'In the silence of a stick buzzing by your head, you realize which self it is you wish to truly defend.'

Dog Brothers Martial Arts, Inc. - NAVBAR_TITLE:

"Marc 'Crafty Dog' Denny replies, 'As Nobel laureate Konrad Lorenz points out, Man is an animal with an aggressive instinct. Whether we like it or not, this instinct will discharge, just as the lack of sex leads to a wet dream. Aggression in nature has three purposes: to spread a hunting species out over territory, for rank within a social group, and for reproductive rights-classically two males fighting over the female or the female in defense of her young. Yet in today's world there is no initiation for the young male, no ritual space to ground this energy, and so it floats, inchoate, spontaneously erupting. I believe that many of the terrible things we read in the newspapers today would not happen if this energy were given its place, acknowledgement, and guidance.

'Some say the world has too much violence, therefore we shouldn't teach violence. I disagree. To quote Carl Jung, 'The idea is not to imagine figures of light, but to make the darkness conscious.' When we go into a fight 'too extreme for the UFC' with no judges, no referees and no trophies, trusting only to the fighters, something very special happens. Of course there a moth and the flame quality to the experience, but I deeply believe that our way of doing things triggers an awareness that to go as deeply as possible into an experience of the true primal core that one must go equally in the opposite direction into a calm wordless state. Wild Dog once said 'In the silence of a stick buzzing by your head, you realize which self it is you wish to truly defend.' I think this is very right. Perhaps even more important than the fight experience is the special altered state which comes in the days afterwards. It changes your life.'"

The Dilbert Blog: Wisdom for Grads

The Dilbert Blog: Wisdom for Grads:

"The person who sits nearest the boss’s office gets the most assignments.

Your potential for senior management will be determined by the three H’s: Hair, Height, and Harvard degree. You need at least two out of three. (Non-Harvard schools will be acceptable if it’s clear that you “could have gone” to Harvard.)

Your hard work will be rewarded. Specifically, your boss’s boss will reward your boss for making you work so hard.

There’s no such thing as good ideas and bad ideas. There are only your own ideas and other people’s. If you want someone to like your idea, tell him he said it last week and you just remembered.

Teamwork is what you call it when you trick other people into ignoring their priorities in favor of yours.

Leadership is a form of evil. No one needs to lead you to do something that is obviously good for you.

You can estimate the time for any project by multiplying the number of idiots involved by one week and adding the number of capable co-workers times four weeks. (The competent ones are busier.)

In any group of three coworkers, at least one of them will be a sadistic loser intent on grabbing your ankle as he circles the drain.

Non-monetary incentives are every bit as valuable as they sound.

Business success is mostly about waiting for something lucky to happen and then taking credit.

Preparing a Powerpoint presentation will give you the sweet, sweet illusion of productivity.

It is better to be an “expert” than it is to do actual work.

The first month on any new job should be spent talking smack about the “idiot who had the job before you.”"

Scott Adams Speaks Wise

The Dilbert Blog: Answer to Your Questions:

"I think opinions have entertainment value and that’s about it. It’s not as if people change their views because someone made a better argument. And rarely are opinions based on adequate information. So from that perspective, all opinions are equally (un)important."

Mad With Power

The finest of Homeland Security.

Defeated by Librarian.

Schmucks with power roam the country.

Fightin' Terra.

Policing Porn Is Not Part of Job Description:

"Two uniformed men strolled into the main room of the Little Falls library in Bethesda one day last week and demanded the attention of all patrons using the computers. Then they made their announcement: The viewing of Internet pornography was forbidden.

The men looked stern and wore baseball caps emblazoned with the words 'Homeland Security.' The bizarre scene unfolded Feb. 9, leaving some residents confused and forcing county officials to explain how employees assigned to protect county buildings against terrorists came to see it as their job to police the viewing of pornography.

After the two men made their announcement, one of them challenged an Internet user's choice of viewing material and asked him to step outside, according to a witness. A librarian intervened, and the two men went into the library's work area to discuss the matter. A police officer arrived. In the end, no one had to step outside except the uniformed men."

Warren Ellis VERSUS Joss Whedon - Beyond Thunderdome.

Two men enter... well... two men leave.

Thousands of geeks cry out in anguish.

Okay, chuckle in pure geekitude enjoyment.

Bringing much funny. And sexual perversion.

Much here, more at link.

Warrenellis.com » The Long March To Nerd Prom Begins:

"Ellis: ...there are one hundred thousand hungry people out there who need to attend San Diego Comics Convention in order to walk right past all that comics shit and go straight to sniffing Brandon Routh’s cricketbox, sending bits of themselves to the cast of SERENITY and masturbating ferociously in the men’s stalls while wearing V FOR VENDETTA masks and discounted Hulk Hands.

No, of course I’m not going.

Nerd Prom: It Begins Now. Never forget.

Whedon: Who is this Ellis guy anyway? He thinks he all that cuz he wroted “Planety”. The facts is, KomiKon is AWESOME becuz people dress up like stuff — but nobody dresses like Warner Ellis, I guess, mister sour grapes. I talked to Sumner Glou and she said nobody ever mailed her body parts except for one time an arm and then a messenger brought her a thyroid gland but big deal, SERENDIPITY fans happen to be the most tastefullest fans who have extra or redundant body parts.

