A game of my own

There's two actually. And how's this reading someone elses blog about game theory I actually got inspired, or influenced, or am writing about it in an abstract way with only vague references
Anyhoo hopefully my links work.
As you may know or for you Johnny come lately's may not know, Shinmen no Mushashi Miyamoto's treatise 'Go Rin No Sho' or the book of five rings has been a huge influenza on me as the italians would say.
And apon discovering a pdf file in italian of Camillo Agrippa's 'Trattato Di Scienzia d’Armes’ or scientific treatise on arms a revolutionary in fencing who used geometric principles to make swordplay more efficient.
Swordplay is of course a metaphore for everything else. Now Musashi and Yagyu Munenori both have treatises were they have Identified invincible strategies.
And I thought with some little sketches I had determined which srategy wins: Musashi's. SImply because Musashi's is more invincible.
It came down to a numbers game and I'd like to think of it as like my attempt to define an 'opposite of zero'
That is to try and be revolutionary in year 12 I thought whilst excited by the reality of doing imaginary homework for imaginary numbers I would concieve of a new concept that is: If numbers arent arranged in a straightline but a continuos circle and zero represents the point where numbers become positively so small as to become negatively small in value and vice versa then there must be a point corresponding on the circle of values where infinitely large positive numbers become so large as to become indistinguishable from infanitely large negative numbers' but in my excitement I never bothered to imagine a premis or even logical explanation as to why this is so. A theory thoroughly crushed by learning about number theory and Goedel's incompleteness theory neither of which I really understand at all.
But to put the case of mushashi's more invincible strategy it was simple. It can be illustrated by the exercise we probably all have engaged in in childhood or watched in a portrayel of childhood that we now assume ours must have reflected.
That IS: 'did not, did too, did not 100, did not 1000, did not infinity, did not infinity plus 1...did not infinity times infinity' and how infuriating it became when you could not concieve of a larger way to express the same number.
So Yagyu's strategy works on a concept of judging the distance an opponent needs to attack you and then maintianing the minimum distance needed to be not attackable and then select a time to broach this distance where you will 'cut down the evil'
Musashi's strategy in short is simply having a counterattack to any attack. Making Yagyu's strategy a subset of Musashi's. Therefore if the Yagyu attack = 1 then musashis attack = 1 + 1
unless of course Yagyu's attack = 2
Then Musashi's must be = 2 + 1
unless of course Yagyu's = n
Then Musashi's attack must = n + 1
or even = n + n
or even = n.n
or really even = n + n!
The point is musashi's game contains yagyu's and musashi's wins.
I'd draw it but i really can't. I promise I will some day.
Moral of the story: never ever bet against batman.

HBO

Mosugu teribi no kaerumono o shimashite. Consumer choices let's talk about that. I've been writing a TV script for the past 9 months now, I'm sitting on a TV script that I wrote in two weeks and was submitted to the ABC open tender period. I got a non form letter in response to that and had it pinned on my wall for several years before I packed up and left. My cowriter of more than that time has held the ball and run with it building networks, producing plays, earning rep as a professional while I seem stuck in the draft literally and figuritively waiting to explode onto the scene.
And you know I have dreams and I got faith in myself too. I firmly believe Bryce and I can be a team like Shaq and Kobe in their threepeat playoff champion run. Or as he would have it Bert and Graham.
While I jump through hoops for the man and cultivate an air of arrogant confidance, Bryce is the Shaquille O'Neal. A giant of the game, worthy of a double team even after so long in the big leagues, coming from an unassailable position where back boards have needed reinforcing since he introduced his style of play.
If we teamed up I am sure we would be unstoppable, apart from the inevitable ego clashes.
Personally I'd like to think with all the introspection i've undergone and the cathartic experience of writing again I'm more the Dwayne Wade than the Kobe Bryant.
Anyhoo you can tell how much Basketball has eaten into my unskilled posterior, what I really thought about was Mr Show.
Mr Show, Garth Merenghis Darkplace, Big Train. All shows I badly want to write, would aspire long term to be writing in their calibre. Even painting pictures that as neatly express the placenta of ideas they do. But when I watch them a malaise creeps over me.
Australia would never pay for shows like that to be made. Instead we have neighbours and more to our detriment it spins off mediocre talents like Delta Goodrem as profit spinning salable goods to crappy britain.
Similar to my bitch the other day the most likely place you would hear a sketch about a school excursion up the teachers mom's ass or a preacher declaring God king dick of fuck mountain' all whilst in the context of social commentary and clever satire. Infact the most mainstream of these shows Southpark is still a better social commentary and more thought provoking than most newspaper columnists. How do I know, because I quote it sometimes and it blows peoples minds which I can't believe. I mean you'd have to pretty much never have thought about anything to get such an impact.
Cest d'accord, I know plenty of talent too. Some talent even sweetcheeks mcbryce I worry is a generation of something as fresh and vibrant as inserting a new colour into our visable spectrum I feel are crushed into a stifling mold of TV that must not offend the anzacs.
I remember being interviewed by Deborah and some kiddy fiddler for Race Around the Corner and they said 'we want the show to be an insight into teenage lives' so long before the voyeurism of big brother we filmed a sleep over with my friends at a farm, went down the street trying to pick up chicks and the other contestants did stories from the piss weak 'homesickness' [though the more I think about the prospect of living long term in Sydney vs say somewhere sane like Bangladesh the more i think he may have had a point] to teenage suicide or death or something with equal impact, I forget. And it was real but what was our biggest obstacle? Cutting back the swearing, the timeslot demanded infrequent use of course language.
Anyone else spot the paradox? Here they want an insight into teenage lives and yet foul language must be infrequent. What do they want teenagers in school? in the school yard maybe you'll capture something resembling life but you better be able to use: fuck, shit, anus, cunt, slut, arsehole, fucktard, cunteyes, motherfucker, dicksmoker, faggot, felcher, bulldyke, feotus, gunt, cumbucket, axewound, buggery, assrape, skullfucked, rimjob, fisting, pearl necklace, dirty sanchez, donkey punch, pink sock, cocksucker, dickhead, fuckeyes, inbred, snowballing, spunk and the magical rainbow kiss.
I mean fuck cosmo sealed section right off. I heard girls craved it as the girl with the most sexual savvy was the ringleader generally. But I mean at 15 I had friends smoking pot listening to Anal Cunt's 'your dad robbed the sperm bank coz he's a cum guzzling fag' a band that's only warning on their website was that it wasn't a porn site.
Compared to anything in that, anything I wrote is really quite tame, and unclever, unshocking even. I don't think such subject matter would really spark a loss of innocence. Infact innocence isn't even that good, much better than ignorance of right and wrong is the ability to choose right from wrong.
It's why I'm nervouse around teenagers today. I dropped the f word the s word and both c words when I fell of a slide in front of my dad in grade 5. I'd hate to think how not with it I am amongst teenagers these days.
Admittedly putting such things on television creates an acceptability by the community but surely kids using foul language and disrespecting elderly people on trains has far less social cost than them disrespecting themselves and their bodies thanks to Video Hits and Big Brother role modelling (is one the product of the other?)
I mean something with a script aside from soapies has to be in some part intellectual. I mean you have to be able to use some kind of typing machine for one thing.
So I sit and think about the contents of my script, the most tame elements alude that maybe there's some dissagreeable elements about religion (nothing remotely new by SOuthpark or even Simpson standards) or suggest that someone may masturbate in a public area in a sharehouse situation. (not even scratching the surface)
And I can't rap and shit.
So why am I made to feel like I'm taking on the pentagon by making anything more offensive or challenging than neighbours (but possibly less challanging than sex in the city).
'It's not HBO, it's just regular ass tv' quips one Dave Chappelle sketch.
It seems I'm stuck with regular ass tv here. still it won't stop me writing (although this blog might instead of it) and thanks to community tv there is a network of people my age that by now is numerous and skilled enough to churn out decent quality.
So get to it, look out for the Shaq attack and Flash to the rescue. GO the white hot heat.

It's your birthday

So it isn't my birthday. What makes you so special?
I first got interested in Sikhism when I watched a day time documentary on their culture and beliefs and discovered that they couldn't shave or cut their hair. I immediately seized upon this as I badly needed to find legitimate cause to circumvent my highschools bullshit policy of clean shaven page boy haircuts. Unfortunately credibility was not on my side. People new me too well to ever believe I believed any shit.
But similarly while bored I came across the Wikipedia article on Sikh's founding father Guru Nanak whom shares the same birthday as me, or at least historians have picked the same birthday as me to apply to him. Whatever. Coincidence? Yes. Pure random coincidence and further more with the whole list of historical figures and celebrities born the same day as me (including Danii minogue) I picked him to look at and be inspired by one dreary day at work.
Guru Nanak is famous for his revalation 'there is no Muslim, there is no Hindu.' So he created another religion and ignored buddhism all together. Whatever. The Sikh are community oriented and a lot of there pillars and philosophies have appeal.
The marketer in me applauds theologians that position religions around key concepts as they make them easier to accept and digest for the uninitiated: Jesus - love, Buddha - Compassion, Mohammed - terrorism.
But I like delving deeper because while you can argue Jesus stood for love, there's millions of designs of Air Jordan's and like love is one of the best selling brands around today.
Sikh often gets overlooked though, buddhism is popular and accessable but Sikhism is not only a copulation of two beautiful religions Hinduism and Islam it also has practical and non threatening ways to go about spreading the love.
One core concept and one I would love to introduce, are the communal kitchens, where a prince can dine with a begger all free. Living and consuming together. I gotta be honest I eat a lot better at camp. Also being a young bachelor with entirely disposable income I never have small issues like 'seconds' and 'that's all the cheese we have' to prevent me from overconsumption and thinking about what resources I allocate myself thaty may infact be better allocated to others. It's simple and powerful, and I'm too lazy to cook most nights.
The more I think about having just me to look after and how I behave, which is better than most of my friends who don't save and piss money up the wall at pubs or crown casino, and you multiply that by the 7 million Austalians currently living alone and you know we may as well have just a big mountain of oil and brown coal burning somewhere to no end at all.
Guru Nanak you may have had a funny preference for yellow but I salute you!

