Sunday, February 26, 2006

Thank You Mr. Rogers


From the Tao Te Ching:

The true leader leads from behind

Taoism was not a religion which was invented by a leader to set forth a way of being. It was not an invented religion. It was a description of the ways of the great sages who came before "Taoism." In this way it is unlike any other religion or philosophy. Taoism did not teach the people, the people taught taoism.

If you wish to know the way of the great sages, you need look no further than Mr. Rogers.

Mr. Rogers led from the bottom, and yet I believe that his silent impact on people in our century will have been greater than many political so called "leader."

Mr. Rogers taught a message of peace, sympathy and inclusion that was beautiful. Though he had been a minister, he refused to ever mention religion in his show, because he said that he would be devastated "if any child ever felt excluded from the neighborhood." He defined "injustice" as not taking care of the people who can't take care of themselves, and in a calm and forgiving tone, he said that this injustice made him very angry. Most importantly, he said the very purpose of the neighborhood was to teach children that THEY were special, not because of their things, but because of themselves, and that the greatest gift any person could give was just to be themselves-- it's the only unique gift that we're capable of giving, and that every person is worthy of our love. He believed that it was insecurity that drove people to take more that their fair share.

But his message was only the beginning of his teaching. Just as in the Lotus sermon, where the Buddha silently held aloft a lotus blossom and appreciated it's beauty, Mr. Roger showed us.

Today, who will teach the children?

Modern TV and Video games don't "entertain" us. They do not act on us by telling us stories or by communicating with our minds-- Modern TV acts on the human body directly-- TV shows are now designed to trigger the FIGHT OR FLIGHT mechanism. They trigger a release of chemicals into the blood and make us feel liker we're being chased by a band of viscous cave men. And this is very exciting.

When I was a child, we had cartoons in the morning and after school, and on the weekend there was Saturday morning. The rest of the time we had to entertain ourselves. And we had Mr. Rogers to entrance us and to relax and calm us. Today, children have 24 hour a day cartoons and video games. Furthermore, the Cartoons have become more sophisticated about triggering the nervous system's defense mechanisms and causing "excitement." We are teaching people in our society to feel beset by cavemen at all times. This will be a generation of Americans who crave constant drama constant strife-- "stress" will be the very way it "feels to be human" for us, and we will go out of our way to create violence and stress in our lives. In essence we are creating in our culture a dependancy on our own body drugs, and addiction to violence and drama.

Will we become an even more violent culture? A culture of ultra consumers who require constant vital stimulation and "entertaining?"

Who will be there to provide the example of a calm mind and a caring soul?

Mr. Rogers we still need you....

Thursday, February 23, 2006

Guilty

And now I feel all guilty....

Ok, she has to have some redeeming characteristics....

Um, well she's sort of nice.... But also kind of rude and well, ok, she isn't very nice at all actually. And she isn't very trustworthy either. OK, so she's basically morally despicable.

But I do feel sorry for her.

Oh, I got it! There is something really really good about her.

She is (usually) very open about what she doesn't know, and she's very honest about that (on most occasions). It's amazingly charming to find someone so lacking in hubris (most of the time)-- and that really is something to learn from!

Ok, now I feel better.

Longest. Post. Ever. Sorry.

Wow, that sure was a lotta garbage yesterday.... If you're just checking in here today, I recommend you skip all the stuff after "IQ" unless you're really into educational philosophy.

But the parts about the really dumb person are gods honest truth. And please don't think I was making fun of dumb people-- in fact, I usually believe that there is no such thing as "dumb people," most all of the time calling someone "stupid" is a judgment of their values-- that's just the point.

