On New Years eve - and what not

Well it’s snowing – hell it should be snowing and a bit cold for the New Year’s its winter and that’s the way it should be – the 68 degrees on Christmas was just wrong.

It’s been a bit of a grind this year and looks, at least for the moment it looks like next year is going to be even more of a grind – so time to celebrate hope for the best and maybe just dose off during a football game.

On the bright side – after January 20th we won’t have someone in the White House who instinctual response to any crisis will be to make things worse.

And that at the next gathering of international leaders the President of the United States won’t automatically be the stupidest person in the room.

And I don’t think folks will be tossing shoes at him anytime soon. Maybe the beltway insiders might but they are useless wastes of protein as witnessed by the unbelievable Cookie Roberts comment this year about Osama might be making a mistake going to Hawaii because it’s too exotic and foreign in the eyes of normal Americans. Cookie: One it’s a state, two the closest you get to normal working types are the people you yell at when your coffee is cold.

Meantime well the Middle East is an unholy mess again. After all this time I can’t imagine either side really expects the other side to stop.

In the US state governments are cutting spending everywhere – it’s not something that makes sense really in a down turn this is not the time for the states to do this but many of them are limited either by balanced budget amendments or simply limits on how much they can tax who. It’s a bad system but again proves the power of a bad idea. I read and it makes a lot of sense is that one of the reasons that Keynes is so roundly hated in economic circles is that he approached economics as technical subject not like it was morality play – were one should be punished for falling away from the true faith of free markets and balanced government budgets.

Had a nice Christmas and all that but didn’t nearly get done what I wanted to get done. First I was tired and second – the various cable channels had a free preview weekend – so well between that and Boxing Day soccer – not much happened to me.

Finally got to see Spiderman 3 and frankly I was glad I was seeing it for free – the guy playing Parker should never appear in the spidey suit without the mask and never ever again try to act like John Travolta ever. Meantime my overall reaction was to start yelling at the screen “ for god’s sake all of you – stop whining!” Mary Jane – you’re a beautiful and talented young woman – you had a bad outing – so did fucking Katherine Hepburn so either learn from it or just do something else –. Parker you can god damn climb up walls and despite your nerdy looks and self absorbed whining personality Mary Jane loves you so shut the fuck up. Sandman – for god’s sake just shut up about the daughter okay – why not try getting a normal job like sanding paint of cars – go into business for yourself. Damn I mess the self confident villains that was always the treat of Spiderman comics – the bad guy never had a second of hesitation about himself EVER – and Harry – you’re a fantastically rich victim of amnesia – roll with it you have been given a chance to make your self into anything you want to be without to be honest – the burdens and wounds the rest of us have picked up getting to your age – so shut up!

No I didn’t like the movie.

I was however impressed with Rocky Balboa much to my surprise – the fight at the end was well kind of expected – but the film had a real feel of the weight of age and experience coming down on these people – and it was like Stallone was taking one last look at the character that made him into a star and using it to work out things like the cost of stardom and the effect it has on the ones you love and the price you pay and what happens when it’s not what it was. You needed to see the other films with their ups and downs to get to this one but it seemed worth the trip.

Meantime picked one of those 50 movies for 10 buck things you see in the stores from time to time – and once again it’s proved to me again – you get what you pay for.

But as a rule of thumb one, any film with John Saxon as a guest star is probably not going to be very good and two if that film is Prisoners of the Lost Universe well you know you’re not getting much. And I didn’t. I didn’t even get a “bathe her and bring her to me” scene.

Bleh.

And now some New Year’s stuff. Why not?

1) Lose some weight – don’t well have this
2) get to the gym more – not just to lose weight – I’m just outta shape all over
3) Get out more - see more shows and the like – I live in amazing city were if I wanted to I could find a show that has dogs barking Shakespeare – I need to do more of that.
4) If somehow romance does re-enter my life I’ll try not to react like I was getting the news that I need still extensive dental work sans Novocain.
5) This one’s a bit well hard to say but simply put I need to let folks in more and be more accepting that people like me and well just let them express that to me rather than cut it off out of combined embarrassment and low self esteem. It’s rude and hurtful and I apologize for doing it in the past. Like I said I’ll try not to do it as much in the future.
6) Maybe a few less hideous films
7) Write more songs – good and bad isn’t really my call – I need to be writing more – the bad ones we’ll just toss and the way it works for me I have to write more than a few bad ones before we can get a keeper.
8) get better on the guitar – esp. the electric so The Enemy Below isn’t carrying all the weight on the instrument.
9) – Lighten up

Well that’s it have a great New Year – get home safe and get home safe and un marked – when did folks decide writing on someone who’s passed out is fun? I missed that memo.

Again Happy New Year

Peace Love Shonen Knife.

Some Days - and some worlds

Some days

Some days I feel like I’m watching the beginning of the Road Warrior.

