everyday nomad souls

Sell me the blue sky and paint me with clouds of blasphemy. Apparently the Vatican’s are reconsidering their ban on the use of condoms. The spin in this case is that it’s for the prevention of AIDS among married couples, choosing the lesser of two evils; there’s the spilling of ones seed, subverting “God’s will” in reproduction vs. being culpable in the infection of innocent party. So literally, if you screw your wife you may as well consider yourself screwed too. Unless algorithmic procedures are in your philosophy of life, take the time to mull over the possible alimony. Hell, America alone may be rich off infidelity.

Like I said, that’s the spin. The nitty gritty is that approx 7.5% of the sub-Saharan African population is infected with AIDS and that percentage continues to grow each year along with some 2.2 million deaths so far and the likely worst yet to come. The biggest source of growth for the Catholics has long been 3rd world countries; poverty and desperation are great indicators for religious growth potential. What the church sees is it’s believers dying off faster than they are being replaced. What they see is children dying because fathers infected mothers because of this other women insist on condom use despite the church’s pronouncements, a situation that will always lead to a lessening of the church’s authority. Loss of authority over the sheep combined with a declining believer base due to AIDS has left them little choice.

Cloak it however you like the use of contraceptives has never really been about theology, it has always at its root been about power, authority and the need for the church’s followers to breed with great fecundity in order to produce many more of the brainwashed and often sexually abused by the clergy into believing their hogwash.



Amusing the inner nerd to a video game based on the Star Wars films, I thought to myself about life on the Skywalker Ranch, contrary to what you might imagine, it’s no sprawling shrine to the Lucas empire (or “Empire”). You’d be hard-pressed to find so much as an Ewok spear, in the way of props, laying around campus - unless you hit the archives building, where everything from a life-sized “Jedi” speeder-bike to the Ark of the Covenant from “Raiders” go to die.

But what rocks about this place is how quiet it is. Nestled in the hills of Marin County, Lucas used his “Empire Strikes Back” bankroll to purchase 5000 acres that would make up the ranch, home to the best sound-mixing facilities on the planet. But if you didn’t know what went on inside most of the architecture that dots the landscape, you’d never imagine it was in any way tech-oriented: the buildings resemble large bed-and-breakfast Colonials, vineyard houses, and barns.

I picture myself roaming hills and fields in all manner of livestock, looking for turkeys to steer. Every once in awhile a ranch-hand vehicle would roll through, but other than that life as I imagine would be still, ever present, and beautiful. So peaceful you can hear bees buzzing from ten feet away. The kind of place you don’t want to pass wind in, for fear that everyone will know it was you; not even the one-cheek-sneak would be safe. Things like that now are hard to find. The kind of pastoral beauty so quiet yet so moving, the avowed Atheist would remark “This is God’s country.”

Yeah, may I offer to say that I too am oblivious as to where this is going.

Excuse me if I’m not too current on world news. Maybe you can answer a couple questions for me? So what is up with the Pope? So what, is Sasquatch doing the Atkins diet? It’s amazing how much you miss just by spending a few nights in the seclusion of darkness. What’s that you say? The voices tell me we’re still fighting in the middle east? Well, point as you may, the issue as I see it is that we’re too busy pointing fingers at each other rather than taking a moment to realize that we are all part of a problem.

I use my computer on a daily basis and enjoy what privileges that come along with my minuscule secular life. At times when I’m reminded of simplicities, I think of this one particular person from my art school days, someone who would say if we’re all so advanced and smart and innovative, how about a day without relying on technology? How about a week? Bathe in a river. Plant some trees and be happy discussing life and its mysteries with your friends.

And if your answer is “But that’s unrealistic! I need to go crunch numbers and write reports in hopes of receiving at least twice the minimum wage at my office job otherwise those who judge me won’t be impressed by my fancy shoes and knowledge." then you are the problem.

There are different attitudes out there. For one, stop using your television and computer to check up on how poorly the world is doing and go make some change. And don’t expect anybody to thank you or offer gratitude because true giving is selfless. Perceptibly I am a problem as well. Point fingers at all my hypocrisies all you want, that won’t change the fact that you’re still sitting here clicking ‘refresh’ while you could be off to planting vegetables.

