2 Minutes for Slashing

I had the opportunity recently to sit in on a strange but common phenomenon. My roommate had invited some of his friends over to watch a hockey game. There was scotch and cigars, hollering and sighing, and a general sense of pleasure. Now, I've never really understood sports, sure it's interesting watching overpaid athletes compete with each other. It's just the whole point of sports. What is it? Surely it's far more enjoyable for the athletes than it is for you at home sitting on your ass.

Every now and again I'll catch a game of soccer on television. These I tend to enjoy, mainly due to the lack of commercials and the fact that I can do some other activity for several minutes without missing anything. That's about the extent of my love for professional sports. That being said, what the hell is up with hockey? Take a second to actually think about it. The whole premise is ludicrous. Five players, on ice, skate around and try and fire a small piece of rubber around with a stick. Their objective, a goal that is being blocked by a mongoloid with more padding than the Michelin man. And every now and then, two of these tooth-lacking millionaires decide they're just not having enough fun, so they beat the guts out of each other.

This happened several times while I was watching the television. In every instance that these fights occurred, some of the company watching would display strange behavior. Their testicles would swell, they'd stand up and howl at the television, impressing each other with their displays of manliness. During these events, I was enjoying it far more than the game itself. Beers were opened and things calmed only until one team scored. At one point, one of them asked where I was from. I replied that I was born and raised in Calgary, which was met with a very cold response.
"Huh. Calgary fucking blows!" one said.
"Fuck that place. They're all assholes there. Fuckin' Calgary."
All I could do was shrug and ponder if the city which I grew up in had any measure for how much of a dick I may or may not be. I did not even know these people and already they had passed some form of judgment on me. Suffice to say, I kept quiet for the remainder of the evening so as not to upset the apple cart.

Apparently in Canada, our regional differences are heightened by this game of hockey. I realized that the argument 'my city's team is better than your city's team' is a statement that can never be answered. Perhaps hockey fans just need something, anything, to make themselves feel superior to some unseen group. What's sad about it is that it hinges on a game so silly. Sure, people take some of the most bizarre activities seriously, but perhaps just by being Canadian, we are expected by our peers to rabidly worship at the altar of the puck. Before each game, we are expected to sing the national anthem. This is insane! Of course you realize that you're not cheering for a city or a country, right? You're cheering for a corporation, a business entity, if you will. It would be like Exxon expecting you to stand up and shed a patriotic tear every time somebody puts gas in their tank.

Look- it's a game. It's supposed to be fun, not a religion. When it becomes anything more than that, you know you're being fooled.

A pig coughed on me

Alas dear readers, this may be my last post. You see I have come down with a tickle in my throat and a cough escapes my lips now and again, which can only mean one thing: I've come down with the swine flu! Don't cry! Dry those tears! It was meant to be. My last post, wherein I utilized the image of Johnny Cash to express my annoyance at those who confuse earth-friendly practices with commodity shopping, has offended mother nature and all the male gods who tend to her well being. And now I must pay the price, for I think that some of that foul swine vapor down in Mexico has made its way into my own lungs and there sits among my brochus, alveoli and cilia. When a globule of snot escaped my nostril this morning and my tongue eagerly darted up to taste its salty goodness, I was very alarmed. "What's this?!" I exclaimed, "Do I taste bacon in my boogers?!" You can imagine my dismay.

Having accepted my fate, this afternoon I made my way to the nearest Mexican restaurant so to accelerate my end by eating delicious burritos. I ordered pork burritos, chorizo quesadillas and the spiciest salsa available, oh yes, "mucho especia hombre!" I demanded, and my request was granted. I sat at the table, my mind nursing a fever and thoughts of my imminent death, my mouth nursing a swollen tongue on account of the ridiculously spicy salsa. No wonder the flu came from Mexico, if they're crazy enough to eat salsa that spicy, somebody has probably humped a sow on occasion. I could hear the wheezing gurgle of my own breathing as the mucous slowly climbed up out of the infinite blooms of alveoli, I presume, up my trachea and throat and out my nose. Sometimes a wad of the stuff was compelled to exit by the mighty coughing fits which sounded the call of my doom. I inhaled the food, figuratively, and after paying, where I was sure to exchange money using the hand which has received the brunt of my cough when it occurred to me to be polite, I made my way home, "adios tacos, I'll see you in heaven."

