Chateau Ajasont

I am reminding myself that I need to write something about civility and 'off the cuff' remarks in emails.

If anyone is reading this and knows where it came from, it's not about anything especially that was said elsewhere. It's really about me and getting older and wishing that the society I have chosen to live in weren't moving people so far apart in thinking while pushing us all so much closer together. The comment I reference above is for my memory only and not any sign of wishing ill on anyone.

Got this in my email inbox this morning:

http://www.whysoserious.com/kickingandscreening HA HA HA HA HA ha HA HA ha HA HA ha HA HA HA ha HA HA HA ha HA HA HA HA HA HA HA ha ha ha HA HA ha HA HA HA ha ha ha HA HA ha HA HA HA ha ha HA HA HA HA HA HA HA ha HA HA ha HA ha ha HA HA HA HA HA HA ha HA HA ha ha ha HA HA HA HA HA HA ha ha HA HA HA ha HA HA HA HA ha ha HA ha HA ha HA HA HA HA HA ha ha ha HA HA HA HA ha HA HA HA ha HA HA HA HA ha HA ha

Which took me to a website for free tickets for a screening of The Dark Knight on Tuesday night.

But all the tickets were already gone. I'd checked my email around 830 last night, so it came in some time after that. Did anyone get tickets?

While I'm a little sad, sleep IS more important....

This whole viral campaign has been damned entertaining. Can't wait for the film.

Via black13:

Your result for The Best Thing About You Test...

Intelligence

Intelligence is your strongest virtue

Take The Best Thing About You Test at HelloQuizzy

Off the grid, on the grid, off my rocker, are there patterns in the static? Where's the goddamn grid?

Business is booming, plumes of fire and smoke lately; even a mushroom cloud for a whole week over my head.

No bemoaning my fate because I chose this path, but maybe some regret at the time I don't take to do things that really matter and would ultimately have been important.

Acceptance of above does not mean failure, only proof of Maslow's hierarchy.

Friends of old south and east of me are owed communications. I don't know when I will get to that.

The fourth ain't what it used to be and my son shouldn't have to understand that. Why did some irresponsible people have to ruin it for everyone else?

Assembly of 'zine is scheduled this weekend. It will be as haphazard as this.

'Islands of calm in the chaos' is a direct quote from an email I received last night from the head of my corporation.

He has no idea how true that would be, but I suspect it would also be the center of more chaos that would also cost my unit a great deal of money.

Congrats to Rob on the opening. I need to call Ande and have a drink with him. I hope that the APA team gets together after missing last month.

First tomato harvested last night. It's beautifully yellow.

Two baby eggplants are developing nicely. I can't wait for those. The peppers have finally started to bloom, too. We will drown in tomatoes this summer.

Fucking rain.

I need to interact more, charge batteries, contact.

This video has been making the rounds, and I finally watched it today:



If you can't see the above video, here's the url:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FiQJ9X

This link is a little more about the movie itself:

http://imvotingrepublican.com/more.php

If this doesn't motivate you to register to vote, you're probably not from this planet and you came here looking for Doritos,, didn't you? (Link via Warren.)

No means no and that’s what no means, right?

Of course, there are shades of gray to the word like any other in the American lexicon. Shades that don’t begin to appear until we first test our autonomy and continue to deepen as gray creeps into our hair as we age. As children, no is the word that teaches us that something is wrong though from the point of view of the child, no isn’t “fair”. As adults, we’ve been taught through anecdotes and personal experience not to accept ‘no’ as a final answer which really continues the idea that ‘no’ isn’t “fair”. So when we hear ‘no’ we have to figure out the subtle reasoning that’s implied behind the answer to our question.

The word ‘no’ is our way of teaching children right and wrong as they experience the world for the first time from infancy through adolescence. ‘Yes’ is the polar opposite, but occurs less frequently in a child’s growing up. During this time we learn that there are other words that equate to ‘no’ and that they mean the same thing. For instance, don’t is a contraction of ‘do not’ which is itself a warning that you cannot do what you intend because of various reasons. Then there’s the word ‘stop’ which is a warning to quit what you’re doing and can be said for various other reasons. When you put the two words together, however, we get ‘don’t stop’, which proves the simple mathematical equation that two negatives do make a positive. This is the beginning of the confusion for Americans in our current state of society.

