The V for Vendetta Shrine is finished.

I didn't think this day would ever arrive, but it's done. The timeline was completed Friday; a few tweaks to the code yesterday. META tags added this evening, and I changed every page on the Geocities site to re-direct to Shadow Galaxy, which no links directly to the Shrine--no more "caveat" disclaimer that apologized for a novice's design.

I'm going through the site now, mainly to make sure every page works, the links are correct, etc. It's really finished. All the nights toying with formatting; the design I'm not even sure I know how I did it; the countless days I bled from my fingers trying to finish those damnable essays; the timeline which nearly didn't come to pass until I tweaked the GIF format for the text layers; the script reviews, the music research. It's all done.

It's taken me four years to get to this point. Three years of procrastination, always saying "when I get to my re-design..." not even sure I ever would. The aborted designs from last April that drove me crazy because I just couldn't get them to look right. And then . . . what, this past November, when the final design came to me, and all the starts and stops and delays and blowing off. It's all, finally, done.

And it's all mine. Oh, I had help: the people who tipped me off to information, especially regarding the music. The guys who I discussed the story with on e-mail who helped make the Analysis section something more than just me babbling. And Mike Zav for pinch-hitting every time the code out-smarted me. But, go on. Go to the site, look at what's there. It's me. I did it.

The internet is the great equalizer. Yes, there are good web designers, and better web designers, but, ultimately, everyone can get a website and put it out there. Back when I first got into web deisgn and had The Shadow Gallery, my answer "why" was always: "because it proves I exist."

And it does. I checked my Geocities stats. The Vendetta Shrine averages 400 unique hits a month. Yeah, I'll never have to worry about traffic eating up my bandwidth, but, dammit, that's several hundred strangers visiting my site. It's there, I built it, and they see it, read it, use it. Out there, somewhere, someone I never met is going to mention The V for Vendetta Shrine. They never met me, never will. But they have, because all the Shrine really is is a part of me that's dressed up in HTML.

It's done.

(Hmmm. Would this be a bad time to mention I still have to create the Flash intro? Hey, what's that rock rollin' down towards me....)

Dancing with friends is easy. Dancing with strangers. . . ?

The paralysis of analysis, lack of confidence and poise. Self-conscious to a fault.

When you're on the dance floor--not off to the side where there's safety in the shadows, but on the dance floor--in the light, in the crowd of moving bodies, pheremones and 4/4 bass beats--but still not quite dancing; that one leg that's locked at the knee, anchored to safety, for dear life, because if it moved then you'd be in the crowd, with the crowd. Your own stubborn rhythm that thinks its following the beat but it's really off its own tempo, and you know it, can't stop knowing it. Never mind every other white-boy-two-step that's going on around you; it only matters that you're doing it to. So you stand--on the dance floor but not dancing--one foot taking root while the other one taps in time, thumbs hooked in pockets, trying to look comfortable even though when someone taps you on your shoulder you jump out of your skin.

Meeting people shouldn't have to be a matter of kamakazie raids on unsuspecting persons. It shouldn't have to be a matter of buying their attention with a drink. You shouldn't have to worry about matching your inept rhythm with their own before you even say a word to them. We shouldn't be reduced to Hail Mary passes at women in low-lit bars, where the music is too loud to even hear her name.

In these circumstances, the lack of confidence to be bold should not be a fault. . . .

MTV tries to register 20,000,000 American youths to vote in the 2004 election.

Sadly, MTV's section spotlighting a special on gay marriages holds less information than their page on Nick and Jessica. Which of course begs the question: MTV can't get 20 million people to watch one of its "hit" shows. How the hell are they gonna get 'em to register to vote?

Wanna read about an FBI-whistle-blower under court-orders not to reveal what the FBI doesn't want to reveal what it knew about the September 11, 2001 plane hijackings? The Memory Hole has the pertinent info, and Salon has a story on it, too.

Aerogel is a solid, but it is 99.8% empty space. In fact, it very closely approaches the density of air. It practically IS air. It's still a solid, though, and you can even pick it up or set things on it. (Via BoingBoing.)

And, lastly:

KHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN!!!!!!!!

With apologies to Jethro Tull, of course.

Last night I got an e-mail from a friend of mine. She had gone to TWAS and read the entry marked "TransAm". In that section there's a line that sat uncomfortably with her: The perpetual menacing orange of the inane Homeland Security beacon, obviously, is being used to muzzle political discourse in this country. Dissent is being rendered voiceless by paranoia.

She found this it be a wildly over-statement of reality, that we are far from being supressed, and such statements are patently false, if nothing else than the simple fact that McDonald is very clearly able to voice his dissent without being punished for it. Furthermore, she felt that statements like this in general are unnecessary as no one is in any danger of having their opinions silenced.

The next day she wrote that she was rethinking her opinion somewhat, hearing how Howard Stern was upset regarding the proposed bill to increase the indencency fines levied by the FCC to $275,000, Stern commenting that if that bill goes through, he'd quit. He pointed out how Bono can say "fuck" without being fined, and how a recent interview with a basketball player, the player used the word "shit" and that wasn't bleeped either; his point being that the rules will be enforced arbitrarily and unfairly. This made her think that while McDonald's rhetoric was exaggerated, there may have been some validity behind it.

Now, the thing about Stern is that he's painted himself as a target. He's been lowest-common-denomenator humor for twenty years. Alienating conservatives is his bread and butter, and it's no surprise that now that his critics are given more ammunition, they're going to happily put him in their cross-hairs. You pay your money, you take your chances. What's more, the FCC has actually reversed it's decision on Bono using "Fuck" at the Golden Globes, although it did not levy any retroactive fines.

