Quote of the day

"It doesn't take all kinds, there just IS all kinds"
- S. Pearson

Bungholio.....

Yes folks, you too can have designer turds. Simply apply the patented turdtwister technology to your rear portal, squeeze, and VOILA one loaf in the shape you love to share with your friends.

Evolution watch....

This means "Hey Baby, what's your sign" in Bonobo. No, really.

Thoughts from a non-environmentalist.

I am getting worried about the oceans. Yeah yeah you environmentalists can now say "I told you so" but if you didn't let the wack jobs run the asylum, I and others might have taken you more seriously before now. You've been warned :)

Anyway, my two bigs concerns are overfishing and trash. This is about the latter.

Take a look at the article linked if you have the time, but here's the soundbite:

A. 1990 Running shoes spill
B. 2002 Garbage strip
C. 2000 Plastic bag spill
D. Shoes found
E. Eastern Garbage Patch - At the eye of the gyre, plastic reaches concentrations of a million pieces per square mile. Researchers have mapped a giant spill of bags and a mile-long strip of wind-driven garbage.
F. Caught in a gyre - Some of the plastic drifting in the North Pacific is swept to shore, like the thousands of Nike shoes that washed up in the Pacific Northwest. But much is trapped by calm winds and sluggish water within the North Pacific's loop of currents.

A million pieces of plastic per square mile. Plus "ghost-nets", shoes, hazardous waste drums, etc. etc.

If that was in your neighborhood......

630 days left.....

Needles and haystacks.

In their zeal to find a needle, people often burn haystacks to the ground and proclaim “I found the needle!”.

Water For People

Welcome to church. No, No, don't run out the door!

I just wanted to take a moment to pitch a great charity.

"Billions of people throughout the world are suffering and dying from the world's number one health problem, lack of safe water and sanitation facilities.6,000 children die everyday and half of the world's poor are sick at any given moment from the same cause-water-related illnesses.
Safe, sustainable drinking water is a fundamental building block for improvement in people's quality of life. Sometimes it is pure survival. Without it, no other development goals can be met."

These people address that problem! And they have a four star charity rating. What's a few bucks a month, right?

Odoriferous? Need your coffee? Well here you go.

Enuf Said.

Luckiest Man Alive that isn't married to Jenna Jamison

Whale shit anyone?

Ambergris......

SD Camera Card that bends, transformer-like into a USB plug.

Throw away your card reader, you can just fold and plug into an open USB slot! Available in 2 GB as well. Get's rave reviews.

Segway Centaur.

I think it needs twin-mount rocket assist.

(Click title for more info)

The Culture Code

Society behaves. Add a “mis”. Do you smell the odor? The Culture Code, spoken and unspoken. I know you see it. It’s that thing at the corner of your vision. The corner of your noggin. That set of things that We Must Do. Be careful not to violate the Code. Girl, will you hear about it.

It’s not a conspiracy mind you. A conspiracy takes thought, secrecy, and planning. Good luck with all three. The Culture Code is random, obvious yet not, understood, if not at all. Obey or Ostracize.

The Culture Code core curriculum: “freedom”, “school”, “get a career”, “work hard”.

What a pantload.

Freedom?

We throw people in jail for doing things like marijuana and shrooms while letting everyone but kids stone themselves on ethanol bottled with the best artistic talent and taxed with blood.

Republican fascist state, Democratic nanny state, pick your punch. Neither gives a dump about you and what you think. Really. Where you can, fight The Man.

School?

You mean math, science, history, reading, and writing, right? Hell no, assimilation and programming of Culture Code, minion. Be sure to enjoy that.

Diploma: a license to narrow your options.

“What’s YOUR major?”

CEO once said: “A diploma tells us that you can complete four years of something”. That’s it. College graduates are Useless in the best sense of the word. Programmed for obeisance. Ready to bully.

Career?

No, really, please be serious.

Commencement Speech: Graduates! Travel the world; create art; live on $10 a day in Ensenada, Phnom Penh, and Rome; meditate; rinse and repeat five years. Then fucking skip the career. Start a business. Congratulations, you win!

