Exhibit A In The Trial Of Existence

A miscellany of esoterica. That's one ridiculously ambiguous way to describe this blog. It might be more successful if it had one theme, one purpose, one simpler categorization. But I'm much too inconsistent for that. I can't stay consistently serious or consistently silly, consistently glib or consistently heartfelt. My motives for writing change from day to night. At night a bout of not-sleeping often motivates me to dislodge the contents of my mind's introspective underside, an act of exorcism. By day I tend more towards the extrospective topsoil. If there are recurring themes to this posting pattern they'd include: a sense for the absurd, a critical examination of values and an obsession with lists. If it entertains or inspires or horrifies-fascinates me I'll share it. If there is anyone who happens to share my general interest areas--personal philosophy, affecting music, metahistory, the decline of the West, the tragicomedy of everyday life--I guess they'd be my target audience. Since I don't know if such a target audience even exists, I don't expend much bother trying to pander to it. The real target audience is my sense of self-satisfaction, to be honest, and my need for sublimation and tangible evidence that my consciousness exists. Looking back at the evidence, I believe a pretty good case can made. So I can rest just a little easier as the trials continue.

Illustrated Rhyming Couplet Of The Day

It's a monumental big screen kiss,
It's so deep it's meaningless.
- So Hard Done By, The Tragically Hip

The Roughest Game In Video Game History!

Featuring the late great Phil Hartman.

Illustrated Lyrics Of The Day

Map found at the always interesting Catholicgauze blog.

The Sisters Of Mercy - Flood II

And her hallway
Moves
Like the ocean
Moves

At the head of the river
At the source of the sea

Sitting here now in this bar for hours
Trying to write it down
Fitting in hard with harder to come
Trying to fight it
Down the river there's a ship will carry you
Down river down stream
Down the river there's a ship will carry the
Dream
Dream of the flood
Down the river there's a ship will carry the
Dream of the flood

And her hallway...
As the water come rushing over
As the water come rushing in
As the water come rushing over
Flood...Flood...

Push the glass, stain the glass
Push the writer to the wall
It may come but it will pass
Some say we will fall
Dream of the flood...
Flood...

And her hallway...

Oh, maybe, in terms of surrender,
On a backcloth of lashes and eyes
In a flood of your tears, in sackcloth
And ashes and ashes and ashes and ashes
And ashes and ashes and lies...

And her hallway...
Like...
As the water come rushing in
As the water come rushing over

Sitting here now in this bar for hours
While these strange men rent strange flowers
I'll be picking up your petals in another few hours
In the metal and blood, in the scent and mascara
On a backcloth of lashes and stars
In a flood of your tears, in sackcloth
And ashes and ashes and secondhand passion
And stolen guitars

And her hallway...
As the water come rushing in
(Like the sea)
As the water come rushing over
(Dream of the flood)
In a flood of your tears, in sackcloth
And ashes and ashes
And ashes and ashes
And ashes and ashes
And ashes and ashes and lies...

As the water come rushing in, rushing in

At the head of the river
At the source of the sea

And her hallway...
Like...

Flood...

Mission Impossible Afghanistan

As much as I'd like to support Canada's mission in Afghanistan, I'm finding it harder and harder with each soldier's death. I say I'd like to because I supported the original war in Afghanistan, and I think a just and winnable conflict can spur the positive development of a nation's identity. Such was Canada's role at Vimy Ridge in World War I, a defining moment in the development of a Canadian identity independent from Britain. It's not the quantity of deaths that necessarily makes me opposed to the war. It is the right of human beings to choose how they wish to live and die, and soldiers who choose to risk theirs on the battlefield don't deserve to have that choice taken away by pacifists who'd rather die slipping in the shower. On a personal level I would rather not fight in a war, but I think it is less hypocritical to respect those who do than to despise the warrior tradition for the warriors' own supposed benefit. It should go without saying, but perhaps it doesn't, that without the liberal West's warrior tradition the lights would've stayed out across Europe in the 1940s. The patriotism and traditional masculine values espoused by the military class may make elements of the left uncomfortable, but Nazi world conquest would've made them even more uncomfortable I'd like to think. Additionally, it's a bit ironic that the pacifist left, with its emphasis on multiculturalism, sidesteps the uncomfortable fact that many cultures are in fact geared around a warrior tradition.

That being said, my opposition to the mission in Afghanistan is not based, like the NDP, on a knee-jerk despisal of any pre-postmodern values. Rather I think the problem is that pre-postmodern values--valour, brotherhood, patriotism, moral choice--are being deployed to support a cause that is in fact more in tune with NDP sensibilities, even if it's too rough around the edges for them to admit. Namely the idea of fighting to protect a Western conception of human rights for peoples who generally do not share this conception. With the ongoing violence in Iraq I think it is rather empirical to say that some cultures, though there are obviously exceptions when it comes to individuals, value democracy and individual freedoms less than sectarian solidarity and their traditional religious-patriarchical power structures. This is not solely a matter of Islam, although obviously religion plays a strong role in culture. If the goal of the Iraq war was simply to liberate and protect the Kurds, a Muslim people, it would've been a winnable mission. This is because the Kurds have proven themselves capable of maintaining a mostly civil and stable society without the use of a dictatorship. Historically, the Germans and Japanese, despite obvious aberrations, have proven capable of the same, which is the major reason why the post-World War II reconstruction efforts succeeded there while failing in Iraq.

