inherently different

Archive for April, 2005

I think everyone has moments of extreme clarity. You could be walking down the street and realize, albeit to late, that you just hurt someone’s feelings and the relationship will never recover. Or you can be in a meeting with your boss and your bosses’ boss and offer a clever answer that not only makes you look bad, but makes your boss look like a complete tool for hiring you. Clarity after something like that is good, but remorse is ill spent.

I’ve had an unknown number of such moments and for the most part, I tend to accept the consequences without complaint. I know what I am and I know what my words have done to people. My problem isn’t with keeping my mouth shut, although some might suspect that is the source of a majority of the problems I have with people.

I chalk it, my problems with people, up to a complete lack of emotions. Or maybe its is better explained as a lack of peaks and valleys on the emotional scale of human interaction. I don’t often feel angry, hurt, sad, lonely, confused, happy, joyous, bitter, solemn, or overwhelmed. Most of the time I just feel empty… a void that accepts readily whatever is willing to take up space.

Emotions, for the most part, are a complete waste of energy for me. I don’t think I’ve ever experienced a meltdown of any kind and hope I never do. It might also be said that I don’t readily accept being mistreated when someone has a meltdown. I’ve been on the receiving end of those emotional outbursts and have really said and done some truly horrific things in response. I’m not writing that with pride or remorse, just making sure it all gets down so there isn’t ever any misunderstanding.

I can’t fake empathy or compassion for my fellow man. It comes across as insincere and lets face it, when it comes to those two things, it is. Really empathy and compassion arise not out of remorse for what has been said and done TO another, but out of fear that they will lose something for it. Is that sincerity? If this is true, and I believe it is, then apologies are really the ultimate form of selfishness because they are only beneficial to the apologist since the damage has already been done.

I think I’d rather say and do whatever it is I feel like saying and doing. It might cause problems for me and others, but at least there is an honesty not often displayed in human interaction. I won’t lie to make you feel good, but I won’t tell you the truth to hurt you. There is a balance in all things and I try to walk along the edge of the precipice that borders ego. A fragile country to be sure, but one that I have a long history of exploring.

Just came back from watching The Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy and need to digest what I’ve just seen to really offer anything remotely resembling a review. Was it good? Was it bad? Was it somewhere in between? You’ll just have to wait and find out.

Living in San Francisco for 12 years did introduce me to something you may not have come in contact with where you live. The “healer.” Not much better than the sanctimonious televangelists that populate sunday morning TV, healers (anyone who consideres themselves one) are everywhere in the Bay area.

Well here on Maui, you can’t turn over a rock without some yahoo calling themself a healer. I have a few friends here who are massage therapists and they call themselves “healers.” Trained in the art of massage therapy in an area here on Maui called “up country” that is essentially the Haight/Ashbury of the Pacific Rim. I put healer in quotes because, lets face it… all of them are full of shit.

All that metaphysical hooha is really disturbing to me… not because there are people who look to profit from the gullibility of others, but because there are people dumb enough to actually believe that horseshit. Crystals? Crapstals. Feng Shui? Feng Shit. New Age? Outrage.

There are things you can believe in because they have been proven by the scientific community to be worthwhile. And even then, modern medicine is still pretty much a black art practiced by men and women with god complexes. When someone is troubled physically, emotionally, or mentally, seeking the help of a healer is pretty damn ignorant. There are no such things as miracle cures despite what that turban wearing goofball is telling you. He/she can’t possibly cure your back problems with a few crystals and a constant chant. Your pancreatic cancer isn’t going away if only you’d align your chakra with your oprah. Your life will not improve if you just rearrange your furniture. Its all horseshit and if you believe in any of it, you’re a dumbass.

Now, the red queen would tell me to lighten up and let people believe whatever they want to believe in if it helps them get from point A to point B. And she’s right. But whenever I’m feeling down, I can just look up from the black hole and see one of these fucktards stealing money from a hapless tourist and it makes whatever seems to be bothering me evaporate. I look at these foundering souls looking for the easy way out and say, “There but for the grace of god and an IQ above 48 go I.”

Remember the massage therapists? Well, one of them is one of the most unstable, ridiculously angry, bitter women I have ever met in all my years on this godforsaken rock. Yet. She calls herself a healer. She rambles on about helping people find their center, healing them, because, well… she’s a healer. Only, she can’t even find her own center and her anger gets in the way all the time. Yet. People trust her to help them feel better. Its a sham that is equal to the white man buying Manhattan for $16 in shiny beads. In fact, all “healers” are the same in this respect. They are usually the most fucked up beings within a given environment, yet they are the ones who pretend to have all the answers.

Maybe I should become a healer. I can cure you of rickets, the plague, depression, or any of thousands of other imaginative maladies. Operators are standing by.

Top Ten Films I Want To See

10. the adventures of shark boy and lava girl in 3D
09. kicking and screaming
08. mindhunters
07. unleashed
06. rize
05. dust to glory
04. cronicas
03. mr. & mrs. smith
02. lords of dogtown
and the number one film I want to see is…
01. batman begins

An honorable mention goes to The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy, but I have to preface that with the fact that I have very high expectations that must be met for this film to be considered worthwhile. Another honorable mention should go out to Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, which could also go horribly wrong.