Career Deux.

Screw working for The Man. Haven’t you read Dilbert? I mean really.

Work Hard?

Nice Codespeak. Wanna better one? Work smart. Career and Cocaine, probably the same root word in Latin.

Managing owners enjoy using your time. A lot. Got a problem with that, worker? That loathing is the Code having its way with you.

Singapore created such a pleasant place to live. Safe. Clean. Fascist. Graffiti gets you caned. Cameras will fine you if you spit on the street. Stupid bastards.

The Creatives fled. Stifle the Creatives with Culture Code and all you have left are the robots. Flexibility and creativity in the marketplace? Fuggit about it. Singaporians are correcting that now. Good luck with that.

Religion.

Oh dear. The Big Two, politics and religion. Hang on tight folks, I’m playing with fire. Hell fire. Whoosh!

Believe in gods or not. I hang with the crucifix crowds and the navel gazers. It’s all good.

What are your preacher teachers ACTUALLY doing you anyway?

Jesus talked. Talked hard. So does your shaman/pastor/preacher/priest. But what does he (and it is a he) NOT teach you?

Sex a sin? Song of Solomon, baby.

Iraq War is just peachy? Jesus, the original peace loving boomer.

Women shouldn’t be in positions of authority? Homosexuals not part of God’s design? Slavery is cool in the bible too.

Do ya Get it?

Humans twist theology to fit the Culture Code. The way you can tell we are monkeys is by watching the chimpanzees scream at each other.

Fundamentally, church is a place where people get together to reinforce their habits. Sometimes it’s to reinforce the good ones. Sometimes it’s another place to be entertained, go figure. Churches can have nothing on a Moose or Rotary Club. Sometimes much less.

Does the preacher tell us to do stupid shit? Priests molest boys and were cloaked by the church. Rev. Haggard preached against gays and counseled GW Bush while doing men and methamphetamines. Pastor perfect? He may not be doing boys, but he’s probably doing something.

Do what your gods tell you to do, “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you”. Nearly all the gods said it someway. No need for Ten Commandments on the courthouse, folks. Simple.

Morality.

Sociologists tell us that there are hundreds of moral rules that apply to every culture in the world.

“Do not sleep with your mother” is one.

“Do not sleep with your father” isn’t.

Yeah. This is the Code. Frightening isn't it?


Are things Black and White?

Culture Code, all the way down. Grey is life.

The immigrant you want thrown out of the country was your grandmother. Cops murder. Drug dealers go to church with you and pay their tithe with other people’s high. The Senior Deacon at church sells cigarettes. And of course, that’s only the other people.

and speaking of White and Black:

Don Imus versus Al Sharpton, the musical.

Round 1. Big Al.

A racist gets another racist fired for being a racist. Do you GROK that? Think that solved the race problem? Really?

Round 2 – Ignorant Imus.

Imus gets a job. A better job.

Fight over

If you think we know what happened there, look again. We don’t fully get it. Deep down there is something there. Do you smell it?

Got Milk?

I just came in and installed a sign in your living room. No?

How about if I put it on your house? Oh!

You don’t mind The Code if it keeps The Program on the freeway, on another building, in your TV, on your computer, in your face, and in your head? Do the calculus. More monkeys screamin’…..

Buy it. Live it. Drink it. Eat it. The Jones got theirs, where’s yours? Right?

I say, paint out a sign, and put yours in its place.

Let it say “Blah Blah Blah”

Making of Samurai Katana Swords.

Fascinating video. Long download but worth it.

Waco

"19 April 1993 was the first time since the Spanish Inquisition that people have been burned alive for their religious beliefs."

