered unable to act. Kneeling down, he threw back his hood, and began slowly wrapping his mouth tentacles around her skull. At first, the four tentacles spread their viscous enzyme on her hair. The thick, mucous-like substance matted her hair down, making it easier to manage.
After her hair was coated in his saliva, Xor’chylic tightened his feeding tentacles, bringing her forehead directly to his mouth. His mouth consisted of three rings of serrated teeth, with an eighteen inch, rough as a sharpening-stone tongue behind them. They did not open and close as he brought her skin to his teeth, but instead, each ring of teeth rotated in a separate direction, and then back again.
This was how he bored through her skull. She was still conscious once it was done, but he knew it wouldn’t last. Her body and mind couldn’t take much more. Once his tongue went into her brain cavity and began severing the tissue attaching her brain to her skull, she lost consciousness.
Not that it mattered, the heightened brain activity would last for long enough. Long enough to fuel his psychic energy for another month, and long enough to be absolutely delicious.
With an obscene slurping sound, he vaccuumed her brains into his mouth, in the space of fifteen seconds. He spent the next few minutes licking the skull clean.
Xor’chylic did not run. He floated a few inches off the ground, but increased his speed. Reaching out with his mind, he sensed his meal's location. Through the alley, surrounded by log buildings with thatched roofs, he ignored the drunkards and beggars. Their brains weren’t nutritious enough for his needs, and they had no flavor. Closing the distance to his prey, he projected the sound of running footsteps into its mind, and felt the “fear” emotion in the creature increase.
If he had lips, he would’ve licked them. As it was, the tentacles surrounding his mouth excreted more liquid. His victim's brain waves would become more intense with heightened anxiety, which would make its brain delectable.
It stopped moving abruptly, and Xor’chylic assumed it had reached a dead end. Though he didn’t understand the emotion, “fear,” he had felt it from other beings countless times before. The amount spewing from this creature’s psyche was almost enough to render it unconscious. If he was only interested in the grey matter, this wouldn’t be a problem, but since he devoured the cognitive energy housed in the brain as well, unconsciousness was simply unacceptable. At least before the feeding process began.
In order to be truly nutritious, this creature needed to be awake and aware of what was happening to it.
Just around the corner, he knew his meal waited, cowering and trembling. Possibly defecating itself. Xor’chylic lowered himself to the ground, relishing the visceral feeling of hard packed earth on his ancient feet. He walked around the corner.
The darkness blanketing the simple village was no barrier to his eyes, and he saw her with perfect clarity. She was certainly human, with soft, pink flesh and golden hair. She was wearing leather armor, though she seemed to have lost her shoes somewhere in the muddy streets. Clearly, she had forgotten about the dagger at her belt. With her back to the log wall of a building, she was digging furrows in the dirt with her heels as she tried to escape through the wall somehow.
He entered her consciousness with little difficulty.
I WILL NOT HURT YOU. He projected.
She clapped her hands over her ears and fell over, the weight of his consciousness touching hers causing her intense pain. He walked slowly to her and took her head in his hands. With his mind, he flung the dagger out of her belt and into the darkness behind him.
He didn’t live to be thirteen hundred and eighty four by being careless, even with a human made feral with fear.
With a fierce blast of mental energy, he stunned her. She could still sense her surroundings, but was rendered unable to act. Kneeling down, he threw back his hood, and began slowly wrapping his mouth tentacles around her skull. At first, the four tentacles spread their viscous enzyme on her hair. The thick, mucous-like substance matted her hair down, making it easier to manage.
After her hair was coated in his saliva, Xor’chylic tightened his feeding tentacles, bringing her forehead directly to his mouth. His mouth consisted of three rings of serrated teeth, with an eighteen inch, rough as a sharpening-stone tongue behind them. They did not open and close as he brought her skin to his teeth, but instead, each ring of teeth rotated in a separate direction, and then back again.
This was how he bored through her skull. She was still conscious once it was done, but he knew it wouldn’t last. Her body and mind couldn’t take much more. Once his tongue went into her brain cavity and began severing the tissue attaching her brain to her skull, she lost consciousness.
Not that it mattered, the heightened brain activity would last for long enough. Long enough to fuel his psychic energy for another month, and long enough to be absolutely delicious.
With an obscene slurping sound, he vaccuumed her brains into his mouth, in the space of fifteen seconds. He spent the next few minutes licking the skull clean.
Sep 25, 2006
At some point you wanted to write. You wrote a lot, and called it practice. You went to school, and you wrote. Smoking cigarettes and drinking coffee. Then what? It went away. Like your grandmother’s ashes in a hurricane. Just. Gone.
Whoosh. With nothing left but a feeling of hopelessness, when you’d think about trying to find any of it again.
They say these things happen.
Then you thought you’d play poker. It was more difficult and less fun than you thought. You told everyone that you were a professional poker player. You talked about poker more than you played it. You thought that the money would just fly at you, and all you had to do was catch it. Not so, good sir, not so by a stretch.
The trouble with being your own boss is that you’re a lazy shithead.
Then you got a job. A job that carefully trained chimpanzees could accomplish with little fallout. You play videogames, but are not content.
You stumble across this concept. It’s like reading about something you already know by heart, but never incorporated the name of the thing into your consciousness.
But you know, you want to find your flow.
Then what? That part of the story, is still unwritten.
Whoosh. With nothing left but a feeling of hopelessness, when you’d think about trying to find any of it again.
They say these things happen.
Then you thought you’d play poker. It was more difficult and less fun than you thought. You told everyone that you were a professional poker player. You talked about poker more than you played it. You thought that the money would just fly at you, and all you had to do was catch it. Not so, good sir, not so by a stretch.
The trouble with being your own boss is that you’re a lazy shithead.
Then you got a job. A job that carefully trained chimpanzees could accomplish with little fallout. You play videogames, but are not content.
You stumble across this concept. It’s like reading about something you already know by heart, but never incorporated the name of the thing into your consciousness.
But you know, you want to find your flow.
Then what? That part of the story, is still unwritten.
Aug 16, 2006
What happens in a year?
It's been almost a year since I've posted.
What happens in a year? I'm sure you guys can guess: Not much.
Not much at all.
What happens in a year? I'm sure you guys can guess: Not much.
Not much at all.
Sep 25, 2005
On Rage
There are two types of people in this world. Accept that as a fact, and everything will be easier. Those who induce rage, and those who become enraged.
Guess which I am.
Yeah, you fuckin' got it. I get mad all the damn time. When I say that automobiles infuriate me, I'm not kidding. Seriously, I think about the carbons and the toxins and the people suffering all over the world because of our dependance on decayed organic matter as fuel. I think about the fact that this black sludge is the result of ALL LIFE before us on this planet.
No, really. Everything that came before. The floating mountains of bacteria that inhabited this planet, all the way to the fucking dinosaurs. Well, not really ALL life, but most of it. A good portion of it became this black sludge shit.
What are we doing? Burning it at such a rate that we're almost out. We've almost burned away the remains of everything that came before.
If you don't think this is wrong and unnecessary, if you honestly don't think there's any other way worth pursuing, then we have nothing further to discuss.
So fuck you. If nobody ever insisted that there was a better way of doing things, we'd still be letting "Priests" of "THE ONE TRUE GOD" fuck our small children.
Oh wait...
Guess which I am.
Yeah, you fuckin' got it. I get mad all the damn time. When I say that automobiles infuriate me, I'm not kidding. Seriously, I think about the carbons and the toxins and the people suffering all over the world because of our dependance on decayed organic matter as fuel. I think about the fact that this black sludge is the result of ALL LIFE before us on this planet.
No, really. Everything that came before. The floating mountains of bacteria that inhabited this planet, all the way to the fucking dinosaurs. Well, not really ALL life, but most of it. A good portion of it became this black sludge shit.
What are we doing? Burning it at such a rate that we're almost out. We've almost burned away the remains of everything that came before.
If you don't think this is wrong and unnecessary, if you honestly don't think there's any other way worth pursuing, then we have nothing further to discuss.
So fuck you. If nobody ever insisted that there was a better way of doing things, we'd still be letting "Priests" of "THE ONE TRUE GOD" fuck our small children.
Oh wait...
LINKS
New, Poker-only blog!
Click over neaw!
Two of my friends and myself are authoring it.
Also, in some non-poker news, a friend of mine has started a blog.
It should be mostly fiction, if I'm to believe what he tells me.
Click over neaw!
Two of my friends and myself are authoring it.
Also, in some non-poker news, a friend of mine has started a blog.
It should be mostly fiction, if I'm to believe what he tells me.
Sep 20, 2005
I love gambling
I just got done with an up and down session at the tables. There were some massive swings in chip totals, and mistakes were made.
That's right, mistakes were made.
Somewhere between my fingers and my brain, a communication breakdown occurred.
Honestly, at this time, that's all the information we have. Of course it has been reported through members of the liberal, jew-run media that proper precautions were not enacted to protect the chips.
These accusations are simply not true. There was nothing more that could be done to protect the chips. While there may have been mistakes, the chips themselves knew the risk of living in that region.
I mean, can't my chips afford the weather channel? My chips can't afford to drive their SUV's out of the destroyed area? I know gas is expensive, but fuck.
When the whirlwind of destruction comes careening toward you, get in your automobiles and drive, you stupid, stupid, black chips.
That's right, mistakes were made.
Somewhere between my fingers and my brain, a communication breakdown occurred.
Honestly, at this time, that's all the information we have. Of course it has been reported through members of the liberal, jew-run media that proper precautions were not enacted to protect the chips.
These accusations are simply not true. There was nothing more that could be done to protect the chips. While there may have been mistakes, the chips themselves knew the risk of living in that region.
I mean, can't my chips afford the weather channel? My chips can't afford to drive their SUV's out of the destroyed area? I know gas is expensive, but fuck.
When the whirlwind of destruction comes careening toward you, get in your automobiles and drive, you stupid, stupid, black chips.
HOLY FUCKING SHIT!
I JUST GOT A FREE FUCKING LAPTOP!
Oh wait... It was just a bullshit popup. My bad.
Is anyone else getting really sick of advertising in this country?
I swear, the next innovation is going to be a nano-machine earweevil that will burrow into your brain. See, it won't take control, because advertising is spearheaded by a bunch of morons, it'll just start broadcasting from inside your brain.
"Eat at Joe's.... Eat at Joe's."
You must remember that the main goal of advertising is to drive the more intelligent members of a species insane.
That's the definition of advertising, it's in the dictionary. Read it sometime.
Oh wait... It was just a bullshit popup. My bad.
Is anyone else getting really sick of advertising in this country?
I swear, the next innovation is going to be a nano-machine earweevil that will burrow into your brain. See, it won't take control, because advertising is spearheaded by a bunch of morons, it'll just start broadcasting from inside your brain.
"Eat at Joe's.... Eat at Joe's."
You must remember that the main goal of advertising is to drive the more intelligent members of a species insane.
That's the definition of advertising, it's in the dictionary. Read it sometime.
Sep 19, 2005
While I'm talking about poker, here's something that can stop:
Starting sentences with the phrase, "Poker is a lot like life..."
This is only a trend with people seeking to validate the devotion they give to poker. Poker isn't like life. Poker is a game of strategy in the long-term, and luck in the short-term.
In life, you can make all the incorrect decisions and reach the top of the iceburg. Naturally, you forget about the 70% of us that are underwater, but you get what you pay for, and life is free.
An example would be President George W. Bush. Here's a man that's the "leader" of the most powerful nation on earth, and he still thinks naming an anti-theft device "The Club" is really fucking funny.
That doesn't belong on the resume of the President of the United States. That is on MY resume. Fuck.
Poker is not like life. It's easy to see similarities between something that is not understood by humans (life) and anything else that's so incredibly complicated that it's nigh incomprehensible (in this example, poker).
Starting sentences with the phrase, "Poker is a lot like life..."
This is only a trend with people seeking to validate the devotion they give to poker. Poker isn't like life. Poker is a game of strategy in the long-term, and luck in the short-term.
In life, you can make all the incorrect decisions and reach the top of the iceburg. Naturally, you forget about the 70% of us that are underwater, but you get what you pay for, and life is free.
An example would be President George W. Bush. Here's a man that's the "leader" of the most powerful nation on earth, and he still thinks naming an anti-theft device "The Club" is really fucking funny.
That doesn't belong on the resume of the President of the United States. That is on MY resume. Fuck.
Poker is not like life. It's easy to see similarities between something that is not understood by humans (life) and anything else that's so incredibly complicated that it's nigh incomprehensible (in this example, poker).
This post is about one of the ultimate expressions of capitalism.
A theoretical exploration of poker.
Of course, I'm not speaking literally. However, poker is an extreme expression of lassiez-fair economics. My spelling might be off, of course, but the concept remains true.
When you play poker, you wager monies. Pretty simple concept there.
Naturally, it gets more complicated if you want to do this for a living. A little like the stock market, though I'm sure that's a common analogy.
With each wager, you attempt to maximize the amount of *expectation* you have when risking your monies.
Expectation is an important concept. Excpectation is the amount of money you expect to make given the *average* of all possibilities for the outcome of a hand. The important part is to disregard individual results, because poker is a game of wild variations in "luck".
I call luck "variance" because it means much the same thing, but doesn't have any sentimental attachment.
Sentimental attachments, whether it is to a particular hand or class of hands in poker, is a dangerous position.
The equation works like this:
Expectation = edge * volume.
Your "edge" is essentially the skill you have in excess of your opponents (If it helps, think of it in terms of the mistakes they make but you avoid. Every time an opponent makes a mistake, there is a potential for profit. Conversely, when you make mistakes, you SHOULD lose money, though unskilled opponents will frequently not capitalize on your mistakes.) The more you play, the bigger your edge will get (if you try to improve, which most people don't or can't). It's a positive feedback equation, because the more you play, the larger your edge gets (again, if you try to improve). The more you play, the bigger your edge gets, and the more you are betting (the volume section of our equation) and the more your edge affects your profits.
Any questions?
A theoretical exploration of poker.
Of course, I'm not speaking literally. However, poker is an extreme expression of lassiez-fair economics. My spelling might be off, of course, but the concept remains true.
When you play poker, you wager monies. Pretty simple concept there.
Naturally, it gets more complicated if you want to do this for a living. A little like the stock market, though I'm sure that's a common analogy.
With each wager, you attempt to maximize the amount of *expectation* you have when risking your monies.
Expectation is an important concept. Excpectation is the amount of money you expect to make given the *average* of all possibilities for the outcome of a hand. The important part is to disregard individual results, because poker is a game of wild variations in "luck".
I call luck "variance" because it means much the same thing, but doesn't have any sentimental attachment.
Sentimental attachments, whether it is to a particular hand or class of hands in poker, is a dangerous position.
The equation works like this:
Expectation = edge * volume.
Your "edge" is essentially the skill you have in excess of your opponents (If it helps, think of it in terms of the mistakes they make but you avoid. Every time an opponent makes a mistake, there is a potential for profit. Conversely, when you make mistakes, you SHOULD lose money, though unskilled opponents will frequently not capitalize on your mistakes.) The more you play, the bigger your edge will get (if you try to improve, which most people don't or can't). It's a positive feedback equation, because the more you play, the larger your edge gets (again, if you try to improve). The more you play, the bigger your edge gets, and the more you are betting (the volume section of our equation) and the more your edge affects your profits.
Any questions?
Sep 15, 2005
Sep 14, 2005
Yes!
So it's been about a month since the last update. Sadly, there is not any new fiction at the moment. I know, I can't seem to finish a story, so I've decided to shelf it for a while.
Shelving something is sort of like putting something on the back burner, but not quite as gay.
