I've been watching a fairly new anime, Ergo Proxy, and it's fucking weird. That may seem strange to those of you who know my tastes in anime (NGE anyone?), but it's weird even for me. I'm having a hard time following it.
There's a lot of hidden meanings behind the story, as there is in any fictional work. But this takes the principles of read between the lines to a whole new game, not just a new level. I've got the Shinsen Subs version and I'm on episode 9. Already there's been reference to the beginnings of science fiction as a genre, multiple references to greek, norse, celtic, hindu, chinese, japanese and wiccan lore and five psychologists/psychiatrists (none of whom my teacher, who has a masters in clinical psychology, recognized!) that I could count. This one definitely goes in my "Shows for people who think to much" for sure.
I'm not going to get in to what the series is about. There's plenty of people who've done that already, and much better than I can at 0300 wee-fucking-hours. Just watch it, or at least look at it.
DFQ of the year!
I know it's been a long time since I did one of these but I've got a doosy.
"But then you can't get to the same internet, can you?"
Honest to god story here. I was doing some work for someone on their computer. I introduced them to Mozilla Firefox with the expressed desire that they use it instead of exploder. So I tell them how to use it and they actually whether the could because they thought they wouldn't be able to get to the same internet. Do I really need to fucking elaborate on why this is one of the dumbest fucking questions ever?
gryyphyn@section-9, out.
20061222
20061215
Music
I love music. Music has a power that no other force on earth can match in intensity. No extreme emotion, love or hate, can match the experiences that can be brought on by music. Music can invoke emotions, can move thoughts, and can take you places that words can't. There really is no force like it.
Sometimes, like now, I'll sit and read while listening to music, not noticing that subconsciously I'm reading at the pace of the music. My mind has grown so accustomed to the music I listen to, and can predict it without bringing it to the forefront, that fantastic points in the story are mirrored in the music and make the experience and the picture that much more complete.
There are other times when I will watch the images on my screen, moving rhythmically to the music, and my mind and emotions will be taken somewhere else entirely. My mood will shift dramatically through the effects of emotions and that will call up memory cues while my mind pieces together some new story.
Other times music can be meditative, taking me to new places within my sense of self, helping me discover new things or reach some realization that has been out of grasp. There may be some place in my mind, a feeling or a location, that I've been trying to reach but that has been elusive, even just subconsciously. The right music will come on at the right time, with no prompting from me, and I'll be taken there. I'm always satisfied, even if I didn't find what I was looking for when I set out on the metaphysical journey.
Just some thoughts...
Sometimes, like now, I'll sit and read while listening to music, not noticing that subconsciously I'm reading at the pace of the music. My mind has grown so accustomed to the music I listen to, and can predict it without bringing it to the forefront, that fantastic points in the story are mirrored in the music and make the experience and the picture that much more complete.
There are other times when I will watch the images on my screen, moving rhythmically to the music, and my mind and emotions will be taken somewhere else entirely. My mood will shift dramatically through the effects of emotions and that will call up memory cues while my mind pieces together some new story.
Other times music can be meditative, taking me to new places within my sense of self, helping me discover new things or reach some realization that has been out of grasp. There may be some place in my mind, a feeling or a location, that I've been trying to reach but that has been elusive, even just subconsciously. The right music will come on at the right time, with no prompting from me, and I'll be taken there. I'm always satisfied, even if I didn't find what I was looking for when I set out on the metaphysical journey.
Just some thoughts...
20061202
The Spoils of War
So I recently sent a post to my Linux group with reference to a certain article and this has spawned a very serious and heated argument.
The post, as you'll see, is related to French Parliament's decision to incorporate, even replace, Microsoft Windows with "the open source operating system, Linux" for their government office computing. Before I get much further in to this whole story let me make one thing very clear: THIS IS A VERY GOOD THING FOR THE LINUX COMMUNITY. This is government openly recognizing the power, capability, cost benefit and ease of deployment of using a Linux infrastructure.