As I walked down the busy urban street, I heard coughs similar to my own and I thought that this signified the end times, like rats piled up and rotting in gutters. "I'm not alone," I thought and let fly a frightening and painful wretch of the lungs, spraying far and wide the toxic molecules, allowing them to play near the gaping mouths and nostrils of the strangers I saw around me. Their time was also inevitable because everyone knows that there's another plague coming, we can feel it in our small intestines and thyroid glands, among other organs. I've had a change of heart! Here on death's door I'll stop with my cynical mockery, let me formulate it another way. The plague's coming and after first attending to the evidence, weighing and analyzing the data and hard fretting over computer models, only then do we allow ourselves to express opinions of certitude. It's our passion for the sciences you see, can't get enough of them, can't stop learning, always chomping at the bit to further hollow out the gourds of our understandings. Yes, a plague in our time has long been expected, and I'm among the first to get it, making me a hipster, at least where the swine flu's concerned. See you on the other side! Cough!

Monday Prep ....

Indifference towards fledgling plants

I know, I know, like, "fledgling plants" makes no sense, what does "fledgling" even mean, whatever, I need to text somebody or tell somebody that, like, I'm so going to the show tomorrow night. Burgeoning, almost existent, not quite existent fauna, I mean flora, are a massive favorite among the "green" generation, they can't get enough of nature and its bountiful exuberance. But you already knew that. The present, like contemporary generation, like, is obsessed with decreasing their carbon footprints, like, obsessed with it, you know what I mean? Like, carbon footprints are, like, terrible, like. But don't feel too bad green, like, environmentally conscious people, our hypocrisy is minor when considering human civilization from a long term, like, telescopic perspective. The green movement is merely a scene in the farce of a play that is human kind. Oh just kidding, like, ride a bike, they've got, like, nothing to do with mining or exploitative agriculture, like.

So I was walking home from the bar this evening, where you know I imbibed, like drank, only the finest local and organic ales, when I noticed that the trees that where forced to make their way beside the busy road where I live were presenting brand new buds out into the world. They were indeed fledgling and, like, no one that I noticed gave the slightest most slight "eff you see kay" about that fact. So the baby leaves were trying to poke their, like, heads out into the world, to do their part and absorb what carbon dioxide they could, you know, convert the carbon dioxide into, like, oxygen but the passionate carbon footprint not-wanters were not too concerned in the least. I confronted a group of the anti-naturalists, and I asked of them, "pray, do tell, why are you so passionately indifferent to the struggles of young plants, you do realize that they contribute to lessening your so-called carbon footprints, don't you?" And the folk there gallivanting hollered at me, "No! we have no time for the budding of plants! We save our environmental awareness for shopping!"

Riding your bike to places to purchase shit which got there by truck, yes internal combustion driven you insatiably curious earth warrior, does not equate to diminishing your environmental impact, sorry, to be current, your carbon footprint. Is this really what a sense of the natural world has come to in my time and culture!? We're dumber than I thought! You can't purchase your way into predictable seasons people! Quote me: The "green" generation, or like, the "green" movement will go down as one of the great human farces of, like, "all time." If you don't give a shit about the world around you, you're a fool to think that your consumptive habits will affect that secret, hidden, mysterious world in any way but negatively. Consume your self to death eco-warrior, your hypocrisy and absurd delusion will make for an interesting, sustainably produced and bio-degradable documentary. Oh and of course, the footprint of your existence will betray only the slightest complicity with that, like, evil element carbon. Only a fool would suspect that carbon could sneak past your diligent elemental savvy.

Translation: If you don't care about the goings on of nature you don't give an eff you see kay about nature. My own carbon footprint is forever emblazoned on your organic-cottoned ass. (Check out Freilly's post here for a less emotional and flippant discussion of similar themes)

Flea's greatness empirically verified!