Watch Global village, 9/10 they feature some Sikh community or warrior training camp.

R.E.S.P.E.C.T

For the first time in a long time I'm actually 3 or 4 postings behind what I wanted to talk about. Coincidentally I also finished Uni for good (I hope) and have entered the enjoyable phase of my education where I start paying for it. Did you know 2 out of 5 women will never repay their HECS? Wow. But that's not what I'm talking aboutah I'm just saying in a fragmented way expect more posts.
My work has a fair few young people in the organisation and overall is a good employer compared to the average. In fact I'm lucky to be a full time permanent (as it ironically decreases my required loyalty) but with the casualisation and endemic underemployment out there I can really rest easy at the end of the day, dreading ennui more than rising petrol costs and IR reforms.
But I overheard a conversation between one of the 3 logistics staff (Porter who wrote the book on business strategy and competive advantage [2 books!] says logistics is the most critical value activity for wholesaler business) in our entire organisation (sales has double the staff and we twiddle our thumbs and shoot the shit most of the time) was talking about her job prospects and how she was looking at switching to recruitment. She'd been offered more money by a company to work in a field of which she had no experience, now I didn't say this girl was a genius and young people are more likely to equate job satisfaction with reimbursement than older people and reality. But the Managing Director apparently had turned around and said 'What can I do to keep you here?' now person in question I would have ditched a while ago to give the opportunity to someone more deserving. But it is because I was possibly ignorant of the labour market out there. Apparantly my company is desperate to keep young people in the organisation. And when I think about the fact that the business structure is based around a seniour middle management band.
A. I don't think said managers are as productive as they might think they are.
B. Our generation have been raised on a healthy fear of unemployment I thought there were six people lined up for my job behind me.
C. If I was asked that same question by the MD I would produce a list as long as my collective blog posts, I've given my needs and aspirations extensive thought and second guessed them all.
Maybe this might shed some light though?
The three blogs linked to my right represent 3 close friends all of whom have left Australia to pursue opportunities in other countries. In two months time they will be joined by my housemate who will leave Australia permenantly because he chose to do philosophy which has approaching 0 employment prospects in Australia. My other housemate is studying International Studies so I presume he will leave our* shores in the next couple of years as well.
My plan was to live and work in Japan which I went cold on because I felt my many and varied ambitions were easier to pursue here, but now I'm not sure of that. Could it be that most of the talent in Australian corporations is going overseas?
Or maybe it has something to do with the fact that it took me a whole year for my director (whom I respect as smart and progressive) to admit that maybe I didn't have to follow the standard ten year career path his generation had followed. My old manager who's relatively young went out into the field as a stepping stone not because he wanted to do the job.
Maybe it's because as a young person more educated than my managers my opinion is seldom asked. I'm lucky because I have the balls to offer it and because I look different they assume it's natural for me to think differently whereas noone else does. In fact I have one of the brightest prospective career paths at Honda and I feel stifled. I'd hate to see what happens to the other 'young people' if I left.
Yet yesterday I went to FLN's strategic planning process and was blown away (well not quite blown away I got blown away two weeks ago at their strategic planning process session 1 they just maintained the standard).
In the first 5 minutes of session 1 I was invited to join the marketing committee and work with someone as senior as my boss at work - the same thing was initiated by me at my job and took 8 months to implement.
In terms of the organisational structure I am a stake holder as a volunteer but about as low a rung on the ladder as you get (infact I considered myself more a customer as volunteering helps my esteem needs more than I help my student - I don't mean to say I do shit work, he just can't profit as much as I do). There where eight other people there my age. 2 people from my parents generation and about 8 more from the generation above it. There would be about 6 genxer's as well. No baby boomers(?)
and here I was participating in an organisations strategic plan.
So what are volunteers? you gotta understand I have come from a conservative mindset (ballarat - the whitest town in Australia!) so I assumed volunteers were full of pig ignorant good-will unproductive esteem seekers (which is why I volunteered in the first place) but it's not. They are young professionals. More likely to be tertiary educated** some trade unionist backgrounds in the middle generations and the older generation predominantly teaching backgrounds.
So immeadiately you lose all he cocksuckers who's ambition exceeds their ability and have a prefessional approach thaat gravitates around the pivotal axis of self interest. I agree with Nietzsche in saying without ego there is no motivation but profit maximising behaviour requires long term focus and efficiency achieved by thinking of others, the strongest case for most liberal mindsets are the same arguements for conservative just with a longer time frame and more stakeholders.
So could this have something to do with it. My volunteer work gives me opportunities my work does not, like trying my hand at marketing strategies, writing strategic plans. Setting business goals and objectives. Interaction with diverse backgrounds. Is it something to do with the fact that as a member who's main form of correspondance is over the internet I am actually better informed of the activities of an organisation I work for for an hour a week than one I work for for 37.5 hours (though I'm always trying to shave time off that. Not because I hate what I do but in the pursuit of efficiency).
What an isolated example though. Let's maybe take an organisation like SYN FM. I worked on their strategic plan for a school assignment expecting to find a shithouse, idealistic and sloppy vision full of youth cliches like the environment and skate parks. These did get mentioned to be sure. But structurally the plan was as sound as anything big business has developed over the years. Terminology was different (like using Mad's Sad's and Glad's instead of Strengths and Weaknesses) but in the end an organisation who's members age range is between 16-22, and I'm probably wrong about that ie younger, had produced a sound plan, workable nd if anything erred on the side of being too comprehensive and as such unlikely to be read by members and staff and reflected on. But either Bryce blows smoke up his own arse (which is entirely possible) or Syn has outperformed every KPI you or I can set for it and grown in almost every direction, ratings, revenues, membership, public events, other events, sponsorship, diversity etc. No input from older or wiser heads whatsoever. Now I've also herd stories out of bryce of people doing dumb things and causing frustration and it's same for the voluntary orgs I belong to as well. In the strategic meetings I've seen some real dumb pie in the sky suggestions that are excellent for brainstorming but not when there is no question of refining the idea. But I see such stupidity at my million dollar company as well.
Now Bryce is on a greased pole in terms of he get's paid roughly the same as me except he's top of the heap in his current organisation and I am bottom, and as I said I have a good employer with a range of employee development programs and other benifits but Bryce doesn't have to iron a shirt in the morning. Doesn't have to listen to ignorant opinions from an under educated elder generation who qualify homophobic statements with '...not that there's anything wrong with that.' which is the entire opposite of my preferred qualifier of 'fuck them faggots' the difference being neither of us mean what we say (think about it).
So maybe that's why it's the opportunities and shit that an employer offers. In many ways my good employer is hamstrung because it has to nurse the fragile ego's of the older management who already feel like a retard around technology and put more effort into achieving the same outcomes as us.
I don't know a single person my age who plans to stick with their current employer and their not really lamenting the loss of lifetime employers and pre-determined career paths.
Why can some old people really value my difference and input and others can't. Why because some just are vision impaired.

My New Girl

Her name is Sophia, she is curvacious, in faact she is pretty much all curve. When I touch her she is covered in goose pimples and is quiet except when we bounce together, rythmically in harmony.
She is a basketball and the current obsession has gone one step further than the others. Or has it?
I don't want to be a clapped out baby boomer living vicariously through my son. I'd much rather live vicariously through myself. In fact heiho compells me to. My friend Callie remarked I get obsessed easily but while the world is focussed on Joga Bonita campaigns by nike I'm checking the nba playoffs.
It is my firm belief that if you dream big enough you'll achieve a big dream just in the attempt. This was the quote most popular with girls from my highschool for their VCE commerorative page 'aim for the moon and even if you miss you'll be amongst the stars' frankly these girls didn't aim high enough with their choice of boyfriends but the sentiment is still there.
Now that I think about it it could have been the standard editorial addition for people who didn't submit quotes.
But Sophia, oh Sophia. It is time to get personal, to get intimte with my dream of achieving a slam dunk. I'm like 5' nothing can't jump for shit, but when you check out the photos of the pros in the nba captures you gotta wonder whether their feet ever touch the ground.
I've been listening to Chemical brothers 'come with us' while cycling of late and it just puts me in the air up there. The deep galactic musical journey of raver shit seems so appropropriate to my hoop dream.
So it manifested in Sophia being the girl in my life. So what? fuck you. Do you know there are as many asexuals practicing currently as homesexuals? ('but if I'm asexual why am I such a chronic masturbater? 'is the question you ask yourself right now).
Am I really that disturbed? It's not my first inanimate object I've intimated with. Why, explain Talula my bass guitar. Nor will it be the last, I am sure I'll get round to naming the drumkit soon.
They are my girls because they mean a lot to me. Unlike the real girls I've had they don't try to change me, but ironically I actually hope they do.
See you down on the ground earthlings.

Community

A Quick one because I am freezing my nipples off sitting in nothing but my underwear, underwear so exciting that when this dude saw only the band of it above the waist of my shorts he said 'You are phenomenouly hot and I want to suck your cock.' Which is about the best thing anyones ever said to me in a bar. He was serious too.
Anyway organising basketball or bike riding, going to UNESCO conferences, sustainable living festivals or strategic planning weekends for the FLN, or laborious awards ceromonies for radio stations. The most amazing thing by far that gets me every time is that people turn up.
I've had weeks where one lonely student has turned up to ride with me around melbourne. And we just talk and ride around. That's it but it's yeilded powerful moments like when this dude Eric after directing him the best way to get home to Collingwood after cycling the Yarra tail just smiled at me and said how happy he was. It's like being kicked in the nuts by Jesus.
I'm a fuck most of the time, shooting down ideas and only letting those with the most stringent self belief remain in my presence.
So when I organise something as hap hazard and namby pampy as some community minded thing I can't see beyond myself to envision anyw\one turning up to support me.
But they do and it's powerful for an intravert like me to find people from nothing without going clubbing getting introduced and networking. Taking a flimsy email network and building something of people who just want something to do.
So do it. Start something, build something even if it's a sand castle and you know not a very big one with holes cut in it for candles and shit.

