junkmail - braindump edition

A wild armadillo appears! (at Kennedy Space Center, and we even touched it):

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 18:48:15 -0500

via tweetie

Posted via web from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

18:14: in Valdosta a miracle occurs:

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 18:15:19 -0500

via tweetie

Posted via web from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

14:50: Genuine Georgia BBQ for lunch:

Mon, 08 Mar 2010 14:52:32 -0500

via tweetie

Posted via web from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

10:57: There go my plans for the night, then:

Sun, 07 Mar 2010 11:00:03 -0500

via tweetie

Posted via web from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

From yesterday, neon by night:

Sun, 07 Mar 2010 08:24:10 -0500

via tweetie

Posted via web from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

Photo: Nice parking job, asshat

Wed, 03 Mar 2010 14:31:51 -0500

And this right outside the DMV building, across the street from the
main Troy police station, and a block or two away from the County
Courthouse…

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

Done for no particular reason this weekend. Just sad I have to look "normal" for work tomorrow...

Sun, 28 Feb 2010 19:16:12 -0500

via tweetie

Posted via web from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

Found: This picture wins the internet. The rest of us can just stop trying

Wed, 24 Feb 2010 14:00:36 -0500

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

Behold! The Holy Day of Chaoflux is upon us, you primitive screwheads!

Fri, 19 Feb 2010 10:39:22 -0500

And so, as yesterday I ranted profanely and insultingly about someone
else’s sacred rites, today I will give credence to a fake holiday made
up by hippies and followed by lunatics from the internet. We call this “Fair and Balanced” where I come from. And if you’ve read
my previous Discordian essay
(http://misterdiskord.posterous.com/whats-a-discordian-anyway) you
might know that taking turns of mocking religious celebration and
embracing it is perfectly in character.

Anyway to me, made-up holydays are much more interesting than
established ones anyway, because they allow for further introspection.
In a religion which is set out as half-joke, and which has no dogma
and anyway instructs its adherents to never pay attention to anything
they read, there isn’t anything written about what Chaoflux really is,
or what one has to do with it. And but so, I’m going to try anyway. Feel free to disregard me. I’m
only your Pope.

First things first: the Discordian calendar, which no one who is sane
actually follows, consists not of months, but of 5 (always five, the
Law of Fives is never wrong) seasons of 73 days each: Chaos, Discord,
Confusion, Bureaucracy and Aftermath. On the 50th day of each season
is a holiday commemorating that season, and getting in the mind of
transition to the next one. These follow the general gist of things;
the universe itself, most human endeavours, basically everything that
exists goes through these cycles. And so we have Chaoflux, Discoflux,
Confuflux, Bureflux and Afflux. (1) Carrying on. Chaos is the primal chaos that exists at the beginning.
You could call this the Whatever Before the Big Bang, or a human
swimming around the womb, or that lazy period where you get a crazy
idea to start some big project, or whatever. Chaos has the very fine
property that everything is immanent and imminent; anything could
happen. All and nothing exist in equal measures. But at the same time
nothing happens. Order and disorder in perfect balance. It’s a fine
state if you can get it, though I have to think that typically it’s
not so easy in the real world. And it’s only ideal in a sort of
Platonic or idealistic sense. You wouldn’t want your life in a state
of Chaos, because nothing much can happen. If you’re of a buddhist
bent, I see it as kind of Nirvana, or some Christians conception of
heaven: probably something you’d strive for, but if you think too much
of it, it seems kind of boring and useless. But when you’re in it,
it’s totally not, because it it EVERYTHING all at once.

It’s like the old question, why do we have time? So everything doesn’t
happen all at once. And so eventually of this Primal Chaos gives way to some semblance of
order. Reality imposes itself on stochastic bliss. Eventually we must
be born. The chaos of childhood must give way to the various rules and
regulations of being an adult in a society. Our crazy idea to get the
band back together and take over the world as rockstars has to give in
to practicing our instruments and working in seedy clubs for 10 bucks
after working a day job all day. And so on. This is not a bad thing
nor a good thing, but just a thing. Certainly less Chaos brings some
things into sharper focus. But a lot of the EVERYTHING goes into less
focus.