Also known as Mad Max 2 – the movie opens with an old man talking over a montage of stock footage and scenes from the first film as western civilization collapses as oil supplies dwindle down to nothing.

“The leaders talked and talked and talked but nothing could stem the avalanche”

It’s been a weird holiday season – the economy keeps tanking and a new a fascinating weakness pop up weekly – this week it’s the commercial real estate market that is coming to Washington with their hands out for cash. Retail sales are just awful and yet – there is no real sense of crisis in the mainstream media - everybody is trying to keep a good face on things and 150 billion dollar ponzi schemes are uncovered every day of the week.

I really really am worried about the next 20 or so days – I just saw that a money market fund is going to restrict withdrawals – which is what one does when you have a run on your money market company. Money markets are not – gee what a damn surprise – part of the FDIC and therefore offer better rates the problem when this shit happens.

I am assuming that the presidents and what not of this company will do okay and get bailout money. The folks who own the money market accounts themselves well not so much. It’s the way of things – people in steerage are not allowed to go to the life boats.

It is the irresponsible playing with fire by folks with ideological axes to grind that truly frighten me. However I’m not going to be saying both sides are as guilty as the other in this – that’s simply not damn true.

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Next day –

Had planned to get this up yesterday but things got in the way. It’s finally Christmas Eve and finally I’m done.

I’ve come to the conclusion that shopping for Christmas like emptying a desk drawer or doing a work of art is not something that you finish – it’s something that you abandon. I’m sure I’ve missed someone but boys and girls – I’m outta time and outta cash so better luck next year.

Anyway – want to thank the band for allowing me to have more damn fun than a man my age should have I think. It’s been a present that just keeps on giving. Here’s to more tastelessness in the coming year.

Saw Handel’s Messiah for the first time in a while – at 3 hours it is a bit on the long side and there are parts that you could say drag a bit to someone who plays violent video games and listens to the Ramones – but I’d rather hear the whole thing rather than highlights – the hallaluia chorus is far more moving within the contenxt of the of whole oratorio rather than as a highlight you can feel the piece lead up to it. I think that goes for Wagner’s Ring as well – which I am almost through – one last one to go – I kind of think of it as intellectual spinach or mind roughage to make up for the repeated watching of Plan Nine from Outer space, Manos the Hands of Fate, Super Inframan and Robot Monster.

Also reading a book on parallel universes which has a surprisingly respected place in physics when dealing with Quantum mechanics.

The basic thrust of the idea is that when ever one quantum event is observed – trust me it would take days for me to write out what is meant by quantum event and I’d probably miss most of the important points – anyway once a quantum event is observed, multi-worlds holds that the other quantum possibly (heads tails although its far more complicated than that) shows up in another universe.

This always struck me as being well excessive but the book is interesting anyway – and it has an interesting kick.

One of the great problems of contemporary physics is the problem of Quantum Gravity – or how does gravity work on the quantum level – Einstein’s theory of General Relativity is what is known as a classical theory where in the objects being acted upon are real in that they have attributes that are there whether you are looking or not as opposed to Quantum entities which aren’t real in that manner – like a coin that didn’t have heads or tails before you flipped it only the potential – that’s probably not quite right neither. In any event the book pointed out that one link between General Relativity and Quantum Mechanics are both of them have solutions that predict multiple universes. I’m only about 1/3rd of my way though the book but I do find that an interesting coincidence.

Of course science fiction writers have used the idea of a multiple universe for ages now – hell even Jet Li used it in a movie.

Still what kind of bugs me about the whole idea , aside from the extravagance of it , is that if there are multiple universes and some of them contain some version of me who is wildly successful and beloved of beautiful women – why is that not be. And to that bob if you are out there – I hate you with the heat of a thousand suns.

Well before I start to think about the Bobs who are worse off than me and get totally depressed I’m going to wish you all happy holidays from all of me

Peace, Love, The roll of Quantum Dice and love the earth a bit okay?

If the Shoe Fits Throw it?

Well I’ve seen a lot of surreal things over my years – including things that would make Salvador Dali just toss up his hands and say “oh you can’t be serious.” But this most recent incident with W is just pins the bizarre meter. In the long and not always glorious history of the presidency – nobody ever got shoes tossed at them. I suspect that the Secret service will be inspecting reporters at press conferences for things like rotten fruit and dead cats (to list two traditional things folks in the west have been known to toss at folks they dislike).

There is little chance really that people will start tossing shoes at W where ever he goes, especially in America, shoes are expensive even the damn sneakers.

As we continue to careen towards the great depression part 2 – we have folks who just want to make things worse – because they either a cynics or truly believe the nonsense they spout or they are stupid – this is not to rule out all three being true by the way.

Odd warm day – the rest of the country seems to crawling out of ice and snow but here in the northeast where you it supposed to be cold – well it’s 60.

