christmas is the season for loving children

yes, it's time to talk of the pagan origins of just about every little piece of the modern christmas, and talk of how many different cultures are represented in having had parts of their old winter festivals stolen and corrupted by the catholics (notably pope julius i, who announced that christ's birthday would be celebrated on december 25 (nevermind that the bible implies he was born in the fall)). yes, it's time to mention that the yule log came from worship of the sun god, that the winter solstice and saturnalia and the kalends of january, the dies natalis invicti solis (the birthday of the unconquered sun) all rolled into what the catholics stole just to make it easier for romans to join up. afterall, it's more palatable to be sucked into a new church if they bring your parties with you

trees were brought inside in winter to remind folks that crops would be growing again come spring. and, it's been said that martin luther first lit his with candles--already, the trees were decorated but not lit--after spotting a star through a tree and thinking it was cool. mistletoe was sacred to pagans, thought to have healing properties and got that whole kissing vibe from fertility rituals (cause you know those romans loved fertility rituals, any excuse to fornicate)

and jolly old saint nick was a real guy in turkey who definitely had a thing for kids (he was catholic, so take that to have a double meaning if you want). of course, he wasn't jolly or wearing red all the time until clement moore wrote what would later be called "twas the night before christmas." of course that also had santa doing a bewitched like nose thing to get his magical trip back up the chimney (unless that was some drug reference, with the snorting and the flying)

so, you've got a bunch of old traditions all rolled together in a neat little commerical package, marketed by everyone like it's nobody's business. it's a national holiday and a religious holiday and a commercial holiday and it's got something for everybody...

which would make it great but for the fact that atheists and people who hate happiness (and i'm both of those, obviously) don't need any of those pagan rituals anymore than we need fucking saint nick, anymore than we need to be forced into debt every winter buying presents for greedy little children convinced by everything they see that they're in for a nice treat under the tree come christmas morning. you'd think, technically speaking, that the greed of wanting all those things for christmas would be enough to toss all those kids onto the "bad" list, no matter how "good" they've been all year, nevermind that all kids are inherently evil but we love em anyway.

clearly, we can assume santa is a pedophile, offering gifts regardless of whether or not a particular kid has actually been good or bad. and, who else would watch kids so much while their awake and asleep but someone either researching child development or a pedophile who, over time has gotten worldwide authorization to visit any kids he wants on christmas eve and give them... "gifts?" he wears bright colors, he keeps animals and strange little people around and he offers gifts while wearing a rather creepy beard. if that doesn't sound bad, i don't know what does. so, let's stop the rituals, the trees, the logs, the carols, the ornaments, all of it, and put a stop to this unattractive man preying on all of our children once and for all

we've got catholic priests for that

i smell a cat-lamp assembly line
so, there's been talk here about that swedish girl making artwork out of dead animals (which she's killed herself). and, a detail in that story that bugged me was that she didn't use any preservative agents, hence the art is actually photographs of the sculptures and not the sculptures and hence she is killing the animals herself to save prep time, rather than have a vet constantly on hand (though, maybe she could find a vet somewhere with dreams of being an artist). but, good news from texas (well, involving texas, anyway): the first cloned-to-order cat has been delivered

owner in texas was so distraught about her cat that died she got together $50,000 and sent it off to sausalito-based genetic savings and clone (cause, apparently, a new cat, presumably to be had for free or for a pocket change from a newspaper ad just wouldn't do to replace poor nicky (the original cat). and, so, cloning ensued and little nicky (the sequel's name) was delivered to owner and happiness resulted. and people say money can't buy you happiness. those people never had cloned cats, obviously

now, i could wonder about when this technology will be applied to humans, dead kids or spouses perhaps, but that might get me whining about that godsend movie (which, i'll admit, i did not see, because it looked like a pathetic piece of crap with stupid ideas at its core--what i want is a good melodrama about dealing with a cloned kid, parents learning not to actually expect the same shit from the kid as from the original, learning to fucking deal with their grief and be faced with it over and over and over again every time they see the new kid, sad, depressing stuff like that, not a demonic angle on silly science fiction schtick that you just know is begging to become a series on the new sci-fi channel, with their new bent on horror and the supernatural... ugh, i didn't want to ramble about godsend) and i don't want that. instead, i've got a marketing idea to piss off a whole lot of folks

and, here it is: we get edenmont (the dead animal artist from sweden), we get this genetic savings and clone (and you know, with that name, they've got the sense of humor for what i've got in mind) and maybe get a taxidermist involved to deal with that preservative angle, and i can be the idea man. so, we get ourselves some marked-for-death pets, we put them out of their misery (aka, their life as pets to stupid humans), we cut off paws and tails and heads and whatever other parts we feel like using (maybe get some fish fins involved), and we make some nice sculptures, maybe a few cat head lamps, some mouse head on angel body bookends. we preserve it all nice like good hunting trophies and then, we get our cloning friends to make us a whole army of identical animals. we might get a godo ethical debate going, what with breeding (does it count as breeding, the cloning process?) new animals just to put them down and cut them up, but we can just bribe the complainants with a nice set of bedside lamps, maybe with heads of clones of their favorite childhood pets. i'm sure that will soften them up plenty

