home remodeling

Here's an idea I'd like to create some day:
three identical rooms in a row. You walk in one door and then open another door and the next room is identical to the last. And then the next room is also identical. But identical down to the very pencil shavings on the floor. It would be a statement on uniformity. I want to hire Andy Warhol impersonators to greet you as you walk in.
He could be sitting in a chair and say, "I've been waiting for you." Every time you opened the door he would say that. And then you walk into the next room and the next guy would say the same thing. It just sounds weird so I know it would be weird in real life. Something about opening a door and closing it and not changing environments at all is strange. I think the brain would reject the stimuli.

computers and objectivism

what frustrates me is that computers foil my completionist spirit. With my 1974 Vespa Ciao moped, for example, I can literally teach you everything you can know about it in maybe a few days. If you're ambitious and have a dry workshop we can cover all topics in one day. I mean, everything. From single cylinder combustion theory to mechanical drum brakes to electric circuits. I mean, I had never seen one before I bought mine and there are only a few specialists in the country who deal with them anymore and I was living in a van at the time but I was still able to sort out pretty serious issues with the moped engine and electrical systems. I understand them well enough to explain them now. The light switch is a little baffling since all the electrical systems have been removed except the high tension coil.

Anyway, you don't really need a handbook unless you want to study it on your own. Even the process of refining aluminum and pouring engine castings could probably be covered in a week or two. Copper current theory. All that is fundamental engineering trades that haven't changed (as far as the Vespa Ciao is concerned) in 200 years. I'm talking about a complete understanding of how this thing was made and how it works. You can actually explain it all with a chalkboard, a crescent wrench and a calculator.

Now, computers are completely and totally different. I just was looking at the help section for mozilla. That's all. Just looking for a bit of information on links...and I'm telling you that it would take you years to understand JUST HOW THE BROWSER WORKS. The help section would take up volumes. It's gigantic. To use the browser for basic things is pretty easy. You can use all the default settings. But if you wanted to change every default setting and also to understand the process for changing them and what will happen...then you would quickly find a never ending mobius strip. Every setting has another setting behind it. It becomes a fractal puzzle.

look at this madness...

/* Variable definitions
====================






















*/

You just go deeper and deeper into a fine tuned universe. For me, this is difficult because troubleshooting any computer problem turns into a trip down the rabbit hole. And that is just the browser settings. Forget about the microchip processor that has microscopic threads of copper somehow programmed to turn binary into images. That's just overwhelming to approach. You take a Piaggio 49cc engine apart because it leaks and you will have time to check out the low tension coils. Go ahead. It's copper wound in a circle. opposite Magnets go around it real fast and create a current. That current can directly light a bulb, or it can go into a high tension coil where the current builds up and is released when the points separate. Boom. 6 volts is turned into like 200, which is enough to make a spark...which detonates the fuel....etc.
At some point the fractals stop. That's not true with computers. it just gets more and more...mysterious. Settings upon settings.
This is a complaint totally separate from the environmental consequences. This is more about self-determinism. When your life is dependent on technology that is constructed of several components that are each complex technical fields of study then are we determining our lives? It feels like we're flying with invisible wings. It works but no one person can grasp the complexity. Not even Steve Jobs has read every word in the Safari browser help manual. It would take forever.

