cloth n mixers

I like the summer look of a tan jacket and white shirt accompanied by a necktie with a black ground ... Away from the office, try mixing the clothes with a gin cocktail as a change of pace from gin martinis.

So the best mixer for gin is linen.

The best mixer for a bottle of vodka is Kevlar. Pour a shot of vodka, serve with enough Kevlar to cover one's torso.

The best back for a double shot of well whiskey is a pair of filthy Converse.

And the best accompaniment to a gin and linen is over-privileged fops.

Practice chopsticks should be illegal.

Frickin' training wheels for your damn hands.

Some notes on Corporation Rock

Corporation rock is music which promotes the mindset necessary to exist as an employee in a large business/corporate environment.

It is music for drones. It is music to give a modicum of feeling to an otherwise emotionally unfulfilling existence. It is music to listen to after a long day at the office. Music which calms the listener and gives them some emotional release so he can return to the office the next day without going Section 8. It is MTV designed by Bill Gates. It is the soundtrack to Friends. Corporation rock is the musical antithesis of Office Space. It is the music Winston Smith rocks out to.

I. Corporation Rock is not a synonym for corporate rock.
Corporate rock is popular music which large corporations with no interest in art profit from.

Large corporations also profit from corporation rock, but in a different way. Corporation rock creates acceptable employees. It programs its listeners to accept the specific constraints of working for a large corporation. Corporation rock teaches the listener to accept the sublimation of identity in favor of another’s profit, to happily lose themselves in conformity, to ignore the lack of emotional fulfillment.


Corporate rock and corporation rock are conceptually similar but distinct. Both, however, suck.

II. Corporation rock can be defined.
Some of the qualities which define corporation rock include:
1. A musical formula or specific "sound" which defines the group's music. Corporation rock is not tied to genre. But once you've heard a few songs by a corporation rock band, you'll be able to recognize their entire discography.
2. Promotion of goal-orientation. This is conveyed lyrically, visually, and in the personalities of the band members. It's never about corporate goals. It's about personal and social goals.
3. Promotion of the acceptance of servitude (this is often disguised as "humility").
4. Promotion of group behavior.
5. A manufactured emotional state to replace the basic sterility that is a corporate office environment. (Depending on the band, this emotional state may tied in to romantic love, sexual pleasure or even religious expression or political causes.)


Coldplay are the most important corporation rock group recording today.

Let's take a look at the music of Coldplay, a good example of corporation rock:

1. A "Sound." Yes. The "Coldplay Sound" is so well-defined they may as well be a polka band.
2. Promotion of goal orientation. Yes. Sample lyric: "When you try your best but you don't succeed" - Fix You. (But don't get hung up on lyrics, it's not always about them.)
3. Acceptance of servitude. Yes. Lyrically and in Coldplay videos, frontman Chris Martin often takes a forgiving, paternal stance. He absolves the listener of responsibility. The listener can choose to let the singer think for him. The singer becomes the listener's boss.
4. Promotion of group existence. Yes. Many of Coldplay's lyrics are written in the first person plural, which encourages the listener to identify with them. Because corporation rock is unintentional, manifestations are often subtle. Corporation rock is not a call to arms. It is a call to put down arms. (Or more accurately, it is a call to never pick up arms.)
5. Manufactured emotional state. Yes. Coldplay are extremely skilled at instilling a specific form of melancholy nostalgic longing in their listeners. Coldplay is Jeff Buckley without the drunkenness and pathos.

III. Corporation rock is not the same as arena rock.
While some arena rock may be corporation rock, the two are not synonymous. At their heyday KISS and Aerosmith were arena rocking corporation rock bands.

Led Zeppelin was an arena rock band, but was not a corporation rock band. (They neither promoted nor accepted servitude, and they didn't give a shit if you were part of their group.)





Corporation rock arena rockers.

IV. Corporation rock is not brainwashing.
It is extremely rare that musicians who play corporation rock are aware that they play corporation rock. It is equally rare that their labels recognize the nature of their music. Corporation rock is unintentional.

V. Corporation rock is sincere.
Groups that perform corporation rock are not in it just for the money. Without sincerity, the audience will not take their message seriously.

VI. Corporation rock is not tied to a specific ideology.
Corporation rock bands espouse a variety of political and social points of view. Corporation rock is well-meaning. Many corporation rock groups are activists. However, the range of viewpoints they may have is directly limited by the following point.