The best thing about Comicvention is the girls are pretty and the younglings are pretty (is that a legal issue?) and the men is pretty when they are Jedi but not so much Sith. I like to meet the Comedy Books artists (Not everyone wants to meet Angelina Michelle Watts, you know) and to buy a picture of an elf or dragon already. So stay off this grumpity webcamsite becuz Warner Ellis is just a grouchypants! I met a real General Griefuss, who amongst you can say that?

Peace, dog.

Altho that hulk hands thing was me. Sorry. Romulan Ale.

Ellis: There will, of course, be revenge.

Whedon: Revenge, eh? So, mister Ellis — (swishes brandy in large glass) — let the games begin, unless they are games of skill, or physical exertion of any kind, or with math. I know the bitter bitter truth, why you are so threatened by my genius, my, class, my big glass of brandy. It’s because you’re so OLD, so terribly terribly OLD, isn’t it! Mountains were hills when you were middle-aged. I hear you left your wife for a younger, trophy Cromagnon. And that you’re… that a young person would find you strange, and… from many years of… you being… DAMN! This round to you, Ellis. But the game is far –(drains Brandy, gasps like beached whale) — from over.

Ellis: I am twenty years younger than Joss Whedon.

Also, HE cannot hide things in his beard.

…of course, he can pay people to do that for him now. He can even pay people to grow the beard for him. And he doesn’t have to run his own website to look big and clever on the internets.

Whedon: All right, Ellis, I am a couple of decades older than you. Touche. But you don’t know all of it. Jeph Loebi-Wan never told you the truth about your father…

Yes. You’re my youngling. Oh for chrissake, everybody knows it but you! Even my beard-growers speak of it freely! Now join me and together we can rule an infintisinimimmsally tiny portion of the galaxy and have a mildly amusing interweb flame war! If you only knew the power of the Hack Side! Join me. Seriously. I’ll cut off your other hand, you pansy.

Ellis: Every time you say “youngling”, I throw up in my mouth a little bit. And look around to see if John Munch from SVU is in the room.

Look, everybody. Joss and Warren are avoiding writing.

[Later]

Joss Whedon: Wow, we both went right to the cross-dressing humor! This is just like the Algonquin round table, except there’s only two of us, and no table, and no particular surfeit of wit, and no great certainty about how spell ‘Algonquin’. Huzzah!

Ellis: The last time I was at San Diego, I saw a porn star being bitched out by a midget pimp. Who was not a pimp of midgets, but a midget who was also a pimp.

Your tv show FIREFOX should have had midget pimps in it.

Is that a guy from The CW I see over there?

Whedon: Well, this has been educational. But it’s hard to type while I’m holding Warren. So on to greater things. Lunch things. May the Federation be with you, or something. Nerds.

Ellis: Move your hand, Joss. Yes.

If you loved me, you’d hold me THERE.

Time for a cigarette. Take it easy, people."

'tis true, 'tis true.

Rigorous Intuition: Why They Fight:

"So, let's see what we've got: when Plame was outed by Cheney's office she was working on the Iran file, tracking WMD technologies; the congressional probe into NSA spying will likely now be dropped; new photos of Abu Ghraib frat pranks have filtered out; an Ohio Republican county commissioner has been charged with the attempted abduction of a 14-year old ('come here, little girl'), and Democratic senate hopeful Paul Hackett has been pressured by his party to drop out of a race the popular Iraq war vet could probably win to ensure a slot for a career politician who probably won't.

What's missing? Oh yeah: Harry Whittington has a pellet in his liver, now too, as well as in his heart (though he's said to be doing 'extremely well'); Dick Cheney admits to drinking; and the ballistics just don't make sense at the reported distance of 30 yards.

Anything else? Just everything. Everything touched by the fallen angel of the American republic has become a farce, begetting tragedy. It's why The Daily Show has become the premier news program in the United States, because citizen/viewers are permitted to laugh at their condition, but powerless to do anything to change it."

Mrs. Kung Fu Monkey brings the funny.

Kung Fu Monkey: I Married Up -- as in "Funnier":

"Me: Hey, what are you watching?

Lovely Wife: A British show combining the best of sexism and class-ism. 'Ladettes to Ladies.' They take these ten young working class women and send them to English finishing school... There's a team of snotty old women. They 'help' the girls by teaching them how to sew dresses, how to walk, how to wear pearls and cross their ankles, flower arranging ... In this one, they're paraded around at a country mansion dinner party with rich people to see if they can blend in. If, by being sufficiently demure, will they be accepted by their 'betters.'

Me: ... sweet God.

Lovely Wife: (plummy British accent) 'And the winner receives a special prize from the prestigious Eggleston Hall Finishing School.'

Me: What's the prize?

Lovely Wife: A clitirodectomy.

Me: (spit take)"

The Role of Attorney General

REDSOXVILLE: Ignoring the UN:

"...the only times we see Alberto Gonzales these days is when he's defending another of George Bush's illegal programs. It seems his real job is to keep Bush out of prison.

I thought the AG was the nation's top prosecutor. Instead, he's ignoring evidence of criminal wrongdoing by his boss and ignoring the lack of evidence of criminal wrongdoing by everybody else.