That's right. Gay. Because of the fire. Nevermind.
I'm still playing poker. It's not quite where you could call me a professional poker player, but it's what you would call the 'cusp' of playing professionally.
Soon, I should be moving up in stakes, from single dollar to multiple dollar bets. This is great and exciting. I've been lucky.
There's a new blog that you guys should check out. I'll add it to the links on the right as well. The blog is authored by an unemployed rocket scientist.
Anyway, I'll post again once I move up.
So it's been about a month since the last update. Sadly, there is not any new fiction at the moment. I know, I can't seem to finish a story, so I've decided to shelf it for a while.
Shelving something is sort of like putting something on the back burner, but not quite as gay.
That's right. Gay. Because of the fire. Nevermind.
I'm still playing poker. It's not quite where you could call me a professional poker player, but it's what you would call the 'cusp' of playing professionally.
Soon, I should be moving up in stakes, from single dollar to multiple dollar bets. This is great and exciting. I've been lucky.
There's a new blog that you guys should check out. I'll add it to the links on the right as well. The blog is authored by an unemployed rocket scientist.
Anyway, I'll post again once I move up.
Aug 10, 2005
So. I've been playing poker.
A lot of poker.
I've learned some things about myself.
I love writing, and I love playing poker. I also love lots of people, but that's not what this is about.
Maybe, just maybe, I can reconcile the things I love to do with the fact that I have to work for money in this culture to have any freedom at all.
It's a secret dream of mine that I could earn a living playing poker, and write.
What would I write about if I could make money playing poker?
I dont know what I would write about exactly, but it wouldn't be poker. Poker would be work.
With the internet and all, this wouldn't even be something I'd need to come into the office for, this would be something I could do from home.
That. At least, is worth a shot.
I'm done writing for the moment, but since you've been kind enough to wade through the avalanche of bullshit about my life, I'll post the first outline for the first chapter of a story I'm writing.
Oh. You don't care? Then fuck you.
This character's name is Whispering Leaf, Whisper to his friends. He's the best hunter in his tribe. He is called whispering leaf because of the obvious quietness relevance. Rumors in his tribe circulate about his methods, because he always hunts alone. Unlike his tribesmen, he refuses to use anything but his father's obsidian dagger.
It is large for a knife, and hasn't broken. Usually, a knife made of glass shatters at some point (though it is always usable to *finish* the kill, it must be replaced afterwards). This one, however, has not been blemished or dulled since the day Whisper's father died.
This was all teaser stuff.
Here's the first outline for the first chapter.
---
Whispering Leaf peered through the leaves of a towering oak, grasping the hilt of the obsidian blade strapped to his thigh. He knew nothing of his mission, though the wise woman had told him something ominous.
"You will observe, Whisper. You will watch, and your purpose will be known to you."
"Tell me, mother," he had said, "tell me what my purpose is."
"I cannot, my dearest son. I cannot because it has not been shown. The spirits have told me that you must be there. They will say no more, and you must obey. You must be patient."
"Yes, wise woman."
"Go with the spirits as your allies," She said, "and hold no malice in your heart. Be true to your father, but strike swiftly when you must."
Once the parting words had been spoken, there was nothing to do but nod and leave. Even if you were the wise woman's son, you left when the parting words were spoken.
Whispering Leaf shook the sorrow from his head. It didn't leave, but receeded from his attention, to a dark corner of his head where the last conversation was kept on constant loop.
He looked once more at the pale men in a smooth, wooden boat.
---
In the next chapter, Whispering Leaf will come into contact with the Europeans he has been watching from his hiding place. (though we know nothing about their mutual surroundings yet) More secrets about his past, and clues as to his mission concerning these white men, will be exposed.
A lot of poker.
I've learned some things about myself.
I love writing, and I love playing poker. I also love lots of people, but that's not what this is about.
Maybe, just maybe, I can reconcile the things I love to do with the fact that I have to work for money in this culture to have any freedom at all.
It's a secret dream of mine that I could earn a living playing poker, and write.
What would I write about if I could make money playing poker?
I dont know what I would write about exactly, but it wouldn't be poker. Poker would be work.
With the internet and all, this wouldn't even be something I'd need to come into the office for, this would be something I could do from home.
That. At least, is worth a shot.
I'm done writing for the moment, but since you've been kind enough to wade through the avalanche of bullshit about my life, I'll post the first outline for the first chapter of a story I'm writing.
Oh. You don't care? Then fuck you.
This character's name is Whispering Leaf, Whisper to his friends. He's the best hunter in his tribe. He is called whispering leaf because of the obvious quietness relevance. Rumors in his tribe circulate about his methods, because he always hunts alone. Unlike his tribesmen, he refuses to use anything but his father's obsidian dagger.
It is large for a knife, and hasn't broken. Usually, a knife made of glass shatters at some point (though it is always usable to *finish* the kill, it must be replaced afterwards). This one, however, has not been blemished or dulled since the day Whisper's father died.
This was all teaser stuff.
Here's the first outline for the first chapter.
---
Whispering Leaf peered through the leaves of a towering oak, grasping the hilt of the obsidian blade strapped to his thigh. He knew nothing of his mission, though the wise woman had told him something ominous.
"You will observe, Whisper. You will watch, and your purpose will be known to you."
"Tell me, mother," he had said, "tell me what my purpose is."
"I cannot, my dearest son. I cannot because it has not been shown. The spirits have told me that you must be there. They will say no more, and you must obey. You must be patient."
"Yes, wise woman."
"Go with the spirits as your allies," She said, "and hold no malice in your heart. Be true to your father, but strike swiftly when you must."
Once the parting words had been spoken, there was nothing to do but nod and leave. Even if you were the wise woman's son, you left when the parting words were spoken.
Whispering Leaf shook the sorrow from his head. It didn't leave, but receeded from his attention, to a dark corner of his head where the last conversation was kept on constant loop.
He looked once more at the pale men in a smooth, wooden boat.
---
In the next chapter, Whispering Leaf will come into contact with the Europeans he has been watching from his hiding place. (though we know nothing about their mutual surroundings yet) More secrets about his past, and clues as to his mission concerning these white men, will be exposed.
Jul 24, 2005
Jul 15, 2005
Do you own a company? Do you have motivation problems? Do you wish your employees were just a little more productive?
Do you have trouble getting out of bed in the morning?
Do you feel that life, sometimes, just isn't worth it?
Well, recognize your potential!
All of your answers are here.
Be sure to check out their posters at the bottom of the page. A new wall-mounted, life changing system. Developed exclusively for Cephaladon Studios!
At Cephaladon Studios, we heartily recommend the posters which espouse these issues:
Power
Blame
Planning
Leaders
Potential
Success
Teamwork.
And many, MANY more.
---
Legal Disclaimer: Cephaladon Studios is, in no way whatsoever, affliated with despair.com. I just think they make a fine product, and so I have presented their link like I've been paid to sell it.
Besides, people fucking HATE motivation posters, don't they?
Do you have trouble getting out of bed in the morning?
Do you feel that life, sometimes, just isn't worth it?
Well, recognize your potential!
All of your answers are here.
Be sure to check out their posters at the bottom of the page. A new wall-mounted, life changing system. Developed exclusively for Cephaladon Studios!
At Cephaladon Studios, we heartily recommend the posters which espouse these issues:
Power
Blame
Planning
Leaders
Potential
Success
Teamwork.
And many, MANY more.
---
Legal Disclaimer: Cephaladon Studios is, in no way whatsoever, affliated with despair.com. I just think they make a fine product, and so I have presented their link like I've been paid to sell it.
Besides, people fucking HATE motivation posters, don't they?
Jul 6, 2005
I'm posting something much more to read it later myself, than for other people to find enjoyment. This is not for you. You are not special. This is for me, so if you don't like it, use the back button on your browser. Oh, and thanks for stopping by. And, FUCK YOU! This is mine.
Anyway, I haven't worked on my screenplay in a while, but I've been wanting to. The problem I'm having is how the characters get from the beginning to the end of the story. It's a simple problem of a plot arc, if we want to talk like we know how stories "should" be told. In a modern day story, a character begins the story, then undergoes some kind of conflict, from within or without, then learns from this conflict. That's how every story is created.
It helps to have a love interest. False emotions within your audience will lend them towards liking your movie more, if a heterosexual coupling is completed at some point during your screenplay. Why this happens, I really don't know. It could be that, you know, genetically, that's *why* we're here, or it could be that it just makes us happy to imagine perfection.
Anyway, I'm falling into a cognitive trap where I write for a reader (My target audience, however, is always myself, so fuck off you bastards.)
This is where I start putting in ideas for the script:
The interesting thing about the characters, Jack and Seth, is how impassive they both are. The difference between them is that Jack reacts to everything he thinks about with anger, while Seth doesn't react unless he is interacted with.
Seth is driving, Jack sits in the passenger seat, fidgeting, trying to see in all directions at the same time.
Jack (pointing at the dashboard panel): Dude, engine light's on.
Seth: So it is...
Jack: Does that mean anything unpleasant? I was raised to believe that the engine light being on was a bad thing.
Seth: It could be.
Jack: Well, are we going to get stranded in the middle of buttfuck Suburbs? I live in the city man, I don't know how to get home WALKING.
Seth: I don't know, give it another minute.
Jack: Do you have any idea how fat I am? I can't walk home. (seth doesn't respond) I mean, when you go on a ride with someone, there's a certain expectation that you will be given a ride home. I was fucking depending on you man. What the fuck!? Oh, I see how it is, the silent treatment, well fuck you too. (Jack crosses his arms and stares straight ahead.)
They both stare straight ahead at the camera for several seconds. Jack turns on the radio and turns it up loud.(then Jack could hear a campy song he likes and start singing along obnoxiously, or he could quietly groove) Seth turns the radio down to a reasonable level. Jack stops enjoying it.
There is a seven second, awkward pause.
Jack: You know, maybe nothing's wrong.
(Seth says nothing. Jack turns from looking at Seth to staring straight ahead.)
Three second awkward pause, then the radio cuts out.
Both characters look panicked, then relax over a few seconds. As soon as they have relaxed.
The car breaks.
Seth: FUCK! My fucking car.
Jack: Jesus, I'm sorry.
Cut to a shot of traffic speeding by.
Seth: Fuck you, what is this sorry shit? FUCK. What the fuck did you do?
Jack: This wasn't my fault.
Seth: Then what the fuck are you apologizing for? What's your fucking problem?
Jack: Fine, I take it back. I did jinx it though.
Seth: That doesn't... nevermind. (Grips the steering wheel, trying to contain himself.) FUCK! (completely calm) Okay, let's see what we're dealing with.
They exit the car.
VO: Please step away from the vehicle.
Jack: What? (he turns) Oh fuck.
Cut to a shot of a police officer.
Wimble: I said, "Please step away from the vehicle."
Seth steps away from the vehicle. Jack takes a step backward, then realizes he moved parallel to the vehicle, and takes a step directly away.
Jack: More than one step?
Wimble: Why don't you boys just come over here, and present me with your license and registration.
---
Plot sketch in progress.
Anyway, I haven't worked on my screenplay in a while, but I've been wanting to. The problem I'm having is how the characters get from the beginning to the end of the story. It's a simple problem of a plot arc, if we want to talk like we know how stories "should" be told. In a modern day story, a character begins the story, then undergoes some kind of conflict, from within or without, then learns from this conflict. That's how every story is created.
It helps to have a love interest. False emotions within your audience will lend them towards liking your movie more, if a heterosexual coupling is completed at some point during your screenplay. Why this happens, I really don't know. It could be that, you know, genetically, that's *why* we're here, or it could be that it just makes us happy to imagine perfection.
Anyway, I'm falling into a cognitive trap where I write for a reader (My target audience, however, is always myself, so fuck off you bastards.)
This is where I start putting in ideas for the script:
The interesting thing about the characters, Jack and Seth, is how impassive they both are. The difference between them is that Jack reacts to everything he thinks about with anger, while Seth doesn't react unless he is interacted with.
Seth is driving, Jack sits in the passenger seat, fidgeting, trying to see in all directions at the same time.
Jack (pointing at the dashboard panel): Dude, engine light's on.
Seth: So it is...
Jack: Does that mean anything unpleasant? I was raised to believe that the engine light being on was a bad thing.
Seth: It could be.
Jack: Well, are we going to get stranded in the middle of buttfuck Suburbs? I live in the city man, I don't know how to get home WALKING.
Seth: I don't know, give it another minute.
Jack: Do you have any idea how fat I am? I can't walk home. (seth doesn't respond) I mean, when you go on a ride with someone, there's a certain expectation that you will be given a ride home. I was fucking depending on you man. What the fuck!? Oh, I see how it is, the silent treatment, well fuck you too. (Jack crosses his arms and stares straight ahead.)
They both stare straight ahead at the camera for several seconds. Jack turns on the radio and turns it up loud.(then Jack could hear a campy song he likes and start singing along obnoxiously, or he could quietly groove) Seth turns the radio down to a reasonable level. Jack stops enjoying it.
There is a seven second, awkward pause.
Jack: You know, maybe nothing's wrong.
(Seth says nothing. Jack turns from looking at Seth to staring straight ahead.)
Three second awkward pause, then the radio cuts out.
Both characters look panicked, then relax over a few seconds. As soon as they have relaxed.
The car breaks.
Seth: FUCK! My fucking car.
Jack: Jesus, I'm sorry.
Cut to a shot of traffic speeding by.
Seth: Fuck you, what is this sorry shit? FUCK. What the fuck did you do?
Jack: This wasn't my fault.
Seth: Then what the fuck are you apologizing for? What's your fucking problem?
Jack: Fine, I take it back. I did jinx it though.
Seth: That doesn't... nevermind. (Grips the steering wheel, trying to contain himself.) FUCK! (completely calm) Okay, let's see what we're dealing with.
They exit the car.
VO: Please step away from the vehicle.
Jack: What? (he turns) Oh fuck.
Cut to a shot of a police officer.
Wimble: I said, "Please step away from the vehicle."
Seth steps away from the vehicle. Jack takes a step backward, then realizes he moved parallel to the vehicle, and takes a step directly away.
Jack: More than one step?
Wimble: Why don't you boys just come over here, and present me with your license and registration.
---
Plot sketch in progress.
Jul 3, 2005
The attempt at a fantasy story has been removed.
And the people rejoiced... Yaaay.
Thank you for rejoicing, and thank you for not telling me this story was good.
Because it was bad. I have decided that, and now it has forever been lost to the void.
Let's have a moment of silence for the story that, because of my slow wit, just couldn't make it.
Okay, that's enough silence.
It was just a fucking story.
What? Are you crazy?
And the people rejoiced... Yaaay.
Thank you for rejoicing, and thank you for not telling me this story was good.
Because it was bad. I have decided that, and now it has forever been lost to the void.
Let's have a moment of silence for the story that, because of my slow wit, just couldn't make it.
Okay, that's enough silence.
It was just a fucking story.
What? Are you crazy?
I realized I haven't been posting jokes lately. Then I thought: Who gives a shit? Then I got bored. Long story short, here is a joke or two that I've written recently.
Now, I'd like to talk about cows, or as I call them around my vegetarian friends: The milk trees.
---
I love reality television. Calm down, calm down. Let me explain. The thing I love about reality television is that it shows us how really, really stupid people breed. I know you're thinking, "Hey Nate, who gives a shit?" But I think it's important information. We HAVE to know how stupid people breed. Why? Well, because one day, someone is gonna have to stop them. Or at least, slow 'em down a little. And you can't just walk up to each of them and say,
"HEY! Stop it! Stop fucking, we're running out of stuff. Like what? Um, you know, stuff, like food... and stuff."
