All of this is true.

Since conference week is basically over (finished the draft two hours ago, bitches!), I can finally live without my computer long enough to send it in for repairs under the warranty. Which is magnificent. Because the screen is going out; if I nudge it, everything fucks up until I feel around the edges of the monitor and press together in a very specific spot, and that heals it for a while. And look at how awesome my computer is, holding together until I've finished my most important paper of the semester, what a trooper.

Anyways, I need to attatch a post-it to the computer when I send it in:

"Dear Compaq:

Why does your repair service involve me sending my computer to you and then not having a computer for several weeks? Going several weeks without a computer has not been okay since I was born - which is why I've been holding out on sending this to you, until I finished my exams and didn't need it every day of my life. So as long as you're taking care of the monitor...

The power cable is only able to send power to the PC intermittently; I need to twist the wire into the right place or it falls back onto battery power. Which sucks, because the battery's also fried; a nudge while the PC's running off the battery and the whole unit shuts down. Also, I think the wi-fi card melted.

Also, sometimes when I touch the speakers, they spark and the computer turns off. And as long as you're at it, could you do something about my optical drive not being there?"

I'm pretty sure they're not going to replace the battery or the cd-drive, even though it was their shitty construction that got the disk drive snapped off in the first place. Still, everything else should be covered under the warranty.

...oh, man. Those guys are gonna be so pissed.

----------------
Now playing: Unknown Error - [Fear No Evil LP #06] Fear No Evil [foobar2000 v0.9.4.1]
via FoxyTunes

Suck on this, Freud

I had a dream last night.

Before I go on about that, though, I want to make sure we're all on the same page. So we're clear: I get super excited whenever I get a dream. I don't know if it's the insomnia or the insanity or what, but I only ever get about one a year. Before tonight's, lats night's, whatever, I only remember two.

From two years ago: I was sitting outside, on my back porch, and all of my pals were there. The grill was up, we had hot dogs cooking or a barbecue going, or something... and we chat around and chilled and chatted and smoked.

And that was it.

Last years? Finally, finally, I got one: Zombie Apocalypse. I never fucking get zombie or vampire dreams, I've always wanted one, and last year, I finally got it: The newsmen were screaming on the television --"Zombie Apocalypse is HERE" "Do not attempt to rescue your loved ones!" "Stay in your houses and lock your doors" "If you see one of the enemy, do not make contact" "The End Is Extremely Fucking Nigh" -- and so on. So I got up. I walked into my basement. I walked into my zombie shelter. And I shut the door behind me.

There was enough water and food. Nothing went wrong. I waited it out and everything was chill. Nothing went wrong.






The entry isn't over, I just want you to take a minute to dwell on that.





Okay, good? Well now you can see why I'd be so eager for this year's shot. At this point, I could raise my track record by having a dream about cutting off my foot with a bandsaw.

I did not cut off my own foot with a bandsaw. Instead, I had a dream that was clearly influenced by watching too much anime.

Which has nothing at all to do with whatever you're thinking of. I did not have a six foot long magical sword. I could not cast magic. I couldn't shoot fireballs or fly. I couldn't even catch 'em all. Nope. Instead, every woman who has ever been in my life decided, on the same day, that they were going to act on their suppressed lifelong attraction for me. Friends. Friends' girlfriends. My elementary school teachers, one of whom it turns out is actually really hot, so goddammit, I guess. But yeah. Every female influence in my life.

And boy, was there drama. Oh my god. My fourth grade teacher - the hot one - was doing some heavy campaigning and scheming to get me away from the other girls, and good old Rachel from the coffeeshop, I think she may have killed someone, god bless her. Some classmates were just going at it like cats, and oh, you know who else was stirring up trouble? My girlfriend. Yes, even in my subconscious, every single person I knew waited until I was no longer single to reveal their lifelong crush.

So how did it all play out? Who won? Did any of the girls have enough character and savagery to beat out all the other girls for my attention? Did I just settle for the annoying female lead? Or - how 'bout this, -did I stay faithful to my girlfriend even in this time of adversity? Well not technically, no. (~Scandalous!~)

I lasted for four hours before I drove myself off a bridge.

And that's that

That wraps up the maintenance bit; from here out we return your to youre regularly scheduled blogcast programming.

