The new laptop

My mom got a new laptop, (what I'm using now), which compared to mine, is like a supercomputer. I discovered a program on it that allows one to make movies.

Like this short thing I put together.

Mathoms

Remember, gentle readers,

When it is late on Christmas Eve.
And all the stockings are hung by the electric heaters with care.
And all the stores are closed.
Let the reader be aware.

That mathoms make excellent Christmas presents.

The Neuter Scooter

I got caught in traffic beside a large truck with paintings of multi-colored cats and dogs the other day. The truck was called 'The Neuter Scooter.' Probably the brain child of some depraved veterinarian.

The animals were smiling and laughing, and having a good ole time being unable to reproduce after their own kind, then again, this might have been what the furry creatures looked like before the vet showed up.

I like vets. It might even be said I have a bit of a crush on one un-named female vet with blond hair who lives in a neighboring state, but I'll not go into details lest she read this post.

Working eighty hours a week is not conducive to good blog updating. Nor is it conducive to non-blog dating. I have a hunch it's not even good for blog-dating, dating blogs, or debating something that rhymes with og. . .frogs, logs, dogs, clogs???

But I can assure you Jason will be writing more in the future.

Oui Ski

It's all in how you look at it.

If you're from Kentucky, you drink it or need spelling practice.
If you're from France, you head for the Alps.

Earlier today, my sister was robbed at gunpoint and told to celebrate the season for giving by emptying her cash register.

Alas, some people do not celebrate Christmas. Thursday, a short, squat, hump-backed little fellow with long pointy beard, little hair, and beady eyes. . .one may have been a marble-I'm not certain. . .came to fix one of our office computers. The little dwarf-like creature said he did not celebrate Christmas, instead, he and his wiccan wife celebrate Yule, which occurs on December 21st.

"We're pagans," he said

I truly felt sorry for the guy. Imagine being married to a witch who doesn't celebrate Christmas, but Yule. . .reminds me of mule.

Because I felt the need to do so, I changed the subject and said,

"I know a man."
"You do?"
"What man?"
"The man with the power?"
"What power"
"The power of hoodoo."
"Hoodoo?"
"I do."
"You do?"
"I do. . .know a man. . .with the power of hoodoo."
"Hoodoo?"
"I do."
"You do?"
"I do."
"You know a man with the power of Hoodoo?
"I really do."

It was a really long conversation and this is just a paraphrase. Or rather, many phrases. My favorite phrase comes from the book of Proverbs. The one that says,

"Arise from your bed of sloth o' thou sluggard, and consider the ways of the ant."

I mentioned this to an un-named co-worker who does not know the meaning of the word 'diligence,' yet considers himself or herself to be a paragon of virtue.

I wish I had a camera then.

And no, the little pagan never could fix the computer.

Waxing Crescent

This is what the moon is doing now-waxing crescentlike. Which reminds me, I should wax my car. Do people wax cresecently if they stand out in the sun too long, or is this a phenomenon strictly limited to heavenly orbs? I should like to know. The current writer's strike is a good thing. Most of what has been written was not worth writing, or hearing, or seeing, so perhaps all these striking writers can practice writing-or at least read something worth reading. Something like The Watchers, by Dean Koontz-what I'm reading now. A most bizaar book involving a super-intelligent golden retriever and a mutant baboon, also with great intelligence. Intelligence is the mark of an high society, a smart society, a cultured society. When asked what he thought of Western Society, Ghandi said, "I think it's a great idea. Somebody should start one." I went to CostCo this morning in a western society-one on the east coast. I saw a woman there who was skinnier than Ghandi. . .anorexic embodied and personified. Most freaky seeing a human that skinny.

Blogging on 4 hours sleep. . .

can be rather difficult, especially as the current time is 3:17 AM EST.

But press on I shall in the hopes that something coherent will come from these purple hands of mine. Yes, they really are purple. I'm wearing purple nitrile gloves and typing from a chemistry lab. The store only sold purple gloves in my size, so I really had no choice, except white. And who wears white gloves anymore?

Dumbness and Stupidiousity

Let the records show I an completely insane and drug-free, Your Honor.


I'm not complaining about Society, merely observing. But has anybody else noticed how incredibly stupid most people have become over the past decade?

Anybody?

I think the average national I.Q. in this country must be about . . .87. And I'm being generous. If you are a 47-year-old man and make $7.50/hour digging ditches, and you have a college degree in chemistry, somewhere along the line you've made a wrong career choice.

If you eat Big Macs everyday for lunch and wonder why you're sick all the time, not to mention being clinically obese, and try to give me 'health advice,' please do not take it personally if I take what you say with a grain of salt.

Somebody is messing with the water supply. Perhaps it's all that sucralose in the drinks we consume. Could be people have rejected God and now live in a constant state of repression, where what they're repressing is common sense and logic.

A hundred years ago, the literacy rate in the US of A was near 100%. Today, if you find somebody who can spell 'receive' correctly, consider yourself fortunate.

(No Mikey, the Himalayas are NOT in Oregon. I've told you that before. Sheesh.)

Sacks and Ashes

Attention world:

Jason will not be blogging today. He has a migraine and is still in mourning over WVU's loss to Pitt. Currently, he can be found sleeping in sackcloth and ashes and weeping uncontrollably. If you still wish to contact His Royal Highness, call or e-mail and send him gifts of food. He prefers Papa Johns over Dominoes and anything Chinese that does not resemble large chunks of phlegm in chicken broth.

Thank you for your support.

Me

The Mourning After

Last night was one of sadness for WVU fans.

(I cannot believe Pitt won.)

The only thing we had to do was beat that Pittsburgh team with the ugly uniforms to go to the national championship.

(I simply cannot believe Pitt won.)

I'm not one for conspiracy theories, but I think that Pittsburgh team might have snuck in a few Pittsburgh Steelers into their defense.

(That game didn't really happen last night.)

13-9 was the final score, ESPN tells me. It was like 60,000 guys had just broken up with their supermodel girlfriends. . .simultaneously.

(I'll just close my eyes, and wake up. . .)

According to my previous post, 13% of adult conversation involves cursing.

(Pitt won? Surely you jest.)

I just discovered a new curse word. It has 4 letters.

It starts with a P, and ends in a T. . .I'll let somebody else finish this one.

&*^$3@k)8!!!

13% of adult conversation involves cussing.

Among college students, the rate is 8.1%.

Part of the reason is that college students talk much more than non-college-attending adults. I cannot remember the last time I cussed, even in my mind. Like Swedish, it's simply not a part of my vocabulary. Sometimes, when I'm alone, I get irritated with somebody just thinking about them and mumble something like,

"You low-down-worthless-good-for-nothing-motherless-pusillanimous-piece-of-vacillating-slug-dung..."

Or something similar.

I don't usually use the word dung in everyday speech-mostly crap-as I feel this covers a greater spectrum of the fecal family continuum. Other words come to mind such as spate, feces, guano, bio-waste, and . . .what's that popular one?

It begins with an s, and ends in a t.
It comes out of you, and comes out of me.
It's pretty darn smelly, we all agree on that.
Scientific people refer to it as. . .

Scat!

That's it. What I'm thinking about, (as I'm sure you are too O' Gentle Reader). Scat, followed by an exclamation point, is unique in having the two-fold purpose of being descriptive and scaring angry dogs, used car salesmen, Jehovah Witnesses, and thirsty hobos at 7-11, away.

I like scat-not the smell, of course.

Scat is also remarkable in that, spelled backwards, can be pronounced as taxes.

Most interesting.

Just because you have a good intention, does not mean you have a good idea

For example:

This afternoon I put some sealant on my camper.

Alone.

Bad idea this sealing camper alone.

Especially as I was sitting underneath it inside the bed of my truck.

Fortunately, I was able to escape from this self-imposed trap and call somebody to help finish this little project.

Busyness

"And what have you been up to lately, Mr. Puddleglum?" I asked myself recently.

"Working 60+ hours a week, you know, being busy."

Work 16 hours-a-day for weeks and you find yourself not even thinking, just reacting. Reacting like an animal on the plains of Africa. Working is part of man's nature, rather, to produce something is man's nature. But if you're just working ridiculous numbers of hours to make money, well, that's not good. When man works many many hours, it is best if he does what he was made to do. A farmer should work farming if that's what he was designed to do. If Farmer John decides to market Amway to rich Chicago socialites because he can make more dinero, he's made a bad decision. I've made a few bad decisions in my life, nothing really terribly bad, . . .still, any bad choice is a bad choice. Spending too many years in college is a bad choice. . .a waste of precious time. Time is valuable, and worth more than money. There is a time and season for all things.

