Monday, December 22, 2008

Irony strikes again

Bush administration officials might be covering up their tracks:

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/bush-insider-planned-tell-all/story.aspx?guid={3386CE02-96CC-4933-874A-C96677A2F36E}&dist=msr_1


If this is true, it confirms all my worst fears about this administration. Figures it's the week after I start to feel sorry for GWB. *Sigh*

Friday, December 19, 2008

GWB = Judas?

It's rare for me to post twice in the same week, let alone the same day, but I feel compelled. A lot has been made of the shoe throwing that happened this week towards GWB - I like the headlines that make fun of the fact that shoe-throwing in Islamic countries is a sign of disrespect, but apparently is okay every where else. It brings a nice bit of realism to what is becoming an overinflated ideological identity, an us vs. them mentality that just isn't true. Throwing shoes at people = not a sign of respect pretty much universally.
As anyone who has read past blogs might realize, there have been a lot of changes in this country in the eight years that GWB has been in office, many of which I have vehemently disagreed with. I can't stand listening to him talk, I think of him with distaste that our President could have brought the office to such a bumbling disprespected conclusion. Yet, I and many others are guilty of exactly what Congress and Big Business want us to do - blame the figurehead. Presidents have some power, but by far the most power resides with Congress and lobbyist. It's not flashy in the same way that the latest recession doesn't have one cause - it's a lot of minor details that most people get bogged down on. Don't get me wrong - the Presidential right to pardon is probably one of the most abused privileges of office in my opinion; however, presidents just don't get to do a whole lot besides be figureheads.
That being said, as much as I decry this presidency, it is not right to put all the blame with Bush and act as if it will all be better once Obama is in office. True, he's already lining up a talented cabinet. He will still have to deal with Congress and Big Business in the same way that every president has since the birth of the corporation. Money is what talks, people. Money is what put Bush in power and kept him there. Money is what has allowed people to look the other way as atrocities are committed. After all, look at Oskar Schindler...yes, he saved a lot people, but if he and other businessmen had taken a stand against slave labor and Nazi fanaticism do you think history would have quite turned out the same?
Alright...stepping away from Godwin's law and back to the point - it's wrong to place the blame for the failures of this country squarely on Bush's shoulders. He's a figurehead. He's been a participant in a very unpopular movement which has a right to a backlash. He is not the devil. He is a man, and at the end of the day when I see the videos of him being shunned at G20 and having shoes thrown at him (he's a world leader!!) I feel pity for a man that like many of us has gotten caught in the wheels of a machine. Yes, he participated in it and helped to create it, but who among us has not participated in actions with unforseen consequences? He is human.
So, President George W. Bush, I wish you peace. I hope that when you go from office that you go to a quiet existence, a humbled man but not a broken man. Each man's failure diminishes me, to paraphrase John Donne, and I feel a part of what is occuring. Peace and the setting aside of grudges is not weakness, rather the mark of compassion and a sublime understanding that "but for the grace of God go I." I wish you the best, my one-time foe, and a happy time with your family away from the pressure of the Presidency.