Before Bush, you never heard the phrase 'prison for suspects.' But when the United States attorney general is your own private defense attorney (well, him and Harriet Miers), you take liberties with things like due process and the Constitution of the United States. And with Congress tucking its sack at every turn, you get away with it."

Warren Ellis Cracks Me Up

BORN DEAD:

"Warren is home alone from Saturday afternoon until Tuesday evening. Within 24 hours of this message, will Warren be:

1) So drunk that he can barely see, throwing lit matches at the neighbour's baby and calling in bomb threats to totally random telephone numbers?

(Like that time he wiped the outgoing-number data off his fax machine and then wrote a letter in marker with his left hand that read 'I am the brain damaged brother you never knew you had. Call me today or I'll kill someone' and then faxed it to comics artists Steve Pugh)"

"Dick Cheney was picked up twice in Wyoming for driving under the influence of alcohol... at the ages of 21, and 22."

http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/cheney_doc.html

Just saying.

The Reality-Based Community: Least hypothesis:

"All right, then.

We've had the Cheney-hunting-accident jokes, and the solemn analyses of how the incident encapsulates the entire experience of the 'ready-fire-aim' Bush Administration: the inexplicable bungling, the contempt for law (Cheney hadn't bothered to buy a bird stamp), the obsessive secrecy, and the reflex to pin the blame on someone else: in this case, the shooting victim.

But jokes and synecdoche only take you so far, and I'd be inclined to agree with Glenn Reynolds that the matter is being attended to all out of proportion to its importance, if it weren't for the fact that Cheney arranged not to talk to sheriff's deputies investigating the incident until the next morning. (There are conflicting reports about the role of the Secret Service in keeping the deputies away from Cheney that evening.)

That, paired with the long delay in making the incident public, has two possible explanations, the same two as apply to Ted Kennedy's actions after the Chappaquiddick incident: either the principal was a complete idiot, or he needed time to sober up. The determination by the sheriff's office that no alcohol was involved in the shooting is, of course, completely worthless; since none of the witnesses was likely to talk, the only way to know would be to have done a Breathalyzer or blood-alcohol test on Cheney within a few hours of the incident.

Cheney told Brit Hume that he'd consumed 'one beer' at lunch, which is exactly half the 'two beers' usually reported to police by drivers too sloshed to walk a straight line."

The Absorbascon: Could Vibe Dance?

The Absorbascon: Could Vibe Dance?:

"There's not enough dancing in comics nowadays. Heroes used to dance all the time; when did we all become so serious, so ashamed, that we became embarrassed about dancing? Nowadays, readers lap it up when characters hump, shoot, decapitate, or yell at one another. Is dancing so much more horrible?

...But now that comics are written for painfully self-conscious adults, desperate to be taken seriously, and to have their prefered reading material taken seriously, heroes must be dour. Our superheroes used to enjoy their jobs; now it seems like a punishment (wow; how very Marvelesque!). Kids try to have fun every day; adults seem satisfied if they can make it through the day on grim determination and a sense of purpose.

Terry Sloane loved having the opportunity to put his talents to use for society's benefit; Michael Holt seems like he's been sentenced to 100 hours of community service. Plastic Man (friggin' Plastic Man!!!) struggles with being an out of wedlock father, Blue Devil wears black leather, Zatanna is a mindraper/mindscraper, Detective Chimp has a drinking problem, the Elongated Man's wife is raped and killed, Flash's Rogues now include a psychokiller who cuts out people's tongues, Aquaman is wielding a sword instead of embarrassing people with the clever use of electric eels.

Why? Because we killed Vibe, because he could dance."

Transference

Overheard in the Office: The Voice of the Cubicle - 12PM Order Pens:

"Co-worker #1: Why do you keep breaking your pens? That's company property.
Co-worker #2: I break things so I don't have to kill again."

"Jesus wouldn't allow it"

Overheard in the Office: The Voice of the Cubicle - 1PM Lunch:

"Co-worker #1: So who is this [Harold] guy?
Co-worker #2: He was hired for a job, but never showed up.
Co-worker #1: Why? Did you ever find out?
Co-worker #2: All he wanted to do was rape and pillage, but Jesus wouldn't allow it in this establishment."

COMICON.com: WARREN ELLIS' THE MINISTRY - "The Single"

COMICON.com: WARREN ELLIS' THE MINISTRY # 1:

"Yeah, mummy and daddy used to go out and hunt their food when they were your age, you bluetooth-earpiece-wearing Star Trek-looking fucker...

(Isn't anyone bothered that that piece of telephonic fashion makes everyone look like a stand-in for Lieutenant Uhura? Are people going to get SMS-ready fashion ridges for their foreheads next?)

In my position as The Minister, I believe that there should only be two kinds of singles. The kinds that tell a self-contained story without the necessity of reading eighteen other comics to understand it, and single-to-collection, the graphic novel serialised in chapters. The latter is the early-adopter form -- if you're paying for cable and watching BATTLESTAR GALACTICA each week instead of waiting for the DVD, you're a cultural early-adopter.

This is the way things should be. This is my Proclamation. And understand, I'm only talking about singles here, not comics in general -- OGN, for Original Graphic Novel, was another of my terms. Sorry about that.