I cooked a turkey on Thanksgiving day and now, much of it's remains are in an enchilada mixture sitting pretty and orange on my stove. I'm not sure why I said that, but felt like it needed saying.

What else? Hmmm. . .West Virginia University should be playing in the NCAA national championship, and they should. I'm not saying that because I went there for 8 years and grew up near Morgantown, nor am I saying that because the head coach went to my high school, and I'm certainly not saying that because my last girlfriend moved to Missouri. I think they really are the best football team in the country.

This week-end I watched a good bit of TV. Watching was a bit of a shock to my system as I've not done the TV watching thing for nearly a decade. I was surprised by the coarseness, language, vulgarity, and poor writing/grammar of the programs. It seemed nearly every show was obsessed with image and sexuality was always present. The camerawork was much better than I remember from the 90s. But the special effects were a bit annoying.

The big-boned Baptist girl with lots of inner beauty and a thyroid problem

I met her in the doorway of her parent's house. . .the blind date that is. I don't know how many blind dates I've been on, but somebody should give me a seeing-eye dog.

"Hi! This is Betsy. She's what we call special. "

I spent the night under the impression Miss Betsy was from Eastern Europe. A unibrow, larger-than-normal brow ridges, a thick accent, and a constant desire to mutter led me to believe Eastern Romania, perhaps the bad section of Bucharest. Later, she told me she was from New jersey and English was her native tongue. I acted shocked, but acting was never one of my strong points. Betsy didn't seem to notice as she did most of the bragging talking, especially about her new bifocals. Interesting glasses these bifocals. They were made by the same company that developed the Hubble Space telescope. As the night wore on swiftly passed by, it became evident that this wonderful woman had led a remarkable life the past 40? 30? 20 or so years. She had met famous actresses and world leaders, traveled to exotic locations, helped discover the Titanic. . .just fascinating. Only she kept blinking alot and when pressed for details she became fuzzy with a difficulty for remembering exact dates. At midnight, I implored God Almighty mused on whether or not she would turn into a beautiful frog. (I would have said toad, but everybody knows. . .toads are male, frogs-female.) As this would be a step up in the beauty scale. Don't get me wrong, but on a scale from 1-10, Betsy gets the negative square root of 2.

Memo to self: e-mail that Richard Branson's daughter

I should say the night was not a total loss, as it makes a pretty good blog entry.

(OK. So, maybe the above short never actually took place-but it could have.)

Apparently, I'm a junior high blogger

Get a Cash Advance

Night(s) of the Comet

I was wondering what that really bright thing in the sky was. It wasn't Jupiter.

Demise of de Mad

The following is an un-edited version of how my mind operates when writing at speed on a blog post. It's not grammatically correct, and even makes little sense at times. It also contains incomplete sentences and ideas to insert later.

One of the 1st signs of an over-analytical mind going mad is excessive talking to oneself. They consider themselves (bad grammar-I know) so wise, that nobody else can fathom their wisdom. They ramble on and on, muttering incoherent nonsense, counting mysteriously. I have also observed that they frequently are obsessive-compulsive over mundane tasks, i.e., they like to count things, straighten out cabinets, read CNN.com 20 times a day, or never walk on the black tiles at work. They're frequently jumpy and become nervous twitchers, who can't seem to look you square in the face without blurring their vision or averting their eyes when you look at them.
But talk, they must, for this is man's nature-to communicate (even with one's self.)

Over time, they become less articulate and mumble a lot. They obsess over trivial details and are prone to obsessive-compulsive behavior. . .like repeating the same basic thought, over, and over, and over. Excessive hand-washing comes to mind. It's not unusual to see them work at dull, repetitive tasks, far below their natural abilities, to allow their mind to wander and daydream. Over-eating causes them to concentrate on their body and forsake their spirit man-which is to give up their humanity. Now, they are ruled by their flesh-not unlike an animal.

Later in Life, they become so lost, they cannot think clearly. The flesh is so dominant-all decisions are based on these base desires-all thoughts. . .cannot control the flesh. . .want more and more. . .always more. . .like Gollum.

Always seeking, never finding.
Always hearing, never listening.
Always studying, never learning.
Always thirsty, never drinking.

The cravings of the flesh increase so that NOT knowing Right from Wrong becomes a dominant function, and is replaced by a system of Preferences bases on societal norms.

They become unkempt.

These preferences (says the fallen society) is explained or rationalized as Normal Operating Procedures for a human. Since the majority of the mob thinks and does like this-it must be so. What is now Normal, is the old Abnormal. The Abnormal is now the Normal, and any 'deviants' are considered mean and unrealistic. Gone and forgotten is the true nature of man,the true man, though sometimes stories of the past arise. Perhaps as a myth or a legend with the characters having superhuman-like abilities.

Preferences, as societal norms, can harden into law-like entities, but are by their nature, subject to change. . .elastic and subject to revision-they're elastic. This is one of the signs. For a true law does not change. It is valid for all cultures and for all eras. So, you really can say humans are evolving. Evolving, and it is a fact. I think that one can tell another all the facts, but still be lying.

How?

Giving all the facts of a situation does not necessarily equate with giving a true perception of Reality. And still, some laws can be superseded by other laws. Spiritual laws trump Natural laws, but in a fallen creature, the fallen creature must obey the lesser laws-even if it is against their wills. C.S. Lewis said if one neglects the Law of Prudence while walking on an icy sidewalk, one must obey the Law of Gravitation.

The one thing I always do, no matter how fast I write, is I ALWAYS correct my spelling. I will put a thought on hold and actually go to a dictionary if need be. But that is rare.

Southern Fried Arsenic

He killed about 60 people.
He went to medical school.
He was on 20/20 with Barbara Walters.
He worked in the very same laboratory as I do.

I'm glad he's in prison now.

Nada

If anybody reading this blog is more tired than I am right now, I do not believe you.

That is all.

Time to rest.

And sleep.

Dragon Skin

I have become a dragon.

I picture you, O' Gentle Reader, sitting on your chair thinking, "Hate it when that happens."

The rough, dry, crusty, scaly skin drives me mad, but it protects me. It's not really me. Deep down inside the beast is a man. Like the grain of sand in an oyster, the deposits formed slowly year by year until the man was fully encapsulated in reptile skin.

The cave.

I am a nocturnal creature, one who lurks at night when all else sleeps. Living on my bed of gold, my hoard. making more money than I used to. . .but rarely sleeping. I don't consider it much money. . .but more than others.

Do others notice the dragon?

An aside: Do you ever get the feeling that you-the real you-is much bigger than your physical body? Lets say you're laying in bed and you get the feeling you're actually 2-3 feet beyond the confines of your flesh. . .as if you're bordering on an out-of-body experience, but not quite there. I have never had an out-of-body experience, nor do I want to.

The dragoning process started years ago. I think in my mid-20's.

Another aside: I have been thinking recently about why I write so much. Hopefully, it's entertaining. If somebody ever has opportunity, they can have a psychologist analyze me. I'm sure he would have a heyday. Not that I'd agree with his diagnosis. . .but it would be fun reading.

In college, I spent more and more time studying and less and less time with my friends. It was not unusual for me to get up at 5 AM and study 16 hours straight. Usually, I'd take a break and run a few miles to maintain fitness. I became obsessive compulsive about knowledge. I had to know everything about everything. I studied biology. . .Life. During this time, much as I hate to admit, I grew more arrogant. Knowledge breeds arrogance when God is not involved. The metamorphosis from man to beast had begun.

With each passing semester, I accumulated more and more dragonish thoughts. . .more knowledge. Soon, it took more than biology to satisfy my desire. I read like a mad man. Everything from philosophy, to Creationism/Darwinism, psychology, health, literature, apologetics, ancient history, to you-name-it. Well, not quite everything. I never (and never will) read or looked at pornography. That is something I would never do. (I might be somewhat crazy, but I'm not stupid.)

I refused to watch television and saw my friends only about once a week. My skin grew rough and a rudimentary tail started forming.

I grew increasingly condescending with D, C, J, and the others. When we did hang out, it was generally them chatting and me listening. When asked my opinion, I would start lecturing and purposely use long words they didn't understand. I grew impatient and increasingly irritated by their peevish inability to see the obvious. I spent more time in my cave and retreated in my mind to solitude. I embraced the quietness. I got lonely.

My good friends were excellent and warned me. I recall one particular incident when T came over and wanted to chat. Wanting to study (who knows what. . .microbiology), I answered his questions and basically shooed him away. Dragons are dangerous creatures who excel at wit and are keen for knowledge. They live in caves far from others and sleep on beds of gold. They're selfish, but rationalize it by saying things such as, "that's OK. We're not like others. Ours is a high and lonely destiny."