Christmas with the agnostics

There is a great series of photos over at The Big Picture (http://www.boston.com/bigpicture/2008/12/hubble_space_telescope_advent.html) from the Hubble Telescope. These picture are awe inspiring and amazing, especially considering the Hubble's troubled history. As always, it's more my response to the comments that I'm writing about rather than telling you what you can see for yourself.
It strikes me more and more that there is a real anger in the non-Christian community. Anger at being persecuted, anger at not being legitimate to Christians, and anger at not having their rights respected in everyday life. I know this anger - I've lived it, too. An anecdotal story - once, while in college and undecided about religion, I was reclining in the grass and enjoying the beauty around me. Two girls walk over and ask me if I've received Jesus...as I like to call it, "the talk." I'm feeling particularly in tune with nature that day so when they ask me what religion I am (after finding out that I am not Christian,) I tell them "I'm sort of Wiccan." I kid you not, without missing a beat the one girl tells me, "That's okay. We're all wicked before we receive Jesus into our hearts." I'm not calling Christians morons - I'm just saying that a little cultural awareness would be nice, you know, before you try and change us.
So I come from an understanding of the persecution and misunderstandings that come from being nonChristian in a Christian community. There's a lot of damage control - "yes, I still have morals, no I don't believe in Satan, I don't know what happens when we die, if there is a God then he made me who I am and he'll understand"...anyone who has lived this life understands. Family that prays for you, or flat out doesn't believe you. The whole "You're too good of a person not to believe in God" - (yes, that's a real example. On more than one time, too.)
What I don't understand is using the veil of science and technology to hide the fact that athiests/agnostics have an axe to grind. In the comments of the advent calendar, many went to religion. There are comments along the lines of "God is amazing" and "The glory of the Lord shall be revealed." Now I can be as sensitive as the next person when it comes to religion, but are the comments from the athiests/agnostics really necessary? Here's a quote - "it is so sad how ignorance is so alive in the world that when religious nuts who simply can't comprehend such great images see past what is there, and instead start babbling about God and creationism."
Again, I don't know what this particular author was responding to, and honestly after that I didn't read all the comments, but...seriously? Where's all that tolerance that nonChristians so rightly crave? Calling someone a religious nut because their gut reaction in their experience with something so majestic is to call it God? Excuse me, but that is the beauty of faith - to fill up with wonder and awe. Most people who have religious affiliations that they truly believe in look for just that experience, and I think it's wrong to deny them, just as it's wrong to deny me my awe not affiliated with a god.
Athiests/agnostics are crossing their own lines into intolerance by calling everyone a "nut" or implying that they are stupid for believing in God. Faith is not inherently tied in with intelligence. There are plenty of smart people on both sides. The anger there at being persecuted cannot be assuaged by becoming the persecutor.

Tuesday, December 9, 2008

Still not Spam

I'm not a very nostalgic person. I remember things about the past but they seem distant, like they never really belonged to me. Sure, I went to high school, but I'm not that person anymore. I was in a relationship for 10 years, but I'm not that person anymore either. I have this increasingly long continuity of memories that add together but aren't quite the sum of their parts. It's incredibly frustrating how fragmenting depression can be. I've been working on controlling it for as long as I've known the word, yet all I seem to do is make myself into different versions of myself like combinations to a padlock I can't open yet. I've given up thinking there's a solution. For me, there is only coping every winter and trying to remember all the tricks that worked from the last time to keep me from losing my job, killing my relationships, and getting suicidal. It's not easy, especially since depression both impairs memory and concentration.
My mind is a mess. Since this blog is degenerating into me complaining about my life and not focusing on putting my thoughts out there, I'll sign off for now.

Friday, November 28, 2008

Blog lockdown

I'd like to "thank" Blogger for locking my block for a good week and a half so that I couldn't post. Apparently mentioning Obama qualifies as spam to their bots.
I'll post again when I have something interesting to say. Just wanted to whine in my blog about the outage.

Thursday, November 6, 2008

An Open Letter to Obama

This is from one of the teeming American people, underrepresented, who came out in droves to elect you. You're the first presidential candidate who won with my vote. My first experience with elections was voting for a candidate who won the popular vote, but was not elected president. I have watched with scorn and contempt these past 8 years as concepts such as habeas corpus, civil rights, separation between church and state, foreign policy negotiations, and peace were summarily ignored by the ruling elite. I have watched the presidency turn from a position that should carry some sort of dignity into something that other countries mock alongside us. I have watched the decline of America.
All this sounds grim, and it was. I say was because honestly, until yesterday, I didn't realize there was another way for the world to be. It's only the renewed spirit that is permeating the air that causes me to realize what a prison we had put ourselves in. You ran on a campain of hope for the future, and when I look around me now I see that hope in the air, in the joy in others, the open way that people are speaking to each other. You have brought hope, at least to a blue state.
I hope this carries over to conservatives, gives them something to rally behind besides what has become the status quo. I hope they can see you as a man of faith who does not act to exclude, but to embrace different ideas and creeds in the hope that together we can forge lasting bonds and a stronger nation. We need each other for balance, and to exclude one side is to risk an uncontrolled spiral, a descent into darkness. Moderation is key in all things.
History has a way of making idealists into martyrs, though, and I worry. Maybe it seems silly for someone who doesn't know you personally to care, but I see your family up there with you and I worry that they won't see you at their graduations, at their weddings, in the same way that JFK was not there, MLK, Jr. was not there. History has taught us to fear the lone gunman, yet there are more guns in this country than college graduates.
Perhaps this letter has gone on too long, but it is a time of change, of uncertainty, and that cannot be summed up into short sentences. But it is also a time of hope. Thank you for that.

