I Feel Vindicated

This substantial article in The Guardian UK looks at the evils of the Protestant work ethic and the value of indolence.

I, of course, always understood this.

Here are some excerpts:

"Greatness and late rising are natural bedfellows. Late rising is for the independent of mind, the individual who refuses to become a slave to work, money, ambition."

and

"Idleness as a waste of time is a damaging notion put about by its spiritually vacant enemies. Introspection could lead to that terrible thing: a vision of the truth, a clear image of the horror of our fractured, dissonant world."

and even

"God himself set a good example... after working for six days, he rests for all eternity."

This dog was no one's best friend

When in doubt, chuck him out...

How much are you worth?

Here's somewhere where you can find out exactly how much you cost in terms of dollars.

Hopefully it serves as a guideline rather than a figure to put on a ransom note...

Dubya and JEK Rock Web Monkeys' Vote

Just for the sake of interest, I found Dubya's blog right here.

Then I looked about and found JEK's blog here.

Dubya's one has got some Texan flare to it, whereas JEK's is more understated and blue (maybe to draw a connection to his blue blood?).

All I can say is that politics makes me feel ill after a few minutes and then I have to go here to get it out of my system.

Extreme Outsourcing

It was bound to happen...

Fahrenheit 9/11

A few days ago I saw this movie and was very impressed with the way it went about talking about the facts around 9/11. I was expecting demagoguery, but rather I got a documentary (although not unbiased) which was sensitive and ultimately concerned about how the people who benefit from freedom are not the ones who pay for it.

Have a look at Michael Moore's Website to examine the facts stated in the movie...

HRH Jon Kerry?

Is blue blood the judge of the presidency?

You choose...

Let it snow....

It has snowed for three days
And the trees bow down in humility
Monochromatic scenes outside the chilled window
Remind me of ski trips spent in the car
Chains beating the road
Behind the string of taillights
Rows of red eyes staring

The world is colder today
Coated with this shroud
The clouds blend with the ground
And the sound of life is muffled
Like a vow of silence
Stuffed into our gaping mouths.

A repost in honor of Michael Moore

America… Uhhh… merica

Night and day the bombs punctuate
Exclamations of hot expletives
Pock mark walls
Potholes the size of buses
Building trusses shudder blazed with blast marks
Dark streaks like morbid blush
Traffic jams of Bradleys and Abrams blazing dust
Rubble crushed bodies laze beside a saline drip
Maimed children missing legs, arms
Mothers clutching their damaged progeny
Ululating grief
Brief glimpses of calm under the fossil fuel smoke
Soldiers toke the pungent air wearing camouflaged stone
Reporters hone their skills for the ratings war
Civilian casualties soar into the thousands.

We say we came to liberate,
But when they see our rockets red glare
And bombs bursting in air
They will pray for us take the oil and leave.

4 April 2003

The big catchup

Well...

Almost two years has gone without a song -
What have I done to deserve this rest?

Even the best need a break from pace of change.

Some might say I'm not as strong as I once was
But moreso now I feel strange.

I've rearranged my life until it ressembles so little of what went before.
I used to know what was in store - or at least I could predict it well,
But rather than expect hell in a future that was bleak
I broke from the marital bonds that held my breath

And now after love, birth, moving, death and finally severance,
There is a chance that peace is soon to follow.

Tomorrow I will be closer to being apart and finally whole.

is this a plea?
be - and there you are
sitting there slumped
limp like a beaten dog
lumps for eyes and slush for thought
pushed to it's natural conclusion

hush - you might wake the neighbors


i've closed the door on you
i've closed the door again
i've meant to push you out
but your ring is still here
locked in with me
you can't see it
but it is here
it cycles in smaller turns
like a lecture
and i'm through taking notes


speak like a trauma
gutteral vivid unintelligible
language slurred by pain, confusion
a contusion of bruised seeping
weeping down over skin and cloth
ugly, vulgar, something to cover, hide
something to layer until forgotten
until rotten and diseased

won't you be pleased? it looks fine from the outside...

i'm back but i've lost the knack
don't kack on my backwash
you've stacked books against me

i've been vacationing on a fling
twisting on a swing
flung like a doll from side to side
eyes wide like a socket (no dreams)
with some lint in my pocket
and a rocket between my seams

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post9b

it seems that microsoft may take over the world after all....

post 9a

i've resurrected my connection
fingers doing their thing
letting you add the tune, sing,
to the black and white patterns in make-believe eyes
glimpsed faster than a drop of rain,
on a hood ornament
reflecting your surprise

post 8a

this poem is relevant whereas i may not be...


insomniac's salute

to the column heater hum in pre-dawn black
to the neon clap of vcr zeros
to the secondary clunk of the plastic wall clock tick
to the whirring tock of my laptop as i type
to the click and pop of joints out of place
to the rattan chair complaints stiffened by subzero lethargy
to the wool itch stitched in scratched sympathy
to the wobble of spheres stretched by a whisper sliver of moon
to the airplane boom mumbled into distant thought
to the serum sugars mulched in the pressured march of habit
to all these things sung in the muffle of sleep,
that creep in the dark and blend in the light,
these jab the pricks of insight gone wrong
like the hand of choice withdrawn
or the misstep of a song
syncopated impossibly to the rhythm of doubt
gone out into the ignorant night.

20/6/01

post 8

the days fade in a haze of repetition
unfazed by trauma, death
this too is a reprise
like every joy every hope
stirred evenly into grey soup
slopped for consumption
regurgitation (bis)
pasted on the wall like a warning
(insert coda)
surprise is for the forgetful
15/10/01

post 7

decision is a dull ache of consequence like a burn from a blaring sun

post 6 a

"There will be time, there will be time
To prepare a face to meet the faces that you meet;
There will be time to murder and create,
And time for all the works and days of hands
That lift and drop a question on your plate;
Time for you and time for me.
And time yet for a hundred indecisions,
And for a hundred visions and revisions,
Before the taking of a toast and tea. "

-From "Prufrock", TS Eliot

choice:

it's what i long for.

yet - the problem with choice is the responsibility of having made it, the responsibility of the effects of the choice.

i think as an american i want choice but don't want responsibility

i'll eat my cake but i don't want all those calories

i want to break the rules and not be punished

i want to escape and be free

thus i am indecisive

but responsibility is the given - if i am not responsible then someone else will ultimately be

and then i'd live in fear of reprisal in the intangeable eye of justice -

omnipresent, patient, precise

always pleading

mercy mercy mercy

please please please

so to be different than that i have to think

i have to be willing to accept the results of choice

i have to feel pain and heal

i have to stand up

i have to open my eyes

i have to live

i suppose there isn't really a choice in this matter...