(no subject)

If you are part of a society that votes, then do so. There may be no candidates and no measures you want to vote for ... but there are certain to be ones you want to vote against. In case of doubt, vote against. By this rule you will rarely go wrong.
--Robert Heinlein

It seems that the "vote against" theory of elections has been upheld once again with Governor Arnold. Arnold isn't going to damage the state any more than Davis already has...he will have far too many people "advising" him. The only thing he really needs to worry about is too many cooks.

In every political society, the pendulum tends to swing from conservative to liberal and back again. In California, perhaps this pendulum swings faster and farther than most. Though there is much wailing from liberals when conservatives are in office, and much wailing from conservatives when liberals are in office, in reality, the course of society has always been forward -- no matter who is at the helm.

(no subject)

I am personally offended by the fact that Clint Eastwood is 73 years old. When did that happen?

(no subject)

I'd been bumming cigs all last week. This weekend, I was in Florida (for my niece's baptism -- loads of fun!) and I smoked a few there.

Monday, my body revolted in a combination nicotine overload rapidly followed by nicotine withdrawal. Think of every neuron in your brain and skin singing their own versions of "The Good Ship Lollypop" in combination 2:4 and 3:4 time. Or, think of watching Einstein chalk out E=MC^2 on a blackboard with each chalkstroke screeching sympathetic vibrations within one's skull.

I haven't smoked since Monday. I'm alternating between feeling good about it, and wishing that cigarettes won't just fucking kill me dead. Because they will if I don't have the willpower.

Once upon a time, I used to have willpower. I wonder where it went?

Book Corner

Okay, the last few books in my queue:

The Robber Barons by Matthew Josephson. When I bought this book, I didn't realize it was written in 1934. It is a tough book to read, but each time I was almost ready to toss it against the wall, it got interesting. I finally finished it. In one sense, it was fairly anti-industry, which given the year, isn't surprising. In another sense, it was amazing how much these industrialists actually controlled the country at the time. From bribing politicians to swinging the stock market for their own gain, the post civil-war industrialists were amazingly brazen compared to today's captains of industry. It's a good book to have read...maybe not as fun during the actual process of reading.

The Da Vinci Code by Dan Brown. Being a raised catholic, it was an interesting veering point of view of my own faith. Having studied and even experienced everything from paganism to gnosticism, I think that there are points where the author is bang-on. However, there are points where he was just plain wrong. There is a passage, for instance, where Brown mentions how much the left (as in, the feminine) has been maligned in society. He mentions the left-hand of God, which has always been the side of sinners. He mentions the term "sinister" which literally means "left sided" but in the vernacular means evil. However, he also mentions "left brained" as being the irrational side, which is actually wrong -- the left side is logical and the right side is the artistic, non-linear side. He also mentions the left as being politically activist, which is only true in democratic societies like the US and UK -- in the former Soviet union, the left were the conservatives and the rightists were the liberals. Facts like these that were just plain wrong made me step back a bit from the book. But, then again, it's a bestseller, so what can you expect? Overall, after requiring a substantial suspension of disbelief, it was a fun read.

Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan. I've just started this book. It's SF meets Noir Mystery. Imagine a world where people can record their souls in a chip in the spinal column. Get killed, you just download your soul into a clone and you're back in action. A rich industrialist is murdered and framed for suicide, and thus hires a private investigator to figure out who did the deed. It's a first novel, so parts are rough, but I'm being sucked in. It's gritty and modern and requires a bit of intellect to follow along -- so I love it despite the first-novel jitters.

Last post before bed...

So, what the hell happened to Joe?
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This Saturday, I was flying down to Florida. This time of year there are, of course, a lot of families going to Disneyworld. I got the first class upgrade, so I saw just about the entire plane board. Suddenly, around the corner, a five-year-old boy boarded the plane and said in a loud voice, "Hi, everybody!" It was cute -- everyone laughed and said hi back to him. I said, "There goes a future President of the United States"