VII. Corporation rock is inclusive.
Corporation rock wants you to be a part of their scene. Corporation rock is made by bands, not soloists. This promotes the acceptance of the group and its goals while subtly glossing over the romance and appeal of the rebellious outsider. Corporation rock takes care not to offend. Corporation rock is the musical equivalent of Whole Foods: conscientious, but not controversial. And still making a profit. This, incidentally, is why very few rap and country music artists are also corporation rockers. Although goal-, servitude-, and group-oriented, they're too far afield from the political mainstream. Corporation rock does not promote identification with a specific subculture, nor with a counterculture.

Some solo artists do record corporation rock. Interestingly, solo corporation rock artists tend to be marketed towards female fans.


U2 wants you to hang out with them. But on their terms.

VIII. Corporation rock is largely male and largely white.
This may largely be due to the preponderance of white men in middle management positions within the corporate world. There are, of course, some notable exceptions.

IX. Bands that play corporation rock are not democratic.
Most corporation rock bands consist of a charismatic frontman and a set of followers. This charismatic frontman is respected and looked up to by both men and women. The charismatic frontman is a surrogate for the listener's boss.


Bono is the frontman for a popular corporation rock group. He is a charismatic white male. He is also sincere. He is your boss.

X. Even bands with actively anticorporate lyrics can be corporation rock bands.
Because corporation rock is unintentional, the lyrics can on the surface be diametrically opposed to the very notion of corporations.


NIN: Year Zero is corporation rock. It would be ironic if it were not so sad.

Year Zero seems to say “ Lose yourself in the familiar NIN sound. Let Trent Reznor express your angst in carefully measured doses.
Let me think for you. "


A seminal album in the annals of both indie rock and corporation rock.

Against all logic, Radiohead's OK Computer is corporation rock.

Exactly what happens when you put a minifridge into a microwave?

ATTENTION ALL GIRLS EVERYWHERE

STOP READING EAT PRAY LOVE

THAT IS ALL

REGARDS, REGIS

neighbors

To the west, they have kids and have a French-speaking friend or relative who watches the kids frequently. I very much enjoy hearing her speak to the toddlers.

To the east, a couple with a dog. The man smokes Swisher Sweets before he walks the dog, I hear, but I'm on the wrong side of the house.

Half a block away, the Boys and Girls Club, which is full of life and sport and activity. I can hear the kids playing and yelling all afternoon.

It's a good neighborhood.

the space needle looks like a huge thumbtack to me
and seattle center is a substitute teacher's chair
and i am one of the kids who put it there
giggling in the back of the class
waiting for the biggest prank school's ever seen

Royksopp - Remind Me

this is pretty awesome and even if i have posted it already just watch it again!

wikipedia is either the anti-myspace or it's myspace squared

gender perception and the coming environmental apocalypse

On a church board, i read BE CONTENT FOR GOD PROVIDES as BE CONTENT FOR WORLD PROVIDES, which led me into reimagining Mother Earth as Papa Earth. Earth God, not Earth Goddess. As far as I know this is rare in human perception (mythology, folklore, all forms of anthromorphization). Picture Father Earth as a midway point between Moses and Hemingway at his peak.

I daydreamed what it would be like to live on his surface and figured that it would be much more permanent and respectful. A "mother" figure, while nurturing and creative and a wellspring of life, ultimately must be conquered or moved away from by the Male Hero in any mythic arc. The father figure's authority must be usurped via assassination or accepted. We're talking about how gods mature here, but we are not gods. So we can rage against Papa Earth until we're back in the stone age or dead. He will just wait until we've learned our lesson.

found this out the hard way

TREES ARE TENTACLES

plans

I'm not sure about the specifics, but I think I'd like to be involved in a kidnapping someday.

Ideas?

"smart and weird"

Oh man, I just saw Hellboy II: The Golden Army, and who would've thought: It's a comedy!

Maybe it's the glorious, beautiful hangover I'm working through (I can barely feel my legs), but man, what an enjoyable film.

Food Party FIRST EPISODE : part 1/5

Say hello to your new best thing.

a big problem

A big problem with living in a place with fun things to do with like-minded people is that about half the time you're too hung over from having immense fun with the like-minded people the night before to do the fun things the next day.

Angeli*as

Do you ever get the feeling that Angelina Jolie really, really wants to be Anjelica Huston (combining the high-royal look with the vaguely exotic), but that it's sort of a doomed wish?


Pistols do not automatically imbue confidence.


Being Anjelica Huston automatically imbues confidence.

awesome realization re: tinkertown

It's the anti-steampunk. That is to say, that, while aesthetic like steampunk, it embraces our history and formulates a philosophy and narrative to accompany that aesthetic and encompass that history.

