Progress or Regress?

I would quote this article, but I find it obnoxious and poorly-written.

Let me piece together here is how it stands:

NAF, Planned PArenthood, some doctors sue in three major cites (well, one is Lincoln, Nebraska...).

They sue to overturn the ban on partial birth abortion and the ban on the dialation and extraction method of abortion.

Their stated reason for this: the language of the ban "could criminalize more common types of abortion."

photo by Mark Finnern.
Displayed here in accordance with the Creative Commons License.

Its been a while since I've been able to get to a computer or the internet (this is normally a good thing, though the widthdrawal symptons do start kicking in hard after a while).

This lapse of digital-void-time-wasting has been due in part, as usual, to sporadic travel. First to the city, San Fran, only 30 minutes away from my current residence.

Friday night The Random Englishman and I watched the latest Coen brothers' movie (The Ladykillers), drank a bunch of good beer in the theater, saw the most beautiful [woman of ill repute] in the world on 5th street (the street of man, hmm), and grabbed a few bottles of wine and hiked up the lovely Bernal Heights. Though the city is pretty in the morning (which it wasn't) as you can see from the borrowed photo above, it is SPEC-TACULAR at night. The fog creeping over the city, the innumberable lights... Bernal heights is postioned such that you can have a 360-degree view of nearly the entire city, all within the space of a 5-minute walk around the summit (while being blasted by enough cell phone towers to make you glow for weeks).

After three or four hours of sleep, I woke up two hours later than i was supposed to, and drove to Sacramento and pickedup a old-friend who was traveling down through California.

Then, after 20+ hours awake, 11+ of that being on the road, and a nice long visit at LuluCarpenter's (coffee shop) in Santa Cruz with HeraclitusChanging, I found myself back in Southern California, just for a few days i promise. I'm sure I'm leaving out something, but there you have it.

Wow, it seems as if Achilles (of AchillesRunning fame) has discovered Hector's Neoterornous blog.

Hop over there for some frenzied-commenting dialetic.

Kerry whacks Bush
on WMD comment
Responds to president's joke delivered at dinner, asks 'He thinks that's funny?'

So, I just finish having this phenomenal dream. I wake up, but immediately close my eyes in order to remember it better.

It was one of those dreams that you want to remember. So I look at my clock, 11:38 am. Crap, I'm late for work. I get up, write down the dream, get dressed, etc, and go on with my day...

Then I wake up again...

To no written-down-dream. And it's only 9:23 am. Sigh. I go back to sleep.

What a weird morning of dreaming and waking and waking only to find that your still dreaming. Good times.

On a side note, an eternal question:


Are ALL of the most prolific Blogger's unemployed?



This in response to The Commissar's terrific article on bloggers, and to the responses.

This from a post I posted over at Toque's blog.

My body's circadian rhythm keeps tending towards a 2:30-pm to 5:30 am activity cycle.

I have just realized something, with the help of the recently mentioned TM.

That "breath of fresh air" that I am always trying to get by going on road trips and mountain climbs and such is really the touch of the Holy Spirit.

Of course, many times it comes in conjunction with those activities...

But it seems to me that the sure place to find Him is in the Sacraments.

2004.03.21

2004.03.18

Huh

Oh, man, I love those little fish symbols that folks put on the back of their cars.

The fish was one of the first symbols of Christianity and of Christ.

The origin of this, i do believe -- and correct me if i am wrong -- was from the greek word for fish, which was used as an acronym for the phrase "Jesus Christ, Son of God, Savior."

The symbol of the fish was, for a time anyway, used as a covert sign of belonging to the Brootherhod, as the Church was known back then.

Ah, the stories of the early Church! What a magical, wonderful time! God's hand so close, Christ's presence so recent, God's grace so bounteous!

Ahh yes, and those lovely people who, i suppose in reference to some ideaology opposed to that of the universal Church, mock it by putting those little fish with feet on their cars! What a brilliant, though definately non-standard, way of attacking those who deny the existence of the Creator! What a way to represent the cold hard facts of life to those who have lost sight of reality, those who have become ensared in and enamored of the illusions and mock-ups which spawn within their feeble minds. Way to smack those lacking common sense in the face with the simple, irrefutable message of truth that everyone already knows: Fish with feet do not exist.



Wait, I'm getting a message... Incoming from the mothership...

Hold on, hold on, you don't mean to tell me that people who put the darwin-fish-with-feet-things on their cars think that they are SUPPORTING darwin's views???!

The only thing they suppport (and confirm with out a doubt) is that humans can look you in the eye, nd without hesitation, affirm falsity (or to word it better -- deny truth, even obvious, apparent, and logically sound truth).



This is sheer lunacy, and insufferable idiocy.



The ability to "rationalize anything" is, I believe, the product of a long process of teaching oneself how to turn one's intellect off. Which is accomplished by completely detaching one's starting principles from truth.

Here's a sample dialogue I can imagine having with one of these protozoa, assuming that a dialogue could actually happen, which it probably countn't, given that you need to agree on something before such a conversation could take place -- say the existence of truth, for starters --



Fish-monger: (confidently) Darwin says that fish have feet!
Me: has Darwin ever seen a fish?


or

Fish-Monger: Look, this fish has legs
Me: that's because you cut off your hamster's legs and super-glued them too that fish! you're sick, man!


or

Fish-Monger: (sing-song voice) Fish have legs! Fish have legs!
Me: no they don't.
Fish-Monger: I believe what I want to belive.
Me: I am sure you do. That much is obvious.


There is no truth in this. If I belive what I want to believe, and so do you, and we disagree,there is no solution. Thus something is and is not in the same respect andd the same way (to use the common phraseology). And this is what these nice folks believe.

Which, if anyone thought about it, should not make you very confidant about them AT ALL.



And this article should not convey any diminuative opinion or imply any ill-will to any who profess the fish-monger profession as a way of life; I am well convinced that it is a noble and worthy trade, and I have met several very well-educated and pleasant fish-mongers in my travels.

This is just too good to pass up.

...from the WTF? dept...

...from the juxtaposition !X@#$! department...

If by some weird hiccup of fate you missed this article (Cheney's speech on terrorism) over at Michael William's Master of None, please go read it. Truthful, honest, and clear statements on the current state of terrorism and so forth. Solid.

Billings area stages 'disaster' emergency drills today


"Billings?"


Wait, something about a swan... Lewis something? Eb White... Nope, its gone...



Hmm, last I checked "Billings" was...