- Alec McCol, in Soldier of Fortune

Bob Peterson - In Memoria

I had the great luck to get to meet Robert Peterson, owner of Peterson Publishing, aka Guns and Ammo Magazine, Hunting, Hot Rod Magazine, Motor Trend, and about a zillion other magazines. He was also a shooting legend and a bigger hunting legend. He was a huge fan of the Devil Pups organization and threw a shooting fest at his Peterson Ranch once a year that I got invited to with a company I used to work for. All the Barbeque, Skeet, Trap, and Rifle and Pistol Shooting you could eat in a short day. Then it was off to the Lodge where he had trophy elk, antelope, rhinos, bears, etc. completely filling the Lodge. There was also the first Polar Bear taken with a .44 magnum revolver, by Peterson, see link above for the story.

Oh yes, he also had three gatling guns, one of which went up the hill in Cuba with Teddy Roosevelt and had been on loan to the Smithsonian. A real piece of history (pardon the pun).

Peterson was the quiet and strong type in the best sense. But when he spoke, people listened.

A seriously amazing man.

Jeff Cooper - In Memoria

Two great men have recently died. A very excellent homage to Jeff Cooper and his infamous quotes is on Guns and Ammo Magazines website (click link above). Here's a few soundbites:

August 1973--"A good general range rule for pistols is that, if what you want to hit appears larger than your front sight, you are within range."

January 1975--"One bleeding-heart type asked me in a recent interview if I did not agree that 'violence begets violence.' I told him that it is my earnest endeavor to see that it does. I would like very much to ensure--and in some cases I have--that any man who offers violence to his fellow citizen begets a whole lot more in return than he can enjoy."

February 1988--"Considering the amount of fancy equipment now seen in competition, some readers have complained loudly that the 'average guy' does not have a chance. It might be pointed out that this average guy never has had a chance. Competition is held to determine what is best, not what is average. And if all the equipment were standardized, the man who won would still not be in any sense average."

November 1993--"Fight back! Whenever you are offered violence, fight back! The aggressor does not fear the law, so he must be taught to fear you. Whatever the risk, and at whatever the cost, fight back!"

THE NANNY CULTURE

January 2005 - We happen upon two somewhat different conclusions from our friends down there in Iraq. On the one hand, our selected riflemen are scoring very well, sometimes at long range but mainly at inner-city distances. On the other, we are bedeviled by reports that the people we send over there are basically unfamiliar with rifle shooting. This may be so, and if so, it may be attributed to the increasing urbanization of our culture, in which there are large numbers of young men who have never touched a weapon of any kind (possibly excepting a baseball bat) prior to putting on a soldier suit.
This may be a reflection of the "nanny state," in which a large proportion of young men have no fathers at home. Even if there is a man around the house, he is usually not a father figure. If he does not know anything about firearms, he is unlikely to have anything useful to hand on to his sons. This need not always be the case, of course, since my own father, who was expert in many things from viticulture to epic poetry, never owned a gun of his own and had to be educated by his sons.

HASTING'S FOURTH LAW

August 2005 - As the mess continues in the Land of Canaan, we observe that a lot of that trouble could be avoided by simple observance of Hastings' fourth law, which reads: "Never throw rocks at people with guns."

MACHISMO

January 2006 - In our current emasculate culture, valorous behavior is somehow regarded as inappropriate. The Spanish term machismo is, for example, often regarded as insulting rather than complimentary. This is by no means as intended. To be macho, in the classic sense, is to be manly rather than boastful. False modesty is no particular virtue. When you earn both ears and the tail in the bull ring, you are fully entitled to take a bow.

For those of you with performance issues....

One Terrabyte Hard Drive to go. $400. Saweeet.

These boots weren't made for walking.....

Eelko Morrer (don't get me started witht the name) has come up with yet another innovative design. Boots with a special hook built in so as to hang upside down from the overhead handrails in the London Tube (Subway for my fellow Yanks). Performance art or innovative back stretch? You get to decide.

Meanwhile Eel-Co (couldn't resist) also came up with this:

Any takers ladies?

What women (or special men for that matter) won't do for fashion.

Bottled Water? More like Bottled Waster....

As the link says, bottled water is a scam. Bottled water is often no more pure than tap water. And you pay more than you pay for gasoline when you buy it. That is one expensive bottle, I gotta say....

Banksy makes Bank!