I think the war in Afghanistan was justified--not for humanitarian reasons, though the despicability of the Taliban regime was certainly added justification. Rather it was justified because by harbouring and refusing to relinquish Osama bin Laden the Taliban had engaged in an act of war. Perhaps without Iraq the West would have been able to devote enough focus to Afghanistan to turn it into a peace-loving democracy as a bonus to defeating a hostile regime. Maybe. But in addition to reducing the focus on Afghanistan, the war in Iraq has also inflamed the situation there by proving the effectiveness of suicide bombings as means to weaken the occupier's will. As allies of the Northern Alliance, one could argue that the West has a moral obligation to assist those forces that assisted in the deposition of the Taliban. Much like it had a moral obligation to help the Kurds when it encouraged their anti-Saddam rebellion, but failed to do so. Yet like Iraq, Afghanistan is less a nation-state than a convenient label for a patchwork of mutually hostile ethnicities. Pretending that we can unite all these hostile ethnicities under our benevolent banner is looking more and more like a pipe dream. The best we can hope to do is aid those national groups with a pro-Western orientation and a tradition conducive to democracy, rather than trying to assist those to whom our assistance is nothing but an insult. Dying to defend a beleaguered, friendly people is one thing; dying to defend the unity of a geographical fiction is another.

Song Of The Day

One of my favourite industrial stompers from a short-lived Ministry side-project, though the chorus, "Faster than light and harder," is a bit of a non-sequitur. Why not "Faster than light and hotter"? Still, one must remember the copious amount of drugs the Ministry crew were on and applaud them for effectively communicating their psychotropic mania in such a manner. I salute you! Look for a brief, pre-bigshot appearance by Trent Reznor on guitar a little after the three-minute mark.

Lead Into Gold - Faster Than Light

Again we understand
Mauled by greasy hand
Worked to the bone
Again
Feel it ready
Again
Feel it ready
Once more it's ready
Believe that speed will win
Again

Faster than light and harder
Bleeds into overkill
Faster than light and harder
Never stop never ever

Truth lies at the core
It always worked before
Starve to the bone
Some more
Takes forever
Feels like it takes forever
Believe that speed will win
Some more

Faster than light and harder
Bleeds into overkill
Faster than light and harder
Never stop never ever

Faster than light and harder
Bleeds into overkill
Faster than light and harder
Never stop never ever

Again we prostitute
And hold a greasy hand
Cooked off the bone
Cooked to the end
Is it ready?
Believe it ready
And know that speed will win
Again

Faster than light and harder
Bleeds into overkill
Faster than light and harder
Never stop never ever

Faster than light and harder
Bleeds into overkill
Faster than light and harder
Never stop never ever

Quite Possibly The Greatest Thing I Have Ever Read

In Olearius' Travels, a King of Persia commands his steward's head to be cut off, and on its being brought to him, remarks, "what a pity it was, that a man possessing such fine mustachios, should have been executed," but he adds, "Ah! it was your own fault."

- From Wikipedia article on Beards

Stop Snitchin': The Message Of Our Times

According to the Associated Press, a woman had the word "snitch" burned into her face with a branding iron in apparent retaliation for helping police in a domestic violence case. Those who think today's hip-hop has no social conscience obviously aren't familiar with the Stop Snitchin' campaign, which is to today's rappers what stopping the Ethiopian famine was to the rock stars of the 80s. While activists waste time focussing on issues like the genocide in Darfur and global warming, today's hip-hop stars know that the bigger issue is giving back to the community by making sure it stays crime-ridden and riven by tit-for-tat violence. Bully for you, assholes! I have to drop my sarcastic tone here because this legitimately pisses me off. I know all hip-hop isn't so stridently pro-ignorance as its mainstream proponents (though some lesser known rappers like Immortal Technique and Dead Prez are also outspoken in their self-righteous stupidity), but those underground rappers aren't the ones making a cultural impact. The kids in size XXXXXXL white shirts I see at bars and clubs don't know who Grandmaster Flash or Boogie Down Productions are. Their knowledge of hip-hop history extends nor further back in time than Tupac. And in a marvelous example of a self-fulfilling prophecy, by embracing the ghetto values of their idols they make sure the ghetto remains drug and crime-ridden enough for new idols to emerge and keep rapping about the same tired material. There are smart, educated people that love hip-hop. I know some. But it is sublimely ignorant to pretend there is no link between, to give an example close to my neighbourhood, the spate of gang-related gun violence in Toronto last summer and the kind of value system that promotes Stop Snitchin' as a community cause. Then voices emerge complaining that the police isn't doing enough to solve these crimes! A human being has a limited supply of sympathy to go around, and I don't waste mine on those who live and die by the gun. But it is not even the violence that offends me so much as the stupidity. The prideful stupidity at that. I don't know why so many people in my generation have been suckered into this world of crass materialism and terrible fashion sense. Or why seemingly attractive girls are into these assholes. Oh wait, I do remember now: because people are idiots! I know it's not exclusively hip-hop's fault. A decade ago the same idiots with ridiculously long shirts would've had some other ridiculous look. I think the net volume of human stupidity (about 70 percent of all young people at the very least) remains constant through time even if it takes different forms. Lower-class people (which is not exclusively defined by wealth) are going to embrace whatever lower-class values are fashionable. But the current form I witness when I go downtown is this one, so that is where I direct my wrath. I blame the death of God. Seriously. Religion used to be enough to placate the mass of idiots, but in a post-religious world cults of materialism like mainstream hip-hop have simply taken its place. I defy any believer in a utopian or pro-masses ideology to explain the popularity of 50 Cent. This is why I could never be a socialist and why even democracy is a deeply flawed political system in my eyes. I believe the Stop Snitchin' campaign has officially destroyed any remaining faith I may have had in my generation, mainstream culture and the future. I invite any remaining people with souls to join me in my underground bunker as I wait out the apocalypse. May a better world emerge from the ruins!

