“There are nights when the wolves are silent and only the moon howls.”
—George Carlin

Joey Michaels made a post today I would like to point you all at. My brain is chewing on it, and I always like having something for my brain to chew on … especially since my teeth can’t chew on anything and I’m getting obsessive about wanting solid food.

A snippet to whet your appetite:

If everything is potentially good depending on the viewer, then “good” has no meaning. If good and bad have no meaning, then it stands to reason that “quality” - also a subjective term - has no meaning.

I even left a long and babbling comment over there, because I am in that sort of mood. I’d babble here and now, but the Daily Show is on, and I haven’t been able to stay awake and coherent late enough to watch it for a couple of weeks now. I got to go get my Daily Show fix.

It is in how we treat the perceived outcasts, misfits, and undesirables in our society that the true form of our freedoms and rights are demonstrated.
–Orb

“You have to have the time to feel sorry for yourself in order to be a good abstract expressionist.”

American artist, Robert Rauschenberg, died today at the age of 82. I don’t often mention my favorite artists or the ones who have influenced my own work in any way, but Mr. Rauschenberg has always been at the top of a very short list. I am saddened by his passing.

You can see some of his works here and here.

Rauschenberg on YouTube, discussing art and his erasing of DeKooning works:

In a recent interview on Trinity Broadcasting Network, Ben Stein had this to say:

Stein: When we just saw that man, I think it was Mr. Myers [biologist P.Z. Myers], talking about how great scientists were, I was thinking to myself the last time any of my relatives saw scientists telling them what to do they were telling them to go to the showers to get gassed … that was horrifying beyond words, and that’s where science — in my opinion, this is just an opinion — that’s where science leads you.

Crouch: That’s right.

Stein: …Love of God and compassion and empathy leads you to a very glorious place, and science leads you to killing people.

Crouch: Good word, good word.

Really, Ben?? Really?! Science may make it more efficient or easier to kill people, thanks to newer technologies than rocks and tree branches, but I’ve read a good bit of history. Seems to me that people had no problems killing other people long before science was anything more than alchemists trying to turn lead into gold, and sometimes they even did it all in the name of God and religion.

Ben Stein is a disgusting piece of work. I’ve never thought much of him, but lately my apathy has been turning to loathing.

Orb: [standing outside closed bathroom door] Hey. You alive?

Lin: [brief silence] Um … yeah. Why?

Orb: [toddling down the hall] Just wondering.

It would take too long to explain. I have to walk Lin out to the truck and put today’s coffee grounds on one of my tomatoes.

Let’s just say I am probably an annoying person to live with and leave it at that, shall we?

It’s OK to forget people you once knew.

Anything more I might say now would only serve to diminish that simple and true statement.

The justice has been explaining his positions publicly more and more, and even delving into some thorny issues, like torture.

“I don’t like torture,” Scalia says. “Although defining it is going to be a nice trick. But who’s in favor of it? Nobody. And we have a law against torture. But if the - everything that is hateful and odious is not covered by some provision of the Constitution,” he says.

“If someone’s in custody, as in Abu Ghraib, and they are brutalized by a law enforcement person, if you listen to the expression ‘cruel and unusual punishment,’ doesn’t that apply?” Stahl asks.

“No, No,” Scalia replies.

“Cruel and unusual punishment?” Stahl asks.

“To the contrary,” Scalia says. “Has anybody ever referred to torture as punishment? I don’t think so.”

“Well, I think if you are in custody, and you have a policeman who’s taken you into custody…,” Stahl says.

“And you say he’s punishing you?” Scalia asks.

“Sure,” Stahl replies.

“What’s he punishing you for? You punish somebody…,” Scalia says.

“Well because he assumes you, one, either committed a crime…or that you know something that he wants to know,” Stahl says.

“It’s the latter. And when he’s hurting you in order to get information from you…you don’t say he’s punishing you. What’s he punishing you for? He’s trying to extract…,” Scalia says.

“Because he thinks you are a terrorist and he’s going to beat the you-know-what out of you…,” Stahl replies.

“Anyway, that’s my view,” Scalia says. “And it happens to be correct.”

Scalia is one scary, scary man, and he’s going to be a Supreme Court Justice for a very, very long time … unfortunately.

“They should all just wear pastels and get over it. WE ARE THE STEPFORD WIVES.”
– Lin

Lin: And that super-collider blowing up the world? The chances of that happening are one in a google.

Orb: Oh boy. A google. A gooooooogle.

Lin: Besides, they have it wrong. It’s only going to mess up the rest of the universe. We’ll be OK.

Orb: Great. We’ll be the destroyers of the entire universe.

Lin: That’s probably how it all got started anyway.

Orb: Yes … and it’s been us doing it over and over, trapped in a never-ending time bubble, creating and destroying ourselves forever.