and, once we've made millions off our dead pet lamps and bookends, we start on the humans. i mean, think of it: every redneck bastard in the country could have his own little saddam to kick around when he's feeling insecure about his manhood and the greatness of his homeland. and, we could even market little bushes and rumsfelds for the liberal media to beat on rather than let them get in the way of our imperialism

random stuff segueing into dead pregnant women

odd thought from this morning: if darth vader is so powerful in his use of the force (and if you believe the midachlorian talk from phantom menace, destined to be, like, one of the most powerful jedi ever, with the jesus power to bring balance to the force (though, he apparently does this by killing the rest of the jedi, not very christ like)) why does he need his vader suit to live? i mean, damaged body is too much for his powers to handle? he can't simply will his lungs to keep breathing with the force? he couldnt's find some bizarre little swami on the edge of the universe and figure out how to use the force to grow a new hand, or new eyebrows (apparently, they've been digitally removed in the latest release of return of the jedi)? just sayin'

napoleon dynamite was oddly watchable, occasionally funny but nowhere close to actually being good. they tried way to hard to grab a cult audience, the napoleon character never did anything remotely redeeming, and was barely even harsh in an amusing way

and, while i can understand people having trouble with the formulaic ways of house, do they not get that er is just as formulaic, that law & order and csi are in the damn dictionary under formulaic? obviously, if you are not into science or medicine, house won't do much for you, regardless of whether you like the characters, just like if you don't care for murder mysteries, law & order and csi won't appeal much to you, even if you like the science. but, how can those shows be so popular and people question the formula of house?

the other rental from yesterday's venture to blockbuster was shaun of the dead. saw it in the theater and had to rent it so the family could see it. gotta love the british humor mixed with horror and social satire. it's like that one line from dawn of the dead about the dead doing what was familiar in life, going to the mall. but, here we get the convenience store guy and the homeless guy walking around with their hands out, the soccer kid still kicking his ball around, and the working stiffs (already zombie like before) just lingering about waiting for stimulating lights or noise

and, in politics and war, apparently, our troops were so angry after being attacked while on a lunchbreak that they went out after curfew through mosul. brings to mind that footage michael moore had in fahrenheit 9/11 with the troops invading that iraqi house seemingly in the middle of the night and expecting cooperation from tired, scared women with guns in their faces. how dare they shoot at us while we're eating, but we can do whatever we want to them at all hours of the night

a few hundred people showed up for the funeral of teh woman who had her baby cut out of her... that is, the woman who had her baby forcably kidnapped as opposed to the quite-common-now scheduled c-sections all around the country, though i'm sure those kill women from time to time as well. small missouri town, a woman who was nobody while she was alive, but crowds must gather to mourn her, cause cllective mouring for strangers is the way of things in this country. kids shoot each other at school and we gotta pile up flowers and photos and candles and pretend it had anything to do with us (and not in a constructive way, like, say accepting our responsibility in promoting a society that creates these situations and only reacts afterward). we're a bunch of reactionaries dying for a chance to react... to anything. we love it when rich guys get accused of murdering their wives and dumping them in san francisco bay cause we can all get together and cry fro conner and laci and get our daily hate on for scott. we love it when our towers are razed by passenger planes cause we can be wounded without being touched and cry out for revenge, for war, war on anybody and everybody who might have ever sat in the same mosque as those involved. we love our tragedies, and in these days of omnipresent media and live team coverage, big brother everywhere looking over our shoulders at each little death, we can all line up to be first to mourn. we can wait through hours of traffic and stand in line to mourn a past president or make a pilgrimage to the outside of a courthouse to cheer on a death sentence. we can go to missouri (missouri, where i'm sure most of this country never really cares to go) to mourn some woman who died violently, nevermind all the other deaths across this country. sure, urban deaths, gang murders--those get their mourners too; they get their makeshift alters and shrines, with photos and candles and stuffed animals and flowers, but if they get any mention on the news, it's local and it's for one night only. a white woman in middle america dies, it's national news. a pregnant white woman dies, by the hands of her husband or by the hands of some crazy woman in the throes of the horrifying feeling of her own baby dying, and it's a national tragedy, worthy of new laws if not new wars. and, we don't have to look into causes so much as long as we can still cry over the result and write the whole thing off, in this case, as a crazy woman doing a crazy thing, she oughta fry

nevermind the so-called culture of violence that puts bush's culture of life to shame, nevermind that people generally don't "snap" and do crazy violent shit without already having serious problems, nevermind that this woman meant nothing to any of us last week