But this person however (and this will be that last time I write about the poor gal)... every day that she manages to stay out of the Darwin awards baffles me. And what's more impressive is that she somehow managed to get a college degree without ever learning that people in different countries speak different languages, or that the "middle east" isn't in "in England-- where jesus was"... she was shocked to learn that there are people in the world who don't have electricity and indoor plumbing and more shocked to learn that toasters and showers do not work without electricity or plumbing... amazed to learn that there was such a thing as deserts and bewildered that people actually live in them... she's perplexed by higher mathematics like single digit addition, and she is incapable of having a simple conversation without getting hopelessly confused. Then, when she gets frustrated and embarrassed about her inability to have a conversation she shakes her head and makes obscene farting noises and slaps and ridicules herself (which she basically does constantly)... all this without any obvious clinical mental handycap. Ah... I have so many great stories about this person, but unfortunately my blog is not anonymous enough to tell them....

It's very frightening to think of what she must have been like many years ago when she was actually in college... has her brain just atrophied in her post college years, or was she always like this?

Wednesday, February 22, 2006

"I.Q.", "G," & "MI" at the U and my "almost too dumb to be alive" acquaintance.

OR

Beating Around the Cliche Bush with the Ugly Stick


OR

"Help! Those Ninjas Stole My Multiple Intelligences!"



Ok, so as you might have guessed, this post has to do with concepts of "beauty and intelligence," "stereotyped perception and cliches" and "Ninjas kicking butts."

Well, actually, it doesn't have much to do with Ninjas kicking butt.... However I did have an unfortunate reunion with what has to be the dumbest person I've ever encountered, and I really wish someone would drop kick her butt. But, uh, I'll try to work in the Ninjas somewhere anyhow.

About this woman:

Kurt Vonnegut once described a character in a novel as being "almost too dumb to be alive." This acquaintance of mine might be the only person I have ever met worthy of such a description.

For example, I once witnessed her volunteering to explain to someone what a "denominator" was. It was bad enough that she clearly had no idea that this was the word for the unlucky chap on the underside of a fraction, but couldn't admit her ignorance. No, what followed was one of the greatest displays of dumb I have ever witnessed, and god, I wish I had it on tape. And let me stress, this spectacle was completely in earnest: she transformed before our eyes into Coach Z. She kept trying to say the word "denominator" over and over agian, and somehow couldn't say it right. Actually, she couldn't even get close. She is a native speaker of English, but I have never heard the sounds she was making in any language before-- it could easily have been the native language of Pluto:

"dee- norm-men-urgenerg"

'dee-nort-enizer"

"dee-neg-gent-urger"

And she kept stopping and shaking her head, slapping her own face and saying "why can't I say it?" And then she would try again, fail, and then make a raspberry type of farting noise, and try some more:

"dee-germ-entyper"

Then, she even wrote the word down. She studied it carefully, and tried again very slowly. Each time we thought she was going to be successful until at the last moment she would somehow miss it:

(very slowly and deliberately:) "deeeeeee-noooooom-eeeeeeen-aaaaa--geerrggggeoorrrrrrggg."
"deeeeeee-nooooooom-eeeeeeen-gerrrrggggggner.

This went on for what seemed like an hour. She must have tried literally at least 40 times.... (denomejader)

And this story by no means exhausts this being's vast resources of stupidity....

So, as you can imagine, the only thing that gets me through any meeting with this person are my fantasies of her being ripped apart by Ninjas while she inexplicably and gleefully makes fart noises and shouts "look dancer, Whooo! I learned to crochet!" (which she annoyingly pronounces "crotch it.")

IQ



But not only is her existence personally trying, her irrefutable dunder-headed-ness is intellectually upsetting for me as well.

You see, her absolute lack of intelligence is the only sure refutation of my insistence that there is no such thing as "general intelligence" ("g") or even more broadly intelligence as a whole.

"No such thing as intelligence?" you ask? Yes, the idea of "so and so" being smarter than "whosey who" has become an unquestionable assumption in our culture. But it is just these types of absolute truths that we need to question the most. When someone says "boy, that sure is a smart kid!" or "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" or some other well-worn platitude, it carries the power of generations of acceptance. Hence it's veracity is never questioned. Which is really too bad.