Aussie Bands Making the Big Time

My best friend Bryce put it best, better than anyone in the music industry by far - 'Australian bands aren't worth celebrating just because they are Australian, they should be celebrated because they are good' I think I may have already spoken about the Australian music phenomenon. On my Ipod I have two Aussie bands - Regurgitator and Skunkhour.
I listen to Syn FM everyday. I wake up to Syn FM I wake up to 1 of 2 things auto-dj or the last hour of the graveyard shift. Sometimes I sleep in too late because the prepubescent voices of the graveyard shift dj's talking ill informed shite and reading aloud text messages they are recieving from one lousy listener with emotional problems dominates the 20 minutes between thrash metal songs designed to shock me so early in the morning resulting in me turning my radio alarm off.
Sometimes though you get a real crazy weird bunch, uni-philosophy students or mechatronics students playing a weird arse mix of songs from a diverse and eclectic bunch of sources from Darryl Sommers cover of 'Why are there so many songs about rainbows' to Red Hot Chilli Peppers mothers milk classic 'nobody weird like me'
On these occasions THESE occasions which aren't rare and aren't common the grave yard shift upstages 'the hoist' in the hour where the hosts are only semi lucid, admittedly the hoist hosts aren't really any better off having most likely just woken up themselves rather than delusionally sleep deprived.
The hoist is dedicated to Australian music and it took me far too long to figure out what 'hoist' referred to which I'm not ashamed of as only the oldest of youth culture can probably remember swinging around on a hills hoist clothes line it's not really an Australian icon to anyone born into modern city living which is becoming increasingly back-yardless.
2 hours a day dedicated to Aussie musc. I hear an hour to half an hour of all Aussie music a day and I'd scratch my head to name an Aussie artist unless of course its Skunkhour or Regurgitator. I really cant, I am trying now and sorely tempted to check out the Syn website for a refresher from the hoist top ten list - I think maybe 'sounds like chicken' is Australian.
Why is it so? Why is Aussie music like this, so important we dedicate 2 hours a day airplay to it and in that you have all the subprogramming of an entire radio station itself - request day, oldschool day, top ten countdowns, aussie hip hop everything bar Aussie world music day. I just remembered another band Hill top hoods infact I've got them on my ipod I actually really like those dudes.
One of the DJ's made a passing remark on playing a female singer songwriter 'there aren't enough of those in the aussie music scene' and that prompted me to think at the time 'yeah who the fuck from these record labels is discovering *another* female singer songwriter with an accoustic guitar and thinking this acts gonna be the next big thing and break through the charts win an aria. The australian market for female singer songwriters is so saturated it needs it's own category. R&B and Hip Hop outsell all other music genres combined, a female singer songwriter on the accoustic guitar section in a record store would probably be larger than the hip hop section and sell less albums than Darryl Somers - 'Why are there so many songs about rainbows' remix by Sonic Animation.
So that question puzzled me and I don't want to pick on female artists either I can discern between missy higgens and the rest of them and Bic Runga (new zealand I know) is kinda hot which is more than I can say for Aussie Punk outfits infact the only stand out band there is the Spazzy's an all female act (but I hate their stuff).
So who is signing up this plethora of shit that I can't tell one from another even given my modest exposure. Why have so few aussie bands caught my attention since the Gurge and Skunkhour were big and that was way back when grunge was big.
It could be that I'm a loser that still lives by the grunge philosophy of no effort achievement, that's probably right but is it possibly to do with Aussies just having no talent?
No I can't believe this, and here's why in year 12 I was doing a ENTER prediction session where teachers came out with what they thought we'd get for their subject and find out 6 months early what we were expected to do better than given the teachers expectations of how we were going to do given how we'd done so far. The principle a prize cocksucker but inspirational non the less I have to admit was remarking on the phenomena that girls did better than guys at VCE he posed a similar question to mine 'does anyone believe girls are smarter than boys?' no one did. Same question different answers same issue.
Australia has produced one boundry pushing bass player in the form of Red Hot Chilli Peppers' bass player Flea. Infact by most accounts Flea is the second best bass player in the world and by far the most popular. Compared to flea Australian artists have struggled to make an impact overseas the most notable exceptions being Silverchair and recently Jet (and yes Savage Garden and the Wiggles too) but none of these have enjoyed the fame nor been as influential to upcoming generations of artists as flea, they had their day in the sun and faded or changed into something else.
The difference is Flea grew up in the california bay area, THE area for alternative rock a risk taking music industry where flea goes to school with anthony keidas who goes to school mike patton of faith no more who takes on support act primus headed by frontman Les Claypool (#1 bass player) who went to school with Mettalica's Kirk Hammet.
Melbourne is one of the best gigging towns in Australia and you may see the next jet or you am i or any of those not quite anything rock bands. Chances are if you saw a band singing a metal composition with vocals about anal fisting you wouldn't be in australia right because Oz hasn't produced any weird arse bands like Frank Zappa, Pink Floyd or Tool that have changed the way people think about music, created new genres or taken dead ones and reinvigorated them.
So are Australians just genetically deficient in the talent department. Our higher brain functions cant handle a drum kit like Danny Carey? cant play guitar like frusciante? cant slap a bass like Claypool? its bullshit infact of course we should be because support of the Australian music industry has only really taken off after baby boomer Howard grabbed triple j's balls and took the Oz music show from a once a week 3 hour special to 2 hours a night and cut into the request fest which had been shit for years - ie taking away a program that allowed youth to decide what they wanted to listen to themselves and forced them to listen to oz music a strategy that wouldn't work if at the time Triple J had any formiddable competition. Myself I just stopped listening to radio altogether till my best friend started running a station.
Anyway for those artists that went to sleep listening to 'It's time to pick up everything and put it away' or possibly stayed on listening to mix up or the three hours of power we've been inspired by the worlds best. It's just I never got dedicated to bass and joined a band but I wouldn't be playing punk if I did.
And there's the key I just wouldn't get signed.
If I didn't play the same old generic crap no risk averse australian record label would actually sign us, them whoever all the talent out there artistic enough to push for something different. They wll scramble to sing up girls with accoustics and aussie punk outfits with less raw talent than the sex pistols but none of their vision and creativity.
The frontman from the Black Eyed Peas was so outraged by the industries neglect of the innovative talent in the unrecognised australian artists he now will live in Sydney for 6 months each year to sign up this neglected source of talent.
Why would someone aspire to be daniel johns when they could be hendrix? what happened to the Australian bands of the 90's that I could recognise and tell apart, the tisms, liquid, primal scream, beaverloop, frenzal rhomb (okay we know what happened to them), custard, super jesus, skunk anansie, pangaea, spiderbait etc. quantity has increased but not quality. Some of these artists still outsell the next big things in Aussie music in the entire post Living End era.
Wolfmother I salute you, you and the hilltop hoods. The rest well if I knew who you were because I could tell who you were when I heard you on the radio, I might care. Right now the Aussie music scene seems to be the sad Sydney bandwagon mentallity of trying to imitate the world by getting excited about local celebs that don't deserve it aka James Packer, the former host of My Restaurant Rules etc. But think what the music industry could be if our record labels where signing up all those crazy friends we know who have a weird perspective more inspiring than 'hey rollover dj' I mean roll over beethoven was a pretty shitty song to begin with.

Makin' aint easy

What happened to Kriss Kross? Kriss Kross where awesome. They were awesome. They were totally Mac Daddy. They made us all Jump. They made us all jump jump.
They really had it all going for them on their powerful number one hit with a bullet:
Jump.
It had mac daddy, daddy mac, self validation lyrics like 'don't try to compare us to a little fad...' so ironic so kool. They had wiggida wiggida wac.
No other rap single has so universally captured everything so true and real about Rap and Hip Hop than Jump. I remember when my brother bought the Totally Crossed Out LP he played it non stop until I hid or destroyed it. Fact is first thing tomorrow I'm gonna get my arse down the street and buy it.
Let us all remember Kriss Kross.
I doubt channel 7 will do a where are they now thing on Kriss Kross, if you google it though you can see what bad asses they grew up to be.