The Single's never going to go away. I would like there to be fewer of them, and for them to be better-considered objects, but that is outside my control. For the moment. The tentacles of my Will extend further every day, like a Japanese monster groping blindly for schoolgirls. It's never going to go away because it's an entry-level format -- small, portable and relatively cheap. The standard graphic novel size isn't something you can shove in a pocket or a small bag, really. This is one reason why manga's finally taken off so big -- the small format makes it easy for a kid to shove a book in a backpack or a coat pocket, like a paperback novel."

Cranky Old Man Truth.

Fred On Everything:

"The other day I found myself trapped next to the lobotomy box in the house of a friend. The show was one of those dismal productions based on sexual innuendo, the sort that I would have found titillating when I was eleven. The format was not complex. Neither, I suspect, was the audience.

Several shapeless young couples sat together. The host asked them seriatim such questions as, “Other than your wife, who did you last take a shower with?” or “What part of your anatomy does your husband most like to kiss?” The studio audience invariably moaned, “Oooooooooooooooooh!” like third-graders who have heard a bad word. The couples themselves giggled with delicious embarrassment also in the manner of dimwitted children.

I happily imagined sending them to some barely heard-of tribe in the Amazon Basin for use in human sacrifice. Almost human. Something involving army ants would have done nicely.

The sexual reference didn’t offend me. I have misspent more hours in third-world skin bars than those people had aggregate brain cells, which means at least three skin bars. I’ve seen raunchy sex shows to the point of boredom, and am not real shockable. Pornography doesn’t upset me. If I had to choose whether my kids watched Dory Does Dallas, or Oprah, I might go with Dory.

No, it was the infantilism, the snickering, low-IQ tastelessness of a class of people who have no class. These, with their childish prurience and slum-dweller’s aversion to civilized existence, now dominate American culture. Anyone who points out that they are crass finds himself attacked as elitist—which, since elitism simply means the view that the better is preferable to the worse, all people should be.

We are not supposed to use phrases like “the lower orders,” which is the best of reasons for using them. Yet the lower orders exist. Its members are not necessarily poor, and the poor are not necessarily members. Nor is the level of schooling a reliable indicator of loutdom. Nor is the level of schooling a reliable indicator of loutdom. Nor is intelligence or race a particularly good marker. One may be a moral moron without being unable to tie one’s shoes. Rather the lower orders consist of people who think fart jokes uproarious.

...The fear of social inferiority always concerns the peasantariat: “You ain’t no gooder’n me.” Until the sudden florescence of pay packets occurred, the lower orders had either accepted that they were the lower orders, however resentfully, or tried to rise. They might learn to speak good English, read widely, and cultivate good manners. Or they might not. If they did, it was likely to work, since in America those who behave and speak like gentlefolk (another inadmissible word) will usually be accepted as such. In either case, they did not impose their barbarousness on others.

Ah, but with their new-found and enormous purchasing power, they discovered that they could do more than compel the production of skateboards, trashy television, and awful music. They could make boorish childishness and ignorance into actual virtues. And did. Thus wretched grammar is now a sign of “authenticity,” whatever that might mean, rather than of defective studies. Thus the solemnity with which rap “music” is taken. Briefly the sound of the black ghetto, it is now around the world the heraldic emblem of the angry unwashed. Thus the degradation of the schools: It is easier to declare oneself educated than to actually become so, and the half-literate now had the power to have themselves so declared.

With the debasement of society came a simultaneous, though not necessarily related, extension of childhood and adolescence. In the remote prehistorical past, which for most today means anything before 1900, the young assumed responsibility early. It wasn’t a moral question, but a practical one. If the plowing didn’t get done, the family didn’t eat. By the age of eighteen, a boy was likely to carry a man’s burdens.

Today, no. Now a combination of the enstupidation of the schools, the inflation of grades, and the threat of class-action suits by the parents of failing students means that an adolescent can graduate without assuming any burden whatsoever. Indeed escaping schooling is easier than finding it. Countless colleges will accept almost anyone and graduate almost anyone. Chores do not exist. Sex and drugs are everywhere available. Few things have obvious consequences.

The result is a cocoon of childhood that stretches on almost as long as one wants it to. I encounter adults in their mid-twenties who cannot be relied upon to show up at an appointed time, who do not read, who judge a professor by whether he makes the material “fun,” who have no idea where they want to go in life. It is not grownup behavior."

Oh. I see. Frank Miller's gone crazy[er].

ABC News: Batman Takes Aim at Osama:

"Beware, terrorists! The Caped Crusader is targeting a villain more sinister than the Joker — Osama bin Laden.

At the WonderCon 2006 comic-book convention in San Francisco last weekend, legendary comics writer and artist Frank Miller revealed that Batman would hunt down bin Laden and al Qaeda in his next DC Comics graphic novel."

Nothing Explains Everything.

It really does.

I mean it.

Literally, even.

And vice versa too.

Think about it.

Willie Nelson is cool.

He's a tax-evading, pot smoking, gay rights loving cowboy.

Awesome.

Dallas Morning News | News for Dallas, Texas | Entertainment Columnist Mario Tarradell:

"Willie Nelson's crooned cowboy songs before, from the signature 'Mammas Don't Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys' to 'My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys.'

But never like this: On 'Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly Fond of Each Other,' the Texas country icon sings about love among men on the range. Available exclusively at iTunes today, the song aims to show Mr. Nelson's support for gays, particularly to conservative country-music fans.