According to the internet, Olivia and Jacob were the most popular names for children in 2007 in the State of Washington.

the sort of person who only saw the first half of trainspotting

the first half of goodfellas
the first half of badlands

a hooker in a skyscraper
kind of inverts the normal order of things


the amen after whatever it is you were saying

Does anyone have any idea what film this is?

That's Michael Pitt, by the way.

Indefensible Shoes

On the bus S. and I were people watching and we had a talk about how we each find certain types of shoes extremely unattractive on women. It's technical sandals for me, and very pointy flats for him. What's particularly interesting is that he and I have such absolutely different points of view regarding personal style: He's is actively anti-fashion, while I appreciate someone who dresses well, but both of us have extremely strong dislikes of specific types of women's footwear. This makes me wonder if it's something universal.

I have this idiotic theory that it's something vaguely instinctual: Perhaps men subconsciously recognize that, as the mode of transportation, the feet are the most important parts of the body and ought to be shorn in only the finest wear?

Look, I said it was idiotic.

Bluetooth to my heart

friends think i'm obnoxious
because i wear this headset all day
in stores
in theaters
in the park
yelling and murmuring
the light blinks frequently and endlessly
but it's not a telephone
it's a bluetooth to my heart
that sings your love into my ears

Bastille Day

Today is Bastille Day, the day the French stormed the Bastille, a prison which housed those imprisoned by royal decree. As a symbol of the absolute power of the royalty, the Bastille was a fine target to defy. Here's to symbolic refusals and active defiance.

Robert Cornelius, American Daguerrotypist

If you're interested in photography, you probably know who Louis Daguerre is.
However, lesser known is Robert Cornelius, the Philadelphian responsible for the first photograph of a person. (There is debate as to his primacy: some claim that Nicolas Huet made a daguerrotype in 1837, but the accuracy of the date is in dispute.)

Cornelius lived from 1809 to 1893. He was not a photographer, but a chemist and a metallurgist, and it was through contact with a photographer who commissioned him to produce a silver plate that he became interested in the craft. In 1839, he stood outside his father's place of business in Philadelphia and took this self portrait:




"Robert Cornelius, self-portrait facing front, arms crossed. Inscription on backing: The first light-picture ever taken. 1839."

After discovering the daguerrotype process and advancing its efficiency to the point where human photography was possible, Cornelius opened two successful daguerrotype shops which he ran until 1943, when he seems to have become bored with the entire venture. Cornelius was a scientist and a businessman, not an artist, and he ultimately followed in his father's lighting and gas company. This lacuna from photography is especially interesting given how little is known about Cornelius. Although he worked at the dawn of photography, one would except to find many more self-portraits. However, as far as I know, only two exist: that above, and this curiously faceless specimen below:




The pose, again, is what I focus on. Even Cornelius' improved daguerrotype process required that the subject sit perfectly still fors several minutes, so it is particularly interesting that he chose such an active pose. I've said before that the charm of the 1839 portrait lies in its modernity: he stands with an informality and lack of pose that it is shocking to see in pre-1900 photograph. I am inured to the idea of the stiffly posed Civil War and post-Civil War photographs, but Cornelius' portraits are are full of personality. That's also hard to reconcile with the era.

Unfortunately, we know little of Cornelius himself. The void of information regarding Cornelius is especially interesting given the tantalizing hints we have regarding his personal life. A contemporary wrote this of him. Note the shallow forays the author makes into his life:

There is a young gentleman of this city, by the name of Robert Cornelius, one of the firm of the well known house of Cornelius, Son & Co., who has more genius than he yet supposes himself to possess. As a designer in the way of his profession, he has no equal; as a ventriloquist—but here we are getting into private life:—as a Daguerreotypist his specimens are the best that have yet been seen in this country, and we speak this with a full knowledge of the specimens shown here by Mr. Gouraud, purporting to be, and no doubt truly, by Daguerre himself. We have seen many specimens by young Cornelius, and we pronounce them unsurpassable—they must be seen to be appreciated. Catching a shadow is a thing no more to be laughed at. Mr. Cornelius, in one matter, has outstripped the great master of the art, a thing, by the way, peculiar to our countrymen; he has succeeded in etching his designs onto the plate, from which they cannot be removed by any effort. A few more experiments in this way, and we shall do without engravers—those very expensive gentlemen.

-Godey's Lady's Book (Philadelphia) Vol. 20 (April 1840) pg. 190.

The author notes that he has "more genius than he supposes himself to possess," an observation almost at odds with the jaunty air Cornelius has in his self portrait. And she notes that Cornelius had a life as a ventriloquist - a fact she quickly shies away from. A private man? Perhaps. But perhaps he was one of whom not much was written. Much of his work is preserved at the Library of Congress and by various Philadelphian historical societies, but I cannot in my research even tell if he married. I would relish the opportunity to read more on Cornelius.