I was in the lab the other day, conducting experiments, observing phenomena, recording and making sense of data and to my shock and delight I was able to confirm that Flea is the world's greatest human being. Now, I must tighten my criteria a little lest I give the impression that I've surveyed all peoples from all cultures. My criteria were these: The greatest human being must demonstrate an undying passion for life, like a font which sprays everywhere at all times like the sun. Second, they must be deeply dogmatic about the eternal virtues of humility, kindness, gentleness and love. Third, that person must play an electrified four stringed instrument. I know, I know, you're saying, "but erasmus, surely the person you sought to find was none other than one of the several fiddle players in Dexy's Midnight Runners!?" Ah, not so fast, we don't want to forget the fourth and most vital ingredient to the world's greatest person: I'm talking funk here people. He or she must be deeply funky, yay, disgustingly funky, such that even to hear them clap at a sporting event one would be compelled to stand and tear the roof off the mother. Adhering to these strict conditions, I crunched the data using my special "greatest human" calculating apparatus. I feel confident that my own results will be easily replicated by generations of curious inquirers: Flea is the world's greatest human being. If contacted by an alien civilization we should send Flea and a curry buffet to serve as our reconnaissance diplomatic gesture.

Whittling down to just one from the billions of living and billions of dead human beings that are here or have been here has been difficult and I'm tired. And not wanting to bore you (I mean you single noble reader who while still in diapers knew in his heart the truth of Flea's greatness) with the minutia of the difficult road of hypothesis-test-adjust-repeat, I'll here simply provide a few youtube testimonials from whence you may gather the truth of my findings. Like this one for instance, where you'll witness Flea induct Metallica into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Now, leaving aside your personal thoughts on Metallica, induction speeches and halls of fame, do fritter a few minutes of your day away to listen to Flea's, as ever, lively inspiring words. Here's an excerpt: "Cliff Burton was an outstanding, superb, deep and wicked virtuoso of a bass player... Every Cliff Burton bass solo I've ever heard is a soulful, psychedelic, headbanging expression that rocks your world, trips your brain out and gets the house rocking. A beautiful peace of music played by an awesome rocker of a young man, a masterpiece of a human being."

Or consider his words here, at a RHCP session at Abbey Road studios. He speaks of his equal love for The Clash and Van Halen, if you thought that could ever be possible. Another excerpt: "In terms of like a band speaking about things that are, you know, political subjects, it's relative to the band, you know I could take like a political album like Clash's Sandinista!, which is one of my favorite albums of all time, which I love completely, you know, and then I can, you know, listen to like Van Halen's second album which I fucking love too, you know. And notice how I say fucking for Van Halen." Again you will observe him tossing off generous helpings of exalted humanity. There is a vibrating immediacy and excitement in his speech but he's not preaching, he says nothing about eternal truths or the correct path to god. Every time this strange creature speaks an invisible hand clenches at my throat and liquid emotion seeks to rush out of glands stored in my eye sockets. All while simply offering a few thoughts about rock bands.

If you've been lucky enough to see the RHCP during their long and deservedly popular influence in our times, you'll have experienced at least one point in the concert where Flea urgently thanks the audience for their beauty and goodness, and asks them to treat one another well and be good and be kind. Here's an example when playing at Slane Castle in Ireland. He does indeed give it away, the magnanimous (good-naturedly openminded and generous) good vibes that is. And so having completed my study, I leave to posterity the task of confirming or rejecting my results. I just want to offer a little note to Flea that it's partly thanks to him and his belief that we all "Be true to our imaginations and our idea of what's beautiful" that I'm happily unemployed and relaxing. (Kidding mom, not kidding Flea.)

The Jews were right...

It's true. Although I am convinced myself that the world is slowly getting better (optimistic, yes) there are still a plethora of things wrong with the way the world ticks. To me at least, much of it comes from business. Work to be specific. There is too much of it about.

Now, I'm not saying that work isn't a good thing. We need to do it. Commerce itself isn't flawed, it never has been. What the hell else would we do with our time if we didn't work? The world has been built upon the labors of generations, and doesn't it all look nice? Indeed it does. Every great accomplishment in this world began and begins as a process of work. Sometimes people get paid or pay for work, some work you do just because you want to and some work only happens because it needs to. This is all well and fine.

But I think that many people believe that work is the be all and end all of existence. I would hope that people who are of this mind are doing something that they really love, but I know this just isn't the case. Shame, really. 'Is it worth the aggravation to find yourself a job when there's nothing worth working for?' a great protest singer once asked. Unfortunately we don't have a choice. Money makes this rock spin.

But, I think there has got to be some kind of slowing down of work.

Yes, we need to have an imposed sabbath. It's time to go biblical.

