No Matter What, Watch This

Okay, this is sappy. But so worth it, watch the whole thing, and if you're in exactly the right mood, you'll be blown away.

Computers, or at least A computer when my dad worked on them....

That's one computer filling a whole room. There were cards that fed it the language...or something.

Don't tell me, we don't have the technology to do this, or do that...it's silly. Let's get going on developing our portable renewable energy maker converter gadgets, and a catchy new name for whatever it is, too.

GMA is EVIL- Life in the Philippines

GMA stands for Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.
This paper can be purchased at any news stand here in the Phlippines. A student was reading this in my class, and I couldn't help but notice the headline. Only part of this was scannable, the right margin is missing. I grabbed it because this is the general feeling of anyone here I've ever talked to, and this headline is quite blunt. I can't even imagine a major newspaper in the US running a headline that says GWB IS EVIL.

Here's a joke picture of her I found on Flickr.

Just to mention...there's isn't a hint of misogynistic hatred here for her, it stems purely from corruption, the most used word here in the Philippines. The gender of the president is neither here nor there to the people, likely because of the beloved Corazon Aquino.

Anyway, just thought I'd share.

Part I and II Working Title: The Pedestal

In The Desert

In the desert there is sunlight and heat and rattlesnakes minding their own business, not even bothering with their rattles. There's brush here and there. Off in the far distance is a huge dark wall of a mountain, but straight ahead is a winding road to an ocean shore.

In this desert I'm hot but happy, comfortable and careless. This location isn't one far from civilization, it's just on the edge, not far from a shore or change of landscape or life. There's a paved road and in this desert that's where I'm walking, almost shuffling, thumbs in my jeans. There's a hot wind blowing, giving my hair a treatment. My hair seems long from the top, but is cut short and thick with layers blowing over my face and off again. I'm quite pleased with it.

I'm thinking about this because it's just me and the desert, me and denim and cotton and canvas-rubber shoes and a cool haircut. It's just me and my hairdo and my freckles and my form, shuffling along.

I could go off road and watch a rattlesnake, but I'm headed toward the beach. I'm not afraid of snakes, even venomous ones, but I'm walking to the ocean. This desert turns into dunes before joining the ocean, but before that, I'm stopped in my tracks.

Off to the right maybe twenty-five long steps away I see a pedestal. I don't know if it's ionic, or Doric, or Corinthian, that hardly seems the point. There's a clear glass box on top with blood red contents. Off in the distance, there are bushes and a young man, or maybe a boy is hiding there. I pretend not to notice. There's no way I'm not going to look at that box. I'll deal with that person if I must.

This is a perfectly cube shaped clear glass box. I step up and can open it from the top, the top frame of glass is a lid. Inside there are rose petals! Rose petals! How delicate, beautiful, vivid, soft. I reach my hand in to feel and find something like a card that I pull up. It's a photograph- of me!

Kind of. It's this beautiful version of me. I mean, more um...polished. Well not really me on any given day, but it's me nonetheless. And all I can think is-

What is this shit?
---------
Children of the Apocalypse

There's at least one person who knows.

The cryptic missive in the bushes knows I saw him, but he's a child of the apocalypse. Children of the apocalypse don't answer questions. These children have a set mind that 1) at any given moment they've done something wrong and 2) others have bad motives toward them; and so to hide their vulnerability and protect themselves from harm, they answer all questions wrongly regardless of topic. They could be asked where they purchased their rations for the day, or simply what time it is, but every question is a potential assault. Even eye contact is out of the question. They dart to and fro continually as scavengers of sorts. If they like you, they don't mind if you figure things out on your own. Hints or clues will be dropped sometimes. I can see that he's still peeking at me from behind the brush, but just the thought of talking to him sends a wave of irritation over me from head to toe. Presently, I don't feel like playing games.

My thoughts return to the mystery of the pedestal and the box. My moves aren't planned in advance, so this wasn't placed here for me. This was not supposed to be seen by me, and it doesn't feel like it has anything to do with me at all. Yet, this is a picture of me, kind of. So anyway, which is the creepier reality? For me, or not for me?

These are the things I'm pondering after turning on my heels to head back to my bike. My steps now are much more purposeful and speedy. I expect there to be a couple more children of the apocalypse near my bike, but I won't ask them anything.

Children of the apocalypse are so named because they are survivors of such. Had there been a planetary apocalypse, I suppose we would all be children of the apocalypse, but theirs was a localized destruction. Only their settlements were obliterated.

All that they had, every resource, every tool, every tradition, all that they knew to be true fact and every shared belief was gone, torn away, ruptured and raptured at the cellular level. What didn't rip apart atomically was damaged and so failed to replicate and so died. Many children live on, as do some of the mothers, but these mothers live in the past, unreachable.

