Please read this...

I have several friends who will often refer to astrology as the wisdom of the cosmos, or "readings" as actual guidance, to escort their hopes and dreams through the confusing maelstrom of life.

I beg of all of you... please read this simple article, and consider what it's saying.  Why isn't this a required course in school?

Criticism of Astrology

Astrology has been widely criticised by skeptics who consider it pseudoscience. This page summarizes some of the most common criticisms.

The Theory

Scientists believe that the underlying theory of astrology lacks any evidential support, and in fact is impossible.

Firstly, there is no known force that can cause celestial objects to affect human life in the way claimed by astrologers (the four known forces of nature can all be ruled out). There is no evidence of any other type of force at work, leaving no mechanism for astrology.1

Perhaps there is some mysterious force at work, unknown to science? Even so, such a force could not work in the way astrology describes because astrology is based on a false understanding of the sizes and positions of celestial bodies. According to astrology, the influence of celestial bodies is more or less evenly spread amongst the most obvious visible heavenly objects. If an object appears brighter or moves in an interesting fashion (e.g. stationary, direct or retrograde), it will tend to be given more significance. This would have made sense 6000 years ago but we now know better. We have learnt that objects we perceive as bigger, brighter, nearer or more active are not necessarily so.

Consider this example: If the outer planets have a similar level of influence to the inner planets, this would mean their level of influence is independent of distance. In turn this means that every planet in the galaxy is also influencing us. The effect of those planets would overwhelm any influence of the planets we can see.

The Evidence

Astrologists claim that astrology does work even if scientists say it can't. Their argument is that scientific knowledge is incomplete and scientists simply don't yet understand how or why astrology works. To answer this, scientists point to the evidence.

In a way astrology is scientific, insofar as that it has a reasonably well defined framework that predicts clear, consistent and testable outcomes. For example, astrology predicts that people born at certain times and under certain conditions will share certain personality traits. However, when studies of these traits are undertaken, no such correlation is found. To date, studies continue to show that personality traits are spread randomly across all star signs.3

Another prediction of astrological theory is that an accomplished astrologer should be able to match people with their birth charts. To test this, astrologers are presented with a series of randomized test subjects and birth charts, then asked to match the subject with their chart. To date no studies have demonstrated an ability to do this better than random chance.3,4

Horoscope Readings

Astrological readings tend to be made up of the following:

• Generalized character assessments that would apply to most people, e.g. "You are family-oriented", "You are mindful of your financial situation", etc.
• Double meanings that are almost always correct because they cover all possibilities, e.g. "You like to be decisive but sometimes you find it hard to make decisions."
• Obvious advice that applies universally, e.g. "Work hard and rewards will come."
• Vague references which could be interpreted in many different ways.
• Most importantly, things the subject wants to hear, e.g. "This is a positive time for romance".

Using these simple tricks, astrologers can create a horoscope reading that will always apply to the reader. Most advice applies to most people, and readers will naturally tend to interpret the readings as being personal to them. A graphic example of this phenomena was provided in a 1979 study by French statistician Michel Gauquelin. 150 people were given a horoscope reading and asked, along with their friends, to rate it for accuracy. 94 percent said the horoscope accurately described their character, and 90 percent of their friends agreed. In fact they had all been given the same horoscope—that of notorious mass murderer Dr Petiot.

Ethics

A less common but quite serious criticism of astrology is that it discriminates unfairly. For example, it is claimed that a number of prominent business people routinely use astrology to assist their decision making, including the hiring of employees1. This would naturally upset applicants who do not believe in astrology. Such discrimination is illegal in most western countries so people who use astrological methods would be inclined to keep their methods secret, making detailed study difficult.

Related Categories:
Astrology

Resources:

1. Article by Scott Payton in Financial Management (UK), ISSN 1471-9185, 2007-12-01
2. Article by Harry Edwards in Quadrant, ISSN 0033-5002, 1999-05-01
3. http://www.rudolfhsmit.nl/hpage.htm
4. http://psychicinvestigator.com/demo/AstroSkc.htm

Earth Goddess in the back yard

(Rachel, Rhys - closing her eyes in honor of Mother's Day)

I should have qualified.  My post from yesterday was not meant to be quite as specific as it sounded.  It was not meant to be directed at one person, though it was one person's Facebook ranting that triggered it.  At the end of the post I address a few things my brother posted, but that was as specific as I intended to be.  I come across these one-dimensional screeds and I resist them, often line with line.  

Rants give rise to ranting.  

The main issue I have with so-called "conservative" opinion is that it conveniently seems to forget a few factors that went into forming the nation.  They tend to act as if it was they, and their direct lineage, that created this wonderful hotbed of liberty. Yet they seem to forget many of the most basic truths of liberty and equality in doing so.  Without going into yet another tirade about it I'll simply say that the nation, and its principles, are profoundly liberal values.  They seek to preserve human dignity, not the status quo. 

The left sometimes seems to misunderstand the purpose of government, the right seems to misunderstand the purpose of this government's founding doctrine, but you'd never know it listening to either of them.  One would think that they have exclusive access to understanding it, and their foes are merely an impediment to understanding - if you didn't already know better.  

Doctrine, no matter how well-written, is a retreat from thought, not an advancement of it.  That is why the framers of The Constitution made it amendable.  The reason the 1st amendment is what it is, and the reason the 10th is what it is, is because they foresaw that they could not foresee.  Much has been said about various amendments that should be repealed.  Even the founding fathers must have thought that if there was one that might need repealing, among the ones that they wrote, it would be the 10th and not the 1st.  Suck on that states' rights revelers....  That's just pure founding wisdom there...  When a state is run by a bunch of bigots and religious fundamentalists then they should be dealt with by bigger ideas and a larger power.  That's why individual states can't amend.  It takes a nation...

