So a bit over three weeks ago, I announced I was going offline for at least two weeks. I made it to three. Less than I wanted to, but more than I expected. (Sad, right?)
I'mmmmmm baaaaaaaaaaaaaack!
But, I still have to cut way back. I'm addicted to expressing myself, but I gotta get unaddicted to this G+ socialsphere thing.
I got a shitload of writing, household projects, exam study (still haven't taken the exams, but am so much better prepared), etc., etc. by not spending 3-4 hours every day hanging out on G+ and associated time wasting Internet stuff.
So. I totally love you guys, but I'm going to try really hard to not be around (and probably not as entertaining) as I was last month.
Wish me luck? I'd smiley, but I'm seriously going to have a hard time controlling this. Sigh.
Seriously? Okay, I think it's cool people can make a sport out of anything, and this is a very healthy activity, and I'm sure the rules are well-structured and the old ladies are cutthroat on the track, but this is still silly, no matter how you try to dress is up. :)
If we strip out just the "stock awards" for the CEO, CFO, President and Chairman-of-the-fucking-Board then those 1,100 people could all have been retained at minimum wage.
(And if we strip out the "non-equity incentive plan compensation" those 1,100 people could have been retained at minimum wage PLUS health insurance!)
Look, even God doesn't need $11 mil. No sane, healthy human being "needs" that much money. At that point, it's not about the money any more. It's about prestige and showing off, and glitz and glamour and bullshit like that. As a male friend of mine likes to say "It's about showing off how big your dick is."
It's good to be filthy fucking rich. You can make up any rules you want, including "I want it, I take it, and no one can stop me."
"The Golden Rule: Them that have the gold, make the rules."
It's Class Warfare, Bitches, and we need to fight back.
I was toying with the idea of becoming a writer, but then I saw that Darrin Drader - who has his name on something like fifty (50!) books - was like “Yeah, I repair battleships now.” Um, okay, now I’m depressed. I think I’ll definitely keep my day job. I mean, the perks suck being a supervillain henchman, but the pay is steady, better than McDonalds, and my chances of getting knifed by some psychopath are no worse than if I worked at Wal-Mart.
One of the few things I liked about the D&D 4e books was that every piece of artwork was labeled with the artist's name.
I felt this showed a lot of respect for the artist. I also found it really useful when I wanted to see more art like that, because the artist's name was right there.
5e has a lot going for it, but this lack of artist recognition is a bit of a black spot by my tally.
Elitist - She believes with absolute conviction that she is better than anyone she can exploit, and idolizes those who can exploit her;
Opportunist - amorally bends to capitalize on opportunities, no matter if doing so hurts others, or appears to contradict the values demonstrated while amorally seizing earlier opportunities;
Pig - has few ethics beyond "gimme", which means "If I can get away with it, then it's morally justified and okay," and "If I can't get away with it, then you're a jerk, and I'm still morally justified, you jerk."
So, no surprise, but it turns out that the embarassing, humiliating, borders-on-treason, letter from 47 GOP Senators to Tehran, deliberately, openly, and directly intended to undermine the sitting US President (and - they can't have been so blind - to undermine and embarrass the entire United States) was bought and paid for by Neo-Feudalist asshats.
It is now very clear that these Very Expensively Educated Neu-Feudalists are using the movie "Idiocracy" exactly the same way the use Orwell's "1984" - not as a warning, but as a strategic playbook.
Apologist Defenders
I love how apologists try to defend it. "Oh, it's not as if 47 Senators actually sent the letter - they just posted it on a website where the entire world could see it. Not the same thing at all!"
Um, yeah, it actually is. Especially when 47 of the highest ranking officials in the country sign on to it. When posted publicly like that, for all intents and purposes, it speaks with the voice of authority. It may not be legally binding, but as the Fox News asshats run their playbook, perception is reality. Sen. Cotton - or at least his staffers - could not possibly have been so dense or clueless as to think otherwise. Someone in that office had to smart enough, educated enough, and media savvy enough to get him elected, and therefore to understand.
I'm really glad this is one of the top posts, because language is important, and a small change in how we refer to corporations and the people who run the damn things can potentially have world-shattering impact
This one technically didn't make my cutoff, but most people agree it's probably one of my most beautiful posts, even if it is a lot more subtle and doesn't have any f-bombs.
