Category Archives: History

I never got my wish

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LiveJournal 4/6/2003 –

Well, surprise surprise surprise! It turns out that the US Military can’t find any of the much dreaded Weapons of Mass Destruction after all. So I can’t help but wonder why we are in Iraq? Oh yes, to free the people from their oppressive regime, so we can give them the same benefits of democracy that we’ve become accustomed to -=cough=-. The entire operation is starting to show it’s threadbare bits – why didn’t we just let the Iraqi people lead their own civil war or wait for their despotic leader to simply die of old age? First we beat the shit out of Afghanistan, now we’re bitch-slapping Iraq. I can’t but wonder what sandy oil-rich nation is next? Perhaps Saudi Arabia, they have a monarchy ripe for democracy, since Weapons of Mass Destruction is now a thinly veiled bid for popular re-election (er, re?) I can’t help but wonder what new excuse our proud and upright Misunderestimated Presidentiary will come up with next? We certainly have fallen off the beaten path when it comes to these wars:


Korea
Drugs
Illiteracy
Homelessness
Child Hunger
Terrorism

It’s definitely not manly to leave such wonderful opportunities for bloodshed unexplored Mr. Bush! I hate to state this of course, but wouldn’t the image of American and British troops flooding over your country while you were a small, impressionable little boy, watching your house and local hospital blow up because someone told someone who overheard it from someone else that there might be someone wearing black clothes somewhere in the vicinity of a city block from where you live – and that this psychological trauma, mixed with the notion that the United States needs to legislate Christian prayer during a time of war lead any small Iraqi boy to contact their nearest French or Jordanian weapons dealer, strap as much C4 as one can carry without tipping over and walk into something very fragile, like a fuel depot loaded with US Servicemen? Oh goodness no, our war for the “Hearts and Minds” of Iraq will be utter and complete I’m sure… I’m sure all the dead Iraqi fathers will be sure to tell their sons not to regard a white man in desert kahkis as someone to throw kerosene at… after all, dead fathers raise such balanced children. I just hope that the witless fool which is our esteemed President understands that while concentrating on his buff and raw masculinity in “Dealing with Saddam once and for all” that we’ve let all the other wars we need so very badly to identify us as Americans fall by the wayside and rot:


Kim Jong Il, case in point.

How many of your friends are hooked on something easily obtainable and dangerous?

Ask a random American to find two places on a globe: America and Iraq, then spin the globe and ask them to find China as quick as they can.

Our stunning Economic Boom has relieved us of the terror of unemployment and potential homelessness. The men and women walking around downtown with everything they possess in a shopping cart stolen from a supermarket are merely actors put on stage to remind people just how lucky we are to have such a caring and effective President when it comes to matters of Domestic Policy.

It’s been forever since a caring and well-educated Mother asked to trade her WIC and USDA food-stamp payments for Cigarettes while her svelt child looked on with pride and happiness.

By scarring the people of Iraq with the experience of War, we have saved them from the long drawn out agony of some sort of lengthy and dull diplomatic solution to the question of Weapons of Mass Destruction that, heh, might not really be there. I’m sure the proud and stalwart citizens of Iraq will have a good belly laugh about this whole thing once the US has established that we have won and that it is over Vietnam, and quite like the Vietnamese, welcome us with open arms and endeavor not to randomly explode busloads of Christian missonaries and the random US Embassy on accident.

Mr. Dubya Bush, YOU THE MAN!

I look forward to ANYONE ELSE in 2005! 🙂

Who's Hungry?

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LiveJournal 3/30/2003 –

Man alive is it chilly out there! I just got back from doing something I haven’t done in a long, long time – went down to the park and fed the ducks. However there bears a correction in that I wasn’t absolutely surrounded by just ducks but rather some geese and a cadre of very bedraggled squirrels who weren’t sure I was actually feeding them or throwing dirt at them, dumb squirrels. So I went down to the edge of the parks pond/lake and immediately when I rustled the plastic Meijer bag it was like someone rang the dinner bell, I was approached very cautiously by ducks, geese, and perhaps a gosling – I couldn’t be sure. The law of supply and demand at work was fascinating to see, drop a entire slice of bread in the water and immediately female ducks paddle over, quacking the whole time, taking nips from the males and even challenging the geese – these are some ballsy ladies. I of course as a human had to throw the entire shebang off it’s balance point by flooding the “market” with supply, even the most sickly looking male got at least a nibble. I was down to half of what I came with and I walked over to this very short concrete pier and I heard this chittering sound, turn, look down, see one very audacious squirrel just sitting on his haunches staring up at me with his hands out – it was so endearing! I put my hand in the bag and the little squirrel started to move off nervously until I brought out a huge chunk of whole-wheat hamburger bun, I tossed the entire bun right in front of the squirrel and he made this happy little squealing noise, grabbed the bun which was nearly as big as the squirrel and started munching away. I left with nearly half of what I came with and decided to save the rest for some warmer day when I can gather a bigger group of avian guests. There is this wonderful feeling from knowing that one single act, tossing stale worthless bread to the wildlife, could possibly keep a few of them alive and that it was a vastly superior thing than simply tossing the bread in the trash to rot.

