We're Gonna Find You

In my backyard, a viral (not aviral) video gone global. No cute cats or laughing babies.

A father's legacy performing well on the field.

Ringing ears. Hoarse voice.

Bistros and Bubba burgers.

Squeaky teeth and onerous onlookers.

A clean bill of health and a bill for poor health.

Acting out a public role to draw attention away from the players in play.

Happy and tired family.

Forty-year anniversary and another Kindle 2, too.

Crown and goose and checkerboard, Jennie and royal stout on a long weekend.

Montreat and PC in a small world after all; pretty eyes, adopted or otherwise; soccer, lacrosse or other sports. Ocean crossings and practical jokes.

Playing DJ for mother and her new family. Tackling pillows in slo mo like the pros.

Sleep...much needed sleep...too worn out to proofread or re-edit...nighty night.

Why?

A friend, who promised to fix the economic woes for a favour, asked me to solidify the voting base for Sarah Palin.  I have honoured the request and wait for the favour to be returned.

Now, it's up to the other side to show me what they can offer in return.

Remember, I play both sides against the middle, hoping compromise puts the economy in this sector of the world in a state where more people are actively using their capabilities for improved self-esteem.

Otherwise, the world is a grand comedy to my sense of humour.

Time to sit back and enjoy the show!

Once More Into The Great Outdoors

In putting together a report for the T'ursday night club meeting of the Inquisitive Believers, I found myself staring at a stack of research papers assembled by "publish or perish" pariahs.

My report was supposed to summarise the thousands of subtle methods for 'bringing up baby"; in other words, how do we carefully prepare children during their formative years to optimise their performances as adult contributors to society, ensuring that we have a sufficient mix of scientists, doctors, lawyers, athletes, soldiers, sailors, pilots, mothers, fathers, alcoholics, schizophrenics and antisocial types to keep a modern civilisation going?

Some Internet news articles help, like the one on future outdoor scientists.

What about humourists, writers, comedians, philosophers and others who see the clouded, astigmatic lens through which others view life?

I'm stumped.  I'm at a standstill, a deadend.

I can't find the one paper I need to justify the various inspirational teaching methods to create those with the insight to be funny.

Without that paper, how can I create a parallel universe of atoms, molecules, politicians, musicians, dung beetles and street cleaners?

I mean, shouldn't the parallel universe contain all the same stuff ours does, but just gets skewed in places where we see straight-and-narrow roads here?

I think back to the time a career counselor suggested I be either a chemical engineer or a priest, based on a quadrant of plotted points derived from a set of questions I answered.  There wasn't a place on the test that stated, "Don't answer these questions facetiously."  Instead, it said to answer the questions to the best of your ability, based on what you currently believed.

I look up into the clear, blue sky and want to see rain but I don't, the ground dry despite my wishes.

Time's a wastin'.  Closer and closer the clock gets to the moment for my presentation and I don't have the missing puzzle piece my colleagues expect me to elaborate upon.

Shall I, as always, ditch the prepared teleprompter speech and talk from my mental notes extemporaneously, relying on my dry wit and reading of the crowd to elicit laughter and squeeze out tears like ghosts of tragicomedians past?

I am neither a professor nor just another pretty face.  I am plain ol' me, here for all to see, humbly walking the local shops and watching live sporting events anonymously.

I vaguely remember the speech patterns of my great-grandfather but I can fairly easily recall the speech patterns of all my grandparents.  None of them were Yale grads or Rhodes scholars.  Instead, they were my down-to-earth family, working in the local factory, teaching at the local schools, or working as a chief warrant officer for the Navy.  All of them raising children on low-scale salaries.

Happiness is what you make of the moment, not what you collect or buy to temporarily satisfy a never-satisfied craving.

But do we want happiness?  That's a question I can't answer because I'm always looking for the next gentle poke at our seriousness, knowing death (which I can't find funny) is never far away from any of us.

I don't have the research paper in hand that I wanted to reference, but I have a feeling I can talk about my experiences with tragedy to place in front of my colleagues the supposition that comedy and tragedy have been and always will be intricately linked.  If we want more funny people, let tragedies run their course and comic voices will rise up to help heal the pain.

Just as not everyone will become scientists or understand the results of scientific research, not everyone is cut out to be naturally funny or understand every joke.

Will I ever give myself complete permission to be myself, knowing that I sometimes offend those I wish not to offend?  Find the answer to that question and I have created the research paper for which I have searched in vain.

I grew up with the likes of Flip Wilson, Henry Gibson, Andy Griffith and Jerry Clower setting examples of what's funny.  There never were any purely scientific types who rode the comedy circuit, were there?

Are there?  Maybe not, because professional science practitioners compose such a small percentage of paying audiences, it would be a starving comic artist who could thrive on speaking at scientific gatherings.