[much exhaustive research]


...in Montana. What is the population of Billings, Montana? Or Montana in general?


[more exhaustive research]


Ah-hah. From this site here, the population of Billings is 89,847. The population of Montana is 902,195 (courtesy of here).


Combine those two telling figures with the fact that most americans, much less most terrorists have never heard of Montana, much less being able to find it on a map, and I think that we have a pretty stunning conclusion:

Nobody is going to terrorize Billings.



But the smart Billings people are one step ahead of the game.

"Sooner or later, we're going to have one. It may not be terrorists, but it could be a natural disaster," Jochems said.

Uh-huh. One WHAT?



Some more highlights:

"There were a few small glitches...but nothing glaring, according to Billings Fire Chief Marv Jochems."

His name is Marv. Cool.

"Today, the exercise will be more animated. Full-scale simulations - complete with "injured" victims, "intruders" and fake bombs - will be held..."

"This week's drill, which was two years in the making..."

Okay, a bit excessive. And, still, the lingering question -- WHY?


But some further prying (as in reading the article) lends an answer to that question...

The drill, perhaps the largest ever staged in Yellowstone County, is required of the five largest communities in Montana. It's also a requirement for local agencies to receive certain grant money from the Department of Homeland Security, which will reimburse the agencies for the drill.



Oh, those crazy "local agencies." The will do anything for that grant money, won't they?




And from the Priceless Quotations Department:

"It was confusing a few times and noisy in that small room," Jochems said.

From the Compare and Contrast Department:

"We did really, really well during the drill and identified some necessary resources that we need but don't have," Jochems said.
...

"Sarin, a colorless and odorless nerve gas, wafted from three canisters and into the mall, killing perhaps 30 people and injuring 80 more."

Hmm...



However, God Bless Montana for two things:
1) the no speed limit law (which they just axed a few years ago)
2) no restrictions on open containers (rub this in the face of MADD)

Well, so much for the "perfect" poker.

So, anyways, I'm leaving SoCal for a while, maybe for good.

Thoughts on this? Well, it's been a good run. There's a few loose ends I expect to tie up tommorrow, and then it's like the song says: "another chapter in this life is through."

Well, I expect to keep blogging, so y'all stay informed I suppose...

G'night and God Bless.

- Dz

Read Rumsfeld on war in Iraq. A few flaws, but worth the read, and mostly correct.

From the poetry archives (soon to be re-established online, currently down)::

Written Monday, February 23, 2004.

Just made a far-out mate-based refreshing summer drink. Unfortunately, the coffee machine i brewed it through was old and saturated with coffee...

The concoction contained (concoction contained? huh?) soy milk, mate, sugar, water, but had this terrible burnt-coffee after taste that ruined it.

Oh, where is a french press when you need one?

Life without an Alarm Clock

Chronicles of an Unemployed College-Dropout

Volume II




Waking up once again, to a messy, empty house.

Before I attack the mess, which seems to be more or less my duty, or at least something good to do -- Besides, it's rewarding... -- before I attack it anyhow, I sit and clear my head, have a bowl of cereal, do a little coding...

I survey the scene, as well as recall several highlights of last night.

1) I constructed a wall of liquor in the cabinet above the stove, creating a defensive ring of scoresby and jack daniels to shield the "good stuff."

2) I played nearly perfect poker, losing big and early to set the stage, and then coming back to being second richest on the table from 4 chips.

However, this "perfect poker" was soon interupted because, while I was playing everything right for the cards I saw, I saw the wrong cards. I thought that the Ace of Hearts, which was flopped at the far end of the table was a diamond...

This cost me quite a bit, and rattled me so bad that I didn't really recover. During the next tourney which I played in, a few minutes later in the night, I did almost the same thing, picking up my cards once and mistaking my Queen-Jack for a King-Queen somehow. This time I was rattled even worse, and though there were only two men in the house who I feared as poker players, something wasn't right (like my vision). And there's nothing quite as upsetting to be all-in and flip your cards thinking you have a win and realizing that you don't have the cards you bet on.

3) The heart transplant of the computer world is underway in the living room. I have swapped the CPU's between two Dell laptops and ... (drumroll) ... neither work now. This is the computer equivalent of both patients dying on the operating table. Except that there still is hope...

4) Bought some good, clay poker chips and a folding, felt poker-table-top for a good price online. 500 chips!

5) It's a typical humid almost-summer SoCal day. Whooee! Time to drive to Claremont!

Book, Movie, Music Update

Orthodoxy, G.K. Chesterton	trailers for starsky and hutch, anchorman, the punisher	gillian welch, luther allison, buena vista social club, Homelands Ireland, Sasha, The Orb...

Spellbound.

[]



I have fallen for her before.

But not that corpse of a feeling which you know

You will not act upon, the hollow kind


But rather the tingling of the spine

That melting of the heart

This is me, a puddle on the floor


The thousand thousand bubbles of joy

The freezing shock of being suddenly

Rendered immobile by her grace


A grace which assuredly descends

Straight from God

And makes my tears run


I have fallen for her before,

A secret whisper in a corner...

A promised dance


"I think I'm in love"

The giggles of a supporting friend

The catalyst of the dancing


She sits alone, depressed

The cars belt out Just What I Needed,

As I ask her to dance


I cannot fathom

How I crossed that floor

Or dared to hold her hand


And gently spin

Around the floor

With my heart pounding


I have fallen before, for her

And before her, I

Would lie -- at her feet


And die, my soul swooning

Before her beauty, and

Though it be idolatry --


I have fallen for her before.

And here's one for the masses::

Think of it as a blessing or a curse, what you will, but recognize it's overwhelming beauty (and the sound effects).

Maelstrom

Oregon in Brief

Volume 1.7-9


A thousand miles of highway five. Shasta, Mt. Hood, Castle Crags, the snow, the beauty, the shoulder pass of the big rigs on a shimmering oregon morning highway.

Steaming into Oregon after fifteen hours behind the wheel. Getting a little jumpy; eyes can no longer shift around without pain. They are bound into looking straight ahead, or looking at whatever they are already looking out. We all jump around a bit after getting out of the car, bring out a little bottle (actually a 5th) of jim beam and take a few sips...

Some few hours of broken sleep. Birds chirping, people moving around. Not a deep sleep, but some kinda sleep anyway.

The wedding.

[The craziness of the recording. Look for this in Volume 1.]

The reception, broken mixers [turned out to be okay, actually, some kookiness of the s/pdif in]

The reception, wine, drunken toasting, hard-to-hear prank messages, weird european ritual dance thing -- me not going to do, more wine, and mixing...