Some samples of Cornelius' work follow:





Emlen Cresson, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing front




John McAllister, Jr., head-and-shoulders portrait, facing front




View of intersection of Eighth Street and Market Street, Philadelphia. This is the street upon which his self portrait was taken.

William Robertson Grant, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing right

Isaiah Lukens, head-and-shoulders portrait, facing left

John Henry Frederick Sachse, half-length portrait, facing front, seated

Paul Beck Goddard, a chemist who helped Cornelius replicate the daguerrotype.

Peter Stephen Duponceau, head of the American Philosophical Society

next tattoo

I think it should be something less direct, which is an influence from C. An albatross or a Roanoke symbol, perhaps? I don't know. Are those literal? Are those curses?

the internet is not comprehensive

It used to be that the best weird things were things that didn't turn up when you searched for them on Google.

Now the best weird things are the things that don't result in the first search result being a Wikipedia entry.

Do you use Firefox

You know the address bar?

You know the Web 2.0 icon that you click in the address bar?

The orange and white one for subscribing to an RSS feed?





Doesn't it look just like a fine cut of salmon?

you're still famous to me

Ten Commandments or More: Human Decision Making in the Pre- and Post-Reynardian World

Journal of Economic Theology and Orthodox Statistical Studies
v.12, March 25, 2007

Harold Quiroga^1,2,3, Ana-Maria Fitzgerald^1,2, Prakash Winch^1,3, Christopher LaFleur¹ & Ram Nasamir¹

1. University of Oxford, Department of Applied Theology and Statistics, South Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3QU, UK
2. These authors contributed equally to this work.
3. Present addresses: European Destiny and Mathematics Laboratory (EDML), Meyerhofstrazlig">e 1, 69117 Heidelberg, Germany (C.H.H.); Department of Philosophical Sciences, University of Warwick, Gibbet Hill Road, Coventry CV4 7AL, UK (P.A.).

Correspondence to: Ram Nasamir¹ Correspondence and requests for materials should be addressed to K.N. (Email: ram.nasamir@theostat.ox.ac.uk).

Abstract

Recent studies in post-mortal theology have hinted at lessened upwards-trending numbers of heaven-goers. Theological statisticians have found this difficult to reconcile with classical theories of destiny and religious economics, which infers that, given a population exhibiting standard deviation of deviance, equal numbers will ascend to hell to bathe in the light of the father as will descend to heaven to suffer the severest possible punishments for the longest period of infinity. Reynard's equative destiny theory posits that roughly half +/- 5% of a given population will reach their reward above while the remainder will reside below, but computer modelling within the past ten years has shown a discrepancy of up to 15% in favor of inferno-bound subjects.

Descriptive moral statistics has typically focused on freedom of will in associating post-mortal destiny with pre-mortal behavior, positing that it is the decisions of the individual that result in his or her final destination. Outside of the field of statistical theology, the deviation above has been interpreted to indicate a trend towards sin and evil behavior. However, this presumes full disclosure of knowledge regarding sin and salvation upon each individual actor: To avoid damnation, an individual must have knowledge of each possible sin.

This paper examines the possibility that the 15% deviation listed above results not from a rising level of defects within the character of our population, but from a lack of full disclosure involving the nature of sin.

Introduction

Excavations upon the site of Mt. Sinai (verified as the Biblical Sinai in 1973 by an Israeli-Ethiopian team using the Horeb-Helena test) have shed new evidence upon the number of tablets brought by the Biblical Moses from his covenant with YHVH. Carbon dating and empirical reverse prophecy has uncovered remnants of a third tablet, which when compared to the existing tablet sherds currently held at the Chicago Field Museum, was discovered to be a close match. This suggests the possibility that the Hebrew God gave the lawmaker Moses a set of fifteen, not ten, commandments.

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dirty and perfumed

Today I walked past a dirty, sweaty construction worker who smelled like a fine cologne. I really enjoyed that combination and approve of filthiness in conjunction with perfumes and scented oils from here on out.

james McAvoy is the British Josh Hartnett

Same forgettably handsome faces.
Same shitty action movies.

Mix them 'n' match them.

I've reconnected with many many people, most of them important and unique in my life and most of them within the past year. It's a big fear of mine that I'll forget their faces. Like, if I meet an old friend at a bar after having not seen them for years, I'll check every single person's face because I'm concerned my visual memory is shot to hell. They could look like anyone for all I know, but the minute they walk in they jibe with my memory perfectly.


It's fucking ridiculous.