The problem with "obscenity" is that you can never quite define what that means. Some people find gay sex obscene. Some poeple don't. Personally, I see nothing wrong with adults using "curse" words. Fuck me if some asshole has shit for brains, but I don't see why they'd think the words themselves have inherit value. It's all about the context. But, even that's a trip-up because context is equally subjective. Using Bono's case, when he uttered the word "fuck" he was not fined because he used the word "as an adjective" as opposed to describing the act of procreation. Now, "fuck" is "fuck", whatever meaning you use it in, and obviously enough people found the context irrelevant because they successfully petitioned/pressured the FCC to reverse its ruling. But if context becomes irrelevant, then what basis do you have for judging something? If "fuck" is an obscene word regardless of how it's sued--noun, adjective, adverb, etc--then how do you know it's bad in the first place? What makes a word bad? Is it the definition? The juxtapositioning of certain consonants and vowels? Inflection?

But, bringing things 'round to my initial point: What mcDonald was getting at, and what the FCC machinations show, is that the recent trend shows that unpopular opinions are being punished swifter than before. The government hasn't played it's September 11th card as much as it did in the first year since the attacks, but no less a personage than Dan Rather commented on the lack of the ability to disagree with popular opinion:

It is an obscene comparison - you know I am not sure I like it - but you know there was a time in South Africa that people would put flaming tyres around people's necks if they dissented. And in some ways the fear is that you will be necklaced here, you will have a flaming tyre of lack of patriotism put around your neck. Now it is that fear that keeps journalists from asking the toughest of the tough questions, and to continue to bore in on the tough questions so often. And again, I am humbled to say, I do not except myself from this criticism.

Note that Rather had to say this in England, not America.

Political dissent and societal obscenity are not quite similar enough for me to talk about them interchangably, (even though I've done that here). Granted, this country may not yet get to the point where the Thought Police will come take me away in the night for posting this to my blog, but the trend is growing that whatever doesn't fit into the party line will not be allowed broad access. You won't be able to rant like Micheal Moore at the Academy Awards because the tape delay's now insure that networks can cut out anything that might cause problems. Dan Rather had to go to another country to dicuss our government's intolerence of dissenting opinions.

It's not the end of the world. But it's definitely getting uglier.

As some of you know, I have a Tori Amos fansite, MandaTori Amos. It's a review site, where I critique what I feel are Tori's best songs. It was incredibly challenging, trying to put into words what her music made me feel. And as any "best of" list is subjective, the irony in trying to be as objective as possible was a constant impediment to what I wrote. And then there was the small matter of lacing any sort of understanding about music--compsoition, structure, terminology, etc. But, overall, I think my reviews turned out quite well; well enough for any Tori Amos fan to read them and understand what I was talking about. And I've been fairly confident that my reviews almost make me sound like I know what I'm talking about.

But then I found Glenn McDonald's The War Against Silence and I'm ashamed to have even thought I knew how to write about music.

McDonald's site is mesmerisingly addictive. His reviews make my blog entries the eptiomy of brevity. His reviews are part music review and part biography. McDonald relates to music autobiographically. Specific songs and bands relate to specifics moments in his life. You read several paragraphs about his life fifteen years ago because the only way he can describe the music he's planning on writing about is to describe how that music reminds him of what happened fifteen years ago. and, as he freely admits, if you wonder why half the time he describes music by describing other music, it's because that's how he relates to it. Everything is relative, both figuratively and literally.

There aren't that many Top 40 artists here. But, in an attempt to provide interest to my loyal readers, please note there are reviews for: Tori Amos, Alanis Morisette, U2, Sarah McLachlan, Echo and the Bunnymen, Megadeth, the Goo Goo Dolls, Savatage, Smashing Pumpkins, and far too many bands I never heard of.

So go on. The War Against Silence. Go read.

It snowed almsot every day this past week. It's cold enough to keep my winter jacket zipped. But it's a sunny day today and most of the snow has melted. I drove through Brookdale Park this afternoon and the playgound was littered with kids and their parents. I drove down a side street and saw a woman on the sidewalk video taping her toddler daughter next to her infant sibling, the father watching all three of them on the steps of their house.

Everybody wants it to be Spring.

My guess is we've got one more storm coming. This past week was a bitch, and certainly feels like a "Last Hurrah", but I'd be willing to bet that there's going to be one more storm before warm weather settles in for a duration.

* * * * * *

There's a protest going on in New York City. Last night I dailed around the TV, Channel 11 mentioned it and happily trumpeted how they can be the ones to tell you how to make your way around the city and "avoid the chaos." I'm trying to remember if they use that phrasing when describing the Thanksgiving Day Parade.

I was at the protest last March, the one that wanted to stop the war. That was when I saw one of the best pictures I didn't take: a bunch of protesters on the subway, their protest signs hanging in their laps, talking jovially, right under the subway sign that announced its last stop is the World Trade Center.

There was, what, some 100-300 thousand people at that protest. It was bitter cold. As the crowds grew the police kept closing the exits. The protest started around 49th street. Last I heard, when I finally left the area, you couldn't get in until at least 60th street. Soon there were mobs on Second Ave protesting the fact that they couldn't get to the protest. They blocked the road compeltely and the cops came in dressed in riot gear and on horseback, lining up and walking into the crowd to push them back.

I got some good pictures, then.

I'm still ambivalent on the whole protest thing. I think it's a great way to vent and air feelings but, as a tool, protests are very limited. The real change happens behind the scenes and there's rarely someone who can be both at the protest, and involved in the crucial moments when the decisions are made. Protests are like neon signs, basically, flashing to get your attention but not really doing more than that. I'm glad they're there, I'm glad they can bring in the numbers and make the opposition known, but it does so little besides that, and though it makes for nice headlines, that's hardly enough.