Something called the Aneristic Illusion tells us that Order is always
good and disorder is always bad. This philosophy would tell us that
moving away from Chaos is always a good thing, an advancement, but
it’s not. Remember when you were a child and you thought you could do
anything. There is value in that. Even if you will never, in “reality”
ride a unicorn through space, if you really believe you can as a
child, that’s almost as good. And so when that dies it is a loss. So
in a way Chaoflux as a transition from Chaos to Discord is somewhat of
a sad time, a time for reflection on lost possibilities. But of course the Eristic Illusion tells us the opposite: that
disorder is always better than order. And of course, as people living
in Westernized America this is easier for us to debunk. We know the
value of ordering things. We know that as adults we can do more and
get more done, and even have better delusions than children. An adult
on acid will probably have at least as good a unicorn spaceflight (if
not better) than a child.

And so: go forth today and commemorate the Primal Chaos from whence we
have come. Do something random. Be an idiot. And contemplate on the
transition to Discord, on giving up some of your infinite
possibilities to immanentize those most important to you. And remember
always that we’ll be back through here again, everything is cyclical,
so don’t make like a big fucking deal out of it or anything. There’s
always next year if you fuck it up. And as always, All Hail Discordia. But not too loudly, cause you don’t
want Her to notice you and start paying attention to your life…

—-
1. The fifth (fnord) day of each season is an Apostle’s holy day, and
you are encouraged to make up your own additional holydays as you see
fit (or don’t, what the fuck do I care?)

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

Lent: a rant

Thu, 18 Feb 2010 20:14:35 -0500

So, it’s Lent. The idea being you’re supposed to give something up for
40 days, because god gives a shit whether you eat chocolate or not.
Because let me tell you, god is all up in your grill about what you’re
supposed to eat. Especially in the OT. Dude was hardcore on shellfish. I guess you don’t have to do an eating-related Lent, but you know,
we’re all Americans and if there’s one thing we do to nearly-sinful
excess, it’s eat. Some people also give up like, smoking or drinking
coffee, or booze or something like that.

And it’s all pretty ridiculous. I mean theologically, even. Don’t take
my word for it, I’m an atheist or a discordian or at BEST a Jew. But
listen — if you can appease the cosmic flying beard in the sky by not
stuffing your fat face for 40 days, seriously, this is not a very
difficult religion to abide with. Try 613 mitzvot on for size some
time, OK? It’s not that I’m necessarily against self-improvement. I just find it
tedious that people have to turn to the threat of eternal torture, or
the reward of eternal pleasure, to fucking do something positive in
their lives. And I say this as a person who, for a tremendously long
period of time had no motivation to positively change my life. So
yeah, hypocrisy. Totally. But it’s like, if it takes the Bearded
Genocide Dude in Heaven to make you stop eating Micky D’s 4 times a
week, maybe you just want to consider visiting him that much sooner,
cause that shit ain’t gonna stick as a life habit.

So listen… believe in god if you want to. I might argue with you for
fun, but I know I’m not going to change your mind. But if you think
that Lent is anything but one more way for the various churches in the
world to get you to become a little healthier, and have a little more
money to throw in the kitty on Sunday, you’re fooling yourself. It’s
all bread and circuses. Unless you gave up bread and circuses for
Lent. In which case it’s um… lentils and televangelism? I don’t
fuckin’ know.

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

Found: A really terrible physics joke that nevertheless made me snicker...

Mon, 08 Feb 2010 21:14:38 -0500

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

More numerological inanity

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 18:15:50 -0500

And so my vehicle reached another insignificant but
numerically-interesting milestone. And documented it, because I’m just
wired incorrectly.

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

Remember being "offline"?