Random Erotic Animal Fact Of The Day

As adolescents, male bottlenose dolphins perform a kind of oral sex on one another—or in threesomes or foursomes—in rituals that create lifelong friendships and defense partnerships against sharks and other predators.

- From the Science of Gaydar article in New York Magazine

The Saints Ain't Marching Anywhere

Last night I went to a Mardi Gras festival at Hess Village, an authentic celebration of the best of Creole culture. It featured jazz, parades, costume balls, feathered masks and the tossing of doubloons. Or rather: beads, breasts, popped collars, drunken hooligans and a most glorious celebration of mass degradation. The saints ain't marching anywhere. Now of course I rue the decline of Western civilization and the nihilistic hedonism of my generation, BUT... Babylon is going to whore itself with or without me, so why not put on my animal skins and help bloody the pagan altar? I take my cue from the Folk Implosion song "Natural One," which tells us, "The world is falling down so we may as well crash with it." I also take my cue from the cliché, "When in Rome, do as the Romans do," which is quite appropriate since we are the Romans and the barbarians are inside the gate. I'm all for women treating themselves with respect, and for men treating themselves with respect at that! But giving a 20-year old woman breasts is like giving North Korea a nuclear bomb: a recipe for the irradiation of the Sea of Japan. And we are all irradiated.

Unfortunately I made the mistake of initially attending the festivities relatively sober. This caused me feelings of disgust, misanthropy, misogyny and melancholy at the surrounding bacchanalia. I felt much like an Old Testament (or as I see it, Only Testament) prophet rueing the Caananite-aping, Baal-worshipping tendencies of his wayward People. But then I had a few shots and remembered that these aren't my People: I owe them nothing and they owe me nothing. Neither blame nor sympathy, that's my motto. This is not my beautiful house, this is not my beautiful wife. So trash the house and ravage the wife! Not literally of course, merely spiritually. When I'm drunk I can play the role of happy spectator, happy participant, instead of ornery observer. I love post-apocalyptic movies, books, games, anything really. So when I'm drunk I turn myself into a road warrior, taking on a wasteland world of irradiated mutants and techno-primitive savages. A man of the 21st century, not a man out of time nostalgic for the Romantic Age. Utopia may be lost or non-existent but dystopia has its pleasures too.

Am I the only one that feels this way? Yes, I am. That has been my most important recent discovery. It's a terrible mistake to assume other people think and feel as you do. Or that they think and feel at all. So: neither blame nor sympathy. Ride the downward spiral with your eyes toward the sky. I may be a hypocrite but we are all hypocrites. I like to think I'm an honest hypocrite at least. We can't all be Jesus throwing money-lenders out of the temple. Some of us need to borrow money to make investments. In other words: capitalism and human nature, which are more or less the same, are inevitable. We can rue it but we must live with it. And if we must live with it we may as well enjoy it, or at least put ourselves into a state where we can enjoy it. If this involves copious amounts of alcohol so be it. I can have my fun and still have my soul. In fact the two make a good cocktail. I'll down it tonight, which will be Night II of the totally authentic Mardi Gras festival. Words like these will not be spoken there because they would only dampen the desert. And dampening the desert is worse than pointless, it's futile. So on we go with the show. To paraphrase Led Zeppelin, "Babylon I am coming."

The Knot Of Human Relations

Noted Frenchman Jean-Paul Sartre argues that people try to reconcile their subjective self (the for-itself) with their objective nature (the in-itself) through relations with others, and that these attempts are doomed to failure as human relations are defined by conflict. It is certainly true that there exists a core human need to escape the uncertainty and freedom of a constantly evolving self through encounters with others who see us as complete and finished beings. We desire a “mirror” to provide reassurance that we exist, and the mirror of the other’s gaze allows us to see a complete, if not necessarily accurate, reflection of our self from another standpoint. A part of us wishes to be a limited and thus definable object in another’s eyes, a total being instead of a work-in-progress. Thus we are attracted to other people at least in part because of how we believe they see us. We identify how they see us with how we truly are, although that knowledge is filtered through our own perception of how we believe they see us. Conflict arises because to maintain control of how we are seen we must control how the other person sees us. Since the other person wishes the same thing, subjective wills clash in order to maintain their desired definition of their “objective” status. We wish to own our mirror while our mirror wishes to own us, and neither is willing to look away in fear of the confusion of subjective self-definition.

