Confusing

I heard from somewhere, I no longer have any idea where, about a soda that's supposed to burn calories. I thought it was interesting, but useless because water has 0 calories, so you could get the same effect by just drinking a lot of cold water, and you couldn't drink enough to cause any kind of actual weight loss.

Browsing around Safeway shopping for more T-Mobile To Go™ minutes I came across a giant display of "Enviga" the aforementioned diet+1 drink. My rule about following impulses towards maximum world exposure lead me to buy two packs, one of each flavor.

The Berry flavor is just bad. Imagine if you made cool-ade, but made it really weak, and made it using green tea instead of water as the base. Imagine it, really focus on that image. Taste it in your mind, let the noxious flavor dance on your tongue. Not good is it?

The peach flavor is confusing. It's exactly on the line between good and bad, but it achieves this neutrality through a chaotic fluctuation. When it first hits your lips it's good, then it's bad, then it's kind of sour bad after taste, then it's a kind of smooth rich after-after taste. I have no idea how to feel about it, but I think I'll be sticking with cold water in the future.

Spacecataz

The Moon Rules #1

Whiteboard

Another item for my pile of T-shirt ideas.

"I Don't Care About Nihilisim"

Maddening

CNN Headline News repeats its cycle every 20 minutes or so. I've watched the whole cycle four or five times now, I still haven't heard any news.

Some building got destroyed. That's more of a You-Tube video then a headline news story.

Anna Nicole Smith continues to be a train wreck despite the hindrance of being dead.

The Powers™ are preparing to invade Iran. They're using the pretense that we have to stop Iran from getting nukes, but I think that stopping Iran from getting nukes is something that we would have had to have started in 2004, at the latest. I am glad that they've moved up a level of significance in terms of Evil Middle East countries, but I wish they would have skipped turning Iraq into a quagmire rivaled only by Lebanon and gone directly to the Saudis. Still Iran is one step of relevance up from Iraq, so after we spend a few years destroying a society and creating a humanitarian crisis there, we can move on to doing that to Syria, then we can finally get around to bombing the people who actually need to be bombed. It's too bad they give the Power™ so much money, otherwise we might have actually done some good in the region.

The Oscars... I don't really care.

Snow in Colorado. I guess that sucks for Colorado, but I'm not in Colorado. This really seems like the territory of the Weather Channel™

Obama is preaching to the crowd and slamming Cheney. Really it's not that impressive, he's just beating around the bush, the bush in this case is made of slanderous accusations and conspiracy theories I and people like me have already hurled at Cheney. In other words he's doing the whole "Mass Market Appeal" thing. It seems good, I guess, but the left doing a weak job of bashing the right really isn't news.

New airport scanners, you don't have to get patted down. If you're going through this one airport that has them. It's almost interesting, but still not news.

And then they show that building getting blow up again. I really wish CNN would have the balls to say that nothing big is going on right now. 24 Hour news channels are a bad idea because there's really not 24 hours of TV worthy news. Especially not with the Internet around.

Getting Shit Done

It occurs to me recently that I haven't been listening to my evil aspect. In a world with a more traditional definition of evil this would be a good thing, the problem is that my evil aspect is the cold rational one who is good at making plans, finding errors, and getting stuff done. Upon that thought I turn to it and it spill indignation and planning.

-I've gone to UW, I've talked with several registration officials. They're busy handling end of term, but they gave me a re-application form and I arranged to meet with them in early May.
-I've locked down my plans for next year. Two roommates, Kevin and Adam, and I've begun looking for housing in the U District.
-I've run the numbers on the next few months, and I've determined a spending plan that is solid and will last me through July.

There are times when it benefits me to be introspective and philosophical, but I've spent far too much time being that person recently. It's good to get in touch with my heartless calculating mastermind again.

The Three

I've spent a lot of time recently talking to my own personality fragments. I'm not sure whether it's a survival technique or a from of psychosis or whatever but I've come to exist as the sum total of three pseudo-beings. Note that this is not schizophrenia, I remain one person, I've simply grown into this method of internal structure.