The children that dart to and fro scavenging here and there and avoiding eye contact, these are the boys. Their given names are like Noah, Josiah, Jeremiah, Zeke -short for Ezekiel, Hosea, Amos, Elijah, Seth, Isreal, Jebediah, Micah, Jonah, and Bo- short for Boaz (my personal favorite and the nickname I have given any and all of them.) Their worlds are gone, they live in no world. Yeah, that's right, come to think of it, they live in no world.

There were girls, but they're all gone. They've easily assimilated into any group of their choosing. Melding together with new loved ones and new identities, they were changelings, or simply became invisible. These are called Mary.

The boys make their way daily by being useful to others which is quite a feat considering they do this with no direct communication. It has to be experienced to be believed. Schematics of archaic apparatus from their tribes survived their apocalypse, so these boys are good with technologies and adapt them to others' apparatus that, they believe, could use a retro-fit for improvement. All are water technologies. Now, in reality, people have the water technologies that they need and these children of the apocalypse came from tribes that used cumbersome and cryptic technologies to get anything done. I've never personally found anything that they've had to offer useful, and most settlements won't either. But there are those with limited time and resources to plan well, and sometimes these boys can fit a niche here or there, "upgrading"- as they like to think of it- a traveling vendor's water apparatus, or some motorcycle here and there. It's a temporary fix, whatever they're doing and the materials are not renewable, but it's cheap so for the time being all parties in the transaction are happy.

That's why they love my bike. It's not really powerful and it's obvious that I've made some adjustments to it, so they figure I'm the type that wouldn't mind a "more efficient" (it's not) water system. I happen to know that, if anything, it's a lateral move at best. Anything they could offer is done better on the new bikes. New bikes are cheap anyway. I just happen to like my bike.

You can't blame them for trying, so sure enough, my bike has a couple of Boes examining it, and they're having an animated conversation with each other for my benefit. I figured as much anyway. I know what to do. As usual they are avoiding direct contact but the message is loud and clear. It's not appropriate for me to address them directly, so I start up my bike and happily mumble something in a friendly tone about getting a new one. I grab two wrapped pieces of candy from my pocket and throw them on the ground behind all three of us, I wink with my left eye to no one in particular and put my helmet on, which in these parts is necessary for a sand screen, and I speed off.

The Boes are young enough to dart for candy and they laugh hysterically at some funny joke that I'm not in on. They like to try to make people feel that they are laughing at them. Frankly speaking, Boes are punk asses. Alot of people don't like them, but they're in a tough position.

It's really hot out here, and I don't know where I'm headed.

Vinnnie Quits OCC- I Finally Saw The Episode

We're out here in the Philippines and we get OCC on the Discovery Channel Asia where it's called American Choppers. I found out on the internet awhile back that Vinnie and Cody had quit, but I hadn't seen the episode. Well, last night it was on, so here's my take on the whole thing.

One, I'm glad there weren't bad vibes. -On camera. I mean the whole thing is like...wait a minute, no two weeks notice, no goodbye party? So, I mean, I'm not dumb, there's some kind of situation for sure. I was happy that senior said to Vinnie that he appreciates what he did there. It was strange how Vinnie said a warm "thank you" but didn't even turn around.

I had read on the internet that Senior said something like 'anyone can be replaced'. It sounded pretty cold. Watching the episode and his demeanor for that part, I wasn't too upset with him. He said he's been in business thirty years and he's seen good people come and go. That was nice. Then it was edited to the comment, "anyone can be replaced"...it was just Senior being philosophical, and really, I've seen the same thing in work places. Life tends to go on.

I like the show and will continue to watch it. I do wonder this, though:
Do the Teutuls have the right perspective on Vinnie's importance to the show? Now some may think, well, that's not important. The heck it's not. OCC is a tv show whether or not some may pretend otherwise. I wouldn't know these people unless they were on television, and their tv reality is woven into their business. We're not just flies on the the wall there...the choppers they make speak to their unique status as a TV SHOW: Bill Murray, Billy Joel, visiting Russel Crowe's house in Australia, the list goes on. The auctions for the charity bikes work well because OCC is a TV SHOW, it's not just because nubby does a pretty paint job.

So what I'm saying is while they're tooling around in the shop, they may want to believe that they live inside a reality in which Vinnie is just another tool, just another employee, some low man on the totem pole, or whatever. But guess what? That's not reality. The reality is that Vinnie was a cast member on a world wide popular tv show and people love him just as much and maybe even more than the other players. He actually built the bikes, you know, a lot of the time. And he's a nice guy, funny and all that jazz. He was straight man to all the chaos if it broke loose. Some view Vinnie as indispensable to the success of that show.