I do hope they amend The Constitution to define marriage as the legal and recognized union between two consenting individuals, and nothing less. 

So, go ahead... praise the individual states' policy and power concerning marriage rights.  History has a way of dealing with such matters, American history in particular.  A "civil union" differs little from the failed "separate but equal" status that we now realize was abject negligence in both policy and language.  As well as being a miserable failure in serving, and advancing, the noble ideas laid out in the concepts of equality and liberty.  

I'd just like to see the conversation advanced.  

Ok, no more philippic, for now.  

Happy Mothers of Invention Day....

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Dirty Old Egg-Sucking Dog

(A suspected welfare recipient, likely fleeing a crime)

Yikes.  I've been naughty on Facebook again.  I can't help myself.  I'm like a dog that chases cars, incurable.  A dirty old egg-sucking dog, as Johnny Cash used to say.  I'll see some post about stopping the federal government from interfering with states' rights to discriminate freely, and without question, and then I'm off and running in the middle of the night.  Sometimes I feel like I'm having to say, "Whoah, whoah, hold on here... Nobody's suggesting that a heterosexual white woman shouldn't be allowed to be given away at her wedding.  We're not talking about total social upheaval here.  We're talking the sanctity of tradition here."

Once people start using the word "sanctity" to argue their point I get very shaky.  What's the first sentence in The Bill of Rights again?  Something about making no law respecting the establishment of any religion. How the fuck do people not know what the word "sanctity" means?  Don't get me wrong... I really believe in the sanctity of marriage.  I believe the ownership of all of Rachel's land should have been given over to me the moment I married her.  I mean, truly, I believe in the sanctity of the word, and its long glorious history.  If Rachel and I have a daughter I want to arrange a wedding for her at my choosing, to increase my political powers, or to extend my land usage.  I seek only to preserve the meaning of the word, the sanctity of it.

If these people had any more intellectual curiosity they might put themselves in serious danger of UFO abductions. 

This is the same group of people that decry the "liberal media" and the damage that it's doing to the country, stopping just short of suggesting ways to silence them, conveniently forgetting the second half of that first sentence in The Bill of Rights, something about the freedom of the press.

My demands would be much simpler: literacy tests for every employee of Fox News.

I often raise the point that if they're such big believers in democracy then why can't they accept that people regularly vote for social systems, and elect politicians who will vote for such systems?  Even though I am not a strong believer in the welfare system, it ires them to no end to have to accept that democracy works against them in many ways.  In that same way I've always maintained that if Jerry Falwell was elected president then I would accept him as the commander in chief of the largest military in the world.  

"You've got to kill the terrorists before the killing stops. And I'm for the president to chase them all over the world. If it takes 10 years, blow them all away in the name of the Lord." -Jerry Falwell

But the rattling of conservatives sabers continues, the beating on the chest, the waving of The Constitution, accusations, calls for a return to 18th century values.  I often wonder why they don't want to return to that time's science as well.  If we could only amputate this poor ol' bum nigger leg of mine.... instead we've got to drag it around with us as it destroys the rest of a perfectly healthy body...

Get them salivating about social systems.  It's really something.  Then shift the conversation from welfare to crime.  Ask them how much they'd be willing to pay to support a police structure that could handle all of the increased levels of crime that would result in a nation devoid of social programs.  No price would be too high, of course.  But this is when you can really glimpse the hatred in their minds. These are people that don't seem to be very bothered with the idea of the military assisting local law enforcement agencies with both intelligence and enforcement, they'd just prefer if it was happening in another country, mostly.  

Of course, if they can discern what you're doing then you'll only get the looks of condescending admonishment.  The "don't try to 'out' me on this issue" stare.  It's the old, I've been a closet racist for longer than you can possibly know, look.  It is a stern warning, an assured stare, that functions as warning as much as it does declaration.

None of them ever give me an example of a modern nation state that functions perfectly - the way that they desire - peeling back the clock to a time when only the first 10 amendments were in place.  Because there are none.  Their response is simple, those nations were never worthy of what we've enjoyed here.  Simple, right?  Ah, the first 10 commandments...  Why the fuck do we even let women vote?  That wasn't even on the list...!!!  In this strange and imaginary perfect world of the past where Call of Duty style capitalism reigned nobody ever stopped to question if all of the promises of liberty had yet been fulfilled.  Bullshit, lots of people did.  Ah, the glorious past, where we all at least knew our place... We fought for it, god-damn it. We had to....  We were Christians.

When is the republican party going to admit that they've been hijacked by the conservative christian right the way that the southern democrats had been up until they split off in the early 60's?  The democratic party came out in strong favor of civil rights, and the dual decisions had been made to prohibit state-sanctioned prayer and mandatory bible reading in public schools.  That was enough for them, it was time for action. With Jerry Falwell as one of their guiding lights they took up arms against the heathens. There was a massive shift towards republican leaders that could be swayed by christian voting coalitions.  Now they're strangling the party and, as always, reducing the conversation down to terms like "sanctity, testimony and miracle."  The political trinity of words that suggest all that needs to be said.  They are the words of veiled threat and religious intimidation.  Watch for them.

"The abortionists have got to bear some burden for this because God will not be mocked. And when we destroy 40 million little innocent babies, we make God mad. I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians who are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way -- all of them who have tried to secularize America -- I point the finger in their face and say 'you helped this happen.'" --(on the 9/11 attacks) -Jerry Falwell

I dunno.  Hearing some of the rhetoric that I have concerning Obama's personal stance in support of same-sex marriage has shed light on an old injury.  My brother responded to me on Facebook saying that, even though he is in support of gay marriage, states actually do have the right to privilege one group by granting them rights and denying others those same rights.  He says that I may see this rejection as arbitrary, but that the state does not.  It can be found in the interpretation of their state constitution, he says.  What could be less arbitrary?

