BunkBlog

When one must turn on the cooling system at 7 am, one lives in a region with a climate that is just fucked up.

At least it rained a bit last night, supposed to rain the rest of the week, and I won’t have to worry about my apples and peaches looking sad.
current_music:
current_mood: hot

Continuing the riff I refer to in one of my old “thoughts” on my site, Janis Ian (an artist I’d never heard of but may seek out now) has written an article about the hypocrisy of the RIAA and their rapacious attitude toward consumers and artists.
current_music:
current_mood: amused

Earth’s population will be forced to colonize two planets within 50 years if natural resources continue to be exploited at the current rate, according to a report from the World Wildlife Fund.
Read more
current_music:
current_mood: annoyed

Here is what I want for my birthday. It is only two weeks away, so get hopping!

Or, if you want to “surprise” me, check out Amazon for my wishlist.

Hey, it’s worth a shot!
current_music:
current_mood: depressed

Latest Friday Five

1. Where are you right now? At my computer, duh. At home.
2. What have you lost recently?My life.
3. What was the first CD you purchased? Does it embarass you now? I have no idea. Maybe LL Cool J or Prince. Not embarassed.
4. What is your favorite kind of writing pen? As opposed to a pig pen I suppose. Parker, chrome, with a pressurized black refill.
5. What is your favorite ice cream flavor? Festivus, the Ben & Jerry’s flavor only available during December and inspired by a Seinfeld episode.

current_music:
current_mood:

I added a new page of photos to the site, this time from my trip to Biosphere2. There are only a few photos up right now, but more will follow as I resize them and get a round tuit.
current_music: Roxy Music – Take A Chance With Me
current_mood: accomplished

Who sang that song, “I Spy” from like 1986 or so? The cover of the album had a guy in a fedora or something. “I spy for the FBI, I spy for the CIA, I spy for MI5…”

Once again, I feel the need to make it perfectly clear that not all of the intelligence community is James Bond. I just got an absolutely hilarious phone call today, telling me that I was in the CIA and knew hitmen. Sorry, I don’t know any hitmen. I wasn’t in the CIA. In fact, I don’t know anyone in the CIA even today. I know folks in the NSA, in NIMA, and some other acronym agencies no doubt, but nobody in the CIA.

I was in military intelligence for 12 years. You know how much excitement I saw? None. I read some cool stuff, heard a few interesting things on the radio, but never saw or did anything cool. Sure, going into a blast-proof bunker 3 stories underground may sound neat, but it was just another dark air-conditioned room full of computers and geeks.

Today, I work for a defense contractor and still talk to intelligence geeks. Yesterday and today I had to assist in briefing some high muckety-mucks from D.C. My job was clicking the button to make the powerpoint slides advance on cue. I’m an overpaid audio-visual lab geek now. At least they pay me more than the army did.

But, I still don’t know who to call to have someone killed. Hell, I only got to fire my rifle in the army annually.

Last month, I hung around with Special Forces Command geeks (not green berets, the support team), next month I get to hang around with imagery geeks, in August or September I get to go on a ship and hang around with signal geeks. Lots of geeks, still no James Bond. We’re mainly really mild-mannered, bespectacled dweebs. You know the guys that read Slashdot at work? That’s us.

Sorry to burst anyone’s bubble. Real life is actually a lot duller than fiction in this case.
current_music: Joe Walsh – I Like Big Tits
current_mood: amused

It just struck me yesterday, I’m going on the world’s longest “weekend” starting tomorrow. Mom comes to town on Friday, I am taking off work through the 3rd. The 4th and 5th are mandatory days off from work, followed by a normal weekend of the 6th and 7th. So, I’ve got a 9 day weekend. Pretty cool.

hey
don’t write yourself off yet
it’s only in your head you feel left out or looked down on
just try your best
try everything you can
and don’t you worry what they tell themselves when you’re away

hey you know they’re all the same

you know you’re doing better on your own so don’t buy in
live right now
just be yourself
it doesn’t matter if that’s good enough for someone else

it just takes some time

little girl, you’re in the middle of the ride
everything everything will be just fine
everything everything will be all right

do your best

do everything you can
don’t you worry what their bitter hearts are going to say
current_mood: awake

OK, folks, quick lesson in the basis of our government in the United States of America – there is no enumerated right to avoidance of offense. You have every right to be offended at things that happen, and I have every right to tell you to fuck off.

If you are such a kneejerk anti-religion person that you think having the phrase “In God We Trust” on our coinage is making us into a theocracy, get the fuck out of my country. We really don’t need anyone with such a complete lack of intellect around here anyhow.