'The song's been in the closet for 20 years,' Mr. Nelson said in a prepared statement. It was written in 1981 by Lubbock-born singer-songwriter Ned Sublette.

'The timing's right for it to come out. I'm just opening the door.'

Mr. Nelson recorded a song for the Brokeback Mountain soundtrack, the melancholy ballad 'He Was a Friend of Mine.' And the movie about two cowboys in love may have provided the perfect opportunity to release this new song. But Mr. Nelson also has a personal connection to the tune.

Two years ago, David Anderson, Mr. Nelson's friend and tour manager of three decades, told his boss he's gay. Last March, while Mr. Nelson recorded a batch of previously unreleased songs for iTunes, he discovered the song in a stack of demos he had tossed into a drawer.

Singing 'Cowboys Are Frequently Secretly Fond of Each Other' was Mr. Nelson's way of telling a longtime pal everything was OK, says Mr. Anderson."

True.

Suburban Guerrilla » Teacher:

"And a very wise person once taught me there is no difference between giving and receiving"

Happy day after Valentine's Day

Warrenellis.com » Horny Werewolf Day:

"Happy Valentine’s Day to all. And to those who hate the day, I say this: Valentine’s Day is a Christian corruption of a pagan festival involving werewolves, blood and fucking. So wish people a happy Horny Werewolf Day and see what happens."

Sadly, I'm the slightly whiny Jedi.

Luke Skywalker You scored 69% wisdom, 40% aggression, 50% power, and 67% morality!

Last of the Jedi, you carry heavy burdens and have great potential. Your fighting prowess has only progressed so far, having started your training later in life, but you can hold your own regardless. You have great wisdom and insight beyond your years and experience, and your moral code could not be any stronger. You find the paths no one else can see, and save the galaxy because of it.

My test tracked 4 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender: You scored higher than 44% on wisdom You scored higher than 30% on aggression You scored higher than 6% on power You scored higher than 46% on morality

Link: The Famous Jedi or Sith Test written by SarumantheMad on Ok Cupid, home of the 32-Type Dating Test

Though really, "agnostic" would be more accurate.

The Ardent Atheist The results are in, and it appears that you have scored 75%...

You are an atheist, pure and simple. You think God is just one big lie, and consider religious people to be both annoying and beneath you. Ardent atheists will argue tooth and claw for their position, and have no truck with people that won't listen. You think being an atheist is the only way to lead an honest life, and see no reason to accept the pleas of faith. Ardent atheists are the backbone of atheism. Be proud.

My test tracked 1 variable How you compared to other people your age and gender: You scored higher than 72% on pentagrams

Link: The Atheist Test written by chi_the_cynic on Ok Cupid, home of the 32-Type Dating Test

Though I am, apparently, brilliant.

English Genius You scored 100% Beginner, 100% Intermediate, 80% Advanced, and 86% Expert!

You did so extremely well, even I can't find a word to describe your excellence! You have the uncommon intelligence necessary to understand things that most people don't. You have an extensive vocabulary, and you're not afraid to use it properly! Way to go! Thank you so much for taking my test. I hope you enjoyed it! For the complete Answer Key, visit my blog: http://shortredhead78.blogspot.com/.

My test tracked 4 variables How you compared to other people your age and gender: You scored higher than 60% on Beginner You scored higher than 37% on Intermediate You scored higher than 5% on Advanced You scored higher than 63% on Expert

Link: The Commonly Confused Words Test written by shortredhead78 on Ok Cupid, home of the 32-Type Dating Test

I don't know... I kinda wish I was sluttier

http://www.okcupid.com/slut

Wannabe tough guy chickenhawk schmucks continue to endanger lives. Now with added jackassery.

POLITICS: U.S. Risks Reporter's Life to Strike Tough Pose:

"The George W. Bush administration went well beyond refusing to negotiate with terrorists in its handling of the threat by freelance journalist Jill Carroll's abductors to kill her if all female detainees were not released from U.S.-run prisons in Iraq.

According to Iraqi officials, U.S. officials delayed the scheduled release of six female prisoners whom they knew had already been found innocent because of the kidnappers' demand for their release. Then they refused to speed up the review of the files of the five remaining female prisoners, in violation of a policy of giving priority to females in the review of detainee files for release.

Had the normal policy been followed, it is very likely that all the women held by the United States would have been released by now. By delaying the releases of female detainees to strike a tough anti-terrorism pose, the administration has increased the risk to Jill Carroll's life. "

Real Transformers

From the Japanese, of course.

Joss Whedon is awesome.

WHEDONesque : Comments on 9548 : This explains Joss perfectly.:

"But I am here with a purpose, my friends. Call me joss Whedon: Rumor Crusher! (Or 'Mister Fendendo', if we're being intimate.)

Since everyone's all abuzz with the CW rumor, I have to get all official and say: WE'VE STARTED FILMING NEW EPISODES! Of Dateline. I'm such a troll.

No, there haven't been any overtures from the CW as regards a SereniFly spin-off. I haven't even heard the orchestra tuning up. But if they happen to come calling, I do know what I would do:

1) In order to keep the show cost efficient, we would get rid of a few things we don't need, like spaceships, floors, and Jewel. (You thought I was gonna say 'costumes', didn't you? Porn guy.)