Way Too Effective

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LiveJournal 3/26/2003 –

As I was reading Salon an idea crossed my mind, as it has for the past few days and especially when I hear about war coverage on the news. That the Coalition forces are SO awesomely advanced and powerful that we can’t seem to keep our enthusiasm for killing in check and that we may have killed more of our own accidentally than any Iraqi can? Of course not, in an age of advanced information technology it’s unthinkable that a Patriot Missile Battery would be obliterated by a United States bombing plane only after the Patriot system targeted the US plane first, or that two British tanks would attempt to destroy one another because they thought they both were facing the enemy.

I’ve got images of Redcoats and Hessians running around Yorktown with their underwear on the outside of their trousers while the American Colonist Rabble stab themselves with bayonets mounted improperly.

We are a nation of idiots, but a well armed bunch of idiots we are! 🙂

Meyers-Briggs Personality Inventory

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LiveJournal 3/23/2003 –

Your Type is
ESFJ
Extroverted Sensing Feeling Judging
Strength of the preferences %
1 11 44 44

Description of the ESFJ:

Guardians of birthdays, holidays and celebrations, ESFJs are generous entertainers. They enjoy and joyfully observe traditions and are liberal in giving, especially where custom prescribes.

All else being equal, ESFJs enjoy being in charge. They see problems clearly and delegate easily, work hard and play with zest. ESFJs, as do most SJs, bear strong allegiance to rights of seniority. They willingly provide service (which embodies life’s meaning) and expect the same from others.

ESFJs are easily wounded. And when wounded, their emotions will not be contained. They by nature “wear their hearts on their sleeves,” often exuding warmth and bonhomie, but not infrequently boiling over with the vexation of their souls. Some ESFJs channel these vibrant emotions into moving dramatic performances on stage and screen.

Strong, contradictory forces consume the ESFJ. Their sense of right and wrong wrestles with an overwhelming rescuing, ‘mothering’ drive. This sometimes results in swift, immediate action taken upon a transgressor, followed by stern reprimand; ultimately, however, the prodigal is wrested from the gallows of their folly, just as the noose tightens and all hope is lost, by the very executioner!

An ESFJ at odds with self is a remarkable sight. When a decision must be made, especially one involving the risk of conflict (abhorrent to ESFJs), there ensues an in-house wrestling match between the aforementioned black-and-white Values and the Nemesis of Discord. The contender pits self against self, once firmly deciding with the Right, then switching to Prudence to forestall hostilities, countered by unswerving Values, ad exhaustium, winner take all.

As caretakers, ESFJs sense danger all around–germs within, the elements without, unscrupulous malefactors, insidious character flaws. The world is a dangerous place, not to be trusted. Not that the ESFJ is paranoid; ‘hyper-vigilant’ would be more precise. And thus they serve excellently as protectors, outstanding in fields such as medical care and elementary education.

Screws in the Past

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LiveJournal 3/5/2003 –

While reading the New York Times online, I came across an article relating to the upcoming war in Iraq, about how shocking Iraq may lead to a short war. This quote caught my eye: “He said disarming Iraq would define victory, not capturing or killing President Saddam Hussein.” Allright, so, simply disarming Iraq is what we are after, then is this a war or is it just mopping up after what we tried to do in 1991? Won’t this be just like a can of worms, sure, we can clip, nip, and tuck Saddam’s forces here and there because all of a sudden they threaten us with their WOMD (Weapons of Mass Destruction, which by the way is nearing complete hyphenation because it’s quickly becoming a cliche phrase) but wouldn’t that be rather silly? I mean, if we’re just after weapons then technically Iraq becomes a unwilling manufacturer of WOMD, selling their wares to us by trading expensive WOMD for aerial bombing? I get this intense feeling that we aren’t going to actually listen to anyone else, ie, the United Nations, but we’re going to forge ahead like the brainless oxen we are, missing out on dealing with the reason *why* Iraq makes WOMD and doesn’t want to play fair like all the other disarmed lands out there, like Angola, France, and North Dakota. That by simply bombing Iraq we can “spook” them into behaving properly, ie, the way we want them to. How likely will the Iraqi’s be in finding agreement with the United States out of fear of some future bombing attack? And how do we feel if Iraq suddenly turns on terrorist organizations and fights the “War on Terror”, will we ignore their WOMD just like Donald Rumsfeld did in 1983 when Iraq was at war with Iran? Curious…

