"The Original of Laura, or, Dying is Fun"

http://www.randomhouse.com/catalog/display.pperl?isbn=9780307271891

I have reason to live another 7 months.

This makes me sad and happy in surprisingly egual emounts.

Driving home from Mike's place, stopped at a light. Up ahead party-lights, a cop standing in the rain waving the cars through one at a time. Out of the corner of my eye I notice something white against the wet dark background, and once again I'm glad I always try to have a camera with me.

If there weren't a cop two cars behind; if there weren't party-lights & a car accident just ahead; and if the passenger seat didn't hold a half-empty bottle of gin in my manpurse I would have circled around for a better picture.

Sitting up in the tree, unblinking, a sad wet witness to the slow procession of single-occupant cars, a lone lop-eared stuffy.

A wet poem.

Eat it before it eats you.

First off, read this post by my friend Mike: http://blog.riotnrrd.net/2009/03/mcbukkake.html
Seriously, read his first.













Read it?

Good.

I try to eat a very healthy diet these days, partly since I'm coming up on 40 years old & my carcass has developed the unfortunate habit of converting every single calorie I consume into about a pound of fat.

Plus after switching to a Raw Vegan diet a few years ago I lost a great deal of weight and felt years younger. No kidding, I honestly felt physically younger. Fresher, fitter, bouncier; it was great.

Hard diet to stick to, though. Now I try to maintain at least a 75% raw diet, which keeps me fairly fit, but still allows me to enjoy the odd Bacchanalian pig-out. Or the occasional foray into American-style fastfood creativity/death-defying.


My review of Mike's creation, the McBukkake:

First, the Positive.

• The flavor. Believe or don't, this beast actually tastes pretty good. Two types of fried meat, with cheeze! Plus what doesn't taste better with Ranch Dressing?

• The audacity. Seriously, think about it. Roughly one in six persons on this planet of ours doesn't have access to clean drinking water on a daily basis. 2.2 million die each year from dirty water, and 90% of those deaths are children under 5. But we got Double Quarter Pounders & Crispy Chicken Ranch BLTs, handed over the counter in less than one minute.

• The Size. I mean honestly. This will end up being at least three 'meals' for me.


um, that's about it for the positive.


As for the Negative (besides the obvious; this thing is Fried Death with Cheese):

• The price. Part of the charm of the McGangbang was the fact it was constructed from a couple of Dollar Menu items; $2.18 after tax. The McBukkake? A staggering $10.30. I couldn't believe I was spending that much, and spending that much at McDonalds, and spending that much at McDonalds for two sandwiches.

• The damage. Dbl Quarter Pounder: 740 calories, 42 grams of fat, 19 grams of saturated fat, 48 grams of protein. Crispy Ranch BLT: 580 calories, 23 grams of fat, 4.5 grams of saturated fat, 32 grams of protein. If consumed all at once that represents almost all your daily allowance of calories, all of your fat, and slightly more than your daily saturated allowance. That's assuming a 2,000 calorie a day American diet; mine is normally considerably lower on all counts (not counting calories from alcohol).


Overall take on it? The McBukkake reminds me of Las Vegas, a city for which I have a deep & heartfelt love. Like Vegas, it exemplifies all the things great about this country; gaudy, entertaining, sad, slightly greasy, overwhelmingly large, ridiculously priced, ultimately deadly, and just all-around good old-fashioned goofy fucking fun. Try it at least once, but have an escape route planned.

"Soul-scarring..."

... is not a phrase I use lightly. It was coined, as far as I can tell, by my friend Mike (the smartest human I've ever known). But I'm using it now to describe a true story you must view: "Dear Zachary: A Letter to a Son About His Father"

Staggering.

Amazing.

Shattering.

Sobering.

Wonderful.

Horrible.

Uplifting.

Shocking.


Quite frankly, I haven't cried like this since my grandmother died. This is a moving, terrible, wonderful event.

This is why film was invented. Truly, if 'art' is defined as one human trying to express an emotion or a moment or an experience to another human being then this is one of the finest examples of art I've ever seen.

It should be required viewing (especially for anybody interested in movies and movie making). Trust me.

If you can't find it at your local rental, ask them to get it in. If they don't/can't, let me know and I'll bootleg you a VHS.

word....

"To Paul"
"The Unknown Comic knows you."

This almost makes me want to 'pluck out mine eye'....

http://www.eyeborgblog.com/

"Take a one eyed film maker, an unemployed engineer, and a vision for something that's never been done before and you have yourself the EyeBorg Project. Rob Spence and Kosta Grammatis are trying to make history by embedding a video camera and a transmitter in a prosthetic eye. That eye is going in Robs eye socket, and will record the world from a perspective that's never been seen before."




I've got one eye that even with corrective lenses only achieves about 20/200; I would voluntarily lose it to get a camera embedded.

"HI I'm Paul, and I'm an info-holic."

I am addicted to information. I love to learn new things, and I love incorporating new knowledge into what I already know of my world. 'Trivia' is my pornography.

So I got quite a thrill recently when I came across a reference to the "Index Translationum", and found out about it at the UNESCO website:

http://portal.unesco.org/culture/en/ev.php-URL_ID=7810&URL_DO=DO_TOPIC&URL_SECTION=201.html


"The Index Translationum is a list of books translated in the world, i.e. an international bibliography of translations. The Index Translationum was created in 1932.

By publishing this list, to serve as a reference work, UNESCO provides the general public with an irreplaceable tool for making bibliographical inventories of translations on a worldwide scale.

The database contains cumulative bibliographical information on books translated and published in about one hundred of the UNESCO Member States since 1979 and totals more than 1.800,000 entries in all disciplines: literature, social and human sciences, natural and exact sciences, art, history and so forth. It is planned to update the work every four months."


I'll probably never need to use it, but just the fact it exists thrills me. I mean, not just a list of books published around the world, a list of translations. That's like double-porn!

Humans are a strange creature.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29509977

"Blinded woman demands eye-for-eye justice"
Iranian welcomes harsh punishment for suitor who blinded her with acid

MADRID - An Iranian woman living in Spain said Wednesday she welcomed a Tehran court ruling that awards her eye-for-an-eye justice against a suitor who blinded her with acid.

Late last year an Iranian court ruled that the man — identified only as Majid — who blinded Bahrami in 2004 after she spurned him, should also be blinded with acid based on the Islamic law system of "qisas," or eye for an eye retribution, according to Iranian newspaper reports from November.

But Bahrami, who moved to Spain after the attack to get medical treatment, said Wednesday that under Iranian law, she is entitled to blind him in only one eye, unless she pays $25,110, because in Iran women are not considered equal to men.


What sort of 'social contract' are we fooling ourselves with when a man feels justified in blinding a woman for refusing his sexual advances?

What sort of 'justice' are we pretending is dispensed from a court system that legally decides on an acid-blinding as an appropriate response?

And what sort of balance is there in only allowing one eye to be burned, since she's "just a woman"?


We are the strangest of animals.

Best ... Capcha ... Ever!

"be" in the middle of 666