Then out the door, food, wendy's -- a drunken toast, CrashBoxing orders his food at wendy's by gesturing with his mini pastic wine glass at the item on the menu. Here we are, in full wedding garb, somewhat sauced and in wendy's, with our beverages. As we sit down, CrashBoxing is telling me about his strange experiences with alchohol, how sometimes he drinks and drinks and never feels a thing, and goes to bed, and how sometimes he does not drink very much but still gets absurdly toasted. As I am taking this all in, he also mentions how sometimes he is not feeling it at all and then it hits him as a sledgehammer. Two minutes later he nearly falls out of his chair. "It just hit me," he reports, struggling to maintain his balance.

We get back, I am determined to go to bed right away -- remember 15 hours on the road, 3-4 hours of bad sleep [any sleep is good sleep, but this is relatively poor quality], a wedding reception, we are going on 24 hours since departure from Southern California. That determination soon becomes a determiniation to have a beer and then go to bed. So I go buy two cases of corona and some lemons [why i didn't get limes i dunno] at the "convenient, yes?" safeway across the street from our place-of-residence-for-the-weekend.

Then the determination flounders, I succumb to peer pressure and I end up waltzing down the street to the local bar, where people are singing kareoke. We start to annoy them, and gradually take over the bar by our overwhelming numbers of underage ladies. After a while I sit down at the the bar and drink glass after glass of jack. Then some good conversations later, we walk back down the street to the aforementioned place of residence. I go to bed quickly.

I do not sleep well, and wake up hung over somewhat and not feeling too pleasant. So, I cook breakfast. RelapsedNerd and I go to the aforementioned safeway and procure some supplies for our envisioned feast. A friend whom I will only refer to as Old Man River accompanies us, and in no great amount of time at all, we realize that his hilarious antics are due in part to his wonderful sense of humor, but that that beautiful facet of his character has been ridiculously heightened by the fact that, despite it being somewheres around 9:30 or 10 in the morning, he is still absurdly slom-boppered. This provides much amusement to us all, and much discomfort to everyone else in the store, which only increases our amusement.

Cut to the kitchen. I am deeply involved [way over my head] in a kitchen-size fiasco that, at the time, i could only describe as "cooking." Between flipping bacon, cracking eggs, cheese, taking pulls off my now-cap-less bottle of beam, we had a kitchen that rapidly became full of incredible smells and consequently ravenous tac'ers. Not only did we have every burner on the stove going all the time, we even made delicious breakfast burritos for the owners of the house [or relatives of].

Here I am, in the kitchen.

People swarm around me, I am an oasis of concentration. Mostly focused on a one-sided dialogue with my friend Jim.

Suddenly, in the midst of swirling people, fumes, food, crackingly bacon grease and whiskey, a still inebriated Old Man River stumbles in, distributing fortune cookies to the myriads of dirty, disheveled, and hung-over wedding-celebrators, like some cracked-out imitator of St. Nicholas.

I, suffering from massive sensory overload, massive hang over, and massive tiredness concentrate my entire being upon this new gift. All my mental powers are focused on the problem at hand: "How do you open this?"

Snack!

I crack it open:





It really speaks for itself, don't it?

Beautiful!

So, dya'll like my pictures? Mas, mas?

This was found in the bathroom stall of the upper wing (on the right) of St. Peter and Paul dormitory some weeks ago. It was not posted because of logistics involving the scanner. It was found in the handicrapper stall, with the pen on the floor, and, from all appearances, the author subsequently flushed himself down the toilet. Oh, ye gods! How we mortals suffer so!

Life as Oh


Warning! Musings Ahead!


It seems that life is on some level essentially an Oh. As in,

"Oh, that's how it is."

or

"Oh, that's what he meant."

or

"Oh, look at that!"

or just

"Oh."


I have heard it said that when you stop learning, you die. And I believe that's true, although perhaps in a way different then the orignal utter uttered it (I'm firmly convinced that everything spoken before my lifetime was uttered).

Because man's highest function is to love...[Editor: insert answers to all those questioners who don't think this here]... and love intimately involves the knowledge of the intelect ...[Editor: insert chain of reasoning, and of course proofs from the good old philosophers]... Then man's natural progression to his highest end involves knowing. And the way we know involves the arcane, mystical process known as learning.

And learning seems to be something based on existence. But the claim here is that it is not only based on existence, but necessary for existence. How could this be true?

Well, perhaps in this way:

Wait,

Actually, given more time I would more properly make this argument backwards from God as the highest end first. [backwards as the highest end first??! Huh?] ... But that's for another time and place.

[Okay, let's start over again.]

The Role of Learning in Man's Essential Existence

[And give it a title in bold, that will make it official.]

1) Assume that man is created by a personal, loving God, who man can, in some way know and love, and that some means of this are provided for by God to man, or the human race at large.

2) Assume that man's final end is to love God. [why were you created? to know, love and serve...etc]

Thus, man, being in a state of not having achieved his end [nmely, loving God to the highest extent possible, let that be] he will move towards it. And since it is the essential fulfillment of his nature and created purpose, as long as he is moving towards this goal, he is increasingly becoming more real. As his existence is fulfilled more and more [whether it be by his efforts or by God's grace, let that be], he exists to a greater and greater extent.

And this motion towards his end is accomplished in this life by a chain of events. We gather knowledge through daily living, many times by sheer brute experience, even monotony. This increasing knowledge of life, in turn, from every facet of existence, increases our knowledge of God. And the more we know God, the more it is possible for us to love Him.

[His nature being infinite and ours being finite, and assuming that we are able to love Him, any and all limitations are clearly on our side of the table.]

[Love is fundamentally a motion of the will, and the will is informed by the intellect, and can only act insofar as it has that information, be it by sense experience, the hard facts of life [induction], or directly by grace.]

Thus, here is a conclusion of this train of thought.

Learning is an early step in the chain of events that leads to increased existence, specifically as in fulfilling the essential goal of humanity more completely.

As such, it is mistaken for that which actually matters in these considerations, but this is an exception from the strict way of speaking of things to prove a point, much like a hyperbole. The way to continue growing towards God [for that is what it is] is to increase the possesed knowledge of Him.

[I belive that this is universal to all walks of life, though perhaps some may circumvent the learning and simply love what they already know at some high level. But I doubt that any but Jesus [and Mary?] could do that because of the disproportion between God and man.]