Firstly, these cliches make a duality where there is more likely a continuum: "either beauty is in the eye of the beholder or it isn't." The truth however is probably more gray than black and white. I think we continue to use cliches because we want them to be true, not because they are. The idea of intelligence is very flattering if you come out on the "superior" side while it makes a lovely excuse for ones failings if we land on the downside. So for a long time we had the idea of "general intelligence," which as we now know, was invented by a couple of Phrenologists for the purpose of showing that white people were better than people with other colors of skin, after measuring skulls failed to verify Arian superiority.

But there were lots of problems with "G." Firstly, it didn't seem to be a good predictor of anything (not even race, which to some was it's greatest failing.) One kid gets a high IQ and another gets a low IQ. Statistically their odds of success remained the same.

But then Howard Gardner back-flipped onto the scene with his theory of Multiple Intelligences and saved the day. Gardner gave us the idea that there is no such thing as "g", but instead there are "self smarts," "music smarts," "body smarts," "math smarts," "picture smarts," "word smarts," "nature smarts" and the "popular girl smarts." Well, I guess that's a little better.... And it does seem to be a slightly better predictor of success-- at least in specific endeavors.

However, here is the problem. Take Mozart for example. Did he have "music smarts." Sure he did. Did he have lots of other smarts too? Of course. But why was Mozart so great? Was it just a gift for tunefulness? Absolutely not. Perhaps it was his math smarts which allowed him to construct such perfectly ordered compositions. Or his "popular girl smarts" that enabled him to communicate so fully with us. And what happens when we compare Mozart to Bach, Beethoven, Debussy, Lizt or Mahler? Well, we see that one is a great composer because of his picture smarts, one because of his self smarts, one because his nature smarts and one because of his body smarts. How important were their "music smarts?" I'm not sure there even is such a thing!

And the same would be true for writers, mathematicians, and popular girls.

So because of this failing, certain people have tried expanding Multiple Intelligences into a complex swirling entangled grid of fluctuating kinds of intelligence. Though I enjoy contemplating these theories to the music of Pink Floyd, they are basically worthless for understanding anything about so-called intelligence

The truth is that as our concepts of "intelligence" come closer to the real world, "intelligence" becomes synonymous with "individuality." Mozart was a genius because of his specific life experiences and understandings. Same with all the other composers, and same with every other human. We each have something unique and powerful that we can all learn from-- we are each a clever solution to the problems that we encounter. And even a lack of typical "g" can represent a powerful intelligence of a sort. Those of us who encounter difficulties learning may become geniuses at teaching! Remember that Einstein declared that his eventual insights were due to the relative trouble he had at understanding concepts that were easy for his contemporaries.

The truth is that their ARE multiple intelligences-- somewhere's around 6 billion of em.

And as for my ridiculously stupid friend from above, I even learned from her! I'll be consulting with her about my new theory of "singular dumbs."

Monday, February 20, 2006

Happy Birthday George Washington...

I'm glad to celebrate by not going to work today!



George Washington's Birthday is interesting in that it was widely celebrated as a folk-holiday before it was made a national holiday. People used to have "birthnight dances" and singings and such... it seems odd to me from the perspective of today that politicians would be celebrated as national heroes.... Because Presidents today are seen to be the primary representative of their political parties, there is always a rush to either deify or destroy them (which is why republicans always talk about Ronald Reagan as the greatest being to ever walk the earth, while trying to erase both Roosevelts and Kennedy from history.) So after all the bickering, most Americans love the presidency but hate the president.

As for the "Day of Opera" at the Cultural Center, it was a big success. If I told you not to come because we weren't performing all of Tartuffe, I was wrong-- this event was really really neat. If I'm not in it next year I plan to attend. Tartuffe, for it's part was very popluar.

As for me, I think I did the best singing I've ever done. However, I wasn't offered a myriad of A-house contracts on the spot. but I'm told "the important people" were there.... I did get a lot of very nice compliments, and I met a very nice composer.

And I learned something kind of interesting about character choices. When we first performed Tartuffe it was set historically. For the role, I used a sort of character voice-- this had to do with certain vowel choices and phrasing. When we set it in Texas-- this character voice didn't work anymore, so I started using more southern mannerisms and vowel sounds....