Wishing you the best,
LH

Monday, October 13, 2008

Education vs Political leanings

A friend sent me some interesting articles written by conservatives decrying the Republican shift...not away from traditional values, or free economy, but towards the undiversified undereducated masses. It's interesting to think of that as a conservative Republican crises; after all, much of their party is the traditional, bootstrap, free economy do it for yourself mentality and I can see that leaving a lot of people behind. What's interesting to me is the idea of an educated Republican mindset, a responsible mindset who uses well-reasoned facts to govern instead of just traditional values...remember, the first president I remember was Reagan and the first was I knew was the Cold War. Republican values haven't represented reasoned, rational interests to me in quite some time.
One of the editorials mentioned the liberal bias in colleges, which caused me to rethink that idea. Until now, I had figured that liberalness came as a product of being educated - that you would be more open-minded and willing to cultivate diversity and less traditional mindsets. It's caused me to rethink this - it's true in a way...Conservatives are more likely to go for the self-made person approach and spend their time in corporations where their own ingenuity is rewarded rather than an institution where they are rewarded by the growth of others. Liberals most of the time have an idea of giving back and enriching the individual, while Conservatives tend to put those impulses into caretaking - feeding the poor and homeless through church initiatives, donations, etc. Therefore a college campus and teaching would have a broader appeal to liberal minds than conservatives.
I think for me it has come down more to depth of perception of the individual. It turns me off to hear a factoid rattled off by some talking head who equates the zeal they support the idea with to the facts of the debate. I can't say that liberals or conservatives have the edge on this front (Sean Penn comes to mind) but I can truly say that a well-reasoned person probably comes closer to moderation than any other leaning, and I wouldn't mind having four years of that...or eight...or twelve, rather than electing someone based on how well they can quote sound bytes that put me at ease with them.

Thursday, September 11, 2008

Politics

I don't need to remind any American what day it is. Too many posts are spent looking back...I choose to spend this one looking at the state of things right now. Wow. I've been reading the news, and the comments below the news, and it always seems to make me want to blog. I mean really, are we as a people so divided on basic facts (evolution as a science, abstinence education, Iraq as a war from God!!) that we cannot sit down and discuss what should be ideas with a basic sense of humanity? It seems to me like the more political spin gets put on things, the less it becomes about what our leader will do and more about who they are, what they're wearing, how they're going to uphold our deeply held values.
Honestly, I want the government to stay the hell away from my deeply held values. Less government. There, I said it, and now I sound like a libertarian, but it's true. Bureaucracy is known for how deeply they can screw things up - why do I want more government laws? They're not passed in my best interests (hello exonoration of the phone companies who did the phone taps, hello Patriot Act, hello TSA and their incompetence) so why even waste the money?
If government were truly acting in our best interest and upholding Christian values or whatever the hell they call it, they'd stop legislating and start doing. Make it a part of being a congressman to get out there and do public service. Volunteer for soup kitchens, build houses, work in a medicaid office. Those are the public servants and they work damn hard with what little budgets they get.
I am a realist. I don't knock people who have religion - faith is a beautiful thing. But that's not the realm of government, and never should be. After all, most Christians would detest having a government-sponsored religion such as England, where the ruling monarch is the head of the church. Why would you even have the hubris to assume that you know what God wants in our government? Why is God in the government so important to the basic population of America, such to the point that the Republican party is now the Faith party? It doesn't make sense to me. Is this still the conservative backlash for the liberalism of the 70s?
This post probably doesn't make sense - I'm tired, and all this is touching on a very complicated topic: why people base their choices only on themselves. It's one thing to use yourself as a reference point, but has American individualism come to such a point where the "other" guy is no longer even of any importance? If so, I can see it coming from our culture quite clearly, but is there any way to use this "moral" streak the Republicans have capitalized on to do something besides make a lot of corporations a lot of money? Face it, that's what they're doing. Feeding America the bible on one hand and lining pockets with the other. But have we become too selfish to see that as a bad thing?