2) Nathan is busy making movies, but since I don't want new cast members, everybody in the cast would just move over one. Jewel (she's back!) would play Mal, Ron would play Kaylee, Morena would play Book, and so on.

3) People love a happy ending. So every episode, I will explain once again that I don't like people. And then Mal will shoot someone. Someone we like. And their puppy.

4) The actors can make up their dialogue. I'm bushed, and they're all funny, and the hell with it. Maybe I'll give them a premise to work off of, like 'You're all in trouble' or 'Wash has a thing'. They could maybe light it too.

5) Klingons, but not alien Klingons. But still Klingons.

So already the show is running like a well oiled companion. I'm just proud to be a part of the Country Western network, and I know this will be their biggest hit since 'Have Space-Gun, Will Travel.'

I hope, as always, this clears things up. And I hope the executives at the Carnie Wilson network DO give me a call. I've got a million ideas for redoing their offices.

Power to the people who are powerful enough to crush the other people! -jossy."

Sorry. I may be throwing off the curve. "Japan Battles Rising Obesity - Yahoo! News"

Japan Battles Rising Obesity - Yahoo! News:

"TOKYO - For those who think Japan is all fish and tofu, consider Sayaka Oyama's former diet: spaghetti and meat sauce for lunch, chocolates and cookies for snack and a dinner of rice balls and sandwiches at nighttime classes."

The Key to Everything

"In the province of the mind, what is believed to be true is true or becomes true, within limits to be found experientially and experimentally. These limits are further beliefs to be transcended. In the province of the mind, there are no limits."

The Center of the Cyclone, Dr. John C. Lilly, 1972

Man is ignorant of the nature of his own being and powers. Even his idea of his limitation is based on experience of the past, and every step in his progress extends his empire. There is therefore no reason to assign theoretical limits to what he may be, or to what he may do.

Proposition 12, Magick, Aleister Crowley, 1932

When I grow up, I believe I'd like to be Grant Morrison.

Comic Book Resources - CBR News - The Comic Wire:

"In response to a question about 'The Invisibles,' Morrison recalled the transformation he underwent while writing that Vertigo series. 'It was weirder than I imagined it, because it was like doing voodoo. The comic began to write me. I lost control of it in a lot of places. Things in the comic then happened to me. I made the King Mob character be tortured and sick and have his lung collapse. And three months later I was in the hospital with a lung collapsed, dying. So after that I gave him a real, good time. If I can make myself sick and put myself in the hospital, then by god, I'm going to make myself into James Bond!'

Morrison continued, 'My life by the end of 'The Invisibles' was nothing like my life at the start.'

...In terms of politics, Morrison spoke about growing up with two anti-war activists as parents and hopping fences into military installations. Now, though, his outlook is less radical. 'I don't have politics. I just kind of explore things. By the end of 'The Invisibles,' it was more about incorporation than Us versus Them. I started as a kid who was taught to hate the police and hate the army and authority, but the more I grew up and studied those things, the more I realized they were just part of the system we live in, an inescapable part.'

...A practicing magician, Morrison discussed the connections between language, magic and science. 'Language is magical. People talk about magic as if it's something over here that only some people do. The human race is a race of things that do magic. The only reason we think there isn't any magic in the world is because there's so much of it. We don't see it anymore. We can use Google to look down at our house from space. That's magic!"

You cannot makes this stuff up. Cheney and hunting the Most Dangerous Game.

Boing Boing: Mind control book and Cheney's hunting accident:

"Trance-Formation of America is a bizarre 1995 'autobiography of a victim of government mind control' that you'll see referenced a lot among the tinfoil beanie conspiracy theory set. Today, Jeff Long posted about a particularly interesting bit from the book. From Trance-Formation of America, self-published by Cathy O'Brien in September 1995:

Dick Cheney, then [assistant] White House Chief of Staff to President Ford...was the reason my family had travelled to Wyoming where I endured yet another form of brutality - his version of 'A Most Dangerous Game,' or human hunting.... Dick Cheney had an apparent addiction to the 'thrill of the sport.' He appeared obsessed with playing A Most Dangerous Game as a means of traumatizing mind control victims, as well as to satisfy his own perverse sexual kinks.

Link to CNN article 'Hunter wounded by Cheney 'doing well'' "

Kung Fu Monkey: Conservatives with Apostate Problems

Kung Fu Monkey: Conservatives with Apostate Problems:

"...'conservative' now seems to mean 'I support George Bush' rather than, oh, limiting the intrusiveness of the federal government and fiscal responsibility. Basically, no matter what your long-held policy views or conservative bona fides, as soon as you say 'I think George Bush might be screwing up job X', you get to star in the Broadway Revival of 'Galileo vs, The Catholic Church', and you ain't playing the role of Pope Urban VIII, if you get the drift. "

Lou Ferrigno will be sworn in Monday night as a reserve Deputy Sheriff

Lou Ferrigno Already Annoyed At Being Referred To As 'Deputy Hulk' - Defamer:

"We couldn’t help but scoff just a little when we read that Ferrigno was issued a gun, which, we presume, he’ll crush into a steel ball and hurl with great force at an escaping assailant. And while the Hulk won’t be brought in to quell the ongoing prison race riots (“You black. You latino. Hulk green. Hulk no see difference!”), we somehow feel safer all the same knowing he’s on our mean streets."