I tried that, and it didn't work. Yeah, maybe I was a little less than articulate, but if you can't just look around and SEE that we're running out of space on this fucking rock, then nothing I can do will bring you around.
---
Those are the jokes. The second one is still being re-written, but the body of the joke is about reality TV and stupid people fucking, and how it's going to be helpful further down the line to understand the retarded fornicators. In order to be able to stop them, so we don't all choke to death, together.
Because, honestly, I don't want to die with those assholes.
Now, I'd like to talk about cows, or as I call them around my vegetarian friends: The milk trees.
---
I love reality television. Calm down, calm down. Let me explain. The thing I love about reality television is that it shows us how really, really stupid people breed. I know you're thinking, "Hey Nate, who gives a shit?" But I think it's important information. We HAVE to know how stupid people breed. Why? Well, because one day, someone is gonna have to stop them. Or at least, slow 'em down a little. And you can't just walk up to each of them and say,
"HEY! Stop it! Stop fucking, we're running out of stuff. Like what? Um, you know, stuff, like food... and stuff."
I tried that, and it didn't work. Yeah, maybe I was a little less than articulate, but if you can't just look around and SEE that we're running out of space on this fucking rock, then nothing I can do will bring you around.
---
Those are the jokes. The second one is still being re-written, but the body of the joke is about reality TV and stupid people fucking, and how it's going to be helpful further down the line to understand the retarded fornicators. In order to be able to stop them, so we don't all choke to death, together.
Because, honestly, I don't want to die with those assholes.
MTV makes me want to smoke crack.
I watched, "Pimp My Ride" last night. Yeah, for the first time, and I'm sorry. Why am I sorry? Well, lots of reasons. I'm sorry if me watching "Pimp My Ride" destroys your vision of me. I'm sorry I contributed to the show's ratings. I'm sorry that people want their rides "Pimped." I'm sorry that mindlessness is spreading through our species at an alarming rate.
I'm sorry that I'm human, mostly because I'm ashamed to belong to the race of creature that decided MTV was a good idea.
So I guess what I want to say is this:
Dear MTV, Xzibit, and producers of "Pimp My Ride":
My name is Nate, and I'm a 21 year-old, white male who lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Under no circumstances whatsoever, are you to contemplate "pimping" my ride. I don't want to "Step off the sidelines and become a player." I don't want the super sweet shit you guys seem to have in abundance, and I don't want to be on your show.
If you touch my "ride," I will rub my testicles on your collective lips for all time, amen.
Also, I disagree with the premise, intent, and application of your television program. I encountered it on a channel which is incorrectly known as "Music Television". There was very little music in your show, and all of it was used to instigate false emotions within the lower creatures that watch your program.
In summary: I don't need a playstation and a 34 inch Television permanently tuned to MTV in my vehicle. I don't want Xzibit within twenty meters of my vehicle. Please, leave my "ride" the fuck alone.
Nate
PS: I know your audience has a short attention span, but I think you guys could use the title of your show a little less during the show itself.
Also... I think that simple, suburbanite, pasty white kids are doing just fine co-opting black culture on their own. You don't need to help them, or make them feel good about it. Because it's not cool, it's not their culture, and they're just realizing that everything their parents believe in is empty and meaningless. Let's let them kill themselves when they have this realization, alright? Really, it's for the best.
I watched, "Pimp My Ride" last night. Yeah, for the first time, and I'm sorry. Why am I sorry? Well, lots of reasons. I'm sorry if me watching "Pimp My Ride" destroys your vision of me. I'm sorry I contributed to the show's ratings. I'm sorry that people want their rides "Pimped." I'm sorry that mindlessness is spreading through our species at an alarming rate.
I'm sorry that I'm human, mostly because I'm ashamed to belong to the race of creature that decided MTV was a good idea.
So I guess what I want to say is this:
Dear MTV, Xzibit, and producers of "Pimp My Ride":
My name is Nate, and I'm a 21 year-old, white male who lives in Minneapolis, Minnesota. Under no circumstances whatsoever, are you to contemplate "pimping" my ride. I don't want to "Step off the sidelines and become a player." I don't want the super sweet shit you guys seem to have in abundance, and I don't want to be on your show.
If you touch my "ride," I will rub my testicles on your collective lips for all time, amen.
Also, I disagree with the premise, intent, and application of your television program. I encountered it on a channel which is incorrectly known as "Music Television". There was very little music in your show, and all of it was used to instigate false emotions within the lower creatures that watch your program.
In summary: I don't need a playstation and a 34 inch Television permanently tuned to MTV in my vehicle. I don't want Xzibit within twenty meters of my vehicle. Please, leave my "ride" the fuck alone.
Nate
PS: I know your audience has a short attention span, but I think you guys could use the title of your show a little less during the show itself.
Also... I think that simple, suburbanite, pasty white kids are doing just fine co-opting black culture on their own. You don't need to help them, or make them feel good about it. Because it's not cool, it's not their culture, and they're just realizing that everything their parents believe in is empty and meaningless. Let's let them kill themselves when they have this realization, alright? Really, it's for the best.
Jun 30, 2005
Mephisto shrugged. His robes heaved like the techtonic plates above him, rising into mountains before smoothing out to a semblance of calm. Unlike most of his kin, peace bore no malice toward his theologies. Serenity, peace, quiet, all of these human words he understood, though his word for the situation was older, and more complete for expressing the ideas contained in the human word.
He remembered being new. Even in his ancient mind, the first memories were easy to access and contemplate. The world dominated by humans, the world above him, was something he had helped to shape, but the best times had been much before humans were concieved.
At the beginning, the earth had been hot. Like his current home, it boiled and seethed with liquid metal and rock. Sure, the masterful propaganda machine of the host had made the legion's departure from the surface sound like a banishment, and in a way it was, but Mephisto would rather be near the center. Near the liquid rock that still flowed and boiled like fresh water, as it had on the surface. Before the host named him Legion, before anyone was named Legion.
In the beginning, before the first ones invented names, nothing was static. Everything was changing, everything was evolving. Volcanoes sprouted like weeds would in several billions of years. They sprayed liquid rock, which would cool, and form a mountain range where a sea had been.
The first ones were happy. Their origins had always been vague, but each of them knew they came from beneath the liquid rock. They watched the young planet boil and churn, wondering idly what would become of it.
A knock woke Mephisto from his reverie. The ivory throne beneath his demonic form groaned with shifting weight as he rose to answer. His thought-chamber had no windows or doors, but a select few knew how to rouse him from his ponderous slumbers. The chamber itself was a cube, with hewn basalt forming the walls, ceiling, and floor. Light came from mephisto's heavy-lidded eyes, and nowhere else.
He strode quickly to the wall, and reached through it. The wall parted like a liquid, and he grasped the hand of his visitor. The visitor would be Lilith or Lucifer, the prince himself, but they could be anywhere. Real distance between those who wished access and the location of the room was unimportant, as long as they wished to visit they would be dragged through the wall.
It was Lilith, which was unsurprising, since Lucifer conferenced so rarely of late. She had pressing news.
----
End of this short fiction.
He remembered being new. Even in his ancient mind, the first memories were easy to access and contemplate. The world dominated by humans, the world above him, was something he had helped to shape, but the best times had been much before humans were concieved.
At the beginning, the earth had been hot. Like his current home, it boiled and seethed with liquid metal and rock. Sure, the masterful propaganda machine of the host had made the legion's departure from the surface sound like a banishment, and in a way it was, but Mephisto would rather be near the center. Near the liquid rock that still flowed and boiled like fresh water, as it had on the surface. Before the host named him Legion, before anyone was named Legion.
In the beginning, before the first ones invented names, nothing was static. Everything was changing, everything was evolving. Volcanoes sprouted like weeds would in several billions of years. They sprayed liquid rock, which would cool, and form a mountain range where a sea had been.
The first ones were happy. Their origins had always been vague, but each of them knew they came from beneath the liquid rock. They watched the young planet boil and churn, wondering idly what would become of it.
A knock woke Mephisto from his reverie. The ivory throne beneath his demonic form groaned with shifting weight as he rose to answer. His thought-chamber had no windows or doors, but a select few knew how to rouse him from his ponderous slumbers. The chamber itself was a cube, with hewn basalt forming the walls, ceiling, and floor. Light came from mephisto's heavy-lidded eyes, and nowhere else.
He strode quickly to the wall, and reached through it. The wall parted like a liquid, and he grasped the hand of his visitor. The visitor would be Lilith or Lucifer, the prince himself, but they could be anywhere. Real distance between those who wished access and the location of the room was unimportant, as long as they wished to visit they would be dragged through the wall.
It was Lilith, which was unsurprising, since Lucifer conferenced so rarely of late. She had pressing news.
----
End of this short fiction.
Jun 23, 2005
John was used to cognitive dissonance. He believed that communsim was altogether correct, believed that it was the optimal way to organize human affairs and the inevitable politicing that results from them, yet worked in a retail outlet that fueled the machine he despised.
He still preached revolution rhetoric like he survived without the capitalist system. Health problems plagued him, though he was only in his early twenties. They were all stress related, and he did such heavy research on health that any twinge in his body was a hint of a much deeper malady. Stomach ulcers, heart palpitations, rapid weight loss and gain, problems with the most elusive addiction he had: sleep. He was addicted to many, many other things, but most of them were socially acceptable.
Mental instability had been with him, like an abusive love affair with a high-school teacher, since puberty. He knew he was unstable, even cultivated the image among his friends, yet still could not resist chemicals that drove him closer and closer to the brink of outright mental collapse. Methamphetamine, Cocaine, TetraHydroCannabinol, Ethanol, and anything else offered. It was all beyond him to refuse.
Panic attacks were a symptom of his extreme, unmitigated, auto-biographical stress levels coupled with his brain's inability to let some things slide. He had panic attacks more frequently if he used recreational chemicals and didn't sleep for a few days. He knew all of this, yet kept pushing himself towards the edge. Creating a comfort zone was beyond him.
Stress was a keyword in his culture. Everyone had it, and somehow, everyone else had learned to live with it. John knew he couldn't handle stress, knew that extreme stress made his heart develop atypical rhythms that would last for days, knew that his panic attacks were only getting worse, and also knew that his first heart attack was not in the distant future. It wasn't standing next to him, persay, but was much closer than the distant horizon, like the serial killer that would, in time, devour his entire family. Just waiting.
Yet again, here he was. The Canterbury Card Club, pretending to be a professional poker player. John knew that dreams of playing poker for a living didn't belong inside his head. Since he was so used to things not matching up in his life, he kept pushing, but he knew that panic attacks had no place at the poker table. He tried to fight them off, but sitting in his chair, drinking sugar, water, and caffiene blended together rarely did much to calm his nerves. This was mostly due to the stimulants he was addicted to, nicotine and caffeine. He looked at the cards he was dealt.
They weren't bad. Some people would call them good, but John had learned that he was unable to lie without instigating the first stages of a panic attack. Professional poker players are required to lie without thought, and he knew that his inability was a disadvantage. His only defense was to let his oppresive demeanor show through, and undervalue any hand he would happen to have in the game. If he had the absolute best hand possible, he still believed that he could easily lose a great deal of money. Better players would attempt to capitalize on this weakness, only to find themselves beaten. The problem was that it only worked once. Depression was a very real and tangible thing in his universe, like a closet holding the secrets of a lifetime, when the door won't quite close.
----
The action in this story isn't quite finished, in case you didn't notice, dear reader.
He still preached revolution rhetoric like he survived without the capitalist system. Health problems plagued him, though he was only in his early twenties. They were all stress related, and he did such heavy research on health that any twinge in his body was a hint of a much deeper malady. Stomach ulcers, heart palpitations, rapid weight loss and gain, problems with the most elusive addiction he had: sleep. He was addicted to many, many other things, but most of them were socially acceptable.
Mental instability had been with him, like an abusive love affair with a high-school teacher, since puberty. He knew he was unstable, even cultivated the image among his friends, yet still could not resist chemicals that drove him closer and closer to the brink of outright mental collapse. Methamphetamine, Cocaine, TetraHydroCannabinol, Ethanol, and anything else offered. It was all beyond him to refuse.
Panic attacks were a symptom of his extreme, unmitigated, auto-biographical stress levels coupled with his brain's inability to let some things slide. He had panic attacks more frequently if he used recreational chemicals and didn't sleep for a few days. He knew all of this, yet kept pushing himself towards the edge. Creating a comfort zone was beyond him.
Stress was a keyword in his culture. Everyone had it, and somehow, everyone else had learned to live with it. John knew he couldn't handle stress, knew that extreme stress made his heart develop atypical rhythms that would last for days, knew that his panic attacks were only getting worse, and also knew that his first heart attack was not in the distant future. It wasn't standing next to him, persay, but was much closer than the distant horizon, like the serial killer that would, in time, devour his entire family. Just waiting.
Yet again, here he was. The Canterbury Card Club, pretending to be a professional poker player. John knew that dreams of playing poker for a living didn't belong inside his head. Since he was so used to things not matching up in his life, he kept pushing, but he knew that panic attacks had no place at the poker table. He tried to fight them off, but sitting in his chair, drinking sugar, water, and caffiene blended together rarely did much to calm his nerves. This was mostly due to the stimulants he was addicted to, nicotine and caffeine. He looked at the cards he was dealt.
They weren't bad. Some people would call them good, but John had learned that he was unable to lie without instigating the first stages of a panic attack. Professional poker players are required to lie without thought, and he knew that his inability was a disadvantage. His only defense was to let his oppresive demeanor show through, and undervalue any hand he would happen to have in the game. If he had the absolute best hand possible, he still believed that he could easily lose a great deal of money. Better players would attempt to capitalize on this weakness, only to find themselves beaten. The problem was that it only worked once. Depression was a very real and tangible thing in his universe, like a closet holding the secrets of a lifetime, when the door won't quite close.
----
The action in this story isn't quite finished, in case you didn't notice, dear reader.
Jun 17, 2005
I wonder what the capitalists would do if they realized that the revolution never happened.
If they knew that the revolutions in the Soviet Union (Russia) and China were just murmurs of the prolitariat's distaste for the working conditions they are subjected to.
Even communists believe that the revolution failed in China and Russia, and they are just as incorrect as the capitalists.
Marx wasn't theorizing about the next few years, you silly fucks.
HE WAS TALKING ABOUT UNABATED CONTINUATION of capitalism.
This is what's been happening ever since the manifesto.
What's important is that we all remember what it said.
If Marx knew that capitalism would subjugate people worse than it was then, and worse than it is now, if he knew a thing like that. If he knew the framework the world would operate under well after his death, who are we to say that his predictions are wrong because they looked like they were coming true, but didn't.
Workers heard the message and knew it to be the message they had been waiting for.
The only workers that didn't just *negotiate* instead of going to war were peasants (in Russia and China). The workers that had the tool necessary to inflict damage to the capitalists were factory workers, and the peasants were the ones who revolted.
Two questions now nag our brains:
1. What was the specific tool that factory workers in a capitalist society had?
2. Why did the peasants revolt instead of the factory workers?
The tool factory workers possess is a basic flaw in capitalism. As an economic policy, capitalism won out over feudalism by being more a more efficient way to distribute wealth.
The flaw in capitalism's economic efficiency is simple: The production facilities are social. They are OWNED privately, by people who have nothing to do with the actual production of goods.
All that needs to take place for a more efficient society is coordinated political maneuvering of all workers.
If a coordinated political movement occurred within a peasant community, which is by default a private production system with private ownership, they would lack a voice once the revolution was concluded. Why? Because SOMEONE had to organize the peasants, and since peasants are only valuable to a political regime when growing foodstuffs, the person who organized the peasants sends them home after the revolution and says, "Things will be better soon."