Thursday, September 4, 2008

Naievte

I'm not sure if there's a place in the world for people like me. It sounds so juvenile to say that statement, but the more I come across in life, the more it keeps me wondering that same thing every year I'm alive. I'm not very competitive, I'm cooperative. I don't like the idea of being afraid of things I don't know about and trying to legislate them away. I'm usually the first to admit that I'm not an expert on a subject but I'm very prideful of my intelligence (and yes, I looked prideful up to make sure I was using it properly...details are important to me.) I was just reading a few articles on Boing Boing about the Republican National Convention on how some of the "rioters" might have actually been hired by the police to instigate news opportunities and another post on an old comic that was done against homosexuality. It's not really the items that get me, it's more the people that defend it in the comments. Does it make me a hypocrite that I wish to beat down those beating down others?
I think it's probably because I'm moving on psychologically, developing into the next level of awareness. If I remember right from my classes, it's about now that you start developing a community membership, having developed your individuality in your teens and your support structure in your 20s. It's all very strange. I wish there was a myth for today, for how to grow and progress without all this worry. If all is true, then we are remaking the same world our fathers and grandfathers made and so the social dynamic isn't too terribly different. I don't believe our mindset is too different from the Renaissance at this point, except that in America the government isn't representative of God like Queen Elizabeth was thought to be. However, many people think that the President is there by God's will, so that doesn't make it too different.
Humanity has made it through those times. I don't suspect we will end ourselves with these. It does leave the question though - how far into the dark side will we get before we come back to lighter times?

Tuesday, August 5, 2008

Post Secret

For anyone who's had their head in hole for the past few years, Post Secret is a site where people send in postcards of the secrets that they can't tell to anyone else. It's supposed to be a liberating experience. I'm not sure - I don't really keep secrets. I have in the past, and they usually come back to haunt me, usually because I'm lying to cover them up. So while the site interests me, I've never had anything to send in. *cue dramatic music* Until now. *duh dun dunnh*
It's not exactly a secret. Everyone in my life - hell, anyone who's even read my last post - knows what's been going on in my life. The problem is that it's driving me into another depression; again, this isn't a secret. Depression changes who you are and it's not exactly like the people around you won't notice.
My secret is that it's driving me towards a nervous breakdown and that I'm fighting it as best I can. It's just hard to fight the enemy that is yourself, and with depression breaking down my defenses, it makes it that much more difficult. But I like my job, I don't want to give a bad impression and I certainly don't want to lose what I do have in my life. I've been trying to stay active - today was the first day I called in late to work and honestly it was one of those duh moments ("oh yeah, I sleep more when I'm depressed" - you'd think I'd remember by now) that I hope to avoid in the future. I will try to start making it to the gym and eating right, but I'm afraid what's going to drag me down is the emptiness. I need human interaction. But I am fighting the urge to contact him tooth and nail. It won't help, but it still hurts. Everyday.
At any rate, I should actually get to work. It's busy but not enough to keep my mind busy...gym is definitely necessary.

Tuesday, July 22, 2008

I am in pain

(No words can describe it, and if they could, you probably wouldn't want to hear about it.)

"He that loses his conscience has nothing left worth keeping." - Coussin

Monday, July 7, 2008

Blogging is a job

I treat this outlet more as a journal than a place I really expect people to read. After all, most of the things I put into this are things that others wouldn't get about me. It's hard to find people who can discuss politics and comics, philosophy and video games. There are a few out there, but in practice it makes a better curiosity. It gets old not having people understand you. Or maybe they do and I'm just not very interesting. Whatever the case, it makes for frustrating conversation.
I'm disappointed again. For me, it's something that colors every aspect of my life when it occurs, and it occurs too often for my taste. It's just a friend, who I thought the world of, isn't what I thought he was anymore. I believed the best in him for a long time, and I think that best is slipping away.
"We do what we must, and call it by the best names." - Ralph Waldo Emerson