Still, if I didn't go to the office today to get some work done, I'd have gone into the City. It seems a bit silly, really. What are they protesting? So it's the anniversary of the second Gulf War. This alone confuses me: this marking the first anniversary of the war. It seems like such false presumption on peoples part to make the occasion as something meaningful. I have no doubt that invading Iraq wil be a notable moment in history. But events in history are noticeable for the gravity they have, for effects that reach beyond the immediate moment. The chain-reaction started by invading Iraq has not finished, nor will it for several years, and to act as if it is a moment that can be fully comrephended and understood--let alone appreciated--strikes me as an act of extreme arrogance.

Likewise, protesting said moments seems equally fallacious. I can understand why their doing it--if you want to protest U.S. occupation of Iraq, choosing the anniversary of the start of that occupation certainly makes sense. And as long as your protesting the ongoing situation, as opposed to a moment of time that has already come and gone--the War itself--then at least the event has a sence of relevancy. But no amount of protesting is going to change things. You can stand outside with signs and chants for as long as you want, but all you'll accomplish is setting a new record for standing outside with signs and chants.

The real opportunity for change, the one moment where any citzen will be able to affect policy--for better or wose--is still seven months away. It seems to me, those interveening months would be far better suiting in preparation of that day, then sprinkling large-scale protests in between.

This merely spotlights a problem that's apparent on all sides: No one seems to be able to think long-term anymore.

* * * * * *

I haven't written anything Blog-wise for almost a week. This is the longest gap in quite I while, I think. I apologize, you faifthful half-dozen readers. Work has been stressful, and it seems like I spend nine hours a day slogging through mounts of mud simply to stand still. This is why I spent a little over four hours at the office today: I finally got to file paperwork that had been lying on my desk since January. that filing paperwork provided me with the greastest sense of accomplishment at my job in several weeks should tell you the state of affairs at my office. Yet I still get praised, so I must be doing something right.

The past week had a large amount of personal distress, and I'm afraid it's all under the juristiction of Setec Astronomy. Mostly because I feel that, having wallowed in things enough inside ym brain that I doubt spewing them on my Blog is going to change anything, other than show how much I dwell on things and enjoy scuplting moutain ranges out of molehills.

But it was a dissapointing week, and it occurs to me, as Spring begins in Spirit if not in Body, that the first quarter of the year is done with and I have very little to show for it. My Vendetta site is still hopelessly overdue; supposed to have been done by January, then February. April is ten days away and as of . . . Monday, I think, I decided "my visual timeline lookes like shit and why even bother?" I'll be looking at it with fresher eyes tomorrow and we'll see what I decide then. Meanwhile, in three months I've done zero productive work for Bright-Matrix.

See--even that should've gone by way of Setec Astronomy, because now that I've typed that out I'm started to get depressed all over again. I am now doubly glad that I haven't bitched about what's really been on my mind this week.

* * * * * *

I have an active evening tonight: dinner in half an hour with Amii and Bob. Evening at my co-worker Pete's house, then the main event with Mia, John, and Tricia at The Harb and Bard. So I have to get going, shave, and put on a decent shirt for tonight.

There are several people--including a few who read this blog--that I haven't spoken to in a while. Don't think I've forgotten you.

We're gonna try this again, although it'll be the short(er) version because I ain't spending another two-plus hours writing the fucking thing.

Just make sure you've read Part One first. Because if you don't then you'll have read things backwards and totally bum-fucked the entire Space-Time continuum, creating a paradox of Donnie Darko-esque proportions.

OK, now that we've gotten that settled:

Saturday

Rain.

Jen and Jason picked me up and we had breakfast at Denny's.

Stopped raining.

Went to Observation Park to watch the planes land at BWI airport. It rained some more. We got stopped by a traffic cop while trying to walk where we weren't supposed to. But everything was fine until a plane crashed into my neck. I did get this really cool pic, though. Note the wild clouds. I think we took more pictures of the amazing cloud formations than of planes themselves.

Weather cleared up.

We went into Baltimore, driving to Fells Point. Which reminded me a lot of Philly's historic district, and Penn's landing. Only the wharfs were much dirteir in Baltimore. We wandered around, checking out the little shops and what not. Jason snapped this great picture. (It figures; I'm the amatuer photographer that likes to compose his shots and Jason takes one spur-of-the-moment shot that beats the purposely composed shot I took. At least I'm in his shot though.)

We were eventually joined by Susan, another Fiberconn loony I was down to meet, and we all had lunch outside a bar called The Green Turtle. We finished up and decided to head downtown to the Inner Habor. Our timing couldn't have been better: as soon as we got into the parking garage, this massive deluge came out of now where. Thunder and lighting and torrential rain, for about twenty minutes. It lasted the entire time we rode downtown and stopped just as we parked the car. There was a lovely double rainbow. But I'm tired of hyper-linking pictures so you'll have to do without the visuals for that one.

Anyway, we wandered around the Inner Harbor for a few hours. Learned about the Water Taxi accident. It got to us a bit more than you might expect--we had planned on going on the water taxi's that afternoon, and odds are if we had we would've been doing it 'round the time the storm hit. No way of knowing for certain if we would've been in the accident, but the fact that when Jen's mother head about the accident, she called Jen to see if she was OK--even though she didn't know we had planned to take the Taxi--was just a bit odd.

Finally dinner time came, where we were joined by Schenelle, another Fibercoon loon, her boyfirend Elliot (who showed up all us guys in his Mack Daddy suit), and their one-year-old daughter, as well as Matt, a friend of Jason's. We were supposed to eat at The Cheesecake Factory except there was a three and a half hour wait. So we wound up at Pizza Uno's instead. (Yeah, we were really living it up with our choices of restaurants.)

Here's where things dragged for a bit. By the time dinner ended it was around 8:30. Schenelle left because we were club hopping the rest of the night and she is only 19, so it was down to five. The original plan was to hit PowerPlant Live for the evening. the thing was, we didn't really plan on hitting it as early as 8:30. But with nothing else to do, that's where we went.