Science just becomes another prop in the clown's box of general sight gags, I suppose.

Maybe.  Hmm... I think I'll title tonight's diarrhea of the mouth, "Parsimony - can you parse any money out of it?"

Is Buddhism Pseudo-Christianity or the other way around?

Experts outside my network have informed me that Buddhism performed its usual role of absorbing and becoming part of the societies that argue about who has the best religion, overcoming Christianity, Islam, Judaism and Hinduism as the religion of choice amongst the world's youth, where peace rather than war is the word du jour.

Meanwhile, the Interplanetary Youth Brigade announced that all local, national and international political candidates and government workers on Earth must take the Turing Test in order to separate the robots from the real to properly point out who has been making decisions about how to wisely redistribute the people's public monies and who has been simply following preprogrammed instructions.

Friends reminded me they have fun with my light-hearted poke at conspiracies, showing me that the first generation of "discovered" artificial lifeforms is still under investigation by skeptics and believers alike, whilst I point out the youngest generation of our species continues working on the latest regeneration of artificial life.

A German reminds the Americans what they're supposed to be made of.

The Book of the Future has not stopped predicting that our species will merge with an artificial lifeform yet to be.  The witch doctor warns us to be prepared for this transition period in which the old species will fall behind and use barbarianism to attempt one last defense of its existence, "losing" in the end (the witch doctor won't say why "losing" is in quotes, which could mean the old species won the war but lost the fight?).

Some of my colleagues, during post-processing of photographs of artifacts under glass, showed me the messages we were expecting in the 360-degree view we had been advised to look for.  In a reflected image, using infrared and ultraviolet light filters, one finds much that the human eye cannot.

We shall respond to these messages when the prime opportunity presents itself shortly.  Here is the code key we were asked to show at this time [you must use an amber CRT at 60 Hz refresh rate to decode it]:



Global empirebuilding creates no favourites, only flagrante flavours of the moment.  Of course, since/because we live in the moment, we can't see anything but what we see.

Unless you knew the moment doesn't really exist.

Let's say you knew who was handholding the handholders who were leading the majority down the rosy path of living in the moment.

Let's say you were able to unplug the youngest generation from massively maneuvered mass media movements.

Let's say you were willing to face a high level of chaotic noise for something better, if not quieter.

Let's say you knew there was something and nothing more to know than what is there before you.

Very few could handle the destruction of all the self-deceptive veils that surround us.

If it's for the few that the rest of the species lives, then would you be okay with that?

Or would you rather believe that every individual reserves the right to become part of the few?

Should I say more?  Certain colleagues say the precious cargo I carry is not ready for primetime.  Best stick to humour and let the preplanned scenarios continue to play out.

Am I a player or the amateur professional amateur wondering wanderer I profess to be?

Those who put the moment to their best advantage are those to whom you'll pay attention the most.  Why should I bother to divert your attention from simple gaze-based programming already built into us?

My friends in the drug cartel business are thrilled that Paris Hilton is getting so much attention with her [alleged] cocaine and marijuana use, hoping she'll get more attention, no matter whether it's because she received no jailtime or she received hard jailtime.  Either way, it's free publicity for them!  They thank my friends in the mass media business for continuing to promote freewheelers like Ms. Hilton - they say there's plenty money in the slush fund (in the guise of behind-the-scenes perks and overpaid adverts) to go around, now that one of their major distributors is in the hands of U.S. authorities, lowering the number of players and thus increasing their profitable slice of the pie.

Taking down a criminal is never the answer.  Changing how the system works is.  Do you know how?

Hand Sanitiser

Sitting here watching the homely homage full of fromage called "Inglorious Basterds," I contemplate many things, such as a runaway jury, the wonder of it all, a family named Chobey allegedly building a "mother in-law" garage apartment to attach within five years to a main house (to which their neighbours will hold them, barring lawsuit activity in the interim) and Maggie working at a Ben Franklin store while Nicholas considers his college's consideration of abandoning the coast for safer turf inland and Chestney completes her senior year.

Never underestimate underestimation's power to underwhelm swimmingly underwater.

Is a Star Wars exhibit a place for science fiction or fictional science fiction?  Where do you leave messages in plain public places in the arrangement that was gently suggested to occur randomly?

I don't care what happens today or tomorrow - it's what's planned for 1000 years from now that my associates have their claws into.  Are you a dinosaur?  A condor?  An eagle?  A hawk?  A rat?  A species that doesn't exist yet?

Ah, but you don't know what I'm talking about, do you?  I haven't kindly shared the Book of the Future's view of us as the past recently, have I?

Shame on me.

It's a shame you don't know what's going to happen next.