In the next few hours, I’ll be attending a congregation in honour of the old buddy of mine that I speak of. We will celebrate being swept into a sea of motion. In his case, en route for New York after spending more than his fair share of time in a one-road town filled with an odd variety of mindless shapes.

Life comes down to these small moments, and in these moments, all the big decisions are made. In this particular moment, I can see deflection into perspective in all the practical arguments trying to pull together a short notice, or opt out, already emotional and simply given in to this night.

traditional concerns

What has felt like my first full retreat in over days, I’ve reached into the sloppiness that is my life and decided to take a load off. I am admittedly unaware of the comings and goings of today’s fast-paced pseudo society and acknowledge that I like many others am only misunderstood to a point exaggerated with problems beyond periodicity to concentrate on something much deeper.

I’ve noticed time has managed to produce lots of big news and for some, couldn’t wait to hear what thoughts I have to share. Well, my site design and a lot of ideas for new features and types of content are still in the works, but I will leak to you what I can now, and continue updating you as new items become more certain and concrete.

While many of you may think I have been operating this website since September of last year I have been writing blog entries since spring of 2004. I have since and always thought of new ways of writing without diminishing the strengths that have brought to where I am now, including the consistent stream of original content along with what most can come to expect as a reflection of nonpartisan skepticism and hopeful belief that news media, politics and social change all have vast – what’s the term I’m looking for? – potential for improvement.

My gears are still turning, although rather slower on the selection of things to write as I’m persuaded by the beginning of a hybrid series of summer movie releases and lavish computer animations.

While lacking response or valuable input from readers I have given a sense of less urgency in priority blogging. But I am always open to various proposals via e-mail; some, to my delight, so concerned they’ve even submitted suggestions to me for penis enhancement.

I thank you for your patience and understanding as we all happen to be wrapping up something in our own personal ways this month. All in all, I imagine we all have a lot of challenging work and exciting prospects on our collective plate at the moment, thanks to the supporters who come through for me. I can’t wait to show you the enhanced results.

how to manufacture news

Got Spam? How about this, got something intelligent to say about one of my posts? Maybe you just find me so damned attractive you need to get to know me better? Well relief is at hand, incase you didn’t notice, I happen to have had the same damned e-mail address for the past two years now. Can you spell e-mail?

Here’s what is on my mind right now. One being that it is already just plain scary that there is a moron in the White House and why he and his cabal can get away with whatever they want, especially nuclear strikes against Iran if as they say diplomacy fails to curb the Islamic Republic's atomic ambitions. And two, why is the local news and abroad so bad?

I remember speaking with Taz Boga from the local Broadcast news station, and besides I having failed miserably on a number of occasions to ask her if we could share a future together we adamantly agreed that outlets today are becoming no longer a real resource for information. They tend to take the, "if it bleeds it leads", theory to a whole new level. Stories are rarely covered in any depth. Rather, sound bites and quick overviews of a topic, followed by the ever annoying, "let’s ask the people on the street" what they think about this issue, are the general reporting style. More and more radio and television news stations, especially at the local level, have fewer and fewer actual reporters. Instead, they have plenty of microphone toting pretty faces asking us all "how we feel" about issues or the weather in the Byward Market. National newscasts and programs are not immune to this either. They tend to have seasoned reporters actually reporting, but all too often the news agenda is driven by producers who are looking to provide stories that will drive the largest audience. That policy of sensationalism can lead to excesses.