There you have it.  The victory of equality.  Just trust that your state is doing everything it can to do things right, fall back on doctrine when all else fails.  I mean, it's the feds that we're not supposed to trust, right?  Our local like-minded boys have it all figured out nice and easy, just the way it's supposed to be. 

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The horror, the horror.....

Friday.  It often reminds me of a Kink's song.  Where have all the good times gone?  Or maybe, Friday On My Mind, by The Easybeats.  I am off from work for one more week anyway, so it doesn't matter as much to me, but it is Rachel's Friday.  So it feels like a Friday because of her.  I anticipate the two days to come.  

My weeks rarely ever begin or end on a Monday or a Friday.  I have lost all sense of what a weekend is.  Perhaps I never had a clear sense anyway.  My weekends were spent "working" in the music industry, sort of.  Weekends are when I would eat ecstasy like it was going out of style, literally.  It was going out of style, and the transition seems to be nearly complete.  Perhaps I am just old and kids are out there eating ecstasy daily and loving each other during their moments of being high, and occasionally during the moments between. 

Today I will babysit Rhys with grandma all day.  We will try to get a few errands run as well.  I will go into Marin for a last and final jousting session with the lady at the film processing place.  I will prepare to talk about resolution and compression algorithms.  I will show her the advertisement her store uses, advertising something it does not quite provide.  In truth she is actually quite nice and helpful.  I will go easy on her.  I have to tell myself that a few times to prepare.  If I don't remind myself to be nice then things can sometimes go terribly wrong.  So far I fit in perfectly in California.  I just need to keep smiling and pretending that I'm nice, centered even.  I'm going to get a bumper sticker that reflects my interest in saving the earth.

I want to make a bumper sticker that just says, "Drop the bomb. Exterminate them all."  See if anybody gets the humor, the irony of it.  It could even be framed in quotation marks.  "  "  Maybe even give it a credit, Col. Kurtz...  I want to get a bumper sticker that's about 4 feet wide and just as high.  One that covers the entire back window of my car.  On it I would have printed, in a very small font, the entire text of Ovid's "Metamorphoses."

Maybe not.  I suppose it could just as well be Virgil's "Aeneid", in Latin.  It would be ironic if the bumper sticker caused an accident in which I was killed.  It's been said many times that it is a dead language.  I had been warned.

I suppose my epic bumper sticker idea doesn't necessarily have to be a classic of the form.  It could be Tennyson, or Pound.  

Very Andy Kaufman, that.  I just want more nonsensical things in my life.  I'm looking forward to Rhys learning the language.  I've been storing up nonsense for a lifetime.  It'll be fun to finally have somebody to unravel it all on.

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Growing Up

(Burdened with the misfortune of youth)

The president comes out in favor of civil rights...  It will surprise nobody that the Tea Party will never back him up on this, of course.  I love the flatulent rhetoric of that group.  They act as if they are the defenders of The Constitution but fail to grasp the very essence of the doctrine, that the amendments are there to preserve and protect the rights of the individual.  That some are being denied the rights enjoyed by others doesn't seem to phase them too much.  They'll all fall back, gasping, that "It's up to the individual states..!!!"  Sure it is, just like Little Rock was.  

It's not just the Tea Party, the entire right will use the prez's stance as a rallying call.  This, more than just about anything I can imagine, will reveal the two-fold lie of the conservative right.  When they jabber about rights they mainly mean their right to deny rights to others, basing their bigotry on a thing they call "sanctity."  I also believe in the sanctity of liberty.  I hope Obama beats Romney, and the coalition of the christian right that he so hopes to appease, like a wayward pack of clumsy mongrels.  I'm actually looking forward to this presidential election now.  I had almost lost interest once old Newt re-strategized.  Newt has enjoyed some-sex on sex on sex on sex marriages.  I'm curious what his stance on marriage overlap is.  What fun.

But ol' Obama, wow...  I guess he's really decided that he's going after the liberal, the youth and the gay vote.  The conservative christians can go fuck themselves.  I've long felt that way but it's astonishing to see a president take the stance in an election year.  He might actually be able to pull off the trick of getting us to believe in "change" again.  It'll be fun to watch, for sure.  I almost want to convince Rachel to get a t.v. in the house.  I want to see more mainstream coverage.  They must be pissing themselves with excitement.  I almost typed excrement.  Almost.

Moving on.  What the fuck is a bunion and how did I get one?  No, I thought I had one.  I was even diagnosed with one by a friend.  But it turned out to just be a bruised bone in my right foot.  I was really about to give up, this time for good.  About once a month or so I wake up with some new hideous malady.  Some go away, some don't.  I don't remember getting injuries in my sleep when I was younger.  Injuries were usually the sole domain of stupidity in action, mine.  Almost every injury I got was self-inflicted and occurred most often through the execution of conscious acts.  Every now and then I would sort of "come-to" and I would be damaged, often in a very visual way, but there were usually others that were happy to tell me what had happened.  Injury served as a temporary reminder not to do certain things, or perhaps to do things better next time, or to try to anyway.  The memory of pain and shame wore off as the body healed.  I would be back to high speed idiocy again with an enthusiasm for ruin that many found breathtaking.