a real inaugural ball
Mood:  sharp
Now Playing: enya

you know what would be nice? inauguration day, presidential motorcade passing by. all the fools who think turning their backs on the president get shoved out of the way by some real protestors who, since they've been searched by the fbi and secret service (who, reportedly, will have "tightest security in inaugural history, with police planning to search every one of the tens of thousands of people expected to line the parade route"), will not have any signs or offensive shirts or any useful protest equipment (molotov cocktails or grenades, just for a couple harmless examples), wander out into the street and just lay down or sit or stand, whatever position feels right, anything to block the motorcade and fuck up the whole inaugural celebration, no violence (until the aforementioned fbi and secret service, backed up by the police and the national guard... oh wait, we don't have any of the latter left in this country, do we? anyway, until the authorities make a move), no subtlety, just civil disobedience en masse

except, that would hardly make a point, nevermind that bush would already have been sworn in by the time of the motorcade (right?). it's too bad we can't stop the swearing in... not that that would keep him from being president, as it's all just formality; he'll be emperor whether the inauguration goes to plan or not. this guy may have signed an executive order authorizing torture of "detainees" (according to the aclu today) and he's gotten us into a war we can never really win and scarred our economy and our reputation, made us the conquering enemy of the world, and we let him win the election, let him take it as a mandate to do whatever the fuck he wants, and we have become nothing, irrelevant. we're just those people who didn't vote for him, that minority (of some %49) who are so timid and powerless that we don't matter now that the religious Right have the floor. maybe if a few more of us could get over OUR religious beliefs and embrace something more realistic, we might get off our asses and fight for the country this is supposed to be...

of course, everyone will say this country was founded on religious ideals. our forefathers were all religious, the separation of church and state was there to protect church, not state. but, even the point misses the point. those men didn't know what we know today. they couldn't see, like we should be able to see today, that religion is dated and dying. thing is, though they were religious and founded this country on ideals that came from their beliefs, the whole reason they were here on this continent in the first place (well, at least the ones who get all the publicity, the pilgrims and whatnot) was to escape religious persecution, to get out of a country where they had to believe one way and only one way. and, now, what's become of this country. the leech of christianity has it's hold on everything. we dare show religious icons in a negative light and a study is done to show how evil we are. we dare suggest a new crusade on the holy land is wrong and we're antiamerican, unpatriotic, traitors to the empire

so, can we get a spectacle like the wto riots in seattle from five years ago? or do we sit by silently, maybe turn our backs and still go unnoticed? or, can we at least fall somewhere in between? or, should we just sit back and settle in and lament our loss and lick our wounds and wish ourselves better luck next time?

at what point do we give up? at what point do we fight?

at what point do we find some new promised land to escape perescution by the religious? what will be our mayflower and where will be our plymouth rock?

dead animal art
Mood:  irritated

nathalia edenmont of sweden: an artist. her art: she decapitates animals she's euthanized and sticks their heads on other sculptures then takes photos of them. apparently, she does nothing to preserve the body parts, so the photos are taken within fifteen minutes of the death, thus her having to kill the animals herself rather than getting a professional involved (this lack of professional involvement here being the one possible crime in the situation). wanna see? or read an explanation or read an interview (the latter, quite simplistic and brief)?

so, the big debate: is it okay to kill animals for art? we kill them for food, and most folks dont' mind that, though even some meat eaters don't like how the slaughterhouse works, nevermind that they don't tend to do anything to change that situation (talking the majority of folks, here, not the people who throw blood and say meat is murder and all that, or, of course, any of the peaceful hippy vegans or vegetarians, and don't even get me started on the harm we bring upon vegetables and plants each and every day). we kill animals for sport (though we DO tend to complain when that doesn't also involve use for food. we kill animals for protection (that is, to stop an animal from attacking a human). and, we kill animals for clothes, leather skirts and jackets and boots and pants and whatnot. the thing is, is there a moral line to be drawn at the purpose behind the killing? or, is it the method that dictates the morality? and, if it is the method, would edenmont's humane killing of pets that have reportedly been intended for consumption by large snakes anyway (can't find that article, but i've heard the reference a couple times now*) be better or worse than cows lined up to have bolts fired into their skulls, their throats cut, oftentimes then hung up while still alive and kicking (just this month, peta got some tape of steers staggering around and bellowing in pain after their throats were cut, not that i like peta but it's hard to fault video evidence), nevermind the screaming of the cows in line waiting to die? and, what about lobsters, refrigerated or boiled to death, or sometimes cut up while still alive, for a nice, high-class meal?

is art too high class to involve death? and, is it only bad if the corpse is actually in the piece of art? or should we discount all the depictions of death? that last question jumped into the realm of silliness for most of you, i'm sure. but, seriously, is that any different than any of the rest of it. isn't the whole thing silly? we kill animals every day. sometimes we kill them just cause they were wandering around the city unattended and no one bothered to come take them from the pound. "the humane society" euthanizes animals all the time. and, whether we like to think we mind, we obviously don't or we'd do something about it, wouldn't we?