To make matters worse, I began to lose my ability to listen to people. More opportunity for solitude. Reptiles don't listen well, but their vision is keen. When one sense becomes dull, the others (sight, taste, touch) compensate and adapt. I'm much more intuitive now. My dragon wings sprouted. I soared. I flew to Asia and spent a month in the Land of Dragons. My wings were longer.

In time, the dragoning process became complete. The rough, dry scales, (what is another name for dragon skin?) . . .knowledge. Knowledge is power. Few dare approach a powerful dragon.

But something is happening to me right now. I won't always be a dragon. A man with pink fleshy skin who likes people and enjoys company. What is happening is that the dragon skin is coming off. It's not off yet, it's coming. I feel it moving, heaving. Already my human skin has detached from the reptile and now I am encased in this great mass of dragoness.

Style

More people should read this book

misc.stuff.randomly.generated

3:54 AM

The very current time.

I am awake.

"Why?" I ask myself. "Because it is my job."

3:55 AM

Still awake. Typing. Looking at what I just typed. Want to sleep. Cannot stand to misspel words. Too impatient to use spellchecker at the end of post. Must delete entire word and spell it right. Can always see a mispelt word. Irritation. Tiredness. Thirstiness. I drank over 30 ounces of water in the past 5 hours and still dreadfully thirsty. Must be the salt from the spaghetti eaten earlier. Always must add chili powder to the can of spaghetti sauce. For who can eat it otherwise. Some do.

4:04 AM

Cold. It is cold in Virginia Beach now. In the 50s. Fahrenheit. Cold and dark. Cold and dark and dank. Wonder if the fellow at 7-11 got a new battery for his rusty van? I tried to help him. Honest. Tried to jump start his car. Nothing. Told him he needed a new battery. Did this knowledge move him? Who knows? He ran out of gas at 7-11 and told me so. Said it wasn't the first time it happened. The van had no tread on the tires. The guy wandered off to McDonalds and came back. Why did he go to McDonalds? Did he have a friend there? Do not know. Do know the guy wasn't the brightest light bulb.

4:11 AM

Cold. Still cold. Vaguely. . .anticipated something. Close to time to leave. Elvis will leave the building soon. I see a black chair. A dirty old thing that fallen humans have spent much time in. It reaks of evilness. Reminds me of slime. Dark things. And toads. There is something about the black chair that reminds me of a toad. An unclean reptilian thing. Not inherently good. A fallen creature. It should be burned. And the ashes buried in the Earth.

4:16 AM

Nose is cold. Not as cold as it was earlier. Warmer than 5 minutes ago. Thirstier. I ate ice cream this afternoon. Reeses Pieces ice cream with chocalate fudge, and in an edible waffle bowl. Heated it up in the microwave to make it easier to eat. After the spaghetti. And the hamburger and rice and italian dressing. Got the Italian dressing yesterday at Farm Fresh. Like Italian dressing. Not fat-free Italian dressing. That's bad. Bad taste and bad as in unhealthy bad. Detest fat-free food. Sucralose. Bad. Kills puppies. And maybe old people. Seniors should not eat sucralose. Bad. Unhealthy. Typing that last word just reminded me of salty peanuts. Mysteriousness. Such a long word with a limited meaning. God is such a short word for the infinite. As is the word 'sea.'

4:21 AM

I posted on this blog today. Somehow I feel like an astronaut in 2001: A Space Oddyssey. Like Dave Bowman. INTJ. Like the Keirsey temperament sorter. Puddleglum is an INTJ. Jason is an INTJ. 1% of the population is an INTJ. C.S. Lewis was an INTJ. Katherine Hepburne was too.

Hell, 48169

I found Hell, and it's a small town in Michigan.

No lie.

Click here to go to Hell.

Suffering

Suffering, I think, is one of the signs that an afterlife exists.

It it possible to be completely satisfied on Earth? I think not. This tells me we we're made for another place and time. We're like embryos, biding our time until we can become fully human.

It would be a strange world if humans got hunger pangs, but no food existed.

Tuesday morning. 330 AM. Current time. Have not slept-really slept-since Saturday night. Have taken some extended naps and worked nearly 30 hours so far this week. Amazingly-not very tired. Caffeine and chai tea, you know. Not really tired, more like a full body malaise. The mind is not tired. It's on auto-pilot. Cannot stop thinking-fast. Not eaten much either. Just want to stare out the window at the moon. Still at work. Always at work. Saturday. Something strange. Watched TV for 45 minutes.

Description of the table beside me: black ebony surface. @50 glass bottles of pulverized coal that can fit through a 60-mesh screen, a bottle of Benzoic Acid for calibrating bombs, compressed air can, one metal spatula, an ancient radio that Tertullian might have used, 2 pens, one pencil, half a book holder, dust, 3 notebooks explaining the intricacies of bomb calorimeters (interesting reading, btw), two more notebooks containing the scribblings of some co-workers (they might be alchemists), some biotech magazines, a calendar with train pictures. I should mention that inside the table, one can find a dozen or more packs of condiments and probably a plastic knife. . .and a pez dispenser (a silver kermit-like creature that boxes).

History

It seemed the world was divided into good and bad people. The good ones slept better... while the bad ones seemed to enjoy the waking hours much more.
--Woody Allen



In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.

A little later he created man in his image and placed him in what is now present-day Iraq.

The man fell asleep naming all the animals, so God made another person and gave it curves.

Now, men sleep a whole lot less and hardly talk at all.

Twins

Do what you've been designed to do.

I met a man who, for the past 25 years, has been under the impression he is a horse.

But in the meantime, it's a good idea to work your day job with diligence until you can do what you been created to do full time.

Only he's not Mr. Ed, of course. He's not even a horse at all, though sometimes he gets hoarse.

For if you don't work your day job with diligence, and do just whatever is necessary, co-workers will despise your laziness.

He likes to talk alot-too much, in fact, and spends much of his work time on the phone-pretending he's a horse. . .or a yak.

His name is Woody Cedar-not his real name. We call him Cedar because he smells funny. I don't think he knows that.

Yep, 25 years, and still, he wonders why people don't recognize his horsey equine nature.

People who practice what they're designed to do, do not have to tell people what their gifts are. It will be self-evident over time.

I told him perhaps he's not really a horse, maybe just a jockey or even a horse trainer. Alas, he got mad and neighed at me.

Naysayers come and naysayers go. So, better hold on to your dream and not tell everybody what it is.

Woody Cedar wants a raise.

There is a good reason why the Master gave the lazy servant only one talent. He knew what the lazy creature was worth. . .knew his abilities and inclinations. Though the Master was called Cruel, he certainly wasn't stupid-and he was rich.

Do you think Woody Cedar is a horse? He is obsessed with Quaker Oats and sugar.

Apple trees produce apples, pear trees produce pears, and strawberry plants produce strawberries.

Confused???

Madness

Madness is most definitely the end result of an over analytical mind subject to extended periods of solitary. NASA, or some private space company, on a mission to Mars would be wise to keep the astronauts busy with extremely complex tasks to forestall this insanity. Like it or not, an atheist should never be sent to the red planet. A married couple would be best as two men or two women would kill one another.

Looking for evidence?

Who do you argue with the most growing up? Most likely your siblings, as they're the ones you spend the most time with. I know from personal experience that what is a slight irritation with a co-worker can, and does, eventually lead to thoughts that best not be published online as. . .certain things can be taken the wrong way by those looking for. . .perhaps I should stop here.

The spaceship must must contain an area where one can go and be alone for as long as necessary. . .for peace, and quiet, and solitude. A place to be alone with one's thoughts and. . .let's see. . .a soundproof room would be fantastic. (A soundproof room would be great right now). The ship also mustn't contain weapons as it is almost inevitable one will be tempted to use them to, say. . .to smack the co-Mars-traveler over the head to stop his. . .singing?. . .hand-clapping?. . .(great! now he's pointing at the wall and heckling!). . .and , um, dancing. Did I mention I'm writing this (wrote this) blog entry late at night at work in the same room. . .with others. Yeah, stress. Now..I'm feeling it. Yep. Apparently, Jason does have a breaking point. . .and has emotions, and can under extreme duress be. . .forced to. . .I think now I should make myself busy. . .Thank God I can clock out soon. I would hate to post my next blog entry from prison.

Life at 33

Another thing I have found in Life @ 33,is the more analytical one's mind, the harder it is to make decisions based on what your spirit says. If one is a Christian, one should endeavor to make all important decisions based on your spirit, which is really using your intuition as it (should be) in sync with the Holy Spirit.