Here's what I learned-- a European-ish (read sophisticated, college educated and liberal) man getting angry and jumping up and down and yelling at his daughter, wife and maid is funny, because it's not threatening. In fact, the angrier he gets, the funnier it is, because everyone knows he isn't actually going to do anything about it. On the other hand A southern, American man jumping up and down and yelling at women conjures the trailer park, and makes people a little nervous. Everyone is thinking "oh my god, he's going to hurt that girl!!'. Indeed, when I exited in rage, I charged at a woman in the audience and she actually yelped at me in terror: "oh my god! I'm sorry!" It was a comedy, but she was honestly terrified of me!

The second time through, I played the character very charming at the start of the scene, and established that I loved my daughter. Then I played down the angry stuff. The result was that the audience laughed a lot more....

Anyway, it was a wonderful day. I've been something of an absentee boyfriend lately with rehearsals and such, and I got to spend the day with K... it was really nice.

PS- Happy birthday to "she who must not be named in this blog."

Friday, February 17, 2006

early morning blogging

early morning blogging requires no capital letters-- no need to wake those poor chaps up yet. the sun slants through the window in that funny way that makes the inner "vampyre" itch uneasily. (thank you sharkey for the true spelling)

its damn cold outside. burr.

even the passing cars still sound sleepy to me. this is day two of teaching early morning class. day 1, there were only 2 students. today, in the cold, i'm hoping that they will skip class, and i can come home before my rehearsal. or better yet get my huge hair tamed a bit. i'm getting it cut short so i can look businessmanlike for tartuffe.

rehearsal: starting to get a little nervous, as i'm not sure who i will be singing for. g seems to think there will be lyric opera people and others. and the music is very difficult....

more later....

Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Governor/Impaler candidate's wife fired for witchcraft!



Firstly, let me state that I'm so glad to live in an America where googling "satanic governor" isn't just for fun anymore!



In case this is news to you, MN Gubernatorial candidate Johnathan "the impaler" Sharkey ran on a platform of serving the dark lord Satan and personally ritualistically impaling criminals in front of the capital building (veiw the rest of his here.

Apparently, things arn't going so well for Sharkey lately. First, he was arrested, and now his wife has been fired from her job as a school bus driver on the grounds that she is a Pagan. School officials arn't trying to hide the reasons, saying they "don't think she's a good rolemodel."

What is the moral of the story? That it's stupid to be a Satanist. You see, Satan is an underachiever.

As everyone knows, Jesus has George Bush on his VAD (Voice Activated Dialup-- fer you ol timers), and when the J. man wanted his guy in office, he got it. Satan, on the other hand can't even get his people a buss driving job. You see, Satan needs to set his goals a little higher-- all he was going for was a few impalings on the state dime. Jesus on the other hand has apparently followed through on two invasions, the overthrow of 4 governments, the destruction of New Orleans (according to Pat Robertson and others...) the attack on the world trade center (according to evangelical leaders) countless deaths in Iraq.... and on and on. Really, when it comes to death and destruction Jesus has the market cornered.

And Sharkey might look mean with that sword, but remember, Dick has a shot gun.

On a different note, I feel beset by a band of viscious cavemen. My alarm-clock/radio sent my fight or flight mechanism into high gear this morning with this top story:

Congress declares "the rapture is near-- there is no longer any such thing as a deficit!" According to unamed sources:
"well with this rapture thing here, it's not like we'll need social security--(shouting madly:) tax cuts for everyone! I'm buying 17 hookers." In other news, America is ****ed!

I think it's time for lucky to take a break from the news for a while.

Penultimate ramble:

My new class started this morning. Gee wiz, I'm practically working like, "real work" hours.... I need a nap.

Final bit:

Um, I forgot what I was going to say....

Tuesday, February 14, 2006

Dear Readers, happy valentines day, all of you...


are my telephone!



I know that I linked to them yesterday, but that one was just too funny!


