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Love Illusion
2004-01-06
Is love an illusion? Real or dreampt it nonetheless is a perceived connection. Of course reciprical sentiment makes it that much more precious.
Lasting or fleeting it doesn't always matter. How can one put a price on the montage of meaningful moments? The sway of a neck, a flash of a smile, an excited laugh, burning eyes, fitting hands together just so, opening up. This bag of secrets is harboured from being lost in time by every emotional entity. Some share whole lifetimes together while others are fortunate with passion. Regardless, anyone who lusts for life is lucky in love whatever forms it blesses, blisses and kisses you.
Why, You
2004-01-08
Why is it that in Hollywood it's always the little guy vs big guy or monsters or one guy saving humanity or the human species. Or the little guy when bad is a minority of ultimate evil like Nazis or terrorists. Who says humans being wiped out wouldn't be the best thinq for Earth. Or why can't there be more than 2 points of view treated equally without right and wrong.
Downloading MP3's and movies may be theft, but ask yourself if music labels consider their corporate greed as robbery, especially when they take so much from the artists and only add to the commercialism problem. No, it's never that simple. Yes it's more than that. It's about the art of it. Essentially.
Or how about Nike, and other giant brands, that capitalize (take advantage of) people, nations and resources of the Earth.
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Driving home east I saw the shrouded full moon draped in clouded veils and I thought of how much I want to know more of you and to strip it all down to be as close as I can to your genuine precious luscious moonbeam.
America's Workout
2004-01-16
American culture needs a work out (Canadians included). We are an overpaid, overleisured, overweight society living longer lives than ever with our obese health care budget showing no signs of shrinking for all the wrong reasons. I am compassionate towards and like many people that are old, out of shape, lazy and/or unaware (as I am frequently) but can't in logical good concience condone unproductive old age 'retirement' or underproductive overpaid unioners using up resources.
(Maybe I'm just too lucky. I generally like what I do for a living and still have passionate optimism for projects current and future potentials. I don't forsee a stop in this.)
Without pretending to know the full ramifications (political, economic, environmental, etc) I'm just going to fire off a few ideas about what Western culture needs to do.
- We need to make all foods healthier and tax the unhealthy food to cover the later health costs. (A sin tax, just as Canada heavily taxes alcohol and tobacco. I also believe drugs and prostitution should be legalized, regulated and taxed as well, not for myself, but generally for a safer society.)
- An easily understandable rating (such as 1-5 stars colour coded by food groups (simple, like the terrrorism warning system)) of food's health value would make it easier for many mislead consumers.
- More motivation and education is required to help people be inspired and informed about their lifes, their consequences, and the rewards of being healthier. It's not only in the better interest of individuals, but society, it's happiness and budget, productivity, etc.
We live in a culture that is suffering from consumerism. Our increased consumption levels do not come close to equalling our productivity. We may have the edge right now, but technology is making this world smaller and education and information is making the world a more even playing field.
Military and economic bullying seems to work for now, but that edge is becoming blunt as it spreads and the motivated find ways to pursue the rare and the common only becomes less valuable.
The environment is evolving as the population is exploding while the poor stay poor and the rich get richer. In this Global Village the lazy want more for less and the motivated will change the world as they will. For now I guess we'll just suffer the curse of success's unquenchable appetite.
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Health Canada's Estimated Deaths In Canada 1996
Murders - 510
Alcohol - 1,900
Car Accidents - 2,900
Suicides - 3,900
Tobacco - 45,000
I wonder if there's a figure for overweight figures?
Time / CNN Poll
2004-02-22
Today there are many different kinds of lifestyles that people find acceptable, such as homosexual relationships. How do you feel about this?
Acceptable for others but not for self 49%
Acceptable for others and self 11%
Not acceptable at all 38%
- Time, Feb 16, 2004, p60
I just don't understand why people are so self righteous and judgemental.