"Some 60 percent of individuals remain unemployed a year after their incarceration, according to recent data. And those who do find work are likely to earn significantly less money than they did before prison. "
"This lost employment from criminal records amounts to an estimated $65 billion per year in lost gross domestic product. And with a population that has become increasingly criminalized,..."
...we, as a nation, are shooting ourselves in the face for excessively and exuberantly throwing people in jail for the least and dumbest shit.
This is also insane that people should fall in love with his photograph. Yes, he's gorgeous, but he's up on weapon charges, so is he even sane?
I am glad he is getting a new chance to make a better life for himself and his family. Prisons are just a horrible way to warehouse and waste humanity. I sincerely hope he does make a fresh start with the new contract and hopefully turn out to be a decent human being who re-invests in his old neighborhood to help other young men avoid prison.
I think that "cops" who take an oath to serve and protect and live on the ground where they see shit, would love to test every damn rape kit and put rapists in jail.
I think that politicians - and judges are now politicians thanks to "Citizens Untied" (typo intentional) - don't care, especially since the vast majority today come from wealth, aspire to wealth, or are sociopaths (since politics today is psychotic) and are all bought by the uber-rich in any case.
This guys are as insane as they are brilliant. It shouldn't be possible to do this kind of thing with cellos (okay, technically they get some audio help from other instruments, but it's a damn good show).
I love this official video for the period flavor. It's funny. I guess they start with Vivaldi, and then go "Thunderstruck".
I love music, and I love D&D, ergo I love bards in D&D. The blend of "hard rock" and cellos, with period costumes, is just the kind of bard I want to play - dressy, stylish, fantastically skilled, and rocking-the-fuck-out.
This one is fun, too, since it shows a bit more and we can see how much of the sound is them, separate from other instruments.
Yes, I have a mother. Despite popular misconception, I was not spontaneously generated from the migraine of a skygod (that was Athena, although I can understand the mistake). Yes, she is still alive, and yes, I've already talked to her. I am grateful that my mother and I get along very well.
Motherhood is totally undervalued by everyone, which is really amazing, since everyone has a mother. While it is possible not everyone knows who his, or her, mother was, she still existed. Motherhood is both a physical component (pregnancy, delivery) and an emotional and psychological one (nursing, nurturing).
On this day (Mothers' Day in the United States), take a minute to say "thank you," to your mom, or her memory, because it's the right thing to do.
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On a total technical tangent, while I am a grammar snob and want to spell it "Mothers' " - the plural possessive, the Wikipedia article has a section explaining why the official proper title is "Mother's" with the singular possessive. Frankly, I think it's awesome that Anna Jarvis had the foresight to trademark the phrases used with the day. It's sick shit how people will steal trademarks these days, and really discouraging how expensive the damn things are for small operators (while the mega-corp operators still won't give a crap and can lock up even the vaguest trademarks with impunity).
I NEED to unplug. I don't know which I fear more: being doxxed while offline and defenseless, or simply being forgotten.
I think I've just nailed why I MUST unplug. I think the word I'm looking for is "addiction," and that ain't healthy.
I have been thinking about this for a long time, it's just that this week, something finally snapped, and so I'm actually going to do it.
I'm losing my edge. I just had an argument with a sub-par troll, and when asked why, I didn't really know the answer. I got something out of the pointless exchange, but I can't even put my finger on what.
You guys are my secret community. No one in the meat world crosses over to this life. I can say anything here, and feel some measure of insulation from everyday concerns. Here, with you, I don't have to hold back. Here, I'm about as unbridled and free as I can ever be.
I love you all. I love entertaining you and being entertained by you. I love sharing energy, thoughts, words and experiences with you. I love seeing what you're going to give a crap about next, what winds you up, what makes you happy. You've become part of me, and that means a lot to me.
Friday night is when I usually go offline. This time I'm going to have my password changed by the one person I trust. He has orders not to release it for at least two weeks. I bet after two weeks without my therapy community (you guys), he'll force my password on me, just because he'll get tired of listening to all the noise in my head. That's both sad and funny at the same time.
Between the three blogs, I'm dumping out a lot of energy. Five-a-week is actually easy for me to produce content, because I have a lot of mental energy, and the blogs are a great release of energy, but I need that energy for other things right now.
I need to pass some tough exams to advance from a job to a career, so I need the energy to study.
After that, I've got some pure fiction projects I want to polish to enter some competitions, but made myself promise to wait until the exams are done.
Keep visiting this site to see what new material spills forth! I've got the autoblog queued up to post very-nearly every day from now into June.