Yet there is a certain paradox at the heart of human relations which causes me to veer from Sartre’s argument. Namely that the more we consciously desire others to see ourselves highly, the more an anxiety manifests itself which sabotages that desire. Since generally the desired human relationship is one in which anxiety is minimized, the natural inclination is to minimize that anxiety by detaching from the mutual death grip that Sartre seems to characterize human relations as. This is to say that we desist from overly ruminating on our perception of how their perception of us affects us—and on and on until our thoughts mesh into the knot of a psychological complex. While certain people undoubtedly thrive on relationships of conflict and battling wills, and others thrive on being dominated, this is not a proper basis on which to form a universal theory of human relationships. The desired relationship is generally one of relaxation spiced with enough passion to stave off boredom. To achieve a state of relaxation generally requires achieving an equilibrium in which each person recognizes the other on his or her own terms. The deeper the relationship the more the two people view each other not as objects-in-themselves but as subjective and evolving beings. Of course one can’t fully experience the subjectivity of the other, but generally a long relationship reveals enough complexity of character to disabuse the notion of a simple being in-itself. In certain social situations the goal is indeed to see our self as an object through other’s eyes, particularly in flirtations and interactions with strangers. Yet to characterize all human relationships in this way is to discount the high value most people place on comfort and relaxation in a deeper relationship, a value that negates or minimizes the role of conflict.

Furthermore the greatest value one can place on other people is viewing them as subjective beings. A group of close friends view each other as subjective beings aligned against the objective beings outside the closed circle. The pleasure of good company lies in the concept of a united front of like-minded souls, or at least souls conscious of the intricacies of the others. The long-term value of true friends is not to act as mirrors, because anyone can serve as a mirror; if seeking a mirror was all people looked for in others, there would be no long-term relationships. Rather the value of a long-term friendship is that the one friend can provide the other with what mirrors cannot, namely companionship and advice reflective of a wealth of knowledge large and small about the other person that for all intents and purposes makes them a subjective being. Certain relationships do consist of people who are merely objects to each other, and such relationships do have a pleasure and tenor of their own. Sometimes we wish to be away from those who know us too well, who see us perhaps too deeply and complexly. This is certainly a factor in the impetus for affairs among those in long-term relationships. There is a passion in two objects seeing each other as objects, which is animalistic and thus sexual in a primal way. In relationship terms, this is equivalent to what Kierkegaard called the aesthetic stage of existence, and it is indeed a stage which conjures pleasures of its own. Yet inevitably most people reach a point where aesthetic experiences alone cannot satisfy them, where “the sadness after sex” outweighs the pleasures of the stand-alone, consequence-less experience. Masochism, the pleasure of being reduced, does indeed have its appeal, but it is rarely one that lasts in the long-term.

The irony of Sartre’s approach to human relationships is that it is one that is generally unsatisfactory to the types of people driven to read his books. There are undoubtedly people whose relationships are based on a mutual reductionism of masochistic eroticism. Cosmetic surgery may provide an example in this regard. People who undergo cosmetic surgery likely base their self-image to a large extent on how they think other people see them. The shallow bases of their personal relationships may cause them to fear their decline if facial features sag or they lose their former physical attractiveness. There is no deeper reserve of friendship to fall back on, no perception among their friends that they are a being for-itself and not a being in-itself. Their relationships with others are probably based in large part on the fact that attractive people wish to be perceived as attractive by other attractive people. By becoming ugly, the attractive person thus loses their function as a suitable mirror for their attractive friends. No longer an equal on the vanity scale, the person once a member of a privileged clique becomes an ugly sycophant not suitably worthy of the beautiful gaze. A person satisfied with these sorts of relationships, however, is unlikely to feel the sort of existential despair that causes them to question the entire bases of these relationships. Sartre provides a fine definition of the extent of relationships for the non-reflective, non-existential person, but for those who would look to his works seeking insight into the soul-piercing questions of a mind delving deeper, his reflections leave one desiring more.

The Greatest Rhyming Couplet, Of All Time

Generals gathered in their masses
Just like witches at black masses
- War Pigs, Black Sabbath

The Holy Order Of Canadian Disciples: We Stand On Guard For Thee

Click to zoom.

Left to Right: The Montreal Magi, Lord Ironcross, The Spirit Ranger, Father Dominion, Newfoundman, Cold Lady Midnight, The Great White Avenger.

