The Appreciation of Experience

We meet to depart


The purpose of the above post is to pull out that some cultures in this world look at an event such as departing the company of someone that you care about, as valuable as meeting with that person in the first place. An appreciation of the event. Of the emotional tugging. Of knowing that you are a human being with an emotional core.

I have come to appreciate new things in my life. Espresso. Hard work. My brothers. Wine. A clean and organized apartment. Making coffee in the morning for someone...

Each of these things mattered to me more than the simple value of the event. The emotions associated with each of these events. The thought that goes into them. THe thoughts that come out. The ideas that wander through your mind as you sit and contemplate the color of your object of attention. Maybe the shape. Or the touch. All of the thoughts that occur are part of it. Even the nostalgia brought up from the deep.

We meet so we have the opportunity of experiencing the departure.

Little Baby Steps

Space FUNGI!!

As weird as it does sound...we will leave this planet (hopefully) one day in search of another. We will probably already have a few planets in mind as we leave. The trip will be significant. We will live, breath and be born elsewhere in the universe. The Human Race of planet Earth circling Sol.

Little baby steps.

Women In Art

Woman...most beautiful women.

Ode to all that matters.

Thank you.

The United States in Iraq

This is a tough topic ot broach. THere are umpteen opinions already in play. And this is a subject of deathly reality. It hurts to think about teh waste of human beings. When a things like this occurs to a generation of people it stays with them. The children are being formed. The great people in society maimed. Culture is being lost. A civilization is being destroyed. There are arguments that say that we are saving what was already being destroyed and this aftereffect is a result of those evils beforehand. That doesn't matter to me. Because the current situation is one of brutality.

The United States of America and its citizens now have a responsibility to the people of Iraq. Now that we have decided to input ourselves into the situation we have to fix it. How we do that, I have suggestions like everyone else, but, in no short way is anything easy any longer. This is a complicated war we are in. The American Army is fighting on multiple fronts against a dug in enemy. The culture and society of one group of people is fighting that of another. Who is right is a complicated question as well. There are some who are of an absolute evil nature in this affair, but those people do exist on both sides. The solutions here are looking to solve some problems which have now been allowed to explode that have been around for thousands of years.

Our war machine upended the balance of power. There is a struggle for power and control in the region. Human life is an allowable casualty. The individuals are of no relevance. The people are suffering.

Iran is a complicated group to sit across from. Saudi Arabia is a underutilized force. Afghanistan is rugged landscape. Palestine has been raped. Israel is a powder keg. Turkey peers from above and the Kurds attempt to strengthen. Syria is a complicated little brother of Iran. And Lebanon is just trying to get things together so they can love life again. The region is significant.

The Middle East has chosen a path to glory via profit by taking advantage of oil The United States took advantage of good land that allowed for a large amount of food and resources.


Something will be done because change and action are constant. How we are further hurt or benefit as a human race will affect our futures potential. Resources such a human life are precious.

Bound for Glory: America in Color, 1939-1943

Bound for Glory: America in Color, 1939-1943

I do have a certain nostalgia for the a United States that I don't know. I was born in 1979. I live in a very different world than some American's have. I do long for that simpler life. Would I exchange it for the increased risk and absolute knowledge of a pending death so long ago? I don't know...but I do wish I could have a chance in a land of opportunity like that in my days. Maybe I do and I just need to see it...the colors there look so much prettier. The people healthier. They live. Again, nostalgia often ignores the harsh realities, fantasy absolutely does.

ProjectCensored.com: The Top 25 Ignored News Stories

Top 25 Ignored News Stories

None of these news stories were truly censored (I actually knew about all of them in one angle or another) and not all of these stories are absolutely of the highest order of knowledge and truth. But it is a good list. Story number three, in my mind, should be number one. But we really haven't yet figured out how to fix it and it scares us so we push forward hoping for the next scientific breakthrough.


