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