So the post spawns a debate about which distro will be chosen. Myself and a couple other users suggests that Novell's SuSE Linux would be a good choice (find the open version here). I stated that the interoperability with closed-source functionality will be a key factor in their decision. That's a founded concern in the IT field and I felt justified in saying so. Many agreed with me. But some didn't, and voiced their concerns vehemently.
This all turned to an ongoing argument about the partnership between Novell and Microsoft. Some good arguments were made about this, both for and against the two rival companies cooperating. I even commented on the parntership, which I am very much for, by the by. So "what's the big deal?" you ask.
It was off topic. I'm all for being a little off topic but this was getting out of hand. In the space of a single day the argument had turned to insults, innuendo and general backbiting. I don't approve of this and stated so. I was greeted by semi-apologetic replies from the offending parties and now all is well.
What the fuck am I talking about?
The deal between Microsoft and Novell is that Microsoft will, over the course of the next five years, distribute SuSE Linux to 350,000 of their customers in an effort to "work together to improve the interoperability between Linux and Windows". This is good, right? Microsoft gets to lie and say they don't fear or hate Linux and SuSE, at least, will get more exposure to the world.
SuSE is, at least in my opinion, the easiest Linux distro to use. I set it up just today and it just friggin' works. With the exception of DVD playback, which is easily solved by getting libdvdcss. Everything else, from simply browsing the web to installing programs to reading (not writing to, unfortunately) from NTFS partitions, is unbelievably easy or works automatically. I RPMd Firefox 2.0 and it just worked. It replaced the existing version (at least as far as I can tell it's gone) and just started working. I had to run a version check just to make sure because I wasn't interrupted by install scripts and wasn't asked to reboot, something that happens quite frequently in Windows and other Linux distros.
Sound worked from the get go, as did video and networking. The cards were detected automatically (and correctly, much to my surprise...), drivers loaded for them and they just worked. I set my monitor type (LCD), resolution (1280x1024) and aspect ratio (4:3) and rebooted. I was logged in automatically and there was a beautiful, high res desktop in about 23 seconds. I've never had to work less!
I've yet to run in to any issues that I didn't cause myself (tried to download libdvdcss the first time and grabbed a package that contained the utils but not the library; my bad). Changing system settings is never more than a few clicks away. The shell is still BASH, so no change there and it has yet to fail me. Things load exceedingly fast, close faster and the whole thing just works almost flawlessly (I won't say completely flawlessly because a) I'm not that far in to it yet and b) it'd just be stupid; there's always some little thing that makes it incomplete).
These are a few of my favorite things...
GET OUT OF MY HEAD, JULIE ANDREWS! Sorry, stroked out for a second there.
1. YaST, the installer/configurator/guru tool for SuSE is much improved over previous versions. It's not nearly as invasive as it has been in the past and is truly enjoyable to use now.
2. RPM management, whether through YaST or the other system installer tools, has gotten a hell of a lot better over the years and I don't have to think as much if I don't want to. You click to download an RPM and 99% of the time the browser asks if you want to save or launch the file with the appropriate utility, resulting in a fast install.
3. GNOME (haven't played with KDE yet and don't think I will now... :) is just as fantastic as always. The re-org on the interface, namely the sys bar, makes it way too easy to use. The menus make more sense and things are where they are supposed to be. If you browse your applications and go to the "Multimedia" menu you expect to see media players and tools. That's what you see. Isn't it great when you don't have to think?
4. Size has always been an issue for SuSE. My last installation, SLED (SuSE Linux Enterprise Desktop, these are the boxed versions) 9.3 Pro, was a whopping 8.5 GB. That's huge. Open 10.1 is a mere 3.44 and theres probably stuff I'll remove. I didn't install everything for either of them but being less than half, almost 1/3 the size, of 9.3 is a huge accomplishment and Novell should be very proud of themselves.