'Sposed to do that

Chris Rock says there is a race war going on in America, between Black People and Niggers. Eloquently summarised by a prospective audiance member heading into his never scared show as 'He says there are black people and niggers.'
Irrelevent. But the arguement Chris puts forward is that the sub class of black americans letting the team down get proud of shit that they were supposed to do anyway like 'I look after my kids... You're 'sposed to do that what do you want a fucken cookie.'
I thought of this as I started reading the intro to 'Please just fuck off it's our turn now.' seldom have I picked up a book that has got me so angry I've wanted to jump up during the opening paragraphs and punch a Malaysian in the face.
I been playing basketball of late, you know the man crush and all that. The book deals with baby boomers putting a strangle hold on the resources and channels to progress to the next generation, the title adequately reflects what you'd say to a team that hogs a basketball court or ay form of play equipment.
Books don't get me angry when they are wrong, I've laughed at more Awake! jehovahs witness mags than I've gotten angry at. I get angry when they are right. I don't have enough love of the human race to get angry at social injustice either. Just personal injustice.
This book strikes a cord though because I was involved in a Young Leadership Award camp that is a feather in the cap of Rotary international. Rotary are an old organisation who's young members are 45. They are understandably proud of the RYLA project and happy to make it possible through their support. But thats the thing.
I've been involved in Youth Council in ballarat and other smaller youth initiatives. Youth forums and yes the majority of youth have not much more to offer than suggesting a skate park. But the majority of people are dumb anyway it has nothing to do with the fact they are young.
Most adults have nothing more to offer on the meaning of life than 'Buy a house, then buy a rental property.' an idea as cliched and as unexciting as a skate park. At least the skate park promotes exercise rather than watching TV. Particularly watching Tv shows about people living in a house without a TV.
Rotary are proud of something they are supposed to do which is pass on some of the resources you accumulate to the next generation. In fact in order for progress to be made you need to pass on more resources than you had to the next generation.
The Youth Council was an organisation that involved 1 full time employee and the city council were proud of twice a year.
I recently went to the strategic planning weekend of the Fitzroy Learning network and everything was in balance. There where some old heads there and more young heads and EVERYONE GOT CAKE. more to the point everyone was involved in the discussion, could contribute to ideas and the company could move on.
My work on the other hand... the other day I looked around most of the old heads were people that came to it as part time sales staff 20 years ago, which makes it fairly young. There's good points to it. but the marketing department for one is made up of this staff with no marketing qualifications. The whole department probably came about from someone somewhere down the track reading an article about marketing departments. There knowledge and expertise has probably come from finding ways to spend money.
As such advertising adgencies have done all the brand building and made some classic marketing mistakes.
In the sales support department there are now 4 marketing degrees. In the marketing department there is 1. Why has this happened? because the older generation can't trust the young people with the resources. To its credit if you speak up you are heard and all that shit. The problem with the marketing example is that 80% of marketing graduates can't explain what Brand Equity is - regardless of institution. 99% of advertising graduates couldn't explain it but do say it a lot which reassures marketing graduates because they know they've heard it somewhere before but are not sure what it means.
But enough of ripping on my past time of the past couple of years.
My company like a thousand others in Australia has a big problem, in ten years 70% of it's management are going to retire. Because they are all baby boomers.
Baby boomers decide through sheer market power, what our government cares about, what we watch on every channel, what we listen to on the radio, where and how we shop, what technologies are available to us and how much shit we swallow.
This book in cutting through to the bone gets me angry on a level as profound as Wild Swans a pretty faggy book to have read but a worthwhile read.
In wild swans I laughed because in the midst of Mao Zedong's cultural revolution and mass famine that killed more chinese than the holocaust killed jews Chinese people thanks to controlled media said 'times are tough now but at least we're not in America where capatilism is in control.' Similarly to think about we think we are an important country, when was the last time Australia got mentioned before Spain in the coalition of the willing on foreign press coverage? we think we are the lucky country, what industries are we leaders in the world at? we think we are the sporting nation of the world? how many American swimming "stars" can be named by an American. Fuck baby boomer mentality is so old and outdated Graham kennedy is still ahead of his time, his first season of IMT reruns are more entertaining than Rove.

You Probably Can't

TV can be underrated. I was watching Southpark last Monday in which the 'Earth Day Brainwashing Festival' was taking place and the Earth Day organisers kept using a Jedi mind trick any time they made a point or statement about the environment.
Now I have been to and enjoyed some great events like the Sustainable Living Festival which to all extents and purposes was a trade & lifestyle show.
The episode culminated in Stan or the other one yelling 'Run! these environmentalists don't use reason or logic!' it was one of those artfully crafted poignant comments that struck me blind. My boss at work has said often 'They are exactly right for the exact wrong reasons' not referring to environmentalists or any particular group but it made me think that out there in society there are people that are right (without wanting to get into a shitfight about what right is) but there passion and enthusiasm is detrimental to their cause.
Probably the best example of this is the Church. There is nothing proposed in the fundamental philosophy of Jesus that is detrimental or offensive, everyone could probably benefit from getting some Jesus into them. The problem is the enthusiasm of the pre existing pro Jesus institution unintentionally forming a barrier.
The Church isn't cool, it never was and never will be. Great guitar skills can make a person cool and impress chicks but equally a Christian flavour can make great guitar skills unchool and fails to impress me. Infact when I've obligingly gone to upsetting Christian Youth "information sessions" that generally upset me they have often opened up with a Guitar Rock ballad about Jesus giving his life for my sins (not Jesus' philosophy by the way) and I find myself sitting amongst asian kids with there hands in the air and their eyes closed thinking: 'I would rather have my balls sawn off with an old school razor than be here right now'
And it works in some cases, generally in two cases Isolated students coming to study from Malaysia and the Hillsong Christian Factory is unfortunately the closest thing to a good time they can find in these foreign surrounds. And dudes who convert for the sake of a girl.
But the point is energy and resources go into this strategy and it wins over nothing but the converted. It isn't really succeeding, the biggest threat posed by hillsong is that Charity Organisations and Churches will get taxed on their profit making activities (hillsong are being investigated for pocketing Charity funds via administration, the Jehovah's witnesses own Sanitarium and red rooster or some shit*)
Athiests aren't finding Jesus left right and centre due to this strategy, it would be nowhere near the slow and steady rate family units are going agnostic and church attendance drops.
The second poignant example is Environmentalism (which has a brighter future than institutionalised religion) there are strategies that just don't work and shy off people that probably quite like the environment. When people want to see systems and strategies and programs and businesses (which are growing) they have traditionally been met with poor hygene, passionate speaches deviod of reason and calls to action deviod of planning and even clear starting points. More and more effort is getting put into strategies the 'enemy' has learnt to ignore. I see posters every day reacting to every headline in a newspaper calling for a 'day of action' using melodramatic language and I see fewer and fewer groups actually turning up to these things.
From the point of view of say a CEO of a logging company, or an MP with some input into Environmental folios I do what? I look out my window and see 20-30 people protesting something with some off putting graphic pictures hanging out on placards. Maybe even a burning effigy of John Howard. I have two choices 1. Call the police if I can be bothered/have to get past them to get to my car. 2. Close my venetians and get on with my evil plan.
I used to have these fanatics corner me all the time in first year because I had long hair, ironically at that stage I cared less about the environment than I do now but had been a fan of Captain planet. I always came across plenty of passion, energy & enthusiasm and new that this person would never succeed in anything but alienating her cause and eventually jump off the band wagon.
For what is a fanatic? Someone who has a deep vested interest (esteem or ego needs) and low understanding of the broader issues regarding this interest. It's a common trate that nows no race, colour, creed or social standing. At work I have fanatics for overtime. They work overtime. Some fucktard the other day asked me why I was leaving already. I said 'it's 2 past 5 I've already worked overtime' you talk to anyone who loves working overtime about how economics bears out no relationship between productivity and extended hours. Within the G8 contries with lower work hours outperform countries with longer work hours. Its a fad a fashion inherited from wall street and Japanese fuedal culture with little substance. If you really want to upset an overtime fanatic just say 'I don't work overtime because I don't want the boss thinking I can't efficiently finish the job in the hours they set me.' or something to that effect. It really upsets those fuckers and what's more its true. These poor fools donating their time thinking it would advance their career are doing themselves a disservice. I would have to say from my experience I'm struggling right now to justify staying at work 8 hours/5 days a week. I can get through most of my work in time to spare.
Other work fads that generate fanatics are professional attire, meetings and weekend work functions. But more to the point the 'Can do' spirit is useless if the task just Can't be done. My whole philosophy is infinite human potential, that infact anything can be done. It can be even the normal probability distribution curve allows for infinite possibilities (though with infintismally diminishing probabilities of them occuring). All things are possible. But some places just can't be gotten to using some starting points or some strategies.
Example 1. You can't ride a bike (and bike only on the natural surfaces of the Earth) from Melbourne to Paris, France.
Example 2. You cannot be the best company for every single product in the world.
Anyone trying to achieve these outcomes could with enough effort. But phenominal effort. The first one would involve riding the bike into the ocean and then hoping your body could physically endure the hopefully favorable currents that would drive you over some weeks into the African or Asian continent and then ride the west of the way on a fully oxidized bike to Paris.
The second can be done by becoming the best company in the world at one product then aquiring a company that is best in the world at another product with it's own branding and infrastructure and slowly aquire company after company until you own the number one brand in everything.
Unfortunately managers with the Can do Spirit take on a brand say Rolls Royce 'The Rolls Royce of Automobiles' and then say Rolls Royce are now in the guitar business. And this manager makes plenty of passionate speaches, spends up on product launches, makes more passionate speeches, offers sales incentives for Rolls Royce Guitars (they may have had a shot if they'd called it something else but the company knows Rolls Royce means the best and the best Guitars are Rolls Royce guitars) in the end for all the can do spirit of the Manager they end up making only one big sale before the project packs up and for all the energy and resources put into achieving this classic case of ambition exceeding ability no trees have been saved and I am stuck listening to some fucktard playing his uncool rolls royce guitar in a Jesus rock ballad in their efforts to convert me.
For the record I imagine Jesus himself if he lived in our age would be a pretty awesome shredder on the guitar.