The one word description of the three are good, evil, and trickery, but those fail miserably. You would need a form of the word evil that doesn't have a negative connotation and a form of the word trickery that also incorporates whimsy, impulse, and resourcefulness. I've named them, a clear sign of my insanity, but my recent introspections have prompted me to rename one of them. As of now the official names for the personality fragments are:

Good: Sulfuras
Evil: Nihel
Trickery: Slyz

In my recent introspections I've found that they each spring from one core belief, or belief system, and they can be understood best by explaining their core system.

Nihel: The Force of Evil.
There is only one rule in the world; what one can do and what one can't do. The whole of the world amounts to nothing more then a vast continuous exchange of power. Society is a machine constructed in order to shift power to those who know how to use it. The same is true of ethics. Every system of rule or order is nothing more then means of shifting power. Those who cling to hopes and ideals in defiance of this will be ground up by the vast machine, and what power they might have once had will be shifted to those who know the machine for what it is. The only one's who will succeed are those who have the courage to see the machine for what it really is, and the tenacity to take power for themselves.

Sulfuras: The Force of Good
You have to do what's right. You know, deep in the core of your being, what is the right thing to do. It may not always be easy, and it may not always be in your interest, but it is what you have to do. You aren't doing this for some outside entity, don't do it for country, don't do it because it's the law, don't do it because you expect something in return do it because it's right. No matter the burden, no matter the chore I will do the right thing; though I be damned I will live forever in service to the lord, and to that which I know to be truly righteous.

Slyz: Force of Trickery
It's all a big game. No matter how preachy anyone gets no matter how serious anyone may seem never forget that it's all a big game, and games have winners and losers. You've gotta stay on top, you've gotta keep your hand full and you have to know when the cards don't matter. The game is ever changing, the rules aren't consistent and if you do it right they won't even matter. Sure it's a constant high wire act but that's half the fun. What would life be without a bit of danger? As long as you keep moving and keep playing like you know what you're doing you'll be fine, and if the impulse strikes you then jump. You may win, you may fall, but either way it'll be a good story, and as long as you can scrape yourself together and keep moving you'll be fine.

Random Thoughts

I only have 20 minutes right now so I'm not going to address one of the significant topics and instead jot down a quick barrage of random thoughts.

The pills are only useful if you take them in a regular way. The near total loss of last week is clear evidence of this.

February being a short month is suddenly something that matters because it effects the pay periods to monthly fees balance.

I need to either brush my teeth more or buy more orbits gum. One is an actual solution, the other involves tasty orange gum. I'm not really sure which will win out.

I need to schedule a third kind of time in my weekly routine. My current schedule system only appeases two parts of my mental triality.

I should just start coming to work at 10. J is always eager to leave so he can go drink with S, who can leave whenever he wants because he's the boss. I find this a little disturbing, but going drinking after work on the weekends isn't really a bad thing. It's actually something that I would bet most people do, it's just that those people aren't people like me.

The game "Need For Speed Carbon" has the ultra-thug veneer that is fairly common in video games. The thug thing isn't really me, but I can appreciate it and I'm amused by it even if I don't subscribe to it. The best part by far is the fact that every salient character has an associated song. I think things would be a lot more interesting if every time someone showed up a particular bit of a certain song began to play. I'm also amused to find that I already know exactly what I would use as my song. It would be the opening to Manson's "This is the New Shit"

I need to remember the exact quote that was the origin of the phrase "Gordian Cull-De-Sac" I don't remember how it went but I remember that it was really funny.

Screw you spell check, Triality is a perfectly reasonable word. Being a bizarre conjugation doesn't mitigate is credibility.

Screw you grammar check. If I want to start a sentence with the word Being I will, damnit.

Go To Hell Spellcheck, damnit is also a legitimate conjugation. It implies an exclamation, not an order. You can't just turn it into damn it because that doesn't mean the same thing as damnit. Damn machines, they just don't appreciate my art.

I always forget one

6: Gridstream. I have to post all of the new stuff I've written on my white whale.

Preperation

I have kind of a lot to say right now, but I've just gotten up and I don't feel like doing the right brain leisure activity that is as close as I come to 'work' nowadays. Instead I'm going to go back to Azeroth where I waste far too much of my time.