Ourt first stop was a place called Howl at the Moon, which is a dueling piano-bar and I know this would normally have been a wonderful place to be in. the problem was, in order to get the most out of the place, you need to be within eye-sight of the pianos. But we all wanted to sit down, and even as early as it was, there was only one place left to sit; a small table all the way in the back. So imagine: four of us just spent all day walking around town. We just ate a large meal. We're sitting down, out of sight of the main entertainment. Where do you think our energy level was at?

We lasted at Howl for about an hour. At this point I was really beginning to think the night would be a bust. This fear was strengthened when Susan announced she had to call it a night. Apparently her dinner was not agreeing with her and she was feeling very sick. Considering the whole point of going down to Baltimore was so I could go out clubbing with Jen and Susan, you can imagine how I felt. Now we were down to four.

Fortunately, this is where the low-point ended. No sooner did we go into our first club--Bar Baltimore, which played modern club music--did things brighten up. Just the fact that there was music to keep us on our feet got our energies going and we were soon dancing the night away. We lasted at the club for about an hour before heading off to Have a Nice Day Cafe, a 70s/80s/90s/modern music club.

This was when things really kicked into gear, especially for me as the music in this club was much more to my liking. At this point, I think it best if I let the pictures do all the talking. (Yes, that's seven separate links, folks; make sure you click 'em all.)

And that's about that. We partied until a little after 1:00, at which point three hours of dancing on top of the rest of the days walking/activities left us pretty wiped out. Matt went his way, Jason and Jen drove me back to the hotel, and I hit the pillow sometime between two and two-thirty. I woke up at 8:30, showered, packed, had breakfast, checked-out of the hotel, and was on the road just after 10:30. I made it to my folks around 1:00, and the rest I've re-counted elsewhere.

It was a grand time. Jen and Jason are very cool people, and perhaps in the future I can introduce them to you if/when they make it up here. At the very least I'm sure I'll make my way back down to Baltimore before the summer is done. I also owe them a large debt of gratitude as it's mostly their pictures which appear in this entry. (The blackmail video, however, remains safely offline. For now.)

Eugh. And this was the short version. Finis!

Crap, I have nothing to say. I was just reminded that today is the anniversary of the assassination of Caesar and realized the phrase makes for an excellent title. But, alas, I have nothing to really add beyond pointing out the date.

So go read about Julius Caesar instead.

Taken this past Friday at Contempt. Make with the clickey for the full-sized version.

I started re-reading 1984 today. It's been ten years since I read it, so while snippets are familiar, it's pretty much like reading it again for the first time.

It's very much written in the classic uptopian/dytopian form, which is to say the narration is mostly concerned with finding a way to explain everything to the reader. It's not 100% exposition, but 40 pages in and so far Winston has written in his diary, perfomed his morning exercises, had a good Two Minute Hate, and has started his day at work. So we're not exactly talking a book that is plot-driven. Which is of course the point. It's more a treatise in novelized form--which is how utopian/dystopian fiction works--so if you're looking for intense characterization, you may want to look elsewhere.

But the prose is enaging enough; I'm not bored by it. I'm enjoying Orwell's mental exercizes. there's not much subtlety in nicknaming the ruling Ministries as "minipax", "miniluv", "minitrue", and "miniplenty", but the need to abbreviate a concept, and thus remove the depth and meaning of that concept, goes on to this day. Death by abbreviation.

Though I'm wondering whether or not looking for parallels, or modern-day equivalent of the concepts in the novel, is the right way to read this book. Conkite says those looking for are missing the point: the novel isn't about forseeing the future but understanding the implications of the present. After all, 1984 has resonated since its publication because there was always very little leaping from what exists now to what exists in the novel. The threat of Big Brother loomed large in 1948 as much as it does in 1984 or 2004.

Yet, when Cronkite wrote his introduction in 1983, there was no such thing as the internet. No such thing as The Patriot Act. This isn't to say the novel is a prophetic one after all, but I think, if the novel voiced concerns regarding the abuse of power and freedom, its a warning that is currently ignored by those who are responsible for those things.

Some great concepts in the novel--the idea of a Two Minute Hate is wonderful. There's something about giving people an amount of time to carte-blanche spew every little ugly piece of themselves that they posses and let it out . . . you know that carnival is latin for carne vale--"farewell to flesh". The idea was that the Curch realized asking the populace to give up something--specifcally meat for Lent-- would be dicey, so they allowed the populace a brief time to gorge themselves of that which they were giving up. the idea that they were institutionalizing a period of time of excesses meant that, at its end, the people were more accepting of restrictions because they already had their release. The Two Minute Hate is just a stylized version of it; giving the peope a chance to be emotional and out of control so they'd be easier to control the rest of the time.

And, speaking of time, being the Time Junkie that I am, I just love how Orwell plays with the concept. The idea that time is malleable because it's simply a contruct. It needs physical reference to be marked and believed. Control the reference point--as Big Brother does with its continuous re-writting of all documents--and you control time. At one point, Winston has to re-write a times article, so he decides the best thing to do is to change the article completely, and he creates an obituary for a fallen Oceania solider. A complete fabrication that is nontheless made real simply be creating the necessary documentation. Or, as Orwell writes:

Comrade Ogilvy, who had never existed in the present, now existed inthe past, and when the act of forgery was forgotten, he would exist just as authetically, and upon the same evidence, as Charlemagne or Julius Ceaser.

If you take that implication further--our realince on documentation, and extend the questionability of documentation to our world now . . . it's implications may be absurd, but that's rather the point.

I also want a Newspeak dictionary. I'm sure there's one out there somewhere. I'll have to get one and one day write a journal entry entirely in Newspeak.

Time to add some new links to the 'Worth Your Time" section.

Firstly, my dear deranged roommate has decided to take the plunge and has started a Blog o' his own. And he's doing it in comicstrip form. I kid ye not-- our man Hale is creating is own comicstrip to detail the details of his life. So get three to Prentice Hale and make all the requisite "oohs" and "aaahhhs" at his majesty.