Since everyone else has weighed in on this…

What I find amusing is that the majority of people who are decrying the recent court ruling assume that Godless heathen atheists, probably baby-killing drugusers as well, are behind it all.

Sorry, but the majority of atheists who came to their beliefs through logic instead of a kneejerk reaction to some bad church experience really couldn’t care less about such matters. Would it offend you that your neighbor, the Buddhist, had a darma bracelet on? Probably not, because it does not affect you in any way. Same thing with words in the Pledge of Allegiance – if you are a true atheist, you wouldn’t care if the words “under God” were there or not, because it wouldn’t offend you to say something that you think is silly and mythical. No more than you would be offended by the names of the days of the week being Norse gods. Oh, no, I can’t say “Thursday” because it means I’m offering fealty to Thor. Whatever.

The unexamined life is not worth living (Socrates).

Apparently the Scifi Channel was having “post-apocalyptic movie” weekend or something. I never saw an announcement, but the fare was pretty clear. Steel Dawn, Mad Max (1 & 3 but not 2), etc. The capper though, was WaterWorld. Never saw it in the theater, since it was only out for a couple days or so. Never felt like picking up the most recent movie to be labeled “Heaven’s Gate” so I missed it until now. It’s actually not as bad as you would expect, but it’s no classic. Think Mad Max with worse dialog, better set design, and Dennis Hopper looking really uncomfortable.

Wanting to get my grocery shopping for the week done early, I hit Safeway at 9am on Sunday. Picked up a bottle of 1999 Beringer Gamay Beaujolais, to go with the French Country Bake I’m making for my little dinner gathering this week.

“Sorry, I can’t sell you this until 10 o’clock on Sunday.”

Is there a state in the Union that has no restrictions on alcohol sales on the weekend? I feel like I’m in the 18th century at times.

Oh, well, I still forgot the lemon for the hefeweisen and I was planning to pick up the crusty bread Tuesday afternoon anyhow.

Just saw a promo for something on the Food Network that involved a six-pound cheeseburger. Holy cow (pun intended)!

Sorry for the over-abundance of song lyrics lately, but I’ve got some good CDs and not much else to talk about.

Today I woke up and you were gone
The whole day wondering what I did wrong
It’s like I’m falling from a mountaintop
My heart keeps pounding and it won’t stop

Can you see this hell I’m living
I’m not giving up

Will you crawl to me
Will you fall with me
I’ll never crawl to you
I’ve done it all for you

Well don’t deny
The hand that feeds you needs you
Oh god I’d die to try to
Finally please you

There goes a piece of me
Will I cease to be
I’ve never lied to you
Fought bled and died for you

Well don’t deny
The hand that takes you breaks you
Oh god I’d die to try to
Finally please you

There she goes and I’m on the ground, I’m on the ground, I’m on the

Well don’t deny
The hand that feeds you needs you
Oh god I’d die to try to
Finally please you

Will you crawl to me
Will you fall with me
I’ve never crawled to you
I’ve done it all for you

From a Salon article of recent vintage:

Great sex is an incident. A relationship is a story. You need to run arm in arm from a collapsing building, bless some children, bury some loved ones, build a house and still be there to talk about it all, to walk in off the deck and remember something together. You need some struggle, some mutual purpose. If you stick together, the world will enlist you in its narrative. And the sex will be part of the story, maybe not the best part, but a true part.

current_mood: content

I’ve never done one of these before, but what the heck.

1. Do you live in a house, apartment or condo? House
2. Rent or own? Own
3. Does anyone else live with you? Right now, just the boy
4. How many times have you moved in your life? Damn…Maybe 16?
5. What are your plans for this weekend? Playing with the boy, reading, shopping for the little dinner party I’m having next week.

Overcome By Events…It’s a phrase one of my 8 bosses uses on occasion. I’ve realized, as I’ve slowly resumed writing a story I began in 1987, that every idea I had that was new and original when I put it on paper (ok, in bits) has been done by someone else.

Among those ideas:

• Traffic Automation (done by DKM in The Long Run
• Gyro-stabilized hovercars (done by DKM in Emerald Eyes)
• Remote-control VR warfare (Haldeman in Forever Peace)
• Major consensual fully immersive VR system (done by Stephenson in Snow Crash)
• Artificial island used for nanotech research banned elsewhere (done by Egan in Distress)
• Reverse auctions for durable goods (Priceline anyone?)
• Paper-based books become rare (Stephenson – Diamond Age)
• Commercial-skipping technology ubiquitous (Tivo and Replay)

It’s obvious – I have to write faster. Or maybe I can just sell my ideas to other people to use for their stories…
current_mood: mellow