This possesed knowledge of God then, by an [inspired] act of the will increases the love of God, and thus the life and the existence of the person involved.

And conversely, when the love decreases, it also decreases the capacity to love, which is precisely [though perhaps not limited to or only] the knowledge. Sin makes us forget, or act like we have forgotten. And so we regress, and we die. And this is essentially because we do not love as much any longer, but caused, in part, or as a consequence, by diminished knowledge.


So keep saying, "Oh", excitedly.


more clearer thoughts on this later i promise

But despite the fact that its time for bed, this is too good to pass up:

After a really good conversation with a buddy I will refer to here only as RR, in which one of these specific passages came up (the depraved generation one) it is only right that they be represented here.


From the Divine Office

(Wednesday, Week II of Lent, Evening Prayer)



Their plan is only to destroy:
they take pleasure in lies.

Psalm 62


In everything you do, act without grumbling or arguing; prove yourselves innocent and straightforward, children of God beyond reproach in the midst of a twisted and depraved generation -- among whom you shine like the stars in the sky while holding fast to the word of life.

Phillippians 2:12b-16 (selection)


Lord, guide the minds and hearts of peoples and all in public office, may they always seek the common good.

Bless your people, Lord.



I wonder if i am the only person saying the evening office at this time, given that it is 5:25 in the morning and that the international date line is only four hours west. That means that unless someone in hawaii or alaska is saying it as 2 or 3 am, I am the only one. Far out. Guess that fits with being late and last and all. But think of how many people have already said those prayers sometime in the last 24 hours. It gives one hope (like Endless account of OLA -- The Endless Approach).

a strange life (style)

Well, I guess I'll get some breakfast. (It's 4:48 am).

I lurch into the kitchen, eyes slightly glazed, teeth feeling like they needed brushing at bedtime, five and a half hours ago. At least, that would have been reasonable.

But my life (style) is nothing that reasonable members of society would demand.

Quick review of the evening as I pour my life cereal and a glass of orange juice.

Come home. (right there it needs qualification). It is somewhere around 11 or 12 or something like that. One of my roomates -- housemates, rather -- is asleep, one is drunk, complete with wine colored lips.

A bizarre process of setting up computers, wires, etc takes place, and then php and cgi code begin to flash before my eyes. An addled mechanical brain which has just been doing some of the most complex wiring ever done in an automobile before for six hours is just about spent as a crazy bash2 shell bounces back memories from long ago, which mostly escaped then, long ago.

Housemates. Yes, in the sense that we do not share rooms -- and thus become roomates. Not that we share a house. In fact, if four walls make a room, there are really only four here, though the kitchen is somewhat seperated. This means that my quote room unquote is the living room/dining room/smoking room/everything else. Which seems oddly satisfying at 4:58 am, to know that I have approximately double the amount of cubic space in my room than my apartment-mates. Aaahhh.

I finish the orange juice, and decide its time for bed.

Spoonerisms:


There was a huge craze of these things on campus last year, and once your mind starts rolling on them, they take over all of your mental processes.


Here's one I made up while lying in bed this morning:

Q: What's the difference between a poker that's been in the fire for a while, and someone who has watched too much tv?


A: One's red hot and the other's head rot!



This was one of John Marie's favorites:

Q: What's the difference between me and you?

A: Well, I'm a shining wit...

Snowboarding!! Whoooeee! At Mountain High today was awesome! Many jumps and slushy turns and mountains screamed down! Hooray! Good for the soul!

Woah!

Thanks to Coors (tm), Papst Blue Ribbon (tm), Guiness (tm), Heiniekein (tm), and the rock band Twaddle (web site: Twaddle Mountain) and the band The Velvet Crochets, as well as this man, (web site, blog type: here)...

I just quote unquote GOT this joke:

4. Time flies like an arrow; fruit flies like a banana.

After here Townes Van Zandt, Bob Dylan, etc say it contless times, I finally got it! Hooray!

Fruit flies! HAh-hah! Ha!

The snowy peaks of the LA valley simmer through the fog and smog, brown and grey haze of the valley. Exquisite chant peacefulyl emmanates from the human-sized speakers that live next door. USA-flag-colored wind toys spin lethargically in the pre-evening breeze.

Don sips his mate. And rejoices in the newfound posting abilities. No more need for ftp and arcane shell commands. Sign.

Okay, let\'s see whats noteworthy today.
Martha\'s going to jail
And then theres the whatnot about mayors violating law to give gay couples certificates, planned parenthood winning cases against pro-life lawyers, and plenty of other hackle-raising events.
world net daily
cnn

peace

Well, the new post processor and posting form are now setup for my blog, so it is like a regular blog stuff now. Wow! The formatting will probably be all off, because i am now putting in html tags into this. Ah, well. Life at the StraussHouse continues. Peace.

peace

volumes

Yeah, so just spent an evening with Stephen Koch, one of the foremost adventurers in our day and age, he is living his dream to snowboard the seven summits, the highest peaks in each continent, climb up them and snowboard down them...

Kinda makes me wonder about my life, about the dreams that i have had and not pursued, the things that i have always wanted to do, but for some stupid, silly reason have blown off. Life is there to be grabbed, to be taken, to be lived to the hilt, to be done.

I am tired of excuses. While men are out scaling the world's highest peaks, i am sitting on my rear, tinkering with some little electronic device.

It is time to stand up, half-drunk and getting sick, to the world's challenge. To life's challenge. It is time to say "I am going to do it." It is time to act. To make life that much more worth living. We need to be doers, we men. We need to get shit done.

3) The campus has strict rules about opposite-sex dorm visitation, drugs, and alcohol. Are these enforced, or are the rules frequently broken?

No. I do heroin.

6) Are student-faculty relationships close?

No. I do heroin.

7) Describe any extracurricular activities that you particularly enjoy.

No. I do heroin.

9) Do you consider the academic workload heavy?

No. I do heroin.

Any mention of drug names, properties, and effects on this website are purely academical, and to be used for the sole purpose of education. The author of this document and this website does not condone the use, possesion, or transfer of any illegal drugs, including but not limited to heroin, mary-wanna, pcp, 'shrooms, acid, or any of the other drugs mentioned by Sublime in Scarlet Begonias. As well as every other drug in existence. We also think that you should always wear your seat belt.

isi_college_guide_heroin.doc

Heroin

Sublime

Scarlet Begonias

After six days (or is it seven) of flossing, my gums are ceasing to bleed. PErhaps years of chewing tobbaco can be worked off with a simple regimen of inter-toothal stringing. Hmm.