Elsewhere in the Internet cesspool, Pete's fiance CJ has equally invested herself of this thing they call Livejournal and is using it well. Well, lately she's using it to post those ubiquitous internet quizes that tell you what type of person/flower/TV show/sex toy/equinox/gemstone/orifice you are. But who am I to judge? I'm still amused by YetiSports. So enough about me--go visit the Highlands and see whether or not she writes about me!

However, as you astute Wire-Readers have undoubtedly noticed, there is one link missing from my nifty little side-bar: For while I am sure that, somewhere in the world, it is indeed Miller time, that time ain't here. Don't get me wrong--I love my Miller--but when the bastard hasn't updated his blog since November 21 . . . well, the Internet is a harsh, harsh mistress. If you don't attend to her, then she won't attend to you.

Now go read them. So it is written, so shall it be done!

Yes, folks, you can call off the troops; Your DT's can stop; your lives have meaning again: The Electric Wire is (obviously) back online.

We apologize for the inconvience; webhosting problems resulted in the last 36 hours of downtime. My many thanks to the dilligent team at Dreamhost for getting my lovely blog up and running.

The Wire can now resume its (ab)normal semi-regular service.

Now, if only Blogger will magically un-delete my Baltimore: Part Two post.....

Otherwise you spend two hours writing "Part Two" of my Baltimore trip only to have it magically disappear when you try and post it to your blog. Which, of course isn't being shown anyway because my web hosting service is having sever problems. Which doesn't matter because now Blogger is taken ten years to edit any of my posts. Which doesn't matter either because with my ISP cutting me off every five minutes it's not like I can stay online long enough to expect a page to load.

I fucking hate right now. Fucking hate.

Dream

Dream a little dream. Sweet dreams (are made of these). I can dream about you. Do you dream about me? Dream lover (Dream, lover). All I have to do is dream. Daydream beliver. California Dreaming. I've got dreams to remember. Get out of my dreams. Just another dream. Only in my dreams. When I was dreaming. These dreams. In your wildest dreams. How do we hang on to a dream? Dream on.


"Show me, show me, show me
how you do that trick.
The one that makes me scream" she said
"The one that makes me laugh" she said
And threw her arms around my neck
"Show me how you do it
And I promise you
I promise that
I'll run away with you
I'll run away with you"

Spinning on that dizzy edge
I kissed her face and kissed her head
And dreamed of all the different ways
I had to make her glow
"Why are you so far away?" she said
"Why won't you ever know
that I'm in love with you
That I'm in love with you"

You--
Soft and only
You--
Lost and lonely
You--
Strange as angels
Dancing in the deepest oceans
Twisting in the water
You're just like a dream

Daylight licked me into shape
I must have been asleep for days
And moving lips to breathe her name
I opened up my eyes
And found myself alone alone
Alone above a raging sea
That stole the only girl I loved
And drowned her deep inside of me

You--
Soft and only
You--
Lost and lonely
You--
Just like heaven

-----"Just Like Heaven", The Cure

This is PART TWO. If you're reading this before reading Part One then scroll down and read that first! Otherwise you will be hopelessly confused, experiencing events out of their natural order, causing the Timestream will collapse upon itself in a paradox of Donnie Darko-eqsue proportions--and it will all be your fault!

If you have already read Part One, then keep reading, assured in the knowledge that Order has been restored to the Timestream. Just don't pay any attention to Frank.

(oh, and get compfy; this is a real long one)

Saturday

Saturday began around 10:30 with Jen and Jason picking me up for breakfast. We kept it simple, going to a local Denny's not far from the observation park. What obversation park, you ask? Why the Obversation Park is an area just across the street from BWI Airport where you can watch the planes coming in for a landing.

It was pretty cool to see them come in, even though the weather was, as you can tell from the picture, just a smidge overcast. In fact, at one point it was raining quite heavily. But Jason is very much the aviation buff; he even has a portable scanner that he can tune into the airport Tower so he knows when the planes are coming in. As we huddled in the car, we could hear the tower discuss thw weather and that it would pass in a few minutes. Sure enough, it did.

then we almost got arrested. See, the observation park is really nothing more than a parkinglot. The fields are all off limits. But the "no tresspassing" signs are all posted a good five or six feet in from the start of the field. This holds true of the nearby road. Apparently Jason and Jen thought this meant that as long as you stand on the field ahead of the sign, you aren't tresspassing; they had done it on earlier trips and so planned to take me to their favorite spot--a place where you can watch the planes pass directly overhead. But no sooner had we begun walking along the road than a transit cop pulled up asking us where we were going. Seems that just because the signs are posted six feet infield doesn't mean the boundry starts six feet in, after all. So one quick detour later and we were back in the safety zone, free from police molestation. On the bright side, we took one of the hiking trails the area has to another spot where the planes pass directly overhead. While not as close as we had hoped, it was still a pretty cool sight to see.

After killing an hour or so at the park, and with the weather clearing up considerably, we headed into Baltimore proper, specifically Fells Point, an area of Baltimore close to the habor with lots of very old buildings. It reminded me a lot of the Historic district in Philly, actually. By then the weather had cleared up considerably. We walked around for a while, enjoying the scenery and checking out some shops. We were soon joined by Susan, yet another lunatic from Fiberconn whom I was looking forward to meeting. We walked around some more and then decided to sit down at an outside table of The Green Turtle, a small bar in Fells Point. We had a light lunch, as by then it was already 3:30, and after an hour or so decided it was time to head downtown. By then the sky had clouded up again and the temperature had dropped noticeably.

No sooner did we make it back to the parking garage than the sky opened up and a torrential downpour started. As we drove through the city streets we were amazed at the thunder and the lightening in a storm that came out of nowhere. Then, just as we entered the parking garage, the storm ceased as suddenly as it started and the skys parted again.

