Unintelligent Designs

It's unfortunate when one of my favorite hobby sites is hit with something like this:

Jon Power's "Happy Newtonmas!" List

However, this being the intarweb, I suppose it's unavoidable. On many other sites, it would be deleted for yet another intarweb phenomenon, trolling.

What I believe is irrelevant. That list is simply a nice study in human nature. You might want to say Geek Nature to be specific, but the existence of a higher power is a very human argument. It's also a pretty worthless argument, since no one ever convinces anyone of anything different from what they believed going into the argument.

Each individual is a summation of his personal reality. His belief system is colored by his experiences. Thus, his belief in a higher power, or lack thereof, can be traced to his unique human makeup - natural intellect, upbringing, education, media influence, the stuff he eats for breakfast, and what brand of soap he uses (if any).

I've been on both sides of the fence in my thirty-odd years, though never quite as extreme to either end (assuming you condsider the two sides as opposites in terms of belief, which many do, but I'm not convinced that they are). I think I've found a happy medium, couched in human nature as I understand it. Some people find comfort in knowing that there is a higher power, something to look forward to after death, someone to turn to when there is no hope left. Others draw strength from certainty that this existence is all that there is, and there is little (if anything) that cannot be understood and/or influenced by humans (ie, themselves).

Both ways are fine, because people need different things.

The truth, if there is one, is irrelevant.

Merry Christmas Morning

I find it interesting that weblogging has become such as part of peoples' lives that making entries on significant days, like today, has become second nature. Yes, it's just an evolution of the diary, especially for weblogs such as this one which have no audience, but it's still interesting. Hopefully, the electrons will stay in place and these words will be preserved forever.

Merry Christmas, 2005. See you at the turn of the year.

Ballad Of The Times

Somehow I've run out of podcasts to listen to, so I've been able to get back to listening to music in the car for a spell. After playing the new CDs a few times, I'm running through my collection.

Eveything But the Girl has made a lot of great music over the years. I prefer their earlier acoustic, Tracey Thorn vocals-driven work compared to their later electronica-infested catalog. My favorite cut is a lesser-known tune called "Ballad of the Times". It's a track off their second album, the 1985 disc "Love not Money". (That's not my favorite album though - that honor goes to 1988's "Idlewild".)

Two Kinds of Writing

It's a curse.

I can write on a lot of things. 2,000 words on music? Easy. 3,000 words on a movie or book? Child's play. 4,000 words on a board, card or roleplaying game? No problem.

A 2,000 word contract for work? Stuck. Two weeks and counting. I start reading and editing and I zone out. I try to work it from a template and the words blur. I even tried to do it from scratch from an outline and my writing brain blanks. Holy shit, what's the deal? It's just a bit of legalese; I did this shit for 18 months in my last job and it didn't bother me, what the fuck is wrong now?

Sigh.

This writing thing is so fickle, which is why I always have serious doubts when I consider attempting writing for a living. My writing gene is unreliable. My writing soul is picky.

Tomorrow, there is no work. I will attempt the writing for work from a Starbucks with a steaming hot Peppermint Cafe Mocha on my left, and a nice ham and cheese croissant on my right. If that doesn't work... crap.

The Devil is in the Dust

I didn't really consider Bruce's last effort, The Rising, as a typical "Bruce album". It was full of 9/11 imagery and it was powerful and parts of it rocked hard, but it was off the beaten track for The Boss.

This is more like it.

Devils and Dust is back to the storytelling Bruce, the dark, quiet version that spawned the haunting Nebraska and the desolate The Ghost of Tom Joad. Devils isn't quite as sparse as the previous two CDs I mention, the former a renowned Boss classic, the latter a forgotten, underrated brilliant work. Its tunes are a bit more upbeat, its instrumentation a bit more robust, but the stories told are, if possible, even more depressing and desparate. Hookers, illegal immigrants, criminals - they're on Bruce's mind again, and they contribute to making this the best album he's made in a good long while.

In my part of the world we get two separate discs - the CD and the DVD with the 5.1 and videos aren't in the very strange "Dualdisc" format that seems to be de rigeur in North America. So, my wife can play the DVD at home while I play the CD in the car. Works for me. I haven't had the chance to take a look at the DVD contents. When I do, I'll post an update.

Back in the Saddle

The sad part about running three separate blogs compared to a single one with tags is that one or two might get neglected for a while. Sucks, but what can you do?

I've been meaning to post some thoughts on other media here (I'm not going into them deep enough to call them "reviews"), so I hope to eventually get there:

Kathleen Rowling's "Harry Potter and the Half-blood Prince"
Neil Gaiman's "Anansi Boys"
Alan Moore's graphic novel "V for Vendetta"
Bruce Springsteen's new CD "Devils and Dust"
Robbie Williams's new CD "Intensive Care"
Madonna's new CD "Confessions on a Dance Floor"

I'm still reading George Martin's "A Feast for Crows" and Jared Diamond's "Guns, Germs and Steel."