Ignatius talked about a King who favored taste and decency. He rebelled against things like fashion and trends. He lived in a time before computers but I suspect he would've preferred his big chief note pads to an iPad. In another book, Round the Bend, by Nevil Shute a wealthy Arab oil baron is asked why he doesn't build roads or hospitals or schools for the people in his town. He says something about self determinism, that only an industry developed by the people should be used by the people. And while he had the money to pay to build the hospitals and roads, the people who would use them were "not ready" for them. They were not ready for them because they themselves had not built them on their own. See? It's a philosophic book. Furthermore, the practice of Islam was the priority. Plain and simple. He could build a mosque, but not a school. It was very interesting, even if it wasn't based on actual fact, it rang true. The muslim world is actually richer than the united states because of the oil. So why aren't they shopping at macys and Apple and Nike? Because their priorities are different. they will forgo luxuries to concentrate on religion. Has it gone haywire in some respects? Yes. And that could be used as an example of why they "aren't ready" for roads and subways. Saudi Arabia could put a man on the moon. Why don't they?
Think of it this way, your teenage kid wants a sports car. "Buy it for me." What's your instinctual reaction? No way. Buy it your self. Everyone together, "You won't appreciate it if I buy it for you."
Right?
So what Steve Jobs is doing is basically jumping light years ahead in complexity. We have to buy the iPad but are there 50 people in the world would could make an iPad from scratch, who could earn it?
See, this is the Ayn Rand philosophy: That the man of intellect leads the world one way or another. He can't be stopped. He's a intellectual trendsetter. I agree with this. And the Objectivist conclusion is that while havoc may be the current environmental trend, men of intellect will figure it out. I also agree with this too. But I feel that it skips over some ugly consequences, namely wolves perishing as their habitat melts. And Rand loved to highlight the futility of providing for the mentally deficient. Oh, she had so much fun describing the mealy mouthed social service activists who posed for pictures with state dependent retards. Oh, she loved it! But what if those kids chief crime was living in San Jose, where Jobs and crew were pumping mercury laced wastewater into the aquifer? It's natural progress, she would say. More people benefit from microchips than are harmed. Furthermore, the market demanded (allowed/funded) the progress. It happened so therefore it should have happened.
Is she really a philosopher with this perspective? Or is she the first of a rogue think tank that understood propaganda? It worked and it is irreversible, but what would her response be to my suggestion that Jobs is just the father who is buying his kid a car it won't appreciate? That's what being an intellectual leader means. I don't want to argue about Steve Jobs. I want to talk about philosophy. That's what is important to me. This is a philosophical debate and I still don't see their side of the argument. What we have now is uncontrolled growth because the theory is that if we don't grow then we die. Is that a valid theory? Or if we don't grow then you'll die? Because we're going to die no matter what. People are living longer, and we are going further into debt to provide for those people...and the lives they lead are more like machinery devoted to Steve Jobs. I just don't see this as progress.

But I think the model the oil baron was defending is one of slow sustainable growth, rather than the Steve Jobs model of fast growth and damn the consequences.
I've said it before that the technology is evolving but not man. I go to an Apple store and I don't see high tech people. I see frumpy, lazy, shuffling caffeine addicts poking gadgets and drooling in front of dancing lights. That's just me. Call me an asshole. So I guess, it's an issue of philosophy. Is the development of devices more important than the development of the man. Because I WOULD LOVE for someone to explain how America is actively developing better people right now. PLEASE SHOW ME SOME EVIDENCE OF THIS!
You can point to Obama being elected and I'd ask what made that possible? I've got my suspicions but why do YOU think Obama is president.

There are two camps: Do it because it can be done.
OR
Ponder what can be done and Allah will decide.

I just want to point out that I'm not alone in questioning unchecked research and development. Most cultures and most animals have some instinctual hesitation to develop. Is it a flaw? Or is it priorities. Are computers a priority of life? Right now America is definitely worshiping a silicon deity. They might be the words of Jesus, but they are on an LCD screen. Are the screens spreading the word of God, or are the words of God spreading the LCD screens?
I think these are the questions Muslim Imams don't want to ask.
This is impossible to answer, just like it's impossible to totally understand computers.

Venture

I spent the last of the funspot tokens today in a marathon of Venture. I embarrassed myself yet again because ordinarily the place is desolate empty. So I can curse all I want. But today as I reached a critical stage and could not negotiate the hall monsters I was killed by a mere pixel length of a hall monster's leg and I yelled "Fuck!" and almost punched a hole in the cabinet.
of course it is a weekend and the place is filled with 9 year old kids and their parents. They didn't kick me out but they didn't exactly give me free tokens either.

Oddly, the very game where I recorded was the best game I played with at one point I think I had 4 players left and was on the 5th level. Oh, it was so so close to going further. I didn't record the whole thing because that would be too unbearable to watch.
In case you have to know, Banananarama sings "Love in the first degree" the song playing in the background. Great chorus. The soundtrack in the classic arcade area is commercial free 1980s music to completely recreate the ambiance of, say, Dream Machine circa 1984. I heard at least two adults walk by with awed expressions and say, "I'm in heaven." The song that comes on second is...Pac Man Fever by Buckner and Garcia. It's like Country pop. Lord, tell me this as a bad as it gets.