Legs On The Stairs
2004-02-24
Climing the stairs I see a light on in the window across the alley. Behind a rough curtain I see almost twice daily a shapely pair of knees, frequently a hand writing or a lovely calf and foot, but never the head or face. Unless they reveal themselves in two days, I may never know the owner of these knees, woman or perhaps even a man.
Atlas' Desperation
2004-02-28
Realizing the aging of my flesh and seeing the desperation of older women I percieve the weight of the world's future more than ever. When I was younger I didn't know what to make of it and I still don't. We are a predictably odd species.
City Of Canyons
2004-03-02
Back in the city of canyons
Where buildings almost block the sky
So much you almost forget to be humble.
Casualties
2004-05-15
777 US Troops killed versus 15200 Iraqis killed.
That is a ratio of 1 American to 19.56 Iraqis.
I wish the news would not separately report on 'American' casualties. Every single one is a person. Nationality may be an interesting detail but it amplifies the whole 'Us' versus 'Them' problem, adding value to American citizens and devaluing everyone else.
Also, 'Black Hawk down' (1992?)
USA: 17 Dead, 73 Injured
Somalia: 1,000-10,000 Dead, ? Injured
Updates
2004-05-16
Continued self-righteous, self-indulgent, judgemental, critical, blog notes kept on my Palm Vx were beamed to my new PDA and updated to my website. I look back and wonder why these issues were/are so forefront in my mind and why they aren't in everyone else's. I also see that since I lost my keyboard (at Walter's?) the entries dropped off dramatically. I'm excited about my new O2 XDA II (also known as MDA, I-Mate, Q-2020, etc.) Pocket PC but find it more frustrating than regular Windows.
I always wonder about this long distance relationship with Lena. Where is this going? How is her heart and what is she thinking? What are her doubts? How can I resolve them on my own or prompted by her? How much of this more personal, (dare I say private though no more private than other fluffy sentiments expressed here), material should I publish here? (In the fall I debated how much I wanted to shout out to everyone about my love for Lena (still do) but thought my silly/serious words would be better as private intimate expressions.) Every question only raises 10 new questions.
Lena Stones
2004-06-16?
Rocks and sand and minerals and dirt,
These are elements in which plants grow.
Food and gas and electricity and ideas,
These are fuels that help mankind go.
Brains and beauty and humour and grace,
These are ways you compel me to follow.
Thoughts and words and deeds and life,
These are where my love for you will show.
Lena Less
2004-06-22
Sometimes less is more,
More hopeless, dreamless and alone,
Lena, more or less.
Obesity - Time Magazine
2004-06-28
I'm certainly no genius nor ahead of any intellectual fashion let alone a health guru, but this cover story only echos what I said several months ago (2004-01-16) about the obvious obese state of the nation:
There is something wrong in the world when other countries are starting while we Americans are eating ourselves to death.
It is only to be expected that we should become a nation of overweight people; after all, from childhood we are taught to consume as much as possible... Clearly too many of us believe that a little is good, more is better and too much is just enough.
In the U.S. fewer than 5,000 Americans have died as a result of terrorist-related activity, wheras 300,000 obesity-related deaths occur each year in this country, according to the Surgeon General's estimates.
80% of children played sports every day in 1969 while only 20% do so today.
- Time Magazine, p.9 , June 28, 2004
Life Is Cray Z
2004-07-25
Do you ever wonder if life, the universe, and everything is just a sim running on an advanced monsterous machine cycling us past redundant variables?
Maybe I am just a chaotic feather in an electric dream wishing to land somewhere pleasant.
Mooning Haikus
2004-07-31
Full peach of a moon
Absinthe in my blood tonight
She's so far away.
She says come and go
Optimism disolving
I'm confused as her.
Suburbia
2004-08-01
Why does it make me so angry and nausious to be around oblivious suburban luddites? They don't know the consequences of the society they embrace nor do they care to. They don't embrace technology for anything other than their own benefit nor do they care to. All they care about is if a designer bag is on sale, if it is genuine or a fake, and who in their circle of friends has a real one. These trivial lives, their trivial drama and the trivial meaning they have in the world anger me so much while the collective consequences are not trivial, impacting and supporting earth's decline in the name of capital consumerism.