I suppose if one is not a Christian, one must rely on the mind, to a certain extent, but even then, all Life decisions would be a hit-or-miss affair at best, or lead to madness at worst. For when a predominately analytical person goes through Life, inevitably they go mad. It's the logical endpoint of the sum of all their decisions.

Why?

Because leading an existence with your spirit out of phase (to use a physics term) with the Holy Spirit can only be meaningless, as only Order can come from God.

Order is part of the intrinsic nature of God. To act out on one's own. . .to not be on the Spirit's wavelength. . .leads to inevitable chaos.

Once a writer wrote an epic novel, such a good novel the characters seemed real, though Reality was much more than the created people fathomed. . .or could fathom. The characters even had something called Free-Will, a two-edged sword. They could go through the story doing what the writer intended, or go off on their own way based on their perception of reality using all the facts of life they knew. Though some of the more noble characters knew all the known facts, they didn't know all the facts for not all the facts were known and remained hidden-for it amused the writer to do so.

Once, one of their seers, a son of a king and well-learned in all the known facts, forsook all and lived in the desert for 40 years. Then, the author wrote himself into the story and told the seer to return to the city. Though he did not want to do so, he complied. The seer happened to be the most humble man on the Earth. . .but perhaps the reader already knows this story.

The more analytical, or logical, one becomes without the Holy Spirit, the more Creativity declines. This is the nature of the universe. The ancient Egyptians could tell you that the bigger, the better, does not necessarily lead to the good life. Hieroglyphics and the Chinese system of writing (the one used before the Pinyan system that was based on characters) are examples of the bigger, and the better, and comprehensive systems leading FROM creativity.

At a future time, decisions will be made on intuition. . .on one's spirit. Humanity will function as one organism, like a colony of bees, or cardiac muscle, or. . .what else? A body.

I have had enough apocalyptic dreams over the past few years to know a little more than most. Time forbids me now, but I think that in the future, we will have the ability to convert our bodies (mass) into energy (E), and move at ridiculously fast velocities through the universe.

We already know Energy and mass are incontrovertible. . .E = mC2 with c being the speed of light. Does this not make sense? I think it makes more sense than the inside of what a certain candy bar wrapper reads. . .substantialicious. . .the weight of something when you weigh it with your tongue. . .

If one has a body of pure energy, one can do some remarkable feats.

Travel through walls
Walk on water
Move from one planet to another without the constraints of flesh and populate new planets

Sounds like weird science fiction. . .or perhaps Jason's been spending far too much time alone.

I've not really watched TV in 7 years. . .scary.

Movin'

Moving, moving, moving. That's what I'm doing.

Something interesting. I advertised a combination washer/dryer on Craigslist two days ago. Out of the 400,000 people who live here (in Virginia Beach alone), the woman I'm selling it to is my sister's boyfriend's roommate's mom. She knows the guy quite well.

600 yards

As of yesterday, at 11:00 AM, we now live exactly 600 yards from the Atlantic Ocean.

I think God likes me. The place is a whole lot cheaper as I will be saving $300/month than the current place. I find it remarkable that for the past year, I had planned (in great detail mind you) on moving to Washington State, close to the Pacific. Perhaps one day, I will move there. . .I really want to. I miss mountains.

Unfortunately, I am blogging here at my former place, my sister is still at work, still has all the new house keys, and apparently does not remember where she put them.

And that is OK. Because the Chinese food was good and I found a buyer for this ridiculously heavy washer/dryer/noisemaker I've been trying to get rid of.

The Sloth that could. . .but didn't

If you tell a lazy person to do a certain task, don't be surprised if they do not do it.

Though you tell him time and time again, a stupid person will continue on in his stupidity for it is his nature. . .his fallen nature.

Words have no effect on the lazy man. In business, the lazy man should be told to do something twice, and if no change occurs--->fire him. This will lead to less aspirin consumption.

Beating him would work too, but I don't think this is legal.

If left to himself, he will continue on in his stupid ways and lead an unproductive and useless life, irritating others along the way.

One should not associate with the lazy and the stupid for they cannot help you achieve your goals in Life. Besides, they can rub off on you and affect your view of the world by tricking you into thinking mediocre is the proper state of affairs.

Sending a lazy person on an errand is like making a 4-year-old clean your car. . .frustrating. It is better to eliminate the dross, lest it contaminate the gold. For when gold, if dirty, loses it's luster and does not have great value.

If one works, must work, on a consistent basis with a lazy man, the thing to do is not talk in their presence unless necessary. Humoring them works well too. One should do the right and proper thing despite what the lazy creatures do. Perhaps they can change. You certainly cannot change them with words.

If after a time no change happens, then differentiate your work from their work. Somebody with sense might see the difference and reward the better.

Don't be surprised if this angers the lazy man. People without a goal have more time to mope.

Once there was a rich man who hired a lazy man. The lazy man, despite being his incompetence, was never fired. A precedent was established on what and what he would not do. When times changed, the lazy man did not, and became an irritant and a parasite to the company.

Parasites need living bodies to exist. The Healthy can survive on their own.

I must remember this when I have my own business.

Too much aspirin can kill a man.

Lets Go, Bananas!

For some time now, the alpha-female of the Hill-Airy clan, Lewdspeaker, waxed eloquent.

"No, you don't understand. We are not like other chimps. We have 5 arms, not 4."

"I only see 4 and a tail," said a slightly confused barn owl.

"How would you know. . .why, why, you're a mere bird. What you call a tail is really an arm. Hill-Airy apes have 5 arms. Why, we're the next step in Ape-olution. Our ancestors walked upright and grunted different. Nobody understood one another with all the strange dialects running about. Now. . .we all think alike, speak alike, and talk rite. (Because what really matters is more bananas.)"

Lewdspeaker's latest mission was to raise taxes to pay for bananas from the Northern Barbarians. For reasons no chimp could truly comprehend, it was cheaper to import bananas than growing them on a tropical island. The Hill-Airy apes debated this from sun-up to sun-down with the other beasts during banana growing season and knew their logic to be firm, water-tight, somewhat mysterious, but in perfect accord with the Commonly Reasoned Ape Principles (CRAP).

"Besides," said Lewdspeaker, "To explain it fully would require lots of higher math and statistics. . .the kind only us of the 5-arms can understand."


editors note: I am feeling very ornery today.

Turtles

"Good for pets and soup"
(Something I saw earlier and felt like sharing)

September is a quiet month, especially in the evenings. The hot August sun no longer beats down, the wind is calm, the air feels cleaner, the little ones are back in school. You can feel the cool Autumn coming.

And October, with it's pumpkins, Halloween, squash, football games, and cross-country races. September though, is the transition between green leaves and multi-colored leaves. I used to hate September, now it's my favorite month. It's slightly melancholic and makes one feel nostalgic about things past. Every other month I'm consumed with the future. . .the distant future. . .always have been. Both 10 years from now and 10,000.

Have you ever read the complete archives of a perfect stranger's blog? It is enlightening and one feels as if one knows that person. It's like reading the journal of a Confederate soldier, except this person currently exists.

Come to think of it. . .every person ever born is still in existence. Some are experiencing life-as-we-know-it, some are what we call dead. Among the dead, you've got the ones who are experiencing a reality greater than us human people still encased in matter and clamoring to get out. The other dead people are merely existing. . .in torment. A torment not designed for humans to endure, but endure they must. It has to be this way too. I would like to say that I wish the situation were otherwise. Is there still hope for these people? That is a question I don't know the answer to.

But maybe I do and simply refuse to think that thought. Humans know alot more than they think they know. . .you know? We all know more than we let on, but are limited to how much we can think because. . .why? We think with our mind, not to be confused with the brain. (they're separate you know.)

And still. Still the spirit of a man knows much more than his mind. Intuitive types. That's who they are. The prophets, the seers, new mother's have a ridiculous intuition about their newborns that men can only wonder about. It comes from carrying around this person for nine months.

I went to the mid-west, Oklahoma, almost exactly two years ago. Few people there compared to the highly-populated East Coast. You can stand outside and tell that there is a lot less people there and has been alot less people there. I think that one reason why when one goes to a land that used to be populated by many many people, one knows it. Something still lingers there. What. . .I don't know. It could be the spirits of the dead people brooding around the place. Kathmandu is like that. People have been there for at least a thousand years and still when one walks the streets, the very air is thicker than North America. Truth be told, I know more than humans walk those streets.

In the mid-west, one knows that one is far from any large bodies of water. . .like the ocean. I cannot explain why, but it's not because I didn't see any seagulls soaring around Tulsa.