Case in point: although not locally, Dateline NBC recently, publicly and unapologetically sought out Muslims to be filmed attending a NASCAR race for a segment on racism in America. Various segments of the US population may very well be racist against Muslims given the decidedly paranoid environment their President has fostered in relation to the War on Terror. But that is really beside the point here. Dateline is trying to manufacture a news story. They are not actually reporting on a case of racism, but instead, are trying to put a scenario together whereby an act, or acts of it, will occur. They would then presumably show the segment in their program declaring that their little hypothesis and experiment was correct. Curiously, they weren’t looking to try this stunt at a baseball or basketball game, speaking volumes about the intent of the piece. When did manufacturing news become an acceptable tactic in news gathering? ‘

This post will probably put me in company with some of the more shrill elements of conservative bloggers, who themselves pounce on examples like this as a left wing media conspiracy against them. So be it. Not only dateline but many and more gathering news resources are not reporting news; they are trying to make it up. In doing so, they are fueling cynicism everywhere which should be a concern to all of us.

conflicted with the outside world

The freedom to inform and the right to know are not, by all appearances, equitably shared in the world. After centuries of dominance by monolithic political structures and dictatorships, we’re realizing that the Leaders of the Revolution, the helmsmen and fathers of the nation, are predatory vampires whose insatiable appetites have assisted us into a cesspool of human misery. To retain their power, these predators reign in disguise as Bunnies with tools of terror: an efficient system of physical and psychological torture.

Despite the appearance… a guy in a Bunny suit was beating a woman on a busy street corner, witnesses to the assault called police and some guys even boldly took pictures on their phones. Most in all probability just turned up the volume on their spanking new iPods to drown out the screams and kept walking to the mall. Not exactly knights in shining armour. In the face of the doubts and the uncertainties of this shameful scenario, you wonder about the challenges before it.

…You know, come to think of it, I never even thought Bunnies would be important enough to have their own day. I think this weekend used to be about Jesus or something, but like all things, everyone goes out of style sometime, man. Bunnies however are in. Their cute and cuddlesome appearance has therefore usurped Jesus and made this day their own. Along the same lines as how the fat-man and his army of elves and reindeer smuggled Christmas. All I have to say is good job to the identity who had it in on us, oh yes, of course, the Bunny. I love pointless trivial holidays, wait, my mistake, sorry their not holidays, their special days.

Easter to some is about a man who many years ago gave up his life to show us how we were living ours unjustly. Religious or not, Jesus existed and although his miracle performing skills are questionable, he was a great man who did a great many things for many people in need. In case you didn’t know, you can help people without having magic powers. Magic powers make it look only a little more decorative while doing it for the history books. On such days we should remember to realize how we should be at the very least celebrating good will towards our fellow being and we should be sacrificing certain things to help others. So I hope you had a Happy Bunny Day and your chocolate made with slave-gotten beans were consumed merrily as you danced the night away.

In case you have been pondering where I may have been, I’m turning whatever creative energy I have these days into learning Portuguese…

Nah. Not really.

Actually, I have learned a very clever trick so that I don’t embarrass myself while out in public—at least this works in certain situations. There is no possible way that I can keep from embarrassing myself on a fairly regular basis. I have come to accept that an embarrassment-free existence isn’t going to be possible so I just try to keep my personal public humiliations to a minimum by avoiding the public altogether.

I came to this realization just after I had arrived from my brief visit to Montreal. I visited many new locations and enjoyed even more fascinating sceneries. I also found that in Montreal, it’s not that a man happens to carry a purse that makes him a sissy but what's inside that probably does.

I myself have tried to be a real man and although I haven’t completely given up, you wonder how far off could that be before there are too many controls to manipulate, for one, my video game system. I still happen to drink regular coffee from a pot, if you happen to remember that, but more and more often it’s becoming a requirement to have more instructions than a kitchen remodelling job to have just a plain cup. I used to go to the barber shop for a haircut, now only the salons happen to exist.

The professed men’s magazines have articles about how to blow dry your hair and exercises that will make your derriere look more masculine. No wonder Hemingway blew his brains out. Guys who run with the bulls in this day and age probably carry purses and use their free hand to read text messages about hair growth products. Maybe now it’s called “Sauntering” or “sashaying” with the bulls. Maybe the bulls aren’t as tough as they used to be. I hope not because the old bulls would have eaten tall lanky wimps like me for breakfast.