Yesterday I was talking with my mother and another thought occurred to me, that The Gulf War was just like Vietnam. We didn’t really win anything, we just declared it was won, declared our intent to be finished with it, and left. If proper wars are to have an ignition, a duration, and some definite conclusion then we haven’t had one of those in quite some time. We apparently have another kind of war, one with ignition, building, and lame-duck wobbling away. Another thing just now, if there is a definite and clear winner, doesn’t that make the loser feel like post WWI Germany, wouldn’t that lead to the contributing factor of WWII, ie, make the loser so sore they have no choice but to pursue some grander scheme?

And we’re still ignoring North Korea. Gah… we’ll treat the Koreans with diplomacy yet we’ll bully Iraq when the clear and present threat is just the opposite! 

It’s a good thing that presidents have terms and those terms are limited. I wonder how close George Washington would be to considering forming a militia and taking that boat ride across the Patomac River… Dubya is the best thing to happen to the GOP in years, I hope they reap everything they’ve sown.

Rosewar Chronicle

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LiveJournal 3/1/2003 –

I broke down and did it. I printed out the website for the Rosewar Chronicle, the Changeling Game that Scott is running and that will be playing later today. I’ve started with a highlighter and the NPC list and I’m carefully marking down key bits for my character to know and now I can put faces and names to what they did. However it does feel very much like an Agatha Christie novel, I keep on expecting a Trod to open up and Poirot to jump out with the stock phrase “I know the culprit!”. Of course that will never happen, Scott doesn’t make it *that* easy. I think that maybe this time if I know who is who and what everyone is referring to by being able to read it all up while we play I can be more “into” the game. I suppose all my years of regarding D&D players as unsociable pale number freaks will have to erode away – there is just some limits to how “into” the game I can get.

A movie quote has been bouncing around my head these past few weeks:

“Life is suffering your highness, anyone who says differently is selling something.” – The Princess Bride.

Anyhow, moving along, Ryan has to sleep and I can certainly understand, I’m the walking dead myself. Tomorrow will be great fun, here’s to early game starts and not passing out. Maybe I can wrest control of the entire party and exercise my early game playing will on them all. Hah, my character leading… terrifying.

Grow Lights

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LiveJournal 2/13/2003

What I remember from last nights dreams don’t add up to much at all. I was back in Buffalo wandering across a grassy field in front of fraternity row. I had tickets in my hands to watch some kind of field sport played between two teams and the “gist” of the game was “the fighting eagles”. I turned to the first open field I saw and I saw people playing a field game, and asked someone at random who was playing and their response was “the buzzing mosquitos”, then the scene went all wobbly and I could see a whole series of fields going up like a ladder, each one expressing some type of larger conflict. I’m not too sure what was at the end, wether it was indeed the eagles or the flying wooly mammoths. After that dream I slipped into another one in a hardware store, where everything was covered in a fine dust and the clerk behind the checkout counter was so old and stationary as to be covered in the same layer of dust, all that was moving was his big white eyebrows, as if he was dreaming. I asked him if he had any grow-lights for plants and he beamed, ran into the back room behind the counter and came out with a dozen boxes all containing a grow-litebulb for plants. He commented that nobody wants them anymore and he starts to scrape off the old pricetags, $90.95 the stickers say. He puts them all in a bag and hands them to me like it is some kind of gift, then I pop awake right after that.

Power Outage

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LiveJournal from 4/25/2002

It’s a sunny april day and I’ve decided to take today off sick, primarily because I haven’t been sleeping well as of late and secondarily because today looks to be so great outside and I think I deserve the little break. 
Last night a monstrous cold front moved through the area very quickly which brought with it some massive winds, up in the range of 40mph and up. Evidently these winds were strong enough that when I went to go pick up Scott at work last night at 11:45pm I found myself driving down Westnedge Avenue on a city block that had no power running into it. It was such a surreal experience that I felt compelled to write about it today here in the journal. It was a strange feeling, driving into a zone of darkness left the impression of nothing new but rather the new feeling of something absent. It was ephemeral, like something just oozing out the side of consciousness, the feeling was fleeting and spry but if you tried to ignore it it would dash back in front of you and play around. All of the buildings looked so terribly strange, as if by extinguishing all the light they became the true empty shells that they really were. This lead me to the idea that all the attendant lights, the floodlamps, the little nightlights and the perpetual glow from fluorescent tubes all created this kind of fuzzy zone of intended purpose, that these buildings could spring back to life at the flick of a switch. Instead what I saw and felt was rather a nagging impression that these buildings would never be lit again, or at least they never would be lit in the same way as before now that I saw them robbed of their background personalities and exposed for what they are, cinderblock loneliness covered in plastic and asphalt.