When this story broke, I found out about it because I got hundreds of hits a week on my blog here, people looking for information about it. Every week I still get people googling this even though the story has died down a bit. People love Vinnie, it's that simple.

Like I said, I'm not quitting OCC as a viewer, but I just felt the need to share my view on that whole thing. My best wishes to Vinnie and Cody as they start their new bike shop.

Did You Ever Have One Of Those Days?

This is how I feel today. Did you ever have one of those days, where you hear a song and it hits you JUST RIGHT?



This is one of them days for moi and this is the song...play it.

Funny Mitt Romney Video

I know this makes me look not neutral, but I am...
and it may make me look godless, but...
this is FUNNY. Sometimes swearing is ok. I guess.
No, swearing is never ok...I hate it. It's just there's genuine frustration with this lame thinking, ya know?

Clone This

I HATE smoking. Hate it. But Brad, you're adorable. I also don't watch your movies because most of them are rated R. But...still I wrote this for you:
If you read my blog on MySpace...you've already seen this, sorry.

I'd like to make the case that Brad Pitt be cloned. Why should women have to suffer with the lack of choices out there? Many of us have already decided that we like him, why should we have to continue to search the world over?

Clone as many as neccessary. One for any woman who wants one.

The problem that I see with this, is that men woud clone a bunch of Angelina Jolies.

And then...

You know what would happen. All the Brads and all the Angelinas would run away together.

But think...

of all the children that would be adopted. Would there be any needy ones left?

So then I come full circle...let's clone Brad!

(Come on Angie, can't I have just one?)

-----------------------------------

You, know I was thinking after I wrote this about how this came up. Actually I was in class with the Koreans and we were talking about cloning and this is the conversation that came about naturally, it's just the way I think. The students were in stitches though. I forgot about it until Dave posted this picture of Brad in my comments section. Hm..

And I've always had this fear that if I got together with Brad Pitt that he would dump me for someone else. Now, that sounds like a joke. It's quite funny, so I say it as a joke, but seriously. I really did think that one day. So I say it now and again and there's usually someone around that will go into convulsions of laughter. Also because of delivery. I say it quite seriously. So because I really do think like that, when I thought about cloning Brad, those old fears raised their head again and I thought, sure then here comes a bunch of Angelinas to steal him. But then I enjoy them as a couple and their work. They're doing great things in New Orleans now.

Imagine a whole new meaning to 'Attack of the Clones'

Dedicated to the Lost Boys of FLDS

Hinkley, the president of the Mormon (LDS) church died, which has got me thinking.
LDS is not a cult...but FLDS is...
The people who get out, or are ex-communicated have a very hard time adjusting outside, and Anderson Cooper reported that the young men that leave are called the "lost boys" and are almost all of them- on drugs. My heart goes out to them and how hard it must be to adjust to the outside world. They don't need conversions, they don't need drugs...they need help with material things and opportunities and emotional support. They don't need another Warren Jeffs running their life and they don't need all the crazies out there in thunderdome, either.

Wow, I forgot how cute Mad Max is.

Out of the ruins
Out from the wreckage
Can't make the same mistake this time
We are the children
the last generation
We are the ones they left behind
And I wonder when we are ever gonna change it
Living under the fear till nothing else remains

We don't need another hero
We don't need to know the way home
All we want is life beyond the thunderdome

Looking for something we can rely on
There's got to be something better out there
Love and compassion, their day is coming
All else are castles built in the air
And I wonder when we are ever gonna change it
Living under the fear till nothing else remains
All the children say

We don't need another hero
We don't need to know the way home
All we want is life beyond the thunderdome

So what do we do with our lives
We leave only a mark
Will our story shine like a light
Or end in the dark
Is it all or nothing (less)

Worst Building In History

I saw this on yahoo and just in case you missed it, Yahoo news has a link to an article called "The Worst Building In History" it's pretty interesting. And here's a You Tube video. It's in North Korea, and this 3,000 room nightmare has been VACANT for decades.

Esquire Article

A picture doesn't lie -- the one-hundred-and-five-story Ryugyong Hotel is hideous, dominating the Pyongyang skyline like some twisted North Korean version of Cinderella's castle. Not that you would be able to tell from the official government photos of the North Korean capital -- the hotel is such an eyesore, the Communist regime routinely covers it up, airbrushing it to make it look like it's open -- or Photoshopping or cropping it out of pictures completely.

