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I’m just here to say that freeamp has got to be the most buggy, undertested piece of unstable crap I have ever had the pleasure to run. Furthermore, rich people who can afford to work nice internships because they don’t need any incoming cash to live really suck.

Nobody will ever match Einstürzende Neubauten, so beautiful…

And that’s the truth.

There are so many stupid people out there spewing nonsense in the most authoritative of ways… I am almost embarrassed for them — but not quite. Too bad so many of them are in positions of power and authority.

So I wake up today thinking I’m ready to go and interview at a couple of local places until I realize that I feel like total shit and have a fever again. Damn. I usually don’t get abused by the onset of cold season like I am this year. I wonder why I’m having such a rough go of it. Maybe it’s the letdown from finishing my degree.

People all over are starting to think I’m a flake because I keep having to cancel and/or reschedule things due to illness. I don’ t know whether to start showing up for interviews groggy and medicated with four pounds of tissue or keep rescheduling them. Either way it doesn’t look terribly good…

As of today, the senate and house have taken away all rights you ever had as an American citizen, without giving you anything in return in the way of health care, wage or livelihood guarantees. I am more convinced than ever that I need to get out of this country and head for the EU before it’s too late.

I could say more here, but it’s no longer safe. All notes on politics or the cutting edge of technology will from now on be “Notes from Underground” if they appear here at all…

There is a secret club of men all around the world that I have never belonged to. I know because there are all of these odd handshakes with fifty moves that various guys throw at me, acting like I am supposed to know what move comes next, even if I’ve never seen them before in my life. Some of them are longer than others, but regardless of implementation, I always end up with a blank look on my face and a hand that doesn’t know what to do next.

I wonder what the hell I was supposed to do to be let in on the secret? I mean, some of them I sort of vaguely recognize from the neighborhood where I grew up, but I don’t think it’s a local thing, ’cause some of them are way out there and it’s not like every idiot out there really thinks I grew up in his neighborhood.

Another mystery of the universe. Shit.

I finally managed to catch a friend’s radio show (normally I have trouble seeing straight that early in the morning) and I got some eBay deals taken care of and a minor market survey done, but otherwise ’twas another Monday that got away from me in a big way. And in truly Monday fashion, my laundry is disappearing on me again. I hate that, it means I will have to go out and buy clothes again. I wonder where it all goes — I lose it like I lose everything else that I handle for more than four seconds.

I did have a fairly productive weekend (from my perspective) — pulled out Lame and Paranoia once again with my own mp3bot script to re-encode all of my discs with -r3mix, got out and got some photo-ing done and did a little bit of writing. Need to do more writing and more reading, I’ve sort of forgotten about the humanities in the push to graduate and then get a job. More writing and more reading.

It’s a little strange, but I also saw rather a lot of football over the weekend. It’s like after all of the CNN and highbrowing I’ve been doing lately, I just needed to reconnect with something light from childhood. I’m not a big sports guy, but it was cool. I even got in an argument with someone over the BCS vs. playoffs. (Playoffs are needed.) Also saw the MLS cup game (yes, both types of football seen here) but cheered for the wrong team…

Side note: anyone remember Three Mile Island? On camera: There’s been a minor incident, but it’s completely under control, nothing the public should worry about, everybody don’t panic and go about your business as usual while the authorities handle it completely. Off camera: What is going on? Does anyone know exactly where the threat is or how far it has developed? Does anyone have a plan? Does anyone know exactly what the HELL is going on? Should we evacuate or what? Not yet? Whatever. If you watch the news at all, this may seem very familiar…

Actually spent time cleaning, organizing and calculating my debt load. It was very, very painful. I have no idea how I will ever be able to afford the entire Robotech legacy series on DVD, but I will find a way. Oh, the majesty! Oh, the humanity! There will never be another like Robotech, meta-media or original alike.

Spending some time re-working my resumé. Everyone seems to think that it’s a tech resumé, so I’m trying to re-shape it into a media/communications resumé so that I can do something interesting for a change. If nothing else, I may end up (*choke*) as a substitute teacher for a while. Shoot me now.

Sometimes you’re spending ten minutes hating everything, other times you’re spending ten minutes loving everything and still other times your skull just hurts. Ironic now, but that’s something else entirely. Busy Monday ahead.

Got to head back to campus to negotiate for the release of the hostage, plus I’ve finally got to get the referral forms to the talking heads so that I can pass to the next level. Also got to find a job so that the IRS doesn’t come and shoot me down, knock on wood, and that won’t be fun at all. Been trying, but so far things have been a little sparse. Probably that’s as a result of hubris — after all once you’ve written a few books and managed a few Web sites you hate to start ringing up slurpees, but it looks like it’s time to say “entry level” and lower my sights, especially considering the fact that I absolutely refuse to do “professional” and am even fairly wary of “business casual”.