Parents say ‘no’ to teach children a particular lesson or to save themselves some kind of headache later on, and that’s the beginning of selfishness in our children. The most common response is “that’s not fair!” and the most common response to that is “well, life’s not fair, get over it”, which is a selfish answer. Often parents want to ‘avoid a fight’ with their kid and just say no to accomplish that without realizing that a child will exercise his autonomy at the earliest opportunity, equating their own selfishness with their parents’ and using that as justification for doing what he wants to, anyway. Herein lies the path that is then followed into adulthood where the word ‘no’ in all its shades of gray is most prevalent.

How many times has a story been told of someone overcoming negative forces to achieve greatness? Often enough that the story is now part and parcel of the physical makeup of Americans, and quoted as ‘the American dream’. Dreamers and scientists and politicians and activists and athletes all have overcome some sort of hardship ranging from a lack of parent or money to physical disability and eventually encountered someone along the way who tried to discourage the person from pursuing the dream or the knowledge or the right to equality. Each story is buttressed by the personal argument “I won’t/can’t/don’t want to stop” which turns the two negatives (the hardship and the negative person) into a positive motivator. The story is meant to inspire one to chase one’s dreams and to make oneself as great as possible.

However, being ‘great’ doesn’t mean not understanding that ‘no’ means ‘no’. Celebrities have gotten in trouble for doing what they want to because their greatness entitles them to do whatever they want in their minds. There is no one close to these ‘greats’ who is saying ‘you shouldn’t do that’ or ‘remember that’s illegal’ when there needs to be. ‘Stop’ means ‘no’, too, and that’s often forgotten in one’s selfishness. Because one is ‘great’ this means that one doesn’t have to accept ‘no’ as an answer, final or not. Greatness does not translate to ‘entitlement’, a shade of gray. These shades are blurry at best and often require definition for everyone. It would be simpler if there were more common sense present in every American. As much as I’m loathe to quote it, the Golden Rule is a good one: treat others as you’d like to be treated. This might translate into: no means no and that’s the end of it unless you can find a way to do what you want without hurting someone else.

‘No’ is the answer we hear when what we want is going to hurt someone in some way that we hadn’t previously considered. What too few Americans grasp of this concept is that hurting someone to accomplish your own goals is wrong. You shouldn’t do it. We are selfish, vain and hurtful as a society. We do not remember the lessons of childhood if we were ever taught them. When we are told ‘no’ we look for someone to say ‘yes’ because that’s what we want and we must overcome whatever obstacle is in front of us to accomplish some thing that will make us great. The difference has always been, and must continue to be, that when we are told ‘no’ we must then evaluate with a modicum of common sense what is ‘right’ and what is ‘wrong’ and whether or not what we want will hurt someone else in our effort to achieve it. Then we must consider whether or not we are willing to be hurt in a similar fashion when someone else decides to not take ‘no’ for an answer.

What does no mean? That’s something you have to decide for yourself.

My Dad is one of the hardest-working people I know. He spent eighteen years working third shift in a factory taking the benefits and profit-sharing he earned to open a delicatessen featuring my mom's recipes. He built a house on his family's land and was visionary enough to build it passively solar, allowing the sun to heat a good portion of the house in winter. He learned a new business enough to work for himself for nearly twenty years now. He takes more pride than the average American in his work and backs it up with his current customers.

Dad is an inspiration and a leader by example for me. He taught me an awful lot, and I'm glad he's been there for me.

See you at lunch today, Dad, and happy Father's Day!

To all the fathers out there: you make a difference every day even if you don't know it or even see it. Any man thinking about being a father needs to understand and realize it.

He’d started walking when he left the house after breakfast, wishing his mother goodbye and promising to be home for lunch. Garrison was a boy who preferred to spend his summer days outside occupied in all manner of things that interest pre-teen boys. Yesterday he’d decided that he would walk as far as he could before lunch to see if he could get to the horizon.

Today he intended to try.

His mind set, one foot in front of the other, Garrison walked with determination. His stride lengthened, his shadow grew out in front of him and gravity was strange. He felt like he was stretched from toe to follicle and his tongue tasted like a warm blue wool blanket. Garrison didn’t know a lot about physics yet, only what he’d learned from watching Ben 10 and reading comic books, but he thought it had something to do with space and time. He made a mental note that he needed to check out that Brian Greene DVD his father had kept trying to get him to watch. Maybe there was something there that would explain how he felt.

He kept walking, and the horizon, that previously unreachable goal, was closer.

The place where the earth meets the sky was in front of him, about waist height. Garrison stopped within arm’s length and he while he still felt stretched in ways that were unfamiliar (and which he wasn’t quite sure was physically possible) he was curious. What would happen if he reached out to touch the horizon? Would there be repercussions? Almost certainly, but the excitement was almost too much to bear and he put his hand out gingerly, stretching his fingers.