(I don't know the model's name; she's on Snorg Tees, so go click about and see for yourself. :)
1) it does look super f-ing creepy. Great blending of old horror standbys with modern reality!
2) Watch the first 41 seconds, then pause it. Yeah, that's why I keep so much of my shit private, and while I adore my friends and family, why I don't let them take pictures of me. Just ask Jennifer Lawrence, Paris Hilton and Pamela Anderson how well that shit stays private.
And, if you've read any of my posts about doxxing and the Interweb bloodlust, you can get the picture about why I'm so paranoid about what shreds of privacy I can protect. There are a lot of psychos out in the world.
I love you all, but please stop asking for pictures.
One of the other things often overlooked is that all modern currencies are based solely in fiction, without material backing.
For example, if I buy Apple stock today, and tomorrow the value of the stock increases by 10%, then I sell it. My bank account is magically 10% bigger than yesterday for no reason other than the magical perception of what people value at that moment. Oh, sure, people like to gyrate through hoops to come up with justifications for some physical basis for the magic 10%, but in the end, there isn't one. It's all smoke and mirrors. So, too, magic money like bitcoin is all about what people are willing to value something at.
Mostly it's how fucking stupid people are. I mean, for crying out loud! How can "common sense" be so rare as to be non-existent. How can people get so wound up over tribalism - by any other name such as "nationalism," or "racism," or "sexism," - but that's what it all boils down to.
Totally agree with the opening sentence "latest format into fascism" - fascism, aka corporatism - is a form of government whereby power is stripped from individuals and handed to non-existent entities called "corporations". HUMANS hide behind the paper facade of corporations to commit deeds against other humans.
The concept that my supervisor should be granted privilege into my private life is very pre-industrial revolution and pre-union. In other words, very Dark Ages.
What many of these business owners who might advocate for this fail to realize is that in most instances, there remains someone higher up the food chain.
When not - such as a small business - then the morale-crushing intrusion into the private life of the employee does wonders to undermine the small business, leading to failure.
At every possible level, this is class warfare. Destruction of the low- and middle-class is the hallmark of the modern GOP, and this is yet another insidious way to drive that forward.
Your own freedoms are best guaranteed by removing the rights of others?
You believe that LGBT folk don't deserve the same rights as anyone else since this would infringe if not totally destroy your own, it would in fact cause you deep an abiding pain?
You believe that the freedom to worship is a Christian right, and any other religion is just plain un-American, and Muslims have a special right to be hounded no matter what? You believe that to avoid the imposition of Sharia law one must impose fundamentalist Christian doctrine first by applying old testament laws?
Ruminate on that a moment. Think about what that really means. Imagine if the most powerful man in the world - that's the President - got shot tomorrow.
Do you think nothing would change? Do you think America would stand united? Only if it was a foreigner that shot him, and in that case America would unite in a bloodbath of short-lived and short-sighted revenge, then we'd turn upon ourselves like jackals.
The President of the United States of America is not a person. It is a mantle. It is a role. It is a title. It is a fucking symbol of America.
A man - or woman - takes the Oath of Office, and until death or a new election cycle, that person is the President 24/7/365. Yes, even Pres Bush (43) was President 24/7/365. He took more "vacation days" than any other President ever, but even he could not shirk the responsibility of the mantle. If the Country called, he was still the President.
Anyone who disrespects the President shits on America. You can't separate the President-as-Symbol from America anymore than you can remove the Mantle of Office from the President.
Anyone who says "Obamanazi" or "Obummer" or any other stupid shit is saying "I fucking hate America."
You remind those turds how they hate America when you kick them in the nuts and smack them upside the head.
I thought the disrespect shown Pres Clinton was outrageous and staggering, but the sheer offense, overt racism, and stupid disrespect shown to this President is mind-boggling.
The hypocrisy is stunning, but also the short-sightedness. They cannot possibly expect that they can piss on, embarrass, denigrate and humiliate the office of the President one term, and magically expect "their boy" won't be pissed on and suffer from the tarnished office when the tides change again.
Then again, maybe it isn't short-sighted. Maybe it is part of a long-term agenda to weaken the Government of The People, by The People, for The People. If the Government is undermined and weakened, then there is less to protect The People from the neo-feudalists who seek to drag us back to the middle ages - the time of the unlimited Privileged class, and the peasantry who could literally be abused, murdered or raped without consequence.
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