WARNING: READ THE FOLLOWING ONLY IF YOU TRULY HAVE NOTHING ELSE TO DO WITH YOUR LIFE!
This comes very close to replicating the graduate projects invented by Hermann Hesse in the Glass Bead Game. One of them is something like, "The role of lap dogs in the lives of 14th century courtesans."
The first level can be cleared in about one minute. The game isn't timed but there is a bonus for fast gathering of the treasure. The clock starts at 10. So if you complete the level with a bonus of 8 and you earned 1000 points then you get a bonus of 8000. plus the original 1000 is 9000 for the level. and so on. The highest score ever is 370,000. Now, there are 36 rooms but each level repeats itself three times. There are only 12 unique rooms and 3 unique levels or "floors". So, you go level 1a, level 2a, level 3a....then level 1b, level 2b, level 3b...then level 1c, level 2c level 3c. Each level has 4 rooms. 12 rooms for the first cycle. 12 rooms for the second cycle. 12 rooms for the final cycle. 36 rooms. I just noticed that level is a palindrome. Anyway, the first level usually ends with 12,000. The second level with 40,000. The third level with 80,000 and that's where you get a free winky which you will need to finish the second cycle. Completing level 2b will leave you with about 140K. Completing level 3b will give you about 160K. You can see by the amount of treasure I had that I died with 2 rooms cleared on level 3b.
Thus far I have completed only the first cycle a and then on level 3b I die swiftly and mercilessly. That will get you to 150,000. So on the final cycle, level 1c, 2c, 3c you will earn another 150K + meaning the value of the treasures increases by some factor. This also means that you will earn more free Winky and be able to continue the game because after the first three floors the monsters all move much faster than winky so you have to anticipate where they are going. I'm telling you it's tense. In my memory I never cleared the entire game. What I did was get to level 1c or level 2c in 1982 and 1983 at the Little Store. Remember, this game was one block from my house at a time when arcades were the absolute Valhalla of childhood. This was before Atari, computers, CGI, GPS. Hell, The Terminator didn't even exist. Holy shit, there was no Return of the Jedi. Think about that! And at 12 years old I was among the top 5 players ever in this game, better in fact than I am today.

I think if I were able to open the control stick and clean the carbon off the copper then I'd get better response. I've still got some tricks to learn but when the enemies are working flawlessly and Winky is limping along like a hobo then it won't work. This is really the maximum I can do these days. If absolutely everything went right I could make it to the final cycle of levels, Level 1c, but I know that would be the end. I've got 12 rooms to clear at that point with maybe 2 Winkys. It'll never work with a crappy control stick. Ever!
It seems there are two plateaus for the game. One plateau is 80K. The other plateau is at 150K. The next plateau has only been officially reached by 3 people and it starts at 300K. So either you end your game at 150K or your are one of the elite. That's a huge spread.

The reason I like this game is because it is fast. Each level takes no more than 1:30 to complete. Most can be done in about one minute. Furthermore, you can't take longer! The hall monsters speed up and make it impossible to tarry. You have to complete each level in under 2 minutes or you will lose. A lot of games allow for ways to take breaks. Not Venture. So, maximum 2 minutes multiplied by 3 levels. That's 6 minutes for the first cycle. Then you have to be even faster on the second cycle. But let's say it takes 5 minutes. That's 11 minutes to be among the top 5 players in the world (I am currently #4). The final cycle will take no more than 5 minutes. That's 16 minutes to finish the game. I'm sure the world record holder finished his game in less time. I like it because the longest a game will take is 10 minutes. In fact, by 8 minutes you're either one of the best or your game is over. That's unusual. The thing is that when you die then you lose time and also you start from the original starting spot which screws up the whole pattern that makes winning possible. So, you either don't die or you win. You can't die and also finish fast. It's well designed to make a game fast.
In the second cycle the hall monsters enter the treasure rooms in about 15 seconds. At that point you have about 5 seconds to exit. So, you can't really finish the second cycle in more than 1:30.

