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Showing posts from September, 2011

I Don't Necessarily Like This Song

So, I was playing 5 in a row after work today - waiting for something to finish up so I can leave - and there's a song running through my head. And I don't necessarily even like this song. But it won't leave. The song is Filthy/Gorgeous - By the Scissor Sisters. Is it something about the animation of the game? I wish I knew. Will this song ever leave my head? Off to the Airport...

The District Sleeps Alone Tonight - The Postal Service

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The Atlanta Braves Wild Card

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In order for the Atlanta Braves to make it to the post season, they must prevail against the Philadeplhia Phillies. Even if they do so, there will be a one game playoff following - assuming that the St. Louis Cardinals do not lose their game against the Houston Astros. Why do I make this assumption? Because only queers and steers come from Texas, and last time I checked those Astros aren't wearing any horns. They will likely fall down like a house of cards against the onslaught of St. Louis. They'll be blown down into ash faster than a Texas prairie home. The entire state is led by someone who can't even do the math to figure out global warming is happening - they just don't have a chance against the calm, cool, collected St. Louis cardinals. The problem for tonight is that the Braves got stepped on , in a big way - last night. Getting stepped on, by anyone - is painful. But when they do it with baseball cleats on - it really hurts. The Phillies took apart the br

The Arab Spring

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WebifyMe.org

This is a project that the open source guys at Mozilla are a part of - I'm not really sure what it is, but I think it's based on the concept that you can set up a page to be , sort of your 'internet desktop'. It's fun to see how other people use the net. This is mine. I noticed - in passing, that the buttons 'share on facebook' and 'share on twitter' are of little to no use to me. I've already shared them. Here. The essence of this 'share' is that it can be hit by you without having to login, backed up, indexed, read, and kept as a journal or ignored. It will not be washed over with advertisements or lost in a stream of polysynaptic 140 character utterances. There are some drawbacks, of course. You can't instant chat with me, and interrupt whatever it was that I was doing. You don't have pictures of me on a 'wall', that you can use to look at . If you want to see me, you can use my always on - organically

Tonight's Gonna Be A Good Night - B.E.P./ Univ. of Montreal Project

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To Hear Your Banjo Play

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The Seyfert Historian Speaks

In the beginning the planet that orbitted the distant yellow sun produced little Small trilobites scurried to and fro happy to be nothing Then Passing through the storm the sky lit up with fire and the earth was undone Somewhere Civilization was torn down in an era of greed men were elected that were not of reason but instead they required those who elected them to use faith and in the undoing of democracy the cynical destruction of governance and the loss of the body polity There was an Arab spring and some of them learned that democracy still burns bright The year two thousand two hundred and ten The Al-Jazeer An image of Bettie Page painted upon her nose Arrives at Alpha Centauri Faster than light They regenerate, every twenty years bathing in a liquid bath that removes the myriad imperfections a combination of telomerase and secret ingredient X And slowly as their ships spin to distant galaxies The great computer begins to take shape conn

September

The world was gray the sky dark I looked up The clouds rolled in like a wall I stood in place feeling small looking up at the storm No thunder nor lightning Just the cool calm wind that whispers of rain and September Something wicked this way comes

A Game that Solved a Genetic Engineering Problem

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Today on CNN , an article was released that states - a group of gamers playing an online puzzle game have solved a major problem in the development of an immune deficiency vaccine. The name of the game is Foldit (which you can play from this link), and it's a game that generates tetris-like configurations that, if you can match - will correctly fold a 3D shape into the proper configuration and give you a great score. The puzzle is, in fact, a virus. And its solution - that is - the way that it folded - was a major obstacle in the development of an AIDS vaccine. Quest complete . +2200 Reputation with Sanctum. Here's your new mount.

Thoughts about Dying, Death and Video Games

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I have a lunch hour game that I play, which is supposed to make me forget how hungry I am - and it never works. I play it and keep wondering just how well this game describes the process of death itself - and needless to say, it's an annoying game to me right now. Here's what it's called: "Five or More". The premise is that you have a field of squares, and you're starting out with three colored balls. There are a total of seven different colors, and three drop down each time you move. You're allowed to move the balls next to each other, from anywhere on the board - until you get five or more, and then they'll disappear. However, more pieces keep coming each time you make a move and it's not five cleared. Here's what it looks like. As you can see, two blues are dropping - there are three blue on the board. Pink is lined up for four in a row, so as soon as a pink colored ball hits the playing surface, you will clear that line. It'