I tend to get burned out on occasion. This last week being one of those times. It isn’t that I didn’t have things to write about: a broken finger, a run-in with a friend with whom I no longer speak, the new pope, tree-huggers writing me about my previous post.

A few weeks ago, I took on another writing project for a client and it left me wondering whether or not I’m wasting my time as a writer. Now, I’m not asking for a pity party. My thoughts lean toward exploring what I’m writing rather than if I should be writing.

I read so many blogs now that I know that there are few that offer something entertaining everyday. It isn’t easy to come up with something worthwhile everyday. Even daily columnists such as Dave Barry, Erma Bombeck (when she wasn’t fertilizing the grass greener over her cemetary plot), and Herb Caen, all had periods that they ran off and let the syndicate rerun previous colunms.

Who knows what they did to recharge their batteries or find the groove they were in before the empty page stared up at them mockingly. What I do is avoid acting like a jackass. Yes, I’ll admit that most days I wake up with the sole purpose of making someone uncomfortable. I like making people doubt the things they believe. Somedays though I wake up and apply that very practice to myself.

Afterall, Descartes once said, “If you would be a real seeker after truth, it is necessary that at least once in your life you doubt, as far as possible, all things.”

Over the last few days I have doubted my chosen path as a writer. After a bit of examination, I realize that I may never write the great Mexican-American novel, and that is ok. The truth of the matter is I never really did. The future holds many possibilities, both literary and literally. I just need to find which one fits me best.

There is a great article in the April 7 issue of Rolling Stone, The End of Oil, which I strongly suggest should be read by anyone who owns/drives a car. I get into a number of discussions with treehuggers every now and again about the fact that there is no such thing as a free lunch when it comes to fuel.

Of all the evils you can imagine, a world plunging into the dark ages in terms of transportation is one of the worst… especially for Americans. The article linked above talks about the very strong possibility that the world will run out of “cheap” gas by 2010 and what might (most likely will) happen when the world’s industrial civilization finds itself with an empty tank. Oil is used not only to create gas, but to heat homes, make plastics, make electricity, and power farm equipment (to harvest foodstuffs) among other things. If we run out of oil, frankly, we’re fucked.

The article also discusses the rather piss poor promise of cheap renewable fuels like hydrogen. While on the surface it seems like an answer to our oil-dependent culture, hydrogen-fueled cars are nothing more than slightly less evil sisters of the gas guzzler. See, the current crop of hydrogen fuel cells are produced by burning natural gas… a fuel who’s reserves are in worse shape than those of crude oil.

I’m not saying hydrogen isn’t a viable solution, but here is where the treehuggers will get their hemp thongs in a bunch: The other way to make hydrogen is through electrolysis of water using power from hundreds of nuclear power plants. No such thing as a free lunch remember? Maybe the Berkeley hillbillies are ready for a world without the automobile, but are they prepared to live without their I-Pods filled with their bootleg Grateful Dead mp3s?

Personally I’m all for the world collapsing upon itself. I’d like nothing more than to see the world’s oil-fueled economy fail. What will happen when the world’s oil producing nations no longer have the threat of oil embargoes to blackmail the US into doing their dirty work? It should be quite a explosive event let me tell you.

None of the current “green” energy options (solar or wind) will provide enough power to keep the industrialized world from goosestepping beyond 2020. For just a moment today, think about all the wonderful things man’s ingenuity has produced over the last 30 years (coincidently, around the same number of years since the last major decline in oil reserves). Computers, DVDs, CDs, MP3 Players, digital cameras, the Internet… now imagine what the world will be like without them. Pretty soon you won’t have to imagine that world, because it’s going to happen in our lifetimes. I’m not prophesizing about the doom of civilization, but instead a return to a less materialistic economy. One based on the common goal of survival instead of comfort. Are you ready?

I’m usually not a link whore and I rate the French just below fungal communities when it comes to recognizing talent (see Jerry Lewis), but this is vindication of a sort for my love of all things Bruce Willis.

Ever wonder what a day in the life of a freelance writer is like? Well, as much as I’d like to say that it is filled with unbeliveable amounts of alcohol broken up by bouts of creative genius, it’s really not like that at all. One of my favorite writers, Ernest Hemingway, would write on a strict schedule that produced an average of 500 to 1,000 words a day. He’d start at 7 am, work for a few hours and stop just as he was hitting his stride. Then he’d start drinking.

My schedule is a lot like that. Only I start writing at around noon, pound out 200-300 words if I’m lucky, and drink two to three cups of coffee spiked with hazel nut coffee mate. Don’t get me wrong, I tried out Hemingway’s plan of action once before with mixed results. Under the influence of Hemingway’s regimen though, I tend to write about how painful my hangover is and little else. While writing like Bukowski is something I aspire to, feeling like him is another thing altogether.