Never mind the Mounties, this is a new century, a new millennium. And a new millennium requires new heroes. Borders are disappearing, enemies are taking different forms, the Great White North is melting and the people don't know whom to turn to. A shadowy outfit known as the Holy Order of Canadian Disciples have dedicated themselves to the protection of the Dominion, taking the black maple leaf as their mantle. They seek neither public nor government approval, hearkening back to an older, some say forgotten sense of frontier justice and New World imagination. They bring ancient values to this young nation, combining the fervor of the prairie populist, the mystique of the French Jesuit orders and the British tradition of the gentleman-soldier. Their black robes and religious symbology is based on their idiosyncratic, largely hidden belief system, which is known to include the recognition of Louis Riel as divine prophet and the deification of Canada as the mystical Ultima Thule, the Promised Land of the North. Their base is said to be somewhere in the wastes of the Northwest Territories, the so-called Frozen Jerusalem, running on telluric currents from a forbidden temple directly beneath the North Pole. But who are these journeymen, these dreamers, who dare forge their own cryptic vision of a Canada sea to sea? They are:

The Montreal Magi, inheritor of the forgotten French esoteric tradition, student of Jesuits and Kabbalists, a Quiet Revolutionary prowling the Old City in search of salvation and the secrets that lurk beneath.

Lord Ironcross, British aristocrat banished from the United Kingdom for unknown offenses against the royal order, a believer in Canada as the British Empire's chosen descendant and the transmutated banner-carrier of Anglo civilization.

The Spirit Ranger, half-Inuit shaman and seer into other dimensions, unrivalled in his knowledge of the dark and the cold both in the Arctic and in man's heart.

Father Dominion, wizened founder of the Holy Order known for his cryptic wisdom and intimate knowledge of his country's terrain and soul, unwearied by age and possessor of the legendary Vinland runes, rumoured to grant primordial strength and vision to their possessor.

Newfoundman, descendant of the greatest navigators of the Maritimes and self-proclaimed spiritual heir of Newfoundland's original Viking explorers, master of the fiddle and protector of the Atlantic through hatchet and harpoon-gun.

Cold Lady Midnight, a former Vancouver prostitute turned dark seductress of the streets, known for a "zero tolerance" policy towards drug use that includes the free distribution of syringes filled with potassium chloride.

The Great White Avenger, a loose cannon among loose cannons, former populist prairie preacher turned grey-bearded vigilante enforcing national unity and Western values through the tip of his poison-bladed cane.

Compliments Of The Soviet Bloc

A massive, ruddy-faced, black-tuxedoed waiter with iron-gray hair embraced Guillermo. "This is Lupcho," Guillermo told me. "He reads palms."

"He looks just like Brezhnev," I replied.

Guillermo translated what I had said to Lupcho, who beamed, thanking me for the compliment.

- Balkan Ghosts by Robert Kaplan, pg. 199

Song Of The Day

If love was really anything like this song, I wouldn't be so opposed to it.

Serge Gainsbourg & Brigitte Bardot - Bonnie & Clyde

You've heard the story of Jesse James
Of how he lived and how he died
You liked that eh? You ask for more.
So then, listen to the story of Bonnie and Clyde.

So then, Clyde has a girlfriend
She is beautiful and her name is Bonnie,
Together they had left the straight and narrow
A gang of two: Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow.

Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie and Clyde

When I met Clyde a long time ago
He was loyal, honest, and straight-arrow.
For you must see that it was society
That drove me to a life of crime and misery.

Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie and Clyde

The newspapers think they have our measure
They say we kill for cold-blooded pleasure.
That's not true but sure it's in our nature
To shoot first and ask questions later.

Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie and Clyde

Every time that a policeman hears
That a gas station or a bank was held up
For the cops it's nothing mysterious
They hang it on Clyde Barrow and his mistress.

Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie and Clyde

There's no point in trying to settle down
To find a little house, a quiet town
By the third day there's the tac-tac-tac
Of machine guns coming to attack us.

Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie and Clyde

One of these days we will fall together
Me, I don't give a damn, it's for Bonnie I tremble
What does it matter if they kill me?
Me Bonnie, I tremble for Clyde Barrow

Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie and Clyde

Ambushed on a road their end was nigh
The only way out for them was to die
But more than one followed them to hell
When they died, Barrow and Bonnie Parker

Bonnie and Clyde, Bonnie and Clyde

Borat Eat Your Heart Out

The Invisible Race

I'd like to marry within my race. The race of people who give a shit. This is an invisible race and members are rarely able to even recognize each other. There is no material homeland for this race, since this is a race of exiles and strangers in a strange land. Their only possible homeland is a place outside of time, memories of an imaginal past or a future several lifetimes away. It is utopia: no-where. A benefit of standing outside of time is that one may embrace long-dead and even unborn figures as contemporaries. Geography, blood and coincidence of time are the traditional links uniting countrymen, family and generations. It's easy for most people to adapt to the default position they were born into, if any adapting is required at all. Adaptation is a survival instinct after all, and survival is usually reward enough. Add to survival the bonus benefits of technology, sex and money and the choice is so obvious as to hardly be perceived as a choice at all. Drugs and drink suffice to smooth over any additional wrinkles in the social fabric, as everyone has a place at the bar. Acceptance is only a pint away. The invisible race however is united by spirit and nothing else. I use the term race because race is not something you choose. You are born into a race and you cannot escape it, despite skin bleaching and/or nosejobs. It is an ingrained part of your identity whether you acknowledge it or not. Jeremiah 13:23 asks, "Can the Ethiopian change his skin or the leopard his spots?" Similarly, I can't help giving a shit. If I don't I atrophy and die. The problem is, finding other members of an invisible race is intrinsically difficult. Many carry affectations of giving a shit, but they don't really. They're the invisible race equivalent of white people who wear size XXXL white shirts. An invisible race seems a contradiction in terms, but then this is a race of contradictions in terms. A generation outside of time might be another way to put it. The feeling matters more than the terminology. As one invisible protagonist put it, two plus two makes five is often preferable to two plus two makes four. Even the best math leaves remainders, and this is a race of remainders. Sometimes I feel like its last survivor.