This probably is a waste of time for many of your intellects, but i penned it during seminar. I confess the complete works of e.e. cummings have been hovering over my nocturnal equivocal catharsing sessions for some time now.

Morning, car, one nutter-butter left lying forlornly on the dash, the product of some crazed starvation to-hell-with-health-i-need-food moment of weakness at a southern cali gas station.

The theme of this trip was doing everything that we didn't have enough time to do... And we did it all: Santa Cruz, Joko's in Nipomo, San Jose, San Francisco, San Rafael, Fairfax, Doc Watson with David Holt and Richard Watson, Budweiser, G & T's, Two new blogs, Three laptops, Two computer repairs, and 800 miles. And I'm probably leaving many things out, like the travel-belt-notch that is earned from the development of the on-road-liquid-waste-elimination skill...

Oh yes, and burned seats and burned-out immersion heaters, lego animations, and bedrooms completely funkified by unshaved, unshowered, burrito-eating, beer-drinking men.

So there's the weekend in a nutshell. Good times.

Blogging once again. Crazy times, trips, travels... Up and down the coast of california, company, comradery, and caravans... Time perhaps will provide the reasons which we do not see as yet...

When the cold winds come to find you
Blowing down from the top of the high rise
I'll come and take you back down to Soho
Away from all those mad men's eyes
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp - The Pogues, London Girl

2:03 am. She drops me hanging, naked; tired, teased, taut and uninspired; she is playing with me, flirting, sentences, fragments, comings and goings in my mind, unable to be expressed and lost forever. Or something like that. She leaves me stranded in front of this keyboard.

Yes, naked. Because everything worth doing is worth doing naked. Even snowboarding. Especially blogging.

It was one of those days, today, where, having no ante-meridian duties, and having had plenty of post-reasonable-man's-bedtime activities the last night, make that the last week (or decade, to be still more accurate), it was one of those days where a late morning of beauty sleep was quite in order. Add that to a week of slept-in mornings and you reach tonight's dilemma: a circadian rythmn that is set roughly to the time of the Poly-wonga islands. Wonderful. The body does not lke going to sleep only nine hours after awakening. It wants more like fifteen, which puts me at scheduled sleepy time about three am this night...

I wanted to examine the narcissic side of blogging, make a real investigation into it, for it is something that has been mentioned over and over again in these blogs... these phalanxes of the revolution... and something that does not sit well within my soul, for it would seem to contradict the nobility of the honest blogger... Thus...

The overwhelming urge to "express ourselves." . I think that, while it is true that there is some reality, some drive, some deep desire that truly exists, this manner of expressing it seems woefully inaccurate.

It is as if the reality is only behind the concept of needing to "express ourselves" the same way that something is and must be within a concept in order for it to be a perversion. Simply naming this draw as the need to "express ourselves" and leaving it there is atrocious. For that meaning ultimately rings hollow - with the hollow ring that deceit and pride lend to any activity they taint.

And thus, i begin to see why calling blogging narcisstic and selfish and prideful irritates me. Not only because i resemble that remark and hate that fact, but because that shows the perversion. And the perversion, falling, as all evil does, as a privation of the good, and what can the good be here but expression of the truth? Thus, I believe that mans need to express himself is only a (rather poor) way of characterizing what he really needs to express - the truth. And, ultimately, perhaps not simple truth, but the ultimate Truth.

How does the fact that what i'm saying is MINE effect this? Certainly men are almost universally attached to their own opinions. Certainly this often times taints their view of what is actually true.

But this seems like the same sense in which people (myself included) defend the artist.

"Oh, but it's what's in his soul."

Yes, but what if his soul sucks? If it's filled with grit and pain and exhaustion, that's one thing (and he sings the blues), but what if it has surpassed being grimy, and is deceitful, despairing, and odious? What if it is not truthful, or true? Does it not then violate some standard of commmon decency, some standard that says "hear no evil" ? It seems like that standard can only be truthfulness.

And the truth does not admit of ownership. One thing is not "my truth." It is simply the truth. The very nature of the true is the universal, that which can be had by all, and that which can be shared withou limit - and yet be undiminished. It applies to all. It is the counter-weight, the anti-greed, the sunshine, the essence of freedom, God's gift to all.

(and it's better naked.)

So every man desires to express truth, and what better truth to express than the truth he knows the best, perhaps that which is in his own soul. And many times, especially in a society that fosters moral relativism, and in a land that practically demands self-deification and self-worship, many times that need gets subverted and robbed of its meaning, and is channeled into a base need to express... what, anything? something, anything but what is true, but definately that which is yours...

Ultimately that which is ours is sin. Everything else belongs to the Truth. Thus, the point of the blog, like other expression, it to express truth, and beauty, and what we can of the good. The Good, the True, the Beautiful. And so it should not matter who says what, but rather that the truth is said, and shared, and known. And though it is encouraging to know that there may well be some truth within you, and manifested through you, it is necessary, proper, and romantic to know that it is not your truth,and that you are but an instrument, striving to conform to the truth, and not to deform yourself in the process. Boast in the Lord.

Thus, the need for expression found in all men is intricately tied in with the need for God. Men must express, but they must express the Truth. Not only do they yearn for God, they also yearn to glorify Him.

[a tired Don goes to bed at 3:0o am]

Strange moods, feelings, depressions of many of those around me... Are spritual attacks that widespread? Is a cool change coming? Is the moment being forced to a crisis?

Spent today battling materialism - on a very tangible and personal level: somehow i had accumulated so many clothes (due in part to, A, horror of washing, B, not wanting have to think about them and so acquiring enough to always have around) that i did five loads of laundry for the dirty ones. Five! And there we still plenty of clothes on the rack in the room. So something snapped. Muttering things like "Absurdity, that's all there is too it!" I visciously attacked the clothes. My roommate helped render a number of garments, which we then cast out... It was wonderfully therapeutic...

I am going to attack some stuff soon, and achieve my mastery over it by the utter denial of it.

Patty Griffin tells me to "count [my] ribs and say [my] prayers and get to sleep," but i am still up and not so much bloggin, but rather crusing others blogs ... domain registrars... [don't register without talking to me, i should have my reseller papers in soon and be able to cut you an amazing deal...

Maybe its those two point five cups of coffee early this evening (having broken the pure cement addiction to the cruel black oil definitively two years ago and being decidely unused to the stimulant now, however much mate you consume... different buzzes, like different alcohols, affect you differently...hmm...