Tuesday, July 1, 2008

Psychology of wasted potential

Human psychology is one of the most interesting fields there is with such a squandered potential. Psychologists don't study the complexities of the human mind; at least, not if they make money. They study drugs for problems that are created by society and prescribe those drugs. Sometimes they might actually talk to you to see if you have a problem, but more often than not it's just a precursor to getting out the prescription pad.
Don't get me wrong, sometimes with chemical imbalances and schizophrenia and real genetic disorders, there is a need for those drugs. I should know; I'm currently classified as type II bipolar, and have struggled with depression since I was a child. However, psychology as a field, the way the mind interacts with the body and society, what forces shape who we are and the choices we make - totally wasted. After all, lord knows "generalized anxiety" is something we've all felt from time to time, yet it gets more attention than the fact that on an evolutionary scale, our brains are still living in caves and we have every right to feel anxious in our society where one slipped word at work can lead to political repercussions and sometimes loss of employment. People aren't allowed to make mistakes anymore. Our brains, with their hormones and chemical synapses, aren't prepared to deal with the deluge of information that gets thrown our way. And emotions? Forget it - no place in the modern world, and it's wearing on us. Where are all the studies that deal with this? I read somewhere, probably in the works of Joseph Campbell, that myths were the tools that guided our transitions in life, from childhood to adulthood, from adulthood to parents, from parents to elders. It informed us what was expected and let us prepare ourselves mentally for that change, and they remain important changes even in modern culture. We need modern myths.
Wow, this is a ramble if I've ever seen one....

Thursday, June 12, 2008

Work and Fear

I'm about to head into a lot of work. Coming from me, that's no small statement. While I tend to whine more than the men I know in my life, it doesn't diminish my capacity to work hard for a long time. As we speak, I'm on my 11th day in a row of working (as in 58 hours last week) and I have a major exam to take this weekend. I think if I were to be measured against laziness, I would at least come out on the positive side.
The main difference is that this work is uncertain. I've not done a lot of uncertain things in my life; in fact, that's where I tend to quail the most and find excuses not to do it. But this is unavoidable, and must be done, and I must find a way to do it. It's my Master's Project, after all.
The thing that strikes me the most is how much possibility it opens up. I'd forgotten the freedom of not telling myself no all the time. It might be a disappointment, but it just might be wonderful, too.

My charge to you, my nonexistent readers - go out and do something that you don't think is possible. I need company in this, for me, uncharted expanse.

Sunday, June 1, 2008

Indiana Jones is dead

An icon is dead...yes, it's true. Henry "Indiana" Jones, Jr. has died a horrible and merciless death at the hands of the money-grubbing Evil Elf and the Spielberg doppelganger. Gone are the days when Indiana Jones sought treasure to help mankind, or knew the wisdom of leaving powers that are beyond you alone...no, in his latest adventure he retrieves the treasure and gets...married. Yes, that's what he gets out of it. Of course I get the heavy handed "knowledge is important, knowledge to cherish the one you've always loved" idea behind the script, but by the time it made it to the screen it had been puked on so many times and rolled in money that I don't think it shined the way it was originally intended. Oh, and Shia LeBouf swings through the trees like Tarzan.
I can't say enough bad things about this movie. To know that they spent ten years on this script and this is what they came up with is just agonizing. Indy talks too much. The plot is terrible. I mean.....aliens? Aliens, for god's sake? And for anyone who thinks I'm giving something away, I'm not. The movie starts out with an alien body in a crate in Area 51. You think it's going to be cool, you think they're rewarding you for knowing that the Ark is in a crate but no...it's a f*cking alien. Sure, you see the Ark for one shining second....and then you're out rolling around in a NUCLEAR EXPLOSION in a goddamn Frigidaire. Did I mention the gophers?
Everything about this movie reeks except for the chance to see Marion in action again, and even that isn't as fun as it could be. Here's a tip to make it better: STOP MAKING HIM TALK SO MUCH! I swear Indiana Jones turned into my grandmother in between these movies - I'm surprised he doesn't go on about what he had for lunch at some point. Speaking of time in between the movies, did they talk enough about crap you're never going to get to see and people you'll never know? It's like they're planning to fill in those movies later when the Evil Elf perfects his digital technology and they can make a younger Harrison Ford act through a computer. Also, you can't fire someone with tenure - that's the whole point of tenure!

I writhed in agony during this movie. Indiana Jones was my dream man. I used to play like I was him in the backyard growing up. Thanks, Evil Elf, for taking a huge shit on my childhood dreams. And if you put "I've got a bad feeling about this" into one more movie, I swear I will find you and punch you in the face.