This whole thing along with the very evident appearance and decorative arguments one hears everywhere, the media muzzle. It is all relegated to reflect – with more or less accuracy – the interests of prevailing economic, cultural, political, and social powers. Media manipulation and structured disinformation have become an organizing force, as demonstrated here or to more recent extremes, 9/11, and the extent to which world opinion has had its fill of that media phenomenon. It is all giving me a headache.

Personal opinion is literally submerged by the weight of information which has been culled, wrought and aimed at a public which is considered to be a rabble of cultural morons, incapable of personal judgement and unable to think otherwise than in accordance with the cannons of some source.

I’m not sure where this long inexorable slide into for example, metro sexuality—or whatever you want to call it—began, but taking it from one who's been there I happen to have a pretty good idea of where it will end. I see the Village People adopting a new character in their act that dresses in Kenneth Cole and has a fresh manicure. He can keep everyone’s schedules straight on his palm pilot. Considering this, I’d rather walk around with a tomahawk any day. America’s new male archetype will be the sissy in the Village People.

What’s next? Exposed midriffs or thongs hanging out of our pants? Now don’t get me wrong, I don’t equate homosexuality with being a sissy. I’m addressing the mindless pursuit of personal grooming that has gripped our culture. Both men and women I think are becoming more and more fatuous, boring, and indirectly heightened towards converging into one archetype: unintellectual twits with nice hair. I find it curious that in a culture where everyone is obsessed with health, no one seems the least concerned about the precipitous drop in our ability to carry on an intelligent conversation about anything other than working out or clothes.

If you happen to roughly know my history, I realize the inherent contradiction; this is my arbitrary shutdown into the realization of this principle strewn with obstacles in the shape of archaic, obscure, restrictions. Over the course of my life I have picked up bits of wisdom that I am now ready to begin sharing with the rest of the world. Much of this insight has been acquired through tremendous personal effort, trial and error, cliff notes, forged notes, cheat sheets, purloined answer keys, cassettes tapes, diligent study, over-the-shoulder peaks, night school, imitation, invention, improvisation, correspondence courses, group therapy, psycho therapy, private tutors, and home schooling. I offer this knowledge to you free of charge. That people are working out their bodies for an hour while they pollute their brains the next with People Magazine. It is the replacement of thought with higher grooming standards. That’s a shitty trade-off in my book.

So are we going to give up our weekends in favour of shopping vacations? I may have been had since I mentioned the consumer cultured Montreal in the first, but actually I was trying to figure out what to do with the dead hooker in my motel while worrying about paying for excess baggage on my return trip. Just shoot me now and put me out of my misery, but not in the face. I just put on an exfoliation mask.

garbage storing loyalties

How do you ruin a perfectly good pagan holiday? Simple. Invite the Christians. Works every time. With such a guilt ridden lot I’m sure we can all get along very well. Just can’t let anyone else have any fun can we? Because we’re too afraid of fun ourselves.

These past few days I’ve scuttled around to say the least. And when your working a government day job near downtown parliament you haphazardly notice where more and more people tend to congregate. They are the very pleasant and the very familiar in a world overwhelmed with distraction. They are the consumerists collaborate with their thoughts being invaded.

Riding up the escalator for a higher vantage point, a hill for your own safety above all else, you may find yourself reluctant to concentrate on a very familiar stranger travelling down your opposite direction. Maybe someone you had seen before. You awkwardly exchange silent stares, neither of you propelled or hurried. Not in wary, mutual sizing-up; in bewilderment one points out to say “So you’re still dealing with… high school trauma?”

“Maybe.”

And despite your means for escape, the maze continues without exit. You come full circle. As you notice how many reflective surfaces there are in your surroundings. The elevator mirror will have you staring at your reflection in its closed doors. The structural columns are also covered in mirrored glass. Certain stores employ reflective trim around their plate glass windows. Everywhere you go, you get to see what terrible decisions you've made visiting this migraine.

