fuck school

Public Grade school is a compulsory institution that is run with involuntarily seized funds.

It’s methods are never questioned, and it’s employees are unfairly rewarded.

Teachers get paid proportionally far more than other professions, for doing a physically safe job 35 hours a week 9 months of the year.

Young people are damaged by waking up early when their biological clocks are not anywhere near that schedule.

Left to their own devices, children will take it upon themselves to learn.

School food is too low in nutritional value, and has been shown time and time again to contain toxic materials or laxatives.

Results on tests do not predict success, or something even more important: happiness.

There is no reason to make a child do repetitive busy work(classwork, homework) if they can demonstrate aptitude for a given subject.

The grading system encourages competition in fields where it is unnecessary or harmful.

If 2 people can both read when they are 25, it doesn’t matter if they learned when they were 4 or 12.

mean guys finish first

I’d like to think that I’m writing with some insider knowledge, as it hasn’t been uncommon throughout my life to hear myself described as “mean” or “an asshole”. I never went out of my way to disagree with such statements, only their purpose.

What is the difference between being nice and being mean? On the surface level, it only describes a manner of speech and presentation. If I say “please” and “thank you”, I am nice. If I say “gimme that” and “about time!”, I am mean. But these distinctions are entirely superficial. The only content in these phrases, respectively, is “I desire that” and “my desire is fulfilled”.

What’s far more important is a persons actual intentions and effect. Regardless of how they choose to speak and present, an individual could have nice, or mean, intentions. There are individuals who have been known to present themselves as nice, caring, and worthy of sympathy; but really have intentions to harm and bring pain to others(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_bundy). On the other side, there are individuals who have been known to present themselves as mean, cold, and worthy of disdain; but really have intentions to help and bring betterment to others(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penn_Jillette). I call this “Cobe’s the ‘Jillette-Bundy’ spectrum”.

But it isn’t a spectrum as much as a map. Because there are individuals who are both nice in mannerisms and intention, or mean in mannerisms and intention. The former may sound great, but in actuality falls flat. Imagine said individual getting on a megaphone and shouting “We’re greatly concerned!”... doesn’t make the best chant. However, getting on the megaphone and yelling “Power to the people!” is a little more impressive. The latter, on the other hand, is dangerous. “Heil hitler!” on the megaphone might have sounded like a praise of hitler, but instead it rallied the complacency of people during a genocide. I call this “Cobe’s the ‘rule of megaphones’”.

The best application of nice and mean is to have nice intentions, but mean presentation. Mean presentation is required to catch the right audience. Right off the bat, it scares off the squares. Those who are concerned with surface-level mannerisms are lost sheep anyway. And afterwards, anyone with one cell more than half a working brain would understand that your message, beyond it’s initial shock, is one of compassion and concern. Which is something we all need if we want anyone to hold and elevator or a door for us, literally and figuratively.

So fuck all of you, for your own good. Suck my dick, please.

Jack and Jill

Jack doesn’t know how to think his way in to feeling better. He rides his emotions like a roller coaster, on the same tracks, everyday, to the same low point. There is very little to be happy about, so he isn’t. He doesn’t have the imagination to escape with the usual methods; flights of fantasy, optimism for the future, or fond memories. He is in the here and now, and the here and now is not where or when he wants to be. He is depressed.

Jill could think herself in to, or out of, anything. She drives her own emotions, but at such dangerous speeds that she inevitably crashes. There is plenty to be happy about, which causes her guilt because she's not. She has the imagination to simultaneously have episodes of paranoia, pessimism about the future, and regrets. Always thinking of an unattainable ideal, she takes no time to realize that the present moment is not so bad. She is depressed.

Never Lose your Ego

A stream of consciousness should be like a raging river. Maybe a geyser. Never just a trickle though. No one wants to read thoughts that only babble on a brook. They need to cut permanent canyons. And don’t even offer anything if your consciousness is clear and free of fish and debris. I only want to take a swim if there’s salmon swimming upstream and huge branches falling down from the thunderstorm of your internal dialogue. I only catch the big fish. I only use live bait and I drive in a big fucking boat. I always drink beer, always buy american and spank my kid when he’s bad. I call my mom and I love jesus. I change my oil on time, every time. I make sure my kids are at school on time and I drive them in the vehicle with the highest safety rating. I stop at red lights. Don’t inch up. It’s not going to turn green from will alone. Take your time, you wouldn’t want your surgeon to rush. You wouldn’t want your pacemaker to rush. You wouldn’t want a writer to rush and you definitely don’t want that crowd to rush. You’ll be trampled like so much road kill without the similar courtesy of seeing a rainbow in that gasoline spill first. Without the efficiency of a vulture picking your corpse clean. Without the comradery of the birds flying south. We need each other. It’s clear when you look down and imagine when you looked up no one was flying with you. But they always are. There’s always some ahead and if you’re lucky, some behind. It’s all about the system. Can’t break it. Stay in formation. Stay in formation while the motorcyclists stay in formation, while the sedimentary rock stays in formation, while the gymnasts stay in formation, while the clouds stay in formation and spray information to the sea below. Don’t forget what we know, and never lose your ego.