Mon, 01 Feb 2010 14:22:57 -0500

When I was your age(1), we had this thing called being “offline”. I’ve
been around computers of one primitive sort or another almost my whole
life, but only ever owned a real one after I got out of high school,
and it went online. But at that time, online generally meant “dial-up”
which meant “in relatively short doses or late at night, unless you
want to tie up the damn phone line all day”. This was, at first,
during the age of America Online anyway, so you didn’t want to spend
too much money either. And but so this necessitated periods of time
during which one was not, actually online. Shocking I know. And in many ways of course, it is kind of fucking amazing, the level
of like connectivity and information we have available these days. I
still have a moment of future shock whenever I have some inane trivia
question pop up that I can’t quite remember, and I realize that I can
pull out my phone and look it up from almost anywhere in the civilized
world(2). I mean this is fairly amazing, living-in-the-future level
shit here.

But on the other hand, I’ve been living mostly offline most weekends
now for a while. Granted, there’s still the occasional looking at
funny cat pictures, but this is mainly vicarious and on the same level
of watching a TeeVee program or something with someone. I tend to
limit my data consumption as much as possible in favor of human
contact. Sort of a novel new thing for me. I like it. Which isn’t to
say I’m particularly effective, said phone being insidious in an “I’ll
just check my email quickly… oh and see who’s on the Twitter… oh
and check Facebook…” sort of way. And I don’t want to fall into the alarmist camp where you occasionally
see news articles like “IS GOOGLE MAKING US DUM?”, like we’re becoming
incapable of knowledge because we can just look everything up. I’m
just saying I personally benefit from a period of time where I’m not
moving a mile-a-minute browsing this and that and following links and
playing games that go for exactly ONE MINUTE. It’s not something I’d
do permanently, I’m as addicted as the next person, but I’m really
liking taking a break from these things. I like that I can still go
out and drink a bunch of cactus by-product and bullshit about whatever
(granted, it’s often about what evil Google is up to, so by the nature
of my work and my interests, the grim specter of technology is never
far behind).

I don’t know that I particularly have a point to make here. I was just
struck by the idea that, years ago being “online” was a state you
actively entered, and then stopped doing when you were finished. This
is a cultural artifact which has fallen by the wayside, much like
television stopping broadcasting at a certain hour, or the US Senate
ever accomplishing anything(3). So I figured I’d go on about it for a
little bit while I’m unable to figure out a particularly pressing
problem about a web application for work (which is used by the courts,
all of which are online nearly all of the time and which has made
information sharing actually work so that the courts can function to a
more reasonable semblance of sanity [though still VERY far from
actually reaching sanity]). So maybe, be offline a little while and see what happens. The internet
will survive without you. Though of course, it can’t survive without
me for very long…

—-
1. The esteemed Ashleigh is a little bit younger than me, which I like
to use to mock her incessantly, saying things like “when I was your
age…” or telling her things from when I was in college are “before
her time”. And but so, “When I was your age…” has become a sort of
go-to thing for me when talking about the Distant Past. I’ll even say
it to people who are older than me, often to some befuddlement if they
know our relative ages. 2. Except, ironically, inside my own home. Because fuck you, AT&T and
your shitty coverage.

3. Zing!

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

Found: Put the Thor back in Thursday

Thu, 28 Jan 2010 10:25:11 -0500

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

Found: I... I don't even know...

Fri, 22 Jan 2010 10:36:33 -0500

This is completely mystifying and more than a little bizarre, but for
some reason I am fascinated by it. Welcome to the weekend, children.
Almost.

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

Found: Come, my minions!