And yet, why should not the powerful of mankind not reap the benefits of their plunders? Why shouldn't we use our intellect to destroy the planet like a jurassic meteor, to forever change existence on Earth? Why am I so judgemental to declare the reality television lives of suburbia to be such a nightmare? Because I say they have bad taste too.
People say if they were rich their worries would go away. I might not have as much as Bill Gates, or even the next guy, but I sure know that I am wealthier (by material measures) and luckier than most people on this earth could ever be. I hope I never forget that. Even if I get rich. ;)
Now, how can I help everyone else get rich too? Or should I just be selfish and forget everyone else? In that case, perhaps I should settle into suburban amnesia blissfully ignorant of the rest of the globe's suffering. But the suburban lifestyle looks so tacky on me.
From an old email:
World Population Percentages***
57% Asian
21% European
14% from the Western Hemisphere, both north and south
8% African
52% female
48% male
70% non-white
30% white
70% non-Christian
30% Christian
6% possess 59% of the entire world's wealth and all 6 from the United States
80% live in substandard housing
70% unable to read
50% suffer malnutrition
1% near death*
1% near birth*
1% college education
1% own a computer
When one considers our world from such a compressed perspective, the need for God**, acceptance, understanding and education becomes glaringly apparent.
* I don't know what 'near' means.
** I don't know about that. Spirtuality perhaps, but too many people are fighting over their idea of God. I wish the word wasn't invented.
*** Interestingly enough, a month after I posted this I discoverd my young 10 year old friend, Ocean, in Seattle had this same list to discuss in her 5th grade class.
What To Do?
2004-08-04
I struggle internally about issues like equality, focus, and purpose. Everyone should have equall opportunity and wealth and respect for themselves, each other and the earth. And yet some people are not equal because they lack the resources, tallent, motivation, intellect, or good health. What to do?
I have so many ideas, enthusiasms, inspirations, and things I want to accomplish and so little time or focus. The world is too miraculously distracting. What to do?
I am lucky enough to be tallented with media, art, ideas, and creative expressions but how can I channel it into impactful and meaningful edutainment with purpose for the good of earth and humanity. What to do?
Life By The Numbers
2004-10-03
(It's been a while and I haven't yet written (let alone written to anyone) about my latest 1.5 month journey through out the North West so I'm throwing more interesting statistics at you, gentle reader, whome ever you may be. While you are at it, consider the global population problem or consider what another 4 years of Bush would do to the world.)
Quoted from: http://tlc.discovery.com/tlcpages/human/numbers.html
Another baby is born, 3 kilograms of potential. Its body is a collection of assorted chemicals: 10% protein, 10% fat, 1% sugar and 75% water. Their assembly has been orchestrated by the 100,000 genes the baby has inherited from its parents. These have determined what it has become, and they will continue to organize its body throughout life.
During a lifetime, an average human being will:
have sex over 3,000 times, with perhaps eight different partners.
dribble 154 quarts of saliva before its first birthday.
crawl 93 miles before age 2.
after age 2, learn a new word every two hours for the next 10 years.
utter its first words at about 12 months after birth
by age 6, master the essentials of language.
by age 21, breathe over 3 1/2 million balloons full of air.
fall in love twice.
spend two weeks kissing.
have two children and four grandchildren.
be able to put names to around 2,000 faces, but only consider about 150 as friends.
be able to distinguish over one million colors.
produce 200 billion new red blood cells every day.
grow until it contains ten thousand billion cells, nearly all of which will undergo a constant cycle of death and renewal.
spend five solid years eating and drinking to supply fuel to its body.
walk 14,000 miles.
spend a year traveling in a car.
spend nine years working for pay.
spend 22 years sleeping.
spend 12 years talking.
blink 415 million times.
produce 42,400 quarts of urine.
spend over 12 years watching TV.
spend 2 1/2 years on the telephone.
grow 30 yards of fingernails.
shed 40 pounds of dead skin.