Thursday, April 24, 2008

Fucking pathetic

I wrote a long letter to my ex this morning and I couldn't send it because of how pathetic it seemed to me. Why are you hurting me, change please -- I mean, good god. If he was any kind of man he would do it on his own. Why does he need a fucking letter to remind him to be a good person and have some goddamn compassion?
That's what 10 years gets you, ladies and gentlemen. A pathetic whining mass who has plenty to get done but takes an hour to write a letter that's absolutely useless. Problem is, I don't know how to let go. I've honestly tried. Problem is that I don't know how to fill the gaping void he leaves in my life. He's more than just a romantic interest - he's a mentor and a role-model (at least professionally) and is the smartest man I know. I wish I could keep those parts and discard the romantic interest, but all of those things wrap up together for a truly wonderful experience. So what brought the trouble to Paradise then, you ask? Simple - he's a cheater. A big liar. An egomaniac who can't make decisions based on anything but his own wants and needs. Right now he's living with his ex (not me - the one he cheated on me with) so that he can save money. He was supposed to move out in January - he's still there and it's almost May. And yet somehow I'm supposed to believe that he cares about me and still loves me? Sad part is that I try really hard to believe it because it's what I want more than anything - to have that wonderful experience all the time.
When I was younger I had a best friend we'll call M. M and I had some pretty strange things happen to us, some of which I can't explain to this day, but the whole time I wondered if it was a lie. Eventually, growing up led to us parting ways - she moved on and I didn't. It strained our relationship to the breaking point because I still wanted the wonder. I think she got tired of it, maybe she got tired of me. The point of this is that I tend to fall in with people who lie to me, or at least put themselves in less than credible situations, and I believe them. Then once they're done they try to move on and I'm still stuck. Or in this case they keep stringing me along and I can't break free.
I'm beginning to wonder if real life will ever hold the joy for me that I want it to have. Everything hurts right now. I feel like a teenager all over again, powerless to change the things in my life that make me unhappy.
I can't think of any snappy lines or good sentences to end this post. You'll just have to go on without it.

Thursday, March 6, 2008

Writing again - woo!

You might think I mean here, but instead I'm talking about the long set of stories that I haven't finished and have never published. I counted up the words the other day and I actually have enough for almost two novels, with a third one by the time I fill in all the gaps, finish the current storyline, etc. There's a lot that's happened with the character (I've been writing these since I was 13 or so) and a lot that needs to be cleaned up and rewritten (again with the 13-year-old) I almost don't want to go back and change all the old stuff even though it's pretty embarrassing how immature the writing was. It's almost cute - I'll never be that naive again, at least on the topics I write about. I worry that my work won't really have an audience - it's almost like a written-out comic book, and about that level of sophistication...well, Frank Miller level of sophistication maybe, with aspirations towards Alan Moore. It's got sex that's not whitewashed or described in such appalling terms as "manhood" and "honey pot" and a lot of violence. A lot of violence. There is a quote by Oscar Wilde that says "in every first novel the hero is the author as Christ or Faust" and I think I've managed to make my hero into both. I've also got another set of stories in the works that I'm up to 8 parts on, another 2 stories that are in development and an idea for 2 more that never have gelled at this point but sometime in the future will turn into stories.
Wow, if I keep this up, I might actually be an author one day. Although I must relate a tidbit that I find amusing. Fuzzy and I were sitting around on the couch and I was grousing about a parking ticket that I got and how I needed to make more money.
Me - "I need to find a way to make money that doesn't take up anymore time."
Fuzzy - "You could sell a couple of stories."
Me - "..."

Sometimes the obvious is the hardest to grasp on your own. That's why you need good friends. Thanks to all my good friends who have supported me on this. Maybe one day I'll be more than just a hobbyist with a penchant for dialogue.

Saturday, February 23, 2008

The Drugs Like me.....

Things have been better since I was put on medication. I'm pretty sure I'd be non-functional by now by the way that I feel now. Unfortunately, now I have reasons for it. My oldest friend Dr. Jones and I are in the middle of some strange power struggle, where on one hand he has his extraordinary busy life and living situation and on the other hand there is ...well, me. He's stopped answering his phone around some people, and to me that's just insulting. It would be different if he were to call back later, or answer sometimes around that person but not other times. Nope, a consistent shut out with no regard for my feelings or even my understanding.
I get the feeling I'm being lied to. Again. It's the worst feeling in the world to think that the person you trust the most doesn't respect you enough to tell you the truth. Things just aren't adding up though.
Bitterness is like wasp stings - it adds up until the entire skin is painful and you go into shock.
It makes me sad to know that it has come to this.