Wed, 20 Jan 2010 13:19:01 -0500

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

In which there was a Cavalcade of Scientific Whimsy

Tue, 19 Jan 2010 18:21:19 -0500

This weekend I became ensconced in my natural habitat, which is to say
SCIENCE!, by way of the Connecticut Science Museum. This was, as
expected, fairly awesome, as this is not really the sort of thing I’ve
done for a very long time, probably since such time as this would have
been a type of school field trip I’d have gone on. So it was a fine
use of a holiday and a splendid time was had by all. Fotografs will be
soon forthcoming. And so as we were waiting in line to pay for admission to the
Cavalcade of Scientific Whimsy, there was a woman in the next line
(the “if you have a membership or season pass or something express
line”) with a small collection of children, which unexpectedly warmed
the frozen cockles of my heart. She was overheard expressing to the
children (I assume some of which were hers) that they should be sure
to visit the rooms they hadn’t been to yet. And so I was quite buoyed
by the idea that children should not only be taken to a science
museum, but that they should be taken there frequently enough that
they should have passes and have to plan out making sure to see the
whole place.

In that brief moment I had at least a tiny bit of hope for our
misbegotten planet. I mean it was only one group of kids, only one
woman, but hey, even misanthropes can be touched sometimes. I know
that, if I should ever change my ways and decide to breed, my children
will certainly be found among those excited to see Science. Of course
with my luck they’ll end up being hardcore Fundamentalist Nutbags, or
Scientologists or something, and I’ll never get them to set foot in
such a place. But a person can dream about what their unlikely spawn will be like, can’t he?

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

Why I don't want to hear about the full moon at work ever again.

Thu, 14 Jan 2010 19:08:22 -0500

So there’s this individual with whom I work… Let me back up, and start by saying that I work in state government.
This is a wonderful thing, at least coming from a position of having
several years of rampant unemployment and commensurate stress,
depression, desperation (and subsequently working for a huge asshole
who caused me panic attacks because it was a paycheck)… after all of
that, a steady (union!) job with a pension at the end (assuming the
state remains solvent until I’m retirement age [which is no guarantee
these days]) is a lovely thing, to which I offer no complaints
whatsoever, praise Eris and the Flying Spaghetti Monster for it.

But let us just say that the stereotypes about state government
employees, if not even nearly universally true, are based on some
fact. There are a few of them out there, the sorts of people who
basically consider anyone getting between them and their next coffee
break The Enemy. Even if the person getting in the way is, I don’t
know, a user they have to support and a problem they have to deal with
as part of THEIR JOB. And so, there’s this individual with whom I work, who does not
hesitate to complain whenever someone calls in with some bug or some
error in communication between our agency (the courts) and some other
group with whom we have to communicate (for example, the DMV for
traffic violations, or the criminal justice system, or whoever). It is
his job (or part of it) to keep these things working properly, yet
every problem that springs up is a personal affront to him.

Fine. I’m not here (solely) to rag on the guy. He’s kind of a weird,
chumpy guy for that, but whatever, y’know? I don’t have to work with
him directly most of the time, so more power to him. What I want to complain about is the fact that every single day, no
matter what, he’ll reference “the full moon” as the cause of people
calling in. I hear this approximately 27 times a day “I swear, it must
be the full moon”. “I think we just had one last week, but I feel like
it must be a full moon again”. “I tell you, what is with this full
moon, all the crazies are out.” This all regarding the same small
group of people who always call him.

And I have no other comment on this, except that it makes me WANT TO
FUCKING KILL HIM. That is all.

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

The man in the saffron robe

Tue, 12 Jan 2010 19:15:07 -0500

In the busiest part of the city (it doesn’t matter which one, you
won’t find it) is a shop. In the back of the shop is… well, mainly
in the back of the shop is the sort of thing you’ll find in the back
of any shop: boxes of spare merchandise (in this case mainly mens’
coats, hats and pants), staff break room, a disused and filthy
restroom, rats, an emergency exit… But behind all of *that* is
another door, to another room, and in that room is a woven mat, a
small table, and a man in a greasy saffron-colored robe. It is said that if you ask this man a question, he has to answer it,
and the answer is always correct. It is further said (probably to fend
off the familiar disappointment of other such tales) that his answers
are actually useful, and relevant, and in the spirit of the
questioner’s desires. None of this monkey’s-paw, gift-of-the-magi,
ironic postmodern bullshit, oh no. Ask a question, something that’s
been bothering you, something that will help you in your life, get a
valid answer. You can see why I don’t tell you where the shop is. And
why it doesn’t actually exist.