This last Monday, I decided to devour a form of General Tso's chicken—probably the third-lowest tier of the food pyramid. The lowest rung is the fried onion loaf. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy the Tao. General Tso must have been the most reviled military leader in the history of China, because if ever there was a "f-you" entrée created by a disgruntled personal chef, it would definitely be General Tso's Chicken. Napoleon lucked out. And General Custer's custard, although not a reliable meal for dinner.

But General Tso's chicken is like a culinary dare disguised as comfort food. Like most things fast food, it's made of all the wrong parts of chicken, each blindly hacked off with a cleaver, and then cleverly concealed inside some kind of glazed doughnut. The worst part is that its deep-frying only creates a perfect outer seal, protecting the bacteria crawling throughout the bizarre interior of poultry and tendon clinging desperately to each other.

What may have summoned that thirst for Fast food, Fast sex, Fast times, Fast anything, is abandoned once you’ve found maggots tale grinding inside and out of your appetite that is literally on the go. You’ll come to understand how flesh-chafed this reality is when it comes to experiencing life on the fast lane. I don’t know about you, but I think we should slow it down a morsel because I’m spent with having my head in a toilet.

On my way back from purchasing my General Tso's Chicken, again I found myself passing about fifteen mirrors and I remembered when I realized that the proliferation of mirrors in shopping malls might have been a secret act of consumer advocacy on the part of mall architects. All of those mirrors primed as mines under pressure to explode, repeating over and over again for emphasis, telling you, "Will you look at yourself? Is this what you really want?” If you’re not in the category of wholly mesmerized narcissists or desensitized to compassionate teachings you may find mirrors saying a lot of these things, then again...well.

As an ex-retail employee, I did the window dressing and engaged clients with “freedom… only for how much you've got?” while notably dressed in a suit with my tie worn around my cranium. My way of saying don’t think I’m any less fortunate than yourself to enjoy this perpetuate hypocritical philosophy specially branded as freedom.

Our ancestors built our land with their calloused hands. They fought off invasions—and it makes you think, for this?! I say drop that fried chicken and just start running. Run for miles from any advertisements or free samples until you hit an undeveloped parcel of land. Enjoy the scenery, maybe even talk yourself out of the flavoured mocha-frappe-chino coffee cravings.

But I guess even that is hard to absorb.

tired but cannot sleep

Sometimes overnight I get worried. In the mornings I seem forever on the verge of trying to recall my dreams, when I get the faintest of glimpses before the whole thing evaporates like my childhood. Last night after this call I started to panic. Laying down for an hour or two with my mind feeling like cake batter, looking down every slight hint of grey and dry wall my window omitted into my dwelling area that I share with the bug men.

During the late hours, I had received a phone call from a probable mental patient with a british accent who asked me to suck his genitalia then admittably place a plastic bag over my head while I’m attempting to rest. The night before, my mind had spent sometime in a Nuthouse for the psychiatric disabled. I was dressed in a black suit as I travelled through decending elevators and into corridors of blood red rust stains with black mold and mildew walls of concrete. I had been conscious of the fact that I was sent here by the board to report an issue indicated in dealing with a patients difficulty in dealing with his experiences and suffered ‘severe depression and recurrent nightmares’.

The shock gets you through as your senses get taken away from you. Overstimulation, too much noise, too much movement, too much to do. So much that the specialties of any one sensing are lost or ignored. You can almost call it a sickness of the human condition.

I can hear you but I cannot listen to your plea. Much like yourself, I do not have wings but have such a strange and strong urge to fly.

Santos-Dumont, the diminutive dapper aeronaut from South America came to Paris, crashed his flying contraptions, and opened a restaurant with chairs and tables 15 feet high, requiring customers to climb up ladders. Isn't that wonderful? Isn't it psychotic? Mr. Laas on the otherhand has a burrowing tendency. He has an aversion to stairs and multiple-storied housing. In the endless Nebraska prairie a four-foot tall wispy-haired Freddy boy standing in a wheat field was the only landmark for miles and miles. The hawks could swoop down and carry him away, or lightning would be attracted to him.

He devoted a month to digging a hole in his backyard, made it eight feet deep and needed a ladder to get out. (Correction: He says it was 12 feet deep.)