Microsoft Word is literally more bothersome to use than a typewriter

That's not true, young'un! You'd know better, if you ever hammer those dang-blasted keys like we did in my day, and why, if you ever futzed up and made a typo, then you'd have to take the whole darn thing anFUCK YOU. Okay? Fuck you. I have a goddamn typewriter, it's set up right next to my goddamn Compaq tower. It's a Smith-Corona Skyriter, a non-electric portable that has a shift key and the caps lock function. There is no number one key, to make a 1 you hit the L key, and if you want to make an exclamation mark you have to type a period, backspace, and type an apostrophe. I have typed entire letters and essays on it, I frequently go back and forth between it and a keyboard, and yes when I go back to the computer I hit the keys too hard. When you fuck up, you backspace and lift the ink ribbon, there's a white-out strip and you just type the same key again. It does not take forever to dry, it takes exactly as long as the normal ink. It costs me six dollars a spool, and I have to order them from this one very esoteric, sketchy-looking site that takes about a month to ship them, probably because nobody wants goddamn typewriter ink ribbons. I do know what I'm talking about, and yes I feel that Microsoft Word is goddamn more frustrating than the technology it made obsolete sometime last goddamn century. The one single advantage that Word has is that it saves documents in a digital format, rendering it more practical than the "archaic" technology in the way that burning down towns with the plague used to be more practical than treating the infected.

Thing about natural beauty, is it's always trying to grab you or give you Lyme's disease.

I left the house yesterday, because as always our kitchen is a barren, god-forsaken place, and I needed food. Of course, since everything in Owings Mills is within a few miles, and it had cooled off considerably as evening was falling, I decided I’d hoof it, and enjoy a nice walk. Having neither a car nor a license had nothing to do with this decision.

I didn’t find food, but I did swing into the Best Buy to buy a new pair of headphones and this, which is much better than food anyway:








> Eating.














Out in the parking lot, I rolled myself a cigg – a new habit I’ve picked up that I’m particularly fond of. I popped in my new headphones – cheap ear-clips, nothing fancy with noise cancellation or bass boost (not that I wasn’t sorely tempted to opt for the latter) – and then, in a sudden burst of inspiration, I took them out again. Deep down, you see, I’m secretly a Romantic, and occasionally I just can’t help these urges to appreciate my environment – to “stop and smell the roses,” and all that nonsense. It’s what separates me from efficient, practical people who get things done and advance society.

I took the long way back, walking alongside Owings Mills Boulevard. Perhaps you’ve never walked along side a four-lane road, as cars sped by? The wheels, spinning along the pavement, intermittently accentuated by flashes of music or bits of conversations floating out of open windows – it’s not very unlike the lapping of waves against a seashore. And though there is human life carried in that river of movement, hearing the waves of sound and seeing, maybe, the white and red currents of light, you feel lonely and awed. On this particular stretch of road, that loneliness is accentuated, because the place really is barren; business complexes with sprawling, empty parking lots, shopping centers that have so few customers that after years of operation they look brand new, and massive, empty buildings with more being built… It was surreal, standing under that geometric skyline, while the setting sun reflected off shattered beer bottles and empty potato chip bags.

When the future comes, we’ll only miss trees because environmentalist pussies say we should.

Dear Apple Customer:

Recently, you contacted Apple support using Apple's online web support form. We're very interested in getting your feedback regarding your support experience.

If you have a moment, we hope that you'll take our support survey. The survey should take less than 5 minutes to complete.

Did you find Apple's Customer Support to be helpful?

[ ] Yes.

Do you have any additional comments you would like to make?

I recently sent in a complaint about a few iTunes purchases that would not work on my iPod, and promptly forgot about it, expecting that I'd get form response sometime that week.

I was surprised, then, when I got an email the next day from a human, detailing a concise, clear, and practical response (delete the songs from the library, sync, the iPod, download them again), along with another FAQ to consult in case that didn't work.

Years of working with computers and being beset by bizarre, inane, and stubborn difficulties has led me to distrust clear and practical tech support. I much prefer the branch of tech support that involves buying candles and pigeons. It never works any better than the practical solutions, of course, but it has its own merits - there's a kind of comfort that comes from making a sacrifice to some Dark God and getting no response.

(After going through the e-mail, I decided to just bite the bullet and restore my iPod. It didn't make the songs play any better, but it did get all the rest of that pesky "music" off my iPod, so there's that, I guess.)

After expending even that option, I read through the e-mail again, hoping that maybe there was another suggestion in there, somewhere. There wasn't, but there was a line saying to reply if my problem persisted - and I planned to, really. But then a friend showed up with some tickets to a show, and then I had work the next day, and then there were those Christmas cards I've been meaning to write...

So in the end, I just gave up, and bought a book instead - "Villa Incognito." It's okay, I guess, except a printing error left about a hundred or so pages out of my copy. I'm pretty sure if I read and listen at the same time, my technical difficulties will balance out and I'll come out of the experience having done a whole pastime somewhere in there.

Cheers.

Thanks for your feedback! We're totally going to read all that, we promise. Just, uh, quick thing, though, if you could summarize that really quickly...