The peasants revolted because peasants never get concessions from their exploiters, because peasants are so replaceable. If you kill a third of your peasant population to stop a revolution, the peasants are the class that feels the brunt of the starvation.
Since concessions were never made to the peasants, they were angry. Anger is a critical element for any revolution.
The factory workers? Well, they had taken steps when they organized themselves into labor unions. Then, the greed and intelligence of the exploiters won out, and the capitalists gave a little bit back to the workers in terms of higher wages and less time at work.
This concession is no longer acceptable, because as long as capitalists retain control of the social production means we're enslaved by, the select few capitalists will fight for the majority of wealth, and we (the proliteriat majority) must share the minority(ie: whatever is left and uneaten by the capitalists).
I just want to say: Communism is not dead. It is incorrect to postulate that communism doesn't work. The communist revolution hasn't happened yet.
I apologize if it seems that I'm insulting the people of China and Russia. That is not my intention at all, and for what it's worth: Good show. Kudos for trying, because without you we might not have seen the pitfalls to avoid when the revolution comes.
Dear NSA: I'm a comedian. This is a site for me to dump my thoughts onto. I'm not a subversive element. I like hot dogs, and being alive, and not dead. I like both of those two things more than Communism, and I say this to you: How could anyone who loves hot dogs more than economic equality really be a danger to anyone?
If they knew that the revolutions in the Soviet Union (Russia) and China were just murmurs of the prolitariat's distaste for the working conditions they are subjected to.
Even communists believe that the revolution failed in China and Russia, and they are just as incorrect as the capitalists.
Marx wasn't theorizing about the next few years, you silly fucks.
HE WAS TALKING ABOUT UNABATED CONTINUATION of capitalism.
This is what's been happening ever since the manifesto.
What's important is that we all remember what it said.
If Marx knew that capitalism would subjugate people worse than it was then, and worse than it is now, if he knew a thing like that. If he knew the framework the world would operate under well after his death, who are we to say that his predictions are wrong because they looked like they were coming true, but didn't.
Workers heard the message and knew it to be the message they had been waiting for.
The only workers that didn't just *negotiate* instead of going to war were peasants (in Russia and China). The workers that had the tool necessary to inflict damage to the capitalists were factory workers, and the peasants were the ones who revolted.
Two questions now nag our brains:
1. What was the specific tool that factory workers in a capitalist society had?
2. Why did the peasants revolt instead of the factory workers?
The tool factory workers possess is a basic flaw in capitalism. As an economic policy, capitalism won out over feudalism by being more a more efficient way to distribute wealth.
The flaw in capitalism's economic efficiency is simple: The production facilities are social. They are OWNED privately, by people who have nothing to do with the actual production of goods.
All that needs to take place for a more efficient society is coordinated political maneuvering of all workers.
If a coordinated political movement occurred within a peasant community, which is by default a private production system with private ownership, they would lack a voice once the revolution was concluded. Why? Because SOMEONE had to organize the peasants, and since peasants are only valuable to a political regime when growing foodstuffs, the person who organized the peasants sends them home after the revolution and says, "Things will be better soon."
The peasants revolted because peasants never get concessions from their exploiters, because peasants are so replaceable. If you kill a third of your peasant population to stop a revolution, the peasants are the class that feels the brunt of the starvation.
Since concessions were never made to the peasants, they were angry. Anger is a critical element for any revolution.
The factory workers? Well, they had taken steps when they organized themselves into labor unions. Then, the greed and intelligence of the exploiters won out, and the capitalists gave a little bit back to the workers in terms of higher wages and less time at work.
This concession is no longer acceptable, because as long as capitalists retain control of the social production means we're enslaved by, the select few capitalists will fight for the majority of wealth, and we (the proliteriat majority) must share the minority(ie: whatever is left and uneaten by the capitalists).
I just want to say: Communism is not dead. It is incorrect to postulate that communism doesn't work. The communist revolution hasn't happened yet.
I apologize if it seems that I'm insulting the people of China and Russia. That is not my intention at all, and for what it's worth: Good show. Kudos for trying, because without you we might not have seen the pitfalls to avoid when the revolution comes.
Dear NSA: I'm a comedian. This is a site for me to dump my thoughts onto. I'm not a subversive element. I like hot dogs, and being alive, and not dead. I like both of those two things more than Communism, and I say this to you: How could anyone who loves hot dogs more than economic equality really be a danger to anyone?
Jun 15, 2005
Manifesto for the Guardians of Time.
I would like to propose a theory that the profession of 'writer,' in terms of one who makes his survival with transcriptions of real or imaginary events, is an undertaught and underappreciated profession.
It is difficult to learn the craft, difficult to understand the craft, and many times more difficult to apply the craft. By craft, I mean the learned skill of articulating oneself through written words, rather than our instinctual method: speech.
Before I continue, I would like to discuss the word, "Talent," because I feel that the word is misused by many people, and furthermore that the misuse of this word displays something telling about present-day culture and preceptions of "writers."
Talent is a slippery word. The word's origins tie to units of currency and weight, but the most commonly used modern-day usage of the word is: "The natural endowments of a person," or, "a special, often creative or artistic aptitude."
It is interesting that this word's origins are in Ancient Greece, but that is the subject of another discussion entirely, so let's go back to my point about modern talent.
Talent is imaginary. There are instincts, learned behaviors, skills, physical prowess, and mental capability. There are no talents in this world of humans. None of us are born better able to paint with a brush and dyes better than the others. A person that argues for talents in this framework is undoubtedly wrong.
The ability to articulate something using a brush and carefully applied colors is not inborn. If it is not inborn, then it must be learned. Homo Sapiens, for all of the altogether surprising things they have done, do not have abstract things like science and art and oration hard-wired to their genes. This DOES NOT HAPPEN.
What does happen is this:
The range of genetic mutation in a species with over six billion living members is rather large. Every organism, including this prolific creature we are discussing, has instincts hard-wired to its brain chemistry influencing genes. These instincts are behaviors that increase its chances at survival.
Natural Selection has not had enough TIME since our speciation to create "Talents," in the way we describe them.
We do have instincts, which could be likened to talents, but they are NOT aesthetically pleasing in the way that we infer meaning from a "talent."
Your instincts, if you can't think of any, are probably much like mine.
I eat when I am hungry, and generally don't give it more thought than this: I'm hungry. Where is some food?
I hope you can follow me on this, because this first point is necessary for my argument. The word talent, as it is used in everyday speech, is a misnomer, and altogether illusory.
Everything humans learn to do that involves articulating their opinions is a learned skill, excepting body language and speech (though language is a learned skill, our brains are engineered to learn a language for vocal communication, which dictates that a genetic disposition for vocal communication exists).
A painter described as "talented" is actually just "practiced" or "skilled."
Good, I hope you're coming with me on that.
Now, since we have realized that there is no innate disposition for writing (Though I will concede that a human with an exeptional memory would make a good writer once (s)he learns the craft, this is different from an inborn ability that directly correlates to writing itself.), we immediately wonder why there are great writers.
They are very skilled. The human brain has an immense amount of space for learned skills. With time, patience, and desire to articulate something, the ability to articulate it will emerge. A human may not understand exactly how he or she has learned how to write well, but he or she will do it.
Of course, if you've never had a doubt as to whether or not you possess the raw brainpower necessary for writing, then you probably don't have it. The ability to doubt oneself on a level uncompromised by ego is a difficult proposition for Homo Sapiens, because our brains are not meant to do it on a regular basis. For all the sophistication of a Homo Sapien brain, it is not wired to consider things objectively. Everything we process through our over-evolved thinking organ is filtered in terms of our sense of "self."
Is it possible to think objectively? Yes, I think it is possible to judge oneself on a scale that is not relative. It is just difficult, and requires active concentration.
Enough of this though, my concerns involving Homo Sapien thought are for another post also.
The point is this: The modern conception of talent impedes the teaching of a craft like writing. If students are seen as either "talented" or "not talented", meaning that most students just don't have the predispositions for writing, then students are being judged incorrectly.
To better understand the way writing is taught in our culture, which will allow us to better understand what is cataclysmically wrong with writing in our culture, we must first know what a "writer" is.
A writer is not a storyteller. A storyteller can be a writer, but a writer is not limited to telling stories. Much like a square must always be a rectangle, but a rectangle need not be a square, writers can write anything they wish.
A "writer" in the purest since, is a champion of time. More specifically, a champion of his path through time. A writer makes it his duty to transcribe at least one set of thoughts among the chaotic babble of all thoughts. As infinite as time is, it is a thankless and difficult occupation.
It must be done. For our species. Writers are protectors of a specific portion on the infinite timeline. They are keepers of history, but they are not historians. Our historians memorize baroque events and dead names among the seething chaos of life in the universe. A writer believes that there are important ideas that must be remembered, because (s)he knows that events, locations, and names fade quickly from existence.
Some ideas must not be forgotten. To take that idea, and really run with it, a writer has to forget that everything is forgotten on a long enough timeline. A writer must know that what he does is almost certainly futile, and he must know that he will never know if he was successful. Not financially sucessful, though he most likely will be a financial failure, but successful in his duty to protect the timeline he was assigned.
Just because it already happened, does not mean that it isn't still there. It's just behind us, and we lack the ability to move freely in the dimension where our memories, and futures reside.
As a writer, you try to preserve a consciousness for as long as possible. Why you want to, is anyone's guess. All I know is that there are some reasons that you will want to stay away from. The first is money. Second: Fame.
These are things you may acquire as a skilled writer, but if they are the goal, then the entire enterprise is empty and meaningless. And the trouble is that you will never know, straight up, whether you can do it or not.
You have to commit yourself beforehand, and that is the scariest thing in the world.
Herein lies one of the first difficulties with teaching "writing" to "writers." This art of writing is elusive and difficult to grasp ahold of. Most people who learn to write well are unaware of how they learned it. As a result, our only teachers of writing offer bland insights on how they learned to write, but they did this entirely on their own. Already, upon your first instruction, a deviation takes place in regards to the specific teacher, and it should be clear that Homo Sapiens (ie, the teacher) can only teach what he learned as a student. The trouble with teaching students in the way that you learned (if you learned on your own) is that it's possible the way you discovered only works for you.
The difference in learning from a teacher and learning on one's own is merely the difference between knowing and doing. When you learn a skill by stumbling around in the dark until you know your way around, then you are learning to do it. Anytime something is passed on from a teacher to a student, it is known. Teacher says to student,"When x happens, do y," and the student knows what to do for one contingency. The teacher must separately instruct the student how to do the thing they understand so well.
Let me explain. If a teacher learned something from another teacher, he learned through instruction. He consciously controlled his mind to accomplish a certain end. With skills like writing (in terms of a craft), a human is entirely capable of doing it right without knowing consciously the right way to do it. If someone who doesn't *know* how they became a skilled writer, because they taught themselves, teaches an auditorium full of students, there is one single worthwhile thing he can tell the students:
You need to write and read a lot to learn how to write.
The people that write this way have no idea how to instruct anyone else on the craft(writing), because they accomplished it by making mistakes and seeing them.
One would think that, teaching a craft as vital as writing eloquently would be of paramount importance to Homo Sapiens (being that writing is our way of keeping the history of our species since we began writing).
Also: In a teacher/student relationship, two things must take place for anything beneficial to happen. The teacher must agree to teach the student, and the student must agree to learn. As it is a craft, the student should submit his request for teaching, and the master artisan should accept or deny the apprenticeship. This is not a folley of the teachers themselves, but the system which governs teaching. When the power to teach or not teach an individual student does not lie with the teacher, a problem arises. Simplified, it is not a complex problem, though it has far-reaching implications. If a teacher must accept students that cannot learn the craft, much like a blacksmith forced to accept a student with fingers that cannot swing a hammer effectively, the teacher will become frustrated with students that clearly cannot gain expertise in the craft. This frustration, if not viewed objectively, will transfer to the other students until the teacher applies it to all of them.
But to continue: In order to teach a skill, you must know how it is learned. If your teacher does not know a universal way to communicate the learning process, there is very little a student can glean.
Now, the format for writing instruction is also a detriment to the actual duty of the occupation. In order to gain the right students, the instructor must know that writing is a thankless duty that some of us must take it upon ourselves to do.
The fact is that we know it is a useless attempt. Shakespeare will be forgotten one day. Everything fades until it doesn't exist in a given timeline. Let me say it a different way: As our universe experiences the dimension of time as a single-direction journey, and as we experience ourselves moving only one direction within time, there are beginnings and ends of everything. Everything save the dimension itself.
As a writer, you must know that your efforts are futile, but you must also know that you still have to do it. You still have to record it. You still have to get it down in a format that will outlast you.
Why?
I don't know, but I do know that many Sapiens before me have done it when they must have known it was futility defined. I hope that many Sapiens after me will do it, even though they know it is pointless. This is not to say that they will find inspiration through my words, because that would imply success as a "writer," and success is never confirmed for us.
We build upon the shoulders of the timelines ending before our own begin, and through that, through each individual writer that does his duty to time, we can hope to start forming something that doesn't end.
This isn't about money or perfection, because both are tantalizing mirages. This is about each person doing their part for the better.
And this I say to you:
Tell me your stories.
I will be the lore-keeper.
I will be the defender of our mutal timelines.
I realize that I cannot defeat time, but I know that if those like me continue to do what they have done, we will create something real and lasting. Something without end, as long as we can wake up our brothers before they kill us all.
That, I think, might be worth it.
----
This post isn't finished. - Nate
I would like to propose a theory that the profession of 'writer,' in terms of one who makes his survival with transcriptions of real or imaginary events, is an undertaught and underappreciated profession.
It is difficult to learn the craft, difficult to understand the craft, and many times more difficult to apply the craft. By craft, I mean the learned skill of articulating oneself through written words, rather than our instinctual method: speech.
Before I continue, I would like to discuss the word, "Talent," because I feel that the word is misused by many people, and furthermore that the misuse of this word displays something telling about present-day culture and preceptions of "writers."
Talent is a slippery word. The word's origins tie to units of currency and weight, but the most commonly used modern-day usage of the word is: "The natural endowments of a person," or, "a special, often creative or artistic aptitude."
It is interesting that this word's origins are in Ancient Greece, but that is the subject of another discussion entirely, so let's go back to my point about modern talent.
Talent is imaginary. There are instincts, learned behaviors, skills, physical prowess, and mental capability. There are no talents in this world of humans. None of us are born better able to paint with a brush and dyes better than the others. A person that argues for talents in this framework is undoubtedly wrong.
The ability to articulate something using a brush and carefully applied colors is not inborn. If it is not inborn, then it must be learned. Homo Sapiens, for all of the altogether surprising things they have done, do not have abstract things like science and art and oration hard-wired to their genes. This DOES NOT HAPPEN.
What does happen is this:
The range of genetic mutation in a species with over six billion living members is rather large. Every organism, including this prolific creature we are discussing, has instincts hard-wired to its brain chemistry influencing genes. These instincts are behaviors that increase its chances at survival.
Natural Selection has not had enough TIME since our speciation to create "Talents," in the way we describe them.
We do have instincts, which could be likened to talents, but they are NOT aesthetically pleasing in the way that we infer meaning from a "talent."
Your instincts, if you can't think of any, are probably much like mine.
I eat when I am hungry, and generally don't give it more thought than this: I'm hungry. Where is some food?
I hope you can follow me on this, because this first point is necessary for my argument. The word talent, as it is used in everyday speech, is a misnomer, and altogether illusory.