All that's old is new again

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LiveJournal from 2/11/2003

Dull meetings abound, but alas, they are done. I’ve started my weight loss regimen in order to ultimately lose “1 small child” from my overall weight. I’ve decided on replacing two meals with Slim-Fast (which doesn’t have such a horrible aftertaste if you get it very cold and then chase it with water just afterwards) and two snacks in the middle of the day. The first snack is a D’anjou Pear cut into sections and 1 yogurt, then the afternoon is 1 Navel Orange cut into sections (ripped), and 1 yogurt. 

I’ve got a theory that no dietician is actually correct, that they are very much like blind men wandering around an elephant, each one noticing small bits but nobody really understanding the whole. I suppose what is supremely disturbing is that human beings don’t completely understand how human beings digest food and metabolize energy, each “dietician” has their own little gimmick and each one preaches something different. If you were to follow the food pyramid on the back of a loaf of bread, according to present conventional wisdom, you’d expand like a zodiac dinghy because of all the carbohydrates. Others seem to value one kind of energy over others, the all fat camp, the all protein camp, and the all onion-soup-and-cabbage camp. 🙂 I’ve decided to give up Soda-Pop mostly because after I started to read the analysis on the back of the canisters I discovered what I pretty much knew but chose to ignore – that soda is very much liquid candy. I’ve turned to fruits and vegetables to provide the small boosts in bloodsugar that help me stay awake and functioning at work and trying to pare down the amount I eat without really worrying about *what* it is that I eat. I figure as long as I’m not snarfing down logs of lard soaked in bacon fat and butter with a rod of pure cane sugar running thru the middle I think I’ll be ok. My problem with diets that many people are on is in the overall stress they have at having nearly zero selections other than this one type of foodstuff that isn’t as popular as your average American Fast Food Item and then railing at some idea that if you were just faithful to the diet it would work, you can’t injure an idea no matter how angry one gets. While on my diet I haven’t lost any weight however I am getting smaller, so I have this fanciful notion that all my working out (carido, 10.8 miles of biking) combined with the shift and regularity of my food intake may mean that I am gaining muscle mass and losing fat mass, then again, maybe not. I must also consider that I am a slave to my setpoint, that I can try to lose weight but my system will just reject it and preserve where I am for as long as it can, and there in lies the awfulness of diets – how to break thru so you see progress. Doctors have told me that an adult human male who is 6’3” must consume 2500 calories to remain alive, however I consider that I’m doing quite well on 800-1200 calories a day and nothing seems to happen. One other thought along with this is some kind of overall spooling effect, that indeed I’m changing my body chemistry and raising my metabolism and there will be a day when my body decides, “Fine, to hell with this…” and starts shrinking.

I suppose in the end short-term results are always going to lead to some type of heartache because for me a diet isn’t something I have to try, it’s got to be a radical shift in how I perceive food, a long-haul approach. The biggest hurdle deep down in my mind is the ability to let food go, to either box it up for later or leave some behind – perhaps for many of us there is a karmic pressure to never leave a plate without it being cleaned because at one point we died starving and vowed we’d rather die of being too fat than being too thin. Now we get to my question for those that are still with me and reading, I’m faced with a small decision, here it is:

I have a membership to a “Health Club” (used only in the most tangential of definitions) that will run until August of 2003. This place is 1/2 ok, 1/2 abhorrent, they have proven themselves to be a pack of liars and lazy dullards and their management is knitted together by an ever changing pile of “kids” trying to make something work that really isn’t. Would it be wiser to purchase a membership with the University Student Recreation Center (SRC) for $75 and simply let the other place go to expiry and forget it, or would it make more sense to use what already exists in the University to my advantage. The benefits of the SRC is that it’s CLEAN and managed by people who at least are bound to the rules of the university. If I do choose the university would it be better to pay outright or trade Sick Leave for access, even tho trading Sick Leave alters my W-2 withholding slightly? I’m leaning on going to the SRC but since I have this new journal I thought perhaps input from my readers would be a valuable source of opinions.

LiveJournal Import…

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Scott suggested that I import my LiveJournal to my WordPress Blog. I have to see if I can back-date the entries or maybe I’ll just write up entries and put the dates in the blog post itself. Should be quite interesting and a jaunt through my past, Paris is in there, both times we went, and my liberal ravings about Shrub-ya is also in there as well.

I also have to start getting my Traverse City Wine Extravaganza posted on here as well. So much to do! 🙂