[ ] Apple is Awesome, I love Apple.


Thank you! The information you provided will be used to improve our product support and future offerings. We will not use information collected via this survey to sell you products or services. If you have additional questions about how Apple will use this data, please consult Apple's privacy policy at http://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/.

We know you're very busy and we appreciate the time you take to give us your thoughts and suggestions.

Sincerely,

The Apple Online Support Team

So I'm making a list of things I hate, and it's Yonkers, NY.

So, I heard a little rumor that today was Halloween.

And don't you start with me on that "But it's after Midnight so it was actually yesterday" bullshit. Half the clocks I own have automatically reset themselves for Daylight Savings, and the other half are waiting a week because they're linked up to a different clock that won't reset until next week sometime. So don't even get me started on time being a completely arbitrary concept, and we'll leave it at it it Halloween until I see the motherfucking sun rise.

Anyways, I heard it was Halloween today when I went in to work - at a Halloween shop - and it was Halloween. Imagine that! By the way, protip: don't shop for a Halloween costume on Halloween. There are no costumes left, you look like a huge idiot, and it makes me hate you. So I guess I'll add that to the list; Yonkers, NY and people who Halloween shop on Halloween.

So I show up and throw on a priest outfit, catering to one of my deep dark fantasies - the one where I slay vampires, not the one where I betray the human race and and sleep with an evil sorceress. Or maybe both, actually. (One of the little perks at working at the shop is that you get to wear any costume. Also you get to play with the toy scythes in the back room.) So that was fun. I felt like a badass during my break, chillin in the middle of the shopping center, rocking the collar and shades while I had a cigg.

But motherfucking Yonkers, man. Let's get beyond how much I hate being associated with a place called Yonkers. Yonkers. Jesus. Do you know they have a tattoo parlor here? Could you imagine that? Getting a tattoo and then having to tell people you got it in Yonkers? I'd fucking lie.

"Sweet tat, man, where'd you score that?"

"I don' fucking know, man, I was drinking at this party and I passed out, and when I woke up I was strapped to this chair with a fucking beartrap on my face, and I had this ink of a unicorn goring Santa Clause while trampling his gnomish slaves as a redheaded virgin straddled his back and held up the bloody severed head of rudolph."

"Oh. Actually I was talking about that one."

"Thor smiting Mecha-Hitler? I picked that one up on a trip to Sydney. Yeah, I knew you were talking about this one, I just love telling that story."

Not that the people who live here don't deserve it. I swear to God, I had this conversation with just about every parent who came into the store today.

"Ooh, are you Harry Potter?"

Why no, I would respond, trying to stay cool and suave while not punching them in the face. Then I would point subtly to my collar and say, I'm a man of the cloth.

"I don't know what that means, but can I give you a hug?"

No, because I took a vow of celibacy and you're a fucking idiot.

And then I would give their children candy, which I liked to think was a metaphor for giving them shotguns, and make the sign of the cross above them, and tell them "May the Light of Lights go with you," which I liked to think was a metaphor for telling them "Your parents are zombies. If you kill them and everyone you know, God will forgive you."

I should take this opportunity to bring up that when the three people who did recognize a priest tried to confess to me, I would have none of it because I really didn't want to know about their lives. When the fuck did being a priest stop meaning that you carry a revolver loaded with silver bullets? All I wanted to do was burn witches, man. That's all I fucking wanted. Burn witches, stab vampires, shoot werewolves. I just wanted to be a good priest, the kind from back when being a priest meant you weren't a pussy.

Whatever. Who had a good Halloween? I did. I had a posse! I'm waiting on pictures, I'll throw them up first chance. Whatever, I need a cigarette, I'm leaving.

A noise outside my window, and Portal is the best thing that ever happened to me.

Jesus Christ, I think the Earth's sound card is corrupted. It's like twenty fucking degrees out, and I've got an industrial fan running to try and drown out this noise that I think is a lawn mower, and a car alarm, and a baby getting pounded by a sledgehammer all at the same time. Christ.

I'm taking an Econ course this semester. And a poli-sci course. And of course a nonfiction writing course. Also I have a job at the Haloween store (which is technically a lingerie shop, which is still a step up from, say, a porn shop), where I spend all my free hours. Why would I ever do this? I hate doing work.

Oh, but I do so love money.

And Haloween.

And this bitchin' mp3 player and headphone combo I just picked up.



But that's enough about that; now let's get down to a more serious matter. You all have known me for some time, now, so I think it's only appropriate that you all are the first to know: I am running for the Presidential Office in 2008. I know, I know, it seems a bit late to announce it, but the playing field seems ripe for a new contestant, and I think I've got a real shot at this. I've already ordered up a companion cube as my running mate, and as we speak I've got posters being printed out by the hundreds: Rob, '08: Putting the sexy back in power.