An Awesome Arguement

Today I got to chat face to face with racism. How did it feel? I'm not some interviewer like Andrew Denton or Oprah. Not even a lowely TV psychologist like Doctor Phil or Koschie from Sunrise.
But I was excited and thrilled and got to smack that racism bitch down like a true chauvanist!
It started with the innocuos question (i really shouldn't use adjectives what I don't know what they mean) 'How was your weekend' my UNESCO seminar on aboriginal entrepreneaurship one out over tupperware party (even though tupperware party is a more exotic experience for me than peace and love gatherings of intellectual snobs) I was really feeling strongly about this one because a couple of corn kernals had gone pop in my brain and they were dripping with butter.
Australia is racist. 90% of funding from the government goes to remote communities even though 70% of the indegenous population live in urban areas. This perception is cultivated by the media. Of the 6089 aboriginals classed by the ABS as Self employed (representing 4.8% of the indigenous population) 2058 are employers only the rest are classed as Other Self Employed which is a politicised term of the work for the dole scheme.
Many Aboriginal entrepreneaurs claim to be indonesian and south east asian because it is favorably percieved relative to being Indegenous.
My spelling is pretty atrocious but as I was realing off such facts racism surfaced and stopped me.
'Hold on, I have a friend who went to Dubbo and she was afraid to go out on the streets because those arogant ungrateful aboriginals would have beaten her up'
A) Suggesting she was afriad of something that might happen rathen than something that would happen.
B) I have said before the Anglo Saxon is Mr. My Way or the High Way, the most merciless, intolerent and violent race to ever grace the earth.
C) Aboriginals as far as I am aware have never committed genocide and dispossessed any White races in history.
When I explained this racism said:
'Your talking about our great great great great grandparents'
To which I replied 'Up until the 70's an aboriginal women wasn't allowed to own property the government would confiscate it, this isn't generations we are talking about this is generation.
So racism got tactful: 'Australia is multi cultural, they get all these benefits. Any other race that comes here can get work.'
A) Being on centrelink is not the dream of any individual anywhere. It isn't a glorious or worthwhile occupation it is a symptom of a racist repressive system.
B) Italians an greeks were brought in as migrants to employment and as such were given more of a chance than any indegenous residents ever got simply by having structural employment and being able to freely practice their way of life (being European)
C) $8 an hour is a good wage for a Chinese international student in China town, these students find it incredibly hard to find employment in decent jobs against local students.
We two'd and fro'd between customer calls for a while but racism was cornered, not realising this manifestation of an attitude was precisely the problem.
'They get all these benefits and do nothing with it'
All these benefits what about all the free land white colonists stole and have derived millions apon millions of dollars of wealth only to spend a measly few million on indegenous affairs. I'd fucking attack these whiteys too.
'They can get work, I lost my job and I put out heaps of resumes and got work.'
Where did you work racism?
'Jeans West'
And how many overweight people did jeanswest employ on the shop floor?
And that was it that was the clincher I had to put it like that before she realised that an aboriginal can no more get a job with the Australian attitude than a fat chick can work at jeans west.
Life isn't as simple as trying hard.
The real sad thing that highlights it all was this guy that spoke to us spoke of a dude who was the first aboriginal member of the Coffs Harbour Golf Club and President no less, as well as president of the Hoteliers and Caravan association actually went to England to get educated.
An abbo had to go to another country to have a chance. Not in Multi-Cultural Australia.

Blasphemy and Criticism

Tom Jones said 'There isn't a day I wake up where I don't thank god I'm Welsh' it's an odd quote. Everyday I appreciate that I am a dude and I am an atheist.
A fair while ago Father Bob wrote on his blog about dealing with blasphemy highlighting the violent riots of Moslem communities around the world to the portrayel of Mohammed by some newspaper (a reaction Mohammed would have condemned and furthermore the purpose of forbidding Mohammed from being portrayed is so he would never become the focal point of the religion and treated as an idol rather than a messenger) and the Taliban's destruction of carved Buddha's in Afghanistan. The Christian groups protests against the da vinci code and Scientologists outrage at the Southpark episode that portrayed their religion as a money making scam.
Yet these reactions highlight the flimsiness of the belief and the misalligned energy of its practitioners.
I'm not a fan of democracy but what I love about it isn't the supposed self determination of the electoral process, nor all civil liberties put together but the fact that comedians can bag out the powers that be.
Think about it when was the last person too fragile to hear criticism ever to make an impact on the world. Most religious leaders and economic theorists were regarded as crack pots and weirdos in their time.
My coworker is a smoker, rather than thinking about the new graphic imagery on her cigarette packs she got the guy at the store to filter through them till he found one with only a graph on it.
I can't imagine how many teenage girls are being spared this debilitating habit right now by the fact the package conflicts with the 'cool' imagery.
Yet her solution was to find a way not to look at it.
If your a smoker see if you can handle this criticism: You smeel bad, your dwellings smell bad, you are unfit, your fingernails are yellowish and your teeth are brown.
There's ways to cover up all of this but the fact is if you don't confront the criticism the criticism will destroy you. Whatever it may be, (I was criticised over my appearance and attire recently at work, it pissed me off but I felt at ease when I addressed it) it exists. The things portrayed on cigarette packaging doesn't not exist because it's not their.
Blasphemous thoughts don't go away because nobody is voicing them. They infact get channelled into policy by the resentful populace all achieving further alienation because nobody is willing to engage in discussion.
If you disagree with me, just imagine you smell real bad, maybe you do. Wouldn't you rather know?

Choo Choo

Hey all. I thought I'd include this quote that recently inspired me from Allen Iverson star of 76'ers NBA team and one of those little engines that could players that I always gravitate towards. Read it, I mean you're going to because you've already read this far, it is inarticulate and delivered post losing a finals knockout match where coach Larry Brown criticised Allen for not attending practice in the lead up to the playoffs.

I'm supposed to be the franchise player, and we're in here talking about practice. I mean listen, we're talking about practice. Not a game . . . We're talking about practice. Not a game . . . that I go out there and die for, and play every game like it's my last. Not the game. We're talking about practice, man. I mean, how silly is that? We're talking about practice. I know I'm supposed to be there. I know I'm supposed to lead by example . . . I know it's important . . . I honestly do. But we're talking about practice, man. What are we talking about? Practice? We're talking about practice, man . . . We're talking about practice. We're talking about practice. We ain't talking about the game, we're talking about practice, man. When you come into the arena, and you see me play . . . you see me give everything I got, right? But we're talking about practice right now. We're talking about practice . . . We're not even talking about the game, the actual game, when it matters. We're talking about practice.

— Allen Iverson at a press conference on May 8, 2002

He said "practice" more times than he's actually practiced.
— Larry Brown speaking to reporters the next day

Racism the T-shirt

I was in K-mart last week looking for Sydney Swans Away socks, I figured what better way to showcase my delicious calves than in the candy cane white and red stripes of my surrogate finals team in the Carlton dismal years.
I ended up settling on St Kilda socks which I must admit caress my legs in a surprisingly delightful manner.
But those two points are irrelevent except that on the day I bought these socks Carlton got slaughtered by the Saints by 92 points.
The point which is not the point but in fact my introduction is that there was a shirt for girls that said 'my eyes are up here' on it and had an arrow pointing from the chest to the neckhole. I thought I should buy that shirt. I did think that but now I don't know why because I can't recall what the point of this observation was as an introduction. But I'm going to buy that shirt and fuck the consequences.
Anyway, people complain about rising petrol prices. My work is obsessed with Chinese copy product. Everyone is nervouse about the Chinese communist parties recent decision to allow the most populous nation in the world to participate in the economy.
Everyone feels uneasy as resource industries experience record sales ripping minerals out of the earth and other billion dollar corporations cry poor as their manufacturing costs are suddenly well above the global benchmark.
But seriously this mentallity is fucked up. I've been studying international trade for a semester now and all methods of intervention and prevention cost society a deadweight loss even in the best of circumstances.
And all methods of intervention and protectionism are infact racism. When motorists are outraged at the price of oil they are being racist. When mum & dad investors buy Telstra shares for fear of some multinational taking over we are being racist.
Because it's all based on the assumption that we are somehow more entitled to the worlds common resources simply because we are used to consuming them.
When I see Tasmanian loggers coming out in force to bitch about their livelihood being lost I never see them coming out in force to protest the lost livelihood of offshore manufacturers who aren't employed because of Tariffs or Subsidies.
Nobody gets indignant about who misses out unless its us that misses out. Possibly the source of all inequity in the world is the fact that occasionally people forget to even stick up for themselves.
But seriously. Why should we drive an SS Sports Utility with its inefficient fuel consumption and burn petrol that could have been split between 5 families worth of mopeds in thailand or indonesia? Sure we'll put our loose change into buckets and bins for ambiguous tsunami charities. We'll give two bucks to anyone foreign looking with a jar at times like those.
There's really no justification, no justification at all apart from racism to 'buy Australian' if you take a truly global perspective. Australian products don't sell to well against imports because they are expensive. They are expensive because due to inefficient processes we consume more resources producing them than another nation with a comparitive advantage in one of the factors of production.
Any resource wasted in production is a cost to society, generally because wasted inputs cost money (unless sold as by-product) and this cost needs to be recovered by the producing firm so is passed on to the consumer.
A consumer won't pay this cost if they can consume a more efficiently produced competitor product that fulfills the same need. So in free trade you purchase it off the countries that produce it more efficiently.
If you tax these imports consumers can not only consume less of the good than they want to they are forced to buy normally uncompetitive products. eg. You have a one legged representitive running for Australia in the melbourne commonwealth games so you bring the competition to their level by making all the other athletes tie their ankles together.
It's less enjoyable and we're needless throwing away POTENTIAL for the sake of national pride.
Nobody would say it was right for an Executive to employ his son over better candidates. Why do we make an exception when it comes to whole industries where surely it is more morally reprehensible.
For the record the Australian Made brand doesn't mean much to consumers, Australians aren't big on nationalistic buying opting for quality. Japanese consumers are yet they have started to take the right steps in their stagnant economy (Japan is my Jesus isn't it the moral always seems to come back to it) Sony corp has employed a british dude as it's global CEO a powerhouse like Sony has broken through one of the most jingoistically Xenophobic nations in the world.
Nobody thinks much of Australia, at least not as much as Australian media portrays maybe we could surprise them and open up. How can you invade and conquer a country with no defense?

Man crush

A lot of interesting things happened today. But I wont talk about it because this blog was never going to be as coherent as an account of daily events.
Something curious has happened to me that I have never experienced before. Not true love no, I have experienced that a couple of times and would be sure if that were the case. I got my first man crush. I've never thought anyone but far off ditant rockstars an celebrities were cooler or had more to offer me than I did myself but since I've started playing basketball again for the first time I've got a role model in coolness.
He's a japanese dude. I've met cool Japanese before and I must say Japanese people re very dedicated and generally are dedicated to either being cool or being studious. The studious ones are the ones that tend to make it to Australia. At any rate this guy had done both so you know high fives all round for him.
He's one of these showman harlem globetrotter spin the ball on their finger types and he has it ll down, the style, the humour all of that.
I have friends who are funny, but not attractive.
I have friends who are attractive but not funny.
I have friends who are funny and attractive but they aren't good for anything or at anything.
So this dude has all three as far as I'm concerned.
It's not homo erotic or anything, which is why Man-crush is a popular but misleading term. It's like when women talk about Angelina Jolie, because really what they are seeing is John Voight minus a moustache I guess.
I culdn't begin to speculate if I would be attracted to this dude if I was a chick. If I was a chick I'd probably have different interests, tastes and preferences anyway.
so really its a dumb question and I'm offended that you ask.
Besides Japanese people are supposed to have real small dicks.

