Tuesday, November 17, 2015
Monday, November 16, 2015
Thursday, November 12, 2015
Um and Ahem and Other Place Holders
So... if I had an audience of readers, I would apologize for being away for a couple of weeks, but, since I don't, who cares?
Over the past three weeks I have had a cold, a headache from trying to go cold turkey on coffee, and a brief relapse with alcohol. I had nearly twenty months sober and lost my way. I sometimes have to remind myself that it's not the end of the world, that I didn't just throw away twenty months of hard work and self-improvement. As long as I use the relapse as a means of strengthening my sobriety, then nothing was lost.
I attended the Blue Lotus Buddhist Temple last night for guided meditation, and found it quite... nice? That's such a useless word. I found it relaxing. I found it satisfying. I found it another important step in rebuilding the scaffolding around my sobriety. This is a work in progress, though it's not a project that will ever be complete.
May we be happy. May we be safe. May we be peaceful.
Over the past three weeks I have had a cold, a headache from trying to go cold turkey on coffee, and a brief relapse with alcohol. I had nearly twenty months sober and lost my way. I sometimes have to remind myself that it's not the end of the world, that I didn't just throw away twenty months of hard work and self-improvement. As long as I use the relapse as a means of strengthening my sobriety, then nothing was lost.
I attended the Blue Lotus Buddhist Temple last night for guided meditation, and found it quite... nice? That's such a useless word. I found it relaxing. I found it satisfying. I found it another important step in rebuilding the scaffolding around my sobriety. This is a work in progress, though it's not a project that will ever be complete.
May we be happy. May we be safe. May we be peaceful.
Sunday, November 1, 2015
The Hurt Locker
I finally got around to watching The Hurt Locker yesterday, and I'll say that I was unimpressed. The story was long and meandering, the plot felt loose and flowing rather than tight and well-constructed. There were several tangents which didn't seem to contribute anything to the overall story arc, and Jeremy Renner's stellar acting skills were just kind of wasted on the production.
Bleh.
That said, towards the end of the movie, while speaking to his infant son, Renner's character said something that struck me as both true and important: as we humans get older, we grow to love fewer and fewer things.
When we're young, the world is a source of endless fascination and beauty, and we so easily fall in love with every shiny thing that catches our attention. By the time we're adults and have begun to sink roots into the earth, we are not quite as susceptible to the quick thrill of love anymore.
That's not necessarily a bad thing. On the contrary, it's probably an important evolution that occurs within us.
I just wanted to share the line with you because it made me think, and thinking is a wonderful thing.
Bleh.
That said, towards the end of the movie, while speaking to his infant son, Renner's character said something that struck me as both true and important: as we humans get older, we grow to love fewer and fewer things.
When we're young, the world is a source of endless fascination and beauty, and we so easily fall in love with every shiny thing that catches our attention. By the time we're adults and have begun to sink roots into the earth, we are not quite as susceptible to the quick thrill of love anymore.
That's not necessarily a bad thing. On the contrary, it's probably an important evolution that occurs within us.
I just wanted to share the line with you because it made me think, and thinking is a wonderful thing.
Thursday, October 29, 2015
Pop-Culture Feminist Warriors
I consider myself a feminist.
I have always considered myself a feminist, even before I knew what the word meant. I was, to be certain, a weird little boy. When I was seven I wanted Wonder Woman underwear more than anything else in the world and my parents, being obliging and open-minded, bought me a pair. A picture of me posing in them sits on top of the desk in bedroom now. Of course, I also had Superman pajamas that I proudly wore, so I represented both sides of the gendered coin.
Being a father to two lovely girls has only reinforced my commitment to feminist principles. You know, the radical idea that women are human beings deserving of the same treatment and opportunity as men.
Which brings me to... Barbie?
Yes. Barbie. As a rule, I abhor Barbie. Mind you, Barbie is not the problem, but rather a symptom of a much more insidious illness within society. It is the illness that makes women feel bad about the way that they look, that makes women believe that there exists an unattainable ideal for which they must strive and suffer. This false idol of beauty is omnipresent: Disney princesses, singers, actresses, and, of course, Barbie dolls.
There is a new ad for Barbie out, entitled Imagine the Possibilities, that offers a new take on playing with Barbies. While the ad makes no effort to alter the physical impossibilities of Barbie's shape, it does promote the endless possibilities of empowering young women, and for that, at least, I am pleased.
Check it out.
Remember: you are you. The way you look is perfect. You don't need to lose weight in order to look better. You don't need a different nose. Lipstick does not make you more appealing. Waxing is not an evolutionary imperative. Be yourself. Love yourself. Fuck anyone who demands something different from you.
I have always considered myself a feminist, even before I knew what the word meant. I was, to be certain, a weird little boy. When I was seven I wanted Wonder Woman underwear more than anything else in the world and my parents, being obliging and open-minded, bought me a pair. A picture of me posing in them sits on top of the desk in bedroom now. Of course, I also had Superman pajamas that I proudly wore, so I represented both sides of the gendered coin.