Even by Communist standards, the 3,000-room hotel is hideously ugly, a series of three gray 328-foot long concrete wings shaped into a steep pyramid. With 75 degree sides that rise to an apex of 1,083 feet, the Hotel of Doom (also known as the Phantom Hotel and the Phantom Pyramid) isn't the just the worst designed building in the world -- it's the worst-built building, too. In 1987, Baikdoosan Architects and Engineers put its first shovel into the ground and more than twenty years later, after North Korea poured more than two percent of its gross domestic product to building this monster, the hotel remains unoccupied, unopened, and unfinished.

Construction on the Hotel of Doom stopped in 1992 (rumors maintain that North Korea ran out of money, or that the building was engineered improperly and can never be occupied) and has never started back up, which shouldn't come as a shock. After all, who the hell travels to beautiful downtown Pyongyang? It would make sense if the hotel were in South Korea, where Americans are allowed to travel and where projects like the Busan Lotte Tower and the Lotte Super Tower now rise thousands of feet above the formerly modest skyline.

With Pyongyang's official population said to range between 2.5 million and 3.8 million (official numbers are not made available by the North Korean government), the Ryugyong Hotel -- the 22nd largest skyscraper in the world -- is a failure on an enormous scale. To put it in context, imagine if the John Hancock Center (1,127 feet tall) in Chicago (population 2.9 million) was not only completely vacant, but unfinished with zero hope of ever being completed.

You may not be able to actually live there, but the building now has its own virtual real estate managers, Richard Dank and Andreas Gruber, a pair of German architects and self-described "custodians of the pyramid's diverse manifestations." The duo run Ryugyong.org, which they describe as an "experimental collaborative online architecture site." Sad you can't visit the building in real life? Log on, view the detailed 3-D models, and "claim" a subsection for yourself.

I know, I know, I know

You've already heard a lot about oil, but this is an interesting video I found on the Foreign Policy website with important people saying different things.

I really take issue with that dude at the end, it's actually the same dude at the beginning, but at the end he makes this BOLD statement. I just completely disagree and I think he talks that way because he's as old as the crusty-acean period.

This Is Why

You Tube really stuns me sometimes, I love the creative people out there

Teaching Stint

I'm teaching for a couple of weeks until my deal gets settled and I head back to the USA. My friend is on the board here at a private school...so HIGH SCHOOLERS. A big huge class full of them...and sixth graders. I'll have four classes. Hm, it should be interesting. I live for interesting!

One of the Greatest Movies Ever!

During this brief blog intermission...here's some entertainment. If you have any way, you've got to see this movie. The cast is amazing and there are so many great lines.

Murder By Death- a Neil Simon deal.

Where I Grew Up

Theresa...how come you don't really like where you grew up?
Well, here's a story from MSNBC for you to chew on.

Sheriff: Dad Duct-Taped Packers Jersey To Boy
WMAQ-TV
updated 4:53 p.m. PT, Thurs., Jan. 17, 2008

PORTAGE, Wis. - A Wisconsin man faces charges of abuse after a woman on Monday reported that her 7-year-old son was forced to wear a Green Bay Packers jersey. According to a release from the Columbia County Sheriff's Office, Matthew Kowald, 36, of Pardeeville, Wis., told his son to wear the jersey and when the boy refused, he restrained the 7-year-old for about an hour.

The boy's mother told sheriff's deputies that Kowald also used the tape to attach the jersey to the boy during that time.

In an interview with Madison radio station Z-104, Rebecca Kowald, the boy's mother, said that the incident, which happened during the Packers game on Saturday, upset her son and scared her to the point where she felt unable to call police until Monday. She also said that the boy was "having a bout with his dad," and that her son is, in fact, "a true Packers fan."

[well, gee that's the important part and of course it had to be written into the article here- ME]

She said the boy became stubborn when he and his father began arguing. She said that her husband refused to let her cut the boy free from the tape, telling her, "He's not hurt. Sit down and shut up."

Rebecca Kowald told Z-104 that her husband was "very inebriated" when the incident happened.

Kowald was arrested and initially charged with two felony counts -- causing mental harm to a child and false imprisonment. He was also charged with domestic disorderly conduct. The felony charges were dropped and Kowald was released later in the week, but the suspect is not being allowed to see his children.

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Boy oh boy do I not miss home this football season. Sorry guys (you know who you are).

Crippled And Dazed

If you opened an electronic device and studied the inside, you might think about the person who designed it. Wait, even if you use one of Steve Jobs' new releases without opening it to see the inner workings, you may wonder at the designer. We've got some pretty amazing devices out nowadays.