Something else I have seen under the sun. Look at the world. The areas that have worshipped God are prosperous and more technologically advanced than other places. Even the places that used to, but have grown cold, are better off than the non-God-worshipping places. Indonesia is riddled with Poverty. India is riddled with Poverty. The Dark Continent is dark, poor, and poverty-stricken as well.

Iraq and Iran are desolate. Look at Israel. There is a difference. America should take note lest it becomes a continent-sized Mad Max land mass. She really should. The beginnings of the birth pangs have started.

Update

It's official.

I updated this blog today. Now my life has a bit more meaning than it did, say, 5" ago.

Have you ever come to a point in your life where everything seems to have come to a screeching halt? You turn around to see what exactly you've been doing for the past 33 years and wonder if you should have taken that turn at Albuquerque.

That is me now. . .as of 5:03 PM. Here, today, in the beginning of the 7th millenium of the planet called Earth.

Migraine

The good thing about Monday/Tuesday/and part of today's headachefest is I got caught up with much of my sleeping.

Building a wedding cake

My sister built a wedding cake last Saturday. A very time-consuming process.

Some pictures I took this past week-end while traveling to the great state of West Virginia.

The lawn mower my great white uncle blew up while trying to jump-start with a pick-up truck. (Don't do this)



Some fungis



Parents front deck



A cabin by a pond



Butterfly on a blue towel

Last week's Lunar Eclipse

Outside the window, I could see the full moon peering down at me like an old man. As the night grew long, it traveled from the left side of the window to the right. So you can imagine my surprise when at 5AM, I walked outside and noticed half of it missing.

AWOL.

Since I don't use drugs and felt fine physically, I figured it was either a lunar eclipse or the Day of the Lord. I remembered on the DofL, the moon would be turned to blood or at least an ashy-red color, and seeing as how La Luna appeared greyish-purple, I did not worry.

I went to Wal-Mart to not celebrate the end of the world and pick up a few things: Aquafina, Pepto, pop-tarts, 4 small bottles of some energy drink processed in a New Jersey chemical factory, and then noticed the moon completely gone. Nobody else in the parking lot seemed to notice the disappearance of our nearest heavenly orb, which is rather telling about modern American Society.

We need to get out more. By out, I mean outside.

Black Wednesday

The unthinkable, I think, has just occurred.

When I was 25-years-old, I started writing a book. Most of the updated files were stored on a small, black, flash drive laying here beside me on this white table.

I think the flash left the drive and now body lays here, dormant, comatose, incapacitated, perhaps even dead.

This is not a good thing.

Not at all.

A new post

It's 3:31 AM.

I am awake.

I am updating this blog for the first time in a week.

More will come later.

I promise.

And there will be pictures.

Monday, 27 August 2007 A.D.

Another day in the history of planet earth. What will happen today? Something significant to be sure. Will it go into the history books as a world-changing event? The Butterfly Effect says that the fluttering of a butterfly's wings in Indonesia can cause a hurricane in the Atlantic. Small changes affect everything. . .because everything is connected??? Perhaps. Everything on the planet is linked to everything else. For every effect there is a cause. Everything causes something else to happen, either directly or indirectly. . .which is how prayer must work.

This morning I ate two bologna sandwiches for breakfast and drove to a car dealership to see about a bumper they promised to fix for free as a condition for buying a truck.
I bought the truck to carry my stuff across the North American continent, but apparently that is not going to happen soon. I wish it would happen soon, but I think I know the voice of God, and the last time I moved across country (to Hawai'i) God told me not to do it. I felt the exact same tone of voice this time, only not as sharp and pointed. Now I have a hundred and fifty silver horses that need feeding.

What does one feed 150 horses? Modified corn and old plant remains, of course. What else?

It's going to be nice out today. I think I shall go running.

Washington State

I do not think I shall be going here as soon as I had planned. I simply don't feel quite right about this little journey I had planned in great detail. Something about it bothers me and I hate being confused and not knowing all the facts. Too many unknowns.

Some stuff about me:

I find it really difficult to not micromanage. I see other people at work, and when they leave, sometimes (I must admit) I re-do what they did because. . .you know, their results just don't look right.

When I have an opinion, and know I am right, only God himself can make me change my mind. And sometimes, He has to almost speak audibly to do so.

I find it terribly difficult to just help people, especially when others are more willing to step in. I either do not help, or do everything by myself. There is no in-between.

I detest incompetence and laziness with a passion bordering on fanatic. If I think somebody is one of these two things, I have been known to ignore them completely or step on their head.

Misspelled words irritate me to no end.

Memo

Dear You-know-who-you-are,

Do not use my weight bench as an ironing board. The vinyl seat was not designed for very hot temperatures. If you continue to do so, I will roast you over a pile of hot coals.

Thank you.

Me.

a non-rhyming poem-like word thing

Walking along the shore
Red sand beneath my toes
I shiver

That, my friends, is a Martian haiku

Trapped!

Trapped in Belbury.

This is how I feel right now. . .and no Jane either.

Some of you know what I mean.

Everything seems to be going great, until you meet the ghost of Whither.

The spirit of Whither that seems to follow you around and won't leave you alone. Try as hard as you might, you cannot escape. For how can one escape from a wandering spirit?

You simply go through Life on the path that lays before you, doing what you do, and then. . .everything comes crashing down. Or rather, slowly erodes.

Then one ceases being creative, melancholy sits in the seat where happiness used to dwelt, and Whither walks by. . .old man Whither. . .humming his dreadful tune. . .

Always humming.

After a time, everything becomes meaningless, like wind chasing. Nothing really matters, or so it seems. And one thinks that all one has done in Life was for nought.

Is it Depression?

Nope. It's a battle between the mind and the spirit.

Elvis is dead

Live with it.

30 years ago, the king of rock and roll died while sitting on the toilet.

No lie.

I was 3-years-old at the time and remember nothing of it.

Actually, he died 30-years-ago today minus two, but who's counting.

Uncle Buck

Uncle Buck

Ever see the movie?

I have an Uncle Buck.

Tis true.

In my biological family, there is a man who is classified as an uncle in relation to me, and his name is Buck. Actually, he's my great-uncle Buck, but I still call him

Uncle Buck

Uncle Buck has long curly red hair and a pointy red beard.
Uncle Buck rides a Harley and smokes a pipe.
Uncle Buck always wears blue jeans.
Uncle Buck lives in the mid-west and can play a banjo.
Uncle Buck does not wear ties-he wears bolos.
Uncle Buck likes to bowl.

Uncle Buck

A Light Paradigm Shift

Suppose that light, all the light in the universe, all the photons taken together simultaneously as a whole (this might be bad grammar, but hey, it's 3:30 AM), is really a single entity. And that when one measures the position of a photon, one is really measuring one aspect of light, when in reality, light has it's fuller existence in a higher plane of reality than ourselves. That is, light is in it's fuller form, in a higher dimension than us 3-dimensional humans. So when one measures the location of a photon, it is analogous to measuring one side of a crystal, when in fact, the crystal has many sides.

So, when you you perform your measurements using 3-D tools, from our perspective, what you measure is a 3-D aspect of light. This would explain all the mysteriousness of the famous double-slit experiments, and how every photon and electron seems to know the location of every other sub-atomic particle.

It's all the same creature. Make sense?

Castroleum Bonapart, the Carribean Sea-Monkey. . .

Coming soon to a post near you.

Farewell my friend

I'm selling my car.

If anyone wants to purchase the one and only turquoise chariot of Mr. Puddle E. Glum, he is willing to make a good price. . .$2,900 in U.S. dollars, or $10,000 Canadian dollars, and I will even consider pesos and Euros. Gold bars would also be nice, as would stock in Berkshire-Hathaway.

I washed it today in 107 degree weather.

It took awhile as the coin exchanger only accepted ones and fives and I had two tens. I went to the dollar store, not exactly dressed for public appearances as I was wearing a wrinkly white tee-shirt and had not shaved.

"But is not this how most dollar store shoppers look?"

Good point, and quite true, nevertheless I hate the unkempt grunge wispy look. Naturally, one cannot waltz into the dollar store without buying something, so I bought a half-gallon of Sunny Delight even though it has been known to change your skin colour from off-white to a semi-jaundice mustard.

I washed the car. It was clean. It was dry. Then it began to sprinkle. . .and thunder. . .and lightning. . .and then the passenger door opened as I was leaving the car wash. . .and then the open passenger door would not shut. . .seriously. . .The Sunny Delight was cursed, I am sure. . .so back to the car wash I go.