If anybody ever tells me to "grow old gracefully", or that they actually enjoy growing older then I'm just going to respond with, "Yep, everything just keeps getting better and better.  I can't wait to be infirm, complete debilitation should be pleasant, of course, and death is going to be simply fantastic. I am beside myself with anticipation."  What the fuck?  There is nothing about growing old that is preferable.  Nothing.  I've heard people talk about maturity and making better decisions and all of that nonsense.   The best times of my life were when I was making marvelous mistakes, not when I was slowly avoiding them.  Making grand mistakes is the only way to live.  People tell me about serenity and inner-peace... all of which sounds miserable and dull.  I question how these people live with themselves.  Truly.  How boring must their dreams be.  I've heard some talk about training themselves to meditate in their dreams.  At some point peacefulness resembles death, and not the victory of death - the release from pain and entering the cosmos once again - but just eternal dullness, floating by yourself in a sea of useless self.

I am even boring myself writing about it.

Being old is disgusting.  Meditating is a form of practicing how not to live.  Dreams should be wild and weird and enjoyed as they are, whenever possible.  As a counterpoint, I'm going to try to start exhibiting more obsessions and compulsions in my dreams.  Or, maybe I'll just try to go on manic shopping sprees in my dreams.  I'll pursue any distraction, no matter how odd or neurotic.  Seems easy enough, all I have to do is stay asleep just a few seconds longer.

   

The Tell-All Heart

Have any of you read Edgar Allan Poe?  Some of what he wrote predicted a world in which Keith Richards reigned.  He wrote one story in particular called The Tell-Tale Heart.  It is about Keith Richards and his lone, lost, rusty eyeball.

I'm not sure why Keith was trying out for the part of "Mork" in the picture above.  Mork from Ork, that is.  Nanu Nanu, etc.  Luckily Robin Williams landed the part instead of Keith.  Otherwise, we might not have had all of those great Latter-Day Stones albums like Undercover of the Night and Bridges to Babylon.  I'll let you argue amongst yourselves which is the worst of the late, the deceased, period of The Stones' swan-song album era. 

It's no small wonder that people thought he was more fucked up than he really was.  Nobody ever got to look him in the eyes and say to him, "Keith, pull yourself together....Look at me, god-damn it! Pay attention, for christ's sake, this is really important."  That was simply never an option with Keith.  I mean, it's not his fault.  Lots of people have an eye that wanders hither or thither, to or fro.  

He sees only in two dimensions, but sees slightly more of those two dimensions, from right to far left-ish.

  

I rarely ever notice.  I don't like to look people in the eyes anyway.  I am afraid of what I might see there.  One eye looking right at me, pleading for understanding - the other meandering, planning its escape.

But in conversation I always remember this picture of Keith Richards.  It helps me.  His right eye seems very serious, and quite intent on making its point.  His left, however, is already looking for its next fix, somewhere off stage, somewhere else.  

Anywhere else but here, always just over there, to his left.

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My best friend, J.C.

The hills are returning to their summer brown.  The change has begun.  Everywhere you look there is the beginning of the brown mixed in with the rolling green.  Once the transition is complete then they will take on that "golden" look that the state is so famous for.  I'm uncertain if its designation as "The Golden State" is for this reason or because of the gold rush of the mid 19th century.  The famous "forty-niners."  I'd like to believe it's for the hills surrounding where we live and all through northern California.

In the trees behind our house there are cicadas clicking away each night.  Cicadas or locusts, I'm not sure.  Either way it is a sign from god that the end times are near.  I'm sure of it.  It is a lovely sound, letting me know that soon I will be going home, ascending into the heavens with all of the other believers, returning to my Father's house to live in eternal harmony with him and the hordes of angels.  To spend all of time in loving bliss, filled with the holy spirit.

Have I told you yet about my best friend, Jesus Christ?  

Each evening the backyard fills with butterflies.  It is some sort of a mating ground for them, or perhaps there is a butterfly war going on each day.  There seem to be many different varieties.  I'm no lepidopterist but I'd say there's at least 5-7 different families represented.  Maybe it's a gang thing, they are all fighting for their turf.  I bet butterflies are assholes once you really get to know them.  They seem very whimsical and vain, not to be counted on in any way.  

I am just a witness, a patsy to the seasons.

I've finally gotten several rolls of film processed.  5 rolls of Tri-X bland and white, and one old roll of color.  The image above was taken as an accident at f16 with a very old roll of color film, inside our old apartment.  It left a ghostly likeness of Rachel in there that I liked.  A total accident.  

I've driven back to the processing place twice now to argue with the owner.  They advertise, and the guy at the counter assured me, that the size of each image would be 4.5MB.  When I got the disk they were each about 1.3 MB.  She explained that this was because they were compressed into jpeg format.  When you open and re-save them as TIFF's then they are 4.5MB each, approx.  I argued that I should have been told that I would be getting 1.3MB jpegs, rather than 4.5, which is what I was led to believe. She actually tried to tell me that there's no difference.  I showed her that there most certainly was, on every single app she had on all of her computers in the store.  It was only when the jpeg was opened and re-saved as TIFF was it 4.5.   I felt that I should have been warned, as I thought I was getting higher res jpegs.  Again, she tried to claim that there is no difference between a 1.3mb jpeg and a 4.5mb jpeg.  Flustered, I had her read the wikipedia article on jpegs, compression and the algorithms that constitute "lossy compression."

Finally, I won.  But at what cost.... In the future I'll just make my printing decisions from the miniature contact sheet they provide with each roll.  After $80 in processing and print scanning, and two trips into Marin from Sonoma, all I've really accomplished is to teach the owner of a film processing/printing place that, in an image, less information means lower resolution, making it a jpeg does not change that fact, it actually amplifies it.  All in day's work. 