"Meanwhile, since its peak in 2000, the global wild fish harvest has begun a sharp decline despite progress in seagoing technologies and intensified fishing. So-called efficiencies in fishing have stimulated unprecedented decimation of sealife. Long-lining, in which a single boat sets line across sixty or more miles of ocean, each baited with up to 10,000 hooks, captures at least 25 percent unwanted catch. With an estimated 2 billion hooks set each year, as much as 88 billion pounds of life a year is thrown back to the ocean either dead or dying."

Pretty Pictures

I like.

The Future: As we Cannot See It

An interesting write up about how the future that we think matters...really doesn't. What makes you think we can predict the future when doing that requires us to look beyond certain points that we cannot due to our incapability to see beyond those certain concepts.

Charlie's Diary: Shaping the Future

Institutionlized Artist On Display Again...

Martin Ramirez spent a large piece of his life in a mental institution. While there he painted and drew for you and I.

Just because you are my friends...

A good friend of mine showed me a column in the Palm Beach Post -- The Palm Beach Post & Frank Cerabino

As a result of that column I then did a google search and found this -- Argos Cherry Casket by Universal Expedited Shipping Solid Cherry Wood

The Music Industry

Trent Reznor Speaks (Nine Inch Nails)

I am not going to comment on what he says...merely give you a link to it and reproduce the verbiage. Enjoy.

Posted on [05_13_2007]

As the climate grows more and more desperate for record labels, their answer to their mostly self-inflicted wounds seems to be to screw the consumer over even more. A couple of examples that quickly come to mind:

* The ABSURD retail pricing of Year Zero in Australia. Shame on you, UMG. Year Zero is selling for $34.99 Australian dollars ($29.10 US). No wonder people steal music. Avril Lavigne's record in the same store was $21.99 ($18.21 US).
By the way, when I asked a label rep about this his response was: "It's because we know you have a real core audience that will pay whatever it costs when you put something out - you know, true fans. It's the pop stuff we have to discount to get people to buy."
So... I guess as a reward for being a "true fan" you get ripped off.

* The dreaded EURO Maxi-single. Nothing but a consumer rip-off that I've been talked into my whole career. No more.

The point is, I am trying my best to make sure the music and items NIN puts in the marketplace have value, substance and are worth you considering purchasing. I am not allowing Capital G to be repackaged into several configurations that result in you getting ripped off.

We are planning a full-length remix collection of substance that will be announced soon.

The Most Beautiful Bridge in the World

Google Images of the Millau Bridge

I know this isn't "hot off the press news," but this is the most beautiful bridge in the world and ties in well with the previous post on amazing architecture. Those people building a skyscraper down in the Middle East should draw inspiration from the French and know that those amazingly artful ideas on paper and in computers can in fact turn out to be incomprehensibly beautiful
pieces of our modern world.

We can do anything. We will.

New Skyscaper Uses Zero Total Emissions

Zero Emission Building

The first thing one must do when speaking about an idea like this is first throw out that the building is still in the planning stages. Computer simulations have shown that the ideas work. But..let us leave that now.

The building has a wind turbine built on the top. It's air movement system allows hot air to be sucked out of the top and cold air to be pulled down inside. Custom made window coverings to shield from the HOT desert sun. A floating island of solar panels to power the building. Hydrogen storage tanks to allow for energy storage. Internal mirror system which pumps real sunlight throughout the building. And I am sure a whole host of other ideas.

These concepts that are being tested all over the world by ultra wealthy countries will slowly filter down to you and I. In the near future you will create your own energy. Your home will have some of these tools. Your car will run on hydrogen (or electricity) created by you on your land. You will sell power to those companies and individuals who have chosen not to partake in the revolution.

I am happy this Sunday morning. :-)

Russian Jets Flying Near

Russian Bombers Probing English Military Exercises

It is interesting to see that even in today's times brinkmanship is still quite healthy. The bear has chosen to stick its head farther out to the see how the gentlemen was doing in military exercises. Its almost like siblings fighting each other...except here is it just a bit of flying expensive jets with big bombs.