EXODUS 35:2 Six days shall work be done, but on the seventh day there shall be a sabbath of rest: whosoever doeth work therein shall be put to death.

Now I am aware that such things may be scoffed at. Think about it for a moment. What if, say every Monday (everyone hates Monday) we close the stock market, shut down all the businesses, the restaurants, the grocery stores, TV stations, everything. Sure, there would have to be some people who would have to work, say the police and hospitals. We'll give those kind folks two days off for every day they work, give them some kind of incentive. But let us all take at least one, just one, day off every seven days.

You can do everything you want. Sure you can work, you just won't get paid for it. In fact, you will be crushed by well-sized stones thrown by your fellow idlers. Why would you even take a chance. You'd be forced to take that time off. Paint a picture, read a story to your children or eat corn chips and masturbate.

All jokes aside, I guess what I'm driving at is perhaps one day a week where we don't consume or produce. Arguments could of course be raised that it would throw the economy into some form of turmoil. Perhaps. But it would also allow us to bring back a great deal of autonomy into our lives. Maybe it could even restore some amount of community good-will. What else would there be to do than go for a walk and talk to people? I'll bet that public areas such as parks would flourish, I'd wager you'd see more flowers planted and maybe people will start to feel (gasp) happy...

I am fully aware of such things as the 'weekend'- Saturday and Sunday. To most people I know, the weekend is either an extension of the stresses of the work week or two days of doing less than relaxing shit. Let's reclaim the right of sabbath. A true day off from everything that has wound us up tighter than a coo-coo clock.

Or if this dream of mine never gets realized and governments all around the world don't wish to enforce this mandatory sabbath, then do it yourself. Try for the next couple of weeks when you have time off, to really do nothing. Don't buy anything, do something that makes you happy and meet some new people. At least you can guarantee that your world will get just a little bit better. Fast.

Boycott all things! Marketing slogans are stabbing my heart!

So I was fuming about Gillette this morning. They're all like, "check us out, it's the best a man can get," and I was like, "Gillette, your brazen sloganeering is a feeble gloss atop deceit and lies!" I've been a Gillette hater for some years now, ever since they tucked tail and fled to cheaper locales in the wake of NAFTA, otherwise known as The Deal That Allows Manufacturers to Produce their Cheap Goods more Cheaply. TDTAMTPTCGMC meant that companies like Gillette could make their low-grade disposable products in the peace and quiet of destitute foreign villages, not far from the border where they might lob their goods north into Fred Meyers and Walmarts. Anyway, why do we put up with these nonsensical slogans?! Life's short, probably too short to care about such trivia, but something tells me it's these bloody marketing slogans which are killing me in a way. Are we to believe that the best this life has to offer, for us males at least, are armpit deoderants and disposable razors?! Quickly Gillette, hand me your High Performance, Mach 19, Turbo, Ultra, Fusion, Power razor so that I might slice at my wrists with it.

While I'm on the topic, no discussion of the idiotic marketing plague in which we live would be complete without pointing an accusative finger at the Canadian behemoth Tim Horton's. For years now they've been shoveling the lie about freshness down our bovine throats. "Always fresh, always got time for Tim Horton's" goes the jingle, sung by some insipid devotional singer, as if between takes of "Moment Made for Worshiping" and "Amazing Grace." Are they trying to induce us to eat their poisonous doughnuts or to break into tears (Much like campy Folgers Coffee ditty of years gone by)? Beginning in the 1960s, Tim Hortons has successfully established itself as Canada's premier establishment for simple, crappy food, just like olden times. For a while it was indeed true that their fried sugar treats could be obtained "fresh" in that they were fried on location. But in modern times, with the constraints of competition ever pushing producers to save on quality and costs, Timmy's has tightened its belt around its pudgy waist. Now all the frying happens at a factory in Ontario from whence its dispatched across the country, into the waiting mouths of clamoring freshness seekers. Oh, they reheat them, to refresh them I guess. How can Tim Hortons insist on referring to their products as fresh? Who cares? No one, or few of us anyway. Gotta have our Timmys!