I mean if such a thing did exist, the poor bastard would just be
giving out lottery numbers and stock tips all day. The entire economic
system would be crushed under the weight of inflation inside a week.
Most churches would probably go out of business, the secrets of the
universe having been revealed and the conflicting premises of every
other faith laid bare as just so much nonsensical muttering. And it might occur to you to ask: if such a man did exist, why would
he be living in the back of a haberdashery, wearing a robe anyway? I
mean is this just dramatic license, or what? Sure. But remember this:
if you could correctly answer anybody’s question, you could never go
outside, at least not once word got around. It’d be a few orders of
magnitude worse than being some famous celebrity. At least they can’t
do anything useful, except maybe look good (or sing well, or whatever
it is that some celebrities who don’t look good or sing or act or play
sports DO). And so I suppose if he couldn’t answer his own questions
for some reason, that’d pretty much be a cogent definition of hell.
Being able to solve anyone’s problem but your own is basically a kind
of exquisite torture, a sentence of a life of self-imprisonment, lest
you become like the goose who laid the golden eggs.

And so it came to pass that a particularly disheveled woman, without
home or family or possessions or even a shopping cart ran across this
man. He had retired, for obvious reasons, but somehow she knew it was
him. Saw it in his eyes maybe. And she asked him a question, whispered
it into his ear, and looked on, plaintively, hoping for the answer. And he, having been silent for many years, having shut himself out of
the world of conversation for fear of revealing his oracularness to
the world at large, bit his lip. Drew in breath. Let out a sigh,
filled with warmth and resignation and fear and hope (it was quite a
sigh to behold). And at length, he opened his eyes, and opened his
mouth, and opened his eyes, and answered.

She wept, and thanked him, and moved on.

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »

Excuses, self-doubt and other things nobody gives a shit about

Mon, 11 Jan 2010 21:19:47 -0500

So I made this goal, or at least plan, for 2010 to start writing
again. And I ostensibly said I’d try to write something every day,
although I’m pretty sure even when I wrote that I knew it was
basically a lie. But nevertheless it’s kind of indicative of myself
anyway that I didn’t keep up with a schedule I’d made for myself. I
mean I’m hardly known for my slavish adherence to plans and like,
order and such. I think basically the main thing is, I’m sort of afraid people will
actually pay attention to my writing. Which is why I tend more toward
emo bloggery and less toward actual like, writing. Mainly when I was a
youth in high school, one of the few things people ever said to me was
that my writing was good. I’m still sort of afraid that it was a sort
of “big fish/small pond” thing, or at least that it’s all just
atrophied away in the intervening years. So if I never let anyone see
it, they can never tell me that I suck, and I can continue to believe
that it’s this awesome talent I have that I’ve just never done
anything with. Sort of along the lines of “better to be silent and be
thought a fool, rather than open your mouth and remove all doubt”.

And so I’m not sure exactly what I intend by writing. I mean on the
one hand I don’t intend anything: it’s just something I used to enjoy;
it, like so many other things, fell by the wayside over the past…
oh, many years… and now I’m rediscovering many things and
discovering a lot of new ones to boot. So I don’t really intend
anything, I don’t expect it’ll come to anything apart from maybe a
little bit of creativity, make my old, rusted-out brain start working
again, and maybe on the off chance anyone is paying attention, to
entertain someone a little bit. On the other hand, there’s a reason I guess that it’s so hard for me.
The easy answer is it’s just self-consciousness as always. So the
answer I suppose is, to keep going, keep trying, and damn the schedule
and damn what anyone says (or doesn’t say) and just keep trying.

Or I could just punt and keep writing navel-gazing blogosity, which
technically counts as writing (if only in the barest sense of the
word)… :P

Posted via email from misterdiskord’s posterous | Comment »