Now naturally, what I hope will be the key to victory will be keeping my campaigning platform clear and concise, none of this jerking the public around with political jargon bullshit. It would be unacceptable if, as a hopeful leader of the country, I made a practice of deliberately baffling the public with confusing and unnecessarily verbose words like "consolidate," or "economy." So the pitch? "The other candidates are all dicks. Especially Hillary."

Eh? Now is that clever, or is that just plain sly? It's clear enough to connect with the common everyman, yet thought-provoking and controversial enough to ignite thoughtful and meaningful discussion.

Of course, we all know that campaign platforms mean nothing, and that I'm going to win by virtue of fairy tales and lies. What really matters is what I plan to do when I'm in the office, and since I trust you guys, I'll give you a little glance at the "coming attractions."

First off, I'm going to cut off the secret CIA prisons. With that out of the way, I'll have valuable CIA resources at my disposal, to start my true plan: I'm going to pick at random a family living out in the Midwest, and have CIA agents tail their 8 year old son for months. Every time he litters, every time he pushes a girl at his school, every last transgression, no matter how trivial, will be reported back to me. And then, come next November, I'm going to stand up in front of the cameras on live national television, and deliver this message:

"Bobby Myers, who lives on 15 Jonas avenue, Ohio. Can you hear my, Bobby? I hope you're listening, because I've been watching you, and you've been a bad boy, Bobby. Yes you have. Why, this week alone, when you threw away your can of Sprite, you watched it bounce out of the trash can, but did you go pick it up and put it back in, Bobby? No, no you didn't. You thought no one was watching you, and so you just walked away. And it doesn't end there, does it, Bobby who lives on Jonas Street in Columbus Ohio? How about just yesterday, when you lied to your mother about playing World of Warcraft instead of doing your homework? Did you really think you would get away with that, Bobby? Did you think that know one would know? Well guess what, Bobby. I know. And do you know who else knows? Santa. That's right, Bobby, Santa and I have been discussing your behavior lately, and frankly? We're both appalled. Disgusted, really. So much so, that Santa doesn't even know if it's worth leaving the North Pole this year, and you know what? I don't blame him. and in fact, I'm making the decision for him: There will be no Christmas this year. That's right: I'm canceling Christmas."

And then I will step off the podium before the press can ask me any questions about Iraq.

But there's more to this ploy than just avoiding irritating questions, of course! You didn't think I would cancel Christmas just to avoid a potentially awkward or even slightly uncomfortable press conferrence, would you? No, my plans are far greater than that: I plan on projecting the pent up frustration, anger, and hatred of America all on the Midwest, ultimately to gain support for my secret "Horseshoe America" plan, which I'll reveal shortly thereafter: To keep the East and Western coasts of the United States, along with Texas and Louisiana and the other Southern states, and lease out the middle of the country to china, everything between Illinois and Canada. The rent money would pay off the National Debt, the Midwest isn't ours anymore, and China brings all our outsourced jobs techinically back into the country. Everybody wins.

Oh, and also I'm going to Drill Alaska dry of oil, and then trade it out of the Union and establish Puerto Rico as a state, so that we can get Puerto Rico but still have 50 states, so we won't need to change the flag.



By the way, some of you assholes need to message me up on TF2, so's I can shoot you in the face. And by "shoot you in the face" I clearly mean "run at you with fire until I explode," because I suck very much at TF2. I got a kill once. It was with a turret. It was cool.

Some general maintennance

The next few entries are consolidated archives of other blogs that I'm backing up.

So, archiving starts... now.

Why Are Goblins Such Dicks?

A Lecture On The Recent Proposal By The Committee of Social Welfare
Professor Fox

The breadth of Goblin atrocities are well known, and have sparked a recent proposal by the Committee of Social Welfare to enact an aggressive response program, inspiringly coined the "Repression of Evil" Act.

Before, however, the public is swayed by melodramatic wording and passionate rhetoric, I propose that the "Goblin Problem" has far more complex routes than incorrigible Goblin nature, and merits further analysis.

Goblins are, undeniably, savage and straightforward by nature, but they are not naturally lawless. To the contrary, they thrive under a very strict central government. The Goblin King, it should be noted, is consistently elected by merit of being the cleverest of the Goblins, a merit that in spite of the simple nature of Goblins as a whole, should not be taken lightly.

If, however, the Goblin King is so clever, why then does he allow the Goblins to continue in such rapacious activities as are inevitably going to elicit retribution, especially from such far stronger nations as our own?