But I do love that film look.  I'm going to spend some more time playing around with different types of film.  I bought a few rolls that are meant to have far less grain that the previous ones I had been shooting.  We 'll see how that goes.  My other option is to purchase the Fuji X-Pro1, a camera that claims to produce images that are far closer to film than all of the other digital cameras in its class.  I mean, Fuji makes film, they should be the ones that could make a camera that emulates that "film look."  I've become very suspicious of the images coming out of my Nikon D7000 now.  They seem too clean, too clinical, too sharp, no grain.  

I was happy with it just a few days ago.  Always there is something luring me towards a new happiness and away from another.

Here is a snapshot I took against awful apartment blinds that we daily endured.  I love it.

(Rachel, at the police station)

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Titties

If I've ever hinted or joked here before that taking care of a child is easy, and I hope that I haven't, then I now retract those words in full, and offer apology.  For the last two days I have taken care of Rhys for a few hours each morning.  Most of that time has been quite pleasant.  But it has not been "most of that time" that has been most memorable.  Pleasantness is rarely memorable, it can leave a strong impression, but few lasting memories.

If you've never been in charge of a baby's needs, the direct link to their happiness or wailing frustration, then I strongly advise you to give it a try.  It might teach you many things about yourself.  Perhaps not, I can only speak for myself.  But what seems to come so easy for the boy's mother has been an occasional struggle for me.

Again, I want to emphasize that I've enjoyed this time, mostly.  But the times that put us nearly to the test are not the pleasant times.  

Oh, fuck it.  I was going to launch into a (hopefully) funny retelling of my morning's experiences, but I just don't have it in me.  The boy is going to wake up soon.  And even though the nanny, Lisa, is here I know that I won't be able to maintain any concentration for it.  Even the thought of it distracts me.

I'll say this though, at the hope that this post does not result in an excess of unsolicited advice: don't scramble.  I've discovered that once the boy is upset and I scramble to make him happy it only seems to make matters worse.  It's an easy impulse to give into, because once found, the peace that the solution provides is priceless.  The boy has a very limited range of emotions and a few of those emotions are there to expressly communicate that he wants something.  There are only a small handful of things that he ever wants.  But knowing in advance, or at the time of crisis, can be very tricky.

Titties.

I've always loved titties.  They are wonderful, alluring transmitters of happiness and pleasure, repositories of tender affection and generosity.  In my mind they are made only of a woman's sugar, filled with lovely lactose and life-giving goodness.  Though I know this to be incomplete fact, it is what I enjoy believing...  They can be used in an astonishingly wide array of interactions, from flirtation through to its completion, and each diversion along the way.  Seduction is barely possible without them, yet they are an unnecessary component to love - not superfluous, but also not required.  

They are perhaps their most intriguing when not being consciously used at all.  Very little ignites a daydream the way that two titties moving underneath a blouse can.  They just are.  They are magically self-explanatory.  They exist in perfect relation to the life that carries them, the life they carry.  It is no wonder that I've always felt they were put there just for me.  They were.  I see that now, the silliness of it all.  

The beautiful, delicate, silliness of it all.

  

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Feed him when he cries

I think I've got this whole baby thing figured out.  I took care of him for two hours this morning.  He really seems to like me.  I fed him when he cried, walked him around the neighborhood between naps and feeding, gave him gas drops after burping him.  I think I've got it all figured out.  I don't see what the big deal is.  

There was a fire in the neighborhood, so we went and checked that out.  It was two doors down from the garden.  We were already out walking when it happened so we stood around watching the action.  Two generations of morons.  The firemen came and cut a hole though the roof of the house and then proceeded to drown everything from the roof down.  We have long suspected that there is something illicit going on in the house.  There have been many strange occurrences.  Things that defy easy explanation.  People losing their minds, marching up and down the streets half-naked, screaming nonsensically.  Full winter clothing in summer, dancing and singing up and down the streets at all hours of the night.  Screaming.  Televisions being thrown through second story lattice walls.  

Drugs.  We know this.  But we just don't know the specifics.  We're assuming the authorities will take this opportunity to figure things out.  We posited that it was a meth lab, but those end in explosions more often than fires.  To be more precise, any fire would quickly be followed by an explosion. 

Okay.  It's time for me to go back to sleep, if I can.  I slept terribly last night and feel unrested today.  I've run out of NyQuil and the neighborhood drug lab seems to have just been flooded.

This is how Rhys feels about it:

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Flower Moon

Two friends came in from SF.  There was much drinking the night before last, resulting in no post yesterday.  They showed up with wine.  We drank many bottles, late into the night.  Late for me, that is.  They are from the city and were probably going to bed the earliest they have in months.  Yesterday I was hung-over all day.  At breakfast I purged some stomach acids in the old-fashioned way, then ate my breakfast, which really helped.  Truly, it saved me.

In the afternoon we all three sat on the back patio and played guitars, sometimes together, sometimes meandering into different keys, rhythms, bits of song.  It has been some time since I had played along with others and the feeling was nice.  Acoustic guitars sound marvelous when played together.  One of my friends has bought two guitars that are the type guitars one would hope to keep for life.  Beautiful instruments worth caring for.  It made my Martin look like an old farmer's guitar.  Nobody seemed to even want to touch the Ovation.  We all took turns with the pale instrument, friends that we are.

Occasionally I added a few chords here and there on the baby grand.  But inexperience and a hangover does not good musical accompaniment make.  With a little practice, hopefully, soon.  Today the tips of my fingers on the left hand are sore.  It has been too long since I've played the guitar and my fingers have lost all of their callouses.  It's like doing too many pushups, drunk, after not having worked out in some time.  The flesh reveals how tender it truly is.