Everything humans learn to do that involves articulating their opinions is a learned skill, excepting body language and speech (though language is a learned skill, our brains are engineered to learn a language for vocal communication, which dictates that a genetic disposition for vocal communication exists).
A painter described as "talented" is actually just "practiced" or "skilled."
Good, I hope you're coming with me on that.
Now, since we have realized that there is no innate disposition for writing (Though I will concede that a human with an exeptional memory would make a good writer once (s)he learns the craft, this is different from an inborn ability that directly correlates to writing itself.), we immediately wonder why there are great writers.
They are very skilled. The human brain has an immense amount of space for learned skills. With time, patience, and desire to articulate something, the ability to articulate it will emerge. A human may not understand exactly how he or she has learned how to write well, but he or she will do it.
Of course, if you've never had a doubt as to whether or not you possess the raw brainpower necessary for writing, then you probably don't have it. The ability to doubt oneself on a level uncompromised by ego is a difficult proposition for Homo Sapiens, because our brains are not meant to do it on a regular basis. For all the sophistication of a Homo Sapien brain, it is not wired to consider things objectively. Everything we process through our over-evolved thinking organ is filtered in terms of our sense of "self."
Is it possible to think objectively? Yes, I think it is possible to judge oneself on a scale that is not relative. It is just difficult, and requires active concentration.
Enough of this though, my concerns involving Homo Sapien thought are for another post also.
The point is this: The modern conception of talent impedes the teaching of a craft like writing. If students are seen as either "talented" or "not talented", meaning that most students just don't have the predispositions for writing, then students are being judged incorrectly.
To better understand the way writing is taught in our culture, which will allow us to better understand what is cataclysmically wrong with writing in our culture, we must first know what a "writer" is.
A writer is not a storyteller. A storyteller can be a writer, but a writer is not limited to telling stories. Much like a square must always be a rectangle, but a rectangle need not be a square, writers can write anything they wish.
A "writer" in the purest since, is a champion of time. More specifically, a champion of his path through time. A writer makes it his duty to transcribe at least one set of thoughts among the chaotic babble of all thoughts. As infinite as time is, it is a thankless and difficult occupation.
It must be done. For our species. Writers are protectors of a specific portion on the infinite timeline. They are keepers of history, but they are not historians. Our historians memorize baroque events and dead names among the seething chaos of life in the universe. A writer believes that there are important ideas that must be remembered, because (s)he knows that events, locations, and names fade quickly from existence.
Some ideas must not be forgotten. To take that idea, and really run with it, a writer has to forget that everything is forgotten on a long enough timeline. A writer must know that what he does is almost certainly futile, and he must know that he will never know if he was successful. Not financially sucessful, though he most likely will be a financial failure, but successful in his duty to protect the timeline he was assigned.
Just because it already happened, does not mean that it isn't still there. It's just behind us, and we lack the ability to move freely in the dimension where our memories, and futures reside.
As a writer, you try to preserve a consciousness for as long as possible. Why you want to, is anyone's guess. All I know is that there are some reasons that you will want to stay away from. The first is money. Second: Fame.
These are things you may acquire as a skilled writer, but if they are the goal, then the entire enterprise is empty and meaningless. And the trouble is that you will never know, straight up, whether you can do it or not.
You have to commit yourself beforehand, and that is the scariest thing in the world.
Herein lies one of the first difficulties with teaching "writing" to "writers." This art of writing is elusive and difficult to grasp ahold of. Most people who learn to write well are unaware of how they learned it. As a result, our only teachers of writing offer bland insights on how they learned to write, but they did this entirely on their own. Already, upon your first instruction, a deviation takes place in regards to the specific teacher, and it should be clear that Homo Sapiens (ie, the teacher) can only teach what he learned as a student. The trouble with teaching students in the way that you learned (if you learned on your own) is that it's possible the way you discovered only works for you.
The difference in learning from a teacher and learning on one's own is merely the difference between knowing and doing. When you learn a skill by stumbling around in the dark until you know your way around, then you are learning to do it. Anytime something is passed on from a teacher to a student, it is known. Teacher says to student,"When x happens, do y," and the student knows what to do for one contingency. The teacher must separately instruct the student how to do the thing they understand so well.
Let me explain. If a teacher learned something from another teacher, he learned through instruction. He consciously controlled his mind to accomplish a certain end. With skills like writing (in terms of a craft), a human is entirely capable of doing it right without knowing consciously the right way to do it. If someone who doesn't *know* how they became a skilled writer, because they taught themselves, teaches an auditorium full of students, there is one single worthwhile thing he can tell the students:
You need to write and read a lot to learn how to write.
The people that write this way have no idea how to instruct anyone else on the craft(writing), because they accomplished it by making mistakes and seeing them.
One would think that, teaching a craft as vital as writing eloquently would be of paramount importance to Homo Sapiens (being that writing is our way of keeping the history of our species since we began writing).
Also: In a teacher/student relationship, two things must take place for anything beneficial to happen. The teacher must agree to teach the student, and the student must agree to learn. As it is a craft, the student should submit his request for teaching, and the master artisan should accept or deny the apprenticeship. This is not a folley of the teachers themselves, but the system which governs teaching. When the power to teach or not teach an individual student does not lie with the teacher, a problem arises. Simplified, it is not a complex problem, though it has far-reaching implications. If a teacher must accept students that cannot learn the craft, much like a blacksmith forced to accept a student with fingers that cannot swing a hammer effectively, the teacher will become frustrated with students that clearly cannot gain expertise in the craft. This frustration, if not viewed objectively, will transfer to the other students until the teacher applies it to all of them.
But to continue: In order to teach a skill, you must know how it is learned. If your teacher does not know a universal way to communicate the learning process, there is very little a student can glean.
Now, the format for writing instruction is also a detriment to the actual duty of the occupation. In order to gain the right students, the instructor must know that writing is a thankless duty that some of us must take it upon ourselves to do.
The fact is that we know it is a useless attempt. Shakespeare will be forgotten one day. Everything fades until it doesn't exist in a given timeline. Let me say it a different way: As our universe experiences the dimension of time as a single-direction journey, and as we experience ourselves moving only one direction within time, there are beginnings and ends of everything. Everything save the dimension itself.
As a writer, you must know that your efforts are futile, but you must also know that you still have to do it. You still have to record it. You still have to get it down in a format that will outlast you.
Why?
I don't know, but I do know that many Sapiens before me have done it when they must have known it was futility defined. I hope that many Sapiens after me will do it, even though they know it is pointless. This is not to say that they will find inspiration through my words, because that would imply success as a "writer," and success is never confirmed for us.
We build upon the shoulders of the timelines ending before our own begin, and through that, through each individual writer that does his duty to time, we can hope to start forming something that doesn't end.
This isn't about money or perfection, because both are tantalizing mirages. This is about each person doing their part for the better.
And this I say to you:
Tell me your stories.
I will be the lore-keeper.
I will be the defender of our mutal timelines.
I realize that I cannot defeat time, but I know that if those like me continue to do what they have done, we will create something real and lasting. Something without end, as long as we can wake up our brothers before they kill us all.
That, I think, might be worth it.
----
This post isn't finished. - Nate
Jun 12, 2005
Joshua glanced at his customer, drinking the woman's appearance in a single, swift glance.
He began to process it as he automatically tallied her purchases.
Fingers attached to his hand hit the two key, then the nine key three times. Conscious thought was unnecessary. A 29.99 item meant nothing to him save the correlation between the muscle memory that corresponded to his ring and middle fingers, which hit the numbers.
She might be too young to make these purchases, but he didn't want to offend her if she was. An offended woman meant that copulation with her was impossible, and since Josh considered his copulation options limited, he aimed to offend as few females of his species as possible. He wasn't optimistic, but stranger things had happened.
He wondered if this specific woman worked for the money she was spending. Did she, like so many he had encountered, work very hard for another person's profit, only to spend her compensation on chemicals to help her relax?
If she didn't work for her money, he wondered where she got it.
His fingered reached a distinct point in their automated sequence, the end. The last key was struck, the one that said "Sub-Total" in blocky, printed characters.
His brain initiated his vocal chords, because he had found the best way to alert people that he was finished was telling them.
"Fifty-three, sixty-two, ma'am." Josh said.
The woman began digging in her satchel. He extracted a sheaf of pulverized trees and handed him several. The papers were vaguely green, and had strange symbols and markings on them. She smiled. A stimulus ran down Josh's spine, and she had no idea. The smile of a female sent his brain into overdrive, he began thinking so fast he was unable to articulate any of it in the way he was familiar with communicating.
Diaphragms contracted, pulling open the lungs and allowing oxygen into the carrier vessel, blood.
He stood with the paper in his hand, looking like an automated machine that has been switched off. Only the air-conditioner was audible.
She coughed. He snapped out of it.
"Out of fifty-five." He said, and took the papers from her outstretched hand. Fighting the desire to touch her was expected of him, so he did it.
His fingers began moving again, like the mechanic limbs of a robotic assembly line. This time, his middle finger and thumb did all the work, but it was simple work. They did it entirely by themselves. Five, five, zero, zero. Two strokes per digit. None of it required his attention.
He looked at her, and began counting out her change. It was one hundred and thirty-eight cents. Thousands of thoughts, conversation beginnings flogged through his head like a whip.
She took the money and left.
--
Poop.
He began to process it as he automatically tallied her purchases.
Fingers attached to his hand hit the two key, then the nine key three times. Conscious thought was unnecessary. A 29.99 item meant nothing to him save the correlation between the muscle memory that corresponded to his ring and middle fingers, which hit the numbers.
She might be too young to make these purchases, but he didn't want to offend her if she was. An offended woman meant that copulation with her was impossible, and since Josh considered his copulation options limited, he aimed to offend as few females of his species as possible. He wasn't optimistic, but stranger things had happened.
He wondered if this specific woman worked for the money she was spending. Did she, like so many he had encountered, work very hard for another person's profit, only to spend her compensation on chemicals to help her relax?
If she didn't work for her money, he wondered where she got it.
His fingered reached a distinct point in their automated sequence, the end. The last key was struck, the one that said "Sub-Total" in blocky, printed characters.
His brain initiated his vocal chords, because he had found the best way to alert people that he was finished was telling them.
"Fifty-three, sixty-two, ma'am." Josh said.
The woman began digging in her satchel. He extracted a sheaf of pulverized trees and handed him several. The papers were vaguely green, and had strange symbols and markings on them. She smiled. A stimulus ran down Josh's spine, and she had no idea. The smile of a female sent his brain into overdrive, he began thinking so fast he was unable to articulate any of it in the way he was familiar with communicating.
Diaphragms contracted, pulling open the lungs and allowing oxygen into the carrier vessel, blood.
He stood with the paper in his hand, looking like an automated machine that has been switched off. Only the air-conditioner was audible.
She coughed. He snapped out of it.
"Out of fifty-five." He said, and took the papers from her outstretched hand. Fighting the desire to touch her was expected of him, so he did it.
His fingers began moving again, like the mechanic limbs of a robotic assembly line. This time, his middle finger and thumb did all the work, but it was simple work. They did it entirely by themselves. Five, five, zero, zero. Two strokes per digit. None of it required his attention.
He looked at her, and began counting out her change. It was one hundred and thirty-eight cents. Thousands of thoughts, conversation beginnings flogged through his head like a whip.
She took the money and left.
--
Poop.
Don't stop me now.
Here's a poker quiz:
1. At a six player limit table, four players are active. First to act raises the pre-flop betting to two bets, second player folds, and both blinds call the flop.
The flop is A-spades, K-spades 4-clubs.
Small blind checks the flop, big blind places a bet, and the pre-flop raiser acts. He raises to two bets. Small blind agonizes and then calls, clearly expecting a call from the player to his left. His hopes are confirmed when that player calls.
The turn card falls. It is a 10 of diamonds.
Small blind checks, big blind bets, third player raises. Small blind calls quickly, and big blind raises. Third player re-raises, making it three bets for a river card. Small blind calls again. Betting progresses until the raise-limit is reached. Big blind and player #3 raise each other and small blind calls it down.
The river is: 7 of spades.
Small blind checks, big blind checks, third player bets. Small blind raises, big blind raises to three bets. Player 3 folds. Small blind raises one final time, to four bets, and big blind calls.
What were the cards in hand? More importantly, what rank was each player's hand at each stage of the betting?
Well? You've decided on your answer?
Small blind had 9 2 spades.
Big blind had K K, or pocket kings.
First to act had A 4 off-suit.
Weeee! that was fun.
Here's a poker quiz:
1. At a six player limit table, four players are active. First to act raises the pre-flop betting to two bets, second player folds, and both blinds call the flop.
The flop is A-spades, K-spades 4-clubs.
Small blind checks the flop, big blind places a bet, and the pre-flop raiser acts. He raises to two bets. Small blind agonizes and then calls, clearly expecting a call from the player to his left. His hopes are confirmed when that player calls.
The turn card falls. It is a 10 of diamonds.
Small blind checks, big blind bets, third player raises. Small blind calls quickly, and big blind raises. Third player re-raises, making it three bets for a river card. Small blind calls again. Betting progresses until the raise-limit is reached. Big blind and player #3 raise each other and small blind calls it down.
The river is: 7 of spades.
Small blind checks, big blind checks, third player bets. Small blind raises, big blind raises to three bets. Player 3 folds. Small blind raises one final time, to four bets, and big blind calls.
What were the cards in hand? More importantly, what rank was each player's hand at each stage of the betting?
Well? You've decided on your answer?
Small blind had 9 2 spades.
Big blind had K K, or pocket kings.
First to act had A 4 off-suit.
Weeee! that was fun.
Jun 4, 2005
I saw a movie called "High Tension," two days ago.
Whoa boy do I have some things to say about this movie, and the first should be that the name is not a misnomer. It was fucking tense.
It's also a French film, which I have no problem with because I knew going into it. When you go to see a French film, you just need to realize that the people who made it are fucking French. They just can't help it, and as a result, their movie is just... really... French.
The fact that it's French doesn't come into play very often except in two avenues of the experience: First, it's French, and really wierd. Second, parts of it are dubbed into English by shitty voice actors and parts of it are subtitled. That fact was jarring, and plus, I hate dubbed versions of almost anything. Excepting maybe Iron Chef, because that show is so fucking funny. All I'm saying, Lions Gate Films, is this: Leave the fucking audio track alone and give me some subtitles so I know what the fuck is going on. There's no need for these people to speak my language. The combination of subtitles and dubbing in the movie was jarring, and was unnecessary.
Now, the fun stuff about the movie deserves some introduction. As I said, it was a horror movie. I am not well versed in horror, BUT, I have NEVER seen a movie quite so disturbing. It's not a psychological thriller by any means, it's not an exceptionally plotted horror (though the French are notorious for complicated plots). When I say disturbing, what I mean is this: I had to look away from the screen. Many, many times. This hasn't happened to me since I was a young child and saw Braveheart in theatres. At that time, the scene where William Wallace is disemboweled made me look away. Now that I'm older, I can watch it without flinching.
This movie, on the other end, was fucking brutal. Don't take a girl to see it. I mean BRUTAL. You still don't believe me, you can't just take my word for it. Let me describe one of the deaths:
A man is cut several times with a straight razor. He collapsses to the floor from the pain, while blood streams out of his face and chest. The killer calmly follows him as he crawls ever so slowly up a flight of stairs. When the man with a straight razor catches up to the man who is belly-crawling up the stairs, he grabs the prone victim by the hair and wedges his head in between the handrail supports on the stairs. The head won't quite go through, but after a savage kick, squeezes in.