At this point we were down by the Inner Harbor area, part of the bay that has become all nice and touristy. there were two small indoor malls that we walked around to kill some time. We even stopped off at Fudgery to watch the Fudge show. It's a well known fudge store where they perform occasional song and dance routines to the delight of all. Apparently Cisqo used to work there. From Fudge to Thong in so little time; who knew.

This was the point where the trip started to lag a bit. I think it was just a matter of poor timing. We hadn't really figured on how much time Fells Point would take, and I think it was finished sooner than expected. Plus, we had figured we'd take the Water Taxi's around the harbor and visit other areas as well, but scrapped that idea because of the weather. (This, of course, proved incredibly prophetic a decision given that one of the water taxi's capcized in the middle of the mid-afternoon storm, killing five people.) So we wound up with a fairly large chunk of time that we didn't have anything planned for, so we settled for walking around the Inner Harbor, which was nice but, ultimately, just walking around and window shopping.

Dinner improved slightly, where we were joined by Schenelle, another Fiberconn co-worker, her boyfirned Elliot, and their year-old daughter, and Matt, one of Jason's friends. We had originall planned to eat at the Cheesecake Factory, but by the time we went to put our name down--an hour before we were all to meet for dinner--there was already a three to three-and-a-half hour wait. So we settled on a Pizzeria Uno's instead. Not exactly unique Bo-more fair, but at least they only had a forty minute wait. Dinner was all right, and after that Schenelle and Elliot bid adieu as Schenelle was only 19 and could go to Power Plant Live! with us.

We started off our journey at How At the Moon, a giant piano bar that Jen had raved about. The gimmick is the bar has two piano players that take requests. The concept is a sound one: you get a bunch of goofy friends around, you sit near the piano and sing along to the songs and have a grand old time. And the piano players have an unearthly knowledge of songs at their disposal, and are also very good showmen who do all they can to bring the bar patrons into the show. Unfortunately, it didn't quite turn out that way for us. Again, it was a matter of poor timing: we had arrived at the bar around 8:30--incredibly early for a Saturday night. The abr was already packed, which was good, but it meant the only table available to us was all the wayin the back, where we couldn't see the pianos. I think that, combined by post-meal lethargy, not to mention being tired from walking around all damn day, left us all very quiet and lethargic. to be honest, I was beginning to wonder if the night was going to be a dud.

We stayed at "Howl" for an hour, during which Matt made the sagacious observation that the club is a lot different when you're sober, and I learned that while Ben Fold Five's "Song for the Dumped" is a rocking tune, it should not be performed when you're the only person in the bar who thinks so. So after an hour or so we decided to leave for other pastures. By this point Susan wasn't feeling very well and called it a night--at 9:30--and so it was down to the four of us--me, Jen, Jason, and Matt, to pass the evening away.

Fortunately, things became significantly better once we hit the other clubs. We first went to Bar Baltimore which was your average modern club, but with its loud bass and throngs of party-goers, our spirits were livened instantly. We stayed their for about an hour, dancing about and feeling much more energized. 9This includes Jason almost getting into a fight with a guy that was getting a little too friendly when he danced with Jen; fortunately once the guy realized he was dancing with someone's wife he apologized and backed off. Still, an interesting moment to be sure.) We stayed at Bar Baltimore for about an hour, then decided to head over to the Have a Nice Day Cafe.

This was when the evening really kicked into high gear--for me at least, as I was finally in a club with music that was more to my tastes. Also, by then Jen, Jason, and Matt had a couple of beers in them so everyone was much more loose and peachy-keen. Here: look
at
these
seven
pictures
we
took.

That last shot, by the way, is me doing my infamous "Muppet dance" to The Ramone's "I wanna Be sedated". There is a video clip. Be nice and I might post it.

Anyway, by 1:00 we were all pretty tired, especially having just danced for the last three and a half hours straight. So at that point we called it a night. Jen and Jason dropped me off at the hotel just before 2:00.

And that was it. I got up the next morning, had breakfast, and was on the road by 10:30. I stopped off at my folks by 1:00, planning to spend the day there, but was so exhausted I knew I wouldn't last long, so I left after a bit and was home by mid-afternoon. The rest you know.

So it was a damn fun trip. Jen and Jason were incredibly nice people, and I give them all the credit in the world for spending their entire weekend with me, not to mention doing all the driving. I trully hope to get together with them again, maybe even have them come up to my neck of the woods so I can return the favor.

But there you are. This entry has rambled long enough. If there's anyone still awake, feel free to ask questions.

Yes, believe it or not, I will actually talk about my trip to Baltimore.

Friday
I left work at 12:30, bought some last-minute items for the trip, filled up the gas tank, and was officially on the road by 1:06 PM. The ride down was fairly easy. It was raining in Jersey but was pretty clear by the time I hit Delaware. I made excellent time, getting to the hotel a little after 4:00. I unpacked, relaxed, changed shirts, and Jennifer picked me up at 5:30.

We drove over to this giant mall, it reminded me a lot of the mall in West Nyack. It was there that we ate dinner at this place called Rememo, or was it Meremo? I dunno. I forget the name--and it wasn't too memorable anyway but I'll get to that.

At any rate, at first it was just Jen and I, but after 6:00 we were joined by Jay, one of the other people in Fiberconn I talk with often. Very nice guy. Also very quiet, and Jen took great delight in making him blush. Soon after that Jen's husband Jason joined us, and the last to arrive was Jen's friend Kathy.

Kathy, it turns out, is good friends with this guy Rob that tracy dated several years back. It was very surreal connecting the dots: first her mentioning she knows people in jersey, then realizing she knows people from my area, people who used to perform in Rocky Horror. It figures: I drive 200 miles and wind up meeting someone who hangs out just around the block from where I live. (I didn't tell her that Rob wasn't the best of boyfriends to Tracy, and given that she's good friends with the guy, I think I can be forgiven for that.)