One of my favorite street artists (aka graffiti artist) Banksy, just sold at an art auction for 288,000 pounds (around $577,000). His ape self portrait also sold for about 198,000 pounds. Sweet.

Conspiracy

"Never ascribe to malice that which can be explained by incompetence"

"The more you know,
The worse you look"

- Doc Searles on TWIT

Wow.

That was challenging!. I switched to blogger (a.k.a blogspot) in order to have more control over my blog and options and getting Godaddy to switch my "Custom Domain" was a real PITA. But we are back up!

Make life easier.

I love outsourcing chores to teenagers. What a bargain.

Self Mediatation.

My Neice's self-portrait.

Beat The Fuzz

Caffeine

Tax Collectors

Be wary of strong drink. It can make you shoot at tax collectors... and miss.

— Robert A. Heinlein

I am free.

I am free, no matter what rules surround me. If I find them tolerable, I tolerate them; if I find them too obnoxious, I break them. I am free because I know that I alone am morally responsible for everything I do.

— Robert A. Heinlein

Billboard Liberation Front

Loved the anti-advertising agency benches.

Exorcise in job surrealism.

I just found out today that an environmental project I worked on in the past has been overran by none other than THE Erin Brokovitch. I just don't know what to think about that. Kinda like knowing a green three armed dwarf showed up at your dinner party when you were gone. Weird.

"Shit"

Privatized ID? Bueller? Anyone?

There is now the "Clear" card. It is a private business that screens and keeps your identification on a card that allows frequent fliers as special fast lane through airport security. Iris ID and ten fingerprints required plus two form of ID. Social in-Security Number is optional but will possibly delay application (What a shock!). While this gives me the creeps, it also has the privitization of government programs (in this case, identification) that I so crave. $99. Tough call.

More: http://www.american.com/archive/2007/april-0407/what2019s-wrong-with-a-one-size-fits-all-identity

War

The questions learned from the Vietnam war about getting into wars were as follows:

1. Do we have a clear objective?
2. Do we have an overwhelming force?
3. Is there an exit strategy?

".....[Saddam Hussain] poses no imminent or direct threat to the United States or to his neighbors.....

...even a successful war against Iraq will require a US occupation of undetermined length, at undetermined cost, with undetermined consequences."

— Barak Obama 2002

Superbaby Jesus.

While in Bassano del Grappa, Italy last year a friend showed us her favorite fresco. Now frescos in Italy are as common as graffiti on crack houses, but this one did have something special going on. If you look at the picture, there is an angel on the left, God at the top, and the Virgin on the right. But look closely (see the zoom).

Yes gentlepeople, that is the SuperBaby Jesus flying from God to Mary, and apparently the immaculate conception was fuel injected.

Silent Protest.

When the great lord passes by, the wise peasant bows deeply and silently farts.
— Ethiopian Proverb

48 Laws of Power.

I have been reading the 48 Laws of Power which is a treatise on the gaining and effective exploitation of power. The author Robert Greene, reads something written by Machiavelli every year, which should give you insight into how this book works.

It is written amorally, to say the least. Do not try this at home. But yet, it is very well done as Greene provides great examples for each Law of how the Law was "transgressed" (and someone lost their ass), how it was "correctly observed", the "Keys to power" with regards to each Law, and "Reversal" - how doing the reverse of the law can in limited cases be successful. The author provides lots of stories from the usual power suspects like Machiavelli and Lao Tzu, yet also provides lesser-discussed power players like Galileo, Fouquet, various scam artists, and lots of others.

I first heard about this book through Hip-Hop culture. The book is apparently the bible of how to make it in the Rap/Hip Hop Music industry, a male-dominated tribal testosterone business if ever their was one.

As I said earlier though, do not try this at home.

Odds of an IRS audit 150 to 1. Odds of being killed in a car 1 in 84.

Too many people worry about tax audits. In my not-so-humble-opinion, this is like seriously worrying about your next place to take a crap. Don't forget you can actually do that anywhere, if you must. Just leave the building real quick. I digress.