Tuesday, February 12, 2008

I don't write very much

If I wrote more often, perhaps maybe there would be an audience for this blog instead of me talking and ranting to myself. It's okay, though; I've been through a lot lately.
Depression is the mind-killer. I don't have depression where my life sucks and I think everything is worthless - I have the kind where my brain decides to throw a switch and stop producing chemicals I need. I stop sleeping well. Eventually this wears on me and I get irritable and anxious. This in turn wears away on the chemical production in my head - just like sleep deprivation - and I start to withdraw. I'm not the most outgoing person to begin with, but I am friendly...until I get depressed. Then I don't want to talk to anyone. Work is hard to get to on time. Every responsibility drags down on me until I feel like the only things I can manage are going to work and breathing. I stop eating properly. I don't do my homework.
I'm sure this list is boring to everyone else, but this is what you would get if I was blogging for the past three months. I go to a doctor tomorrow, but I don't expect a miracle cure. I've been on four different medications, each one cruel and worse than the depression. I don't think we should mess with our brain's chemicals lightly - but at this point I have to go if for no other reason because I cannot make decisions right now and people close to me think I should go.
At any rate, I wish all of my nonexistant readers well. May you never go through this.

Saturday, January 19, 2008

Political rant

Holy shit...I just got done reading an article about something that Bill Clinton said - the way they spun it, you'd think he was tearing the heads off of reporters - and the comments underneath were outrageous. I mean, are we actually allowing people who make comments about "Bill needs to stop lying hurr hurr" to vote for President? I can't relay to you the depth of things that didn't matter that were being brought up on the messages below; Obama playing the "race" card, Bill being president again; entitlement, lying - I mean, this list is even more coherent than the actual comments were. I think the thing that really got me was that some loser posted a comment to the effect of "I'm starting to see what the Republicans were talking about...I'm voting Republican"
BLACK AND WHITE ARE NOT THE ONLY COLORS, PEOPLE!
Just because one party points out a valid fault doesn't mean that they're right about everything else. Yes, Republicans have a lot of good ideas - if they didn't, there wouldn't be a Republican party because no one would vote Republican. You don't see anyone from NAMBLA running for President and getting votes, do you?
America has got to get over the duality - we need a third party. Bring back the Whigs! Put some Torries in our government. Give people a different perspective. Too bad Nader can't get a real campaign going...I mean, like mainstream.
The other thing that bothered me about the comments of our nation's voters was just how much they brought up the Clinton's "lying liarly lies" as if the current administration was any different. Hello? War crimes? Our entire Presidential Cabinet could be brought up on war crime tribunals in the Hague if any other country really had the guts to prosecute. It's like GW is a nonentity to everyone - NO! You fuckers voted for him - you should be reaping the absolute humiliation of propagating genocide and corporate greed. It's your fucking fault...none of this bringing up Monica and Watergate - a white stain and a sham marriage is nothing compared to an endless war that is taking away any prosperity our economy has and slamming us into recession. Canada has a better currency than we do right now...WTF!? How do you sleep at night, America? Your off-base comments and five-second span of attention are symptoms of a deeper pathology...you don't care! You still have a home, and a big fucking gas guzzler of a car, and can dispose of anything you wish because it will be magically carted away - you're only going to wake up from your apathy when its too late, when the environment is ruined, when you're broke and desperate, when India and China have taken away all the professional jobs and America is left with an overeducated team of McDonald's workers.
All I ask is this; pay some goddamn attention to the real world. Not just the news, because the news lies. Look around you, watch how people operate, listen to the debates, listen to Al Jazeera, listen to everything AND THINK! The only thing that's constant in this world are people. Become a good judge of people and everything else will be easier. Pay attention to something other than what party lines are, who wore what, who prays to who. Stop being led around by your religion; it belongs in your heart, not prostituted out on the corner. Stop letting them do that to you, faithful people! The measure of a man is his actions, not a seat in a pew. Stop confusing morality and status.
The only thing that can be worse than this president is if you people vote in another quasi-religious nutjob who'll screw over the constitution and the country for a profit. Democrat or Republican. NO MORE APATHY!