Did you know there are young people who've connected via the Internet to create what I'll loosely call an invention but will better serve as a precursor to a new species in the near-term capable of surviving short-term exposure in the long-term vacuum of space?

Living, but not breathing.

Thinking, but not independent.

Beautiful, but not gorgeous.

Can you imagine being a being with hand sanitiser in your "veins"?

Can you imagine yourself merely existing in a high-pressure place like Earth but thriving elsewhere?

Would you believe the disposable income you give them will fund the greatest invention known to our species, all the while assuming you're paying for iPads, jeans and music/movie/game downloads?

Is it possible that the youngest generation will pool their resources to usurp the squandrous spending of their short-sighted parents?

You mean you don't understand the full power of, or the real reason for, the invention of the Internet?

You really thought it was just an exercise in military research funding?

Don't tell me your plots and charts and trends leave out the branches that branch out of and into the Law of Unintended Consequences?!

See what happens when you teach your children to think for themselves.  They no longer bah like sheep, seeing social media for what it is and never will be.  The power of the crowd is slumbersome.  The independent thinkers who wear sheep's clothing lead the way quietly, transparently and for the lives of those living thousands of years from now.

Go back to sleep now.  We don't want to disturb your cumbersome dreams.

Heard another rumour, that hand sanitiser contains the nanotechnology we wanted to implant in you but wanted to do it with your ready compliance and full cooperation, in order to test a theory that a species can be transformed to another species through artificial environmental conditioning, only if the species is not stressed in the process, having already accepted fluoridation and chlorination without question.

Now who would spread rumours like that?  Bring them to me immediately!  We shall give them big salaries, large offices and extra-long, important-sounding job titles.

Ninety Years Later

Did you celebrate on 26th August 2010?  If anyone made a big deal of 90 years of women's suffrage in the United States, I missed it.  And yet...

Yet, here we are, contemplating a not-so-unique-anymore idea in 2010 - Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Ann Dunwoody on the 2012 Republican Party ticket, switching Glenn Beck and Sarah Palin over to the Tea Party nomination to keep people in suspense for the runup to the runoffs.

Meanwhile, Steve Jobs does his job getting the Apple faithful excited about the new iPod changes, after talking about gaming and iOS 4.2.  First the shuffle, and then...

Where would we be if we didn't have something interesting to bite our teeth into?

What if "What if?"?

The curios* implore, "What is the bigger picture?"

An ant explores the ceiling fan light globe.

Having no vested interest in the outcome of local/national political elections around the globe, I turn my gaze toward what the corporapolitico types could/will do for the species.

It is the end game I was raised/trained to play effectively. Ultimately, a zero-sum game, with daily winners/losers.

It is about neither treehugging nor total wilderness wipeout. It involves both.

It is providing a path for the hungry to get to food and a path for the wealthy to get richer - limitations, built into the way our planet works, restrict both paths.

It is not about these words although the words here describe the process at a high level thinly.

Proverbially, the pendulum swings to all points on the compass. In other words there is hope for everyone.

Thus, those who serve the people first and by permission of the people then benefit transparently (amazing, what a large number of transparent steps ahead will do for those who attract others willing to play along) win the most.

Do closed-door deals go away? Of course not. This is the real world, after all, not some utopian paradise where our personalities and family histories become one noncontroversial ode to joy.

In my part of the world, there appears to be a conservative "back to basics" movement gaining traction. Pop culture personalities, conservative or not, are working within the moneymaking system to take advantage of this moment.

I know that people are asking themselves, "If an SNL actor/writer/comedian can serve in the U.S. Capitol, then why can't a talk show host or resigned Alaska politician serve in the White House, especially if an actor/governor already has?"

Hope. That's going to underscore many a speech leading up to November elections in this country. The rhetoric will flow like New England maple sap in the fall. Politics as usual will rule the airwaves.

Now, I'm nothing special, a former restaurant kitchen dishwasher and Appalachian Trail hiker, so what am I doing here pretending to know anything about politics?

I don't. But my network does.

We don't predict elections. Instead, we survey the landscape to determine what makes candidates tick. Political favours never go out of style.

The likely voters will likely vote for whom they like.

After the elections, the select few will be selected to be let in on how true transparency works.

The rest will follow their whims and, where they think it best works politically, the wishes of the people.

Complications arise out of ignored eddies and backwaters.

Governing seven billion people is not an exact science. That's why our network doesn't get involved directly in politics. Our goals are too general, unable to be translated into local politics on an easy changing basis to keep the elected and the voters happy constantly.

The system's not rigged but it's tested all the time, to divide truth from rhetoric for use later on - to benefit all seven billion of us ultimately.

Like I said, you'll see. It's you who runs the network, after all!

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*What a difference "u" makes.