Hey Mikey, I don't think he likes it
1. The package selection used to be as granular as I wanted. Not so much now. During install YaST makes many of the decisions for you, just like it should. But I like to get picky, to the point of taking an hour or so removing this and adding that (why do I need the Arabic help for PERL again?). I can't do that as much now. While the packages are available for review it's pretty much grouped by dependencies or application. In other words "you take all of this stuff or none of it".
2. Partitioning and disk setup is somewhat lacking. All of the partitions are available but the expert mode isn't as expansive as I prefer and mounting Windows partitions is a little... weird.
3. Documentation, while available online, feels like it was relegated to the back seat. I downloaded all of the docs that were available but they didn't go much beyond "this is your computer, it has disks; this is SuSE; go at it, big guy". In other words it was lacking in the detail. They should really get O'Reilly to write their docs.
Wait, that's it?
Yep, that's it. Those are really my only complaints. I'm used to being on the phone with Squall while I'm configuring stuff. I'm smart but he's miles ahead of me when it comes to Linux. After all, he introduced me back when SuSE 8.0 was "new" (god, I'm old... :( ). But this time I was able to call and tell him "it just...fucking...works!". And that's a really good feeling.
Dumb fucker of the week
Maybe it's DF of the past few months. Haven't had one for a while, but this is a doosy.
"Is that those flappy things that look like wings?"
Yeah, this one was fun. My friends and I were up camping on a four day trip a while back. We'd been getting drunk until well in to the evening. The group was mixed company and all but one of us had someone of the opposite sex on our lap. Except Scott. Kid is completely fucking hopeless.
So we're pretty sloshed and talking about sex in general. You know,... well, you know. Drunk and sex are like peanut butter and jelly, they go between bread (or sheets, as it were). Somebody gets on the topic of female anatomy and brings up labia, a subject I never get tired of talking about (god I need to get laid!). We've been having a serious discussion about what types of labia we enjoy, what we like to do to them and whether or not it's proper to dress them in little dresses or make them carry heavy objects when Scott pipes up with what I thought was a joking comment. "Labia (he pronounced it lab-by-uh)... is that those flappy things that look like wings?"
I looked at him, as did everybody else. He had a serious look on his face, like he was in math class and wanted to know what the pythagorean theorem was. The rest of us thought he was in math class and had just asserted that 2+2=5. So everyone completely fucking lost it.
We'd been laughing for about 15 minutes when we all finally regained our composure. Then Brandon (not you, Baren) decided to fuck it up for us again with an impersonation of what should have been a baby seal but wasn't. More hilarity followed by weird barking sounds, accompanied by wet sloshing and slapping sounds. I really have to get some new friends...
Gryyphyn, out.
Section-9/The Wired
The post, as you'll see, is related to French Parliament's decision to incorporate, even replace, Microsoft Windows with "the open source operating system, Linux" for their government office computing. Before I get much further in to this whole story let me make one thing very clear: THIS IS A VERY GOOD THING FOR THE LINUX COMMUNITY. This is government openly recognizing the power, capability, cost benefit and ease of deployment of using a Linux infrastructure.
So the post spawns a debate about which distro will be chosen. Myself and a couple other users suggests that Novell's SuSE Linux would be a good choice (find the open version here). I stated that the interoperability with closed-source functionality will be a key factor in their decision. That's a founded concern in the IT field and I felt justified in saying so. Many agreed with me. But some didn't, and voiced their concerns vehemently.
This all turned to an ongoing argument about the partnership between Novell and Microsoft. Some good arguments were made about this, both for and against the two rival companies cooperating. I even commented on the parntership, which I am very much for, by the by. So "what's the big deal?" you ask.
It was off topic. I'm all for being a little off topic but this was getting out of hand. In the space of a single day the argument had turned to insults, innuendo and general backbiting. I don't approve of this and stated so. I was greeted by semi-apologetic replies from the offending parties and now all is well.
What the fuck am I talking about?
The deal between Microsoft and Novell is that Microsoft will, over the course of the next five years, distribute SuSE Linux to 350,000 of their customers in an effort to "work together to improve the interoperability between Linux and Windows". This is good, right? Microsoft gets to lie and say they don't fear or hate Linux and SuSE, at least, will get more exposure to the world.