Where do you escape?

The ducks like to show you where things are. You can always trust a duck . You can always trust a duck to be loud and foolish and helpful. Ducks should hold more signs more often. Especially pedestrian cross walks. Ducks command a lot of slap happy attention. Today, I’m going to feed them on my bench by the river.

prime time deliverance

Darkness had been interrupted by a shy artificial glow as Canadian Rock Artist Matt Good had granted a somewhat romantic aura of intimacy to the loneliness of the Alumni Theatre, in the Ottawa Carleton University yesterday night. Having reached the mid-way point of his solo acoustic tour and still as fiery as ever, for the entirety of the night he glided through hidden passages between lights of numerous shape shifts as they streamed and poured onto him playing his guitar in the greatness of our shared lodgings.

I had included myself amongst the audience of fans. In what was one of plenty of his concerts I’ve attended during his tenure. Again, I wasn’t surprised I found that state of awe-inspire to the indiscernible edifice that stood at first silent in the fog of atmospheric deliverance. Between melodic escapades Matt shared his frame of mind intermittently with his defined occasional restlessness. A pale shadow erratically ventured through his quite disturbing although magnetic sight, his limbs at times stretched out as if to capture essence in his shared tales of tragic to the sanity of rock and roll after The Muppet Show disruption. With or without props that included a discovery guide to many things Paris Hilton or confessions of a Barbie doll for our democracy, it was all animated for amusement without, as he’d say, the bull-shit.

The stage in his presence was a perfect circumference dotted by pale lamps shining dimly as if speaking in sinuous language to each and everyone without being afraid of the towering obelisk, rising brave from the ground in the pivot of that immense space, surrounded by the endless sounds of ambience. In personal dedication, his song ‘Fated’ had his voice breathlessly stimulated, lunged for refuge behind an aged tree of adopted method, there upon at times he timidly peeked to discover a rare sight: in a bright but soothing light reverberated from the sheer ivory marble of his eyes; we overlooked our surfaces.

His shadow agilely skimped through, craving that mythical scenery: the dawning air was defining shapes and colors, pale reds, ashen grays, and those unmemorable whites, the brick of culture from the imperial time, through his renaissance, the modern and contemporary era, ages revealed by such a well assorted variety of urban drama entwined in emerald greens surfacing from historical ground. That night we indulged in perfection craving its embrace, oblivious to the rising sun; inexorably it disappeared in a breathless gaze.

What makes Matt Good a crazy good artist is not that special capacity for being creative, thinking outside the box, spending too much time alone (although all strong traits of his), etc. It's none of that romantic lore that has us believing that craziness is a prerequisite of artistic talent. What makes a person in pursuit of the truth in an art form crazy is the relentless noise of the necessary unreality that encloses our humanity.

Every time a singer has to stop singing the way he has been singing, every time a musician has to stop playing the way he has been playing, and makes a journey back into what we call "real life", some element in the psyche suffers a jolt. A shock if you will. And what is felt is the returning to what matters most. Whatever it may be. The sounds of today that are not music are not worth listening to. In the world of telephones, cars, high-pitched whininess of the person next to you, computers, people arguing and preaching, people asking for money or things--these sounds are considered a part of reality, when in fact, they are not. They are a rouse; the only sounds you can trust to be honest expressions of reality are made with the intent of listening. That was what made this a good night to remember.

one or the other

"There is no greater sin than desire No greater curse than discontent, No greater misfortune than wanting something for oneself. Therefore he who knows that enough is enough will always have enough." — Lao Tsu: Tao te ching

I am hypnotized and lost in the haze of retirement. This is the fifth year since my father was vanished across the planet to spend the rest of his days in the desert instead of our front yard lawn or backyard garden, maybe followed by watching Westerns on the television. I'm in my early twenties and am still considered far too young and excitable to take it easy. My mother who’s still around will call me religiously at 7 o'clock in the morning and spit and curse and damn the idiot North American bandwagon lackeys that think them so brilliant.

