November 22, 2010

What TSA Stands For Now

Given the paranoia around security issues, and the wholesale cowardice that legislators use by exploiting fear of terrorist attacks for cheap political gain, the United States' Transportation Security Administration or TSA is in need of renaming to more accurately reflect what they actually do.


1 - Travel Suspiciously Arrested

2 - Touching Swimsuit Areas

3 - Tits, Sacs, Asses

4 - Totalitarian Safety Abrogation

5 - Tough Shit America

6 - Travelers' Smoldering Anger

7 - Theater, Securely Absurd

8 - Terrorist Sanctioned Aggression

9 - Thanks, Senator Assmunch

10 - Tenuously Skipping Anuses

11 - Total Sexual Assault

November 21, 2010

I Cannot Understand Poetry

I Cannot Understand Poetry

I've never understood poetry, the practice of lining up words and the spaces between silence, the sound of symmetry.

I never understood poetry, a broken mirror to reality they told me meant anything can be reflected, opaque but precisely.

I'll never understand poetry, life is too much without covering your thoughts in shadows, boxed-in by complexity.

I cannot understand poetry, and that's very frightening.
It probably means too much to mean too little to me.

Where Is My Mind? An Impossible Essay about What Goes On In My Head.

There really can be no sure way of saying where my mind is at any moment.

Experts claim that all higher-order living beings, and most non-Glenbeckian humanoids, have what they call primary consciousness - they are alive, they can integrate what's happening to them to create a sense of the present and what needs to happen to continue living.

Most humans also possess a secondary consciousness where they know that they have consciousness, and it is the filter for their world and allows them to integrate past, present, hypothesize about unknowable things, test their perceptions, draw conclusions and even predict the future.

However, I feel often that I am in the throes of an uncontrollable tertiary consciousness.  It almost feels like a dissociative state, bordering perhaps on pathology, except it breezes in and out of my mind so quickly that I hesitate to call it anything other than a waking lucid dream.

Lucid dreaming is being able to know that you're dreaming while you are dreaming.  I am not a lucid dreamer in that I've never had the ability to know I'm dreaming while still asleep.  I have these when I am awake.  It can happen dozens of times a day, or I can go a day or two without it happening at all.

I would say that they were lucid daydreams, but unlike daydreams, nothing weird happens.  I simply feel like I've stepped out of my mind for a few (maybe 3-5) seconds, and what I am perceiving mentally doesn't become bizarre and dream-like - no fish driving cars or polygons that have the ability to speak - I just observe myself observing my reality.

It's almost impossible to describe.  Not an out-of-body experience, because I know and feel myself as still there and do not perceive other things that are not there or are three miles away, just the observance of my observance of reality.

Yes, it's very metacognitive, but it is also not of my control.  I can consciously chose to think about what and how I'm thinking.  This is different.  This can even be layered on top of metacognitive states.  It just happens, then goes away.  It comes back 15 minutes later, or 12 hours later, or it happens several times in the same minute.

Here's what goes through my head while these incidents are happening to me:

1) Oh... it's happening...

2) What happens if I say this / What happens if I do this?

3) Is the world continuing?

4) Yes, it seems to be.

5) Did I cause it to continue in this way?

6) What if I had done this differently?

7) Would the world be continuing in precisely this manner as I now perceive it to be continuing?

8) I cannot know.

9) Can I ever know?

10) Is it stopping now?

11) It's melting away.

12) Here's my reality again.

I don't mean to seem melodramatic, but it is a bizarre series of perceptions that are entirely mundane and impossible to answer at the same time.  Those questions all race through mind in a few seconds.

When I'm wondering in question #2, it is almost always the most rudimentary of things to say or do - picking up a scrap of paper, scratching my chin, saying "yes" instead of "no" about something - it is not ever about big words or actions or grand moments.  Always finding me in only quotidian thoughts or actions.

I can say that I mentally feel different while it's happening, and there is a very brief sense of the incident being "switched on" in my brain, and then it seems to dissipate or melt away when it's ending.  I still can function normally, but everything feels a little muted, echoed and filtered by this state of mind.

It happens when I'm talking to people, when I'm silent, when I'm running, when I'm resting, when I'm reading.  There does not appear to be any time when it cannot happen; perhaps because I still function normally even in the middle of the incident.

It's a spontaneous, instantaneous test of reality; sample size of one; no controls; untraceable methodology; and an unknowable hypothesis.  In other words, a horrible experiment, testing nothing and proving nothing at the same time.