I don't know. Star Castle was finally taken off the floor and never returned. That game will have to wait for the summer to conquer.
I feel with my imminent move out of Laconia this was possibly the final chapter on Venture. Or at least the chapter before the final chapter.
I posted my high scores on another site that cares about these things (nerds who support each other's insane regressions) and someone posted "Get your Winky on!" That's commitment, people. Dedication. love. In this world you take it in whatever form you can get it.

Surfside Resort

This approaches the level of magnification that I need to be satisfied with this story. It's really all about me letting loose. I think I've got the right voice and the ideas and the setting but to expose this kind of insanity isn't coming as easy as it should. This is exactly how my journals from 1995 look like, an endless string of moralistic theorems. I probably spent three years writing about the rationalization of vegetarianism. So it should be easy to just translate that into third person, right? Well, tell that to my fingers. It's a matter of focus...of unlocking a private perspective. It's not a dark place for me even though it appears like a dark place. Visiting this place is like going home, completing a circle...as long as the circle has no gaps. I've heard writing compared to duck hunting, where you wait and wait and wait and suddenly a duck appears and you have to act fast. But the ducks are ideas created by the writer's mind. So it's conceivable that the ducks are always there but were aren't seeing them. There are ducks outside my window right now. Fly ducks! Fly!


Oggy limped up the rotting steps of Surfside Resort, dislodging wood and rusted steel onto the pavement below. A woman stood on a balcony across the parking lot yelling at a shrunken figure in a bathrobe.
“Take your goddamn mitts off me. Oh, you’re fucking disgusting. You pig!”
Bathrobe tossed a cigarette over the balcony. Oggy watched it land and made a mental note to pick it up when he was leaving. He considered going to fetch it at once but since he was already half way up the stairs he thought the extra expenditure of energy was not warranted. The cigarette butt was likely to still be there when he left, so it was reasonably justified to continue in the direction he was going and then when he was leaving he could pick the butt up…along with the aluminum can that Bathrobe just tossed at the woman. Still, if a seagull did pass this way and thought the butt was a worm then that carcass would be on Oggy’s hands. As soon as he recognized the butt was on the ground and that no one else was going to pick it up then he be became responsible for it. And one single cigarette butt in the ocean could choke a sea turtle or clog the gills of a fish. Birds were often attracted to them and it was common to find a fist full of cigarette butts in a seagull’s belly when it washed ashore. The storm drains all had blue stencils saying “Drains to Sea”. It’s message was clear and Oggy was an unofficial steward of the sea. Calculating that he would only stay a few minutes and then scanning the grey sky for seagulls (seeing none) Oggy decided he would risk leaving the cigarette butt on the ground, continue with his business, and collect trash in the parking lot on his way to the food not bombs meal. Ignoring the screams of the woman and the various projectiles launched by bathrobe, Oggy pulled himself up the stairs like a mountaineer climbing a summit with the help of fixed ropes. He found room number 22 and knocked softly.
“I’m calling the police!” yelled the woman at Bathrobe. Bathrobe put a lamp down as Mary opened the door wearing a flannel bathrobe with printed ducks.
“Oh, hey baby! You wanna get high?”
Mary presented a syringe and vial, toothlessly grinning a pink maw. She scratched her crotch.
“We’re just about to get fucked up. Are they fighting again?” she said as she squinted in the direction the balcony. “Fuckers”
Oggy shook his head and looked for Isabelle. He tried to smile but his eyes didn’t get the message so his expression gave Mary the idea he had just been stabbed in the back.
“You alright, baby? You want some pills or something? Whiskey? I know there ain’t nothing like some whiskey and Vicadin. We got some. Knock you out.”
“It’s just my foot,” said Oggy. “Can I sit down?” He scratched his beard.