And he could feel the seam, where the earth meets the sky.

He stepped closer and brought his other hand up, feeling the rough edge in the fabric of reality. Garrison knew he wouldn’t be home for lunch, now, because when he pulled up on the sky and down on the ground there was something behind that fabric that was instantly fascinating and alluring. How did he know that word? It must have been in an X-Men comic or something, probably one of his dad’s. Regardless, he kept pulling them apart, the earth and the sky, and made a space large enough for his body to slip through.

Without a glance backwards, Garrison stuck his head into the hole he’d created, then with determination wriggled his body through to follow.


© 2008 Jason Arnett. All rights reserved.

Written hastily this evening between 830 and 915, all in one pass with no edits. Comments welcome.

Check out the trailer for Gonzo: the life of Dr. Hunter S. Thompson. Johnny Depp, Jimmy Carter, Pat Buchanan, George McGovern.... Hunter would be critical and proud and run for his guns to urge you to see this movie so he could slip you the acid.

http://www.newsfromme.com/archives/2008_05_30.html#015316

Mark Evanier on Harvey Korman's passing:
"...I love people who can just laugh unreservedly and with the entire body and soul."

Exactly summing up what I loved about Harvey Korman and his work on the Carol Burnett Show and with Mel Brooks. Korman killed me every time.

Sleep well, Harvey. You're loved.

http://www.comicbookresources.com/?page=article&id=16590

"...most people really don't understand the difference between liking someone's work and being influenced by it; the work that truly influenced us, should we even realize it, is often not work that puts us in the best light when its name is spoken aloud."

I don't read Steven Grant's column as often as I used to (once upon a time I was RELIGIOUSLY reading him), but I've never forgotten just how often he gets things right. Check out the entire Permanent Damage column this week.

Kevin Mellon is doing commissions! Help a guy out and order one. Kevin's one of the very fine up-and-coming comics artists out there, and one hell of a nice guy.

Remember the bird flu? We're all SO going to die...

Invaders beware.

Striped icebergs?

and finally:



Via Warren.

What do we fear?

Collectively, as Americans living in the United States, what do we fear? In the 30s, it was an invasion from Mars (thanks, Orson!) in the 40s: Nazis and the Axis powers. The 50s was the grand fear of The Bomb along with our own ignorance of our place in the universe as our general understanding was expanded, and the 60s gave us Communism and the threat of nuclear war. What was the fear in the 70s? Equal rights for women? Women's empowerment? Radicalism?

The 80s taught us to fear poverty, for greed is good. We were so afraid of being poor that we decided to tread upon everyone who didn't have money to keep them down, and the classes separated. In the 90s, the average American was probably more afraid of our own government than anything else. Sure there were carbombs in Ireland, the Middle East and elsewhere along with a petty, poorly-executed attack on the World Trade Center but those pale in comparison to the shootings at Ruby Ridge and the debacle with the Branch Davidians. Private citizens were gunned down by the American government on American soil. Add to that the persecution of the President for having extra-marital sex, and I bet most of the nation was terrified at some level of the government if they gave it any thought.

This decade (the Naughties?) has taught us that greed is not so good, that the poor aren't just camping, that the classes are more divided than ever, there's still a nuclear threat and Communism doesn't last forever. It's also taught us that women shouldn't strive, that non-whites are still to be feared and that our government doesn't want to change. We won't ever elect the smartest person in the room to the highest office in the land because we can't have politics interfering with our sports and reality entertainments.

I guess we don't fear the invasion of our planet from outer space any more because we've ruined our own home. Why would anyone else want it in the condition we've left it?

So what is there to fear? Loss of personal liberty? We're perfectly willing to give that up, with our representative government passing things like the Patriot Act. Mother Nature? Hurricanes, tsunamis, earthquakes, tornadoes and the like have always done major damage, but the problem isn't the events themselves, it's the response to them that's the issue. No, what we have to fear is our own inadequacies. We have to step up, each of us, on our own and take responsibility for our actions. If we don't, then nothing will change and there's certain comfort in that.

But if we do, if we face the fear of failure, of repercussions for acts in our name, then we can be proud Americans again. Then we'll be able to face anything that comes, whether from outside our country or even outside our world.

The only thing we have to fear, as is said over and over again, is fear itself.

It's been a while... Everything is fine, just busier than hell after Lucifer dropped off the keys and said 'seeya'.