On a certain level, this scares the bejesus out of me. However, on many other levels, I think I am comfortable here. We need mature international relations. I tend to think of the countries of the Earth much like the ancient Greek city states. Among ourselves, we will fight like animals, but when there is a greater threat we will bond together. So I still hold some hope...

"The Russians obviously thought it might be worth coming to have a look at what we were up to and probably take some photos. It's a throwback to the Cold War when they used to fly in regularly to poke and prod at the edges of British airspace and test our reaction times. It's normal to let such aircraft know we're there by pulling up alongside them and they left quietly. The whole encounter probably lasted 20 minutes." - Keith Wardlaw, Sqn Leader

I Cooked Dinner for Myself

A real dinner. Pasta. Red Bell Peppers. Fresh Parsley. Fresh Garlic. Extra Virgin Olive Oil. Green Tea. Red Wine. Copped it up. Cooked it all.

I don't like how dependent I am upon the machine for my sustenance. Free youself as best you can.

As we contemplate further action...

Remember, Iran, historically has been our friend. It is a great country to have on your side. Don't listen to the empty rhetoric.

September 18th, 2001.

$465 Billion Dollars ($465,000,000,000)

What would you do with $465 Billion dollars? The Boston Globe put together some pretty pictures.

You really don't even have to read much to get the point here.

Charity As it Should be Done

Kiva is something I have harped on in the past (here and here). I like it because it allows me, on a very micromanaged level, to choose how I wish to develop the world within a set of pre-chosen receivers. Kiva gives me a list of potentials who would like to receive a loan and it gives me a description of them. What there busness will be. A very slight snippet of their life. A talk about where they live. And possibly something of their ambitions. I donate there because I trust. Yes, I do know there are potential risks associated with giving money to groups in far away countries (419) but the risk of me losing my money versus a single individual losing the potential of a proper existence doesn't compare. I like giving. It makes me feel a little more relevant. It almost makes me feel as if I am, in some way, part of the solution. Ode to my emotions...as wild as they might be.

One thing I hear a lot from people is that they don't give because they think their hard earned money will go to inefficiency. Most people don't mind paying taxes. They receive services as a result - roads, police, protection from foreign invasion all the way down to social security, a certain level of available public health and a space program. I like to pay my taxes when I see the deal I get is worth it. I have in the past not donated to churches or groups like the Red Cross because of all of the lacking care I see in spending my money. How much money goes to pay for the executive's suite or the pretty leather chairs located in the Manhattan offices of whomever is collecting my hard work? I work hard and sacrifice for that money and as a result, I want it to be looked at and cared for in a similar manner as I do my own money. That money represents my productivity in life. In the American economy that I exist in, it represents my life's work (in the working sense of the word, my life will one day encompass helping the future of my planet through the raising of healthy children one day). It does matter.

What I would like to see created (or, lord knows, help create) is a tool, similar to Kiva in a few ways, to allow me to donate money to groups like the Red Cross but to donate money only to very specific places and parts of that process. I do know on the Red Cross' website they allow for you to specify where your donations go on a very high level (for instance when the Asian Tsunami destroyed so many lives I was able to choose from a drop down menu where I wanted my money to go). But that isn't enough for me. I want to be able to choose to allow my money to go specificially for the blankets of a child in a hospital located in Indonesia or the formula for a baby in the Sudan. Let every cost that is associated with a particular project around the world be paid for on an individual level. Quite possibly we might not choose to give money to the salaried employees of these groups, but I have a feeling that over time these positions will whither away as the collection of monies becomes automated and private enterprise then steps in. If I have chosen to pay for the blankets and you choose to pay for the air transportation from the factory that makes said blankets then what else is needed? I know that is an oversimplification but the world can be that easy if the time is taken in terms of programming the software and the end users appropriately invest their time.

Hospitals in Jakarta should explicitly define their needs. Locals associated with the website should invest their time to check up and verify the quality of the work done by the group and that the product is being appropriately applied to where it is needed. yes, there will always be risk but that is part of the equation when knowledge isn't perfect.

Just an idea at a loony hour of the weekend.