At any rate Jay had to leave because of prior commitments--and the fact that he lived an hour away from Fiberconn. So it was Jen, Jason, Kathy and I for dinner, which was a bit dissapointing. The food was OK, but incredibly small portions that were indirectly proportional to the price of said food. But this is hardly the worst thing to happen so life went on.

From there we went to Jillians, and the best way I can describe Jillians is to think of Dave & Busters but instead of a sports-bar, it's more clubbish. It has video games, a bar, a bowling alley, pool tables, and two night clubs. Very fun place. The four of us played Hyperball, which is a sort of virtual bowling; only instead of a bowling lane, you have to navigate the bowling ball through city streets. We chose San Fransisco. Now, you have to imagine: the way you play the game is you roll a bowlingball-sized rollerball. And of course it's all proprotional to the things you see on a view screen. So imagine rolling a bowlingball up and down the streets of San Fransisco for about an eigth of a mile and then still make sure to knock down ten pins. This is the game we played. Needless to say it was highly amusing, espeically as the pins were at the top of a large hill so by the 8th frame it was a struggle just to get the ball up there, never mind hitting the pins.

After that we jumped around a bit. we played some racing games, some shooting games. Jen and Kathy played this Firefighter game--it's your basic first-person shoother arcade game (a la Houses of the Dead or Area 51) Only you have a fire hose. So here were two young, attractive women working a hose. If you have trouble imagining this, let me help you out.

I also wound up wasting lots o' money on those claw machines. there was a Garfield doll that looked easy to get, and I succeeded in grabbing it after two or three tries. And on that last try, not only did it pick up the Garfield doll, but also a little stuffed baseball player. Well, the stuffed baseball player made it through the chute, but the Garfield got caught on the glass; thus it became a matter of pride to get it. It took four or five more tires, but I got it. Kathy got the Garfield and Jen took the baseball player to give to her daughter who's apparently starting softball this Spring.

After about two hours we went to one of Jillian's clubs, the Groove Lounge, I believe. It was pretty empty seeing how it just opened up, but Jen and Kathy were out on the dance floor. And let me tell you: Jen can dance. This girl moves her body and swishes and sways and it's just mezmerizing. I swear to you, she's so sexy when she dances that she'd give a corpse a hard-on. I just turned to Jason and shook his hand.

Anywhoo, after Jason (who's dancing skills, by his own admission, are directly inversely proportional to his wife's) got on the dance floor for a bit, we decided to head elsewhere. In this case, elsewhere was The Cancun Cantina. I wouldn't say it's a "hick bar/club" per se, although the fact that the cover charge on a Friday night was only three bucks--and the main room was reserved for country music/dancing--certainly gave it that air. But it actuyally was pretty cool. they played some modern dance stuff, but then this cover band came on and they were quite good, and extremely ecclectic. I never heard a rock-n-roll cover of "Play that Funky Music White Boy", but they did it well, nonetheless.

We left the Cantina a little after 12:30, calling it a night in preparation and expecatation of a long, late Saturday. Which you can read about in Part Two of this lovely travelogue. So scroll up, dammit! Scroll UP!

Er, "Blog".

After much hemming and hawing and a disgusting amount of pestering on my part, the wonderful and talented Christine Cheplic has started her own blog. She's two entries in and they're both pure gold. It's choc full of ruminations, pop culture references, philosophical insight, satire, social commentary, and self-deprication I trully hope she keeps up with it.

Get thee with the clickery:

The Basement of the Alamo

You'll must all read and bask in the glory that is her Brain. Well, either that or run away screaming in terror. It's a win-win scenario for her, really.

Blech.

I have a cold. It's not ALL Baltimore's fault. Leaving my window open overnight while it's raining/snowing probably didn't help. But had I gotten even one decent night of sleep in the last, oh, year this probably could have been avoided.

So I sit and snuffle and sneeze. And I have some pictures to edit so I shall keep this brief as, for the third night in a row, I plan to be in bed by 11:00.

I can't believe I'm going to bed by 11:00 for the third night in a row. My body is simultaneously dying from exhaustion and jumping for joy at the prospect of eight hours sleep.

Needless to say, however, that work on the Vendetta Visual Timeline has ground to a halt. I'm hoping to get back on the damn thing by Thursday. Place bets.

And I will talk about my Baltimore trip soon. Probably tomorrow. I almost want to wait until Jen sends me the pictures she and her husband Jason took. I'd like to post photos to go along with my recap. Jen's been sending me the more incriminating ones at the office, and they're an absolute riot; I can't wait to see the rest. But I have a feeling I may not got the CD of their pictures until next week and we all know there's a very small statue of limitations on when I give up recapping any event and just move on.

So:

I have one more post to make (that I save for last so it can be first--ironic, isn't it--it's like strategic posting for blogs. Yeesh.

Anyway, one more entry, then the photos, and then to bed.

I don't like this going to bed early thing. I feel waaaaay too old doing it.

Craig

I have to run and do laundry, so, jusdt to prove I do intended to blog about my Baltimore trip, I give you the following picture, subtitled "Craig and his Bitches":





Left to right: Susan, Jennifer, myself, Schenelle.

More to, er, come.

Yes, I am back. Back for almost an hour and a half now. I should still be at my parents, killing time before going to dinner for my Granma's birthday, but I was too damn tired to stick around. So I got back here around 3:30 . . . I think. It's 4:45 now... I thought I left my folks a quarter after 2:00 . . . no, wait, closer to 2:30. Fuck, I'm so damn tired I can't even keep track of time.

(Obviously my time management issues have not been helped by this weekend.)