We spent the rest of the day over at the garden, sipping beers, chatting about the world's many ills and joys.  The driver responsibly cut himself off a few hours before they knew they would depart.  The beer seemed to help, but also exacted its own price.  I could feel the energy fleeing my body, trying to save itself.  

Then they went back to SF and I had some pancetta with porcini and pasta with Matt and Lisa.  It was delicious but I was beaten and drained.  I had a single glass of wine with dinner and all it did was remind me of the danger.  Everything about me felt weary and consumed.  I had little conversation to offer.  Rachel and I had agreed to watch a movie together so I left after dinner.  I practically slept on the short drive home, having no memory of it, though knowing that it somehow happened.

I climbed into bed with my jeans on, certain that I would not be awake for long.  It was still very early, perhaps too early to go to sleep.  The city was just waking up for the night.  Rachel had just put the boy to bed, maybe only an hour and two before.  As we reclined there together watching images move on the screen the moon came up through the trees.  It was just as they said it would be, larger and brighter than normal.  It was our first full moon in our new place together.  Everything is a first now.  

The moonlight coming through the trees and into our bedroom was pleasant, even enchanting.  We kept the door to the deck wide open as the moonlit shadows of the trees moved slowly across the room, putting me to sleep, holding us there together as the night passed.

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Suckers...

Yes, I know it.  I'm a sucker.  I was driving into San Rafael yesterday to drop off some black and white 35mm film to be processed, something I've been telling myself that I'm going to do for some time now.  I hadn't even made it out of Sonoma when I saw a small dog going underneath a car with its tail pulled between its legs.  I pulled over.  The woman in the car had gotten out and was trying to lure the dog over to her.  Believing myself to be greatly in tune with, and a friend to, all animals - I also gave it a try.  

I won.

It was at this point the woman told me that she had her dog in the car and couldn't really do anything about the situation.  What did I think that I was going to do?  Fuck.  The little guy was scared.  He wasn't used to being out.  No collar, less than a year old, good teeth and gums, no fleas.  The little guy was scared.  I decided to drive him to the Sonoma Police Station and drop him off.  I put him in the car, moving my 35mm camera out of the way and putting my bag of film canisters on the floor so he could sit on the passenger seat.  That didn't last long.  He was on my lap in no time, still scared, but warming up to me.  I was a savior of sorts.

Once at the police station, a place I fastidiously avoid under normal circumstances, I locked him in the car.  I snapped the picture that you see above before heading in, prepared to have them take over.  Nope.  They explained that the dog was found in the county and not in the city.  They would have to ship him to Santa Rosa animal control.  This sounded ominous.  The Belsen of Sonoma County.  I asked where Pets Lifeline was.  They explained.  I knew exactly where they were describing.  It was a place I was very familiar with from my bike rides.  Off I went.  

"Not on my watch", I told myself.

Once at Pets Lifeline I waited at the vacant front counter for about 5 minutes, pacing back and forth, wanting to just walk in the back and request help.  There was a lost puppy in need.  Finally a woman came to the counter and asked what I needed.  I explained.  Nope.  She said that they didn't have any vacant kennels.  I told her the near death experience of the police station.  She inquired as to who told me that dogs were put to sleep in Santa Rosa.  I explained that that they hadn't actually said that, but it was implicit.  She said no, oh no, that's not what they do around here.  But she went out to the car with me anyway and inspected him.  She agreed with me.  He was a dog that was not meant to be out.  No collar, no tracking device (she had a wand that checked for such things), but in good shape, just a scared little adorable pup. 

She claimed to have seen a flea on him, but I never saw it.   

Back to the police station I went, to drop him off.  "Shaky" was his name by now, named after Neil Young, and for the other, obvious reason.  He was scared.  A Chihuahua mix of some sort.  A pleasant little guy that didn't deserve to die at the hands of a society that's spun dangerously out of control.  The woman at the front desk listened to me explain that Pets Lifeline was full.  I asked her in very clear terms whether or not they would put the pup down in Santa Rosa if nobody claims him.  She said that they definitely would.  I explained that Pets Lifeline told a different story.  She said that they don't like to send people away thinking that they're bringing dogs to their doom.  

"What a fucking cunt.", I said.

No, I didn't.  I didn't have to.  It was in the air, everybody felt it, I'm pretty sure.  

But she explained again that because the dog was found just over the city line, and into the county, that she would have to call the county to handle it.  But she was happy to keep the dog at the police station until they arrived.  I got all of the phone numbers I needed, and a verbal promise, from a cop, that they don't put the dogs down immediately.  Nobody was sure how long the waiting period was, but everybody head-noddingly agreed that it was probably about a month.  I left with a verbal promise from a cop, and a silent promise to myself, that this dog would not die, could not die.  By the time I left that police station the dog was practically immortal, frolicking amongst the saints.

Rachel had already blossomed into full mothering mode by this point, even from the great distance of Napa, over mountain and across valley.  She was making arrangements to care for the pup and explaining in rapid texts, one after the other, that we would find a home for the little guy.  Nope.  I had to tell her that the best thing to do was give the rightful owners a chance to retrieve him first.  There could be a little boy or girl at home crying their eyes out that poor little Shaky was gone....

This worked.  Finally something I had done for the day was working.  But then on the way home I imagined all sorts of scenarios in which the rightful owners never did find poor little Shaky, and then trembling in his final moments he was letting out imaginary whimpers in my mind as the poison needle of bureaucracy drew closer.  God-damn it.  I resolved myself to going home, making a flyer, and putting them up near where I found him.  Fuck.

