Fight til the End

Yesterday I woke up, rolled to the side of my bed, picked up my guitar, and literally played till my fingers bled. Well, til one of them bled. And no, I didn't pick it up at the 'five and dime'. That was about all old man productivity had in store for me for Saturday. Today, I did the same.

My weekends lately are seriously devoid of any kind of excitement, and have become far too predictable. Learning a couple new riffs or memorizing a couple new chord progesssions, simple or no, is only self gratifying for so long. And the alcohol does nothing but tax my wallet.

And why is it a remaining tradition for senior citizens to do their shopping on weekends. I completely respect equal opportunity for all people, including the geriatrics among us, but come on! You people have 5 days of the week where most of the working, professional, or schooling world will be totally out of your way and you can waddle through the aisles of your local grocery store at leisure. Why do you insist on saving your shopping for Saturdays and Sundays, when the stores are busy enough with the volume of the working world, and park your carts in the most inopportune of locations, and laze slowly about.

If anyone catches me shopping on a Saturday or Sunday beyond the day I offically retire, I hereby grant you permission to take me into the stock area and kick my ass.

Today provided a little bit of activity to the weekend with a playoff soccer game in my rec league, which we lost to a team full of those people that take things way too seriously (I'm sure you know the type) and a number of NFL weird and wacky games.

The Packers were beaten again, and Favre is fading not so gracefully into the sunset, but he sure as hell is ready to go out doing the best he can manage with the talent around him he has to work with. And now the Bills at the Patriots is started, and Ted Bruschi who had a stroke after last years Pro Bowl, and who looked like it would be impossible for him to play ever again started, and is playing influential football. Its gamers like Favre and Bruschi that fight, and don't give up that reflect positively on professional sports, despite the whiners and sucks you will find out there in all sports.

Hallows Eve Suggestions

If I was into going out and doing the Halloween partying thing I have a couple costume ideas for this year, feel free to use them as you see fit:

-Internet Pirate (a la Maddox): Get yourself an eye patch, and bring along your ipod/mp3 discman/pirated media weapon of choice, and maybe wear a torrentspy or I Hate Lars t-shirt.

-Leafs Fan:
option 1 - Find someone willing to lend you a Leafs jersey, cut off the blade of a hockey stick, tape the leftover shaft such that it is lodged up your ass or
option 2 - Find someone willing to lend you TWO Leafs jerseys, and find yourself an inflatable doll to put the second jersey on, strap to back in suggestive pose. (Note: you might be best off asking that Leafs fan pal of yours who lent you the jersey for his inflatable doll...we all know he's got one...and its probably effeminately named 'Darcy')

-Your Evil Twin: The big bonus here is no money lost on costume, the downside lack of originality, this is the low budget option (if it gets you into the party/kegger/bar cheaper, do it). Only lots of pride and self respect lost in defaming yourself, but you'll most likely be drunk soon enough and prone to embarrassing your sorry ass anyways.

-George W. Bush: I dare you. If you could find a friend to dress as a WMD for the evening though, you could run that gag all night in a crowd; "Has anyone see my WMD?" (Note: to the WMD friend, if you decide not to show up, the image is complete, find yourself a better party, and tell G.W. about it later.)

Apparently I misplaced the rest of the mildly amusing ideas that came to me today, my memory is a seive lately, unfortunately, it has an affinity for only keeping the crap. Post your suggestions!

Its a Start...

The U.S. today apparently decided to cease funding for the development of back-pack nukes according to the BBC.

Its alright to call everyone else on even the slightest hint of nuclear arms development, impose sanctions against them, and threaten to attack them if their actions don't fit with the visions of the big guy. Yet, millions per year go towards funding their own weapons of the same destructive energy. Millions per year for too many years that, just for the sake of simple analogy, could have easily been diverted to levee construction everywhere in hurricane alley. Clearly there are numerous other programs both domestic and international that the U.S. could have better spent that money on, but instead it goes to flexing the military might. Military might so shocking, and awe inspiring that 2 and a half years later, Iraqi militants are still so bewildered that they continue to strike randomly at the occupant military, and other political and religious sects in the nation.

It should have been quite apparent right from the start that a big military presence wasn't going to be met by an equally large military in some large battlefield, with the mess to be mopped up later. Battles like that haven't taken place since the World Wars, and for good reason, good commanders realized they were a waste, illogical, and for the most part meaningless. On top of that, those few nations that do have such a large military will obliterate one another with nukes before any large scale battle could ensue. The North Vietnamese demonstrated the effectiveness of guerilla tactics against a much larger enemy, and one would think there'd be a lesson learned. Instead, the posturing continues, and the big boys on the block belabor young nations about their nuclear intent, while continuing to do the same themselves. And sadly, instead of choosing this, smallest of opportunities, to lead by example, a main argument from within instead comes:

However, critics doubted whether the weapon could go deep enough to contain any fall-out.