SuSE is, at least in my opinion, the easiest Linux distro to use. I set it up just today and it just friggin' works. With the exception of DVD playback, which is easily solved by getting libdvdcss. Everything else, from simply browsing the web to installing programs to reading (not writing to, unfortunately) from NTFS partitions, is unbelievably easy or works automatically. I RPMd Firefox 2.0 and it just worked. It replaced the existing version (at least as far as I can tell it's gone) and just started working. I had to run a version check just to make sure because I wasn't interrupted by install scripts and wasn't asked to reboot, something that happens quite frequently in Windows and other Linux distros.
Sound worked from the get go, as did video and networking. The cards were detected automatically (and correctly, much to my surprise...), drivers loaded for them and they just worked. I set my monitor type (LCD), resolution (1280x1024) and aspect ratio (4:3) and rebooted. I was logged in automatically and there was a beautiful, high res desktop in about 23 seconds. I've never had to work less!
I've yet to run in to any issues that I didn't cause myself (tried to download libdvdcss the first time and grabbed a package that contained the utils but not the library; my bad). Changing system settings is never more than a few clicks away. The shell is still BASH, so no change there and it has yet to fail me. Things load exceedingly fast, close faster and the whole thing just works almost flawlessly (I won't say completely flawlessly because a) I'm not that far in to it yet and b) it'd just be stupid; there's always some little thing that makes it incomplete).
These are a few of my favorite things...
GET OUT OF MY HEAD, JULIE ANDREWS! Sorry, stroked out for a second there.
1. YaST, the installer/configurator/guru tool for SuSE is much improved over previous versions. It's not nearly as invasive as it has been in the past and is truly enjoyable to use now.
2. RPM management, whether through YaST or the other system installer tools, has gotten a hell of a lot better over the years and I don't have to think as much if I don't want to. You click to download an RPM and 99% of the time the browser asks if you want to save or launch the file with the appropriate utility, resulting in a fast install.
3. GNOME (haven't played with KDE yet and don't think I will now... :) is just as fantastic as always. The re-org on the interface, namely the sys bar, makes it way too easy to use. The menus make more sense and things are where they are supposed to be. If you browse your applications and go to the "Multimedia" menu you expect to see media players and tools. That's what you see. Isn't it great when you don't have to think?
4. Size has always been an issue for SuSE. My last installation, SLED (SuSE Linux Enterprise Desktop, these are the boxed versions) 9.3 Pro, was a whopping 8.5 GB. That's huge. Open 10.1 is a mere 3.44 and theres probably stuff I'll remove. I didn't install everything for either of them but being less than half, almost 1/3 the size, of 9.3 is a huge accomplishment and Novell should be very proud of themselves.
Hey Mikey, I don't think he likes it
1. The package selection used to be as granular as I wanted. Not so much now. During install YaST makes many of the decisions for you, just like it should. But I like to get picky, to the point of taking an hour or so removing this and adding that (why do I need the Arabic help for PERL again?). I can't do that as much now. While the packages are available for review it's pretty much grouped by dependencies or application. In other words "you take all of this stuff or none of it".
2. Partitioning and disk setup is somewhat lacking. All of the partitions are available but the expert mode isn't as expansive as I prefer and mounting Windows partitions is a little... weird.
3. Documentation, while available online, feels like it was relegated to the back seat. I downloaded all of the docs that were available but they didn't go much beyond "this is your computer, it has disks; this is SuSE; go at it, big guy". In other words it was lacking in the detail. They should really get O'Reilly to write their docs.
Wait, that's it?
Yep, that's it. Those are really my only complaints. I'm used to being on the phone with Squall while I'm configuring stuff. I'm smart but he's miles ahead of me when it comes to Linux. After all, he introduced me back when SuSE 8.0 was "new" (god, I'm old... :( ). But this time I was able to call and tell him "it just...fucking...works!". And that's a really good feeling.