To spend the next 20 minutes fiddling with an extremely greasy metal clip that allows one to shut passenger doors. . .on a 107 degree August day on a busy road in the bad section of town with homeless people staring at the sweaty white guy clearly breaking the rules of car washes everywhere in this great land of ours that clearly state,

"No mechanical work of any kind on the car wash premises."

Fortunately, the only other human there was the owner of the car wash giving me sinister looks.

Pics forthcoming.

100 Degrees Fahrenheit

Current temperature in Chesapeake, VA not including the above 90% humidity.

I am in the pre-packing stages of my trip across the face of the North American continent in one month's time. This is where you pile up all your belongings in stacks to see exactly how many boxes you need to haul them in. I lost count after 40 or so which means some of the stuff will have to stay here, be sold, or given away.

Except the National Geographics. Some of these puppies are 50-years-old, and who throws away NG magazines?

Nobody.

Is it the yellow border? The pictures of naked Botswani tribal women riding zebras? The stories about 16-year-old kids that tour the world alone on their private sailboat? The Polar adventurers? The maps?

Growing up, I decorated most of my bedroom walls with National Geographic maps.

I'll have two cows, cover em' with blankets, and mate em' with pigs

Definition: cheeseburgers

--from a Dean Koontz novel (I think it was Odd Thomas)

Another must read.

Nope. Haven't been blogging much lately. Summer you know. Most of the blogs I read are pretty sparse during the dog days of summer.

And why is this?

More stuff to do.

Yoda am I. . .apparently

3:30 A.M.

That is the current time, or rather will be when I finish typing. On my lunch break now. . .what I consider a lunch break. I never eat lunch or any food on my midnight shift job. Merely, lots of water and energy drinks.

And now, a description: Running shoes, dark-green khaki pants, grey tee-shirt, light-blue lab coat (polyester), purple nitrile gloves, and sometimes safety glasses.

You won't find this motif in GQ or Cosmopolitan. You might find it in a biological supply magazine or National Geographic where they interview refugees from Yugoslavia. But it's midnight, in a chemistry lab, and few people know me. (I like the anonymity)

Life is not crazy, but will soon be. I feel it in my bones. The insanity started this morning when I felt the beginning of birth pangs of busyness. For now, I'm spending precisely every 7'35" inserting small nickel-cadmium crucibles into a 950 degree celsius furnace. Funness. I'll say that again. Fun-ness. Like Loch Ness, but without the monster.

Now

I have not slept in nearly 30 hours. I have a headache. I am starting to see things others don't. I hunger for food and sleep. I am starting to talk alot. . .a whole lot. It's what happens when I go for long stretches of time without sleep. I become talkative. I shall sleep now and read what I have written later. Who knows? It might be coherent.

Goodnight.

3

Number of samples I analyzed at work this morning: 3
Number of kidneys a co-worker has: 3
Number of miniature cinnamon rolls I ate today: 3
Number of bonuses I have received the past 3 years: 3
My age in years: 33

Cleaning some old boxes yesterday put me in a fit of melancholy. True, I have a melancholic personality, but this was an amplified melancholy. The goal was to throw away alot of stuff I really do not need. Things with a possible sentimental value, or rather, things that have the potential to jolt my memory banks when I am an old man living in Orlando sitting on a swing people-watching and alligator avoiding. (I should note that as I type these words, Austin Powers is playing on the TV and I have this annoying habit of looking at the screen which is quite distracting, especially when you're trying to type something for the masses.) So,so,so...perhaps I will write more later.

The 21st day of July, 2007 A.D.

While bathing today, it dawned on me that the lyrics to 'The Raven' by Edgar Allen Poe fit quite nicely with the song 'Knockin' on Heaven's Door.'

Earlier this morning, President Bush gave presidential powers to Dick Cheney for 2 1/2 hours, which might possibly explain that cold spell I felt this morning at work.

I have a headache now from a combination of formaldehyde, turpentine, house paint, lack of sleep, burning sulfur fumes, and no caffeine. I must be in pretty good shape since the pain is only mild. A puppy in my state would have died hours ago.

I am buying a truck.

Seriously.

I have not shaved in 3 days.
I am wearing earth colored clothing.
I just ate fried potatoes and instant gravy.

And, I have been hacking and coughing alot.

And this is because?

It puts me in the truck buying spirit. Unlike, say, dog-fighting, as the Vick family down the road should know.

Soon, I will have narrowed my choices to 3 or 4 models.

And then. . .?

Then, I will lift some weights, cough and grunt, possibly put a toothpick in my mouth (if I can find one, and decide.

In running news: Nothing new under the sun. Jason is still trudging 4-6 miles every few days in his pre-marathon training. Allen Webb broke the American record for the mile two hours ago. Unofficially, he ran 3'46.9"

Once I took a speed-reading course. . .

. . .and read War and Peace in twenty minutes. It's about Russia.

--Woody Allen






My current read, which can be purchased here

Or read free-of-charge here.

Or rather, one of them as I'm always reading about 3 books simultaneously.

Some Links

My sister's MySpace space








Don't know who this fellow is but he's cooler than the frozen guacamole in my freezer. The top link is my sister's MySpace space. I should note we have very little in common except last name, although our middle names are somewhat similar.

Bastille Eve Day

So, here I am and there you are on this sunny hot Saturday and you're reading these words looking for something inspiring, profound, humorous, or. . .I think I spelt humerous wrong. . .and believe me o Gentile Reader, unless you're Jewish, I am thinking, not very hard, but nevertheless thinking, about something to write about that will change the course of History and make Life more enjoyable for all literate persons.

Late Night

It is, right now, a little bit after 3 AM on the East Coast of America and the company next door, an Alcoa plant that makes parts for Volvo, has erected a circus tent. And now, some of the employees are throwing balls at a short fat man who is sitting on a chair suspended over a tub of water. The short fat man is yelling insults at the jeering mob as they attempt to drown him.

This is happening right outside my window.

I had planned on a quiet night of paperwork, perhaps even a little writing, but no, the neighbors are restless.

07-07-07

Don't get me wrong.

I try very hard to get along with a certain un-named co-worker. But I can't help but feel that God is preparing me to oversee an orphanage of little boys who spent their formative years being raised by wolves.

I have a cough. I didn't purchase it at Sears, I did not inherit it, I do not even claim it as my own. Still, I have a cough.

It is now 96 degrees Fahrenheit outside, and Jason has a cough.

I DO have cough drops. Tis true. A bag of lemon-honey cough-suppressing little gems to make me feel better and assuage the itching of my throat. I don't like coughs. I don't like hearing others cough and hack and try to expel phlegm from their esophagus. Their esophagus'. . .esophagii. . .what a strange word.

Congratulations to Alan Webb, native Virginia, who yesterday ran a 3'30" 1500m (a 3'47" equivalent to the mile) in Paris. This is the fastest time run by anyone this year, so far. The Tour de France begins today. An American has won this for the past eight years. Our best option cette annee is George Hincapie, another Texan.

Things I did today: make banana bread, cough, nap, work 4 hours, cough, eat pancakes and coffee, cough, eat cough drops, ponder the meaning of Life, cook spaghetti squash and make spaghetti sauce, deposit money into checking account, mindlessly check alot of web sites on my browser to see what all the other blogging perfect strangers are doing and cough while doing so, read, write. . .and perhaps this is not the most interesting post du jour in a while.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I needed to do that.

(Stress you know)

Today I. . .

did very little, so far. I ate, slept, drank, bathed, read, drove, breathed air, lifted some weights, surfed, and experienced a most strange dream in which Dr. James Dobson came to my parents house and called me crazy.

But hey, I updated this blog.

My Application

Qualifications


• BS or MS in biosciences or related field

--I have a bachelor's degree in biology.

• A minimum of 1-3 years experience in a research setting

--got it

• Significant experience working with small animals

--I have spent many a time working with small vermin.

• Experience in cell cultures and cell- based assays highly desirable

--I have never been in a jail cell, so have little direct experience here. Assays? Yes, I think I do have some skill at writing assays.

• Experience with gel electrophoresis and immunoblotting a plus

I read my old college biology textbook. Does that count?

• Ability to work in a dynamic team environment

--My 1st job as a cook in a Mexican restaurant has prepared me quite well for employment in a dynamic team environment. As a matter of fact, it was so dynamic, half the time I didn't even know the people I was working with.

• Ability to work independently in a fast paced environment

--I am a stranger in a strange land. As a grade A introvert in a city, I fit this description to a tee.

• Strong communication, interpersonal, and organizational skills

--I communicate very well except when I have to talk, then my voice gets mysteriously scratchy. I have an amazing ability to organize anything. Finding where I put it is another thing altogether.

• Must demonstrate good computer skills

--I have a blog and spent way too much time reading letsrun.com and cnn.com.

