Moratorium, Day 2

Evening and Day 2 of no seed in the Bird Park but birds are still occasionally dropping by, some drinking a little water before taking off again. Otherwise, it's pretty quiet out there.

I spent some time in the morning working on the Coda for Three Cockroaches, not writing it, it's been done for months, but playing it in different voices on the keyboard. I must say some where kind of nice. I got a mixer and microphone for my birthday last month so I would like to record and upload it to the Cockroach Diary but I still lack one set of cables.

I also spent some time at the drawing board today. Like all of my projects, that's going very slowly. I've become self-conscious about what I'm doing and every other line now looks wrong. I'm much better when I don't think about these things but seems the mind always finds a way to intruded. Then begins the hard part.

The sky is blue here in Nevada this evening with elongated white clouds tethered to the desert by invisible ropes. Inside the window I am completely surrounded by things — 360° of stuff — in front of me brain coral from the Caribbean, Crow Stone, the Mayan leopard, then to the right the camera cradle, book holder, lamp, microphone, printers, scanner, bookshelf crammed with boxes of paper, notebooks, photographs, CDs, then the small table with books and drawing paraphernalia, the drawing table, then another bookshelf, file cabinet, another table with shelving holding my minuscule puppet theatre, and shelves of pens, tape, glue, rubber stamps, paper clips, scissors, post office stickers, labels etc. and so on, then the window in front of me again and the big table at which I sit typing. The clutter is contained compared to other days but it is the open blue sky on the other side of the glass toward which I lean like a plant bound in a pot that is too small.

When I began writing this post I was listening to a CD by woman called Sada Sat Kaur, an American disciple of Yogi Bajan. A friend loaned it to me. It's horrible. I knew it would be. I can't complain about an American taking initiation and wearing robes. I have a guru. Did. Do. Did. ...do... in an abstract way ... so I can't fault Kaur for that but god! her syrupy synthesized muzak just doesn't cut it.

Rumsfeld's dance with nazis

Following up on Rumsfeld's recent accusation that any American critical of his war on Iraq is a nazi, the NYT just published an article by Frank Rich about Rummy and Saddam. Naturally Rumsfeld didn't embarrass the dictator by criticizing him for torturing political prisoners. I guess there's some kind of twisted honor among sociopaths.

Donald Rumsfeld's dance with the Nazis'

NYT via The Raw Story

" ...what made Rumsfeld's performance special was the preview it offered of the ambitious propaganda campaign planned between now and Election Day. An on-the-ropes White House plans to stop at nothing when rewriting its record of defeat (not to be confused with defeatism) in a war that has now lasted longer than America's fight against the actual Nazis in World War II.

Here's how brazen Rumsfeld was when he invoked Hitler's appeasers to score his cheap points: Since Hitler was photographed warmly shaking Neville Chamberlain's hand at Munich in 1938, the only image that comes close to matching it in epochal obsequiousness is the December 1983 photograph of Rumsfeld himself in Baghdad, warmly shaking the hand of Saddam Hussein in full fascist regalia. Is the defense secretary so self-deluded that he thought no one would remember a picture so easily Googled on the Web? Or worse, is he just too shameless to care?

...Well before Rumsfeld's trip, Amnesty International had reported the dictator's use of torture -- "beating, burning, sexual abuse and the infliction of electric shocks" -- on hundreds of political prisoners. Dozens more had been summarily executed or had "disappeared." American intelligence agencies knew that Saddam had used chemical weapons to gas both Iraqi Kurds and Iranians.

According to declassified State Department memos detailing Rumsfeld's Baghdad meetings, the American visitor never raised the subject of these crimes with his host..."







rumsfeld saddam nazi fascist

John Dean on Rumsfeld

Zendaba

"Nazi" and "fascist" are the New Big Buzz Words the neocans are rolling off the talking points assembly line this upcoming election season. These words are intended to fend off the growing awareness that it's the conservatives themselves who are fascist. As usual, the neocans hope to dazzle, baffle and intimidate voters into staying lock step with the party. The problem is that more and more people are catching on to the fact that, as Dean points out, this current government is a "textbook example of authoritarianism".

Rumsfeld's recent accusation that Americans who disagree with the war in Iraq are nazis is typical over the top offensive game they have played all along. The difference is that now the conservatives are getting desperate and sloppy in their effort to stem the tide by lobbing as many accusations of fascism against their critics as possible in an effort to own the word first. Until recently it has worked to boldly declare black is white, hot is cold, wrong is right but the magic has grown thin.

Seems we have reached a state of critical mass as people from both the "left" and "right" finally grasp the fact that the conservatives in power are a very sick blend of Christofascism and corporate fascism and their stubborn resolve is leading us over a cliff.

Zendaba
Karl, Rummy, Dirty Dick and the Bushman depend on team sport politics to support them but the election is not a football game and truth is not a team sport. People are getting tired of waving pennants from the stands as The Deciders run amok on the field. Americans died winning and protecting our right to dissent and this new strategy is designed to crush us into silence. Rumsfeld and company are the Nazis.