Today though there was something new. As usual, I began with a cup of coffee. The first cup is always the best cup and I tried to make sure it lasted. Somewhere between cups 2 and 3 though, the Red Queen asked if I’d be willing to watch her friend’s baby, Makana, for a few hours while they went to the gym. Being the perfect boyfriend that I am, I agreed.

I practically raised my younger brother and I’ve learned a thing or two about keeping babies amused and too busy to realize they’ve been left behind. Makana is one of those rare babies that is pretty mellow and makes watching him easy. Of course, I have a secret game plan when it comes to babysitting. Many first time sitters make the mistake of rewarding good behavior with candy, but a child hopped up on sugar is likely to cause you much suffering. Its ok to hop the kid up just before his parents return, but it’s not the best way to start the experience. Today I chose a few cheerios, a half a banana, a few grapes and a cup of water to begin my dirty work.

The next step is to wear ‘em out until they beg to rest. After the cheerios and fruit, we went swimming, then took a walk down to the beach, and finally crawled around the grass for a few hours. Then we returned to chateau de ed and enjoyed a nice bottle of milk. I thought I might need to lace it with cold medicine or a shot of brandy, but the rigorous exercise seems to have done the trick. Makana was no match for my surefire plan of action.

Need a qualified babysitter? So long as you don’t mind if I feed your child something that has plenty of triptophan, I’m your man. I once had a get rich quick scheme in which I would rent out an abandoned airplane hangar filled with baby harnesses on bungy cords hanging from the rafters. For just 10 dollars each per day, I’d watch a whole army of babies. Really I’d just hang ‘em from the ceiling, walking among the rows of bungy baby harnesses and giving them a bounce or two before wandering into the next row. Feeding time would consist of a turkey on rye sandwich and a bottle of warm milk.

I could be the McDonald’s of daycare… a baby burgermeister so to speak. Well, I can dream can’t I?

[via 6togo] www.delocator.net (won’t hotlink since I don’t want to reward them with a referral) is one of those pursuits that I just don’t get. It lists “non-corporate” cafes based on your zip code. I guess the idea is that they are trying to generate business for mom & pop type establishments that can’t compete with large corporations.

My issue with anyone who won’t frequent a corporate establishment is two fold. First, these zealots fail to realize is that they are really anti-competition. The main reason any establishment becomes corporate is through success. If a mom and pop cafe has a hard time competing with Starbucks, it is because they suck, are overpriced and fail to deliver an experience that sets them apart and above what you can expect from Starbucks. It is one thing to make the personal choice to do business with an establishment, it is another to try and convince others to refrain from making their own personal choice. The website listed above is an attempt to do just that.

Secondly, Starbucks isn’t great coffee, but it has something I have never found at a small cafe. Consistency. I like my coffee the exact same way everytime I order it. At a cafe, depending on which disgruntled hippie is currently taking a break from simultaneously rolling a joint and weaving a hammock from hemp to make my coffee, I can be sure of only one thing. It will suck. It’ll either be too bitter, too hot, too cold, too weak, too strong, or just too damn bad. The reason why Starbucks (which started out as a local coffee maker in Seattle I believe) has become a behemoth isn’t because they get poor guatamalan children to pick their coffee cheaply. It definitely isn’t because they do things better than other coffee houses. It’s because they provide you, the customer, with a known entity. Reasonably priced coffee, served in a clean environment, with a higher than average chance that the coffee lives up to a set standard of quality. That’s it folks, it isn’t rocket science.

When Jerry the dreadlocked hippie slacker scenester can make a consistently flavorful cup of joe, I’ll sit my ass down in his establishment. Until then, I’ll drop dime in corporate establishments. At least I won’t have to listen to ani d’franco or stare at tie dye and that’s always a good thing.

Jen Cookie asked me what I thought of Brittany Murphy who is currently in Sin City. Rather than leave my response in the comments, I thought I’d share it with the masses (all five of my regular readers).

Let me preface the following comments by saying that I like Brittany Murphy on the whole, but I think this question deserves a timeline since my perception of her has changed along with her appearance:

1995 Clueless: Soft, round the way girl. Up and coming actress who begs keeping an eye on.

1996 Freeway: Soft, road hard and put away girl. The trials of living in Hollywood are taking their toll. My eye begins to wander in another direction.

1999 Drop Dead Gorgeous: Hmmm, something is amiss. She looks like she skipped a few meals. My eye is watering.

1999 Girl, Interrupted: That’s it! She’s a nutter! I’m not sure she’s acting here. Ooops, I’m closing my eyes.

2001 Don’t Say A Word: Yep, she’s crazier than a shithouse rat, but she’s looking good in a kill you in your sleep kind of way. My eye is a slit.

2002 8 Mile: What is she thinking? This movie should have been called 8 minutes, which is the length of time she was on screen and coincidently held my attention. My eye is warily open again.

2003 Uptown Girls: Oh my god, it’s skeletor! She looks like something Mary Kate Olsen would toss up. My eyes are wide shut.

2005 Sin City: Still crazy, but at least she’s gained some weight back. When you could see her ribs, backbone and clavicles, she reminded me of a coat rack. Coat racks are great places to store coats and hats, but very difficult to watch on screen. My eye is open but with reservations.