The offhand answer has always been that the Goblin King does not have enough control over his subjects to repress their basic nature. I contend that this is not so. Though rarely acknowledged, case studies from as many as three decades ago have proven the Goblins' unerring loyalty to their king, and present research only continues to confirm this stance. The answer to this basic question, then may not be as straightforward as is commonly believed.

To answer it, I turn to basic economics. As has been proven time and time again, Goblins possess, amongst the bulk of them, a crude and simple nature - and their products are made in kind. What's more, "investment" is a concept beyond most of the race, creating a stagnant climate for innovation. There is no such thing as a "high quality" Goblin product, and demand for Goblin goods on a global scale is rare.

By contrast, Goblins' simple nature makes them an ideal market for foreign investment. Possessing neither the propensity nor the patience to save their earnings, Goblins will buy without hesitation the first shiny bauble a foreign merchant dangles in front of them, as many of our own native firms will happily attest.

Which leads us to a basic conundrum. With capital constantly leaving the Goblin market to foreign trade, how can the Goblin economy subsist without an export market of their own? Without capital flowing back into the Goblin economy, it will quickly wither and die, which in turn will leave many of our own firms high and dry, bringing about severe market repercussions on our own economy. Yet the Goblin economy thrives. Capital must be coming in from somewhere - but if not from export, then where?

Which brings us, at last, to the well-known and much abhorred Goblin practice of kidnapping foreign children who wear shiny trinkets. What if it is not the case, as many believe, that Goblins specifically target children wearing trinkets simply because they are attracted to shiny objects? What if, instead, they do so because of the belief that trinkets denote familial wealth? It is well documented that in almost one hundred per cent of cases, the Goblins issue a ransom for kidnapped children before eating them. While undoubtedly a symptom of basic Goblin greed, I posit that this is also the sole source of foreign income upon which the Goblin economy - and by proxy, our own - relies for survival.

I therefore advise strongly against the proposed military action against the Goblins. If the Committee of Social Welfare is truly committed to the goals of social betterment, then it should not be pursuing means through which our own merchants will lose business. Rather, they should reallocate the proposed military budget for the "Repression of Evil" act, and turn it towards a far more productive mean; that is, establishing an aid fund to support families faced with Goblin ransom demands. Given the inevitable cycle of business, it would be nothing if not money well spent.

Professor ASL Fox, 10/18/07

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Now playing: Various Artists - I'm Not a Killer - Evil Dead: The Original Broadway Cast Album
via FoxyTunes

Some pictures I took today with my phone.

An open apology to my fellow Americans.

I saw a shooting star last night. Just chillin' outside, wishing I had a cigarette like it was nobody's goddamn business, when there it was - right up there, burning up in the xenosphere: a free wish. A shooting star.

I don't know how, but somewhere within my breast, it turns out there's a depth of moral fortitude that I've never seen before. God knows it hasn't bothered to show its head in recent years, but somehow, last night it shined so brightly it put my ego to shame. So I did not wish for a cigg.

But something I read today made me seriously rethink that decision. Oh, not that I should have wished for a cigarette - that's assumed; we've moved on from that - but a little twinge of doubt, a qualm even, makes me feel that I used my minute amount of divine influence irresponsibly and selfishly.

Do you remember 2002? I don't. Which is why I had to read an article somewhere or another.

Aside: If you must know, I was reading an ESPN article. It's not, as they say in the cheesy soaps, what it looks like; I am not a closet basketball junkie, keeping my 'Terps fandom on the downlow to keep my street cred with the geeks. In fact I'm reading a collection of articles by Hunter S. Thompson, pathblazer of Gonzo journalism. If you've read this far without cutting anything out or off of you, then it's safe to say that it's worth your time to check him out.

I had forgotten that at one point we (the populace) were being convinced that marijuana supports terrorism. All the money you spend on drugs goes right back into Bin Laden's pocket. Oh, and there was also the (somewhat later, if I remember correctly) scare that if you donate money to any organization that supports terrorism - regardless of wither or not you were aware of this - you were supporting terror, and no further cause was needed to arrest you.

It's so easy to look at these in retrospect and wonder how things could have gotten like this. 1984 or Amerika might spring to mind for some, or V for Vendetta for those who don't read. Or maybe we could split it down the middle of the road; that one episode of South Park.

But maybe that's because we were so pampered as children, growing up with a booming economy and conspiracy movies, that we have no idea what it's like to be in a for-reals war. We've been living in this dream world where our country can go to war and we can sit back and watch it on television, maybe flip over to the weather channel when the soldiers run out of children to shoot. We're appalled at the idea that a war might require a personal sacrifice from us.