We're generations deep in this mire of worm-tongued sloganeering. Everyone has heard about the continuing ebb of our attention spans: "The average commercial changes scenes every 1.5 seconds," "Presidential debates have become soundbytes," "Everyone's got ADD." So culture reflects society and society reflects culture. We think we've got the attention spans of fruit flies and can quickly skim a few articles on the internet to convince ourselves of the fact. "I can't concentrate, here let me try, see, it's no good, I can't do it. Wanna get some Timmy's?" Thinking in canned expressions, cliches, is becoming a normal way to think. Perhaps this is why this constant bombardment of offensive stupidity causes such slight, feeble protest. We are not ducks and this crap isn't water. These slogans are polluting our ethos, diminishing the beauty this life has to offer.

So fuck off Gillette, your toiletry products are among the hordes, great piles and stacks of stuff available to us men. Folgers your low-grade cheap bulk coffee is not the best part of waking up. And please Tim Hortons stop saying you serve fresh food; Food that hasn't yet been eaten doesn't equal fresh, it's like saying that Knowingdoing is always worth reading.

Uh, like socialism, like sucks

In December 1773, enraged Boston colonists boarded ships bound for England and tossed their contents, mostly tea, into the city's bustling harbor. It became known as the Boston Tea Party. Men rowed around in boats, using their oars to bat the floating tea leaves under the water's surface. "That'll teach them Brits to conduct opportunistic trading practices!" the Bostonians probably thought, if not yelled at the pretentiously dressed colonial administrators and tax collectors who were foolishly mulling about the docks. And were one of these unfortunate fools spotted among the herd, they would have been tarred and feathered, made the laughing stock of the entire pantyhosed, buckle-shoed and awkward hatted throng. The angry Bostonians couldn't accept the British government's Tea Act of 1773, which allowed the struggling British East India Company to undercut merchants from the ballooning empire's many colonial offshoots. The American merchants said "fucketh thou!" and made plans for their own opportunistic self-serving trading practices. The event was just one of many leading up to the War of Independence, after which time American tea merchants could nurture their own culture of unjust undercutting competition in solitude.

But of course, this remote tale of past absurdities has little bearing on those of us living today, right? Trick question! Apparently, in the minds of uncountable history nuts, the Boston Tea Party of 1773 remains a vital reference for their own visceral experience of theft and injustice. Thus, last Wednesday "Tea Party" protests were held across America to protest Obama's "bankrupt liberal (dare we admit socialist?) agenda." According to the brain child of the momentous occasion, CNBC's Rick Santelli, it's about "rewarding people who can carry the water, instead of just drinking the water." Ah yes, a great thinker of our age has pinned down the slippery essence of the issue: The industrious few carry the load for the lazy many. It's a few John Galts and the rest of us! So Obama's stimulus package and pending budget is really a Trojan horse, it hides an easy ride for the lazy, probably liberal, masses, while the conservative, probably libertarian, few pull at the rope with all their might. Alas, even their children, and children's children, and children's children's children have been conscripted. The government's reach extends even into the pockets of unborn generations, as one of our day's more trite cliches tells us.

An interesting gallery of images is available through Huffington Post. There a curious time waster such as myself, might idly scan dozens of images at various tea party events around the country. Some of the stand out placards equate Obama with Hitler, calls for impeachment, and eulogies for the dying creature that was the USA. One aspect of the gatherings that impressed me most was the number of kids and small children out to protest. If you've ever wondered just what toddlers get up to during day care, you'll find your answer: Political science. These kids just can't get enough political history and theory. They're obsessed with contextualizing present events using the long-reaching roots of history. Easy answers and slogan thinking are rejected by them, only the most patiently reasoned lines of argument attract their eager young minds. So when they made the calculations, children across the country determined that the Obama's administration's current policy line is sure folly! Their consciences compelled them to fashion out of simple materials advertisements by which they could give voice to their piqued moral compasses. And the children wonder: "Why is the president destroying our country mommy?" And the Tea Party protester answers her: "But dear, Obama is a leftist socialist communist Nazi Muslim freedom hater, don't you see?" I can imagine feeling the breeze as angels of stupidity excitedly flap above their heads. Sorry, I meant angels of freedom.

AAAAAAAAaaaaRRRRRgh, No!!!

Fake or not fake?

One thing is for sure, the video is one of the more disturbing things I've ever seen. If it's real, the implications are enormous. If fake, well, my hat is off to however made it.