crutches

It is common to hear terminology like “he uses that as a crutch”. What’s strange is that it’s almost always in the context of abandoning said crutch. Whereas a physical cripple, with a real-life crutch, is never hounded to just drop that damn crutch and support himself.

And we hold unjust standards to certain crutches. If you think TV is a crutch, consider that vapid entertainment in your book or magazine. If you think drug use is a crutch, consider the endorphin overload you get from your exercise. No one on earth can go without help, without support, without a mental crutch of some kind.

We can’t see someone’s brain like we can see their body. We can’t understand what will work for their own chemistry, what life experiences they’ve had before, and what incidental pain they’re in for no good reason. Insisting that each individual become completely emotionally self supporting would be like insisting that everyone in a wheelchair simply stand up.

baby snakes

[I don’t intend this to be a journal. But If I have a real life experience that most people don’t have, It will be. This is one such time.]

It is 40 minutes into April the 25^th, 2008. I had to stay up late because of a surprise upon coming home from work at 10PM. I have been attempting to breed ball pythons for the past several months. Initially I was very optimistic, but towards the end very pessimistic. I had been pairing up 3 different females with one male. 1 of the females was very fat to begin with. I could safely assume the others didn’t become pregnant, but with this particular one I couldn’t tell because of her girth. Well, just when I figured the chances of 1 out of 3 were too slim, I did a routine cage cleaning and when I opened hers, my heart skipped a beat to see 2 big eggs. Immediately I rushed to set up the incubator(which they must be in A.S.A.P). Before discovering this, I had been gone for 2 days, so they could have been laid any time since then.

The urgency I felt was unreal. But also, I was scared to make any mistakes. At 11:30, I felt that the incubator was at the right temperature and humidity to move the eggs. I removed the female(who was coiled around 5 more) and moved the eggs one at a time into the incubator. 2 of the eggs were dented, which means that they were not properly humid. I panicked and got a spray bottle of water and sprayed them. The water was room temperature, but even so It dropped the temperature in their container from 90 degrees to 80. This is about 9 degrees too cold, and if they stayed in those conditions they’d be stillborn. I turned the thermostat up very high to compensate. After only a few minutes the temperature was 99. I decided to slowly drop it instead of panicking again and making it too low. Over a period of about a half an hour, I brought it down to 89, where it should be. The eggs became undented almost instantaneously. Things evened out and stopped swinging back and forth so much.

At this point, there’s no way to tell if they’ll go full term but I can only hope so. 2 thoughts occurred to me during this ordeal that surprised me. One was simply how much concern I had for the well-being of a species that wasn’t my own. There certainly was a monetary investment to this project that was at stake, but in that moment I wasn’t thinking about that, only that I didn’t want to be responsible for the non-birth of these snakes. I thought about how If these were spider eggs, most people would be happy to step on them. If these were turtle eggs, someone might coddle them only to make soup. And If these were copperhead rattlesnake eggs, someone would be chopping them up with a shovel right now. Sad that we only show empathy and care when the thing belongs to us.

The second major thought that occurred was even more troubling. I thought, ‘if humans laid eggs, abortion would be like throwing these eggs in the trash’. Now, you don’t have to point out to me all the problems with this. One, humans don’t lay eggs, and the womb of a real person with rights is different than a machine plugged into an outlet. But the general concern for the propagation of life was pretty foreign to me until that thought. Although I still keep a pro-choice outlook, It quickly wiped away my dark sense of humor about it and total disregard for those with the opposite view.

All in all, this was a humbling experience. I feel like a big pussy. If anyone could be emotionally detached from this experience, it would be me; and I’m not.

Drinking more at 5:18AM

Out of all of the drugs of the world, Alcohol is the least likely to be mystified. The common knowledge is that it is a very concrete drug, that is; that it brings you down to reality and not up to any higher plane. For the non-drinkers and weekend drinkers alike, it is thought of as a wheel-greaser, and in black-out amounts some sort of cathartic release. But certainly not anything that grants any insight or mind expansion.