Whatever it is, the fact that it is nearing five am does not seem to effect me. Maybe it is the fact that tommorrow is St. Thomas Aquinas day, (in the old calendar, i'm pretty sure) and our interestingly-minded school (soon to be alma-mater, hopefully) has pronounced a day of festivities in honor of its namesake, which for me seems to be waking up at about 3 in the afternoon, switching the loads of laundry, and hoping to pick up an extra 12er of corona while vons still has the 9-buck sale... oh, and maybe some seminar...

At this point in the evening

When we are in our boxers

&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp When sleep looms

And intimacy is a foreign word

"You kiss at me"

A russian's utterance crosses my mind

You, perhaps, do not get the reference,

But manys the man who thought the russians were coming.

"Perhaps, in her own way [insert woman's name here] she consitutes an entire second front."

In the high august style of the Straussian:

Yesssss, Yeesssss, second front, that isssss gooooood....

For the confused, The Russians are Coming, The Russians are Coming.

Perhaps it would be useful to have a permanent resource established "For the Confused"...

[Don makes the mistake of putting on the headphones again. This immediately precipitates the desire for another beer, and taps once again into the (seemingly) inexhaustible of the late-night blogger, especially one without any responsibilities for the ever-nearer morrow.]

Lying on my floor

Between my drunk roommates

(In fact all the roommates i've ever had lie drunk inside this house)

No, that's lie, for though he may be more properly soulmate, though we did share a house , a hut, a hovel [even that last is a stretch] we were roommates in someway, and he is here and not drunk tonight...

I still have some of that budweiser left, which is a blessing and a curse: a blessing in that it means i haven't debauched myself recently, a curse as it is still left on the menu...

Yes so here I lie on the floor of what i generally refer to as "The Pad" typing my blog on an extremely sexy blue glowing keyboard, with incredibly responsive keys... its sooooo beautiful...

Yes, i mentioned network crimping tonight in a disparaging tone. I did not mean that, really. I said, "yes, i'm going to crimp some network cable, cause its not a party, unless...

But i did not mean to trail off there. I did not mean to imply that it is funny that network-cable-crimping must go on at a party. For we have all been there, at those parties, you and i, where, deep in the city of mammon, we have been enticed to attend... I have crimped network cable at those parties... At the parties where you would like to think that the hostess invited you because her sister likes your friend, but where you know the real reason is that she is sleeping alone - and has been since last week, when she broke up with your buddy... And she is not used to sleeping alone, here, in the city of the flesh, Sacramento California. And so, I crimp network cable. Not because it has to be done, but because sticking those damn tiny loopy wires into their little slots after those six gin and tonics and five beers is the only thing keeping your sanity alive and thus your morality and thus saving yourself from the 28 or so steps it would take to be fucking her.

And so, you crimp network cable. And thus, at every party, there must be someone crimping network cable. And this is good, because it preserves the right order of things.

God Bless RJ45!

Rock the House!

So what's with the vaguely depressed post lamenting moral restrictions regarding sexual boundaries? Nothing, it just seems that within the act of denying temptations lies the painful growth of the human soul. The journey to God. The ultimate self-denial. The surrendering of your will to His. This is the foundation of the blues.

For the blues are sung as an act of self pity, but - and here's where the beauty lies - they are not sung without hope. The blues are sung as a comedy, a play upon life, a pun upon death, and a sarcastic mockery of all that evil stands for. Because we know that life is absurd. We know that what temptation promises us is phony. We know that to take it at its word is to embrace a farce, a lie, that to sin is not only to be untruthful, but to rub our untruthfulness in the face of Truth Himself, and that is absurd. It is absolutely ridiculous, one that we would do that at all (being rational, sort of), two that, we doing that, He has the gumption and bravado and honest-to-goodness cojones to forgive us despite our actions! Hence, the blues. We know its wrong and bad for us, yet we choose it anyway; He knows that we know what we do and yet forgives us anyway.

Of course, that does us no good, unless we finally admit that He is right and that we are wrong - for some on the deathbed, for some in between the bridge and the water; for some, never at all, it is sad... But those who sing the blues, THEY know... That self-pity is not such a bad thing ("Weep for yourselves and your children, Do not weep for Me") as long as it (1) is proportional, (2) honest and part of the process ("I would think it strange if, for many, there were not many late nights of weeping..."), and (3) comes to an end. Perhaps above all it must be comical, sung with a certain leer, a lilt, a tone that implies that all our supports have been knocked out, all our allies have forsaken us, and that God has forced our reliance to rest ultimately in Him, and in no other. No person, no material thing, not even ourselves. For some of us, He turns our lives upside down until we reach that state of utter abandon. For some of us, he keeps reducing us to that state because we just don't get it [I hope you get it soon, River-Man, whatever it is in particular that He wants. You are in my prayers.]...

And so the bloggin continues late into the night... The various sleeping roommates and accomplices [sic] are no doubt kept from the deepest levels of sleep by my glaring monitor light, glowing keyboard, muted desk lamp, and perhaps even the faint echos of the tunes just added to augment my blogging experience... Ah, no matter, their dreams will be all the more interesting for being REMed so much tonight...

In order to comply with proper blog fashion, or at least as my sources tell me that the fashion is, i will try to include more general linkage in my pots... er, posts...

man, I think i have a signifcant soft spot in my hard heart for lucinda williams... maybe its that brutally honest gritty geetar of her's...

speaking of the blues earlier and now of lucinda (a name now that will always imply unpleasantry, when mentioned by itself), lucinda williams, it seems a good time to quote some... it seems that for some reason i belive my audience has not been exposed to nearly enough Townes Van Zandt (now this may be a gross misperception, please inform me if it is...

[the paper delivery boy informs me that it is 4:22 am as he throws the paper out on the path and then reverses with that beautiful golf-cart-electric-whir that only a honda can provide, myself knowing well from the experience of the lovely '83 accord, the Blue Charger which my brother and i shared, and that i never really came to grips with his wrecking it and selling what was left to cover the costs of fixing it up...]

Well, nothing to do tommorrow but catch-up on the catch-up stuff itself, try to reassemble some semblence of rationality within the framework of a life whose only stability is its Purpose, whose only life is His life... or so i strive for... only kidding myself when a notion of completion or goal reached crosses my mind... for while there are many stepping stones, the river is not crossed until we die... it really is that long... and hence, the blues. God Bless 'em. I'll bet Jesus could have sung the blues better than anyone, if he had the mind to. Time for bed.