The point is, I am back, and I had a ton of fun while I was down there. It wasn't the utter "semen-on-the-walls" kind of time I was expecting--for one thing, Sue (one of the women who works at Firberconn that I was going down to hang out with) wasn't feeling too well and she left early in the evening. And none of Jen's friends came out to party (except for Kathy, who joined us for a while on Friday but also bailed early) so it was mostly me, Jen, her husband Jason, and his friend Matt. But what we lacked in group size we made up for in spirit.

I will detail more later. I hope. You know me and details. Suffice to say there is a disgusting amount of blackmail photos, both of Jen and Jason and of (gulp) me. Like I joked with them last night, I'm already mentally sorting between the ones I'll show my co-workers, the ones I won't show them but will show my friends, and the ones that will never see the light of day again.

But, yes. Ready to collapse. The beauty of utter exhaustion means that I'll probably get my first decent nights sleep in about a year and a half.

And I'll get to details tomorrow or something.

Wheeeeeeeeeeeeee!

In the midsts of this morning half-awake stupor, as I tried to bring myself to consciousness while in the shower (which, let's face it, is where all the really good ideas occur to people), I wondered whether or not it would be possible to make a movie about 1984. I know there already is a movie version, though to my knowledge it wasn't well recieved.

The thought occured to me when thinking about e-mails and Microsoft Word, how you can effortlessly edit text, changing the meaning and content of a pre-existing document, and that use sturck me as eeriely similar to how the government of 1984 edited news and documents to suit their purpose. 1984, the novel is still extremely relevant, although I think in the country's current conservative atmosphere, I doubt it would be taken seriously.

The big problem, of course, is the very title. 1984 is . . . dear Christ, it's twenty years ago! Holy fuck, just think about that for a second. The pre-eminent dystopian novel is overdue by an entire generation! I am in serious need of re-reading this book.

But, anyway, back to point: given that the title alone is so outdated, it seems to me that the only way a new movie based on this book can be taken seriously is if they put the novel back into the future. Orwell arrived at the novel's title by transposing the last tow digits of the year he wrote the novel, this 1948 became 1984. So, in homage to that twist of time, it seems to me one can make a movie set in 2048--only 44 years from now, but far enough to still be The Future.

But I think the selling point--or, more to say, the way to make the movie compeltely effective and subversive, is to take the novel's Big Brother and only use modem equivalents--E-mails, computers, video cameras, etc. It's easy to dismiss the novel because you can either argue it's twenty year's dated, or that the specific vision presented in the novel is still far removed from reality. (This is a pseudo-argument, here; I'm going to have to re-read the novel to know for certain if this line of thinking is valid.) But if you present the novel as something that is happening now rather than what will happen, then you have a far more immediate and recognizeable . . . tangibility. An immediacy to the implication of what Orwell was warning us about.

The copy of the book that I have (which I just dug out) is itself about twenty years old. I think the front cover is going to fall off if it's opened one more time. It does, though, have an introduction by Walter Cronkite. and he ends his introduction with the following wrods:

It has been said that 1984 fails as a prophecy because it succeeded as a warning--Orwell's terrible vision has been averted. Well, that kind of self-congratulation is, to say the least, premature. 1984 may not arrive on time, but there's always 1985

I'm going to enjoy re-reading this book.

Just to keep things moving along, what with, well, it being Tuesday already.

And it's 11:30. This "time" thing really sucks. Which is to say I've become very horrible at managing it properly of late. Still lots to do and no time to do it in. And I've gotten NO sleep since, oh, Friday, and that just bites.

So lets see if I can run it all down fast:

1) If anyone is still trying to check out the V/PALS thread I mentioned over the weekend, forget it. The PALS forum deleted the thread. Damn fundamentalists; no sense of humor.

2) I should post my "review" of the Swimsuit Special. Eventually. but I do have one. I just have to find the time to post it. And, as mentioned above, with my current time management skills I'm not sure that'll happen before the weekend.

3) Sue's wedding was this past Saturday. Have some pictures:

Yes, that is a puppet of Sue's husband, Michael. She put on a puppet show, the highpoint of an utterly hysterical show being the unveiling of the above puppet. Normally, the idea of someone performing a puppet show during a wedding celebration would be met with derision and fear. For shame on us all for underestimating Sue and her brilliant, wry, tongue-firmly-in-cheek humor. It was hysterical.

There's also the matter of seeing Scott Miller dance, which could be a blog entry in itself. I shall simply say it was an experience I shall never forget.

4) I'll be in Baltimore this weekend, as some of you know and some of you don't. Visitng fellow co-workers from the Fiberconn branch. They're crazier than I am, so I expect much fun to be had, and pictures will be posted.

5) I'm geting a very nice tax refund this year. More than lastyear, and last year was a very nice tax refund. I'm already trying to figure out how to spend it. I'm sure some of it will probably go to the credit card bills incurred thanks to Point Four, but there will still be plenty left over. Find it a very scary reality that the idea of a much-desired comicbook buying binge is seriously considered being be put aside for "more important things". Who am I and what have I done with the real me?

6) There is no Point Six.

7) things are progressing well on the Vendetta Timeline, the last piece to my redesigned site. I've gotten up to 1997, which when the story proper begins. Considering I had to cover almost 500 years of backstory before getting to that point, it's really more of an accomplishment than the previous sentence makes it out to be. I won't get it done this week, but with luck I can get all the visuals done and then worry about the text and web-prepping next week. Only about two and a half months overdue now.

8) In comparing pictures I took of myself tonight versus ones taken during My Unemployed Life, I think I've gained ten to fifteen pounds, all of it in my cheeks. This is double-plus-ungood.

9) My internet connection has improved, but still sporadically kicking me offline. I want to kill Webspan but I'm afraid anything of equal price (which is really all I can afford at the moment) will be of equal, or lesser, quality. Anybody know of any good dial-up ISP's for $20 a month?

10) Hey, I think that covers everything (albiet briefly. Well, briefly for me anyway.) How does one add more hours onto the day? I could really use a few extra ones to catch up on sleep.