Now apparently there is much to consider from the video. The experiments themselves were somewhat real. They were carried out by Lenin Prize winner Sergei S. Bryukhonenko who, it can be said, was either a genius or bat-shit crazy. His experiments were outrageously notorious more than seventy years ago. He would hook up lung and heart machines to dogs and apparently bring them back to some kind of life. The USSR at the time hailed him as a national treasure. Of course, due to the USSR's competitiveness with the USA in all things, this may just be them perpetrating a massive hoax.

Perhaps the more scientifically inclined readers of this blog can shed some light. Is this even possible?

Babies everywhere!

MAINTAIN HUMANITY UNDER 500,000,000
IN PERPETUAL BALANCE WITH NATURE

- First Sentence of the Georgia Guidestones

We like to make people. Lots of them. In many parts of the world, you are not a human being until you've had a child. Most of my Jamaican friends, while not the best of fathers, speak with pride about their "seeds." Like animals enslaved to Darwin's edict, we are but dancers on the floor of evolution. For some, propagating our species is perhaps the meaning of life.

Yet we are steadily reaching the point at which we cannot sustain all of our bodies on this planet. To think that we can is unwillingly hopeful and to think that we can continue to increase our population and still not impact our surroundings may be a tad ignorant. It would be fantastic if we could, but it seems we cannot. Not with the way we are living now. We'd have to change a great deal.

Yet who has the right, or even the initiative to say that we should curb the amount of beings we bring into this world. Surely, we've all heard stories about China and the measures they go through to attempt such goals. Granted, some of the stories are true and some of them are not. The effect that these measurements have has been small. There are places all over the world that are currently experiencing a population explosion. For a country such as ours, which has a population insignificant to the amount or resources at our disposal, the torrent of questions somehow do not seem as prudent.

Murkiest of these waters is the question of abortion. Could you imagine a world in which every pregnancy was carried to it's fruition? Can you imagine the world which bid riddance to every pregnancy that was wished to be terminated. The issue raises great personal feelings to be sure. Moral or not, this particular issue is also not a very directed one, it seeks to distract us from the real question. Should we confront population increase or not?

Could it possibly be that somehow people all over this globe could come to some consensus on how we should go about the increase of our species? Should people be given complete choice in how many children they wish to bear? Does an assembly like the United Nations, or even our elected officials have a right to broach such matters?

I fear the question may be too large to answer.
Perhaps you've already answered it yourself.

A natural history of an absurd man

Riding the bus the other day, I had occasion to share intimate quarters with a rare sort of man. Analogies with the natural world have never seemed more apt. Had I been prepared I would have taken detailed notes, or better yet, cut to the chase and gone straight for the glory by making a documentary. I would be doing my best David Attenborough, whispering interesting facts in the background as the camera focuses on the specimen blithely frolicking, unknowingly playing the star in my groundbreaking work. "Now you see the absurd man in the full splendor of his obliviousness," I might say. Then I would direct the viewer to admire his furrowed brow as he wields his newspaper annoyingly, smoothing it out unnecessarily before reading each article, as if the words on the page somehow depended on his patient folding and refolding, rustling and crinkling.

That's only the beginning though. When he first emerged onto the bus, I was delighted that his instincts would have for some reason caused him to choose a path directly to me. For a moment I thought the absurd man might actually attempt to sit on my head, making a little nest for himself up there where he could look down imperiously at all us other creatures, unfamiliar and uninteresting. This is one of the distinguishing features of the absurd man, his ability to somehow convey the impression that he's not like those around them, that he is of a distinct species. His mental experience is nothing like other people's, his senses are coordinated differently, he may even have the use of a sense unknown to humankind, like bat sonar or raccoon paws. And then, after he judged the top of my melon unsuitable for his nest, he selected a seat directly at my side. In some sort of display of territorial marking, he made sure to cling a buttock as tightly as he could to my own thigh, such that I received third-degree friction burns. I wondered, "what invisible conditions does this absurd man experience?" Of course, do not mistake the rubbing of the buttock with any sexual impropriety common among us lonely humans, as another hallmark of the absurd man was clearly evident: Obliviousness.