Dumb fucker of the week
Maybe it's DF of the past few months. Haven't had one for a while, but this is a doosy.
"Is that those flappy things that look like wings?"
Yeah, this one was fun. My friends and I were up camping on a four day trip a while back. We'd been getting drunk until well in to the evening. The group was mixed company and all but one of us had someone of the opposite sex on our lap. Except Scott. Kid is completely fucking hopeless.
So we're pretty sloshed and talking about sex in general. You know,... well, you know. Drunk and sex are like peanut butter and jelly, they go between bread (or sheets, as it were). Somebody gets on the topic of female anatomy and brings up labia, a subject I never get tired of talking about (god I need to get laid!). We've been having a serious discussion about what types of labia we enjoy, what we like to do to them and whether or not it's proper to dress them in little dresses or make them carry heavy objects when Scott pipes up with what I thought was a joking comment. "Labia (he pronounced it lab-by-uh)... is that those flappy things that look like wings?"
I looked at him, as did everybody else. He had a serious look on his face, like he was in math class and wanted to know what the pythagorean theorem was. The rest of us thought he was in math class and had just asserted that 2+2=5. So everyone completely fucking lost it.
We'd been laughing for about 15 minutes when we all finally regained our composure. Then Brandon (not you, Baren) decided to fuck it up for us again with an impersonation of what should have been a baby seal but wasn't. More hilarity followed by weird barking sounds, accompanied by wet sloshing and slapping sounds. I really have to get some new friends...
Gryyphyn, out.
Section-9/The Wired
20061122
Green Society
What is a 'Green Society'?
Apart from being an environmentalist society tied up in politics a green society is one where many public laws and regulations, pertaining largely to environmental decisions, is governed by a naturalist viewpoint. This means that a good portion of the society is interested in so-called 'green energy' that does not harm the environment to produce and low-emission, non-petroleum based fuel sources for transportation.
Many ideals that have come from this point of view are: electric rail transportation (New York's subway system is a great example); bio-diesel (diesel fuel manufactured by purifying and modifying vegetable oils used in restraunt deep fryers and corn oils); solar and wind power (this solution is expensive to implement but works exceedingly well); and electric/hybrid car designs.
One of the more revolutionary ideas comes from GM: the hydrogen fuel cell platforms. Their Hy-wire designed skateboard platform vehicles run entirely on hydrogen fuel cells and put of clean, pure water. A renewable resource that is clean and *could* help our environment recover some.
What the hell am I talking about?
I was out driving earlier tonight (which for me, coincidentally, is about 0300 hrs) and was looking at the dealerships along our local auto row. 4.5 miles of auto dealerships, most of which are full of SUVs and trucks. I love trucks, having owned three previously, but hate SUVs. Why? If you've ever looked at a) the people who drive them and b) their mileage specs you know why. Before I explore this tangent let me make one thing very, very, clear: I don't hate the smaller SUVs such as the Toyota Rav series or the Subaru wagon/SUV concoctions. We're talking about the larger vehicles here. The kind rappers usually drive, incedentally...
Why do I hate SUVs so much? Their mileage is horrid. "Our new SUV has an industry standard high mileage of .5 mpg!" The other reason: they cost way too fucking much. "Our high mileage means we can charge you $48,000 for $8,000 in materials!" Don't believe me? Ever check what kind of mileage the Hummer gets? 15 piddly-ass miles per gallon. You know how bad that sucks? It sucks real bad. My '04 Cavalier costs half as much as I have it configured and gets almost twice the mileage. If I stay off the pedal and stick to the high speed roads it gets more than twice the highway miles.
Who needs SUVs? People who carpool with large groups. I can fit four in my car comfortably and I don't know many people who carpool with more than that. People who run sports teams, but a van is better suited to this purpose. People who haul pets around, and I'm talking about medium to large dogs or many pets, not your fucking poodle or chihua"annoying little yipping bastard"hua. No contention there. And people who haul Girl Scout cookies. Soccer moms, you know who you are. Now buy a damned van because it's better suited to what you do!