Lacher's Prison for Very Bad Dogs and Cats

We built it quickly but that doesn't mean we did so enthusiastically. After the first bad dog incident (A black Lab named Gilbert robbed a Savings&Loan in southern Minnesota, killing four. The lookout and driver were stray cats.) it was pretty clear that it was going to be up to people who didn't own dogs to act. I started planning the Prison for Very Bad Dogs and Cats as soon as I saw Gilbert's story on CNN. During the ensuing chaos I kept planning because I knew we were in it for the long haul. I kept planning and brainstorming even through the stories of arsonist mutts and treasonous service animals. The canine units that broke out of their cages and overran the Dallas and Iowa City police stations were particularly hard to break away from, but I tried to keep up on the news no matter what. It was only after I realized that the CDC had a lethal combination of experimental dogs and virulent diseases that I started building.

Pet owners were obviously too easily swayed, either intentionally or forcefully, into being collaborators or outright traitors. We designed it on our own. It's pretty easy to contain dogs and cats no matter how bad they are: the lack of thumbs and other inbuilt physical inabilities meant we still had an advantage on the bad dogs regardless of their behavior. I built it with the help of immigrant labor partly because no one wanted to help (even people allergic to pet dander had some residual fondness towards our former pets and new enemies), but mainly because it would've been to costly to hire legal labor.

It's a good building. Concrete walls, about two football fields in acreage. Every very bad dog and cat who's apprehended gets sent here. I'd tell you what that is in feet but I honestly don't know. Planning isn't my strong suit so I kind of winged it, and football fields seemed like an easily understood unit of measurement.

It'll hold the bad dogs and the bad cats as long as we can man it. Four stories tall but wide open inside, with hoses mounted high on the walls where the dogs can't climb. If the cats climb, we spray them down. Sundays we open the roof to let the light in because I think that's a nice way of correlating vocabulary with nature. We drop food from a walkway above. They seem to like jumping for it from below, although it's pretty obvious they're not playing now that they've changed. There's one Shih Tzu that is jumps particularly high. She bares her teeth more than the others and looks at me when she jumps. She tore the throat out of an elderly woman who'd been babysitting two toddlers. The toddlers she gnawed on after killing.

I had this absolutely terrific dream last night involving a singing baby whom everyone wanted to use as a fuel source (using people as fuel is a common theme in my dreams). The baby's songs could act as power, but I was the only one who noticed that the baby would one day grow up and stop singing.

Is this about peak oil?

Be Whale Wise

Stay 100 yards away from a whale if you see one!

I love that there are billboards here in Seattle informing the citizenry of the proper course of action upon seeing an orca.

In New Mexico there are public campaigns about the dangers of ditches: "Ditches are deadly! Stay away!"

I never quite understood those campaigns. In fact, the main takeaway of those ads for me was a feeling of sheer terror, not at ditches, but at La Llorona, whom the state of NM had seen fit to include.

La Llorona prophecies woe for these schoolchildren.

But the threat of being swept away by a flash flood is so much more abstract than the threat of an apex predator violently stabbing upwards of forty 3-inch long teeth into your soft, spongy body.

a fly has accompanied me three states

The flies have been under the drivers seat for two days and some thousand miles. I cracked the windows but at high speeds they knew to find respite in a crevice until I closed the window to get away from the heat of the air in Nevada or the slightly futuristic whizz of the wind in California. I'll drive lazily this morning with the windows open completely to get rid of my stowaways.

The drive is easy so far. I just point the car ahead and divide my senses: My vision on the road and my hearing on the radio. Everything else gets put to the side until I get to my destination 9 hours later, when the hunger and the ache of my body comes rolling in like a rockslide.

Nevada was the opposite of heaven. Not hell on earth, but possessing as attributes the polar opposites of those qualities I would personally ascribe to a perfect place. I feel simply awful for each and every one of the state's residents.

The major pass between Arizona/Nevada and California is looked down on by dozens of tall white wind turbines. They're deceptively large: If you've seen a windmill your instinct is to assume the turbines are of similar height (two stories or thereabouts), but each one of the three blades on each turbine typically requires a row of boxcars to transport it, and at the thickest point the blade is as wide as a small car. It's a pleasant experience to drive near them, they're productive, large, and friendly in a way similar to a herd of grazing cows.

In Sacramento now. California is lush and growing and reminds me of nothing so much as Minnesota. It's easy to forget that this is farm country. Semis trundle down the highway pulling trailers full of oranges or onions or horses. The highway is bordered pleasantly by great round bushes bearing pink and rosy blossoms, and by fields of produce trees I can't quite identify.

I'll drive through Northern California to Oregon today.