The cool photo was from Ohio U's vintage advertising gallery which has lots of really funny stuff

For example,

For my spamentine Leonie:

canned meat is always funny! And, is that little girl supposed to be licking that giant piece of processed meat product?


And, TMK and Leonie get special V-day link love over there to the right!

PS-- Happy b-day Mr. K!




AND A FINAL ADDITION TODAY.

I added a sound file of me in the OperaModa Tartuffe.

Sunday, February 12, 2006

Long Weekend, Require Levity

I think I have another couple of chapters of the "add on" novel writen, so I'll post again soon....

Had another good rehearsal for the Tartuffe Scene today....

Stood up dear friends for bowling night, shitty of us, sorry guys.... We were both just feeling really out of it and then....

Laugh at silly names for chocolate here.

Saturday, February 11, 2006

Look at a Black Man

So, if you've noticed the increasing scarcity of black people on TV and in movies lately, and you live in the suburbs, it's probably been a while since you've seen an actual black person, so you can see one here: to view African American click here.

The link, by the way, is to a beautiful site about the American hero Paul Robeson. In addition to being a great scholar, activist and actor, he was the owner of one the most beautiful voices in the history of recording. And though he was classically trained in the lineage of the great teacher Garcia, and his early recordings display a remarkable technique (to here model bass high voice production click here) Robeson rarely sang opera, as it was generally considered upsetting to have black people sing songs written by dead white men.



More beautiful music files can be found here:
music files here.

So I had this conversation this morning about how, well, since they took black people off TV I hardly ever see them any more. And that led to this post.

By the way, I've determined that this post sounds pretty racist, but that is necessarily so. So first let me apologize. You see, it's our society's habit to cover over all our steaming shittiness with rose gardens. And if Rush Limbaugh and Bill O'Reilly say that racism and discrimination are things of the past, then most Americans want to believe them. And it must be true, I mean people tell me all the time that THEY AREN'T RACIST:

It usually goes something like this: "now I'm not racist, but..." and then they say something about the way --insert your favorite minority here-- people: smell bad, are lazy, are destroying america, caused the sinking of the titanic.... or some other "Non-racist" statement about the inferiority darker skin color.

So, firstly, if you are intentionally racist, let me inform you that you are an idiot. Perhaps I'm being a little hard on you because I myself am in an "inter-racial" relationship: while my earlobes are properly attached, my girlfriend has well, detached earlobes. But, I don't hold it against her because it's not her fault, and SHE'S not like those other ones. Yes, according to some geneticists, "earlobe" attachment is a better basis for establishing race scientifically than skin color. So, if you're white, and you think you hate black people or vice versa, here's the bad news: if "African genes" were cooties, we'd all be itchin with the critters. And "black people" are so varied genetically that if you took two random black people and two random white people, the black people would statistically probably have more in common genetically with the white people than they do with each other. Actually, I just heard an "African American Studies" professor explaining on the radio that he should really be teaching "Northern European Studies," because although his skin is black, he is genetically almost entirely Irish. Not that that really matters, because as he explained it, all Europeans are a sub set of one type of African: "the small northern-most bit of Africa called 'Europe.'"

And Secondly, if you're not one of those idiots with pointy white hats, it's time to give up the act and admit it. Unless you are from a different planet, you were probably raised, like I was, as a racist. And unless you are remarkably dim, some of it probably took even despite your best efforts.

Yes, even being a super liberal, raised as I was by a pack of socialist wolves, I have to admit these ugly little tendencies in myself. In our society, being white and seemingly middle(ish) class, people say horrible, horrible racist things to/in front of you, even when you are still young, quite routinely.

Luckily for me however, my grandparents and mother couldn't have set a better example, when someone said something racist in front of me, they would quite vigorously tell them that it was inappropriate to talk that way, especially in front of children.

So I learned to congratulate myself heartily for being so un-racist by the time I got into high school. And when I went to college, I congratulated myself for having actual black people as friends (or at least that I hung out with them now and then.) But one day discovered that one of these black friends of mine was smarter than I was,

and I was surprised.