“The rainwater didn’t help? I knew a guy in Cleveland who cut his own foot off. Fucked him all up. Hahahaha.” Mary belched. “Excuse me. We got some bologna and shit.”
“Maybe it helped a little. It’s a puzzle but there’s a lesson here too. Abe told me not to depend on my body. It’s flesh and blood and subject to the wrath of the elements. Life is suffering, says the Buddha. We’re working on balancing my level of reaction because balanced action is what is most lacking in the universe. Right?”
“Aw, get in here, Oggy. You sit down in that chair and I’ll fix you a whiskey and soda. You want rocks? How you like it?”
Oggy chuckled. The mere mention of such a spiritual betrayal was ludicrous. He would sooner burn rubber tires to keep warm than drink alcohol.
“Thank you, but I brought rainwater,” he said gesturing with his cracked and leaking plastic water bottle. “I’ll just wait for Isabelle to get back.”
“Oh, she’s here. She’s in the shower. Why don’t you go in there and wash her back. I know you two ain’t alone enough. Go on, ball her in the shower. She needs a good screw, that girl. Me and Steve already did. It’s fun as fuck. Wet and wild, huh, Steve?”
Only then did Oggy notice that Steve lay among the piles of nylon blanket covers, empty beer cases, magazines and pizza boxes that had collected on the bed. Steve moaned incoherently and raised a beer can. A talk show was blaring on the television. Two heavy set men were wrestling on a stage while a crowd cheered. Oggy’s mouth gaped open and he frowned.
“Why doesn’t someone help that man?”
Steve said, “Just don’t get her pregnant, Oggy. Fucking Christ, that’s all we need.”
"How about it?" asked Mary.
“I…,” Oggy began but found himself at a loss for words broad enough to respond to Mary’s suggestion. “I’m good.”
“Ya need a shower, Oggy. I can smell you from here. Not to tell you what to do”
Oggy nodded slowly. It was natural to be repulsed by his odor. He washed often enough but washing his clothes had proved difficult ever since his life had been thrown into chaos. Chaos! There was that word again! A single event like having his home destroyed should never have been enough to derail his quest for purity and peace. What was going wrong? Before losing his hut he had regularly washed his clothes in the river or the park water fountain. That worked for months but ever since reentering civilization he had adopted the filthy habits of the common street person and wasn’t washing his clothes. So they were stiff with sweat and caked soup and rotting bits of fruit stashed in the pockets of his overalls. They naturally reeked.
“Go soap up your ass. Get some shampoo in that natty dreadlock of yours. How about it?”
Oggy pondered the soap, bleach-based, chemical, and pictured liquid death streaming toward the sea turtles in the ocean. This was the kind of thoughtless, reckless behavior that had brought the environment to a state of complete upheaval.
“No. I’ve renounced soap.” Oggy said simply. “It’s poisoning the world.”
“Whatever. I’m not gonna tell you what to do. Here.”
Mary handed Oggy a glass of whiskey and ice. Oggy placed it next to an empty pack of cigarettes on the night table. The pack fell on the floor and when Oggy bent over to pick it up he saw a machete under the bed. His lower back spasmed.
"Ow!" cried Oggy.
Mary leaped across the room and grabbed an open prescription bottle.
"That's it! Oggy, take two of these pills. You gotta take care of yourself." She handed Oggy the pills and then did a slithering shimmy of a dance, running her hands into her hair so her bathrobe opened.
Oggy blushed and dropped the blue pills on the nightstand. He opened his notepad and wrote, "Pick up cigarette butt on the way to FNB."
Mary moaned, "It'll make you feel like dancing! Sheeet"
Steve yelled, "You're blocking the T.V.! Woman!"
Isabelle opened the bathroom door, her face and neck were red from hot water. She hugged a towel around scrubbed body.
Mary bounced over to her and laughed, "Dance with me, darling."

Onion news

There is non stop brilliance over at the onion. All the articles and news spoofs are funny but this one is hilarious. I love how he mispronounces AOL, like it's impossible to know how it sounded back in 2002. Notice the pic below "Last Login: 1,921 days." How funny is that? All the madness does make rich soil for the writers at the Onion. At the very end there's a banner that says,

Friendster's final users left only string of cryptic "I'm Rick James, Bitch" messages.



Internet Archaeologists Find Ruins Of 'Friendster' Civilization