Absentia

I should really post something profound later today. Last week was crazy. I like craziness, since Life is an adventure. But once you're in the midst of an adventure, sometimes it doesn't seem that way. It seems like adventures always happen at inopportune moments. Would it be an adventure if it was planned? Of course. You can plan adventures. I do it all the time. Spontaneity is good, as long as it is planned. . .and you've a syllabus. . .and lots of readily available cash.

I am looking to purchase a new vehicle to drive across the continent. Something that will be able to carry alot of stuff and isn't a mini-van. I dislike mini-vans. Mini-vans are like those big-boned girls with lots of inner beauty and gland problems that seem to be attracted to nerdy skinny guys with acne. Any suggestions?

I am fighting a headache now. Monday, you know. And there is a thousand things to do. But the sun is out and the weather is cool. And I just ate a hamburger for breakfast on a large pre-sliced bagel, which is cooler. And drinking iced tea, and typing nonsense as the trash man just drove by because I just feel like typing. . .not fast. . .just sort of slow-like. Slow like a cowboy loping slowly across the plains of West Texas looking for a li'l dogie to rope. Why cowboys rope li'l dogies is beyond me, but that's they're business. It's their job. Like mine is to blow up coal and coke samples to determine caking characteristics and trace mineral content. Part of me always wanted to be a cowboy, I just hated cowboy boots. Can one be a cowboy with hiking boots? I have a really nice pair of Asolo's I wore when hiking on volcanoes in Hawai'i. And yes, this is how you spell Hawai'i. Native Hawai'i people speak with no diphthongs. Every vowel is pronounced. So when somebody tells you to go to Waimanaeia street, take a left at aioeu blvd, and go 3 blocks downs ohia-lehuia-oamanipaoli ave. It takes a while. I just remembered there's a spaghetti squash in my refrigerator that needs cooked soon. And for that I need meat, as I already have the pasta sauce and spices, which means I will be going to Wal-Mart later. Always going to Wal-mart. It's a weekly ritual. And it is 5 minutes away. And open 24 hours. 7 days a week. This Saturday will be 07-07-07, and according to the black guy I worked with last night who looks like a Kenyan tribal chief but is really from Chicago and has a degree in chemistry, it will be a most popular day for weddings. Prolly a good luck thing. My dead grand-mother never believed in luck and always told me so. She also never called deviled eggs. . .deviled eggs. I asked her if I could call them bedeviled eggs and she made me cut a switch from one of the bushes in the backyard. She beat me with that switch. And it stung like I don't know what. My headache is a little bit less now. The tea is starting to perform it's magic but I'm still typing slow. I need coffee creamer.

A wonderful day in the neighborhood

For Sale or Trade: One evil. . .very evil. . .vile. Possibly even possessed. . .combination washer/dryer.

Will consider all offers. Or quite possibly will trade for some dry towels, an industrial-sized mop and bucket, and. . .a flame-thrower. Yes, why not.

Or one young beautiful wife with a W/D of her very own that knows how to cook mashed potatoes and gravy with the right amount of pepper. . .and some Pepto-Bismol (just in case). And if she has a mop and bucket of her very own. . .well by all means. . .give me a call.

Am also looking for an apartment-sized trash compactor that will compact. . .um. . .Whirlpool Combination W/D.

And, what else.

And if anybody knows somebody willing to part with a CostCo-sized bottle of aspirin, I am open to talk.

(Maybe I should post this on Craigslist instead of here. Somebody might think I'm. . .a little crazy. And. . .that person would be right)

Current Mood: Frustrated

Currently Reading: the instruction manual for a brand new 5 gallon (quiet series) shop-vac

South Texas

I went to San Antonio, TX for the past two days. It's larger than I expected and a little dirtier from Virginia Beach. I apologize for the picture quality, as my camera was only the size of a credit card.




This is part of the garden area around the mission. The trees made the 96 degree heat feel cool. . .almost.



Inside, it was much smaller than I expected, and you weren't allowed to take pictures. However, some things were noted.

-Davy Crockett was much smaller than I thought he'd be. They have his buckskin vest on display inside.

-Gen. Santa Anna should have had no trouble taking over the Alamo much sooner. I think he was either incompetent or lazy. Of course, the guys inside were not your average joes. . .

-The people who built the missions in that part of the country knew what they were doing. They're much cooler inside and built to last for hundreds of years. Unlike the wood houses you see nowadays.

-Davy Crockett had excellent penmanship. You can actually read his script quite easily. . .that had a couple of his journals and his law book on display.




Another Alamo shot.

The entire mission is smaller than what I thought. I pictured it being in the middle of the desert with 2-3 drunk Mexicans slouching outside drinking tequila. Not true. It's in the middle of downtown, right across the street from a wax museum and a Guinness Book of World Records store. It reminds me of Niagara Falls actually. . .touristy.



I found this razor sticking in the wall of my room. I did not put the razor there and do not know why this razor was sticking in the wall. When I was packing to leave, this very strange-looking cat. . .don't know the breed. . .walked into my room, jumped on the bed and stared at me. It would have been nice if it miaoed at me. . .you know. . .to let me know there was an actually animal in the room.

Words

Sing a song from sixty.
Drink a little rye.
And if engineers make more than you,
Don't dare wonder why.

We spurned the steak and potatoes and ate the icing on the cake.
We got fat.
We craved more icing because sugar is sweet.
We went to 7-11 to buy it by the can.
We dumped the icing into our troughs and fed the pigs to make them fatter.
Sleep overcame the pigs, so we put caffeine in the icing.
Now the pigs are happy.

One of us gambled and got lucky.
Became like the Haves.
A year later, we lost it all.
Then we leached off the Haves.
Those mean nasty folks with big houses.
"You have so much. Give us what you have!"
We begged the goddess pass a law to make the Haves offer us food and drink.
We ate and drank and for a time were equals.
Then we became poor again.
And still, the Haves have and the Nots naught.
Then I thought to myself, leeches and pigs are never satisfied. Always looking for more.
But leeches need other's blood.
Though both love the mud, the Farmer feeds only the Pigs.
This is called History.

A fool is aloof by any other way.
Or, aloof is a fool. Think of it that way.

Poverty and Laziness are good friends.
Sometimes you'll see them hand-in-hand visiting Shame.
On a road that does not lead to Life.

Chick-Fil-A sells good food and is closed on the Sabbath.
But too much, Honey, is still meaningless in the end.

'Pleasant it is for little tin gods, when great Jove is gone.
But little tin gods make their mistake, when the hour comes for great Jove to wake.'
Kipling said this once upon a time.

Once upon another time, I saw a poor man get some wisdom.
It cost him all he had.
Now, that very man is still wise, but he is no longer poor.
And he eats steak and potatos and owns the bakery.

'When I come, will I find Faith on the Earth?"
I know somebody will be in the waiting room drinking coffee,
but I don't know if they'll still be happy.
Somebody else said that.

If all of your friends talk to you like Aesop,
perhaps you're not as smart as you think.
They might be trying to tell you something.
And if you have initials after your last name,
better listen closely.

Never sign a contract with a hyphenated-woman,
Unless, of course, you have a lot of money.
Sometimes even naive people know more than they let on.
This keeps them out of trouble.
And sometimes even Isaiah bowled alone.

Granite is a hard stone and take much chipping and pounding to make it useful.
But granite erodes less than marble, though it is duller.

Jezebel is a powerful woman and Elijah lives in the desert.
But Jezebel has more respect for Elijah than Ahab, though Ahab be a king.
Even Jezebel has a sense of humor. . .according to one insider.
She used to live in the desert,
Sometimes, I think, she forgets.

Another thing I saw.
Paris is a beautiful city, but nobody wants to live there.
Some men like to live in metal boxes, not many women do.
Not even Parisians.

In a wax museum, the lights are always on.
Though nobody is home, the statues need polished.
It's the nature of wax.
To decompose that is.
Madame Tussand told me this when I was a young man.
I never forgot what I heard in the City of Lights.

Fly away little bird, flee while you have the chance.
For the Fox knows this, and waits to pounce.
I don't think CNN said this.