It's like a tripartite cognition: when it happens I recognize what's objectively happening, what's subjectively happening inside me, and what's not happening subjectively all at the same time.

It all leaves me with the question of how much my ability to subjectively perceive my world actually affects my objective world.  Not in the sense of controlling each and every thing around me, but rather in the sense that there may be no difference between subjective and objective reality.

In my thinking brain, I know there must be.  In my brain during these episodes, it conflates the two, and so creates a bizarre feeling of cognitive overlap.  One template on top of the other.

Where the edges do not overlap perfectly, however, I see blurred and gray moments in time.

Why?  I have no clue.

I'm wondering if anyone else has any ideas.

Thank you.

(Sorry for the lack of humor in this post and the poorly-worded ramble.  I am at a loss for accurate ways to describe what's happening and how it actually feels.  Even if I can describe it accurately, I'm not sure I can make it relatable it to anyone else.  I don't possess the philosophical vocabulary for it.)

November 18, 2010

Some Fun New Fast Food Restaurant Names and Concepts

These fast food restaurant names are free to all. I will allow you to use the name in exchange for all the pointing and laughing.

Rapirito (Extremely fast Mexican food, extremely prone to being mispronounced.)

Oozers (Burgers loaded with everything that makes them compulsively edible.)

Extroodles (Quick pasta, quickly processed by both ends of the transaction.)

Kwik 'n Frickin' Chicken (Otherwise known as K'F'C where the apostrophes are said as adorable little clucks.)

Sum Ho's Spread (A Korean buffet-style eatery, leftovers can be taken home in adorable pink boxes.)

Chunkers (Everything gets put in a blender that you get to control! Weeeeee! Will it be a spoon or a fork for eating?)

Fastcism (You don't get to chose, but you eat quickly, quietly and leave. Eyes down!)

Doms' Subs (You can tell them to make you any kind of sandwich you want, any way you want it, and please don't be nice about it. You won't believe the different toppings and sauces they'll give you if you don't ask for them!)

Lances (Waiters in only barbecue aprons serving only the finest of hotdogs and elongated meat meals.)

Cooters (Snuggled closely to Lances, waitresses in only barbecue aprons serving only fish tacos and many forms of finger food.)

Foodthings (What? Oh, yeah... I think we have something like that in the back. Hold on.)

November 16, 2010

Proposals to End Road Rage

Road rage is a curable disease.  

Our best transportation emotologists have been working on this issue for decades, and although their funding always hangs like bloody threads from the windshield, they persist for the benefit of fellow travelers all. 

Presently, new research promises diversionary tactics may help lessen even the most virulent outbreaks.  Road rage, apparently, can be detoured before it even starts.  The potholes of perturbation can be smoothed over with the asphalt of amelioration.

Here are some of the most likely cures to this epidemic.


1 - Highway Hilarity

2 - Freeway Folksiness

3 - Exit Ramp Empathy

4 - Interstate Intercourse (Social)

5 - Thoroughfare Thoughtfulness

6 - Journeying Je Ne Sais Quoi

7 - Path(os)

8 - Avenue Avuncularity

9 - Way Whimsy

10 - Boulevard Bon Vivance

11 - Passage Passion

12 - Merge Mirth

13 - Tollway Tolerance

14 - Pike Placidity

15 - Lane Lassitude

16 - Go de Vivre

17 - Street Stoicism

18 - Overpass Openness

19 - Cobblestone Concern

November 3, 2010

Mind over Matter: The Empirical Tests

Matter: Broken femur, protruding slightly through the flesh
Mind: Over this matter after eleven shots of tequila

Matter: Vomiting guts out
Mind: Over this after purchase of replacement, vomit-proof guts

Matter: Moving 180 pound sofa-bed up three flights of stairs to new apartment
Mind: Over this after providing eleven shots of tequila to a nearby draft horse

Matter: Ten pages due to boss in three hours
Mind: Over this when you remember you hate your stupid boss

Matter: Only half way through the marathon, and you can't take another step
Mind: Over this when you repurpose marathon as a fist fight, anger carries you home

Matter: Draft horse stuck in your third floor apartment
Mind: Over this when you find two old pairs of rollerskates and rediscover gravity

Matter: Lost your mind
Mind: Doesn't matter

What I'm Crushing Today

1 - Hope
2 - Fear
3 - Bunnies, ugly and farsighted
4 - Umbrellas
5 - Certainty
6 - Peanut Shells, unsalted
7 - Love, love of
8 - Derivatives
9 - Sons-a-bitches
10 - Underwear, plaid
11 - Snodgren, Irma
12 - Pleasantness
13 - Haste, undue nature of
14 - Spelling
15 - Stuff, things and
16 - Logic, lists displaying

November 2, 2010

I Will Totally Punch You In The Face!!!!!!!!