My New Cat
2004-10-05
While getting a new cat for my Mom from the Humane Society I picked up a new cat today as well though I was not intending to. Not unlike my first two cats, Bud Mewsephalus Asquith and Charlie Agador Sparticus, Jr., this cat is also belligerently affectionate, named Thurston Howell The Third. I thought Mr. Howell was full grown, then a Humane Society girl initially estimated him to be a year old, then the vet said he was 7-8 months old and still had some growing to do!
Manufacturing Consent
2004-10-14
More interesting statistics from the movie and book Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky And The Media (1992):
In North America there are: 7 major movie studios and more than 1,800 daily newspapers, 11,000 magazines, 11,000 radio stations, 2,000 TV stations, 2,500 book publishers. 23 corporations own and control over 50% of the business in each medium. In some cases they have a virtual monopoly.
Brainwash anyone?
SaveTheWorld
2004-10-17
If the right thing to do is fix poor oil-rich Iraq (even though there are no weapons of mass destruction), how come the USA doesn't save those in Sudan, Haiti and all the other desperate souls throughout the world?
America doesn't even have democracy since George W. Bush wasn't even elected.
President Elect
2004-11-04
How can the American people be so foolish? This is a dark day for life on Earth. Bush is bad news.
I could mention that at least Bush seems to have one legitimately this time, but I won't. (Hitler stole his initial authority too.)
I could mention the perpetual war product Bush is trying to sell and the capitalist tyranny he's running, but I'll just recommend that you read, listen, or watch Noam Chomsky or turn off your generic media / propaganda / brain wash machines every chance you get.
Instead I'll mention how I recently heard/read that one third of all the species now on Earth will become extinct by the year 2050. Plus in 20 years the global warming should move us dramatically into an ice age.
Should I stop being so sentimental for the old ways and weaker life forms? There's nothing I can do for those stupid dinosaurs now anyway. They died out because they were cold blooded, small brained, and had no opposable thumbs. Then again, Ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome were beautiful and successful for centuries before they fell. There were some Dark Ages before there ever was a Renaissance. Is the world about to slip into a cooler time?
Should I not care about suffering throughout the world? Granted I am not the richest person but I am not poor either. (I'm lucky to be born privileged with a few talents into a good family in a good country.) I look at the ridiculously rich and occasionally think if I were them how much I could do for my career, love life, and of course, for everyone else. (To the rest of the world's population I am wealthy beyond most of their imaginations.) Should I just party cause I can and forget the rest like the rich do? Am I already?
Should I not care about the world of tomorrow that we are leaving for future generations? I mean, I don't even have any children. For that matter, what difference does anything I do make?
Bush is bad for the brain, the spirit, and the heart of life on Earth. Sheesh, nuff said. Twit happens.
Three Judges
2004-11-13
Three judges of the Supreme Court of the United States are soon retiring, all due to cancers. (There is something else altogether to be said about all the resignations of the Bush Administration, not to mention the cancer epidemic.) The President Elect 2004 will nominate 3 replacements. All nine non-democratically elected judges collectively hold the most power in the world, more than the house of representatives, and in many cases, power over the President. To date, the left, the right, and the moderate judges have been 'moderate', but over the next ten years the world will doubtlessly witness demonstrations of the new supreme court power.
Fool Economy
2004-11-14
I am driving Windsor to Toronto round trip this weekend. I'd rather loose a little time and convenience and not waste productive time (reading, writing, etc on the way) or resources (polluting fossil fuels, wear on the car, etc) but the drive costs $37.67 for diesel (2-3 times that for gasoline) while taking inconvenient mass transport (slower, limited schedules, etc) is significantly more expensive (options listed below).
This frustrated rant is obviously a criticism of the system that doesn't even try to encourage more responsible resource management and discourage selfish convenience with waste. Granted it's a drop in the ocean compared to North American industrial waste (not recycling, inefficient, pollution, etc.), or worse, third world industries (wiping out rain forests, copper mines, etc).
Via Rail ($171.20 round trip, last minute not two week advance) plus TTC subway ($5.50 for two rides) totals $176.70.