What I'm trying to say here is if you're not in the military and running through bogs you don't need a fucking Hummer (and the new ones, bless GMs stupid think-tank brains, suck). If you're not rock crawling and camping in a different canyon every weekend you don't need a big Jeep. If you're not hauling a soccer team all over the place and their gear at least once a week you don't need a Yukon Denali. 'Nuff said.
Trucks and their place in society.
Ah, the truck. It's the perennial choice of transport for Americans... that are farmers and contractors! The people who need trucks are the guys hauling just enough hay to fill a small trailer but not enough to require a flatbed. Guys that are hauling loads of lumber and sheetrock to do one house, not five. Guys that go up in the hills at least once a week when they're not hauling previously mentioned articles and get muddy heading to a favorite camping spot!
You know who doesn't need a truck? Your 17 year old son who managed to pass a test for once in is wretched life. I'm serious here! An old friend of mine had his parents co-sign on an F-350 because he got better than a C average in school for a year! A-fucking-mazing, isn't it? "You're a failure at life and you've had too many accidents to get a fast care so we'll get you a big truck!" Then, and this is my favorite part, he jacked it 4", put 36" tires on it and, get this, refused to take it on a dirt road because "I'll have to wash it once I get home". Why don't you just chop your dick off now and save your future wife (or husband, you fucking nancy) the trouble?
As I said previously I don't hate trucks and have owned three. First was a '69 F-100. Beat the hell out of it. Sunk it 6' in to a river bed up in the hills (heh heh heh, that one was fun!). Rebuilt the trans myself. Next one was a '79 GMC C2500. God, that thing was a beast! Shit mileage but ran perfect (until the engine seized going down the freeway). Managed to put 130,000 miles on it myself, bringing the total to 300,000 w/ rebuild. They don't make 'em like that anymore... Last one was a late 1980's Toyota pickup. Great little truck, perfect for the city, the hills, the highway and haulin' stuff. Know what I did with all of them? Hauled stuff around, moved people's homes, made regular runs to Lowes, got them dirty (and fucked up) in the hills and had the self-satisfaction of being able to fix them myself. I did a lot with those trucks. Even made a trip across country in the GMC with 1500 lbs. of my friends life in the back to move him 1400 miles! Yeah, I used them like the trucks they were meant to be.
What's the point, Gryyphyn?
My point is that to get to a green society we should start with our transportation. If you look at other countries there are strict limitations on what types of vehicles you can own/operate under normal circumstances. Gas prices are higher to help influence people to use mass transit. There are also manufacturing standards that are 300% more strict and effective than ours, cutting pollution drastically. I've made the vow to many of my friends and I'll make it publicly here: the moment GM releases one of their hydrogen platforms I'll be first in line to get the coupe. I am committed to making the environment a better place for future generations because I just might sire kids in to the future (gods help us...). And because I know that I don't need a seven-ton SUV to drive 1/2 mile to work and back every day.
I'm going to continue this line of thought for the next little while. Next post I'll be delving more deeply in to electrical power and alternative systems for achieving a green environment and lower cost than is currently available.
Apart from being an environmentalist society tied up in politics a green society is one where many public laws and regulations, pertaining largely to environmental decisions, is governed by a naturalist viewpoint. This means that a good portion of the society is interested in so-called 'green energy' that does not harm the environment to produce and low-emission, non-petroleum based fuel sources for transportation.
Many ideals that have come from this point of view are: electric rail transportation (New York's subway system is a great example); bio-diesel (diesel fuel manufactured by purifying and modifying vegetable oils used in restraunt deep fryers and corn oils); solar and wind power (this solution is expensive to implement but works exceedingly well); and electric/hybrid car designs.
One of the more revolutionary ideas comes from GM: the hydrogen fuel cell platforms. Their Hy-wire designed skateboard platform vehicles run entirely on hydrogen fuel cells and put of clean, pure water. A renewable resource that is clean and *could* help our environment recover some.