Speaking of climate they have remade the Day the Earth Stood Still – but this time –it’s about the environment – from the reviews it’s heavy handed and no fun at all which kind of undercuts the point.

There is problem with making message films – you end up losing the story because of the message – the original Godzilla was an Anti-war primarily anti- arms race film but it didn’t beat you over the head with that – Godzilla was the embodiment of the bomb – and it’s blind destruction and horror. But that was as it where subtext.

the original Day was also about the Bomb – but the message here was while heavy not preachy – it was simply “ do what you do with this mudball – but if you take your warlike ways outside this solar system Robots like Gort will reduce you planet to a lifeless cinder – thank you have a nice day.

The message could have been similar but keyed towards the environment – go ahead and treat this planet like a toilet if you want to but – bring your garbage outside your local system and we’ll reduce this planet to a cinder. Have a nice day.

I was saddened by some of the nasty comments about the film that were talking about how the global warming folks wanted us to go back to the dark ages – when of course not doing anything about warming is formula for chaos – with a pretty good chance of a dark ages that would make the on imagined in the Road Warrior look like a day at the beach. It’s sad folks have this attitude but I remember one person who said people will not fight for their liberties but they will turn suicidal in defense of the privileges. And we see that over and over again. I keep thinking of Sicily that at one time was covered with trees.

I’m told there were demonstrations asking for the release of the shoe tosser.

You know it’s things like this that can snowball into trouble very very quickly. Revolts have started with less. We’ll have to see what happens. I’m not sanguine about our ability to keep the Iraq street calm.

No Christmas shopping as of today – which means if it wasn’t for Amazon nobody gets a thing from me.

Need some new strange stuff – I guess a trip to the record store is in order.

Been thinking about the Captain America Movie – there are going to be some problems here - one the man altered by science into a superman or superhuman has been done to death in Sci-fi films – and the whole man out of time deal where he’s in WW2 and then gets frozen is something else that’s been done to death. In the comic although it was a shock for Steve it was 1964 and 20 years – now were talking 64 or more – how does someone even begin to understand what happened or what the changes are?

Well they did a good job with Iron Man who had as many problems in his back story – we’ll see what they do.

Peace Love Cap

The Dismal Science and a Dead Lizard King

Been light on the blogging for a while – a) I’ve been busy and b) I’ve been sick as a dog – I don’t know why a dog should the ultimate example of being sick but there you have it – I have learned not to question the wisdom of the makers of idiomatic expressions.

Anyway, I’ve been locked in las casa de illness for the past week – I did drag myself to work Wednesday on but I think the only result was everybody else is getting sick. Well on to other things

Been reading Paul Krugman’s book Depression Economics – one does not stay as boring as I am without constant study – and true to its title, it’s a pretty grim read. Krugman is in a way an heir to the John Kenneth Galbraith wing of economics – although much more towards the center than JKG ever was – but in these days anyone left of Milton Friedman is considered some kind of dangerous radical.

Economics is a funny discipline in a lot of ways – it’s treated as important because it is about money and anything about money will always get people’s attention, it’s cloaked in of complex mathematical formulas much more so than the other social sciences and it has a rather peculiar ideological component that the free market is the correct answer every time to every social question. . Which can lead people to make – what are in hindsight (and even well before) – hideously bad even stupid choices.

Anyway Krugman isn’t that amused by that aspect of the deal, although the recent trashing of FDR and Keynes in the right wing press has caused him no little amusement.

One thing as I was buying the book I founded surrounded by books that were insisting that the gods were still in the temples and that the solution to the problems was more deregulation and just to pick a random example that CEO’s are not over paid (you might want to check on that out a bit since they are the ones screaming for government handouts right now)

In the book Krugman examines several events that led panics and the kind of sluggish no growth afterwards for quite some time - the essence of how the great depression played out.

One of the odd things about this crisis is that there are people who – despite years – like years and years of evidence – continue to proscribe slashing government spending and balancing the budget – this is akin to some one suggest that they bleed the patient to treat the infection despite the large stocks of antibiotics on hand.

It would be amusing if people’s lives weren’t going to get ruined by all this.

Meantime the internets let me know what if the lizard king had lived he would be 65 years old today.

The idea of an acid casualty Morrison just gibbering into a press microphone today as he swilled scotch is rather too depressing for words.

The doors and the myth of the doors held me in a un healthy fascination for a time when I was younger. It was a bad time for me – everything life, sex, death, love, just day to day things seemed fucking dangerous to me – whole sense of self was very very fluid to be sure. Hell, I was very young, in years and in experience. To me, Jim was the yeah isn’t’ that great – it’s all dangerous, it’s freedom to me. At least until the Ramones showed me another path. Still once I finish this, I’m going listen to the old man.

Peace love You cannot petition the lord with prayer!