This evening after wading through homework I told myself I'd start this thing up again, because I'm clearly the least productive member of FHP. So, having stared at the screen for a good three hours, there's yet to be a decent idea to cross my mind. I leave you with this tidbit:

Chronically depressed people shouldn't study philosophy.

i drew a picture for mikey's bday! I've also done some sketches for an apocalypse comic i'm doing, which is pulling together most of my old little ideas into something nice and big. those are secret tho. i am working again.

have a picture!
million points to anyone who figures out what's actually going on.

I just posted over in my private journal, countingupwards</b>, because I felt the need to write a more personal post. It ended up being suitable for here as well. I'll be doing things like this a lot, probably, and making note of them here. At the end of the post is a lovely list of Topics I'll be covering over the next... however long you want to set it, probably my whole life really. Rants about things will go over there, while organized thoughts will go here. The comprehensive descriptions for each of the subjects, however? Those I'll probably not have available until I get MediaWiki running on my other machine, on FHP's main server. But in the meantime I'm writing them, and thinking about them.

I'm considering forsaking this outdated method of edification in favor of my own subdomain with Found Hat Press, probably http://stuv.foundhatpress.com/ I've got Wordpress 1.5 and MediaWiki 1.3, a safe build x.4 is due soon, and I'm just tired of this messy interface. I have a hard enough time expressing without my machines trying to kill me and my thoughts. Loading both of those on there would give me a far smoother interface. That, and I think I could code some RSS in there pretty easy. You might call me lazy, but technology's here to make life easier. (Stay tuned for something on Technology.)

Meanwhile, poor wikipedia. It just couldn't handle becoming the 78th/157th most trafficked site on the web. Please consider donating when they finish their repairs. There's a link to the donation page from the current "down" message.

Have you ever done someone a favor? Those of you who haven't, slap yourselves; you'll have done all of us a favor.
Those of you who have, keep reading. A favor, in the sense I'm using here, is an abstract noun referring to a certain benevolent act or set of acts. What's benevolence? "Well-wishing", or being kind. The opposite of course is malevolence, or "bad-wishing". These are Latin roots, and of course another word we get in this trip down etymology lane is malicious, which I'm sure you've all heard said in reference to a person's actions or disposition. Provide your own definition.

So, what's war? Organized malicious/malevolent acts in order to destroy/destabilize a certain power structure. So what's the opposite of war, then? It sure as hell ain't peace. Isn't it organized benevolent acts for the purpose of ensuring greater stability between certain power structures? Peace is just what we do in the meantime. It's a long line, a continuum of human interaction. On one side is violent anarchy, selfish bigotry, fascism,  separatism, racism, se*xism, isolationism, World War, and total buggery. On the other is baking cookies for your neighbors, picking up the trash without being asked to, Red Nose Day, the parking meter fairy**, wikipedia, textbook socialism, direct democracy and a host of other pleasant things.

Where are you on this line?

"War and Peace". I never read it. I'm sure it had an "important" lesson. I'm sure that I learned that lesson in kindergarten, minus the socio-culturo-political skew.

*Section II, cf. "community of women."
**Sadly, picture not in the public domain.

- This would have been longer, but from personal experience no one can ever tolerate my invectives into culture for very long.

I've been writing in private lately, keeping my thoughts mostly to myself. I've also been trying to get the balls up to draw again, because in all my discourse I'm continually encouraged to establish my truths. I've kept from putting them to form because I'm not happy with them yet.

And THERE is my flaw. I'm enrolled in an Ancient Chinese Philosophy class, a level 400 course even though I'm only a sophomore at UB. I'm the youngest person there, yet each instance of class, I predict the day's lesson. I also keep my observations to myself. I also meet with the professor weekly to discuss some of the deeper trends we both see in human society and culture (those are different, I'll get to that soon) and what can be done to reconcile them to bring about human peace. There's my flaw.

As a human, we each walk singular paths towards greater truth, greater peace with ourselves and others (and peace is not the opposite of war, but I'll be covering that next.) I've skipped ahead on my path, learning lessons at "too young an age," and I've lost a great deal of my childhood for it. Am I less of a person? That is not my concern. My concern is to share. I can leave to an advisory board to decide what age of person should read/hear/see/play/sing/eat/dance my work, once I've created it. For now, I must create, because I have tales to tell.

The world is too a beautiful place, your glasses are just dirty.

Hunter S. Thompson: July 18, 1937 - February 20, 2005

i.am.jamie sent me this as I walked in the door at midnight tonight. It was filed 18 minutes previous to his sending. The article has been rewritten even as I write, a note being changed about "Uncle Duke," the Doonesbury character that is a tribute to him, to a series of quotes from a former editor, giving a greater sense of the creature he was. Wikipedia had already taken note, filling in the sparse details of his death as they have become available.

Would the good Doctor have appreciated this? In his mind, I hazard yes, though after a thorough round of verbal abuse. But in his outward mannerism I almost surely say no, for such is the way of the gonzo journalist. It seemed he needed to be hated in order to get any work done. But for his work to mean anything, he had to be loved. I might say that his work at ESPN could have made him feel irrelevant, tamed. I wish that he were still here, because he did what he did so well.

But you can build yourself a house out of wishes, and a good solid shit will tear it down, so I'm going to carry on doing what I do well, and maybe see if I can't do a bit of what he did too. He was a good bastard while he was here. I'll be working through the channels of my newspaper to try get something published for him, hopefully written by my good friend Dann Ryan.

Recipe for Gonzo Journalism:

- 7 parts Muckraking,
- various parts Yellow (to get the doped-up masses interested)
- 2-to-4 parts New (in case Yellow can't counter the evening news' death tolls)
- a dash of Citizen (if your EIC doesn't quite like the angle you're working)
- and as many illegal substances as you can hide on/in your person, or need to get the job done.

(Yes, I am responsible for Yellow and Gonzo making it onto en.wikipedia.org's Journalism page. I would appreciate it if some alterolingual people would make the links in at least German and Japanese. For now.) This entry was finished at 4:17 a.m.

Classes have been pretty crazy lately, but I'm on the verge of something very big. That, or I've gone batshit mad again.

I don't know how long this is going to last, just like that haiku thing, but here goes with a new idea: A fair number of axioms and maxims manage to be contradictory in nature, and explication of their origins and changes over time can give us insight into their attempted meaning, as the expressed word doesn't always hit its mark in that department. I present to you then a first juxtaposition, to be followed in a few days by a history and my opinions regarding their absolute worth and which, if either, is superior:

"Good things come to those who wait" v. "Carpe diem"

Hopefully I'll have a bit of feedback before I make the followup post?