Looking for inspiration but realistically experiencing some serious writers’ block. I’m not nearly inspired or technically good enough to hit the “real” freelance market either (have to lose a limb or be a bum for a while to do that) so there’s nothing doing on that front.

No, I don’t fit, and I don’t keep a clean house either. Shoot me.

P.S. Mail server seems to be down again so if you can’t get to me now (should have managed that damned thing myself) try, try again.

Anyone who thinks that this terrorism has nothing to do with Israel, Palestine and double standards is smoking fancy weed indeed. Take a moment and read some of the Arabic dailies to see what half of the world thinks of the U.S. and Israel right now — even those who support the U.S. retaliation feel sorry for us and our ignorance. And the damn fools who say we just need to crack down like Israel does in order to have some security are even more stupid than that.

How much security does Israel have? There are armed guards everywhere, young people have to enlist and drive tanks, crackdowns are routinely spoken of, and still a bomb goes off and nails innocent citizens every other weekend. The Israelis have no security and they never will until they pull their heads out of the sand and make peace. Aside from the obvious fact that Americans would never agree to live as the Israelis do, it is also important to realize that it would do no good anyway — at a certain point (which we have clearly passed), violence makes the uprising angrier, not more frightened.

I sympathize very much with all of the victims in the WTC and Pentagon bombings, and I sympathize very much with Americans who fear for their lives today (in some ways, I am one of them) — but I also sympathize for many of the citizens of the Middle East who are normal people like you and I dying every day of unnatural causes because they’re so far away and differently colored than us that we feel we don’t need to think about them. This applies to citizens of Palestine (who are getting nailed in large numbers by tanks and missiles after throwing pebbles), yes, to citizens of Israel (outside the government and right wing), and to citizens of Afghanistan who are right now watching rubble sweet home get flattened even more efficiently by the Americans than by the Russians before us.

People are people. In the end, the vast majority of them just want to live.

It is a grey, slightly rainy day in Salt Lake City, just as I like it; a Yuri Gagarin print arrived from Moscow as well, making today doubly nice. If only it would snow… The last month has been a blur, and now I’d like some snow.

I heard from someone in an employment agency today that they’re completely swamped since September 11th, and that they’re having more and more trouble hooking people up with jobs. Not good, especially considering that I finally got the letter from U/U today — the one that I knew would piss me off: “sorry, we can’t send you your diploma until you pay your tuition bill.”

Rivets!

Still can’t shake this cold. I can’t take job-related calls ’cause I have little or no voice and I can’t stop coughing.

About that domain news… I registered other “personalities” of my personal domain so that other people don’t snatch it up (I got worried after I found a “leapdragon” that wasn’t me at AOL). I also registered a sleeping dream and will hold onto it for now, with the intent of turning it into something in the future.

The season will fully change soon.

I am freakin’ ill. I don’t know why, it’s not cold season yet or anything. It’s about 100 degrees outside and I’m sitting in here like it’s January hacking all over the place.

Meanwhile, in the middle of my snot-fest, some tele-sales lady calls to ask if I would like two free months of life insurance to “evaluate how well the plan works” before buying into it. How the hell does that work? Does she expect me to die in the next few weeks so that I can see how they handle the claim? I hung up on her and blew into a tissue.

Bought another domain, my dream-domain for future ventures. A link will appear once it goes live, though nothing will actually be there until I’m ready to do something beautiful. Must go fill another tissue and hack a little more.

Intended to rant here about buying/selling troubles of the week so far, but I’ve decided against that. You know how you have those moments in your life that are full of good intentions, and then the next morning you wake up and throw it all away and get on with things as though you hadn’t ever waken up in the first place?

There’s got to be a way out of the trap — out of work, bosses, paychecks, work, bosses… I just can’t bear it. I’m looking for work now that I have my society-membership-card, and then today for the first time in a while I get a clear reminder of what it was actually like to have a job and it scares the hell out of me. It’s the saddest thing I’ve ever seen. There must be a better way to be productive, or an alternate definition of “productive” that I can work with. I don’t want to join the rat race.

I don’t want to spend my life doing things for other people that I wouldn’t do for myself just so that I can eat. There must be another way to eat, another way to live. I’ve suffering from the the maladaptive malady. I need to go and buy Playtime and watch it over and over.

So I’m finally starting to wean myself from the whole terrorism thing. I’m down to only three or four hours a day watching CNN and I’m working on thinking about real life again. Like everyone else, I’ve thought about my life over the last couple of weeks and some things have changed.

I’d always fought with myself about whether to study archaeology, anthropology, English or film in graduate school. Now I’m almost sure that I’m heading in another direction. I’m looking at communications once again. Specifically, either print or broadcast journalism. It’s a minor stretch, but doable I think. I’ve always loved history, but not really in history books so much as in formats intended for mass-consumption. Watching the news coverage of these events has made the decision both obvious and easy.

Bought a monitor today, for what it’s worth. It’s damn hard to get one that looks good. Damn hard.

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