One should take every single little dot and tit one can in deductions. And if you still end up paying, you're screwing up. Can't buy a house? Start a business for Buddha's sake already!

Not a hobby mind you, an actual business! You've got skills, deduct them already. Basket weaver? Make gift baskets. Artist? Paint and sell once or twice a year at an art sale. Like to play with cats? Professional Cat-Sitter. Whatever. And then watch for every single stinking thing you can deduct to that business. Pens, paper, business lunches, client goodies for marketing, books, classes related to the business, mileage related to business, computer supplies, magazines, phone charges, etc etc. You can do this for approximately seven years if you are actually trying to make the business go. If you are profitable, well then there you go, more money.

Now, I am not a tax professional, and if you don't have one, get one. Not a tax weenie professional you saw on television that rhymes with Cock. Those "professionals" are people like you and me that had a class given to them and are near useless in my opinion. A real professional can tell you what risk level (as if) you are approaching for audit and run that line as high or as low as you want.

There is a line between tax avoidance (legal) and tax evasion (illegal) and don't cross it. But the difference can be thousands, if not tens of thousands, of dollars in your pocketses.

Free Speech.

I am really getting tired of this encroachment on our free speech rights. I first heard about this at the democratic national convention, the establishment of "Free Speech Zones" which is NewSpeak for herding protestors into controlled areas "For their protection" of COURSE. What a load.

Now we have this too: http://www.boingboing.net/2007/02/02/usc_protestors_sent_.html USC setting up a zone which, fortunately, students are defying. This stuff is going to motivate me to get arrested yet. WTF?

Tyranosaurus closest living relative is......

No Really. DNA Testing is in.....

Tastes like chicken.

Star Wars.

Apparently our trick is to take out satellites are not limited to kenetic-kill. We have a stealth satellite that parks next to other satellites and blocks thier signals. We (and the Russians) can tamper with the commands sent to a satellite and cause it to spin out of control. And so on. Lots of nasty little tricks that don't involve shredding debris in space.

Jackson Pollock

This is my desktop background. I use it because I like Jackson Pollock's paintings a lot, and because coworkers go insane when they try to use my computer. I'm so used to it, I don't even notice other than to enjoy the painting "Full Fathom Five". If you zoom in on the beige drops, you can even see the three dimensionality of the drops of paint. Genius.

God gave us the free market.

"For God so loved the world that he gave it The Market, that whoever owns shares shall not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send The Market into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through it."

— Friend, Papio, on the ship-of-fools.com bulletin boards, intended sarcastically, which really didn't work out on me.

Ospreys going to Iraq.

I am fascinated by all things military. Probably has something to do with coming from a family of marines and an unhealthy fascination with things that burn or explode. It's a thing.
Anyway, the Marines are about to put ten V-22 Osprey aircraft into Iraq. Poor insurgents, I almost feel sorry for them. Not. But I digress. The video is way cool and worth seeing all the Ospreys do a flyby at the end of the video!

Write Shit Down

The cult of "Getting things done" is great if you are already an anal-retentive freak with serious OCD tendancies. For those of us that are, shall we say, organizationally challenged, there is another option, Write Shit Down. Works great in my Moleskine reporters notebook. Just write shit down. Anything that comes to mind, work numbers, job assignments. Everything. Don't lose the book. Simple.

Stubbornitrant.

"I have to get a new slave, you are getting stubborn and recalcitrant"
— My Wife, the Teutonic Goddess.

OODA, Observe, Orient, Decide, Act

Incompstupidity.

"....more harm is done in life through incompetence and stupidity than outright evil. Stupidity is seen as a form of imbalance. Animals have their instincts to depend on in danger. We have our reason and rationality. When we lose those reasoning powers, it is like falling between two stools: we cannot depend on our instincts, and we cannot depend on our intelligence. We fall and create waves of problems.....
......One of the most obdurate forms of stupidity is the frozen idea. We all suffer from this. What I mean is the following: we develop some idea about life. This could come from things we read and hear in the media, or from our own experiences. These ideas freeze into an opinion about something. As time goes on, this opinion of ours tends to lose touch with reality. Sometimes we hold on to such opinions because to admit they were wrong or irrelevant causes us emotional turmoil and anxiety; out of vanity and laziness we don't ever want to admit we were mistaken. Listen to people in their 60s or 70s; almost every idea they express is some kind of hardened cliché formed in their youth.....