Greyhound Bus ($134.50 round trip) plus TTC subway ($5.50 for two rides) totals $140.00.
WestJet Airline doesn't even fly Windsor to Toronto. Flights two weeks in advance start at ($376 round trip) plus Go Bus downtown ($9.00 round trip) plus TTC subway ($5.50 for two rides) totals $391.50
I could even lie and say I was going to catch a flight from the Toronto Airport and take a Robert Q Shuttle ($110.00 round trip) plus Go Bus downtown ($9.00 round trip) plus TTC subway ($5.50 for two rides) totalling $124.50.
Corporate Options
2004-11-14
Just as there are ©opyrights and copylefts (or creative commons), and just as there is private self-serving code (Microsoft) and free open source code (Linux), so too, plundering profit-driven corporations without morals or conscience must develop a counterpart that can still be profitable while also being successful with additional mandates to respect and benefit the employees, community and the environment. I am determined to find out what it is called and I will post it here. We have to do what we can and share when we can.
Mark Achbar, director of The Corporation, informed me that what I was thinking of is called Participatory Economics or ParEcon for short. Read more where it all started: http://www.ZMag.org/parecon/indexnew.htm
Now, Then, And Everywhen
2004-11-28
Today we live in an age of violence on poor nations and even poorer peoples, animal testing, and bio-chemical testing (intentional or otherwise), undoubtedly corporate future interests will breed bio-genetic experiments of viral, plant, animal, and human qualities. Just as countless unfortunate people have lived, suffered, and died anonymously, the future doubtlessly will see many more live, suffer, and die. Nature is refined and raw simultaneously. As we evolve to become more 'civilized', our technologic and calculated savagery has also reached new heights behind the sterilized media façade of ignorant, romantic, capitalistic pillaging. In our constructed lives in our constructed environments we have lost touch with nature and that we are all animals. Around the world museum collections full of lifestyles that have been decimated have been made impossible to live in those ways forever. Mother Earth is dieing of cancer and the cancer is humanity and their corporations, however, She is a perpetual phoenix, continually birthing new variations of life and existences. Long after we are gone, Earth will still be here in one way or another.
How much can I do? How much can we do? Who cares? What does anything mean anyway?
I still care. I'm still a part of this world, it's problems, society, cultures, and solutions, if only a small part. Hopefully we can make things smoother and better for everyone and everything on Earth, not just by majority or democracy, but by consensus. What's the greedy hurry anyway? Somehow hope lives on.
Imagine
2004-12-01
George W. Bush visits Canada for 3 days.
Imagine if the world renowned peace keeping country of Canada were to imprison George W. Bush for war crimes, starting with Iraq. If only for 24 hours. Granted, there would certainly be financial repercussions. The symbolic gesture would certainly lend courage to the world, or at least pay attention, peacefully, to what the US Government is doing.
If I Were A Terrorist
2004-12-11
As much as I despise George W Bush I don't hate the brainless head of the monsterous US Government. Rather, I loathe what he and that government represent. If you don't understand then go to my Wage Peace pages and open your mind to possibilities other than what we've been programmed with through propaganda.
Simply, I am creative, I am not an activist. Maybe I'm a coward, afraid to loose what freedom I have. I make outraged web pages and hopefully I'll make some conscious animated films. These are ideas I support (that's all I feel comfortable to do) and if I were a 'terrorist' this is what I'd do. (Granted the tradgedy of 9-11 was horrible. The wars following even more despicable.)
First, above all, get the message with the meanings of the actions out there stating objectives, ideas, and perspectives in a short and clear press kit on as many websites as possible so it can't be censored. This way the global public (including press media) will have a chance to understand for themselves without spin, twists, or absolute perversion by the corporate press.
What is critical? Life on Earth is unbalanced with the Human population consuming out of control. It seems to me that there are two options. We cooperate and share, including sharing with future generations who must inherit the good and bad, or thriving of the fittest and sufferable survival for the rest, if they can. The exploitive nature of Capitalism, the latter, just doesn't seem to be working out for satisfactory life on Earth, despite the fact that it works well for a minority of wealthy people right now. This is not even about morality, fairness, or justice (might makes the right).