This LOOKS interesting.

On Saturday afternoon, I'll be sitting in a dark theater looking at the new Indiana Jones film. I don't understand this NEED to see a movie like this at 1201 AM on a Wednesday night/Thursday morning. It's a Saturday matinee, folks! See it on a Saturday!

I haven't read much lately, but did score a copy of Marvel Masterworks vol. 10 with a chunk of Amazing Spider-Man run in it (21 - 30 and an annual, I think) with art by Steve Ditko. It's masterful, and now that I know more about how the process with Lee and Ditko worked, the dialogue is even clunkier in spots. It seems that Stan was trying to shoehorn in loads of expository dialogue. Interesting to break it down a little more with some age and experience. Speaking of which, even though I have a DVD copy of Spider-Man 3, I still haven't watched it. Dunno why, just haven't.

I did see FF 2: Rise of the Silver Surfer yesterday. My thought on that was "Why did they burden this film with such a clunky title? Why not something like 'The Herald'? "Rise of the Silver Surfer" is just TOO comic-booky. Add in that the movie wasn't all that great and I'd be surprised to see the next one do anything at the box office if it's still on the books to get made.

I bought a piece of software that will allow me to import digital films from my DVR that I can transfer from my old video camera. With the addition of QuickTime Pro and the new Canon Digital Video Camera to the arsenal from a couple weeks ago, I now have a three-camera capability in making the short films I have in my head. Mostly they're training videos for work right now, but there's some artistic ideas floating around there, too. So it goes like this:

Hi-8 video camera --> transfer to DVR --> burn DVD --> put DVD in computer --> make movies with iMovie.

Pretty simple, huh?

I'm glad the primary season is winding down, finally, though I'm disapointed that the media has gone to such extremes to paint Hillary Clinton as a harpy. Every chance they get, most media outlets will do something to tear her down, with the high point having been when she cried in New Hampshire. Chris Matthews' view that she's only a senator 'because her husband fooled around' is myopic, misogynist and just plain stupid. You know what's really too bad? That the best-qualified candidate isn't in the race, and hasn't been for months. John Edwards is probably the smartest guy who threw his name in the hat this year, but he was just too late. Still and all, history will be made this fall, and I hope that our country will finally begin to grow up. It's probably too much to hope, but I've got faith in my fellow Americans even if they don't know what's best for them.

Sad to hear about Ted Kennedy, too. I hope that science can do something to help him with that malignant brain tumor. Good senator but a bad date, as Dennis Leary says. Thinking good thoughts for him.

I missed Fraction at the AstroKitty event last week. Just couldn't get there.

Oh, there's more, but I don't want to overdo it all at once.

Dunno if Mom'll check here before she comes over with Dad for the big lunch at 1, but wanted to wish all the Moms out there (you know who you are!) a great day. Moms are the best, no matter what. They say things you want to hear and then need to hear and they listen when they have no idea what you're on about. Moms encourage when needed and try to discourage when they can but are there to help you through it when you come back and say "I should have listened to you" without saying "I told you so". I'm married to a damn fine Mom, too, and she's great for putting up with me the way she does. I love her beyond all reason.

Not that anyone of you needs any encouragement to say nice things, let alone a Hallmark holiday, but take the opportunity today to let her know:

Mom, you rule! Thanks for everything!

See you for lunch.

Since I didn't do a Quarterly review at the end of March (and no one missed it but me) this will have to fill in for a year-to-date sort of thing, and it's by far NOT complete.

Winter was cruel enough in that I put too much weight on, and I blamed it on the bum knee from November. That wasn't it, though, and I just didn't exercise enough, nor did I exercise enough self-control when choosing to snack instead of not snacking. January and February were consumed with writing a budget for the business for the first time, then March was the trip to Indianapolis and a couple days off that I actually took off and didn't do a goddamn thing. The Well was finished as much as it will be for the foreseeable future and got some small notice among my peers who create comix. It actually represented my first attempt at writing a 6K word short story and despite its obvious shortcomings was an accomplishment that I'm very proud of. The audio version taught me a lot and informed the next step in my continuing endeavor to be somewhat creative.

April turned into a wash with several work-related issues taking over and of course taxes being due. However I did get back out on the track and start walking and running if a little irregularly until mid-month and now some of the weight I gained is coming off. Slowly, but it's coming off and that makes me happy. I've also begun studying writing in a way I never thought I'd try, but it seems to be effective. I'm not comfortable enough to share it yet, but I've written a couple of short things that seem to be pretty okay, mostly just for me.

