Max: Fuck It

Fuck all of it.

Jericho: FIF-TEE!

Wednesday I went with my friend Angi to the cargo scale. I hopped on first, the numbers did their little roll and a final answer came up: 427.5

For those of you playing the home game, I started at 475.8, that means I've lost 48.3 pounds in 94 days. I'm calling it 50 pounds, I was wearing jeans, I had been getting weighed in shorts, I'm calling it 50!

That comes out to an average of about a half pound a day. Since we started the diet, we haven't made it to the gym once. It's so bad - going to the gym is part of the diet and I know my metabolism has suffered because I haven't gone to the gym. We're looking for ways to fit it into our schedule, but it's tough.

I had been hoping to hit 50 pounds by the end of the year. I think I need to reassess that goal. It looks like I'm losing about 10 pounds a month. In the first 12 days of the diet, I lost 17.1 pounds, in the next 82 days, I lost 31.2 pounds. So, 10 a month isn't far off the mark. I'm looking at my original weight, 475, and there is a nice number to hit there, 75. So, my new goal is to be 400 pounds on Dec. 31, 2004 - that's 27.5 pounds, by jinkies I think I can do it!

Steph is down like 25 pounds so far, she's getting into clothes she had before she moved out here. She is very excited. I've started to notice my shirts are bigger, my belt fits better, the seat belt goes over my belly instead of under. Good things.

I can't wait to be thin. I can't wait to be svelte. Who knows why I might be capable of if I can pull this caper off!

Max: Republicans For Kerry

Republicans For Kerry

Max: Innocents Abroad, by Rick Steves

Innocents Abroad by Rick Steves: "Here's the arithmetic: the wealthiest ten percent of a society can call the shots in a democracy if 20 percent vote on moral rather than economic issues and half the rest don't vote at all. An alliance between the champions of capital and moralists (those whose vote is determined by moral issues such as prayer in school, abortion, and gun control rather than by economic policy) becomes potent when half of the rest of the electorate (those who would gain most from a more liberal government) are confused or simply don't bother to vote. The electorate is ten kept in line by a cattle-prod called fear."

Max: Stranger moves in, redecorates while woman's on vacation - Oct 22, 2004

CNN.com - Stranger moves in, redecorates while woman's on vacation - Oct 22, 2004: "DOUGLASVILLE, Georgia (AP) -- A woman came home from vacation to find a stranger living there, wearing her clothes, changing utilities into her name and even ripping out carpet and repainting a room she didn't like, authorities said."

Coming up next on HGTV, Squatter Design.

Max: Pointless Nostalgic

I have long been a bit of a jazz head. I mainly go for instrumental jazz. Outside of Sinatra, Ella, and a few others, vocal jazz just never really grabbed me. So, I am not entirely sure why I decided to check out Jamie Cullum's Pointless Nostalgic. I guess it was because I was curious what an attractive, young Brit who by all rights should be fronting some dance pop band was doing making jazz. I have to admit, I am impressed. It has just enough edge to appeal to a jazz spaz like me, but listenable enough to appeal to civilians. I recommend it to all. Except Jericho, because he hates vocals of all sorts.

Max: CNN.com - Robertson: I warned Bush on Iraq casualties - Oct 20, 2004

CNN.com - Robertson: I warned Bush on Iraq casualties - Oct 20, 2004: "NEW YORK (CNN) -- The founder of the U.S. Christian Coalition said Tuesday he told President George W. Bush before the invasion of Iraq that he should prepare Americans for the likelihood of casualties, but the president told him, 'We're not going to have any casualties.'"

WTF?!? And half the fucks in this country are still planning on voting for this fucktard?!?!?

Max: Alan Keyes Says, "Homos Cause Incest"

The wit and wisdom of Senatorial carbet bagger Alan Keyes.

"U.S. Senate candidate Alan Keyes told a rally Saturday that incest was 'inevitable' for children raised by gay couples because the children might not know both biological parents.

'If we do not know who the mother is, who the father is, without knowing all the brothers and sisters, incest becomes inevitable,' Keyes told the Marquette Park rally held to oppose same-sex marriages."

It's almost a shame that Barak Obama is going to kick his ass come November. We don't have nearly enough full bore loonies in the Senate.

Max: Peoples

Jon Stewart, a true Irate Weirdo...

KRS-One, however, needs to be kicked in the nuts. Hard. Repeatedly. With steel-toed boots.

"I say that proudly," the Boogie Down Productions founder went on, insisting that, before the attack, security guards kept black people out of the Trade Center "because of the way we talk and dress.

"So when the planes hit the building, we were like, 'Mmmm - justice.'"

Max: Must Have Been Something I... Read

It is amazing how effective a good book can be at helping one to get through this thing we call life. I have just torn through four good uns.