Then, with the bleeding jackass stuck with his head in the stairs, the killer gets a running start while pushing a clothing dresser. Pushing it parallel to the stairs, he catches the other guy in the face with it, and rips his head off. Our view for the killing blow is from the ceiling, so we can see it all in perfect detail.
Now, that wasn't very well narrated, and was also one of the easier deaths to watch in the movie. Hopefully, you get the point. Not a movie for the faint of heart. It scared the shit out of me, and I was shaking when I left the theater.
Also, a pair of titties can be seen at one point in the movie, as well as a female masturbation scene.
Kudos for that.
Whoa boy do I have some things to say about this movie, and the first should be that the name is not a misnomer. It was fucking tense.
It's also a French film, which I have no problem with because I knew going into it. When you go to see a French film, you just need to realize that the people who made it are fucking French. They just can't help it, and as a result, their movie is just... really... French.
The fact that it's French doesn't come into play very often except in two avenues of the experience: First, it's French, and really wierd. Second, parts of it are dubbed into English by shitty voice actors and parts of it are subtitled. That fact was jarring, and plus, I hate dubbed versions of almost anything. Excepting maybe Iron Chef, because that show is so fucking funny. All I'm saying, Lions Gate Films, is this: Leave the fucking audio track alone and give me some subtitles so I know what the fuck is going on. There's no need for these people to speak my language. The combination of subtitles and dubbing in the movie was jarring, and was unnecessary.
Now, the fun stuff about the movie deserves some introduction. As I said, it was a horror movie. I am not well versed in horror, BUT, I have NEVER seen a movie quite so disturbing. It's not a psychological thriller by any means, it's not an exceptionally plotted horror (though the French are notorious for complicated plots). When I say disturbing, what I mean is this: I had to look away from the screen. Many, many times. This hasn't happened to me since I was a young child and saw Braveheart in theatres. At that time, the scene where William Wallace is disemboweled made me look away. Now that I'm older, I can watch it without flinching.
This movie, on the other end, was fucking brutal. Don't take a girl to see it. I mean BRUTAL. You still don't believe me, you can't just take my word for it. Let me describe one of the deaths:
A man is cut several times with a straight razor. He collapsses to the floor from the pain, while blood streams out of his face and chest. The killer calmly follows him as he crawls ever so slowly up a flight of stairs. When the man with a straight razor catches up to the man who is belly-crawling up the stairs, he grabs the prone victim by the hair and wedges his head in between the handrail supports on the stairs. The head won't quite go through, but after a savage kick, squeezes in.
Then, with the bleeding jackass stuck with his head in the stairs, the killer gets a running start while pushing a clothing dresser. Pushing it parallel to the stairs, he catches the other guy in the face with it, and rips his head off. Our view for the killing blow is from the ceiling, so we can see it all in perfect detail.
Now, that wasn't very well narrated, and was also one of the easier deaths to watch in the movie. Hopefully, you get the point. Not a movie for the faint of heart. It scared the shit out of me, and I was shaking when I left the theater.
Also, a pair of titties can be seen at one point in the movie, as well as a female masturbation scene.
Kudos for that.
I know we can't agree on much as a culture, fragmented as we've become, but we need to get together and decide finally, and for the first time, who it was that let the dogs out in the first place.
Nobody likes that joke but me, and I wrote it like 3 years ago. It's teething.
I haven't been able to work on anything lately. More posts soon.
OH! This might interest you guys:
I found out exactly why republicans don't care about clean air to breathe or clean water to drink. For a long time, I thought it was that they were just ignorant, lazy and greedy, but it's not the WHOLE story. They're ignorant, lazy, greedy robots! Makes perfect sense doesn't it? They just need oil! You know, for lubrication or whatever robots need oil for, but it's been cleartly established that robots need oil. It all fits together so perfectly!
Nobody likes that joke but me, and I wrote it like 3 years ago. It's teething.
I haven't been able to work on anything lately. More posts soon.
OH! This might interest you guys:
I found out exactly why republicans don't care about clean air to breathe or clean water to drink. For a long time, I thought it was that they were just ignorant, lazy and greedy, but it's not the WHOLE story. They're ignorant, lazy, greedy robots! Makes perfect sense doesn't it? They just need oil! You know, for lubrication or whatever robots need oil for, but it's been cleartly established that robots need oil. It all fits together so perfectly!
May 30, 2005
I wouldn't want the four people who read this to get bored, especially since my last post was largely nonsensical.
Well, almost all of it was quotated without appropriate documentation. Also, if you're not listening to "Fat-Bottomed Girls" by Queen when you read the post... well, it's largely nonsensical.
I apologize for the lack of electronic information from me. check out Yoshville for some stuff. He's got some great arguments, and if you want to learn about anything, just reply to his posts.
I'm working on a screenplay right now, and so have nothing significant to add. While you grapple with the fact that I've got nothing for you, ponder this:
Where are all the good men dead? In the heart, or in the head.
Yeah, it's not my line. Fuck you. You're just supposed to think about it.
Well, almost all of it was quotated without appropriate documentation. Also, if you're not listening to "Fat-Bottomed Girls" by Queen when you read the post... well, it's largely nonsensical.
I apologize for the lack of electronic information from me. check out Yoshville for some stuff. He's got some great arguments, and if you want to learn about anything, just reply to his posts.
I'm working on a screenplay right now, and so have nothing significant to add. While you grapple with the fact that I've got nothing for you, ponder this:
Where are all the good men dead? In the heart, or in the head.
Yeah, it's not my line. Fuck you. You're just supposed to think about it.
May 26, 2005
Are you gonna take me home tonight?
Oh! Down beside that red firelight.
Are you gonna let it all hang out?
Fat-bottomed girls, you make the rockin world go 'round.
This post is for Monica Lewinsky, Alisa Walters, Lisa Cook, Eleanor Roosevelt, Jackie Onassis, and all the ladies whose names may have already been lost to the great beast of time. Mostly for Alisa Walters, because I feel her contributions to the world in a very real, and legally binding sense.
This song is for all the fat-bottomed girls.
You ladies make it all worthwhile.
Oh! Won't you take me home tonight?
Oh! Down beside your red firelight.
Oh! And you give it all you got.
Fat-bottomed girls, you make the rockin' world go 'round.
GET ON YOUR BIKES AND RIDE!
----
And I couldn't have said it better myself. When a man works a job he hates, and tries to manage everything else in his life. When he's exhausted, and when he still tries to do the things he feels he has to do. Not for any base instinct, but because he feels an obligation to himself and his reality. The only reason is a fat-bottomed girl. One more time? You're right.
I was just a skinny lad
Never knew no good from bad
But I knew life before i left my nursery
Left alone with big fat Fanny
She was such a naughty nanny
Hey big woman, you made a bad boy out of me.
Hey hey.
Are you gonna take me home tonight?
Oh! Down beside that red firelight!
Are you gonna let it all hang out?
Fat-bottomed girls, you make the rockin' world go round.
Oh! Down beside that red firelight.
Are you gonna let it all hang out?
Fat-bottomed girls, you make the rockin world go 'round.
This post is for Monica Lewinsky, Alisa Walters, Lisa Cook, Eleanor Roosevelt, Jackie Onassis, and all the ladies whose names may have already been lost to the great beast of time. Mostly for Alisa Walters, because I feel her contributions to the world in a very real, and legally binding sense.
This song is for all the fat-bottomed girls.
You ladies make it all worthwhile.
Oh! Won't you take me home tonight?
Oh! Down beside your red firelight.
Oh! And you give it all you got.
Fat-bottomed girls, you make the rockin' world go 'round.
GET ON YOUR BIKES AND RIDE!
----
And I couldn't have said it better myself. When a man works a job he hates, and tries to manage everything else in his life. When he's exhausted, and when he still tries to do the things he feels he has to do. Not for any base instinct, but because he feels an obligation to himself and his reality. The only reason is a fat-bottomed girl. One more time? You're right.
I was just a skinny lad
Never knew no good from bad
But I knew life before i left my nursery
Left alone with big fat Fanny
She was such a naughty nanny
Hey big woman, you made a bad boy out of me.
Hey hey.
Are you gonna take me home tonight?
Oh! Down beside that red firelight!
Are you gonna let it all hang out?
Fat-bottomed girls, you make the rockin' world go round.
May 25, 2005
I would like to thank everyone on the feedback about Firmly Disenchanted. I really want to flesh out that story and finish it. However.
I have to put it on the back burner for now because I want to tell a different story. This other one started as a screenplay, so I'm attempting to finish it in that format. Honestly, I haven't worked on the screenplay in a couple of days (i mean really worked on it), because my life keeps getting in the way.
Right now I've just got the beginning and the tenative end.
It's hard, but I want to see it through until it is finished and I can show it to someone who's willing to read a 100 page script. I want to be able to show it to that person unabashedly.
This might take a while, but after it's finished, I want to finish "Firmly Disenchanted."
Here's a transcript of the beginning of the script:
----
Ext. Afternoon. Establishing shot of a largish, white house on the corner of two streets. Cut to the sidewalk in front of the building, again to the front door, again to the interior. (3 fast cuts, each one zooms in slightly with a broken up, jagged feeling, almost as if someone is teleporting thirty feet every few frames.)
Int. Afternoon. A disheveled living room has shoes, jackets, grungy socks and taco bell wrappers littered on almost every surface. Seth appears to be sleeping on a couch, with an aerospace engineering textbook open over his face, while Nate is working (playing poker online) on a laptop.
Nate screams and flails his arms: FUCK. Fucking shit on a . . . fuck. FUCK. What the fuck. Fucking... (he begins to trail off and sputter, forming only a few more real words) Who the fuck does that?
Seth doesn't move, but from under the book he says something inaudible.
Nate (tersely, without looking up from his computer): WHAT?
Seth lets the book fall to the floor as he sits up.
Seth: I said, "How many finals do you have Tuesday?"
Nate: Is it...? (he looks up from his computer and glances around) What day is it?
Seth: Sunday. It's Sunday. How many?
Nate: I don't know, two maybe. (gestures to his computer) This fucking asshole...
Seth: Maybe you shouldn't play the game if it gets you so strung out. Just drop it if you can't be Zen about the shit, you know?
Nate: Fuck you. Do you even know who I am? Agriculture infuriates me.
Seth: Ri-ight. How many finals do you have?
Nate: I dunno, I'd have to check my ... (he starts looking around without getting up, moving shit around near him, but making no significant progress). Fuck, where are my syllabuses?
Seth: Ballpark it. Ten. Two. ... Less?
Nate: Why are you crawling up my ass about this? Like one, maybe. (he starts looking around again) Where the fuck...
Seth: I have five. FIVE. So I need my fucking sleep. Oh, and it's syllabi, by the way.
Nate: Who's the English major here? That's how it's pronounced, number boy.
Seth: Whatever.
The conversation stalls, Seth closes his eyes and Nate goes back to his computer.
----
It goes on from there. Comments? You can click on the comments link at the end of this post, OR hit up the tagboard. The possibilities are almost limitless, if limitless is three, and almost limitless is two.
Anyway, after that conversation the characters decide to go to a coffee shop. It's self-important drivel really, pretentious as all hell, but I'm going to finish it. Once the plot is finished, I can make the rest of it better.
It takes so much patience to fill in all the dots between the beginning (which i've been working on) and the end (which i've been thinking about), because I have found that I absolutely cannot just write it chronologically. When I'm writing it I have to jump around and write whatever conversation I'm thinking about, so it takes a lot of cutting and pasting to get something that flows.
Anyway, it's late and I'm finished working on shit for now, because I have to work a job I don't give a shit about tomorrow. I guess I just wanted to squeeze a little more time out of my day off.
Good night kids. Don't work too hard for anyone but yourself.
Nate
I have to put it on the back burner for now because I want to tell a different story. This other one started as a screenplay, so I'm attempting to finish it in that format. Honestly, I haven't worked on the screenplay in a couple of days (i mean really worked on it), because my life keeps getting in the way.
Right now I've just got the beginning and the tenative end.
It's hard, but I want to see it through until it is finished and I can show it to someone who's willing to read a 100 page script. I want to be able to show it to that person unabashedly.
This might take a while, but after it's finished, I want to finish "Firmly Disenchanted."
Here's a transcript of the beginning of the script:
----
Ext. Afternoon. Establishing shot of a largish, white house on the corner of two streets. Cut to the sidewalk in front of the building, again to the front door, again to the interior. (3 fast cuts, each one zooms in slightly with a broken up, jagged feeling, almost as if someone is teleporting thirty feet every few frames.)
Int. Afternoon. A disheveled living room has shoes, jackets, grungy socks and taco bell wrappers littered on almost every surface. Seth appears to be sleeping on a couch, with an aerospace engineering textbook open over his face, while Nate is working (playing poker online) on a laptop.
Nate screams and flails his arms: FUCK. Fucking shit on a . . . fuck. FUCK. What the fuck. Fucking... (he begins to trail off and sputter, forming only a few more real words) Who the fuck does that?
Seth doesn't move, but from under the book he says something inaudible.
Nate (tersely, without looking up from his computer): WHAT?
Seth lets the book fall to the floor as he sits up.
Seth: I said, "How many finals do you have Tuesday?"
Nate: Is it...? (he looks up from his computer and glances around) What day is it?
Seth: Sunday. It's Sunday. How many?
Nate: I don't know, two maybe. (gestures to his computer) This fucking asshole...
Seth: Maybe you shouldn't play the game if it gets you so strung out. Just drop it if you can't be Zen about the shit, you know?
Nate: Fuck you. Do you even know who I am? Agriculture infuriates me.
Seth: Ri-ight. How many finals do you have?
Nate: I dunno, I'd have to check my ... (he starts looking around without getting up, moving shit around near him, but making no significant progress). Fuck, where are my syllabuses?
Seth: Ballpark it. Ten. Two. ... Less?
Nate: Why are you crawling up my ass about this? Like one, maybe. (he starts looking around again) Where the fuck...
Seth: I have five. FIVE. So I need my fucking sleep. Oh, and it's syllabi, by the way.
Nate: Who's the English major here? That's how it's pronounced, number boy.
Seth: Whatever.
The conversation stalls, Seth closes his eyes and Nate goes back to his computer.
----
It goes on from there. Comments? You can click on the comments link at the end of this post, OR hit up the tagboard. The possibilities are almost limitless, if limitless is three, and almost limitless is two.
Anyway, after that conversation the characters decide to go to a coffee shop. It's self-important drivel really, pretentious as all hell, but I'm going to finish it. Once the plot is finished, I can make the rest of it better.
It takes so much patience to fill in all the dots between the beginning (which i've been working on) and the end (which i've been thinking about), because I have found that I absolutely cannot just write it chronologically. When I'm writing it I have to jump around and write whatever conversation I'm thinking about, so it takes a lot of cutting and pasting to get something that flows.
Anyway, it's late and I'm finished working on shit for now, because I have to work a job I don't give a shit about tomorrow. I guess I just wanted to squeeze a little more time out of my day off.
Good night kids. Don't work too hard for anyone but yourself.
Nate
May 21, 2005
I just read "Firmly Disenchanted," again, and I think it will be one of my better stories after being edited.
It's basically about a Political Science student that instigates a social revolution in the United States of America.
Anyway, I think that the thing people really disliked about the story was the obtuse way it is told. It is an interesting story, but I had too much fun with the language.
You see, the main character's name is Firmly Proctor, and I personally find his name hilarious and love making puns with it. Other people don't find it so funny.
Honestly though, it amuses the shit out of me.
Anyway, this is me deciding to edit the Firmly story. It was originally called "Firmly Goes and Gets Some," which is an inside joke with a person I've never met. She's an author in the twin cities named Emily Carter who published a book titled "Glory Goes and Gets Some."