However, I don't want to let this stuff go to waste, so I'm going to blog it tonight after things are done spinning and I've done the miscellaneous folding that is the entirety of my labor.

1: The Three. An examination and explanation of my personality fragments following my recent prolonged introspections.

2: The Age of Wisdom. A few things from Valis, by Phillip K. Dick, that blew my mind.

3: Upon the Precipice of Destiny / Getting Shit Done. Drawing upon my evil aspect to move things forward.

4: Tim Buckley is a Prick. A quick essay on the Webcomic "Ctrl Alt Del" and why I don't read it anymore, and an unnecessary ascervic rant against it's creator.

Is Ascervic a real word? I should look that up.

5: Secure. Another rant about money, but this time it's positive in nature.


Okay so that's what I have to write about later tonight. I'll see you then.

Hmm, spell check refuses the word ascervic. That probably isn't a word. In case it isn't 'Caustic' is the closest word to my intended meaning.

Cheap as Free

I recently found out that huge portions of the Daily Show and the Colbert Report are hosted free on the internet by none of other then Comedy Central. It' Awsome, and Legal, and on the internet. You'll almost never see those three in the same place again. I've watched a lot of it and I think there are two things that must be said.

Awsome

Awsome

The Plan

I've had a lot of time off recently because I've quit my VMC job. From my point of view quitting that job was an obvious move. If you go to work and all you want to do while at work is not be at work, then leave that job. If you receive nothing but frustration and indignation from your profession, choose another profession.

So I've left VMC. I'm actually able to survive on my Homestead job, but it's just survival so I'm looking for another job. Despite my continuous economic peril I'm confident that I'll still achieve my key goal of "Survive until June," so I've learned to stop wasting time worrying about money and instead waste time on the various self exploration things that I came here for in the first place.

If you recall the key issue, the one that must be dealt with before I return to UW, is picking a major. The major heavily determines the career path and if you're unhappy with your career you're going to be unhappy with a lot of other things. VMC proved that one to me. I've gotten a lot closer to an answer to this question recently.

First of all throw pharmacy, psychology, and law off the table. Those things all still interest me but anything less then a Doctorate in psych is useless, and AFAIK most law schools would prefer someone with a technical degree to someone with a pre-law degree. We'll come back to pharmacy.

So what's still in play. The short answer is Engineering. I hate saying that after all the time I've spent lamenting my pre-destination to an engineering degree, but it's really going to be the best choice. It fills my needs, and it plays to my strengths. The problem is that it's not a real conclusion, there are different kinds of engineering. So now the table is

Electrical Engineering
Chemical Engineering
Computer Science
Bio Engineering

Okay scrap chemical E. It seems kind of rude to my father for me to say this, but I think Chem E is going away. It'll get divided up between Material Science and Bio engineering and stop needing its own heading. EE, Bio-E, CS. I'm really not sure between those three. I've heard recently that there may be a spike in the need for good CS people, and I've also heard that there may be a flood of Bio-E people, but I decided that I'm not going to take demand trends into account when making this decision. I'm not going into the field for a little while, I'm not getting a quick degree to fill a need while it's around, this is a life long thing. Demand trends will come and go, but I think all three of the ones I've got on my list will continue to be needed throughout my lifetime. I also think that the brain drain will hit all of them, so I'm not taking globalization concerns into mind.

That's where the discussion stops though. I've gotten a focus, and I've gotten it down to three sub-foci. After that I really don't know.

For now.

Last Hurrah

I canceled my CoV account a few days ago, and I spent a few hours today screwing around and getting one last bit of it in. Nothing I did was noteworthy, but one thing I saw was.

It was a group of 4 villains, each of which was a great character on their own, but together it was simply hilarious. They were:

"The Decider" ss/inv Brute
"Cheney's Got a Gun" AR/Kin Corruptor
"Snowjob" Ice/Ice Dominator
"Condi" Dark/Dark Stalker

It's stuff like that which just made the game for me.

Exodus Activity: Lucid Dreaming

I’ve been subjecting myself to a battery of bizarre mind exercises this past week. This is part of the “Exodus Activities” that I’ve been doing and while they haven’t helped my stress level they have been very eye opening.