Primitive Drug-Suckers

Comic Book Resources - CBR News - The Comic Wire:

"'The Wolfskin is a Viking-like warrior; 'wolfskin' was in fact one term for the famous 'berserker' warrior of Nordic antiquity. Like the 'warp-spasm' warriors of ancient Ireland, the berserkers were said to transform into animals, in some accounts, like werewolves. What it seems they did, of course, is to take psychoactive mushrooms, which drove them nuts.

'Historically, they were far from alone in the concept of getting out of their heads before battle; some eastern cultures would give their soldiers sugar, which sent them absolutely haywire, as humans just didn't eat that stuff at the time. And, of course, there were the hash-head killers of Hassan I Sabbah, the hashishin from whom we take the word 'assassin.'

'But never assume the Vikings were just primitive drug-suckers. They were treated as freaks by other cultures because they washed every day. They were literate, and good with languages. I lifted a lot from the period and put it into a fantasy context: an elite Northish soldier, a Wolfskin, walking south into temperate Europe - speaking several languages, having adopted elements of other cultures as his own, and yet somehow excommunicated from his people."

See, it's about them hatin' our freedom. If you're a moron.

Why They Hate Us by Jacob G. Hornberger:

"After 9/11, many Americans had no idea why there was so much anger and rage in the Middle East, especially against the United States. All their lives, Americans had been taught that foreign policy was for federal “experts” and, thus, they had chosen not to concern themselves with what their federal officials were doing to people abroad. Innocently believing that federal overseas personnel, including the CIA and the military, had been helping foreigners for decades, Americans had no reason to doubt the official U.S. pronouncement immediately after 9/11: “We are innocent. The terrorists hate us for our freedom and values. That’s why they have attacked us.”

What Americans didn’t realize is that federal officials were being disingenuous when they made that pronouncement. U.S. officials knew full well that their decades-old U.S. interventionist policies in the Middle East were at the bottom of the volcanic rage that people bore in that part of the world.

Consider:

1.
The U.S. government’s international paramilitary force, the CIA, covertly engineered the ouster of the popular and democratically elected prime minister of Iran and replaced him with a brutal dictator whose secret police tortured and terrorized the Iranian people for decades. Yet to this day, Americans cannot fathom why so many Iranians still hate the U.S. government.
2.
The United States and other Western nations actively supported Saddam Hussein and his tyrannical regime, even delivering him the infamous weapons of mass destruction that U.S. officials later used as an excuse to invade Iraq.
3.
In their role as imperial international policeman, U.S. officials turned on Saddam when he invaded Kuwait, even though the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait was no more the business of the U.S. government than the U.S. invasion of Panama or Grenada was the business of Iraq. Moreover, the fact that U.S. officials had supported Saddam’s attack on Iran and then later had turned a passive eye on his intention to attack Kuwait makes U.S. officials look even worse. Thousands of Iraqis were massacred and maimed by U.S. bombs and missiles in the Persian Gulf War, decimating Iraqi families.
4.
After the Persian Gulf War, U.S. officials inspired Kurds and Shi’ites to rebel against Saddam and then stood aside as Saddam massacred them.
5.
Brutal economic sanctions were imposed on Iraq and then continued, year after year, for more than a decade, with the aim of forcing the Iraqi people to oust Saddam from power. The sanctions contributed to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children from disease and infection, especially from dirty water.
6.
There were the infamous no-fly zones over Iraq, by which U.S. officials continued killing Iraqis with bombs and missiles, even though the zones had never been authorized by either the UN or the U.S. Congress.
7.
U.S. troops were knowingly and deliberately stationed on Islamic holy lands, in utter disregard for religious sensibilities of Muslims. In fact, is it not easier to understand the depth of the adverse Muslim reaction to the stationing of U.S. troops in those areas given the recent adverse reactions to U.S. military abuse of the Koran and to the publication of the cartoons mocking Mohammed? Does anyone honestly believe that U.S. officials were unaware of the potential for such adverse reaction when they stationed U.S. troops in those areas?
8.
The U.S. government invaded and waged a war of aggression against Iraq under false and deceptive claims regarding weapons of mass destruction and then continued a brutal military occupation of the country under the deceptive rubric of “spreading democracy.” The invasion and occupation have killed and maimed tens of thousands of innocent Iraqi people – innocent in the sense that neither they nor their government ever attacked the United States or even threatened to do so.
9.
U.S. military and paramilitary forces tortured, sexually abused, raped, and murdered Iraqi men taken into custody. What better way to turn anger into rage than to knowingly and deliberately humiliate Iraqi men in such a manner rather than treat them like men and soldiers entitled to the protections of the Geneva Convention, especially given that most of them were doing nothing worse than defending their nation against an illegal invasion and war of aggression by a foreign power?
10.
The U.S. government has long provided unconditional financial and military support to the Israeli government as well as foreign aid to such pro-U.S. authoritarian regimes as Saudi Arabia, Jordan, and Egypt."

Remember

Alchemical Braindamage:

"What really happens is not that at some arbitrary marker your body decides to swirl down the crapper. More like, at some actually quite predictable interval, the neglect or bad habits you haven't addressed, have quite predictable effects.