So the no and low-users ask themselves ‘why would you drink any more often, or in any greater amounts?’. They don’t know, and don’t experience, what us 4-24 standard drink a day drunks know and experience. Alcohol is almost invariably thought of as the cause of various debaucheries. It is popular knowledge that people lose control of themselves, become different people, and do things they will regret. This is absolutely true, for some. But the functional drunkard quickly realizes they are a different breed. After pushing their limits of consumption, and of drunkenness, they notice that their life isn’t spinning out of control and they haven’t done anything regrettably out of character.

At this point, there is no logical reason for them to stop or slow down. This is when a little bit of magical thinking sets in. They feel superior. It’s not necessarily true, but if they can do what everyone else can do, while impaired; they feel like they’ve gotten over on the world. Thoughts like “ha, I’m drunk and you’re not” might present themselves. Then begins a slight mystification of alcohol. “If I can finish this flask in 45 minutes, I can finish anything else I start”.

But after the drunk, in all their glory, settles down a bit, perhaps that’s the point when alcohol should be mystified. Instead of simply feeling better drunk than sober, they feel better all the time. A general upswing in mood and disposition is achieved. How did that happen? You may ask yourself. Well, alcohol has given them a safety net, an excuse to go out, an excuse to stay in. Soon enough, they realize that they don’t need excuses for anything. They are less ashamed, and less scared of what life brings their way.

The haziness and shuffling of events is also embraced. It’s the lubrication in their life. They glide comfortably from one event to another, one conversation to another, one lover to another. Life no longer has the rigidness it once did. The weight of the world is lightened. Now, even after long stretches of sobriety, they can remember that life really never was that rigid, and the world never was too heavy. Their outlook has changed, positively, presumably permanently, wether they continue to drink or not.

If Alcohol was only a way to make people act a fool, it would be a mere curiosity at best. And for some it is. But for those who can handle it, it is mind expansion, it is insight, and it does bring you to a higher plane.

ken and barbie

One of the earliest forms of bullshit is believing in an ideal man and an ideal woman. It’s still going strong after all these years. What’s bullshit about it, you never asked?

I can only imagine that the common threads in the ideal man and woman originated from observations of their sexual relationship. A man is hard and rigid, always dominating. A woman is warm and receptive, always submitting. Because as we all know, a penis has never stayed limp and a vagina has never been an impenetrable brick wall. A man has never been on his back and a woman has never pushed back for her own pleasure. Freudian criticism aside, there are commonalities between the personality, if not the physicality, of the ideal man and woman throughout history. And they make no sense.

The personality we assign to each ideal couldn’t be fully realized without a lot of pain and suffering in all directions. We tend to value a woman who puts her emotions, and empathy for others emotions, first. But imagine dealing with a person who never sidestepped emotions. They’d always let you know how they felt, and wonder how you felt, constantly. It would be like reading a “blog”, only in real life. Likewise, the ideal man is often pictured as being solely concerned with results, and never considering empathy or emotional dilemmas. Imagine a person like that(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Panzram).

The physical side of things is equally nonsense because it’s always in flux depending on time and location. At one point in history, in one place, the ideal man had a small penis, was soft and flabby, pale, and had a curly head of hair. The ideal woman was fat, pale, with hips as wide as Texas. If you believe everything you hear on the TV, the standards now are just the opposite. But the standards are not, and never have been, either of these extremes. Time and time again, cross-cultural studies show that on average men do not prefer rail thin women, or fat women. And women do not prefer rock hard muscley men, or flabby men. They usually pick something in between. And there’s always some who prefer either extreme regardless of what time period and/or culture they’re in.

If everyone, in every gender, lived up to these ideals, we would have no cool-headed girlfriends, no caring fathers, no women with wide shoulders, no men with soft hands. The world would be stratified into 2 extremes that aren’t really that attractive to begin with. Next time you are concerned that you are not living up to what your randomly chosen chromosome expects of you, remember what a pretty feminine looking and acting man told you to take a deep breath and remember that like most things, gender roles should be ignored.

profuse prolific prodigal prototype

I've always admired anyone who simply puts out a lot of fucking work. Instead of the brooding, on-and-off tortured genius, I relate more to the essentially normal person, who by way of constantly recording themselves, stumbles on insight, darkness, good ideas, bad ideas, and everything in between. Everything in between is often most of it. It's much more human to just throw everything you've got out there instead of staying in your room until your masterpiece is done. More importantly, in the world of writing you can do both.

So in honor of prolific writers, musicians, actors, thinkers and anyone else who dares live a life where you don't bother to rerecord your phone messages and you can't take back what you've already said; I will publish a new piece of writing everyday. If I miss a day I will make it up on another. It's a challenge for me to see how long I can do it and with what effect. So, feedback(esspecially negative) will fuel the pain and keep me from writing in circles. See you in a few hours!