Rhyming Couplet Of The Day

Good love is what I'll be givin ya
I got a pussy 'bout the size of Bolivia
- I Need Some Pussy, Willie D (guest verse by Choice)

The Classiest Plaza Hotel In The World

Only in Hamilton...

Illustrated Quote Of The Day

"The way the neurotic sees it: bars on his door mean that he's locked in; bars on your door mean that he's locked out."
- Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook

Rhyming Couplet Of The Day

It's a small world and it smells funny
I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money
- Vision Thing, Sisters Of Mercy

Next Level Terminology

Aether:
According to the ancient Greeks, the pure essence where the gods lived and breathed. The perfect drug of which Trent Reznor preached.

Anarch:
Ernst Jünger said, "The Anarch is to the anarchist, what the monarch is to the monarchist." Minimalist rulership with maximum results.

Apophenia:
The experience of seeing patterns or connections in "random" or "meaningless" data. So, ultimately, all acts of perception.

Apotheosis:
The transmogrification to a divine form. How Jesus became Christ.

Architectonics:
The scientific systematisation of all knowledge. Having the world all sussed out.

Ataraxis:
The absence of stress or conflict. The rare state of the self-fulfilled mind.

Autochthony:
Originating in and of itself. The genesis of the self-crafted self-propelled wheel.

Axis mundi:
The cosmic pillar uniting earth and sky. A symbol latent in anything worth symbolizing.

Collective effervescence:
The atmospheric energy created by a festive gathering. The hidden link between a rave and a riot.

Élan vital:
The vital force which French philosopher Henri Bergson proposed drove the evolutionary process forward. "It's evolution baby."

Extended mind:
A view of the mind in which it encompasses relevant aspects of one's physical surroundings. The mentalization of reality.

Extropianism:
An evolving framework of values and standards for continuously improving the human condition. No way out but forward go!

Flâneur:
A person who walks the city in order to experience it. See Perry Farrell: "Way down low where the streets are littered, I found my fun with the freaks and the niggers."

Fnord:
The typographic representation of disinformation or irrelevant information intending to misdirect, with the implication of a conspiracy. The fjord of the mind.

Grok:
A verb that connotes knowledge greater than that which can be sensed by an outside observer. To understand so thoroughly that the observer becomes a part of the observed—to merge, blend, intermarry, lose identity in group experience. The process of overcoming the illusion of objectivity.

Homo ludens:
Playing human. The game of life in which the winners are those who know it is a game.

Homo sacer:
A person who is banned, may be killed by anybody, but may not be sacrificed in a religious ritual. The person is excluded from all civil rights, while his/her life is deemed "holy" in a negative sense. "This savage freedom I love."

Islomania:
A rare affliction of spirit: people who find islands somehow irresistible. The mere knowledge that they are in a little world surrounded by sea fills them with an indescribable intoxication. The metaphysical descendants of Atlanteans.

Katabasis:
Descent into the underworld. The way out is through.

Liminality:
The liminal state is characterized by ambiguity, openness, and indeterminacy. One's sense of identity dissolves to some extent, bringing about disorientation. Liminality is a period of transition, during which your normal limits to thought, self-understanding, and behavior are relaxed, opening the way to something new.

Kenosis:
The concept of the 'self-emptying' of one's own will and becoming entirely receptive to God and his perfect will. Man is a vessel to be filled with illusions of the divine. Use your illusion!

Mythopoesis:
Tapping into the half-hidden cauldron of imagery that inspires national epics and faintly remembered nightmares. The creative repository of the soul.

Ouroboros:
The snake that eats its own tail. A symbol of infinity and self-consumption, not mutually exclusive terms.

Palingenesis:
The theory that the human soul does not die with the body but is born again in new incarnations. Also the doctrine that the will does not die but manifests itself afresh in new individuals. "Souls are recycled in the Death & Resurrection Show."

Paraverse:
A parallel virtual world geographically linked to the planet earth or other bodies in the physical universe. "Why live in the world when you can live in your head?"

Pataphysics:
A philosophy dedicated to studying what lies beyond the realm of metaphysics. The Ultima Thule of absurdity.

Profane illumination:
The process by which, sometimes but not always aided by dreams or hashish, a person perceives the most ordinary, overlooked objects of everyday reality – from obsolete train stations to out of place arcades – as uncanny, supernatural, and irrational. Marcel Proust: "The real voyage of discovery consists not of seeking new landscapes, but in having new eyes. . ."

Psychogeography:
The study of specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behavior of individuals. Utopia can be where we stand, if we will it.