Activity 1: Regain the ability to lucid dream.

Lucid dreaming, for those of you who don’t know, is going into a dream state but maintaining control of yourself. This gives you control over the dream, a bizarre form of omnipotence really, and is an amazing self exploratory exercise. The way I know to trigger it is by going into a theta state meditation, then consciously making the transition from theta state to asleep. If you don’t lose your focus you should end up in a lucid dream, and I’m glad to say that after only a few attempts I was able to do it.

The dream is something that words can only scratch the surface of. Omnipotence instantly rushed to my head, big flashy things start happening for no reason, mountains rise and fall the sky bends etc. Soon the rules of physics have gone away entirely, I begin to see the world as objects all of which are symbolic of something and each of which holds some deeper meaning. Actions leap instantly to reactions, the symbols shift and that shifting triggers further shifts. I am the center of propagating waves of being. Soon actions themselves become unnecessary, mere thoughts effect the storm of meaning that surrounds me. As soon as I can form a coherent idea I can see it spreading throughout the symbols of self, and on into the vast storm of meaning. I think, the storm shifts, but is ever an incomprehensible mass of meaning. My mere intent begins to effect things. Everything my mind does is propagated outwards, thoughts cease to fully form, the storm churns onwards, and at the instant in which I think that I will break from trying to see the whole it, it suddenly stops. In that instance I can see every action, and every reaction. I can see all things that every will be or ever have been and how they have come to be, I catch just the tiniest glimpse of perfect enlightenment. In that moment I see one thing clearly. It’s all a circle. It is the perfect cycle of existence, without start or end, and all things exist within it. And because it is a cycle, it no longer needs to rush forth, for in that instant I sit at the center of it, touching all of it, and existing beyond it. In that splinter of time I perceive true enlightenment.

Then I wake up, and my expanded consciousness is suddenly replaced by a headache and the distinct feeling that my mind has been blown. I look over at the clock, it’s 9 a.m, I go back to sleep.

More stories will be told.

Origin

There is a question I would like to ask of anyone and everyone reading this. Know that I'm not trying to prove any point by asking this, I simply want to stretch a few minds and here other people's responses.

The first one is aimed at people of science, meaning anyone with a functional understanding of science. One of the fundamental principles of science is a mechanical universe. All of the physical functions can be explained mathematically, and many believe all functions altogether will be shown to follow some form or another of grand machine. Even the creation of the universe can be explained back until the first few seconds using these principles. My questions to anyone who believes these things is this.

Where do you think those principles came from? If Science has the origin of the world, what is the origin of Science.

Doom!

So the UN has confirmed what is currently the front runner in my giant list of things that are going to kill of humanity. Global Warming!!! Crazy Weather! Rising Seas! Three Degrees Of Madness!!!

Don't mistake my cynicism for sarcasm either. I'm legitimately worried about this, but I'm too bitter to care any more.

Simultaneously the other possible world-ending threat loomed it's head again. Nuclear Holocaust is back in the running. I'm not surprised though. I think our window of opportunity for actually stopping Iran from making nukes closed about four years ago when we decided to attack Iraq. Anyone know why we attacked Iraq? All the reasons I have are depressing on a level so profound that I am physically burdened just thinking about them. The problem is that they're also true. Now I do understand why we couldn't have attacked either Iran or Syria, the two actual problem countries, but thinking about those reasons is almost enough to send me into a full blow depressive episode. I might have to take personal grieving days to mourn the loss of my faith in humanity. Anyway, Iran's Nuclear advancement was essentially unstoppable after that. Especially given the tactics used by the UN. No offense to the UN, but the diplomacy of enlightened elected leaders doesn't work with power mad Tyrants. So now the biggest of the anti-Zionist fish is going to get nukes. Part of me hopes for another Israeli raid like the one that pwnd Saddam's nuclear program, but a much more reasonable part of me is just hoping that they manage to keep their little nuclear squabble between themselves. A third, reasonable but bitter part of me is only willing to hold out hopes that the impending nuclear war doesn't cause nuclear winter.