Do you see that?  Count'em!  Go on, count the exclamation points in the title of this post.


Yeah?  What did you get?  Seven?  


Okay, I thought there were eight or nine, but seven works, because I'm at least that mad, and it's probably best from a public relations angle to not oversell too early in the game.


People will start not knowing if I'm serious, you know?  If I just throw out eight or nine (or ten!) exclamation points, and then am only able to deliver seven (or six!) exclamation points' worth of rage and violence.


That would cause my reputation great harm.  I can envision a day when people would stop taking my posts seriously because of such punctuation-based hyperbole.  That would be horrible!


Actually, that would be horrible!!


Better.


It's never wise to start off a violent tirade and have people expect more than you can deliver.  Outside of YouTube commenters, very few writers can objectively "bring" eight or nine exclamation points to an argument in a convincing manner.  


At the most recent regional conference, the Central Region Aggressive Punctuation symposium, the keynote speaker chastised the audience to dial down the rage within the prose and use fewer exclamation points!  Unbelievable!  


He was nearly shouted down.  Someone even called him an ALL-CAPSer, which I could tell from my seat near the back of the room stung quite a bit.


Once the attendees quieted down, we learned that the speaker wanted us to try to use something he called "wit" to underscore our vitriol.


What?!  Instead of bitterness and sarcasm?!


As an experience purveyor of harsh punctuation, I didn't need some jag-off telling me how to convince people with written volume!


Whatever!  I stopped listening and walked out!


I'm sure he felt good to get his huge speaking fee and leave all of us...


What?


There's eight?


No, come on!  Stop joking!


You said seven!  You did too!


Yes!  Seven!  I'm not... I'm... I'm just not ready!


Because you said seven, that's why, Asshole!


Fuck!  Now I have to swear more and bring up Hitler somehow!


Oh!  This is not good!  Not good at all!!


Fuck!  Fuck!  Fuck!  Fuck!


I coulda sworn there were only seven!  I'm not ready to do eight!


Whaddya mean, "I have to?"


Who the fuck are you anyway?!  Hey!  Douchebag!


I'm talkin' to you, Fuckface!!


I don't fuckin' care 'bout that!!  You're the Nazi who insists of perfect, regimented accounting of all punctuation marks!  


You and your jackbooted thugs gonna break down my door at midnight if I don't bring eight to this game?!!


Yes!  You so fuckin' are!  


Come here, Hitler!!  Now!!!!


NOW!!!!  


Just come here right fucking now, or I WILL TOTALLY PUNCH YOU IN THE FACE!!!!!!!!

November 1, 2010

Ways I Spice Up My Life Without Frequenting Prostitutes!

You wouldn't think it was possible, but here are some solid entertainment options for those locked in drudgery looking to break away from all that sex with prostitutes they keep accidentally having.


1) When on vacations, I mail any spare body parts I find to my home address in packaging that looks very suspect.  Upon returning home, I bring the packages back to the post office, and they open them for me while I exclaim things like: "I sure hope there isn't a nose in that package!" or "Who keeps sending me kneecaps?" or "Whoa!  That box is adult male leg-sized!"


2) I put dry ice and red food coloring in my swim trunks, dive into the public pool and just start thrashing around.


3) Go to the bank and exchange the dollar bills in my wallet for the exact same amount of money in dollar bills just to enliven my currency.


4) It's not abduction if you tell the person they're under citizen's arrest.  To strengthen your case, read the person their Miranda rights or whatever rights you can remember.  It's the least you can do.


5) Tickle strangers.


6) Read Proust to the chickens but only to some of the chickens to create vicious, but literate, rivalries in the coop.


7) Frequent prostitute interns.  Not the same thing.


8) Drink soap, water and glycerin, then, at midnight, stand under a lonely streetlight in a black trench coat and fedora, head downcast, and French exhale bubbles.


9) Using only four million toothpicks, record a top ten pop album and discern the true nature of love.