You know how one may clench one's jaw in a manner which causes the lower lip to protrude slightly? Then, taking one's index finger (other appendages also work, though not as well) and 'diddling' it up and down on the protruding lip, as it rebounds it will make a most ridiculous popping sound as it banks again and again against the upper lip. Be creative and try such diddling while emitting the slightest moan, which can be tuned as desired. Having affected this gesture, one has captured the essence of obliviousness. Like a cat sitting on a king's throne, the absurd man moves about perpetually diddling his bottom lip, consciously or unconsciously declaring to the world, "Here is I, and I have no self-awareness, diddle, diddle, diddle." Breathtaking to behold.

But on this day on the bus, I was privileged to witness a most sacred display of absurdity, such that if anything in the history of the world has been more absurd I have my doubts. Though, as it turned out, his ride was not long at all (perhaps 10 minutes), this man (perched with one buttock clung to my thigh like a mollusk to a pier) decided to take out his National Post and with cramped agility proceed to unfurl it. "Is he actually going to do this!?" was the question that shot through my mind. What followed was a lesson in awkward diligence and unnecessary competence. I was schooled. If ever I wanted to achieve something ridiculous in public, I would take a class from this absurd man. As I mentioned above, every article which received his inquiring gaze first required that he fold the paper just so, according to specifications known only by him. Amidst all this folding and refolding and folding some more, he also employed varied techniques to "smooth" or "collapse" the paper and he patted at it incessantly, there was never a time when the paper could be patted down enough. "What tiny inconsistencies burn in his mind, that he feels it necessary to constantly swat at his paper that way?"

For 10 minutes I watched this unusual display. A few times I mistook his folding for an experiment in origami, and I thought finally, after all the swatting and smoothing were over, he would have an elaborate paper statue to display, perhaps as a gift to the strange creatures he happened upon in that moving vessel. But no, all that effort was not towards artful paper statuettes, it was to read analysis of Sydney Crosby's backhand and the most suitable cabernet to accompany a pasta in cream sauce. "Egads, he likes his paper!" And then it was over. Like those fabled flowers which bloom once a millennium, the bus stopped and he scampered off, to some vista known only by him and which depends only on the direction and pace of his feet beneath him. I followed him with my eyes as the bus pulled away and through the window I thought I could see him again at work on his paper, slapping it in defiance of the breeze that was slyly attempting to fashion out of it a fool's crown. Adieu, absurd friend. My thigh will be clung to by no buttock such as yours e'er again!

wandering along, time.

One night in 1764, the Cardinal De Rohan was hosting a dinner party. A group of about twenty three diners sat with the cardinal and shared pleasant conversation. One man in particular was dominating all the discourse that evening; the Count of St. Germain.

At one point during the night, the party was discussing the folly of choice that the crowds of Jerusalem chose Barabbas instead of our lord Jesus Christ. At this point the Count of St. Germain stopped eating and delared that he had known Pontius Pilate; "A good man." The guests stood aghast at the suggestion, but the Count merely kept talking. He described in great detail the house that Pontius lived in and the servants that he had. He could even recall the dishes that he supped upon when invited for dinner by Pontius himself.

The Cardinal was indeed skeptical, but somewhat enthralled by the Count's claims. He turned from his guests and spoke to none other than St. Germain's valet. He was a strikingly tall man, who was older looking than the Count. There was a certain air of honesty in his expression.

"My friend," said the Cardinal De Rohan. "I find it hard to believe what your master is telling us." He proclaimed, "Granted that he may fancy himself some sort of magician; and that perhaps even he can sythnesize gold from base metals. But that he is two thousand years old? Well, that is too much for one to believe." The guests all nodded in agreement. The count himself dabbed at the sides of his mouth with his serviette, hiding a somewhat obvious smirk. The Cardinal spoke once more; "Since you are the Count's valet, I assume that you were present at that dinner?"

"Oh, no, Monsignore," the valet answered ingenously. "I have been in M. le Comte's service for only four hundred years."

Never met a custom I didn't like. Just kidding, I don't like a few of them

Are all human customs equal? In our increasingly sophisticated world, it's becoming commonplace to state that, more or less, yes they are. For who can say that one way of doing things is inherently or obviously better or worse than another way? To do so would require one commit to a criteria or standard which will in some sense be arbitrary. A criteria of efficiency, happiness, health, common good or whatever, will usually reflect cultural, geographic and linguistic characteristics.