Sublimation:
The refocusing of psychic energy away from negative outlets to more positive outlets. These drives which cannot find an outlet are rechanneled. The holy drain that filters us through to the sublime.

Surautomatism:
Any theory or act in practice of surrealist creative production taking, or purporting to take, automatism to its most absurd limits. The Big Sur of absurdity.

Telluric:
The meta-mystical energy currents flowing through the earth. Capable of powering mass hysteria, but not cities.

Trompe-l'œil:
An art technique involving extremely realistic imagery in order to create the optical illusion that the depicted objects really exist, instead of being just two-dimensional paintings. Also: reality as we know it.

The Coming Rise Of Kurdistan

"If a Kurd becomes a piece of gold don’t place it in your pocket."
- Assyrian proverb

The Default Future And The Great Inertia Highway

I feel the slow pull of inertia towards a future by default. As much as I hope for some Great Way Out, some imaginal Brazil, I don't know how long the illusion can stand. I'll always have my escape valves, imagination and music and books, but they may have to be compartmentalized. Acceptable distractions rather than bids for utopia. I've waited too long, I've succumbed to what I claim to be against: dependence on fate and a mysterious messianic Other. Someone to, as the KMFDM album title goes, "Help Us, Save Us, Take Us Away." Sadly such a being isn't coming, despite the most fervent wishes of the Hassidim. We create our own saviours and I've been lax in doing so. I can relate excuses, like silent hidden battles with my own unmentioned demons which I've only recently tentatively mastered, but there's no mysterious messianic Other to care. It's my responsibility and I know this. University definitely wasn't a completely wasted opportunity. I learned a lot, I evolved, I met some great people. But unfortunately my revelations of self-understanding and responsibility came relatively late. The fact that they came at all I of course won't discount. It's been a struggle despite being invisible and beneath mention, and I have emerged stronger for it. Yet I wasted time making false starts, trying to be people I wasn't born to be, surrounding myself with poison atmospheres. Specifics aren't worth relating because they make something that in the abstract seems big seem petty and small. I realize this but this is my platform for self-indulgence and I demand absolution.

I could write two histories of my life, an inner history and an outer history, and they'd look totally different. Neither would necessarily be very interesting which is why I don't bother. But the point is I've lived these two divergent streams which have only now come to merge in a meaningful way. It's taken this long because I've struggled against my own nature. I've come to recognize certain mutable flaws and learned to fight them. These include laziness, irresponsibility, social inconsistency, bitterness and too often a lack of judgment. But there are also parts of me I can't change and must, and have, come to grips with. For one, as you may be able to tell if you've read this far, I'm sometimes a little overly introspective. Particularly at night. Again, another part of my nature I've learned to compartmentalize to certain hours. I realize introspection and unironic emotionality are unattractive qualities in the wider world of shit and irony, so I know not to express them in polite company. But I no longer fight myself over them and I try not to blame myself when they make their inevitable appearance. I also know I have a mind prone to fixation and alas obsession, so I make sure to be conscious of the occasional slip into what I once called a constant image loop. A constant image loop being an internal visual repetitive poke in the eye. "You do it to yourself, you stupid bloke," I know too well. Yes I do. But now I've found there are more worthy and greater enemies than myself, so I should sign up for those battles instead. But, I refuse to accept all that internal struggle was for nothing. I have to justify it by making something of myself in spite/because of it. It must be my slingshot forward.

But I'm not hurtling fist-first into the future. I'm being taken there by inertia. The chant seems to be a Homeresque, "Default! Default!" It's always taken me a long time to realize I've been unconsciously following a path I don't necessarily want to follow. Usually by then I've wasted an untoward amount of time. I get distracted by circular motion. I fall asleep in the bath. I twiddle my hair. That's the kind of person I am. I have to kick myself in the pants to get going. I don't want to be the narrator from "Once in the Lifetime," going: "My God, what have I done!" No matter how straight and clear the path may be it still may lead over the cliff. I can make an approximation of pouring my heart out but really, am I going to do anything about it? The path of least resistance is beckoning with neon signs and flowers. It seems as inevitable as the cat coming back the very next day. As the desert growing three miles a year. I'm already getting distracted. Should I end this on a positive note or end this at all? I secretly still want that messianic Other. A patron or a guide or a benevolent dictator to make my trains run on time. But if the Holocaust has taught us anything, it's that the cavalry ain't coming until it's too late. And frankly even if it does come it's coming with its own interests in mind. "Come to rescue you just to lean on you with interest soaring," as one of my favourite bands sang. Jesus is the exception but, well, if he hasn't come by now I'm afraid he isn't coming at all. Walking on water is a nice ambition but it's a lot more realistic to start building a bridge.