My Friend the Rose - Francoise Hardy

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Death

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Death is in opposition to life To win the chess game against him you must learn to rage against the machine Death is a process that began in the morning by sickness It will continue quietly its viral disassembly of you your mind your heart your body your soul It is a process of burning things down that the stars create tearing apart what was made right into pieces because they are needed by the dark It is a sickness infecting us Your head Your bones You feel it in your sex that's the place it grows

A Worker's Confessional

My productivity is nearly zero I can't seem to solve any problem they give me I surf the net, when I can't seem to focus and it doesn't help I check social networking sites and mail accounts I read Craigslist Sometimes I get lucky and find a deal or something worthwhile Gas is expensive and I drive Every day to be here And somehow they pay me But I'm not sure exactly why And then, as I write I remember that I actually have something to do Maybe a blog is just an internet version of graffiti But focus returns and I stop writing and quit surfing and go get done what I need to do But I swear to God there are times when I seriously wonder if the internet is helping anything at all But I'm leaving at five and thankful that you're that kind of girl kind of girl..

Them

They watch in the dark and listen They feed on the slow, the weak, and the unsuspecting They hunt together but sometimes alone They move through the woods silently Once , I saw one just at the edge of the woods and it turned toward me eyes glowing I decided to build a trap in the middle I hung a piece of meat springs and rope were used to drop a cage When I checked the next day Yellowjackets had swarmed around the brown steak and eaten it So the next day I put a plate of warm, soapy water below the meat and the insects fed and then, lazily dropped in the water and died It's now the third day They're still out there but at least we've worked out the bugs

You

Who are you Why are you here? Did the grace of angels bring you Did the wind guide you here Where did you come from Where are you going? What time, do you have. My watch says 12:12 I didn't make that up. The night is so dark The stars are so far and few and distant Empty space grows as cold as death Are you my lock or are you my key Why do I respond to your touch Is it the body or the soul that feels love Is it both? All is fair in love and war. A beautiful liar comes from afar Never laugh at the person drowning in the river that you have not crossed yourself They say Without you is there an us a we a them a they Without you is there hope Here is a secret: The sound coming from that box over there is a daemon. Trying to escape.

Contagion: A Review

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Stephen Soderbergh, Stanley Kubrick and Terrence Malick form the highest echelon of filmmaking. They are , in my view, unassailable. Of the three, Soderbergh is the least consistent - followed then by Kubrick. Malick never misses. Kubrick sometimes. Soderbergh has been off and on, his entire career. There's a four hour biopic out there he did - that, I am pretty sure you'll never see. And that's ok. Soderbergh's latest film - Contagion - does not miss. In my humble opinion, this is his best film - even better than 'Sex, Lies and Videotape'. Very rarely has any filmmaker succeeded in building a window into our society, and having it open just wide enough for us to see our future +as we are building it in society+. This film is a commentary about who we are, and how we operate - on so many levels. And it's also a really cool , end of the world - type film. It is a thriller, a story of how we connect with one another - and to a certain degree, sci fi - alt

Contagion

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See. this. film.

Tough Mudder

I've done a few tris, and a marathon. Part of why I did it , was just to see if I could do it. Training for an iron man takes so much time (literally 20, 30 hours a week) . But I am known for it, I guess. At least around the office. A colleague of mine suggested a new kind of race , that he'd heard about recently. The Tough Mudder. I've heard of similiar races in New England. I can't recall the name, but it was something where you ran up a hill carrying a big log. The race itself seems pared down to a sort of test of both endurance and pain. It will never be an actual sport; it is more of an event. Someone once told me that things like this are part of who we are in the 21st century. They said that we are isolated ourselves from nature, and that when we return as return we must - we drink ever deeper from the wellspring. The tough mudder might be more like trying to drink from a fire hydrant. We should not ignore things like this. My feet itch

Vinings

In my window was a vine stained glass the grapes were purple the bars white the vine a deep brown leaves green Light filters , the grapes glowing purple a little bit of twine Someone in the room mentioned the name of someone who died And the room seemed to darken as I realized life is a one way journey thankfully there was silence and quiet enough to realize that everything that person had done or said is not entirely gone the danger I think comes in the simple things that grow swinging their tendrils into a spiral blindly at first until it finds something it can grow upon the covering the hillside and everything in your backyard even your sleepy basset hound Everything is the same to Kudzu it covers backyards slow moving cars buildings dogs your long lost copy of catcher in the rye its roots penetrate your coffin when you die cutting through stone and wood piercing roots through silk sarcoph