Being a father to two lovely girls has only reinforced my commitment to feminist principles. You know, the radical idea that women are human beings deserving of the same treatment and opportunity as men.
Which brings me to... Barbie?
Yes. Barbie. As a rule, I abhor Barbie. Mind you, Barbie is not the problem, but rather a symptom of a much more insidious illness within society. It is the illness that makes women feel bad about the way that they look, that makes women believe that there exists an unattainable ideal for which they must strive and suffer. This false idol of beauty is omnipresent: Disney princesses, singers, actresses, and, of course, Barbie dolls.
There is a new ad for Barbie out, entitled Imagine the Possibilities, that offers a new take on playing with Barbies. While the ad makes no effort to alter the physical impossibilities of Barbie's shape, it does promote the endless possibilities of empowering young women, and for that, at least, I am pleased.
Check it out.
Remember: you are you. The way you look is perfect. You don't need to lose weight in order to look better. You don't need a different nose. Lipstick does not make you more appealing. Waxing is not an evolutionary imperative. Be yourself. Love yourself. Fuck anyone who demands something different from you.
Thursday, October 22, 2015
It's a Trap!
So... white supremacists are apparently enraged over the newly-released preview for the new Star Wars movie. I guess it promotes white genocide or some other anxiety fetish of the fringe right-wing.
They've even started their own hashtag, so you know it's a serious political movement...
It seems that black actor John Boyega has an important role in the movie, and this inclusion of a black dude in a space movie from an unspecified time and place is proof positive that... white people now face cultural and or literal extermination. If you find that connection difficult to make, then pat yourself on the back, because it's a clear demonstration that you're a functional human being.
This is so mindbogglingly stupid that I'm not even sure where to begin with a counterpoint. The fact is that I'm exhausted of treating these idiot racists as though they were human beings deserving of my patience and time. If you think that the new Star Wars movie represents some kind of covert cultural plot to subvert white supremacy, then I hope that you move to the backwoods of an unmapped area, construct yourself an outhouse from moldy wooden boards that you salvaged from an abandoned doghouse, don a tinfoil hat, and spend your day masturbating to your Nazi fantasies.
Good riddance.
They've even started their own hashtag, so you know it's a serious political movement...
It seems that black actor John Boyega has an important role in the movie, and this inclusion of a black dude in a space movie from an unspecified time and place is proof positive that... white people now face cultural and or literal extermination. If you find that connection difficult to make, then pat yourself on the back, because it's a clear demonstration that you're a functional human being.
This is so mindbogglingly stupid that I'm not even sure where to begin with a counterpoint. The fact is that I'm exhausted of treating these idiot racists as though they were human beings deserving of my patience and time. If you think that the new Star Wars movie represents some kind of covert cultural plot to subvert white supremacy, then I hope that you move to the backwoods of an unmapped area, construct yourself an outhouse from moldy wooden boards that you salvaged from an abandoned doghouse, don a tinfoil hat, and spend your day masturbating to your Nazi fantasies.
Good riddance.
Tuesday, October 20, 2015
Your Life in Pi
Pi. Sometimes approximated as 3.14 or 22/7, it is an irrational number that has no exact fractional representation and whose decimal representation goes on into infinity.
It's an incredible number.
Check it out. Since it's an infinite, non-repeating number, every conceivable sequence of numbers will be represented at some point on the endless line of digits of pi. Your phone number is somewhere in there. Your birthday is in there. Your paternal grandfather's birthday followed by his first phone number followed by the date he was married is in there.
But it gets better. When the digits of pi are converted into binary (the 0's and 1's that compose the digital script for the pictures that we see on television sets), every conceivable picture will show up at some point along the line of pi. There will be a picture of you when you were born. There will be an exact replica of the Mona Lisa. A picture of you and your significant other engaged in your first awkward kiss. Every movie ever made, every book ever written, every unplanned Tourette's outburst: all represented within pi.
This blog post.
Basically, all of the information ever created within the universe is stored within the digits of pi. It's really breathtaking when you take time to consider the implications of this fabulous number.
It's an incredible number.
Check it out. Since it's an infinite, non-repeating number, every conceivable sequence of numbers will be represented at some point on the endless line of digits of pi. Your phone number is somewhere in there. Your birthday is in there. Your paternal grandfather's birthday followed by his first phone number followed by the date he was married is in there.
But it gets better. When the digits of pi are converted into binary (the 0's and 1's that compose the digital script for the pictures that we see on television sets), every conceivable picture will show up at some point along the line of pi. There will be a picture of you when you were born. There will be an exact replica of the Mona Lisa. A picture of you and your significant other engaged in your first awkward kiss. Every movie ever made, every book ever written, every unplanned Tourette's outburst: all represented within pi.
This blog post.
Basically, all of the information ever created within the universe is stored within the digits of pi. It's really breathtaking when you take time to consider the implications of this fabulous number.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)