and, surely the answer to people's hypocrisy about killing animals shouldn't be answered by killing a few more and photographing their heads on scultpures, right? isn't that just another layer of hypocrisy? i mean, you sink to the level of those you're protesting, you're as bad as them, right? except, if you kill people to stop them from killing other people, you're a hero, you get reelected. shouldn't edenmont be revered for standing up and killing animals for the sake of not killing animals? aren't those particular animals martyrs to the cause?

next time you're eating a good steak or hamburger, imagine mr cow, his throat gushing blood, bellowing in pain, trying desperately to stay standing, to stay alive, even as the life drains out of him. next time you eat chicken, picture mrs chicken hung upsidedown by her feet, her wings flapping desperately, as if she could fly under regular circumstances, let alone when she's about to be killed and her feet are stuck in those little clamps. next time you eat fish, imagine that hook piercing the fish's lip, the fishing line dragging it up out of its watery home. now, think of the dogs and cats put down every day for the sake of not having to deal with stray animals about your hometown. think of your leather shoes, that leather miniskirt or leather jacket you wear cause it makes you look hot, art to make your ass look good... but at least it doesn't involve a scuplture

or is the problem here that she's making people look at the dead animal, at the face of it (and, i'll contend here, that the art would work better if she preserved them and used the resulting sculpture as the piece rather than the photo). i'm sure she doesn't want us all to join the "can't eat anything that had a face" camp, but you gotta wonder, is it the rabbit's little eyes, the cat's vacant stare, that's getting to us? if she used a cow's head, what would the reaction be? if she mounted a deer head on a block of wood... oh wait, folks do that all the time, and it's called a trophy

personally, i think the finger puppet mice and the real rabbit head on the plush toy rabbit body and the mouse head on the silly little angel figuring are kinda cool looking. but, maybe that's just me. maybe i'm as much a psychopath as people are making edenmont out to be, nevermind the sociopaths and future serial killers torture animals; they don't euthanize them humanely. and, for the record to the nonartists out there, she's got to care for the animals to use them as materiel in her art. you don't produce art in support of things you hate and you don't use materials you don't like. if you have an abhorrence to paint, you don't paint. if you don't like animals, you don't take the time to acquire them and kill them nicely and use them in your art. she's not a hater of animals kicking a puppy or tying a bunch of cats in a bag and tossing them in a river, or some heartless child trying to make a rat king by tying some tails together. she's an artist, clearly of some intelligence and with a point to make

is her point that we shouldn't kill animals? is her point that killing animals is perfectly fine and there's no difference between doing so for art and doing so for food or clothing? what if it's both? contradictory? maybe. hypocritical? maybe. but, not to be childish, but, "made ya look" didn't it?

* since i'm mentioning the hearsay**, i should also mention a report that she beats the animals to death with a stick. of course, that one sounds unlikely. how would she be sure to have a usable body if she inflicts such physical damage on it?

** looked again, after writing on and found a link that mentions that the animals were intended to be eaten by snakes here. "The animals that were used for the installations were bred to be snakefood, or simply "put away" as they were not wanted anymore by the petowners."

faith in a box and an anti-american upbringing
Mood:  a-ok

opening note: yesterday, got eight pages of the clubhouse blues rewrite out of the first four pages of the original version

and, now to interrupt the season of lists...

the parents television council released the results of a study they called faith in a box. 2,385 hours of primetime shows, with 2,344 treatments of religion, were analyzed. and, negative treatment was the winner, yay

specifically:

"nbc was the decisive leader in broadcasting negative depictions of faith and religion. nbc programming had 9.5 negative treatments for every positive treatment of faith. fox followed with 2.4 negative depictions for each one that was positive. wb and abc tied with 1.2 negative for each positive, followed by upn with 1 negative for every 1.1 positive, cbs with 1 negative for every 2 positive and pax which did not have a single negative depiction."

582 of the "treatments" were references to faith and those tended to be positive. hell, even that originally great character grace on jack & bobby had a speech about faith that religious organizations like the ptc would love (nevermind that it was silly and didn't fit the character established previously, not that i'm still complaining about that show which i subsequently dropped). "less common, and more likely to be shown in a negative light, are more specific elements of religion, such as a particular church and its teachings, devout laity, and the clergy."