The Meaning of Life

What is going on in my head right now (or a random miscellany of stream-of-consciousness) :



The phrase 'then we got religion,' spirit, supermen, Jesus was the first of the new men, we're supposed to act like him, most don't, faith, walking on water, there will be things to do in heaven, lay up (deposit) treasures in heaven, food is not a deposit, I need to fast, the title of a blog post called 'leaving los larvae,' a demo for a Microsoft touch screen, an apocalyptic dream with people fighting over food and looking for me and the distant future in a Star Wars type universe. People want to kill me but cannot because I remain somehow invisible to them, or rather, appear just like them to their eyes. . .like cats think humans are other cats, but aren't, I should think noble thoughts, 'Whatsoever is good, holy, pure, etc., think on these things,' Why? For practice. In heaven, everybody will be able to read everybody else's thoughts. Storage. Mental storage. Microsoft (again). Why do I think of Microsoft all the time??? God is using Bill Gates to accomplish his goal of instant mass communication all over the globe and time is short. Time is being compressed. The sowers are overtaking the reapers. . .or is that the other way around? Oprah Winfrey. Why her? She's an excellent communicator. Thinking noble thoughts is like storing stuff for eternal purposes. Coarse joking is bad. Robin Williams is funny, but what he says isn't noble so don't think that. Adam messed up. God likes matter. Made it to see what man would do with it. Information. logos. Logos. words. Words are logos. Words come from Logos. God is Logos. Jesus is Logos personified. We should all be Logos personified like Jesus. 'What would Jesus do?' Jesus did what Jesus was designed to do. We should do what we were designed to do. We're not all designed to do what Jesus did. 'WWJD is a religious saying.' Sounds good though. That means we should be supermen. Everything we do in eternity requires faith. Walking on water requires faith. Designing a new planet and populating it requires faith. Why does this dream keep recurring in my mind? It's like a vision. I feel like Daniel. He probably saw airplanes and helicopters and freaked out. And what was the white Lamborghini-type-car-thing I dreamed of levitating on? Another future machine. Perhaps magnetism was involved. Nonsense. I distinctly remember orange gases in the rear area. God spoke and light appeared. Light is matter which is interchangeable with energy. What God is made of. When He speaks matter is affected. God is spirit. What is spirit? All humans are spirits. that possess a soul and live in a body. We have a body (matter) in order to interact with matter. For how can matter interact with other matter to become useful. Useful like cars. God likes cars. Fords make Him a little uneasy though. Chevys are like 'what might have been.' matter is like play-doh for spirits. Dormant until manipulated into the right conformation. And how can it be manipulated unless information to do so is present? And how can matter become molded into a useful entity without Complex-Specified Information? Crystals are complex, but they're not specified. Randomness. I hate randomness. Chance. Entropy. Murphy's Law. Matter on it's own tends to entropy. When God first made everything, He wound it up. Now it's winding down. Like a spring. Or a cuckoo clock. Does not everybody know this? I should lay off the energy drinks. I like to brood. Sauron did too. He should have gotten married. Would have caused less trouble for Middle Earth. Brooding. Just like a mother hen over her chicks. Late at night, hunched over a table, with glaring lights, intensely focused on a sheet of paper. I must transfer my thoughts to the material medium called paper. Conversion of energy to matter. E=Mc2. Like a force compelling me. I narrow my eyes and force circular thinking to cease. Channel my thoughts to the task at hand. And I know this is just a taste, a glimpse of what I will do for eternity. A prophet once told me I will possess people's souls through my patience. I think he meant I should start writing more. Shadowlands. Earth is the Shadowland. The Dark Planet. The Silent Place. The Land of Hidden and Dormant Things. Thulcandra. We see through a glass darkly, yet with enough concentration we can see more clearly. Ah, the prophet was right. One reason why Cary Grant was so popular. Embryos. We're in the early stages of metamorphosis. This is what the Great Designer had in mind when He formed Adam. He gives us things to help us achieve greater things. Life. Adam was designed to act like God, to imitate Himself, yet remain a separate entity from Himself. We're like pets. I wonder if squirrels get uncomfortable in summer with their furry faces? Adam was supposed to take the elements and fashion them into substance. To create. To take the dust from the ground and form it into machine that enhance his physical body. Engineering is art. Modify. And then. . .go to the farthest reaches of the universe and explore. Limitless possibilities. Still, the universe is finite. God smiled when man landed on the moon. One of the few things we did right. But the universe will end. The what? All matter will return to it's most elemental forms-quarks, muon, hadrons, bosons, leptons. Funny how every sub-atomic particle is composed of three parts. I think is hinting to us. Something we should know about particle physics. We're missing something big here. And it will make computer run faster. All matter will then be transformed to energy? Lots of things happened in the past, only what was done for Christ did last. A future saying. So, all that remains is what the spirit produced. The time is come to produce. Produce, produce, produce. Write, write, write. The mind of Jason is simply unable to comprehend this. What is written here is only a hint of my thoughts. . .and still, my spirit knows. For it senses something my mind cannot articulate or properly know. Words are useful but they convey only so much. Energy is more comprehensive than Matter. Frustrating. Someday Reality will be known.

Mondayness

Some running news: Got home at 3 AM. Woke up at 9 AM and warmed up cold tamales and chili. Still hungry. Added a can of ravioli. . .just right. Then, drank coffee and lots of water. 5 hours later crawled through a 6 1/2 mile run in 90 degree heat. Came home and washed the salt crystals off my dehydrated body. The last mile didn't feel all that bad. What I remember of it.

Sometimes it's better to ask no questions

9 June 2007, 8:48 PM, Saturday, Chesapeake, VA

Went to Walmart at 7AM and saw an old woman talking to all the other customers as if they were old friends. What does one do when a talkative person wishes to discuss Life with you in the early morning hours? Why you nod your head, smile, and politely say, "Por lo siento Senora, pero no hablo ingles."

In the parking lot I walked past a giggling woman saran-wrapping a blue Chevy. I asked no questions and acting like this was a perfectly normal Saturday morning occurrence.

Then I drove to work, set off 25 bombs (because it's my job), clocked out and then. . .I accidentally killed the bird of peace, a dove, with my car.

and then. . .when I got home, a Jamaican walked over and handed me a free slice of pizza. Again, I asked no questions.

Earth, wind, and fire. . .and water and weeds. All of these can be purchased at Walmart. This amuses me to no end. The meaninglessness of it all. This. . .chasing after the wind. . .with one's Visa. I find it funny that can you not only purchase dirt, but organic dirt. That is, 'naturally produced dirt. Dirt free from dirt. Clean sterile dirt. Aseptic soil. and then. . .

In the food section we have, by the lettuce, . . .bags of dandelion shoots for sale. Weeds. Think of that.

Weeds. Weeds for your hard earned cash. Organic weeds with no pesticides. Pesticides, of course, can be purchased separately. Weeds with no chemicals and no bugs. Bugs can be purchased at Burpees magazine and NorthernTools.com. I know. I have the catalog. Pestilence for a price. Hmm. . .interesting. And still, in this meaningless life, the Teacher asks no questions.

Fire. That gift from Prometheus is now bought at a price in the form of matches, cigarette lighters, and gas grill ignitors.

Air costs 50 cents and you've got to pump it yourself.

Wind is a bit more expensive nowadays, but $20 sounds about right. Multiply that by 10 if you want it cold.

70% of the planet is covered in water, but rest assured gentle readers. . .Walmart sells plenty of water as well. In fact, some of the water is injected with greenhouse gases. . .which makes little sense. Why? Because you drink it. . .then burp, thus re-releasing the greenhouse gases back into the atmosphere and hastening the heat death of the Universe by producing more entropy.

This is why I ask no questions.

It's a mad mad mad mad world.

Naturally speaking

So why do we create things? Why do writers write, painters paint, and sculptors sculpt? To express who we are. We make things to reveal our real self to the world. Because some of us are not terrible articulate, we reveal our real self, our soul, by what we make. We have to to do this too. It's not right otherwise. It's God's fault really, he designed us this way. It's inherent to want to do this. Have you ever tried not talking for 3 days? Can't do it. You'll start talking to yourself. . .and answering yourself because, naturally, you need an audience. And the more work you put into a project, the wearier you become because. . .you put a lot of yourself into it. And that's why God rested after making the universe.

Think about this, if you dare. Anything you make, only reveals a tiny part of your real self. Anything you make, any choice you decide upon, is telling about your nature.

Idols and idolatry are wrong because though idols may be pretty to look at. . .it's the fact that one is giving attention to the created rather the the createe.

Natural Selection. Nature is thought and taught in most universities to be a blind, random entity. Humans are believed to be the result of a series of chance events. Richard Dawkins says biological entities give the appearance of being designed. Is it just me, or does it sound like he's trying to persuade himself to believe what he intuitively knows to be otherwise?

Running news: I was bad this week. I have many excuses, headaches, heat, lack of sleep, need more rest, iron defiency, fear of asteroids hitting the planet-you name it. I didn't do a whole lot of running. Some weight work, but that's about it.

Non-running news: I'm going to San Antonio next week. I promise to post pictures if I have time.