So, after about an hour and a half, going to the print shop with a thumb-drive that was formatted for Mac and not PC, returning home, emailing the flyer to the print shop, returning once more, finally I had the flyers in hand.  I paid for them and a roll of shipping tape.  Putting up flyers is almost a two-man job.  Holding the paper steady while trying to negotiate the roll of tape and its awkward distribution is a frustrating task.  Several flyers were ruined in the process.  It was raining lightly and the paper was already beginning its decline.  After about a half an hour I was finished with my task.  I stopped by the woman's house who had found the little guy with me this morning, gave her a few of the flyers, we shook hands, then I headed home.

I sent the flyer image to Lisa who subsequently posted it on her Facebook page, where it was shared by many in this close-knit community.  The news was spreading fast.  Tragedy would be averted, I told myself.  

Nope.

I called the police station later yesterday.  Nobody had claimed the pup and Santa Rosa had been called. They would be picking the little guy up later in the day or tomorrow, this morning.  When Rachel got home she gave me a look that placed me in league with, or perhaps even beyond, the executioners.  I might as well have been a guard at Auschwitz.  Sean, her eyes seemed to say, doing the "right thing" under these circumstances isn't quite good enough, is it?  I could hear Paul Newman's voice echoing from the Cool-Hand past, "Calling it your job don't make it right, Boss."

Nope.  I suppose it doesn't.

So, any careful reader knows what my day will now include.  I will be tracking Shaky down to save him from certain death, or adoption by loving others.  

Say hello to the (temporary) new member of the wandering Cusick pack of trembling gypsies. 

(Shaky)

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Victory Garden

(Mint)

Speaking of "the garden"... we have yet to be kicked out.  Our collective effort is going very well.  It was one of the things I promised myself we would have if we left New York.  I wouldn't call it a "bucket list" item, but it was a meager want of mine.  We don't actually have our own garden yet, we are sharing the backyard garden space of Matt and Lisa, but that makes it more fun.  It's sort of a community garden effect, even though they can have a trespassing warrant filed against us if they choose to.  There has been no talk of a trespassing warrant yet.  I am just being prepared.  If I happen to eat from the beanstalk of knowledge, or the pumpkin of life, etc.

(Beanstalk)

"We are stardust, billion year old carbon.  We are golden, caught in the devil's bargain.  And we've got to get ourselves back to the garden." - Joni Mitchell

Yes, indeed.  I am becoming a hippie, losing my edge.  California has made my brain soft.  I find myself sitting contentedly in silence and reading, gazing out upon the grass and trees in the backyard and thinking to myself, "How pleasant..."  I talk very earnestly, and endlessly, about what zodiacal signs people are, or might be.  I pray to rocks, for healing power.  The other day I burped and tasted applesauce.  That's how much my brain has turned to mush.  This place has melted my cerebrum, converting it into a wet, pulpy mass that smells and tastes just like applesauce.  

It's what happens to apples after they leave the garden.  

(Bok Choy)

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The fall of man

(Eden at a 65 mph drive-by)

It never ends.  Job problems even when I'm not at work.  There is an almost constant dance between rights and responsibilities, orders and insubordination, initiatives and lack of initiative.  Others don't seem to have these same problems.  Others, always others.   My life moves from trouble to trouble, on oceans of assumptions and whims, or worse.

We have begun to settle into our new house, unboxing books in an effort to humanize the place, to keep the cardboard boxes from stealing our precious humidity.  I have steely resolve to never let a roomful of boxes give me a sinus infection again, even if I do like sipping NyQuil through the hazy late nights as if it's honey-whiskey.   The time has come for me to put a fence on the cliff rather than always keeping an ambulance in the valley.  Soon our lives will be unboxed.  I'll keep a bottle of NyQuil handy just in case though.  You never know.

I love our new home.  The exterior of the house is comprised of cedar siding.  It is impractical and was popular in the 80's.  At once we felt a spiritual kinship with it.  Some spots are faded and split, others wet and weathered, almost moist in appearance.  Its impracticality is its charm.  It's like much else in my life - cracking, and needing to be replaced. 

I have written 1/3 of a million words on this site since its beginning just over two years ago.  I found out yesterday.  It occurred to me that I don't have a local copy of any of it.  So I set out copying-and-pasting, one month at a time.   Then I put them all into a single document.  320,000 words.  I'm am not writing for numerical totals, but still... I was impressed with myself.  I usually have a difficult time sticking with things.  I give up easy, expect more praise than I deserve, bore quickly with my own efforts, etc.  I am the classic underachiever.  My own biggest fan, my own worst enemy.  

But, I am proud of myself for having stuck with this.  It requires a discipline of sorts, a daily dedication of time.   I wonder what they would say at work about it...  There is little place at work for anything that does not feed the monster.  All things should work towards the edification of the juggernaut behemoth. 

It is the curse of the tree of knowledge.  The sweet taste of pomegranate or apple filling man's head with the knowing from which there is no return.  The curse and pain of labor, both women's and men's.  The gorging ourselves upon information, and the access to it.  The juice of the forbidden fruit drowning out our senses, intoxicating us with its daily dizzying increases.  Oh, dear bandwidth, won't you widen like the Nile...

  

I'd better stop all of this talk.  Rachel will be wanting to baptize little innocent Rhys soon, to wash away his pre-born sin.  We'll want to assure him a spot in paradise, saving him from his little automatic guilt, his unoriginal sin.

People are completely out of their muddled minds.  I wish there was a way of baptizing him against idiotic religious mumblings.  Not even education seems a certain safeguard any longer.  