Though our individual sense of certainty or doubt about customs might fluctuate in relation to those who are similar to us, in general we tend to think what those around us think, behave how those around us behave. And though the human mind is infinitely capable of conjuring wholly new images and ideas, our individuality is highly overstated. We tend to be like those around us, like our parents and friends. It's the old parable about apples and trees, they don't fall far, indeed, they tend to stay where they are, decomposing in the sun, being absorbed back into the earth. Even if they happen to be picked up by a hungry mammal, their essence will sooner or later be evacuated, once again likely not far from their relatively personal tree, all things considered.

Customs are historically contingent, like towering kelp, they extend from time's bottom to its top and we are lucky otters playing among their fronds, or clinging and hiding among them like nervous fish eggs. They are an ordinary feature of our worlds, most of them seem normal and necessary. The tendency towards customary habits is a natural impulse, it makes the lives of living things more pleasant, hopefully. Customs mean a kind of workable status-quo is being achieved, so usually there's no great pressure to change them. My method of slouching has been moderately successful for some years now, and I'm as faithful to it as it is to me. But customs can be modern and momentary. They're always trying to be so cool, though most slip into obscurity after temporary glory, and like Marco Polo we require the patient labor of the tenacious dork to trek out to their remote bazaars, return and tell us what's forgotten but still forsale. Customs pervade us and resonate through us, lucky for us temporarily contemporary folk. We use them to make sense of the world and they serve us well. Even our inanimate comrades are at the party, they also appear to embrace customs, especially inertia. We stopped talking to them long ago so I can't really say, but they seem happy enough, sitting there.

So it's very difficult to speak in definite terms about what is right and wrong with the behaviors of people not from our own places. We are essentially outside their ways of life, and even should we somehow come to know about them, it's true when cultural relativists say that we just don't understand. Worse, many of our impressions of other people's cultures are conjured, built and woven out of stereotype and cliche. Misunderstanding and misrepresentation all around! A bit of a glimpse and a cliche to pass on to our grandchildren. Familiar canards and faithful templates. Ham-handedly wielding canned hams, I mean expressions. I'm personally full of such thoughts, barely formed, like the distant whispers of my ancestors' prejudice. No, ancestors are cool, most of them probably did their best, and we should thank them for all the things they keep leaving behind.

These stereotypes inform my most general opinions of probably anything I can think of. I'll try it. "Goat Cheese." Hmm. I know it's made from the sturdy goat which stands atop the mountain and does there hop thither and hither, ever so sturdily, wherever pleasant odors and sights might coax her. If a daring woodsman were to stalk up behind her, and her ingenious horizontal pupils failed to spot him, well then he might nab her! After, he would forcibly lead her to his trusty milking stool and there would steal her milk. After filling his bucket and releasing her he churns the hell out of the milk until it's thick and delicious. Then he cuts off a thick slice and gobbles it down. He expresses his satisfaction with an, "Ahhh" followed unnecessarily by, "That was certainly delicious." And that's about it, all cliches. I plainly know nothing about goat cheese.

I also know nothing about media reports about the abuse of girls somewhere where I don't live. Girls are probably also being abused not far from where I sit and type, so what business of mine are the abusive customs of others? Especially when there are local abuses to consider? Still, reading a bit about madness of a few lads out there, and I'm forced to heap opprobrium and contempt on large swaths of strangers. Take for instance a recently filmed teenager flogging in Pakistan. She had let an electrician into her home and the local bearded ones got to wondering about just what was going on in there. They told her father and he too grew curious: "Was the man really fixing the electricity? Soldering irons? Ruse! He was in fact sending out sexy-time vibes to my seductive and stupid daughter! Let's learn 'em a less'in boys!" So naturally the girl and local tradesmen were tortured publicly and afterward forced to marry. Alas, no commemorative wedding video to speak of, but at least the couple can relive their engagement. At a certain point in the spectacle, a valiant hero is seen reaching down and he pulls the young woman to safety. Just kidding, he held down the arm she was using to protect herself, thereby aiding the other two men already holding her.

The custom of parochial honor codes which do such absurd and unjust violence are to be mocked and spit on. From my own parochial perspective, I damn the lot, do not forgive them their ignorance and I use the custom of women abuse as a spittoon for only my choicest gobs of counter-hatred. Damn the unknowable customs of the acid tossers too.