Sometimes that sacrifice is civil rights. Usually it's money. But if we want to ever end this war, this hundreds of billions of dollars a year war, if we even want a prayer of putting an end to this before our children's children are paying for this, it's going to take much much more then an "I support our troops" ribbon. We need to donate our wishes.

Instead of asking for a pox upon the SLC housing department, I could have used that wish to request bigger budget cuts in our schools, so we can afford more tanks. I should have called out for the government to draft the poor people. I should have wished for Bush to die, so we can have a far more effective warmonger running the country.

But words, like bullets, cannot be called back, and what's done is done. It's no use crying over what could have been wished for; we must trudge forward and when the locusts overrun Bates just sigh and mutter, "oh well."

But to let more opportunities slip through our hands would be criminal. So henceforth, take note! First stars you see in the evening. Shooting stars. Pennies you flip into public fountains. Birthdays. Hell, wedding vows, if you can manage it. Overwhelming firepower, leadership, planning, greed, and corruption alone haven't won this war yet; it's time to start wishing for it.

I hate the internet.

I am too utterly incensed right now to function properly. Sarah Lawrence dropped me out of housing, completely. Last week I had a spacious Hill triple; today I'm homeless. So that's awesome. Also, the Weekly World News just ran an issue with Bat Boy in a coffin, and the words "LAST WWN ISSUE EVER" on the cover.

Fuck. I really wanted to write for them.


Well as long as we're on the WWN, let's talk about zombies. And who knows zombies better than CapCom? (George Romero does, but let's ignore that for now.)

Well this is old news, but Capcom finally released the Resident Evil 5 Trailer. (Oooh, exciting!) The synopsis? Zombies in Africa.

And the response?

The race card.

The new Resident Evil video game depicts a white man in what appears to be Africa killing Black people. The Black people are supposed to be zombies and the white man’s job is to destroy them and save humanity. “I have a job to do and I’m gonna see it through.”

This is problematic on so many levels, including the depiction of Black people as inhuman savages, the killing of Black people by a white man in military clothing, and the fact that this video game is marketed to children and young adults. Start them young… fearing, hating, and destroying Black people.

The basis of this argument, ridiculous as it is, doesn't really irritate me that much - and I mean beyond the magnanimously flawed "marketed at children" bit. I think we can all say that we've become so accustomed to this level of uninformed hate-mongering that, like cigarettes, the exposure itself may be harmful to us, but a day without it just doesn't feel right.

So no, the claim itself doesn't bother me. What bothers me is the response this claim has earned in the last few months: "Why is it only racism when black zombies are getting shot? What about when you were shooting up Spaniards in Resident Evil 4?" "Capcom is pushing the envelope by going into Africa, by clinging onto your knee-jerk reaction to 'black people can't be portrayed in a poor light, ever,' you're trying to hold back a potentially insightful medium with crass censorship," and of course, "Why do you capitalize the word "black" but not the word "white"? I think that maybe you are the racist."

A better spelled and much better worded summary of every argument on the internet.

These points are so trite, so unbelievably banal that it irritates me to no end that we - who subscribe to logic - have to put up with these people arguing for us.

So instead of dwelling and harping on the painfully obvious, how about this:

Resident Evil 5 takes place in Africa. Because there have been 4 other Resident Evil games, we can infer a fair amount about the plot. For example: there are zombies in Africa as a result of an outbreak of the T-Virus. Also, the multi-billion dollar international corporation, Umbrella, probably had a hand in the outbreak.

So therefore, to call out Capcom on racism is to imply one of two things:

1.) That having multi-billion dollar pharmaceutical corporations exploiting African peoples is racist. Which is true, to a degree; while not entirely "racist," per se, it is entirely and unarguably unethical. (Oops! Sorry, I've got some bad news concerning corporate ethics...)

OR

2.) That it is racist to depict the populace of Africa as black.

Whatever. I hat a whole list of things I was going to be upset about, but maybe I should have written it down because I don't remember what was after "resident Evil racism thing."

I think this is what they call a "cry for help."

I've never had to hide anything from my old man. Drugs? Never had any. Weapons? He gave me my first ones. Porno mags? He'd take 'em if he found 'em. (True story, happened when my grandmother sent me a subscription to Playboy... but that's for another time.)

True enough, I'm trying to pretend I don't smoke around him, but it's a half-hearted ploy and I'm sure that deep down he already knows.

But right now, I'm scared. He comes home on Saturday, and I'm absolutely terrified.

Before you judge, let me explain: I work eleven hours a week, for $7/hour. That's about $50~60 a week, less taxes. Okay? That's not a lot. It's not enough to buy food, and come out with a profit. Doubly so, since I'm trying to save up enough to make it back to Maryland for a seminar on the 8th; an $80 ticket both ways has a funny way of sucking you dry.