Hair Hair Hair Long Glorious Hair

I am a long hair. For over a year now no artificial mens has been used to cmbat the progression of my hair. I don't want to sound queer or nothing but long hair is beautiful. On a guy. On gils too, nothing is as surer sign of surrender to middle age than closely cropped hair on a girl with a few exceptions like shaved heads and lezbian haircuts.
Anyway nothiing is so manly as the Leonine main created through a combination of extreme patience and shampoos designed for 'curl enhancement' although women are of differing opinion since the advent of 'Friends' and chandler's puncey move to gelled (that's groovy - can be heard by your hairdresser as she tries to reassure a teenager they are cool) short spikes in what is otherwise a haircut acceptable for the milatary. In Chandler's case it was probably a good move as he is and remains a punce.
But you see a guy running around a park with a shaved head you just think he's someone who you don't particularly want to talk to. But Vainglorious locks bouncing rythmically up and down like unsecured breasts in flight is majestic, hypnotic and more to the point distracts people from how fast/slow you actually run.
Take my advice grow your hair guys even if the girls don't apreciate it at least you can braid it at sleepovers.

I am back

After having my wireless drop out over afortnight ago, inexplicably I have finally wired up my computers on LAN now I have fast reliable internet. I have missed you blog more as a forum for my self love than I miss an emotional crutch like a weak willed friend that you push around. Those are fun too.
Just remember picking on other people DOES make you feel better about yourself. Screw those who judge your motivations.
Oh yeah and love thy neighbour.

Chizmolackin

Last night I was at some dude I don't know's birthday party at the queensberry and I said to my friend when we stood in the empty dance room which had a disco ball in every corner 'this is what it's like in my head all the time.'
I don't want to sound like das uberman or any thing but there's probably three-four times a year where I'm actually bored because my head is all glitter on the inside. Generally I get bored when something is holding my attention that I can't space out from, like a performer that has me trapped in a small place.
My ex gave me a book for a birthday or christmas or some shit called 'the outsider' an 'exostentialist' novel about a dude who shoots a guy and is convicted on the death penalty because he fails to show emotion about his mother's death.
Wasn't that a nice aside?
I forget why I brought it up but those of you familiar with the text will hopefully draw lines easier than those who haven't in how I find really mundane experiences quite entertaining. Like those fucking Lipton tea adds with the fucking drops from the tap and dust catching sunlight.
So today I got on a train around 12 and had my trusty black jacket on with it's trustier YKK zip. I had my headphones in and my pocket perfection pants on. I have been hitting 'Peeping Tom' Mike Patton's solo album that was much anticipated by people who anticipate things, pretty hard. I've probably listened to the album 100 times through in a week. The new Tool album was a different story, one too painful to talk about.
So anyway I was plugged in and turned on, a Peeping Tom on the train. Cruising into Flinders St, I walked past Ben Rossi and some girl he had his arm around which was fucking weird because Bryce and I had been talking about him over dinner the night before and neither of us would have seen him inside two years, I assume.
Cruised on through and ordered my Hungry Jacks for lunch. Zen tells us to eat with mindfullness, as in tune in and be aware of the tastes, textures and sensations in eating a food, they suggest you start out with peas. Anyway I forget to do this with just about every food that I eat like an animal except for some reason the Hungry Jack's whopper. It truly is a food sensation in your mouth. Like national coming out day for your taste buds or some shit.
So I did that and loved it. Then cruised up swanston.
I was just going to comment on my ipod when I relised all references to my ipod could be taken as condescending and pase (with that accent thing on the e). Seriously fuck you, ask for one for your birthday. They are great and easy to use and have 90% of the market so I'm not going to pretend to be something I'm not and say 'MP3 player' you know Esky is a brnd name? and mp3? fuck you poor arse in your poor arse.
Anyway what I was going to say is that ipod's allow you to soundtrack your lives and I have a playlist I randomly threw together called 'chizmolackin' and I thought as I walked up swanston towards the QV Big W if anything could describe Chizmolackin as a sensation it is how I feel right now.
Complete fucking ease, like a carnal commencement after copious foreplay. Nothing like cruising the streets dressed how you want to be, not how work wants you to be. Listening to something that adds texture to the living gray populated by impressionistic colour that is the streets of Melbourne.
So there you go pure pleasure in the activity that defines ballafornian youth 'going down the street'.
I bought a new Basketball, and started playing basketball with the REW kids. It was a runnaway success and yet another thing that makes me truly great. Maybe I'll start a backyard charity called 'Fun for Foreigners who can't speak english good'.
Peace out contrarians.

The Promise

After year twelve I made a solemn vow. I vowed never to work that hard again. It could be said as as solemn as I've ever made a vow, I've certainly never been more serious in all my life.
In reflection this was naive of me all that 'work' I did in year 12 was not that much in the broad scheme of things. I mean apart from scant patches of intellectual property from particulalry remarkable projects and competition entries which are truly far and few between, students produce very little.
I'm not lobbying for more Nelsonesque funding cuts for education, but all students do is consume resources for those years and the consumption expenditure is theoretically recouped in later years with a more productive labour base.
But I work 9 to 5 and don't believe in overtime at all. Overtime in my book is like bragging that you're incompetent and barely managing your workload, exaserbated if you don't take your annual leave (which pisses employers off because the value of your annual leave appreciates over time). but that already an 1 1/2 more than I used to 'work' at school and I had longer breaks. And I can tell you now with the shoddy concept of 'homework' seriously what kind of fucked up fucking concept is homework. They can't efficiently teach you concepts such as differentiation or the functions of money or grammar in class time they have to load you up with homework to take home weekly on top of assignments. I'm sure it fucking enriches the learning experience, infact I'm sure I'm fucking positive it doesn't since I expended more energy coming up with excuses not to do homework than energy put into doing homework. Home time is Tom time.
Where was I? what the fuck did I bring up homework for. Oh yeah some school in Briton got rid of it, that is a positive step away from unproductive workaholics right there.
But that's not why I raised it what I meant to say is if you added up all the time I spent doing homework in my entire school career it wouldn't average out to shit.
So I'm sitting on 6.5 hours and three times a week I had to go to cross country training until 5 so I'm still sitting pretty when I made my vow. I wonder how much more productive our economy would be if work time built those 4.5 hours of extra curriculae exercise into the Industrial reforms.
Someone should seriously do a study. Most studies already show we work more hours than we can justify even in the limited concept of GNP. My brother had a mate who was an IT PhD developed a theory that the average person works 3 hours of productive time a day so even if he was paid for 8 hours he would dedicate himself to working only 3 hours with complete commitment and then walk out. His employers loved him. I love him even though I've never met him.
I'm not saying I'm lazy. I just think there's things I'd rather be doing than work. Even if my work was painting which I love I'd never dream of spending 8 hours a day doing it. I mean what kind of person can do anything for eight hours with the odd break? What moron came up with this system?

Xual

My bike, I love my bike, is A shogun Metro SE I presume the SE stands for Special addition as really as far as bike models go there's no real recognised model like the 'louden boomer' etc.
But those Japanese in their unassuming way have given a bike that I ride a name that is four letters short of being Metrosexual. This pisses me off. I'm very pro testosterone. In high school I formed a beard union since my private school didn't let us grow manly beards as was our right when we man blossomed above the year 7's with their bad haircuts oversized blazers and dirty sanchez moustaches.
I tried not shaving for lent and got sent home, I walked in after a school holidays and got sent home, I represented the school in a foreign country and awed all with my ability to age 7 years while on Christmas break.
SO riding a bike called the Metro, fucking Metro anything doesn't appeal to me. The japanese don't know better they love beckham and Ian thorpe and regard them as real men. In fact in Japan the more androgenous you are, the more lipstick you wear, the more angle in your fringe and highlights in your hair, the more hardcore.
I don't get it.
Anyway I love my bike. There is no more perfect machine than the bike. A device that inhances our own anatomy more than any other.
The city the last two days has been coating in a hazy cloud of black in an otherwise pristine sky. I wonder as I always do what drivers are thinking as they drive towards it. Those filthy particles in the sky brushing up against all our lovely buildings, coating the inside of the mouth you use to perform oral pleasures.
Word on the street of oil is get fucking use to it.
Furthermore even if oil does miraculously become more available Keynsian economics tells us why would anyone put prices down? We know you can afford it.

Face of an Arsehole

I was reading some passage in my book about gene's being passed down a line of logic so if you look like your father and your father looks like his father and his father resembles his father then you resemble your great grandfather. You see it all the time in cartoons and movies and shit were the same actor plays the ancestor when they travel back in time.
I have been told since I was young that I bear a striking resemblence to my maternal grandfather, I just realised I can't remember his name. Anyway this was great gave me a feeling of connectedness and my grandfather was described as quite the dashing young man in his time.
To me he was a fun, warm, active, wrinkly bald old man with green tattoos from war and a malaria yellow complexion curtesy of WWII.
At some point though the other half of the picture comes out, that he was a drunk irresoponsible arsehole that dished out a few love taps in his time.
I've found this hard to take because it's totally against my values and nature. I was a teato before I found this shit out, had a brief stint at pacifism (provoking more violence amongst my friends than previously) and was stingy with the coin.
I don't like sharing a face with this man. I remember being angry with mum when she told me of the darker side for 'ruining a hero' but he wasn't and I got angry at the wrong person. He was a great grandpa and otherwise a fucking arsehole.
Point of the story I feel sorry for anyone who bears a striking resemblance to Hitler they have bigger issues than me.