Alcoholic Mystic rants about dying and wanting to leave a very personal diary in his grave, saying that when he is exhumed and found to be incorrupt that he wants a message there to be broadcast, namely - "I am not a saint, I merely ingested vast quatities of alcohol and preservatives"...

Ahh yes, the blogs of friends and accomplices in arms (see The Revolutionaries) are starting to trickle in... It is, after all, only 1:16 in the morning on this pregnant, midweek night.

And though the three of us are well into our second twelver, and the drunken munchies have exacted their toll on our bodies - and our wallets, providing the "dorm store" with undeserved profits - despite that, the night is still laden with much potential...

And though I fight the nemesis, the curse/blessing that is the gift of sleep, I struggle to blog on...

[And fail...]

Wishing intellectual stimulation, but lacking it...

In half an hour i will go and sit in seminar - unstudied, stinking, starving, hurting, and apathetic.

Locke's system of something will unfold itself in the bickering debacle of the frenzied minds of aspiring philosophers. My thoughts will wander, in and out, for two hours... How will I manage? By taking it one minute at a time...

I have starved you
Starved you of what you need
And, finally, I bring you the plate
The feast, the food
And you cannot eat
For you are dead.

Are you going to blog on the way down?

having not thought anything about it but, of course

i get in the car, and begin to drive, hear this faint beeping sound... in my head i run through the list of electronic devices in the car... none that i know of make that type of electronic beep... eventually i turn to the backpack which houses the laptop and pull it open. the beeps get louder... i flip open the screen, and the laptop has been sitting there, running down its battery, waiting for me to start, softly calling to me with its friendly beeps...

the 101 north of san fran cruising into the tunnel, through beautiful marin

it's a road you CANNOT fall off of, the tourists, mistakenly creep at 45, the locals know its banked for 95+...

i have figured out what flying by the seat of your pants, flying term WWII fighter pilot talk.

i thought that it just meant flying from instinct, but it actually means using your body's internal gyroscope to guide your vehicle through a course that you have already plotted with your eye... this is unlike normal vehicular operation, which involves directing the vehicle with your eyes along the pre-programmed visual route...

Some people want to steal her heart.
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp - Bilt to Spill

I am going to build a non-automated robot arm, for the car, and name it/him Logan Hotfur.

South San Fran, 280, fast freeway...

No one goes slow on the two-eighty, this side of san francisco...

[Don narrowly makes his turn off to the 380, then 101...]

if they wanted to go slow, they would have taken the 101 through the city. Everyone knows where they are going on the 280. Either to San Francisco or away. Out of the many varied Freeway Philosophies (tm), its one of the simplest. Another, simpler one is that of the CA-126... West of Fillmore, please, where it starts again, the veterans memorial highway is unmentionable...

Lover Of God And Nature, Holder-Of-Things-For-Users Robot

The philosophy of the 126 is, "In the sun."

No notion, of destination, direction, departure, deviation, death, degeneration, development, decesion, derivation, or dissension...

Look for the record with me on the cover!
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp - Bilt to Spill

40 miles of blogging so far... I wonder if it will get so that i must be driving somwhere in order to blog... Or maybe i'll just have to be "In the Sun."

I need to write down a list of the "misquotes" of the things i heard wrong the first time, and for that reason still hear wrong.

Its actually a feeling in the seat of your pants. It feels like a combination between liquid energy flow and adrenal rush, and it sustains itself for a long time continually...

And it works. Thats all that can be said about it... Maybe some people find it easier to tap into at will than others...

Its that same feeling that i have gotten as a passenger when i felt the car lose traction right beforen it slid (or careened is the better word)...

A lovely [providential ?>>>!] acidental [in the philosophic sense, please!, meaning not from proper cause] speed change spares my bacon from the san jose pork...

When your lane slows down, change it. PUSH. consistently...

Idols [equivocally] : Mandolin - Bill Monroe, Banjo - Bela Fleck, - Doc Watson [why do all these guys play bluegrass?, not meaning it like that, of course...]

Here we go, Remixers - Kruder & Dorfmeister, Electric Guitar - Jerrry Garcia (heck, everything he does, except drug usuage), Drug Usuage - Hunter S. Thompson, "The Chop" - David Grisham (heck, EVERYTHING he does, well, excepting that he should ratify the new covenant as well)

They say that a commercial airliner is only heading on course fewer thanj 10 percent of the time. Heck, i'm doing MUCH better than that [Don knocks on wood, superstitiously - and maybe even sacreligeously]

[pause to attone for his sins]

[passes 4 cops]

Three thoughts from prayer...:

...forgive us our sons, er, sins... thought flash: for some, their sons are their sins, though [chuckle and equivocation]

if i pray for someone and their intentions, and i'm in their intentions, some of my prayerfulness is directed at myself! Wonderful! It's like a spiritual loopback [device]...

I wonder what my ip is on the spiritual network?

(gasp) and what is my subnet mask?!

[cruising cop observes don blogging, and don maintaining a steady 4 over the speed limit, and keeps cruising, bless him]

Is life a progression from a non-routable subnet to a class A?

Are saints routers with rip enabled, contemplatives those with static routes?

Then packets must be prayers, fragmentation diffused thoughts, and i'm way carried away by this crazy analogy!

100 miles from 215k, 512 from the next palindrome.

[Strange Interlude]

I'm rolling all the time.
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp - Bill Monroe

just was in some kind of mental cloud, WAY out there some where... Stopped for gas, saw a sign out of the corner of my eye that said :Flick your BIC" andliterally jumped when i saw it, thinking it said something else, namely, something about a four letter anglo saxon word and a female dog belonging to the accosted. I was much taken aback. Perhaps i've been on the road too long... Nah!

I remember really liking where i was, where ever that was...

And it wasn't king city, thats for damnsure. [a whole chain of thougts too non sequiter to relate, or actually too weird-sequiter too relate]

[Don blogs during a high speed pass along some "Historic Route"]

215k.. Doc Watson, interrupting a few hours of Bill Monroe informs me that he has the "lonesome jailhouse blues" (i think Monroe is playing with him). Coffee, Mate, and Red Bull play with me.]

What is the loneliest hour of the night?

She took all the love that a poor boy could give her.
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp - Bill Monroe

I wonder if i've ever been to heaven?

Yes, I think that I have...

See Canyon
Next Right
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp - Road Sign, No. of Avila Beach Dr.

I was wrong about that upcoming palindrome... It was 600 miles not, 500...