"How did that happen," i thought, "I mean, they aren't that smart on TV."

So it was a subtle little thing, but ugly. And once I discovered that little bit of ugliness, I started searching myself, and I found other subtle little bits of racist programming.

And I would have gotten away with it too, if it weren't for you kids and that dog....

OK, so the lecture's over kids, daddy has gained some weight, and his soap box is getting creaky....

Wednesday, February 08, 2006

Tribute to "Meme"



This is my "companion animal" Mimi.

Firstly, let me explain that I have what some people would call "strange" ideas about animals. Specifically, I don't believe that "humans" are "more evolved" or superior to "animals" in any meaningful way. Firstly, to paraphrase Steven Jay Gould I believe that Meme represents an ideal and brilliant evolutionary solution to the problem of being a hamster-- no less than I do for the problem of being human. But more importantly, I don't see how her small size or lack of "higher thinking" would lessen the size of her "peep hole" into experience. And to go even further, I strongly suspect that in some real meaningful ways most animals may be supperior to humans despite their inability to perform well on standard IQ tests. Adolf Hitler was a particulary "intelligent" man, but I've never known of a hamster to to do the things that he did....

Sadly, Mimi has hamster breast cancer, which is not uncommon or unexpected for a hamster of her years.... It has been interesting knowing her, because when we met her, she felt like the baby, and we like her parents. But in her brief years, she has taken on a a sort of wisdom and dignity that I as yet lack. And I believe that I have learned something about the meaning of gentleness, and of many other things, because I have known her.

And that's all I'm going to say about that.

Tuesday, February 07, 2006

really good

While I'm on the topic of music,

This is my friend Stephen, and he rocks:

http://www.myspace.com/emptyorchestra

And here he is with the band Lingua Franca

Their music is just utterly beautiful.

Monday, February 06, 2006

Have NOT Lost the Will to Rock



Will give you the rock you love/want/need!

So when I first heard these guys I was completely in awe. So much of what's out there today just sounds like the same old gravy in a new train. But MSI at least sounded different.... Which took me quite a while to get used to....

I'm not gonna get all analytical and geek out about stuff, but let me just say it's refreshing to hear a "punk" band that gets what "punk" was about in the first place. I hate hate hate almost all of the current "punk" bands out there today and here's why:
/

The Cosmology of Rock



There are always these two forces competing in the music business: money and soul. Soul gives birth to something new and cool. And there is rock. And it is good. Then after a while, the money people always find just the right formula for success and start grinding out bland flavorless artless tune-sausage for the masses. Back in the days when The Cure was a punk band the punks were rebelling from the whole gray dried up and lifeless souless world that was disco. But after a while "punk" became the "new sound of youth culture..." and out came the tune-sausage. So the Cure would go out to clubs, where they would be worshiped as youth culture punk heros and they would put a bunch of Disco tunes on the Juke box and get their asses kicked. So they wip't out the synths and started cutting disco tracks that actually rocked like "lets go to bed" and "fascination street."

Now that's punk rock!

And most of the "punk bands" that are being cranked out today got the authentic sound, but they're pure tune-sausage.

MSI, on the other hand are cutting techno dance tracks (the bane of the last wave of punks) that frickin' rock!

The other thing that most "punk" bands completely miss today is IRONY. And though it is ironic to talk about irony with such a complete lack of irony, MSI knows exactly how to simultaneously attack all the A-holes out there and freak-out parents at the same time--this delicate balancing act has always been a strong point of true "punk" movements.


"But don't take my word for it," go rock out for yourself, Groove to the tunes and crack up to great lyrics like: "I can't wait for you to shut me up," and well, I don't want to quote some of their other great lyrics because they're the kind of stuff that freaks out parents but, if you're not easily offended check out:

MSI Homepage-- and take a close look at the art!

Tunes at myspace

"what do they know," and "uncle" are clean enough for work!

Also, does anyone have a link to the live video of "molly?"