"the treatment of religion in an institutional or doctrinal context (such as a reference to a church service, a particular denomination, or to Scripture) was strikingly negative." I'm sure the Simpsons made it on that list, since most times they go to church it's played for a laugh or an annoyance

here's a finding that bugged me: "negative depictions of clergy were more than twice as frequent as positive depictions - 36.2 percent negative compared to 14.6 percent positive." it didn't bug me that clergy were referenced negatively, of course. i'm all for that. the thing is, 36 percent negative plus 14 percent positive doesn't come anywhere close to 100 percent. apparently, 50 percent was indifferent. couldn't we throw indifference into negative, just to make the results sound... better? isn't indifference worse than a blatantly negative reference? or, if it isn't, can't we take another look at that indifferent half and get some new criteria to find results before we fucking publish? i mean, come on. only half the damn representations bother to put a value judgement (in the opinion of the ptc, anyway) on clergy, and that's worth publishing?

how about, we get a new study focused on just that 14 percent positive and why it still exists. i mean, sure, a big part of this country is religious folks, and supposedly some 90 percent of us believe in god (80 in the resurrection of christ, by the way). but, shouldn't writers (the folks putting together the content of all these shows) be smarter than average? and, shouldn't that make them less likely to be religous. afterall, we all know intelligence and religion are not analogous, right?

right? we DO all know that? you religious people haven't actually convinced yourselves that you're smart and that's why you believe in magical beings in the sky that look out for you when you do stupid and dangerous things. it's not your genius that makes you see god in every tree and in every child and in every pile of shit, is it?

permit me a roll of the eyes and a sad, sad sigh

"these findings lend credibility to the idea that hollywood accepts spirituality, but shies away from endorsing, or even tolerating, organized religion," concluded bozell, the president of the ptc. see, spirituality doesn't have to be religous. someone should explain that to him, and to all the rest of the religious people

then, we'll get started on the "spiritual" people and indoctrinating them into atheism

except that might be illegal soon, just like teaching anything "anti-american" to our children could be, nevermind the definition of the term. an 11-year old who lives near washington dc was accused of being anti-american. an official complaint about some things he said in school made its way to the county sheriff and the boy and his parents were questioned. had the parents been teaching him anti-american things? were they anti-american? what did they think of 9-11? did they associate with foreigners who didn't like america? stuff like that

the kid opposes the military and refused a veteran's day assignment (writing a letter to a marine), saying something about how all marines could die, for all he cares. and, this got him investigated for potentially being anti-american and a danger to his fellow classmates and his fellow man, cause you know after the terrorist attack on columbine high school, we can't be too careful. and, with christianity under attack by television, we must assume that this kid isn't getting some good christianity ingrained in him how we want and that with his anti-american parents, he's certainly a danger to us all. hell, why isn't he in camp x-ray already? i mean, a complaint was filed. damn the evidence. damn the investigation. let's just send him away with saddam and peterson and mcveigh... oh wait, last one's already dead

last one was a christian, as well, as far as i've seen. wonder if that makes any sense, a christian doing violent things? a christian wanting people to die? that's crazy talk. it's only the dark-skinned followers of allah who kill people. it's only the enemies of the united states that kill people. it's only the cohorts of emmanuel goldstein... saddam hussein... osama bin laden... that kill people. only al qaeda and whoever else we fell like bombing

the season of lists part one - books
Mood:  cool

it's december, the season for "best of" lists, and while i won't be as shallow as to name the most beautiful people of the year or anything like that, i'm not above making lists. hell, i rather like lists. i like organization of information, keeping track of what tv shows to watch, what movies to rent, what books to read, what tv shows have been watched (or recorded), what movies have been viewed, what books have been read. it's all good fun for obsessives like me. so, without further ado, here's a probably incomplete list of my favorite books* (in no particular order):