What the hell am I talking about?
I was out driving earlier tonight (which for me, coincidentally, is about 0300 hrs) and was looking at the dealerships along our local auto row. 4.5 miles of auto dealerships, most of which are full of SUVs and trucks. I love trucks, having owned three previously, but hate SUVs. Why? If you've ever looked at a) the people who drive them and b) their mileage specs you know why. Before I explore this tangent let me make one thing very, very, clear: I don't hate the smaller SUVs such as the Toyota Rav series or the Subaru wagon/SUV concoctions. We're talking about the larger vehicles here. The kind rappers usually drive, incedentally...
Why do I hate SUVs so much? Their mileage is horrid. "Our new SUV has an industry standard high mileage of .5 mpg!" The other reason: they cost way too fucking much. "Our high mileage means we can charge you $48,000 for $8,000 in materials!" Don't believe me? Ever check what kind of mileage the Hummer gets? 15 piddly-ass miles per gallon. You know how bad that sucks? It sucks real bad. My '04 Cavalier costs half as much as I have it configured and gets almost twice the mileage. If I stay off the pedal and stick to the high speed roads it gets more than twice the highway miles.
Who needs SUVs? People who carpool with large groups. I can fit four in my car comfortably and I don't know many people who carpool with more than that. People who run sports teams, but a van is better suited to this purpose. People who haul pets around, and I'm talking about medium to large dogs or many pets, not your fucking poodle or chihua"annoying little yipping bastard"hua. No contention there. And people who haul Girl Scout cookies. Soccer moms, you know who you are. Now buy a damned van because it's better suited to what you do!
What I'm trying to say here is if you're not in the military and running through bogs you don't need a fucking Hummer (and the new ones, bless GMs stupid think-tank brains, suck). If you're not rock crawling and camping in a different canyon every weekend you don't need a big Jeep. If you're not hauling a soccer team all over the place and their gear at least once a week you don't need a Yukon Denali. 'Nuff said.
Trucks and their place in society.
Ah, the truck. It's the perennial choice of transport for Americans... that are farmers and contractors! The people who need trucks are the guys hauling just enough hay to fill a small trailer but not enough to require a flatbed. Guys that are hauling loads of lumber and sheetrock to do one house, not five. Guys that go up in the hills at least once a week when they're not hauling previously mentioned articles and get muddy heading to a favorite camping spot!
You know who doesn't need a truck? Your 17 year old son who managed to pass a test for once in is wretched life. I'm serious here! An old friend of mine had his parents co-sign on an F-350 because he got better than a C average in school for a year! A-fucking-mazing, isn't it? "You're a failure at life and you've had too many accidents to get a fast care so we'll get you a big truck!" Then, and this is my favorite part, he jacked it 4", put 36" tires on it and, get this, refused to take it on a dirt road because "I'll have to wash it once I get home". Why don't you just chop your dick off now and save your future wife (or husband, you fucking nancy) the trouble?
As I said previously I don't hate trucks and have owned three. First was a '69 F-100. Beat the hell out of it. Sunk it 6' in to a river bed up in the hills (heh heh heh, that one was fun!). Rebuilt the trans myself. Next one was a '79 GMC C2500. God, that thing was a beast! Shit mileage but ran perfect (until the engine seized going down the freeway). Managed to put 130,000 miles on it myself, bringing the total to 300,000 w/ rebuild. They don't make 'em like that anymore... Last one was a late 1980's Toyota pickup. Great little truck, perfect for the city, the hills, the highway and haulin' stuff. Know what I did with all of them? Hauled stuff around, moved people's homes, made regular runs to Lowes, got them dirty (and fucked up) in the hills and had the self-satisfaction of being able to fix them myself. I did a lot with those trucks. Even made a trip across country in the GMC with 1500 lbs. of my friends life in the back to move him 1400 miles! Yeah, I used them like the trucks they were meant to be.
What's the point, Gryyphyn?