As opposed to, "we will take a step to denuclearizing the world, and our own military, and hope that the rest of you will follow".

Find the Time

This week is stupid busy for me, so anything that isn't mildly stressed out garble will be at a mininum. Its not so much difficulty as quantity, but still enough to put too much on my plate.

That said, Matt Good made a stellar post today on the future of global sociopolitical action, and specifically how attitudes here in North America are going to need to change before we can change the direction that some of the powers that be are taking us. The best things in life are worth working hard for.

Check this.

In My Dreams

Lately I have been having very vivid, or at least realistic dreams. When I wake up I couldn't give a written account of the affair or anything, I just know that its not anything too fantastical. But the issue is that I remember enough of them, like snippets of dreamt conversations that I get confused as to whether the discussion ever actually took place.

I don't know if its the stress, or the alcohol, or the getting old, or some function of the three that does it, but its really weirding me out lately, and making me feel more than mildly retarded at times.

Did I pass on that message that the family doctor called confirming an appointment? Is my buddy gonna stop by to pick up that DVD today? Did I leave the lights on in the van?

Its not obsessive compulsive or anything; I don't go tracking things down in some paranoid frenzy. Infact, I feel like to much of an idiot when these things come up to do anything about it but some subtle, careful retracing of the previous few days events.

Whatever it is, hopefully it goes away soon...I miss my normal falling dreams, and touring the world within the span of a night, and talking with people I haven't seen in years.

Just lay back down your pretty head...

The MG show kicked ass, and for the most part only a couple of the idiots. A guy in a leather jacket jumpin around like a fool and waving his hand in peoples face or almost hitting them in the face, and people who just couldn't shut up for a couple minutes while Matt was trying to connect on an intellectual level with the crowd, you win some you lose some.

Of the weirder moments of the evening was the kid behind us who we thought was pushing his way forward, and was actually passing out and ended up fallin down between me and my buddy and a couple other people. I assume it was just exhaustion or over excitement or something for the kid, but we got him back up and the one guy took off to make sure he got somewhere to sit down.

Anyways, here's the best of my shots...

Downhill From Here

At long last this week is all but over, and I survived the beatings of a midterm and the abundance of assignments and labs that always seem to be due all at once. I even got in 4 hours of 'contract' work today to pad my wallet a bit, and now have the Matt Good show to go to tonight to relax before it all starts again with two more midterms and too much other stuff for me to remember at the moment.

I'm hoping beyond hopes that there aren't some morons there tonight, or at least not close to me. But its a small venue (which makes it awesome) and there are inevitibly morons amongst the crowd that take it upon themselves to try to start a mosh pit during a solo acoustic number. I'm bringing my camera, we'll see if the batteries last and if I can get any decent shots out of the evening...you'll know soon enough if I do.

Employees Wanted

I wish I could get away with applying to jobs not nearly as high in stature or importance with as vague a description of my past education and work experiences as Harriet Miers'. This woman, nominated by Bush to be the replacement for Sandra Day O'Connor as an Associate Justice in the Supreme Court of the U.S. of A, while having an impressive list of past experiences and positions, can't go through the relative ease of looking up the dates of past employment to submit in her official response to the judiciary committee of the Senate that is basically responsible for grilling her before being allowed to take the position.

One would only hope that a higher standard would be expected of someone that could see a lifetime tenure in the court that makes some of the most important decisions in United States Law. Sure, there are plenty of experiences to account for, and many of them date back a fair way, but anyone deemed worthy of being able to handle the responsibility that Bush wants to bestow on her should be able to figure these things out and fill out a complete description.

Someone should have been kind enough to let her know that she wasn't running for Grade 9 student council rep. If I applied to a co-op job with 'Date unknown' or 'mid to late 80's' there's not a chance in hell I'd even be considered for the job in question. Nevermind the limited experience with the kind of job environment that she would find herself in, or the questions about her ability to separate her beliefs and politics from fair unbiased case hearings.

I don't see how, unless she's trying to not get the job, you could go about returning a response to a job like that in such a casual fashion. I'm sure many will argue in favour of its honesty and candidness, and that's fair enough, but as a matter of principle and dedication to her cause and possible future job, she's sure gotten off to an extremely poor start.

Oh yea, and Saddam Hussein goes on trial tomorrow. The hope is to come across as a fair trial, and one can only hope beyond hopes that it actually goes down as such. Its fairly obvious that he was responsible for brutal crimes in his time, so a trial like this shouldn't need unfair loading of the scales to begin with.