So I have to rely on the old man for food. Which is normal, right? I mean, that's what students, you know, do, right? Expecting your parents to provide feed is a reasonable expectation?

This week he left three frozen pizzas and some bagel bites. And I was ecstatic. Because this is more food than he has ever left me ever. Dead serious. You know how I survived high school without starving to death? I got addicted to drugs that kill the appetite. And I was dizzy a lot. But not this week! No, for this week, my house was all but laden with ready food: frozen pizza, instant noodles, and cake.

Well that's awesome for about a day.
By the second day, it gets old.

By the third day, you wish you could remember what color oranges are.

The vitamin deficiencies start causing nosebleeds by day six.


Day ten is my favorite. Get this: Your eyes start turning yellow. Only happened to me once or twice, though, and you never have the foresight to plan it for haloween.


Look. I'm not a health freak. At least, not in the normal sense. Health is not, per se, one of my top priorities - I mean, it's up there, yeah, but it just got beat out by money, fame, partying, bad action movies, that new mario soccer game, and wild sex. I don't sleep, I certainly don't eat well, and sometimes I go cold turkey on coffee or cigarettes just because the withdrawal's fun. I absolutely won't see a doctor unless I'm covered in skin lesions, or coughing up blood. Chunky blood, not just some red spittle: I'm not a pussy.

Anyway, point is, I don't really pay attention to what's going into my body. I'm no stranger to classy food, it's true, but I'm best pals with being hungry, and somewhere between high school and college my power animal changed from a penguin to a rat. You'd think that'd make me really detest people who won't eat food because it isn't "Just So," but it's actually done a lot to help me raise my tolerance. They're my favorite people in the world to eat with.

Alright, maybe not a penguin. Probably a fox. Probably still a fox, but whatever; it's just a metaphor.

Well, vitamin deficiency sucks, and coupled with insomnia it can get to you real quick. The usual hallucinations of Sumner Redstone crawling through my window with a dead owl in his mouth gave way to very vivid images of my half-rotted body trying to swat flies away from an open gash with swollen, artery-clogged hands, something you could really live without seeing ever.

At some point, you have to snap and call "enough." The half-rotted thing really did it for me.

I walked down to the local Safeway (literally chased half the way by a storm that snuck up on me and ran me down faster than I could walk), bee-lined for the organic foods section and bought myself some packages of cooking tofu, some organic curry sauce, and a tofu snack. I also picked up some vegan chilli on a whim.

It's not that I'm switching sides, or anything - far from it; I'm still 100% a meat eater, totally human, through and through - I just need to detox a little bit, that's all. But I'm afraid my old man won't see it that way... I'm worried that he'll open the fridge when he gets back, see the big "O" on the organic food packages, and that will be that. Two days later I'm alone and naked in a Louisiana swamp, and the last thing to hear me speak will be some fucking alligator that any reasonable, god-fearing man should have turned into a handbag long ago.

For now I've put everything in an old plastic container and disguised them as leftovers, but that can only work for so long; the actual food can't last forever, and sooner or later some midnight scrounger is bound to look through even the leftovers in a fit of desperation; I can only hope that when that happens I'll be able to pass it all off onto my stepbrother, as the result of some frat hazing or suchlike.

You know what our generation needs? Shadowy, secretive, truely evil men who are destroying society.

You ever walk down the street, and see facets of American culture that just make you be ashamed to be human? You know what I mean. That bulk of society born and raised by American media. Thank God MTV makes its culture easy to pidgeonhole, at least; could you imagine what it would be like if they acted like decent, acceptable human beings? Christ, they could be anywhere. Like the agents in the Matrix, you know? God, it's enough to make you shudder.

And it's not just today's youth, who were raised on MTV and BET. You know as well as I do that next year's brats are already being prepared, suckling at the tits of that vapid media subculture: Dora the Explorer, or another favorite, The Wild Thornberries. (Did you know that every other culture on the planet is actually just an American culture with our same beliefs and values? I know, isn't that crazy? Who ever knew that every other value system is actually just a misunderstanding!)

God, it's enough to make me sick. Don't you just wish that there was a single, malevolent man responsible for this? A single figure, whom you could hold up next to Stalin, and the Devil, and hate with that very deep, black part of your heart?

Yeah. Me, too.


National Amusement
A privately owned media and entertainment company, NA is currently run by Sumner Redstone, who owns 80% of the company. The other 20% is held by his daughter. I’m guessing that right behind an enslaved Santa Clause and the island of Cuba, it was the best birthday gift ever.

National Amusements currently owns the controlling voting interests in the following companies.