Cloud Atlas is one of the oddest (novels? short story collections?) I have read. It starts off in the late 1800's, with the journal of a notary from Frisco. It details his voyages in the South Pacific and the troubles he has with the heathen natives and corrupt crew of the ship he is traveling on. Suddenly, the journal cuts off in mid sentence.

The next thing we know it is the 1920's and we are reading the letters of an aspiring composer and general low life to his friend, a physics student at Oxford. The letters detail how the young composer insinuates himself into the household of an aging, disabled composer and becomes elder composer's student and secretary while secretly ripping him off and having an affair with his wife. What does this have to do with the journals we had just been reading? In the course of looking for things to steal from his employer, the author of the letter comes across and reads the very fragment of the journal that started the book. The letters end almost as jarringly as the journal with just as little closure.

Next it is the 1970's and a young gossip columnist who aspires to being an investigative reporter finds herself stuck in an elevator with an elderly scientist who just happens to be the recipient of the letters that comprised section two. He gives her the tip of a lifetime and she finds herself wrapped up in a concierges to hide the dangerous flaws in a nuclear power plant that is about to come online. Again the story cuts off.

Suddenly it is modern day London and a somewhat shifty owner of a vanity publishing house somehow finds himself the publisher of a massive best seller. Unfortunately, his success makes him the target of some less than non-violent criminals and he finds himself on the run. Just before he hits the road he receives a submission to his publishing house, a mystery adventure about a gossip columnist who aspires to be an investigative reporter and who receives the tip of a lifetime from an elderly scientist in an elevator. Once again the story cuts off.

The scene shifts to a futuristic Korea, ruled by Corpacracy, an absolution oligarchy of corporate leaders. In this society, most of the dangerous and menial tasks fall on the shoulders of vat grown clones who are kept compliant with the help of drugs an religion. One, however suddenly starts to notice how poorly she and her clone brethren are being treated. The next thing she knows, she is whisked off to a university lab. When the graduate student who was supposed be studying her uses her as a servant and a target during a drunken game of William Tell, she is taken away from the lab and is promoted from test subject to student. She soon finds herself mixed up with an abolitionist group who are fighting for clone rights. Once again, the story cuts off, but not before our clone sees a movie about a shifty owner of a vanity publishing house who... Well, you know.

The scene shift to a distant, post-apocalyptic Hawaii. The agrarian society, which just so happens to worship an ancient, Korean clone as a goddess, would almost seem paradise were it not for a warlike tribe determined to make everyone else's life nasty, brutish and short.

This is an odd, but very well written, book. It sucked me in from the start. It was not perfect. The overly stylized language of post-apocalyptic Hawaii took some getting used to, but on the whole it succeeded in taking me for a mind-fuck of a ride.

Next up was Traveling Music, the latest travel narrative from Rush drummer Neil Peart. On the surface, this would seem to be his least adventurous adventure, a quick drive from his home in California to an national park in Texas and back. However, his car's CD player is loaded with some of his favorite music and along the way, we get some fascinating reflection on music and the role it has played in his life. Peart is revoltingly talented. He is one of the greatest drummers in history, he writes some of the best lyrics ever penned and does both for one of the best bands in rock. On top of that, he has hit three home runs, written three top notch travel narratives, allowing us homebound peons to take part in a few of the adventures life has afforded him. Not that I could in any way ever envy the man, not after reading his last book.

Next up was a book that may not be of interest to everyone, Me and My Bass Guitar. It is called a biography, but is really a tribute from a friend to one of the most generous and talented human beings on the planet, Victor Wooten. It was special to me because I got to get a taste of some of that generosity and talent recently. It was interesting to get some insight into someone who has been such a major influence on me.

Finally there was Contents Under Pressure, which dovetailed nicely with the last two. It is a chronicle of Rush, which has been one of my favorite bands for quite some time. This is another that is for fans only. It was interesting to hear what the band thought of their own work and they went over their history album by album, tour by tour.

Read any good books lately?

Jericho: We cheated!

Yesterday was a really bad day followed up by a really good day. I realize that might seem impossible, but indeed it's true.

I have a few major projects ramping up at work, the largest of which is a "forklift upgrade" of our voicemail system in our main office. That means we'll be replacing the hardware and software - a complete change out. This was set to occur this weekend. We ordered a new, big server for this upgrade. This is a big deal for me - screwing up was not an option.

After two or so weeks of ripping my hair out, nearly quitting my job three or so times (not kidding) we finally seemed to be getting somewhere yesterday. It was a busy day but things were looking good. We (finally!!!) got to unpacking the server.