There's a party in my Mouth and the KKK is invited

No not hollandaise sauce or carbonara but harissa:

250 g red chillis
1 garlic clove
dry mint
dry cumin
olive oil
lemon juice
salt

chuck in blender and blend up then put in a jar and you have a delicious spread that due to the unique nature of the chilli will speed up my metabolism if I have it on anything.

So here's what I did:

Assume if you are specifying red you mean those baby red chillis and clean out 3 supermarkets trying to get 250g of them (this cost me less than a buck though I was real impressed) 250 g is a lot of those little red chillis. So who can be fucked removing the seeds from like a million tiny little chillis? I cut the stems off and skinned a whole bulb of garlic and threw it all in the blender. Then I squeezed in my lemon juice and then added some olive oil and blended it all into a salmon pink.
Now I'd been told to taste it in order to determine how much spice I needed to add, so I cautiously dipped my pinky into the now stationary blender and dabbed it on my tongue.
The shit stuck to my face like napalm and burned for an hour and a half.
My nostrils burnt just lifting the lid off the blender.
I know you go to restaurants and shit and people tell you wasabi and chilli and shit is real hot shit and you see cartoons where people jump up and down and flames come out and shit. It's not like that but it is the hottest thing I've ever made and the sensation is more like having an ingrown toenail bumping against something wherever the mix touches your flesh whether that be lips, nostril or tear duct.
So follow that recipe except mix in some red capsicum for some of the chilli. Remove the seeds and look after yourself instead of just relying on chilli oil to spead up your metabolism.
If you've ever wondered why thai people always look like they need a feed, yo.

Brisbane & Sydney

Coming from International House, having friends all over the world from every single obscure nation, religion, sexual persuasion etc. I forgot how much culture shock there can be just travelling in Australia.
I headed up to Brisbane to see my best friend, I hadn't seen him in ages and had promised to be his family a couple of years back and more or less done nothing up until then about it.
So feeling guilty, tired and excited, a potent combination even for someone as versatile as gumby I got off the plane and walked into the arrivals lounge. First off what I like about my friends is they are laid back, they are laid back because they are capable of rational thought and use this process to create confidence. I hadn't arranged to be picked up yet Q was there we shook hands, got talking were in the car and chowing down on breakfast in no time.
Brisbane is overwhelmingly green to me. I couldn't get over it. Running around the hilly district of wherever the fuck I was staying, I saw no other runners, plenty of trees and cyclists and it was beautiful. Brisbane was beautiful and wasted on fucking Queenslanders in their Bundy rum paraphenalia and handle bar moustaches. Crows garnished the trees too and they are an unbeautiful bird, waking me up every morning. The trains too had spikes coming out of the ceilings in the doorways so in rush hour the people clusttered in the doorways had a central object to hang on to, which was great because it was an admission of defeat that they can't cater in rush hour.
In melbourne ticket inspectors are an admission of defeat that train tickets don't deliver more value than risking a fine.
Anyway in brisbane 20 minutes out of the city I was in bush, bush plots like some people lived on in ballarat. Decking, Big free form garden, an acre of bush sloping downhill and no sign of your neighbour. It was my dream house. I chowed down on some tasty prawns and tuna just thinking that. I really chilled.
I could relax in Brisbane. The roads made no sense to me. The surroundings were beautiful and compared to melbourne it was quite quaint.
But you know that episode where homer goes to New York and has the worst day of his life trying to get a clamp off his car wheel. This is how I feel in Sydney.
I read a good weekend article about how some minority of yuppies had hijacked Sydney's culture. They had written 'People in SYdney are cool, going to nightclubs, wearing trendy designer clothes and drinking cocktails. They do not engage in anything tribal like football or drink beer.' It was in-fucking-sane.
I am always overwhelmed by how beautiful Sydney is. Again it seems much greener than melbourne, the harbour is beautiful and their architectural triumphs are architectural triumphs.
How can Melbourne have been rated the world's most liveable city? (that really is some fucking title not to be taken for granted) I've had many a friend say they've had a relative visit them in Melbourne and they couldn't do anything there. Two days I spent in Sydney. In two days as a tourist I had to conclude that Sydney has nothing more to offer than views of the harbour and eating seafood.
Like Kyoto in Japan where you get overwhelmed followed by 'templed out' Sydney gets old fast. It's roads are crazy, you need a seperate ticket for every form of transport. I've had it explained to me the ways to get around town in order to tolerate it, but in melbourne even with shitty public transport you'd never be expected to make the same sacrifices.
People don't seem to care about anything either. Most of the people I try to hang around with are big AFL fans, most of the people I end up hanging around with are left wing pinkos who just don't appreciate what a great thing AFL is to our culture. You go to Sydney, people don't care about anything. That was the overwhelming impression I got, just scratching the surface I know but even cruising the harbour most of the audio tour commentry started with 'On your left is one of the most expensive properties in SYdney harbour foreshore...' seriously every minute was another real estate tidbit.
If there is anything that defines the baby boomers it is real estate fever but I don't give a fuck. There was no multicultural vibe in the CBD. No visable graffiti, posters for rock concerts, nothing. Just a beautiful ornamental tourist snap town. Like being stuck in the docklands. I've camped in Sydney, 'worked' at the ABC and stayed at a university college the place still makes my skin crawl.
I'm feeling hostile even now home again.
Brisbane is endearing I could retire there and take it easy and talk to bogans on the train. In Sydney I would be hunted down and put on a cattle truck for going bogan and my skin would crawl from my face into my colon.
Fuck you Sydney and your fucking impolite shabby service and overpriced beer.

Jetsetting

This entry is suspiciously like an actual journal entry letting you know what is going on in my life. I went to brisbane, I will write more about brisbane later. Tomorrow morning I get up and go to sydney.
The jetseetting globe trotting life sucks. It fucking sucks. I have a bag that is too big for these two day trips and a backpack that is too small. Since last time I got a plane they really have become the flying bus. Like the Magic schoolbus except less educational. I can't wait till they have ultra violet lighting and semen stains on the seats.
Anyway I go to Sydney tomorrow, I get up early in the morning to go to Sydney. I really don't want to go to Sydney tomorrow. I wonder what breakfast will be like on the plane. It better be good or else I'm going to attack somebody.
The guys from Broadmeadows I sat next too were real nice though. I didn't even get lice when he put his head real close to mine only to shake his head in disgust that I was listening to Bach.
Bach is the shiznizzel of Music that is pleasing but unexciting. Unless you get a hard on for fruges or however it is fucking spelt.

Optimus Prime

Life is simple for the Transformers, there are good and evil. A cartoon devised in the Reagan years, Optimus is the definitive leader for me. Uncompromising values, a close collaborative team and the ability to transform into a truck with a trailer mysteriously appearing out of nowhere.
I hear there are plans to make a CGI transformers movie which if like the Japanime revival of recent times it will be phenomenally shit, focussing on the powers of heart and friendship blah blah blah. If it’s like the recent Comic revival, epic and moving in it’s storyline and pitched at the generation that grew up with them well it could be something else.
I once told a girl that I would rather have Optimus Prime on my side during Armageddon than Jesus. This still holds true. Jesus performed miracles sure but a walking talking robot warrior that can turn into a truck and shoot lasers, nobody can beat that.

Semantics and God

Semantics tells us that words have no intrinsic meanings, that means a word written must have a meaning associated with it by a person. I.e. nodachi cannot be understood by everyone who sees it, it is only if someone tells you it means field sword (refering to a sword greater than 5 shaku in length) can most people understand what a nodachi is. Likewise you notice shaku is presumably a unit of length (based on the meanings attatched to the words around it) that you can't quite comprehend in terms of it's exact distance and you begin to feel like you need to learn Japanese.
The problem is apparant in translation and in education where kids look at flash cards with words like cat, dog etc matched up to pictures of the objects they represent starting to associate meanings with words after having first learnt to associate sounds with words.
It becomes less apparant in sacred texts however. The Quaran/Koran is reprinted word for word with no deviation tolerated (the only interpretation allowed arises in translations) books of the bible preserve the word less so (changing Pharoah to King etc depending on the target audiance etc) and pretty much every holy book associated with a religion. The assembled words have no meaning whatsoever in themselves and cultural values such as homophobia in Catholacism are based on such words 'flimsy interpretations' I would dub them if I was quoting myself but I'm sure others have said it.
There is no magical inherant value in the particular sequences of words because you couldn't chuck the holy books in the back of a plane and drob them on some previously isolated amazonian tribe and expect them to pick up the gist of it.
When Jesus said 'I shall return' did he mean 'I'll return...with milk, anybody need anything while I'm nipping out' or 'I shall return on the day of armageddon where we will wage war on the forces of evil.' I don't know because 'I will return' is meaningless in and of itself, we choose the meaning we want to attach to it.
Catholics have come out with the Gospel of Judas and more or less said 'at the end of the day we will believe what we want to believe'
My boss's job is interpreting the Head office's boss' philosophy who in turn is interpreting the philosophies of the founding father. The fact that they were written down means the message probably lasts longer with less disparity between interpretation and intent but fundamentally is little better in the long term than an oral tradition.
Would the world be a better place if we could just admit:

If god does exist, his/her/their words are interpreted by man, who in turn speaks on behalf of god, exercises judgement for god and by extension controls god.

Which I think is true of absolutely all religions even if my blog was to become the basis of a religion for as Paul Atredies said 'The moment one accepts godhead one loses control of it' Faust got fucked out of his answer to the meaning of life when Mephisto tells him 'I would explain the answer to you but it is only possible in a language you would never understand'
Isn't anyone else pissed off the pope gets to sit in the Vatican where Dali paintings struggle to get wall space and all he does is attempt to interpret whatever the fuck god is getting at in the fucking Bible?

Pimp my Blog

I remodelled the site when bored, sorry for the lack of potpurri and petunias and shit.