Mattie Rd
Spyglass Dr
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp - Road Sign

Perhaps, as a great cosmic joke, our fates are laid out in road signs all over the world. Perhaps that explains my need to travel, merely to read uyp on myself [!absurdity>>>insight!]

[Bill Monroe abruptly gives way to far-out-hefner-space-groove-thing]

[We fly passed Donny's farthest Northern exposure - as a surfer]

[arms ache from massive stimulant intake and over-strenuous typing posture, but good posture, and oh so safe]

Happy Angel Band

Suddenly Don's heart leaps!

Childhod fears of being "bored" in heaven disperse and turn to naught!

We will be making music in heaven!

[And I will be able to sing...]

I think we ought to build checks into our lives - things that (manually or artificially, even) enforce patience and hard work, sweat, things like that. Do not grow soft, or relax for too long.

Fatigue tries to battle its way through the barricade of taurine, cafeine, and mateine... It always does get through, eventually... And if you make the barricade too thick or tough, when it finally breaks through it will have summoned enough force to kill you...

Ricky Scaggs and Bill Monroe do this version of Blue Moon of Kentuckey that has CrazyBass(tm).

Everybody Must Get Stoned is actually called "rainy day women." how beautiful is that!?!!! [very]

AaAazA

warmth creeps throgh mylegs - a post red bull burn... santa barbara, ventura, sulphur mountain road. backwoods califonia redneck territory. Must stop and pick up an 18 pack of high life, or bud.

Listening to Dylan's Blond on Blonde, part way through it for the second time...

It ain't a road trip without Dylan, just like its not a party unless someone is crimping network cable, as i've always said.

[don stops for the afprementioned 18-pack]

Turned out to be bud... I guess the wallet-manager programme is feeling the effects of spurious but perhaps necessary [!] road trips - and the vast quantities of petroleum products consumed upon them....

and there were the three requisite jacked up pickups and 4 wheelers, with engines running, and youthful hicklings sounding of their horns outside the circle k.

the fuzz welcome me baCK to signal street, i turn, and thus this post ends.

one line that sticks in my mind is the [sage?] advice to do one thing every day that scares you.

[significant pause, for breath and effect]

whether that means you should do something really stupid and dangerous is one question.

whether you should do something that scares the farging crap, white as a sheet, feces everywhere, adrenaline rush so high that the world shakes and shivers below you, and shimmers and blurs away and you ride the pure intoxicating high of life one instant shy of death.

Blogging at 75 miles an hour.

Tea is the intellectual's drink.
&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp&nbsp - JMSF

The red glare of the optical mouse sins on the seat as the car magestically sails around a smooth asphalt curve.

You have to love life to lose it... You have to lose life to love it... You caan't love life without being willing to lose it. Life is essentially loss... Specifically, loss of yourself, which is the only thing that you could ever own, and [irony], you can't own it in this life, and when you can, you find you don't want it, and never did.

The keyboard glows blue on the dash, townes sings on the radio [equivocation].

Chuck Yeager was always talking about "Pushing the Envelope."

You go higher faster farther, you taste a glimpse of peace, which only comes by the juxtaposition of yourself against the infinite and understanding that...

The Ocean. Someday, this, too will be explained...

180 miles to San Francisco...

Townes says he isn't coming back.

Codename :: Tiny spoke of the American Haiku... Perhaps my "fragments" fit that image, i don't know... I love the way that mockery and derision of them only shows the depths of the reality represented... The words, trite and corny, carry the trancendental meaning, despite themselves, and the mockery lets the words slide away, and thus only the meaning remains...

Somewhere
Just east of Pismo Beach
I whisper her name
Guy Clark's Dublin Blues make me cry again

I wanna say "I'll bet no one has ever done this before" and be right more times than anyone else.

Is life stretched out before me, or behind me?

We absorb an awful lot. Are humans essentially sponges?

Dripping when squeezed, dried in the heat, shrunken when wrung out, and finally good for nothing, kept under the sink in case someone needs to scrape some dog shit off an old shoe, and then, carefully placed, with much annoyance, disgust and distaste, into a used plastic sandwich baggie, and gingeerly dropped into the outside garbage can and left for the three am, stinking, unshaven, half-baked, rolling, and ploughed disposal service man, who with one more day on the job, doesn't return the lids to any of the 4,291 cans he services on route 12, every tuesday, here in ohio.

[Don mocks a "going out of your mind scream," and bangs his head with his left hand.]

"Give your lover a call," Townes says...

130 miles to San Francisco.

[Townes sings about coacaine. We sweep through them lights of Gonzales together.]

Sometime later the second powerade bottle makes the ultumate sacrifice. Its utility used up, it tries to reconcile its bitter fate with some principle of divine justice. If only my death was not so analagous to my purpose, it moans, sighs, feels sorry, cries, yet does not regret, repent, or relent. I have made my decision, he says. I have now earned - though not through my own strength, or choice - the right to bear that proud red badge of humility.

Cherise squawks a quarter mile from the potter road turn off.

Townes sings of dead-woman-he-loved, he thinks. Boomer-humor rings in my head.

Its not so much the jokes these fellows told, but the fact that they told 'em.

Not meaning the Boomdog, though he might be in that category one day.

Nothing quite like road grime, to cover you and make you smile 295 miles into the journey, hands smell of wiper, you rub your nose, 75% alertness... more tea...

San Francisco greets me in the fog. sixth street, folsom...

Come up swimmingly on taylor and california... cathedral...

San Francisco is my city. I turn on city driving mode...

i have never bothered to learn the layout of the city, a statement only partially true...

i like the excitement of not knowing where you are going, it helps you blend in, because no one in san francisco knows where they are going:

First Guy: Where are you going?
Second Guy: Up!
First Guy: Wow, me too!

And then down down down, first gear, fingers flying on the keyboard, lights, sky scrapers, the bay bridge whiz by...

One windshield wiper flicks the city rain to the side, one wiper just twitches...

Past the embarcadero, my heart knew where it was going the whole time, left on polk...

this is the scenic route, signified by a white bird on a medium size sign...

come to a stop at a red on francisco, taxis screech [?] by... pick up the fare...

we meet the 101 on lombard and take her for all she's worth, one of the busy streets, pulses with the rythmn the heartbeat of the great sinning city...

then a right, and on to the golden gate...

blogging in city traffic...

the last of lombard the bridge, the bay, the city behind, the ocean to the left, bridge all red, assured from my youth that the red is just painted over the gold to protect it...

and marin, on to home, the soul soars, the journey ends, and so does this entry.