Gullistupidity.

"You can't go and download a Windows update for stupidity... or gullibility."
— Kevin Mitnick

Narconihilism

It’s the combination of narcissism and nihilism that really defines postmodernism
— Al Gore

Street Art.

I am sorely tempted to become a graffiti artist. "Why!?" Many people would ask. Well, here's the answer. It is a form of protest. Take a look at the stencil art done by Banksy below. More and more our environment is being contaminated. Contaminated by Little Brother and Big Brother alike. Walk around your town and look for spy cameras watching you. Did you approve that? Is there a way to get them to edit you out of those cameras? NO. Your image is being forceably recorded, and for what? You don't honestly think it will help? Do you? The best you could hope for is the cops to see the hoodie after he kills you or mugs you, right? The criminals know about those cameras, right? So why are they there? They are there to give comfort to weak minds.

I say, spray 'em, trash 'em or at least tag 'em with irony like Banksy. One of my heros.

Datsun 1600

Datsun 1600 observed at guess where (the background should give it away). This thing was Cherry with every part of it restored original.

Tricycle Race

This was the sixth annual tricycle race assembling at the top of Lombard Street (crookedest street in the world). We happened to notice all the goofy people climbing the hill with trikes (notice the tricorn hat guy) and snapped a picture.

http://www.jonbrumit.com/byobw.html

Word of the day: Wall wart.

The power packs that festoon our walls thanks to the scads of electronics that parasite our persons, offices, and homes.

Can't we do better than this?

Treo, thy name is Suck.

I just had our Palm Treo 700s cross-pollinate and give my wife my contacts and me her calandar book. It turns out that the desktop software they issue with the phone is not the same as the software they issue on the web, and it is NOT compatible. If I have to reinstall Windows to unscrew their stupid software, we are going to switch to iPhones a lot sooner than we originally thought. F*$!

The phones are also crashy so far, with or without the current problem. Not impressed.

My Life Span.

Tshirts by Dr1vel

Preach It Bro

"Why don’t we let the president make all the choices, make all the decisions? There are some, I suspect, in this administration who would like that, some in this country would like that. But we tried a monarchy once. It is not suited to America."

- Senator Chuck Hagel. Our Republican from Nebraska

Affirmation

I should write a book called,

"Positive thinking doesn't do dick, unless you get off your ass".

Imagine the graphics I would use on the cover.

The Prime Directive and Nation Building

In the Star Trek series (Yes I am a geek, deal with it), The Prime Directive (according to wikipedia) dictates "that there be no interference with the natural development of any primitive society, chiefly meaning that no primitive culture can be given or exposed to any information regarding advanced technology or the existence of extraplanetary civilizations. It also forbids any effort to improve or change in any way the natural course of such a society, even if that change is well-intentioned and kept completely secret. 'Primitive' is defined as any culture which has not yet attained warp drive. Starfleet allows scientific missions to investigate and move amongst pre-warp civilziations as long as no advanced technology is left behind, and there is no interference with events or no revelation of their identity. This can usually be accomplished with hidden observation posts, but Federation personnel may disguise themselves as local sentient life and interact with them."

So I would put out the question, should we follow a form of the Prime Directive? And if not, why not? The types of societies on this world that I might potentially label as "primitive" include those that conduct female genital mutilation, hiding of women in Burkhas or similar, and those that practice widespread child labor.

Do these societies deserve to be simply left alone? Should we simply ignore them totally, except for scientific observation purposes? Give them no technology. Let them stew in their own fetidness? Or should we go the other way, engage them in direct corrective actions? Commit a veiled form of genocide on their way of life?

Something in between?

Beat The Fuzz

Caffeine