If you continue the slouching and slumping that most of us do in front of tv and computers and in our lumbering awkward gait, you will invariably experience neck, back, and joint problems in an accelerating downward spiral. I'd say 95% of the massage clients I've seen so far have this and pretty much all of them dismiss it as 'stress'. Except when they're in permanent pain and can't move anymore.

If you require glasses for reading and lazily wear them all the time, when you don't have to, the muscles around your eyes that are supposed to control the shape of your corneas, will atrophy, and you will end up wandering through a landscape of blurry nonsense at any juncture when you happen to not have your security blanket.

If your diet consists of the usual over-processed, fiberless, nutrient denuded crap that most of us were weaned on, then as time goes on your digestive and metabolic health will decline, and the buildup of toxic byproducts will trigger all kinds of allergies, sensitivities, chronic illnesses and early death.

If you abuse your body in the characteristic ways of going about 'exercise' and don't invest the time or money in some kind of regenerative or healing activity, like yoga, massage work, fasting, or meditation, the cumulative wear and tear of various trivial but never fully healed injuries will eventually cripple you.

None of this has anything whatsoever to do with actually being chronologically older. Except insofar as a thirty year old has ten more years of stupid habits to account for than a twenty year old, and ten years of momentum in the way of repairing them.

As time goes by, the backlog of stupidity does narrow your options somewhat and makes the window of health a little smaller to fit through. Everything in life is about balance. The thin edge of that balance point never changes, but the consequences of falling off it are proportional to how long you've been wandering, as is the difficulty of getting back on after you've fucked up."

Never stop.

To be nobody but yourself in a world which is doing its best, night and day, to make you everybody else means to fight the hardest battle which any human being can fight; and never stop fighting.
e. e. cummings

Persistence

'So long as there is breath in me, that long I will persist. For now I know one of the greatest principles on success; if I persist long enough I will win.'
Og Mandino

Becoming

'Man often becomes what he believes himself to be. If I keep on saying to myself that I cannot do a certain thing, it is possible that I may end by really becoming incapable of doing it. On the contrary, if I have the belief that I can do it, I shall surely acquire the capacity to do it even if I may not have it at the beginning.'
Mahatma Gandhi

"the “Neal Adams, hairy-chested, love-god” version of Batman"

Brilliant.

NEWSARAMA.COM: WONDERCON '06: DC - THE BEST IS YET TO COME PANEL:

"In an unexpected announcement at the DC panel (though not coming as a complete surprise), it was just announced Grant Morrison will be the next regular writer of Batman, following James Robinson’s eight-part story arc running through that title and Detective beginning in March.

...Morrison said that he’s already plotted 15 issues, and in his first issue alone, he has 15 ninja man-bats as well as Talia, and the story is called “Batman & Son”. Morrison said Batman coming out of 52 OYL will be a more of a “fun guy, more healthy”, more like the “Neal Adams, hairy-chested, love-god” version of Batman."

Live up to it.

“Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do not believe in anything simply because it is found written in your religious books. Do not believe in anything merely on the authority of your teachers and elders. Do not believe in traditions because they have been handed down for many generations. But after observation and analysis, when you find that anything agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all, then accept it and live up to it.”

Hindu Prince Gautama Siddharta, the founder of Buddhism, 563-483 B.C.

Evolution

"1000 BC Eat this root.
1000 AD That root is heathen. Say this prayer.
1600 AD That prayer is superstition. Drink this potion.
1900 AD That potion is snake oil. Take this pill.
1960 AD That pill is ineffective. Take this antibiotic
2006 AD That antibiotic has resistance. Here, eat this root."

People sometimes suck. Therefore, Wilde gives perspective.

a life in the day of cheezygoof: che is so smart:

"'it is absurd to divide people into good and bad. people are either charming or tedious.' (oscar wilde)"

Balance in the Media

The Rude Pundit:

"What's it gonna take to surprise anyone? At this point, we could discover that Karl Rove and Dick Cheney rape Iranian village pre-teen girls and then the President, ashamed of the sinful actions of his two close advisors, as well as of the defiled children, kills the girls, gutting them, cutting them up, and feeding the press corps a buffet of pate' and meatloaf made from the bodies, catered, of course, by Halliburton...

And you know what? CNN would still balance the facts of the story with the demonic visage of Scott McClellan spinning it away, calling it ludicrous and ridiculous and 'beyond the pale to suggest' yet never really denying all the fucking and gutting and grinding and rubbing, although if it had been done, it was for security reasons that are classified."

Tales of the Obvious

When Death Is on the Docket, the Moral Compass Wavers - New York Times:

"Common wisdom holds that people have a set standard of morality that never wavers. Yet studies of people who do unpalatable things, whether by choice, or for reasons of duty or economic necessity, find that people's moral codes are more flexible than generally understood. To buffer themselves from their own consciences, people often adjust their moral judgments in a process some psychologists call moral disengagement, or moral distancing.

In recent years, researchers have determined the psychological techniques most often used to disengage, and for the first time they have tested them in people working in perhaps the most morally challenging job short of soldiering, staffing a prison execution team.

The results of this and other studies suggest that a person's moral judgment can shift quickly, in anticipation of an unpalatable act, or slowly and unconsciously."