I don't know how to convince the wealthy to be less mercilessly exploitive let alone quickly teach the rest of the world to curb their consumption, be satisfied, and limit their desire for large families and populations.
I do know that there are ways to force revolutionary change. If a group like the Weather Underground of the 60's and 70's (who would give ample warning to the targets then bomb the empty buildings without injuries) could force change without loss of life, then power to them. When lives are a timely issue those measures are more extreme than Gandi's passive resistance.
The obvious targets wouldn't be single individuals, such as George W Bush, but representational examples of the worst institutional tools that enable the rich to exploit. The Pentagon (the 'war department' relabelled 'defense department') and the World Trade Center are a good start. Fox News is a propaganda engine that must, along with all other media, be forced to be accountable and tell the truth or the public should take the plutocracy's voice away. Stock exchanges are the corporate backbone of artificial ephemeral vallues thinking only of greed for the moment with no generosity, equality or future in mind. Supreme courts are top of the legal system that enables lieing media, corporate corruption, and exploitation of the public, natural resources, and the environment.
That would be a start, but the public needs to go down a long path to unlearning the nonsense it believes is good for it and understanding what ideas, values, and actions actually are good for all humanity, not to mention all life on Earth. I don't know how to enlighten the masses beyond getting truly Left representation in the media, such as Noam Chomsky.
Mad Cows
2004-12-11
Mother Nature might be scolding us for forcing vegetarian cows to cannibalistally eat protien suppliments, not to mention the other ways they are raised and slaugtered.
I wonder if mad cow disease might ultimately be a good thing. Amosphere destroying methane farts, cancer causing nitrate rich shit, and of course the catastrophic rainforest clearing and natural habitat destruction are problems the earth really doesn't need. If suitable vegetarian food alternatives and subsitutes can be developed with public acceptance then much less resources will produce much more.
"It takes 12,500 pounds of grass to support a cow for one year and raise a 450-pound calf. It takes another 4,000 pounds of grass to raise the calf to 850 pounds. If the calf is retained another 10 months, it will take another 9,450 pounds of grass to get it to weigh 1,250 pounds. The total for grass is 25,950 pounds. At once cent per pound that's a feed cost of $259.50, plus it covered the cow. Compare this to a $290 feed bill at a feedlot to raise a 500-pound calf to 1,250 pounds. And that's just for the calf post weaning."
(quoted from http://TexasGrassFedBeef.com/grass_fed_beef.htm)
The despicable US hypocracy has closed their borders due to a single BSE cow discovered May 20, 2003. Canadian bovine tracking, while not perfect, is vastly superior to much non-existant US bovine tracking. There are at least 18 BSE cows discovered and well over that many CJD related deaths in the US but the government and the media have refused to investigate therefore censoring the issue. The closed border is destroying hundreds of independent cattle farmers and all supporting communities. Not only is that a blow to the farming industry but it doesn't help the Mom&Pop cause for diversity and independence, especially when the corporate meat rendering factories are exploiting the situation and able to sell the cheap Canadian meat in the US for prime prices.
Gift Certificates
2004-12-24
Gift certificates are great, except when you think about it. It's like telling you where to shop because you're taste is terrible or that they are too lazy to take the trouble to find a suitably personal present. They won't give you cash because they can write this off, you might just deposit it in the bank, or because you simply might pay off bills. However, the worst thing about gift certificates, besides the corporate advertising and personal endorsement cheerleading, is how you need to spend extra money in order to recoup the entire gift credit.
Thought Bytes
Through 2004
lady of negotiable virtue
gasoline rainbow traces
I feel the cold. But there's always someone who feels it more. - on CBC
The world and its problems are like the man who fell off the 10 story building.
People on the different floors kept hearing him say, "So far so good."
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2000-2007 Jason 'Sunshine' Carswell.