Read About MSI



A great interview.

another good interview

also

Friday, February 03, 2006

Last night I dreamt of Operatic Satanic Muppets!





Check out this article: http://www.nfcs.net/forumindexframe.html.

Apparently this teacher showed a video of a Muppets Faust with Joan Sutherland and now parent's are trying to get her fired for it. The video has a muppet which depicts Satan.... and so the parents are trying to say the teacher is a Satanist. OF course if they were'nt utter ignoramouses they would know that Faust is a story of redemption through Christ and it's probably exactly their sort of thing....

I'm lazy so I'll republish part of what I wrote in a comment on no substance.


Just because Conservatives seem organized doesn't mean they're smart. Take for example those folks in Colorado who freaked out over a muppets doing Opera. A teacher there showed a muppets video of Faust and now a group of conservative wacko parents are trying to get her fired for it. Now these people are clearly incredibly moronic. Infact, I normally don't even believe in the idea of G, but these people personify a certain lack of the stuff: "almost too dumb to be alive." I mean sheesh, Faust is a redemption story, they should love this stuff... but there's a devil and a crossdresser and it's art, so it might make their children think and then where would they be....

And the evidence that conservatives are idiots doesn't end there-- just listen to anything any of them ever say publicly... they can't really believe that crap can they?

And the idea that there are intelligent movement leaders out there cooly pulling all the strings is a figment of progressive paranoia. Certainly it means something when the likes of Grover Norquist publicly declares that the true aim of his conservative policy is to concentrate power in the hands of some rich white folks (fascism) before the white folks become a minority "in their own country," but our current social prediciment goes way beyond the social engineering of a few Pat Robertson types.

And yet they ARE effective. This probably has more to do with institutionalized american greed and fearmongering and the cognitive dissonance that go with it than the intelligence of american conservatives. We've created a system where all the checks and balances are invested in the status quo-- this resulting "stability (a strong conservative movement) " was a theoretical strenghth of the facist economic model the US has intentionally adapted when it voted Ronald Reagan into power. Essentially we've just written ourselves into a box and there's nothing we can do about it. Perhaps if Americans were more culturally and historically literate, but then that's why the congress just quietly passed massive education funding cuts 'to balance the budget...."


And that's pretty typical of the polital ranting I do on other people's webpages so it doesn't show up here!

Actor's web pages--really really ridiculously good looking

Ah well, I'm such a spoil sport... I was going to post some screenshots from some actor/singer web pages, but I just can't do it. Really, they are ridiculously funny to me-- totally taken right out of the script for Zoolander.... But when I thought about it, I decided that these are probably just good people who got some bad advice (or they are copying people who got bad advice.) and I can't bring myself to make fun of them here....

But for the few people who might read this here is my advice about "marketing" and "branding yourself:" the branding of the future is "unbranding." Every one of us has something unique that is in essence "brandable." When you make some materials that make you look like everyone else.... what's the point, even if you are really really really ridiculously good looking?

But then again, who am I to give career advice?

Wednesday, February 01, 2006

Aha! The front page of my singer web site has arrived!

Argh! I've decided that I hate hate hate Firefox! Hate hate hate!
Safari, for those of you who don't use it is simply the easiest fastest coolest and most stylish web browser ever invented.

However, after I slaved over the HTML, I think I've worked out most of the bugs for most browsers, so here it is:

http://homepage.mac.com/luckymortal/

So far I've got up a temporary front page where I mock the front page that I will eventually have, and a bio, and some sound files if you dare to navigate the site to find them. As for the front page, while I was looking around at singer and actor web pages I discovered that they are essentially the silliest narcisism fests known to man. Everyone has to be mugging at the camera in different angles trying to show their best "blue steel" look-- perfectly ridiculous. So I give it a go and show that I too can "have the look."

Also, if you can find it, there is a sound file up of my old band Drive-by Elvis, which I grow more impressed with every year. I now believe that I really missed out on something because I never saw us live.

I'll write more about all of this later, but for now I'm off to work....

 
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