May has been another whirlwind with work-related stuff (this time trainings and thinking for the future of the business with the cost of food projected to shoot through the roof), and that's got to be the biggest challenge of all right now. Can't cut services and have to improve them without spending any more than we already do, but money's going to go out the door when buying in the food needed for the services. Sigh. That's why they pay me to be a manager. Add in that I've got a sore knee again, too, and that's another level of frustration that slows me down, but it won't stop me.

The most exciting creative news is that I've finished a rough mix of the first installment of a new series of radio-styled things. I've got a great voice besides my own to add to the excitement, and I'm really glad it's coming along. I've got two scripts in various stages, and the stories for a dozen more written and in need of revision for radio.

So, it's all good, in case you were wondering. I owe several folks emails, still!, and I'll get to them. I've got a vacation coming up at the end of the month and I won't be doing much for work during that time in favor of the personal creative stuff. Hope to have some Sky Inside Me to share around the first of July.

More to come, gang. More to come.

Okay, Congress is saying that there needs to be a second round of 'economic stimulation' because the tax rebates just weren't enough.

Well, that's right, they weren't enough because we have to pay tax on them for this year in our returns next year. (Unless I have that wrong. If I do, I apologize, but it's not really a factor in what I'm saying next, so there.)

If the wonks in D.C. want to stimulate the economy and offset just a little of the rising costs of commodities that are actually IMPORTANT to the well-being of the United States, get Hillary and McCain off the damn gas tax relief and turn around and tell the states that the government will cover 75% - 80% of local sales taxes and stop taxing foodstuffs in grocery stores.

I realize not every state has a sales tax, and some don't even have a personal property tax, so they're already set in this regard. But if you want REAL stimulation in states where there's already a pinch on money, you can sell this by saying:

"Stretch your dollar further at the grocery store and stop eating all the time at the fast food chain. You can spend more time with your family, your children, your spouse by eating together a meal you create together. You can lose a little weight by actually eating food and not things that are processed into unrecognizable mush and then 'flavored' to resemble what it used to be in the first place. Come on, America, let's return to a time when we actually liked each other and wanted to be together. Gather over food!"

Maybe it wouldn't work that way, but it could. It could be sold so many ways that would encourage Americans to eat better, lose weight and regain social skills lost to the internet and cell phones. Wouldn't that be good? Wouldn't that be good for everyone? The farmers who will produce more, the clerks that will have jobs (maybe even good jobs) in an industry maligned by the majority of the populace and can't work at Enron any more, the Food TV stars and cookbook writers who could actually have to produce recipes that were tasty and easy to make would all profit. If we eat right, exercise more, actually communicate and it's all because of food, we might be able to think straight long enough to remember that Jimmy Carter was trying to warn us about getting off foreign oil THIRTY years ago!

Then again, who'd listen? We'd have to take the buds out of our ears and learn to read a newspaper.

I spent some of last night a portion of this morning remixing and adding and editing and remixing again a sound sample of one horse galloping across a grass field.

Now I have a stampede.

What I should remember is that a little reverb goes a long way.

But I'm having too much fun getting this off the ground and playing with it all the way. Lots more to come, just didn't have time to post much here. Be good to each other and try to stay warm if you're in the midwestern US. It's damn cold this morning.

25

Thanks, Copy J, for posting this.

Ah, hello. I see it's been a while.

I've gotten a demo version of one episode (starting close to the middle and working out from there) of the new project, The Sky Inside Me.

Taking what I learned from The Well, I'm recording smarter, working with Creative Commons-licensed sounds from the web, and rewriting and rewriting and rewriting. I'm very pleased with what's happening so far, it's just slow. Honestly, this is a better form (the shorter 'song'-style, is what I'm calling it) for me to work in. I don't have to have more than five or six pages of script, I can record a pass or two in an evening and then spend a weekend as I have time laying in and mixing sounds. It's more fun, and quite satisfying when it's done. Fits in with what I'd hoped to accomplish with Knight's Tour by now. (KT isn't dead by the way, just resting. I wasn't ready for that one and got ahead of myself. Go figure!)

Thanks to everyone who commented on The Well. I'm really proud of it, and if you liked that at all, this one'll be a lot better. I'm going to launch when I've got six episodes in the can so I can work ahead a bit. Maybe release in 'books' or 'seasons' in chunks of six episodes that'll fit nicely on a CD.

Plan is for three CDs total.

I owe my friend Kirsten an email, and several others. I am not hibernating, only distracted.

More later, less soon.