And a part of me that rarely gets to talk hopes everything will go down perfectly causing nuclear winter to cancel out global warming, because that would be hilarious. We'd all still die, but seeing as the world is going to end anyway, why not make the apocalypse histories biggest ironic twist.

A Bad Sign

So flipping through the news I see a lot of buzz about a new drug resistant HIV strain that's popping up in Seattle. I'm a bitter introvert, and essentially although unintentionally celibate, so I'm not actually worried about this hitting me in any way, I'm more worried that things that start out as jokes on South Park keep coming closer to being true.

Anyone else remember this? Butter's dad tells him not to be afraid of ghosts because there's much more dangerous things in the world. Like Super Aids, a new drug resistant form of AIDs. Butters then freaks out over that instead of his perceived haunting etc. Good episode, bad sign.

Money for Nothing

I thought of a job I'd really like to have. Ambassador to Palau. Palau is a third world tiny island nation that we have no major ties to in any way, but we still have an ambassador to them. That's gotta be a sweet gig. Ambassador probably doesn't pay big money, but I bet it gets you straight to upper middle class, and you really wouldn't have to do anything for it. Basically I think I'd have to learn whatever language they speak in Palau, grab a few native art pieces for my office, and sit around browsing the Internet and looking busy. Then once a month hop on a government subsidised flight, go to Palau and basically say "Everyone okay?" When the people nod at you and go back to subsistence fishing you just give them all a big wave, get back on your federal jet and say "All right guys, see ya next month!" It's token courtesy and a free weekend in a by and large unspoiled tropical paradise. It wouldn't have to be Palau either. Any insignificant country will do. A good job, a good title, and all I have to do is pay token respect to a bunch of people I don't really interact with anyway.

Which reminds me, Happy Black History Month. One of the many things we do to pretend we care while continuing to exploit. Go America!

Weird Night

It's been a long strange night, and it's not even three yet.

The whole thing starts with me leaving an hour early. Indulge in a tangent so I can explain why I did that. My job is part of a continuous cycle with the housekeepers, all revolving around the closet. The keepers come in, fill the laundry carts and empty the closet. Then I come in, empty the carts, and fill the closet. How much I'll have to do in a given night varies, but I've got a theoretical means of measuring it. At the end of a night I can look at the closet and see how much we have in stock, and from that I can figure out how much is out. The more that's our the more that should be coming in right? So last night we were at around 10% on towels, wash clothes, dish towels, and hand clothes, and around 50% on queen sheets, and everything else looked fine. Since towels, hand towels, and queen sheets are the ones that I deal with the most I took their low count to mean a big order was coming up. So I leave early and I arrive at 10.

This is when the first weird thing happens. I meet with Josh who was on shift, and hear that the shifty Hispanic coke fiend who was my first disturbance call has become a repeat offender, and is in fact an employee of homestead bellevue.

Substance abuse and my coworkers is becoming a recurring theme.

We discussed that for a while and the picture is pretty bad. It would be bad if he was knocking on random doors asking for coke, but he's actually opening random doors asking for coke. Remember he works here, he knows where to get a master key, and we're missing one of the master keys. I'm not prepared to convict him, but I'm ready to accuse him, and report the full story if I get another call about him.

So Josh and I wind up our discussion and I head over to the laundry room. The load isn't just light, it's comically light. It ends up being 3 loads, my usual is around 9, but could easily have been two is I didn't like to sort king and queen size sheets prior to wash. At 12:30 I'm essentially done with the laundry. I would have been done by midnight but I'd been having really bad bouts of stomach pain and indigestion. It's at 12:30 that they move into some higher plateau. In one brutal sweep I'm suddenly nauseous, incredibly tired, and light headed. I focus on keeping my mental cool, and very carefully walk back to the lobby restroom. An agonizing half hour later I shove the clean towels into the dirty cart, pack up my stuff, and check myself into a dirty room. I may not have finished my task, but this way I won't vomit on anything, or die. I lay in bed for about an hour, drifting into sleep for only 10 minutes or so, and around 2 I realize that I can't sleep, and I don't really feel any more pain. I get up and find that whatever it was that had beaten me so quickly into submission has completely passed. I finished the laundry without any event.