The Sand

For the record, if ever I fucked up and had to admit I'd made expensive, expensive mistakes. Expensive beyond my means or morality - I'd go into the desert to die. You know run away from problems rather than confront them or have to apologise.
Except I wouldn't go to a real desert. I'd go to the dune known to me as 'the dune' in my camping ground. Every year I climb 250m of soft sand heated up to a cool 45C without stopping. I only use my feet not hands and when I reach the top and walk aways until I reach a dead grotto. It kind of reminds me of Lord Byron's 'Ozymandias' which I think was the Greek name for Ramasis or one of them egyptians with the funny hats which is about a broken shattered plinth with some feet on it that was engraved 'I am Ozymandias, look on my and despair' a poem about the mighty falling with the passage of time. I say kind of reminds me of it because I can't remember it except for that last line.
Dimitri Martin said if you have a cactus and it dies that means you are less nurturing than a desert. I think thats why I'd like to sit and think about what I did until my body packs in on top of the dune. Of course if it is winter I would probably die of pnuemonia which just wouldn't be satisfactory way to die in a desert so I'd hope my collapse would come in the summer months if it ever did at all.
I mean really I hope it never comes at all because I'd rather not have to spend time contemplating my stupidity I'd rather succeed to the point where I create my own Authentic Saloon and sit at the bar listening to Robert Johnson woundering what he has the blues over.
But on the other hand as Topol would say I can see the spiritual value of the desert, I understand those fools who wander out to find themselves, I'd be sensible though and wander out to peacefully end myself*

*and hopefully work in some kind of spectacular explosion like the plastic shark in the Adam West Batman Movie. If I just keeled over from a sitting position and then BANG! when I hit the ground, that would be awesome.

Eccentric

This guy at work reckons I'm eccentric. The very word 'eccentric' the mere fact that it exists is an embarassment to the human race. That the fact I wear a headband to hold my hair back and keep it out of my eyes makes me 'eccentric' says there's some pretty structured guidelines on how to live your life out there. That's sad, its more than that its tragic. Pink shirts, shaved heads, long hair, donating money to a charity, wearing odd socks, eating donuts for breakfast, going to bingo, owning a guitar all these things I have heard people use in labelling someone eccentric.
It's fucking ironic 6 years I spent trying hard to avoid the label of try hard, no bleaching my hair, no piercing, no dreadlocks, no surf clothes, no mobile phone, no skateboarding n shit. Then you get called an eccentric for not trying at all just fucking putting a headband in your hair. The amount of time and money wasted trying to be different could probably feed the third world.
If you want to get noticed, ride a bike through a MYER's store. If you want a friend feed any animal. If you want to be eccentric shop at Target.

The Arguement

I'm really letting April down. I've been distracted since uni went back and being poor. I'm poor enough now to let people take photos of me licking their leprous feet for $1. There's no justice in the world. I know there's people with real issues out there but seriously I'm a girl with expensive tastes I don't like to have to think about money.
Enough of that though. There's one line, in one book that hits the nail on the head 'An armed man will never obey an unarmed man' said by Machiavelli in the perrenial amoral handbook 'The Prince' I also recommend 'The Little Prince' as a worthwhile read.
Arj Barker would say Machiavelli excepts the isness of the buisness. A lot of people hate Machiavelli, a lot of people hate their uncle playing low to the ground well placed shots in back yard cricket. Yet they both exist and frankly better the devil you know.
So anyway why is that line important? Environmentalism. I wrote about my favorite campsite a few posts back and some of you may have got the impression that I love nature. This is true, but unlike someone who believes in getting naked and mingling amongst the trees in the moonlight to abandon oneself to their feral nature and appreciate the ambiance of the environment because my parents were hippies or something, I approached environmentalism from a megalomaniacal angle out of a disturbed youth.
Basically when I see someone spit on the ground I don't think of it as everybodies ground but MY ground. For example close your eyes (and somehow manage to keep reading the instructions isn't it amazing how many times those instructions are written in print) so keep your eyes open for now and just think what I'm writing.
You bake a cake, a delicious cake you ice it and leave it on the cooling rack. Some snotball runs his finger through the icing. Your pissed off, your bigger than your snotball so you wack them with a wooden spoon and when they threaten to call the police you tell them that's fine, they'll send you to a foster home where your new parents will rape you and post pictures on the internet. Alternatively you get down on their level look them in the eye, explain what they've done wrong and sit them on the naughty step. They both work.
So now you're an all powerfull conquering warlord, you invade a cake, it's your cake you take it, but some snotball ran his fingers all through the icing, so you cut his ear off as a warning to future sabotoers (sabotage people) who will ruin things you intend to one day own.
So say the cake is Europe or the Middle East or the world, at some point in the future someone is going to claim rights to that land that is not who has rights to it now whether that be future generations or some world superpower or the Wiggles. They have the power to take that land from another in possession to it.
Like Australia dispossessed all the native inhabitants of the land and went one step further and declared they didn't even exist when clearly they were there. And we freely buy, trade and/or rent this stolen property enjoying full ownership under our legal system, never contemplating anyone would claim a brunswick or werribee dwelling as their birthright and knowig full well any trouble makers would be handily handled by the police.
We all enjoy this. So why can't someone really powerful just make the laws that only they have the power to enforce and others cant stop them?
Seriously if I was as big as I am now and a bunch of preppies formed a committee to say I had to pay a toll to walk on a footpath I would laugh at them and if they pressed the point tossed them aside like teddy bears.
That's the crux of what Machiavelli is saying. When he wrote amorally it wasn't with evil intent. It was amoral which means non-moral as in he wrote extensively on the mechanics of politics and in a time dominated by the church didn't presuppose what one should use political power for.
So the arguement would go something like this (and a belive throughout history it often has) some one sits in a chair and argues rationally, logically, conscicely and passionately about some cause, a moral injustice and positively suggests a remedy that may be counterproductive or merely inconveniant to his opponants position in the debate. He can draw on utilitarianism, economic schools and theories, exciting new Harvard research, new age philosophies. He can reiterate his arguements and provide precedent after precedent for his remedy.
The oppositions arguemen involves breaking his teeth until he can no longer talk. No logic no rational, no rightness or wrongness, he/she does so only in the knowledge that he/she can get away with it because ultimately it is his/her choice, they have afforded themselves a mandate that means they don't have to listen to anyone tell them what to do.
Compelling television I don't know depends who's debating and I guess that's all relative.
But seriously if I ruled the world I wouldn't tolerate PBS commentary on my policy because I wouldn't seek legitimacy through democratic election. I'd seek advice for sure, I'm no expert on fiscal policy, sustainable energy, health & infrastructure etc. I take this stance because I see the US spend several times more than probably 30 of the worlds poorest nations GNP just to get elected.
You can arm yourself pretty well with just a brain, anyone can, and if there's certain things you don't provide no leader can retain power for long, yet effective leaders can emerge in almost any system and be successful simply by understanding how to balance and sustain their power. Power just as a word sounds so totalitarian and testosterone charged that it immediately sounds bad.
I don't think it has too. Polittical parties in Australia fight out benign election campaigns on drab issues with unappealing personalities and far too much coverage in order to retain the power, not to oppress, maim, butcher but instead to decide how to spend the budget and which bigger fish to kiss arse to and the extent of that arse kissing (Do you stick out the tongue or just peck and hope minimal residue gets inhaled when your lips part again?)
Power's useful and nothing goes anywhere unless someone has it. The US mantle as world superpower isn't under threat by terrorism, in this day and age they should be afraid of competence.

Hail the Conscious crush the unconscious

You know what, I was sitting on the train with this Goth girl that had to be 16 or some shit. She had a long nose so her black mascara made her eyes seem really sunken into her head. And sometimes I think I should just say to these people 'Come over to my camp, you'll like it it's pretty cool, we're easy going, just enjoy life.'
Then I remember I don't have a camp, or an estate or anything to support these people. I'm tempted to try and just finance a school in Africa through Oxfam not because I particularly want to help Africans over other people in the world but because I can afford to in Africa, it'd cost me $200 to set up a school there verses $1.7 million here (Capital plus loan money) and then it wouldn't make money unless I taught what the fucking government wanted me to teach I couldn't go unlocking humann potential that way.
When I went to see Joe my Psycholigist it was fortuitous that his office was located in the Brunswick Incubator. Just a small space to allow startups to take place. I thought Paul Rubens woould love this place.
That's what I really want to do. I was talking to Damo on the train last night on the way to Haruka's farewell and commented how nobody was really shocked or surprised at his news that he was going to do a PhD in the US.
He started laying into how a lot of people wouldn't think much of my dream of going to Japan to make lots of money. Which tells me that not many people really know the essence of my dream. I mean that isn't even a dream no more than riding the corkscrew at seaworld is someone's dream.
My dream is to be a finacer or the fancier term I was using in Damo's presence: financier.
I had a lot of good ideas when I was 16. Nobody would back a 16 year old though because a lot of bad ideas come from 16 year olds and a lot of them cant get past the 'let's build a skatepark idea' which was what lead to me getting so frustrated that I quit Ballarat City Youth Council.
I want to be a Medici, I want to bankroll actual human development. I want to have a building with crazy people trying to make there ideas and dreams feasible realities under my roof. Like some kind of umbrella which I don't personally ever use.
An estate a legacy, to build something in my time here and contribute something visable and tangible even if I'm just some name in line three of thankyous that contributed cash that in itself has no inherant value.
Like Lao Tzu's ideal I want to take this and give that. A true sage. I got that ring commisioned, for the same price as a school with textbooks in africa. Was the money ill spent? I don't think so because the ring represents this camp, this building that houses dreams like a rubix cube that I want to sprout out in the frontrunners of humanities search for meaning. I'll build the school aswell as soon as I find out who to give the money to, but I want it to be under the umbrella of that idea sitting there on a finger reminding me of the bigger picture.
A syndicate of dreams.