Almost every computer made these days has a built in Network Interface Card (NIC). Without a NIC, you cannot connect to a network. I didn't even think to wonder if this $12,000 server had a built in NIC. So, when we opened up the box, we saw that the server didn't have a built in NIC, it had a NIC in one of the six PCI expansion card slots. I happened to need all six slots for the cards I would use to connect the phone system to the voicemail system. In short, I was screwed over a $10 NIC card. It's a big mess and my big install is off for the weekend. While I didn't "screw up" I certainly didn't come out of this looking very good. In the four years I have been here, I have only been this close to quitting this job once. If I knew I wouldn't lose everything by quitting, I would be gone. I'm really starting to loathe this job. That sucks, because it's a good job.

Yesterday was also my third wedding anniversary. Steph and I have been planning since August to celebrate our love for each other and our luck on our current weight loss by breaking our diet! We planned to order a pizza. As it turned out, we ordered two pizzas! We are big fans of Papa Murphy's. They have a low carb pizza called deLITE. It's just a very thin crust pizza, but it's really good. Now, their nutritional information is kinda vague, so I have no idea how many carbs we ate. But, we each ate a medium pizza and I'm sure it's more carbs than I'm supposed to have in a day! I had two 20 ounce A&W Root Beers and Steph had a couple of low carb sodas. Then we followed that up with chocolate cake and Ben and Jerry's!

The meal was fantastic! I haven't been that full since I went on Atkins - you forget how much dough expands in the stomach! So, yeah, we binged, but we binged smartly. The pizza was low carb because it was on an ultra thin crust, my soda was full sugar, but no caffeine, we split the pint of Ben and Jerry's over a piece of cake that was about a quarter of what I would have eaten before the diet. We probably each got a week's worth of carbs, but considering we have been on the diet for ten or so weeks (today is day 74!) it was worth it! We didn't even feel gross this morning, which shocked the heck out of me.

I can't say that the pizza made up for the hell I went through earlier in the day. But, it was a darned good pizza and I'm glad we did it. It was pretty sad how excited we both were about eating pizza. It's also pretty sad that the pizza was the highlight of my week if not my month.

Max: Happy Happy

Happy Birthday to my lovely Wife.

Happy Anniversary to my hetero lifemate and the woman who took him away from me.

Much love to all.

Jericho: High Carb Flash

I have taken a recent interest in Flash animation - don't ask why, it's a long story. So, while out googling for something completely different, I ran across this and I just had to share. This site is totally safe for viewing at work. This is the closest I have been to a muffin in nearly three months!

Jericho: Replying to Corinna

Start by reading this post from Cupie.

Then read this comment to Cupie's post.

Now then, read my long ass comment:


Doesn't sound like you plan to make a living as a writer, Corinna.

We, the masses, determine what will and what will not survive in the market place. We vote with our feet, or, more precisely, with our credit cards. Don't like the big box stores? Don't shop there. Don't like Amazon? I'm sure B&N will take your money.

The problem is that the majority of the masses likes big box and they like Amazon. They are voting for ease, simplicity and one "trip" shopping. Can't say I blame them. While I, too, love the smaller book stores, I hate wasting my time. I hate going into several stores looking for what I want and never finding it. When I look at Amazon, it's a 95% certainty I will find what I'm looking for.

Amazon is also sharing the spotlight. They like having people come to them for all their needs, so they have allowed other retailers to sell their wares via Amazon's online presence. No corner bookstore can offer the selection that the combination of Amazon and these other retailers can provide. When you buy a used book or whatever from one of these retailers you are supporting some mom & pop, small box operation. Amazon & eBay may actually be saving some smaller retailers.

In the end, he who has the gold makes the rules. In our capitalist system, he who makes the most money will be the most likely to survive. Money is the measurement of fitness, regardless of what our definition of fit may be. The masses like big box. If the small boxes don't find ways to stay afloat, they will not survive to the next generation.

As writers, we need to find ways to gain an audience. Bucking the system can be good for a while - but unless you find a way to appease a larger market, you will always need a day job. Are you saying that if your work were accepted by the establishment to be sold in big box stores - you would refuse? If so, enjoy flipping those burgers!

I'm not saying big box is the only way. Prince is a great example that both I and Cupie have spoken of recently. He is bucking the system right and left, he sells music directly to his fans - no music conglomerate in the middle. He sells his album as part of his ticket price, thus keeping his numbers up making him more marketable, etc. But, he was a "slave" to Warner at one time. Without Warner, would Prince have ever left Minnesota?

Poo-pooing the system gets us no where. Using the system to our advantage can move us forward. Sure, the big guys dominate the market. But, get a smaller retailer to carry your self published work - and now Amazon is selling you to a VERY LARGE market. You are George Lucas making your own movie with your own money, using 20th Century Fox for distribution only. Do you have a "Star Wars" in your pen? Saved on your hard drive? May the force be with you!

Max: Turkey Bacon

This is pretty cool

Max: Scraping The Bottom (End)

Here is my very firstest bass recording. Watch for me on next year's Grammies.