My closest ones will talk to me about politics and we'll agree and disagree and I'll lose my cool and I'll shake my head and we will yell. And when the phone rings sometimes I'll pick up the television remote and try to answer it. Sometimes I get it right and pick up the phone. Then again.

I have found it hard to sleep as of late, lots of counting seconds and minutes and hours. The sheep have unionized making it impossible for me to count to fifty without them demanding a half hour. So I am left with a magnificent collection of gin and ice cubes. Oblivion is something grand once in awhile. So let it be undertaken in a like manner.

It is questioned that Internet may be reducing our literacy skills. Noticeably reducing young people’s proficiency in thinking critically and writing cogently.

“Talk of decline was old news in academia even in 1898, when traditionalists blasted Harvard for ending its Greek entrance requirement. But today there's a new twist in the story: Are search engines making today's students dumber? In December, the National Center for Education Statistics published a report on adult literacy revealing that the number of college graduates able to interpret complex texts proficiently had dropped since 1992 from 40 percent to 31 percent.” - read more

I sit at my desk in my office, the sky grey and the windows sealed. I yearn for the time of day for music to play and ascend my spirit if but only slightly. Aside from the trivials of day to day life...we all have to blame the weather, right? For too long, and I’m not sure why, it has been easy to blame the weather—particularly the winds, which have seemed so often to come from the wrong quarter—but perhaps it’s simpler than that. Perhaps I’ve been away from the outside world far too much. In the evenings, I’m watching films (Thumbsucker was a great film by the way. I recommend it) exploring ideas, and blogging. Maybe I simply haven’t been where I should be for many of the good evenings when I could have sat out there, doing nothing in particular and so much that matters. I’ve been elsewhere a good quarter of my life. I’ve said, I regret none of it.

Now spring is here; yet with winter beginning to stretch its shadow across the land towards winter again. It’s likely I’ll have few of these evenings left to enjoy. I’d like to share sometime with my old friends; here, squinting across into the sun after another day floating and spiralling and scanning, falling and rising.

It’s hard during these few weeks for most; for those I know personally, we’re faced with the prospect of work the next day, and a relaxed session has to compete with a decent nights sleep and it’s easy to say, “let’s leave it for the weekend” usually meaning Saturday. One day of seven. It seems wrong. A life is so precious and so ephemeral that to waste any of it seems an unbearable tragedy. No...to think of it, it is an unbearable tragedy. Yet so many of us do bear that tragedy; most days getting up reluctantly and heading off to a job we often dislike; a job where we find ourselves most often stressed; most importantly, a job that seems largely trivial and sometimes unimportant, without real meaning emphasized.

What can be done? Well, you can either change your circumstances or change the way you think. Occasionally, changing your circumstances—for example, switching jobs, going elsewhere—can work. Often it doesn’t. Conversely, changing how you think can always work—the catch is that it’s far harder. All I can say, from my own experience, is that it gets easier with practice.

Returning to that sad thought about how so much life gets wasted, I think about the recent sale of this one online auction and the response to that. A small company developed on the internet sold for millions and the news was full of the story of cofounder named Sam, who, only a few years ago, was a trying to keep warm in a shared flat. Now he’s banked something between $200–300 million and is fielding numerous offers of marriage. Good luck to him. I have no complaints about Sam—what disturbs me is the sort of thinking (if that’s not too generous a word) the story has encouraged. Suddenly it seems everyone wants to know how he did it so they can do it too. That, or something equally successful. The tragedy is that, yet again, success is measured as money.

Sam’s either hailed as a hero to emulate or he’s envied because, well, he got rich quick. That is what is considered significant; that is what we should strive for. What seems to have been ignored or downplayed, even when Sam pointed it out himself, is that he enjoys what he does.

To me, that’s his real success.

I wonder: what if we all found a way to make $200 million within a few years? Would we be happier? Would our society be better?

If I were rich I would be on a terrace on the far side of the river where a stag roars: a deep, drawn-out groan full of lust and aggression. I would be at it up in the hills too, wandering about, setting up territories, herding hinds, challenging interlopers. In that state I want to be. It would be easier to hunt the more vulnerable teens who have sex in my woods seasoned in mists and mellow fruitfulness.