• house of leaves by mark danielewski - a strangely put together book, involving multiples layers of plot (author is writing for a young man who seems to be losing his mind and is providing often (seemingly) unrelated footnotes on a manuscript he found written by a crazy, possible nonexistent old man about a film that never existed about a house that never existed), footnotes, typesetting bordering on pretentious (until you bother to actually read for context) and a central mystery (a house that is bigger inside than outside) that is quite powerful
• the poisonwood bible by barbara kingsolver - the story of a missionary and his family told through the voices of several narrators (the missionary's wife and daughters, taking turns), a fascinating journey into africa and many social and politcal issues, not to mention a great family story and a memorable sequence involving natural destruction at the hands (so to speak) of an army of ants
• hearts in atlantis by stephen king - actually a group of interrelated stories (two novellas and three short stories), all dealing with vietnam (before, during and after) and the politics of the 60s and 70s, connected through a group of children and a violent incident from the past. brilliantly constructed, violently emotional, nothing like what most people would expect from king
• bag of bones by stephen king - one of king's many books about writing, the emotional core of this story (a widower falling in love with a young mother and her child even as he deals with a ghostly mystery and the sudden death of his wife) raises this above the others
• lolita by vladimir nabakov - a bit of poetry; it's amazing how nabakov (whose first language was russian) can do so well in english, with great imagery, evocative metaphor and a great story about obsession and love (not pedophilia, as you might expect)
• dune by frank herbert - the first of a series, a great treatise on politics buried in a richly detailed science fiction world
• god emperor of dune by frank herbert - the tale of a half worm, half man mad with power and those who would attempt to thwart his rule. the second and third book of the dune series seemed like flimsy little placeholders to me, adding to the overall story only a little, like there was a demand for sequels before herbert had ever envisioned any, but this fourth book has a richness that makes it stand beside the original.
• catcher in the rye by j d salinger - what to say about this one? there isn't much plot to speak of. it's all about the narrator and his aimlessness, his detestation of the world of adults. but that barely describes it
• to kill a mockingbird by harper lee - a brilliantly simple and deceptively complex story, about growing up, about secrets, racism, and so much more
• the adventures of huckleberry finn by mark twain - above all, i always saw this one as being about the power of imagination to improve any situation
• crime and punishment by fyodor doystoevsky - a densely written novel about a young man determined to commit a crime and prove there don't have to be consequences
• 1984 by george orwell - a prescient look at the omnipresent media/government and the death of the individual
• insomnia by stephen king - another dense novel by king, this one focused on an old man who fins his insomnia gives him the ability to see beings that cut away the life force of those who die, leading into a supernatural struggle to stop a disaster, not to mention a back and forth debate about abortion, a little like the early chapters of king's tommyknockers gives us a serious debate about nuclear weapons
• replay by ken grimwood - a surprisingly powerful but fairly simple story about a man who gets to live his life over and over again, finding ways to improve upon what has come before, fix past mistakes and find happiness (if he can)
• ishmael by daniel quinn - one of those books that can change your life if you give it the chance. not really a novel but more a conversation about the state of the world and modern culture and where humanity has gone wrong in "growing up"
• my ishamel by daniel quinn - the sequel that continues the conversation, taking it in different directions and giving using a little more of a more novel-like structure
• it by stephen king - don't trust the miniseries, which, despite its pathetic ending, was still well made. this book is a seriously epic look at childhood and growing up and finding who you are as a grown up, not to mention the supernatural aspects, the allusions to numerous horror film staples and the unfilmable battle in the end, a great exercise in characterization
• ender's game by orson scott card - a classic science fiction novel about a brilliant boy destined for greatness, sent away to battle school to play at zero-g war and learn how to fight aliens, except that descripton makes it sound far too shallow
• speaker for the dead by orson scott card - the sequel to ender's game that brings ender into adulthood, fashions a brilliant alien world, gives us a disturbing and powerful family dynamic, a fantastic way of looking at death (and the life of the recently deceased) and, in my view, surpasses it's predecessor
• i know this much is true by wally lamb - take a simple tale of twin brothers, one schizophrenic and hospitalized, one whose life is falling apart and expand it into a detailed character study several hundred pages long, and you've got this book
• the story of b by daniel quinn - take quinn's angle on modern culture and focus it on religion and a character who is essentially the antichrist
• after dachau by daniel quinn - a deceptive metaphor about life focused on a woman who wakes one day to recall a life lived previously and who may provide a drastically different way of viewing the world
• lord of the flies by william golding - the simple tale of a group of planewrecked boys stranded on an island and letting go of the trappings of modern life only to fall prey to their own savage ways
• brave new world by aldous huxley - like 1984, this book seems more prescient than it seems a treatise on it's own present, about the way of the world to sedate us into conformity
• the sea came in at midnight by steve erickson - an eerily complex novel, moving forward and backward in time, shifting perspectives and narrators and looping around on itself so that, in a way, it's hard to be sure what it's all about
• from the corner of his eye by dean koontz - about the coincidence and interconnectedness of our lives, and also (contrary to what one might expect i would enjoy) about god and his place in life
• false memory by dean koontz - despite one glaring detail that bugged the hell out of me (and which i brought up to the author at a signing), this seemingly overlong novel about three people succumbing to the sudden onset of severe phobias turns out to be a fantastic exercise in characters, with one of the more powerful scenes i've ever read
• american gods by neil gaiman - about the gaudy faux religious trinkets and landmarks of modern america. though written by british gaiman, a strangely insightful look at american culture through the trappings of a weirdly supernatural plot
• the holy by daniel quinn - a look under the surface of america and the world, at strange goings on behind the scenes of the reality we know. a let down in the end (though not anywhere near as much as quinn's newcomer's guide to the afterlife was) but a great read anyway, with some great imagery
• the third chimpanzee by jared diamond - a look at what truly sets humans apart from other mammals and the other two chimpanzees (diamond's contention being that humans are just, well, the title says it all), with looks at the origins in other species of what has become in humans drug use and self desructive behavior, including the making of nuclear weapons
• guns, germs and steel by jared diamond - a richly detailed look at what makes different cultures different, from the availability of specific edible plants to the presence of large mammals, from continent to continent and how geography has shaped the evolution of culture
• hamlet by william shakespeare - a man going crazy after the death of his father at the hands of his uncle who's having an affair with his mother, or a man bent on revenge because his father's ghost demands it
• high fidelity by nick hornby - a book about lists and about men and about relationships, as the main character tracks down the five greatest break ups of his life to discover why his girlfriend recently left him
• about a boy by nick hornby - a man with the simplest life he can make for himself finds it complicated after he pretends to have a son in order to meet more interesting women than he might usually
• fever pitch by nick hornby - hornby's autobiograpy by way of an exploration of his obsession with soccer, told through anecdotal accounts of the games that figure in the major cornerstone events of his life
• into the great wide open by kevin canty - a relatively straightforward tale about two teens falling in love, complicated by their miserable lives outside of each other <

watchlist for yesterday:

• house "damned if you do" - though the tea was obvious, the humor in this episode, not to mention regular jabs at religion, was great
• veronica mars "an echolls' family christmas" - predictable ending with the poker game culprit but the why of it was a great mystyer and the stalker plot was done well with a fantastic ending, not to mention veronica's confrontation with jake kane
• ghost hunters - the evp wasn't too impressive this time, but it's refreshing in a way to have a couple episodes now where the team didn't really find much of anything. the approach of proving the science over the supernatural is a great new angle for a show like this
• the daily show - nothing special but it's the daily show, funny and great even at its worst
• south park "woodland critter christmas" - wrong in so many ways, like the best of south park's episodes. gotta love stan demanding that there's a point to this when he's stuck helping the mountain lion cubs learn how to perform abortions... for those of you who didn't see this, that must sound either disturbing or hilarious out of context

watchlist for today:

• zatoichi
• the door in the floor

* not limited to novels, obviously, as there are some plays or nonfiction works involved, though i've left comics out for now

a quiet protest?!
Mood:  incredulous

bush's inauguration celebration is going to cost some $40 million, not counting security costs. there will be nine balls (inlcuding a special one for the few soldiers we've bothered to let come home from iraq), a concert, a parade, fireworks and the swearing-in ceremony

and, an aside, did you know there's a joint congressional committee on inaugural ceremonies? i know that our culture loves its parties, but, seriously, we need a congressional committee for this kind of thing? from their website: "this website has been created to provide comprehensive information about presidential inaugurations past and present. it is part of our continuing effort to encourage all americans to appreciate and participate in the inaugural ceremony... it is our hope that this website will encourage you to become more involved in this important part of american history." who knew this was an important part of american history? raise your hands. then, hang your heads in shame, cause you are all stupid, stupid people. we don't need balls (permit the unfortunate pun). we don't need parades. we don't need parties. hell, we barely need the damn swearing-in; we all know the president lies for the rest of his four years, so why try to get an oath for this one day?

anyway, it's a big deal (apparently), the inauguration, lots of partying and parading and lots of money spent--gotta wonder how much people will be spending to travel to dc to see the whole shindig go down. bush will get a big celebration, all the gay-hating, abortion-despising folks who voted for him will get to grin all day cause they won, and screw the other half of the country (and the rest of the world, for that matter)

and, the best we can come up with is a quiet protest in which the participants don't even have to acknowledge one another as they turn their backs on bush as he parades past 'em. see turnyourbackonbush.org for the boring details. the protestors don't have to know one another (a useful detail, to be sure), don't have to wear pins or carry signs (a useful detail, since security can't herd them into a pen like they have tried at other events in recent years), and they don't have to acknowledge one another or even all participate at teh same time (while i like this, it certainly is not a useful protest, as there's no guarantee anyone will notice scattered folks turning around, and it probably won't disrupt anything)

and, it should be about disruption. they already know half of us don't like him. we've already turned our backs on him. doing it in a literal fashion isn't going to do a thing. blocking the streets and stopping the inaugural parade, locking down dc traffic for the day, storming the inaugural stage--those kinds of things will get some attention. it's all nice and good for us hermit types (like me) to think there are protests out there that won't involve us having to actually interact with others, but come on. this won't have an impact and ultimately, won't make us feel any better. you've got to create a spectacle, got to make life hard for the other guys. you've got to have signs ands tee shirts and pins and arm bands and you've got to parade through the streets, and damn the security forces who try to coral you out of the way. it doesn't have to be violent (though security will likely make it so), but it does have to be big, it does have to be active. none of this turning around crap. then, you'll just miss the spectacle they've got going

watchlist for yesterday:

• collateral - while i rather liked this film, and it made we want to watch heat again, the cell phone not working at the end pissed me off. it's too common a suspense trick now, to have the cell phone not work. and this was in downtown los angeles; i could be wrong, but i've never heard of any cell problems in the fucking middle of los angeles. max could've just stolen the cell phone closer to the building if you wanted to leave it working until then (obviously, he had to find the cell phone cause he (and we) needed him to call here for reasons i won't spoil here)
• unlocking the da vinci code - the shortest and the most boring of the three da vinci code documentaries i've watched in the past week or so, and not just cause it was reiterating stuff from the other two
• babylon 5 "no retreat, no surrender" - up to this climax of season four, rewatching the series with the kids, and the themes of this show's big revolution seem more relevant now than when the show was made
• the rebel billionaire - taped most of this (sarah's psychology final altered the already complicated tuesday night schedule a bit), haven't watched it yet
• amaxing race 6 - jonathan is an abusive asshole (even the host, who tends to stay disconnected from the players, seemed fed up) and kendra is a stuck up, rude bitch, and too bad for the old folks. i think i'm rooting for lori and bolo at this point. didn't expect that
• house - taped, haven't watched yet
• veronica mars - taped, haven't watched yet
• the daily show - funny stuff. loved the thing about the guy suing the muscular dystrophy association for not paying him a million dollars. guest and interview were a little boring

watchlist for today:

• a movie from blockbuster, not sure what
• the door in the floor, maybe
• jeopardy
• ghost hunters
• south park, maybe
• the daily show

tomorrow (maybe): "the season of lists" begins

conner must've done it
Mood:  caffeinated
Now Playing: kids watching dora the explorer

you know one of the more disturbing aspects of the scott peterson trial?

apparently, your cell phone calls can be tracked (by location) after the fact. they had evidence of scott's calls while he was on his fishing trip, tracking him on his trip home. i knew calls could be triangulated while in progress, but i'd not heard anything of being able to track them after the fact. i suppose, if it's a wide open area with scattered cell towers, maybe they could tell which towers covered which calls, but seriously, if you're up to anything untoward, don't use your cell phone. (and this from evidence in scott's favor)

as for other things:

• laci's stepfather went fishing the same time scott did, and in a more secluded spot (and apparently, no one "plan b"ed his ass). yet, it's supposed to be strange that scott went fishing after it was "too cold" to go golfing. we're supposed to think fishing on christmas eve (nevermind that technically, it's not christmas eve until the sun goes down) is the craziest thing ever
• not caring (which is a debatable assessment of scott peterson's attitude) if your wife is dead is not illegal (yet)
• cheating on your wife is not evidence of being willing to murder her. contrary to what the bible might imply or say, one "sin" is not equal to another. being a bad person, however unlikable, does not make one prone to doing horrible things. having options on your day off (fishing or golfing) doesn't make you a privileged, arrogant son of a bitch (though scott could very well be one)
• prior to the day laci died, her mother (who says they were very close and shared things of importance) hadn't seen a thing to make her think her daughter's marriage was not a happy one
  • an extramarital affair doesn't even necessarily prove a marriage isn't a happy one
• police tracking dogs had no interest in scott's boat, where laci supposedly would have spent several hours (either already dead or still alive) before being dumped in the bay
• you know, my wife's hair is all over the place. i think i'll stick some in some pliers just in case she dies, so everyone can assume i did it

it's a bit pathetic, the cheering and whatnot, folks so happy that he got the death penalty. of course, this is california, where he might not ever get executed, and i've heard death row is nicer than a general population prison, so there's that at least. and, conviction on circumstantial evidence (and hardly any of that) has got to be good grounds for appeal. so, keep on cheering if you like. keep on with the bloodthirsty cries for death, for scott to fry for not having remorse for something you can't even prove he did. hell, he should fry just for not being that outwardly emotional. i mean, that's just unnatural, right?

the lesson to be learned: if you go anywhere without someone who you might be accused of having a reason to murder, keep all your receipts and have affidavits with you for witnesses to sign at each and every stop. you never know when the media will decide you're worth headlines (and thus, worth harsh penalty despite the evidence)

no blog entry today, seriously

there's only so much failure one can take, and when you start out with low self esteem, there's only so much farther down you can go before you just have to focus your attention on something else and give up certain dreams or risk psychological self destruction or death. you can write and write and write until the cows come home (and i don't even own any cows) and that won't make anyone read any of it. hell, it won't even make any of it worth reading. all the product will just get filed away with all the rest, to linger in memories of dreams of publication that need to stop meaning something

thing is, i actually think i can write, when i bother to try (which isn't often enough anymore). but, it doesn't matter cause no matter how much i write, be it in comic form or blog form or prose fiction, i haven't a clue how to convince anyone else to care outside of my wife

it occurs to me, though, that i'm doing something that i've complained about others--notably our government and the scott peterson haters--doing. there isn't actually any evidence that my writing isn't worth anyone's time. the fault is all my own in my lack of ability to "sell" it. but, i don't "sell" it to people, i don't have an audience, so i get to thinking my material must be horrible because otherwise wouldn't an audience magically show up? like, if we can't find evidence of weapons of mass destruction, then we must assume they are hidden, if we can't prove scott peterson didn't do it, we must assume he is still hiding the evidence of his guilt, if i can't prove that there are people out there who might read my stuff if they'd ever even get the chance to read it, then those people must not exist and i must give up completely and devote all my time to what i do best... which, apparently, is watching television and cooking, not a good combination when i've been wanting to lose more weight of late

it doesn't have to be logical to get an obsessive like me to latch onto it and live by it, you know...