Midway Games
What does Midway Games make? Well, Gauntlet, for one. Also Mortal Kombat, and some of the Unreal Tournament games. (Maybe all? I think they might have bought the license, I didn’t bother to check.)

CBS Corporation
The CBS Network
The CW Television Network (Includes UPN and the WB networks)
Showtime
Includes FLIX, the Sundance channel, etc.

Viacom

Major Assets

BET
MTV
Includes VH1, MTV2, etc.

Additional Film & Television Assets

Paramount Pictures
Dreamworks
Nickelodeon
Includes Nickelodeon movies, Nick at Night, etc.
Also includes Nickelodeon exclusives, such as Spongebob Squarepants and Dora the Explorer. In case you were wondering where that quality programming came from.
Comedy Central
Spike TV
Logo

As well as Gaming Assets

Xfire
Harmonix
(Yes, the Guitar Hero people.)
GameTrailers

“On May 21, Viacom entered into a 50-50 joint venture with Indian media company Global Broadcast News to form Viacom-18 which will house Viacom's existing channels in India - MTV, VH1 and Nick as well as Network 18's Bollywood movie business. All future Viacom content for India and new ventures such as a Hindi entertainment channel and a Hindi movie channel would be housed in this JV.” – Do not get up in arms based off of that, it’s just a Wiki quote. You’re expected to do your own research.

Cock-chopping filth-mongering son of a reptile scum!

God fucking damn it, the jack to my brand new power cord decided to slide of like an old shell while still in the power jack. It's not "broken" per se, but only by the thinnest margin of technicality. I can't get the old shell out, which is alright for now, as the current power cord just slips right into it like something vaguely suggestive, but once this this cord stops working - and it will - I am fucked. Again.

This on top of the snapped-off DVD drive, the old broken power cord, a refusal to accept internet through an Ethernet cable, and that neat trick where sometimes it will turn off when I touch it. How does this happen? This computer is a year old.

I mean, it'd be a thing if I were dumb. Or old. That'd be okay, I'd be cool with that. But I don't use Kazaa or Mozilla to find porn. I don't open e-mail attachments from XpandYoJunk.net. I don't use internet explorer.

I don't take my laptop into the hottub for cram sessions. I don't leave it out in the heat and sun all day. I don't take it cross-country biking with me. I leave it on my desk! Sometimes I take it into the basement, where it should be even more comfortable - why does it look like I've been using it to tee off?

Fuck computers. I want to go back to typewriters. I want to go back to "your carriage isn't sliding? Well lemme just take a look... yep, yer bail's jammed up, lemme just twist it around a bit and... there ya go, fixed. It works now."

Also I hate fucking alligators.

People stopped reading my other blog. Clearly that means I need to find a new audience, not make my posts more interesting.

Testing, mostly to see if this accepts the vBulletin formatting that I've been trained to use. (Probably not.)

I left the house today, because as always our kitchen is a barren, god-forsaken place, and I needed food. Of course, since everything in Owings Mills is within a few miles, and it had cooled off considerably as evening was falling, I decided I’d hoof it, and enjoy a nice walk. Having neither a car nor a license had nothing to do with this decision.

I didn’t find food, but I did swing into the Best Buy to buy a new pair of headphones and this, which is much better than food anyway:



> Eating.


Out in the parking lot, I rolled myself a cigg – a new habit I’ve picked up that I’m particularly fond of. I popped in my new headphones – cheap ear-clips, nothing fancy with noise cancellation or bass boost (not that I wasn’t sorely tempted to opt for the latter) – and then, in a sudden burst of inspiration, I took them out again. Deep down, you see, I’m secretly a Romantic, and occasionally I just can’t help these urges to appreciate my environment – to “stop and smell the roses,” and all that nonsense. It’s what separates me from efficient, practical people who get things done and advance society.

I took the long way back, walking alongside Owings Mills Boulevard. Perhaps you’ve never walked along side a four-lane road, as cars sped by? The wheels, spinning along the pavement, intermittently accentuated by flashes of music or bits of conversations floating out of open windows – it’s not very unlike the lapping of waves against a seashore. And though there is human life carried in that river of movement, hearing the waves of sound and seeing, maybe, the white and red currents of light, you feel lonely and awed. On this particular stretch of road, that loneliness is accentuated, because the place really is barren; business complexes with sprawling, empty parking lots, shopping centers that have so few customers that after years of operation they look brand new, and massive, empty buildings with more being built… It was surreal, standing under that geometric skyline, while the setting sun reflected off shattered beer bottles and empty potato chip bags.

When the future comes, we’ll only miss trees because environmentalist pussies say we should.


(Nope. Whatever, ['s to <'s is an easy fix. Still, though, goddamn if [tags] aren't more pleasant in every possible way to use.