But today, my ass hurts. I sit back in my chair with the sun-rotted. Realizing how hormones and testosterone poison our soul of understanding. The ability to understand fractured into the assumption of it and the reality of it. Exactly how convoluted has it become? For all the advances made in the last 100 years, consider the complications and stresses amplified in the pursuit of conveniently and expeditiously understanding. It is, in a way, the accumulation of confusion that distances you from yourself. Would you say that in ages past people knew themselves better or worse than we do? That unspotted by the white noise and the low hum of a million emancipators they knew the peace of their internal selves better or worse? Was there once a greater respect for that inward honesty that we judge ourselves with in private, or does it remain unchanged within us? And how does misinformation and the bombardment of our minds with useless information about useless things effect that inward state and the truthful notions of ourselves?

In a world in love with live broadcasted casualty free wars, television stations devoted entirely to celebrities-their whereabouts-their wardrobe-who they're fucking, and the outcomes of 'reality based' television shows, can we even honestly answer those questions?

Probably not.

blew up in the bathroom

What is going on? I hear from someone at my office that an explosion went off at a Tim Hortins in Toronto. From the news acquired thus far, a man went into a Tim Hortins strapped with explosives and blew up in the bathroom. Only one person confirmed dead and all the stores continued business as usual. No real panic, just curiosity. And very strange.

"Investigators have ruled out terrorism as a cause for a "very intense, very hot flash fire" in a downtown Tim Hortons Sunday that brought the intersection of Yonge and Bloor Sts. to a halt. The incident, shortly after 1 p.m., sent dozens of patrons scrambling out of the coffee shop after a "wall of flames" erupted from the men's washroom. Police found the burned body of a man in one of the washroom cubicles and, according to one report, a gas can nearby. Attempts to revive the man were not successful. Coroner Dr. Jim Edwards ruled out terrorism." -read more

I’m a little late on this but I thought I would follow up with my weekend for those interested. Dirty jokes and one-liners were on tap at Yuk Yuk’s this last Saturday. Everyone gathered to enjoy a lineup of comedians that included host Sabrina Jalees, opening act Matt Billon, and headliner Terry McGurrin.

A comedian I find of interest is Matt Billon, a mid-twenties Vancouver native. He got the crowd in the mood with draws of humour from his own life, no matter how embarrassing or incriminating. After being in the business for nearly four years he got his big break with a solid performance at last year’s annual Just For Laughs Festival in Montreal. He wasn’t afraid of bringing his own shortcomings into his act, revealing he was born two months premature and doctors had so much trouble discerning his sex that his parents originally named him Tracy. He included a story of him and his brother taking turns shooting each other in the backside with a pellet gun given to them by their uncle.

His calm appearance and deadpan delivery had the place in hysterics for the duration of his set until there was this one moment where he established his unrelenting opinion about the war on the Middle-East and how self-deprecating we Americans are with draws to 9/11 being an entire sham. It’s particularly galling when a voice (whether or not coming from a comedian or anyone else with any other occupation for that matter) has to strip oneself of their own full-time thought mechanics and are towered over by a scowl, in this case a majority of government employed audience members. I made sure to sincerely thank him in person after the show. It certainly felt good to laugh and to know some people aren't afraid to be absolute with themselves and their beliefs.

Of the thousands of North Americans in Iraq, half of them are members of the National Guard and Reserves. Of course, compared to US casualties, the number of Iraqi dead and injured is extreme. If, by way of grizzly math, one were to compare civilian losses endured during the US led war on terror, Iraqi civilian deaths dwarf those of the US, who lost just under 3,000 people on September 11th of 2001; the crucial aspect of the comparison being that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. If the most extreme calculations are to be heeded, that being the figures produced, Iraqi civilians have been violently affected by the policies adopted to fight the war on terror more than any other civilian population on earth, despite the fact that no direct link existed between Iraq and the impetus for the unilateralist and preemptive doctrine adopted by the United States after 9/11.