I think of the DNA strand. Actually, when I was in biology class in college I listened to lectures about cells many times with my mouth half gaping open. The inside of our bodies is amazing. We've got these larger parts, heart, lungs circulatory system, bones, intestines, really meaningless apart from the whole. Also further into the cellular make up of these larger organs...it's mind boggling the functions, actions and purposes of this cellular activity. And even smaller...dna.

I mean who are we kidding by ignoring these things? Nothing on the inside of my body resembles anything on the outside. Not in any way. Why are these little devices used to create a whole being that could, on any given day, just sit on the couch and watch the telly and eat junk food? I really want to stress the point here, that we resemble nothing of our insides. When I was in biology class I wrote a little poem on my lab notebook

Tiny spheres of matter
without will
yet surpassing me in measured purpose.

If we're a direct succession to millions of nature's modifications, why on earth are we such radically different beings than our building blocks? I mean if we're nothing but modifications of building blocks -what's with the complete difference from outside of my body to inside?

It is inexcusable to look a the human body and not see that all parts work in concert for the purpose of the whole. The human brain is absolutely beyond our comprehension and without the rest of the body, would die.

This has all formed *spontaneously* *accidentally* and without purpose so that I can live and love and create, or destroy or be lazy...or laugh at Kermit the Frog riding a bicycle? What a radical departure from rna transcription. Why? And why do I ask why? I don't believe that cellular respiration asks why, or longs to laugh. What do cells long to worship, or wonder about? Why would those things come together to form a being that does?

To say that forces in the universe accidentally formed people is illogical. Why? Because I'm a person. How does something personal come about from the non-personal? It's nature?

One must personify nature so much, that we're back at square one. Who is this nature? Why is the nature of nature a personal one?

Look, I understand rejecting theological orthodoxy, but to reject the idea of design is delusional. The question that I like honest hearted people to get to is, "why have we been abandoned?"- that's the valid question and a good place to start on a spiritual journey.

When we look around, if we're not delusional: we're crippled and we're dazed.

The only way I could get this song was this tribute to John Lennon, but here's someone who was creative and questioning and does well representing mankind and his plight.

Amazing Race Asia Video!

Here you go beloved. This one's a little old, but it shows the Philippines! Marc and Rovilson win like every leg, and like I said in my last entry, I'm mad that they're on the show. Marc actually hosts a sports show out here. This is NOT a celebrity edition. Nothing personal against them, they're nice and funny- I just don't want elite celebrity types on AR.

There's even a part on here where one of the teams show the camera that Marc's face is on one of the maps there on some advertisement. I was so excited to see them in the Philippines, I especially know the bus situation, I've been on those buses! Yes, you pay once you're already on...a contestant asked.

This is the Philippines!

Well I posted the prisoners dancing in the past, and I said that video really shows a lot about the people in the Philippines. Well...
American Idol is back this season, and ...here's another video that IS the Philippines. It's more insight into the national character if there is such a thing.

Watch the whole thing. I love the whole Napoleon Dynamite thing about American Idol, where people believe in themselves, and they might not get in the competition, but they end up getting some dreams fulfilled. It's interesting. This is the spirit of the people here.

Wish You Were Better

You know, yesterday was strange, I actually felt like I had been hit in the stomach with a cannonball. It was painful depression. Some of my friends here live in almost abject poverty (we have relatively 'clean' water) and their life is getting worse by the ticking clock. I have GOT to get this deal finished, it's taking forever, when I get that money I can help in a substantial way. I don't talk about my day to day life much on here, or I haven't so far, a lot of it is perplexing so I haven't addressed it yet. I'm so tired of seeing good people suffer. People here can work and work and work and not have enough money to eat let alone pay any bill or rent, or transportation. Heavy sighs. And back home I've got this friend living with someone psychotic and that's hard too. I'm looking forward to that ending for her. On the world front Bush is trying to really quickly get peace going between Palastine and Isreal before he leaves office and then last night the breaking news story was that for some reason Isreal did an air strike against Gaza. The news reports it and banners it as "airstrike against Hamas". The week before Bush was in Saudi rattling his saber against Iran. World events aren't physically depressing to me, but they're not so great either. And then sometimes I think about boys. And then I try not to. But in that department, here's a good role model:

I was thinking this week about one of my favorite movies, Say Anything. So here's something from that. Quite enjoyable.

Gents, take note of the parking lot scene. (Just a tip.)
"No English tips, I won't give you any tips of any kind!"

Umm, yeah...

I know it's been forever. But I'm closing a deal here. I'll be back soon with all kinds of crazy posts. I HATE to predict 2008 as good for me...because I thought the same thing last year...but...

Now I feel superstitious and that's a yucky feeling.