The Back of Tuor's Head

Well, I've changed my Keenspot sig to point here -- Welcome to both of you. Also to those who have followed out from my webpage.

Well, I've recently become aware of two good bands, Cheap Trick and Letters to Cleo. Star-corssed by their renditions of "I Want You to Want Me". I know, I know; Cheap Trick sings "wussy" songs, but they're good. So there. Also, when they were on Conan, their singer reminded me of a certain caving Rick pictured here in the right-hand image.

Humm... difficulty with random story for today.

I'm excited that I've had a few captions accepted recently at A1-AAA. I've floated in and out of that for years now, since just before the Dysfunctional Family Circus (DFC) ended, and I've never hand more than one caption appear in a stretch of active pictures. If you ever get the chance, Google for "Free Floating DFC Archive" and download it. The DFC is by far the funniest long-running gag I have ever found on the internet. I have laughed until I hurt on a few of those gems. I quote some of my favorite captions.

I haven't, however, read all 400 of them. There are a few in the middle I have missed, and I've must get through them one of these days. It is a classic part of the web. It's too bad that King Features Syndicate decided to shut them down, but once you see the darkness of the humor there you may understand why they would when they saw it.

I will never forget such great phrases as "Sperm-burping gutter slut" and "Uniboob" that I got from there.

Finally, I would like to apologize for the verbosity of the last post. Sometimes you feel like going over the top.

TTFN

I saw Old School last night. It was very good, not what I expected. The previews I had seen didn't do it justice.
The wedding at the beginning, however, seemed a little random. It was woven into the fabric of the story well, but seemed almost unnecessary back-story.

Speaking of weddings, I helped film one this weekend. Quite the panoply of Christianity. Not physically, but verbally. I mean knee-deep in Dogma. Quite the dedicated bride and groom, as a matter of fact her parents didn't approve of the marriage, partially due to the religousosity of the groom; they didn't show up.

It is quite amazing to experience this first-hand. To be in the spectacle was in many ways amusing and enlightening. They would pray animatedly and often when the chance arose.

But for me, as well I expect most, it was too much. Religion, yes, should be part of your every-day life, but you should not constantly be pulling it out of your pocket and looking at it, as if it might disappear. That was the feeling I got.

I found this Bible verse on a message board the other day that was in the middle of a religion debate. I should read that book through one day, there are quite a few good quotes you can pull out against the 'thumpers.

(Matthew 6:5-6)
"And when thou prayest, thou shalt not be as the hypocrites are: for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the corners of the streets that they may be seen of men."

I don't believe this was the case in this situation, simply I was in the presence of a few devoted followers. It is, however unfortunately, the case most of the time you hear prayer in public. Televangelests, and evangelists of most types are so adamant and forceful, I believe, for a great variety of negative reasons. They don't believe as much as they feel they should; they do bad things and pronounce faith to sooth their conscience; they feel the need to fit in or stand out or be more holier than thou.

On the other side, the quiet ones are often more profound. This seems to be part of the secret attraction of many Eastern spiritual belief systems; non-evangelistic, quiet and thoughtful monks. Of course, these people do appear in most major religions, but are over-shadowed by the loud ones. The loud ones who drown out the message with chatter and bigotry.

Perhaps next week we should go outside and thank the Sun and whatever deity you hold dear for its gift of light, heat, and life. Quietly.

While fiddling around on "FARK" (see sidebar) I came across two links I liked. (A) (B) about some random number affected computers. I just think it's cool a college really has a parapsychology department. After all, many important developments have come from ideas no one believed.
FARK is great for all those random news items. And Photoshop. Photoshop is good.

I don't get on the internet as much, or get as much done on it, since I'm away from my broadband connection. Modems are just too damn slow for us wild techie types. Otherwise there'd be a few Slashdot stories floating around here too, perhaps some other random computer-stuff.

Maybe I'm just being strange, but I hate it when roommates eat your food. It drives me blimey up the wall. "No I left food out so YOU wouldn't be inconvienced by going to the fridge to get it out. I wasn't going to eat that later."
"Of course I bought that for YOU to drink. I never spend money on myself."
Some people just believe the world owes them, I guess.

Also today, I was over reading Wil Wheaton dot net, and I think I may have to buy his book. Smart kid that Wil. I wish I had made it to the Comic Con myself. I never really got into print comics, but webcomics strike a certain weak spot in me. Well, that shall be a rant itself some day.

TTFN

I hate Wal-Mart.
Sometimes you have to go there, like when it is the only major store in the town, or everything else is closed by six. Even then, the chance they have what you want is usually about sixty percent; and if they have what you want it will take you forever to find it since it is in an unintuitive department that has just been re-arranged in the past week.

This is going beyond the whole understanding that as soon as Wal-Mart comes in it depresses your local business by under-cutting them, or offering cheap, poorly-made items so people believe they are getting some kind of value. They will also use their might to make a loss on a store until they drive their competition out of business, leaving you with higher prices and less variety.

Of course, they whine for tax and utility breaks from a community, which everyone ends up paying for in the end; and ship off their profit to corporate headquarters off in god-knows-where instead of returning it to the local area.

-----

On a more positive note, I love summer showers. They seem to cleanse the earth of the dust and grime that accumulates as humanity blunders across her face. Things just feel cleaner during and just after a shower, sounds seem clearer and colors are more intense.

-----

Thought for the Day:

If Microsoft made toasters...
Every time you bought a loaf of bread, you would have to buy a toaster. You wouldn't have to take the toaster, but you'd still have to pay for it anyway. Toaster'95 would weigh 15000 pounds (hence requiring a reinforced steel countertop), draw enough electricity to power a small city, take up 95% of the space in your kitchen, would claim to be the first toaster that lets you control how light or dark you want your toast to be, and would secretly interrogate your other appliances to find out who made them. Everyone would hate Microsoft toasters, but nonetheless would buy them since most of the good bread only works with their toasters.
If Apple made toasters...
It would do everything the Microsoft toaster does, but 5 years earlier.

Well, here is my first post. I'm sitting here watching a little Dennis Miller Live on my computer. Gods Above, I need HBO. And my two-button mouse just kicked the bucket.

And have you heard about the Jesus sign in Bedford, PA? Some people just like to try to piss other people off, and towns, and boards. That's what I want outside my window, blinking neon.

Well, that would be my first gripe. I shall have plenty more as time goes on, but TTFN.