Keith Olbermann recently interviewed John Dean on Rumsfeld's Nazi speech. A lot of people have trouble asking simple, direct questions and even more trouble answering them but these guys do an excellent job of it. The only place I have a complaint is about 4 minutes in when Olbermann asked Dean if there can be a bigger threat to our democracy than the repression of open debate, never mind the issue. Seems to me Dean wandered a bit here, focusing on Rummy's speech instead of addressing the larger issue ... that open debate is indispensable for the health of a free society ... but the debate is on whether Rummy likes it or not.





olbermann dean rumsfeld nazi fascism

Sad day in bird land

It will be a sad day in the Bird Park for the next 5 days. Mr. Lee is in the final stage of prepping the off-road trailer for painting and asked me to stop putting out seed so I pulled the feeders. Most of the birds have already taken off but throughout the day others drop by and wander around looking baffled and confused that everything has suddenly disappeared. At the moment there's one lone pigeon just standing looking at the empty pool that usually has a happy bather or two by this time of day. I'm leaving the water but will move it to another part of the yard. I know there's plenty of food elsewhere. All the weeds are currently going to seed. It's me that needs them to bring a little life to the suburban monoscape where we are currently living.

Saturday at the Roxy - 09.02

Today I have a couple of pieces by Werner Herzog, one of the great directors of the German new cinema. He is unique, one of my favorites. If you're not that familiar with him here's short article by Michael Atkinson. Or just jump in. The first clip is all the introduction you'll need. But, as this is a matinee, to kick things off first here's a little cartoon by David Firth called...

Men From Up the Stairs

Werner Herzog eats his shoe

"In 1981, the last of the hidden tribes that had lived a nomadic life in the remotest parts of the Brazilian rain forest was finally contacted by our civilization. This event propelled a tribal people from a stone-age existence into the world of TV, cars, and big cities."
- Werner Herzog

Ten Thousand Years Older

roxy werner herzog david firth

Slogan contest

Here's a contest for all you word warriors.

Working for Change is looking for a phrase that cuts through the "cut and run" shield conservatives are hiding behind defending their failed policy in Iraq. Anyone with half a brain knows by now that getting out of Iraq is not "cutting and running" but tagging dissenters as cowards has, so far, been pretty effective. It's a war of words. Simplicity is essential. Brevity is not only "the soul of wit". It is the heart of wisdom. Being a very complicated person I'm having a hard time of it. Can you do better? More info and contest rules here.


Ps. Ah.....and speaking of brevity... the contest ends tomorrow.



writing contest writers

New space

End of the day. A dog is barking in the distance. At dusk I caught a glimpse of the waxing moon at midheaven and now the stars are out.

I set up another work space in my office today which is amazing because the room is so small. I found the table yesterday at the second hand store, seven bucks, talked down from ten. It fits perfectly so I'm feeling pretty good about things.

And at the moment I'm listening to Low through headphones...

"two-step around the room
kneel down on white

that's not all
voices small
heed them either way they call

and the light, it burns your skin
in a language you don't understand."

Uncle Monkey and Ugly Bear in Otherland

I haven't got time tonight to write a scintillating revelation or grind out a scorching rant. We're going to watch a movie in about 15 minutes. I just have time to finish pounding out quick update about what's been going around the office today.

I hate to say it because he's a nice guy, very likable, but Uncle Monkey is, well, sometimes full of shit. No, I take that back. He's a story teller, not a liar. Anyway, he loves telling Ugly Bear all kinds of wild ass stories and the poor guy believes every word he says. But no harm, I suppose. They enjoy each other's company and don't get into any trouble. Well, much trouble.

I managed to snap a candid shot of them this afternoon when they thought I was out of the room. I don't know what crazy yarn Uncle Monkey was spinning but Ugly Bear was transfixed. Looks like it had something to do with the book but we'll never know. As soon as they heard the click of my camera they looked up and Uncle Monkey became veeeery quiet.

Nice book though, wouldn't you say? I got it for 13 cents at the second hand store this weekend. I was already reading the crappy paperback version with tiny print that was hard to read to the end of the inside line when I found this one. In case you're wondering why I got it for such an insanely low price it's because Saturday was Half Price Day.






otherland uncle monkey ugly bear

Note to the future self

Don't change the template for this blog yet. I tried out the new features on one of my other blogs and found out that Blogger hasn't activated html editing yet. Very bad. They're only allowing access to templates at the moment, slick but too limited.

Beta blogger

It's been out for a couple of weeks but I just switched to the new beta Blogger format. It's a mad thing for me to do but it had to be done. Mad because I will now waste even more time screwing around with templates but there's no going back. Once you switch, that's it. No return. I haven't started fiddling yet but I'm sure I'll be down in the rat hole soon enough. My kind a fun/nightmare. There's a helpful link on the upgrade at BotHack if you're interested.




blogger beta templates

Saturday at the Roxy - Weird Day

Today is Weird Day at the Roxy. A few friends of mine just showed up from Mexico bound for Burning Man, reminding me it's that time of year again. Burning Man, for all it's strut and fret, sham and flim flam, is still a feast for the eyes and, if nothing else, the desert will restore some perspective on the ephemeral nature and tenuous hold we have in the universe. Also, Burning Man is in Nevada and therefore it is only right to honor this prestigious, local event. But first a word from one of today's fine sponsors...

Before going to Burning Man
you'll want to get a costume together
and for all your costume needs,
I always recommend ...

Shaye's Thrift Store
03:15 YouTube



Now on to...


Burning Man
06:42 YouTube

Today's Feature Presentation:

Elephants Dream



"Elephants Dream is the world's first open movie, made entirely with open source graphics software such as Blender, and with all production files freely available to use however you please. The short film was created by the Orange Open Movie Project studio in Amsterdam during 2005/2006, bringing together a diverse team of artists and developers from all over the world."

roxy saturday shaye st. john burning man emo elephants dream