Rhyming Couplet Of The Day

Toilet paper baby when you cry
'Cause you're so full of shit it's coming out your eye
- Leave No Ashes, Burning Brides

Circles End Where We Begin

I've been watching the last season of The Sopranos, and one of the ongoing subplots involves A.J.'s (Tony's son) depression and suicide attempt. In this week's episode Tony tells A.J. about the death of his Uncle Bobby, that they'll have to leave the house and to take care of his mother. Tony is sympathetic when A.J. starts crying until he says something to the effect of "I was doing so much better, why did this happen to me?" Then Tony, justifiably I'd say, throws him to the floor. There's a line from a Manic Street Preachers song that goes "Self-disgust is just self-obsession," and I consider this a truism. Depression and narcissism are flipsides of a self-obsession complex. That they're both prevalent in this age of celebrated self-obsession is no surprise. I don't mean to say depression isn't real. It is. I've had it. But looking back I can say that while a lot of is undoubtedly chemical, a lot of it also has to do with thought patterns. If you focus inward, if you relate everything back to yourself, you're going to get stuck there. It's not fun being stuck inside yourself, always thinking in the same circular solipsistic way. From my own experience, you don't realize how wrong your way of thinking is until a revelation of responsibility comes. A revelation that no one can dig you out of your own pit. It's painful to change your way of thinking, but it's possible. Reading helps. The more you read the more you realize how huge the world outside of you is, and the more things outside of you there are to think about.

The old saying that an idle mind is the devil's plaything fits perfectly with depression. An idle mind, for people with certain self-destructive tendencies, will eat itself. You have to force yourself to stay busy even if a certain lazy impulse complains, because your future, tired self will thank you for the good night's sleep it earned. The actor can become his role. If you act like how you want yourself to be, eventually you will no longer need to act. You will simply be. It takes a conscious effort to change yourself, but what else is consciousness for? I still suffer from a degree of self-obsession but when I feel those sorts of nihilistic, useless thoughts come about I find something to keep me occupied until they pass. I read about history and politics and it reminds me how much of a greater and more rewarding challenge it is to engage the wider world instead of just your inner world. I get into this blank haze sometimes and I have to kick myself into gear. Like right now I was just staring absently and playing with my facial hair, and while it is fun to play with it's exactly like those nihilistic circular thoughts. It's not productive, it's self-consuming, it's a minor but nonetheless real means of escape from greater problems and responsibilities. I have to use the mental overlord that is consciousness to bring on the whip.

Depression isn't minor to the sufferer, but the realization that it is minor in the scheme of things is a way to move beyond it. Winston Churchill suffered from depression and he managed to defeat his narcissistic opposite, Herr Hitler, who probably could have used a good bout of depression to knock his ass down to size. When you have Nazis to defeat there's no time to lie in bed feeling sorry for yourself; as "99 Luftballoons" singer Nena put it, one must hurry hurry super-scurry. It took incredible force of will, no doubt, for Churchill to fight his inner demons while also fighting real demons, which is one reason I think mental illness can make people stronger. By necessity we are forced to develop a greater willpower. That's what Nietzsche meant when he said what doesn't kill us makes us stronger. And there are all kinds of Nazis out there to give us motivation to fight instead of surrendering to ourselves. So evil does serve a function! It forces us to get out from our lethargy and self-absorption and ride into glory. Or at least die gloriously trying. But even if we do, a glorious death on the battlefield beats suicide. And the front is anywhere you look. So while Tony Soprano might have gone a bit too far in throwing A.J. to the ground, it's that kind of visceral wake-up call--usually not physical, to be fair--which forces our eyes to turn outward instead of staring into our brain. And there I go again with the facial hair. It's a constant battle.

Or as the Soviets would put it, troika.

I went to this record show today, full of lots of aging hippies selling memorabilia and assorted collectables. I probably spent at least three hours there because, well, I'm obsessive about what I like and I like music. Plus I enjoy the process of browsing, particular when prices are cheaps and gems are hidden everywhere. Everywhere! I went alone because I don't know anyone who has my kind of appetite and patience for these things. I got some cheap and rare records, mostly on the eighties tip: "From the Lions Mouth" by The Sound, "Vision Thing" by Sisters of Mercy, "what's THIS for...?" by Killing Joke and "Natural History" by March Violets. I mostly collect CDs but these are all very hard to find on that format, plus it's how they were meant to be listened to and the cover art is nice and big. I also got a couple of bootleg concert DVDs from the back of some guy's van, one of Jane's Addiction and one of Faith No More. I got to preview them on a portable DVD player. I was going to get a Nirvana one, but whoever put it together did a really awful job. Beyond the weird blurring camera effects, during "Smells Like Teen Spirit" the video randomly shifted to swirling scenes from a Don Cheadle movie and "artistic" images of soldiers and corpses. Why! I also got a bunch of used CDs and basically spent too much money, but each individual purchase was cheap so I justify it that way. Plus it was for a good cause, supporting the vagabond lifestyles of aging hippies who've wasted their lives as martyrs to rock n' roll. I'm the type of person who needs escapist obsessions to stay on the level. I've narrowed what I collect down to music and books, which works nice since I can combine the two. Beyond that booze fills my trifecta of good fortune. Or as the Soviets would put it, troika.

A Salute To Killing Joke

One of my favourite bands, and the one I turn to the most for pure emotional catharsis, is Killing Joke. Not enough people have heard of them sadly, particularly people my age (early 20s). Basically if you like any music considered dark or heavy from the 80s and 90s, they were probably influenced by Killing Joke or influenced by people who were influenced by Killing Joke. Their singer Jaz Coleman is delight