My point is that to get to a green society we should start with our transportation. If you look at other countries there are strict limitations on what types of vehicles you can own/operate under normal circumstances. Gas prices are higher to help influence people to use mass transit. There are also manufacturing standards that are 300% more strict and effective than ours, cutting pollution drastically. I've made the vow to many of my friends and I'll make it publicly here: the moment GM releases one of their hydrogen platforms I'll be first in line to get the coupe. I am committed to making the environment a better place for future generations because I just might sire kids in to the future (gods help us...). And because I know that I don't need a seven-ton SUV to drive 1/2 mile to work and back every day.
I'm going to continue this line of thought for the next little while. Next post I'll be delving more deeply in to electrical power and alternative systems for achieving a green environment and lower cost than is currently available.
20061117
Smash my PS3!
Smash my fucking $600 PS3!
Yeah! Smash the holy living shit out of it! Why? Because you can! I love SmashMyPS3.com! It's fucking hilarious! Go, watch, enjoy.
Other links of interest:
Smash My XBox (360)
Coming soon...
Smash My Wii (Nintendo)
Begin edit...
I forgot to add this:
I'm an asshole!
This guy's a serious piece of shit. Everyone knows (or should know...) that I hate stupid people. Everybody also knows (or again, should know...) that Sony owns half of my soul. Probably more. But I was cheering for this one. Hell, I've been waiting for it since the announcement of the PS3! I hate stupid people.
Stupid-assed comment of the week!
"I hope that you all put up douchebag comments and I hope a big pile of shit falls on them!"
Yeah! Smash the holy living shit out of it! Why? Because you can! I love SmashMyPS3.com! It's fucking hilarious! Go, watch, enjoy.
Other links of interest:
Smash My XBox (360)
Coming soon...
Smash My Wii (Nintendo)
Begin edit...
I forgot to add this:
I'm an asshole!
This guy's a serious piece of shit. Everyone knows (or should know...) that I hate stupid people. Everybody also knows (or again, should know...) that Sony owns half of my soul. Probably more. But I was cheering for this one. Hell, I've been waiting for it since the announcement of the PS3! I hate stupid people.
Stupid-assed comment of the week!
"I hope that you all put up douchebag comments and I hope a big pile of shit falls on them!"
20061031
Blurb
UPDATE
I've just upgraded to the Blogger Beta which runs on a Google platform base. I strongly urge you to make the switch if you can. This should help in getting the new Blogger up and going faster. ^_^ But I'll be god damned if I can figure out how to edit a friggin' post with the new interface!
I've just upgraded to the Blogger Beta which runs on a Google platform base. I strongly urge you to make the switch if you can. This should help in getting the new Blogger up and going faster. ^_^ But I'll be god damned if I can figure out how to edit a friggin' post with the new interface!
For the love of...
It's official: I'm a jerk
It's been months since I've updated. And yes, I am aware of this.
Have you ever been just unbelievably busy? I have. I am. And it's not stopping.
Quickies
Head over to Baren's blog and you can see his update about Anime Banzai! 2006. I'll have mine up soon with more pics.
Check out Hookie Dookie Panic!, a new favorite web comic of mine.
That's all folks!
That's all I have for today. Look for a more detailed update soon.
Gryyphyn, out.
UPDATE
I've just upgraded to the Blogger Beta which runs on a Google platform base. I strongly urge you to make the switch if you can. This should help in getting the new Blogger up and going faster. ^_^
It's been months since I've updated. And yes, I am aware of this.
Have you ever been just unbelievably busy? I have. I am. And it's not stopping.
Quickies
Head over to Baren's blog and you can see his update about Anime Banzai! 2006. I'll have mine up soon with more pics.
Check out Hookie Dookie Panic!, a new favorite web comic of mine.
That's all folks!
That's all I have for today. Look for a more detailed update soon.
Gryyphyn, out.
UPDATE
I've just upgraded to the Blogger Beta which runs on a Google platform base. I strongly urge you to make the switch if you can. This should help in getting the new Blogger up and going faster. ^_^
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