I think her writing is very, very good. Chick stuff, but still awesome. Pick it up if you waste your time watching soap operas, if you want to see some fucked up relationships and personal delimmas, without all the bad acting and commercials.
Oh, if you like that kind of stuff, I also recommend Jonathan Franzen. His characters are so flawed that you can't like any of them, but it's really fun watching them fuck each other over. Again and again.
So, this post is mostly a reminder to me to either continue the plot of Firmly Disenchanted, because the intro and the conclusion match, but the middle of the story, where everything happens, is much, much shorter than it needs to be for the story to make sense to a reader.
Also, editing the story would be good, because the language is like muddy poop in parts.
If you're interested in the story by reading this post, you can find it in the archives, I think it's got a title and everything, or I could just link it here.
It's about 22 pages double spaced. Email me if y0u require a word .doc and I will send it.
TAG THE TAGBOARD!
Post comments!
Good lord, someone has to be reading this. I want guilt and or sympathy posts.
*begins to cry* You bastards!
It's basically about a Political Science student that instigates a social revolution in the United States of America.
Anyway, I think that the thing people really disliked about the story was the obtuse way it is told. It is an interesting story, but I had too much fun with the language.
You see, the main character's name is Firmly Proctor, and I personally find his name hilarious and love making puns with it. Other people don't find it so funny.
Honestly though, it amuses the shit out of me.
Anyway, this is me deciding to edit the Firmly story. It was originally called "Firmly Goes and Gets Some," which is an inside joke with a person I've never met. She's an author in the twin cities named Emily Carter who published a book titled "Glory Goes and Gets Some."
I think her writing is very, very good. Chick stuff, but still awesome. Pick it up if you waste your time watching soap operas, if you want to see some fucked up relationships and personal delimmas, without all the bad acting and commercials.
Oh, if you like that kind of stuff, I also recommend Jonathan Franzen. His characters are so flawed that you can't like any of them, but it's really fun watching them fuck each other over. Again and again.
So, this post is mostly a reminder to me to either continue the plot of Firmly Disenchanted, because the intro and the conclusion match, but the middle of the story, where everything happens, is much, much shorter than it needs to be for the story to make sense to a reader.
Also, editing the story would be good, because the language is like muddy poop in parts.
If you're interested in the story by reading this post, you can find it in the archives, I think it's got a title and everything, or I could just link it here.
It's about 22 pages double spaced. Email me if y0u require a word .doc and I will send it.
TAG THE TAGBOARD!
Post comments!
Good lord, someone has to be reading this. I want guilt and or sympathy posts.
*begins to cry* You bastards!
May 19, 2005
I'm werking, and the place is dead, so I've been writing a rough draft of a fiction piece.
Here it is:
Christine dreamed herself into a different universe. In the dream, she opened her eyes.
Immediate knowing assaulted her consciousness. She grappled with it for a few moments, and when all seemed lost, scored a late submission hold for the victory. Control of her senses, and the ability to interpret their input rushed to meet her like friends and family after her wrestling match with knowledge.
Knowledge was a fierce opponent, and she knew that the more information it held, the more fiercely it would fight her. All of this is beside the point though. We want to know exactly what knowing assaulted her, and why, not the intricacies of ego destruction and belief systems.
Chris knew that she was in an alien universe, a foreign world, she was dreaming it, and it was wonderous.
Her visual cortex told her she could see a certain wavelength of light, indicating an endless field of grain refracting the golden color of a setting sun. She could see the sun setting behind an ocean of grain. The wheat, or other plant-structure, looked like a three dimensional audio-track of her favorite song. The very motion from the faintest air movements brought great crests and valleys. Everything was working perfectly.
The wheat waved to her like a beloved relative welcoming her home. She was home. Stalks trembled and bent in the slight breeze, sheparding the golden waves of light from the sun.
She had one thought for a long time: Oh my God. This is so beautiful.
Only one real word came into her mind.
Harmony.
But the thought she had wasn't exactly a word. It went farther, deeper into her brain. Her language called the feeling 'harmony,' but she knew that any language would have a word for the concept she was thinking about. It was an idea. Of perfect beauty. Of a beauty so immaculate, that one could spend eternity looking for the flaw, spend twenty million human lifetimes trying to uncover the naked ugliness it was hiding, and never find a single thing wrong with it.
She said, "Harmony."
The sun disappeared and the moon rose. The moon set and the sun rose. This rotation began to speed up to her perception, until the two celestial bodies became a godly blur in the infinite darkness beyond.
Time became malleable, but Chris did not shape it. She wished it would slow down, that the rotations the sun and moon would slow to a pace she understood, but she did not try to stop it herself.
How much time was passing in each second? Was she still asleep? Had she dreamt? What was the dream, and was it important?
Chris had no illusions about only forgetting unimportant information. If that was the case, she reasoned, her language wouldn't have had a word for forgetting. What would be the point if it was unimportant in the first place?
What was important? The blur? In the unique location of time-space she was in, differences between things became insubstantial, faint, unimportant. Then, completely insignificant before disappearing altogether.
She began to panic, though she hadn't been the least bit afraid before. Difference between herself and everything else was something she was used to holding as truth. Looking through the amalgam of energy around her, she was unable to differentiate where anything ended or began. Everything was essentially the same.
What made her special?
She couldn't think of anything, and began to scream.
Her apartment in Dallas, Texas reverberated with the sound, and when she found herself back in a reality that she recognized, she forgot the dream.
Sleep wrapped his arms around her again, shushing her over-evolved, over-achieving thinking organ. The organ that never thought about Chris. The brain began sorting things, slightly cross that Christine had panicked and woken up the lower levels of herself that needed reassurance in a chaotic universe. They were too simple. They would never understand. The brain filed the dream away in the section Chris had no access to, a place she would never see them.
There was still something fundamental, at the core of her being that the brain couldn't sort out.
Couldn't find it, and didn't know what it was. There was something, though, beyond the science that explained her. Her brain knew the science that explained most of her actions, but she continually surprised it, as she had done when she woke herself up.
Maybe it wasn't really there, this imaginary thing that kept her brain from understanding her entirely. But the brain had to admit, that there was evidence to support a theory.
----
Anyway, I haven't proofread that story, and I just wrote it. Keep in mind the fact that I'm at work.
I apologize for my shittiness.
Fuck.
---
This is the second draft, but I'm not going to update what I wrote at work. Meaning the stuff after the story and before this paragraph. It's there, and I'm going to leave this here when I do a third draft. If you've read the story in it's entirety before but not read this... try reading it again, I added a whole paragraph!
I'm gonna go do something else for now.
Here it is:
Christine dreamed herself into a different universe. In the dream, she opened her eyes.
Immediate knowing assaulted her consciousness. She grappled with it for a few moments, and when all seemed lost, scored a late submission hold for the victory. Control of her senses, and the ability to interpret their input rushed to meet her like friends and family after her wrestling match with knowledge.
Knowledge was a fierce opponent, and she knew that the more information it held, the more fiercely it would fight her. All of this is beside the point though. We want to know exactly what knowing assaulted her, and why, not the intricacies of ego destruction and belief systems.
Chris knew that she was in an alien universe, a foreign world, she was dreaming it, and it was wonderous.
Her visual cortex told her she could see a certain wavelength of light, indicating an endless field of grain refracting the golden color of a setting sun. She could see the sun setting behind an ocean of grain. The wheat, or other plant-structure, looked like a three dimensional audio-track of her favorite song. The very motion from the faintest air movements brought great crests and valleys. Everything was working perfectly.
The wheat waved to her like a beloved relative welcoming her home. She was home. Stalks trembled and bent in the slight breeze, sheparding the golden waves of light from the sun.
She had one thought for a long time: Oh my God. This is so beautiful.
Only one real word came into her mind.
Harmony.
But the thought she had wasn't exactly a word. It went farther, deeper into her brain. Her language called the feeling 'harmony,' but she knew that any language would have a word for the concept she was thinking about. It was an idea. Of perfect beauty. Of a beauty so immaculate, that one could spend eternity looking for the flaw, spend twenty million human lifetimes trying to uncover the naked ugliness it was hiding, and never find a single thing wrong with it.
She said, "Harmony."
The sun disappeared and the moon rose. The moon set and the sun rose. This rotation began to speed up to her perception, until the two celestial bodies became a godly blur in the infinite darkness beyond.
Time became malleable, but Chris did not shape it. She wished it would slow down, that the rotations the sun and moon would slow to a pace she understood, but she did not try to stop it herself.
How much time was passing in each second? Was she still asleep? Had she dreamt? What was the dream, and was it important?
Chris had no illusions about only forgetting unimportant information. If that was the case, she reasoned, her language wouldn't have had a word for forgetting. What would be the point if it was unimportant in the first place?
What was important? The blur? In the unique location of time-space she was in, differences between things became insubstantial, faint, unimportant. Then, completely insignificant before disappearing altogether.
She began to panic, though she hadn't been the least bit afraid before. Difference between herself and everything else was something she was used to holding as truth. Looking through the amalgam of energy around her, she was unable to differentiate where anything ended or began. Everything was essentially the same.
What made her special?
She couldn't think of anything, and began to scream.
Her apartment in Dallas, Texas reverberated with the sound, and when she found herself back in a reality that she recognized, she forgot the dream.
Sleep wrapped his arms around her again, shushing her over-evolved, over-achieving thinking organ. The organ that never thought about Chris. The brain began sorting things, slightly cross that Christine had panicked and woken up the lower levels of herself that needed reassurance in a chaotic universe. They were too simple. They would never understand. The brain filed the dream away in the section Chris had no access to, a place she would never see them.
There was still something fundamental, at the core of her being that the brain couldn't sort out.
Couldn't find it, and didn't know what it was. There was something, though, beyond the science that explained her. Her brain knew the science that explained most of her actions, but she continually surprised it, as she had done when she woke herself up.
Maybe it wasn't really there, this imaginary thing that kept her brain from understanding her entirely. But the brain had to admit, that there was evidence to support a theory.
----
Anyway, I haven't proofread that story, and I just wrote it. Keep in mind the fact that I'm at work.
I apologize for my shittiness.
Fuck.
---
This is the second draft, but I'm not going to update what I wrote at work. Meaning the stuff after the story and before this paragraph. It's there, and I'm going to leave this here when I do a third draft. If you've read the story in it's entirety before but not read this... try reading it again, I added a whole paragraph!
I'm gonna go do something else for now.
May 13, 2005
Sometimes, when I look at a blank page, nothing pops into my brain. This is one of those times. I could write about how I've been reading HP Lovecraft, and how it amazes me. Cephaisis is my favorite story so far, though the journey to unknown kadath was excellent as well. Just the balls this guy puts onto the paper, and after you get the impression that he really might know the answer to life, the universe, and everything and is expressing it to you in this story, right after that happens, the main character wakes up and goes back to work in everyday London.
The character gets so close to complete understanding that we as readers feel as though we completely understand something. Then, that character wakes up. The entire, 120 page story was a fucking dream. I didn't know you could even DO THAT.
In fact, I know it's considered bad narrative style. You are not supposed to leave things open to your audience, you wrap it up into a neat, little pre-digested ball of information that you've figured out and tie the bow on it (that's the conclusion part of the story-arc).
What you DO NOT DO, is write a novella, where the character begins to go insane and die, then whoops! it was all a dream, the character wakes up. He has a life in the reality we know of.
There is no more story after the main character in quest for unknown kadath wakes up. That's RIGHT where it ends. And it's absolutely beautiful.
It's, it's just that it's the perfect expression of aesthetically pleasing reading. The kind that gives us pleasant thoughts, and something that leaves us thinking. It was beautiful.
I don't mean it was well done or cunningly crafted. Those are different qualities a story can possess, it was beautiful, in the most basic definition of the word.
Pleasing. His stories ease the stress involved with the very FINITEness of my existence, using their absolute beauty like a soothing balm. I know you didn't tell me to put on the balm. But I put on the balm, and honestly, it helps. It feels better now.
I can't explain it any better than that, but if you've ever wondered what it will be like after you die, read some Lovecraft, he's got a better idea than the current leader of Catholicism. Which, in case nobody has told you, was a fucking NAZI in his youth.
Maybe I think being a NAZI would prevent you from leading a religious order.... but I'm no economist.
Maybe I'm rambling. Mitch Hedburg is dead, and I feel that loss much more personally than I feel the death of Pope John Paul IVXIVIX or whatever the fuck letters go after his name. Was he the ninth? Twentieth? Does anyone give a fuck? No. I feel bad for saying that, but I think that the Catholic Church is an anitiquated institution that has no fucking bearing on the conditions people are trying to survive.
Though the former pope did some nice things, which I honestly don't know a damn thing about, I must say: Thanks for trying.
I do know that birth control pills still send you to hell. And God, and the Bible.
Good night.
Proofreading is a bitch.
The character gets so close to complete understanding that we as readers feel as though we completely understand something. Then, that character wakes up. The entire, 120 page story was a fucking dream. I didn't know you could even DO THAT.
In fact, I know it's considered bad narrative style. You are not supposed to leave things open to your audience, you wrap it up into a neat, little pre-digested ball of information that you've figured out and tie the bow on it (that's the conclusion part of the story-arc).
What you DO NOT DO, is write a novella, where the character begins to go insane and die, then whoops! it was all a dream, the character wakes up. He has a life in the reality we know of.
There is no more story after the main character in quest for unknown kadath wakes up. That's RIGHT where it ends. And it's absolutely beautiful.
It's, it's just that it's the perfect expression of aesthetically pleasing reading. The kind that gives us pleasant thoughts, and something that leaves us thinking. It was beautiful.
I don't mean it was well done or cunningly crafted. Those are different qualities a story can possess, it was beautiful, in the most basic definition of the word.
Pleasing. His stories ease the stress involved with the very FINITEness of my existence, using their absolute beauty like a soothing balm. I know you didn't tell me to put on the balm. But I put on the balm, and honestly, it helps. It feels better now.
I can't explain it any better than that, but if you've ever wondered what it will be like after you die, read some Lovecraft, he's got a better idea than the current leader of Catholicism. Which, in case nobody has told you, was a fucking NAZI in his youth.
Maybe I think being a NAZI would prevent you from leading a religious order.... but I'm no economist.
Maybe I'm rambling. Mitch Hedburg is dead, and I feel that loss much more personally than I feel the death of Pope John Paul IVXIVIX or whatever the fuck letters go after his name. Was he the ninth? Twentieth? Does anyone give a fuck? No. I feel bad for saying that, but I think that the Catholic Church is an anitiquated institution that has no fucking bearing on the conditions people are trying to survive.
Though the former pope did some nice things, which I honestly don't know a damn thing about, I must say: Thanks for trying.
I do know that birth control pills still send you to hell. And God, and the Bible.
Good night.
Proofreading is a bitch.
May 12, 2005
Alright. It's way past due. I'm adding a link to Yoshville.
It's a great site, and since the guy does his own code, I'm calling it a site instead of a weblog.
Anyway. It's in the links page now. I've got a post about something right here though, so hold your curiosity about yoshville for a second.
I've been thinking a lot about genetics and selection lately. Evolution. Particularly the evolution that created Homo Sapiens Sapiens, because it is such a unique and interesting animal.
It is, in its own collective and recorded existence (which it calls history) an absolutely unique animal. Personally, in all my years, I have not encountered an organism that behaves the way humans (as they call themselves) behave.
Now, there are certain animals and bacteria, and even more primitive forms of life such as RNA viruses and such, that possess behaviors humans routinely exhibit.
Several examples of this can be found. My favorite example of a simpler organism that shows something about human behavior is yeast.