The night continues to be weird because just recently a friend of Josh's stumbled into the lobby, completely smashed, looking for Josh. They eventually met up, and I found something that's almost funny. A few of my coworkers, their friends, and my boss are all drinking in a room around here somewhere. What do I do if I get a noise complaint about my boss? I'm not even setting foot into that labyrinth of protocol and priority.

So now it's 3, I've got nothing to do, and I may have some kind of stomach imp. I'm sure this story isn't over yet.

Apply Directly to the Forehead

If anyone can find me a ringtone of the headon commercials I woudl be practically giddy. It would also be the thing that finally pushed me into buying a USB cable for my phone.

Random thoughts

I miss the old head on commercials. I know they annoyed the majority of the world, but I thought they were hilarious. They had a good simple message. What is is? Head on. How do you use it? You apply directly to the forehead. They're also the only commercials that understood one of the key rules of speech giving, that is that when telling somebody something you must first tell them what you're going to tell them, then tell them, and finally tell them what you told them.

Head on! apply directly to the forehead!
Head on! apply directly to the forehead!
Head on! apply directly to the forehead!

If you watch CNN you'll soon realize that 99% of what's being said is sensationalist schlock. It's something that would pull on my heartstrings if they weren't so heavily embittered, and won't provide me with any actual news. However, the ticker on the bottom of the screen is almost news. It's about as close to being news as Google news is, and quite frankly I think that's as far as you'll get in today's society.

Google spell check automatically capitalizes the word Google. It amuses me.

Dracodar

Dracodar is that series of fantasy novels I have planned. I'm writing down a brief rough outline of the series while it's on my mind and the various towels and cloths are spinning. This is more of a note to myself then anything else.

Book 1, Operating title "The Prodigal Son"
Prologue, fall of Baelnazzar. Starts with Dreykellan's introduction to his heritage. Covers the following: his training, his pariah phase, his period serving as advisor to a goblin king under the name of "The Demon," his ascension to war chief, and his betrayal. Ends with him finding out that his heroism didn't make him any less of an outcast, and ends with him wandering off into the mountains.

Book 2, Operating title "The Light That Blinds"
Prologue: Excerpt from war in the fifth age describing the rise of paladins and the role of holy warriors. Opens with Makatiel being told lies about his ancestry. Follows Makatiels journey into the military, then the Sanctified legion. Covers Dreykellans reported death at the hands of a demonic spellcaster in service to a goblin army. Covers the fathers descent into alcoholism. End with Makatiel being knighted and being sent off to kill "The Destroyer"

Book 3, Operating Title Pending.

Prologue: Dalmara's dramatic scene. Cuts back too Dalmara telling off her father who is, by then, a full blown alcoholic. Covers dalmara's period of hardship when first arriving at the city, her descent into crime and her montage esque training sequence. Covers her meeting with Slyz, and goes through Slyz's act of regicide. Ends with her going home to rescue her younger brother.

Book 4, Operating title "The Last Gasp of the destroyer"

Prologue: excerpt from war in the fifth age about divine magic. Opens with Dalmara trying to retrieve Nyazi. covers Nyazi's attack, and test subject phase. Covers dreykellans amassing of all of the half bloods and outcasts. Covers Nyazis escape, and dramatic reveal that Nyazi has mystical abilities and hence isn't the youngest son. Covers fathers resurfacing in the city and the presence of Zaistig. Covers Z being taken under Dalmara's wing. Covers Nyazi meeting up with Dreykellan. Dramatic reveal that Dreykellan is the destroyer. Covers Nyazi betraying dreykellan by telling the legion where the destroyer is. Covers Nyazi's attempt to save dreykellan by tell Makatiel who he is. Ends with Makatiel's betrayal of his brother and the death of the destroyer.

Book 5, operating title "Dragon blooded"

Slyz's rise to power. as of yet unlayed out story involving Zaistig. The Redemption of their father, the introduction of Gregory.

Book 6, operating title "Unstoppable Force"

Mobius's backstory. The Endgame period. End of the fifth age.

I'll flesh this out later, things have stopped spinning so I have to get back to work.