(Rhys) 

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Watching it happen

(Yevgeny Mokhorev)

It must have been 1979.  We all knew each other from the neighborhood.  There were at least seven or eight of us all together, but it was mainly us three.  Nicky, Steven and me.  We were just a group of misfit kids, just like others, but more than most.  

There was a patch of undeveloped land behind the last row of houses in the neighborhood.  It was a wide strip that stretched all of the way to the golf course.  We weren’t supposed to be going through there.  A kid had drowned once in a muddy river that barely qualified to be called that.  It was just a little creek  that was created mostly of runoff from the golf course.  Even the golf course could barely be called that.  Nobody ever seemed to be taking care of the fairways.  There were large areas where it was mostly dirt, or dried brown grass, even though it rained most every day in the summer.  I only ever saw a handful of people golfing the course each year.  

Before the kid drowned nobody ever called it a river.  Afterwards, all of the parents did.  It seemed unfitting for a kid to die in some golf course runoff water, little more than drainage sludge that had found its path.  Everybody started referring to it as “the river in the woods” like it was even a river, or those were even woods.

It was impossible to cut through without crossing it, the little river.  There wasn’t a single place where it was difficult to cross.  After the drowning we always crossed there, at the spot where he died.  We could never figure out how he drowned.  He must have stood on his head, or crossed doing a handstand, or tried to.  None of us saw the body but we all saw them pulling away from the neighbor’s driveway where we would cut into the trees.  We saw it all after they had pulled him out, everybody did, as they were putting him in the coroner’s car, just a bag and a body on a moveable metal bed with wheels.  We stood together and stared at the car after the door had closed.  None of us liked him that much.  We all felt bad about it afterwards for weeks.  For a while we would say his name like he was one of us, but then we stopped that.  He wasn’t.  We all knew it too.  He was a couple years older than the rest of us and he didn’t have many friends.  His parents weren’t even crying.  They were just staring at everything, moving slowly.  Then they just got into one the cars and pulled away with everybody else, like they were going to the grocery store, or the movies.

At night the spot was spooky.  It became that way.  We would spook each other with it.  Telling stories about being able to see the boy’s face in the reflected moonlight.  Ghosts, voices, all that.  It was spooky for sure, that spot.  After that.  

There was another place not far from there where there seemed to be a hallway made of briars.  It was just a group of bushes that had grown together leaving a sort of walkway underneath them.  It didn’t lead from anywhere or to anywhere.  It was a point of constant daring.  We claimed that the boy’s ghost was still trapped inside of it, trying to get out.  We would stand around it, challenging each other to walk through with our shirts off.  Well, not Nicky.  She didn’t have real titties yet, but we knew that she was supposed to soon, that they had just started.  She knew it too.   She was a terrible tomboy.  We would tease her about it, but never in the really mean way.  Just the way that we would tease everybody about everything.   

I caught Steven and Nicky one day in her garage.  He had her up on the tool bench and had his forefinger inside of her.  She was sitting, facing him with her legs spread, her head was tilted back and her eyes were closed.  They were both making noises.  I saw that his finger was up past the second digit.  When he pulled it out it made a sound and I could see between her legs for a second.  I saw everything.  It all happened so fast.  She turned to jump off the bench and I saw her naked butt then too.  I had seen that before.  He had his pants down to his ankles but his underwear up, which I thought was stupid, but I was relieved because of it.  He seemed to know this too, that it was stupid.  They were both embarrassed.  I was too.  They pulled themselves together and ran out of the garage and acted as if it hadn’t happened.  I walked out of the garage and they were in the front yard.  They both wanted to go somewhere else, anywhere.  The suggestions, the possibilities, poured out of them in a torrent.  They were eager to move on.  I was still lingering somewhere back there in the garage, replaying again and again what I had seen, what they had done.  

Nicky had let us watch her climb poles before, to see her panties, but she didn’t have any panties on this time.  She left them in the garage.  I saw them crumpled up there as I walked by, following them both to the front yard.  They were light yellow and seemed unspeakably clean in comparison to the bench where they sat crumpled up and abandoned.  It kept crossing my mind later that day that she didn’t have any underwear on.  I couldn’t stop thinking about it.  Later, I went back to the garage but they were gone.  Her family was inside eating dinner when I snuck in to look.  I could hear them talking, the sound of silverware on plates.  I waited to hear Nicky’s voice but it never came. 

We were inseparable, or so we thought.  There were times when I felt it between us, the knowledge.  We would make little jokes, just learning to be vague, our first lessons in subtlety.  None of us were very good at it.  It would always result in much flustered blushing.  But we all three knew.  We all three knew that.


I came home from school one day and my father announced we were moving.  It would be happening soon, during the summer, so that it wouldn’t affect our school year.  That’s what we were told.  We began driving over to where our new neighborhood would be, looking at the empty house that we were to buy.  My parents deciding in advance how things would be for us.  We all knew what it meant.  Our friendship would be demolished forever.  Nicky and Steven, of course, would remain.  I knew that too.  I hadn’t meant to ever keep them from each other, but now somehow I knew that whatever was going to happen would happen.  I imagined their clandestine impulses suddenly unleashed.  I imagined all sorts of things.

The week before the last day we took extra time each day to run through the strip of trees that separated the neighborhood from the golf course.  I daily imagined all manner of different colors underneath her pants, and skirts.  Even her socks looked erotic.  We would both let her run in front of us.  The day before my last Nicky stopped me near the gate and kissed me on the lips, in front of Steven.  She held me there with her lips pressed to mine, and moving.  We were standing in the neighbor’s yard, the one we used to cut through to get to the trees.  We had worn a path there.  Not just us three, but everybody.  He didn’t say anything at all.  It was as if we were all just standing there, watching it happen.

(Mokhorev)

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