What we call yeast is a name for a number of single-celled fungi that are, in reality, separated into several of their own subgroups. It is an organism that Homo Sapiens Sapiens utilize for an interesting ritual that will be explained later (see section 17, "Getting Tanked and Loving it"). Most cultivated yeast belongs to the genus Saccharomyces. The yeast called "Brewer's Yeast" is Saccharomyces cerevisiae.
There is a quality which all of the things Homo Sapiens sapiens call "yeast" share. One interesting thing about this same quality is that all Humans share that same quality.
This quality I speak of is a behavior, and will be my final point for the night. First we need to understand how a delightful substance called "Beer," is formed. Three things are absolutely required for beer: yeast, an oat or grain (This is what gives the beer flavor, anything you've got laying around will work though. I think. I'm getting sidetracked, but I think you'll want to make a sort of wine or more heavily distilled liquid if you don't have a grain or an oat or barley or something.), and something for the yeast to eat. They like sugar. Sucrose, anything. They just love sugar, and will eat the shit out of it day in and day out.
Yeast will eat whatever sugary substance you put them in a container with. They're only one cell in size, but they absolutely love to consume. They will eat and shit until there is no food left (when they go into hibernation) or they all choke on their own shit (and die).
Yeast shit is called Ethanol, and it has an intoxicating effect on humans. It loosens their control over themselves. Being restrained in a society such as they are, humans have an unhealthy amount of self-control. They like the relief yeast shit gives them.
Ethanol, or yeast shit if you prefer (I know I do), is poisonous to yeast. Every animal's shit is poisonous to it. The solution every animal has is that it is adapted into a system that keeps its population under control, because every animal will eat, reproduce, and shit until it kills itself (within the geographic location this portion of the species is located) unless controls are imposed upon it.
Humans have removed the controls set in place to keep them from exterminating themselves.
There are two options for Homo Sapiens sapiens now that they have recognized the exact size of the bottle they are trapped on. They must learn to limit themselves, or they must concoct an escape plan to flee their cage.
--
The sad part, is that the second option only prolongs the extinction of the race, because unlimited growth and consumption has to end sometime. I think.
I've heard the universe is big, and sometimes, I really hope it is.
Einstein said the only neverending things were the universe and human stupidity, and he wasn't positive about the universe. Unless population growth is reduced or eliminated, we may learn (as a species, not individuals, this will happen after we are all dead) which is actually larger.
Until we know how big, and can travel it in periods of time shorter than our lifetimes, let's all take it easy on the consumption and propagation, OKAY?
If your genes are too fucking stellar to pass up, throw them in.
ONCE. That's all you get.
Maybe the universe truly is infinite. Once we know that, we can go hog wild. If the universe is infinite, and there are no other species like ourselves, then I don't see a problem with all the FUCKING that's going on right now.
However, if the universe is infinite, and human expansion continues unabated, contact with a sentient life-form alien to Earth is exponentially more likely than you might think. I'd be so audacious as to call it probable. If that ever happens, bad things will follow.
---
Sapiens, we need to get our shit together.
Do it! Right now.
---
I'm too tired to proofread this anymore. Nate.
It's a great site, and since the guy does his own code, I'm calling it a site instead of a weblog.
Anyway. It's in the links page now. I've got a post about something right here though, so hold your curiosity about yoshville for a second.
I've been thinking a lot about genetics and selection lately. Evolution. Particularly the evolution that created Homo Sapiens Sapiens, because it is such a unique and interesting animal.
It is, in its own collective and recorded existence (which it calls history) an absolutely unique animal. Personally, in all my years, I have not encountered an organism that behaves the way humans (as they call themselves) behave.
Now, there are certain animals and bacteria, and even more primitive forms of life such as RNA viruses and such, that possess behaviors humans routinely exhibit.
Several examples of this can be found. My favorite example of a simpler organism that shows something about human behavior is yeast.
What we call yeast is a name for a number of single-celled fungi that are, in reality, separated into several of their own subgroups. It is an organism that Homo Sapiens Sapiens utilize for an interesting ritual that will be explained later (see section 17, "Getting Tanked and Loving it"). Most cultivated yeast belongs to the genus Saccharomyces. The yeast called "Brewer's Yeast" is Saccharomyces cerevisiae.
There is a quality which all of the things Homo Sapiens sapiens call "yeast" share. One interesting thing about this same quality is that all Humans share that same quality.
This quality I speak of is a behavior, and will be my final point for the night. First we need to understand how a delightful substance called "Beer," is formed. Three things are absolutely required for beer: yeast, an oat or grain (This is what gives the beer flavor, anything you've got laying around will work though. I think. I'm getting sidetracked, but I think you'll want to make a sort of wine or more heavily distilled liquid if you don't have a grain or an oat or barley or something.), and something for the yeast to eat. They like sugar. Sucrose, anything. They just love sugar, and will eat the shit out of it day in and day out.
Yeast will eat whatever sugary substance you put them in a container with. They're only one cell in size, but they absolutely love to consume. They will eat and shit until there is no food left (when they go into hibernation) or they all choke on their own shit (and die).
Yeast shit is called Ethanol, and it has an intoxicating effect on humans. It loosens their control over themselves. Being restrained in a society such as they are, humans have an unhealthy amount of self-control. They like the relief yeast shit gives them.
Ethanol, or yeast shit if you prefer (I know I do), is poisonous to yeast. Every animal's shit is poisonous to it. The solution every animal has is that it is adapted into a system that keeps its population under control, because every animal will eat, reproduce, and shit until it kills itself (within the geographic location this portion of the species is located) unless controls are imposed upon it.
Humans have removed the controls set in place to keep them from exterminating themselves.
There are two options for Homo Sapiens sapiens now that they have recognized the exact size of the bottle they are trapped on. They must learn to limit themselves, or they must concoct an escape plan to flee their cage.
--
The sad part, is that the second option only prolongs the extinction of the race, because unlimited growth and consumption has to end sometime. I think.
I've heard the universe is big, and sometimes, I really hope it is.
Einstein said the only neverending things were the universe and human stupidity, and he wasn't positive about the universe. Unless population growth is reduced or eliminated, we may learn (as a species, not individuals, this will happen after we are all dead) which is actually larger.
Until we know how big, and can travel it in periods of time shorter than our lifetimes, let's all take it easy on the consumption and propagation, OKAY?
If your genes are too fucking stellar to pass up, throw them in.
ONCE. That's all you get.
Maybe the universe truly is infinite. Once we know that, we can go hog wild. If the universe is infinite, and there are no other species like ourselves, then I don't see a problem with all the FUCKING that's going on right now.
However, if the universe is infinite, and human expansion continues unabated, contact with a sentient life-form alien to Earth is exponentially more likely than you might think. I'd be so audacious as to call it probable. If that ever happens, bad things will follow.
---
Sapiens, we need to get our shit together.
Do it! Right now.
---
I'm too tired to proofread this anymore. Nate.
Apr 28, 2005
For a link regarding the inherent flaws in Right Wing Politics, click here.
Thanks to www.yoshville.com for the argument.
Thanks to www.yoshville.com for the argument.
Spoken Word/Oratory:
This is your life.
Good to the last drop.
It doesn't get any better than this.
Sometimes we forget this simple fact, and we live unconsciously.
If you never knew that you were alive.
I mean really knew it,
you've always been dead.
Before it happens,
you'll probably look back and take stock of your life.
Leave your livestock alone and remember:
This is your life.
Good to the last drop.
It doesn't get any better than this.
This is your life.
It is right here.
All you have to do is open your eyes and look at it.
The scariest part is figuring out what you want to do before you die.
It isn't a list.
It isn't an opinion poll.
This is one,
simple,
question.
And you have to know the answer.
But first thing's first: Imagine you're dead.
If you were dead,
right now,
what do you wish you would've done before you died?
Why aren't you doing it?
We are the middle children of history, and all middle children have to find their own way.
----
This was inspired (though I certainly don't consider it inspired, I'm only saying that some of the phrases and all of the ideas came from somewhere) by Daniel Quinn and Chuck Palahniuk.
Thanks for reading. Please send questions/comments/blasphemy/small children/complaints to absh0005@umn.edu or click on the 'Email Nate' link.
This is your life.
Good to the last drop.
It doesn't get any better than this.
Sometimes we forget this simple fact, and we live unconsciously.
If you never knew that you were alive.
I mean really knew it,
you've always been dead.
Before it happens,
you'll probably look back and take stock of your life.
Leave your livestock alone and remember:
This is your life.
Good to the last drop.
It doesn't get any better than this.
This is your life.
It is right here.
All you have to do is open your eyes and look at it.
The scariest part is figuring out what you want to do before you die.
It isn't a list.
It isn't an opinion poll.
This is one,
simple,
question.
And you have to know the answer.
But first thing's first: Imagine you're dead.
If you were dead,
right now,
what do you wish you would've done before you died?
Why aren't you doing it?
We are the middle children of history, and all middle children have to find their own way.
----
This was inspired (though I certainly don't consider it inspired, I'm only saying that some of the phrases and all of the ideas came from somewhere) by Daniel Quinn and Chuck Palahniuk.
Thanks for reading. Please send questions/comments/blasphemy/small children/complaints to absh0005@umn.edu or click on the 'Email Nate' link.
Apr 27, 2005
Moderatly humorous tagboard activity.
Here is a transcript.
Jon: Nate, get on AIM, we got a WC3 tourny.
Cephaladon: I saw the PBS documentary, "The Elegant Universe" It Rules.
Anti-Tasha: Tasha, you are very attractive.
Anti-Tasha: In fact, Tasha, you are so attractive that I would buy you a library of magazines.
Anti-Tasha: Well, half of a library.
Anti-Tasha: Oh, what the hell. I'd get you an entire library of magazines.
Anti-Tasha: Well, I'd buy them for you if they were good magazines.
Anti-Tasha: But then I would have to ask myself (as I don't know you) whether form or content is more important, or some combination of both?
Anti-Tasha: If you value content, then I'd buy you a library of magazines with good content in them.
Anti-Tasha: On the other hand, if you value form, then I'd just buy you some flowers and point out their prettiness.
Anti-Tasha: But if you're an all-in-one woman, and value equally both form and content, then you get Cosmo.
Anti-Tasha: If Cosmo got boring, I hope that you would let me know. I could get you so many other magazines!
Anti-Tasha: Wait! Come to think about it, I would have given you an entire library of magazines, so you could pick out your own reads!
Anti-Tasha: You know, I've given it some thought, and I've decided to take back my offer of the library. I think that I'd be better off finding somebody else. Goodbye, Tasha.
Anti-Tasha: Nate, do you like magazines? ;)
Here is a transcript.
Jon: Nate, get on AIM, we got a WC3 tourny.
Cephaladon: I saw the PBS documentary, "The Elegant Universe" It Rules.
Anti-Tasha: Tasha, you are very attractive.
Anti-Tasha: In fact, Tasha, you are so attractive that I would buy you a library of magazines.
Anti-Tasha: Well, half of a library.
Anti-Tasha: Oh, what the hell. I'd get you an entire library of magazines.
Anti-Tasha: Well, I'd buy them for you if they were good magazines.
Anti-Tasha: But then I would have to ask myself (as I don't know you) whether form or content is more important, or some combination of both?
Anti-Tasha: If you value content, then I'd buy you a library of magazines with good content in them.
Anti-Tasha: On the other hand, if you value form, then I'd just buy you some flowers and point out their prettiness.
Anti-Tasha: But if you're an all-in-one woman, and value equally both form and content, then you get Cosmo.
Anti-Tasha: If Cosmo got boring, I hope that you would let me know. I could get you so many other magazines!
Anti-Tasha: Wait! Come to think about it, I would have given you an entire library of magazines, so you could pick out your own reads!
Anti-Tasha: You know, I've given it some thought, and I've decided to take back my offer of the library. I think that I'd be better off finding somebody else. Goodbye, Tasha.
Anti-Tasha: Nate, do you like magazines? ;)
Apr 26, 2005
So. I wrote today. I worked on a little comedy, a little fiction, and a little pretentious drivel(I have to get it out somehow). I don't really have the text handy at the moment, so I'm just going to re-write a joke I thought of today, since this site is supposed to be about my comedy.
If you don't think things written in here are quite funny, then just keep looking. If you don't think this next joke is funny, just trust me that it is utterly hilarious, and when this joke--that I will re-write later in the post--was performed live, it nearly killed five people.
I'm saying that a lot is lost in the translation.
I was just kidding, I'm not going to re-write the joke right now. I know, I know, you didn't really care. That's why I'm spiting you like this. It wouldn't be spite if it wasn't just an empty gesture.
Just so you know though, it was about bears. And really, really fucking funny.
Fuckers.
If you don't think things written in here are quite funny, then just keep looking. If you don't think this next joke is funny, just trust me that it is utterly hilarious, and when this joke--that I will re-write later in the post--was performed live, it nearly killed five people.
I'm saying that a lot is lost in the translation.
I was just kidding, I'm not going to re-write the joke right now. I know, I know, you didn't really care. That's why I'm spiting you like this. It wouldn't be spite if it wasn't just an empty gesture.
Just so you know though, it was about bears. And really, really fucking funny.
Fuckers.
Apr 1, 2005
I'm currently trying to get my life back on track. This isn't the forum that I use for explaining these kinds of things (what's wrong and what I'm doing to change it) so I'll leave it at that.
Suffice it to say that something's been wrong and I'm working on fixing it.
I'm not going to go on about this, but I wanted to explain my lack of posts.
I'll have a story (probably unfinished) posted soon, or some standup that has been written but has yet to be performed, or something funny in general before the week is out.
I haven't forgotten you, the humor-seeker, the barrel rider, the riddle master. This isn't livejournal, so keep that in mind when I don't post for a while. I've been dealing with shit, and it's the kind of shit that you really don't care about.
Now, I will try to write some musings and things that are worth reading.
If you ever write fantasy, you have to realize that the poems in the world you're writing about will require much more work than the story itself, because you suck at poetry.
Mitch Hedberg was a shining star that everybody loved. His comedy was the magic kind. The kind that everybody liked. This made me angry at times, because I consider myself to be much more intelligent than some of his other fans, but now I realize that the single accomplishment of pleasing everyone who heard his acts was probably the most amazing facet of his abilities. Let's not even go into the acts themselves.
I feel like an asshole saying this, but comedy has lost a luminary. Mitch, perhaps it means nothing to you now, but you are missed by people you never knew of.
Do you like american comedy? I like american comedy. I like american comedy, baby.
Suffice it to say that something's been wrong and I'm working on fixing it.
I'm not going to go on about this, but I wanted to explain my lack of posts.
I'll have a story (probably unfinished) posted soon, or some standup that has been written but has yet to be performed, or something funny in general before the week is out.
I haven't forgotten you, the humor-seeker, the barrel rider, the riddle master. This isn't livejournal, so keep that in mind when I don't post for a while. I've been dealing with shit, and it's the kind of shit that you really don't care about.
Now, I will try to write some musings and things that are worth reading.
If you ever write fantasy, you have to realize that the poems in the world you're writing about will require much more work than the story itself, because you suck at poetry.
Mitch Hedberg was a shining star that everybody loved. His comedy was the magic kind. The kind that everybody liked. This made me angry at times, because I consider myself to be much more intelligent than some of his other fans, but now I realize that the single accomplishment of pleasing everyone who heard his acts was probably the most amazing facet of his abilities. Let's not even go into the acts themselves.
I feel like an asshole saying this, but comedy has lost a luminary. Mitch, perhaps it means nothing to you now, but you are missed by people you never knew of.
Do you like american comedy? I like american comedy. I like american comedy, baby.
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